《Cultivation Pet Shop》


 1 Chapter 1

    "Ouch!"


    Lin Fan sat up too quickly and mmed his brain on the head of his bed.


    As he looked around in a daze, he slowly realized that he was in a room that he had never seen before.


    Gradually the pain faded and the memories slowly started toe into his mind.


    To put it simple, this was another world, but strangely he had transmigrated into a body with the exact same name and the exact same age. Even their birthdays were the same.


    He sorted through his memories until he figured out his new identity.


    This world was a world of cultivation, but it was different from a normal world of cultivation since everyone relied on Cultivation Pets to raise their cultivation.


    While he was lost deep in thought, there was a sudden knock on his door.


    "Wake up youzy bones or I''ll make sure you''ll never wake up again!"


    There was this tender, but gruff voice that came from outside.


    ording to his memories, this should be the voice of the little sister of this body, Lin Yue.


    Unlike him who was someone without any talent, Lin Yue was a talented Iron Level Three Beast Master with a Iron Level Four Cultivation Pet.


    When they were still kids, she had always been shy and hid behind him, but now she had turned much colder. If he had to guess what the reason was, it was probably because she was ashamed of her weak big brother who wasn''t even able to cultivate even now.


    In the end, he still quickly changed and went downstairs for breakfast.


    There he met his parents in this new world. His father in this world called Lin Ao was a gruff, but handsome looking uncle who was sitting at the table eating. His mother called Yue Qingrou in this world was still a beautiful looking youngdy with a fine figure, but looked quite tired.


    In this world, his dad had been a seeker and his mom had been a pet breeder. They used to run a pet shop together where his dad found pets for his mom to breed and sell. That was until his father took an arrow to the knee which gave him the limp that ended his career and his mother became ill, feeling the effects of illness even now.


    Since they were both incapacitated, they could no longer run the shop, so his mother became a stay at home mom and his father had be abourer, leaving the shop to Lin Fan to give him a stable career since he had no talent for cultivation at all.


    Seeing hime down the stairs, his mother set a ce at the table for him and brought out his breakfast before saying, "You''re still sleeping even though it''s thiste, hurry up or you''ll bete for work. Come and grab some food before you leave though."


    His father just shed him a grin and said, "It''s a big day for you today, I heard that the city has been investing in pet shopstely and they''re sending a batch of fresh pets for you."


    Lin Fan searched his memories and remembered that the local government in their Silver City had announcedtely that in order to deal with the rise in beast swarms, they would be supporting all businesses that promoted the growth of Beast Masters, which naturally included pet shops.


    When he sat down, he could have sworn that he heard a camera click, but looking around, all he saw was his father eating while reading the newspaper and his little sister coldly ring at him when he looked at her.


    Shaking off the strange feeling he had, he quickly finished off his breakfast since he was curious about the pet shop he ran.


    After finishing, he got up and shouted to his mom, "Mom, I''m all done. I''m heading to the pet shop to deal with the new shipment."


    As he got up, his little sister also got up and specially went in front of him. When she passed by him, she even flipped her hair into his face before giving a cold snort. While he was a bit annoyed by this, he had to admit that it did smell good.


    What he didn''t know was that after he had left, his little sister went back to her room and the moment the door closed, the corners of her lips slowly raised.


    She took out her phone and on it was a picture of Lin Fan as he was sitting down.


    Lin Fan hadn''t made a mistake that morning, there really was someone secretly taking photos of him!


    Her smile kept growing wider as she said, "Now if only I could keep him here instead of him going to work each day."


    On the walls all around her, there were thousands of pictures of Lin Fan posted there, taken over the years.


    ¡­<sub> </sub>


    Not long after Lin Fan had set out, he arrived at his pet shop.


    The pet shop wasn''t that far away from their house, but it was a pet shop that was set up in the poor part of town, so there usually wasn''t much business.


    When he arrived, there was a truck and a person standing by it waiting in front of his store.


    That person saw hime over and he waved to him, "Sir, are you the owner of this store?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this person, but he quickly said, "Yes."


    "Sir, I''m here to deliver the shipment from the government aid office." After saying this, that person reached out the watch on his hand, "If you could just confirm that you''ve received the shipment, I can be on my way."


    The technology in this world was also quite advancedpared to his previous world. In this world, everything was stored on their personal ID Watch, which included their identification, their wallets, and their bank ounts.


    Lin Fan didn''t see any problem with this, so he tapped his watch against that man''s outstretched watch.


    After receiving confirmation, that man went to the back of his truck and took out three cages before saying, "Sir, this is the shipment that you are receiving today, please take care of them." After saying this, he began moving towards the truck to leave.


    Lin Fan was stunned the moment he saw the three cages because inside them were a chicken, a dog, and a tiny lizard¡­


    Before the delivery person could make their getaway, Lin Fan quickly grabbed him and asked, "Are you sure that this is the delivery you''re supposed to make?"


    Seeing Lin Fan question him, the delivery person''s eyes filled with disdain, but he still seriously opened up a panel on his wrist watch to show Lin Fan.


    "This is the order from the government. Since your pet shop is only a low level pet shop in this lowest grade neighbourhood, therefore you''re only entitled to a first grade subsidy. This first grade subsidy is a total of three Iron Level Pets, this Fire Chicken, this Lightning Dog, and this Breeze Lizard, which have all been delivered." There was a trace of disdain in the delivery person''s voice.


    Lin Fan knew that there was no arguing with him since his shop was indeed quite shabby, so he just agreed with this and sent the delivery person on his way.


    After taking the three cages into the shop, he finally got a good look at his own shop.


    To describe it with one word, it would be shabby!


    Everything in the store looked like it was quite worn out and there wasn''t a single thing that seemed new in this store.


    It seemed like everything in his new life was designed to make him feel depressed. He hade to a cultivation world, but he couldn''t cultivate. He had a store, but it waspletely run down. The only thing that was a positive was that he had a loving family...well other than his new little sister it seemed.


    While he was wallowing in despair over his new reality, there was a voice that had suddenly rang in his head.


    "A suitable host has been found. Currently importing system."


    Lin Fan looked up in shock when he heard this. He quickly looked around while shouting, "Hello, is anyone there? What do you mean by host and system?"


    There was no response to him for an entire minute before the same voice rang out again.


    "Congrattions host, you have been selected by the system to be the best pet shop owner."


    "System? Best pet shop owner?"


    Lin Fan was confused by everything that was happening.


    But soon he reacted and his eyes lit up since the part of him that came from earth finally caught up with this new reality.


    System!


    He was finally going to get his cheat!

 2 Chapter 2

    As someone who came from a modern world, Lin Fan knew just how much of a cheat a system was, so he was looking forward to what he would receive.


    "System has finished syncing up to the host''s shop."


    "System has detected three pets that can be trained."


    "System will now release beginner gift, bloodline augmentations."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this sudden notification, but he soon realized that something was wrong.


    The system had said three pets, the only three pets in the store that he could think of were the chicken, the dog, and the lizard in the cages¡­


    "Wait, system, abort, abort!"


    "Bloodline augmentation has been given, host please check status of the pets to confirm."


    If one looked carefully, they could see actual ck lines that had appeared on Lin Fan''s forehead.


    Since it had already been done, there was nothing that he could do.


    Following the instructions of the system, Lin Fan opened the system interface to check the status of the three pets.


    Fire Phoenix (Young)


    Grade: Unique


    Cultivation: Iron 1


    Bloodline: Phoenix


    Skills: me Breath, me Control, me sh


    Combat Strength: 1.0


    System''sments: What a waste of heaven''s resources!


    Lightning Qilin (Young)


    Grade: Unique


    Cultivation: Iron 1


    Bloodline: Qilin


    Skills: Thunder Bolt, Thunder sh, Thunder Control


    Combat Strength: 1.0


    System''sments: What a waste of heaven''s resources!


    Wind Dragon (Young)


    Grade: Unique


    Cultivation: Iron 1


    Bloodline: Dragon


    Skills: Wind sh, Wind Control, Healing Breeze


    Combat Strength: 1.0


    System''sments: What a waste of heaven''s resources!


    Even though their names now sounded quite imposing, the three animals still looked the same as before. If one had to pick out something that was different, the Fire Chicken now had a reddish hue to it, the Lightning Dog had hair that was standing up like it was hit by electricity, and the Breeze Lizard had an extra reverse scale at the bottom of its neck.


    Seeing thements the system had put under each of these pets, he really couldn''t help agreeing. Who would have thought that a chicken, a dog, and a lizard would be divine beasts!


    But while he was drowning in his sorrow, there was another sudden message from the system.


    "The host has activated the first main quest."


    "Host, look how shabby your pet shop is. The best pet shop in the world shouldn''t be like this, it should be imposing and luxurious with the best quality pets. Please take your three pets and train them until they are worthy of your status as the best pet shop owner! The time limit for this quest is twenty four hours."


    "The host will be sent to a cultivation realm for the main quest."


    "Beginner protection has been activated. The cultivation realm chosen has changed from a low grade cultivation realm to a high grade cultivation realm. The cultivation realm chosen is the World of Elements. Host, please prepare to be transferred."


    "Wait, what do you mean by training and what is this cultivation realm?"


    Before Lin Fan could receive his answers, there was a sh of light thatpletely obscured his vision.


    When the white light had faded and he could see around him, he found that he had been dropped into a forest. Beside him were the three pets that he had just received also looking confused.


    While he was still getting a sense for the area around him, the system''s voice sounded again.


    "Host, please form contracts with these three pets."


    "Error, a problem has been detected with the host body, now scanning the host."


    "Host''s body contains a disconnected meridian, not allowing the host to cultivate. The system will now fix the host''s body as per the beginner protection."


    It was like something had suddenly clicked inside of him, but Lin Fan could suddenly feel the energy flowing through him.


    "System, what did you just do?" Lin Fan quickly asked.


    "The system has connected the disconnected meridian in the host''s body."<sub> </sub>


    "Does that mean that I can cultivate?"


    "Host, please do not ask silly questions, first warning."


    "Damn, is that even an answer?"


    "Profanity detected, second warning."


    "What a useless system." Lin Fan said in his mind.


    "Doubting the system, third warning."


    "Random punishment will now be selected."


    "Heavenly thunder punishment selected!"


    All of a sudden, Lin Fan felt like he had been hit by a taser, but it was several times stronger than a normal taser. All that electric stimtion soon manipted his body and he began doing the running man in ce.


    After the punishment, Lin Fan fell down on the ground, but nothing could extinguish the excitement that he felt since he could finally cultivate.


    Lin Fan was a nerd back on earth and he had read plenty of novels, so he had a certain expectation when it came to transmigrating into another world. He should have a cheat and be able to cultivate faster than everyone, bing the strongest person in the world!


    After that disappointing start, it seemed like everything was finally getting back on track!


    When he finally calmed down, Lin Fan formed contracts using his life energy with the three pets as instructed by the system. His life energy came out of him and formed small seals that imprinted themselves on the foreheads of the three pets.


    Right after the contract was established, the three pets all walked up to Lin Fan and started acting cute, which was something that he couldn''t resist. He was someone who had loved pets back on earth, owning two cats and two dogs himself, so he didn''t hold himself back as he started cuddling with them.


    But while they were in the middle of cuddling, there was a giant roar that suddenly shook the trees around them.


    This roar shook them to their core and as they looked around, they saw that there was a giant ape that had appeared on a branch above them, looking at them like they were a tasty meal.


    Before any of them could even react, the ape had thrown a giant boulder down at them, crushing the Lin Fan and the three pets that were currently in his arms.


    "Host has died, activating beginner protection."


    "The host can now revive for free at the same location or a random location for the rest of the duration of this cultivation realm."


    Lin Fan and the three pets who had died had all turned into ghosts in the same location. They could see around them, but there was nothing that could see them.


    "System, you''re saying that I can die as many times as I want?"


    "Host, the system''s words were clear enough. First warning."


    "System, does that also include my pets?"


    "The pets of the host always receive free revivals. The best way to learn is to try and try again."


    Lin Fan was confused for a few seconds, but he soon understood what the system meant. The system was telling Lin Fan to kill his pets again and again until they could adapt and be stronger!


    In the end, Lin Fan chose to revive in the same spot since there was already an enemy for them to fight.


    The giant ape had just jumped down and was prepared to bring the prey that it had hunted home, but all of sudden, Lin Fan and his three pets had revived.


    "Xiao Huo, shoot your mes at it! Xiao Lei and Xiao Feng, go around and use your sh attacks on its back!"


    Lin Fan shouted out these orders, but these three pets were only low level pets who hadn''t ever been in a fight before. The moment they heard the orders from Lin Fan, all they did was cutely tilt their heads like they were asking for food¡­


    The giant ape fell down in front of them not long after, but all that did was make the three pets run behind Lin Fan like they were using him as a body shield.


    Lin Fan was pushed to his limit seeing all of this and he could do the only thing he could do¡­


    He grabbed all three pets and threw them right at the giant ape.


    The three little pets didn''t expect this at all. As they flew out, they looked out at the giant ape with wide eyes filled with terror.


    Seeing that they had no other choice, the three pets steeled their hearts and used the only skills that they had.


    The Fire Phoenix took a deep breath before releasing a plume of mes that was aimed right at the giant ape''s head, while the Lightning Qilin and the Wind Dragon sent out des made of lightning and wind respectively.


    Even though they had the bloodline of ancient divine beasts, they were still all new hatchlings who hadn''t unlocked any of their powers at all.


    As their attacksnded on the giant ape, all they did was leave a few small scratches which surprised the ape itself before they all were beaten down and crushed.


    "Your pets Fire Phoenix, Lightning Qilin, and Wind Dragon have been killed, do you wish to revive them?"


    Lin Fan immediately said yes as soon as the system''s voice appeared in his mind.


    The three pets were revived right by Lin Fan and before they knew what was happening, he had picked them up and thrown them at the giant ape again.


    When the three of them realized what happened, they knew that they had no other choice. While feeling aggrieved over how Lin Fan treated them, they finally decided to steel their hearts and follow his instructions since there was nothing to lose from doing so.


    The Fire Phoenix released a wide spread me Breath this time to obscure the view of the giant ape, while the Lightning Qilin and the Wind Dragon went in different directions to appear behind the giant ape and used their elemental shes to cut the back of the giant ape''s leg.


    The giant ape saw that the pests that it had killed had suddenlye back and was confused, but receiving their attacks, it became enraged.


    After receiving minor injuries from the attack, it smashed all three pets once again.


    "Your pets Fire Phoenix, Lightning Qilin, and Wind Dragon have been killed, do you wish to revive them?"


    Once again, the three pets were revived at Lin Fan''s side and once again they were thrown out.


    The three pets continued battling the giant ape, dying again and again.

 3 Chapter 3

    The three pets had died over a hundred times each by the time the giant ape was finally taken down.


    During this time, Lin Fan had also died a few times when the giant ape realized that just killing the three pets didn''t do a single thing, but he revived each time and continued throwing the three pets at the giant ape.


    Eventually, the three pets realized a few things from dying after their attacks had no effects.


    The Fire Phoenix realized that its mes were too scattered, so it focused the power of its me Breath into a single point, creating a denser mass of mes with more destructive power.


    As for the Lightning Qilin, it realized that it could gather lightning energy in the air to create bolts of thunder that fell from the sky, which was much stronger than just a single sh of electric energy.


    And for the Wind Dragon, it gathered up the wind around it with its Wind Control skill, creating arge tempest around them which it gathered into a single sh that was much stronger than before.


    Even with therge difference in levels between the three pets and giant apes, their powers came from their bloodline, which allowed them to skip levels to hurt the giant ape.


    In the end, the giant ape copsed under thebined efforts of the three pets, but they were all exhausted.


    Lin Fan had been silently observing from the side, so he had noticed a few things.


    One important thing that he noticed was that every time that pets had revived, they had been revived back in perfect condition.


    After the pets had finished taking down the giant ape, even with how tired they were, they proudly came over to Lin Fan looking for praise.


    Lin Fan had a smile on his face as he patted the pets on their head, but when they let their guards down from receiving this praise, he suddenly stabbed out three times with the sharp stick in his hand¡­


    "Your pets Fire Phoenix, Lightning Qilin, and Wind Dragon have been killed, do you wish to revive them?"


    When the three pets had revived, they all looked at Lin Fan and felt wronged, but seeing the same smile on his face that now seemed a bit more eerie, they immediately felt a chill run down their spines before they went back to acting cute.


    After that grueling battle, while the three pets hadn''t broken through, they were much strongerpared to before.


    Respectively, the Fire Phoenix, the Lightning Qilin, and the Wind Dragon had gone up tobat strength of over six, which wasparable to a rank of Iron 6.


    Seeing that everything had calmed down, Lin Fan decided to explore this cultivation realm since it didn''t matter if he died.


    Walking through the forest, there were many strange nts that grew all around them, many of which released a strange energy.


    Now that he was finally a cultivator, he could sense all of this natural energy that was around him. He could feel the variety of elemental energy that the nts around him contained.


    The three pets were all wandering around looking for nts on their own. Whenever they found a nt that had the same type of energy that they had, they would drool over it a bit before bringing it over to Lin Fan. Remembering the cold smile he had when he revived them, there was a natural fear in them that made their first instinct to offer it to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan saw his pets cutely bringing the nts over.


    "It''s alright, you can eat them." He said as he patted them on the head.


    He could tell that the elemental energy inside these nts would be helpful to his pets, so he wasn''t against them eating it. However, what made him happy was that they had learned the meaning of fear, knowing to ask for his permission first.


    The worst thing for a Beast Master was for their pet to turn on them and Lin Fan was a firm believer in discipline.


    As they continued forward, the pets kept finding all different kinds of nts that increased their power that they gobbled down with Lin Fan''s permission.


    After around an hour, they had finally walked out of the forest to find arge castle standing in front of them.


    "System, there are natives living in this cultivation realm?" Lin Fan asked in a shocked voice.


    "The host does not have enough permission to ask this question." The system said in an emotionless voice.


    Seeing that the system was refusing to answer his question, Lin Fan had no choice but to continue forward and explore the castle.


    As he walked through the main gates, he entered a hall that was madepletely of white crystals. In the center of the hall, there was a throne upon which an angel was sitting.<sub> </sub>


    The angel had snow white skin and jet ck hair as dark as the night. She had a perfect hourss figure with perky round balloons on her chest and nice round mountains on her behind. She was wearing nothing more than a white dress with six pairs of wings furled up behind her on her back.


    The moment Lin Fan walked in, the angel suddenly opened its eyes, revealing itspletely white iris that didn''t have a pupil.


    Lin Fan was in shock at the beauty of this angel when he suddenly heard a voice in his mind.


    "*********" It was a voice that was soft and gentle, like being wrapped up in a bed of clouds, filling him withfort when he heard it, but he couldn''t understand a single word.


    Still, it didn''t see like the angel was hostile, so he went forward with a smile and said, "Hello, my name is Lin¡­"


    Before he could even finish his sentence, the angel had lifted its hand to materialize a de of wind out of the air.


    With a casual wave like cutting through butter, she flicked the sword and Lin Fan''s head was chopped clean off his neck.


    Thest thing he saw before turning into a ghost was his own decapitated body.


    Lin Fan was in shock, but he still chose to revive on the spot since this was the first local that he had met.


    When the angel was about to forget his existence, she suddenly felt something and knit her brows as she looked in the direction Lin Fan was revived in.


    "Timew maniption?" The angel said aloud in a shocked voice, which was still in thenguage that Lin Fan couldn''t understand.


    Lin Fan knew that the barrier between theirmunication was their differentnguages, so this time he triedmunicating in gestures.


    The angelpletely ignored what she considered a bumbling idiot as she tried probing Lin Fan with her life energy, but she couldn''t find a single trace of the timew that she felt earlier.


    "Just who are you?" The angel asked aloud again, but still Lin Fan couldn''t understand her.


    Lin Fan just continued trying to speak in slow and broken words, while gesturing, like he was talking to a foreigner, but all it did was make him look like an idiot. He even tried speaking a few words of English that he had learned back in high school.


    The angel saw that she wasn''t going to receive an answer from him, so she decided to take matters into her own hands.


    The sword of wind was once again formed and it shed through Lin Fan like a hot knife through butter, but this time she cut him to hundreds of pieces because she wanted to see what he contained. In the end, she was disappointed since she found that there was nothing special about him.


    When she was about to forget this matter again, she once again felt the fluctuations of timew maniption as Lin Fan was revived once more.


    Lin Fan had finally lost his patience this time, as he picked up his three pets and threw them at the angel, "God damn it, you think I''m someone who''s easy to bully!"


    All the angel had to do was narrow her eyes slightly as she looked at the three pets to make thempletely freeze in fear. After flying through the air from being thrown, the three pets bounced right off the angel like stuffed animals before falling to the ground.


    Shepletely ignored them as she stood up this time, heading towards Lin Fan step by step.


    Her face was ice cold as she said, "Who are you and how dare you invade my realm?"


    Lin Fan knew that this wasn''t good for him, so he just waved his hand like he was clearing up a misunderstanding and slowly backing off.


    The angel finally lost her patience after not receiving an answer and this time she cut up Lin Fan until there wasn''t even a single molecule left of him.


    Lin Fan knew that he had no chance ofmunicating with her and he definitely had no chance of beating her, so with a heavy heart, he chose to revive in a random location.


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t revive this time, the angel slowly rxed, but she quickly knit her brows again as she said, "Space and timew maniption this time? Just who are you?"


    Since Lin Fan was gone, she knew that he must have run away, but he should still be somewhere in this world. She released her life energy to try and pinpoint Lin Fan, but there was a strange aura thatpletely shut her off, making her unable to search for him at all.


    Sensing this aura, the anglepletely lost her temper as she exploded with energy, roaring into the sky, "How dare you invade my home and my realm!?"


    But unfortunately, she couldn''t find Lin Fan to vent her anger at all, so all she could do was fume and rage.

 4 Chapter 4

    When Lin Fan was revived again, he found that instead of a forest, he had been sent into the middle of an empty field this time.


    Looking around, it was arge grassy area that was devoid of any creatures and any form of nts.


    Thinking about what had just happened, Lin Fan couldn''t help but give a sigh.


    That angel really was too strong, he stood no chance against it at all.


    While remembering that angel, he couldn''t help ming his system for not helping at all.


    "System, couldn''t you have helped me trante hernguage?" Lin Fan said to his system.


    "Host, you do not have enough permission to exchange fornguage skills." The system coldly said back.


    "Damn, what a trash system." Lin Fan muttered under his breath.


    "Profanity detected, first warning."


    Lin Fan immediately stopped after remembering what happenedst time, but he still cursed the system in his mind.


    "Cursing the system, second warning."


    He was shocked that the system could read his mind, so he just let it all go with a strong stomp of his foot.


    "Bad manners, third warning."


    "Random punishment will now be selected."


    "Pain shock punishment selected."


    It was instant, but every single one of Lin Fan''s pain receptors began to fire. It hurt as much as when the angel had shed him down to molecules, it hurt so much that he fell to the ground and started doing the worm, but even that didn''t help with the pain.


    After a minute, Lin Fan finally recovered from the punishment, no longer daring toin about the system.


    Since there was nothing else to do right now, Lin Fan went around looking for other beasts to fight to keep training his three pets.


    The four of them continued walking around this field, fighting all kinds of different monsters.


    As night settled, Lin Fan realized that he didn''t know just how long he would be in this world, so he asked the system.


    "Host, this mission willst for seven days and you will be graded based on what level of power your pets have when the mission ends."


    Hearing this, Lin Fan knew that he had to work even harder.


    Over the next six days, he found all different kinds of monsters to challenge with his three pets and by the end of it, all three of his pets had reached abat strength of over 30.


    This meant that even though all three pets were still at the Iron 1 level, they could match a pet that was at the Silver 1 level!


    "Evaluation, host has raised all pets to over 10bat strength."


    "Evaluation, host has raised all pets to over 30bat strength."


    "Evaluation, host has passed the first main quest with flying colours."


    "Special reward has been given along with normal reward."


    "Host has opened the system''s shop."


    When Lin Fan finally returned to his own world, he appeared in a pet shop that waspletely different from the one that he just left.


    This pet shop was brand new with plenty of new rooms with different functions.


    "System, are we in the right shop?"


    "Host, the shop has been remodeled as a reward forpleting the first main mission."


    Lin Fan began looking over his shop, finding all kinds of new and different things.


    But after calming down from his excitement, he suddenly remembered his new family and realized that he had been away for a week now.


    When he was panicking about what to tell his new parents, the system''s voice suddenly rang in his mind.


    "Host, only an hour has passed in this world."


    Lin Fan looked over the clock on the wall and found that indeed only an hour had passed.


    When Lin Fan tried asking the system about this, the system began exining in detail about timepression using timews, but it was tooplicated for Lin Fan to understand, so he had the system stop.<sub> </sub>


    Now that he was back, it was finally time for him to start running his pet shop, but unfortunately, there were no customers at all.


    He was excited and raring to go at the start of the day, but all he did that day was sit at the register until the afternoon waiting for a customer toe in.


    Finally, as time passed, there was a customer that came in.


    It was a girl who was being followed by a boy.


    "Xiao Qing, why are you going to a shabby shop like this? Come with me, I''ll bring you to the Excellent Shop downtown. It''ll be much better than a ce in the slums like this."


    Lin Fan heard this before he heard the bell ring over his door.


    "Murong Quan, this is my business. I already told you, stop following me."


    "But Xiao Qing, this is such a shabby¡­"


    The boy''s words were suddenly stuck in his throat when he finally took a good look at the store. He wanted to call this store shabby, but he really couldn''t since it was quite clean and professional.


    Luo Qing was also surprised when she walked into the shop. She already knew that this shop was shabby, but she still came here because this was where her parents bought her her first pet.


    This store wasn''t shabby back then, it was still being run by the old owners who were a monster breeding couple, but it had gone downhill since they suddenly quit and gave their shop to their son.


    Seeing the exact opposite of what she had expected, she was quite pleasantly surprised.


    Luo Qing ignored Murong Quan and walked up to the counter where Lin Fan was sitting.


    "Sir, do you offer pet training services here?" Luo Qing hesitantly asked.


    Even if she was pleasantly surprised by the appearance of the shop, all the reviews that she had read online said that this ce was terrible.


    Lin Fan was surprised that there were customers at first, but he quickly reacted, "Yes pretty miss, we offer professional pet training services here."


    Luo Qing''s face flushed when she heard Lin Fan call her pretty, which was something that Murong Quan didn''t miss.


    After calming herself down, she asked, "How much does it cost for your pet training service?"


    Lin Fan saw that she was actually interested, so he immediately entered his customer service mode and said with a bright smile, "It''s not that expensive, it''s only just a hundred energy crystals for Iron Grade pets."


    Luo Qing was shocked by this and Murong Quan immediately exploded.


    The currency in this world had two faces, one was the currency for normal people which was gold coins and the other was the currency for Beast Masters which was energy crystals.


    Each energy crystal cost a hundred gold coins, which meant that the training for the lowest tier pet already cost ten thousand gold coins.


    To give some context, this was equal to the average yearly ie of a normal family!


    "You fraud! Trying to take advantage of Xiao Qing''s goodwill!" Murong Quan roared.


    ? Murong Quan charged forward to grab Lin Fan''s cor, but before he could even touch him, there was a force that suddenly pushed him aside.


    Murong Quan was surprised by this, but he didn''t think too much since his anger had already taken over.


    He immediately called out his me Hound and ordered it to attack Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan saw that this me Hound was only in the Iron 5 level, so he was toozy to deal with it. He grabbed the little Fire Phoenix chick that was cuddling up to him and threw it out in front of the me Hound.


    Luo Qing saw the cute little chick and was immediately angry with Lin Fan. She called out to Murong Quan, "Stop!"


    However, Murong Quan waspletely enraged and didn''t stop his me Hound at all.


    The me Hound looked at the little chick like it was a snack and opened its jaw wide to swallow it in a single gulp, but the little chick suddenly gave a chirp and the me Hound lost consciousness.


    Both Murong Quan and Luo Qing were shocked by this. They thought that the owner must have used some secret technique to knock out the me Hound.


    Before either of them could react, the Fire Phoenix chick had already taken a deep breath and gathered the mes in its mouth. It knew that its master didn''t want to kill these kids, so it scattered the mes as it blew them across Murong Quan.


    Murong Quan waspletely blown away by the mes and when he came out of them, he waspletely charred ck.


    On his face was a terrified look since he could feel the energy contained within the mes. These mes contained energy that was on the Silver Grade, so if the owner wanted to kill him, it would have been as simple as flipping his hand.


    The Fire Phoenix chick saw that everything was over, so it dawdled over back to Lin Fan and raised its head like it was looking for praise.


    There was only silence left in the shop as Luo Qing and Murong Quan both had looks of shock on their faces.

 5 Chapter 5

    Seeing how shocked they were, Lin Fan didn''t say a thing and just waited for them to naturallye back to their senses.


    After a while, Murong Quan and Luo Qing were able to gather their emotions and calm down.


    Murong Quan looked at Lin Fan with apletely different gaze now, it was a gaze filled with fear that contained a trace of admiration.


    Luo Qing knew that Lin Fan wasn''t normal just based on the Fire Phoenix chick alone, so she steeled herself and summoned her pet, "Sir, can you train this pet for me?"


    The pet that she summoned was an Iron 4 Song Bird. This was a pet that had a low grade bloodline, so it wouldn''t reach a high level in its life, but this was the first pet that her parents bought for her. She couldn''t just give up on it since it was sentimental to her.


    Lin Fan just repeated the same thing he said before, but this time his voice was much colder since he knew that these kids didn''t have much money, "It''s one hundred crystals for Iron Grade pets."


    He had thought that he had encountered some rich young masters based on how they dressed, but it seemed like they were nothing more than beggars. They couldn''t even afford a measly hundred crystals!


    Luo Qing and Murong Quan didn''t know that Lin Fan was looking down on them, but if they knew, they would have cursed him right away. They were both from noble families, which were families that had Gold Grade Beast Masters. For them, a hundred crystals was just a drop of water in the ocean, but they were hesitant since this was an unknown shop.


    In the end, Luo Qing decided to trust her gut and let Lin Fan train her pet since the power of the Fire Phoenix chick couldn''t be faked. Although it looked like it was only an Iron 1 pet, it already had the power of the Silver Grade!


    Lin Fan was immediately filled with joy since he had gained his first customer, but his good mood was quickly dampened by the system''s voice.


    <o>,m "Host, you have activated a special mission."</o>


    "Host, your customers are looking down on your ability. Provide high ss service to put your customer''s mind at ease and repair the store''s reputation."


    "Mission content: Train this pet to have abat strength of at least 10 or one of your pets will be removed."


    "Removed? System, what do you mean by removed?" Lin Fan asked the system in his mind.


    "The pet will be officially adopted by the system and will be given a new home."


    "Well at least you''re humane about it¡­" Lin Fan said in a depressed voice.


    "Sarcasm detected, first warning."


    Lin Fan had learned his lesson after his punishments, so he didn''t have another thought.


    While Lin Fan was having a conversation with his system, Luo Qing was very nervous as she was met with the silence of the owner.


    She hesitantly said, "Sir, will you take my pet or not?"


    Lin Fan was brought to reality by her words and he quickly said in a friendly voice, "Of course we''ll take your pet, pleasee back tomorrow to pick it up.??


    At first Luo Qing was put off by the owner''s constant switching between cold and friendly, but then she realized that he had told her toe back tomorrow. Even top grade trainers would take at least a week to train a pet, but this guy was actually telling her toe back tomorrow?!


    Luo Qing was beginning to feel more and more certain that this store was a scam, but since she already decided to leave her pet here, she couldn''t back out now.


    The Song Bird noticed that it was being left with someone who was weaker than it, so it decided to show its superiority by trying to peck Lin Fan''s hand as he reached out to grab it. The moment it was going to peck Lin Fan''s hand, there was a pressure that suddenly came over it.


    This was a primal suppression that came from its bloodline, it felt like it had no choice but to submit.


    The Song Bird suddenly jumped out of Luo Qing''s hand and began running away.


    Luo Qing was embarrassed when she saw her Song Bird doing this, so she quickly apologized to Lin Fan, "I''m really sorry, I don''t know what''s gotten into my Xiao Ge today."


    Lin Fan just nodded in agreement before petting the Fire Phoenix chick.


    The Fire Pheonix chick just gave a single chirp and the Song Bird immediately stopped running. It quickly turned and had its head down as it flew in front of Lin Fan, almost like a peasant in front of an emperor.


    Luo Qing was surprised to see this since her Song Bird was usually quite prideful, but now it was submitting itself to the owner of this shop. That just meant that the owner was more than what he seemed.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan made the Song Bird sit on the side as he took care of Luo Qing''s payment.


    After receiving her receipt from Lin Fan, Luo Qing took onest look at her strangely well behaved Song Bird before walking out.


    Murong Quan noticed that everything was over and he could finally leave this terrifying shop, but before he left, he didn''t forget to show off onest time.


    Murong Quan put on a fierce look when he turned back to Lin Fan, "If I find out that you lied to Xiao Qing, I wille back and destroy your store."


    Lin Fan heard this and just raised the Fire Phoenix chick in his hand.


    Murong Quan saw the chick and he began shivering in fear, but he pretended to be calm as he turned with a soft snort.


    As Lin Fan watched him leave, he couldn''t help giving a soft chuckle to himself because of the performance of this funny kid.


    After patting the Fire Phoenix chick on the head, Lin Fan picked up the Song Bird and brought him into the back of the store.


    Since the store had been upgraded, there were many new facilities for him to test.


    The most important one was the shadow cultivation room, which was a room that created a perfect shadow of the pet ced inside, allowing it to fight itself and make breakthroughs.


    Of course, the shadow made was much more perfectpared to the original since it had full understanding of how to use the skills the original possessed, even knowing a few skills that the original might now know.


    But training in life and death situations was risky, so to make it much safer, the system also provided revival services for when the pets being trained inevitably died.


    When Lin Fan had entered the cultivation room for the first time, he really couldn''t believe how big it was. The space inside was actually bigger than the entire space of his shop.


    What also shocked him was that he could simte any environment in this cultivation room, which was technology that even surpassed the level of technology in this world.


    After putting the Song Bird inside the cultivation room, he changed the environment into the natural forest environment of the Song Bird and then set in the shadow clone.


    The Song Bird was shocked when it saw that the environment around it had suddenly changed into a forest, but what shocked it even more was seeing apletely ck version of itself suddenly appear out of its shadow.


    Before the Song Bird could even try tomunicate with it, the shadow Song Bird had already started singing, gathering wind energy into a de that flew out at the Song Bird.


    The Song Bird was quite the pampered pet since Luo Qing treated it dearly as her first pet, so it normally didn''t have any fighting experience.


    While the Song Bird was shocked at the sudden attack of the shadow Song Bird, the wind de had already arrived and had cut the Song Bird in half.


    The Song Bird had an aggrieved look as it died, wishing that it could see its master onest time, but then it was suddenly revived.


    The Song Bird was confused by what had happened, but seeing that it wasn''t dead, its pride suddenly surged. The Song Bird was a very prideful cultivation beast, so how could it ept being killed so easily?


    The Song Bird began singing as well and it also created a de of wind that flew out at the shadow Song Bird, but the shadow Song Bird was more than prepared as it pped its wings and avoided the wind de.


    While the Song Bird was still singing and gathering more energy, the shadow Song Bird pped its wings and released a whirlwind that picked up the Song Bird, spinning it until it died once again.


    Dying and reviving again and again, that was how the Song Bird spent the next day.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan was outside the shadow cultivation room watching everything that was happening, but of course he wasn''t watching it in real time.


    The shadow cultivation roompressed time like the cultivation realms, but it wasn''t at the same level as the cultivation realms, so a single hour was only a day in the cultivation room.


    Lin Fan watched the Song Bird die twice before turning off the monitor and heading back to the register out front.

 6 Chapter 6

    When Lin Fan came back to the register after putting the Song Bird in the cultivation room, the first thing he did was open up his system interface.


    Sinceing back from that cultivation realm, he had unlocked many new features after upgrading his shop to level one, which included the extra shop feature that he had unlocked.


    Now that he had his first customer, he finally had some points to spend.


    Thinking about how he had to give 99% of his revenue to the system, Lin Fan couldn''t help shed a tear as he looked at the single crystal in his hand, but it was a good thing that the system had left him with anything.


    Just this crystal alone was what normal people would earn from a few days of work, so it wasn''t bad for a single sale.


    The other crystals had all been converted into energy points with a ratio of one crystal to one point, so currently he had a total of 99 points.


    But when Lin Fan looked into the mall, he couldn''t help feeling depressed even with these points since every single item in the mall cost at least 100 points!


    In the end, he could only drool over the various items that he couldn''t afford. There were amazing items like legendary cultivation items or legendary pets, but their price reflected just how amazing they were. It had reached a point that Lin Fan couldn''t even dream about reaching that point one day.


    There were also several items that were quite basic, but their effects were still shocking to Lin Fan.


    There was an item called the Monster Net that had a 100% chance of catching Iron and Bronze monsters, 50% chance of catching Silver monsters, 20% chance of catching Gold monsters, 10% chance of catching tinum monsters, and 1% chance of catching Legendary monsters which only cost one hundred points!


    Legendary monsters were already on the peak of this world''s hierarchy. Legendary monsters were at the same level as Legendary Realm Beast Masters, which was the highest realm of cultivation one could reach in this world.


    Lin Fan just sat at the register continuing to dream about all the amazing items he could obtain when he had enough points as time passed.


    Time continued to pass until it was almost time to close the store.


    When he was about to get up to clean up, there was the sound of the bell above the door.


    Lin Fan turned over to see an elderly man walk into his store with a bird that was cloaked in mes resting on his shoulder.


    The old man was visibly surprised by how the inside of the store looked since there was such arge disparity between the inside and outside of the store.


    After being dazed for a few seconds, the old man walked over to Lin Fan to look him over before looking a bit disappointed.


    Still even as disappointed as he was, he still asked, "Young man, do you have any pet food in this store? My little Yan Yan hasn''t been feeling welltely and there''s no store with food that he will eat."


    When Lin Fan was about to tell this old man no, the bothersome system had something to say.


    "Sudden quest has been activated."


    "How can a pet shop not sell pet food? That won''t do, my host."


    "Please inform this gentleman that you do have pet food and make your way into the cultivation realm World of Elements to collect pet food."


    Lin Fan was excited to do another mission since it meant that he would receive rewards, but he said internally, "That''s fine, but how am I going to convince this man to stay?"


    The system was silent for a few seconds before suddenly speaking.


    "Out of consideration for the host, the system will be offering a 99% discount on low grade pet food."


    "1 energy has been taken, the low grade pet food has been ced under the counter."


    "..." Lin Fan really couldn''t help be speechless at how efficient the system was when taking away his points.


    Since there was no other choice, Lin Fan just had to continue with this mission.


    "Unfortunately we''re currently out of stock, but we do have one final pack of pet food avable." Lin Fan said in a polite voice with what he considered a sincere smile.


    The old man was a little put off by Lin Fan''s smile, but still he decided to give the pet food a try since this was his dear pet.<sub> </sub>


    "Young man, how much is this bag of pet food?"


    "It''s not that expensive sir, it''s only two hundred crystals." Lin Fan said with the same smile.


    "Oh, it''s only two hundred...wait, you said crystals?" The old man had been raising the watch on his arm to pay, but then he suddenly jolted when he realized Lin Fan''s unit of currency.


    "Young man, are you certain that it''s two hundred crystals and not credits?" The old man looked at Lin Fan like he was a scammer.


    Lin Fan knew that this would happen, so he decided that he could only target the old man''s weak spot, the pet on his arm.


    "Sir, of course I mean two hundred crystals. Our pet food is made with the highest quality ingredients that not only nurture your pet, but will also satisfy their taste buds." Lin Fan said with the same smile.


    The old man wasn''t convinced at all. The more he looked at Lin Fan, the more he felt he was a scammer, especially with that smile on his face.


    Seeing the old man pull back and how distrusting he was, Lin Fan used his final tactic.


    He opened the bag and took out a small piece of pet food which he ced in front of the Inferno Hawk.


    The moment the Inferno Hawk saw this piece of food, it was like it had been injected with chicken blood as he dove right at it. It snatched the piece of food up like it was catching prey and tossed it right down its mouth with a look of ecstasy on its face.


    The old man was shocked when he saw this since his Yan Yan had been nothing but listless over the past few days. Suddenly seeing it filled with energy, this old man knew that this pet food worked.


    He still hesitated a bit over the price, but since it was what his Yan Yan loved, he didn''t mind paying that much since he had no worries of money.


    Finally, the old man decided to buy the bag of pet food.


    Before he left, Lin Fan didn''t forget to remind him, "Sir, that bag you have is only enough for a single day, so if you don''t have as much money, feel free to mix it with other types of pet food."


    The old man was shocked by this, "You''re telling me that this bag is only enough for a single day? It costs this much and it''s only enough for a single day?"


    "Yes sir, but we will be receiving another shipment of pet food tomorrow, so feel free toe back and pick up some more." Lin Fan said with the same smile.


    The old man really didn''t know what to say when he saw that smile. He inwardly didn''t want toe to this shady shop again, but since the pet food worked for his Yan Yan, he had no choice but to considering again.


    In the end, the old man just left while saying, "We''ll see."


    Lin Fan didn''t really mind, he knew that one couldn''t just give up on the system''s pet food after a single day. It was as addicting as drugs, but it was much more beneficial than them. If a pet was fed with the system''s pet food for a long time, it even had a chance to evolve!


    Watching the old man leave, Lin Fan went back to his own business, namely his second time in the World of Elements.


    He looked at the clock and found that there was still an hour before he needed to head back for dinner, so he decided to get it over with right now.


    While he was preparing to enter the World of Elements, he suddenly remembered that he didn''t know thenguage.


    "System, can''t you give menguage skills?"


    "Host, you may exchange fornguage skills in the shop."


    "Oh, really?" Lin Fan opened the shop interface and found that there really was an item for thenguage of the World of Elements. Apparently it was something called the "Spirit Language".


    Seeing that it only cost a hundred points, Lin Fan decided to exchange for it since he didn''t want to be as helpless asst time.


    After calling his three pets over and making sure that he was prepared, he had the system transfer him to the World of Elements.


    Unfortunately for him, the system decided to drop him in the worst ce possible.


    It was ake near the castle fromst time and there was currently a person bathing inside saidke.

 7 Chapter 7

    When he appeared in the World of Elements again, Lin Fan''s first thought was to curse the system since the system had dropped him in the air above ake.


    "Foulnguage detected, first warning."


    After falling into theke and creating arge ssh that soaked the person who was currently in theke.


    Lin Fan took a while to adjust to his surroundings, but once he did, he saw a scene that shook him to his core.


    In front of him was the greatest spring scenery that one could dream of, bountiful curves and perfect white skin, all being disyed to his eyes.


    A rush of blood came over him and Lin Fan couldn''t control himself as blood began dripping from his nose.


    "You really are bold." The same voice asst time sounded once again. There was a tone to this voice that seemed like even she didn''t know how to process this situation.


    Lin Fan quickly averted his gaze and waved his hands to show that he meant no harm, "It really was an ident, it really was an ident." At the same time he was cursing the system in his mind.


    "Foulnguage detected, second warning."


    Hearing what he said, the angel realized that she could actually understand his words, which caused her to be filled with rage, "So you could understand what I was sayingst time, does that mean you were just making fun of me?!"


    Waves of life energy spread around her, creatingrge waves in the water that pushed Lin Fan all the way to the shore.


    With a sh of white light, she was wrapped up in the same white dress from before and her wings had been released as she floated in the sky, moving towards Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan could feel the rage that wasing from her and if looks could kill, Lin Fan would have already been pierced by a thousand des.


    The only thing he could do now was beg, so without any hesitation, Lin Fan rushed forward and went into a sliding dogeza.


    The angel''s rage faded slightly as she was visibly surprised by Lin Fan''s actions. After giving this issue some thought, she calmed herself down as she asked, "Tell me, who sent you?"


    Lin Fan really wanted to know the answer to this as well, just where had his systeme from?


    But since he had no answer, he could only tell the truth, "No one sent me here. I run a pet shop and I came here to collect materials to make pet food."


    "Pet shop?" The angel tilted her head in a confused manner. It was such a cute gesture that Lin Fan couldn''t help gushing over it on the inside.


    "It''s a shop where we raise cultivation pets for people."


    "Ah, it''s a shop for the human vers, I''ve heard of those before."


    "Human vers?"


    "You humans call yourselves Beast Masters, but all you''re doing is enving spirit beasts to serve under you." The angel said in a disgusted voice.


    Lin Fan had never really considered it, but this description could be considered urate to a certain degree.


    "While this statement is technically correct, human and spirit beast rtionships are much deeper than you think. I think it''s more of a rtionship of mutual respect and caring." Lin Fan said in a patient voice.


    But even with how patient he was, the angel eventually lost her patience, "None of that matters, I know I sensed thews of time and space from youst time. With your current cultivation, it''s unlikely that you were the one who controlled it, so call out your master."


    During that entire conversation, Lin Fan had been talking to his system in his mind, trying to find a way out of this situation.


    The system had offered him two solutions.


    One, leave the World of Elements and fail the quest.


    Two, die and avoid being chased down by the angel.


    The first option waspletely uneptable and the second option was just a backup n, Lin Fan really wanted to tame this angel since he was certain that she was at least a Legendary Realm expert.


    The strongest experts in the world he was currently in was in the Legendary Realm, so with a Legendary Realm expert following him, he could wander the realm unfettered.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, the angel lost patience once again and decided to take matters into her own hands.


    Before Lin Fan could even react, there was a sword lodged in between his eyes. The only thing he could do was look at the angel like he had been wronged.<sub> </sub>


    After a few seconds, the angel felt the fluctuations of timew again as Lin Fan was revived in front of her.


    She spread her spiritual senses as far as possible, but she still couldn''t sense where they wereing from.


    Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t convince her with honesty, so he decided to bluff his way into tricking her.


    "Alright, you were right, I have a master who sent me here." Lin Fan said in a resigned voice.


    The angel just gave a cold snort, "I could already tell. That master of yours isn''t simple, he can fully control thews of space and time and he can hide from my spiritual senses. Even I can''t tell what realm of cultivation your master is on."


    "Now that you know that I have a master, can I go?" Lin Fan hesitantly said.


    The angel immediately shut him down, "Of course not! Bring me to meet your master, I know that he will be able to bring me into the God Realm!"


    Lin Fan''s mind quickly turned and he soon formted a n.


    "You say you want to enter the God Realm?" Lin Fan asked.


    The angel just gave a cold snort, "Who doesn''t want to enter the God Realm? Only in the God Realm can you break free of the fetters of mortality and be a god!"


    "Well, my master just contacted me and said that if you''re willing to study under him by working at our pet shop, he would be willing to take you to the God Realm." Lin Fan said with the same smile he used with his customers.


    The angel was a little put off by that smile, but the lure of the God Realm truly was great. Still she was cautious as she asked, "Why doesn''t your master show himself then?"


    "Unfortunately, my master cannot find the time to enter this realm, so he has authorized me to negotiate with you as his representative. If you''re willing, please sign this contract." Lin Fan took out the contract that he had just bought from the store and ced it on the ground in front of the angel with the same smile.


    The angel couldn''t read a single word on the contract, but she could sense the power of thews from the system inside the contract, so she chose to believe it in the end. The allure of the God Realm really was too much.


    After she sent her spiritual imprint into the contract, chains suddenly came out of the contract and went to bind her.


    The item that Lin Fan had bought from the store was actually an Ancient Taming Contract, which used the ancient power ofws to tame monsters.


    It was his one weekly sale item and even then, it had cost him 150 points!


    Still, if it could be used to tame this angel, it was all worth it!


    The chains continued to bind the angel and it seemed like she was about to fall under the power of the chains, but then she gathered all her power into a single point that she unleashed in a flurry of white light.


    The flurry of light shattered the chains and she instantly appeared in front of Lin Fan, preparing to smite him down with her fury.


    When Lin Fan saw her shatter the chains, he immediately shouted, "Wait!"


    While the angel was distracted by his shout, he held an internal conversation with the system.


    "System, am I allowed to hire employees?"


    "Host, as a level one pet shop, you are currently allowed to hire one other race employee."


    After confirming this with the system, Lin Fan slid into another sliding dogeza as he said, "I''m sorry, that was my fault for being too mistrusting. I wasn''t certain what you would do, so I tried to use the scroll my master gave me to catch you. However, it is true that my master has agreed to take you under his wings and he has prepared a contract for you. Would you allow me to show it to you?"


    The angel hesitated a bit, but she realized that there was nothing to lose from letting this human show her the contract first, so she agreed to see it.


    This time, Lin Fan took out a real contract that was written in anguage that the angel could actually read. The terms of the contract were quite simple, it just stated that the angel would be working as an employee for Lin Fan''s pet shop and it offered benefits such as the chance to evolve or to enter the God Realm.


    Since this time she could read everything and the terms were stated clearly, the angel decided to give Lin Fan another chance. After all, the allure of the God Realm and the chance to evolve really was too much.


    So once again, the angel sent her spiritual seal into the contract, but this time it was different.


    This time, it felt like there was a restriction that had wrapped her soul, but it didn''t contain any ill will.


    It was like that, Lin Fan''s pet shop had hired its first employee.

 8 Chapter 8

    Now that the angel was an official employee, Lin Fan could see her stats in the system interface.


    Before he did anything else, Lin Fan realized that he had forgotten to ask the angel her name.


    "Right, I never got to ask. What is your name?"


    The angel was slightly confused before suddenly thinking of something, "Name, right that is something that you humans like to do. I don''t have a name, so you can just call me whatever you want."


    "Oh, is that so? Well, since you look like an angel, how about Ang?" Lin Fan casually said.


    "Whatever you want."


    After taking care of that, Lin Fan opened the system interface to see the newly named Ang''s stats.


    Name: "Ang"


    Race: Spirit Overlord


    Cultivation: ??? (System''s authority is too low)


    Skills: ??? (System''s authority is too low)


    Combat Strength: >150 (System''s authority is too low)


    Lin Fan waspletely shocked by what he saw, the system couldn''t even grade Ang''s power, which meant that his bet hadpletely paid off!


    When it came tobat strength, each cultivation realm had 9 levels and each had an incremental increase inbat strength. Each level in the Iron Realm was an increase of 1, each level in the Bronze Realm was an increase of 2, each level in the Silver Realm was an increase of 3, each level in the Gold Realm was an increase of 4, and each level in the tinum Realm was an increase of 5.


    Once one reached the Legendary Realm, they would have a totalbat strength of over 150.


    Moreover, this was a higher worldpared to the world Lin Fan came from, so that means that Ang was definitely at a higher cultivation than the Legendary Realm!


    While Lin Fan was fiddling around with his system interface, Ang was probing the newws that were wrapped around her soul. Eventually she forced open the new system interface that she gained.


    Employee Name: Ang


    Employee rating: 100


    Warning, if rating falls below 80, the employee will be punished by having their privileges removed.


    Warning, if rating falls below 50, the employee will be subject to either suspension or being fired.


    If the rating is over 150, the employee will be able to receive one benefit of their choosing.


    If the rating is over 200, the employee will be able to receive a week''s vacation in the world of their choice.


    All increase and decrease in rating will depend on the owner of the pet shop, who is currently Lin Fan.


    Ang was overjoyed seeing this. It seemed like her instincts were right, as long as she worked properly for this "pet shop", the senior would allow her a chance to enter the God Realm!


    After they both calmed down from the excitement of this employee contract, Lin Fan went back to his original purpose ining here.


    "Ang, what does Spirit Overlord mean?" Lin Fan asked in a curious voice.


    "Huh? This is the World of Elements, it''s filled with elemental spirits and I am their overlord, what doesn''t make sense?" Ang was confused by this question.


    "You''re telling me that you rule this entire realm?" Lin Fan was shocked to hear this.


    "I leave most of the work to the Spirit Kings under me, so I generally just cultivate and try to reach the next realm."


    p "Then can you let me take a few things back?" Lin Fan asked in an excited voice.</anda>


    "We spirits don''t really believe in the concept of ownership, so there''s not much that we have. We just take what we need and we leave the rest for nature." Ang said in a natural voice.


    Lin Fan was immediately depressed, but he didn''t stop there. He then asked, "Then can you ask your subordinates to gather some nts with elemental energy for me?"


    Ang was confused, "Why do you need that stuff?"


    "Didn''t I tell you earlier? I came looking for materials to make pet food with."


    "Oh, so you weren''t lying."


    Lin Fan had ck lines on his forehead as he said, "My master was the one who sent me to get the nts, he''s the one who makes the pet food."<sub> </sub>


    Hearing that it was Lin Fan''s master that wanted the nts, Ang didn''t hesitate any longer.


    She raised her hand and wind gathered until it formed a flute. She brought the flute to her lips and blew a melodious tune that suddenly summoned a wisp.


    After saying a few things to the wisp, it suddenly flew off.


    Ang turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Just wait a bit and you''ll get what you want."


    It took around half an hour before six giant beingsnded down by theke.


    When they arrived, these six giant beings quickly shrunk down to the size of a human.


    They were all exceptionally beautiful and handsome, but the difference between them was in the colour of the clothes they wore. Respectively, the colours of their clothes were red, blue, green, brown, yellow, and ck.


    Lin Fan asked Ang in a curious voice, "Ang, who are these people?"


    Ang just casually said, "They''re the six Spirit Kings who serve me. I had the wisp send the message that I was looking for ingredients and they all came to bring me some."


    When Lin Fan heard Ang mention Spirit Kings, he waspletely stunned. As someone who had transmigrated from earth and someone well cultivated in the ways of the otaku, he was very familiar with Spirit Kings.


    In many of the games he yed and the novels he read, Spirit Kings were always either end game bosses or high level NPC supporters. The fact that Ang had six of them under her really meant that she was equal to a final boss!


    After giving a few orders to the Spirit Kings, they led their subordinates to create a pile of nts in front of Lin Fan.


    Once the pile was done, Ang said, "Pick whatever your master needs."


    Lin Fan didn''t show any courtesy at all since they were all a part of the same shop now. He walked over to the pile and had the system scan over the pile to see what was inside.


    When the system finished scanning, it gave a report.


    "Host, there are 2054 normal pieces of ingredients and 11 special ingredients found inside this pile."


    "Special ingredients? What do you mean by that?" Lin Fan immediately asked in his mind.


    "Special ingredients are pet food that can be sold separately. They are special nts that have special effects when eaten, which include being able to increase stats or induce evolution."


    "So how will they be sold?"


    "Host, the special ingredients will receive a corresponding price based on grade and effect."


    After getting the system to categorize everything, he said to Ang, "Master said that he wants everything."


    Ang wasn''t surprised since she had heard that humans were greedy, but since this was her key to the God Realm, she just epted it.


    The Spirit Kings were curious why there was a human with their ruler, but of course they didn''t overstep and question her. That was just how much stronger she waspared to them.


    After getting the system to put everything away, Lin Fan had Ang bring them around the World of Elements for the next seven days.


    Since they were already here, Lin Fan would make the best out of it and train up his three pets.


    When he was being killed by Ang again and again, Lin Fan knew that without power, he wouldn''t be able to stand up in this world, so he tried to make his pets as strong as possible since they were a part of his strength too.


    By the time they were finished, they had ughtered over half of the monsters in the forest that Lin Fan had appeared in the first time.


    When their time in this world was up, Lin Fan finally broke the news to Ang that they were leaving this world for a lower world.


    "You want me to go to a lowly human world?" Ang was surprised.


    She really thought that Lin Fan''s master had just recruited her for her power, since it wasn''t convenient to do things in the mortal world, she never thought that he would actually have her work as an attendant in the store!


    Seeing that she was hesitating, Lin Fan said, "You know that your benefits are based on whether you increase your rating or not. If you really don''t want it, I can''t really do anything."


    After being with Ang for seven days now, Lin Fan had learned that she really didn''t have anymon sense. She had grown up sheltered as the Spirit Overlord, so there were many things that normal people understood that she didn''t.


    To put it simply, she was quite "naive" and "easy to trick".


    Of course, Lin Fan would never dare go over her boundaries, otherwise he wouldn''t even know how he died.


    So in the end, Ang epted the conditions and after leaving an avatar behind in the World of Elements, she went to Lin Fan''s world.

 9 Chapter 9

    When they arrived in the shop, Ang was like a kid who had just been brought to a toy shop as she ran around looking over all the new things around her.


    The World of Elements was a world that wasn''t as technologically advanced since most of the intelligent beings in that world were elemental spirits who lived with nature.


    While letting Ang run around as she pleased, Lin Fan went into the back where the pet food machine was.


    After entering the room, he had the system take out all the nts that he had ced in the storage before stuffing them all into the slot on the machine.


    As for the special ingredients, he had the system t out prepare a few tags that listed the price the system had set and a description of what they did.


    While looking through the different special ingredients, Lin Fan was shocked by the effects they had.


    The one with the most amazing effect was the True Spirit Vine, which had an effect of increasing the intelligence of a pet!


    The others all had effects like increasing one''s elemental resistance, elemental infinity, or certain stats, which wasn''t as amazing as the True Spirit Vine.


    When Lin Fan left the room and allowed the machine to run, the system suddenly chimed in.


    "Evaluation, the host has collected 2054 normal pieces of ingredients and 11 special ingredients.


    "Evaluation, the host has collected over 100 pieces of normal ingredients."


    "Evaluation, the host has collected over 1000 pieces of normal ingredients."


    "Evaluation, the host has collected 1 piece of special ingredient."


    "Evaluation, the host has collected over 10 pieces of special ingredients."


    "The host has passed the sudden mission with flying colours."


    "Calcting."


    "The host will receive a top grade special reward with the normal reward."


    "The host has received two Mortal Coil Shedding Pills."


    "The host has received a God Tier Cultivation Technique, Nine True Sun Body Art."


    "Wait, what is this God Tier Cultivation Technique?" Lin Fan knew from the name that it wasn''t simple.


    "Host, as the name implies, it is a cultivation technique that can allow one to be a god."


    God, that was something that could even move someone as strong as Ang, so there was no way Lin Fan wasn''t moved when he heard this.


    After bringing out all the special ingredients and setting them up in the store, he immediately took out the Nine True Sun Body Art from the system.


    Feeling it in his hands, he could sense the power that was contained within each word.


    He helped Ang find a ce to stay in the shop before heading back home.


    Before leaving, he also remembered to order some takeout for her. Even though he didn''t know if she needed to eat or not, she seemed quite happy to explore the fast food that he ordered.


    When he got home, his parents were waiting with dinner prepared. As for his little sister, she was as cold as always. She rushed to finish her dinner and went to her room to cultivate as soon as she finished.


    He did the dishes like usual since the original owner of this body was quite the filial son.


    After taking care of his chores, he locked himself in his room as he was finally able to start cultivating.


    Following the instructions of the Nine True Sun Body Art, he began drawing life energy into his veins and using it to temper his body.


    As he was drawing in life energy, he noticed that there was a vortex in the middle of his dantian that continually spun as he drew in this life energy. As it continued spinning faster and faster inside of him, the energy it gathered became thicker and thicker.


    The increase in energy caused the life energy around him to also be much richer.


    In the room beside his room, his little sister was also cultivating when she suddenly noticed that the concentration of life energy around her had be much thicker.


    She suddenly opened her eyes and looked around in confusion, but she couldn''t sense what was creating this phenomenon even after releasing her spirit sense.


    In the end, she gave up on trying to figure out what this phenomenon was and began taking advantage of it, trying to absorb as much life energy as possible, which was great help to her cultivation.<sub> </sub>


    Just like this, the two siblings continued to cultivate through the night.


    ¡­


    Luo Qing had finally arrived at home after ditching Murong Quan and going out with her friends.


    When she walked through the door, her dad came out of the living room after hearing the door open.


    Seeing her, he asked, "Well, how was the pet shop?"


    Luo Qing didn''t know what he was talking about at first, but then she remembered that she had left the Song Bird at the pet shop in the afternoon.


    "I didn''t see the couple you mentioned, it seemed like the store had been taken over by another person. He was a young man who had a mature handsomeness to him." Luo Qing casually said.


    Her dad thought for a bit before saying, "Ah, that must be their son Lin Fan. I heard that they had been injured and had left the store to their son now."


    After that, his brows suddenly knit together, "Did you ask about them like I asked you to do?"


    Luo Qing suddenly remembered the reason why her parents had her go to the store, it was to ask about the couple that had been in charge before.


    Between being shocked by the strength of Lin Fan''s pet and the ridiculous fees that he charged, she hadpletely forgotten about this.


    After feeling awkward for a bit, she honestly said, "Ipletely forgot. I just left Xiao Ge there like you told me to, but everything else slipped my mind."


    Her dad was a bit disappointed, but he still said, "It''s fine, try to ask about them when you go pick up Xiao Ge. When are you going back?"


    Luo Qing hesitantly said, "Actually, the pet shop is very strange. The owner told me that he could train my pet in just a single day and the worst thing was that it cost a hundred crystals!"


    Her dad was surprised before falling into thought, "Could it be that Xiao Fan has be a scammer?"


    Just like that, the father daughter pair continued to wonder about this all night.


    ¡­


    When the old man returned home, he found that there was his grandson waiting at the door for him.


    Ever since the old man had retired, he had been living with his son and his main job had been taking care of his grandchildren, so they were quite close to him.


    When Yang Xin saw his grandfathere home, he immediately went forward to support him into the house before asking him, "Grandfather, where did you go today? I''ve been looking all over for you."


    The grandfather said, "Oh, Xiao Xin, what''s got you so worked up?"


    Yang Xin excitedly took out a bright red fruit from the storage in his watch and he held it up in front of the old man.


    "Grandfather, I remember you saying that Yan Yan hasn''t been feeling welltely, so I had a friend help me find this. This is a Jade me Fruit that''s said to contain pure me energy. It''s the best nurturing elixir for fire elemental pets, so I got this to help Yan Yan recover."


    The old man had also heard of this Jade me Fruit before, so he was excited when he saw the one in his grandson''s hand. He was touched by everything his grandson had done for him, but he also didn''t show any courtesy in taking the Jade me Fruit since they were family.


    The old man called the Inferno Hawk out of his pet space and brought the Jade me Fruit up to its mouth. The Inferno Hawk could smell the pure me energying from it, which did excite its appetite, but it turned its head away after just taking two bites.


    In the end, the old man had no choice but to take out the pet food that he had gotten at Lin Fan''s pet shop and sprinkled a bit of it over the Jade me Fruit. Only then did the Inferno Hawk wildly bit into the Jade me Fruit like it couldn''t get enough of it.


    Yang Xin saw the old man take out the strange bag and he was very curious about what it was, so he asked, "Grandfather, what''s in that bag?"


    The old man said, "I found a small shop this afternoon and bought some pet food from them after seeing how much Yan Yan liked eating it."


    Yang Xin cautiously asked, "Grandfather, where did you find this shop?"


    The old man said in a confused voice, "I found it in the eastern part of town, why?"


    Yang Xin pped his forehead as he said, "Grandfather, I''ve told you many times not to go there. That is the slum of the town, it''s where all the shady products gather. I wouldn''t feed anymore of that pet food to Yan Yan, it might cause somesting effects on him. I''ve heard from some friends recently that pet shops in the slums have beencing their pet food with a special chemical that makes it very delicious, but it also hurts the foundation of the pets, making them unable to advance any further."


    The old man was immediately worried, "You think that I bought something that could be tainted?"


    Yang Xin began calming him down, "I''m not certain, but I''ll have a friend check it for me. Also, tell me where you found that shop, I''ll go and take a look tomorrow."


    Yang Xin said this very casually, but he had already decided that he would teach the owner of this shop a lesson tomorrow!

 10 Chapter 10

    When he finished cultivating the next morning, Lin Fan felt much more refreshedpared to when he first entered this body.


    After an entire night of cultivation, he wasn''t tired at all, rather he was filled with energy.


    There was now a single sun that had formed inside his dantian, releasing endless amounts of pure yang energy.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what level his cultivation was since his cultivation method was different from other people''s, but when he released his life energy, there was a silver hue to it which meant that he was at least in the Silver Realm.


    In truth, this was a God Tier Cultivation Technique, so that meant that by just reaching the first level, Lin Fan''s body was already able to match the power of the Legend Realm. The only difference was that his life energy hadn''t reached the same concentration yet, but it would slowly change with time.


    After stabilizing his cultivation, Lin Fan felt like he had been starving for a year. He didn''t know why he was this hungry, all he knew was that he needed some food.


    When he went downstairs, he found that his mom had already prepared breakfast. Without even waiting for them to say anything, he immediately began scarfing down the food like there was no tomorrow.


    His parents who had been at the table were shocked by this, but they just figured that he was undergoing a growth spurt, so they ignored it.


    By the time his little sister hade down, he had already finished all the food at the table, so he could only awkwardly match her cold re.


    After finishing all the food at the table, Lin Fan felt a little better, but he still ordered a bunch of takeout to be sent to his store since he couldn''t just keep eating food like this in front of his family or they would think he was being weird.


    So with a quick goodbye, he quickly ran off to the store.


    As he went out the door, Lin Yue muttered under her breath, "Now he''s running as soon as he sees me? Maybe I should lock him up."


    p ¡­</anda>


    When Lin Fan arrived at the store, he was surprised to find Luo Qing already standing outside waiting for him.


    When she saw Lin Fan approaching, she quickly came forward.


    She hade this early because there was an exam at school and the Song Bird was her only pet left.


    She had other pets before, but they had been injured during thest interss exercise, so she only had this one pet left.


    If her parents hadn''t told her toe to this store, Luo Qing wouldn''t have left her Song Bird here.


    She just hoped that the owner didn''t do anything strange to her pet and that it could help her pass the exam today.


    "Sir, is my pet ready yet? You said that it would be ready by today." Luo Qing quickly said.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by how early Luo Qing hade, but he still opened the store as usual.


    "Well, it is, but you really are early." Lin Fan casually said.


    Luo Qing knew that she really was here too early, so she could only awkwardly say, "You''re the one who said it would be done in one day."


    As she was arguing with him like a petty child, there were multiple food delivery drivers that had arrived.


    Luo Qing was stunned when she saw all the food delivery that Lin Fan had ordered.


    "Are you hosting a party? Why is there so much food delivery?" Luo Qing asked.


    Lin Fan was toozy to answer her, he just opened the door to the shop and walked in.


    After telling the food delivery people where to put the food, he went into the back to get the Song Bird.


    There were several cages in the room he had entered, but the strange thing was that they werepletely cked out and one couldn''t see what was inside. However, if one carefully released their senses, they could feel the enormous flow of life energy that filled every cage.


    When Lin Fan took out the Song Bird, its first reaction was to look back at the cage longingly. It had been veryfortable in the cage and it provided all the life energy that the Song Bird had wanted.<sub> </sub>


    Its second reaction was to cower in fear when it saw Lin Fan.


    This was because after it had finished its training with the shadow, Lin Fan had brought his three pets into the cultivation room.


    As the Song Bird struggled to get up after finally defeating the shadow, Lin Fan had walked over with the same sinister smile that had terrified his three pets and without a single word, he snapped the Song Bird''s neck.


    When the Song Bird revived, it immediately attacked Lin Fan, but it was stopped by the Fire Phoenix chick.


    After a while, it waspletely beaten into the ground by the chick and when it was lying there dying, Lin Fan came over with the same smile to snap its neck again.


    When it was revived again, this time it was the Lightning Qilin''s turn to beat it up.


    Just like that, it was a cycle of being beaten by one of Lin Fan''s pets before being revived again while looking up at Lin Fan''s smile.


    Eventually it created a form of trauma in the heart of the Song Bird, causing it to tremble uncontrobly whenever it saw Lin Fan.


    This time, its reaction was to y dead, but Lin Fan just petted it on the head as he brought it out of the room and back to the front.


    When Luo Qing saw Lin Faning out with her Song Bird, she immediately came forward to inspect it, but what she found was that its aura wasn''t different from yesterday.


    But when the Song Bird saw that its master was here to pick it up, it was immediately filled with joy as it dove into her weing embrace, nuzzling its head against her slightly t chest.


    Luo Qing was surprised to see how affectionate her Song Bird was acting, but she definitely weed it. Normally her Song Bird was a bit prideful, so it wouldn''t be as affectionate to her even if she wanted to be affectionate with it.


    But after that, she turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Sir, are you sure you trained it?"


    Lin Fan on the other hand was surprised to see Ang stuffing herself with the pile of food.


    Ignoring Luo Qing''s question, he walked over to Ang and asked with one raised brow, "What are you doing?"


    Ang just kept stuffing her face as she said, "You humans really do know how to make food. This stuff is much more delicious than the sap we normally eat."


    Luo Qing heard this and was confused by what it meant, but she shook it off after thinking that it wasn''t her business. Once again, she asked, "Sir, are you sure you trained my pet?"


    Only then did Lin Fan turn to Luo Qing. He already knew that this would be a problem, but he was already prepared.


    Lin Fan looked at the Song Bird with narrowed eyes and said, "Show her what you can do."


    The Song Bird after giving a tremble immediately jumped out of Luo Qing''s arm and saluted Lin Fan like a soldier, waiting for orders.


    Lin Fan just casually said, "Show her your Wind Typhoon."


    The Song Bird began pping its wings and soon there was a tornado that began forming in front of it. As the tornado grewrger andrger, it started creating a mess in the store, blowing up dust into the air. Of course, it didn''t bother Ang at all as she had created a barrier, protecting herself and her food.


    Luo Qing waspletely stunned by the Song Bird''s disy. Wind Typhoon was an advanced wind ss skill that could only be learned by pets with advanced bloodlines. A pet like her Song Bird only had a low grade bloodline that made sure it would only be able to reach the Bronze Realm at most.


    What shocked her even more was that based on the fluctuations of the Song Bird''s life energy, this attack was actually at the same level as the Bronze Realm.


    What Luo Qing didn''t know was that Lin Fan had already trained the Song Bird to abat strength of 20.3. Not only did it have the power of a Bronze Realm pet, it was in the middle of the Bronze Realm.


    Lin Fan saw the mess that the Song Bird was making, which caused him to narrow his eyes even more as he red at the Song Bird.


    The Song Bird felt this gaze and it immediately stopped pping its wings as it hid behind Luo Qing''s legs, poking its head out to timidly look at Lin Fan.


    During all of this, Luo Qing was just looking forward in a daze, not believing what she had seen.

 11 Chapter 11

    After a while, Luo Qing finally came back to her senses.


    She looked down at her Song Bird and realized that it was being rude, so she quickly apologized, "I''m sorry sir, I haven''t taught my Song Bird properly."


    As she was saying this, the Song Bird looked at her with an aggrieved look like this was the biggest betrayal in its life.


    Then she took a quick look at her watch and saw that she would bete if she didn''t head out soon.


    Luo Qing picked up the Song Bird and was prepared to run out, but then she remembered that she hadn''t said anything to the owner.


    She turned back and quickly shouted, "Sir, thank you for your training! I''ll be sure toe back for more!"


    When she began to run, Lin Fan shouted, "Wait, I still haven''t told you about all the other abilities that it has!"


    But it was toote since she was already out the door and around the corner.


    As she was running out, the Song Bird had cast onest longing look at the room with the cages in the back.


    Lin Fan peeked his head out the door, but not even seeing a single trace of her, he just gave a sigh and went back in.


    Looking at Ang demolish the pile of food he had ordered and rubbing his own stomach that wasining to him about how hungry it was, he decided to order a bit more food.


    ¡­


    When Luo Qing arrived at school, barely making it on time, she realized that she had forgotten to ask the owner about the previous owners.


    Thinking about it, she realized that she had no choice but to go back there again this afternoon.


    Still she wondered what kind of training the owner had given her pet to teach it an advanced skill. It was said that only High Tier Trainers or up could teach pets advanced skills.


    Could it be that the owner of the shop was a High Tier Trainer?


    But High Tier Trainers were people that royals had fought over to invite and they were all proud people with status, so how could one be willing to operate a small pet shop like this?


    As she was thinking this over, she walked through the corridor into her ss. Even after entering the ss, sitting down, and listening to the teacher call names, she was still lost in thought.


    When the teacher called her name, she didn''t answer in her daze. When the teacher called her name a second time, her friend Wang Ning poked her, but she was still lost in thought. When the teacher called her name a third time, she finally lost her patience and threw a stick of chalk right at Luo Qing''s forehead.


    When the chalk hit her head and pain came over her, she finally came back to her senses and answered the roll call.


    It took her a while to calm the teacher down, but when she sat down, her friend Wang Ning poked her and asked in a whisper, "What gotten our Qing Qing in a daze? Could it be a boy?"


    Luo Qing''s face turned a bit red since technically she was thinking about a boy, but she quickly denied it, "No, you''re thinking too much."


    Seeing the blush on Luo Qing''s face, Wang Ning quickly revealed a smirk, "Oh, ho, ho, so even our ice queen can be moved."


    Luo Qing saw the smile on her face and knew that nothing she said would change her mind, so she just turned her head and ignored her.


    Even after being ignored, Wang Ning didn''t let that put her down as she covered her lips with her hand while she revealed a knowing smirk from behind it.


    ¡­


    Time passed and finally it was time for the exam.


    This was an exam that was taking ce in the virtual world.


    After logging into the virtual world, the teacher brought their ss to a colosseum type structure.


    The students all sat down in different spectator seats with their groups.


    Luo Qing found a seat near the edge of the arena with Wang Ning and watched the other tests.<sub> </sub>


    The format of the exam was that the examiner would be facing virtual beasts that were at the same cultivation as them, which would change to match the cultivation of the pets they summoned if their pets had higher cultivations.


    The exams of the others passed, with some failing and some passing.


    One exam of note was Wang Ning''s exam.


    She was the daughter of a rich family, so she really wasn''t that invested in bing a Beast Master. She was just taking this course so she could learn some basic education and to gain the ability to protect herself.


    Her pets were mainly weaker than her, so they were all ughtered when they appeared before she was sent flying out of the arena.


    When she came back to the stands, her face was covered in tears as she ran over to Luo Qing.


    Luo Qing had been childhood friends with Wang Ning, so they were quite close. When she saw Wang Ning, she let her dive into her embrace and she patted her head, as sheforted her.


    When it was finally Luo Qing''s turn, she hesitantly walked up to the stage.


    She was already in the Iron 7 level, which meant that the opponent they were facing would be in the Iron 7 level, a whole level higher than her Song Bird.


    Even if the owner had taught her Song Bird an advanced wind skill, it still didn''t mean that her Song Bird could win.


    Not to mention that she had pampered her Song Bird since it was the first pet she had received from her parents, which meant that it had very little realbat experience.


    When she arrived in the middle of the field, she called out her Song Bird and prepared for battle since she knew that she would do most of the fighting.


    Her n was to have the Song Bird support her from afar with its long range wind attacks while she fought the beast head on, but the moment it appeared, itpletely ruined her ns.


    The beast that was chosen for her was a Berserker Ape which was a closebat beast that boasted great strength and great defense. The only weakness it had was that it was quite slow, meaning that it could be slowly worn down, but the bad thing was that the Song Bird wasn''t strong enough to break through its defenses, so she couldn''t wear it down.


    As she was feeling despair, she could do nothing except try to attack the Berserker Ape, but all that happened was that she was thrown back against the wall.


    Feeling nothing but despair, she could only pray for a miracle as she said to her Song Bird, "Xiao Ge, use the Wind Typhoon."


    The Song Bird had been quite calm during this entire time. It had died countless times during yesterday''s training session, but it had also gained a wealth ofbat experience.


    It was no longer as weak as that same pampered bird from before, it was a bird that had faced beasts with ancient bloodlines. It was now a bird that had experienced the world and knew how big it was.


    To the Song Bird, this Berserker Ape was nothing more than a small pawn in the chess game of life, it felt no pressure from it at all. Not to mention that it was much stronger than this Berserker Ape.


    The Song Bird just casually looked at it, which made the Berserker Ape flinch. Then after flinching, the Berserker Ape became angry since it didn''t know why it was feeling fear from a small bird like this.


    Hearing the angry roars of the Berserker Ape ignited the pride of the Song Bird, how could a little monkey like it provoke its noble bird self?


    This noble bird would teach it a lesson!


    So the Song Bird began pping its wings and gathering the wind in front of it in the form of a tornado which slowly grew in size until it was a giant tornado.


    The Berserker Ape stopped its charge as it watched this tornado grow and with a helpless look on its face, it was crying as it was swept away by this tornado.


    What had it done to deserve this? Wasn''t this a weak little bird in front of it?


    The Berserker Ape was thrown around inside the tornado until the Song Bird stopped pping its wings, at which point the Berserker Ape was thrown up before mming into the ground. When the Berserker Apended, it was covered in cuts and its neck had been snapped. On its face, the final look it had was an aggrieved look.


    The Song Bird just gave a cold snort before casually flying back onto Luo Qing''s shoulder.


    As it flew back, everyone''s eyes were following the Song Bird, even the teacher, even Luo Qing, looking at it inplete shock.


    There was only silence that filled the area.

 12 Chapter 12

    Unbeknownst to Lin Fan, he was slowly gaining fame at Luo Qing''s academy, but for now, he had to deal with the problem of an empty shop.


    After dealing with arge pile of delivery food with Ang, it was back to sitting in front of the counter to wait for another customer.


    But like yesterday, there was no one that came in at all.


    One person that Lin Fan had expected to see was the old man who had bought pet food yesterday, he knew that a pet couldn''t quit eating the system''s pet food after having a taste.


    However, to his dismay, the old man didn''t appear in his store at all.


    Instead of the old man, there was a rather aggressive young man that had appeared.


    When it was getting close to noon and Lin Fan was thinking about what to get for lunch, the bell at the door suddenly rang and a young man came in.


    The young man didn''t have a kind look in his eyes as he looked over Lin Fan. It was like he was looking at someone who had scammed him, but this could be considered the case from his scenario.


    This young man was none other than Yang Xin, the grandson of the old man from yesterday.


    After looking over Lin Fan for a while, the young man finally came up to the counter and pped down on it to catch Lin Fan''s attention.


    Lin Fan was surprised by this sudden action, but he quickly figured that this person wasn''t here with good intentions, so his hand slowly moved over to the Fire Phoenix chick that had been sleeping on the side.


    Yang Xin started by first getting up in Lin Fan''s face and ring at him before shouting, "So, you''re the scammer that wanted to fool my grandfather?"


    Lin Fan was confused since he hadn''t scammed anyone before.


    Ang had been ying around in a corner of the store when she suddenly heard someone shouting, so she quickly came to the register.


    When she was prepared to raise her hand and gather her wind sword, Lin Fan quickly shook his head to stop her, but all this did was make Yang Xin think that Lin Fan was acting like he didn''t know anything.


    Seeing this insult to him, Yang Xin who was a hot tempered young man by nature raised his fist and gathered his life energy.


    Yang Xin growled in a low voice, "I''ll show you what happens to people who make fun of me!"


    Sending his fist flying, he threw a punch right at Lin Fan''s face, but before his fist could make contact with Lin Fan, there was a giant wall of invisible force that mmed into him and threw him out of the shop.


    When Yang Xin mmed into this force, Ang on the side waspletely shocked since she could feel the power ofws in the attack that had sent Yang Xin flying.


    To be more urate, it was a simple application of spatialws, but still it was controlling spatialws which was an impressive feat by itself!


    When Yang Xin finally came to his senses over what had just happened, he stared at the pet shop in fear. When he had been knocked out of the store, he felt like he was nothing more than an insignificant bug that could have been swatted at any time.


    After Yang Xin had been blown out, Lin Fan casually walked out of the store.


    When Yang Xin had attacked him, he had seen that there was a tint of silver to his life energy, which meant that he was in the Silver Realm just like Lin Fan. After he had been thrown out, Lin Fan actually walked out of the store and rolled up his sleeves.


    He wanted to use Yang Xin to test his own strength since after he finished cultivating this morning, he really had no idea just how strong he really was.


    Seeing the owner roll up his sleeve, Yang Xin panicked.


    Lin Fan had just been protected by the unknown expert in the store, so Yang Xin misinterpreted as Lin Fan being weaker than him, but what happened next was something that he never expected.


    After rolling up his sleeves, Lin Fan released his silver life energy, which was actually much more densepared to the life energy that Yang Xin had released.


    Yang Xin was shocked by this, the owner was actually in the same realm as him and he seemed to be at a higher level!


    When Yang Xin held his hands up to wave stop and he tried to exin, Lin Fan was already charging at him with both fists wielded.


    Yang Xin had no choice but to defend himself, but when his fist collided with the fist of Lin Fan, all he felt was an unstoppable force sending him flying away.<sub> </sub>


    Yang Xin skidded across the ground, skipping like stone across the pond beforending several meters away.


    Lin Fan looked down at his hands in surprise, he never expected that he would be this strong!


    All Yang Xin felt was the numbness in his hands. It was like he had been practicing for hours and he had lost all sensations in his arms.


    Lin Fan didn''t spare Yang Xin another nce as he just turned and walked back into his store, leaving behind someone with wide open eyes and a mouth agape.


    It took Yang Xin a while before he came back to his senses, but when he finally did, he got up and awkwardly walked back into the store.


    Hearing the bell above the door ring again, Lin Fan turned over, but he went back to his watch after seeing that it was Yang Xin.


    Yang Xin just awkwardly made his way to the counter before hesitantly saying, "Sir, I''m sorry for what I did before. I didn''t know that you were such an expert, that''s why I thought that you were a scammer."


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort in response to this.Yang Xin felt like a fool, but he still kept going since he knew that he couldn''t offend this store, "Sir, based on your power, I know now that you''re not a scammer. If possible, could I get some more of the pet food you offered my grandfather yesterday?"


    Someone that had a Silver Realm cultivation and was even stronger than him was sitting at the register, just how strong was the master hidden in the store? That person must be someone in the Gold Realm at least!


    In this world, families that had someone in the Gold Realm were considered noble families and families with someone in the tinum Realm were considered royal families.


    As for families that had someone in the Legendary Realm, they were considered rulers.


    The strongest person in Yang Xin''s family was only in the Silver Realm and they were nothing more than seekers who were doing quite well for themselves. If aparison was made to earth, they would be considered a middle ss family.


    For this kind of family, there was no way they couldpete with a noble. Nobles had ties with the Union Government and if they were to create a mess, the government would definitely side with the nobles.


    Hearing that he was here this time to buy pet food, Lin Fan revealed his usual smile which immediately made Yang Xin take a step back.


    His smile really made him look too much like a scammer!


    Lin Fan said with that smile, "Well, if you''re looking for pet food, we had a new shipment today and there are some special items that have been put up for sale. At our store, our motto is always quality first!"


    Yang Xin really wanted to just turn around and walk out of that store after seeing that smile, but he suppressed this urge. Since the owner seemed like he was in a good mood now, he smiled along with him as he asked to see the goods.


    Lin Fan brought Yang Xin over to a shelf to the right of the store and when Yang Xin saw the items on the shelf, he waspletely shocked.


    One of the items on the shelf was something he was very familiar with, it was the Jade me Fruit that he had his friend search for!


    But what was the most shocking was the price tag!


    Jade me Fruits weren''t that easy to find, so when he had his friend find one for him, it had cost him over ten thousand crystals!


    But right in front of him, there was a Jade me Fruit being sold for only two hundred crystals!


    Yang Xin looked at the Jade me Fruit before turning to look at the owner and asking, "Sir, are you certain that you are only selling this for two hundred crystals?"


    In all honesty, Lin Fan also felt that it was too cheap. He had searched this Jade me Fruit online and had found that thest one had sold for over ten thousand thousand crystals, but the system wouldn''t bend the price at all, so he could only cry internally.


    Seeing Lin Fan nod in response, Yang Xin was stunned into silence.


    Yang Xin continued to look over the other items and finally his gaze fell onto the True Spirit Vine.


    When he saw the effects, he almost fell down in shock.


    It was actually an elixir that could increase a pet''s intelligence!


    This was something that only legendary elixirs could do!

 13 Chapter 13

    Yang Xin immediately turned over to Lin Fan and while pointing at the True Spirit Vine, he shouted, "Sir, you know that you can''t write random things about your elixirs! Even if you are a noble, the Union Government will punish you for doing this!"


    Lin Fan rolled his eyes at him and then said, "The effects are as written, there is nothing wrong."


    Yang Xin didn''t want to believe him, but thinking about all the crazy things he had seen sinceing to this store, he didn''t have a choice.


    Seeing Yang Xin deep in thought, Lin Fan thought he was considering buying the True Spirit Vine, so he came forward with his usual smile and said, "Dear customer, you''re in luck right now. This elixir is one of a kind and my provider was super lucky to find it, so you''ll be sorry if you miss it."


    If it really did have the function that was being described, Yang Xin would have spent all his money to buy it, but he just wasn''t sure.


    Not to mention that it cost way more than he could afford!


    This True Spirit Vine was being sold for 4300000 crystals, this was an amount that he couldn''t make in ten years!


    So in the end, the only thing he bought was the Jade me Fruit that he was certain was real since he could sense the me energy that it contained, it was just like the one that he had bought from his friend.


    Other than that, he had also bought a few bags of pet food since he was certain now that this store wasn''t a scam. This was a store that had the support of a noble, it definitely wasn''t a scam!


    Before Yang Xin left, he asked the owner for his number, but the way he did it was quite suggestive which made Lin Fan a bit scared.


    So he decisively turned Yang Xin down, which made him more depressed when he walked out.


    After he had left, Lin Fan muttered to himself as he stroked his face, "Man, it really is a problem being too handsome."


    Ang on the side almost fell over when she heard this. She really didn''t understand what went on in this human''s brain.


    After looking at himself in the mirror for a while, Lin Fan also muttered with a sigh, "That kid really was a poor man, he couldn''t afford to buy anything."


    If Yang Xin were to hear this, he would have fallen over. Being able to spend that much already meant that he was quite well off, but somehow in Lin Fan''s mind, he had be a pauper.


    Ang couldn''t take it anymore as she chimed in, "If it wasn''t for your smile scaring him off, I''m sure he would have bought more."


    Lin Fan looked at her in confusion, "What do you mean by my smile scaring him? It''s my best smile for weing customers."


    Ang had dark lines on her forehead as she said, "If that''s your best smile, I really don''t want to see your worst smile. Your best smile makes you look like a scammer."


    She remembered how she had been tricked by this smile before and she couldn''t help shaking her head.


    "Eh?" Lin Fan just looked surprised at being told that he looked like a scammer. He really felt that he was the perfect representation of a handsome and mature store owner.


    If Ang knew this, she definitely would have fallen over.


    ¡­


    p The rest of Luo Qing''s day had beenpletely filled with chaos.</anda>


    There were many people who came up to her asking her about how she trained her Song Bird, but she really didn''t know how to answer them.


    The reason why?


    She didn''t really know how her Song Bird had been trained either!


    She knew for sure that her Song Bird was a coward that didn''t have any battle experience, how could it have faced the Berserker Ape so calmly!<sub> </sub>


    This Song Bird had been pampered by her and her parents since it was a symbol of their parent and daughter rtionship, so both her and her parents all loved this Song Bird.


    It had lived apletely pampered life, so it was a coward that only acted prideful when it was certain that it was stronger, yet now it could even face a Berserker Ape that was stronger than it.


    When Murong Quan had heard about Luo Qing''s incredible Song Bird, the first thing he thought of was Lin Fan''s pet shop.


    He had felt that power of the Fire Phoenix chick, so he knew that it wasn''t a normal shop, but to train Luo Qing''s Song Bird to this degree, it wasn''t something that he dared to imagine.


    Just like this, all her ssmates kept bugging Luo Qing, asking her for her secret, but she really couldn''t exin it.


    Even Wang Ning kept bugging Luo Qing about how her Song Bird had suddenly be so strong.


    As they were walking home, Wang Ning grabbed Luo Qing''s arm and swung it back and forth as she said, "Come on, I''m your best friend, I won''t forgive you if you don''t tell me!"


    Luo Qing really didn''t know what to say, but in the end, since this was her best friend, she decided to tell Wang Ning about the pet shop.


    The pet shop was a magical ce, so she didn''t want to share it with too many people or it would be too crowded, but Wang Ning was Wang Ning.


    "To be honest with you, I really didn''t train my pet. Yesterday, I left my Xiao Ge at this pet shop that my parents sent me to and it learned the advanced wind ss skill today." Luo Qing honestly said.


    Wang Ning didn''t believe her at first, but since Luo Qing insisted on this story, she started to cave. So she said, "Then bring me to this magical pet shop, I want to see how amazing it is."


    Luo Qing was a bit worried about her friend, so she decided to give her friend a warning, "I''ll bring you there, but remember not to annoy the owner." After that, she told Wang Ning about what happened to Murong Quan yesterday.


    Wang Ning couldn''t believe what she had heard, "You''re kidding right? Murong Quan is in the Bronze Realm and he couldn''t fight back at all? How could that be possible?"


    Even if Murong Quan had been made to look like a clown yesterday, there was no denying that he was indeed one of the top students. He was someone who ranked in the top hundred in the academy, which was an academy with over ten thousand students!


    So the two of them slowly made their way to the pet shop, but what they didn''t know was that there was someone else following them and for once, it wasn''t Murong Quan!


    ¡­


    As the two girls arrived in the district the pet shop was in, Wang Ning sceptically looked around since this district really was too poor.


    There were many shops that had been closed down and the ones that were open were all broken down shops that most people would choose to avoid.


    Wang Ning couldn''t help pouting her lips as she pinched Luo Qing''s waist, "I bet you''re bringing me to this ce so you don''t have to tell me your secret."


    Luo Qing really didn''t know whether tough or cry. People wouldn''t believe her no matter what, it really didn''t matter if she lied or not at this point.


    But there was nothing else she could do, she still had to go to the shop to ask the owner about the previous owners. While she was there, she also wanted to see if the owner would train her pet again.


    When they finally arrived in front of the shop, Wang Ning was even more discouraged by how shabby the outside looked and she wasn''t silent with herints at all.


    Luo Qing just dragged Wang Ning into the store while ignoring all herints, but they were both surprised when they walked through the door.


    Wang Ning was surprised because she finally saw the real appearance of the pet shop, which honestly wasn''t quite that bad.


    As for Luo Qing, she was shocked by the scene she saw inside the shop.


    What she saw was Lin Fan and Ang on the ground together, but the most amazing part of this was that Lin Fan was on top of Ang, pressing her down on the ground in a most suggestive manner.

 14 Chapter 14

    Lin Fan and Ang both turned to see Luo Qing and Wang Ning standing at the door and after being in a daze for a bit, Lin Fan quickly jumped off of Ang.


    It had been a pure ident, they had been fighting over some of the snacks Lin Fan had at the register and he had fallen down on her.


    But of course Luo Qing and Wang Ning didn''t know that, the first thought when they saw the devious owner and the poor little worker was that she was being bullied!


    Luo Qing immediately came forward and pushed Lin Fan away. Surprisingly, the system didn''t act up this time.


    Luo Qing quickly helped Ang up and patted the dirt of her, looking all over her to see if she was hurt.


    Once she was done all of that, she shouted at Lin Fan, "Sir, to think that I used to respect you! But now you do something like this to such a poor, sweet, young girl!"


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say, he could only stutter out, "But¡­I...She...We¡­"


    Luo Qing immediately cut him off, "I don''t want to hear any of your excuses!"


    Right after that, she proceeded into a lecture while forcing Lin Fan to kneel down.


    Ang didn''t know what was going on, but surprisingly she wasn''t against this feeling of being protected.


    As the Spirit Overlord, Ang never had friends her own age and currently she was only eighteen year old, being just two years older than Luo Qing.


    Being protected by a girl her age and being treated as a friend was something that created a bit of a warm feeling to fill her.


    But after a while, she still came out and stood up for Lin Fan since it really was just an ident.


    Luo Qing was still lecturing Lin Fan, but after hearing what Ang said and making sure that she wasn''t being forced to say this, she just said, "Oh."


    Lin Fan knew that he had to change the topic quickly, so he said, "So, what are you doing back here again?"


    Luo Qing gave Lin Fan onest re before saying, "I''m here to ask you something. Do you know the previous owners of this shop?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by the question she asked, but he honestly replied, "The previous owners were my parents, what about them?"


    Luo Qing seemed relieved to hear this, "Then have you ever heard of someone called Luo Wang?"


    "Luo Wang?" Lin Fan looked confused.


    Luo Qing exined, "Luo Wang is my dad and he''s an old friend of the previous owners. He used toe here, but he lost touch with the previous owners after they closed this shop."


    Lin Fan searched through the memories of the original owner of the body, but he couldn''t remember the name Luo Wang. So in the end, he said, "I don''t remember this name, but I can mention it to my parents. If you want, you can add me as a contact so I can tell you what I find."


    Luo Qing readily agreed to this.


    It was only at this time that Wang Ning decided to cut in.


    Wang Ning had been on the side covering her lips while giggling to herself, watching everything happen between Luo Qing and Lin Fan.


    This had been a perfect love buffet for her and she already had her ship ready, but now it seemed like there was a three way love triangle which made it even better!


    But since it seemed like it was over, it was time for her to get down to business.


    "Sir, did you train Qing Qing''s Song Bird?"


    Lin Fan only then realized that there was someone else in the store. He looked over at Wang Ning in surprise before saying, "Yes."


    "Then can you also train my pets too?"


    Only then did Lin Fan reveal his usual smile as he enthusiastically said, "Of course, I can. It''s quite cheap to train a pet, it''s only 100 crystals for an Iron Realm pet."


    "Oh, it''s only 100¡­..wait, 100 crystals!?" Wang Ning revealed a shocked look.<sub> </sub>


    100 crystals, even professional trainers didn''t charge this much.


    There was a job in this world that specially dealt with training cultivation pets, they were called Monster Trainers.


    To be a Monster Trainer, one had to have the ability to increase a pet in their realm by a single level or to make them learn a skill of a corresponding level.


    For Iron Monster Trainers, they were considered the lowest of the low, so they didn''t charge that much. For each Iron Realm training session, it would cost at most 10 crystals if they were well known and less than 1 crystal if they had no fame.


    Of course, Lin Fan''s store was part of thetter.


    Wang Ning was from a rich family, so she knew about all the famous Iron Monster Trainers and she had never heard of Lin Fan''s store before.


    After looking around and not finding a Monster Trainer certificate, she knew that this store didn''t even have a certified Monster Trainer, yet they were charging 100 crystals per training session.


    But when she thought about the amazing disy of the Song Bird, she made up her mind and decided to trust her friend.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that she wouldn''t tease her friend and the store owner a little in revenge.


    "Sir, can you give me a discount on ount of me being Qing Qing''s friend? Look at our ice queen Qing Qing, she even took the initiative to ask for your number and everything, you have to show some sincerity. Since I am her best friend, you should give me a discount¡­" Wang Ning said in a sly voice, but before she could finish, Luo Qing had already covered her mouth and dragged her to the side.


    Hearing what Wang Ning said, Lin Fan couldn''t help being a bit surprised.


    To be honest, he had been a single dog his entire life back on earth, so he really never got to experience dating before.


    Now that it was being thrown in his face so tantly, he couldn''t help feeling a bit shy.


    As for Wang Ning, her fate wasn''t good.


    After being dragged to the side by Luo Qing, she had to suffer a lecture from Wang Ning while being forced to kneel down.


    When they were finished, Luo Qing dragged Wang Ning back and said to Lin Fan, "Sir, she was just kidding. There was no special meaning behind my actions, I really was asking solely for my parents."


    Since the other side had denied it so adamantly, Lin Fan didn''t push it any further, but of course his actions were still a bit stiff.


    Wang Ning knew that she couldn''t push it any further, so she just summoned her two pets, a Stone Golem and a Zephyr Shark to leave to Lin Fan.


    Of course she had no problem paying for the training since she was rich, but when she tried to sneak a peek at the back of the store, Lin Fan firmly shut the door in her face.


    After they had finished their business, the two girls didn''t stay any longer and headed off to enjoy their afternoon.


    However, five minutes after they left, there was another girl that came in.


    This girl seemed to be around the same age as them, but her personality waspletely different.


    The moment she came into the store, she arrogantly came up to Lin Fan and while looking down on him, she said, "Those two girls that were just in here, did they leave their pets for training?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see how far the girl tilted her head back to look down on him, but he honestly said, "Yes and no, one of the girls left their pet here and the other was here on some personal business."


    This arrogant girl was called Wang Hua, the self proimed rival of Luo Qing.


    She had beenpletely shocked by Luo Qing''s disy in ss, so she had secretly tailed her ever since they left school in hopes of finding out her secret.


    But in the end, the only clue she had received was this pet shop, which she was certain couldn''t be the reason why Luo Qing''s Song Bird had be so strong!


    After sizing up the owner, Wang Hua just gave a cold snort before walking right back out the door, leaving behind a stunned Lin Fan.


    All Lin Fan was thinking was, what kind of medicine did that girl take?

 15 Chapter 15

    There was nothing else that happened for the rest of the day, so after taking the new pets out of the shadow cultivation realm and storing them in the special cages, Lin Fan closed the store early.


    When he got home, he went looking for his parents to ask about Luo Qing''s dad, but when he entered the living room, he saw his parents looking quite worried over something.


    Lin Fan asked, "Did something happen? What are you guys worrying about?"


    His parents turned to look at him in a daze before slowly saying, "We''ve just heard some news about your Uncle Zhang."


    Uncle Zhang?


    Lin Fan searched through the memories of the original owner of the body before finally finding what he was looking for.


    This Uncle Zhang was in his dad''s group when he was still a seeker, he was one of his dad''s closest friends.


    Lin Fan asked, "What happened to Uncle Zhang?"


    His dad said, "Your Uncle Zhang went into a nar crack with his party, but there''s been no contact since. It''s been a big case for the local government, there''s been plenty of parties that have gone missing in this one particr crack."


    Lin Fan quickly went through his memories again.


    In this world that he had transmigrated into, this Blue Star hadn''t always been a world of cultivation. It had originally been a normal world like earth, but that changed with the appearance of the nar cracks.


    These nar cracks were a method of invasion by the Beast n, which relied on creating a tunnel into this world to send soldiers to invade it.


    Of course, this attracted the attention of the Human n''s interster government, which brought them down to incorporate the Blue Star into their circle.


    After the Blue Star was integrated, they were offered various cultivation resources and were given experts to guard the Blue Star as it developed.


    Of course, the interster government wouldn''t do something that they didn''t profit from. By incorporating the Blue Star into their circle, it allowed them to inject new blood into their organization, which came in the form of talent.


    As the Blue Star continued to cultivate, there were some individuals who showed talent for cultivation and were brought off world for further training.


    They were eager to go since the Blue Star was only a lower tier world, which meant that the limit to their cultivation was in the Legendary Realm.


    The Beast n wasn''t willing to give up on this world, so they continued invading with various nar cracks and the interster government wasn''t willing topletely seal off this world, so they just made sure the locals were strong enough to deal with these nar cracks.


    These nar cracks formed small worlds which were filled with resources, so human seekers would frequently go in to find their fortunes and possibly ways to increase their own cultivations.


    Of course, these nar cracks were still ways of invasion, so they were closely monitored and the government made sure to clear them before they fully formed, allowing the invaders to arrive on their.


    Now that there was a nar crack that no seekers returned from, the government would definitely send stronger people in to investigate the situation.


    Lin Fan knew that since there was no contact, the situation didn''t seem good for his Uncle Zhang, but he still triedforting his parents, "I''m sure that Uncle Zhang is fine. The government will send in experts to investigate soon and I''m sure they''ll find him."


    His dad just said in a low spirited voice, "I hope so."


    Lin Fan saw how worried his new parents were and he fell into thought.


    After saying a few words offort to them, he went up to his room to make a call.


    However, before he could make a call, there was a sudden prompt that came from the system.


    "Host, you have activated a special mission."


    "Find the Qilin Bone located in nar crack 1314 and retrive it. The position of the bone has been marked on the map."


    nar crack 1314, this seemed familiar...Wait, it was the crack that his Uncle Zhang had gone into!


    "System, could it be that you¡­" Lin Fan said in a touched voice.


    "Host, please stop making spections. This mission only came about because you activated the conditions for unlocking it."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help teasing, "System, there''s no need to be shy¡­"<sub> </sub>


    "Shameful behaviour, first warning."


    Lin Fan quickly stopped, "Alright, alright, you win, you bashful system."


    "Shameful behaviour, second warning."


    Lin Fan knew better to push his luck, so he ignored the system.


    After dealing with the system, he went back to his call.


    It was a good thing that thews of this world required him to get the phone number and the personal information of his customers, otherwise he really wouldn''t know how to contact him.


    Yang Xin had bragged about being a Silver Ranked seeker that afternoon in the store, so Lin Fan was certain that he would be chosen by the city government to explore nar crack 1314.


    It took him two tries before Yang Xin finally picked up the call.


    Yang Xin had been hesitant since it was an unknown number, but the moment he heard Lin Fan''s voice, he was very surprised.


    Yang Xin asked, "Brother Lin, is there a problem?"


    The only thing that Yang Xin could imagine Lin Fan contacting him for was that there was something wrong with what he had bought this afternoon, but he was surprised to hear what Lin Fan wanted to talk about.


    "Do you know about nar crack 1314?" Lin Fan said in a deep voice.


    Yang Xin was silent for a bit before saying, "Brother Lin, why are you asking about that? That''s not something that the public should know about."


    Lin Fan just continued in his calm voice, "I have an acquaintance who is lost in there and I wanted to see if you could bring me in with you."


    Yang Xin immediately began to worry, "Brother Lin, the nar crack is a very dangerous ce, it isn''t a ce you can go as you wish. It''s a ce where you might not be able to evere back from."


    Lin Fan just calmly shut him down, "But I''m stronger than you, I''ll be fine."


    Yang Xin waspletely silent since there was no way for him to refute this. Even if he did, the memory of being beaten this morning couldn''t be erased.


    After taking a while to get over this sadness, Yang Xin said, "Well, Brother Lin, my team is one of the teams chosen to go in and investigate and we are allowed to bring in helpers, so I''m sure that someone of Brother Lin''s level will definitely be able to help."


    After thinking it through, Yang Xin realized that there was no downside to helping Lin Fan.


    First, he was doing him a favour and second, with Lin Fan''s strength, he might be able to save them when they were in danger.


    "Good, tell me when you''re going in."


    Now that he had thought it through, Yang Xin excitedly said, "We''re scheduled to head in tomorrow, so I''lle by the store in the morning to pick you up."


    Lin Fan just said, "Alright, see you tomorrow. I''ll owe you one."


    That was all Yang Xin needed to hear!


    To receive a favour from the disciple of a noble, that was something that all normal people dreamed of!


    After hanging up, Lin Fan went online to do some shopping.


    Since he was heading into the nar crack tomorrow, he needed to buy some provisions, otherwise he would be in trouble.


    It took him an hour going through various suppliers until he was sure that he had found the best equipment, but the most important thing was that it was also the cheapest!


    The system had taken away most of the money he had earned, so Lin Fan had no choice but to save where he could.


    Once he was done buying everything, Lin Fan sat cross legged on his bed and entered his state of cultivation.


    He didn''t know what he would face, but no matter what, it was better to be as strong as possible when facing them.

 16 Chapter 16

    The next morning, Lin Fan told his parents that he might not be home for a few days because of a business deal he was handling for the store and that he would call them if he was going to be back.


    Of course they were worried, but they still respected his privacy since he was an adult now.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the store, there were several packages waiting for him at the door. It was all the survival gear that he had orderedst night. Of course they weren''t handled that well since he had ordered the cheapest delivery option.


    After bringing everything in, Lin Fan headed into the store to get ready.


    As Lin Fan was preparing, he suddenly remembered that there was Ang in the store.


    When Lin Fan was about to ask Ang to go with him into the nar crack, the system blocked him.


    "Host, this is a quest for the host, you may not bring along any help other than your pets."


    While this did bring Lin Fan down, it didn''t matter to him much since he was now much more confident in his own strength after his fight with Yang Xin yesterday.


    So just like that, after he had prepared everything, Lin Fan sat down at the counter to wait for Yang Xin to arrive.


    While he was waiting, there was a surprising customer that had arrived.


    As Lin Fan was about to doze off, he heard the sound of the bell by the door ring, waking him up to see a familiar figure walking it.


    The person who had walked in was Murong Quan, it was the boy who kept following Luo Qing around!


    Lin Fan raised one brow in curiosity as he watched Murong Quan timidly walk over to the counter.


    This time Murong Quan wasn''t as arrogant as before, instead he was very polite when he spoke.


    "Um, sir, may I ask if I can have you train my pet?" Murong Quan hesitantly asked.


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this from Murong Quan, but Murong Quan hadn''t really done anything to him and he was desperate for customers, so he said with his usual smile, "Of course you can, what kind of pet do you want to train?"


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t straight out reject, Murong Quan let out a long sigh of relief.


    Murong Quan had seen what kind of training Lin Fan was capable of, Luo Qing''s Song Bird was the best proof of this. If he were to miss this opportunity, he would definitely want to kick himself.


    Murong Quan quickly summoned his me Hound out, who the moment came out of the pet space and saw that it was back in this pet shop again, immediately went to hide behind Murong Quan''s leg.


    Murong Quan was embarrassed by this and tried to nudge it out, but it was shaking in fear as it clung to his leg.


    To say that Lin Fan didn''t hold a grudge at all wouldn''t be truthful, of course he would be a bit annoyed at Murong Quan for grabbing his cor before, so he took a little bit of revenge now.


    Instead of bringing the pet into the back himself like normal, he had Ang do it.


    Ang normally wasn''t in charge of taking care of the animals since she hadn''t learned to control her aura yet. Whenever she approached a pet, it would always fall down in submission to her and this time wasn''t an exception.


    The moment Ang came over and stretched a hand out, the me Hound immediately fell to the ground and pretended to y dead, looking like a dead cockroach with all four legs sticking up in the air.


    Murong Quan really wished he could find a hole to jump in to hide his embarrassment. He had once thought that his me Hound looked very cool, but now it just felt like a dumb puppy to him.


    Ang dragged the me Hound that was ying dead away.


    Lin Fan looked back at Murong Quan who was just awkwardly standing there and he said, "Are you going to pay or not?"


    Murong Quan then realized that he was just standing there like an idiot and he quickly came forward to pay.


    After paying for the training, Murong Quan tried to get Lin Fan''s number like Yang Xin had, but he was kicked out just like Yang Xin.


    Once peace came back to the store, Lin Fan went back to preparing himself for his journey.<sub> </sub>


    ¡­


    Later that morning, Yang Xin finally arrived at the store in an armoured car.


    Based on how thick the armour was on the car, it really didn''t seem like it was cheap.


    When Yang Xin walked into the store, he found Lin Fan fighting over some food with Ang. Seeing that they didn''t stop when he came in, he just awkwardly stood on the side while waiting for them to finish.


    In the end, Angpletely stomped Lin Fan since of course she was the Spirit Overlord, but she did show mercy since he was still technically her boss. On a side note, she found that it was much harder to beat Lin Fanpared to the first time they met. She really thought that it was strange, it was definitely the work of the master hiding in this store.


    Lin Fan was rubbing his sore head before he finally noticed Yang Xin.


    Seeing that Yang Xin was already here, Lin Fan picked up his bag and put the closed sign on the store before heading into Yang Xin''s ride.


    During his time in the store, Yang Xin hadn''t said a single thing, he had just stood there watching them in a daze.


    Lin Fan opened the window of the car and called to Yang Xin, "Hey, what are you waiting for?"


    It was only then that Yang Xin came back to his senses and got into the driver seat of the car, driving it off to the base outside the nar crack.


    When they arrived, Yang Xin led Lin Fan to his team.


    Along the way, Yang Xin had exined a few things to Lin Fan. For example, Yang Xin exined the terrain of the nar crack which was reported to be a dense jungle. As well, Yang Xin had told Lin Fan about his team and that Lin Fan would have to register as a temporary seeker to join them in the nar crack.


    When Yang Xin''s team saw him bring over someone they were unfamiliar with, they knew that it was the helper that Yang Xin had brought for them.


    Yang Xin waved at the team and called out, "Boss Gao, I''m here." Then he went on to introduce Lin Fan, "This is Brother Lin, the helper that I told you all about."


    Yang Xin had told them that he had found a helper that was even stronger than him, but no matter how they looked at Lin Fan, he seemed like he was nothing more than a kid.


    Boss Gao came over and with a smile, he raised his hand out to Lin Fan.


    Of course, there was a part of him that didn''t believe in Yang Xin, so when Lin Fan gripped his hand to shake, he began exerting pressure on Lin Fan.


    But with Lin Fan''s new physique, he didn''t feel it at all.


    Even though Lin Fan didn''t feel it, Boss Gao felt like he was squeezing a block of steel, making his hand turn numb.


    Boss Gao realized through his tests that Yang Xin wasn''t kidding, this kid really was stronger than him, he might even be stronger than Boss Gao himself.


    Realizing this, Boss Gao patted Lin Fan on the back and broke out in loudughter, "Good kid, you really are as strong as Xiao Yang said you are. Come, let''s take you to get that temporary license."


    While they were walking towards the administration tent, Yang Xin came up beside Lin Fan and whispered, "Don''t mind Boss Gao, he''s a good guy."


    Lin Fan knew that Boss Gao was doing what a good leader should do. He was responsible for their lives, so of course he had to make sure that everyone could do their part.


    Yang Xin also said, "Actually, Boss Gao is quite the interesting guy. His real name is Gao Fu Shuai, his parents named him this in hopes he would turn out this way."


    Gao Fu Shuai, tall, rich, and handsome. Boss Gao was a short and stumpy man with an ape like face, he was the farthest thing from this as possible.


    The only thing that was matching was that he was rich to a certain extent since he was a Silver Realm seeker.


    As they were walking along, Lin Fan couldn''t stop his lips from twitching a few times as he forced himself to calm down, to avoid breaking out inughter.


    When they arrived at the main administration tent, there were a few people who weren''t as friendly waiting there.

 17 Chapter 17

    It was the other teams that the city had found to enter the nar crack, among them was one team who held a grudge against Boss Gao''s team.


    When the leader of that team saw Boss Gao''s teame in with an unfamiliar face, he immediately stood up and said with a cold snort, "Oh, Gori Gao, you were so afraid that you found a kid to babysit you babies?"


    Boss Gao saw that the one who spoke was Ao Jian.


    Boss Gao''s team had been in dispute with Ao Jian''s team more than once over prey before, but the main reason behind their dispute was that their families were at war with each other.


    Boss Gao and Ao Jian both came from noble families and were juniors that received the most training, so they had always been pitted against each other. If possible, they wished that they could kill the other person.


    He just ignored Ao Jian and led Lin Fan to the counter.


    "Xiao Zi, help me set up a temporary license for my friend over here. He''ll be joining us for the exploration mission."


    The girl at the counter turned when she heard Boss Gao call to her and when she saw Lin Fan, she hesitantly said, "Boss Gao, are you sure you don''t have a grudge against him? He''s just a kid and you''re trying to bring him into the nar crack."


    Boss Gao justughed and said, "It''s fine, it''s fine, he''s even stronger than me."


    Of course Xiao Zi wouldn''t believe this, but she had to do her job still, so she led Boss Gao''s team to the testing room in the back.


    Everyone from Boss Gao''s team followed Lin Fan into the back since they were curious just how strong he really was. He was strong enough to make Boss Gao acknowledge him and Boss Gao was in the high Silver Realm, being at the Silver 7 Level, which meant that he should at least be in the Silver Realm.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything and just followed Xiao Zi into the room. The moment he came in, he was confused to see that there was a pole in the center that was hooked up to thisrge machine.


    Xiao Zi told Lin Fan to use all his strength to hit the pole and it would record his cultivation level.


    Lin Fan went up to the pole and gathered his life energy around his fist before punching out.


    As he was doing this, everyone was shocked by the colour of his life energy, which was silver with a tint of gold.


    Based on their understanding of the cultivation system, this meant that Lin Fan was at the peak of the Silver Realm!


    Peak of the Silver Realm, just how old was Lin Fan!


    ording to the registration he filled out earlier, he was only 19 years old!


    Compared to them, this was a true genius.


    The one most shocked was Yang Xin since just yesterday, Lin Fan''s life energy was still pure silver. The fact that it had gained a tint of gold meant that Lin Fan had broken through in a single day!


    While they were all shocked by Lin Fan''s life energy, there was a beep from the machine on the side that signified Lin Fan''s test was finished.


    When Xiao Zi heard this, she turned to look at the screen and received an even bigger shock.


    On the panel, written inrge letters was the word "ERROR"!


    She had never seen this situation before. When she thought of all the various possibilities to this, she remembered that this machine could only measure life energy up to the Legendary Realm.


    When she had this thought, after her body trembled, she shook this thought out of her mind.


    A 19 year old Legendary Expert?!


    That would have even surpassed the cultivation speed of the cultivation legend Mo Tian Ji!


    In the end, Xiao Zi made a decision, "Mister Lin, our machines seem to be malfunctioning right now and couldn''t make a proper judgement, but based on your life energy, I should say that you''re in the Silver 9 Level, so how about I record that for you?"


    Lin Fan didn''t really mind since that''s what he felt he was at anyway, so he just gave a nod to her.


    But little did they all know that Lin Fan''s body was actually on par with an expert in the Legendary Realm since he condensed that first sun in his dantian.


    The machine hadn''t made a mistake, Lin Fan''s full force attack was indeed on par with the attack of a Legendary Realm Expert!


    After the test, Xiao Zi was much more respectful towards Lin Fan since seeing his abilities.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was confused about what privileges a temporary seeker license gave, so Xiao Zi patiently exined on the way back, "A temporary seeker license grants you ess to the various exchange sites that our Seeker Guild offers, but of course you won''t receive the special discount that normal seekers receive. But since you have qualified for a temporary seeker license, you can easily apply to formalize it and that will grant you many of the services avable to registered seekers. It really does make things much more convenient."


    Lin Fan was someone at the peak of the Silver Realm, if she could reel him into the Seeker Guild, she would definitely receive arge bonus.


    Lin Fan just replied with an "oh".


    Being a seeker did give plenty of rewards, but he earned them by risking his life. It was much better to follow the system and properly manage his pet shop!


    But Lin Fan was tempted by the exchange sites that Xiao Zi had mentioned, so he asked, "Now that I''ve gotten my temporary seeker license, how do I ess the exchange sites?"


    Xiao Zi exined, "You can just ess our site and input your temporary license once you receive it."


    Lin Fan replied with the same "oh".


    They came back to the front and Xiao Zi quickly typed in Lin Fan''s information, registering his temporary license.


    Once that was done, Boss Gao led his group out to get some supplies from the base''s warehouse.


    As they were heading to the door and passing by Ao Jian''s table, he suddenly stood up and bumped into Boss Gao, spilling the drink in his hand all over him.


    Ao Jian just revealed a cold smile as he said, "Oh, I''m sorry, you were so short that I must have missed you, Gori Gao."


    Boss Gao had beenpletely drenched from head to toe with wine and judging by the vein popping out on his forehead, he was about to lose his temper.


    "You¡­" Boss Gao was about to lose it, but Lin Fan had stepped forward to stop him.


    "Friend, you should really be careful of how you act. Sometimes you might make an enemy you might not be able to afford to offend." Lin Fan came forward and revealed his usual smile when he said this.


    Ao Jian was surprised to see this kide out of nowhere and talk to him like this, but that smile of his really was off putting.


    After being surprised by that smile, Ao Jian wanted toe forward to punch this kid down, but there was an overwhelming pressure that came over him.


    It was like at that moment, he was facing the aura of death and his legs crumbled under him.


    He tried to speak but all that came out was a few stuttering sounds.


    Lin Fan just came forward to help him like he was being friendly before saying, "Look, Boss Gao, it really was an ident. He can''t even seem to stand on his own two feet."


    The reason why Ao Jian had suddenly fallen was naturally because of Lin Fan.


    His cultivation technique was very special, so there were many things that he could do that others couldn''t.


    One of these things included the ability to freely manipte his aura, which he used topletely crush down on Ao Jian alone, suppressing him to this extent.


    The moment Lin Fan tried to help Ao Jian up, he seemed to have regained hisposure as he pped Lin Fan''s hand away, but all that did was make his hand numb like he had just hit a steel block.


    Holding his hand, Ao Jian looked at Lin Fan with a venomous look before coldly saying, "I''ll remember you." Then he walked away with his group.


    Once they were gone, Boss Gao apologized to Lin Fan, "Brother Lin, I''m sorry about that. If it wasn''t for me, you wouldn''t have offended Ao Jian."


    Lin Fan just casually waved his hand, "It''s fine, it''s fine, we were destined to be enemies anyway."


    Boss Gao was confused by this, "What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned cold as he said, "I know his type, he''s someone who won''t leave any loose ends, so it was destined that we would be enemies once your team invited me."


    Boss Gao was even more confused by this, he didn''t understand the meaning hidden in Lin Fan''s words at all.


    But Lin Fan knew exactly how the minds of people like Ao Jian worked.


    That was because he used to be exactly like him back on earth!

 18 Chapter 18

    While Boss Gao''s team were picking their equipment, Lin Fan used his watch to check the exchange sites.


    After putting in the number for his temporary license, he immediately gained ess to the various exchange sites.


    Since he had been recorded as the peak of the Silver Realm, he had ess that was equal to the Gold Realm, allowing him ess to the Gold Level Warehouses.


    Looking through them, he found several things that were familiar, namely they were the special elixirs being sold in his store.


    This exchange store used points for exchange and the exchange rate for points to crystals was at one to one.


    Looking at the prices, the elixirs were being sold at a price that was several times what it was being sold at in his store. Seeing this, Lin Fan could feel his heart bleed from all the profit he was losing.


    "System, can''t you see how much they are selling it at? If we sell it at such a low price, we''re clearly disrupting the market." Lin Fan tried to use logic against the system since everything else he had tried before didn''t work.


    "Host, everything has been marked at the price it is worth. The system does not care about the intion found on this."


    "But since we''re on this, shouldn''t we follow the customs and sell at the proper market price, even if it is inted?" Lin Fan didn''t give up.


    "Host, you should follow proper business strategies and shouldn''t think about cheating people. First warning."


    Lin Fan really didn''t know how to respond to this. For some reason, everyone seemed to be calling him a scammer, but this was just how he acted and how he looked¡­


    Since he couldn''t convince the system, Lin Fan continued looking through the catalogue until his eyes arrived at a certain item.


    Golden Honey: When used, it has the ability to clear up all bacterial infection.


    This was something that Lin Fan could use for his mother.


    His mother''s illness was mainly because of bacterial infection and with this Golden Honey, he could finally cure her of her illness.


    While he hadn''t known his new mother for long, the filial piety that came with the memories of this body influenced him heavily, making him quite filial as well.


    Since he had a chance to help his new mother, he would definitely find a way to make it happen.


    Seeing that Boss Gao and the others were back, Lin Fan asked, "Boss Gao, how does earning points for the exchange work?"


    Boss Gao came over and saw that he was looking through the catalogue, "Oh, did something catch your eye? Well it''s quite easy to earn points here, you either finish missions or you turn in materials from beasts you kill. For materials, you receive points based on what grade it is. Generally Iron and Bronze are worth less than a hundred, but Silver Grade and higher start at at least a thousand points. For someone like you at the peak of the Silver Realm, you should be able to get peak Silver Grade materials which are worth at least ten thousand points."


    Lin Fan looked back at the price of the Golden Honey and found that it was worth fifty thousand points, which meant at least 5 peak Silver Realm beast carcasses. That would be his goal for this nar crack dive other than the mission from the system.


    After receiving the information he needed, Lin Fan said, "Boss Gao, when are we heading into the nar crack?"


    Boss Gao felt awkward since Lin Fan just jumped from one topic to the other, but he still respected his strength, so he just amodated him, "There''s still another team that hasn''t arrived yet, so once they get here, we''ll be heading into the nar crack."


    "Oh, so how long before they get here?" Lin Fan said in a monotone voice.


    "I don''t know, but it should take at most another half an hour."


    After that, they discussed a few details of how to arrange their team and for everyone to introduce themselves.<sub> </sub>


    There were five members of Yang Xin''s team and other than him and Boss Gao, the other members were Hou Zi, a young looking man who looked like a monkey withrge ears, Mei Rou, a tall and tough looking girl who was the exact opposite of her name, and Zhuang Da, a meek looking man who had been peeking out from his book the entire time.


    This really was a strange team, other than Hou Zi who was exactly like his name and Yang Xin who had a normal name, the others really were the exact opposite of what their names meant.


    But they were all quite friendly and after talking for a bit, everyone had be close friends.


    During this time, their team was surprised to learn that Lin Fan was actually a pet shop owner.


    With how strong he was, there were a million different things that he could be doing instead, but he was running a pet shop.


    However, when they heard that Lin Fan''s shop was selling stuff like the Jade me Fruit for a fifth of the market price, they were all very interested in Lin Fan''s store. It was clear that a store with this kind of financial backing wasn''t simple, it was most like a store backed by some noble family.


    As they were talking, Lin Fan demonstrated a bit of his knowledge when it came to beasts and they quickly agreed to let Lin Fan lead them around. Compared to Lin Fan, most of their group weren''t that smart and it was much safer to be led by someone who knew what they were doing.


    After around half an hour of chatting, thest group had finally arrived and they were told that it was time to enter the nar crack.


    Before heading in, Lin Fan pulled aside Boss Gao for a talk.


    Lin Fan lowered his voice and said, "Boss Gao, we need to be careful of Ao Jian after we enter the nar crack, he''s clearly trying to start something."


    Boss Gao was very rxed as he said, "Ao Jian is always like that, it''s because of the feud between our families that we treat each other like this."


    Lin Fan kept trying to convince him, "No, Ao Jian is clearly trying to provoke you more than normal, which means that he probably has a n."


    Boss Gao was a little concerned when he heard this, "Brother Lin, what do you know?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug, "I don''t really know anything, but I know Ao Jian''s type. The look in his eyes and the way he''s acting, he''s clearly plotting something."


    Boss Gao thought that Lin Fan was thinking too much, but he still gave it the benefit of the doubt, "Alright, after we head into the nar crack, I''ll make sure that everyone''s on guard."


    Lin Fan said, "That''s all I''m asking."


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t need to do this, but it was better to be safe than sorry.


    After they came back to the group, Yang Xin and Hou Zi drove the two vehicles of their group into the nar crack and they entered apletely new world. What appeared in front of them was dense forests, as well as the other groups that hade in before them.


    Once all the groups had entered the nar crack, the portal behind them had disappeared and they were seemingly stranded in here. Lin Fan walked back to the area where the portal had disappeared and it reappeared once again.


    Ao Jian''s group didn''t miss this and they all gave coldughs at Lin Fan, this noob in nar crack exploration.


    After setting the coordinates of the exit to their navigation devices, the groups began to wander off in various different directions.


    Lin Fan just led Boss Gao''s group ording to the map from the system since he had no other clues right now.


    Their main mission ining into this nar crack was to find out the cause of the disappearance and if possible, rescue the lost seekers if possible, so most of the groups were wandering off in different directions.


    As Lin Fan''s group left, they missed Ao Jian''s cold and sinister gaze locked onto them and the cold smile that he revealed after they left.

 19 Chapter 19

    As they headed into the forest, there were many strange sights that had appeared.


    There were all kinds of strange looking nts that filled the forest, but they weren''t useful elixirs that were filled with natural energy, rather they seemed to be aggressive nts that were filled with killing intent.


    After driving for a bit, they arrived at ake that was several kilometers away from the portal.


    Once they came to the side of theke and seeing that it was clear, Boss Gao made the decision to take a break and scout their surroundings.


    Hou Zi was the one who was normally in charge of scouting for their team since he moved as fast as a monkey.


    Hou Zi called out his Zephyr Hawk to help him scout out the area and when he came back, he reported, "There are human tracks that are leading to the east."


    Lin Fan immediately asked, "Are you sure it was the east?"


    Hou Zi was confused by this question, but he still answered, "Yep, the tracks were heading east."


    "And they were fresh tracks?" Lin Fan added.


    "Yes." Hou Zi replied before hesitantly saying, "Didn''t you know this already, isn''t that why you had use this way?"


    It was only then that Lin Fan had remembered that he was the one that led them this way.


    To be honest, he was only following the map that the system had provided, he had no idea what he was doing.


    But of course he wouldn''t tell everyone else that since that would be embarrassing.


    "Of course, I know where we''re going based on the animal tracks, but our job is to find the survivors as well." Lin Fan said it was the most natural thing.


    He was so confident that Hou Zi didn''t have anything to refute it with, he just responded with an "oh".


    Boss Gao in the end made the decision to fill up on water by theke first just in case before heading out, so everyone went over to fill up their bottles.


    When they reached the edge of theke and they let their guard down to get some water, there was a sudden ssh as the surface of the water broke.


    As soon as they looked up, there was a giant alligator mouth that popped out of the water and tworge pairs of teeth snapping at Mei Rou.


    Watching therge pairs of teeth approaching, Mei Rou tried to move out of the way, but she tripped on a rock in her rush.


    Seeing that Mei Rou was about to be eaten, Boss Gao erupted with all his life energy and charged in front of her, using all that life energy to form a barrier that shattered the teeth of the alligator that was falling on her.


    Unbeknownst to him, Mei Rou''s face had a faint blush on it as she stared at Boss Gao''s back in front of her.


    Erupting with all his life energy had exhausted Boss Gao, but the other members of the team had all quickly reacted to get in front of them to protect the two.


    In truth, the alligator was only in the beginning Silver Realm, so it was no threat to them unless it caught them off guard like it had just done.


    When Yang Xin was about to charge in to cut down this alligator, Lin Fan shouted, "Wait, don''t rush in."


    Lin Fan''s soul had been nourished by the sun in his dantian, so his spiritual senses were much stronger than what would be normal at his recorded level.


    Lin Fan''s spiritual senses hadpletely wrapped around the alligator and he found that there was actually a vine that was piercing into the back of the alligator''s head. He continued stretching his senses along this vine, but once he reached a certain point, there was another spiritual sense that shed against his, blocking him from spreading any further.


    Once he knew that there was something controlling it, Lin Fan immediately said, "Circle up! There''s something controlling the alligator and it might be controlling other beasts as well!"


    When he said this, there was a roar that came from the forest around them, as several other beasts also jumped out to attack their group.<sub> </sub>


    Hou Zi and Zhuang Da were the ones to react the fastest, jumping into the cars and driving them in between the beasts and them to create a barrier, trying to slow their approach.


    While the beasts were weak, they were outnumbered four to one, so it would definitely be a hard battle if they had to fight and Boss Gao was already weakened.


    While they were feeling despair, Lin Fan was actually quite calm.


    He had assumed that the soldiers sent would be much stronger, that was why he was being cautious, but seeing that the strongest one was only at the Silver 4 Level, it meant that this was the highest level beast that the mastermind could control.


    Lin Fan had already found its general location through sending his spiritual senses along the vine, so the mastermind had to know that it was in trouble, making it send its army at Lin Fan''s group while it escaped.


    But what it never expected was that Lin Fan was much stronger than it had expected.


    As the beasts were about to m into their vehicles, Lin Fan suddenly sent out a punch that created a giant gust of wind and life energy, mming into the beasts and stopping them in their tracks.


    During this, Hou Zi and Zhuang Da were bracing for impact, but they found that impact never came in the end.


    When they opened their eyes, they saw that all the beasts were lying on the ground unconscious just a few feet away from them.


    They were bothpletely confused by what had just happened, but turning back to the others, they saw that everyone else had a shocked look on their faces while staring at Lin Fan who was holding an arm up in a punching posture.


    The God Tier Cultivation Technique was clearly more special than other normal cultivation techniques, it allowed Lin Fan to freely control his aura and life energy at a level that normal people at his level couldn''t do.


    It was actually something that only a Legendary Expert would learn after stabilizing in their realm!


    Lin Fan knew that it wasn''t over, so ignoring everyone else who was just standing there looking stunned, Lin Fan quickly ran off to chase after the mastermind.


    But the mastermind was already prepared for Lin Fan when he came.


    Lin Fan carefully approached the hollowed out tree that the mastermind had been hiding in, but all that he found was an explosive seed that blew up right in his face.


    All the explosion could do was blow back his hair and turn his skin a bit dark, but other than that, Lin Fan waspletely fine.


    When the explosion was over and Lin Fan could hear again, he heard something that seemed like snickering that came from above him.


    When Lin Fan went to look up, all he saw were a few more seeds dropping down on him that came from a snake that seemed to be made of vines.


    He only caught a short glimpse of that snake before the seeds exploded, obscuring his vision and his hearing.


    By the time the smoke cleared, the snake was already gone and all that was left were a few feathers.


    Picking up the feathers, Lin Fan knew that the vine snake had escaped through putting a parasite into a Gale Oriole, which was one of the fastest beasts in the Silver Realm, meaning that Lin Fan had no chance of catching it.


    Based on the appearance of the vine snake, Lin Fan was sure that what attacked him was a Brain Vine, but the actions from earlier confused him.


    While Brain Vines was a beast that possessed high intelligence, it wasn''t at the level of being equal to humans yet and that Brain Vine was clearly only in the low Silver Realm since that was the highest level it could control.


    There was only one exnation for this, the Brain Vine that he had encountered was definitely one that had mutated and gained increased intelligence!


    When he thought of this, Lin Fan really wanted to catch this Brain Vine since mutated monsters were leagues above normal beasts. However, the Brain Vine had already escaped, so he had no choice but to head back to Boss Gao''s group.


    Once he came back, it seemed like Boss Gao wanted to ask something, but he didn''t say a single thing about this in the end since he knew that everyone had their secrets.


    Once they had rested for a bit, they set off again, heading in the direction of the human tracks.

 20 Chapter 20

    As they continued along, Hou Zi would set off from time to time with his pet to find tracks for them to follow.


    During this time, they hadn''t been attacked again, but they could feel that there were beasts moving all around them.


    It was a good thing that they still had their vehicles, otherwise it would have been much harder to move through this jungle.


    Beasts were beasts in the end, they didn''t fear the known, but rather they feared what they didn''t know. Humans were just another creature, but these strange beasts that were made of steel werepletely unknown to them, so most of the beasts either avoided them or vigntly watched them as the vehicles left their territory.


    Lin Fan had been watching the map the entire time and as they slowly approached, Lin Fan prepared himself.


    But what they didn''t know was that in the sky above them, there was a tiny fly that was following their every move.


    They were getting close to the marked spot on the map, but there was still a forest between them and that spot.


    Hou Zi went out to scout the forest like normal, but after some time passed, Hou Zi still hadn''t returned.


    Boss Gao said in a concerned voice, "Hou Zi is taking much longer than normal, could it be that something happened to him?"


    Yang Xin replied, "Maybe he ran into some beast? Should we go help him?"


    Lin Fan said in a vignt voice, "We would have heard the sounds of him fighting if it was a beast. Boss Gao, do you remember what I warned you about before we came in?"


    Boss Gao was confused for a bit before suddenly remembering what they had talked about, "You mean...it might be Ao Jian?"


    The others were all surprised.


    Ao Jian''s team had been considered theirpetitors, but they had never done something so open before.


    Lin Fan felt that unless something had changed, Ao Jian''s family wouldn''t dare do something like this, so he asked Boss Gao, "Boss Gao, has something happened to your or Ao Jian''s families?"


    Boss Gao fell into thought, but he couldn''t think of anything, "I haven''t heard anything recently, but I don''t think that something has happened."


    Lin Fan just fell deeper into thought.


    If it wasn''t something that happened to their families, then there was only one possibility, there was an outside force influencing all of this!


    While they were considering what to do, there was a sudden "thud" sound as something was dropped to the ground.


    Turning to look at the source, they found that it was Ao Jian and under his foot was Hou Zi who was beaten within an inch of his life.


    Ao Jian proudly held his chin up and said, "Gori Gao, what a coincidence that we met here. I found one of your dogs on a walk and it was rude to me, so I helped you discipline it."


    The vein on Boss Gao''s head popped out seeing this, but when he tried to charge at Ao Jian, one of the cloaked people standing by Ao Jian suddenly came forward and knocked him back.


    Ao Jian just happily said, "Now, now, we''re having a good time, don''t ruin it."


    Boss Gao wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and said, "What do you want?"


    Ao Jian looked down on him and said with a faint smile, "Oh, Gori Gao, how long have we known each other?"


    Boss Gao honestly answered, "We''ve known each other for around twenty years now."


    Ao Jian fell into reminiscence as he said, "Yes, it''s been a long twenty years of fighting each other, but now it is finally over."


    Boss Gao immediately knit his brows, "What do you mean by over?"


    Ao Jian didn''t reply, he just picked up Hou Zi from under his foot and lifted him up by the neck before saying, "Look at this kid, he''s like a little monkey who''s following the gori."


    Suddenly Ao Jian''s eyes turned sharp and cold as he suddenly tensed his hand, "But now this little monkey is going to learn what happens when you mess with the wrong people."<sub> </sub>


    When Ao Jian was about to snap Hou Zi''s neck, the same pressure he felt before descended upon him again and his legs went soft, as he fell onto his butt.


    While he was falling, his hand had rxed and Hou Zi who had been released was quickly pulled away by someone.


    Once the pressure on him had disappeared, Ao Jian was filled with anger since he saw just who had taken Hou Zi away.


    Ao Jian roared with rage, "So it was you who did thatst time!"


    Lin Fan just looked back at him with a faint smile, "So what if it was?"


    Ao Jian roared, "Kill him!"


    The two cloaked people that he had brought suddenly released their life energy, which was silver with a trace of gold to it.


    These two experts with Ao Jian were actually at the peak of the Silver Realm!


    For noble families like Ao Jian''s, peak of the Silver Realm was generally what one needed to be to be an elder, so that means the Ao Family had invested two elders for this mission!


    While Boss Gao and the others were stunned, Lin Fan had a rxed look on his face.


    The two experts moved to both sides of Lin Fan, preparing to m down on him with their attacks, but something they never expected happened.


    Lin Fan took a single step forward and raised both hands, catching their attacks before throwing them off to opposite sides.


    Of course, just throwing them wasn''t enough to actually hurt them, all it did was shock them since this kid who didn''t seem like he was 20 yet was actually just as strong as them, maybe even stronger.


    Lin Fan just turned back to Boss Gao and said, "Boss Gao, I''ll let you take care of Ao Jian, I''ll take care of the rest."


    Boss Gao wanted to call out to stop Lin Fan, but Lin Fan had already charged out before he could say a thing.


    The two experts didn''t believe that they couldn''t defeat Lin Fan, so they charged at him again.


    When the two sides shed, there was just a giant explosion that pushed everything back before they disappeared.


    To bring in these two experts, Ao Jian had to leave behind two members of his party. His party was one that was on par with Boss Gao''s but now that they were missing two members, even if Hou Zi was incapacitated, Boss Gao''s team was stronger than theirs.


    Boss Gao was already filled with rage over what Ao Jian had done to Hou Zi and he was worried about Lin Fan fighting the two experts alone, so he wanted to end this as soon as possible so he could go help Lin Fan.


    The rest of their team had the same thought, so with quick coordination, Ao Jian was stalled by Boss Gao while the others took care of the remaining members of Ao Jian''s team.


    The fight went quite quickly since Ao Jian''s team members were overwhelmed by this disparity and they were beaten within an inch of dying.


    Ao Jian saw that the situation was bad, but he had hope that the two experts that he had brought would save him, so he continued to hold on.


    But even thatst hope shattered when Lin Fan came back while fighting only one of the cloaked duo. It was also clear who was winning just based on their appearance. Lin Fan waspletely fine and didn''t have a single speck of dust on him, while the other side had many different tears in their cloak and one of their arms was hanging on the side.


    For some reason, Lin Fan had a very serious look on his face as he fought this cloaked expert.


    After a few rounds, Lin Fan finally lost patience and gathered all his life energy for onerge attack.


    The cloaked expert tried to block it, but he waspletely exhausted and couldn''t even bring out half of his full life energy, so hepletely copsed under Lin Fan''s fist.


    The fist wind generated by Lin Fan''s punch blew away the cloak that person was wearing and it was revealed to be a beast standing on two feet!


    Lin Fan turned to Ao Jian, "So you''ve fallen low enough to be the Beast n''sckey?"

 21 Chapter 21

    Lin Fan had already guessed that Ao Jian would be up to something, but he never guessed that it would be something this serious.


    Since the beginning of the cultivation era, the Beast n had always been trying to invade the Blue Star, so there was a deep set hatred between the humans and the beasts.


    There had been cases of traitors since people were always moved by wealth and benefits, but they had been severely dealt with every time.


    Once Boss Gao and the other learned that Ao Jian had actually betrayed the human race, they werepletely enraged just like Lin Fan.


    Ao Jian had a very ugly look on his face right now. His helpers had been killed and his plot had been exposed, he was really in the worst position possible.


    But after forcing himself to calm down, he actually released a wildugh.


    "Ha, ha, ha, ha, you really think you''ve won?" Ao Jian had a crazy look on his face as he roared, "You have no idea what you''re meddling with and now you''ll be paying for your actions!"


    Boss Gao and the others just thought that he was bluffing, but Lin Fan didn''t feel that way. Ao Jian had nothing else to lose, there was no way he could fight Lin Fan alone since Lin Fan could fight those in the peak of the Silver Realm, while Ao Jian was only in the Silver 7 Level like Boss Gao.


    Since Ao Jian could stillugh in this situation, it must have meant that he still had a trump card!


    Lin Fan immediately released his spiritual senses to search the area, but he couldn''t find anything unusual.


    While Lin Fan was doing this, Boss Gao roared at Ao Jian, "Ao Jian, you are finished. I can''t believe that I once respected you as my rival, but it turns out that you''re nothing more than a dirty traitor!"


    Ao Jian keptughing like a madman as he ranted, "Gori Gao, you really have no idea just how tiny our world is. The Beast n are one of the top races in the universe, the humans will eventually be defeated. Instead of living as a ve, I would rather live like a king!"


    Boss Gao just stared at Ao Jian like he was a helpless case, as he said, "It seems like you can''t understand words anymore. I''ll put you out of your misery."


    Ao Jian spread his hands out and shouted, "You? Put me out of my misery? I think that''s my line!"


    As soon as his voice fell, there were ten beasts that suddenly jumped out from underground and surrounded Lin Fan''s group.


    Based on the life energy they were releasing, these were all Gold Realm beasts!


    One of the beasts that was closest to Ao Jian came over to him and pped him across the face as he wasughing before saying, "You called us out just for this? What happened to the Fen Brothers, why aren''t they with you?"


    Ao Jian immediately stoppedughing and put on a respectful disy as he said, "Lord Yu, it was these humans who killed the Fen Brothers and forced me to call you."


    The beast that Ao Jian called Lord Yu looked over at Lin Fan''s group before turning back to p Ao Jian again, "Are you serious? Just these kids killed the Fen Brothers?"


    Then he kicked Ao Jian in the stomach and stomped his face in the ground, "If you dare disrupt Lord Ao''s n, you can be sure that your entire family will be destroyed! Don''t think that just because you share a name with Lord Ao that you''ll be spared!"


    While Lord Yu was disciplining Ao Jian, Boss Gao''s group waspletely shocked.


    This was a beast that had unlocked its intelligence and could speak the humannguage!


    This was without a doubt a mutated beast, it might even be a second mutation beast!


    There were actually ten Gold Realm beasts and the leader was a beast with unlocked intelligence, it seemed like the Beast n was really nning on invading their Blue Star!<sub> </sub>


    If they couldn''t stop these Gold Realm beasts here or at least warn the Union Government about this, it might be toote by the time the Beast n armies marched out of this nar crack.


    After Lord Yu had finished venting his rage on Ao Jian, he called two Gold Realm beasts over and said, "Take these two and finish this quickly. I need to bring back the corpses of the Fen Brothers or the Fen Tribe won''t drop this matter." After he said this, Lord Yu disappeared off in the direction of the other Fen Brother''s corpse.


    Once Lord Yu was gone, Ao Jian regained his arrogant appearance, "Now do you understand Gori Gao? This group is nothing more than vanguard from one of the smallest alliances in the Beast n, this is just a single drop of water in the ocean! We humans could never match them, so it is better to serve them on our own terms instead of being turned into ves."


    Boss Gao still put on a fierce look, "You really think you''ll get away with this? There are still other seeker groups in here, one of them will definitely expose your betrayal!"


    While Boss Gao said this, he secretly made a few signals with his hand to the rest of his team. This was amunication system that they had developed before, but the main gist of what he was saying was to leave him and go.


    When the others saw this, tears came to the corner of their eyes.


    Only Mei Rou came forward to take Boss Gao''s hand and she shook her head, as she matched his gaze with a determined look.


    Boss Gao''s eyes softened when he saw this, but then he revealed a pleading look, asking her to go.


    Mei Rou just shook her head and went forward, cing a kiss on Boss Gao''s cheek before revealing a blush.


    Boss Gao waspletely stunned, he had never thought that he would be confessing and receiving an answer in a ce like this. All of sudden, he felt like it wasn''t that bad to die here, but he still wished that he could send Mei Rou away.


    Ao Jian saw this and said in a taunting voice, "You really think that you can get away? Gori Gao, I''ll cut that female gori to pieces in front of you as a final present for you."


    This was the final straw for Boss Gao, he could take Ao Jian insulting him, but he would never let him insult the one he loved.


    But before Boss Gao could do a single thing, there was augh that cut through the tense atmosphere.


    Lin Fan just looked at Ao Jian and the Gold Realm beasts with him like he was looking at a fool, "What a joke.  And here I was worrying that this might be dangerous, but it''s just a bunch of fools."


    The vein on Ao Jian''s head popped out, he still hadn''t forgotten his rage towards Lin Fan, "Keep on acting! I want to see just how long you can maintain this calm act when you''re being tortured to death!"


    Lin Fan stoppedughing and looked at Ao Jian with cold eyes, "I know what kind of person you are. You are nothing more than a coward and a proud idiot who thinks everything he does is right, but in reality you are nothing more than a fool. But of course, I have no right to judge since I was like you once." After saying this, Lin Fan fell into a period of reminiscence as he remembered his life back on earth.


    Once he was over his nostalgia, Lin Fan continued, "Since you are the same kind of person as me, I am the most suitable person for teaching you a lesson."


    Ao Jian couldn''t take Lin Fan''s ridicule anymore as he lost control of his rage, "Kill him!"


    The two Gold Realm beasts looked at each other first, but they still followed Ao Jian''s orders since they had received orders from Lord Yu.


    When the two Gold Realm beasts were prepared to attack, Lin Fan suddenly gave a snap and opened a portal into his pet space, bringing out one of his pets.


    But what jumped out instantly stunned everyone.


    What had appeared in front of them was nothing more than a little chick.

 22 Chapter 22

    At first everyone was surprised that Lin Fan had called out a little chick, but soon they burst intoughter.


    Theughter of the two Gold Realm beasts were giant booming sounds that seemed like they could shake the ground itself.


    As for Ao Jian, he just threw his head back andughed like a maniac before saying to Lin Fan while wiping a tear from his eye, "How much of a joke are you? You''re actually sending a little chick to fight for you?"


    Lin Fan was as calm as ever as he said, "Xiao Huo, they''re looking down on you. How about you teach them a lesson?"


    Xiao Huo as the inheritor of the ancient beast bloodline, so he at least had some pride as an ancient beast. When Xiao Huo saw that it was being looked down on, its pride wouldn''t allow it to be insulted like this. Xiao Huo would have beaten them all even if Lin Fan didn''t order him to do so.


    Lin Fan saw that it was incited, so he added, "No need to show mercy, just kill them."


    Xiao Huo gave a chirp before suddenly exploding with golden mes.


    The two Gold Realm beasts suddenly felt a pressuree over them, one that they only felt when facing a beast with a greater bloodline than theirs. An ancestral fear that came from facing someone that was naturally born to be their superior.


    The two Gold Realm beasts no longer dared to look down on the little chick, even the surrounding Gold Realm beasts became tense.


    While they were being cautious towards Xiao Huo, the golden mes continued to wrap around Xiao Huo. The golden mes created a vortex around Xiao Huo and when he finally emerged, he had turned into a meter long phoenix.


    The Gold Realm beasts roared out in shock, but there was also a greedy look on their faces. This little chick actually had the bloodline of a phoenix. If they were to take this bloodline from this little chick, they would be able to take it and strengthen their own bloodlines!


    Moreover, based on the mes this little chick had released, it had only just broken through to the Gold Realm, which meant that even if it had a stronger bloodline, they could overwhelm it with numbers!


    The two Gold Realm beasts looked at each other and they could see the greed in each other''s eyes. They both knew that whoever went first would be the one who would do most of the work and receive no rewards, so they were both hesitant in making a move.


    However, before they could even decide what to do, Xiao Huo made the first move.


    While they were both staring each other down, Xiao Huo charged at them first and released a breath of golden mes, catching them both off guard.


    The mes were much stronger than they had expected, heavily injuring both of them.


    The one beast with a weaker cultivation was even so heavily injured that it had lost most of its ability to fight.


    The rest of the Gold Beasts recognized the danger, but they were still simple minded beasts. Lord Yu had only given the order for those two beasts to take care of them, so the other beasts didn''t even think about making a move.


    Xiao Huo naturally wouldn''t give the remaining Gold Realm beast a chance to escape, so he gave a p of his wings and summoned a wave of me feathers that were aimed at the injured beast.


    As the me feathers were about to hit the injured beast, there was a roar that rang out and sted all the feathers away.


    After this roar, there was a figure that had appeared. It was Lord Yu who had gone to pick up the corpse earlier.


    Lord Yu roared out, "What is going on here?" After saying this, he turned and pped Ao Jian, "I gave you one simple task and somehow you managed to mess it up! Now I''ve even lost one of my Gold Realmckeys!"


    Once he finished venting his anger on Ao Jian, Lord Yu turned back to Lin Fan with narrowed eyes, "You, how did you obtain the sacred bloodline of our Beast n?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug, "I just found it."


    Lord Yu''s eyes turned cold, "So you''re nning on defying us to the end? Very well, I''ll help you since you want to die so much! Kill them all!"


    With hismand, the remaining Gold Realm beasts began to move, but Lin Fan was also prepared for this.


    With another snap of his fingers, there were two more pets that came out of his pet space.


    All the beasts were shocked to see the puppy and the lizard appear, but soon they felt the same ancient pressure from these two as they felt from the little chick.


    As they all stopped moving, the puppy and the lizard were surrounded by lightning and wind in a vortex respectively. After the energy vortexes disappeared, what appeared again was a meter long qilin and a meter long dragon!


    Lord Yu revealed a cautious look, "The ancient qilin and dragon bloodlines, just who are you?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan casually said, "I''m whoever you think I am."


    Then Lin Fan gave another snap and his three pets followed his mentalmand to attack the various Gold Realm beasts. Xiao Lei and Xiao Feng took three beasts each, while the slightly tired Xiao Huo took one beast and the beast that he had already injured. As for Lord Yu, Lin Fan himself had jumped out to face him.


    Lin Fan knew that his body was strong, but he didn''t know just how strong it was yet. Still he was confident that he could hold off this Lord Yu with his physique alone.


    Lord Yu was insulted that someone in the peak Silver Realm actually dared to fight him, so while being filled with rage, he gathered all his life energy to punch out.


    When Lord Yu and Lin Fan''s fists had shed, the one who was pushed back was actually Lord Yu.


    Lord Yu''s gaze when looking at Lin Fan waspletely differentpared to before, it was a gaze that was filled with a bit of terror.


    It had to be known that Lord Yu was a mutated beast, which meant that other than gaining intelligence, he was also much stronger than normal beasts at the same level. For normal beasts, they were already much stronger than humans when it came to their bodies, but this Lin Fan''s physique was truly terrifying since it was even stronger than his body!


    Lord Yu wiped a trace of blood from the corner of his mouth as he said once again, "Just who are you?"


    Lin Fan just gave a knowing smile and said nothing before he charged at Lord Yu once again.


    Lord Yu no longer dared to look down on Lin Fan any longer, he activated his secret technique that forced him into the next level of the Gold Realm, but even then he couldn''t match Lin Fan in terms of physical strength.


    Every time his fists shed with Lin Fan''s fists, they turnedpletely numb. After several rounds of fighting, he couldn''t feel his hands anymore, forcing him to retreat.


    This time, Lin Fan didn''t chase him, rather he just looked down at his own fists with surprise. He never thought that he would be able to face someone in the Gold Realm with just his physical strength alone.


    During the time Lin Fan was keeping Lord Yu upied, Xiao Huo, Xiao Lei, and Xiao Feng had already executed the other nine Gold Realm beasts, just leaving nine Gold Realm carcasses on the ground.


    After they had finished ughtering the other Gold Realm beasts, they came to Lin Fan''s side, lifting their heads towards him as they asked for praise.


    Lin Fan just ignored them as he slowly moved towards Lord Yu.


    Lord Yu now felt an immense pressureing from Lin Fan and he couldn''t help taking a single step back.


    Lord Yu said in a shaky voice, "You, just what do you want to do?"


    Lin Fan asked back, "What do you think I''m going to do?"


    Lord Yu forced himself to calm down as he said, "I can see that you''re a smart person and it''s much easier to deal with smart people. I can offer you benefits that you''ve never seen before, you and your family will live like kings. You''ll be able to see much more of the universe that''s beyond just this small."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile, "Well, that''s very tempting, but how do I know that you won''t go back on your word?"


    Lord Yu thought that meant that Lin Fan was moved. He thought, these silly humans, they really are greedy.


    Lord Yu took out a token from his chest and threw it to Lin Fan, "This is my token, it is my personal guarantee."


    Lin Fan grabbed it and looked it over. His spiritual sense told him that there was a special aura that surrounded this token, it wasn''t just a normal token.


    Lin Fan just asked him, "Is this it? Is there nothing else?"


    Lord Yu had a difficult look on his face, "This is all I have on me now, you''ll get what you earn in the future."


    Lin Fan just said, "Oh." Then his eyes turned cold and he gave a snap, as his three pets jumped forward to surround Lord Yu, using their energy to lock him up.


    Lord Yu immediately roared out, "Human, what is the meaning of¡­"


    Before he could even finish, Lin Fan had formed a de of life energy around his hand and had cut off his head.

 23 Chapter 23

    There was only silence in the air, everyone just watched on as Lord Yu''s head dropped to the ground and rolled a few times before stopping at Lin Fan''s feet.


    All Lin Fan did was swing his hand, throwing off the blood that was on it.


    Then when his pets came over to be praised, it was like he was apletely different personpared to before as he warmly patted them on the head.


    Ao Jian''s legs turnedpletely soft and the only thing he could do was fall t on his butt as his legs gave out from under him.


    Lin Fan justpletely ignored him as he moved over to the corpses of the Gold Realm beasts. These were beasts in the Gold Realm, these were all high grade items that could be exchanged for points.


    He just went up and put all the corpses into the storage of his watch before moving back to Lord Yu''s corpse.


    Compared to the other Gold Realm beasts, this Lord Yu was a mutated beast, so he clearly had a higher position.


    As Lin Fan searched through Lord Yu''s corpse, he finally came upon what he was looking for.


    As the technology for humans progressed, there were innovations in storage technology, which led to storages being integrated into the watches that everyone wore. There was a certain amount of storage in the watch at first, but that could be expanded with further payments.


    But the Beast n wasn''t as advanced when it came to technology, therefore they still used antique storage methods like spatial rings, which is what this Lord Yu had.


    Lin Fan sent his spiritual sense into the ring and seeing the few items inside, he couldn''t help feeling disappointed.


    This Lord Yu was a mutated beast, so he should be someone who received focus training within the Beast n, but why was he so poor?


    After taking care of that, Lin Fan moved over to Ao Juan who was trembling on the ground.


    His eyes were cold when he moved towards him, but surprisingly, the one who stopped him was Boss Gao.


    Boss Gao grabbed him by the shoulder and said, "Brother Lin, even if he has betrayed humanity, we should bring him back as evidence."


    Lin Fan just coldly looked at him for a while before his eyes rxed, "Alright, but I still advise ending things as soon as possible."


    Boss Gao let out a sigh of relief since he was also a bit scared of Lin Fan, after all he was someone who had fought against a Gold Realm mutated beast alone!


    Boss Gao came over to Ao Jian and seeing the sorry state he was in, he could only shake his head, "It didn''t have to be this way."


    Ao Jian just had his head in his hands and didn''t answer at all.


    Boss Gao tied up Ao Jian and put him in their car, he clearly wasn''t in any condition to run away, so he didn''t have to worry about that.


    After taking care of this, Boss Gao came over to Lin Fan''s side and said, "Brother Lin, we should head back and report this."


    But Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Before we go, let''s try to find the survivors. There were tracks, so there might still be survivors."


    Boss Gao didn''t agree with him, "Brother Lin, there were ten Gold Realm beasts. The seekers that went missing before were all in the Iron and Bronze Realm, there is no way that they would have survived. As for the tracks from earlier, they must have been tracks left by members of the Ao Family."


    Lin Fan continued shaking his head, "No, call it a gut intuition, I think they are still alive."


    Seeing that Lin Fan was insistent, Boss Gao had no choice but to agree to his request, "Alright, we''ll look around a bit, but I doubt we''ll find anything."


    Once they decided their next move, they headed off in the direction that the tracks went and they went through the forest until they reached this grotto on the other side.


    This was a grotto with a waterfall crashing down in the middle, creating mist that sprayed through the air.


    The tracks led them to the edge of the pool in the center of the grotto, but they seemed to lead straight into the water. On the side, there were several beast tracks that were scattered around.


    Boss Gao came forward to look it over and said, "Brother Lin, see? There''s beast tracks scattered all over, which must mean that they were attacked."


    Lin Fan just ignored him and released his spiritual sense, spreading across the area and into the pool.


    As his spiritual sense spread, he couldn''t find anything strange, but then he found that he actually couldn''t reach the bottom of the pool.


    Lin Fan gathered his spiritual sense and pushed it all down the pool, trying to reach the bottom.


    Once his spiritual sense hit the bottom of the pool, it spread across the bottom, but it only hit the wall on a single side.<sub> </sub>


    On the other side of the pool, there was an underwater cave that led to an unknown ce.


    After retracting his spiritual sense, Lin Fan said to the others, "There''s a cave under the water leading somewhere, they might have gone in to hide."


    Boss Gao was surprised, "Underwater cave? How did you find it?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "Spiritual sense."


    Boss Gao released his spiritual sense, but he couldn''t reach the bottom of the pool at all. Once he retracted it, he looked at Lin Fan like he was looking at a monster. Not only was Lin Fan''s body strong, even his spiritual sense was powerful.


    Since they had a lead, everyone gathered their life energy around them and dove into the pool.


    They quickly reached the bottom and found the cave, swimming through it for a while before reaching the end.


    When they surfaced, they had appeared in arge cave that waspletely dark.


    Boss Gao lifted his hand to release a ball of life energy that instantly lit up the room.


    The moment the room was lit up, what they saw were cages with people lining the walls of the room.


    There were many cages lining the wall, but the one simrity was that every single of the people locked inside had been beaten.


    Lin Fan walked around the cages until he found the one he was looking for, "Uncle Zhang, are you ok?"


    The middle aged man inside had a gruff beard and was quite thin from starvation, but when he heard someone calling him Uncle Zhang, he couldn''t help turning in surprise. After staring at Lin Fan for a while in a daze, a spark appeared in his eyes as he seemed to recognize him, "Xiao Fan, is that you?"


    Lin Fan saw that his Uncle Zhang could still speak properly, which meant that he was alright even if he did look a bit ragged, "It''s me Uncle Zhang, let me help you get out of this cage."


    After saying that, Lin Fan used his hands to rip the bars of the cage apart and helped his Uncle Zhang out. He took out some of the food and water that he stored in his watch and gave it to his Uncle Zhang.


    While Lin Fan had been doing this, Boss Gao and the others had been taking care of the other people in cages. After verifying they were the seekers that had gone missing, they quickly helped them out and gave them food and water.


    After the prisoners had finished eating, Lin Fan came forward to ask, "Do you know why they locked you all in these cages?"


    One young man who recovered faster than the others looked at him and said, "None of us know why they dragged us here, but all we know is that they didn''t kill us when they clearly had a chance to do so."


    Lin Fan kept asking, "Are you sure?"


    The young man gave a certain nod.


    Well since there was nothing else they could get from asking them, Lin Fan just let them rest while he walked around the cave.


    When he opened the map, he was in the exact spot that the system had marked, so that meant for sure that the Qilin Bone was here.


    Lin Fan called out Xiao Lei since it had the same qilin bloodline, so he wanted Xiao Lei to find the bone.


    Once Xiao Lei appeared, it took a sniff and it revealed an excited look. Xiao Lei came to an area in the back of the cave where there weren''t any cages and started digging.


    After digging for a while, Xiao Lei had found the thing that made it so excited. It was arge bone that seemed like a bone from theics on earth, but it looked like it waspletely carved of jade.


    When it had been dug out of the ground, there was an ancient aura that filled the cave that drew everyone''s attention.


    Lin Fan turned back to the group and casually said, "This was what my master sent me to find."


    Only then did Boss Gao''s group understand why Lin Fan wanted to join them for this mission, so it was because of a task from his master.


    Based on how terrifying Lin Fan was, they couldn''t even imagine what kind of master had trained him.


    There were a few greedy looks among the sorry looking seekers, but of course they wouldn''t dare do anything right now.


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t miss those looks.

 24 Chapter 24

    Since it was gettingte, Boss Gao decided with Lin Fan that they would stay the night before bringing all these other seekers back with them.


    The mission that they had taken had a week long deadline, so it wouldn''t matter if they stayed one night.


    For Lin Fan, he had already told his parents that he might not being home, so there was nothing to worry about, but what he didn''t know was that there was someone who wanted to kill him for staying out sote. It really made them wish they could trap him in their room forever.


    While everyone else was settling in for the night, Lin Fan secretly snuck off.


    In thete afternoon, while everyone else had been setting up camp, Lin Fan had secretly sent out Xiao Huo to find something for him. It had taken this long for it to find what Lin Fan wanted, but it had done it.


    Lin Fan travelled several kilometers on the back of Xiao Huo until he reached this cliff overhanging a forest.


    Xiao Huonded at the bottom of the cliff, near the top of the tree line. Afternding he used his wing to point out which cave the Brain Vine was hiding in.


    Lin Fan couldn''t use his spiritual sense to check whether the Brain Vine was inside the cave or not since that would immediately expose him.


    He still remembered what had happenedst time when he tried to sh spiritual senses with the Brain Vine, he actually had actually been on the losing side!


    Lin Fan stayed there on that ledge for a bit as he had Xiao Huo explore around to see if there were any other caves that might be entrances to this cave.


    There didn''t seem to be any other caves in this area, so Lin Fan knew that his chance was here.


    Lin Fan took out the new item he had received from the system out.


    When he had found the QIlin Bone and taken it in his hand, the system had given him a notification that he hadpleted his task, therefore it had given him a reward.


    The reward that he had received for this task was a Monster Ball, which had a 100% chance of catching all beasts at or below the Silver Realm.


    The minute he took out the Monster Ball, Lin Fan really had to close his eyes and rub them to make sure there wasn''t something wrong.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that he was already in a different world, he would have thought that he was in the world of Pok¨¦mon, since what had appeared in his hand was an exact copy of a masterball¡­


    There was even arge M that was on the center of the ball...


    Did this mean that he had to throw out this ball whenever he wanted to summon the pet he caught? Did he suddenly enter the world of professional Pok¨¦mon training?


    But his excited thoughts were soon crushed by the system.


    "Host, the Monster Ball is only used to capture beasts. Then the beasts are stored like normal in the host''s pet space."


    There went his dreams of turning his hat around and saying "I choose you".


    After this tiny interlude in his thoughts, Lin Fan readied himself.


    He went into the cave alone since any one of his pets would be radiating their ancient beast bloodline aura, so he wouldn''t be able to sneak up on the Brain Vine.


    Moving carefully along the walls, Lin Fan moved deeper and deeper into the cave until he came onto a nest in the center where there was a vine snake coiled up.


    The vine snake seemed to be asleep, but the moment that Lin Fan passed a certain point, it immediately opened its eyes and spat out a seed.


    The Brain Vine had expected this already, so it hadid its traps down. There were seeds that had been embedded into the walls of the cave and the moment the Brain Vine spat out that seed, it caused the other seeds to dislodge and fall down at Lin Fan. The moment the seed spat out touched one of the seeds, there was a chain reaction as all the various seeds that one seed exploded.


    But of course Lin Fan had expected this after seeing itst time, so he immediately called out Xiao Huo who exploded with mes that shed with the mes of the explosion. The two clouds of mes from the explosions matched each other in intensity, cancelling each other out. Xiao Huo had also manipted his mes to create a path in the mes of the seed explosion for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had charged forward the moment the seeds had exploded, running straight down the path that Xiao Huo created without stopping for a single second.


    The Brain Vine saw that Lin Fan was charging right through its explosion and panicked, trying to quickly run away, but it didn''t get a chance.


    Before the Brain Vine could even turn around to run, Lin Fan had already thrown the Monster Ball at the Brain Vine.


    The Monster Ball seemed like it was locked onto the Brain Vine as it created a perfect arc in the air,nding right on top of the Brain Vine''s head.<sub> </sub>


    As soon as it touched the Brain Vine, the ball opened and a white light came out to trap the Brain Vine before pulling it into the ball.


    Once that was over, the Monster Ball fell onto the ground and began shaking while the light in the middle kept blinking.


    After it shook three times, the blinking had stopped and the ball became still.


    Lin Fan''s face turned dark at the sight of this and he couldn''t help saying, "System, are you sure we''re not going to get sued for copyrighting Poke¡­"


    Before he could finish, the system had cut him off.


    "Host, please don''t doubt this system''s integrity. First warning."


    Lin Fan felt like there was nothing else to do except wait for thewyers to break down the door.


    Once the ball had calmed down, Lin Fan walked over to pick it up, but the moment his finger touched the ball, it turned into a ball of light that disappeared into his chest.


    When he concentrated, Lin Fan could feel that there was something else inside his pet space other than the three pets he already owned.


    With a thought, the Brain Vine came out of the pet space, but it waspletely different from how it acted before. After being tamed by the Monster Ball, it became much more friendly towards Lin Fan, nuzzling its head against Lin Fan''s leg.


    Now that Lin Fan could take a closer look at it, he really thought that it was cute. It looked very much like a starter Pokemon that he quite liked back on earth which had also been a green serpent.


    Lin Fan picked it up and rubbed the Brain Vine''s head much to its delight, as it rubbed its head against his palm.


    After ying around with it for a bit, Lin Fan said, "Well, now that you''re with me I should really think of a name for you. Since you are a Brain Vine, how about calling you Brainy?"


    The Brain Vine was excited when it heard it would be getting a name, but the moment it heard the name it received, it facepalmed itself.


    Lin Fan was quite surprised by this action, it meant that the Brain Vine could actually understand himpletely instead of just understanding the gist of his words like the other pets.


    Lin Fan asked, "You can understand what I''m saying?"


    Brainy nodded before gesturing to show that it didn''t like its new name, but it was too bad for Brainy since Lin Fan quite liked the name. He even thought that he was quite a genius for thinking of such a "perfect" name.


    Now that that had been settled, Lin Fan decided to look at the status panel that the system had generated for Brainy.


    Brain Vine (Young)


    Name: Brainy


    Grade: Rare (Single Mutation)


    Cultivation: Silver 3


    Bloodline: Queen of Knowledge


    Skills: Parasite Seeds, Vine Lash, Super Intelligence, Explosive Seeds, Mind Split, Telekinesis.


    Combat Strength: 45.3


    System''sments: Meh, not worth mentioning.


    "Queen of Knowledge? What is this bloodline?" Lin Fan was surprised by Brainy''s status, it was a bloodline that he had never heard of before.


    However, even after searching it up in his watch, he still couldn''t find this bloodline, so he decided to forget about it for now.


    It was just like Ang''s bloodline, he couldn''t find any information about it, which meant that it had to be something that was past the standards of this world.


    After he had finished his side task, Lin Fan called the Brain Vine back into his pet space and returned back to camp.

 25 Chapter 25

    Lin Fan returned to the cave and saw that many of the prisoners had divided into groups based on their seeker groups. They had found most of their watches thrown in a pile on the side, so they had taken out most of the supplies they brought in with them.


    When Lin Fan came in, there were a few people who had a snuck a greedy look at him, but they quickly went back to what they were doing.


    Lin Fan of course noticed them all, but he ignored them since he couldn''t take care of them now. That didn''t mean he didn''t make a mental note forter.


    He walked over to where Boss Gao''s group was and he saw that his Uncle Zhang was also there, but he was currently digging a hole with a corpse beside it.


    "Uncle Zhang, what are you doing?" Lin Fan asked.


    Uncle Zhang turned when he heard Lin Fan''s voice before turning back to continue digging while saying, "Not everyone was spared for our team, I thought that I could at least give them a proper burial."


    Lin Fan looked over at the corpse and it was a young girl who seemed to be around the same age as him. In this world, most students graduated at the age of eighteen and if they didn''t have any special backing or were extremely talented, they were mostly thrown into the working world.


    This girl was clearly someone who had just graduated from her basic education and was thrown into this dangerous line of business since she had no other choice. But in the middle of it, she had fallen to the plot of someone stronger and more influential than her, causing her death.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head as he looked at the corpse with pity.


    After that, Lin Fan took a shovel out of his watch and began helping Uncle Zhang dig.


    Uncle Zhang could see him digging, so he worked with him to quickly finish digging the holes.


    After they finished the holes, Lin Fan helped Uncle Zhang lift the bodies in before burying them again.


    Once they were done, Lin Fan pulled Uncle Zhang to the side to have a secret conversation with him, "Uncle Zhang, you can''t tell my parents about meing here."


    Uncle Zhang was surprised by this.


    He could clearly tell that Lin Fan was a genius based on how Boss Gao treated him. Boss Gao''s team was a rather well known silver team, one that even Uncle Zhang looked up to, but Boss Gao was actually treating Lin Fan this respectfully, it wasn''t normal.


    For Boss Gao to be this respectful to Lin Fan, it meant that Lin Fan was at least as powerful as him, which meant that Lin Fan was at the top of the Silver Realm!


    This was even higher than what his father had been at back in the day!


    The old saying really was true, the apple really didn''t fall far from the tree.


    But now Lin Fan was actually asking him to keep this a secret? Why?


    "Your talent isn''t something that you should hide, you might even be able to catch the eye of the Union Government with your level of cultivation." Uncle Zhang tried persuading him.


    The Union Government was the biggest organization on this, being able to work for them was the dream of countless people since the Union Government was also linked to higher worlds. As long as they continued climbing the ranks of the Union Government, they might even have a chance to get off this lowly and reach a whole new realm of strength.


    But none of that mattered for Lin Fan since he had a little something called the system.


    The system could bring him to countless different higher worlds and he wouldn''t be restricted like in those various organizations.


    "Uncle Zhang, I have my own ns." Lin Fan said in a resolute voice.


    Seeing that Lin Fan had made up his mind, Uncle Zhang could only respect it and agree, "Alright, I won''t tell your parents about this, but I really think it''s a waste of your talent. That''s right, who is your master? Also, what are you doing now?"


    Lin Fan honestly said, "My master is someone who wishes to keep his identity a secret and I''m running my parents'' pet shop right now."


    Uncle Zhang was shocked, "You''re wasting your talent at the pet shop? Are you worried about your little sister? Are you hiding your talent to make it easier for your parents?"


    Lin Fan once again said in a resolute voice, "Uncle Zhang, I really do have my own ns."<sub> </sub>


    Uncle Zhang knew that there was nothing more that he could say to convince Lin Fan, so he just shook his head and gave a sigh, "It really is a waste."


    The night quickly passed without any incidents and soon they were on their way out of the nar crack.


    It was much harder to transport all prisoners, but it was a good thing that Boss Gao had called the other teams to have them gather with themst night.


    Once morning came, all the other teams arrived with their vehicles.


    When they heard the real story, they couldn''t believe it at first, but once Lin Fan took out the ten Gold Realm beast carcasses, they had no choice but to believe.


    They had felt sorry for Ao Jian at first seeing his state, but after learning of his betrayal to humanity, there was no pity left for him at all. There were even a few people who wanted to execute him, but Boss Gao stopped them.


    With the extra vehicles, they smoothly made their way out of the nar crack and came back to the base outside.


    They had stabilized everyone during their time in the nar crack, but there were still those that needed medical attention, like Hou Zi. After his medical exam, the doctors said that he would be fine and would be back to adventuring in no time, so everyone heaved a sigh of relief.


    Once again, the Seeker Guild couldn''t believe it when they heard the story, but they had no choice once they saw the ten Gold Realm beast carcasses. When the story was over, there were many people who looked at Lin Fan like he was a monster.


    When they had first arrived at the base camp, Xiao Zi hadn''t believed in Lin Fan''s strength, but hearing the story now, she even began flirting with him once she learned that he hadn''t been taken yet. She even secretly asked Yang Xin for the location of Lin Fan''s pet shop because she was already hatching her n to seduce him.


    There were many people that noted down the location of Lin Fan''s pet shop. He had trained three pets that could fight multiple Gold Realm beasts, it clearly wasn''t a normal pet shop.


    The Seeker Union asked Lin Fan if they could buy the Gold Realm beast corpses from him and he agreed to it right away since he still needed the Golden Honey. In total, the Seeker Union bought all the Gold Realm beast corpses for a hundred million points.


    Eight of the Gold Realm beast corpses were worth one million points each, one was at a higher level, so it was priced at two million points, and then there was the special mutated beast corpse of Lord Yu.


    Since it was mostly intact, Lord Yu''s corpse had fetched quite a high price, going for ny million points and that was only because Lin Fan was toozy to bargain, so he sold it cheap.


    With these hundred million points, Lin Fan easily exchanged for Golden Honey. He also wanted to find something to help his father''s leg, but he couldn''t find anything with the Gold Realm ess that he had.


    Since he had all these points, he also exchanged for a few artifacts, a few cultivation techniques, and a few spiritual skills since these were all things that hecked.


    There was no need to mention the artifacts since he could clearly use them directly, but he found that he really wascking in spiritual skills since most of his attacks were just straight punches after gathering his life energy in his fists.


    As for the cultivation techniques, he wanted topare how this''s cultivation techniquespared to his God Tier Cultivation Technique.


    During this time, the Seeker Guild had reported this matter to the Union Government who had decided to send a Legendary Realm Expert down to close this nar crack, as well as a tinum Realm Expert to destroy the Ao Family.


    As for Ao Jian, he was held in temporary custody by the Seeker Guild until the Union Government came to pick him up.


    But none of that mattered to Lin Fan.


    Though, there was one important thing that came out of this adventure.


    After they arrived at the camp, Boss Gao knew exactly what he should do and confessed to Mei Rou.


    She was willing to give her life to die with him, if he didn''t step up as a man now, he would never be able to face her.


    And just like that, the two of them started going out. Lin Fan was happy for them, but he also didn''t forget to curse them as normies secretly.


    After everything had been taken care of, Lin Fan made Yang Xin drive him and Uncle Zhang back to his home.

 26 Chapter 26

    When Yang Xin dropped them off at Lin Fan''s house, Lin Fan sent him off immediately.


    Yang Xin didn''t mind since he still had a favour from Lin Fan and he knew where Lin Fan''s shop was, so he could go see him at any time.


    After seeing just how powerful Lin Fan''s pets were, Yang Xin had even made up his mind to let Lin Fan train his pets. How cool would it be if he were to have Gold Realm pets!


    Once Yang Xin was gone, Lin Fan stopped Uncle Zhang from heading in as he handed him the Golden Honey.


    Uncle Zhang looked at the drop of water with a confused look before asking, "Xiao Fan, what is this?"


    Lin Fan exined, "This is Golden Honey, it can cure my mother. Give it to my dad for me and say that it was from you, I can''t expose myself yet."


    Uncle Zhang pushed his hand back, "Xiao Fan, this was something you earned by yourself for your mother, she would much rather receive it from you."


    Lin Fan just kept pushing it back, "Uncle Zhang, you already know that I can''t reveal my abilities now, so I need you to do this for me. I promise I''ll tell them in the future when the time is right."


    Who told Uncle Zhang to let Lin Fan save his life?


    Since Lin Fan wouldn''t back down, Uncle Zhang could only take it in the end.


    Lin Fan didn''t forget to add, "Remember, don''t tell them I saved you. Just follow my lead when we go in."


    Uncle Zhang had already given in so much, he didn''t have a problem following him any longer, so he just said, "Alright."


    When they came in, Lin Fan''s mother had walked past the entrance on her way to the kitchen when she saw Lin Fane in.


    "Xiao Fan, you''re back¡­" Then she saw who was behind Lin Fan and she almost dropped the te in her hand, "Brother¡­..Brother Zhang?"


    Lin Fan''s dad in the living room heard this and immediately ran over, "Brother Zhang, it really is you!"


    Lin Ao was stunned at first, but he soon quickly pulled Uncle Zhang into a hug. He pped him on the back as he said, "I knew that you would be alright!"


    Uncle Zhang''s eyes also misted over as he said, "Un, I''m back."


    Lin Fan just waited on the side as theyposed themselves and once they did, his mother asked him, "Xiao Fan, why are you with Brother Zhang?"


    Lin Fan exined, "I had juste back and I met him outside, so we came in together."


    His mother didn''t have anything to say to that since there was nothing wrong with it.


    Then she asked, "Where did you gost night?"


    Lin Fan replied, "I was getting some supplies for the pet shop, so I stayed out for the night."


    This was something his parents had done before when they managed the pet shop, so this was nothing new to them.


    After they finished asking questions to Lin Fan, they turned their attention back to Uncle Zhang.


    Lin Ao invited Uncle Zhang to stay for dinner and he didn''t take no for an answer.


    Lin Fan''s father even took out the special bottle of wine that he had been saving away and he didn''t stop until his face waspletely flushed.


    It was quite the happy meal, so much so that Uncle Zhang even forgot about what Lin Fan had told him.


    Near the end, Lin Fan gave him a little nudge and a look which reminded him of the task he had been given.


    "Brother, sister inw, I have something for you." Uncle Zhang suddenly said.


    Lin Fan''s father was already quite drunk, so he said in a slurred voice, "What ish it?"


    Uncle Zhang took out the bottle with the few golden drops of liquid inside and ced it on the table, "This is for sister inw."


    Lin Fan''s mother was surprised as Lin Fan''s father picked up the bottle and looked it over before saying, "You still haven''t told us what it is yet."


    Uncle Zhang calmly exined, "This is Golden Honey, it''s effective in clearing up bacterial infections, so it should help with sister inw''s illness."


    When Lin Fan''s parents heard this, both of them were stunned.


    After a while, Lin Fan''s father was the first to react as he snapped out of his drunken state, "Brother Zhang, something like this is too precious, we can''t ept this."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan''s father tried to hand it back to Uncle Zhang, but Uncle Zhang just pushed it back as he said, "Brother Lin, if you take me as a brother, you won''t reject this. You''ve saved me more times than I can count, this is only a small thing I can do for you."


    Lin Fan''s parents were touched by this and after giving each other a look, Lin Fan''s mother supported Lin Fan''s father as he came forward to give Uncle Zhang a bow.


    Uncle Zhang saw this and quickly came forward to lift him up as he said, "Brother Lin, what are you doing? If you treated me as a brother at all, you would never do something like this."


    Lin Fan''s father looked embarrassed as he awkwardly scratched his head, "But Brother Zhang, I really don''t know how to thank you for this other than giving you this bow."


    Uncle Zhang just said, "Pei, what is there to thank me for? When we took that vow back then, we became brothers for life! What is wrong with a brother supporting a brother?"


    Lin Fan''s father''s eyes misted over, but he quickly put his hands over his eyes before he said, "You''re right, you''re right! We''re brothers for life!"


    After that, he picked up the bottle of wine and shouted, "To apologize I''ll drink this entire bottle!" Then he started chugging it down.


    Uncle Zhang just pped along as he said, "Good, good, we''re not allowed to stop tonight until we''repletely drunk!"


    After Lin Fan''s father had finished his bottle, he suddenly asked, "Brother Zhang, how did you even get this Golden Honey?"


    Uncle Zhang hesitated a bit, but seeing the re from Lin Fan, he gave the excuse that he already thought of with a sigh, "Actually, the Seeker Guild gave this to me aspensation for what happened this time. Otherwise, how could I afford something that is kept in the Silver exchange sites like this?"


    Lin Fan??s father heard this and asked in a worried voice, "What happened to you this time? The Seeker Guild was even willing to offer this aspensation?"


    Uncle Zhang just gave another sigh, "It''s something that involves the top organizations, so we''re not allowed to say anything. All I can say that it was so important that the Union Government is sending out a Legendary Realm Expert to deal with it."


    Lin Fan''s parents were shocked, "Legendary Realm Expert?!"


    They had been adventurers back when they were younger, so of course they knew the significance of a Legendary Realm Expert.


    There were said to only be less than thirty Legendary Realm Experts on this entire, so Legendary Realm Experts weren''t sent out so easily.


    For one to be sent this time, it really did seem like something serious.


    Thinking of this, Lin Fan''s father became depressed. If that ident hadn''t happened to him, he would have already be a Gold Realm Expert and became a noble, but sometimes life didn''t go the way you wanted.


    Lin Fan''s father had a sad look on his face as he said, "Our team used to have so much potential before, but look at us now. We don''t even know where all of our brothers have gone or if they''re even alive anymore."


    Uncle Zhang also became depressed when he heard this, "That''s right. I can still remember all our brothers and sisters from before."


    Lin Fan''s father said, "Do you still remember Brother Luo, Brother Feng, Little Sister Nangong¡­"


    Before he finished listing them, Lin Fan suddenly cut in.


    <o>,m When he heard his father mention Brother Luo, he suddenly remembered what Luo Qing had told him before.</o>


    Lin Fan said, "Dad, do you know someone named Luo Wang?"


    Lin Fan''s father and Uncle Zhang''s eyes both popped out, as Lin Fan''s father asked in a surprised voice, "How do you know Brother Luo, Xiao Fan?"


    Lin Fan casually exined, "There was a girl who came to the store the other day asking to see the old owners and she asked if I knew a Luo Wang."


    Lin Fan''s father and Uncle Zhang were both filled with excitement.


    Lin Fan''s father excitedly said, "Did she leave a way of contacting her?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by this, but he replied, "Yes, she left me her number."


    "Well, call her then!" Lin Fan''s father shouted, as he lost control from the wine.


    Lin Fan took a small step back from this enthusiasm, but he still took out his watch to call Luo Qing.


    Unfortunately Luo Qing had juste out of her bath and she was quite rxed. When she heard the sound of her watch ringing, she tapped it casually to answer, but she didn''t notice that she had tapped reply with video.


    When Lin Fan''s call connected, his eyes almost popped out of his head from what he had seen.


    In front of him, there was Luo Qing''s figure with nothing more than a towel wrapped around her.

 27 Chapter 27

    When Luo Qing saw Lin Fan''s face pop up with his wide eyes, she immediately knew that she had made a mistake.


    She grabbed her watch and immediately cut off the video feed, but Lin Fan had already seen enough.


    Even though she was still young, she was a girl that had developed quite well.


    She normally wore loose fitting clothes to hide her figure, but Luo Qing was actually someone with quite the figure. She had curves in all the right ces, so much so that it actually made the idiot with no love experience Lin Fan''s mind run a bit.


    After a while, when Luo Qing had finally forced herself to calm down a bit, she tried to say in what she considered a rxed voice, "Owner Lin, what do you need?"


    Lin Fan was still in a bit of a daze from what he saw, so he said in a mechanical voice, "Well, I''m asking about your dad. You said that his name was Luo Wang?"


    Luo Qing felt a blushe over her cheek when she heard Lin Fan''s tone, but she still replied, "That''s right."


    Lin Fan said, "Well my dad does seem to know your dad, so he wants to meet him if possible."


    Luo Qing said, "Alright, let me go ask my dad. I''ll call you back in a bit." Then she hung up the call.


    Both Lin Fan and Luo Qing were d that they had some time topose themselves, what had happened really was too embarrassing.


    Five minutester, Luo Qing called back.


    When Lin Fan picked up, there was an unfamiliar male voice that rang out, "Brother Lin, is that you?"


    Lin Fan calmly replied, "This isn''t him, this is his son."


    That voice said, "Oh, so it''s Xiao Fan."


    Lin Fan then said, "Mister Luo, if possible, could youe to the store tomorrow? I will bring my parents there to meet you."


    Luo Wang said, "I have time tomorrow, when does your store open?"


    Lin Fan gave him the details and set up everything before going back to tell his parents.


    Both his parents and his Uncle Zhang were filled with joy and excitement, which led his dad and Uncle Zhang to continue drinking into the night.


    ¡­


    The next morning, when Lin Fan woke up from his cultivation and came downstairs, the first person he met was his little sister.


    Since he hade hometest night with Uncle Zhang, his little sister had already gone to cultivate in her room and he hadn''t seen herst night.


    What he didn''t know was that she had been secretly peeping on him through the gap in the door until he had gone to his roomst night¡­


    The moment he appeared in front of her, all she did was coldly re at him.


    He felt like he was being hit in the face by the coldest winter breeze, so he quickly moved out of the way and headed to the kitchen, but as he moved past her, he felt a light tap at his waist.


    He wasn''t sure what it was, so he just continued on, but as for his little sister, once Lin Fan had left the corridor, she actually clutched her hand in pain as a few tears came to her eye.


    "When did his body be so hard?" Lin Yue muttered.


    When Lin Fan walked past the living room, he saw that his father and Uncle Zhang were lying on the ground fast asleep. It seemed like they had just fallen asleep after getting dead drunkst night.


    Lin Fan just ignored them and walked into the kitchen where his mother was preparing breakfast. Her face no longer seemed as pale as before after she had taken the Golden Honey and she seemed to have much more energy.


    But Lin Fan was still worried about her, so he asked, "Mom, how are you feeling?"


    His mother turned with a skip and said, "I''m great honey, I feel like I''m full of energy and can do anything."


    Lin Fan was happy to see that she was feeling well, it seemed like that Golden Honey really did its job.


    After they finished breakfast, Lin Fan brought his parents and Uncle Zhang to the store.


    When they arrived at the store, Lin Fan saw that Luo Qing was waiting there with her parents.


    As soon as the adults saw each other, they immediately rushed forward to give each other hugs.<sub> </sub>


    "Brother Luo!"


    "Brother Lin!"


    The fathers gave each other bear hugs while the mothers held each other''s hands with tears in their eyes.


    Emotion filled their eyes as they had finally been reunited with their long lost friends.


    After the fathers released each other from their bear hug, Luo Wang turned to see Uncle Zhang.


    "Brother Zhang, I knew you were still alive!"


    Luo Qing''s mother also quickly came over to give Uncle Zhang a hug as tears came down.


    Luo Wang looked at his two brothers and said in an emotional voice, "I never thought I would see you two again."


    Both Lin Fan''s father and Uncle Zhang were feeling as emotional as Luo Wang.


    On the side, Lin Fan and Luo Qing were just awkwardly watching their parents reunite with one another.


    The other reason for why Luo Qing and Lin Fan were feeling awkward was because of the incident fromst night.


    When Lin Fan saw Luo Qing, he couldn''t help thinking of the spring scenery he had been shown and his face turned red.


    When Luo Qing looked at Lin Fan and saw that his face was red, her face also turned red since she naturally knew what he was thinking.


    She really wished she could have buried herself in a hole to hide her embarrassment.


    Ang who had heard themotion came out at this time and saw Lin Fan trying to awkwardly exin while Luo Qing hid her blushing face with her hands.


    For some reason, she didn''t like seeing this, but it was unknown if it was because she misunderstood this as her new friend being bullied or if there was another reason¡­


    She immediately came over to Lin Fan and kicked him in the butt, knocking him to the ground.


    Lin Fan looked up at her with a surprised look since he didn''t know why she did that, but he didn''t try to fight back since he knew he couldn''t win.


    Of course, none of this escaped Lin Fan''s mother''s eyes.


    She had been worried about the love life of this son of hers, but seeing the actions of these two girls, she realized that maybe she didn''t need to worry after all.


    All she needed to do was give these two girls a helping nudge once in a while.


    The only thing she was still worried about was that strange obsession that her daughter had. She was worried since they were brother and sister, but she still supported her since she was her daughter¡­


    After the adults had finished catching up, they finally turned their attention back to Luo Qing, Lin Fan, and Ang.


    Seeing how close Luo Qing and Lin Fan seemed and the slight blush on Luo Qing''s face, Lin Fan''s dad couldn''t help asking, "Brother Luo, does your daughter have a boyfriend?"


    Luo Wang said, "Not that I know of, but she does seem quite close to Xiao Fan. She has had quite a few things to say about him during the past few days."


    Lin Fan''s mother revealed a knowing smile, "Oh ho, maybe we should let these kids get to know each other better sometime."


    Luo Qing''s mother also took this time to look over Lin Fan. The body that he had transmigrated into was quite handsome, even if it wasn''t talented, so it did leave quite the good impression on Luo Qing''s mother.


    Luo Qing''s hearing was quite good, so naturally she had heard everything their parents had said, causing her face to blush even more.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what was going on, but seeing her face turn this red, he couldn''t help think that she was sick.


    Lin Fan leaned in and put a hand on her forehead, "Are you alright? Do you have a fever?"


    Luo Qing''s face burned even more when he put his hand on her forehead, but she quickly pped his hand away and kicked his shin before running off.


    Lin Fan was just left there with a confused look, not understanding what he did.

 28 Chapter 28

    Over the next few days, life went on like normal for Lin Fan.


    After the show he had put on at the Seeker Guild, his store had gained quite a bit of fame among the seekers.


    As well, after Luo Qing''s demonstration of her pet during the exam, there were quite a few students that had spent money to learn about his shop.


    ? So there were many more customers that came during this time, but most of them were scared off by the prices that he offered.


    But there were a few repeat customers that came out of this since they couldn''t quit once they had a taste of what the store offered.


    The two most prominent cases of this were Murong Quan and Yang Xin.


    Murong Quan now came daily to train his pet and whenever he came, he would always hang around Lin Fan like a little brother, but Lin Fan always ignored him.


    Yang Xin hade as well to buy pet food and a few ingredients for his grandfather, but he dropped in irregrly since he still had his seeker job.


    On one of his trips, he had also brought Boss Gao and the others over.


    They had told Lin Fan that Hou Zi''s injuries weren''t too serious and he would be back on duty once he recovered a bit, which made Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief. They had gotten close during their time together, so he considered them friends and naturally worried about them.


    But during their visit, Lin Fan always kicked Boss Gao''s group out since Boss Gao and Mei Roy were flirting in front of him.


    How could an old dog like him take people forcing dog food down his throat?


    The one customer that Lin Fan had expected toe was Luo Qing, but surprisingly she never came to the store after that one day.


    Instead, she came directly to his house now with her dad.


    Whenever she came, her dad and his dad would go off to drink and she would be dragged off by his mother.


    He didn''t know what they talked about, but whenever she saw him, she would lower her head with a blush.


    It seemed like his mother''s reach didn''t just stop with Luo Qing, aftering to the store thest time and seeing Ang, she had been visiting the store more toe see Ang. She even made Lin Fan bring Ang home for dinner almost every day. It had reached the point where he even stayed overnight at the store just to avoid her, but that caused a few flowers to bloom between him and Ang.


    But as for the store, business was good since there was a constant flow of special ingredients that was being sold.


    After signing the employee contract with Ang, Lin Fan had unlocked the World of Elements as a special cultivation realm that he could freely visit to train and farm ingredients, though it did cost him 100 points per trip.


    However, since he did have the ruler of the World of Elements as his employee, the residents brought him special ingredients each time that easily covered the cost of each visit.


    Lin Fan went every night when he closed the store for an hour to train and gather more ingredients and when it came to open the next morning, he would bring out the special ingredients.


    Lin Fan''s store had been bing more popr over the past few days, so there were quite a few sellers with sharp eyes that noticed how cheaply Lin Fan sold his special ingredients.


    So when he opened every morning, there were several people who were usually waiting outside to fight over the special ingredients he stocked every morning.


    Of course, they only bought the cheaper ones since they didn''t recognize some of the more expensive ones and didn''t want to get cheated. But even so, Lin Fan had made quite a bit of profit during the past few days and he had saved up his points in case there was something he really wanted.


    He had even saved up quite a few crystals, so he was no longer as poor as before.


    Today, after the store closed, Lin Fan went back to the World of Elements with Ang and his pets.


    He had gotten into the habit of diving into forests in the World of Elements and fighting the beasts that spawned there naturally whenever he came, so he and his pet had already be much stronger. They were even stronger than when they fought Lord Yu.


    But today''s trip was different.<sub> </sub>


    When they arrived in the World of Elements, Lin Fan was about to go wander around in the forest with Ang, but one of the Spirit Kings had stopped them from leaving.


    The Water Spirit King came forward and said, "Ruler, some of my subordinates have found a disturbance in the southernke. It seems to be rted to those damn undead."


    Ang knit her brows when she heard this.


    Spirits were the embodiment of nature and life, so their natural enemies were the undead who embodied death and destruction.


    The World of Elements had been at war with the undeads ever since they had both been born, so this wasn''t something unusual, but it was unusual for the Water Spirit King to personally report it.


    Ang waved her hand at the Water Spirit King before turning to Lin Fan, "I''m going to check it out, you can wander around by yourself."


    Lin Fan had heard the report and was actually curious about it. He had heard about the undead realm before, but it was still locked, so he couldn''t head over there to take a look. Lin Fan really expected it to be a realm filled with treasure like this World of Elements.


    Before Ang could leave, Lin Fan called out to stop her, "Wait, bring me with you. I want to see what this disturbance is."


    Ang raised a brow as she looked at him, but she still agreed with his request in the end.


    With a wave of her hand, Lin Fan was lifted up by the wind and they quickly flew off in a southern direction.


    After flying for a bit, they arrived over a body of water, but there was something strange on the surface of the water.


    There seemed to be a dark energy that was spreading from the very center of theke, polluting everything around it.


    As Ang released her spiritual senses, she found that there were barely any aquatic species left in the waters and the ones that were left were floating dead on top of the water, having been drained of their life force.


    This scene made Ang knit her brows as she sent her spiritual senses even deeper into the water. After reaching the bottom of theke, she finally found what she was looking for.


    At the bottom of theke, there was an ominous skull with red eyes that was radiating this death energy, but it seemed quite passive. That was until Ang''s spiritual sense fell onto it and it was like the skull had been activated.


    The red lights in its eyes glowed even brighter as the death energy spread, gathering the corpses of the aquatic species on the surface of the water. As the death energy spread over them, it ripped out the bones of these corpses and gathered them around the skull, creating a vortex of bones.


    After the vortex of bones spun for a while, they finally gathered together into a single skeleton under the skull that connected together.


    When the skeleton came into form, it jumped right out of the water and looked around. Once it saw Ang, the skull revealed an ugly looking smile and said, "Lowly spirit, bow down to your new master."


    Ang just gave a cold snort and before the skeleton could do anything else, she brought her palm down to p it apart, shattering the skeleton.


    But she didn''t stop there, as she gathered her energy to form a prison around the skeleton to stop it from escaping.


    The skull''s red eyes glowed as it looked at her, "Little spirit, you dare try to imprison this great one? Are you ready to suffer the cons¡­"


    Before the skull could finish, Ang tightened her hand and shattered the skull to pieces with her life energy before releasing her hand again, letting it regenerate.


    Before the skull could talk this time, Ang said in a cold voice, "Who sent you?"


    It was just three words, but her tone was so cold that it dropped the temperature around her by several degrees.


    The skull was unfazed by this as it continued speaking in its prideful voice, "This great one is its own master and soon I will be your master too."


    Ang knew that she wouldn''t get anything out of this skull, so she was about to clench her hand to silence it once and for all, but Lin Fan spoke up at this time.


    Lin Fan said, "Wait! Can you give this skeleton to me?"

 29 Chapter 29

    Ang paused for a second since she was surprised by this, but then she asked, "Why?"


    Lin Fan just came over and said, "Well, I think that I have a use for it."


    Ang still raised a brow at this, but she epted his request as she moved the life energy cage she had around the skeleton in over to in front of Lin Fan.


    The skull''s red eyes turned to Lin Fan and looked him over before saying, "So this little girl belongs to you? I''ll give you a chance to gain the ultimate power and serve this great one."


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he heard this as he was filled with a strange anger over hearing this skull insult Ang.


    Lin Fan just ignored the skull as he moved his hand towards the life energy cave. The moment his hand made contact with the cage, the system''s voice sounded.


    "Unknown energy detected, currently analyzing."


    After that, the system took over and released its power through Lin Fan. This was a normal urrence for Lin Fan, but both the skull and Ang revealed very different looks.


    Ang was surprised by the power ofws that had just appeared, but she was used to it since she knew that there was a powerful master behind Lin Fan.


    But the skull revealed a look of absolute terror. In front of this power that it couldn''t resist at all, it couldn''t even understand what was going on.


    The skull finally lost its facade as it began to beg, "Alright, alright, I know that you''re a great being, so I''ll settle for being your number one general! All you have to do is spare me now and I''ll¡­"


    The skull never got to finish what it was saying as the system had finished taking it apart and analyzing it.


    Ang came over and asked, "What did you do to it?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and answered her question with another question, "Do you want to take a trip with me?"


    "Huh?" Ang was confused.


    Lin Fan felt that she was quite cute when she looked confused, but he exined, "Well I found an interesting ce, so I want to see if you want to go there with me."


    After the system had finished analyzing the skull, it had released a new cultivation realm and a new quest rted to that cultivation realm.


    Lin Fan looked quite calm in front of Ang, but he was actually filled with excitement deep down.


    If this new cultivation realm was like the World of Elements, that meant a whole new world''s resources he could tap into!


    Ang saw that Lin Fan wasn''t going to reply, but since the master had decided to interfere, it must be something rted to the master. If it was rted to the master, it had to be something good.


    So Ang followed Lin Fan, but first they had appeared in the shop.


    Ang looked around before saying, "The interesting ce you were taking me is the shop? There''s nothing special about this ce."


    Lin Fan just shook his head with a faint smile, "It''s not the shop, we just had to return to the shop to go to the interesting ce since we can''t directly head there from your world."


    Ang just said "oh".


    Lin Fan then went to order some food and when they arrived, Ang went over to start eating.


    During her time on the Blue Star, she had really gotten used to eating the food that the humans prepared. They really knew how to cook their food, as opposed to spirits who generally ate things raw.


    But when her hand reached over to the delivery, Lin Fan pped it away.


    Lin Fan had also be more bold after being with Ang for a while. He knew that small things like this wouldn''t cross her bottom line, but there were still things that he didn''t dare do.


    Ang red at Lin Fan, but she didn''t do anything.


    Lin Fan exined, "We''re heading somewhere special, this will be our rations and also our bargaining chip."


    Ang was confused, "Bargaining chip?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a strange look and said, "Well, you''ll see what I mean."


    Ang just blinked in confusion, looking quite cute.


    After he had finished gathering everything, Lin Fan waved his hand and opened the portal before reaching his hand out to Ang.<sub> </sub>


    Ang took it and walked into the portal with him and the moment they came out, she was shocked by what she had seen.


    They had appeared in a world that waspletely dark and devoid of any colour. It was a world that waspletely built of bones and was filled with death energy.


    Ang immediately grabbed Lin Fan by the arm and shook him as she shouted, "How did you find this ce? We''ve been trying to find this world for countless years, but we''ve never been able to find it."


    That''s right, Lin Fan had brought Ang to the Lich''s Necropolis, it was the world of the undead that had been at war with the World of Elements for countless millennia. The ancestors had even tried pooling their energy together to divine the location of the Lich''s Necropolis, but they had never found it.


    Lin Fan just smiled and pointed up.


    Ang immediately understood as she let go of Lin Fan''s arm and cracked her knuckles looking like she was prepared to start a fight.


    This time it was Lin Fan''s turn to grab her arm.


    Lin Fan asked, "What are you nning on doing?"


    Ang just revealed a cold smile, "Now that we''re here, of course I''m going to settle this."


    Lin Fan facepalmed, "Just with you alone?"


    Ang confidently said, "I''m enough."


    Lin Fan shook his head before saying, "Look at your interface, you should have a quest."


    Ang opened the system''s employee interface and found that she did indeed have a mission. It was the same mission Lin Fan had, but slightly varied.


    Her mission was to escort Lin Fan to meet the ruler of this Lich''s Necropolis, while Lin Fan''s mission was to meet the ruler.


    But she couldn''t help pouting her lips and saying, "But why can''t we just beat them up?"


    Lin Fan had ck lines appear on his forehead, "Do you really think that we can beat them up alone?"


    Ang said, "With your master, what is there to be worried about?"


    Lin Fan facepalmed again, "Don''t you see the mission? If my master wanted peace, why would he have us meet with the ruler?"


    Ang just gave an "oh" sound.


    Lin Fan really didn''t know what he was going to do with her. This girl really was headstrong and naive, most of the time she just charged forward without thinking.


    After settling this, Lin Fan had Ang carry him as they headed towards the area marked on the system''s map.


    Once they arrived, they came to a deste castle that waspletely carved out of dark stone that seemed like it was exuding death energy.


    When they arrived, they found that the gate suddenly opened when they came up to it, like it had been awaiting their arrival.


    Lin Fan and Ang looked at each other in confusion before deciding to head forward since they had no other choice for now.


    Carefully making their way forward, they eventually arrived at a throne room where there was a giant skeleton covered in a dark robe with a golden crown sitting atop a stone throne. At his side, there were two ghosts who were dressed as maids.


    The moment Ang came in, the eye sockets of the skeleton suddenly lit up with a purple glow that seemed like it could pierce right into one''s soul.


    The skeleton''s jaw suddenly moved as it said in a cold voice, "So, Spirit Overlord, you''ve finally found our world. Are you here to start a war?"


    Ang was about to charge forward and attack, but Lin Fan reached out to grab her hand and stopped her.


    Language wasn''t an issue this time since thenguage Lin Fan had exchanged for the first time was themonnguage of these upper realms.


    Lin Fan came forward and said, "This great lord, we''re not here to start a war, we''re just here to talk. If I may, I have a proposal that will benefit us¡­"


    Before Lin Fan could even finish, the skeleton had raised its skeletal hand and a beam of purple light had pierced through Lin Fan''s chest.


    "Who do you think you are, lowly human? You are not qualified to speak here." The skeleton said in the same cold voice.

 30 Chapter 30

    When the Lich King was about to dismiss Lin Fan, it''s purple eyes suddenly moved back onto Lin Fan''s corpse as he felt the appearance of timews.


    This wasn''t Ang''s first time seeing this, so she wasn''t surprised, but she did find it funny that the Lich King had the same reaction as she had.


    Once Lin Fan had been revived, the Lich King asked, "Boy, who are you?"


    Lin Fan dusted off his clothes before saying, "It really is rude to interrupt someone before they finish."


    The Lich King just stared at Lin Fan for a bit, as it looked like it was deep in thought. After a while, the Lich King suddenly gave a sigh and said, "Alright, I get what''s going on."


    Lin Fan was confused by this as he asked, "What do you mean?"


    The Lich King spread his hands as he said, "You''re a lowly human, so you definitely can''t control the power of thews and this little girl is the Spirit Overlord, so she definitely hasn''t broken through the mortal limit yet. The only exnation for the appearance of the powers of thews of time is because there is someone else behind you. But that also makes sense since you''re able to get the Spirit Overlord girl here to listen to you, which means they must either be someone from the God Realm or you have some kind of special illusion ability."


    The Lich King had been born with the Lich''s Necropolis, so he was the crystallization of wisdom over the countless millennia. The Lich King had already reached a degree of knowledge that could be considered unparalleled in the mortal world, so it was easy for it to see through this.


    Lin Fan was more than d to see this since it was always easier to negotiate with someone smart than with someone stupid.


    But what happened right after thatpletely broke down Lin Fan''s world views.


    As soon as the Lich King finished his analysis, he waved his hand and the robe around him was changed into gym sweats. After his clothes changed, he turned in the throne and leaned back as he kicked his leg up on one armrest while lying on the other.


    Thispletely shattered the view of the Lich King that Lin Fan had before, it even shattered the image of the serious Lich King that Ang had in her mind.


    When she had faced the undead in battle before, they had all said that their king was the most solemn and powerful being they had ever met.


    Even when she heard of the Lich King from the previous generation''s Spirit Overlord, she heard them describe the Lich King as a being of absolute power and dignity.


    But what she saw in front of her was the exact opposite of this.


    As for Lin Fan, he was quite excited to see a kindred spirit since it was easier for him to talk to someone like this.


    He already had a feeling that this was the case earlier when he saw the maid costumes the ghosts were wearing. Each one was uniquely designed and handmade, it was clear that this Lich King had his hobbies.


    Lin Fan casually said, "To be honest, you really should have said omae wa mo shindeiru when you killed me earlier."


    The Lich King looked at him with a confused look at first, but after thinking about it, he said, "I don''t know what that means, but it sound like a good fit."


    Lin Fan had tried testing him since he seemed like an otaku, but it seemed like he wasn''t someone from his world. Still someone like this was much easier to talk to, so there was nothing to feel bad about.


    Lin Fan just said, "Never mind, I was just talking to myself. So you seem like a smart person, do you know what we''re here for?"


    The Lich King gave a shrug and said, "You have a master that can control the power of thews, so it would be easy for him to destroy our world, but he doesn''t choose to interfere. The only logical exnation for this is that he wants to mediate between our two worlds for some reason, which I agree with."


    Ang couldn''t help jumping up at this moment, "You agree with mediation? Then why did you send your subordinate to attack us just now?!"<sub> </sub>


    The Lich King looked at Ang with a confused look before giving another shrug, "The undead aren''t as you think, we''re much more free without the fetters of life. I might be known as the king, but in reality they rule over themselves and use me to threaten others. The undead are split between many different local rulers and I am considered a figurehead that they hide behind, but I don''t really care since no onees to bother me that way."


    Ang didn''t back down, "Who can trust the words of an undead like you? I''d rather talk with my fists!"


    The Lich King ignored her and looked at Lin Fan who was holding her back, "So what does your master want?"


    Lin Fan revealed his usual smile which immediately put the Lich King off, but he also took out the delivery food that he had brought which had attracted the Lich King''s attention, "How about we have a snack before we get down to business?"


    The Lich King stretched out his head as he looked over the food and took a deep sniff, "Oh, human food. It''s been a while since I had human food, it really does seem much betterpared to before."


    One of the ghost maids came forward and carried a pizza over to the Lich King. The moment he took a slice and took a bite, his purple eyes lit up even brighter, "Oh, humans really are the best, they''re so creative when ites to making things."


    Lin Fan didn''t stop there and brought over a bucket of fried chicken which he offered to the Lich King.


    And just like that, they binged on the junk food that Lin Fan brought out for while Lin Fan also showed the Lich King the various shows from the Blue Star. After a while, the Lich King waspletely hooked on these shows. His favourite seemed to be the Blue Star''s version of Madoka.


    Ang had been standing on the side watching the Lich King with vignce, but after a while, her stomach started to grumble from the scent of the junk food. Eventually she couldn''t take it anymore and started fighting the Lich King for the junk food, but the Lich King was a gentleman and let her take it. Of course, he didn''t let her take it for free as he had been staring at her the entire time, thinking about what kind of costume would suit her the best.


    Once they cleaned up the junk food, Lin Fan got down to business, "So, what my master wants to do is mediate a peace between your two realms."


    The Lich King had a casual attitude, but his words were quite sharp, "Basically your master is looking to unite the realms under him since he needs resources, right?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback by how direct the Lich King was, "If you want to put it that way, yes."


    The Lich King''s eyes turned sharp all of a sudden, "So, what is your master offering me?"


    Lin Fan calmed himself by taking a deep breath first before saying, "Well, how about a chance to enter the God Realm?"


    The Lich King stroked his bony chin, "It would be possible for someone at the level of your master to bring me to the God Realm, but the fact that he''s gathering resources and not showing himself means that he isn''t at his full strength. The fact that he''s hiding also means that he could have enemies that want him dead, so even if there is a chance to enter the God Realm, it wouldn''t be worth it to jump on a sinking ship."


    Lin Fan really was in awe at the Lich King''s wisdom, he thought of all this in just a few minutes, "My master can guarantee that he has no enemies, it was an ident during cultivation that caused him to lose his powers."


    The Lich King gave a shrug, "Your word means nothing to me, we just met today. If you really want to prove it, show some sincerity."


    Lin Fan racked his brain before he finally remembered who he was dealing with. After thinking it over, he leaned over beside the Lich King and whispered something into his ears.


    The Lich King''s purple eyes suddenly lit up and he said in an excited voice, "Are you sure?!"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and a knowing smile.


    The Lich King also revealed a smile and said, "Alright, since you have shown your sincerity, I guess I can ept your offer."


    Lin Fan asked the system for an employee agreement, but the system''s response surprised him.

 31 Chapter 31

    "Host''s level is currently too low to hire another employee from another realm."


    Lin Fan had a confused look as he said to the system in his mind, "What do you mean my level is too low?"


    "The pet shop is currently at level 1 and only allows one employee to be hired. If the host wishes to hire another employee, please upgrade the shop first."


    "Upgrade? What do I need to upgrade?" Lin Fan asked.


    "The first upgrade requires 1000 points, does the host wish to upgrade?"


    Over the past few days, Lin Fan had been earning quite a few points and saving them up, so 1000 points wasn''t much for him, but it still meant spending a lot of his points. He had been browsing the store as well and saw many different things that he wanted, but if he spent his points upgrading the pet shop, he wouldn''t be able to afford them. But then the system drove the nail into the coffin.


    "If the host upgrades the shop to level 2, you will also unlock new features of the shop and the system."


    Gritting his teeth, Lin Fan finally decided, "Upgrade the shop¡­"


    With a "ding", his hard earned points disappeared in front of his eyes and he lost most of the points that he had saved during this time.


    <o>,m But what came nextpletely made up for it.</o>


    "The shop has been upgraded to level 2."


    "The host has unlocked the egg incubating chamber."


    "The host has unlocked cultivation realm farming."


    "Various other facilities have been upgraded and given new functions."


    Not only had he unlocked various new functions for his existing facilities, he had also gained many several new facilities, but that would have to wait until he was back in the shop.


    For now, Lin Fan took out the employee contract for the Lich King.


    The Lich King quickly read through the contract and then he signed it with his life energy seal.


    He felt the same restriction that Ang had felt when she became an employee, but there was nothing else special about the process.


    Once this was over, Lin Fan suddenly remembered that he hadn''t asked the Lich King his name yet, "So mister Lich King, what do I call you?"


    The Lich King thought it over before saying, "It''s been so long since I''ve been called by my name that I''ve already forgotten it. You should be able to see what my name is on that contract."


    Lin Fan looked down at the contract and he was instantly shocked by the name on it.


    "Your¡­Your¡­Your name is Momonga? You''re a lich and your name is Momonga?" Lin Fan said with a stutter.


    "Momonga, yes that seems to be my name. It''s been such a long time since I''ve heard that name. Thest time I heard it was when I was roaming thend with myrades." Momonga said in a sentimental voice.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Could it be that the name your group had was Ainz Ooal Gown?"


    Momonga looked at Lin Fan in surprise, "How did you know that? Have you heard of us?"


    Lin Fan was thinking, "Bro, please, there''s no otaku in the other world that doesn''t know about you! You''re the freaking Ruler of Death and Ainz Ooal Gown was a name that was feared across thend!"


    But on the surface, he tried to stay calm as he said, "I''ve heard some stories."


    Momonga said to himself in an emotional voice, "In the past, there wasn''t anyone in the world who didn''t know about our guild, but now we''ve faded into the annals of history. All myrades are gone now and I''m the only one left."


    Lin Fan asked, "What happened to yourrades?"


    Momonga said, "In the past, we tried to take over an entirend, but before we could seed, there was a group that gathered these powerful items that could change the world itself and cursed our group. It caused ourrades to slowly fall into a deep sleep and to this day, they haven''t awakened yet. The only reason I didn''t fall asleep was because they gathered all the powerful world changing items we had and gave them to me, granting me immunity to this curse, but I still haven''t found a way to break the curse for them. In the end, we broke the first kingdom we took away from thatnd and created a separate realm with it, which created this necropolis."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan hadn''t read the ending to this particr novel yet, but he really didn''t want to hear any more spoilers. For his own sake, he couldn''t help asking, "Was the name of this kingdom the Re-Estize Kingdom?"


    Momonga was surprised once again, "You really do know your history, I thought you only knew a few stories about us."


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "It was one of the stories I was told."


    But under that smile, he couldn''t help twisting inside, "I can''t believe that this was how that novel ended! Shouldn''t they have taken over the world since they were the most powerful things in it!"


    Momonga saw that Lin Fan had things that he was hiding, but since they were going to be allies from now on, he didn''t keep asking him about it. Instead, he moved over to Ang and said, "Do you really need to keep ring at me like that? We''re going to be allies from now on."


    Ang just coldly red at him as she said with a snort, "Like I would believe that an undead would be able to feel any loyalty. I''ll be keeping my eyes on you and the day you betray us, I will be the one to crush you."


    Momonga just spread his hands while shaking his head. But what he was secretly thinking was that there went his chance to ask this little girl to do some cosy for him. He really wanted to see her dress up as one of those magical girls he had just watched.


    After Lin Fan got over his heartbreak, he came back to his senses and opened up the system panel to see Momonga''s status.


    Name: Momonga


    Race: Elder Lich


    Title: Ruler of Death


    Cultivation: ??? (System''s authority is too low)


    Skills: ??? (System''s authority is too low)


    Combat Strength: >150 (System''s authority is too low)


    Momonga was the ruler of a realm that was on par with the World of Elements, so that meant that he definitely wasn''t weaker than Ang.


    While Lin Fan was looking over Momonga''s status, Momonga was also looking over the system interface that he was given since Ang waspletely ignoring him.


    He was shocked by this system since he couldn''t tell just what kind ofws had created this thing, but he could feel the power of thewsing from it.


    Once they were done with that, Lin Fan asked Momonga, "Momonga, do you have any special ingredients here that I can have?"


    Momonga thought about it before saying, "Well, you can probably tell that not much grows in thisnd of death, but there are some nts that do grow here. The only problem is that they are in the territory of the local rulers and we would have to start a war to get them."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Aren''t you the ruler? Can''t you just make them pay tribute?"


    Momonga said, "I''ve never interfered with the governing of this realm, so they won''t listen to me. However, I do have some nts that do grow in my own territory, so you can have those."


    Lin Fan still insisted since the system had given him a new mission. His new mission was to subjugate this entire realm and unite it under the Lich King.


    Momonga also knew about this mission since it was also given to him, but he said, "While we do have experts, we can''t just take care of those local rulers alone since they haverge armies behind them. Even if Ang and I are strong, our powers are still limited. If you give me some time, I''ll send out the word and gather up an army, then we can start our conquest."


    Lin Fan knew that one individual couldn''t fight an army alone, so he agreed with Momonga''s suggestion.


    Momonga then gave another suggestion, "You told me earlier that we''ll be returning to your world soon, so for now, how about we just explore my territory? We''ll be able to gather resources and you''ll be able to train your pets like you want."


    Lin Fan didn''t see anything wrong with this, so he said, "Alright."


    So for the next few days, Momonga led Lin Fan and Ang on a tour of his territory, collecting different ingredients and fighting different lower tier undead without intelligence, the kind that didn''t know to run away when faced with Momonga''s aura of death.


    Once these few days passed, they went back to the Blue Star.

 32 Chapter 32

    Before heading back to the Blue Star, Lin Fan asked Momonga if he could change his appearance. He couldn''t just bring a giant skeleton back to a human world with him.


    Momonga snapped his skeletal fingers and a vortex of ck energy appeared around him.


    Once that vortex had disappeared, what came out was a handsome looking young man with silver hair and piercing purple eyes.


    The only problem was that Momonga''s sense of fashion was too old, he was wearing clothes that nobles wore in the medieval ages.


    Lin Fan couldn''t just bring someone who looked like he was from the Middle Ages out onto the streets, so he opened his watch and went to find some fashion magazines to give Momonga an example.


    But still, Momonga''s tastes were quite old fashioned as he chose to dress himself in a sleek fitting ck suit.


    Once they were done with that, Lin Fan brought them all back to the Blue Star.


    Momonga''s first reaction was the same as Ang''s as he went around looking over everything while Ang looked at him in disdain.


    Lin Fan on the other hand went into the back to check out the new facilities that he had unlocked.


    One of those was the egg incubating chamber.


    When Lin Fan came into the room, he found a single fountain in the center that was surrounded by several pedestals.


    On each pedestal, there was a ss dome covering the top and there was a ss tube that led from each pedestal to the fountain in the middle.


    Lin Fan couldn''t make any sense of this, so he asked the system, "System, what is this thing?"


    "Host, this is the egg incubating chamber. By cing an egg in the middle and providing it with energy from normal or special ingredients, you have a chance to breed a pet with a rare bloodline."


    "But how does it work exactly?"


    "The egg is ced in the center and the ingredients are ced around in the pedestals, where their energy is extracted to be provided to the egg. The stronger the energy, the rarer the bloodline."


    "So does the system provide any eggs?" Lin Fan asked.


    "The host can purchase eggs from the store for points."


    "Let me rephrase that, does the system give any free eggs?" Lin Fan stressed.


    "The host shouldn''t bezy in supplying the shop. First warning."


    Lin Fan mostly understood what this room was for. He could just purchase normal eggs from different suppliers to breed new pets with decent bloodlines, but for rarer bloodlines, he had to get eggs with rare bloodlines already to upgrade them.


    Still, this meant that there was a new source of revenue for the store even if he did breed a fewmon pets, so it was fine.


    Lin Fan opened his watch and went online to find a few egg suppliers.


    He found a few suppliers for rathermon pet eggs and ordered a few batches to test this incubating chamber with.


    After he was done with that, Lin Fan headed off to the shadow cultivation room.


    After the shop had finished its upgrade, the shadow cultivation room''s function had also been improved.


    When he arrived at the shadow cultivation room, he found Ang and Momonga were also there.


    Lin Fan walked up to the door of the shadow cultivation room and beside the door, there was now a slot for inserting things in.


    Lin Fan asked the system, "What is this slot for?"


    "Host, after the pet shop has been upgraded, a new function was added to the shadow cultivation room. This slot is used for inserting ingredients into the shadow cultivation room."


    "Inserting ingredients? What for?" Lin Fan had a confused look on his face.


    "By inserting ingredients, the shadow cultivation room will gather the energy contained within the ingredients to create a high density energy environment, perfectly suited for training. The attribute of the life energy will depend on the attribute of the ingredients used."


    Lin Fan understood a bit after hearing this exnation, but there was nothing better than trying it out yourself.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan took out the ingredients that he had gathered in the Lich''s Necropolis and put a few down the slot. As he inserted the ingredients, he saw that a bar began to light up beside the slot.


    He continued to insert ingredients until that bar waspletely filled and then Lin Fan walked into the shadow cultivation realm.


    The moment he entered, he was hit in the face by a wave of rich dark life energy. This life energy was even more dense than what the vortex in his dantian could draw in, it really created the best environment for cultivating.


    Lin Fan had heard of some organizations that had life energy gathering arrays to create high density areas perfect for training, but Lin Fan bet that none of them couldpare to the cheat of his system. The only downside was that it had used up quite a few ingredients, but he could always farm for more.


    Ang wasn''t surprised by what Lin Fan was doing since she had seen it before, but Momonga was quite curious so after a while, he followed Lin Fan into the shadow cultivation room.


    Once he came in, there was a shadow lich that had suddenly appeared, releasing a mountain like pressure that almost crushed Lin Fan.


    Since Lin Fan was the owner of the shop, he was able to control every part of the shadow cultivation room. The moment that pressure mmed into him, Lin Fan immediately exited the shadow cultivation realm with a thought and closed the door behind him, but that meant he had also locked Momonga inside.


    Lin Fan went to the control panel and found that the shadow cultivation realm was active.


    "System, what is going on? Is there something wrong with the shadow cultivation realm?"


    "Host, after the shop was upgraded, the shadow cultivation realm''s benefits can now also be enjoyed by the employees."


    "You mean that we can also cultivate in the shadow cultivation realm now too?" Lin Fan was shocked.


    "But wait, why didn''t it activate when I entered the room and only activated when Momonga went in?" Lin Fan once again asked in a confused voice.


    "The host has administrator rights to the shadow cultivation room, so the host can control when it activates. The employees do not have this same right unless the host grants it to them, meaning the shadow cultivation realm will activate automatically when it detects a target for training before they are granted this right."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling sorry for Momonga, it was his first day on the job and he was already being used as a guinea pig. But after thinking about it, he didn''t pity him that much since he was getting a free use of the shadow cultivation realm.


    After a few minutes, Lin Fan turned the shadow cultivation realm off and Momonga was able toe out, but he was covered in all kinds of injuries.


    "Hey, Lin Fan, just what was that?" Momonga said in an aggrieved voice.


    Lin Fan exined the shadow cultivation realm to Momonga and once he was done, Momonga no longer had the same expression as before, he only had shock on his face.


    Momonga closed his eyes and looked over his cultivation, seeing that he was actually strongerpared to before.


    p It had been eons since his cultivation hadst improved, he really couldn''t remember when it hadst happened.</anda>


    But thinking about it, he really shouldn''t have been surprised.


    In the shadow cultivation realm, he was put under pressure in an environment rich in life energy, while fighting an enemy that pointed out all his ws. If he still couldn''t advance in such a perfect cultivation environment, he really should dig a hole to crawl in.


    Ang had also heard Lin Fan''s exnation and she was shocked since she could tell that Momonga was indeed stronger.


    Ang immediately came over and said, "I want to go in as well."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "This is a product for the customers and it costs too much for us to use ourselves. This is a special benefit that employees only get to enjoy once a week at the end of the week, so wait until then."


    Ang didn''t agree with this, but she had no choice since this shop was the shop of that mysterious master, she couldn''t just force Lin Fan to do what she wanted.


    Lin Fan ignored their gazes of desire and went off to explore the other new feature, the cultivation realm farming.


    "Host, the cultivation realm farming means you will receive a low grade cultivation realm to build a farm in and gather resources for the shop."


    "You mean I''m using an entire world as a farm?" Lin Fan was shocked.


    "Host, it is only a low grade cultivation realm."


    "Still, that''s an entire world!"


    When Lin Fan opened the system interface for the cultivation realm farm, he was once again filled with shock.

 33 Chapter 33

    What appeared in front of Lin Fan''s eyes was the same interface used for Starcraft 2.


    The only thing that was different was that there was only a single race to choose from, the Terrans.


    Lin Fan looked at the other two races and fell into thought. Terrans in the game were humans with technology, which is what the human government was. The Zergs were bug creatures that focused on quick production and quickly spreading, which is simr to the Bug Race that he had heard about. As for the Protoss, they were beings that had names that mean divine race, which meant that the closest thing to them were probably gods.


    Lin Fan had heard the term God Realm many times from Ang and Momonga, so he was quite sure that gods were the ultimate beings in this world.


    Since he was ying as the Terrans, wouldn''t that mean that he would be meeting Zergs and Protosses in the future?


    The Zergs were like the Bug Race that were infamous in the universe for swarmings andpletely devouring them, creating new hives that created new swarms, but they were a normal race and Lin Fan could deal with them.


    However, facing the Protoss meant facing the strongest race in the universe!


    ? Lin Fan began sincerely praying that he wouldn''t have to face the Protoss in the future.


    After this little aside, Lin Fan finally came back to the main topic which was trying out the cultivation realm farm.


    When he tried to activate it, the system spoke up to give him advice.


    "Host, please note that it is advised to be sitting when activating the cultivation realm farm system."


    "Sitting?" Lin Fan was confused, "Why do I need to be sitting?"


    "It is advised that the host is sitting when activating the cultivation realm farming system." The system repeated.


    Lin Fan was confused, but he still followed the system''s instructions.


    After sitting down, he pressed the start button on the system interface and it felt like he was pulled out of his chair, flying straight forward. It was a whole minute before he finally could see what was around him.


    Lin Fan had been pulled into another world where he found himself in a forest, but this time it was different from when he went into the cultivation realms before. This time he had appeared in the ghost form that he normally took when he died.


    When he tried to open the system, all that he saw was arge start button on the system interface and nothing else.


    "System, what is going on?" Lin Fan asked.


    However, the only answer he received was silence from the system and arge start button on the system interface.


    Since he had no other choice, Lin Fan pressed the button.


    "Wee, wee to the cultivation realm farming tutorial! Wee to our yer!"


    Lin Fan waspletely shocked by this! Who was this system! This definitely wasn''t his system!


    "Are you a new yer or a returning yer?"


    Two options appeared on the system interface.


    Lin Fan wanted to say that he was an experienced yer since he had yed his fair share of Starcraft 2 back on earth, but he still pressed the new yer option since this was something that waspletely different.


    "Wee new yer! Please follow the instructions for this tutorial campaign."


    The system interface expanded and soon wrapped him up like an egg, bing something that was simr to a virtual reality game pod that he had read about in novels.


    The game interface lit up in front of him and he was given the option to bring out 2 SCVs first, while also giving him a stash of resources needed to build amand center.


    While this game interface seemed like the normal Starcraft 2 interface, there were also many things that were different. Instead of normal minerals and Vespene Gas, there were many different resources bars like food, building materials, energy, and other bars.


    For now, Lin Fan chose to summon the two SCVs to build themand center so he could start colonizing the world.


    When the two SCVs came out, Lin Fan went up to them and found that there was actually someone piloting them. When he came up to the pilot, the pilot had a nk expression on his face and didn''t react to anything at all. It was like he had been turned into a puppet.


    "System, are you taking people and turning them into puppets?" Lin Fan said in a shocked voice.


    The system couldn''t ignore it this time and specially said, "Host, please stop thinking nonsense. The pilots are human shaped puppets made by the system using natural ingredients and not corpses. First warning."


    "But they really do seem like real humans¡­" Lin Fan said in a doubtful voice.


    "Host, that is because of the system''s skilled craftsmanship."<sub> </sub>


    "Alright¡­" Lin Fan said, but he was still feeling doubtful.


    The system had given him just enough resources to build a singlemand center, so he found an area that had an open field in the middle of the forest and had the SCVs put down themand center.


    "Congrattions to the new yer on building your firstmand center. Now you have to gather resources to continue building more SCVs and more buildings."


    Once the tutorial system''s voice fell, there was a window that appeared on the top left of Lin Fan''s field of view that had a quest in it.


    "Build 16 SCVs. 2/16."


    "Build supply depots."


    While it was a bit different, this seemed like the normal Starcraft 2 Terran tutorial that he had yed before, but Lin Fan knew that it wouldn''t be that simple.


    Since he was done with themand center, he knew now that his next job was to collect resources to build more SCVs and then he would use those resources to build a barrack to build marines.


    Lin Fan clicked on the SCVs in his game interface and had them go around collecting the stones and metals needed to build the next SCV.


    When it was time to build that next SCV, the moment he pushed the button, parts of themand center began churning and turning. After a while, it pushed out another SCV that was like the others.


    Once the next SCV was done, Lin Fan had it start collecting ingredients instead of rocks and metal because he knew that he would need itter.


    Lin Fan continued this cycle of having SCVs gather rocks, metals, and ingredients until he was up to his sixth SCV.


    Based on the tutorial that he had yed back on earth, once he had built enough SCVs, it would be time to build a barrack to defend against invaders. So before the tutorial even prompted him to build the barracks, Lin Fan saved up enough to build it before building his next SCV.


    Once the SCV assigned finished the barracks, Lin Fan clicked on it and saw that he was right to gather ingredients since it required ingredients to build marines and reapers.


    Lin Fan immediately put two marines in the queue before moving onto his next SCV.


    When the marines were done, what came out were two standard issue marines that had the same armour as the marines in the game. The only difference was that these marines didn''t have gauss rifles that normal marines had, instead they came out with a Chinese sword.


    When Lin Fan released his spiritual sense over these marines, he could tell that they were in the low Bronze Realm.


    Marines were considered the most basic out of all the Terran troops, but even this marine was in the Bronze Realm.


    But then again that raised another question. If these marines didn''t use guns, what about theter Terran troops like the siege tanks that reliedpletely on heavy artillery?


    Still, that was a question forter.


    Once Lin Fan finished the mission, the next mission was to build a barrack and create three marines.


    As soon as Lin Fan finished thest marine, there was a wolf that suddenly appeared to attack hismand center, but this wolf was only in the peak Iron Realm and was quickly disposed of by the marines.


    Once the marines finished off the wolf, they dragged it back to themand center where it was processed by an SCV.


    Only then did Lin Fan remember that this was a farm.


    "System, what happens to the ingredients gathered by the SCVs?" Lin Fan asked.


    "Host, they will be stored in the pet shop''s storage to be used at the various pet shop facilities or to be used to build more units in the cultivation realm farm."


    This was what Lin Fan had expected.


    Basically this was a game/farm where he used units to gather the resources of this world, but still that was exciting since that was an entire world''s resource!


    While this was a low cultivation realm, based on the information provided by the system, Lin Fan knew that the resources in this world were alreadyparable to the Blue Star.


    He had an entire as his farm, that really was taking things too far.


    After ying around with the interface for a bit, Lin Fan set the SCVs on auto collect while creating a few more marines to patrol the area that he set for the SCVs to mine in.


    Once it was done, he would receive a notification and he would be able toe back to give new orders.


    After taking care of everything, Lin Fan headed back home.

 34 Chapter 34

    When Lin Fan came back, there was nothing else to do, so he closed the store and headed home to cultivate.


    After a good night''s rest, Lin Fan came back to the store early in the morning to find the wholesale suppliers already waiting outside. Among the wholesalers, there was Wang Ning standing there with her dad.


    Ever since her dad had heard that she was friends with the owner of the store, she had been dragged here every single day to buy ingredients. Her dad kept pushing her towards Lin Fan in hopes that he would receive a special discount or special treatment, but that never worked in front of Lin Fan who had the emotional capacity of a block of wood.


    Of course, Wang Ning didn''t want anything to happen either since she still thought that Luo Qing was interested in Lin Fan.


    Whenever she came, she always asked Lin Fan about his nights with Luo Qing since her best friend had of course told her that she had been dragged to Lin Fan''s house day after day.


    Lin Fan normally would ignore everything that people said about love, but after every single thing that had happened between him and Luo Qing, Lin Fan really couldn''t help losing his cool a bit when Wang Ning teased him.


    After sending off all the wholesalers that came in the morning, the store entered a period of lull.


    Since it was a weekday, even the usual customer who never left Murong Quan was gone since he still had to go to school.


    Lin Fan took this time to check the cultivation realm farm and found that his orders had been finished, so he gave them a few new orders.


    Looking over the inventory gained, Lin Fan was disappointed since there was only a single special ingredient found. It seemed like he would have to keep going into high grade cultivation realms to gather special ingredients, but it did make sense that he didn''t find any since this was just a low grade cultivation realm.


    From time to time, there would be a seeker or two that had heard of Lin Fan''s fame that came to check his store, but they were quickly scared off by his high prices and his famous smile.


    During this period, Ang was doing her usual thing of teasing the few pets that they did receive or ying around with the watch that Lin Fan had got her. During these times, it really made her look like a teenage girl who was bored during her job. No one would have thought that underneath that sweet appearance, there was an angel of death.


    As for Momonga, he had gotten quite close with Brainy.


    Brainy aftering out of the nar crack had been exploring the inte with theptop that Lin Fan had left. Brainy was someone who possessed the Queen of Knowledge bloodline, so of course Brainy was someone that learned quite fast.


    After skimming through the inte, Brainy had learned the majority of the humannguage, just still not understanding a few idioms and ng that people used.


    However, since Brainy didn''t have vocal cords and it couldn''t use the vines it was made up of to create some even though it could take many different forms with its vines, Brainymunicated through writing with the electronic notepad that Lin Fan had ordered for it.


    Currently Momonga and Brainy were focused on their chess match and based on the other strategic board games on the side, it seemed like they had been going for quite some time.


    Lin Fan was about to get up and move over to see who was winning, but the bell over the door suddenly rang and attracted his attention.


    When Lin Fan turned over, he saw an old man walking in and he paid no more attention to him.


    However, if he had looked closer, he would have seen that while this old man''s clothes were quite ordinary, they were actually made of the finest materials. As well, there was an aura around this old man that made himpletely different from normal people.


    Ang and Momonga would have been able to tell instantly what this was, but they didn''t pay any more attention to this old man since they considered all humans beneath them, with the exception to Lin Fan and his mysterious master.


    This old man was actually a Legendary Realm Expert, namely the Legendary Realm Expert that had been sent by the Union Government to close the nar crack.<sub> </sub>


    After he had heard that a young man who wasn''t even twenty yet had defeated nine Gold Realm Beasts and a mutated beast, as well as being able to tame three pets that were in the Gold Realm, he knew that this young man was a genius.


    The reason he hade today was to see this talented young man and if he was as talented as everyone said, he nned on taking him as a disciple. To be more urate, this old man was nearing the end of his life and he didn''t see hope in breaking through even if he left this world, so he wanted to leave everything to a final disciple.


    But the old man was disappointed the moment he came into the shop because of how ordinary it looked.


    While the shop did look quite well decorated despite where it was located, it seemed like there was nothing special about it.


    The old man continued to look over the shop and remained unimpressed until his eyes fell onto Momonga and Brainy.


    He was shocked to find that this silver haired young man was actually ying chess with this vine snake. The fact that the vine snake could actually y chess meant that it was a pet that had developed intelligence and it seemed like it wasn''t just normal intelligence, it seemed to be supreme intelligence which made a pet as smart as a human. This was a skill that was only obtained when a beast underwent a mutation.


    On this Blue Star, there were few pets that were like this. Even on the that was on a higher realmpared to this, there were few pets like this.


    Mutated beasts were much stronger than normal beasts, so to tame one, it required one to have immense strength and willpower, all of which were signs of great talent.


    But after he got over his shock of Brainy, the old man''s eyes drifted over to the silver haired man and he felt even more shock than when he saw Brainy.


    What shocked him was that he couldn''t see through this silver haired man no matter how hard he tried, it was like it was a bottomless abyss that he couldn''t see into.


    There were only two exnations for this. One was that this silver haired man had a strong technique for hiding his cultivation that was at a level that surpassed his senses. Two was that this silver haired man was actually at a higher level of cultivation than him.


    p If it was thetter, this would have shattered his world views since this silver haired man looked like someone who was just entering his twenties. It was a good thing that this old man didn''t know that this silver haired man was someone who was more than a million times his age.</anda>


    The old man continued looking over the shop and his eyes soon turned to Ang. Just like the silver haired man, he found that he couldn''t see through this ck haired teenage girl either.


    This was a girl who was only in her teens and yet he couldn''t see through her cultivation, what could it mean?


    Just what was with this shop?!


    The old man moved over to where Momonga and Brainy were having their chess match and he asked Momonga, "Young man, is this your pet that you''re ying chess with?"


    Momonga had felt this old man trying to probe him again and again, which he did find a bit annoying, but he still calmly said, "No, it''s the pet of the owner. He''s the young man standing over there." After saying that, he pointed to Lin Fan.


    The old man turned over to Lin Fan and he could tell that Lin Fan was already in the Gold Realm based on his spiritual energy.


    The incident had only happened over a week ago and during that incident, the records stated that Lin Fan was someone at the peak of the Silver Realm who could fight a mutated Gold Realm beast!


    It only took a single week for him to jump from the peak of the Silver Realm into the Gold Realm! This was talent that couldn''t be described with words, this was evenparable to the top geniuses in the upper realm!


    The old man moved over to Lin Fan who looked at him with a wary gaze since he was a bit put off by the overly warm gaze the old man gave him and the old man said, "Young man, do you want to be my disciple?"

 35 Chapter 35

    When the old man said this, everyone in the shop looked over at him in surprise.


    Momonga and Ang looked at this old man like he was crazy.


    Lin Fan was already the disciple of a master from the God Realm and this human that was just barely over the line for the Legendary Realm was asking Lin Fan to be his disciple instead?


    Wasn''t this the biggest joke in the world?


    It would be like presenting trash in front of the richest man in the world and iming it was the best.


    As for Lin Fan, he looked at the old man with one brow raised.


    Lin Fan could tell that this old man was powerful, he was someone who was at least in the tinum Realm since Lin Fan couldn''t see through him with his Gold Realm cultivation.


    But what did that matter in the end?


    There were two experts beyond the Legendary Realm already in the store and he had the system that could controlws behind him. Why did he need this tinum Realm old man to teach him when he could just learn from them and the system?


    Still, this old man did have some power on this and Lin Fan had no reason to offend him for no reason.


    Lin Fan politely said, "This sir, I don''t know why you are asking me to be your disciple, but unfortunately I have to decline."


    The old man already expected this, but he still didn''t give up, "I know that you already have a master and he''s probably stronger than me based on the situation of this store, but there are things that I can give you that he can''t. Moreover, I''m not that stingy, I''m willing to share a disciple with your master."


    The old man knew that any store with two experts who he couldn''t see through wasn''t simple and then there was the master behind them, however such a store clearly couldn''t be a local power. He knew all the local powers and for three Legendary Realm experts to suddenly appear, the only exnation was that it was a force that came from another realm that was on the Blue Star for some reason.


    However, he had also done a check on the store and found that Lin Fan was indeed a local of the Blue Star. Lin Fan''s entire family came from the Blue Star and still lived here, so that meant that he could use the influence he had on the Blue Star to help them, which would definitely be tempting to Lin Fan.


    But what he never expected to happen still happened.


    Lin Fan still said, "Sir, I thank you for your kind intentions, but I''m really not looking for a master right now."


    The old man still wouldn''t give up, "Kid, I know that your master is powerful, but I''m not a slouch either. Moreover, I know that your master is not someone from this, so there are plenty of things that I can do that he can''t. For example, I am a Legendary Realm Expert affiliated with the Union Government, so there are many things I can help you take care of."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this. This old man was actually a Legendary Realm Expert!


    His mind quickly turned and he remembered Boss Gao telling him that the Union Government was sending a Legendary Realm Expert to close the nar crack, so it was no wonder this old man knew so much about him.


    Still Lin Fan had no reason to ept.


    Moreover, if he did ept, this old man might start snooping around the store on the pretense that he was his master, which would make it harder for him to keep his secret.


    Once again, Lin Fan still rejected the old man, "Sir, I know that you are a powerful expert and have influence, but I am just a small pet shop owner. I''m not qualified to be your disciple."


    Yet still the old man didn''t give up, "Kid, I can tell that it is fate for us to meet. You are someone with talent that is found once in a thousand years, you need someone to guide you along your way, someone like me. I promise you now that you will be my final disciple and will inherit everything that I own."


    The more the old man tried to convince Lin Fan, the more he sounded like a scammer. It soon reached a point where Lin Fan started doubting whether this old man had other motive for wanting him as a disciple.


    Still Lin Fan was firm in his rejection, "Sir, I know you mean well, but unfortunately the fate between us isn''t there."


    The old man came forward to grab Lin Fan''s shoulder when Lin Fan turned to go to the back and he squeezed a bit harder than he meant to squeeze, but it felt like he was squeezing steel!


    This was a young man in the Gold Realm, yet his body wasparable to the Legendary Realm!


    What was this? Just where was he?


    Of course, his actions didn''t escape the eyes of Momonga and Ang. Lin Fan was the one who brought them to this store and slowly they had be close friends. There was even an ambiguous part in the rtionship between Ang and Lin Fan¡­


    Lin Fan felt a bit of paining from this shoulder. A Legendary Realm Expert really was a Legendary Realm Expert, he really did have the strength to back it up.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan turned and said, "Sir, you are disturbing my business. If you aren''t here to buy anything, please leave."


    At this, Momonga and Ang were about toe over to help him, but Lin Fan turned and shook his head slightly to stop them.


    The old man didn''t miss the small actions that Momonga and Ang had taken, so he pulled his hand back. He wasn''t here to offend, he just wanted Lin Fan as his disciple and maybe make a connection to the master of this shop.


    So the old man''s mind quickly turned and he tried toe up with another way to show off to Lin Fan.


    Right away, he came up with an idea. Since he couldn''t convince Lin Fan with his strength or his status, he could at least try convincing him with money, "Who says I''m not here to buy anything."


    After that, he moved over to the special ingredients and read over their description until his eyes fell onto the True Spirit Vine.


    An elixir that could increase the intelligence of a pet, this True Spirit Vine was something that he had only seen once in an auction of items from the upper realm, yet he saw one being sold here today.


    "Hey, kid, are you serious about selling this thing?" The old man pointed at the True Spirit Vine.


    Lin Fan turned to look at what he was pointing and then his eyes lit up as he revealed his usual smile, "Of course, all items on disy are for sale."


    The old man immediately said, "Are you sure that this is the price you want to sell it at?"


    Lin Fan''s lips twitched and he said to the system in his mind, "See? Even the customers think that it''s too cheap!"


    "Host, don''t be greedy. First warning."


    Lin Fan had no choice since the system had spoken, "Yes, this is the price we''re selling it at."


    The old man tried to act calm, but there was a trace of excitement in his voice, "I''ll take it!"


    The old man quickly transferred a million crystals, which Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling emotional about. A Legendary Realm Expert really was rich!


    Once he received the packed True Spirit Vine, the old man asked again, "Kid, are you sure you don''t want to be my disciple?"


    ? Lin Fan just said with a smile, "Sir, I''m sorry, but I really am not interested right now."


    Hearing this, the old man just gave a sigh and said nothing else as he walked out.


    Once the old man was gone, Ang suddenly asked to take a break and headed out the shop with a strange look on her face.


    Lin Fan was curious, but he didn''t pry since he respected her privacy.


    ¡­


    The old man felt someone trailing him after he went out of the shop, so he turned into an alley and waited.


    After a minute, Ang suddenly appeared in front of him.


    The old man said, "This young miss, aren''t you the one from the store? Why are you following me?"


    Ang had a slightly angry look on her face as she said, "You hurt him just now, so you deserve to be punished."


    The old man had a confused look, "What are you¡­"


    But before he could even finish, he felt arge forcee down on him and he was mmed into the ground, spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    When he came out of the hole, Ang was gone, but the fear inside him hadn''t faded yet.

 36 Chapter 36

    After the appearance of the old man, there was nothing else special that happened that day.


    Once thest customer was gone, Lin Fan closed up the shop before heading over to Brainy.


    Brainy and Momonga had been ying games the entire day and they still showed no signs of getting tired, but they did stop when Lin Fan came over.


    Brainy could tell that Lin Fan was here for it because they were continuing their nightly business.


    Ever since Lin Fan hade back from the nar crack, he hadn''t forgotten about the greedy seekers that had ideas towards him.


    Brainy only took a single night to learn the humannguage, so Lin Fan had been using its special ability to take care of these seekers. Namely, he had been using Brainy''s Parasite Seeds to track and kill them.


    Brainy''s Parasite Seed could be injected into a victim''s body and then it sprouts along their nervous system, allowing Brainy to gain ess to their brain and control their body. Brainy''s seeds were well hidden, lying along the nerves of the body and the spine, so they couldn''t be easily discerned.


    The first thing Lin Fan had Brainy do was inject a Parasite Seed into Xiao Zi at the Seekers Guild, that way he would have ess to the information of each seeker that had cast their greedy and unkind gazes onto him.


    Once he had all this information, Lin Fan had injected Parasite Seeds into these seekers one by one. He had Brainy gather information on what they had been doing through these seeds before taking care of them one by one.


    Of course, if he started a ughter of these seekers who were all seekers that he had saved from the nar crack, he would have be the prime suspect. So Lin Fan had been careful in his methods of killing these seekers.


    It was a good thing that most of these seekers were in the Iron Realm with only a few in the Bronze Realm, which meant that Brainy could easily control them with its peak Silver Realm cultivation.


    Another good thing was that most of the seekers that Lin Fan targeted were seekers with bad reputations, so it was quite easy for him to create "idents".


    One example was a seeker who had a connection to a local gang, which made his disposal very easy.


    That seeker was brought to the gang''s hideout and then Brainy used the Explosive Seed skill to blow up the Parasite Seed that it had injected in that seeker, blowing up that seeker and the gang itself.


    In the paper the next morning, Lin Fan had noticed a small report where the authorities suspected that it was a surprise attack from another gang that created this explosion.


    Another example was this seeker who was publicly known to have a bad rtionship with his wife.


    Lin Fan had Brainy inject the wife with a seed and had the wife kill the husband in a very loud manner. Once the deed was done and the wife was arrested, Lin Fan also had Brainy make the wifemit suicide to erase all traces.


    Cases like this had been happening over the past few nights, but they had been treated as normal urrences since these were the scenes Lin Fan created.


    Tonight, there would be another death.


    Brainy raised its electronic notepad that said, "I already found the next target, but you won''t like where they are."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this, but he still asked, "Where are they?"


    Brainy wrote, "The seed hasn''t spread enough for me to control them yet, but they were taken this afternoon. They were taken to a hidden location, but I tracked them with the seed and found that they were taken to the house of the Zhao Family."


    Lin Fan didn''t recognize this name, "Zhao Family?"


    Brainy exined, "They''re one of the top rank noble families of the west side, it''s said that they currently have five Gold Realm Experts in their family alone."


    "So what did they take our target for?" Lin Fan asked.


    Brainy continued, "The target was bragging about how he had found a supreme treasure at the bar which was overheard by the Zhao Family. They had investigated the nar crack incident, so they had some idea of the Qilin Bone, but they didn''t know who was the one who had it. Hearing what the target said, they figured that they could get some more information from the target."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan fell into thought before asking, "Are you able to keep the target silent at all?"


    Brainy shook its vine head, "No, unless I forcefully do it by exposing the seed and blowing up the victim, but that will raise suspicion that could lead back to us."


    "But if you don''t, it''ll attract the attention of a noble family to us." Lin Fan argued back.


    Brainy carefully wrote down, "Compared to attracting the attention of the Union Government and being condemned as a criminal for killing all those seekers from before, a noble family is something that we can handle with our current capacity. Moreover, there was the Legendary Realm old man from earlier today. With how passionate he was in taking you in as his disciple, I''m certain that he would be willing to help us put pressure on them if something did happen."


    Lin Fan considered it and thought that Brainy was right.


    "Alright, we''ll go with your n then. Then again, what is your n?"


    Brainy said, "I''ll listen and learn their n, then we can adjust our actions ordingly. I''m certain that they''ll "take care" of the one we want to take care of when they''re done with their questioning, so that saves us the trouble. But since it''s only a single noble family, they should have some qualms about offending our shop as long as we show them a bit of our strength. They won''t rashly charge into a shop that they know nothing about and that should stall it out long enough for us to gain more power."


    Lin Fan nodded his head in thought before saying, "Brainy, you are right. It really was a good thing that I found someone as smart and useful as you."


    On the side, Momonga revealed an aggrieved look. While he didn''t have the same parasite ability as Brainy, he did have plenty of skills that allowed him to manipte souls that would have achieved the same effect and he was just as smart as Brainy, actually he was even smarter than Brainy with his umtion of knowledge over time.


    But what they never expected was that when it rained, it poured.


    ¡­


    At a certain banquet.


    The mysterious old man that had been at the pet shop earlier was attending as the guest of honour.


    "Lord Mu, what happened to you?" Someone asked in a concerned voice.


    Ang''s beating hadn''t seriously injured Mu Bo Hai, but she did make sure to leave a mark so he learned his lesson.


    On the right side of Mu Bo Hai''s face, there was arge panda eye that looked quite prominent. With how dark it was, one could tell that it must have hurt quite a bit.


    After reaching the Legendary Realm, one''s body should have be much stronger than normal and should have healed much faster as well, but no matter how Mu Bo Hai used his life energy, the ck eye wouldn''t disappear.


    Whenever he sent his life energy to his eye, there was something that fought back and scattered it. However, he could tell that it was dissipating slowly and in three days, it would bepletely gone.


    Thinking of this, his heart couldn''t help trembling in fear.


    Just what was that shop? Even that little girl in her teens was that powerful?


    Mu Bo Hai said, "It''s nothing, it was just an ident during training."


    The surrounding people had doubtful looks on their faces, but they didn''t press this matter.


    This was a banquet that gathered the most powerful forces in Wind Snow City in a single room and it was all being held for Mu Bo Hai, so most of the guests were gathered around him with a few talking amongst themselves on the side. To be qualified toe to this banquet, one had to be at least the direct descendant of a noble family.


    Mu Bo Hai had been thinking about how to leave an impression on Lin Fan and his master and after thinking for an entire afternoon, he hade up with an idea that he considered brilliant.


    Mu Bo Hai changed the topic, "Have you guys ever heard of this pet shop before?"

 37 Chapter 37

    The next morning was normal for the store, but Lin Fan had his guard up a bit since he was expecting the Zhao Family toe at any moment.


    After sending off the daily crowd in the morning, the store fell into silence once again.


    But what he never expected was that when it rained, it poured.


    After a quiet morning, there was a sudden wave of people who came at the beginning of the afternoon.


    Before they even came in, there were two groups that stopped in front of each other outside, ring at one another without saying a word before entering the shop, trying to ignore the other party as much as possible.


    There was also one person who ignored both sides and came in alone, wandering around the shop like he was looking for something.


    This sudden influx of customers naturally caught Lin Fan''s attention.


    But it didn''t just stop there, as more and more customers continued to enter the shop. There were some that were like the first two groups, ring at each other before wandering around the shop on their own. There were also some that came together to talk when they saw a certain group, like they had been long time friends.


    Of course, there was an uneasiness that filled the shop as everyone was on guard against each other.


    After a few groups hade, Brainy sent a signal to Lin Fan, telling him that the Zhao Family was also here.


    The member of the Zhao Family sent here was very surprised to see so many people that he knew and they weren''t just normal people.


    The Zhao Family hadn''t gone to the banquetst night, so this member that hade today didn''t know why there were so many nobles gathered in this shop today. He had thought that just a little disy of strength would be enough to scare Lin Fan into handing over the treasure, but now it seemed like he needed to be careful.


    All the other families were being wary of each other. Naturally they hade from the Mu Bo Hai''s rmendation, but so far they hadn''t seen anything that made them believe this store was worth this rmendation, but no one dared to take Mu Bo Hai''s words lightly, especially with how he praised this store.


    Some of the smarter people sent out their spiritual senses, but they found that they couldn''t find a single thing from the owner nor could they send their senses into the back. Rather when their spiritual senses touched Lin Fan, it triggered a strong reaction that instantly scattered their spiritual senses.


    All of them were direct descendants of noble families, which meant that the weakest among them were still in the low Silver Realm. However, they still couldn''t see through Lin Fan. They were slowlying to understand why Mu Bo Hai had been filled with praise for this shop, it didn''t seem as simple as it seemed.


    Finally, one of the more impatient young masters couldn''t take it anymore and he came up to Lin Fan, arrogantly saying, "Hey shopkeeper, why would Lord Mu rmend a rundown store like yours?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused look as he said, "Lord Mu, who is that?"


    The young master gave a snort before taking out his token, "Do you see this? This is the token of the Ding Family, one of the top noble families in this city. I''ll give you one chance, sell this store to me or don''t me me for being impolite."


    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows as he looked at this Young Master Ding like he was looking at an idiot.


    On the side, the ones who had tried using their spiritual sense to see through Lin Fan looked on with expectation. Since there was someone dumb enough to take the lead, why wouldn''t they use him to test Lin Fan?


    As for the rest of the people, some were angry that they didn''t take the first step and there were some that were waiting to see what happened.


    The Ding Family was actually only a middle ranked noble family, so there were plenty of other noble families who were confident in dealing with him. Even if the Ding Family got this store from that weak looking owner, they could just plot to take it from the Ding Family before they could offer it to Lord Mu.


    Lin Fan just asked with a frown, "What are you talking about? Why would I sell my store?"


    Young Master Ding gave a cold snort, "You''re just a simple store owner and you''re asking this many questions? Well I''ll tell you now that your store for some reason has attracted the attention of the great Lord Mu, a Legendary Realm Expert! That''s right, a Legendary Realm Expert! If you give me this store now, I''ll be sure to mention you when I offer it to Lord Mu."


    Young Master Ding said all this since he wanted to use Lord Mu to scare this little shop owner into giving up his store for free. Since he would be getting on Lord Mu''s good side this time, why not start reaping the rewards now?<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan knit his brows even deeper. That old man yesterday had just asked him to be his disciple and now he was sending nobles toe take his store? How could someone change faces that fast?


    Lin Fan just had a cold look on his face as he said, "What if I don''t want to give up my store?"


    Young Master Ding narrowed his eyes and looked at him with disdain, "Do you have a say in this? A little ant like you can''t do a single thing."


    Lin Fan had a dangerous glint in his eyes, "You''ll find that this little ant can do more than you think."


    Young Master Ding''s expression immediately turned to rage when he heard what Lin Fan said. This piece of trash was daring to talk back and threaten him? Him, the young master of the prestigious Ding Family?!


    Young Master Ding just ignored Lin Fan and turned to hisckeys, "Break his legs and take the deed to the shop, then throw him out."


    Theckeys moved towards Lin Fan with their hands raised. Theseckeys weren''t considered weak since they were in the Bronze Realm, but in front of Lin Fan, they were just like pieces of paper.


    Lin Fan could have just had the store defenses take care of these idiots, but he decided to show off a bit of his strength to deter the others. He could tell that the other customers were also from noble families and they were quite focused on the results of this. Since they wanted to test his store, he would give them a show.


    When theckeys were about to put their hands on Lin Fan, he suddenly grabbed the hand that was about to touch him and twisted theckey in the air before mming him onto the second closestckey.


    Theckeys couldn''t even react in time and by the time they knew what was going on, theckeys were already lying on the ground and Lin Fan was back in his original position.


    Lin Fan looked at Young Master Ding with a raised brow and asked, "Just with you?"


    A vein popped out on Young Master Ding''s forehead as he slowly lost his temper, "You dare attack members of my Ding Family? Do you know what you have just done?"


    Lin Fan just said, "So what if you''re the Ding Family, you think I''m easy to bully?"


    Young Master Ding released his silver life energy and charged out at Lin Fan without saying a word.


    As his fist approached Lin Fan''s face, Lin Fan suddenly disappeared from in front of him and he felt his arm being pulled by something as it was pulled behind him.


    When Young Master Ding realized what had happened, Lin Fan had him trapped with his arm being forced behind him.


    Young Master Ding tried to say, "You, you dare to¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan pushed his arm higher until it snapped before letting go.


    Young Master Ding screamed in pain as he clutched his arm before looking at Lin Fan with a gaze of rage, but Lin Fan didn''t let him do a single thing.


    With a single kick from Lin Fan, he snapped the bone in Young Master Ding''s other arm.


    Young Master Ding was slouched over on the ground with both hands hanging weakly at his side as he screamed in pain.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about this at all as he picked up Young Master Ding and hisckeys. He carried Young Master Ding and theckeys over to the door and then threw them out before turning to everyone else in the store, while releasing his life energy.


    Being surrounded in that gold life energy, Lin Fan said, "Anyone else?"


    But all that answered him was silence.

 38 Chapter 38

    Everyone in the store looked at each other in nk dismay, they never expected that the owner of this store was a Gold Realm Expert!


    Just by being a Gold Realm Expert, he could apply to create his own noble family and receive benefits from the Union Government, but he was actually spending his time running a pet shop.


    If there was even a Gold Realm Expert running the shop, just what other secrets was this shop hiding?


    On the side, Momonga and Ang found what they watched funny. These weak humans were already this shocked by the weak Lin Fan, they really didn''t know how big the world was.


    Seeing that no one else wasing forward to challenge him, Lin Fan moved back to the counter and sat back down, watching everyone in his store.


    The smarter ones that had tried probing Lin Fan weren''t surprised by this at all since they figured that something like this was normal. This was a shop rmended by that Lord Mu, how could it be anything but extraordinary?


    As for the others who were just watching the fun or had other ns, they werepletely shocked since they never expected Lin Fan to be this strong.


    In the end, they came to the same conclusion as the smarter people. This was a shop rmended by that Lord Mu, how could it be anything but extraordinary?


    With this change in mentality, the young masters began looking around the shop seriously and they found the special ingredients.


    Being from noble families, they of course had an understanding of high ss ingredients, but they were also spoiled children so they had no idea of the price.  Their followers on the other hand were capable people, so when they asked their followers about the prices, they learned that this ce was selling these items at a very cheap price.


    Once they learned of this, the young masters began concocting ns to bring these elixirs back to their families and earning credit from their family heads.


    As for the young master of the Zhao Family, he went outside where he found the Young Master Ding being treated by his followers.


    Young Master Zhao came over to help Young Master Ding up, which surprised Young Master Ding, but he had no time to care with the pain in his arms.


    Young Master Zhao brought Young Master Ding to the closest hospital and after Young Master Ding''s injuries were treated, they began having a secret conversation.


    Young Master Ding first said, "Many thanks to Brother Zhao for bringing me to the hospital."


    Young Master Zhao said in a humble voice, "Young Master Ding, it''s nothing, it''s nothing."


    After that Young Master Ding''s eyes turned serious, "Young Master Zhao, is there something you need from me?"


    Young Master Ding was a bit hotheaded, but that didn''t mean that he was an idiot. Once he had calmed down, he could easily see that Young Master Zhao had other motives.


    Young Master Zhao came closer and lowered his voice, "Young Master Ding, you''ve seen how strong that shop''s owner is, but if our families work together¡­"


    ¡­


    Meanwhile in the store, there were fights that were starting between the young masters over the elixirs, but most of them kept it civil.


    That was until the argument between two young masters had reached a point where they were about to start a fight.


    At that point, Lin Fan had no choice but to interfere.


    Lin Fan came over and said with a cold look, "Alright you two, break it up or you''ll be cklisted from this store like that fellow with the broken arms."


    The two young masters shuddered when they thought of what had happened to Young Master Ding earlier.


    Young Master Duanmu was a rather proud person, so while he didn''t have any thoughts of fighting Lin Fan since he knew he couldn''t win, he still wouldn''t show a weak side to him. After matching Lin Fan''s gaze, Young Master Duanmu just gave a snort before walking away.


    As for the other young master, Young Master Situ revealed a smile as he came over to Lin Fan, cupping his hands as he said, "Brother Lin, I''ve troubled you."


    Lin Fan just looked at him with narrowed eyes before saying, "Just follow the rules of the store."<sub> </sub>


    Young Master Situ came closer with a ttering smile as he said, "Of course, of course, but I do have a question that I wonder if Brother Lin can answer."


    Lin Fan was the owner of the store, so he had to answer the questions of the customers, but he didn''t have a good impression of this Young Master Situ.


    Still Lin Fan said, "Ask."


    Young Master Situ leaned in even closer as he lowered his voice, "Brother Lin, do you harvest your own stock or do you have a supplier?"


    The people that were smarter had been listening the whole time and of course this was something that they wanted the answer to as well. If they could create a contact with a supplier that provided them elixirs of such quality as these low prices, they would be able to consolidate their power in their families.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look over this Young Master Situ before calmly saying, "I get my own stock."


    Young Master Situ had a trace of disappointment sh in his eyes, but he quickly recovered before saying, "Then Brother Lin, are you interested in cooperating with me? My Situ Family has many connections that would make distributing your stock much easier."


    Lin Fan knew what this Young Master Situ was up to, but he could still use this kind of people, "For now, I don''t have enough stock to discuss cooperating with Young Master Situ, but we might be able to discuss something in the future."


    Young Master Situ wasn''t disappointed when he heard this, Lin Fan clearly had his secrets and if he pulled too hard, he would lose this fish. Young Master Situ just said with the same smile, "Of course, of course, but isn''t Brother Lin being too insincere? There''s no need to call me Young Master Situ, you can just call me Brother Situ."


    Lin Fan didn''t respond and just gave a perfunctory agreement before walking away.


    Young Master Situ didn''t stop him since he had achieved his goal, he had at least made the connection to Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan walked to the side, Brainy stopped its game to slither up to Lin Fan''s arm.


    Brainy wrote, "Isn''t it a good thing to make a connection with a noble family, especially since we''ve already offended two of them?"


    Lin Fan looked at Momonga who responded with a nod before saying, "He''s not someone good to cooperate with, he''s someone who wouldn''t hesitate to betray you for benefits. Didn''t you see everything he did before?"


    Brainy was confused as it wrote, "What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan said, "That Situ fellow secretly provoked that Young Master Duanmu to create a fuss since he knew that Young Master Duanmu would be too proud to lower himself with an apology. He wanted to create a fuss to draw my attention, that way he could have a reason to approach me and get the information he wanted."


    Brainy still wrote, "Even if he is someone who is moved by benefits, we clearly have more to offer than those two noble families, so we could use him temporarily."


    Lin Fan still shook his head, "No, rather than someone like him who''s always plotting, I would rather work with that Young Master Duanmu?"


    Brainy was surprised, "You want to work with that unfriendly fellow?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile, "Even if he is unfriendly, he is someone who is frank and honest. He was just acting that way because of his pride and the position he was put in, but I''m sure he''s someone who sticks by his friends."


    Brainy couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was saying, "How are you so sure?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned distant and a trace of fondness entered his smile, "Well, I''ve seen plenty of people like him before." As he said this, Lin Fan fell into his memories of the distant other world, one where he had been deeply trapped in the world of the upper ss.


    Brainy saw that Lin Fan had his own ideas, so it didn''t say anything else.


    As for whether or not the other people in the store had heard Lin Fan and Brainy''s conversation, Momonga had taken care of that. He had used his spiritual senses to create a barrier around them that stopped sound from spreading.


    After Lin Fan came back to his senses, he asked Brainy, "Did you nt the seeds on them?"


    Brainy nodded its vine head.


    Lin Fan revealed a cold smile as he said, "Good."

 39 Chapter 39

    After that disy of power, no family dared to act rashly in Lin Fan''s store before they had an understanding of how much power was hidden behind it.


    Of course that didn''t apply to the Ding and Zhao Families since they had already offended Lin Fan, so of course they would continue to plot against his store. But what they didn''t know was that he was already nning on how to deal with them.


    As the news spread by word of mouth, more and more people came to see the Gold Realm Expert that they had heard about.


    While Gold Realm Experts weren''t considered that rare, they were still rarely seen since most of them had formed their own families or were out training to reach the next realm, which could be considered the peak of average humans.


    No one dreamed of reaching the Legendary Realm since it was something that was normally out of their reach. Only the most talented and the people with the most fate would have a chance to reach the Legendary Realm. It wasn''t something that people with just a bit of luck dared to think about.


    Of course, most of the customers that came were scared off my Lin Fan''s price since they were just here to watch the fun.


    Lin Fan''s store was packed the next day, but most of them were just here to admire the noble young masters that came. It even went as far as groups of fangirls waiting outside the store for their idols with signs.


    They would have been waiting in the store, hoping for a chance to get close to their idols, but they were scared off with a single trace of golden life energy from Lin Fan.


    They were just normal people, how could they dare offend someone in the Gold Realm.


    Of course, the body that Lin Fan had transmigrated into was considered quite handsome, so he did attract the attention of a few girls.


    Lin Fan''s body was quite handsome, but because the original owner of the body had no talent at all, his handsomeness only took him so far. Most of the girls that had been interested in him at first quickly lost interest once they learned that he would never amount to anything. This had been a hidden bitterness for the original owner and why he had been so oblivious to girls, namely a certain little sister.


    But with the addition of the noble young masters who after testing Lin Fan''s training service became addicted, Lin Fan was now earning quite a decent amount each day.


    However, the store still limited him since it had only provided him with 50 pet storage cages, so Lin Fan could only ept 50 pets for training each day. This never came up before since he never had enough customers to fill up all the slots before, but now that he did, it really made him cry on the inside.


    "System, can''t I buy more cages? Look at all these people who want to give us their money. They are the customers, we should do our best to amodate them." Lin Fan tried convincing the system.


    "Host, you do not have the permission to buy more cages."


    The system very mechanically shut him down.


    It was a good thing that the noble young masters didn''te before Lin Fan had upgraded the shop since he only had 25 cages back then. If they hade then, there definitely would have been more disgruntled young masters.


    After the young masters received their pets and demonstrated the new skills that their pets had learned, the crowd watching them was shocked.


    Every pet that this store trained had actually learned a new skill, this was something that was already on the same level as a Master Monster Trainer.


    For Monster Trainers, other than being separated into different cultivation realms, they were also separated into different realms of mastery.


    A Monster Trainer that could only give a pet basic training would be considered a Junior Monster Trainer. A Monster Trainer that could increase a pet''s strength by a single level each time was considered an Expert Monster Trainer. A Monster Trainer that could increase a pet by several levels and could teach them a skill each time was considered a Master Monster Trainer.


    Beyond that, there were Grandmaster Monster Trainers that could raise a pet by an entire cultivation realm with each training and even further beyond that were Legendary Monster Trainers. Legendary Monster Trainers were said to be able to train pets into the Legendary Realm, King Beasts that were on par with Legendary Realm Experts.


    Lin Fan''s shop had been able to teach every single pet a new skill or increase their cultivation by several levels, which meant that there was at least a Master Level Monster Trainer in this store!


    Yet even though there was a Master Monster Trainer in this store, they were only charging ten thousand crystals to train a Silver Realm pet!<sub> </sub>


    Normally it would take at least a million to invite a Master Monster Trainer of the Silver Realm, but Lin Fan''s shop was training pets at a hundredth of the price.


    When everyone learned that Iron Realm pets only cost a hundred crystals to train, there were plenty of people who wanted to give their life savings just for a single training session.


    But of course they had to wait their turn since the noble young masters were here. Even if they wanted to train their pets, they wouldn''t dare take the ces of the noble young masters. There were many people who had the idea ofing early next morning to get the early spots.


    Of course the noble young masters didn''t miss their intentions and were also nning on sending their servants toe line up as well.


    Even if they had ideas of using their power to cut the line, those ideas were immediately blown away when Lin Fan put up a new sign that said "FIrste, first serve. Line up properly or get lost."


    After the example the Young Master Ding had set yesterday, no one wanted to try pushing Lin Fan''s bottom line.


    Of course, the noble young masters didn''t just stop with the training, they also brought much more moneypared to yesterday and appraisal masters with them.


    They brought their appraisal masters to the elixirs in the shop and after confirming that they were genuine articles, there were even some that were prepared to fight over them. But that was just a figure of speech since no one actually dared to fight in Lin Fan''s store.


    After taking care of all the customers, Lin Fan found that he had earned over five hundred thousand and he got to keep 1% of that as crystals for himself, which was over five thousand crystals!


    Seeing the dazzling glow of the crystals and the huge number in his system interface, he couldn''t help revealing a wide smile as he felt giddy.


    It really was important to have a different ss of clientele. When rich people wanted to spend, they felt no pain as they threw money in Lin Fan''s face.


    But while being showered with money from these rich people, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit sad as well.


    He might have be stronger, but he was still a poor man in the end¡­


    After dealing with all these noble young masters, it was about time for the store to close when two unexpected customers had appeared.


    Boss Gao and Mei Rou were surprised to see all these noble young masters in Lin Fan''s shop. Boss Gao came from a noble family himself, so he knew some of the young masters that were there, but Boss Gao had been busy dealing with his family, so he didn''t know what had been going on.


    Boss Gao and Mei Rou came up to the counter where Lin Fan happily greeted them.


    "Boss Gao, Mei Rou, you were just here a few days ago, why are you back already?" Lin Fan asked with a smile.


    Boss Gao had an awkward look on his face as he said, "Well, Brother Lin, it really is awkward for me to say this, but I have a request for you."


    Lin Fan revealed a curious look, "Oh, what is it?"


    Boss Gao gave a sigh before saying, "Well, it''s a long story. My family didn''t approve of me being with Mei Rou since she came from a lower ss family, so I''ve been fighting with them recently. But yesterday they suddenly surprised me by asking about you."


    Lin Fan knit his brows, "They asked about me?"


    Boss Gao nodded, "I don''t know why either, but that isn''t even the shocking part yet. The most shocking thing was that they suddenly said that they would ept my rtionship with Mei Rou as long as we could invite you toe visit our family."

 40 Chapter 40

    Lin Fan suddenly revealed a look of understanding once he heard Boss Gao finish.


    Boss Gao was confused by this as he asked, "Brother Lin, do you know something?"


    Lin Fan asked, "Boss Gao, you must have been confined during this time since you were fighting against the wishes of your family, right?"


    Boss Gao gave a nod.


    Lin Fan exined, "Then there must be plenty of things you don''t know about yet. The reason your family should be interested in building a rtionship with me is because of this."


    Lin Fan raised his hand and released his golden life energy.


    Boss Gao and Mei Rou both had their eyes open wide in shock.


    Boss Gao eximed, "Brother Lin, you broke through?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod, "That''s right, I broke through to the Gold Realm recently and that''s why most of these young masters have been crowding around my store. They also said that they heard about my shop from someone named Mu Bo Hai who seems to be a Legendary Realm Expert."


    The shock on Boss Gao''s face became even deeper, "You mean that Lord Mu who''s known as the Forest King?"


    Lin Fan was confused, "Forest King?"


    Boss Gao looked at Lin Fan like he was someone who had been living under a rock, "You don''t even know about Lord Mu? He''s the famous Forest King who held off an entire beast horde in Wild me City, standing alone against tens of thousands of beasts!"


    The previous Lin Fan didn''t pay much attention to experts since he focused more on trying to find a way to cultivate and the current Lin Fan didn''t pay attention to experts since he was more interested in information for surviving in this world.


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say anything, Boss Gao knew that it was no use exining, so he changed the topic, "Why did Lord Mu rmend your shop?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug, "How would I know?"


    Boss Gao didn''t know anything either, so he went back to the main topic, "Then Brother Lin, will youe with me to my family?"


    Mei Rou who had been waiting on the side came forward to hold Boss Gao''s arm as she asked, "Brother Lin, could you please help us?"


    "Tch!" Lin Fan saw the intimacy between the two of them and he clicked his tongue, as he called them normies in his heart, but still he said, "Alright, wait here for a bit. When I close up shopter, I''ll go meet your family."


    Boss Gao was someone who had offered to sacrifice his life just so Lin Fan could get away back when they were in the nar crack. Although Lin Fan didn''t really need him to do this, this action had still touched Lin Fan''s heart.


    Since leaving that nar crack, Lin Fan had treated Boss Gao and everyone else as true friends.


    Boss Gao and Mei Rou both revealed looks of joy and Boss Gao came forward to hug Lin Fan, but he quickly raised his hands to stop him, "If I wanted a hug, I would prefer a cute girl!"


    Mei Rou decided to tease him at this time, "Then do you want a hug from me?"


    Lin Fan turned to her and said with a serious look, "I would, but I''m afraid I wouldn''t be able to survive what Boss Gao does after."


    Boss Gao justughed, "You''re my good brother, how could I do anything to you? Ha, ha, ha!"


    ¡­


    After a few minutes, once it reached the hour on the dot, Lin Fan closed the store even though there were a few customers left.


    Before he left with Boss Gao to head to the Gao Family''s Manor, Lin Fan went over to Brainy to check a few things.


    Brainy ensured Lin Fan that it was keeping an eye on everything and that everything was under its control.


    Lin Fan trusted Brainy, so once he was done ordering food for Momonga and Ang, he headed off with Boss Gao and Mei Rou.


    Before they reached the Gao Manor, Boss Gao suddenly said, "Brother Lin, my family can be a bit abrasive, so just be careful."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he asked, "Abrasive, what do you mean?"


    When Boss Gao didn''t exin, Lin Fan turned to Mei Rou, but she spread her hands and shook her head. After all, the Gao Family didn''t approve of her, so of course she hadn''t met them yet.


    But he soon got his answer the moment he walked into the Gao Manor.


    Once they were through the doors, they were immediately surrounded by several members of the Gao Family.


    These people were all like Boss Gao, they were very friendly and very forward, without a bit of hidden intention at all.


    Boss Gao''s father, the head of the Gao Family came forward and forcefully pped Lin Fan on the shoulder as he said whileughing, "Ha, ha, ha, Brother Lin, it really is an honour for you toe to our family."


    While Lin Fan was bent over, trying to recover from the heavy ps to the back that he had just taken, Boss Gao suddenly cut in, "Dad, Brother Lin is my brother, you can''t just mix up generations like this!"


    Boss Gao had to say something, otherwise if he had to call Lin Fan uncle, he would rather run away every time he saw Lin Fan.


    Boss Gao''s father said, "Tch, son, is it your turn to speak right now? I''m talking to little friend Lin."


    Even though his tone was gruff, there was a bit of loving in his voice and he clearly listened to his son as he changed how he addressed Lin Fan.


    Boss Gao''s father turned over to Mei Rou and he said with a smile, "So this is the girl that our little handsome boy is bringing home."


    Mei Rou was surprised by how she was being treated. She had heard from Boss Gao that his family didn''t approve of him, but now his dad was actually being this friendly with her. She looked at Boss Gao with a confused look.


    Boss Gao used his eyes to look at the family elders on the side who didn''t try to conceal their looks of disapproval at all and Mei Rou immediately understood.


    Mei Rou acted like a good daughter inw and said, "Father, it''s an honour to meet you. I''ve heard many good things about you from Big Brother Gao."


    Boss Gao''s father broke out inughter, "Good girl, wait until you meet our little handsome boy''s mother, she''ll definitely like you." Then he turned over to Boss Gao and nudged him with his elbow as he said in a low voice, "So you like to make her call you big brother, that''s what you''re into?"


    Lin Fan understood what Boss Gao meant by abrasive, but that really wasn''t the best term to describe them. If he had to choose, he would have preferred to call them honest and simple, or maybe even crude.


    But that kind of personality was one that Lin Fan liked since it was easy to be close with these kinds of people. They weren''t always plotting behind your back and you could trust them.


    As Boss Gao''s father was teasing his son, one of the elders came forward to stretch his hand out to Lin Fan, "Hello Owner Lin, we''ve long heard of your fame and it is an honour to meet you now."


    Lin Fan looked this man over and he could tell that he wasn''t going to like this person.


    Compared to the rather open and friendly dad of Boss Gao, while this elder''s chubby appearance made him look quite friendly, he could tell from the look in his eyes that this elder''s mind was filled with schemes.


    This was probably the culprit who had Boss Gao bring him here, but for now he didn''t know what this man''s goal was.


    Lin Fan took his hand and while shaking, he said with a smile, "The honour is all mine. Boss Gao has always taken care of me and I''m very happy to meet his family."


    The chubby great elder revealed a smile and said, "Owner Lin is being too kind, you''re always wee at our house. But I''m really surprised to hear that Owner Lin was acquainted with Lord Mu."


    Lin Fan thought that this elder really was from the Gao Family, he didn''t waste any time at all.


    Lin Fan just casually said, "I wouldn''t say that I''m acquainted with Lord Mu, he just came into my shop once."


    The chubby elder said, "Even if it is once, it did leave quite the impression on Lord Mu that he had such high praise for it."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug, "My shop aims to give the highest service."


    The chubby elder gave augh, "Of course, of course, Owner Lin is a dedicated businessman, it''s no wonder you left such an impression on Lord Mu. But Owner Lin, you really are a talented person, reaching the Gold Realm at such a young age. Your master really must be someone amazing."


    Finally, he was showing his true colours.

 41 Chapter 41

    The chubby great elder didn''t beat around the bush at all as he said, "Is your master a part of any organization? If not, we would be more than happy to have your master stay in our Gao Family."


    This chubby elder was indeed from the Gao Family, even if he did have a plotting mind, his personality was still quite straightforward as he didn''t beat around the bush at all.


    Lin Fan however just smiled and said, "My master isn''t considering joining any organization for now, but many thanks for your kind intention."


    But the chubby elder didn''t just leave it there, "Little friend Lin, since you take our little Fu Shuai as a brother, you can be considered a part of our Gao Family. Since we are family, it''s better if we work together instead of apart. I can tell you now that our Gao Family can offer many resources and it will be much easier for you in the future if you work with us."


    Lin Fan''s smile turned cold, "Elder Gao, was that a threat?"


    The chubby elder just smiled, "How could it be a threat? It''s nothing more than some well meaning advice."


    Lin Fan turned to Boss Gao''s dad, "Uncle Gao, does Elder Gao represent the entire Gao Family?"


    Boss Gao''s dad came over with slightly knitted brows, but he quickly revealed a smile, "Xiao Lin, you''re thinking too much into Elder Gao''s words. He''s just saying that since you''re Fu Shuai''s brother, you can be treated as a part of our family. As for whether he represents the entire Gao Family or not, you can make your own judgement."


    Lin Fan understood that there seemed to be a power struggle in the Gao Family.


    Based on the fluctuations that he felt, he could tell that Boss Gao''s dad was the strongest expert of the Gao Family, but with how closely the elders stood with the chubby elder, it didn''t seem like the Gao Family was united.


    Lin Fan turned back to the chubby elder and said, "Elder Gao, I have to discuss this with my master first before making a decision."


    The chubby elder just smiled and patted Lin Fan on the back, "Little friend Lin, of course, of course. This is a big decision, it''s best if you discuss it with your master first."


    Then the chubby elder didn''t wait for Lin Fan to respond before leading the other elders away.


    But what they missed was the cold glow in Lin Fan''s eyes or the few spores that came out of Lin Fan''s hand that stuck to a few elders.


    Lin Fan could tell which elders were in the Gold Realm and which ones weren''t. Since Brainy was currently in the peak of the Silver Realm, it still couldn''t parasitize Gold Realm Experts, so Lin Fan made sure that the spores onlynded on the elders that weren''t in the Gold Realm.


    But based on the fluctuations he could feel, Lin Fan could tell that the Gao Family wasn''t that weak of a family.


    Including Boss Gao''s dad, there were at least three Gold Realm Experts that he could sense in the Gao Family. There might be other Gold Realm Experts hiding deeper in the Gao Manor that he couldn''t sense.


    Once the elders were gone, Boss Gao''s dad said, "Xiao Lin, you must be hungry. When Fu Shuai told me that he was bringing you over, I had the chef prepare a banquet in my courtyard."


    Lin Fan could tell that Boss Gao''s dad wanted to talk and he was fine with it since he also had things to ask Boss Gao''s dad.


    Boss Gao''s dad led them to a little courtyard that was on the side of the Gao Manor.


    Seeing how small this courtyard was, Lin Fan felt it was a bit strange since Boss Gao''s dad was the head of the family, but he was living in this small courtyard.


    This was clearly also very surprising to Boss Gao as well as he asked his dad, "Dad, why did you bring us here? Why didn''t you bring us to our usual courtyard?"


    Boss Gao''s dad gave a sigh before saying, "Let''s go in before we talk."


    After they came in and were seated, Boss Gao looked around before saying, "Dad, where''s mom?"


    Boss Gao''s dad had a sad look when Boss Gao asked this, "Your mother isn''t doing well right now. You don''t know since you were locked up, but your mother was attacked just a few days ago and she was heavily injured, so I had to call in many favours just to find a way to heal her. With all the favours I called in, I lost quite a bit of my power in the family, that''s why we were moved here."


    Boss Gao was shocked before he asked in a worried voice, "What about mom? Where is she now?"


    Boss Gao''s dad pointed upstairs, "Your mother is sleeping right now, don''t bother her and just let her rest for now. She was up quitetest night worrying about you, but she finally fell asleep after hearing the good news about you being released and that you were bringing your girlfriend home. When she wakes up, let her see your girlfriend, that''ll make her much happier."<sub> </sub>


    Boss Gao was still worried, but he said, "Alright dad, I''ll listen to you. But just how did mom get attacked when she was in our manor?"


    Boss Gao''s dad''s face turned cold, "I don''t know how they managed to sneak in, but I''ll definitely find them and make them pay for hurting your mother."


    Boss Gao hesitated a bit before slowly asking, "Dad, could it be that it''s rted to Great Elder Gao?"


    Boss Gao''s dad shook his head, "I don''t know, but let''s not talk about this now."


    Boss Gao''s dad turned to Mei Rou and Lin Fan, "Alright, let''s not talk about these serious matters now, we have guests here."


    While Mei Rou was looking at Boss Gao who was deep in thought with a worried look, Lin Fan said, "Head Gao, there''s actually something I wish to discuss with you."


    Boss Gao''s dad had a confused look as he said, "Oh, what does little friend Lin have to discuss with me?"


    Lin Fan slowly asked, "How bad is the situation in the Gao Family right now?"


    Boss Gao''s dad was caught off guard, but he preferred this kind of frank discussion since he also wanted to discuss this topic with Lin Fan, "It''s not as bad as you think it is yet, but it''s getting worse with each day. That sly old fox Great Elder Gao has been gaining more and more support, that''s why he dared to make a bold move like letting Fu Shuai out to contact you. His ambitions aren''t just contained by the Gao Family, so he wants to climb the ranks using you."


    Lin Fan said in a calm voice, "I figured as much, but Boss Gao is my brother, so this matter is still rted to me."


    Boss Gao''s dad was touched as he turned to Boss Gao to say, "Fu Shuai, you really have a good brother."


    Then he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Xiao Lin, if your master is willing to help, I''m certain that we can turn the tides."


    Lin Fan shook his head, "It''s not convenient for my master to move since there are many things restricting him."


    Boss Gao''s dad was disappointed, but he understood since there were plenty of people in this world and he couldn''t expect someone to give up everything to help someone unrted to them.


    p Lin Fan then continued, "But I feel like there is a different way that I can help you."</anda>


    Boss Gao''s dad saw hope once again as he asked, "Oh, what kind of way do you mean?"


    Lin Fan slowly said, "You should know that I have a pet shop, right?"


    Boss Gao''s dad nodded, "That''s right, the elders have been gathering information on your shop since the banquet and the information they''ve received really is shocking."


    Lin Fan said, "Well, there are still things they don''t know yet. If you''re willing to trust me, you can bring three Silver Realm pets to my store for training."


    Boss Gao''s dad was confused, "How would that help our situation?"


    Lin Fan exined, "If you give me a month, I can have all three of them reach the Gold Realm. That should give you enough power to match Great Elder Gao''s side with my help and bring them down."


    Boss Gao''s dad was sceptical since he had never been to Lin Fan''s shop before.


    Seeing his dad hesitate, Boss Gao said, "Dad, we can trust Brother Lin. He''s someone who can create miracles."


    Hearing this, Boss Gao''s dad decided to bite the bullet, "Alright, let''s go with Xiao Lin''s n. But how will we carry it out."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Well, the n will be¡­"

 42 Chapter 42

    When Lin Fan left the Gao Manor, there was a smile on his face.


    He didn''t know how well this n would work, but at least he had achieved his goal.


    Since he was going to fight noble families, he would need to slowly gather his own power and the Gao Family was the best ce to start since he took Boss Gao as his brother.


    For now, what he needed to do was to head back to the store to prepare.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan woke up the next morning and came down for breakfast, he found that his little sister was already gone.


    But when he reached the table, he found that her lunch box was still on the table.


    When his mother saw hime in, she said, "Are you heading to the store?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a curious gaze, "I was about to, why?"


    His mother brought his sister''s lunch box over and said, "If you have time in the morning, can you bring this over to your sister''s school for her?"


    Lin Fan actually had much more free time recently since Momonga had joined the store as an employee.


    Momonga was the great Lich King, so of course he came with his own summons like the great liches do. Momonga had summoned the two ghost maids that Lin Fan had met before and he had taught them how to do simple things like handle the register after Momonga had helped them set up their human disguises with his life energy.


    As for specific questions that the customers had, Lin Fan either took care of it himself or left it to Momonga, but Momonga was a ratherzy person. Momonga spent most of his time browsing the inte for different mangas to read and animes to watch, or he spent most of his time ying different games with Brainy. With how many games Brainy was starting to y, Lin Fan was starting to worry that Momonga was bringing Brainy down the wrong path.


    Still Lin Fan said, "Alright, I''ll bring it over to her after the morning rush. But do you know why she forgot it?"


    His mother thought about it before saying, "I don''t know what''s with that girl. All I know was that she rushed out of here this morning, she almost didn''t even have time to eat breakfast."


    Lin Fan was still confused, but still he took the lunch box and headed off to the shop.


    When he reached the shop, there was the usual crowd outside so he couldn''t head anywhere. Looking at the crowd, he found that it was even biggerpared to yesterday and it was so airtight that he couldn''t even make it to the door.


    But once the crowd saw that Lin Fan was here, there was a corridor that was created in the crowd like the tides parting for Moses.


    As Lin Fan walked through that path, there were quite a few people that called out to him in a friendly manner.


    "Owner Lin, do you have anything special today?"


    "Owner Lin, I''ve been here so many times that we can be considered good friends. How about you let me have first pick today?"


    "Owner Lin, if you''re not busyter, how about we go get some coffeeter?" Unfortunately the one who said this was a buff man in a dress with thick makeup on.


    Lin Fan shuddered when he saw the person who said this and he began walking even faster.


    But the man in the dress didn''t mind, "What a shy boy Owner Lin is, makes me want to chase him even more." After saying this, he licked his lips like he was staring down his prey.


    Even though Lin Fan had quickly moved away, there was a cold chill that ran down his spine.


    When he came to the store, he noticed that Wang Ning was there with her dad, so thinking about what happened this morning, he went over to them.


    Wang Ning was surprised to see Lin Fan walking over, but she still greeted him with a friendly smile, "Owner Lin, what brings you over here?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan asked, "Is there something happening at your school today?"


    Wang Ning was surprised to hear this question, but still she thought it over before saying, "Well I wouldn''t call it anything special, but our school is holding a festival today to celebrate our founder founding the school."


    Lin Fan understood why his little sister was in such a rush this morning, but he was still confused about something, "Wait, so why are you here instead of at school preparing?"


    Wang Ning gave a shrug, "My ss is doing something together and I helped pay for most of it, so that''s why they let me skip most of the work."


    Lin Fan had dark lines on his face. This was the power of a rich girl, as long as she had money, others would always be willing to do her work.


    But after that, Lin Fan said, "I need to run to your school for an errand and if you''re not busy, can you show me around?"


    Wang Ning revealed a teasing smile, "Owner Lin, are you asking me out on a date? I really don''t know what to tell Qing Qing if that was true. But also shouldn''t you show some sincerity when asking a girl out on a date? Why don''t you let my dad get first pick today?"


    Lin Fan''s lips couldn''t help twitching before he turned to leave, but Wang Ning called out, "Alright, alright, Owner Lin, you really can''t take a joke at all. I''ll take you around the school, but you should at least tell me what you''re doing there."


    Lin Fan turned back and said, "I''m delivering lunch to my little sister."


    Wang Ning looked at him in surprise because she really couldn''t believe the stone cold Owner Lin would do something like this, but eventually she said, "Alright, sure, whatever you say." It was clear that she still didn''t believe him.


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Your dad can pick one item first as thanks."


    Wang Ning''s face lit up with a smile and she wanted to jump Lin Fan to give him a hug, but before he could even raise his hand, Ang got between them and Wang Ning wrapped her arms around her.


    Wang Ning was surprised since she never thought that Ang would suddenly appear, but she went along with it since Ang had never given her a chance to get close with her.


    Wang Ning revealed a teasing smile as she said, "Oh, it seems like our cute little Ang is jealous."


    Ang looked at her like she was insane and just threw her arms off before storming back into the store.


    She actually didn''t even know why she had suddenly appeared in front of Wang Ning, but the moment she saw that Wang Ning was about to hug Lin Fan, there was a strange feeling that told her that she couldn''t let it happen.


    Her body had moved before she could even think and she had appeared between them.


    Lin Fan looked at Ang with a confused look, but then he raised his hand to stop Wang Ning when he saw that she still wanted to try to hug him.


    In the store, Momonga was watching everything that had happened with a secret smile and when Ang came back in, he said, "Little girl, you really don''t know what this feeling is?"


    Ang looked confused at first, but then she remembered who was talking to her. She gave Momonga a cold re and a cold snort before walking off to the other side of the store.


    Momonga just smiled as he watched her walk away, but then he noticed Wang Ning looking over. The moment their gazes match, it was like something had clicked and there was a tacit understanding between the two of them.


    They both looked at Lin Fan before looking back at each other and giving each other nods, like they had formed some kind of unspoken pact.


    Meanwhile Lin Fan was still lost in thought over what had just happened. Why had Ang suddenly appeared between them?


    After a while, he shook these thoughts out of his mind and focused on the business of the store.


    Once the morning rush was over, Lin Fan set out with Wang Ning, heading off to school together.

 43 Chapter 43

    When Wang Ning and Lin Fan walked through the gates of the school, they were suddenly hit with a burst of sound.


    There were all kinds of different voices shouting out from their stalls, it really seemed like the festival was in full swing.


    Wang Ning was easily affected by the mood and she began looking around at all the different things offered by the stalls.


    Of course, she didn''t forget to tease Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, since we''re on a date, shouldn''t you be a gentleman and offer to pay?"


    Lin Fan''s face turned dark when she said this.


    He knew that Wang Ning was the daughter of a rich man as he saw the father and daughter pair in his store day after day. Just the amount that they had spent already was more than ten times what he had earned in his entire time running the store¡­


    Yet here she was feeling no shame at all in asking Lin Fan to pay for everything for her.


    If they were dating, maybe that would make sense, but clearly there was nothing between them.


    But before Lin Fan could even say anything in response, there was a slender figure that ran over and took Wang Ning''s hand.


    Luo Qing said, "Ning Ning, you''re finally here. Come, our ss has been waiting for your help the entire time¡­" But it was at that moment that Luo Qing turned and saw Lin Fan.


    Luo Qing immediately had a blushe over her face and she began stuttering her words. That had been her reaction recently whenever she saw Lin Fan.


    But soon there was a feeling of displeasure that came over her when she thought about how Lin Fan was walking around alone with Wang Ning at the festival, it was almost like they were on a date.


    Wang Ning saw the look on Luo Qing''s face and tactfully exined, "I''m just guiding Owner Lin on his task. Apparently he''s here delivering lunch for his little sister."


    Luo Qing was surprised, but that feeling of displeasure quickly faded, "Oh, then maybe I can help as well. What grade is your little sister in and what is her name?"


    Lin Fan also wanted to find her quick so he could drop off her lunch as soon as possible. There were quite a few sharp res around him since he was currently standing there with two beautiful young girls.


    Lin Fan said, "Her name''s Lin Xue and I think she''s in first year."


    Both Wang Ning and Luo Qing were taken aback, "Are you sure her name''s Lin Xue?"


    Lin Fan raised a brow and said, "What do you mean? I don''t know the name of my own little sister? Also, Luo Qing, shouldn''t you know her already since you''re always at my house?"


    Luo Qing''s face turned red from this since she hadn''t told Wang Ning about this and Wang Ning suddenly revealed a smile like she had been fed something sweet.


    Luo Qing said in a shy voice, "She was never around when I went, I was always in the kitchen with aunty or in the living room listening to our parents talking¡­"


    Lin Fan gave an "oh" of understanding before saying, "Right, my little sister''s name is Lin Xue."


    Wang Ning revealed a doubtful gaze as she said, "There''s only one girl named Lin Xue in first grade that I know about and she''s the one who''s top of the year. She''s been nicknamed the Ice Princess because she''s like a younger version of our Ice Queen here."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this. He had known that his sister was talented, but he never expected her to be this famous.


    Wang Ning continued, "I''m really wondering if you''re just using the excuse of delivering lunch to your little sister as a way of getting closer to the Ice Princess."


    Lin Fan didn''t know whether tough or cry, "I''m not trying to do anything, she really is my little sister¡­"


    Wang Ning still looked at him with doubt, but then she said, "Alright, we''ll help bring you to your little sister, but you need to help us with something first."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t really want to agree, but it was easier to help them than to search for Lin Xue by himself. Moreover, if his mother had heard that he didn''t help Luo Qing, he would definitely get a stern lecture, "Alright, tell me what you need."


    Wang Ning casually said, "Well there''s a tournament this afternoon that I wanted to enter with Qing Qing, but we wouldn''t have a chance of winning with how strong my pets are, so I want you to take my ce."


    Luo Qing''s eyes opened wide and she quickly said, "Ning Ning, what are you saying¡­"


    But before she could say anything else, Wang Ning had grabbed Luo Qing by the mouth and stopped her. Then she turned to Lin Fan and said, "Well, what do you say?"


    Lin Fan felt that this was a rather simple request, but he also couldn''t help feeling this was somehow a trap, so he asked, "But I''m not a student here, how can I enter the tournament?"


    Wang Ning said with a smile, "It''s a tournament that''s open to everyone thates to the festival and the prize is something that I really want, so that''s why I really want to win."


    Lin Fan was still doubtful, but he couldn''t find any reason to refuse, so he said, "Alright, I''ll help you. Where do we sign up for it?"


    Wang Ning''s smile became wider as she said, "Don''t worry about it, I''ll take care of the registration. How about we take you to see your little sister first?"


    Lin Fan had no reason to disagree since this was the whole reason he was here, "Alright, let''s go."


    Wang Ning and Luo Qing led Lin Fan to the first grade building and along the way, they seemed like they were having quite the intense conversation. From time to time, Lin Fan could hear a few stray words like "couple" or "embarrassing", but he couldn''t make any sense of it.


    Finally when they reached the first grade building, Wang Ning and Luo Qing brought Lin Fan to Lin Xue''s ssroom where he found a cafe.


    Wang Ning, Luo Qing, and Lin Fan were shown to a table and the maid that was in charge of taking their order was actually Lin Xue.


    The moment Lin Xue saw Lin Fan sitting at the table, her heart skipped a beat, but then her entire body was covered in a cold chill when she saw Luo Qing and Wang Ning sitting with him. There was even a slight killing intent that filled her eyes.


    One of her male ssmates felt the cold chilling from her and came over before she even said anything. He turned to Lin Fan and said, "Hey, what did you do to our Xue Xue? Don''t make me throw you out¡­" As he was talking, he tried to move his hands closer to Lin Xue in a natural manner.


    But before he could even finish talking, Lin Xue had pped his hands away and said to him in an ice cold voice, "He''s my brother, you''re not qualified to throw him out."


    The male ssmate was just left there in a daze as Lin Fan just smiled at him and said, "You heard her, I''m her big brother. Thanks for taking care of our Lin Xue."


    Lin Xue gave a cold snort as she said, "Don''t be so proud of yourself, you''re nothing more than a trash big brother."


    Wang Ning and Luo Qing were taken aback by how Lin Xue treated Lin Fan. Lin Fan''s shop was a shop that created miracles and he himself was clearly a powerful expert, so how could he be trash?


    But they didn''t say anything since this seemed like a matter between their family.


    Lin Xue asked, "What are you doing here?"


    Lin Fan said, "Well, you forgot your lunch this morning, so mom had mee and deliver it for you."


    Lin Xue turned over to Luo Qing and Wang Ning, "Then what about them?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "They''re acquaintances. You should know Luo Qing, she''s the one who''s been visiting with Uncle Luotely."


    Lin Xue narrowed her eyes as she looked over Luo Qing and Luo Qing for some reason felt the atmosphere be tense around her. It almost felt like Lin Xue wanted to have a fight with her.

 44 Chapter 44

    But of course nothing came out of it in the end.


    Wang Ning on the side saw what was happening, so she intervened, "Hello there little sister, sorry for borrowing your dear brother from you." After saying that, she gave a wink.


    Lin Xue just gave a cold snort and said, "I don''t care what you do with him, he''s just an embarrassment."


    After saying that, Lin Xue turned to leave without even taking their orders, but of course she remembered the faces of these two girls.


    Since it didn''t seem like they were getting any service, Lin Fan and the two girls left, but he didn''t forget to leave his little sister''s lunch for her.


    But since he needed to stay here for the tournament in the afternoon, he went around the festival with Luo Qing and Wang Ning, going from stall to stall, enjoying everything there was to offer.


    In the middle, Wang Ning had gone off to take care of something, so he had lunch alone with Luo Qing.


    To be honest, Lin Fan quite enjoyed this time because both of his bodies had never experienced a normal school life.


    The original owner of the body had no talent, so he had spent his school life alone trying to cultivate as hard as he could to make up for it, only to give up and work at the pet store after graduation.


    As for Lin Fan, he had never gone to school and experienced this because of his family back on earth, they had never let him go to a normal school.


    But all of that ended when Wang Ning came back in the afternoon.


    When Wang Ning came back, she came back with two matching contestant tags for Lin Fan and Luo Qing.


    Lin Fan figured that they were matching since they were a team, but the design was a bit strange.


    Lin Fan asked, "What is with this heart design on the tag?"


    Wang Ning said with a smile, "I picked it myself, don''t you like it?"


    Lin Fan''s face was covered in ck lines as he couldn''t help saying, "But isn''t it a bit girly?"


    Wang Ning pouted her lips and said, "After all I did to help you, you can''t even help me with this little favour?"


    Lin Fan waspletely speechless, he really didn''t know what to say to this.


    Meanwhile, on the side, Luo Qing was taking deep breaths like she was preparing herself for something, while also seeming like she was trying to talk herself out of something.


    But it was toote since the event was already starting and they were called to the arena for their first fight.


    Lin Fan wasn''t aware of how big of a trap he had fallen for, but he was definitely stunned the moment he realized it was a trap.


    As they walked through the corridor, they finally arrived at the arena where over a thousand people were sitting in the stands looking down at the stage.


    But the moment Lin Fan walked out with Luo Qing, there was a silence that came over the crowd. Even the host couldn''t help being speechless when he saw this.


    But then the host came back to his senses and shouted into the mic, "And now the next pair of contestants in our couples tournament! You should all recognize who this is, it''s the Ice Queen Luo Qing! She is named the Ice Queen for her ice cold demeanor that scares away everyone, but surprisingly she is participating in this tournament with an unknown man!"


    It was only then that the crowd reacted as waves of jeers came, mostly from other men.


    "Who is that pretty boy standing beside my goddess!"


    "How can this unknown man stand by our queen!"


    "Someone pull him off stage, I''ll take his ce!"


    <o>,m Lin Fan waspletely speechless. He never heard that this would be a couples tournament! Wang Ning hadpletely tricked him!<sub> </sub></o>


    When Lin Fan turned back, he saw Wang Ning waving at them with a sly smile. It was only at that moment did he feel a bit of fear towards Wang Ning. She had clearly learned from her dad and was a shrewd businesswoman.


    Luo Qing meanwhile had a slight blush on her face. She had known about this all along, but there was a part of her that stopped her from telling Lin Fan. Even she didn''t know what was wrong with herself, she had never felt this way before.


    In the stands, Lin Fan''s little sister was sitting there watching with a few friends.


    The moment Lin Fan came out, there was a killing intent that filled her eyes as she stared daggers at Luo Qing. But then she turned to the crowd and memorized the face of every person who had jeered at her big brother.


    The host wanted to keep talking about Luo Qing, but the organizers were screaming at him through his earpiece, so he had no choice but to move on.


    "And now introducing our challengers, it''s Wang Feng and Yang Long!"


    There wasn''t as big as a reaction from the crowd this time since this was a rather unknown couple.


    Wang Feng and Yang Long came up to the stage and they werepletely shocked to see Luo Qing and an unknown man.


    They knew that they were considered a normal couple, so they were surprised to be called up to the main stage which was only used for featured fights between famous people. They were even more shocked when they saw Luo Qing in front of them with an unknown man. Wasn''t Luo Qing the infamous Ice Queen who had turned down a thousand men? Why was she in a couples tournament?


    The host ignored their reactions and continued, "Now the rules are simple, the best couple is clearly the strongest couple! So we''ll have our couples summon their pets and duke it out to see who''s the stronger couple!"


    The host raised his hand into the air and shouted, "Are you ready!"


    Then bringing down his hand, he shouted, "Start!"


    Wang Feng and Yang Long immediately called out their pets, but on the other side, Luo Qing was the only person who called out her pet.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan in confusion, including Luo Qing, but he casually said to her, "With how much you''ve brought your pet to my shop for training, you''re more than enough to take care of them."


    Luo Qing thought about it and couldn''t help nodding in agreement. It would be a waste for Lin Fan to show his powers now and based on what she had seen, she knew that Lin Fan had at least a Silver Realm pet.


    But what she didn''t know was that she had been underestimating Lin Fan. During this time, other than going to the shop to drop off her pet, she had rarely appeared, so she didn''t know Lin Fan''s real power.


    A Silver Realm pet? That wasn''t even close to how strong he was now!


    But Lin Fan was right, Luo Qing alone was definitely enough to take care of these two.


    The Song Bird had been tortured time and time again in the shadow cultivation realm, so it had definitely be much stronger. It had already reached the peak of the Iron Realm, but its strength was actually in the peak of the Bronze Realm!


    So Luo Qing defeated the opponents by herself, but this caused the crowd to jeer even more at Lin Fan.


    "What a piece of trash! He only has his handsome face and all he can do is hide behind his woman!"


    "Pei, pei, pie, what woman! I refuse to believe that he''s dating my goddess! That piece of trash is definitely using some trick to force my goddess to enter this tournament with him!"


    "That''s right, how could a piece of trash like him who hides behind women possibly be worthy of being even in the vicinity of the queen! He''s definitely using some sinister method to force the queen to enter this tournament with him!"


    Lin Fan heard all of these jeers, but he didn''t care at all. Instead he said to Luo Qing, "You really don''t know how to control your Song Bird, you could have ended it in one move, but you had to drag it out to three moves."


    Luo Qing didn''t know what to say since she really didn''t know how to control her Song Bird. It had be so much stronger that she didn''t even know what abilities it even had anymore.


    But in the end, Lin Fan still said, "Well, still, you did a good job taking care of them yourself."


    A blush came over Luo Qing''s face since she never expected the stone faced Lin Fan to give her words of praise.


    When the crowd saw this, there were even more jeers that came Lin Fan''s way, but he ignored them all.

 45 Chapter 45

    Since the round was over, Lin Fan and Luo Qing went off the stage to head to the contestant waiting room.


    Lin Fan wanted to have a little talk with Wang Ning, but it was a good thing she was smart and had already escaped into the crowd sitting in the stands. Lin Fan couldn''t find her no matter how hard he tried, so he had no choice but to give up.


    Luo Qing however was enjoying every part of this experience, even though she knew that it was wrong lying to Lin Fan like this. She had slowlye to terms with her feelings, but it was too bad a blockhead like Lin Fan would never understand.


    They only spent a few minutes in the waiting room before being called out to the arena once again.


    Lin Fan and Luo Qing were prepared for another easy fight, but this time their opponents came as a surprise.


    After they had been introduced, their opponents were actually Murong Quan and a girl that seemed to be in her twenties.


    Murong Quan was shocked to see Luo Qing in this tournament since this was a couples tournament after all! But he was even more shocked to see that Lin Fan was here with her!


    Murong Quan looked betrayed as he said, "Owner Lin, how could you do this to me?"


    Murong Quan was considered a regr in Lin Fan''s store and with how much he stuck to Lin Fan, eventually Lin Fan epted him as a little brother, so Lin Fan was currently feeling a bit guilty.


    Lin Fan tried to exin, "Xiao Quan, this isn''t what it looks like, if you just let me exin¡­"


    But before Lin Fan could finish, the host had already started the match.


    Murong Quan was too angry to hear Lin Fan''s words, so he summoned out his me Hound and charged out with the me Hound to attack Lin Fan.


    The me Hound had a look of fear when it saw Lin Fan, but it quickly got over that fear since it was much strongerpared to before with all of Lin Fan''s training. The increase in its power had gone to its head and now it thought that it could beat anyone!


    But Luo Qing moved in front of Lin Fan and summoned out the Song Bird.


    The Song Bird had received much more trainingpared to Murong Quan''s me Hound, so naturally it was much stronger. The me Hound was onlyparable to the Intermediate Bronze Realm, while the Song Bird wasparable to the Peak Bronze Realm!


    The Song Bird pped its wings and created gusts of wind that blew Murong Quan and the me Hound away. They tried to fight against it, but eventually they copsed on the other side of the arena after spending all their power.


    Then Luo Qing turned her attention to the other opponent, but she found that she was already gone.


    While she was looking for the other girl, there was a cough that came behind her.


    When she turned, she felt a finger tap on her forehead and everything turned to ck in front of her.


    Her Song Bird couldn''t even do a single thing since it was also knocked out with a single tap of the finger.


    Thest thing she saw was a wisp of silver life energy.


    The young woman smiled as she said, "Ho, ho, this Song Bird is in the Peak Bronze Realm, this youngdy really is a rare talent. It''s no wonder Quan Quan likes her so much."


    Then she turned to Lin Fan and said, "Now, you really shouldn''t get in the way of Quan Quan and his crush, it''s quite rude. Especially since you''re just ying with her."


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he heard this and he said, "ying with her? What do you mean?"


    The young woman was taken aback, "Are you pretending or are you really that dense? Well either way, it''s good for Quan Quan."


    Then with a flicker, she appeared in front of Lin Fan, "Either way, big sister will take care of everything for Quan Quan."


    As she was about to tap Lin Fan on the forehead with the same move she used against Luo Qing and her Song Bird, Lin Fan suddenly flicked her finger away, causing her to reveal a look of shock.


    "You¡­" She tried to say, but she didn''t get a chance at all.


    Before she could even react, Lin Fan had tapped her on the forehead, knocking her out with the same method she had used earlier.


    Once that young woman had fallen down, the crowd fell into silence. They couldn''t believe what had just happened, this pretty boy had actually knocked out the young woman who had knocked out the Ice Queen!


    No matter what, they wouldn''t believe that this pretty boy that had tricked their goddess was actually an expert!


    "He must have cheated! Host, disqualify them immediately!"<sub> </sub>


    "He tricked our goddess and now he''s using his tricks on other women, despicable!"


    Of course there were still a few quiet voices that supported Lin Fan.


    "He didn''t seem like he cheated, it seemed like he won that fair and square."


    But they were immediately drowned out by the waves of negativity.


    "Pei, pei, what are you saying? He clearly cheated! Do you really think a pretty boy like him could knock out a Silver Realm Expert with a single poke?"


    <o>,m The host also felt conflicted over this and didn''t know what to say, but soon there was a voice that came over his earpiece that cleared up everything.</o>


    The host shouted, "The judges have ruled that the Lin Fan and Luo Qing team have won fair and square and will move on to the next round!"


    But all that answered him were waves of jeers and booing from the crowd since they still couldn''t ept this.


    Since the match was over, the medics came up and woke everyone that had been knocked out.


    Murong Quan was still ring at Lin Fan and Luo Qing, but he didn''t have any strength to do anything about it.


    Now that Murong Quan had no power to fight back, Lin Fan finally had a chance to exin things to him.


    After listening to their exnation, Murong Quan was still a bit angry, but he reluctantly chose to forgive them.


    But he also swore that he would find Wang Ning after this and give her an earful.


    He didn''t forget to add, "Qing Qing, if you needed a partner, why didn''t youe to me?"


    But all he received in return was a cold snort from Luo Qing.


    As for the young woman who was with Murong Quan, he introduced her as his big sister, Murong Ling.


    Murong Ling just waited for them to finish beforeing over to Lin Fan with a seductive smile, "Little brother, you''re the first one to give big sister an experience like this, you''ve really caught my attention. How about you and I have some fun together some time."


    But Luo Qing came in front of her and stopped her from moving any closer towards Lin Fan.


    It was her womanly instinct that Murong Ling was dangerous.


    Murong Ling just smiled and hugged Luo Qing, "You really are a cute girl, I really want to eat you up."


    Her instinct was right, Murong Ling really was dangerous.


    ¡­


    In the judge''s room, there were currently three old men with white beards who were staring at the stage.


    They were looking at no one else other than Lin Fan.


    One of the old men stroked his beard and said, "So young and so talented, he was able to reach the Gold Realm at such a young age."


    Another of the old men said, "How about you give him to me? You could all tell that he specializes in training physique, so he''s perfect for me."


    But the third old man said, "Don''t try to y that trick with us, you could clearly see how fine his control of his life energy is. He created a perfect pin prick with his life energy to poke that Murong girl in the head to knock her out. That kind of life energy control can only be found once in a hundred years! He''s perfect for me!"


    But then the first old man raised an important point, "Still, who is he? Is he even a student of our school?"


    The other two old men also fell into thought before calling someone to investigate Lin Fan.


    Then they went back to arguing like little kids over who would take him as a disciple.

 46 Chapter 46

    Once again, Lin Fan and Luo Qing went back to the waiting room and once again, they didn''t have to wait long before they were called out.


    But this time, their opponents were not familiar, rather they didn''t seem to lose in poprity to Luo Qing.


    Instead of them being introduced first, they were actually introduced second. It seemed like their opponents weren''t normal.


    They were hit with waves of cheer the moment they came out, but that soon quickly turned into jeers when the crowd saw Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan ignored the crowd and looked at his opponents, but the feeling they gave made Lin Fan feel this would be different.


    Before they moved onto the stage, Lin Fan reached out to stop Luo Qing, "Wait, I''ll take care of it this time."


    Luo Qing''s face turned red when Lin Fan grabbed her arm, but she still gave a nod.


    Lin Fan moved forward with Luo Qing following behind him,ing onto the stage. During this entire time, the male opponent had been staring back at Lin Fan, matching his gaze without turning at all.


    When they came to the stage and were facing each other, the male opponent spoke, "So you''re the one."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused gaze, but that male opponent cupped his hands and said, "Owner Lin, I am Wang Lei of the Wang Family, I ask for a duel."


    Lin Fan was sure that he didn''t know who this was, but still since he was given respect, he would give respect in turn, "Alright, let''s do this."


    The female opponent moved to the side with Luo Qing and there were only the two of them left on the stage.


    Lin Fan released his spiritual senses and found that the feeling that came from him was the same as the feeling he received from the Gold Realm beasts, which meant that this kid in front of him was at least in the Gold Realm!


    Lin Fan and Wang Lei walked to the center of the stage and stood right in front of each other, staring at each other.


    There were the sounds of cheers and jeersing from all around them, but they ignored it all.


    "Young Master Wang, punish that viin!"


    "Trash Lin, you think you canpare to Young Master Wang!"


    Lin Xuan still in the stands was memorizing each person''s face, but she also knit her brows when she saw that her brother was about to fight Young Master Wang. Young Master Wang was a famous alumni of this school, he was someone who had graduated early after he had reached the Silver Realm. There were even rumours that he had already reached the Gold Realm! Yet her older brother was about to fight him, was he crazy!


    Lin Fan and Wang Lei shook each other''s hands before taking a step back.


    Once they had taken that step back, they immediately pulled up their fists to punch the other.


    The moment their fists shed, there was a wave of golden life energy that spread across the arena, sweeping across the crowd in the stands.


    All the cheers and jeers stopping in that moment when the wave of golden life energy came out.


    It confirmed that Young Master Wang was in the Gold Realm like the rumours, but Lin Fan had actually matched the power contained in his fist, which meant that he was also in the Gold Realm.


    This pretty boy that hid behind women and relied on tricks to win was actually in the Gold Realm?


    The members of the crowd that had jeered at Lin Fan had pale looks on their faces.


    They had actually insulted a Gold Realm Expert, what should they do now? All Gold Realm Experts were all nobles and nobles were people normal people like they couldn''t mess with!


    But the most shocked person in the crowd was Lin Xue!


    Was this the trash brother that she knew her entire life? Just what was going on? Her trash brother was actually a Gold Realm Expert!


    Why did he always take her bullying and her insults?


    She suddenly felt like she didn''t know this brother at all.


    Meanwhile, in the arena, the waves of energy continued to spread out from the center of the sh. But after a few seconds, Wang Lei couldn''t take it anymore and was forced a step back by the force of Lin Fan''s fist.<sub> </sub>


    Wang Lei''s fist was actually numb from the force of Lin Fan''s punch!


    Wang Lei had a look of shock as he stared at Lin Fan. Just what was with this man''s fist? It was as if this man''s fist waspletely made of steel!


    But Wang Lei didn''t pause at all as he immediately charged forward and with a turn, he sent his leg out in an arc like a whip, cracking down at Lin Fan''s head.


    Lin Fan quickly ducked underneath this kick and using the momentum, he charged forward trying tond a palm on Wang Lei''s open chest, but Wang Lei using the momentum of his kick went into a spin and passed Lin Fan on his right.


    Continuing like this, Lin Fan and Wang Lei continued for over ten rounds, but neither of them couldnd a blow on the other.


    As time passed and more rounds continued, they couldn''tnd any hits on each other, but they became more and more tired.


    Finally, they separated and both were panting as they tried to catch their breath.


    The crowd was shocked by the exchange they saw.


    There was a barrier that protected them from the waves of energy that swept over them, but they could tell just how strong the force behind each attack was.


    If they were to take a single hit from either one of these two, they would have been crushed in a single hit.


    Finally after catching their breath, Wang Lei revealed a smile and said, "Owner Lin, you really are someone worthy of praise. I''ve never fought someone as strong as you before."


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile, "You are pretty strong, you''re among the strongest people I''ve ever faced."


    Wang Leiughed at this, "It really is an honour to be treated this highly by Owner Lin, but unfortunately this match has toe to an end eventually."


    After he said this, he summoned out his pet.


    What came out of his pet space was arge rhino that had a single sharp drill horn.


    Lin Fan recognized this beast, it was a Drill Rhino that was said to have the strongest piercing power among all Gold Realm Beast. It was said to even have enough piercing power to break through the defenses of a tinum Realm Expert!


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all since he had something that could match it.


    With a snap of his fingers, there was a small chick that came out of his pet space.


    Wang Lei was confused and a little insulted at first, but then he could feel the auraing from the chick. It was even stronger than the aura that he felt from Lin Fan, so he was certain that this was not a chick he could underestimate.


    But before he could do a thing, the chick chirped into the sky and golden mes wrapped all around it as it began to transform.


    The little chick continued to grow until it became a meter and half long phoenix that waspletely wrapped in golden mes.


    When the three old men in the judge''s room saw this, they werepletely shocked.


    This was a beast with the pure phoenix bloodline, which meant that it was a beast that could be a Beast King!


    Beast Kings had the ability to match Legendary Realm Experts, so that meant as long as Lin Fan was given the chance to grow, he would be able to grow a Beast King!


    This ignited the desire to take Lin Fan as their disciple even more.


    All three of the old men vigntly looked at each other since they knew they couldn''t trust the other two.


    When the mes transforming the chick disappeared, its full aura was released and a chill ran down Wang Lei''s back.


    This feeling, he had only felt it once before.


    It was from the head of the family who was in the peak of the Gold Realm!

 47 Chapter 47

    Wang Lei immediately pulled back with his Drill Rhino, creating distance between him and Xiao Huo.


    Lin Fan didn''t make a move as he let him draw back. Since his opponent had shown him respect, of course he would give him respect back, giving him a chance to have a fair fight.


    Wang Lei now felt a bit of regret, but also a bit of excitement over his decision to challenge Lin Fan. He had never faced someone who was the same age and hadpletely dominated him like this like Lin Fan had done.


    Wang Lei could feel his blood boiling and he could sense that he was being pushed to his limits, bringing his power to another level.


    Since he was the one who had asked for this duel, of course Wang Lei couldn''t back down even though he knew that he couldn''t win this fight. Still he steeled his heart before deciding to charge forward while coordinating with his Drill Rhino. Gathering all his life energy, he wrapped it around the Drill Rhino to form ayer of armour while also gathering it at the tip to increase the Drill Rhino''s prating power.


    Lin Fan was impressed by the level of coordination Wang Lei had with his pet, but still he wouldn''t let him win that easily.


    Lin Fan had also been working on coordinating with his pet, but so far he had onlye up with a single move with Xiao Huo, but it did remind him of a special move for a certain captain back on earth.


    With a mental order to Xiao Huo, Xiao Huo gave a cry before flying onto Lin Fan''s back and continuously releasing mes that wrapped around him perfectly without burning him.


    The mes that seemed to wrap around him like ayer of fiery armour before gathering slowly into his fist.


    As both sides continued to gather their life energy, it seemed like they would end this fight in a single sh.


    Once they had finished gathering their life energy, Lin Fan and Wang Lei exchanged a nce. Like there was a tacit understanding between the two of them, they suddenly charged at each other at the same time.


    At the same time, they screamed out the names of their attacks.


    "Shining Drill!"


    "Phoenix Punch!"


    There was a bright light that came out of the tip of the Drill Rhino''s horn before it formed a little cone of light at the tip of the horn.


    As for Lin Fan, the mes around his fists seemed like they were transforming as they took the shape of a bird that wrapped around his fists.


    The two attacks shed against each other, but there was no contest at all as the cone of light was shattered to pieces and the waves of mes carried Wang Lei to the other side of the arena.


    Wang Lei struggled to stand, but he stabilized himself after a few seconds. There was a sliver of blood that came out of the corner of his mouth, but his injuries weren''t serious since Lin Fan had held back at thest second.


    This was a duel between men, this wasn''t a fight to the death. Lin Fan wouldn''t force Wang Lei into a corner.


    Wang Lei knew that he had been beaten, so he calmly walked back to the center of the arena where Lin Fan was waiting.


    When Wang Lei came back, the first thing he did was cup his hands and give a slight bow to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, it has been an honour. I thank you for giving me the chance to fight you."


    Lin Fan was someone who treated others how they treated him. Since he was shown respect, of course he would return it.


    Lin Fan also cupped his hands and said, "Young Master Wang, it was also quite the learning experience being able to spar with you. If possible, we should find time to do it again."


    Wang Lei broke out inughter, "Are you sure you don''t want another chance to beat me up? What young master? Owner Lin has no need to be this formal, you can just call me Brother Wang."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile, "Brother Wang is the one who was formal in the first ce, you can also just call me Brother Lin."


    Wang Lei was really simr to Boss Gao when it came to personality, but of course there was a difference when it came to talent between the two of them. Boss Gao was in his thirties and he was still in the Silver Realm, while Wang Lei was in his early twenties and he was already in the Gold Realm.


    But Wang Lei was someone who was direct and treated others with respect, so he was definitely someone that Lin Fan could get along with.<sub> </sub>


    They chatted for a bit before Wang Lei said, "Brother Lin, if possible, do you have time toe visit our Wang Family?"


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before saying, "Alright, when I have time, I''lle visit you."


    Lin Fan really hoped that the Wang Family wasn''t like the Gao Family, he really hoped that they were just like Wang Lei and he could be friends with them.


    Since they had reached an agreement, they exchanged contact information before Wang Lei surrendered.


    During this time, the crowd waspletely filled with silence. They couldn''t believe what they had just witnessed!


    This was a fight between Gold Realm Experts which was something that most of them would never have the chance to see in their entire lives.


    It took awhile for the host to react, but soon he shouted, "The winner is Lin Fan and Luo Qing!"


    Wang Lei''s female partner came over and checked over his wounds, but Wang Lei just waved her off. Wang Lei didn''t forget to introduce her, "This is Yin Hua, she is my childhood friend and my fiancee."


    Yin Hua gave a polite bow to Lin Fan, but he didn''t miss the slight cold gaze in her eyes.


    Based on the aura that came from her, Lin Fan was almost certain that she was even stronger than Wang Lei. The aura that came from her was almostparable to the aura Xiao Huo released when he transformed.


    But nothing happened in the end and Wang Lei left.


    Lin Fan and Luo Qing were sent back to the waiting area and after a few minutes of resting, they were brought back to the stage.


    No one dared to jeer at Lin Fan this time, but of course they still wouldn''t cheer for someone who had stolen their goddess. Still, his disy of power had brought a few people to his side and he had obtained a few fans who cheered for him.


    Butpared to the people who cheered for their opponents, these few cheers were drowned out.


    Lin Fan could tell from this person''s aura that he was the same was Wang Lei, an expert in the Gold Realm and based on his age, he should be the young master of a noble family like Wang Lei. However, this young master''s personality waspletely different from Wang Lei''s. If it had to be described, it was actually the exact opposite of Wang Lei''s personality.


    The moment this young master saw Lin Fan, the first thing he did was give a cold snort as he said, "So you''re the one who beat that trash Wang Lei?"


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but he still defended his new friend, "Who are you to call Wang Lei trash?"


    The young master revealed an arrogant appearance and said, "Trash, you dare talk back to me?"


    Lin Fan deeply knit his brows as he was confused by this.


    Most of the noble families should know who he was and the ones that didn''t should have heard from the other nobles, so it was strange that a noble young master was treating him like this.


    Even the ones that he was enemies with were weary around him, but this young master was openly hostile with him.


    Did they know each other? Was there some previous grudge between them?


    Lin Fan wanted to ask him why he was acting this way, but he didn''t get a chance.


    The host had finished introducing Lin Fan and Luo Qing, so he shouted, "Now, it''s time to begin!"


    The moment the host started the fight, the proud young master flew out, sending a punch right at Lin Fan''s head.

 48 Chapter 48

    Of course Lin Fan didn''t panic at all since he could easily keep up with this proud young master''s attack. For some reason, the attack of this proud young master seemed even easier to dodge than Wang Lei''s.


    Lin Fan moved out of the way and went past the proud young master,ing up behind him beforending a kick on his back.


    With the force of this kick, the proud young master was carried by the force of his attack and flew into the wall of the arena.


    But even after that, the proud young master didn''t give up.


    He wiped off the blood from the corner of the mouth before turning back to re at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was surprised since this young master was surprisingly easypared to Wang Lei, but he had called Wang Lei "trash" just now. Just where did he get his confidence?


    Still Lin Fan didn''t show any mercy at all.


    The moment the proud young master came forward to try to punch Lin Fan, he dodged past him again and kicked him into the wall.


    The proud young master didn''t give up as he continued to charge at Lin Fan, but he was sent into the wall again and again.


    As the crowd watched on, they couldn''t help feeling sorry for the proud young master and they couldn''t help cheering him on. They would have jeered for Lin Fan since he was clearly the viin bullying the weak, but they didn''t dare do it since he was still a Gold Realm Expert after all.


    After a few rounds of being mmed into the wall again and again, the proud young master struggled to stand firm on his feet, but there was still a look of defiance in his eyes as he red at Lin Fan.


    But his body didn''t listen as he finally copsed on the ground.


    Lin Fan turned to his female partner and she just gave a shrug.


    She came up to Lin Fan and said, "Don''t take him that seriously, he just doesn''t know how to express himself."


    Then she came up to Lin Fan and stretched her hand out, "Hello, I am Yue Xin and the one you beat up is Yue Jian who is my older brother."


    Lin Fan was stunned since he never expected her to do this. He had just beat up her brother, but here she was politely introducing herself¡­


    What was this situation?


    Yue Xin saw that Lin Fan was confused and exined while pointing at Yue Jian, "He''s been dering himself Wang Lei''s rival since they were kids, but he can never admit that he admires him. When he saw Wang Lei being defeated by you, he also wanted to fight you, but he was too embarrassed to admit it and that''s why he tried acting tough."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but then he couldn''t help thinking, was this kid a "tsundere"?


    He acted tough, but really all he wanted was to be acknowledged by and be friends with Wang Lei.


    Lin Fan was confused why Yue Jian had acted so hostile against him, but it turned out that he was just embarrassed¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking that Yue Jian was quite cute, he really was just a shy boy.


    After that, Lin Fan shook hands with Yue Xin and said, "Well it''s not that big of a deal, I find it quite cute."


    Yue Xin revealed a smile and said, "Isn''t he just the cutest? He''s always been like this, even when he was young. He never knew how to express himself and always chose to hide his feelings under that tough act, but I always knew that he was acting tough."


    As Yue Xin continued to talk, her voice filled with more and more excitement as the look on her face became slightly twisted.


    For once, Lin Fan wasn''t too dense to see what was wrong. It was clear that this little sister didn''t feel normally towards her older brother, rather her feelings were quite twisted.


    Too bad this keen sense didn''t apply to his own little sister¡­


    After talking for a bit with Yue Xin, with Yue Xin doing most of the talking about her big brother, Yue Xin told the host that they were giving up in the end.


    Just like that, Lin Fan and Luo Qing continued to move up through the brackets of the tournament.


    They faced many different couples, but they never faced anyone that was as strong as Wang Lei or Yue Jian, they were the exception to the rule.<sub> </sub>


    Most of the opponents they faced were either in the Iron or Bronze Realm, so Lin Fan left most of them to Luo Qing to fight to let her gain more experience.


    But there were also a few opponents that were in the Silver Realm that Lin Fan personally faced. Though usually he only ended it with a single flick of his finger.


    There were also quite a few opponents that just directly gave up when they heard that they would be fighting Lin Fan. They knew clearly that they weren''t a match for a Gold Realm Expert and it was better to surrender than to embarrass themselves.


    During the time in the waiting room, Murong Quan''s big sister had also taken to clinging to Lin Fan, flirting with him in front of Luo Qing. However, Luo Qing always came between them, but Lin Fan didn''t understand at all. Rather he thought that Luo Qing and Murong Ling were close since she would always hug Luo Qing when Luo Qing got between her and Lin Fan.


    Eventually they moved through the brackets until they reached the finals.


    When they walked onto the stage, their opponents took a single look at them before telling the host that they were surrendering.


    Even though it was the finals, they knew that it was futile and didn''t want to embarrass themselves.


    And just like that, Lin Fan and Luo Qing had won the tournament and had received the prize, but the prize itself hade as a shock to Lin Fan.


    The prize for the tournament was actually a couple''s ticket to an amusement park, promising a full VIP treatment for the couple.


    When Wang Ning came over to them after the tournament, Lin Fan asked her in a confused voice, "This is the prize that you wanted?"


    Wang Ning gave a nod and said, "That''s right."


    Lin Fan finally found his chance to get back at Wang Ning for all her teasing, "So does that mean that you have a boyfriend to use this with?"


    Wang Ning said with a smile, "Why can''t I use it with Qing Qing, I love her."


    Lin Fan was stunned by this, he never thought that they would actually be this close.


    Still, he handed the tickets over to Wang Ning. He wouldn''t judge if that''s what she wanted to do.


    Wang Ning took the tickets and then knit her brows.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Wang Ning said, "Well I''m busy on the date these tickets are for, so I can''t go."


    Lin Fan just said, "Oh."


    Wang Ning then turned to Lin Fan and said, "Well it really is a waste if they aren''t used since you worked so hard for them, don''t you think so, Owner Lin?"


    Lin Fan thought about everything he went through and he couldn''t help nodding.


    Wang Ning immediately said, "Great, it''s great that you feel this way!"


    She turned and grabbed Luo Qing''s hand, "Qing Qing was also looking forward to going as well and I don''t want to let her down, so you can just take her in my ce."


    Lin Fan waspletely stunned.


    He never expected Wang Ning to suddenly propose this.


    Lin Fan turned over to Luo Qing with a questioning gaze.


    Luo Qing''s face waspletely red at this point and she had a confused look on her face, but eventually there was a strong feeling thatpelled her to give a nod.


    Lin Fan through abination of not wanting to waste the tickets and fearing how his mother would react if he let Luo Qing down agreed to Wang Ning''s proposal in the end, but he had a bad feeling about this.


    What he didn''t know was the serious consequences that would follow when Ang learned about these tickets and his ns for them.

 49 Chapter 49

    Since everything had been settled, Lin Fan was nning on returning to his store, but there was suddenly an announcement that came over the speakers of the school.


    "Could Lin Fan and Luo Qing pleasee to the teacher''s lounge?"


    Lin Fan turned to Luo Qing with a confused look, but she looked back at him with the same confused look.


    She didn''t know why they were being called into the teacher''s lounge either.


    But still, they went since Luo Qing was a student after all and Lin Fan was too scared of his mother to cause trouble for her.


    When they arrived, they met Luo Qing''s homeroom teacher who brought the two of them over to three old men.


    These three old men were no one else but the three judges from the tournament.


    The moment Lin Fan arrived, the three old men all came out of their seats and walked over to him, looking him up and down.


    Lin Fan was surprised by this, but he could tell that these old men were all in the Gold Realm.


    As for Luo Qing, while Lin Fan wouldn''t recognize who these three old men were, it didn''t mean that she wouldn''t recognize them. She was shocked to see these three old men since they were the vice principals of her school. They had all been famous Gold Realm Experts in their time, but they had all retired to be teachers, but that didn''t mean they had lost their edge.


    The three old men went around Lin Fan, probing him with their senses and they were shocked to find just how powerful his body was.


    They found that even if they used all their strength, they might not be able to break through the natural defenses of his body.


    The old man who specialized in training physical techniques couldn''t help feeling overjoyed like he had discovered a treasure. This physique, it really was something amazing! It was even better than the physique that he had trained his entire life and this kid wasn''t even twenty yet!


    Seeing the obsessive looks in the eyes of three old men, Lin Fan almost couldn''t help covering his body. He almost felt like a naked woman being surrounded by a bunch of men just with how they were looking at him.


    As he didn''t know what to say, it was Luo Qing that finally broke the silence.


    "Vice principals, did you need something from us?"


    The three old men finally came back to their senses and stopped moving around Lin Fan, as they turned back to Luo Qing.


    The first vice principal Yang Wen who had been the first one to ask for Lin Fan said, "Well, we were curious about the ones who won the tournament."


    The second vice principal Li Li said, "We wanted to see the young man who could match Young Master Wang. I''m especially curious about what kind of physique he has to even push Young Master Wang away."


    The third vice principal Tang Wen who was the more tactful one out of the three of them said, "Of course, we also wanted to reward student Luo Qing for her aplishment in the tournament."


    Luo Qing was a smart girl, so she could guess what they were really called here for, but she wouldn''t expose them just like that since they were still her teachers.


    Lin Fan was also quite astute and could tell just what they wanted.


    He couldn''t help secretly calling them shameless old men in his mind, they were almost as shameless as that Mu Bo Hai.


    Yang Wen asked, "Little friend Lin, can I ask if you have a master?"


    The other two vice principals didn''t say anything, but it was clear that they also cared very much about his answer.


    Lin Fan said, "I do have a master, but he only teaches me when he has free time."


    Since everyone else already believed that Lin Fan had a master, he might as well use this master of his to hide behind.


    The eyes of the three vice principals lit up when they heard this.<sub> </sub>


    ? Li Li couldn''t take it anymore and he immediately grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder, "Young man, I know that you specialize in physical training based on how developed your body is. You and I are birds of the feather who flock together, so I can tell that there is destiny between us. How about you take me as your master instead and I''ll teach you everything I know about physical training?"


    Yang Wen and Tang Wen wouldn''t let Li Li get in front of them, so they said at the same time, "Old Li, you can''t do something this shameless!"


    Yang Wen moved faster than Tang Wen as he came up to p Li Li''s hand off Lin Fan''s shoulder before grabbing them himself, "Young man, you shouldn''t listen to that old muscle head. You don''t want to be as stupid as him, thinking that muscles are everything. Listen to me, I''ve seen how precise your life energy control is and I can teach you everything I know about how to fine tune that even more. I can help you create life energy needles the size of atoms."


    Tang Wen gave a cough and didn''te on as strong as the other two, but he still said, "I can tell that you''re quite skilled at training pets, which happens to be my specialty. I can guarantee you that I can help you train that phoenix pet of yours until it bes a King Beast. You will be an expert who everyone looks up to and will be able to go wherever you want."


    Luo Qing on the side was shocked by how passionate the three vice principals were in trying to take Lin Fan as their disciple.


    These three were three famous Gold Realm Experts, they were said to be in the peak of the Gold Realm and all three of them were fighting to take Lin Fan as their student.


    If this had happened to Luo Qing, she would definitely be unable to hold back her excitement.


    As Lin Fan was about to reject all three of them, there was a knock and a cough that came from the door.


    Everyone''s attention was immediately grabbed by those sounds and when they saw who it was, everyone other than Lin Fan was shocked.


    The one who came into the teacher''s lounge was another old man, but unlike the other three, he was dressed in quite the casual clothes.


    He had a hawaiian shirt and a straw hat on, making him look like someone who was enjoying his retirement.


    This old man came over to the three of them shaking his head and said with a sigh, "What are the three of you doing?"


    The three vice principals were surprised to see this old man, but they quickly came back to their senses.


    Tang Wen reacted quickest and said, "Sir, why are you here?"


    The straw hat old man turned to him and said, "I look away for a second and you guys are doing this¡­"


    Then he turned back to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, I''m sorry to show you this embarrassing disy, I didn''t teach these kids properly."


    Lin Fan could tell that this straw hat old man was clearly the one in charge, so he said, "It''s been no problem, this treatment could be considered quite kind for normal people."


    The straw hat old manughed and said, "Owner Lin is as the rumours described. I apologize for this and I will try toe to Owner Lin''s store for a visit when I can find some time."


    Lin Fan just politely said, "Elder, you are being too kind. Our store wees you whenever youe."


    The straw hat old man then said, "Owner Lin, while these kids have gone too far, they are correct when they say that Owner Lin truly is a talented young man. If possible, could I propose something?"


    Lin Fan revealed a curious gaze, "Esteemed elder, you''re overpraising me. What is it that this elder wishes to propose?"


    The straw hat old man said, "Well, with Owner Lin''s abilities, your master is clearly a grand expert. If possible, could we ask Owner Lin to share some of his wisdom with our students?"


    Lin Fan was confused, "Elder, are you asking my master toe teach at your academy?"


    The straw hat old man shook his head before saying, "No, no, our school can''t afford to pay an expert as grand as your master toe lecture here. Instead, I was hoping that Owner Lin would be magnanimous enough toe teach our students."


    Lin Fan was shocked, "You want me to be a teacher?"


    The straw hat old man gave a nod, "It wouldn''t be much trouble, you would only have to teach one ss each month." Then his eyes narrowed before he said, "Of course, as a part of the faculty, you would receive some benefits and some protection from our school."

 50 Chapter 50

    Lin Fan could tell that this straw hat old man had some idea of his situation, that was why he had said thosest words.


    Lin Fan was currently on the edge of the knife as most noble families wanted a piece of his shop and he had already made enemies with both the Ding and Zhao Families.


    Right now he waspletelycking in allies and if he didn''t make some soon, he might be forced into a desperate situation as more and more people set their eyes onto his shop.


    If possible, he didn''t want to be forced into making Ang or Momonga reveal their power since that would risk exposing their true identities.


    This was a human dominated and if there were members of the other races, especially high ranking members like Ang and Momonga, it might bring real trouble by alerting the upper realm and having them send down experts to investigate.


    Lin Fan might even be charged with treason against humanity if that were to happen and he definitely didn''t have enough power to protect his new family if that were the case.


    The only thing he could do now was gather more allies while growing his shop and increasing his own power.


    So the straw hat old man''s conditions were quite tempting to Lin Fan.


    The academy that Luo Qing attended was considered one of the top schools in the city, even though it was a school that catered to normal students.


    Still, the academy was said to beparable to noble families and there were quite a few noble families that sent their children here.


    So if Lin Fan received the protection of the school and could establish connections here, not only would it deter many nobles, it would also make it easier for him to be allied to different noble families.


    After thinking it through, Lin Fan finally said, "Esteemed elder, that is a very generous offer, but what exactly do you mean by benefits?"


    The straw hat old man said, "Well, you''ll receive the same sry as a normal teacher and you will receive points that can be used for exchange like students of our school."


    Lin Fan was confused by this and he turned to Luo Qing who quickly exined the system to him.


    Students received points based on their grades and the different missions theypleted for the school, which they could use to exchange for items and cultivation techniques from the school.


    This was one of the main reasons why noble families sent their children here, it was all to exchange for items from this school''s library because it was one of the biggest collections in the city. It was said that most of it had been collected by the principal.


    Then Lin Fan turned back to ask, "Elder, how many points will I be receiving?"


    The straw hat old man said with a smile, "It''s quite generous, you''ll receive fifty thousand points per ss."


    Lin Fan turned back to Luo Qing and this time she had a shocked look.


    He poked her and she came back to her senses, quickly exining to him.


    Most students at this school wouldn''t even receive a thousand points per year, only the top students earned more than a hundred thousand, but Lin Fan would be receiving fifty thousand per ss and he would only teach once a month.


    That meant that Lin Fan would be receiving five hundred thousand points each year, which was an unbelievable amount!


    Lin Fan fell into thought when he heard this. What was the n of the principal? Why was he offering him such generous terms?


    Was it because of his so-called master or did he have some other objectives?


    Lin Fan looked at the straw hat old man and he couldn''t see through that smile.


    In the end, Lin Fan decided to ept this offer since it was easier to find the straw hat old man''s intention by epting first.


    Lin Fan said, "Elder, your offer is beyond generous and I would be honoured to ept it."


    The straw hat old man looked at Lin Fan before revealing a smile, "Alright, then Xiao Lin, since you''re joining our faculty, there''s no need to address me so formally. You can just call me principal like everyone."


    Lin Fan returned the smile and said, "Alright, principal."


    The straw hat old man took out a token from his pocket and gave it to Lin Fan, "Xiao Lin, this is the token of a special ss teacher for our school, it''s yours from now on. As for when you''ll teach your first ss, I''lle by your store in a few days to discuss this with you."


    Lin Fan took the token and put it away before cupping his hands, "Alright, principal. If there''s nothing else, I''ll be leaving first."


    The principal just said, "Un."<sub> </sub>


    With that, the youngest teacher in the history of this school had been hired.


    Once Lin Fan left the teacher''s lounge, the straw hat old man narrowed his eyes and turned to the three vice principals.


    The three old men all quickly bowed their heads and didn''t dare look up. Tang Wen who was more tactful said, "Master¡­" But the straw hat old man cut him off.


    The straw hat old man said in a cold voice, "I turn away for a second and you all do something like this. Do you know whose disciple you were trying to encroach on?"


    The three of them looked at each other in confusion before saying, "Master, what do you mean?"


    The straw hat old man said, "Even Old Mu couldn''t see through that shop and you''re trying to poach their disciple, are you trying to destroy our academy?"


    The three old men were shocked when they heard this since they only knew a single Old Mu that their master knew.


    It was the Legendary Realm Expert, the Forest King Mu Bo Hai!


    Even a Legendary Realm Expert couldn''t see through that shop, just how terrifying was it?


    The straw hat old man said, "Don''t provoke them anymore and treat Lin Fan with respect, that is the only way we can make up for this."


    The three old men nodded before meekly walking off.


    The three old men bickered like that because they were disciples that had trained together and their master was the principal! Even now they still couldn''te close to matching their master.


    It was said that the principal was someone who was in the tinum Realm, but they knew that their master was actually in the peak of the tinum Realm, which was the peak of humanity other than the Legends.


    Their master was also someone who was close to the Forest King Mu Bo Hai, so no one dared to provoke their master without a good reason.


    Yet now their master was actually being cautious towards this store, it showed that this was not an ordinary store.


    After the three vice principals left, the straw hat old man tapped his finger on the table beside him as he fell deep into thought. But after a while, he gave a sigh and walked out of the room.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan''s experience at the festival was finally over and he could go back to his store, but before that, his little sister caught him.


    As he was prepared to leave the school, he was caught by his little sister who had been waiting at the entrance the entire time.


    Lin Fan was just minding his own business when he was suddenly grabbed by the neck and pulled away.


    He was shocked at first and wanted to struggle, but once he saw that it was Lin Xue, Lin Fan just epted it since he knew that this wasing already.


    Lin Xue brought him to the back of the school and threw him against the wall before pointing a finger in his chest, "Tell me, was it fun seeing my act like a fool all this time?"


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say and had a difficult expression on his face, but after gathering his thoughts, he raised his hand in surrender and slowly said, "It isn''t what you think, I didn''t do anything to make you a fool."


    Lin Xue coldly red at him, "Yet here I am looking like a fool. Not even knowing that my own big brother was actually a Gold Realm Expert."


    Lin Fan wanted to exin, but he couldn''t exactly tell Lin Xue that he had a magical system that had changed everything.


    So in the end, Lin Fan just remained silent.


    Lin Xue saw that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a word, so she just gave a cold snort and left.


    Lin Fan began racking his brain on how to solve this problem, but what he didn''t know was that the problem he thought wasn''t actually the problem that he had.


    All this had actually raised Lin Fan''s position in Lin Xue''s mind and she loved him even more. After all, he had purposefully hid his cultivation for years just to give her all the best resources, it meant that he clearly loved her too!


    Now that he was a Gold Realm Expert, as long as she became stronger too, it didn''t matter what the rest of the world thought since she could silence them with her strength!


    She would be so strong that she would break the taboo between them and own Lin Fan!

 51 Chapter 51

    After that exhausting day, Lin Fan had finally made his way back to his store which was quite calm since the slots for training had been filled and there weren''t many special ingredients left out for disy. The only special ingredients left outside were extremely rare ones that were just too expensive, so no one bought them.


    When he came in, for some reason, Ang came up to him and began sniffing around his body. After taking a few good sniffs, she knit her brows, "There''s an unfamiliar smell on you."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this and he raised his arm to take a sniff, but he couldn''t smell anything, "What do you mean? I don''t smell anything."


    Ang red at him and said, "There''s a strange flowery scent that''sing from you. Where did ite from?"


    Lin Fan was even more confused since he had no idea what she was talking about. In the end, he had to just walk around Ang ring at him since he had no idea how to deal with her.


    When he was about to walk into the back, Momonga suddenly waved him over.


    He walked over to where Momonga was ying chess with Brainy and Momonga said, "There was an order of eggs that came in today, I think it''s the first batch you ordered a few days ago. I had the girls put it in the storage by the egg cultivation chamber for you."


    Lin Fan''s expression filled with excitement when he heard this.


    He had unlocked the egg cultivation chamber a long time ago, but he had never been able to use it since he didn''t have a stock of beast eggs.


    He had ordered these eggs more than a week ago, but it had taken its time getting here. But now that they were here, it was finally time for him to test out this egg cultivation chamber!


    Lin Fan waved his hand at Momonga to show that he heard him before running off to that storage room.


    Of course, Lin Fan back then didn''t have as much money as he did now, so he had ordered a cheap batch of eggs.


    When he opened the door to the storage room and saw the crates of eggs in front of him, his eyes lit up. But now that he was much stronger, he could tell based on the aura that came from the eggs, the beasts in these eggs had low grade bloodlines and were quite weak.


    But still, this was just a test, so he was fine with using these low grade eggs.


    Worst case scenario, he could just sell the creatures that hatched since he had also unlocked that feature when he had upgraded the shop.


    Lin Fan brought one of the crates of beast eggs into the egg incubating room. When he put them down, he picked up the card that came with the crate to see what kind of eggs he had picked.


    There were six eggs packed into this crate and the card said that there were two fire attributed eggs, two water attributed eggs, and two earth attributed eggs.


    The card didn''t specifically state what bloodline or what creature these eggs came from because that was the case for every egg.


    Every beast egg that wasid was just a container for elemental energy and after the egg hatched, that elemental energy would eventually take a beast form. The higher the density of elemental energy contained within the beast egg, the higher the grade of the bloodline.


    So that meant that an eggid by a chicken could give birth to a dog, or ignoring the fact that a dog beast couldy an egg, that egg could hatch into a dragon.


    Lin Fan picked one of the earth eggs since he didn''t have an earth attributed pet just yet. Brainy might seem like an earth attributed pet since it was a vine, but Brainy was actually a mutated spiritual attributed beast since its spiritual senses were the most developed part of it.


    Lin Fan brought the earth attributed egg over and ced it into the central pedestal before taking out a few earth attributed ingredients out of the shop''s spatial storage.


    He was tempted to take out special ingredients at first since everyone said that the first attempt was always the luckiest, but he still didn''t know how this would turn out, so he was hesitant about doing this. Unfortunately, he was filled with regret over what the system saidter when he activated it.


    When everything was put into their proper ce, Lin Fan moved over to the control panel and pressed the button to start the machine, but then there was a message from the system on the panel.


    "Host, please note that it costs 100 points for each attempt of the egg incubating chamber, please confirm by pressing the button again."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this, but he gave a shrug since he was no longer the same Lin Fan from before, he was finally somewhat rich.


    After receiving the business from the nobles and selling all those ingredients in the morning, Lin Fan had slowly amassed over two million points, which meant that he had earned over two million crystals!<sub> </sub>


    That was what a store under a noble family made in an entire month, but he had earned all of that in a single week.


    Of course this was not counting all the points he had spent on the various expenses of the store like for the cultivation realm farms and for entering the high grade cultivation realms to train and farm special ingredients.


    But once Lin Fan pressed the button, the next notification from the system filled him with regret.


    "First activation of the egg incubating chamber has been detected, now activating first time luck. The first egg ced in the egg incubating chamber has a high chance of being increased by a single rank."


    Lin Fan was stunned by this.


    Why had he been greedy and not stuffed this egg full of special ingredients.


    As Lin Fan was regretting his life choices, the center pedestal began to light up as elemental energy was sucked out through the tubes connecting to it. Once the elemental energy was sucked into the main pedestal, it created a vortex with the egg in the center. As the earth elemental energy continued to swirl around the egg, streams of it came out of the vortex as it entered the egg, increasing the aura of the egg itself.


    Lin Fan with his spiritual senses could tell that the energy concentration inside the egg was getting stronger.


    Since this was an Iron Realm egg, he had expected the egg incubating chamber to push it at least to the Silver Realm, but he could tell from the aura that it was already at the peak of the Gold Realm and approaching the tinum Realm.


    Then he remembered that there was the first time bonus from the system, so that was probably why it was being pushed that far.


    Eventually the elemental energy vortex waspletely sucked into the egg and there was just silence in the room.


    Lin Fan walked over to the egg and when he was about to pull it out, he suddenly saw a wisp of light fall down through the central tube andnd on the egg. The moment the wisp of light touched the egg, the entire egg lit up and released a dazzling light that forced Lin Fan to block his eyes.


    After a moment, the light slowly faded and Lin Fan regained his vision, but the egg strangely hadn''t changed at all.


    This time Lin Fan waited to see if there were any other changes, but after waiting for five minutes and seeing nothing, he realized that it was over.


    Lin Fan opened the central pedestal and went to pull out the egg, but the moment his hand touched the egg, the shell cracked and a pile of stones fell out.


    "Congrattions, the host has hatched a mutated beast, the Aegean Giant."


    Lin Fan was surprised to see that it was a mutated beast, but he was also filled with excitement. Brainy was a mutated beast and it had all kinds of different wonderful abilities, which meant that this Aegean Giant should be the same.


    Aegean Giant (Young)


    Name: N/A


    Grade: Rare (Single Mutation)


    Cultivation: Iron 1


    Bloodline: Divine Giant


    Skills: Rock Slide, Rock Control, Super Regeneration, Indestructible


    Combat Strength: 10.1


    System''sments: Meh, not worth mentioning.

 52 Chapter 52

    Divine? Giant?


    Did that mean that this pile of rocks had the Divine Blood in it? Could it reach the God Realm in the future?


    Lin Fan waspletely shocked by this.


    But what Lin Fan didn''t know was that this was just normal for all mutated beasts.


    A mutated beast was a beast that had returned to its original, which meant that it had returned to the root of its progeny, namely its divine ancestor.


    That meant that mutated beasts contained a portion of Divine Blood in them.


    As for how much Divine Blood they had, that all depended on how many times they had mutated.


    ? Normal single mutation beasts typically only had a single drop of their ancestral Divine Blood diluted through their bloodline, meaning that they had ess to a portion of the power of the ancestral bloodline.


    But even that portion was much stronger than most normal beasts, making them natural leaders in the beast world.


    As for beasts that had double or triple mutations, the concentration of Divine Blood in their veins had reached a point where they had developed the aura of their ancestral bloodline.


    Once beasts reached their fourth mutation, the concentration of Divine Blood in their veins would reach a point where they could induce single mutations in normal beasts if normal beasts drank their blood. But of course normal beasts had no way of killing a fourth mutation beast since it would mean killing a beast that had more than half of its ancestral bloodline''s power.


    So while this Aegean Giant only had a single drop of Divine Blood, it was a beast that had ess to divine powers,pletely justifying its ssification as divine.


    As for the three pets that Lin Fan had since the beginning, they had true Divine Bloodlines, which meant that as long as they grew up, they would reach the God Realm!


    While Lin Fan was stunned by the status screen, the small pile of rocks began moving until they formed a small golem that was the size of Lin Fan''s palm.


    The little rock golem looked around itself and then it turned its head to Lin Fan. Just like a little chick imprinting on the first thing it saw, the little rock golem immediately took Lin Fan as its parent.


    The little rock golem went over to Lin Fan''s hand on the pedestal and suddenly hugged it, knocking Lin Fan out of his stupor.


    Seeing the little golem hugging his hand, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking that it was quite cute.


    After ying around with the little rock golem for a bit, Lin Fan decided to form a contract with it and keep it for himself instead of selling it.


    For the pets that were hatched in the incubation chamber, they were all born with a natural formed temporary contract to Lin Fan. He could either decide to formalize that contract and take a pet as his own or he could sell the pet and let it form a new contract with the one who bought it.


    But since this was a mutated pet like Brainy and it had a "Divine" bloodline, he might as well keep it. Lin Fan really was looking forward to seeing how this little rock golem would develop in the future.


    Once Lin Fan formed the contract, he thought about it and said, "Now all you need is a name¡­"


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan asked the little rock golem, "How about Rocky then?"


    The little rock golem just gave an obedient nod since it didn''t know any better.


    Lin Fan tapped it on the head and said, "I really am a genius, I cane up with such perfect names."


    It was a good thing that little rock golem still had the mentality of a child and couldn''t really understand what Lin Fan was saying, otherwise it definitely would have fallen over at what Lin Fan was saying about himself. It definitely would have demanded a better name!


    After taking care of the contract with the little rock golem, Lin Fan moved back over to the other eggs.


    One by one, he went through the five remaining eggs until they were all hatched.


    In the end, all he hatched were three Silver Bloodline pets and two Gold Bloodline pets.


    For someone like him who had multiple mutated pets and pets with ancient bloodlines, these pets were nothing to him. In the end, he decided to sell off all these eggs.


    However, for those noble families, pets with Gold Bloodlines were incredible treasures.


    Most noble families only had two or three Gold Realm Experts and the strongest noble families had no more than ten Gold Realm Experts. A pet with a Gold Realm bloodline could be a Gold Realm beast if properly nurtured, which meant that it would give any noble family another Gold Realm Expert! Even for the strongest noble family, that meant an increase of one tenth when it came to their total power!<sub> </sub>


    This was clear the next morning when Lin Fan put these pets up for sale.


    At first no one believed that these were actually pets with Gold Realm bloodlines, but the moment the noble young masters arrived and used their spiritual senses on these pets, they started fighting over them.


    Of course no one dared to physically fight in Lin Fan''s shop after his disy of might, but they immediately crowded Lin Fan and started out shouting prices.


    Lin Fan should have been happy to hear all these bids, but all he revealed was a bitter smile as he tried convincing the system in his mind.


    "Look at them, they''re all telling us to take their money¡­"


    "Host, one should not have excessive greed. First warning."


    "But if we take their money, it means more points for you."


    "Host, do not try to bribe the system. Second warning."


    Still Lin Fan wouldn''t give up in face of all this money.


    "Then how about I take them out of the shop to sell? I''ll still give you the money."


    "Host, excessive greed is never good. Third warning."


    "Random punishment will now be selected."


    "Thousand needle punishment has been selected."


    It felt like there were thousands of needles that were being inserted into him, turning every single part of his body numb like when a pin was inserted into one''s skin.


    The sudden sensation made his body turnpletely numb before he copsed to the ground.


    Everyone surrounding him shouting prices was suddenly shocked to see Lin Fan just copse like this and they all moved back.


    But then after a while, they saw Lin Fan jump right back up like nothing had happened and everyone was too scared to say anything.


    Lin Fan turned over to them and said, "These pets will be sold based on how I feel each day. It doesn''t matter how much you offer, they''ll be sold at the price listed however I want to sell them."


    Actually the system didn''t care how Lin Fan sold these pets, it just didn''t let Lin Fan change the price of these pets.


    The nobles were anxious since these were rare treasures and they didn''t want it to go to their enemies.


    One of the young masters asked, "Owner Lin, just how are you selling these pets?"


    Lin Fan went behind the counter and pulled out a few pieces of paper along with a tub.


    He ripped the pieces of papers into tiny pieces and said, "You''ll write your names onto these pieces of papers and we''ll do a draw for them. Anyone can participate and if I catch anyone cheating, you can be sure you''ll be punished."


    The young masters obediently took the pieces of paper and wrote their names on them. They wanted to stop the other people in the store from also writing their names, but they didn''t do it since they didn''t want to offend Lin Fan.


    This was a store that not only had a Master Trainer, it also had a supply of high grade elixirs that were being sold cheap. If they lost ess to this shop, it would be a huge loss.


    In the end, the draw went as the following. There were two young masters who were drawn for the Silver Realm bloodline pets and one for the Gold Realm bloodline pet. As for the other two pets, they went to normal customers, but those normal customers couldn''t help sumbing to the rich offers that the noble young masters offered.


    The Silver pets were sold for ten thousand each and the Gold pets were sold for a hundred thousand, but the noble young master raised that price by ten times just to buy it from these normal customers.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help saying to the system, "Look at all the money that''s leaving our pockets."


    "Host, excessive greed is never good. First warning."


    Lin Fan knew when he had been beaten.

 53 Chapter 53

    Just like that, Lin Fan''s days consisted of selling elixirs and training spots in the morning and selling off pets in the afternoon.


    Time continued to pass and soon a week had gone by, reaching the day that Lin Fan was supposed to go to the couples experience with Luo Qing.


    Of course, Ang didn''t know any of this until the day of the date came.


    The tickets were of course for a Saturday because they were given by the school, so of course they had to ount for the winner going to school.


    After finishing the morning rush, Lin Fan anxiously waited for Luo Qing to appear.


    At first he didn''t seem like he wanted to go, but somehow Wang Ning hade in contact with his mother and had told her about the tickets. Of course Wang Ning had left out a few parts when talking to his mother since Lin Fan had explicitly forced her to hide the parts about his true abilities.


    Now that his mother knew, if he tried to get out of it, he definitely would have been punished.


    Even though Lin Fan wasn''t that filial back on earth, for some reason he felt quite attached to the new parents he had received in this world.


    After waiting for a bit, Luo Qing arrived, but she lookedpletely differentpared to usual.


    It wasn''t an outfit that was exposing, but somehow the outfit perfectly coordinated with Luo Qing to make her look even more beautiful than usual.


    When Lin Fan caught his first gaze of this, he couldn''t help being frozen on the spot and his chin dropped slightly.


    Luo Qing saw this and her face couldn''t help blushing, "Do I look that weird?"


    Lin Fan was just in a daze and didn''t know how to respond, but there was someone who didn''t like his response. Inside the shop, Ang had been sitting there bored on her phone, but the moment she saw Lin Fan''s response, her eyes turned cold. For some reason, it just bothered her.


    Also in the shop were Momonga and Brainy, ying their usual board games.


    When Momonga saw this scene, he couldn''t help revealing a sly smile and covering his lips. As for Brainy, it was still a young beast, so it really didn''t understand what was going on.


    After being in a daze for a bit, Lin Fan finally awkwardly said, "No, no, you look good." Back on earth he was fine with talking to girls, but for some reason, ever since he had transmigrated, he felt like he didn''t have the same groove as before.


    Ang came over with her hands at her waist and said in a slightly cold voice, "Where are you two going?"


    Lin Fan was a bit surprised by this cold voice, but he still said, "We''re going to the amusement park, it''s the tickets that we won at the tournament."


    Ang narrowed her eyes, "Amusement park, so you''re going out to have fun? How dare you leave me here alone while you go out having fun?" At this she poked Lin Fan in the chest.


    "Eh?" Lin Fan didn''t know what to say to this.


    But before he could say anything, Momonga on the side came over and said, "Well, I figured something like this would happen, so I bought another ticket the other day just in case."


    Lin Fan''s first reaction was, "Where did you get the money?"


    Momonga slyly said, "I earned some money online."


    Aftering to earth, Momonga had adapted quite well to the inte system and he browsed the inte quite often. Of course with his intelligence, it was quite easy for him to earn a bit of money on the side.


    Lin Fan couldn''t find anything wrong with that, but he did find something wrong with something else, "Why did you buy this extra ticket?"


    Momonga revealed a sly smile, "Of course it''s to watch this harem story of yours, it''s quite interesting waiting to see who you will choose."


    Lin Fan was stunned by this before he looked at Luo Qing and Ang, then he quickly shook his head and said, "No, no, no, you''re mistaken. There''s no harem here, we''re all just friends."


    Once Lin Fan said this, Luo Qing and Ang both felt a bit disappointed.


    Momonga just smiled and said, ??Sure, if you say so."


    Lin Fan couldn''t take it anymore, so after grabbing the ticket from Momonga, he ran off with Luo Qing and Ang.


    ¡­


    It didn''t take them long to reach the amusement park, but even more chaos came after they had arrived.<sub> </sub>


    The tickets that Lin Fan and Luo Qing had were for a special VIP couples experience while the one that Momonga had bought for Ang was just for normal entry.


    Once Lin Fan and Luo Qing showed their tickets, they were immediately brought to the side where there was a heart shaped cart that was waiting to chauffeur them around the park. With everyone watching, even Lin Fan who was made of stone couldn''t help feeling a bit embarrassed.


    Ang who saw this and was left alone couldn''t take this, so she promptly walked over and tried to get in the cart with them, but there was a member of the staff that came over to stop her.


    The poor girl was just trying to do her job, but Ang wouldn''t take it at all.


    The girl staff member tried to stop Ang from forcing her way over, but Ang wouldn''t ept this at all, so she released her aura.


    The moment her aura locked onto the poor girl, the poor girl felt a primal feare over her. The fear reached the depths of her soul and she couldn''t resist it at all, as her legs began to turn soft and every inch of her body trembled, while her soul screamed at her to run. In the end, shepletely lost control of her body and there was a certain scent that filled the air as the front of her pants turned wet.


    But luckily there was someone there who could stop her that was there.


    It was someone that no one would have expected to be at the amusement park.


    It was the Legendary Realm old man, Mu Bo Hai!


    Mu Bo Hai was someone with strange hobbies, namely he loved to run around having as much fun as possible. Whenever he had free time, he would run off to amusement parks, arcades, hobby shops, or even concerts.


    It was hard to imagine that this Legendary Realm old man that everyone respected and worshipped was someone who ran to idol concerts with glow sticks and love headbands on. Someone who fought over merch with all the other concert attendees¡­


    Mu Bo Hai was currently free because before closing the nar crack, the Union Government wanted to farm as much as they could from it, so they''ve been sending teams of seekers one after another during these days. Theypletely emptied the nar crack during these few days.


    Mu Bo Hai quickly came over and wrapped his aura around the poor girl to help her.


    Mu Bo Hai turned over to ask Ang, "Young miss, is there a need to do all this? Can you tell me what''s wrong?" There was a trace of fear in his voice since he still remembered the beating he receivedst time.


    Ang saw that it was Mu Bo Hai and gave a cold snort, but she still pulled back her aura. She knew that if she took it any further, she would be causing trouble for Lin Fan and she didn''t want that.


    Ang said in a cold voice, "She said that I couldn''t go with them, so I taught her a lesson."


    Mu Bo Hai really didn''t know what to say to this. This girl really was like a female gori, she just used her fists to solve everything.


    During this time, the manager hade over with severalrge men in ck suits who were clearly part of the park''s security.


    Mu Bo Hai ignored Ang and went over to the manager, taking out a white token as he walked over.


    This park was owned by a noble family that was allied with the school, so that''s why they had sponsored the prize for the tournament.


    As for this manager, he was a branch member of that noble family, but of course he had some more knowledge than the average person.


    This white token was the mark of the Union Government and the white colour showed that it was a Legendary Realm Expert. There was only one Legendary Realm Expert in Snow Wind City, the Forest King Mu Bo Hai!


    The manager said, "Lord Mu, it is an honour for us to have you visit our park!"


    Mu Bo Hai was used to this, so he just said, "Yes, yes. I''m sorry, it was one of my acquaintances who caused this mess."


    The manager quickly shook his hands and said, "No, no, no, how could I ept an apology from Lord Mu. It must have been one of my employees who did something wrong."


    Mu Bo Hai didn''t argue and just said, "My acquaintance also wants to experience the VIP couples experience, so could you help me arrange that? Consider it as doing me a favour."


    The manager quickly said, "How could that be? It would be an honour to do this for Lord Mu."


    After listening to the manager tter him a bit more, Mu Bo Hai came back to tell Ang that she could go with Lin Fan and Luo Qing. Of course, Mu Bo Hai also followed them.


    Lin Fan had seen everything happen, but he didn''t step in since he knew it would be easier for Mu Bo Hai to solve this with his influence. He couldn''t help thinking of what happened with the Ding Family before deciding that it was just the Ding Family acting alone and that Mu Bo Hai was sincere.


    So the three of them went on their awkward date just like this, but of course Mu Bo Hai didn''t leave them alone and followed along just in case there was trouble.

 54 Chapter 54

    Once again, several weeks passed just like this and soon a month had gone by.


    During this time, Lin Fan had been slowly gathering more and more points, as well as slowly cultivating himself and his pets.


    But that wasn''t all that happened because during this time, Boss Gao had also beening over with his pets, spendingrge amounts of crystals to train them.


    He didn''t forget toin to Lin Fan each time he did, but he was still shocked by the progress that his pets had made. Lin Fan had kept his promise and in just a single month, he had turned Boss Gao''s pets into Gold Realm pets.


    It was a bit special when Boss Gao came in today because he didn''t want his pets trained, rather he came to invite Lin Fan to a banquet at the Gao Manor.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see the invitation, but then he asked Boss Gao, "Are there any other guests that areing tonight?"


    Boss Gao slightly knit his brows as he said, "It''s a bit troublesome, the great elder said that he would be announcing something at tonight''s banquet and he told me to invite you, so he''s clearly nning something."


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned a bit cold at this, "It doesn''t matter what he''s nning, he won''t be able to back it up."


    But Boss Gao still knit his brows, "It doesn''t seem that simple. The great elder has also invited several other noble families and they seem to be sending some important members. It seems like he''s already been busy recruiting different allies."


    Still Lin Fan''s eyes were cold, "I haven''t been idle either. You''ll see what I mean tonight."


    Boss Gao looked at Lin Fan with doubt, but still he didn''t say anything. Boss Gao just gave a sigh and hoped that everything would turn out alright tonight.


    ¡­


    Once the store was closed, Lin Fan went with Boss Gao to the Gao Manor.


    This time, instead of leaving Brainy behind, he brought Brainy along curled up in his sleeve.


    Brainy through hard training during this period had finally reached the Gold Realm.


    Previously it had been the only one of Lin Fan''s pets that hadn''t reached the Gold Realm which had left a bad taste in its mouth. Even if Lin Fan obtained the Aegean Giant afterwards, the Aegean Giant had grown at an incredible rate which had put quite a bit of pressure on Brainy.


    So Brainy found the motivation and began focusing on training, pushing itself from the peak Silver Realm into the Gold Realm.


    But stillpared to the rest of Lin Fan''s pets, Brainy''s progress was considered quite slow.


    After being driven by Boss Gao for a bit, they arrived at the Gao Manor.


    Lin Fan looked around and was surprised to see that Mei Rou wasn''t there, so he asked, "Where''s sister inw?"


    Boss Gao knit his brows and said, "I know how dangerous tonight is, you really think I''m going to bring her along?"


    But Lin Fan countered, "But it would be strange if you didn''t bring her along, don''t you think?"


    Boss Gao had to admit he was right, but he still said, "It''s just a small thing, they''ll pay more attention to you tonight."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile, but his eyes were cold, "I''m just afraid they won''t pay attention to me."


    Boss Gao''s heart skipped a beat from this, but he didn''t say anything in response. He really just hoped that everything would turn out well.


    As they slowly came to the entrance, there were several other people that they saw also arriving. Once those other people saw Lin Fan appear, several of them came over to talk to him.<sub> </sub>


    "Owner Lin, I never expected that you would be here as well."


    "Owner Lin, it really is rare seeing you out of your store."


    Even though they said that, it was mainly out of courtesy. Lin Fan could actually tell that most of them seemed like they already expected Lin Fan to be there.


    Lin Fan just smiled at them and nodded, but he really didn''t say anything.


    He was here for one reason tonight, so he waspletely focused on this.


    The other guests didn''t seem to mind that Lin Fan didn''t talk to them, they just gathered around him and walked in with him, talking among themselves as he smiled and nodded.


    Eventually they all came to the hall of the Gao Manor where the elders led by great elder Gao had been waiting.


    Great elder Gao saw that everyone was gathered and a faint smile appeared on his chubby face. He came forward with outstretched hands and everyone moved aside as he moved towards Lin Fan.


    Great elder Gao came up to Lin Fan and said, "Little friend Lin, it truly is an honour that you came tonight. Come,e, we have much to discuss." After saying that, he led Lin Fan to the banquet hall.


    Lin Fan just kept nodding and smiling as he followed great elder Gao.


    The banquet began once Lin Fan had arrived and the mood was quite harmonious as everyone talked among themselves, but it seemed like most people were paying attention to Lin Fan.


    After a while, great elder Gao raised his ss and tinked it to get everyone''s attention before saying, ??I am honoured that all of you have gathered at our Gao Manor tonight, it brings me great joy that we can gather together like this. But of course, there is also something very special to announce tonight."


    Great elder Gao turned over to Lin Fan and pointed his hand at him, "As many of you know, little friend Lin here owns quite the wondrous pet shop. We have been in discussion during this time and we would like to announce that little friend Lin here will officially be working with our Gao Family to develop his shop."


    Everyone else was a bit surprised to hear this, but they had already expected it when they heard the Gao Family was hosting this banquet with Lin Fan as the guest of honour.


    There were even a few people who wanted to figure out how to get closer to the Gao Family. While there were also a few people who had been talking to the Gao Family during this month, so there were some alliances that were already formed.


    As for Lin Fan, he crossed his arms and while he had the same smile on his face, the temperature in his eyes had dropped by several degrees.


    When great elder Gao was about to continue with his announcement, he was suddenly cut off by Lin Fan''s cough. Once everyone''s attention was on Lin Fan, he said, "I don''t mean to interrupt great elder Gao, but I''m curious, when did wee to this agreement?"


    The smile on great elder Gao''s face dimmed a bit, but he still said in a calm voice, "Doesn''t little friend Lin remember? We discussed thisst time our little Fu Shuai brought you to visit. You even said that your master would agree to this."


    Lin Fan said, "I remember that, but I''m pretty sure that I said that I would talk to my master about it. My master still hasn''t decided during this time, so I''m not sure that there''s a cooperation to talk about right now."


    The smile on great elder Gao''s face dimmed even more and it was now turning a bit dark, "But little friend Lin, since you''re so close with our little Fu Shuai, you can already be considered a part of our family. Your master will definitely agree to this, so there''s nothing to worry about if we announce it now."


    At this point, Lin Fan finally stopped smiling as he looked right into great elder Gao''s eyes, "Are you sure you can speak for the entire Gao Family on this?"


    Great elder Gao''s smile also disappeared as he said, "I''m certain that I can speak for the Gao Family. Does little friend Lin have some doubts?"


    Lin Fan turned his eyes to the side as he said, "Well, I''m certain that there are a few members of the Gao Family who don''t agree with you."


    Great elder Gao followed his gaze and then said, "Oh, so there are still a few ants who won''t give up without a fight."


    Great elder Gao was currently looking at Boss Gao and his dad standing on the side.

 55 Chapter 55

    Boss Gao''s dad Gao Zhuang stared right back at great elder Gao.


    They were already prepared for this, so of course they wouldn''t back down now.


    Great elder Gao was surprised since he had already assumed that he had taken care of them, but it seemed like this father and son pair still had their backbone.


    Great elder Gao gave a snap and three elders moved over to where Boss Gao and his dad were standing.


    Then he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "I don''t know what lies they have been telling little friend Lin, but I guarantee that cooperating with the Gao Family is the best choice."


    In the end, if he could end this without any real action, that would be for the best. He wasn''t sure just how much power Lin Fan had, but he assumed that it wouldn''t be able to match up to the power of the Gao Family.


    But what he didn''t know was that he waspletely wrong and how he would suffer from itter.


    Lin Fan matched his gaze once again, "Unfortunately, my master doesn''t n on cooperating with this kind of Gao Family. Maybe we can discuss this again once the Gao Family has solved its issues."


    At this, great elder Gao gave another snap and this time the elders behind him surrounded Lin Fan.


    Great elder Gao said in a cold voice with a cold smile, "I think that little friend Lin shoulde and have a chat with us first before we decide anything. I''m sure we can convince you to change your mind."


    Lin Fan was already expecting this, so he broke out inughter before suddenly stopping to say in a cold voice, "Are you certain you want to do this?"


    Great elder Gao had the same cold smile, "Little friend Lin is the one who can make all this stop with a single word, I have nothing to do with this."


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh and shook his head at this, then without saying a single thing, he just gave a snap of his finger.


    What came out didn''te as a shock since he had already called it out several times. It was the phoenix chick, Xiao Huo.


    With the informationwork of these nobles and therge show he had put on at the tournament at Luo Qing''s school, it would be hard for them not to find out about it.


    But even so, great elder Gao didn''t panic since he was already prepared when he came up with this n.


    Great elder Gao came forward and gave his orders, "All of you work with the second and fourth elder to restrain Lin Fan, I''ll take care of the pet! Seventh elder, you restrain Gao Zhuang!" Once he shouted these orders, he immediately released his aura and rich golden life energy was released.


    In response to this challenge, Xiao Huo released his mes. The gold mes had a tinge of white to it, showing that Xiao Huo was in the peak Gold Realm.


    Great elder Gao was about to attack Xiao Huo, but he immediately drew back the moment he saw these mes since he was only in the high Gold Realm.


    He immediately changed his mind once he saw just how strong Lin Fan''s pet was and great elder Gao called out, "Old He, Old Yong,e help me!"


    Two of the attendees jumped forward tond behind great elder Gao and they also released their life energy, which while was a bit weakerpared to great elder Gao, it was still quite rich.


    These two were clearly close to the high Gold Realm, so working together with great elder Gao, they were able to stall Xiao Huo.


    Xiao Huo had plenty of fighting experience, but the one thing he didn''t have experience fighting was with other humans. Most of the opponents Xiao Huo fought were beasts since beasts under the Legendary Realm couldn''t transform into humans and Xiao Huo fought its shadow self in the shadow cultivation room.


    So while Xiao Huo was trained from rich fighting experience, he was still inexperienced when dealing with the coordination between these three Gold Realm experts.


    As for great elder Gao, he didn''t mind using these two trump cards because he was certain that as long as he could bring Lin Fan to his side, either by persuading him or beating him, he would be able to control Lin Fan''s shop. It really was a shame that he didn''t know a thing.<sub> </sub>


    On the other side of the room, Gao Zhuang was fighting the two elders that great elder Gao had sent to attack him, but both sides seemed like they were holding back.


    In truth, during this time, Gao Zhuang had been losing his influence in the family, but before that, these two elders had been on his side. They still had a bit of friendship between them even if they were on different sides now, so neither side could bear to use any real strength.


    While Xiao Huo was being held off by great elder Gao and his two allies, Lin Fan was surrounded by two Gold Realm elders and several Silver Realm elders. The two Gold Realm elders were the ones in front while the Silver Realm elders stood in the back, forming some kind of array that generated power that was given to the Gold Realm elders.


    When the Gold Realm elders released their aura, it became as strong as the two Gold Realm Experts helping great elder Gao, almost reaching the high Gold Realm.


    Both these elders were confident since their job was taking care of Lin Fan who was barely in the Gold Realm ording to their intelligence. Even if he had some time to train, he wouldn''t have be much stronger than when he was in the tournament.


    It was a shame that neither of them knew that Lin Fan had a certain cheat called the system.


    The elders even felt like they were bullying Lin Fan, so only the fourth elder came forward with a smile and said, "I''ll be the first one to y with little friend Lin, I hope you don''t mind."


    Lin Fan just gave a chuckle and said, "You''re attacking me, why do you need to be this polite?"


    The fourth elder gave a confident smile, "Well, we will be working together in the future, so it''s better to have a good rtionship."


    Lin Fan just said with a cold smile, "You''re attacking me and you''re trying to talk about a good rtionship? What a joke."


    The fourth elder didn''t say anything and just slowly walked forward with a smile. When he was halfway towards Lin Fan, that smile suddenly disappeared along with the fourth elder. Once the fourth elder appeared again, he was already in front of Lin Fan with his fist raised prepared to punch.


    Lin Fan immediately reacted and sent out his fist as well.


    When the two fists shed, waves of golden life energy spread.


    The fourth elder was confident at first, thinking that he would easily defeat Lin Fan, but soon he found that it was like punching a steel wall and he couldn''t move forward no matter what. Then as time passed, the fourth elder felt his own power weakening as Lin Fan began pushing him back.


    The second elder could sense this disparity in the sh and immediately charged forward to punch out at Lin Fan, but Lin Fan just raised his other hand to collide fists with the second elder and the same thing urred.


    Both of these elders were pushed back, but with tacit understanding, they immediately charged at Lin Fan together.


    Lin Fan just continued duking it out with these two elders like it was the simplest thing in the world, pushing them back again and again as their auras began to weaken.


    On the other side, Xiao Huo eventually adapted to the attack patterns of great elder Gao and his two helpers.  Xiao Huo was filled with all kinds ofbat experience, allowing him to adapt to all kinds of enemies. That was just what one gained from dying thousands of times.


    Great elder Gao could tell that Xiao Huo was slowly pushing them back and he could also tell that the second and fourth elder were being pushed back by Lin Fan alone. He knew that if this situation continued, they would be defeated here.


    With one big attack, great elder Gao pushed back Xiao Huo and called out, "Elders gather with me!"


    As soon as he shouted this, all the elders attacking Lin Fan and Gao Zhuang retreated, moving back and creating space between them and Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t in a rush to end this because he knew that this plot wasn''t as simple as it seemed.


    Great elder Gao had a very hesitant look and a bit of fear in his eyes as he looked at Lin Fan, but eventually he said, "Lord Feng, it seems like we do have to rely on you."

 56 Chapter 56

    There was a sudden gust of wind that was raised in the hall and then that wind gathered in the air above great elder Gao, creating a ball of wind that eventually scattered to reveal a person floating there.


    However, that person didn''t remain floating for long before hended right by great elder Gao.


    Everyone was silent as they waited for this person to act. During this time, Lin Fan looked over that person.


    That person was a middle aged man with clothes weaved from fine cloth to form a white tuxedo, with a white cape on his back. The man himself had wind swept back brown hair and green eyes that had a strange glow to them.


    While everyone watched, that mysterious person slowly raised a hand before suddenly pping great elder Gao across the face, sending him to the ground.


    But what was even more shocking was that great elder Gao didn''t dare resist at all, rather he took the p before kneeling down in front of that person.


    Finally, that person spoke. His voice was soft as the wind, but still it reached everyone''s ears, "This was a simple job, yet you managed to still mess it up this much. Is there a need to keep trash like you?"


    Great elder Gao didn''t dare raise his head as he said, "Lord Feng, this lowly understands that it is this lowly one''s fault. But please, on ount of all this lowly one''s merits, please forgive this lowly one. This lowly one didn''t expect him to be that strong."


    The person called Lord Feng turned over to Lin Fan and narrowed his eyes, sweeping over him with his spiritual sense. After a minute, Lord Feng suddenly opened his eyes in surprise as he said, "This kid really has an interesting physique. He''s clearly only in the Gold Realm, but I can''t prate him even with my spiritual senses. It''s like he''spletely made of steel."


    It was like great elder Gao had seen a straw to grasp as he quickly raised his head, "Lord Feng, you can also see that he isn''t normal¡­"


    But Lord Feng cut him right off as he stepped down on the raised head, pushing it right back into the ground as he said, "But it isn''t anything special that should have ruined the n. In the end, this is your mistake and I''m here to clean it up."


    Lord Feng looked over the rest of the elders before turning over to Gao Zhuang and saying, "I told you to deal with this piece of trash and yet here he is standing in front of us, defying us. If you had taken care of him like I told you, none of this would have happened."


    None of the elders dared to say a thing as they all quickly bowed down.


    Lin Fan could tell that this Lord Feng wasn''t normal since he couldn''t see through him with his spiritual senses at all. There were only two possibilities, this Lord Feng was either cultivating a special technique or he was at least in the tinum Realm!


    Lord Feng finally turned back to Lin Fan, but surprisingly he revealed a faint smile, "I''ve heard about you before. I know that you''re a bit strong, but you really have no idea what you''re dabbling with. Even if your master is strong and has some connection to Lord Mu, you''re still not someone who can survive in this city without a backing. Therefore, I suggest youe under my Feng Family and work for me."


    Lin Fan looked back at him with a smile as well as he said, "Ho, so what can the Feng Family offer me?"


    Lord Feng''s smile became wider, "You''re a smart one, I like dealing with smart people." Then he paused to look down at great elder Gao to step on his head again before turning back to Lin Fan, "Unlike this piece of trash."


    Then Lord Feng changed his tone as he said in a sincere voice, "I can tell that you are a talented young man and you have quite the special inheritance, so I will take you on as my personal subordinate. As long as you follow me, I can guarantee that no one in this city will mess with you."


    Lin Fan just nodded like he was considering it, but he didn''t say a thing.


    Lord Feng could tell that his words were convincing Lin Fan, so he continued, "You should know that our Feng Family is one of the four royal families of Wind Snow City. Once you join us, we''ll be strong enough to take down the other three families and rule over Wind Snow City."


    While there were over a hundred different noble families in Wind Snow City, there were only indeed four royal families since tinum Realm Experts weren''t that abundant. But these families had existed for hundreds of years, so it wasn''t hard for them to have several tinum Realm Experts in them.<sub> </sub>


    Lord Feng had already heard the various rumours and after hearing great elder Gao''s report on the shop, he learned that this shop had a Master Trainer in it. None of the other families had a Master Trainer affiliated to them, so as long as their Feng Family received this Master Trainer, they would be able to jump over the other families.


    This was a shop that was personally rmended by Lord Mu, so that meant that the expert behind it was at least in the tinum Realm. A tinum Realm Master Trainer, as long as they worked with this expert, they might even have a chance to train a King Beast and bring the Feng Family to another level!


    Lin Fan continued nodding like he was considering it, but then he suddenly stopped and looked back at Lord Feng as he said, "But what if I don''t want to work for your Feng Family?"


    At this, Lord Feng''s smile froze and then he narrowed his eyes, "You think you have a choice in this matter? You will work for the Feng Family one way or another, it''s better if you make the right choice now."


    But Lin Fan just gave a shrug, "Compared to working with you, I''d rather work with the Beast n."


    A vein popped out on Lord Feng''s head as he said in a slow and deep voice, "You will pay for your insolence."


    Once his voice fell, white life energy was released as the wind began picking up. Like his name, Lord Feng''s cultivation technique focused on controlling wind.


    As the wind picked up, strands of wind began forming around Lin Fan, picking him up off the ground.


    Lin Fan had never experienced the might of a tinum Realm Expert before, but feeling it now, he could tell that it wasn''t simple.


    Legendary Realm Experts were those that could control thews of the world and tinum Realm Experts being at the peak of humanity had a foot into the power ofws.


    Lin Fan could feel the restraining power of thews contained within Lord Feng''s wind. No matter how much he tried to resist with his body, he couldn''t break free of the restraining powers at all.


    Lin Fan could tell just from the tiny sliver ofws contained inside this wind cage thatws were things of absolute power. When he went back, he really should ask Momonga aboutws. He didn''t choose to ask Ang because she really did have a one track mind.


    Since Lin Fan had no other choice, he had to reveal his trump card.


    With a single thoughtmand, Xiao Huo suddenly burst into white mes and transformed once again, changing from the meter long phoenix into a meter and a half long phoenix.


    But it was different this time since Xiao Huo waspletely d in white mes, mes made of white life energy.


    Xiao Huo burst forth and came to Lin Fan''s back, releasing white mes that burned away the wisps of wind surrounding Lin Fan the moment they came into contact.


    Once all the wisps of wind had been burned off, Lin Fan slowly fell onto the ground with Xiao Huo pping his wings on his back.


    All around them, there was only silence.


    Even Lord Feng had a look of surprise as he looked at Xiao Huo.


    This phoenix was actually in the tinum Realm!

 57 Chapter 57

    But after a few seconds, Lord Feng came back to his senses.


    After quickly thinking about it, Lord Feng didn''t really find it strange.


    Lord Feng gave a chuckle and said, "It seems like your master really does treasure you, he even gave you one of his personal pets."


    Then Lord Feng looked over Xiao Huo and his eyes lit up, "Oh, ho, it''s a pet with a pure phoenix bloodline, that really is quite rare. I was just missing a good pet and since you''re bringing one to me, of course I''ll take it as a greeting gift."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "With just you?"


    Lord Feng said in a confident voice, "You''re nothing more than an upstart, you have no idea what a real tinum Realm Expert is like."


    Lin Fan said in an equally confident voice, "Then why don''t you show me?"


    Lord Feng turned back to the elders and said, "Alright, I''ll give you onest chance to redeem yourselves. Take care of that kid while I take care of his pet, you pieces of trash can at least do that, right?"


    The elders quickly nodded their heads while kneeling as great elder Gao said, "Of course Lord Feng, we''ll take care of him right now."


    Then all the elders gathered behind great elder Gao in an array, gathering all their energy together behind great elder Gao. The energy continued to flow through each part of the array before finally channeling into great elder Gao.


    When great elder Gao released his life energy this time, it was a rich golden colour with traces of white in it. With all the energy of the elders gathered together in that array, it had pushed great elder Gao into the peak Gold Realm.


    Lord Feng was the one that moved first since he needed to take care of the phoenix before leaving the others to take care of Lin Fan. Lord Feng gathered the wind and created a divider between Lin Fan and the phoenix, using the wind to guide the phoenix to the side.


    Lin Fan watched this happen, but he didn''t have Xiao Huo stop it at all. Lin Fan just had Xiao Huo take care of Lord Feng while he prepared to take on the elders.


    Gao Zhuang on the side was prepared toe over to help, but Lin Fan shook his head at him and Boss Gao.


    Lin Fan could have had them help, but he wanted to test his own power first.


    He knew that he couldn''t match a tinum Realm expert, but he wanted to see if he could fight someone in the peak Gold Realm.


    Once he saw that Lord Feng was taking care of the phoenix, great elder Gao flew out at Lin Fan with his fists raised.


    Great elder Gao knew that this was his final chance, so he spared no expenses at all as he used his strongest technique. Lightning wrapped around his fists as they flew through the air towards Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just calmly gathered his life energy around his fist before punching out to match great elder Gao''s punch. Even if Lin Fan wanted to use a special move, he didn''t have one in the end.


    He had exchanged for several techniques back when he left the nar crack, but he found that none of them could match his cultivation technique. In the end, the only move that he had was gather his power and punch out.


    When the two fists shed, neither side backed down as waves of gold life energy spread in all directions.


    Once the sh was over, both sides stood firm.


    Lin Fan had a surprised look while great elder Gao had a look of fear in his eyes.


    Just how strong was this kid''s body? It had actually blocked an attack from an expert in the peak Gold Realm?


    Lin Fan was surprised since he never expected his physique to be this strong. He already knew it was strong with how much beating he had taken from Ang, but he never expected it to be this strong.


    The sad thing was that Lin Fan was still underestimating his physique since he could take the attack of a Legendary Realm Expert just with his physique.


    However, great elder Gao didn''t give up as lightning wrapped around his fists and he continued to punch out at Lin Fan. Since one punch didn''t work, that meant that he would keep punching until it did!


    Lin Fan didn''t back down as he matched great elder Gao punch for punch.<sub> </sub>


    But after going for over thirty rounds, Lin Fan realized that while his physique was strong, his life energy was still a problem. He still wasn''t strong enough, so he didn''t have enough stamina and eventually he was forced a step back since he was slowly running out of life energy.


    He gathered his energy once again and forced great elder Gao back before jumping away.


    This wasn''t the way to keep fighting since he would eventually be forced back, so he had no choice but to reveal another one of his trump cards.


    Pretending to make a few seals with his hand, he then had Brainy activate the parasite seeds that he had ced in the second and fourth elder earlier.


    The seeds hadn''t fully spread and they weren''t strong enough topletely control the second and fourth elder, but they were still strong enough to control their movements to a certain extent.


    Once the second and fourth elder were controlled, Brainy had them disrupt the array by going against the flow of life energy.


    Great elder Gao immediately noticed that something was wrong and turned back to see the second and fourth elder jumping out to attack him, to which he immediately moved out of the way.


    But then he saw the second and fourth elder move over to Lin Fan. The moment they arrived in front of Lin Fan, they turned and stood in front of him, blocking great elder Gao from reaching him.


    Great elder Gao shouted at the two of them, "What are you two doing? Get out of the way!"


    The second and fourth elder both had pained expressions on their faces, but they didn''t move at all. The second elder said, "We can''t control our bodies, we don''t know what''s going on!"


    Great elder Gao saw Lin Fan still moving his hands to form fake seals and he shouted, "You, just what are you doing to them! Fight me fair and square!"


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "Now, whatever do you mean? I''m not doing anything."


    Great elder Gao was confused why this was happening, but then after releasing his spiritual senses, he realized something. Lin Fan was actually using a spiritual technique to control the bodies of the second and fourth elder. He could feel the waves of spiritual energy around the second and fourth elder.


    While great elder Gao was at a loss as to what to do, on the side of Lord Feng, he was actually gaining the upper hand against the Xiao Huo.


    Xiao Huo had just advanced to the tinum Realm not that long ago, so his control of the power ofws couldn''tpare to Lord Feng who had reached the tinum Realm a long time ago.


    Lord Feng used his mastery ofws to slowly push back Xiao Huo''s mes until Xiao Huo''s mes couldn''t reach him any longer.


    As Xiao Huo was pushed back further and further, eventually it had no choice but to retreat back to Lin Fan.


    It was only then that Lord Feng noticed the second and fourth elder standing in front of Lin Fan.


    Lord Feng said in a cold voice, "Now even you two are betraying me?"


    Great elder Gao quickly said, "My lord, it isn''t like that. This kid is using a strange technique to control Old Second and Old Fourth."


    Lord Feng said in a surprised voice, "Strange technique?" Then he released his spiritual senses and noticed the strange spiritual energy around them.


    Lord Feng stroked his chin and said, "Ho, a spiritual technique. That truly is something rare. Kid, you really are a treasure trove, I wonder what else you have on you."


    But even though Xiao Huo had been pushed back, Lin Fan was still strangely calm.


    Lin Fan had already expected this to happen, it really was hard to fight someone who had been in the tinum Realm for a long time. However, since one pet couldn''t do it, he would use a second one.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and gave a snap, summoning another pet out of his pet space.


    What came out was a little lizard.

 58 Chapter 58

    At first everyone was surprised to see this, but then they put up their guard since they learned not to underestimate Lin Fan''s pets.


    Of course, they were right.


    After the little lizard had appeared, the wind suddenly started picking up.


    Wisps of wind gathered around the lizard before turning into aplete tornado that surrounded the little lizard.


    Eventually the winds died down, but what appeared from inside the tornado was a meter and a half long dragon.


    Based on the aura that it released and the white life energy contained in the wind generated just now, it was clear that this dragon was also in the tinum Realm.


    But even with all that, Lord Feng didn''t seem worried at all. He had a confident smile on his face as he said, "It seems like your master ces more importance on you than I thought, he even gives you two of his personal pets to follow you around. But in the end, they will belong to me."


    Lin Fan knew that even with the addition of the Xiao Feng, he might not be able to fight Lord Feng, but there was another technique that he hadn''t used yet, so he was also calm.


    Lin Fan just said, "Take them if you can."


    Lord Feng revealed a smile, "With pleasure."


    Lord Feng stirred up the wind around him again, creating des of wind that flew out at Xiao Huo and Xiao Feng.


    Xiao Huo released his mes while Xiao Huo also created wind des that shed against Lord Feng''s wind des. By working together, the two of them were able to stop Lord Feng''s attacks.


    At the same time, Xiao Huo had gathered a ball of me in front of Xiao Feng that Xiao Feng was slowly feeding wind into. As more and more wind was being pushed into the ball of me, it continued to grow like a tiny wisp of me being fed kindling.


    Lord Feng could tell from the aura that it gave off that if he continued to let it grow, it would be more and more dangerous. Lord Feng didn''t give them a chance as he gathered more life energy to release more wind des.


    But Lin Fan knew that this would happen, so he also came forward with his fists raised and smashed them into the wind des.


    The moment his fists came into contact with the wind des, they shattered to pieces, but those pieces were still tiny wind des that cut the skin on Lin Fan''s arm.


    This was actually Lin Fan''s first time being injured in a fight, but his injuries weren''t serious. Most of the power contained within the wind des had already been shattered and it was just the remnant power that was causing slight injuries to him.


    As for great elder Gao and the other elders, they were slowly being pushed back by the residual waves of the tinum Realm battle. None of them took a single step towards the fight since they knew that they would be instantly killed by trying to interfere.


    Slowly the battle continued and after a few minutes of sending out wind des, Lord Feng knew that this situation was looking dangerous for him.


    As the fireball continued to grow, he could tell that he wouldn''t be able to break through their defenses in time to stop it.


    Lord Feng turned to the elders and shouted, "All of you, stop the kid for me! If we continue to let them gather their power, even I won''t be able to stop them!"


    But he was already toote since enough power had been gathered in the fireball.


    The elders were prepared to move forward, but they couldn''t take a single step forward once the fireball came out.


    Lord Feng knew that this situation was bad, so he immediately stopped his wind des and gathered all his life energy around him. After forming that armour of wind, he used the wind under his feet to quickly move behind the elders.


    The elders all felt betrayed by this, but they had no choice but to gather all their life energy together in a barrier to protect themselves.


    As they gathered their defenses, the fireball that had started out as a wisp of me that was now the size of a person flew out towards them. The moment it shed with their life energy barrier, there was arge explosion that filled the room, filling it with mes.


    Lin Fan had the protection of his two tinum Realm pets, but the other guests weren''t as lucky as most of them were thrown into the wall or out of the room.<sub> </sub>


    Once the mes disappeared, the scene that it revealed was quite tragic.


    Most of the elders were heavily injured with serious burns all over them, there were even a few Silver Realm elders that had been directly killed in the sh.


    As for Lord Feng, his clothes were filled with burns and the tip of his hair had been singed. He clearly hadn''t gotten out of this with light injuries, but that was to be expected since this was abination move from two tinum Realm pets.


    Lord Feng knew that this situation was bad, but before he could even try to run away, he felt himself being locked down in mes.


    He tried to resist those mes with his wind, but he found that there was another current of wind thatpletely cancelled out all his wind and soon he was trapped inside this cage of mes.


    When Lord Feng looked back at Lin Fan this time, he was no longer as arrogant as before, rather there was a trace of fear in his eyes now.


    Just what was with this kid, he was in the Gold Realm and yet he could smash wind des from a tinum Realm Expert with his fists alone! This was just too heaven defying!


    As for Lin Fan, once the mes scattered and the dust had settled, he began walking over towards the trapped Lord Feng in a rxed manner.


    Even though he had been injured, his wounds were already slowly closing.


    Lord Feng was even more terrified when he saw this. Not only was this kid''s body powerful, he even had such terrifying regeneration.


    But Lord Feng didn''t panic since he was still confident that this kid wouldn''t kill him.


    He was a tinum Realm Expert of the royal Feng Family, they were the ones that practically ran this city. As long as he nned on staying in this city, he wouldn''t dare offend the Feng Family.


    Even now as he was being trapped in this cage of mes, Lord Feng was still nning his revenge.


    When Lin Fan came in front of him, Lord Feng looked up at him with a confident smile as he said, "Do you know what you''ve done? If you release me now, I can¡­"


    But before he could even threaten Lin Fan, with his powers sealed by the cage of mes, Lin Fan had used his hand as a de with a wind de surrounding it provided by Xiao Feng to cut across Lord Feng''s neck.


    Even as his head flew through the air, Lord Feng''s eyes were wide open in disbelief as he never imagined that Lin Fan would kill him this decisively.


    Lin Fan hadn''t even hesitated for a single second to behead Lord Feng!


    Once Lord Feng had been executed, Lin Fan slowly turned to the other elders that were lying on the ground, staring up at him in fear.


    Lin Fan slowly moved to great elder Gao whose eyes were wide open with terror.


    Great elder Gao tried to crawl back as Lin Fan approached, but his wounds were too deep and he couldn''t move at all.


    He raised his hands as he tried to say anything to save his life, "Wait, wait, I can help you. As long as you spare me, I''ll serve¡­"


    But before he could finish, just like with Lord Feng, Lin Fan had cut off his head. The terror on his face as his head fell down and rolled to his corpse couldn''t be described in mere words. It was a type of terror that was found only in the depth of one''s genes.


    The other elders all began begging for mercy, but their words all fell onto deaf ears.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother walking up to each elder to behead them, Lord Feng and great elder Gao were the only ones that had annoyed him enough to warrant this. As for the other elders, Lin Fan had Xiao Feng take care of them.


    In a single instant, there was the sharp sound of wind des flying out before there was nothing but the sounds of heads falling to the ground. Once that was over, it became so silent that the sound of a pin falling could be heard.

 59 Chapter 59

    Once the mes and dust subsided, the people who had been blown out of the room slowly came back onto their feet.


    Some of them were still weak from the explosion and there were some that recovered faster, so they came to the entrance of the hall to see what was inside.


    All they saw was the terrifying scene of Lin Fan being surrounded by heads and headless corpses with blood still dripping off his hand. At the edges of the room, there were people who had been knocked out by the explosion when they mmed into the wall.


    The most terrifying thing was that Lord Feng had also been decapitated.


    There were many people who wanted to run the moment they saw Lord Feng''s corpse on the ground. This was a tinum Realm Expert who had been killed, this wasn''t a joke!


    Once the royal Feng Family heard of this, their wrath would rain down upon all those involved in this incident. The less they knew of this and the less they were involved, the better for them.


    The only thing that kept them from leaving was that they didn''t know what Lin Fan would do.


    This was someone who had killed a tinum Realm Expert, he definitely had some backing behind him that gave him this courage!


    They were in a situation where they couldn''t offend either side, so no one dared to act rashly.


    Boss Gao came over and said in a slightly fearful voice, "Brother Lin, are you sure about doing all this?"


    Lin Fan turned over and said, "It''s fine, it''s better to do this than to show any weakness. It''s better to just kill people than to let them plot against you."


    Boss Gao couldn''t help saying, "But if you kill him, doesn''t that mean making an enemy of the entire Feng Family?"


    Lin Fan asked back, "What made you think they wouldn''t have been my enemy anyway? Would they have left me alone if I had spared that Lord Feng?"


    Boss Gao didn''t know what to say.


    Lin Fan saw his stunned expression and continued, "You should remember for the future, a dead enemy is a safe enemy. Any enemy you leave alive might one day hurt you in the future."


    This left a deep impression on Boss Gao.


    Lin Fan was right in the end, even if he had left Lord Feng alive, the Feng Family would never let this disgrace go and would have done anything to get back at Lin Fan. But by taking care of Lord Feng, he had effectively cut down the Feng Family''s power, while also giving himself some time to gather his strength since the Feng Family wouldn''t rush into a fight with an unknown enemy.


    With how rxed Lin Fan seemed when he was taking care of Lord Feng, once these rumours spread, they would certainly believe that Lin Fan was still hiding some cards. Moreover, there was still the unknown master that was behind Lin Fan.


    Without any more information than what they had now, they definitely wouldn''t rashly attack him.


    Then Lin Fan changed the topic, "So what do you and your dad n on doing now?"


    Boss Gao knit his brows at this, "With everything that''s happened, the Gao Family''s power will have definitely dropped with all the experts we lost."


    Lin Fan said, "I wouldn''t be so sure of that."


    Boss Gao looked at him with a confused look, "Brother Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan just gave a knowing smile and didn''t say anything as Boss Gao''s dad came over.


    Gao Zhuang had gone around checking the various corpses and knocked out people to get a sense of the damage to the Gao Family, but he had found that there weren''t as many casualties as he had expected.


    The elders that had been killed were mainly elders that had firmly been on great elder Gao''s side, the ones that were more hesitant and only joined when forced had been spared.


    The only exception to this was that the second and fourth elder had also been spared.<sub> </sub>


    Gao Zhuang looked at Lin Fan with a strange look as he said, "Little friend Lin, how did you know who was who?"


    Lin Fan just said, "Those that were determined held nothing back and those that were hesitant held back. For now, your Gao Family would still need them, otherwise you''ll be in a dangerous position if your forces drop too low."


    Gao Zhuang turned to the second and fourth elder and said, "Then what do we do about them?"


    Lin Fan also turned to look at them and the two elders trembled when Lin Fan''s cold gaze fell onto them, "Well, for now, you can just keep them as elders."


    Gao Zhuang was shocked, "But they were firmly on great elder Gao''s side. If we leave them, they will definitely betray our family and go to the Feng Family."


    Lin Fan revealed a sly smile, "I wouldn''t be so sure about that. Do you remember how I controlled them?"


    Gao Zhuang was confused, "I do, but what does that have to do with this?"


    Lin Fan''s smile became even wider, "Well that''s one of my secret techniques and it involves a spiritual sense seed that''s embedded into the people I''m controlling. As long as that seed is inside that person, I can kill them whenever I want."


    The eyes of the two elders werepletely filled with fear. They quickly gathered their spiritual senses to search their bodies, but they couldn''t find a trace of this seed at all.


    They doubtfully turned back to Lin Fan, but all they saw was his cold gaze on them.


    Lin Fan slowly said, "You wouldn''t be thinking that I was bluffing, right?"


    As soon as his voice fell, they lost control of their bodies once again. All the two elders could do was stare right into Lin Fan''s cold eyes in fear.


    Once Lin Fan turned away, they regained control of their bodies, but what Lin Fan said next filled them with fear again.


    Lin Fan took out a token that he gave to Gao Zhuang, "This token has my spiritual sense attached to it. As long as you shatter it, it''ll instantly shatter the seeds inside those two and kill them."


    Of course, this was all a big bluff, Brainy''s abilities couldn''t be that strong.


    Brainy had been forced to activate its parasite seed early, so it had lost most of its functions over the two elders. He couldn''t kill them with the parasite seed at all, but what they didn''t know didn''t kill them.


    Lin Fan was also nning on putting new parasite seeds in them once he left because it would be better to have fully developed seeds instead of these half developed seeds.


    Once that was taken care of, Lin Fan had something he was curious about, "I understand what Lord Feng didn''t take out a pet since he said he wascking one right now, but why didn''t the elders of the Gao Family take out pets to increase the power of their array?"


    Gao Zhuang exined, "The main cultivation technique of our Gao Family is a bit unique. Instead of relying on pets like most other experts, we cultivate our bodies and rarely focus on training our pets. But of course pets that are stronger than their owner like what little Fu Shuai has now are exceptions."


    Lin Fan was still confused, "But even if they have powerful bodies, their pets shouldn''t be that much weaker."


    Gao Zhuang said, "Little Fu Shuai is an exception still, he was someone who was born with a talent for training pets which he inherited from his mother. As for the rest of us in the Gao Family, we really have no talent at all. The strongest pet that I have is actually only in the Bronze Realm."


    Lin Fan really was shocked.


    This was a family that went against the norm of this world and trained their bodies instead of their pets, yet they had still be a noble family.


    It really was strange, Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering if there was something special about the Gao Family''s cultivation technique.


    But he wouldn''t feel greedy for it since the Gao Family were now his allies.


    Now that they had taken care of everything, Lin Fan said, "Head Gao, there is something that I actually need your help with¡­"

 60 Chapter 60

    A week had passed since that fight at the Gao Manor.


    After everything had settled, the Feng Family surprisingly hadn''t made a move yet.


    They hadn''t even sent someone to the Gao Family to retaliate, not to mention sending someone to scout out Lin Fan''s store.


    It was like the incident had never happened.


    But this kind of situation made Lin Fan worry even more.


    There was no way the Feng Family with their intelligencework wouldn''t be able to find out what happened, especially with all those witnesses. Moreover, this was one of their limited few tinum Realm Experts that they had lost, this was not something they could ept that easily.


    Yet there was no response from them at all.


    During this week, Lin Fan had been heading to the Gao Family during the nights to consolidate their cooperation.


    Most of the Gao Family''s business were in running training schools and practice arenas, which made sense once one thought about what kind of personality this family had.


    Since Lin Fan himself could be considered a physical cultivator with how strong his body was, he had given some of his experience to the Gao Family to teach in their schools.


    They had even used the fact that Lin Fan had beaten a tinum Realm Expert as advertisement, yet the Feng Family still did nothing.


    While it did make a few people hesitant toe, the fact that Lin Fan had killed a tinum Realm Expert was a well known fact and that didn''t stop many people seeking strength toe to the Gao Family''s training schools. Business had soared during this time since everyone thought that the Feng Family wouldn''t be able to get back at everyone who joined if there were enough of them.


    But none of that matter to Lin Fan since what he really cared about was the influence that the Gao Family had. The favour that Lin Fan had asked was for Head Gao to use the influence of the Gao Family to apply for the status of a noble from the Union Government.


    While Lin Fan disdained the nobles for how they acted, he had to admit that nobles received the best benefits.


    Once nobles received their title, they had ess to various services offered by the Union Government.


    The most important thing was that nobles received a discount on everything they purchased through these channels and that these channels connected all the nobles in the world. Compared to the normal market, there were many rare things that would never appear on the public market that were in these channels. Then add in the discount which the Union Government offered, which was paid by them, so no nobles lost money selling through these channels.


    This system was made to encourage nobles to be stronger and to encourage those that weren''t nobles to work hard to be nobles.


    It was a system that rewarded those on top.


    The Union Government had to take note of this application once it came in since Lin Fan was someone who could even fight tinum Realm Experts, that was a power that couldn''t be ignored.


    The key part of the noble and royalty system was that it bound those that applied for it to a promise of defending their world. This world was still being invaded by the Beast n and humanity needed to be united in their fight against their invaders, otherwise their home would fall.


    Lin Fan personally had no problem with this since he had personally witnessed how bad life would be for the human race if the Beast n invaded, so he would do his best to protect his family.


    Also during this time, Lin Fan had been visiting the Gao Manor with Ang every night.


    When they appeared for the first time together, everyone couldn''t believe that they were together since Ang was just too beautiful.


    Even Boss Gao came over and asked, "Miss, are you sure you''re at the right ce?" He just couldn''t believe that Ang would be with Lin Fan.


    Ang found this funny while Lin Fan had dark lines on his face.


    Ang turned over to Lin Fan and said, "See, even these lowly humans know who their superior is."


    Lin Fan couldn''t refute this since technically speaking, she really was their superior. She was probably someone who was at the peak of thisrge universe and he was just a lowly human in a mortal world.


    But eventually people came to ept that Ang was here with Lin Fan. Even though they epted it, they didn''t fully "ept" it. They all still thought that Ang could do better than Lin Fan.


    The reason why the two of them had beening to the Gao Manor daily was to help cure Boss Gao''s mother.<sub> </sub>


    Boss Gao''s mother had been poisoned by great elder Gao as part of his plot and while Head Gao had managed to stabilize her condition, her body was still weakened and she was still in danger.


    That was why Lin Fan had been bringing Ang along the entire time, but of course he had to bribe her with quite a few things, namely food. Ang had recently discovered cakes and now she''s been eating through several whole cakes each day.


    It was also a good thing that Lin Fan was also earning a share from the Gao Family''s business, otherwise he wouldn''t be able to feed the kc hole that was Ang.


    But Ang was a spirit, which was the embodiment of nature. She had been using natural life energy to heal Boss Gao''s mother and she was finally done with her treatment after an entire week.


    After the treatment was done, Boss Gao brought Mei Rou to see his mother along with everyone.


    The moment Boss Gao''s mother saw their group, the first one to catch her eyes was Ang as she said, "Ho, such a pretty girl. Are you my little Fu Shuai''s girlfriend?"


    Ang immediately revealed a look of disdain and a bit of disgust. She really couldn''t stand anyone even thinking that she was dating Boss Gao. If anything she would rather have them think she was dating Lin Fan.


    But then she revealed a confused look as she pondered over why her first thought was Lin Fan.


    Meanwhile, Mei Rou on the side revealed a disappointed look.


    She had wanted to make a good impression on her future mother inw, but it seemed like she really couldn''t make the cut.


    But she didn''t me Ang because when she saw Ang the first time, she waspletely defeated. She couldn''t believe that there was such a pretty girl in this world.


    However, Boss Gao tightly held her hand and brought her forward to stand in front of his mother as he said, "Mom, it''s not her. This is Mei Rou, she''s my girlfriend."


    Boss Gao''s mother sized up Mei Rou who was nervously looking down and then Boss Gao''s mother said with a smile, "Well, she''s quite the beauty isn''t she. She''s definitely better than what you deserve."


    Mei Rou quickly looked up and waved her hands, "No, no, Big Brother Gao is really kind and treats me well, he''s the one who''s too good for me."


    Boss Gao''s mother broke out inughter before saying, "Look at that, she''s even got such a good personality! She''s definitely too good for you!"


    Lin Fan watched as they teased each other and felt that his decision to ally himself with the Gao Family truly was a good one.


    This was a family that was simple and honest and even if they had a few members that were quite sly, most of them were quite loyal.


    Allying himself with them was much better than allying with those families who lied straight to your face.


    After a while, Boss Gao''s mother chased everyone else out of the room and only had Mei Rou stay so she could get to know her better.


    As Lin Fan, Ang, and Boss Gao walked out of the room, Ang was walking in a daze.


    Lin Fan saw this and moved his head in, putting his hand on her forehead, "Is something wrong? Are you sick?"


    Ang couldn''t help blushing when she realized what had happened and then she punched Lin Fan in the gut, but it really was a light punch, "Who do you think you''re touching?"


    Boss Gao watched the two of them with a knowing smile. It was clear to everyone around, but it was only the two of them who didn''t understand.


    Of course, it wasn''t any of his business and he really didn''t want to be punched by Ang. He had seen the life energy she released and could tell that she was an expert just like Lin Fan.


    After watching them for a while, Boss Gao gave a soft cough before saying with a serious look, "Brother Lin, what do we do about the Feng Family?"


    Lin Fan stopped arguing with Ang and turned back to Boss Gao. He said with a sigh, "We can''t attack them, so the only thing we can do is wait, but isn''t this taking too long? They clearly know where we are, just what are they thinking!"


    Boss Gao was confused, "Isn''t it a good thing if they don''te? Doesn''t that give us more time to gather our forces?"


    Lin Fan said with a serious look, "It also gives them time to gather their forces. A de hidden is more dangerous than a de in the open."

 61 Chapter 61

    Time continued to pass just like this and soon it had been over a month since the banquet at the Gao Manor.


    Lin Fan had been training in preparation this entire time, but the Feng Family never showed up. They didn''t even send anyone to investigate his store. It was like the Feng Family didn''t even exist.


    It was also strange that none of his regr clients had disappeared during this time. It was like none of them were afraid of the Feng Family.


    Could it be that he had been overthinking it and the Feng Family was really nothing to worry about?


    But what he didn''t know was that the currents under the city ran deep and he had some unknown allies who had been helping him put pressure on the Feng Family.


    Even though there were people putting pressure on the Feng Family, it still wasn''t enough to stop them from doing certain things.


    The Union Government had long received Lin Fan''s application for a noble title and even though he was more than qualified, they had held off processing this request the entire time to see how the Feng Family would react.


    Even with the Legendary Realm Lord Mu endorsing Lin Fan, the Union Government still firmly chose to stay on the Feng Family''s side.


    Lord Mu couldn''t help sighing on the inside since he knew that there was more than one Legendary Realm Expert in Lin Fan''s shop, but no one at the Union Government would believe him.


    A force that had more than one Legendary Realm Expert? They would have already been qualified to be the strongest force on this, so what would they be doing running a pet shop?


    This story was just too unbelievable.


    ¡­


    So Lin Fan didn''t hear a peep from the Feng Family, but that didn''t mean they weren''t out there.


    It was a normal morning for Lin Fan as he was preparing for the morning rush, but before he could even open the store, there were the sounds of explosionsing from outside.


    When he came out to see what it was, he found that it was an opening for the store across the street.


    The store had been sold a few weeks back and it had been renovating the entire time, but Lin Fan didn''t know what it was being renovated into.


    Most of the store owners on this street didn''t really talk to each other since this was the poor part of town, so security had been bad and most people tried to avoid each other to avoid trouble.


    Lin Fan was curious who was making such arge ruckus for a store opening, but when he walked over with the curious crowd, his eyes narrowed when he saw the store.


    The store that had opened right across from him was actually another pet store!


    It was the Nature Brand Store that was considered the biggest brand of pet stores in the entire city, now they were actually opening a store right in front of Lin Fan. This was clearly an act of war against his store.


    <o>,m The Nature Brand Store was the business of one of the noble families, but Lin Fan wasn''t exactly sure which family it was.</o>


    Lin Fan even suspected that this was the long awaited retaliation of the Feng Family that he was waiting for.


    But when he walked over to the store, he was surprised to see who was there.


    It was Young Master Ding who had been beaten up by Lin Fan before and Young Master Zhao who had plotted against Lin Fan.


    They had both suffered a loss at Lin Fan''s hands, so of course they would want to take their revenge, however they couldn''t beat him directly. Since they couldn''t fight him head on, there was no better way than to attack his business.


    Then there was the fact that Lin Fan had also offended the Feng Family, which had allowed them to hug the Feng Family''s legs.


    The Feng Family were the owners of the Nature Brand Store and they had put everything into creating a store that would steal all of Lin Fan''s business.<sub> </sub>


    When Young Master Ding and Young Master Zhao saw Lin Fan appear, there was a cold look that appeared on Young Master Ding''s face when he remembered everything he had suffered through. As for Young Master Zhao, he was much calmer and was carefully watching for Lin Fan''s reaction.


    Young Master Ding came over and said, "Ho, if it isn''t trash Lin, did youe to see what a real pet shop is like?"


    While he acted all arrogant, the moment Lin Fan turned his gaze on him and narrowed his eyes, Young Master Ding couldn''t help taking a step back in fear. He could still feel the pain that came from the arm that had been broken.


    Lin Fan just ignored this fool and turned his attention to the store. This was a store that was luxuriously decorated,pletely looking out of ce in this neighbourhood.


    But this expensive look attracted the attention of many people and there were quite a few of his customers that had been drawn over.


    Lin Fan poked his head into the store and he found that there were many special elixirs just like in his store, but they were being offered at an even lower price.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows at this.


    He knew that if they continued to sell these special elixirs at this low price, they would definitely suffer a loss that they couldn''te back from. This was not something that lowly noble families like the Ding and Zhao Family could do.


    After thinking for a bit, there was a wire that connected in his mind and he realized that there must be someone behind them supplying all these elixirs. The only people he could think of who would do this was the Feng Family.


    This seemed quite roundabout, but he did feel that it was appropriate.


    The Feng Family had already lost a tinum Realm Expert at the Lin Fan''s hands and that was already uneptable. It had already seriously damaged the power of the Feng Family.


    While the Feng Family was still confident that they could take care of Lin Fan, if they attacked him directly, it might mean that they would suffer more casualties. Especially since they knew that Lin Fan had Lord Mu on his side and an unknown master behind him.


    When they tried to suppress Lin Fan''s application for a noble title, Lord Mu had been Lin Fan''s greatest supporter which concerned them a bit.


    They knew that Lord Mu wouldn''t fight them directly for Lin Fan, but just how strongly he opposed them was enough to make them cautious.


    Not to mention that if they suffered even more casualties, it might even mean damaging the foundations of their family. This was definitely not worth it to take care of just Lin Fan, they had to consider the future of their family.


    If they hurt their own power any further, the other three royal families of Snow Wind City might plot to destroy them.


    So, the Feng Family was making use of the Nature Brand Store and the two noble families that Lin Fan had offended to attack his store.


    Lin Fan found this funny when he thought it through.


    The Feng Family really were foolish, they didn''t bother sending anyone to investigate him and just assumed that they were stronger than him. Lin Fan really didn''t understand why such an arrogant family hadn''t already been destroyed by their own hubris.


    But thinking about it, since the Feng Family had survived for this long, it must mean that they had some kind of secret trump card they were holding which Lin Fan should be worried about.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan turned right away and headed back to his store, leaving behind a stunned Young Master Ding.


    Young Master Ding never expected Lin Fan to just ignore him like this, which had pushed all his buttons and infuriated him.


    He was the Young Master Ding that everyone had worshipped, no one had ever dared to ignore him ever since he was born!


    Young Master Ding''s angerpletely pushed aside his fear of Lin Fan and he quickly followed Lin Fan into his store.


    But the moment his foot went over the threshold of the store, Lin Fan turned back and said, "Sir, you are cklisted from this store. Please leave or you will be escorted out."

 62 Chapter 62

    Young Master Ding couldn''t stop his foot in time and he stepped into the store.


    The moment that he did, Lin Fan didn''t give him a second to think as he immediately pushed out with his palm,nding a palm strike on Young Master Ding''s chest.


    Young Master Ding felt the breath being knocked out of him as he spat out a mouthful of blood. He could feel that several of his ribs had been cracked.


    Lin Fan was much strongerpared to before and he held nothing back with this strike. Well, he did hold back enough not to kill Young Master Ding, but he didn''t hold back by much.


    Young Master Ding was thrown out of the store like a piece of paper and he went skipping across the ground before skidding to a stop.


    Young Master Ding felt like he had just been hit with a giant sledgehammer, he couldn''t muster any strength at all to stand up and his chest had actually copsed slightly.


    Young Master Zhao quickly came over to help Young Master Ding, but he stopped when Lin Fan came out of the store.


    Young Master Zhao clearly never expected Lin Fan to suddenly attack Young Master Ding, this was just too unreasonable!


    But Young Master Zhao didn''t dare say a thing to Lin Fan. He could tell from Lin Fan''s attack that Lin Fan was even stronger than before when he broke Young Master Ding''s arm. Plus there was the rumours that Lin Fan had killed a tinum Realm Expert. If he was careless, he might just lose his life today.


    But Lin Fan didn''t do a thing since he couldn''t just publicly kill people like it was nothing. If he did, it would definitely affect his family since there were stillws in this world and he wasn''t strong enough to go against them.


    So Lin Fan just gave a cold snort and had turned halfway when he suddenly heard someone apuding.


    Lin Fan turned in the direction of that sound, but all he saw was thin air. Then he thought to look up and as expected, there was someone floating in the air, slowly falling down.


    It was a man who looked like he was in his fifties, but he was also quite fit for an old man. He was dressed in finely woven white Chinese silk clothes, making him look like an old martial arts master. The one thing of note was that he had the sparkling green eyes as Lord Feng.


    The old man slowly came down andnded right in front of Lin Fan. The moment he touched the ground, he suddenly stopped pping and said with a smile, "So the rumours are true, it seems like Owner Lin is indeed quite strong."


    Lin Fan looked at this old man with cold eyes and said, "Do I know you?"


    The old man stared right back into his cold gaze and said, "Owner Lin is being quite rude. You should at least know the father of the person you killed in cold blood."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this introduction. He never thought that he would be this direct, but it seemed like the grudge he held wasn''t small.


    Lin Fan just said back to him without shrinking back, "It wasn''t that I wanted to kill him, he was the one who forced my hand."


    The old man said with a sigh, "But still, was that a reason to kill him? You have to know that he was someone''s son and someone''s father, so why did you have to kill him?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this from this old man.


    From his understanding ofrge families on earth, there was no love between them, only benefits and how to increase one''s position. There were many cases of people disposing their parents to take over theirpanies or letting children fight to see who was the most worthy heir.


    He never expected the Feng Family to have such love between them.


    But still, Lin Fan said in a cold voice, "You already know that there was no other ending with how the situation developed. In the end, he is dead and I am alive, that is how this world goes."


    The old man revealed a friendly smile, "You''re very correct Owner Lin, that is just how the world goes. You had no choice in this matter."


    Then the old man''s face suddenly turned ice cold, "So understand this, Lin Fan, I will kill you one day. Make no mistake about it, this isn''t for the glory of the Feng Family, this is just to avenge my son. Wash your neck and wait for that day."


    Lin Fan just said in an equally cold voice. "Why do you want to wait, let''s do this now."


    The old man was taken aback by this, he clearly never thought that Lin Fan would challenge him directly.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan could tell that this old man was much stronger than Lord Feng since his senses were much strongerpared to before. He could feel the power ofwsing from this old man and they were much stronger than thews that Lord Feng had.


    However, Lin Fan was also much more powerfulpared to before and he really wanted to test his power. He had been down since he couldn''t defeat Lord Feng alonest time, but this time he had learned a few new tricks.


    But when they were about to start fighting, there was a voice that suddenly cut through the air, "Feng Tu, are you really picking a fight with a kid?"


    The old man and Lin Fan both turned to see the straw hat old man walking over towards them.


    After calling out to Feng Tu, the straw hat old man turned to Lin Fan and said, "Owner Lin, sorry for being sote, but I''m finally here to visit your store."


    The old man called Feng Tu narrowed his eyes the moment this straw hat old man had appeared. He thought to himself, "What is this old coot doing here? How is he rted to this store?"


    ? Lin Fan was also surprised to see the principal here because he had alreadypletely forgotten about his promise in light of everything that had happened.


    Feng Tu was the one who spoke first, "Old Lei, what business do you have here? This is between me and this kid."


    The principal who was called Lei Guang said to Feng Tu, "Oh, ho, what business do you have with our newest teacher?"


    Feng Tu was taken aback by this, "When did he be a teacher at your school?"


    Lei Guang casually said, "Little friend Lin here made quite the impression at our school''s festival, of course I would want to snatch him up if he appears in front of me."


    Feng Tu narrowed his eyes and said, "Are you sure you want to do this?"


    Lei Guang gave a snort, "Do you really think you can scare me?"


    Feng Tu became hesitant since he really didn''t want to fight this straw hat old man.


    This straw hat old man was a legend in their Snow Wind City. He was once a promising genius, but one day he suddenly retired and said that he would be opening a school. No one understood just what he was thinking, but no one said anything since he had been in the peak of the tinum Realm then.


    There were some people who said that this straw hat old man had hit his limit and couldn''t break through to the Legendary Realm, that was why he retired.


    But there were also people who said that he had already broken through and was just retiring since he had ascended above all the petty fighting of the world.


    But no one really knew what it was, so no one dared to provoke this Lei Guang.


    Feng Tu didn''t give up as he said, "This little brat harmed my business partner, you have to give me an exnation for that!"


    Lei Guang gave another snort, "Your so-called business partner was the one who charged into little friend Lin''s store even though he had been cklisted. To protect his other customers, little friend Lin''s method may have been a bit forceful, but it was justified."


    Feng Tu didn''t know what to say to this as he was choked up with anger, "You, you, you¡­"


    But then he just turned and said while leaving, "Fine, we''ll settle this another day!"


    At that, Lei Guang said, "See you another day then, don''t trip on your way out."


    Feng Tu almost did trip when he heard that.


    Lei Guang turned back to Lin Fan and said, "So little friend Lin, am I wee in your store?"

 63 Chapter 63

    Lin Fan stared at the straw hat old man in a daze for a bit before inviting him in.


    Lin Fan still hadn''t opened the store yet because of the ruckus outside, so the store was still empty other than its employees.


    When Lei Guang walked into the store, he was surprised to feel spiritual sense sweeping over him. What surprised him was that it was at a level that he couldn''t resist at all.


    Lei Guang looked around, but he found that he couldn''t find the source at all.


    Then when he walked in and saw Momonga and Ang, he had the same reaction as Mu Bo Hai when he first came to this store.


    He looked at them in shock before a trace of fear also appeared in his eyes.


    Even with his cultivation, he couldn''t see through them at all!


    The Blue Star was a lower tier, which meant that the highest cultivation that it could support was the low Legendary Realm. Once most people broke through to the Legendary Realm on the Blue Star, they would feel the limits of their cultivation, unable to progress any higher.


    As for those that remained on the Blue Star and worked for the Union Government, they either didn''t see any talent in themselves, choosing to retire to this or they were getting their final affairs ready before leaving this low tier world forever.


    If there were any experts that were past the low Legendary Realm, they were obviously experts from a higher tier world.


    Lei Guang was friends with Mu Bo Hai, so he knew what the aura of a low Legendary Realm Expert was like.


    But that was also strange.


    Why would such high tier expertse down to a lower world just to set up a pet shop?


    Moreover, these two were nothing more than workers at this shop.


    Just how strong was the master of this shop?!


    Just what was their goal in setting up a shop here?


    Was it just to train Lin Fan?


    After thinking this, Lei Guang couldn''t help feeling sorry for the Feng Family. They had really kicked a wall this time.


    While Lei Guang was looking over the two, the two were also sweeping over Lei Guang with their spiritual sense.


    Ang was immediately bored by this old man, but Momonga was different. He could tell that this old man was hiding his real cultivation, but there was no reason for him to expose this old man''s secret.


    Once they were bored of Lei Guang, the two of them went back to doing what they did before.


    Lei Guang was still cautious, but he was no longer afraid since he could tell that this store didn''t mean any harm to him.


    Lin Fan could feel the tense atmosphere in the air, so he broke the tension by saying, "Principal, is there a reason that you''re visiting me?"


    Lei Guang turned back to Lin Fan with a smile, "Little friend Lin, did you already forget about our agreement? You said that you would be a teacher at our school, so I''m here to give you your contract and to assign you your first ss."


    Lin Fan was taken aback, he hadpletely forgotten about this matter.


    But Lin Fan came back to his senses and said, "Principal, now might not be a good time for this. You saw it today, the Feng Family currently holds a grudge against me and they might act on it any day. If Ie to teach at the school, I might put the kids in danger."


    Lei Guang gave a chuckle and said, "You don''t have to worry about that right now, those royal families are too busy with something else to deal with you."


    Lin Fan raised one brow and asked, "What do you mean? What are they busy with?"<sub> </sub>


    Lei Guang revealed a serious look, "This is a matter that is ssified by the Union Government, you think that you''re qualified to know this?"


    Lin Fan was surprised, but as he was about to apologize, Lei Guang suddenly revealed a smile.


    "Alright kid, no need to be this serious, I''m just kidding with you. Actually this matter is rted to you because of what I''m about to say."


    Lin Fan was confused once again, "What do you mean by that?"


    Lei Guang had a real serious face this time, "What I''m about to tell you doesn''t leave this room. It''s fine if the other people in this shop hear this since they are technically qualified to hear this."


    At this, Momonga and Ang''s interests were piqued as they turned over to listen to Lei Guang''s story.


    Lei Guang continued, "As you know, our Blue Star is only a low tier, so of course we can''t survive against the Beast n alone. Because of that, we joined the Gctic Humanity Alliance, which is the alliance of all humans in the universe, but even that belongs to arger organization which we''re not clear on. The Gctic Human Alliance is an alliance between twelve different upper human worlds who make up the twelve seats of the alliance. Once someone on the Blue Star reaches the Legendary Realm, they move on to an upper world where they join one of the twelve factions for more resources."


    This was all new to Lin Fan, but this was something that was below Ang and Momonga.


    Momonga had some impression of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but they really were too low on the rankings to enter his eyes.


    As far as he remembered, they were nothing more than a small group that ruled over a tiny gxy and yet now they were daring to call themselves an alliance of all humans in the universe¡­


    Lei Guang continued after a pause to let this information sink in, "Once they start working for these twelve factions, one of their main jobs is to enter something called the Void Battlefield. This is a battlefield out in the void of space that was made by some ancient force for an unknown reason, but it waspletely abandoned. Since then, this Void Battlefield has be the frontline of where races fight each other since it is an empty ce for them to fight, other than invading lower tier worlds to use as farms."


    Once the Void Battlefield was mentioned, Momonga and Ang both fell into reminiscence since both of them had once spent time in this Void Battlefield.


    While to lower realms it seemed like the Void Battlefield was a ce to battle between races, it was actually a ce for upper realms to train their young.


    Both Momonga and Ang had gone into the Void Battlefield when they were younger for training and they knew just how dangerous of a ce it was.


    Lei Guang said, "The Void Battlefield is a very dangerous ce and the mortality rate is very high. Once in a while, we hear news from the upper realm that one of our ascended experts has died in the Void Battlefield. Once that happens, they send down the inheritance left behind by that expert and give the nobles and royals a chance to gain this inheritance. We call this event an Inheritance Realm."


    Lin Fan had been deep in thought processing all this new information, but once he heard about the Inheritance Realm, he became curious and asked, "For you to mention it, it must have something to do with me, but what does it have to do with me? I''m not a noble or a royal, how can I enter this Inheritance Realm?"


    Lei Guang revealed a smile, "And that''s the main reason why I''m here today. Old Mu and I have discussed it and we''ve decided to both give you one of our rmendation slots."


    Lin Fan knit his brows, "Old Mu?" Wasn''t that the shameless old man from before? Why would he suddenly give him one of his rmendation slots?


    Lei Guang said with a smile, "That''s right, Old Mu. He''s the Forest King Mu Bo Hai. He even said that he was quite close to you."


    Lin Fan just had a confused look, "Eh?"


    Lei Guang could guess what this was about, so he said, "Alright, let''s not worry about that now. So, do you want to ept these rmendation slots?"


    To Lin Fan, the inheritance of a Legendary Realm Expert really wasn''t anything, not with his system. But when he was about to decline, the system had something to say.


    "Sudden mission issued!"


    "Go into the Inheritance Realm and find the Dragon Vein. Bring the Dragon Vein back to the store!"


    "Eh?" Lin Fan was suddenly confused. Why did the system suddenly release a mission?


    But in the end, Lin Fan couldn''t say a thing, since the system wouldn''t listen even if he did.


    So Lin Fan said, "Alright, I''ll go into the Inheritance Realm."

 64 Chapter 64

    After hashing out the details of the Inheritance Realm, Lei Guang said that he would send someone to pick Lin Fan up when the timees in a week.


    But before he left, Lei Guang didn''t forget to mention, "That''s right, before I forget, little friend Lin, remember toe to school on Monday for your first ss."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this, "First ss? I''m really going to teach a ss?"


    Lei Guang couldn''t help finding this funny, "Of course. You''re a teacher hired by our school, how could we just pay you without having you teach the students? Be sure toe as soon as you''re done with your morning rush and we''ll get you into a ssroom."


    Lin Fan couldn''t say anything since technically he had agreed to be a teacher, so it was normal to expect him to teach a ss.


    So Lin Fan agreed and sent Lei Guang away before opening his store.


    The talk with Lei Guang had taken an hour and his customers outside were anxiously waiting for him to open, but they didn''t dare rush him or criticize once he did open. They all remembered what just happened to Young Master Ding, they wouldn''t want to be the next Young Master Ding.


    And so the business of the store continued.


    ¡­


    The weekend passed and Monday came.


    There were still four days before the Inheritance Realm opened.


    The morning rush in Lin Fan''s store was still ongoing, but he left it to Momonga as he headed off to the school early in the morning.


    Today was the day of his first lesson!


    Since he had already promised that he would be a teacher, he wouldn''t feel right receiving benefits without doing any work.


    When Lin Fan arrived, the guards at the gate immediately came over to him with friendly smiles on their faces as they led him right to the principal''s office.


    Once Lin Fan walked in, he was surprised to see all three vice principals and the principal waiting inside for him.


    Lei Guang saw Lin Faning in and immediately stood up with a smile, "Little friend Lin, you''re here earlier than we expected."


    Lin Fan said, "Well, you''ve shown your sincerity, so this is the least I can do."


    The three vice principals were much more well behavedpared tost time. Now that they knew that Lin Fan was already as strong as they were or possibly even stronger, they no longer had any intentions of taking him as their student.


    The principal ignored them and came over to Lin Fan, "Little friend Lin, since you''re here this early, we can have you teach first period."


    He took Lin Fan by the shoulder and led him out of the office, while the three vice principals all followed behind them.


    The principal led Lin Fan to arge building that seemed to be a training arena where several thousand students were waiting for them.


    When they came in, all the students looked at Lin Fan in surprise, including Luo Qing, Murong Quan, Wang Ning, and Lin Xue all in the crowd.


    They had all been called here today for a special assembly, the principal had even brought in all four different years of students. It sounded like there was going to be a special lecture.


    Most people assumed that it was the principal who was going to teach this lesson, but now they saw the principal walking in with this unknown young person and everyone couldn''t help wondering who he was.


    The principal came to the podium set in the center of the arena and cleared his voice before saying, "Hello everyone, I''ve gathered you all here today for one special reason. This is our newest teacher, Lin Fan and he will be holding a special lesson today for all of you."


    Everyone was shocked by this, including Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had thought that he would at most be teaching a small ss, he never expected that he would be teaching the entire school!


    The principal ignored all this and continued to say, "Now, let''s wee our newest member of staff up here to say a few words to everyone." At this he turned and beckoned to Lin Fan.


    At first Lin Fan didn''t react, but once he realized that everyone was looking at him, he quickly came back to his senses and came to the podium.


    He didn''t know what to say at first, but then he decided to use the only training method that he knew.


    Lin Fan said in a calm voice, "I don''t know much about teaching, but I do know quite a bit about training. So my first lesson will be a brawl and whoever beats me will receive ten thousand points."


    The students clearly never expected a lesson like this. They were expected to fight their teacher and they would be receiving points for it.<sub> </sub>


    As for the principal, he was quite amused by this. He never thought that Lin Fan woulde up with such a novel idea.


    Lin Fan just stood at the podium and looked over the crowd. Seeing that no one was making a move, he said, "Welle on, I don''t have all day."


    Some of the students that were more hot blooded couldn''t take this and immediately summoned their pets as they charged out.


    It was unfortunate that most of them were only in the Iron Realm with a few being in the Bronze Realm since reaching the Silver Realm was one of the ways to graduate. The other was going to lessons for four years and graduating at the end.


    The first one to reach Lin Fan didn''t even get to touch him before he was grabbed and thrown at the second closest person.


    While throwing that person, Lin Fan said, "It''s good to be quick, but it''s never good to rush in without any knowledge."


    After that, he turned to face the third closest person who was trying to attack his blind spot.


    The third closest person couldn''t believe how fast Lin Fan had moved, but they still continued with their attack.


    Lin Fan easily grabbed their fist and twisted them, pushing them in front of the attack of the fourth closest person.


    Once the fourth closest person stopped this, they immediately stopped their attack, but they were pushed back when Lin Fan shoved the third closest person at them.


    At this, Lin Fan said, "It''s good to look for blind spots, but you have to know when to draw back. It''s also good to know when to hold back, but sometimes holding back is the wrong choice."


    And just like this, Lin Fan continued beating every since person who came at him. He either grabbed them to push them away or directly pushed them into another person attacking him.


    None of the students were seriously injured, they were just dazed from the force behind the push that threw them away.


    While he was taking care of the students attacking him one by one, Lin Fan also gave them advice on how they should have acted.


    At first there were few people that attacked him, but soon there were more and more that came forward since they all thought that Lin Fan must be getting tired, but they were all beaten back one by one.


    For Lin Fan, dealing with them was like an adult handling children, so he didn''t feel tired at all. However, he did eventually get bored of handling them himself, so with a snap, he summoned out a little chick.


    When this little chick came out, Murong Quan couldn''t help thinking about the awful experience he had the first time he entered Lin Fan''s store.


    At first, the students thought that Lin Fan was making fun of them, but once Xiao Huo transformed surrounded by golden mes, they didn''t dare look down on Xiao Huo at all.


    Golden mes! This was a pet in the Gold Realm!


    To control this pet, this meant that Lin Fan was also at least in the Gold Realm!


    He was a Gold Realm Expert at such a young age!


    It was only then that people recognized him as the champion of the tournament!


    He was that trash who was with their goddess Luo Qing!


    Lin Fan jumped over to where the principal was waiting while shouting, "All of you will be fighting Xiao Huo now, the same rules will apply. If you beat Xiao Huo, you''ll still receive ten thousand points."


    Even though he said this, none of the students had hope.


    Defeat a Gold Realm pet? That was like asking them to teach pigs to fly!


    Lin Fan continued to shout out advice while talking to the principal.


    Eventually everyone had a chance to be beaten by Xiao Huo, there were many students who had burnt hair.


    But they had to admit that they did learn quite a few things from fighting Lin Fan and his advice always came at the right time. Now many of them had ideas of what to fix with their fighting styles.


    It turned out, Lin Fan was quite good at teaching.


    But it was too bad that Lin Fan treated them like he was training his pets...

 65 Chapter 65

    Surprisingly, this method of training made Lin Fan quite popr with the students since it was such an efficient teaching method.


    When Lin Fan left the school, there were several students that followed him, asking him questions about cultivation.


    Once they reached the gate, the principal waved everyone away before saying to Lin Fan in a low voice, "Little friend Lin, are you prepared for the Inheritance Realm? It''s more dangerous than you think, you can''t be negligent."


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all as he said, "I''ve prepared everything I can, but I''ll have to see what''s in the realm after I get in."


    The principal revealed a slight frown at this, "Little friend Lin, I''m serious. This Inheritance Realm is more dangerous than you think, you mustn''t underestimate it."


    Lin Fan said with an honest look, "I really am not underestimating it. Moreover, Ang ising with me."


    The principal was taken aback, "Is Ang the girl I saw at your store?"


    Lin Fan just nodded without saying a thing.


    The principal revealed a worried look. He didn''t reveal this worried look because he was afraid that Lin Fan was underestimating this Inheritance Realm, rather he was worried about what problems he would cause with Ang¡­


    After all, the principal had heard the real story of Mu Bo Hai''s ck eye¡­


    ¡­


    Time passed and soon it was finally the day to enter the Inheritance Realm.


    Lin Fan posted a closing notice the day before entering the Inheritance Realm since the principal had already told him that it would be open for a total of seven days.


    He also had to lie to his parents that he would be gone on a business trip for seven days.


    Of course some people had some opinions about this, but no one dared toin to Lin Fan''s face. They could only indirectlyin about it.


    The good thing was that the store didn''t force Lin Fan to open every day, it was just that he relied on the system to get stronger and if he closed the store, it meant that he didn''t earn any points to use in the system. In the end, it became a vicious cycle of dependence.


    When the principal came to pick up Lin Fan, he found that other than the principal, Mu Bo Hai was also sitting in the bus.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see the two together, but he epted it since remembered the principal mentioning Mu Bo Hai before. It made sense that they were friends.


    But along with Mu Bo Hai and the principal, there were also four other young people.


    The principal saw the confused look Lin Fan had, so he exined, "Little friend Lin, Old Mu and I have three rmendation slots each, so these are the other four that we''ve given our rmendation slots to."


    The four young people were surprised to see Lin Fan since he was clearly younger than all of them, but none of them said a single thing other than one brawny young man who was clearly dissatisfied with Lin Fan.


    That brawny young man couldn''t help saying, "Lord Mu, are you certain you wish to give a rmendation slot to this kid? He''s so young, just how strong can he be?"


    Lord Mu slightly knit his brows at this, but he just said, "Yang Kai, is who I give my rmendation slots to a concern of yours?"


    Yang Kai quickly cupped his hands and bowed his head, "No, Lord Mu, that wasn''t my intention. It''s only that this is an important trial, should we really be wasting a slot on this kid?"


    Lord Mu just gave a snort, "This kid will surprise you, I wouldn''t underestimate him."


    Still Yang Kai would not back down, but it was at that moment that he saw Ang.


    He had never seen such a perfect woman in this world, just a single nce was enough to captivate him.


    Yang Kaipletely forgot about Lin Fan and came over to Ang as he said, "Young miss, this one is the young master of the Yang Royal Family of Ice Mist City. I wonder if this miss would be interested in exploring the Inheritance Realm with me."


    Ang didn''t even spare him a nce as she just gave a cold snort and followed Lin Fan.


    A vein popped out on Yang Kai''s forehead as he grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder, "Kid, isn''t it rude to ignore your elders like this? A beautiful girl like this is wasted on someone like you, you should just hand her over to father."<sub> </sub>


    Mu Bo Hai and Lei Guang both had dark looks on their faces when they heard this. This was the girl who had even beaten up Mu Bo Hai, this idiot Yang Kai really was seeking death!


    But before Ang could turn around to beat Yang Kai into the ground, Lin Fan spoke first, "This Young Master Yang, I suggest you remove your hand from my shoulder."


    Yang Kai said in a voice of disdain, "Ho, this kid actually has a spine. What happens if I don''t?"


    Lin Fan suddenly grabbed Yang Kai''s hand and squeezed it as he said, "Something bad might happen."


    Yang Kai wanted to resist, but he found it was like gripping steel when trying to squeeze Lin Fan''s hand. He couldn''t do anything to Lin Fan at all.


    Eventually Lin Fan let go and Yang Kai took a step back as he looked at Lin Fan with a weary gaze.


    Lin Fan didn''t just beat up Yang Kai like he normally would because he was giving Mu Bo Hai face.


    ? Although Mu Bo Hai''s actions were a bit strange, he was indeed sincere. He had even given Lin Fan one of his precious rmendation slots.


    The only reason Mu Bo Hai had even given this Yang Kai a slot was because he owed the Yang Family a favour, so he had no choice but to do so even though he looked down on this Yang Kai.


    With this, an uneasy truce had been settled between the two of them.


    The other three in the car noticed that Yang Kai had a strange look during that exchange, which meant Lin Fan must have done something. They didn''t know what Lin Fan did, but they did note it down in their hearts.


    Of the other three, only one of them was a girl and she had a strange gaze as she looked at Lin Fan.


    Eventually they arrived at the teleportation gate that would bring them to the site of the Inheritance Realm.


    Each city had a teleportation gate that was strictly controlled by the Union Government. Normally each gate could only be used by high ranking nobles or royals because of the enormous cost of each use.


    Once the sh of white light faded, Lin Fan''s group had appeared in arge clearing that was filled with thousands of people.


    Lin Fan could tell from the various different races of people that this was a very big event.


    On the Blue Star, the world was separated into five different continents, each with their own experts united under a single Union Government.


    In thisrge clearing, there were five separate groups that were waiting together. Each group clearly represented one of each of the continents.


    One group was made of people who mainly looked like they were Asian, which represented the Eastern Continent, which would be Asia on earth.


    One group was made of people who were a mix of different races, which should have represented the Western Continent, which would be North America and South America on earth.


    One group was made of people who were mainly Arian, which represented the Northern Continent, which would be Europe on earth.


    One group was made of people who were mainly Muslim, which represented the Central Continent, which would be the Middle East on earth.


    And the final group was made of people who were mainly ck and Spanish, which represented the Southern Continent, which would be Africa and Spain on earth.


    Then even among those groups, there were smaller group divisions based on cities located on the different continents.


    But just based on the way they were standing, it was clear that there wereplicated rtions between the continents and even each city.


    Looking at the Eastern Continent group, Lin Fan soon found a few familiar faces.


    While he was looking around, there was a familiar voice that called out to him.


    "Brother Lin, over here!"

 66 Chapter 66

    Lin Fan turned to see Boss Gao waving at him from the Wind Snow City group.


    Among the group, Lin Fan saw several familiar faces, such as Young Master Ding and Young Master Zhao, as well as several noble young masters who had frequented his shop.


    But when those young masters saw Lin Fan, they didn''t approach him right away since Boss Gao had brought someone else over first.


    Boss Gao came over with a handsome young man who had spiky hair who was dressed in all ck. If Lin Fan really had to describe him, the best way to do so would be a punk.


    The spiky haired young man came over and looked over Lin Fan before revealing a smile and pping him on the back while saying, "So this is the little brother Lin that I''ve heard so much about! You really are something else, you even dared to kill that annoying Feng Yu''s dad!"


    Lin Fan looked at Boss Gao with a questioning gaze.


    Boss Gao quickly introduced the spiky haired person, "Brother Lin, this is Wang Da Dong of the Wang Family. They''re also a royal family just like the Feng Family."


    This time, Lin Fan carefully spread his spiritual sense over this Wang Da Dong and he could tell that even though he was in his early twenties, he was already in the peak Gold Realm!


    Lin Fan really had to hand it to the royal families, the resources they had really couldn''tpare to the resources of normal noble families. This Wang Da Dong was even younger than Boss Gao, but his cultivation was miles ahead.


    Lin Fan turned back to Wang Da Dong and carefully said, "What business does Young Master Wang have with me?"


    Wang Da Dong just gave a bigugh and said, "Well at first I wanted to use Brother Gao here to get closer to Brother Lin and see what kind of person Brother Lin is, but now it''s different. Brother Gao really is an interesting person, he is someone who just clicks with me."


    Lin Fan could tell that this was true since it seemed like this Wang Da Dong was really just like Boss Gao. Both of them were both quite forward and honest, so they made friends quite easily.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Brother Wang, any friend of Brother Gao''s is a friend of mine."


    Wang Da Dong broke out inughter again as he pped Lin Fan''s shoulder, "Good kid, you really are my kind of person!"


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing.


    Wang Da Dong then continued to say, "Since you consider me your brother, of course this big brother can''t be stingy. Come,e, let me tell you about this Inheritance Realm."


    At this, Lin Fan''s interest had been piqued.


    The principal had only told Lin Fan about the background of the Inheritance Realm, but he had never told him which expert this inheritance hade from.


    Of course, Lin Fan had no interest in this inheritance, but it didn''t hurt to have as much information as possible.


    Lin Fan listened with rapt attention as Wang Da Dong began his exnation, "From what I''ve heard from my family, this Inheritance Realm belongs to Xie Jun, the Evil Spear Monarch. It''s said that his True Darkness Spear was able to pierce through even the darkest nights to end the lives of his enemies."


    Lin Fanbed his memories, but he couldn''t remember this name.


    As for Boss Gao, his eyes immediately lit up when he heard this, "Are you sure it''s the Evil Spear Monarch? I remember reading that he chose not to ascend and passed on surrounded by his family after dying of old age a few thousand years ago."


    Wang Da Dong nodded in praise when he heard this, "You really know your history. But unfortunately, that was only a cover that the Xie Family released to maintain their own power. In truth, all the royal families knew that Xie Jun had already ascended to the upper realm."


    Boss Gao scratched his head in embarrassment as he said, "I wouldn''t say that I''m good at history, I just had some interest in using the spear before, but I never had an aptitude for it. I remembered Xie Jun because every book I read imed that he was the strongest spear user of our Blue Star."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan fell into thought after hearing this, but in the end, he chose to forget about it. So far Lin Fan had found through his variousbat experiences that he wasn''t suited for any weapon. With his cultivation technique, his body became his strongest weapon since he still didn''t know what the limit to the power of his body was.


    While the three of them were chatting, there was suddenly a stir in the crowd around them as whispers turned into chatter and continued to grow in volume.


    It reached a point where the three of them couldn''t ignore anymore and they turned to see a group being led by Feng Tu. Everyone in that group had the same green glowing eyes.


    There was one person in that group that looked just like a miniature version of Lord Feng who had been ring at Lin Fan the entire time.


    That group led by Feng Tu walked over at a calm pace before stopping in front of the three.


    But before Feng Tu could say anything, the smaller version of Lord Feng who had been ring at Lin Fan the entire time came forward to Lin Fan and said, "You will die at my hands."


    There wasn''t any buildup or anything, the first words out of his mouth was a death threat against Lin Fan.


    Wang Da Dong didn''t take this at all and he came forward, pointing the pan that he was carrying at this smaller version of Lord Feng, "Feng Yu, you really have gotten bolder. You dare ignore your father and threaten your father''s brother right in front of me?"


    Feng Yu turned over to Wang Da Dong and was surprised to see him, like he hadn''t noticed that Wang Da Dong had been here the entire time. He narrowed his eyes and said, "Idiot Wang, this isn''t rted to you or your Wang Family. There''s no way you don''t know what this man has done, so you should know the consequences of interfering in this business."


    Wang Da Dong just gave a snort, "You think I care about that? Brother Lin is someone that your father has taken as a brother, you think that you can go through your father as you wish?"


    At this, Feng Tu came forward, "Does Young Master Wang really wish to start a war today?"


    But when Feng Tu came out, there was an elder that suddenly appeared beside Wang Da Dong, "Feng Tu, don''t you feel embarrassed? An old man like you getting involved in a fight between kids?"


    Wang Da Dong''s eyes lit up when he saw this elder, "Dad, you''re finally here!"


    The elder rubbed Wang Da Dong''s head and said with a smile, "You think I''d leave a troublemaker like you alone? I turn away for a second and you''re already starting a fight."


    But then his eyes narrowed and he turned back to Feng Tu, "But this fight seems like it''s worth fighting. I''m proud of you, you did listen to me. When our friends are being bullied, we bully them right back, that''s the Wang way!"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling touched by this.


    Even if this was an act, he could feel that there were genuine feelings behind these words.


    These people were actually protecting him even though they had just met him.


    There really were all kinds of people in this world.


    At that, Lin Fan called out Xiao Huo and said, "Brother Wang, it''s an honour to fight with you."


    Feng Tu saw this and he gave a snort, "Since you want a fight, then let''s start one."


    At this, both sides prepared to fight and a crowd slowly gathered around them. There were even a few people from other cities that had gathered around to watch this. After all, this was a fight between royal families, it was something that could even affect the surrounding cities.


    But the moment the two sides were about to sh, there was a voice that shouted out, "Who dares to fight here!"

 67 Chapter 67

    When everyone turned to the source of the sound, they saw Lord Mu standing there with his hands crossed with several other old men beside him.


    Lin Fan didn''t know who these old men were, but it was clear that everyone else did as they all gave a bow to this group of old men. In the end, Lin Fan and Ang were the only ones who were still standing there.


    The attention of this group of old men all fell onto Lin Fan at first, but then when they turned to Ang, they couldn''t help breaking out in a cold sweat.


    Most of them had thought that Old Mu had been exaggerating the power of this little shop, but it seemed like they were the ones who had been underestimating this shop.


    When they were about to say something, they suddenly felt Ang''s sharp gaze fall onto them, forcing them to swallow their words.


    Ang didn''t understand what Lin Fan kept insisting on hiding their power when this was nothing more than a small world, but since Lin Fan''s master hadn''t made a move even with all his power, he probably had a reason. Since this was the case, she would follow his example and not cause any trouble.


    As Ang''s sharp gaze was on them, she gave one shake of her head to stop any further ideas they would have before releasing the suppression she had put on them.


    The old men all looked to Mu Bo Hai who just gave a sigh before saying, "Alright, since you haven''t actually done anything yet, we''ll let you all off with a warning. But if any of you dare to cause any more trouble, you can be sure there will be consequences."


    At this everyone quickly scattered.


    The Feng Family group took onest look at Lin Fan before also quickly moving to the side.


    As for the old men who came with Mu Bo Hai, they were too afraid to approach after being suppressed by Ang''s power. They quickly said goodbye to Mu Bo Hai before quickly heading back to their own groups.


    Mu Bo Hai came over with the principal, both still a bit fearful of Ang, but they came over to Lin Fan.


    The principal said, "Little friend Lin, you really do know how to get into trouble."


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug, "It''s not me who''s causing trouble, rather it''s other people who want to cause trouble."


    After that Lin Fan turned to Wang Da Dong and his dad and said with cupped hands, "I have to thank Brother Wang and Elder Wang for standing up for me."


    Wang Da Dong and his dad looked at each other before they both broke out inughter. Wang Tian Yang patted Lin Fan on the shoulder and said, "Little friend Lin, we''ve already long couldn''t stand those Feng jerks for the longest time. Any chance we have to stick it to them, we''ll always take it. Plus, we can''t just watch them bully people without caring, that''s not the Wang way!"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling at this.


    Mu Bo Hai also said with a smile, "You Wangs really are a refreshing grouppared to all those other royal families, but you really should look out for yourself."


    Wang Tian Yang turned to Mu Bo Hai and said, "Lord Mu, you know that''s not what our ancestor taught us."


    Mu Bo Hai''s expression turned deste as he gave a sigh, "That was the problem with Old Wang, he was always friendly and cheerful, always wanting to help others. While that did make him plenty of friends, it was also his trusting nature that got him killed in the end. I don''t want to see the same happen to you all."


    Wang Tian Yang gave a slight bow to Mu Bo Hai, "It''s all thanks to your eminence and the other lords that our family could have this day."


    Mu Bo Hai waved his hand, "Alright, you know I don''t like things like that."


    Mu Bo Hai turned to Lin Fan and said, "Little friend Lin, I can tell what you''re thinking and I can confirm that it is the right choice. The Wang Family is as you see them, sometimes they really are honest fools, so they could use someone as shrewd as you looking out for them."


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and said, "Brother Wang was willing to fight to the death with me, of course I would be honoured to have a brother like him."


    Mu Bo Hai just nodded before saying, "Good, good. Now let''s get going."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was confused, "Get going? Where are we going?"


    Mu Bo Hai revealed a faint smile, "Before all of you were about to start a brawl, we wereing over to announce the opening of the Inheritance Realm."


    With that, Mu Bo Hai led Lin Fan''s group over to the entrance of the Inheritance Realm where arge crowd had begun to gather, but with Mu Bo Hai leading the way, the crowd created a path for them.


    Eventually they came to the front where they saw the same group of old men from before who all had their own little groups with them.


    Once they saw that Mu Bo Hai was here, the old men gathered at the entrance of the Inheritance Realm with Mu Bo Hai and they allowed him to speak for them.


    Mu Bo Hai spoke into the microphone, "Wee everyone to the opening of the Inheritance Realm, I hope that you all will cherish this opportunity and give it your best."


    After a few perfunctory words, Mu Bo Hai turned and with the other old men, they sent in life energy to the entrance and the seal was opened.


    But not everyone rushed forward the moment the seal was opened, rather the crowd waited for the group in front to go in first.


    It seemed like the people who had been brought to the front by the old men were all seeded candidates who were given priority, but of course that also drew the attention of the others to these people.


    Lin Fan really didn''t want this attention, but since Mu Bo Hai had also brought Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong forward, he would just ept it since his friends would also benefit from this.


    Back when he received this invitation into the Inheritance Realm, Lin Fan was worried since he had been told that only those under the age of 50 would be allowed into the Inheritance Realm. He thought about who he would give his other spot to until Ang volunteered toe with him.


    But the biggest surprise to Lin Fan wasn''t that Ang offered toe with him, rather it was when he found out that Ang was only eighteen years old. She was actually even younger than him since she had ater birthday than him.


    Lin Fan had asked Momonga to confirm this, which he did.


    Momonga told Lin Fan that unlike him who was a lich, who had gathered power over the course of his endless lifespan, the Spirit Overlord bloodline gathered power over generations, inheriting the power of their sessors and building upon it. So even if Ang was younger than him, she was the crystallization of thousands of years of power.


    All this did was make Lin Fan feel that there really was arge difference between a natural genius and himself. Even if he had reached the Gold Realm in just a month of training, Ang was younger than him and was already in what he assumed was the peak of the Legendary Realm!


    Once the entrance was opened, Mu Bo Hai and the other old men moved aside.


    Once they moved to the side, the groups that were standing in front quickly headed into the gate.


    Boss Gao also couldn''t take it as he shouted to the others, "Come on, let''s head in!" Before charging right at the gate.


    Wang Da Dong immediately charged forward with Boss Gao since he was also filled with excitement.


    Lin Fan shook his head as he looked at the two, but he still quickly went with them into the gate with Ang following close behind him.


    As they moved towards the gate, Feng Yu in the crowd gave Lin Fan a look that could kill, which Lin Fan hadn''t missed.


    Lin Fan knew that he had to kill Feng Yu in this Inheritance Realm, or there would be even more trouble in the future.


    Once they entered the gate, there was a sh of light before everything turned dark.


    When the light came back, Lin Fan found himself in the middle of a forest.

 68 Chapter 68

    Lin Fan looked around himself and he found that there wasn''t a single person with him.


    He was sure that he had entered the gate at the exact same moment as Ang, yet somehow they had been transported into different locations.


    As Lin Fan was wondering what had just happened, there was a sudden sharp pain in his head.


    It was just a jolt of pain before words began forming in his mind.


    As one word formed, more and more words began forming in his mind until they formed aplete set of instructions. These instructions were detailed instructions on what seemed to be the first trial of this inheritance.


    It read as the following.


    "Wee youngling to my Inheritance Realm."


    "I never expected someone like me to fall in the Void Battleground, but here we are in the end."


    "If you are deemed worthy of my inheritance, all I ask that you take care of my Xie Family and if you aren''t, I hope that you will take care of my Xie Family because of your gains in my Inheritance Realm."


    Then after that, there were the strict rules of the first round.


    "The first round willst for 48 hours. It will consist of hunting beasts and surviving."


    "How could oneck battle experience when ites to being an expert? But the most terrifying thing sometimes in this world are other people."


    The rules of the first round were simple. There were spirit beasts released all over this minor realm and each kill would reward one with points. The points were based on the cultivation of the spirit beast, going from one point for an Iron Beast to over a million points for a King Beast. But of course, the prerequisite for that was being able to kill one.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking that whoever set these rules were crazy.


    The age limit for this Inheritance Realm was fifty and it would be crazy to even think about a fifty year old tinum Realm Expert, not to mention a fifty year old Legendary Realm Expert!


    Yet, there were King Beasts running loose in this minor realm, wasn''t that setting a wolf on a pack of sheep?


    Thinking this, Lin Fan made his first priority finding Ang because if anything went wrong, he could at least have her protect him.


    What he didn''t know was that Ang was currently running all over the realm looking for him. She had sensed the King Beasts in the minor realm and knew that it wasn''t a joke. She also knew that Lin Fan wasn''t strong enough to face a King Beast and when she thought of this, she couldn''t help feeling a bit anxious.


    Then there was the part about people being the most terrifying thing.


    That part meant that people could kill each other to steal their points, which meant that you couldn''t truly trust anyone. But for Lin Fan, he knew that he could trust Ang since this inheritance didn''t mean anything to her at all.


    Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t be negligent, so the first thing he did was have Brainy release parasite seeds into nearby beasts to scout the area.


    As Brainy grew stronger, it refined its control over other living organisms with its parasite seeds.


    Brainy had learned a new skill in its battles and had learned how to release parasite seed spores which allowed it to spread its seeds much further than before. Back then, Brainy could only spread its seeds to people it made contact with and the people that made contact with those with parasite seeds in them.


    The spores spread on the wind and attached themselves to nearby beasts.


    The beasts with lower cultivation realms were quickly taken over by the spores and Brainy sent them out to investigate the area.


    After a few minutes, even the stronger beasts sumbed to Brainy''s parasite seeds and soon fell under Brainy''s control. In just a few minutes, Brainy had control over a hundred spirit beasts that went from the Iron to Silver Realm. As for the beasts in the Gold Realm, they would take some time and for beasts in the tinum Realm, Brainy''s parasite seeds had no effect on them.<sub> </sub>


    As Brainy had the beasts scout the surrounding area, Brainy quickly found some people as well. These people were mostly alone since they were quite spread out and they were all focused on killing beasts right now.


    When Lin Fan heard that there were people around him, he considered killing them for their points, but he quickly gave up that idea. The cultivations of these people weren''t that high and the trial had just begun, so there was no point in killing them since they probably didn''t have that many points yet.


    In the end, Lin Fan chose a direction to head in and began heading off into the forest.


    Along the way, Lin Fan also killed a few Gold Realm Beasts that Brainy had found with its spores.


    Since Brainy had already infected them with its parasite seeds, even if it couldn''tpletely control them with the parasite seeds, Brainy could still stop their movements to a certain extent, making it easy for Lin Fan to cut them down.


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t cut down every single Gold Realm Beast he met since he wanted to let Brainy control a few. If something did go wrong, they might be an important trump card.


    One other feature that came attached in this Inheritance Realm was a ranking board that appeared in front of one''s eyes whenever they thought about it.


    One could choose to reveal their name and for obvious reasons, Lin Fan didn''t choose to reveal his name.


    Lin Fan looked over the board and found that he was in the top hundred from killing these Gold Realm Beasts.


    The rules had stated that at least half of them would be eliminated, whether from ack of points or from being killed. Since there were over ten thousand different people in this Inheritance Realm, being in the top hundred put Lin Fan in quite the good position.


    Looking at the top of the rankings, Lin Fan found that the person on top already had over a million points while the person in second had less than a hundred thousand.


    It was clear to him who was on top, there was only one person in this entire Inheritance Realm who could kill a King Beast¡­


    He had told Ang countless times that they had to keep a low profile or it would be bad for his master if the experts of the upper realm found him here, but Ang continued to go on her rampage whenever her emotions took over.


    The only sce that he had was that she had chosen to hide her name, which meant that no one knew it was her.


    For Lin Fan, his most important goal ining to this Inheritance Realm was to finish the mission from the system and find the Dragon Vein.


    Lin Fan had asked Momonga about this Dragon Vein, but Momonga''s exnation wasn''t the best.


    The gist of it was that a Dragon Vein was the crystallization of draconic energy that could be converted into powerful life energy if it was tapped into. Most Dragon Veins came from the remains of high grade bloodline dragons, whose bones contained most of their draconic energy.


    As for whether there was a Dragon Vein in this Inheritance Realm or not, Momonga really doubted this since Dragon Veins only came from high grade dragons. They were things that even high grade cultivation realms like the World of Elements or the Lich''s Necropolis considered rare, so it was very unlikely that a small world like the Blue Star would have one.


    But whether Lin Fan would be able to find it or not would all depend on how far he got in this Inheritance Realm.


    Something as precious as the Dragon Vein must be a part of Xie Jun''s inheritance, so if he wanted a chance to obtain it, he had to pass these trials first.


    In the end, if he had to take the inheritance, he would just take it and give it to his friend if he didn''t need it.


    As for the karma to protect the Xie Family, he wouldn''t need to worry about that since the Xie Family was currently doing well. Xie Jun must have left them a secret weapon to keep them safe, so unless they were truly threatened, Lin Fan wouldn''t need to worry about them.


    As Lin Fan continued forward, he suddenly stopped in his tracks as he heard someone call out.


    "Help!"

 69 Chapter 69

    Lin Fan immediately had Brainy use its pets to scout the source of that cry.


    In just a few seconds, Brainy found that it was a girl who was currently being surrounded by three rough looking men, pushing her back against a tree.


    If Lin Fan didn''t know better, he would have thought that this was the most stereotypical case of a hero saving a damsel in distress ever, but somehow there was a part of him that wanted to help her. Maybe he just thought it would be cool to act like a hero for once?


    As Lin Fan approached he made sure to conceal himself until he was close enough to see the situation with his own eyes.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see who the girl was. It was actually the girl from the bus, the one that had received Lord Mu''s other rmendation slot.


    Other than Yang Kai who he had already marked for death, he didn''t have much of an impression of the other three who hade with them. But still, since this girl had received Mu Bo Hai''s rmendation, there was a chance that he could be friends with her.


    Lin Fan could tell from the aura released by the three that all three of them were in the Silver Realm, but that didn''t make sense to him. Lin Fan could tell from the aura from Yang Kai that he was in the Gold Realm and since this girl was also rmended by Mu Bo Hai, she should also be the heir of a powerful family. Yet here she was being threatened by these three thugs.


    When Lin Fan swept his spiritual sense over the girl, he found that she was surprisingly only in the Bronze Realm!


    What was going on?


    This girl was only in the Bronze Realm and yet she had the courage toe into this dangerous Inheritance Realm?


    Why did Mu Bo Hai give one of his rmendation slots to her?


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to worry about that now since those three men were getting closer and closer. As they approached they slowly raised their hand towards her mouth as she continued to shout out for help.


    Lin Fan came out from the tree he was hiding behind and confidently moved over towards the three men as he said, "Alright, how about we stop here?"


    Once they heard this, all three men stopped and turned towards the source of this sound.


    The moment they saw Lin Fan, all three of them started waving their hands as they said in stuttering voices, "This...this isn''t what it looks like. You...you can''t make assumptions."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "I think it''s quite clear what this is, there''s really no way to make a mistake."


    The three of them looked at Lin Fan with wronged looks, but they no longer tried to exin. They had alreadye to terms that there was nothing they could say to change Lin Fan''s mind.


    After hesitating for a bit, one of them suddenly said, "Since it''se to this, we''ll go all out with you!"


    The other two still hesitated as they looked at the one who had suddenly gained a burst of courage.


    The one who had suddenly changed his tone said, "There''s no other way for us now, the only thing we can do is silence them or we will lose all our prestige. It''s a good thing we''re in an enclosed realm now, we just need to silence them both."


    Seeing that the other two were still hesitating, the one who became braver said "Of course, we''ll silence the girl after we''ve had our fun with her."


    At this, the other two swallowed a mouthful of saliva before finally making up their minds.


    With a thought, there were three beasts that suddenly appeared beside them. Then with tacit understanding, all three of them spread out in different directions with their beasts beforeunching a three pronged attack on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan saw this and didn''t panic at all, as he had Brainy activate the parasite seeds that he had ced inside the three of them.


    The parasite seed hadn''t fully spread since it had only been a few minutes since they were injected, but they were still strong enough topletely freeze these three men.


    As for their beasts, Lin Fan raised his hand to stop the two on the edges before mming them together at the one in the center. All three of these beasts felt their heads spin as they fell to the ground, unable to stand up at all.


    The three men fell face down on the ground in front of Lin Fan, looking up at him in fear.<sub> </sub>


    They clearly never expected this man ying hero to be this strong, but once they caught a good look at Lin Fan''s face, they suddenly recognized him.


    He had been one of the seeded participants, it was no wonder he was this strong!


    Lin Fan was about to finish the three of them, but then he received a mental message from Brainy that stopped him in his tracks.


    Brainy had noticed that there were others heading in their direction and it seemed like it was arge group being led by someone who was in the Gold Realm.


    Lin Fan looked down at the three of them again and found that they all had the same symbol on their clothes. Lin Fan asked Brainy if it could find this same symbol on the clothes of therger group and Brainy did find this symbol.


    It was clear that these three were a part of therger group and thatrger group wasing towards them right now.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before knocking the three of them out.


    After they were knocked out, Lin Fan had Brainy release the half developed parasite seeds and ced new parasite seeds into these three.


    If he just killed these three, it would mean having to fight therger group eventually. It was better to take care of all of them right now.


    Lin Fan went over to the girl and quickly took her by the hand.


    At first the girl struggled a bit, but when she saw that it was someone new and that her assants were on the ground, she quickly stopped struggling and decided to follow him.


    As they passed by the three on the ground, what Lin Fan didn''t notice was that the girl''s tongue quickly came out of her mouth and pierced the hearts of the three on the ground beforeing back into her mouth.


    What was even more incredible was that Lin Fan and Brainy both had their spiritual senses spread out, looking for anyone that was near them, but they hadn''t been able to sense the movement of this girl''s tongue at all.


    Brainy''s spiritual senses were even stronger than Lin Fan''s which was already at the level of the tinum Realm. This meant that this girl''s tongue had moved at a speed that was equal to the Legendary Realm!


    Before Lin Fan had arrived like a knight in shining armour, this girl had actually been manipting these three men.


    At first, these three men had been making their way over to their group when they suddenly saw this girl being chased by beasts.


    They quickly saved her and even offered to protect her, which she had expected.


    As they approached their group, when they thought that they had a chance with her, this girl suddenly cried out for help.


    They didn''t understand what was going on and started approaching her, but they never expected her to swing out and p them away.


    They knew that this situation would be bad for them if they were discovered like this, so out of desperation, they wanted to cover her mouth and slowly calm her down.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan had shown up and they were forced into a corner.


    Of course, the girl had nned all of this since she had already sensed Lin Fan nearby. Since the beginning her goal had been Lin Fan.


    Ever since she met Lin Fan on the bus, she could sense a strange power inside him.


    Now that he was holding her hand, she could feel that strange power even more clearly.


    As they quickly ran off, there was a deep andplicated look that appeared in the girl''s eyes.

 70 Chapter 70

    After moving a decent distance away, Lin Fan finally slowed down and let go of the girl''s hand.


    He and Brainy made sure that there was no one around before rxing.


    Lin Fan turned to the girl and seeing that she was still a bit wary of him, he said, "Don''t worry, it''s fine now, we can be considered acquaintances. I was the person who received Lord Mu''sst rmendation slot."


    At this, the girl revealed a look of recognition as she carefully examined Lin Fan''s face. After a while, she said, "You were the one that Yang Kai picked a fight with."


    Lin Fan found it a bit awkward being referred to as that, but he said with a nod, "That''s right, I''m that guy."


    The girl finally calmed down and let out a sigh of relief.


    After calming down, the girl shyly looked at Lin Fan, like she was looking him over and for some reason Lin Fan felt strangely awkward about it. That was because she was actually using her spiritual sense to check out Lin Fan''s body, but he didn''t know that.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to do, but the girl suddenly said after a while, "My name is Zi Ling, what''s yours?"


    Lin Fan very happily jumped at this chance to end this awkward conversation, "I''m Lin Fan. So what happened back there?"


    Zi Ling fell into thought before she said while trembling a bit, "At first they said that they wanted to help me, but then when I let my guard down, they suddenly had me pinned against the trees¡­"


    Lin Fan could see that she was ufortable with this topic, so he quickly changed the topic to something he was curious about, "With your cultivation, why did Lord Mu give you a rmendation? Isn''t that sending you to your death?"


    Zi Ling gave a sigh, "It''s not like that. My ancestor once saved Lord Mu''s life and he''s trying to repay my family by giving us this rmendation spot. While it is dangerous and he has told us many times, our family insisted on sending me in. After all, this is the inheritance of a Legendary Realm Expert, one that even went to an upper realm. If I could obtain this, it wouldpletely change the world for me and my family."


    Lin Fan asked with a voice of doubt, "Even if it means death?"


    Zi Ling said with a helpless smile, "Sometimes death is better. An expert like you wouldn''t understand what it''s like to suffer under the foot of others."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help sympathizing with her, "Actually, I''m not an expert, I''m just a normal person like you."


    Zi Lingughed at this, "There''s no need to pity me, you''re clearly a great expert with how you easily took care of those three."


    Lin Fan was happy to see her rxing, so he said with a smile, "Actually, I''m not as great as you think I am. Until recently, I wasn''t even able to cultivate, but I was lucky enough to get an encounter that changed my life. Everything I have now is all because I was lucky enough to meet this encounter¡­"


    At that, Lin Fan suddenly stopped talking.


    Even he didn''t know why he was sharing this much. Maybe it was because he could see the past owner of this body in Zi Ling. He had the memories of the past owner, so he could tell how hard it was being unable to cultivate in this world of cultivation.


    Zi Ling saw how Lin Fan suddenly stopped and while she was curious, she didn''t keep asking him about this. She suddenly changed the topic.


    Just like this, they sat there and chatted for a while, but after an hour, Brainy suddenly noticed something.


    The three seeds that it had left in the three men had suddenly withered when they died.


    Brainy had sent a few beasts with low cultivations to watch them and after Brainy saw the three of them meet up with therger group, the three of them had suddenly clutched their chests where their hearts were before dropping to the ground.


    Within seconds, their breaths had stopped and their eyes had diluted as they turned into corpses.


    Seeing theirrades suddenly die in front of them, therger group immediately put up their guard, but they couldn''t find anything.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, they wouldn''t suspect that a few Iron and Bronze Realm beasts that were wandering around would actually be watching them.


    Brainy''s seeds had already fully developed inside the three men, so Brainy could have taken control of them, but it had no idea why these three men had suddenly died. All that it knew was that there was a miniature explosion in their hearts before their hearts were ripped to pieces, killing them instantly.


    Brainy tried to think of possible reasons why these three men had died, but it couldn''t think of a single feasible reason. They had just suddenly died without a single warning sign.


    Brainy didn''t even have time to imnt seeds into therger group with the three men.


    But as therger group went to bury the three men, Brainy took this drop in their guard to let a few Iron Realm beasts approach, releasing seeds into therger group. Now Brainy just had to wait for those seeds to develop before taking over.


    Just from watching them, Brainy could tell that there were at least twenty people in this group and there were three of them in the Gold Realm.


    Now that Brainy was in the Gold Realm, if it was given time, it could wipe out this group with its parasite seeds, but Brainy chose to report it to Lin Fan first.


    When Brainy sent a mental message, Lin Fan excused himself and went to the side.


    When Lin Fan left, Zi Ling''s eyes turned sharp as she watched him leave. She knew the reason why he left, but she was curious why he knew what happened to those three men.


    They were already several kilometers away, yet Lin Fan was able to know when they had died. What kind of ability did Lin Fan have?


    When Lin Fan came to the side, Brainy told him what had happened and he was just as confused as Brainy.


    Lin Fan asked Brainy for every detail, but he still couldn''t figure out what had happened. But since it had happened, the only thing he could do now was take care of therger group directly since he couldn''t take care of them from the inside like he had nned.


    Of course, if he waited for Brainy''s new parasite seeds to develop, he could just take care of them that way, but there was a time limit on this trial and he didn''t have that much time to waste.


    So he went back to Zi Ling and said, "Miss Zi, I have something to take care of, so I have to head off for a bit. Do you mind waiting here while I handle my business?"


    Zi Ling suddenly revealed a slightly frightened look as she said in a stuttering voice, "Are, are you abandoning me, me here?"


    Lin Fan quickly shook his hands as he assured her, "No, no, I just have some business to take care of. I will be leaving one of my pets here to protect Miss Zi while I''m away, that is if Miss Zi is willing to trust me."


    With a snap of his finger, Lin Fan called out Rocky.


    Rocky had only been born for over a month, but Rocky had already reached the Gold Realm, a fact that frustrated Brainy.


    Even though they were both mutated beasts, for some reason, Rocky''s cultivation grew at a faster ratepared to Brainy.


    Rocky had also grown as its cultivation grew and now it was already two meters tall at its full size, but it preferred to remain in its small form whenever it was with Lin Fan.


    Seeing the tiny pile of rocks be a small golem, Zi Ling couldn''t help revealing a smile when she saw how cute it was.


    She patted Rocky on the head and Rocky was very happy about being patted on the head as it rubbed its head against her palms.


    Seeing that Zi Ling had epted Rocky and that Rocky was happy to guard her, Lin Fan gave her a few more words offort before disappearing.


    Once Lin Fan had disappeared, Zi Ling revealed a faint smile with a deep meaning.

 71 Chapter 71

    Zi Ling turned to Rocky and patted it on the head again, but this time it was different.


    There was a strange force that surrounded her hand as she patted Rocky and as she continued patting Rocky, its eyes had slowly dimmed like it was falling into an illusion.


    After a while, Rocky had stopped moving and just stood there like a statue.


    Once this was over, Zi Ling left a trace of her life energy on Rocky to keep away other beasts before disappearing on the spot.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan was quickly led by Brainy to where therger group was currently camping out while burying their dead.


    They had been several kilometers away, but with Lin Fan''s cultivation and physique, he quickly rushed over in a matter of minutes.


    When he arrived, they were still finishing up digging the holes and gathering food for lunch.


    Lin Fan could feel the Gold Realm aurasing from three of these people like Brainy had mentioned. As for the rest, there were seven in the Silver Realm and the rest were all in the Bronze Realm.


    While watching them, Lin Fan began devising a n on how to ughter them all.


    If he just attacked them head on, while he would be able to win, it would draw too much attention and would waste too much time. So after thinking about it, he discarded that n.


    While thinking, Lin Fan suddenly came up with an idea.


    As soon as Lin Fan came up with this idea, he began asking Brainy a few questions, as well as nning their next move.


    Lin Fan had thought that he was quite well hidden, but what he didn''t notice was that Zi Ling was flying in the air above the trees, watching his every move.


    ¡­


    After around half an hour, there were more beasts that showed up around the area this group was camping in, but strangely they were all moving in a coordinated manner.


    There were five Gold Realm beasts and over twenty Silver Realm beasts, it was plenty to ughter this entire group.


    But of course Lin Fan didn''t want a single one to escape, so he had been waiting for Brainy to gather its Bronze Realm puppets.


    In the end, Brainy''s spiritual senses capacity was limited.


    When it had first mutated and was only in the Silver Realm, it was only able to control a few puppets. As its cultivation grew, it had gone from 50 puppets in the peak of the Silver Realm to over 300 puppets in the high Gold Realm. Brainy was certain that as long as it reached the peak Gold Realm, it would be able to control over 500 puppets.


    Brainy left one hundred of its puppet limit to controlling Iron Realm for scouting purposes before creating arge army of a hundred Bronze Realm beasts.


    These beasts had already gathered around the area and were surrounding therger group, with most of them gathered on one side.


    Lin Fan''s n was to send thisrge group in to simte a beast wave before ambushing them with the surrounding beasts. During this time, Lin Fan would be waiting on the side, waiting for the chance to ambush them.


    In the beast wave that would be leading the attack, there was one Gold Realm beast that was leading them with five Silver Realm beasts and close to fifty Bronze Realm beasts.


    With these numbers, it would be an enticing bait in this realm where killing beasts earned you points. The three Gold Realm Experts they had would be more than enough to take care of this beast wave, so they would have no intentions of running.


    After all the beasts reached their positions, Brainy gave the signal and the beast wave charged forward.


    The scout of therge group had sharp ears and once he heard the sounds of trampling footsteps, he immediately said, "Everyone, it''s a beast wave!"


    The experts all released their spiritual senses and the moment they sensed that it was only a single Gold Realm beast leading this wave, they were much more rxed.<sub> </sub>


    They had three Gold Realm Experts here, as long as they worked together, they could easily defeat this. Now the only problem was who would get the points for the Gold Realm beast. But in the end, they decided to give it to the leader and share the Silver Realm beasts.


    As for the Silver Realm Experts, of course they had no say since they wouldn''t even be able to survive if these Gold Realm Experts weren''t here.


    While they were preparing to face the oing beast wave, Lin Fan had already moved to the other side with one of the Gold Realm beasts while he had Brainy prepare the other three.


    When the first beast came out of the trees and charged at the group, they were excited at the chance to gain more points.


    The ones in the Bronze Realm were the first to move forward to push back the Bronze Realm beasts, while those in the Silver Realm stood behind them in a defensive line.


    Eventually, the Silver Realm beasts came out of the tree lines and the Silver Realm Experts moved forward to engage them. It fell into an even fight with the Silver Realm Experts taking care of a single Silver Realm beast each and the remaining Silver Realm Expert supporting the Bronze Realm Experts in taking care of the Bronze Realm beasts.


    Finally, the boss of the beast wave appeared and the leader engaged the Gold Realm beast while the other two Gold Realm Experts provided support.


    The fight continued until it reached an even exchange, but the humans were slowly gaining ground as they continued to kite the beasts around until they became tired.


    When the humans thought that they had won, there was a sudden howl that came behind them as another Gold Realm beast had appeared.


    The two Gold Realm Experts who had been supporting the leader immediately broke off and surrounded the new Gold Realm beast. They were trying to stall it while their leader finished off the first Gold Realm beast.


    However, the moment they were about to engage the second Gold Realm beast, they heard one more roare from the side.


    When they all turned their heads towards the source of the sound, they found that it was another Gold Realm beast leading another two Silver Realm beasts and several Bronze Realm beasts.


    Just what was going on here?


    Why were there so many beasts that were drawn to them?


    When they were filled with despair and were prepared to escape, there was another roar that came from the final and only side they could escape to. This final roar was enough topletely fill them with dread.


    ¡­


    As for Zi Ling who was observing above the trees, at first she thought that Lin Fan was just lucky enough to catch this group as they were being swept up with a beast wave, but that all changed when the second Gold Realm beast appeared.


    She knew that it was no coincidence that this second Gold Realm beast was here, so she immediately released his spiritual sense and found the spiritual energying from Lin Fan. Or more specifically the vine snake that was wrapped around his arm.


    She wasn''t shocked by the fact that Brainy was a Gold Realm Beast or the fact that Brainy was a mutated beast, rather she was shocked that Brainy was a spiritual type pet that could control other living beings.


    This kind of pet was even rare in the upper realms because beasts rarely developed this ability. The only race that had this power was generally the Bug Race that were feared across the universe. The queens of that race had spiritual sense abilities that allowed them to control thousands of bugs, creating an instant army.


    Brainy''s abilities were simr to that, as long as its spiritual sense was strong enough, it could create an army of puppets that were at the same level as it. Even if an expert was strong, their stamina was limited in the end and they would never be able to defeat an army at the same level as them.


    ¡­


    As for Lin Fan, he was currently stalking up towards the group.


    Since they were panicking over the sudden appearance of four Gold Realm beasts, their spiritual senses were in a mess, making it much easier for Lin Fan to sneak up on them.


    Once the fourth beast appeared, they all fell into a panic, giving Lin Fan the perfect chance to attack.


    In one swift motion, he gathered all his strength and sent out a palm at the head of one of the supporting Gold Realm Experts.

 72 Chapter 72

    That Gold Realm Expert waspletely caught off guard and he didn''t have time to put up his guard against Lin Fan.


    The moment Lin Fan''s palm came into contact with his head, it was like a watermelon shattering as his skull burst into pieces. Once his head had exploded, blood poured down his body before his legs crumpled and the headless corpse fell to the ground.


    At this, everyone finally noticed Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan didn''t just stop there, he immediately turned to attack the other Gold Realmckey, but this one wasn''t as easy.


    The others all reacted this time, but with a single thought from Brainy, they were all unable to move.


    The Gold Realm Expert tried to put up his guard, but the moment Lin Fan''s palm mmed into his arms, there was a loud snapping sounds as his arms bent inward at the center. Then as Lin Fan''s palm continued pushing forward, the Gold Realm Expert''s chest copsed and arge mouthful of blood came out of his mouth.


    But this Gold Realm Expert was quite tenacious. Even with a copsed chest, he still pushed through and tried to get a kick in at Lin Fan, but the moment his legs made contact, it felt like he was kicking a sheet of steel and it was his leg that turned numb.


    After the first palm, Lin Fan quickly ended it with another palm, shattering the head of this Gold Realm Expert.


    The leader wanted to take advantage of this moment to attack Lin Fan, but the moment he jumped out, the Gold Realm wolf that had appeared second suddenly jumped out. That wolf shed with the leader and pushed him back before jumping to Lin Fan''s side where it allowed Lin Fan to pat its head.


    Seeing this, every single member of the group felt a chill run down their spine.


    It was clear that they had fallen for a trap, but they still didn''t know what grudge this person had against them.


    The leader tried to calmly say, "This friend, we''re all trying to im the inheritance, there''s no need for you to do this."


    Lin Fan just looked at him and said, "Unfortunately, there was some conflict between me and your group, so there''s no other choice."


    The leader quickly said, "This friend, what conflict could we have with you? This is our first time meeting."


    Lin Fan turned to where the three corpses were buried, "Maybe you haven''t met me before, but those three certainly have."


    The leader''s mind quickly turned and he put the pieces together. The strange way that those three died proved everything, it was clear that they provoked this unknown man and now he was tying up loose ends.


    But the leader didn''t give up, "Friend, those three were nothing more than burdens for our group. This friend has done us a favour by eliminating them."


    Lin Fan pointed at the two dead Gold Realm Experts, "Then what about these two?"


    The leader''s face twitched, but he still said, "It can be considered the price to pay for making new friends."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and shook his head, "You already know how this will end, why do you keep trying to stall?"


    The leader''s expression fell at this.


    While he had been stalling, the other members had already started moving in different directions. They didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to chase all of them down.


    But the moment they tried to escape, Brainy suddenly activated the seeds and none of them could move. They had thought the first time Lin Fan stopped them was just a special skill that he couldn''t use in session, but how wrong they were.


    Seeing the members of his group dropping to the ground like flies, the leader knew that there was no other way.


    The leader quickly said, "This friend, my name is Qi Yu of the Qi Royal Family. As long as you spare me, I guarantee that our Qi Family will be your closest allies and we will fulfill any wish you have."


    Lin Fan just shook his head again, "You and I both know that everything you''re saying is a lie."


    Qi Yu was desperate, so he took off the ring on his left hand, "Friend, this is a Spatial Ring with everything that I have. I will unseal it and give you everything as long as you allow me to leave here safely."


    While the wrist watches did provide storage, it was a storage that relied on service from the Union Government. This meant that as long as there wasn''t service, one couldn''t ess their items.<sub> </sub>


    That would never happen on the Blue Star since the Union Government hadid down apletework, but that gave control of your items to the Union Government.


    Most people had no choice since they couldn''t afford spatial treasures, but royal families preferred to use Spatial Rings which they could imprint with their own spiritual sense seals. After all, the safest hands were your own in the end.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t tricked at all, "You think I don''t know what you''re trying to do? This is a grudge that you will never drop and as long as I keep your Spatial Ring you''ll have a way to track me. How long do you think I''ll live with a royal family hunting me down?"


    Qi Yu wanted to say something else, but Lin Fan didn''t give him a chance at all as he jumped out at Qi Yu.


    Qi Yu tried to put up his guard, but then he found that there was something inside him that restricted his movement.


    Lin Fan charged forth and with one smooth motion, he cut off Qi Yu''s head.


    In his final moments, Qi Yu had a look of absolute terror which remained on his decapitated head.


    Once he took care of that, Lin Fan picked up the Spatial Ring before saying to Brainy, "Have the beast take care of the others."


    After saying that, hepletely ignored the rest of the group as he went off to the side to look through Qi Yu''s Spatial Ring as Brainy controlled the beasts to take care of the corpses.


    The beasts put bite marks and signs of battle in the surrounding area, making this look like the aftermath of a beast wave. That way, no one would ever connect this incident to Lin Fan.


    ¡­


    Zi Ling in the sky waspletely amazed by Lin Fan, she never thought that he would be this decisive.


    He had just ughtered an entire group because of a single act of saving her, this kid really was bloodthirsty.


    But she didn''t care about that since all experts were like this. They had to be decisive living in the cultivation world because the cultivation world followed thew of the jungle. If he didn''t do this, he might have been the one to be hunted down once they left this realm.


    As for what she really cared about, it was the power that she could sense inside Lin Fan.


    During that entire fight, she could tell that Lin Fan wasn''t even aware of the power that he had, but traces of it could be seen in the way he fought. Especially how he sucked in the life energy of the enemies he yed.


    There was only one exnation for this and it was what Zi Ling had been looking for.


    ¡­


    Once Lin Fan cracked the spiritual sense seal on the Spatial Ring, he immediately started digging around inside.


    This Qi Yu really was quite the rich person, he had plenty of elixirs and pills, as well as many different artifacts.


    But too bad none of those artifacts suited Lin Fan since his fists were still stronger than any of those artifacts.


    As Lin Fan continued to dig around in the ring, he eventually came across a piece of paper that caught his attention.


    There was a limited map on the paper and based onndmarks he had passed, Lin Fan could tell that it was a map of the Inheritance Realm. But the most interesting part was that there was a X that was marked on the map.


    Could it be that this was a treasure map?


    Lin Fan put this away with ns to check it outter before continuing to dig around in the Spatial Ring.


    When he ran out of things to dig through, the veryst item he found caught his attention.


    It was a jade token with a picture of a rat on it.

 73 Chapter 73

    As Lin Fan touched this token, he could feel a special auraing from it.


    This was an aura that he hadn''t felt since he first met Ang and Momonga, it was the feeling of a powerfulw. He couldn''t help knitting his brows and trying to send his spiritual sense even deeper into the token.


    But no matter how he tried to scan the token, he couldn''t find anything from it.


    The story of this token was actually a funny one.


    Only beings that had touched the power ofws could sense thews hidden in this token, but it was unlucky enough to be sold in a low ss auction where Qi Yu had bought it for a low price since he found it interesting. Unfortunately he couldn''t sense anything special from it, so he had thrown it into his Spatial Ring to this day.


    In the end, he decided to put it away in his system''s storage and bring it back for Momonga to see.


    The moment he put it in, the system actually reacted.


    "Mission item has been found, new mission being released."


    "Host, please find all twelve tokens and unlock the path to the inheritance of the Zodiac Knights."


    "Host will receive the upper cultivation realm, Zodiac Realm, forpleting this mission."


    It was an upper cultivation realm! That was on the same level as the Lich''s Necropolis and the World of Elements!


    Lin Fan was filled with excitement at this, but he knew that this wasn''t a simple quest. Who knew where the other eleven tokens were scattered?


    He still had to ask Momonga about thister.


    Once he had finished sorting through all the loot, Lin Fan left the area and had the beasts scatter until he needed them again.


    As he was heading back, Zi Ling quickly rushed back to where Rocky was and undid her illusion. Once the illusion was undone, she also made sure to imprint fake memories to cover up for herself.


    While Rocky was still under the illusion, she even brought back a Silver Realm beast for Rocky to kill to create a cover story.


    When Lin Fan came back, Rocky was bragging about how he had killed this Silver Realm beast to save Zi Ling. When Lin Fan checked his points, he found that he had indeed received the points from killing the Silver Realm beast.


    Now that everything had been taken care of, Lin Fan decided to return back to his original n of wandering around and trying to find Ang while killing beasts for points. But now that n had changed with the addition of Zi Ling, he couldn''t just leave her alone.


    So in the end, Lin Fan decided to bring Zi Ling along.


    For some reason, he couldn''t help feeling sympathy for her because of her background and he caught several Bronze Realm beasts for her to kill to give her enough points to reach the second stage.


    Just like that, a day passed as they wandered around killing beasts.


    ¡­


    Early the next morning, after waking up Lin Fan was surprised to see Ang standing in front of him, staring down at him.


    He had left Rocky out as a guard, but when he turned over to Rocky, he found that it was cowering in the corner of the cave, copsed into pieces.


    When he looked back at Ang, he could have sworn that he saw a bit of dust on her fists.


    Lin Fan was about to speak, but Ang spoke first, "Who is that girl?"


    As she said this, she pointed over to Zi Ling who was sleeping on the other side of the cave.


    Lin Fan turned over to Zi Ling and exined how he had saved her yesterday.


    During this time, Zi Ling had been woken up by the sound of the conversation and when she saw Ang, she revealed a faint look of fear. She immediately tried to move over to Lin Fan to hide behind him, but Ang quickly cut her off.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan saw this and quickly said, "Miss Zi, you don''t need to worry about her. This is Ang, she was the one that I came here with, so she can be considered an ally."


    Zi Ling had acted much closer to Lin Fan during the previous day, so of course she would keep that act up. Once she was assured by Lin Fan, she revealed a smile to Ang, but all that she received was a cold stare back.


    Ang just grabbed Lin Fan by the cor and brought him to the side before throwing him down. Then she said in a cold voice, "You shouldn''t trust her that easily."


    Lin Fan looked at Ang with a confused gaze as he said, "What do you mean?"


    Ang just said, "She isn''t what she pretends to be."


    Lin Fan just said, "Ang, I think you''re thinking too much. Miss Zi is someone that Mu Bo Hai gave a rmendation slot to, she can be considered an acquaintance and even an ally. Besides with her low cultivation, what is there to worry about."


    Ang didn''t say anything else since she knew that there was nothing she could say to change his mind. She had already seen how Lin Fan treated her, so unless she had a way to prove definitively what she felt from Zi Ling, she wouldn''t be able to change Lin Fan''s mind.


    It was her own fault for taking too long to find Lin Fan, she could only me that annoying ape that got in her way yesterday.


    When they came back, Lin Fan still tried to mediate between the two, but Ang just ignored Zi Ling. The only thing she did was keep the two apart whenever she could.


    Lin Fan didn''t understand what was wrong with Ang, but still being together with her for the past two months had created a bond between them. In his heart, there was now a trace of doubt towards Zi Ling.


    After that was over, Lin Fan pulled out the map and showed it to Ang, "I found this yesterday, it should be a map of something special in this area."


    Ang looked it over and could remember a few of the spots marked that she had passed yesterday. She had actually passed where the X mark was, but she didn''t remember anything being there. However, she had flown over the trees, so she really couldn''t be sure.


    Lin Fan heard this and fell into thought before saying, "Alright, let''s go and check it out since you know where it is. Since there''s a map for it, there should be something there."


    Ang had no objections to this, but she didn''t forget to say, "Then let''s leave her and go."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "We can''t just leave Miss Zi by herself. Miss Zi, we''ll go and check this map out, I''ll leave Rocky here to protect you."


    But this time Zi Ling said, "I''lle with you. If it''s really treasure, there must be something guarding it and you''ll need your pet to help fight it. I don''t want to be a burden."


    Lin Fan was filled with admiration towards her, but for Ang who knew that it was all an act, she just gave a cold snort.


    So the three of them set off, following the map until they came close to the location of the X.


    But when they approached the location, Ang suddenly raised her hand to stop them as she said, "Wait, there''s people up ahead."


    At this, Lin Fan had Brainy send in the Iron Realm beasts to scout.


    Brainy had kept a few beasts with them as they traveled as scouts, so now was the perfect time to use them.


    After a few minutes, Brainy passed the information it had heard to Lin Fan.


    Apparently there were several tents set up as a camp near the location marked on the map and there were young masters from several royal families gathered here.


    Based on what Brainy had heard, these young masters had ancestors who had known Xie Jun back when he was still on the Blue Star.


    Even back then, Xie Jun had already nned on stepping onto the Void Battlefield, so he had designed his Inheritance Realm a long time ago. These ancestors had received some information from Xie Jun that he was hiding one of his most precious treasures in the first round as a bonus and after getting him drunk, they had gotten him to reveal the location, which was the location marked on the map.


    Qi Yu''s group was supposed to join them, but now they had run out of patience and were prepared to get the treasure without Qi Yu''s group.


    When Lin Fan heard this, his eyes couldn''t help lighting up.


    This was a good chance, how could he let it go?

 74 Chapter 74

    Lin Fan quickly ryed the information to the girls and they both agreed to his n.


    Lin Fan had Ang ce a stealth spell around them, which Ang agreed, but she refused to put one around Zi Ling. In the end, she still agreed and put the spell over Zi Ling after Lin Fan convinced her, but she really had an ugly look on her face.


    The stealth spell was just using spiritual energy to form a barrier that blocked spiritual senses, creating a false image if one used their spiritual sense on them. So while it prevented them from being found, it didn''t make them invisible.


    The three of them slowly approached the camp, but they didn''te out of the foliage. The three of them just sat there watching over the movements in the camp.


    It didn''t take long before the group in the camp gathered in the center.


    There was one person who seemed quite strong based on his aura that seemed to be leading them. After giving a speech, he led the rest off in the direction of the mark on the map.


    While they couldn''t hear what the speech was about, it seemed quite inspiring seeing that the group all raised their weapons and let out a cheer when he was finished.


    Lin Fan''s group of three followed behind the group, making sure to maintain a distance so they wouldn''t be seen, but also close enough to see what was happening.


    Eventually the group came up to arge cave, which was in the exact location of the mark.


    Once they arrived, the group took up formation and slowly approached the cave. But the moment they came within ten meters of the cave, there was suddenly a loud roar that came from inside.


    This roar was no ordinary roar, there was an extreme power that filled this roar that shook all who heard it to their core. However, that only applied to the group in front.


    As for Lin Fan''s group, Lin Fan wasn''t shaken since he had already felt much stronger from Ang and Momonga, Ang was Ang, and only Zi Ling acted scared even though she really wasn''t.


    Before the group in front of the cave could even react, there was a giant lion that came out.


    The lion was five times higher than the average human and when it came out, it looked down on these intruders like they were nothing more than ants. Of course, it was justified since this was a beast in the Legendary Realm! This was a King Beast!


    Once this King Beast appeared, the group of royals knew that their ancestors had been tricked by Xie Jun. He deliberately told them about the treasure, but of course it was all to lead them to this trap!


    In an instant, every single royal charged off in a different direction, trying to escape, but how could they escape from a King Beast so easily?


    The King Beast gave a roar and several figures jumped out of its shadow, creating several miniature lions.


    While these lions were much smaller than the King Beast, they were nothing tough at since each and every one of them were in the peak of the Gold Realm.


    These lions quickly scattered to chase down these royals and more than half of them were unlucky enough to be caught by them.


    In the end, these royals had no other choice but to use their trump cards, bringing out high tier Gold Realm Artifacts. Various coloured lights exploded as these artifacts released their power and pushed back the Gold Realm lions.


    After a quick battle, most of the royals managed to escape using their artifacts, but there were some that were unlucky and were caught by the lions. As for most of their followers with lower tier cultivations, they were almost all killed off.


    As for the leader who seemed to be the strongest, he was unlucky as he was locked onto by the King Beast itself.


    As the King Beast attacked, the leader released his cultivation and Lin Fan was shocked to find that this leader was actually in the tinum Realm!


    He had thought that most of the people here would be at most in the Gold Realm, he never expected tinum Realm Experts who were less than fifty years old. It seemed like his calctions were wrong and he couldn''t act as freely as he thought.


    After releasing his cultivation, the leader also took out a sword that once it came out of its sheath, it released lightning that filled the area.


    This wasn''t just a simple artifact, the auraing from the artifact was filled with the power ofws, meaning that it was a Legendary Realm Artifact.


    It seemed like this leader''s position in his family wasn''t low, his family was even willing to invest a Legendary Realm Artifact in him. However, that did make sense since he was a supreme genius that had reached the tinum Realm before he was even fifty.


    Gathering all the power of the Legendary Realm Artifact, the sword was covered in lightning that exploded in all directions, creating a that quickly flew out at the King Beast.<sub> </sub>


    The King Beast raised a paw to swat it down, but the moment its w touched the lightning, the lightning shattered instantly. However, the lightning didn''t disappear as it ran across the pelt of the King Beast, quickly forming a web on its skin.


    The King Beast quickly gave a roar at this, but it seemed like it couldn''t move at all.


    The leader took advantage of this one moment to immediately gather all his strength into running, immediately dashing out into the forest.


    After a while, the lightning disappeared from the body of the King Beast, but it didn''t chase after the leader.


    Once the Gold Realm lions finished clearing out the stragglers, they returned into the shadow of the King Beast who turned back to the cave.


    As for Lin Fan''s group, they still remained in their hiding spot, watching the entire battle.


    When all the humans had been killed, that was when Lin Fan came out with Ang.


    The King Beast seemed to have felt the threat that wasing from Ang, so it came out once again to meet them, but this time it wasn''t as arrogant.


    This time, the King Beast vigntly watched over Ang who stared back at it like she was looking down on an ant.


    Every beast that could be a King Beast had a certain amount of intelligence and luck, so this lion King Beast wasn''t an exception. It could tell that it couldn''t defeat Ang, but it also couldn''t just leave since there was a contract that sealed it to protecting what was in the cave.


    Ang could tell from the fluctuationsing from the King Beast that it was contracted to protecting the cave, so she didn''t n on wasting words.


    However, when Ang raised her hand to attack, Lin Fan suddenly called out, "Wait!"


    Ang turned to look at Lin Fan with a confused gaze as she said, "What is it?"


    Lin Fan said, "Could you let me fight it instead?"


    Ang''s expression became even more confused, "You know that you can''t beat it, why would you fight it?"


    Lin Fan said, "I want to use it to be stronger."


    After seeing that the leader was actually in the tinum Realm, as well as the Legendary Realm Artifact he had, Lin Fan had realized that he had underestimated this Inheritance Realm. If he didn''t be stronger, he wouldn''t be a match for these people and he wouldn''t have a chance to get the Dragon Vein.


    Now that there was a perfect chance for him to cultivate, why would he let it go?


    Lin Fan''s main form of cultivation was just like the cultivation method of his pets, he fought different powerful foes and gained battle experience, increasing his cultivation under pressure.


    Hearing this, Ang didn''t agree right away and actually knit her brows, "There''s no protection here."


    Normally when Lin Fan cultivated like this, it was usually in the World of Elements where he had the protection of his master. Even if he was killed, he would be revived on the spotpletely healed.


    Lin Fan turned to Ang and said in a confident voice, "I believe in you."


    Ang was a bit stunned before she gave a nod with a smile, "Alright."


    Then with a snap, she created a barrier around the area, isting them from the rest of the Inheritance Realm.


    Ang said, "Have fun."


    At this, Lin Fan revealed an excited look.


    This was his first time fighting an expert in the Legendary Realm, just how would he stack up?

 75 Chapter 75

    As Lin Fan moved forward to fight the King Beast, Ang also turned to look at Zi Ling.


    Zi Ling knew that she couldn''t fool her, so she spread her hands before pointing to the side, indicating that she wanted to talk.


    Ang couldn''t feel any ill willing from her, so she decided to follow Zi Ling to the side for a talk.


    ¡­


    During this, Lin Fan summoned all three of his pets to help him.


    These three pets quickly transformed into theirbat forms before integrating into Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan''s cultivation technique made him a physical fighter, so he didn''t rely on coordinating with his pets to fight, rather hebined himself with their powers.


    Xiao Feng was the first, creating a set of wind armour that wrapped around Lin Fan. Then it was Xiao Lei''s turn who created gauntlets and boots of lightning that wrapped around Lin Fan''s hands and feet. Finally, it was Xiao Huo''s turn to create a pair of fiery phoenix wings on Lin Fan''s back.


    Once his armour had been formed, Lin Fan charged forward to attack the lion King Beast.


    The lion King Beast had no choice other than to fight. It waspletely terrified by the aura that Ang released, but it was forced to defend the treasure inside the cave.


    The lion King Beast released its life energy which erupted into several des of water that flew out at Lin Fan.


    But with Lin Fan''s wind armour, he easily punched out and deflected it with the force of the windws.


    Pushing forward, Lin Fan gathered his own life energy into the me wings to create even stronger mes with Xiao Huo. As the mes became stronger, when Lin Fan was close to the lion King Beast, the mes began moving forward along his body.


    When the mes pushed along the wind armour, it drew in some of the wind which made it even stronger. Then as it reached the lightning gauntlets, sparks of lightning quickly filled the mes.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was getting closer, the lion King Beast finally stopped shooting out water des. Rather it gathered all of its waterws in its ws as it brought it down on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t feel any fear when he saw this, rather he continued punching out with his fist covered in lightning mes.


    As the energy surrounding the w and fist shed, there were sparks, mes, and drops of water that scattered in all directions.


    For the first few seconds, there was an even sh of force, but that quickly changed as the King Beast''s w pushed Lin Fan back bit by bit.


    While Lin Fan had a body that could match the Legendary Realm and he had the life energy mix of three different tinum Realm beasts that had a sum that was greater than any one of its parts, it still couldn''t match the power of a true Legendary Realm beast.


    As Lin Fan was pushed back bit by bit, until he finally couldn''t take it anymore and was swatted down into the ground. Lin Fan flew backwards like a cannonball being shot out, mming down into the ground and creating arge crater.


    When he made contact with the ground, the shockwave from the attack of the King Beast pushed through the wind armour and raged inside his body, forcing a mouthful of blood out of him.


    This was his first time receiving an internal injury like this. Before, the worst injury that he had ever received were minor scratches on his arm from Lord Feng''s attacks.


    Being injured for the first time like this created a sense of danger in Lin Fan''s heart, but it also filled him with a certain amount of excitement. To be honest, he had been finding his battles to be too simple, so he never felt any excitement in them and he never grew from them. But this time, there was a real chance that he might die if he was even the slightest bit careless, which provoked the talent within him.


    Lin Fan wiped the blood off the corner of his mouth and he jumped up before charging at the King Beast once again.


    The King Beast saw this human charging again, so with a roar, it released the smaller Gold Realm lions from its shadow again.


    The King Beast was still vignt of Ang, so it had been holding back to a certain extent to save energy to fight her, that was why most of its attacks against Lin Fan had seemed a bit weak.


    While the Gold Realm lions charged, the King Beast also continued firing off the water des once again.


    When the Gold Realm lions reached Lin Fan, they couldn''t do a single thing to him as they were caught up in the current of the wind armour and torn to pieces.<sub> </sub>


    As for the water des, they were deflected by the wind armour again and again.


    Once Lin Fan was close to the King Beast, it raised its w to release another strike, but this time the energy around its w was much thicker. It was clear that this King Beast was trying to end it with this one attack.


    But when the fist and the w shed this time, Lin Fan wasn''t shot out like a cannonball.


    There was a strange suction force that came from Lin Fan''s attack that drew in the King Beast''s life energy while restoring Lin Fan''s life energy, greatly reducing the power of the King Beast''s w.


    This strange suction force was simr to the one that was released by Lin Fan''s dantian when he cultivated at night, drawing inrge amounts of life energy from the King Beast''s attack.


    After the sh, instead of being shot out again, Lin Fan was only pushed back a few steps.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at his fist in surprise, but he didn''t give it much thought as he charged forward again.


    The lion King Beast now looked at Lin Fan with a bit of fear in its eyes.


    The King Beast was no longer passive as it charged out at Lin Fan this time with water life energy gathered around its ws.


    Lin Fan punched out again and again, matching the King Beast''s continuous w attacks.


    Each time their attacks met, there was the same suction force that drew in life energy from the King Beast''s w attacks, bringing it into Lin Fan''s body.


    Each time, the shockwave of the King Beast''s attacks made Lin Fan spit out a mouthful of blood, but he quickly recovered from the injection of life energy. However, his face was pale from all the blood he lost.


    Just like this, exchanging attacks again and again, Lin Fan slowly pushed back the King Beast.


    The King Beast''s disposition changed over time and soon it began seeing Lin Fan as a real threat.


    Finally when it was pushed back a single step by Lin Fan, it realized that it couldn''t hold back any longer.


    The King Beast gathered all of its power into a single attack, which came out as a lion madepletely of water life energy.


    Lin Fan could tell from the intensity of this attack that he would be seriously injured if he were to take this head on, but he was unwilling to back down.


    Over the course of the battle, Lin Fan had slowly learned how to control the suction force that came from his body, so now he had a decent control over it. Bringing both his arms back, he was prepared to punch out with both of them filled with suction force to draw in as much life energy as possible, allowing him to break the attack.


    As the King Beast released the water life energy lion, it roared out as it charged right at Lin Fan. Lin Fan was about to bring both his fists forward to meet this attack, but right before it could, there was a de of wind that flew out.


    The de of wind shed right through the water life energy lion and reached the King Beast, shing it across the head, creating arge gash that spat out blood.


    The King Beast roared out in pain and wanted to fight back, but then there was another wall of wind that mmed down on it from above and it couldn''t move at all.


    Lin Fan turned back to see Ang with her hand raised and he knew that she had interfered. While he was a bit disappointed since he couldn''t sh with this final attack, he knew that she was just looking out for him.


    Ang saw him looking at her and she said, "Finish it."


    Lin Fan gave her a nod before walking over to the King Beast. Looking into the King Beast''s pleading eyes, he cupped his hands and gave it a bow before mming his palm right in between its eyes on its forehead.


    Ang had already shattered its life energy barrier, so Lin Fan''s attack easily prated through and killed the King Beast.


    Once it was dead, Lin Fan suddenly felt a surge of life energy and sat down cross legged to cultivate.

 76 Chapter 76

    As Lin Fan sat there cultivating, Ang and Zi Ling couldn''t help staring at him.


    They had felt it earlier during the battle, Lin Fan had awakened the power of his physique from the pressure the King Beast put on him.


    Ang couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with curiosity, just what was his background that he had all these things? A God Realm master and this strange physique, it really defied all expectations of someone from a lower realm.


    As for Zi Ling, she looked at Lin Fan with a deep look.


    What she had seen had confirmed all her doubts and now she had to n her next moves¡­


    In the talk with Ang earlier, she had told her a few things about her and she had ensured Ang that she meant no ill will towards Lin Fan.


    At first Ang didn''t believe it, but eventually she did since her intuition told her that she wasn''t lying and generally her intuition was right. Like when she decided to follow Lin Fan.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally finished cultivating and he erupted with life energy, but this time his life energy was a strong gold colour with tints of white. After all this time, he had finally broken through into the peak of the Gold Realm!


    Once he came out of his cultivation, the first thing he did was gather his life energy around his hand and look at it. The strange thing about this life energy was that there was a different part of it that was like water.


    Lin Fan picked it out of his life energy and found that it was actually life energy containing a trace of thews of water. It was just like thews of water that the King Beast had used.


    ying around with it, Lin Fan found that he could manipte the life energy containing thews of water into various shapes that he could use to attack.


    Ang and Zi Ling both noted this and were both surprised to see this.


    Zi Ling was surprised because this wasn''t in the information she received, this was actually beyond what she had expected.


    As for Ang, she knew that a physique that could draw in the power ofws wasn''t normal. This was simr to one of the Ten Divine Physiques that her predecessor had warned her about.


    After Lin Fan was done, he turned to the two and pointed at the cave with a smile, "Let''s see what the treasure is."


    Before either of them could react, Lin Fan had already walked in.


    Seeing this, they had no choice but to follow him.


    When they came into the cave, they didn''t find anything special, but as they continued forward, they eventually came to the residence of the King Beast.


    In the center of the residence, there was a pedestal that had a ray of light shining down from above on it. It couldn''t have been more obvious that this was the treasure they came for.


    The three of them walked over and surrounded the pedestal, looking at the object that was ced in the center.


    When Lin Fan saw what it was, he was very disappointed.


    In the center of the pedestal, there was a small marble sized orb, but inside the orb was swirling darkness. It was waves of dark smoke that continued to swirl around, looking like there was a storm inside.


    Zi Ling was surprised by this since she knew what it was and she knew how rare it was to find in this lower realm.


    As for Lin Fan, he was disappointed since he also knew what it was, but he already had one of these.


    And Ang, she just didn''t care.


    This orb was a crystallization of thew of darkness. As long as one had this, they could use it to instantly reach the Legendary Realm by integrating thew of darkness into themselves, but it would forever cut off any chance of progressing past that realm.


    For people of the lower realm, this was a treasure since it would mean instantly reaching the Legendary Realm.


    Even for the people of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, this was a treasure since Legendary Realm Experts were still rare resources, which was why they recruited them from lower realms.<sub> </sub>


    But for people of true upper realms, this bead was nothing more than a toy that contained a trace of thew of darkness.


    Lin Fan could have given these to his parents and little sister to instantly bring them into the Legendary Realm, but he would have rather found ways to help them reach the Legendary Realm without cutting off their future progress. He wanted to help them continue progressing forward so they could live as long as possible.


    Even if one reached the Legendary Realm, the upper limit of their lifespan was still a thousand years.


    While Lin Fan was feeling depressed about this treasure, Ang began wandering around the cave.


    She walked around and found many bones of varying sizesying against the walls, but eventually she came up to a bone that was two thirds her size. She couldn''t sense anything special about it using her spiritual sense, but her instinct told her that this was definitely a treasure.


    Ang turned and called out, "Lin Fan,e over here."


    Lin Fan looked over with a confused gaze, but he still walked over as he said, "What is it?"


    Ang pointed at therge bone and said, "Take this with you as well, it should be useful as well."


    Lin Fan was even more confused as he looked at the bone, "What do you want me to do with this? Use it as a club?"


    Ang smacked him on his head and said, "Just take it, my instincts are telling me that it''s precious."


    Lin Fan looked at her with a gaze of doubt, but he still took it and put it in the system''s storage.


    After going around the cave onest time, they made sure that there was nothing else precious here.


    Zi Ling hadn''t really taken anything. The excuse was that she didn''t feel right taking anything, but the real reason was that she looked down on everything. The only thing that could excite her a bit was maybe thew of darkness orb, but she knew she shouldn''t be greedy or she would blow her cover.


    Once everything was packed up, they quickly left the cave in case anyone from the previous group came back to check and went flying through the forest.


    After running for a bit and creating some distance from the cave, they found a smallke that they decided to take a rest at.


    But the moment they wanted to stop for a rest, there was a sudden roar that was filled with pain that came from nearby.


    p Hearing this, they quickly put up their guards and went over to investigate.</anda>


    But of course before they even approached, Lin Fan had Brainy send in its Iron Realm scouts.


    Brainy quickly found out what the situation was and described it to Lin Fan.


    It was a group of participants who were surrounding a white mother tiger. Behind the mother tiger, there were several small white bundles that were tinted with hints of blood.


    When Lin Fan heard this, for some reason, there was an impulse that filled him. This impulse swallowed his reasoning and he didn''t stop as he charged forward.


    This impulse hade over him when he had seen Zi Ling being helpless when she was being surrounded by those three men.


    He didn''t know where this impulse came from, but whenever he saw someone who was helpless and being bullied, he just felt the urge to protect them.


    But that didn''t make sense to Lin Fan himself since he knew that he was cold blooded towards all his enemies. He was even cold blooded towards his pets when he trained them.


    He honestly never considered himself a good person, but for some reason, he just couldn''t help protecting the weak. This had been the case ever since he transmigrated into this world¡­


    While Lin Fan was pushed forward by his impulse, his mind didn''t stop and he was just able to stop himself from rushing out of the tree line.


    But this time, what surprised him was that Ang was the first one to charge out.

 77 Chapter 77

    Lin Fan watched on in surprise as Ang jumped out andnded in front of the mother tiger.


    He didn''t understand why, but this girl who normally seemed cold and uncaring actually seemed like she was filled with emotion at this moment.


    It was like the sight of a mother protecting her child seemed to have triggered some kind of memory in her, causing this sudden burst of emotion that came from her. She stood there in front of the mother tiger, releasing her full aura.


    The four people surrounding the mother tiger with their pets were instantly ovee with fear from being suppressed by Ang''s aura.


    Lin Fan saw that this situation was bad, so he quickly jumped out as well,nding at Ang''s side. He quickly put his hand on her shoulder and brought her behind him as he said, "Friends, perhaps we can talk this out?"


    When Lin Fan pulled Ang back, she had taken back her aura, so these four were finally freed from their fear.


    They looked at each other and felt slightly embarrassed over the fact that they had been afraid of this girl, so their leader said in an angry voice, "What is there to talk about? This is the Inheritance Realm, what you''re doing right now is stealing our prey!"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "While it is true that we do have to hunt prey, can''t you show some kindness and let this one go?"


    Now that they had calmed down, they finally got a good look at Ang and found that she was the most perfect girl they had ever seen.


    As well, Zi Ling had alsoe out of the bushes and she was also quite the looker, otherwise how could she have gotten those three men to fall for her?


    Zi Ling had a head of purple hair and purple crystal eyes that seemed like they could mesmerize anyone that looked in them. As for her figure, while her chest wasn''t that big, she made up for it with her bottom half.


    Once they saw these two girls, these four men all released lewd looks.


    To put it simply, these four were quite crude men who thought more with their bottom half than with their brains.


    They had been embarrassed that they had been scared by this girl, so now they were feeling angry from their shame. They were so dumb that they didn''t even realize that their pets were all on their bellies in positions of absolute submission. The only thing they thought was that they must have made a mistake when they felt the feare over them.


    The leader of these four said, "Alright, we can let this beast go, but you shouldpensate us. How about letting us spend some time with these two girls? A dumb kid like you probably doesn''t even know how to satisfy them."


    At this, the other four also started making lewdments, "Come on baby,e y with daddy." "Little girl, I promise I''ll make you feel good."


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned cold the moment he heard this.


    He had been holding back since there was no need to make more enemies nor was there a need to ughter needlessly since it could be tracked to him, but the moment he heard how they talked about Ang, he had already marked them for death.


    Lin Fan just turned to Ang and said with a sigh, "You can take care of them."


    Ang had been holding back the entire time since Lin Fan had warned her beforeing into this Inheritance Realm, that was why she suppressed them with her aura instead of directly killing them like she normally would have done. But now that she received Lin Fan''s approval, she didn''t hold back at all.


    Without any ceremony, Ang raised her hands and gave a flick outwards, raising up a gentle breeze.


    The four men didn''t know what had just happened, but thest thing they saw was everything splitting apart right in front of them.


    After that, they turned into a million pieces of flesh that fell down to the ground into puddles of blood.


    Ang had sent a wind right through them, cutting them into tiny little pieces. Even then, she felt that she had let them off too easily.


    Once they took care of those four, Lin Fan and Ang turned back to the mother tiger.


    The mother tiger had a bit of intelligence and could tell what they had just done for her, so it didn''t put up any guard towards them. However, the mother tiger also knew that it wouldn''t be able to hold on for long.<sub> </sub>


    The mother tiger pushed out a small white bundle that was covered in blood towards Ang. As for the other two small white bundles, their eyes had already dimmed and their bodies had turned cold¡­


    With onest look into Ang''s eyes, as the mother tiger''s eyes dimmed, she conveyed a final message to Ang.


    Ang just gave a nod and took the little white bundle in her arms as her eyes filled with emotion, letting out a single tear.


    Lin Fan waspletely shocked since this was his first time seeing Ang cry. At that moment, there was a part of his heart that couldn''t help churning as he felt a desire that he had never felt before.


    Lin Fan could clearly tell that this mother tiger was reminding Ang of something, but he also knew that he shouldn''t ask unless Ang was willing to talk about it.


    After using her life energy to clean up the little white bundle, she turned to Lin Fan with a pleading look.


    This seemed like it was the first time Ang had ever asked for anything from Lin Fan, so of course he didn''t want to let her down.


    Lin Fan looked down at the little white bundle before opening up the system''s shop.


    He knew he had to do something quickly or this little bundle wouldn''t be able to make it.


    After looking through the shop, he finally found what he was looking for.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about the price since his shop had been earning more than enough during this time, immediately paying ten thousand points for a single bottle of pills.


    These pills were Mandragora Pills, they were pills that had a strong nourishing effect.


    For now, this was the only thing he could do for this little white tiger since everything else would be too powerful and could potentially hurt it even more.


    After feeding the little white tiger the pills, Lin Fan and Ang watched on silently as they waited for a response. After waiting for a few minutes, there was finally a small cry that came from the little white bundle as it turned around to start suckling on Ang''s finger.


    Both Lin Fan and Ang couldn''t help revealing smiles when they saw this.


    Lin Fan immediately took out a bottle of pet milk for the Ang which she used to feed the little white tiger.


    This pet milk also came from Lin Fan''s shops since now that he was also breeding pets, there were quite a few babies that he needed to take care of. Just like with the pet food, the system also had a machine for creating baby pet milk by taking the nutrients found in various ingredients and creating a nourishing form.


    As he watched her feed it, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that Ang really seemed like a mother and that she would make a good mother. Then he realized what he had thought and couldn''t help revealing a blush.


    After the little white tiger finished off the bottle, it gave a satisfied burp before nuzzling into Ang''s embrace.


    Lin Fan could tell from the loving look Ang had in her eyes that she would definitely want to take the little tiger with them, so Lin Fan went back into the shop and bought a pet contract.


    This little white tiger was too young to form a contract on its own, so Lin Fan had to just use what he normally used to form contracts with baby beasts in the shop. Of course, the pet contract would normally be provided as part of the service since the cost was included in the fee to use the egg incubating chamber, but this time he had to pay for it. But now that Lin Fan was raking in money from the nobles every day, it didn''t seem that expensive since it cost only a hundred points and Lin Fan had already earned over five million after deducting all his costs.


    He put the contract on the white tiger''s forehead and it instantly disappeared with a sh of light, creating a new contract with Lin Fan.


    And at that moment, there was a voice that rang in their minds.


    "Attention all participants, the first trial has now ended!"

 78 Chapter 78

    Once they heard this message in their minds, Lin Fan and Ang quickly stood up and went over the mother tiger.


    The least they could do for this mother tiger was bury it before leaving.


    Ang quickly used her wind life energy to dig out a hole and ced the mother tiger in with the two cold bundles as Lin Fan made a quick grave. All of this only took them five minutes.


    But on the dot of the fifth minute, as soon as they finished, there was a golden barrier that wrapped around them, including Zi Ling who had been silently watching from the side.


    The golden barriers slowly lit up, blinding them with golden light until they couldn''t open their eyes anymore.


    When the light was gone and they could open their eyes again, they found themselves in front of arge tower.


    All around them were thousands of people and while there were a lot of, there were clearly much lesspared to when they first entered the Inheritance Realm.


    In the center, right in front of the tower, there was a giant board that contained the ranking for everyone. However, those that chose to hide their names still had their names hidden.


    At the very top, looking very prominent were two scores that were over a million each and the third score wasn''t even close to being able topare to those scores.


    Listening carefully, Lin Fan could hear that most of the gossip around them was about this.


    "Just who are these two? What kind of maniacs are these?"


    "To get such high scores, do you think they killed a Legendary Realm beast?"


    "Pei, pei, pei, what kind of crow''s beak do you have? If that were the case, we would all be dead by now."


    "Right, right, how could there be a Legendary Realm expert that is younger than fifty? That would just be insane."


    At this, Lin Fan couldn''t help turning towards Ang who was lovingly watching the little white tiger sleeping in her arms. No one would have thought that this sweet looking girl was someone who had just cut three men to pieces half an hour ago.


    While waiting, there was eventually a familiar voice that called out to them.


    "Brother Lin, you made it after all!"


    Lin Fan looked over and knew that only one person would have such a loud voice. As he expected, he saw Boss Gaoing over.


    But then another voice called out that shattered this thought, "Brothers, you''re here!"


    Turning over, they saw Wang Da Dong walking over. His voice didn''t lose to Boss Gao''s voice at all.


    But Lin Fan first said, "If I didn''t make it, wouldn''t I be dead? Did you want me to die that badly?"


    Boss Gao was taken aback by this, "What do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan pointed at the board and said, "There were over ten thousand people who entered, but there are only just over four thousand people who were ranked. What do you think happened to the rest of them?"


    Boss Gao quickly turned to the board and saw that Lin Fan was right, "Ah, I didn''t even notice at all."


    Wang Da Dong reacted the same.


    Neither of them had seen much fighting during their time, but that was because Boss Gao had two strong Gold Realm pets and Wang Da Dong was the descendant of a royal family, so he had his own trump cards.


    So neither of them had thought that thepetition was that intense, but it seemed like they were wrong.


    But both of them got over it quite quickly since this was also quite normal.


    Boss Gao turned to Ang and pointed at the little white tiger she was holding as he said, "So what''s with this little tiger?"<sub> </sub>


    Wang Da Dong also came over looking at the little tiger, but when he tried to poke its little cheek, he was immediately scared off with a single re from Ang.


    Lin Fan said with a sigh, "It''s just a little thing that we picked on our way here."


    Boss Gao tried to approach the little tiger, but that just woke it up and it immediately dug itself deeper into Ang''s chest.


    This caused Ang to immediately re at Boss Gao, making his legs turn soft.


    Lin Fan saw this and said, "A lot happened, but basically we had to save this little tiger, so it''s afraid of new people. Don''t mind it Brother Gao."


    Boss Gao nodded, but he didn''t give up as he took out a small berry from his storage which he used to slowly draw out the little tiger.


    Seeing this, Ang couldn''t help ring at him, but she couldn''t do a thing when she saw the little tiger happily chewing on the berry.


    Wang Da Dong saw this and also took out a few berries, but for some reason the little white tigerpletely ignored him. His face couldn''t help being covered in dark lines when he saw this.


    To make it worse, when he tried again, the little white tiger even pped his hand away.


    As they were ying around, there was suddenly an announcement that silenced everyone.


    "Wee to the second trial."


    "The second trial will be held inside this Dragon Tower! You will now try to climb as high as you can in the tower while resisting the pressure thates down from below!"


    ??This trial willst a total of twenty four hours and all those that can reach the seventh floor will be considered to have passed this trial!"


    "Before you are all allowed to climb up the tower, you will be ced into rooms based on your rankings and be allowed to climb up in ordance with your rank. The person ranked first will go first and the person ranked second will start a secondter. For each rank behind that, one will start a secondter until the final person starts climbing."


    "Please prepare yourselves for the trial, it will begin in ten minutes."


    Lin Fan quickly calcted it in his mind, based on the number of people that had passed, it meant that it would take over an hour for the final person to start, so it did seem like the one who started first did have quite the advantage over thest person.


    As for Boss Gao, Wang Da Dong, and Zi Ling who were in the top five hundred, it would be around eight minutes after he had started for them to start.


    It took Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong this long to notice Zi Ling. For some reason, the first thing these tworge men saw was the little tiger instead of Zi Ling and for some reason, they seemed to quite like how cute the little tiger was.


    Lin Fan noticed this and introduced them, "This is Zi Ling. She was also invited here by Lord Mu and we bumped into each other on the way, so she''s been following us."


    Boss Gao reached out his hand and said in a happy voice, "Any friend of Brother Lin is a friend of mine."


    Zi Ling took that hand and shook it with a smile, but there was a trace of disdain in her eyes as well. She said, "It''s nice to meet you Brother Gao, I hope we can get along."


    After introducing each other, they chatted for a few minutes before falling quiet. Each of them were preparing themselves for what lied ahead.


    During this time, Lin Fan went over to Ang and took the little white tiger from her. Even though she had an unwilling look, she knew that this was for the best since what wasing might be dangerous, so it was safer for the little white tiger in Lin Fan''s pet space.


    After the ten minutes passed, there was the same golden barrier that surrounded each of them before they all disappeared.


    When Lin Fan could see again, he found that he was inside this gray room all by himself.


    When he was wondering what was going to happen, the same voice from before spoke up and he assumed that it was the same for every other participant.


    "This trial will be starting in five minutes. The first person will be allowed to enter and the one following that. Please patiently wait your turn."


    And then after five minutes passed, the door in the room opened.

 79 Chapter 79

    When Lin Fan came out, he entered arge space with a single staircase.


    Looking around, Lin Fan saw that this space was actually quite small, there was no way that it would hold more than a hundred people.


    Moreover, there was only a single door, the door behind him. Where were the others going toe out from?


    After looking around, Lin Fan took another step forward, but the moment he took this step, he felt a bit of pressuree over him. Of course, it was only a tiny bit of pressure that didn''t affect him at all, but he could tell that there was something above that was putting pressure on him.


    It wasn''t hard to shrug it off and move to the staircase, but before leaving, Lin Fan didn''t forget to take one final look to make sure he didn''t miss anything.


    Once he was done, he went up the stairs to the second floor.


    When he arrived, he found that there were already other people there.


    Lin Fan had taken around five minutes toe up, so that meant that there were already three hundred people who had started.


    When he looked around, he found that there were actually less than twenty people around and they all seemed to be gathered around the staircase in the center. Most of them had difficult looks on their faces when they tried to move forward.


    The only person who was looking rxed was Ang standing there with her arms crossed, looking quite impatient.


    The moment she saw Lin Fane over, she waved at him impatiently, telling him toe over as quickly as possible.


    Of course Lin Fan didn''t dare dy, Ang was still quite scary even if she had mellowed out over this time. If he dared to keep her waiting, he might be beaten and her fists really were blind.


    As Lin Fan was walking over, he also got a good look at the people around him.


    At first there wasn''t anyone who he recognized, but he could tell from their auras that they were either in the peak of the Gold Realm or in the tinum Realm. It seemed like there really weren''t weak people here.


    But then as he walked forward, he suddenly found someone he did recognize.


    It was the leader of the group who had led the attack on the King Beast, he had somehow made it out and was here.


    When that leader saw Lin Fan staring at him, he stared back with a confused gaze. He searched his memories and it didn''t seem like he knew Lin Fan, but why did it seem like Lin Fan knew him?


    Still Lin Fan continued forward after pausing a second just to look at this leader, he actually still didn''t even know this leader''s name.


    But when he was about to pass the final person in front, that person suddenly grabbed his hand and stopped him.


    Lin Fan turned back to look at this person and saw a pair of burning eyes staring right back at him that somehow made him take a step back.


    That person looked right at Lin Fan before asking, "Are you number one or number two?"


    At this, all the others began seriously looking at Lin Fan.


    Before they just thought that he had a special treasure that had allowed him to move so freely, but now that they thought about it, even if he did, how did he get this treasure? Could it be that he also had many other treasures as well?


    If so, it wouldn''t be strange if he had used them to gain first ce.


    Looking at him, there were those that could tell that he was only in the Gold Realm, which meant that as long as they were careful, there was a chance to take his treasures.


    Treasures that could allow him to move freely here and give him first ce in the first trial were definitely precious. As long as someone acted as a scapegoat first, they would be able to catch him off guard and take it from him. And right now, there was already someone acting as a scapegoat.


    Now the only thing they needed to worry about was each other.


    In their greed, they had forgotten one thing, there was also someone else standing ahead waiting for Lin Fan, someone who was slowly losing their patience¡­<sub> </sub>


    Moreover, she looked like she was quite rxed standing there¡­


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look over this person. This person was someone with fire red hair and burning red eyes, it really made him feel like he was a person made of mes. But the one strange thing was that this person was quite short, the top of his head barely reached Lin Fan''s chest.


    Lin Fan slowly said, "Why would you think that?"


    The little guy said, "Instinct."


    Lin Fan just revealed a confused look and said, "Ha?" Before he came back to his senses and said, "I don''t know what you''re talking about."


    The little guy just revealed a smile and said, "It doesn''t matter if you know or not, all that matters is, are you strong?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes a bit before rxing them and shaking his head, "I don''t think I''m strong."


    The little guy didn''t give up, "I can tell that you''re strong and I like that. Fight me."


    Lin Fan was confused once again, "Ha? What do you mean? Fight you? Why would I do that?"


    The little guy said, "My name is Huo Yan and I love strong people, especially fighting strong people. From now on, you are my rival. I''ve had many rivals, but I''m the only one standing in the end."


    Lin Fan threw off the little guy''s hand and said, "I have no interest in being your rival, goodbye."


    When Lin Fan was about to leave, the little guy suddenly released his life energy as he shouted, "It doesn''t matter if you''re interested or not, you will fight me and I will be stronger from beating you!"


    It didn''te to Lin Fan as a surprise that this little guy was actually a tinum Realm Expert, releasing his white mes. This little guy was ahead of everyone else, it was clear that he was quite strong.


    But when he attacked Lin Fan, Lin Fan easily dodged this attack since the little guy was still under the pressure of the tower, making his attacks much slower than usual.


    As for Lin Fan, after experiencing the auras that Ang and Momonga released, his spiritual sense had slowly developed and was much strongerpared to before. Now he could easily resist the auras of powerful experts without much trouble.


    Lin Fan just took a few steps towards the staircase and the pressure soon enveloped the little guy, making it impossible for him to chase after Lin Fan. Even after releasing all his power, he couldn''t push any further at all.


    The little guy tried throwing white mes at Lin Fan, but Lin Fan just used the little drop of waterw to easily push all the mes away.


    Now everyone knew that Lin Fan wasn''t a normal person. He could move so easily in this pressure and he could counter the attacks of a tinum Realm Expert with such ease, they really shouldn''t underestimate him.


    During this time, no one dared tounch a sneak attack against Lin Fan, or rather they weren''t able to since he had gone too deep for them to attack.


    Lin Fan took onest look at the rest of people on the second floor, narrowing his eyes to reveal a cold look that swept over them before turning to move towards Ang.


    The people on the second floor knew that Lin Fan had already seen through them, so most of them took back their greed, but there were some that still had greed in their heart. They still thought that Lin Fan could only do all this because of the treasures he had, not with his own skill.


    As for Huo Yan, he exploded with mes as he shouted, "Don''t run from me! I am your rival, you are destined to fight me and make me stronger!"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head as he walked forward without turning back. In his heart, he couldn''t help thinking, "What a narcissistic fellow."


    When he reached Ang, she didn''t say a thing as she moved behind him and they headed towards the third floor.


    In front of everyone, the two of them walked up the stairs and disappeared from their sights.


    At this, everyone confirmed that these two were first and second, but they had no idea who these people were.


    The only shocking thing was that they really were young, both of them were clearly not even twenty years old yet!

 80 Chapter 80

    There wasn''t really a change in the pressure when Lin Fan and Ang came to the third floor, but after taking a few steps, Lin Fan could tell that the pressure was increasing slowly.


    This time it wasn''t just a tiny amount of pressure that came over him, rather it was enough that it was starting to affect his movements. He felt a bit sluggish when he moved his limbs, but it wasn''t to the point where it was affecting his movement yet.


    But as Lin Fan approached the stairs in the center of the room, it felt like there was more and more pressure falling down onto him.


    He looked over at Ang and asked, "What level is this pressure at right now?"


    Ang said, "This isn''t a normal kind of pressure, this is Dragon Might. There should be the soul of a powerful dragon on the top of this tower and that''s what''s creating the pressure that flows down. This isn''t like the normal pressure of an expert, rather it''s a bloodline suppression."


    Lin Fan looked at her with a confused gaze and said, "Then why aren''t you affected?"


    Ang just raised a brow and asked back, "You know my bloodline, so do you really need to ask this?"


    Lin Fan revealed a look of understanding. ording to the system, Ang''s bloodline was the Spirit Overlord bloodline that ruled over final bosses like the Spirit Kings. There was no way this Spirit Overlord bloodline was inferior to a dragon bloodline, so she probably felt no pressure at all. Maybe she might even be cing a bit of pressure on the dragon soul up top.


    Ang fell into thought for a bit before saying to Lin Fan, "Actually, your bloodline shouldn''t be that much weakerpared to this dragon''s, but you haven''t awakened it, so that''s why you''re still feeling pressure here."


    Lin Fan was confused again, "My bloodline? You mean the suction power that I used against the King Beast earlier?"


    p Ang nodded before saying, "If I''m not mistaken, that should be the physique that came with your bloodline. The power of that physique proves that it isn''t normal, especially how you can suck in thews of other people."</anda>


    Lin Fan asked, "Then can I use this power to suck in this Dragon Might?"


    Ang thought for a bit before saying, "Well, you should be able to if you can even suck inws, this little bit of Dragon Might is nothing."


    With this confirmation, Lin Fan began cultivating and releasing the suction power.


    Once this suction came from his dantian, the surrounding pressure seemed to have relieved itself whilerge amounts of life energy seemed to gather in the space around him.


    Slowly, Lin Fan could feel a strange kind of energy that started taking form inside his dantian.


    As he continued to draw in more and more of the Dragon Might, there was a golden energy that appeared in his dantian that took the shape of a dragon.


    Once he finished a cycle of his cultivation technique and opened his eyes again, he found that there was now a golden dragon inside his dantian.


    When he tried to touch this golden dragon with his spiritual senses, it was like he had connected to that golden dragon as the power of that golden dragon began pouring into his body.


    He could feel the prestige of a dragon filling him and being released around him, pushing back against the Dragon Might that wasing from above.


    As for the participants down below, they were quite unlucky since first they felt all the life energy around them being sucked away before the pressure on them being doubled. It was like there was something else up top that was releasing pressure that was falling down on them.


    As for Ang, she stood on the side watching Lin Fan.


    She had deliberately told Lin Fan everything because she was curious about his physique and his bloodline. If it was really the same physique that she had heard about before, then this meant that there was something different about Lin Fan. This would also give her idea what Lin Fan''s real identity was.


    Lin Fan felt the power coursing in him and before he knew it, he was suddenly punching out with the power of the dragon. As his fist came out, there was a golden energy that wrapped around it in the form of a dragon, giving a loud roar that reverberated around the room.


    The sound instion of the tower was quite good, so the people down a floor couldn''t hear the sound of the roar at all.


    But good sound instion meant that the sound was kept in the room, which made it quite loud, echoing throughout the room.


    It was so loud that even Ang couldn''t help covering her ears.<sub> </sub>


    Once the roar slowly faded away, Ang red at Lin Fan beforeing over to p him on the back of the head.


    All Lin Fan could do was give an apologetic smile since he couldn''t beat her.


    When he released his suction power once again, Lin Fan felt that there wasn''t any pressure on him at all anymore, he could freely move on this floor.


    As the suction power continued, the gold dragon inside his dantian continued to grow in size until it reached a certain point where it didn''t grow any bigger. No matter how much more of the Dragon Might he sucked in, it didn''t get any bigger at all.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan knew that he had reached the limit of cultivation on this floor, so there was no point staying here any longer.


    He took one look back and saw that there was no one behind them at all.


    This surprised Lin Fan since he had taken half an hour to finish cultivating here, but during that time, no one had climbed up from the second floor yet.


    Since there was no oneing, Lin Fan couldn''t do a thing but move up to the fourth floor.


    The moment the two of them went up the stairs, there was someone who came up to the third floor.


    This person waspletely wrapped up in a gray cloak and there was only a pair of sharp yellow eyes that were staring out of the slit on the hood. As that person looked at Lin Fan and Ang leaving, those sharp yellow eyes became even more narrow.


    "Ho, so it seems like other ns are also making their moves. I should just wait and watch to see what happens for now."


    After saying that, that gray cloaked person sat down cross legged on the third floor, even though it was clear that he had no problem with the pressure here.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan reached the fourth floor, he immediately felt the pressure increase once again.


    Even with the power of the dragon surrounding him, he found that he still couldn''t resist the pressure here.


    If he had to measure it, the pressure on this fourth floor was more than five times stronger than what he felt on the third floor.


    But still, that didn''t mean that he didn''t have a way to resist it at all.


    Rather what he felt right by the staircase was the same feeling he had felt when he had just entered the third floor. It was like his arms and legs were a bit sluggish, but he still had no problem moving them.


    Since this was the case, Lin Fan released his suction power again, but this time he felt that it was much harder to draw in the Dragon Might.


    The Dragon Might on the fourth floor was much more concentratedpared to the Dragon Might on the third floor, so it was much harder for the suction force to do anything to the Dragon Might. Still, Lin Fan was able to suck it in, even if it was a bit slowerpared to the third floor.


    As Lin Fan drew the power of the Dragon Might in, the gold dragon inside his dantian continued to grow.


    At first it had been a small speck, but now it was slowly growing in size until it had doubled in size.


    Once he was finished his first cycle, Lin Fan released this new energy and the sluggish feeling disappeared. But once he took a few steps forward, it had appeared again.


    So just like this, it was a cycle of drawing in the Dragon Might before taking a few steps forward. Lin Fan continued on as he slowly moved towards the stairs to the fifth floor.


    Ang was on the side silently watching as she tried to see through Lin Fan''s bloodline, but she couldn''t see a single thing.


    But what they didn''t know was that they were causing quite the stir outside the tower where everyone was gathered, where the ranking board was ced...

 81 Chapter 81

    While Lin Fan was slowly cultivating in the tower filled with Dragon Might, there were others that were gathered outside the tower.


    Compared to the first trial, the second trial was much more friendly.


    In the first trial, they were more encouraged to kill each other, but it was all different in this second trial.


    In the second trial, when someone was about to sumb to the pressure of the Dragon Might and copse, there was a protection system in the tower that brought them out to the front of the tower.


    Once they were ready, they were free to enter the main entrance and retry climbing the tower again.


    For the first few times, most people rushed head first as they tried to push as far as they could and force themselves to adapt to the pressure. But after being sent out several times, there were people that started slowing down and thinking things through.


    There were people who pushed themselves to a point where they could still move, but only barely before stopping to cultivate themselves under the pressure. They found that under this pressure, their cultivations increased several times fasterpared to normal. Then after they finished cycling their cultivation techniques, the pressure seemed much smallerpared to before, allowing them to move forward again.


    Then there were those that still didn''t think and continued to charge head first into the pressure, but they did slowly adapt and were able to continue forward.


    Everyone had their own method of pushing forward under the pressure of this Dragon Might.


    But there were those that stopped to watch theirpetition.


    Right outside the tower, where therge board ranking everyone for the first trial was, now there was a ranking board for the second trial.


    It listed everyone and ranked them based on what floor they had reached.


    Most of the people on the rankings were all stuck on the first floor, so they were all in the same rank.


    As for the people who were on the second floor, so far there were only just over a hundred people that had reached that level.


    Then there was the third floor, only three people had made it that far.


    Finally there was the most shocking result of all.


    The top two were both on the fourth floor!


    For those who had only felt the pressure on the first floor, they couldn''t even imagine what the pressure was like on the second floor. There was no need to mention what the pressure would be like on the fourth floor!


    As Boss Gao was sent out of the tower again, he looked around before finding Wang Da Dong and Zi Ling sitting together on the side.


    Well, sitting together was a bit of a stretch. It was more like Zi Ling was sitting by herself and Wang Da Dong was just standing nearby.


    Boss Gao came over and Wang Da Dong waved at him.


    Wang Da Dong patted his back and asked, "How did you do?"


    Boss Gao gave a sigh and said, "I couldn''t make it past the first floor again, I always get stuck just a few meters away from the stairs. What about you?"


    Wang Da Dong also shook his head in a depressed manner, "I finally made it past the first floor, but as soon as I took a step onto the second floor, the pressure immediately crushed me and I was sent out¡­"


    While both of them were feeling sorry for themselves, Zi Ling was focused on the ranking board.


    Since she didn''t see Lin Fan out here, she knew that he was currently inside the tower and if her guesses weren''t wrong, he and Ang should be the ones on the fourth floor.


    Unfortunately, even if she wanted to send her spiritual sense into the tower, it would immediately alert the dragon soul inside and she would be caught breaking the rules.


    Her mission was a secret one, so if she got caught, the only path for her was death. Either by her own hands or by the hands of the one in charge of her.


    After they got over their depression, Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong turned over to Zi Ling and tried to ask her about how she did, but they couldn''t approach her no matter how they tried. It was like there was a special wall that blocked them off and they couldn''t approach no matter how hard they tried.


    While the two of them were feeling sorry for themselves and Zi Ling fell into thought, there were the sounds of gossip around them.


    Some people who had sharp eyes had already connected the dots. There were two people who had reached over a million points and there were two that were on the fourth floor right now, it could only mean one thing.


    The only thing that was confusing for them was the person on the third floor, just who was that person?


    But while they were all thinking about this, there was another person who entered the third floor.<sub> </sub>


    Once again, it was a name that they didn''t recognize which raised even more questions.


    Which hidden ns had sent their descendants in?


    Why did they only decide to show themselves in the second round? What had they been doing in the first round?


    As these questions filled everyone''s mind, there was someone who was plotting in a corner.


    Feng Yu was surrounded by hisckeys, watching Wang Da Dong''s group, "That idiot Wang, he''ll suffer soon. He''s lucky that he didn''t run into me in the first round."


    Feng Yu''s score had been rather low despite how strong he was, that was because he had been running around searching for Lin Fan and Wang Da Dong. Since murder was allowed in the first round, it would have been the best time for him to finish the two of them off. Unfortunately, he didn''t run into them at all.


    Feng Yu turned to hisckeys and asked, "How is the n going? What does the other side think?"


    One of hisckeys said with an awkward smile, "The other side has already agreed, but they want half the payment now¡­"


    Feng Yu thought about it for a bit before taking out a golden card, "Fine take this to them, but make sure that they understand that I want results!"


    Theckey quickly caught the golden card before running off while promising, "Yes, yes, young master, I will definitely let them know."


    Feng Yu turned back to re at Wang Da Dong''s group, "Idiot Wang and that bastard, just you wait¡­"


    ¡­


    On the third floor, there was another gray cloaked person that walked up and looked at the other gray cloaked person.


    Both of them gave each other a nod before sitting down to cultivate, waiting for the person up above them to continue moving.


    The new person asked the one with sharp eyes, "Do you know who''s up there?"


    The one with sharp eyes narrowed his eyes, "When did we be friends?"


    The new person said in a calm voice, "For now, we can be considered allies, don''t you think?"


    The one with sharp eyes thought about it before saying, "I honestly don''t know, but they aren''t simple. I could tell that one of them was absorbing the Dragon Might, but I don''t know how he did it."


    The new person''s voice suddenly filled with a bit of surprise, "Absorbing the Dragon Might, are you sure? What faction did this monstere from?"


    The one with sharp eyes shook his head, "I honestly don''t know, but there''s no reason to provoke them for no reason."


    While they were talking, Huo Yan finally made it up to the third floor as well.


    He had seen these twoing up, but he didn''t try to fight them. His instincts told him that it would be bad if he fought them now, which was the first time he felt this way.


    Huo Yan turned to the two and asked, "Did you see where those two went?"


    The two in gray cloaks turned to Huo Yan before turning away without answering him.


    Huo Yan saw this, but there was nothing that he could do for now. It wasn''t like he could just fight them.


    Moreover, they were currently halfway across the room, so even if he wanted to fight them, he couldn''t reach them at all. It was already taking everything he had to just to stay standing on the third floor.


    Since they didn''t want to respond, Huo Yan couldn''t do anything but sit down and start cultivating.


    But in his mind, he swore that he would beat these two one day in the future.


    ¡­


    On the fourth floor, Lin Fan was drawing in more and more of the Dragon Might, increasing the size of the golden dragon in his dantian.


    But as the golden dragon increased, his dantian also increased in size. It was like the golden dragon would always be a single drop in his dantian.

 82 Chapter 82

    Eventually the golden dragon stopped increasing in size and Lin Fan knew that he had reached his limit for this floor.


    Once he was done, he did the same thing as before, but this time he made sure that Ang knew to cover her ears.


    When his fist came out, the golden energy surrounding his fist was much more densepared to before and the roaring was even stronger. Lin Fan could tell that as long as he continued absorbing the Dragon Might, it would eventually push him into a tinum Realm and be a partialw.


    As for whatw it would be, he had no idea.


    Once he was done testing the might of this golden dragon, Lin Fan turned to Ang who looked a bit annoyed since it was louder this time. After apologizing and promising to buy her more cakes once they got out, they moved up to the fifth floor.


    ¡­


    "Holy shit, look at that! The two in first ce are moving to the fifth floor!"


    "How long has it been? It hasn''t even been half an hour yet since they just arrived on the fourth floor and they''re already reaching the fifth floor!"


    "There''s still close to eleven hours left and they''ve already almost reached the seventh floor to clear this trial! Where did these monsterse from?"


    The moment the two hidden names reached the fifth floor, they immediately created a stir in the people outside watching.


    Seeing how quickly these two progressed, there were some people who thought that this trial might seem easier than they had thought and wanted to try again. Also they saw that there were now five people who had reached the third floor.


    Other than the two unknown gray cloaked people and Huo Yan, there was Yu Xiao, who was the tinum Realm leader of the group who attacked the King Beast and an expert from the Western Continent.


    That expert''s name was Tyrant, he was considered the most powerful among the younger generation.


    The reason why his name was Tyrant was because he was a tyrant who challenged everyone tobat and to this day, he dominated them all. There were even rumours that he challenged elders of smaller families and dominated them all too!


    For those people who came from the same cities as the people who made it to the third floor, they all made ns to get closer to those people. This Inheritance Realm was a direct measure of one''s talent, so those that ced near the top would definitely be the most talented members in their generation. As long as they approached them while they were still small families, they could be friends with a giant in the future.


    Feng Yu was impatiently waiting when someone who waspletely wrapped up in a ck cloak came over. Feng Yu''s eyes immediately lit up when he saw this person and he quickly asked, "Is it done?"


    The ck cloaked person gave a shrug and said, "I couldn''t find him."


    Feng Yu''s eyes narrowed at this and he said in an angry voice, "What do you mean by that?"


    The ck cloaked person wasn''t fazed at all, "I searched around based on the photo you gave me and I couldn''t find the person."


    Feng Yu turned back to the tower. He had seen Lin Fan earlier talking to Gao Fu Shuai and Wang Da Dong, so he knew for sure that Lin Fan had survived. Could it be that he was still stuck on the first floor trying to break through?


    It never urred to Feng Yu that the two on the top of the rankings would be Lin Fan and Ang, he hadpletely underestimated Lin Fan. Even though Lin Fan had killed his father who was in the tinum Realm¡­


    Still, there was nothing he could do since he couldn''t force his way into Lin Fan''s private room on the first floor.


    It was only for the first floor, but the portal at the entrance sent one into the room they were first sent into and they began climbing from there.


    So as long as Feng Yu thought that Lin Fan was in there, he would be unable to do a thing since he couldn''t touch him. So the only thing Feng Yu could do now was wait.


    ¡­


    On Wang Da Dong and Boss Gao''s side, they were wondering about something.


    Wang Da Dong asked, "Brother Gao, where do you think Brother Lin is? Do you think he''s still trying to break through the first floor? I didn''t see him on the second floor."


    Boss Gao fell into thought before saying, "If my guesses are correct, Brother Lin and Sister Ang should be the two up top."


    Wang Da Dong was surprised, "I can understand if Ang is, she downright scares me, but are you sure about Brother Lin?"


    Boss Gao revealed a faint smile, "Brother Lin doesn''t seem like it, he seems like he''s a handsome yboy, but he''s actually quite the serious person. He can make miracles happen when you least expect it. That''s something I''ve experienced firsthand many times since I''vee to know him."<sub> </sub>


    Wang Da Dong could see the deep emotions in Boss Gao''s smile and he said, "Hmm, it seems like you two have been through a lot together."


    Boss Gao''s smile became deeper, "More than you think. That''s why I know it''s always better to be Brother Lin''s friend than his enemy." At that, he turned over to Feng Yu''s group.


    Just like how Feng Yu took note of them, they had also taken note of Feng Yu. They were just waiting for him toe now, but he never did.


    After a moment of silence, Wang Da Dong said, "Well as his brothers, we can''t put on too poor of a disy. I''m heading back in."


    After watching Wang Da Dong walk away, Boss Gao paused for a second before also heading towards the entrance.


    He had depended on Lin Fan quite a bit and if he continued to drag his brother down, how could he call himself his brother?


    As for Zi Ling, she noted this and shook her head.


    Why were all men like this?


    ¡­


    As time passed, more and more of the people stuck on the second floor reached the third floor. Most of them were the top experts of their respective continents and their total reached over twenty people.


    Other than the two in gray cloaks that they didn''t recognize, everyone naturally deviated into their groups respective to their continents.


    Everyone was trying to get the best of each other.


    But while they werepeting, the two in gray cloaks suddenly stood up and headed to the staircase, moving up to the fourth floor.


    Everyone just stared at them with cautious gazes. Just who were these two?


    But they never received an answer as the two disappeared in front of them.


    ¡­


    As for Lin Fan on the fifth floor, when the two stood up and headed to the fourth floor, it had been half an hour since he came to the fifth floor and he had already adapted to the pressure here.


    This time he didn''t test the power of the golden dragon since he had an idea of how powerful it was. He was certain that at this rate, as long as he reached the seventh floor, there was a chance he might break through to the tinum Realm.


    He had also thought about bringing out his pets, but the moment he did, none of them felt any pressure because of their bloodlines. The bloodline pressure of the Dragon Might didn''t affect them at all since all of them had divine bloodlines.


    So Lin Fan just called them back in and headed up to the sixth floor.


    It was a cycle of cultivating and growing the golden dragon in his dantian before moving up to the next floor.


    The sixth floor took a total of half an hour ago before hepletely adapted to the pressure there.


    Once that was done, he moved up to the seventh floor and there was a voice that rang out on the seventh floor.


    "Congrattions, you two have qualified for the final trial."


    "You may continue to climb this tower or you can wait for the final trial, but there is a special prize for those that reach the top of the tower."


    Once they reached the seventh floor, their ranks on the board outside turned golden to signify that they had passed the trial, shocking everyone watching it.


    These two had only taken close to two hours out of the possible twelve hours to finish this trial, what monsters were these!


    Lin Fan''s n was to climb as high as he could anyway since it would help him break through, so he didn''t n on stopping here. As for Ang, she would follow Lin Fan since that was her n to begin with.


    And so, Lin Fan sat down to cultivate once again.

 83 Chapter 83

    Lin Fan sat down once again to cultivate and it took him another half an hour just like the previous floor, but unexpectedly, he didn''t break through like he had expected.


    While he didn''t know why, Lin Fan could tell that the golden dragon inside his dantian didn''t seemplete yet. Maybe that was why he didn''t break through.


    So without thinking too much, Lin Fan headed up to the next floor.


    The moment they entered the eighth floor, another uproar was created outside.


    They were still going?!


    What kind of monsters were they?


    When Lin Fan and Ang reached the eighth floor, Ang narrowed her eyes for a bit before saying, "The next floor should be the top floor."


    Lin Fan looked at the staircase and looked around the room, but he didn''t seem to see anything different, so he asked in a confused voice, "How do you know?"


    Ang just said, "Because I know."


    Lin Fan really didn''t know what to say to refute this neither did he want to refute it¡­


    So Lin Fan went into cultivation mode once again and half an hourter, he finished.


    Now they were heading to the final floor.


    When they came up the staircase, this room was very different from the other rooms.


    This room was quite small unlike the previousrge rooms, only being a few dozen meters wide instead of over a hundred meters wide. Moreover, there was arge crystal that was floating in the center of the room.


    Lin Fan was confused by this crystal, but Ang knit her brows when she saw this.


    Lin Fan asked Ang, "Do you know what that is?"


    Ang was silent for a bit before saying, "That should be a Soul Crystal, but what is a Soul Crystal doing in this lower realm?"


    Lin Fan was more confused, "Soul Crystal?"


    Ang exined, "A Soul Crystal is crystal that can be used to store the souls of the deceased, it is considered a final safety since the soul can be rented into a new crafted body or the soul can choose to possess someone else. But Soul Crystals are very rare, even in upper realms they aren''tmonly found. For one to be here¡­"


    After pausing, Ang continued, "It seems like the Dragon Might ising from it, so it must contain a dragon soul, but this shouldn''t be right. Why would there be the soul of a Dragon n expert here on this lower human realm?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything and tried to move forward to take a look, but the moment he took a step forward, the pressure came over him.


    This was different from the other floors, the pressure was over ten times stronger instead of just five, making it hard for him to even move.


    Lin Fan quickly activated his cultivation technique and his suction force, drawing in as much of the Dragon Might as he could.


    Ang saw that he was struggling, but she didn''t do anything to help him since she knew that it would be good for him if she just left him.


    Lin Fan desperately tried to absorb the Dragon Might, but this was pure concentrated Dragon Might, which made it very hard to absorb.


    As he continued, he found that the realm inside his dantian continued to expand with the vortex in there and soon the suction force became even stronger, allowing him to draw in this Dragon Might. As he continued trying to suck it in, the bigger the vortex became.


    Eventually, it reached a point where it could suck in the Dragon Might and finally stopped expanding.


    This time, it took longer for Lin Fan to finish cultivating. It took a total of an hour, but once he was finished, the golden dragon inside his dantian was also finished.


    It soon crystalized into aplete golden dragon statue, which then copsed and turned into a mass of pure golden energy.


    That mass of golden energy released waves of the power ofw and it pushed the boundary of Lin Fan''s cultivation until he was forced into the tinum Realm.<sub> </sub>


    When Lin Fan exploded with white life energy, there was a cloud that began to gather above his head and soon it became a ck thunder cloud. Once it was fully formed, it released a bolt of thunder, but that was also quickly absorbed by Lin Fan, creating a thunderbolt statue in his dantian.


    But that thunderbolt statue also quickly copsed and turned into a mass of white energy.


    "Ho, so this kid is strong enough to trigger the thunder tribtion while still in the tinum Realm. You really are something special."


    There was a deep booming voice that soon filled the room, appearing out of nowhere.


    Lin Fan looked around while looking confused, but Ang''s eyes locked onto the Soul Crystal. She casually moved in front of Lin Fan and was prepared to fight.


    "Rx little girl, I''m not gonna steal his body." With this, there was a see through dragon that appeared from the Soul Crystal, "Besides, I made a promise with Xiao Jun that I would only watch over the trial, I wouldn''t touch any of the participants."


    Lin Fan looked at the transparent dragon in surprise while Ang didn''t let her guard down.


    The transparent dragon continued saying, "Still, it really is surprising to see this generation''s Spirit Overlord here. Are you really that bored that you''re hanging out on this lower human world?"


    Ang said with a snort, "I don''t want to hear that from a shattered soul."


    The transparent dragon gave a sigh, "I might be a shattered soul, but I''m still one of the elders of the Dragon n¡­"


    Lin Fan asked Ang, "Ang, what is that thing?"


    When Ang was about to speak, the transparent dragon spoke first, "Hey kid, it''s rude to talk about someone like that in front of their face, you know? You can just ask me."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward look before asking, "Elder, may I ask who you are?"


    The transparent dragon gave a chuckle, "You really do know how to change faces quickly, but that''s fine. This one is the fifth elder of the Dragon Race and the chief of the Red Dragons, Hong Long."


    Lin Fan then asked, "Then, Elder Hong Long, why are you here?"


    Hong Long gave a sigh, "It''s a long story. I once faced invaders of the Dragon n, but they were too strong for our n to defeat, so I was the one who sacrificed myself to activate our final defensive array, which was strong enough to defeat them. Unfortunately, that also killed me, but I had this Soul Crystal which I stored my shattered soul into. But then my Soul Crystal fell into the Void Winds and was blown to this lower realm''s Void Battlefield. That was where I met Xiao Jun. At first I was tempted to possess him, but we quickly bonded and became friends, as well I became his mentor. However, I never expected Xiao Jun to be ambushed by those bug bastards, so now I''ve been put with his inheritance, waiting for someone else to help me rebuild my body."


    This story really was too much for Lin Fan. What kind of invaders were they that forced an elder of the Dragon n to sacrifice themself?


    Ang knit her brows and was silent for a bit before saying, "Was it those Outsiders?"


    Hong Long gave a sigh, "They really have been rampant over the years, but it suddenly became worse. I don''t know what gave them the courage to suddenly attack us like that, but they were much stronger than before."


    Ang fell silent once again.


    Lin Fan had a confused look on his face. He looked to Ang and asked, "Outsiders? What are those?"


    But Ang didn''t say a single thing.


    Then Lin Fan turned to Hong Long.


    Hong Long shook his head, "Kid, this isn''t something you need to worry about now, you''re not even close to being at that level yet. This is something that involves the top forces of the universe, you''re nothing more than an antpared to them now."


    Lin Fan knew that he was nothing right now, but he believed that with his cheat system, he would one day reach that peak.


    But he also knew that they were right, there was no need for him to worry about this now. Even if he knew, he wouldn''t be able to do anything.


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug beforeing over to the Soul Crystal and asking, "Elder, how are you nning on restoring your body?"


    Hong Long said, "There are many ways to build a body, but building a good body is hard. I need to find special materials for that. Once I do, I''ll need at least an Earth Grade Alchemist to help me refine that body and I definitely won''t find one on this lowly."


    Lin Fan''s mind quickly turned before he said, "Then, do you want toe with us?"

 84 Chapter 84

    Hong Long looked at Lin Fan with a confused look, "What do you mean by that?"


    Then those dragon eyes narrowed like he had suddenly thought of something and revealed a sharp look, "Let me warn you kid, before you even speak, think carefully about your next words. Don''t let greed take you over."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind at all as he said, "Elder, you''re thinking too much. I just want to ask you if you want toe with us, I should have a way to bring you out of here and find someone to refine a body for you."


    At this, Hong Long turned over to Ang, "Little girl, can you guarantee his words?"


    Ang looked at Lin Fan for a bit like she was trying to confirm his intentions, but after being silent for a bit, she still gave a slow nod, "He''s someone with a master that can''t be measured, this must be his master''s will."


    Hong Long looked confused, "What do you mean by his master''s will? Who is his master?"


    Ang gave a shrug, "I don''t know who his master is, but I''m certain it''s someone from the God Realm."


    At this, Hong Long''s eyes opened wide in shock, "God Realm, are you sure? Are we talking about the same legendary God Realm?"


    Ang nodded, "The way he usesws, it''s not the fragmentedws that we''re used to. It''s definitely thepletews they have in the God Realm¡­"


    When he heard this, there was a strong look of desire that was alight in Hong Long''s eyes. God Realm, it was something they had all dreamed of. Ever since that event a million years ago, it was like the God Realm had suddenly closed and no one had ever been able to reach it since. This was the first time any of them had contact with the God Realm in a long time¡­


    It was only then that Hong Long turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "How would you bring me out?"


    Lin Fan walked over to the Soul Crystal and ced a hand on it, as he asked the system in his mind, "System, can I bring this Soul Crystal into the storage?"


    "Host, you currently do not have enough authorization to bring this Soul Crystal with you."


    Lin Fan said, "Then how much authorization do I need?"


    "Host, you do not have enough authorization to ask this question."


    Lin Fan had ck lines appear on his face as he thought, "What kind of logic is this?"


    "Host, there''s no need to be rude. First warning!"


    Lin Fan quickly calmed himself down and he asked the system again, "Then is there a way to bring Hong Long back with us?"


    "Calcting¡­"


    "Host, the system hade up with two feasible methods based on the resources currently avable to the host."


    Lin Fan was filled with curiosity at this, there actually was a way.


    He had just been hoping that he would be able to bring this Dragon n expert with him since that would mean being able to create a rtionship with the Dragon n.


    Lin Fan already had Ang and Momonga, which provided ess to their top tier cultivation realms. If he were to bring in another supreme expert like Hong Long, maybe he would have ess to another top tier cultivation realm. This Hong Long even made Ang cautious which meant that their Dragon n must be equal to the Spirit n which Ang led. Since the World of Elements was a top tier cultivation realm, it should mean that the Dragon n''s world was also a top tier cultivation realm!


    "Host, the first method is to buy a Low Tier Avatar from the shop and draw this shattered soul into it, creating a Legendary Realm puppet. But the downside to this is that it will shatter the will of the shattered soul and create an obedient puppet that will never advance."


    "Isn''t this no different from killing him and refining him into a puppet!" Lin Fan couldn''t help saying.


    "Host, there''s no need to be rude. Second warning!"


    "Host, the second method is to take a scale from pet "Xiao Feng" and draw the shattered soul into the scale, allowing it to store the shattered soul like the Soul Crystal."


    "Wait, why would that work?" Lin Fan was confused.


    "Host, pet "Xiao Feng" has the true dragon bloodline, which is the progenitor of all dragons. This gives every part of pet "Xiao Feng''s" body a special attribute, such as being able to contain shattered souls of the Dragon n."


    Lin Fan didn''t really understand, but still he called out Xiao Feng.<sub> </sub>


    The moment Xiao Feng appeared, Hong Long''s eyes were filled with shock.


    When Xiao Feng had been called out on the fifth floor, Hong Long hadn''t been able to sense its bloodline because of the distance, but now that Xiao Feng was in front of it, it was shocked by what it sensed.


    Hong Long said in a trembling voice, "K-Kid, wh-where did you f-find this pet?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but he honestly said, "This was a pet my master gave me." Of course that technically wasn''t wrong since it was given to him by the system and the system was currently his "master".


    Hong Long was even more shocked by this as he turned back to Ang and remembered what she said. God Realm Expert, this kid''s master had to be a God Realm Expert!


    This master had even found the long lost progenitor bloodline!


    Just who was he?!


    Ang saw how shocked Hong Long was and she couldn''t help thinking of when she had first met Lin Fan.


    Thinking back now, she remembered how shocked she had been to see the power ofwsing from Lin Fan. She couldn''t help considering Hong Long arade.


    Of course, Momonga had also gone through the same experience, but she would never consider him arade since he was still nothing more than a dirty undead in her eyes¡­


    As for how Momonga saw her, he really wanted to see how this dense little girl would deal with her emotions¡­


    After a while, Hong Long finally calmed down and said, "Kid, I''m fine with leaving this ce, but you have to promise me that you''ll let me bring this little dragon back to our Dragon n. I''m telling you now, this little dragon will be the hope for our entire Dragon Race, that''s how insistent I am on this."


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but he was fine with this since he wanted to go to the Dragon n''s world anyway, "Alright, that''s fine. I wanted to go to the Dragon n''s world anyway."


    At this, Hong Long gave an internal sigh of relief. If he could bring this progenitor bloodline back, he would be the greatest hero of the Dragon n.


    Hong Long then said, "Alright, I have an idea of what you''re nning on doing, but before you do it, let''s wait for a bit."


    Lin Fan asked in a puzzled voice, "Why do we need to wait?"


    Hong Long exined, "If you take my shattered soul out of the Soul Crystal, it also releases the Dragon Might that''s crashing down on the tower. So we should at least wait until the end of the trial before doing this. Of course, we can''t wait until the very end, since you''ll be teleported away right at the end, so we''ll do it a minute before the trial ends."


    Lin Fan picked up on the words at the very end, "Teleported away? What do you mean by that? Also, what''s the next part of the trial?"


    Hong Long just shook his head, "I can''t tell you, but I can tell that you should be able to easily pass through the final trial and obtain Xiao Jun''s inheritance."


    Lin Fan could tell from his firm tone that Hong Long wouldn''t say anything, so Lin Fan didn''t push it. Instead he asked about something else, "Then do you know about the Dragon Vein?"


    Hong Long was surprised to hear this, "I don''t know how you found out about the Dragon Vein, but it should be the one made from my bones. It''s not here with me, but it should be with Xiao Jun''s final inheritance. As long as you finish the next trial, you should be able to get it."


    Once he heard this, Lin Fan now knew how to finish his mission.


    While he didn''t want Xie Jun''s inheritance, he had no choice in this matter since he had to get the Dragon Vein.


    Since he was doing this, he wouldn''t let anyone stand in his way. He would obtain the inheritance.


    ¡­


    And so time passed and ten hours went by, it finally came to the end of the second trial.


    Right before it did end, Lin Fan took a scale from Xiao Feng and drew Hong Long''s soul in.


    All this took thirty seconds, which meant that for the final thirty seconds, the pressure in the tower had disappeared...

 85 Chapter 85

    On the dot of the twelfth hour, the same golden light barrier wrapped around everyone and they were teleported once again.


    When Lin Fan could see again, he found that this time he had been teleported to the entrance of a cave, but there was nothing special about this cave at all. But instead of over four thousand people here, there were only a total of just over twenty people.


    Most of these people were the people that he had seen on the second floor and a few people who he hadn''t seen.


    Lin Fan was actually surprised to see that Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong were both here as well.


    Actually, the two of them had forced their way to the sixth floor with sheer will alone, but they had been stuck right before the entrance to the seventh floor at the end.


    What surprised them was that there was a moment when the pressure suddenly stopped right before the end of the trial, which they took advantage of to rush to the seventh floor, allowing them to pass this trial.


    But before Lin Fan could even do anything, Huo Yan rushed over to Lin Fan first with his fists raised. As he rushed forward, mes gathered around his right fist before he punched out at Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan was about to raise his hand to guard against it, there was suddenly a golden barrier that appeared between them. It blocked Huo Yan''s attack and pushed him back several meters.


    When he flew out, there was the voice of the trial that rang out.


    "Please do not attack each other during this transition period. You are free to attack each other once the trial starts."


    Then it changed tones and spoke in an excited voice.


    "Wee to the final trial!"


    "You will now be given twenty four hours to reach the depths of this cavern and seek out the inheritance. Whoever reaches the inheritance first will be the one who receives it. Everything is allowed inside the cavern, so please be careful. If you feel like you cannot remain in the trial any longer, please yell out "I quit" and you will be immediately teleported out."


    "In five minutes, the participants will be allowed in based on their rankings. Every rank down, the participant will start a minuteter."


    "Since there is a special scenario where there are two people who hold first ce together, they will be leaving at the same time and the person in third will leave two minutes after them."


    Then there was silence once it had finished exining the rules.


    p Huo Yan got up with a trace of blood dripping from the corner of his mouth, but his eyes staring at Lin Fan were still filled with the will to fight.</anda>


    Still, Huo Yan knew that he wouldn''t be able to fight him here, so he could only endure for now. Huo Yan no longer cared about this trial, the only thing on his mind was getting one fight with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just ignored him and went over the Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong as he said, "You two should be careful, just drop out if you really have no choice. There''s no point in dying here."


    Boss Gao nodded, but he still said in a firm voice, "Got it, brother. But still, we can''t fall behind you too far, can we?"


    Wang Da Dong agreed with a smile.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say to this, but he was still touched by this. He raised his fist in front of him and waited.


    The two of them saw this and raised their fists to touch his.


    Ang on the side couldn''t help giving a soft snort when she saw this.


    Why were all men like this?


    ¡­


    Five minutester, Lin Fan and Ang were allowed to head into the cave first.


    Being watched by everyone, the two of them slowly walked into the cave.


    When they entered, they found that the cave was actually quite well lit with torches lined against the wall, so they didn''t need to worry about being able to see in here.


    They quickly moved through the cave and eventually came to a central room with nine different snake mouths surrounding them. Each snake mouth created another cave for them to head down.


    Right in the center, there was a statue of a buddha with que at its feet, but the face of the buddha was actually the face of a demon.<sub> </sub>


    The que read, "Nine paths leading to nine different realms of death. Choose carefully to suffer the least pain. Turn back now if you fear death. Perhaps a little kindness is the most important thing."


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he read this, but still he couldn''t find any clues on what to do next.


    It seemed like the only way for him was to choose a path and head down it.


    Looking around at the snake mouths, they all seemed like they were carved exactly the same. There wasn''t even a centimeter difference between their fangs.


    Since there was no way of telling which one was different, he had no choice but to use his secret move.


    "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe, catch, a, tiger, by, the, toe¡­.."


    Eventually he picked one of the tunnels and stuck by his decision as he began walking down that tunnel with Ang silently following behind him.


    Once they went through the snake mouth and continued forward, what they didn''t notice was all the snake mouths closing and suddenly changing.


    The one snake mouth they picked suddenly moved up and the others shifted to the side to take that snake mouth''s ce, while also bringing out a new snake mouth.


    It seemed like no matter what they picked, their trials may be the same¡­


    A few minutester, the third ce person who was the sharp eyed gray cloaked person arrived in the room. This person didn''t even pause at all as they walked down the central path. Once they entered the snake mouth, the same thing happened as it disappeared from the room.


    Just like that, with each person that came, another snake mouth disappeared until the final person chose their path¡­


    ¡­


    Back to Lin Fan and Ang, they continued down their path which was quite well lit from the various torches on the wall. It took them several minutes before they were able to reach the end of the tunnel.


    The moment they came out, they found themselves in arge cage, but this cage was the size of a giant arena.


    When they came to the sides of the cage, they found that they were in a cage that was on top of a giant pir and they weren''t able to see the bottom of this abyss at all.


    Looking at the other side of the cage, they could see a giant griffinying there, guarding the exit to this cage.


    Based on the aura of the griffin, it was a beast that was in the tinum Realm.


    For most of the participants, this would indeed mean death since most of them were still in the Gold Realm.


    Looking around the cage, they found that there was nothing else of note in this cage, so they had no choice but to fight the griffin.


    Of course, it wasn''t Ang''s turn to fight since it would be a simple wave of the hand for her to take care of this tinum Realm griffin.


    Moreover, this would be Lin Fan''s first fight since reaching the tinum Realm, so he was actually looking forward to this fight.


    He currently had three different masses of energy inside his dantian that represented three differentws, so he was anxious to try them out.


    Plus he was looking forward to seeing whatws this griffin had and if he would be able to absorb it with his suction force.


    Lin Fan slowly walked up towards the griffin while Ang moved to the side to watch.


    When Lin Fan came close, the griffin sensed something and suddenly woke up. It narrowed its sharp eyes to look down at Lin Fan before giving a screech that was quite loud.


    But that didn''t impede Lin Fan at all, rather he began moving even faster as he brandished his fist.


    The first thing he would be testing would be thew of power that he received from absorbing the Dragon Might.


    The golden energy erupted from his fists as it created a dense covering over it, filling his fists with power.


    Charging forward, Lin Fan sent out his strongest punch.

 86 Chapter 86

    As Lin Fan''s fist approached it, the griffin suddenly erupted with wind and created a set of wind armour around itself that was imbued with the power of thew of wind.


    When Lin Fan''s fist crashed into the wind armour, there were sparks that were generated as the twows crashed, but eventually both sides were pushed back a step.


    It seemed like they had been even.


    But that in itself was surprising since Lin Fan had just reached the tinum Realm while the griffin was clearly a beast that had been in the tinum Realm for a while. The density of the griffin''s life energy was not something that Lin Fan''s life energy couldpare to. This kind of life energy could onlye from the high tinum Realm.


    Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t underestimate this opponent so after stabilizing himself, he released the power of his secondw, thew of lightning.


    His suction power had absorbed the lightning tribtion that he had faced when he entered the tinum Realm and had turned that power into thew of lightning.


    The white energy of thew of lightning wrapped around the golden energy like a web, creating what seemed like a set of golden gloves that had a white mesh over it on Lin Fan''s hands.


    Then Lin Fan also released thew of water that he had absorbed from the King Beast. The power of thew of water formed masses of blue energy on the knuckles of the gauntlets, turning them into studded gauntlets.


    Only then did Lin Fan charge forward with his fists raised again, preparing to duke it out with the griffin, but the griffin wouldn''t let him approach that easily this time.


    The griffin gathered more windw powerpared tost time since it didn''t have much time to gather its power in thest sh. This time it was releasing the power of its windws to the max.


    The windws created a vortex armour around it that also released des of wind that rained down on Lin Fan from every direction.


    As the des of wind came down, Lin Fan just held his fists up over his head and the powerw created a golden barrier around him thatpletely blocked all these wind des.


    These wind des were just quickly thrown out by the griffin to dy Lin Fan while it gathered its strength, so they didn''t contain much energy within them. The golden barrier of the powerw was more than enough to block them.


    The griffin saw that the situation was bad, so it suddenly spun with its ws sticking out in front of it, creating a deadly spiral with a sharp tip. It also hardened the feathers on its wings which created sharp des along the edges of the spiral which seemed like the des of a blender.


    Lin Fan saw the sharp spiraling towards him, but he felt no fear at all as he first pulled back his fist while charging and brought it back forward when he approached the spiral.


    His right fist covered in the gauntlet created with variousws shot forward to m into the ws of the griffin. While the sharp ws of the griffin did create scratches on thew of water studs, it didn''t affect it too much as it seemed like both sides were even.


    Thebination of the threews together didn''t only create power that was their sum, rather it was a multiplication of the power of the threews, creating power that was much greater than their sum.


    But there was also another reason why Lin Fan could match this griffin or even push it back a little.


    Lin Fan had also used a bit of his suction power in his fists, which slowly drew in parts of the griffin''sw of wind, weakening its attack while also strengthening him.


    After the first sh, Lin Fan brought his left hand forward and smashed it against the griffin''s ws. Just like that, Lin Fan continued to attack with one hand at the time, punching again and again as he slowly pushed the griffin back.


    The griffin could tell that it was slowly losing energy and it was being pushed back, so it knew that this situation wasn''t good for it. The griffin quickly turned to the side and it went past Lin Fan, making sure to use its feathers to cut across him.


    Lin Fan quickly noted this and bought his arms together to create a shield with the golden gauntlets, but still there were scratches that were formed on the gauntlets.


    The griffin could tell that a direct confrontation with Lin Fan wasn''t good since Lin Fan had his suction force, but Lin Fan didn''t let the griffin escape.


    This time, the griffin gathered all its power into wind des that buffeted Lin Fan while also using its wind power to quickly move back, avoiding Lin Fan. However, Lin Fan had no problem running after it while punching the wind des apart, absorbing part of the power contained within it.


    Slowly, the griffin was running out of energy and it knew that it had to make a final stand or Lin Fan would definitely run down its stamina.<sub> </sub>


    The griffin stopped running and shooting out wind des. It gathered all of its energy into its beak, ws, and wings.


    With a single p of its wings, it burst forth with its greatest speed while gathering all of its power into its beak and w, creating a sharp point that moved at an incredible speed towards Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried about this at all, he just gathered all his energy and the energy he had drained into his fists.


    Bringing both of his fists back, he stood there waiting for the griffin to approach. When the griffin came close, Lin Fan suddenly punched out with both fists at the griffin, punching right at the tip of its attack.


    When both sides shed, their powers bnced each other out. As the sh continued, wind des and bolts of lightning flew out and shattered the ground around them.


    Neither side took a single step back for an entire moment, but the griffin''s power was slowly fading as Lin Fan released his suction power on full, drawing in as much of the windw as possible.


    Eventually the griffin couldn''t hold on any longer and was sted back by the force of Lin Fan''s fists, bouncing along the ground like a pebble on ake beforending in a crater several dozen meters away.


    The griffin was in very poor shape, bleeding from various parts of its body, unable to get up at all.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan decided to put it out of its misery.


    When he came over to it and raised his fist, there was suddenly a sharp chirp as three smaller griffins appeared in front of him, blocking him off from therge griffin.


    Therge griffin panicked when it saw this and quickly tried to move the smaller griffins away, but they just firmly stood there, protecting therger griffin.


    Lin Fan looked down at them and seeing the tears that were dripping out of their eyes, his heart couldn''t help feeling a bit of an ache.


    After pausing for a few seconds, Lin Fan lowered his hand and released his energy, taking a step back to show that he meant no harm.


    At that moment, the voice of the trial rang out again.


    "Congrattions on passing this part of the final trial."


    "While an expert should be strong, they must never forget to havepassion when there is a need for it. The power of an expert is limited and if they try to fight the entire world, eventually they''ll run out of power. One cannot only think about continuous fighting, there must be times when one must be smart and know when to withdraw."


    Once this was done, there was a door that opened on the side of the cage that the griffin had been guarding initially.


    But before they left, Ang came over to heal the griffin with her power.


    She took care of most of its wounds with her healing wind, but it hadn''t been injured that much by Lin Fan, so it didn''t take much time for her to heal.


    Once they were done, the griffin no longer wanted to fight and even nuzzled up to Lin Fan and Ang. Surprisingly, Ang wasn''t against this and she even cuddled with the baby griffins.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking an extra look as Ang yed with the little griffins. She really was just too cute.


    But after they finished this, they waved goodbye to the griffin family and headed off through the door for their next trial.


    As for why the trial didn''t stop Ang from passing even though she didn''t do anything, it could only be said that the trial was indeed a bit afraid of her¡­

 87 Chapter 87

    Once they were through the door, they arrived at an empty space withrge walls in front of them and only a single entrance into the area enclosed by therge walls.


    Looking straight forward, they couldn''t see any bends in the hallway, but when Lin Fan jumped up, he could tell that this was a giantbyrinth.


    When he tried to jump over the walls though, Lin Fan could feel that there was an invisible barrier over the top of the walls that prevented him from moving forward.


    For Ang, it was easy for her to break through these invisible walls, but there was no meaning for her to do so. The only reason she hade was because she was a bit worried about Lin Fan, but as long as nothing happened to Lin Fan, she had no reason to help.


    So with Ang silently following him, Lin Fan led the way into thebyrinth.


    The first corridor was quite long, but soon they arrived at the first split. At the split, there were two signs that were hung on different sides, but they both read the exact same thing.


    Both signs read "certain death".


    Lin Fan stopped to consider this.


    Now that the trial hade this far, why would there still be certain death?


    Xie Jun wanted someone to gain his inheritance so he could help create an expert that would protect his family and bring his inheritance to a higher realm. There was no way that he would be trying to kill off every participant here. There had to be a different meaning to this.


    After thinking about it for a bit, Lin Fan suddenly remembered the message of the first part of this trial.


    Maybe it was sometimes better to take a step back instead of charging into certain danger.


    Lin Fan turned around and saw that he couldn''t see the entrance just like how he couldn''t see this first turn when he first looked in.


    After pausing for a bit, Lin Fan decided to turn around and walk back in the direction he had juste from.


    It took him a while to walk all the back, but he had been correct.


    The theme of this final trial was to take a step back, so by going backwards, he had actually arrived at the correct answer,ing to another split.


    What he didn''t know was that the moment had entered thisbyrinth, thebyrinth had actually been turning. It had taken him and the corridor that he had taken to another location in thebyrinth while turning another corridor into a new entrance.


    Reaching this split, this time both the signs said "This way".


    Lin Fan couldn''t see any difference between the two signs, so he really didn''t know which way to choose. But one thing was certain, this was different from the certain death signs fromst time, so the choice here was probably not to head back.


    In the end, Lin Fan gritted his teeth and chose one of the paths, walking along the path to its end. But when he came to the end, he was surprised to see that there was another path that also led to the same ce.


    It seemed like both paths would have led him here, so this was nothing more than a test of his courage.


    Once he came out of the path, he arrived in an open space that waspletely void of anything other than a single statue at the end.


    When Lin Fan appeared, the statue suddenly opened its eyes and Lin Fan raised his fists, as he prepared to fight, but the statue stopped him, "Now, now, there''s no need to be on guard. This part of thebyrinth isn''t a test of your strength."


    At that, Lin Fan was surprised, but he still didn''t drop his fists.


    However, when he took a single step forward, he felt a bit of pressure falling onto him. It was just like back in the tower when he was being suppressed by the Dragon Might.


    The statue saw this and was a bit surprised, but it still said, "This is nothing more than a simple test of your willpower, just like in the tower. As long as you can resist this pressure and make it to the end of this hall, you will be considered to have passed this trial."


    Lin Fan took a step forward and felt the pressure be a bit stronger. This pressure wasparable to what he experienced on the ninth floor.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan gathered the golden energy of the powerw around him and the pressure was immediately dispelled. He just walked forward like nothing was wrong.


    Of course the most shocking thing was that Ang just walked through all of this Dragon Might like it was nothing.


    When they came to the statue, the statue just looked at them like they were monsters, but it still said, "Well, well, you two really are surprising. I bet Xiao Jun never expected people like you two to appear on his home world and toe into his Inheritance Realm."


    But then it said in a serious voice, "Do you know what thisbyrinth was a test of?"


    Lin Fan looked at the statue and shook his head.


    The statue said, "This was a culmination test of everything that you learned from the three stages of this Inheritance Realm. The first test was a test of whether you knew when to take a step back like you learned in the final stage. The second test was a test of courage, whether you had the courage to move forward, just like in the first stage. Finally thisst test was a test of your willpower, just like you learned in the second stage. Only by possessing all three can you be worthy of Xie Jun''s inheritance. Since you have demonstrated all three of these qualities, I officially dere you worthy."


    As soon as it said that, the wall behind it suddenly opened to reveal a portal.


    The statue then said, "Step into that portal and receive your prize. I wish you luck, young ones."


    At that, the statue closed its eyes again.


    Lin Fan and Ang looked at each other before heading into the portal.


    Once they came out on the other side, they appeared inside an arena, sitting in the spectator seats.


    When they were confused on what to do next, the voice of the trial suddenly rang out in their minds.


    "Congrattions on passing the trials and earning the rights to gain the inheritance. Please wait for the others to finish before we start distributing the rewards."


    Since there was nothing to do, the two of them waited for others to appear.


    Eventually after several minutes, the person with the gray cloak and sharp eyes also appeared in the stands.


    When that person saw the two of them here, he didn''t seem surprised, but he did put his guard up. That person looked at them for a bit before moving to another part of the stands to sit down. It seemed like the voice of trial had also spoken to it.


    After a few more minutes, the other person in the gray cloak also appeared.


    This person had the same reaction as the other person, looking over Lin Fan and Ang for a bit before moving to the side as well, sitting down beside the other person in the gray cloak.


    The one who appeared after that was Huo Yan.


    When he appeared, he looked at Lin Fan with a desire to fight, but he also heard the voice and decided to wait. If he couldn''t fight Lin Fan in the Inheritance Realm, he would find him in real life and fight him.


    Then there were five more people that appeared, including the leader of the team that attacked the King Beast.


    After waiting for a few more minutes, there was no one else that appeared.


    When they were wondering what was going to happen, the voice of the trial suddenly spoke.


    "Congrattions, you have all qualified to receive the inheritance, but unfortunately the inheritance can only go to one of you."


    "For making it this far, you shall all receive some rewards to bring back with you."


    "Now to exin who will receive the final inheritance, please wee a special guest!"

 88 Chapter 88

    Once the voice dropped, there was a sh of light in front of them before a white figure appeared on stage.


    That person was dressed in apletely white embroidered robe with jet ck hair that hung down to his waist. In his hand, there was a pure white spear with a jet ck tip.


    If one looked closely they would be able to see a faint blue outline around that person.


    That person looked over the participants sitting in the stand before stabbing his spear into the ground and suddenly starting to p.


    That personughed as he continued to p, looking a bit like a lunatic. But once he stopped pping, he said with a smile, "Congrattions, congrattions, all of you have qualified for my inheritance. As you may have guessed by now, my name is Xie Jun, the owner of this Inheritance Realm." The voice that came out of that person was the exact same voice as the voice of the trial.


    After a slight pause, that person continued speaking, "Now as stated before, all of you will receive a reward for making it this far."


    With a single snap, there were ten balls of golden light that appeared in front of them, one for each person. Inside each of the golden balls of light was a Storage Ring.


    Xie Jun then said, "Of course, there is a difference in reward based on the time you arrived, since this is a world where the talented thrive." At this, he slowly turned to Lin Fan.


    When everyone saw Xie Jun turn to Lin Fan, they all knew the meaning behind this and it was like there was a target instantly ced on Lin Fan''s back.


    But Xie Jun''s gaze didn''t stay on Lin Fan for long as he turned back to looking over them as he said, "Now, like I''ve said before, there is only one person who will obtain my inheritance, but how are we going to decide that person you ask? It''s very simple, you will now all participate in a battle royale and thest person standing will be the one who obtains it."


    After saying this, Xie Jun''s eyes turned sharp, "While I may have taught you different lessons, you have to remember that as experts, you should take what you want with your own hands. That will be the case in every scenario you meet in the future and if you''re not willing to fight, you deserve nothing."


    Lin Fan revealed a cold smile at this, Ang and the two gray cloaked people didn''t seem to care at all, but there was a chill that ran down the spines of all the other people.


    Seeing this, Xie Jun gave a satisfied nod before saying, "Alright, now I''m sure that as young people, you are all impatient. So, let the battle royale begin."


    With another snap, all of them were suddenly transported into the arena, ced in a perfect circle around the walls of the arena with an equal distance between all of them.


    The strange thing for Lin Fan was that he and Ang had been ced on opposite sides of the arena.


    But for Huo Yan, he was filled with excitement since he was ced right on Lin Fan''s left.


    As for the two gray cloaked people, they were perfectly just on the left and right of Lin Fan, being equidistant to Lin Fan and Ang.


    Once they appeared, Xie Jun floated over to the main spectator seat which was a box seat that was right over Lin Fan''s head.


    When hended in his seat, he gave a nod as he looked over them before saying, "You can start now."


    There was no signal or anything, he just started the fight with this.


    All the normal participants summoned out their pets, but they all stayed in their starting positions. They knew that as long as they made a move now, it would be easy for others to team up on them. The best move they had was to stay in position and wait for someone else to start the fight.


    As for Ang, she didn''t seem to care at all as she walked straight forward towards Lin Fan.


    When the others saw this, at first they thought that it was a chance for them to act, but when they met Ang''s cold gaze, they found that they were unable to move.


    Just what kind of monster was this?


    She could stop them with just a single nce!<sub> </sub>


    While Ang was slowly moving across the arena, Huo Yan took his chance and turned. He pointed right at Lin Fan and shouted, "Now, you will fight me!"


    At that, he charged right out at Lin Fan, but Lin Fan didn''t want to bother with this kid at all. Still Huo Yan didn''t give him a choice.


    Huo Yan exploded with mes and this time without the suppression of the Dragon Might, he could freely move and catch up to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan could have just avoided him, but he knew that if he didn''t handle this now, this kid would bother himter.


    Since he had no choice in this matter, it was better to crush this kid now.


    Lin Fan immediately erupted with the goldenw of power.


    At first Huo Yan thought that this was just the golden energy of the Gold Realm and he was disappointed, but then he realized that this wasn''t just golden life energy, this was actually the power of aw!


    Huo Yan gathered his mes around and riding on his Inferno Wolf, he turned into a giant ball of me hurtling towards Lin Fan.


    But as he was charging, he was shocked by what Lin Fan did next.


    <o>,m Lin Fan spared no effort at all and released all three of hisws, creating the golden studded gauntlet once again.</o>


    It wasn''t just Huo Yan, even Xie Jun sitting up top was shocked to see Lin Fan suddenly releasing threews.


    Even in the upper realm, it was rare to see someone who had mastery over twows. Those that did were already fiercely fought for by the ten factions, even drawing out high elders that wanted to take them as disciples.


    Someone who had threews would definitely be the holy son of a faction and would be groomed as their next leader!


    The two in gray cloaks narrowed their eyes when they saw this before looking at each other, knowing what either person was thinking. They never imagined that they would be able to find someone with threews down on this lower realm.


    They were already both nning on contacting their factions and having them secretly contact Lin Fan, but they also clearly knew what the others were thinking.


    Actually, Lin Fan had a total of fourws already, but the windw wasn''t as developed as the others since it was still in the preliminary stage, taking the form of a tornado. The statue it formed hadn''t broken down yet into pure energy that Lin Fan could use.


    While Lin Fan could draw out the energy of the windw from the statue, he didn''t dare mix it with the other threews since the unbnce of energy would make thebination copse and he wasn''t sure he could handle the bacsh of that.


    Huo Yan was shocked by Lin Fan''s disy, but he didn''t stop, he just continued pushing forward with his zing ball of mes.


    Lin Fan just raised his right hand and casually punched out.


    The force generated by the mix of the threews wasn''t something that Huo Yan could break through at all, it was much stronger than his mew alone. Not to mention that Huo Yan was only in the low tinum Realm, having only made a breakthrough a few weeks ago. His control of the power ofws still wasn''t at a stable level yet.


    It was no surprise when the sh between Lin Fan and Huo Yan ended with Huo Yan''s ball of mes beingpletely shattered and Lin Fan''s fist mming into Huo Yan''s chest.


    Spitting up a quick mouthful of blood, Huo Yan couldn''t even react as he was sent out of the arena.


    Thest thing he did was look at Lin Fan in shock and a bit of confusion because he had felt a bit of his life energy being sucked away from him.

 89 Chapter 89

    Once Huo Yan had disappeared, Lin Fan turned to look at the others.


    Seeing this disy of strength, everyone knew that they weren''t a match for Lin Fan alone.


    The remaining few began moving towards each other, in the end forming a group of three and a group of two.


    As for the two gray cloaked people, they were still in their original spots, looking at Lin Fan with a deep look.


    Lin Fan had quickly checked the Storage Ring that he had received earlier and he was certain that the Dragon Vein wasn''t in there. He had also conferred with Hong Long in the scale and Hong Long said that it was unlikely the Dragon Vein was in any of the other rewards. This meant that he had to win and take the inheritance.


    Lin Fan could tell that the two gray cloaked people would be troublesome to deal with, so Lin Fan decided to take out the others first. Of course, he wouldn''t look down on them either.


    For the group of three, there was the leader of the group that attacked the King Beast, he was someone who had a Legendary Artifact. That was not something that Lin Fan could look down on.


    And as for the group of two, they probably had their own trump cards.


    The reason why Huo Yan had been so easy to take down was because he was too confident in his own power. He actually had his own trump cards, but he never expected that he would be crushed in a single blow from Lin Fan. Otherwise, he might have been able to match Lin Fan with his trump card, but it was too bad that he never got a chance to show it.


    During this silent period, Ang had slowly made her way to Lin Fan''s side, but she didn''t look like she was prepared to fight. Ang just moved behind Lin Fan and silently stood there behind him, making no other move.


    Lin Fan could tell from how rxed she seemed that it didn''t like she would make a move unless he was really in trouble.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan had no choice but to take care of them himself.


    But before he could even make a move, someone else had made their move.


    When the two groups were still hesitating on what to do, the two people in the gray cloaks suddenly charged forward.


    Before either of the groups could react, the two people in gray cloaks suddenly summoned out their pets, which was a gori and an alligator respectively.


    The two groups tried to summon their pets and the leader of the King Beast raid tried to pull out his Legendary Artifact, but they didn''t get a chance to do so. Before they could even do anything, their defenses were shattered by either a single punch from the gori or a single jaw snap from the alligator.


    All of them had eyes wide in shock as they stared at the two gray cloaked men, they couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    They were all clearly in the tinum Realm and even working together, they couldn''t take a single hit from these pets.


    The only exnation for this was that they were King Beasts!


    Just who would be crazy enough to give King Beasts to juniors!


    King Beasts were family guarding treasures that normally wouldn''t be taken out unless the family was in danger of being wiped out.


    On this Blue Star, reaching the Legendary Realm meant you would reach the peak of this realm. King Beasts meant that as long as no one had a life or death grudge against you, your family would be safe for at least a thousand years, maybe even more since beasts had much longer life spanspared to humans.


    Yet there were two King Beasts in front of them.


    With onest unwilling look at these two beasts, the five of them turned into golden light before disappearing from this realm.


    Once they were gone, both of them turned to re at each other before turning to Lin Fan. When they turned over to Lin Fan, they finally took off their cloaks, revealing their true appearances.<sub> </sub>


    The one with sharp eyes was a straightced looking man with hawk like eyes and slicked back hair. But even with how serious he looked, there was a charm to him that one couldn''t deny.


    As for the other person, it was a man with azy look to him, but that was actually all part of his charm. To put it more simply, he gave off a yboy kind of feel.


    Both of them said at the same time, "That one over there, which faction do youe from?"


    When Lin Fan heard this, he was confused, "Faction, what do you mean?"


    Hearing the sincere confusion in his voice, the two of them both revealed a happy look.


    This kid with threews wasn''t actually a part of any factions, this meant that he was a native of this lower realm.


    His performance had been too shocking, so they had assumed that he was someone from one of the twelve factions that had been sent here to take the inheritance, but they had never heard of someone like this. Even if they had never heard of them, their factions would have since such an important chip wouldn''t escape the informationworks of the twelve factions.


    This meant that this kid was a treasure they had found in this lower realm!


    Both of them revealed a smile and since again said at the same time, "Then do you have any interest ining to the upper realm?"


    Once they finished, both of them red at each other.


    They both knew what kind of merit they would receive for bringing such a seedling back and neither of them wanted to give it to the other.


    The yboy said, "Ying Feng, you already saw what kind ofws this kid has. You should know that your family''s cultivation techniques aren''t suited for him. How about you give him to us and we''ll consider it as owing you a great favour?"


    The man with sharp eyes said, "Dian Ting, you should know that the Cultivation Realms under my family are much better suited to this kid. How about you just give him to us instead and consider it as us owing you a great favour?"


    Neither side was willing to back down, this was a kid that had threews, this was talent that was incredibly rare!


    But they were interrupted by Lin Fan, "Excuse me, what do you mean by upper realm?"


    Ying Feng took the lead and said to Lin Fan, "The upper realm is the realm that this realm works under, namely the Gtic Humanity Alliance. You are someone with rare talent and we could use you in the upper realm." Then he pointed at Xie Jun, "That old man over there that''s supposedly an expert in this lower realm was one of theckeys that was under our Twelve Factions. His position wasn''t high and that''s why he died like a dog on the Void Battlefield. But you''re different, you''re someone whose talent can let you be groomed by any of the Twelve Families. However, if youe with me, I can guarantee that you will receive the best resources the Ying Family of the Twelve Factions can offer."


    At this, Dian Ting cut in right away, "Don''t listen to him kid. While everything else he said is true, you''ll receive much better resourcesing to our Dian Family. With your lightningw, you''re much better suited to cultivate our Dian Family''s cultivation technique. I can also guarantee that no one will dare mess with you or your family ever again in this lower realm or even in the upper realm."


    Ying Feng cut him off again, "I can promise that you''ll be able to be one of the top experts of the upper realm as long as youe to our Ying Family."


    Dian Ting didn''t give up, "We''ll bring you to heights even beyond our upper realm, maybe even into the Ster Kingdom."


    But then Lin Fan cut them off, "But I already have a master."


    Dian Ting and Ying Feng both snorted at this, "Kid, it''s good to have loyalty, but what can a lower realm master teach you? The limit of this lower realm is only the Legendary Realm and we both know that your ambitions don''t stop there."


    Still Lin Fan insisted, "Can you give me some time to discuss it with my master first?"


    At this Dian Ting and Ying Feng both took a step back, "Alright, we can understand that." Then they both threw a token to Lin Fan, "As long as you show up in the upper realm with those tokens, someone will lead you to our families. Be sure to remember our offers."


    And then they summoned their pets again as they said, "But this Inheritance Trial is a different matter. Our families have given us a mission to bring it back, so you''ll have to leave now."

 90 Chapter 90

    Lin Fan knew that this was going toe eventually, so he wasn''t surprised at all.


    He just raised his fists and prepared to fight, but what surprised him was that Ang actually came forward to stand in front of him.


    He looked at her in surprise as she started gathering wind in her palm. It didn''t seem like she was going to hold back against these two.


    When the two saw the wind gathering in Ang''s palm, they couldn''t help feeling a bit of fear. It was like there was this strange sense of dangering from this girl that they had ignored before, but they couldn''t tell what it was.


    Both of them raised their guard, but before they could do anything, Lin Fan gave a cough.


    Ang turned back to look at him and saw him shaking his head, but she didn''t give up as she narrowed her eyes. However seeing that Lin Fan didn''t stop shaking his head, she had no choice.


    So Ang silently moved back behind Lin Fan, but of course her lips were pouted.


    She would let Lin Fan fight the two of them first, but the moment he was in danger, she would immediately stop them. Or maybe she might even do a bit more than that¡­


    The two of them didn''t let their guard down. While it seemed like the sense of danger had passed, the two of them now knew that this girl wasn''t that simple. Of course she wasn''t simple, she was silently following this man with three differentws, she must be someone special.


    Still they didn''t have time to worry about that now, their first priority was to take care of these two so they could take the inheritance.


    p So the two of them wasted no more time as they released their life energy, creating a faint outline around them.</anda>


    Once one reached the Legendary Realm, their life energy was no longer visible to normal people. Only others who had reached the Legendary Realm could see the silver white life energy, anyone who didn''t would only see a faint translucent outline around the Legendary Realm expert. This was because once one reached the Legendary Realm, their life energy reached such a high level of purity and concentration that it couldn''t just be seen with the naked eye.


    Once they released their life energy, Lin Fan was certain that they were Legendary Realm Experts. He had already guessed this, but now that it was confirmed, there was a certain feeling of excitement that filled him.


    This would be his first time fighting real Legendary Realm Experts!


    Lin Fan immediately released his threewbination gauntlets and prepared for the impending fight.


    The two Legendary Realm Experts called out their pets and both of their pets jumped up before integrating into their weapons.


    For those that reached the Legendary Realm, there were threemon paths of cultivation they could follow.


    The first kind was the most obvious, which was the body cultivation route.


    Body cultivation allowed one to draw the power of their pets into their bodies and fight with their pets that way. Most body cultivators relied onws of force or power, things that easily provided might.


    The second kind was the weapon cultivation route, which these two clearly followed.


    Weapon cultivation allowed one to integrate their pets into their weapons, improving the might of these weapons. Most weapon cultivators relied onws that were rted to weapons like thew of swords or thew of spears, allowing them to increase the might of their weapons and their techniques.


    The third kind was the energy cultivation route.


    The energy cultivation route mainly relied on using the power ofws to control the elements around oneself, such as thew of mes or thew of wind. Ang fell into this category since she was a spirit that embodied thew of nature. These energy cultivators didn''t draw their pets into them, rather theybined their senses with their pets to increase their control of their life energy.


    Lin Fan was someone who fell into the categories of body cultivation and energy cultivation.


    Thew of power that he had was something he could integrate into his body to increase the might of his physique which was already quite strong with his God Tier Cultivation Technique.


    But he also had many elementalws that allowed him to control the forces of nature to bombard his enemies, as well as pets that had purews of elemental forces, which meant that he could use them as well to control elemental energy.


    Currently, Lin Fan was caught in between the paths of body cultivators and energy cultivators, but he would eventually have to choose one path.


    That was unless he became an Abnormal.<sub> </sub>


    Abnormals were those with rarews such as thew of time or thew of space.


    These Abnormals didn''t pick any of the three conventional paths, rather they used a mixture of the three since their specialws could be integrated in such a way.


    For those with thews of time, they could elerate their body while decelerating their enemies, they could integrate thews of time into their weapons to elerate the time of anything it touched, or they could use thews of time to elerate the time in a certain area. Each one of these applications fell under one of the three conventional paths.


    But Abnormals were incredibly rare since thews they possess werews that couldn''t be trained, they could only be produced if one was lucky enough to have that spark ofprehension.


    But rare as they were, Abnormals were treated as peak experts since no one dared to look down on the power of thews they controlled.


    The two Legendary Realm Experts wielded their weapons, a sword and sabre respectively as they charged forward at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t retreat, he just charged right at them with both of his fists brought back and right before they made contact, he brought both fists forward to punch out at their weapons.


    Both sides shed, but the result became clear very soon as Lin Fan was pushed back several steps immediately.


    But both the Legendary Realm Experts were shocked by this, they never expected that Lin Fan would be this close to matching them.


    Even though they had been holding back a bit since they knew they would have to fight each otherter, that attack had still used half of their power. They had fully expected to defeat Lin Fan in a single blow, not just to push him a few steps back.


    They knew that it wasn''t just Lin Fan''sbination ofws that allowed him toe close to match them, they could tell that Lin Fan''s body was terrifying, it was actually enough to match their physiques as Legendary Realm Experts. To be honest, it might even be stronger than their physiques.


    But there was also something that confused them during thatst sh. There had been this strange suction force that had drawn away a bit of their life energy. They weren''t clear where it hade from.


    As for Lin Fan, he knew that he wouldn''t be able to match them with just this and he knew that they had been holding back. If he continued like this, he might just fall with the next sh.


    So with a snap, he summoned out his three pets.


    The three pets instantly transformed and integrated theirws into Lin Fan.


    The lightningw mixed with Lin Fan''s lightningws to turn that lightning mesh into apletely whiteyer of lightning that covered the golden gauntlets.


    The mews turned into a pair of phoenix wings that appeared on Lin Fan''s back.


    Finally, the windw formed the same set of armour from before.


    Ying Feng and Dian Ting werepletely shocked by this.


    This kid not only had three tinum Realm pets each with their ownw, he could actually integrate them into himself! This was aplete mix of five differentws!


    Just what kind of body did this kid have that could take that much strain!


    It had to be known that when onebinedws, there would be a certain amount of strain from the sh of those twows. That was why most people couldn''t learn two differentws.


    But now this kid in front of them was actuallybining five differentws together! They couldn''t even begin to imagine the strain on his body.


    Just what kind of monster was this!


    But both of them looked at each other and gave a tacit nod. They knew that if they didn''t use their full power to defeat him now, they might be the ones who sufferedter.


    Both of them raised their weapons above their heads and gathered all their strength for one single attack, but before they could finish, something had stopped there.


    There were suddenly two des of wind that cut through the air and dealt a fatal wound to their chests.

 91 Chapter 91

    They suddenly turned into golden light that disappeared from this realm.


    Thest thing on their faces were looks of pure confusion and fear.


    Just what had attacked them? Why couldn''t they sense anything at all?


    What kind of monster was hiding in the shadows waiting for them to let down their guard?


    Of course, it never clicked in their minds that it could have been Ang who had done it.


    When they were gone, Lin Fan turned to look at Ang who had her palm raised with wind still wrapping around it.


    When Ang saw Lin Fan look over, she didn''t turn away at all. She looked right into his eyes and said, "It would have been dangerous if you continued."


    Lin Fan looked at her before giving a sigh. He knew that she was right, but he was still a bit unwilling.


    Actually, he had been pushing himself to his limit with thatbination of fivews just now. Even with his enhanced body, he could feel that creaking of his muscles and bones in response to the pressure thebination of the power ofws created.


    He could tell that he wouldn''t have been able tost long with that power, he would have broken his arm just from a single punch.


    In the end, it was the best ending since he had distracted the two of them, so Ang could easily send them out without them noticing her. At least he made a connection to the upper realm while also keeping Ang''s power a secret to a certain extent.


    Now there was only a single thing left, getting the inheritance.


    Lin Fan turned back to Xie Jun who had been watching them the entire time and he said, "So how about we end it here?"


    Xie Jun just smiled and said, "Now that there are no more witnesses, you''re not afraid of letting this little girl disy her power?"


    Xie Jun had felt the power from Ang just now, he knew that she was someone that was even far above him.


    Lin Fan just said, "Neither of us are interested in your inheritance anyway, but giving it to us is your best choice right now."


    Xie Jun continued to smile, "I can feel an old friend on you, can you let him out to talk?"


    Lin Fan was surprised that Xie Jun''s senses were this sharp, but he still brought out that scale.


    Hong Long appeared in his ghostly form and looked at his friend standing there before saying with a sigh, "Xiao Jun, so this is how it ends."


    Xie Jun gave a sigh as well, "Elder Hong, it seems like I was unable to fulfill my promise in the end. I''m sorry for letting you down."


    Hong Long said in an emotional voice, "Xiao Jun, it wasn''t your fault. This is just how fate acts sometimes, it is willful when it wishes to be. The one to apologize should be me for not guiding you properly, that was why you fell so early."


    Xie Jun just said, "Then it''s neither of our faults. If it wasn''t for Elder Hong, the grand expert Xie Jun would have never existed."


    After that, Xie Jun turned to Lin Fan and said, "Are you sure you''re not interested in the inheritance?"


    But Lin Fan''s mind was on a different topic, "Are you really Xie Jun?"


    Xie Jun patiently exined, "Do you know the Soul Realm of the Legendary Realm?"


    Lin Fan had heard of this before from Momonga.


    The Soul Realm was what the Legendary Realm was truly called because breaking into the Legendary Realm wasn''t just breaking into another realm, it was actually a rebirth of the soul.


    The Soul Realm was where one''s soul underwent a qualitative change to prepare for the next realm of cultivation, the Universe Realm, or rather the first realm of the Universe Realm, the Star Realm.


    If the soul wasn''t strong enough, when one broke into the Star Realm, their entire soul would copse under the weight of the star being born.


    But of course, this was still too far off for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan gave Xie Jun a nod in response.<sub> </sub>


    Xie Jun continued exining, "The Soul Realm is divided into different stages based on the development of one''s new soul. But of course, developing your soul means that it is much stronger and harder to destroy, which is how a fragment of my soul was able to survive in this Inheritance Realm."


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "But the Legendary Realm doesn''t seem that strong to me."


    Xie Jun gave a soft snort, "Are you talking about those two upper realm kids? Those two were only in the Primary Soul Realm which is only a quasi Soul Realm. They''ve only just reached the Soul Realm and have only formed a single fragment, so they can''t even draw out the true power of the Soul Realm. Only when you''ve condensed several fragments and reach the Fragmented Soul Realm are you considered a true Soul Realm Expert."


    Lin Fan then asked, "What about you, what realm were you at?"


    Xie Jun said with a sigh, "I barely reached the peak of the Embryo Soul Realm, which was why when I died, I could send a fragment into this Inheritance Realm."


    Lin Fan had heard about this too. The Embryo Soul Realm was when the soul fragments gathered to form an embryo of the new soul, it was considered a major turning point of the Soul Realm. It would be the first time forming aplete new soul.


    Seeing Lin Fan in thought again, Xie Jun tried to bring it back to the main topic,  "Once again, are you certain that you don''t want my inheritance?"


    Lin Fan came out of his thoughts and shook his head, "I''m certain, but there is something that I do want from it."


    Xie Jun''s interest was piqued as he asked, "What do you want?"


    He actually really wanted this young man to take something from his inheritance to create karma between them. He had seen how this young man hadbined over fivews inside his body, he knew that when this young man reached the upper realm, he would definitely create a stir. As long as he took something from his inheritance, it would mean he would have karma to the Xie Family and would protect the Xie Family if something ever happened.


    Lin Fan casually responded, "I want the Dragon Vein."


    Xie Jun narrowed his eyes first before revealing a smile, "You really do know what the good stuff is." He paused as he turned to Hong Long, "Did you tell him about it, Elder Hong?"


    Hong Long shook his head, "I don''t know who this kid heard this from, but he also asked me about the Dragon Vein. He really does know the good stuff, wanting the Dragon Vein of a high ss dragon."


    Xie Jun nodded as he said, "Elder Hong is one of the highest experts of the Dragon n with one of the purest bloodlines, wanting his Dragon Vein really is being greedy. I would say that there would be no other dragons that could match his bloodline other than the other elders."


    At this, Elder Hong''s face suddenly turned red.


    This Xiao Jun, he was bragging about his bloodline, but didn''t he know that Lin Fan had a pet with the progenitor bloodline?


    That was like a man who won the lottery suddenly bragging to a rich tycoon that they were rich¡­


    Still Xie Jun decided to give Lin Fan the inheritance in the end.


    With a sh of golden light, they appeared inside arge room that was filled with many different treasures. In the center pedestal, there was a jade statue of a dragon.


    Xie Jun said, "That is the crystalized form of the Dragon Vein, as long as you bring that jade dragon with you, you''ll be able to take the Dragon Vein energy hidden in this realm."


    Lin Fan walked over and the moment he touched it, the system spoke up.


    "Missionplete, the Dragon Vein has been recovered."


    "Mission analysis, the Dragon Vein is of top grade quality."


    "Mission analysis, the host has obtained a top grade quality Dragon Vein, going beyond the mission requirements, so the host will receive extra rewards."


    "Rewards will be calctedter."


    At this, Lin Fan suddenly revealed a wide smile, but it was his usual evil smile.


    Xie Jun and Hong Long couldn''t help being put off when they saw this, but still there wasn''t anything they could do.


    After taking the inheritance, Lin Fan looked it over and found that he really had no use for it. So, in the end, he promised that he would find someone suitable to take this inheritance.


    Once he packed up everything in this room and once Xie Jun was finished saying his final words, they were teleported out of the room and back out to the outside world.

 92 Chapter 92

    When Lin Fan appeared outside again, he found that half the people had already left.


    It was a good thing he had Ang put up the same stealth technique they had used during the first trial.


    When they appeared, no one noticed them and while everyone was distracted by the Inheritance Realm''s closing and subsequent disappearance, the two of them returned to where Mu Bo Hai''s group was.


    Lin Fan was relieved to see Zi Ling, Boss Gao, and Wang Da Dong waiting with Mu Bo Hai''s group.


    He hadn''t seen Zi Ling in the third trial, so he knew that she was safe since she couldn''t make it to the seventh floor of the tower. As for Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong, he had been afraid that they might have run into one of the stronger candidates or was even killed by the tinum Realm beast, but it seemed like they were smart enough to give up.


    While everyone was distracted by the Inheritance Realm''s disappearance, Lin Fan quickly moved over to Mu Bo Hai and tapped him on the shoulder.


    Mu Bo Hai turned around in surprise, but he saw no one there, which scared him. It was only then that Lin Fan had Ang release the stealth technique on his hand, allowing him to signal to Mu Bo Hai, while he also whispered, "Let''s go."


    Mu Bo Hai was surprised to see that there was a stealth technique that could even fool him, but he knew for sure that it was Ang. He could still feel his eye ache from the beating he took¡­


    Mu Bo Hai and the principal quickly brought the group to the side and it was only then that Ang released her stealth technique.


    When they were away, Lin Fan finally had time to look around and he realized that other than Zi Ling, himself, and Ang, the other three who hade with them were all gone.


    Mu Bo Hai saw his expression and said with a sigh, "Don''t bother looking, they''re all dead."


    At this, Lin Fan revealed a look of surprise.


    With another sigh, Mu Bo Hai continued, "This Inheritance Realm can be considered one of the more bloody realms, it really has cost our Blue Star to pay quite a price. Although not all of them were geniuses, at least half of the people who died were the hope of their families. Normally Inheritance Realms have death rates of no more than 20%, but this one had a death rate of close to 60%. It really must have been a hard one."


    Then the principal continued, "Judging by how you''re acting and what we heard from the others, you should be the one who received the inheritance."


    Lin Fan knew that there was no point in hiding it since he had given such a dazzling performance, so he said, "Yes, it was me. However, I have no use for it, so I''m looking for someone to give it to."


    It was only Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong who were shocked by this. As for Zi Ling, naturally she had to act shocked as well, but she knew that Lin Fan had no use for this inheritance just based on how Ang followed him.


    Mu Bo Hai suggested, "How about you give it to me and I''ll submit it to the Union Government for you? They''ll keep it a secret and will find someone suitable for it. As well, you''ll also receive merit points that you can exchange for items with the Union Government."


    Lin Fan thought about it and agreed in the end.


    He would still be on this lower world for some time and the Union Government was the strongest force here. It was a good idea to stay on their good side because his family was still here, so he might need their help if anything happened.


    Of course, he didn''t forget to offer the inheritance to Boss Gao, Zi Ling, and Wang Da Dong first.


    Zi Ling just shook her head and said that it didn''t suit her.


    Wang Da Dong took a look at the inheritance and seeing that it was a spear inheritance as he expected, he also declined. He was more used to using his pan.


    As for Boss Gao, he had been interested in using the spear in the first ce, so he was indeed interested in this inheritance.


    Boss Gao hesitantly asked, "Is it really alright for me to take this?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "It''s fine, unless you''re unwilling to take it because you don''t take me as your brother."


    Boss Gao quickly said, "How could that be?" But he still hesitantly turned to Mu Bo Hai.


    Mu Bo Hai naturally knew what he was thinking, "It''s fine, you''re a talented young man and the Union Government wouldn''t mind it if you received this as well. Besides, Owner Lin is the one who owns it in the first ce, he has the right to give it to whoever he wants."


    Only then did Boss Gao take it without any hesitation.


    Since everything was settled, the only thing left for them to do was head back to Snow Wind City.<sub> </sub>


    Zi Ling would being with them since her ride home was still waiting in Snow Wind City.


    So they left the ce where the Inheritance Realm was, but if they had paid attention, they would have noticed that the Feng Family was also gone.


    The Feng Family had also heard who had received the inheritance and all the stories about that person''s might. Naturally they were able to put the clues together to realize that this person was Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had broken through to the tinum Realm and he was able tobine threews together, this wasn''t a good sign for their family.


    Unless they took drastic measures, they might be wiped out by Lin Fan soon.


    Pride and shame no longer mattered, all that mattered was their family being able to survive!


    ¡­


    When they arrived back in Snow Wind City, everyone scattered to head back to their own homes.


    Before leaving, Zi Ling told Lin Fan, "Young master, please be sure to reconnect to your family, it is important for your future."


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but before she could leave, he asked, "Wait, which family are you from? Let''s meet again some day."


    But Zi Ling shook her head and said, "It would be too embarrassing to show the young master my family, but we''ll surely meet again one day."


    At this, she turned to leave without even looking back once.


    Mu Bo Hai followed her off and when they were far away enough, he asked, "Lord Envoy, did you finish your mission?"


    Zi Ling didn''t stop, but she did say, "Yes, I''ve aplished my mission and the results are even better than I expected. You will receive a great reward this time."


    Mu Bo Hai revealed a look of joy as he said, "It''s an honour to help the Lord Envoy."


    Zi Ling fell into thought for a bit before saying, "There''s something else I need you to do for me as well."


    Mu Bo Hai quickly said with a look of wanting to please, "Lord Envoy, if there''s anything you need, please tell me."


    Zi Ling said, "Keep an eye on that Lin Fan for me. He is a very important person and if anything happens to him, both your and my head won''t be enough topensate for it. I repeat once again, make sure absolutely nothing happens to him."


    Mu Bo Hai''s eyes opened wide when he heard this. He had a look of disbelief as he said, "Is this rted to his master?"


    A trace of confusion shed in Zi Ling''s eyes, but it quickly disappeared as she said, "I don''t know who his master is, but Lin Fan himself is an important person in the upper realm. I can''t even fathom the wrath that would fall down on this lower realm if even a single hair on his head was touched."


    Mu Bo Hai''s eyes opened even wider, but he knew that it wasn''t his ce to question her, so he said, "Yes, Lord Envoy. We will ensure that nothing happens to Lin Fan."


    ¡­


    Lin Fan and Ang headed back to the pet shop.


    When they came in, Momonga was surprised to see them, so he asked, "Weren''t you supposed to be away for seven days?"


    Lin Fan exined, "It can take up to seven days for an Inheritance Realm, but the timing for them varies. This one only took three days."


    Momonga then asked, "Then are you opening the store today?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "No, we said that we would be away for seven days, so let''s close it for seven days. I need some time to organize the things I gained from the Inheritance Realm."


    Momonga nodded and knit his brows for a second before suddenly saying, "Oh, that''s right, there was a call from your family early. I didn''t get it in time, but the message they left sounded quite urgent."

 93 Chapter 93

    "Urgent? What do you mean by urgent?" Lin Fan asked in a confused voice.


    "Well the call came this morning and it sounded like something had happened. You can listen to it yourself if you want." Momonga went over to the store''s phone.


    The voicemail inbox was opened and he yed the message, "Lin Fan,e home if you can. There''s something we need to talk to you about."


    Lin Fan could tell by this voice that it was his father, but there seemed to be something strange with his tone. It was like he was unwilling to make this call, it almost seemed like he wanted Lin Fan to do the opposite of what he said.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows and thinking about what might have happened, but he really couldn''t think of anything.


    Still, since they called him, it must mean that something had happened since normally his family never interfered with the store.


    Lin Fan didn''t risk it and immediately went home.


    Ang could tell that something was wrong, so she quickly followed him.


    As for Momonga, he stayed since even if something happened, it usually was his job to watch the store which he honestly didn''t mind. There were plenty of new things to y with and all kinds of new food here, it was quitefy.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan arrived at his house, he found that the front door was unlocked and ajar.


    Judging by the mark left on it, it was clear that someone had broken in.


    Lin Fan immediately released his life energy and charged forward, but when he came in, he found that there was no one around. The only things that he saw were broken parts of the furniture lying all over the ground and a few shattered items like tes or vases.


    Whoever had broken in clearly didn''t have kind intentions and they definitely weren''t kind to the residents living here.


    Lin Fan ran upstairs, but he found that most of the rooms upstairs had been left untouched.


    Running back downstairs and heading into the kitchen, Lin Fan found that there was where most of the struggle had been.


    The breakfast that was on the table there was still warm, but there had been all kinds of tes and cutlery that had been thrown to the ground. On the table, there was a note that was pinned there with a needle.


    Lin Fan came up to the note and removed the needle, bringing it up to look over the contents.


    The contents of the letter was simple, but it created a rage thatpletely consumed him.


    The letter read, "Your family is waiting for you." At the bottom, it was signed with the word "Feng".


    Lin Fan never expected that a respected royal family would act in such a manner, they had actually kidnapped his family to force him toe to them!


    Lin Fan wanted to tear the note to pieces, he wanted to shatter the table, he wanted to do anything, but he forced himself to stay calm.


    Ang who had been following him also saw the letter and after thinking about it, she remembered that it was the family that had been harassing Lin Fan the entire time.


    She didn''t know why, but her hands suddenly clenched in anger as well. It might have been because she didn''t want to see Lin Fan in pain like this or maybe it was because of how his mother had treated her¡­


    Still, there was a me of rage that was burning inside of her when she read this note.


    Lin Fan calmly thought it through before raising his hand to make a few calls.


    Since the Feng Family wanted a war, he would give them one.


    A dragon had a reverse scale that couldn''t be touched. No one was allowed to touch it.


    ¡­


    Mu Bo Hai had just sent off the Lord Envoy when he suddenly received a call.<sub> </sub>


    When he picked up, he was shocked to hear that it was from Lin Fan. After all, they had just seen each other.


    Before he could even ask Lin Fan why he was calling, Lin Fan jumped right into the topic.


    "The Feng Family is holding my family hostage. How much trouble would I cause if I were to exterminate them?"


    Mu Bo Hai couldn''t believe what he was hearing, "Wait, wait, what do you mean by the Feng Family has kidnapped your family? Are you sure about this?"


    Lin Fan''s voice turned even colder, "How could I not be sure if they left a note provoking me?"


    Mu Bo Hai really didn''t know how to process this, but he did react fast as he said with a sigh, "Alright, I understand you''re angry, but it''ll be a big deal if you eliminate an entire tinum Family."


    Lin Fan replied in that ice cold voice, "Then what do you want me to do?"


    Mu Bo Hai quickly said, "I know you''re angry right now, I am too, I can''t believe that they would stoop so low. However, it is in times like this that we have to keep our calm. A tinum Realm family is not something that can be randomly created, each one is built up over time over hundreds of years. If you were to destroy one, it would destabilize the situation in Snow Wind City and it might even cause us to lose this stronghold. Moreover, you already know about the strange situation with the nar crack, we can''t afford to lose a guardian right now."


    Lin Fan responded, "Then you''re saying the Union Government would choose them over me?"


    Mu Bo Hai couldn''t help cursing in his mind.


    Choose them over you? Do you know how many Legendary Realm Experts felt the aura from that girl in your shop?


    The Union Government had already told Mu Bo Hai that they would be epting Lin Fan''s application to be a noble. When they also heard that Lin Fan was already in the tinum Realm, they even hinted at the possibility of increasing his title to a royal.


    To choose the Feng Family over this den of unknown experts was suicidal, there would be no way that they would do that.


    However, if possible, they would try to find a way to ensure that everyone could remain at peace.


    Mu Bo Hai quickly said, "Of course not, but the Union Government needs to consider the safety of the public as well. Like I said, if we suddenly lose a tinum Family, it would mean losing a strong fighting force for Snow Wind City and we just lost that noble family recently from them being traitors. Who knows what other traitors there might be in Snow Wind City? Please, I''m asking you to just stay calm for now and let us negotiate this matter. I promise you that I will give you an answer as soon as possible."


    But his pleas fell onto deaf ears. Lin Fan just said, "It''s good to hear that the consequences aren''t as serious as I thought. While I do worry about the people of Snow Wind City, this problem can be easily solved. I will take over for the Feng Family in protecting the people, this matter will not end with just negotiations. I will tell you that one thing is certain, the Feng Family will disappear from Snow Wind City today. It doesn''t matter what the Union Government wants, they have crossed my bottom line. That is all I have to say."


    Mu Bo Hai wanted to try to change his mind again, but before he could even say anything, Lin Fan had already hung up.


    "God damn it!"


    Mu Bo Hai couldn''t help cursing out loud.


    Just what was that Feng Family thinking! They just had to push Lin Fan over the line like this!


    If Lin Fan were to bring his master into this, could the Union Government even handle the consequences?


    No, Lin Fan wouldn''t bring his master into this since his master was still in hiding. However, just bringing Ang alone into this was already bad enough¡­


    Mu Bo Hai knew that he didn''t have any time to waste, he had to try to settle this as soon as possible.


    So with a headache pounding in his head, he quickly began making calls while rushing to the Union Government branch.


    One thing was certain, today would be a day of change for Snow Wind City.


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan hung up, he didn''t wait any longer.


    Mu Bo Hai was thest person he called and now it was time to go to war.


    Today, there would be a storm of blood.

 94 Chapter 94

    The first ce Lin Fan headed to was the pet store.


    After making the calls, there were people that were now gathered outside the store.


    When they saw Lin Fane over, they all had worried looks on their faces, but they still looked determined.


    The ones that were called were the Gao Family, the Wang Family, and a few nobles that were allied with either the Wang Family or Lin Fan, which included the Luo and Murong Families.


    Luo Qing was worried when she saw Lin Fan approaching with that dark look on his face, but she knew that she wouldn''t be able to help in this war at all since she was too weak.


    But her dad hade along with Uncle Zhang as soon as they heard that Lin Fan''s dad was being held hostage by the Feng Family. The bonds between these brothers ran quite deep.


    As for Lin Fan''s brothers, Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong both looked at him and when he looked back, they didn''t say anything as they both just nodded to him.


    Lin Fan thanked everyone foring and asked them to stay outside for a bit so he could get a few things from the shop first.


    When Lin Fan came in, Momonga was surprised to see him back so quickly.


    Momonga asked, "What''s going on? Also why are there so many people outside?"


    Lin Fan just simply said, "We''re going to war."


    Momonga was still confused as to who they were going to war with, but seeing the serious look on Lin Fan''s face, he knew there was no point in asking. He just said, "Are you certain this is what you want to do? There''s no going back once you reveal this power."


    Lin Fan just said, "They took my family and touched my bottom line, there will be no mercy."


    Family, that was a word that Momonga hadn''t heard in a long time.


    A long time ago before he was even turned into a lich, Momonga had been a human with a family. But it had been too long ago so he couldn''t even remember what they were like.


    If he had to assign something to the word family, it would be the group that he had gone around with all those years ago, Ainz Ooal Gown. They were the closest thing to a family he had.


    But of course, the one person he would always remember would be his mother from his life as a human.


    The warmth and gentleness of her love for him had left a deep impression that hadsted through the ages. He would never forget that one moment of putting his head in her chest and just feeling her love.


    Lin Fan''s parents had actually invited him over once and he felt the same warmth he had felt from his mother from their family. He could tell that they were a very close family and they loved each other very much, which moved him quite a bit.


    Of course, he had also secretly snuck a peek into the little sister''s room and had found something quite interesting which made him want to see him. Of course, he wouldn''t tell Lin Fan about it since it wouldn''t be interesting that way.


    Then there was the concept of family from his memories of long, long ago, from a time when he seemed to have lived in another world¡­


    After a bit of thought, Momonga gave Lin Fan a nod and asked, "What do you want us to do?"


    Lin Fan was consumed with rage, but of course he didn''t lose his reasoning. It wasn''t the time to reveal his full strength yet, but he should release a bit to make sure no one would dare touch his family again.


    So Lin Fan gave his instructions to Momonga before walking out with him.


    Looking at everyone gathered outside, he was surprised to see that there were now the three vice principals from Lin Yue''s school who were also here.


    When the three of them saw him look over, Tang Wen said, "Student Lin is one of the students of our school, we can''t just turn a blind eye to this."


    Lin Fan looked at them for a bit, but he didn''t say anything. He knew that this was the principal''s way of showing his support.


    And so, he led all of these people off towards the Feng Family''s manor.


    Along the way, many people pointed at them as they saw all these experts gathered together. All the people in this group were famous in Snow Wind City and now that they were all gathered together, it naturally created arge scene.<sub> </sub>


    There were also spies from the other two royal families who were following their group. The sh between two royal families would definitely change the scope of Snow Wind City, this was something they had no choice but to pay attention to.


    ¡­


    In a building not far from the Feng Manor, there were two men sitting there waiting for Lin Fan''s group to arrive.


    The first man who seemed like a weak schr said, "How do you think today will end?"


    The second man who was quiterge and muscr gave a shrug, "Who knows, I don''t know enough about that Lin Fan kid. It''s said that he has arge force behind him, but who knows if the rumours are true."


    The first man then gave a sigh, "But no matter what, this will change Snow Wind City¡­"


    The second man gave another shrug, "Once again, it doesn''t matter. All that matters is that we make sure nothing happens to that Lin Fan kid like Lord Mu says."


    These two were the family heads of thest two royal families of Snow Wind City.


    Since Mu Bo Hai had received special instructions from the Lord Envoy that nothing was to happen to Lin Fan, even though he knew that the Feng Family would be destroyed today, he still arranged protection for Lin Fan.


    It was all based on the slight chance that an ident could happen¡­


    ¡­


    The first thing Lin Fan did when he arrived was gather all his energy into a single punch that sted down the gates of the Feng Manor.


    The guards that had been there just stared at him in shock before shouting out, "Do you know where you are! This is the Feng Manor!" But after the smoke cleared, they saw therge group of experts standing behind Lin Fan and they couldn''t stop their legs from turning soft.


    Just what was going on here?


    They were just simple guards, so they had no idea what the upper echelon of the Feng Family had done, but they knew that it wasn''t their ce to interrupt here.


    Lin Fan didn''t even spare these guards who had been hired. With a single palm, these two guards had been turned into meat pancakes.


    Then he turned back to the Feng Manor and shouted, "I''m here now! Do you trash dare show your face!"


    The door to the Feng Manor suddenly swung open and out came Feng Yu, walking in a confident manner.


    Feng Yu didn''t seem worried at all when he saw all the experts that hade with Lin Fan as he slowly walked forward. When he was only a few meters away from Lin Fan, he suddenly gave a snap and experts jumped out to fall in line behind him.


    Both sides had gathered and were now staring daggers at the other side. There was a storm brewing in the undercurrent and it was about to erupt.


    But before they could even start, Feng Yu suddenly raised his hand and wagged his finger, "Ze, ze, you shouldn''t be in such a rush to start a fight. Did you forget about your family?" At this, he revealed a cold smile.


    Lin Fan''s eye twitched, but he didn''t make a move. Feng Yu was right, as long as his family were in the hands of the Feng Family, he couldn''t act too rashly or he would put them in danger.


    Lin Fan gritted his teeth as he suppressed his anger and said, "I never thought that for royals, you would be scum. Kidnapping families, that isn''t something that even beasts would do!"


    But Feng Yu didn''t mind this as he kept wagging his finger, "Ze, ze, you really should learn how to speak with courtesy when you''re asking someone for something. Now, now, don''t be angry. You might make my friend so scared that his hand might slip." Once his voice fell, he gave a snap.


    There was a panel that opened on the roof of the Feng Manor and a tform came out.


    When the tform reached the top, there was Feng Tu with three figures on crosses with three people holding des up to them.


    Those three people were people that Lin Fan recognized very well.


    When they saw Lin Fan, one of them called out, "Fan''er!"

 95 Chapter 95

    Lin Fan saw his three family members being tied up on the poles and he tightly clenched his fists.


    He turned to them and shouted, "Don''t worry, I will get you all down and bring you home safely!"


    But his mother shouted, "Fan''er, don''t worry about us, just go!"


    But Lin Fan shouted, "Don''t worry, just believe in me and I''ll get you out of this!"


    His mother wanted to say something else, but seeing the determined look on his face, she didn''t know what to say.


    As for his father, he knew that there were things between men that couldn''t be said. When he saw Lin Fan show up with everyone behind him, he knew that Lin Fan had some secret he had been keeping from them. But he also knew that as men, they should have secrets, so he silently epted his son''s secret.


    Then there was Lin Yue, who while looked calm and cold on the surface was actually worried about Lin Fan right now.


    Why had they been kidnapped?


    Why were these people looking to hurt her big brother?


    Moreover, why was she so weak that she couldn''t beat them all up?


    Feng Yu just had the same cold smile on his face as he began pping and he said, "Well, well, isn''t this all very touching? But unfortunately, this isn''t the time for this."


    Lin Fan turned back to Feng Yu, "What do you want? Or do you really think you would win in a fight against us?"


    p Feng Yu suddenly raised his hand and wagged his finger, "Ze, ze, there''s no need to be in such a rush. Before that, how about we y a game?"</anda>


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at Feng Yu, trying to see through him, but he couldn''t see any clues, "What kind of game?"


    Feng Yu''s smile became wider as he said, "Well, it''s a very simple game. We''ll be ying a game of Simon Says and as long as you follow along, I''m sure the hands of my subordinates up there won''t slip. I''m sure we wouldn''t want anything to happen to the pretty face that your little sister has, right?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes filled with rage as he roared, "Your Feng Family truly is shameless!"


    At this, Feng Yu''s smile disappeared and he said, "We might be shameless, but we will be the one who survives in the end. In the end, only the winner will be able to write history while the losers will turn into dust in the yellow springs."


    Lin Fan could tell that he was serious. The Feng Family had been pushed beyond their bottom line, at this point they were fighting for their survival. Prestige meant nothing to them.


    Lin Fan wanted to smash Feng Yu into the ground, but right now he couldn''t since Feng Yu was holding every card. For now, the only thing he could do was endure.


    He gritted his teeth and said, "Alright, I''ll y your game."


    Feng Yu gave a p and revealed a smile once again, "Good, good, it''s always a good sign when someone is willing to cooperate. I really do hate seeing blood and creating a mess."


    Then Feng Yu''s tone changed, as it was filled with a domineering tone, "First, Simon says kneel down in front of me."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a hard gaze, but when Feng Yu just pointed to the three on the roof with a smile, Lin Fan clenched his fists and came forward. He arrived in front of Feng Yu and fell to one knee.


    Feng Yu just smiled as he patted Lin Fan''s cheek, "Now, now, that''s not right. I said kneel, not fall to one knee. I''m sure you wouldn''t want anything to happen to the hostages, right?"


    Lin Fan looked right into his eyes and after three seconds, he fell down to both knees and his head came down.


    Seeing this, his mother broke out in tears, while his father just firmly looked on. As for his little sister, there was a cold killing intent that filled her eyes.


    Feng Yu broke out inughter when he saw this, "Now that''s the way to do it! You really are good at ying games!"


    Then he stopped and he said, "Now, Simon says kowtow to me and apologize for killing my father. Then beg for me to release your family."


    Lin Fan gritted his teeth with his head lowered, but still he fully brought his head down.


    Once his head was on the ground, he said, "I''m sorry for killing Lord Feng. Please, please let my family go."<sub> </sub>


    Feng Yu once again broke out inughter and gave an apuse, "Ha, ha, you really are great! You may call us shameless, but I don''t think you would lose whenpared to us!"


    Then he came forward and stepped on Lin Fan''s head, pressing it into the ground.


    Lin Fan had his teeth gritted so hard that they were about to crack, but still he continued to hold on.


    Once Feng Yu had enough of stepping on him, he took a step back and called for a servant toe over.


    The servant quickly ran over with arge stick that was covered in wire, but based on the life energy that wasing from it, it wasn''t just a normal stick and it wasn''t just normal wire covering it. This was clearly some kind of artifact.


    Feng Yu took the stick with both hands and said with a smile, "Well Simon says that you can get up."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but still he got up. The moment he did, he understood why Feng Yu wanted him to get up.


    Feng Yu then said, "Simon says, don''t move and don''t defend."


    Just seven simple words, but they were filled with malice.


    Lin Fan knew what wasing next, but still he also knew that he could take it.


    Feng Yu came forward with a smile once again and raised the stick high above his head before bringing it down right on Lin Fan''s shoulder.


    Lin Fan''s expression didn''t change at all as he took that blow and based on the blood that came out, it really looked like it hurt. However, Feng Yu wasn''t done yet.


    As soon as the batnded, the wires suddenly began twisting and with their sharp barbs, they dug into Lin Fan''s skin, drawing out even more blood.


    But even through all of that, Lin Fan''s expression didn''t change at all.


    Feng Yu revealed an amused look, "Ho, ho, it seems like you''re quite sturdy. I want to see how long you can keep that same expression on your face."


    Then with that, he pulled back the stick once again and mmed it down on Lin Fan''s head. But even after smashing Lin Fan''s head, he didn''t move at all as he continued to stand straight, looking right into Feng Yu''s eyes.


    Seeing those eyes that were filled with determination, the rage that burned inside Feng Yu began burning stronger and stronger. It became a wild fire that roared through the ins that was his heart, never ending as it consumed every single bit of it.


    At first Feng Yu was quite calm, but after a few seconds of seeing Lin Fan stare right at him, he was consumed by his rage more and more until he began wildly swinging at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan waspletely covered in blood, but his back never bent and his gaze never changed. He just stood there like a statue, staring right into Feng Yu''s eyes.


    As this gaze continued to stare him down, there was a trace of fear that soon appeared inside Feng Yu''s heart.


    Lin Fan''s brothers and friends couldn''t stand watching this and most of them turned away during this. As for the allies of his brothers and friends, even they winced a bit when they saw this. But they were also filled with admiration for Lin Fan, since a man who was willing to go this far for his family was definitely not a bad person.


    Even the Feng Family''s allies almost couldn''t stand watching this. They knew that they were the viins, but still they couldn''t stand watching this kind of scene.


    They were also touched by Lin Fan''s disy for his family. If only they could be allies with someone like that, they would have nothing to worry about.


    Unfortunately they had already made their bed, so they had no choice but to lie in it.


    Feng Yu continued to swing at Lin Fan again and again and each swing drew even more blood.


    But every time, Lin Fan never wince, never backed down, he just took it all silently.


    But as time passed, things had to change eventually.


    After five minutes passed, Lin Fan suddenly grabbed Feng Yu''s stick and roared out, "This ends now!"

 96 Chapter 96

    Feng Yu''s eyes were still filled with rage and he was panting from beating down on Lin Fan, with a bit of foam at the corners of his mouth.


    He was about to roar out, but before he could even make a sound, Lin Fan''s fist had already made contact.


    Lin Fan''s fistnded right in the center of his chest, right in the center of his dantian. Once it made contact, it immediately shattered it and all his life energy started to scatter!


    With just a single punch, Lin Fan had crippled Feng Yu!


    As Feng Yu flew back from the force of Lin Fan''s punch, his eyes were filled with disbelief. Even up to thest second, he couldn''t believe that Lin Fan would cripple him like this!


    "Lin Fan!" Feng Tu flew into a rage, but deep down he was also shocked. They were holding all the cards and Lin Fan had been so obedient up to this point, just what had changed?


    Feng Tu quickly moved over to the three poles, but when he turned to look at them, he was shocked to find that they were empty and his three subordinates were nothing more than corpses on the ground.


    Just what had happened?


    Someone had snuck in under his senses and had killed all three subordinates without making a single sound!


    Just what kind of expert would be required to do this!


    If it was someone in the tinum Realm, they must have been cultivating a speed cultivation technique to move so quickly.


    But if it was someone in the Legendary Realm¡­


    Feng Tu broke out in cold sweat when he thought of this and he quickly shook his head.


    If there was a Legendary Realm Expert here, was there even a fight worth fighting?


    During Feng Tu''s minor breakdown, Ang had appeared by Lin Fan''s side with his family.


    When she saw the blood thatpletely covered him, she couldn''t help knitting her brows, but she didn''t say a single word. Ang just raised her hand and sent out a healing wind that swept over all his wounds.


    In truth, Lin Fan''s wounds weren''t actually that serious.


    No matter how it was said, in the end, Feng Yu was only in the Gold Realm. Even if he was in the peak Gold Realm and he had a tinum Realm Artifact, Lin Fan was someone with a bodyparable to the Fragmented Soul Realm!


    When he had been beaten by Feng Yu, he used his life energy under his skin to create light injuries that produced blood, making it seem like he was being beaten up. In reality, he could heal himself with just a single cycle of his cultivation technique, but since Ang had already healed him, there was no need.


    The only reason he had put on that y was that he had sent Ang to free his family from the beginning, all he had to do was buy time.


    Even though she saw him being healed, Lin Fan''s mother quickly ran forward and looked all over Lin Fan. Only when she made sure that he wasn''t hurt did she calm down, but then she revealed an angry look and was about to p him on the head.


    Lin Fan just stood there to take it since he knew he deserved this, but what surprised him was that his father was the one who came forward to stop her.


    Lin Ao just held his wife''s hand as he stared at his son. After a few seconds of silence, he said, "Do what you have to do. Sometimes a man has to keep his secrets."


    Then with a pause, he said, "But you should know that you can rely on your family when you''re in trouble."


    Without saying another word, he fist bumped Lin Fan on his chest as he walked by, moving over to where Luo Wang and Uncle Zhang were standing, bringing his wife along with him.


    Yue Qingrou clearly seemed like she had more to say, but she could tell that Lin Ao had already made up her mind. She just gave a sigh and followed her husband.


    As for Lin Yue, while she seemed cold and aloof on the surface, the way she dragged her feet was clear enough to show that she was unwilling to go.


    While they were walking away, Lin Fan spoke in a voice that wasn''t loud or soft, but they could still hear it clearly, "I promise, I''ll exin after this is all over."


    Lin Ao just raised his hand and gave Lin Fan a thumbs up without turning back.


    There was no need for words, this was the bond between men. This was the bond between father and son.<sub> </sub>


    Meanwhile, during this time, Feng Tu had jumped off the roof andnded among the Feng Family allies.


    Since they had lost their trump card, they had no choice but to fight and they would fight since they wouldn''t let their family be destroyed just like this!


    Feng Tu released his aura and pointed at Lin Fan, "It''s fine if you take them back. I already said it before, I will kill you. Do you know what royals really are?"


    Lin Fan raised a brow since he really didn''t know, he only knew that the minimum requirement for bing a royal was to have a tinum Realm Expert, he didn''t know that there were other conditions involved.


    Feng Tu suddenly pulled out a sword that had a vague green outline over it.


    A vague outline, that was the sign of the life energy of a Legendary Realm Expert!


    This meant that this sword that he just pulled out was a Legendary Realm Artifact!


    Lin Fan suddenly narrowed his eyes in vignce when he saw this.


    Feng Tu revealed a cold smile as he said, "We royals are the descendants of Legendary Realm Experts! When we''re pushed into a corner, we won''t go down that easy!"


    Feng Tu knew that he had no other choice now, he had to bring out the family protecting artifact, otherwise there wouldn''t be a family to protect!


    In truth, most of the royals that were currently in this world were descendants of Legendary Realm Experts. The reason why they degraded down to royals was that while they had received the inheritances of those Legendary Realm ancestors, there was ack of talent in theter generations. So once those Legendary Realm ancestors either passed or moved on to the upper realm, their families gradually decayed to their current state.


    The Legendary Realm Expert of the Feng Family was one that was only moderately talented, reaching the Legendary Realm was already his peak. Once he passed he left behind his famous weapon, this Zephyr de for his family.


    The Wang Family that supported Lin Fan was also one that had descended from a Legendary Realm Expert and they had their own family protecting treasure, but unfortunately it was only a single branch that was currently supporting Lin Fan right now. Even if it was the main branch of the family head, it still didn''t mean they had enough authority to bring out their family protecting treasure.


    So in an instant, Lin Fan''s side was ced at a disadvantage.


    Of course, that was only the case if they didn''t include the power of Lin Fan''s store.


    Ang saw this and was prepared to fight Feng Tu, but Lin Fan spoke first.


    He said, "Ang, Momonga, track down the ones that are fleeing right now and kill them all. I already said that we would erase them today, we won''t let a single fly escape."


    Seeing the determined look in his eyes, Ang knew that she could only follow his orders.


    As for Momonga, he wasn''t nning on interfering in the first ce unless it was necessary since his cultivation technique was rather easier to see through. Moreover, most people thought that those who cultivated dark cultivation techniques were quite dirty, so they chose to avoid them.


    The two of them looked at each other and jumped off in different directions with a nod.


    Momonga headed off into the distance while Ang disappeared with a breeze.


    As for Lin Fan he just continued staring at Feng Tu, as he said, "Well, let''s start then."


    Feng Tu also couldn''t wait any longer, so he charged forward with his sword and a roar, shing down at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan quickly condensed the gauntlet made of three differentws and punched out at the sword approaching him, but there was a hint of danger that made him realize his mistake.


    His body was at the Fragmented Soul Realm, but thebination ofws was only at the Primary Soul Realm, while thews that covered the sword was at the Fragmented Soul Realm, allowing it to break through hisws and his body to injure him.


    Luckily Lin Fan reacted in time to twist his arm to avoid direct contact with the sword, so there was only a slight cut on his arm, but this was enough to wake Lin Fan up.


    He began regretting sending Ang and Momonga away since he had realized that he had been too confident.


    In the past, he had relied on his physique to push back against his opponents, but now that he had met an opponent that could break through that, he couldn''t use the same strategies anymore.


    For once, Lin Fan was actually in a bind.

 97 Chapter 97

    Lin Fan quickly tried to think of a way out of this situation, but he really couldn''t find a solution.


    The only way out was to find a weapon that could match the Legendary Realm Artifact that Feng Tu was using since he couldn''t fight it with his bare fist.


    But the problem was that every single Legendary Realm Artifact in the point store cost at least ten million points. Even after opening his store for this long, his entire worth was only five million points.


    As for the artifacts that he had stolen from all the people he killed in the Inheritance Trial, the strongest one was only in the Gold Realm.


    The only other thing that he could think of was summoning his pets and integrating the power of theirws into him, just like he had done in the Inheritance Realm.


    However the one drawback with that was that he still couldn''t control that power. If he were to mess up, that would leave him injured and at the mercy of Feng Tu''s weapon.


    But as his mind raced, he suddenly thought of something he had picked up in the Inheritance Realm.


    It was something that Ang had found for him. Back then, he kept it even though he didn''t believe her, but now it seemed like it might be his saving grace.


    As Feng Tu approached again, Lin Fan suddenly pulled out a giant bone club from his storage and wielded it like a giant sword.


    Feng Tu was surprised by this, but he didn''t falter since he had absolute faith in his family''s protecting artifact. It was an artifact that was in the Legendary Realm, that was already the peak of this world!


    Even though he didn''t know that there were separations in the Legendary Realm and the highest realm one could reach in this lower realm was the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    The two charged forth at each other, both swinging their weapons at each other. The weapons continued to approach until they shed.


    Everyone honestly expected the Zephyr Sword to cut straight through the bone that Lin Fan had brought out, but surprisingly neither side was pushed back as sparks flew out from the crash.


    After they continued to evenly push against each other for a few seconds, both sides were pushed back from the collision.


    Once they both slid back far enough, both were looking down at their weapons in surprise.


    Lin Fan was shocked that this giant bone was actually able to sh against the Legendary Realm Artifact, it really was shocking.


    This also made Lin Fan revise his thoughts. While Ang seemed like a rough girl who behaved like a gori that only depended on her strength, her instincts were indeed quite sharp.


    He also suddenly felt a bit of regret for not trusting in her instincts before, while also thinking about what she had said about Zi Ling.


    Maybe he had been too trusting of her?


    As for Feng Tu, he was looking down at the Zephyr de in surprise because the sh with the giant bone had actually chipped it!


    This was their family protecting artifact, it was something handed down to them from their ancestor, how could it chip just like this!


    That thing that brat was using wasn''t even a real weapon, it was nothing more than a giant bone!


    Feng Tu just shook his head, desperately denying the truth that was ced in front of his eyes. He refused to believe that he wouldn''t be able to defeat this brat even with their family''s greatest power.


    Once he steeled himself again, Feng Tu charged forth once again, bringing the sword high up above his head before swinging down with every bit of his might.


    In response to this, the vague outline around his sword seemed to increase in size, like there was more power being drawn out of the sword.


    But Lin Fan was no longer afraid since he decided to put his faith in Ang.


    During their time together, she had slowly taken a special ce in his heart that even he couldn''t describe, so the faith he had in her was quite deep.


    They shed once again and once again it was an even match.


    They continued like this for several rounds, but over time, Lin Fan found that he was slowly gaining the advantage.


    Now that he didn''t need to worry about the might of the Legendary Realm Artifact, he found that it didn''t really increase Feng Tu''s speed or reactions at all.<sub> </sub>


    Now that Lin Fan was in the tinum Realm and he had threews boosting him, he was actually faster than Feng Tu, so slowly he began pushing him back.


    At the same time, Feng Tu could see more and more chips appearing on the Zephyr de and he knew that if this continued, he would be ced in a bad position. However, there really was nothing he could do since Lin Fan waspletely suppressing him.


    Feng Tu was someone who walked the path of a weapon cultivator, so he could summon his pets out to imbue his sword with more power, but his sword was a Legendary Realm Artifact, so the power from a tinum Realm pet wouldn''t be much of an increase.


    Eventually, Feng Tu was pushed back to the point where he had no choice but to retreat.


    Feng Tu quickly moved away from Lin Fan andnded where his allies were supposedly waiting, but the moment hended among them, he found something shocking.


    All around him, covering the ground were corpses and people who were half dead, struggling just to stay alive.


    It had only been a few minutes, but somehow all of them had been ughtered¡­


    Feng Tu wildly looked around, but he couldn''t see a single person here. Just who had done this?


    Lin Fan''s allies had clearly seen everything that had happened.


    It was only one person at first suddenly losing their head, but soon there was one person being knocked down after the other. They didn''t even see a sh of light, it was just a sudden burst of blood before a head flew off or that person suddenly fell to the ground, critically injured.


    Eventually, every single person was on the ground and it was like a scene from hell with how the heads decorated the ground and people were calling out to be put out of their misery.


    They had seen it all happen, but they couldn''t make sense of it at all.


    But as for Feng Tu, he had no time to care since Lin Fan was pressing down on him. Lin Fan continued to swing down with the bone onto the Zephyr de, creating more and more chips on the edge of the de.


    Eventually, the de couldn''t take it anymore and finally cracked right in the center, breaking right down the middle.


    <o>,m Feng Tu was shocked as he stared at the half broken de in his hand.</o>


    The vague outline around the de quickly retracted until itpletely disappeared.


    Now he had nothing to protect against Lin Fan''s attacks!


    Lin Fan saw this chance and didn''t waste any time as he mmed the bone down on Feng Tu''s chest, mming him down into the ground and forcing him to spit out a mouthful of blood.


    Only at this moment did Feng Tu have a look of regret, but he couldn''t do anything now. The only thing he could was ept the consequences without struggling, hoping that Lin Fan wouldn''t notice anything. Then he remembered that Lin Fan had sent out two helpers¡­


    Feng Tu looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and asked, "Are you going for them?"


    Lin Fan looked right into his eyes and didn''t say anything as he just gave a nod.


    The reason why the Feng Family elders hadn''t been here was that they were escorting the other members of the family away just in case of a worst case scenario. No matter what, the bloodline of the family had to survive.


    But unfortunately for them, Lin Fan had already condemned their family to be erased the moment they touched his family.


    A dragon''s reverse scale couldn''t be touched, a man always had a bottom line.


    Feng Tu looked at him before suddenly breaking out inughter, "Who would have thought that the great Feng Family that hadsted for eight hundred years would fall at the hand of a kid like you! Finish it!"


    Lin Fan could tell that he had beenpletely broken, so without any courtesy, he raised the bone up and was about to bring it down when he was suddenly interrupted.


    "Stop!"


    It was Mu Bo Hai and he had arrived with two other old men who seemed just as strong as him.


    Mu Bo Hai said, "Lin Fan, I know what they have done, but can you give me face this one time and let them go?"

 98 Chapter 98

    Lin Fan suddenly revealed what could be considered a warm smile as he looked at Mu Bo Hai.


    Mu Bo Hai saw this and he thought that there would be a chance for negotiations, but what happened nextpletely shocked him.


    Lin Fan''s hand had already been raised since he was prepared to finish Feng Tu off. At first he slowly brought it down like he was prepared to let Feng Tu off, but suddenly it fell with incredible force, bringing the bone down right onto Feng Tu''s head.


    Feng Tu had had eyes of hope when he saw Mu Bo Hai appear. Those eyes of hope had been staring at Mu Bo Hai until he heard the sounds of the bone suddenly moving faster. Those eyes filled with hope had turned just to see his final moments of despair as the bonended right in between his eyes.


    The bone continued to smash down on his head until it shattered his skull and popped his head, creating a ssh of blood and brain matter that stained the ground. Once his head had been popped, his body lifelessly dropped to the ground, perfectly lining up with the ssh of blood and bone that had been his body.


    In his final moments, he had been given the hope of life, but it had been taken away just like that. How could Feng Tu have died willingly?


    He might have had peace if he had died after working up his conviction to die, but now that he had been given false hope, it shattered that conviction.


    That was how a man who had acted arrogantly his entire life and bullied others with his position had finally lost his life.


    Mu Bo Hai''s hopeful look turned ugly and the two old men who had been with him suddenly came forward as one of them said, "You!"


    But before they could do a thing, Ang released her stealth and suddenly appeared by Lin Fan''s side.


    Mu Bo Hai''s eyes still ached from the beating, so he quickly raised his hand to stop them.


    They looked at him in surprise, but once they felt the aura that wasing from Ang, they knew that Mu Bo Hai had just saved them.


    Mu Bo Hai looked down on the corpse of Feng Tu on the ground before shaking his head with a sigh and saying, "I really wish you hadn''t done that¡­"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at Mu Bo Hai, "I already told you that I would wipe out their family today, there was no other way. They had already crossed my bottom line."


    Still Mu Bo Hai gave a sigh, "I know, but if he was still alive, the situation would be easier for the Union Government to ept."


    Lin Fan''s eyes filled with a cold glint, "But you and I both know that if he was left alive, he would have been a danger to me and my family in the future."


    Mu Bo Hai looked right back into his eyes, "Don''t you trust the Union Government? We have been protecting the Blue Star for thousands of years, don''t you think that we know what we''re doing?"


    Lin Fan said in the same cold voice, "The safest hands are my own. Who knows what will happen one day?"


    For some reason, it was like the impulse to protect that he had when he saw the weak. When he was being challenged like this, there was an impulse thatpletely took over him and filled him with arrogance.


    He didn''t know where these impulses came from, but in a way, he also could tell that he couldn''t suppress them at all. It was like these impulses came from the depths of his soul. Or, they could even be considered the real him¡­


    Mu Bo Hai knew that there was no talking to Lin Fan like this, so he tried to reason with him instead, "But doesn''t this go against what your master wants? Doesn''t your master want to find a quiet ce to recover his strength? If you keep creating waves like this, even the Union Government can''t keep suppressing them, you know? It''ll be really troublesome when the upper realm gets involved."


    Thinking of the upper realm, Lin Fan suddenly calmed down a bit. When he met the young masters of the factions in the Inheritance Realm, they were already in the Legendary Realm. He could imagine what realm the elders or even the heads of their families would be at.


    If they were toe down, Lin Fan would either be captured or forced to reveal the true strength he had in his shop, namely the power from other races. Once that was revealed, Lin Fan would definitely bebeled as a traitor to the human race and chased off this world.


    Unfortunately, he still hadn''t established another branch or did he have the ability to move his shop, so he had no choice but to remain on this world. Without his shop, he definitely would not be strong enough to protect all he cared about.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan took a deep breath before calmly saying, "I know what you want to say, there''s no point in mentioning useless things like this. Just tell me what conditions the Union Government has made."


    Mu Bo Hai nodded in praise, "Sharp eyes, that''s what I like about you. Very good, there''s good news and bad news, which one do you want to hear first?"


    Lin Fan raised his brow, but he still said, "Let''s hear the good news first then."


    Mu Bo Hai said with a smile, "Congrattions, the Union Government has approved of your application and from now on, you and your family will be nobles."


    Lin Fan knit his brows slightly at this, but he didn''t respond to it. Lin Fan just said, "What''s the bad news then?"


    Mu Bo Hai''s smile suddenly turned bitter as he said, "The bad news is that you have to paypensation for wiping out the Feng Family, namely you have to take over their part in protecting Snow Wind City. Of course, we know that you''re not someone who will stay on this lower realm for long, so we won''t force you to stay. The only thing we''re asking is for the service of your pet shop."


    Lin Fan had a confused look, "What service do you want?"


    Mu Bo Hai''s expression suddenly turned serious, "What else could it be? We want you to train or breed pets. To put it simply, you have to provide a certain amount of pets to the three royal families that are left and bolster their forces to make up for the loss created by the destruction of the Feng Family."


    Lin Fan revealed a look of understanding and gave a nod.


    This was rather simple, since he already had four tinum Realm bloodline pets and several dozen Gold Realm pets, as well as plenty of ingredients that he didn''t have. Even if they asked for more, it was very easy for him to breed more since he had everything he needed for them.


    Lin Fan just calmly asked, "How much?"


    Mu Bo Hai''s expression was still serious as he said, "Three tinum Realm pets and ten Gold Realm pets for all three families, that is the bottom line that the Union Government is willing to ept. What do you say, Owner Lin?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile at that, "That''s no problem at all, I already have a tinum Realm pet for each of them and I have all the Gold Realm pets, but unfortunately they still haven''t grown up yet."


    Mu Bo Hai shook his head, "No that''s fine, as long as they''re pets with tinum and Gold Realm bloodlines, it''s already enough."


    Then he gave a sigh and said, "Why does it feel like this is too cheap for you? It doesn''t seem like a punishment at all."


    Lin Fan said with a sly smile, "Then do you want to push your luck and ask for me?"


    Mu Bo Hai looked at Ang who was cracking her knuckles from behind Lin Fan and he quickly shook his hands, "Of course not, of course not, we''re already satisfied."


    Then it was like he had thought of something, "Of course, we also need to take the Legendary Realm Artifact of the Feng Family."


    Lin Fan turned to look at the broken Zephyr de on the ground before asking in a confused voice, "What do you need that broken de for?"


    Mu Bo Hai said in a voice filled with deep meaning, "We have our uses, let''s just leave it at that."


    Lin Fan could guess what they would use it for, but he didn''t mind since he had no need for it anyway. Even if he could use it, he disdained from using it because he would think of the trash Feng Family every time.


    So just like that, one of the four royal families of Snow Wind City had fallen and just like that, Lin Fan''s pet shop had be legendary to the residents of the city.


    From this day forth, no one in Snow Wind City would dare provoke him.

 99 Chapter 99

    Once that was settled, now it was all about taking care of the Feng Family''s properties.


    While they didn''t really do anything, most of the allies that came with Lin Fan hade to earn benefits. They all wanted a part of the Feng Family''s assets and properties. After all, the Feng Family had been one of the four royal cities who ran the city, it could be said that they earned more than 20% of the businesses in the city.


    Once Momonga came back, he brought back a Storage Ring with him that he threw to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan searched through the ring and found that it contained quite a bit of items, it even contained more than he had expected. It seemed like the treasures royal families had wasn''t something to look down on.


    He took out half of the items and split them among the various allies that hade to help. Then he took out the deeds and split them among the various families, leaving most of them for the Wang Family.


    Since he took Wang Da Dong as his brother, he wouldn''t be petty with his brother and their family.


    But since Wang Da Dong had also taken him as a brother, he wouldn''t cheat his brother.


    The Wang Family would take their share and then run the businesses that Lin Fan owned for him, sharing the profit they earned between the two of them, with Lin Fan taking arger portion.


    While this seemed like a bad deal for the Wang Family, with this extra increase in businesses, they now controlled over 30% of the businesses in the city, which meant they were now the richest and most influential family in the city.


    Now that everything had been settled, everyone went off in different directions as they returned to their families.


    Only Boss Gao and Wang Da Dong followed Lin Fan back to the store where he had sent his family.


    There were elders of the Wang Family that had arrived, but when they tried to talk to Lin Fan, all they received were a few curt words of courtesy. They knew that they had missed out on a big chance, but still they wereforted when they saw the business deeds that their head had received.


    They all made a vow in their hearts that they would follow the head''s branch from now on. With a big backer like Lin Fan behind them, they would be stupid if they didn''t follow him!


    Lin Fan arrived at his store and he saw his friends and family waiting there.


    His mother had been pacing around in circles while his father had been sitting in silence with his brothers. As for his little sister, she had somehow found the baby pets that he had hidden in the back and was bullying them, pinching their chubby cheeks.


    When they saw Lin Fane through the door, his mother immediately came up to him and looked him all over before jumping onto Ang.


    Ang was surprised, but somehow she didn''t reject it. Rather when she was being looked over by Lin Fan''s mother, she felt a warm feelinge from the bottom of her heart.


    Momonga revealed a faint smile when he saw this, but when he tried to move to the side, he was suddenly grabbed by the cor by Lin Fan''s mother. He had a look of surprise as he was pulled in front of her and she looked over him as well.


    Just like Ang, he also felt a warm feelinge from the bottom of his heart.


    Wang Da Dong and Boss Gao weren''t an exception to this as they were also both pulled in front of Lin Fan''s mother.


    When she was finally done, she immediately went back to Lin Fan and angrily said, "Xiao Fan, just what kind of dangerous things have you been up to! You will exin everything to me right this instant! Don''t think you can get away today if you don''t exin everything!"


    But suddenly Lin Fan''s father cut her off, "Qingrou, stop! Give the boy some room and let him talk first!"


    Lin Fan''s mother stopped and stared at Lin Fan''s dad with an aggrieved look, but still she moved aside.


    Lin Fan''s father turned to Lin Fan and pointed to the chair in front of him, "Sit and let''s talk."


    These few words might have been simple, but the power they contained was somethingpletely different.


    They might have been father and son, but at this moment, this was a talk between men.


    Lin Fan nodded and walked over to sit in the chair. He looked at his father and both of them just sat in silence for a bit.<sub> </sub>


    The others sitting there felt awkward and wanted to say something to start the conversation, but no one knew what to say. Whenever they were about to say something, they saw the look between the father and son and swallowed their words.


    Finally Lin Ao broke the silence by saying, "Just tell us what you want to tell us, that will be enough."


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "I''m actually in the tinum Realm."


    For his brothers that knew Lin Fan''s power and his employees, they weren''t shocked by this, but everyone else was.


    There was no need to mention his parents since they knew nothing about his cultivation at all, but even his sister was shocked since she had only seen him in the Gold Realm just over a month ago. In a single month, he had broken through to the tinum Realm!


    There was a deep fire that burned inside her, she knew that if she cked any longer, she would fall far behind him and would never have the right to stand by his side.


    Luo Qing had also been here, she had been patiently waiting for Lin Fan toe back. Hearing his confession, she felt that he was getting further and further away from him. There was a deep feeling that told her that if she didn''t do anything, she wouldn''t be able to stay with him¡­


    Murong Quan was standing on the side and he had aplicated look when he looked at Luo Qing. He knew exactly what she was thinking, but he was feeling very conflicted over it.


    Lin Fan''s mother quickly said, "But Xiao Fan, how can you cultivate? You haven''t been able to cultivate since you were young, how did you suddenly be able to cultivate?"


    Hearing this, everyone other than his family was deeply shocked. They had thought that Lin Fan had been hiding his power this entire time, but now it turned out that wasn''t the case!


    Could it be that Lin Fan had really reached the tinum Realm in a short period of time?


    Just what kind of perverted talent was this!


    Lin Fan calmly exined, "A while back, I met an expert who helped me with the store while also restoring my ability to cultivate. It was all because of him that my life changed and I could be this strong."


    Yue Qingrou was about to say something else, but Lin Ao once again stopped her.


    He just looked Lin Fan right in the eyes before turning to Ang and Momonga and suddenly asking, "Thank you for taking care of my son, I know it''s been hard on you."


    Ang didn''t know how to react, but Momonga was still a man even if his heart had stopped beating thousands of years ago. Momonga said, "He''s been the one taking care of us, you don''t need to worry about anything."


    At this Lin Ao suddenly gave a sigh, "But there''s so much to worry about. Now that you''ve revealed this power, things will change."


    Lin Fan was surprised as he asked, "Change, what changes?"


    Lin Ao hesitated a bit before he said, "It has something to do with your father''s family. The Lin Family is¡­"


    But before he could finish, he was suddenly cut off by a voice that came from the door, "Now, now, Big Brother Ao, you shouldn''t say such things. Not after all the way we''vee to visit our niece and our very "special" nephew."


    Everyone suddenly turned to the door and they found two people standing there. There was one young man and one older man.


    The older man looked a bit like Lin Ao, while the younger man looked a bit like Lin Fan.


    The older man narrowed his eyes as he looked down at Lin Ao, "Exiled trash don''t get to say anything about their family."


    Meanwhile, the younger man was looking at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes like he was looking over him, but then his eyes caught sight of Ang and they immediately lit up.


    He came over to her and tried to grab her hand, but Lin Fan suddenly appeared by his side and grabbed that outstretched hand as he said in an ice cold voice, "Who are you?"

 100 Chapter 100

    Looking at Lin Fan''s hand that was grabbing his, the younger man went to p it away, but the moment his hand made contact with Lin Fan''s hand, it felt like he was pping steel.


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned colder and he began squeezing even harder on the younger man''s arm.


    The younger man felt the vice like grip around his wrists and he winced in pain. It felt like if this continued, his wrist would be snapped like a twig.


    But the older man came forward and also grabbed Lin Fan''s wrist. The moment he did, it was like what the younger man had experienced, it felt like he was grabbing a piece of steel.


    At this, the older man no longer held himself back and released his full power, releasing white life energy. This older man was actually in the tinum Realm!


    Lin Fan also released his life energy, but before the two sides could sh, Lin Ao suddenly said, "Xiao Fan, stop!"


    Lin Fan looked at his father with a confused look, but seeing his firm eyes and him shaking his head, Lin Fan let go of the younger man.


    This time when the younger man looked at Lin Fan, his eyes were filled with a trace of vignce. There was no longer the same look of disdain anymore.


    The older man red at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly revealing a smile, "Little nephew Lin, you really are more talented than we thought. I am your uncle Lin Yu and this is your cousin Lin Jun. We are here on behalf of the Lin Family to bring you back to the family for training."


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned cold at this.


    From the beginning, these two had been looking down on his father, so it was clear that they were here with unkind intentions.


    If he went with them, he might lose his entire family by the time he came back¡­


    Lin Fan''s mind turned for a bit before he said, "Then I want to bring my family back with me, after all, they also belong to the Lin Family."


    Lin Yu''s eyes narrowed as he turned back to Lin Ao, specifically looking at his knee before saying in a cold voice, "Unfortunately, the family has only given permission for us to bring you back with us. As for exiled trash like your father, he has no right to evere back to the family after what he has done."


    Lin Fan shook his head, "Without my family, I couldn''t possibly think of leaving for an unknown ce."


    Lin Yu''s eyes turned colder, "Unknown ce? Little nephew Lin, we are also your family, rather your rightful family. Someone as talented as you isn''t suited for a lowly ce like this, stuck taking care of your trash father."


    Lin Fan calmly said, "One side is a family that I''ve never even heard of to this day and the other side is the family that has raised me, I think it''s clear which one is my rightful family. Moreover, is my father someone who you can call trash again and again?"


    At this point, Lin Yu knew that he was just ying with him, so there was a trace of anger that shed in his eyes, but he quickly calmed himself down, "Little nephew Lin, I don''t think you understand what you are turning down. What you areing back to is one of the rulers of the human world, a Legendary Realm Family. We are one of the most influential families in the world and with the resources at our disposal, you will have the greatest opportunity to reach the Legendary Realm, or even go beyond that!"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes at this moment, "Is that so? Then can you tell me if you can represent the Lin Family or not?"


    Lin Yu flinched at this since Lin Fan had hit the nail on the head.


    That was right, Lin Yu couldn''t make a decision for the Lin Family, the Lin Family didn''t even know he was doing this.


    He had been passing by this low ranked city with his son on a mission when he had heard the news of a royal family being destroyed. Normally he wouldn''t care about this, but when he heard the name Lin Fan, he couldn''t help being curious.


    To his surprise, he found that this Lin Fan was actually the son of Lin Ao, the disgrace of the Lin Family who had been exiled all those years ago!


    Blood truly showed that the apple didn''t fall far from the tree, this talent that Lin Fan had even surpassed the talent Lin Ao had shown in the past!<sub> </sub>


    As long as he was able to bring this Lin Fan back to the Lin Family with him, he would definitely receive focused training and Lin Yu would receive a high position for bringing him back. If Lin Fan took over the Lin Family one day, he would remember Lin Yu for bringing him back and that would be Lin Yu''s ticket to the top.


    Lin Yu said after a slight pause, "Of course I can represent the Lin Family, I am one of the recognized main family members, unlike your father here who was exiled. That is the reason why I can call him trash."


    Lin Fan could guess most of why Lin Yu was here, but he didn''t expose him just yet. He had insulted his family, clearly he had to suffer a bit first.


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and came closer to Lin Yu.


    Lin Yu thought that this was a good sign, but the next words crushed all his hopes.


    "Then what will you do if I say no?"


    Lin Yu flew into a rage and wanted to threaten Lin Fan, but before he could, Lin Fan had already condensed hisw gauntlet and hadnded a punch right to Lin Yu''s chest.


    Lin Yu found that he actually couldn''t take this hit at all and was sent flying towards the door of the shop, but before he could crash through that ss door, there was an invisible force that he bounced off of. The force was like an invisible wall that he mmed into, doubling the force that he was hit with.


    Lin Yu immediately spat out a mouthful of blood before copsing to the ground. He found that after being hit, he couldn''t muster up any strength at all.


    He looked at the door in shock before looking up at Lin Fan in fear. They were both in the tinum Realm, yet he found that he couldn''t block Lin Fan''s hit at all. This truly was a monster!


    As Lin Fan moved closer to him, Lin Yu said in a panic, "Do you dare do this! I am from the Lin Family, we are a true Legendary Realm Family, it isn''t something remnants like the Feng Family canpare to! If you dare do anything to me, you can be sure that the wrath of the Lin Family will wipe you off the face of this earth!"


    Even if he had wanted to recruit Lin Fan before, it didn''t matter now that Lin Fan was trying to kill him. The only thing Lin Yu was thinking was how to survive, that was what growing up in a Legendary Realm Family had taught him. He was tough on the surface, but he caved faster than anyone in the face of true death. He didn''t care what he had to do, as long as he was able to survive, he would do anything.


    Right before Lin Fan was about to end Lin Yu, Lin Ao suddenly shouted, "Xiao Fan, that''s enough."


    Lin Fan turned with deeply knitted brows and said, "But dad, if we let him go¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Ao stood up and said with a stern look, "No matter what, he is family in the end. We don''t treat family like this."


    Then Lin Ao limped over with his bad leg and offered his hand to Lin Yu, which was subsequently pped away by Lin Yu as he said, "Don''t touch me trash." Then he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "You will rue this day, you hear me?"


    Lin Fan''s face turned dark and he was prepared to move forward again, but Lin Yu quickly got to his feet and ran out of the store, not even turning back once.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before turning to his father, "Dad, you know the consequences of letting him leave."


    Lin Ao shook his head, "No matter what, he is family and family should stick together. But Xiao Fan, you could have gone with him, you know that right? It''s true that the Lin Family would be much better for you than staying here."


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile, "Dad, you and I both know what his ns were. Besides, staying here is definitely better for me."


    Lin Ao nodded and patted him on the shoulder, "Alright, you are a man now and you can decide your own life."


    At this, Lin Fan suddenly heard a notification from the system.


    "Congrattions host, you have finished the tutorial."

 101 Chapter 101

    Lin Fan immediately revealed a shocked look which surprised everyone around him.


    While they were confused why he looked so shocked, Lin Fan quickly asked the system in his mind, "Tutorial, what do you mean by tutorial?"


    "Host, a tutorial is by definition a paper, book, film, orputer program that provides practical information about a specific subject."


    Lin Fan had dark lines on his face, "I mean, what do you mean by a tutorial¡­"


    "Host, before properly running the pet shop, you had to learn how to be a proper owner and spread your name. Now that you have done that, your tutorial is over and it is time to step on the path of dominance."


    "Host, to reward you forpleting the tutorial, you will now receive another bloodline augmentation."


    "Bloodline augmentation has been given. Host, please check the status of the pet to confirm."


    Lin Fan was shocked again, it was this bloodline augmentation again. Last time he received this gift, he had received three ancient bloodlines. Now that he was receiving another one, just what kind of amazing pet would he get?


    Lin Fan immediately opened up his system interface and went through his pets one by one until he finally came to the one that had received the augmentation.


    As expected, it was Xiao Bai and the bloodline that it received was the White Tiger bloodline!


    Water White Tiger (Young)


    Grade: Unique


    Cultivation: Bronze 1


    Bloodline: White Tiger


    Skills: Water de, Water Control, Water Shatter, Water Clones


    Combat Strength: 30.0


    System''sments: Could be better!


    But before Lin Fan had time to react to this, the system''s voice once again rang out to give him another notification.


    "Host, since you havepleted the tutorial, the system has been upgraded to a grade two system."


    "Host, you have unlocked a new tier of items in the shop and you have unlocked the lucky draw function."


    "Ding, the host has unlocked the next main mission!"


    "Host, please establish three branch shops within the next six months. Failure to do so will result in the host being struck down by heavenly thunder and turned to ashes!"


    "Young man, how can you live your life in a small pond? A carp must jump over the dragon gate, you must see the world to be a real man!"


    "System, are you sure you aren''t making a mistake!? I thought we were close, but now it seems like you''ve been plotting against me the entire time!" Lin Fan couldn''t help shouting in his mind.


    "Host, please make no mistake, all the system''s missions are for the good of the host."


    "Host, also please be aware that each of the three branch stores must enjoy the same level of poprity as the main store. Each store must have their training spotspletely filled each day just like in the main store."


    "Sure, sure, why not kick a man when he''s down? Not only do I have to get three branch shops, I also have to make them popr?" Then Lin Fan calmed down and gave a sigh, "At least I have the deeds to the Feng Family''s pet shops, that should help me with this mission."


    "Host, please be aware that each of the branches have to be in a different city. How could you experience the world if you only remain at home all the time?"


    "F**k!" Lin Fan really couldn''t help swearing, the system really was being too unreasonable!


    Not only would he have to deal with the Lin Family, he had to run around creating different stores at the same time? This was just asking too much of him!


    "Host, foulnguage detected! First warning!"


    That was a nostalgic warning that hadn''t been heard in a long time¡­


    Lin Fan knew that it was no use arguing with the system when it made up its mind. The only thing he could do now was n out how he would set up three branches in six months¡­


    After watching Lin Fan go through a roller coaster of emotions and finally seeing him calm down, while they were worried about his mental state, his parents still excused themselves and headed home first.


    Lin Fan wanted toe with them, but his dad just waved his hand and told him to stay with his friends.


    Lin Fan knew that his dad was telling him in his own way to not worry about the family and he appreciated it, so he said that he would be home soon.<sub> </sub>


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan''s parents left the store, Lin Fan''s dad sent his wife and daughter home first as he headed off with his two brothers. But once they went a certain distance, Lin Ao also excused himself from his two brothers.


    Once he went off for a bit, he came to this dark alley where he waited patiently until a dark figurended beside him.


    "Greetings, young master." The dark figure said.


    "Cut the crap, just tell me what grandfather has nned." Lin Ao angrily said.


    "Young master, the old master has long thought that the Lin Family could do with a purge, that is why he had this subordinate stop the young master." The dark figure said in a humble voice.


    It had been this dark figure that had Lin Ao stop Lin Fan from killing Lin Yu.


    "Then why is he having my son do it?" Lin Ao''s face turned dark.


    "This is the old master''s test for the young young master and at the same time, it''s a way for the young young master to establish his prestige in the family." The dark figure said.


    "The old master is nning to make Xiao Fan his sessor?" Lin Ao said in a surprise voice.


    "That isn''t certain, but young master must agree that the Lin Family must be purged, right?" The dark figure said.


    Lin Ao thought about the scene from before and he couldn''t help shaking his head as he gave a sigh.


    Just from Lin Yu''s behaviour he could tell that the situation was much worse than before he left the Lin Family.


    Their arrogance was slowly undermining them from the inside, but they were too stuck in their ways to notice their errors.


    Perhaps grandfather was right, the only way to fix this problem was for a purge¡­


    Still Lin Ao revealed a firm look and said to the dark figure, "I understand grandfather''s thoughts, but pass on a message from me to him. If he puts Xiao Fan in any danger, I won''t hesitate to break off all face with the Lin Family. I will bring all of us down together."


    The dark figure lowered his head and solemnly said, "Young master, please be assured, the old master has made all the preparations. The old master assures that nothing will happen to the young young master."


    Lin Ao revealed a cold look as he said, "I hope so." Then without looking back, he walked off.


    The dark figure couldn''t help thinking of the glorious past of this exiled genius as he watched this back and he couldn''t help give a sigh when he remembered this past.


    ¡­


    Back in the store, when Lin Fan''s family left, the only ones left were his friends and his employees.


    When Lin Fan''s family were still here, Luo Qing seemed like she had been struggling with something, but she seemed to have to have made a decision as soon as they left.


    Before anyone could even say anything, she came up to Lin Fan and staring right into his eyes, she said, "I need to talk to you alone,e with me."


    Not giving him any chance to say anything, she grabbed his hand and led him out of the shop.


    Lin Fan wanted to say something at first, but seeing her determined look, he felt like there was nothing he could say. The only thing he could do was obediently follow behind her.


    Before she left the shop, Luo Qing turned back to everyone and said, "No one is allowed to follow us."


    Then without looking back, she dragged Lin Fan to an alley by the store.


    Standing there, she looked at Lin Fan and Lin Fan looked back at her, neither of them saying a single word as they silently stared at each other.


    After a few minutes, Luo Qing finally worked up her courage.


    In front of Lin Fan''s surprised eyes, she suddenly came forward and stood up on her tiptoes, suddenly nting a kiss right on Lin Fan''s lips.


    It was clear that she was new to kissing with how sloppy her technique was, but she put every emotion that she felt into this kiss.


    After a few seconds, she separated from Lin Fan and with a face that waspletely red, she said, "This is how I feel. You don''t have to respond to me now, but I hope that you will respond to me soon."


    Then without giving Lin Fan a chance to say anything, she quickly left with her burning red face.


    Lin Fan''s mind waspletely nk and his face waspletely red as he just stood in a daze in that alley.

 102 Chapter 102

    Lin Fan didn''t know exactly how he felt, but he knew that the feelings inside him wereplicated.


    After spending several minutes standing there in a daze, he suddenly looked up into the sky and gave a sigh.


    But still there was a determined look in his eyes as he had sorted out his emotions.


    ¡­


    The next morning, all of Lin Fan''s friends and family had gathered at his store.


    Today was the day that Lin Fan was leaving Snow Wind City, he had contacted them allst night to tell them what had happened.


    His parents had been confused at first by this sudden decision, but still they epted it in the end since they knew that it was something he had to do.


    But this morning before they left the house, Lin Ao had specially dug up his old dagger from his adventuring days and gave it to Lin Fan.


    He had said, "Even though I know that you won''t be able to use this, I hope that you''ll keep it with you so you know that we are always with you."


    <o>,m Lin Fan took it and carefully put it at his waist, he wanted to make sure that it would always be with him.</o>


    As for his little sister, she was actually acting colder than usual, but Lin Fan still had a gift for her.


    He had given her a special pet and the two Mortal Coil Shedding Pills that he had received in the beginning from the system.


    The special pet he gave her was an ice fairy type pet that had a single mutation.


    Back when he had bred this pet in the shop, his first thought was to give it to his little sister since she needed something to protect herself with. Moreover, fairies were something that girls quite liked.


    As for the two Mortal Coil Shedding Pills, they were pills that could push one through a level in their current realm, but it was only for lower cultivation realms like the Iron or Bronze Realms.


    Lin Yue had been slowly working hard at her cultivation and had broken through to the Iron 8 Realm. The moment she used these two pills, she broke through the hardest bottlenecks in the Iron Realm and reached the Bronze Realm in a single night.


    Moreover, these pills had an effect on strengthening the body of the user like the name implied, breaking free of the mortal coil.


    As for why Lin Fan never used them, he had reached the Silver Realm in a single cultivation session and his physique had already shed his mortal coil, so he never would have received anything from these pills.


    Lin Yue transformed in a single night, as her talent was nourished by these pills and she went from a normal genius to a monstrous genius.


    Then there was the fairy, it was from the Ice Queen bloodline, so it was quite the proud pet. That was one of the reasons why Lin Fan didn''t want it for himself.


    When he had tried to approach it, all that he received was a turn of the head and a cold snort.


    But after just a single night with Lin Yue, the Ice Queen looked much closer to her, even riding on her shoulder.


    For some reason that Lin Fan wasn''t aware of, when the Ice Queen looked at Lin Fan, there was a strange look in her eyes. It was almost like a kind of obsession. But Lin Fan thought that there was no way that this could be true, so he just threw this thought away.


    At the shop, Lin Fan gave Momonga some instructions, but since Momonga was usually the one who was left behind to watch the shop, he was aware of what he should do.


    Then there were the rest of his friends, or rather the brothers that he had made over this period. Murong Quan, Boss Gao and his team, and Wang Da Dong were all here to send him off.


    They all gave him various things that they thought would aid him on his journey, such as maps, snacks, and different artifacts which he all epted with words of gratitude.


    When it finally came to Luo Qing''s turn, Lin Fan''s expression suddenly became a bit awkward. When he was facing her, he couldn''t help thinking about what had happened yesterday.


    Luo Qing acted like nothing had happened and just gave Lin Fan a good luck charm that she had made. She didn''t say a single word on the topic during this entire time.


    However, Lin Fan had already made up his mind yesterday, so he knew that he had to finish this before leaving.


    Lin Fan took Luo Qing by the hand and brought her to the same alley as before.


    Before walking out, he made sure to re at everyone to make sure that they didn''t follow them like Luo Qing had done yesterday.<sub> </sub>


    When he brought her to the alley, Luo Qing lowered her head as a blush came over it, but there was also a bit of nervousness in her heart since she knew that there was the chance that she would be rejected.


    At first Lin Fan didn''t say anything because now that he was in this situation, he was hesitating over the decision he made. But after calming himself down, he knew that his decision was correct.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything, as he directly lowered his head and bowed down to Luo Qing. Only when he finished did he say, "I''m sorry, I can''t ept your feelings."


    Luo Qing was only stunned at first, even forgetting to react, but soon she couldn''t stop the tears that swelled in her eyes. She just looked at him with those tear filled eyes as she asked, "Can I ask why at least?"


    Lin Fan didn''t raise his head as he said, "There''s someone else that I like, that is why I can''t ept your feelings."


    He didn''t know when these feelings had started to appear, maybe they were there from the beginning, from the first moment he saw her and he had just been trying to ignore them until now.


    But after being incited by Luo Qing, he had no choice but to face these feelings. He had to admit that this was what he felt and there was no changing it.


    In his heart, there was that figure with jet ck hair and snow white skin, the one with six wings on her back.


    Luo Qing couldn''t say anything in response to this. She just nodded and walked away.


    Lin Fan knew that he had broken her heart, but he couldn''t deny what he felt in the end¡­


    When the two of them came back to the shop, Luo Qing had finally stopped crying, but her eyes were red and puffy.


    Lin Fan''s mother and her father quickly came over, but she ignored her father and dove into Lin Fan''s mother''s embrace.


    The two of them quickly moved off to the side.


    Ang came over and lightly punched Lin Fan in the arm, but she didn''t do anything beyond that.


    While she would normally be dense, she was surprisingly sharp this time and had guessed most of what had happened, but she had also epted it.


    Just like with Lin Fan, being incited by Luo Qing had forced her to ept her feelings as well and now she knew just how she felt.


    Just like with Lin Fan, she didn''t know when this started, but she just enjoyed the feeling of being by his side.


    Now that this matter had been taken care of, Lin Fan and Ang headed off on their adventure.


    ¡­


    In a corner of the store, Yue Qingrou wasforting Luo Qing.


    When she learned about what had happened between the two of them, she couldn''t help clicking her tongue.


    Sure Ang was good, but Xiao Qing was also a good daughter inw.


    As a mother, naturally she wanted the best for her son and if he could have both, that would have been for the best.


    But her son was foolish enough to let such a good girl go, she really had to teach him a lesson.


    Yue Qingrou patted Luo Qing''s hand as she tried tofort her, "It''s alright, it''s alright. Xiao Qing, that boy is just a bit dense. Just give him some time and he''ll eventually learn. In the future, if he dares do anything like this again, I''ll be sure to spank him!"


    Luo Qing tried to smile at this, but she just couldn''t bring herself to do so.


    She knew that it was all over with this confession.


    Lin Fan was not someone who was destined to stay in a small ce like this, if she couldn''t move his heart now, she would never be able to move his heart.


    On the side, Murong Quan just watched silently as aplicated gaze filled his eyes. He knew that he had to grow up and he made a vow that he would.

 103 Chapter 103

    Lin Fan and Ang were currently on a giant airship flying through the sky.


    For the first city to set up a branch in, Lin Fan chose to head to Green Wood City which Mu Bo Hai was from.


    Before leaving, Mu Bo Hai had given him a token to take with him so he could go find the Mu Family for help. Since he had a connection in another city, it would be foolish not to take it since he had to set up three branches in six months. That meant that he only had two months for each branch store!


    The main form of travel between cities on the Blue Star was by airship which traveled at more than three times the speed of sound, but even then, it would take them close to two days to go from Snow Wind City to Green Wood City.


    It was a good thing they were only traveling on the Eastern Continent. If they were to travel between continents, the only method would be to use transportation arrays that could allow them to travelrge distances, but it would cost quite a bit.


    The Blue Star had a surface area that was more than ten times that of earth, but it also meant that it had a greater poption, having over a hundred billion people living on it.


    But people in this world could only live in scattered strongholds because of the Beast n invasion that left beasts wandering the wilderness in this world. These strongholds were established by experts gathering together who ruled over them.


    Snow Wind City was considered a B Rank Stronghold since it was a stronghold with four royal families and a poption of over a hundred million people, but it was considered weak since most B Rank Strongholds had five royal families.


    Then above the B Rank Strongholds were A Rank Strongholds which had a poption of five hundred million people and had ten royal families.


    And further up above that were S Rank Strongholds which usually had poptions of a billion people and had at least one Legendary Realm Family.


    Green Wood City that they were heading to was one of these S Rank Strongholds.


    There were only a total of twenty five S Rank Strongholds in this entire world, five main cities on each of the five continents, ruled over by a single Legendary Realm Family each.


    And then under the B Rank Strongholds, there were even smaller strongholds.


    C Rank Strongholds only had a poption of ten million and were ruled by a single royal family.


    D Rank Strongholds only had a poption of one million and were ruled by a gathering of several noble families.


    Anything smaller than that couldn''t be considered a stronghold, they were just considered trading outposts.


    The S Rank Stronghold they were heading to now was thergest city on the south of the Eastern Continent and it was a stronghold found in the center of a giant forest, hence the name Green Wood City.


    But since the trip would take them two days, Lin Fan and Ang found that it was quite boring since most of the entertainment on this ship was designed for people of lower cultivations.


    There were also more adult entertainment options such as a brothel or bars, but neither Lin Fan and Ang were interested in this.


    So they headed to the restaurant in the center of the ship and sat there bored in the lounge after ordering their drinks.


    This area was an open lounge mixed with a cafe, where one could order both alcoholic drinks and coffee based drinks. There was arge open space with many tables set up for one to rx in.


    There weren''t many people currently there. Other than the two of them, there was only a single old man who was ying chess alone.


    After a while, they decided to leave since there was nothing to do here, but the old man ying chess suddenly spoke up, "Young people, if you have nothing to do, how about a round of chess with this old timer?"


    It was true, they really had nothing to do during this two day trip and neither Lin Fan or Ang wanted to be cooped up cultivating the entire time.


    Since they had nothing better to do, Lin Fan decided to ept this match, but he did say, "Old timer, I won''t be holding back."


    Lin Fan had learned quite a bit about chess from observing Brainy and Momonga y, so he could be considered an expert in chess now.


    Lin Fan took the white side and in just a few minutes, he had taken everything from the old man''s ck side except for a pawn, a knight, a rook, a bishop, and the king while he had only lost three pawns.


    He couldn''t help feeling sorry for the old man as he said, "Old timer, how about we just end it here and call it a draw?"


    The old man suddenly revealed a smile as he said, "Young man, you shouldn''t be so sure about things without seeing them through to the end."<sub> </sub>


    Then in just a few minutes, the old man took every single one of his pieces other than his king and he waspletely surrounded.


    Lin Fan couldn''t believe it!


    The old man had been ying horribly at first, but then it was like Lin Fan couldn''t read through his moves at all!


    The old man just smiled as he said, "Owner Lin, sometimes you shouldn''t judge a book by the cover. You need to have a more open mind."


    Lin Fan was still shocked by the sudden turnaround of the game, so he didn''t react right away, but then he realized that something was wrong. From beginning to end, he had never mentioned his name or his upation, yet this old man had called him "Owner Lin"...


    Lin Fan immediately narrowed his eyes and vigntly looked at the old man, but the old man quickly raised his hands and said, "Now, now, I''m not an enemy. If possible I wish to be friends with you."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he released his spiritual senses, but he found that he couldn''t see through this old man. There was only one exnation for this, this old man was in the Legendary Realm!


    Where did all these Legendary Realm Expertse from?


    First there was Mu Bo Hai, then there was the Lin Family, and now there was this old man.


    Why did all these Legendary Realm Experts alle looking for him?


    Lin Fan calmed down and then said, "Old timer, what do you want?"


    The old man had allowed Lin Fan to scan him and once Lin Fan spoke, he replied, "Well, I wanted to see what kind of person the infamous Owner Lin was. After all, you are someone who''s caused quite a bit of trouble for the Union Government by destroying an entire royal family. These royal families don''t just grow on trees, they take hundreds of years to nourish. Each one loss is one that we can never recover from and it weakens the overall power of the human race."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes again, "Then are you here to address this issue?"


    The old man gave a chuckle, "Now, now, I''ve already said it, I''m not here as your enemy. Young man, you really are too hasty sometimes."


    Lin Fan just said in a cold voice, "After saying all that, you still aren''t getting to the main point."


    The old man had the same smile, "Now, there''s no need to rush this. To be honest, I want to see just how strong you are, but we can''t just fight here. So I propose that we y another game."


    Lin Fan asked in a curious voice, "What game?"


    The old man waved his hand and a ball suddenly appeared, "Well, let''s go to the training room and y with this ball. If you can take it from me within twenty minutes, it''ll be considered your win."


    Then Lin Fan asked, "Yes, but why should I y with you?"


    The old man just said, "Well, I''m sure you would love to hear some news on the Lin Family after all they''ve done."


    Lin Fan suddenly stood up and said, "You! Are you from the Lin Family!"


    The old man waved his hand, "No I''m not, but I''m someone with connections."


    Then the old man waved for Lin Fan to sit down, "Young man, sit down. Now, both of you will have the chance to take the ball from me and if either one of you can do so, then I''ll tell you the information I have."


    Information on the Lin Family was definitely something Lin Fan wanted since information would make it easier for him toe up with a way to deal with them.


    But then he suddenly revealed a smile when he realized what this old man had said, "You''re saying that if either of us can take it, you''ll tell us?"


    Seeing the shady smile on Lin Fan''s face, the old man couldn''t stop a chill from running down his back, but he still said, "Yes."


    Lin Fan just said in a refreshing manner, "Alright, let''s do this."


    Ang on the side just shook her head as she knew that this old man had been yed.

 104 Chapter 104

    Since they had already agreed to y, Lin Fan and Ang went to the training room with the old man.


    The old man jumped into the center and threw the ball from hand to hand in a very rxed manner, as he looked at the two and said, "Well you can start whenever you want. If you want toe together, that''s fine too."


    Lin Fan and Ang looked at each other with the same smile before shaking their heads.


    This old man, he really was seeking death.


    Sure he might be able to handle Lin Fan, but he was actually underestimating Ang?


    Thest Legendary Realm Expert who had done that was Mu Bo Hai and he had received a ck eye from it¡­


    Lin Fan shook his head as he came forward and he said, "I''ll be first."


    The old man raised a brow and asked, "Are you sure you don''t want toe together? I''m sure you know how strong I am."


    Lin Fan really didn''t know what was wrong with this old man, was he just confident or was he just stupid?


    He just walked up to the old man and stuck out his hand as he said, "How about a friendly handshake before we begin?"


    The old man looked at Lin Fan in surprise, but still he wasn''t against this. Rather he was quite happy to see that this kid knew how to be humble as well.


    But when the old man was about to shake Lin Fan''s hand, Lin Fan''s hand suddenly moved up towards the ball he was holding in his other than.


    The old man''s eyes opened wide in surprise, but then he just revealed a calm smile.


    Right as Lin Fan''s hand was about tond on the ball, the old man disappeared with a sh of white light and he appeared behind Lin Fan. Lin Fan wildly looked around, but then he felt a tap on his left shoulder.


    When Lin Fan turned his head around, his cheek went right into the outstretched finger of the old man.


    Lin Fan was annoyed at this and swung out at the old man, but that old man disappeared once again and appeared on the other side, standing in his original spot.


    When he turned back to see the old man standing in his original spot, Lin Fan couldn''t help clicking his tongue.


    The old man just said with a smile, "Young man, you really are sly, but that''s good sometimes. On the battlefield, being sly can sometimes be the same as using tactics, so there''s nothing wrong with being sly sometimes."


    Lin Fan just gave a soft snort before saying, "Then I''ming for real this time."


    Instead of releasing his normal threew gauntlet, Lin Fan released the power of thews as auras around him, creating a three fold aura of gold, blue, and white energy.


    When the old man saw this, he couldn''t stop a sh of surprise from shing in his eyes as he became a bit more vignt. It seemed like he had indeed underestimated this kid.


    Lin Fan didn''t want to kill this old man since this was just a friendly game, so that was why he surrounded himself in hisws which would only give his physical attributes a boost.


    When Lin Fan charged forward this time, he moved much faster, but still he couldn''t catch up to the old man.


    His first move was dashing around in a circle around the old man, creating afterimages as he went along, but still the old man''s eyes saw through everything. The old man just followed him as he ran around in the circle and he stared right at him when he charged forward. The old man raised the ball up with one hand as he jumped over Lin Fan with the other, sending Lin Fan head first towards the wall.


    Lin Fan quickly leaned back and used his feet to ground himself, stopping just a few inches away from the wall.


    But he didn''t stop for a single second since the old man was still flying through the air, so he knew that the old man couldn''t dodge at this moment. Lin Fan quickly turned around and jumped forward once again, sending out a kick at the old man.


    When Lin Fan''s kick was about tond on the old man''s chest, the old man suddenly grabbed his foot and with a turn, he swung Lin Fan in the air before throwing him onto the ground.


    Lin Fan mmed down and quickly jumped up just to have the old man softlynd right on his head.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan quickly gathered his life energy and pped above his head, aiming for the old man''s foot, but the old man just jumped down andnded in front of Lin Fan with a smile.


    The old man said, "Young man, you really are impressive, but your moves are a bit predictable. It seems to me that you''re focused on cultivating your body and haven''t cultivated any fighting styles yet, making your attacks quite simple and straightforward. When you fight against anyone with a bit of battle experience, it makes it quite easy for them to avoid you as long as you don''tpletely overpower them."


    Lin Fan knew that this old man was right.


    He had been focused on gaining as much strength as possible in a short amount of time, which meant that instead of focusing on technique, he''s been drawing out all the potential that his body had to increase his cultivation.


    But by doing this, he had ack of techniques which made his attacks quite simple and straightforward.


    Even if he had plenty of battle experience from putting his life on the line, that only meant that he could read his opponent.


    When facing someone with the same amount of battle experience and the same level of cultivation, he would definitely be on the short end of the stick since he wascking techniques to use.


    But having this pointed out so directly made Lin Fan a little annoyed, so he just gave a snort and said, "Maybe, but let''s see if you can keep that ball!"


    The old man just shook his head with a smile, but he didn''t say anything else. He had already said anything he had needed to say, anything else was unnecessary.


    Lin Fan charged at the old man again and again, but the old man dodged easily time after time.


    There were a few times when Lin Fan came close by using special little tricks, but every time his hand was about to touch the ball, there was a sh of white light before the old man disappeared.


    Time continued to pass and eventually time ran out for Lin Fan.


    Right before time ran out, Lin Fan made a desperation move of summoning out his three pets to create a three foldw cage around the old man. However, just like every time before when he almost caught the old man, there was the same sh of white light before the old man disappeared.


    Finally, Lin Fan fell down to the ground feeling exhausted. He had given his all and in the end, he had failed.


    Although this was just a game, he couldn''t stop it from pressing down on his heart as a failure.


    This was the first time he had failed at anything sinceing to this world, it really did bother him.


    Then he thought about what the old man had said before about hisck of techniques and he decided that maybe it was time for him to learn some techniques. He had seen some in the Feng Family''s treasures, maybe he should seriously look over them next time.


    The old man just walked over to where Lin Fan was lying down and said, "Well, that was a good try, but I think that you should know what you arecking now. If you were to make up for that, I doubt I would have been able to escape your final trap."


    Lin Fan looked up at the old man and knew that he had plenty of energy to spare, so he said, "What a liar."


    The old man just gave a shrug.


    Then Lin Fan said, "Just you wait, I''ll get you next time."


    The old man revealed a smile and said, "I''m looking forward to it." Then he turned to Ang and said, "What about this young miss, do you want to take your turn now?"


    That was the main reason why Lin Fan had epted his defeat so easily, he knew what wasing up and he was looking forward to seeing the old man eat his words.


    Ang had been watching this entire time and knew that this old man had been training Lin Fan, so her guard against him was rxed a bit, but there was still a trace of annoyance from being looked on earlier.


    She just went over to where Lin Fan was and threw him to the side before saying, "Let''s do this then."


    For some reason, the old man felt a chill run down his back at these words...

 105 Chapter 105

    But still the old man said with a smile, "I''m ready whenever you''re ready."


    He woulde to regret those words very soon.


    Ang just gave a snort and gathered her windws in her palm.


    When the old man saw this, he was only mildly surprised at first, but then his face was soon filled with shock.


    The degree of thew of wind in her hands, it had already surpassed the threshold of the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    This old man had been confident since he was one of the strongest experts of the Blue Star, but the limit of the Blue Star was still in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Only now did he understand why Mu Bo Hai''s report had been so serious, this was clearly something that involved powers that were above them.


    The old man tried saying, "Alright, you win¡­" But before he could even finish, Ang had already jumped out.


    The old man tried using his lightningws to dodge just like he had done with Lin Fan, but before he could finish channeling them, Ang''s fist had already hit his eye.


    Ang didn''t stop with just a single punch, she released a second punch at his other eye, causing it to swell up as much as the first eye. Only then did she take the ball from his hand with a proud smile.


    The old man could see that proud smile through his swollen eyes and he could only reveal a helpless smile at this. He had underestimated her and he had paid the price for it, but he couldn''t me anyone but himself for not believing the reports.


    The old man stood up and spread his hands, "Alright, it''s your win."


    Lin Fan had recovered enough energy to stand up, so he came over and asked, "Then are you going to tell us what you know about the Lin Family now?"


    The old man turned to Lin Fan and the moment he did, Lin Fan couldn''t hold back hisughter. The old man really looked like a panda with his two swollen eyes.


    The old man saw this and ignored it as he said while spreading his hands with a shrug, "I was going to tell you anyway, but now it seems like I''ve bitten off more than I can chew. Anyway, there hasn''t been any movement from the Lin Family yet. It doesn''t seem like they''ll be moving against you for what you did, but Lin Yu''s side branch does seem like they are making some moves."


    Lin Fan heard this and fell into deep thought.


    This didn''t seem right, one of the main descendants of the Lin Family had been beaten like this, it didn''t make sense for them not to make any moves.


    Could it be that they were going the underhanded method like the Feng Family? Would they move against his family?


    No, that wasn''t right either since if that was the case, Lin Yu would have already done it. Lin Ao in the eyes of the Lin Family was trash, so why would he hesitate to move against Lin Ao?


    None of this made any sense to Lin Fan, but he didn''t waste more time thinking about this.


    He had already left enough protection for his family back in Snow Wind City, namely he had Momonga protect them with his maids.


    Both of those maids were already in the Legendary Realm, but as for which realm specifically, Lin Fan had no idea. The only thing he was certain about was that they surpassed the limits of this Blue Star.


    As long as the Lin Family didn''t have a connection to the upper realm and could bring down stronger experts, his family would be safe.


    Then Lin Fan turned to the old man and asked with narrowed eyes, "So, are you gonna tell us who you are and why you''re telling us this?"


    The old man revealed a smile, "Beat me and you''ll find out."


    Lin Fan turned to Ang and she gave a nod, but the old man had also seen this and he quickly said, "I meant you, not her! I''m never getting involved with this little girl again, I want to live for a few more years!"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling at this, but that smile quickly disappeared as he said, "Then can you tell me one thing? Are you my enemy or my friend?"<sub> </sub>


    The old man gave a shrug, "I''ve already told you before, I''m not your enemy and I want to be your friend, but that all depends on you. The one thing I can tell you is that I''m friends with Mu Bo Hai."


    Mu Bo Hai, he was the old man who kept sticking around Lin Fan, but he did show his sincerity with the help he provided to Lin Fan when it came tomunicating with the Union Government.


    As his mind turned, Lin Fan quickly came up with a guess, but he wasn''t certain. The only thing he was certain of was that this entire encounter was connected to the Union Government.


    While Lin Fan was in thought, the old man carefully looked him over. After a bit of time passed, the old man suddenly asked, "Owner Lin, do you like this world?"


    Lin Fan was confused why this old man suddenly asked this, but he answered, "I like this world quite a bit, why?"


    The old man could hear the sincerity in Lin Fan''s voice, so he gave a nod and said, "Good, it''s all good if you like this world."


    Lin Fan was even more confused, but before he had a chance to say anything, the old man suddenly said, "Alright, now that I''ve aplished what I came here for, I need to get going."


    Before either Lin Fan or Ang could react, the old man quickly walked out of the room, but he didn''t forget to leave a few words, "Owner Lin, I hope you remember that this world is your home and your home will always be a special ce."


    The two of them just watched this old man leave like that. He had left just like he had appeared, in the same mysterious way.


    ¡­


    The old man walked a distance and finally when he turned the corner, there were several people in military uniforms that came over.


    "General, we finally found you!"  One of the officers with the most badges on his chest came up and gave a salute before then saying, "What happened to your eyes, sir?"


    The old man just nodded and ignored this question, "Un, it doesn''t matter."


    That officer reacted quickly and forced himself to say in a normal voice, "General, we''ve prepared everything for engaging special war factor three, all we are waiting for is your order."


    The old man stopped for a second and turned back in the direction of the training room before saying, "Forget it, cancel the mission."


    The officer was shocked, "Cancel the mission? But general, what about our orders?"


    The old man just shook his head, "It''s fine, it''s fine, I''ve already talked with special war factor three and I''ve confirmed that he is of no threat. There is no need for this mission any longer."


    The officer still wouldn''t give up, "Sir, this was an order that came directly from the Union President. If we don''t fulfill this mission, it¡­"


    The old man suddenly cut him off with a stern voice, "I''ve already given my order!"


    Only then did the officer back down with a salute, "Yes sir!"


    The officer gave a hand signal to the other men in military uniforms and they quickly headed off to cancel the mission.


    The old man then said, "Send a message to the president for me. Tell him that special war factor three is mainly harmless, but he is protective of the things he cares about. He also considers himself a member of this world, so that will y in our favour."


    Once he was done speaking, there was a sudden sh of white before the old man disappeared from this airship.


    The officer stared at where he had been standing in shock before suddenly knitting his brows in thought. But after he was done thinking, he still went to obey the old man''s orders.


    This old man wasn''t just a normal old man, he was the Grand General of the Union Government''s forces, one of the strongest three experts on the Blue Star.


    The prestige that hemanded wasn''t normal.

 106 Chapter 106

    The rest of the day was quite serene for the two of them.


    Lin Fan stayed in the training room and he mulled over the different things the old man had taught him. He found that there were many parts that he wascking even with hisbat experience since most of hisbat experience was with fighting beasts.


    Combat experience was valuable, but beasts fought in a different waypared to humans, so the lessons they taught couldn''t fully be applied to human experts.


    While Lin Fan was lost deep in thought over his new learnings, Ang just sat on the side waiting for Lin Fan to finish. Of course, she didn''t forget to get a few more orders of cake while waiting¡­


    ¡­


    The next day came and it seemed like they would arrive at their destination in time, but before they could arrive, there was an event that disrupted this.


    As they wereing up on Green Wood City, entering the range of the forest, there was a sudden explosion that came from the front of the ship.


    Lin Fan and Ang were still in the training room when this happened, but thatrge explosion brought Lin Fan out of his training.


    Lin Fan knit his brows as he looked in the direction of the explosion and based on the screaming he could hear, it didn''t seem like it was anything good.


    The two of them made their way to the main dining hall where most of the screaming wasing from.


    They didn''t enter right away and peeked in from the door while Ang hid the two of them. Inside there were most of the passengers gathered in the center while being tied up and they were surrounded by rough looking men who were the very definition of bandits.


    The surprising thing was that there were even Gold Realm Experts who had been tied up after being beaten, evident by their swollen faces.


    The airship that Lin Fan and Ang had been on was a luxury airship that Mu Bo Hai had given them tickets for. It was mainly filled with rich passengers who all had special guards with them, so it was strange seeing them all being captured like this, but when Lin Fan caught sight of the bandit leader, he found it wasn''t that surprising at all.


    The bandit leader was a suave looking man with wind swept hair and one purple eye who seemed to be in his early twenties. However, the shocking part about this leader was that even with his young age, he was actually in the tinum Realm just like Lin Fan.


    Normally young experts like this would be the crux of a family, not running around being a bandit, but here this young man was leading these bandits.


    But still, seeing them here gave Lin Fan an idea.


    There was a pet that just recently broken through to the next level of cultivation and he had been looking for someone to test their might on.


    So after letting the pet do their thing, Lin Fan walked into the room looking quite confident, drawing in surprised looks from everyone inside, whether they were bound or not.


    The bandit leader looked at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes and said in a calm voice, "Well, well, it seems like we missed one, boys. Let''s get him tied up and put him with the others."


    But then the rest of the bandits finally noticed Ang by his side and they had greedy looks in their eyes.


    One of the bandits came over and reached his hand out towards her as he said, "Now, now, prettydy, let this big brother take care of you."


    Lin Fan didn''t take too kindly to this. With sharp eyes that fell onto that bandit which caused that bandit to feel a chill run down his spine, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Well, it seems like you have to beat the dogs to show the master."


    Then as soon as his voice fell, Lin Fan stepped forward. He disappeared before he appeared right in front of that bandit, bringing a fist forward that shattered the bandit''s dantian in a single hit.


    Once this was done, all the bandits became weary as they raised their weapons once again. However, there was a chill that came over them when they felt Lin Fan''s aura sweeping over them. This was a feeling like they were being hunted.


    The bandit leader felt this as well and he knew that this wasn''t good, so he shouted, "All of you get back! I''ll take care of this!"


    Once he said that, the bandit leader released his pet, which was surprisingly a giant turtle.


    The giant turtle gathered rocks that formed a set of armour around the bandit leader before he charged forward at Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all when he saw this, he just snapped his finger and released his own pet.


    Xiao Huo appeared in a burst of mes beforending on Lin Fan''s shoulder.


    The bandit leader stopped in his tracks when he saw this, since he could feel the heating from the powerful mes.


    Lin Fan just said, "Xiao Huo, burn them up."


    Xiao Huo flew out to attack the surrounding bandits and when the bandit leader saw this, he said through gritted teeth, "Are you looking down on me?!"


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a word.


    Even if the bandit leader was a bandit, he was someone who had his pride as an expert. Being looked down on this so directly really hurt that pride, quickly igniting mes of rage in his heart.


    The bandit leader didn''t hold back any longer and he roared out as he charged at Lin Fan, bringing down his sword in arge arc at Lin Fan''s neck.


    Lin Fan just released hisw of power to create a set of golden gauntlets around his hands which he used to punch the bandit leader''s sword.


    The bandit leader was a bandit in the end, he wasn''t something with powerful artifacts, so Lin Fan''s powerw gauntlets cracked the sword. It continued forth until it mmed into the rock armour that the bandit leader was wearing.


    The bandit leader was forced back several steps as his eyes widened in shock. On the rock armour at his stomach, there were cracks that had formed.


    This was a set of armour forged by the rockws of both the bandit leader and the tinum Realm pet of the bandit leader, but it had been cracked by Lin Fan''s powerw like it was nothing.


    The bandit leader knew that if he wanted to turn this around, he couldn''t hold back.


    As soon as he stabilized himself, the bandit leader charged up to Lin Fan. He dodged the first punch from Lin Fan before bringing his other hand holding a bright red orb up towards Lin Fan''s chest.


    But what he never expected was that Lin Fan would suddenly grab that red ord and whisper into his ears. The moment he heard what Lin Fan had to say, the bandit leader''s eyes opened wide before he narrowed them again.


    When he was finished speaking, Lin Fan let go of the red orb and the bandit leader jumped away before shouting, "Retreat, use the smokes and retreat!"


    The other bandits had been burned by Xiao Huo, but their injuries weren''t serious, so they all quickly moved away. They brought out smoke bombs that they mmed into the ground before running away to their airship parked by this luxury airship.


    Lin Fan pretended to chase after them, but once the smokepletely covered him up, he just stood there in ce with a smile on his face.


    When the smoke cleared, all the bandits were gone from the hall and even their airship was flying away in the distance.


    When the bandits were gone, Lin Fan went over to free the captives.


    Some of the captives thanked Lin Fan for saving them, while some of them med Lin Fan for letting the bandits get away. As for the guards that followed these rich people, almost all of them looked at Lin Fan in admiration.


    They knew how strong the bandit leader really was and this young man was actually able to chase him away. This young man really wasn''t normal.


    After this incident was taken care of, the airship made the rest of the journey in peace andnded in Green Wood City not even an hourter.


    The ones that had been grateful to Lin Fan all gave him their cards and promised to help him if he ever needed it. Some of the ones that were ungrateful had secretly reported Lin Fan to the guards that had asked about this situation, but the guards of course ignored them since the good reports about Lin Fan far outweighed the bad.


    The guards gave Lin Fan amendation and quickly allowed him to leave, but once Lin Fan left the airfield, the first thing he didn''t wasn''t head into Green Wood City, rather he walked out the city gates...

 107 Chapter 107

    Once Lin Fan came out of the gates and moved a distance away, he had Ang carry him off into the forest in a certain direction.


    Aftering out ten kilometers which only took Ang around ten minutes with her speed, which also ounted for avoiding anyone seeing them, the two of them arrived at a mountain with a waterfall deep in the woods.


    This was the ce the signal from Brainy''s seed, so this was where Lin Fan came.


    When he arrived, he didn''t see anything out of ce, but when he called out, "I''m here!", there were suddenly a bunch of rough looking men that appeared.


    They quickly surrounded him, but they were all on guard towards him.


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile and suddenly pointed to one of the men, causing him to immediately lose control of his body and fall to the ground.


    The man who fell to the ground wildly looked around trying to find the source of this phenomenon while all the other men around him looked at him in shock.


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "Now, will you lead me to your boss, or do I have to beat you some more first?"


    But then there was a voice that rang out, "Enough!"


    Looking over at the source of this voice, Lin Fan saw the bandit leader walking over.


    The bandit leader took a deep look at Lin Fan before shouting, "All of you retreat!"


    Then he came up to Lin Fan and said, "Does the young master want toe up to our mountain for a rest?"


    Everyone was shocked when they heard this, but remembering how Lin Fan had immobilized one of them just by pointing at them, it made sense.


    The bandit leader and his two adjutants brought Lin Fan up to the mountain and through the waterfall toe into a base hidden behind it. This cave inside the waterfall wasn''t just a normal cave, it was an absolutely giant cave with arge grotto inside, with many different doors carved into the walls.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help feeling excited since this cave seemed like a hidden base.


    The bandit leader led Lin Fan and Ang into the main hall before heading to a side room which had arge table and several chairs around it. The bandit leader signaled for them to sit down and once everyone was seated, the bandit leader spoke first.


    This time, he was no longer as polite as before, but he also didn''t waste any time, "What did you do to me?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "It isn''t much, it''s just a special technique that I''m using to control you."


    Once he finished talking, the leader and the two adjutants felt their body losing control temporarily before regaining control of their bodies.


    The bandit leader and the adjutants looked at each other with dark looks before the leader said, "What do you want?"


    At this, Lin Fan revealed a wide smile, but of course it was his normal smile which just scared the three sitting across from him.


    After what had happened with the Feng Family in Snow Wind City, Lin Fan knew that he had been too careless. The Feng Family had ties in the underworld of Snow Wind City, which had allowed them to easily capture his family.


    Lin Fan knew that if he wanted to protect himself, he didn''t just need power, he also needed to build up his forces, both in the light and in the dark.


    ? Now that these bandits had shown up in front of him, of course he wasn''t just going to turn them down.


    Especially since Brainy had just broken through and he wanted to test his might.


    The leader of these bandits was in the tinum Realm, which was evident by how he had been able to match Lin Fan in a fight, even if he did end up losing in the end.


    But Brainy had just broken through to the tinum Realm as well, which allowed it to spread its seeds into the tinum Realm bandit leader.


    Brainy''s main method of cultivation was by draining energy from its puppets to use for its cultivation. The puppets that were still in use would slowly provide energy for Brainy while the puppets that were destroyed had all their energy absorbed by Brainy.


    During this period, Brainy had sent out puppets to kill and parasitize various beasts outside Snow Wind City and it had finally absorbed enough energy to break through to the next realm.<sub> </sub>


    It was the bad luck of the bandits that Brainy had broken through just the day before they decided to attack.


    Back on the airship, Lin Fan had whispered into the bandit leader''s ear, "If you don''t want to die, you should retreat."


    Then he had Brainy use the seed that it had sent out to paralyze the bandit leader for just a split second which made the bandit leader''s eyes open wide in shock.


    When the bandit leader pulled away, Lin Fan hadn''t forgotten to say, "I''ll be seeing you soon."


    That was why the bandit leader wasn''t surprised to see Lin Fan and was even courteous to him at first, he knew that Lin Fan would definitelye find him for something.


    Now that he was trapped in a room with him, the bandit leader was filled with fear, but he kept himself calm on the surface.


    Lin Fan had the same smile as he said, "I want you toe under me."


    That was right, Lin Fan wanted these bandits to work for him!


    He had seen how these bandits treated their captives, all of the women were left untouched and the only thing they seemed interested in was the goods.


    Even when that bandit had tried doing something to Ang, the bandit leader had been about to make a move, but he didn''t make it in time as Lin Fan had already crippled that one bandit.


    It seemed like while this bandit leader didn''t have full control over his men, he did have some prestige among them and he was quite the honourable person.


    That was just one of the reasons Lin Fan wanted these bandits under him.


    The bandit leader''s eyes opened wide in shock as he said, "You want us to work for you?"


    But then he quickly narrowed his eyes and looked at Lin Fan as he said, "What benefits will there be if we work for you?"


    Lin Fan''s smile turned a bit cold as he said, "Well, first, life is very important. Don''t you think so?"


    The three bandits all opened their eyes wide open, but they said nothing.


    They already knew that Lin Fan could kill them all in an instant, that was why they dared to sit here so calmly with him. If he wanted to kill them, he would have done so already.


    But then Lin Fan said, "But that''s not the kind of rtionship I want. I want you to sincerely work for me."


    The bandit leader was silent for a bit before he said, "Then I''ll ask this once again, what benefits can you give us?"


    Lin Fan looked right into the bandit leader''s eyes as he said, "I can help you take the revenge you want the most."


    The bandit leader felt like he had been seen through and the two adjutants also looked at Lin Fan in shock.


    Most people wouldn''t care about the backstory of a bandit, but Lin Fan was different.


    This was a man who was in his early twenties and yet was in the tinum Realm, there must be a story in his past. This kind of man was definitely someone who would be treated as a treasure in any royal family, yet here he was running around as a bandit instead.


    The bandit leader took a deep look at Lin Fan and somehow he felt like he could believe him. Maybe it was because of the strange power that Lin Fan used or maybe it was because of the aura that he felt from Ang. This aura was simr to one that he had felt before, it was the same aura he had felt from his father, the head of the family¡­


    Lin Fan could tell that the bandit leader was wavering, so he raised his hand to the table and brought out three sets of armours, "And if you''re willing to work for me, there''s nock of rewards."


    The bandit leader was shocked to see these three sets of armour. It was a set of Gold Realm Armour and two sets of Silver Realm Armour.


    When he was back at his family, these things didn''t seem that rare, but now that he was a bandit, he knew just how rare these things were. He had been running around as a bandit for two years now and he was still using a tattered set of armour.


    The bandit leader reached out his hand to touch the armour and feeling the quality before he said, "Alright, we can serve as your subordinates, but are you willing to listen to my story first?"

 108 Chapter 108

    The story the bandit leader had was actually quite a stereotypical one.


    The bandit leader''s name was Jiang Zhi Shu and he was from the Jiang Family of Rock Mountain City.


    He had been the golden offspring of the Jiang Family, the most talented one of the younger generation who was destined to take over the Jiang Family.


    But there was this girl who he had grown up with, always butting heads with her. However, he didn''t know when it started, but he slowly fell in love with her attitude of never giving up.


    This girl was someone who came from a low birth, so of course his family wouldn''t allow for them to be together.


    So in the end, he decided to run away with her.


    But that was quickly dealt with and she was imprisoned in his family.


    He soon saw his family for what it truly was, even his father, the head of the family had turned his back on him.


    In the end, Jiang Zhi Shu faked his own death and ran away from his family. But before doing so, he had arranged for his big brother to watch over the girl until the time came that he would be able toe back to take her away.


    Since that day, two years had passed and he was no closer to going back to the Jiang Family.


    When his story came to an end, Ang turned to Lin Fan with a bit of a sparkle in her eyes.


    It was clear that this story had moved her and she wanted Lin Fan to help, but Lin Fan gave a slight shake of his head and squeezed her hand.


    Lin Fan leaned in to whisper, "We can''t act rashly here. I''m almost certain that the Jiang Family he mentioned is the Legendary Realm Family of Rock Mountain City, which is one of the five main cities."


    Then after pausing, Lin Fan continued, "The fact that he didn''t mention this means he''s thinking about using us to take care of his family, or rather he wants to use his family to see how strong we really are. I''m sure that his story is true because I can tell that those emotions can''t be faked, but he isn''t an idiot. A rtionship takes a long time to forge, we have to forge our rtionship with him first before helping him."


    Jiang Zhi Shu saw all of this and knew that it was no use acting any longer, so he said with a sigh, "I guess that didn''t work."


    Lin Fan looked back at him with a smile, "We''ll help you one day, but before that, we need to make you stronger. I''m sure you won''t feel satisfied letting someone else take care of everything for you."


    Jiang Zhi Shu hesitated a bit before nodding, "You''re right, I need to settle this with my own hands. But what ns do you have for making us stronger."


    Lin Fan casually said, "in and simple, you will be righteous bandits."


    "Righteous bandits?" All three of them said at the same time.


    They had never heard such a contradictory term before, but here it was being said by Lin Fan.


    "Simply put, you will¡­"


    ¡­


    After they finished their discussion, the bandit leader and the two adjutants escorted Lin Fan out of their base, but this time, their expressions were much more genuine. They had been won over by Lin Fan''s words and felt it was worth giving it a chance to work with him.


    Once Lin Fan and Ang came out of the bandits'' base, they quickly headed back to Green Wood City.


    They easily passed through the gates since the guards already knew who they were from before. While the guards were confused why they headed out right afternding, when they brought out the Gold Realm beast corpse Lin Fan had Brainy bring to them on their way back, the guardspletely understood. They must have had some special task to take care of, it all made sense when they thought about what kind of expert Lin Fan was. He was someone who could chase off a pack of bandits led by the tinum Realm Expert.


    When Lin Fan and Ang entered the streets of Green Wood City, they were swept up by the waves of people moving through the city. It was just an endless sea of people as far as the eye could see.


    But main cities had their own businesses to deal with this problem.


    Standing by the sides of the streets near the gate were kids waiting there.


    When these kids saw Lin Fan and Ang just looking lost, they quickly came over.


    With therger cities, there were many people living in different situations. Withrger cities, there were more people who went out and died, meaning there were more kids who were left as orphans.<sub> </sub>


    For these kids who lived on the streets, they had two ways to make their living. They could either pickpocket and work for the street gangs, or they could make a living off of doing odd jobs.


    The kids that approached Lin Fan and Ang were part of thetter, they survived by guiding neers to the city around for a fee.


    But of course, not all of them were good. Some of them took the fee from the mark before leading them to certain ambush spots¡­


    Lin Fan could guess what these kids wanted, but he didn''t trust people that easily. Lin Fan swept his spiritual senses over these kids which they couldn''t feel at all and he found several of them with blood stains on the clothes hidden under their coats. It was easy to tell that these kids were involved in some shady business, but Lin Fan wasn''t here to clean the gutters of this city.


    Still, as his spiritual senses swept over them, there was one kid who caught his attention.


    It was a scruffy looking kid who hade over with the crowd, but was shyly standing on the edge of the crowd of kids surrounding them. What surprised Lin Fan was that under all the dirt on that kid, there was a beautiful little girl who had skin that was white as jade who seemed no more than eight years old.


    It was surprising to see an orphan who looked like this on the streets, normally it would have been easy to be adopted with her looks, but somehow she was still living on the streets.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit of pity for this little girl, so after shooing off the other kids, he approached her and said, "Do you know your way around this city?"


    <o>,m The little girl grabbed her hat and lowered it over her head before saying in a shy voice, "Yes, yes, sir, I know my way, way around."</o>


    Lin Fan brought a crystal out of his storage and said, "This is for you if you can bring us to the Mu Manor."


    The little girl was shocked to see a crystal appear, this was the currency of beast masters!


    But still she nodded and said, "I can take you there sir."


    Lin Fan took her hand and put the crystal in her palm before saying, "Lead us there then."


    The girl just nodded before waving at them and running off.


    Lin Fan and Ang were surprised by how fast this little girl ran, but they followed her through the streets of the city.


    Along the way, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Little girl, what is your name?"


    When she heard this, the little girl was surprised, "Little girl? Sir I think you''re mistaken, I''m clearly a boy."


    Lin Fan was also a bit surprised by this answer, but he didn''t refute it, "Alright, little boy, what is your name?"


    The little girl hesitated a bit before answering, "Song Shu, they say that I look like a squirrel when I eat, so they called me that."


    "Hmm." Lin Fan just said without saying anything else.


    He did feel a bit of pity for this little girl, but since she wasn''t willing to ask for his help, he wouldn''t butt into her business.


    After a few minutes, they made their way to the Mu Manor.


    Once the little girl brought them to their destination, she seemed like she was struggling with something, but she never said a thing in the end.


    Lin Fan just took out another crystal and tossed it to her, "This is for bringing us here so quickly. Thank you."


    The little girl quickly caught it and after realizing her mistake, she gave a bow to both of them before running off along the streets.


    Lin Fan and Ang watched over this little girl for a bit, both falling into thought before turning back to the Mu Manor.


    When they approached the gates to the Mu Manor, there were two guards that suddenly appeared.


    "Halt!"

 109 Chapter 109

    The two guards crossed their spears in front of Lin Fan and Ang as one of them said, "Identify yourselves! This is the property of the Mu Family, no trespassers allowed!"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see that these guards were actually in the Gold Realm. These were people who were qualified to be elders for noble families, yet here they were working as guards.


    When one had a higher status, one really did things on a different scale.


    Lin Fan took out the letter that Mu Bo Hai had written for him and he said, "I have a letter here from Lord Mu, rmending him to his family."


    The guards knit their brows when they heard this and one of them quickly said, "Is the name of Lord Mu someone like you could invoke?" But still they took the letter just in case.


    When they opened the letter and the power of thew from the seal it was signed with was released, they immediately knew that this letter was real.


    Both the guards looked at each other in nk dismay before they quickly bowed to Lin Fan, "Please, please wait a minute...We will inform the family head now!"


    After that, both of the guards ran off into the manor with the letter.


    Less than a minute, they came back with an important looking person in a pure green robe.


    That important looking person looked to be middle aged with a thick head of green hair and sharp piercing light green eyes. He also had a strange thin mustache that was also green in colour dangling off his lips.


    When the man saw Lin Fan and Ang, he quickly came over with a friendly smile as he said, "Owner Lin, it truly is an honour to meet you. Pleasee in and have a seat."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this, "You know me?"


    The man said whileughing, "My father sent word long ago of you and I''ve been waiting a long time to meet you. I know that you are someone who likes to get straight into business, but the shop that my father asked to prepare for you isn''t ready yet, so how about we sit down and talk first?"


    Since the other side was being this friendly, Lin Fan had no reason to deny their invitation. Lin Fan might be someone who was quite resolute when it came to killing, but that didn''t mean he wasn''t someone who ughtered everyone.


    When they arrived inside the manor, Lin Fan could tell that it was the manor of a rich and powerful family.


    Just the density of the life energy inside the manor waspletely different from anything Lin Fan had seen before.


    Most of the manors that nobles and royals built were built on life energy gathering arrays which meant they gathered the surrounding life energy, creating a life energy dense area that was perfect for cultivating. Lin Fan had already felt the life energy gathering array of a royal family when he was at the Feng Family''s manor, but that was absolutely nothing whenpared to the Mu Family.


    It seemed like there were indeed benefits to increasing one''s status, but that was just the way of the world. This was a world that worshipped experts since their strength gave themon popce safety.


    The middle aged man brought Lin Fan into the living room and had the servants bring all kinds of desserts with tea before finally introducing himself, "Owner Lin, this humble one''s name is Mu Dong Hai, I am Lord Mu''s son."


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to hear that this man was Mu Bo Hai''s son, but he was surprised to hear what his name was. What would the youngest generation be called, Mu Xiao Hai?


    Mu Dong Hai continued, "Owner Lin, I''ve long heard of your fame and your power, you really are someone to admire. If possible I would wish to be brothers with you."


    Mu Dong Hai was someone in the tinum Realm, so he was eligible to be Lin Fan''s brother.


    With the increase in lifespan from cultivation, it was hard to differentiate generations sometimes.


    Those that were in the tinum Realm could live up to five hundred years, so there were many who looked young who were actually over a hundred years old.


    So most experts judged generation either by real age or by cultivation realm. Those that were in the same realm generally called each other brothers regardless of age sometimes.


    But of course, this Mu Dong Hai had a motive for making Lin Fan his brother. He was trying to put Mu Bo Hai in a generation higher than Lin Fan to give his father more respect from this young man.<sub> </sub>


    As for Lin Fan, he had no reason to reject this since he did indeed want to get closer to the Mu Family. His branch would be in Green Wood City from now on, so there was nothing to lose from gaining backing from thergest family in this city.


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "It''s an honour, Brother Mu!"


    Mu Dong Hai justughed and patted Lin Fan on the back, "Good brother!"


    Then he took out a box from his storage ring and said, "This is a gift from me for our first meeting, you can''t say no, brother!"


    The box opened up to reveal a sword that waspletely made of jade and judging from the fluctuationsing from it, it was a tinum Realm Artifact! This really was an expensive greeting gift!


    Lin Fan didn''t feel right just taking this gift without giving anything back, so he also took out an oak leaf that seemed to be carvedpletely out of jade.


    This oak leaf was from a Jadeite Oak and any wood attributed pet that ate it would have their life energy cleansed and purified, making them much stronger than any other pets.


    The key thing was that the value of the Jadeite Oak Leaf was not any lower than the tinum Realm Artifact!


    Mu Dong Hai was surprised to see this, but of course he wouldn''t turn it down since it was an important symbol of their alliance.


    After chatting with Lin Fan for a bit, Mu Dong Hai made a suggestion, "Brother Lin, since you are new to our Green Wood City, you must take a trip to see the specialty of our Green Wood City, the Alchemy Tower."


    Lin Fan was a bit confused, "Specialty? Alchemy Tower?"


    Mu Dong Hai exined, "Since Green Wood City is surrounded by forests, it''s quite easy for the people of our city to harvest ingredients. That is why plenty of alchemists have settled here and eventually created the Alchemy Tower. Now it is where most of the pet food and pills on the continente from."


    Lin Fan felt a bit of interest in this, "Ho, maybe I will check it out now since I still have some time."


    It was currently the afternoon and Lin Fan didn''t have anything to do since he was waiting for the Mu Family to prepare the shop for him.


    Mu Dong Hai said with a smile, "Perfect, I''ll have someone prepare a beast carriage for you right now. But unfortunately I won''t be able to join you since I have another meetingter, but you muste back for dinnerter."


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "Of course Brother Mu, I''ll have to impose on your hospitality a bit longer."


    Mu Dong Hai waved his hand, "Brother Lin, you''re too courteous!"


    So Mu Dong Hai arranged the beast carriage which had the mark of the Mu Family on it. This beast carriage wasn''t normally seen around the city, so people pointed at it wherever it went.


    Finally when it arrived at the Alchemy Tower, there was someone that came out of the Alchemy Tower to wee them, but they were surprised to see that it wasn''t the Mu Family. That person just watched on awkwardly as Lin Fan and Ang walked past them, moving into the Alchemy Tower.


    This ce was filled with all kinds of medicinal scent, but it was quite lively inside the main hall of the tower.


    There were people running all around, browsing all the various shops that filled the hall.


    Right opposite to the main entrance, right along the wall on the other side, there was arge reception area.


    Beside the reception area, there were tworge boards that were covered in various pieces of paper that had crowds of people around them. There were people taking pieces of paper from these boards before heading over to the reception desk. Most of these people went to the middle where they talked to the receptionist there and shed their badge before leaving.


    On the sides of the main receptionist, there were two different desks. One seemed to be for turning in missions and one seemed to be for creating new missions.


    As Lin Fan and Ang looked around, they suddenly heard someone calling out, "You scammer!"

 110 Chapter 110

    When they looked over at the source of the sound, they found a small boy who was being held down by tworge men. Standing in front of the boy being held down was someone in gold rimmed robes, looking like the exact definition of a noble.


    The rich man looked down at the little boy and said, "You''re calling me a scammer? You should be d that I even took your job for that low price!"


    But the boy wouldn''t give up even with the tworge men pushing him into the ground, "Your pet food was what caused my pet to get ill, how can you deny it now?"


    The rich man could see that a few people were looking at him with gazes of doubt, which angered him, so he raised his hand to bring down on the little boy, "You piece of trash, you dare nder me like this?"


    The little boy closed his eyes and prepared for the hit, but the p never came.


    Lin Fan had appeared in front of the rich man and had grabbed his hand. He gave the rich man a cold re and the rich man''s legs turned soft, as they gave out under him.


    The two rough men who had been pushing the kid down immediately let go of the kid and ran over to the rich man, helping him up.


    As for Lin Fan, he just ignored the rich man and reached a hand out to the kid as he said, "Can you stand?"


    The little kid looked at him in surprise, wondering why he would help him like this, but he still took Lin Fan''s hand. When he stood up, he quickly walked over to where his dog had been mmed into the ground by the rough looking guards and tried to tend to it, but the dog wouldn''t respond at all.


    It wasn''t in Lin Fan''s nature to interfere in the business of others for no reason, but when his gaze had fallen over the little kid''s dog, the system had suddenly given him a mission.


    "Host, how can you ept frauds walking around tricking people?"


    "Host, please expose this fraud for what he is and use real pet food to cure this little boy''s pet."


    "Host, if you fail or reject this mission, you will lose your pet food selling privileges."


    Once he heard that, Lin Fan definitely couldn''t let this mission fail.


    Currently in Lin Fan''s shop, the pet food business was earning him more than half of his points.


    He was currently at his lowest point and he needed points to gain more power, but if he were to lose his most precious source of points now, it would be equal to shooting him in the foot.


    The rich man slowly overcame his fear and his anger over how pathetic he looked immediately surged to his head as he jumped up and roared, "How dare you, how dare you! Do you even know who I am?!"


    Without even waiting for Lin Fan to respond, he pointed his finger at Lin Fan and continued to rant, "I am the young master of the Chen Family, Chen Yi and a Junior Alchemist! Do you know who my father is! He is the Grandmaster Alchemist Chen Mu, one of the elders of the Alchemist Tower! You dare to defy me like this, watch how I crush you with a single finger!"


    He then waved his hand at the guards and said, "This man is the one who assaulted me, what are you idiots doing! I want you to tie him up and beat him in front of the Alchemy Tower a hundred times! The same with the kid who ndered me!"


    The two guards looked at each other before moving towards Lin Fan.


    Since their young master had spoken, they had no choice but to follow his orders.


    Seeing the two approach, Lin Fan just shook his head with a sigh.


    Once the two were close enough, Lin Fan took care of both of them with a single palm thrust, sending flying past Young Master Chen and mming into the ground. They created two small holes in the ground when theynded.


    Young Master Chen looked back at the two in the ground and he suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.


    It only hit him this moment that he might have provoked someone that he couldn''t afford to provoke. This madman didn''t even care about the fact that he was in the Alchemy Tower, he was just beating people as he wished.<sub> </sub>


    Didn''t he know that there were plenty of experts in the Alchemy Tower? Or did he just not care?


    After taking care of these two, Lin Fan began moving towards Young Master Chen. When Young Master Chen saw Lin Fan approach, his legs gave out underneath him and he slowly began inching back on his butt as he shouted, "Do you really dare hit me! Don''t you know who I am! I am the star of the Chen Family, you will feel our wrath fall down on your head!"


    But Lin Fan just ignored him as he approached.


    However, right before Lin Fan could reach him, there was an old man who suddenly appeared between the two.


    Lin Fan didn''t recognize this old man, but Young Master Chen acted like he had just seen his saviour as he immediately jumped up to shout, "Elder Gu, you''re finally here! This piece of trash dared to act up in the Alchemy Tower, he deserves death for his transgressions!"


    But even with Young Master Chen shouting in his ears, Elder Gu didn''t act up as he cautiously looked at Lin Fan.


    He could tell that even though this man was young, he was in the tinum Realm just like him. This wasn''t someone who could be easily provoked, this kind of talent normally only came from a Legendary Realm Family!


    Elder Gu raised his hand and calmly said, "This little friend, perhaps there has been a disagreement, but there''s no need to resort to violence."


    Lin Fan just gave a slight snort, "We''re not the ones resorting to violence, it''s the one hiding behind you." Then he turned to the little kid and said, "Tell him what happened."


    The little kid hesitated a bit since he was facing one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower, one of the only ten Grandmaster Alchemists in this entire world.


    But eventually the little kid overcame his hesitation as he said in a firm voice, "My father spent thest of our money to pay Young Master Chen to make a special set of pet food for my little dog so I could do well in our school''spetition, but we were scammed in the end! When I fed the pet food we received from Young Master Chen to my dog, my dog immediately lost all its strength and copsed. Then when I asked Young Master Chen about it, he called his goons onto me to silence me!"


    Elder Gu knit his brows when he heard this.


    Young Master Chen immediately said, "You''re trying to nder me! I am a respected Junior Alchemist, why would I need to fool someone like you? You''re clearly trying to pin some mistake you made on me to receivepensation!"


    Elder Gu was stuck in a hard spot right now, one side was a Junior Alchemist who was a part of their Alchemy Tower and whose father was one of the elders who held the same rank as him. But the other side had an unknown young expert with an unknown background who was already in the tinum Realm. It wouldn''t be good if he offended either side.


    But before he could decide, Lin Fan spoke first, "Committing a crime and being too afraid to admit it, you really are something special."


    Young Master Chen suddenly fell silent before being filled with rage once more, "What crime! What proof do you have!"


    Lin Fan ignored Young Master Chen as he came over to the dog that the kid was holding and ced his hand on its stomach. He sent in his spiritual senses to see what was wrong with the dog.


    The system had already told Lin Fan that this Young Master Chen was a fraud, so Lin Fan would never doubt the system since he knew just how powerful it was.


    As expected, when his spiritual senses swept over the stomach of the dog, he quickly found the problem.


    Lin Fan opened the dog''s mouth and suddenly stuck his finger inside, making the dog puke out the contents of its stomach.


    When the dog was finished, there was a dark mass that was found in the center of the vomit.


    Lin Fan picked it up after surrounding his hand in life energy and raised it up for everyone to see as he said, "I think this is plenty of proof."


    Seeing this, Elder Gu deeply knit his brows.

 111 Chapter 111

    But this Young Master Chen wouldn''t give up unless he saw his coffin.


    Young Master Chen just had an arrogant look on his face as he said, "What kind of shit proof is this? Isn''t that just proof that the dog ate something random and he is trying to me this mess on me?"


    Lin Fan shook his head at this, even Elder Gu couldn''t help shaking his head at this.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "This ck mass is a mass of impurities that can onlye from poorly refined pet food or pills. This is something that cannot be digested and is harmful to the pet if there is too much found in their bodies. The fact that this was found inside this dog after it ingested your pet food can only mean that your skills are so poor that there was too much impurities umted in your pet food, which negatively affected this dog."


    Young Master Chen just gave a snort, "You act like you know so much, but are you an alchemist? You''re clearly just trying to make up nonsense to pin the me on me!"


    Elder Gu knit his brows when he heard this. This was actually the most basic thing for an alchemist, but this Chen Family brat was acting like he had never heard of this before. Elder Gu really didn''t know how Elder Chen raised his son, but it seemed like his son had turned into a wastrel.


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile and said, "Who says that I''m not an alchemist?"


    At this, everyone looked at him in shock. Even Elder Gu looked at Lin Fan with one raised brow, but after thinking about it, he realized that this made sense. Lin Fan was able to quickly find what was wrong with the dog, this meant that he at least had some knowledge on alchemy.


    But still Young Master Chen wouldn''t give up. After being shocked for a bit, he quickly came back to his senses as he said with a snort, "Ya, like everything you say is true. Just because you say you''re an alchemist, we''re all supposed to believe you? In your dreams!"


    But Lin Fan didn''t lose his smile as he said, "Then do you want to make a bet?"


    Young Master Chen couldn''t help being taken aback by this. He looked at Lin Fan, but there was a chill that ran down his spine from Lin Fan''s "normal" smile.


    Still Young Master Chen didn''t want to show any weakness and besides, he had his back Elder Gu with him now, there was nothing he couldn''t do!


    So Young Master Chen said, "What kind of bet?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "If I use my blend of pet food to save this little dog, how about you p yourself ten times and kowtow to this little boy to apologize?"


    Young Master Chen''s rage came up again, but this time he suppressed it, "Then what about when you lose?"


    Lin Fan just said, "Though I doubt I will, but if I lose, how about I do the same to you?"


    Young Master Chen gave a coldugh, "You truly are arrogant. I can''t wait to see you kowtowing to me."


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing.


    With a wave of his hand, Lin Fan took out some of the pet food he had stored inside his system storage. This was pet food that was made with the machine and was specialized pet food made of wind attribute ingredients. He took out this wind attributed pet food since the dog was also of the wind attribute.


    When he took it out, no one was surprised to see it, rather plenty of people looked down on Lin Fan since he had taken out a seemingly normal piece of pet food.


    But for an experienced alchemist like Elder Gu, he could tell that this wasn''t just a normal piece of pet food. The purity of this pet food was something that went beyond anything he had ever seen. He could smell it from the faint scent of the ingredients in the air, this pet food could be pet food with 100% purity which had never been seen before!


    Thismotion had of course drawn out other high ranking alchemists, but there were two in the rafters that were just as shocked as Elder Gu when they saw this pet food.


    Lin Fan just said nothing as he brought the pet food to the mouth of the dog. He ced it in the dog''s mouth and gently massaged the throat to get the dog to swallow the food.


    After a while, once the food entered the dog''s stomach, the little dog suddenly opened its eyes.


    There was a swirl of life energy that gathered around the little dog before it broke through to the next level.


    Everyone was shocked except for a few when they saw this, they never expected that not only would this pet food cure the little dog, it would even make it break through.


    For those that knew what kind of purity this pet food had, they already knew that this would be the result, so they weren''t shocked. But they were still surprised to find that their guesses were right, it really was pet food with 100% purity!


    Young Master Chen''s chin dropped to the ground when he saw this scene, he never would have dreamed that this would be the situation he would be in now.


    Would he really have to kowtow and p himself in front of amoner?<sub> </sub>


    No, he could never ept this!


    Young Master Chen roared out, "You must have cheated somehow! This must be a y between you and that brat to nder me!"


    Lin Fan just gave a coldugh before turning to say, "Then I take it you won''t be honouring the bet?"


    Young Master Chen screamed like a maniac, "Like I would ever honour a bet with a cheater like you!"


    Lin Fan just passed the little dog back to the little kid and stood up before cracking his knuckles.


    Young Master Chen''s legs gave out once again when he saw this.


    But before Lin Fan could move, Elder Gu released his aura and shouted, "Enough, do you think I''m not here?"


    Young Master Chen looked at him like he was his saviour while Lin Fan looked at him with slightly knit brows.


    Elder Gu first turned to Lin Fan and said, "Young friend, you have proven more than enough to show the truth of this case. Our Alchemy Tower will refund all fees this little boy''s father has paid and we will give him ten times that amount aspensation. I hope that will work for this young friend."


    Lin Fan turned to the little boy and asked, "Are you alright with this?"


    The little boy quickly nodded his head. This was one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower who was personally handling this case, how could he show any dissatisfaction?


    Moreover, if he kept pushing, he might be targeted by Young Master Chen and the Chen Family behind him.


    Fortunately, he didn''t need to worry about that since Lin Fan was so dazzling that he had taken all the aggro from Young Master Chen.


    Young Master Chen quickly shouted, "Elder, you can''t just¡­"


    But before he could finish, Elder Gu cut him off, "As for you, you truly have disgraced our Alchemy Tower this time!"


    Young Master Chen''s face turned pale when he heard this.


    Elder Gu continued, "In light of this event, I hereby announce that Chen Yi will be stripped of his qualifications as a Junior Alchemist and will be banned from the Alchemist Tower for the next five years."


    Young Master Chen''s facepletely copsed when he heard this.


    He tried to speak, but he couldn''t even stutter out a single word.


    Once Elder Gu was finished disciplining Young Master Chen, he turned back to Lin Fan with a bit of greed in his eyes, "Little friend, if possible, could I invite you to be a guest at our Alchemy Tower?"


    "Si!" Everyone took a cold breath when they heard this.


    This was the biggest shock of the day. It was rare for the Alchemy Tower to invite someone as a guest, it was normally reserved for members of royal families or Legendary Realm Families!


    But there was an even bigger shock that came right after.


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "I''ve seen enough of the Alchemy Tower to know what kind of ce it is, so I don''t want to stay here any longer today."


    After saying this, Lin Fan turned to the crowd of people all staring at him and he said in a loud voice, "I will be opening my own pet shop tomorrow, so for anyone that wants toe and get some real pet food, pleasee and visit my shop!"


    Then without saying another word, he took the little boy''s hand and walked out of the Alchemy Tower.


    Everyone just watched as he left, but they were all shouting the same thing in their minds.


    Bro, can you at least tell us where your shop is!?

 112 Chapter 112

    When Lin Fan walked out of the Alchemy Tower, he had quite the smug smile on his face. He really thought that he had looked quite cool back then.


    Ang could see that smug look and she revealed a faint smile since she knew that he had forgotten to say something important right before leaving.


    After walking out the front door, Lin Fan suddenly realized that he hadn''t told them the location of his new store and the smug look on his face twitched. But since he was already out the door, he couldn''t just walk back in¡­


    Ang had been waiting for this and when she saw it, she really couldn''t hold it back as she let out augh.


    Lin Fan heard it and red at her, but he continued to walk forward.


    After moving away, they sent the little kid off. The little kid kept thanking Lin Fan for everything and promising that he would pay them back, but Lin Fan just waved to the kid and sent him home.


    ? Once they were alone, Lin Fan red at Ang one more time, but knowing that he couldn''t do anything to her, he began moving back towards their beast carriage.


    But before they could take more than a few steps, there was a voice that called out, "Wait, stop right there!"


    This was a voice that was as soft as bells, feeling very soothing and nice to the ears.


    When they turned around, they saw this girl with short green hair and a pair of piercing red eyes. Unfortunately that was all they could see of that girl''s face since she had a silk veil covering the rest of it. However, based on her figure and the parts of the face that were revealed, it was quite clear that she was quite the beauty. The only thingcking about her was the two t mounds on her chest¡­


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he looked at this girl in surprise, but then he turned back around and began walking away.


    The girl immediately came forward and grabbed Lin Fan''s arm as she shouted, "Don''t you hear people when they''re telling you to wait!"


    Lin Fan then knit his brows, but he quickly rxed them as he turned and said, "What do you want?"


    The girl looked Lin Fan up and down first before saying, "What was with the pet food you brought out before?"


    Lin Fan just calmly replied, "It was just normal pet food, there was nothing special about it."


    "Bullshit!" The girl immediately shouted out to cut him off before saying, "If you really think I would believe that was normal pet food, you must be thinking that I was the most gullible person in the world!"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling when he saw this as he said, "Miss, you really should change the way you act. Girls should be more gentle¡­"


    But before he could finish, the girl had already raised her fist and had ced it in front of his face.


    Lin Fan felt a dangerous feeling, so he quickly swallowed his words with a smile.


    Then he tried to change the topic since he felt that there was nothing good that woulde out of interacting with this girl.


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "Well miss, it has been a pleasure to meet you, but there are other things that I have to do. If there is a chance, let us meet again."


    As soon as his voice fell, Lin Fan smoothly turned on his heel and began walking away, but before he could even take more than two steps, the girl had caught his arm again.


    This time, that feeling of nothing good woulde out of interacting with this girl came true.


    When she grabbed his arm and he tried to pull it away, there was someone who called, "You scoundrel, how dare you bother Xiao Yun!"


    Lin Fan turned to look at the boy who had just arrived with a look of amazement.


    Please, bro!


    No matter how you looked at it, he was the one being assaulted by the girl here!<sub> </sub>


    She was the one who was grabbing his arm and wouldn''t let him run away!


    In what world would this be considered him bothering the girl?!


    But he didn''t have time to convey any of that as the boy who just showed up ran over and pped Lin Fan''s arm, causing the girl to let go of him.


    The girl was surprised to see someone suddenly appear, but seeing his face, her expression immediately scrunched up like she wanted nothing to do with him.


    But the boy ignored all of that as he pointed at Lin Fan and said, "You piece of trash, who do you think you are, daring to bother my family''s Xiao Yun!"


    "Xiao Hai, I''ve already told you that I''m not a part of your family!" The girl immediately shouted.


    The boy called Xiao Hai said, "Xiao Yun, don''t be agitated, don''t be agitated. Anyone can see that we are a match made in heaven, the fact that we''ll be married sooner orter is just a fact. Let me take care of this piece of trash for you first and then we can go back to discuss this."


    The girl called Xiao Yun couldn''t take this boy anymore and was about to stomp off, but then she remembered what she hade for. She turned back to Lin Fan with a thoughtful gaze before saying with a gentle expression, "But this gentleman has shown his interest in me and to be honest, I''m quite interested in him. For our sake, let''s just remain friends."


    Xiao Hai and Lin Fan both revealed a shocked look.


    Lin Fan was shocked because of how fast this girl''s face had changed.


    One moment she was as fierce as a lion and the next she was as gentle as a kitten¡­


    He really wanted to curse in his heart since he knew that this girl was trying to use him to take care of this boy, but he also didn''t know whether tough or cry at the fact that he was stuck in this situation.


    Xiao Hai immediately turned towards Lin Fan with an angry look and pointed in his face as he said, "You, you, you, I don''t know what kind of tricks you have yed on my Xiao Yun, but you definitely won''t get away with this!"


    Lin Fan just calmly raised his hands and said, "This friend, I think there''s been some kind of mistake here. I don''t even know this miss."


    Xiao Hai became even more angry, "One minute you''re confessing to a girl and the next you''re trying to run away, what kind of man are you! Do you even know who this girl is? Yang Yun is the disciple of Elder Hai of the Alchemy Tower, one of the only ten Grandmaster Alchemists in this entire world! Do you think that you can get away with just ying around with someone like her!"


    Lin Fan looked at Yang Yun in surprise, but there was also a bit of understanding in that gaze. He had sensed the aura of experts in the higher floors of the Alchemy Tower, so he knew that there must have been more elders watching what had happened between him and Young Master Chen.


    Could it be that the elder had sent this girl to ask about his pet food?


    But he didn''t have time to think about this now with how Xiao Hai was bearing down on him.


    Lin Fan still had his hands up trying to calm Xiao Hai down as he said, "Little friend, you''re thinking too much. There really is nothing that happened between me and this girl."


    Xiao Hai flew even more into a rage, "This girl? This girl? Is that how someone like you can address Xiao Yun? Let me tell you, Xiao Yun is the most perfect girl in the world! Not only is she beautiful, she''s also an Expert Alchemist at the young age of twenty, there is no one that canpare to the talent that she has! She is the goddess of my heart and the goddess of everyone''s heart in Green Wood City!"


    Hearing Xiao Hai praise her excessively, even the proud Yang Yun couldn''t help feeling a bit shy as a blush came over her face.


    Yang Yun pped Xiao Hai on the back of his head and said, "Mu Xiao Hai, can''t you see you''re in public, what kind of things are you saying!"


    Mu Xiao Hai didn''t mind being pped in the back of the head at all, he just turned to Yang Yun with a righteous look and said, "How can I stand here and let him disrespect you like this? Xiao Yun, there are things that a man has to do!"


    Lin Fan suddenly asked in a surprised voice, "Mu? As in the Mu Family?"


    Mu Xiao Hai heard this and he turned back with a proud look, "That''s right, I am the young master of the Mu Family! You''ve definitely heard of my grandfather, Mu Bo¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan had suddenly pped him across the face!

 113 Chapter 113

    Mu Xiao Hai and Yang Yun both had looks of shock on their faces as they couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    Meanwhile, Lin Fan just had a faint smile on his lips as he looked at this kid.


    He could tell that this was a good kid by how he treated Yang Yun, but he could also tell that this Mu Xiao Hai was quite the excitable kid.


    He also found Mu Xiao Hai''s name quite funny.


    The Mu Family really had a unique naming sense. The grandfather was Mu Bo Hai, the father was Mu Dong Hai, and the son was Mu Xiao Hai, every generation was named after the sea!


    But it almost seemed like they becamezy when it came to Mu Xiao Hai''s generation, just naming him small sea¡­


    Once Mu Xiao Hai got over the shock of being pped, he immediately jumped up again and shouted, "You actually dare to p me! Are you looking to be trashed!"


    Lin Fan just shook his head before suddenly taking Mu Xiao Hai''s hand and pulling him forward.


    Mu Xiao Hai lost his bnce and he soon found himself lying down over Lin Fan''s knee, while Lin Fan had a hand raised in the air.


    Mu Xiao Hai had a bad feeling where this was leading and that feeling was correct as Lin Fan''s hand fell right down on his butt, with a firm pping sound.


    It came down again and again on his butt cheeks, making Mu Xiao Hai call out in shock every time his butt was pped.


    After several dozen ps, Lin Fan finally let Mu Xiao Hai up.


    Mu Xiao Hai just rubbed his aching butt as he stood there in a daze, not understanding what had just happened.


    But this time it wasn''t Mu Xiao Hai that acted up, rather it was Yang Yun.


    She came up to Mu Xiao Hai and looked at the mark on his face, which she couldn''t help knitting her brows at.


    She took out a little jade bottle from her storage and poured the ointment onto her finger before she gently applied it to Mu Xiao Hai''s cheek.


    When the cool sensation of the balm touched his cheek, Mu Xiao Hai suddenly realized what was happening. The joy that he felt from this far outweighed the pain from his butt as he grabbed Yang Yun''s hand with a wide smile, "Xiao Yun, I knew you cared for me."


    Yang Yun was surprised at first, but then she actually just gently pped his hand away as she said, "Stop talking, let me finish."


    She slowly applied the ointment onto his face and once she was finished, she pped a gauze over it.


    Mu Xiao Hai winced a bit when the gauze was ced on, but then he felt nothing. It was only then did he remember the pain from his butt. He said with an awkward smile, "Xiao Yun, what about my butt?"


    Yang Yun''s gentle expression disappeared as she knit her brows again. She went behind Mu Xiao Hai and he was expectant as he raised his butt slightly, but then he suddenly felt a foot collide with his butt and it sent him flying.


    Yang Yun then ignored him as she turned to Lin Fan, "You really have ruined my view of you. Here I thought that you were an honest and righteous person."


    Lin Fan spread his hands and said, "One must treat others how they themselves want to be treated. If you didn''t treat me like this first, I wouldn''t have done anything." But then he said with a sly smile, "But it seems like you don''t hate this boy like you pretend to do."


    Yang Yun couldn''t refute this since she did n to use Lin Fan to get away from Mu Xiao Hai, but still, he didn''t have to be this rough with him. She just gave a soft snort and walked away.


    Mu Xiao Hai saw that Yang Yun was leaving and knew that there was no point in provoking Lin Fan anymore. He just turned to Lin Fan and said, "I''ll remember you." Then he ran off to chase after Yang Yun.


    Lin Fan turned to Ang before both of them revealed wide smiles.


    These two kids didn''t have bad personalities, it just they didn''t know how to be honest with their feelings. Rather one of them was too honest with their feelings and that made the other one feel shy, ruining their chances.


    The funniest part was that these two who were incredibly dense with love were actually criticizing the love life of someone else!


    Once this was over, Lin Fan and Ang took their beast carriage back to the Mu Manor.


    Some time had passed since they had gone to the Alchemy Tower and now it was close to dinner, so Mu Dong Hai had also finished his meetings. He had been waiting for them toe back to entertain them.


    When they had just sat down in the living room and the maids had brought over tea and snacks, there was someone who burst through the door. This was a person who Lin Fan and Ang were already acquainted with.<sub> </sub>


    Mu Xiao Hai burst right through the doors and shouted, "Dad, I''m home!"


    But then when he saw who was sitting in the living room, his chin dropped down in shock as he stammered out, "You, you, you, what are you doing here!?"


    Mu Dong Hai revealed a confused look, "Xiao Hai, you know Brother Lin?"


    Mu Xiao Hai''s chin dropped even further to the ground as he said, "Dad, did you just call this man brother?"


    Mu Dong Hai was even more confused, but when he was about to ask his son what he meant, Lin Fan cut in first, "Why can''t I be here and why can''t I be his brother?"


    Mu Xiao Hai ignored this and pointed at Lin Fan''s face, "Dad, you have to take revenge for me! This bastard pped me and spanked me in public today, you have to take revenge for me!"


    Mu Dong Hai first looked over at Lin Fan with a brow raised before he turned back to p Mu Xiao Hai on the back of his head, "Who taught you this kind ofnguage? Brother Lin is your elder generation, you have to treat him with respect! You should at least call him uncle."


    Uncle?


    Uncle!?


    This brat had pped his face and spanked his butt and now he was to call him uncle?


    What kind of world was this?


    Was this bastard a part of the Mu Family or was he a part of the Mu Family?


    Was he adopted after all?!


    Mu Xiao Hai wouldn''t give up as he said, "But dad, he''s nothing good. He''s someone who bullies the weak and only knows how to act arrogantly!"


    Mu Dong Hai pped Mu Xiao Hai in the back of the head again, "Like I don''t know what kind of personality you have. If Brother Lin disciplined you, you must have done something to deserve it."


    Mu Xiao Hai just didn''t know what to say anymore, even his family wouldn''t side with him.


    Mu Dong Hai red at him as he said, "If you don''t apologize to your Uncle Lin now, I can guarantee you''ll receive a proper punishment for not knowing how to respect your elders."


    Mu Xiao Hai looked at his dad with aggrieved eyes, but eventually he had to give in.


    He gritted his teeth for a bit before rxing them and saying, "Uncle Lin, I''m sorry for my behaviour from before. Please forgive me."


    As he said this, his eyes were filled with unwillingness.


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "It''s good to be young, you''re allowed to make mistakes while you''re young. But you should learn from them in the future."


    Mu Xiao Hai gritted his teeth so hard that he almost shattered them when he heard this. His eyes were bloodshot and he almost vomited out blood, but there was nothing he could do.


    In the end, Mu Xiao Hai quickly left the room since he couldn''t stay with this man any longer.


    When Mu Xiao Hai was gone, Mu Dong Hai apologized first, "Brother Lin, I''m sorry for the disrespect my son has shown you."


    Lin Fan just waved his hand before saying in an apologetic voice, "Brother Mu, some of the fault lies with me as well. I may have been a bit rash when I disciplined your son."


    Mu Dong Hai just gave a soft snort when he heard this before saying, "I know what kind of person my son is." Then he gave a sigh as he said, "He''s my only son and my wife may have spoiled him a bit too much. Brother Lin, please feel free to discipline him whenever you want, it would do that brat some good."


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "Brother Mu, I will keep your words in mind. But still, that kid has a good personality, he just needs to be corrected a bit."


    Mu Dong Hai said, "Thank you for yourpliments Brother Lin and I hope that you will keep looking out for him."


    With this harmonious atmosphere, they spent a good night having a feast.


    As for the story of Ang beating Mu Dong Hai up over a piece of cake, that would be for another time.

 114 Chapter 114

    But it wasn''t all peace and quiet that night.


    In a different part of the city, in a certain room in the Chen Manor.


    "Dad, you have to take revenge for me on that bastard! Not only did he humiliate me in front of everyone, he even got my qualifications as a Junior Alchemist taken away, as well as getting me banned from the Alchemy Tower for five years! What will I do with my future?" Chen Yi said in an aggrieved voice.


    It was Chen Yi, the fraud that Lin Fan had exposed.


    "Yi''er, don''t worry, your dad is one of the ten elders of the Alchemist Tower, he will take care of this." Chen Yi''s mother patted him on the head while holding him in her embrace.


    But Elder Chen didn''t have a calm look like the rest of his family.


    He knew that this matter wasn''t as it seemed on the surface.


    Not only was Elder Gu involved, there was also this unknown tinum Realm Expert involved.


    As one of the elders of the Alchemy Tower, he naturally had his own intelligencework and they had quickly investigated the situation this afternoon for him.


    This was currently a critical time for the Alchemy Tower, there were still many things he had to take care of and that didn''t include offending one of the other elders or an unknown power.


    Elder Chen put his head in his hand as he gave a sigh and tried to calm himself down, but his wife wouldn''t let him.


    Chen Yi''s mother turned to Elder Chen and nagged at him, "What kind of a man are you, you can''t even protect your family! Look at your poor son, he''s suffered this much and you''re just standing here looking useless! I don''t know why I even married you!"


    Elder Chen angrily looked at his wife, but he didn''t do a thing.


    Elder Chen was actually quite a good man, he took care of his family and was never too harsh with his discipline, but it was too bad that his wifepletely spoiled their son after their first child ended in a miscarriage. He loved his wife dearly, so he had never interfered with this, but now it seemed like it was alling back to bite him in the butt.


    Elder Chen gave a sigh before he said, "Now is a bad time for this. I promise that I''ll do something about this, but the Alchemy Master has his own ns and none of us will survive if we were to mess with his ns."


    Elder Chen''s wife wanted to keep berating her husband, but when she heard the words "Alchemy Master", she knew that she had no choice but to calm down.


    The Alchemy Master was the real master of the Alchemy Tower, the ten elders couldn''tpare to him¡­


    ¡­


    In another part of Green Wood City, there was another meeting between two different elders.


    Elder Gu and Elder Hua were gathered in a private room in the Hanging Moon Pavilion, but they were also discussing what had happened this afternoon like the Chen Family.


    Elder Hua stroked her slender fingers around the cup in front of her as she asked Elder Gu, "Provoking the Chen Family like that, what were you thinking?"


    Elder Gu gave a sigh before saying, "We''ve been on the passive side for too long, I was hoping to force Elder Chen to make a move, that way we could at least pick up a few clues."


    Elder Hua also gave a sigh at this. If there were other men around, their hearts would have filled with a desire to protect her since she was theplete embodiment of what others called a "loli". She was a little girl who was only one meter and forty centimeters tall with brown twin tails hanging off on both sides, as well asrge brown eyes that one could see their reflection in.


    Still Elder Gu wasn''t fooled since he already knew what she really was. In reality, she was already an old hag that was over three hundred years old,ing close to four hundred. But he still respected her as a colleague, being one of the ten elders and the only female Grandmaster Alchemist of the Alchemy Tower.<sub> </sub>


    After pausing for a bit, Elder Hua turned to her apprentice standing on the side and asked, "Xiao Yun, what are you so upset about?"


    Yang Yun who had been pouting on the side said, "Master, the man you had me follow this afternoon turned out to be a disappointment. At first he seemed like a good person, but then without saying a word, he suddenly pped and spanked Xiao Hai."


    Elder Hua revealed a confused look, "Why would this man suddenly p and spank Xiao Hai?"


    Yang Yun shook her head, "I don''t really know master, he just suddenly pped him. Then even when Xiao Hai told him that he was from the Mu Family, he actually started spanking him."


    Elder Hua revealed a thoughtful look before saying, "He went to spanking Xiao Hai as soon as he heard he was from the Mu Family...There''s probably a deeper story here. He''s either an enemy of the Mu Family or he''s a friend of the Mu Family. But if he was an enemy of the Mu Family, he would have done more than just spank him, so it''s probably thetter."


    Yang Yun knit her brows at this, "Still why would he spank Xiao Hai for now reason?"


    Elder Hua turned to her apprentice and said, "You probably tried to use him to make Xiao Hai jealous to test him, right? I know what kind of personality you and Xiao Hai have, it probably left a bad impression on him."


    Yang Yun awkwardly looked down before she said with pouted lips, "But still, that didn''t mean that he had to spank Xiao Hai¡­"


    Elder Hua gave a sigh as she thought of the rtionship between her apprentice and Mu Xiao Hai. Both of them were good kids, but neither of them could be honest with each other¡­


    Elder Hua paused for a second before saying, "Since he seems to be a friend of the Mu Family, he might help us in dealing with the Alchemy Master."


    Elder Gu was surprised to hear this as he quickly said, "Are you sure we want to include some unknown person in this? This could decide the entire fate of the Alchemy Tower."


    Elder Hua paused to think for a bit before saying to Yang Yun, "Go and find Xiao Hai tomorrow, this man should have gone to the Mu Manor tonight. Find out what Xiao Hai knows and if he really is a friend to the Mu Family, we can include him in our ns."


    Elder Gu hesitated a bit before nodding in agreement to this.


    Lin Fan''s pet food had left a deep impression on him. Even though it was only low grade pet food, it was pet food that had 100% purity. That was not something that could be easily aplished.


    If they could discover Lin Fan''s secret to this, their alchemy skills could improve a level and maybe they could even make that final step to the Legendary Alchemist Realm.


    Yang Yun was hesitant when she heard that her master was ordering her to go find that terrible man again. She stayed silent for a bit before saying, "Master, do I really have to go find him again? He was mean to Xiao Hai."


    Elder Hua revealed a smile as she waved for her apprentice toe over. Once Yang Yun came over, she took Yang Yun in her embrace as she said in a gentle voice, "I know that you care about Xiao Hai, but you have to admit that you were in the wrong in this matter. He isn''t really a bad person, he was just trying to teach Xiao Hai a lesson. We all know how Xiao Hai acts normally, but he does have good intentions, I''m sure that man could also see it."


    Then she said in a serious voice, "Still, you have to apologize to him for what you did wrong and we have to think of the greater good. This is a problem that will affect the future of our entire Alchemy Tower, so you have to at least give him another chance. Until we''re certain that we can''t be friends with him, there''s nothing to lose from trying to be friendly with him."


    Yang Yun wanted to say something, but seeing her master''s serious face, she gave a nod in response in the end.


    Elder Hua turned back to Elder Gu and said, "These truly are trying times, ever since the previous master disappeared two years ago. Do you still ever think about what happened to the young miss who went missing?"


    Elder Gu''s expression filled with a bit of sadness, "I can guess what happened to her, but we can''t dwell on the past. We can only do our best to handle the current Alchemy Master. We''ve prepared for a long time, we will prevail."


    Elder Hua turned to look out at the crescent moon before saying, "I really hope so¡­"

 115 Chapter 115

    The next morning, after having breakfast with a weing Mu Dong Hai and Mu Xiao Hai who kept ring at him, Lin Fan headed out to his new store.


    Mu Dong Hai was busy today, so he sent his most trusted subordinate to bring Lin Fan to the store that he had prepared for him.


    Their beast carriage moved through the streets until it came to a street that was only one block away from the Alchemy Tower.


    This was a ce that was bustling since this was the main business district.


    The beast carriage came to a pet store that was fully decorated with expensive looking equipment.


    Lin Fan was shocked to see this, but he was also filled with appreciation. It was clear that the Mu Family had done their best to help Lin Fan prepare this store, they had even gotten him a shop that was right in the center of the main business district.


    When the people around saw the beast carriage stop in front of the store, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    That store was the most popr pet store in all of Green Wood City, but just yesterday, it had suddenly closed without any warning.


    Yet today, there was someone who came in the Mu Manor''s beast carriage to take over this shop.


    Most people recognized the members of the Mu Family because of their uniform and the badge they wore, but this person was clearly not someone from that family.


    Just who was this person that he could have the Mu Family shut down their biggest store and hand it over to him? The Mu Family was a Legendary Realm Family after all!


    Lin Fan went into the store and Mu Dong Hai''s subordinate introduced every part of the store to him. This store was much bigger than the store that Lin Fan had in Snow Wind City, it was a store with several floors for merchandise and many different cages filled with pets.


    That''s right, the cages that were still inside were filled with pets! The Mu Family had not only filled the shelves with merchandise for Lin Fan to sell, even the pet stocks were filled.


    This didn''t just cost a few crystals, adding everything up together, the price of the store with all its merchandise would cost over a hundred thousand crystals. Yet the Mu Family was willing to give it all to Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan was thinking about how to handle this store, the system suddenly spoke up in his mind.


    "A suitable location has been detected."


    "Host, please evacuate the area, the system will now remodel the store."


    Lin Fan couldn''t react right away, but then he said to the system, "But there are still pets and merchandise inside the store, what are you going to do with them?"


    "Host, the system has detected a total of 563 pets with inferior bloodlines and various trash tier ingredients."


    "The system will now trash all the trash tier ingredients and recycle them into average ingredients."


    "The system will also convert the pets with inferior bloodlines into eggs for the host to breed into passing pets."


    Lin Fan was shocked at this. These were fully grown pets, but the system was now turning them back into eggs. This seemed like a miracle.


    But then thinking about it, the system could even bring him and his pets back to life whenever they died in the cultivation realms, so this didn''t really seem like much.


    Lin Fan just brought Mu Dong Hai''s subordinate and Ang out after he closed all the curtains to the shop.


    After waiting for around ten minutes while being stared at with a curious gaze from Mu Dong Hai''s subordinate, he finally received a notification from the system that the shop had been remodeled.


    Once this was done, Lin Fan walked in with a smile.


    When they came in, Mu Dong Hai''s subordinate waspletely shocked to see what was inside and even Ang was a bit surprised.


    The system had remodeled the shop to look just like Lin Fan''s shop in Snow Wind City. There was the same counter right in the center and the same area for disying elixirs and pet food in front of that counter.


    The only difference with this shop was that instead of the elixirs and pet food taking up the entire shop now, this portion was only ced on the left side. On the right side, there were a few cages that were put out on disy.


    Lin Fan looked around before giving a nod of satisfaction. He was used to this setup and it would have been awkward if he had to get used to a newyout. He couldn''t help thinking that the system really knew him best.


    Lin Fan then asked Mu Dong Hai''s subordinate for the key and the subordinate knew that he was no longer needed here, so he tactfully handed it over before going back to report to Mu Dong Hai. He definitely had to report what had just happened to his master, this pet shop clearly wasn''t as simple as it seemed.<sub> </sub>


    Once he was gone, Ang asked Lin Fan, "What did your master put these cages up front for?"


    Lin Fan replied, "Well, our space was too small in the other shop, so we could never do it there. Basically these cages are for disying the pets that we sell."


    Ang just looked at them and said "oh" beforepletely losing interest.


    Lin Fan saw this and he couldn''t help smiling, but he said nothing else.


    He just went into the back to look at the facilities.


    This shop was several floors high, but the system had only used a single floor for the interior of the store. The rest of the floors were being used to store the facilities.


    There was a floor for the shadow cultivation room, there was a floor for the pet food facilities, and there was a floor for the egg incubating room.


    The only new facility here was a floor being used as a storage room and a floor that was being used as an arena.


    This arena wasn''t just a normal arena, it was a space that could simte any terrain and create a simted space for people and pets to train in, allowing them to use all their strength without worrying about breaking anything. There was even a space for people to sit and watch.


    Then there were also a few other floors up above that currently weren''t being used.


    When Lin Fan asked the system about it, the system replied, "Host, those floors are currently locked because you haven''t unlocked the facilities for them. Please level up the system to unlock new facilities."


    Lin Fan only then remembered that he still hadn''t upgraded the system past level 2 yet. So he asked, "System, how much does it cost to upgrade?"


    "Host, it costs a million points to upgrade the system. Do you wish to do it now?"


    A million points was actually a bit too much for Lin Fan, he currently only had around six million points in total. Moreover, he was trying to save up his points for something special in the shop.


    So Lin Fan decided not to upgrade the shop for now since there was no urgent need to do so.


    Lin Fan was about to head down to the first floor to open up the shop when he suddenly noticed a strange door.


    "System what is this door?"


    "Host, this door is the Any ce Door, it allows the host and employees to travel between branches of the shop for a small fee."


    "Ha?" Lin Fan couldn''t believe what he had just heard.


    To be honest, once he heard the name, he really was expecting a blue cat to suddenly jump out.


    "Host, please don''t let your imagination run wild. First warning!"


    Lin Fan gathered his thoughts and asked, "System, how much does this door cost to use?"


    The system said, "It depends on the number of uses in a single day. The first use will cost a hundred points and each use after that will cost an extra hundred points."


    A hundred points? That was basically negligible for Lin Fan right now!


    With how popr his shop in Snow Wind City was, he was making close to half a million with each day! He would be earning even more when people bought special ingredients!


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all as he used the Any ce Door to appear in the shop in Snow Wind City.


    Momonga had beenzing around at the counter when he suddenly saw Lin Fan appear in the back. The moment he did, he opened his eyes in surprise, but that surprise quickly passed when he felt the spacew fluctuations.


    This was a rather small, so using spacews to travel this short distance was nothing. The expert behind this shop could even transport them between this and higher realms like his own world or the World of Elements.


    Lin Fan was happy that he had a quick way home now, but still he decided not to use it since he was out training. Right now the most important thing was gathering his forces to protect his family, he couldn''t afford to be distracted now.

 116 Chapter 116

    When Lin Fan came back to the Green Wood City shop, he went to the door and turned the sign on the door to show they were open.


    There was already a crowd that had gathered outside because they were curious about who had taken over this store, so when they saw the sign on the door turn to signal they were open, the crowd quickly moved in to check out the store.


    They were surprised to see that the store was only a single floor even though this was a multi floor building, but they were shocked when they saw the price of the merchandise.


    A single pack of pet food that would onlyst for a single day already cost two hundred crystals!


    If this store was a store with a famous alchemist who was refining the pet food, this might have been worth it, but there was no famous alchemist here.


    Everyone immediately thought that this store was a sham and they quickly left. However, there were a few that were still curious since this store used to belong to the Mu Family. If someone took over from the Mu Family, they must have some ability for the Mu Family to offer this store to them.


    One of these people who were still curious came over to Lin Fan and asked, "Sir, does your store offer any other services?"


    Lin Fan saw this person and he immediately revealed his usual smile, "Of course, of course, we also offer the best pet training here."


    That person was immediately put off by the smile, but he still asked, "How much does it cost for you to train a Bronze Realm pet?"


    Lin Fan said with the same smile, "A thousand crystals."


    That person didn''t react at first, "Of a thousand crystals." But then he suddenly realized something, "Crystals? Are you sure you mean crystals?!"


    Lin Fan nodded, "Of course sir, the best service deserves the best price."


    That person just looked at Lin Fan like he was crazy before quickly leaving the store.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan gave a sigh.


    The mission the system gave him really was too difficult!


    He only had two months to make this store as popr as the store in Snow Wind City?


    Would he have to crush another royal family to make that happen?


    With his prices revealed, the various potential customers that had been listening in quickly left the store as well and soon his store was as empty as when he took over the store in Snow Wind City.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head with a smile when he saw this.


    It really was hard to run a business when your prices seemed like a scam¡­


    But the system wouldn''t let him change those prices, so he had no other choice.


    A quiet morning passed with crowds of people walking past his store, but not a single person came in. The rumours of his prices had spread like wildfire and now everyone had dubbed his store as the scamming store.


    Just like that, it wasn''t until right after noon that Lin Fan''s first real customer came in and it was someone that he already knew.


    Hearing the bell ring by the door, Lin Fan turned to find a familiar face half covered in a silk veil being followed by another familiar face.


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "Little nephew, did youe to support your uncle''s store?"


    Mu Xiao Hai almost tripped over the threshold of the door when he heard this whileing in, but he caught himself in time.


    Mu Xiao Hai gritted his teeth, but he didn''t explode this time. He knew that he couldn''t win against Lin Fan and he wasn''t willing to embarrass himself in front of Yang Yun again.


    Yang Yun ignored this and came in front of Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, I want to apologize for what happened yesterday. It was my fault and I hope that you can forgive me."


    Lin Fan raised a brow in surprise when he heard this, but then he said in a calm voice, "Forget it, it''s my fault too for going too far. Xiao Hai, I''m sorry for what I did."


    Mu Xiao Hai''s butt was actually still stinging a bit from yesterday, but since Lin Fan was apologizing and he was in front of Yang Yun, it wouldn''t be good to insist on acting this way. Besides, he wasn''t someone to hold a grudge to begin with.


    Mu Xiao Hai reached out his hand and said, "I was also a bit disrespectful yesterday, I''m sorry for acting rashly."


    Lin Fan shook his hand with a smile and didn''t tease him anymore.


    Now that that was over, Yang Yun then asked, "Owner Lin, would you be willing to see my teacher? She has a few things she wants to discuss with you."


    Lin Fan spread his hand and said, "As you can see, I''m too busy running my store to go anywhere. If she really wants to talk, she cane to my store."


    Yang Yun knit her brows as she said, "My teacher is one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower, there are many people who would want to meet her privately."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan spread his hands again, "Maybe there are, but unfortunately I''m too busy for that."


    Yang Yun then turned to the pet food and said, "What if I buy all of your pet food, would you close your store once all your stock is sold ande meet my teacher?"


    Lin Fan pointed at the pet food and said, "If you can afford it, then I''ll go meet your teacher."


    Yang Yun was surprised by this, but when she saw the price, she was shocked, "Are you sure you have the right price¡­"


    But then she suddenly caught a whiff of a scent that she had only ever heard of before.


    Yang Yun quickly knit her brows and moved closer to the pet food. When she did, she could smell the scent even more clearly.


    She quickly moved to another bag of pet food and she could smell the same scent from that bag as well.


    She continued to move from one bag to the other, checking for the same scent and with each bag that she went by, the shock on her face continued to increase.


    Yang Yun quickly turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Owner Lin, how did you make all of these?"


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "Miss Yang, isn''t this going against the code of business. You should know that the recipes of a shop are considered a secret."


    Yang Yun wanted to keep asking, but she knew that she had no right to do so. He was correct, the recipes of a shop were their secret, otherwise if everything was shared, who would be willing to develop new recipes if they couldn''t make money?


    She struggled with her emotions, but in the end, she just said with a sigh, "Then I''ll take this bag of pet food."


    Mu Xiao Hai came over and said, "Xiao Yun, let me buy that for you."


    Yang Yun just ignored Mu Xiao Hai as she took out the crystals which she ced on the counter.


    Being an alchemist was quite the lucrative upation, so Yang Yun naturally didn''tck crystals.


    Then when she turned to leave, she realized that she hadn''t finished the task that her master had given her.


    After hesitating for a bit, she turned back to ask, "Owner Lin, do you also train pets here?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this and he said, "Of course we also train pets here. Do you need a pet trained?"


    ? Yang Yun called out her pet which was a tiny ball of light.


    When Lin Fan was surprised to see this pet, "Oh, a Light Sprite, now that''s quite a rare pet."


    Yang Yun was surprised that Lin Fan knew about this pet, "Owner Lin, you know about Light Sprites?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Not only do I know about them, I know that the powder from their wings can help increase the sess rate when refining."


    Yang Yun was surprised at first, but thinking of the pet food that Lin Fan had made, it was natural that he knew about this. She even thought that he might have a Light Sprite of his own in this shop.


    Lin Fan then said, "A Bronze Realm pet costs a thousand crystals to train."


    Yang Yun just nodded, before she said with a look of disbelief, "A thousand crystals? Are you sure you don''t mean credits?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said with a serious look, "Crystals, not credits."


    Mu Xiao Hai couldn''t take this, so he said, "Uncle, you''re a friend of my father, so you can''t just rip people off like this. Why don''t you tell Xiao Yun the real price."


    Lin Fan turned to him and said, "This is the real price. Since you''re my nephew, I''ll tell you that my training can let your pet learn an advanced skill at a minimum."


    Mu Xiao Hai gave a snort, "Right, like I would believe that you are a Master Trainer."


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug.


    After struggling for a bit, Yang Yun decided to pay for the training.


    Mu Xiao Hai tried to talk her out of it, but seeing that she insisted, he had no choice. He also called out his pet and left it for training too.


    But then when Lin Fan told them toe pick them up tomorrow, they were shocked once again.

 117 Chapter 117

    Once Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai were gone, there were no other customers that came.


    asionally there would be someone that woulde to check out the store when they heard that it was a scamming store. They were curious just how much of a scam the store really was.


    When they came in and saw the prices, they didn''t stay a single second longer.


    It was like the reviews had said online, this store was definitely a scam shop!


    Lin Fan had actually gone to check out the reviews online when he had free time and every single review was a one star review that called his shop a scam. Most of them didn''t even include any real content, they just called his store a scam in capital letters.


    Lin Fan really couldn''t do anything with this wave of negative reviews bombarding his store, so in the end, he decided not to care.


    Once it was time for him to close his store, he locked up and headed back to the Mu Manor.


    During this period where he was new to Green Wood City, Mu Dong Hai had invited Lin Fan to stay at the Mu Manor for a bit before he found a ce for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wanted to maintain the good rtionship he had with the Mu Family, especially after everything they''ve done for him, so he saw no reason to reject this offer.


    Getting into the beast carriage, it headed back to the Mu Manor, passing along the Alchemy Tower.


    When they passed by the Alchemy Tower, there were a few voices that caught Lin Fan''s attention.


    Looking out the window of the beast carriage, he saw several street rats ganging up around one street rat lying on the ground in an alley. When he looked closer, he could tell that it was the same girl who he had hired to bring to the Mu Manor just yesterday.


    The ones surrounding the one on the ground were shouting all kinds of things as their leader stood over the little girl.


    "Get him, teach him a lesson!"


    "Show him what happens when he messes around on our turf!"


    "How dare he not pay his due! We all saw him with that crystal yesterday!"


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows. It seemed like his kind intentions had actually caused trouble for this little girl.


    Ang took his arm and looked at him with a concerned look.


    Lin Fan nodded before he had the driver of the beast carriage stop.


    Once they stopped, Lin Fan and Ang both came out of the beast carriage and walked over to the small alley.


    When they approached, the ones surrounding the little girl looked at them vigntly before the leader spat on the ground in front of Lin Fan, saying, "Hey old man, get out of here. Don''t you know that this is Urchin territory? This doesn''t involve you."


    Lin Fan turned to look at the little girl on the ground, "What are you doing to this one?"


    The leader turned to the little girl before turning back to look at Lin Fan with a mean re, "What does it matter to you what we do with him? He''s the one that lives in our territory, so he must pay his dues. If anyone doesn''t follow the rules of our territory, they must be taught a lesson or everyone will look down on us!"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "How much?"


    The leader was taken aback before asking in a confused voice, "How much for what?"


    Lin Fan said, "How much for you to let him go?"


    The leader then revealed a smile, "You want to be a hero? If that''s what you want, then you have to pay for it. A hundred crystals and we''ll let him go."


    Lin Fan slightly knit his brows, "Little friend, you should know that you shouldn''t take things too far. Now, how about you tell me the real price."


    The leader''s smile fell from his face and he revealed an ice cold look before releasing his aura, "You''re the one that wants to y hero, no one is asking you to step in. If you want to y, then you have to be prepared to pay the price."


    Lin Fan knew that there was no talking to these brats, so he just gave a snort and released his own aura.<sub> </sub>


    When the leader felt this mountain like pressure fall onto him, he fell onto one knee. As for the rest of the ruffians, they were all ttened to the ground.


    The leader was only in the Silver Realm, so he had a better time dealing with this pressure, but his subordinates were mainly in the Iron Realm with one or two being in the Bronze Realm. They couldn''t take the pressure that came from Lin Fan at all.


    The leader just red at Lin Fan as he said, "You, do you really want to make an enemy out of the Urchins? Do you know how many people you''ll be turning into your enemy?"


    Lin Fan red right back at him as he said, "I tried to end this in a friendly manner, but you''re the one who forced my hand. I''ll give you a final offer, ten crystals and you let him go. Deal or no deal?"


    The leader paused for a second before saying, "Fine, fine, we''ll take your deal!"


    The boss of the Urchins was actually only in the Gold Realm and this leader had never felt such a heavy pressure from his boss before. He knew that this person was stronger than their boss, so he was someone that couldn''t be provoked.


    If this person was offering a quick resolution to this, the leader had no reason not to ept this.


    Lin Fan heard this and he took out ten crystals which he threw onto the ground in front of the leader.


    The leader knew that this was Lin Fan''s way of making a show of him, but he had no choice but to ept this. If he didn''t he might not even be able to escape from here.


    The leader quickly picked up the crystals and waved for his subordinates to follow him.


    When he saw this, Lin Fan released his aura and allowed them to escape.


    Of course, when they went by, Lin Fan didn''t forget to tag them with a few of Brainy''s seeds. There was no knowing what they would do in the future.


    When they were gone, Lin Fan came over to the little girl and looked down. He found that her lip was cut and there were several bruises on her faces. Then looking at the parts of her body that were revealed by her clothes, there were also several bruises covering her skin.


    It seemed like she had been conscious when Lin Fan had appeared, but she fainted once she saw that she was safe.


    Lin Fan picked her up and walked over to the beast carriage.


    When the driver saw Lin Fan bringing the little girl back, he raised one brow, but he knew better than to question Lin Fan. Lin Fan was someone who even the head of the family had greeted politely, it wasn''t his ce to question Lin Fan''s hobbies.


    So the beast carriage quickly headed back to the Mu Manor.


    Once they came back, Lin Fan headed to his room and put the girl on the bed before calling for a few maids.


    When the maids came, he instructed them to get some new clothes for the girl, to bathe her, and dress her wounds.


    The maids looked at Lin Fan with strange looks, but still they didn''t question him.


    Lin Fan had a weird feeling when he received these looks, but for now it was more important to take care of this girl. Since he was the one who caused this mess for her, he would take care of her to the end.


    Once the maids were finished bathing and dressing her, they brought the little girl back.


    Instead of being dressed in those baggy and dirty clothes, she was now dressed in a pure white sundress and had a few hairpins that held her long messy hair in ce. With how she was dressed, she was like a little porcin doll.


    The maids couldn''t help gushing over her with how cute she looked and when they brought her back, they looked at Lin Fan with unwillingness, like they didn''t want to leave this little girl with him.


    Lin Fan still didn''t understand why they looked at him like this, but he waved them off in the end.


    The little girl hesitantly stood there for a bit as Lin Fan looked over her, waiting for her to speak. Then the little girl suddenly went over to the bed andid down, hiding her head in the pillows.


    Lin Fan was confused why she did this, so he asked, "What are you doing?"


    The little girl said, "I''m waiting to give this mister my first time."

 118 Chapter 118

    Lin Fan''s jaws just dropped down.


    But before he could even say anything, Ang suddenly burst out inughter.


    She had been confused why the maids had been acting that way as well, but she had just put it all together.


    Lin Fan came back to his senses when he heard Ang''s wildughter and he quickly red at her.


    She covered her mouth and tried to hold in herughter, but she really couldn''t do it. She broke out inughter from time to time, trying her best to hold it in.


    p Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t do anything to her, so he just chose to ignore her in the end as he looked at the little girl and asked in a gentle voice, "Why do you think you need to repay me with your first time?"</anda>


    The little girl wouldn''t look up as she said with her head in the pillow, "That''s what I heard from the other girls, they said that there were nobles that had this kind of hobby. Sometimes they even took a few of the younger boys with them."


    Lin Fan couldn''t stop three ck lines from appearing on his forehead.


    He had saved this little girl out of kindness and now it was being mistaken as a hobby of bad tastes.


    Back on earth, when he had been part of the upper stratum, he had seen this kind of thing happen.


    There were even some people who had hobbies that were much more disgusting than this. However, whenever those people had offered Lin Fan the opportunity to join them, he had always declined.


    Even with how bad he had acted in his previous life, he wasn''t someone with these kinds of hobbies.


    Ang once again couldn''t take it anymore and broke out inughter again. She couldn''t help teasing him, "I promise I won''t be jealous."


    Lin Fan red her down until she stoppedughing before talking to the little girl again, "I don''t have those kinds of hobbies, I saved you for another reason."


    The little girl raised her head with a confused look when she heard this, "Sir, I have nothing valuable, what reason could there be for you to save me?"


    Lin Fan tried to act calm as he said, "I heard what those ruffians said. I was the one who gave you the crystal yesterday, so to a certain extent, what happened to you was my fault. That is why I saved you."


    The little girl quickly came off the bed and shook her hands as she said, "No, no, sir, this is definitely not your fault. You paid for me to guide you and once I finished, none of this was rted to you. This was merely payment in exchange for service."


    Lin Fan came forward and stopped her from panicking by grabbing her head, "No, it was my fault. I was the one who gave you the crystal and that''s why you were attacked."


    When the little girl was about to panic again, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand and asked, "What was your name again?"


    The little girl was taken aback by this and just replied in a stunned voice, "Song Shu, they call me that because I look like a squirrel when I eat."


    Now that this little girl hade out, Lin Fan finally got a good look at her. She really was something to look at once she was cleaned up.


    While her body wasn''t as developed in certain ces, there were bumps that had begun to form. The most dazzling thing about her was her pure white skin that seemed like it was made of snow. It gave her an angelic feeling that could even match Ang''s beauty.


    He really had to praise the maids for their choice of clothing, the sundress gave her a youthful and vibrant look, even though there were still quite a few bruises on her.


    Lin Fan then asked, "Other than guiding people around, what else do you do to make money?"


    Song Shu lowered her head and muttered, "I tried to pickpocket someone once, but I was caught immediately and beaten up. After that, I only guided people around the city¡­"


    Lin Fan stroked his chin as he fell into thought for a bit before saying, "Then how about youe working for me?"


    Song Shu was stunned once again, "Sir, I''m just a lowly orphan, I don''t even know how to count. How can I work for a noble like you?"


    Lin Fan just waved his hand at this, "It''s fine, the job is easy and you can learn how to count while doing the job. I''ll even pay you one crystal a day."


    While he had been stroking his chin and thinking, he had also been conversing with the system.


    Lin Fan had asked, "System, do I need to upgrade the shop to hire new employees?"


    "Host, you only need to upgrade the shop for employees that require contracts. Employees from this lower world do not need a contract to bind them to the store, so you can freely hire employees."


    Song Shu waspletely shocked.


    What kind of a job was this that even earned her one crystal a day?


    She hesitated a bit before asking, "Sir, are there any special requirements for this job?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had ck lines appear on his head again when he heard the implied tone in these words. Ang also broke out inughter when she heard this, but this time she covered her mouth so she wouldn''t make too much noise.


    Lin Fan just said, "I own a pet shop, so I want to hire you to run the register and stock the shelves. It''s a simple job, but my shop''s prices are higher than normal, so that''s why the wages are higher."


    When she heard this, Song Shu''s hesitant look rxed a bit, but there was still a bit of hesitation.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked, "What are you thinking about? Is there something that you''re still not satisfied with?"


    Song Shu quickly shook her hands as she said, "No, no, this is like a dream job for me, but¡­"


    Lin Fan asked, "But what?"


    Song Shu bit her lip for a bit before saying, "I also have some siblings who are still on the street, I can''t just abandon them."


    Lin Fan asked, "Siblings? Aren''t you an orphan?"


    Song Shu exined, "Life is hard on the streets, so we orphans gather together to make families. My family is made up of me, my two little sisters, and our big brother."


    Lin Fan looked over her for a bit which made Song Shu lower her head, but then he said, "Alright, I''ll get Ang to send you back tomorrow and you can pick up your siblings. I''ll also offer them a job since they are your siblings. I''m sure they''ll be like you."


    Song Shu was still a bit hesitant as she said, "Stay here? But I need to go back or they will worry about me."


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t budge on this, "You''re staying here tonight, who knows if something will happen to you with your injuries if you stay on the street tonight. Tell me where your siblings are and I''ll get someone to go over there to bring a message. Once they are there, you can just talk to them through themunicator."


    Seeing that Lin Fan was this adamant, Song Shu had no choice but to agree.


    Once that was taken care of, Lin Fan went off to find someone to find Song Shu''s siblings.


    After around half an hourter, there was a call that came in on his wrist watch and when it connected, three dirty looking kids appeared on the screen.


    The oldest one immediately revealed a tough look when he saw Song Shu, "Song Shu, if someone is holding you hostage, just tell us and we''lle get you right away."


    While the two little girls looked a bit afraid, they also had a bit of determination in their eyes.


    Song Shu immediately said, "No, no, this mister saved me when I was being beaten by the Urchins, he''s a good person."


    Seeing that Song Shu had an honest look on her face, the vignce in the look of these children disappeared, but they still looked worried.


    Lin Fan was happy when he saw this, it seemed like he had found a good bunch of kids.


    Once they were done questioning Song Shu, Lin Fan cut in, "I''ll get her toe pick you all up tomorrow. I''m sure you won''te tonight since it meansing with a total stranger."


    The oldest one nodded before saying, "If I find out you''ve done anything to her, I won''t let you off."


    Why did everyone think he was a lolicon? Was there something wrong with his face?


    After letting Song Shu say goodbye, he cut off the call.


    He turned to her and said, "Alright, it''s time for bed."


    When she heard this, Song Shu jumped up with a bit of fright, but she still nodded.


    Lin Fan turned to Ang and said, "You can sleep with her tonight." There was a special meaning in his voice.


    She nodded when she heard this.


    She pulled the little girl into the bed and cuddled up with her. Ang was someone who liked cute things and this little girl was just right for her.


    As for Lin Fan, he went over to the couch on the side andid down there.


    In the morning, the first sound that came with the rising sun was, "Uncle, is my pet ready yet?"


    But when Mu Xiao Hai opened the door, he was shocked by the scene inside.

 119 Chapter 119

    The moment he opened the door, he saw two girls sleeping in the bed and Lin Fan lying on the couch.


    Then he saw just how young one of the girls were and he couldn''t help revealing a slight look of disdain.


    As a descendant of a Legendary Realm Family, he had seen plenty of this among the nobles and royals, but he never expected Lin Fan to be someone like this.


    But then before he could say anything, Lin Fan stood up and grabbed him, pulling him out of the room.


    Lin Fan just red him into silence before saying, "What are you doing so early in the morning?"


    Mu Xiao Hai stuttered a bit before he said, "I, I was justing here to see if you had my pet ready." Then he looked back at the door, "But I never thought that you had this kind of hobby before."


    Mu Xiao Hai was a descendant of a Legendary Realm Family, so he had seen this kind of thing before. While he hadn''t personally indulged in this hobby, there were many noble and royals that indulged in this. They had even tried inviting him to suck up to him, but every time he looked down on them in disdain.


    But Lin Fan had earned his respect yesterday the way he apologized, so seeing that he had these habits too really was a disappointment for him.


    Lin Fan had dark lines on his face when he heard this. Why did everyone think that he was into that kind of stuff?


    Lin Fan took him by the ear and said clearly, "I''m not into that kind of stuff. You already saw that I was on the couch and they both had their clothes on, didn''t you?"


    Mu Xiao Hai doubtfully looked at him, but he still leaned towards believing him. Even with his personality problems, Mu Xiao Hai could be considered a decent judge of character since he had to learn to do so from a young age. When you were born in arge family, you had to learn how to read people quickly or you would be swallowed.


    He could tell from Lin Fan''s expression that he was being serious, but still he teased Lin Fan, "Oh, are you sure about that? Who knows what happened during the night."


    Lin Fan shook his head and just ignored him before saying, "If you want your pet,e by the shopter. I''m sure you''ll be surprised by what you see."


    ¡­


    Later at the shop, Lin Fan had arrived alone to open up the shop for the day.


    Ang had gone off with Song Shu to go pick up her siblings. She would take them back to the Mu Manor first to wash them up. Then they would bring them to the store tomorrow to start training them.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the store, he found that there was arge crowd that was gathered around the entrance which surprised him.


    After yesterday, he thought that today would be another empty day for the store, but it seemed like that wasn''t the case. He couldn''t help wondering what had changed to cause everyone to gather there.


    When he reached the front of the store after using his aura to create a path through the crowd, he found Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai standing there with the elder who had stepped in at the Alchemy Tower yesterday, as well as a little girl.


    Yang Yun came up and said, "Owner Lin, I''m here again today. I''ve brought my master and elder¡­"


    But before she could finish, the elder from the Alchemy Tower came up and said in an anxious voice, "Owner Lin, you might not remember me, but I am Elder Gu from the Alchemy Tower. If possible, I wish to discuss your pet food with you."


    Lin Fan just looked at him for a bit before calmly saying, "This elder, unfortunately our shop hasn''t opened yet. Please wait until we are open to ask your questions."


    Elder Gu still wouldn''t give up, "Owner Lin, this won''t take much of your time. How about this, I''ll buy everything in your shop today and you can just take the day off to talk to me?"


    Lin Fan calmly rejected him, "I''m sorry, we don''t do business like that. If you wish to buy our pet food, please wait until business hours."


    But internally, he wasining to the system, "Come on, why can''t we just sell it to him? He''s offering to buy everything in the store! Do you know how much money that is?!"


    "Host, please don''t be too greedy. First warning!"


    Lin Fan knew that he could never beat the system in an argument since the system didn''t even bother to argue. In the end, while feeling depressed inside, he rejected the elder and moved to open the store.<sub> </sub>


    When the crowd saw this, they couldn''t help breaking out in gossip.


    "Just who is this owner? He actually dares to make even Elder Gu of the Alchemy Tower wait?"


    "No, don''t you see it? Elder Gu is actually this courteous to this owner. This owner must have some special backing."


    "It''s obvious that this owner has some special backing, don''t you see that he took over this store from the Mu Family? If he didn''t have some special backing, how could the Mu Family give him this store?"


    "But I went in yesterday and the prices he had really were too much! This store really is a big scam!"


    "Shh, don''t say it so loud. We don''t know who''s behind this store, do you really want to be chased out of Green Wood City?"


    Lin Fan just ignored all this as he unlocked the door to the store.


    After walking in, he actually closed the door on Elder Gu who wanted to follow him in.


    Only after ten minutes of stocking the shelves and preparing everything did he finally open the door.


    The moment he saw the door open, Elder Gu immediately dashed into the store, but Yang Yun, Mu Xiao Hai, and the little girl weren''t far behind him.


    The four of them quickly moved over to the shelves of pet food and began inspecting them. As they continued to inspect the pet food, the expressions on their faces continued to change. It went from surprise to shock toplete disbelief.


    Elder Gu kept moving from one bag of pet food to the other, as if he was frantically trying to find something. But when he tried to rip them open and take the pet food out, he felt a cold chilling from behind him. When he turned around, he saw Lin Fan sitting at the counter ring at him and he quickly put down the bags of pet food with an awkward smile.


    As for the little girl, she only held the same bag of pet food in her hand as she silently looked over it. She looked at it from various different angles, but she still couldn''t find what she wanted to find.


    Finally Elder Gu couldn''t take it anymore and was about to charge towards Lin Fan at the counter, but this little girl grabbed him and stopped him. The little girl turned to Yang Yun and Yang Yun gave a nod before heading towards Lin Fan.


    Yang Yun came forward and politely said to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, if I may, do you have time to talk?"


    Lin Fan looked at the little girl holding the old man back and he couldn''t help finding it a bit funny. He said to Yang Yun, "That''s fine, but there''s something I want to ask you first."


    Yang Yun was surprised when she heard this, but she quickly said, "Owner Lin, if you have any questions, please ask."


    Lin Fan pointed at the little girl and said, "Who is that little girl? Is she your little sist¡­"


    Before he could finish, the little girl had already let go of the old man and had charged forward, flying through the shop with a flying kick thatnded right in Lin Fan''s face.


    After kicking Lin Fan''s face, she did a neat turn in the air before firmlynding on the ground. Once shended, she bent down and held her foot in pain, but she still said, "Who are you calling a little girl!"


    Lin Fan was surprised, this little girl''s life energy was actually white in colour, she was in the tinum Realm!


    Yang Yun had an awkward look on her face as she exined, "Owner Lin, this is my master, Elder Hua. She is over three hundred years old and one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower, not my little sister."


    Elder Hua actually had a bigplex over the way she looked. She always hated being called a little girl by others. Whenever she was addressed like this, she would always lose control of herself...Like when shended a flying kick in Lin Fan''s face.


    Lin Fan just looked at Elder Hua in disbelief as he cursed in his heart, "Granny loli!"


    This was something that he had seen in many animes on earth, but he had never expected to see the real thing!

 120 Chapter 120

    Elder Hua suddenly raised her fist again, but thinking of how painful it was just to kick Lin Fan, she hesitated to punch out.


    Yang Yun quickly came forward to grab her master''s arm as she shouted, "Master, what are you doing? Didn''t you say that we needed to be polite?"


    Elder Hua pouted her lips and muttered, "I don''t know why, but it just feels like he''s thinking something rude."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward look since he was indeed thinking something rude, but he quickly put up his hands to surrender as he said with an awkward smile, "I''m sorry, for being rude earlier. I have some free time now, how about we discuss the business you came to discuss?"


    Elder Hua''s mood brightened after hearing this, "Getting straight to the point, I like that!"


    Then she came forward and said, "Your pet food, how do you make it?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by how direct she was, but then he said with slightly knit brows, "I''m sorry, but that is a secret. You can''t just expect me to give out my recipe and lose all my business, right?"


    Elder Hua just waved her hand, "I don''t want your recipe, just show me how you make it. I can tell that making something like this doesn''t just depend on the ingredients, it''s your skills I want."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile at this. He wasn''t even the one who made this, it was all made with the machine from the system. He could show them how he made this pet food, but he was also sure that it wasn''t what they wanted.


    Until he had finished training in the alchemy skills that the system had given him, he wouldn''t be able to teach them a thing.


    Lin Fan just said, "That is still a secret of this shop, unfortunately I can''t share that with you either."


    But Elder Hua wouldn''t give up, "I knew that you would say that as well, so work with our Alchemy Tower instead. Our Alchemy Tower is the best known supplier of pet food in this city and that famees with its privileges. We have ess to the best ingredients, the best equipment, and the best recipes because everyone knows of our fame. Moreover, it doesn''t seem like your store is doing well, the fame of the Alchemy Tower can help you change that."


    Elder Gu didn''t forget to add, "With your level of skills, I''m sure you can be one of the ten elders, no, the eleven elders in no time. Maybe you could even one day break through the Legendary Alchemist Realm with the resources of the Alchemy Tower."


    Lin Fan was a bit tempted by their offer, especially with how many poor reviews of the store there were online, but the system clearly didn''t ept this.


    But before Lin Fan could even answer, there was someone else who had walked in.


    It was a stoic looking man who seemed to be in his early fifties with a thin moustache that hung down from the sides of his lips.


    When this man came in, Elder Hua and Elder Gu immediately knit their brows together.


    What was this man doing here?


    That man came over to Lin Fan and looked him over before saying, "So you''re Owner Lin."


    Lin Fan raised a brow and asked, "And you are?"


    The man gave a chuckle before saying, "You beat and humiliated my son yesterday, but you don''t even know who I am?"


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he heard this.


    The man then continued, "I''m Elder Chen, one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower like the two of them. Now, how are you going topensate me for what happened yesterday?"


    Lin Fan''s brows knit even deeper when he heard this as he asked, "Should Ipensate you for something? Shouldn''t you be thanking me for helping you teach your son a lesson?"


    Elder Chen just narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly breaking out inughter, "I like your style."


    Then he stoppedughing and said in a serious voice, "All can be forgiven, but you have toe work for me."


    Beforeing here, he had naturally sent his own informers to scope out this shop. Moreover, when he hade in, he had smelled the scent the pet food was giving off. Under his calm exterior, his emotions were close to erupting like a volcano.


    But the 100% purity pet food was just icing on the cake, the most important thing was the Mu Family.


    The Mu Family had always been neutral in the struggles of the Alchemy Tower, buttely it seemed like they would be leaning towards Elder Hua and Elder Gu''s side with how close the young Mu was with Elder Hua''s disciple.<sub> </sub>


    But now that all changed with this new variable that had just appeared.


    He was strong and possessed strange things which meant that he clearly had a strong backing behind him. Moreover, the Mu Family even gave him this store, which meant that he must have some special connection with him.


    Seeing that Lin Fan''s was silent, Elder Chen thought that he was tempted so he added, "If you work under me, I can guarantee that you''ll have the full support of the Alchemy Tower, including the Alchemy Master."


    The crowd outside gasped when they heard this.


    The Alchemy Master was the renowned ruler of the Alchemy Tower, everyone wished for a chance to just meet him.


    Lin Fan still didn''t say anything, so Elder Chen added, "I could even get you a spot as the Alchemy Master''s apprentice, that is something everyone dreams¡­"


    Then before he could finish, Lin Fan suddenly said, "I''m not tempted by this at all, I''m just curious what you are thinking."


    Elder Chen''s face became ugly for a split second, but he quickly restored his calm look before saying, "You''re new to Green Wood City, so I''m sure you don''t know this. The Alchemy Tower is one of the two powers of Green Wood City, it would be smart to fall under me."


    Elder Hua revealed a sly look beforeing out to say in a righteous manner, "Owner Lin, don''t be fooled by him! He clearly just wants to take your special method for making 100% purity pet food for himself!"


    Once these words were said, there were shocked gasps and confused looks that came from the crowd.


    For the normal people, they had no idea what this 100% purity thing meant, but the alchemist in the crowd had clear ideas.


    These alchemists weren''t at the same level as the elders, so they couldn''t recognize the signs right away. There were some that had been here yesterday and had even missed the signs after looking at the pet food.


    But now that they knew what they were looking for, these alchemists quickly found the signs of 100% purity in these bags of pet food.


    "This, this, this, it really is 100% purity!"


    "Has anyone ever achieved this since the age of the Alchemy God?"


    "How could I have missed this yesterday? The signs were all here!"


    Seeing the reaction of these alchemists, the crowd could tell that something was off here. Some people in the crowd began asking the alchemist friends they hade with what this meant.


    When refining either a pill or pet food, there would be impurities that would be inside the pill or the pet food based on the recipe, the technique, or the equipment. Only by perfectly refining every drop of medicinal power in the ingredients would one be able to achieve 100%.


    The wall between 99% and 100% was not a small one, it was like the gap between heaven and earth.


    Just that 1% meant a difference of several hundred folds. With even 1% impurity, it meant that the full potential of the ingredients couldn''t be unlocked. Only with 100% purity could the medicinal power of the ingredientsbine to create a total that was far greater than the sum of its parts. It increased the effect of the pet food or the pill by several hundred folds.


    Some people who had been at the Alchemy Tower yesterday began talking.


    "So he fed that dog 100% purity pet food, it was no wonder that dog suddenly broke through!"


    "That dog really is lucky!"


    "This store really might not be a scam after all. It''s selling pet food that could be easily auctioned for over twenty thousand crystals at only two hundred crystals per bag, this is a steal!"


    "I have to buy some for my pet before everyone else finds out."


    These words quickly spread through the crowd and soon the crowd entered a ferver, but still no one dared to enter while the elders were still here.


    Elder Hua just looked at Lin Fan with a smile like she was waiting for thanks from him. Since she couldn''t convince Lin Fan to work with them or keep the secret of the 100% purity pet food, the next best thing she could do was make him owe her a favour by helping him advertise his shop.


    Even though she looked like a cute and innocent girl, she was actually quite the sly fox.

 121 Chapter 121

    Lin Fan naturally could tell what she was up to, but he appreciated it since this was just the help that he needed. If his store continued like yesterday, he really might not be able to finish his mission.


    So he was grateful towards Elder Hua even though she had just sent a flying kick into his face a few minutes ago.


    Elder Chen had an ugly look on his face since he had lost one of his cards, but still he didn''t panic, "I''m sure that you''ve been misinformed about the situation of our Alchemy Tower. These two aren''t enough to represent the Alchemy Tower, rather they are currently shing with the current Alchemy Master. If you align yourself with these two, there will not be a good ending for you."


    Lin Fan raised a brow when he heard this, "Oh, is that considered a threat."


    Elder Chen just revealed a smile when he heard this, "Owner Lin, please don''t misunderstand, it was just a simple warning. I hope that you won''t be misled by others and make a wrong decision."


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile at this, "You think that your offer is the right decision?"


    Elder Chen said, "I can''t say if it''s the best decision, but it''s the best decision you have right now."


    Lin Fan asked, "Elder Chen, was that a threat just now?"


    Elder Chen said, "Owner Lin, you must have misheard. How could I be threatening you?"


    Then Lin Fan''s eyes turned slightly cold, "But I''ve already said that I''m not tempted by your offer at all."


    Elder Chen''s eyes also turned cold, "I''m sure that you''re overwhelmed by the generosity of this offer. Let me give you three days to consider it. I''ll be sure toe back with the Alchemy Master so he can see what kind of a talent Owner Lin is as well."


    Lin Fan then revealed a taunting smile, "Maybe when youe next time, you coulde as a paying customer instead."


    Elder Chen also revealed a taunting smile as he walked over to take a pack of pet food, "Then Owner Lin, let me purchase this pet food as a sign of a goodwill."


    Lin Fan had the same smile as he said, "Unfortunately, we''re not selling this item today."


    Elder Chen slightly knit his brows, "You''re saying you''re closing the store for the day?"


    Lin Fan said, "No, you didn''t let me finish. I''m saying that I just won''t sell to you today."


    A dark look appeared on Elder Chen''s face, but it quickly disappeared as he revealed a cold smile, "Owner Lin, I hope that you won''t make the wrong decision when Ie back next time. The Alchemy Tower isn''t as weak as you think we are."


    Then without another word, Elder Chen turned and left without sparing a single nce backwards.


    Once he was gone, Lin Fan suddenly gave a snort, "Acting all tough, who does he think he is fooling?"


    Elder Hua said with a smile, "Owner Lin, now that you''vepletely offended their side, you should being to our side, right? After all, you do owe me a favour."


    Lin Fan looked at her and shook his head with a sigh, "I''m on no one''s side, I''m just trying to run a business." Then when Elder Hua and Elder Gu revealed disappointed looks, he said, "But if otherse looking for trouble with me, I won''t say no. As well, I''ll always return my favours."


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu''s faces lit up again, but they didn''t say a thing since they knew there was no need for words now.


    Seeing that Elder Chen was gone and that these two elders had finished their business, the people waiting outside poured into the store. They quickly fought over the packs of pet food, but they were careful not to harm the product.


    Once they got their pet food, they rushed over to the counter and said to Lin Fan, "Owner, we want to buy this pet food!"


    Lin Fan looked at them before turning to Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai, "Before that, let me get your pets for you."


    Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai just nodded, clearly not expecting much from Lin Fan''s training.


    Lin Fan went upstairs and brought the two pets down to the first floor.


    When the two pets saw their owners, they immediately bolted to them, hugging their legs.<sub> </sub>


    Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai were surprised to see how affectionate their pets were being, but they weren''t against it. They had spent quite a bit of time with these pets, so it was normal for them to be affectionate.


    The only strange thing was that their pets were hiding behind their legs and looking at Lin Fan in fear.


    Lin Fan just gave augh inside his heart, but he remained calm. He had put a fear of him into these pets with the training that he had put them through in the shadow cultivation realm, but his training did yield results.


    When Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai overcame their surprise, they quickly realized that their pets werepletely differentpared to before. They could feel that the aura around their pets were much strongerpared to before.


    Yang Yun''s Light Sprite had gone from the low Bronze Realm to the mid Bronze Realm, while Mu Xiao Hai''s Wood Sprite had gone from the high Bronze Realm to the Peak Bronze Realm.


    Then the words Lin Fan said after thatpletely shocked them.


    Lin Fan said, "Your pets have also learned two new skills each. Normally they would learn three or more skills with the first training session, but I really don''t know what went wrong this time."


    Learning skills and going up several levels, these were a sign of a Master Monster Trainer!


    Not was Lin Fan an alchemist who could produce 100% purity pet food, he was even a Master Monster Trainer!


    Just what kind of monster was this man?


    Lin Fan saw the looks of disbelief on their faces and thought that they didn''t believe him, so he said, "If you want, you can test out your pets now."


    Mu Xiao Hai came back to his senses first, "How are we supposed to test out our pets, by smashing your store?"


    Lin Fan pped him on the back of the head, "Of course not! My store is a specialized store, of course we have a ce for you to test the ability of your pets. Normally there is a fee, but this is your first time, so I''ll let you use it for free."


    When the system had renovated the shop, it had turned the second floor into an arena. This was an arena that could simte any terrain and could generate enemies for one to test their might. It even had a space for people to watch the fights that were happening inside the arena.


    Since this was a new facility, the system had given Lin Fan some privileges that he could use with it. He had the right to give away ten free uses of the arena, either to the same person or different people.


    He had the perfect chance now to show off the arena, so he might as well show it off now.


    Lin Fan led Yang Yun, Mu Xiao Hai, and the two elders to the second floor, while the crowd followed behind them since they were curious about what was further into this store.


    When they came to the second floor and saw the giant arena that was there, they werepletely shocked. This arena clearly wasn''t the same size as the building, it was much bigger than what the surface area of the floor should be. The only exnation for this was the use of spatialws, but no one, not even the elders had heard of spatialws being used like this before.


    But they didn''t have time to ponder this as Lin Fan threw Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai right into the arena before asking, "What kind of terrain do you want?"


    Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai were both confused, "Terrain, what do you mean?"


    Lin Fan just ignored them and set it as basic forest terrain.


    Before the two could keep asking questions, the surrounding space around them had changed and soon they found themselves inside a forest.


    Then before they could have time to question what had just happened, there were Bronze Realm enemies that came out of the forest.


    Their minds quickly turned and they realized that this was a simtion zone that Lin Fan had thrown them in. While they were still thinking, the Bronze Realm enemies had already approached.


    Outside the arena, the onlookers were shocked by what they saw, especially the two elders.


    There were indeed simtion zones like this that were used by experts to train themselves, but they had never seen technology that was this advanced before. This simtion was just too realistic, the ones they had seen before were nothingpared to this.


    The two elders couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan again and wondering just who this man was.

 122 Chapter 122

    Seeing the enemies approach them, the two inside the arena quickly reacted as they had their pets quickly attack.


    During this time, they tested out the new skills that Lin Fan had told them their pets had learned and were shocked to see that it was all true, confirming Lin Fan''s identity as a Master Monster Trainer!


    This news sent ripples through the entirety of Green Wood City.


    But the next day, there was almost not a single negative review of Lin Fan''s shop left. The only ones that were left were from hispetitors who hated the fact that he had taken all their business.


    People started lining up in front of his shop early in the morning, but of course no one dared to cause trouble in this shop because they had all heard the rumours of the owner''s backing. Even the Mu Family gave him face, who were they to try and cause trouble?


    Just like that, the morning rush came and passed, with the training spots being quickly filled and the pet food being sold.


    Once that was done, the store fell into a silence again.


    During this time, Ang had brought the kids over.


    She didn''t bring them early in the morning since she knew that they would be terrified by the mass of customers that filled the store in the morning. It was better to bring themter to let them slowly learn at their own pace.


    For the two smaller girls, it would be hard for them to lift the heavier goods out to the front, so Lin Fan had tasked them with handling the register and cleaning up the store. They easily picked up the cleaning part, but they couldn''t handle the register well since they never learned how to read, write, and to do simple calctions.


    But since Mu Xiao Hai now had a habit of visiting the store whenever he was free, Lin Fan roped his "nephew" into teaching these kids.


    Mu Xiao Hai''s first reaction when he saw these two girls was to doubt Lin Fan again, but seeing the happy smiles on their faces, he could tell that this wasn''t what he thought it was.


    The real surprise from this was actually how good Mu Xiao Hai was at teaching kids. Even with the temper that he had, when it came to these kids, he was very gentle and careful.


    As for the boy, Lin Fan put him to work in the back moving all the different goods they had and at work stocking the shelves.


    While it was hard work, the boy didn''t mind since the pay was decent and it was good honest work.


    As for Song Shu, Lin Fan had her manning the counter full time, helping customers with any questions and helping with the register since unlike the other two girls, she was surprisingly well taught.


    This made Lin Fan curious, but there was a pained look on Song Shu''s face when he asked her about her past, so he had never pushed this topic.


    So the work was divided and they learned on their first day before being overwhelmed on their second day.


    Lin Fan took the tiger training method and threw these kids off the cliff, letting them handle the morning rush by themselves.


    By the time the morning rush was over, the kids were copsed on the counter, looking dead tired.


    Song Shu surprisingly had the hardest time of them all, as she was very popr with the customers. Not only were there customers that had questions for her, there were many customers that came over just to pat her on the head and offer her a treat. She took every single treat and stuffed her cheeks with them. When Lin Fan saw how she looked with all the treats stuffed in her cheeks, he really couldn''t help thinking that her nickname really did fit.


    But thinking about that, he then thought about her real name. Still since she wasn''t willing to speak of the past right now, Lin Fan could only wait until she wasfortable enough to do so.


    When the morning rush was over on the second day, Mu Xiao Hai came once again to teach the girls, but he was surprised to see his pupils lying on the ground looking exhausted. He looked at Lin Fan with a curious gaze and Lin Fan said, "I let them handle the morning rush."


    Mu Xiao Hai immediately understood since he had been here for the morning rush yesterday. The only reason he wasn''t here today was because he had a meeting this morning. Still he couldn''t help saying, "Isn''t it a bit too early for them?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug, "I hired them to do work, they''re working for their pay."


    Mu Xiao Hai wanted to say more, but Yang Yun came forward to stop him.


    The reason why Mu Xiao Hai wasn''t here this morning for the morning rush was because Yang Yun had actually called him over.<sub> </sub>


    Yang Yun pacified Mu Xiao Hai beforeing forward to greet Lin Fan with a slight bow, "Owner Lin, I hope you''re well this morning."


    Lin Fan was a bit surprised at being treated this politely, but he still said, "I''m fine."


    Yang Yun nodded before heading over to the little kids and taking out breakfast for them, as well as several pieces of cake for dessert.


    Once she smelled the cake, Ang quickly came over as well. However, instead of taking all the cake for herself, she divided them among the kids. It seemed like even the invincible Ang couldn''t help herself in front of cute kids.


    Lin Fan noted all of this, but he didn''t say a thing.


    Finally Yang Yun couldn''t take it anymore and said, "Owner Lin, can I discuss something with you?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a faint smile and said, "You couldn''t take it anymore? There''s no need to be this indirect, just tell me what you have to say."


    Yang Yun was surprised at first, but then she said, "There''s an auction being held tonight by the Treasure Pavilion tonight. It''s a yearly auction with many different treasures. My master was wondering if Owner Lin is interested ining."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this as he said, "I already told you, there''s no need to be this indirect. Just spit it out already."


    Yang Yun nodded and then said, "My master wishes to ask if Owner Lin would be willing to submit a pill for the auction."


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before saying, "What conditions does she have?"


    Yang Yun revealed an awkward smile, she didn''t expect to be seen through this quickly, but she still said, "My master wishes to watch you as you refine the pill and when it is being announced, she wishes for the auctioneer to announce that this pill was inspected by her."


    Lin Fan fell into thought once again.


    These terms were eptable for him since he did owe her a favour and there was also the fact that there was still the mission from the system.


    After Lin Fan had finished the ''exposing the fraud'' mission, he had received another mission to spread his fame as an alchemist. The system stated that as the owner of the greatest pet shop, how could others doubt his ability to create pet food? Therefore, he had to be known as the greatest alchemist as well as the greatest pet trainer.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried about this quest since his reward from the previous mission was actually a God Tier Alchemy Skill, the Nine Revolution Pill Refining Technique.


    <o>,m At first Lin Fan didn''t have any experience with alchemy, but it was a good thing that he had the Any ce Door. He had gone back to Snow Wind City during the nights to receive alchemy lessons from Momonga.</o>


    Momonga just taught Lin Fan the basics of alchemy since he was asked to do so, but then when Lin Fan used the God Tier Alchemy Skill, he was shocked by how effective it was. He had been practicing alchemy himself for several thousand years, but he had never seen a technique as refined as this. However, when he thought about it, it did make sense with the master of this store, so he didn''t worry about it in the end. As long as he continued working for this store, he would receive such things eventually.


    After thinking through everything, Lin Fan finally said, "Alright, those terms are eptable, but I also want something from her."


    Yang Yun hesitated a bit before asking, "Owner Lin, what are you asking for?"


    Lin Fan pointed at the four kids and Ang eating their cake before saying, "I want her to teach those four kids alchemy skills."


    He couldn''t stay in this ce forever, it was better to give these kids a way of taking care of themselves in the future than to leave them with nothing.


    Yang Yun had a difficult look on her face, "Owner Lin, you do know that my master is one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower, right?"


    Lin Fan just said in an indifferent voice, "So?"


    Finally Yang Yun said with a sigh, "Alright, I''ll tell my master."

 123 Chapter 123

    Lin Fan felt quite weird having to put on a suit after going so long without wearing one. He used to wear the top brand suits every night back when he was on earth, but after being free of that lifestyle, it felt weird putting on a suit.


    But when he saw Ange out in her pure white one piece dress, all hisints about having to dress up in this ''monkey suit'' waspletely blown away.


    Ang had a slim white one piece strapless dress that hugged her figure, perfectly outlining the shapes of her body, with curves in all the right ces. Then on her bare shoulders, there was a white silk scarf that wrapped right around her, showing off just the right amount of skin. At the bottom of the dress, there were two pairs of slender legs that seemed like they were carved out of jade, glistening in the light.


    When Lin Fan saw her, his jaw almost dropped to the ground.


    Ang saw this and she couldn''t help feeling a bit of pride, as well as a bit of happiness.


    Surprisingly Ang hadn''t been against wearing this when she was shown this dress.


    As a spirit, she lived quite freely, wearingfortable and simple clothing. This was her first time dressing up like this, she had even been shocked when she saw herself in the mirror. All the maids that had helped her into her dress couldn''t help doubting their own preferences after seeing what she looked like.


    Mu Xiao Hai was also here since Yang Yun had tasked him with guiding Lin Fan and Ang to the auction. When he saw Ang, he had the same reaction as Lin Fan as his jaw dropped.


    Once Lin Fan came back to his senses and saw Mu Xiao Hai''s appearance, he quickly raised his hand and pped Mu Xiao Hai on the back of the head.


    This p brought Mu Xiao Hai back to his senses and he quickly said with an awkward smile, "Uncle you really are a lucky man."


    Lin Fan didn''t refute this like he would have done in the past, he just said with a faint smile, "I know."


    When Ang heard these words, she couldn''t help it as a bit of warmth filled her heart. She looked up at Lin Fan and revealed a smile that was like a flower blooming.


    Lin Fan''s face turned red and he quickly turned away. He gave a cough as he tried to calm himself down before saying to Mu Xiao Hai, "Xiao Hai, let''s get going."


    But hearing no response from Mu Xiao Hai, he turned his head back and saw that his jaw had dropped again. Lin Fan pped Mu Xiao Hai on the back of the head again and Mu Xiao Hai revealed an awkward smile. He guided them to his personal beast carriage and they headed off towards the Treasure Pavilion.


    There wasn''t much traffic along the way, but once they were close to the Treasure Pavilion, the streets were suddenly filled with carriages.


    All of these carriages had symbols of royal and noble families on them, not a single one looked like they were cheap. Every single carriage was heading towards one building.


    However, when they saw the symbol of the Mu Family, all these carriages moved to the side and a path was created for Mu Xiao Hai''s beast carriage.


    They smoothly arrived at the front of the Treasure Pavilion, but once they did, the crowd waiting outside for the auction to start all turned over. All of them recognized the symbol of the Mu Manor, so once the beast carriage arrived, they all started whispering among themselves and pointing at the beast carriage.


    But once the doors to the beast carriage opened, the one that attracted the most attention wasn''t actually the famous young master of the Mu Family, Mu Xiao Hai. Rather it was Ang that attracted all the gazes of the crowd.


    Regardless of whether they were male or female, every gaze fell firmly onto Ang as she walked out holding Lin Fan''s hand. At first, every gaze waspletely focused on Ang with many chins dropping to the ground, but then their gazes were cast onto Lin Fan walking beside her.


    All of the men were filled with jealousy, even most of the women were filled with jealousy.


    When there were people who were about toe forward, the doors to the Treasure Pavilion came out and a fatty dressed in a golden robe covered from head to toe in jewelry came out.


    He came up to Mu Xiao Hai in a very humble manner while rubbing his hands together as he said, "Young master Mu, it is an honour for you toe to our humble auction hall. Please,e this¡­"


    But before he finished, he had turned his head to see Ang and his jaws dropped along with the crowd, instantly falling silent.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had seen everything, but he had ignored the crowd since this was the normal reaction. However, this damn fatty dared to ignore him to his face, how could he take that?


    While the fatty was still stunned, he suddenly felt a chille over him and he couldn''t help shivering which shook theyers of fat all over his body. The fatty quickly turned to the source of the chill and when he saw Lin Fan coldly ring at him, there was a trace of fear that appeared in the fatty''s eyes. The fatty quickly revealed an awkward smile before turning to lead the way in.


    While walking past the crowd, Lin Fan''s eyes swept over them, sending chills over every single person who had been staring at Ang. All of them quickly turned their gazes away, but they didn''t forget to secretly sneak a peek when Lin Fan''s gaze had turned away from them and they were about to head inside.


    Once they were inside the building, the fatty led them down a hallway until they came to a room that was on the side of the building.


    This fatty was actually the manager of this Treasure Pavilion whose name was Bao Bao.


    Once he felt the chill from Lin Fan, he knew that this man was not someone to look down on, especially since he was with such a beauty. Perhaps only a man like him was worthy of this beauty.


    Bao Bao did his best to keep his eyes away from Ang as he brought them to this appraisal room. Then once they were all seated and the appraiser was brought in, he said, "Young master Mu, I''ve heard that you wish to submit an item for our auction tonight."


    Mu Xiao Hai nodded before saying, "It''s not me who wants to submit an item, rather it''s my uncle over here."


    Bao Bao was surprised to hear Mu Xiao Hai address this unknown man as uncle, but thinking about it, it did make sense. Experts had very long lifespans and everyone preferred looking young. This unknown man must be some supreme expert who was keeping himself looking young with his cultivation.


    Since he was someone that was an uncle to even Mu Xiao Hai, this man might even be a Legendary Realm Expert!


    Bao Bao then quickly turned to Lin Fan and said in a humble voice, "My apologies, this lord. May I ask, what is your name?"


    Lin Fan just said in simple and concise words, "Fan Lin." Then as soon as his voice fell, he raised his sleeve and waved it, letting out a pill that dropped onto the table.


    Bao Bao was someone who could turn the Treasure Pavilion into the number one auction hall in all of Green Wood City, so naturally he wasn''t new to this. He certainly knew how to keep the discretion of the customers.


    Bao Bao gestured to the appraiser beside him who quickly moved towards the pill.


    The appraiser looked at Lin Fan for permission and seeing that Lin Fan said nothing, the appraiser picked up the pill to look over it.


    The pill was deep blue in colour and it had a very smooth surface. If one didn''t know better, they might have even thought that this pill was a sapphire.


    The appraiser then moved in closer to take a sniff of the pill and once he was done, he revealed a look of shock as he shouted, "Enlightenment Pill!"


    But he wasn''t done there, as he suddenly realized that there was something off with the smell earlier.


    He went back in for another sniff and then his eyes opened even wider in shock, as he fell back onto his butt, dropping the pill on the table.


    Before Bao Bao could reprimand him for what he did, the appraiser said in a voice filled with shock, "How can this be?!"


    Bao Bao realized that something was off, so he asked, "What is it?"


    The appraiser said in a stuttering voice, "This, this, this pill is of 100% purity!"


    Enlightenment Pills were rare themselves, but he had never heard of one that was of 100% purity before!

 124 Chapter 124

    Bao Bao had some idea of purity since he was in the business of selling items, but he wasn''t certain what 100% meant.


    "What do you mean by 100% purity, why do you look so shocked?"


    The appraiser turned to look at Bao Bao before moving over to whisper the implications of a 100% purity pill to him.


    When he heard what the appraiser said, Bao Bao''s eyes couldn''t help lighting up. If he could secure this pill for his auction hall, it would firmly cement them as the number one auction hall in all of Green Wood City.


    As for the appraiser, he was actually an alchemist as well, so he knew that someone who could refine a 100% purity pill definitely wasn''t a normal person. Especially someone who could refine a Mortal Grade Pill that was considered an Earth Grade Pill!


    This Enlightenment Pill was ssified as Mortal Grade, but with how difficult it was to refine and with how strong its effects were, many regarded it as a Earth Grade Pill instead.


    When pills were refined, there were four grades that it could take. They were respectively the Normal, Mortal, Earth, and Heaven Grade.


    Normal Pills were refined by Junior Alchemist, Mortal Pills required one to be at least a Master Alchemist, Earth Pills were expected to be refined by Grandmaster Alchemist, and Heaven Pills were expected to be refined by Legendary Alchemists.


    It had been centuries since a Heaven Pill had been seen and it was rare to see Earth Grade Pills in auctions, so this Mortal Grade Pill that was considered to be on the same level as an Earth Grade Pill was already considered top of the line. That wasn''t even including the fact that it was a 100% purity pill!


    Bao Bao''s mind quickly turned as he tried to think of a way to make as much profit out of this as possible.


    After a few seconds, Bao Bao quickly turned to Lin Fan and said, "Sir, if possible, would you mind waiting and letting us hold a special auction just for this pill? I promise that we''ll sell it a price that you will be satisfied with."


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "I want it sold tonight and if you can''t do it, I''ll take my business elsewhere."


    Bao Bao quickly raised his hands and jumped over the pill like a mother protecting her child as he shouted, "No, no, please don''t misunderstand. We can definitely sell this pill tonight." Then after calming down, he said with a difficult look, "Sir, it''s just that if you''re looking to make the most profit off selling this pill, it would be best to dy it. We could hold a special auction and invite guests from many other different cities which would increase the price even further."


    Lin Fan just shook his head, "I know how valuable my item is, so I''m aware of what I''m doing. I can let you sell this for me, but there are two conditions that I want you to follow."


    Bao Bao knew that he couldn''t do anything to change Lin Fan''s mind, so the best course of action for him was to obey Lin Fan''s terms. It didn''t matter what these terms were, as long as they didn''t go too far, he could make up for any losses he suffered with just the fame of being able to sell this pill.


    Bao Bao then said in a solemn voice, "Mister Fan Lin, please tell me what requests you have. I''ll do my best to fulfill them."


    Lin Fan nodded in satisfaction at this. It seemed like this Bao Bao really was a smart businessman and smart people were the people he liked dealing with the most.


    Lin Fan said in a sly voice that made him seem like a fox, "It''s very simple, you just need to¡­"


    Bao Bao revealed a look of surprise when he heard these two conditions, but he quickly nodded with a smile as he said, "Mister Fan Lin, there are no problems at all with these two conditions. We will do our best to satisfy your needs."


    Then he quickly snapped his fingers and one of his subordinates ran over holding a card in her hand.


    This subordinate was a beautiful red headeddy in a fire red dress, perfectly showing off her curves. After handing over the gold card in her hand to Bao Bao, she turned to smile at Lin Fan while also giving him a wink.


    Bao Bao also smiled at Lin Fan as he said, "Mister Fan Lin, since you are a special guest of our Treasure Pavilion, please take this VIP Card. This card will allow you to borrow up to ten million crystals to bid on items in our auction house and you can repay us at any time without any interest. At the same time, if there are any items that you wish to auction with us, we will not charge you a fee for auctioning that item."


    Bao Bao then gave a snap at the red headeddy and pointed at Lin Fan before continuing with a smile that had an implied meaning behind it, "As well, we will provide special services for you. If you like, Hong Mei here can personally wait on you while you are in our auction house."<sub> </sub>


    The red headeddy was about to move over towards Lin Fan, but then she heard a cold snort and an ice cold chillpletely covered her. It was like she had been thrown into ake of pure ice and she was so cold that she couldn''t feel a single part of her body. She couldn''t help it as her legs turned soft and crumbled under her, falling to the ground.


    The one who had given this cold snort was Ang and she was currently ring at the back of Lin Fan''s head while he had dark lines on his head.


    Please he didn''t want this either, alright? He was being implicated!


    Lin Fan quickly looked at Bao Bao, signaling with his eyes to deal with this situation.


    Bao Bao was a businessman with years of experience, so naturally he had his tact. He quickly called two guards this time who helped Hong Mei up and carried her away before saying, "This miss, I''m sorry for being rude. It was all my fault, please don''t mind my idiotic mouth."


    Ang just gave another cold snort before saying, "Watch that mouth next time, or you''ll lose it."


    Bao Bao felt a chill run down his spine and he was certain that this woman wasn''t just Lin Fan''spanion, she was also a supreme expert in her own right. Bao Bao quickly mmed his head on the table as he said, "Yes, yes, it was all this idiot''s fault. Miss, please forgive this idiot."


    Shame was one thing that one couldn''t have when it came to doing business, so Bao Bao''s face was thicker than the walls that surrounded this city. He didn''t mind degrading himself, it was all worth it as long as he could make a profit out of it.


    Ang didn''t say a word, she just nodded.


    Bao Bao could tell that he had avoided this danger, so he quickly went back to the main topic, "Mister Fan Lin, are you staying for the auction?"


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "I''m a bit curious about what you have here, can you give me a list of your items?"


    But surprisingly, Bao Bao shook his head at this, "I''m sorry Mister Fan Lin, but I can''t do that. That is one of the special gimmicks of our yearly auction, the fact that no one knows what will be in the auction is what brings everyone back each year. If we were to break this rule, I''m sure Mister Fan Lin could understand¡­"


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before giving a nod, "It''s fine, each store has their own gimmick to bring in customers. If I force you to break that rule, it would be breaking the rules of business and I can''t do that as a businessman myself."


    "Businessman?" Bao Bao asked in a confused voice.


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing.


    Bao Bao quickly followed up and said, "Understood, understood."


    Then he changed the topic as he said, "Mister Fan Lin, since you are staying for the auction, would you please follow me to a private VIP room? We still have two more that are empty and we would be happy to provide you with one of those rooms."


    Lin Fan shook his head, "Bring me to Elder Hua''s VIP room, she should be waiting for me."


    Bao Bao was surprised by this request, but thinking of the two conditions that Lin Fan had put forth, it did make sense.


    Bao Bao just asked them to follow him, but before they left, the appraiser asked Lin Fan, "This master, can you please take me as a disciple?"


    Lin Fan didn''t even turn back as he said, "I don''t take disciples." Then he continued forth as he followed Bao Bao.

 125 Chapter 125

    When Lin Fan''s group arrived in Elder Hua''s VIP room, Elder Hua who had been waiting for a long time stood up to greet them.


    Bao Bao understood that this was a private meeting, so after leading them here, he quickly left to take care of the auction. After all, there was going to be a special ending tonight, there were still many things he had to prepare.


    Elder Hua came forward with a smile once Bao Bao left, as she said, "Owner Lin, you really took your time in getting here."


    Lin Fan said, "Well, there was some trouble on our way in and we had to drop off the item as well."


    Elder Hua noticed Ang on the side before saying with a smile, "I can imagine that trouble must follow you around. Well, still it''s been hard on you."


    p Lin Fan and Ang both had blushes on their faces, but Lin Fan still said, "It wasn''t much trouble."</anda>


    Elder Hua nodded before she revealed a serious look, "Has everything been taken care of?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile, "Didn''t you see how that Bao Bao was acting just now? Everything has been taken care of."


    Elder Hua also revealed a smile, "It''s in the nature of a businessman like him to tter. Since you came with Xiao Hai, it''s not hard to imagine how he would treat you, but it was a bit more than usual. I guess you really hit him hard with that pill."


    Lin Fan looked around before asking, "Where''s Elder Gu? He didn''te today?"


    Elder Hua pointed out the ss window at another VIP room, "He''s here, but he''s in a different room. Besides don''t you think it would be strange if he and I went everywhere together?"


    Lin Fan fell into thought at this and he couldn''t help admitting that what she said was true.


    Elder Gu looked like an old man with white hair and a white fu manchu, he looked like a grandpa would be practicing tai chi in the park on weekdays. As for Elder Hua, she was a little girl with brown twin tails.


    If they walked around together, one might even think that they were a grandfather and a granddaughter going out together.


    Elder Hua noticed that Lin Fan wasn''t speaking, so she narrowed her eyes to look at him. After a while, she said, "I don''t know why, but it feels like you''re thinking something rude."


    After she said this, she raised her fist.


    Lin Fan quickly revealed an awkward smile and changed the topic, "So do you know what is being sold on the auction today?"


    Elder Hua put down her fist and shook her head, "I''ve heard some rumours, but even with my status, I still can''t find out any information on the items in this auction. But it''s the same as each year, they always hide it, so just wait to be surprised by what they''ll offer."


    Lin Fan nodded before inviting Elder Hua to sit down.


    They moved over to the seats in front of the ss window and began chatting while waiting for the auction to officially begin. Yang Yun took this time to bring over tea and snacks since Elder Hua had already dismissed the servants of the Treasure House.


    It was better to be safe than sorry sometimes. Even if they weren''t talking about anything important, people could still be bought for the right price.


    While they were chatting, they also saw people starting to fill the hall beneath them.


    Elder Hua told Lin Fan that most of these people were all nobles and only a few of them were rich merchants. Then she pointed at a few special seats in the front row of the hall and informed Lin Fan that those were the special seats for the royals.


    Eventually, the hall was filled with people and everyone patiently sat in their seats waiting for the auction to begin.


    Less than five minutes after the entire hall was filled, the lights suddenly dimmed and there were spotlights that had appeared on the stage.<sub> </sub>


    Then with the sound of explosions, there were fiverge plumes of red smoke that appeared on the stage. As the smoke covered the stage, there was an hourss figure that moved through the smoke until she came to the front of the stage and appeared in front of everyone.


    Hong Mei had a microphone in her hand as she said, "Wee honoured guests to our Treasure Pavilion''s annual action. We guarantee that you''ll leave here satisfied and with the item of your dreams!"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see Hong Mei here. Last time he had seen her, her legs had given out under her and she almost lost her mind from being overwhelmed by Ang''s aura. But then when he looked closely, he found that her face was still a bit pale and she was forcing herself toe onto the stage.


    As for Ang, the moment she saw Hong Mei, her eyes turned a bit cold.


    During her introduction, Hong Mei couldn''t help feel a chill run down her spine and she gave a shiver, but her professionalism forced her to keep going.


    As he continued to think about it, Lin Fan was actually filled with a bit of admiration for Bao Bao. He had an eye for good items and he was an astute businessman. He could tell that Lin Fan wasn''t a normal person, so he was even willing to offer his auctioneer to serve Lin Fan.


    Looking down at the crowd, he could see several people looking at Hong Mei with infatuated looks since she was indeed quite beautiful. She had nice round mounds on her chest that were just covered by her strapless dress and there was a slit at the bottom of her red dress that showed off her legs. Adding in her perfect features and fire red hair, she was indeed quite a knockout.


    Then thinking of how Bao Bao was willing to offer her to Lin Fan, it seems like his position in Bao Bao''s mind wasn''t low.


    Hong Mei continued her introduction for a bit, before suddenly changing the tone of her voice, "Now, I''m sure that you''ve all been waiting patiently for long enough, so let''s get this auction started!"


    With a wave of her hand, the wall behind her suddenly slid up as a cart was pushed out to the center of the stage where a spotlight was waiting. The show girl who pushed out the cart didn''t wait at all as she pulled off the curtain to reveal a ss case under the box with a shining stone ced atop a pillow.


    This stone was aquamarine in colour and it released a light blue glow that was as pure as the sky. It was also perfectly cut, making it look like a gem rather than a normal stone. There were strange fluctuations that wereing from the stone that even the ss case couldn''t hold back that spread through the crowd.


    Hong Mei spread her hand at the stone while saying, "Ladies and gentleman, for our first item, we have this mysterious stone that was brought to us by a mysterious source. ording to that source, this stone was found deep in the bottom of the Red Ocean. While we don''t know the source of this stone, we do know that it is a stone of abnormal strength. Our Treasure Pavilion had even invited a tinum Realm Expert to test this stone and that expert couldn''t leave a single dent on this stone. Then there''s the fact that it is perfectly cut and has a beautiful sheen, which makes it the perfect gift for any lover. As well, there is this strange fluctuation thates from it that I''m certain that all of you can feel."


    Once she was done trying to hype up the stone, Hong Mei got to the main part, "Now, seeing that this is a special item, we will begin the bid at one thousand crystals."


    There was a silence that came over the crowd when she announced this as no bids came in. But eventually, one of Hong Mei''s admirers bit their teeth as they raised their sign and announced the first bid.


    During this time, Ang had actually moved forward to the ss window to look down at the strange stone while tapping on the window.


    Everyone else in the room looked at her with confused gazes, but no one said a thing and just let her continue with her strange disy.


    Then after a few seconds, Ang turned to Lin Fan and said, "Get it."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this before asking, "Are you sure?"


    Ang just nodded and said, "Certain."


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate any longer as he pressed the button on his chair and said, "Two thousand crystals."


    The previous bid was still a thousand crystals from the one admirer of Hong Mei, who looked happy to see Lin Fan bidding for this because he only made that bid to try to impress her, even though he didn''t really want it.


    But then before Hong Mei could even announce that bid, there was a bid that came from another VIP room.


    "Two thousand and one crystals."

 126 Chapter 126

    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this and he turned towards that VIP room.


    Elder Hua also followed and once she saw whose room it was, she revealed a cold look.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked, "Who does that room belong to?"


    Elder Hua spread her hands and said with a sigh, "Who else do you think that room could belong to? How many people have you offended sinceing here?"


    Lin Fan revealed a cold smile when he heard this.


    He never thought that this old man would be so petty.


    Without hesitation, Lin Fan pressed the button again and made another bid.


    "Two thousand and five hundred crystals."


    But of course, his voice was a bit more strained this time.


    Elder Chen in his booth revealed a faint smile when he heard this since he knew that he had aplished his goal. This act was nothing more than to put a little pressure on Lin Fan and to get a bit of revenge for his son, so of course he wouldn''t go too far.


    But that didn''t mean that he would let Lin Fan off this easily. This was only the first bid, he knew that Lin Fan could still go a bit further.


    Elder Chen pressed the button on his chair and made another bid.


    "Two thousand five hundred and one crystals."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile when he heard this, but when he made his bid, his voice sounded a bit desperate, "Three thousand crystals¡­"


    Elder Chen knew that he had pushed Lin Fan far enough, so he stopped bidding at this point.


    Making him bid an extra thousand crystals, that could count as a bit of revenge for his son. It was too bad that he didn''t know that Lin Fan had another surprise nned for himter.


    Elder Hua saw the smile on Lin Fan''s face and was confused, "Why are you so happy? Didn''t he just force you to bid an extra thousand crystals for this unknown stone?"


    Lin Fan nodded as he said, "Yes he did, but at least he didn''t force me to pay even more than that. My limit was much higher, but it''s a good thing that he''s such an easy person to fool."


    Elder Hua thought about it and she realized that Lin Fan was right. Just by acting like he was having trouble making this bid, he easily fooled Elder Chen to stop his harassment this quickly.


    Elder Hua changed the way she looked at Lin Fan, she felt that he was quite the sly fellow. Even thinking about it now, she felt that she might have been cheated by Lin Fan somehow. But then thinking about everything that she had gained from cooperating with him, it might have been worth it to be tricked by him.


    Lin Fan just had the same smile as he added, "Not to mention, we have another surprise for himter."


    Elder Hua was confused at first, but then she realized something. She also revealed a smile as she said, "Oh, we do have quite the good surprise for himter."


    At this time, Hong Mei on the stage was drawing out the bid by adding in a few more facts on the stone after calling the bid twice, but seeing that the other side wasn''t willing to keep bidding, she could only say, "Three thousand crystals going thrice. Sold to VIP room 2! We hope that you enjoy this item!"


    Then she went on to introduce the next item, but this item was much more normalpared to the first item.


    The next few items that came out were all ordinary things. There were low grade pills, special elixirs, and different artifacts. There was even a Spatial Ring which might have enticed Lin Fan before, but he already had his own Spatial Ring after destroying the Feng Family.


    The items kepting one after another, but seeing that there was nothing special that came out, Lin Fan was quite bored just sitting there and watching.


    But that then changed with the next item.<sub> </sub>


    Hong Mei gave a signal to the people backstage and they created a special effect where snowkes filled the air of the hall.


    This special effect attracted everyone''s attention, including Lin Fan.


    Hong Mei slowly said, "There are beasts that are considered legends among legends, these are beasts of divinity. Their bloodline has been worshipped before in the long ago history of our world and now we would like to bring out an item with that bloodline."


    With a snap, there was a drum roll that sounded as another cart was pushed out from the back, but it was different this time. The moment the cart came out, the temperature in the hall visibly dropped by several degrees. It was so cold that people could even see their own breath in the air.


    When the sheet was lifted off, there was a sharp bird''s cry that rang through the entire hall, shaking the souls of everyone who heard it. This was a primal sense of awe that came from the cry.


    With the sheet off, there was a ss case that was revealed with a single blue feather inside that seemed like it was made of ice itself, but if one could touch it, they would find that it was soft just like a normal feather.


    Hong Mei continued, "The next item we have for bid is a feather from an Ice Phoenix. This was found by one of the local seekers in one of the nearby nar cracks and they are offering to sell it tonight. We all know that the phoenix is a primordial being that was worshipped by our ancestors as a god and it wasn''t without reason. The phoenix is one of the most powerful beasts in this entire world, who knows what secrets this feather contains."


    Then after letting this sink in, Hong Mei said, "We will now begin the bid for this Ice Phoenix Feather. With how special this item is, I''m sure that everyone will have no objections of a starting price of ten thousand crystals."


    Most people in the crowd were actually sitting up in their seats since their blood was boiling from the power of that cry alone. They were all excitedly holding their signs and waiting for the auction to begin.


    Hong Mei deliberately drew it out to instill even more excitement in the crowd, but once she saw that the crowd almost couldn''t take it anymore, she said, "Now, let us begin the auction!"


    As soon as her voice fell, there were shouts that came from the crowd as people kept shouting more and more bids. The price quickly climbed and soon it had already reached twenty thousand crystals which was already twice the starting price.


    During this time, Lin Fan had been staring intently at the Ice Phoenix Feather. He had to admit that even he was tempted by this since he could use the phoenix bloodline in this feather to help Xiao Huo break through. Then with the remaining icews in this feather, he could help Lin Yue''s Ice Queen break through as well.


    He wasn''t in a rush since he could tell from the constant bids that it wasn''t even close to the final price yet.


    After he was done thinking this through, he said, "Xiao Hai, go down to the floor and make a bid for me."


    Mu Xiao Hai was surprised by this, "Why do you want me to go down and make a bid?"


    Lin Fan said in a casual voice, "To avoid a certain stingy old man making it hard for us, of course. Now go on, help your uncle with this task."


    But before Mu Xiao Hai could say anything, Yang Yun came forward first, "Owner Lin, how about I go for you instead? Xiao Hai is the young master of the Mu Family still, he shouldn''t do things like this."


    Lin Fan turned to look at Yang Yun with a smile as he thought that this girl really couldn''t be honest with her feelings, but he still said, "No, Xiao Hai can go." Then he turned to Mu Xiao Hai, "Look at that, you''re even making this little girl worry about you. Why aren''t you going yet?"


    Mu Xiao Hai couldn''t help sneaking a peek at Yang Yun before puffing out his chest, "Alright, I''m going."


    Mu Xiao Hai had actually gotten used to following Lin Fan after being around him for a while. To put it simply, he had been trained to ept his fate as Lin Fan''sckey¡­


    Yang Yun had aplicated look as she watched Mu Xiao Hai run out of the room, this was an expression that Lin Fan didn''t miss.


    He couldn''t help smiling as he said, "Sometimes we need to really look deep into ourselves and not run from our feelings."


    Yang Yun looked at Lin Fan with a confused gaze, "Owner Lin, what do you mean?"


    But before Lin Fan could say anything, Elder Hua interjected, "Owner Lin, you shouldn''t interject in these matters. They need to figure these things out themselves."


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a word, leaving Yang Yun feeling even more confused.

 127 Chapter 127

    Mu Xiao Hai quickly went down and purchased the item that Lin Fan wanted.


    The bidding war was fierce, but after a certain point, it reached a price that most people couldn''t ept anymore. At that time, when Mu Xiao Hai suddenly raised the bid by another thousand crystals, it would deter most of the people who still wanted this item.


    The price had just reached thirty thousand crystals and the bids wereing in much slowerpared to when the auction had just started, it was at this time that Mu Xiao Hai suddenly increased the bid by another thousand crystals.


    Before this, the bid had increased by at most a hundred crystals each time, but now someone was suddenly jumping up by this much. Everyone couldn''t help looking at Mu Xiao Hai in surprise, but it was a good thing that he had already covered himself up with a cloak.


    Still, there were people who didn''t give up and tried using their spiritual senses on him. However, Mu Xiao Hai wasn''t a pushover, he was the scion of the Legendary Realm Mu Family. Even at his young age, he was already in the peak of the Gold Realm, preparing to break through to the tinum Realm.


    He easily repelled the spiritual senses that tried to sweep over him and once that happened, no one else dared to sweep him again. This was clearly an expert, once was the epted custom and anyone who tried sweeping someone a second time generally had bad intentions. There was no one who was willing to offend an unknown expert for such a small reason.


    After Mu Xiao Hai made his bid, there were a few people who were hesitant since they still wanted to make another bid.


    Hong Mei could naturally see this, so she began stalling once again. After a bit of stalling, there was finally someone who made another bid by adding another fifty crystals to the price, but that didn''tst long.


    As soon as that other person made his bid, Mu Xiao Hai shouted out, "Thirty two thousand crystals!"


    Thispletely crushed the spirits of the remaining hopeful bidders since they were hoping that he was just making a desperate bid. However, the rich really didn''t care about money, he actually threw out another thousand crystals so casually¡­


    Lin Fan had actually been contacting Mu Xiao Hai during this time and he had told him that the price didn''t matter. He also told him that when anyone made a bid, he was to increase that bid to the nearest thousand digit.


    The only person that Lin Fan was worried about was Elder Chen, but it seemed like he wasn''t interested in this item since he hadn''t heard a peep from Elder Chen''s VIP room at all.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan was assured that he would get this easily.


    Hong Mei tried to stall once again, but she could tell from the crowd that no one was going to make another bid. Eventually she could only give a sigh on the inside as she announced, "Sold to number 356 for thirty two thousand crystals! We hope you enjoy your item!"


    Mu Xiao Hai didn''t linger any longer as he immediately headed out as soon as he finished purchasing this item. He wanted to head back to the VIP room, but Lin Fan had told him to pick up the items first after transferring the crystals needed over to Mu Xiao Hai.


    Mu Xiao Hai had no choice as he went over to the exchange desk and exchanged for the items that Lin Fan had bought.


    Normally the exchange desk would require identification, but once Mu Xiao Hai revealed his identity, they didn''t dare hold him there any longer and immediately exchanged the items for him.


    Once that was taken care of, Mu Xiao Hai came back to the room and put the items on the table in front of Lin Fan.


    Yang Yun had poured a cup of tea for him once he came in and she brought it over to him. She didn''t forget to add, "Good work."


    Mu Xiao Hai''s eyes lit up when he saw this and he happily took the tea from her, not forgetting to hold her hand a bit as he said, "Xiao Yun, you''re the best."


    For some reason, Lin Fan''s words couldn''t help floating to the top of Yang Yun''s head at this moment and then she strangely didn''t p Mu Xiao Hai''s hand away like normal. She just nodded and let him hold it a bit before he let go himself.


    Mu Xiao Hai was stunned by this, but then he revealed a wide smile. It seemed like acting like a man had worked in attracting Yang Yun, he needed toe up with more ns like this.


    However, he didn''t know just how wrong he was.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he saw this before turning his attention back to his items.


    After confirming they were the right items, Lin Fan called out Xiao Huo to give it the feather before putting the strange stone away in his storage. He would have Momonga help him take a look at that strange ster.


    When Xiao Huo came out, everyone else in the room other than Ang was surprised to see it, but they could also ept it.<sub> </sub>


    Now that Lin Fan was in the tinum Realm and with the abilities he had demonstrated as a Master Monster Trainer, it seemed right that he would have a pet that would be at this level. People no longer assumed that this pet was one that his master had given him. But of course, no one knew that there was a master in this shop just yet since the system hadn''t revealed itself.


    Back when Elder Hua had kicked Lin Fan in the face, normally it would have meant that the system would block this attack before it had hit Lin Fan and would have reflected it at Elder Hua, but the system didn''t do it this time.


    When Lin Fan had questioned the system about thister, the system''s answer had been shocking.


    "Host, because the attack was deemed to be an attack without hostility and could cause no injuries to the host, it was deemed as an attack without malice, so the system''s automatic defenses didn''t trigger."


    Lin Fan was shocked as he had said, "Does it matter if there''s malice or not? Doesn''t the automatic defense exist to protect the host? Why would any of this even matter?"


    "Host, the system isn''t here to babysit the host. Please defend yourself once in a while."


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand this answer at all.


    Actually, since the system had gone up a grade, the replies of the system had been changing ever so slightly. Lin Fan had felt that it was no longer as cold as before and it seemed like the system had somehow gained a personality.


    Still he wouldn''t give up on this. If one day the automatic defenses were gone, it would mean trouble for him.


    "Still, the automatic defense should exist to protect the host from all harm in the shop. It shouldn''t matter what kind of harm it is."


    "Host, please stop acting like a spoiled child. First warning!"


    Once the warning came, Lin Fan knew that there was no point in arguing any longer. Whenever the warnings came, it meant that the system had just had enough of him and wouldn''t allow anymore discussion.


    But even though the warnings came, Lin Fan hadn''t actually been punished by the system in a while. Maybe there really was something wrong with the system¡­


    Still there was no time to consider that.


    Lin Fan took the Ice Phoenix Feather and gave it to Xiao Huo whose eyes immediately lit up after taking a sniff of it.


    Xiao Huo sucked in and drained the feather of its phoenix bloodline before patting its stomach in satisfaction. It then curled up in Lin Fan''sp and fell asleep as it began digesting this bloodline.


    The auction continued after that, but every single item that came after that was not something that Lin Fan was interested in.


    Finally it came close to the end of the night and when Lin Fan and Elder Hua were expecting their item toe out for the climax, there was another item that came out first that caught them off guard.


    Hong Mei got the crowd riled up before introducing the next item, "Now for our second tost item, this is one that everyone will not want to miss!"


    But then without any further dy, she had the crew at the back of the stage bring out the item which was a capped white jade bottle.


    Then the moment she uncapped the bottle, there was a strong medicinal scent that filled the entire hall.


    Turning it, there was a pill that dropped out of the bottle andnded right in Hong Mei''s hand which she held up to show everyone.


    Lin Fan looked at it and was surprised to find that it was a pill that was deep blue in colour, looking just like a sapphire.


    That was right, it was an Enlightenment Pill!

 128 Chapter 128

    Hong Mei raised her microphone and said, "Everyone should know about the four grades of pills that exist. This pill is one that is said to be of the Mortal Grade, but with how difficult it is to refine, it is regarded by all to be in the Earth Grade. This is a pill that has great effects on one''s cultivation and is rarely produced, so this is a rare chance for everyone! Please don''t miss this chance!"


    Elder Hua narrowed her eyes as she looked at the pill before saying, "Why are they auctioning off our pill so quickly? Didn''t she say that there was another item after this?"


    Lin Fan had also knit his brows at first, but he quickly rxed them after smelling the scent in the air, "This isn''t our pill."


    Elder Hua immediately turned to Xu Yi in shock, "This isn''t our pill?! How are you so certain?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "You can smell the medicinal scent in the air, that isn''t the characteristic of an 100% purity pill. But based on the concentration of this scent and the surface of the pill, it should be a high purity pill of at least over 95%."


    Elder Hua turned back to look at the pill with a curious gaze before asking, "Who else would have made the Enlightenment Pill? And to make it with this high purity, it isn''t simple."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile, "Who else do you think would be able to make this pill?"


    Elder Hua turned to the other VIP room and said, "You mean¡­"


    Lin Fan didn''t agree or deny this, he just said with a smile, "Well, in the end, we still have another surprise for him. It''s not our fault that he had the same n as us."


    Elder Hua just smiled at this without saying a thing, but with the way her eyes sparkled, it seemed like she really couldn''t wait to see what happened next.


    ¡­


    Meanwhile, in Elder Chen''s VIP room, he was sitting back with a ss of wine in his hand and enjoying a few choctes while watching the auction happen.


    While he was surprised that there was another item that wasing up after his pill, his ns were still progressing smoothly. He had worked with the Alchemy Master to make this pill, they had put everything they had into this just for this one moment.


    After she finished introducing the pill, Hong Mei added, "This pill came to us from Elder Chen and the Alchemy Master of the Alchemy Tower, so this is a very special item, please don''t miss out on this! Moreover, it is a pill with 98% purity!"


    When this was said, Elder Chen could see that several people in the crowd fell into contemtion. He knew that once these royals and nobles knew that the Alchemy Master was someone who could make pills with such high purity, they would definitely want to align themselves with them to gain ess to these pills. This move would even move the families that had aligned themselves with Elder Hua''s faction.


    Elder Chen turned to the other VIP room and he had a smile on his face.


    He really wanted to see what kind of expression that old hag had on her face. He really wanted to drown himself in the pleasure of seeing her anger, but it was too bad that these sses were one way ss, so he couldn''t see into that other VIP room at all.


    Still he couldn''t help happily imagining what kind of expression that old hag had now.


    Once Hong Mei finished introducing the pill, she finally came to the bidding, "Since this is a special item and one of the final items, I think no one will have any objections to a starting price of one hundred thousand crystals. Do we have any bidders¡­"


    But before she could finish, there were signs that were already going up.


    "One hundred and ten thousand!"


    "One hundred and fifty thousand!"


    "Two hundred thousand!"


    The price continued to steadily climb by tens of thousand until it had reached three hundred and fifty thousand crystals. Once it reached this point, the bids came much slower, but still there were still quite a few bidders left.


    Finally once the price broke five hundred thousand, there were only two people left in the bid.


    One was a family that was famous for being neutral and one was a family that was firmly on the side of the Alchemy Master.


    Eventually the family that was neutral won and after they made the winning bid, the head of that family turned to Elder Chen''s VIP room and said, "As long as there are enough benefits, we can consider working with the Alchemy Master."<sub> </sub>


    This really was a bold move, he was basically dering to the entire city that he was putting his entire family onto the boat of the Alchemy Master. However, this could have been considered a smart move if it wasn''t for what happened next.


    There were also several other family heads that looked at that one family head with contemtive looks as they thought about switching sides as well. This included several family heads that were currently on Elder Hua''s side.


    After all, these family heads cared about what mattered to their family most and whoever could offer them the best resources, that would be the side they would back.


    Once the hall had calmed down from the excitement, Hong Mei went right into the next item since she wanted to keep the momentum going, "Now, I''m sure that plenty of you are disappointed since you missed this chance, but our Treasure House wants to give you another chance."


    Many people were confused by this.


    What other chance? Wasn''t there only a single pill?


    When Elder Chen heard this, he firmly knit his brows because he could tell that something was wrong, but he couldn''t put his finger on it. In short, it felt like something was about to go wrong for him¡­


    Hong Mei paused for a bit before continuing, "For those of you who missed out on thest pill, you better get your wallets ready for this next one."


    Then the same process urred and another pill bottle was brought out, but this time when the pill came onto her hand, everyone was confused because there was no sudden release of medicinal scent.


    Hong Mei smiled when she saw this and she said, "I''m sure many of you are confused why I''m saying all this, but I can tell you now that this is indeed another Enlightenment Pill, but¡­"


    She paused once again to create even more hype and some of the people in the crowd couldn''t take it anymore.


    "What''s so special about this one? It doesn''t even look as good as the other one!"


    "There isn''t even a scent thates with this one, it''s clearly an inferior product!"


    "Hong Mei, I love you! Please marry me!"


    Hong Mei just smiled and said nothing for a while. Finally she broke her silence as she said, "While this pill doesn''t seem like much, I can tell everyone that it is indeed better than thest pill. Our appraisers have carefully looked over this and they have determined...that this pill is of 100% purity!"


    When this was said, the entire hall fell into silence as everyone was shocked by this!


    Even Elder Chen couldn''t avoid this shock.


    He had been doubtful at first, but then he remembered something important. A pill that was impure would have a scent because all the medicinal essence wasn''t captured in the pill and leaked out, creating that scent. For a pill to have no scent at all, it was either a trash pill, which was impossible since it wouldn''t be the climax of an auction, or it was a pill with 100% purity!


    Elder Chen immediately pressed the button on his chair and shouted, "Let me test it!"


    Hong Mei was about to continue with her introduction when she was suddenly taken aback by this.


    But the voice in her earpiece told her to continue with this and allow Elder Chen to appraise the pill. After all, Elder Chen was one of the ten elders of the Alchemy Tower and a Grandmaster Alchemist, they had to give him some face. Moreover, if he was willing to appraise the pill, it would definitely give more evidence of this pill''s extraordinariness.


    Hong Mei''s shock onlysted a few seconds before she revealed a smile again, "Everyone, Elder Chen of the Alchemy Tower has graciously offered to appraise this pill for us. Let us please wee Elder Chen to the stage!"


    Elder Chen rushed out of his room and quickly came to the stage, taking less than ten seconds.


    The moment he arrived, hepletely ignored Hong Mei and moved over to the pill, looking over it and taking a sniff from time to time. As he continued to appraise it, his eyes couldn''t help getting wider and wider.


    This pill was in a realm that he could never reach!


    It was a true pill of 100% purity!

 129 Chapter 129

    There was a look of greed that suddenly appeared in Elder Chen''s eyes.


    He was very tempted to steal this pill right now, but then he stopped himself since he knew that he was in front of the entire upper stratum of Green Wood City right now. If he were to do something like this, there would be no way he would be able to remain in Green Wood City.


    Elder Chen suppressed the greed that he felt and a determination filled him. He had to get this pill and study itsposition, it would be of great help to him and the Alchemy Master in improving their alchemy skills!


    Elder Chen finally stopped looking over the pill and acting as calm as he could, he said, "It is indeed a pill with 100% purity, this is a rare item that even I would want to get my hands on." At this, he swept his eyes over the crowd and there was a slight chill in his eyes.


    The meaning in his words were clear, but there were still quite a few people who didn''t back down from this. There were plenty of royals here, they didn''t need to fear Elder Chen.


    There were also royal factions that hade from other cities, so they wouldn''t fear Elder Chen since his influence didn''t spread to their cities.


    Elder Chen moved back into his VIP room and during this time, he kept sending out messages to his people to get him as much liquid funds as possible. Since he had set his eyes on this pill, he would definitely win it!


    He also sent a message to the Alchemy Master because he was sure that the Alchemy Master would also be interested in this.


    Once Elder Chen had moved away, Hong Mei finished up the introduction, "This item was given to us today by Master Fan Lin as ast minute submission. As you all know, this is an Enlightenment Pill, but it is one with 100% purity, which means that its effects are increased by several timespared to normal. If a normal person were to use this, it would instantly turn them into a genius. If a genius were to use this, they would be a monster!"


    The eyes of many family heads lit up once they heard this.


    All of them had younger generations in their family and they knew that the growth of these younger generations would determine the fate of their family.


    If the juniors of a family were trash, their family would eventually copse.


    But if the juniors of a family were geniuses, their family would prosper and even have a chance to increase their rank.


    But there were also a few whispers that hit the nail on the head.


    "Fan Lin, could it be that rumoured Lin Fan that could make 100% purity pet food? The name is simr enough, right?"


    "Do you really think that someone who could make 100% purity pet food would be this dumb? This isn''t even considered changing your name, he''s just reversing it! How could that be considered a disguise?"


    What they didn''t know was that Lin Fan had felt quite confident in this...


    Hong Mei looked around and she could tell that the crowd was riled up enough, so she didn''t keep them waiting any longer.


    Hong Mei put the pill back into the pill bottle before turning back to the crowd, "Now, since this item is the finale of our auction tonight and with how rare it is, it definitely won''t have a low price. For this 100% purity pill, the first bid will be five hundred thousand crystals. Let us start the bid!"


    Even though it was already a price that was higher than the ending bid of thest pill, there was nock of people who made bids.


    This was a pill that could change the future of their entire family, who wouldn''t be willing to be their family fortune on it?


    The bids continued toe in until the price was pushed to six hundred thousand, but the bid didn''t stop there.


    But during this bidding, there was one bid that dominated all the other bids, it was a bid that really was going all in.


    "Seven hundred thousand crystals!"


    The price was only at six hundred thousand when someone had suddenly increased it by a hundred thousand.


    Everyone turned in the direction of this voice and they found that it was Elder Chen''s VIP room. It seemed like he was determined to get this pill.


    However, there were still people who weren''t willing to give up.


    This single pill could bring life back to a dying family and there were such families in this hall right now. Moreover, what did Elder Chen of the Alchemy Tower count for when there was this genius alchemist? For some of them, that name didn''t mean anything in their cities.<sub> </sub>


    So after Elder Chen made his bid, there were people who didn''t give up as they increased the bid to seven hundred and ten thousand crystals.


    But Elder Chen wasn''t done yet, he had received a message from the Alchemy Master and he was determined to get this pill!


    Elder Chen didn''t even hesitate as he pressed the button on his chair and shouted, "Eight hundred thousand!"


    There was no pause, he had jumped it up to the next hundred thousand.


    Most of the people gave up after seeing this, but there were still a few who stubbornly believed they couldpete.


    "Eight hundred and ten thousand!"


    Once again, Elder Chen didn''t hesitate at all as he pressed the button and shouted, "Nine hundred thousand!"


    Almost everyone had given up at this moment, but there was still one person who didn''t.


    This was the head of a royal family, but his family had degraded to the point where he was the only tinum Realm Expert left in his family. If they couldn''t generate any new blood, they would be picked clean by the other families.


    Gritting his teeth, that head shouted, "Nine hundred and fifty thousand crystals!"


    That was his bottom line, that was every single bit of asset that his family held. As long as it could be exchanged for an expert who could protect them for the next five hundred years, it would be worth it since they could generate that amount again.


    But what he didn''t know was that Elder Chen was being backed by the entire Alchemy Tower, this family head could neverpete in terms of assets.


    Once again without any hesitation, Elder Chen said, "One million!"


    Everyone took a cold breath at this, this was a record being set right in front of them.


    They had never heard of anything being sold for a million crystals before at the Treasure House, this would definitely break the record. Moreover, it was a million crystals for a single pill!


    Hong Mei had a wide smile on her face as she watched that family head, hoping that he would continue pushing the price up, but she was disappointed in the end as he hung his head in defeat.


    Since the match was settled, she didn''t hesitate at all to make the call to end it.


    "One million going thrice! Sold to VIP room 4!"


    Once he had won this item, Elder Chen came out once again to step onto the stage. He took the microphone from Hong Mei and said, "Our Alchemy Tower is honoured to win this pill. We also wish to invite this Master Fan Lin toe to our Alchemy Tower. I will personally guarantee that as long as Master Fan Lines to our Alchemy Tower, he will be the eleventh elder immediately!"


    It was too bad that when Hong Mei took back the microphone, she had to say, "Thank you Elder Chen for your inspiring words. However, Master Fan Lin also has a few words to say."


    Elder Chen was surprised as he asked, "Oh, what does Master Fan Lin have to say?"


    Hong Mei knew that what she was going to say wasn''t good for her, but she had no choice since this was an order from her boss, "Master Fan Lin has stated that this pill was crafted by him with the help of Elder Hua of the Alchemy Tower. He has also stated that he was delighted with working with Elder Hua this time and he will definitely find her to cooperate in the future."


    Elder Chen''s face turned very ugly at this.


    He had put himself out to ask this Fan Lin toe work for him, but before he could even meet that Fan Lin, he had been pped in the face.


    Fan Lin had just announced to the world that he was working with Elder Hua''s faction while he was here looking like a clown trying to invite Fan Lin to his faction.


    Was there anything that was more embarrassing than this?


    Elder Chen really wanted to find a hole to bury himself in!

 130 Chapter 130

    In VIP room 2, Elder Hua was bent over clutching her stomach as she was wildlyughing.


    The moment she saw the ugly expression that Elder Chen had after hearing what Hong Mei had said, she just couldn''t helpughing into the sky at first before bending over clutching her stomach afterughing too much.


    She knew that this moment wasing ever since he charged onto the stage, but still she couldn''t hold back herughter.


    This was all part of the n that she had before and surprisingly Lin Fan had agreed to it.


    Like they agreed before, Lin Fan would tell the Treasure Pavilion that she had inspected this pill, but she had never expected Lin Fan to tell them that she had helped with creating this pill.


    This was creating a working partnership between her faction and the mysterious alchemist that could create 100% purity pills, which would be a great attraction to make different families. This would be a great boost to her faction as long as she yed her cards right.


    What Lin Fan did far outweighed the favour she had given him in helping him promote his store.


    All of this caused her to be unable to control herughter.


    As for Lin Fan, he just watched Elder Chen on the stage looking like an idiot with narrowed eyes.


    He had already seen the look Elder Chen had when he came to the store, he knew that this was inevitable. If that was the case, it was better to make the first move to weaken his faction to make it easier to deal with him.


    As for when Elder Chen woulde back tomorrow, he already had ns on how to deal with him. If Elder Chen still insisted oning tomorrow, he might not be able to leave¡­


    ¡­


    Elder Chen was frozen on stage for a while before he red at VIP room 2.


    He knew that this was all a plot by Elder Hua that was set for him, but there was nothing he could do.


    At the very least, he had won the 100% purity pill. Even if the other side had an alchemist who could make this pill, he was certain that this definitely was a fluke.


    But as long as their faction had this pill, with the abilities of the five elders that sided with the Alchemy Master, he was certain that they would be able to break through that final 2%.


    There was also that store with 100% purity pet food. As long as that store came under him and they learned the secret to that, he was certain that they would be able to aplish this task.


    Even though he knew that the Mu Family was connected to Lin Fan''s store and there was a possible Legendary Realm Family behind Lin Fan, he was still confident in bringing the store under the Alchemist Master''s faction.


    The Alchemy Tower was actually a division under one of the upper realm''s major factions.


    While the upper realm faction didn''t interfere in the internal struggles of the Alchemy Tower, namely the struggle between the two factions for who should be the Alchemy Master, they would have no qualms in interfering in dealing with a lower realm family that had recipes for 100% purity pet food! This would all be for the good of the Alchemy Tower if this pet store was brought under them.


    The Alchemy Master had already reported this matter to the upper realm faction and they were sending an envoy to inspect the situation. But before then, Elder Chen was confident in forcing Lin Fan''s shop into their faction with the threat of an upper realm power.


    So what if they had an alchemist who could refine 100% purity pills?


    They would have a pet shop with 100% purity topete and they would be able to make 100% purity pills soon as well!


    Elder Chen calmed himself with these "certain" circumstances, but it really was a pity that he didn''t know just how wrong he was.


    When he looked back on this moment in the future, he realized that he was nothing more than a frog at the bottom of a well.


    ¡­


    Once the auction was over, Lin Fan went out of the Treasure Pavilion with Elder Hua.


    They quickly disappeared from everyone''s sight and came to the Mu Family''s beast carriage that was waiting for them. Since they came out together, they might as well head back together since Elder Hua still had things to discuss with Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    Elder Gu had also snuck out with them and was going back together with them.


    Elder Gu was the one who spoke first as he broke out inughter, "Owner Lin, you really are something! I''ve never seen that stingy old man have such an ugly expression before!"


    Elder Hua also revealed a smile before she knit her brows, "While it was satisfying to see that old fool look like that, it wouldn''t be good to provoke him too much. Since Owner Lin isn''t a part of our Alchemy Tower, they are certain to report this matter to the upper realm faction and bring an envoy down. This will be a problem for Owner Lin if the upper realm faction gets involved."


    But Lin Fan had a rxed look on his face even though he heard this. Of course he had also nned for this, he was no longer as weak as he was in Snow Wind City. His influence and power had grown, so he knew how to trick an upper realm faction too.


    As long as he lured them into the shop, he could use the cover of his "master" once again.


    Lin Fan just waved his hand and said, "I have my own ways of dealing with them, you don''t need to worry about me."


    Elder Hua still said with knit brows, "Owner Lin, I know you are a talented person with a strong faction behind you, but you can''t look down on this. This is an upper realm faction."


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing.


    Elder Hua just shook her head knowing that there was nothing she could say, so she changed the topic, "They are certain toe looking for you tomorrow, what are your ns?"


    Lin Fan''s smile turned cold when he heard this, "Well I already have my ns. If that Elder Chen ns oning alone, he might not be able to leave."


    Elder Hua''s face filled with shock before she said, "Owner Lin, you mustn''t do that. It''s fine if they keep harassing you, but if you kill them, you''ll definitely bring the wrath of the upper realm faction on you."


    Lin Fan just said, "I told you, I have my ways of dealing with the upper realm faction. Besides, they weren''t nning on letting me go in the first ce. I can tell that tomorrow''s events aren''t going to end well for me, so it''s better to weaken their forces before they can do anything to me."


    Elder Hua wanted to say something, but she really didn''t know what to say since she wasn''t certain what force was behind Lin Fan, but to make 100% purity pet food and pills, it definitely wasn''t a weak force. It also couldn''t be a force that belonged to this world, so maybe Lin Fan really was prepared to deal with an upper realm force.


    The only thing she could do for now was worry.


    The rest of the carriage ride passed on in silence until they arrived at Elder Hua''s residence.


    When Elder Hua left, she turned onest time to say, "Owner Lin, I hope that you will know when to stop tomorrow. Please don''t make the situation worse than it has to be."


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "I know what to do."


    But these words didn''t assure Elder Hua.


    The only thing she could do now was go to Lin Fan''s shop early tomorrow morning to make sure she was there to support him.


    ¡­


    In the Alchemy Tower, in a room at the top.


    The Alchemy Master was holding the 100% purity Enlightenment Pill with a shocked expression, but then he revealed an ugly look when he heard Elder Chen describe what happened next.


    Elder Chen had a worried look as he asked, "Alchemy Master, what should we do now?"


    The Alchemy Master fell into thought before saying, "You''re definitely correct in thinking that we need to get the store under us. We need to move fast or else the upper realm faction will side with them since that damn hag has connections to both the alchemist who made the 100% purity pill and pet food. Only by bringing that store under us can we bnce this out and restore our worth."


    Elder Chen asked, "Then what about tomorrow?"


    The Alchemy Master revealed a sharp look as he said, "I''ll go to the store with you tomorrow. I don''t believe that brat will still stand up to us if I show my face."


    That night, there was a storm brewing in Green Wood City and it would soon roll over the entire city.

 131 Chapter 131

    The next morning, Lin Fan ran his store like normal.


    The morning rush came and the kids were pushed to the limit of their stamina, but still they performed much better than they had done yesterday.


    When the morning rush was over, they copsed on the ground as exhausted as yesterday, but at least there was Elder Hua who had been there with cakes for them.


    Even though Elder Hua looked like a kid herself sitting with them and handing breakfast and cake to them, she had quite the happy smile on her face. For someone of her age, she was someone who didn''t have kids, so her motherly instincts came out in different methods.


    Well it was hard for her to find someone when she looked the way she did. The ones that were interested her were all perverts or weird people.


    But even with how rxed they looked on the surface, they were actually also tense deep down since they were waiting for Elder Chen''s arrival.


    Today was the third day limit that Elder Chen had given them and with what happenedst night, he definitely wasn''t going to let them off easy.


    They were expecting the full assault, but they were disappointed since Elder Chen never arrived.


    They continued to wait until noon, but even then Elder Chen didn''te.


    It was only after they let their guard down and decided to get some lunch that he finally came, but he wasn''t alone.


    Behind Elder Chen was arge group that all had an imposing aura around them as they approached the store.


    Lin Fan and the rest were all gathered around the counter with their food when Elder Chen suddenly led thisrge group into the store.


    Lin Fan and the rest all looked up in surprise to see Elder Chen with food in their mouth, but they quickly swallowed and put their guards up, all except Lin Fan and Ang who were quite rxed.


    Elder Hua was the first to speak, "Old man, what are you doing with all these people? Are you nning to start a war?"


    Elder Chen ignored her and said to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, it''s been three days, I''m here for your answer."


    Lin Fan looked at him and the group behind him with a calm look before saying, "My answer is the same as before, there is nothing to gain from cooperating with you, so why would I agree?" Then he spread his hands and said, "I just want to run a normal pet shop."


    Elder Chen narrowed his eyes and said, "It''s clear that you have a power behind you, but do you really think that you have nothing to fear since that is the case? You should know if youe onto the territory of another force, you should pay respects to them. The Alchemy Tower isn''t as weak as you think it is."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes at this, "Oh, what do you want to do then? Moreover, can you really speak for the entire Alchemy Tower?"


    Elder Chenughed at this, but then he said, "While I can''t personally speak for the entire Alchemy Tower, I think that we can speak for it as a group. Don''t you guys think so?"


    At this, the people behind him took off their cloaks and there were four other old men revealed, as well as one middle aged man.


    While Lin Fan and Ang didn''t recognize them, the other people present did.


    Elder Hua said in a shocked voice, "The four elders and the Alchemy Master! Just what are you trying to pull today!"


    Elder Hua knew that they were in a bad situation if this came down to a fight.


    They only had four tinum Realm Experts present, while the other side had six and one who was in the peak tinum Realm!


    She knew that Lin Fan was a tinum Realm Expert because of what happened back in the Alchemy Tower back then, but she didn''t think he was at a high level. As for Ang, since she followed Lin Fan, she was probably at the tinum Realm as well. Elder Hua never would have dared to imagine that Ang was actually far beyond that since she looked like she was even younger than Lin Fan.


    The only thing she could hope for was that the force behind Lin Fan made a move, otherwise it would be hard for them to escape today.<sub> </sub>


    In a worst case scenario, she could only send Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai away with her life. If they could leave, perhaps they could do something with the other elders and the Mu Family¡­


    During this time, she also made a few secret hand signs to Elder Gu who moved a bit closer to Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai.


    But even though Elder Hua had revealed the identities of these people, Lin Fan didn''t seem worried at all.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "What are the intentions of your Alchemy Tower then?"


    Elder Chen moved to the side this time and the middle aged man came forward, "Owner Lin, I''ve long heard of your fame, but it really is a shame that we''re only able to meet in this situation. If possible, I would have preferred to meet an outstanding man like you in a different situation."


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he looked at him before asking, "And you are?"


    The few elders became a bit agitated at this, but the middle aged man raised his hand. Then he looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and said, "How rude of me not to introduce myself, especially since we''ll be partners from now on. I am the Alchemy Master of the Alchemy Tower, I''ll be looking forward to working with you."


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I look forward to working with you as well, but unfortunately there''s no work at all."


    The Alchemy Master revealed a smile, "Oh, but I don''t think so. After all, your store will be falling under the domain of the Alchemy Tower from this day forward, so our rtionship will be quite close in the future. If that isn''t considered working together, I don''t know what would be."


    Lin Fan said in a calm voice, "But I wonder who was the one who agreed to this? It certainly wasn''t me or anyone from my shop."


    The Alchemy Master still had the same smile, "Owner Lin, it really is an honour for you that our upper realm faction has decided to ept you into our midst. You will officially be a branch of the Alchemy King Hall of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, just like our Alchemy Tower. Since we all will serve the same master, of course we will be working together from now on."


    After he said this, the Alchemy Master took out a decree that was filled with the power ofws. These power ofws far surpassed the limits of this world, so it clearly came from an upper realm.


    Elder Hua tightly knit her brows at this.


    She never expected such a move from the Alchemy Tower.


    This wasn''t a simple matter, this was being folded into an upper realm faction. As long as one wasn''t an idiot, they definitely wouldn''t reject this.


    Moreover, Lin Fan''s shop would be receiving the same treatment as the Alchemy Tower. That wasn''t a small honour, this was definitely giving him plenty of face.


    But it did make sense since Lin Fan could bring out 100% purity pet food which didn''t exist in this lower realm, so that meant that he probably had another upper realm faction behind him.


    Although the decree said that he would be a branch, it was equal to saying they would be willing to make an alliance with the faction behind him, creating a path for cooperation between both sides.


    This would allow Lin Fan to end this matter peacefully and establish a friendly rtionship between their so-called factions, it was definitely in Lin Fan''s best interests to ept this.


    However, their one mistake was thinking that Lin Fan actually had a faction behind him.


    This was the same reason why Lin Fan didn''t want to join the Dian and Ying Families.


    If he joined these upper realm factions, he would be drawn into their matters and it would mean trouble for him. But for him who had the system, as long as he was able to continue building up his shop and his power slowly, he would eventually surpass them and even reach the level of Ang and Momonga. To put it simply, there were no benefits to him other than these factions leaving him alone, but the downsides far outweighed the benefits.


    While Elder Hua was worried about what might happen next, she was surprised to hear what Lin Fan said.


    Lin Fan just shook his head as he said, "While it is an honour to be invited, I can''t ept this honour."


    Everyone except Ang was shocked by this, even the Alchemy Master!

 132 Chapter 132

    But he quickly came back from his shock and said with a smile, "Owner Lin, that is a funny joke. I almost thought that I heard you say that you were rejecting the will of our Alchemy King Hall."


    Lin Fan just calmly nodded, "That''s right, you heard correctly. I am indeed rejecting your offer."


    The smile dropped from the Alchemy Master''s face and his face turned dark, "Do you truly understand the situation you are currently in? This isn''t a game, you do know that right?"


    Lin Fan finally revealed a cold smile, "And there is your true self. What''s the point of hiding behind all that deception?"


    The Alchemy Master was taken aback for a second, before he suddenly broke out inughter, "You''re definitely right, Owner Lin. As expected of someone I respect."


    Then as soon as his voice fell, the aura of the peak tinum Realm suddenly exploded from him, "Then I guess there''s no other way."


    Elder Hua immediately moved back towards Elder Gu and her disciple, putting up her guard along the way.


    The other elders that had followed the Alchemy Master here also released their tinum Realm auras.


    As for Lin Fan, he just calmly watched as they prepared for battle, waiting for the Alchemy Master to attack him.


    However, before the fight could even start, Song Shu came out of the back and said, "Boss, here''s the thing that you asked for."


    Her words cut through the tense atmosphere like a knife as everyone turned towards her. Even Lin Fan knit his brows when he suddenly remembered that the kids were in the back getting something for him. He realized that he made a mistake.


    But before he could do a thing, the Alchemy Master was the one who spoke first.


    The Alchemy Master narrowed his eyes when he looked at Song Shu at first, but then his face was covered in shock like he had just realized something.


    He looked closely at her face again and found that his intuition was correct, it really was the girl he had been looking for the entire time.


    "It''s you!" The Alchemy Master shouted out.


    This caused everyone to be confused since they didn''t know what was going on.


    The Alchemy Master turned to Lin Fan and asked him, "Why is this girl in your shop? What is your rtionship with her?"


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look before answering, "She is my employee, what does it matter to you?"


    The Alchemy Master broke out inughter at this before turning to look at Song Shu with a cold gaze, "You''re even keeping a murderer like this in your shop, you really are a surprising person."


    "Murderer?" Lin Fan''s confused look became even deeper.


    The Alchemy Master then said, "Owner Lin, how about we make a deal? As long as you let me take away this girl, we will call this matter settled? What do you think? This is quite a good deal for you."


    Elder Hua knit her brows and turned to look at Song Shu. Earlier she hadn''t looked at Song Shu carefully, since she just thought that she was another kid that Lin Fan had hired off the street.


    Now that she was looking at her carefully, she realized that she did look a bit familiar.


    Combing through her memories, pieces came together in her mind until they formed aplete image.


    Finally, she couldn''t help but shout out, "Young miss, it''s really you!"


    Song Shu looked at her in surprise when she heard this, she never expected someone to call her "young miss".


    Elder Hua immediately covered her mouth when she said this as she realized that she had made a mistake.<sub> </sub>


    Only the Alchemy Master had recognized her, but her words made everyone realize just who Song Shu was.


    Lin Fan''s expression continued to increase with more and more confusion as he looked at Song Shu and muttered, "Young miss?


    When the elders that followed the Alchemy Master heard this, they also recognized who Song Shu was and they were filled with killing intent.


    If they let this girl live, the situation might turn bad for them. Therefore, there was no reason for this girl to live!


    The Alchemy Master knew that the situation would be worse the more he let it develop, so he began moving towards Lin Fan and consequently Song Shu as he said with a smile, "Owner Lin, this really would be a great deal for you. Just give me this little girl and we''ll consider this matter over." But during this, he continued moving forward.


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he saw this, but before he could speak, the Alchemy Master suddenly charged out at full speed at Song Shu with one palm extended, aiming right at her head. His eyes were filled with killing intent as he stared right at her.


    Song Shu just watched as the palm grew in size in front of her eyes, unable to do a single thing as the killing intent of the Alchemy Master locked her down.


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu who wanted to protect her had reacted slow. Even if they wanted to save her now, they were only in the mid tinum Realm while the Alchemy Master was in the peak tinum Realm. Before they could even reach Song Shu, the Alchemy Master was in front of her.


    Lin Fan was right beside her, but he didn''t do a thing since he knew what was going to happen.


    The funny thing was that the Alchemy Master had taken this as tacit understanding, he thought that Lin Fan was letting him kill this little girl in exchange for leaving this store.


    But what he never expected was that even without Lin Fan doing a thing, he would be sent flying soon.


    Right before his palm could hit Song Shu''s head, there was an invisible force that appeared in front of him. No matter how much he tried pushing into that invisible force, he couldn''t move forward even a single inch which was all he needed to smash Song Shu''s head in.


    He used all his powers to push forward, but he couldn''t move at all.


    Eventually all his force was negated and once that happened, he suddenly felt a powerful force being mmed into his palm. It was much stronger than anything he could expect and when hended, mming into the wall, his arm was bent in a very strange manner. It was very clear that the bone inside his arm had been shattered and broken in several ces, it took all he had not to faint from the pain.


    The Alchemy Master gritted his teeth and set the broken bones of his arm back in ce. Once he was done, he took out a pill that he swallowed, which caused smoke to appear from his arm. Once the smoke was gone, he waved his arm and it had surprisingly been connected back in ce.


    The Alchemy Master turned back to Lin Fan, but this time there was an extra look of fear in his eyes, "Are you really intending to protect this little girl from me? Do you really think that you can stop me? Do you even know who you are protecting?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him calmly and asked, "Who is she then?"


    The Alchemy Master knew that violence was out of the question and seeing that Lin Fan was open to talking, he said, "This girl was the daughter of the previous Alchemy Master, but she betrayed us all when she suddenly went crazy one day and poisoned her own father! If you''re not careful, she might poison you too!"


    Lin Fan''s eyes opened wide in surprise as he turned to Song Shu to notice the shocked look on her face. It wasn''t shocked from being exposed, rather it was shock and confusion from not understanding what this man was talking about.


    Elder Hua quickly said, "Owner Lin, don''t listen to his lies! While it is true that Master Jun was poisoned, no one ever found the culprit! It''s all rumours spread by them to keep their position as the new Alchemy Master! The young miss had even disappeared under mysterious circumstances!"


    The Alchemy Master quickly added, "Owner Lin, as long as you hand this little girl to me, I can promise you that you will never be bothered by our Alchemy Tower ever again. I can even use the resources of the Alchemy Tower to help promote your store."


    Lin Fan''s mind turned and he could guess most of what this was about, but none of that mattered to him.


    <o>,m The only thing that mattered was that this little girl was now part of his store.</o>


    Lin Fan calmly turned back to the Alchemy Master and said, "You can''t have her."


    The Alchemy Master''s face turned ugly, "What else do you want? I can give you anything you want as long as you give her to me."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "She is my employee, so you can''t have her. It''s as simple as that."

 133 Chapter 133

    The Alchemy Master''s face turned ugly at this, but there was still the look of fear in his eyes from that unknown attack. It was a power that he had never seen before.


    Humans couldn''t help fearing the unknown and in front of this overwhelming unknown power that he couldn''t match at all, of course there was a primal fear that came from the bottom of his heart.


    The Alchemy Master didn''t give up as he said, "You will regret this decision, it''s easier to give her up than to protect her."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at him and said, "Was it not enough being beaten, do you not want to leave this ce?"


    The Alchemy Master flinched because he didn''t know what would happen to him, so he quickly gathered his group and left, but he didn''t forget to throw behind him, "You''ll regret this."


    Lin Fan just shook his head before turning back to Song Shu who was still terrified.


    She eventually came back to her senses and looked at Lin Fan with a worried look as she said, "Boss, maybe it would have been better to hand me over. Those people looked quite important."


    Lin Fan just patted her on the head and said, "It''s fine, you just worry about your work. As long as you''re an employee here, no one will touch a hair on your head."


    Elder Hua also quickly came over and took Song Shu by the shoulders, looking right at her face for a while before grabbing her in a hug, "Young miss, I''m truly sorry about what happened. It was all my fault."


    Elder Gu also came over and stood on the side, but there was a worried look on his face as he looked at Song Shu.


    However, Song Shu had a confused look on her face while being hugged by Elder Hua. Only after a while did she say in a hesitant voice, "I''m sorry, do we know each other? I think you''re mistaken, I''m not this young miss that you''re talking about."


    Elder Hua pulled back immediately and looked at her in shock before saying, "I would never make a mistake, you are clearly young miss Jun. Your father Jun Ting was the most honourable man that I''ve ever known, he was the person I respected the most in my life. Hisst orders to me were to protect you, but I''m ashamed to admit that I failed this mission until now."


    Elder Gu also echoed, "We truly are sorry young miss, it was all our fault that day. We only looked away for a second..."


    But before he could finish, Song Shu suddenly grabbed her head as she cried out in pain.


    Earlier when Elder Hua had mentioned the name of the previous Alchemy Master, she had narrowed her eyes and after a bit, there was a piercing pain that filled her head, one that she couldn''t take at all.


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu were both shocked to see this, even Lin Fan was shocked by this sudden outburst.


    But before any of them could do anything to help, Song Shu suddenly stopped and she fell down like a puppet whose strings were cut. It was a good thing that Elder Hua was still holding her, otherwise she would have hurt herself falling to the ground.


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu gathered around her, looking her over in a worried manner. As for Lin Fan, he just watched on the side with slightly knit brows.


    Eventually, Lin Fan said, "Bring her over here, we''ll lie her out on the counter, there''s enough space for her here."


    Elder Hua carefully brought Song Shu over to the counter and put her atop it. During this, Lin Fan had Ange over to take a look at Song Shu.


    Ang moved her hand from head to toe over Song Shu, using her mental energy to scan her.


    After she was done, she turned to the rest and said, "It doesn''t seem like anything physical. Other than suffering from malnourishment a bit, there isn''t anything wrong with her body. This condition that she''s suffering from is most likely mental, such as a past trauma. She suddenly broke down after hearing about her past, so it must be rted to that."


    At this, Elder Hua and Elder Gu revealed depressed looks.


    If they hadn''t failed in their missions back then, the young miss wouldn''t have had to suffer this much.


    Then Ang said, "It also seems like her memories are sealed based on what I''ve seen. The way she talks ispletely shaped by her time on the streets, but there''s also a few formal words that should havee from her teachings when she was younger."


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu''s faces fell even further when they heard this.


    After some deliberation, Elder Hua turned to Lin Fan and said, "Owner Lin, this ce isn''t safe for the young miss. We need to find another ce for her before theye back again."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "As long as she is my store, there is no safer ce for her on this."


    Elder Hua knit her brows and argued, "They didn''t seed today and with how you hurt them, they are justified to call an envoy, which they most likely have already done. The envoy will be here in just a few days and when that timees, no one will be able to stop them. This is an expert from the upper realm, he surpasses the limits of this lower realm."


    Lin Fan still insisted, "I can tell you now that if he really doese, there is no safer ce on this for her than right here. There will be no one else willing to help her and you definitely won''t be able to hide from them. As long as she remains here as my employee, no one will be able to touch a single hair on her head."


    Elder Hua wanted to say something else, but she realized that Lin Fan was right. From what she had seen today, Lin Fan was also supported by an upper realm faction and it seemed like they valued this store quite a bit to send an expert to guard it.


    She had no idea how strong this expert was, but with the power he demonstrated, it was clear that he also surpassed the limit of this realm.


    Moreover, he showed that he was willing to protect the employees of the store, so that meant Song Shu would be under his protection as long as she was at this shop.


    But still, she couldn''t help feeling worried since this was an unknown faction, it was hard to predict their actions.


    Then again, after being with Lin Fan for some time, she felt that she could trust him since he had kept all his promises.


    So in the end, she said, "Owner Lin, I''ll leave the young miss to you then. I hope that you can keep your promise."


    Lin Fan just nodded and said again, "Only in this shop will she be safe." Then after thinking for a bit, he added, "Also, don''t call her young miss. We need to slowly let her recover her memories, so forcing it will damage her mind instead of helping her. We''ll slowly let her remember what happened in the past."


    Elder Hua nodded at this and said, "You''re right, I was too excited just now."


    Then they just waited for Song Shu to wake up.


    After half an hour, she slowly opened her eyes to find everyone gathered around her.


    Song Shu slowly sat up and asked, "What''s going on? Why am I sleeping at the store?"


    Lin Fan looked at everyone before saying, "Do you not remember what happened just now?"


    Song Shu knit her brows before she suddenly said, "What happened to the bad guys just now? Why are they suddenly gone?"


    Lin Fan knit his brows too when he heard this, but he still said, "What else do you remember?"


    Song Shu tried to think, but then she knit her brows and started clutching her head.


    Lin Fan quickly said, "Alright, alright, calm down. You don''t need to think about it."


    Only then did Song Shu calm down, but she was still confused why her head had suddenly started hurting.


    Lin Fan had the rest of theme to the side before saying, "It seems like her mind is blocking out everything that has to do with her past. Let''s just slowly work on this and not force her."


    Everyone nodded before turning back to Song Shu who was looking at them with a curious gaze.


    Then before anyone else could say a thing, Ang came forward to take her in her arms and she said, "It''s fine now, no one can hurt you."


    Song Shu was even more confused, but for some reason, this hug felt very nice and she couldn''t resist it as tears came out of her eyes.


    No one said anything when they saw this, they just silently watched as Song Shu let her tears out.

 134 Chapter 134

    In the end, they decided to drop this topic because there wasn''t anything else they could do for her.


    The only thing they could do was watch over Song Shu and slowly let her memoriese back, which they would since they had already been stimted.


    So Elder Hua and Elder Gu left and there was a calm period after that since most of the customers that normally came to the store came in the morning when there were training spots or new stock of pet food. The only thing that was in the store in the afternoons were the special elixirs which were generally too expensive for normal people to buy.


    The day passed and the next morning, Song Shu had gone back to her normal self.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help shaking his head as he said with a sigh, "Kids really do recover fast. It hasn''t even been a day and she''s back to normal."


    But he was also happy to see this since after being with these kids for a bit, their happiness had rubbed off on him a bit.


    Then during the normal morning rush, there was suddenly a notification that came from the system.


    "Host, the first cultivation realm farm has beenpletely developed. Please prepare to build the second cultivation realm farm."


    This had been something that Lin Fan had been waiting for a long time, it had already been close to two months since he established the first cultivation realm farm.


    He had logged in daily to build new units and new buildings, so now he had an industrial system set up on that lower cultivation realm. There were several differentmand centers located all over the, each one with different buildings and several missile and auto turrets ced at eachmand center.


    Lin Fan had already gone past the normal marines and were already building hellions, siege tanks, and thors. Each one of these units were in the Legendary Realm.


    With this supreme army, he had his units patrol the and wipe out any dangerous elements that lurked there. As for the ones that didn''t attack his army and allowed his SCVs to continue farming, he left alone since he didn''t n on destroying this world.


    Lin Fan had wanted to expand before, but the system had told him that before he could expand to the second farm, he had to fully colonize this world first. Now that his SCVs were mining in every part of this world and were utilizing all of its energy, he was finally allowed to build his second farm.


    When Lin Fan pulled up the interface, he found three different worlds were avable to him.


    There was a world that waspletely blue as it was covered in oceans, there was a world that waspletely green as it was covered in grasnds, and there was a world that waspletely brown as it was covered in various rock formations.


    But the strange thing was that when Lin Fan scrolled his finger of the brown, there was a warning that popped up that said, "Warning, this has dangerous elements on it. Please be aware that the difficulty will be higher."


    Lin Fan was confused by this, so he asked the system, "System, what does this warning mean?"


    "Host, as the warning says, this will be much more difficult to build a farm onpared to the other twos. But with greater difficulty, there will be greater reward."


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this. Greater rewards, didn''t that mean more higher grade elixirs?


    He didn''t know why, but his store was slowly making more and more enemies, so he definitely needed more resources to make himself stronger. While this might seem a bit more dangerous, it was worth the risk.


    Lin Fan chose the brown without hesitation.


    Once he did, the system asked him to choose three units to bring with him to the new realm.


    Lin Fan thought about it before deciding to bring two hellions and one siege tank.


    His idea was that he could use the hellions for quick scouting and he could use the siege tank for defense. It wouldn''t take him long to start spamming out marines, so it would be easy to build defenses with the siege tank as the core.


    Once he was done with his choices, Lin Fan''s spirit was sent to the new cultivation realm with amand center, three SCVs, two hellions, and one siege tank.


    When he arrived, Lin Fan quickly gave the order to the hellions to start scouting the area while having the siege tank position itself by themand center for protection. At the same time, he had the SCVs immediately start gathering resources since he didn''t know what to expect from this realm. Since there was a warning from the system, it would mean that it wouldn''t be a normal level of hard.


    Very soon, Lin Fan had gathered enough resources to build a barracks and a few supply depots, allowing Lin Fan to quickly build several marines.


    But of course, Lin Fan didn''t forget to build several SCVs at the same time to increase his resource gathering potential.


    Soon, Lin Fan had finished building the foundations of his base and his hellions had finished scouting out the immediate area. Based on their reports, there didn''t seem to be anything that special around this area other than a few beasts made of rocks which the hellions easily kited with their speed.<sub> </sub>


    When Lin Fan was about to send out his SCVs to extract the resources from the corpses of these beasts, the hellions suddenly encountered something.


    Out from behind the rocks near the hellions, there were suddenly several bugs that had appeared. These bugs were the size of dogs with twin scythes and were running on four legs.


    The moment Lin Fan saw the image of these bugs on the feed from the hellions, he immediately recognized them. They were the second of the three famous races of Starcraft, they were the Zergs!


    Lin Fan immediately ordered the hellion to retreat, but the zerglings had already locked onto it. The one good thing was that zerglings were still basic melee units while the hellion was an advanced unit. This difference was made even more clear in this cultivation world.


    These zerglings were all only in the Bronze Realm, while the hellion was already in the Legendary Realm.


    The hellion kited the zerglings until they lined up and with a single methrower burst, it burnt all the zerglings to a crisp. That was the power of a fully upgraded hellion against five basic zerglings, it wasn''t even a contest.


    But the fact that there were zerglings here, meant that there was a hatchery near here.


    Then if one followed the rules of bugs in the real world, there must mean that there was a queen leading them.


    Lin Fan immediately asked the system, "System, what is going on here? Why are there zerglings?"


    "Host, you have encountered another yer. Please defeat them and im this cultivation realm."


    Lin Fan was shocked, "Another yer? What do you mean by another yer?"


    ¡­


    On the side of the zergs, inside a basic hatchery, there was a woman who had sharp bug talons on her back and deep green skin.


    If Lin Fan was here, he would have recognized her as the famous Queen of des!


    This queen had been resting in the nest when she suddenly saw one of the zerglingse over.


    The zergling just stood in front of the queen andmunicated telepathically to it.


    When the queen heard its report, she suddenly stood up and said in a strangenguage, "Are you sure that is what you saw?"


    The zergling said a few more things telepathically which made the queen suddenly reveal a smile.


    The queen then said, "Well, it seems like there''s someone else trying to take this as well. We''ll have to show them the power of our Bug Race."


    As she said this, the smile on her lips became even wider.


    It had been quite a while since she had some fun, she was looking forward to this.


    ¡­


    On Lin Fan''s side, the system had slowly exined the concept of another yer.


    When it came to cultivation realm farms, these were actual realms that were being used as farms, which was something that the races that ruled this universemonly did. This meant that if Lin Fan continued to build his cultivation realm farms, he would have eventually encountered other races that were also building farms.


    It was just his luck that he met the Bug Race first, which was simr to the Zerg race of Starcraft. But if he continued, he would have met all kinds of different races that would have been trying to cultivate realms.


    Still, even if he did encounter them, there was only one thing he could have done.


    In this world, it was thew of the jungle, so the only thing he could do was defeat them and take this world for himself.

 135 Chapter 135

    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time and didn''t take things slow like he did with the first cultivation realm.


    Since he knew that there would be another yer that would be acting against him, the only thing he could do now was build as quickly as possible, especially since he was up against the zergs. The Bug Race were quick to generate new units, so he had to prepare for the possible zerg rush.


    Lin Fan made sure to mark the area that he found the zerg in as dangerous while also making sure to create a line with turrets and troops. He had three marines ced with each turret, that way they could stall long enough for the other troops toe, unless it was a full zerg rush.


    Once he was done with that, Lin Fan also created anothermand center which he sent off in theplete opposite direction. For now, he needed to collect resources as quickly as possible, so he also sent half of his SCVs to help build the new base while creating new SCVs at the old base.


    When that was all finished, Lin Fan also started researching different tech as well as different units.


    He found that setting up this second cultivation realm farm was equal to starting a new game, but at least he was allowed to bring several units along with him which made starting out much easier thanst time.


    Now that he had prepared everything, the only thing he could do now was wait for everything to finish, so after making sure that everything in his queue was correct, Lin Fan headed back to the shop.


    It was a good thing that he did head back because there was currently an incident in the shop.


    The morning rush had been going normally, but near the end, there was suddenly someone who started causing trouble in the store.


    At first it wasn''t much, he just kept pacing back and forth in front of the pet food section, but then he suddenly summoned his pet which copsed on the ground and shouted, "Look at what happened to my pet after it ate your pet food! What are you going to do about this!"


    Song Shu who was in charge of things like this while Lin Fan was gone had gone over to mediate, "Sir, can I ask what is the problem here? What do you mean when you say that your pet has copsed?"


    The man pointed at his pet lying on the ground that had froth at the corners of its mouth and came up close to Song Shu to shout in her face, "You want to try telling me that you won''t im responsibility for what you did for my pet? What kind of trash shop is this?!"


    Song Shu tried to remain calm, but in the face of this screaming man, she couldn''t help it as tears appeared in the corners of her eyes.


    When the people around saw the tears in the corner of Song Shu''s eyes, there were a few that came over to protect her. They couldn''t help it when there was a cute little girl crying, it ignited the urge to protect inside them.


    "Hey man, how about you calm down? It isn''t like shouting at this little girl will make it any better?"


    "How about we just calm down and talk about this?"


    "Song Shu, here''s a treat for you. How about youe with me and we''ll have some fun together?"


    Of course thatst person was dragged away into the crowd and beaten up¡­


    The man didn''t falter when he was faced with this crowd, rather he started shouting at them, "Why don''t you all mind your own business!" Then he pointed at Song Shu and said, "The pet food that this little girl''s store is selling is poisoned and it might have killed my pet, how can I calm down at this! I must report them and getpensation from this store!"


    The people around could clearly see that the man''s pet was in a bad situation, so they weren''t that keen on interfering. Still, Song Shu''s cuteness attracted a few people to stand between her and the screaming man.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan had appeared.


    He walked over to the man and the man couldn''t help taking a step back in surprise at Lin Fan''s aura.


    Lin Fan came over to the pet and looked it over before looking down at the empty pet food package that had been dropped on the ground. This package looked almost identical to the one that he used, but his sharp eyes could see a few differences.


    However, even if he did point out those differences, he knew that people wouldn''t believe it with how well made this fake was. But of course, he had other ways of dealing with this.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan turned to the man and calmly asked, "What happened here?"


    The man didn''t know why he felt a bit of fear towards Lin Fan, but he calmed himself and said, "Are you the owner of this store? Well I fed my pet your food after I finished buying a pack and before I could do anything, my pet suddenly started frothing at the mouth and copsed! Tell me, what are you nning to do about this?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile at this, "Are you sure you want to do this? I''ll give you onest chance to back down."


    The man was stunned for a second before he recovered his courage to shout, "Do you hear this everyone? This owner is trying to threaten me into submission! What kind of store is this?!"


    Lin Fan just had the same smile as he picked up the empty bag of pet food and picked up a bag of his store''s pet food.


    He lifted them both up as he said, "Well, there''s a very clear difference between these two bags. I tried giving you a chance to get out of this unscathed, but since you won''t take the olive branch I offered, I have no choice."


    He turned to one of the men protecting Song Shu and said, "Come here and inject your life energy into this bag first." He lifted up the bag that the man had dropped on the ground.


    The man was confused, but he still followed Lin Fan''s directions and came over to inject his life energy into the bag. When he did so, there was nothing that happened.


    Lin Fan nodded when he saw this and then he said, "Alright, inject your life energy into this bag." He lifted up the full bag of pet food.


    The man was still confused, but he still did it. When he did, there was a symbol that suddenly lit up on the face of the bag. It was a symbol that everyone recognized since it was the symbol that hung outside Lin Fan''s store.


    The screaming man panicked at this, but he calmed down and said, "What can that prove? For all we know, you might have just drawn that on there."


    Lin Fan shook his head at this, "I guess you won''t give up until you see a grave."


    Then he turned and said, "Ang."


    Ang threw a bucket that she had already prepared over to Lin Fan who skillfully caught it with a single hand.


    Lin Fan leaned over the pet on the ground and gently picked it up.


    The screaming man said, "What are you doing to my pet? Does everyone see this, he''s trying to get rid of the evidence!"


    Lin Fan just casually stroked the throat of the pet before poking three acupuncture points, making the pet suddenly spit up a round thing into the bucket. Even after spitting it up, the pet still didn''t move.


    Lin Fan however covered his hand in life energy and picked up the pill to let everyone see what it was before saying, "For those of you who have any knowledge of alchemy, you should recognize what this pill is. It''s the most simple Acting Dead Pill, even the worst Junior Alchemist can make this. This one is clearly decently made, but that doesn''t mean it''s a good pill."


    Since the Alchemy Tower was in Green Wood city and there was a forest around which made it easy to gather ingredients, alchemy was a major industry in this city. Many of the customers here were actually alchemists who were able to recognize the pill with a single nce.


    Lin Fan turned his attention back to the pet and released his aura just to cover the pet alone as he whispered, "I''ll kill you if you continue acting dead."


    The pet''s eyes suddenly opened wide and it jumped to its feet, running away to hide behind the leg of its master.


    When everyone saw this, they immediately red at the screaming man.


    When the screaming man saw this, he knew that he was finished.

 136 Chapter 136

    The screaming man tried to take back his pet and make his way out of the store, but who would let him do that?


    Before he could even touch his pet, Lin Fan had already grabbed his hand and had it pinned behind his back.


    Lin Fan just smiled at the man as he said, "I tried to give you a chance, but you''re the one who didn''t want to take it."


    The man had a terrified look on his face as he said, "What are you going to do? Are you gonna beat me in broad daylight? Don''t you know that''s a clear vition of thew?"


    Lin Fan just said, "You and I both know that this argument isn''t valid, but I''ll give you onest chance."


    It was like the man had seen a straw to grasp at as he said, "What do you want?"


    Lin Fan then said with a sly smile, "As long as you tell me who hired you toe here, I''ll let you leave this store unharmed."


    The man''s expression froze when he heard this.


    But he knew that he couldn''t say a thing because if he did, it would certainly mean death. Compared to certain death, it was better to take the beating that he would receive from Lin Fan, which meant that he would be able to survive at the very least.


    It was a pity that things didn''t go as he nned.


    Lin Fan gathered his life energy around his hand to form a de and with the same smile, he ced the tip of the de at the throat of the man and said in a calm voice, "Well you know what will happen if you don''t talk."


    The man suddenly began trembling, "You can''t do this, it''s against thews to kill someone like this."


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "It might be, but we all know that there are exceptions to thosews. You''re the one who came to cause trouble in my store, this is all considered self defense. Besides, who would be able to hear the words of a dead man?"


    The man began trembling even more as his eyes filled with fear. He had thought that this would be an easy job, but now he was on the edge of life and death. This mental strain was not something that he could take.


    The surrounding people watching this couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spine. They had always thought that Lin Fan was azy store owner, but now it seemed like he was much more than that.


    As for those that had seen him take care of Young Master Chen before, they were still shocked by this. They knew that Lin Fan was a rabid dog, but they never thought that he would be this crazy.


    Still even though he was consumed with fear, the man didn''t believe that Lin Fan would really do it.


    Lin Fan could see this, so he moved his hand slightly forward to nick the skin and drew out a drop of blood.


    The man couldn''t believe that Lin Fan had actually done that, but he still believed that Lin Fan would draw back at thest second.


    Lin Fan saw this firm look on his face and shook his head before he began moving his hand forward bit by bit, stabbing deeper and deeper into the neck and drawing out more blood.


    It finally reached a point where the man couldn''t stay calm anymore and he shouted, "Alright, alright, I''ll tell you! But you have to promise me that you''ll let me go!"


    Lin Fan''s hand stopped and he calmly said, "As long as you tell the truth, you''re free to go."


    The man calmed down and said with a serious look, "It was Elder Hua of the Alchemy Tower who hired me."


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh and shook his head before raising his hand, "I guess you don''t want to live any longer."


    The man was calm, but then when he saw the life energy de right in front of his eyes, he suddenly shouted, "Alright, it was Elder Chen! It was Elder Chen of the Alchemy Tower! He was the one who hired me!"


    Lin Fan''s hand stopped once again and he revealed a smile, "Now see, isn''t that much easier?"


    The man had a defeated look on his face as he said, "Can I go now?"


    Lin Fan waved his hand at Ang to have here over.<sub> </sub>


    When Ang came over, Lin Fan had her heal up the wound on the man''s neck before saying, "I said that you would leave here unharmed if you told me who hired you and I intend to keep my word. Now you better get going soon or you might not be able to escape the wrath of Elder Chen."


    The man was shocked by this disy, but he also knew that Lin Fan was right, so he quickly picked up his pet and left the shop. The first few hours would be crucial, if he couldn''t get out of the city in time, he would be dead. But still that was better than dying right here at Lin Fan''s hands.


    Little did he know that Lin Fan had never nned on letting him go.


    He had already ced one of Brainy''s seeds on him before he let this man leave.


    If he got caught, Lin Fan would receive some nice information. If he got away, Lin Fan wouldn''t let him escape with his life.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had already prepared for this scenario.


    He had actually prepared these bags to use against the Feng Family when they had set up their pet shop back in Snow Wind City, but too bad he never had a chance to use them before he destroyed them.


    Still they didn''t go to waste as he could use them now.


    He knew that this man was just a stalling strategy while the Alchemy Tower was waiting for their upper realm faction to send an envoy. Lin Fan was looking forward to seeing what this envoy would be like.


    ¡­


    Time passed after that incident and soon a week had gone by.


    There were no further incidents since Elder Chen had already learned his lesson. He didn''t know what other ns Lin Fan had and there was already bacsh to his reputation from the first n.


    As the man who had been the one to perpetrate this n, he waster found dead in a ditch with his eyes wide open. No one could tell just how he had died, but he clearly died a painful death with the look on his face.


    After the week had passed, while the Alchemy Tower was feeling tense, there was a meeting of the Alchemy Master''s side that was called.


    When everyone was gathered, they were wondering why the Alchemy Master had called them, but they weren''t kept wondering for long.


    The Alchemy Master came in with someone who was dressed in a dark cloak,pletely covering their appearance. But they could tell from the aura that came from this person that he wasn''t a simple person. They could tell that this person could beat them all down in an instant without breaking a sweat.


    The Alchemy Master brought that person to the center of the room before saying with a smile, "Everyone, our worries are finally over. The Alchemy King Hall has heard our pleas and they have sent down this Lord Envoy."


    At this, the cloaked person took off their cloak and revealed their appearance.


    All the elders present were shocked to find that it was a young man who was in their twenties. This young man looked handsome with his long dark hair that flowed down and his face that seemed like it was carved from jade. But the most piercing part of this young man were his red eyes. They were crimson red like blood and it seemed like they could pierce into one''s soul.


    The envoy looked over them before giving a snort, "You really are all trash, how can you even call yourselves elders of a branch of our Alchemy King Hall if you''re struggling in a lower realm?"


    The elders had ugly looks on their faces, but none of them dared to refute him since this was the envoy the upper realm had sent.


    The Alchemy Master just mediated with a smile, "Now, now. Cousin, there''s no need for such harsh words, this is a special asion."


    The young man turned back to look at the Alchemy Master and while he didn''t say anything, it was clear by the look in his eyes that he disdained this man.


    The Alchemy Master dide from the same family as the young man, but he only came from a branch family, which was why he was down in this lower realm. Still, that allowed him to call this young man "cousin" since they were from the same generation.


    The Alchemy Master ignored this and said, "Cousin, how about you tell them the n?"


    The young man turned back and said, "We''ll be holding an alchemy contest."

 137 Chapter 137

    "Alchemy contest?" The elders all said at the same time.


    They were confused, why would the envoy suddenly think to hold an alchemy contest?


    The Lord Envoy ignored them as he continued to say, "For now, we don''t know what forces are backing that pet shop, so we can''t make a rash move. If this starts a war in the upper realm, your entire Alchemy Tower might be sacrificed to avoid that. So for now, what we need to do is to bait them out and see who they are, only then can we make a move. It''s clear that they want to set up their shop here, so there''s nothing better to advertise that shop with than an alchemy contest. There is no doubt that they will send someone topete and this will let me see their techniques, so I can see which force they belong to."


    Hearing this, the elders began nodding their heads showing that they agreed with the envoy.


    Then the envoy added, "I''ve also heard that there was a person who appeared in this city who could refine 100% purity pills. While that isn''t that strange in the upper realm among the geniuses, this person can be considered quite the talent. There is no doubt that he will have his own pride and once he is drawn in by this contest, I''ll reveal myself and draw him to our Alchemy King Hall. There is no way that a genius like them would be satisfied with being the big fish in a small pond."


    This was a perfect n of killing two birds with one stone.


    If he were to bring a genius like this back to the Alchemy King Hall, there was no doubt that the Alchemy King Hall would greatly reward him for this.


    Moreover, the genius would without a doubt be an important figure in the Alchemy King Hall in the future. As the one who brought him to the upper realm, he definitely wouldn''t forget this envoy.


    Then the envoy revealed a crude smile as he said, "As for the daughter of the previous Alchemy Master, I''ll bring her back with me to the upper realm. I heard that she''s quite the beauty, there'' no doubt that she will make a fine toy."


    At this, the elders suddenly knit their brows again.


    While they were on different sides, when Alchemy Master Jun was in charge of the Alchemy Tower, it had been a golden time for them. They all felt admiration for this talented man.


    Moreover, that girl was still not even ten years old yet and the envoy wanted to do that to her¡­


    While they were inwardly disgusted by this envoy, they couldn''t say a thing since he was the envoy sent from the upper realm.


    When the envoy was finished with his imagination, he turned back to the elders and said, "I need you all to do this¡­"


    ¡­


    The next day, the Alchemy Tower had suddenly made an announcement that shocked all of Green Wood City.


    The Alchemy Tower had announced that they would be hosting a tournament for alchemists for "the prosperity of future growth" and to find talents.


    But the shocking part wasn''t that.


    The shocking part was that they were offering a Heaven Grade Pill, the Tribtion Pill.


    When one broke through to the Legendary Realm, it meant facing a heavenly tribtion where one was struck by nine bolts of lightning. Each one was stronger than thest and only by enduring all nine bolts could one break through to the Legendary Realm.


    This Tribtion Pill was a special pill that could block one of those bolts of lightning for the one breaking into the Legendary Realm. Even though it could only be used once, which meant that it would only block a single bolt, one could use it to block the most powerful bolt of lightning for them. This greatly reduced the difficulty of the tribtion.


    But because of how hard it was to refine this Tribtion Pill, there weren''t many found in this world. Even the ingredients for this pill were very rare to find.


    The fact that the Alchemy Tower was willing to take out this treasure for just a tournament meant that they were serious, or they had some special motive.


    But as for what that reason was, no one was certain.


    However, the offer of the Tribtion Pill was definitely a great enticement.


    For those experts that were close to the Legendary, they needed this Tribtion Pill since it was a chance for them to break through to the Legendary Realm.<sub> </sub>


    For those that weren''t close to the Legendary Realm, this Tribtion Pill didn''t hold any less enticement to them. If they could win this pill, given how rare it was, they would be able to make a fortune that they could never spend in their entire life if they auctioned it.


    So there were many people who signed up for the tournament and in just a single day, there were over a hundred thousand entrants.


    On the day that the tournament was announced, Elder Hua and Elder Gu had immediately rushed over to Lin Fan''s store since they knew that this was the move from the Alchemy Tower they were waiting for.


    Elder Hua was the first to ask, "Owner Lin, what do you think the Alchemy Tower is nning?"


    Lin Fan was surprised at first to hear this news, but then he fell into thought.


    After a while, he said, "If my guesses are correct, they are probably trying to use this tournament to draw out the power that is behind me. Without knowing who they are facing, if they were to suddenly make a move, it might even cause trouble for them in the upper realm. That should be the only reason why they are willing to invest this much. As for the other reasons, I might not have an idea, but I do know someone who does."


    Lin Fan summoned out Brainy.


    During this time, Brainy had been on the verge of a breakthrough, so Lin Fan hadn''t called it out during this time to let it focus on that. But Brainy had just finished its breakthrough and had reached an even greater level of power.


    Everyone was surprised to see Brainy appear, but the kids immediately gushed over how cute Brainy was. They came forward to pet it, but how could the proud Brainy let them do that?


    Brainy easily avoided them and used its vines to keep the kids at bay, causing them to have sad looks on their faces.


    When that was over, Lin Fan exined the situation to Brainy and it fell into thought for a bit before writing, "This should be more than just luring out the forces behind our shop. It should also be a plot targeting ''Fan Lin''."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this as he said, "What do you mean a plot targeting Fan Lin? What does he have to do with this?"


    Brainy wrote, "Fan Lin is a mysterious lower realm alchemist who can refine 100% purity pills and is known to be on Elder Hua''s side. This kind of talent is something that even the big factions would want, so of course the faction behind the Alchemy Tower is also interested. The envoy they sent must want to bring Fan Lin to the upper realm, so he wants to make use of this tournament to draw Fan Lin out and give him a chance to go to the upper realm. The envoy is very confident since this is a choice between staying in the lower realm or going to the upper realm. A normal person would definitely choose thetter."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin for a bit before saying, "That is true, but we can use this to our advantage."


    Brainy wrote, "Are you thinking what I''m thinking?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and gave a nod, but he didn''t say anything else.


    At first the two elders were surprised by how intelligent Brainy was, but they quickly adapted since they knew that there were all kinds of different and strange beasts in this world. It was normal that there would be a pet as intelligent as Brainy.


    But they couldn''t make sense of the conversation between Lin Fan and Brainy.


    What did they mean by they could use this to their advantage?


    Elder Hua couldn''t help asking, "Owner Lin, can you tell us what you are nning to do? Isn''t this a very bad situation?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "No, this situation is very good. They are practically ying into our hands. As long as we follow my n, it''ll be easy for us to take care of them."


    Elder Hua then asked, "What is your n then?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "You''ll see, but you can be sure that it will definitely be a n that will shock you. As for them, well they''ll wish they never crossed me."


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu both felt chills run down their spines at this smile.


    They couldn''t help wondering, did they make the right choice trusting Lin Fan or did they walk into the mouth of the lion?

 138 Chapter 138

    Two dayster, it was time for the tournament the Alchemy Tower was holding.


    But there were just too many entrants, even more than they had been expecting.


    In total, there were over five hundred thousand people who had entered the tournament, so of course they had to hold qualifying rounds to cut down on these numbers.


    This meant a change in the schedule to the tournament and the extra qualifying rounds took up another two days.


    So for the first two days of the tournament, it would be pure qualifying rounds that would try to cut down the numbers as much as possible.


    But even with qualifying rounds, there really were just too many people. Even the first qualifying round that they held was in a hall that waspletely filled with participants and there were over ten thousand people taking the qualifying test at the same time.


    There was quite a bit of trash that had been drawn in by the enticement of the prize, so there were actually quite a few Junior Alchemists that had entered even though they had no chance of winning.


    To make things easier, the first qualifying round was for the participants to refine a Mortal Grade Pill.


    Mortal Grade Pills were pills that only people who were at least Expert Alchemists could refine, so almost all of the participants in the first round were eliminated.


    But there were a few that had managed to refine the pill after some difficulty, allowing them to move onto the second round.


    The only person who was different was someone who was dressed from head to toe in ck and was wearing a ck mask that covered his face, only revealing a pair of sharp eyes. On the chest of that person, there was his identification which read "#133769 Fan Lin".


    It was no one other than Lin Fan, he was here participating under the name Fan Lin.


    He easily refined the Mortal Pill with a wave of his hand and when the judges looked over his pill, they were shocked to find that it was a pill with 100% purity.


    At first when the judges discovered this, they immediately thought that Lin Fan was cheating, but after reviewing the tapes, they found that he had indeed refined this pill himself.


    While they were still doubtful, they suddenly received a message and once they read that message, they immediately stopped investigating this matter and allowed Lin Fan to pass.


    They were shocked to see this message since it was one that came from the elders themselves.


    These judges were only normal alchemists and hadn''t been at the auction, so they never saw the finale. They had only heard rumours about what had happened and it never urred to them to link that Fan Lin to the Fan Lin in front of them.


    Just like that, Lin Fan had passed the first qualifying round and was sent to the next round.


    It was just too bad that the next round wouldn''t be until two dayster with how many entrants they had to test for this first qualifying round.


    There were over five hundred thousand participants and each qualifying round took thirty minutes to test ten thousand participants. It would take a total of twenty five hours for them to test all the entrants, which took up most of the day.


    Lin Fan just smiled as he walked out, entering an alley to drop his disguise before heading back to the shop.


    ¡­


    In the Alchemy Tower, in the conference room at the top.


    The elders had once again gathered after two days to discuss the tournament.


    They had all been busy during this time since it took quite a bit to prepare this tournament. Especially with how many entrants there were since they had never expected things to develop to this level.


    But this was also a good sign since this meant that it would be a great boost to the fame of the Alchemy Tower.


    While they had taken out one of their treasures from a previous Alchemy Master, the fame that they had generated from this tournament was already enough to make up for that.


    Over the past few years, the situation of the Alchemy Tower hadn''t been good.


    With the death of the previous Alchemy Master and the dissent between the two factions, it had caused the Alchemy Tower to gradually lose more and more power. They were now only a mere shell of what they were under the lead of the previous Alchemy Master.


    As long as they had the fame from this tournament and the envoy''s n seeded in taking down the other faction, they could stabilize the Alchemy Tower. Then with the connections and orders that woulde from the fame of this tournament, they would have no difficulty in rebuilding the power of the Alchemy Tower.<sub> </sub>


    While the elders were thinking about their bright future, the envoy actually had his brows knit while reading the report in front of him.


    "Why isn''t that Lin Fan participating in this tournament? What could the faction behind him want?" The envoy muttered to himself.


    But still, he saw that Fan Lin''s name was on the list of entrants, which meant that he had aplished at least one of his goals.


    He had made sure that the elders were carefully watching Fan Lin''s path through the tournament since he had already seen Fan Lin''s technique before. He could tell that it wasn''t a refining technique from this world. The refining technique that he used even surpassed the level of the upper realm.


    This Fan Lin had clearly found some King''s inheritance and that was the only exnation why he was so talented.


    At first the envoy had felt a bit of greed towards Fan Lin''s inheritance, but he soon gave up that idea.


    If he was talented enough to gain anything from that inheritance, he wouldn''t have been sent down to this lower realm. The best path of action he could take now was to groom Fan Lin and take him as a junior of his family. As long as he could do that, he was certain that his family would thrive.


    So he had the elders send that letter to the judge during the qualifying round.


    He would be sure to make Fan Lin''s path as smooth as possible just so Fan Lin would get the chance to meet him.


    ¡­


    Back in Lin Fan''s store, the morning rush had just ended when Lin Fan hade back.


    The qualifying round that he was in was the first round of the entire process, so he had gone off early in the morning to participate, leaving only the four kids to handle the store.


    But there was no one that dared to cause trouble in his store anymore after what had happenedst time, so it waspletely safe.


    Elder Hua and Elder Gu hade early in the morning and they were surprised to see that Lin Fan was gone.


    When Lin Fan came in, Elder Hua asked him, "Owner Lin, where did you go?"


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "I went to take care of some business, nothing important."


    Elder Hua didn''t keep pressing him since there was something more important that she had to ask, "Owner Lin, the Alchemy Tower''s tournament is starting today, what are we going to do? From what I''ve heard, there''s over five hundred thousand participants! This is clearly going to increase the fame of the Alchemy Tower and make them stronger! Are we just gonna watch as they be stronger?"


    Lin Fan had the same smile, "You don''t need to worry about a thing, I''m already implementing my n."


    Elder Hua had a confused look, "Your n? What is your n?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing.


    But it was at this time that Elder Hua heard some interesting gossip from some customers that were just leaving Lin Fan''s store.


    "Did you hear about what happened at the qualifying round? That infamous Fan Lin from the Treasure Pavilion''s auction showed up and refined a 100% purity pill!"


    "100% purity pill? It must be fake, no one can refine something like that!"


    "No, no, the judges even inspected it for quite a bit of time and they couldn''t find any problems with it, they even reviewed the tapes frame by frame. In the end, there was a letter that people are saying came from the elders themselves and the judges immediately let Fan Lin pass."


    "No way, could it really be a 100% purity pill?"


    Elder Hua narrowed her eyes when she heard this and then she turned to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, could it be that this is the business you were taking care of?"


    Lin Fan spread his hands with a smile, but he didn''t say a thing.


    Elder Hua deeply knit her brows at this, "Owner Lin, just what are your intentions?"


    Lin Fan responded with the same smile.

 139 Chapter 139

    Another two days passed and the qualifying round had narrowed down the entrants from five hundred thousand to just five thousand, but still that was far too many entrants.


    So the Alchemy Tower had no choice but to hold another qualifying round to narrow these people down to only one hundred.


    They brought all the alchemists together once again and divided them in half, forming groups of two thousand and five hundred. From those groups, only fifty people would pass onto the next round.


    Lin Fan was ced at one of the tables just behind the center position, so his position wasn''t one that obtained plenty of attention, but it was still a spot that people paid attention to.


    Right beside him, there was a fierce looking man with a scary looking cross shaped scar over one of his eyes.


    This fierce looking man had a proud look on his face and when he saw Lin Fan, he immediately came over with a pat of his chest and said, "Kid, do you know who I am?"


    Lin Fan looked at him before turning away, trying to ignore this idiot.


    But it was too bad that this idiot didn''t get the hint and kepting forward to bother Lin Fan.


    The fierce looking man continued to say in a loud voice, "Kid, you really are lucky today, you get to watch the famed Xiahou Dun''s alchemy techniques. If you didn''t get it earlier, I am Xiahou Dun!"


    Lin Fan didn''t turn his head at all, but that didn''t bother Xiahou Dun.


    Xiahou Dun just came over to Lin Fan and took him by the shoulder, "Little brother, as long as you follow me, I can guarantee that we''ll enter the Alchemy Tower together and we''ll one day rule over it!"


    Lin Fan really couldn''t tell what was wrong with this idiot, but when he was about to say something, the round had started.


    Xiahou Dun saw this and he moved back to his bench, but he didn''t forget to add, "Kid, you truly are lucky today being able to be by me. Even if you don''t make it, don''t forget that you were the one who was lucky enough to by me, Xiahou Dun when I refined the pill that made me famous."


    Then he immediately began refining his pill.


    This Xiahou Dun''s techniques were truly sloppy, his control of his me was non-existent and he didn''t know how to separate his ingredients properly, causing them to cross and create impurities.


    But the way he acted was like he was a master teaching a student as he continued to speak to Lin Fan during the entire process.


    "Kid, do you see how I control my mes perfectly to melt down my ingredients?"


    "Kid, do you see how I perfectly integrate these ingredients together to create the perfect pill?"


    "Kid, do you see how I form my pill to make sure that none of the essence of my ingredients escapes?"


    "Kid, are you seeing all of this?"


    For every step, he made sure that he called out something to Lin Fan.


    The only reason he didn''t bother the person on his other side was that it was an old man who was actually quite the well known alchemist. Even if he was proud and arrogant, he wasn''t that crazy.


    So the only person he could show off to was Lin Fan.


    When Xiahou Dun was almost finished with his pill, he turned to Lin Fan and saw that he hadn''t started refining at all.


    Xiahou Dun was shocked, but then he said in an understanding voice, "Kid, were you just too moved by my beautiful refining techniques and you forgot to refine your own pill? That isn''t good! I know that my refining techniques are amazing, but you should focus on your own pill still, even if you were going to be kicked out in the first ce."


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort at this before he said, "Since I''ve done the favour of watching you, you should do the favour of watching me."<sub> </sub>


    Xiahou Dun didn''t get the meaning behind his words at all as he said with a wide smile, "You were so moved that you wanted me to watch and teach you? While this is a bit below me, it is still something that I can do for a loyal fan."


    Lin Fan just ignored him as he took his ingredients, but he didn''t put them into his cauldron at all.


    Lin Fan just held them in his hand as he released a me from his palm.


    The me quickly spread and enveloped the ingredients, quickly melting them and extracting their essence.


    The essence of each ingredient was held in a separate me where it was refined once again at different temperatures, clearing out every single bit of impurity inside the essence of the ingredients.


    Once the impurities were cleared, Lin Fan gathered the mes into a single ball of mes with all the different ingredients gathered together.


    When they came together, Lin Fan finally allowed them toe together to form a single whirlpool of liquid medicinal essence. This whirlpool continued to spin faster and faster until all the impurities that came from mixing the liquid ingredients together was spun out.


    Once everything had been refined, Lin Fan condensed all that liquid essence into a single pill. When the pill was done, the mes dissipated and the pillnded right on Lin Fan''s palm.


    Xiahou Dun couldn''t understand anything that had happened, but he felt that everything Lin Fan did was a trick, so he said, "Kid, it isn''t good to rely on shy tricks like that. True alchemy is hard work, it takes time to refine a truly good pill like mine. It''s a good thing that you still have another set of ingredients to give it another try, don''t be discouraged."


    When his voice fell, the judge hade over to inspect his pill after he had put up his sign signifying that he was done.


    The judge that came over looked down at the pill and immediately shook his head before saying, "This pill is truly a mess. The control of the mes werepletely off, so the ingredients weren''t fully refined. Then when the different ingredients were mixed together, there wasn''t a fine control and all different kinds of impurities were formed. This can''t even be considered a pill, it is nothing more than trash."


    Xiahou Dun had a shocked look on his face since he believed that he had created the best pill in his entire life. He naturally didn''t believe what the judge had said, but he wasn''t crazy enough to pick a fight with the judge.


    The only thing he could do now was refine another pill, one that would match this judge''s strange tastes.


    The judge then moved over to Lin Fan''s station and began inspecting Lin Fan''s pill.


    He acted the same way as he did when he inspected Xiahou Dun''s pill, but instead of shaking his head, he actually jumped up on the spot.


    The judge couldn''t stop the tremble of his hand as he picked up the pill and inspected it from every angle. When he was finished, he couldn''t help pinching his arm to see if he was dreaming. Then feeling the pain, he inspected the pill again just to make sure he wasn''t making a mistake.


    It was only after all that did he say, "!00% purity pill! This is a 100% purity pill!"


    Xiahou Dun had just been about to start his refining and had just released his mes when he heard this. The moment he did hear this, he lost control of his mes and they exploded, burning away his second set of ingredients, but he didn''t care at all.


    Xiahou Dun looked over at the judge and shouted, "Are you sure? How can this brat who only knows shy tricks refine a 100% purity pill? I saw him using his shy tricks to y with the ingredients just now, I won''t ever believe that he actually refined them properly!"


    The judge just red at Xiahou Dun who immediately covered his mouth before turning back to Lin Fan, "Contestant 133769 Fan Lin, you pass this round and qualify for the next round. Pleasee back tomorrow for your match."


    Lin Fan just nodded and took the confirmation sheet from the judge before turning to leave. On his way out, he didn''t forget to add, "It seems like my shy tricks were better than your true alchemy. With your acting skills, it would be better to quit alchemy now. One day you might even win an award for acting."


    He didn''t give Xiahou Dun a chance to speak as he walked out.


    Xiahou Dun just had a stunned look on his face as he stood over his burning ingredients in his cauldron.


    There was not a single thing he could say since he still didn''t even understand what had just happened...

 140 Chapter 140

    Just like that, another day passed.


    Lin Fan wasn''t called out early in the morning for the tournament like the past few days because the tournament was finally going ording to schedule.


    During the morning rush, Elder Hua and Elder Gu hade once again to question Lin Fan since they had been hearing the news of Fan Lin''s performance in the tournament.


    But no matter how Elder Hua questioned him, Lin Fan just didn''t reply and revealed the same smile.


    While Elder Hua felt the urge to kick Lin Fan in that smile, she didn''t do it. After experiencing the power of the master in this storest time, she really felt lucky that the master hadn''t done anything to her the first time she kicked Lin Fan in the face.


    So the only thing she could do now was trust Lin Fan, but still she wouldn''t go to the tournament.


    This tournament was something that the Alchemy Master''s side had arranged, so she refused to go to the tournament since it meant that she was showing support for them.


    When the morning rush was over and they had finished their breakfast, Lin Fan casually headed to the location that was marked on the confirmation sheet that he had received yesterday.


    Once he arrived at the arena in his Fan Lin disguise, there were many people who were already gathered outside waiting to get in to watch the tournament.


    Now that they were finally back on schedule, the Alchemy Tower was finally holding an opening ceremony for this tournament. At the same time, they had kept the format of the tournament a secret and the confirmation sheet had said that they would be informing him today.


    When Lin Fan appeared in his Fan Lin disguise, there wasn''t much attention at first. However, once one person noticed him, there was a whisper that soon spread through the crowd. Eventually there was arge portion of the crowd that was pointing at and talking about him.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this, but when he walked towards the crowd, there was actually a path that had opened up for him.


    As he walked through, he could hear various people talking about him.


    "Do you see who that person is? It''s Fan Lin."


    "Fan Lin? Who''s that?"


    "He''s the dark horse of the tournament. No one knows which faction hees from, but the only thing they know is that he''s already refined two 100% purity pills."


    "100% purity pills? Is that even possible? I''ve never heard of that before!"


    Of course there were also other kinds of whispers being said about him.


    "He''s clearly a fake and the judges are all in on it too. How could someone like him refine 100% purity pills?"


    "I don''t know, I think that he might be a wandering expert who was lucky enough to find an inheritance."


    "All I know is that I think he looks quite cute and mysterious dressed all in ck like that."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help turning in the direction that voice came from, but he came to immediately regret that decision.


    He didn''t know what it was about him that did this, but it was the second time that this had happened.


    When he turned, what he saw was arge muscr man dressed in a skimpy dress winking in his direction.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to turn and walk towards the entrance as quick as he could, but there was still a chill that ran down his spine when the muscr man blew a kiss at him.


    The guards were about to stop him from entering, but when they saw his confirmation sheet, they immediately let him in.


    They hadn''t done the same for any of the other contestants, but they still remembered the order they had received from their superiors.


    Once Lin Fan came in, there was someone who immediately came to receive him and he was brought to the contestant waiting room.<sub> </sub>


    When he came in, he saw that most of the contestants were already here and he was close to being thest one who had arrived. However, the moment he did enter the room, every gaze fell onto him.


    There were plenty of these gazes that contained hostility as they looked him over, trying to see through him. There were also gazes that were just filled with curiosity towards him.


    ? But Lin Fan just ignored them all and found a ce to sit.


    After a while, the staff members came in and led all the contestants to a room that was behind the stage to prepare for the ceremony.


    In that room, there was a screen for them to watch the events happen live on stage.


    When the clock reached 10 AM, there was a sudden explosion that came from the screen as smoke appeared on stage. From that smoke, the host of the ceremony appeared to hype up the crowd.


    After hyping them up, the host introduced the elders of the Alchemy Tower who were present and the Alchemy Master.


    When everyone looked at the Alchemy Master''s seat they were all focused on the Alchemy Master himself, but Lin Fan with his sharp eyes noticed that there was someone sitting beside him. It was a young man with eyes that were crimson red like blood that could pierce into one''s soul.


    Lin Fan didn''t know who this young man was, but if he had to make a guess, he would say that this was the envoy from the upper realm. With this information, he was more certain about his ns and what he would have to do next.


    After the host had finished introducing everyone, he moved into the format of the tournament, "This tournament will be a series of one on one refining matches between contestants. However, since there would be an uneven number of contestants during rounds, there will be one special bye that will be included in each round with an uneven number of contestants."


    Then after pausing, the host continued, "As for how we will decide which contestant will face each other, we will now bring our contestants onto the stage one by one to draw lots."


    When he said this, the staff that had shown the contestants to the room had everyone stand up and line up as they waited for their turn to go onto the stage.


    Lin Fan was actually first in that line.


    The host said, "Now without further ado, we will call up our first contestant. He is the most famous dark horse in this tournament, now let''s see who he will face as his first opponent! He is contestant number 133769 Fan Lin!"


    Lin Fan was led to the stage and once he appeared, he felt a spiritual sense fall onto him. Even without looking in the direction it came from, he could tell that it hade from the envoy, so he didn''t resist it. However, based on the level of this spiritual sense, he could tell that the envoy was in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    The envoy narrowed his eyes when he looked over Lin Fan. He had already seen that he had inherited a rare alchemy refining skill, but he never thought that this Fan Lin would also be an expert. He could tell from his bone structure that he wasn''t that old and yet he was already in the tinum Realm. It seemed like he had inherited more than just alchemy knowledge, this made the envoy want this Fan Lin even more.


    When he was finished, the envoy called over an attendant and whispered a few words into his ear before waving him off. After the attendant left, the envoy just sat there with a faint smile on his lips.


    Lin Fan moved to the center of the stage and under the direction of the host, he put his hand into the box with a hole in the center. Digging around inside that box, he finally pulled out a ball.


    The host took that ball and opened it up, revealing a piece of paper that had arge number 1 written on it.


    The host immediately began doing his job in hyping up the crowd, but Lin Fan didn''t care. After he finished drawing his number, he just turned and walked off the stage.


    After him, the other contestants had their chances to draw their numbers, but even with half of the contestants drawing their numbers, there was no one who had drawn the number 2 to be matched with Lin Fan.


    Finally the second tost person drew that number and the moment he did, there was a look like dying embers on his face.


    This person had actually barely been able to qualify and now he was being matched with the dark horse of the tournament, it didn''t seem like he would go far¡­


    But that was just his luck, he couldn''t do anything about it.


    Finally after everyone had finished their draw, the host drew the crowd''s attention to the center where five arenas suddenly appeared out of the ground.


    The tournament was about to begin.

 141 Chapter 141

    Lin Fan had drawn the number one, so he was one of the first people to go up.


    The ten contestants who had drawn the numbers one to ten were led up to the stage where they would be facing each other. Then they were split into pairs of two based on who they were facing and led to separate arenas.


    When they were on stage facing each other, Lin Fan''s opponent couldn''t stop himself from shaking a bit.


    He had worked hard to get into the top hundred and now he would be eliminated immediately since his luck with the draw was bad. But he really couldn''t me it on anything since this just meant that his skills weren''t good enough and he had bad luck.


    There was no suspense at all in this match as Lin Fan easily destroyed his opponent.


    He did the same thing as he did in the qualifiers, he used his mes as a cauldron as he refined his ingredients down into essence beforebining them into pills.


    It took him less than ten minutes to finish the pill they were assigned and of course it came out as a pill with 100% purity.


    Lin Fan''s opponent couldn''t stop the tears froming out when he saw that Lin Fan was done, but still he couldn''t just stop now since he was on stage with thousands of people watching him.


    In the end, he was able to finish his pill, but the end result was as expected. Lin Fan won in andslide and he was allowed to go back to the contestant room to rx.


    However, one strange thing did happen.


    As the judge was looking over Lin Fan''s pill, he had also leaned closer to Lin Fan to whisper, "There is someone who wishes to meet with you. The staff member leading you back to the room will bring you to meet someone special who can change your life."


    Lin Fan acted surprised when he heard this, but deep down he let out a coldugh because he knew that it meant his n was working.


    Lin Fan''s opponent was dejected as he was led away, but the staff member leading Lin Fan led him in a different direction from the waiting room. After going through twists and turns, they came to a luxurious looking door that was covered in gold trims.


    The door opened to reveal a viewing room with a view of the entire hall, with two chairs in the middle facing the ss window.


    In those two chairs, there was a middle aged man and a young man with piercing eyes.


    p When they heard the door open, they turned to look over and when they saw Lin Fan, they both revealed smiles.</anda>


    The staff member gave a bow to the two of them and indicated for Lin Fan to go in before quickly leaving, closing the door behind him as he went.


    The young man was the first to speak when Lin Fan walked in, "So you''re Fan Lin. I''ve heard a lot about you and I must say that I am not disappointed by what I''ve seen."


    Lin Fan just pretended to be confused as he asked, "Who are you?"


    The envoy didn''t say a thing and the Alchemy Master took over for him, "I know that you don''t know who we are, but we do know that you''ve been tricked by Elder Hua and the others. They must have tricked you with benefits and led you on the wrong path, but it''s alright since we are here to help you."


    Lin Fan said in an impatient voice, "That doesn''t answer my question."


    The Alchemy Master revealed a smile, "It''s good for you to have your pride as a talented young man, but you should also know to have a bit of patience. I am the Alchemy Master of the Alchemy Tower and this esteemed gentleman here is the envoy sent from the upper realm faction above us. You should be aware of the upper realm, right?"


    Lin Fan nodded to show he understood.


    The Alchemy Master continued after seeing this, "You should know thatpared to that Elder Hua, we are the true masters of the Alchemy Tower and your key to the upper realm, so instead of working with them, you should work with us."<sub> </sub>


    The envoy added, "I can see that you''re a talented person, so as long as you agree toe to our side, I can promise you that I will bring you to the upper realm."


    Lin Fan asked, "But how do I know that you''re really who you say you are? Elder Hua has offered quite generous terms to work with her, I won''t betray her for just an empty promise."


    The Alchemy Master smiled at this, "I knew that you were a smart person. Of course we would be more than willing to prove ourselves." After that, he took out a token and threw it to Lin Fan, "This is the token of the Alchemy Master, as a citizen of Green Wood City, I''m certain that you would have heard of it before."


    Then he looked over at the envoy and the envoy nodded.


    The envoy said with a smile, "I can give you a token, but you wouldn''t recognize it since it is something thates from the upper realm. However, the only thing that really matters in this world is strength." At this, the envoy released his aura and applied his pressure on Lin Fan, "I''m sure that you can tell that I''m not just a simple person, right?"


    Lin Fan pretended to wince and struggle under the envoy''s aura, but feeling this aura, he confirmed that the envoy was indeed in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    After a few seconds, the envoy pulled back his aura and waited for Lin Fan''s response.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before saying, "Alright, I can tell that you''re not lying, but what benefits can you offer me?"


    When they heard this, the smiles on the Alchemy Master and the envoy''s faces became wider. They knew that as long as they offered enough benefits now, they would be able to sway this genius in front of them. That was just how this world was, people were moved by the most benefits.


    The envoy said, "As long as youe work with us and help us take down the insurgent faction, with your talent, it will be easy for you to be epted into our upper realm faction. Once you reach the upper realm, your wings will spread and you will be a true master. I''m certain that someone like you wouldn''t be content with just staying on this lower realm for the rest of your life."


    The Alchemy Master also added, "This is a great opportunity young friend. Also as long as you take this offer, we will support you with everything that our Alchemy Tower has during your short time in this lower realm. We just ask that you remember us when you reach the upper realm."


    The Alchemy Master was someone who knew how to tter people, that was how he had reached his current position. With his family connection in the upper realm, he knew just how rare talent like Lin Fan''s was.


    Once Lin Fan reached the upper realm, it was certain that he would be groomed by the Alchemy King Hall. As long as he ttered Lin Fan here, there was the chance that he could also be brought up if he could make a good impression.


    Lin Fan fell into thought again before asking, "Is there something that you want from me?"


    The envoy''s smile became even wider since he knew that he had already gotten him. The fact that he was asking this meant that he was moved, but the only thing that was holding him back was the possibility that they were after his techniques.


    The envoy just said, "All we need you to do is to help us take down the insurgents and then I''ll personally bring you to the upper realm. The only thing that we can ask is that you remember lowly people like us when you''ve be an expert."


    The Alchemy Master nodded vehemently as he echoed, "Yes, yes, all we can ask is that you remember lowly people like us."


    Lin Fan pretended to hesitate a bit before finally saying, "Alright, I can agree to these terms. What do you need me to do?"


    After that, the envoy and the Alchemy Master began sharing their ns with Lin Fan.


    It took them an hour to finish their discussion and when they were done, two more batches of refining duels had already finished.


    Once they were done, the Alchemy Master summoned a staff member to lead Lin Fan back to the participant room.


    When Lin Fan had left the room, he revealed a wide smile under his mask since his n had worked and these two idiots had taken the bait.

 142 Chapter 142

    When Lin Fan left the room, he was led back to the contestant waiting room by the staff member who had been waiting outside.


    This time, the staff member was no longer as casual as before, rather he was much more respectful towards Lin Fan.


    Someone who could meet the Alchemy Master and his guest, it seemed like this Fan Lin''s backing really wasn''t small.


    Lin Fan came back to the waiting room and finished watching the remaining matches, which took another four hours. In between that time, there was an hour long break given for the viewers and contestants to take lunch.


    Once the first round of one hundred was finished, the contestants were once again called onto the stage to draw their next opponents. Once again Lin Fan was called up first.


    After a quick introduction by the host, Lin Fan was allowed to draw his ball.


    When the ball was opened, what was revealed was a piece of paper that had the number 1 on it.


    As soon as he finished drawing his ball, he was sent back to the contestant room to wait for his turn, but he didn''t have to wait long since there were less people drawing this time.


    Since he was number 1 again, he was immediately brought out in the first batch and once again he defeated his opponent as easily as flipping his hand. His opponent was left crying as he continued trying to finish refining his pill even though he knew that he had already lost.


    Lin Fan came back to the waiting room and was told that he could either leave now since his matches were over or he could stay to watch hispetition. Lin Fan being someone who treasured his time, he naturally chose to leave.


    When he left, everyone in the waiting room looked at him with a bit of anger since it was clear that this person was looking down on them. He clearly thought that they weren''t worth his time at all, but there was nothing they could do with his dazzling performance.


    Lin Fan left the stadium and came to an alley to take off his disguise before sending a message to Elder Hua.


    His n would alle to fruition tomorrow, he needed to make sure that everything was ready, which meant that it was finally time to tell Elder Hua his n.


    ¡­


    That night, in one of the top private rooms in one of the best restaurants in Green Wood City, there was a meeting being held.


    At thisrge table that was clearly meant for arge conference, there were only two people sitting. One was an old man and the other was a young girl.


    If one were to guess, they would think that it was the young girl who had invited the old man, but it was actually the opposite.


    When that old man looked at the young girl, his eyes were filled with a bit of fear and his actions contained reverence. He was very careful in everything he did, like he was afraid that any mistake would anger her.


    The young girl just enjoyed the dishes that had been brought in and never said a single word.


    Finally the old man couldn''t take it anymore and asked, "Your highness, if I may ask, why did youe to this lower realm?"


    The young girl just casually ate her food before saying, "Well, it seems like your Alchemy King Hall has been acting quite overbearingtely. Why else do you think I''m in this lower realm?"


    While her tone was very calm, the old man could hear the implications that were behind her words. The old man immediately broke out in a cold sweat as he said with a bow, "Your highness, we wouldn''t dare to act that way, this is all a misunderstanding. If there is some way that we have offended you, we will immediately fix it."


    The young girl was still very casual as she said, "No, no, you haven''t offended me, yet. You should know what that brat from your ce has been doing. If you keep letting him act this way, you might provoke someone who you can''t afford to provoke."


    The old man was confused when he heard this, but then he remembered that the reason they had been called down was because of a pet shop with a mysterious faction behind them. His eyes suddenly filled with understanding as he thought, "Could it be that this pet shop is rted to the princess?"


    When this thought entered his mind, he immediately stood up and bowed to the young girl, "Your highness, we didn''t know! Please show mercy, we will definitely cease all actions in this lower realm immediately!"


    The young girl waved her hand and said, "No, I never said that. You will allow that brat to do what he wants to do until the end, but when he inevitably gets taken down, you will step in and clean up the mess. Do you understand what I mean?"<sub> </sub>


    The old man was stunned. The princess was basically asking him to throw away that kid they had trained and to use him as a grinding stone, then he had to even clean up the mess and create a good rtionship with the one who destroyed the one from their faction. This was basically asking them to take the p to the face and smile while doing so.


    But the old man only hesitated for a second before he agreed to her request.


    This young girl didn''t seem like much, but she was someone that came from even above the Gctic Humanity Alliance. With just a simple wave of her hand, she could clean out all ten of their factions and rece them within a single day. To offend someone like this would be equal to walking the path of death and this old man still wanted to live.


    The young girl nodded when she heard him agree and then she said, "The only thing you have to make sure of is that the owner of that shop doesn''t get hurt. If he does, neither of us can handle the consequences, understood?"


    The old man was filled with curiosity at this, but he knew that he shouldn''t ask with how serious her tone was. The old man just agreed to everything the young girl told him.


    The young girl nodded once again before waving her hand to send the old man out.


    Once the old man was gone, with a few distortions in the air, there was a dark figure that suddenly appeared beside the young girl. This figure had been in the room the entire time, but the old man had never noticed this person.


    Once the dark figure appeared, he gave a bow to the young girl before saying, "Your highness, why are you so insistent on protecting that young man?"


    The young girl ignored this and said, "You will follow him during this time and make sure that he is safe. But you will not interfere unless his life is in danger. He needs to experience danger to grow, but we can''t let anything happen to him."


    The dark figure knit their brows as they asked, "Your highness, is this really worth it?"


    The young girl knit her brows as well, "When have you ever questioned my orders? This is my direct order to you, are you disobeying me now?"


    The dark figure still didn''t give up, "Your highness, there''s still many things to take care of back in the kingdom, but you keep running down to this lower realm. If we continue doing this, we''ll start losing bases and our power will drop."


    Finally, the young girl rxed her brows and said, "This is an order from that ce. As long as we can finish this mission that they gave us, it doesn''t matter if we lose a few bases. This is the most important thing."


    The dark figure trembled in shock, "That ce? Do you really mean that ce?"


    The young girl nodded and said, "Now do you understand why this is so important?"


    The dark figure still knit his brows and said, "Your highness, are you still trying to¡­"


    But before he could even finish, the young girl had cut him off, "Stop! Don''t ask any further."


    The dark figure gave a sigh before saying, "Your highness, you know that I would give my life for you, but this really doesn''t seem like the right decision."


    The young girl just smiled and said, "Grandpa, I know that you treat me best, I can only trust you with this."


    The dark figure gave a helpless smile before saying, "Alright, alright, I''ll do my best."


    Once he said this, there were ripples in the air again before he disappeared.


    The young girl stood up once that figure was gone and walked onto the balcony. When she walked out, the moonlight shined down on her face and if Lin Fan was here, he would have recognized her.


    It was Zi Ling!


    She just revealed a faint smile as she said, "That Lin Fan, he really gets into all kinds of trouble¡­"

 143 Chapter 143

    That night didn''t just end there, there was another meeting that was being held, but this one was held at the Mu Manor.


    Elder Hua rushed over as soon as she had received the message from Lin Fan.


    Based on the tone of the message, it seemed like it was urgent, which probably meant that Lin Fan was finally going to tell her his n. However, the n that he told herpletely surpassed her expectations.


    She never would have expected that Lin Fan''s ns would cut so deep.


    When she arrived, she was at first confused hearing Lin Fan''s n, but then that confusion quickly turned into surprise before shock and worry.


    Elder Hua said in a concerned voice, "Owner Lin, are you sure you want to do all of this? If you do this, you wouldpletely anger the upper realm faction and their wrath might not be something that you can handle."


    Lin Fan just revealed a confident smile as he said, "I have my own trump cards, so there''s nothing for you to worry about. You just need toe to the tournament tomorrow and we''ll take care of it then."


    Elder Hua still looked concerned, but she couldn''t help being inspired by Lin Fan''s confidence.


    And when she thought about it, she felt that it made sense.


    Lin Fan had that unknown force behind him and the Alchemy King Hall wouldn''t start a war just for a lower realm force. So they should be fine as long as they didn''t take things too far¡­


    But there was still a bad feeling that filled her when she left the Mu Manor.


    ¡­


    The next morning, Lin Fan went to the store for the usual morning rush since the tournament was starting at the same time as yesterday.


    When Elder Hua and Elder Gu came to the store, they had sombre expressions on their faces.


    Elder Gu had heard about Lin Fan''s n from Elder Huast night, so he couldn''t help asking, "Owner Lin, are you certain that this will work?"


    Lin Fan just nodded and said, "You just have to do your part, I''ll take care of the rest."


    While his words didn''t really calm Elder Hua or Elder Gu down, they still chose to believe in him. He had already shown them enough miracles that there was an unspeakable trust in him that was already developing.


    So when it was time to head off, Lin Fan sent the two elders off first before making his way to the stadium.


    But when Lin Fan arrived, the scene was much more tensepared to yesterday since he had arrived at the same time as Elder Hua and her group of elders.


    While Elder Hua and Elder Gu had left earlier than Lin Fan, they had gone to meet up with the other three elders and all five of them came to the stadium together.


    Anyone who knew anything about the Alchemy Tower knew that there were currents under the calm surface. There were two factions that were in the Alchemy Tower, one led by the Alchemy Master and one led by Elder Hua.


    When everyone saw the Alchemy Master and the five elders under him being introduced at the event yesterday, it made it clear that this was an event that was being held by the Alchemy Master''s faction. However, Elder Hua was now leading her faction to attend the event of the Alchemy Master''s faction.


    If someone said that she wasn''t here to cause trouble, no one would believe it!


    But they were after all elders of the Alchemy Tower, so the staff had no choice but to arrange seats for them.


    The five elders easily made their way into the stadium, but of course everything was reported to the Alchemy Master.


    When the Alchemy Master heard this report, he couldn''t help knitting his brows, "What is going on? Why is that old hag here with all those other old men? What is their goal?"


    But the envoy wasn''t worried at all as he revealed a smile, "They must have noticed that something was wrongst night, but it doesn''t matter since it''s already toote. We''ve already stolen their geniuses, so what else can they do?"


    The Alchemy Master was worried at first, but then he also revealed a smile, "You''re right, they''re toote. We can at least watch a good show today when they see their one hope copse in front of them."


    ¡­


    Lin Fan made his way into the contestant waiting room just like yesterday, but today the format for the tournament was different from before.<sub> </sub>


    Because the number of contestants were even before, they could have an even number of pairs and an even number of matches.


    However, there were only twenty five contestants today which meant that there would be one left over if they followed the same format as yesterday.


    After the nners had discussed it, they had decided to leave one spot as a bye. They would continue with this until they would be able to reach an even number, which would be the top four. So there would be a bye for the next three rounds.


    The person who would receive this bye would be determined by the drawings. Namely, for this first round, there would only be twenty four balls with sheets with numbers and there would be a single ball with a sheet that had a star on it. The person who drew the one ball with the star sheet would be given the bye.


    Just like yesterday, Lin Fan was the first one to be called to the stage and just like yesterday, he went to draw his ball.


    When the host took the ball from Lin Fan and opened it to reveal his result, he was surprised to find that Lin Fan had drawn the sheet with the star, meaning that Lin Fan would be allowed to move on without having topete.


    The crowd was disappointed since those that had been here yesterday had witnessed Lin Fan''s dominating performance. Those that hadn''t been here wanted to see if the rumours they had heard were true.


    As for the other contestants, they were feeling disappointed at first, but then most of them felt relieved.


    They had all worked hard to get to this point and being matched up with this monster was equal to a death sentence. No one wanted to be sent out here and if they weren''t matched with him, they would at least have a chance to move on.


    But there were a few contestants that were genuinely disappointed since they felt that this Fan Lin was just lucky yesterday. He had relied on a few tricks to win, but when he faced real alchemists like them, he wouldn''t stand a chance.


    So, just like that, Lin Fan got to sit inside the contestant waiting room and watch the other contestantspete.


    After this round was over, Lin Fan was once again called up to the stage to draw his number.


    Lin Fan dug around in the box and spun it a few times because he didn''t want to draw the bye again since he wanted to test himself.


    It was too bad that he didn''t get this chance.


    When the host opened the ball he drew, he was surprised to find the sheet with the star once again.


    Lin Fan had once again received this bye and was allowed to move on to the next round.


    Many people in the audience couldn''t help thinking that this Fan Lin really was lucky, he had drawn the bye twice in a row.


    So once again Lin Fan sat in the waiting room, waiting for the round to finish.


    Once it finished, Lin Fan went back to the stage one more time to draw his number.


    But too bad when the host opened the ball again, what he saw was another piece of paper with the star on it.


    When the crowd saw this, they couldn''t help giving a few doubtful whisperers.


    "Could it be that this drawing is rigged? Perhaps Fan Lin has some connections to the organizers?"


    "But we''ve never heard of Fan Lin before, so that''s probably not the case."


    "Could he be the illegitimate child of one of the elders? Maybe even the Alchemy Master?"


    Lin Fan just headed back to the contestant waiting room feeling confused about this as well.


    Was he just lucky or was there something else at y here?


    The funny thing was that what he didn''t know was that the Alchemy Master and the envoy had rigged the drawings for him. They felt that since he was going to be on their side, it was a waste of time for him topete with these less talented alchemists. Therefore, they rigged the drawing to let him rest and build up mystery around him before he crushed them all in the final round.


    In the end, Lin Fan didn''t care since he just needed to win this tournament to realize his n and this strange series of events actually made it easier for him.

 144 Chapter 144

    But of course this string of lucky draws couldn''tst forever since there would finally be a round where there wasn''t a bye.


    Once the round of quarter finals were over, it was finally time for the semi finals.


    This time there were only four contestants left, which gave an even number and meant that there would be an even number of matches.


    Lin Fan once again went up to the stage to draw, but this time he didn''t pick the ball with the piece of paper with the star on it since it no longer existed. Instead Lin Fan picked the ball with the piece of paper that had a 1 on it instead.


    After he finished picking his number, the rest of the contestants quickly picked theirs and the matches were set.


    Lin Fan and his opponent were the first ones up, so they were quickly brought up to the stage. But on the way up, Lin Fan was surprised to see that his opponent had been ring at him the entire time.


    Lin Fan also couldn''t help feeling a bit strange since this person did look a bit familiar. Lin Fan was also strangely annoyed by this person, even though he didn''t know why.


    Once they got to the stage, his opponent didn''t stop ring at him.


    Rather, before the host could even say anything, his opponent was already shouting at Lin Fan.


    "So you''re the genius Fan Lin are you? You don''t seem that amazing!" This man was quite the fierce looking man, but Lin Fan didn''t care at all.


    Lin Fan just casually nced over at him before turning back to look at his own station.


    There were several girls who cheered and swooned at this.


    While Lin Fan still had a mask on his face, these girls could tell that this Fan Lin was quite a handsome person just by how talented he was and how he acted.


    Hearing the cheers of these girls, one of the cloaked people following Elder Hua had a cold look and they clenched their hands.


    The fierce looking man couldn''t take Lin Fan ignoring him so he exploded, "You think that you''re so great! You''re nothing more than a fake who''s relying on tricks to fool everyone! If it weren''t for your tricks, my little brother would have been here now!"


    Lin Fan turned back to this fierce looking man with a confused gaze when he heard this, but when he looked closer, he found that this fierce looking man reminded him of a buffoon who had tried showing off to him during the qualifiers.


    The fierce looking man didn''t give Lin Fan a chance to speak as he said, "I will take revenge for Xiao Dun, I will make you bow down to him and apologize with my alchemy skills. You will remember the name Xiahou Tian as the one who defeated you!"


    Lin Fan just shook his head at this and said, "Not interested."


    Xiahou Tian''s face turned red, but he calmed himself down and said, "If I win this match, you will bow down to my little brother and beg for his forgiveness."


    Lin Fan just said, "Once again, not interested."


    Xiahou Tian revealed a smile as he took out his cauldron, "I know that you''ll be interested in this."


    Lin Fan turned once again and his eyes narrowed when he saw the cauldron. This was quite the interesting cauldron because the different energy fluctuations that came from it showed that it contained many different me energies.


    This cauldron was called the Thousand me Cauldron, it was a cauldron where thousands of different mes were refined, creating a cauldron that had evolving mes. This was the treasure of the Xiahou Family, whose ancestor had once been an elder of the Alchemy Tower.


    Still Lin Fan turned away still since while this cauldron was good, he had no use for it since he used his mes as a cauldron. He would rather not waste his time engaging with this idiot.


    But when Xiahou Tian saw that Lin Fan still wasn''t moved, he went on to use his final card.


    Xiahou Tian called out, "Alchemy Master, please approve of our duel on behalf of our Xiahou Family! I am even willing to put this Thousand me Cauldron on the line just to get revenge for my family!"


    While the Xiahou Family had declined since their ancestor eventually died and they hadn''t trained another Grandmaster Alchemist yet, their family was still quite influential with several Master Alchemists.


    Then there was Xiahou Tian who was actually one of the more talented younger alchemists of Green Wood City. It was said that he had one of the highest chances in bing a Grandmaster Alchemist in the future.<sub> </sub>


    With all this behind him, Xiahou Tian was certain that he could win the favour of the Alchemist Master and force this duel.


    However, the Alchemist Master had a hesitant look on his face when he heard this.


    On one hand, he had been trying to bring the Xiahou Family to his side for many years now and this was clearly the best opportunity. On the other hand, he didn''t want to offend Fan Lin, who was clearly much more talented than anyone present. He was so talented that even the upper realm faction wanted him.


    But then the envoy said something thatpletely scattered that hesitation.


    The envoy softly said, "Just let them duel."


    The Alchemist Master looked at the envoy in surprise, but then he understood what the envoy meant.


    The Alchemist Master''s expression rxed as he turned back and said, "Alright, I agree to this duel."


    Xiahou Tian''s face lit up when he heard this and he profusely thanked the Alchemist Master.


    As for Lin Fan, his eyes turned a bit cold when he heard this.


    He immediately turned to look at the Alchemist Master''s seat and his gaze met the envoy''s. The envoy just looked right at him and revealed a faint smile.


    Lin Fan could immediately guess what had happened.


    It seemed like this envoy was still doubting him and wanted to use this idiot to force out his real skills. A genius had his pride and when it came to being humiliated, he would rather die. In this situation where he either won or was humiliated, the envoy believed that Fan Lin would use his real skills.


    Lin Fan gave a coldugh on the inside, but he was still fine with this.


    Since this idiot was offering him a free cauldron, why wouldn''t he take it?


    Xiahou Tian turned back to Lin Fan with an absolutely confident look.


    Even now, he firmly believed that this Fan Lin had used tricks to make it this far, but he had been exposed in the past few rounds. He clearly bribed someone or cheated to let himself draw the bye in all those rounds, which meant that he was afraid topete and reveal the fact that he had used tricks to win.


    Xiahou Tian was confident that with his skills, he would definitely expose this Fan Lin and make him pay for his actions. He would make this Fan Lin bow and beg for his forgiveness.


    There was no doubt in his mind that he would win and he was certain that he would never lose this Thousand me Cauldron, but how wrong he was.


    The pill they were assigned for this round was a High Mortal Grade Pill, but its effects were close to that of an Earth Grade Pill, which meant that it was difficult to refine.


    Even for a genius like Xiahou Tian, he had only refined this kind of pill less than five times.


    But since this was a difficult pill, Xiahou Tian was even more assured in his victory. He knew that with such a difficult to refine pill, it would be even harder for Lin Fan to y his tricks.


    Once the round started, Xiahou Tian immediately took his ingredients and put them into his cauldron. The moment the ingredients entered the cauldron, Xiahou Tian released mes from both his hands that were sucked into the cauldron and began refining the ingredients.


    While Xiahou Tian was fully focused on refining his pill, Lin Fan just stood on the side waiting and watching.


    Since he was forced to take this duel, he wouldpletely crush the other side otherwise he wouldn''t be able to gain the trust of the envoy. This was a critical moment, he needed to prove his worth and gain the full trust of the envoy, otherwise his n wouldn''t work.


    Xiahou Tian continued focusing on refining his pills while Lin Fan just stood there. The crowd waspletely confused by Lin Fan''s actions, but they were also expectant since Lin Fan had already created many miracles.


    When Xiahou Tian came to the critical part of his refining, he couldn''t help knitting his brows before losing control and causing an explosion.


    Xiahou Tian gave a cough before looking up and he saw that Lin Fan was just standing there. It seemed like he had been watching him the entire time...

 145 Chapter 145

    Xiahou Tian couldn''t help having a bad feeling when he saw Lin Fan just casually standing there and watching him, but he still shouted, "What are you doing? Are you giving up before you even do anything?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "You just focus on your refining, I''ll show you something amazing once you''re done."


    Xiahou Tian felt a bad feeling fill him, but he still said, "I bet that you''re only trying to act calm because you know you can''t win. Just give up now while you still can."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Refine your pill, it would be a real shame if you also blow up yourst set of ingredients."


    In this tournament, each contestant was given two sets of ingredients in each round and once they blew both sets up, they would be out unless the other side also blew up their ingredients. In that case, the results would be based on the points given by the judge panel based on technique.


    Xiahou Tian forced himself to calm down and not let Lin Fan''s taunts get to him. Hepletely cleared his mind and focused on his refinement. This process forced him to focus like he had never focused before, pushing his level of alchemy even higher.


    However, even like that, he was still destined to lose.


    Xiahou Tian finished refining his pill and he had even reached 70% purity which was a new benchmark for him.


    He took out the pill with a proud look on his face as he took out his pill and turned to look at Lin Fan, but he found that Lin Fan still hadn''t started refining yet and just looked at him casually.


    When Lin Fan saw that Xiahou Tian was finally done, he went over to his ingredients and picked them up one by one, holding them in his hands.


    His actions confused Xiahou Tian who hadn''t seen his refinement technique before and still considered him a fraud, but it excited the people who had seen him in the qualifiers.


    Fan Lin had a very unique method of refining. Instead of using a cauldron to gather his mes to refine pills and then gather their essence together to form a pill, he used his mes as a cauldron to refine and gather at the same time.


    Xiahou Tian''s eyes opened wide when he saw the mes appear in Lin Fan''s hand and surround the ingredients that he was holding. The me enveloped the ingredients before taking the shape of a cauldron.


    The mes released an even coating of heat that slowly refined the ingredients that were contained inside, allowing for the most bnced refining of ingredients that Xiahou Tian had ever seen.


    While those mes might seem like normal mes to the untrained eye, for an alchemist like Xiahou Tian, he could tell that these mes were different. The mes that Fan Lin was using were mes that exuded a powerful yang energy. Just a single nce was enough to tell Xiahou Tian that this was one of the legendary thirty three Alchemy mes.


    This me was the me that was ranked twentieth on that ranking, it was the True Yang mes.


    These were mes made of true yang energy that relied on the energy of the sun, allowing it to reach levels of heat that normal mes could never reach.


    The only reason this me wasn''t ranked higher was because it was a rathermon mepared to the rest, since all it required to refine this me wasrge amounts of pure yang energy. But this didn''t mean that this me was easy to obtain. It would still take arduous amounts of training just to control this me, not to mention therge amounts of pure yang energy it would take to feed it.


    Lin Fan just casually refined his ingredients inside the me cauldron before they all turned into liquid essence.


    Since Lin Fan''s cauldron was made of pure mes, everyone could see his refining process.


    The liquid medicinal essence swirled around inside the me cauldron, removing purities as it continued to swirl. The swirling only reached a total of seven revolutions before it stopped.


    The alchemy skill that Lin Fan was using was called the Nine Revolution Pill Refining Technique. As the name implied, while Lin Fan was refining his pill, he used the revolutions to help him remove impurities and refine the pill even further. As of now, Lin Fan had only reached seven revolutions, but even then he was able to refine 100% purity pills.


    Of course, his True Yang mes also yed arge part of that since yang energy was a pure form of energy, which reduced the amount of impurities added when refining ingredients. This True Yang me came from the Nine True Sun Body Art, which created nine suns inside his dantian. Lin Fan found that he could easily draw out yang energy from the sun that he currently had which had allowed him to refine this True Yang me.


    But even after refining this True Yang me, it was still a seedling and needed to be fed even more yang energy before bing a true Alchemy me.


    Once Lin Fan finished his revolutions, he gathered all the medicinal essence in the center to form a pill which he continued to condense until it went from liquid form to solid form.


    When the pill was finished, Lin Fan released the mes and allowed the pill to drop down into his hand. Butpared to when Xiahou Tian finished his pill, there wasn''t a strong medicinal scent that was released into the crowd.<sub> </sub>


    Xiahou Tian had a bad feeling after seeing Lin Fan''s technique, but he still convinced himself that Lin Fan was just showing off tricks and there was no way he would lose. He couldn''t even smell the scent of the pill from here, he knew that it must be an inferior pill.


    But that hope of his was quickly crushed by the judge that came forward.


    The judge looked over Xiahou Tian''s pill since it was finished first and he had to admit that he was impressed by Xiahou Tian''s talent.


    A 70% purity High Mortal Grade Pill, this was talent that if nurtured would allow him to refine even Earth Grade Pills soon which required one to be at the level of a Grandmaster Alchemist at least. It seemed like with enough time, this Xiahou Tian really might be a Grandmaster Alchemist like everyone had thought.


    It was just a pity that he had met this giant wall known as Fan Lin.


    The judge moved over to inspect Lin Fan''s pill and he gave a sigh once he looked over it.


    This judge was one of the judges that had looked over Lin Fan''s pills during the qualifier rounds and during his earlier rounds. After inspecting Lin Fan''s pills in those rounds, Lin Fan had left a deep impression on him, so he asked to be ced as the judge for this round as well.


    It seemed like his intuition was correct, this Fan Lin really was something special. There was no way to describe his talent other than calling him a monster!


    The judge turned back to Xiahou Tian and said, "You do indeed have quite the talent, you were able to refine a High Mortal Grade Pill with a 70% purity."


    Xiahou Tian''s eyes lit up when he heard this. He had never actually seeded in refining a High Mortal Grade Pill before, this was the first time he had done so. But the bigger shock wasn''t the fact that he had refined the pill, it was the fact that the pill had 70% purity!


    Before this, he had never cracked the 60% purity mark, but now he had added a whole 10% purity to his pill.


    His eyes were filled with joy until the following words of the judgepletely crushed him.


    The judge continued after a pause, "However, you have lost this round since your opponent has refined the better pill. This is a pill with 100% purity, I don''t think you need me to exin what this means."


    Xiahou Tian looked at Lin Fan in disbelief. He had already heard that Lin Fan had crushed his opponents with 100% purity pills, but he had never believed them until this moment.


    He still couldn''t believe it because what Lin Fan did seemed like he was just ying around rather than refining.


    Xiahou Tian couldn''t take this and said, "I want to change judges."


    In this tournament, in order to make things fair, all contestants had a right to change judges if they ever doubted the call of the judge, but they only had one chance to do so. Up to this point, this rule had never been used before, but now it had been invoked.


    The judge had a dark look on his face, but he still called over the other judges who went to look over the two pills.


    After a while, the panel of judges gave the same result which Xiahou Tian still couldn''t ept, but there was nothing else he could do now.


    The only thing he wanted to do was get out of here as soon as possible, but when he tried to leave, there was a voice that called out to stop him.


    "This brother, I wonder where you are going?" Lin Fan said in a casual voice.


    Xiahou Tian turned with a dark look and said, "I lose this round, so I''m leaving. Am I not allowed to leave?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile, "You''re free to leave, but I think you''re forgetting something."


    Xiahou Tian had a confused look, "What am I forgetting?"


    Lin Fan''s smile became wider, "I remember that we had a bet for this round. Could it be that you''re nning on skimping this bet?"

 146 Chapter 146

    Xiahou Tian''s face turned ugly when he heard this.


    In his shock and disbelief at Lin Fan''s abilities, he hadpletely forgotten about the bet that he had made before.


    But this was the treasure of his family, they had given it to him in hopes that he would lead them back to the top once again. If he were to lose it now, he would be letting down all the hopes his family had ced on him.


    After being taken aback, Xiahou Tian said, "You think you''re worthy of taking the Thousand me Cauldron,e back in a thousand years!"


    Even if this did hurt his prestige a bit, Xiahou Tian couldn''t hold up his end of this bet at all. This was the hope of his entire family!


    Lin Fan just smiled since he already expected this, so he said, "You have to be willing to ept a loss as a man, just give up and hand over the cauldron."


    Xiahou Tian revealed a fierce look and said, "What if I don''t hand over the cauldron, what will you do?" Once he said this, he also released his Gold Realm aura.


    Xiahou Tian didn''t just focus purely on increasing his knowledge of alchemy, he also focused quite a bit of effort on his cultivation. Only by increasing his cultivation could he increase the power and control of his mes, so he didn''t ck off there.


    He waspletely confident that with his peak Gold Realm cultivation, he would be able to overpower Fan Lin.


    Alchemists generally were weak when it came to cultivation and Xiahou Tian was an anomaly who spent quite a bit of time on cultivating, but that only worked out since he had arge family behind him supporting him with resources.


    This wasn''t the case for most alchemists, so their cultivations were weaker. There were even Master Alchemists who were only in the Silver Realm.


    Normally Xiahou Tian was right to be confident in using force with his cultivation, but he had kicked a steel wall this time. Lin Fan wasn''t that easy to beat down.


    Lin Fan just continued looking at him with a smile and said, "Are you sure you want to do this?"


    Xiahou Tian thought that Lin Fan was just acting tough, so he gained a bit of confidence back. He turned to the Alchemy Master and said, "Lord Alchemy Master, the bet we made just now doesn''t count, right? That was nothing more than a friendly joke."


    He was confident that the Alchemy Master would support him since he had done so earlier when he allowed him to make this bet. He knew that the Alchemy Master had been wanting to win his family over, so the Alchemy Master would definitely side with him and his family, but the words of the Alchemy Master shattered that dream.


    The Alchemy Master casually said, "You''re the one who made this bet, don''te looking for me. This is a bet that I''ve personally guaranteed, so I have no idea what you mean by it''s a joke." Then his eyes turned cold as he looked at Xiahou Tian and said, "Of course, if you''re not willing to abide by the bet, that is your own fault. It would just make you less of a man."


    The words of the Alchemy Master were clearly hostile. He had made his stance clear that he wasn''t going to support Xiahou Tian and firmly stood on Fan Lin''s side.


    But this also confused Xiahou Tian.


    Just who was this Fan Lin, he was clearly some unknown kid yet the Alchemy Master was willing to throw away their Xiahou Family just for him!


    However, Lin Fan''s next words pulled Xiahou Tian from his daze, "So what are you going to do now? Are you going to beat me instead of handing over the cauldron?"


    Xiahou Tian''s temper surged and he had already been pushed into a corner, so he had no other choice.


    Xiahou Tian just shouted, "You''re the one who forced me to do this!"


    Then with those words, Xiahou Tian flew out with his fists, throwing a punch right at Lin Fan''s face.


    He had been wanting to punch Lin Fan since the moment heid eyes on him, but it was too bad that he didn''t get this chance.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and with a single finger, he stopped Xiahou Tian''s fist without being pushed a single step back.


    Everyone was shocked when they saw this.


    Xiahou Tian was a famed body cultivator, which meant that his punch should have been even more powerful than punches from normal cultivators. Not to mention that he was in the peak Gold Realm.


    Xiahou Tian looked at Lin Fan in shock and fear, he couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    Lin Fan didn''t even give Xiahou Tian a chance to react as he suddenly opened his hand to grab Xiahou Tian''s fist before moving behind him. Lin Fan''s other hand came forward to grab Xiahou Tian''s free hand and he pulled both of those hands behind Xiahou Tian.


    Then with a single kick to the back of his knees, he forced Xiahou Tian to kneel before putting his foot on Xiahou Tian''s back. As his foot was ced as Xiahou Tian''s back, he continued putting more and more pressure on Xiahou Tian''s back.


    Xiahou Tian tried to break free, but the more strength he used, the more pain he felting from his arms.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just stood over him and said with a cold smile, "What will you do now?"


    Everyone in the crowd at first had just thought that Fan Lin was a genius alchemist who was proud and confident, but now it seemed like they werepletely wrong about him. When seeing him stand over Xiahou Tian like this, the crowd couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spines.


    Xiahou Tian''s mentality finally broke down and he shouted, "Alright, alright, you can have the Thousand me Cauldron! Just let me go!"


    Lin Fan suddenly let go of his hands and kicked him to the ground before moving over to take the Thousand me Cauldron that Xiahou Tian had let out of his Storage Ring.


    But of course, when he was leaving, he didn''t forget to add, "You are nothing more than trash, remember that. Every time you try to stand up, I will crush you."


    Those words were the final straw that broke the camel''s back for Xiahou Tian. He was nowpletely afraid of Lin Fan and Lin Fan had be his heart demon. As long as he couldn''t break free of the grasp of this heart demon, he would never be able to progress again.


    Naturally Lin Fan knew this which was why he said these words.


    Who told this idiot to challenge him in the first ce?


    After this exciting semifinals, the finals were considered quite tame.


    This time, Lin Fan''s opponent didn''t provoke him, rather he was quite respectful towards Lin Fan.


    His opponent cupped his hands and gave a bow as he said, "Young master Fan, it truly is an honour to face you in the finals. My name is Jin Dong."


    Jin Dong didn''t expect much of a reaction from the cold and proud Lin Fan, so when Lin Fan actually cupped his hands back to him, he was shocked.


    Lin Fan was someone who treated others based on how he was treated and he could tell that this kid was sincere.


    Compared to the other young masters, this kid was clearly someone without any backing with how poor his cauldron was. This kid was someone who had made it up with his own efforts and that was something that Lin Fan could respect.


    Lin Fan cupped his hands and said, "It is an honour to be facing you too. I hope that we can learn from each other."


    The crowd fell into silence from their shock.


    Was this really the same Fan Lin they had just seen?


    The same cold blooded Fan Lin who almost killed someone on stage?


    But after this moment of shock, the crowd broke out in cheers again!


    This was the attitude that a true expert should have. He showed no mercy for those who offended him, but he was a kind and approachable person to those that showed respect. This was someone who was worth respecting!


    The finals began after this polite exchange, but instead of a contest, it seemed more like a lesson.


    During their refinement, Lin Fan used his me cauldron to refine his pills while giving advice to Jin Dong during his refinement.


    Of course the results were as expected, with Lin Fan winning in the end, but Jin Dong felt that he had gained quite a bit just from this experience.


    Jin Dong cupped his hands and bowed to Lin Fan once again as he said, "Master Fan, I''ve truly learned a lot from this, thank you."


    Lin Fan smiled and said, "Come and see me after this tournament, I might have a job for you."


    Jin Dong''s eyes lit up at this, "Really?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said nothing else.


    But just this was enough to fill Jin Dong''s heart with hope.


    He had gained more alchemy knowledge from a single lesson from Lin Fan than he had learned in the past month of studying. He was certain that if he followed Lin Fan, he would have a chance to break into a realm that he had never seen before.


    No one would be able to resist this temptation!

 147 Chapter 147

    With the finals finished, it was finally time to give out the rewards.


    There should have been a round for the third ce finish, but unfortunately Xiahou Tian couldn''t break through his heart demon at all. Whenever he tried gathering mes to refine a pill, all that would happen was that the mes would scatter before he could even bring them near his backup cauldron.


    As for his original cauldron, Lin Fan had no use for it at all. He hadn''t even used it in the final round, opting to continue using his Alchemy me cauldron.


    Since that was the case, Xiahou Tian had no choice but to forfeit the round and took fourth ce. This was a finish that hadpletely crushed him and it was obvious to everyone that he would have no further aplishments in the future.


    The Xiahou Family was enraged by this, but what could they do now?


    The only thing they could do was remember Fan Lin and take their revenge in the future.


    With all these positions settled, the top three were brought onto the main stage for the rewards ceremony.


    There was no suspense as the third and second ce rewards were given out, but once it was time for the first ce reward, everyone bated their breath. They all stretched their heads out a bit in hopes of being able to catch even a single peak of the Heaven Grade Tribtion Pill.


    This was a pill that was considered a treasure by all, one that could turn someone from a peak tinum Realm Expert to a Legendary Realm Expert!


    There were even some in the crowd that had already locked their eyes onto Fan Lin. They had sent people out earlier in preparation of what woulde next after Fan Lin received this pill and this tournament was over.


    With the crowd silent, there was a door to the back that was opened and a cart with a cloth over it was pushed out to the center of the stage.


    During this time, the host had moved over to Lin Fan and was asking him all kinds of questions about how he was feeling to win this tournament. However, since most of Lin Fan''s answers were one word answers, it made it quite hard for him to do his job. Still, he was professional and he wouldn''t give up asking Lin Fan more questions while stalling for time.


    Finally the cart arrived in the center of the stage where the trophy case was ced, but before it was revealed, the host first gave an introduction.


    The host shouted into his microphone, "Before we present the final prize for our victor, I want to introduce a very special guest!"


    The people in the crowd looked at each other, feeling confused.


    What special guest? Why hadn''t they heard of a special guest before?


    The host saw this and deliberately slowed down his introduction to build up more excitement, "This special guest hase from afar,ing from the distant Alchemy King Hall of the Gctic Humanity Alliance. It is the Lord Envoy of the Alchemy King Hall, Chen Ba Wang!"


    Most people in the crowd were confused when they heard this.


    While it wasmon knowledge that there was an upper realm, most people didn''t know what the name of the upper realm was. Only those families that had a certain amount of power could learn the name of this upper realm and about a few factions in the upper realm from their connections to the Union Government.


    The ones that dide from noble or royal families had the expression on their faces change.


    Since they were nobles and royals of Green Wood City, naturally they knew that the Alchemy King Hall was the upper realm benefactor that was behind the Alchemy Tower.


    It seemed like this wasn''t just a simple alchemy tournament if even an upper realm faction had sent down an envoy.


    When these people looked back at Lin Fan, their eyes couldn''t help filling with respect and envy since they knew that the reward Lin Fan would be receiving wouldn''t just be the Heaven Grade Tribtion Pill.


    The envoy Chen Ba Wang walked out with a smile as he looked at Lin Fan.


    While he didn''t manage to bait out the people hiding in that pet shop, he had at least found this gem on this trash lower world.


    With his sharp eyes, naturally he could tell that Fan Lin also had the True Yang Alchemy me and while it was only a seedling right now, he was certain that the Alchemy King Hall would be able to nurture it.


    At first he had thought that Fan Lin might only be able to be an elder at best, but now he predicted that Fan Lin might even be able to contend for the position of Hall Master in the future.


    If he was the man who discovered the Hall Master and nurtured him into his position, what kind of payout would he receive when that timees?


    Just thinking about it made him unable to stop the wide smile that crept onto his face.


    When Lin Fan saw that smile, he could tell just what the envoy was thinking, but he also smiled since he had other ns. Lin Fan couldn''t wait to see what would happen once his ns were ced in motion.<sub> </sub>


    The host then continued, "Now, we will ask the Lord Envoy to present the first ce reward to our victor, Fan Lin!"


    At this, everyone came back from their confusion as they looked back at the center of the stage where the cart and the trophy was.


    The envoy lifted off the cloth and revealed a jade pill bottle underneath it before beckoning for Lin Fan toe over.


    Only when Lin Fan was standing in front of him did he finally pull off the cap of the jade bottle and reveal the pill.


    When the pill dropped out onto his hand, he lifted it up for Lin Fan to see. The moment Lin Fan did see it, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    This Tribtion Pill was actually of 100% purity!


    It seemed like the depths of the Alchemy Tower really were deep!


    The envoy saw the look on Lin Fan''s face and he said with a smile, "I know you can see through this pill. This pill was created by the Alchemy God who founded the Alchemy Tower hundreds of years ago."


    The shock on Lin Fan''s face deepened.


    This was a pill that was refined hundreds of years ago yet it was still perfectly preserved with all of its medicinal essence.


    Even for Lin Fan with his God Tier Alchemy Technique, he still couldn''t imagine what kind of skill it took to create something like this.


    The envoy''s smile opened wider when he saw this, this was the effect that he wanted to achieve. The envoy calmly said, "You can tell just how powerful the Alchemy God was at his peak, but you can have a chance to meet him. The Alchemy God ascended hundreds of years ago and came to our Alchemy King Hall as one of our five elders. As long as you agree to work for the Alchemy Tower, I will personally bring you up to the Alchemy King Hall once I take care of my business here."


    The envoy''s words woke Lin Fan from his daze as he revealed a smile.


    If he was a normal alchemist of the lower realm, he might really have been tempted by this offer, but it was too bad that he was a transmigrator with a cheat system. As long as he continued developing his shop and finishing missions, he would reach that point one day. As for now, there was still the system''s mission of increasing his fame as an alchemist.


    Lin Fan just smiled and nodded as he took the trophy and the pill from the envoy.


    The envoy was of course happy to see this since he interpreted this as Lin Fan epting his offer, so he said, "You know what to do." Then he waved at the host.


    The host tactfully came over and asked Lin Fan, "Contestant Fan Lin, are there any words you want to tell everyone here?"


    Lin Fan took the microphone from the host and said, "Well just now, the Alchemy Master and the Lord Envoy have offered me generous terms toe and work for the Alchemy Tower." After this, he took a pause.


    Everyone in the crowd had bated breath, even the elders of the Alchemy Tower.


    Elder Hua had a worried look on her face as she looked at Lin Fan.


    She had seen the way he had talked to the envoy, she was worried that Lin Fan might have really been tempted by the envoy and was about to betray them.


    After all, even she would be tempted in the face of reaching the upper realm if it wasn''t for her convictions holding her back.


    Then after his pause, Lin Fan said, "But unfortunately I have to turn down this offer because I have something else I need to do."


    The envoy and the Alchemy Master both revealed looks of disbelief as they looked at Lin Fan. They just couldn''t believe what they had heard.


    The envoy''s expression changed several times before he shouted, "Who are you?"


    The only exnation he coulde up with was that someone had reced Fan Lin during the period of time after the finals and before the ceremony.


    But Lin Fan just turned to him and said, "I am Fan Lin, but you also know me by another name."


    At that, he took off his mask and revealed his true appearance.

 148 Chapter 148

    This face was a face that was familiar to the envoy because he had seen it multiple times during the past few days. He had seen it almost daily as he investigated that pet shop that he couldn''t see through. He had seen it so much that he was sick of seeing that face.


    The envoy just shook his head and said, "No, how could it be you? I''ll never believe this!"


    Under that mask was the face of Lin Fan, the one that he couldn''t see through.


    Lin Fan just smiled at him as he said, "Why can''t it be me?"


    The envoy didn''t know what to say at all, all he could do was open and close his mouth as shockpletely wiped his mind nk.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile when he saw this before turning to say to the crowd, "Now I see a few familiar faces out there, but there are many people I don''t recognize. Hello everyone, I am Lin Fan, the owner of the infamous pet shop that you''ve all heard of."


    At this, the crowd exploded.


    Over the past few days, since the Alchemy Tower couldn''t make a move against them, they had resorted to another method of attacking his shop. Since they couldn''t directly attack it, they could only use indirect methods, like the mostmon business strategy for taking care of rival businesses, spreading bad rumours.


    There were all kinds of different rumours that were spread about Lin Fan''s shop, but the mostmon one was naturally the rumour that Lin Fan''s shop was selling fake goods.


    For those that had been to Lin Fan''s shop and had personally seen his products, naturally they didn''t doubt the quality of his shop and his goods.


    But for those that had never been there before, even if the Alchemy Tower had degraded since the passing of the previous Alchemy Master, it was still one of the leading authorities in alchemy on the Blue Star. So naturally their words carried weight and many people had avoided Lin Fan''s shop because of this.


    Then again, those that did were those who couldn''t afford to buy Lin Fan''s items, so it really didn''t affect his store. However, it did affect his poprity which hurt the progress with his mission.


    He was supposed to create three branch stores with the same amount of fame as the main store, but how could he achieve that with someone hurting his reputation like this?


    All of that changed in this moment when Lin Fan revealed himself as Fan Lin.


    Everyone had seen Fan Lin''s talent during the tournament. With how talented he was in alchemy, was there even a need to doubt the products in his shop?


    Then again, there were also rumours that there was a powerful expert guarding the store, which helped add even more credibility to that store.


    The Alchemy Master was the first one to react. When he saw the changes in the crowd, he knew that the situation was bad.


    The Alchemy Tower''s reputation had been thrown into the ground at this point and if they didn''t stop Lin Fan now, they wouldn''t be able to recover. However, the Alchemy Master was still a bit afraid of Lin Fan after what had happenedst time.


    Since he didn''t dare stop Lin Fan, he went to the only person he thought that could. He came to the envoy''s side and tapped his shoulder a bit, which woke the envoy from his daze.


    When the envoy came out of his daze and saw the situation, his face became very ugly.


    How had his perfect n copsed like this?


    He had seen his perfect future already, but now he had been thrown into the pits of hell. He had seen paradise, but now he had lost everything.


    When he thought of this, his eyes were filled with rage and hatred as he red at Lin Fan.


    Since he was already pushed this far, he had no choice but to use his final trick. While that trick might seem shameful, he had been pushed onto a path of no return.


    The Alchemy King Hall had sent him down to deal with this situation, but with how things had turned out, if word of this reached the Alchemy King Hall, he would definitely lose his position.


    He had no other choice now, he had to silence everyone, whether it was with his wit or by force.


    The envoy approached Lin Fan who was just standing there and watching the crowd with a smile.


    Lin Fan quickly noticed the envoy approaching him, but he was confident since he knew that the envoy wouldn''t attack him in front of everyone, otherwise it might mean losing all face and starting a war.<sub> </sub>


    But once the envoy approached Lin Fan with a smile, before Lin Fan could say a word, the envoy suddenly punched out.


    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows and crossed his arms in front of his chest to block this attack.


    Even with his physique that was in the Fragmented Soul Realm, he still couldn''t block the attack of the envoy since the envoy was an expert in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    This meant that they were a match when it came to their physiques, but thews that Lin Fan controlled were much weaker inparison. When theirws shed, Lin Fan''s tinum Realmws copsed under the power of the envoy''s Fragmented Soul Realmws.


    It was a good thing that this one strike from the envoy was a quick strike where he hadn''t gathered all his strength yet, so Lin Fan was still able to resist it.


    Even though he did resist it, Lin Fan was still pushed back several meters. Once he stabilized himself, he suddenly felt bloode up his throat as he spat out a small mouthful of blood.


    When the envoy saw that Lin Fan was only slightly injured, he couldn''t help being shocked by this.


    This didn''t make sense at all, when did a tinum Realm Expert be strong enough to resist a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert? The level of power they controlled waspletely different!


    Even if it was a quick strike that didn''t use all his power, he had still used at least 50% of his power in that one strike.


    The strangest thing was that when the envoy punched Lin Fan, Lin Fan''s body actually wasn''t weaker than his. If it wasn''t for hisw, he felt that he might not have even been able to hurt Lin Fan.


    When a certain cloaked figure in the stands saw Lin Fan spitting out blood, she really wanted to jump out, but Lin Fan had turned to her and shook his head.


    The most power that Ang could use in this lower realm was in the True Soul Realm, which was the peak Soul Realm. Once she used power in the Star Realm, it would expose her true nature and expose her true identity which would be bad for Lin Fan.


    Since this envoy came from an upper realm faction, Lin Fan assumed that he would have someone stronger with him. Otherwise, if he thought that he could dominate the lower realm with just his Fragmented Soul Realm cultivation, he really was too arrogant.


    If Ang were to help Lin Fan now, it would leave her exposed for a sneak attack from the escort of this envoy. If that were to happen, Ang would either have to expose her true identity or be forced to take the hit and get injured.


    While Ang didn''t mind this, Lin Fan did since that would go against his n.


    ? If Lin Fan was being pressured by something stronger than a kid in the Fragmented Soul Realm, he might consider this, but someone in the Fragmented Soul Realm was someone he could still deal with.


    Lin Fan would use himself as bait to draw out the escort by taking down this envoy and Ang would take care of the escort once they were drawn out, that was the n Lin Fan came up with.


    Lin Fan stood back up and pulled out a giant bone club from his Storage Ring.


    This was the same giant bone that Ang had found for him in the Inheritance Realm, the one that was able to sh with the Fragmented Soul Artifact of the Feng Family.


    But this time, it was different when Lin Fan was wielding it.


    With a swing of his hand, the giant bone club had suddenly turned into a giant two handed zweihander sword.


    After the fight with the Feng Family, Lin Fan had asked Momonga about this giant bone club and he was shocked by what Momonga had found.


    Momonga had told him that this was a special artifact made with the bones of a very special species of wild beast, the Iron Eater.


    The Iron Eater was a beast that could change into the shape of various weapons, so once its bones were refined into an artifact, that artifact gained the same ability.


    Once Lin Fan dripped a drop of blood onto the giant bone club, he felt that it had formed a connection with him and he was free to change it at will with a single thought.


    He had tested it several times and had learned how to use various different weapons because of it, but now he was much stronger than when he only fought with his fists. That was because of the most shocking thing Momonga had found about this artifact.


    This wasn''t just a Fragmented Soul Artifact, it was actually an Embryo Soul Artifact!

 149 Chapter 149

    When the envoy saw the weapon appear in Lin Fan''s hands, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of dangering from it.


    Then the envoy shook his head and couldn''t help feeling ashamed at feeling danger from this lower realm trash.


    The envoy released his pet which was a Sun Crow and had that Sun Crow release its golden mes, which gathered around the envoy like a cloak. At which point, the envoy raised his hand and gathered a portion of the me in his palm as a fireball.


    The envoy looked at Lin Fan and said with a confident look, "This is yourst chance to submit, choose wisely."


    Lin Fan just looked back at him and said, "So the envoy of the upper realm doesn''t need to care about anything when he''s killing trash of a lower realm? Is this how the upper realm treats people of the lower realm?"


    Lin Fan was trying to incite the crowd so they would support him since the power of the opinion of the public was much stronger than it seemed.


    The envoy just revealed a smile and said, "Of course not, how could I tantly break the rules of the Gctic Humanity Alliance? After all, we are all humans."


    Thews of the Gctic Humanity Alliance stated that humans weren''t allowed to attack each other at will, doing so would divide the unity of mankind and leave them weakened when facing their invaders. The only thing that meant one could be attacked was to break thews of humanity. Once that happened, the offender would be stripped of their ssification as a human and would be hunted by all humans.


    Then after a pause, the envoy said, "Of course, it is different if it is a matter of personal vengeance."


    At this, Chen Ba Wang turned to point at Elder Chen as he said, "Do you remember that trash son of his?"


    Elder Chen''s face turned ugly when he heard this, but he couldn''t refute it since it was the envoy saying this. If it was anyone else, he would have already fought to death with them. Even if his son was trash, he was the only one who was allowed to say this.


    The envoy ignored the look on Elder Chen''s face and said, "His surname is Chen and my surname is Chen, so what do you think that means?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a cold smile and gave a cold snort when he heard this. Clearly he could understand what the envoy was trying to say.


    The envoy paused again to say, "As you can guess already, this trash son is actually a distant branch member of my family and with how you''ve shamed him, naturally it is up to me to get revenge for him."


    No one believed this envoy when he said that Elder Chen''s family was a branch family of his family.


    The only thing that was true was that his surname was simr to Elder Chen''s surname, but as for whether they were rted or not, everyone knew the answer in their hearts. Still, who would dare to call him out on this?


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "Why are you wasting all these words? We all know what is going to happen, so let''s just begin."


    The envoy was surprised since he thought that Lin Fan would try to argue, he never expected Lin Fan to directly fight him. It had to be known, Lin Fan was only in the tinum Realm and he was in the Fragmented Soul Realm. This wasn''t just a single step, this was the difference between heaven and earth.


    Still since this fit his idea, he had no reason to deny this.


    The envoy revealed a smile and said, "Since you want to die, I''ll be more than happy to oblige."


    The envoy used the fireball that was gathered in his hands and released it at Lin Fan, but this time it was different since Lin Fan was prepared.


    Lin Fan gathered thebination of threews into his weapon and shed down at the fireball, cutting it in half. Both halves went on opposite sides of him before exploding in the air.


    The envoy was shocked when he saw this, but then seeing the power of the threews mixing around Lin Fan''s sword, his eyes immediately narrowed.


    There was also a faint sparkle around the artifact which was different fromst time.


    ording to what Lin Fan had heard from Momonga, this sparkle was actually an indication of the artifact developing an artifact spirit.


    Artifact spirits were spiritualizations of artifacts, which allowed them to be self aware. This was important because artifacts that were self aware had the ability to improve themselves.


    For this specific artifact, since it was made from Iron Eater bones, this meant that this artifact had the same specialty of the Iron Eater. As long as this artifact was fed different kinds of metals, it would be able to evolve and increase in grade.


    To put it in game terms, this was a weapon that could level, which meant that it would grow with Lin Fan and he wouldn''t need another weapon.


    Then there was the fact that it had an artifact spirit which when developed enough, would be a second brain for Lin Fan during fights.<sub> </sub>


    But for now, it hadn''t fully developed its artifact spirit, so the artifact still couldn''tmunicate with Lin Fan. There was only a special bond that was formed between them that allowed Lin Fan to easily control the artifact, as well as infusing hisws and powers into it without resistance.


    The envoy quickly overcame his surprise as he looked over Lin Fan''s sword and he realized that it wasn''t a normal artifact. The danger that he had felt earlier wasn''t from Lin Fan, but rather his weapon, so there was nothing to worry about.


    This time, instead of letting the envoy attack first, Lin Fan released his life energy and gathered the power of hisws around his sword as he charged forward.


    But Lin Fan''s life energy was also differentpared to before, it was much thicker and brighterpared to before. Lin Fan had broken through to the mid tinum Realm!


    This was all because of the Enlightenment Pill that he had refined.


    One defining feature of Lin Fan''s God Tier Alchemy Skill was that when he refined and condensed the medicinal energy of the ingredients enough, there might be enough to form two pills as long as he used his technique properly.


    That was the case with the Enlightenment Pill and he had received a second 100% purity Enlightenment Pill that he had kept for himself.


    During this time, he had used that pill and with the help to his cultivation, he had broken through to the mid tinum Realm.


    Lin Fan shed down at the envoy with his giant sword, but the envoy was no pushover himself.


    The envoy gathered his mews to block Lin Fan''s sh, but then they were both pushed back.


    It seemed like they were even, but there was a slight difference.


    The envoy had been pushed back a single step while Lin Fan had been pushed back two steps.


    In the end, the envoy was still the one who came up on top since he was a genuine Fragmented Soul Realm Expert, it was still not something that Lin Fan who was in the tinum Realm could match, even if he dide close to matching him.


    The envoy didn''t give Lin Fan a chance to catch his breath as he raised both his hands and created two whips of me that shot out at Lin Fan, but Lin Fan was prepared. Lin Fan quickly swept out with his sword in a horizontal arc that cut through the me whips.


    However, the envoy didn''t stop there as he continued waving his hand and sending out more and more me whips which Lin Fan cut down with more and more swings as they approached.


    The two of them seemed like they were even, but it became very clear that Lin Fan wasn''t able to keep up in terms of endurance.


    While Lin Fan''s physique could match that of the envoy''s, his life energy reserves weren''t as rich even if he was using his suction power to drain part of the envoy''s power.


    As the me whips continued, Lin Fan was pushed back step by step as the power ofws on his sword began to weaken.


    Lin Fan could tell that he would be defeated if this were to continue, so he had no choice but to use one of his trump cards.


    Lin Fan summoned out three pets with a whistle, they were a little chick, a little dog, and a little lizard.


    The envoy was taken aback by the sudden appearance of Lin Fan''s pet as he stopped his attacks, but then he broke out inughter and said, "What are you trying to do, kill me with cute pets?"


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "You''ll see."


    Then the three pets exploded with life energy as they changed into their battle forms beforebining with Lin Fan to form his battle armour.


    The power of theirwsbined with the power of Lin Fan''sws created a powerful glow around the giant bone sword.


    The envoy''s expression immediately fell since he could tell that this was bad.


    He could ept thebination of threews because this was something the top geniuses of the upper realm had reached, but thebination of fivews? That was something that had never been heard of before.


    He could tell that even if it was him, this would be dangerous.

 150 Chapter 150

    But his pride wouldn''t allow him to back down in front of this lower realm trash.


    The envoy just said, "You think that you can win with these petty tricks, just watch as I crush them."


    Then after that, he took out a staff with a fire red crystal iid at the top of it.


    This was his personal artifact, his weapon of choice. He hadn''t used this before because his pride wouldn''t allow him to do so. If he did use it, it meant that he was taking this lower realm trash seriously and that was something that crossed his bottom line.


    But now he had no choice but to use it since he knew that it would be dangerous for him if he didn''t.


    Still now that he had taken it out, he definitely would show no mercy at all for this lower realm trash that had forced this out of him. His pride wouldn''t allow this trash to be even at the same level as him!


    But Lin Fan saw this and was still rxed since he was confident in the power of thebination of fivews, even though he had never seen how strong it was before.


    Lin Fan just slowly moved forward and said, "Are you sure you can do that though?"


    The envoy just gave a cold snort as he watched Lin Fan walk up in front of him, allowing him to be standing right in front of him.


    They both looked at each other in silence for a few seconds before suddenly swinging their weapons at each other.


    Lin Fan did a simple sh down with his zweihander sword, bringing the power of all fivews down onto the envoy.


    As for the envoy, he had pulled his staff back and held it like a sword before stabbing out with the crystal at the front, which had condensed every single me that had been surrounding him. The crystal released a fire red glow as it shot out right at Lin Fan''s sword.


    The moment the two weapons met, there wasn''t arge explosion like one would have expected. Rather, there were distortions in the air created by thepressed energy as they continued to battle against each other. It seemed like both sides were equal for now as they continued pushing back and forth, with a bit of the red me energy from the envoy being drained away by Lin Fan''s weapon.


    Finally after a few seconds of evenly pushing each other back, the zweihander that Lin Fan slowly pushed forward, pushing down the staff of the envoy. Eventually, the zweihander''s depletely cut through the crystal at the end of the staff, shattering it to pieces.


    The zweihander didn''t stop there as it scattered the red me energy of the envoy and continued down until it mmed the envoy in the chest.


    Luckily the envoy still had a second trump card. He was wearing a set of armour underneath his clothes that was also a Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact, which helped block some of the force.


    However, Lin Fan''s zweihander sword was an Embryo Soul Artifact, which meant it contained the power ofws from the Embryo Soul Realm. The gap between these two realms was even greater than that of the tinum Realm and the Legendary Realm!


    The zweihander didn''t cut through the armour, but it still created enough blunt force that itpletely copsed the armour that the envoy was wearing, mming him right into the ground. As the envoy was mmed into the ground, there was arge crater that was created all around him.


    As the envoyid there spitting out blood with a look of disbelief that had appeared the moment he saw the crystal at the end of his staff shatter, Lin Fan''s arms holding the zweihander slowly fell to both sides of him, weakly dangling there like the bone inside had been shattered.


    The crystal at the end of the envoy''s staff was a Fire God Crystal, which was a rare crystal that his father had found for him. It had the ability to containrge amounts of fire energy inside and amplify it bypressing the fire energy.


    The envoy was only in the low Fragmented Soul Realm, but with thebination of the life energy from his pet and his own life energy beingbined and amplified by the Fire God Crystal, his attack just now had been at the mid Fragmented Soul Realm. This was an attack that should have been considered unparalleled in this lower realm, yet he had still lost.


    There were two key factors that had decided this battle.<sub> </sub>


    One was the strange suction power that Lin Fan had. It had allowed Lin Fan to draw away some of the fire energy that was in the envoy''s attack and supplement it into his own attack. To put it in a simpler way, it was like dulling the enemy''s de while sharpening your own since the attribute of the mews was explosive power. Taking away the explosive power of the envoy''s attack and supplementing it into his own, it had allowed him to shatter through.


    The second factor was the Iron Eater Artifact. This was an artifact in the Embryo Soul Realm with residual Embryo Soul Realmws. Even if they were residualws, they were still much stronger than that of the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan stood over the envoy looking down at the envoyying in the crater.


    The envoy looked up at Lin Fan in terror, before calling out, "Someone, take him down right now! Do you know how important I am! My father will take all your heads if anything happens to me!"


    But no one dared to make a move since they were all terrified of Lin Fan. The energy waves that hade from their battle was something that had far surpassed their realms.


    There were even people who doubted that Lin Fan was already in the Legendary Realm based on how he had defeated the envoy.


    The Alchemy Master even took a step back in fear since he never expected this to happen. He felt the same helpless feeling that he had felt when his arm had been shattered in Lin Fan''s shop before.


    Lin Fan just ignored the frantic pleas of the envoy. In truth, he really wanted to kill the envoy right now, but his arms had actually been shattered in that attack.


    The force of thebination of fivews had created tremendous strain on his body, he was lucky enough to only get away with all the bones in his arms being shattered.


    But he wasn''t just lucky, it was also because of the special God Tier Cultivation Technique that he had received in the beginning from the system. This cultivation technique had trained his body to a point where his physique was stronger than thews he controlled, allowing his body to take the strain ofbiningws. If his physique had only been in the tinum Realm, he wouldn''t have gotten away with just shattered arms¡­


    Still, Lin Fan couldn''t just let him go now that things had developed to this point.


    Lin Fan pushed through the pain in his arms and raised his leg over the head of the envoy who could only helplesslyy there.


    The envoy''s eyes opened even wider in fear when he saw this and his tone immediately changed, "I''ll give you anything, anything you desire as long as you don''t kill me! You should know that my father is a very powerful man in the upper realm, I can definitely be of use to you if you spare me!"


    But Lin Fan didn''t stop there as he began bringing his leg down.


    The envoy''s pleading became even more frantic, "No! You can''t kill me, my life is worth more than this entire lower realm! If you kill me, do you think this lower realm will be spared! I''ll do anything to live, just let me live!"


    Then when Lin Fan''s foot was about to fall down on the envoy''s head, there was a sudden spiritual sense that had suddenly stopped it from falling any further. The envoy''s eyes were wide open and pouring tears as he looked at the foot that was only a single inch away from his face.


    There was a voice that rang out through the entire hall, "Little friend, how about we stop there?"


    When everyone turned to look at the origin of that voice, they found that it was an old man who had suddenly appeared on the stage where only the two of them had been previously. Everyone else had already evacuated the moment they started their fight.


    Once the envoy turned to look at this old man, his eyes filled with hope and joy like he had seen his saving grace.


    The envoy joyfully shouted, "Ha, ha, ha, now you''re finished! I don''t know what unlucky star you were born under, but this is one of the five elders of our Alchemy King Hall! You will now feel the consequences of the Alchemy King¡­"


    But before he could finish, the voice of the old man boomed out once again, "Shut your mouth for this old man right now!"

 151 Chapter 151

    While the envoy was left lookingpletely confused, the old man''s voice quickly changed to a gentle tone as he said, "Young friend, while he is a disgrace to our Alchemy King Hall, I still have to ask you to spare him. I can promise you that we will do our best topensate you."


    Lin Fan was just as shocked as the envoy when he heard this.


    He could naturally tell from the aura of this old man that he wasn''t a normal person, he was definitely a true expert from the upper realm. But why was this old man being this respectful to him?


    Ang of course could see through this old man. She could tell that he was someone of the Nascent Soul Realm, which meant that the envoy hadn''t been lying about this old man being an elder of the Alchemy King Hall.


    The envoy was the first to react as he shouted, "Elder Fu, how can you allow this lower realm trash insult our Alchemy King Hall like this? We must eliminate him immedi¡­"


    But once again, the envoy''s voice trickled off. This time the elder didn''t say a single word to silence him, rather he just looked down at him with a cold re.


    The old man''s gaze didn''t remain on the envoy for long before he turned back to Lin Fan, "Young friend, I truly apologize for this piece of trash from our Alchemy King Hall. I hope that this doesn''t ruin your opinion of our Alchemy King Hall."


    Lin Fan still hadn''t reacted yet, but once he heard this, he finally came back to his senses.


    He waspletely confused why this elder acted this way, but since he didn''t know what was going on, the best way to find out was to y along for now.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "He''s already tried to kill me. If I let him go now, what will stop him from trying again?"


    The old man''s expression became awkward at this, but he still said, "I understand your concerns, but I can guarantee that with my power as an elder, I will ensure that he will be locked up and punished once he is brought back. However, if you were to kill him now, it wouldn''t end well."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he asked, "What do you mean?"


    The old man exined, "Even if he is trash, he is still the illegitimate son of one of the five elders of the Alchemy King Hall, a man who holds equal power to me. As long as he is alive, I can still use my status as an elder to punish him, but once he is dead, that would be a p to the face for that elder. When that timees, the consequences would be hard to imagine."


    Hearing these words, the envoy waspletely shocked. He couldn''t believe what he had just heard. The elder was actually proposing sacrificing him just to appease this lower realm trash.


    At this, the envoy turned with difficulty to look at Lin Fan again. He couldn''t help wondering, just which scion was this man? There was no way the elder would lower himself for a piece of lower realm trash, which meant that the force behind him must be at least equal to the Alchemy King Hall. At this, the envoy couldn''t help feeling a sense of dread since he knew this wouldn''t turn out well for him.


    Lin Fan just fell into thought at this before revealing a smile. He turned to the elder and said, "Alright, I understand your point of view and I''ll respect it."


    The elder also revealed a smile at this, but then that smile quickly faded when he saw what Lin Fan did.


    The elder had let his guard down since there was an unconscious trust for this young man who the princess had told him to take care of, but that was a mistake that he truly did regret.


    Before the elder could react, Lin Fan had suddenly kicked out to shatter the envoy''s head. The envoy had used all his energy in battling Lin Fan earlier, so he couldn''t guard at all against Lin Fan''s kick.


    The elder''s brows slightly knit when he saw the pieces of Chen Ba Wang''s head scatter on the ground. There was a slight irritation that arose inside his heart when he saw. He didn''t feel irritated because of Chen Ba Wang''s death, rather he felt annoyed since this was clearly a p to the face of the Alchemy King Hall he represented and himself now that he had revealed himself.


    But thinking of the instructions the princess had given him, the elder quickly calmed himself.


    He shook his head with a sigh as he said, "You really shouldn''t have done that, this makes my job much harder."


    Lin Fan was confused by these words, but he still said in a resolute voice, "With how many witnesses there were, do you really think this matter could be hidden? No matter what, they would havee for me again, so it''s better to leave myself with one less enemy."<sub> </sub>


    The elder still said, "But if you had at least left him alive, I could have suppressed them with my power. But now that they are dead, this situation has be much moreplicated."


    Lin Fan didn''t falter as he said, "But you''ve forgotten one important thing. Why should I trust someone who I just met today?"


    The elder knit his brows when he heard this and he began to say, "Young friend Lin, I am here on the orders of the prin¡­"


    But before the elder could finish, he felt a powerful sense of fear ovee him, causing him topletely break out in a cold sweat. This was a sense of fear that he had only ever felt when facing the envoys from that ce¡­


    The elder looked into the crowd and he saw a cloaked figure standing there with one finger at his lips telling him to be quiet. This was the same cloaked figure that the elder hadn''t noticed was in the same room as him and the princess back in the restaurant.


    Lin Fan turned to look in the direction the elder was looking, but he couldn''t find anything strange.


    As for Ang, she could tell that there was someone powerful hiding in the crowd and based on the energy fluctuations, she could tell that this person was highly skilled at shadowws. As long as that person didn''t want to reveal themself, she would never find her.


    Of course, for an expert of her level, she could find them if she were to release her true powers which went beyond that of the person hiding. Though if she were to do so, she would be revealing her true identity.


    She chose not to do so since she could tell that this person''s aura was locked onto the elder in front of Lin Fan, so there was no hostility aimed at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan then turned back to the elder and asked, "Prin? What do you mean by that?"


    The elder was pulled back from his fear and he quickly turned back to Lin Fan, "Never mind that, never mind any of that."


    It was clear what that aura locking onto him had just meant, it was a message for him not to tell Lin Fan anything, but that just confused the elder. The princess had specially made a trip here to have the elder protect and take care of things for Lin Fan, so the elder had assumed that they were close, but now they were keeping things from Lin Fan?


    What did all of this mean?


    Still it wasn''t his ce to question the ideas of people like the princess, so he wouldn''t do it.


    While Lin Fan was still confused on why this elder was helping him and what the words of the elder had meant earlier, he knew that he wouldn''t be able to get an answer for those questions.


    Lin Fan just turned to the Alchemy Master and the five elders with him, "What do we do about them?"


    The elder turned to them and said in a confused voice, "What is there to do about them?"


    The Alchemy Master also reacted at this since he saw that the topic had finally turned to them. He had already expected this since he knew that Lin Fan definitely wouldn''t drop the grudge between them and his biggest backer had already been killed. It didn''t seem like the elder fully supported Lin Fan, so the Alchemy Master had only one thing he could count on to save himself.


    The Alchemy Master immediately came forward and kowtowed in front of the elder, "Elder, this one is the Alchemy Master of the current generation who has faithfully served the Alchemy King Hall."


    The elder looked at him and nodded before asking Lin Fan, "So what''s wrong here?"


    Lin Fan just had a calm smile as he said, "How about the murder of a previous Alchemy Master?"

 152 Chapter 152

    The elder immediately knit his brows when he heard this.


    The murder of an Alchemy Master, this wasn''t a small usation. Even if this person was the one that the princess had ordered him to look after, he still couldn''t just back him on this.


    The Alchemy Master on the other hand had his face down and he had a calm look on his face, but he was panicking deep down.


    No matter what, he never expected Lin Fan to suddenly lead with this.


    He had been sure to clean up any loose ends that were left behind when this matter had happened years ago, how could it surface once again?


    Still he didn''t show any signs of panicking as he waited for the elder''s response.


    Elder Fu looked down at the current Alchemy Master for a bit. When the Alchemy Master felt Elder Fu''s gazeing from above, his forehead was covered in a cold sweat, but he kept his head down the entire time to hide it.


    Finally Elder Fu turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "Young friend Lin, we both know that this is a serious matter, so I''m certain that you have your evidence to prove it. How about you stop keeping us in suspense and bring it out?"


    Lin Fan had also been looking at the Alchemy Master for a while with the elder, but it seemed like this Alchemy Master was much better at acting than he thought, so he brought out his first trump card.


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "Alright, since I''m the one using him, of course I would have my evidence."


    After saying that, Lin Fan tapped at his watch before saying, "Come on in."


    While his arms were still broken, he released life energy to hold the bones in ce which allowed him to move it slightly, albeit it was painful to do.


    Then after a few seconds, there was someone who had walked through all the guards toe to arrive on stage.


    The Alchemy Master looked up at this person and his face couldn''t help twitching when he saw him. This man was someone that he recognized very well since it was one of the two trusted subordinates that he had under him.


    This was a man who had loyally followed him for many years, but now he was standing on the same side as his enemy.


    When that man came onto the stage, he first bowed to Lin Fan before bowing to the elder.


    Elder Fu had noticed the change on the Alchemy Master''s face when he saw this man, so he could tell that this man was indeed someone the Alchemy Master recognized.


    Lin Fan nodded at this man who came up before saying, "Why don''t you tell them what you told me before?"


    The man nodded once again before he started speaking, "I''ve served the current Alchemy Master for many years, but¡­"


    Then before he could continue, there was a burst of blood that came from his mouth before he suddenly fell to the ground.


    Lin Fan and Elder Fu both knit their brows as they were confused why this man had suddenly died in front of them, but the Alchemy Master who had been on the ground still revealed a sly smile.


    ? The Alchemy Master was someone who liked to n for the unnned, so he had ced a special pill inside the heart of each of his most trusted subordinates. If they ever betrayed him, it would only take a single thought for him to eliminate them.


    But it was too bad that Lin Fan had more than a single trump card.


    And this time, he was prepared since Brainy had already found that reason why the other one had died and removed it.


    After a while, Lin Fan then tapped his watch again and said, "You can alsoe in now."


    The Alchemy Master''s back twitched a bit at this, but then he quickly calmed down. He knew that he was already prepared for this since everyone that should know about this matter already had pills in their hearts.


    The one who came out was the second person who had followed the Alchemy Master for many years.


    The Alchemy Master revealed a smile when he took a quick peek, but he didn''t immediately burst the pill to crush this man''s heart. He allowed the man toe up to the stage first.<sub> </sub>


    The man began talking just like the other one had and then the Alchemy Master tried to shatter his heart with the pill like his other subordinate, but this time it was different. No matter how many times the Alchemy Master tried to explode the spiritual sense seed in the pill which would shatter the man''s heart, he just couldn''t do it.


    The man continued as he said, "The Alchemy Master has forced us to do many things and we silently epted it because we had no other choice, but now I personally can''t continue living this way."


    Elder Fu had been looking over the dead man with his spiritual sense and he had found the cause for that man''s death. That man had his heart exploded by a pill that he had swallowed.


    Elder Fu stopped this man in the middle of his words and came over, sending his spiritual sense into the man and he found what he was looking for at the man''s heart.


    In the center of this man''s heart, there was a pill that had traces of spiritual sense still left on it. Based on the energy of the spiritual sense, Elder Fu could tell just who it belonged to, which not only helped prove this man''s identity, but also what he was about to say.


    But even with his spiritual sense searching this man, Elder Fu couldn''t find the seed that Brainy had put in this man.


    The vine that Brainy used to control peoplepletely wrapped around the host''s nerves, mimicking them and taking their ce. Unless Elder Fu intensely searched this man''s body and knew what he was looking for, it was unlikely that he would find Brainy''s vines.


    Brainy had also taken care of the spiritual sense seed inside the pill. It had scattered the seed, but had left traces of the spiritual sense behind for the elder to find.


    Elder Fu looked down at the Alchemy Master again, but this time his gaze was much colder. He could tell that there was clearly a plot afoot and this man kneeling was clearly trying to hide something.


    Elder Fu waved for the man to continue and that man said, "Chen Hu had ten of us and the five elders surround Alchemy Master Jun, even then that was after we had poisoned Alchemy Master Jun. We were supposed to wipe out their entire family, but since the little girl had escaped, the only thing we could do was me it on her."


    Elder Fu narrowed his eyes and looked at this man, "Why are you suddenlying forward with this information?"


    The man looked at Elder Fu and calmly said, "I was someone who had respected Alchemy Master Jun before and my heart has been racked with guilt the entire time. I just want to make amends before I die."


    Elder Fu just nodded at this.


    Of course, that was all a lie.


    When Lin Fan had sent back that one bad customer with the seed in him, he had sent him to his death, while also sending him to imnt seeds into people who were close to the Alchemy Master.


    Over this period, Lin Fan had been spreading the seeds through thework of the Alchemy Master and gathering more and more information on what had happened to Alchemy Master Jun back then. This was to be his final trump card just in case the envoy did have a guardian, he could use all this information to pressure the guardian to back off since this would be a disgrace to both the Alchemy Tower and the Alchemy King Hall.


    However, using it like this was also good since he could clean up all his loose ends like this.


    The Alchemy Tower elders saw that this situation was bad for them, but of course they couldn''t do anything since they couldn''t just fight their way out of this. Or at least they couldn''t with the elder here.


    The Alchemy Tower elders on the Alchemy Master''s side began shouting out to refute this.


    "What do you mean, I''ve never heard of this before!"


    "Alchemy Master, did you really kill Alchemy Master Jun?"


    "Alchemy Master Jun was a true leader, how could you do that?"


    There were all kinds of tones in the voices of these elders, some yed dumb, while some tried to cast all the me on Alchemy Master Chen.


    But of course none of that mattered since Elder Fu could easily see through them.


    However, before Elder Fu could say a thing, there was a small figure that suddenly charged onto the stage from the side wielding a small dagger above her head.


    "My name is Jun Xiao Hua. You kill my father, prepare to die!"

 153 Chapter 153

    That figure was Song Shu waving a dagger above her head as she charged at the Alchemy Master on the ground.


    The Alchemy Master heard this, but he didn''t worry at all since he knew that this little girl couldn''t do a single thing to him, not to mention that there was Elder Fu presiding over all of this. Rather he was hoping that Song Shu woulde even closer so he could cause an "ident".


    Now that things had been pushed this far, the only thing that he could grasp at was his usefulness to the Alchemy King Hall as the Alchemy Master. Over the years, while the Alchemy Tower had slowly degraded, he had always found ways to increase the payments they made to the Alchemy King Hall which had earned him quite a bit of merit with his family in the upper realm.


    As long as he yed on the usefulness that he had, there was still a chance that the elder would allow him to live even though he had killed the previous Alchemy Master. There were many different factions in the upper realm and they could put pressure even on an elder, so this angle was the only angle he had.


    He wasn''t worried that Lin Fan would suddenly kill him like with the envoy since the elder was already on guard for this, the elder wouldn''t allow it to happen a second time since it would be a direct p to his face.


    The only thing standing in the way of his perfect n was the fact that the previous Alchemy Master''s daughter was still alive.


    While he didn''t dare directly attack her, if an "ident" were to happen to her while she was attacking him, it wouldn''t be his fault.


    It was too bad that he never got a chance to make this "ident" happen since Ang was much too fast for him.


    Ang immediately came forward to take the dagger out of Song Shu''s hand and lifted her up, carrying her over her shoulder before walking back to Elder Hua who had rushed over in worry.


    She ced Song Shu down and pushed her behind Elder Hua before turning back to watch the stage.


    Elder Fu had turned to look at Ang in shock the moment she had appeared to stop Song Shu.


    He was shocked because he wasn''t able to see through her cultivation at all, which could only mean one of two things. One of those two things was a very terrifying concept since he was already one of the top experts in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But then thinking of how even the princess had him protect Lin Fan, it wasn''t strange that he had this kind of expert following him.


    Then again, even the follower of the princess was shocked since even he couldn''t see through Ang. He couldn''t help thinking of how the princess had mentioned that Lin Fan was from that ce, only then could such a situation make sense.


    Elder Fu took back his shock and turned to Song Shu, looking at her for a bit before asking, "You said that your name is Jun Xiao Hua?"


    Song Shu looked at Elder Fu with a confused look, wondering why this old man was talking to her, but she still answered, "Yes, what does it matter to you?"


    But Elder Hua quickly covered her mouth and said, "Elder, please don''t mind this child. She doesn''t know what she is saying."


    Elder Fu revealed a smile as he said, "It''s fine, she reminds me of Xiao Jun when I taught him all those years ago." But then that smile disappeared from his face and he had a cold look as he said, "Tell me what happened to him."


    Song Shu was even more confused when she heard this as she muttered, "Xiao Jun? Does he mean my dad?" But still she said as she pointed to the Alchemy Master and the elders of the Alchemy Tower, "They were the ones who murdered my father that day."


    The Alchemy Master quickly raised his head and said, "Elder, please don''t be fooled by the words of a child¡­"


    But before he could finish, Elder Fu''s cold gaze fell onto him as he said, "Shut your mouth this instant."


    The Alchemy Master felt like he had fallen into a freezer as every part of him felt like it was frozen in ice. He didn''t understand what this feeling was, but it felt like there was a trace of anger in the elder''s voice.


    Elder Fu turned back to Song Shu and said, "Child, can you give me a drop of your blood?"


    Song Shu looked a bit afraid with this sudden request and even Elder Hua took a step forward, but then she nodded.


    Elder Fu carefully touched her finger and with the power of his life energy, he drew just a single drop of blood out of her finger. That drop of blood floated in the air as he took out a jade that was carved in the shape of a flower.


    When Song Shu saw that jade flower, she felt like there was something familiar about it.


    When the drop of blood touched the jade flower, there was a resonance that came from the jade flower.<sub> </sub>


    Once the elder saw this, his expression turned soft and there was a trace of sadness that filled his eyes, but he quickly steeled his expression again.


    Elder Fu said to Song Shu in a soft voice, "Can you tell grandfather how it happened?"


    When everyone heard this, they were in utter disbelief.


    This great elder of the Alchemy King Hall, one of the top experts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance was now calling himself Song Shu''s "grandfather"? Just what was going on?


    Song Shu didn''t know why, but when she heard this, she felt like she could trust him. This feeling of trust had appeared from the moment she had seen the jade flower appear.


    But Song Shu''s face filled with sadness as she said, "It was a birthday celebration that my dad was holding for my fifth birthday, so all the elders and allies of the Alchemy Tower were invited. When my dad, my mom, and I went into the back room to open presents alone, my parents suddenly fell over when they drank the tea the maids brought in. Before they could do anything, the Alchemy Master had brought in the five elders and ten other people to finish us off. My father tried his best with the poison and thest thing he could do was send me out to safety."


    Song Shu''s memories had been returning bit by bit over the past few days, but suddenly seeing all the Alchemy Master kneeling had unlocked them all. It was like her mind knew that this was the only chance she would have to take care of him, so the memories came back to her like a dam suddenly opening.


    Elder Fu nodded along when he listened to this story, but there was no change in his expression at all.


    But the Alchemy Master and the five elders could tell that this situation was bad for them since someone as aloof as Elder Fu would listen to a child. Moreover, there was the jade flower and the way Elder Fu had addressed himself.


    The Alchemy Master knew that it was no use to keep saying anything, but the five elders didn''t have this tact.


    The five elders didn''t let Song Shu continue at all as they began shouting to cover for themselves.


    "Great Elder, please don''t listen to the lies of a child."


    "Great Elder, my family has loyally served the Alchemy Tower for ten generations. It would be a disgrace to my family if you were to even believe the ramblings of a child."


    But Elder Fu just ignored them all as he continued listening to Song Shu.


    Once he was done listening to her, he turned back to the Alchemy Master who was still on the ground and said, "Is there anything you have to say for yourself?"


    The Alchemy Master only then looked up and said, "I have faithfully performed my duties to the Alchemy King Hall over these years. I believe that has more merit than anything I am capable of saying at this moment."


    Elder Fu nodded in thought for a bit before saying, "That is true, your performance over the years has indeed been satisfactory, there''s nothing that can take away from this fact."


    The elders of the Alchemy Tower revealed happy expressions, but the Alchemy Master''s expression didn''t change. He could tell that there was a "but"ing.


    Once it dropped, the expressions of the elders fell once again.


    Elder Fu said, "But, you have touched something that you shouldn''t touch."


    The Alchemy Master didn''t wait as he said, "My family is a branch family of Elder Chen''s family, we ask Elder Fu to give Elder Chen some face."


    Elder Fu just gave a snort at this.


    While it was true that Elder Chen was an elder of the Alchemy King Hall like him, this matter couldn''t be solved that easily.


    Elder Fu gave another snort as he said, "You think that you can use Elder Chen to scare me? You really have some guts."


    The Alchemy Master wanted to say something else, but Elder Fu didn''t give him that chance.


    Elder Fu just said in a cold voice, "Even if Elder Chen was here today, he wouldn''t be able to protect you. What you''ve done is touch the taboo of the Alchemy King Hall!"

 154 Chapter 154

    The Alchemy Master''s face waspletely filled with confusion.


    How could the small matter of the Alchemy Tower touch the taboo of the Alchemy King Hall?


    When the Alchemy Master wanted to say more, Elder Fu still didn''t let him speak.


    Elder Fu just continued, "You might not believe this, but you should know that there is a saying in the Alchemy Tower. The saying goes "The Alchemy Master position is inherited by blood", I''m sure you''re familiar with this."


    This was the motto that had been passed down through generations of the upper stratum of the Alchemy Tower, but they had only thought that it was a saying that was passed down by the Jun Family to stabilize their position.


    The Alchemy Master saw that Elder Fu was looking at him and waiting, so he said, "There is such a saying, but that is only a saying that the Jun Family¡­"


    "Humph!"


    Elder Fu cut him off with another snort before saying, "That saying isn''t one that was created by the Jun Family, it was a warning from our Alchemy King Hall! No one in this lower realm is allowed to touch the Jun Family!"


    The Alchemy Master was taken aback by this, but he still argued, "What is so special about the Jun Family?"


    Elder Fu looked at him in disdain, "That is why even though you have the blood of the elder in you, your branch was banished to the lower realm. This is a story that anyone with power in the Alchemy King Hall knows."


    At this, Elder Fu gave a snap of his finger and a soundproof barrier of life energy surrounded the main stage, cutting them off from the crowd. Everything after this would involve a taboo for the Alchemy King Hall, so other than the elders of the Alchemy Tower, no one else was allowed to hear this.


    Well of course, Lin Fan and Ang were an exception since they were people acquainted with the princess¡­


    When the barrier was formed, Elder Fu continued, "The Jun Family is the founding family of our Alchemy King Hall, but there was a certain disaster for our Alchemy King Hall that forced them to sacrifice themselves for the rest of us. Since then, we have always been indebted to the Jun Family and have secretly taken care of them, even going as far as creating this Alchemy Tower for them in this lower realm for them."


    Then after a slight pause, Elder Fu continued, "Moreover, Jun Ting was the most talented member of the Jun Family after all these years. We elders have been training the juniors of the Jun Family for every generation in hopes that we can find one talented person to bring back with us restart the Jun Family in the upper realm. Jun Ting was supposed to be that hope, but unfortunately he passed away."


    Elder Fu turned to Song Shu and said with a sad look, "The Alchemy King Hall didn''t look into this matter since we heard it was Jun Ting''s daughter who poisoned him. No matter what, she was still a member of the Jun Family and we owed them too much, so we had no choice but to let her live even if she didmit this heinous crime. But now it seemed like this was all a plot!"


    Elder Fu turned back to look at the Alchemy Master, but this time there was rage that covered his face, "I was the elder who was assigned to teach Jun Ting, he was like a son to me! I couldn''t do anything when I heard that he had died and I couldn''t do anything for Xiao Hua because of the reports that she killed him. A part of me died that day, but now to find out that it was all a lie, do you really think I''ll let you off easy?"


    Song Shu suddenly looked like she had thought of something before she said, "Handsome Grandpa, is that you?"


    Elder Fu trembled when he heard this before he turned back to Song Shu, "Xiao Hua, do you still remember me?"


    Song Shu narrowed her eyes as she looked at Elder Fu''s face and her eyes couldn''t help misting over, "Handsome Grandpa, why are you so old now?"


    Elder Fu gave a sigh at this, "Time has been hard on me after losing both Xiao Jun and you. I didn''t want to believe it, but the facts were put right in front of me and I had no way of refuting it. In the end, I caused you to suffer all these years. Can you forgive grandpa?"


    Song Shu shook her head and came forward to hug Elder Fu, "Handsome Grandpa, it isn''t your fault. You did your best for father and Xiao Hua, it must have been the hardest on you."


    Elder Fu returned that hug and patted Song Shu''s head, "It''s alright now, grandpa will take care of everything."<sub> </sub>


    After he finishedforting Song Shu, Elder Fu had her move back to Elder Hua''s side before turning to the Alchemy Master and saying, "Have youe to terms yet?"


    The Alchemy Master still wouldn''t ept this and grasped at the only straw he had left, "If you do this, you will be pping the face of Elder Chen. This will start a war in the Alchemy King Hall."


    Elder Fu just gave a snort at this, "They sent you here with the idea that you would be eliminated once you failed. You think we don''t know what ambitions Elder Chen''s faction has?"


    The Alchemy Master revealed a bitter smile at this.


    When their branch had been sent down to enter the Alchemy Tower, he hadn''t understood why they were being sent down. He had always assumed that it was because they were untalented, so they were being sent down to the lower realm, but it seemed like it was for another reason. The Alchemy Master was smart, so of course he could piece together the idea that his family had been used as a pawn.


    The Alchemy Master didn''t struggle anymore as he turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Would it have all turned out different if we weren''t enemies? Would it have turned out differently if I had met you first?"


    Lin Fan looked right back at him with a calm gaze before shaking his head, "I know what kind of person you are, you are the same kind of person that I am. You and I both know that we never would have gotten along."


    The Alchemy Master revealed a bitter smile at this since he knew that Lin Fan was right.


    Since the beginning, he felt a special kind connection with Lin Fan, like he was his destined rival. No matter what plots had hee up with, he felt that none of them could faze Lin Fan. It was like Lin Fan was shrouded in mystery, a mist that hadpletely blinded his eyes.


    The Alchemy Master just nodded and said, "It really is a shame." He turned back to Elder Fu and said, "I ept my punishment."


    The five elders that supported him saw this and none of them could ept this since there wasn''t a single one of them that wanted to die. However, no matter how they argued or pleaded, their words fell onto Elder Fu''s deaf ears.


    Elder Fu looked at the Alchemy Master and nodded.


    Then with a single punch, he crushed all six of them into the ground, creating six identical meat patties.


    Only then did he release the life energy barrier and summon someone with a snap of his finger.


    The rest of the people still here couldn''t hear what he whispered into the ear of that person, but they could tell that this person was going to clear out the rest of the people involved as he took the witness Lin Fan brought in with him.


    Elder Fu walked back over to Song Shu and said, "Xiao Hua,e with me to the upper realm, there''s no reason for you to stay here any longer. It seems the situation is much worse than I thought and if you stay here, you might be in danger."


    Song Shu looked at Elder Fu before taking a peek at Lin Fan. After lowering her head to think, she looked back up with a determined expression and said, "I want to stay with Owner Lin. He was the one who saved me when I was at my lowest point and I want to stay with him to repay him."


    Elder Fu knit his brows when he heard this and he said, "Xiao Hua, I know that you feel indebted to Owner Lin, but it isn''t safe for you to stay here. Rather if you be stronger after following me to the upper realm, it''ll be easier for you to repay him in the future."


    But then Song Shu said something that no one expected.


    "Owner Lin, make me your apprentice."

 155 Chapter 155

    Lin Fan was shocked when he heard this.


    But he quickly recovered and said, "Song Shu, I''m not someone who has much to teach you. If you follow Elder Fu, there will be many more chances for you."


    Elder Fu saw that Lin Fan was on his side, so he quickly echoed, "Yes, Xiao Hua, the resources of the upper realm are not something this lower realm canpare to. Plus our Alchemy King Hall is one of the ten factions controlling the Gctic Humanity Alliances, which means that the resources we receive is the best of what the entire upper realm has to offer."


    But Song Shu just pouted her lips and a blush came over her cheeks as she said, "But I want to stay with Owner Lin."


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with awkward gazes.


    Lin Fan felt a chill from behind him which he could clearly tell came from Ang''s cold gaze.


    Lin Fan couldn''t helpining in his heart, "Why did everyone think that he was into little girls?"


    Lin Fan just revealed an awkward smile and said, "I''m ttered that you think this way, but¡­"


    But then before he could finish, there was a prompt from the system that immediately made him swallow those words back in.


    Song Shu looked up at him and asked, "But?"


    Lin Fan said, "But, you don''t need to admire me to be my apprentice. As long as you work hard, that is all I ask."


    Song Shu''s eyes lit up immediately when she heard this, "Does that mean you''ll take me as your apprentice?"


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "Of course!"


    Elder Fu quickly said, "But Owner Lin, it''s dangerous for Xiao Hua if she stays in this lower realm."


    Lin Fan just said, "As long as she stays in my store, she will be safe."


    Elder Fu thought about how not only did the princess protect him, there was also this expert that was by his side. He turned over to look at Ang before giving a slow nod.


    There was nothing Elder Fu could say to this since it did seem like Lin Fan was right. Jun Xiao Hua would be safe as long as she remained in his shop.


    But still he didn''t feel assured, so he decided to stay in this lower realm for some time first before heading back to the upper realm. He had to make sure that everything was safe for his granddaughter before he went back to the upper realm.


    As for what the system had suddenly said to make Lin Fan change his mind, it was very simple.


    The system had said, "Host, if you ept Jun Xiao Hua as your apprentice, you will immediately finish your side mission and one third of your main mission. Jun Xiao Hua will be the new Alchemy Master of the Alchemy Tower, with the fame of having the new Alchemy Master as your apprentice, you will not only spread your fame as an alchemist, you will also spread the fame of your shop."


    And the words of the system were true.


    Over the next few days, the shop gained a burst in poprity, it even reached the point of Snow Wind City. Of course there was a difference between the two cities since Green Wood City was a much bigger city inparison.


    Over these few days, there were even more customers and with the richer customers of this S Ranked City, there were many more special elixirs that were bought.


    Lin Fan had a very happy look as he watched his points soar, reaching the ten million mark, but he still saved it since there was also a new feature unlocked with the sess of the alchemy quest.


    But with how busy the store had be, Lin Fan had to hire even more workers, namely Mu Xiao Hai and Yang Yun since they already spent most of their time here with Song Shu and the three other orphans.


    The three other orphans had also been adopted by Elder Fu as grandchildren since Song Shu insisted on taking them as her siblings.


    Elder Fu was someone who didn''t have biological grandchildren since he had spent his entire youth on training and before he could find a wife, he had already found a son in Jun Ting. Of course, there were other members of his family who did have children, so their bloodline would still continue, which was why no one from their family forced Elder Fu to find a wife.


    As for Elder Hua, she didn''te to the store as much since she was now running the Alchemy Tower. While Jun Xiao Hua was the Alchemy Master, since she was still too young, Elder Hua ran the daily operations of the Alchemy Tower for her so she could learn from Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    That was also one of the main reasons why she let Yang Yun work in this store. She wanted Yang Yun to keep watch over Jun Xiao Hua.


    The other reason was of course to learn as much as she could from watching Lin Fan work.


    ¡­


    Time went by and it had been a week since the ending of the tournament and the shuffling of the Alchemy Tower.


    Lin Fan had been very busy managing his new store during this week and teaching his new staff, but now that all that was over, he could finally leave the store to the staff while he headed off on his own.


    Normally Song Shu liked to tag along with Lin Fan wherever he went, but this time he wouldn''t allow her toe since he was meeting someone special.


    As for her name, even though Lin Fan had learned that her real name was Jun Xiao Hua, he and the other kids still called her Song Shu since they were used to calling her this.


    Lin Fan and Ang made their way out of Green Wood City and they came to the mountain base of the bandits once again, but the treatment they received was much more different.


    When the bandits came out to see who it was, they were much more respectful towards Lin Fan after what had happenedst time.


    Lin Fan took this opportunity to look over the bandits and he found that among the faces he had seen before, there were also quite a few new faces that were looking at him with puzzled looks.


    These new bandits clearly had never seen Lin Fan''s power, so they were confused why their seniors treated Lin Fan like this.


    But once the word of Lin Fan''s arrival had been spread and one of the two vice leaders came forward to lead Lin Fan into the mountain, everyone understood that this had to be someone special.


    Lin Fan came through the waterfall, he was surprised to see just how much had changed with this base.


    The doors had all been reced with steel doors and there was much better upholstery that filled the gathering area outside.


    Even the clothes and food that the bandits had were leagues better than what they had before.


    Lin Fan was led to the same side room as before where they had held their meeting the first time.


    But this time, when they came in, Lin Fan took the main seat while the Jiang Zhi Shu and his two adjutants took seats on the side. Ang just remained standing behind Lin Fan which put Jiang Zhi Shu and the two adjutants off a bit, but of course they didn''t dare say anything.


    Lin Fan just sat down and looked at them for a bit before saying with a smile, "So, how''s it going?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu revealed a serious look and had someone on the side bring over the reports they were holding. Only the leaders of the bandits knew about Lin Fan''s identity, the man who had been standing on the side was the first squad leader whomanded respect among the other bandits, but here he was relegated to stand on the side. But of course, he didn''tin since he knew just how powerful Lin Fan and Ang were.


    While Lin Fan looked over the reports, Jiang Zhi Shu said, "The main points in those reports is that we''ve expanded our ranks, reaching over two thousand members in our group now. Their strength goes from the Iron Realm to the Silver Realm. Then there are the ten squad captains who are all in the Gold Realm."


    The reason why they were able to recruit all these people was that this bandit group had changed from robbing everyone to just robbing the wicked, while donating a portion of that to the poor, turning them into righteous bandits.


    But of course, they didn''t give everything away. Just a single portion of it was already enough for them to earn a good reputation and these wicked merchants were quite rich, so they kept quite a bit for themselves.


    As for where they found these wicked merchants, there was nock of them in this world that followed thew of the jungle. All merchants wanted to make money and in this world, one had to get their hands dirty to make that money.


    It wasn''t hard to find these secrets with Brainy''s ability and once they were exposed, they became ripe targets for Jiang Zhi Shu''s group.


    Then with a bit of clever advertising, it was easy to establish a brand for Jiang Zhi Shu''s group.


    To make it even more memorable, Lin Fan even came up with a nickname for Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Currently, he was known as Robin Hood, the defender of the public and his band were known as the Merry Men.

 156 Chapter 156

    As Jiang Zhi Shu exined the situation with his band of Merry Men, Lin Fan continued to look over the reports until he narrowed his eyes after seeing a certain report.


    This was an investigation that he had Jiang Zhi Shu''s men take of the surrounding viges, namely the resources that each vige contained.


    Jiang Zhi Shu had been confused why Lin Fan had given this order, but he still had his men investigate those viges and put all their findings in this report.


    Jiang Zhi Shu noticed the change in Lin Fan''s expression, so he asked, "Boss Lin, is there something wrong with the reports?"


    Lin Fan turned to him and revealed a smile, "Rather than something wrong, there''s something great about these findings."


    "Great? What do you mean by great?" Jiang Zhi Shu was confused.


    Lin Fan had the same smile as he said, "There''s quite a few natural resources in these viges that we can turn into a business while also making these viges more prosperous. If we do this, don''t you think that we will have even more fame?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu was even more confused, "But we''re bandits? If we create a business, wouldn''t it be attacked by others using the justification that we are bandits?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "We''ll take a few of your members and create a separate merchant group. If anyone tries to mess with that merchant group, that''s where you guys wille in to take care of them. That way, it''ll be a simple merchant group hiring mercenaries for protection."


    Jiang Zhi Shu gave it some thought before giving a nod. Based on the traditions of this world, this was amon urrence and it did prevent people from attacking their businesses just because they were bandits.


    But then there was another issue that he had with this n.


    Jiang Zhi Shu asked, "But what kind of business can we run with these resources? They''re nothing more than some fruit trees and some crops that no one wants."


    Lin Fan couldn''t helpughing at this.


    This world was indeed more advanced when it came to technology since the human race had to quickly advance their technology to deal with the beast invasion, there were other aspects that they were inferior in whenpared to earth.


    One such industry was the culinary industry.


    Humans only had limited space to cultivate food and they were more focused on cultivating just enough food to survive on before, so there wasn''t much progress when it came to delicious food.


    Even the cakes that Ang loved were only created within thest century and it was considered an enormous innovation even with how simple it was. The cakes of the Blue Star were very simple, being made of sweetened cream on soft bread, but yet it was something that everyone loved.


    The simple ones for lower ss consumers which Lin Fan bought used low quality ingredients while the ones which nobles ate used pure white sugar to sweeten the cream.


    But even then, all of the culinary inventions of this world could only be considered crude in Lin Fan''s eyes.


    Since he would have to live in this world from now on, he didn''t mind bringing out a few recipes to make some money while also improving the culinary industry in this world.


    The first thing he would take out would be preserved fruits and jams.


    The only reason Lin Fan knew the recipes for these things was because of his grandmother.


    When he was young, the earth Lin Fan''s parents had been too busy with their business to take care of him, so his grandmother had taken care of him for most of his childhood.


    One thing that his grandmother loved to do was cook, so Lin Fan would often help her with her cooking because her food had been delicious.


    His childhood was one of the happiest times in his life, but unfortunately all things had toe to an end.


    His grandmother had lived for a long time and finally her time hade, so she left Lin Fan before he was fully grown.


    After losing his grandmother, there was no one to take care of him, no one to manage him, no one to bring him back from the dark side. Lin Fan fell deeper and deeper into the vices of the rich and became quite the viin.


    However, he would never forget the recipes that his grandmother had taught him.<sub> </sub>


    He would now be bringing them into this new world, letting everyone taste the delicious food that he had in his childhood. This would be a way of passing on his grandmother''s legacy in this new world.


    He was sure that everyone would love his grandmother''s recipes as much as he had back in his childhood.


    Lin Fan said to Jiang Zhi Shu with a smile, "Even if others don''t know how to use these resources, I do. Just follow my instructions and I''ll give you a few recipes¡­"


    ¡­


    After taking care of Jiang Zhi Shu''s group, Lin Fan headed back to the shop.


    His n for the band of righteous bandits right now was to expand their power in the surrounding area and build up their foundations before deciding on how to expand them.


    Lin Fan would still be in Green Wood City for another month or so, so he was nning on seeing how far they developed before deciding whether to bring them with him to his next city.


    Lin Fan had nned two months out of the six for each of the three cities he had to visit. Even though he hadpleted the mission for the shop in Green Wood City, he wanted to make sure that everything was running fine before moving on, otherwise it would be meaningless if the store copsed before he finished setting up the third shop.


    When Lin Fan came back to the shop, he was surprised to see who was in it.


    It was the patriarch of the Mu Family, Mu Bo Hai with another person who Lin Fan wasn''t familiar with.


    When Mu Bo Hai saw Lin Fan appear, he came forward with a friendly look, but he faltered when he saw Ang following Lin Fan. He still had bad memories of Ang from Snow Wind City.


    But Lin Fan was actually the first one to speak, "Elder, you''re back from Snow Wind City? Does that mean the crack has been closed?"


    The only reason Mu Bo Hai had gone to Snow Wind City in the first ce was to close the crack which the Beast n had nned to invade from. If he was back, it meant that he had either closed the crack or the crack was getting worse. Lin Fan of course didn''t expect the crack to be worse since the news of a crack break would be top news that would be spread immediately, but he was still worried about his family in Snow Wind City.


    Mu Bo Hai gave a nod, "Un, I closed the crack a few days ago and after resting up, I came back right away." Of course Mu Bo Hai could tell what Lin Fan was thinking, so he added, "Your family is fine, but they did give me a message for you before I left."


    Lin Fan looked surprised as he said, "Oh? What message did they have for me?"


    Mu Bo Hai said, "It seems to be your little sister''s birthday next week and they wanted to see if you could make it back in time for it. Of course they understand if you were too busy, but they really want you toe."


    Lin Fan fell into thought as he searched the memories of the original owner and found that it was indeed Lin Xue''s birthday next week.


    He also realized that after all the time he had been in this world, it was already December and getting close to Christmas, but Christmas wasn''t a holiday in this world.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "I should be able to make it back in time." Then he turned to the person beside Mu Bo Hai and asked, "Elder, who is this?"


    Before Mu Bo Hai could introduce them, that person came forward to introduce themselves, letting Lin Fan finally get a good view of that person, "Hello Owner Lin, I am Zhu Ba Jie of the Zhu Family of Water Pearl City."


    Zhu Ba Jie?


    Looking at his face, he really did seem like a Zhu Ba Jie with his t nose that looked like that of a pig and his fat build. If Lin Fan didn''t know better, he would have thought that this was a pig that walked on two feet instead of four.


    Still Lin Fan didn''t say this out loud since it would have been rude, so rather he just said with a smile, "Hello Elder Zhu, what can I do for you?"


    Zhu Ba Jie gave augh before saying, "Owner Lin really is as direct as the rumours say you are, but I like that! I''ll be straight with you, Owner Lin, are you interested in building a branch in our Water Pearl City? We have long heard your fame and our Zhu Family would like to invite you to build a branch."


    Zhu Family? Water Pearl City?


    Finally Lin Fan reacted to these names and there was a memory that was triggered in his mind. He had heard these names before when he was reading about this world.


    The Zhu Family were like the Mu Family, they were also a Legendary Realm Family!

 157 Chapter 157

    Lin Fan quickly overcame his shock and looked at Zhu Ba Jie again, finding that he couldn''t see through this man''s aura at all.


    Lin Fan''s spiritual sense was actually stronger than his cultivation, which allowed him to control pets that were stronger than him, which was why even though he was in the mid tinum Realm, his pets could be in the high tinum Realm.


    Of course, with the bloodlines that his pets had, they could easily break through, but they didn''t since if they did, Lin Fan would lose control of his pets. Still their battle strength was above their cultivation, since they were pets with rare bloodlines, reaching the peak of the tinum Realm.


    For Lin Fan to be unable to sense this man''s cultivation, it meant that he was already at the peak of the tinum Realm or he might even be a Legendary Realm Expert!


    Mu Bo Hai and Zhu Ba Jie naturally could sense Lin Fan''s probing, so they both revealed smiles.


    Mu Bo Hai said, "Owner Lin, there''s no need for this. Let me introduce my friend here, he is Zhu Ba Jie, the patriarch of the Zhu Family and a Legendary Realm Expert just like me. But if we''re topare who is stronger, I would still have to say that it''s me."


    Zhu Ba Jie gave a snort, "Old man, you''re a hundred years older than me, it would be a shame if you were also weaker than me."


    Mu Bo Hai said, "Little brat, do you still remember when I saved you when we were surrounded by those beasts?"


    Zhu Ba Jie didn''t give up, "Old man, do you remember when I killed that frog and carried you back?"


    Seeing these two old men squabbling like kids, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile, but then he revealed a serious look and said, "Elder Zhu, while I am honoured that you would be inviting me to build a branch in Water Pearl City, I do have to ask, why me?"


    Zhu Ba Jie ignored Mu Bo Hai and turned back to Lin Fan to say with a smile, "Owner Lin, there''s no need to sell yourself short. Your store is a wonderful store with all kinds of amazing products, especially that 100% purity pet food. That is a treasure that others would auction off, yet here you are selling it for a low price. If our city were to have ess to that, it would increase the power of humans as a race and we would be able to easily fend off the beasts. So, why wouldn''t I invite you to invest in a branch store?"


    Lin Fan looked at Zhu Ba Jie with a doubtful gaze. While his words did sound righteous, it couldn''t have made it sound even more fake. If Lin Fan were to really believe these words, it might have been easier to call him an idiot.


    Lin Fan just looked at him with one raised brow without saying a thing and after a few seconds, Zhu Bai Jie revealed an awkward smile.


    Zhu Bai Jie tried waiting a few more seconds, but seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t nning on saying a thing, he finally relented and said, "Alright, to be honest, it''s not just the request of our Zhu Family, it''s also the request of the Monster Tamer Union."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look, "Monster Trainer Union? What do they have to do with this?"


    Zhu Ba Jie revealed a knowing smile as he said, "Owner Lin, there''s no need to hide it. It''s clear from the customers of this shop that there''s a very skilled Monster Trainer here and based on the training the customers have received, this is a Monster Trainer who isn''t just skilled in a single element. As you already know, Monster Trainers usually choose a type of pet to specialize in, allowing them to give the best training to the pets of that attribute. It''s rare to see a Monster Trainer who specializes in two elements, but as for one who specializes in even more...I can say that it''s never been heard of in the history of our Blue Star."


    Lin Fan had a surprised look since he honestly thought that being able to train all kinds of pets was a normal thing, but it was far from being normal in this world.


    Pet training on the Blue Star was mainly done by working with the pet to increase their control of their elemental energy or learning new techniques, so there was a need to focus on one element since different elements had different properties. That was why most Monster Trainers on the Blue Star focused on a single type of monster to train. Of course, that wasn''tmon knowledge since once a Monster Trainer reached a peak, they had no problem giving basic training to all different kinds of monsters, but it wouldn''t be specialized training.


    But that wasn''t the case for Lin Fan since he used a special technique with the technology from the system.


    Lin Fan''s training didn''t involve learning to control energy or teaching pets new techniques, rather it was training that was done by drawing out the potential of a pet.


    In a life or death situation, one had to draw out theirtent potential to survive or they would die, which was what Lin Fan used to train pets. He constantly put them to the brink of life and death and they drew out their potential whether they wanted to or not.


    The or not part came from the technology of the system where it kept reviving the pets being trained, so they were put into the same life or death situation again and again. Of course, they could just ept the death and move on, but dying again and again naturally wasn''t a very good feeling. Survival instincts were strong in all living beings and who would choose to die if they had a chance to live?<sub> </sub>


    That was how thetent potential within the pets being trained were drawn out again and again.


    Lin Fan had always thought that his method of training was quite normal, but now he was being told that it was a strange method of training¡­


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan suddenly narrowed his eyes, "That means the Monster Trainer Union and you want to take my methods?"


    Zhu Ba Jie quickly waved his hands and said, "Of course not, Owner Lin. I actually have someone that I want you to meet if that''s alright with you."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look, but he nodded to show his agreement.


    Zhu Ba Jie went over to the door and called out before bringing someone back in with him.


    This person was someone that Lin Fan had seen when he came into the store, but he had just been hanging around outside, so Lin Fan had thought that he was a passerby or some customer thinking about whether to go in or not.


    This person looked much more like an old manpared to the two Legendary Realm Experts. While those two did look like old men, they were quite fit for old men.


    This person came walking in with a cane and his head waspletely covered in white hair.


    Zhu Ba Jie introduced that person, "Owner Lin, this is my friend from the Monster Trainer Union, the vice president Zhang Liang."


    Once he was introduced, Zhang Liang immediately came forward and grabbed Lin Fan''s hands, "Owner Lin, it really is an honour to meet you. I''ve been here since early in the morning and after seeing all the different pets, I''m certain that the technique you''re using is much more advanced than the techniques we''re using. If I''m not mistaken, you should have a technique that draws out thetent potential of beasts which not only allows them to be stronger, it also allows them to develop much easier in the future!"


    This old man''s enthusiasm really put Lin Fan off as the old man looked at him with sparkling eyes.


    Zhu Ba Jie saw this and came forward to pull Zhang Liang back before saying to Lin Fan with a smile, "I''m very sorry about this. Owner Lin, vice president Zhang is someone who''s quite easy to get worked up, so usually hees off a bit too strong. But I''m sure you can see our sincerity when ites to inviting you to our Water Pearl City."


    Lin Fan could tell that this Zhang Liang was indeed just curious about his techniques and didn''t intend to steal them. If Lin Fan had to use a word to describe him, it would be schr.


    He had seen many people like this back on earth, they were people whopletely devoted themselves to their studies, caring for nothing else.


    While he personally didn''t understand why they would do so, that didn''t mean he couldn''t appreciate them.


    Many of them hade up with many discoveries that had benefited all of mankind, even though some of them did also create weapons of mass destruction¡­


    Still, someone who could devote themselvespletely to their craft was worthy of respect. These people were also people that Lin Fan could get along with since they were also quite simple and straightforward.


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "It''s alright, I rather like interacting with people like this instead of people who hide their meanings with their words. It''s possible for me to create a branch in your Water Pearl City, but there are a few conditions that I have."


    Zhu Ba Jie''s eyes lit up but then he asked, "Like?"


    "Well¡­"

 158 Chapter 158

    When Mu Bo Hai left the store with Zhu Ba Jie and Zhang Liang, they both had happy smiles on their faces.


    After a few negotiations, Lin Fan had reached a deal that they were satisfied with and had agreed to build a branch store in Water Pearl City. However, he did state that he would only be able to head over in another month since he wanted to make sure that this store was doing well before heading over.


    Zhu Ba Jie and Zhang Liang both had no problems with this request since it was quite a normal request and had stated that they would be waiting for him with everything prepared in a month.


    At least now he had decided on which city to set up his second branch shop in. With the support of a local tyrant, it would be much easier for him to set up the shop and reach the level of fame that the system required him to reach.


    But then there was still his third store to consider.


    Of course he wanted the third store to also be in a S Ranked City, but there were only three cities on the Eastern Continent to choose from. Not to mention that two of them were ruled by families that he wanted to avoid.


    There was the city ruled by the Lin Family, the family that his father came from who he was currently trying to build up power to fight. Then there was the other city that was ruled by the Jiang Family, the family who had imprisoned the lover of Jiang Zhi Shu, the family that Jiang Zhi Shu was asking Lin Fan to fight. For now, he wanted to avoid both of those cities until he had finished building up his forces.


    The Legendary Realm Experts of those families were nothing tough at.


    They had been in the Legendary Realm for many years, building strength to move up or spending the rest of their lives in this lower realm, so most of the family heads were already in the high Fragmented Soul Realm,ing close to the peak Fragmented Soul Realm.


    As for the final S Ranked City, Lin Fan didn''t have much information on it other than the city''s name and the surname of the family, but none of that meant anything to him.


    When he thought of this Lin Fan came to the realization that his current informationwork really was too shallow. During the next month, he should start building an informationwork with Jiang Zhi Shu''s group and bring them over with him to Water Pearl City.


    Once everyone was gone and the store was quiet, Lin Fan fell into thought as he began nning out his next moves.


    ¡­


    A week passed just like this and soon the day of Lin Xue''s birthday was here.


    Lin Fan of course was nning on going since this was a family event, one that he had never experienced on earth, so it was something that he quite looked forward to.


    When the day came, Lin Fan just left the morning rush to his employees and went through the Any ce Door to head back to Snow Wind City.


    For some reason though, Song Shu insisted on going with Lin Fan to the birthday party.


    While she insisted that it was just for her to meet his parents as his apprentice, but the blush on her face told a different story. However, Lin Fan didn''t ask too deeply since he didn''t want to open up that hole.


    When they came back to the shop in Snow Wind City, it was also currently the morning rush in this store. Momonga was casually sitting at his usual desk surfing the web while his ghost maids were taking care of the customers.


    When the customers saw Lin Fan appear, they all immediately crowded him.


    "Owner Lin, when did youe back to Snow Wind City?"


    "Owner Lin, can you take me as your disciple?"


    "Owner Lin, who is this cute little girl?"


    "Owner Lin, please give me your babies!"


    When Lin Fan turned to look at the person who spokest, he turned to see an old woman being held back by what seemed to be her grandson¡­


    Lin Fan''s face turned dark and he quickly grabbed Momonga before moving to the back of the store.


    There was still some time before the party and there were a few things that Lin Fan had found in Green Wood City that he wanted Momonga to appraise. He took them out in the back, but Momonga was more interested in something else.<sub> </sub>


    Momonga looked over Song Shu before asking, "Xiao Fan, did your tastes change? Is this the kind of thing you''re into now?"


    Song Shu''s cheeks turned red and she buried her face in her hands.


    Lin Fan had a dark look before he pped Momonga in the back of the head. Then he said, "She''s my apprentice, stop letting your mind wander. Just help me appraise these things."


    Momonga just revealed a smile like he was enjoying this, but he still went over to the items to appraise them. Of course, he didn''t forget to add, "Well, just don''t forget, yes loli, no touch."


    Lin Fan had a dark look on his face as he red at him, but he didn''t do anything else.


    He could p the back of Momonga''s head since they had be friends over the span of a few months, but Momonga no matter what was still the all powerful Lich King, there were still limits to what he could do.


    Once Momonga finished appraising all the items that Lin Fan brought out for him, the morning rush had ended and it was about time for Lin Xue''s party.


    Since it was a special asion, Lin Fan closed up the shop and brought everyone back to his house for the party. Especially since before he knew what had happened, Momonga had be close friends with his parents. ording to the calls he made to his parents from time to time, they would always talk about how good Momonga was at talking¡­


    Once they arrived at their house, Lin Fan had found that it hadpletely changed.


    Gone was the shabby house that the Lin Family had once lived in, gone was the neighbourhood full of broken down houses. In its ce, there were various different luxury manors that had appeared all the way down the street.


    Outside the manor that was where his house had been, there were many reporters waiting.


    The moment he had appeared, all the reporters surrounded him and started taking pictures.


    While Lin Fan was trapped by the reporters, there was a voice that called out, "Brother Lin, is that you?"


    Lin Fan turned to see Boss Gaoing over with his parents and Mei Rou. He quickly waved to them and shouted, "What''s going on here?"


    Boss Gao came over and with his family, they brought Lin Fan''s group through the crowd and past the gate to the door of his house.


    Only then did Boss Gao exin, "Since the destruction of the Feng Family, every family has heard of your name and with Lord Mu''s support, everyone wanted to get closer to your family, that''s why they all moved here. The manors around this one all belong to one of the three royal families. As for the rest of the manors, they all belong to various noble families."


    Lin Fan was surprised to see just how much had changed in a single month, but he was d for this change. With all these nobles and royals gathered together, it meant that his family was definitely safer than before. It seemed like Mu Bo Hai had kept his promise.


    Then he turned to point at the crowd of reporters who were kept outside the gate and asked, "Then what about them? Why are there all these reporters?"


    Boss Gaoughed and said, "It''s the birthday of the most famous little sister in Snow Wind City, it''s a party that gathers all the upper ss of Snow Wind City, so of course they''re here to get a scoop. As for you, you''re the most famous person in Snow Wind City after what you did to the Feng Family, of course you''re the one they want to interview the most."


    Then Lin Fan said with slightly knitted brows, "Is Xiao Xue happy with her party being turned into an event like this?"


    Boss Gao said with a smile, "Of course your family just wanted a small event, but they knew that they couldn''t do that with their current status. It would bring shame to you if you only held a small event, so they decided to hold this big event in the end. But you don''t have to worry since Brother Wang and I took care of everything. There''s only a big event in the front for everyone and we only have to appear at the end, but the real party is being held in the back with all your family and friends."


    Lin Fan wanted to say something else, but there was amotion that drew his attention that came from the reporters.


    When he turned to look over to see what the cause of this was, he saw a group walking through the reporters that were having their pictures taken.


    When the group finally made it through the crowd and came through the gate, Lin Fan felt a bit awkward seeing who it was.


    It was Luo Qing who he hadn''t seen since he hadst said goodbye to a month ago...

 159 Chapter 159

    p After that awkward meeting with Luo Qing at the front door, they were led to the back where a private party with Lin Fan''s family and friends were being held.</anda>


    Of course, they all came in together since they were bothing to the same party, it would have been strange toe separately after meeting at the front door. But that didn''t make it any less awkward.


    When they arrived at the party, Luo Wang went off with his wife to go find Lin Fan''s parents while the kids were left standing there awkwardly.


    Finally the ice was broken by Song Shu who looked at Luo Qing with sparkling eyes as she said, "Big sister, you''re so pretty."


    Luo Qing turned to look at Song Shu and she was instantly in by her cuteness. Song Shu had porcin white skin and big eyes, making her look like a little doll. During this past month, she had also been slowly growing out her hair since she no longer needed to dress as a boy in the street, so she looked much more feminine.


    She instantly picked Song Shu up and hugged her, patting her on the head as she said, "You''re quite cute yourself, where did youe from?"


    Song Shu didn''t fight the hug and just epted it as she said, "I came with master to meet his family."


    Luo Qing slightly knit her brows as she asked, "Master?" Then she turned to Lin Fan and said, "I never knew that you had such tastes¡­"


    Lin Fan''s face turned dark. He had slowly gotten used to other people saying it, but it was clear that there was a hidden meaning in Luo Qing''s words, especially after she had once confessed to him.


    Lin Fan quickly said, "It''s not what you think, I''m teaching her alchemy, so she''s my apprentice and I''m her master."


    Luo Qing just said, "Oh" which made Lin Fan''s face turn even darker, but he knew that he would just make it worse if he kept exining. Still he was happy that this had happened since it broke the awkwardness between him and Luo Qing.


    More and more of their friends came in and Lin Fan caught up with all the friends he hadn''t seen in a while.


    Of course, there were some that teased him when they arrived such as Wang Ning. She still didn''t give up on her n of bringing Luo Qing and Lin Fan together, so she had her fun with Lin Fan after arriving, even if it didn''t work.


    As for Wang Da Dong, he was the same as ever, but he did feel a bit depressed being the only one here without a girlfriend after seeing Boss Gao and Mei Rou together.


    Then finally it was time for the main star of today to arrive. Lin Xue came in with her friends from school who werepletely starstruck when they saw Lin Fan. But her appearance was like that of a fairy descending to earth.


    She had this ice blue dress that had crystals hanging off it that looked like icicles, making her look like a fairy of snow when she walked in.


    Of course, the first thing that she noted when she arrived was Song Shu. It seemed like her big brother was collecting more and more girls without her knowledge and this one seemed quite cute.


    But she couldn''t help wondering, is that what kind of girls her big brother liked? Was that why he had rejected Luo Qing?


    Lin Xue ignored Lin Fan and went to sit with her friends who kept pestering her to introduce them to her big brother since Lin Fan was now a celebrity in Snow Wind City. However, why would she introduce morepetition for herself?


    Her big brother belonged to her, even if he was a bit confused by other girls right now¡­


    After the party was in full swing, Lin Fan''s mother finished her chat with the adults and came over to where Lin Fan was sitting with his friends.


    When she saw Song Shu, her eyes immediately lit up as she said, "Xiao Fan, did you finally bring home a granddaughter for your mother?"


    Lin Fan immediately spat out the juice that he had been drinking and he broke out in a series of coughs.


    Lin Fan turned back to his mother and said, "Mom, you know how old I am, how could I have a kid this big already?"


    Yue Qingrou tilted her head to think and she knew that he was right. It seemed like she had been a bit too excited, but she still said, "You know that I''m still waiting for my first grandchild, when are you going to get to it?"


    Lin Fan immediately avoided the topic by saying, "Mom, this is Song Shu, she''s my apprentice."


    Song Shu lowered her head and said, "Hello Mother Lin, it''s an honour to meet you."


    Yue Qingrou looked at Song Shu with a knowing smile since she could easily see through her thoughts.


    Yue Qingrou turned to Lin Fan with a smile and said, "Apprentice, are you sure that she''s just an apprentice? Mom doesn''t mind, but I do want to be a grandmother soon."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan''s face turnedpletely dark as he thought: Why did everyone think that way about him? He had normal tastes when it came to girls, alright?


    Lin Fan just ignored his mother, but she didn''t let him off that easily, "Xiao Fan, how is it going between you and Ang? Is there a chance that I''ll be able to see my grandchild''s face by this time next year?"


    He continued ignoring her, but she didn''t give up, "Xiao Qing has been waiting for you for so long, don''t you have anything to say to her? Also, doesn''t Xiao Xue look good in her dress? Why don''t youpliment her?"


    This really was one encouraging mother, she was pushing every girl on him¡­


    But thestment was a bit strange, why did she also include Lin Xue in this?


    Still Lin Fan decided to take thement at face value as he stood up and went over to Lin Xue.


    Her friends were all excited when they saw Lin Fane over, but they still gave him space since they knew that he was onlying over to talk to his little sister.


    Lin Xue coldly looked at him and waited for him to say what he had to say.


    Lin Fan took out a little wrapped box and handed it to Lin Xue as he said, "Happy birthday, you really look nice today."


    Lin Xue just calmly took the box, but not before sending a mental message to her pet to stop the recording. She would definitely have fun with the recordingter¡­


    When Lin Xue opened the box, she found a finely made ne with a tear shaped blue gem hanging off it.


    Lin Fan scratched his head and awkwardly said, "I didn''t know what you liked, so I just found this while I was walking around."


    But of course that was also a lie.


    He had gone to the best jewelry store in Green Wood City and had bought the most expensive ne that he could find. The clerk at the store told him that this was an Ice Tear Gem that adorned the ne and it had a special ability to create a water barrier that would block a single attack up to the Gold Realm.


    While Lin Fan wasn''t the Lin Fan that had grown up on this Blue Star, the memories of the original owner of the body hadpletelybined with his memories.


    He wasn''t the Lin Fan from earth nor was he the Lin Fan from the Blue Star. He was just now Lin Fan.


    This family was the family that had given birth to him and had raised him, so naturally he felt love and care for them. This was the little sister he had cared for when they were younger, the one that he had vowed to protect from the first moment he saw her and held her little hands.


    Lin Xue looked at it and after a while, she said, "Would you help me put it on?"


    Lin Fan was happy to do so. Once he put it on her, he also added, "You look beautiful with it on."


    Lin Xue didn''t react at all, having the same calm look on her face, but she said, "I''m going to the bathroom."


    Lin Xue went into the bathroom and once the door was closed, her expressionpletely twisted into an abnormal smile.


    She held the blue gem in her hand and sniffed it for a while before cing it on her tongue, suckling on it with a look of pure ecstasy on her face.


    This was a gift from her precious big brother, there was nothing else that would make her happier in this world. But in her mind, it also confirmed to her that her big brother felt the same way about her, even though that wasn''t true.


    She thought of the other girls that had clung to her big brother like flies and revealed a twisted look of hatred, but then she calmed down.


    She wasn''t strong enough yet and her big brother still hadn''t thought it through.


    There was still time before she was strong enough to break all taboos and her big brother''s eyes would eventually open.


    All of this was just a matter of time.


    She could wait.

 160 Chapter 160

    The birthday party ended after that with everyone of the Lin Family going out to the main banquet hall and thanking everyone foring.


    These were all the nobles and royals of Snow Wind City who hade to curry favour with Lin Fan, but they knew that they were right to do so when they felt the auraing from him.


    Lin Fan had already reached the mid tinum Realm and was stronger than when he destroyed the Feng Family. If there were still people on the fence about getting close to the Lin Family, they no longer had any doubt.


    If Lin Fan could already fight someone in the peak tinum Realm back then, just how strong would he be now?


    After greeting everyone, Lin Fan was finally free to return to Green Wood City and start preparing for his next adventure.


    ¡­


    Over the next month, Lin Fan had made various preparations for all his different ventures.


    He trained Yang Yun and Mu Xiao Hai on how to use the pet food machine and how to put pets into the shadow cultivation realm. He also arranged a spot in the store where ingredients woulde from the cultivation realm farm right to the store.


    During this past month, he had also been fighting against the zerg queen in the cultivation farm realm and slowly he had put up enough defenses with turrets and various units to hold half of the world. At the same time, he was slowly building up his forces while kiting the zerglings creating a slow disparity in forces. At this point, it was only a matter of time before he defeated the zerg queen.


    Then there was Jiang Zhi Shu and his band of Merry Men.


    Over the past month, they had begun their cooperations with the various viges around Green Wood City, producing all kinds of various jams and fruit products. These products were all very wee and Lin Fan had earned quite a bit from selling them, especially since he had minimum costs and high prices, since he wanted to sell these food products as high ss items.


    But all of the money that he earned was immediately invested back into thepany running the food business, while most of it went to building an intelligencework under Lin Fan.


    They had already recruited many informants and were slowly building arge over Green Wood City.


    On this trip to Water Pearl City, Lin Fan had also paid for the travel arrangements of a manager and several informants from the ck Organization that he created, just so they could create a branch in Water Pearl City. They would be traveling with the merchants from Lin Fan''spany who were also going to spread their food business.


    In all, since Lin Fan was traveling to a city where he didn''t know what would happen, it would be best if he had some form of backup that he could count on.


    Finally the day Lin Fan had agreed to with the Zhu Family and the Monster Trainer Union hade. It would take him another three days to travel by airship to Water Pearl City, but the Zhu Family and the Monster Trainer Union had booked the most luxurious ship for him.


    Lin Fan at first only wanted to go with Ang, but Song Shu wouldn''t give up and continued to hug onto his legs until he gave in.


    When Elder Hua heard about this, she had been worried at first about letting Song Shu leave, but then she felt assured since she would be going with Lin Fan. There was still a mysterious force behind Lin Fan ording to Elder Fu, one that even Elder Fu didn''t dare go against, that was why Elder Hua felt assured.


    So she immediately booked another ticket on the same luxurious airship for Song Shu.


    When Song Shu boarded the ship, she looked around with wide open sparkling eyes, looking around at everything on the ship in excitement.


    This was actually her first time riding on an airship, this was actually her first time even leaving Green Wood City.


    When she was still a child and her parents were with her, she had been too young to ride an airship. Once she was old enough, her parents were gone and she was wandering the streets as an orphan, so of course she didn''t even have time to think about riding in an airship.


    In the end, Ang was dragged around by Song Shu as she ran all over the ship, looking at all the new and amazing things to her.


    The strange thing was that normally Ang would have hated being dragged around like this, but for some reason, she was quite happy letting Song Shu drag her around.


    When Lin Fan followed and watched over them, he couldn''t help smiling as he thought that the two of them really looked like a pair of mother and daughter. That was especially true since both of them were dazzling beauties...Well, Song Shu was more of a beauty that was being developed, but with the foundations that she had now, she would definitely be a drop dead beauty in the future.


    For some reason, there was also a warm feeling in Lin Fan''s heart as he watched them. It was almost like having the feeling of having a family of his own¡­


    While Lin Fan was lost in thought, there was a voice that suddenly brought him back from his thoughts.


    "Is that your wife and daughter?"<sub> </sub>


    This was a warm voice and when Lin Fan came back from his senses, turning to see who it was, he found that this voice came from a sweet olddy who was standing beside him holding the arms of an old man.


    Lin Fan was surprised that these strangers would suddenly talk to him, but he let his guard down since they seemed like they were nothing more than an old couple who were just passing by.


    Lin Fan said, "No, no, they''re not."


    The old woman revealed a sweet smile as she said, "But the three of you really seem like a happy family."


    Lin Fan thought about it, but then he strangely decided not to refute this old woman, "I guess you can think of us as one."


    In this family, Lin Fan was the father, Ang was the mother, and Song Shu was their little daughter.


    The old woman turned to the old man and said, "Do you remember when we were like that¡­"


    But at thetter half of her words, that sweet smile slowly disappeared and a pained look appeared on her face.


    The old man patted the old woman''s hand and said, "It''s alright, it''ll all be over soon."


    Lin Fan was confused by these words, but it seemed like it was a personal issue for this old couple, so he didn''t feel it was appropriate for him to pry any deeper.


    The old woman wiped away the tears in the corner of her eyes before revealing the sweet smile again and turning back to Lin Fan, "I''m very sorry about that, it''s just that we lost our child and his family not that long ago¡­"


    Lin Fan quickly waved his hands to stop her and said, "No, no, it''spletely fine. I''m very sorry for your loss."


    The old woman said, "Thank you. My husband and I were hoping to find a way to ovee this grief on our trip, but it seems like we still haven''t ovee it yet. I hope that you won''t take your family for granted like we did and enjoy the small moments in life."


    Lin Fan was once again confused by these words, but he still said, "It''s alright, I know it''s not easy to get over a loss, but I hope that you will be able to get over it in time. I will make sure that I don''t take this for granted, thank you for your advice."


    Then after exchanging a few more words with the old man and old woman, Lin Fan headed off to chase after Ang and Song Shu who had run off.


    The old man and old woman just stood there watching him run off for a few seconds before walking off in another direction. There was a look with an unclear meaning in their eyes as they walked off, but it did have a sinister feel to it.


    ¡­


    The afternoon passed just like that with Song Shu dragging Lin Fan and Ang around all over the ship, exploring all the various entertainment options found all over the ship.


    It was true what they said about children, they really didn''t know how to get tired.


    Halfway, Lin Fan couldn''t keep up with them any longer, so he headed back to the room first to rest up before dinner.


    As the time for dinner approached, Lin Fan woke up from the nap he took and he took a quick shower to freshen up.


    When he came out, he found that Ang hade back alone without Song Shu and he couldn''t help asking, "Where''s Song Shu?"


    Ang looked over at himing out of the bathroom and she also had a confused look on her face, "Wasn''t she with you?"


    Lin Fan revealed a surprised look before answering, "I was in the room all afternoon and I just took a shower, when did I have time to find her?"


    Once this was said, both of them immediately knit their brows as their eyes filled with worry.


    Song Shu had gone missing!

 161 Chapter 161

    After a slight pause, Ang immediately turned around and was prepared to charge out the door, but Lin Fan quickly grabbed her hand to stop her.


    She turned back to him with a slightly annoyed look, but Lin Fan still said, "Calm down, we can''t aplish anything by just running all over the shop. We need toe up with a n first."


    Now that they had known each other for some time and they were slowly taking their rtionship further, Ang trusted Lin Fan much more.


    While she was someone who would rather charge forward, she calmed down after hearing Lin Fan''s words and realized that he was right.


    But she couldn''t help saying in a voice filled with a bit of worry, "What are we supposed to do then?"


    Lin Fan immediately asked, "When was thest time you saw her? We need to trace back our steps and see if there are any clues at all before running all over looking for her. Also, we need to hurry because the longer it takes, the more likely it is that something bad might happen to her."


    Ang quickly went through her memories, but it had all been a blur to her since they had gone all over. But she knew that this wasn''t the time to give up, so she knit her brows and used all her brain power as shebed her memories.


    Finally she came to the specific memory as she said, "We wereing back to the room when she suddenly ran off saying that she wanted to race me back to the room. She ran off so quickly that she just disappeared. When I came back to the room, I didn''t see her, so I thought she went off somewhere with you."


    Lin Fan knit his brows as he muttered to himself, "I was in the room the entire time taking a shower, but that only took me around fifteen minutes. So the maximum span of time that she''s been missing is a total of twenty minutes since it should have taken you and her no more than five minutes toe back to the room."


    Then Lin Fan turned back and asked, "Where were the two of you when she suddenly ran off, we should head there and see if we can find any clues."


    Ang knit her brows to think before suddenly saying, "The arcade!"


    As soon as she said this, she bolted out of the room and dashed down the hall, pushing aside anyone who was in her way.


    Lin Fan didn''t falter at all as he quickly followed behind her.


    To be honest, he was feeling plenty of worry under that calm surface, but he forced himself to remain calm since he knew that would be the only way to find her.


    In a family, the father was the one who seemed the most calm, but he worried more than anyone when it came to his precious little daughter. He was even more worried than Ang in her frenzied state.


    The two of them quickly made their way to the area outside the arcade and both of them immediately spread their spiritual sense, quickly picking up leftover traces of Song Shu''s aura.


    Over the past month Song Shu had not only been picking up alchemy tricks from Lin Fan, she had also been using the store of elixirs and learning from the cultivation technique that her Handsome Grandpa had given her. Through her hard work and determination, she had already be a Junior Alchemist and was in the peak of the Bronze Realm.


    That was the only reason why they could still feel traces of her aura even though some time had already passed.


    They followed those traces until they came to a certain corridor with a dead end that led to a storage closet where those tracespletely disappeared.


    They quickly searched around the area until they found a piece of string and a few scattered beads on the ground.


    Ang immediately kneeled down to pick them up with a trembling hand when she saw them.


    Her hand wasn''t trembling out of fear, rather it was trembling in rage.


    The fact that this bracelet had been broken and was scattered on the ground like this clearly meant that there was a struggle. If there was a struggle, there was a chance that Song Shu had been hurt.


    Thinking this, Ang''s hand couldn''t help moving to the bracelet with the same kind of beads on her own left hand.


    These bead bracelets had been a pair the two of them had bought at a night market they had visited together.


    It had been the day when Song Shu had broken through to the Bronze Realm and she had asked for a trip to the night market together with Lin Fan and Ang, which they agreed to. Of course as the man, Lin Fan had been forced to pay for everything, but he was happy to do so.<sub> </sub>


    As they were walking along, this pair of bracelets had caught the eye of Song Shu and she asked Lin Fan to buy it for her.


    Lin Fan had tried haggling with the vendor, but the vendor had stuck to his price since he knew that Lin Fan would be willing to pay with these two beauties by his side.


    So in the end, Lin Fan had been cheated out of his money, but he was happy to pay when he saw the smile on the faces of these two girls as Song Shu offered one of the bracelets to Ang while taking one for herself.


    Of course, the people around had cursed Lin Fan for his disy of being a normie, but he didn''t care at all since he knew that he wanted to protect the two of them as soon as he saw this scene.


    Perhaps those curses did eventually stack up which caused this incident or perhaps it was all just bad luck¡­


    Lin Fan quickly grabbed Ang by the shoulder and forced her to calm down when he saw that she was about to go on a rampage, tearing the entire ship apart if she couldn''t find Song Shu.


    If he had let her go on a rampage, this ship definitely wouldn''t have been able to take it and they would have all been sent flying to the ground.


    While it was fine for Lin Fan and Ang since they could fly, Lin Fan with his windws and Xiao Huo''s wings and Ang with the power of Legendary Realm Laws, that didn''t mean everyone else could fly. Or even worse, Song Shu might be caught up in the rampage¡­


    Lin Fan tried to think of a way to think of a way to find more clues, but he also knew that this was definitely a dead end and they couldn''t avoid getting the help of others.


    But it was a good thing that this airship was owned by the Zhu Family.


    Before even getting on the ship, the captain hade over to acquaint himself with Lin Fan and had promised that if Lin Fan needed anything on this trip, he would do his best to fulfil that need.


    While Lin Fan had a strange feeling of not wanting to rely on others for this, he knew that there was no other choice so he dragged Ang to the helm and met with the captain.


    After Lin Fan exined the situation, the captain immediately said, "Young master Lin, we will immediately lock down the entire ship and search each cabin until we find youngdy Song."


    The captain was actually covered in cold sweat when he heard what had happened.


    The family head of the Zhu Family, the Legendary Realm Expert Zhu Ba Jie had personally given him the order to ensure that every single one of Lin Fan''s needs had to be taken care of perfectly. He had even said that if Lin Fan was even the slightest bit dissatisfied, he would suffer the consequences.


    This was a job where he would suffer consequences just from the slightest bit of dissatisfaction, then how much would he suffer if he had managed to lose one of Lin Fan''spanions?


    The captain was about to give his orders, but Lin Fan quickly stopped him.


    Lin Fan said, "Don''t do that. If you do, you''ll just alert the culprit that we''re onto them and they''ll hide even deeper on the ship, making it harder for us to find them."


    But the captain was still worried, "What do we do then?"


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before saying, "I want you to send men to start searching from the arcade area and spread out across the ship, searching in a all over the ship. But you have to make sure that your men blend in and create no disturbances at all, do you understand?"


    The captain quickly nodded and said, "Of course, of course." Then he headed off to send down Lin Fan''s orders.


    Lin Fan in the meantime had the person in charge of surveince pull up all the tape of the area around the arcade during those twenty minutes.


    As the cultivation of an expert grew, their mental power also increased with their cultivation. As such, Lin Fan and Ang could easily split their spiritual energy to survey all these videos at once.


    They quickly sped through the videos and they found that there were a total of six people who had been in the area during that time.


    The captain had returned from giving his orders and Lin Fan immediately said to him while pointing at frozen frames on all six of these people, "Gather these six for me immediately, they are the prime suspects!"

 162 Chapter 162

    The captain moved very quickly, gathering all these people in just five minutes in a separate room on the helm.


    During this time, the search had already begun, slowly moving outwards from the arcade with the pretense of providing house cleaning or maintenance to gain ess to each individual suite.


    But of course this was a slow process since they were trying to keep their actions under wraps to avoid arousing the suspicions of the kidnapper.


    Lin Fan really hoped that he would be able to find something from these six, otherwise he would have to rely on the sweep to turn up results. But by the time the sweep turned up results, it might already be toote for Song Shu¡­


    In short, time was of the essence right now.


    When Lin Fan came into the room, he could tell that the six of them were all clearly agitated from being suddenly brought here, but that only made it worse since it was hard to tell who was guilty or not.


    The six of them all turned to look at Lin Fan the moment he came into the room with surprise as they never expected someone so young.


    Of course, Ang had been left outside the room. With how agitated and angry she was, who knew what she would have done if she was allowed in. She was just ring at the screen, watching the situation in the room as the people around her all sat there nervously, not daring to make too loud of a sound.


    Inside the room, Lin Fan didn''t rush as he calmly sat down. He knew that if he were to rush, he would be showing how anxious he was and that would throw off the bnce of power that he had.


    These people were anxious because they had suddenly been caught and ced in a room with no exnation, they had been given enough time for their imaginations to run wild, so even the smallest bit of guilt that they had was tearing into them at this moment.


    When he had still been on earth, Lin Fan''s parents had been strict with his education while not caring about his upbringing, so they forced him to go to university to get a degree.


    While most subjects bored Lin Fan, he did find one subject that didn''tpletely bore him like the others. When he graduated, he had even made that one subject his major.


    The only thing that had appealed to him during university was psychology.


    He liked the feeling of using what he learned to manipte the other rich young masters.


    But now his love for manipting others yed a great use when it came to interrogating these six suspects.


    p Lin Fan just calmly walked over to a chair that was in front of all six of them and slowly sat down.</anda>


    Finally, one of the six couldn''t take it anymore. This was arge man with bulging muscles who was wearing a white tank top, showing off the bulging muscles on his arms. It was clear that this was a man who had simple thoughts and only relied on force to get his way.


    The man mmed the table in front of him and shouted, "Who are you and why are we being locked up here?!"


    Lin Fan calmly looked at him and asked with one raised brow, "You don''t know why you''re here?"


    The man''s face turned even more red as he shouted, "If I knew why I was here, do you really think I would still be asking you?!"


    Lin Fan just nodded.


    He knew that his man wasn''t lying based on his personality and the minor changes with his body.


    Unless this man was a master of acting, there was no way he could be faking these minor changes. Changes like the slight intonation in his tone, the slight tensing of his muscles when he shouted, and the bit of sweat that dide from his forehead.


    This man was indeed guilty, but he wasn''t guilty over the matter that Lin Fan cared about. This man was one of the top lieutenants of a powerful gang and his boss had entrusted him with an important package to bring to Water Pearl City. While he didn''t know why he was brought here with all these people, he was worried that it had something to do with this package.


    Lin Fan then turned away and ignored this man.


    The man''s face turned bright red as he mmed his fist down on the table again, but he was soon covered in a cold sweat when Lin Fan''s gaze turned to him.


    The aura that came from Lin Fan was like nothing he had ever felt before, it was a feeling of a mountain that he could never climb, one thatpletely crushed down on him, shattering all his bones.


    It had to be known, this man as one of the top lieutenants in his gang was actually a Gold Realm Expert! While he was only in the low Gold Realm, he was still considered quite the expert.


    The muscr man instantly fell silent and fell on his butt on the couch behind him.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan ignored him and turned back to look over the rest of the six people in the room, but no one took the initiative to speak.


    He knew that this was as far as this trick would take him, but being able to get one out of six was already good enough.


    So without waiting any longer, Lin Fan slowly said, "The six of you have been gathered because you were in the arcade area between 5:40 and 6:00. During this time, there was an incident in that area and we wish to ask you what you saw during that time. Please cooperate with us and you''ll be free to leave right after."


    The six of them were all confused when they heard this, but they still cooperated with Lin Fan.


    The six of them tried their best to answer the questions that Lin Fan had, but the answers they gave were all answers that didn''t give Lin Fan any clues at all.


    The only strange thing he could get from these people were slight observations from two of them.


    They came from one meek lookingdy with sses and one schrly looking gentleman who had been reading his book while waiting for his turn.


    The two of them hadn''t seen anything strange, but they did mention that they had seen an old couple wandering the halls near the arcade during the period that Lin Fan had mentioned. They didn''t talk to the old couple, but they did remember the olddy giving them a sweet smile when they walked past.


    This was strange to Lin Fan since he hadn''t noticed this old couple in the camera footage at all.


    Could it be that these two were lying or could it be¡­


    But thinking about it, it didn''t seem like these two were lying since he had been using his spiritual sense to observe them the entire time. At no point during their ount did their heartbeat increase or did they break out in sweat.


    Then could it really be that old couple?


    Lin Fan fell into thought again and he suddenly thought of the old couple that he had met when he first came onto the ship.


    He did get a strange feeling from them, but he had ignored it then. However, thinking back now, the words they said were indeed quite strange.


    While Lin Fan was lost in thought, there was someone that suddenly came in to get him.


    Lin Fan left the six in the room while he came out to the helm where the captain had something to tell him.


    "Young master Lin, there''s been reports of other missing children on the ship." The captain said in a worried voice.


    This situation was just getting worse and worse, not only had Lin Fan''spanion gone missing, there were even more children going missing on his ship. If he wasn''t able to solve this, he wouldn''t be able to get out of this mess in one piece.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before asking, "Where did the other children go missing?"


    The captain looked at the report he received before answering, "The missing children were reported from all different parts of the ship, but the kidnappings did happen at different times."


    Lin Fan turned to the monitors and said, "Bring up all the surveince tapes during this time and y them all at once."


    The captain nodded at the person in charge of the tapes and soon the tapes were ying on various monitors.


    Lin Fan already had a hunch as to who the suspects were, but going through the tapes confirmed this hunch even more.


    As he went through, he saw various different people moving in these areas, but the people he wanted to see didn''t appear on the tapes at all.


    Lin Fan immediately turned to the captain and asked, "When you questioned the parents of the kidnapped children, did they ever mention seeing an old couple, one where the olddy had a sweet smile?"


    The captain looked through his reports and he revealed a surprised look before turning back to Lin Fan, "You''re right, all the reports that we received mention an older couple with an olddy who had a sweet smile. How did you know that, young master Lin?"


    Lin Fan ignored this and immediately said, "Find the room of that old couple right now, they are our prime suspects!"

 163 Chapter 163

    The captain was surprised when he heard this, but he quickly came back to his senses and gave the order to his men to find the old couple.


    His men quickly went through the passenger list and it didn''t take them long before they were able to find this couple since there was only one old couple on this entire ship.


    Lin Fan was led by the captain himself to the room of this old couple and the captain had his men blockade the area and surround the door. At first the captain wanted to send his men in to breach, but Lin Fan stopped him and said he would do it himself.


    Ang also volunteered, but Lin Fan knew better than to let her go on a rampage.


    Once all the men were in ce, Lin Fan raised his foot and kicked in the door before charging inside to find a disturbing scene.


    The shades werepletely closed, but when they turned on the lights, they found many kids sitting in various parts of the room.


    On the bed was Song Shu who had been tied spread eagle with a gag in her mouth, but the good thing was that her clothes were still intact and there weren''t any visible injuries on her.


    As for the other kids, they were sitting on the ground against different walls with nk expressions on their faces. It was clear that they had been drugged and weren''t conscious at this moment.


    The captain was about to rush forward to help these kids, but Lin Fan suddenly grabbed him by the back of his cor, stopping him from moving forward.


    The captain looked at Lin Fan with a confused expression, but Lin Fan wasn''t looking back at him at all.


    Rather Lin Fan''s eyes had been on Song Shu.


    Song Shu for some reason hadn''t been drugged like the other kids, maybe it was because she was thest one captured or maybe it was for a different reason. When she saw Lin Fan, her eyes immediately lit up, but then she began trying to signal him with her eyes by pointing up with them.


    Lin Fan didn''t understand what this meant at first, but then he felt a dangerous feeling from above him. Lin Fan quickly moved back with the captain as two des fell down from above where they had just been standing, stabbing into the ground.


    Once he moved back a bit, Lin Fan raised his other hand to punch at the two figures that had dropped down with these two swords.


    The two figures both gave clean turns, allowing them to avoid all of the force released in this punch. Then using that force, they floated back several meters and created distance with Lin Fan,nding near the bed.


    This airship was an airship for rich people, so each of the rooms offered to guests were all quite spacious and luxurious.


    This was actually one of the smaller rooms and it already took up an area of over ten square meters.


    The two figures firmlynded before standing up to reveal their true appearance. It was the old man and woman who had spoken to Lin Fan when he first got onto the ship.


    Since Lin Fan''s group had alreadye to their room, there was no point in trying to hide who they were. Not to mention that they were confident in their ability to take care of Lin Fan''s group.


    The old man said, "See, I told you you shouldn''t have taken that little girl. Now look at all the trouble you''ve brought."


    The old woman said, "But she looks just like a doll, I really couldn''t help myself. You know that we would take better care of her than these kids ever could."


    As the two of them argued with each other, Lin Fan began moving towards the bed and he pushed the captain towards some kids near the walls. Moving silently, they slowly approached their targets, but once they were just out of reach, the old man and woman stopped arguing and turned back to them.


    They both released an air de attack with their swords which pushed back Lin Fan and the captain.


    Once they did that, Lin Fan turned to them and asked, "Do you want to tell us why you''re doing this?"


    The old woman revealed the same sweet smile as before as she said, "You already know that we lost our son, but we never got over it. So we figured that the only thing we could do now was rece him with even more children to fill the void. Of course, we''ll definitely take good care of these kids, better than any of you could ever take care of them."


    Lin Fan ignored this and just asked, "There are plenty of kids who are orphans on the streets that you can adopt, why do you have to resort to stealing kids?"


    The old woman said, "Those street urchins are filthy, but these kids are well behaved children who were raised well. If you had a choice, which one would you choose?"<sub> </sub>


    Then she moved over to Song Shu on the bed and said, "Especially this little one, she is just like a little doll. How could I resist taking her and raising her as my own?"


    Lin Fan had heard enough, he immediately released his aura and prepared for a fight.


    The old couple revealed surprised looks when they felt Lin Fan''s aura since they never expected him to be in the tinum Realm at such a young age. Moreover, he was already in the mid tinum Realm.


    But the old couple wasn''t worried at all since they were confident in executing this n, even if it did mean offending royals.


    The two old people released their auras and everyone around was shocked.


    The aura they released was actually stronger than Lin Fan, both the old man and the old woman were in the high tinum Realm!


    The old woman said with her sweet smile, "Child, you don''t have to get hurt. I know that you''re a good kid by the way you raised this little doll, but it''s also clear that she isn''t yours. Just give her to me and no one has to get hurt, alright?"


    The old man however said, "You know you can''t win, both of us are stronger than you, how will you be able to beat us?"


    But Lin Fan just ignored them as he gave a nod to Ang.


    Ang gave a nod back and before the old couple could even react, she had suddenly used her windws to elerate and pick up all the kids around the room, bringing them outside.


    Then when she was prepared toe back in to take care of the couple, Lin Fan raised his hand to stop her.


    When the old couple finally reacted, they realized that every single kid was gone from the room, but they didn''t know how it happened.


    The old man had a cautious look on his face, but the old woman went into a frenzy, "What did you do?! How dare you take all my precious babies! They belong to me, I am their mother, how dare you take them away!"


    Lin Fan was more than confident since he knew that he could easily defeat them, so he asked, "What happened to your son that it caused you to act this way?"


    The old woman roared out, "My son? My son? You''re the one who took him away from me! You took away my sons and my daughters, give them all back to me!"


    When she was about to charge out at Lin Fan, the old man took her hand and held her back as he said to Lin Fan, "Our son, to be honest, it was all our fault. We were wild back in our younger days and that created a lot of enemies. Those enemies teamed up together and plotted against us, a plot that had cost the life of our son." Then his eyes turned cold and sharp, "Of course, we punish them all for that and now they''re all dead."


    Then his eyes rxed as he looked at Lin Fan with a pleading gaze, "How about you just give us one or two of those kids, they aren''t rted to you at all and you can avoid this fight. We''ll leave once you give them to us and we''ll never bother you again. What do you say?"


    But the old woman wouldn''t take any of this as she said in a hysterical voice, "Old man, are you serious? After all we''ve done, you''re just going to let them take our babies? Those are our precious children and you''re just letting them take them away from us? I won''t let that ever happen again!"


    Lin Fan could see that the old man was also hurting from the loss of his son, but he also cared deeply for his wife which was why he went along with her crazy n.


    But even then, when he thought of how the kids were treated, there was an impulse that filled him that made him want to protect them.


    It was the same strange impulse that had made him protect Zi Ling, it was just an impulse that made him want to protect anything that he deemed helpless and unable to stand up for itself.


    He didn''t know where it came from, but it was too strong to ignore.


    Lin Fan looked at the old man and said, "Unfortunately, I can''t do that."


    The old man gave a sigh, but then he suddenly disappeared.


    When he reappeared again, the de of his sword was already right in front of Lin Fan''s eyes.

 164 Chapter 164

    But of course Lin Fan had already expected this and was prepared to block the old man''s attack.


    He had already brought out the Iron Eater Bone Artifact and was already swinging up when the old man had disappeared, but this time he didn''t turn it into the same zweihander.


    It was clear that this old couple specialized in windws and the main characteristic of the windw was its speed.


    Lin Fan had instead shifted the Iron Eater Bone Artifact into a little dagger that he brought up to block and knock away the sword of the old man.


    The old man had a look of surprise when he saw this little dagger easily block his sword, but he didn''t pause for even a second as he used the momentum of the dagger''s upward swing to turn in the air. Using that spin to generate force, the old man''s sword came shing up, aiming to cut Lin Fan''s face from the chin to his forehead.


    Of course, Lin Fan wouldn''t just let himself be cut that easily, as he brought the dagger that hade up with the swing down again to block the old man''s sword.


    But when the dagger came down, it changed forms into a heavier sword that utilized the gravity gained from the falling of this heavier weapon to generate a stronger sh.


    The swords shed and the old man was sent flying through the air, flying back towards the old woman.


    The old man skillfully spun in the air and neutralized most of the force that came from Lin Fan''s swing beforending on the ground near the old woman.


    However, when he didnd, his hand suddenly came to his mouth and he gave a cough, spitting out blood onto his palm.


    During that sh, even though he had used hisw of wind, Lin Fan had somehow overpowered him and he had suffered internal injuries from that sh.


    After wiping off the blood from the corner of his lips, the old man looked at Lin Fan and once again his eyes filled with surprise when he looked at Lin Fan''s sword. That was because Lin Fan''s sword was currently covered in the power of three differentws.


    Without anyone noticing, during the time that Lin Fan''s dagger changed into a sword and fell down, it had suddenly been covered in three different coloured glows of gold, blue, and white, symbolizing thews of force, water, and lightning.


    The old man said in a surprised voice, "You can actually wield the power of three differentws?"


    The old woman finally stopped her hysterical screaming and looked at Lin Fan with a cautious gaze in her eyes. She finally had no choice but to stop herself from losing her mind and actually paying attention to Lin Fan.


    The old woman cautiously said, "Just who are you?"


    This was a young man who was in the tinum Realm and could use three differentws, it was clear that he wasn''t just a normal person.


    Then there was the fact that the captain working for the Zhu Family was this respectful to him, it was clear that he came from a power that the Zhu Family treated equally.


    At that moment, the old woman started feeling a bit of regret about taking Song Shu. If she hadn''t taken her, she wouldn''t have provoked this young man with his mysterious and powerful backing.


    But it was toote to feel regret now, there was only one path for them to take.


    Lin Fan ignored this question and said to them, "It isn''t toote to give up now, I can promise you that you won''t suffer much if you surrender."


    The old couple looked at each other before giving softughs.


    The old man said, "Do you really think we would believe you? We''ve offended the Zhu Family by trying to steal children on the airship they run, this is equal to pping the face of the Zhu Family. Do you really think that they would let us off?"


    The old woman added, "Moreover, there''s a little monster like you, which means that the Zhu Family should be paying more attention to this matter than normal. This matter will almost definitely reach the head of the Zhu Family and at that time, there would only be death for us."


    It was clear to Lin Fan that these two didn''t mean any harm, they were just driven to craziness in their grief which was understandable. If possible, he genuinely wanted to help them, which was once again the strange impulse that came from deep down inside him. So he continued trying to convince them, "I''ll give you my word that I''ll do my best to help¡­"


    But he didn''t get a chance to finish as the old man said, "Enough, we all know how this will end, so at least let us go out with dignity."


    The old woman moved over to the old man and stood back to back with him, sping their hands together and putting away their swords.


    The old man said, "This is our final move, if you can take it, it will be your victory."


    Lin Fan wanted to say something, but he didn''t have a chance as the old couple suddenly jumped up and started turning. As they turned in the air, they gathered more and more wind energy around them, creating a giant cyclone with razor sharp wind des.


    Once they finished gathering their wind, they suddenly changed directions and pointed themselves at Lin Fan, beginning to elerate once they finished aiming.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan could tell that this attack wasn''t simple, in terms of how powerful the life energy contained in this attack was, it had already reached the peak tinum Realm.


    But that didn''t mean Lin Fan couldn''t deal with it.


    He released all threews again and this time the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was transformed into a ymore as he gathered all his life energy around it, in the form of three differentws.


    He swung down with the ymore and the ymore shed with the cyclone of wind des. At first it seemed like Lin Fan was about to be pushed back, but he somehow held on. The most important part of this entire sh was that during the sh, there were slivers of green wind energy that were absorbed by Lin Fan''s sword and were absorbed into his body.


    Eventually, the cyclone was weakened enough that it couldn''t sh with Lin Fan''s sword any longer and it was dispersed. Lin Fan''s sword continued forth and created arge gash in the chest of the old man who had moved in front of the old woman to protect her before sending them flying away.


    The old man and old woman crashed into the wall before falling to the ground.


    The old woman was able to get back up since she only suffered minor internal injuries, but the old man was just lying there with therge gash across his chest.


    The old woman came over to him and held him in her arms, looking down into his eyes with sadness.


    After sharing onest final look, she said, "Together?"


    The old man nodded and said, "Together."


    They knew that they had been beaten, so the only thing they could do was go out on their own terms.


    But before they did, the old man turned to Lin Fan and said, "I can tell that you are the same as us, you think you''re strong and can beat anything, but I can tell you now that that attitude will earn you plenty of enemies. There will be a day when thates back to hurt you, namely the one you love the most. I hope you''ll be able to get past it better than we did."


    Once he finished saying this, he gripped his wife''s hand and there was a sudden increase in life energy around them.


    Everyone''s faces fell when they saw this.


    This kind of life energy increase could only mean a single thing, it meant that they were about to kill themselves and blow up their cultivation!


    The captain and his men began running away, but Lin Fan just calmly summoned out his three pets.


    The old man and old woman were surprised to see these pets since these pets were all in the high tinum Realm just like them.


    The three pets released theirws and trapped the old man and old woman. At the same time, Lin Fan transformed his Iron Eater Bone Artifact into two daggers which he threw out at the trapped old couple, piercing them right in the heart.


    The old couple died sharing onest look and holding each other.


    Lin Fan revealed a sad look before walking over to use his suction power to absorb the remaining bit of windw that was left in the corpses since no one else was around.


    As he sucked it in, the green energy inside his dantian began taking a more physical form, bing close to what a giant tornado would look like.


    Then after that, he gave the couple a moment of silence before walking out.


    ¡­


    Far away from the airship, inside a giant ck tower.


    There was a person who suddenly came inside a gathering hall where several cloaked figures were sitting around a long table.


    That person immediately kneeled down to these people and said, "Reporting in, the soul jades of the Wind Demons have been shattered!"


    The people at the table were all shocked when they heard this.


    The cloaked figure sitting at the head of the table mmed his fist down before saying in a dark voice, "Find out who did it."

 165 Chapter 165

    After taking care of the old couple, the captain and his men took care of returning the other kids to their parents.


    Lin Fan on the other hand went to take care of Song Shu with Ang.


    But to his surprise, Song Shu wasn''t fazed by this at all, rather she was still quite high spirited as she helpedfort the other kids who had been kidnapped with her. Seeing her with those other kids, it gave her a big sister feel.


    She took care of the kids until the final one was brought away by their parents before copsing on the couch in the room.


    Lin Fan silently looked at her before turning to give a look to the captain and his men who were still present. The captain took the hint and quickly left with his men, leaving only Lin Fan, Ang, and Song Shu in the room.


    Lin Fan came over to Song Shu and sat down beside her, patting her on the head without saying a thing.


    Song Shu didn''t react at first, but after a while, she turned and put her head into Lin Fan''s shoulder.


    Lin Fan still didn''t say anything, but he could feel the shoulder part of his clothes bing wet. Song Shu just trembled without saying anything, but it was clear that she was crying.


    Still he didn''t do a thing as he just continued to pat her head, but then Song Shu grabbed him and muttered, "I was scared¡­"


    Lin Fan said, "It''s alright, you''re safe now."


    Neither of them said anything past that and they just stayed there for several minutes before Song Shu stood up. She wiped her eyes and went over to Ang, taking her hand as she walked out with her.


    Ang cast a look at Lin Fan and he just nodded to her before she went out.


    Lin Fan looked down at his fists that were clenched before revealing aplicated look.


    ¡­


    The rest of the journey progressed as nned and after three days, they finally reached Water Pearl City.


    During this trip, after that single moment of weakness, Song Shu returned to normal the next day and brought the two of them around once again. But this time it was different, Ang didn''t let her out of her sight for even a single second. Even Lin Fan followed the two of them at all times.


    But nothing happened in the end.


    When they arrived in Water Pearl City, the first thing that they saw when theynded were therge canals that ran through the city which all fed water to the giant fountain that was right in the center.


    It was a city that waspletely filled with water as the name said and right at the tip of the fountain, there was a giant pearl that radiated sapphire blue light with a rainbow right above it.


    This pearl was actually the city guarding treasure of Water Pearl City, it was a treasure that was left by the founding family and would create a barrier around the city when it was attacked. This was a treasure that was left by a Legendary Realm Expert, so everyone trusted its power and slowly moved here, creating the S Rank City.


    Once the airshipnded and Lin Fan''s group got off, they were shocked by the scene they witnessed.


    There was arge crowd gathered on thending strip, but the reason for this was that they were all surrounding a luxurious looking carriage with a pig symbol on it.


    Lin Fan recognized this symbol as soon as he saw it since it was the symbol on the token that Zhu Ba Jie had left for him, which was the symbol of the Zhu Family.


    However, just this carriage alone shouldn''t have been able to draw in thisrge of a crowd. But then when Lin Fan saw who was standing there, he immediately understood.


    Standing there was Zhu Ba Jie and several people who looked just like him who should have been members of his family. Also standing there with him was Zhang Liang and several people standing all around him.


    They were clearly here waiting for something with the way they were just standing there, but this was a big deal for the crowd since these two were very famous people in Water Pearl City. Now the two of them were actually standing on thending strip for an airship waiting for someone, just who were these two waiting for?


    Their questions were soon answered as Lin Fan''s group came out with the captain beside them, they had been the first ones who had been allowed to exit the ship.


    When Zhu Ba Jie and Zhang Liang saw Lin Fan, they immediately came over with smiles and leading their entire group.


    Such arge group moving was very eye-catching and the crowd''s attention followed them until they allnded on Lin Fan, but this also confused them. The head and the Legendary Realm Expert of the Zhu Family and the vice president of the Monster Training Union, these two were at the top of thedder in Water Pearl City, but they were here to wee a young man who wasn''t even in his twenties yet?


    Just what was the identity of this young man thatmanded such respect?


    Zhu Ba Jie ignored the crowd and came forward with a smile, "Owner Lin, I hope that you''ve had afortable journey?" Then he turned to the captain and said, "I''m sure that there weren''t any mishaps, correct?"


    The captain revealed an awkward look since there had indeed been a mishap, but he looked to Lin Fan with a pleading look.


    Lin Fan of course wouldn''t me the captain for what had happened since the old couple had been in the tinum Realm, they could be considered powerful experts in this lower realm.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was the one who answered as he said, "It was indeed quite a good journey. It was our little Song Shu''s first time on an airship, so she was quite excited."


    Zhu Ba Jie turned to Song Shu and he cupped his hands to her, "Alchemy Master, it''s an honour to meet again."


    Everyone watching was once again shocked by what they saw!


    The head of the Zhu Family was actually cupping his hands and giving a slight bow to a little girl who wasn''t even ten years old yet!


    Once they saw this, their minds really went wild and all kinds of different rumours were spread.


    "Maybe these two are juniors from an ancient family?"


    "No, no, no, they must be famous disciples from some sect."


    "I think they might even be envoys from the upper realm¡­"


    <o>,m "No matter who they are, we must make sure that we never offend them."</o>


    But of course, with power and fame, there was also a different kind of emotion that was generated.


    "That young man really is handsome, if only I could find some way to get close to him."


    "It would be great if I could have his babies."


    "That little girl really is cute, I want to keep her for myself."


    Of course thest person who said this was secretly dragged away and beaten up by the crowd.


    Song Shu was surprised to see Zhu Ba Jie acting this polite with her, but she quickly remembered what Elder Hua had taught her and she gave an awkward curtsy.


    Zhu Bai Jie was someone who was easy to get along with and his one fatal weakness was that he was weak against his cute grandchildren. He was famous for being someone that spoiled his cute grandkids.


    When faced with this cute attack from Song Shu, his heart couldn''t help melting and he had a silly smile on his face as he patted her on her head.


    Song Shu didn''t mind this and was quite happy with being patted.


    While Zhu Ba Jie was upied with Song Shu, Zhang Liang came forward with a fanatic look and said, "Owner Lin, if you have time now, pleasee with me to our Monster Trainer Union. I have many things I want to discuss with you."


    But Lin Fan was quite tired from his trip, so he said, "Elder Zhang, it''s been a long trip and I was hoping to rest up a bit first."


    Zhang Liang was about to say something else, but one of the people who came with him came forward to say, "Master, young master Lin has travelled a long way toe here, I''m sure he must be tired and needs some rest. We can always have young master Line tomorrow morning."


    Zhang Liang wanted to say more, but seeing the stern look on his disciple''s face, he could only give up. But he didn''t forget to add, "Owner Lin, you have to remember."


    The way he said this made him sound like a girl who had been neglected which caused a chill to run down Lin Fan''s spine, but he still said with a smile, "Elder Zhang, I will definitely be there early tomorrow morning, please be assured."


    Elder Zhang still looked aggrieved, but he muttered, "Alright, I''ll take your promise for now then."


    At this point Zhu Ba Jie finished pampering Song Shu and came back over, "Owner Lin, should we head back to our Zhu Manor? We have prepared rooms and a banquet for you."


    Lin Fan nodded at this.


    Zhu Ba Jie turned to Zhang Liang, "Old Zhang, are youing with us?"


    Zhang Liang shook his head and said, "I still have to go back and report to the president." Then he turned to leave, but he didn''t forget to turn back and add, "Owner Lin, you have to keep your promise."


    Lin Fan just waved his hand and nodded with a smile as he watched Zhang Liang leave.


    Once they were gone, Zhu Ba Jie turned and said, "Shall we?"


    With that, they entered the beast carriage Zhu Ba Jie came in and headed off into Water Pearl City.

 166 Chapter 166

    The beast carriage headed through the main street of Water Pearl City, heading off towards the Zhu Manor that was right at the tip of the fountain.


    There were many strange sights to see in Water Pearl City and Song Shu waspletely glued to the window.


    By the streets of Water Pearl City, there were canals that ran along them which were all connected to each other. When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help thinking of the famous canals that he had once seen in Venice on earth.


    But different from Venice, these canals weren''t filled with gonds, rather they were filled with strange vehicles unique to this world.


    This was a world where beasts were tamed as pets, so these beasts were also used in creative manors. For Water Pearl City, there were fish type beasts that were tamed and being used as transportation. It was arge fish that was slightly bigger than a human with a seat attached to its back that could fit one or two people.


    Then there wererger fishes that were around the size of the beast carriage that they were sitting in withrger seats on their back which could fit several people.


    These small and medium sized fishes swam on the sides of the canals and in the center, there were thergest fishes, which were actually just whales.


    These whales were asrge as the buildings that were on the road, but the seats on their backs were also just asrge and could carry several dozen people. But of course, most of these whales weren''t private use and they had a banner on the side of them showing that they were buses.


    The speed of these fishes and whales were a bit slower than that of the beast carriage they were in, but it wasn''t that much slower which meant it was quite a good form of transport. Inparison, there were actually far fewer carriages on the roadpared to fishes in the canal.


    Of course, the Zhu Family''s beast carriage was different since this was a special carriage being pulled by Gold Realm beasts.


    They slowly made their way through the main street beforeing to the center fountain where they had to get out of the beast carriage.


    The only way up the fountain was canals, so they had to get out and change to arge whale.


    Song Shu was very excited since she had been wanting to ride one of these whales ever since she saw them on the street.


    Song Shu came up to the whale and patted it on its head which the whale enjoyed quite a bit.


    When Zhu Ba Jie saw this, he revealed a smile before calling to the person who took care of the whale. That person immediately followed his order and brought out a bucket of fish for Song Shu to feed the whale with.


    When Song Shu threw a fish into the mouth of the whale, it was so happy that it blew out a jet of water from the hole on its back, sshing everything around it which included Song Shu.


    Sheughed as she was being sshed by the whale before throwing another fish into its mouth.


    Everyone on the side seeing this scene couldn''t stop their hearts from melting from how cute it was.


    Once that was over, they all got on the back of the whale and disproportionate to its size, it immediately shot off along the canal and climbed up the fountain.


    This canal was actually quite steep, so it threw them all back against the backrest of the seats. There were some people who were almost thrown off, namely Song Shu who didn''t have a high cultivation, but it was a good thing that they were advised to strap in before sitting down, so they weren''t thrown off.


    Eventually the whale came to the very tip of the fountain and arrived in front of a giant manor.


    Everyone got off the manor and walked through the gates of that manor. As they walked through the front garden, the topiaries in the front were in quite the surprising design. No matter where they looked, all the decorations were made in the shape of pigs. Whether it was the topiaries, the basin, the fountain, or even the gazebo, everything was designed with a pig motif.


    Finally they walked into the main hall and once again, they were hit with the same pig motif. Everything was designed with pigs in mind and it really was strange.


    But they were guests here, so Lin Fan''s group really couldn''t say anything.


    Since it had been the afternoon when they arrived, it was now close to dinner with how long it took them toe to the manor. Zhu Ba Jie led them all to the dining room where there had been a luxurious banquet set up waiting for them.


    Everyone took their seats and it didn''t take long before they were happily enjoying the feast that was ced in front of them.


    During this feast, Zhu Ba Jie introduced his family and true to their names, all of them had features that made them look like pigs. Even the granddaughters that winked their eyes at Lin Fan all had pig like features which really caused chills to run down Lin Fan''s back.


    But there was one strange thing that had caught Lin Fan''s attention during these introductions.


    Zhu Ba Jie had a total of four sons and every son had many different children, but each and every one of them had the same pig like features, that was except for a certain one who had a mask on the entire time.


    When that person was introduced, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Elder Zhu, is there something wrong with this Zhu Tie? Why is he wearing a mask during dinner?"<sub> </sub>


    Zhu Ba Jie revealed an awkward look at this and he turned to Zhu Tie to allow him to exin.


    Zhu Tie gave a sigh before saying, "Young master Lin, the reason why I''m wearing this mask is that my appearance is disfigured and I don''t want to ruin the harmonious mood of this feast. I normally try to stay away from others since my face is disfigured, but I really couldn''t helping to meet young master Lin after hearing all about you. I am truly sorry for ruining everyone''s good time."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows when he heard this, but he said, "Actually if you don''t mind, Ang here is quite good at using healing techniques. If you could show us what''s wrong with your face, we might be able to help you fix it.''


    Since they were guests here, Lin Fan didn''t mind helping them a bit, especially with how much respect the Zhu Family had shown them.


    Zhu Tie''s eyes through the mask lit up when he heard this, "Really?"


    He had been living with this ugly appearance since he had been born and he just couldn''t help feeling ashamed whenever he looked in the mirror.


    After getting confirmation from Lin Fan, Zhu Tie slowly took off his mask and what was revealed waspletely shocking.


    If Lin Fan had to describe it with one word, it would be "angel".


    Like the pictures of angels that he had seen on earth, this Zhu Tie was a perfect representation of what artists on earth thought angels looked like.


    Zhu Tie had flowing long blond hair and longshes with piercing blue eyes. His skin was as white as milk and his teeth glittered against the light. All his facial features were perfect, like they had been chiseled out of marble.


    But for some reason this Zhu Tie was calling himself ugly, it really was confusing for Lin Fan.


    Song Shu on the side even couldn''t stop herself when she saw Zhu Tie''s face as she said under her breath, "Wow!"


    She had honestly never seen such a pretty person before.


    But when Zhu Tie saw the shock on their faces, he misunderstood why they were shocked.


    Zhu Tie put his hands to his face and he said, "I''m very sorry you had to see my ugly face. I know that I am not as handsome as my father, my grandfather, or all my other pretty family members. I should have just stayed in my room instead ofing out here to ruin everything!"


    When he heard this, Lin Fan''s face couldn''t help twitching.


    In the end, it was the strange sense of taste that the Zhu Family had!


    They felt that things that looked like pigs were beautiful, so that''s why they felt that those that looked like pigs like the rest of the family were beautiful and anyone who didn''t look like that were considered ugly¡­


    But of course thatpletely went againstmon sense!


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before saying, "Actually, I don''t think you''re that ugly. Rather you''re one of the more handsome people that I''ve seen."


    Zhu Tie of course didn''t believe this as he said, "Owner Lin, you don''t have to be polite. I know what I am."


    Lin Fan''s face couldn''t help twitching again, but thinking about it, if he had this eye candy in his store, he would definitely bring in plenty of customers.


    At this, he turned to Zhu Ba Jie and said, "Elder Zhu, if it is possible, could I have Zhu Tie work in my store?"


    Zhu Ba Jie was surprised by this, but he also said, "Sure, that''s not a problem."


    Actually, Zhu Ba Jie didn''t like seeing his grandson like this. While he did think that Zhu Ba Jie was a bit ugly, it still hurt his heart to see his grandson like this, so he had racked his brain to think of ways to help his grandson regain his confidence. Perhaps Lin Fan might be able to work a miracle and make this happen.


    Zhu Tie had a shocked look on his face as he quickly said, "But grandfather, if I go out with this appearance, I will definitely scare everyone. I can''t do this."


    Zhu Ba Jie looked at him with a worried look as he said, "Xiao Tie, you can''t just hide in the manor your entire life. Eventually you will have to go out and I trust Owner Lin to take good care of you. If you really can''t do it, you can always go out with your mask on."


    But Lin Fan cut in at this, "Actually I want him toe work in my store without his mask on. His face is actually the main reason I want to hire him."


    Both Zhu Ba Jie and Zhu Tie were shocked when they heard this.

 167 Chapter 167

    After dinner and hiring Zhu Tie, Lin Fan''s group were led to rooms that had been prepared for them in the west hall of the manor.


    These rooms were all luxuriously decorated, but they had been put in separate rooms.


    Once night fell and it was time to sleep, all of them naturally came into a single room and they fell asleep together.


    Lin Fan was of course banished to the couch while the two girls took therge bed that was in his room. Tomorrow he would definitely have to get the servants to bring a smaller bed in like they had done at the Mu Manor.


    The next morning, after they woke up and finished cleaning up, they arrived at the same dining hall asst night for breakfast.


    This time, the entire Zhu Family wasn''t gathered and it was just Zhu Ba Jie as well as Zhu Tie who were waiting for them.


    Zhu Ba Jie happily greeted them when he saw them, "Good morning Owner Lin, how did you sleepst night?"


    Lin Fan did his best sleeping on the couchst night, but it was still sleeping on the couch which was quite ufortable, but he still said with a smile, "It was alright."


    Zhu Ba Jie then said, "Good, good. Then Owner Lin, when do you want to see your new shop? We already have it prepared and we can bring you there at any time."


    This was what Lin Fan had been waiting for. He still had his mission from the system, so the sooner he could get this store up and running, the sooner he could build his business.


    But then he remembered what he had promised vice president Zhang Liang yesterday. He still had to visit the Monster Trainer Union this morning, so he couldn''t immediately head over to his new shop.


    However, thinking about it, he did realize that he didn''t know theyout of Water Pearl City at all either, so he would need a guide. Lin Fan said, "Elder Zhu, if possible, could you let Zhu Tie lead us around? You know that I still have to go to the Monster Trainer Union this morning and I don''t know my way around Water Pearl City. If Zhu Tiees with me, he can bring me to the store right after and I can have him help me out at the store while exining his duties to him.


    Zhu Ba Jie nodded at this, "Of course, I don''t mind at all. Rather this is a very good idea since Xiao Tie always stays at home anyway. I always tell him to go out and get some fresh air, but he never listens."


    Zhu Tie looked worried at first, but seeing that his grandfather had already agreed, he looked resigned as he gave a nod as well. It was very clear by his appearance that he didn''t want to go out at all.


    After breakfast was over, Zhu Ba Jie headed off but he gave his personal beast carriage to Zhu Tie to show Lin Fan around. He also told Lin Fan that he would see themter at dinner.


    Zhu Tie was wearing his mask when he came out of the house. Lin Fan thought about having him take it off, but he decided not to do so since they weren''t in the store yet. With that handsome face, he would use it while in the store and when it was outside, it was better to hide it. But if he did ever gain enough confidence to show his face full time, that was fine with Lin Fan too since that would also be good advertisement for his store.


    They rode the same whale as yesterday, taking some time to let Song Shu y with it again and they came down to the main street where Zhu Ba Jie''s beast carriage was waiting.


    The Monster Trainer Union wasn''t that far away from the Zhu Manor since these two were the peak organizations of this town. Since they didn''t have an antagonistic rtionship and regrly worked with each other, their headquarters were quite close.


    It only took them ten minutes of heading down the main street, going around the edge of the fountain to the other side to reach the Monster Trainer Union.


    When they arrived, Lin Fan''s group got out, but Zhu Tie stayed inside.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he asked, "Zhu Tie, you''re noting with us?"


    Zhu Tie said, "I''m still not used to being outside, so I''ll just stay in the beast carriage."


    Lin Fan didn''t insist, but he did say, "You''ll have to get used to being around people eventually since you''ll be working in my store. I can tell you now, working in my store isn''t easy at all since it will be a very popr store."


    Zhu Tie had an awkward look on his face under the mask as he said, "Owner Lin, I''ve actually been meaning to talk to you about this. Could I not work in your store?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan shook his head, "Of course not, I need someone like you in my store and I can''t find someone else that easily. You''re someone I definitely need in my store."


    Zhu Tie still had an unwilling look in his eyes, but he couldn''t go against the orders of his grandfather, so he said with a resigned look, "Alright Owner Lin. I''ll wait here for your return."


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and turned to leave.


    Zhu Tie was definitely the best eye candy possible, how could he let him go that easily?


    p Besides, he''ll gain confidence soon with all the girls swarming him¡­</anda>


    Lin Fan''s group walked to the front of the Monster Trainer Union and they found a group waiting outside for them.


    When Lin Fan looked over that group, he found that it was the same group that Zhang Liang had brought out with him yesterday and the one leading them was the same disciple who spoke up. But with that group, there was also another group that was led by this ugly looking young master who kept pestering that disciple.


    Zhang Liang''s disciple was actually quite the beautiful young woman with light green eyes and cyan hair. She was quite tall for her age, which was the start of her twenties. As for her figure, while she was a little t up top, her bottom half had all the right curves.


    When Zhang Liang''s disciple saw Lin Fan, she ignored the ugly young master who kept pestering her and came up to Lin Fan''s group. She cupped her hands and gave a slight bow as she said, "Hello young master Lin, we''ve been expecting you. You might not remember, but I am Yu Ning, Master Zhang''s disciple who was there to wee you yesterday."


    Lin Fan nodded and cupped his hands towards her as well, "Miss Yu, I''m sorry for keeping you waiting. Have you been out here for long?"


    Yu Ning shook her head, "No, no, young master Lin has nothing to apologize for, it''s an honour to wait for you. My master wanted toe this morning, but there was a matter that came up that he had to take care of. He wants to express his utmost apologies for not being able toe personally."


    Lin Fan waved his hand, "It doesn''t matter, I''m sure that Elder Zhang is busy. I don''t mind at all since I''m the one who is dropping in on him."


    Yu Ning said, "Master has instructed me to take you to a ce to rest,ter he wille with the president to meet you. If you would please follow me."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling at this since he really didn''t want to just sit around waiting, so he said, "Um, Miss Yu, if possible, could I walk around the Monster Trainer Union first? This is my first time here and I would love to take a look around."


    Yu Ning was surprised by this, but she quickly recovered and said, "Young master Lin, of course we can walk around. We just thought that it would be boring for you since there''s nothing special with our Monster Trainer Union."


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "How could that be? The Monster Trainer Union is famous, how could there be nothing special with it? You should know that I''m also a sort of Monster Trainer, but I''ve never actually gotten my license yet."


    Yu Ning was even more surprised by this since she had heard from her master that this young master Lin was actually a Master Monster Trainer at his young age, but she said, "If young master Lin doesn''t mind, we can sign you up for a test and you can get your license today."


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "Alright, that''s a good idea. I should get the proper certification since I am running a pet store."


    With this, their two groups began walking into the Monster Trainer Union.


    But there was someone who suddenly appeared in front of them.


    The ugly young master had endured being ignored by Yu Ning, but seeing her happily talking to Lin Fan, he couldn''t stop the jealous feeling inside him. He even ignored all of the things Yu Ning said about her master, just seeing how happy they were filled him with anger.


    He came up to Lin Fan and poked him in the chest as he said, "How are you qualified to make Yu Ning guide you around? Who do you think you are?"

 168 Chapter 168

    Lin Fan took a look at that young master before turning to Yu Ning and saying, "Miss Yu, should we go? Since I don''t know the way, I''ll have to count on you to lead the way."


    Yu Ning was surprised at how calm Lin Fan was, but she followed his lead and led the way, moving past the young master.


    But that young master wouldn''t just let things rest like this.


    When Lin Fan passed by the young master, the young master made it look like he was about to move out of the way, but then he suddenly tripped. As he tripped, his fist came up, flying right towards Lin Fan''s face.


    But Lin Fan had already expected this, so he smoothly moved to the side and dodged past the fist. At the same time, he didn''t forget to slightly stick out his foot right in front of where that young master was "falling", making him fall for real.


    The young master didn''t even have time to react as he realized that he hadpletely lost his sense of bnce, tumbling forward andnding on his face.


    Once he was on the ground, everyone was stunned to see what had happened.


    During this time, Lin Fan didn''t forget to turn around and stick his hand out to help the young master as he said with a smile, "Are you alright?"


    The young master''s face scrunched up when he heard this, but he didn''t do anything other than take Lin Fan''s hand.


    He had already embarrassed himself by taking this tumble in front of the one he was trying to impress, if he continued like this and took it too far, he wouldn''t have any face left. At this point, the only thing he could do to save his pride was to back off, but that didn''t mean he would forget it easily.


    When Lin Fan helped him up, the young master came closer to Lin Fan and whispered, "You''re going to regret that, just you wait."


    Then with a slight push, which didn''t move Lin Fan at all and felt like pushing against an iron wall, the young master gave a cold snort before walking off with his goons.


    Lin Fan just watched him leave with a smile, but he didn''t say a word.


    Yu Ning came over with a worried look and said, "Young Master Lin, while I have no doubt of your abilities, that might not have been the best move. That Gu Xiong is actually quite talented despite how he looks and the family behind him isn''t one to look down on. It''s said that they have someone who''s already close to reaching the Legendary Realm."


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "It''s fine, I have my own ways to deal with people like him."


    Yu Ning slightly knit her brows when she heard this, but then she realized that Lin Fan waspletely right to not be worried at all. Not only did he have the Legendary Realm Zhu Family behind him, it seemed like even her master and the president valued him. With these two organizations behind him, he had the right to be confident.


    But for Lin Fan, he was actually hoping that this Gu Xiong woulde after him which would allow him to crush another family. Crushing one family in each city was the best way for him to advertise his store, that''s what he had found from experience. Then there were also the treasures that the family was keeping in their storage which they had gathered over hundreds of years, that was also wee.


    Neither of them said anything else as Yu Ning led Lin Fan into the Monster Trainer Union.


    ¡­


    After walking around the Monster Trainer Union, Lin Fan found that it waspletely different from the Alchemy Tower.


    Instead of having a single area where quests were given and taken, materials were sold or bought, and where alchemists signed up, the Monster Trainer Union was organized more like a university.


    Most of the rooms in the Monster Trainer Union were used as ssrooms to teach various types of monster training. Then there was a separate building that was made just for testing and giving certification. Finally there was one more building that was made for finding jobs for Monster Trainers.


    Unlike the alchemist, Monster Trainers didn''t rely on materials that much, so their system was much more rxed. The only thing that one would need points to trade for would be different methods of training.


    Yu Ning led Lin Fan''s group around the entire campus, peeking into several ssrooms to listen to the lectures before finally making their way to the testing building.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan hade early in the morning since today''s tests hadn''t begun yet.


    The tests for the Monster Trainer Union were different from the Alchemy Tower. Instead of tests one on one, letting a higher realm alchemist judge the lower realm alchemist, the Monster Trainers held onerge test each day.<sub> </sub>


    Because Monster Trainers were much more free, the examiners for these tests were chosen from whoever was free at the time rather than having set examiners like with the Alchemy Tower.


    Yu Ning brought Lin Fan to the front desk of the testing facility and helped him sign up.


    When the person sitting behind the desk saw Lin Fan''s application, she couldn''t help asking him, "Young man, are you certain that you want to take this test? Are you sure you don''t mean to take the Junior Monster Trainer test instead of this Master Monster Trainer test?"


    This was a young man who wasn''t even in his twenties, if he were able to be aMaster Monster Trainer, what kind of monstrous talent would he have?


    Even Yu Ning was a bit doubtful, but it wasn''t her ce to say anything since even her master respected Lin Fan. Rather she wanted Lin Fan to take this Master Monster Trainer Test since she did have her doubts about him, so she wanted to see if he was worth his reputation.


    Lin Fan just had a confident smile as he said, "I''m certain that I want to take this test."


    The person sitting at the desk was still a bit hesitant, but after taking a look at Yu Ning, she just nodded and epted the form. It wasn''t because she believed that Lin Fan could pass, rather it was because Yu Ning was standing beside him.


    Who didn''t recognize the famous disciple of vice president Zhang Liang?


    It was said that she was already an Expert Monster Trainer and it would only take a few more years for her to be a Master Monster Trainer. At the rate she was improving, it was very likely that she would be a Grandmaster Monster Trainer and take over her master''s position as vice president.


    Yu Ning led Ang and Song Shu to the viewing stands while Lin Fan was led by the person at the desk to the test site.


    There were already several people waiting there for the test to begin, but they were all shocked when they saw Lin Fan arrive.


    All the people who were already at the test site were all in their forties, there was only one person who was in histe thirties. These people had worked hard for over a decade to reach the level they were at now and they still weren''t confident that they would be able to pass this exam.


    The man who was in histe thirties had been quite proud about being the youngest person here, but that pride had been crushed the moment he saw Lin Fan.


    That man couldn''t help ring at Lin Fan when he came in and once the receptionist left, that man came over and looked over Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at him, but he didn''t say anything before turning his head away.


    When that man saw this, he couldn''t help feeling like he had just been disdained when in fact Lin Fan simply didn''t care about him. That man came forward and poked Lin Fan in the chest as he said, "Kid, what do you think you''re doing here? Do you think that this ce is a joke?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes after being poked in the chest to look at that man before asking, "Why do you think that I don''t belong here?"


    That man gave a coldugh before saying, "You think that a kid like you could really be a Master Monster Trainer? Wouldn''t anyone off the street be able to be one? Do you know just how hard it is to be a Master Monster Trainer?"


    Lin Fan just said, "Why do you think you can be one then?"


    The man revealed a proud look when he heard this, "You don''t even know who I am, you must be some bumpkin kid. I am Chu He of the Chu Family, we''re a family that has already had three Master Monster Trainers and I am the most talented person in this generation. If I can''t be a Master Monster Trainer, who else would be able to?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he heard this, he had seen this kind of person too often before.


    They took pride in the aplishments of their family and bragged about it like it was their own achievement.


    Lin Fan then hit the nail on the head, "So how many Master Monster Trainers does your family have now?"


    Chu He''s expression became ugly when he heard this.


    Lin Fan''s words had punched right into his sore spot.

 169 Chapter 169

    Chu He''s face twisted and he couldn''t say anything for a few seconds before he suddenly said, "You think that you''re better than everyone here? We''re all people who have worked hard our entire lives to reach this point and you''re nothing more than a kid who''s here just for fun! How dare you mock us like this?"


    Lin Fan spread his hands and gave a shrug, "Why do you keep insisting that I won''t be able to pass? Don''t you know not to judge a book by its cover?"


    Chu He gave a coldugh at this, "You''re clearly a kid who just came here to have fun, you know nothing about how hard this test is. This isn''t just a game, this is the Master Monster Trainer test!"


    Lin Fan revealed a sly smile at this, "Then do you want to make a bet?"


    Chu He raised one brow and asked, "What bet?"


    Lin Fan''s smile became even wider as he said, "That I''ll be able to pass the entire test and be a Master Monster Trainer."


    Chu He looked at Xu Yi in a daze for a few seconds before suddenly bursting out inughter. He kept onughing for a bit before looking Lin Fan right in the eyes, "What a joke, I''ve never heard anything funnier in my life!"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Then you want to take the bet?"


    Chu He had a confident smile as he said, "Alright, what will we bet on?"


    Lin Fan said, "If I don''t pass the Master Monster Trainer test, I will bow and apologize to you in front of everyone, but if I do, you will have to run around the entire Monster Trainer Union in your underwear three times."


    Chu He hesitated a bit when he heard the terms, but his pride quickly came over him and he said, "Alright, but I know that you won''t take that long to fail. You won''t even pass the first knowledge exam. I can''t wait to see you bowing in front of everyone."


    Chu He walked off, but Lin Fan just had the same smile on his face since he had a secret weapon.


    Momonga was the Undead King who had lived for countless years, he was a pool of knowledge to drain from and if Lin Fan just wasted this, he would have been a fool.


    During the past month, Lin Fan had been learning all kinds of new things from Momonga since he knew that it wasn''t just cultivation that he needed to bring him higher up. He also needed knowledge since sometimes power couldn''t solve everything.


    He had been focusing on the different characteristics of different kinds of beasts, trying to find weaknesses that he could expose during battle.


    However, just like how medicine can be poison if one wasn''t careful, this knowledge on how to defeat beasts could also be used to train them. As such, Lin Fan could actually match a Master Monster Trainer when it came to knowledge on beasts.


    When the time for the exam finally came, Lin Fan was led to a separate room where there were two old men waiting behind a table with a desk in front of that table for him.


    The two old men were both Master Monster Trainers who had been tasked by the Monster Tamer Union to administer this test.


    For the other participants taking this test, they were also led to rooms with Master Monster Trainers waiting for them.


    Of course, there weren''t that many people taking this test since Master Monster Trainer was a rank that wasn''t easy to reach, so they had enough examiners for all the examinees at once.


    These two old men were surprised to see how young Lin Fan was, but as esteemed Master Monster Trainers, they had much more open mindspared to the people outside. They chose not to judge Lin Fan by his age and decided to wait to judge him by his performance.


    One of the old men took out a folder which he held up for Lin Fan to take. Inside the folder were several pieces of paper that had different general knowledge questions on them.


    While Monster Trainers generally focused on a single type of pet to train, there were many simrities between most beasts and this was something that all Monster Trainers had to know. Being a Master Monster Trainer meant that one had to have plenty of general knowledge on beasts, which was what this first test was about.


    The old man held up that fold while saying, "You are free to answer whichever questions you want to answer, but you have to get at least five out of ten correct to pass."


    Lin Fan looked at the two and cupped his hands as he said with a smile, "May I ask the elders to pick a few random questions for me?"<sub> </sub>


    The two old men were surprised to hear this.


    There were only so many questions that could be asked, so normally when presented with the choice, there were many participants who memorized just a few questions thatmonly appeared on this test. They hoped that they were lucky enough to get the questions that they had memorized and pass this written test.


    But Lin Fan suddenly asking these two old men to pick out random questions eliminated that chancepletely since these two old men would really pick random questions.


    These two old men looked at each other skeptically, thinking that Lin Fan might be using a ploy to show off, but they still picked out the questions for him. If he could answer these questions, then he might really be a genius.


    The old man who had taken out the folder picked out ten sheets and handed them over to Lin Fan as he said, "Alright, you can try these questions to see if you can answer them."


    The old man didn''t really have any opinion towards Lin Fan, so he tried making it as fair as possible. If the difficulty of the questions were to go from a scale of one to ten, then these ten questions would perfectly fit that scale. Each one of these questions would correspond perfectly with one digit of that scale, going from one to ten.


    Lin Fan just nodded and took the questions before moving over to the desk.


    These two old men also released their spiritual sense in a manner that they considered secret, trying to see if Lin Fan might be using an borate way of cheating by distracting them with asking them to pick the questions for him. However they couldn''t detect anything at all.


    When Lin Fan sensed the spiritual sense of these two old men which of course he could since these two old men were only in the peak Gold Realm, he just secretly revealed a smile.


    There was no need for him to cheat at all and if he did, he really would be letting down all the hard work that he had put in over the past month.


    Momonga was a crystallization of knowledge that had existed for over thousands of years and Lin Fan was getting personal teachings from that crystallization of knowledge. Even though only a short month had passed since he had started learning, the amount that he had learned was already enough to match him with the president of the Monster Trainer Union who was one of the few Grandmaster Monster Trainers.


    As for someone who was at the Legendary Realm, that didn''t exist in this lower realm, or at least it no longer existed.


    Just like with the Alchemy Tower, there was an upper realm faction that was behind the Monster Trainer Union who had drawn in all the talents that the Monster Trainer Union. Even if there was a Legendary Monster Trainer in the past, they would have been recruited by that upper realm faction and taken to the upper realm.


    Lin Fan just casually looked over the question and he could see that they were of a varying scale of difficulty, perfectly scaling with each question and he couldn''t help feeling respect for this old man.


    Some examiners might make it harder for the examinee if they asked the examiner to pick the questions, but this old man had tried to make it as fair as possible for him, which he could appreciate.


    But for someone with his knowledge, these kinds of questions were already at too low of a level for him.


    From the moment Lin Fan picked up his pencil, it only took him a total of twenty minutes to finish all of these questions.


    It had to be known, the entire time allotted for this exam was an entire hour and that was usually barely enough time for most examinees to even finish five questions. Yet Lin Fan had taken twenty minutes to finish all of these questions, even finishing questions with difficulty levels of ten, which would be hard for even normal Master Monster Trainers to finish.


    When the two old men saw him put down the pencil, they looked at him in surprise. At first they thought that Lin Fan had given up on the exam, but then they were shocked to see Lin Fan walk over with all ten pieces of paper and say, "I''m finished."


    The two old men quickly came over their shock and the one who picked out the questions asked, "Are you sure you''re finished? You still have plenty of time."


    Lin Fan ced the pieces of paper in front of them and said, "I''m sure."


    The old men looked over these questions and as they did, the shock on their face became deeper.


    The only words in their mind was "monster genius"!

 170 Chapter 170

    The two old men read through all of Lin Fan''s answers and they couldn''t believe what they had read.


    All of Lin Fan''s answers could have been considered textbook examples of what answers to these questions should be.


    Then when they came to the more difficult problems, they weren''t certain of the answers that were given since they went into even more details than the answer key they were given. However, as Master Monster Trainers, after discussing it with each other, they realized that Lin Fan''s answers past the answer key were all correct.


    Rather if they were all true, it might even open up a new field of study for these topics.


    When this thought passed through their minds, they couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their backs.


    Just what was with this kid?


    How could he have this kind of knowledge?


    Even if he started reading books in his mother''s womb, it would be impossible for him to have all this knowledge!


    But how could he have all this knowledge?


    Could it be that he was one of those body snatchers?


    The body snatchers that these old men were thinking of were the soul fragments of a Legendary Realm Expert that survived after death, which were capable of possessing another''s body, slowly taking them over until destroying the host soul.


    There had been a few cases of this happening and a disaster had urred each time since one lost part of their soul when they died, so these fragmented souls normally had mental defects. There were cases of no morality, turning the body snatchers into homicidal maniacs. There were cases of no apathy, creating monsters that only worked towards their goals, whether they were bad or not.


    In most cases of these body snatchers, they had the memories of their past life''s cultivation to rely on, so they had a wealth of knowledge since birth and quickly increased their cultivations, making them incredibly powerful. On the other hand, since they were powerful, it meant that they were very hard to stop if an important part of their soul was missing.


    But that didn''t seem to be the case with Lin Fan since hecked the characteristics of a body snatcher.


    Since fragments of souls turned into ghosts and specters which were beings of pure yin, when they possessed a body and made it their own, that body would have an excessive amount of yin energy. This would result in that body being extremely pale and weak to sunlight, almost making that body snatcher feel like it was burning away when it was standing under pure sunlight.


    But this room was a rather well lit room, so there was bright sunlight that came in through the window, falling right onto Lin Fan. If it did burn him, he really was a great actor since he didn''t show any signs of difort at all. However, he also didn''t have the pale skin of a body snatcher.


    The only other exnation they could think of was that Lin Fan was a reincarnator.


    This reincarnator was different from the reincarnator that were featured in the novels on earth, this reincarnator was an expert from the upper realms.


    Sometimes when an expert reached a bottleneck in their cultivation or if they came close to reaching their natural lifespan, they had the choice to scatter their souls and reincarnate in a lower realm.


    By reincarnating, not only did that give them extra time, it also gave them new perspectives into theirws and gave them a chance to interact with differentws.


    But there was always a risk when it came to doing anything. By scattering their souls and reincarnating in a lower realm, they would be sealing off their memories and returning to a lower cultivation.


    To return to their peak, they would have to slowly unlock their memories again and regain their cultivation, but they would have a much easier time to cultivate with their experience from their past life.


    Even so, there was still a chance that they would be unlucky and would encounter something that would take their lives before they could finish developing. But with life, there were risks that came with rewards and one could never gain anything without taking risks.


    There were reincarnators that had far surpassed their strength at the peak of their past lives and went on to be unparalleled experts. Of course, there were also plenty of reincarnators that had be nothing but dust in the end.


    Still, to even have the chance to reincarnate, one would have to be at a cultivation level that was even past the Soul Realm, which was a realm that was past the upper echelon of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    This meant that each reincarnator probably had a powerful force behind them if they felt secure enough to reincarnate, or at least a decent amount of rtionships in a true upper realm that would deter others from messing with them for no reason.


    Of course, that was not something that these two old men knew.


    The only thing they knew about reincarnators were the rumour that had trickled down from the upper realm. As far as they knew, reincarnators were just people of the Legendary Realm who reincarnated.


    These two old men weren''t sure which theory was correct, but the one thing they were certain of was that their Monster Trainer Union had to recruit this genius.


    If they could, they might even catch the attention of the upper realm faction behind them and they might receive a reward for discovering this genius.<sub> </sub>


    When the two old men looked back at Lin Fan, they had a much more friendly appearance.


    The old man who picked the question asked, "Young man, how were you able toe up with your answer for the tenth question? That''s something that even I never thought of before."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Fairies are beings of elements simr to spirits, as long as we remember the elemental theory of spirits, we can¡­"


    Lin Fan went into an in depth description of his method and when he was done, the eyes of the two old men were sparkling as their minds were filled with ideas.


    The other old man couldn''t help asking, "But even if you can apply the elemental theory of spirits to developing the elemental energy of fairies, isn''t there still a difference when ites to control?"


    Lin Fan exined, "You have to remember that at theirponents, elemental energy is nothing more than energy used to control the elements. It doesn''t matter how they are controlled, as long as we remember that the fundamental elements don''t change at all."


    "But¡­" The old men still had several more questions that they wanted to ask, but for every question that they did ask, Lin Fan patiently exined his theory. By the end of it, the two old men were looking at Lin Fan with gazes filled with admiration.


    Just based on that conversation they had now, if they had to guess, Lin Fan''s general knowledge was already at the peak of the Master Monster Trainer ss. He might even be close to reaching the Grandmaster Monster Trainer ss.


    What they didn''t know was that Lin Fan had already passed that, he was already getting close to reaching the Legendary Monster Trainer ss.


    After their conversation, the two old men were filled with excitement.


    The first old man who picked the questions said in an excited voice, "Young friend, you really are a talented person. Can you tell me who your master is?"


    Now that they had confirmed that he was a genius, of course it was time to start poking at his background.


    For such a genius, there was no way that there wasn''t a master that had taught him everything. The master that could raise such a monster, he was definitely a monster himself.


    Lin Fan just humbly said, "My master is nothing more than a simple schr, he has pounded all this knowledge into my mind, but I amcking when ites to practical skills."


    At this, the two old men calmed down.


    After all, being a Monster Trainer wasn''t all about just having knowledge. The other important part was being able to apply this knowledge and actually train the pets.


    But after thinking about it, the two old men became excited again.


    Someone with this kind of talent when it came to knowledge saying that he wascking in practical application had to be acting humble. There was no way that he would actually be that bad.


    The old men conferred with each other for a bit before turning back to Lin Fan.


    The first old man said, "Alright, young friend, I hereby announce that you have passed the first test of the Master Monster Trainer test. But I also want to announce that we will be giving you the special right to skip the second test and go directly to the third and final test."


    Lin Fan was confused when he heard this and he asked, "Third and final test? Special right? What was the second test even about?"


    The two old men were surprised when they heard this.


    The first old man couldn''t help asking, "Do you not know anything about the Master Monster Trainer test?"


    Lin Fan casually said, "This is my first time taking any Monster Trainer test, so I have no idea what to expect."


    The two old men were shocked by this.


    This was only his first time?


    He had never taken the Monster Trainer test before?


    What a freak!

 171 Chapter 171

    The two old men couldn''t help staring at Lin Fan in a daze for a bit after the bomb that he had dropped.


    Most people would at least learn the format of the test they were taking, but this young man hade into the testpletely blind without any preparations, just where did he get this courage from?


    Was it because he was confident or was it because he believed in his luck?


    Still, thinking about how easily Lin Fan had answered his questions, they had to believe that he was confident.


    The first old man exined, "The same format is used for Monster Trainer tests of all grades. The first test will always be the general knowledge test since a Monster Trainer''s greatest weapon will always be his knowledge. The second test will be a specific knowledge test based on the type of pets that you specialize in. The third test will always be a practical demonstration test of your abilities since in the end, one has to have the ability to train pets to be called a Monster Trainer."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.


    While he did have a great amount of general knowledge, he felt that he didn''t have too deep of a knowledge on different types of pets. Not to mention that he didn''t specialize in any one type of pet to train since he could train them all with his special methods.


    But what he didn''t know was that his general knowledge was actually deep enough to be considered specialized knowledge. Lin Fan could be considered the only person on the Blue Star with the special all type specialization.


    Of course, that was just what came naturally when he was being taught by a walking encyclopedia.


    Lin Fan then said, "It''s a good thing I''m skipping the second test, I don''t really have a specialization."


    The two old men were shocked again when they heard this.


    The first old man asked, "Young friend, what do you mean by you don''t have a specialization? I''m sure that there''s one type of pet that you can train better than any other type, right?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "No, I can train all kinds of pets equally. There''s no one type of pet that I can train better than the other."


    The two old men didn''t want to believe it at first, but seeing the serious look on Lin Fan''s face and thinking of how easily he had answered those questions, they couldn''t help suspecting that he wasn''t lying.


    The two old men began conferring again before one of the old men suddenly left the room.


    Lin Fan watched that old man leave the room with a confused look before turning to look at the one who was still left in the room.


    This was the first old man who had chosen the questions for Lin Fan, he just sat there with a smile, trying to look as friendly as possible.


    Seeing Lin Fan look at him with that confused gaze, the old man understood and said, "With this information, there might be a need to change the format of your test since all of our tests are prepared for Monster Trainers of specific specializations. For now, I''ll take you to the site of the third test, but we can take our time since it''ll take some time to prepare the test."


    Lin Fan didn''t have a problem with this since there didn''t seem to be anything wrong with this.


    The old man stood up from the table and walked out of the room with Lin Fan. During this time, there were plenty of things he wanted to discuss with Lin Fan. He even began discussing his most recent theory paper with Lin Fan, gaining quite a bit of insight from this discussion.


    When they came back to the main room for the people taking the test, the old man stopped and said, "Young friend Lin, I''ll go and report to the results of your test. Normally we just send a message, but since I''m already here, I''ll report it and prepare a few things."


    Lin Fan agreed and headed back into the main room alone, but there was no one else there since everyone was still in their tests.


    Time passed quickly and thirty minutes went by. Once those thirty minutes were up, the other participants slowly came out of their test rooms and came back to the main room.


    There were plenty of people who looked depressed and only a few who looked happy.


    The one who were depressed were clearly the ones who had failed their tests and the ones who were happy were the ones who had guessed correctly on which questions to memorize, which had allowed them to pass.


    Then there were the few who looked quite calm since they had already been prepared for this and had easily passed.


    Among those that looked depressed was Chu He.


    He was especially depressed since he was only a single question away from passing the test.


    He had been lucky with the first four questions, but then once he reached the fifth question, he didn''t know the answers at all. He flipped through the rest of his questions, but there hadn''t been a single one that he was able to answer.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, he had nned for this and had prepared a cheat sheet on his wrist watch, but with the examiners watching him like a hawk, he didn''t dare look at all.


    In the end, he spent thest half an hour of his time agonizing over finding the answer to the question in his mind while also trying to find a chance to cheat, but that chance never came and his mind gave him nothing.


    He could only watch as the two examiners gave him the grade that was just a single point away from letting him pass.


    All his efforts had gone to waste just like that and now he couldn''t take the test again for another year. It wasn''t like he was getting any younger, the longer it took him, the slower his progress would be in the future.


    The Monster Trainer Union had a rule that if one failed their test for any grade, they would have to wait another year before taking the test again. This was to stop stubborn people from wasting their resources since if they couldn''t pass it the first time, there was no doubt they couldn''t pass it the second time. It was better for them to take the time to slowly develop their skills and try again in another year.


    Now that he had failed, Chu He was filled with frustration, but there was nowhere for him to vent.


    That was until he noticed Lin Fan casually sitting in the participant room. The moment he saw Lin Fan, his eyes lit up as he found his target.


    He walked over in a proud manner and said, "Hey kid, you''re out so early? Did you give up as soon as you saw how hard it was?"


    Lin Fan heard this voice and when he saw him, he couldn''t help finding this man funny. He said with a smile, "What do you think?"


    Chu He gave a coldugh at this and said, "I think that someone here still owes me an apology? How about it, are you going to go back on your words?"


    Lin Fan just said with the same smile, "I would, but I''m not the one who lost the bet. I remember that someone said that they would run around naked if they were to lose our bet, wasn''t that the case?"


    Chu He looked at him for a few seconds before bursting out inughter, "I''ve never heard anything so funny before! You really think that you''re fooling anyone? Does everyone hear what this kid is saying? He thinks he actually passed the test!"


    Hearing Chu He''s loud voice, everyone turned over to look at them.


    Many people sided with Chu He since they knew just how tough the exam had been, they didn''t believe that someone as young as Lin Fan could pass it as easily as he made it out to be.


    However, the voice that suddenly came from behind Chu He changed everything.


    "Young friend Lin, I hope that I didn''t keep you waiting for long. Pleasee with me, I''ll take you to the special test that we''ve set up for you."


    Chu He immediately turned around and said, "Who do you think you are¡­"


    But before he could even finish, he saw the badge that was on the cor of this person and his words couldn''te out of his mouth anymore.


    This badge was one of honour when one was inside the Monster Trainer Union, this badge was what they were all working towards, it was the badge of a Master Monster Trainer!


    This Master Monster Trainer was actually personallying out to meet Lin Fan and he was treating him this kindly, just what was going on?


    The old man ignored Chu He as he came up to Lin Fan and said, "I''m really sorry about how long it took, it took a while to prepare everything. But the good news is that even the president and the vice president was notified of this matter and they''reing to watch your test."


    Everyone was in a daze as the old man led Lin Fan away.


    As they walked away, Lin Fan spared onest look at Chu He and revealed a smile beforepletely walking off.


    Someone like Chu He wasn''t worth any of his time at all.


    When Lin Fan and the old man left, everyone came back to their senses.


    One person who had sharp eyes couldn''t help asking, "Hey, where did that guy who was shouting go?"


    Chu He was no longer in the room, he had run out while everyone was in their daze.

 172 Chapter 172

    The old man led Lin Fan deeper into the testing building and they came to the biggest open room there.


    This was the room that was to be used for the final exam, so there were already plenty of spectators sitting there.


    The spectators had been waiting the entire time since only the third test could be spectated.


    Butpared to normal, there were much more people there.


    One reason for this was because Yu Ning was here. In the Monster Trainer Union, she was considered quite the idol since not only was she pretty, she was also the disciple of the vice president. There were plenty of people who wanted to woo her.


    Then for some reason, there were two beauties that had appeared with her. One was a perfect definition of a woman and the other was a little beauty who could melt people''s hearts.


    There were plenty of people who were sitting close, secretly taking peeks at them.


    The other reason was that for some unknown reason, there was suddenly a change in the test field and there were all kinds of things that were brought in.


    As well, for some unknown reason, the president and the vice president had alsoe to watch the tests and they were currently sitting in the main seats right beside the testing area. Right behind them, there were the various high level Master Monster Trainers sitting there.


    All of these people were very hard to find normally, but now they were all gathered in this one ce.


    Seeing all of them here, naturally people were curious as to why this was happening. Many of the people who were already here called their friends and soon this information spread all over the Monster Trainer Union.


    In just ten minutes, the entire viewing area waspletely filled with people, creating two bubbles. One was around the cute girls and the other was around the high ss Monster Trainers.


    Even after the stands were filled, there were many people who stood outside the door peeking in, hoping to get just one look of what was happening inside.


    While they were waiting, Yu Ning had naturally seen her mastering in, but when she tried to approach, her master waved his hand at her to tell her to stay.


    Yu Ning of course couldn''t disobey her master and when she texted her master with her watch, her master told her to stay and take care of their guests. Yu Ning had no choice but to stay there, being ogled by the people around.


    At the same time, there was a conversation that was happening between the vice president and the president.


    The president looked around before saying with a smile, "It seems like we''re still quite popr, don''t you think, Old Zhang?"


    "President, that''s not what''s important right now." Zhang Liang impatiently said.


    The president still had the smile, but it was smaller than before, "Right, right, so what do you think of this kid? You''ve been to his store, you should know what he''s capable of."


    Zhang Liang said, "President, this kid and the store behind him has a secret that we can''t even imagine. The things he knows about training pets might just be what we need to break our bottlenecks."


    The president couldn''t help revealing a doubtful look, "Are you sure? He doesn''t seem that impressive to me. Sure he has good knowledge, but we haven''t even seen if he can train pets yet."


    Zhang Liang shook his head, "You haven''t been to his store yet so you don''t know, but from what I''ve seen from the pets that have been trained in his store, he doesn''t use the same training method as us. Instead of just helping the pets be a bit stronger, he actually draws out their hidden potential and creates a chance for them to not only grow stronger, but also evolve. If they continued training in his store, they might even have a chance to mutate."


    Mutations were when pets suddenly had a purification of their bloodline, meaning that they would break past the fetters set by their bloodline and have a chance to reach an even higher realm.


    That was not something that the Monster Trainers of the Blue Star did.


    Their methods for training pets was just increasing the control ofws the pet had or helping the pet increase their cultivations. But no matter how much they tried helping the pet, they couldn''t push past a certain bottleneck that was set by the pet''s bloodline.


    The only way they could push past that was to draw out the potential of the pet and purify their bloodline, helping them evolve or even mutate.


    The president still couldn''t help feeling doubtful, but seeing how excited Zhang Liang was when he said this, he decided to wait and see with his own eyes.


    But Zhang Liang didn''t stop there, he began going into the various details of what he had seen in Lin Fan''s pet shop.


    The president knew that once Zhang Liang started, it would be impossible to get him to stop, so he just sat there and pretended to listen while drifting off into his mind. After being with Zhang Lian for some time, he had actually gotten quite good at doing this.


    As for the Master Monster Trainers that were behind them, all of them were confused as to why they were all gathered here.


    Normally they wouldn''t be gathered unless it was a situation that would decide the fate of the Monster Trainer Union, but this was nothing more than a simple test.


    Just what were the president and the vice president thinking?<sub> </sub>


    Also among these Master Monster Trainers was the other old man who had sat in on Lin Fan''s test. He was also surprised, but it was for another reason.


    He never would have imagined that the president and the vice president would ce such importance on this one genius that they had found. He couldn''t help feeling that maybe this would be his big break. If he were to enter the president''s inner circle, his position in the Monster Trainer Union would definitely increase.


    Then there was Lin Fan who walked in with the other old man.


    When he came into the testing area, everyone was surprised to see him and he was surprised to see everyone.


    He thought that he was just taking a test, why were there so many people watching him?


    Well, he did know that there would be people watching him since Yu Ning had told him about this, but for there to be this many people watching, it surpassed his expectations.


    As for the crowd, many of them were confused as to why a Master Monster Trainer was leading this young man into the test site, that included quite a several of the Master Monster Trainers.


    They could tell that this young man was the one they were waiting for, but was he worth having a Master Monster Trainer lead the way?


    Lin Fan looked over the crowd and he quickly noticed two pockets where the president and vice president were and where Yu Ning''s group was sitting.


    When Song Shu in the stands saw Lin Fan looking at her, she immediately stood up with a happy smile and waved at him. Then she turned back to Ang and pulled her up to wave to him as well, which she only did because she couldn''t say no to Song Shu.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling when he saw her being dragged up by Song Shu like this. To be honest, he even felt that she was quite cute with how she almost looked shy.


    But everyone else seeing this didn''t have the same reaction.


    There were quite a few guys who were staring at Lin Fan with dark looks, Not only did he have the little loli waving to him, even the bigger perfect girl was waving at him. Just who was this man, how did he have this kind of luck with girls?


    Lin Fan could feel the waves of hatreding from the guys in the stands around him, but hepletely ignored them all. Right now, he just felt happy with what he had, he didn''t want to mess that up.


    Once he was finished with this, Lin Fan went to the center of the testing site with the old man who led him here.


    The old man first gave a bow in the direction of the president and the vice president before turning to Lin Fan to say, "This is where you''ll be taking your test, there''s no need to mind the crowd, just focus and do your best."


    Lin Fan then asked, "What is the test?"


    The old man smiled before nodding at the people waiting by an iron gate. Those people went through the door on the side and after a while, therge iron gate opened and there was a booming sound as something came out.


    Soon, there was arge tiger that walked out and appeared in front ofLin Fan. It looked quite vicious and it was being restrained by two people around it with chains.


    The old man turned to Lin Fan and said, "It took some time to prepare this, but this is your test. You will have to tame this Asura Tiger and train it. You''ll pass if you can either teach it a new skill or make it go up a level."


    Lin Fan just nodded with a smile and the old man gave a signal to the two holding back the Asura Tiger.


    They released their chains and quickly ran off.


    The old man gave a nod to Lin Fan and said, "Good luck." Then he also quickly disappeared and went into the stands.


    Lin Fan looked at the Asura Tiger in front of him with a smile, looking right into those sharp and white teeth without any fear.


    He had actually developed a new method of training pets, but he had never had the chance to test it before. How could he let such a perfect chance in front of him go?


    The Asura Tiger was a Gold Realm beast, so it had its pride. It looked down at Lin Fan like he was nothing more than prey before suddenly pouncing out to attack Lin Fan with its ws.


    Lin Fan didn''t move back at all, he just stood there and watched as the Asura Tiger approached.


    Everyone watching began feeling a bit of fear for Lin Fan since they were all worried that he wouldn''t be able to handle this Asura Tiger.


    But then Lin Fan did something that shocked them all.


    It truly was something that no one had ever expected.

 173 Chapter 173

    The Asura Tiger had charged up to Lin Fan in a matter of seconds and once it appeared in front of him, it immediately smashed its paw right down, trying to crush Lin Fan into the ground.


    However, Lin Fan was very rxed as he watched the paw slowly fall down on him since he wasn''t in danger at all.


    This Asura Tiger might have seemed quite scary, but it was nothing more than a Gold Realm beast. It was still something that Lin Fan in the tinum Realm could still easily deal with.


    As the paw fell, time seemed to slow as Lin Fan suddenly moved back, taking a single step to avoid the paw that fell down. When the paw reached the ground, it had crushed the ground where Lin Fan had just been standing, missing Lin Fan by the smallest margin.


    Still Lin Fan had a smile on his face as he pulled back his fist and very calmly sent out a punch that was aimed right at the face of the tiger that was actually higher than him.


    Before the Asura Tiger could even react, the fist had collided with its face and it was sent flying back, bouncing across the ground like a stone being skipped across a pond before mming into the walls on the side.


    Everyone, except a few certain people had looks of shock as they watched Lin Fan send the Asura Tiger flying.


    Most people here weren''t even close to the Silver Realm, not to mention the Gold Realm, so this Gold Realm Asura Tiger being sent flying like this was not something they could ever imagine.


    But seeing Lin Fan send this Asura Tiger flying away so easily, people couldn''t help wondering just who he was. At the very least, no one doubted his qualifications anymore, he definitely was a very special person that deserved being singled out like this.


    As for the president and vice president, they just had calm looks on their faces since they already knew about Lin Fan, especially how he had even fought an envoy of the upper realm faction of the Alchemy Tower. Pitting him against a Gold Realm Asura Tiger was like making him fight a little child.


    But the strangest thing hadn''t even happened yet.


    After the Asura Tiger had been sent flying into the wall and slowly fell to the ground, once it recovered, it was no longer as hostile as before.


    The Asura Tiger stood up and looked at Lin Fan with a curious gaze before running over to Lin Fan again, but this time it didn''t attack Lin Fan. Rather it dropped down in front of Lin Fan and rolled over to show its belly, looking like a giant kitten.


    Everyone''s chins dropped at the sight of this, well everyone except Ang. Even the president and vice president couldn''t understand what had just happened.


    Lin Fan with a single punch had actually tamed the Asura Tiger and now it was acting like a little kitten in front of him.


    Lin Fan had the same smile on his face as he looked at the Asura Tiger lying there. He leaned over to pat its stomach and the Asura Tiger licked his face with its big tongue.


    Then he pulled the Asura Tiger up and pulled back his fist one more time to punch it, yet the Asura Tiger had an expectant look on its face when it saw Lin Fan was about to punch it. It looked like it couldn''t wait to be punched and even wanted to jump out to make it easier for Lin Fan to punch it.


    Lin Fan sent out punch after punch whichnded on the Asura Tiger''s body again and again which it didn''t defend against at all. It just had a look of ecstasy on its face as Lin Fan punched it again and again.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at the Asura Tiger with a strange look.


    This was an Asura Tiger, a beast that was famous for being proud and aloof, yet here it was acting like a silly cat asking to punched again and again. When did such a proud and aloof beast be a masochist?


    But as the punches continued tond on the Asura Tiger, people could tell that there was something that was changing with the Asura Tiger.


    The aura that it released was suddenly bing sharper and much stronger, it seemed like the more Lin Fan punched it, the closer it came to a breakthrough.


    Finally after punching it for five minutes straight, the Asura Tiger suddenly broke through and reached the Gold 5 Realm.


    Everyone''s chins dropped once again when they felt this breakthrough.


    What kind of training method was this?


    How did he let the Asura Tiger break through just by punching it?


    Also, could they learn this technique from him?<sub> </sub>


    But what they didn''t know was that Lin Fan was the only person on the entire Blue Star that could use this technique. This technique was the new technique that he had slowlye up with over the past month.


    To be honest, he had even considered himself untalented for taking an entire month toe up with this method, but if anyone ever heard him say this, they would have scolded him to death. Taking just a single month toe up with a new training technique that no one else had ever thought of, you still want to call yourself untalented after that? Wouldn''t that mean that no one else on the Blue Star couldpare to you?


    Lin Fan''s new technique could only be used by him because it required him to use the strange suction force that only he had.


    Through his experiments, he had found that there were different ways for him to utilize this strange suction force. Not only was he able to suck in life energy, he could also suck in various other things. The most important thing of all was impurities!


    He had tested it with a few of the pets that had been brought into his store for training and he found that as long as he punched them with the strange force, he could actually use that force to draw out the impurities inside the beasts.


    By drawing out impurities, he could slowly purify the body of the beast and even the bloodline, helping them draw out their potential and evolving their bloodline. By evolving their bloodline, they would have a chance to break through their upper limit and reach a whole new level.


    Of course, beasts weren''t dumb, so they could tell exactly what Lin Fan was doing and what Lin Fan was doing was something very beneficial for them.


    That was why after a single punch, the Asura Tiger saw the chance of purifying its bloodline and reaching the next level, so it started ttering Lin Fan.


    Whenever Lin Fan punched it, it could feel the suction force drawing out the impurities in its body, which gave it a very warm feeling that made its blood boil as it became more purified. That was why the Asura Tiger had such a happy look whenever it was punched by Lin Fan, rather it even wanted Lin Fan to keep punching it forever.


    Once the Asura Tiger had broken through, Lin Fan had stopped punching it to the Asura Tiger''s dismay.


    It looked at Lin Fan with a pitiful gaze and even began begging Lin Fan to hit it more by licking his hands, as well as getting on its belly and lowering its tail.


    When everyone saw this, they almost fell over.


    Tiger bro, please! You''re the proud and aloof Asura Tiger, can you please not act like this?


    Seeing the way the Asura Tiger had acted hadpletely ruined their views of the world.


    But as for Lin Fan he just gave it a look before turning to the old man who had led him here.


    The old man was still in a daze, but then when he saw Lin Fan looking over at him, he realized that it was his job to judge Lin Fan, so he quickly jumped into the testing zone.


    The old man came up to the Asura Tiger and sent his spiritual sense into it. The moment the old man confirmed the situation inside the Asura Tiger, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a gaze of awe and horror.


    The old man stammered as he asked, "How, how, how did you do this?"


    Everyone could tell that something was wrong when the old man said this.


    The president stood up and asked out loud, "What''s the matter, is there something wrong with the Asura Tiger?"


    The old man woke up from his shock when he heard the president''s voice. He turned and quickly said with cupped hands, "President, there is nothing wrong with the Asura Tiger, only...This Asura Tiger''s bloodline has been purified and now it''s close to evolving."


    Once these words were said, the way that everyone looked at Lin Fan hadpletely changed.


    It was one thing for him to make the Asura Tiger break through just by punching it, but to purify its bloodline with punches, that meant somethingpletely different.


    The president had a look of shock as he looked over at Lin Fan who was just standing there with the same smile. After a while, he finally came back to his senses and said, "Continue with the next beast."


    The staff also came back to their senses when they heard this and they came forward to bring the Asura Tiger away.


    As the Asura Tiger was dragged away by the chains on its neck, it inserted its ws into the ground and left w marks as it cried out to Lin Fan, begging him to punch it more.

 174 Chapter 174

    Lin Fan''s Master Monster Trainer test continued just like this.


    After the Asura Tiger, there were more beasts that were brought out, each one of a different species and of a different attribute.


    Lin Fan had said before that he didn''t have any specialization, which was why all these beasts differed now. They had all been specially prepared for Lin Fan to see if his words had been true and the results had proved that they were.


    The next beast that was brought out was an Abyss mingo. This was a bird with the legs of a mingo, but instead of feathers, it had a cover of dark mes around it that looked simr to the mes of hell of legend, giving it the name Abyss mingo.


    This was another Gold Realm beast that was also hard to tame, but that meant nothing for Lin Fan.


    Just like with the Asura Tiger, it only took a single punch from Lin Fan before the Abyss mingo was begging to be punched.


    Lin Fan continuously sent a rain of punches down on the Abyss mingo whoid on the ground taking it. It revealed a look of ecstasy and joy whenever it felt Lin Fan''s fist making contact with it.


    Seeing this scene, the crowd couldn''t help feeling aplicated mix of feelings.


    These were proud Gold Realm beasts, but under Lin Fan''s hand, they looked like nothing more than big pets that had a masochistic side to them. They were looking so happy at being beaten by Lin Fan¡­


    Then just like with the Asura Tiger, after taking the rain of punches from Lin Fan, the Abyss mingo made a breakthrough to reach the next level in the Gold Realm.


    When it saw that Lin Fan was no longer punching it, it began begging for Lin Fan to punch it even more.


    The old man who was in charge of the test came up to examine the Abyss mingo and once again he had the same look of shock.


    The president saw this and asked, "What is the result?"


    The old man said, "Reporting to the president, it is the same as with the Asura Tiger. The Abyss mingo''s bloodline has also been purified."


    The president fell into thought before saying, "Continue with the next one."


    But this time instead of leaning back like he had done after the Asura Tiger was taken away, the president sat forward and paid special attention to Lin Fan.


    The other Master Monster Trainers also did the same.


    Perhaps it might have been a fluke the first time, but for it to happen a second time, it was too unlikely. It seemed like there might really be something special with this kid''s training method that they had to carefully examine.


    Just like this, there were three more Gold Realm beasts that were brought out for Lin Fan to tame and train.


    Every time, they all became docile with just a single punch from Lin Fan. Every time, they all revealed looks of ecstasy and joy as Lin Fan rained his punches down on them. And every time, they broke through and had their bloodlines purified.


    Finally, they were dragged away and looked at Lin Fan with pleading looks every single time.


    At the end of this, everyone in the stands were looking at Lin Fan withplicated expressions.


    Even if they didn''t know how to describe the feeling in their hearts, they had to admit that Lin Fan was quite special.


    As for the Master Monster Trainers sitting in the stands, they were currently locked in deep discussion with each other. They had been focused on Lin Fan''s actions the entire time, but they had been unable to see through them at all.


    Not a single one of them could tell just what kind of technique Lin Fan had used.


    As the final beast was taken away, the old man in charge of the test didn''t know what to do, so he turned to look at the president.


    The president had been in deep thought, so everyone waited for a few minutes to see what would happen.


    Finally the president came out of his thoughts and stood up, walking over to Lin Fan and reaching out a hand as he said, "Owner Lin, it truly is an honour to meet you. I can see now that the rumours I''ve heard weren''t false at all."


    Lin Fan smiled when he saw this since he knew that this would happen.


    One reason that he took this Master Monster Trainer test was because he didn''t have a license yet.


    The other reason was clearly because he had expected the Monster Trainer Union to test him in some capacity. After all, it was important to know the people you were going to cooperate with and so far they knew nothing about Lin Fan other than a little bit about his shop. It was clear that they would try to find some way to test him to see his abilities, so he might as well get it over with since this opportunity was in front of him.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan took that hand and shook it as he said, "It''s an honour to meet you too Sir President, I have long heard of your fame, but they do no justice to you in person."


    The president narrowed his eyes at this before suddenly breaking out inughter. Then after calming down, he said, "We both know there''s no need for this courtesy. Come, let''s go to my office to discuss what needs to be discussed."


    After that, he turned to the old man in charge of the test and said, "Help Owner Lin set up his Master Monster Trainer certification and bring it to my office. We''ll be heading there first."


    Then without caring about anything, he led Lin Fan and the vice president Zhang Liang out of the testing site and headed towards the main building of the Monster Trainer Union.


    During their short talk, Zhang Liang had already signaled to Yu Ning to bring Ang and Song Shu along before following the president out.


    Lin Fan turned to look at where Yu Ning''s group had been and seeing that they were gone, he didn''t even look back as he followed the president out.


    They came to the main building of the Monster Trainer Union and after being led down some halls, where at a certain point they met up with Yu Ning''s group, they were led by the president to a certain room.


    If Lin Fan had to describe the interior of the room, he would say that it was like a teachers room that he had been frequently called to back when he was still in high school.


    At the back of the teachers room, there would be the principal''s office and this was where the president''s office was.


    After sitting down, Zhang Liang had Yu Ning serve them some tea and snacks before sending her off.


    Only when Yu Ning left did the president start talking.


    The president looked at Lin Fan for a bit before asking, "Owner Lin, is there a chance that we can learn the technique that you used?"


    The president didn''t beat around the bush at all, he directly jumped into the main topic, but Lin Fan liked people who were straightforward like this.


    Lin Fan took a sip of his tea before saying, "No, it''s not possible."


    The president slightly knit his brows and asked, "Why?"


    Lin Fan put down the teacup and raised his hand towards the president as he said, "Let me show you."


    The president had a confused look on his face as he took Lin Fan''s hand, but once he did, he realized what Lin Fan meant by that.


    He could feel the suction forceing from Lin Fan''s hand, but instead of draining life energy like Lin Fan had used against other people, he could feel the suction force entering his body and pulling out a certain something. Of course that certain something was the impurities in his body.


    As the impurities were drawn out, he could feel a pleasant feelinging from all around him.


    After a few seconds, the suction force stopped and Lin Fan pulled his hand away.


    The president looked down at his hand and found that the skin was much more whitepared to before.


    At this, he fell into deep thought.


    On the side, Zhang Liang was still confused, so Lin Fan offered his hand like he had done with the president and soon Zhang Liang was caught up to speed.


    Zhang Liang looked at his hand in daze for a bit, but then he revealed an excited look and was about to speak, but the president cut him off first.


    The president said, "Owner Lin, I get that you can''t teach anyone this since this must be a special cultivation technique that you''re using, however it seems like you''re also able to use it on people. Does that mean that you can purify human bloodlines as well?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile before saying, "While I can use it on people, you should know that the human bloodline has its limits."


    The president was taken aback by this at first, but after thinking about it, he couldn''t help nodding.


    Human bloodlines were just average, but humans could match beasts because of their quick reproduction and their ingenuity ining up with different cultivation methods. Even if the human bloodline was purified, there was no great power that woulde from it, so humans would be limited by it still.


    The president then asked, "Is there a way for us to cooperate then?"

 175 Chapter 175

    p Hearing this, Lin Fan revealed a smile that had a deeper meaning.</anda>


    Lin Fan then said, "Well, that depends on what you mean by cooperating. It''s clear that by sending out five Gold Realm beasts at me one after another, there should be another reason for why you invited me here, isn''t that right?"


    While the president seemed like he had been quite straightforward with his questioning, he had actually been beating around the bush.


    He had been testing Lin Fan, but it wasn''t to test his abilities in training beasts as it seemed on the surface, rather he had been testing his strength and knowledge.


    The president was taken aback when he heard this, but then he revealed a somewhat helpless smile, "When did you notice?"


    "Well for the two top powers of Water Pearl City, a S Rank City to work together to invite me, it must be for a special reason. I really doubt that it would just be to invite me to set up a branch here." Lin Fan casually said.


    The president said with a smile, "Owner Lin, you really shouldn''t sell yourself short. Your store isn''t a normal store, we all know this. Just the fact that you have 100% purity pet food is already shocking enough and then there''s your special training method, just those two things already merit us inviting you."


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile as he replied, "Maybe, but you have to admit that it does raise suspicions. And then my suspicions were confirmed when you showed up at the third test and sent five different Gold Realm beasts who all came from five different environments, it was clear that this wasn''t just a test of my training abilities. Tell me, did I pass your test?"


    The president looked at Lin Fan for a few seconds before bursting out inughter, "Owner Lin, I have long heard tales of your wit, but it seems like they were all underestimating you. Yes, there is another reason why Lord Zhu and I agreed on inviting you to our Water Pearl City, but it was an urgent issue so I hope that you understand."


    Lin Fan raised a brow at this, "Urgent issue, what do you mean?"


    The president revealed a serious look at this and said, "Well first, there''s something I need to show you."


    After this, he opened a drawer in his desk and took out a file which he handed to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan opened the file and looked through the sheets inside, but he was confused by what he saw.


    "These are information on beasts that can be found in different environments, so why are you showing me all this?" Lin Fan asked in a confused voice.


    The president revealed a bitter smile before taking out a photo and saying, "What if I told you that we found all these different beasts in the same nar crack?"


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he heard this.


    nar cracks followed the rules of minor realms, which meant that when a nar crack was formed, there would be only a single environment that filled that nar crack. A nar crack with multiple environments had never been heard of before.


    "Are you kidding? How could these different beasts survive in the same nar crack?" Lin Fan asked in a surprised voice.


    The president put the photo he took out and ced it on the table in front of him, sliding it over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan took the photo and when he saw the image that it contained, he was surprised because in that photo, it was the impossible situation that the president had described.


    There was an Ice Tusk standing with a Magma Slug with a Desert Horror on the side and they were all standing in a forest.


    The president then said, "That was a photo that was taken by one of our scouts after we received different reports of beasts that you wouldn''t normally find in a nar crack of this environment. We are putting together a team to scout this out and we were hoping that you would be able to join them."


    Lin Fan put the photo down and turned to the president with a smile, but then that smile suddenly disappeared as he said with a cold look, "So you want me to be your bait?"


    The atmosphere suddenly became tense in the room.


    Lin Fan was actually a bit angry about this situation. He had been invited here, but now he found out that they had lied to him about the situation and even wanted him to run an errand for them, one that might even put his life in danger.


    Of course, if he were to take Ang, that danger wouldn''t exist at all, but he still didn''t like the feeling of being lied to.


    The president and vice president both revealed awkward looks when they heard these words from Lin Fan.


    After a bit of hesitation, the president said, "Owner Lin, I apologize for not telling you everything, but the situation wasn''t right just yet."<sub> </sub>


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response, the president continued, "You should know that the situation in any city isn''t as calm as it seems on the surface. We require someone with great knowledge about beasts and the ability to deal with them on this team, but if either me or the two vice presidents were to leave the Monster Trainer Union, either some humans or the Beast n would take advantage of this. Therefore we had no choice but to look for outside help."


    Lin Fan could hear the sincerity in the president''s voice, so after pausing for a bit, he said, "How are you nning onpensating me?"


    Hearing that there was still a chance, the president quickly said, "Of course we''ll offer enoughpensation to satisfy Owner Lin. At a minimum, both our Monster Trainer Union and the Zhu Family will do all we can to help Owner Lin setting up his store, as well as doing all we can to advertise the store for you. We will also help you find the supplier with the lowest prices for you. If there''s anything else that you want, please feel free to tell us."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin before saying, "You can just help me advertise the store, there''s no need for either of your factions to do anything for my store. As for the supplier, I already have my own supplier, so there''s no need for me to get supplies from all of you. Finally what I do want is a supply of free pet eggs from all of you, as much as I can want and I want some workers from you."


    Hearing this, the president revealed an awkward look, "We can provide you with the workers, but as for the pet eggs, we can''t just give you as many free pet eggs as you want since we don''t have the supplies for that."


    Lin Fan expected this, so he said, "That''s fine, I just want at least a hundred pet eggs a week, I''m sure that arge organization like the Monster Trainer Union can at least afford that, right?"


    The president hesitated a bit before saying, "Alright we can agree to that amount, but are you certain you don''t want us to help you hatch those pets? Wouldn''t it be easier than having you hatch them all yourself?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "I have my own ways, there''s no need for you to do anything."


    The president then said, "But Owner Lin¡­"


    ¡­


    Their negotiations went back and forth for over an hour, but by the end of it, when Lin Fan had walked out with Ang and Song Shu, the president fell back in his chair looking exhausted.


    Lin Fan hadn''t given him a single inch in these negotiations and the president had no choice but to give in to all of Lin Fan''s demands.


    The president seemed quite straightforward with his words, but actually there were all hidden conditions in his offers.


    One, if the Zhu Family and the Monster Trainer Union were to give their all to Lin Fan''s store, that would be equal to investing in the store. If they were to invest, they would have shares in the store and would have a chance to investigate deeper into the store, while also creating a deeper rtionship with Lin Fan.


    Two, if they were to find suppliers for Lin Fan, they could find out what kind of ingredients Lin Fan used to make that 100% purity pet food. Although they were alchemists, they did have connections with alchemists and by knowing the ingredients that Lin Fan used, they could slowlye up with their own recipe.


    Third, if they were to hatch the pets for Lin Fan, they would have to help Lin Fan take care of the pets and would be able to examine them while he trained them to slowly learn his techniques.


    Then there were many other offers with hidden conditions, but they were all shut down by Lin Fan decisively.


    In the end, not only did they not have a single condition that was favourable to them, Lin Fan had even taken Yu Ning from Zhang Liang as an employee.


    At first Zhang Liang had been against this, but then when Lin Fan told him that Yu Ning would be able to watch his techniques close up, Zhang Liang immediately changed his mind.


    Zhang Liang had been very curious about Lin Fan''s techniques ever since he examined the pets that had been trained by his shop in Green Wood City. If Yu Ning could learn some things about his training methods by working in the shop, he was more than willing to send Yu Ning to work there.


    So just like that, Lin Fan had taken a bunch of things from the Monster Trainer Union and had left them with nothing, but they had to thank him still for taking these things.


    How could the president not feel exhausted after this kind of negotiations?


    As Yu Ning led them back out, Ang and Lin Fan moved a bit further back from them so they could talk alone.


    Ang looked at Lin Fan with a confused look for a bit before asking, "Why did you agree to help them?"


    Lin Fan looked around to make sure that no one was listening before revealing a serious look, "It''s a gut feeling that I have. I''m almost certain that the strange circumstances of the nar crack are rted to the Beast n. If they are rted to the Beast n, this might even be the sign of an invasion."


    Ang was even more confused, "What does it matter to you still?"


    Lin Fan said with a sigh, "Right now we can''t leave this world and I have important people here, so I have to at least help them. At the very least, this is my home, you understand that, right?"

 176 Chapter 176

    After they finished this talk, they left the Monster Trainer Union and headed back to the beast carriage that Zhu Tie had been waiting in the entire time.


    Since they left the beast carriage, it had already been more than two hours, so Zhu Tie was getting quite bored sitting inside.


    Of course, the idea of leaving the beast carriage never entered his mind since that was never a part of his personality and to leave without Lin Fan''s group, he couldn''t do that without facing the wrath of his grandfather which he feared even more than going outside without a mask.


    In the end Zhu Tie could only patiently wait in the carriage for Lin Fan''s return. However, he was also a master of finding things to do since he was someone who stayed in his room all day.


    It was a good thing that he had brought hisptop with him.


    When Lin Fan and the others returned to the carriage, they found Zhu Tieying on his stomach on the seat with his feet kicked up as he was browsing the web on hisptop. It almost looked like he was just rxing at home without a care, like he wasn''t outside at all.


    When Zhu Tie saw that Lin Fan and the others were back, he turned back to hisptop and turned back to Lin Fan before quickly sitting up and putting theptop away.


    Lin Fan and the others all had smiles on their faces, but they didn''t call Zhu Tie out on what he did. Lin Fan even felt a bit of a connection with Zhu Tie since he had quite often stayed home just to catch up on his favourite animes and mangas when he wasn''t being called out by the other young masters.


    Yu Ning only led them out before leaving since the shop wasn''t opening today, she had no reason to go with them. She still had to take care of a few matters in the Monster Trainer Union before she could run off and work in his store.


    Without a word about Zhu Tie''s behaviour, the beast carriage headed off towards the site of the store that the Zhu Family had prepared for Lin Fan.


    This store was of course once again in the most popr business street of the city, but this time it wasn''t a store that had once been a pet shop.


    The store that had been prepared had been one of the most popr training halls in all of Water Pearl City that had been run by the Zhu Family. But suddenly, a week ago, this training hall was shut down without any warning by the Zhu Family.


    All the disciples that had been training there had been confused as to why it had shut down, but they were equally shocked the next day when it was announced that there would be a pet shop being set up using this location.


    When the beast carriage reached the shop and Lin Fan came out, everyone''s attention quickly fell onto them as they walked into the store.


    Everyone had slowly lost interest in the Zhu Family''s previous training hall after a whole week of inactivity, but now it seemed like something was happening.


    It started with one person taking out their phone to take a picture to post on their social mediawork, but soon this quickly spread all over Water Pearl City and everyone was gathering outside the store to see what was happening inside. It was too bad that Lin Fan had closed the blinds.


    Lin Fan walked around the store and was quite satisfied with what he saw. This store was quite big, so big that he might even have empty space after the remodeling.


    Of course he didn''t care that it used to be a training hall, that was where the system came in.


    After he finished walking around and familiarizing himself with the store, Lin Fan led everyone back out once again and locked the door behind him.


    The crowd that had gathered outside was surprised to see hime out again and they had no idea what was happening as they just stared at Lin Fan and his group standing outside the store. Then after five minutes, Lin Fan led the group back into the store.


    During this time, they hadn''t heard a single sound that came from inside the store.


    When they came back into the store, Zhu Tie and Song Shu''s chins dropped to the ground when they saw what was inside.


    Zhu Tie couldn''t believe that in just five minutes, the entire store had been remodeled.


    Song Shu had a look of disbelief because theyout of this store was exactly the same as the store in Green Wood City.


    As for Ang, she wasn''t surprised since something like this was just a wave of a hand for a God Realm Expert like Lin Fan''s master.


    Lin Fan gave a nod of satisfaction before leading them around, looking over the different facilities while also giving Zhu Tie a tour in preparation for tomorrow.


    The store wasn''t that different from the one in Green Wood City, but that was mainly because Lin Fan hadn''tpleted any missions, so he never gained any new facilities for his store.


    But the ones that were in the store already were enough topletely shock Zhu Tie.


    His grandfather had actually given him the task of looking over Lin Fan''s store to see what his secrets were, but Zhu Tie couldn''t make any sense of what he saw. Once the tour was over, he was just as confused as when he first came into the store, but Lin Fan didn''t give him a second tour.<sub> </sub>


    After making sure that everything was functional, Lin Fan led them out of the store again.


    During this time, Ang for some reason had been walking outside with Song Shu since she hadn''t been interested in the tour. She had wandered around the neighbourhood and had found a park nearby.


    When Lin Fan came out to find her, he saw her staring at a couple that were sitting at a bunch sharing a meal that the girlfriend had made.


    He didn''t understand why she was looking at them like that, but he would soon find outter at dinner.


    Lin Fan called out to Ang who quickly came back to her senses and they headed back to the Zhu Manor to rest up for tomorrow.


    ¡­


    When they came back, Ang disappeared for the rest of the afternoon.


    Lin Fan offered to y with her and Song Shu, but she strangely disappeared without a trace during the afternoon, taking Song Shu with her.


    So Lin Fan spent the entire afternoon cultivating and reading a few books that he had put aside.


    When it was time to dinner, he still didn''t see Ang, but the maids came to bring him to the dining table.


    Everyone was gathered in the dining hall, except for Ang and Song Shu.


    At the table, everyone''s ce had been set and they had their dishes in front of them, with the sole exception of Lin Fan.


    When he was about to ask where his food was, there was a cart that was pushed out of the kitchen and the ones pushing the cart were Ang and Song Shu.


    The other members of the Zhu Family smiled when they saw this because they all thought it was sweet, but Lin Fan''s face turned dark the moment he saw this.


    He knew that there was only one way this was going to end, especially with girls that had personalities like Ang''s. This was a verymon trope that was found in many different stories and he would soon be another casualty.


    But now he also knew the reason why Ang had been in a daze this afternoon.


    Even though they had been together for over three months now, they didn''t do many of the things that normal couples did because Ang didn''t know what normal couples did. Momonga who was having fun watching them had given her a few suggestions, but she had never taken them because of her distrust for him.


    But when she saw how the couple acted in the park this afternoon, there was a twinge in her heart that made her feel that it would be nice if she could act that way with Lin Fan.


    So aftering back to the Zhu Manor, she had spent the entire afternoon preparing this meal for Lin Fan. Seeing her shy appearance and how she had dragged Song Shu along with her, the hearts of the maids had melted and they did their best to help Ang, but even then it didn''t mean that she could cook well.


    In the end, the maids chose to believe in the power of love¡­


    When Lin Fan took the dome off the dish that was ced in front of him, it was just like he had imagined.


    It was a pile of ck sludge and there was a part of it that was still moving, making a strange sound as it moved.


    For some reason, the people of the Zhu Family didn''t find this strange at all and all looked at Xu Yi with gazes that made it seem like they were enjoying this.


    Lin Fan looked over at Ang and saw that she was looking at him with expectant eyes, so he knew that he had no choice at all.


    In the end, he took a deep breath and used his fork to take a part of the food which he hesitantly ced in his mouth.


    The moment the food touched his tongue and the taste spread, he knew he had made a mistake, but he couldn''t spit it out. Eventually he forced himself to swallow.


    Looking down at all the food that remained, Lin Fan had a single tear run down from the corner of his eyes before he went to face his maker.


    After dinner, Lin Fan was confined to the toilet for the rest of the night...

 177 Chapter 177

    After spending a night on the throne, Lin Fan didn''t get much sleep, but still he had to get up to open the store today.


    However, it was a good thing they were in a cultivation world where it was much easier to refresh oneself instead of being forced to live on coffee for a day.


    After a single round of cultivation, Lin Fan felt his fatigue disappear and he was filled with energy once again.


    Then again, with his tinum Realm cultivation, he would have been alright even if he didn''t sleep for more than three days in a row. But of course, there was nothing that could rece the rest that he got from natural sleep.


    But there was no time to waste at all. After having a quick breakfast with everyone, they headed off to the store in the same beast carriage as yesterday.


    When they arrived at the store, it was already surrounded by people.


    These people were all either people who were intrigued by the rumours that had spread yesterday or saw the advertising that the Zhu Family and the Monster Trainer Union had posted.


    When they saw the beast carriage with the Zhu Family mark, everyone moved aside to let them pass. Then when they saw Lin Fan''s groupe out, they couldn''t help being surprised by how young Lin Fan was.


    But as they went through the crowd, there was a path that was created for Lin Fan''s group.


    Once they reached the door, they found Yu Ning was there waiting for them as they had agreed to yesterday.


    Yu Ning had been surprised that her master had allowed her to work for Lin Fan''s store, but thinking about the disy that Lin Fan had put on at his test, she couldn''t help thinking that it was the right decision. She was a talented person, so naturally she could tell that Lin Fan''s techniques were revolutionary, they were not something that just anyone could do.


    If her master agreed to let her work in this store, it must mean that her master wanted her to see if she could find the secrets to Lin Fan''s technique. Since this was a mission from her master, she definitely wouldn''t let him down.


    Lin Fan brought Yu Ning into the store and began showing her around. During this time Zhu Tie was assigned the task of bringing the stock to the shelves and cleaning up the front of the store.


    Once Lin Fan was finished showing Yu Ning around, although she had many questions that she still wanted to ask, he ignored her and came to Zhu Tie.


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he saw that Zhu Tie was still wearing his mask, so he asked, "Zhu Tie, what did we agree on before?"


    Zhu Tie flinched when he heard this and he raised one hand to his mask as he asked, "Do I really have to do this? Can''t I just work in the back?"


    Lin Fan said, "No, you''ll work the register and you''ll do it with your mask off."


    Zhu Tie had a bitter look on his face that was hidden by the mask, but he still took off the mask in the end since he didn''t dare disobey his grandfather.


    Yu Ning had been confused at first when she heard this conversation, but the moment Zhu Tie took off the mask and revealed his face, she was shocked and even more confused.


    This was simply the most beautiful man that she had ever seen. Even though she considered herself a beautiful girl, she couldn''t help feeling inferior in front of Zhu Tie.


    But then she couldn''t help wondering why Zhu Tie insisted on wearing a mask all the time?


    Was it because being too beautiful was troublesome?


    If only she knew what Zhu Tie was really thinking¡­


    But once everything was set up, it was time for the store to open and Lin Fan opened the gates to the dam, allowing the crowd to flood in.


    The crowd quickly came in and walked around the store, but they were soon put off by the high prices of the store just like with the other store.


    As for some of the girls, the moment they came in, their eyes werepletely captured by Zhu Tie''s beauty. They gathered around the counter, but not a single person dared to approach.


    To them Zhu Tie was so dazzling that it felt like they would be burnt the moment they approached him. All they could do was point and whisper, but of course none of this escaped Zhu Tie''s eyes.


    In Zhu Tie''s mind, he considered himself very ugly, so he always had the most negative thoughts. Seeing these people point and whisper, he felt that they were whispering bad things about him which made him shrink, but that just made him look even more beautiful.


    The sad look on Zhu Tie''s face made him seem like a dark and brooding angel, which immediately struck the hearts of many girls, making them faint in the arms of their friends.


    It didn''t take long before Zhu Tie''s picture was spread all over the social mediawork of Water Pearl City and he took the crown of the most handsome young master, but that was much further.


    When the people saw the prices in Lin Fan''s store, there were plenty of people thatined and even left the store, but that all soon changed when a certain someone came through the doors of the shop.


    "Ting a ling"<sub> </sub>


    The bell above the door rang and everyone''s eyes turned to look at the source of the voice in surprise.


    "Owner Lin, I hope I''m not bothering you."


    The one who came in was the president of the Monster Trainer Union and in Water Pearl City, he was someone that everyone recognized.


    No one could understand why the president of the Monster Trainer Union would be visiting a shop like this, but what he did nextpletely shocked them, even stunning them out of their previous shock.


    "Owner Lin, I''ve brought the Master Monster Trainer certificate that I promised to bring yesterday. I do have to apologize for the dy, we really should have gotten it to you yesterday." The president said in a tone that sounded so sincere that no one could tell it was fake, but Lin Fan and the president both knew this was fake.


    This was actually something that the president had offered to do for Lin Fan yesterday since he didn''t mind using his fame to help advertise Lin Fan''s store. After all, he did kind of owe Lin Fan for lying to him like that.


    No one could believe that such a young man was actually a Master Monster Trainer and that he was someone the president personally delivered their certification to.


    Just what kind of backing did this young man have tomand such respect?


    Thinking about Lin Fan''s prices, now that they knew that he was actually a Master Monster Trainer, they didn''t seem that expensive at all.


    But the shock of the president''s visit didn''t stop there.


    After exchanging a few words with Lin Fan, the president gestured to an old man beside him who had been patiently waiting and said, "Owner Lin, this is a friend that I''ve invited along to take a look at your shop. You probably don''t know him, but he is the foremost expert on alchemy in our Water Pearl City and is a Master Alchemist. Dan Dan, this is Owner Lin that I''ve told you about."


    Dan Dan came forward and took Lin Fan''s hand before saying, "Owner Lin, you really do have a unique shop here."


    Lin Fan could hear the slight tone of disdain in his voice, but he still said, "Master Dan Dan, it truly is an honour for you to visit my store. Would you please take a look at the pet food that we have in our store to see if it is up to your standards?"


    Dan Dan had a slight look of disdain in his eyes at first when he heard this, but he had been invited here by the president of the Monster Trainer Union, so he couldn''t just say no directly.


    Dan Dan came over to the pet food disy and leaned over to look at the pet food. The moment he took a sniff of the pet food, his eyes opened wide and filled with disbelief.


    He quickly looked over the pet food from every angle and the disbelief in his eyes became deeper and deeper.


    He picked up that bag of pet food and put it in Lin Fan''s face as he asked, "Owner Lin, is this really what I think it is."


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "Indeed it is."


    Dan Dan had a frantic look in his eyes as he asked, "Could you please teach me a few things about how you made this pet food, I beg of you."


    Even though he was someone called the foremost expert on alchemy in Water Pearl City, Dan Dan was someone who was stuck in the Master Alchemist grade. He hadn''t been able to find a way to break through to the Grandmaster Alchemist grade in ten years, but now there was a trace of hope in front of him in the form of this pet food.


    As long as he was able to get some pointers, there was the chance that he would be able to break through.


    But Lin Fan''s words crushed his dreams, "I''m sorry, this is a special recipe that I use and I can''t just share it."


    Dan Dan had a look of despair as he said, "But, but, but...I''m begging you, I''ll take you as a master if that''s what you want, just give me some inkling of knowledge on how you made this 100% purity pet food."


    Still Lin Fan turned him down with a shake of his head.


    When Dan Dan wanted to keep begging, the president stepped in and pushed him aside as he said, "Now, now, Master Dan Dan, let''s not bother Owner Lin too much on the first day of his store opening. How about we go and have a chat first?"


    At this, the president dragged Dan Dan out, but Dan Dan looked at Lin Fan just like the Asura Tiger as it had been dragged away.


    With this, many people realized that Lin Fan''s training and pet food weren''t normal since even the Monster Trainer Union''s president and even Master Alchemist Dan Dan approved of them.


    Many people overcame the hesitation in their hearts and finally decided to pay the high prices for Lin Fan''s services and goods.


    But when business was picking up, there was a voice that rang through the store.


    "So this is the broken shop that I''ve heard so much about."

 178 Chapter 178

    The owner of this voice was of course the ugly young master that had been chasing Yu Ning before.


    Ever since he had left the Monster Trainer Union yesterday, he had been focused on getting his revenge


    He had gathered the power of his family''s intelligencework to search up Lin Fan and he had found a shocking discovery. This brat that had embarrassed him in front of his goddess Yu Ning was actually rted to the Zhu Family!


    It seemed like he couldn''t just directly attack this kid, he would have to n ordingly.


    But everything fell into ce the moment that he learned that this punk had a pet shop.


    He couldn''t directly fight him, but if he were to use his status as a well known genius to ruin the reputation, that wouldn''t mean he was directly in conflict with the Zhu Family. After all, this was just normal business practice, there was nothing wrong with using rumours and threats to harm someone''s business.


    So the young master personally went to Lin Fan''s shop the next morning bringing us to the current situation.


    Everyone was staring at the young master who had suddenlye into the shop.


    Lin Fan also stared at him for a bit before turning to walk away.


    The ugly young master saw this and said, "This store is nothing more than a scam, don''t trust this¡­"


    But then he suddenly stopped when he saw Yu Ning walking around in the store.


    The ugly young master came over and asked in a surprised voice, "Ning Ning, what are you doing here?"


    Yu Ning wanted to ignore this young master at first, but seeing everyone looking at them, she had no choice but to say, "I''m working here, can''t you see that Fan Yu?"


    The ugly young master Fan Yu immediately said with a concerned look, "Are you being forced to work in this store? I''ll get you out of here right away if that''s the case."


    Yu Ning really wanted to p this idiot, but she couldn''t do that since she was an employee and he was a customer. However, before she could even speak, there was someone else who spoke.


    "Now, now son, there''ll be time to flirt with your little girlfriendter. For now, let''s focus on what we were nning to do here."


    Hearing the word "girlfriend" put a dark look on Yu Ning''s face, while a happy look appeared on Fan Yu''s face.


    This person was Fan Yu''s father and the head of the Fan Royal Family. Since Fan Yu had already decided to take revenge on Lin Fan, of course he wouldn''t shy from using every bit of power that he had in his disposal. That of course included the Fan Royal Family that stood behind him.


    But once again, before Fan Yu''s father could say a thing, there was another voice that came from the door.


    "Oh, why did I never hear about my disciple having a boyfriend? I wonder who this person could be."


    When the Fan Family''s group turned around, they saw vice president Zhang Liang standing there, but they didn''t panic at all.


    Fan Yu''s father came over to Zhang Liang and said, "Vice president Zhang, it truly is lucky to meet you here today. This is a matter between the kids and whates naturally wille naturally, after all, my son isn''t that bad of a catch."


    As the head of a Royal Family, of course he wouldn''t back down in front of Zhang Liang, rather he was quite bold in trying to push his son onto Yu Ning. After all, if this marriage were to be arranged, it would mean the Fan Family would be able to get closer to the Monster Trainer Union which they always wanted to do.


    Zhang Liang was going to say something, but then he thought better of it and he just gave a cold snort as he began moving towards Yu Ning.


    The Fan Family head didn''t know what lucky wind blew his way today. Not only had he found Zhang Liang''s disciple being forced to work in this shady shop, he had even bumped into Zhang Liang as well. As long as he and his son could show off in front of them, it was a sure deal that they would be able to build this marriage rtionship.


    The Fan Family head came forward and followed Zhang Liang as he said, "Vice president Zhang, it really is a good thing that you came in time to see this. Your disciple has been tricked by this scum owner into working in this shady shop. Do you see these prices that he''s offering? This is aplete rip off!"


    Perhaps if he came earlier, he might have been able to generate the sympathy of the crowd, but he hade toote.


    Everyone had seen Lin Fan being awarded his Master Monster Trainer certification by the president, how could they still doubt that?


    Zhang Liang turned and was about to respond to this, but then he saw who came in to hear everything and he just revealed a smile.


    The Fan Family head was confused by this smile and wanted to keep condemning Lin Fan, but another voice came from behind him.


    "Shady? Are you doubting the certification that I gave Owner Lin?"<sub> </sub>


    The Fan Family head gave a cold snort when he heard this. No matter what, he was still someone who was considered rather famous in Water Pearl City, when had anyone talked to him like this?


    Moreover, this was someone who gave a certification to this brat? There was no way he could be anyone important.


    But that confident look on his face copsed the moment he turned around. There was no way that he didn''t recognize this person since it was the one person that he wanted to suck up to the most.


    The president looked at him and gave a cold snort, "Are you really doubting the certification that I personally issued? I was the one who watched over Owner Lin''s test."


    The Fan Family head''s brain couldn''t process what had just happened.


    His son had told him that this was a store that had some connections to the Zhu Family, so he wasn''t worried since he didn''t mind even if he did offend the Zhu Family a little. But he never expected even the president of the Monster Trainer Union would be here.


    Moreover, what did he mean by certification?


    To survive in Water Pearl City, one had to depend on one of the two giants of Water Pearl City. Most factions either had deals with the Zhu Family or the Monster Trainer Union and there was a small rivalry between them even though there was no real hostility between the two giants.


    The Fan Family was a family that mainly had deals with the Monster Trainer Union, that was why the Zhu Family head had always wanted his son to get closer to Yu Ning, that way he could put himself in a better position, but now it seemed like he had kicked a steel te. For some reason, this store seemed to have rtions with not just the Zhu Family, but also the Monster Trainer Union.


    The Fan Family head had felt lucky that he had found a way to get closer, but now it seemed like this was a trap and he had fallen face first into it.


    After ring at his son who was still stunned by the appearance of the president, the Fan Family head quickly said, "No, no, sir president, I didn''t mean that. I just feel that this store''s prices are a bit too steep, they are just charging two hundred crystals just for a single bag of pet food? I''ve never seen such a ck hearted store before."


    Then this time it was Dan Dan who came forward, "So 100% purity pet food isn''t worth that much to you? Have you ever seen 100% purity pet food before? You think that it''s somon that it isn''t worth this much?"


    The Fan Family head didn''t know what was going on here, why were all these famous people gathering here today and why did they all seem like they were on the side of this unknown pet store!


    The Fan Family head didn''t dare linger any longer, he revealed an awkward look and grabbed his son as he said while running out, "I''m sorry, but I have another appointment. I really have to go. If there is a chance, I hope we can have a chat another time."


    Everyoneughed deep down when they saw this, but no one dared tough out loud since this was the head of a Royal Family after all. However, that also didn''t stop them from posting these videos online¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t do a single thing during this whole time because he did have his own methods to dealing with those idiots, but his methods were generally more forceful, so he preferred not using them if he didn''t have to.


    He didn''t know why the president and Dan Dan were back, but he still went forward to talk to them.


    They had a chat between them and Lin Fan reached a deal with Dan Dan while the morning rush finished.


    When they left again, both the president and Dan Dan had satisfied looks on their faces.


    ¡­


    A week passed just like this and business was quite good with the various forms of advertising Lin Fan had received.


    Whether it was from Dan Dan, the Monster Trainer Union, the Zhu Family, or even the Fan Family, all of these advertisements brought him many customers.


    But the main reason they all stayed was because of how effective Lin Fan''s items and training were.


    After just a single day of using Lin Fan''s services, the people who had used them were hooked and those that came to watch the fun were shocked by the abilities the pets disyed when Lin Fan returned the pets to their owners.


    Lin Fan''s store quickly reached the same level of fame that he had reached with his two previous stores and this time there was nothing that stopped him. Rather it was quite hard to even want to stop him since he had the support of the two big giants of Water Pearl City behind him.


    To actually want to fail was close to impossible with all this support. For once, there wasn''t a giant organization that was intent on crushing his store.


    But arge part of his fame also came from his use of Zhu Tie.


    Even after the morning rush was over, there would be girls who hung around his store just to sneak a peek of Zhu Tie¡­


    It even made Lin Fan feel a bit jealous, but that was quickly dealt with by Ang...

 179 Chapter 179

    But now that a week had passed and the situation with Lin Fan''s store was stable, he had to keep his end of the bargain with the president.


    After taking care of the morning rush, Lin Fan headed off in an armoured vehicle that the president had sent for him with vice president Zhang Liang sitting inside. This vehicle waspletely empty, it had been sent just for him.


    Song Shu wanted toe along, but Lin Fan knew that this wouldn''t be a safe journey, so he was firm in denying her.


    As for Ang, he had nothing to say about hering along, but she actually didn''t want toe along since she wanted to stay with Song Shu¡­


    But in the end, Lin Fan bribed her as usual with cake and she tagged along with him in the armoured vehicle.


    The armoured vehicle drove out the west of Water Pearl City, speeding across the road until it arrived outside a blockade. This blockade had many guards and they were all armed to the teeth, looking like they wouldn''t let a single person past them.


    But when they saw this armoured vehicle, the guards oved to the side and created a hole in the blockade, allowing them to pass without a single word.


    Once they were past the blockade, Lin Fan looked out the windows of the armoured vehicle to see arge nar crack and arge base that was built around it.


    The armoured vehicle moved through the base until it arrived in front of the main building where Lin Fan, Ang, and Zhang Liang got out.


    Everything seemed quite normal, that was until they arrived inside the hall of the main building where there were furniture flying all over. The moment they came in with Zhang Liang leading the way, there was a chair that flew at Zhang Liang''s head.


    Of course, as a tinum Realm Expert, a chair was not a threat to Zhang Liang even if it hit him, but it had caught him off guard.


    Lin Fan reached out and grabbed the chair before putting it down on the side.


    Zhang Liang hadn''t been able to react since he clearly never thought that he would be met with a faceful of chair, but once he dide back to his senses, he thanked Lin Fan before shouting, "What is going on here?"


    The loud noises in the hall faded when his roar echoed across it and the three fighting in the center suddenly stopped.


    As the dust settled, Lin Fan finally saw the situation of the hall.


    There were a total of eight people present, all of them looked to be no older than thirty years old which was quite concerning. However, Lin Fan could tell by their auras that the weakest person here was in the low Gold Realm.


    The three that were fighting in the center were two boys and one girl.


    The girl was someone with a short bob haircut that didn''t even reach her shoulders who was wielding two des that were separately pointing at one of the boys each.


    Of the two boys, one was a person who had long hair and was wielding a Chinese sword, looking like the perfect representation of a sword cultivator. As for the other one, it was a boy with fiery red hair and bronze knuckles that made him look like a street brawler.


    All three of them red at each other for a bit before turning away and giving snorts, moving separately to different corners while all ignoring Zhang Liang.


    Finally another one of the boys in the room came over and said, "Vice president Zhang, please don''t mind them. They were just bored, so they did a little sparring."


    His tone wasn''t strong or soft, it was just said in a natural manner, but one had to remember that Zhang Liang was the elder here. For this boy to talk to him in this manner, almost treating him as an equal, he really was filled with arrogance.


    Zhang Liang''s face turned dark as he said, "You do know why we called you here, right? You''re about to enter the nar crack and before you even do so, you''re here tearing at each other''s throats?"


    The boy who spoke didn''t say anything, he just smiled as he looked at Zhang Liang.


    Zhang Liang looked at him before putting his hand on his head and shaking it.


    There really wasn''t anything they could do about this, these kids were all geniuses and they were all arrogant in their own way. It had been a risk bringing them all together, which was like mixing various chemicals and seeing what result it brought. In the end, it seemed like the result they achieved was creating a bomb.


    But they really had no choice in this matter since they didn''t want to alert people before they could get information and they couldn''t let real experts enter, or they might alert the possible invasion force of the Beast n inside. That left them with no choice but to bring together these geniuses from various families and send them into the nar crack under the guise of a training mission.


    Of course, they couldn''t risk the lives of ordinary people, so they only gathered people who were at least in the Gold Realm.


    But each one of them was a genius who was on the Heaven Rankings, so they all had their own pride.<sub> </sub>


    Zhang Liang knew there was nothing else he could say to these arrogant kids, so he brought Lin Fan to the side to talk.


    Before Zhang Liang could even say a thing, Lin Fan could already guess what he wanted to say, so he said, "You want me to babysit these kids as well?"


    Zhang Liang swallowed his words and revealed an awkward smile before saying, "In a sense yes."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything and just waited for Zhang Liang to continue.


    Zhang Liang''s smile became more awkward as he said, "If there really is something going on, this will make sure that they don''t get suspicious about what we''re doing. After all, it is normal for us as humans to send in talented people into nar cracks, so this would avoid suspicion while you can find actual clues."


    Lin Fan just gave a hum of acknowledgement and he didn''t stop staring at Zhang Liang.


    Zhang Liang really wanted to turn away, but he knew he couldn''t do that. Eventually he gave a sigh and said, "If possible, please make sure that they don''t die at a minimum. After all, we are borrowing them from their families, so it would be hard to exin to them why they died."


    Lin Fan still said without any expression on his face, "So basically you want me to babysit them?"


    Finally Zhang Liang couldn''t say anything other than saying in a helpless voice, "Yes, we want you to babysit them."


    Lin Fan said with the same expressionless face, "How much are you willing topensate me for this."


    Zhang Liang hesitantly asked, "How much do you want?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Fifty more pet eggs each week."


    Zhang Liang quickly agreed, "Alright, that''s fine since we''re beingpensated by those families anyway for letting them enter this nar crack under our supervision. We can just squeeze a bit more out of them, there''s nothing they can say."


    Hearing this, Lin Fan felt a little bit like he had been tricked, but there was nothing he could do since the other side had already epted his terms.


    So after this mini discussion, the two of them came back to the group and Zhang Liang ignored everything that happened before as he introduced Lin Fan.


    As soon as he did, the two boys who had been fighting earlier came up to Lin Fan and eyed him over before one of them said, "Who are you and how are you qualified toe into this nar crack with us?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and repeated what Zhang Liang said, "I''m just a helper that the Monster Trainer Union hired to investigate some things, nothing more, nothing less."


    But the red haired boy didn''t let this go as he poked Lin Fan''s chest and said, "That doesn''t answer my question. Do you really think a kid like you can survive in this dangerous nar crack?"


    Lin Fan smiled as he reached a hand out.


    The red haired boy looked at that hand before suddenly reaching his hand out to p Lin Fan''s hand. However, the moment his hand hit Lin Fan''s hand, it felt like he was pping a b of iron as a tremble filled his entire body and he couldn''t help pulling his hand back as he grasped it with the other hand.


    The others all noticed this and realized that Lin Fan wasn''t normal.


    It seemed like they really couldn''t judge this book by the cover.


    The red haired boy looked at Lin Fan with a bit of hostility, but there was nothing he could do right now.


    Lin Fan ignored him and asked the others, "Anyone else?"


    There was a bit of anger that appeared in the eyes of these young geniuses, but none of them said a single word. They were all experts in their own rights, so of course they could tell there was a difference in strength between them and Lin Fan.


    Zhang Liang had been standing on the side waiting, but seeing that everything had calmed down, he came forward and said, "Alright, now that you''re all acquainted, let''s get into our discussion. There are no real rules for the nar crack this time, you are all free to move around as you please, but you should at least keep the lines ofmunications open and work with each other as much as possible. That''s all we ask of you."


    The geniuses looked at each other before giving a few grumbles, but they agreed to this in the end.


    Zhang Liang nodded before saying, "Alright, let''s get you all geared up and send you inside the nar crack."

 180 Chapter 180

    Zhang Liang brought them to a warehouse where they were all provided with the supplies that they needed. However, since most of these young geniuses came fromrge families, other than basic supplies like food, water, and camping supplies, they had everything they needed provided to them by their families.


    It didn''t take long before everyone had their gear and they were ready to head in.


    Zhang Liang brought them outside to where three armoured vehicles were parked. Standing by those armoured vehicles were a team of technicians that were currently standing there and waiting.


    These people were in charge of operating the base camp inside the nar crack and they would be responsible for operating themunication.


    Communication inside a nar crack was different from outside since the nar crack created a minor realm in space. That minor realm had different spatialws from the major realm outside, since it was a crack thatid in between normal space, which was how it connected the Blue Star to thends of the Beast n. This was a passage thatid in between two realms which created different spatialws from the realms outside, which interfered with themunication signal.


    This meant that when they were inside the nar crack they didn''t have a way ofmunicating unless they had a specialmunicator that locked onto certain spatial frequencies, but those all cost a lot and were not things easily provided. So there would be nomunication with the camp outside, but they would be setting up a camp inside the nar crack with an antenna which would allow formunication inside.


    While that seemed to be the reason for the base camp on the surface, Lin Fan could tell that wasn''t all since he recognized a few of the people running the base camp.


    These were people who hade to greet Lin Fan with Yu Ning when Lin Fan went to the Monster Trainer Union for the first time. They were all disciples that studied under vice president Zhang Liang with Yu Ning.


    It could be seen that the Monster Trainer Union had really invested quite a bit this time into the operation this time.


    Since these were disciples that were under the vice president Zhang Liang, it meant that they were some of the best and brightest talents in the Monster Trainer Union. However, they were now being sent on this potentially very dangerous and very important mission.


    But this also meant that the Monster Trainer Union was putting quite the importance to the sess of this mission, which Lin Fan could understand.


    This nar crack might possibly be a breach that the Beast n had made and if that were the case, there might be an invasion force prepared to break through at any moment.


    While this might not mean the end of humanity, but it would be a very costly fight since in the past, the beast waves that had resulted in the deaths of up to billions of people.


    In one particrly bad beast wave in the past, the human poption had even been reduced by a half. It was so bad that the upper realm even had to step in and bring immigrants from other lower realms over.


    But of course this event had been erased from the minds of most people and after several thousand generations of mixing blood, they all regarded themselves as people of the Blue Star. This event was only remembered by a few people who had ess to the Union Government''s library or those that had rtionships to people that had ess like Lin Fan.


    Once they were all loaded into the armoured vehicles, the armoured vehicles set off. They drove right up to the nar crack and there was a small gap left in the barricade where they could enter.


    Zhang Liang gave them onest goodbye as they entered the nar crack and their surroundings changed.


    When everything came back into view, they found themselves inside arge jungle with another crack behind them.


    Everyone got out to examine their surroundings and once they did get their bearings, the support team began setting up their equipment.


    They were setting up near the nar crack''s exit just in case anything went wrong, that way they could just ditch their equipment and escape as soon as possible.


    While they were setting up, the eight geniuses were all preparing their gear. It was clear by how they were splitting that they were either nning to go off in pairs or alone, but that was normal considering what kind of pride they had as people touted as geniuses.


    During this time, Lin Fan walked around like he was looking over the camp, but there was something that he was dropping every time that he moved past one of the geniuses.


    After he made his round, he came back to Ang who he had left waiting for him and watched as each of the geniuses headed off in a different direction.<sub> </sub>


    When they all set off, he also set off with Ang since there was nothing for him to do right now. The people at the camp would be able to help analyze anything that he captured, so what he needed to do was scout around to see if there was anything noteworthy and to capture beasts as samples for the camp.


    Lin Fan also chose a direction that was different from the direction that all the others headed off in and he walked along with Ang like they were having a nice stroll. At first they were walking separately, but eventually Lin Fan moved closer and closer until they were walking side by side.


    There was something that he wanted to do, but he was hesitant in doing it even though he had done it before. For some reason, when it came to Ang, there was this strange nervous feeling that filled his heart.


    His hand came up a bit beforeing back down to his side again and again until he finally made up his mind and brought it fully up. It just stayed in the air for a bit while they were walking along, looking a bit strange just hanging there, but eventually Lin Fan''s hand moved forward to grab something.


    Ang hadn''t been aware of this the entire time as she was just enjoying her walk with Lin Fan.


    She didn''t know why she felt this way, but as time passed, she felt that just spending time with Lin Fan was good enough for her.


    At first she didn''t want toe on this trip because she felt that it would be a waste of time, but now she was d since she was able to get some alone time with Lin Fan.


    While she was just happily enjoying the walk, she suddenly felt a hand slowly grab hers.


    When she turned down to see Lin Fan''s hand holding her own, she didn''t know how to react at first, but remembering the shows and movies that she had seen, she remembered that this was something that couples did. The moment this thought appeared in her mind, there was a faint blush that came over her face and she quickly turned her head, looking very shy.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to expect when he tried grabbing Ang''s hand, but seeing her shy appearance now, he really couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    When he saw her the first time, Ang had been a cold and aloof angel that was a being that he knew that he could never beat. Deep down, he always knew that that was the first moment that he felt something towards her, a different kind of feeling.


    She had always seemed out of reach for someone from a lower realm like him, but now this cold and aloof angel was acting shy in front of him. It gave him the realization that she was now his and there was a strange feeling of pride and happiness that filled his heart.


    Of course, they weren''t just wasting time as they walked through the forest leisurely like this. During this time, Lin Fan had already summoned Brainy who had been spreading its parasite seeds all around, taking control of various different beasts that would be its eyes and ears.


    Lin Fan had instructed Brainy to search for any beast that seemed like they didn''t belong in this ecosystem, but Brainy hadn''t found anything in the beasts around them. So Brainy sent the beasts that it had put its seed in further out, as well as to scout the surrounding area.


    So during this time, there was nothing for Lin Fan and Ang to do except take a leisurely walk through the forest.


    They kept moving through the trees until they eventually came to ake that was in the middle of the forest.


    Walking hand in hand, they walked along the shore of the beach, enjoying just walking along in silence without a need to say a single thing. They didn''t need to say anything, they could just enjoy the warmth of the other person they felt from holding hands.


    But they had only taken a few steps along the short before there was a beast that suddenly popped out of the surface of the water.


    This was a beast that had a strange appearance.


    This beast had a single center purple cylinder that was its main body with arge eye at the top of it and then it had many different purple tentacles that stretched out from its body, but that wasn''t the strangest part. The strangest part was that there was another eye that was attached to the ends of every tentacle, giving it thousands of different eyes.


    The moment it popped out of the surface of the water, it brought a few tentacles back and swung down at Lin Fan and Ang who were walking along the shore.

 181 Chapter 181

    As the tentacles swung down, the eyes at the ends of them turned to stare right at Lin Fan and Ang.


    When the eyes locked onto Lin Fan and Ang, they felt a strange slowness that came over them. As well, there was a strange numb feeling that filled their limbs.


    This beast was called an Eye Monster, it was a special type of monster that didn''t belong to this kind of environment. This Eye Monster was a monster that normally lived in an abyss environment, since it was a monster that was considered a demon type monster.


    The reason why it was called an Eye Monster was clearly because of all the various eyes that it had along its tentacles. But there was also another reason why it was called Eye Monster.


    These eyes all had the ability to imbue a special effect on whatever they were looking at. In terms of video games, these eyes had the ability to debuff enemies with status ailments which weakened the prey of the Eye Monster.


    That slowness that came over them was the slowing effect of one of the Eye Monster''s eyes and the numbness was a paralyzing effect. However, of course the Eye Monster couldn''t do much to the two of them since there was arge difference in cultivation since the Eye Monster was only in the Gold Realm.


    The two of them had suppressed their cultivations as they were walking along since they were enjoying the scenery of nature and making sure they weren''t scaring off any wildlife, but they never thought that this beast would be dumb enough to target them.


    Ang reacted immediately and jumped back to avoid the Eye Monster''s tentacles swinging down at them.


    Since the two of them were still holding hands, Ang had also pulled Lin Fan along with her. So instead of looking like a couple jumping back in sync, since Ang was much stronger than Lin Fan, it looked like Ang was dragging Lin Fan like a doll as she jumped away from the attack, but there was nothing that Lin Fan could do other than going limp.


    Afternding, she ced Lin Fan on the ground before drawing her hand back.


    Normally Ang would ignore situations like this, but when she looked at this Eye Monster, she didn''t know why she felt annoyed whenever she looked at it.


    Perhaps it was because of how disgusting it looked or perhaps it was because it disrupted the nice atmosphere that they had, but it looked annoying whenever she looked at it.


    Before Lin Fan could even react, he felt the flow of wind as it gathered inside Ang''s hand, forming a little spiral of wind. Then she suddenly pushed her hand out and there were thousands of wind des that flew out, cutting the various tentacles of the Eye Monster''s body.


    The Eye Monster''s one single eye on its main body was opened wide as its blood spilled all over the ground from its various tentacles being severed from its body. Those tentacles fell to the ground and twitched a few times before the eyes dted, while the pupils constricted.


    As more and more wind des flew out, more and more of the Eye Monster''s tentacles were cut off from its body.


    The Eye Monster tried to regenerate the tentacles as they were being chopped off from its body, but the wind des never stoppeding and they kept chopping off more and more tentacles before they could even regenerate.


    Finally the Eye Monster couldn''t keep up anymore and stopped trying to regenerate as it focused all its energy into a single tentacle which it tried to use as a shield. However, Ang didn''t give it a chance to escape as she shot out one final wind de that cut right through the tentacle and severed the one main eye of the Eye Monster.


    Once the eyeball dropped to the ground, the main body of the Eye Monster slumped as the main eyeball dted and the pupils constricted.


    All of this only took a few seconds, but that flurry of wind des had been an attack that the Eye Monster just could not handle.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say when he saw this, he didn''t even know why Ang looked so angry.


    Ang didn''t just stop there.She walked over to the corpse of the Eye Monster and stomped down on the eyeball on the ground, crushing itpletely. Only then did her rage subside a bit, but she was still filled with anger for some reason.


    Lin Fan moved past her and gathered up the corpse of the Eye Monster.


    This was a corpse that he would have to bring back to the base campter for them to study since this was a beast that wasn''t native to this environment. Though he was sure that it would be hard for them to study with how many pieces Ang had chopped it into with her wind des.


    When Lin Fan finished gathering everything in his storage, Ang had calmed down and came back to his side. It was clear that with the way she looked, she wanted to keep walking, but Lin Fan revealed an awkward look.<sub> </sub>


    While he had been collecting the pieces of the Eye Monster, Brainy had advised him that it had found another beast that wasn''t native to this environment. Lin Fan had been nning to head over as soon as he was done collecting the corpse of the Eye Monster, but now Ang wanted to keep walking.


    "Um, Brainy found another beast and I was thinking that we should head over there." Lin Fan hesitantly said.


    Ang slightly knit her brows at this and Lin Fan could tell that this was getting dangerous for him.


    But before Ang could raise her hand, Lin Fan reached out his hand and said, "How about we fly there together?"


    Ang looked at his outstretched hand and after looking surprised for a bit, there was a blush that came over her face as her brows unfurrowed and she took his hand with a slight nod.


    Compared to back in the Trial Realm, Lin Fan now had control over windws, so he had gained the ability to fly. Actually, even without windws, Lin Fan was somehow able to fly with just his life energy which should have been only possible after one reached the Legendary Realm.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been able to do this before, but during his cultivation recently, he had finished condensing half of his second sun in his dantian. When that happened, there was a strange energy that had been released from the suns that had transformed his life energy.


    The life energy that he now had was much more transparent, almost like the life energy that one would have once they reached the Legendary Realm.


    Lin Fan didn''t understand why this was happening, but Momonga had told him that there was something inside his body that was purifying his life energy and that was why it became like this.


    But after he described what happened to Momonga, Momonga said that he had never heard of such a cultivation technique before. The only thing he said was that since this was a God Tier Cultivation Technique, there must be something special about it and that was why it purified his life energy.


    There was no point in thinking this through, so Lin Fan just stopped worrying about it.


    The two of them flew through the air holding hands, looking like an immortal couple like Lin Fan had read about in novels back on earth. Lin Fan had even thought about using his life energy to control a sword, just so he could ride it like a sword cultivator.


    The two of them flew above the trees for several minutes before they came to a cliff that led into a deep abyss.


    ording to Brainy''s parasites, this was where it hadst seen the beast.


    Looking down into the abyss, the two of them found that there were thousands of holes that were made in the wall of the cliff, like there was a colony living inside.


    ording to Brainy''s reports, this was a beast that was like an ant, but it was the size of a rhino and had sharp piercing jaw mandibles.


    If Lin Fan''s guesses were correctly, these should have been Desert Horrors.


    The reason why Desert Horrors got their name was because they lived in the desert and they were like antlions, creating sandpits that trapped their prey and drawing them in. When one found that they were stuck in a sandpit, they faced the horror of the Desert Horror that owned it.


    But this situation was strange since normally antlions formed traps in the sand, but now that they were in an environment that didn''t have sand, they were forming colonies in tunnels just like normal ants.


    Could it be that when beasts were put in an environment that was different from their own, they would adapt ordingly to how simr beasts in that environment survived?


    Did it naturallye from the knowledge in their bloodline or was there another reason?


    Lin Fan moved closer to take a peek at the series of tunnels on the side of the cliff, but the moment he came to the edge of the cliff, the ground under him copsed. What appeared under him was the open mandibles of a Desert Horror, waiting for him to fall into its grasps.


    It seemed like these Desert Horrors didn''tpletely adapt, they still used the same hunting method. That could be seen by the uneven curves into the cliff that were around him, it seemed like there had already been other victims.

 182 Chapter 182

    The second the ground copsed under Lin Fan, he didn''t panic at all.


    He just gathered his life energy and utilized his windws to float just out of reach of the mandibles of the Desert Horror.


    The Desert Horror reached out and tried to snap its mandibles at Lin Fan''s feet, but Lin Fan stayed just out of reach of the Desert Horror the entire time.


    Lin Fan looked down at the Desert Horror under him and seeing it this close, it really did look ugly. The head was like the giant head of an ant, but the mandibles were much bigger than normal and took up arge part of the lower half of the head, scrunching up the features.


    But another thing he did notice was that the sides of the pit created by the Desert Horror was covered in sand. It seemed like when the Desert Horror had made this pit, it had turned the dirt and rock in the pit into sand somehow.


    Lin Fan didn''t wait any longer as he took out the Iron Eater Bone Artifact and transformed it into a dagger. There was a golden glow that surrounded it before Lin Fan threw this dagger right down in the head of the Desert Horror.


    The Desert Horror was only in the Silver Realm, of course it couldn''t resist the dagger that Lin Fan threw that had the power of the tinum Realm. The dagger flew right into the Desert Horror''s forehead like a hot knife cutting through butter.


    The mandibles of the Desert Horror cked together a few more times as the final signals from its brain were sent, but it soon slumped over in the pit as it lost all signs of life.


    Lin Fan pulled back with his hand and the dagger he threw out came back into his hand before disappearing.


    Since Lin Fan had already made a bond with the Iron Eater Bone Artifact, he could freely control it to return to his hand whenever he wanted. Also whenever it was away from him, he could will it away and it woulde back to him, allowing him to summon it again.


    Lin Fannded on the edge of the Desert Horror pit and looked down to find that there was a hole that was blocked by the corpse of the Desert Horror.


    A single Desert Horror corpse was far from being enough to study since this was nothing more than one of the gatherer ants. To truly study them, Lin Fan had to capture the queen, so there was no choice but to enter the tunnels of the Desert Horrors.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all.


    Since this Desert Horror was only at the Silver Realm, this meant that the queen and the royal guards would only be in the Gold Realm.


    For Lin Fan who was already in the tinum Realm, but could match those in the Legendary Realm and Ang who was far past just the Legendary Realm, there was nothing these Gold Realm beasts could do to them.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan had already stabilized after making the breakthrough to the mid tinum Realm and was getting close to breaking through to the high tinum Realm. With his recent cultivation gains, he was confident in defeating the envoy from the Alchemy King Hall easily now, even without being forced to use his trump card. Of course, he would still have to use his trump card against that final attack since there was a giant gap between levels in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan turned back to Ang and gave her an inviting gesture, aiming that gesture at the hole like he was inviting her on a date as he said, "Shall we?"


    Ang revealed a faint smile before taking his hand and they both jumped down.


    Ang with a flick of her hand controlled the windws to move aside the Desert Horror''s corpse and opened up the way. Falling down into the hole, they fell for a bit before firmlynding on the ground beneath the hole.


    Looking back up, it seemed like there was a reason why the Desert Horror''s corpse had gotten stuck. This was arge tunnel and the hole was actually quite high above them, reaching ten meters above their head. If the Desert Horror hadn''t been stuck in the hole, it would have definitely fallen down. However, looking at the ant leg tracks on the ceiling, it was clear that they had their own way of moving around.


    There wasn''t much light in this tunnel, so Lin Fan summoned Xiao Huo and had it create several fireballs that acted as torches for them, lightning up the entire tunnel.


    Looking around, they found that there were only two ways to go, so they just chose one way and headed off, not knowing whether it was right or wrong.


    Of course, the Desert Horror colony naturally could smell the new scent that had entered their tunnels, as well as the blood that the dead Desert Horror shed, so it didn''t take them long to find the invaders to their tunnels.


    As Lin Fan and Ang walked along hand in hand, they felt the tremors in the tunnels they were in and they could tell that they had been found. Based on the tremors, it seemed like there was a stampede heading towards them, but they didn''t panic at all.


    After a few seconds, at the end of the tunnel in front of them,ing from around the corner, there was a stampede of giant ants that were the size of rhinos charging right towards them.<sub> </sub>


    Neither of them panicked as they just revealed smiles.


    They let go of each other''s hand and Lin Fan pulled out his two handed sword while standing in front of Ang.


    When the first ants were about to reach them, Lin Fan suddenly dashed forward and swept out with hisrge two handed sword that was covered in a golden glow. The sword didn''t stop at all as it cut through the bodies of every single ant in the front line.


    Even after theirrades had fallen, the waves of ants behind the first wave didn''t stop as they trampled over the corpses of their fallen allies, charging at Lin Fan still, but Lin Fan didn''t stay there. Using the momentum of the sword swing, he let it carry him back and he spun as he turned around, turning around Ang with his de.


    During this time, there were des of wind that were sent out with a wave of Ang''s hand that cut down the second wave of ants.


    When the third wave trampled over the second wave, Lin Fan had already spun around Ang and with the momentum of his giant de, he swept it across the third wave, cutting them down just like with the first wave.


    The two of them continued dancing this strange dance with Lin Fan turning and spinning his de around Ang while she waved her hand and sent out des of wind. It was like a strange dance of death that was like a whirlwind that cut through the waves of ants that kepting at them.


    Dancing this strange dance, the two of them cut down waves and waves of Desert Horrors as they continued moving down the tunnel bit by bit.


    Normally Lin Fan didn''t have Ang help him because most of the time, he was fighting people. If he were to allow Ang to help, there was the risk of exposing her identity which was not good for him.


    However, this time they were only facing ants and these ants weren''t that powerful to begin with, so there was no problem in letting Ang help since she didn''t need to use that much power and there was no chance of exposing her identity in this nar crack. But the main reason why he didn''t mind was because he was having fun dancing with her like this.


    The two of them continued like this until they reached the final wave of ants. Once they stopped their dance of death, there were thousands of Desert Horror corpses that were left in their wake.


    The two passed to look around their surroundings and seeing that there were no more ants around them, they held hands once again with smiles on their faces as they began moving down the tunnel once again.


    The Queen Desert Horror had a special ability to observe through her subordinates and she had seen this ughter of her brood through her observer. As the queen, naturally she had a certain amount of intelligence that was above the rest, so she could tell that these two humans were dangerous.


    The Queen Desert Horror had withdrawn one tenth of her troops to form a final line of defense in the birthing chamber.


    The Desert Horrors waited patiently for Lin Fan and Ang who took their time leisurely strolling through the tunnels.


    Once they arrived and saw the line of defenses in the birthing chamber around the Queen Desert Horror, they didn''t panic at all.


    With tacit understanding, Ang flew up and picked Lin Fan off the ground. Once they were high up in the air, Ang began spinning Lin Fan around, going faster and faster until they created a whirlwind around them before throwing him at the line of ants.


    When Lin Fan was thrown, he had his de drawn and there was a tornado around his de. Lin Fannded right among the wall of Desert Horrors and with thebined windws from him and Ang that were around his de, he blew all five hundred of the soldier ants away, leaving only the queen and her ten royal guards.


    The royal guards wanted to take advantage of Lin Fan''snding to catch him off guard, but Ang in the air didn''t give them that chance at all. The five guards that were in front were buffeted with a flurry of wind des that Ang threw right at them, cutting them to pieces.


    With the remaining bit of wind generated from those wind des, the other five royal guards were pushed back slightly and pushed off bnce.


    Lin Fan quickly took advantage of this, changing his two handed de into a smaller sword that he swept across the vitals of the five remaining royal guard ants, cutting them all down.


    In just a matter of minutes, Lin Fan and Ang''sbination y had taken down all the ants that had stood between them and the queen. This was a force that even normal tinum Realm Experts would have found hard to deal with, but it was only a simple flip of the hand for the two of them.


    Angnded down beside Lin Fan and they slowly moved towards the queen.

 183 Chapter 183

    The Queen Desert Horror saw that these two terrifying people were approaching it and it immediately dropped to the ground, begging for its life.


    Lin Fan and Ang were both surprised to see this, but then they revealed smiles since it looked quite funny begging for its life like this.


    The Queen Desert Horror saw these smiles and thought that these two terrifying humans were about to release it, so it looked up with eyes filled with hope.


    But before it could even finish, Lin Fan''s de was already moving towards the Queen Desert Horror''s head. It would have pierced right through if there wasn''t a voice that suddenly spoke out that stopped him, causing the de to stop just a single inch away from the Queen Desert Horror''s head.


    The Queen Desert Horror naturally wasn''t able to react in time and was caught off guard when it suddenly saw the de that had appeared in front of its face. After a tremble ran through its entire body, the Queen Desert Horrorpletely copsed on the ground as the strength left its body.


    Inside Lin Fan''s mind was Brainy''s voice.


    "Master, please don''t kill this Queen Desert Horror. Can you give her to me?"


    Lin Fan was surprised as he stopped his de. He let Brainy out of his sleeve and asked, "Why do you want her?"


    Brainy said in his mind, "This Queen Desert Horror has the ability to create a colony of thousands of Silver Realm Desert Horrors, this is an ability that even I don''t have. However, if I were to control this Queen Desert Horror, I would be able to control all of them through her."


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this.


    The one thing that he didck now was arge number of disposable troops.


    He did have troops under him, namely the righteous bandits group that he was nurturing, but he didn''t want to use them as disposable troops. He wanted to have them build awork that would wrap around the entire world, making it so he could control everything with thiswork.


    That meant that since he couldn''t sacrifice them, he didn''t have troops that he could send on suicide attacks if there was a need, but now this Queen Desert Horror provided the solution for this problem.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all to let Brainy ce its seed into the unconscious Queen Desert Horror.


    The Queen Desert Horror had fainted from seeing its life sh in front of its eyes from almost dying, so it didn''t resist at all. Even if it was awake to resist, Brainy was already in the tinum Realm, so forcefully controlling the Queen Desert Horror in the Gold Realm was as simple as flipping its hand, or rather its tail.


    When the Queen Desert Horror woke up, the first thing it did was kneel down to Lin Fan and Brainy, showing its fealty.


    Normally Brainy didn''t keep any of the beasts it controlled since there was no point in keeping them, but this Queen Desert Horror would be the first. In the future, when Brainy charged into battle, this Queen Desert Horror and its troops would be the valiant vanguard for Brainy.


    But after letting Brainy tame the Queen Desert Horror, Lin Fan felt that it really was a pity that they had ughtered all the other soldiers. If they had left them, it meant that Lin Fan would have already had an army ready to use.


    Still, there was no point in feeling regret over something that was already over. The only thing they could do now was let the Queen Desert Horror create another army for them. However, it was a good thing that all the Queen Desert Horror needed to create another army was a source of ingredients and Lin Fan had an endless source of that from his cultivation realm farms.


    Lin Fan wouldn''t have any problem supplying the Queen Desert Horror with the excess that he now had since he had already moved onto his third cultivation realm farm.


    The only other problem was that this Queen Desert Horror wasn''t a pet of Lin Fan''s, it was a pet that was controlled by Brainy, so it couldn''t enter Lin Fan''s pet space. However, the fact that he now had his third cultivation realm farm was also a solution to this.


    When he had defeated the Zerg Queen on his second cultivation realm farm world, the system had given him a reward and this reward was a beast storage space. When Lin Fan had opened it, it was like an inventory window that appeared in front of him.


    He had tested it with different beasts he hatched in the store and he found that he could store those beasts in this beast storage space without having to make contracts with them. This had been a problem for Lin Fan since there was only a limited amount of contracts that he could make with his current spiritual sense, so there was a limit to his breeding before.


    Now that he had this pet storage space, the only limit that he had was the amount of eggs that he could obtain.<sub> </sub>


    The other good part about the pet storage space was that it had the stacking item effect of an inventory system, meaning that pets of the same race could be stored in a single storage space with a number underneath to indicate how many of them there were.


    This meant that even if the Queen Desert Horror gave birth to thousands of soldier ants, all those soldiers would only take a single slot. Or at least they would until Lin Fan found the upper limit of a stack in the system''s storage system. So far Lin Fan hadn''t found it yet, but that was only because he didn''t have many of the same race of beasts.


    The storage of the system also didn''t mean that the beasts stored would go into stasis like with other systems, it actually created an isted space for the beasts that it stored, allowing them to move around freely.


    Once the Queen Desert Horror was ced in the storage, Lin Fan also moved quite a few ingredients over to her to let her start breeding eggs. Desert Horror eggs didn''t take that long to hatch, so it wouldn''t take long before Lin Fan would have his army.


    While this storage was good for now, Lin Fan was also tempted to buy a special storage artifact for insect type beasts like this. Those hive shaped storage artifacts could hold an entire colony of insect type beasts.


    If Brainy could have this artifact, it could freely move around and coordinate with Lin Fan as it released soldier ants to attack their enemies. It would definitely be more effective than releasing the soldier ants around Lin Fan since that was the range of the beast storage of the system.


    However, that was all forter in the future. For now, they still had other things to do.


    After the Queen Desert Horror was taken care of, Brainy notified Lin Fan that it had found another beast that wasn''t native to this environment.


    Actually, this one was quite easy to find since it was really bad at adapting to this environment. It had even reached the point where it had burnt down arge patch of the trees around it, creating a giant ck mark in the entire forest.


    p Brainy led Lin Fan over to the ck mark, but just like in the tunnel, Lin Fan and Ang acted like they were just going on a pleasant stroll.</anda>


    As they came closer to where Brainy said the beast was, they could feel the temperature around them rising and they could smell the scent of smoke in the air. It was clear that there was something very hot near them and it had burnt down quite a few trees.


    Finally they came out of the trees to find arge patch of burntnd in front of them.


    This patch of burntnd continued forward in front of them, perfectly forming a straight line. It was like something had been dropped here that had burnt away all the trees around it before it continued moving in a straight line, burning everything around it as it went.


    Looking into the distance, they could see arge patch of smoke rising from the forest in front of them.


    Ang had better eyesight than Lin Fan because of her cultivation, so she could easily make out a red slug that was slithering along in the forest.


    This was the Magma Slug that Lin Fan had seen in the picture before. This was a beast that shouldn''t have been found in this forest environment since it was a beast that was naturally formed in magma, so normally it would only be found deep in volcanoes.


    This Magma Slug''s entire body was made of magma, except for the rocks that covered its back.


    The Magma Slug''s magma was like blood and the filtration organ that was simr to the kidney was located on the back of the magma slug. That organ filtered out all the impurities in the magma and finally all those impurities formed the rock shell that was found on its back.


    These impurities were considered impurities to the Magma Slug, but these impurities were actually rare metals. Once these impurities were released and cooled on the back of the Magma Slug, it created a powerful rock shell that was almost impossible to crack.


    There were only two ces to attack the Magma Slug, its back or its skin that was as hot as magma, reaching 1000 degrees celsius.


    So that meant that one either attacked a ce where the heat was strong enough to melt their weapons or they attacked the shell that was incredibly hard.


    That was why most people had difficulty fighting this Magma Slug, since its defenses were usually an entire realm higher than the cultivation realm it was currently in.


    But that didn''t mean a thing to Lin Fan.

 184 Chapter 184

    Lin Fan took out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact and transformed it into the heavy two handed zweihander sword. He wanted as much force as possible, so that meant that the heaviest sword would let him use the most force.


    Once the sword came out, there was a mix of three lights that surrounded the sword. It was the same power of force, water, and lightning that wrapped around it, creating an intense power.


    Lin Fan quickly utilized the bit of windw that he had to quickly charge forward before bringing it down right onto the back of the Magma Slug.


    This Magma Slug''s defense might have been hard for a normal cultivator in the tinum Realm to break through, but with Lin Fan and hisbination of threews, it was easily done. Not to mention that there were hints of Embryo Soul Realmws that were contained in the Iron Eater Bone Artifact that would have cut through anyways.


    The Magma Slug was cut in half just like a hot knife cutting through butter, being cut right in half.


    Magma spilled out of the cut in the middle and poured onto the Iron Eater Bone Artifact, but it didn''t melt at all, it didn''t even turn red from being heated up. The only thing that changed was that when the Iron Eater Bone Artifact touched the rock shell, it swallowed up pieces of the rock shell that it came in contact with.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this at first, but when he looked over the rock shell, he immediately understood.


    While the pieces of the rock shell were considered impurities for the Magma Slug, the metals that it was made of were all scraps of rare metals.


    These metallic elements had been refined in the magma that the Magma Slugs eat and while they were naturally melted inside the magma, these fragments were things that the Magma Slug''s body couldn''t take, so it had to expel them as impurities which created that shell on its back.


    This was why even though Magma Slugs were hard to hunt down, there were still people who chased down Magma Slugs. It was all for the rare metals that were found on their back, rare metals that could be used to make even better items.


    Lin Fan swept the Iron Eater Bone Artifact across the shell of the Magma Slug and absorbed the rest of the rare metals into the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    The Iron Eater Bone Artifact had developed the seed of spirituality, which had allowed it to bond with Lin Fan. This also meant that it had kept the ability of the Iron Eater, which meant that as long as it continued eating rare metals, it would be able to continue to evolve and be a stronger weapon. There was nothing better than the all you can eat buffet of rare metals on the back of the Magma Slug.


    After the Iron Eater Bone Artifact had finished swallowing the rare metals on the back of the Magma Slug, the structure of the sword had changed. Although it wasn''t that clear what had changed, Lin Fan could tell that the edge of the de was sharper and that the de itself was a bit more sturdypared to before.


    This even made Lin Fan wish that he could find another Magma Slug or a whole colony of Magma Slugs. If he could gather a bunch of rare metals, he was certain that he would be able to evolve the Iron Eater Bone Artifact today. But it was a pity that there weren''t anymore around.


    This was something that he would have to do eventually, he would have to evolve his weapon since his cultivation was also quickly increasing without stopping.


    Now that the Magma Slug had been taken care of, there was only one beast that was left on Lin Fan''s hunting list. It was the Ice Tusk that he had seen in the picture the president had shown him.


    Once Lin Fan caught this final beast, he would bring the corpses of these beasts back to the base camp for the support staff there to research.


    It didn''t take that long for Brainy to find the Ice Tusk, rather it had known where the Ice Tusk had been all along since it had found it at the same time as the Magma Slug.


    It was simr to how the Magma Slug burnt away all the trees around it.


    The Ice Tusk''s bristles were made of ice itself, so wherever the Ice Tusk went, the bristles that brushed against objects or the bristles that fell froze the area around it.


    So it wasn''t hard to find therge patch of forest that had beenpletely frozen by the bristles of the Ice Tusk.


    Brainy led Lin Fan and Ang through the forest at a leisurely pace, but before they could even reach the domain of the Ice Tusk, there was something that had happened. It was something so sudden that Lin Fan waspletely caught off guard.


    "Master, one of the kids is dead." Brainy said in Lin Fan''s mind.


    Lin Fan immediately stopped in his step when he heard this.


    Ang looked over at Lin Fan who had suddenly stopped and immediately knit her brows when she saw the expression on Lin Fan''s face.<sub> </sub>


    "How did they die?" Lin Fan immediately asked.


    "I don''t know." Brainy said.


    Since Lin Fan had taken the babysitting job, of course he nned on following through since he was being paid.


    When they first came into the nar crack, Lin Fan had dropped one of Brainy''s new seeds onto each of the geniuses.


    This seed was different from the parasite seed that Brainy had before, instead this was a seed made for monitoring.


    But putting the seed on the clothes of those geniuses, Brainy could monitor their vitals and their location. So instead of wasting time and effort following thempletely, Lin Fan was just using these seeds to make sure that they were safe. After all, Brainy only had a certain amount of beasts that it could control and he didn''t want to use them monitoring these kids.


    He assumed that since they were geniuses fromrge families, they would at least be able to survive long enough for him to arrive to save them, but he never expected one of them to die just like this.


    "Was there anyone near them when they died?" Lin Fan kept asking.


    "There was the seed of another genius that was nearby, but I wasn''t sure which once it was since they all scattered since the beginning. I was too busy controlling my beasts to search for our prey." Brainy exined.


    Lin Fan fell into deep thought for a bit before saying, "Bring me to the corpse."


    Brainy without saying anything else guided Lin Fan through the forest to where the corpse of the young master had been left.


    When they approached, Lin Fan could smell the blood in the air, as well as see a few scavengers that were nearby, looking to feast on the corpse.


    Lin Fan just released his aura and all the scavengers were scared off.


    As Lin Fan approached, he saw the blood that was scattered across the ground and when he finally came close, he found the identity of the person who was murdered.


    It was the young master with long hair who looked like the perfect image of a sword cultivator. He was just lying there on the ground with a shocked look on his face, but that wasn''t the strangest thing.


    The strangest thing was that the wounds on him didn''t seem like they were made by any beasts, the wounds seemed like they had been made by a human weapon. To be precise, they were made by his own sword that had been discarded on the ground that had blood at the tip of the de.


    Judging by the wounds on the young master''s body, he had been shed across the chest once by another weapon before his weapon was taken and he was stabbed several times with his own sword.


    With the scene of the crime like this, Lin Fan quickly came up with two possibilities. One was that there was a beast that could transform into human form that could use weapons, but that didn''t seem likely since it would take bing a King Beast to have a chance to transform into human form. The only other possibility was that there was a traitor among them who had killed this young master, which was made even more likely by the fact that there had been another tracking seed nearby.


    It seemed like the Beast n was indeed set on invading and it seemed like the Beast n wasn''t just acting alone.


    If that were the case, Lin Fan would have to rethink his ns and he wouldn''t be able to just hunt the beasts like he wanted.


    Lin Fan closed the eyes of the young master before picking his corpse up to head back to the camp, it seemed like he would have to call a meeting.


    There were no real rules that the Monster Trainer Union had ced on this trip, but they did have one strict rule that everyone had to show up when a meeting was called since meetings were only called for the most dangerous of situations. Now that someone was dead, this seemed to fit that description.


    ? When the supporters in base camp saw Lin Faning back carrying the young master, they all stared at him in shock.


    Lin Fan ignored this and just said, "Call a meeting, now!"

 185 Chapter 185

    It took a bit before they came back to their senses, but Lin Fan''s words definitely yed arge part in that.


    The supporters divided in half, with half of them going to contact the various geniuses while the other half helped preserve the body of the young master and the beast corpses that Lin Fan brought.


    When they were taking care of the young master''s body, one of Zhang Liang''s disciples turned to Lin Fan and said, "Owner Lin, the wounds on his body¡­"


    Lin Fan nodded and took out the young master''s sword that he had stored as he said, "It''s as you think."


    The disciple then said, "Then, you''re calling this meeting¡­"


    Lin Fan shook his head, "I have no idea right now, but we need to at least do something."


    The disciple still had his doubts, but seeing that Lin Fan didn''t want to talk, he closed his mouth and continued with his work.


    It took a while before all the geniuses were gathered, but eventually they all came together after half an hour. It seemed like the Monster Trainer Union did have some weight, being able to make these proud geniuses follow their rules,ing to a meeting.


    Once everyone was gathered, they all looked impatiently as they waited for the person who called the meeting to start.


    With everyone gathered, Lin Fan had a clear view of the eight...well, now seven geniuses.


    Other than the long haired genius who was dead, the red headed one, and the girl with short hair, there were five others currently gathered.


    There was a girl who had twin braids and square framed sses which made her look like the perfect representation of a librarian, one person who waspletely covered in a cloak, a pair of fraternal boy girl twins who both had white hair, and a girl who was in a lolita dress.


    When Lin Fan came out, they all turned to look at him with curious gazes. Since they had all gathered and no one was starting, they figured it was either the long haired young master or Lin Fan who called the meeting.


    Once Lin Fan was done looking around, he nodded to the supporters on the side who rolled out the gurney.


    When everyone saw who was on the gurney, they all knit their brows as they realized that something was off.


    The long haired young master named Yu Wang was lying there with bandages all over him, looking like he was in aa, but they could tell from theck of vitals from him that he was dead.


    They all turned to look at Lin Fan with vignt looks, but Lin Fan just gave a shrug and said, "Don''t look at me, I was just the one who found him. Do any of you know what happened?"


    All of them were experts in their own right, so they naturally had also developed their spiritual energy. Sending their spiritual energy over the long haired young master, they could naturally see just what kind of wounds he had all over him.


    They all looked over each other vigntly before turning back to Lin Fan. During this time, none of them said a word and just waited to see what the others would do. Lin Fan did the exact same thing since he was waiting for clues to find who the murderer was.


    Finally someone couldn''t take it. It was the fiery red haired young master from before who had been fighting at camp.


    This young master was named Yan Huo and like his name, he really was a fired up person. The first thing Yan Huo did was point his finger right at Lin Fan and say, "Aren''t you the most suspicious one of us all? You say you found his body, but how do we know what you really did?"


    Lin Fan turned to him and said, "You can believe what you want, but you won''t be safe if you''re wrong and the murderer strikes again."


    Yan Huo just gave a cold snort as he said, "What if I take him down right now, wouldn''t I be safe?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "You think that you can?"<sub> </sub>


    A vein popped up on Yan Huo''s forehead as his face turned a bit red and he angrily shouted, "You think that I can''t? Do you know who I am?!"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "You''re the person who couldn''t even beat Yu Wang, do you really think that you''re the one who can kill the person who killed him?"


    Yan Huo stuttered for a bit since he knew that Lin Fan was right, but he wasn''t willing to give up, "You really think I was fighting seriously then? If I fought seriously, I would be able to take down Yu Wang with only a single finger."


    Lin Fan just smiled as he looked at Yan Huo, not saying a word, but it was clear what he was thinking.


    Yan Huo''s face turned even more red as he waspletely filled with rage. If he could be any angrier, there would have been smoke that would have bursted from his ears already.


    Yan Huo didn''t waste any more words at all as he pulled out his fire red ymore from his storage and immediately mes surrounded it.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this because he could tell that those mes weren''t normal, these were mes made with the power of the mew, which meant that this sword was at least a tinum Realm Artifact. But thinking about it, it did make sense since all of these geniuses were already in the Gold Realm, which meant that the family behind them had to be at least royals.


    Even if Lin Fan was surprised to see the sword in Yan Huo''s hand, he didn''t panic since this sword was of no threat to him at all. This sword was only a tinum Realm Artifact while Lin Fan was a genuine tinum Realm Expert. While the sword did have the ability to harm a normal tinum Realm Expert, Lin Fan was the exception with his unique physique.


    Yan Huo''s ragepletely took him over as he swung his ymore covered in mes at Lin Fan, but no one was worried since they had already seen Lin Fan''s strength. Lin Fan was a man who could even punch Gold Realm beasts away, there was nothing to worry about here.


    As the de approached Lin Fan, he still had the same calm smile on his face. He watched as the de approached and when it came near, he raised his hand up slightly in front of the de.


    The de continued to fall down until it came into contact with Lin Fan''s hand, but the moment it did, it wouldn''t move any further down. The second contact was made with Lin Fan''s hand, it was like there was a giant breeze that had blown away all the mes as they all disappeared.


    Yan Huo''s eyes were opened wide in shock as he just stared at Lin Fan looking rxed as he held his weapon. If he looked a bit closer, he would have seen the faint golden outline that was around Lin Fan''s hand.


    Then when Yan Huo came back from his shock, he tried to pull his ymore back, but it was also toote. Of course Lin Fan had expected this, so when the ymorended in his hand, he had already tightened his grip around it.


    Yan Huo was just stuck there, unable to move back or forward as he looked at Lin Fan in shock. He didn''t know how he felt, but he did feel a chill that came from looking at Lin Fan''s calm smile.


    Yan Huo was about to shout at Lin Fan to let go, but then his legs suddenly gave out under him as Lin Fan swept them with a kick. He fell directly onto his butt and when he tried to get back up, he found that he was unable to do so. The moment he fell onto his butt, there was a mountain like pressure that fell onto him, making him unable to even move.


    When everyone saw this, they were confused about what was going on. They all sent their spiritual senses forward to investigate and found that there was a pressure around Yan Huo thatpletely crushed their spiritual sense.


    When they discovered this, everyone couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with strange looks. It seemed like they really couldn''t judge this book by its cover.


    Based on the pressure they felt from Lin Fan, they could tell that he was already in the tinum Realm. If he really wanted to kill them, he wouldn''t have that much problem doing it with his cultivation. But to call them all back here, that would just make it harder for him since they could work together to resist him and escape.


    If he really was the murderer, what reason would he have to gather them together?


    At first, there were people that had suspected that Lin Fan was the murderer since he was the only stranger among them, but now they weren''t so sure.


    Just who was the one who killed Yu Wang?


    After suppressing Yan Huo for a bit, Lin Fan finally took back his aura and released the sword. The moment he was free, Yan Huo jumped back several meters and was fully on guard towards Lin Fan as he said, "What do you want?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Are you ready to talk now?"

 186 Chapter 186

    Yan Huo clearly wanted to say something else, but before he could, there was someone else who spoke up.


    It was the boy from the pair of twins.


    He said, "If you want to talk, then talk."


    It was clear that he wasn''t as cautious of Lin Fan as the others and that would have seemed strange, but Lin Fan knew the reason why.


    Lin Fan had a spiritual sense that surpassed his own cultivation realm which allowed him to train and tame beasts that were in a higher realm than him. That was what allowed his Xiao Huo, Xiao Feng, and Xiao Lei to reach the high tinum Realm.


    This spiritual sense allowed him to easily see through the cultivation of these twins.


    Unlike their peers, these two had actually reached the peak Gold Realm and were on the verge of breaking through to the tinum Realm. Then there was the powerful energy that was alsoing from them, which was a clear indication that they also had some powerful artifacts hidden on them. It seemed like their family really had made a deep investment on them.


    Lin Fan didn''t get angry at the seemingly arrogant words of this boy and said, "From what I can see, it is clear that the murderer is among us, so it isn''t safe to wander around alone or the murderer will just pick us off one by one. For now, we should stay in the camp for the night and see if we can find any more clues tomorrow morning as a group. What does everyone think?"


    Yan Huo shouted out, "You''re crazy! You think that anyone will trust you after everything you pulled¡­"


    But before he could finish, the boy twin said, "Alright, I agree with this. We''ll spend the night here and search in the morning."


    Yan Huo turned to him and said, "Yue Xing, do you really think you can speak for everyone?"


    But then again, there was someone else that interjected.


    This time it was the girl who looked like a librarian. She hesitantly said, "I also agree to this¡­"


    Then it was the person in the cloak who spoke in a deep voice, "No objection." Once he said that, the person in the cloak walked off without caring about the others.


    Yan Huo''s expression was ugly, but there was nothing he could say since that was already the majority. He just kicked a stone in front of him and shot Lin Fan onest re before heading off on his own.


    The rest of the people dispersed, but the twins came over to Lin Fan first.


    Lin Fan just looked back at them without saying a word.


    Finally the boy twin broke the silence and said, "You''re strong and smart, we can work together."


    But without even waiting for Lin Fan''s response, he took his sister''s hand and walked off.


    Lin Fan just smiled as he watched them leave before looking around. He found that most of the geniuses had left, the only one who was still here was the girl in the lolita dress.


    She just stood there waiting, making it clear that she had been waiting for Lin Fan to look at her. When she saw that Lin Fan was finally looking over, she gave him a wink and stuck out her tongue before turning to leave.


    Lin Fan immediately felt a chilling from behind him in the direction of Ang the moment the girl did this and he couldn''t help feeling cold sweat dripping down his back.


    One of Zhang Liang''s disciples came over and asked, "Owner Lin, what is your n here?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and shook his head before saying, "If I told you, it wouldn''t work."


    That disciple''s lips twitched, but they didn''t say anything else about this. Instead, they asked, "Then the thing you wanted us to prepare¡­"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "If you can get that ready for me by tomorrow, that would be best. I''ll need it tomorrow."


    The disciple nodded and said, "Alright."


    After saying this, he waved his hand at the other supporters and they wheeled Yu Wang off, heading back inside to prepare the thing that Lin Fan asked for.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan''s n was actually very simple. He was showing off his strength to make himself the target.


    With the strength that he had shown, he had made it clear that he would be the biggest threat to the murderer, so the murderer would want to take care of him.


    Lin Fan wasn''t afraid of the murderer doing something, he was most worried about the murderer doing nothing. If the murderer didn''t do a single thing, he would never be able to find any clues and wouldn''t be able to give an exnation for Yu Wang''s death.


    But he wasn''t as worried now since he was certain that he had disyed enough threat to make the murderer worried.


    Lin Fan wouldn''t have done something like this before because he felt that he was weak, but as his cultivation continued to grow, he also began developing the mentality of an expert.


    He was no longer as worried about everything as before and after the kidnapping experience on the airship, he knew that being too passive would only hurt him. He wouldn''t let the same thing happen again.


    Moreover, if this was rted to what he thought it was, this would be much more serious than just one dead person. If he didn''t get to the bottom of this, this might be dangerous for the entire human race.


    ¡­


    The day passed by with Lin Fan and the geniuses just spending time at camp, going around the edges of the camp from time to time to clear out the beasts that came to attack them.


    There was nothing special that happened other than the asional beast that attacked them. That was until night finally came.


    A person was standing by themself at the edge of the camp, leaning against the hull of the armoured vehicle that was beside them, looking like they were just standing there quite rxed. No one had noticed the strange shadow that was beside that person at all.


    That person''s lips didn''t seem to be moving, but if once came close, they would have heard a very ominous conversation.


    "You couldn''t have done it better? Now that they''ve discovered his body, this makes it much harder for us." That person said.


    The shadow just gave a snicker before saying, "What does it matter if they find out? We''ll kill them all eventually. As long as you keep doing your part, you will receive what we promised."


    But that person didn''t ept this and continued, "You saw what that kid was capable of today, he is clearly not someone we want to mess with. If my hunch isn''t wrong, he''s someone who the Monster Trainer Union specially called to investigate this situation."


    The shadow still didn''t care at all as it said, "You can''t tell because you''re weak, but that kid isn''t as strong as you think he is. The tinum Realm might seem strong for you, but it is nothing for us. That girl beside him as well, she seems to be as strong as he is."


    That person still couldn''t calm down, "The tinum Realm isn''t considered strong for you? That''s already as strong as the head of my family. Moreover, as someone specially invited here by the Monster Trainer Union, he must be someone that has a strong backing. He might even have a Legendary Realm Artifact with him."


    The shadow gave another snicker, "That is the problem with you lower realm kids, you really don''t understand how big the world really is. Do you really think that tinum Realm is that special? In front of Lord Jin, it would only take a single flick of his finger to take care of him."


    That person couldn''t help revealing an ugly look when he heard this since he still had his pride as a genius, even if he was forced to work with the Beast n now. But he realized that the shadow was right.


    The they were on was nothing more than a lower realm. For the Beast n that was considered a dominant force in the entire universe, so much so that humans feared them, they had nothing to worry about in the lower realm.


    With what he knew about the Beast n''s ns, this Lord Jin should be at least in the Legendary Realm. In front of the Legendary Realm, all those who weren''t in the Legendary Realm were nothing more than ants. As long as they had this Lord Jin supporting them, they had nothing to worry about.


    That person then asked, "What is our next move then? What does Lord Jin want us to do."


    The shadow gave a smile of disdain as it said, "There''s nothing to do right now, we just have to monitor them and make sure they don''t run away. Lord Jin has a special use for that tinum Realm kid, so we''reing up with a special n for them."


    That person nodded before continuing to discuss other aspects of the n.


    As the two of them discussed their n in this hidden corner of the camp, they didn''t notice that there were actually ants and various other insects that were moving around them, sending information to another ce.


    In another part of the camp, Lin Fan and Brainy were sitting there listening to the information they received.


    After the failure fromst time, Lin Fan had made sure to increase his surveince so that nothing would go wrong. It seemed like that was the right decision.

 187 Chapter 187

    In another part of the camp, there was someone else who still couldn''t sleep.


    Yan Huo''s chest was filled with an ufortable feeling as he swallowed the anger that was inside him. Just thinking about the scene from this afternoonpletely filled him with rage as he couldn''t help wanting to punch something, but there was nothing left for him to vent his anger on.


    All around him, the items in the tent had already been shattered to pieces. There already wasn''t a singleplete item in the tent with him, but even then, his rage still burned and suffocated his chest.


    He felt that if he didn''t do something, he might even spit up blood.


    However, no matter how he felt, there was no one he could vent this anger on.


    Lin Fan''s performance this afternoon had left a deep mark on his heart, he knew that he wouldn''t be able to defeat him no matter how he tried. It went so far that it even created a heart demon for him.


    As long as he couldn''t find a way to break free of the shadow that Lin Fan had cast on him, there was no way for him to progress any further.


    For a genius like him, this was basically a death sentence.


    He was still in the prime of his youth, if he kept growing, he even had the chance to reach the Legendary Realm. But to be crushed just like this, he really didn''t have a way forward.


    The despairpletely fell down on him and hepletely crumpled under it, but there was no way for him to move past it.


    That was until someone came into his tent and changed everything.


    The moment the p of the tent opened, Yan Huo quickly stood up and pretended everything was normal. However, the moment he saw who entered the tent he couldn''t help being surprised.


    It was a girl who had entered the tent and the way she was dressedpletely shocked Yan Huo.


    This girl had curves in all the right ces and the clothes she wore perfectly showcased them. The top that she wore cut off just above the mound, covering the tips while the short pants she wore tightly wrapped around her bottom, showing off the perfect curve behind her.


    When Yan Huo saw this, he couldn''t stop the me of desire from being lit inside of him.


    The girl knew exactly what she was doing as she approached Yan Huo and said, "Do you want to ovee your heart demon? As long as you listen to me, you will not only be able to ovee your heart demon, you''ll be able to kill the one you want to kill."


    Yan Huo seemed a bit moved, but then he came back to his senses and asked, "Do you really think I would ruin my name just to get revenge? You really think too little of me."


    The girl didn''t mind at all as she moved closer to him and brought a finger to his chin, lifting it slightly up before pulling her finger away. During this time, there was a slight scent that came from her, wafting towards Yan Huo.


    When this scent reached his nose, it was like there was a numbing agent that filled his mind and he could feel that his thoughts were slowing down.


    The girl didn''t stop there as she came forward to grab his arm with both hands, perfectly pushing against her cleavage to make thoserge mounds evenrger as she pressed them against his arm.


    The girl pouted her cherry red lips and said, "Big brother, you''ve misunderstood. I just want to help you because you are special to me. If you don''t believe me, I can show you just how special you are to me."


    Yan Huo didn''t know what came over him, but he was slowly being coaxed by the girl. Perhaps it was abination of the perfume that she had and the way she used her body against him, but he was slowly losing control of his thoughts and desire soon filled him. He began feeling that perhaps that she was right and he should follow her words.


    What Yan Huo didn''t notice was the slight pink tinge that was present in the eyes of the girl, as well as the slight outline of a heart in her pupil.


    Eventually, Yan Huo''s mental defenses copsed and he asked, "How do you want to do this?"


    The girl curled her lips into a charming smile as she took out a small bottle, "It''s very simple, all you have to do is take this and add it into¡­"


    The girl slowly exined her n and Yan Huo fell deeper and deeper into her words.


    Under their feet, there was a row of ants that were slowly crawling out of the tent.


    ¡­


    In another tent, there was another pair that were engaged in amorous activities.


    They were lying in the bed they bought together and both of them werepletely naked.<sub> </sub>


    The girl was lying in the arms of the man, leaning against his chest as she asked, "Big brother, what do you think about what happened this afternoon?"


    The boy lovingly stroked her hair as he said, "What do you mean?"


    The girl turned as she looked at him with clear eyes, "You know what I mean."


    The boy turned her back around and ced her on his chest again as he said, "I honestly have no idea."


    The girl pouted her lips as she said, "You big liar, you clearly know what''s going on but you just won''t tell Yue Yue."


    The boy revealed a smile when he saw her pouted lips before he said, "I actually don''t know what''s going on, but I can tell that it isn''t as simple as it seems. The fact that the Monster Trainer Union would send someone like that is proof that there is something much deeper going on behind the scenes."


    The girl revealed a confused look, "Deeper, what do you mean?"


    The boy shook his head, "I''m not sure myself, but I do know who we should ally ourselves with."


    The girl revealed a smile, "You mean that kid who showed Yan Huo a lesson tonight?"


    The boy nodded, "Yes. The others couldn''t see it, but he was still hiding his power. He did all of that on purpose to create animosity with the others, he wants to use himself as a target to draw out the culprit. Unless he was absolutely confident in his power, he wouldn''t do anything like that."


    The girl couldn''t help asking, "You''re just choosing to side with him because of this guess? What if you''re wrong?"


    The boy''s lips curled slightly, "He''s hiding more trump cards than you think. Why do you think he was able to find Yu Wang''s body so quickly?"


    The girl revealed a puzzled look once again, "How was he able to do it?"


    "It''s clear that he has some special surveince ability. He must have been tracking us since the beginning, that was how he was able to find Yu Wang so quickly." The boy calmly said.


    The girl revealed a surprised look, "But if he''s been tracking us the whole time, doesn''t that make him even more suspicious? Are you certain that he isn''t the killer?"


    The boy shook his head, "No, if he wanted to kill us, he would have done it right away. There''s no reason for him to hide his power if he wanted to kill us."


    The boy paused before continuing, "If my guesses are correct, he should be the person the Monster Trainer Union assigned to watch over us. The Monster Trainer Union requested our presence from our families, but it would be a problem if anyone died, so of course they would set someone to watch over us. The problem is that he probably never expected someone to die so suddenly since we should all be able to fend for ourselves, which was why Yu Wang died outside of his area of surveince."


    The girl asked, "Then what about now?"


    The boy replied, "He should have increased his surveince and should be watching over the entire camp."


    The girl was surprised again, "Then is he watching us now? What if he finds out about the rtionship between us?"


    The boy pulled the girl back into the bed as she began getting up and preparing to get dressed.


    Hezily pulled her into his embrace as he calmly said, "There''s no way that he would be able to spy on us inside our tents. If he were to send his eyes and ears into our tents, we would be able to easily detect them with our spiritual sense since this is a confined space. The most he would have done is set up surveince around the camp to try and find the culprit as they prepared for tomorrow."


    The girl calmed down and sunk into his embrace, "If he really is as good as you say he is, he might be worth teaming up with. However, how are you so sure?"


    The boy just smiled and said, "Call it a hunch."


    Then he turned over and pushed the girl down under him as he said with the same smile, "But enough about that for now, let''s have some fun."


    The girl also revealed a smile as she reached her arms out to wee him.


    The two of them went under the nkets, as their white hair intertwined while they kissed each other before going on to do even more.


    What they didn''t notice was the row of ants that slowly crawled across the floor.

 188 Chapter 188

    The night passed just like that and there were no further incidents.


    There might have been plenty of plotting, but there were no actual ns that were put into ce.


    Everyone had a good night''s sleep and when they gathered for breakfast the next morning, most of them looked quite refreshed despite the fact that someone had just died yesterday.


    It could be seen that these young geniuses were all quite strong mentally, but that was normal since they were geniuses. Without a strong will, how could they have progressed so far with their cultivation?


    Everyone sat apart from each other while having breakfast, not saying much to each other.


    But this situation couldn''tst since they had to do something. They came in here for training and if they were to leave just like this, it would leave a bad taste in their mouths. Not to mention that Lin Fan still had his mission so even if these young geniuses wanted to leave, the Monster Trainer Union might not let them¡­


    Since there was no other choice, they had to discuss their next moves.


    Everyone was gathered inside thergest armoured vehicle which had a special meeting room inside, standing around a table that was ced in the center. Even though they were all gathered here, they were all waiting for one another to make a move.


    Lin Fan saw that this was going nowhere, so he said, "The only thing we can do now is go to the scene of the murder and find more clues, does everyone agree with that?"


    After Lin Fan said this, the first person he turned to was Yan Huo since he knew that he would be the first to object. However, when his eyes fell onto Yan Huo, he saw that he was strangely calm.


    Yan Huo didn''t rise at all when he saw Lin Fan turn over to him, he just calmly stood there waiting for the others to speak.


    The others had also been secretly paying attention to Yan Huo because they had the same thoughts as Lin Fan and they were all surprised that there was no rise from Yan Huo.


    Finally the boy twin whose name was Yue Jin said, "I agree with this n."


    Once he said this, it was like flood gates opening as everyone else also agreed to Lin Fan''s n.


    It didn''t take them long to gather their supplies before heading off together as a group with Lin Fan in the lead. Since he was the one who had found Yu Wang''s corpse, of course he would be the one leading them to where he found it.


    After travelling for a bit, they arrived at the scene of Yu Wang''s death.


    The blood that was scattered on the ground had already dried and there were a few marks among them, which were clearly signs that scavengers had been here, drawn in by the scent of the blood. There was even one dried pool of blood that had a straight line through it which should have been the mark left by the tongue of a beast that licked through it.


    They all stood in the center and looked at Lin Fan, waiting for him to speak since he was the one who suggested this n.


    Lin Fan looked around and fell into thought before saying, "Let''s make this center spot the gathering spot and we''ll search around in a five hundred meter radius. If you find any clues, just shout for the rest of us and we''lle. Make sure that you don''t go too far, we don''t want anything to happen to anyone else."


    The young geniuses looked at each other before breaking off from the group to either head off alone or in pairs.


    The twins clearly went together, Yan Huo went off with the short haired girl, the librarian looking girl went off with the girl in the lolita dress, and the person in the cloak went off alone.


    Once they were all gone, Lin Fan brought Brainy out of his sleeve and began letting Brainy search the area around them. He didn''t have time to do this yesterday since he wanted to catch the murderer off guard by calling the meeting. However, when the geniuses responded to the meeting, most of them had arrived at almost the exact same time, so there was nothing suspicious from this.


    Brainy sent out its seeds to take control of the surrounding birds and rodents, using them to search the area while alsobing the area with its spiritual sense.


    As for Lin Fan, he began searching around the area that he had found Yu Wang''s body.


    There were several bushes near Yu Wang''s body that he had never searched, so that was a good ce to start.


    Going through the bushes, there wasn''t much to find other than a few splotches of dried blood. But as he continued looking through them, he found a clue in the end.


    Right at the bottom of one of the bushes, being hidden by the foliage, there was a footprint that was made of dried blood that was on the ground.


    Based on the size of the footprint, it seemed to be the footprint of a man, but Lin Fan didn''t rule out anything. Things like footprints were easy to forge and with how there was only a single footprint, this should be a fake clue created by the murderer to throw them off.<sub> </sub>


    Moreover, he didn''t know how long had passed between the time Yu Wang had been murdered to when he arrived at the scene, so the murderer had plenty of time to create this footprint.


    Lin Fan continued to look around, but he didn''t find anything in the end.


    When he came back to check with Brainy, Brainy told him that it hadn''t found any clues either, but that was all normal. It had been more than twelve hours since the incident, most of the clues should have already been destroyed by the scavengers.


    This was why the rate of murder was high among seekers since in the nar crack, there were plenty of ways to destroy evidence since there were plenty of beasts around. As soon as a corpse was left in the forest, it would be quickly cleaned up by the scavenger beasts around.


    Seeing that he couldn''t find anything in the area, Lin Fan had no choice but to expand his search area, so he was about to have Brainy send his puppets out further to search, but he didn''t get a chance in the end.


    Right as Lin Fan was about to give Brainy the order, there was a shrill voice that filled the forest.


    "What are you¡­"


    Before it could finish, it was suddenly cut off.


    Lin Fan knit his brows immediately as he recognized this voice, it was the girl in the lolita dress.


    Lin Fan immediately had Brainy use the seed that it had put on her to track her, but Brainy just shook it head and said, "I can''t track her for some reason, it''s like there''s some kind of force that''s blocking off my connection to the seed."


    Lin Fan was surprised since this was his first time hearing about this, but he still quickly asked, "What was herst location?"


    That was something Brainy could answer since it had been focused on tracking everyone this entire time. It didn''t make the same mistake asst time.


    Brainy quickly led Lin Fan to thest location of the girl and when they arrived, they found that there were already others gathered.


    It was the librarian girl, Yan Huo, and the twins.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he immediately asked, "What happened?"


    The others looked at him, but no one spoke. Finally, Yue Jin said, "We don''t know either. We just came over as soon as we heard the scream, but when we arrived, she was already gone. We were about to search the area, but then you showed up. Do you know anything?"


    Lin Fan shook his head in response before knitting his brows in thought. After thinking for a few seconds, he turned to the librarian girl and asked, "What do you know? Didn''t you go off with her?"


    The librarian girl said, "I was the first one here since I was nearby. We split up aftering out this way to cover more ground, but when I came here, she was already gone."


    Lin Fan confirmed this with Brainy before saying, "Alright, search around and see if you can find any clues. We need to find her as soon as possible, otherwise she might end up like Yu Wang."


    They began searching the area and they didn''t find much, other than a set of footprints. One set was small and the other was much bigger, which were clearly the footprints of the girl and someonerger.


    Then based on the way the footprints were scattered all over, it was clear that there was some kind of struggle that had happened here.


    During this time, the other two finally arrived on the scene, but neither of them had any clues either.


    When they were about to n out their next step, they suddenly heard a loud sounding from the west.


    The others all looked in that direction in confusion as the short haired girl asked, "What is that?"


    As for Lin Fan, he immediately knit his brows when he heard this sound since Brainy had just given him a report.


    This sound was the sound of footsteps that came from arge amount of beasts running this way.


    This was the sound of a beast wave.

 189 Chapter 189

    ording to the scouts that Brainy had sent out, this was a beast wave of over a thousand beasts that was currently charging in their direction.


    Then based on the aura that Brainy felt after sending some of its scouts closer, it could tell that this wasn''t a simple beast wave. Among the beasts in the beast wave, there were plenty of Gold Realm beasts and many tinum Realm beasts!


    Counting them all, there were actually over a hundred beasts that were in the Gold Realm and there were five tinum Realm beasts that were leading them.


    The strangest thing about this beast wave was that the beasts didn''t just move in arge group, rather they were split into five different groups which each had a tinum Realm beast leading the way.


    Based on how they were moving, this beast wave didn''t seem like a normal beast wave. If Lin Fan didn''t know better, it seemed like there was someone controlling these beasts.


    But that just confirmed his theory, whoever the murderer was, they had already betrayed the human race and were working with the Beast n.


    While the others were still confused, Lin Fan turned and shouted, "Everyone, get ready to fight! It''s a beast wave!"


    The others were all shocked when they heard this, but they all reacted quickly by taking out their weapons.


    Yue Jin quickly asked, "Do you know how many there are?"


    Lin Fan exined quickly as well, "There are over a thousand of them and there are a hundred Gold Realm beasts and five tinum Realm beasts!"


    The faces of the young geniuses fell when they heard this.


    If it was a normal beast wave, there wouldn''t be a problem, but this was a beast wave with a hundred Gold Realm beasts.


    If had to be known, counting them all, there were only nine of them present. While Lin Fan might be in the tinum Realm, just him alone wouldn''t be able to take care of five tinum Realm beasts. Even if he were to have pets, at most he would have just a single pet in the tinum Realm which would be his main pet while the rest would probably be in the Gold Realm.


    This was a very normal case on the Blue Star.


    It was hard work training a pet, so most people focused on training a single main pet that they grew with. They only trained auxiliary pets when they needed them for trivial matters.


    Only in rare cases would an expert have more than one pet that was on the same level as them.


    Then there was Ang who would probably be on the same level as Lin Fan since she came with him, so that would only be another two tinum Realm Experts.


    This would be a total of four tinum Realm Experts which meant that they were still one short.


    Not to mention that there were also a hundred Gold Realm beasts.


    Even if they were all geniuses who could fight enemies that were at a higher level, they were also humans in the end and had a limited amount of life energy. They could defeat more than one Gold Realm beast by themself, but they would run out of energy eventually and be overwhelmed.


    One of them began turning around, looking for an escape route, but there was no such thing present.


    If they were to run, they wouldn''t be able to do so since they were focused more on power than on speed. They wouldn''t be able to outrun the tinum Realm beast with their speed and if they were caught alone by the tinum Realm beast, it would be hard for them to escape in one piece.


    Lin Fan saw the difficult looks on the faces of the young geniuses before turning to Yue Jin and saying, "You can hold off one tinum Realm beast, right?"


    Yue Jin heard this and knit his brows. This was something that concerned his trump card and if he were to reveal it now, that would put him in a bad situation. However, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that he had no choice at all. If he didn''t use it now, there would be no chance of survival.


    Yue Jin gave a sigh before saying, "I can, but I can''tst that long."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I don''t need long, Ang and I can take care of four of them, you just need to hold it off long enough for us to finish. Once we''re done with our opponent, we''ll be able toe and help you finish off the one you''re stalling."


    The others heard this and were skeptical at first, but they soon epted this fact.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was someone who had been sent here by the Monster Trainer Union, so he definitely was a genius himself and was definitely strong enough to take on tinum Realm beasts. Ang was someone who walked with him side by side, which meant she must be as strong as him.


    After Lin Fan said this, he gave a snap and Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei came out. Xiao Huo came out behind him and Xiao Lei came out behind Ang, making it seem like Ang had summoned Xiao Lei.


    In truth, Lin Fan was only worried about the implications of the beast wave, he wasn''t actually worried about the beast wave itself.


    From Brainy''s scouting, he knew that these five tinum Realm beasts were all only in the low tinum Realm. Then among the Gold Realm beasts, there were only ten of them that were in the peak Gold Realm.


    Just Brainy alone was already enough to take care of them since Brainy was already in the mid tinum Realm just like Lin Fan. With its seeds, Brainy could easily take control of the leaders of the beast wave, creating a strong army in an instant. Once the leaders of the beast wave fell under his control, he could easily route the rest of the beasts just with Brainy.


    Not to mention that he had four other pets that were all in the high tinum Realm.


    Any one of those four pets would be able to destroy this entire beast wave by themselves, but Lin Fan didn''t have his pets do this.


    He could have even destroyed the entire beast wave himself since he was already someone who could fight someone in the low Fragmented Soul Realm himself.


    But he didn''t do that and wanted to act like he was in trouble for two reasons.


    The first was that he was certain whoever was controlling this beast wave would be watching. He wanted to give them the false impression that he was much weaker than he actually was to make them underestimate him.


    The second was that he wanted to smoke out the traitor among them. When the girl in the lolita dress had been kidnapped, Brainy could tell that it wasn''t any of them that had done it since it had been tracking all the others with its new seeds the entire time. That meant that someone was coordinating with the Beast n on this, so they would definitely show mistakes here.


    Ang didn''t understand Lin Fan''s n, but she could tell what Lin Fan wanted her to do through his words.


    The fact that he said four beasts and summoned two pets out, it meant that he wanted her to only take care of one beast, so that was what she would do.


    After being together for some time, she had be much better at picking up clues from just Lin Fan''s words.


    Yue Jin nodded when he saw the beasts appear behind Lin Fan and Ang. With a wave of his hand, he pulled out a bow from his ring and prepared for battle.


    Based on the aura that came from the bow, the others could easily tell that this was a tinum Realm Artifact and it wasn''t a low ranking artifact. Based on the aura, it was probably a high tinum Realm Artifact or even a peak tinum Realm Artifact.


    Once this bow appeared in his hand, Yue Jin''s aura was also revealed and the others could tell that he was already in the peak Gold Realm, as opposed to them who were all in the high Gold Realm.


    Yan Huo revealed a conflicted look when he sensed this.


    Lin Fan was one thing since he was clearly a monster found by the Monster Trainer Union, but now even Yue Jin was stronger than him. They were all from the same generation, but Yue Jin had somehow taken this step before him.


    Before this training trip, he had been confident that he was the strongest among his generation, but now that confidence had beenpletely shattered by everything that had happened.


    He was now even more determined to set his and her n into motion since he would not allow anyone to be above him.


    Still, it wasn''t the time for that now, so he put away those feelings. For now, what they had to do was take care of this beast wave and survive.


    The rest of them all summoned out their Gold Realm pets and created a formation.


    The formation they took had Lin Fan, Ang, and Yue Jin, as well as Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei standing in the front to bear the brunt of the tinum Realm beasts attack while the rest cut off the Gold Realm beasts to stop them from helping the tinum Realm beasts.


    This formation waspletely gambling on Lin Fan and Ang, but they had no choice right now because a few seconds after they took this formation, the heads of the beasts poked out of the forest.

 190 Chapter 190

    Leading the pack were the five tinum Realm beasts and right behind them were the Gold Realm beasts.


    When the young geniuses saw the beasts appear through the foliage, all of them suddenly became tense since Lin Fan had been right.


    There were indeed five tinum Realm beasts and plenty of Gold Realm beasts behind them.


    They had been skeptical at first, but now they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with looks of admiration. This man''s scouting abilities really were too strong.


    But thinking about how Lin Fan was the first to find Yu Wang, this didn''t seem that surprising.


    They had all overlooked this, but Yu Wang had been in a decently well hidden ce, but Lin Fan had easily found him. This meant that Lin Fan definitely had some special scouting ability.


    When Lin Fan saw the tinum Realm beastsing through the forest, he wasn''t worried at all. Like Brainy had said, these were all low tinum Realm beasts, they could be easily taken care of with a flip of his hand.


    While Lin Fan was calm, the others couldn''t remain as calm as him.


    Once the tinum Realm beasts were close enough, Yue Jin picked out one of the tinum Realm beasts and drew back the string of his bow. He hadn''t notched an arrow onto the string beforehand, but that wasn''t a problem


    As he pulled back on the string, wisps of wind gathered between the bowstring and the riser, creating an arrow made purely of windws. The arrow took form more and more until it was aplete arrow, at which point Yue Jin released the bowstring in his right hand.


    With arge gust, the arrow of windys flew out at the tinum Realm beast at the far right.


    The arrow didn''t falter at all as it created a perfect arc in the air, aimed right at the head of the tinum Realm beast.


    This was a rabbit type beast called a Gale Rabbit, so it was quite smallpared to the other tinum Realm beasts, but that didn''t mean it was any weaker.


    When the Gale Rabbit saw the arrow flying right for its head, it gradually slowed down beforeing to a full stop.


    The Gale Rabbit didn''t hesitate as it faced the arrow of windws head on, gathering its own windws around its front fangs, creating a tornado around its teeth. It just waited for the windw arrow to approach before chomping right down on it.


    When the fang of the Gale Rabbit hit the arrowhead of the windw arrow, there was a giant gust of wind that was created around it, pushing back the beasts around the Gale Rabbit. The fang and the arrow shed for a few seconds before the fangpletely bit right through the arrow, shattering it into tiny wisps of wind.


    This result was one that no one was surprised about, but there was still something surprising about the behaviour of the Gale Rabbit.


    When the Gale Rabbit had stopped to take Yue Jin''s arrow, around two hundred beasts behind it had also stopped, waiting for the confrontation to finish. Those two hundred beasts just stood there and waited while the rest of the beast wave charged right at them, following the other four tinum Realm beasts to charge at their group.


    This showed that this wasn''t just a normal beast wave, it was a beast wave that was led by five intelligent tinum Realm beasts. What this meant was that this was an intentional beast wave and there was still a traitor among them.


    They all looked around at each other, but they didn''t have time to cast any doubts since the beast wave was already upon them.


    Yue Jin immediately moved back with his sister Yue Yin guarding him from the Gold Realm beasts that approached. During all of this, Yue Jin continued to fire off arrows that kept the Gale Rabbit controlled portion of the beast wave at bay.


    As for Lin Fan and Ang, they shed directly with the four tinum Realm beasts with the transformed Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei supporting them.


    Lin Fan picked a bear type tinum Realm beast called a Charge Bear which was famous for its mighty charges. However, that charge didn''t work at all against Lin Fan and hisw of power.


    Lin Fan met the Charge Bear head first with a palm that was covered in golden glow.


    The Charge Bear tried to push forward, but no matter how much it tried, it couldn''t make Lin Fan take a single step back. The Charge Bear knew that this wouldn''t work, so it pulled its head back as it brought its ws up off the ground.


    The ws were also covered with a golden glow which was thew of power, shing down right at Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan felt the Charge Bear retreat back, he could already guess what it was nning to do. As the Charge Bear reared back, standing up on two feet, preparing to smash its ws right down on Lin Fan, he also brought his fists back.<sub> </sub>


    The Charge Bear was more than over three meters tall, which was a whole meter taller than Lin Fan, so its ws came down as it tried to smash Lin Fan with them.


    As the ws fell down, Lin Fan punched upwards with both hands covered in a golden glow aimed right at the ws of the Charge Bear.


    The fists met the pads of the paw and after a few seconds of even shing, the ws of the Charge Bear were actually pushed back and the Charge Bear went down. The main deciding factor in this was the suction force that Lin Fan naturally had which absorbed part of the Charge Bear''sw of power and supplemented it to his own.


    However, the Charge Bear was surprisingly agile even with itsrge figure, using the momentum of this pushback to fall into a backflip.


    After the backflip, the Charge Bearnded once again on two feet, raising its ws in front of it in a martial arts stance.


    During this entire process, there was another tinum Realm beast that was backing the Charge Bear up.


    This was a fire red lizard with a transparent red crystal on its back that had a me inside of it. This fire red lizard was a Drake Lizard, which was said to be descendant from the legendary Fire Dragons.


    This Drake Lizard actually did have a trace of the dragon bloodline in it, as evident by the me that was inside the crystal on its back.


    This Drake Lizard tried to follow up on the Charge Bear, blowing out a breath of mes right at Lin Fan after the Charge Bear had been sent flying.


    These mes contained the power of the dragon bloodline, making them much stronger than normal mes, but that didn''t matter since they never reached Lin Fan.


    Xiao Huo was already prepared as it also breathed out mes that shed against the mes of the Drake Lizard.


    The mes of the Drake Lizard only contained a trace of the dragon bloodline, while Xiao Huo''s mes contained the power of the full phoenix bloodline. The phoenix bloodline was one of the legendary bloodlines that could match the dragon bloodline, but there was arge difference in bloodline concentration between the two.


    Xiao Huo''s mes easily dispersed the mes of the Drake Lizard, but it didn''t continue to attack the Drake Lizard as Xiao Huo had held back based on Lin Fan''s instructions.


    Both Lin Fan and Xiao Huo had only used strength equal to the low tinum Realm, but both of them had their innate qualities that made their attacks stronger than their enemies, giving them the upper hand.


    On the other side, Ang and Xiao Lei were both dealing with their own matches.


    Ang was currently fighting a bird type tinum Realm beast called the Cyclone Condor.


    This was a tinum Realm beast that could fly naturally, but it became even faster since it utilized the power of the windws. But even if that was the case, it still couldn''t keep up to Ang when it came to speed.


    The Cyclone Condor threw wind des one after the other which Ang kept dodging with ease before sending out her own wind des which the Cyclone Condor couldn''t dodge at all. But of course, Ang also held back her power, so each of these wind des only dealt minor injuries to the Cyclone Condor, covering it with small cuts all over its body.


    The main difference between the two of them was naturally their control of windws. Ang was just at a much higher level ofprehensionpared to the Cyclone Condor.


    Finally Xiao Lei was fighting a Volt Volpi, which was an electric fox type beast.


    Both of them summoned their lightning to send bolts at each other, but Xiao Lei''s lightning easily crushed the lightning of the Volt Volpi since there was arge disparity in bloodlines between them.


    As for the rest of the Gold Realm beasts that came with the tinum Realm beasts, most of the stronger ones stayed with the tinum Realm beasts and provided support. While the weaker Gold Realm beasts led the Silver, Bronze, and Iron Realm beasts to attack the young geniuses.


    The young geniuses didn''t have much trouble fighting them since most of the peak and high Gold Realm beasts were being upied by Lin Fan''s group of four, so most of them were only fighting mid Gold Realm Beasts with a few high Gold Realm Beasts. As geniuses, naturally they were much stronger than enemies with the same realm of cultivation, so they had no problem with their enemies.


    They also summoned their pets and auxiliary pets to deal with the other scattered beasts around them.


    Just like this, the two sides shed and surprisingly an equilibrium was formed.

 191 Chapter 191

    Yue Jin continued firing off arrows at the Gale Rabbit who was slowly getting annoyed by the onught of arrows.


    The Gale Rabbit knew that this couldn''t be allowed to continue, so it called out to its followers and sent some of the Gold Realm beasts to attack Yue Jin while it held off the arrows.


    The other young geniuses saw this and immediately moved to help Yue Yin intercept them.


    They knew that the moment the Gale Rabbit was freed, they would immediately be put in a disadvantage when it came to tinum Realm Experts. They had to hold off the Gale Rabbit for as long as possible, allowing one of their tinum Realm Experts to take care of one of the tinum Realm beasts to free them up to fight the Gale Rabbit.


    Most of them had already taken care of the Gold Realm beasts they were already fighting since they were indeed geniuses. They also had powerful artifacts that they received from their families since they were the hopes of their families, so their families naturally wouldn''t be stingy with the things they gave them.


    As the fight continued, they were able to hold on even if they slowly did get tired, but soon things didn''t look that good.


    Xiao Huo, Xiao Lei, and Ang all had no problems fighting their enemies, but Lin Fan was different.


    Most of the Gold Realm beasts had been sent to help the Charge Bear and this seemed like it had put some pressure on Lin Fan. Even though he had easily pushed back the Charge Bear at first, with the other Gold Realm beasts providing support for the Charge Bear, soon he was the one that was being pushed back.


    Naturally this was all an act that Lin Fan was putting on to see if he could make any of his suspects make a mistake, but none of them were falling for it.


    Every single one of the geniuses were fighting for their lives, it didn''t seem like any of them were being shown the slightest bit of mercy. If they even made a single mistake, a w, a fang, or another part of a beast would have cut right through them.


    Lin Fan knew that continuing like this wasn''t a solution, so he had to do something to change this situation.


    As the Charge Bear came at him once again, Lin Fan this time let himself be pushed back, making it seem like he was running out of energy.


    The Charge Bear pushed Lin Fan back again and again, building more and more confidence in itself. It began attacking Lin Fan vigorously as it saw that Lin Fan was getting weaker.


    Of course that was all part of Lin Fan''s act.


    On the other side, Xiao Huo''s mes were no longer cancelling out the mes of the Drake Lizard. Rather there were wisps of the Drake Lizard''s mes that had pushed through Xiao Huo''s me to push Xiao Huo back.


    As for Ang, when she saw Lin Fan and Xiao Huo being pushed back, she also began weakening the assault of her wind des, as well as slowing down a bit. As she slowed down, there were a few wind des that dide close to hitting her, even nicking a strand of her hair, but they never drew any blood.


    Finally there was Xiao Lei, who was the same as Xiao Huo. Before the bolts of lightning it sent out matched cancelled that of its opponent, but now there strands of electricity that had made it through.


    When the various tinum Realm beasts saw that they were slowly pushing back their opponents, they all gathered their energy and began sending out full force attacks at them. They could finally see the chance to break through, so it would be a shame if they were to miss it.


    Yue Jin on the side had been paying attention to the battlefield and of course he had noticed this shift. When he did, he began changing his target in between stronger shots, sending out arrows to try and help the human tinum Realm Experts.


    But that created a fatal error in spacing since it gave the Gale Rabbit time to slowly inch its way forward.


    Before Yue Jin''s continuous arrows had been enough to hold it back, but now that he diverted some of those arrows and his life energy was slowly being depleted, the Gale Rabbit finally had the space to slowly push forward.


    It was also an intelligent beast since it was able to lead a group of beasts, so it sent more of the Gold Realm beasts that had been following it to attack the main group. Specifically, they headed towards Lin Fan who seemed like he would be copsing at any moment.


    The Charge Bear could naturally see this as well and it sent out its ws in a flurry of attack that continued to push Lin Fan back.


    After pushing Lin Fan back far enough, the Charge Bear finally had enough and decided to end this.


    With its flurries of attack pinning Lin Fan down, it also called out to its subordinates who made reckless suicide attacks on Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    When these Gold Realm beasts had attacked Lin Fan before, he had been able to fend off the Charge Bear while either seriously injuring or killing the Gold Realm beasts that had attacked him. While he was still able to fend them off now, he was no longer able to seriously injure or kill them anymore. It was clear that he was alreadying close to running out of life energy.


    The Gold Realm beasts continued their reckless assault, even more so without fear now that Lin Fan didn''t have the ability to seriously injure them.


    But even if he could, they still would have charged at Lin Fan without any regards to their own lives since that was their instinct.


    Unlike the tinum Realm beasts who clearly had intelligence, these beasts were all beasts that only followed their instincts. The biggest part of that was the instincts present in their bloodlines.


    In the world of Beast n, bloodlines were the most important things.


    A beast with a higher tier bloodline instinctively created fear in those with inferior bloodlines, but it also incited them to follow those with higher tier bloodlines.


    Over the generations, this instinct became stronger and stronger, even overwriting their instinct to survive. Now this instinct to follow the will of those with stronger bloodlines was so great that these beasts no longer feared death if it was following the wills of those with stronger bloodlines.


    Of course, that was all in hope of bing even stronger since only by taking the bloodlines of others could they hope to evolve. By following the ones with stronger bloodlines, there were more chances to receive a bloodline that the leader took, strengthening their own bloodline.


    In the end, it was a dog eat dog world where they could only get stronger by stealing the bloodlines of other beasts to improve their own.


    Eventually the Gold Realm beasts finally wore Lin Fan down and one of them actually broke through his guard.


    The ws of that Gold Realm beast were aimed right at Lin Fan''s back, at the part of his back that was right behind his heart. It continued to approach while Lin Fan was being distracted by the Charge Bear right in front of him.


    As long as this w were tond on Lin Fan''s back, there was no doubt that it would cause a fatal wound to Lin Fan, but it didn''t seem that Lin Fan would be able to react in time.


    But that was all a part of Lin Fan''s n.


    He saw that this was going nowhere, so he was going to take it to the extreme, letting himself be injured just to see how the others would react.


    But of course, if he didn''t allow himself to be injured, the Gold Realm beast would never be able to injure him. After all, Lin Fan''s physique alone was already strong enough to match the power of a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert.


    As the people of the Blue Star said, the Legendary Realm was the true beginning. Everything under that was just like ants at the feet of the Legendary Realm Experts.


    Lin Fan could have just let the Gold Realm beast hit him and it would have been injured just by hitting him. But he couldn''t let that happen, so he was prepared to use his life energy to create a burst inside his body to make it seem like he was injured.


    When Lin Fan gathered his life energy at his back and was prepared to be "injured", something had happened that hadpletely caught him off guard.


    Right before the ws of the Gold Realm panther could hit him, there was a figure that had suddenly jumped out and blocked that blow for him.


    That person raised their ymore to block the w of the Gold Realm panther, but that Gold Realm panther was a beast in the peak Gold Realm, so it surpassed the cultivation of that person.


    That person fell back at the attack and spat out arge mouthful of blood, but he somehow had managed to block that attack. But he did receive serious internal injuries from forcefully taking the attack.


    Lin Fan immediately increased his power and pushed back all the beasts. Then he turned around to be surprised by the person who had protected him.


    Standing behind him, holding his ymore was Yan Huo.

 192 Chapter 192

    Lin Fan waspletely confused by this oue, but of course he wasn''t the only one.


    All of them had seen Yan Huo''s exchange with Lin Fan yesterday and it was clear that they didn''t like each other.


    However, at the most critical moment, Yan Huo out of all of them had sacrificed himself to protect Lin Fan from taking a fatal blow. He had borne all the damage that Lin Fan would have taken, damage from a beast that had a higher realm of cultivation than him, damage that had seriously injured him all for Lin Fan.


    No one could make sense of this situation at all, but they didn''t have time to think about it since they were fighting for their lives at this moment.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate either as he suddenly burst forth with power at just this moment, making it seem like he was using a trump card to take revenge for Yan Huo. Or at least that''s what it seemed for the others.


    But the real reason Lin Fan did this was because he knew he could no longer continue his n in this situation or it would be easily seen through.


    Since that was the case, he would just have to improvise.


    Lin Fan suddenly exploded with golden light thatpletely surrounded him, creating a force thatpletely suppressed everything around him.


    This sudden explosion of power stunned everyone who saw it, including the beasts in front of him.


    Lin Fan gathered his power into his fist before sending out a single punch that contained power in the mid tinum Realm.


    Even with the strong physique of a beast, this sudden increase in realm was not something the Charge Bear could resist, but it couldn''t dodge it either since there was a strange suction force that pulled it towards Lin Fan''s fist. That suction force was too strong for it to avoid, so it had no choice but to meet Lin Fan''s attack head on.


    Of course, it was smart about it and had the other Gold Realm beastsbine their power with it, allowing it to grow stronger. However, Lin Fan wasn''t that easy to defeat.


    The key to this was that the strange suction force actually took a part of the Charge Bear''s energy, which greatly weakened the Charge Bear''s attack.


    When the ws of the Charge Bear met Lin Fan''s fist, there was no resistance at all as Lin Fanpletely shattered the bones in the paws of the Charge Bear and continued forward tond his fist on the Charge Bear''s chest.


    The Charge Bear''s chest copsed and it was sent flying straight into a giant tree that was far away, falling down without a sign of life.


    With that punch, there was a shockwave that had hit all the Gold Realm beasts that had gathered behind the Charge Bear to provide it with energy. That shockwave burst forth and severely injured most of the Gold Realm beasts, making them unable to fight any longer. Only those that were a bit further back received lighter injuries, but they still would have a hard time continuing the fight.


    As for Lin Fan''s arm, he sent life energy through it that created rips and tears all along his arm, making it seem like this was the bacsh from the special move that he had just used. Of course, with the quick healing power that came from the suns in his dantian, he could easily heal this minor wound, he didn''t since he needed to keep up this act.


    The young geniuses saw this and they all believed that Lin Fan had just used a special skill to suddenly explode with force, otherwise if he really was a mid tinum Realm Expert at his age, he would have been too much of a monster for them to ept.


    On the other sides, the other tinum Realm beasts could tell that this situation was bad for them. Now that one of them had fallen, the one that was freed would be able to attack them.


    The first thought that they had was retreat, but how could their opponents let them escape.


    While everyone was focused on Lin Fan, Xiao Huo, Xiao Lei, and Ang turned up their powers a bit to take down their opponents.


    Before the three beasts could even react, their enemies suddenly attacked with power that was in the mid tinum Realm. The attacks of their enemies could not be resisted by them and they all copsed.


    When everyone''s attention finally came off Lin Fan, they turned to find that all the tinum Realm beasts other than the Gale Rabbit had been taken care of.


    The Gale Rabbit had tried to go all out when it saw the Charge Bear go down since it knew that if it didn''t do anything, their side would be at a disadvantage, but how could Yue Jin let it do that?


    Yue Jinpletely focused on shooting arrows at the Gale Rabbit without care for his own consumption. He just knew that he had to buy some time and let the others finish first, or at least give Lin Fan some time to rest first after suffering the bacsh of his special skill.<sub> </sub>


    When the Gale Rabbit and Yue Jin both rxed a bit and took a look at the situation, they saw that the situation hadpletely turned.


    The Gale Rabbit knew that this was bad, so it gathered all of the remaining beasts present and tried to use them as shields for it to escape, but that n didn''t work at all.


    Now that Xiao Huo, Xiao Lei, and Ang had finished their opponents, they were finally free to turn their attention to the Gale Rabbit. They wouldn''t let such an easy prey escape, not to mention that if they did, it might bring information to their hidden enemy.


    The Gale Rabbit gathered all of its life energy into its legs and utilized the full power of itsws of wind to increase its speed to the max, but even then it couldn''t keep up to Ang''s speed.


    Ang quickly moved through the beasts, flying above them. She caught up to the Gale Rabbit and sent wind des that urately fell right in front of it.


    The Gale Rabbit waspletely focused on speed right now, so it was hard for it to control its direction. If the Gale Rabbit had continued charging forward without care, it would have been hit directly by Ang''s wind des. Since it had no other choice, the Gale Rabbit could only slow down.


    However, once the Gale Rabbit did slow down, Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei immediately caught up. With roars from the two of them, they surrounded the Gale Rabbit with a cage of mes and lightning,pletely trapping it inside.


    The Gale Rabbit clearly wasn''t a match for two tinum Realm beasts of the same realmbining their powers together to form a cage. Since it had no chance of breaking through, it could only face the enemy that was attacking it.


    ? Ang didn''t give the Gale Rabbit a single chance to fight back as she floated there in the air, sending down a torrent of wind des down at it.


    At first, the Gale Rabbit could defend by gathering the power of its windws around itself, but this didn''tst long. Eventually with attacks of fire and lightning that came from the walls around it, as well as the downpour of wind des that fell down from the sky, the Gale Rabbit''s defenses were eventually cracked and it fell to these attacks.


    The Gale Rabbit had onest aggrieved look in its cute red eyes as it watched the attacksnd.


    The young geniuses saw that the final tinum Realm beast was taken down and they were filled with energy. It didn''t take them long to finish off the rest of the beasts.


    During this time, Lin Fan had sat down to "stabilize" his injuries.


    After cultivating for a bit, Lin Fan stood up and came over to Yan Huo who was still on the ground, but had already been treated by the librarian looking girl.


    Yan Huo looked up at him, but he said nothing.


    Lin Fan looked down at him and also said nothing for a bit, but then he suddenly said, "Why?"


    Yan Huo revealed a faint smile and said, "Brother Lin, we are both humans standing in the face of the Beast n. At the very least, we shouldn''t let our emotions stand in the way of our duties, right?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes a bit, but then he gave a nod before turning around.


    The rest of the young geniuses had finished sweeping through the rest of the beasts and were picking up the spoils of their battle, but Lin Fan quickly interrupted them, "There''s no time for that right now, we have to get out of here immediately. We don''t know if there''s a second waveing or not."


    The other looked a bit reluctant, but they knew that Lin Fan was right, so most of them quickly picked up a few Gold Realm beast corpses and put them in their storage beforeing back to the main group.


    As for the tinum Realm beast corpses, no one went to touch them.


    There was an unspoken rule between experts and that was that they didn''t steal each other''s prey. Not to mention that their pride wouldn''t allow them to take it, even if they were rare tinum Realm beast corpses.


    They quickly gathered with Yan Huo and two of the young geniuses with lighter injuries helped carry him back to the camp.


    But as they left in a hurry, what they didn''t notice was that all of these tinum Realm beasts still had traces of life in them, even though they were incredibly faint.

 193 Chapter 193

    Even for Lin Fan with his pet shop and his cheat system, tinum Realm beast corpses were still considered rare things. However, he didn''t want these corpses at all since they still weren''t corpses yet.


    Lin Fan had been sure to leave the Charge Bear with a tiny bit of life left when he had "finished" it off since he still had a use for it, rather Brainy still had a use for it.


    As for the rest of the tinum Realm beasts, Lin Fan couldmunicate with Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei and Ang had her sharp senses which told her that Lin Fan had spared the Charge Bear, so she did the same with her Cyclone Condor since she knew that Lin Fan must have his reasons.


    As they left, Brainy had released its seeds into the stronger beasts that were still alive.


    Aftering into this nar crack, Brainy didn''t have much time to create an army yet since it was focused on either tracking certain beasts for Lin Fan, tracking the young geniuses, or keeping up a for their hidden enemy.


    Now that there were a bunch of "volunteers" in front of it, why would it let them go?


    These tinum Realm beasts were a bit weak, but they were still tinum Realm beasts. They would heal quickly with their physique as beasts since Lin Fan and the rest had held off just enough for them to not actually be seriously injured, even though it looked like they were. The beasts had actually only been knocked out, which made it easier for Brainy''s parasites to take control.


    Their group quickly made their way back to the camp where the supporters were shocked to see their conditions.


    The supporters quickly made their way through the young geniuses, looking over their injuries.


    Most of them had finished the battle with minor injuries since Lin Fan''s group had distracted most of the more powerful beasts, so while it hadn''t been easy on them, it was still easier than it should have been.


    But when they came to look over Yan Huo, they were surprised to see how serious his injuries were. Yan Huo not only suffered from internal injuries, he also had several cracked ribs and there were hairline fractures in his arm. It was amazing that he had been able to stay conscious the entire way back.


    Yan Huo was immediately carried off by the supporters into a room where they immediately began operating on him.


    Of course there were medical staff here, but medicine was a bit different herepared to earth. They still used medical technology and medicine was actually more developed herepared to earth since there was arge demand for it with how much fighting humans had to do to survive against the Beast n. However, what they had here was also different from earth since there was the existence of life energy.


    Life energy had many different attributes and one of those attributes was healing. There were some cultivators that had the ability to heal with their life energy, but this was considered very rare.


    That was why healers were considered an upation that rivaled that of alchemists, but it was too bad that healing attributed life energy was just too rare.


    Still, the Monster Trainer Union had really gone all out this time, even sending a healer along with them into this nar crack just in case.


    As for the rest of them, they had their wounds bandaged by the various supporters.


    The supporters had also tried to bring Lin Fan into the healing room when they saw the wound on his arm, but Lin Fan rejected them. He just sat down in the center of camp and began cultivating in front of everyone.


    Everyone was shocked to find that the wounds on his hand were quickly healing, they were closing at a rate that could be seen by the naked eye.


    Soon, the rips that had covered his entire arm like a grid had all closed and there were only minor cuts left.


    It was only then that Lin Fan stopped cultivating and stood up.


    Lin Fan had an amazing ability to heal himself, which came from the power of his God Tier Cultivation Technique.


    The power of his cultivation technique was to refine his body, which was done by using the yang energy gathered by the suns in his dantian to nourish his body. At the same time, the yang energy was also used to assault his body, which made his physique much stronger.


    To put it simple, his cultivation technique was an endless cycle of destroying his body and repairing it. So it was as simple as flipping his hand for him to heal his injuries.


    Once Lin Fan was done, he immediately gathered everyone to call another meeting.


    After all, they had just been ambushed and one of them had been kidnapped. After all of this, they needed to n out their next moves, but that was easier said than done.


    Once everyone was gathered, Lin Fan was the first to say, "Does anyone have any information to go on? Did you find anything when you were looking around earlier?"<sub> </sub>


    Everyone looked at each other before all of them shook their heads.


    Yue Jin like usual was the first to speak, "We have no clues at all, so what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan knit his brows before saying, "We can go out and search the area again tomorrow, but that would just mean falling into another trap. It was clear today that there''s a traitor among us, otherwise they wouldn''t have prepared that trap for us."


    After giving a pause to let his words sink in, Lin Fan continued, "Before we go out, we have to find the traitor among us, otherwise this will lead to our deaths."


    This time after a bit of silence, it was the cloaked person who spoke, "Then do you know who the traitor is or how we can draw them out? If you announce your intentions like this, wouldn''t this make it harder for you to smoke them out?"


    Lin Fan revealed a strange smile when he heard this, "I already know who the traitors are, I found the final clues today. I''m just giving them a chance to reveal themselves. I will be revealing who they are tomorrow, so they have until then to reveal themselves."


    He looked over all of them before saying, "I know that you have your circumstances, so if you reveal yourselves earlier, I will make it easier on you. You should know that betraying the human race for the Beast Race is a serious crime, so you better take advantage of this."


    Lin Fan didn''t wait for the others to say anything after this, he just stood up and left them sitting there in silence.


    The young geniuses all looked at each other before warily standing up and walking away.


    Lin Fan''s move had been yed, the seeds of dissent had been sown among them. Eventually this would result in someone moving, especially the traitor.


    The traitor now had to worry about whether Lin Fan was telling the truth or not, so they would have to eventually make a move. The longer this thought stayed in their mind, the more worried they would be. Eventually it would gnaw on their reasoning until they couldn''t take it anymore.


    Time passed and soon it was time for dinner.


    Everyone was still cautious of each other, but they all came to dinner since it was the best way to keep an eye on everyone.


    Even Yan Huo who had been injured had recovered enough toe to dinner, but he was apletely different person from before.


    Yan Huo came over to where Lin Fan was sitting with two bowls in his hand and said, "Brother Lin, it seems like your words have really shaken them up."


    Lin Fan raised a brow when he heard this, but he still took the bowl that Yan Huo offered to him.


    Yan Huo sat down beside Lin Fan after handing him the bowl. He didn''t begin eating right away and hesitated a bit before saying with a bow, "Brother Lin, I really do have to apologize for my behaviour yesterday. I really don''t know what came over me, but I can''t apologize enough to you. I realize now just how dangerous this situation is and that we should work together for the greater good of humanity. I hope that we can be friends."


    Everyone around looked at Yan Huo in surprise.


    They were all people of the same circle, so they had a decent understanding of Yan Huo''s personality.


    He was a rash person who had an arrogant personality, unless he absolutely had no other choice, he was someone who would never apologize. He was the exact opposite kind of person he was currently acting as.


    But they couldn''t see anything wrong with him, his words and actions all seemed sincere.


    The only exnation they could think of was that Yan Huo finally realized just how dangerous their situation was, so he had no choice but to reflect on his actions and turn over a new leaf. This was made quite evident by how he had ced himself in danger just to save Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at him for a bit before saying, "Alright."


    Lin Fan''s words were a bit cold, but Yan Huo didn''t let that bother him. He just said with a friendly smile, "Brother Lin, please have a taste of this soup. I specially made it for us, it''s a delicacy that I invented when I was out training."


    Lin Fan looked down at the bowl in his hand before raising it in front of Yan Huo and saying, "Why don''t you have a taste first?"

 194 Chapter 194

    The smile on Yan Huo''s face twitched a bit, but that twitch was so small that no one had noticed it.


    Yan Huo didn''t reveal anything as he said in a confused voice, "Brother Lin, is there something you don''t like about the soup? You can tell this little brother and I''ll change it immediately."


    Everyone was even more surprised.


    Yan Huo had actually called himself little brother, just what was going on?


    Could it be that one hit from the Gold Realm beast hadpletely changed his personality?


    But Lin Fan didn''t buy it at all, as he had the same calm look on his face as he said, "Do you really want to keep ying?"


    Yan Huo still acted confused as he said, "y? Brother Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    However, when Lin Fan said this, the others could clearly tell that something was off.


    Without knowing it, they had developed an instinctive trust towards Lin Fan over the past day.


    After all, he was someone who was much stronger than them and if he really wanted to kill them, he wouldn''t need to do all this. He even let himself be injured fighting those tinum Ream beasts to protect them.


    Would someone as strong as him need to do all this to trick them?


    If this was all part of his n, what would even be his end goal?


    Yan Huo''s expression didn''t break, but he did begin to panic deep down. He was very clear that Lin Fan knew something, but there was no other way out for him.


    Yan Huo slightly knit his brows as he asked, "Brother Lin, have I done something to offend you? Is that why you are acting this way? I don''t know how I''ve offended you, I''ve even tried my best to show my sincerity."


    Lin Fan just said, "You know in your heart."


    Yan Huo didn''t give up, "Brother Lin, do you remember when I took that hit for you? Was that not enough to show my sincerity?"


    Lin Fan raised the bowl in his hand and said, "There''s nothing to fear if you''re sincere, just have a taste first."


    Yan Huo knew that he had been pushed into a corner, so he changed his tactic and tried to appeal to everyone else, "Do you all see how he treats me? This clearly shows that we can''t trust him. This man is trying to stir up trouble among our group and cause us to fight each other, he is clearly the traitor!"


    But when he looked around, he saw that everyone was already looking at him cautiously. There was nothing he could do in this situation, Lin Fan had turned everything against him in just a few words.


    Since that was the case, Yan Huo could only do one thing. He turned and began to walk away as he said, "Since that is the case, there is no reason for me to stay here. I would rather go out and face the beasts than to face these beasts disguised as people."


    However, as he tried to leave, he found that everyone raised their weapons towards him, not letting him take another step. That also included the person who had incited him to do this¡­


    Yan Huo''s face was very ugly as he began trying to curse his way out of this, but everyone just ignored him.


    Everyone watched as Yue Jin came over to where Lin Fan was and using his life energy to catch a mouse off the ground, he used his life energy to also force the mouse to take a sip of the soup.


    As soon as the mouse swallowed the soup, it shuddered like electricity ran right through it before it fell limp in Yue Jin''s hand.


    There was no better proof than this, it was clear that the soup had been tampered with. Judging by the reaction of the mouse, it seemed like this poison wasn''t a weak one. Just a single sip was enough to paralyze this mouse to this extent, this poison must be a powerful type of poison.


    Yan Huo didn''t hesitate at all, he knew that he had no other way.


    Yan Huo pulled out a purple ball that he had been saving for after he murdered Lin Fan and threw it down right onto the ground. The moment the purple ball shattered on the ground, purple smoke was immediately released in all directions.


    He had been nning on using this to fake an enemy attack, during which time he would have been able to quickly assassinate the paralyzed Lin Fan, but his ns had fallen apart. Since his ns would no longer work, he would have to use this smokescreen to escape.


    But what he never expected was that Lin Fan wouldn''t give him that chance.


    The moment the purple ball shattered on the ground and smoke suddenly appeared, Lin Fan had already punched out.<sub> </sub>


    This punchpletely scattered the smoke and the force from the punchnded right on Yan Huo''s chest, smashing him into the ground.


    Lin Fan had held back slightly when he had fought Yan Huo before because he knew from experience that this kind of person wasn''t really dangerous since he wasn''t smart enough to be the traitor. However, now it was different since he was being used by the traitor¡­


    Yan Huo had actually been seriously injured since he knew he couldn''t hold back for his n to work, but that also backfired on him now. With his injuries, he couldn''t even use 70% of his normal strength, so how could he resist Lin Fan''s attack?


    Yan Huo was smashed into the ground and he lost consciousness immediately.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan in shock with his raised fist, but no one dared to say anything since Lin Fan''s actions had been justified. If they were to stand up for Yan Huo now, they might be implicated by him.


    Lin Fan looked over everyone before turning to the supporters, "Lock him up, I want to ask him some questions when he wakes up."


    Yue Jin overcame his shock and said, "Brother Lin, it seems like your n has worked and we''ve finally caught our traitor."


    Lin Fan looked at him before looking over everyone and saying, "I said I would give the traitor until tomorrow to reveal themselves, that hasn''t changed now. You have until that time to reveal yourself or things will be ugly for you."


    He began to leave after saying this, but he didn''t forget to add, "Of course, Yan Huo will also know who it is since he was being used. We''ll find out more when he wakes up."


    This was clearly intentionally said to make the traitor strike out at Yan Huo tonight to silence him, but the person in question wasn''t worried.


    Rather that person was secretlyughing in their heart because they had something that would make it rather easy for them to kill Yan Huo. They couldn''t wait to see everyone''s face tomorrow when it actually happened.


    ¡­


    Yan Huo was ced into one of the armoured vehicles and it waspletely ced in lockdown mode.


    This was a mode that was supposed to be used when beasts attacked, creating a bunker for the support staff to hide in, but it could also be used to keep a person inside.


    Around the armoured vehicle were several of the support staff who were standing on guard. While they were support staff, they were still also cultivators. Most of them were in the Silver Realm and there were even a few in the Gold Realm.


    Even though they were much older than the young geniuses, that didn''t mean that they were that much weaker.


    But there was one figure that silently moved through the night, moving through the shadows and the blind spots of the guards.


    That figure made their way through the rotation of guards around the armoured vehicle until they were right beside it. Aftering up to it, that person went underneath the armoured vehicle where there was a secret opening that they could enter.


    This was a secret opening that was supposed to be used as an emergency exit in the case that the bunker was very broken into, but it also made quite the convenient hole for someone to sneak into.


    No one had guarded it since no one expected anyone to make it through all the guards around the armoured vehicle.


    As the figure moved in and entered the armoured vehicle, they didn''t notice the trail of ants that were under them and that there were two figures currently standing in the sky watching over them.


    That person snuck into the armoured vehicle, but that didn''t mean that it was leftpletely unguarded. There were two Gold Realm guards that were inside watching over Yan Huo since it would be crazy to just leave him unguarded.


    But that person didn''t panic and just casually took out an incense which they lit.


    That person was already wearing a mask so the incense didn''t affect them, but the scent that came from the incense quickly affected the two guards.


    They felt that their eyelids just couldn''t stay open any longer before both of them just copsed on the spot, falling unconscious.


    After seeing them fall down, that person walked over with a smile on their face and a dagger in their hand.


    Looking down at Yan Huo, there was no hesitation at all when the dagger fell down at Yan Huo''s heart, but then¡­


    "You really think things would go that smoothly?"

 195 Chapter 195

    That person quickly turned around when they heard that sound and they saw Lin Fan and Ang standing there by the door.


    That person had hesitated when they heard this voice, which had stopped the dagger, but they quickly overcame their shock. With only a single second of hesitation which had paused the dagger temporarily, the dagger then began to fall again right at Yan Huo''s heart.


    But the moment it was about to pierce Yan Huo''s chest and stab the heart, it was stopped once again. There was only a single inch between the dagger and Yan Huo''s chest.


    The only thing that was different was that there was ayer of wind that was holding up the dagger and the hand holding it. No matter how hard that person tried to stab down, the dagger wouldn''t move a single inch.


    Lin Fan wasted no time and immediately punched out at that person.


    That person knew that this was a bad situation for them, so they released their dagger to dodge to the side. Even with how fast they reacted and moved, Lin Fan''s attack still grazed them, knocking off the mask on their face, revealing a familiar looking face.


    It was the librarian looking girl whose name was Yin Zi.


    The force of the punch that moved past her was strong enough that it pushed her against the wall, knocking the wind out of her. However, she knew that she couldn''t stop at all.


    She didn''t know how Lin Fan had found her since she had used all her sneaking abilities, but she knew she couldn''t stop here.


    Yin Zi lookedpletely different from normal, she was wearing dark clothes that perfectly outlined her figure, with parts of her that popped out in all the right ces.


    Yin Zi was someone who came from a family of assassins, so normally she dressed in that unassuming manner to blend in as much as possible. However, now that she was on an assassination job, of course she would be wearing her uniform which made her figure pop since using her charm was also a valid method of assassination.


    She was like a beautiful rose in the night now that she no longer had the librarian braids and thick framed sses. With her hair down and without those sses covering up her eyes, she had a charm that could move any man, that is except for Lin Fan.


    If Lin Fan even thought about it, he knew that a certain person beside him would explode immediately.


    But as someone who came from a family of assassins, naturally she also had her way of sneaking around.


    Quickly catching her breath, before Lin Fan or Ang could release another follow up attack, the space in front of her suddenly flickered before she disappeared.


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he saw this, but he wasn''t worried at all since he had a way to track her still.


    The sound inside the armoured vehicle was of course not soft and it soon attracted everyone in the camp.


    When the rest of the people arrived, they just saw Lin Fan and Ang standing inside with the dagger on the ground.


    Lin Fan didn''t even bother with them as he walked out of the armoured vehicle with Ang.


    While the others didn''t know what was going on, they still followed Lin Fan since there was nothing else they could do.


    Lin Fan led them into the forest and soon they arrived in this clearing where Yin Zi had stopped to catch her breath after escaping.


    When she heard their group approach, she immediately used the same technique as before to hide once again. However this time, Lin Fan saw right through it.


    Without any hesitation, as soon as he walked into the clearing, he punched out in the direction of the hidden Yin Zi.


    Yin Zi was shocked, but she quickly dodged out of the way. Even though she reacted quickly, she didn''t react quick enough and the force of Lin Fan''s punch grazed her, dispelling her hiding technique.


    Yin Zi suddenly appeared,nding on the ground in front of them.


    Everyone was shocked to suddenly see Yin Zi appear, but none of them were fools. They quickly put the pieces together in their mind before raising their weapons, aiming them all at Yin Zi.


    Yin Zi just looked at Lin Fan and asked, "How?"


    Lin Fan smiled without saying a thing.


    What no one noticed was that underneath their feet were a row of ants that were crawling past, moving towards Yin Zi.


    These ants were being controlled by the Desert Horror Queen. As the queen of the Desert Horrors which were high tier ants, naturally she could control these smaller ants.


    The ants had found Yin Zi through her scent since they had a powerful chemosense, which was how ants found food.<sub> </sub>


    Yin Zi was someone who wore heavy perfume since perfume could be used either as poison or as a tool to charm someone, both of which would be useful in assassinating someone.


    That was how even though Yin Zi had used her artifact that contained shadowws, allowing her to blend into her background, Lin Fan was still able to find her.


    Although Yin Zi was currently surrounded by everyone, she didn''t seem to panic at all. Rather she seemed quite calm for someone in the situation that she was in.


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say anything, she turned to the others and said, "Do you really think you''ve won here?"


    Yue Jin gave a cold snort at this and said, "You''re the one surrounded, do you really think that you should be saying things like this?"


    Yin Zi revealed a smile as she said, "Do you really think so?"


    Then there was a sudden pool of ck that appeared at her feet.


    There was a dark figure that suddenly popped out of that pool of ck, taking form before the ck cover slowly fell off them from head to toe, revealing their true appearance.


    This was a person that waspletely wrapped up in a ck robe with a strange pierrot mask on their face. It was a mask that had a smile, but there was a single tear under the left eye.


    But the moment that figure appeared, the pressure that it released suddenly fell down over all the young geniuses and the moment it did, it felt like they were being crushed by a mountain. That is, all of them except for Lin Fan and Ang.


    This was a feeling that they had only ever felt from the heads of their families and it had to be known that all of them were from royal families, meaning that these heads were all peak tinum Realm Experts.


    If that were the case, wouldn''t that mean that this was a peak tinum Realm Expert that had just appeared?


    Only Lin Fan and Ang were able to remain standing, the rest of them all slouched over under the pressure that they felt.


    Yin Zi had the same smile as she said, "You are all frogs at the bottom of your wells, do you really think that you were actual geniuses? This is nothing more than a lower realm and you all have no idea just how wide the universe is."


    Yue Jin struggled as he said, "You...You''ve betrayed humanity?"


    Yin Zi continued in her confident voice, "Humans are nothing in the face of the Beast n. I''m just joining the right side while there''s still a chance. You have no idea what they''ve already shown me."


    During this time, the masked figure had been staring at Lin Fan and Ang. For some reason, he felt a sense of danger from them, one that he couldn''t exin.


    Lin Fan had also been looking over the masked figure during this time.


    Brainy had been trying to use its spiritual energy to investigate this person, but it was the same as when the girl in the lolita dress had disappeared. It was like there was something around this person that was cutting off its spiritual sense and interfering with its search.


    After Yin Zi had finished her confident tirade, she turned to the mask figure and said, "Lord Yin, if you would do the honours."


    But that masked figurepletely ignored her.


    That masked figure was silent for a few more seconds before asking Lin Fan, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan met his gaze and asked back, "Isn''t it polite to introduce yourself first?"


    The masked figure didn''t say another word as it suddenly disappeared. When it appeared again, it was already in front of Lin Fan with a dagger in its hand, stabbing at Lin Fan''s chest.


    Lin Fan naturally was also prepared since he already had the Iron Eater Bone Artifact in his hand in a smallpact cube form. The moment the masked figure disappeared, he had already transformed it and wrapped it up in a golden glow, bringing the golden glowing dagger up to meet the tip of the ck dagger of this masked figure.


    The two daggers shed and there was a slight moment of equilibrium before the masked figure was actually pushed back.


    He looked at Lin Fan in confusion.


    Based on the aura that he had felt from Lin Fan, Lin Fan was clearly only in the mid tinum Realm, but somehow he had been able to push him back.


    It had to be known that the ck dagger in his hand was actually a Legendary Realm Artifact that he had received for his achievements from his lord, yet this kid''s white dagger was able to match it.


    The masked figure couldn''t help thinking, just who was this kid?

 196 Chapter 196

    The masked figure was about to make another attack on Lin Fan, but there was a wind de that suddenly appeared in front of him.


    He quickly raised the dagger in his hand to guard against it and while he was able to scatter it, the wind de had pushed him back several meters.


    He could tell from the aura of the wind de that it was an attack that was only in the mid tinum Realm, but even with all his power, he couldn''t block it at all.


    The masked figure turned back to Lin Fan and Ang, looking at them with a trace of fear in his eyes. These two people were clearly not normal, perhaps it would be best not to fight them directly. He had to report to Lord Jin and make sure they knew about this person.


    Yin Zi was shocked when she had seen all of this.


    Even though she had been surrounded, she had been confident since this Lord Yin had contacted her to tell her that he was nearby.


    She had been working with the Beast n for a long time and she had known this Lord Yin for a while, so naturally she knew how powerful he was. Yet now he was being pushed back by these two people from the Monster Trainer Union.


    But thinking about all the things that the Beast n had shown her, she pushed down the slight bit of hesitation that had appeared.


    She took out a dark pearl that the Beast n had given her and she said, "Lord Yin, I''ll help you. Let''s take care of them."


    But that Lord Yin raised his hand and said, "Wait."


    After that, Lord Yin turned back to Lin Fan and asked again, "Who are you? You shouldn''t be someone from this lower realm with that weapon of yours. Why are you here?"


    Lin Fan still gave the same response, "It''s still polite to introduce yourself before asking others. Moreover, you''re quite the rude person, attacking without any notice."


    Lord Yin didn''t attack immediately like he had done thest time, rather this time it seemed like he was more than willing to talk. Lord Yin paused for a second before saying, "Which upper realm are you from? The Gctic Humanity Alliance shouldn''t have any manpower to spare with their current situation, so you must be from one of the Coalitions."


    The Coalitions that Lord Yin spoke of were upper realms that controlled a number of lower realms, using them as a source of resources and talent.


    The Gctic Humanity Alliance was one of those Coalitions and if it were to bepared to the scale of gatherings on earth, it would be equal to a small town.


    Then there were the lower realms that were below them, which would only be considered small viges. To put it simply, to the people of the Beast n, the people here were nothing more than ignorant vigers.


    But Lin Fan was clearly different, that was evident in the artifact that he had.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''m someone from this lower realm, I have no idea what you''re talking about."


    Lord Yin''s face turned a bit ugly when he heard this, but he continued, "I don''t know what your goals are for this lower realm, but I can tell you now that there''s something important to the Beast n here. As long as you''re willing to cooperate with us, we can both fulfill our goals here. There''s nothing to gain if we fight each other."


    Lin Fan revealed a thoughtful look before asking, "What''s important to the Beast n on this? If you tell me, I might be able to consider this."


    Lord Yin''s expression rxed a bit when he heard this.


    If possible, after that sh just now, he wanted to avoid fighting Lin Fan if it was possible. Now that the other side was open to the possibility of negotiating, he would definitely take this chance.


    Lord Yin calmly said, "I can''t tell you that since even I don''t know the specifics, but I can tell you that there is an important item for the Beast n here. We don''t want to harm this, but they have been keeping us away from this item for tens of thousands of years now, so we have no choice. If possible, we just want to obtain that item and leave."


    Then he added, "As long as you''re willing to help us open this nar crack, our experts wille through to find the item and take it back. Once that is done, we''ll leave this immediately. Of course, we''ll also help you achieve whatever goal you''re trying to achieve in this lower realm."


    Lin Fan revealed a thoughtful look as well as he pondered over this.


    Of course he didn''t believe this Lord Yin''s words when he said that they would leave as soon as they received what they wanted.


    The Beast n were for the most part savages that relied on their instincts to survive. Of course that didn''t apply for all beasts, since there were beasts with extreme intelligence like Brainy that were more civilized than most people.<sub> </sub>


    But for the most part, the Beast n relied on instincts and one of their more baser instincts was their greed. They wouldn''t just stop at the item they were looking for, they would take all the resources that this lower realm had before moving on.


    <o>,m This was evident in the many others that the Beast n had already destroyed. This was one of the key pieces of knowledge that the upper realm spread to ensure that all humans were afraid of the Beast n, while also being willing to fight them to protect themselves.</o>


    But while his words did contain lies, there were parts that could be true.


    If the Beast n were searching for something specific, that would exin a lot. Such as why the Beast n had even been willing to send a single mutation beast like Lord Yu down to this lower realm.


    It had to be known that each mutated beast was a very rare resource for the Beast n.


    All mutated beasts were guaranteed to reach the Legendary Realm and be King Beasts, but it didn''t just end there. Mutated beasts were much stronger than normal beasts and they even had intelligence that was close to that of humans, which made them perfectmanders for the Beast Race.


    For them to send a precious mutated beast down to a lower realm like the Blue Star, unless there was something special with this lower realm, that was something that should have been impossible.


    All of this just confirmed one fact, there was indeed something special about the Blue Star for the Beast n.


    After being in thought, Lin Fan slowly said, "It isn''t impossible for us to work together, but¡­"


    Lord Yin hung onto Lin Fan''s words and repeated, "But?"


    Lin Fan then said, "Unfortunately, I am not from the upper realm like you think and this is indeed my home, so I can''t just let the Beast n just destroy it."


    Lord Yin''s expression fell when he heard this, "You! You want to¡­"


    But before he could even finish, Lin Fan''s right hand had arounde up and the white dagger in his hand had been thrown out.


    This white dagger quickly flew through the air and there was a faint three coloured glow that surrounded it, releasing gold, white, and blue lights.


    Lord Yin could feel extreme dangering from this dagger and with how fast it was going, he knew that it would be close to impossible for him to dodge, but he didn''t panic.


    As the dagger flew through the air and quickly approached him, Lord Yin''s figure suddenly became transparent.


    The dagger quickly flew at him and soon passed right through his transparent form,nding in a tree behind him,pletely cutting that tree down. The dagger continued through several more trees, cutting them all down before finallynding in the ground, creating a giant crater.


    Lord Yin slowly came back into existence, bing opaque again. The attack hadpletely passed through him, like he hadn''t been there.


    But after Lord Yin fully came back into existence, after a few seconds of no reactions at all, there was blood that suddenly dripped down the bottom of his pierrot mask.


    As the lines of blood dripped down, Lord Yin suddenly clutched his chest and couldn''t help faltering a step.


    What Lord Yin had used was his shadowws to fall into a shadow dimension that was hidden in the cracks of the real world. Once he entered the shadow dimension, he would be immune to attacks in the real world, but that was only up to a certain limit.


    Lin Fan''s Iron Eater Bone Artifact had clearly broken that limit, reaching a point where hisws of shadow couldn''t negate itpletely.


    The Iron Eater Bone Artifact itself was an Embryo Soul Artifact and adding in the threebinedws that were strong enough to match thews of the Fragmented Soul Realm, this was an attack that could already match the power of a Legendary Realm Expert.


    Even if Lord Yin was in the peak tinum Realm, he was still not in the Legendary Realm, which was a giant gap that was like heaven and earth.


    So the shockwave from the attack had seriously injured him, but he knew that this was a chance for him since Lin Fan had just thrown his artifact away. He was certain that was the only thing that had allowed Lin Fan to match him.


    But when he looked back at Lin Fan, he saw that he already had the white dagger back in his hand.

 197 Chapter 197

    The Iron Eater Bone Artifact was one that was developing spirituality and was already bonded to Lin Fan, so it had the ability to return to his hand whenever it was thrown away from him.


    It had been unsummoned once it created that crater in the ground, entering a void state that allowed it to return to Lin Fan before it was summoned once again.


    Lord Yin looked at the weapon in Lin Fan''s hand with a bit of fear, especially after how casual Lin Fan had looked when he released it.


    After this fact set in, Lord Yin suddenly realized that he had been a fool for thinking that he could match Lin Fan if Lin Fan didn''t have his weapon. The fact that he had sent out an attack on that scale so easily, it was clear that Lin Fan was still holding back.


    If he wasn''t careful, he might not be able to escape with his life today.


    Or to put it in other words, if he didn''t have the rarews of shadow, there wouldn''t be a chance for him to escape.


    Yin Zi was shocked when she saw that Lord Yin was injured.


    From her understanding of Lord Yin, she had always regarded him as a supreme expert. But now he was being beaten by this kid who was much younger than her. This was something thatpletely subverted her world views.


    Yin Zi quickly overcame her shock since the fear of death quickly came over her. As someone who was trained in a family of assassins, she had always lived on the edge of death and had learned to prioritize her own life above all else.


    Now that the situation was bad, she could only do what she could to survive.


    Yin Zi came to Lord Yin''s side and supported him by the arm as she asked, "Lord Yin, are you alright?"


    Lord Yin turned to the side and spat out a mouthful of blood. He was about to swat her away, but then he thought better of it as he put his arm around her, picking her up.


    Yin Zi was surprised and said, "Lord Yin, what are you doing?"


    Lord Yin just said, "Be quiet, we''re leaving."


    Then the ck pool that had appeared when he arrived appeared again.


    The darkness of the ck pool came up and surrounded Lord Yin and Yin Zi.


    This was another one of the special powers of thews of shadow. They were entering the shadow realm again, but they were using it to quickly move arge distance instead of dodging an attack.


    Ang raised her hand and gathered her wind when she saw this, but Lin Fan raised his hand to stop her.


    Lord Yin saw this and he gave augh before saying, "I can tell that you are a smart person, you know when to hold back. You should already be able to tell what kind of trump card we have, so I can give you another chance. As long as you wish to cooperate with us, we can forget about everything that has happened and we can still work together. I hope that you can seriously consider this."


    Once he was finished with his speech, the darkness from the ck holepletely swallowed Lord Yin and Yin Zi, bringing them into the ground and disappearing from in front of everyone else.


    The other geniuses naturally hadn''t done a thing because they knew that they couldn''t have done a thing. The other side was an expert that was in the peak tinum Realm and they were all only in the Gold Realm.


    Just like the gap between the tinum Realm and the Legendary Realm, those in the peak tinum Realm mastered theirws to an extent that those in the Gold Realm couldn''t even face them.


    Lin Fan on the other hand had other ns, which was why he had let Lord Yin and Yin Zi escape.


    He could have easily killed them or captured them, but there was an easier way for him to get information.


    Right before Yin Zi had left, Lin Fan had been certain to leave a seed in her.


    This wasn''t the same tracking seed as before, this was a true parasite seed that was fully grown. Brainy had the ability to take over that seed whenever it wanted¡­


    Compared to just torturing them for information, it was much easier to get information this way.


    Not to mention that there was still one more thing to take care of before searching for the Beast n.<sub> </sub>


    A few minutes after Lord Yin left with Yin Zi, the young geniuses let out a sigh of relief. They all knew that he was someone that they couldn''t face and if Lin Fan wasn''t here, they would have definitely died.


    The most important thing was that Lord Yin was a Beast n member that had taken human form.


    Normally for a beast to take human form, they had to reach the King Beast Realm first. There were also some beasts that couldn''t take human form after reaching the King Beast Realm, but those were beasts with monstrous amounts of power that couldn''t be condensed into human form, they were not things that people like them could even dream of meeting.


    But they immediately threw this thought away for the sake of their own mental states.


    If his Lord Yin had been a King Beast that had transformed into human form, that meant that Lin Fan was someone in the Legendary Realm if he was able to chase this Lord Yin away.


    Just that thought terrified them and was something they could never ept. This man who was even younger than them, if he really was a Legendary Realm Expert, that would justpletely destroy their confidence. That was why they would never ept that fact.


    They immediately put Lord Yin in the category of special beasts that could take human form before reaching the King Beast Realm, which was correct.


    Lord Yin was a special beast that had the ability to shapeshift, allowing him to take his current form.


    After they finally came back to their senses, the others gathered around Lin Fan since they nowpletely viewed him as their leader.


    For them, this was supposed to be just a training expedition, but now there was one person dead, one person missing, and one person who was seriously injured. Not only that, they were also now caught up in a plot by the Beast n.


    If they didn''t have someone as powerful as Lin Fan backing them, they might not be able to leave this nar crack alive.


    Yue Jin once again led them since they all knew now that he was the second strongest person other than Lin Fan, so he had more rights to speak.


    Yue Jin came over and said, "Brother Lin, should we leave the nar crack and report this? There''s nothing to gain if we were to stay here, so we should go back and bring more reinforcements. This is a matter that will affect the future of the Blue Star, so we can''t be careless about this."


    Lin Fan looked at him and said with a faint smile, "You''re free to leave if you want to, or rather if you''re able to. I still have things to do here."


    Yue Jin knit his brows when he heard this and he asked, "Brother Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan had the same rxed look as he said, "Do you really think that they would let you leave that easily? It''s clear that they''ve been watching us the whole time with how they kidnapped that girl, so why would they let us leave to expose their n?"


    Once he said this, there was a chill that ran down their backs as they realized that Lin Fan waspletely right.


    They had been operating under the assumption that they could retreat at any time, but thinking about it now, these people were stronger than them and they were operating in secret, so why would they let them escape and expose them? It was clear that they would trap them in here to kill them off or bring them to their side, like in the case with Lin Fan.


    Once that thought was on their mind, they immediately tried to move closer to Lin Fan, but he raised his hand to stop them.


    Lin Fan said, "Before all of you start thinking that you can rely on me, I can tell you now that there''s still a traitor among us. Like I said before, I will give that person until tomorrow morning toe forward about themselves and I will show them mercy. If they still don''te forward after that, they shouldn''t me me for being ruthless."


    After saying that, he turned around and headed back into the camp, leaving them standing there looking stunned.


    But after a while, they came back to their senses and looked around at each other with cautious gazes.


    Lin Fan had been right about everything previously, then he must be right about this as well. If there was still a traitor among them after all of this, just who could they trust?


    Eventually, they all gave up and went their separate ways back to camp.


    During the night, nothing else had happened, but no one was able to get a good night''s sleep, especially the traitor.


    They had seen what Lin Fan had done to the other traitor, they had also seen what Lin Fan had done to Lord Yin. If they didn''t expose themselves, they might not be able to escape from here alive.


    So the next morning, another surprise came.

 198 Chapter 198

    The next morning at breakfast, everyone was tense since they knew that the deadline Lin Fan had set was approaching.


    During the entire meal, they were all cautiously looking at one another, wondering who the traitor would be. But there was nothing that came out of this until the end of the meal.


    Once everyone was done, they were all waiting for Lin Fan to make a move first because it didn''t seem like the traitor was about to do anything, but then they suddenly did.


    In front of everyone, one person came forward and stood in front of Lin Fan.


    It was the person with the cloak that just stood there, gathering everyone''s gaze.


    There was still a minute before the time limit that Lin Fan set, but that person came forward to take off the hood of their cloak, instantly causing surprise to fill everyone''s eyes.


    A handsome face that seemed to be chiseled out of stone appeared, but it wasn''t the normal kind of handsome. Rather it was more cute than handsome.


    This person had bright blue eyes and medium length blonde hair, with soft white skin, but that wasn''t the cutest part of him. The cutest part were the rabbit ears that were on top of his head, drooping down slightly.


    However, when everyone saw that pair of bunny ears, there was a look of disdain that filled their eyes along with the shock.


    These bunny ears actually touched on a very disputed topic of the Blue Star, the demi humans.


    Demi humans were humans that had characteristics of beasts, making them a mix between the two.


    Normally demi humans were actually stronger than most normal humans, but for the humans of the Blue Star that had a deep prejudice against the Beast n, they were considered an impure breed. Especially since there were only two ways for demi humans to be born.


    The first way was the natural way.


    During the earlier invasions of the Beast n, they were able to take territory from the humans and in those territories were people that were unable to escape or were just left behind.


    Naturally the Beast n also had a deep prejudice against the humans since they were natural enemies, so the humans that they captured were never treated kindly. Most of them were either used as ves by the beasts or were used as toys to relieve them of their boredom.


    The Beast n had many different races, so of course there were some with special tastes, namely human women.


    The beautiful human women captured were used without care by the Beast n and for the Beast n, they naturally didn''t care about contraceptives.


    One would think that different races wouldn''t be able to produce offspring, but there were some among the Beast n that could transform into human form. Once they were in human form, that was no longer a problem.


    However, even if they were in human form, their beast genes still remained and were passed on to their offsprings. This in turn created the demi humans.


    When the humans finally pushed back the Beast n and reimed their territory, saving the other humans that had been captured, it was already toote since the demi humans already existed. When these prejudiced humans found these demi humans, they marked them and the women who gave birth to them as sinners, banishing them from normal society.


    These demi humans and women were specially marked, forcing them into the cracks of society, doing whatever they could to survive.


    There were also some that went off from the main human cities and created viges that were just for sinners, but no one ever found these viges. And whenever one was found, they would be immediately swept through by hunters and these sinners were taken away to be sold as ves to those with money.


    After all, there were some demi human races that were quite charming, such as the fox race or the bunny race¡­


    Other than this first method of creating demi humans, there was actually another way of creating demi humans, but this method was much more dangerous than the natural method.


    This method was to put the spirit crystal of a beast into humans, allowing the human and the spirit crystal to mix.


    There were still traces of the beast''s soul inside the spirit crystal and with their life energy, it mixed with the human that it was ced in, creating a human and beast hybrid.


    This was much more dangerous because there were many cases where humans were unable to contain the energy inside the spirit crystals, causing explosions orplete disintegration of their form.


    There were tests that were done before by the government, but they had been deemed inhumane and this project was quickly abandoned. However, that didn''t mean that everyone abandoned it.


    There were many dark organizations that still utilized this method since one had to admit that demi humans were indeed much stronger than normal humans. Combining the innate power of the beasts with the infinite potential of humans, it was much easier to be an expert. But usually the price of that was one''s life since there was only a less than one in ten chance of seeding.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan however as someone who came from earth didn''t hold the same prejudices as the people of this world. He was someone who actually really enjoyed beastmen, especially catgirls, or rather catgirl maids¡­


    But this wasn''t the time to think about this, so after a bit of a pause, Lin Fan asked, "What kind are you?"


    The rabbit boy whose name was Yu Shu said, "Which one do you think?"


    Lin Fan fell silent for a bit, but he already knew his answer.


    If Yu Shu was a sinner, there was no way the royal family behind him would ept this. Especially since this Yu Shu was the son of the family head.


    If the family head of a royal family had been cuckolded by beasts and had to raise a son that wasn''t even his, the royal family would have removed him from his position a long time ago.


    So the only possible exnation was that Yu Shu had used the second method to be a man and beast hybrid.


    Since he was working with the Beast Race, it was very likely that he volunteered for this, with the slight chance that he was forced to do this. However, either way, the fact that he chose to do this meant that he had clearly betrayed the human race.


    Yue Jin came forward and said, "You trash, how dare you turn your back on the human and turn yourself into hybrid trash like this? You bring disgrace to all of us!"


    But Yu Shu ignored him and continued looking at Lin Fan, waiting for his reaction.


    Lin Fan raised his hand to stop Yue Jin and the others who clearly wanted to say their piece before saying, "You''re not exposing yourself as the traitor because of my threat, you''re doing it because they want you to lead us to them, correct?"


    Yu Shu said with a nod and no expression, "Correct, I am to lead you to their base where you will meet them onest time."


    Yue Jin pulled out his bow and aimed it right at Yu Shu, "You think that we''ll let you lead us anywhere? I''ll finish you off right now!"


    But Lin Fan stopped him once again, "There''s no point in killing him and besides, since he''s willing to reveal himself, he must have ns already." Then he turned back to Yu Shu to say, "Alright, we''ll let you lead us there, it''s not like there''s anything else we can do right now."


    Yu Shu nodded before praising, "Brother Lin truly is wise, I can see why Lord Yin has such hope for you."


    Lin Fan gave a smile of disdain as he said, "I''m afraid I can''t take the title of brother from someone like you."


    Yue Jin couldn''t understand what was going on, so he quickly said, "Brother Lin, you can''t do this! This is clearly a trap, we shouldn''t listen to him! We should take him out now and force him to give us the location of the enemy!"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''ve already told you, since he''s willing to reveal himself, he must have his preparations. Moreover, the fact that they are willing to reveal him is not just because I already know who he was, rather it''s because they are confident in taking care of us. That confidence isn''t false, they are definitely much more prepared and much stronger than us. Instead of waiting for them to hunt us down one by one, it is better to face them head on while we still have our full strength."


    Yue Jin still didn''t lookpletely convinced, but he had to admit that Lin Fan''s words did have some reasoning to it.


    Lin Fan just ignored him and turned back to Yu Shu, "Then, shall we go?"


    Yu Shu made an inviting gesture and said, "After you, brother Lin."


    Lin Fan gave a snort, "How can I go first if you''re leading the way?"


    Yu Shu revealed his first expression which was an awkward smile, "Eh, you''re right."


    After he said that, he led the way into the forest without care for the others.


    Lin Fan naturally followed behind him, but the others hesitated a bit before following Lin Fan.


    In the end, there was nothing they could do alone and since Lin Fan was their only hope, they had no choice but to follow him¡­


    So they headed off into the forest, not knowing what would await them.

 199 Chapter 199

    Yu Shu led them through the forest which was strangely quiet for once.


    Unlike usual, there wasn''t the sound of different animals around them. It was almost like they were the only ones in the entire forest.


    But they also knew that this was a way for the Beast n to unnerve them, showing them that they were strong enough topletely push out all the beasts and living creatures that existed in this environment, just to create this silence.


    To be honest, it did unnerve the young geniuses a bit since there were quite a few strong beasts that were inside this nar crack. While there weren''t any King Beasts, there definitely were plenty of tinum Realm beasts.


    In truth most of the beasts that were inside nar cracks were rejects of the Beast n that were forced into these nar cracks. Since these nar cracks were considered neutral ground because they were on the edge of the human territory and the beast territory, creating a bridge for either side to invade the other side. It was just that normally it was the Beast n invading the humans¡­


    But it wasn''t just a few tinum Realm beasts that were in this nar crack, there were over a hundred and they were all tightly knit together since they were all refugees that had arrived here together. If even one was touched, it meant offending all of them.


    But now there wasn''t even a single beast around, it was clear that there was a true expert of the Beast n that was in this nar crack¡­


    Along the way, Lin Fan came up to Yu Shu who was surprised to see him approaching him. Lin Fan came up beside him and asked, "Did you do it voluntarily?"


    This sudden question had actually caught Yu Shu off guard and he even stopped for a second to take a look at Lin Fan before continuing forward.


    He continued walking forward in silence for a few steps before saying, "What do you think?"


    Lin Fan kept up with him, walking beside him as he said, "It was just a single minute that you could have waited. If you had waited even that single minute, it would have made your allegiance clear, but you chose toe forward just that minute earlier. That minute means a lot, you and I both know that."


    Yu Shu fell silent once again when he heard this, but then he said, "You''re free to think whatever you want to think, but I can tell you one thing. They are much stronger than you think, that Lord Yin was not their top expert, he is just one of their team leaders. The Beast n has fully invested in their invasion this time."


    Lin Fan took a deep look at him and decided not to say anything else about this topic. Rather he asked, "Tell me about yourself."


    Yu Shu wasn''t surprised, he just said, "There''s not much to say about me, I''m just like those fools behind you, but I was an unlucky one. I went into a nar crack one day and I came out different the next, you can probably guess what happened."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "No one else knows?"


    Yu Shu just gave a sigh, "Who could know and not treat me differently?"


    Lin Fan then said something surprising in a very casual tone, "I wouldn''t."


    Yu Shu once again stopped to look at Lin Fan again, but this time it took two seconds before he started walking again.


    As he walked away, he said, "You don''t seem that trustworthy."


    Even though he said this, his tone was much lighterpared to before.


    ¡­


    After around half an hour of walking, they finally arrived at this pyramid looking structure that was close to what seemed to be the center of the nar crack, or at least that''s what it felt to them.


    For Lin Fan who had Brainy that could scout almost the entire nar crack, he actually had a good mental map of the nar crack based on information Brainy gave him. He could tell from that that this pyramid was actually right in the center of the nar crack.


    But it wasn''t the pyramid itself that surprised him, rather it was the faint energy fluctuations that made him knit his brows.


    If his senses weren''t wrong, these should have been the fluctuations of spatialws that he was sensing.


    As someone who had the system, he hade in contact with pure spatialws when he had died and been transported elsewhere. At first he didn''t know what this was, but Momonga and Ang both told him about the specialws that were used to revive him in the system''s cultivation realms. Now he had a sharp sense for spatial and timews after experiencing it again and again with the system.


    But to be sure, he also looked over to Ang who also gave him a slight nod of affirmation.


    With this strange pyramid in the center of the nar crack that was giving off spatialw fluctuations, there was only one exnation for this. There was a Beast n Expert that could use spatialws here and they were trying to use spatialws to create aplete tunnel for their invasion. They wanted to create a tunnel using this nar crack that would let the Beast n lead their armies to the Blue Star.


    It seemed the situation was much more serious than he had thought and based on the energy fluctuations he felt, they should being close to finishing this tunnel. If he didn''t act now, there might be another beast wave that would erupt on the Blue Star!<sub> </sub>


    Once these thoughts passed through his mind, Lin Fan was about to move forward to attack the pyramid, but there was a pool of dark energy that appeared on the ground. It was just like what had happenedst night and soon the same figure appeared once again in front of them.


    It was the same figure with the pierrot mask, it was Lord Yin!


    Everyone pulled out their weapons when they saw Lord Yin appear, that is except for Lin Fan and Ang.


    Both of them could tell that there was no hostilitying from Lord Yin, but that didn''t mean that he didn''t have anything nned. It just meant that there was no reason to fight him without hearing him out first.


    Lord Yin looked at Lin Fan and gave a p before spreading his hands, "Wee, wee honoured guests to this special game that we have prepared for you."


    Lin Fan raised a brow when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything because he knew Lord Yin wasn''t finished.


    Rather it was Yue Jin who asked, "What game are you talking about? We''re not here to y games with you!"


    Normally these young geniuses would be quite calm, but this was a situation that far surpassed their expectations. They never expected that they would be right in the middle of a Beast n invasion plot.


    Even if they were geniuses with experience, they were also the younger generation that had been carefully raised. While they had experienced danger before, they had never experienced something as crazy as this, which was arge mental strain on them.


    That was why even though Yue Jin was usually quite the calm and calctive person, he was this impatient now.


    They knew that this was all too far over their heads and they might not have the chance to escape¡­


    Lord Yin didn''t even spare Yue Jin a nce as he continued looking at Lin Fan and he said, "We''re so d that you can join us, Lord Jin was delighted when he heard that we had such a special guest among us."


    Lin Fan looked at him and said, "Who said that I''m here to join?"


    Lord Yin''s smile turned a bit helpless as he said, "Ah, then that is truly a shame."


    Then his voice changed as it filled with a bit of despise, "Since you''re not here to join us, you should know that there is only one other fate for you. I really hope that you won''t regret this, after all, we''ve given you plenty of chances."


    Lin Fan gave a snort when he heard this, "What if I choose the third option then?"


    Lord Yin asked, "Third option? What third option?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile, "I can just kill you all and stop your portal."


    Lord Yin also smiled at this, "You really know how to kid. But there''s plenty of time to yter, we''ve even specially set up a game for you."


    Lin Fan''s smile turned cold, "What makes you think I''m here to y?"


    Lord Yin still had the same calm smile on his face, "You might be strong, but you''re not stronger than Lord Jin. You''ll soon see that it is meaningless to struggle in front of Lord Jin." Then his smile turned cold, "I will enjoy watching that despaire over you, it will fill me with satisfaction to see you in pain."


    Lin Fan raised his hand and the white dagger appeared in it again, "Then how about I let you see what pain is right now?"


    But before he had a chance to throw that, there was a sh of white light that appeared in front of him.


    Then before any of them could even react, they disappeared from their original spots.


    The only ones that were left standing there were Lord Yin and Yu Shu.


    Yu Shu turned to look at where they had been standing before giving a sigh. Then he walked over to Lord Yin''s side.


    The ck circle appeared under Lord Yin once again and the dark energy surrounded them before they too disappeared.

 200 Chapter 200

    When the white light disappeared and Lin Fan could see again, he had appeared in arge maze where the only ways to go was forward and back. On both his sides were walls that were more than three times taller than him.


    But there was also someone else with him, someone who had always followed him.


    It was Ang.


    Lin Fan could tell that someone had used spatialws to move them inside the pyramid, but he could also tell that that person had clearly split them all up as well. Why was Ang beside him?


    Ang could see his confusion and naturally could tell what he was thinking.


    Before Lin Fan even asked, she said, "This is just simple spatialw maniption, it''s very easy for me to use my own spatialws to cancel out his control and let me teleport with you."


    This was something that Lin Fan didn''t doubt. To be honest, he was still afraid of Ang since he still had no idea just how powerful she was. The only thing that he did know was that she was right before the God Realm, which was why he was able to get her to work for him.


    But the fact that the system could use God Realmws was a thing that had been in the back of his mind for a while. Especially after he learned the significance of God Realmws.


    Even now, he still wondered who created the system and why they gave the system to him¡­


    ¡­


    On the other side, there was a man that was sitting in a golden throne with a golden suit and a golden cape on his back. Everything about this man was golden, his clothes, his hair, even his skin to a certain extent. The only thing that wasn''t golden with him were his eyes that were a piercing blue eyes.


    At this moment, those piercing blue eyes were looking into a mirror in front of him and being reflected in that mirror was Lin Fan and Ang.


    This man sitting in the throne was Lord Jin, the Legendary Realm Expert that hade from the Beast n and the spacew user. He had been the one that had teleported them into the pyramid and separated them, but for some reason, what he was looking at now went against that.


    He had used his spacews to teleport each person into a set starting point that was at fixed distances from each other, but somehow these two had ignored that and had been teleported in together.


    How had they resisted his spacews and done this?


    But then when he thought of the report that Yin had given him, it made sense since these two were from an unknown upper realm. It was very likely that they had some unknown artifacts on them that had helped them resist his spatialws.


    As he fell into thought, he began gaining more interest in this pair, preparing to watch them as they made their way through the game that he had prepared.


    As for why he had just referred to Lord Yin as Yin, that was because members of the Beast n didn''t have surnames.


    They were all beasts that had gained intelligence and they didn''t want to be like the humans, so they chose to just call themselves whatever they wanted to call themselves. Usually that meant just choosing a single word that they felt best represented who they were.


    As for Lord Jin, it was clear why he chose to call himself Jin¡­


    ¡­


    Back in the maze, Lin Fan and Ang didn''t make any rash moves and first looked over their surroundings, but there really wasn''t much for them to look at.


    The one odd thing was that when they tried to spread their spiritual senses around them, they found that they couldn''t send it through. When they chose to send their spiritual senses up, they found that it was actually quite the thick wall, which was why it had blocked them from sending their spiritual sense through.


    Of course, it had only blocked Ang''s spiritual sense because she didn''t use her full spiritual sense.


    Before evening here, Lin Fan had made Ang agree that she would only use strength limited to under the Legendary Realm. If she were to use strength that was beyond that, it would ruin his n.


    Since they couldn''t find anything with their spiritual sense, it was time to use another method, namely Brainy.


    Lin Fan had actually stored a few of Brainy''s smaller scouts inside his pet storage space, which was now perfect for the situation that they were currently in. As well, there were still the ants that the Desert Horror Queen had.


    Those scouts all headed off in different directions, even though there were only two directions to choose from¡­<sub> </sub>


    There were also some ants that tried to dig under the walls or through the walls, but no matter how hard they tried, they were unable to make even the slightest dent.


    Seeing that didn''t work, the ants then tried to climb up over the walls and go around it, but whenever they reached the middle of the wall, they were unable to move forward at all. It was like there was another invisible wall that was sticking up over the walls of the maze themselves that were blocking them from moving forward.


    In the end, the ants had no choice but to head off in different directions like the beasts.


    Lin Fan and Ang just stood there waiting patiently.


    Finally Brainy had some news, but it wasn''t good news.


    Behind them was a dead end and it wasn''t just a normal dead end, it was one that had a trap to it.


    The trap was a weight sensitive floor that opened up to reveal a pit filled with sharp spikes that impaled anything that fell down.


    The ants hadn''t been heavy enough to activate it, but the beasts scouts were definitely heavy enough.


    When the mice touched the weight sensitive floor, it immediately opened right in the middle and swung open to reveal the pit full of spikes. It was a good thing that Brainy also had a few scouts that could fly that immediately picked up the mice that were falling, stopping them from impaling themselves.


    All that they learned from that experience was that this was a dead end for them.


    As for in front of them, Brainy had found that there were many different paths in front of them and those paths all led to different open spaces.


    Brainy had sent its scouts into those open spaces, but there wasn''t much they could do since those open spaces werepletely surrounded in walls. There didn''t seem to be any way for them to progress any further.


    After rying all this information, Lin Fan decided that there was no point in staying here any longer.


    That Lord Yin had said that this was a game, so there must be a point to those open spaces. Without entering them first, they would probably be unable to continue forward.


    As per Brainy''s investigations, there didn''t seem to be any differences in the open space between them, so Lin Fan just chose to head directly straight forward every time until he came to one such open space.


    The moment he did, there was a voice that suddenly sounded and it was quite the familiar voice. It was the voice of Lord Yin.


    Lord Yin''s voice echoed around them as he said, "Wee to the first stage of the game! To pass this stage, all you have to do is pass the challenge that is presented to you!"


    Lin Fan looked around to see where this voice wasing from, but he couldn''t find a single trace of Lord Yin around them at all.


    Finally Ang tapped his shoulder and pointed above them, pointing at a sphere that was floating in the air.


    This was actually quite themon artifact found in this world, being used by all the different races. This was a Voice Orb that was able to record the voices of the user and y them back.


    As for the reason why it was floating, there was a little blue patch that was attached to the bottom of the Voice Orb, which was a patch made of Gravity Stone. Gravity Stones were a special mineral that was also quitemon, which had the effect of defying gravity, allowing it to float things in the air.


    With these twobined, it created a recording that had a spiritual sense trace attached to it, which allowed it to activate the moment someone walked through the entrance. At the entrance was a special array that could detect motion, which sent a signal to the spiritual sense seal on the Voice Orb, activating it.


    Lord Yin''s voice continued, "Now you''re probably wondering what this stage will be about."


    Then after some pause, it continued, "Since you''re quite the straightforward person, taking all the straight paths, we''ll make it simple and give you a straightforward game. As long as you can defeat your opponent, you will be able to move onto the next stage!"


    There was a dark circle that suddenly appeared on the ground in front of Lin Fan and after a while, there was a deer that slowly rose up from the dark circle.


    This deer looked quite harmless, but when one felt the energy fluctuations that came from it, it was clear that this deer was in the tinum Ream.


    The only problem with that was that this deer was only in the low tinum Realm and it was facing Lin Fan...

 201 Chapter 201

    The deer had quite the imposing aura when it came out, but all of that disappeared when it saw Lin Fan.


    It could tell from the aura around Lin Fan that this human was dangerous and what Lin Fan did after that proved it right.


    Without even waiting for the deer to even react, Lin Fan''s fist had already punched out, creating a golden fist out of hisws that flew right at the deer.


    This deer was a beast known as the Forest Deer because of the foliage that decorated its horns.


    This deer wasn''t a small beast, it was actually three times higher than Lin Fan, so it actually stood quite high and the foliage in its horns were quite wide. Hanging off those horns, the foliage almost looked like the trees that were inside a forest, which gave the Forest Deer its name.


    That also wasn''t the only reason why the Forest Deer had this name, but before it could even show off its abilities, it was smashed into the ground by Lin Fan''s golden fist.


    This tinum Realm beast naturally had its own pride, so it wouldn''t go down that easily, but it didn''t have a chance to get up again.


    When the Forest Deer tried to get up again, Lin Fan had already sent another gold fist that had knocked it right back onto the ground.


    Every time the Forest Deer tried to stand up, it was knocked down to the ground with another golden fist.


    As Lin Fan continued sending out golden fists that knocked the Forest Deer onto the ground, he also slowly moved forward towards the Forest Deer. He approached step by step until he was right by the Forest Deer.


    Now that he was beside it, instead of using his goldenw of power to punch the Forest Deer, he began punching it with his fists.


    The Forest Deer had been struggling to stand up since its pride wouldn''t allow itself to back down to this human, but once Lin Fan''s fists hit it, its expression changed. Instead of fighting back, after revealing a shocked look, it began moving towards Lin Fan''s fists, allowing him to punch it again and again.


    As the rain of punchesnded on the Forest Deer, its expression once again slowly changed.


    It went from the look of surprise that it had at first to a look of pure ecstasy. It wanted Lin Fan to keep punching it forever!


    But after a while, Lin Fan stopped to the Forest Deer''s dismay.


    As soon as Lin Fan stopped punching it, the Forest Deer looked at Lin Fan with a distraught look. It began calling out for Lin Fan to continue to punch it, but Lin Fan just stood there with his hands crossed.


    No matter how much the Forest Deer begged, Lin Fan didn''t send out a single punch.


    Soon it began looking like a wife that had been ignored, begging their husband just for the tiniest bit of attention.


    When Lin Fan saw how the Forest Deer was acting, he couldn''t stop ck lines from appearing on his head.


    He had to admit that the effects of his suction power really was effective against beasts, but the reaction they had to it really did make him feel mixed feelings.


    But now that thing had reached this point, of course there was only one thing left to do.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and Brainy came out of his sleeve to put a seed in his hand. Lin Fan ced that hand in front of the Forest Deer and just waited.


    The Forest Deer looked at the seed in Lin Fan''s hand and it could tell that this wasn''t anything good, but then it looked at Lin Fan again. That feeling just now, it knew that if it followed Lin Fan, it would be able to achieve its dream of reaching the higher realm, but that would mean selling its soul to the devil¡­


    In the end, after a bit of hesitation, the Forest Deer came down and licked the seed out of Lin Fan''s hand.


    As soon as it did, it could feel the seed''s effects appearing inside of it, but it didn''t resist at all. It was doing this for its future and since it had already made its decision, there was nothing to fight.


    Since the target was willing, it didn''t take long for Brainy''s seed to quickly spread through the Forest Deer, allowing it to take control over it.<sub> </sub>


    Once Lin Fan received the confirmation from Brainy, he pulled the Forest Deer into his pet storage space for the future.


    Even though the Forest Deer didn''t get a chance to use it now, it actually had quite the useful ability. It would definitely be of great use to Lin Fan in the future.


    As soon as the Forest Deer disappeared, the Voice Orb in the air rang out again.


    Lord Yin''s voice said, "Congrattions on clearing this stage, but it should have been a little too easy right? Don''t worry, the next stages won''t be as easy as this one."


    Once his voice fell, there was a grinding sound that sounded like rocks pushing against each other that rang out. After a few seconds of this, the wall on the other side of the open space suddenly opened to reveal a passageway for Lin Fan.


    This was a game that relied on seeing if the yer could defeat the enemy they were given, so there was an array that was here that monitored the vital signs of the beast opponent that was sent out. Once those vital signs weakened far enough or disappearedpletely, there was the assumption that the beast could no longer fight or it waspletely incapacitated.


    If that was the case, then naturally the game was considered over and the yer could pass since they had finished their task, which was what had happened.


    Lin Fan knew that based on the first room, the others should be the same, so this time he didn''t send any scouts out first.


    There were only two paths to choose from this time, one left and one right.


    Both of the paths looked exactly the same, so they just had to choose a single path.


    After flipping a coin, they decided to head down the left path.


    After walking for a bit, they came to another open space, but this time this open space was filled with trees and bushes, creating a jungle like environment.


    Just like with the first room, there was another Voice Orb that was floating in the air and the moment Lin Fan and Ang walked in, the Voice Orb activated.


    Lord Yin''s voice rang out once again, "So you chose to go left, it seems like you''re more of a sneaky kind of person. Most people would choose to go right since it''s their natural dominant side, but you somehow chose to go left. Either that is your dominant side or you are quite the thinker, knowing to go againstmon thought. But in the end, it didn''t matter which way you went because both the games have the same level of difficulty."


    After this rant, the tone of Lord Yin''s voice changed to be more yful, "Now let''s y a simple game of hide and seek. Inside this room, there is a beast that is hiding, all you have to do is find them. If you can find them within twenty four hours, it will be considered your victory. Once you take longer than twenty four hours, a vicious beast will be released into this room for you to fight. Good luck!"


    This was much different from the previous game. Thest one was a direct fight and now this one was a game of hide and seek, but that didn''t matter since Lin Fan was good at both. Or rather he had a pet that was good enough to carry him in this game.


    Brainy once again released its scouts and had the Desert Horror Queen release her ants.


    His scouting forces headed out in full force, scouring the entire forest, but the area they could search was limited and this forest was actually quite big. To put it in earth terms, it would have been equal to the area of over a thousand football stadiums, which when roughly converted was over five square kilometers.


    The beasts under Brainy''s control began spreading out in different directions, creating a that spread outwards with Brainy in the center, looking for any traces possible. But the strange thing was that they couldn''t find a single thing.


    ? These beasts were all small beasts that were at least in the Bronze Realm, so they had their own spiritual sense. As they released their spiritual sense outwards like a, they still couldn''t find a thing.


    The ants had their chemosense which would allow them to search for what they wanted to find by scent, but there wasn''t any strange scent here either.


    All they could find was the normal scent of the leaves and wood, there was nothing that seemed out of the ordinary.


    As time passed, Brainy''s scouts swept across the entire forest, but strangely they couldn''t find a single sign of what they were looking for.


    For the first time in its time following Lin Fan, Brainy actually couldn''t find what Lin Fan wanted it to find which frustrated it.


    Brainy used even more spiritual sense to bring out even more scouts that continued to sweep through the forest, but still it couldn''t find anything.

 202 Chapter 202

    Even after a while, Brainy still couldn''t find what it was looking for, which made it quite frustrated.


    This was the first time that it had encountered something like this and it naturally had its pride as a mutated beast. It also had its pride as an intelligent beast and now that it was being outsmarted like this, it definitely wouldn''t take this lying down!


    Brainy summoned out all the scouting puppets that it had and sent them all over the forest, while also releasing its own spiritual sense to scout out the area. Even with all of this, it was still unable to find a single thing.


    In the end, it curled around Lin Fan''s arm feeling depressed.


    Lin Fan patted its head tofort it, but this was a real problem since if even Brainy was unable to find it, there was no way that he could find it.


    If that was the case, what should he do?


    Ang had been silently standing on the side watching the entire time. Seeing how frustrated Lin Fan looked, she actually revealed a smile.


    For some reason, she felt that he looked quite cute like this, struggling to find what was right in front of him.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to do until he turned to look at Ang, seeing that smile on her face which confused him. Why was she just standing there with a smile?


    In the end, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What''s so funny?"


    Ang just pointed at a bush that was in front of them and said, "It''s funny that you missed something that was out in the open."


    Lin Fan looked at the bush with a confused gaze.


    What did she mean by something that was out in the open?


    Why couldn''t he see anything there?


    Lin Fan walked over to the bush that Ang had pointed out and stuck his face in to look over it along with Brainy. However, no matter how the two them looked at it with their eyes, their spiritual sense, or any other methods that they had, they couldn''t find a single thing.


    Finally Ang came over with a smile, reaching out to suddenly grab something that was invisible.


    Based on the shape of her hand around it, it seemed like it was a little lizard, but they couldn''t see the colour or the figure of the lizard at all. It was apletely see through lizard.


    Lin Fan moved in to look carefully at what Ang was holding in her hand, but no matter how hard he looked, he still couldn''t see a thing.


    Finally, he couldn''t take it anymore as he asked Ang, "What is this thing?"


    Ang took her other hand and tapped it on the head of the lizard, causing it to suddenly appear in front of them. She had used her life energy to disrupt thews that the lizard was using to hide itself.


    When Lin Fan saw the lizard appear, he finally understood what this was.


    It was a Change Gecko, an extremely rare beast with two differentws, but neither of thosews could be used to fight.


    The Change Gecko used thews of light and wind to help itself hide from its predators and unless one was much stronger than the Change Gecko, they would never be able to see through it. Of course Ang was much stronger than the Change Gecko, so she could see through itsws easily.


    Ang was already at a level that surpassed the upper realm and if she wanted, she could destroy the entire upper realm with a flip of her hand, but that wasn''t good for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t need a destroyed realm, he needed a proper realm that he could set up a business in and earn more money, letting him develop his strength. His system could turn him into an expert, but that all required arge amount of money since his system was based around his shop.


    Back to the Change Gecko, it had the ability to use lightws to refract the light around it to make it disappear into its environment and it used windws to keep its scent from being released. That way, whether it was by sight or scent, the Change Gecko couldn''t be found.


    That was why neither the scouts or the ants with their chemosense could find it.


    Brainy had Lin Fan raise it in his hand towards the Change Gecko, putting it right in front of it. The Change Gecko could feel the hostilitying from Brainy, so it shrunk back, but it couldn''t escape since Ang was still tightly holding it.


    Brainy looked over the Change Gecko for a bit before suddenly spitting out a seed thatnded on the Change Gecko''s forehead.


    It didn''t take long before the seed went right through the Change Gecko''s outer skin and entered its brain. The seed only took a few seconds topletely spread all over the Change Gecko.<sub> </sub>


    That was because the Change Gecko''s nature was flight over fight, so once it was caught, it resigned itself to its fate. It would never fight back, so it easily epted the seed that controlled it.


    After the seed took it over, Brainy revealed a proud look before slivering back into Lin Fan''s sleeve and curling around his arm.


    Lin Fan also found it funny when he saw Brainy''s little disy of pride, but he also took the Change Gecko into his pet storage space.


    In the future, the Change Gecko would definitely be a powerful tool for him. With its ability to hide, it made the perfect scout and it was already in the tinum Realm. As long as he didn''t send it to spy on Legendary Realm Experts, there was no one that could find it. Even if he were to send it to spy on Legendary Realm Experts, unless they were beyond the Embryo Soul Realm, they wouldn''t be able to see it.


    Once Lin Fan put the Change Gecko into his pet storage space, there was the same grinding sound before a portion of the wall opened to reveal a passage.


    This was the same principle as the previous room, once the vital signs disappeared or weakened enough, the way forward would open.


    That was because when this room was designed, the Change Gecko had been given the order to escape for as long as possible. Even if it was caught, it would continue running and escaping with all its might. It was actually quite fast with the windws that it had at its disposal.


    The only reason why it didn''t escape this time was that it could see the shadow of death that was behind Ang. It knew that if it had even tried to disobey her, it would have been killed in an instant.


    Once the door was opened, Lin Fan and Ang headed down the path again, heading towards the next room. With how rxed they were, it really seemed like they were here to y the game.


    ¡­


    In the center of the pyramid, on arge golden throne.


    Lord Jin was sitting there waiting for the end of this game, but since he was bored, he was also watching the participants.


    He had a mirror that was in front of him that he used to watch this, but instead of watching different participants, he had been watching the same people the entire time.


    In the mirror in front of him, there was Lin Fan and Ang reflected there.


    At this time, the door of the room that he was in suddenly opened and there was a familiar figure with a pierrot mask that walked in.


    The moment Lord Yin walked in, he couldn''t help being surprised by what Lord Jin was doing.


    Lord Yin came over and said, "Jin, why are you watching them?"


    Lord Jin didn''t turn as he said, "It''s important to know your enemies, otherwise they will surprise you, Yin."


    Lord Yin gave a soft snort, "What surprise could there be? They are nothing more than shameless humans who came from another upper realm and won''t even admit it. Now they''re interfering with our ns as well."


    Lord Jin shook his head as he said, "You always jump to conclusions too fast. Just because he has that artifact, it doesn''t necessarily mean that he is from an upper realm. There are things called Inheritance Realms on this lower realm, he might have gotten the artifact from there."


    Lord Yin gave another soft snort, "You didn''t see it, but I know that they aren''t from here. That kid used three differentws together, if he isn''t a special genius trained by one of those upper realm factions, I would smash my head against a wall."


    Lord Jin didn''t reply since he wasn''t able to argue with this, but still he didn''t seem like he believed it.


    Lord Yin didn''t mind this and asked again, "So why are you watching them?"


    Lord Jin turned back to the mirror and said, "Well, they are quite interesting to watch. Especially how those two interact with each other."


    Lord Yin came over to look in the mirror and all he saw was Lin Fan and Ang walking leisurely down a passageway before saying, "You call this entertaining?"


    Lord Jin revealed a faint smile and said, "Well, you haven''t seen the rest."


    Lord Yin looked at him with a confused look, "Are you sure you''re alright?"


    Lord Jin said with the same smile, "If I had to describe it, I would say I''m a fan of theirs."


    Lord Yin didn''t know how to respond to this¡­

 203 Chapter 203

    Lin Fan and Ang continued through the passages of this pyramid, moving along from one room to another. As they moved through these rooms, they had to finish the games set up in those rooms first.


    Other than the second game that was a bit difficult for him, Lin Fan easily cleared out the rest of the games.


    In the games that were presented to him, there weren''t many that were well thought out. Rather most of them were all simple childish games.


    Besides hide and seek, they made him y tag, red light green light, simon says, and kick the can.


    Thest one was very strange because it was a strange beast version of the game where the can was actually a moving beast.


    But after making his way through each and every one of the games, he finally reached the end of thebyrinth which was arge room that had a set of stairs that was waiting in the center. All around him were different tunnels that led to different parts and based on how his tunnel had been shaped near the end, it didn''t seem like they were connected at all.


    All of them also hadrge stone circles that were blocking entrance into them, so Lin Fan only had a single way to go, which was up the stairs.


    Lin Fan also tried sending some of Brainy''s scouts to go through the stone tes blocking the tunnels, but they were unable to make it through at all. It was like when they tried to go through or over the walls, there was a strange force that blocked them.


    So with no other choice left, Lin Fan went up the stairs and arrived on the second floor. When he took his first step onto the second floor, he was surprised to find a small forest clearing that appeared in front of him.


    This forest clearing was a room that was surrounded by the same walls of thebyrinth, but there was a garden table set up in the center of the clearing. On the table were several snacks and a pot of tea that was just waiting for them.


    It seemed like this was some sort of tea garden that had been set up as a waiting room for them.


    At the table, sitting around it were three people. It was the Yue twins and the short haired girl.


    It seemed like Lin Fan and Ang had been thest two to arrive.


    When they came up the stairs, the other three noticed them immediately and stood up to greet them.


    Yue Jin was the first one to speak, "Brother Lin, you''re finally here. How did it go for you?"


    Lin Fan looked over them and found that they weren''t that badly injured before saying, "It wasn''t too bad, how was it for you?"


    Yue Jin said, "It was alright, but some of the games did seem a bit silly. Which games did they make you y?"


    Lin Fan sat down with the rest of them and they began recollecting their experiences.


    All three of them had been sent to different parts of the pyramid and they had made their way here slowly through the various games.


    While the games they yed were dangerous, they also were a bit silly. It was almost as if the enemy was just using them to y with their lives, like they didn''t see them as threats at all.


    Lin Fan had felt the same while he had been making his way through, but since they were in enemy territory, they had no choice on this right now.


    The one strange thing that did happen to them during this was that when they were in true danger, there was a strange golden sh of light that suddenly appeared to defeat their opponents for them. This didn''t just happen to one of them, it happened to all of them.


    They had been confused why the enemy had saved them, but none of them knew that this was something that Lin Fan had set up.


    He had already lost five of the kids he was supposed to babysit and since he knew that none of these three were traitors, he would have to bring them back at least since he did promise Zhang Liang that he would.


    So before they came, he had ced a single use of his powerws on them, which would save them in a critical moment.


    Since they were all in the Gold Realm, the opponents that had been arranged for them were all in the Gold Realm. After all, this was a game, so there had to be the chance that they could win the games.


    With Lin Fan''s powerws being in the tinum Realm, just a single use of it was enough to take care of some Gold Realm beasts.<sub> </sub>


    They spent their time recollecting their experience, but after that, there was nothing for them to do.


    It had taken them only fifteen minutes, but then there was nothing that happened. Even though they were all here, there was nothing that happened.


    After another fifteen minutes had passed, they got out of their seats, all of them except for Ang who was devouring the snacks that had been left on the table for them. There had been an arrangement of sweets that had been left and every time she finished, there was another set that magically appeared.


    The rest of them didn''t trust these snacks and the tea since it was prepared by the enemy, but Ang had a sharp nose which told her that they weren''t poisoned. Not to mention that even if it was, poison at the level that Lord Yin and Lord Jin could prepare wouldn''t have any effect on her who was far above them in terms of realms.


    The ones that got out of their seats came up to the walls around them and began looking over them.


    These walls were the same walls that had been in the passages of thebyrinth, but these walls were also surrounded by a strange foliage that grew with the artificial light orb that was floating above them.


    After they checked out all the walls, they found that there was no exit or secret passages at all, the only way out was the stairs down, but even then there would be nowhere for them to go.


    Lin Fan finally couldn''t take it anymore and after a few minutes of searching, he decided to just punch the wall.


    The moment his fist made contact with the wall, there was a strange white light that appeared on the wall. After that sh of white light, there were sudden rips that had appeared on Lin Fan''s arm, stretching down from his fist.


    Lin Fan looked down at his arm before clenching his fists, causing all the cuts to close immediately and stopped bleeding.


    The other three were shocked when they saw this, they never knew that Lin Fan had trained his physique this far.


    As for what had hurt Lin Fan, it was actually the force of his own fist.


    The walls of this garden were actually coated in spatialws and simr to the spatialws in Lin Fan''s store, it could reflect the force of any attacks that hit it. However, the only difference was the level of the spatialws.


    ? The spatialws that coated these walls were at a lower level, so it couldn''t take the full force of Lin Fan''s physique that wasparable to one in the Legendary Realm, but it did manage to negate most of that force. But barriers made from spatialws didn''t just negate force, it also reflected it back.


    However, since it was of a lower level, it didn''t reflect it back with more than ten times the force like Lin Fan''s store could. This wall only reflected it back with less than 10% added, but that was still enough to injure Lin Fan.


    Still, since it didn''t negate all the force, there was a tiny part of the wall that did crumble under the force of Lin Fan''s fist. But even if it did crumble, it only dropped a little piece of rock that was the same size as the crumbs that Ang created as she devoured her snacks.


    Lin Fan could tell that thews protecting the walls were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm, which meant that if he were to draw his artifact and use his threewsbination to attack it, he would be able to break this wall. However, he refrained from doing so.


    They were currently in the enemy''s territory and if he were to rashly charge forward, it would be hard to tell what kind of traps the enemies had set up for him.


    For now, it seemed like it was better to follow the enemy''s flow until he could find a chance to make a move.


    So after that punch, Lin Fan decided to sit back down and wait.


    When the others saw that even Lin Fan had chosen to wait, there was nothing they could do and they all also sat down.


    After another half an hour, Lord Yin''s familiar voice finally sounded again.


    Looking at the watch on their wrists, it seemed like exactly six hours since they had been brought into this pyramid had passed.


    Lord Yin''s voice rang through the room as he happily said, "Congrattions to all of you on making it through the first floor, but don''t be too happy since that was just the easiest floor! Now there will be two more floors before you can reach Lord Jin, I hope you are all prepared!"


    After a pause, he continued, "Now, please choose one of the two passages to enter."


    As soon as he said this, there was a loud sound as the wall on the opposite side of the stairs suddenly had two passages appear in them.

 204 Chapter 204

    The two passages didn''t seem different at all, they were both dark tunnels that were lit by torches on the wall, leading right into the darkness.


    While Lord Yin had been talking, Lin Fan had actually had Brainy release the ants to scout out the passages with their chemosenses.


    The result that the ants gave Brainy was that the passage on the left didn''t have any scentsing from it at all, but there was a strong scent of blood that came from the right passage. It wasn''t just a faint trace of blood, it was so strong that it almost seemed like there was a pool of blood inside this tunnel.


    Just based on this, it was clear which path was the safer path, but what Lord Yin said afterwards changed everything.


    Lord Yin''s voice rang out, "The path on the left is the shorter and safer path, but it is a path that only three of you can enter. The two that are left behind will be disqualified and they will be swarmed by beasts that will be chasing from behind. As for the path on the left, it is much longer and more dangerous, but everyone will be allowed to enter that path."


    After stopping for a second, Lord Yin''s voice continued, "There is also a time limit for this round. If you can''t make it to the end within twelve hours, there will be a beast wave that will be released onto your group. At that time, the exit will be sealed and the only way to reopen them will be to destroy the entire beast wave."


    This scenario was clearly a game over scenario in their minds. A beast wave that was prepared by a Legendary Realm Expert of the Beast n, it definitely wasn''t something that they could deal with.


    Or rather, perhaps it was a kind of test for Lin Fan.


    They were perhaps hoping that he would either show his real side by either abandoning the others or maybe he would show his real power by fighting against the beast wave. No matter what the scenario was, no one ever believed that they would be able to finish the right path within the twelve hour time limit since there were also quite a few devious traps on that path.


    Finally, Lord Yin''s voice just suddenly cut off after he finished exining the trial.


    When the voice disappeared, everyone turned to look at Lin Fan.


    To be honest, they were tempted to just run into the left passage since there was nothing more important than their own lives, but they knew that they would never get a chance.


    Not to mention the fact that they wouldn''t be able to escape from Lin Fan, they could feel a dangerous feelinging from Ang, as if she could read their minds.


    In truth, Ang as the Spirit Overlord had eyes that were sensitive to emotions, being able to see them in different colours around a person. At this moment, she could clearly see the doubt that wasing from them, so naturally she knew what they were thinking.


    But in the end, it didn''t matter since they knew the left passage was impossible.


    If they were to take the left passage, there would only be one spot left for them since there was no way Ang and Lin Fan would sacrifice themselves for them.


    This was uneptable for the twins since neither of them would go unless the other was going. This wasn''t just because they were twins, there was also a different reason, namely the forbidden rtionship between them¡­


    As for the short haired girl, she knew that Lin Fan would never side with her over the twins. Especially since she had that incident with him before they came into the nar crack and Yue Jin had been supporting Lin Fan the entire time.


    All of them had just epted that they would be entering the right passage, but they didn''t go in right away.


    Lin Fan on the other hand had been sending his scouts into both the passages while searching the room they were currently in. He had tried to send his smaller scouts into the mechanisms that controlled the doors, but he was unable to since everything was covered in ayer of spatialws just like the walls of this room.


    The scouts that he sent into the passages didn''t have time to get far, it seemed quite a long trip for them and they didn''t seem to find anything. The only strange thing was that passage was nted down, which meant that they were climbing deeper into the pyramid.


    That didn''t make sense since they had just climbed stairs up to reach this floor, but now they were being brought down again. Could it be that these passages led to different parts of thebyrinth and thebyrinth they were in previously was just a small portion of the first floor?


    If that were the case, just how big was this pyramid and how did the Beast n bring it with them?


    Moreover, with how big this pyramid was, how was it that they missed it the entire time?


    When they saw the pyramid back in the forest, it hadn''t seemed that big¡­


    Another discovery that Lin Fan made was that these two tunnels were actually connected to each other.


    If he really wanted to, he could enter one and break the wall into the other¡­


    But that wasn''t something he wanted to do now. He wanted to hide his strength still since he didn''t know what cards the other side had and if he revealed them earlier, it would put him at a disadvantage.<sub> </sub>


    Right now it was best for him to y along until he had a chance to make his move.


    Finally, after nine minutes of just standing there and waiting for Lin Fan to finish, as their time limit approached, the three young geniuses couldn''t take it anymore.


    Yue Jin as their leader asked, "Brother Lin, isn''t it time that we chose a passage?"


    These words werepletely useless since they all knew which passage they would be choosing and Lin Fan''s words that came after weren''t a surprise at all.


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Alright, let''s head into the right passage now."


    Everyone looked at each other with a bitter smile. In their hearts, there was a slight hope that Lin Fan would somehow find a way for them to take the left passage or that he would sacrifice himself like he had done before, but that hope was dashed by his words.


    They all came behind him and followed him as he led the way into the right passage.


    Since they weren''t able to take the safe left passage, the least they could do was hide behind Lin Fan and let him take the lead.


    Lin Fan obviously knew what they were thinking, but he didn''t care at all, rather he was looking forward to seeing what kind of things were waiting for him in this passage.


    In the first round, he had actually received quite a few interesting things. For each of the games that he yed, he had found some interesting beast with unique powers. So once he finished those games, he clearly didn''t let those beasts off and inserted a seed into each of these beasts.


    If he could find some more special beasts here, it really would be a good harvest. He was slowly building up his forces.


    ¡­


    In the throne room, Lord Jin and Lord Yin had been waiting patiently, waiting for them to make a choice.


    They both thought that Lin Fan would abandon the rest and go into the left passage since they knew that that was the safest choice, but they also weren''t surprised to see Lin Fan enter the right passage.


    With the loyalty to humanity that he had shown, it was also reasonable that he wouldn''t abandon them since he was probably also confident in his strength. As a genius that came from an upper realm, a genius that could control three differentws, he naturally was confident in himself. It was just as normal for him to take the right passage.


    Lord Jin looked at the image and he couldn''t help knitting his brows slightly before asking, "Yin, what is the final stage for the right passage?"


    Lord Yin was confused when he heard Lord Jin asking this, but he still answered, "It''s that mirror, I told you this when we were designing this yesterday."


    Lord Jin''s brows didn''t unfurrow as he just stared into the mirror in thought.


    When Lord Yin saw this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows as he said, "Jin, it can''t be that you''re thinking..."


    Lord Jin still didn''t say a thing.


    Lord Yin then said, "Jin, they are enemies, you shouldn''t be thinking like this. We need to take care of them for the Beast n''s n, we don''t have time for your willfulness."


    Finally Lord Jin gave a sigh as his brows rxed and he said, "I know, I know, but I really want to meet them at least once. You''ve met them before, you should know how special they are."


    Lord Yin thought of when he had first met Lin Fan and Ang and he couldn''t help admitting that Lord Jin was right.


    He was indeed curious about the two of them, but now was not the time. They were here on a mission for the Beast n, so they should be doing what they could to fulfill that mission.


    Lord Jin saw that Lord Yin didn''t respond, but he didn''t say a thing either.


    He just gave a sigh and hoped that things would work out.


    This was his willfulness, but this was also the first time he was looking forward to something like this...

 205 Chapter 205

    The five of them slowly moved through the passage that was in front of them.


    They knew that they were short on time, but without knowing what was in front of them, no one dared to move rashly.


    The three geniuses were all tense and as for Lin Fan, he was rather rxed since he had sent his scouts forward, so he had a general gist of what was in front of them. Finally there was Ang who waspletely rxed. She was certain that no matter what appeared, she would be able to handle it and she was right to feel this way since she was an overlord.


    Just like this, the five of them continued down this passage for half an hour before they finally arrived at a room.


    All of them were surprised by theyout of this room as soon as they arrived since it was just too strange.


    There was a long hall in front of them and way off in the distance, they could see that there was a stone door that was waiting for them. But in between them and the stone door, there was a floor that was covered in tiles of all different colours.


    There were over a hundred different colours of tiles that were in front of them and they were all arranged in a random pattern. None of the tiles seemed to make any sense, it was just like someone had spilled several buckets of paint that had mixed with each other on the floor.


    But even though this room seemed simple, no one dared to take a rash step forward.


    They all came to the edge of the colourful tiled floor and looked down at the tile from above, while also releasing their spiritual senses to see if they could find anything. But all they could find was that these tiles were linked to a mechanism and as for what the mechanism did, they had no ideas at all.


    Finally they couldn''t take the wait anymore and the short haired girl picked up a rock from the ground which she threw at one of the tiles. She didn''t know which colour tile she should choose, so she just threw it her favourite colour which was surprisingly pink.


    For such a rough looking girl, it was quite funny that her favourite colour was pink, but she was a girl after all.


    The rocknded on the pink tile, but there was no reaction at all. They could tell from the reaction of their spiritual senses that the mechanism registered the weight, but it wasn''t enough weight to activate it.


    Based on the reaction of the mechanism, it seemed that it would only activate when weight that was close to the weight of a person pressed down on it.


    They could throw boulders onto the various tiles and use those boulders to test it, but those boulders would eventually get in their way. Especially if they were to make it down this hallway that seemed like it was filled with traps.


    They could have also destroyed the boulders with their long range abilities, but all of that would be a waste of energy and time since all that would do would be create debris that could get in their way just like the boulders would.


    The three young geniuses just nkly looked at each other because none of them knew what to do and of course, there was no one who was willing to go first.


    As for Lin Fan, he was carefully examining the tiles, trying to find some kind of pattern in their randomness.


    As for Ang, she just didn''t care. With her powers, she could easily break through this stage and also keep Lin Fan safe, which was the only thing that she did care about. Or rather he was the only thing she cared about.


    Finally, Lin Fan decided to take the first step.


    When the three young geniuses saw that Lin Fan was about to step forward, Yue Jin asked, "Brother Lin, are you certain you want to do this?"


    Lin Fan turned to him and gave a nod, "I''ll be fine."


    What he did note was that while they did show concern for him, all of them had moved several steps back. They were making sure that they weren''t going to be caught up in the aftermath of what would happen.


    Lin Fan took a single step forward and his footnded on a red tile.


    There was a sudden clicking sound which they had all expected, but then there was the sound of mes that came from above them.


    Looking up, they all found that there was a ball of mes that was floating right above the tile that Lin Fan was currently standing on. The ball of mes spun for a few seconds before it suddenly exploded.


    As the mes flew outwards, it created a pir of mes that was falling down right on the tile that Lin Fan was standing on.


    Lin Fan could tell that this me wasn''t that strong and that he would be able to block it with his life energy, but it would be a waste of his energy to do so.


    So as soon as the mes fell, Lin Fan did the smartest thing and simply jumped back. While he did lose the progress that he made, it was almost nothing since he had only taken a single step forward.


    It was much better to save his life energy by losing this little bit of progress than to waste it guarding against the mes.<sub> </sub>


    The mes continued to fall down for thirty seconds even after Lin Fan had jumped away. The strangest thing about the mes was that it had created a pir which had outlines that perfectly matched the outlines of the tile.


    The mes that fell from the pir onlynded on that one tile and not even a single spark of that spread to the surrounding tiles.


    After thirty seconds passed, the mes had finally disappeared and there was a click sound as the tile that had sunk down popped up again, returning to normal.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before jumping right back onto that tile.


    The same process urred again. It was the same ball of mes and the same pir that fell down, which Lin Fan avoided in the same manner.


    In the end, the tile popped up once again and everything was silent as it returned to normal.


    It seemed like the traps for each tile reset every time they were finished deploying, which meant that it seemed like they had to endure each trap before being able to make any progress or they would have to just run and avoid every trap they set off.


    There were naturally pros and cons to each of these methods.


    By going slowly and enduring each trap, you would be able to slowly and methodically make your way down the hallway. However, the cons to this was that it would consume a lot of life energy to make it all the way to the end of the hallway and they didn''t know what was waiting ahead of them.


    By running right through and dodging each trap they set off, it meant that they would be able to save on life energy and would be able to make progress, but there was also a huge risk to this. To put it inly, they had no idea what kind of traps were waiting for them in this room and if they were to encounter a trap that they couldn''t avoid, it could even be a powerful trap that was fatal for them.


    The three geniuses naturally weren''t fools and they could easily draw this analysis from watching Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan on the other hand didn''t seem to want to think, he just continued diving right forward.


    He moved to the side and jumped out to test another tile, this time it was the pink tile that the short haired girl had thrown a rock onto.


    The moment Lin Fannded on that tile, he was prepared to jump back, but this time the trap that appeared wasn''t as dangerous as the other one.


    The moment the tile sank and the mechanism was activated, there were two bouquets of flowers that appeared on both sides of Lin Fan''s face, suddenly blooming.


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but then the flowers suddenly released a burst of pollen in his face. Lin Fan was naturally caught off guard and released a sneeze from this, but he also quickly recovered and prepared himself for more from this trap. In the end, even though he was prepared, there was nothing else that came.


    He was confused since he was expecting much more, but thinking of how this was a game, it seemed to make sense that there would be some dud tiles along with the normal trap tiles. This pink tile seemed to be one of those dud tiles.


    Lin Fan looked at the tiles in front of him before eventually choosing a bright yellow one that was a little further in, but not too far that he couldn''t jump back to the beginning.


    The moment hended on this time, there were bees that suddenly appeared around him.


    At first the bees didn''t seem like they were about to do anything, but after a few seconds, they suddenly turned towards Lin Fan. All of them pointed their stingers at him and charged forward.


    Lin Fan jumped away back to the beginning like with the me tile and the bees seemed unable to leave the outline of the tile. It was like there was an invisible barrier that was keeping them in, even though they mmed against that barrier, trying to chase after Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before nodding at Ang.


    Ang nodded back and jumped onto the yellow tile, spawning the bees, but they actedpletely differently this time. The bees didn''t attack her at all, they just buzzed around her for a few seconds before disappearing.


    Ang didn''t move forward and jumped back tond at Lin Fan''s side, going back to her same neutral stance.


    Lin Fan fell into deep thought as soon as he saw this.


    It seemed like there weren''t only single trap tiles, but there were also tiles that needed to be activated together to create a trap, like the case of the flowers and the bees.


    The pollen from the flowers was naturally something that riled up the bees, which was why they only attacked Lin Fan who had been hit by that pollen and not Ang who hadn''t been covered in the pollen.


    It seemed like there was a pattern, but it was very hard to find...

 206 Chapter 206

    Lin Fan didn''t stop with just these tiles, he began moving from one wall of the corridor to the other wall of the corridor.


    From the left side to the right side, there were a total of fifty tiles that were lined up.


    As for how many times there were from the beginning of the hallway to the end of the hallway, it was too far away to count. But with a rough estimate, there should have been at least over a thousand tiles between them and the end of the hallway.


    Multiplying that by fifty, it meant that there were over fifty thousand tiles of varying colours in this hallway, all of them filled with traps.


    While the three young geniuses were still digesting the information they received and were thinking about what to do next, Lin Fan was busy moving from one end of the hallway to the other. By that, it meant that he was jumping on each tile from one end of the hall to the other.


    Each tile in the first row was a different colour and in the span of ten minutes, Lin Fan had set off fifty different traps. No, it was only forty eight since he had already set off two of the previously.


    These tiles varied in colours and they each had a unique trap to them.


    For example, the blue tile suddenly created a pool of water that Lin Fan began sinking into, but he easily jumped out using thew of wind to create a foothold. The green tile suddenly erupted in a burst of leaves which caught him off guard, but then it did nothing else.


    Most of them seemed to match what one would think their colours would mean, but there was one that created a strange reaction when Lin Fannded on it. It was a strange ck tile.


    The moment Lin Fan touched the ck tile, there were strange fuzzy ck balls that had appeared around him.


    At first Lin Fan had thought that this was another dud tile, but that quickly changed.


    He began feeling a bit sluggish after staying on the tile and a few seconds after, Ang shouted out, "Get off the tile now!"


    Lin Fan no longer doubted Ang like he had in the past. The moment he heard what she said, he immediately jumped back off the ck tile.


    When hended back on the stone floor, he felt the energye back to him.


    He couldn''t help staring at the ck tile that he had just been standing on before turning to Ang and asking, "What was that?"


    Ang knit her brows as if she was thinking about something before she responded, "Deathw."


    "Deathw?" Lin Fan repeated.


    This was aw that he hadn''t heard of before, even from the Lich King Momonga. What Momonga used wasn''t thew of death like one would expect from the overlord of the undead, rather he used thew of darkness. This was thew that most of the undead had, rather than thew of death.


    Ang was silent for a few seconds before exining, "Deathws are rare, just like lifews. There are fewws that can directly affect the life force since it is rted to the cycle of reincarnation, which is the foundation of the world. Life and deathws are examples of those which make them rarer. Lifews affect it less because it''s just prolonging life and dying the cycle of reincarnation, but deathws meanspletely cutting off the cycle of reincarnation and going against natural order."


    Lin Fan fell into thought when he heard this, but then he just stopped thinking about it since it was tooplicated for him. All of this cycle of reincarnation and natural order, that seemed far too above him right now.


    Lin Fan just nodded after he came back from his thoughts and Ang knew that there was no point in exining any further. However, this thought did linger on her mind.


    When did the Beast n get hold of the deathws and when could they use it for even a game like this?


    If that were the case, it seemed like the Beast n was holding back at thest summit and they might be nning something for the next summit¡­


    She just hoped that she could gain enough power by staying at Lin Fan''s store and learning from the master. After all, she was the ruler of the World of Elements.


    Lin Fan looked at each of the tiles that he had just tested and fell into thought once again.<sub> </sub>


    During his tests, he hadn''t just been testing what kind of traps were on each tile, he was also testing how strong the traps on each tile was.


    Based on the traps that he had taken, he could tell that these traps were in the range of the Gold and Silver Realm, which meant that he could block them. However, if he were to block them all, he would eventually exhaust his life energy and be unable to reach the end. In the end, one person couldn''t take down an entire army.


    Being unable to find the pattern in this, Lin Fan had no choice but to reveal one of his trump cards. It was one that he had obtained rather recently¡­


    With a snap of his fingers, there was a pile of rocks that suddenly appeared by Lin Fan''s side.


    The sound of the rocks dropping to the ground brought the three young geniuses back from their thoughts and they were shocked to find a giant stone golem appear in front of them.


    This was Lin Fan''s first time calling out Rocky since the Inheritance Realm and it waspletely different from back then. The current Rocky was over three times taller than Lin Fan and it was made of all different kinds of rocks, but it still acted the same.


    Rocky immediately nuzzled up to Lin Fan when it appeared, almost knocking him over since it was now three times taller than him.


    The three young geniuses were shocked when they saw this giant stone golem appear in front of them, but they quickly overcame their shock. They hadn''t seen this giant stone golem when they were fighting the beast wave, but it did make sense that Lin Fan was holding back then to bait a certain someone. Thinking about it now, after seeing how Lin Fan had dealt with Lord Yin, they couldn''t believe that he would struggle with low tinum Realm beasts.


    Lin Fan waved the three of them over and they came up in front of Rocky before he said, "Our n now will be to rush forward while Rocky creates defenses that will keep out all the traps. That means that if you stop for even a second, you will be left behind, understand?"


    The three of them clearly had reservations on this n, but what else could they do. They had already fully invested in Lin Fan and if they didn''t follow his n, being left behind by him, they definitely wouldn''t be able to survive.


    The three of them bit the bullet and gave a strong nod, but it was clear that they didn''t want to do this.


    Lin Fan just ignored this and had Rocky create a defensive rock shield around them.


    Rocky was now already in the high tinum Realm and it was a pet that specialized in defenses, so for it to defend against Gold and Silver Realm attacks was too easy for it.


    The rock shield around them perfectly wrapped all around them, while also creating a slit that let them see what was in front. Lin Fan was personally using hisws in that slit to create a defensive barrier.


    Just like this, they were like a tank that crushed through the various traps of the tiles, slowly making their way forward.


    The rock shields were controlled by Rocky''s life energy, so they could be moved while being just heavy enough to trigger the tiles.


    The traps of the tiles spawned and mmed into the rock shield, but they onlysted a few seconds before disappearing. Once they did, Lin Fan moved forward with the rock shield.


    Of course it wasn''t convenient to have a giant rock golem standing in the rock shield with them, it was already crowded enough with five of them in there. They were actually triggering two traps at a time since the rock shield had to be wide enough for all of them to stand in it. So Rocky had shrunk down into a little stone golem that fit into the palm of Lin Fan''s hand.


    The rock shield that was currently around them was actually part of Rocky''s body, which had the greatest defenses.


    They just slowly progressed and it didn''t seem like there would be anything that would stop them.


    That was until they came close to the end and there was a certain special tile that was waiting for them.


    Unlike the other tiles, this was a tile that was void of colour, it was just apletely white tile that didn''t seem to have any special characteristics at all. That was until the rocksnded on these tiles.


    Perhaps if they had gone in another line, they might have been able to avoid this, but it was their bad luck that they chose this line.


    The white tile sank down and there was a white sh of light that appeared, it was just like the white sh of light that had brought them into this pyramid.

 207 Chapter 207

    The white sh of light created a transparent de that flew out at the rock shield.


    The moment this de appeared, even Lin Fan could feel a sense of danger that came from it. This de wasn''t just a normal de, it was a de that was made of spatialws, spatialws that came from Lord Jin.


    This was spatialws in the Fragmented Soul Realm, which meant that it was more than enough to harm Lin Fan. Spatialws generally ignored the defenses that one had since it could cut through space itself.


    Lin Fan however didn''t panic since he had already expected this. Rather he didn''t expect this specifically, but he did expect that there would be something like this after the deathw incident.


    Ang had already been prepared, sending out a windw attack that had been gathering in the center of her palm the entire time.


    This windw attack was almost invisible to the eye, but the moment it touched the spatialw de, itpletely shattered it to pieces, not leaving even a single trace of it.


    In a certain part of the pyramid, there were two people who couldn''t help being shocked when they saw this.


    This spatialw de had been made with 50% of Lord Jin''s power, which meant that it was actually as strong as an attack in the high Fragmented Soul Realm. Lord Jin was only in the mid Fragmented Soul Realm, but his attacks were powerful because he had this rare spatialw and because he was a mutated beast.


    That was right, the Beast n had actually sent another mutated beast down to this world¡­


    Lin Fan''s group continued forward after crushing the spatialw de, blocking off the rest of the traps with Rocky''s rock shield.


    Finally they reached the end of the hallway, taking over an hour to do so.


    Most of that time had been spent by Lin Fan testing the various tiles. If they had charged right through with Rocky''s shield in the beginning, they would have been able to finish this stage in just ten minutes.


    Unfortunately, Lin Fan wasn''t willing to take this risk. He had only been willing after he had tested all the tiles in the first row, getting the general idea of the power of each trap.


    Rocky hadn''t even spent a third of its life energy to break through these traps, that was all because it had a naturally hard body that it could use to resist most of the traps that it had faced.


    The three young geniuses all looked at Lin Fan with a strange look, they couldn''t believe just how he had broken through all these traps like this. Then they also looked at Rocky with strange gazes. This really was a strange pet, it had such incredible defenses.


    But they didn''t have any time to think this over since the clock was ticking.


    Their time limit for this entire trial was twelve hours and they had just spent an hour and a half on just the first stage alone. Who knew how many stages there were, if they kept spending all this time, would they even be able to make it?


    Not to mention that it had taken them an hour just to reach the first stage. If each stage was this far apart, they really didn''t have time to stall for even a second.


    Lin Fan naturally also knew that, so after catching their breaths, they immediately rushed down the tunnel in front of them to head for the next challenge.


    This time it didn''t take them that long to reach the next stage, it only took ten minutes to reach the end of this tunnel.


    When they came out of the tunnel this time, they didn''te out to another hallway filled with colourful tiles, this time they came out to a giant hole. But in the center of that giant pit, there was a giant arena that was ced on arge pole.


    The pole was actually quite thin and it definitely didn''t seem like it could support the arena, but somehow the arena was ced on it without breaking it.


    In front of them was a bridge and in front of that bridge was a sign.


    On the sign, it read, "1 person = 100 opponents." Then underneath that, it also said, "Each extra person is another hundred opponents, every opponent will be in the same cultivation realm as the challenger."


    These words weren''t hard to understand at all.


    Back on earth, there was something called one hundred men kumite in Kyokushin Karate from Japan that was simr to this. It would be a single person who would face one hundred opponents in two minute rounds of sparring, having them beat all of them consecutively.


    This would be a bit different since it wouldn''t be consecutive rounds of sparring, rather it would be a gang brawl of one against one hundred.


    And since it was the Beast n that controlled this trial, the opponents that would appear would all be beasts.


    Beasts were generally stronger than most humans since they had stronger physiques and special abilities, which made this even harder than fighting one hundred humans.


    The three young geniuses nervously looked at Lin Fan. If he were to abandon them here, they definitely wouldn''t be able to finish this.<sub> </sub>


    While they were all geniuses that were much stronger than experts in the same level, they would still struggle to fight against a hundred opponents at the same level. After all, one person couldn''t take down an entire army. Or at least one couldn''t do that before they became a Legendary Realm Expert.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all when he saw this sign, he knew that they had already wasted too much time with the previous stage, he had to make up some of that with this current stage.


    Lin Fan looked at the three young geniuses and waved at them to follow him. Then as a group, all five of them walked to the center of the stage.


    As soon as they walked onto the stage, the bridge behind them that had brought them onto the stage began drawing back into the cliff that they had just been on. Nothing happened as the bridge was pulled back into the cliff, but the moment it reached the cliff, everything changed.


    With a loud sound, there were beasts that suddenly appeared all around them with a sh of white light.


    There were beasts that fell down onto the stage, there were beasts that came out of hidden panels in the stage, and there were beasts that had just suddenly appeared with the sh of white light.


    These beasts all had varying levels of cultivation to match the level of cultivation that the challengers had.


    The weakest among these beasts were high Gold Realm beasts and the strongest among them were peak tinum Realm beasts.


    The mechanism that controlled this stage was unsure what level of cultivation Ang was at, so it threw a hundred beasts at the highest realm of cultivation that it had, which was the peak tinum Realm.


    Of course Ang was beyond the Legendary Realm, but she was acting like a Legendary Realm Expert here. Still even if she was in the Legendary Realm, it was impossible for them to prepare a hundred Legendary Realm beasts for her to fight.


    Most of these beasts came from the nar crack itself, they had all been gathered by Lord Jin into this pyramid.


    There weren''t actually even one hundred peak tinum Realm beasts in this nar crack. In the end, Lord Jin had to draw into his own invasion force, pulling out a few peak tinum Realm beasts just for this stage.


    He had never expected that it would be used, but now they were here. It was just too bad that they werembs being sent to the ughter in front of Ang.


    Lin Fan finally pulled out his de and he transformed it into his trusty zweihander sword form.


    As he did this, he also called out Rocky who he had prepare a shield around the three young geniuses.


    After doing this, Lin Fan turned to them and said, "Just stay here, I''ll take care of it."


    The three young geniuses all revealed bitter smiles.


    While they were scared of this challenge since they knew they couldn''tplete it themselves, they had still wanted to be useful. However, it hurt their pride now that Lin Fan was just throwing them on the side with a pet to protect them, like they were a burden to him.


    Still, not a single one of them could argue since they were indeed burdens.


    Looking at the lineup in front of them, if they were to even try to interfere, they would definitely be smashed into the ground within seconds.


    So they could only sit in the rock shield and watch as Lin Fan and Ang prepared to fight all these beasts.


    Looking at the five hundred beasts that were in front of them, neither Lin Fan and Ang were scared. Rather, both of them looked like they were nning on enjoying this fight.


    Lin Fan turned to Ang and said, "Want to see who can kill more?"


    Ang turned to Lin Fan and said, "What are we betting?"


    Lin Fan said, "How about the usual?"


    Ang said with a smile, "Alright, but just don''t regret it when you lose."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "We don''t know who''ll lose yet."


    Then with that, both of them charged into the horde of beasts in front of them.

 208 Chapter 208

    Neither Lin Fan and Ang held back as they charged right into the wave of beasts in front of them. However, they didn''t continue forward in the same direction since this was apetition, they couldn''t just share their kills.


    Lin Fan went left and Ang went right.


    The beasts in front of them were spread all over when it came to cultivation, but it didn''t really matter for the two of them since they were cutting them down like wheat.


    The Gold Realm beasts couldn''t even take a single hit, copsing immediately in front of Lin Fan''s zweihander and Ang''s wind des.


    They all copsed with a burst of blood as they were sliced right in half. Different chunks of monster flesh and blood rained down all over Lin Fan and Ang, but they both had smiles on their faces as they continued their ughter.


    It was easy at first since the intelligence of a beast increased with its cultivation realm. The tinum Realm beasts were much smarter and could tell just how dangerous Lin Fan and Ang were.


    They did have the order to attack embedded in their minds, but of course they wouldn''t just throw themselves to their deaths.


    For the Gold Realm beasts that were weaker mentally, they couldn''t resist the order in their minds as well as the tinum Realm beasts. So the Gold Realm beasts were the first ones to charge out at Lin Fan and Ang, only to bepletely ughtered.


    The tinum Realm beasts learned from the mistakes of these pitiful Gold Realm beasts.


    There were a few tinum Realm beasts that tried to be sneaky and attack while Lin Fan and Ang were fighting the Gold Realm beasts, but all of them were only in the mid tinum Realm. Before they even knew what had happened, they too had been ughtered by these two humans.


    The fighting continued for a full five minutes and by the end of it, three hundred Gold Realm beast corpses were covering the ground. There wasn''t a single Gold Realm beast that was left.


    There were even quite a few tinum Realm beast corpses that were on the ground as well. These were all the ones who had tried to be sneaky and ambush them.


    But still there were over a hundred and fifty beasts left and none of them was below the mid tinum Realm. In fact, there were a hundred of them that were all in the peak tinum Realm.


    Those peak tinum Realm beasts still didn''t move forward since they still couldn''t see through Lin Fan and Ang, so they had the rest of the mid tinum Realm beasts go.


    The mid tinum Realm beasts knew that they couldn''t take these humans on individually and charging them as a group wouldn''t work unless they coordinated with each other, so they split into groups based on abilities that would work well together.


    Still, even so, these groups were easily taken care of by Lin Fan and Ang.


    Both of them were already fighting at a peak tinum Realm level and these coordinated attacks by these mid tinum Realm beasts could only take on a high tinum Realm expert. Their coordinated attacks were easily broken through and eventually all of them were cut down as well.


    All of this took two minutes.


    Finally, there were only the hundred peak tinum Realm beasts left.


    They knew that they didn''t have a choice, but they didn''t want to be the first to go forward.


    They could tell that while they would be able to match the current level of power these humans demonstrated, it was also clear that they still had power hidden with how rxed they were. If they were to charge in recklessly, it would mean that they would be cut down before they even knew what had happened.


    Then it seemed like there was a tacit understanding between them, but the beasts began spreading out in a pattern that surrounded Lin Fan and Ang. In this pattern, it seemed like every beast had their own ce and every beast had their own function.


    The beasts were actually forming a battle array!


    The peak tinum Realm beast group drew in some of the subordinates that Lord Jin had brought with him and these subordinates were all well trained. Lord Jin had even trained the art of battle arrays into them.


    These were the elite troops of the Beast n, it was easy for them to get the peak tinum Realm beasts of the nar crack to obey their orders. To take down these elite troops of the Beast n, it definitely wasn''t an easy task.


    Most of the beasts in the nar crack actually had seals ced on their souls before they even entered the nar cracks.


    Even if the Beast n allowed them to enter the nar cracks to gain their own power, of course they wouldn''t just let them run free. Most of these beasts driven to nar cracks were driven there because of discrimination against their bloodlines. This would of course lead to hatred being formed towards the Beast n.<sub> </sub>


    If these ticking time bombs were to be released into the nar crack and they one day met a fortuitous encounter, allowing them to be an expert, that woulde to bite the Beast n in the butt.


    So they had to find a way to control these beasts if this ever came up.


    As the elite troops of the Beast n, these troops naturally represented the will of the entire Beast n. As such, they were given the method of controlling the seals that were inside these nar crack beasts.


    This formation was one that was quite simple, but also it was quite effective.


    This was a formation that relied on relentless attacks while forming an iron wall in front to trap the enemies.


    The beasts that had more attack power were all ced in the back where they rained down their attacks on Lin Fan and Ang.


    The beasts that were ced in the front specialized more in defense. These beasts didn''t unleash a single attack, all they did was gather all their life energy into their defenses to create an imprable wall.


    As for the beasts in the middle, these were support type beasts that pushed all their life energy to the defensive beasts in front. They provided as much energy as they could to strengthen the defenses in front of them.


    After dodging the attacks that rained down on them, Lin Fan and Ang both released their attacks on the defensive wall in front of them, but they were surprised to find that they couldn''t even make a single dent. Their attacks were already at the peak tinum Realm level, just a single step away from reaching the Legendary Realm.


    It really showed just how effective this array was, it could even allow these tinum Realm beasts to match a Legendary Realm opponent. Albeit, this was only an opponent who was in the Primary Soul Realm, one who wasn''t even in the Fragmented Soul Realm. But still, it was amazing enough that this array enhanced their powers by this much.


    Lin Fan and Ang both looked at each other with smiles before they suddenly changed their attacks.


    There was a second white glow that appeared around Lin Fan''s sword as he injected his secondw.


    As for Ang, with a snap of her fingers, the wind des that had gathered around her suddenly turned invisible. If one didn''t know better, they would have thought that she had released them, but one could still tell that it was there based on the breeze they could feel.


    Once again, both of them unleashed their attacks, but this time it didn''t end the same.


    Not only did it make a dent, itpletely cut through the defenses of the beasts.


    With the increased power of their attacks, they had reached the level of the Fragmented Soul Realm, which was not something the array of these beasts couldpare to.


    Their array was only at the Primary Soul Realm, which was actually just a half step into the Legendary Realm. The Fragmented Soul Realm was the true beginning of the Legendary Realm and these were twopletely different concepts.


    In the end, the Legendary Realm and the half step Legendary Realm werepletely different, it was still like heaven and earth.


    Lin Fan and Ang sliced right through the battle array of these beasts,pletely scattering them.


    When these beasts saw that their array had been destroyed, there was a look of despair that filled their eyes, but they had no choice. The seal in their souls only gave them two options, to win or to die.


    Even the subordinates of Lord Jin weren''t given different options.


    Lord Jin was a very serious man when it came to his subordinates, he expected them to fulfill their task or to die trying, that was why he had treated them the same as the nar crack beasts. If they were unable to kill Lin Fan and Ang, their only other choice was to face death.


    Since they had no other choice, the only thing these beasts could do was charge at Lin Fan and Ang and hope for the best, but that never came. This charge was their final charge in life and they could only be filled with regret over the fact that they were chosen over theirrades by Lord Jin.


    All of this took three minutes.


    By the end of it, only ten minutes had passed, but Lin Fan and Ang had in five hundred beasts between the high Gold Realm and the peak tinum Realm with ease.

 209 Chapter 209

    After they cleaned up all the beasts, Lin Fan and Ang turned to each other and they both said, "I won."


    Once this was said, both of them knit their brows as they stared at each other.


    Lin Fan was the first to speak as he said, "I won, I took care of two hundred and fifty one of them."


    Ang gave a soft snort as she said, "I''m pretty sure you miscounted. Thest two were mine, I''m the one who took care of two hundred and fifty one of them."


    Lin Fan didn''t back down as he said, "Your des didn''t kill them, my final swing was the one that finished the job."


    Ang didn''t give up as she walked over to thest beast and picked it up. She pointed at the cut at its chest and said, "Look at that, my wind de was the one that cut through its heart, so it died to my attack. All you did was cut a corpse."


    Lin Fan pointed at the head with his sword, "No, it was still alive with its cut heart. You can tell that it was slowly regenerating already. It only died because I cut off its head."


    Neither of them would back down in the end, so Lin Fan turned to the three young geniuses and said, "Who do you guys think won?"


    But there was no response that came from them.


    Rocky had already released its shield, so the three of them were just standing there in a daze.


    There had been five hundred beasts in front of them, a situation that had lookedpletely desperate, but ten minutester, they were all gone. They still couldn''tprehend what had just happened, but somehow all the danger had disappeared with a blink of their eyes.


    If there weren''t all these corpses that were lying around them, they wouldn''t have dared to believe their eyes.


    Of course, not a single one of them dared to make a move towards those corpses. With how strong Lin Fan and Ang were, if they were to make a move towards their loot which was a sign of disrespect among experts, who knew what would have happened to them.


    Lin Fan and Ang saw that they didn''t get a response out of them, so in the end, Lin Fan decided to be the bigger man and drop this subject.


    Lin Fan said, "Alright, let''s not argue about this and call it a draw then. We don''t have time for this."


    Ang gave a soft snort, but she didn''t argue with him since she knew he was right.


    They had taken quite a bit of time with the first stage and they didn''t know how many stages were still left in front of them.


    They had saved some time by clearing out this stage so quickly, but that didn''t mean that they had much time to spare. Especially since they didn''t know how long it took to travel between stages.


    Still, they quickly picked up a few things that they earned.


    Lin Fan picked up all cores and corpses of the peak tinum Realm beasts. These cores contained the power of thews these tinum Realm beasts had and Lin Fan could absorb them with his power.


    Beast cores normally weren''t used by humans for cultivation because the power contained within them were too wild for humans to absorb. There were only a few people who could absorb them, normally it would be too hard to control the energy that was absorbed.


    Most beast cores were either used to help one''s pet evolve or they were used to craft artifacts. Beyond that, there weren''t many uses for them, so they didn''t have much value.


    But these were a hundred peak tinum Realm beast cores, so they were still worth quite a bit.


    Lin Fan was the exception to the rule and he could absorb thews contained within them. However, they weren''t full Legendary Realmws, so they wouldn''t be able to create a fullw totem inside him. Still, it was better to have an iplete totem than to have nothing.


    As for the rest of the corpses, Lin Fan wasn''t interested in them at all since he couldn''t use them at all. Thews contained in anything under the peak tinum Realm were just too weak that he couldn''t form any totem from them at all. So there was no need for him to waste time picking them up.


    But that didn''t mean the three geniuses didn''t want them.


    After a bit of hesitation, Yue Jin asked Lin Fan, "Brother Lin, can we take some of the tinum Realm beasts corpses back with us?"


    Lin Fan didn''t even bother looking at him since he was busy collecting the peak tinum Realm beast corpses, he just waved his hand at them to let them do what they wanted.


    It took all of them five minutes to finish collecting everything.


    In the end, the three young geniuses split the hundred mid tinum Realm corpses evenly, with each of them taking a third of it. The final mid tinum Realm beast corpse went to the winner of rock paper scissors, which turned out to be the short haired girl.


    Lin Fan quickly collected all hundred peak tinum Realm beast corpses in the time it took the three of them to collect the thirty three corpses each since he had Rocky''s help. Rocky lifted the rocks under those corpses and gathered them all in front of Lin Fan, allowing him to quickly put it in his storage.<sub> </sub>


    Once they were done, they immediately headed across the bridge to the other cliff that had appeared after thest beast had been in. There was another passage that was waiting for them on the other side.


    They quickly traveled down the passage, but this time it took them over an hour just to reach the next stage.


    There were various different twists and turns, with various choices that led to dead ends. Even though Lin Fan had Brainy which he used to find all those dead ends to avoid, it still took them over an hour to reach the third stage.


    They had spent three hours already, there were only nine hours left before their deadline.


    The moment they arrived at the third stage, they were once again surprised by what awaited them.


    The room that they walked into was a room that seemed exquisitely made, but there was only a single thing in the room.


    In the center of the room, there was a giant mirror that was twice their height. This mirror wasn''t the finest looking mirror, but its surface was iparably clear.


    At the very bottom of the mirror, there was a sheet of paper that was attached to it.


    All five of them walked forward to stand in front of the mirror and they looked down to see what the sheet of paper read.


    "Look into the mirror and face your fears to clear this stage."


    Those were the only words on the sheet of paper, there was nothing else written for them.


    None of them could understand what this meant and Yue Jin thought that this was just a trick as he said, "What is going on here? At least the rest of the stages made sense, but what is this?"


    Lin Fan said, "Don''t let your guard down, there might be more to this than meets the eye."


    But Yue Jin felt like he was being yed with and his pride couldn''t take this. He came forward to stand right in front of the mirror and while walking, he said, "I don''t believe that there is anything special about this mir¡­"


    But before he could finish, he had looked into the mirror and his eyes suddenly opened wide as he said, "You!"


    After saying this, Yue Jin''s eyes zed over and he just stood in front of the mirror in the daze.


    It was clear that something was wrong, so Yue Yin came over to shake her brother''s arm, but her eyes also turned to the mirror. Just like with Yue Jin, her eyes also opened wide and she shouted, "No!"


    And then just like with Yue Jin, her eyes had also zed over.


    The short haired girl had followed since she didn''t believe there was anything special about the mirror and she too looked in.


    She didn''t say anything, but with the way she took a gasp, it was clear that she too had fallen under its influence.


    Looking at the three who were standing there in a daze and based on their reactions, Lin Fan and Ang could quickly tell what the situation was. This was a mirror that reflected the trauma of the one who looked into it and that was what the note had meant. They had to face the trauma that was reflected and only by getting past it could they make it through this stage.


    Lin Fan released Rocky and Brainy to stand on guard just in case before walking over to the mirror with Ang.


    With a shared look between them, they both nodded before looking into the mirror.


    Lin Fan heard a soft whisper beside him that said, "Mother¡­".


    But before he could even react to it, the mirror suddenly released a sh of light in front of him.


    When that sh of light had disappeared, there was another world that had appeared in front of him.


    Gone was the room with the mirror, gone were the three young geniuses, and gone was Ang.


    What appeared in front of him was a street that was filled with people and skyscrapers, this was a world that was filled with cars and pollution.


    When he opened his eyes again, Lin Fan had found himself back on earth.

 210 Chapter 210

    This was a very ce for Lin Fan, it was the city that he had grown up in. It had been a long time since he was here¡­


    When Lin Fan was still in a daze, there was a voice that came from behind him.


    "Young master Lin, where do you want to go next?"


    This shy voice came from a beautiful girl who had been standing beside him.


    Lin Fan didn''t really remember this girl''s name, he just knew that this was the girl who he had been on a date with the day he died. It was the same day when he suddenly woke up in Lin Fan''s body on the Blue Star.


    Lin Fan looked at her for a few seconds before suddenly turning to leave.


    The girl had a shocked look on her face, but she quickly caught up to him and said, "Young master Lin, where are you going?"


    Lin Fan shook off her hands, but she didn''t give up. Seeing that she wouldn''t give up, Lin Fan stopped and turned to look at the girl with an angry look.


    The girl saw that he had stopped and revealed a look of joy, but then that copsed at the next words he said. Lin Fan shouted, "Scram!"


    Everyone around turned to look at them and the girl couldn''t hold back the tears any longer. In front of everyone, her legs gave out under her and she fell to her butt while crying.


    Lin Fan only spared a single nce for her before turning to leave without care.


    There was more on his mind than this single girl.


    But for some reason, his mind also wasn''t like it normally was, his thoughts were more like the thoughts he had back on earth. More selfish and more domineering.


    He was still aware of what he had to do, the trauma that he had to face was most likely the person he wanted to see the least in this world or in any other world. What he had to do now was face his father.


    Lin Fan just left the girl there and got into his Bugatti Veyron, driving in the direction of the Lin Group headquarters.


    Lin Fan of earth hade from the richest family on the, the Lin Group had dipped their toes into every single field of business imaginable and had somehow excelled. It was under the leadership of Lin Fan''s father that they were able to develop technology that had surpassed the level of technology at the time, allowing them to hold a virtual monopoly in every field.


    But Lin Fan''s father waspletely focused on business and never had any time for him. Even his mother at least made the effort to call him from time to time to check in, but his father had never shown any sign of caring.


    That had left a deep scar on Lin Fan, one that he had filled by ying around with his friends as much as possible.


    The people that Lin Fan of earth hung around with could be described with one word, evil.


    These were spoiled young masters with money and influence, not caring at all about what they did. They did what they wanted without care for the consequences and if there were consequences, they just used their money and power to sweep it all away. Even if that consequence involved the lives of innocent people, specifically the loss of innocent lives.


    They were all spoiled kids that came from powerful families, so they had never experienced any setbacks, creating this personality for them. They believed that no matter what they did, it was right because they were the ones doing it.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been like them before, but after the death of his grandmother, he felt truly alone in the world, so he looked for friends. It was just too bad that the friends that he had found were the wrong kind of friends.


    It had taken him just a year to develop the same personality as them and as the one that came from the most powerful family, he even became their leader.


    They did truly horrible things together and thinking back on it now, Lin Fan couldn''t believe that he had done all those things.


    Just to prove a point, while he was heading to the Lin Group''s headquarters, there was a call from one of those friends.


    The one calling was called You Qiang, he was the vice leader of their group and one of the worst people there.


    The moment he picked up, You Qiang''s voice said, "Ke, ke, Brother Lin, it seems like you''ve lost the bet. You''re blowing up all over the, it seems like you couldn''t evenst ten minutes with that annoying girl."


    The bet he mentioned was one that they had made about that girl. That girl was one of the groupies for their group and was one of the more annoying ones since she always stuck close to them. They had made a bet on whether Lin Fan could endure a date with her or not, but now Lin Fan hadpletely abandoned her.


    As for how he said that Lin Fan was blowing up on the, that was because Lin Fan was considered quite the famous person as the young master of the Lin Group. Most of the people around them when Lin Fan had ditched the girl had taken out their phones to film this and posted it on the web. So as a famous person, those videos naturally blew up.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about this since he knew that this world wasn''t even real, he just hung up right away on You Qiang and focused on driving.<sub> </sub>


    It didn''t take him long to reach the Lin Group''s headquarters.


    He just parked his Bugatti Veyron right outside the Lin Group''s front door, but none of the security guards dared to stop him. They saw his custom license te and immediately came out to greet him. There were even some that offered to park his car for him.


    Lin Fan just ignored them all and left his car outside as he walked through the hall to the main elevator.


    Naturally as workers of the Lin Group, they all recognized the young master and no one dared to stand in his way. Rather most of them ran out of his way and tried to stay out of his sight since most of them had heard the bad rumours about him.


    When he had been on earth, he had done quite a few awful things to certain pretty girls in the office. Naturally this was all swept under the rug and they had all beenpensated, but all of them had disappeared after these incidents.


    No one dared to offend this powerful young master, especially with his infamy.


    Lin Fan took the main elevator up to the top floor where his father''s office was located.


    The secretary sitting at the desk in front of the office saw Lin Fan and immediately her face turned pale.


    As the secretary of the richest man in the world, naturally she was a great beauty. Of course, she had also heard all the rumours surrounding Lin Fan, so she was afraid for her own life.


    But still she stood up and gave Lin Fan a bow when he came out of the elevator, then she asked, "Young master Lin, is there anything I can help you with?"


    Lin Fan looked at her and she flinched under his gaze, but then he looked away and headed right towards the office doors.


    The secretary saw this and immediately came out from behind the desk to stop him as she said, "Young master Lin, what are you¡­"


    But before she could finish, Lin Fan had already moved past her to push open the door and enter the office.


    Fortunately for her, Lin Fan''s father hadn''t been in a meeting and had been taking care of some paperwork, so he wasn''t disrupted.


    Lin Fan''s father looked up in surprise at his son, but there was no other reaction.


    p The secretary quickly wanted to exin, but Lin Fan''s father just waved his hand and said, "It''s fine, you can leave."</anda>


    The secretary looked like she had just been pardoned as she quickly left the room with a bow before closing the door behind her.


    Lin Fan''s father looked at Lin Fan for a few seconds before asking, "What do you want?"


    Lin Fan didn''t beat around the bush, he came right in front of his father''s desk and asked, "Why did you never have time for your family?"


    Lin Fan''s father was confused as he asked, "What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer as he asked, "What is more important to you, yourpany or your family?"


    That was the question that had been in his heart all these years.


    At every single important event in his life, his father had been missing. All he ever did for his family was give him money and tell him to handle things himself, he had never given him any attention.


    Lin Fan''s father calmly said, "I make money for my family, that is my job."


    Lin Fan flew into a rage at this, "Your family? Are you even qualified to say that after everything you''ve done? What kind of a man are you!"


    Lin Fan''s father was still calm in the face of Lin Fan''s angry words, "Is there something bothering you? Go take it up with your mother or your grandmother."


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort, "Grandmother? She''s been dead for five years or do you not care enough about your family to even know that?"


    Lin Fan''s father finally slightly knit his brows at this, "What nonsense are you saying? Are you trying to curse your grandmother with your nonsense? Your grandmother is very well and she''s waiting at home for you."


    Lin Fan was stunned, he couldn''t process what he had just heard.

 211 Chapter 211

    Lin Fan just stood there looking frozen for a few minutes, not being able to process what he had just heard.


    His grandmother had died five years ago from her illness, she shouldn''t exist in this world anymore, but now his father was telling him that she was still alive.


    Other than his father, his grandmother was his only other trauma.


    He had been devastated when he had lost her and he had felt lost in this world, allowing him to be easily influenced by others. By losing her, it had brought him down the wrong path.


    Lin Fan finally took a deep breath and said, "Are you serious?"


    His father looked at him with a strange look like he couldn''t understand his son as he said, "What are you talking about? Go home and see your grandmother, I''m too busy right now. If you need money or anything, just use the card I gave you."


    After saying this, he waved his hand at Lin Fan, like he was just done with him. There was no love or anything, to him interacting with Lin Fan was just a waste of time.


    But right now Lin Fan didn''t have time to think about that, he had just received a shocking piece of news.


    While it was true that this was a trauma that had gued him, it had been one that he had to deal with his entire life. He had almoste to term with it, the only thing left was the question that he had asked his father. That question was one that had been in his heart for the longest time and he just wanted an answer.


    But there was no time now.


    Lin Fan immediately went out of the office and headed back down to the first floor. He got into his Bugatti Veyron and headed off towards the childhood home he had lived with his grandmother in.


    Breaking all the speed limitws, he charged his way right to that house.


    There were several police officers and cameras that had been along the way, but there was no one that dared to stop him after seeing his license te.


    There had been one officer that had done so in the past, the next day he was fired from the force and arrested for possession with intent to distribute.


    Even as he screamed about his innocence, there wasn''t a single person that dared to look him in the eyes. His entire family was arrested and thrown away in jail.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he couldn''t stop his heart from trembling when he saw the building. It had been five years since he hadst been here.


    After his grandmother died, he couldn''t bear to be in this familiar ce anymore and hadn''te back after all these years.


    Now that he was standing in front of it, he couldn''t stop himself from feeling nervous.


    But he forced himself to walk through the door to find himself in apletely empty house. He went around to every room, but there didn''t seem to be a sign of any person living here. There was no food at all in the kitchen and there were no toiletries in the washroom.


    The only thing that was alive in this house was a single vase on the coffee table in front of the TV in the living room.


    Lin Fan thought that this was a plot by the mirror and that his father had been lying to him. He was about to dash out again and go looking for his father when there was someone he didn''t recognize that came in the house.


    That person was a middle aged woman who hade in with cleaning supplies.


    Lin Fan coldly looked at her and said, "Who are you?"


    That woman naturally recognized Lin Fan, so she said in a shaky voice, "Young, young master Lin, I''m the cleaner. I''m here to clean the house."


    Lin Fan asked in the same cold voice, "Where''s my grandmother?"


    The woman was a bit confused when she heard this, "The old madame? She''s probably at home right now. She called me earlier asking me if I had seen you, but I told her I hadn''t."


    Lin Fan was then surprised, "Home? This is her home. What do you mean by home?"


    The woman was even more confused when she heard this, "But the old madame moved out to live with the master and the young master four years ago? The only reason she kept this house was in hopes that the young master could use it one day¡­"


    Lin Fan didn''t hear the rest of what that middle aged woman said as he immediately charged out of the house and back to his car.


    Once again, he raced through the streets to arrive at the manor he had been living in for five years. This was the manor that his parents had built a long time ago, but he didn''t like living in this empty manor, so he grew up in his grandmother''s house.<sub> </sub>


    The moment he charged in, he frantically went from room to room looking for his grandmother, but this was after all arge vi, so it took him quite a long time.


    Finally when he entered the living room, he found who he was looking for.


    He couldn''t believe his eyes as he saw the person sitting in the armchair in the living room with a ball of yarn and a pair of knitting needles. This was a person he hadn''t seen in five years, but he would never forget what she looked like since she had been deeply imprinted in his heart.


    "Grand¡­..Grandmother."


    The old woman heard this and turned to look over. When she saw the tears that were welling up in Lin Fan''s eyes, she couldn''t help looking concerned as she said, "Ah Fan, what''s wrong?"


    She came over to him and reached up to wipe the tears that were in his eyes.


    Lin Fan couldn''t take it anymore and he took the olddy in an embrace.


    The olddy revealed a confused look, but she still patted him on his back as she said, "Ah Fan, if there''s something wrong, you know you can always tell grandmother."


    Lin Fan had so much to say, but at this moment, he couldn''t say a single word as his voice was too choked up to make a single sound.


    He just hugged his grandmother and cried for over ten minutes, unable to gather himself.


    His grandmother just silently patted his back, taking all the emotions that he had bottled inside him.


    Finally when Lin Fan managed to gather himself, he slowly let go of her and brought her over to the couch where they both sat down.


    Lin Fan''s grandmother was still confused, but she didn''t ask him a single thing. She just sat there waiting for him to speak.


    Lin Fan took another minute to just look at her before asking, "Grandmother, can I tell you a story?"


    His grandmother patted his hand and said, "Of course Ah Fan, you can tell me anything."


    Lin Fan then dived into the story of his experiences on the Blue Star. He told of how he had destroyed the Feng Family, how he took down the Alchemy King Hall''s envoy, and how he was currently fighting the invasion of the Beast n.


    His grandmother had silently listened to him the entire time, but when he finished his story, she said, "Ah Fan, you''ve really gotten better at telling stories. You might even be able to write web novels online."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile at this, but he knew he shouldn''t expect much since for people of earth, this was indeed quite the fantastic story. However, what he did feel was much better after telling his story.


    During his time on the Blue Star, there were many times where he felt these strange impulses, both of pure good and pure evil. There were many times when he didn''t know what to do with himself, it was like there were two personalities that had been shing inside of him.


    But now that he had talked about it with someone, someone that he deeply trusted, it felt like certain knots in his heart had been untied and he could finally see through his own actions.


    His grandmother continued to say, "Ah Fan, is there anything you want to eat?"


    Lin Fan at first seemed like he wanted to talk more, but then after pausing for a second, he said, "Can I have some congee?"


    His grandmother was surprised as she asked, "Just congee? Are you sure?"


    This was the dish that had left the deepest impression on him. When he had a high fever once as a child, he had secretly climbed out of bed to see how hard his grandmother worked to take care of him. The congee that she had made had been the warmest dish that he had ever eaten and it had never left his mind.


    Now, he just wanted to eat this congee.


    Lin Fan gave a nod and then the two of them headed to the kitchen together.


    They made the congee together and shared a meal, which was the warmest meal that Lin Fan had had in a long time.


    At the end of it, Lin Fan could feel the warmth filling him, unlocking the final knots in his heart.


    When his grandmother was about to stand up to clear the dishes, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Grandmother, I love you."

 212 Chapter 212

    This was the greatest regret that he had held in this life.


    The fact that he had never said these words to his grandmother before.


    He has always thought of himself as a tough person, so he never liked to show any weakness by saying things like "love". However, he regretted the fact that he never said it in the end.


    His grandmother had passed before he had grown up enough to realize that not saying it wasn''t tough at all, rather he was just being dumb. He never had a chance to say these words to his grandmother before, which had been thest knot in his heart.


    When his grandmother heard this, she revealed a gentle smile and took him in a hug as he said, "I love you too Ah Fan, you should always remember that."


    At that moment, there was a sh of white light that had appeared around him. Lin Fan knew that he had cleared this stage and that everything was about to disappear, but he didn''t want to leave so soon.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but his grandmother said some words that made him swallow his words.


    His grandmother said, "Ah Fan, are you living your life the way you want to? Do you feel that you are doing the right thing?"


    Lin Fan didn''t know how to respond to this, he didn''t even understand why his grandmother had suddenly said these words. Naturally he didn''t know how to respond either, since this question hadpletely caught him off guard.


    His grandmother slightly knit her brows as she asked, "Ah Fan, are you happy with the way your life is right now?"


    Lin Fan felt ripples appearing in his heart and he couldn''t help saying, "Yes, I''m very content with my life right now."


    His grandmother''s knit brows rxed as she said with a smile, "That''s good Ah Fan. I just want you to live a happy life."


    Lin Fan wanted to say something else, but before he could, the scene in front of him had disappeared. He was heading back to the room with the mirror, or at least he thought he was.


    When the white light in front of him cleared, he found himself in a strange white space with nothing around him at all.


    This was a world ofplete emptiness, all that he could see around him was a world of pure white.


    The only thing that was inside this world was a single kotatsu table and arge TV that was ced in front of it. On the table, there were various snack wrappers that were thrown all over without care.


    Lin Fan came over to the table and found that there was a mysterious lump that was currently lying under the kotatsu.


    Lin Fan slowly approached it and was about to poke it to see what it was before it suddenly stretched out its hands to hit Lin Fan in the face.


    There was blood that spurted out of Lin Fan''s nose from being hit and he immediately reeled back from that impact.


    The most surprising thing to him was not the fact that he had been hit. The most surprising thing was that with his physique, this hit had actually made his nose bleed!


    That meant that this hit was at least past the Fragmented Soul Realm!


    But Lin Fan could tell that he hadn''t been able to resist it at all, so it wasn''t just in the Embryo Soul Realm, it might even be past that!


    Just where had he been taken to that there was such a powerful expert here?


    After reeling back from the hit, Lin Fan turned his eyes back to the mysterious lump that had been under the kotatsu and he found that it was actually a beautiful young girl.


    This girl had short turquoise hair and emerald green eyes, making her look like quite the tomboy, but the most beautiful thing about her was her white skin. It was so pale and dazzling that Lin Fan almost wasn''t able to look directly at this girl.


    Perhaps the only thing toin about was that this girl''s chest was a bit t¡­


    The girl turned to look at Lin Fan and she looked him up and down before revealing a look of surprise.


    She tilted her head to think before asking, "What are you doing here?"


    Lin Fan wanted to ask the same question, but he didn''t know what to say, so he just said, "I don''t know."


    The girl didn''t dwell on it that long before getting up and moving around Lin Fan, looking over every inch of his body.


    For some reason, Lin Fan almost felt like her eyes could see right through him, seeing all the way to his soul. Which it actually could, but he didn''t know that¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling awkward standing there being gawked at by the girl, so he asked, "Um, do we know each other? Why are you looking at me like this?"


    The girl justpletely ignored Lin Fan''s questions and continued circling around him. After going around for a few minutes, she finally stopped to think.


    While thinking she had this peculiar habit of tapping her lips, which drew Lin Fan''s eyes to them and he couldn''t help swallowing a mouthful of saliva.<sub> </sub>


    Her pursed lips really were enticing, he almost had the urge to throw himself at them, but he used everything he could to endure.


    To be honest, the beauty of this girl was one that could even match Ang and Ang had been the most beautiful girl he had ever seen in his life.


    After thinking for a bit, the girl suddenly muttered to herself, "It seems like the integration didn''t work perfectly, it seems like both souls are still shing with each other and haven''t merged yet¡­"


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand a single word that this girl was saying, so he asked, "What are you talking about? Are you talking about me?"


    Two souls, could that mean him since he had transmigrated?


    What did she mean by "integration didn''t work perfectly"?


    What souls shing and yet to merge?


    The girl once again ignored him as she said to herself, "But why is he here?"


    The girl went back to the table and turned on the TV. She changed channels several times and every time the channel changed, there was another amazing scene that appeared on the screen. It went from dragons fighting in the sky to a Lich leading an army of the undead to besiege a castle to thunder falling down on a castle like rain and one man standing under it with an umbre like nothing was happening.


    Finally the image on the TV settled on the room with the mirror Lin Fan had been in previously. Standing in front of the mirror were the five of them with Lin Fan''s pets guarding them.


    The girl saw the mirror and she revealed a look of understanding, "So it was there! The Beast n was the one who took that mirror!"


    Then she fell into thought again as she muttered, "It must have reacted to the energy of the system and created a temporary link to this realm¡­"


    Lin Fan''s body turned numb the moment he heard the word "system". This person knew that he had the system, just who was this person?


    Or rather, the more important thing, were they friend or foe?


    Lin Fan raised his guard, but the girl suddenly turned to Lin Fan with a smile and asked, "Do you want to ask a question?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being taken aback by this, but he still nodded.


    The girl then said, "I''ll answer one of your questions if you answer one of mine."


    Once again, Lin Fan nodded since he didn''t know what else to do here.


    The girl asked with a smile, "Lin Fan, what do you think of this world?"


    Lin Fan was once again taken aback, as he didn''t know how to answer this. This question seemed like a vague question, but there must be a reason for this girl to be asking this, especially with how much it seemed like she knew.


    In the end, Lin Fan answered honestly, "There are things that are important to me in this world, so I don''t hate it."


    The girl nodded with a smile, "That''s good enough for now. Now, ask your question."


    There were many questions that had been on Lin Fan''s mind for this girl, such as who she was, where was this, and why she knew about the system, but there was another question thatpletely pushed all those other questions away.


    "Why did my grandmother say what she said in the end?"


    The girl looked surprised since she clearly didn''t expect this, but she still answered, "The Mirror of Regret is a Divine Artifact, it has the ability to show the trauma of a person to let them move past it. It''s also said that it has the ability tomunicate with the spirit of the dead¡­"


    She purposefully stopped her words there, looking at Lin Fan''s face and waiting for his reaction.


    Communicate with the spirit of the dead¡­


    Then that meant that the grandmother he had met was¡­


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit as he sorted through his emotions, but afterwards, he looked up with a determined look and said, "Divine Artifact, does that mean¡­"


    The girl suddenly raised her hand to cut him off as she said, "I already said it, you only get one question. Besides, we''re running out of time now."


    "Running out of time?" Lin Fan was confused.


    The girl ignored this and continued, "Keep growing and getting stronger, eventually we''ll meet again and you''ll find more answers to the question you''re looking for. First reach the Soul Realm at least."


    Lin Fan still wanted to say something, but there was a burst of white light once again.

 213 Chapter 213

    When that sh of light disappeared, he was back in the room with the mirror, standing right in front of it.


    Looking around, it seemed like he was the first one who had finished facing their trauma.


    He raised his wrist and looked down at his watch, finding that it had only been twenty minutes since he had entered the world inside the mirror.


    Lin Fan went over to his pets and asked Brainy about what happened. Brainy just told Lin Fan that nothing had happened during the time he had been standing there. There wasn''t a single movement around them.


    Lin Fan didn''t touch the rest since he knew that it was no use and if he was too forceful, pulling them out of the trauma world, he might hurt them. Currently their minds were in a fragile ce and if he were to force them out, they would definitely suffer mental damage.


    So Lin Fan just sat there and waited, while also sorting out his thoughts.


    That girl in that strange space, with how much she knew, did that mean that she knew who had brought him to this world? Also did that mean that someone had given this system to him?


    But for someone to give him this system, what was their goal?


    Lin Fan just stood there lost in thought until he suddenly heard a voice that created ripples in his heart.


    Ang muttered in a soft voice that Lin Fan had never heard before, "Mother, please don''t go¡­"


    When Lin Fan turned over to look at her, he waspletely shocked by what he saw.


    Instead of the normal confident and powerful Ang, now there was a little girl who was crying in front of him.


    Ang wasn''t actually that tall, she was a head shorter than Lin Fan. Now that she was no longer looking as tough as usual, all Lin Fan saw was this delicate little girl in front of him.


    He knew that she wasing out of her traumatic illusion and judging by how she looked now, it had been a very tough one for her to face.


    Without another thought, Lin Fan came forward and took her in his embrace.


    Ang''s eyes slowly cleared when she felt herself being pulled into that embrace and when she saw Lin Fan, instead of acting tough like she normally did, she just buried her head in his chest.


    The two of them just stood there holding each other for a few minutes. It was a good thing that none of the three geniuses had woken up from their illusions at that time.


    After a few minutes, Ang pulled back slightly to bring her face out of his chest and it looked like she wanted to say something, but she was looking very hesitant. But before she could even say a thing, Lin Fan put a finger to her lip, "Don''t tell me anything now. Wait until we''re out of here and there''s no one watching."


    Ang''s eyes opened wide for a second, but then she nodded. Of course she could tell that someone was watching them, she had been able to tell from the beginning. It was just that her emotions had been too worked up and she almost lost control.


    They moved to the side and stood there in silence, waiting for the other three to finish up, but they did hold hands the entire time.


    Lin Fan didn''t know why, but he felt that this Ang was also good. Normally he liked the tough Ang very much, but the feeling of having her depend on him was also good.


    It was just a part of being a man, there would be a natural feeling of wanting to protect those that were near to him.


    It took the other three another hour before they were able to pull free of their illusion realms, but they had made it in the end.


    All three of them were young geniuses that were among the top of their generation, so naturally they had a strong will to be able to reach that point. However, all of them did seem exhausted mentally by what they had just experienced.


    Lin Fan came over and sent a bit of his life energy into them to help them recover. Slowly they gathered their minds and calmed themselves down.


    They might have all been mentally exhausted facing their traumas, but now they also seemed much more maturepared to before.


    There weren''t words wasted as they knew that once again they had taken too long for this one stage. It had taken them an hour and a half to finish the stage and then they had taken another half hour to gather themselves.


    Right now they only had another seven hours left.


    After everyone had calmed down and gathered themselves, they quickly headed off towards the next stage.


    This was another stage that had a short travel time in between stages. The passage was very short and it only took them twenty minutes to reach the next stage.


    When they came out of the passage, all they saw was a cliff in front of them and pure darkness in front of that cliff.


    There was a single sign that was ced in front of them that said, "Jump."<sub> </sub>


    There was nothing else, it was just that sign and bottomless abyss.


    At first they tried looking around to see if there was anything else there for them, perhaps this was just a trick and there was another passage waiting. However, there wasn''t much space for them to search since this was just a small cliff and even after searching, there was nothing for them to find.


    Since there was nothing for them to find, the only thing they could do was move over to the cliff to look down.


    Even with the strong spiritual sense that Brainy had, they couldn''t find the bottom of the cliff. There was no guarantee that there would be anything at the bottom and they didn''t even know how deep this pit was.


    If they did jump, they might be jumping into their deaths. Well at least it wouldn''t be death for Lin Fan and Ang since they would be able to use windws to slow themselves down or even float there, but it would definitely be death for these young geniuses.


    They didn''t know what to do and they were just wasting more time by searching the area not to find any clues.


    The only thing they could tell was that there was a draft that wasing from the bottom, which meant that it should be connected to the outside or an exit. That meant that the sign wasn''tpletely lying, the only problem was if they could reach that exit or not.


    Lin Fan and Ang were clearly the ones that weren''t worried at all in this situation, the ones that were worried were the three young geniuses since they knew that without Lin Fan''s help, it would be hard for them to escape this.


    But it was lucky for them that Lin Fan had already made up his mind to keep them safe.


    Even if Lin Fan''s personality did fluctuate from time to time, going from good to evil, he at least kept his promises when he did make up his mind.


    Since he already decided to bring these three back with him at least, he would do that.


    So Lin Fan came forward and offered them his hands.


    Yue Jin couldn''t help asking, "Brother Lin, this is?"


    Lin Fan just said, "We''re jumping."


    The three young geniuses were taken aback.


    Yue Jin couldn''t help asking, "But Brother Lin, we can''t fly."


    Lin Fan summoned out Xiao Huo and said, "It''s fine."


    The three saw Xiao Huo and realized that they had no choice in this matter, so they took Lin Fan''s hands. They then walked over to the edge of the cliff and after taking a deep breath, they made a leap of faith.


    The wind was whistling past them as they fell, but it didn''t seem like they wereing to an end.


    One minute, two minutes, three minutes, they continued falling for what seemed like eternity, even though only five minutes had passed.


    In the end, when they felt like it was never going to end, they actually suddenlynded on something soft that cushioned their fall, but was strong enough to counter the force created by their weight under the pull of gravity.


    The three young geniuses had closed their eyes as they were falling since they couldn''t bear to keep watching anymore, but now that they hadnded, they opened their eyes again.


    They found that they hadnded inrge webs that had spread from one cliff to another. On the cliff that was opposite the one that they had jumped down from, there was a passage that was connected to the webs that they were currently in.


    As for Lin Fan, he felt that something was wrong.


    Giant webs like this didn''t naturally form at the bottom of a cliff like this, there must have been something that had made these.


    And if these were made by something, where would that something be now?


    Lin Fan''s thoughts were correct as those somethings were soon revealed.


    When the young geniuses tried to get up from the web, they found that they were trapped. The web was too sticky for them to even stand up and they couldn''t move an inch.


    While they were struggling to get out of the web, they also heard a noise that came above them.


    When they looked up, there was a ck head that had eight red eyes looking down on them.

 214 Chapter 214

    There was a giant spider that was double their size that was above them and the worst part of it all was that the giant spider wasn''t alone!


    All around the giant spider were smaller spiders that looked simr to the giant spider, all of them looking down on them.


    The most terrifying thing was that every single spider had a hungry look in their eyes as they looked at them. It was clear that it was mealtime for them and they weren''t guests invited to the meal, they were the meal!


    They could tell from the aura that came from each of these spiders that they were all in the Gold Realm and the mother spider was in the tinum Realm.


    Normally this wouldn''t have mattered since they had the monsters Lin Fan and Ang who were able to destroy five hundred beasts from the Gold to tinum Realm alone, but the situation was different right now. Instead of being able to move freely like before, they were currently trapped in the webs. This was even the case for Lin Fan and Ang.


    While the three of them were worrying for their lives, Lin Fan and Ang were calmly observing the situation.


    It was true that they were also trapped inside the web, but this web was nothing more than paper to them. It would take a simple wave of their hand just to break out, but for now they didn''t do that.


    Ang was waiting for Lin Fan while Lin Fan was currently observing the spiders with an interested gaze. These spiders would make great puppets for Brainy just based on their abilities to reproduce and create natural traps. As long as he were to bring them out with him, he would have a reliable support team to work with his ant army.


    Once he made up his mind to capture them, he turned to Ang to give her a nod before saying, "Capture the mother, you can kill the rest."


    Ang gave a nod back before life energy gathered around her.


    Both she and Lin Fan gathered their life energy around them before shredding the webbing around them. The webs were cut to pieces just like paper in front of a de when met with their life energy, they had no chance to resist at all.


    <o>,m Once the webs were cut, both she and Lin Fan were free to move.</o>


    This spider army didn''t create a single threat for Lin Fan and Ang since they couldn''t break through their defenses at all. Not even peak tinum Realm beasts had broken their defenses, how could these Gold Realm fodder do anything to them.


    Lin Fan and Ang quickly crushed their way through the spiders and soon there was only a single spider left, the biggest one.


    As they attacked, they had also cut off a few legs from this big spider, making it hard for it to escape and to fight back. Therge spider curled back into its webs, but that was no use at all.


    The webs had no effect against Lin Fan and Ang since they had controlled their life energy to form barriers around them. The mother spider might have been in the tinum Realm as well, so the life energy infused webs were enough to keep the three young geniuses trapped, the webs couldn''t do a single thing to Lin Fan and Ang.


    There was a desperate look in the mother spider''s eyes, but it knew that it could do a thing. As it watched Lin Fan and Ang approach, it continued moving back until it was up against a wall. It was so scared that it had forgotten that it would have been able to crawl up the wall and Lin Fan and Ang wouldn''t have been able to follow it since they couldn''t move up as freely.


    Finally when Lin Fan and Ang were in front of it, the spider suddenly flipped over and showed its stomach, showing that it had surrendered.


    Lin Fan came forward with an ominous smile and a seed in its hand. When he was in front of the spider, he held his hand out to the spider with the seed in his palm.


    The mother spider could understand what Lin Fan wanted it to do, but it was very unwilling since it didn''t know what this seed was.


    The mother spider tried to rear back so it wouldn''t have to eat the seed, but Lin Fan took its head and moved it towards his palm. Finally the mother spider didn''t have a choice as it swallowed the seed.


    It didn''t take long before the seed hadpletely taken over the mother spider and it waspletely docile.


    Lin Fan brought it into his system''s pet storage where he had it molt, letting it regrow the legs that it had lost. However, before doing so, he also had the spidery its eggs.


    Seeing the stack of spider eggs that was in his system storage interface, he revealed a smile. Once these spiders hatched, if they worked with the Desert Horrors that he had, he would have aplete army.


    After taking care of the mother spider, Lin Fan headed back to the three young geniuses who were still trapped inside the web. With a flick of his hand, there was a life energy de that came out that cut through these webs, freeing them.


    They didn''t waste any more time on this. Since the mother spider had been taken care of and the passage was right in front of them, there was only one way to go.<sub> </sub>


    They quickly moved across the spider webs to reach the passage and then they charged down that passage as fast as they could.


    Finally when they reached the room at the end, they found a room that had two pairs of manacles on the walls and several sofas with games on the table ced in front of them.


    This time, it wasn''t a sign that gave them their instructions, rather it was a Voice Orb that was ced right above the top of the door.


    Lord Yin''s voice said, "Wee to the final stage. Congrattions on passing everything before this, you really have shown your abilities. Now we''ll be giving you a simple task, just choose two of you to chain to this wall and you''ll be free to pass. Otherwise, you''ll have to wait six hours before you can continue forward."


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he heard this since he had a rough estimate of the time in his mind already. Six hours, they wouldn''t have enough time.


    Looking down at his watch, he found that they had passed that by just a single minute. They currently had five hour and fifty nine minutes left to finish this trial.


    The others also had watches, so naturally they knew the time as well. They could also see that they would be out of time if they were to wait.


    Their only options now were to abandon two people here or to wait and face the beast wave that would be released.


    The first option meant that at least some people would survive, the second option meant that they would all die together.


    However, no one was willing to sacrifice themselves since they all viewed themselves as more important than anyone else. That was their pride as young geniuses. They even felt they were more valuable than Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan might be powerful now, but if they were given enough time to train, they deluded themselves into thinking that they would be able to catch up to Lin Fan.


    So there was a silence that filled the room.


    No one listened to anything else that Lord Yin said since it was all useless and they had heard the main part. Now all that mattered was how to deal with this situation.


    The young geniuses looked at each other and they were considering going against Lin Fan. If they had no other choice, they might as well take their chances on going against Lin Fan and hoping they might win instead of facing the path of certain death.


    But then thinking of how much strength Lin Fan had shown during their trip together, that thought waspletely erased.


    They knew that they had no chance, so they had no choice but to be resigned to their fate.


    This stage was designed as nothing more than to waste time for them.


    When designing this trial, Lord Yin and Lord Jin both believed that they would never make it to this final stage, so they hadn''t put much thought into this final stage.


    On the off chance that they did make it to this final stage, they wanted to use this final stage to stall for time to release the beast wave.


    Of course, this was a game to them, so they had to make it possible to win, which was why they gave the second option. They wanted to see these humans tear themselves apart from the inside just to survive, it would be much more fun to watch this than to see them being torn apart by the beast wave.


    So in the end, they had no choice, so they all sat down and picked up a few games to y.


    They knew that this might be the final few hours of their lives, so they might as well enjoy it.


    As for Lin Fan and Ang, they weren''t worried at all. They hadn''t shown all their trump cards yet, so they definitely could handle themselves.


    So the time ticked down and finally there was only five minutes left before the beast wave came.

 215 Chapter 215

    The clock had counted down and finally they were only five minutes away from the release of the beast wave.


    There were many times where the young geniuses had wanted to do something during this arduous wait, but there was nothing they could do. They searched through every part of the room, they even tried breaking down the walls several times, but nothing worked.


    In the end, they had considered sacrificing each other, but naturally this was also impossible for the twins. If there had been one more of them there, they might have turned on the other two and trapped them to escape, but there wasn''t.


    In their darkest moments, they had even considered just ending it all by fighting Lin Fan, but they held back in the end.


    Finally the time was here, so Lin Fan and Ang stood up from their seats and headed towards the passage they had taken to arrive at this room.


    The three young geniuses hesitated a bit before following behind them, but they were stopped by Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and stopped them from following him, while also bringing out Rocky. He then said, "You stay in here, we''ll take care of it. Rocky will block off the door."


    Yue Jin hesitated a bit before saying, "But¡­"


    But Lin Fan didn''t let him continue, "You''ll just hold us back."


    There were unwilling looks on the faces of the three young geniuses, but there was nothing they could say in response to this since it was true.


    They did believe that they would be able to reach Lin Fan''s level one day, but they knew that they couldn''t reach it now. Indeed, if they were to go out, they might be a burden to him.


    Even now, they still couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was still protecting them and to be honest, even Lin Fan didn''t understand it. It was just a strange feeling that felt like he should keep his promise.


    So after leaving the three of them in the room, Lin Fan had Rocky create a wall of rocks in the passage that blocked off that room.


    The sad thing would be if the beast wave didn''te from this side and came from the side of the exit instead, but luckily that wasn''t the case.


    The minute the clock ran down, they could hear the sound of beast roarsing in front and they were slowly approaching.


    It didn''t seem like the beast were that far based on the roars they could hear. It was almost as if the moment the beast wave appeared, they came from inside this tunnel.


    However remembering how they had even been sent into this pyramid, it did make sense. Lord Jin had control of spatialws, that meant that he could easily transport this beast wave wherever he wanted.


    But even with the wave of beasts that were approaching, Lin Fan wasn''t worried. Even if there were thousands of them ording to Brainy''s scouts, Lin Fan looked as rxed as always standing at the end of this passage.


    With a single snap of his finger, there was another army that had suddenly appeared.


    There were giant ants and giant spiders that had appeared behind him, as well as some tinum Realm beasts with zed over eyes.


    This was the army that he had slowly built with Brainy and now it was ready to be used.


    The ones observing already knew that Lin Fan had tamed the Brood Mother Spider and various other beasts, so they weren''t surprised to see this army appear. They were however surprised since it normally took Brood Mother Spiders over twelve hours to spawn a new brood, but only a little more than six hours had passed. Somehow this human had found a way to let the Brood Mother Spider breed in just six hours.


    Actually, that was due to Lin Fan''s system''s storage. The system''s storage actually created a space where time was warped with timews, which allowed eggs to hatch faster than they normally would.


    The Brood Mother Spider eggs normally took twelve hours to hatch, but in the system''s storage, they had only taken two hours. And that was even at the current limit authority that Lin Fan had.<sub> </sub>


    If he were to level up the system or increase its grade again, the time distortion would be stronger and it would take even less time for these eggs to hatch.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that the Brood Mother Spider was molting to heal its broken legs, it would have been able toy two more batches that could have all hatched by now. But for now, he just used what he had.


    The trembling on the ground became stronger and stronger as the beast wave approached and it really did tremble with just how many beasts there were in that wave.


    Lin Fan could see the dust being raised in the distance as they charged at him and he revealed a faint smile. With a nod to Ang, both of them moved to their location in the formation.


    Ang was standing in the back with des of wind all around her, along with some tinum Realm beasts that had the ability to attack from afar. In the front was Lin Fan with Silver Realm Desert Horrors all around him, forming a defensive line. And then right in the middle, there were the spiders that were hiding behind the legions of Desert Horrors.


    As the wave of beasts approached, the spiders began shooting out webs that slowed down the charge of the beasts in front. With therge amount of beasts that were in the beast wave, the moment the ones in front slowed down, they were trampled under the momentum of the rest of the beast wave.


    The ones that were behind the ones in front trampled over their bodies to get over the webs, but all that they received as a prize was charging forward were more webs and a face full of wind des.


    Ang''s wind despletely cut down the waves of beasts that charged forward, reaping them like a scythe cutting through ears of wheat. But that didn''t matter since it was only a small portion of the entire beast wave that she cut down. Even if she cut them down, there was plenty of fodder behind the first wave to rece that wave.


    The beast wave slowly charged forward and eventually they made their way right in front of the defensive line that Lin Fan was leading. Right when they were about to m into it, Lin Fan brought down the giant zweihander sword that he had been lifting the entire time.


    The smashing down of the zweihander sword created a giant shing shockwave that pushed away all the beasts that had been nearby. At the same, the downward sh created a sh of wind that cut right through the hallway, shing through beast after beast.


    This was a very narrow passage, so the number of beasts that could charge forward were limited. Most of them had been trapped by the webs and the ones that did make it through were all mmed away by Lin Fan''s single downward sweep.


    The sh of wind continued forward, cutting down beast after beast without stop. It almost seemed like it would never stop, but then it reached a tinum Realm beast and it finally stopped. However, even though it had been stopped, that didn''t mean the tinum Realm beast got out unscathed.


    The tinum Realm beast took the hit head on, trying to block it with its defenses alone, but it didn''t work. Even if the sh had already been weakened by the hordes of beasts in front of it, the sh still cut through the entire tinum Realm beast.


    Well, not exactly clean through the tinum Realm beast, leaving only a tiny sliver of skin and muscle at the back of this tinum Realm beast.


    The two cleaved sides were like a sack that had been split in the middle, but it hadn''t been split cleanly, so it spilled all of its contents onto the ground.


    This attack didn''t end there, Lin Fan whirled his sword around to create another sh that was aimed at another tinum Realm beast.


    This time, the tinum Realm beasts were much smarter and didn''t dare take this attack head on, but that didn''t mean that the attack would stop. The sh went through the waves of beasts and continued down the passage even beyond the beast wave. No one knew how long it went, but it just kept going.


    But when the tinum Realm beasts dodged, there would be one that would receive a barrage of attacks from Ang and the tinum Realm beasts controlled by Brainy. This barrage of attackspletely swallowed that tinum Realm beast and they didn''t even know how they died as they fell under this barrage.


    They continued this meat grinder, cutting down all the beasts that charged forward without fear of death.


    Lin Fan normally would have run out of life energy with this wild attack, but there was currently a suction force that was around his sword. Every time he swung it to send out an attack, he regained most of the life energy he had spent.


    There were a few stragglers that made it through the meat grinder that was Lin Fan''s de, but they were quickly taken care of by the Desert Horrors and the spiders. Being ganged up on, the stragglers didn''t even have a chance.


    It only took them a total of ten minutes topletely cut down this beast wave.

 216 Chapter 216

    There were piles upon piles of beast corpses that were in this narrow passage and a river of blood was created, but that river of blood never made it past where Lin Fan''s defensive line stood. All the blood seemed to stop right in front of Lin Fan like there was a barrier in front of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother cleaning up, he just took the loot that was worth something to him and left.


    When the three young geniuses heard the door open, they were wary since they weren''t certain that Lin Fan could win. But when they saw Lin Fan and Ange in, they rxed and let their guard down.


    Yue Jin asked, "Brother Lin, is it over?"


    Lin Fan nodded before pointing at the wall.


    There were two manacles that had been on the wall and beside that, there was now a passage that had appeared in the wall, just like all the previous rooms.


    The three young geniuses had been so focused on trying to find out what happened with Lin Fan and the beast wave that theypletely missed this.


    After seeing this, Yue Jin asked, "Brother Lin, do you need to rest first?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and moved over to the passage as he said, "No need, let''s get out of here before anything else happens."


    Lin Fan hadn''t actually used that much life energy fighting that beast wave because he had his suction power. His de had been surrounded by it, so whenever it cut through the beasts that approached him, every swing sucked in life energy from them and filled him up.


    The three of them looked at each other before quickly following behind Lin Fan into the passage.


    It didn''t take them long to head down this passage, it only took them five minutes to reach the end.


    At the end of the passage, there was a room that waspletely empty except for an arch that was ced in the middle. Inside of the arch, there was a distorted space that swirled to create a portal.


    It was clear that this was the end of this level, but they were still wary of the portal since they didn''t know where it led.


    Lin Fan looked at Ang and Ang gave a nod to show that it was safe.


    She couldn''t feel anything strange about the portal, it seemed to be a normal spatialw portal.


    Even though Ang didn''t specialize in spatialws, her understanding of spatialws was definitely much stronger than the Soul Realm Lord Jin.


    After pausing for a second, Lin Fan continued moving forward,ing to a stop in front of the portal.


    The three young geniuses stayed a few meters back, as they warily watched Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan paused in front of the portal for another second before suddenly walking in without any fear. Ang who had been behind him walked in as well, leaving only the three young geniuses in this room.


    The three of them looked at each other in nk dismay before having no choice but to follow Lin Fan in. At this point, after everything they had been through, they had viewed Lin Fan as their core and their leader. Whatever he did, they would follow.


    After Lin Fan stepped through the portal, there was a sh of white light that appeared in front of him again. This was the same sh of white light that he had seen when he had first been transported into the pyramid.


    When the sh of white light was gone, he appeared inside a giant hall where there was a golden throne in the center position. Sitting in that throne was a man that waspletely covered in gold.


    This was the room that Lord Jin and Lord Yin had been in the whole time, watching Lin Fan and his group progress through the game they had designed.


    There were a few more shes of white light as the other four appeared and once they were all there, Lord Yin and Lord Jin began pping.


    The three young geniuses immediately turned in the direction of the pping and pulled out their weapons, warily looking at Lord Jin and Lord Yin.


    As for Lin Fan and Ang, they just casually stood there and waited for Lord Jin and Lord Yin to make their move.


    Lord Jin just remained seated in his throne while Lord Yin came forward to say, "Congrattions on making through the first two levels and reaching the final level. As for this final level, I''m sure that you can all guess what this will be about."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling when he heard this.


    This hall looked just like a hall that he had seen once before, it was a hall that was very familiar to any otaku. This was a hall that would be used at the end of every fantasy game, novel, or manga. To put it simply, this was the hall of the demon king.


    As Lord Yin paused, Lin Fan said, "Is it time to fight the demon king?"<sub> </sub>


    Lord Yin was taken aback by what Lin Fan said, but then he replied in a thoughtful voice, "Demon king? That has a nice ring to it. To be honest, we didn''t know what to call this, but now you''ve given us the perfect name." At this, he revealed a smile before continuing, "Yes, wee to the demon king''s castle, you will now face the demon king himself as the final level."


    It was quite clear who was the demon king in this scenario, it was clearly the imposing person sitting on the golden throne.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Aren''t you going to bring out the four generals first?"


    "Four generals? What do you mean by that?" Lord Yin was once again taken aback by this."


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile and said, "Nothing, never mind."


    Lord Yin looked at him with a strange look before saying, "I don''t know what you mean by the four generals, but we don''t have anything like that. There''s only me here, but unfortunately I already know that I can''t beat you. So, I''ll hand it off to the main character for today, our demon king, Lord Jin!"


    Lord Yin moved to the side while pping, letting Lord Jin fully enter their view.


    Lord Jin looked down at them from their throne, with his gaze mainly focusing on Lin Fan and Ang.


    After a moment of silence, Lord Jin suddenly said, "I''m a big fan."


    Lin Fan and Ang looked at each other with confused gazes before turning back to look at Lord Jin like he was a weirdo.


    Lin Fan then asked, "What do you mean by big fan?"


    It was like a dam had been unblocked and the tide of words came flooding out as Lord Jin said, "I really enjoyed the chemistry between you two. It''s clear that you two are in love, but you don''t know how to show it. Can I be honest? Is this the first time that you''re dating? That applies to both of you. It really is sweet and frustrating at the same time."


    Lin Fan and Ang didn''t know what to say.


    There were ck lines that appeared on Lin Fan''s face while Ang had a faint blush on hers.


    Of course they were aware of the problems in their rtionship, but having someone point it out so tantly really stung their ears and pped their faces.


    Lin Fan said, "I don''t think this is any of your concern. Besides, you won''t be seeing this much longer."


    Lord Jin revealed a sad smile when he heard this. He knew that Lin Fan was right, while he had enjoyed their antics during this game, they were on different sides in the end. He would have to kill them now or it would cause troubleter.


    Lord Jin hesitated a bit before asking, "Are you sure you don''t want to work with us? As long as you do, I''m sure that we can make a deal."


    Lord Yin slightly knit his brows at this, but he didn''t say a thing. They were in front of their enemies right now, it wasn''t the time to show that there was internal friction.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''ve said it before, the Blue Star is my home. I''m not from some upper realm as you think I am, so there''s no deal to make when you''re invading my home."


    Lord Jin gave a sigh at this, "I really wished you wouldn''t say this. It would be so much easier if you had just epted the deal."


    Lin Fan then suddenly asked, "Since you say you are my fan, can I ask you something?"


    Lord Jin looked a bit surprised when he heard this, but then he said with sparkling eyes, "Sure ask me anything."


    Lord Yin knit his brows even deeper at this, but he kept silent.


    Lin Fan asked, "What happened to the girl that you took? Is she still alive?"


    Lord Jin did look a bit disappointed at this, but he still answered the question, "We kept her to bring back for testing since they wanted us to bring a few live human samples back. She''s being kept in a separate room right now and you''ll be able to find her if you beat us. That is, if you can beat us."


    Lin Fan nodded, "Thank you for answering honestly. Then shall we?"


    Lord Jin nodded too, "Let''s do this then."


    At soon as his words fell, he stood up and took the first step.

 217 Chapter 217

    Lord Jin didn''t hesitate at all, flying out the moment he took that step.


    He quickly flew through the air in Lin Fan''s direction, but Lin Fan just watched as he came over. He didn''t even put up his guard at all.


    The three young geniuses were worried when they saw this and wanted toe forward to help, but the aura that they faceding from Lord Jin made them unable to move at all.


    But Lord Jin didn''t n on attacking just yet, which he made it quite clear from hisck of hostility. Lord Jin flew through the air andnded right in front of Lin Fan.


    He was clearly much taller than Lin Fan, so he had to look down on him, but there definitely wasn''t a single trace of disdain in his eyes. All that he had in his eyes was respect for his opponent.


    Reaching out his hand, he waited for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at it for a second before reaching out his hand to shake Lord Jin''s hand.


    It was a simple handshake, a recognition of an equal.


    After a single shake, both of them suddenly reared back with their free fist before sending out a punch at the other person''s face. Both of their fistsnded on the other person''s face and both of them had been sent flying.


    Lord Jin was able to stabilize himself after sliding back a few meters, but Lin Fan had been knocked off his feet, sliding to a halt on his back.


    In the end, Lord Jin was a Soul Realm Expert while Lin Fan was still in the tinum Realm. That wasn''t mentioning the fact that Lord Jin was a mutated beast.


    Beasts by nature had stronger physiquespared to humans, so they had more natural physical strength. Even with Lin Fan''s physique that was much stronger than his realm of cultivation, it still wasn''t enough to match that of a beast''s.


    But this had only been a strike meant as a greeting, neither side had used any life energy in this strike.


    Lord Jin was surprised to see how strong Lin Fan''s physique was. Even though he was clearly only in the mid tinum Realm, he had been able to almost match him in terms of physical strength.


    Lin Fan jumped up and patted himself off afternding, then he turned back to look at Lord Jin.


    During this exchange, there had been others who hadn''t been waiting.


    Lord Yin had disappeared into a pool of darkness the moment both of them had punched each other, reappearing in a pool that was right beside the three young geniuses.


    The three young geniuses naturally knew that they didn''t have a ce in this fight. For them to even survive, it would take a miracle.


    The three of them had been in a circle with their backs facing each other and their weapons raised, prepared to deal with anything that happened. Even if they couldn''t be involved in this fight, they still believed that they would be able to keep their lives if someone did attack them. Unfortunately that wasn''t the case.


    The one that Lord Yin appeared in front of was the weakest one of the batch, the short haired girl.


    The short haired girl was taken aback slightly by this, but her instincts immediately kicked in.


    As a genius, naturally she had faced the threat of death before. She had to work hard to reach her current realm of cultivation and death was a part of that, even though she had her family to protect her most of the time.


    p Her sword shed down at Lord Yin, but Lord Yin had a dagger in his hand which he also used to stab at her chest.</anda>


    The dagger cut right through her sword like a hot knife through butter even though what she was wielding was a tinum Realm Artifact. None of that mattered as the dagger approached her chest.


    When the life of the short haired girl shed in front of her eyes and the dagger was about to pierce her, Lord Yin suddenly pulled back his weapon.


    He had sensed that something dangerous was approaching him and he quickly turned to see a de of wind right in front of his face.


    Without any hesitation, he gathered all his life energy to use his shadowws to make himself invincible.


    The de of wind passed right through him andnded on the ground behind him. The moment the de of wind passed, he phased back into reality and immediately spat out a mouthful of blood.


    Without any hesitation, Lord Yin activated his pool of darkness again to teleport back to the throne to gather himself.<sub> </sub>


    He had known that this girl was powerful, she had even been able to face the formation in the hundred man spar which was at the level of the Primary Soul Realm. To even have a chance against that formation, it meant that her attacks had to be at the level of the peak Primary Soul Realm.


    Knowing this, he had also prepared a trump card, which he had used just now. It was a shadoww bead which helped increase the power of hisws, allowing him to reach the peak Primary Soul Realm.


    Even if her attack was at the level of the peak of the Primary Soul Realm, his shadowws would have allowed him to avoid this. However, the moment he had been hit, he hadn''t been able to maintain this and had been seriously injured.


    This de of wind wasn''t in the Primary Soul Realm, it was at least in the low Fragmented Soul Realm!


    This meant that she was much more than what he could deal with, but it was a good thing that Lord Jin was a mutated beast in the mid Fragmented Soul Realm. All that meant was that he had to stall her for now and not let her work with Lin Fan.


    Once Lord Jin finished off Lin Fan, he would have time to take care of Ang.


    Thinking this through, Lord Yin called out, "Yin Zi,e out here."


    There was a figure that stepped out from behind the throne and it was revealed to be Yin Zi, the assassin traitor who had been taken away by Lord Yin.


    Yin Zi had a hesitant look on her face as she said, "Lord Yin, do I really have to do this?"


    Lord Yin red at her before saying, "The Beast n willpensate you for this once this mission is over, what are you hesitating for?"


    Yin Zi gave a sigh before taking out a dagger that was covered in darkness, "Alright."


    ¡­


    On the other side, the battle between Lin Fan and Lord Jin was getting heated up.


    After both of them separated from the initial attack and stabilized themselves, they looked at each other while drawing their weapons.


    Lord Yin brought his palms together before turning them ny degrees in opposite directions, causing them to be facing different directions. Then he pulled them apart from each other, forming a straight translucent area of space that seemed to be congealed. Once his hand had moved far away enough from each other, his right hand suddenly grabbed that space and he turned it to form a sword that was formedpletely of spatialws.


    Spatialws fell under the categorization of an Abnormal Law, which meant that it didn''t follow the three normal routes of cultivation, while at the same time utilizing parts of each. Abnormals used theirws in ways that suited their style of fighting, so there were many different ways for Abnormal Laws to be used.


    Lord Jin seemed to prefer using the weapon route of cultivation based on the sword of spatialw that he had just formed.


    This de of spatialws wasn''t a normal de, it was one that cut on the molecr level. It severed through space itself and created pure void, which made it much sharper than any weapon in the world. But that was of course limited to the user''s level of cultivation.


    Lin Fan drew his own Iron Eater Bone Artifact and transformed it into his familiar zweihander.


    Lin Fan knew that this wouldn''t be an easy fight, so he gathered all three of hisws around his sword and prepared for the worse.


    Lord Jin had given Lin Fan time to prepare and seeing him pull his weapon, he no longer waited. Lord Jin immediately charged forward and shed down at Lin Fan with his spatialw de.


    Lin Fan saw this and shed upwards with his own de, preparing to meet Lord Jin''s downward sh. He was nning on pushing it back before quickly turning his de to sh down on Lord Jin, but that didn''t work.


    The moment their two des shed, neither sword could move as they were evenly matched.


    They just stood there with their des touching, looking at each other.


    After a few seconds, Lin Fan could feel the pressure that wasing down on him, so he knew that he wouldn''t be able to hold it any longer.


    Knowing that was the case, Lin Fan gathered his strength and prepared to force his way up to knock back Lord Jin''s spatialw de, giving him space to pull back. But the moment he used his strength to push up, the downward force that was bncing his de had suddenly disappeared and his de flew up.


    Lord Jin had disappeared from in front of him, but his spiritual sense quickly red up from behind him.


    Lin Fan could see from the corner of his eyes that Lord Jin was already behind him shing horizontally at his neck.

 218 Chapter 218

    Lin Fan didn''t slow down his sword sh at all, using the momentum of that swing and adding even more momentum into the swing to quickly turn around. His de fell down to m into the spatialw de of Lord Jin cutting horizontally.


    Both des stopped and were unable to move forward at all just like before, but this time Lin Fan had used much more force. After a few seconds of silence, there was a sudden explosion that came from the shing of the fourws gathered in that instance which couldn''t hold up under all that power and imploded.


    Both of them were blown back with their weapons, but neither of them were fazed at all by this and just moved back equidistant from each other.


    They had both used theirws to protect themselves. Lin Fan used thebination of his threews to form a barrier, as well as using his absorbing force to negate a portion of the explosion. Lord Jin used his spatialw to form a barrier that cut off the space between him and the explosion.


    Spatialws was a very specialw with how it was considered an Abnormal Law. Spatialws didn''t follow the normal pattern ofws, manipting energy in a way that defied physics. Spatialws was one of the fundamentalws of this world, which allowed it to alter the fundamental principles of physics itself.


    Lord Jin used spatialws in many different ways to alter the world around him. He used the spatial de to cut through space and create void, he used the spatialw barrier to iste space and create void between those spaces, and he used spatialws to shorten the distance between two points, allowing him to teleport between them.


    It showed that hisws could be used much more differently than normalws and there were still many things that Lin Fan didn''t know about spatialws.


    Since that was the case, it meant that he would no longer be able to y it safe.


    Lin Fan paused for a second before snapping his fingers, releasing Xiao Huo from his pet space.


    Lord Jin saw this, but he didn''t do a single thing to stop him.


    There were two reasons for him just standing there and watching as Lin Fan powered up.


    One, there was his respect for Lin Fan.


    He had said it himself, he was a big fan of Lin Fan and Angl. He wasn''t just a big fan because they entertained him with their rtionship, he was also a fan of his strength. Lin Fan showed a power that was much greater than his power as a mid tinum Realm Expert.


    As a fan and as a person who respected him, naturally he wanted to fight him when he was at his most powerful. Of course that required him to be confident in his own strength, which he definitely was and was his second reason.


    Two, he had his pride as a mutated Fragmented Soul Realm King Beast.


    If he were to be afraid of someone weaker than him fighting at their full power, he shouldn''t be in his position. He was someone who was destined for greatness and this battle would be a glorious step for him on that path to greatness.


    He wouldn''t shrink away from this battle, even if it meant letting his enemy reach their full strength.


    When Xiao Huo appeared, it didn''t waste any time at all as it flew onto Lin Fan''s back.


    This was simr to when Lin Fan used to fight with all three of his beasts, but this time he was only using Xiao Huo.


    Back in the past, him using the three pets had the same effect as thebination of threews that he was currently using, albeit it was a bit stronger since his three pets all had higher cultivation realms than him. However, now that he had his ownws that formed from his suction force, he no longer used thews of his pets to fight.


    Or rather, he wasn''t able to do so without dire consequences.


    Just likest time when he fought the Alchemy King Hall''s envoy,bining the fivews together. During that fight, he hadpletely shattered his arms just with a single attack, so it was clear how dangerousbining thesews were.


    But now that he had reached a higher cultivation realm, progressed further with his cultivation technique, and learned how to use the suction force, he had been able to make a breakthrough in hiswsbination ability.


    The main reasons for this were his cultivation technique and his suction force.


    He was getting close to forming the second sun in his dantian, which had strengthened his physique. His body was now at the same level as a mid Fragmented Soul Realm Expert, which was how he had been able to match Lord Jin for that punch exchange earlier. Even though he was a bit weaker since Lord Jin was a beast and a mutated one at that.


    The other main reason was his better control of his suction force, which had taken part of the energy away from him and released it outside his body. It absorbed the energy from his body and spewed it out around him, meaning that he could still use it, but the energy wouldn''t wreck havoc inside his body, so there was less stress on his body when he used it.


    With this, he had been able to stabilize the power of the fourwsbination.<sub> </sub>


    Xiao Huo''s mes wrapped around Lin Fanpletely andbined with the existingws that he was using. When Xiao Huo''s mes stopped spreading, Lin Fan stood there covered in ayer of me armour, looking like the ruler of mes.


    Lord Jin had been patiently waiting at first, but when he saw what had happened, his eyes popped out in shock. Never in his dreams would he have thought that Lin Fan would do something as crazy asbining fourws.


    To be honest, he had already been shocked when he saw that Lin Fan hadbined threews, which had slowly made him believe that Lin Fan was a super genius that came from an upper realm faction, instead of being from the Blue Star as he came.


    To his knowledge, one would be considered a genius if they were able tobine even twows and threews was something that could only be found in one in a billion. All those that had been able tobine threews previously had been known as experts among experts, dominating all others in the upper realm and being recruited into the Ster Kingdoms.


    But fourws, that was justpletely unheard of in the upper realms.


    This was something that shouldn''t have been possible with the resources of the upper realms, which meant that Lin Fan either had some connection to a Ster Kingdom or he was a super genius that some upper realm had developed in secret.


    But why was he here then?


    What was the reason he was on the Blue Star?


    Could it be that the upper realm he came from knew the Beast n''s secret on this Blue Star and they were interested in taking it for themselves?


    If that were the case, this would be a very bad situation from the Beast n.


    Currently the Beast n had another top secret mission that they were undertaking, so they couldn''t spare too many resources to retrieve their goal on the Blue Star. Otherwise, it wouldn''t have been just Lord Jin and Lord Yin who had been sent here, it was actually supposed to be a much stronger expert that was supposed to lead them, but he had been called away at thest second.


    Finally Lin Fan''s me armour had finished forming and there was a burst of energy that came from him, sending out wisps of near invisible me outwards like a wave.


    Lord Jin immediately put up his spatial barrier to protect himself, but there were cracks that quickly formed on that barrier, which showed just how powerful Lin Fan''s attacks really.


    He knew that this time, he might have bargained for more than he wanted.


    ¡­


    On the other side, Lord Yin by the throne also felt this wave of energy wash over him.


    However, he had been far enough to not be damaged by this and most of the power in that wave had already been blocked by Lord Jin, so it was just a residual wave of energy that flowed over him.


    Nevertheless, he could clearly sense just how powerful Lin Fan currently was from this wave, he knew that the situation was looking bad for them.


    Yin Zi had taken out the dagger, but before she did anything with that dagger covered in shadowws, she hesitated once again.


    Even if Lord Yin had promised herpensation from the Beast n, she knew that it wasn''t worth it still.


    Then when she saw that Lord Jin had had the upper hand, her hesitation had grown even more.


    It seemed like Lord Jin was about to win, so why would there be a need for her to use this sacrifice technique?


    This sacrifice technique used her lifespan in exchange for releasing the power of the shadowws that were contained in the dagger.


    But exchanging her lifespan meant losing her youth, or more importantly, it meant losing her cultivation talent.


    If they were about to win anyway, what would be the point of that?


    But when the wave of energy from Lin Fan washed over them, Lord Yin didn''t care anymore as he took the dagger from Yin Zi''s hand and stabbed it right into her palm.

 219 Chapter 219

    The dagger covered in darkness quickly swallowed the blood that came out of Yin Zi''s hand and her face visibly aged, turning her twenty years older. However, her hair also turned white and parts of it were falling off.


    Eventually, the dagger stopped draining her blood and at that point, Lord Yin pulled it out of her palm.


    The dagger lookedpletely different than it did before, the darkness that had covered it was now extending outwards in an ominous manner. The darkness that came off the dagger looked like tendrils made of shadows, trying to grab at anything that woulde close to it.


    However, it wasn''t just the appearance of the dagger that had changed, the aura that it released had also changed.


    It had gone from the weak aura of the tinum Realm to releasing the aura of the Legendary Realm. Moreover, it wasn''t just in the beginning of the Legendary Realm, it was much more than that.


    Ang could tell that this dagger might be a bit dangerous if it had been used against Lin Fan, but for her, it was nothing. The only thing she had to worry about was how to control her ability to not show all her strength because that would go against Lin Fan''s n.


    The only other strange thing was that she couldn''t feel any hostility from that Lord Jin at all. Even though he was fighting with all his power, it didn''t feel like he wanted to hurt Lin Fan at all.


    She couldn''t understand it, but she also didn''t have time to think about it since Lord Yin was approaching.


    He came under the cloak of shadows created by the dagger and when he stabbed down, the tendrils of shadows created onerge tendril that fell down at Ang''s head.


    She didn''t panic at all as she gathered her wind in her palm, creating a shield of wind which she pushed in front of her, blocking this attack.


    ¡­


    Back at the fight between Lin Fan and Lord Jin, Lin Fan''s me armour had finished forming and the mes had spread over his sword.


    With the mix of fourws that surrounded his de, it looked a bit too dazzling to look at directly. At first he moved slowly, as if he wasn''t clear on how to control his own power, but once the sword had been lifted, Lin Fan immediately disappeared from where he had been standing.


    He charged out just life before, but he was more than five times fasterpared to before.


    Thebination ofws didn''t justbine the differentws as a sum of power, rather the mixing of power created a multiplication of power that was several times stronger than any singlew.


    But this was the fourthw that was being added to Lin Fan''sbination, which meant that it wasn''t just a single multiplication. This was already the third multiply that was added in, which didn''t make it just several times stronger, it became several dozen times stronger.


    Lin Fan was now approaching the speed of the high Fragmented Soul Realm.


    When he had fought the Alchemy King Hall''s envoy, Lin Fan''s triplebination ofws had put him at the low Fragmented Soul Realm. Now that his cultivation realm had increased and he had added in the fourthw, naturally he jumped up to the mid Fragmented Soul Realm even if the tinum Realm was like heaven and earthpared to the Legendary Realm.


    Lord Jin wasn''t able to follow Lin Fan at all. The only thing he could do was that the moment Lin Fan had disappeared, he released his spatial energy around him and created arge scale barrier thatpletely surrounded him.


    Lin Fan appeared behind him and shed down at Lord Jin, but the spatial barrier stopped his de.


    The moment he was stopped, Lord Jin noticed him with his spatial sense and sent out a spatial de at him, cutting through the void. But in the end, Lin Fan was just too fast for him, disappearing with a p of the me wings on his back. Still, the spatial de moved very quickly and nicked Lin Fan''s hair, cutting off a few strands.


    After sending out these attacks, Lord Jin''s breathing became much faster. It was clear that he was being exhausted using his spatial energy like this.


    Thisrge scale barrier was definitely much stronger than his smaller barrier, but it also consumed much more energy and spatialws took more energy than normalws to begin with.


    Spatialws were special, which made them more powerful and that also meant that they spent much more life energypared to normalws.


    The smaller barrier was less powerful and covered less area, but Lord Jin could use more life energy to strengthen it to the same degree as therge barrier, while also spending less life energy.


    But since his eyes couldn''t keep up with Lin Fan''s speed, he had no choice but to use thisrge barrier to block this. Also he had determined the degree of therge barrier based on the wave of energy that came from Lin Fan just now and it was quite thick, so it used quite a bit of life energy.


    So Lord Jin was being quickly drained of his life energy, which was why his breathing became faster.<sub> </sub>


    Lord Jin knew that this was a bad situation if he continued staying here, so he immediately disappeared with a white sh of light.


    There were several continuous shes of white light as he continued teleporting short distances backwards, avoiding Lin Fan''s sh each time.


    Lin Fan tried to keep up with his new speed, but Lord Jin''s teleports were much faster than his new speed. Every single time he tried to keep up, he was being thrown further and further behind until he couldn''t keep up at all.


    Finally Lin Fan stopped moving and stood there watching. Seeing this, Lord Jin also stopped teleporting and looked back at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan could tell that Lord Jin was about to use his trump card since they both knew that if this situation continued, Lord Jin would eventually run out of energy and would be caught. However, Lin Fan didn''t do a single thing to stop him.


    Just as he had been given respect when Lord Jin watched him transform, he would give Lord Jin respect as he pulled out his trump card. He was someone who treated others how they treated him.


    When others had bad ideas towards him, he would cut off their heads without hesitation like all those arrogant people from before. But if someone were to treat him with respect, he would pay that respect back ten folds.


    Lord Jin noticed this and began using his trump card without hesitation. All the golden parts of him began to light up with a golden glow and his golden eyes suddenly turned from gold to silver.


    There seemed to be a power that wasing directly from deep inside Lord Jin, a power that waspletely primal in nature, one that caused an ancestral pressure to fall down on everyone around him. This power however felt familiar to Lin Fan since it carried a bit of divinity that he recognized from thews that the store used.


    Lin Fan knew that Lord Jin was drawing the power of his bloodline, the power of his mutated divine blood.


    A mutated beast was one that returned to their origins, essing the divine nature of their bloodline and drawing out god''s blood. This was the blood that came from the God Realm ancestor of the beasts, mutated beasts just had their bloodline be closer to that of the God Realm ancestor.


    This God Realm power was not something that should exist in this world, it should be a power that existed only in the legendary God Realm, but mutated beasts could draw a portion of that from the god''s blood in their bloodline. However, that was only for mutated beasts that had mutated several times and had a high concentration of god''s blood.


    For a single mutation beast like Lord Jin to ess this power, it was clear that he was burning his foundations and forcefully drawing out this power.


    Just what was it about this mission that made him this desperate?


    Lord Yin who had been fighting Ang felt this trace of divine aura and immediately knew what was happening.


    Without hesitation, he gathered the shadows of the dagger and shed up to create a wall of shadows, separating him from Ang before quickly pulling back.


    Once he moved away from her, he turned and shouted, "Jin, what are you doing? Are you crazy?"


    But his words fell onto deaf ears.


    Lord Jin continued drawing out the power contained within his god''s blood and his aura continued to swell, reaching the level of the high Fragmented Soul Realm.


    It was clear that he was nning on ending this in a single blow because he clearly couldn''t maintain this form for more than that one blow.


    Lin Fan also knew that he wouldn''t have been able to take this hit in his current form, so he had no choice but to use his final trump card as well.


    Lin Fan gave a snap of his finger and Xiao Lei and Xiao Feng also appeared.


    They did the same as Xiao Huo and offered their energy to Lin Fan, creating that fusion of fivews.


    Lin Fan could have actually called out Rocky as well to create the fusion of sixws, but right now he just couldn''t take the bacsh of that. Thest time he tried, he had actually died, but it was a good thing he had done it in a cultivation realm.


    Both of them prepared their trump cards for the final sh.

 220 Chapter 220

    Both of them gathered all their energy around them and finally they were finished powering up.


    Lin Fan had five different colouredws around him gathered in a spiral around his sword.


    Lord Jin was covered in a golden glow from head to toe, except for his silver eyes that pierced through that golden light. The one thing different was that he no longer had the sword made of spatialws in his hand.


    Both of them just stared at each other for a few seconds before suddenly charging forward without any prompt.


    Lin Fan wielded his giant de covered in fivews that he swung down with all his might while Lord Jin seemingly had nothing at all in his hands, however his hands were together like he was gathering something.


    As he charged forward, the space in between his hands seemed to distort, like space was beingpressed inside of it. This was definitely not something that should have been possible with Soul Realmws, this was something that shouldn''t have been possible under the God Realm.


    The space in between his hands continued topress until there was nothing but darkness in a single point in the middle of it.


    He had used spatialws topress space to the point where gravity had copsed upon itself, creating a miniature ck hole.


    Once the ck hole had been formed, Lord Jin pushed it out with both hands at Lin Fan''s giant sword.


    The ck hole flew through the air until it collided with Lin Fan''s zweihander, instantly sucking away all thews that it came in contact with. Lin Fan''s zweihander had been reduced to a strange state where the half of it facing Lin Fan was covered inws still while the other half''sws had been sucked away.


    But the moment it did suck away thews, it also stopped moving as if there was some strange force keeping it away.


    Lin Fan felt this and immediately released all his life energy, creating sending out morews to hold back the ck hole.


    The side that wasn''t facing the ck hold suddenly lit up with even more light while a faintyer of light appeared on the side that was facing the ck hole.


    Lord Jin also noticed this and his hands that had been out the whole time pushed forward again as the golden light around him became even stronger.


    He had been controlling this ck hole with his spiritual sense the entire time, so he could feel that there was something that was blocking it. Since that was the case, the only thing for him to do was to push it forward with as much energy as possible.


    Both of them injected as much life energy as they could into their attacks, but it was stuck in a stalemate.


    However, after a few seconds, the ck hole was slowly being pushed back.


    Lord Jin could tell that even though the ck hole was stronger, there was something strange that was absorbing his spatialws and weakening the ck hole.


    Slowly the ck hole began to deform and decrease in size, shrinking and shrinking until it wasn''t even half the size it had been in the beginning.


    Finally, the ck hole couldn''t maintain its form any longer and was shed in half by Lin Fan''s zweihander de.


    The moment the zweihander cut right through the ck hole, the golden glow around Lord Jin disappeared and he copsed to the ground.


    The one thing that was different from thest time that Lin Fan used thebination of fivews was that his arms didn''t shatter this time. There were two reasons for this.


    One reason was that there was nothing to make contact with his attack, which meant that most of the energy had naturally dissipated. Since there was nothing to rebound part of the attack to him and force him to suffer the bacsh, there was no damage to him.


    The second reason was that the ck hole had sucked up half of the rampant energy of the attack which greatly reduced the bacsh Lin Fan would have suffered in the first ce.


    Lord Yin immediately used the shadow dagger in his hand to create a pool of shadows and when he reappeared again, he was right by Lord Jin, catching him as he fell.


    Afterying him on the ground, he turned to face Lin Fan and quickly raised his dagger in a defensive stance.


    Ang had also appeared beside Lin Fan in the blink of an eye, at a speed that wasn''t slower than Lord Yin.


    Lord Yin knew that this situation was bad, but he had no choice but to face both of them if they wanted to escape.


    Right when he was about to attack, Lord Jin said in a weak voice, "Yin, stop."


    Lord Yin looked at Lord Jin and said, "Jin, you justy there, I''ll take care of this."


    But then Lin Fan said, "I think this game is over and it should be considered our victory, correct? Then can you please send them out first?"


    Lord Yin and Lord Jin were both surprised by Lin Fan''s words, but they also quickly understood the meaning behind Lin Fan''s words.<sub> </sub>


    Lord Yin gave some of his life energy to Lord Jin who then used his spatialws to send the three young geniuses out.


    Once that was done, there were only the five of them left in this room. There was Lin Fan and Ang, the two beasts, and Yin Zi who had been weakly lying on the throne after having her vitality drained.


    Lord Jin looked at Lin Fan and asked, "What do you¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan cut him off by raising a finger to his lips and making a "shh" sound. After this, he turned his head and said, "Ang."


    Ang nodded in response to this and with a snap of her finger, there was a shattering sound that came from above them that was like ss being shattered.


    Lin Fan then turned over to Yin Zi and pointed at her, sending out hisws at her.


    Yin Zi naturally saw this and tried to dodge, but in her weakened state, she couldn''t move at all.


    Lin Fan''sws hit her on the forehead and she immediately lost consciousness.


    Lin Fan turned back to Lord Jin and said, "Now, we can talk."


    Lord Yin didn''t rx his guard, but Lord Jin had him help him up so he could speak.


    Lord Jin''s voice trembled as he spoke, but he said, "What do you want from me?"


    Lin Fan said, "I know you have a story to tell and I''m willing to listen. Moreover, I can take care of those death pills inside of you if I like your story."


    Lord Yin and Lord Jin looked at each other in shock, but they quickly calmed down as well.


    They knew that the shattering sound just now was Ang breaking the monitoring artifact that had been watching them the entire time. Now they were able to talk freely.


    Lord Jin gave a sigh before saying, "Then do you know the situation of the Beast n?"


    Lin Fan shook his head.


    Lord Jin said, "I''ll start from the beginning then. Everyone thinks that the Beast n is a n, but it''s not that. The Beast n survives on thew of the weak follows the strong and the strong enves the weak. There are some tribes where they follow human structures and everyone takes care of each other, but those tribes are in the minority. Most tribes are led by a single leader who enves the rest of the tribe and that is the kind of tribe wee from."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look when he heard this as he asked, "With your ability, while it might not be possible for you to win, you can definitely escape. So why didn''t you?"


    Lord Jin revealed a bitter smile, "You truly are a smart human. The reason why we couldn''t escape was because¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lord Yin cut him off, "Jin, we can''t trust this human. You can''t tell him our secret."


    But Lord Jin turned to him with a stern look and said, "Yin, we can trust him. I know we can trust him."


    Lord Yin still looked a bit hesitant as he said, "But¡­" But he didn''t say anything else after that and just stood back.


    Lord Jin turned back to Lin Fan and said, "We couldn''t leave because we had to protect our princess. The leader of the tribe somehow captured the princess and held her hostage to use against us. If it wasn''t for that, we would have been able to easily escape like all the other times."


    Lin Fan was confused once again, "Princess?"


    Lord Jin didn''t immediately reply this time. He took some time to think before saying, "Are you willing to help us?"


    Lin Fan said in a calm voice, "Without telling me what kind of help you need, how can I help you?"


    Lord Jin hesitated a bit more before saying with a sigh, "You''re right, we have to show sincerity before we can ask for your help."


    Then he turned to Lord Yin and said, "Yin, bring the princess here and let her meet him. She''ll know what to do better than us."


    Lord Yin still looked hesitant, but things had developed this far, so he had no other choice.


    Lord Yin disappeared into a pool of shadows and after a few minutes, he came back with something in his arms.


    It was a fox that hadpletely silver fur.

 221 Chapter 221

    The silver fox had been asleep when it first appeared, but when it felt everyone''s gaze on it, it suddenly woke up.


    When the silver fox woke up, it immediately looked around in a panic since it was in a space that it didn''t recognize. It quickly found Lord Jin who was covered in blood and it jumped out of Lord Yin''s arms to jump to Lord Jin''s arms, licking his wounds.


    After seeing that it wasn''t having any effect, it looked around like it was looking for who did this to take revenge. But with how it was a fluffy little fox, it didn''t look menacing at all, rather it appeared quite cute.


    When Lord Jin took a few steps, the little fox raised its paws to press on his chest like it was telling him to stop, but he still came in front of Lin Fan.


    He raised the little silver fox in his arms until it was face to face with Lin Fan and he asked, "Princess, what do you think of this man?"


    All during this, Lord Yin had his dagger raised, prepared to attack at any moment.


    The silver fox was surprised at first, being put in close contact with thisplete stranger, but then it turned to look at Lin Fan. It took a few sniffs of Lin Fan before giving a shudder and moving back. For some reason it could smell something dangerous that wasing from Lin Fan.


    Lord Jin saw this and he slightly knit his brows. He had clearly never expected this reaction from the princess, but he could tell that it wasn''t necessarily a bad reaction. Something that could make the princess scared definitely wasn''t a normal thing, it would definitely be something powerful.


    Lord Jin lost in his thoughts for a bit before he said, "Young master Lin, our princess is a little shy. Perhaps you can put your hand out to let her get used to you?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by this suggestion, but he still raised his hand and ced it in front of the silver fox. At the same time, he used the suction force to see if he could draw anything out of her.


    The moment he did, the silver fox raised her head and moved her nose closer to Lin Fan''s palm. Taking a few sniffs, it was like she had found something interesting as she ced her nose to Lin Fan''s palm.


    The suction force did enter the silver fox, but there wasn''t much impurity that Lin Fan could absorb from her. It was like her bloodline had already been purified.


    But the moment Lin Fan did make contact with the silver fox, there was a prompt that came from the system.


    "A suitable pet has been detected, do you wish to form a contract with this pet?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised when he heard this. Normally his system would never offer him the chance to make a contract with a pet unless he bought the item first, but now it was offering him this chance?


    When the silver fox made contact with Lin Fan''s hand, she tilted her head like she had heard something. After listening for a while, the silver fox suddenly nodded.


    When Lin Fan recovered from his surprise, he asked the system, "System, what do you mean by that? Why can I suddenly make a contract with this silver fox?"


    The system just said, "Host, you do not have the authority to ask this question. Just know that the pet has already agreed to the contract and is waiting for your approval."


    Lin Fan was once again surprised when he heard this.


    Lin Fan turned back to look at the silver fox and found that she was looking up at him with big eyes that looked like they were filled with pleading.


    Lin Fan really didn''t know what to say about this, he just knew that this silver fox had to be special for the system to do this.


    In the end, Lin Fan said, "Alright, I ept the contract."


    Then with a sh of white light, there was a seal that appeared on the forehead of the silver fox while another seal that was the same appeared on the back of Lin Fan''s hand.


    Once the seal was finished, the silver fox jumped out of Lord Jin''s arms towards Lin Fan''s arms. Lin Fan didn''t react right away, but he did react in time to catch the silver fox.


    The silver fox nuzzled into Lin Fan''s embrace and then dug herself in to make herselffortable.


    Ignoring the silver fox in his arms, Lin Fan opened up the system''s interface to look at the silver fox''s status.


    Inari Okami (Young)


    Name: ???


    Grade: Legendary (Triple Mutation)


    Cultivation: Gold 1


    Bloodline: O-Inari


    Skills: Sealed (Lacking Authority)


    Combat Strength: 1


    System''s Comments: Strong rmendation to focus training, please don''t waste heavenly treasures<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was shocked when he finished reading this. It seemed like his instinct was correct, this silver fox was anything but normal.


    This was a triple mutation beast, what a concept that was.


    Rocky and Brainy were both only single mutation beasts and they already had such incredible skills, what skills would this silver fox have?


    The only problem was that all of the silver fox''s skills were sealed and for some strange reason, itsbat strength was currently at one. Moreover, what did thecking authority that followed the word sealed mean?


    "System what does this mean?"


    "Host, you are currentlycking the authority to ess this information. Please upgrade the shop to increase your authority."


    Lin Fan felt the urge to upgrade the shop once he heard this, it had been a while since he leveled up the shop and he definitely had enough points to do it. However, when he thought of the strange quests that had appeared after he had upgraded the shopst time and how differently the system acted now, he couldn''t help hesitating.


    Maybe it was better to wait until he finished his current mission before upgrading the shop?


    Lin Fan then threw all of this in the back of his head since there was no point worrying about it now, there was something else to deal with right now.


    Lin Fan looked back at Lord Jin and asked, "Does she have a name?"


    Lord Jin shook his head, "We beasts give ourselves names and the princess isn''t old enough to speak the humannguage yet, so she doesn''t have a human name yet. She does have a name in the beastnguage, but I''m not sure if you can pronounce it."


    Then after pausing, he said, "I''ve heard that humans give their pets names, so why don''t you help the princesse up with a name?"


    What he didn''t know was that Lin Fan was famous for his destructive naming sense. Brainy and Rocky had both been past victims of his.


    But this time, Lin Fan didn''t actually have a destructive naming sense this time.


    Lin Fan looked down at the silver fox and thought for a bit before saying, "Shiro, that will be your name."


    Shiro, pure white, it was a name that really did suit this silver fox.


    This name was something that had popped into Lin Fan''s head after seeing the words Inari Okami. For some reason, the name of Shiro''s species was in Japanese and it was a famous god from Japan.


    The Inari Okami was the Japanese god of foxes, wine, and fertility, one of the main gods in the Shinto Religion. For a beast to have the same species name as this god, could it be that Shiro had a divine bloodline and would one day reach the God Realm?


    That was if Lin Fan was able to release the seal that was on her¡­


    Once that was settled, Lin Fan asked Lord Jin, "What will you do now?"


    Lord Jin revealed a solemn look, "You might have broken their surveince, but they know that we''re still alive from the death pill that was in us. The only reason the princess didn''t receive one as well was because we sacrificed ourselves to serve the leader of the tribe. As long as we''re alive, they will track us down and find the princess, so we shouldn''t stay here."


    Lord Yin looked like he wanted to say something, but he couldn''t.


    Lin Fan took a look at Lord Jin and said, "I already said that I could remove that death pill from you, you don''t believe me?"


    Lord Jin shook his head with a bitter smile, "There''s no need for that anymore, I know how powerful this death pill is and my body isn''t in any shape to forcefully take it out. As long as you take care of the princess, it''ll be fine."


    But how could Lin Fan just let him go?


    This Lord Jin was a mutated King Beast with an Abnormal Law, if he were to bring him under him, he would definitely be a strong trump card for Lin Fan.


    Especially if he reached the Legendary Realm and could pass Lord Jin off as his pet¡­


    Moreover, Lord Jin had important information about the Beast n that Lin Fan wanted. So before he got that information, he definitely wasn''t willing to let him leave.


    The one other reason was that now he had formed the contract with the silver fox, he could feel her emotions. He could tell that she was sad from the idea of Lord Jin and Lord Yin leaving and she wanted Lin Fan to do something about it.


    Lin Fan turned over to the side and said, "Ang, do it."


    Ang suddenly raised her hand and there was a wind cage that formed around Lord Jin and Lord Yin.


    Lord Yin''s face fell and he immediately shouted, "What are you doing?!"

 222 Chapter 222

    Lord Yin and Lord Jin werepletely frozen in ce by Ang. Even if Lord Jin had been at full strength, he wouldn''t have been able to break through.


    Both Lord Jin and Lord Yin realized that they hadpletely underestimated Ang, she wasn''t just in the Fragmented Soul Realm like they had thought. Based on the strength of the wind cage that surrounded them now, she was at least in the Embryo Soul Realm!


    Ang just slowly moved towards them while gathering wind in her hand. Her eyes werepletely focused as she looked at Lord Jin''s chest, like she was looking for something.


    She stood there in front of him for a few seconds which made Lord Jin feel quite awkward, but then she narrowed her eyes like she had found something and suddenly pushed her palm out. Her palmnded right on Lord Jin''s chest and it created a hole in it thatpletely cut out that chunk of his chest.


    Both Lord Jin and Lord Yin''s eyes opened wide when they saw this.


    There was a line of blood that came out of the corner of Lord Jin''s mouth when that chunk of his chest was removed.


    Lord Yin shouted, "What are you doing!?"


    But Ang justpletely ignored him.


    Ang was more focused on the chunk of flesh she had taken out of Lord Jin''s chest.


    She looked at it and pulled out a ck sphere from it.


    The moment this ck sphere appeared in front of their eyes, both Lord Jin and Lord Yin narrowed their eyes. They were very clear on what this thing was, it was the thing that had tortured them for many years now.


    The problem was that the moment it left their bodies, it would have exploded, so they were just preparing for the explosion that should have followed, but strangely it didn''te.


    They turned back to look at the ck sphere and found that it was being kept stable since it was inside Lord Jin''s flesh that had been kept alive somehow by Ang''sws. They couldn''t understand whatws this was, but they could appreciate how powerful Ang had to be to use thesews.


    Ang ignored them and focusedpletely on the ck sphere. After watching it for a few seconds, she suddenly closed her hand and the flesh around it suddenly closed in around the sphere. This suddenpression from the flesh created enough force that the sphere shattered to dust, disappearing without a trace.


    Once the sphere was destroyed, Ang controlled her life energy to bring the flesh that she had taken out of Lord Jin back into the hole on his chest. With another injection of her life energy, the flesh fused back into ce and it was like he was never injured at all.


    Of course, the biggest difference was that he no longer had that ck sphere inside his chest.


    Lord Jin looked down at his own chest in shock as he couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    When Lin Fan offered to take the ck sphere out of his chest, he hadn''t taken it seriously because he had assumed that it wasn''t possible.


    He knew how powerful the person who had ced this ck sphere inside him was, so the fact that Ang was able to remove itpletely shocked him. It wasn''t just someone in the Embryo Soul Realm could handle. This gave him apletely new perspective of Ang.


    After she had taken care of Lord Jin, Ang turned to Lord Yin who was also locked in a cage of wind and walked towards him.


    Lord Yin was nervous, but he knew that Ang was going to help him remove his ck sphere as well, so he actually looked forward to it a bit as well. He could tell that this would hurt, but he would endure it if it meant that he would be freed from that prison.


    Ang came over to Lord Yin and looked over him just like she had done with Lord Jin. As she did this, the same windws gathered in her palm.


    After looking over Lord Yin for a few seconds, she put her palm on his stomach and created a hole in him just like she had done with Lord Jin.


    But when the chunk of flesh was taken out of Lord Yin, he couldn''t help spitting out a mouthful of blood before screaming out in pain.


    When he saw this operation being done on Lord Jin, he thought that he could silently endure it just like him, but now that it was actually being performed on him, he couldn''t help feeling admiration towards Lord Jin. He was able to endure this kind of pain silently, this was something that couldn''t be done without the strongest will. Moreover, it was definitely something that he couldn''t do.


    But what he didn''t know was that Ang was a petty person, she remembered everything that Lord Yin had done earlier.


    So when she did the operation for him, she secretly made it quite a bit more painful than it was for Lord Jin without anyone noticing.


    The only person that Lord Yin could me was himself for what he had done.<sub> </sub>


    The same process urred where there was a ck sphere that was removed from Lord Yin surrounded in his flesh that was kept alive by Ang''sws. After she inspected it for a few seconds, she crushed it like she did with the other sphere before healing Lord Yin.


    Of course, she didn''t forget to make it slower and more painful to torture him a bit.


    Once this was all done, Lord Yin and Lord Jin were freed from their wind cages and they looked at each other with looks of joy.


    Ang had also thrown in some extra service and healed most of the serious wounds that they had, but she left the lighter wounds for them to heal themselves.


    At this point, Lord Jin was no longer as weak as before and he could move freely, even if he couldn''t use all his powers.


    The two of them came to each other and took each other in a hug to express their joy, before turning to their princess, but they were shocked by what they saw.


    The princess had been ignoring them and was cuddling up to Lin Fan the entire time.


    The two of them couldn''t help revealing bitter smiles, but there was nothing they could do since this was what they wanted.


    When Lin Fan saw that both of them were finished, he gave a nod to Ang and she moved back as he came forward to ask, "Now, I have a few questions for you."


    Lord Jin and Lord Yin looked at Lin Fan before they nodded since they were already expecting this.


    Of course Lin Fan had his reasons for helping them, there was no way around this. But since he was willing to take the princess, they didn''t care what he did to them or how they betrayed the Beast n. After all, the Beast n had never done anything to them other than try to take their princess and enve them.


    Lin Fan saw the firm looks in their eyes and asked, "First, who was the one that enved you?"


    Lord Jin said, "It was a tribe that was ruled over by the Shadow Lord. He''s the ruler of thergest tribe in this star sector, the one that most human upper realms sh with. But he''s one of the more cruel rulers where he ensures that everyone has to follow his rules or he will kill them with his death pills. Still, make no mistake, he is definitely one of the strongest experts in this star cluster."


    Lin Fan then asked, "This Shadow Lord, what is his position in the Beast n?"


    Lord Jin paused for a second before saying, "If we were topare him to your human society status, he would be one of your upper realm ruling lords, but he is definitely much stronger than your human lords. There are many who say that he is already close to the level of a King."


    Lin Fan was confused by this since it seemed the scale was much bigger than what he knew, "King? What do you mean by King?"


    Lord Jin exined, "A King in our Beast n is one of the true leaders, they would be equal to your Ster Kingdom rulers."


    Ster Kingdom, that was a term that Lin Fan had vaguely heard before from Elder Fu of the Alchemy King Hall. However, whenever he tried to ask Elder Fu about it after the first time, Elder Fu always found some kind of excuse to avoid this topic.


    Still for now, that didn''t matter, there was something else to ask first.


    Lin Fan ignored the Ster Kingdom topic and dove into the real topic that he cared about.


    "What was the Shadow Lord''s goal in sending you here?" Lin Fan asked.


    Lord Jin gave a sigh before saying, "That is a long story."


    After pausing for a second to gather his thoughts, he then said, "I mentioned before that the Shadow Lord is already close to reaching the level of a King, correct?"


    Lin Fan nodded at this.


    Lord Jin continued after seeing that nod, "Well, a long time ago, there was a famous Beast n Expert that came from this star cluster. He was the one to rise the quickest and everyone thought that he would be the first King from our Star Cluster to break through to be an Emperor. However, one day, when he was exploring, he suddenly disappeared."


    Lord Jin gave another sigh when he reached this point before saying, "Thest ce that he disappeared from was this Blue Star."

 223 Chapter 223

    Lin Fan slightly knit his brows when he heard this and then he asked, "Is he still alive or not?"


    Lord Jin shook his head, "We aren''t too sure about that, we just know that this was thest ce that he disappeared from. That is why the Beast n has been so determined to invade the Blue Star."


    This was the reason why the Beast n had invaded the Blue Star hundreds of years ago and the reason for their continuous attempts to invade the Blue Star the entire time.


    The Beast n didn''t know if this King of theirs was still alive or not, but if they could recover anything from him, it would definitely be worth invading this small.


    After all these years, the Blue Star knew nothing about the reason why the Beast n had suddenly invaded them. Or at least that was how it was recorded in the history books of the Blue Star.


    Of course, for something as important as the legacy of a Beast n King, it was something that would definitely warrant a full invasion from the Beast n.


    For the upper realm to block this invasion, they would definitely have to pay a heavy price, so why would they do that for the Blue Star?


    The only logical reason for this was that they knew about the Beast n King''s legacy as well and they wanted it for themselves, which was why they hade to the defense of the Blue Star. Even going as far as taking it under the g of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Most of the upper stratum of the Blue Star was controlled by a force from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so they must have some idea. They might even be using these forces to help them find the legacy of the Beast n King¡­


    Still, this was all understandable since the Beast n King was equal to the ruler of the Ster Kingdom, which was clearly a realm that ruled over upper realms. Everyone in this cultivation world would try to gain as much power as possible, so the upper realm and Beast n tribe fighting over this was all understandable.


    But the problem was that Lin Fan was being caught in the middle of this.


    Lin Fan then said, "Do you have any clues on where the King could be?"


    This time Lord Jin actually had an answer, "Based on the scouts that the Shadow Lord has sent, we''ve managed to track the King''s aura to the Eastern Continent, so we''re sure that it''s here."


    This also exined another strange phenomenon that everyone had been confused about.


    Most of the Beast n''s invasions had been centralized around the Eastern Continent, with a few stray ones appearing on the other continents.


    Eventually, everyone just assumed that it was the Eastern Continent that was connected to the Beast n''s nar cracks which was why most of their invasions came from there. The attacks on the other continents were probably specialized attacks that were much harder for the Beast n to use since they would have to forcefully create nar cracks.


    But now it seemed like what the Beast n was looking for was on the Eastern Continent, which was why their attacks were mainly centralized there.


    Lin Fan nodded at this, but he didn''t continue on this topic since that was all he needed to know for now. He doubted that Lord Jin would have any more useful information based on the answers he had given and the fact that Lord Jin had turned out to be only a ve for the Shadow Lord.


    Lin Fan then said, "Alright, what are you nning on doing now?"


    Lord Jin fell into thought when he heard this. He just stood there for a while before looking at the princess for a bit. After this period of thought, he said, "If possible I wish to stay here, but it would probably be better if Yin and I were to go back to keep eyes on the Shadow Lord. The princess is safe here, so I feel assured in leaving."


    But Lin Fan definitely wouldn''t allow that to happen. Lin Fan had already set his eyes on Lord Jin, how could he let him go that easily?


    Lin Fan said, "How about youe work in my store instead? I have a pet shop that I run and I need some people to work in it."


    Lord Jin was shocked when he heard this, but he quickly shook his head, "No, that wouldn''t be possible, it would be too easy for us to be exposed. Moreover, yourpanions have seen us already, so they will expose us and that will bring danger to you. You''ll be exposed as a traitor to humanity if we go with you."


    Lin Fan had also considered this and he knew that this was indeed a problem. When he was considering whether he should buy something from the system that would allow them to hide or not, Ang cut in.


    "You can just get that old skeleton to teach them a disguise technique that would allow them to hide themselves."


    Lin Fan only then remembered Momonga, the Undead King. He was the Lich King who was the crystallization of wisdom, he must have some unique ways to solve this situation.


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this and said, "That''s right, we have ways to solve this, so are you willing toe with us?"


    Lord Jin and Lord Yin hesitantly looked at each other.


    In truth, they did want to stay here with the princess to watch over them like they had been entrusted by the princess'' parents, but they also didn''t want to cause trouble for the person they were counting on to take care of the princess. However, that person himself was saying that there was no problem if they stayed.<sub> </sub>


    They really didn''t know what to do in this situation.


    While they were worrying over this, Lin Fan was having a conversation with his system.


    "System, can I hire them as workers for the store or do I have to level up the store first before I can hire them?"


    "Host, these two do not qualify as official workers of the store, so they can be treated as the human workers. You can hire them, but they will not receive any of the benefits that official workers are entitled to."


    That was all Lin Fan needed to know.


    He was still on the fence about leveling up or upgrading his shop, so he didn''t want to do it unless it was absolutely necessary.


    Eventually, Lord Jin and Lord Yin came to a decision.


    Lord Jin said, "We are willing to stay here and work in your store, but we hope that you understand that our first priority will be the princess."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "Sure, sure, no problem."


    Seeing the smile on Lin Fan''s face, Lord Jin and Lord Yin couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their back. That was just the effect that Lin Fan''s normal smile had on people¡­


    Then Lin Fan suddenly asked, "What are your names?"


    Lord Jin and Lord Yin were taken aback by this before Lord Jin asked, "What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan said, "Well, I can''t just be calling you Lord Jin and Lord Yin can I? Since you''ll be working in my store, I think it''s best if I just call you by your names."


    Lord Jin nodded at this before he said, "We beasts don''t have names other than the ones wee up with ourselves or the ones you humans give us when we form a contract. You can just call me Jin and you can call him Yin, those are the names we''ve given ourselves."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Alright, Jin, then let''s get out of here. Send me to a different ce from the one that you sent the other three."


    Jin nodded when he heard this and he slowly gathered his spatialws, but Yin suddenly said something that stopped them.


    Yin said as he pointed at Yin Zi, "What are we going to do about this girl?"


    Only then did they remember that Yin Zi was still here, knocked out on the throne.


    Lin Fan turned to look at her before asking Yin, "How involved was she with the Beast n?"


    Yin honestly said, "Her entire family was involved with the Beast n. Their ancestor received his power from the Shadow Lord and used that to create a name for himself. They have been the spies for the Shadow Lord for many generations now."


    Lin Fan then asked, "How much did she know about all of this?"


    Yin said, "She knew everything about the entire n and was working with us the whole time."


    Lin Fan then turned back to Yin with a smile, "Is there a need to ask me what we''re going to do with her?"


    Yin felt a chill run down his spine when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything else.


    Yin raised the dagger that he had taken from Yin Zi and urately threw it right into the back of her head.


    Yin Zi, the traitor to humanity lost her life just like that, not even knowing how she died in the end. But at least her fate was much easier than her family''s.


    But it didn''t end there as Yin asked, "What about the other one?"

 224 Chapter 224

    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he said, "Other one? Which other one?"


    Yin said, "The one that we had lead you all here."


    Lin Fan had to think about it for a moment, but when he did remember who this person was, he immediately knit his brows. He turned over to Yin and asked, "Who was the one that put the beast core into him?"


    Yin was taken aback by this since he never expected Lin Fan to ask this. Jin could also feel the slight anger that was in Lin Fan''s voice, so before Yin could say anything, Jin said, "It wasn''t us, it was an agent that the Shadow Lord sent down to monitor us but was taken back because of a sudden situation."


    Lin Fan''s knit brows rxed a bit when he heard this, but they were still slightly knit when he said, "Is there a way to change him back?"


    This was something that involved the beast core, for a problem like this, there was no one more knowledgeable than actual members of the Beast n.


    Both Yin and Jin knit their brows when they heard this before Jin said, "If it was earlier, maybe, but it is toote now. The beast core haspletely fused with him and to separate him, we require a special Abnormal Law of a certain realm. Unless your friend here has that, we won''t be able to do anything for him."


    Lin Fan turned to Ang for confirmation and she shook her head.


    Ang naturally knew what Abnormal Law they were talking about and she knew exactly where to find it, but it was still too early since the person who wielded it was still too weak. Exposing this ahead of time wouldn''t be good for that person.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before asking, "Where is that person now?"


    Yin turned to Jin who said, "We had him locked up since we found that he was trying to help you, but now that everything has happened¡­"


    Jin didn''t finish the rest of his words since the meaning behind them were apparent.


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Bring him here then."


    Jin nodded before manipting his spatialws. With a sh of white light, there was a boy who had a pair of bunny ears on his head that appeared in front of them.


    The boy was clearly confused by the situation that he saw, but he immediately said, "Young master Lin, you might not believe me, but you have to be careful. The golden one is a single mutation Beast King with spatialws and the one with the mask is a rare Shadow Beast with the ability to transform in the peak tinum Realm with shadowws. The best way to defeat them is¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan had raised his hand to stop him.


    Jin and Yin both revealed awkward smiles when they heard this, but neither of them did a thing.


    The boy was confused once again when he saw this. He looked around him and seeing everyone looking at him with strange gazes he couldn''t understand, he finally couldn''t take it as he asked, "What is going on here?"


    Jin and Yin both looked at Lin Fan and Lin Fan seeing this exined, "They''re on our side now, so there''s nothing to worry about."


    Yu Shu didn''t know how to react to this, but after a moment of being dazed, he still said, "Young master Lin, you shouldn''t trust these beasts. I know firsthand how sly they are and I am living proof of that, don''t be fooled by them."


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "It''s fine, I have my ways to deal with them. More importantly, shouldn''t you worry about yourself?"


    Yu Shu looked confused, "Myself? What do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan calmly asked, "What are you going to do now?"


    Yu Shu was taken aback at first, but then he said, "Where can I go now that I''m like this? I''ll take care of the Beast n''s invasion here before wandering around in the wild by myself. At worst, I''ll just live a life of istion."


    Lin Fan paused for a second before saying, "How about youe work for me at my pet shop instead?"


    Yu Shu was once again taken aback when he heard this, but he quickly came back from his senses as he said, "Work for you? I''ve already been exposed. If I work for you, they''ll call you a traitor and won''t let you off. Even if you are powerful, you can''t stop the Union Government by yourself."


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "It''s fine, I have my connections. Even these two will be working at my shop, another person won''t matter."


    Yu Shu looked over at Jin and Yin before saying, "These two, you mean these two people?"


    Lin Fan nodded and replied, "Correct."<sub> </sub>


    Yu Shu fell silent into deep thought.


    That was right, he didn''t know anything about Lin Fan, so he wasn''t sure that Lin Fan couldn''t do this. Moreover, with the power that Lin Fan had shown, he must have some powerful background that he didn''t know about.


    If he was hiring these two beasts to work for him, then¡­


    Finally Yu Shu made his decision.


    Yu Shu said, "Alright, I''lle work for you, but we have to make sure that we stop this invasion first."


    Lin Fan nodded in agreement. In truth, this had actually escaped his mind and hepletely forgot about stopping the Beast n invasion.


    Lin Fan turned to ask Jin, "How do we stop the Shadow Lord tribe''s invasion?"


    Jin said, "The Shadow Lord''s spiritual sense was linked to the death pill in us and the only ways for those death pills to disappear is to either kill us or for us to die. Either way, it disappears once we die. Since they are gone, the Shadow Lord should think that this invasion is a failure and draw back his forces for another attempt. The only thing left to do is to take care of this pyramid which is the catalyst for the nar crack opening and creating a passage into the Blue Star."


    Lin Fan actually had a question he had been wanting to ask the entire time which he now had a chance to ask, "What is the deal with this pyramid? What is with all those games?"


    Jin revealed a bitter smile as he said, "The Shadow Lord is quite evil, but he also has a twisted personality where he likes to y with his prey. This pyramid was a trap that he made to y with the prey that he caught, which was the reason for all those games."


    Lin Fan then asked, "What about you then? Why did you call yourself the demon lord and go along with all of it?"


    The smile on Jin''s face filled with even more helplessness and bitterness as he said, "When you''re being forced to do something by a maniac, there''s only two ways to stop yourself from going crazy. One is to kill yourself and two is to find a way to enjoy yourself. He forced us to design all these traps, so the only thing we could do was y our roles faithfully and find a way to enjoy ourselves. Although I''m not proud of what I made, I am proud of the things that I made since they were some of my finest designs."


    Yin nodded in agreement to this.


    Lin Fan also nodded and he did feel sympathy for Jin, but there was nothing he could do with this sympathy so he didn''t continue with this topic.


    Lin Fan then said, "So how do we take care of this pyramid?"


    Jin''s bitter smile disappeared as he said with a serious look, "It isn''t really that hard, this pyramid is bound to me, so I can take it away whenever I want. But the problem there is how are Yin and I going to go back to Blue Star with you. I''m sure that there are experts from your Blue Star who are outside this nar crack and if you show up with me and Yin, that definitely won''t end well for you."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he heard this and he said, "You don''t need to worry about that, just tell me how you can put away the pyramid."


    Jin nodded and said, "The pyramid is bound to me, so it''s like your de. Even if I''m away from it, I can call it back to me with a single thought."


    Lin Fan''s smile became wider when he heard this, "Perfect, then all you have to do is teleport us to a different ce to where you teleported the other three first."


    Jin was confused why Lin Fan asked this, but he still opened a portal for them to travel through regardless.


    After walking through the portal, they arrived in a clearing in the forest with nothing around them. But when they turned back, they could see the giant pyramid that was in the distance.


    Lin Fan nodded to Jin and Jin nodded back before the pyramid suddenly disappeared.


    Jin then asked, "What about now? How will you take us out?"


    Lin Fan ignored this first and asked, "Where are the other three?"


    Jin pointed to the north and said, "They''re three kilometers north of here. Once again, how are you going to bring us out?"


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "Don''t resist what I''m about to do."


    Yin and Jin looked at each other with confused gazes, but then they nodded to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan came forward to grab their hands and they instantly disappeared from where they had been standing.

 225 Chapter 225

    Yu Shu was shocked to see Jin and Yin disappear. He stretched his hand out to wave it where they had just been standing, but all he touched was thin air. They hadpletely disappeared.


    Yu Shu turned to look at Lin Fan in shock and disbelief, but Lin Fanpletely ignored him.


    Lin Fan had put both Jin and Yin into the system''s pet storage space since they were technically both beasts that could be trained into pets.


    Jin and Yin both didn''t understand what happened to them, but the moment they opened their eyes, they appeared in apletely white room without anything around them.


    Neither of them understood what was going on, but they quickly found that with a single thought, they could freely change their surroundings with a single thought.


    Jin changed it into a quiet japanese style room with a pond outside the sliding doors while Yin changed it into a medieval room with a firece and arge armchair in front of that firece.


    In the outside world, Lin Fan just began walking north without care, heading in the direction that Jin had told him the other three young geniuses were.


    Three kilometers wasn''t far for someone of Lin Fan''s level, it only took him ten minutes to reach the clearing that the three young geniuses were waiting in.


    When the three young geniuses heard the sounds in the bush, they raised their weapons and were on guard, but the moment they saw Lin Fan appear, they all revealed smiles. But that all changed once they saw who was following Lin Fan.


    Yue Jin came forward and said, "Brother Lin, why are you with him? He was the one who betrayed us, how can we show any mercy to this traitor of humanity?"


    The other two didn''t say anything, but it was clear by their expressions that they mirrored his opinion.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything, which Yue Jin took as tacit understanding as he said, "Brother Lin, I understand. You don''t want to dirty your hands with someone as low as this, I''ll take care of him for you."


    Yue Jin raised his bow and aimed it at Yu Shu''s head. Yu Shu pulled out his sword and took up his stance since he knew that it wouldn''t be as easy as Lin Fan said. However, before either of them could do a thing, Lin Fan raised his hand to stop them.


    Lin Fan said, "He''s with me now, we''re going back together."


    Yue Jin revealed a look of shock, but he quickly came back from his shock as he revealed a righteous look, "Brother Lin, he is a traitor to humanity. No matter what, it is our duty to take care of him here and now."


    But Lin Fan took a single step forward and whispered something in Yue Jin''s ear.


    Yue Jin''s righteous lookpletely copsed as he turned to look at Yue Yin in a daze before turning back to Lin Fan, stuttering as he said, "How, how do, do you know about that?"


    They had been alone in their tent that night and he had even put up his spiritual sense around them. Unless Lin Fan was beyond the Legendary Realm, reaching a level that couldn''t be sustained by this lower realm, it was impossible for him to spy on them without him noticing.


    However, that was exactly what Lin Fan had done¡­


    Lin Fan''s expression didn''t change as he just looked at Yue Jin with a look of deep meaning.


    Yue Jin took a while to calm himself down, but then he said with dark narrowed eyes, "What do you want?"


    Lin Fan whispered a few more words to him and Yue Jin once again revealed a look of shock.


    Yue Jin slowly said, "Are you sure?"


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod before turning to look at the short haired girl.


    Yue Jin knit his brows to think, but then he revealed a smile as he said, "Brother Lin, I trust your judgement. If you say that we should bring him back, we''ll bring him back."


    The other two were shocked, but there was nothing that they could do.


    They both knew that Lin Fan had offered Yue Jin something and Yue Yin would definitely support him.


    In this situation, the short haired girl waspletely outnumbered, so there was nothing that she could do. Moreover, Lin Fan''s strength had left a deep impression on her and she knew that if there was no other choice, she shouldn''t get on his bad side.


    But Lin Fan walked over and whispered a few words to her as well.


    The short haired girl also revealed a look of shock, but then she suddenly gave a nod and revealed a smile.


    Since everyone was happy, they all dropped their weapons and returned back to the camp following Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    When they returned to the camp, Yu Shu had put his cloak back on and hid his appearance again.


    When they had left the camp in the morning, Lin Fan had actually sent the supporters away since he didn''t want them to get caught in his fight against the traitor. Because of this, most of them didn''t know about Yu Shu''s secrets and treated him naturally when he returned to camp.


    Of course the three young geniuses didn''t ruin this since Lin Fan had already made individual deals with them to keep this secret, so everything in camp was peaceful.


    After Lin Fan exined the situation to the supporters, he had them prepare dinner for them.


    Since they were scheduled to be here for a week, they would make the most of it now that the danger had been taken care of. There were still some other special beasts that Lin Fan wanted to capture before heading back out of this nar crack.


    The supporters didn''t mind since they could measure the level of energy from the nar crack. In the morning when Lin Fan''s group had set out, there was a sudden spike of energy that seemed like the nar crack was about to break, but then when they came back at night, the spike had suddenly stopped and the nar crack settled.


    The nar crack no longer showed any signs of breaking and followed Lin Fan''s story, so they didn''t mind staying here for another week.


    Of course the three young geniuses didn''t mind either since this was indeed a high ss nar crack, one that was filled with Gold and tinum Realm beasts, making it a veritable hoard of treasures.


    If they used this week to farm these treasures, they would surely receive great gains that would make up for the losses they had suffered.


    So just like that, they all went off to do their own hunting for the next week.


    Of course, there were some that weren''t allowed to leave, like Yan Huo who was ced under house arrest. He woke up the next day and didn''t try to break free at all since Lin Fan had left a deep impression on him, one that filled him with fear.


    And then there was the girl in the lolita dress that they had all forgotten about.


    It was only when the supporters asked about her the next day that they finally remembered her.


    The three young geniuses said that they didn''t know anything about her while Lin Fan realized that he hadpletely forgotten to ask Jin and Yin about her.


    Lin Fan made an excuse and said that they should look for her, even though most of the others thought that she was dead.


    They all spread out to search on their own, heading off to the area where the pyramid had once been.


    When they were there and Lin Fan was alone, he called out Yin and Jin and asked about the girl in the lolita dress.


    Both of them realized that they too had forgotten about her.


    Jin immediately pulled her out of the pyramid where they had been holding her, making sure that she was unconscious when he handed her to Lin Fan. After that, both of them returned to Lin Fan''s system pet storage since they didn''t want to be here when she woke up.


    When the girl in the lolita dress did wake up, she first panicked as she didn''t know where she was, but when she saw Lin Fan, she calmed down.


    Lin Fan exined to her what had happened and she quickly epted it before following him back to the camp.


    Along the way, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Why do you wear that lolita dress?"


    The girl said in a dejected voice, "I''m the lowest ranked among my peers, so I''m the one that people normally forgets. That was why I started dressing like this so I could get people''s attention."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile at this since he felt that this was true.


    All of them had forgotten about her in the end¡­


    After they made it back to camp, the girl in the lolita dress went off to rest while everyone one else went off to hunt.


    After she rested for a day, she also headed out into the forest to hunt for treasures of her own.


    Lin Fan had to admit that even though this girl had been through a lot, she was indeed quite tough.


    All of them hunted for the rest of the week and gained plenty of treasures for themselves. Lin Fan was especially happy with the beasts he had caught for Brainy.


    At the end of the week, they headed back through the portal and left the nar crack.

 226 Chapter 226

    When they came out of the nar crack, they arrived to find themselves surrounded by experts with their weapons raised.


    These weren''t just the experts from the Monster Trainer Union that had been guarding this nar crack a week ago, there were now various different experts in different uniforms all around the nar crack.


    They didn''t even let their guard down when they saw that it was the armoured vehicles that they had sent in a week ago. All of them still pointed their weapons at the armoured vehicles as if they were prepared to attack at any moment.


    Only when the young geniuses and Lin Fan came out of the car was there a familiar voice that sounded.


    "Move, move, clear the way for me."


    Lin Fan and the others turned to see Zhang Lianging over with arge group behind him.


    Lin Fan didn''t recognize the people in the group, but the young geniuses definitely did. These were their parents and the elders of their family.


    They were surprised why their parents and elders had shown up, but they didn''t have time to deal with this.


    Zhang Liang stopped in front of Lin Fan and asked, "Owner Lin, it''s good to see you, but we need to move away from this nar crack right away."


    Lin Fan wanted to question why there was a need for this rush, but Zhang Liang didn''t give him that chance. Zhang Liang and the others quickly led their group away where they were given physical exams before gathering them all in a single room.


    When Lin Fan arrived in the room and he looked around, he found that there were several adults with dark looks looking at him, but he didn''t feel any pressure from them at all.


    Zhang Liang was sitting at the center of the table waiting for them and once Lin Fan and the rest of the young geniuses were gathered, he started the meeting, "Owner Lin, can you tell us what happened in there?"


    Lin Fan nodded and he began his story, of course he made sure to leave a few things out since he wanted to give them a surprise.


    The rest of the young geniuses chimed in from time to time to help support Lin Fan''s story, but none of them said a single thing about the parts that he missed. They knew that he had his own idea, so they didn''t expose him.


    The seeds that Lin Fan had sown had yed their effects, so most of them either respected or feared Lin Fan enough not to say a thing.


    It was worth noting that Yan Huo had already been freed from his shackles and was also sitting in this room. However, he was doing his best to avoid Lin Fan and hide from him as best as he could. Naturally, that meant that he didn''t say a single thing to poke a hole in Lin Fan''s story.


    Once Lin Fan''s story was over, of course there were people who had doubts since there were clear holes in this story.


    There was someone who was dressed in a dark cloak and looked like a meek librarian, but when he spoke, there was a power in his voice that couldn''t be ignored. That person said, "Then brat Lin, can you tell me what happened to Yin Zi, my daughter?"


    Lin Fan had deliberately left this part out since he wanted to bait the Yin Family into trying to start conflict with him. After all, the best way to take care of a family was to bait them to fall into his trap.


    Lin Fan turned to look at Family Head Yin with a smile and said, "I wonder, what did happen to Yin Zi?"


    Family Head Yin immediately flew into a rage when he heard this and he shouted, "You, you dare y games with me? I think that you''re nothing more than a traitor to humanity and all of you are colluding with the Beast n right now!"


    Lin Fan said with the same smile, "Are we the traitor or are you the traitor?"


    There was a sh of surprise that appeared in Family Head Yin''s eyes that everyone except for Lin Fan and Ang missed. He quickly gave a snort as he said, "You''re trying to pin the me on me? Our Yin Family has served the Union Government faithfully for hundreds of years, what does a kid like you know?"


    Lin Fan raised his hand and there was a dagger that appeared in it as he said, "Then do you care to exin this?"


    This dagger was the shadoww dagger that Yin Zi had. Since it had absorbed her vitality, there was her aura that was currentlying from the dagger.


    Zhang Liang sensed this aura and he knit his brows as he looked at Lin Fan, wondering what Lin Fan''s n was here.<sub> </sub>


    Family Head Yin still had the same angry look, but he wasughing on the inside, "You''re trying to frame me with this? Don''t you know that by taking out this dagger, you are just admitting your guilt?"


    Then Family Head Yin turned to everyone else in the room and said, "It''s clear that this boy is a traitor to humanity. He wanted the artifact passed down in our Yin Family, an artifact that I personally gave my daughter, so he killed her and took it from her! How can we let someone like this live!"


    It was true, taking out this dagger at this point waspletely incriminating himself, but Lin Fan wouldn''t do such things without a n.


    During the fight in the pyramid, it hadn''t been Yin Zi using this dagger, but rather Lord Yin¡­


    Lin Fan released his life energy around the dagger that had been sealing it and there was a powerful beast aura that immediately came from it. If the aura around the dagger before was proof that it belonged to Yin Zi, the aura that came from it now was proof that it belonged to a powerful beast.


    Family Head Yin''s face turned slightly ugly when he sensed this.


    Naturally he knew about the sacrifice function of this dagger and with such a powerful auraing from this dagger, it was clear that Yin Zi had been forced to use it for a powerful member of the Beast n. But the fact that Lin Fan had brought this dagger back even with the aura of the powerful Beast n Expert around it, it showed that Lin Fan definitely wasn''t normal.


    However, how could he back down at a time like this?


    Family Head Yin stuck to his guns and vehemently denied everything, "It''s clear that you''re using some kind of artifact to mimic this aura to fool us, but we won''t fall for this, right everyone? You won''t be able to make those of us loyal to humanity fall, you traitor!"


    But then Lin Fan wasn''t the one to say anything, rather it was Yan Huo''s father who was a giant of a man.


    Family Head Yan said, "All I want to know is, why is my son injured to this extent? What did you do to him?"


    It was like Family Head Yin saw a light at the end of the tunnel and he dashed right towards it as he followed up Family Head Yan, "That''s right! Look at how injured nephew Yan is, you must have coerced him into silence with force! I bet you''re a Beast n Expert who is skilled in deception that is disguised as a human!"


    If it was possible, Family Head Yin wanted to attack Lin Fan right away, but there were two reasons why he didn''t dare to do so. One was that Zhang Liang was in the room and the Monster Trainer Union behind him was definitely not a force that he could offend. After all, this was a force that was directly connected to an upper realm power and Lin Fan had been invited by them to explore this nar crack. Two, it was because he wasn''t certain how powerful Lin Fan was. At first he was certain since he was after all a peak tinum Realm Expert, but then Lin Fan released the powerful Beast n aura from that dagger which made him waver on how powerful Lin Fan was.


    Lin Fan ignored Family Head Yin and turned right to Family Head Yan and Yan Huo. When Yan Huo felt Lin Fan''s gaze fall onto him, he flinched.


    Lin Fan then said without any fear, "Family Head Yan, it was your son who was fooled by the traitor and colluded with that traitor to attack us. That was why we had no choice but to defend ourselves. But of course that is understandable since the traitor had been hiding among us for the longest time, so they were quite skilled at what they did. Isn''t that right, Yan Huo?"


    When Yan Huo heard this, it was like someone had reached their hand out to him to pull him out of the darkness.


    He naturally knew the consequences of his actions and knew what would happen aftering back, but now it seemed like there was a chance to escape. After all, being a traitor and being fooled by a traitor were twopletely different things.


    Yan Huo didn''t hesitate at all as he said, "That''s right, Brother Lin is absolutely right. Unfortunately I was fooled by the traitor, but Brother Lin was the one to stop me. I am deeply ashamed for what I did, but I hope to make it right by revealing that the traitor wasn''t alone, their entire family was working with them."


    It didn''t stop there, the other young geniuses all began supporting Lin Fan after Yan Huo, causing public opinion to sway to Lin Fan''s side once again.


    After all, they trusted their blood above the words of other families.


    Everyone turned to look at Family Head Yin who clearly knew that he was in a dangerous situation. If he didn''t find a way to diffuse this situation, everything that his family had worked for over the past hundred years would go to waste. It was also very likely that their family wouldn''t be able to survive after this.


    Family Head Yin was about to say a few words to defend himself, but before he could even say a thing, there was a giant sound that rang out in the room.


    The Monster Trainer Union''s vice president Zhang Liang naturally believed in Lin Fan since they had a deep rtionship that had been formed over their cooperation and from his admiration of him. But more importantly, what he hated the most was traitors to humanity.


    Zhang Liang had smashed his fist down on the table, creating a web of cracks that spread from the impact that his fist had made, but Zhang Liang didn''t care about this at all. He just looked at Family Head Yin with a dark look as he said, "Family Head Yin, do you care to exin this?"

 227 Chapter 227

    It was clear by the tone of Zhang Liang''s voice that he wasn''t asking for an exnation at all. He had clearly already made his decision.


    The other families all prepared themselves since they knew what would happen next and it was a good chance to get closer to the Monster Trainer Union.


    The elders of the Yin Family looked at their family head with worried looks. Naturally it wasn''t just the family head and his daughter who knew the truth, the entire Yin Family had been involved in this business since the beginning.


    They had been in this business for over a hundred years, naturally the entire family was fully involved in this.


    Of course, the benefits of this weren''t bad and they had all profited well, increasing the power of their family during these years. But now that they had been caught, this was not looking good for them.


    Family Head Yin waved his hands as he said, "Vice president Zhang, you mustn''t let yourself be fooled by this brat. It''s clear that we''re being framed right now. You must remember all the things that our Yin Family has done for the Blue Star."


    But while he was saying this, Family Head Yin and the elders behind him had been slowly moving away from the table. They had also gathered the power of theirws inside them and were nning on making an escape.


    However, this was also clear to everyone else, so they were all prepared to attack Family Head Yin as soon as he tried.


    It was unfortunate that the Yin Family specialized in using the shadoww. They could escape into the shadow space just like Lord Yin had done before, creating a dark portal underneath them.


    The other experts around came forward to stop them, but they were toote to do so as the dark portal had already begun swallowing them up.


    Family Head Yin was confident in his ability to escape, that was until he saw a pure white dagger flying right at him covered in a golden glow. At the rate this dagger was going, it would definitely reach them before they could be swallowed by the shadowws.


    Family Head Yin gritted his teeth and pulled out a rapier from his storage space, as well as summoning a dark crow that appeared on his shoulder.


    The dark energy of the dark crow travelled down his arm until it covered his rapier, which he stabbed out to meet the dagger flying right at him.


    This rapier was one of the rewards he had received from the Beast n, it was a Legendary Realm Artifact. Or to be more precise it was a Primary Soul Realm Artifact, which made it a quasi Legendary Realm Artifact.


    Still, the Legendary Realm was the peak of the Blue Star and even the quasi Legendary Realm was a peak that most people couldn''t reach, so Family Head Yin was confident as he stabbed with that rapier. It was too bad that confidence didn''tst long.


    The moment the rapier made contact with the pure white dagger, it wasn''t even able tost a single second before the daggerpletely cut through the de of the rapier. It was split in half and it continued flying forward right at Family Head Yin''s hand.


    Family Head Yin didn''t dare hold the rapier any longer and dropped it right away, but the dagger continued flying at him.


    With the power of the elders that were with him, all of them formed a barrier with theirws to try and keep the dagger out, but the moment the dagger hit the barrier, it shattered to pieces. However, their gambit had worked and the dagger had been bounced back, dropping to the floor before disappearing and reappearing in Lin Fan''s hand.


    While they had been able to block the dagger that was aiming for their lives, it didn''t mean that they had escaped scot free. Rather because of the power that was behind the dagger creating a shockwave when it hit their barrier, all of them had received internal injuries of varying degrees.


    But that wasn''t the worst part. The worst part was that the dagger had scattered all the shadowws that they had gathered when they used it to defend themselves, which meant that they couldn''t escape anymore. If they tried to gather their shadowws again, someone else would stop them since they no longer had time.


    Lin Fan''s Iron Eater Bone Artifact waspletely different from before because of the things he had found in the nar crack.


    He had found some special ores in the nar crack with the help of Jin who had full control of the beasts in the nar crack. By allowing the Iron Eater Bone Artifact to absorb those special ores, he had enhanced it. The Iron Eater Bone Artifact had gone from the low Embryo Soul Realm to the mid Embryo Soul Realm.


    When one took a single step in the Soul Realm, it couldn''tpare to the different levels in realms below the Soul Realm. This step was almost equal to going from the peak tinum Realm to the low Fragmented Soul Realm. That was what allowed the Iron Eater Bone Artifact to cut through that Primary Soul Artifact like a hot knife through butter.


    Family Head Yin and the elders of the Yin Family saw that they had no other choice in this matter, so they all released their life energy and were prepared to fight their way out of this. However, they weren''t able to get far being surrounded by this.


    Zhang Liang also didn''t give them a chance as he pulled out a pair of iron knuckles from his storage, bursting his shirt apart with a roar.


    This old man with a head of white hair who normally walked around with a cane waspletely stacked. It was like his muscles had muscles on top of them!<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had heard tales of this before. He had heard that Zhang Liang was known for being a berserker when he thought. He normally was a gentle old man, but the moment he pulled out his iron knuckles, there was no stopping him.


    Even though he had heard these tales before, actually seeing in front of him was a different story.


    His lips couldn''t help twitching as he watched this ripped old man charge forward roaring like a beast.


    Zhang Liang''s iron knuckles were actually a real Legendary Realm Artifact, one that was in the Fragmented Soul Realm which he received from the upper realm.


    Family Head Yin was currently injured and his most powerful artifact had already been destroyed by Lin Fan, there was no chance that he could block Zhang Liang.


    Even working with the elders of the Yin Family, they could onlyst a few hits before they were knocked to the ground and were hit by a rain of fists that came from Zhang Liang.


    Finally they were all knocked out by Zhang Liang andid there on the ground like dead fishes.


    The other family heads who had wanted to help all revealed bitter smiles. Even though they had wanted to help, Zhang Liang didn''t give them a chance at all, so they could only stand there and watch.


    However, some of the ones with sharper eyes had naturally noticed the dagger that Lin Fan threw. The aura that they had felt from it definitely wasn''t normal and they could tell that if it had been thrown at them, they definitely would have been in danger.


    Many of them secretly noted down Lin Fan and were going to ask the young geniuses they had sent in about him.


    With the Yin Family members taken care of, Zhang Liang finally calmed down and pulled out another shirt from his storage which he put on. Based on how quickly he put it on, it was clear that he was used to doing this.


    After he was done, Zhang Liang came back to the table and asked Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, you still haven''t told us yet, what is the situation with the nar crack now?"


    Lin Fan said in a calm voice, "It''s already been taken care of and the nar crack shouldn''t be a problem anymore." Then he took out a roll of paper which he spread on the table, showing a map, "This is a map of the nar crack and the distribution of beasts, so you can use this to turn this nar crack into a training ground."


    Zhang Liang''s eyes lit up when he saw this, but he also looked at the family heads around him before taking it and saying, "Thank you Owner Lin, I''ll ept this on the behalf of the Monster Trainer Union."


    Once the Monster Trainer Union name was dropped, all the other people had no choice.


    These family heads naturally also wanted a share of this nar crack since they had invested their young geniuses into it, but if it went to the Monster Trainer Union, they would definitely get their fair share. Even if they wanted more, there was nothing they could do against the Monster Trainer Union.


    Lin Fan nodded before turning to leave, but before he could, there was a voice that called out to stop him, "Young Master Lin, if I may ask, can you tell me what happened to Yu Wang."


    Lin Fan turned to see a man who was an older version of Yu Wang, but with short hair who he could tell was his father. Only when he saw this man did he remember what he had forgotten.


    Lin Fan nodded to the supporters that had gone with him into the nar crack who had been waiting on the side of the meeting and they went out. When they came back, they rolled in a casket which had a corpse in it. Naturally it was the corpse of Yu Wang who had died in the nar crack.


    Once this corpse was pushed in, Lin Fan said, "Yu Wang fought bravely for humanity in the nar crack, but unfortunately he lost his life against the Beast n during that fight."


    Of course Lin Fan wouldn''t tell him the truth of what happened in the nar crack since that would create unnecessary conflict. The best thing to do was to tell Yu Wang''s family that he had been a hero and leave it at that.


    Yu Wang''s father had a tear appear in the corner of his eyes, but he still nodded and said, "Thank you for bringing his body back."


    Lin Fan nodded before turning to leave once again.


    Yu Wang in the end was just an unfortunate ident and he had no grudge against him, so it was only right for him to bring back the body. But as for Yin Zi who had betrayed humanity, he had left her corpse in the forest to be eaten by animals.


    There was no mercy for those that didn''t deserve it!

 228 Chapter 228

    It had been a long week, but Lin Fan was finally back at his store.


    During his absence, his store had been running the entire time and based on the amount of points he had with the system, he could tell that business had been doing well. It seemed like his decision to leave the store with Song Shu had been the right idea.


    Song Shu had been with him for over two months now and during her time working in the store, she quickly learned how to operate it, especially since she did nothing but follow Lin Fan around.


    She knew how to operate all the facilities of the store after learning from watching Lin Fan, so she could be left to handle everything.


    When Lin Fan came in the door, Song Shu didn''t spare him a nce at first, but then when she saw everyone elseing over to greet him, she turned to see him. However, the moment she did see that it was him, she turned her head and didn''t spare him another nce.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he saw this.


    When he had left, Song Shu had thrown a fit to try ande along, but Lin Fan had been adamant on not letting her go since he had a feeling that it might be dangerous. In the end, his instinct had been correct, but that didn''t stop her from being angry with him.


    Lin Fan came over with a bitter smile as he leaned in and picked Song Shu up by the waist.


    She still refused to look at him at first, but then after a bit, she threw herself into his chest.


    Lin Fan could tell from the damp feeling on his chest that she was crying, but he didn''t say a thing.


    Ang also came over and patted Song Shu on the head, but this time the way she looked at her was a bit strange. It was almost like how a mother looked at her child¡­


    Eventually Song Shu stopped crying and she lifted her head. She was still a little angry, but she didn''t ignore Lin Fan anymore as she said, "You have to take me next time."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile, but he didn''t promise anything since he didn''t know what would happen in the future. If it was too dangerous, he definitely wouldn''t take her since he would rather have her be angry with him than to put her in danger.


    But still, Lin Fan did what he could to make her feel better.


    Lin Fan called out Shiro and introduced the two.


    The moment the two little girls, one human and one beast saw each other, they immediately formed a bond.


    Shiro ording to Jin was over a hundred years old, but when that was converted to a human''s lifespan from a beast''s lifespan, she would be around the same age as Song Shu.


    Song Shu picked up Shiro and quickly ran out of the shop with her to go and y.


    Ang took a look at Lin Fan and seeing him give a nod, she quickly followed the two little girls out.


    Lin Fan looked around the store before looking at his two employees.


    It was currently right after the morning rush, so they were cleaning up after it, so he just left them to their own devices.


    But one thing he did notice was that Zhu Tie seemed much morefortable without his mask and that Yu Ning seemed to be a little too close to him from time to time. Seeing this, Lin Fan just revealed a smile to himself and didn''t say anything as he left them to their own devices.


    Lin Fan came to the back to take stock and he realized that his current stock was indeed a problem.


    Now that he had three stores, the amount of ingredients that came from the cultivation realm farm just wasn''t enough. Even if he had already defeated the Zerg Queen and had moved on to his third cultivation realm farm.


    For his third cultivation realm farm, he still had to face another enemy, but this time it wasn''t the Bug Race. When he had sent his Hellions out to scout, he had found several beings made ofplete rocks moving about on patrol.


    These living creatures madepletely of rocks were simr to Rocky, but they didn''t have the same power that he did. Nevertheless, their defenses were quite strong and had been hard for him to deal with, so it took him quite a bit of time to conquer this realm.


    Each cultivation realm farm had been enough to sustain one store, but now he was short one cultivation realm farm with the third store, not to mention that he still needed to open a fourth store to finish his task.


    The only good thing was that he still had another three months to finish this task, which meant that he had to finish taking over this third cultivation realm farm by the end of next month and prepare a fourth cultivation realm farm for his fourth store.


    Currently, with the ingredients that came from two and a half cultivation realm farms, he was slowly draining away at the stock of ingredients that he had stocked up on. With the rate that he was going at, he wouldst another month beforepletely running out.


    He had been too busy during this time to go to the World of Elements or the Lich''s Necropolis during this time to manually find ingredients, which was why his stock was still being drained.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan decided to farm ingredients over the next month just so he could support the fourth store that he would be opening. At the same time, he would have to scout out the remaining three S Rank Cities to see which one would be the best ce for him.<sub> </sub>


    Once he was done with taking inventory, Lin Fan headed through the Any ce Door to return to Wind Snow City to find Momonga. There were many things that he needed Momonga''s knowledge for.


    When he arrived at the store, Momonga was nowhere in sight, there were only the two female ghost maids that followed him that were present.


    The two ghost maids were already used to seeing Lin Fan appear from the Any ce Door. When they saw Lin Fan appear, they pointed to a room in the back before heading back to work.


    Lin Fan nodded to them in response before heading to the back room where he could hear various soundsing from.


    When Lin Fan opened the door, he saw Momonga sitting there in a chair with a helmet on his head which had a projectioning from it.


    This helmet was thetest virtual gaming system and Momonga was ying the most popr game, Hunters Online. Hunter Online was a game all about hunting beasts, which the humans of the Blue Star used to train their abilities from a young age. Since it was all in a virtual world, it was much safer than training in the wild against real beasts, but the effects were much worse than training in a life and death scenario.


    The projection was actually a protection protocol installed just in case the yer needed help from the outside to get them out if something happened, but most of the time this could be turned off. For some reason, Momonga was ying with the projection on and at max volume.


    But the moment Lin Fan stepped into the room, Momonga immediately paused the game and came out.


    He could tell by Lin Fan''s expression that he had something to show him and Lin Fan could see that he knew, so he didn''t waste any words as he pulled out Jin and Yin.


    Momonga was surprised to see the two of them and then two of them put their guard up when they suddenly saw Momonga.


    After looking over them, Momonga asked Lin Fan, "Where did you find these two?"


    Lin Fan said, "In the nar crack I told you aboutst time."


    Momonga looked over them again before saying, "You took out the death pills in them, but there''s still a trace of that energy left that''s hurting their foundation, do you want me to take that out?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this and he asked, "Wait, didn''t Ang already take out all the influence of the death pills and cure them?"


    Momonga revealed a faint smile, "That little girl is sensitive to death energy and herws are perfect for countering them, but this is something that she can''t do. The death energy has already soaked into their foundations, so only someone proficient like me can take it out."


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this before saying, "Alright, do it then."


    Momonga also nodded before waving a single finger.


    Jin and Yin both clutched their chests in pain, but then there were wisps of dark purple energy that came out of different parts of their body, condensing into a ball in front of Momonga.


    This process took five minutes before there was no more dark purple energy that came out of them.


    When this process was over, Jin and Yin gathered themselves and realized that their power was much greater than before.


    Jin didn''t break through, but Yin immediately broke through to the Primary Soul Realm. If it wasn''t for the shop suppressing him and not allowing his tribtion, he would have directly broken through to the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Momonga nodded once again when he saw this before turning back to ask Lin Fan, "What are you nning on doing with the two of them?"


    Lin Fan said, "They''re going to be working in the store with you, but I think you know what I want you to do with them."


    Momonga revealed a smile when he heard this, "I''ve been feeling quite boredtely. Do you care what I do to them?"


    Lin Fan shook his head, "Do whatever you want, just don''t kill them. Also teach them how to work in the store, that''s their job from now on unless I need them for something."


    Momonga''s eyes lit up when he heard this. He had already seen that these two were special, one possessing the rare shadoww and the other having the Abnormal spatialw. In his hands, he could turn them into something special and he had been quite bored recently.


    Jin and Yin could feel the gaze that Momonga was casting on them and they couldn''t help shuddering. They could tell from the disy just now that Momonga wasn''t normal, he was probably a monster in hiding just like Ang.


    With the way he was looking at them, he definitely didn''t have kind intentions.


    But before Momonga could start his training, Lin Fan also pulled out a few other things and said, "Before you start with them, help me take a look at these."

 229 Chapter 229

    When Lin Fan came back to the Water Pearl City store, he came back alone.


    He had left Jin and Yin with Momonga back at the main store for him to train them. Of course he had noticed their looks of pleading when he had left, but hepletely ignored them.


    Once Lin Fan came out of the Any ce Door and came back to the front, he sat at the counter and began pondering what to do next.


    That didn''tst long before Yu Ning came over and said, "Owner Lin, do you have time tomorrow?"


    Lin Fan looked at her in surprise before looking over Zhu Tie, but he didn''t see any jealousy from Zhu Tie at all.


    Yu Ning noticed this and she quickly waved her hands, "Owner Lin, it isn''t what you think it is. This is an invitation from my master on behalf of Monster Trainer Union for you. The Monster Trainer Union will be holding a meeting tomorrow afternoon."


    Zhu Tie also came forth and said, "My grandfather said that he would be there as well and that it was a private meeting."


    Lin Fan took the invitation Yu Ning took out and looked it over before slightly knitting his brows.


    This was an invitation that was only extended to Zhu Ba Jie and him, which meant that this was a meeting between the two top powers in Water Pearl City. Yet for some unknown reason, they were also inviting him.


    Could it be because of his "master" or was there another reason?


    Moreover, were they inviting him as a peer or were they inviting him just to observe?


    Lin Fan thought for a bit before shaking his head with a faint smile.


    He would have to wait until tomorrow to see.


    ¡­


    The rest of the day passed normally, but when Lin Fan headed back to the Zhu Manor, he was surprised to find that Zhu Ba Jie wasn''t there.


    Even after the night passed and it was time for breakfast, Zhu Ba Jie still wasn''t there.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he was sure that he was busy as the head of the only Legendary Realm Family in Water Pearl City. Moreover, he would see him this afternoon at the meeting at the Monster Trainer Union.


    After breakfast was over, Lin Fan headed to the store as usual with Song Shu and Ang, but this time he didn''t take charge in the store, rather he moved to the back and watched Song Shu.


    Song Shu had been in the charge of the store during the week he had been gone and based on the sales recorded in the system, he was certain that she had done a great job. It was so good that he even considered leaving her at this store to take care of it, but he knew that this idea was something that both she and Ang would never agree to.


    Sinceing back from the nar crack, Ang had been strangely attached to Song Shu to the point where she almost seemed like a mother. Or rather, calling her a mother would be the right way to describe her¡­


    Even if Lin Fan wanted to leave her here, he knew that Ang wouldn''t agree and Ang was the one person he could never win an argument with.


    But as he watched Song Shu, Lin Fan had to admit that Song Shu was a quick learner. Not only did she pick up his alchemy techniques quickly, she also picked up how to run the store just by watching him.


    After the morning rush was over, there was nothing to do until the afternoon since the meeting with the Monster Trainer Union wasn''t until the afternoon.


    Song Shu ran off to y with Shiro again while Ang followed, leaving only the three of them in the store.


    Lin Fan had a rare day where he could just rx, so he leaned back in the chair behind the counter.


    During this time, there was a disy that the old him would have been very angry to see.


    It was clear that something had happened between Zhu Tie and Yu Ning during the week he had been in the nar crack because of how they interacted. If it was the old Lin Fan, he definitely would have cursed them as normies, but now that he was with Ang, he was just happy for them. Rather, he felt it was quite cute how shy they were, not knowing that he was the pot calling the kettle ck¡­


    Time passed and soon it was almost time for his meeting at the Monster Trainer Union.


    Yu Ning offered to go with him, but Lin Fan let her stay with Zhu Tie in the store and headed there alone.


    It didn''t take him long before he reached the Monster Trainer Union, but what he saw there surprised him.


    There was already someone outside waiting for him and judging by the crowd, it was someone quite famous.


    Lin Fan moved through the crowd to see Zhang Liang standing at the entrance waiting. Even though he was only the vice president, he was the vice president of one of the top two forces in Water Pearl City, which made him quite the famous person.<sub> </sub>


    When Zhang Liang saw Lin Fane out of the crowd, he immediately came over to greet him, "Owner Lin, you''re finally here. I was afraid that you wouldn''te."


    Everyone was shocked to see how Zhang Liang was treating this young man who had appeared out of nowhere, wondering just who this young man was.


    Lin Fan ignored the crowd as he said, "Well, it''s not like you guys gave me much of a choice."


    Zhang Liang revealed a faint smile at this, but he didn''t say anything in response. He just led Lin Fan into the Monster Trainer Union in front of everyone, closing the doors on the face of the crowd.


    That was right, he had closed the doors.


    For that day, the Monster Trainer Union had actuallypletely shut down just for this meeting, which showed just how important they were treating this. However, that confused Lin Fan since he had no idea why they did this. Or more specifically, if it was good or bad for him.


    ¡­


    After leading him through the halls of the Monster Trainer Union, they finally arrived inside arge conference room where the president and Zhu Ba Jie had been waiting.


    This was a room with arge round table in the center, perfectly divided into three sections. Two of those sections were currently being upied by Zhu Ba Jie and the president respectively, there was another section that was left for Lin Fan.


    Based on this, it seemed like they were treating him as a peer, but if that were the case, why were they doing this?


    Zhang Liang didn''te in with Lin Fan, he just opened the doors and closed them behind him, standing guard outside the door. This just invoked even more curiosity and caution from Lin Fan as even someone on Zhang Liang''s level was being used as a guard.


    Lin Fan sat down in the spot left for him, but he didn''t say a single thing as he looked at the two of them.


    Finally the president couldn''t take it and said with a smile, "Owner Lin, it really is good that you could join us today."


    Zhu Ba Jie followed up and said, "Owner Lin, we have something important to discuss today."


    Lin Fan nodded, but he still didn''t say anything.


    The president then said, "Owner Lin, do you know what this meeting is about?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I only received the invitation, it didn''t tell me anything else."


    The president nodded before saying, "That''s because we wanted to make sure nothing was revealed since this is a top secret matter. But we do have some things to ask you about the nar crack."


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he said, "What things?"


    The president hesitated a bit before saying, "Owner Lin, putting aside everything that happened, did you find anything special in the nar crack? Something maybe rted to an inheritance?"


    Lin Fan finally revealed a look of understanding.


    So it was about that!


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he said, "You''re talking about the King''s inheritance?"


    The president and Zhu Ba Jie both revealed shocked looks and quickly looked around to ensure that they were safe before turning back to Lin Fan.


    The president quickly said, "So you do know about this. Then Owner Lin, can you please tell us what you know? This is a very important matter for the Union Government."


    Lin Fan had the same smile on his face as he said, "Is it the Union Government, the Monster Trainer Union, or the upper realm factions behind you?"


    The president revealed a wary look in his eyes, but he quickly calmed down and said, "Owner Lin, what do you mean by those words?"


    Lin Fan didn''t look away as he met his gaze with his own serious gaze, "I can tell you now that there is the chance to cooperate on this. I can give you the information that I have, but there needs to be some terms discussed before that happens."


    The president and Zhu Ba Jie were both silent as they stared at Lin Fan for a few minutes, creating a very awkward atmosphere. However, after those few minutes, they both suddenly revealed smiles as the president said, "Alright, that''s not a problem. It''s all fine as long as you''re willing to cooperate."


    Lin Fan also nodded with a smile as he said, "Then the first term is¡­"

 230 Chapter 230

    When Lin Fan left the meeting, everyone that had been in the meeting had a smile on their face.


    After negotiating with the president and Zhu Ba Jie, while they didn''t reach a decision since they both needed to report to the upper realm faction first, they both did basically guarantee that this would be epted by them.


    After leaving the meeting, Lin Fan headed right back to the store where someone had been waiting for him.


    It was the Yu Shu who waspletely covered in his cloak waiting outside the store for him.


    When Yu Shu saw Lin Fan approach, he just gave a nod before following Lin Fan in.


    Since Lin Fan had bribed/threatened everyone to keep Yu Shu''s secret, no one knew about what happened to Yu Shu.


    But of course, Yu Shu himself didn''t want to keep living this lie, so when he went back to his family, he had revealed everything for his parents. Naturally his parents didn''t take this well and had kicked him out of the family, but Yu Shu didn''t mind since he had a ce to go.


    Yu Shu had already epted Lin Fan''s offer to work in his shop, so he hade to Lin Fan''s shop.


    He wasn''t worried that his family would reveal anything since it would bring more shame to them than it would to him, so he felt assured in staying with Lin Fan for now. As for what would happen one day when his identity was revealed which he was certain would happen, that would be for the future.


    As for Lin Fan, he actually didn''t get why people discriminated against demi humans that much, but that was only because he came from earth.


    After being saturated by earth''s views of demi humans, naturally he felt differently towards them than the people of the Blue Star.


    If possible, it was even his dream to have a catgirl maid one day, but of course that was a dream that he hid from Ang¡­


    Still for now, he wasn''t strong enough to do anything about that. Once he had more connections with the Union Government and once he was personally stronger, perhaps he would be able to change things, but for now, it would have to stay the way it was.


    Lin Fan came into the store with Yu Shu and he found another rare guest waiting for him inside.


    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows when he saw this rare guest, but after leaving Yu Shu with Zhu Tie and Yu Ning for his work training, he went out with the guest.


    This guest led him through several twists and turns in Water Pearl City before finallying to a small shop that sold food. More specifically, it was a shop that specializes in selling jams.


    The store had been quite packed when he walked in, but he was led by his guest to the back where there was a meeting room setup. All the seats in this meeting room were filled, with just a single seat in the center left empty for Lin Fan.


    When the people in the room saw Lin Fane in, they all stood up to give him a bow before sitting back down once Lin Fan sat down.


    Lin Fan looked over the people in the room before calmly asking, "What is this about?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu was the first to speak as he slid a newspaper over to Lin Fan and said, "Please have a look at the front page."


    Lin Fan picked it up and looked down at the front page to seerge headlines that said "Young Master Jiang finally set to marry, a truly joyous day for Rock Mountain City!".


    Lin Fan knitted his brows in thought when he read this, but then it was like he suddenly remembered something as he said, "Isn''t he the big brother that you asked to look after the girl you loved?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu nodded before saying, "Please keep reading the rest."


    Lin Fan continued reading through the article.


    Most of the article was about offering congrattions to the Jiang Family and their young master on his engagement, which was normal since this was a Rock Mountain City publication. For that newspaper to survive in the city basically ruled by the Jiang Family, they would naturally have to tter them.


    The only strange thing about the article was the name of the girl who was young master Jiang''s fiancee. The name of the girl was Yuan Xiang Qin, the samemoner girl who Jiang Zhi Shu had fallen in love with and had run away with.<sub> </sub>


    She was also the same girl who his big brother was supposed to look after after she was thrown in prison by the Jiang Family!


    Lin Fan turned to look at Jiang Zhi Shu who clearly couldn''t hide his emotions. His eyes were filled with variousplicated emotions, but the strongest ones were anger and confusion.


    Jiang Zhi Shu saw Lin Fan looking at him, but not saying anything. After a while, Jiang Zhi Shu bowed his head on the table and said, "Boss, please help me take down the Jiang Family and take her back."


    Lin Fan calmly looked at him, but he still didn''t say anything as he weighed the pros and cons in his mind.


    During that meeting with Zhu Ba Jie and the president, Lin Fan had learned a few things about the organizations that ran the Blue Star. To be more precise, Lin Fan learned more about the Union Government.


    The Union Government did run the Blue Star, but that didn''t mean that it was fully cohesive. Rather the Union Government was made of three factions which had three different upper realm powers behind them, which was why they could push out the other factions that upper realm powers had set up to take control of the Blue Star.


    At the same time, Lin Fan had also been thinking about which S Rank City he should set up his final branch shop in.


    He had already set up two branches in two S Rank Cities already, so there were only three cities left for him to choose from. One of those cities belonged to the Lin Family who he still didn''t know how to deal with yet, so that city waspletely off the table, which left only two cities for him to choose from.


    There was Rock Mountain City which was ruled by the Jiang Family alone. Unlike Green Wood City and Water Pearl City which had the Alchemy Tower and the Monster Trainer Union, Rock Mountain City only had the Jiang Family alone which allowed them to rule it like kings.


    There was also Illusive Fairy City which was ruled by the mysterious Wu Family that Lin Fan had no information on at all. When he tried to find information on them, he couldn''t find anything at all through public routes at all. Even though it was a S Rank City, no one had any information on it at all.


    The only way he had been able to get some information on it was by asking the Mu Family and the Zhu Family who told him that they were a family that had a very strange cultivation method. If they had to describe it, it would be simr to magic rather than cultivation.


    Those two cities were his only choices right now.


    But with how things were developing, it seemed like Rock Mountain City would be a gamble, but it would mean that he also had a way to control things in Rock Mountain City with Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Compared to Illusive Fairy City which he had no information at all on, it seemed like Rock Mountain City was a much better choice, but that didn''t mean it wasn''t dangerous.


    Going to Rock Mountain City meant that he would definitely have to face a Legendary Realm Family, or at least face most of a Legendary Realm Family since Jiang Zhi Shu could at least bring some of them to his side.


    If this was before, Lin Fan wouldn''t have felt confident in doing this, but now that he had gained a few more trump cards, he didn''t feel as helpless as before. However, that still didn''t mean that he could act rashly.


    Lin Fan finished gathering his thoughts before saying, "It''s not like I can''t help you, but there must be a proper way for us to do this."


    Jiang Zhi Shu had a look of hope in his eyes when he heard this. What he was worried about the most was that Lin Fan wouldn''t help him, but now that didn''t seem like the case. He didn''t care what he had to do to save her, he would even sell his soul to the devil. It was too bad that Lin Fan was worse than the devil.


    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately said, "Boss, it doesn''t matter what you want me to do, I''ll do it all as long as we can save her."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile at this and gave a nod, "It''s good that you''re this willing, but we can''t go yet."


    Jiang Zhi Shu''s expression fell once again when he heard this, "Boss, why can''t we go yet?"


    Lin Fan tapped his finger on the newspaper and said, "It says here that they will be getting married in three months, which gives us time to prepare. If we rush in there without any preparations, how do you think we''ll be able to save her?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t know how to respond to this since he knew that Lin Fan was right, but he didn''t know what to do about this.


    Lin Fan nodded when he saw the expression on Jiang Zhi Shu''s face and said, "Alright, before we go to Rock Mountain City, we still need to prepare some things in the next month. After that, we''ll go there and n our next move."


    Jiang Zhi Shu nodded when he heard this and he listened to Lin Fan with rapt attention.

 231 Chapter 231

    If this was before, Lin Fan would have definitely rejected Jiang Zhi Shu''s request without any hesitation.


    Before this, Lin Fan had been too weak to deal with this and he would have slowly tried to gain power.


    However, after the incident in the nar crack and he learned more about the secrets of this world, he knew that he might not have time to wait any longer.


    The Beast n had already attempted two different invasions in the past few months and who knows what they would do in the future. They were even willing to invest a Fragmented Soul Realm single mutation beast like Jin into this invasion, which meant that they definitely were getting impatient.


    Lin Fan was more powerfulpared to before, but he didn''t have any influence on the Blue Star at all. If an invasion did happen, without any influence, he wouldn''t be able to do anything other than defend himself and his family.


    But after living on the Blue Star for more than three months now, he had slowly made more and more friends, feeling like he did belong to the Blue Star. If he could, he wanted to protect not just himself, but also the life that he had built here.


    Now that there was a chance for him to take influence by controlling the Jiang Family, he didn''t have a reason to say no.


    But to do so meant that there were many things he had to prepare for over the next month.


    After the meeting, Lin Fan headed back to the store and began nning the various things that he had to prepare.


    Over the next few weeks, he had left everything rted to the store to Song Shu while heading off to take care of various different preparations that he needed.


    He went out from dawn to dusk every day, heading out early in the morning and onlying back after the sky had be dark.


    It had even reached the point where Ang had questioned him on what he was doing.


    However, she did trust him, so she only questioned him on whether he was seeing someone else. But the way she asked definitely took several years off Lin Fan''s life.


    In the end, Lin Fan was able to calm her down and convince her that he wasn''t cheating on her. Rather it wasn''t hard for him to do so since his conscience was clear and he actually wasn''t cheating.


    There were a few things that were of note that happened during this month of preparation.


    The first was that Lin Fan received the notification from the system that he hadpleted the second part of his mission, creating another branch that had the same fame as the first shop.


    That wasn''t hard for him to do in Water Pearl City since both of the ruling factions in the citypletely supported him. All the other factions in the city relied on one of these two ruling factions, so if both of them supported him, they had no choice but to support him as well.


    With all these different powers supporting him, it would be strange if Lin Fan''s store didn''t be popr. So a week after he came back from the nar crack, he received the notification from the system.


    It had even be so serious that the rumours about Lin Fan''s store had been greatly exaggerated, turning it into a plot that all that families were involved in.


    But these rumours did nothing but fuel people''s curiosity, making even more peoplee to Lin Fan''s store.


    The second was that Lin Fan had been slowly training Yu Shu as the manager for this branch since he had to leave someone in charge of this store in the end and Yu Shu was the best choice.


    In the end, Yu Shu was the only one who truly belonged to the store since he had nowhere else to go.


    As for Zhu Tie and Yu Ning, they had the Zhu Family and the Monster Trainer Union behind them respectively. Eventually they would have to return to their respective forces and they couldn''t work for Lin Fan forever, so it wasn''t realistic to leave them in charge of this branch.


    This hadn''t been a problem for the Green Wood City branch since the workers there came from the Alchemy Tower and Lin Fan had the Alchemy Master of the Alchemy Tower following him. Unconsciously, he had already taken the Alchemy Tower as a force that was already under him.


    To train Yu Shu, he had Song Shu teach Yu Shu about all the different things that she knew which the manager should know. That way Yu Shu could take charge of the store when they left in a month.


    He knew that it was impossible for him to leave Song Shu because of how close she was with Ang, so he had already assumed that she would being with him.


    The third matter was that around the same time Lin Fan received the notification from the system that he hadpleted the second part of the mission, Zhu Ba Jie and the president of the Monster Trainer Union had contacted him.<sub> </sub>


    They had told him that both the Union Government and the Monster Trainer Union had agreed to his terms and were looking forward to cooperating with him on finding the King''s inheritance.


    This was a big deal for Lin Fan since he had asked for quite a few important things from them, things that would y a role when he headed to Rock Mountain City next month. With the Union Government and the Monster Trainer Union agreeing to his terms, it gave him much more confidence in applying his n in Rock Mountain City.


    The fourth matter was that the tale of Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men had already spread across Water Pearl City as well.


    Jiang Zhi Shu had left some of his forces in Green Wood City and had brought the rest with him to Water Pearl City, doing the same thing he did in Green Wood City. This had allowed him to recruit many more followers and now his troops had almost doubled in sizepared to before.


    During the month of preparations that Lin Fan had told him about, Jiang Zhi Shu had gone all out in spreading the name of Robin Hood to increase the power of his troops and his efforts hadn''t gone unrewarded. By going all out to help the people in the towns and viges around Water Pearl City, there were plenty of young men who flocked to join him.


    A week ago he had doubled his troops, but now his troops had surged to three times their original number back in Green Wood City.


    Not only were there many more followers for Jiang Zhi Shu, Lin Fan had also prepared quite a few Desert Horrors for them as mounts.


    Each Desert Horror was in the Silver Realm, so theirbined force definitely couldn''t be looked down on.


    With these Desert Horrors, it made it even easier for them to sweep through all the enemies in this area.


    The final matter was that Lin Fan''s business had taken off.


    The food culture in this world really wascking, so when something as novel as jams had appeared, all the people had rushed to buy them.


    Of course, with the clear divide in this world, Lin Fan also knew that he couldn''t just offer a single product. So Lin Fan had split his jams into two different versions, a high ss version for the nobles and a mass produced version for themoners to eat.


    This allowed Lin Fan''s business topletely dominate all of the market in Water Pearl City.


    Even if there were shrewd merchants who had tried to mimic their recipe, it was a recipe that was carefully developed by Lin Fan and his grandmother. It wasn''t something that could be easily mimicked.


    Lin Fan had also released several other recipes through the store and their profits hadpletely exploded. It reached a point where theirpany was considered one of the richestpanies in all of Water Pearl City in just a single month.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan took out a portion of this cash to send a group of his workers to Rock Mountain City two weeks ahead of the deadline to prepare for their arrival.


    Jiang Zhi Shu wanted to go along with them, but Lin Fan wouldn''t let him since the timing wasn''t right.


    He used another portion of this money to expand the intelligencework that he was building, making sure that it would be prepared by the time they arrived at Rock Mountain City.


    Lin Fan knew just how dangerous this n would be, so he wasn''t foolish enough to charge in without doing some scouting first.


    And just like that, the month slowly passed, or at least that was how it felt for Jiang Zhi Shu.


    There were many times where he wanted to rush to Rock Mountain City, but Lin Fan had stopped him every time.


    Finally it was the day that Lin Fan had agreed on.


    He had said his goodbyes to all his friends in Water Pearl City in thest week, so the only thing left for him to do was pass on the store to Yu Shu.


    The morning before his flight, he handed the keys to Yu Shu and gave him a few words of encouragement.


    After that, he headed off to the airship flight that he had booked with Ang and Song Shu.


    It had been a long month, but now it was finally time to head to Rock Mountain City.

 232 Chapter 232

    As opposed to when he came to Water Pearl City and Green Wood City, Lin Fan didn''t book a room on a luxury airship this time. Instead he booked on amercial airship since he wanted to hide his identity.


    Before he could set his n in motion, it was best for him to keep as low of a profile as possible.


    But of course that wasn''t possible when he came onto the airship with two beauties like Ang and Song Shu.


    The moment they came onto the airship, they had attracted attention from many people. There were quite a few that had bad intentions in their eyes as they gazed over at them.


    However, when one of these people finally took the chance to approach, they were immediately chased away by Ang''s cold gaze. It was like her cold gaze had created a frozen zone around her that they couldn''t approach no matter what.


    Lin Fan saw this and just revealed a smile in secret.


    He wasn''t going to overstep where he didn''t need to.


    While chivalry was good, there were also times that women should be left to take care of their own problems, especially when they were more than capable of handling it.


    Jiang Zhi Shu and a few followers that he had personally chosen were also on this ship, but they had hid themselves and passed off as normal passengers.


    p With how much attention Lin Fan''s group was drawing, no one noticed their group of men who were all dressed in casual clothing. In fact, if they had been wearing full cloaks to disguise themselves, they would have attracted even more attention than just wearing normal clothes.</anda>


    However, during the entire trip, Jiang Zhi Shu was very tense.


    It wasn''t because he was seasick, or rather airsick, he just wanted to reach Rock Mountain City as soon as possible.


    There were still many questions that bothered him about this whole affair and they were close to exploding from being bottled deep down inside of him.


    The airship ride was quite uneventful, other than being surrounded by people staring at them, Lin Fan''s group didn''t have much to do.


    This wasn''t a luxury airship like the one fromst time, so there weren''t as many amenities for them, so they spent most of their time in their room rxing.


    The trip took a total of three days and when they finally arrived, they couldn''t wait to get off the ship. After all, this wasn''t a luxury ship, so the room that they had was quite small, but it was better than being in the shared living space like the others.


    When the airship finally set down in Rock Mountain City, Lin Fan was surprised by what he saw.


    Rock Mountain City was like the name suggested, there was a giant mountain that was by the city.


    Rock Mountain City had its own specialty like the other towns. Because of therge mountain that was by the town and therge amount of ores found inside that mountain, Rock Mountain City was a city that was filled with cksmiths.


    However, in this world that focused their attention on cultivation and training pets, not many people ced importance on cksmithing since they thought that it was only an indirect method of increasing one''s strength.


    That was because cksmiths didn''t make artifacts directly. Artifacts were made from infusingws into them and depending on how muchw energy was infused, that determined the grade of the artifact. All cksmiths did was create vessels to house thosews, so cksmiths never received the same level of respect as alchemists or Monster Trainers who could directly increase one''s strength.


    That was why even though this town was filled with cksmiths, it didn''t have an organization for them like the Alchemy Tower or the Monster Trainer Union.


    But that also meant that since there wasn''t a secondary power in this city, it meant that the Jiang Family were free to rule this entire city, which naturally made Lin Fan''s ns harder.


    Once they were off the ship, Jiang Zhi Shu gave a nod to Lin Fan when he inadvertently looked over, but Lin Fan didn''t acknowledge him at all. He just kept looking around like it was his first time in this city, which it was.


    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately headed off to meet up with the members of the information that they had set up to start his part of the n. To be honest, there was nothing more that he wanted than to rush to the Jiang Manor for answers, but Lin Fan had firmly ordered him not to do so before they had left Water Pearl City.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan even made a list of things for him to do that he had to follow. Of course, it wasn''t Lin Fan that had made it, but rather Brainy since Brainy was smart enough to guess exactly how Jiang Zhi Shu would act.


    Once Jiang Zhi Shu was gone, Lin Fan also walked around the receiving area for a bit before meeting up with someone as well.


    This person was a middle aged man with a neat moustache and a pair of gold rimmed sses, making him look like quite the schr. This man was the manager of the branch store that Lin Fan had set up here.


    The reason for setting up the branch was to prepare things in Rock Mountain City for his arrival and they had done exactly that.


    The manager handed Lin Fan a map and a list before quickly disappearing into the crowd.


    This map and list that the manager had given Lin Fan was of course a map of the entire Rock Mountain City, but the list was actually a list of avable stores in the worst performing business streets.


    Lin Fan knew that the key for his n this time was to be as low key as possible while he gained information and slowly put his ns into action. Therefore, he was choosing to put his store in an inconspicuous street.


    After receiving this map, Lin Fan headed off into Rock Mountain City with Ang and Song Shu.


    Of course, he wasn''t in as much of a rush as Jiang Zhi Shu was, so he took his time in exploring the city first.


    If Jiang Zhi Shu could see him now, he definitely wouldn''t have been able to keep his calm since Lin Fan was just walking around and having fun with Ang and Song Shu. Even if Lin Fan wanted toe up with an excuse, he really didn''t have one since he was indeed just rxing and having fun.


    They had arrived in the morning, so after spending the entire morning walking around and after they had lunch, Lin Fan decided to scout the poor business streets.


    There were a total of six streets on the list that the manager had given him and he slowly went from one to the next.


    The first two didn''t contain anything special and the foot traffic on those streets was close to nothing. Other than a few people who lived nearby who went to the shops, there was no one else that came at all.


    At the third street, there were more people that shopped at that street, but it was only at a single store. It was a store that surprisingly made a living off selling scallion pancakes and fortune telling.


    Lin Fan had been tempted by the scent as soon as he smelled it and he had tried to get a scallion pancake for himself, but he was told that the daily limit had already been sold. However, when he was leaving, a young man came out of the store and moved past the person who Lin Fan thought was the store owner. He came up to Lin Fan and looked right at him while counting with his fingers. After a while, he said, "It''s fate that we met, as someone who shares the same name, let me share a scallion pancake with you."


    Lin Fan didn''t know what any of that meant, but he wasn''t going to turn down this chance.


    In the end, he was only able to get a single bite of the scallion pancake before it was taken away from him by Ang who surprisingly shared it evenly with Song Shu. However, that one bite that he did take was the best bite that he ever had.


    He had wanted to return to that store, but the doors had been closed when he went back, so he had no choice but to head off to the fourth street.


    When they arrived at the fourth street, Lin Fan had thought that it would be the same as the first two since the situation looked the same, but that wasn''t the case.


    When they passed by a decrepit looking cksmith, Ang suddenly stopped moving.


    She turned to look over at the only good disy of the cksmith shop and knit her brows before pulling on Lin Fan''s sleeve.


    Lin Fan turned to look at her in surprise as she pointed at the decrepit cksmith and then he followed her finger to see what she was pointing at.


    Normally Lin Fan never would have imagined that there was anything special about this cksmith, but it was Ang''s instincts that was telling her to go in, so Lin Fan chose to believe her. After all, the past instances of Ang''s instincts had never disappointed him.


    But when Lin Fan was about to walk into the cksmith, there was a hammer that suddenly flew out at his head as a loud voice shouted from inside, "Get out of here you scum, I told you to nevere back!"

 233 Chapter 233

    Of course, a hammer that was thrown at this level was nothing for Lin Fan.


    He easily dodged out of the way and reached his hand out to grab the hammer that flew past his head, but then he was shocked by the force that the hammer contained.


    He didn''t expect much from the hammer and had casually reached out to grab it, but he hadn''t been able topletely stop the force which had made him stumble back a bit. However, the moment the force of the hammer did make him stagger a bit, Lin Fan quickly used his life energy to neutralize the force of the hammer.


    When he turned to look at the hammer, he was surprised to see that there was a faint golden glow around it that normal people would have missed. This was the golden life energy of a Gold Realm Expert.


    While Gold Realm Experts weren''t considered as rare in S Rank City, most of them were still quite well off, rather than being in a decrepit cksmith like this. So why was there a Gold Realm Expert here?


    Moreover, based on how thin the life energy around the hammer was, it was clear that this expert was quite skilled in controlling their life energy.


    While Lin Fan was wondering about the owner of the hammer, the owner himself came out to see the aftereffects of the hammer they threw.


    The owner of this hammer was a bald old man who while skinny had a very muscr build.


    The old man saw Lin Fan holding his hammer and he narrowed his eyes before saying, "Who sent you?"


    Lin Fan was confused when he heard this as he asked, "This old sir, what do you mean by that?"


    The old man gave a snort and said, "You want to y the fool? Fine, give me back my hammer first."


    Lin Fan was going to give the hammer back, but as the old man''s hand approached the hammer slowly, he suddenly grabbed it and swung up at Lin Fan''s face.


    While this had caught Lin Fan off guard, Lin Fan was in the end a tinum Realm Expert, so an attack of this level wasn''t enough to deal with him.


    Lin Fan just used his other hand covered in a golden glow to stop the hammer.


    The old man narrowed his eyes once again when he saw this and he muttered, "Gold Realm Expert? No, those arews, it''s a tinum Realm Expert."


    The old man quickly jumped back after saying this and said, "It seems like your boss really respects me, he''s even willing to send a tinum Realm Expert to deal with me."


    Lin Fan and Ang looked at each other with confused looks before Lin Fan said, "What do you mean by my boss? I''m here as a customer."


    Seeing the genuine confused look on Lin Fan''s face, the old man was taken aback before saying, "You really aren''t here on their orders?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I don''t even know who they are."


    The old man didn''t know what to say before moving back to his forge, "Well look around if you want then."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he was certain that this old man had his own story, but for now he wanted to check out the old man''s wares first. Not only was Ang''s instincts drawn to this ce, Lin Fan could tell from the control of the life energy around the hammer, this old man was quite skilled.


    As the owner of a shop, naturally the more knowledgeable he was, the better he would be able to run it.


    After the experience in the pyramid, especially with what happened in the mirror, Lin Fan realized that he was too inexperienced. As well, he had been hoarding his points with the system too much since he was afraid of spending them and not having them in the future. He realized that if he didn''t use them now, he might not have a chance to use them in the future.


    Aftering back from the nar crack, Lin Fan had slowly used his points with the system to exchange for new techniques. Namely, different production techniques and information on ingredients.


    One of those techniques that he learned was naturally cksmithing.


    He knew that for cksmiths, the most important thing was the fine control of their life energy since controlled application of energy would allow them precisely refine the material they were working on. With how thin and concentrated the old man had made the life energy around his hammer, it was clear that he had very fine control of his life energy.


    But once again, the question was raised, why was a man of his skill doing in this decrepit shop?


    Lin Fan put that thought aside for now and began moving across the shop, but he saw that there were only a few pieces that were put on disy.


    However, when he began looking over all these pieces he was shocked by what he had found.


    Of the few pieces that were present, most of these were all tinum Grade Seeds


    For cksmiths, the work they created were considered seeds which were vessels forws to be injected into. Before thews were injected in, they were just normal weapons or items, but oncews were injected in, they became artifacts.


    Dependent on the intensity of thews that were injected in, that determined the grade of the artifact, which was why normally no one used an artifact below the Silver Realm unless they were still in training since Silver Realm and below artifacts were nothing more than training artifacts.<sub> </sub>


    But for the seeds to ept thews, that depended on the level of the seeds themselves. Which in turn all depended on the level of the cksmith.


    What a tinum Grade Seed was was a weapon or item that could eptws up to the tinum Realm, which meant that they could potentially be tinum Realm Artifacts dependent on the person who injected thews.


    For Lin Fan, this meant that there were potentially more than ten tinum Realm Artifacts here for him to take.


    While he didn''t personally need this, he could definitely give them to his subordinates and make them much stronger than they were now.


    It had to be known that a high Gold Realm Expert with a tinum Realm Artifact would be able to take on a peak Gold Realm Expert. If he were to give his subordinates these, that would mean increasing the power of ten high Gold Realm Experts.


    Lin Fan was more than confident in his ability to control hisws because of the various techniques he had received from the system. While they were God Tier Techniques which could only be obtained through missions, they were still techniques that were far above this lower realm.


    To make a tinum Realm Artifact with these tinum Realm Seeds was just a simple flip of the hand for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan quickly looked over the prices and found that while these tinum Realm Seeds weren''t cheap, being sold at more than double the price of normal tinum Realm Seeds, he could tell that these were all well made. The fact that they were all well made meant that there was a chance of spiritual awakening during the creation process.


    A spiritual awakening would make the artifact simr to his Iron Eater Bone Artifact, allowing it to develop a will that could connect and grow with the user.


    Just a single spiritual awakening would more than make up for the price of all these tinum Realm Seeds.


    Once again, this begged to differ, who was this old man and what was he doing in a ce like this?


    After seeing all this, Lin Fan made up his mind to buy the store on this street since it would put him closer to this old man, especially since the open store was just next to this cksmith. But before that, he had to buy all these tinum Realm Seeds first.


    Lin Fan picked all of them up and brought them to the counter where he rang the bell that was there.


    The old man looked up from his forge and knit his brows when he saw this.


    The old man came over and said, "What are you doing? Are you trying to cause trouble?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "I want to buy all of these and if possible, anything else you make in the future."


    The old man was taken aback for a second before angrily shouting, "Are you ying with me? Can you even afford all of them?"


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing as he tapped his watch on the payment device in the shop.


    The old man looked down at his own watch and seeing the transaction that was just processed, he was shocked. This young man had actually paid in full for all of these tinum Realm Seeds, not missing a single crystal.


    The old man looked back at Lin Fan and asked, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan pointed at the store next to the cksmith and said, "I''m your new neighbour, nice to meet you."


    The old man looked at the store before looking back at Lin Fan with a confused look, "New neighbour? I didn''t hear about anyone buying that store yet."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he walked out and headed to the store next door, heading in and showing the person at the counter the letter he had from the manager of his branch store.


    The person at the counter was the owner and he naturally recognized this letter, so he happily greeted Lin Fan and wanted to negotiate with him, but Lin Fan didn''t give him that chance.


    Lin Fan directly offered double the initial price which stunned the owner and while the owner was in a daze, he transferred the crystals.


    After the owner saw that the crystals were in his ount, he immediately gave Lin Fan the deed and happily left the door with a smile, skipping as he left the street.


    Lin Fan came out of the store once again and looking at the old man who hade out to look at him, he waved the deed in his hand with a smile.


    The old man didn''t know what to say in response to this as he looked at Lin Fan in a daze.


    It seemed like this kid hadn''t been joking, he really was his new neighbour.


    Only the old man had never expected him to buy the store next to his cksmith as soon as he walked out.

 234 Chapter 234

    After having fun at the old man''s expense, Lin Fan headed back into the store and closed all the curtains before heading back out.


    He let the system do what it did best and in just a few minutes, the shop had beenpletely decorated in the same way as the other stores.


    Now the only thing he had to do was stock up the ingredients and open the next morning.


    Of course, there was something else he had to do as well since this store was being opened in a different situationpared to the rest.


    Instead of having a backer that helped him promote the store, this time he started with nothing. Well, it wasn''t exactly nothing since he had already set up another business and a spywork in the city already, but it was still much less than having the ruling family of the city support you.


    Not to mention that if he attracted too much attention, he would attract the attention of the Jiang Family before it was time.


    So Lin Fan did something that was differentpared to before, he actually advertised his store, but he didn''t use normal advertisements. He went on the forums of this city to advertise using a challenge.


    He had his subordinates make multiple posts about his store on the forums.


    The gist of it was, "I''ve heard that there is a pet store that will offer you twice the fee if you''re not satisfied with their training." Then they also added the price of the training to their post. With how high Lin Fan''s fees were, naturally there would be many people who would be enticed by this.


    So Lin Fan let things stew under the surface while he went to the house that his subordinates had prepared for him to rest up for the night.


    When he arrived at the store first thing the next morning, he had been expecting to see a crowd forming outside his store, but he was proven wrong.


    Rock Mountain City was a S Rank City, but unlike the other S Rank Cities, this city''s economy was much worse.


    In the other cities, there were two forces that bnced each other, which meant that no power could hold a monopoly in that city. Not to mention that the ruling families were actually kind families that cared about developing the city, so they did their best to improve the economy and share the wealth. However, it was different here in Rock Mountain City.


    The Jiang Family was the sole ruling force in this city, so naturally they could form a monopoly on all business in the city. But of course, no family could rule alone, so they gave advantages to the family that supported them. In the end, that meant that all the families that supported them flourished while the other families that defied them were all chased out.


    The Jiang Family was unlike the other Legendary Realm Families who cared about developing their cities. The Jiang Family only cared about their own benefits, so they didn''t distribute the wealth with the citizens of the city, keeping most of it for themselves.


    That meant that Rock Mountain City operated on a noble caste system where one was ranked based on their heritage and family power. The rich became richer while the poor suffered in their poverty with the middle ss not doing that much better than the poor.


    However, two thousands crystals was arge amount, so naturally it had drawn in a few people in the end.


    But not a single one of them used Lin Fan''s service in the end.


    That was because unlike in the other cities, most people in this city had to rely on their strength to survive, so the average level of cultivation was much higher than the other S Rank Cities.


    Most of the people who came to the store were all in the Bronze Realm and it cost a thousand crystals to train their pets.


    Even if they were tempted by the two thousand crystals that they could get from just testing this training once, in truth, they weren''t able to afford it at all.


    Most of them didn''t earn more than a few crystals a month, so there was no way they would have a thousand crystals just lying around.


    Some of them had the idea of grouping together and then splitting the profits between themselves, but most of them couldn''t find enough people who they trusted to do this with.


    Rock Mountain City wasn''t just poor, it was alsocking in public security since the Jiang Family that ruled it didn''t believe in investing in public services. All they did was maintain a certain part of the city where the nobility lived while the other parts of the city received no support at all.


    Other than the main shopping areas which had a few guards around, there were no other guards found all over the city, which greatly decreased public security.


    So most people either had close friends or they didn''t associate with people at all since no one was certain what the other person would do.


    The only reason the main shopping area was even guarded was because the nobles had invested in some stores there, but the guards only guarded the stores of the nobles and didn''t care about what happened on the streets at all.<sub> </sub>


    When Lin Fan had been exploring yesterday with Ang and Song Shu, he had been targeted by pickpocket four times in a row. Of course, none of them had been able to steal a single thing from Lin Fan and had all received a harsh lesson, but that proved just how bad the security in the town was.


    But Rock Mountain City never fell into chaos because it was a city that was guarded by a Legendary Realm Family. No one was crazy enough to pick a fight with a Legendary Realm Family since they represented the peak of the Blue Star World.


    Other than petty crimes, no one dared to do anything too serious.


    Of course, there was another reason for why the city was neverpletely filled with chaos.


    It was because there was the Seeker Guild branch that was near Rock Mountain.


    Rock Mountain was filled with many minerals, but it was also filled with many rock type beasts that were very dangerous.


    In order to take care of these beasts, seekers would be sent into the mines from time to time to clear out portions before workers would be allowed into the mines for work.


    The main thing was that the leader of this branch was a powerful man who had grown up in Rock Mountain City, so he had a deep connection to the city. If anyone ever took it too far, he would always stop them personally.


    The Seeker Guild was an organization that was on the same level as the Monster Trainer Union, so even if he was only the leader of the branch, no one would offend him for no reason.


    With these two deterring forces, the situation in Rock Mountain City never reached a point where it was considered bad, but it definitely wasn''t considered good.


    Lin Fan spent the entire day waiting in the store, watching as people came and left.


    There were even a few that had tried to shoplift, but Lin Fan didn''t even need to do a thing since the moment they tried leaving with their stolen goods, they would bump into an invisible wall.


    This happened several times and there were even a few who had tried to break through with force, but the only thing that happened was that they were mmed into the ground by the force of their own attack.


    Eventually, rumours began spreading about Lin Fan''s store and soon no one dared to steal from it again.


    But even with these rumours and with the enticement of his offer, he still couldn''t get anyone to use the services of his store.


    Lin Fan had sat there for an entire day, watching various peoplee in and out of his store, but not a single person hade to the counter to talk to him.


    All of them wandered around for a bit before leaving the store and by the end of the day, he didn''t have a single customer.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to do, he never thought that the situation in Rock Mountain City would be this bad.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan decided to use money to solve his problem.


    That night, most of the posts on the forum had changed and now they were offering four times thepensation.


    That''s right, it had gone from two thousand crystals to four thousand crystals if they weren''t satisfied with the service.


    ? Four thousand crystals definitely wasn''t a small amount, it was an amount that a family could live a frugal life on without ever having to work, but still it didn''t work.


    When Lin Fan came to the store the next day, there were certainly more people that had shown up to check out his store, eithering because of the enticement of the posts or after hearing the rumours of what happened yesterday.


    However, even with all these people showing up, not a single person was an actual paying customer.


    Most of them hade to check out either Lin Fan or the store and had left after wandering around.


    It wasn''t until the afternoon when Lin Fan was seriously pondering if he should change something that the first customer for this branch appeared.

 235 Chapter 235

    While Lin Fan was behind the counter pondering if he should make some changes, there was a person who walked in.


    This person wasn''t particrly handsome nor did he have a powerful aura.


    If one were to use a word to describe him, it would be the word "normal".


    Everything about him was normal, whether it was his face, his stature, or his aura. There just was nothing special about him, but he did have a special identity.


    This young man was actually a junior from one of the branch families of the Jiang Family, which meant that technically he was actually from the Jiang Family.


    However, this young man was someone who wasn''t that talented, so he never received any focus training. Moreover, because of hisck of talent, his family didn''t bother investing any resources into him. Even if he wanted to be stronger and change his fate, he didn''t have a chance to do so. Or at least there was no chance without risking his life.


    He had heard about this store on the forumsst night which was one of his hobbies.


    Since he had no specialties in real life, this young man found another ce for him to feel a sense of superiority, bing a mod on the city''s forums.


    While scrolling through the forums as usual, he found this topic that had been gaining poprity on the forums. That topic was the one about Lin Fan''s store.


    This young man named Jiang You suddenly had an idea.


    Saving up everything that he had been given he had been able to just save over a thousand crystals which in itself was a funny concept. For a normal family, they wouldn''t be able to save up a thousand crystals in their entire lifetime, but for an average junior of the Jiang Family''s branch family he was able to do so in just a few years.


    Jiang You had been pushed into a corner at this point, if he didn''t do anything, he might even be kicked out of the family at this rate.


    There was a major exam that wasing at the end of this month and at this rate, Jiang You wouldn''t be able to score a single point on the exam, not to mention passing it.


    If he could get the four thousand crystals offered by this pet store, he would be able to buy the one elixir that he needed to strengthen his pet and reach the level necessary for him to pass the exam. Never once did it cross his mind that his pet could be stronger from being trained at this shop, the only thought he had was that he would be able to earn the amount that needed to improve his pet from this shop.


    Even if he was someone from the Jiang Family''s branch family, he still was very prideful as someone from the Jiang Family.


    He believed that true Monster Trainers wouldn''t stoop so low to advertise their store. The only reason that this store could be able to offer such prices must be because it was the ything of some rich young master.


    Since that was the case, he didn''t have any qualms against taking this money.


    But when he came in, he felt much more hesitant after seeing Lin Fan.


    The inside of the store was nothing like he had expected. He had expected a gaudy looking ce with plenty of expensive toysying all around, but what he saw was a clean and professional looking pet shop.


    Then there was the man sitting behind the counter whose aura wasn''t normal at all.


    While others might think that this man sitting behind the counter was a normal person, that was because he was hiding his strength. Jiang You as someone who came from the Jiang Family naturally had an eye for power. He could easily tell that Lin Fan was like those from the main family, his power definitely couldn''t be underestimated.


    But seeing this made him hesitate since he was no longer certain of his n.


    If there was someone of this caliber who was manning the counter, just who was the person behind the store?


    If that was the case, then would he be able to even make them keep their promise after he told them he was dissatisfied with their service?


    This kind of thing was considered a very normal scam in Rock Mountain City, offering a service while taking money from many different people. Then the next day, that store wouldpletely disappear from Rock Mountain City.


    However, without knowing why, there was a small part of him that believed that this store was real, a small part of him that still had hope.


    He didn''t know why that was, maybe it was because of the mysterious background of the store or maybe it was because he didn''t have any hope left at all.


    If he didn''t do a single thing, there was no way for him toe out of this unscathed. Perhaps his only choice really was to make a gamble on this store.


    As for Lin Fan, after taking a single look at Jiang You after he came in, Lin Fan didn''t care about him anymore. To Lin Fan, he seemed like he was just another person who was here to watch and didn''t seem like he wanted to try his service.


    Eventually, Jiang You gave into his hopes and came forward to the counter.


    Lin Fan looked at him with a surprised gaze, but he still didn''t say a thing as he sat there.


    Jiang You hesitated for a few seconds before saying, "Can I get my pet trained here?"<sub> </sub>


    When these words were uttered, everyone in the store around them suddenly turned to look at Jiang You.


    Most of them hade here for the same reason, which was thergepensation that the store offered, but all of them had also been scared off by the high price. Even the lowest price of one hundred crystals for an Iron Realm pet had been too much for them.


    As for the rest of them, they were very curious about this store and just what kind of training they offered that they thought justified this price.


    Lin Fan looked at Jiang You for a bit before revealing his signature smile, "Of course, please take out your pet and let me take a look."


    p When Lin Fan''s "signature" smile came out, Jiang You''s lips couldn''t help twitching and he almost took a step back, but he firmed his heart and took out his pet.</anda>


    As for the people around them, the doubt in their hearts became even deeper. They were all from Rock Mountain City, so they were all familiar with swindlers. Not a single person in this store doubted that Lin Fan wasn''t a swindler after seeing that smile.


    Jiang You''s pet was a Rock Nibbler, which was a rock attributed mouse pet. It looked like a normal mouse, but the only thing special about it was its sharp fang that even went down past its chin.


    Lin Fan nodded as he acted like he was appraising the pet before he said, "This is a good pet young man. If you want to get your pet trained here, it''ll be a thousand crystals."


    This price wasn''t a surprise since most people here hade after learning of the prices first. However, what they were taken aback by was how Lin Fan spoke.


    Most of the people who came here for thepensation were all petty swindlers and they were attracted here by the easy mark, but now most of them felt relieved that they didn''t fall for this. Even if they weren''t certain before, they were certain now that Lin Fan was definitely a swindler.


    With how he talked and that smile he had which seemed natural for him, he was clearly very skilled at this.


    Jiang You naturally felt the same, but the tiny spark of hope in him was still burning bright, so he chose to take a risk and make a bet.


    Jiang You nodded before bringing his watch forward towards the payment device that Lin Fan had set up.


    Lin Fan saw this and set up the transaction with the payment device. Then after Jiang You tapped his watch on the payment device, Lin Fan received a notification that the funds had been transferred.


    Lin Fan''s smile became even wider which made everyone''s lips twitch as they felt pity for this young man who had just fallen prey to Lin Fan''s scheme.


    However, Jiang You had made up his mind and he would follow it to the end since he had no other choice.


    Still, that didn''t mean that he would just leave without making sure that he would get his money''s worth.


    After making the payment, Jiang You asked Lin Fan, "Sir, when can Ie and pick up my pet?"


    Lin Fan waved his hand and said, "There''s no need to be this formal, just call me Owner Lin. You cane back tomorrow morning to pick up your pet."


    Lin Fan acted this way because he knew that he only needed a single customer to start his business, so he was very grateful towards Jiang You. However, what he didn''t know was that as his smile became wider and the more friendly he acted, the more it seemed like this was all a scam.


    Jiang You was taken aback by Lin Fan''s words as he said, "Owner? You''re the owner of this store? Also just a single day? Are you sure?"


    All Monster Trainers took their time training pets, but this store was going to finish their training in just a single day?


    How could that be possible?


    Lin Fan nodded as he said, "That''s right, this is my store and yes, you cane pick up your pet in a day."


    When he heard this, Jiang You felt even more unsettled, but since he had already paid, there was nothing else he could do.


    The only thing that he could do now was wait and see what would happen tomorrow. Well, the other thing he could do was send some subordinates to watch this store and see if the owner tried to skip town tonight¡­


    Still since he had already decided to take this gamble, he would follow through to the end.


    Jiang You nodded in the end and said, "Alright, I''lle back tomorrow then."


    After saying that, he turned to leave, but of course he made a few calls after he did leave.


    Everyone else also left, some went to spread this news and some went to follow Jiang You since they thought he was an easy mark since he had even fallen for such an obvious scam.


    Soon, there was only Lin Fan left in the store, but he didn''t mind since he knew that everything would change tomorrow.

 236 Chapter 236

    That night, after Lin Fan closed the store, he didn''t immediately go back to the residence he had rented.


    Instead he went through the Any ce Door to bring Momonga over to the new store since there was something he wanted to do today.


    After the experience in the nar crack back in Water Pearl City, Lin Fan knew that his habit of saving up his points for a worst case scenario wasn''t the right idea. He realized that if he didn''t use them to be stronger now, they would just go to waste if something were to ever happen to him.


    So other than using his points to learn different techniques and increasing his knowledge, Lin Fan had also splurged and bought ess to another cultivation realm.


    While it wasn''t a top grade cultivation realm since that was something that was far beyond what he could afford at this time, it was still a high grade cultivation realm that was just below it.


    This realm was one of the only high grade cultivation realms that Lin Fan had avable to purchase since his store was only level one right now. If he wanted to have the option to purchase more cultivation realms, he had to unlock them first by upgrading his shop.


    But even though this was the cheapest one that was offered to him, it still took most of his points to buy it. After saving up points for close to four months now, Lin Fan had spent all of that on a single cultivation realm.


    Of course, he also made sure to leave several hundred thousand points just in case since he wasn''t someone that would throw caution to the wind. He left several hundred thousand because just the cheapest item that was considered decent to Lin Fan, which would be the Legendary Realm, cost at least a million points.


    Also he needed points to revive himself in the cultivation realms.


    While it didn''t cost him any points to revive pets, if he were to die, he would have to pay points to revive himself.


    The reason why he resolved himself to buy a new realm was because he had reached the limit of what he could gain from the World of Elements and the Lich''s Necropolis. These two realms were the domains of Ang and Momonga respectively, which meant that they hadplete control over these realms.


    When Lin Fan went to train in these realms, there wasn''t any danger to him since both Ang and Momonga could control the environment that he trained in. Without any danger, it didn''t stimte the potential in him and he didn''t experience any substantial growth. He did grow in terms ofbat experience and cultivation, but it was just too slow for him.


    That was why Lin Fan chose to get another unknown cultivation realm.


    But of course, Lin Fan wasn''t crazy enough to go into this unknown cultivation realm by himself, so he would be bringing along his two powerful bodyguards.


    In these cultivation realms, Momonga and Ang were free to use their powers, which meant that he would be safe to a certain extent.


    They would watch over him and wouldn''t interfere unless his life was in danger, only then would they save him.


    However, that would be a verymon thing in this high grade cultivation realm.


    Even the weakest subordinates of Ang and Momonga were already far stronger than Lin Fan, so for this high grade cultivation realm, it must mean that almost all the beasts there would be stronger than Lin Fan.


    This was basically a babysitting job for Momonga and Ang and naturally neither of them would be willing to take such a job, so Lin Fan had no choice but to bribe both of them toe with him.


    For Momonga, he had recently been getting into idol figurines, but of course he didn''t have that much of the Blue Star''s currency. The currency he did have was on a much higher level than the Blue Star, but it was also tainted with the aura of the dead, so there would be few people that would ept this. Not to mention that if he did use it, his identity might be exposed quite quickly since such a high grade currency would naturally attract the attention of the upper realm forces.


    That was where Lin Fan came in.


    Lin Fan was quite rich now with the profit that he earned from the store and the business that he ran on the side, so he had no problems giving Momonga the money. But of course, Lin Fan wouldn''t give it to him for free, so Momonga was bribed intoing onto this trip.


    For Ang, it was even simpler. Ang was a notoriously big eater and her favourite were sweets, namely cakes. Lin Fan used the same bribe as he always used, promising her new kinds of sweets that she never had before if she came.


    After they were all gathered in the shop, Lin Fan brought out the star of today''s trip, the Rock Nibbler.


    It still hadn''t developed the normal fear that the other pets would develop towards Lin Fan since he hadn''t started its training yet. It had spent the entire afternoon in the special cages of this shop which was specially made to nurture pets, so it actually had quite the good impression towards Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan brought it out of the cage, it even nuzzled up against his hand, asking to be put back in.


    However, Lin Fan used his cheat against beasts and soon the Rock Nibbler was doing its best to act cute to have Lin Fan use his suction force on it.<sub> </sub>


    With everyone gathered, Lin Fan had the system open up the portal to the cultivation realm and they all set off.


    The cultivation realm that Lin Fan chose was called the Rock Field Realm.


    ording to the description of the system, this realm was a realm that was filled with naturally formed mountains that contained a variety of rock attributed beasts, which was perfect for the Rock Nibbler. It would gain knowledge on how to use special skills from fighting these rock attributed beasts, while also absorbing power from their core to enhance its own power since they were of the same attribute.


    When they arrived in the Rock Field Realm, they appeared on a rocky in with mountains surrounding them.


    Lin Fan first started by getting their bearings and Ang just followed behind him. However, for Momonga, the moment he appeared in this realm, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows.


    Momonga then asked, "Lin Fan, how does your master choose these realms that he sends you to?"


    Lin Fan had long expected them to ask this, he just never expected it to take this long. Lin Fan replied, "My master looks for the concentration of energy on each and if one has a suitable concentration of energy, he sends me there to train along with the pets of the store." Then he asked, "Why do you ask this?"


    Momonga''s brows knit even deeper as he said, "I don''t know why, but this realm feels simr to me. However, the strange thing is that there are only beasts that haven''t gained intelligence living here."


    Lin Fan looked at Ang and she gave a nod in response. Then he asked, "Is there a problem if there are only beasts living here?"


    Momonga shook his head, "It''s not a problem per say, but if this feels familiar, it should mean that I''ve been here before. However, I wouldn''te to a without any special resources like this without a reason and generally that would mean an intelligent being here worth visiting. So why does this feel familiar?"


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say to this since he couldn''t answer this.


    However, Momonga wasn''t looking for an answer from him either. After a bit of silence, he said, "I''m going to look around for a bit, you just stay with Ang and train."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he did only need one of them to help him, so he just gave a nod.


    p With that, Momonga set off by himself to explore.</anda>


    ¡­


    On another part of the Rock Field Realm, there were two cloaked figures that were moving through a cave.


    One of these figures was petite while the other one was quite tall.


    These two carefully moved through the cave with their torches raised up, as if they were expecting a trap to trigger at any moment.


    However, nothing happened as they made their way through.


    Eventually, they made their way through the cave and reached arge room.


    The moment they entered the room, there were torches on the wall that suddenly lit up, revealing the only thing that was in the center of the room. It was a totem that went from the floor to the roof and all along the totem were various faces carved into it.


    The smaller figure said, "The rumours were true, we''ve finally found it."


    The taller figure however reached their hand out to stop the smaller figure and said, "Young master, please calm yourself. This isn''t the time to lose your head, we still need to be careful."


    The smaller figure had been about to rush forward to the totem, but once they were stopped by the taller figure, they calmed down.


    The smaller figure gave a nod before reaching into their cloak and pulling out a key that was attached to a string tied around their neck. Then that smaller figure said, "I''ve finally found it."

 237 Chapter 237

    The two of them slowly made their way over to the totem while checking for traps, but there weren''t any to be found.


    Slowly they made their way over to the totem that was ced right in the center of the room,ing to a mouth that was facing them with a keyhole in its mouth. The shape of the keyhole perfectly matched the shape of the key that the smaller figure was wearing around their neck.


    After checking the totem and making sure that nothing was wrong, the taller figure took a few steps back as the smaller figure took the key and ced it in the hole.


    The moment the key was inserted, it was like there was a strange force that pulled it in and turned the key automatically. The key turned a half rotation before being pulled deeper into the hole and turning another half circle to make a full rotation.


    As soon as the key finished its full rotation, the entire cave began to shake as the totem suddenly started spinning. The moment it began spinning, it also began slowly receding into the floor of the cave, turning as it sunk into the floor.


    Once the totem had fully sunk down into the floor, swallowing the key as it went, the shaking in the room finally stopped as arge circr door was revealed in the wall of the cave.


    After the circr passage was revealed in the wall of the cave, there was a booming voice that rang out, "Wee challenger and congrattions on finding our legacy. The trial will begin once all participants enter the gathering area."


    What these two figures didn''t know was that this voice didn''t just ring out in the cave, it had rung out through the entire cultivation realm. Naturally that also meant that Lin Fan, Ang, and Momonga had all heard this.


    The two figures werepletely unaware of this as they headed into the passage.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan had been watching the Rock Nibbler fight a giant rock monster that was more than a hundred times its size, dying again and again to the rock monster when he suddenly felt a tremble in the ground.


    At first he didn''t care about the slight tremble since he thought that it was a small earthquake, but then there was a burst of energy that was hard for him to ignore. Of course, there was also the booming voice that filled the air saying, "Wee challenger and congrattions on finding our legacy. The trial will begin once all participants enter the gathering area."


    Lin Fan looked at Ang who just shook her head to show that she didn''t know what was going on either.


    But while they were confused, Momonga had suddenlye back from his exploration trip.


    Lin Fan was about to ask Momonga what this was, but before he could say anything, Momonga said, "Let''s go, this is a good chance."


    Momonga didn''t exin anything as he suddenly flicked out with his finger, knocking out the rock monster that the Rock Nibbler had been fighting. Then without even turning back, he headed off in a certain direction.


    Lin Fan and Ang looked at each other before Lin Fan called back the Rock Nibbler and followed behind Momonga.


    They tried asking Momonga what was happening, but he ignored all these questions as he looked like he was lost in thought. However, he didn''t pause for even a second.


    Following the waves of energy that came from a certain ce, eventually they reached the same cave that the two cloaked figures had entered.


    Walking along this cave, they eventually reached the same room, but the only difference was that there wasn''t a totem in this room at all and there was only a passage for them. The totem hadpletely sunk down into the floor and the top of the totem perfectly blended with the colour of the floor.


    Momonga didn''t linger for even a second as he walked right down that passage.


    Lin Fan and Ang were clearly still confused, but they still followed him.


    While Ang still had her own personal feelings towards Momonga, she just followed Lin Fan.


    As for Lin Fan, Momonga wasn''t just a friend. Through studying under Momonga for four months now, Lin Fan was close to considering Momonga half a teacher, so there was a bond of trust between them.


    Eventually they came out to a room that waspletely carved out of blue crystals with a single arch on a tform slightly above the level of the floor right in front of the wall opposite of them.


    However, they weren''t alone in this room.


    Standing opposite of them, right by the tform with the arch patiently waiting were the two cloaked figures.


    The two cloaked figures were also looking in their direction and based on the aura that they released, it was clear that they weren''t friendly.


    The shorter of the two figures looked at the taller figure the moment Lin Fan''s group hade in and the taller figure gave a nod. Then without any dy, the taller of the two figures had disappeared.


    Lin Fan couldn''t see what was happening, but that didn''t mean that the other two couldn''t.<sub> </sub>


    Ang just stood there not doing a thing since she knew that Momonga would take care of it and he did just that.


    Momonga raised one hand and with a flick of his finger, the taller figure was knocked away and sent flying back to the smaller figure. That taller figure slid across the floor beforeing to a stop in front of the smaller figure.


    The smaller figure was shocked before quickly squatting down to help the taller figure up.


    Just based on the way they were vigntly looking at Momonga, it was clear that they were scared of him. But that did make sense since Momonga was free to use his full power here and he was the infamous Ruler of Death.


    Since this was a cultivation realm that the system had sent them to, it meant that Momonga was free to use his full cultivation without fear of exposing Lin Fan.


    However, Momonga had his tact and he knew how to handle this situation. He was clear about what kind of cultivation the other side had and he used power that was just a single realm higher, but that single realm was like the gap between heaven and earth.


    Momonga gave a snort and said, "Only in the Realm and daring to act this arrogantly, you really don''t know where you are, do you?"


    The two cloaked figures became even more vignt when they heard this.


    The taller figure was the one who had shed with Momonga, so he could tell just how powerful he was from that blow just now. If his guess was right, this might even be an expert in the Sun Realm.


    Not to mention that he had twopanions with him who were both hiding their cultivation.


    If they were both in the same realm, they would definitely be in a bad position.


    After a bit of hesitation, the smaller of the two figures spoke, "We don''t mean any harm, we just came here to take the trial for the inheritance. If possible, we could work together to take it."


    The voice that came out was one that surprised Lin Fan since it was the voice of a girl.


    He never expected this cloaked figure to be a girl.


    Momonga on the other hand stared at these two cloaked figures for a bit before pulling Lin Fan aside, "What do you think we should do? You''re the one in charge here."


    Lin Fan thought for a bit before saying, "They are the ones who opened this ce, so it''s their right to it. We''re the ones who suddenly intruded on them."


    Momonga revealed a faint smile as he said, "But they''re the ones who attacked us first. If it wasn''t for the fact that we''re stronger than them, they would have already killed us."


    Lin Fan said, "But¡­"


    But Momonga cut him off, "Alright, there''s no need to try and convince me, I''m for working with them as well. Just tell me what you''re really thinking."


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile, "We can get information from them if we work with them."


    Momonga nodded as he said, "That''s true, but you''re not the one who thought of this, right?" At this, his smile became wider.


    Lin Fan said with the same smile, "Yes, it was Brainy who thought of this. Brainy told me that they must have sent the weaker one to test us to see if we''re worth cooperating with. Now that we''ve passed their test, they will want to work with us until they can find a chance to betray us. However, that also means that we can use them for information before that."


    Momonga nodded before saying, "It''s good that you have the same idea as me. Alright, we''ll do that for now."


    As Momonga turned to head back to talk to the cloaked figures, Lin Fan stopped him by saying, "Wait, can you tell me what this ce is first?"


    Momonga turned back to look at Lin Fan as he said, "Wait for a bit, I''ll tell you once we get in."


    Lin Fan nodded and they headed back to where Ang had been waiting and watching the two cloaked figures.


    Momonga was the one who spoke since he was the one who made a move. Keeping Lin Fan and Ang''s abilities hidden would be a good bargaining chip for them.


    Momonga said, "Alright, we can work together."

 238 Chapter 238

    The two cloaked figures rxed a bit when they heard this, but they still maintained a vignt appearance.


    The two sides came a bit closer and they discussed the terms of cooperation.


    Finally after a bit of negotiations, they reached terms that they were both satisfied with and reached a deal to cooperate in this inheritance trial.


    Lucky for them, the moment that had reached this deal, the voice from earlier rang out once again.


    "Congrattions to everyone for qualifying for the Sacred Rock Realm''s legacy inheritance trial. We will now be testing you all to see if you''re truly worthy of epting this legacy."


    When Momonga heard this, he muttered under his voice, "It really is the Sacred Rock Realm."


    Lin Fan heard this and looked confused, but he also knew that this wasn''t the time to ask, so he just made a mental note of the name of the realm.


    Sacred Rock Realm, it really did sound like an important sounding name.


    The voice continued after a pause.


    "The door to the inheritance trial will now open. There will be a total of five trials that you must pass before you''re able to im the Sacred Rock Realm''s legacy. I wish you all the best of luck."


    As soon as the voice fell, the arch that was on the tform suddenly lit up, releasing a dark blue flow. There were runes that lit up all around the arch and soon the space in between the arch suddenly warped before creating a portal.


    This portal was one that everyone here was familiar with since they had all gone through one once before.


    For Lin Fan, it was when he had gone into the Inheritance Realm back in Snow Wind City.


    Both of their parties looked at each other before the both headed towards the portal.


    The portal was decently wide enough for both of their sides to go into together, but Lin Fan''s group stayed back for a second to let the cloaked group go in first.


    The reasoning that Momonga gave them was that they were the ones who found this realm first, so they allowed them to go first, but that wasn''t necessarily the case. After the cloaked figures had gone through, Lin Fan, or rather Brainy and Momonga looked over the different runes of the portal.


    However, after a bit, Momonga and Brainy both shook their heads, showing that they weren''t able to make sense of it.


    So after taking a few photos to document them to study at their own leisure, they headed through the portal.


    When they came through, the two cloaked figures were already moving from cave to cave, looking at the descriptions that were written for each of the entrances with a portal in them.


    This was a room that waspletely filled with different caves that lined the walls, all of them with a portal that filled the entrance of the cave. To the right side of each cave was a small golden que that had some writing on it.


    Right in the center of the cave, there was a wooden sign sticking out of the ground which also had some letters written on them.


    Ignoring the actions of the two cloaked figures, Lin Fan''s group came up to the wooden sign and read what was written on it.


    The sign read, "Wee to the first trial. This will be a test of your intelligence. There are over a thousand caves in this room, each one with a different test with different point values depending on the difficulty of the test. Your goal will be to obtain one thousand points in twelve hours. Good luck!"


    Then below that, there was another set of rules written which said, "You may operate in teams, but the points given for each test will be divided evenly among team members. Please carefully consider this before going into each test because this cannot be changed once the test has been activated."


    This seemed quite straightforward and simple, but this kind of test most definitely always had a twist.


    But since they couldn''t figure out anything right now, Lin Fan''s group began following the example of the two cloaked figures and they also began looking over the different golden ques beside each portal.<sub> </sub>


    The ques all followed the same pattern where they listed the name of the test, the difficulty of the test, and the point value of the test, but they didn''t give a description at all. However, there were also a few ques that were different from the rest.


    The ques that were different followed two different patterns, it was either the name of the test or the difficulty of the test that was reced with a ???.


    Putting these ones aside, the rest of them all seem quite straightforward, which meant that all they had to do was choose a few of them to do. Of course, there was also the twelve hour time limit that they had.


    It took them around five minutes to go look around at the ques and after that, they came back to the wooden sign in the middle where the two cloaked figures had been waiting.


    After a moment of silence, the smaller cloaked figure said, "There''s no need for us to cooperate on this first trial, it''s actually easier if we went our separate ways, so should we do that?"


    She was absolutely right since they didn''t know what these different tests held for them, but if there were more of them that went in, that definitely wouldn''t be a good thing.


    Not mentioning that the points they would receive would be divided among them, so more people meant that each person received less points, if they were to all go into a single test, it wouldn''t be helpful. Unless it was arge scale test where more people would be helpful, most of these tests would be smaller, so more people would actually be detrimental instead of being helpful.


    Based on the names of the ones they had looked over, they saw that most of the easier tests were all at a smaller scale and most of those would be the ones that they would choose. The easier tests might give less points, but they also had a time limit, which meant that they wanted to grind out points as fast as possible. What else could give them points faster than the easy tests?


    So Lin Fan''s group agreed to this and headed off to one of the tests that had caught their attention earlier.


    Without any hesitation, they walked right through the portal and they appeared inside a white room with a white table that had a tower of t rocks on them.


    This was an easy test and the name of the test was Remove From the Stack.


    They walked over to the table where there was a piece of paper with further instructions for them on it.


    ording to that piece of paper, all they had to do for this test was to remove five pieces of stone from any part of this tower and put them to the top. Once that was done, they would receive a total of fifteen points, which would be five points for each of them.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the tower after reading this and thinking that this test really seemed familiar. It was almost like a game that he had yed back on earth¡­


    When Lin Fan was about to reach out to start pulling from the tower, Momonga grabbed his hand and stopped him as he said, "Wait, it might seem simple, but it isn''t as simple as you think."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused look.


    Seeing this, Momonga exined, "There''s earthws surrounding these stones which make them heavier, so we need to use our ownws to counteract that and hold the tower in ce. Let the girl do it, her windws make it easier for her to support the tower. In the meantime, let''s have a little talk, I''m sure there are some things you want me to exin."


    Lin Fan looked over at Ang and she nodded before sitting down in the one chair provided by the room. After sitting down, she looked over the tower, looking for a piece to take out first.


    Momonga waved his hand and also brought out two stools madepletely of bones for him and Lin Fan. After sitting down, he gestured for Lin Fan to sit down in the other.


    Lin Fan was hesitant at first since it was a stool madepletely of bones, but he still decided to sit down since he wanted to hear what Momonga wanted to say.


    Momonga was silent for a bit, like he was gathering his thoughts before he started, "Well first things first, I''m sure that you know that the name of this realm is the Sacred Rock Realm. That might not mean anything to you, but that''s a name that was once quite well known."


    Lin Fan remembered the voice that had introduced the trial to them had mentioned that this trial was for the legacy of the Sacred Rock Realm.


    Momonga continued, "The Sacred Rock Realm was a realm that had a Ruler before and was on the same level as that little girl and my realm, but they were also on a lower level since their Ruler was weaker than the ones of our realm. The Sacred Rock Realm was a realm that was close to the Zodiac Realm and it was said that their Ruler was actually one of the Zodiac Knights of the Zodiac Realm."


    After pausing, he then said, "However, no one was able to confirm that since the Sacred Rock Realm had suddenly disappeared one night."

 239 Chapter 239

    "Disappeared?" Lin Fan revealed a confused look, "What do you mean by disappear? How can a realm just disappear one night? Also, isn''t the realm still here?"


    Momonga gave a sigh, but he didn''t answer right away. Instead he asked Lin Fan a question, "What do you consider a realm? Is it the world itself?"


    Lin Fan didn''t quite understand what Momonga meant by that, but he still said with a nod, "Isn''t it the world? What else could a realm mean?"


    Momonga shook his head, "A world in the end is nothing more than a piece of dead rock, but a realm is the people who live on that piece of dead rock. For a realm to disappear, it naturally means that all the people disappeared as well."


    Lin Fan revealed a surprised look, "But how can all the people on a just disappear without a trace like that?"


    Momonga gave a shrug, "That is why it is a mystery, no one knows how it happened."


    Lin Fan knit his brows and asked, "Just how exactly did it happen?"


    Momonga continued his story, "Well, it didn''t happen as quickly as I made it sound, but they did disappear in one night. It started with the Ruler of this realm, one night, he had suddenly disappeared. His retainers had tried to keep it a secret for as long as possible, but that also didn''tst long until the entire court of the Ruler also disappeared in a single night."


    Lin Fan still had his brows knit as he asked, "How can a Ruler disappear in a single night? Aren''t Rulers at the top?"


    Momonga shook his head, "There are still distinctions between Rulers. The Ruler of this Sacred Rock Realm was only a low level Ruler, so it is possible for him to be taken care of. However, for it to happen without a trace in a single night, there aren''t many people who can do that."


    Lin Fan then said, "Then doesn''t that narrow the list down?"


    Momonga shook his head again, "Even if it does, what would be their gain in doing so? The Sacred Rock Realm had tried to hide these facts, but when all their experts suddenly disappear, naturally it would attract the attention of many people. The Sacred Rock Realm had quite a few allies, so with all these powers focused on this one realm, there would be no benefits being exposed as the person who eliminated all those experts. All that it would do would put a target on your back since everyone would be afraid that they would be next."


    Lin Fan knit his brows once again, "But that still doesn''t exin how an entire realm disappeared."


    Momonga said, "I''m getting there. The various different allies of the Sacred Rock Realm had sent experts toe help the Sacred Rock Realm, but in truth they were only there to inspect the resources of the Sacred Rock Realm. With all the different experts of the Sacred Rock Realm gone, naturally the allies had turned on them, but they did it tactfully. But the strange thing there was that after a week, everyone that hade to the Sacred Rock Realm had disappeared with the people remaining in the Sacred Rock Realm. Not a single person remained."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised, "Not a single person remained? But didn''t those powers have some way to track their experts?"


    Momonga shook his head, "They couldn''t find their experts at all and the strangest thing was that these weren''t weak experts, so they all had Soul Jades left in their respective homes. In a single night, all the Soul Jades of these experts had shattered."


    Soul Jades were jades that contained fragments of an expert''s soul which would allow one to see if that expert was still alive. If it shattered, it meant that the expert''s soul had also shattered and they werepletely dead.


    Lin Fan moved past all of that and asked, "But how does that rte back to the Zodiac Realm still?"


    Momonga said in a deliberate voice, "Because the day everyone in the Sacred Rock Realm disappeared, it was the same day the Zodiac Realm had disappeared."


    Lin Fan slowly asked, "Then you mean?..."


    Momonga gave a nod, "If the rumours about the Ruler of the Sacred Rock Realm is true, it means that we might find a clue on the Zodiac Realm here. We might even be able to find another one of the tokens."


    The tokens!


    That was something that had been on Lin Fan''s mind for a long time.


    The system had given him this quest a long time ago and he had to find all twelve of the tokens to unlock the Zodiac Realm. So far, he only had a single token that he had found in the Inheritance Realm.


    Even after casting out hiss and trying to find some information, he hadn''t had much hope since these tokens were items that could open the path to a top tier cultivation realm. This was a world that was equal to the World of Elements or the Lich''s Necropolis.<sub> </sub>


    If these tokens had ever been found, they must be in the hands of the highest experts in the universe, which meant that this truly was a nigh impossible quest for him right now.


    However, he had a chance to find one here on this realm! How could he let this chance go!


    Lin Fan said in an excited voice, "If there is one in this realm, it must be in the legacy, right?"


    Momonga stroke his chin for a bit, "It might be in the legacy, but I think that there might be a hidden task during this trial that might lead us to it instead. The Sacred Rock Realm Ruler had the awareness to prepare this trial ahead of his disappearance, which meant that he must have expected it. If that is the case, he must also expect the people who made him disappear to know about this, so he must have prepared a secret trial to avoid them from taking it."


    Lin Fan nodded along with this, but then he said, "But why is this realm a high tier cultivation realm instead of a top tier cultivation realm then?"


    Momonga exined, "The concentration of the energy in the realm is also affected by the level of experts found on that realm. With the disappearance of the Ruler and hisws, this realm being able to stay at the level of a Kingdom is already good enough. That just means that they had enough foundations for it to not degrade that much."


    Lin Fan still had another question to ask, "So why did no one evere back to this realm?"


    Momonga asked, "Would youe back to a realm where people suddenly disappeared from? Everyone was too afraid toe back and eventually they all forgot about this realm. But it also seems like there was an inheritance that was passed down, otherwise how could those two have opened this trial?"


    Lin Fan nodded at this. This was also something that he had been pondering.


    Just why had those two cloaked figures been on this abandoned cultivation realm?


    Still, they didn''t have time to think about this right now, they still had to take care of the various tests that were in front of them to get to the next round before this.


    Their talk had taken five minutes and during this time, Ang had already finished taking out four of the five pieces that she needed. She had just been waiting for them to finish their conversation before taking out thest piece.


    Once thest piece was taken out, they were sent out of the test room.


    When they had been sent out, there was no notification at all that they had received their points. But when they looked around, they found that on the back of their left hand, there was a ck dot that had appeared.


    When they tapped the ck dot with their right hand, there was a screen that appeared that showed their points which was all at five right now.


    Their goal was to reach two hundred and fifty points, so they still had to get another two hundred and forty five points each before they passed. However, it seemed quite easy if they were to base it on their previous experience. That one easy test was worth fifteen points and had only taken them five minutes.


    So they quickly went off to find another test.


    They chose another easy test this time, but the point value of this test was forty five, which meant that they would each get fifteen points.


    They had thought that it would be as easy as the first test, but they werepletely wrong.


    This test had been called Find the Pieces, which seemed quite simple enough, but it was anything but simple.


    They had been giving a puzzle that they had to find the pieces for, but the pieces of the puzzle were scattered all over the forest that was around them.


    In the end, it took them over half an hour just to find all the pieces since the forest around them was gigantic. Even when Ang and Momonga had used their full spiritual energy and speed, it still took them over half an hour.


    For the effort they put in, it wasn''t worth the forty five points.


    It was only after they came out and looked at the different ques some more that they had realized their mistakes.

 240 Chapter 240

    It seemed like they had been lucky with the first test. They had picked the one super easy test that also gave arge amount of points.


    Looking carefully through the names of the other tests, they found that most of these were actually traps. They were time consuming tests just like the puzzle and the worst part was that they only gave minimal points.


    Unless they could find another test that was just like the first which was easy, took no time, and gave quite a bit of points for how hard the test was, they were better off going into the harder tests which gave more points. Especially since Lin Fan had two monsters like Ang and Momonga with him. One was the peak of brute strength and one was the crystallization of wisdom, it would be hard for them to fail here.


    Not to mention that the more time they spent going over the description of each test, it would eat into the total time they had for this trial.


    It was better to find one that was nearby and possible for them to do, instead of wandering around like headless chickens and trying to find something that might not exist.


    Finally they settled on a medium level test that was near them.


    The name of the test was Steal the Diamond, but what really caught their eyes was the fact that it was worth three hundred points. Compared to the other medium level tests that were only worth fifty to hundred points each, this seemed like a jackpot, but they werepletely wrong.


    The moment they went through the portal and arrived in the room, they appeared in a pure white room with a podium with a ss box on it in the center. In the middle of the ss box, there was a diamond being held up in a stand.


    All around the podium, there was a white square and beyond that were tiles of the same green colour, spreading out to a total of four tiles.


    The instruction card for this test was also quite simple, it just said, "Avoid the traps, steal the diamond."


    There was nothing else to go on, but it was quite clear that each of these tiles did represent a different trap. Based on the number of tiles between them and the diamond in the middle, it seemed like they needed to make their way past four traps at a minimum to reach that diamond.


    While the other two were still thinking about what to do, Ang was already moving forward towards the podium in the center without a care in the world. But before she could step on the first tile, Momonga had reached out to stop her.


    She was naturally angry at him for doing so since even though they had gotten used to each other while working in the store, they were still natural enemies. But she didn''t have a chance to do anything since Lin Fan had also grabbed her hand and pulled her back.


    While she could re and scowl at Momonga, she couldn''t resist Lin Fan.


    She just let herself be pulled back to Lin Fan''s side and stood there while he held her hand.


    Momonga revealed a faint smile when he saw this, but then he turned his attention back to the test since now wasn''t the time.


    After thinking for a bit longer, Momonga raised his hand and gathered a wisps of energy that eventually turned into a pure ck bone. Once the bone had been formed, he crushed the bone and blew it over the tiles.


    The dust from the crushed bonended onto the tiles and nothing happened for a few seconds before they suddenly began glowing.


    Most of the tiles were glowing red while there were a few that were glowing yellow and then there were four tiles that weren''t glowing at all, perfectly forming a line into the center.


    The bone that Momonga had crushed had been formed from hisw, which was thew of darkness. Thisw of darkness was very sensitive to murderous instinct since it dealt with the undead, so what the glow from the bone dust meant was how dangerous these tiles were.


    Naturally, the ones that were glowing red contained the most killing intent, which meant that they were the most dangerous traps.


    The ones with the yellow glow were those that weren''t as deadly, but there were still traps that could be triggered by those tiles.


    Then there were the ones that had no light around them at all, which meant that they weren''t set up with any traps.


    Just based on this, it was clear that the four tiles in a row that weren''t glowing was clearly the one safe path to the diamond, but Momonga didn''t act rashly after finding this path.


    Instead of personally going down this path, he raised his hand again to raise a skeleton which he had walk across those tiles.


    At first the skeleton seemed like it was perfectly safe as it walked across those tiles, but the moment it reached the white square that was around the podium, the skeleton suddenly went up in mes. The mes had been ignited at its feet and it continued to swallow the skeleton whole.


    No matter what the skeleton did, whether it was using its life energy to block the mes, patting the mes out, or even being desperate and dropping to the floor and rolling, it didn''t work. The mes continued to burn the skeleton until it had turnedpletely ck and had scattered away into ashes.


    Lin Fan knit his brows when he saw this and he turned to Momonga with a confused look.


    Momonga didn''t even look back as he said, "There''s abination trap between those tiles and the middle square. It seems like the ones without traps has some mmable material that will immediately light up in mes the moment one touches the center square."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan looked carefully at the tiles that didn''t glow before turning back and saying, "Then how do we get past this?"


    Momonga revealed a smile as raised his hand again, "Like this."


    Once his hand came up, another skeleton was raised, but this time it was a skeleton with a shield that waspletely made of bones.


    The skeleton moved forward and instead of walking on the tiles that didn''t glow at all, it jumped onto the first yellow tile that was in front of it.


    The moment the skeletonnded on that first yellow tile, there were spikes that had appeared underneath it. The skeleton immediately jumped up and pointed the shield underneath itself, blocking off the spikes that had suddenlye up.


    The spikes didn''t remain long before falling back down into the ground, at which point the skeletonnded back down on the same tile.


    The funny thing was that the skeleton would have been alright even if it didn''t block since the spikes would have justpletely gone through the gaps between its bones, but since it had a shield, it might as well put it to use.


    The skeleton jumped onto the next tile and then arrows shot down at it from different angles. The skeleton immediately crouched down and held the shield above itself to block the arrows that fell down on it.


    Once again, it was funny since the skeleton didn''t need to do a thing since the arrows would have gone through the gaps in its bones.


    After passing these two first tiles, there were only two more tiles left before the skeleton reached its goal. Using the shield, the skeleton easily avoided the rest of the traps and jumped off the final tile tond in the center square.


    The skeleton opened up the ss box and took the diamond from inside that was its prize before jumping back across the same tiles to reach Momonga. After beating the trap, the traps no longer triggered, so it was much easier to jump backpared to jumping forward.


    When the skeleton handed the diamond over to Momonga, there was a warp in space before a portal had appeared in front of them. This was strange because in the previous tests, they had been directly sent out of the test zone instead of having a portal appear for them.


    But since they were finished with this test, Lin Fan and Ang were preparing to leave the test zone. However, before they could reach the portal, Momonga called out to stop them, "Wait, don''t leave yet."


    Both of them turned to see that he was looking at the arrows that were stuck in the ground by the trap tile.


    After pausing for a second, he jumped across the first tile and reached the second tile. Once he was on the second tile, Momonga reached out and grabbed the arrows which he lifted up to his face to look over before revealing a smile.


    After he finished looking over the arrows, Momonga jumped back to where Lin Fan and Ang were and threw the arrow over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this, but he still managed to catch the arrow before asking with a confused voice, "What did you get this for?"


    Momonga said with a smile, "It seems like with the increasing difficulty, you also get more rewards. That is why the portal appeared instead of sending us back right away."


    Lin Fan was even more confused, "More rewards?"


    Momonga pointed at the arrow and said, "That is Blizzard Steel, with how it has been refined, it should be strong enough to kill most experts in the Soul Realm ande close to damaging those in the Star Realm."


    Then he pointed at the other tiles and said, "If you want to take the risk, there''s probably other items we can recover from the traps if you''re willing to trigger them. That''s what I mean by more rewards."


    Lin Fan looked down at the arrow in his hand in shock.


    This arrow was able to kill most experts in the Soul Realm?


    The Soul Realm was the Legendary Realm, which was the realm that all experts in the upper realms were at.


    Not to mention that it could damage those in the Star Realm, which was the realm that was above the Soul Realm ording to what Momonga had told him before. This meant that this was enough to threaten an expert from a Ster Kingdom!


    This really was enticing since even the arrows of a weaker trap was this powerful, what would be the reward from clearing a stronger trap?


    But still, he couldn''t let Momonga or Ang take that risk just to get him some rewards, so Lin Fan gave up that idea.


    However, then he remembered that they had gotten a diamond as well...

 241 Chapter 241

    Lin Fan turned to Momonga and asked, "What about the diamond? Is there anything special about that?"


    Momonga had already been looking over the diamond when Lin Fan had suddenly remembered it. After looking over it for a bit, he turned back and said, "Call out your Iron Eater Bone Artifact."


    "Huh?" Lin Fan was confused when he heard this, but he still called it out in the form of a small dagger which was the easiest form to hold.


    Momonga tossed the diamond over which Lin Fan quickly caught before saying, "Have your Iron Eater Bone Artifact absorb it."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this strange request, but he still plunged the dagger into the diamond without any hesitation. The moment the dagger touched the diamond, it cut right through it and began absorbing the diamond, causing it to continuously shrink until it hadpletely disappeared.


    The moment the Iron Eater Bone Artifact had finished absorbing the diamond, there was a burst of energy that came from it as it suddenly broke through to the next round. Now the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was a high Embryo Soul Realm Artifact.


    Lin Fan looked at his Iron Eater Bone Artifact in shock before turning to Momonga.


    Momonga nodded with a smile as he looked at the change with the Iron Eater Bone Artifact as if he had already expected this. Seeing Lin Fan looking at him, he said, "What it just absorbed was called a Sea Diamond, it''s a rare diamond found at the bottom of the sea, being refined by thousands tons of pressure, creating a super hard diamond. These diamonds are even considered rare in Ster Kingdoms, so it''s no wonder your artifact broke through. I''m actually more surprised that it only broke through a single level."


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this.


    This was a rare diamond even for a Ster Kingdom, which meant that it had to be a rare metal, allowing the Iron Eater Bone Artifact to evolve. However, the disappointing thing was that his artifact still didn''t form intelligence yet.


    Since there was nothing else they could do here unless they wanted to take a risk to get more rewards, they chose to leave through the portal in the end.


    When they came out, they went around looking for another test to take.


    It didn''t take them long before they found one that had caught their eyes.


    It was a hard level test, but the points it gave was exactly four hundred and fifty, which meant that they would get one hundred and fifty each. With the one hundred each that they had just received from the steal the diamond test, that would be enough for them to pass this test.


    So without waiting any further, they went through the portal and entered the test.


    When they came out, they arrived in a cave that was pitch dark except for a few torches on the wall. This was a cave that had nothing else in it, however the moment they arrived, there was a tremble that came from the ground.


    Looking into the distance, they saw a mass of white bones charging right at them.


    The name of this test had been Survive a Horde of Skeletons and as the name implied, they had to find a way to survive the wave of skeletons that was charging at them.


    But this time, they didn''t bother using intelligence and chose to use brute force instead. Momonga and Lin Fan both stood back and watched as Ang charged right into the wave of skeletons.


    She used her des of wind to cut down each and every single skeleton that had stood in her way. Even though the skeletons were wearing armour and had weapons, they couldn''t do a single thing as she crushed her way through them.


    Each one of these skeletons was a Soul Realm Expert, with the ones that were further back being stronger than the ones in front. However, none of that mattered since Ang was finally able to use her full strength.


    Ang was an Overlord, which was equal to a Ruler, who was actually at a higher level of cultivation than the Kings of the Ster Kingdom. Being two full realms of cultivation above these skeletons, she could crush them easily with a wave of her hand.


    While she was only one person, she was a match for this entire army of skeletons. This wasn''t a case where an expert couldn''t fight an army, the army was the one that was unable to do a thing to this supreme expert.


    She quickly pushed her way through the entire horde of skeletons until she finally reached the end where there was a single skeleton on a throne waiting for her.


    This skeleton was clearly different from the other skeletons.


    One, instead of having ash white bones, it had bones that werepletely dark like they were made of obsidian. Two, the armour and weapon that this skeleton had had apletely different aura from the rest of the skeletons.


    But even though that was the case, it still stood no chance in the face of Ang.<sub> </sub>


    With a single sh from a de of wind, she cut through the chain link of mace il that the skeleton had, sending that mace head flying into the wall. The second de of wind that she sent outpletely cut through the neck of the skeleton, sending the head of the skeleton flying.


    However, even with its head gone, the skeleton didn''t stop since its soul me was never in its head.


    The skeleton continued swinging the handle part of the il mace at Ang, but that was shut down immediately with another de of wind.


    The des of wind continued shooting out until the skeleton had been cut into pieces and its soul me had been extinguished.


    Once this final skeleton had been taken care of, the portal had appeared by the throne.


    This clearly wasn''t how this test had been designed, since this was after all a test of intelligence.


    While Ang had been cutting down the skeletons, Momonga hadn''t been idle. He had taken one of the torches from off the wall and had brought it towards one of the bones dropped by a dead skeleton, it had melted the bone away. As he held the torch, he also found that the torch was slowly burning away, meaning that there was a time limit to each torch.


    Momonga went over to the next torch and he walked at a moderate pace towards the following torch, finding that there was just enough time for a torch to reach the next torch before it burnt out.


    Finally, he came over to where the throne was and found that there were several more torches therepared to along the hallway. As well, when he brought the torch over to the ck bones of the skeleton, he saw that it melted at a much slower pacepared to the white bones.


    Judging from all of this, it was clear that the participants of this test were supposed to use the torches on the walls to take care of the skeletons and clear the path to the end. At the end, they would have had to use the torches around the throne to take care of the final skeleton before passing this test.


    However, that didn''t matter since Ang had used absolute force to break through this test without caring for the design.


    That was one of the privileges that came with being a supreme expert, there was no need to y by the rules.


    Of course, they didn''t leave right away since there was still the reward that they gained from passing the test.


    When Lin Fan was about to pick up the scattered artifacts along the way, they suddenly disappeared. All that was left in the path was a bunch of bones dropped by the skeletons.


    Lin Fan''s happy look immediately fell since he had thought that he would be getting a bunch of Soul Realm Artifacts, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    Momonga revealed a smile when he saw this and he said, "Did you really think that they would give you close a thousand Soul Realm Artifacts just for passing this small test? Still, it''s good enough that they gave you the bones. After all, those are bones that are filled with Soul Realmws."


    Lin Fan was sad at first, but hearing what Momonga said in the end, his eyes lit up again.


    That was right, these were bones that were filled with Soul Realmws, which meant that they could either be used as ingredients or materials for crafting artifacts. Even if he didn''t get the artifacts themselves, getting the materials to make more was at least a form of constion.


    Lin Fan quickly went through the tunnel to go back to the entrance, picking up all the bones that had been scattered by Ang.


    When he finished, he realized that he had picked up close to ten thousand pieces of Soul Realm ingredients since each skeleton had dropped at least a hundred bones.


    Normally humans had two hundred and six bones in their body, but Ang had been a bit too rough with them when she crushed all these skeletons.


    After picking up everything, Lin Fan then remembered the ck skeleton as well.


    When he came over to the ck skeleton remains and picked up the bones, his eyes lit up once again.


    He could tell from the concentration of energy in these bones that they were above the Soul Realm. They were clearly in the Star Realm that was above the Soul Realm.


    Feeling happy with his gains, Lin Fan headed back into the main room with Ang and Momonga again.

 242 Chapter 242

    When they came back to the main cave again, there was now a decision that they faced.


    After clearing out these two harder tests with more points to them, they now had enough points to pass the test and no longer needed to do anything else. However, if they were to choose to not do anything else, it would mean that they would be missing out on the various rewards that coulde with doing the harder tests.


    As far as they knew, it seemed like all tests that were medium level or above had some kind of reward to them and there were still several of them that were in this cave.


    However, there was also something else that had attracted their attention.


    Right in the center of the cave, there was a portal that was right behind the wooden sign with the instructions. However, the description of this portal waspletely different from all the other ones in this cave.


    Instead of having a normal description, there were only question marks on the que. The only thing that was present was the difficulty which said "impossible".


    This was without a doubt the hardest test that was here, but the fact that it was the hardest probably meant that the rewards that it gave were the richest. Without a doubt, that was a great enticement since even a medium difficulty test could give a diamond that could evolve Lin Fan''s artifact.


    Just what would this impossible difficulty one give?


    Not even for a single second did the thought of failing this test pass through their minds, that was just how confident they were in their abilities.


    Ang and Momonga were both Rulers themselves, so they never thought that they would struggle with the inheritance for another Ruler''s legacy. But that was just the thing, in most cases they would have nevere here since they would be ruling over their domains. It was only because of the appearance of an anomaly like Lin Fan that brought them out of their domains.


    Unlike with the previous test, Lin Fan didn''t mind taking the risk since he wasn''t asking Ang or Momonga to take the risk for him. Instead, since both of them were curious about this test, they were both willing to enter the test themselves, which meant that they were epting the risk on their own free will.


    Since they were all in agreement, they didn''t hesitate as they headed into the portal.


    This time, they didn''t appear inside a room with a test or a cave, but they had appeared on top of a castle wall.


    This castle was a castle that waspletely made of dirt and stones, but it was a castle that looked impressive nheless.


    While the three of them were still confused on what this test was, there was a rough voice that suddenly shouted out that attracted all of their attention.


    The voice suddenly shouted, "Hey newbies, pick up a spear and get down there already! What are you all standing in a daze for!"


    When the three of them turned to look at the source of this voice, only Lin Fan was surprised.


    The person who had shouted at them was a creature that looked like a human, but it waspletely made out of rocks. Every part of his skin waspletely brown and covered in dirt, but he was also wearing clothes just like a normal human.


    Lin Fan looked at Momonga for an exnation, but he didn''t get a chance to get that exnation as that person who was dressed like the captain of the guard had thrown three spears at them, one for each person.


    With their skills, they were naturally able to easily catch the spears, but they still didn''t know what they were supposed to do.


    Normally there would be a piece of paper that would at least give them instructions, but there was nothing of the sort this time.


    The guard captain saw that they weren''t moving at all and he flew into a rage, "Why you little! Get down there now!" As he shouted this, he also sent a kick flying at Lin Fan, but Lin Fan easily dodged this kick.


    Surprisingly, this guard captain was only in the Gold Realm.


    For a captain of the guard in this high tier cultivation realm, he didn''t even have a Soul Realm cultivation.


    Still, the three of them knew that they couldn''t stay here doing nothing, so they decided to follow the instructions of the captain and headed down to the training grounds. It was only then did they find a piece of paper with instructions for them that floated down.


    The piece of paper floated down slowly in front of them beforending in Lin Fan''s hands.


    When he opened the piece of paper up and read its contents, he was surprised by what he saw.


    "Prepare for battle, defend the castle."<sub> </sub>


    Just six simple words, but they were more than enough.


    That was the content of the test this time, the three of them had to find a way to defend this castle from the battle that wasing.


    They didn''t know how long they had to prepare, but since this was a test, it probably wouldn''t be long before the battle began.


    Just with the three of them, they had to find a way to defend this entire castle?


    That did indeed seem like an impossible mission, but that was only if they were normal experts. It was a good thing that both Momonga and Ang were both monsters.


    But for now, since they didn''t know what the situation was, it was better to follow the orders of the captain and head down to the training ground first.


    While on their way, Lin Fan didn''t forget to ask Momonga, "Hey, so what was that thing that was just back there? He looked like he waspletely made of rocks."


    Momonga took a look back before saying, "That was the rock race, it''s a race of rock creatures that resemble humans, but arepletely made of rocks. They were also the race that had inhabited this world before, but they should havepletely disappeared after the inhabitants of this realm disappeared."


    After he had finished speaking, Momonga had a thoughtful look on his face.


    Lin Fan''s mind quickly turned as well before he said, "Then you mean this test might be rted to what happened to this realm?"


    Momonga shook his head after thinking about it, "I''m unsure what this test is about right now, but I believe there should be something special behind it just based on how different it is from the other tests. But as for what that special meaning is, I have no idea."


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this and didn''t ask anything else since he knew that there was no point in asking anything else right now.


    The three of them headed down the walls of the castle until they reached the training ground in the middle. On the training grounds, there were more of these rock people who were currently training with their spears with an instructor shouting at them.


    When the three of them arrived, the instructor immediately turned over before shouting, "You three over there, you must be the new recruits."


    The three of them didn''t know what to say, so they just nodded.


    The instructor looked them over before revealing a friendly smile, "Well since it''s your first time here, you must be very confused as to what is going on, right? Well take your time and slowly learn from your peers."


    The three of them didn''t know what to make of this, but that didn''t matter since the instructor''s expression had changed suddenly, "Did you really think it would be like that? Get in line with the others and start swinging your spear right this ins-!"


    But before he could finish, there was a sudden explosion that sounded nearby.


    Everyone turned to the source of the explosion and they saw arge plume of mes soar into the sky. The mes were so dazzling that it was hard for the rest of the trainees to look at it, but it was nothing for Lin Fan, Momonga, and Ang.


    They could tell from the density of the mes that it was at least in the Soul Realm and while it wasn''t dangerous for them, it was definitely dangerous for these soldiers who were all in the Bronze and Silver Realm.


    Lin Fan and Ang wanted to rush over to see what the situation was, but they were stopped by Momonga who pulled them back to the unit that was on the training ground.


    Momonga looked at both of them and shook his head, signifying that it wasn''t time for them to act yet.


    After that first explosion, there were several more explosions that rang out, creating even more plumes of mes just outside the walls.


    It was only at this point that their instructor had reacted and shouted at them, "Men, get in line!"


    The soldiers were stunned at first, but after the instructor shouted at them a second time, all of them quickly came back to their senses. Just like they had trained thousands of times before, all of these soldiers formed rows in front of the instructor, gathering as a unit with their weapons at the ready.


    Momonga pulled Lin Fan and Ang over to the rows, moving into free spots that were in the formation.


    But the moment they finished lining up in their formation, there was a ball of me that had flown over the walls that was flying right at them!

 243 Chapter 243

    Judging on the power contained within this ball of mes, there was no doubt that if it hit, it wouldpletely wipe out this squad of new soldiers. But even if that was the case, what could any of them do?


    This was a ball of mes that was on the level of the Soul Realm and the strongest person here was the instructor who was in the Gold Realm.


    However, before the ball of mes could hit, Lin Fan suddenly punched out.


    The force of the wind generated by his fistpletely blew away the ball of me and scattered the mes to the four winds, without leaving a single trace behind.


    Even though they had all seen him shatter the ball of mes, the soldiers and instructors didn''t act like he had done a thing. Rather it seemed like they believed it was an act of god that had saved them.


    Once the ball of me had disappeared, the instructor shouted at the soldiers, "Men, are you ready!"


    The soldiers didn''t miss a beat as they all shouted back, "Yes!"


    Then with a wave of his hand, the instructor began charging forward towards the walls and shouting, "Take your positions and defend the castle!"


    The soldiers all followed him up onto the wall where they picked up their crossbows and began shooting down.


    Lin Fan''s group didn''t know what else they could do at this time, so they also followed them up, but what they saw shocked them.


    The enemies were actually the same creatures that were madepletely of rocks, but the strange thing was that they had been dyedpletely ck. Instead of being made of normal rocks, these rock humans seemed like they werepletely made of obsidian.


    Both sides continued to shoot at each other, the people on the castle using crossbows while the obsidian people seemed to be using giant mammoths that were shooting balls of me at the castle.


    The arrows of the people in the castle hit their targets, but the skin of the mammoths were too thick for these arrows to pierce. In the end, they were slowly being overwhelmed by the difference in firepower between sides.


    During this entire battle, Lin Fan''s group had been running along the walls blocking the balls of mes that fell down. They had saved countless soldiers, but the strange thing was no matter what they did, the soldiers never registered their help.


    It was like when they had saved the first group of soldiers. Right after they finished saving the soldiers, they continued to charge into battle like they had no idea that they had almost lost their lives a few seconds ago.


    This battle continued to drag on,sting for half an hour without any signs of changing.


    Lin Fan''s group had been running along the walls, blocking as many of the balls of mes as they could since they had no choice in this matter. Their mission was to protect the castle, so if they allowed it to be bombarded by balls of mes, that would be counterproductive.


    Finally, after half an hour, there was augh that had cut across the entire battlefield.


    Thisughter was like an echo that came from hell. It cut across one''s ears and was very ufortable to listen to, but no matter what they did, they couldn''t block out the sound.


    When thisughter cut across the battlefield, Momonga and Ang immediately knit their brows.


    They could tell by the power contained within this voice that it wasn''t a normal person who gave thisugh. In fact, it almost seemed to be someone at the same level as them.


    Once theugh finished ringing across the battlefield, there was a pool of darkness that appeared in front of the castle. The pool continued to shrink in size until there was a human figure that had appeared out of it.


    Actually, to call it a human figure was already being generous. The best way to describe it would be a tall figure that waspletely covered in a cloak of shadows, causing it to look as inhuman as possible.


    But the moment this figure appeared, there was a powerful aura that suddenly appeared.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help buckling under this aura. He hadn''t felt an aura as powerful as this since he had been tempered by the Dragon Might in the Inheritance Realm.


    Actually, this aura was even stronger than that Dragon Might.


    Lin Fan was now much strongerpared to when he had been in the Inheritance Realm, but even then, he still couldn''t help buckling under this aura.


    Momonga and Ang knit their brows even deeper when they felt this. Their suspicions had been confirmed, it was indeed an expert that was close to their realm!


    But the moment this aura had appeared, there was another aura that had shed right against it, relieving the pressure this aura ced on everyone in the castle.


    There was a giant red figure that had suddenly appeared, it was a person covered in red armour with a bright red cape fluttering behind them.<sub> </sub>


    The moment this red figure had appeared, all the soldiers had looks of hope that reced the look of despair that had been in their eyes when that shadow figure had appeared. It was clear that this red figure had a very high position among these soldiers.


    The red figurepletely ignored everything as he stared right at the dark figure and said, "Hades, meaning of this? What are you doing here?"


    The shadowy figure gave another coldugh before saying, "Leo, you know full well what I am doing here."


    Leo immediately knit his brows and said, "Are you aware of what you are doing, you''re starting the holy war! This won''t end the way you think it will!"


    Hades didn''t care at all as he said, "Just give me your armour already, that''s all I need from you. I can leave this pitiful realm alive if you just hand over your armour."


    Leo knit his brows even deeper as he shouted, "You really think you can fulfill the prophecy? You''re absolutely mad!"


    Hades revealed a cold smile, "Mad? That is just another word for misunderstood. Everyone will see that I was right in the end and they''ll all thank me for it." Then he suddenly charged forth as he said, "Of course, you won''t be able to see it!"


    Leo''s expression suddenly changed and his red armour suddenly turned golden as lightning gathered in his hand which he ultimately released as a ball of energy.


    Hades didn''t show any signs of fear as he waved his hand, creating specters around him that formed a spiral in front of him which collided with the ball of lightning.


    During this time, Lin Fan had asked Momonga, "Do you know anything about this?"


    Momonga was silent for a bit before saying, "I''ve heard of the name Leo before, it''s the name of one of the Zodiac Knights, which makes sense since this should be the lord of the Sacred Rock Realm. But as for who this Hades is, I''ve never heard of him before."


    Lin Fan fell into thought when he heard this.


    Hades, that was a name that he was familiar with on earth, but to hear it here in this cultivation realm was strange.


    But like the Hades from earth, this Hades in front of him was also controlling the dead to attack.


    There had been many things from earth that had appeared in this cultivation realm, maybe he should have paid more attention to history instead of all those other things¡­


    Then Momonga said, "If I''m not wrong, this should be the history of the Sacred Rock Realm, but this doesn''t make any sense still¡­"


    Hades and Leo shed several times, but slowly Leo was getting pushed back by the dark powers of Hades.


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand it, but Momonga and Ang could since they could see through both their cultivations. This Hades was actually at a higher realm of cultivationpared to Leo.


    That Hades was an entire sub realm higher than Leo and at the level that Momonga and Ang were at, that sub realm was a gap that was close to impossible to bridge.


    But the strange thing was that Leo had been able to do so with the golden armour that he was wearing. That golden armour seemed to be giving him some form of divine power that allowed him to at least fight back.


    Still he was slowly being pushed back which was perfectly normal.


    But that also raised a very strange question.


    It was clear that Leo had been fighting with the purpose of stalling for time from the beginning, but Hades had actually gone along with it.


    There had been many times where Hades would have been able to break through Leo''s defenses, but he had held back at thest second, almost as if he had some other n.


    Even now, he still continued to hold back at thest second as if he was ying with his food as he fought Leo.


    Leo didn''t know what he could do, the only thing that he could do now was hope that his backup woulde in time. He had sent a message to the Zodiac Realm when the battle had started and he had onlye out now since Hades had alsoe out.


    As the two continued to fight, Lin Fan finally couldn''t take it anymore and said, "Shouldn''t you be helping him?"


    It was only then that Momonga and Ang came back to their senses.

 244 Chapter 244

    Momonga and Ang both revealed awkward expressions.


    They had been too caught up by the conversation between the two and how strong they had been that they hadpletely forgotten about this.


    Ang was about to head out to help Leo, but Momonga raised a hand first and stopped her.


    Ang red at Momonga, but he just revealed a bitter smile and said, "Let me take care of this, there''s something I need to do."


    Even if Ang still had a natural dislike for the undead, she had to admit that Momonga was different after spending so long with him. To a certain extent, she no longer viewed him as the same undead as before.


    After pausing for a second, Ang took a step back and moved out of the way. However, when she did move, she didn''t forget to give a soft snort first.


    Momonga revealed a smile before giving a nod and heading out.


    Leo was still slowly being pushed back by Hades who seemed to be in no rush to finish the fight. Leo continued to fire out lightning balls one after another, but Hades had already created a funnel with the specters that he controlled that hadpletely sucked in all the lightning balls.


    It was clear that Leo was getting weaker since each of his lightning balls were slowly decreasing in size.


    When Hades was about to take a step forward and do something, there was a sudden change as a skeletal handpletely made of bones came out of the ground, grabbing at Hades.


    Hades immediately knit his brows when this appeared and he sent his specters out at the skeletal hand that was crashing down on him, but the skeletal handpletely scattered every single specter that it came in contact with.


    Finally Hades gathered his energy together and created a spike with the specters that pierced right at the center of the skeletal hand, which was finally able to stop it from falling down on him. However, after a few seconds of shing, the two sides were both pushed back.


    Even though they had both been pushed back, it was clear that Hades had been on the losing end since he was pushed back further than the skeletal hand.


    Hades immediately looked around to see the source of this skeletal hand, but he was unable to find the source, so he shouted, "Which expert is it that they are willing to resort to sneak attacks?"


    Unlike the other NPCs in this test who hadn''t reacted to interference from Lin Fan''s group at all, Hades was the first one to register this interference.


    Momonga slowly floated up from the wall and appeared in between the two of them.


    Both of these experts looked at Momonga with surprised gazes since neither of them could see through his cultivation. They were both Rulers, yet they were unable to see through his cultivation, that meant that he was either a peak Ruler or even worse, someone in the God Realm.


    Neither case was good, but if they had to choose, they would have preferred a peak Ruler since that was at least something they could contend with. If it was a God Realm Expert, all they could do was wait for death.


    Hades knit his brows once again and asked, "May I ask which expert it is that has decided to interfere this time?"


    Momonga didn''t respond to this directly, instead he just said, "All you need to know is that your attack on this realm won''t work today. I suggest you leave as soon as possible."


    Hades'' brows knit even deeper at this while Leo revealed a look of joy. However, Hades had prepared all of this and if he were to head back without aplishing anything, his pride wouldn''t allow him to ept this.


    So Hades didn''t give up as he asked, "Is there a reason why you are helping them Leo today? Or if possible, is there anything I can do to convince you toe to my¡­"


    But before he could finish, Momonga had already raised his other hand and another skeletal hand had already appeared out of the ground.


    Using both these hands, he pushed Hades back again and again, crushing every single attack he formed using his specters.


    Eventually Hades knew that he wouldn''t be able to do anything else today, so he prepared to run. However, when he did, Momonga strangely didn''t want to let him run away, so he suddenly created two skeletons thatpletely blocked off all routes of escape for him.


    Lin Fan didn''t know why, but he felt that Momonga was strangely being personally affected by this test. It was like there was some memory that had been triggered in him.


    Momonga working with the two skeletons he summoned eventually was able to smash Hades into the ground. Hades spat out a mouthful of blood when hended on the ground, but he didn''t give up fighting until the very end.


    Still, there was a big difference between him and Momonga who was an expert at the peak of the Ruler Realm, one of the top experts in the universe.<sub> </sub>


    Then again, this was only a simted space for the test, so the power that the simted Hades used wasn''t even close to the true power of the Ruler Realm. He was able to use life energy that was at the same level as a Ruler, but hisws were farcking.


    In the end, Momonga didn''t even have to use his Realm to deal with Hades.


    Hades had an unwilling look on his face as he was crushed by the pair of skeletal hands that fell down on him, but there truly was nothing he could do. In the end, he and Momonga were just in two different sses.


    Leo was also different from the other NPCs, fully being able to react to Momonga''s interference like Hades.


    Leo slowly floated over to Momonga while clutching his waist before cupping his hands and saying, "Many thanks for the help¡­"


    But before he could finish, there was a sparkle in his eyes as they suddenly cleared.


    Then after a slight pause, he said, "Lord Momonga, is that you?"


    Momonga turned back to Leo. Seeing his cleared eyes and sensing the aura that he gave, he gave a nod without saying a thing.


    Leo gave a sigh before lowering his head to Momonga, "Lord Momonga, it truly is good seeing you again, but unfortunately it seems like it''s toote. But since you are here, I hope that you will be able to take the legacy of my realm and stop the real Hades before it''s toote."


    Momonga didn''t say anything and just gave a nod.


    At this Leo revealed a smile, but that didn''tst long before his eyes zed over once again and then a mechanical voice came out of his mouth, "Congrattions on passing the test perfectly. You have earned a special reward."


    Then Leo''s appearance suddenly changed. It was like the outside skin waspletely peeled off and all that was left was a gray skinned mannequin. This grey skinned mannequin floated out in front of Momonga and stayed there waiting for him to im it.


    Also from the hole that Hades had been smashed into, there was another mannequin that also floated out to appear in front of Momonga.


    Both of them just floated in the air waiting to be imed.


    Momonga took the two grey skinned mannequins and floated back to Lin Fan where he handed the mannequins over.


    Lin Fan was confused by this as he asked, "What is this thing?"


    Momonga didn''t even bother looking over as he exined, "Those two are Soul Avatars, they''re puppets that can be controlled by a user with life energy. It takes the life energy of the user and will create a copy of the user that has the same cultivation realm as the user. These things can''t take the amount of life energy that me and the girl release, so they''re no use to use. You can have them."


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this and he quickly injected his life energy into them. The two mannequins quickly changed and turned into perfect copies of Lin Fan, even with the same life energy that he had.


    The moment that the two changed into Lin Fan, Lin Fan had a strange feeling. It was like he had suddenly gained two more pairs of eyes, or rather two more pairs of everything.


    His brain immediately became dizzy with all the extra sensory input, but he also quickly learned that he could shut them off with just a single thought.


    Once he shut off this sensory input, he noticed that the eyes of the two mannequins which had been sparkling when he was controlling them had zed over. It was like the light had been taken out of them as the two Lin Fan copies stood there lifelessly.


    After calming himself, Lin Fan began to experiment with the two copies.


    He found that he was able to control them with his mind, just like he was controlling his own body. But another thing he could do was that he could leave amand with these two which allowed them to move without direct control from them. Once they finished themand, they would revert back to their lifeless state.


    Lin Fan did many different experiments with these avatars until he was finally satisfied with his control.


    It was only then that he noticed that there was something in the hands of one of the avatars, specifically the one that had been Leo. He had been too busy with learning how to control these avatars that he hadn''t noticed it the entire time until now.


    Opening the hand of the mannequin, he found that it was a key.

 245 Chapter 245

    Lin Fan was surprised to see this key, but he didn''t know what it was for at all, so he showed it to Ang and Momonga.


    Both of them shook their heads since they didn''t know what this key was for either, but Momonga said, "Since this key came with the Soul Avatar, it should mean that it is a special reward for clearing this trial. As for what it''s for, that is something I don''t know."


    No one said a thing as they all fell into thought over what this key could be for.


    Finally, it was Lin Fan who thought of something.


    Lin Fan said, "Wasn''t there a key hole that was on the sign in the middle?"


    That was right, the sign that contained the rules, there had been a strange keyhole underneath all the text.


    At the time, they had no idea what this keyhole had been for, but now it all seemed to fit into ce. However, before they did do this, there was something else they had to make sure of first.


    The portal had spawned right by them after Momonga had taken the two Soul Avatars, so it had been waiting the entire time, but there was something else strange about this test. When they received notification that they had cleared this test, for some reason they hadn''t received any points at all.


    Still, that was thest thing on their mind right now since they had already earned enough points to reach the next trial.


    After heading back through the portal, the first thing they did was look for the two cloaked figures.


    While they had agreed to cooperate for this inheritance trial, it was clear that neither side trusted each other. To be honest, the only reason the cloaked figures were working with them was because of their strength, but the only reason why Lin Fan''s group took them along was because of the potential information they had.


    So that meant that even though they were cooperating, it didn''t mean they would be sharing everything.


    After making sure that the two cloaked figures weren''t there, Lin Fan''s group came over to the sign that was right in front of them. They walked around to the front of the sign and what appeared was the keyhole that they had remembered.


    Lin Fan raised the key to Momonga, but Momonga shook his head and pushed it back to him.


    Lin Fan nodded when he saw this and brought the key over to the keyhole on the sign. The front part of the key perfectly fit the shape of the keyhole on the sign, but since it was only a picture drawn on the sign, no one expected it to enter the keyhole.


    However, what they didn''t expect was that with a sh of light, the keyhole turned into an actual keyhole that was made of light and took the key in.


    Lin Fan was taken aback and didn''t know what to do, but after a few seconds, he turned the key in the glowing keyhole.


    The key sunk into the keyhole and moved out of Lin Fan''s hand, but Lin Fan didn''t have time to mind that since there was a change with the portal that had been behind the sign.


    This was the portal that had led to the impossible mission, but now it had changed from the normal blue colour, which was the same colour as all the other portals into a golden colour.


    Lin Fan looked at Momonga and Ang before walking forward towards the portal with both of them behind him.


    There was a sh of light as they went through the portal and when the sh of light disappeared, they had reappeared inside a throne room, but the throne room was the same dark blue colour as the starting room with the arch. At the center of the throne room was a giant throne that was of the same colour as the rest of the room and sitting on that throne was a person that they could be considered familiar with.


    Sitting on that throne was the Ruler of this realm, Leo.


    Leo opened his eyes when they came in and after looking over them for a bit, he said, "Wee to the secret reward room. What you receive here will be your reward for clearing the impossible test." Then he paused for a second before continuing, "As you have already guessed, the impossible test is a recollection of what happened to this realm before its demise. While I won''t ask you to take revenge for us, I hope that you¡­"


    But before he could finish, he suddenly stopped talking as he narrowed his eyes to look at Momonga.


    After looking at Momonga for a bit, Leo''s serious expression was suddenly reced with a look of shock as he shouted, "Lord Momonga, is that you?"


    Momonga had been looking at Leo with a calm expression, but in his eyes, one could see aplicated mix of emotions if one looked carefully.


    Momonga after a second of pause gave a nod and said, "It truly has been a long time."<sub> </sub>


    Leo had a tear that came out of the corner of his eyes before he stood up toe forward and kneel down in front of Momonga, "Lord Momonga, it is an honour to see you again."


    Then he looked up with a bitter smile on his face as he said, "Although this can''t really be considered seeing you again."


    Momonga said, "Where''s your main body?"


    Leo gave a sigh and shook his head, "I don''t have a main body anymore, there is only this wisp of my soul here and the wisp of my soup that is running this inheritance. Since you are here, you should already know what happened to me and this realm¡­"


    Momonga finally gave a sigh as he said, "Time truly passes quickly, soon I''ll be the only one left."


    Leo revealed a bitter smile and didn''t say anything in response to this. Instead he said, "Lord Momonga, if I may be bold, may I ask you for a favour?"


    Momonga just waved his hand to have him continue.


    "Thank you my lord. I ask that you finish this inheritance and receive my Zodiac Knight token. Then I have to ask you to gather the rest of the tokens and open the Zodiac Realm." Leo said.


    "Token? Do you mean this?" Momonga said before having Lin Fan hand over the token they had found before.


    Leo took the token to look over and his eyes immediately opened wide, "This...This is the token of Aries, where did you get this?"


    "We found this on a lower realm which didn''t know what it was, so they treated it like trash." Momonga said.


    Leo nodded in understanding since this was an item that one had to know how to use for it to demonstrate its value.


    Leo then said, "My time is short, so I can''t tell you much, but I can give you some information about this inheritance trial."


    Momonga interrupted by asking, "Why is your time short? This is a wisp of your soul, why wouldn''t you be able to stay?"


    Leo exined, "The main power of my soul is left with the core of this inheritance, this wisp of my soul is only here to pass on the reward of the impossible test, so there isn''t much information that I have. I''ll give you what I can."


    Leo waved his hand and a ticket appeared out of thin air, "This is the reward for passing the impossible mission, it''s a ticket that can allow you exchange for anything in the point shop after the first trial. As you have already guessed, the points that you earn in the first trial, other than being used to pass the first trial will also allow you to exchange them for items after the trial. This ticket should allow you to obtain the secret item in that shop."


    Lin Fan cut in by asking, "Do you know what the contents of the next trials are?"


    Leo shook his head and said, "I don''t know much about the rest since there was no need for this wisp of my soul to know that, but what I do know is that each of the trials focuses on a theme. Just like how this first trial is focused on intelligence, the next trial will be focusing on strength. As for whates after, that I cannot tell you. However, I am confident that you will be able toplete it since you''vee with Lord Momonga."


    Lin Fan asked, "Is there anything else you can tell us?"


    Leo shook his head, "There''s not many memories with this wisp of my soul since there was no need. All the information that I have is rted to the point shop after this trial and the Zodiac Realm."


    Leo then continued, "I hope that you will be able to find the rest of the tokens and open up the Zodiac Realm. We sacrificed ourselves to stop Hades back then, but we were unable to destroy him and were only able to seal him. Please open up the Zodiac Realm and revive the Saintess, she''ll be able to bring forth another new generation of Zodiac Knights and stop Hades."


    Lin Fan and Ang both turned to Momonga at this moment.


    Lin Fan of course wanted to open the Zodiac Realm since it was a top cultivation realm, but now it seemed like he was being dragged into someone else''s battle. But still, it was a mission from his system, so he had no other choice.


    Momonga paused for a bit before saying, "I''ll do what I can, I can''t promise you anything."


    Leo nodded before his figure suddenly began disappearing. As he faded away, he still said, "Thank you Lord Momonga."

 246 Chapter 246

    There was only silence after Leo had disappeared.


    Momonga just stood there with aplicated look in his eyes while Lin Fan and Ang both stood there patiently waiting for him.


    Finally after a few minutes of silence, Momonga said, "I''m fine, you don''t have to worry about me."


    Lin Fan nodded before asking, "Was he one of therades that you mentioned before?"


    Momonga shook his head and said, "Back when we took over thend, each of myrades had subordinates under them. This Leo was one of the subordinates under one of myrades."


    Then Momonga took a pause before saying, "But that was a long, long time ago. To be honest, Leo isn''t even his real name, but I''ve already forgotten it since it was too long ago."


    It was only then that Lin Fan had a deep realization. Over time, as he got used to having Momonga around, he forgot just who he really was.


    This was the Ruler of Death that had been around for countless eons, he was one of the oldest things in this entire universe, so naturally he would know plenty of people. Moreover, all of the people that he did know should be at the peak of the universe with how powerful he was.


    But Lin Fan could also tell that he clearly didn''t want to talk about it.


    In the past, Momonga had mentioned his past a few times in passing, but he had stopped every single time before he went too far into details.


    Lin Fan had never pushed him those times and he clearly didn''t push him this time.


    After making sure that they had everything, the three of them walked out of the secret room and went back into the main room.


    Now that they knew what was waiting for them and the potential rewards that they could get, naturally they didn''t waste any time just waiting in the lobby. Since this test had started, only two hours had passed, so they had plenty of time to earn more points.


    Of course, the items that would be offered in the point shop for this first trial naturally didn''t hold any attraction to Momonga and Ang who were both Rulers themselves, but naturally Lin Fan was tempted. For someone like him who came from a lower realm, items that were from a former top grade cultivation realm naturally appealed to him.


    So they made their way through the various tests that were still left in the hall.


    Theypletely ignored all the easy tests since they knew that it wasn''t worth doing them for the mediocre amount of points that they gave. They made their way through the various medium and hard level tests and while they weren''t able to make their way through most of the tests.


    Finally when time ran out, they had earned more than enough points to qualify for the next test.


    When they gathered once again in the center right before the test ended, it was clear that the two cloaked figures hadn''t done as well as they had. Their cloaks were a bit scuffed up and they looked generally depressed. Therger of the two even had a bit of blood dripping down from the edge of his cloak.


    When the two of them saw how rxed Lin Fan''s group was, they couldn''t help feeling a bit of regret not working with them, but that didn''tst long.


    Once the twelve hours ran out, the same voice as before boomed out as it said, "Please gather in the center and prepare to be ranked."


    They had already all gathered there, so it didn''t take long before the voice said, "Please take a look at your ranking."


    There were only five of them in this entire inheritance trial, so the rankings weren''t that big.


    The rankings didn''t use names, but rather pictures to represent the participants.


    At the very bottom of the rankings, there were the pictures of the two cloaked figures and at the top were Lin Fan''s group.


    There wasn''t a difference between fourth and fifth and first to third. That was because they had worked in groups, so their points had been evenly split amongst them.


    At the bottom, the two cloaked figures only had two hundred and fifty one points each. At the top, Lin Fan''s group each had over two thousand points.


    The disparity between them was quite clear. When the two cloaked figures saw these rankings, they couldn''t help being shocked by this disparity, but that was the only emotion that they felt.


    They didn''t feel any regret or shame in this since they thought that the points didn''t matter, all that mattered was getting enough points to qualify for the next round. However, they werepletely wrong as proven by the next words the voice said.


    "Congrattions to all of you on making it to the next trial. Now the point shop where you can spend all your points will open. Please make proper use of this as this will by a one time event."


    Lin Fan''s group couldn''t see the faces of the cloaked figures, but based on the aura around them, it was clear that they were filled with regret. This was a special event that would only happen once and they wouldn''t be able to make use of this.<sub> </sub>


    The one thing that brought them the slightest bit of hope was that they at least had two hundred and fifty one points to spend.


    But then, the voice spoke again and crushed that tiny sliver of hope.


    "Please note, you will have to pay two hundred and fifty points to make it to the next trial."


    As soon as this voice spoke, the point value on the rankings had immediately changed. The two cloaked figures had gone from two hundred and fifty one points to just one point¡­


    The two of them hadpletely copsed at this moment, but what could they do?


    Could they vent on these three?


    They naturally knew that was impossible since they were all clearly stronger than them.


    After the points had been deducted, there were two passages that were opened. One was marked exit while the other one was marked point shop.


    Since the two cloaked figures still had one point each, they still chose to head into the point shop, hoping that they would be able to buy anything. But once again, they werepletely crushed when they went in and saw the prices.


    There were many items that cost a sky high price, but there were also many items that were quite cheap. But even if they were cheap, the lowest price that was in this shop was still two points.


    Even if they wanted to bring their two points together to buy a single item, they still weren''t given that chance since the point store didn''t allow them to buy together or trade points.


    In their despair, they had no choice but to move back to the passage that was marked exit and they went through the portal in that passage.


    Lin Fan''s group had been waiting the entire time on the side, watching the cloaked figures. Only when they had left did Lin Fan''s group finally move over to the point shop.


    Of course the cloaked figures had already been plotting to betray Lin Fan''s group, but the reason why they didn''t stay to see what they got was simple. They fully expected their plot to work since it prepared to take care of even Rulers, so they just assumed that everything Lin Fan''s group got would belong to them in the end.


    When Lin Fan''s group went into the shop, the first thing they did wasn''t look around to see the prices of the various items around them. No, the first thing they did was lead Ang around to see if she found anything that caught her eyes.


    Lin Fan at this point fully trusted Ang''s instincts since she had found countless treasures for him with those instincts already.


    As for Momonga, after hearing about all the various treasures that Ang had found, he was naturally curious. So he followed along since he wanted to see just how powerful her instincts were.


    Ang took a few steps before she stopped in front of an item.


    This wasn''t a special item, but rather it was nothing more than a piece of rock that was just thrown there. However, the one thing special about this piece of rock was its price.


    Just this seemingly normal piece of rock was worth two hundred points.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all to spend two hundred points to buy this rock right away.


    Momonga took the rock to look over while Ang continued moving through the store.


    She found several other items that had caught her attention and they used up all their points to buy all of these items.


    In the end, there were no more items that had caught her attention or the items that did had cost too much for them to buy, so they could only leave it.


    As for their remaining points, they just spent them all on random materials since there was no point keeping them. They wouldn''t be able to take these points away and the voice had said that this was a one time event.


    In the end, all of them had zero points left, but they didn''t care about that at all.


    The only thing left to do was to use the special ticket that they had received.


    They didn''t use it for the most expensive item in the shop since it was only a Ruler Artifact. It was not at the level where Momonga and Ang would want to use it and it was definitely too high of a level for Lin Fan to even touch right now, so there was no point in taking it.


    What they bought with the ticket instead was the second most expensive item, an egg that waspletely brown in colour.

 247 Chapter 247

    Even with Momonga''s knowledge, he still couldn''t tell what kind of an egg this was, so they just put it away in Lin Fan''s system storage for now.


    As for the other items, Momonga had already finished identifying them. He confirmed that they were all indeed special treasures and he had no choice but to admit that Ang''s powers were real.


    Take the first stone that she had found, while it looked like a normal stone, it actually contained a special ore inside. This was an ore that didn''t even lose to the Sea Diamond in quality. In fact it was even rarer than the Sea Diamond.


    When Lin Fan''s Iron Eater Bone Artifact absorbed it, it immediately broke through once again, reaching the peak Embryo Soul Realm. It even came incredibly close to forming its spirituality and evolving as an artifact, but it was just a little bit short.


    Once they finished checking everything and putting it all away, Lin Fan''s group went back and headed through the portal marked exit.


    Once again, with a sh of light and when they appeared, they appeared in a room that was simr to thest one.


    This was also an area with several caves in the wall in front of them, as well as a wooden sign in the middle, but it was much smaller than the first trial. There were only at most twenty caves in the wall and there were two of them that had already been shut off.


    They went over to the sign again and it read, "Wee to the test of strength. Please choose a door to enter and defeat the three beasts inside to make it to the other side. Each beast will be stronger than thest, so please do take care."


    It seemed like quite a straightforward test that there really wasn''t anything to say about it. The only thing that was bad was that this wasn''t a team test, so they would have to split for it.


    However, since this was a test, it would mean that it wouldn''t be impossible to pass. Or at least that''s why Lin Fan was hoping. Otherwise if the opponents that he had to face were all in the Star Realm or above that, he definitely wouldn''t be able to pass.


    Still, just standing here wasn''t a solution, so each one of them picked a door.


    Momonga walked in without any hesitation, while Ang took onest look that had a trace of worry in it towards Lin Fan before walking through her own chosen door.


    As soon as they walked through the entrance of the cave, there was a b of rock that dropped down andpletely sealed off the caves. It seemed like once one made a choice, they wouldn''t be able toe back.


    Lin Fan stood in front of his own cave for a bit before finally taking the first step.


    Once he made it through the threshold of the cave, there was a b of rock that also fell down behind him and sealed his cave off.


    Since Lin Fan had taken the first step, it meant that he had already made up his mind, so he continued forward in that cave. But before he did, he also summoned Xiao Huo to create a ball of me in front of him.


    This cave waspletely dark unlike therge room from before that was lit up with strange blue lights on the ceiling, so Lin Fan had to make his own light with this ball of me.


    It didn''t take him long before he reached an exit with a bright light shining through.


    When he reached the end of the passage, he appeared inside this room that was brightly lit, but contained nothing at all. It was a simple room that was made of the same dark blue material as outside, it couldn''t be considered big, but it also couldn''t be considered small. If one were to describe it, it would be around the same size as a martial arts arena.


    But right after Lin Fan reached the center of the room, there was a loud sound that suddenly rang out. It sounded like rock grinding against each other and when he turned to look at the source of the sound, he saw that there was a piece of roof that was suddenly dropping down.


    The tform made from the part of the roof slowly came down and there was a cage that was on that tform with something inside of it.


    When Lin Fan''s eyes fell onto the thing that was inside the cage, he couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    It seemed like his guess had been correct.<sub> </sub>


    This was a test after all and even if it was a test of strength, if it only tested how strong one was based on their cultivation realm, it wouldn''t be a test in a true sense. If someone in the mortal cultivation realms were to face someone beyond the Legendary Realm, that wouldn''t make sense since that wouldn''t be a test, it would just be a ughter.


    The beast that was inside the cage wasn''t a super Star Realm beast that Lin Fan stood no chance against, it was just a simple low tinum Realm beast that was just below Lin Fan''s mid tinum Realm cultivation. It seemed like this realm was nothing more than a warm up, or rather a measure of just how strong Lin Fan was.


    The cage slowly came to the ground and Lin Fan saw the true appearance of the beast that he would have to face. This was a beast that was very simr to something that he had seen many times on earth.


    This was a beast that had symbolized fortune on earth, so there were statues of it that were ced everywhere, but this wasn''t just a statue, it was the real thing. The only funny thing was that it lookedpletely like a statue since it waspletely made of stone.


    It was a Stone Qilin!


    The minute the tform reached the ground, the cage suddenly disappeared into the tform. Everything in this room was made of stone, so it all snapped together like a perfectly carved puzzle.


    Once the cage had disappeared, the Stone Qilin saw Lin Fan. The moment it did see Lin Fan, it let out an aggressive roar that shook the room, but Lin Fan just smiled when he saw this.


    This Stone Qilin hadpletely overestimated itself since Lin Fan was hiding his aura, so it thought that it was much stronger than him, but how wrong it was.


    Normally, Lin Fan would have allowed Brainy to take this Stone Qilin as a puppet, but now he disdained having such a weak beast. If it wasn''t at least a King Beast, he didn''t want to waste one of Brainy''s seeds on it.


    But to be honest, Brainy was actually slowly running out of seeds to use. Between maintaining its scouts and all the other beasts that it had takenst time in the nar crack, it only had a few seeds left to use unless Brainy broke through. However, there was still some time before Brainy broke through, so now was the time to save the seeds.


    Lin Fan looked at the Stone Qilin like it was just a little kid who knew nothing as it charged at him. Then when it came close, Lin Fan raised his hand which had a golden glow around it and he punched out.


    With just a single punch, the Stone Qilin had been sent flying right into the wall, but even with the force that it was sent flying at, it didn''t damage the wall at all.


    The Stone Qilin''s eyes were rolled back and it had beenpletely knocked out, with even parts of its stone body shattering to the ground.


    The moment the Stone Qilin had mmed into the wall, the passage to the next room had already opened, but Lin Fan didn''t have time for that now. He was more curious about what the walls of this room were made of that he couldn''t make a single dent in it at all.


    But even after looking it over, Lin Fan couldn''t make sense of what it was and he definitely couldn''t take a chunk out to study, so he had no choice but to just leave it there.


    Of course, he wouldn''t just leave that Stone Qilin there since he had already defeated it. He finished off the Stone Qilin with a single hit to the head and then took out the demon core before putting the corpse in his storage. After that, he headed down the passage once again.


    After moving through the passage, he eventually reached another room that was just like the first one and the same thing happened when he reached this room. There was another tform that came down from the roof with the same cage and beast on it, but this time the aura that the beast gave was much stronger than thest one.


    It was in the peak tinum Realm and the aura it gave was just a grade higher than the power that Lin Fan had just shown, which meant that if the level of power that Lin Fan had shown before was his full power, he definitely wouldn''t be able to win. However, that of course was not the case.


    When the cage came down, it revealed the same Stone Qilin as before.


    When the Stone Qilin was revealed, this time Lin Fan didn''t wait as he flew out with his fist raised, but this time his fist was covered in two different coloured lights.


    With a single punch, he had sent that Stone Qilin flying right into the wall just like the first one.

 248 Chapter 248

    The Stone Qilin naturally couldn''t take even a single hit from Lin Fan and just like the first Stone Qilin, its eyes had rolled back in its head and it had fallen unconscious as well.


    The strange thing still was that even though Lin Fan''s strike had been much stronger this time, it still hadn''t been able to make a single dent in the wall. This was power that had already cracked the Soul Realm barrier and had reached the Fragmented Soul Realm, yet it still couldn''t do a single thing to this wall.


    Still, just like before, he couldn''t do anything to this wall, so there was nothing for him to do here.


    Just like before, he finished off the Stone Qilin and gathered its parts before heading down the passage that had opened once again.


    It didn''t take him long to reach the end of this passage just like before, but this time was clearly different.


    This was a test where each opponent became stronger and this was the final opponent, so it would definitely be much stronger than him.


    When the tform finally reached the ground and the cage disappeared, revealing the beast inside.


    It was another Stone Qilin, but this time the aura it released was clearly much different.


    It wasn''t just a Stone Qilin in the tinum Realm, this one was already in the Soul Realm. Moreover, it wasn''t in the beginning Soul Realm, it was deep into the Fragmented Soul Realm, reaching the high Fragmented Soul Realm.


    But it didn''t stop there, since this wasn''t just a normal beast. This was also a Stone Qilin that had a single mutation, which meant that if it was fighting at full power, it woulde close to the peak Fragmented Soul Realm or possibly even reaching the Embryo Soul Realm.


    Still, Lin Fan wasn''t worried about this at all since he also had something that he wanted to test out.


    Not only had Lin Fan''s weapon be stronger, he himself had been growing during the past two months. If he were to face Lord Jin in his condition now, it would be much easier for him.


    However, Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t face the Stone Qilin head on this time since after all, it was indeed much stronger than him. He would definitely be destroyed in a head on sh, which meant that he would have to fight intelligently instead of using brute force.


    There was a sh of light that appeared in Lin Fan''s hand, but this time it wasn''t the same golden energy that Lin Fan always used. Rather it was a white energy, but it wasn''t dazzling white like his lightningw. Instead it was a soft white colour that was simr to the white life energy that Lord Jin had before.


    With a sh of that white light, Lin Fan suddenly disappeared from in front of the Stone Qilin.


    As the Stone Qilin turned around for Lin Fan, Lin Fan had appeared in the air behind it with his fist raised, but this time it wasn''t the white life energy around it. It was the concentration of threews around Lin Fan''s fist that fell right down on the Stone Qilin''s head.


    However, this Stone Qilin was quite strong after all, so it didn''t fall with a single hit like with the other ones.


    The Stone Qilin''s head fell down after being hit, but it nudged it off quite quickly and turned to attack Lin Fan, but Lin Fan had already disappeared.


    When Lin Fan appeared again, he was underneath the Stone Qilin and he had sent a punch right into the underbelly of the Stone Qilin. However, the Stone Qilin had very thick skin underneath and could take this blow.


    Of course, it wouldn''t just keep taking these blows silently. After taking the hit from below, the Stone Qilin immediately crashed down with its body in an attempt to crush Lin Fan, but Lin Fan was once again gone.


    Just like this, again and again, Lin Fan kept disappearing and reappearing around the Stone Qilin, pelting it again and again with blows.


    ? Thew that Lin Fan was currently using was spatialws, the samews that Lord Jin had used.


    After he brought Jin back, during the month that he had been making his preparations, he had also been using his time to drain some of Jin''sws every day. Since Jin was a King Beast and a single mutated beast, it meant that hisws were quite strong, which allowed Lin Fan to form his totem quite quickly. There was now a fourthplete totem that had formed in Lin Fan''s dantian in just over a month of draining Jin''s spatialws, giving himplete ess to spatialws.


    But Lin Fan had just formed this totem, so he was still getting used to these spatialws.<sub> </sub>


    At this time, there was the perfect grinding stone that had appeared in front of him. If he wasn''t going to take this chance and use it, it would be a waste.


    Lin Fan kept teleporting around the Stone Qilin, hitting it with attacks one after another.


    The only upside for this was that the Stone Qilin had strong defenses with its earthws, which meant that it was only taking minimal damage. However, being poked again and again like this, like it was being bothered by a fly really touched its nerves.


    Eventually the Stone Qilinpletely lost its temper and released a wave of life energy, creating a set of rock armour around itself.


    Lin Fan could tell that his poking wasn''t able to break through the defenses of the Stone Qilin and at the same time, he was also done testing this ability. It was time for him to test out something else.


    Normally, it would take quite a bit of life energy to use spatialws to continuously teleport around like this, even if it was short distance teleports. However, Lin Fan was probably the only person who could use spatialws like this because of his special physique.


    Because of the cultivation technique that he practiced, which allowed him to form suns in his dantian, they generatedrge amounts of life energy for him. This meant that Lin Fan had twice or maybe even three times the amount of life energy a normal expert in the same cultivation realm had.


    At the same time, Lin Fan also had his suction force which he had been consistently using to drain the Stone Qilin''s life energy, supplementing his own. As well as draining the life energy around him, helping him recover faster.


    With all these factors, his recovery speed had almost matched his speed of consumption, so Lin Fan had only spent no more than 10% of his total life energy teleporting around like this.


    But since the Stone Qilin had raised its defenses, Lin Fan knew that this no longer worked.


    During that process, Lin Fan had been constantly swapping between his spatialws and his other threews, so he never had time to fully gather his energy into a single attack. This made his quick attacks much weaker than normal, which made it very hard to prate the defenses of the Stone Qilin in the first ce.


    But now that the Stone Qilin had raised its defenses, it meant that Lin Fan could test something else.


    Lin Fan put his hands together and gathered his life energy between them, creating a ball of soft white energy. The energy kept spinning in his hands and bing stronger before it finally was on the verge of copsing.


    Since the Stone Qilin had summoned the rock armour, it was now moving much slowerpared to before, which gave Lin Fan plenty of time.


    Once the ball of energy was about to copse, Lin Fan suddenly pushed it forward, but nothing seemed to happen. However, after a second, there seemed to be something that had cut right through the rock armour that was around the Stone Qilin, cutting pieces of it off.


    Lin Fan had gathered his spatialws together and condensed it to form des of pure spatial energy that had even cut through space itself. it had cut through the defenses of the Stone Qilin, but it hadn''t been able to cut through the Stone Qilin itself. Nevertheless, the damage had been done and the Stone Qilin had been pushed back.


    Just like this, Lin Fan continued to use his various new attacks on the Stone Qilin while it was unable to fight back at all.


    This was only possible because it was a Stone Qilin that relied on using earthws, which meant that it didn''t have anyws that would help it catch up to Lin Fan''s speed.


    The Stone Qilin could only watch as Lin Fan pelted it with attacks after attacks, unable to catch up and hit Lin Fan with its own attacks.


    Lin Fanbined his new spatialws with all his variousws, creating different attacks and learning what the limits of the spatialws were. The Stone Qilin waspletely made of stones, but it was being used as a grinding stone right now.


    The Stone Qilin felt rage at first, but that rage disappeared and it was soon filled with despair before just wanting to die overall.


    It was continuously being tortured by Lin Fan like this, but Lin Fan wouldn''t let it die or leave it alone, so after a while, it just crawled on the ground and covered its head as two rows of tears dripped out of its eyes.

 249 Chapter 249

    Lin Fan saw the Stone Qilin crying on the ground, but he didn''t stop just yet since he still had a few more attacks to test.


    Finally when he had finished testing all his different attacks, Lin Fan stopped attacking the Stone Qilin.


    The Stone Qilin noticed that the attacks had stopped and raised its head to see Lin Fan pull out apletely white sword.


    But before it could get a good look at the sword, Lin Fan had disappeared once again. When Lin Fan appeared again, he was above the Stone Qilin and wildly shed down at it.


    The Stone Qilin didn''t even have time to react as all of its rock armour had fallen off its body andnded on the ground.


    The Stone Qilin had been cowering on the ground surrounding itself with the thickest rock armour that it had since it was unable to fight Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had naturally pulled out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact and after leveling up twice, the sharpness of this artifact had increased by more than ten times. With its peak Embryo Soul Realmws, it was simple for the artifact to cut through the rock armour of the Stone Qilin.


    The Stone Qilin recovered from its shock and justid there with its limbs stretched, waiting for death. As a King Beast, naturally it had its intelligence, so it knew that it couldn''t win. Once it had epted that fact, naturally all it could do was hope that it would be as painless as possible.


    However, Lin Fan had different ns for it, after all, this was a King Beast and a single mutated King Beast at that. This meant that this Stone Qilin was on the same level as Jin.


    The only reason Lin Fan had beat it so easily was because of two reasons. One, he had obtained aw that was a natural counter to it. Two, he had a weapon that was far stronger than he was which allowed him to easily cut through its defenses which was the only advantage the Stone Qilin had.


    Lin Fan came over to the Stone Qilin and reached out his hand, revealing a seed that was in his palm.


    Lin Fan knew that the Stone Qilin had a certain level of intelligence, so he said, "Eat it and I''ll let you live."


    The Stone Qilin hesitated since it knew that this seed wasn''t anything good, but what else could it do right now?


    Of course it had considered just attacking Lin Fan while Lin Fan was close to it, but it could also tell that Lin Fan had his guard up and it couldn''t find a single opening. So even if it wanted to attack, it knew that Lin Fan would be able to teleport away at any second. There was no way for the Stone Qilin to keep up with Lin Fan''s speed if he chose to teleport away.


    Since the Stone Qilin had no choice, it swallowed the seed from Lin Fan''s hand.


    Seeing that it swallowed the seed, Lin Fan then said, "Don''t resist it or else."


    The Stone Qilin''s face hung down in hopelessness at this, but it knew it couldn''t do a thing.


    It could clearly feel that the seed was doing something inside of it, but it didn''t resist the effects of the seed.


    In the end, Brainy was currently only in the medium tinum Realm just like Lin Fan right now, so there was no way for it to forcefully control King Beasts. However, if those King Beasts didn''t resist and allowed its seeds to spread, naturally that was a different story.


    The seed spread quickly across the nervous system of the Stone Qilin and soon it was fully under the control of Brainy. Once the seed controlled the nervous system, it was impossible to break free without dying or unless one was far stronger than Brainy.


    When the Stone Qilin fell under the control of Brainy, Lin Fan put it away in his system pet storage.


    The moment the Stone Qilin disappeared, the exit to this trial opened.


    This trial was simr to the one that Jin and Yin had held in the nar crack, it also judged whether a trial was over based on the life energy of the beast. If the life energy was weak orpletely disappeared, the trial would assume that it was over since the beast must either be dead or incapacitated.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother looking back at all as he headed right into the exit and walked a bit beforeing out to a room that was dark blue in colour just like the rest. However unlike the rest, this room was much bigger, or rather much taller.


    Unlike the other rooms, this one had a giant tower that was right in the center.


    This room was over ten floors tall, which meant that it reached over thirty meters into the air.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was surprised by the giant tower in the center at first, but then he looked around to see Ang and Momonga already waiting for him in front of the tower. On the side, there were also the two cloaked figures, but they clearly weren''t in any good condition.


    It seemed like he had been thest person to finish the second trial.


    For both Momonga and Ang, the trial had been easy. Naturally they couldn''t find an opponent that could match Momonga and Ang, so the final beast they had faced wasn''t even in the Ruler Realm.


    As for the two cloaked figures, both of them were covered in blood. Therger one more so than the smaller figure. With the way he was swaying, it almost seemed like thatrger figure would copse at any moment.


    However, even in their condition, neither of them considered ever asking for help. They both thought that they had to disy as strong a stance as possible, otherwise they would be immediately turned on, so they didn''t dare show any weakness.


    When he came up to the tower, the moment he arrived, there was the sound of stone grinding as the door to the tower suddenly opened.


    It seemed like there was some kind of sensor that had been judging the number of participants and since he was thest one, naturally the door to the third trial had opened.


    The two cloaked figures didn''t say a word as they headed into the tower, disappearing into the dark interior.


    As for Ang and Momonga, they just waited patiently as Lin Fan read the wooden sign that exined this trial just like with all the other trials.


    The wood sign read, "Congrattions on making it to the third trial. This trial is a test of will. Please make it to the top of the tower. Those that don''t make it to at least the seventh floor will be disqualified."


    Lin Fan turned to look at the tower again, but he couldn''t see anything special about it. What did they mean by a test of will, wouldn''t it be simple to make to the top?


    Unless there were beasts that were inside, but how would that be a test of will?


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t wait as he headed into the tower.


    There was nothing when he entered the door of the tower, but the moment he took a few steps forward, there was a pressure that fell down on him.


    This pressure was one that made it hard for him to move, but it wasn''t able to do too much to him in the end. After all, he had dealt with this situation before.


    Gathering his life energy inside of him, he began using his suction force to begin absorbing the pressure that was around him, just like he had done with the Dragon Might.


    It seemed like this test of will was simr to what had happened in the Inheritance Realm with the Dragon Might, but that hadn''t been a challenge for Lin Fan. Rather that had been where he had discovered his suction force and had absorbed his firstw, the powerw that he had been using the entire time.


    If this tower was simr to that tower, this meant that there would be another potentialw for him to absorb which filled Lin Fan with excitement. After all, the morews that he absorbed, the more powerful he became. The only problem was that his body wasn''t strong enough, but that was a problem for another time.


    It was a good thing that this was a test in the end, so the level of pressure felt by each person was adjusted based on their cultivation realm, so Lin Fan didn''t feel the same level of pressure as the others. Otherwise if he did, this wouldn''t be a test anymore, it would just be bullying.


    Lin Fan slowly moved forward, absorbing a bit of the pressure before taking a step forward. Momonga and Ang just matched his pace in moving forward since neither of them were feeling any pressure.


    Both Momonga and Ang were both at a higher realm than the object being used to create this pressure, so naturally they didn''t feel any pressure inside this tower at all.


    But when Lin Fan passed the two cloaked figures, it was clear that they were struggling. Not minding their wounds, it seemed like they would have struggled even if they weren''t injured.


    The two of them watched on as Lin Fan''s group passed them, heading towards the stairs, but neither of them said a thing as they just stood there and cultivated, trying their best to move forward.


    Once Lin Fan''s group reached the stairs, they headed up immediately, but they stopped and turned as soon as they reached the top of the stairs and disappeared from the sights of the two below.

 250 Chapter 250

    Now that these two cloaked figures had been injured and were put in a desperate situation, it was clear that something would have to change with them or they would never make it to the end.


    However, most of these trials were individual trials, which meant that they couldn''t ask for help at this point. Moreover, even if they did ask for help, with how injured they were, there were even more chances of them being betrayed. Naturally they couldn''t ask for help unless they were truly desperate.


    So the only thing they could do now was reveal their trump cards or face the possibility of being eliminated and trying their plot outside.


    Why would Lin Fan''s group give them that chance?


    As they stood on the stairs, Lin Fan raised his hand out to Momonga who took that hand.


    They stood there holding hands as dark life energy flowed out of Momonga''s hand and into Lin Fan''s hand. It went through Lin Fan''s hands and reached the ball of darkness that was in his other hand.


    The moment that dark energy reached the ball of darkness in his other hand, that ball of darkness spread around them to create almost a translucent barrier.


    This ball of darkness was thew of shadows that Lin Fan had absorbed from Yin, however since Yin was weaker than Jin, it meant that this wasn''t apletew. However, even as a fragment of aw, Lin Fan had a way of making it work.


    <o>,m Sincest time Lin Fan discovered that he could draw out the power of hisws and dissipate them in the air around him, reducing theshback to his body, he had been experimenting with his suction force.</o>


    He had found that he was able to pull outws and life energy from inside of himself and from other people. After pulling out thews and life energy, he was able to direct them with the force of his suction power and infuse them into each other.


    This meant that even if hisw was a fragment, as long as he injected enough life energy into it, he would still be able to use it normally.


    Then if he injected life energy that was far beyond his level, it would allow him to use that life energy to usews that were also far beyond his level.


    It could be done with both Ang and Momonga, but Momonga was clearly the better choice since he could actually control his life energy. Compared to Ang whose life energy waspletely wild, Momonga had much more control over his life energy.


    This was a technique where even a single mistake would cause the life energy to bacsh and seriously injure or even kill Lin Fan, so the more control the better.


    Momonga was after all a Lich King who had lived for countless generations and he had been cultivating the entire time, giving him a precise understanding of his own powers. He could control his life energy in ways that others never thought possible, making it quite easy for him to cooperate with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan controlled the life energy from Momonga and slowly fed it to the fragment of shadoww, creating a darkyer of energy that slowly spread over them,pletely covering them.


    Naturally, Lin Fan didn''t have full mastery of this power, so he wasn''t able to fully control the life energy. Part of the life energy dissipated in the air and not all of it was able to be injected into thew fragment, but with how powerful Momonga''s life energy was, that didn''t matter. Even if it was weakened, it was still at the level of a low grade Ruler.


    For the two cloaked figures who weren''t even close to the Ruler Realm, naturally it was enough for them to hide from the two of them.


    Once they were enveloped in the shadowws, they headed down to the first floor again to watch the interaction between the two cloaked figures.


    The two cloaked figures had been silent for a bit, both of them focusing on cultivating as they slowly moved towards the stairs on the other side of the room. However, with their serious injuries, it was clear that this would be very hard for them.


    Eventually, the taller of the two figures couldn''t help saying, "Princess, perhaps it''s better if you continue on without me."


    The shorter of the two looked at him with a hesitant look before saying, "I would, but it would be too hard if I were to go ahead alone. I need you to support me so we can maintain a bnce with their group."


    The taller figure said, "Then perhaps it''s better to retreat now? It''s better to retreat to fight another day than to die today."


    The shorter figure said, "Not yet, there''s still a chance that we might be able to find something. Before we have no choice, I want to continue pushing forward if possible."


    The taller figure said, "But¡­"


    But he didn''t get to finish as the shorter figure had already cut him off, "But nothing." Then she stood up and started moving towards him as she said, "Come, let me help you."<sub> </sub>


    As she moved towards the taller figure, she could feel the pressure on her bing weaker.


    This was a level of pressure that she was certain that the taller figure would be able to pass easily if he was in his normal condition. It was clear just how injured he was, but she still didn''t want to give up this easily. If she were to have a chance at inheriting the throne, this inheritance was the best chance and she definitely couldn''t do it alone.


    She came over to the taller figure and moved to his side,ing under his arm to put it over her shoulder to support him. She needed him, which meant that even if she had to carry him, she would do it.


    But what she didn''t expect was that when she was about to take a step forward, there was a sudden pain in the side of her stomach.


    She slowly looked down at her stomach and found that there had been a dagger that was embedded in her side with blood currently gushing out.


    She slowly looked up again at the taller figure in disbelief.


    This taller figure was actually her attendant and teacher who had been following her since she had first understood what was happening in this world. This was her closest attendant and the one she trusted the most, so naturally she didn''t have her guard up against him, but that had been her downfall in the end.


    She immediately let go of the taller figure''s arm and jumped back with her weapon raised, but she couldn''t help swaying when shended since the dagger had cut deep and she had lost quite a bit of blood.


    She had a look of confusion and betrayal on her face as she looked at the taller figure and asked, "Why?


    The taller figure just stood there for a few seconds before a sharpughter rang through the entire room. It was a gratingughter that cut through one''s ears, making it hard to listen to. It was almost like listening to the sounds of chains grinding.


    Then when the taller figure stoppedughing, he said in a cold voice that waspletely different from the voice he had before, "The fourth prince was right, you really are too trusting and easy to fool."


    The smaller figure deeply knit her brows when she heard this and she asked, "Fourth brother? What would fourth brother gain from killing me when I''m his biggest supporter?"


    The taller figure just casually stood there without worry since he was certain that there would be no problem killing the smaller figure, so he casually said, "Biggest supporter? Do you really not know what his majesty is thinking? His majesty thinks that you''re the one who actually stands out, not the fourth highness. His majesty is even thinking of making you his heir. Naturally the fourth highness couldn''t ept this."


    The smaller figure didn''t say anything in response to this, she just said in a voice filled with betrayal, "But why would you do this to me, teacher?"


    The taller figure gave anotherugh before saying, "Why would I do this to you indeed?"


    But then he couldn''t take it anymore as he gave anotherugh, "Well, that''s because I''m not your teacher."


    The smaller figure trembled when she heard this and she asked, "What do you mean?"


    The taller figure revealed a cold smile as he said, "Well, the old man did put up a good fight in the end, but he was no match for me. Still, even in hisst moments, his final thoughts were about keeping you safe. Isn''t that admirable?"


    The smaller figure''s trembling became even more visible when she heard this as she said, "Stop."


    But the taller figure didn''t stop there as he continued in his taunting voice, "Do you want to know how he begged me to spare you in the end? Or do you want to know how he acted when I told him I would?"


    The smaller figure''s trembling continued to grow as she roared in a low voice this time, "I said stop!"


    But still the taller figure didn''t stop as he taunted, "Or do you want to see what I did to his body in the end?"


    The smaller figure finally couldn''t take this anymore since after all, her real attendant had basically been the man who had raised her. He was more of a father to her than her real biological father had ever been, so how could she take this?


    The smaller figure didn''t hesitate a single second, ignoring the pain from the dagger in her side as she jumped out right at the taller figure with her weapon raised.


    However, that was what the taller figure wanted all along.

 251 Chapter 251

    The taller figure knew that even a cornered rat was dangerous, so naturally he wanted to do this as safely as possible.


    If he were to attack the princess when she was backed into a corner like this, she might lose all reason and sacrifice her life for his. That was not a situation he wanted to see.


    However, if he were to taunt her until she lost her reasoning and wildly charged him, it would naturally be much easier for him to take care of her. Which was exactly what he had done.


    Seeing her ignore all sense of reasoning and just wildly attack him, the tall figure didn''t panic at all as he stood there calmly.


    The shorter figure had thought that she would be able to use her stronger cultivation to take care of the taller figure since she was after all stronger, but that wasn''t the case. When she approached the taller figure, the taller figure didn''t do anything else as he only gave a single snap of his fingers. Once the snap rang out, the ground in front of him suddenly rose and a spike made of rock flew out right at the smaller figure to stab at her sword, knocking her flying.


    The shorter figure had a look of shock when this happened since she never expected to be defeated this easily.


    After all, she was clearly at a higher level of cultivationpared to this man. Even if she had been injured and couldn''t use her full strength, she still should have been able to defeat him easily.


    But now not only had her attack failed, she had even been easily knocked away.


    If he could easily knock her away now, what would she be able to do now that she was even weaker?


    Her power had been slowly draining since she had been injured, that strike had been her final ditch strike and now she had nothing else she could do.


    The taller figure was also clear on this, so he slowly walked over with a smile on his face.


    The smaller figure moved back when she saw this, but how could she escape while injured?


    Eventually the taller figure came over and stood in front of her, looking down at her for a bit before shaking his head and saying, "It really is a pity to kill you now. Perhaps, I should y with you a bit before I kill you."


    The smaller figure trembled when she heard this and she shouted, "You dare! Do you know what you are doing right now!"


    The taller figure didn''t care as he snapped his fingers again. This time, there was a small little fairy made of dirt that appeared on his shoulder and the little fairy raised his arms, creating tendrils of dirt that came out of the ground that wrapped around the four limbs of the smaller figure, lifting her with her limbs spread in front of the taller figure.


    The taller figure came forward and with one swift motion, he ripped the cloak off the smaller figure to reveal her true appearance.


    What was revealed was a short girl who was only four foot eleven, but her figure was one that definitely didn''t fit her height. She had curves in all the right ces and on her chest were mountains of pudding, ripe for the taking. Other than her figure, her appearance and aura were also all perfect. She had blonde hair that was done in pigtails and piercing blue eyes that could see into one''s soul.


    If Lin Fan was here, he would have to admit that this girl was one that could even match Ang. However even if that were the case, he would never actually admit it since Ang was number one in his eyes.


    When the tall figure saw her appearance, he couldn''t help drooling a bit as he said, "I''ve heard tales of the beauty of the seventh princess, but I''ve never imagined that they would all fail to describe it. I''m going to enjoy this."


    The tall figure took a step forward towards the girl with his hand stretched out in a lewd manner.


    The seventh princess saw this and tried to move back or break free, but the tendrils of dirt holding her were much too strong. This little fairy might have seemed weak, but it was actually in the Realm just like her, which meant that even at full strength, it wasn''t certain that she would be able to defeat it.


    But before the taller figure''s hands could reach her, there was a skeletal hand that hade out of the ground and grabbed that outstretched hand, stopping it from moving any further.


    The taller figure tried to break free, but he soon found that the skeletal hand had a grip around him that was too strong for him to break.


    The taller figure looked around before shouting, "Who is it? What kind of person are you that you have to ambush someone like this?"


    But there was no answer to his question.


    Or rather, the only answer he received was another skeletal hand that was much bigger this time that also came out of the ground before falling down on the taller figure.<sub> </sub>


    The little fairy on the taller figure''s shoulder quickly raised its hands and there was a wall of dirt that came up to protect the taller figure, however that didn''t make a single difference. Therge skeletal handpletely crushed the dirt wall and the taller figure that was underneath it, smashing them both into the ground and perfectly burying that taller figure. However, the skeletal hand did then dig out the taller figure''s head and kept it above the dirt.


    The seventh princess didn''t know what had just happened and looked around cautiously as she asked, "Hello, is someone there?"


    After a few seconds, there was a ripple in the air before ayer of darkness appeared, opening up to reveal Lin Fan, Momonga, and Ang standing over the taller figure buried in the ground.


    ¡­


    Going back a few minutes, Lin Fan''s group had been watching the entire thing.


    While the two cloaked figures had been struggling, they had just stood there watching the entire time, not doing a single thing. After all, this alliance was only a fake alliance, with both sides just using each other. They all knew that they would betray each other in time, so if the other side were to take care of themselves, why would they bother to interfere?


    However, when he heard the things that the taller figure had said, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a strange impulse deep down inside him. It was an impulse that was telling him to save the smaller figure.


    When the smaller figure had finally been pushed down and was about to be vited, Lin Fan couldn''t take it anymore and said, "Save her."


    Neither Momonga and Ang were both surprised by what he had said, after all, they knew that this was something that was good for them.


    The two of them looked at each other before Momonga said, "Are you sure? It''s better if they kill each other. Sure I feel sorry for the little girl, but this is just how the world is sometimes. At least she''ll feel nothing in death."


    Lin Fan turned to look at him and this time, he didn''t word it like a question as he said in a determined tone, "Save her, now."


    Momonga and Ang were both taken aback by this. They had never seen Lin Fan talk like this, or at least he had never talked to them like this before.


    Still neither of them did a thing since they knew what the best course of action was.


    Lin Fan was still young and inexperiencedpared to them, so it only made sense that he would still let his emotions get the best of him. They understood this, but that didn''t mean that they would indulge him in this.


    Lin Fan saw that neither of them were moving and feeling the tense atmosphere, he finally gave a sigh and lowered his head to say, "Please, save her."


    Momonga and Ang didn''t know what was going on, but since Lin Fan was even lowering his head to ask this of them, they had no other choice.


    Ang was about to head out to take care of the taller figure, but Momonga reached his hand out and said, "Stop, I''ll do it. You don''t know how to hold back and you might kill him if you do this. There''s a few things I want to ask them anyway."


    After that, Momonga raised his hand and the skeletal hands had appeared out of the ground.


    ¡­


    Now back in the present, the small girl looked on in shock at Lin Fan''s group when they had appeared. Never would she have imagined that the people who had saved her would be the group that had inexplicably shown up and crashed the trial.


    But that didn''t stop her from feeling grateful.


    When she was about to thank them, Momonga suddenly kicked the taller figure''s head and said, "Wake up, I have questions for you."


    The taller figure woke up, but the first thing he did was scream in pain since the skeletal hand had crushed every bone in his body.


    Momonga naturally didn''t have patience for this, so he raised his hand and said, "Death."


    In just a single instant, the taller figure stopped screaming. In fact, every part of his body stopped as he had died just like that.

 252 Chapter 252

    Ang gave a soft snort when she saw this.


    He had just said that she wouldn''t be able to hold back and would kill him, but didn''t he do the same?


    However, she also knew that this was different since this was a controlled way of killing him which she couldn''t do.


    Momonga was the Lich King, so naturally he hadws that were more pertaining to death.


    While it seemed like he had just killed him with a single word like with deathws, in truth Momonga had actually killed him with his darknessws, slowing everything in his body to the point where he had died. But by using his darknessws to kill him, it had also allowed him to draw out the soul of the man he had just killed.


    If Lin Fan had to describe it with a term from earth, it would be called necromancy.


    By pulling out the soul with his darknessws, he would be able to peer into the memories that the soul contained which was a much more effective way of getting information than just interrogating someone. One could never be certain of anything that was said unless it was taken straight from the soul.


    But still, that didn''t mean that Ang had to fully ept it. She could still have her bit of pride, no one could take that from her.


    While Momonga was busy looking over the soul, Lin Fan finally came over to the girl. He bent over and took a look at the dagger that was in her waist and he could tell that this was a serious wound.


    He had been ignoring her questions at first, but then he looked at her and asked, "How good are you at resisting pain?"


    The girl was confused by why Lin Fan suddenly said this, but she said in as strong of a voice as she could muster, "I can take it."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Close your eyes and don''t move."


    The girl hesitated a bit, but she followed Lin Fan''s orders in the end.


    If they wanted to kill her, why would they have saved her?


    Since that was the case, there was no reason for her to not trust him. Anyway, it wasn''t like she even had the ability to resist and even if she did, she still wouldn''t win since someone at the same level as her was easily crushed by them.


    When she closed her eyes, Lin Fan came over and held her arm with one hand as the other hand went to the dagger that was in her waist. With one swift motion, he pulled out the dagger that was in her, causing a scream of pain toe from her as she bent over. Her hands came over to hold the wound, but Lin Fan held them back as he inspected her wounds.


    It seemed like she had been lucky, the dagger hadpletely avoided her organs, the only problem was that she was bleeding out.


    Lin Fan turned back to Ang and said, "Can you heal her?"


    Ang just gave a nod and came over to use her windws to heal this girl.


    Since they had already interfered, they might as well keep going until the end and fully save this girl.


    The girl suddenly stopped when she felt the pain disappear. Opening her eyes, she saw the wound being healed at a visible rate as Ang used her windws on her.


    What she was shocked by was not the rate that her wounds were healing at, but rather thews that were being used to heal them. Thesews were much stronger than anything she had felt before and it was clear that this was windws, which shouldn''t be able to heal, yet it was healing her.


    She couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan''s group with a curious gaze, wondering just who they were.


    During this time, Lin Fan had already moved back to Momonga and asked, "Did you find anything yet?"


    Momonga looked up from the soul and said, "Well I do have some information, but there''s nothing that''s rted to this realm. The only thing I have is some information about the Ster Kingdom theye from and some plot rted to that girl."<sub> </sub>


    The girl heard this and immediately asked, "Can you please tell me what you know? It would be very important to me."


    The two of them just ignored her as Lin Fan asked, "What Ster Kingdom do theye from?"


    Momonga said, "It''s one called the Chu Ster Kingdom, a Ster Kingdom that is far to the north universe, so it''s actually quite isted and not many people know about them. However, for them toe down south just for this Sacred Rock Realm, it really is strange, but there was an exnation in the memory for this."


    Lin Fan raised a brow and asked, "Oh, what is it?"


    Momonga continued, "The fourth prince who''s in charge of this person found this key in an auction and after tracking down the seller, he found out about the Sacred Rock Realm. He knew that this would be dangerous and he also knew that this would be a good chance for him to take care of his seventh sister who had been receiving the attention of the Kingtely, so that was why he sent this man and that girl over there here. As for her, she''s just a pawn, so she probably doesn''t have much information."


    Lin Fan looked over at the girl before asking, "But why would he do all this just to kill her? She''s the seventh princess, it''s not like she would be that high up on the session list, right?"


    Momonga shook his head at this as he also turned to look at the girl, "Normally you''d think that way, but this girl is quite the genius, so she has caught the attention of the King and has been moved up the session list. The fourth prince regarded her as a threat, so that was why he considered taking her out even though she had been supporting him the entire time. But that is all their own problem, it has nothing to do with us."


    They could both see the pleading look on the girl''s face, but that didn''t do anything for them.


    But still, that impulse inside Lin Fan wouldn''t go away¡­


    He looked at the girl and then said, "First, what is your name?"


    The girl was surprised to hear this, but seeing that they''re finally willing to talk to her, she quickly replied, "Chu Ting."


    Chu Ting was the seventh princess of the Chu Ster Kingdom, but she was the only daughter out of the seven children of Ster King Chu, so she had been pampered to a certain extent by her other siblings since she was young. She had lived a rather sheltered life and while she did know about how experts acted among themselves, she was also quite naive which was why she had said her real name so simply.


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "What information do you have on this inheritance? If it''s good, we can make an exchange."


    Chu Ting''s expression became awkward when she heard this since she didn''t actually have much information. She had onlye here because her fourth brother had told her that he had found a hidden realm and didn''t have time to go himself, so he would be giving it to her. She had fully believed this because her fourth brother had always treated her the best, so that was why she had been sincere in supporting him.


    But now her world views had copsed because of everything that had happened.


    Chu Ting hesitated a bit before saying, "We only know that this was the inheritance for a Ruler''s realm, we didn''t know much else beyond that."


    Lin Fan paused before saying, "So that means you know nothing about the inheritance realm and you were lying in the beginning?"


    Chu Ting''s expression became more awkward, but she still said, "Yes¡­"


    With Chu Ting''s nature, she was cautious around people she didn''t know and didn''t mind lying to them, but once she trusted them, she would try to be as honest as possible. That was just the naive nature that she had.


    Lin Fan turned to look at Momonga for a bit before saying with a sigh, "Give her the information about the fourth prince and see what other information you can give her."


    Chu Ting''s eyes lit up when she heard this and she was about to jump forward to give Lin Fan a hug, but then she felt a paine from her wound. She turned to see Ang ring at her and she immediately obediently sat down.


    Momonga looked at Lin Fan for a bit, but then he just gave a sigh and reached into the man''s cloak to take out a ring. He pulled out a piece of jade from the ring and injected his life energy in before throwing it to Chu Ting.


    p They were silent for a few more minutes until Chu Ting''s wounds werepletely healed. Once her wounds were healed, she immediately stood up and began moving towards the stairs again since there was still the test happening, but before she could, Lin Fan had already grabbed the back of her cor and pulled her back.</anda>


    Chu Ting looked at him with a confused look, but Lin Fan didn''t care as he said, "It''s time for you to retire."

 253 Chapter 253

    Chu Ting was even more confused, but then she revealed an expression of understanding.


    That was right, they didn''t know each other. Even if the other side had saved her for an unknown reason, that didn''t mean they would keep working with her.


    Since they werepetitors for this inheritance trial, naturally they wouldn''t let her continue in it. But there was nothing she could do or say since the other side had already been kind enough to save her life.


    Moreover, it was clear that they were much stronger than her and if she kept pushing the limits, she might not be able to get out of here alive¡­


    Chu Ting seemed like she wanted to say something, but then she swallowed her words as she gave a sigh.


    Chu Ting pulled out a token from her Space Ring and threw it over to Lin Fan who skillfully caught it. On the surface of the token was a carved snowke, which was the symbol of the Chu Ster Kingdom''s royal family.


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but he understood when he heard what Chu Ting said.


    Chu Ting said with a serious look on her face, "If you ever need anything, you cane and find me in the Chu Ster Kingdom with that token. I promise that I will do my best to help you to repay you for saving me."


    On the surface it seemed like she was just repaying them for saving her life, but it was clear that there was another meaning to this action.


    She naturally knew how powerful Momonga and Ang were, as well as guessing that Lin Fan was on the same level since he could evenmand them. Since that was the case, if she were to lure them to the Chu Ster Kingdom and make people think that they were friends with her, it would definitely raise her status.


    Or at least that was the reasoning that Lin Fan and Momonga thought that Chu Ting was using.


    In truth, after Chu Ting had handed over the token, she had secretly taken a look at Lin Fan''s face before the slightest blush appeared on her face. She had thought that no one had seen this, but it was actually seen by Ang who was usually not the sharpest person.


    However, it seemed like Ang''s womanly senses were very sharp and she had noticed this small detail that everyone else had missed.


    Of course, there was nothing she could do since nothing had happened yet and acting on it would actually be worse than doing nothing, so she didn''t say a word in the end. However, she did make a mental note of this and she was nning on getting a little payback from Lin Fanter on.


    Since she had finished everything she wanted to do, naturally it was time for Chu Ting to leave, but before she did, she suddenly remembered something.


    Chu Ting suddenly turned and said, "Before I go, I have to tell you that my fourth brother''s forces are surrounding this. He said that it was just in case I ever needed backup, but it''s clear that they''re here for another reason. They won''t dare do anything to me outside of this secret inheritance realm, so there''s nothing for me to worry about, but they will naturally know that you were the ones who interfered with their ns when they see you leave the. You should be careful when you leave."


    Lin Fan''s group all looked at each other with smiles on their faces when they heard this. They naturally didn''t need to worry about this since they didn''t exactlye to this the conventional way, so naturally they wouldn''t be caught by forces that were only surrounding the.


    But still, for her to tell them about this, it was enough for her to show her sincerity.


    Lin Fan just nodded at this and said, "It''s fine, we have our own way of dealing with this. You don''t need to worry about us."


    Chu Ting slightly knit her brows when she heard this, but there was nothing she could say in response. In the end, she just gave a nod before heading out of the tower and leaving the inheritance realm.


    But after leaving the tower, Chu Ting couldn''t help taking one look back and giving a sad look with a sigh. However, after she left the realm, she went out with a determined look on her face.


    Since her fourth brother wanted her dead, there was nothing she could do except do her best to live. Not to mention that he had killed the one that was like a father to her, there was no way she would be as naive as before.


    Once she was gone, Lin Fan turned back to Momonga and asked, "What did you leave out for her?"<sub> </sub>


    Momonga looked at Ang first before looking at him with aplicated look in his eyes, "Why are you asking this?"


    Lin Fan of course couldn''t exin the impulse that he felt to Momonga, he himself didn''t even know why he felt this kind of thing.


    In the end, Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "I feel pity for her, isn''t that enough?"


    Momonga paused and took another look at Ang before saying, "It isn''t just the fourth prince who is targeting her, it''s the fourth prince working with the fifth and sixth prince. They are all princes without much chance of seeding the throne, so they are working together to defeat their older brothers. But now that the seventh princess is on the rise, they wanted to stop her before she could gain any momentum and pose any threat to them."


    Lin Fan was silent for a few seconds as he looked at the token Chu Ting had given him and then he said, "But at least we have this token from the royal family, right? That is considered a gain."


    Momonga shook his head at this and said, "No, rather it''s unlikely we''ll ever be able to use this token."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused look, "What do you mean? Isn''t this the token of the royal family?"


    Momonga came over and pointed at a flower that was underneath the snowke before saying, "That is the sign of the seventh princess, which means that this is her personal token, not just the token of the royal family. How likely do you think it''ll be that she will be able to survive until the timees for you to use this token with three of her older brothers aiming for her life?"


    Lin Fan didn''t give up as he said, "But there''s still a chance isn''t there? As long as she does survive, wouldn''t that mean that we would be able to use this?"


    Momonga shook his head, "You can want to believe that she will survive, but we both know how unlikely that is. It is better not to hold onto empty hopes. Rather if we were to show it after she was dead, it might even harm us since they will want to tie up any loose ends, so they will target us as soon as we reveal this token."


    Lin Fan then said, "But do you really need to be afraid of them?"


    Momonga said with a sigh, "Any trouble that can be avoided is best avoided. There''s no reason to cause more trouble for yourselves if you can avoid it."


    Lin Fan didn''t know how to respond to this since he knew that Momonga was correct.


    That strange impulse deep down made him feel pity for Chu Ting, but right now there was nothing he could do. He couldn''t just have Momonga and Ang solve everything. Not to mention whether they would be willing to do this for him or not, there was nothing to gain from this.


    The only thing Lin Fan could do now was slowly build his power and not meddle in these higher realm politics. When he was strong enough, then perhaps he would be able to do something.


    With renewed energy, Lin Fan headed up to the second floor without another word and began cultivating as he made his way up.


    Without saying a thing, Momonga and Ang also made their way up, not feeling the pressure at all.


    For Momonga and Ang, the pressure that wasing from above was below their realm, so naturally they couldn''t feel a single thing from it. It was like walking normally for them, so they could have made their way to the top and finished the trial at any time. However, the only reason that they were here was to apany Lin Fan. While they were curious what the rewards of the trial would be and Momonga wanted to meet the other fragment of Leo''s soul, in the end they were just apanying Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan slowly cultivated the same way as before, using his suction force to drain the pressure around him, allowing him to slowly make his way up. But with this new determination that he had, it didn''t take him long to break through to the next floors.


    It took him an hour for the second floor, half an hour for the third floor, fifteen minutes for the fourth floor, ten minutes for the fifth floor, five minutes for the sixth floor, three minutes for the seventh floor, two minutes for the eighth floor, and only a single minute for the ninth floor.


    While the pressure was strongest on the ninth floor, he had alreadypletely absorbed thew that wasing from the top, allowing him to easily manipte the power of thew around him. He walked right through it all like a fish swimming in water, easily reaching the tenth floor.


    When he reached the top of the tower, all of the pressure on him seemed to have suddenly disappeared.

 254 Chapter 254

    At the top of the tower, the area of this floor was much smaller than all the other floors.


    ? This was a floor that had a room that was only ten meters in length. At the center of the room was a giant brown crystal floating there.


    It was clear that the pressure on the lower floors wasing from this crystal and based on the aura around it, it seemed like the pressure wasing purely from thew contained within the crystal. However, Lin Fan already knew that since he had already absorbed thew.


    Lin Fan now had a total of fivews that were all at the Fragmented Soul Realm when it came toprehension. Some would naturally be stronger since they came from stronger realms, but that was the limit of Lin Fan''sprehension right now. Even if he wanted to use strongerws, his cultivation didn''t allow him to support it.


    But that was more than enough for him.


    Back then, he had been able to fight someone who was a full realm above him with just thebination of fivews. If he were to add up all the variousws that he had now, he could perform abination with seven differentws.


    It was hard to imagine just what kind of power would be contained in such an attack.


    Of course, the one thing that Lin Fan had also wanted to do was take a bit of Momonga and Ang''sws, but naturally they wouldn''t allow that since they had their pride as experts. The only thing that Lin Fan didn''t know about was that Ang probably would have been willing to do it if only he had asked, but it was too bad that he had never asked.


    Momonga moved towards the crystal in the center of the room, but once he came within a meter of it, there seemed to be a ss pane that had stopped him from moving forward.


    Naturally this barrier was not on a level that could really stop Momonga if he were to use his full force, but there was no need for him to do so. After all, this crystal only contained thews of a Ruler, but this wasn''t considered that rare for him. Once thews in the crystal were used up, it would just be a normal crystal.


    Well, of course it wouldn''t just be a normal crystal since it is a crystal that could hold thews of a Ruler, but that still didn''t mean anything to him.


    After five minutes, they suddenly felt a force appear around them which they chose not to resist since they knew it was part of the trial. The force took them up through a hole in the top of the tower and quickly moved them through a passage in the roof of the cave. They first went up for a bit before suddenly moving forward.


    Eventually they finished moving through the passage to reach an opening which led them out of the mountain that they had been in.


    As they looked around, they could tell that they were in arge ss tube that was connected to something. As well, along the outsides of the tube, there was a barrier that was covering the tube which was clearly camouging it.


    Looking out of the tube, it really was a breathtaking sight to see the entire realm beneath them, but there was actually an even more breathtaking sight above them. In the clouds, there was actually a castle that waspletely made of stone that was floating on a cloud.


    The moment he saw it, Lin Fan immediately remembered a certain movie that he had seen back on earth. After he had seen that movie, even he had wanted to search the clouds to see if that castle in the sky had really existed.


    But at this moment, it really did exist in front of him.


    They continued through the tube, moving at incredible speeds until they reached the end of the tube which was connected to the piece of rock that the castle in the sky was floating on.


    Once they entered the rock that castle was floating on, they continued through a passage until they finally came to the courtyard of the castle.


    It was a castle that waspletely normal, but it was also very strange since everything in the castle waspletely made of rocks. Even the nts that decorated the courtyard were made of rocks. It was almost like someone had used a petrification beam to turn everything in this castle to rocks, but they knew that wasn''t the case. This castle was most likely built like this since the previous inhabitants were also madepletely of rocks.


    There wasn''t anything for them in the courtyard, but as they headed towards the main castle, they found that there was something that was in their way. From the outside, it was abyrinth that waspletely made of stone walls.


    As they headed to the entrance, they eventually saw a wooden sign sticking out of the ground right in front of the entrance.


    Aftering over, they read the sign and found that it was the rules of their fourth trial.


    The sign read, "Congrattions on passing the third test. Your fourth trial will be a trial of luck. Sometimes the most important thing is to have luck, pure and simple luck is the most powerful in the world. There is nothing special about this trial, just make your way through thebyrinth to reach the final trial."


    Lin Fan''s group all looked at each other with confused looks, but there was nothing they could do since there was nothing else here for them. The only thing they could do now was make their way through thebyrinth and see what would happen.<sub> </sub>


    So without another word, their group entered the entrance of thebyrinth and continued right through the passage, walking for around five minutes before reaching their first split. It was worth noting that in the first passage, there hadn''t been a single twist, they had been walking straight forward for five minutes.


    If they had really good eyesight, they might have been able to see the wooden sign that was right behind them still.


    When they came to this first split, it was a very simple split. There was one passage leading left and one passage leading right without any markers at all. There was absolutely nothing special about these passages.


    Lin Fan knit his brows as he stood before the passages, not knowing what to do.


    After a few minutes of thinking, Lin Fan asked Momonga, "What should we do now? Do we really just use our luck and choose one?"


    Momonga had also been considering this situation, but he was much more rxed than Lin Fan since he knew something that he didn''t.


    Momonga had been using his spiritual sense to search thebyrinth and he hadn''t found a single thing from either of the passages, which meant that there really weren''t any tricks here. But he couldn''t help finding it funny since this really did seem like something his old friend would have done and it seemed like he had passed this on to his subordinate in Leo.


    However, after thinking this, there was a slight moment of depression as he remembered the matters of the past. Still, he didn''t let that keep him down since he now had found something interesting in the present.


    Actually, he was quite happy with his current arrangement and while he knew that it wouldn''tst forever, he didn''t mind if it could continue a bit longer.


    Momonga shook his head before saying, "It''s not up to us to choose, it''s up to the little girl."


    Ang and Lin Fan looked at each other with confused gazes before looking back at Momonga with the same confused looks.


    Lin Fan asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    Momonga looked at Ang for a bit before saying, "Do you remember how you let her use her instincts to pick the prizes earlier?"


    Lin Fan was still confused, but he said, "Yes, but what about that? That just means that she has good instincts for this kind of stuff, right?"


    Momonga revealed a faint smile and shook his head, "It''s not as simple as that. Spirits are actually known as symbols of luck in mortal realms, do you know why they are considered that?"


    Lin Fan looked at Ang in surprise since this was his first time hearing this, but then he turned back and asked, "Why?"


    Momonga had the same faint smile as he said, "Well it''s naturally because they are blessed with luck. They are nature''s children and receive the blessing of nature, one of those blessings is the blessing of luck. So spirits are naturally blessed with luck and they can pass that luck onto those around them."


    Lin Fan looked at Ang in surprise to find that there was also a surprised look on her own face as if she didn''t know anything about this.


    Momonga wasn''t finished there as he said, "This little girl is the Spirit Overlord, the ruler of all spirits, so naturally she has received the strongest blessings and has the strongest luck of all spirits."


    But then Momonga turned to ask Ang, "Little girl, didn''t the previous generation Overlord teach you this?"


    Ang suddenly revealed a sad look as she paused for a few seconds before then saying, "She didn''t have time to teach me."


    Both Momonga and Lin Fan immediately knew that they had stepped on andmine and quickly changed the topic.


    But they didn''t forget to make a mental note of this.


    It was clear that this was something that had a deep impact on Ang.

 255 Chapter 255

    Moving past this topic, they didn''t linger any longer at this first turn.


    Ang came to the front of the group and after a few seconds of pause, she suddenly pointed to the right.


    Neither of the other two hesitated as they followed Ang''s instincts and went down the right path.


    They continued for five minutes just like the first passage and soon they reached another split that was just like the first. There was nothing special about this ce at all, it was just a simple spilt that went left and right.


    Ang came in front of the two directions again and after a pause, she pointed right again.


    At this time, Momonga suddenly raised his hand and summoned a skeleton out of the ground. This skeleton was different from all the other ones that he had summoned before, this was just a simple white skeleton that didn''t have anything special about it.


    Momonga nodded at the skeleton and it walked down the left path instead.


    Momonga also raised his hand to have the others wait while he performed his experiment.


    After ten minutes, Momonga finally stood up from where he had been sitting with his eyes closed and said, "It''s done, we can keep going now."


    But Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What was down the other path?"


    Momonga said, "It''s a simple array that leads to an infinite path. It isn''t dangerous, but you''ll definitely be trapped for a while if you don''t know how to break through it. Still, it''s better than what it could have been."


    Lin Fan nodded at this and didn''t ask any further since he knew what Momonga was referring to.


    They headed off down the right path and just like before, they reached another split after another five minutes of walking.


    Just like that, they continued following Ang through the maze. At first it was only ten splits, then it was twenty, then it became thirty and there still didn''t seem to be an end in sight.


    But eventually they dide to an end of thebyrinth after fifty splits.


    Lin Fan couldn''t believe what kind of luck it took to pass through thisbyrinth, it was fifty 50-50 chance choices in a row! The chances of getting fifty right choices in a row was over a one in a quadrillion chance!


    Just how lucky did one have to be to actually get all those right?


    After thinking that, Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Ang with a bit of amazement since she had indeed gotten all of them right.


    Lin Fan was even tempted to go to the jade lottery with Ang after this.


    After they came out of thebyrinth, they arrived at the door of the castle where there was a person that was in a butler outfit that was waiting for them. However, the strange thing about this person was that he had just been standing there in a daze like he was a robot without any power. That is until the moment they came out of thebyrinth.


    That person in the butler outfit suddenly jumped up and came to attention, quickly moving over to Lin Fan''s group of three. He came in front of them and quickly gave them a deep bow before saying, "Congrattions on passing the fourth trial my master set. Please follow me to the fifth trial."


    Lin Fan looked at this butler in surprise before turning to Momonga and asking, "Didn''t you say that there were no living beings left in this realm? What is this then?"


    Momonga pointed at the butler and said, "Look closely, that isn''t a living being. It''s nothing more than a puppet."


    Lin Fan turned back to look at the butler and he saw that there was indeed something different about him. His clothing seemed like they had just been painted on and there didn''t seem to be a divide between his clothing and skin, it was like a blend between the two.


    It almost seemed like the clothes were a part of his skin itself.


    Momonga saw the confused look on Lin Fan''s face and he continued, "He''s a high grade puppet, so he''s designed to be no different from a normal living being. Normally one wouldn''t be able to tell, but it''s clear that this ce is deteriorating and about to lose its power source."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything else after that and began following the butler through the castle.


    It had to be said, even though this castle had been left here for who knows how long, it was still well maintained. There wasn''t even a speck of dust to be found in these giant corridors which must be especially hard since this entire ce and this entire realm was made of rocks.


    There were luxurious decorations that lined this castle, as well as all kinds of foliage which were all made of rocks which seemed strange. However, along the way, Lin Fan recognized several of the nts that were just ced in the hallway.


    These nts were all famous rock attributed elixirs that were said to have wondrous effects when it came to being used on pets, but in this realm, they were just being used to decorate the halls.


    Lin Fan really couldn''t help feeling despair at this disparity in wealth.


    While he was scrounging about, "risking" his life in these various cultivation realms looking for elixirs, there were people who were so rich that they didn''t know what to do with their wealth. This really did bring Lin Fan''s heart down.


    They continued through the halls until they eventually reached a hall that seemed like it was the throne room for a king, but there was indeed a throne in the center of this room.


    When they came into the room fully and saw the throne, they found that there was a familiar figure who was sitting right on that throne. It was a figure that was covered in a red armour that they had just seen.


    At least if Lin Fan and Ang weren''t familiar with this person, Momonga would be.


    It was the former Ruler of this realm, Leo.


    But when he saw them, he didn''t react at all. All he did was wave the butler off before looking down over them. Judging by the way he looked at them, it was clear that he didn''t recognize them.


    Lin Fan whispered to Momonga, "Why doesn''t he recognize us? Well at least you?"


    Momonga whispered back, "This isn''t the fragment of his soul, this is also a puppet just like the butler. It should have some final trial for us before we can meet the other fragment of his soul."


    Lin Fan wanted to say something else, but the Leo puppet suddenly spoke, "Wee and congrattions on making it to my final test. You have proven that you possess all the qualities to be the sessor to my inheritance, but there''s only onest quality that you must prove."


    The Leo puppet then gave a snap of his finger before saying, "To show that you can be a true expert and take revenge for our realm, you must show your determination."


    When the Leo puppet had snapped its finger, the butler hade back pushing two cages in. The cages were of different size, one big and one small. It was also seen through, so they could see that there were two creatures inside of it.


    The two creatures that were inside had the appearance of bunnies, but there was something strange about their ears which had hands on the ends of them. Then based on the way they acted, it was clear that it was a mother and its child that were separated in the two cages.


    The butler pushed the two cages all the way up to the Leo puppet''s throne and left them there. It gave another bow to the Leo puppet before bringing out a dagger that he respectfully offered to the Leo puppet.


    The Leo puppet took the dagger and the butler quickly moved off to the side.


    The Leo puppet opened therger of the two cages and reached in to grab the bunny beast by the neck, holding it in a way that it couldn''t struggle at all.


    Lifting that bunny beast, he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Now, your test will be one of determination and this is how you will show it¡­"


    When he said those final words, he took the dagger and slid it across the throat of the mother bunny beast in full view of the child bunny beast. The child bunny beast''s eyes opened wide before it started thrashing against the cage without care for its own body.


    After mming against the cage several times, there were patches of blood that began covering its white fur, dying itpletely red. Still even though it was clearly in pain, it didn''t care at all as it continued mming its body against the cage.


    Just the cry of anguish that it had was enough to break anyone''s heart, but there was one heart that it did break in particr. A certain spirit that had been standing there had wanted to charge forth andpletely destroy this Leo puppet, but a certain lich stopped her.


    The Leo puppet mercilessly threw the corpse of the mother bunny beast in front of the cage of its child before turning back to Lin Fan and reaching his hand out, offering the dagger to him as he said, "Now, it is time to prove your determination."

 256 Chapter 256

    Lin Fan felt a chill run down his back and there was the same impulse that he felt when he had seen Chu Ting about to be assaulted.


    However, this time the impulse almostpletely took over his mind and filled him with this strange sense of rage that made him want to absolutely rip the Leo puppet from piece to piece.


    Still, he kept his mind and was barely able to keep that impulse in check.


    To do so, he had to dig his nails into his palms, drawing blood that ran down his hand and dripped onto the ground drop by drop.


    He was even biting his lips so hard that there were streams of blood that came out of the sides of his mouth.


    The Leo puppet acted like it saw none of that as it continued to offer the dagger to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just stared right at the puppet for a few seconds before reaching out to take the dagger. But the moment that he did take the dagger, he immediately threw it to the side without any hesitation and said, "No, I won''t do it."


    The Leo puppet didn''t act surprised, it just went over to the dagger to pick it up before heading towards the smaller cage.


    Along the way, he didn''t forget to pause for a second to turn to Lin Fan to say, "If you won''t do it, then I''ll do it myself. You have to see that there are consequences to your action and if you do not have determination, you will lose everything."


    Once again, Ang wanted to step out, but Momonga grabbed her and pulled her back again, shaking his head when she turned back to look at him.


    While it was cruel, this was a lesson that Lin Fan did have to learn. This was something that Momonga already knew after what had happened earlier.


    Lin Fan hesitated as he watched the Leo puppet move towards the smaller cage. The impulse inside him continued to hit his mind, but his mind also stayed rational as he tried to think this over. This was a test, so there had to be a way to pass this test while being able to stop this.


    But no matter how he thought it over, he still couldn''t find the answer.


    Lin Fan had no choice but to turn over to Momonga and Ang and he saw that they were just standing there watching.


    He tried to get them to help with the look in his eyes, but they wouldn''t move at all.


    p Actually, Ang had wanted to help the entire time since what the Leo puppet had been doing had struck a chord with her heart. However, Momonga had been using his spiritual sense to secretly talk to her the entire time, making sure that she didn''t do anything.</anda>


    The only thing that could stop Ang was if it was for Lin Fan''s good and this was indeed for Lin Fan''s good.


    Momonga had noticed that Lin Fan was still missing one crucial thing and this was the perfect chance to help him gain this one thing.


    Lin Fan knew that they weren''t acting for some reason and that made him fall into deeper thought. Was the right course of action not to act at all here?


    But to tell him to watch something like the senseless ughter of an innocent child, even if it was just a beast was not something that he could do.


    His mind continued to tell him to not act and watch, but that impulse deep down continued to grow stronger and stronger inside. It continued to attack his rationality, but then he finally came to an epiphany.


    What was the point of hesitating now?


    Even if he couldn''t get this inheritance, there were still many other things that he could have with his system, so why was there a point in hesitating?


    He found that he had been only thinking about building power to protect what was important to him, but if he were to lose his character along the way, then what was the point?


    If he was to give up on himself to be more powerful, there was no point in this second life of his. He had made that promise back in the Mirror of Regret and if he were to go against it now, he would be not only letting himself down, he would be letting someone else down.


    So without any further hesitation, Lin Fan immediately went forward to stand in front of the cage with a white dagger in his hand. He stood there as he said in a determined voice, "I won''t let you do this."


    The Leo puppet stopped moving as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "Move, it will die one way or another. There is nothing you can do to stop this."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just stood there without taking a single step back as he said, "No."


    The Leo puppet continued, "If you move now, I''ll let you pass the test. That will at least show that you have the determination to see something through to the end."


    Lin Fan had already thought things through, so he wouldn''t be moved by this. He just stood there as he said, "You have to get through my dead body first if you want to kill this child."


    The Leo puppet suddenly revealed a vicious look as he said, "You really think just you can stop me? You overestimate yourself. You''re nothing special and there''s plenty of others out there just as talented as you. I have no qualms with killing you where you stand."


    Still Lin Fan didn''t move as he said, "Come then." After saying this, he raised his dagger and turned it into the zweihander while summoning out all his pets.


    If he was going to do this, he would be going all out.


    If hebined the sevenws, there was a chance that he would survive, but if he didn''t go against the Ruler with his full power, it would be certain death. He was just praying that thews of the Ruler inside this puppet had weakened enough that he would be able to do this since there were plenty of cultivation realms between the two of them.


    The Leo puppet just shook its head before raising the dagger in its hand, gathering its earthws around it, creating a casing of rock around that dagger.


    Lin Fan had been gathering the energy of his pets around him, fusing it with thews that he had absorbed, but this process was going slowly.


    These were seven differentws all with different properties, to force them all into a single point was definitely difficult and required time, but it was made much easier since Lin Fan had the suction force that could force it all into a single point.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t have time to do so as the Leo puppet had disappeared from right in front of him. When it reappeared again, he already saw the tip of the dagger right in front of his eyes, quickly approaching.


    In truth, Lin Fan also had another w which was that he was getting too confident with himself.


    His cultivation had been increasing too quickly, which had allowed him to defeat one powerful enemy after another, giving him a misconception of his own power. It should be known that all the enemies he had faced were only experts of a lower realm, people who had the lowest level of talent and could never make it off these lower realms. He might have been talented, butpared to those that were at the peak of the universe, he was still far from being able topare.


    As the dagger that symbolized his death approached, Lin Fan did feel regret, but he didn''t regret the choice that he had made. If he survived this ordeal, he would definitely live his life differently from now on.


    It hadpletely slipped his mind that he was currently in a cultivation realm and that even if he died, he would be revived by the system. He had beenpletely caught up in the situation and it had slipped his mind.


    This was one of the main reasons why Momonga and Ang were able to continue watching from the side without too much worry.


    But none of that mattered since the dagger stopped right before piercing into Lin Fan''s skull.


    Lin Fan just felt the pressure from the dagger, but it didn''t injure him at all. However, he could tell from that pressure that with the force the dagger had just been stabbed at, it would have most definitely killed him.


    The Leo puppet just stood there for a few seconds before suddenly pulling the dagger back and giving a p while revealing a faint smile.


    After a few seconds of this, the Leo puppet finally said, "Congrattions on passing this final trial, you have earned the rights to the inheritance of this realm."


    Lin Fan waspletely confused as he stared at the Leo puppet in a daze.


    The Leo puppet could see that Lin Fan was confused, so it said, "It''s very simple, while this is a test of determination, this was also a test ofpassion."


    Lin Fan still said in a confused voice, "Compassion?"


    The Leo puppet nodded, "Yes,passion might not seem important to most people, but it is a very important trait to have as well. When you be a true expert, sometimes you need to know how to showpassion because from truepassiones true character."


    Then after a pause, he continued, "And we need someone with truepassion to inherit the mission of this realm¡­"

 257 Chapter 257

    Lin Fan was confused again as he asked, "Mission? What mission?


    The Leo puppet answered, "You should have seen the past of this realm since I can sense one of the special items from the prize shop on you. That item is something that you can only get if you finish the impossible mission and learn our past. That is why I gave you this special test."


    The Leo puppet turned to the corpse of the mother bunny beast and picked it up to pat it on its back, causing it to suddenly wake up like nothing had happened.


    Seeing the shocked look on Lin Fan''s face, he said, "Normally you would never see this part since the normal test would be indeed a test of determination since we need determined individuals to help us take our revenge, however if you know our past, there''s something else we need to test since you are eligible to inherit our mission. That is why we had to test yourpassion and you certainly passed with flying colours."


    Lin Fan then asked, "You still haven''t told me what the mission is."


    The Leo puppet revealed a smile and said, "Right, right, I was getting to that. The mission of our realm is to collect the twelve tokens of the Zodiac Realm and open it to revive the Saintess. We needed someone who would actually keep their promises instead of running away with the true inheritance, which is why we tested yourpassion. We needed to know if you could be trusted to help and you''ve passed with flying colours."


    The Leo puppet went back to his throne and he suddenly reached into the space beside it, causing a vortex to appear before something appeared in his hand.


    When that item appeared, Momonga immediately knit his brows since he felt a familiar aura from it. It was the aura that he had felt from the token Lin Fan had brought back before from the Inheritance Realm.


    p The Leo puppet held the token out in front of Lin Fan as he said, "This is a token that''s only given to the Twelve Zodiac Knights. If you can gather all twelve, the Zodiac Realm will be opened once again. I now entrust this to you in hopes that you will collect all twelve and help us revive the Saintess."</anda>


    Lin Fan was stunned when he saw this.


    He had actually put this in the back of his mind and had almost forgotten about it, but seeing this token now, he remembered where he was and what he had been trying to find. It was one of the twelve tokens that he needed for the mission from the system, the mission that would unlock a top grade cultivation realm for him!


    Lin Fan gave a nod as he took the token and said, "I''ll be sure to help you with this when I find them all, I''m really interested in this Zodiac Realm."


    When the Leo puppet heard this, it revealed a faint smile before saying, "Now, it''s time for me to go and time for you to meet the Ruler, are you ready?"


    When Momonga heard this, he actually took a step forward since this had been what he was waiting for.


    Momonga had been waiting patiently on the side during this test because he knew that this test would give Lin Fan something that hecked. He had found that from time to time, it seemed like there were two different personalities that were inside of Lin Fan and they seemed to sh.


    It made him hesitate when certain important decisions should be made and it seemed like there were key triggers for him.


    Momonga had already guessed what the contents of this test would be, so he wanted to see if he could use it to push Lin Fan to finally make a breakthrough. When he saw Lin Fan suddenly decide to step forward to protect the smaller cage, he knew that Lin Fan would change from now on and he was deeply happy for him.


    What Momonga didn''t realize was that slowly he had begun to ept Lin Fan as part of his family. Perhaps he had been lonely too long, but after spending all that time with Lin Fan, teaching him, he almost saw him as a little brother, which was why he went this far to take care of him.


    But the reason why he had stepped forward was because he wanted to talk to Leo, the main fragment of Leo''s soul left in this realm to maintain it that would be appearing now.


    There was a sudden glow around the Leo puppet before his expression suddenly changed.


    It went from that smile to a dignified expression which it used to look over Lin Fan. But that didn''tst long since that expression soon filled with shock the moment Leo noticed Momonga standing beside him.


    Leo immediately bowed down like the other fragment had done and said, "Lord Momonga, what are you doing here?"


    Momonga just said, "Call the other fragment of your soul and you''ll find out. It''s troublesome to exin again."


    Leo slightly knit his brows when he heard this, but of course he still followed Momonga''s instructions and called the other fragment of his soul over.


    Leo closed his eyes for a few minutes as he organized the memories before opening his eyes again and giving a deep bow, "Lord Momonga, thank you for agreeing to help me with this request."<sub> </sub>


    Momonga nodded before saying, "What can you give this kid?"


    Leo turned to Lin Fan and said, "Since he has Lord Momonga''s approval, I''ll give him the full inheritance. He will receive this entire castle and all the treasures contained within, but¡­"


    Lin Fan had been filled with excitement when he heard that he would be receiving the castle, but he knit his brows when he heard the word but.


    Lin Fan quickly asked, "But what?"


    Leo revealed an awkward look as he said, "The castle''s power system isn''t charged at all and there isn''t any more power source for it in this realm, so there''s no way to move this castle."


    Lin Fan immediately revealed a disappointed look, but then he remembered that there were still treasures. This was treasure that had once belonged to a top grade cultivation realm, it would definitely be something good.


    But once again his hopes were shattered again with Leo''s next words.


    Leo hesitantly said, "Also while I say all the treasures contained within, most of the treasures were lost when the realm was destroyed. The few treasures that were hidden in stashes around the realm were also raided and they''ve already been emptied, there''s nothing really left. But at the very least, you can have everything in the point shop since there''s no need to leave them there with the inheritance being given."


    Lin Fan felt a bit of constion when he heard this. There were indeed quite a few treasures in that point shop, including a Ruler Grade Artifact, but of course it was too strong for Lin Fan to use right now and even if he did reach a point where he could use it, it was actually quite the weak artifact ording to Momonga.


    But still, he was in no position to criticize since he was being given something for free.


    Before Lin Fan could say anything else, Momonga cut in, "Do you know the location of any of the other tokens?"


    Leo was surprised to hear this, but he shook his head and said, "No, I''ve lost contact with all of the other Zodiac Knights after the fall of the Zodiac Realm, so I have no idea where the rest of them are. I pray that you''ll be able to find them eventually."


    Momonga took a deep breath and paused for a few minutes before suddenly saying, "Do you know where the rest of our people are?"


    Leo''s expression filled with sadness when he heard this, but once again he shook his head and said, "I lost contact with them after that incident and I was taken in by the Saintess after that. I tried finding them, but I never received any news. I think they know it''s best for them to hide if they didn''t have anything to rely on like me with the Zodiac Realm."


    Momonga nodded before saying, "You''re all disappearing on me, what am I supposed to do?"


    Leo''s eyes filled with sympathy as he said, "Lord Momonga, at least you''re not alone now, right?"


    Momonga couldn''t help turning to Lin Fan and Ang before turning back to say with a faint smile, "Well, you''re right there." Then after a pause, he added, "Do you want me to keep you alive?"


    Leo shook his head immediately at this, "Lord Momonga, I''m only a fragment of a soul right now. You and I both know that death is the better option."


    Momonga didn''t say a word in response to this. He just turned and walked away, almost as if he had been betrayed.


    He had finally stuck himself out like this, but he had been rejected, so it was no wonder he felt this way.


    But there was nothing that Leo could do. Being a fragmented piece of a soul had many implications and he was right, it was better for him to die than to remain in this world any longer.


    Still, before Leo left, he turned to Lin Fan and Ang and gave them a bow before saying, "Please take care of Lord Momonga. He might seem hard on the outside, but he''s quite the soft person, or at least that''s what my master always told me."


    Lin Fan just said with a solemn look, "We will."


    Leo gave them onest bow before the light drained out of the eyes of the puppet and it crumpled to the ground.

 258 Chapter 258

    Leo had done a final favour for them, using the remaining bit of energy in his soul fragment to provide power for the flying castle. It would ensure that it at least had the necessary amount of power to keep floating, but as for flying off-world, that was a different question.


    Still, there was another problem that Lin Fan faced.


    Leo had said that he had left him this entire castle, but he didn''t know how to control it at all.


    But that wasn''t a problem since Leo had also nned for this and already took care of it for Lin Fan.


    After the Leo puppet had copsed, the butler puppet from before suddenly came back and bowed to Lin Fan as it said, "Greetings to the new master. Do you have any orders?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see that butler puppet still working, but after thinking about it, it seemed right. If there was nothing here to help him control, then wouldn''t he have been scammed?


    Lin Fan said, "How do I control this castle?"


    The butler turned and left, beforeing back with a crystal that he held on a te with both hands. He offered this crystal to Lin Fan and said, "Master, as long as you inject your spiritual sense into this crystal, it will allow you to integrate your spiritual sense into the castle and control it."


    Lin Fan took the crystal and weighed it in his hand before looking it over. He injected his spiritual sense and immediately he feltpletely overwhelmed by the amount of sensory input that he felt, causing his head to be filled with dizziness. It was even worse than when he had used the avatars.


    He immediately pulled back his spiritual sense and took a few minutes to calm himself down.


    It was clear that his spiritual sense wasn''t strong enough to control this castle for now and there was no real need for him to move this castle just yet. It had enough power to maintain the illusion array around it to hide itself and Lin Fan couldn''t move it since he didn''t have enough power to do so.


    Lin Fan returned the crystal back to the butler who carefully put it away before asking, "How do I ess the storage for the point shop?"


    The butler quickly led them through the castle to a room that was in the west wing. When he opened the door, what appeared in front of them was the same point shop, but this time there were no prices on these items. They were all there free for Lin Fan to pick from.


    Lin Fan picked out a few interesting things that Ang had chosen before and left the rest of them there since there was no need to bring them back with him. In the future, this ce would be an important base for him since he had already inherited the entire realm, there was no need for him to move everything just yet.


    So just like that, the inheritance test had ended.


    It had taken them over a day to finish this, but the gains were definitely worth the trouble.


    But since they had finished it in over a day, it meant that they still had plenty of time to aplish what they wanted to aplish before.


    With the flying castle as their base, Lin Fan had gone out from time to time to fight beasts located all over the realm to train the Rock Nibbler.


    <o>,m When the Rock Nibbler had been put away a day earlier, it looked like it had been pardoned from being executed. It thought it was finally able to return to the nice cage that it had received back in the shop, but it was thrown in the system''s storage. However, the system''s storage wasn''t inferior to the cages in the shop, so the Rock Nibbler didn''tin about being put there either.</o>


    However, when Lin Fan summoned it out again, the happy look that it had on its face immediately copsed the moment it saw Lin Fan.


    Just like that, it was forced to fight various different beasts all over the Sacred Rock Realm, dying again and again. The only constion it received was that Lin Fan would hit it from time to time with his special suction force, creating the most wonderful feeling for it.


    Still, just like that, over the span of the week, the Rock Nibbler waspletely changed. It had gone from the most ordinary Rock Nibbler to an elite with a purified bloodline that could easily fight those in the Silver Realm even when it was in the Bronze Realm.


    Of course this was considered higher than Lin Fan''s normal training results since normally he wouldn''t be the one personally training these pets. He would leave them in the shadow cultivation room and let them slowly train by breaking their own limits.


    But since this was his first customer in a new city, he had to make a big impression or he wouldn''t be able to generate fame for his store, which was why he had personally trained this Rock Nibbler.


    Time passed quickly and soon a week had already passed, it was time for them to head back.


    There was nothing left for them on this realm, so they walked through the portal generated by the system and they appeared back on the Blue Star.


    For them, only an hour had passed on the Blue Star, which was due to timepression by the timews of the system.


    What they didn''t know was that there was someone who had been shocked by their sudden disappearance.


    ¡­


    In a ship orbiting the Sacred Rock Realm.


    Chu Ting had been sitting there cultivating when she suddenly opened her eyes.


    The three life energy signatures that she had been tracking had suddenly disappeared from the Sacred Rock Realm.


    She had a specialw that allowed her to track things that she set her target on and she had secretly set them on the three who she had met in this realm.<sub> </sub>


    She had been worried about how they would get off the realm with her fourth brother''s forces surrounding the realm, but now it seemed like she had been worried for nothing.


    Since that was the case, there was no longer a reason for her to stay here.


    There would be a storm when she returned to the Chu Ster Kingdom and she didn''t look forward to it.


    ¡­


    Aftering back to the store, Lin Fan sent Momonga through the Any ce Door and back to the Snow Wind City shop before heading back to the ce that he had rented in this Rock Mountain City.


    For their trip, they had left Song Shu alone in this ce and while it had only been an hour, she was still very angry at them for leaving her at home alone.


    Still, Lin Fan had already considered this and he took out an elixir for her. It was one of the elixirs he had taken from the point shop in the castle and it was quite the rare elixir.


    But what Lin Fan didn''t know was that Ang had also secretly taken several elixirs which she gave to Song Shu in secret.


    Without knowing it, the two of them had turned into doting parents.


    However, this proved that Song Shu had been right in deciding to follow Lin Fan instead of heading to the upper realm.


    The elixirs that she received were much stronger than anything the upper realm could have given her since they came from a realm that was even higher than the upper realm!


    With this, she would certainly be much stronger than if she had followed Elder Fu back to the Alchemy King Hall.


    The night passed and soon the morning came.


    Lin Fan, Ang, and Song Shu headed off to the store early since it was the day they would be serving their first customer. They were confident that with the ability of the store, they would certainly get more customers in the future.


    When they arrived at the store, there was already a giant crowd that had gathered outside the store.


    Naturally what had happened yesterday had quickly spread across the forums and now everyone was here to join in the fun.


    This store had been quite popr on the forumstely because everyone found their advertising method very unique. So many people were here to see if this store was a fake or not.


    Jiang You had also arrived very early and was standing just by the door.


    When Lin Fan''s group arrived, the crowd immediately parted to reveal a path to the door and Jiang You who was standing there.


    Jiang You saw Lin Fan and immediately came forward to say, "Owner Lin, do you have my pet ready?"


    Lin Fan walked forward through the crowd to arrive in front of Jiang You before saying, "Please wait until the store opens in half an hour. You will receive your pet then."


    Jiang You naturally wasn''t happy about this as he said, "Owner Lin, you''re already here, I''m sure you can just give me my pet now."


    Lin Fan gave a snort and released a bit of his aura, forcing everyone in the crowd back before saying, "The store follows a strict schedule, we will only serve customers when it''s time for the store to open."


    Jiang You couldn''t help taking a step back when he felt this aura.


    This aura was the aura of a Gold Realm Expert!


    While they were consideredmon in this S Rank City, it still didn''t mean that they could be freely insulted since they were thatmon since they were still experts.


    Jiang You was from the Jiang Family, but he was only from a branch family, naturally he didn''t have a Gold Realm Expert supporting him.


    If the Jiang Family were to choose between him and a Gold Realm Expert, they would choose the Gold Realm Expert any time.


    So Jiang You immediately backed down and said, "Yes Owner Lin, I''ll wait until your store opens."


    The crowd had noticed all of this and while they were surprised to see that Lin Fan was a Gold Realm Expert, they all thought that he was only stalling for them. In their hearts they had all written Lin Fan down as a scammer and they were looking forward to the show that woulde.


    Jiang You was feeling the same and he swallowed the anger that he felt, but he was thinking, "Just you wait. You''ll be paying me mypensation soon, it doesn''t matter if you want to act arrogant."


    But he didn''t know just how wrong he would be.

 259 Chapter 259

    Lin Fan just moved past him without worrying at all since he was more than confident in the results of his training. After all, he had even personally trained the Rock Nibbler and even he had been shocked by how it had turned out.


    They just casually prepared for the opening of the store and half an hour passed quickly.


    However, during this time, the crowd outside the store had grown even more until the store waspletely surrounded.


    The other stores of this street werepletely shocked to see the sea of people that had appeared. They had been used to the increased traffic that had started with the appearance of the new shop that had appeared a few days ago, but they hadn''t seen anything like this.


    They wouldin that it was disrupting the business of their stores, but they really couldn''tin since they didn''t have any business before that store had appeared. Now that it was here and attracting more potential customers, their businesses had actually been betterpared to normal since there was at least 1% of the people who came to watch the fun at least went to their stores.


    When the half an hour passed, the door to Lin Fan''s shop opened and the crowd followed Jiang You in.


    While the store wasn''t small, it wasn''t that big either. The store quickly filled with people and there were still plenty of people who were standing by the windows peering in.


    Jiang You came to the counter and said, "Owner Lin, I''m here to pick up my pet."


    Lin Fan looked at him and gave a nod before looking at Song Shu.


    Song Shu naturally knew what he meant by that and went into the back where the Rock Nibbler was kept. It didn''t take her long to bring back the Rock Nibbler, but when it appeared, it kept looking at the back with an unwilling look.


    However, once it was brought to the front and saw Lin Fan waiting there, it began trembling in fear. The one good thing for it was that it also saw its master waiting there with Lin Fan.


    The moment Song Shu brought the Rock Nibbler over, it immediately jumped into Jiang You''s arms, catching him off guard.


    Jiang You was shocked by the reaction of his pet, he had never seen it act this close to him before. Before it had even disdained him a bit because it had thought that he was too weak, but now it was acting like it was its saviour.


    Well it wasn''t false that he was indeed its saviour¡­


    Jiang You looked over his pet and he immediately knit his brows.


    This sensation that wasing from the Rock Nibbler was a strange sense of suppression.


    He could tell that its cultivation had increased, but there was a faint sense of pressure that came from deep inside of it, which was a form of bloodline suppression.


    Jiang You couldn''t help looking up at Lin Fan again as he asked, "Owner Lin, what did you do to my pet?"


    When the crowd heard this, they all looked at the Rock Nibbler in Jiang You''s hands. A few of the experts in the crowd even used their spiritual sense to check the Rock Nibbler and they were shocked by what they had found.


    Lin Fan just casually said, "I just released its potential and purified its bloodline a bit, you should be able to tell just by looking at it. As for the specifics, it used to have four skills, but now it has¡­"


    Lin Fan began listing off the skills that the Rock Nibbler had. The first few skills were themon skills that it had before and even the ones that followed were normal since they weremon skills that were taught by ordinary Monster Trainers. However, what followedpletely shocked everyone who had heard it. The skills that Lin Fan listed after the first few skills fell under the intermediate category, which were skills that would normally be hard for normal beasts to learn.


    <o>,m These intermediate level skills would only be learned by beasts that had experienced bloodline purification to a certain extent, but they could all tell that this was the mostmon Rock Nibbler. It shouldn''t have been able to learn these skills.</o>


    But that shock didn''t end there since Lin Fan then listed off several advanced skills. These were skills that only those with the purest bloodline could learn and this was only just a single lowly Rock Nibbler!


    No one believed what Lin Fan said, even the experts who had used their spiritual sense to check the conditions of the Rock Nibbler and could tell just how pure its bloodline was. It had reached a point that no one believed that this thing was still a simple Rock Nibbler, it was clearly a rare variant that looked just like a Rock Nibbler.


    Jiang You naturally didn''t believe this, even though he was the person who was the most familiar with this Rock Nibbler and knew that it was different.


    Lin Fan could see the doubt in Jiang You''s eyes, so he said, "If you want, you can go test your pet in our arena. Normally I would charge you to use it, but since you are my first customer, I can let you use it for free."


    Jiang You revealed a look of surprise as he said, "Arena? You have an arena in this shop?"


    This was a small single floor shop with a small area, where did Lin Fan keep an arena?<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan pointed down and said, "It''s below the store, do you want to use it or not?"


    Jiang You did indeed want to see what his pet was like and since Lin Fan was offering, why wouldn''t he take something that was offered to him for free?


    So Lin Fan led the crowd down a set of stairs until they reached a giant open space under the shop. It was indeed an arena and there were stands all around the arena.


    It was so big that everyone who had been waiting outside the shop was able toe into the shop and fit into the stands, while still leaving a few spaces open.


    Lin Fan ignored the people who hade to watch as he led Jiang You down into the arena in the center.


    He unlocked the door in the ss barrier around the arena and brought Jiang You right to the middle before asking, "Do you want me to show you what your pet can do?"


    Jiang You naturally didn''t know just how strong his pet was and Lin Fan needed to make a big impression on all the people watching, so he offered to demonstrate the power of the pet himself.


    Jiang You just gave a nod that had a bit of doubt in it.


    Lin Fan nodded to Song Shu who had been outside the cage at the control panel for the arena and she followed the instruction that Lin Fan had given earlier to start the arena.


    The space inside the ss dome suddenly changed and Lin Fan, Jiang You, and the Rock Nibbler were thrown into a dense jungle. There were also several beasts that had appeared around them.


    The arena was one that utilized the strongest illusionws to create illusions that were of the highest grade, allowing for the most realistic illusions that could even kill people if it wasn''t properly controlled.


    The beasts that were created by the illusions were all in the Silver Realm, which was an entire realm higher than Jiang You.


    When Jiang You saw these beasts appear, he didn''t realize they were illusions since they were so real and he immediately moved behind Lin Fan.


    What a joke, if you wanted him to fight against these beasts, what could he have done?


    Just one of them was enough to rip him to shreds, not to mention an entire pack.


    Jiang You didn''t understand what Lin Fan wanted to do here. If he wanted to show off the power of the Rock Nibbler, wouldn''t it have made sense to face Bronze Realm beasts instead of these?


    Even if it did have the skills that Lin Fan had described, how could his simple Rock Nibbler take down all these Silver Realm beasts?


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all.


    He looked down at the Rock Nibbler on the ground who was quite rxed, but the moment it felt Lin Fan''s gaze fall onto it, it gave a tremble. This was a gaze that the Rock Nibbler had learned to instinctively fear and it knew that it would never be able to run away.


    The Rock Nibbler could understand what this gaze meant and it immediately went into attack mode.


    At the very least, the beasts that it was facing now weren''t as strong as the ones that it had died to again and again. Compared to that experience, this was a walk in the park.


    When the Rock Nibbler released its aura, everyone in the crowd, including Jiang You were all shocked.


    This was a feeling that they were familiar with since they were all cultivators, they could tell that just based on the Rock Nibbler''s life energy alone, it was strong enough to be considered in the Silver Realm, but its cultivation was clearly still in the medium Bronze Realm.


    The Rock Nibbler didn''t hesitate at all as it charged forward at the Silver Realm beasts.


    The one thing that the Rock Nibbler had learned was topletely disregard its fear. By all right, these Silver Realm beasts were much stronger than it in terms of cultivation, but from facing all different beasts that were realms above it, it had learned topletely ignore the fear that should have been present.


    But that didn''t matter since the Rock Nibbler was actually stronger than these beasts.

 260 Chapter 260

    When the Rock Nibbler charged forth, it went at an incredible speed that shocked everyone who had seen it.


    Rock Nibblers were fast since they were tiny creatures, but normally they never moved at this kind of speed.


    Seeing the Rock Nibbler quickly get behind the first Silver Realm wolf beast before it could even react, many people the crowd all began doubting whether this Rock Nibbler was actually a variant.


    Variants were beasts of the same race that had different qualities. Some could move faster, some were much stronger, and some could even do things like breathe underwater. No matter what the variation was, it almost always made the beast stronger.


    But Jiang You was clear that this wasn''t the case since he had had this Rock Nibbler since he started cultivating and it had never shown any variation. He knew that this was all the results of the training done by Lin Fan and this shocked him even more.


    The Rock Nibbler jumped onto the back of the first wolf and shed down at it with a Sword of Stone, an advanced skill where it gathered rocks around its one fang to create a giant fang of stone that serves as a sword.


    It cut right through the fur and flesh of the Silver Realm wolf and it didn''t even have a chance to fight back as it was immediately cut down. Once the wolf fell to the ground, the corpse immediately dissipated into smoke and disappeared from sight.


    But the Rock Nibbler didn''t stop there as it once again disappeared.


    The other wolves had immediately reacted after the first wolf had been cut down, they all grouped together to sh at Rock Nibbler with their ws, but all they were able to hit was thin air. The Rock Nibbler just took a few steps before itpletely disappeared from their sights.


    The wolves looked around in confusion as they tried to find the Rock Nibbler, but the Rock Nibbler didn''t reveal a single sign. It was like a shadow in the dark as it moved.


    The Rock Nibbler soon appeared behind another wolf and this time, it didn''t use the same Sword of Stone that it had used before. It gathered several stones around itself which it used to hit the other wolves, while using thergest stone to smash in the head of the wolf that it had appeared behind.


    That wolf fell to the ground and it dissipated into smoke like the first wolf that had been killed.


    The other wolves immediately noticed this, but the moment they charged at the Rock Nibbler, it disappeared once again.


    Just like that, the Rock Nibbler continued to dash around, appearing behind the wolves from time to time to kill them while maiming the other wolves.


    The pack of wolves couldn''t do a single thing as they were slowly mowed down by this Rock Nibbler alone.


    Finally after ten minutes passed, the final Silver Realm wolf was turned into smoke and everyone in the stands didn''t know what to say in response to this.


    Lin Fan just casually turned to Jiang You and asked, "Are you satisfied with our training?"


    Jiang You couldn''t react to what Lin Fan had just said, he had been staring at his Rock Nibbler in shock. He couldn''t believe just how much it had changed in a single day, it didn''t even show any fear when facing an entire pack of Silver Realm wolves, it even seemed like his Rock Nibbler showed disdain towards them.


    Jiang You took a few minutes before he was finally able to react.


    He wanted to say that he wasn''t satisfied with this training just to get back his thousand crystals and more, but his pride wouldn''t allow him to say it. There probably wasn''t a single shop that could match the results that Lin Fan had created.


    Even if he were to bring his pet to Water Pearl City where the Monster Trainer Union was based, where all the best Monster Trainers were gathered, he still wouldn''t be able to obtain this kind of result.


    In the end, Jiang You could only squeeze out a single word, "Yes."


    Lin Fan nodded before turning to leave, paying no more mind to him at all. He had aplished his goal based on the shocked expressions that filled the crowd, there was no longer any need for him to keep acting.


    And to be honest, he felt that he looked quite cool like this.


    As they said, a real man didn''t look back on explosions.<sub> </sub>


    The most important thing was that there had been people who had been filming in the crowd since they had been looking forward to exposing Lin Fan''s store, but all they had received was a p to the face.


    If a store that could train a simple Rock Nibbler in the Bronze Realm to the point where it could defeat Silver Realm beasts while still being in the Bronze Realm was a scam, what would a real store be like?


    A few of the people in the crowd with sharper eyes knew that this store was more than what it seemed, so they immediately made ns to leave their pets with this store for training.


    After Lin Fan had left the crowd in the arena downstairs, it took them several minutes before they could finally react and a group of people charged up to the counter with their pets.


    They could all tell from each other''s gazes what they were thinking and it didn''t take long before all the training spots in Lin Fan''s store were taken. There were a few who were dissatisfied with this, but thinking of how Lin Fan was a Gold Realm Expert, they immediately swallowed this dissatisfaction.


    Since all the spots had been taken, everyone eventually left the store and some even made ns toe back early tomorrow morning to line up for a spot for themselves, or even for a spot to sell¡­


    Not a single person paid any attention to the pet food in Lin Fan''s store, but that was to be expected since there weren''t that many alchemists in this city to begin with. Not to mention that even if they were in this city, it didn''t mean that they were high ss alchemists who could recognize the quality of Lin Fan''s wares.


    So just like that, the hustle in the store didn''tst long before there were only a few stragglers who wandered around the store. They moved through Lin Fan''s wares, looking over them like they were interested, but they were actually spies left by the various nobles that had just left.


    A man who was in the Gold Realm had suddenly opened a store that could train pets like this, he must have some kind of background to him for him to open this kind of store.


    Of course, there had been no royals that had been drawn in since their pride didn''t allow them to believe that there would be someone better than the Monster Trainers that they had.


    After an hour of having no business at all, Lin Fan decided to close the store and went out with Song Shu and Ang for lunch to celebrate their sess.


    The stragglers had wanted to stay a bit longer, but they couldn''t do a thing when Lin Fan chased them out since of course they couldn''t be a match for Lin Fan and there was nothing beneficial about being cklisted.


    After putting the closed sign on his store, Lin Fan walked around with Song Shu and Ang, trying to find some good ces to get some food.


    One thing to note was that there were a few of the people who hade to his store for the fun that were shopping in the stores around his store.


    Normally this street would be closed to abandoned because it was quite remote, so there weren''t any customers other than loyal customers or people who lived nearby. But now there was a sudden influx of people who learned about this street all because of Lin Fan''s shop.


    The quality of goods on this street wasn''t considered bad, rather it was actually quite goodpared to all the other streets which Lin Fan had been surprised with when he moved in. Take the cksmith that was beside him for example, there was a Gold Realm Expert hiding in it.


    With the poprity that Lin Fan had brought to this street, the owners of the other stores were actually quite grateful to him. When they saw him walking down the street with Song Shu and Ang, quite a few of them waved and called out to him in greeting.


    Lin Fan naturally didn''t mind being friends with his neighbours and Song Shu''s smile could melt even the coldest heart, but Ang was a natural block of ice that froze everyone that approached.


    Still when they left, the other owners couldn''t help talking about what a funny couple they were.


    Lin Fan''s group walked around the streets, finding all different kinds of delicacies to try out.


    But as they walked along, Lin Fan suddenly noticed something out of the corner of his eye.


    When he turned to look, he couldn''t help knitting his brows slightly at what he had found.


    He brought Ang and Song Shu over to the alley where he noticed this strange thing and in front of him, there was a door with a picture of a dog standing there. But the strange thing with this door was that it was right in the center of the alley and there was no building that this door was attached to.

 261 Chapter 261

    Both Ang and Lin Fan sent their spiritual sense out to investigate this door, but they couldn''t find anything strange with it. The only thing that they could tell was that this was just a simple wooden door, nothing else.


    But what they couldn''t understand was why someone had just left a wooden door standing in the alley.


    Song Shu was much less cautiouspared to the two of them. As a child, she naturally had the curiosity of a child, so she moved forward toe in front of the door before moving around the door, looking it up and down.


    She too couldn''t find anything strange about it, it seemed like this was just a random door that was ced in this alley for some unknown reason.


    Finally, their curiosity got the best of them and they all moved forward until they were just standing in front of the door.


    After hesitating a bit, Lin Fan reached out to put his hand on the handle and after a pause, he pulled down on it.


    The moment he did pull down on the handle of the door, both Ang and Lin Fan suddenly knit their brows. There was a sensation that was familiar to both of them that filled the space around them.


    It was spatialws!


    As the door slowly opened, there was the tingling sound of a bell that rang out before someone shouted, "Wee to the Between World Restaurant!"


    The scene that appeared in front of thempletely stunned them.


    It wasn''t the scene of a cultivation world, but rather what appeared in front of them was a modern diner.


    Lin Fan couldn''t believe what had just happened, he almost thought that he had transmigrated back to earth, but then he saw that Ang and Song Shu were with him.


    The waitress who had called out to wee them saw that they were stunned, but she wasn''t surprised as she came over with a smile, "Wee, is this your first time?"


    Only then did the three of them turn to look at the waitress and they were shocked once again by what they saw. This waitress had ck hair, ck eyes, and a ck dress. The only part of her that wasn''t ck was her pure white skin that was like fresh snow on the ground.


    But it wasn''t her appearance that shocked her, but rather the power that came from her.


    Lin Fan could tell that she was far more powerful than he was, even Ang could tell that she was more powerful than her.


    As for Song Shu, she was too weak, so she was just shocked by her appearance. This was her first time seeing someone who was even more beautiful than Ang.


    The waitress saw that the three of them were just staring at her in a daze and she revealed a faint smile as she said, "How about I get you set up at a table and you can slowly look over the menu?"


    Lin Fan was the first to react while Ang was still trying to probe this waitress with her spiritual sense. He cautiously asked, "Menu, are you telling me that this is a restaurant?"


    The waitress just said with a smile, "Of course, what else would it be?"


    Lin Fan then asked, "Why did you put your restaurant door in the middle of an alley?"


    The waitress was a bit confused as she said, "Middle of the alley? Just which door did youe from?"


    It was Lin Fan''s turn to be confused when he heard this, "Which door? You mean that there are multiple doors in the middle of alleys?"


    At this time, there was a man in a chef''s outfit that came out of the back with a te of food in his hand. After he put it in front of a customer who was actually a lizard man, he came over to the waitress in ck and asked, "Yomi, what''s taking so long? There''s a bunch of tes in the back that I need your help with."


    The waitress named Yomi said, "Lin Fan, there''s some new customers here that I''m helping to their seats, but it seems like they''re more confused than usual."


    The man in the chef''s outfit named Lin Fan turned to look at Lin Fan''s group and the moment he did, his eyes opened a bit wider. It was the same for the Lin Fan that had juste into the restaurant.


    When the two of them looked at each other, they noticed that other than a few differences, they basically had the same face.


    It was only at this time that the girls had also noticed this and they began looking back and forth between the two Lin Fans.


    Finally Yomi was the one who broke the silence and pointed at the Lin Fan who hade in as she asked the Lin Fan in the chef''s outfit, "Is he your doppelganger?"


    But before the chef Lin Fan could answer, the cultivation world Lin Fan asked, "Doppelganger? Is this earth?"


    The chef Lin Fan ignored Yomi as he said, "Yes, this is earth. Is the world that youe from also earth?"


    Cultivation world Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Not exactly." Then after a pause, he went on to ask, "Is the Lin Group doing well?"<sub> </sub>


    The chef Lin Fan was confused when he heard this, "Lin Group, what do you mean by Lin Group?"


    Cultivation world Lin Fan was confused too as he asked, "The Lin Group, the biggestpany in the entire world that controls 70% of the world''s finances? Does it not exist in this world?"


    The chef Lin Fan shook his head, "I have no idea what you''re talking about, there''s no Lin Group in this world."


    Cultivation world Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised as he asked, "Then what about your family, what does your family do?"


    The chef Lin Fan paused for a second before asking, "Dear customer, don''t you think that this is a little too forward?"


    Cultivation world Lin Fan realized this mistake and calmed down as he said, "I''m sorry, I was just a little too excited."


    The chef Lin Fan just gave a nod before saying, "How about you take a seat and have a look at the menu. I can''t guarantee much, but I can at least guarantee that my food tastes good."


    Cultivation world Lin Fan nodded before letting Yomi lead them to their seats.


    After they were seated, Lin Fan looked over the menu and saw that it was filled with all the foods that he was familiar with in his original world. Lin Fan quickly looked over it and chose a few of his favourites, cing the order with Yomi.


    While they were waiting for their food, Lin Fan looked off in a daze at the small television that was in the top hand corner of the room. At the same time, Ang and Song Shu looked at him with curious gazes.


    There were many things that they felt were strange after they hade through this door to this restaurant. There were many things that Lin Fan said that they couldn''t understand at all and Lin Fan seemed quite familiar with this world.


    But they could also see that he clearly didn''t want to talk about it as he just sat there in a daze, so neither of them said a thing.


    Lin Fan through watching the programming on the television could see that this world was simr to his earth, but there were still a few things that were different. The best way to describe this world would be as a parallel world to his original earth.


    After a while of staring at the television, Lin Fan couldn''t help turning his gaze back to the chef Lin Fan through the window to the kitchen and he saw that the chef Lin Fan had also been looking in his direction.


    Both of them gave each other a smile before they quickly turned away.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that the chef Lin Fan had also been talking about him with Yomi in the back.


    It didn''t take long for their food to be prepared and when it was brought in front of them, Lin Fan''s eyes lit up. It had really been too long since he had food that he was familiar with.


    While the Blue Star did have its own food culture, it wasn''t as developed as it had been on earth.


    The main problem was that they focused on staple grains with ack of farmingnd, so that meant that there was also ack of oil crops which meant that rarely would oil be used to fry things.


    Seeing all the deep fried Japanese styled food ced in front of him, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate as he dug in.


    Ang and Song Shu who were big foodies to begin with naturally didn''t need an invitation as they began digging in themselves.


    It didn''t take them long to finish off all the food that they had finished and once they did, they immediately ordered seconds.


    It took them a while to finish their meal, but when they did, they werepletely satisfied with their meal. But then came the problem of how would they pay for it?


    They found that they could actually pay with the currency of their Blue Star and it was actually quite cheap, only costing a single crystal. Lin Fan even received change back for this crystal.


    When Lin Fan received his change, he couldn''t help asking, "Could I get my change in RMB?"


    Yomi, who was handling the register was surprised, but then she took out RMB for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at the bill and found that it waspletely different from the one that he was used to.


    As they were leaving, Yomi didn''t forget to exin with a smile, "This door of ours likes to appear randomly, but it locks onto a person once they open it. It should appear again in a few more days, so please feel free toe back to our store any time."


    Lin Fan nodded before leading his group back, but what he didn''t know was that this would be thest time that he would evere to this store since the door never appeared again.


    As for why it had appeared this time, it was aplete mystery. Still it had been a chance for him to get some nostalgic food from his previous world, so there was no regret on his part.


    What neither he nor the chef Lin Fan knew was that this meeting between them had serious implications for the future...

 262 Chapter 262

    After that filling lunch, all they wanted to do was go back and sleep, but of course they couldn''t since they still had to run the store in the afternoon.


    Well, they didn''t really need to run the store since there were no customers, but Lin Fan still wanted to at least put on a professional disy. Not to mention that it would be good to have some alibis for what he was about to doter.


    During these first few days, he had had Jiang Zhi Shu and his men keep their heads low, but now it was finally time to act.


    Aftering back from his tripst night, he had sent a letter to Jiang Zhi Shu outlining his targets. Most of them were all affiliated to the Jiang Family in one way or another.


    But the main reason why they could attack them was because these were all forces that were affiliated with a few shady connections, which meant that the Jiang Family would never directly help them. If they just sent a few of their lower ranking members over, Lin Fan was more than confident in dealing with them.


    Moreover, these were all organizations that were rather low on the tree when it came to the Jiang Family, so there was no problem if there were a few that were taken out.


    Lin Fan''s n was to slowly clip the branches of the Jiang Family to apply pressure on them to make them reveal their ns. He didn''t have time or the intelligencework to slowly gain information, so the only thing he could do was apply pressure until they made a slip up.


    Jiang Zhi Shu had already led his men to attack a few of the branches that had weaker members. As for the ones that Lin Fan would be joining the attack on, these were all branches that had at least a tinum Realm Expert or pet guarding them.


    As time passed, no one else bought anything from the store. There was nock of people who came to check it out and there were certainly those that tried bribing Lin Fan with money for another training spot, but Lin Fan didn''t budge on this.


    When closing time came, Lin Fan put the pets that had been training during the day back into their cages and locked up the store.


    Before he headed off, he made sure to bring Song Shu back home first.


    While she was slowly getting stronger, she still wasn''t at the point where Lin Fan felt assured in bringing her.


    And of course he couldn''t convince Ang toe since she wanted to stay with Song Shu. For some reason, Ang kept insisting on staying with Song Shu ever since they hade back from the Sacred Rock Realm. It had been like this when they hade back from the nar crack too.


    The only reason Lin Fan could think of was what Ang had wanted to tell him about back in the nar crack, but Lin Fan knew that if she had said it, it would have just made it worse for her.


    Right now, all he could do was support her and the best way to do that was to let her do what she wanted.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan was more than confident in taking care of this himself since he had be much stronger after that trip to the Sacred Rock Realm.


    When it came to love, sometimes obsession wasn''t the right thing. Obsession was good in some cases, but for a longer rtionship, what they were built on was trust.


    Or at least that was what Lin Fan had learned from all the shojo mangas that he had read, which was his guilty pleasure.


    So after leaving both of them in the ce that they had rented, Lin Fan switched into dark clothes before blending into the night.


    It didn''t take him long to locate Jiang Zhi Shu''s group since he still had Brainy''s seed in him, which allowed Lin Fan to quickly meet up with them.


    Lin Fan didn''t have him added to the contacts in his watch and the only way to contact Jiang Zhi Shu was through the manager of his shop. The reason for this was to maintain as much distance between them, so no one would suspect that they were connected.


    While that didn''t mean a thing right now since no one cared about them, with how Lin Fan''s n would develop, this would be an important thing in the future.


    After meeting up, Jiang Zhi Shu revealed a faint smile when he came to greet Lin Fan. After several days of being idle and bottling up the worry inside him, he finally had a chance to vent it to the misfortune of these gangs, but he definitely felt much better now.


    When Lin Fan came over, Jiang Zhi Shu said, "Boss, when do you want to do this?"


    Lin Fan looked at his watch first before looking up at the sky. It had taken him some time toe here, so it was already getting dark, so there was no problem with starting now.<sub> </sub>


    He actually wanted to get this over with as soon as possible since he knew that the Jiang Family would be sending people out to investigate after over ten different gangs under them had been destroyed. If they stalled any longer, this n might be even more dangerous, so it was better to take care of this as soon as possible.


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Let''s do this now. You guys can go in first and I''lle out when I''m needed."


    Jiang Zhi Shu nodded as he said, "Alright." Then he led his men into the office building.


    This gang under the Jiang Family was called the Wasp Hive and it was one of the more lucrative businesses that they had since it mainly dealt with lending money. Or to put it more urately, this Wasp Hive was the den of loan sharks and once they stung, you would never be able to break free.


    Lin Fan stood at the back of Jiang Zhi Shu''s group as Jiang Zhi Shu led them up to the building.


    Naturally as one of the businesses that generated quite a bit of cash for the Jiang Family, they would have improved facilities. Unlike the other gangs that just hung out at bars and pool halls, this one had a proper office building and security guards.


    When the security guards saw thisrge group approaching them, they immediately had one person report this situation in on the radio while the others came forward to stop them.


    The leader of the security guards came forward with his hands up as he said, "Gentleman, please turn back. This is private¡­"


    But before he could even finish, he had already been knocked out by the blunt side of Jiang Zhi Shu''s spear.


    Even if Jiang Zhi Shu was filled with hatred towards the Jiang Family, he still had his wits about him. He knew that these security guards were just hired help for the Wasp Hive, so there was no need to be that cruel to them. They were just trying to do their jobs.


    But Lin Fan didn''t feel the same way. He felt that since they were willing to ept this job, it meant that they tacitly epted this organization and their method of business. Since that was the case, they were just as connected as any member of this organization.


    The security guards were caught off guard, but they were also well trained.


    The Wasp Hive generated quite a bit of cash, so naturally they hired some of the best guards. Most of them were in the Bronze Realm with a few of the team leaders being in the Silver Realm, but they were no match at all facing Jiang Zhi Shu''s group.


    The guards soon quickly fell to the ground.


    After taking care of the guards, Jiang Zhi Shu went up to the building and shattered the ss doors with a single kick. The metal frames of the ss doors flew right into the lobby of the building which was alreadypletely empty.


    As soon as the guards had called in to report this group, the building had been evacuated and their main forces had been gathered.


    There was only a single person in the hall right now standing by the elevator. This was a man who had his hair swept back with gold rimmed sunsses in a purple suit. If one had to describe him, he would fit the definition of a gangster to the t.


    But the problem was that this man''s cultivation wasn''t that high, only being in the Bronze Realm.


    If he thought that he could stop Jiang Zhi Shu''s group alone, that would mean that he must be crazy.


    But that man didn''t show any fear as he came forward and said, "Gentleman, please turn back now before this gets nasty. I''m sure you don''t want to make an enemy of our group."


    Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t ignore him this time like he had done with the guards, instead he looked right at this man with a menacing look as he said, "Call your boss out now, I want to have a little talk¡­"


    Right before he could finish his words, there were sudden cold glints that appeared in the corner of his eyes.


    Before he could finish, there were two men who had jumped out of the ceiling with swords shing down at Jiang Zhi Shu''s neck.

 263 Chapter 263

    Still, even though they had ambushed him, it didn''t mean that they would seed.


    These two men that had suddenly ambushed Jiang Zhi Shu were only in the Silver Realm, so in truth, they moved just too slowly for Jiang Zhi Shu who was in the tinum Realm.


    He didn''t have any problems avoiding their attacks as he casually took a step back, letting their des fall down right in front of him before sweeping out with his spear.


    This time, he didn''t show any mercy since these men had just tried to kill him a few seconds earlier. He swept out with the de at the end of his spear and cut right through the backs of their neck.


    Both of these men crumpled to the ground before they could even react, but neither of them were dead.


    Instead of killing them, Jiang Zhi Shu had controlled his spear to cut right through the nerves on the back of their neck to paralyze them. He still had questions that he wanted to ask them.


    But he never got the chance since as soon as the assassins realized what had happened, they immediately broke the gel capsule in their teeth, releasing the cyanide that was contained within. Both of them hadmitted suicide just like that.


    While Jiang Zhi Shu was annoyed that this had happened, he had to admire them since they were loyal enough to die to keep their secrets.


    That might have been the case with these two assassins, but that wasn''t the case with the man who looked like the very definition of a gangster. When he reacted to what had just happened, his legs immediately crumpled under him and he fell down on his butt.


    He tried moving back, scooting on his butt as he approached the elevator, but Jiang Zhi Shu stabbed his spear right in between his legs, pinning him in ce by the tail of his suit jacket.


    The gangster just looked up at Jiang Zhi Shu in absolute fear as he said, "Don''t kill me, don''t kill me, they forced me toe down as the messenger! The boss is upstairs, the boss is upstairs, just take the elevator and you''ll get to him!"


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked at this man with pity, thinking that it would be a waste of time for him to kill him, but he still decided to kill him in the end. This man definitelycked in crimesmitted under the Jiang Family, he was certain of this, so there was no reason to spare this man.


    Lin Fan nodded when he saw this. He had already condemned this person to death in his mind ever since he had read the information that had been gathered on this Wasp Hive. This was definitely not a good ce and anyone that was affiliated was clearly here on their own free will. To put it in other words, they supported what was going on here, which meant there was no reason to keep them alive.


    This was the cruel side of Lin Fan that seemed to appear whenever he was met with viins,pletely different from the gentle side that appeared when he met the weak.


    After clearing up the lobby, they left the corpses there beforeing to the elevator.


    Standing in front of the elevator, Jiang Zhi Shu couldn''t help hesitating before asking Lin Fan, "Boss, are we really taking this elevator? They''ve clearly put some kind of trap on it since they even sent someone here to wee us, so why should we go right into that trap?"


    Lin Fan just snapped his finger and summoned out Rocky in his small form in his hand before saying, "There''s no need to worry, we go straight up."


    Jiang Zhi Shu wanted to say something, but he knew there was no talking to Lin Fan when he became like this. He had heard all about the various things that Lin Fan had done before and all the important people that he had killed, so he foundfort in that at least.


    But the elevator wasn''t big enough for all of them, so Jiang Zhi Shu split his group in half and said to the other half, "Come by the stairs, but take your time. We want topletely wipe them out, so sweep all the floors first and don''t let a single one of them escape."


    He had faith in his men since everyone with him were elites that had followed him since the beginning. Leading them were two Gold Realm adjutants that had followed Jiang Zhi Shu since the beginning and they had grown quite a bit under him. Both of them were now in the peak Gold Realm.


    The main forces of the Wasp Hive should be gathered on the top floor with the boss, so they should have no problem clearing out the various floors.


    After the other group headed up the stairs, Jiang Zhi Shu led his group which had Lin Fan into the elevator.


    As they were heading up to the top floor, Lin Fan pulled Jiang Zhi Shu aside to have a few words with him. At the same time, the little golem in his hand released a bit of life energy that surrounded the elevator.


    As expected, when they reached the top floor, there was indeed a trap set up for the elevator.<sub> </sub>


    When there was the ding that rang out signifying that they had reached the top floor, there was a sudden explosion that came from outside the door, but none of that mattered.


    When the mes of the explosion dissipated, there was ayer of rock that was revealed to bepletely surrounding the elevator and the rope holding it, causing the explosion to have no effect at all.


    Once the explosion faded, the rocks disappeared and the elevator was revealed with an open door. Jiang Zhi Shu casually led his men through the elevator, none of them looked bothered by the explosion at all.


    Jiang Zhi Shu had hadplete faith in Lin Fan while his men believed that it was his power that had saved them, raising his position in their hearts even higher.


    As for the group that was waiting outside the elevator, they couldn''t help revealing looks of shock.


    This was an explosion that was strong enough to injure Gold Realm Experts, how had they blocked it so easily?


    But even if they were shocked, that didn''t mean that they were worried since they still had their boss.


    The boss was also surprised since he could feel the density of the life energy that had been contained within the rock shield. For it to block the explosion so easily, not even revealing a single seam, it was clear that this was a shield released by a tinum Realm Expert.


    If that were the case, this might be a hard battle for him since he too was only in the tinum Realm, having only reached it a few weeks ago. He hadn''t fully stabilized his realm and he would be considered much weaker than most other tinum Realm Experts of the same cultivation level.


    He just hoped that the help that he called for would arrive as soon as possible.


    He had already heard about this situation this afternoon after several other Jiang Family businesses that he was close with had been attacked. The Jiang Family had been given no choice but to react and had contacted all their businesses to contact them as soon as they were attacked, so they could deploy one of their main members toe and help them.


    p Right now, the only thing that he could do was stall for as much time as he could.</anda>


    The boss of the Wasp Hive was named Jiang Yu, he was one of the branch members of the Jiang Family.


    Although he was in the tinum Realm, that was all achieved from the umted use of elixirs which he gained from his services to the Jiang Family. While he wasn''t skilled in cultivation, his mind was much sharper than others, which allowed him to easily run this loan shark business.


    Jiang Yu came forward and began pping which caught Jiang Zhi Shu and his group off guard. Of course, that didn''t include Lin Fan.


    Jiang Yu then stood there as he said, "This brother, may I ask what business you have with our Wasp Hive? I''m sure we can air our grievances out, there''s no need for us to fight."


    Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t care about his words at all as he raised his spear and charged forward, sending the point stabbing right at Jiang Yu.


    However, before he could even get close to Jiang Yu, there was a barrier that had suddenly appeared in front of him.


    One special thing about Jiang Yu was that he was a coward, but that wasn''t meant in a bad way.


    As an intelligent person and a coward, he naturally had nned for all different contingencies. He had ced all kinds of defenses around him, to prepare for all kinds of scenarios.


    But what Jiang Zhi Shu had done next was not something that he could n for.


    Jiang Zhi Shu took a step back and suddenly raised his spear up in the sky, gathering stones around the tip. On his shoulder was a tiny Rocky which had raised its arms to gather those rocks around the tip of his spear.


    Then once the rock hadpletely covered the tip, Jiang Zhi Shu swept down once again at the barrier, but this time the barrier copsed as soon as his weapon touched it. The energy of the barrier scattered like dust on the wind beforepletely disappearing, leaving behind a stunned crowd.

 264 Chapter 264

    Jiang Yu and all his subordinates were shocked by this.


    They knew just how powerful that barrier was, it was something that they had invested arge amount of money into to strengthen it as much as possible. At full power, it was even strong enough to block a blow from a high tinum Realm Expert.


    For it to shatter in just a single hit, it was clear that the power contained in this strike surpassed the high tinum Realm. It might have even reached the peak tinum Realm!


    Against someone with this kind of power, it was clear that they weren''t able to do a single thing against him.


    Even Jiang Zhi Shu was shocked by the power that he had disyed.


    When Lin Fan had secretly talked to him in the elevator, he had lent him Rocky and told him tobine his power with Rocky.


    Lin Fan had done so to create a stronger impact and he wasn''t surprised at all to see how powerful Jiang Zhi Shu had be after borrowing Rocky''s power.


    Rocky might havee under Lin Fan after his other pets, but it was definitely close to being the strongest out of all of Lin Fan''s pets. Its cultivation hadn''t stopped increasing once it hade under Lin Fan and it had even reached the peak realm it could reach before the other pets.


    It had no problem facing those in the peak tinum Realm with its powerfulws and if it used the trace of God Blood that it had, it could even fight against those in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    After taking care of the barrier, Jiang Zhi Shu only hesitated a bit before charging out once again.


    Jiang Yu and his subordinates didn''t hesitate at all to pull out several orbs that they hesitated to throw for a few seconds before throwing them all at Jiang Zhi Shu.


    These were the secondary preparations that he had made and he had never expected to use them.


    These were all single use artifacts that could create powerful explosions in the tinum Realm and the cost of each one wasn''t below that of the barrier. Using more than ten of them like this was definitely a heavy blow to their finances, but there was nothing more important than their lives at this moment.


    Jiang Yu seemed to have calmed down a bit when he no longer felt Jiang Zhi Shu''s aura after the explosion, but once the smoke faded, he revealed a shocked look. Beneath that smoke was ayer of rocks that didn''t have a single scratch on it.


    Once the smoke had faded, theyer of rocks also dropped down and Jiang Zhi Shu''s figure was revealed, standing there without a single injury.


    These powerful explosions had beenpletely blocked by him without any effort, just how terrifying were the power of hisws?


    Jiang Yu knew that this situation was getting worse with every minute and he was running out of trump cards. Since that was the case, it was time to use his final trump card.


    He pressed a button on the remote that he had been holding and there was a smoke that suddenly filled the room.


    This was a poison fog that would only affect enemies of the Wasp Hive since all the members of the Wasp Hive had antibodies for this poison. It would not only serve as an attack, it would also serve as a distraction for Jiang Yu to make his escape.


    But once again, his attempts at running away had no effect at all.


    The moment the smoke appeared, there was a sudden breeze that filled the room and gathered all the smoke into a single vortex. It just floated in the center of the room before being thrown out the window without a care.


    This was a sealed room, where had this breezee from?


    Jiang Yu knew that there was only one possibility, either Jiang Zhi Shu could also control thews of wind or there was another powerful expert with thews of wind here.


    Judging by the intensity of the energy in the wind, it was clear that this person was also in the tinum Realm.


    Just what had his Wasp Hive done to attract two tinum Realm Experts toe and attack them?


    But now was still not the time to consider this, now was the time to run. However, since he had no trump cards, how could he still run?


    Jiang Zhi Shu naturally didn''t give him that chance, so he immediately charged forward and swung the de of the spear down at his head.


    Jiang Yu could only watch with absolute despair in his eyes as he waited for death, but that death never came.


    The moment before the spear couldnd on his head, there was another spear with the tip covered in rocks that hade from the side to stop it. As the two spears shed, there was a powerful shockwave that blew Jiang Yu aside and pushed back all who weren''t prepared.<sub> </sub>


    This was no longer a simple ughter, there was a true expert that had appeared.


    The person who had suddenly stuck his spear out was a young man who had dark brown hair and fuzzy eyebrows, which worked with his handsome features. He had his brows slightly knit as he looked at Jiang Zhi Shu.


    After a while, he finally said, "Who are you? While you''re trying to hide it, that is the spear technique of our Jiang Family. Only those that are in the direct line have a right to learn this, where did you get this?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately revealed a cold look when he saw this person because this was someone he was familiar with.


    When he had been kicked out of the Jiang Family back then, this young man had been one of the people who had kicked him the most when he had been at his lowest point.


    This young man was named Jiang Feng and was one of the top geniuses in the younger generation of the Jiang Family, but he was also someone who had always lived in Jiang Zhi Shu''s shadow. Naturally that had generated arge inferiorityplex which had eventually evolved into hatred.


    He hadpletely vented that hatred when Jiang Zhi Shu had been kicked out and it was something that Jiang Zhi Shu had never forgotten.


    Plus, he had heard that Jiang Feng had tried many times to harm Yuan Xiang Qin while she had been imprisoned. It was a fact that everyone in the Jiang Manor had known and it had also been spread out quite far. It was a good thing that Jiang Zhi Shu''s brother had been taking care of her the entire time.


    But then again, it seemed like his brother had been doing it for another reason¡­


    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately said in a cold voice, "What does it matter who I am? All that matters is what I am to you."


    Jiang Feng revealed an arrogant look as he said, "Who are you to me?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu coldly replied, "Your murderer."


    Jiang Feng revealed a look of rage as he said, "You!" After shouting this, he immediately released his life energy and gathered it in his spear. At the same time, there were two snakes that had appeared on his shoulders whichpletely injected their life energy into his spear.


    Judging by the intensity of his life energy, it seemed like he was in the mid tinum Realm and with his pets, he could even fight those in the high tinum Realm.


    It had to be said, the younger generation of the Jiang Family really were talented, but it wasn''t just talent that could predict one''s sesses.


    Jiang Zhi Shu was also from the Jiang Family and he had talent that surpassed this Jiang Feng, but he had only just reached the mid tinum Realm while it was clear that Jiang Feng had been there for a while.


    It all came down to resources in the end.


    Jiang Feng had the full support of the Legendary Realm Jiang Family, so he had ess to plenty of resources which had allowed his cultivation to explode.


    As for Jiang Zhi Shu, he had been chased out and had lived as a bandit for a long time. There was no way he could match the resources Jiang Feng had received from the Jiang Family.


    Him being able to reach the mid tinum Realm was already testament to his talent that was stronger and to the aid that Lin Fan had given him.


    Jiang Feng immediately swept out with his spear, pushing away Jiang Zhi Shu''s spear before stabbing out at him.


    However, Jiang Zhi Shu wasn''t afraid at all because he also had a strong supporter now.


    Rocky once again covered the tip of his spear with rocks before Jiang Zhi Shu stabbed out, meeting the tip of Jiang Feng''s spear right on.


    There was only a slight moment of pause before the explosion came.


    Jiang Zhi Shu was only pushed back a single step while Jiang Feng waspletely sent flying.


    When Jiang Fengnded, he couldn''t help looking at Jiang Zhi Shu in shock and a trace of fear. At the same time, he began carefully looking over Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Before this, he didn''t care about Jiang Zhi Shu since he thought that he was just a lowly mercenary who was attacking them for a bit of cash, but now his thoughts differed.


    As he carefully looked over Jiang Zhi Shu, his cautious look was suddenly filled with shock as he shouted, "Jiang Zhi Shu, it''s actually you!"

 265 Chapter 265

    Jiang Feng wasn''t certain at first, but there was no way for him to forget this face that had been deeply engraved in his mind.


    Since he had been born, this was a face that had always stood in his way no matter what he did. It was a face that he had hated from the bottom of his heart and wished he could rip apart piece by piece.


    But after his heart was filled with hatred, he slowly began to calm down.


    He remembered the amount of power that Jiang Zhi Shu had just shown and he knew that he might not be able to take him down.


    Jiang Zhi Shu naturally also recognized Jiang Feng, he had recognized him from the moment he had seen him.


    There was a list in his heart of people from the Jiang Family that he had to kill and this Jiang Feng was one of the people on that list.


    He had heard all about how Jiang Feng had tried to plot against Yuan Xiang Qin and as a man, how could he let this go? He was already a failure for not being able to protect his beloved, but now was he going to let this man who tried to hurt her walk away scot free?


    Thest fragment of his pride as a man would never allow that.


    Lin Fan could tell that there was something off with Jiang Zhi Shu, so he had secretly ced a barrier of wind around this room.


    There was currently adybug on his finger inside his pocket which was one of the puppets that Brainy controlled. He used his absorption power to draw out the power of thedybug''sw tobine with his own fragmented windws to create a barrier that was at the peak of the tinum Realm.


    He could have created a barrier with his spatialws, but that would have been too prominent. Windws were a better choice since they had a low presence while also being powerful.


    It was a good thing that he had chosen to put this barrier up since there was someone who had been trying to escape.


    Jiang Yu could naturally tell that this situation was bad and as the coward that he was, he immediately made ns to abandon all his subordinates and even the main branch member of the Jiang Family just to escape himself. However, he never expected to run right into Lin Fan''s barrier.


    After Jiang Feng had exposed Jiang Zhi Shu, Jiang Zhi Shu hadpletely ignored him and had turned to Lin Fan to say, "Boss, I want to kill him."


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised when he heard this since he had already seen the list that Jiang Zhi Shu had kept. This was one of the conditions that had been discussed when Jiang Zhi Shu agreed to follow Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just nodded and said, "If you kill him, we have to make sure that there''s no witnesses."


    Jiang Zhi Shu turned to the various Wasp Hive members that were scattered around before turning back to Lin Fan, "Boss, can you finish them off then?"


    Lin Fan gave augh, "I can, but you have to remember to take care of this quickly. They might even send another main branch member soon and we want to avoid that."


    After all, Lin Fan''s goals were just to cause pressure to the Jiang Family. Killing a single main branch member was fine, but if they went any further, it would be equal to dering war on the entire Jiang Family which didn''t suit his goals.


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked right at Jiang Feng and said, "I''ll only need five minutes."


    A vein popped out on Jiang Feng''s head, he couldn''t take being looked down on like this.


    He had already ignored the fact that they had been talking like he wasn''t here, but now Jiang Zhi Shu who he hated with a passion was saying that he would defeat him in just five minutes?


    Who was the current Jiang Zhi Shu?


    He was nothing more than trash that had been kicked out of the family while he was one of the brightest geniuses of the Jiang Family. The difference in status was clear and Jiang Feng had been working hard to surpass him, using everything he had to be stronger.


    But there was that small voice of reason that was in his heart saying, "Why? Why is Jiang Zhi Shu stronger than me?"


    He couldn''t deny it since he had been the one who had been blown away in their sh just now. He had experienced the power in Jiang Zhi Shu''s attack first hand, so he knew that he was indeed no match if they were to fight.


    But his pride would never allow him to back down.


    Since that was the case, there was no need to hold back anything. He would burn out in a ze of glory as long as it meant he was able to kill Jiang Zhi Shu.


    That was just how much he hated him.<sub> </sub>


    Jiang Feng gave a roar and those snakes on his shoulders suddenly gave a screech that sounded like the scream of death.


    Those two snakes wrapped around his spear,pletely bing a part of his spear.


    At the same time, Jiang Feng''s cultivation suddenly began to surge. It was like it would keep surging without stopping.


    Lin Fan suddenly knit his brows when he felt this because he knew that something was wrong.


    What Jiang Feng was using was a forbidden technique, he was sacrificing his talent and his life force to forcefully increase his cultivation. There was no limit to how much his cultivation could increase because in the end, what he would pay with would be his life.


    This technique was one that was taught to every member of the Jiang Family because they believed that sacrificing oneself for the family was the greatest thing they could do. This meant that at any time, any member of the Jiang Family could be asked to use their life as payment to protect the family.


    Jiang Feng had always looked down on this rule since to him, nothing was more important than his life since he was destined for greatness. But at this moment, he would dly pay that life to take Jiang Zhi Shu''s.


    That was how much hatred was in his heart.


    Even if it was repeated a thousand times, a million times, it still wouldn''t be enough to describe it.


    As his cultivation swelled, Jiang Feng spat out a mouthful of white breath before saying, "Jiang Zhi Shu, you will die today."


    Lin Fan could tell that Jiang Feng''s cultivation had reached the peak of the tinum Realm already. It was not something that Jiang Zhi Shu could block even with the power Rocky provided.


    It was not because Rocky was too weak, it was because Jiang Zhi Shu''s weapon was too weak to contain Rocky''s power. It would shatter before it could break through Jiang Feng''s attack.


    Lin Fan didn''t even think about it as he waved his hand, drawing out a spear that waspletely white which he threw right to Jiang Zhi Shu before saying, "Use this, your weapon can''t take this attack."


    Jiang Zhi Shu quickly grabbed the spear and the moment it reached his hand, he could tell that this wasn''t a normal weapon. He quickly shouted, "Thanks boss!"


    But Lin Fan didn''t hear this since he was already moving out to take care of the rest of the Wasp Hive.


    He had put up a spatialw barrier around them before throwing Jiang Zhi Shu''s subordinates across the room at the members of the Wasp Hive.


    Jiang Zhi Shu''s subordinates quickly came back to their senses and started attacking these members of the Wasp Hive who were all in a daze watching Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Feng''s sh. It didn''t take long before they were all taken care of.


    Lin Fan personally caught Jiang Yu and was holding his knocked out body by the back of the cor while watching Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Feng, waiting for their sh.


    Jiang Feng had naturally seen all this, but he ignored it all. All he could see in his blood red eyes was Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Both of them had been gathering their power since they both wanted to end it with a single strike, but Jiang Feng suddenly gave a cough and spat out some blood.


    Jiang Feng looked down at his own blood and knew that his body wouldn''t be able to take anymore of this, so it was either he struck now or he would copse before he could strike.


    So without any further hesitation, Jiang Feng immediately dashed out with his spear drawn back, prepared for one final stab with all his power. As he dashed forward, his eyes never left Jiang Zhi Shu as he shouted, "Jiang Zhi Shu, die!"


    But Jiang Zhi Shu was ready.


    He had also been gathering Rocky''s power in the tip of his spear the whole time and while he hadn''t reached the peak of this power yet, he didn''t have a choice.


    <o>,m He also gave a roar as he charged out with his spear pulled back.</o>


    Both of them charged forward and both of them stabbed out at the same time.


    The tips of their spear shed and there was only a single second of bnce before there was arge explosion that came out from the collision.

 266 Chapter 266

    When the smoke dissipated, there was only a single figure that had been left standing there.


    Naturally it was Jiang Zhi Shu who had won the sh and Jiang Feng was lying on the ground with a hole in his chest.


    But Jiang Zhi Shu hadn''t been able to get out of this shpletely unharmed. There was actually a hole in his chest as well, but it was much smaller and didn''t go all the way through like the hole in Jiang Feng''s chest.


    The ultimate deciding factor was naturally the spear that Lin Fan had given Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Rocky''sws werepletely matched by thews that Jiang Feng had created by sacrificing his own life, so all it came down to was the difference in artifacts they used.


    Jiang Feng''s spear was only a high tinum Realm artifact.


    While he was a genius of the Jiang Family, he was actually only a second tier genius which meant that he didn''t receive the absolute best treatment of the Jiang Family.


    On the other hand, Lin Fan''s Iron Eater Bone Artifact had been strengthened by his recent trip to the Sacred Rock Realm, which meant that it was even stronger than before. Not to mention that before, it was already an Embryo Soul Realm Artifact.


    In the end, there were fragments of Jiang Feng''s spear all over the ground and there wasn''t a single scratch on the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    On Jiang Feng''s face was a look that was filled with unwillingness as heid there in a pool of his own blood.


    Jiang Zhi Shu just ignored his corpse as he turned to hand the spear back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan took the spear and called back Rocky before throwing the unconscious Jiang Yu who he had been holding to two of the subordinates on the side as he said, "Take him back."


    This Jiang Yu had been quite prudent, setting up several forms of protection for himself, which showed that he was quite cautious. At the same time, he must have been quite smart being able to run the biggest loan shark operation under the Jiang Family.


    All of this added up must mean that he would definitely have some important information on the Jiang Family. It would be a waste to kill him now since this was not just a battle of strength, this was also a battle of information and information was the one thing that Lin Fan wascking.


    He might be able to pull up some information like which powers were under the Jiang Family since this was something that was well known because everyone needed to know which forces to avoid, but when it came to actual information on the Jiang Family, he didn''t know a thing. That was all because the intelligencework that he wanted to set up in Rock Mountain City was still immature, even though they hade before him to start their set up.


    The problem in the end was that he didn''t have enough men and funds.


    The two subordinates gave Lin Fan a salute before heading off with Jiang Yu.


    Once they were gone, Lin Fan''s group just waited for a few minutes since there was still the team that was clearing out the building slowlying up to meet them. It didn''t take them long, they only had to wait around five minutes before both of these teams arrived.


    They didn''t bother reporting at all because they all knew that time was of the essence right now. A member of the main branch of the Jiang Family had been killed, which meant that the Jiang Family must have been stirred right now.


    They still had another ce to hit before this night raid was over, so it was best that they head there now before the Jiang Familypletely swarmed it. Also it would be best if they left this ce now because there was certainly a team that would be sent to investigate this ce.


    The next ce that they needed to hit was also an important one.


    This Wasp Hive was the main financial subsidiary of the Jiang Family, while the Shark Den they were hitting next were the main muscles.


    This was a group that could be considered the secret police of the Jiang Family, suppressing everything that went against the Jiang Family from the shadows.


    Naturally to do so, it meant that they had a few powerful members among them. It was said that the leader and the two vice leaders of the Shark Den were all tinum Realm Experts.


    This was the main reason why Lin Fan had been pulled along with this night raid because it was impossible for Jiang Zhi Shu to take care of them all by himself.


    As for the appearance of Jiang Feng, that was just icing on top since this was someone that was on Jiang Zhi Shu''s must kill list.


    But now that Jiang Zhi Shu had been injured by Jiang Feng, the task of eliminating the Shark Den would fallpletely on Lin Fan. Still, he had no problem with that since he was confident in his strength.


    After they had all gathered, Lin Fan moved to the back of the group while Jiang Zhi Shu quickly led them off without even treating his own wounds.


    ¡­


    Jiang Manor.<sub> </sub>


    "Crack!"


    There was suddenly the sound of jade breaking that rang out in the room that attracted the attention of the person who was sitting there monitoring the wall of jade tokens.


    At first that person couldn''t believe what had just happened, but then he quickly looked over all the jade tokens, looking for the one that had shattered.


    Finally he came to one that had cracked in two with the word "Feng" underneath it and he had to rub his eyes to double check before rushing out of the room.


    The two guards who had been at the door were shocked when they saw that person suddenlye out, but when they took a peek inside and saw the broken jade token, they immediately went on guard since they knew this wouldn''t be simple.


    When the person who had rushed out came back, he was followed by two people.


    One was a middle aged man who had a sharp moustache and the other was a handsome young man.


    When they came in, they headed over to the jade token that had broken and once they saw the letter under it, they visibly became much calmer.


    The middle aged man said, "I was wondering what this fuss was about, but it''s just one of the outer juniors."


    The handsome young man responded, "Uncle, even if it is an outer, he''s still part of the Jiang Family''s main branch. If others were to learn of this, it would affect the reputation of the Jiang Family."


    The middle aged man stroked his moustache before giving a nod, "You''re right nephew, this will affect the reputation of the Jiang Family if this was known. That useless outer, he can''t even die a proper death and he has to bring shame to our Jiang Family. Which elder''s branch is he a part of?"


    The handsome young man just gave a shrug, "How can I remember each outer?" Then he turned to the person who had been in charge of this jade token room and said, "Which branch was he in again?"


    That person was taken aback since he never expected to hear this from these people. These jade tokens were all the life jades of the main branch members of the Jiang Family, but these two didn''t seem to care at all that one of them had broken.


    No it wasn''t that they didn''t care about the life that was lost, they only cared because of the reputation of the Jiang Family.


    That person took a second toe back to his senses before saying, "It was Lord Jiang Feng of the fourth elder''s branch."


    The middle aged man just waved his hand and said, "It''s the fourth elder''s branch again. Nephew, you take care of this, you know what to do."


    But the handsome young man didn''t drop this matter so simply as he said, "Wait, uncle, this doesn''t seem that simple."


    The middle aged man stopped turning around to leave and turned back to the handsome young man to say, "What do you mean?"


    The handsome young man knit his brows as he said, "Something like this is happening just a month before the wedding ceremony, there must be something rted to this."


    The middle aged man also slightly knit his brows before saying, "No, you''re thinking too much. No one knows about that, so there shouldn''t be anyone trying to stop this. This should just be one of our rivals trying to hurt us a bit. You remember what happened with the other faction at the Union Government just a few days ago."


    But the handsome young man wouldn''t drop it as he said, "But what if it was Jiang Zhi Shu?"


    This time the middle aged man didn''t refute the handsome young man as he knit his brows in thought. After a while, he said, "Maybe, but are you certain?"


    The handsome young man gave a nod as he said, "I don''t know why, but I just have a feeling it''s him."


    The middle aged man then said, "Qi Tai, it''s your wedding ceremony, so you should be the one to take care of this."


    The handsome young man who had been called Qi Tai gave a nod before saying, "Then can I move the Law Enforcers?"


    p The middle aged man hesitated a bit before saying with a sigh, "Qi Tai, you''ll be in charge of the Jiang Family in the future. You have the rights to move whatever you want, but remember that you have to do things thoroughly."</anda>


    The handsome young man gave a nod before saying, "Yes uncle, thank you."


    This handsome young man''s name was Jiang Qi Tai, he was Jiang Zhi Shu''s brother and the man who was marrying Yuan Xiang Qin in just over a month from now.

 267 Chapter 267

    When Lin Fan came back from the night raid, it was quitete.


    It hadn''t been hard for him to clean up the Shark Den, but it had taken some time to get there and take care of everything.


    There had been three tinum Realm Experts there as the report had stated, but the leader was only in the mid tinum Realm while the two vice leaders were only in the low tinum Realm.


    For Lin Fan who could already fight against those in the Legendary Realm, it was no problem for him to take care of these three tinum Realm Experts. But he didn''t even take care of them alone, he had sent out two of his pets who had also easily taken care of one low tinum Realm Expert each.


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t immediately kill them like he did the rest of the experts found in the Shark Den.


    Rather he sealed up their cultivation just like Jiang Yu and had his men bring them to his intelligencework for information extraction.


    These three were the leaders of one of the two main subsidiaries of the Jiang Family, so naturally they would have quite a bit of information. Even if they weren''t as smart as Jiang Yu, they would still know quite a few things.


    So why would Lin Fan give up something that was already in his hands?


    After a long night, Lin Fan finally came home to find Ang was waiting for him.


    Song Shu had tried to stay awake, but she had fallen asleep in Ang''sp while waiting.


    When Lin Fan came in, Ang softly put Song Shu on the side beforeing over to Lin Fan, looking him over. After a while, she pointed to a spot on his back and asked, "What is this?"


    Lin Fan was confused by this since he didn''t know what she was talking about, but when he used his spiritual sense to check his back, he found what she was referring to. There was a few drops of blood that stained the back of his shirt.


    Lin Fan exined with a faint smile as a warm feeling filled his heart, "It''s not mine, it''s someone else''s."


    Then he didn''t know why, but he suddenly teased, "Were you worried about me?"


    Ang gave a soft snort and said, "I don''t want anyone beating up my punching bag, that''s all."


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say in response to this since this was technically true.


    If one had to describe Lin Fan in this rtionship with one word, it would be ''whipped''.


    Ang was the one person that Lin Fan couldn''t go against. It wasn''t just because she was much stronger than him, there were plenty of other reasons¡­


    But Lin Fan still didn''t know what came over him as he asked, "Then do you want to help me look over my wounds?"


    There was a faint blush that appeared on Ang''s face that made it even more beautiful. It was so beautiful that Lin Fan fell into a daze as he stared at her, almost missing her next words.


    Ang just gave another soft snort and said, "You can go look over it yourself, I''m going to bed."


    Ang softly picked up Song Shu and went into the bedroom they shared, firmly closing the door behind her.


    Lin Fan looked at the door with a bitter smile on his face, but there was nothing he could do.


    Even though Lin Fan and Ang were now in a rtionship, they were taking things quite slowly. At most they only held hands and shared the asional kiss, they hadn''t gone further than that. While they did share a bedroom, mainly for Song Shu, they had separate beds.


    Now that Ang had firmly closed the door to their bedroom, Lin Fan knew that he had been banished to the couch for the night.


    Seeing this and knowing there was nothing else he could do, Lin Fan walked over to the couch with a smile on his face while shaking his head. Even though he had this expression on his face, there was actually a warm feeling in his heart.


    After all, she had stayed up thiste just to wait for him and she had been worried when she had seen the blood on his back.


    It was a good feeling to have someone who cared.


    ¡­


    The next few days quickly passed by in a flurry.


    The Jiang Family had suddenly started sweeping across the city, looking for information. They didn''t even hesitate to drag people out of their businesses and houses to take back for questioning.<sub> </sub>


    After all, the Jiang Family had lost quite a few businesses under them, which was quite a heavy blow for them.


    But the most important thing wasn''t the financial loss since they were a Legendary Realm Family with quite a bit of history, which gave them more than enough stored funds toe back from this. The most important thing was the damage to their reputation.


    Even if they wanted to suppress all news about this, there was nothing that was imprable in this world. The news about the businesses rted to the Jiang Family being smashed quickly spread all over Rock Mountain City, causing people to think that the Jiang Family wasn''t as powerful as before. Especially since they hadn''t found who had smashed all their businesses.


    For arge family like theirs, reputation was especially important since reputation made sure that no one challenged them excessively.


    An expert couldn''t fight an army alone and with how many enemies the Jiang Family had, if they were to all attack at once, they would be spreading their forces too thin and would inevitably suffer heavy losses. That was where the importance of reputation came in.


    As long as they had their reputation shielding them, no one would recklessly attack them, allowing them to peacefully rule over their territory.


    If they didn''t wipe away this smear of their reputation and restore it, bad things might happen next if people thought they were bing weaker.


    So the Jiang Family swept over the entire city, but that didn''t affect Lin Fan''s shop at all.


    Lin Fan had made sure that there would be nothing tying his store to these raids, so the Jiang Family never suspected them.


    In the meantime, Lin Fan''s store actually became much more popr after everyone saw the training abilities that it had.


    On the second day, people had thought that the first pet training was a fluke, so they came back to see if the other pets would turn out the same and they were all shocked by the results.


    That was because while the training results weren''t as shocking since Lin Fan didn''t personally train all the pets this time, they were still shocking enough since all the pets had learned new skills and were much stronger than before.


    This firmly cemented the idea that Lin Fan''s shop wasn''t a fake and that just drew in more and more customers.


    More and more people came to Lin Fan''s store and that meant more and more poprity for his store.


    There were even people who started paying others to line up for them because Lin Fan''s store only had a limited number of training slots each day. Even before Lin Fan''s store opened, there would be people already lining up outside the store waiting.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop this since he knew that this would draw in more attention to his store and that was what he needed the most right now. This was the city of an enemy, so sooner orter he would receive suppression from the Jiang Family.


    He only needed one more store to finish his mission from the system¡­


    Of course, it was also a good thing that his customers helped him advertise his store.


    The first customer, Jiang You was the best example of this.


    With the Rock Nibbler that Lin Fan had personally trained, he had easily imed first in his year on the exam and had received quite therge reward from the Jiang Family for this aplishment. He had immediately gone and spent that money at Lin Fan''s store, training his pet again.


    Naturally the people that he had beat to take first ce would be doubtful about how his pet had suddenly be this strong, so they would investigate him.


    With how much he was spending in Lin Fan''s shop, it was clear where he had trained his pet.


    Soon, more and more people from Jiang You''s academy rushed to Lin Fan''s store and every single one of them was rich since they were all juniors of nobles and royals.


    As such, Lin Fan easily sold out the training spots each morning.


    But it was too bad that no one bought any other things like pet food or elixirs from him just yet.


    Still, that didn''t discourage Lin Fan since he knew that even without it, his shop was gaining quite a bit of poprity.


    But of course, poprity wasn''t always a good thing.


    There were some people that tried to sneak into the shop in the middle of the night to find Lin Fan''s secrets, but none of them were able to get through the defenses of the system. They were even secretly infected with Brainy''s parasite seeds.


    None of them were even close to the tinum Realm, so it was as easy as flipping a hand¡­flipping a vine for Brainy to infect them.


    But nothing could stay the same forever and one morning, there was a sudden change that came to the store.

 268 Chapter 268

    It had been a morning that was just like any other morning, but that soon quickly changed.


    During the usual normal rush, while Lin Fan and Song Shu were busy, there was a strange person that moved right through the crowd.


    This was an old man, but he definitely didn''t look like an old man with his thick head of ck hair and muscr build. If anything he looked more like a young bodybuilder. But the wrinkles on his face clearly showed that he was an old man.


    This old man easily moved through the crowd without attracting any attention, it was almost as if he didn''t exist.


    As he came closer to the counter, he watched Lin Fan for a bit from the side as he was working behind the counter.


    Of course, it wasn''t like no one in the store had noticed the old man. In the corner, Ang had noticed the old man the moment he came into the store since he had been using a strangew.


    She could tell that this old man was interested in Lin Fan, but he didn''t seem to have any hostility, so she decided to watch for now.


    Naturally, she wouldn''t let anyone harm Lin Fan¡­


    After the rush was over and the crowd in the store thinned, Lin Fan finally had some time to rx as he leaned back in his chair at the counter. It was at this time that the old man had finally approached.


    But Lin Fan strangely didn''t notice him until the old man was right in front of the counter and he gave a cough.


    Lin Fan looked up in surprise to see this old man who seemed to have suddenly appeared out of thin air, but he didn''t try to engage him. In his store, people were free to do business if they wanted and if they didn''t, he wasn''t nning on convincing them since his store was already popr enough.


    However, that old man had different ns.


    That old man suddenly leaned in towards Lin Fan who slid his chair back slightly in surprise, but that surprise didn''t match the shock that he felt when he heard the words the old man said.


    The old man revealed a smile and said, "Owner Lin, was it fun destroying the businesses of the Jiang Family? How much do you think they would pay for this information?"


    Lin Fan immediately revealed a wary look as he looked over this old man. He could tell that this old man was much more than he seemed, even though he already looked quite special.


    Just based on the aura that the old man had slightly suppressed, but didn''t fully conceal to allow Lin Fan to see his cultivation, this old man was in the tinum Realm. Not only was he in the tinum Realm, it was clear that he was in the peak tinum Realm.


    Why would this old man suddenly say something like this and what was his goal?


    After being shocked, Lin Fan quickly looked around, but it seemed like no one was able to see them. They were all walking by them like they didn''t exist, clearly not having heard what the old man had just said.


    What was going on here?


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to think about this as he turned back to the old man and asked, "What do you mean?"


    The old man shook his head with a smile as he said, "Owner Lin, there''s no use in denying this. I have plenty of evidence proving that you were the one who destroyed those businesses. Moreover, if you were to attack me now, that would look bad for your business, so how about we just have a nice civilized conversation?"


    Lin Fan knew that this old man''s words had covered every possibility, with the only exception being that this old man was lying about his evidence. However, with how confident he was, Lin Fan wasn''t certain of this possibility.


    Moreover, he wasn''t willing to risk his entire n just on this single possibility. It was still far too early in his n for it to be exposed and if it were to fail now, it could only mean that it would fail.


    This was something that he had promised Jiang Zhi Shu and he really wanted Jiang Zhi Shu as his subordinate now that they had spent some time together. He enjoyed his personality, but the most important thing was that Jiang Zhi Shu was someone who was loyal. He had demonstrated this over his four months of service to Lin Fan and he had demonstrated that in his love for Yuan Xiang Qin.


    Lin Fan really wanted someone like him as a subordinate, so he didn''t want this n to fail.


    After a slight moment of pause, Lin Fan forced himself to calm down as he said, "What do you want then?"


    The old man just stood there with his smile as he asked, "What do I want from you indeed?"


    Lin Fan felt a bit of irritation when he heard this, but he forced it down as he said, "Well this is a pet shop, so what do you think you can want from me?"


    The old man said, "But isn''t it interesting that you''re only targeting the businesses under the Jiang Family? What if I were someone who worked for them, what would you do?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan raised a brow and asked back, "If you were working for them, would you have done all of this? Now who''s asking dumb questions?"


    The old man finally dropped his smile and revealed a serious look as he said, "Good, I don''t like dealing with dumb people. It''s always much easier to deal with intelligent people."


    Lin Fan crossed his hands and said, "So?"


    The old man said, "First, let me introduce myself. I am Qiang You, the president of the Seeker Union here in Rock Mountain City."


    Seeker Union, that was actually quite the special existence in Rock Mountain City.


    They were the ones that maintained the semnce of order in this city and the one leading that was the president. It was said that the part of the city that was ignored by the Jiang Family would be much worse if it wasn''t for the Seeker Union keeping the peace.


    There was no doubt that the Seeker Union was the second strongest force in Rock Mountain City since most people either became a seeker or a miner to make a living in this city, or in most cases, they were both. But those that did survive were all powerful experts who were able to survive those beast inhabited mountains.


    It was said that the Seeker Union even had more experts than the Jiang Family¡­


    But it was also said that the Seeker Union was fiercely opposed to the Jiang Family since they were the ones ruining the city.


    Of course, the reason why the Jiang Family never attacked the Seeker Union was because both of their forces had upper realm factions behind them. If they were to ever make a move against the Seeker Union, it would mean starting a war that neither of them could afford to finish.


    That didn''t mean that the Seeker Union wasn''t a thorn in the side for the Jiang Family and vice versa.


    Both of them wished to destroy the other side, but neither of them could do a thing.


    Still, it was clear that the Seeker Union wouldn''t sell information to the Jiang Family. Or at the very least, if this old man really was the president of the Seeker Union, there was no way that he would be working with the Jiang Family.


    In that case, what was his goal ining here?


    The old man could see the confusion on Lin Fan''s face, so he said with a smile, "Owner Lin, it''s like this. To be honest, I''m looking to cooperate with your shop on something that only your shop can help me with."


    The confusion on Lin Fan''s face became even deeper as he couldn''t understand what this meant. Lin Fan asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    Qiang You revealed a knowing smile and said, "What is the main business of your shop?"


    Lin Fan casually answered, "Of course we deal in pets, this is a pet shop."


    Qiang You nodded and said, "Exactly, but do you know how rare pets are in this Rock Mountain City?"


    Lin Fan thought about it for a bit and he realized that he was right.


    Most of the pets that he saw were all the mostmon pets, but these people were clearly all experts who could afford his prices which definitely weren''t cheap. The only people he saw with different pets were clearly those that were nobles and royals.


    He hadn''t thought too deeply into this, but now that it was pointed out, he did find it strange.


    Lin Fan nodded before asking, "Why is that?"


    Qiang You said, "It''s the Jiang Family and the so-called nobles and royals that support them. They hold a monopoly on higher tier pets and don''t allow anyone to get them so they can maintain their power. It really makes it hard for usmon people."


    Lin Fan thought about it before nodding in agreement.


    Those on top clearly wanted to keep their advantage, so why would they let others obtain the ability to oppose them?


    Qiang You then said, "So Owner Lin, I''m looking to see if I can get some pets from your pet shop. I''m sure that someone with your level of training must have some high level pets."


    Lin Fan thought about this and was about to reject this offer since it would hurt his n even more, but then there was the voice of the system that rang in his mind.

 269 Chapter 269

    "Congrattions host, you have unlocked a secret mission."


    Lin Fan couldn''t believe what he heard as he looked at the screen that had suddenly appeared in front of him.


    "How can a pet shop refuse to sell pets? It is your duty to provide the people with pets that they can grow stronger with and love."


    "Please provide pets to all the poor citizens of Rock Mountain City that just want a pet of their own to love."


    "Pets of adequate level provided: 0/1000"


    Lin Fan''s face couldn''t help turning dark when he finished reading what was written on the screen.


    Was the system kidding?


    It wanted him to provide pets for people to love?


    What kind of a world was this where people loved their pets?


    In this world, all pets meant strength and the stronger one''s pets were, the stronger they would be.


    Loving and caring for your pet was only secondary, it was all for the purpose of gaining more strength.


    Yet the system was telling him to sell pets for people to love and care for?


    Still, that wasn''t the part that had moved him, it was actually the second part which contained the rewards and punishments that had moved him.


    "Reward forpleting the mission: Small Gift Bag."


    "Punishment for failing the mission: Shocked to death."


    Lin Fan''s face had turned even darker when he had saw what his punishment would be.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help saying in his mind, "System, you can''t just keep threatening me with death for every mission! That isn''t the right way to motivate me!"


    "Host, please do not question the system. First warning."


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t back down just yet, "System, I''m tired of this. You really think that I''ll be motivated to do the mission just because of this?"


    "Host, please do not question the system. Second warning."


    Of course, Lin Fan no longer pushed after that. He just wanted toin a bit to the system since he knew that if he kept pushing he would receive another punishment.


    It had been quite a while since Lin Fan had received a punishment. After being with the system for a while, he had been testing how far he could push the system and how long it would take for each warning to wear off.


    He had found that it would take an hour for the system to take off each warning.


    But Lin Fan still fell into thought after receiving the mission from the system since after all, he didn''t have enough resources.


    He had opened up the fourth cultivation realm farm, but that meant that he only had enough resources for three stores and barely enough to keep the fourth store running while eating into his storage. Or at least that would be the case if he were able to sell his pet food.


    But he wasn''t worried about that since he was sure that he would be able to sell his pet food in the future.


    Still, there was another big issue with this since he still needed a stable supply of pet eggs to be able to breed suitable pets to sell.


    Suitable pets for the system were those with Silver Realm bloodlines or up, which meant that anything that was under that wouldn''t be considered eligible for his mission progress.


    Moreover, when he incubated pets, the bloodlines that they received were allpletely random, so there was no telling how many eggs he would need. He could need the minimum of a thousand eggs if he was lucky, but if he wasn''t, he might need over ten thousand eggs just to breed all the pets that he needed.


    Right now, it would be hard for him to find a stable supply of pet eggs.


    The only store that was currently selling pets was the main store in Snow Wind City. He had been able to get a stable supply of pet eggs from the Monster Trainer Union in Water Pearl City for helping with the nar crack, but that supply was only enough to maintain the pet sales in the main shop.


    But that supply was also just enough to supply the main shop.


    Right now he was already at the max amount of eggs he could get from the Monster Trainer Union and there was no other way for him to get a stable supply.


    The only way he would be able to solve this was to throw as much money as he could at it and have hispany buy as many eggs as possible without care of price at first before slowly locating a stable supply. However, if he were to do this, it would be a major drain on his finances.<sub> </sub>


    While one would think that he would be able to recoup that by selling the pets in the store, that wouldn''t be the case since the system still took 99% of the earnings from the store.


    This meant that Lin Fan wouldck the finances he would need to build his own force and intelligencework that he had been doing for a while now.


    Still, the Small Gift Bag from the system was very tempting.


    Up to this point, the rewards from the store had


    never let him down, especially his first one. He had been relying a lot on the body that had been tempered from the Nine True Sun Body Art to use most of his abilities. If he were able to get something simr to this from this Small Gift Bag, it would more than make up for this.


    So after weighing all the pros and cons in his mind, Lin Fan didn''t immediately ept as he asked, "Who do you need me to supply these pets for?"


    Qiang You had thought that Lin Fan wasn''t interested at first since there was that dark look on his face and that long moment of silence he had taken, but when he heard these words, his eyes lit up. It meant that there was still a chance.


    Qiang You quickly said, "Naturally I''m looking for pets for the Seeker Union. I can guarantee that we will pay top prices for the pets that you offer as long as they are of decent quality."


    Lin Fan shook his head after he heard this, "That''s not possible, my store doesn''t supply any certain power with anything. We are just a simple pet shop and we do business fairly."


    Qiang You slightly knit his brows when he heard this, "Owner Lin, what do you mean by this?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "I can sell you pets, but that doesn''t mean I''ll be your exclusive dealer. I run a fair business, so the prices will be fixed and the products will be offered to everyone, do you understand?"


    Qiang You still knit his brows for a bit before suddenly revealing a smile like he had understood something, "Of course, of course, that''s not a problem."


    Qiang You had thought that this was Lin Fan''s way of protecting himself since if he were to ally himself with the Seeker Union, the Jiang Family would naturally be suspicious. There was nothing that waspletely hidden in this world and if they had something to start from, the Jiang Family would naturally find Lin Fan''s involvement in the past raids.


    But what he didn''t know was that Lin Fan had beenpletely shut down by the system.


    "Host, you are not allowed to privately make a deal to sell pets to private sellers. Please sell all pets ording to the prices of the shop."


    Lin Fan really wanted to curse the system andin, but he also remembered that he currently had two warnings¡­


    Qiang You immediately reached his hand out as he said with a smile, "Owner Lin, it''s a deal."


    Lin Fan looked at his hand, but he didn''t take it as he looked back at Qiang You with just a single raised brow, "Do you really think that was it? Do you think that I would just agree to your demands because you threatened me?"


    Qiang You''s smile became awkward and he slowly took back his hand to scratch his head as he tried exining, "Of course not, of course not. Owner Lin, you have to know that those threats were just to get your attention, nothing more. You know that our Seeker Union isn''t¡­"


    But Lin Fan suddenly raised a hand to stop him as he said, "Enough, I don''t need your life story."


    Qiang You awkwardly stood there not knowing what to say.


    Lin Fan put down his hand and said, "I have a few conditions of my own and as long as you agree to them, there''s no problem selling pets."


    Qiang You just gave an enthusiastic nod as he said, "No problem. Owner Lin, please tell me what conditions you have and I''ll do my best to fulfil them."


    Lin Fan said, "First, I want to make sure that you''ll never reveal what happened to the Jiang Family businesses to the Jiang Family."


    Qiang You nodded quickly, "Of course, of course."


    Lin Fan continued, "Second, I want information on Rock Mountain City. I''ll give you a list of what I want."


    Qiang You was taken aback, but then he nodded again, "Sure, sure, no problem."


    Lin Fan then said, "Third, I want¡­"


    This time Qiang You didn''t agree that quickly as he suddenly revealed a shocked look before saying with a difficult expression, "Owner Lin, can we discuss this? This is a very important thing that you''re asking."


    Lin Fan just shook his head, "It''s now or never."


    After hesitating a bit, Qiang You gritted his teeth and said, "Alright, I promise you this."


    Lin Fan nodded before reaching out his hand with his usual smile, "Good, it''s a pleasure doing business with you."


    Qiang You had a bitter smile as he reached out his hand and shook Lin Fan''s hand before saying, "Why does it feel like I''m making a deal with the devil?"

 270 Chapter 270

    Even though they had reached this agreement, it didn''t mean that Lin Fan would be able to start selling pets right away.


    After all, there was nothing in this store prepared for breeding pets at all.


    Before he could even do anything, he had to gather some resources from the other stores and bring them over to this store.


    So another few days passed before Lin Fan was able to finally start selling pets, but that meant that he only had another month and a half left to finish this mission.


    He was nning on finishing this mission at the same time he finished the main mission of setting up three branch stores, which meant that he had to sell at least 20 pets a day to be able to do that.


    That clearly meant that he was going to lose money doing this, but it was a good thing that he had also raised a condition that would help him with his n.


    During this time, naturally Jiang Zhi Shu wasn''t idle. He continued to harass the Jiang Family through various ways and the Jiang Family had continued their sweep of the city, but they were unable to find a single thing.


    That was because Jiang Zhi Shu now had the Seeker Union helping him and the Seeker Union wasn''t considered the second strongest power in this city for nothing. If they wanted to keep something hidden from the Jiang Family, they definitely would be able to do so.


    When Lin Fan began selling his pets, he followed the pricing of the store and made them public. At first, there really wasn''t anyone who knew about these pets since Lin Fan had released them at a random time each day, but there were still people who came to check out his pet store during the day.


    They were skeptical of the pets that Lin Fan sold, but unlike pet training which would require a day to see the results of, it was very easy for them to check the pets out. When they found out that the pets that Lin Fan was offering all had bloodlines that were at least in the Silver Realm, they were shocked.


    Everyone wanted to buy some, but of course the people there were just there for fun and didn''t really have any money. There were a few that were there as spies for some of the nobles and royals that immediately sent word back to their families about this, but they didn''t make it in time.


    As the store owner, Lin Fan couldn''t directly sell to the Seeker Union, but he could definitely tell them when he would be stocking up on new pets.


    Every time he brought out these new pets, the Seeker Union would always show up right on time and take these pets for themselves. Without fail, they would always show up just a minute after the pets were brought out, no matter what time the pets were stocked.


    <o>,m But of course, Lin Fan couldn''t just let them take all of them since he still had to do business. So most of the time, the people sent by Qiang You to buy these pets only took 75% of all the pets.</o>


    Of course, as the first customers choosing pets, they naturally had first pick of the pets.


    Lin Fan would asionally bring out a Gold Realm or tinum Realm bloodline pet which would always be taken by the Seeker Union experts in front of everyone''s jealous eyes.


    Still, by doing all this, the news of Lin Fan''s shop being able to obtain high grade pets was quickly spread.


    Moreover, the price in his shop was much lower than those of the pet shops that the nobles owned and they didn''t have any restrictions on who could buy them.


    This was both a good thing and a bad thing.


    The good thing was that people who normally couldn''t get high grade pets because of the monopoly of the nobles and royals now had a ce where they could get high grade pets. If they were able to get one of these pets and nurture it to adulthood, they could rely on it to be an expert.


    The bad thing was that this seriously cut into the business of the nobles and royals, especially since if themoners were able to get stronger pets, they might even be able to threaten their position. Those in power naturally wanted to control the source of their power.


    The one who enforced the monopoly the most was naturally the Jiang Family who were the strongest family in the city.


    But even the most blind person could see that this store must have made a deal with the Seeker Union when it came to these pets.


    The Seeker Union deserved their title as the second strongest power in Rock Mountain City and most of these nobles and royals weren''t willing to mess with them.


    So in the end, it had to be the Jiang Family who led the way.


    A few days after the disturbance brought by Qiang You, there was another disturbance caused in his store.<sub> </sub>


    It was said that when it rained, it poured and it definitely poured.


    It was just a normal day at first and it was getting boring since it was the afternoon, right after they had already sold all their pets and filled all their pet quotas. People still weren''t willing to buy the pet food from Lin Fan''s store yet, so there wasn''t really anything for Lin Fan to do right now.


    At this time, there was someone who was dressed in fancy clothes that suddenly walked in.


    One could tell immediately from his clothes that he was someone important and he even went as far as wearing a tiny crown on his head. But of course, this young man was someone who could afford to do so since he was a member of the Jiang Family.


    He wasn''t a branch member like Jiang You who came before, he was a true direct descendant of the Jiang Family main branch.


    But this young man clearly looked like a pampered young master with the way he walked and fanned himself with his silk fan. If anything, he almost seemed like a young girl rather than a young man.


    The man looked around the store with disdain aftering in and gave a soft snort, but he still came into the store and walked up to the counter.


    When he was in front of the counter, he looked down at Lin Fan who sat there and said, "Hey, boy, go and call your manager for me. I have something important to discuss with him."


    Him calling Lin Fan boy really wasn''t strange since Lin Fan was indeed a boy. He was just eighteen and was about to turn neen this year.


    Lin Fan looked up at this young man like he was looking at an idiot before turning away from him to go back to the web novel that he had been reading. It was a story about a man who had transmigrated into a world where he had a cooking system that tried to turn him into the God of Cooking.


    But of course, after transmigrating himself, he couldn''t help finding this story kind of boring since even his life seemed more interesting than this plot.


    Still, there was nothing else for him to do.


    The young man saw Lin Fan ignoring him and he was immediately annoyed.


    This young man was indeed a pampered young master of the Jiang Family, so when had he ever been snubbed by someone of lower ranking like this? Especially someone who just worked in a small and dirty pet shop like this.


    Still, the young man didn''t say a thing as the follower behind him suddenly came forward to p the table and shout, "You piece of trash, do you know who you''re talking to? This is the noble Jiang Long, direct descendant and genius of the Jiang Family."


    Then the follower on the other side came forward to continue sucking up, "If you don''t know the Jiang Family and live in Rock Mountain City, you really should kill yourself! Do you really dare to go against Young Master Jiang and the Jiang Family?"


    Lin Fan finally turned to look at them, but the way he looked at them was like he was looking at a bunch of idiots.


    Finally, Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "How can I help you?"


    Jiang Long just gave a snort and didn''t say a thing.


    His first follower naturally understood what he meant and he came forward to point his finger at Lin Fan, "Do you think you''re worthy of speaking to our Young Master Jiang? What kind of person do you think you are? You really have a high sense of self worth!"


    The second follower waved his hand in Lin Fan''s face and said, "Scram right now and get your manager, we don''t want to bother with a little clerk like you. You better count yourself lucky that we don''t cripple you right now!"


    Lin Fan just had the same calm look as he said, "You''re looking at the owner."


    Jiang Long and both his followers looked at Lin Fan in surprise and disbelief, it was clear that they didn''t believe him.


    After a few seconds of being surprised, the first follower charged forward and reached his hand out to grab Lin Fan''s cor as he shouted, "You really think this is funny? Bring out your manager now¡­"


    Lin Fan just calmly stood there, letting him do this because he knew that he would never reach his cor.

 271 Chapter 271

    Before the first follower could even finish his words, he suddenly felt his hand make contact with something. However, what he made contact with wasn''t Lin Fan, it was something elsepletely.


    Right before the first follower''s hand could even reach Lin Fan, there was an invisible barrier that suddenly stopped it a few inches away from Lin Fan.


    The first follower couldn''t understand what had just happened. He had been moving his hand forward, but then it had suddenly stopped in midair for an unknown reason.


    He turned to look at his hand that was just frozen in the air, but then there was an irresistible force that had suddenly pushed his hand back. It was so strong that he sent him flying.


    Although the first follower didn''t move his hand that quickly towards Lin Fan, the spatialw of the shop multiplied the force by countless times. Even a small number when multiplied by countless times could be a giant number.


    The first follower was sent flying by the force that had been reflected from his hand, being sent flying right out the door that had suddenly opened. He skidded on the ground several times outside the store beforeing to a stop, having lost consciousness.


    Since he didn''t use that much force, he wasn''t too injured, but his cultivation wasn''t high to begin with. When hended on the ground, he was covered in a few scratches, but the worst part was naturally his arm which had been bent in a very unnatural shape. It was clear that the bone inside had been broken.


    Jiang Long and his other follower were shocked when they saw this, but soon Jiang Long just chalked it up to being a trick. When he came back from his shock, he pped the other follower on the back of the head and said, "What are you doing? Can''t you see it''s just a trick? Take care of him now!"


    The other follower clearly didn''t know what to do at this moment as he stood there trembling.


    Lin Fan shook his head when he saw this and said, "Do you really not know what just happened or are you really just stupid?"


    There was a vein that popped out on Jiang Long''s forehead as he shouted, "Who are you calling stupid!" Then he pped the follower on the back of the head again and shouted, "Get him now!"


    The other follower had a look on his face that made it seem like he wanted to cry, but he couldn''t defy Jiang Long.


    So without any further hesitation, the other follower immediately charged at Lin Fan.


    It wasn''t hard to imagine what had happened.


    The moment he came within a few inches of Lin Fan, the same exact thing happened.


    There was an invisible barrier that stopped the follower''s hand from moving any further and then as he looked at his hand, he experienced the same force as the first follower. This second follower was immediately sted out of the store just like the first follower with his arm bent the same way as the first follower.


    They bothid there in the street like dead dogs, but no one dared to move towards them since they both had the symbol of the Jiang Family on them.


    There had been a crowd that had gathered outside Lin Fan''s store, but none of them dared to go inside. After all, this involved the Jiang Family and if they were to get involved, this naturally wouldn''t end well for them.


    Jiang Long in the store looked at Lin Fan in absolute shock.


    Perhaps once might be considered a trick, but for it to happen twice in a row, it was clear that this wasn''t just a simple trick anymore.


    Lin Fan acted like nothing had happened as he looked over Jiang Long. There were a few thoughts that were running through his mind, but after a bit, he asked, "What did you need the manager for?"


    Jiang Long had been trembling as he stood there, but when he heard these words, he gained a bit of his arrogance back. It was clear that this person was still afraid of the Jiang Family since he was willing to talk to him and that was all he needed.


    Jiang Long raised his chin a bit as he said, "It''se to the Jiang Family''s attention that you''ve been selling some pets from your storetely. Is this true?"


    Lin Fan was inwardly confused, but he still said in a calm voice, "That''s right. What about it?"


    Jiang Long revealed an even more arrogant look as he said, "Don''t you know that selling pets is the business of the Jiang Family? By selling these pets, don''t you know that you are treading on the benefits of the Jiang Family? How are you nning onpensating us?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes didn''t even twitch as he said, "What is the Jiang Family looking for?"<sub> </sub>


    Jiang Long clearly misunderstood this since he immediately said in an arrogant voice, "Give us this store and work for us, in and simple. That is the only path of survival for you."


    Jiang Long had clearly thought that Lin Fan was scared, which was why he had asked this question, but he couldn''t have been more wrong. Lin Fan just wanted to know what the Jiang Family was thinking so he could formte his own n.


    After all, since he decided to sell pets, he knew that this would have happened already, but this was also one of the reasons why he did this.


    Lin Fan still had the same calm tone as he said, "Isn''t this a bit too much?"


    p When Jiang Long was given an inch, he would take a mile. He immediately roared out in an angry voice, "Who do you think you are? Do you know who the Jiang Family is? You''re lucky that we''re even giving you a chance to survive and you''re not even smart enough to take it! My words really are wasted on you!"</anda>


    Lin Fan suddenly gave augh at this as he said, "Well, what if I were to say no?"


    Jiang Long clearly didn''t expect this as his mouth suddenly dropped down in shock. However, the moment he came back from his shock, he immediately began angrily roaring again, "You truly are an idiot, do you not see what is good for you! If you don''t want to ept this, I might as well cripple you right¡­"


    But he never got to finish since he was immediately crushed by the pressure that Lin Fan had suddenly released.


    Jiang Long was a direct descendant of the Jiang Family, but he was also a pampered young master without any real talent. The only reason he was even given all that he was given was just because he was a direct descendant with the main branch''s bloodline. He was nothing more than a breeding stud.


    Jiang Long without any talent naturally didn''t have that high of a cultivation, buting from the Jiang Family with all of its resources, they had stuffed enough into him that he had reached the SIlver Realm. But the pressure that Lin Fan was releasing now was in the tinum Realm, one that he was very familiar with and knew was dangerous.


    Jiang Long quickly took several steps back, or rather his legs crumpled under him and he scooted back a few inches on his butt as he stammered, "You, you, you, what are you, you nning on doing?"


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort and asked, "What does it look like I''m doing?"


    Jiang Long began shaking even more when he heard this and he immediately shouted, "Do you know who I am? I am Jiang Long of the Jiang Family, the younger brother of the genius Jiang Feng!"


    Lin Fan suddenly knit his brows when he heard this and he repeated, "Jiang Feng?"


    Jiang Long''s eyes immediately lit up as he heard this, like he had just seen a life saving straw. He immediately shouted, "That''s right, Jiang Feng of the Jiang Family, the legendary tinum Realm Expert! Even if you''re also in the tinum Realm, do you really think you can beat a direct descendant genius of the Jiang Family! I urge you to give up and cripple your own cultivation now!"


    But once again, he was sorely mistaken.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised because he was scared of Jiang Feng, but rather this was a name that was familiar to him for another reason. It was because the direct descendant genius Jiang Zhi Shu had killed a few days ago was also called Jiang Feng.


    Lin Fan could tell from the look on Jiang Long''s face that he wasn''t lying, so it seemed like he really didn''t know about Jiang Feng''s death.


    But why would the Jiang Family hide this from their own members?


    It made sense that they would hide this information from outsiders, but why would they hide it from their own members?


    It seemed like there was something going on underneath the surface of the Jiang Family, but Lin Fan couldn''t figure it out now.


    After only a slight moment of pause, Lin Fan stood up and began moving towards Jiang Long.


    Jiang Long''s eyes opened in shock and his mouth dropped down as he stammered, "What, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan just said with a cold snort, "What do you think I''m doing? I''m clearly taking out the trash."


    Jiang Long wanted to say something else, but he didn''t get the chance as Lin Fan broke both his arms and legs before throwing him right out of the store.

 272 Chapter 272

    Lin Fan could have killed this Jiang Long, but he had more uses alive right now instead of dead.


    So he just crippled him and threw him out, allowing him to head back to the Jiang Family.


    Of course, it wasn''t just for that n, it was also because he was a little annoyed at how Jiang Long was acting, but he would definitely not admit it.


    There had been a crowd that had gathered outside the store and naturally there were people who recognized Jiang Long.


    Jiang Long was the definition of a wastrel young master, so he hadmitted quite a few evil deeds around Rock Mountain City, which made him quite well known and despised. There were plenty of people who wanted to see a bad end befall him, so naturally they were happy to see him suffer now.


    But of course there were a few people who were rather shrewd who wanted to build a better rtionship with the Jiang Family that immediately came forward to help, while also sending word to the Jiang Family about this matter.


    If they were able to get close to either Jiang Long or the Jiang Family by reporting all that they knew and throwing Lin Fan under the bus, it would definitely be worth it. Not to mention that there was nothing to lose from this situation.


    Jiang Long was quickly carried off and soon this matter was over, however it also quickly spread all over Rock Mountain City. It didn''t take long before this news was spread all over the forums with many different pictures of Jiang Long on the ground outside Lin Fan''s store.


    Even if the Jiang Family wanted to take this down, it was impossible for them to suppress it at this point since almost everyone knew about it. It was without a doubt arge p to their face.


    It was clear that they treated this seriously since the next day, another member of the Jiang Family arrived. This time it wasn''t a wastrel.


    ¡­


    Time passed and the next day came.


    Lin Fan opened the shop like normal, but this time there were much more people who hade early in the morning.


    His shop had been surrounded once again like the day the first pet was given back. This time it was even more crowdedpared to that time.


    However, unlike before, there was a split in this crowd.


    There were people who hade to rely on Lin Fan to make money by saving spots in line or people who relied on Lin Fan to train their pets. These were the ones that were supporting Lin Fan.


    The others were all here just to watch the fun and take joy in Lin Fan''s misfortune.


    Among those that were here to support Lin Fan was actually a member of the Jiang Family, but he was only a branch member.


    Jiang You had been Lin Fan''s first customer and after experiencing Lin Fan''s training, he was also the first one who had been addicted to it.


    After receiving even more resources from his family for his great performance on his test, he was able to afford Lin Fan''s pet training. He hade early each morning just for a ce in line because he knew that sticking with Lin Fan was the best path for his future. His pet became stronger, giving him more fame and resources, allowing his cultivation to proceed even more smoothly.


    It was all a cycle that ended with him bing stronger.


    Now that Lin Fan was in trouble, it meant that this cycle was about to end and he wasn''t willing to let that happen.


    But he didn''t have a choice since when he saw the member of the Jiang Family that was sent, he immediately hid in the crowd. This was someone that he could never offend or he would be directly kicked out of the Jiang Family.


    The one that the Jiang Family sent was the head of the branch Jiang Long was a part of, it was the Jiang Family''s fourth elder.


    This was an elder who was in the high tinum Realm, one of the true top experts in this city. However, today he was here to deal with a pet shop.


    It could be seen just how much the Jiang Family cared about clearing this shame.


    When the fourth elder appeared out of the Jiang Family''s carriage, the crowd in front of the store parted to create a path for him, leading right to the door of the pet shop.


    The fourth elder moved through the crowd and came up to the door of the store, but when he pushed on the door, he found that it was locked.


    The fourth elder mmed on the door and shouted, "Open this door this instant or I''ll smash your shop!"


    There was no answer that came from inside.<sub> </sub>


    A vein popped out on the forehead of the fourth elder and without a single word, he raised his hand and pulled it back, gathering his life energy in his palm. Then after a few seconds, he suddenly thrust out with his palm at the door.


    But what happened nextpletely shocked him.


    There was no shattering of the door as he expected, but rather his life energy was scattered without a trace and there wasn''t a single scratch on the door.


    From the moment the fourth elder had appeared, everyone had started filming this, but they all couldn''t help being shocked when they saw what had happened.


    The fourth elder immediately knit his brows as he stopped his attacks. He could tell from what had just happened that this wasn''t an ident, there was something strange about this shop.


    But when he tried sending his spiritual sense in, he found that there wasn''t even a single gap for it to enter into the store.


    The fourth elder paused for a bit to consider his options before raising his hand again to gather his life energy, but then there was a voice that called out, "There''s still ten minutes before the store opens. Wait patiently or get cklisted!"


    A vein once again popped out on the fourth elder''s forehead, but he didn''t continue attacking. He could tell that there was no use in him attacking this store again after his first attack failed and if he continued, he would embarrass himself. At the very least, he had to get inside and talk to the owner to get a response for the Jiang Family, or he wouldn''t be able to exin to the family head.


    So, just like that, the fourth elder stood there outside the door, patiently waiting for the time to pass.


    And time did pass and soon ten minutes had gone by.


    When the fourth elder was about to lose his patience, the door suddenly opened right on the dot of the store''s opening hours.


    The fourth elder didn''t waste any time as he directly headed into the store, moving past Song Shu who was standing behind the door anding right up to Lin Fan at the counter.


    Just like Jiang Long, his first words were, "I want to speak to the owner."


    Lin Fan looked up from the web novel that he had been reading at this old man who had just appeared in front of him and after taking a few seconds to look him over, he said, "Why are you looking for the owner?"


    The fourth elder Jiang Hei gave a cold snort and said, "What does an insignificant employee like you need to know? Get your owner now or I''ll smash your store."


    Lin Fan casually said, "The owner isn''t that free, it would be better if you told me your business so I can arrange a meeting."


    Jiang Hei''s face turned dark when he heard this and he could only stutter out, "You¡­"


    The people outside the store naturally enjoyed watching this.


    There were even people who came yesterday who couldn''t help thinking that this scene seemed familiar to what had happened yesterday.


    There were those that were worried for Lin Fan since they recognized this old man as the fourth elder of the Jiang Family. Even those that didn''t could tell that this old man was powerful from the strike he released just now.


    All of them were worried about how Lin Fan would get out of this.


    There wasn''t a single person who thought that Lin Fan would be the one at the advantage here.


    As for the rest of the crowd, they were all looking forward to this show.


    Jiang Hei was close to exploding, but with incredible self control, he forced himself to calm down. He remembered how strange the door of this shop was and decided not to underestimate it.


    After a deep breath, Jiang Hei said, "I am the fourth elder of the Jiang Family and I''m here to see the owner."


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he asked, "Oh, it''s the fourth elder of the Jiang Family. I wonder, what business are you here on today?"


    Jiang Hei calmly said, "Yesterday there was a junior of my family who was assaulted in this store. I came today to get an exnation andpensation for this matter."


    Lin Fan looked like he suddenly understood what was going on as he said, "Oh, so it''s for this matter. Good, I was hoping that someone woulde. Now, what kind ofpensation are you offering for that brat? He did damage my store quite a bit and scare my customers after all."

 273 Chapter 273

    The fourth elder Jiang Hei''s face twisted when he heard this.


    This brat had actually turned his words around.


    With the way he phrased it, it sounded like he was here on behalf of the Jiang Family to offerpensation to this store, not the other way around.


    Jiang Hei''s face twisted even further the more he thought about this and he was so choked up with rage that he didn''t even know what to say. He was like a kettle boiling water and it seemed like the kettle would burst with steam at any moment.


    Naturally he wouldn''t take this from just a simple employee of this shop, so Jiang Hei exploded, but he didn''t break out roaring like a normal person would. Instead Jiang Hei''s face turnedpletely dark and he said in a cold voice, "You think you''re smart? What do you think will happen when your owner betrays you and hands you over to our Jiang Family for this? Do you really think the owner of a small pet shop like this will protect a small employee like you in front of our Jiang Family?"


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all as he calmly said with a faint smile, "I have faith in my boss."


    Jiang Hei gave a coldugh when he heard this and he immediately said, "You really overestimate yourself. Do you really think that trash like you is worth anything in the face of the Jiang Family?"


    Lin Fan then said, "Well it''d be hard for the boss to give me up seeing as I am the boss."


    Jiang Hei had still beenughing when he had heard this and the moment he did, his facepletely twisted. It was like he had eaten a lemon candy that was just too sour for him and his face scrunched up like it had folded in on itself.


    After a few seconds of being shocked, Jiang Hei quickly recovered himself and said, "Humph, it seems like the quality of the store is defined by the qualities of the owner. I''m not surprised that someone like you owns a store like this, but how do you n on giving our Jiang Family an answer for what happened yesterday?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "What answer do I need to give the Jiang Family? He''s the one who came in here to cause trouble, all I did was take care of the trash."


    Jiang Hei''s face turned darker when he heard this and he said in a cold voice, "Are you certain that this is the response that you want to give?"


    Lin Fan just calmly looked him in the eyes and said, "So you''re not here topensate me then?"


    Jiang Hei gave a cold snort and didn''t hesitate as he raised his hand, sending out his palm at Lin Fan''s chest.


    Lin Fan didn''t panic as he also calmly raised his fist and sent it out right at his palm.


    Lin Fan could have used the defenses system of the store to easily take care of him, but he specifically shut them off. He also had to show off a bit of his power as well, otherwise they would take him for a pushover.


    The fist and palm shed and there was a split second of bnce before the fistpletely broke through the palm, sending Jiang Hei flying back.


    But this wasn''t the same as the defense system, Jiang Hei was only pushed back a few steps before he stabilized himself. However, when he did stabilize himself, he stood there for a second before suddenly clutching his chest as a sliver of blood came out of the corner of his mouth.


    In that sh just now, he had been injured internally by Lin Fan.


    When Jiang Hei looked back up at Lin Fan, there was a trace of fear in his eyes.


    It had to be known that he was one of the elders of the Jiang Family and a high tinum Realm Expert. When it came to Rock Mountain City, he was one of the top experts there, but Lin Fan had not only easily broken his attack, he had also injured him.


    Then there was how easily the store had dissipated his attack without suffering a single scratch.


    It was clear that this store wasn''t as simple as it looked.


    After thinking for a bit, Jiang Hei didn''t continue to fight as he said, "Do you know what you''re doing right now?"


    Lin Fan just stood there behind the counter, looking calmly at Jiang Hei as he said, "Throwing out the trash?"


    Jiang Hei didn''t let it affect him this time since he knew what Lin Fan was doing. Instead, he said in a very calm voice, "Do you really think you''ll be able to survive in Rock Mountain City after this? Even with your backing, do you really think you can go against the entire Jiang Family?"


    It was only then that Lin Fan had taken a step forward,ing out from behind the counter.


    For some unknown reason, when Lin Fan did take that step forward, Jiang Hei couldn''t help taking a step back. He didn''t know why, but there seemed to be a pressure that came from Lin Fan that even scared him.


    Lin Fan took another step as he calmly said, "Is there anything special about the Jiang Family? If onees, I will beat one. If twoes, I will beat two!"


    Jiang Hei couldn''t help being taken aback like this since this was the first time he had seen this attitude from anyone when he brought out the Jiang Family.


    At this moment, he really didn''t know what to do.


    His biggest card had beenpletely ignored and if he was asked to beat Lin Fan, his answer would be to ask if you were crazy?<sub> </sub>


    Beat Lin Fan, he had already lost the first sh, how was he supposed to do that?


    But he also couldn''t just back down now since this was a matter that involved the Jiang Family''s pride and reputation.


    Where had a maniac like thise from?


    While Jiang Hei was considering what to do, there was a voice that suddenly came from the door, one that Jiang Hei was familiar with.


    Qiang You said in a calm voice, "Now, how about we end the matter here today?"


    Jiang Hei turned to the source of the voice and he was shocked to find that Qiang You was here.


    Qiang You was the president of the Seekers Union, he was naturally very busy as the leader of the second most powerful force in Rock Mountain City. How could he have time to show up here?


    Actually, the Seekers Union had sent their group to buy pets as usual, but Qiang You had received a report from an unknown source that Jiang Hei was heading to Lin Fan''s shop.


    While this was just unconfirmed information, he did know about what had happened yesterday, so it was very likely to be true.


    Now that Lin Fan was a close partner of his, he couldn''t just leave Lin Fan out to dry, so he hade with this group early in the morning. But now it seemed like he hadete.


    However, even though he hadete, he had also seen Lin Fan''s power and he was shocked by it.


    This young man who was the owner of the store was also a tinum Realm Expert, there really was something special about this store¡­


    But this wasn''t the time for it.


    Jiang Hei''s face scrunched up once again when he had heard what Qiang You said.


    Naturally, as the leader of the second strongest force in Rock Mountain City, Qiang You''s words held weight and there wasn''t a need to mention that he was even here personally.


    Still, Jiang Hei couldn''t back off so easily.


    Jiang Hei said, "Qiang You, are you really tearing away all face with the Jiang Family over this small store? Do you understand what is going on right now?"


    Qiang You however still gave a smile as he said, "Owner Lin''s store is currently an important business partner of the Seekers Union." After saying this, that smile suddenly turned cold as he continued, "If you really want to do this, you have to ask my Seekers Guild for permission first."


    Jiang Hei couldn''t believe what he had just heard.


    The mighty Seekers Union, an organization that had an upper realm faction behind them was breaking off all face with the Jiang Family, another organization with an upper realm faction behind them for a little pet shop?


    What was going on today?


    Had the world gone mad?


    In the end, Jiang Hei knew that he wouldn''t be able to do a thing today and if he were to start a full war with the Seekers Guild, the Jiang Family would definitely hold him ountable.


    After what had happened with Jiang Feng, his branch was already on thin ice and he couldn''t afford the consequences of this right now.


    Jiang Hei paused for a second before giving a cold snort. He spat out a mouthful of blood on the ground before walking towards the door.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t done with him yet.


    As he walked away, there was a sudden barrier that appeared in front of him that seemed to be a warp in space.


    He tried to turn around, but he found that he waspletely trapped in walls of frozen space.


    Lin Fan came forward and grabbed him by the cor, mming him down on the ground to wipe off the bit of blood there before throwing him out.


    After throwing him out, he came up to the door and said, "Remember my words, I''ll beat every single one of you thates."

 274 Chapter 274

    Jiang Hei turned back to re at Lin Fan standing at the entrance of the store, but there was nothing that he could do.


    Standing right behind Lin Fan was Qiang You with his arms crossed who was also releasing his aura.


    Jiang Hei knew that if he were to continue this, he would bring even more embarrassment to the Jiang Family and there were plenty of people watching still.


    Jiang Hei just stood up, wiped himself off, and gave a snort before heading into his beast carriage that had been waiting for him.


    As he was leaving, Qiang You quietly said to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, is this the result you wanted to see?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile when he heard this.


    Naturally Qiang You had his own resources and he could easily find who had given him the information this morning. Of course, Lin Fan also didn''t try to hide it that deeply.


    Lin Fan just said with his regr smile, "Isn''t this also the result you want to see?"


    Qiang You shook his head when he saw this smile and he said, "Why does it feel like I''m making a deal with the devil?"


    ¡­


    Over the next few days, the Jiang Family actually didn''t make a single move.


    Lin Fan''s n was actually quite simple, he was putting pressure on the Jiang Family to force cracks to appear in their defenses.


    The first bit of pressure that he put on the Jiang Family was by taking out their underground resources. The next bit of pressure he put on them was slowly encroaching on their main above ground business. Next, there was finally the secret business of the Jiang Family that he would be targeting.


    But even by only targeting their underground businesses and above ground business, they were already crumbling under the pressure.


    There were two main reasons for that.


    First, there was the Seekers Guild that was cing pressure on them.


    The Seekers Guild was a force that could almost rival their own and the Jiang Family waspletely confused why they would be going so far for a little pet shop, but that didn''t stop them from feeling the pressure that they ced.


    Secondly, it was because of their own internal struggle.


    Because it was the fourth elder''s branch that had failed not just once, but twice, there was now doubt cast upon the fourth elder''s branch. The family head had even openly criticized the fourth elder''s branch which had created friction in the Jiang Family.


    While the fourth elder''s branch was considered one of the weakest branches in the Jiang Family, they still were a branch that had an elder behind them. The more important thing was that there was also a powerful backer behind them.


    The Jiang Family seemed peaceful on the surface, but that was only on the surface.


    There were actually twopeting factions in the Jiang Family that had been fighting over control of the entire Jiang Family. They were the family head''s branch and the second elder''s branch respectively.


    The fourth elder''s branch was under the second elder''s branch and the second elder''s branch was actually strong enough to control half of the entire Jiang Family.


    Of course, they couldn''t go too far since they were still part of the same family and they were all under the same ancestor, who was the Legendary Realm Expert of the Jiang Family. As long as they didn''t hurt the foundations of the Jiang Family, the Legendary Realm Expert allowed them to have their petty squabbles.


    And that was what happened in the Jiang Family.


    Of course, with all this pressure upon the Jiang Family, the best move for them was to stabilize themselves and not make any rash moves.


    So, Lin Fan was able to have a few days of peace during this time.


    But of course, it wasn''t all peace as there was suddenly something new that appeared in his store.


    Two days after the Jiang Family''s fourth elder hade and gone, there was another interesting character that appeared in Lin Fan''s store.


    This person wasn''t anyone powerful or important, rather it was just a little boy who seemed to be around ten years old.


    He came alone into the store and looked around for a bit before his eyes fell onto something thatpletely made his eyes light up.


    Since he hade after the morning rush, there were few people currently in the store, which meant that it was currently free time for the staff. However, that wasn''t the case for Song Shu who was currently busy with stocking the shelves, even though there wasn''t anything being sold.<sub> </sub>


    Song Shu had learned how to work hard from her years on the street and this was something that she didn''t forget even after bing the Alchemy Master. She still worked hard in Lin Fan''s store, even though he tried letting her have as much fun as possible.


    When the little boy''s eyes fell onto Song Shu, he just stood there in a daze as he watched her for a bit.


    Naturally, the appearance of this boy was noticed by the two adults in the store.


    Ang''s face had a cold look on it as she looked at the little boy. The more she looked at him, the more displeased she felt. After a while, she couldn''t take it and was about to head forward to deal with him, but Lin Fan reached out his hand to stop her.


    While he did seem calm enough to stop Ang, there was a trace of coldness in his eyes.


    He had already taken to viewing Song Shu as his daughter and as a man, how could he not recognize the look on the little boy''s face?


    But was someone like this worthy of his daughter?


    Still, he knew that this boy had a special status since he could tell who the old man who came into the store after the little boy was. This was a man who hadpletely hid himself from the crowd.


    He would have been able to hide himself from Lin Fan as well, but Lin Fan was now familiar with the method he used to sneak around, so it was much easier for him to notice him.


    It was his acquaintance, Qiang You from the Seekers Union.


    After a while, the boy finally worked up the courage to move over to Song Shu, but after he approached, he found that he didn''t know what to do.


    He awkwardly stood near her, pretending to look over the items she had just stocked, while taking a few peeks at her from time to time.


    During this time, Qiang You had already moved over to the counter and stood there with Lin Fan and Ang.


    Lin Fan''s voice was calm as he spoke, but there was a cold look in his eyes as he asked, "President Qiang, would you please exin what this situation is?"


    Qiang You revealed an awkward smile as he said, "Well, this is my grandson, Qiang Ben. I told him about your store and how the pets that we''ve been buying havee from your store, so he was curious and snuck out. I couldn''t just leave him alone, now could I?"


    Lin Fan didn''t reply as he asked, "That isn''t what I asked, is it?"


    Qiang You''s smile filled with a bit of teasing as he said, "Well, isn''t it clear what''s happening? Then again, the little girl in your store is quite a beauty, so it isn''t strange at all, don''t you think?"


    Despite the fact that Qiang You looked like a gruff old man, he was actually quite the doting parent and grandparent. He was someone who definitely spoiled his offsprings.


    Not to mention that it seemed like his grandson was quite smitten with Song Shu, so he fully supported this idea.


    Furthermore, taking in his position as the president of the Seekers Union, this would only benefit him. If his grandson could marry this little girl who was not only a part of Lin Fan''s store, who he could also tell was someone important to Lin Fan, someone he even treated like a daughter, naturally they would be able to form a better rtionship.


    Since there were only benefits to this for him, what reason did he have to oppose this?


    But of course he could also see the cold look on Lin Fan''s face.


    Still as a doting grandparent, he waspletely confident in the abilities of his grandson in wooing this girl.


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort in response to this, but he didn''t say anything.


    In his mind though, he was thinking, "You want to get together with my daughter? In your dreams. You''ll never be worthy of her!"


    But he didn''t say a thing since he believed in Song Shu''s tastes.


    Eventually, Song Shu noticed that there was something strange about this boy who seemed to keep hanging around her, so she turned to him and said with a smile, "Um, can I help you with anything?"


    Qiang Ben waspletely taken aback because the moment he saw that smile, it was like being hit with the sun. He waspletely dazzled by the glow of her smile as he stuttered, "I, I, I¡­"


    <o>,m Song Shu didn''t say a thing and just kept smiling at him without knowing what effects she had on him, but seeing that he wasn''t going to say a thing, she didn''t n on continuing to waste time here.</o>


    Finally after a while, she said, "Um, if there''s nothing you need, then I''ll be getting back to work."


    Qiang Ben immediately panicked when he heard this and in his rush, he didn''t know what came over him as he suddenly shouted, "I, I love you, please go out with me!"

 275 Chapter 275

    In his haste, his voice came out much louder than he had intended.


    With how loud he had shouted his "confession", he had attracted the attention of almost everyone in the store.


    When everyone looked over at these two kids, they couldn''t help revealing smiles because every single one of them had had childhood romances like this before. Some were embarrassing and some were the best memories for them, but all of them could rte to this situation.


    Not to mention that these two kids really did make a cute scene, so they all waited for Song Shu''s response.


    But Song Shu''s response was one that had disappointed them,pletely crushing Qiang Ben''s heart.


    Without any hesitation at all, Song Shu said, "I''m sorry, I can''t ept this, you''re not my type."


    Qiang Ben''s love had been shut down before it could even bloom and he was left standing there with a stunned look on his face. But he didn''t let that get to him for long as he quickly recovered from his stupor.


    But since he was too immature and also too much in a panic, he couldn''t help raising his voice as it cracked a bit as he almost shouted, "Why?"


    Song Shu was surprisingly calmpared to how she had acted earlier as she said, "I just like another type of person. It''s not that there''s something wrong with you, but I just don''t like you. Plus, we just met each other, so I can''t really just say yes, can I?"


    Her words were very reasonable, but Qiang Ben was too worked up to listen to reason right now.


    Qiang Ben just said, "What kind of person do you like? I can be that kind of person."


    Song Shu couldn''t help taking a step back when she saw this and she said, "I''m sorry, but can you please calm down?"


    Qiang Ben was about to take a step forward, but then he felt someone''s hand suddenly fall on his shoulder.


    Qiang Ben quickly turned and wanted to shout at that person to go away, but then he saw that it was his grandfather Qiang You. He couldn''t help revealing an embarrassed smile as he slowly began calming down, realizing what he had just down.


    Actually, if Qiang You hadn''t stopped him in time, there would have been much worse consequences, so he couldn''t help wiping the sweat off his head. Especially after seeing the look on Ang''s face.


    Ang''s face was so cold that they could freeze a man solid and those eyes almost seemed like she wanted to tear Qiang Ben apart.


    Qiang Ben slowly calmed down and took a deep breath before saying, "I''m sorry, I got a little too excited. Can you forgive me?"


    Song Shu looked up at Qiang You and naturally she recognized him. She didn''t want to cause any problems for Lin Fan, so she said, "It''s alright." But she didn''t give him a single chance to say a thing as she moved behind the counter, where Lin Fan and Ang were standing.


    Qiang Ben wanted to follow her, but Qiang You didn''t let him.


    While he believed in his grandson''s abilities, he knew that he was also still immature as shown by how he had lost control just now. If he were to let him go over now, there was no telling what kind of punishment he would receive.


    Only after Qiang Ben had fully calmed down did Qiang You bring him over to the counter.


    Qiang You cupped his hands and said, "I''m sorry about that disy just now, Owner Lin, my grandson is still young, so it''s easy for him to lose control."


    Lin Fan naturally was still angry about what had happened, but he still nodded after giving a snort.


    Song Shu felt bad since she knew that this was partially her fault, so she came forward to say, "I''m sorry about any problems that I''ve caused, I didn''t mean it."


    Qiang Ben''s heart couldn''t help skipping a beat and then skipping another beat when he saw the sad look on her face. The urge to protect her surged inside of him as he said, "No, no, it''s not your fault, it was my fault for losing control."


    Song Shu looked up at him with a sad look and said, "Is that true?"


    Qiang Ben didn''t even hesitate as he said, "Of course, it''s all my fault."


    Qiang You couldn''t help shaking his head at this as he finally began doubting his grandson. Was he perhaps too immature?


    He had been rejected and now he was even apologizing to the person who had rejected him.


    He really couldn''t help feeling a bit ashamed when he saw this.


    p As for Qiang Ben, his eyes had never left Song Shu''s face. He had been staring at her in a daze the entire time.</anda>


    But it was only now that he chose to have sharper senses as he noticed that Song Shu''s eyes couldn''t help drifting over to Lin Fan beside her.<sub> </sub>


    When he saw the way she looked at him, he could immediately tell that this wasn''t a normal gaze. He couldn''t help feeling a bit of difort when he saw this and it felt like his chest was stuffed up.


    After a few seconds, there was something that clicked in his mind as he realized something¡­


    Qiang Ben couldn''t help immediately shouting out, "So it''s you! You''re the one that she likes!"


    Everyone turned over once again when they heard Qiang Ben shouting as they all knew that this kid was quite interesting.


    Qiang Ben didn''t waste any time as he came forward to the counter that was still too high for him and he pointed at Lin Fan as he shouted, "So you''re the one that took her from me! I won''t forgive you for this!"


    Lin Fan waspletely confused by Qiang Ben''s sudden outburst, but Song Shu''s face had turnedpletely red when she heard this.


    Song Shu quickly came forward with a bright red face as she waved her hands, "You''re wrong, you''re wrong, it''s not like that at all! I just admire Owner Lin, it''s not like that at all!"


    Everyone at first had thought that Qiang Ben''s words were that of a child who refused to give up, but now that they saw how strongly Song Shu reacted, they couldn''t stop the doubt from filling their minds.


    Could it be that the owner of the store really did like young girls?...


    Lin Fan had viewed Song Shu as a daughter, so naturally he didn''t see her in that manner. It also clouded his views of Song Shu''s reaction, which he thought was just her trying to help him, which warmed his heart.


    In truth, even Qiang You couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look because he could tell that Lin Fan was clearly too young to be this little girl''s father and he didn''t see any other adults around¡­


    Could it be that Owner Lin really was into that kind of stuff?


    Lin Fan looked around and he saw the way that everyone look at him¡­


    Why did everyone always think this?


    It had been this way when he had brought Song Shu back to the Mu Manor back in Green Wood City and now it was even this way in Rock Mountain City. Did he really look like he was into young girls?


    While Lin Fan wasining about the way others looked at him in his heart, Qiang Ben suddenly came forward to shout, "I challenge you! I want to duel you for...Um, miss, what was your name again?"


    Qiang Ben suddenly realized that he had made a mistake.


    He had been so taken by her that he hadn''t even asked her name yet!


    Song Shu was too busy to hear this as she had only heard the first part. She began looking back and forth between Lin Fan and Qiang Ben as her heart skipped a beat while filling with expectation. She was hoping that Lin Fan would really fight for her¡­


    Lin Fan just ignored Qiang Ben like the kid he was and turned to Qiang You with a helpless look, "President Qiang, can you please bring your grandson away. He is disturbing my business."


    It was only then that Qiang You was pulled back from his thoughts. There was a sh of a strange look in his eyes as he looked at Lin Fan, but that strange look quickly disappeared as he grabbed Qiang Ben by the back of the cor. He said with an apologetic smile, "Of course, of course. I''m very sorry about my grandson, Owner Lin. He''s still young, so he easily loses control of himself."


    Then he turned to look at Qiang Ben to re at him, but Qiang Ben didn''t see this at all as he continued to shout, "Duel! Duel! I want a duel for the fair maiden''s hand!"


    Qiang You could only shake his head when he saw this, but he didn''t stay here any longer as he pulled his grandson out of Lin Fan''s store.


    As he pulled Qiang Ben away, Qiang Ben continued to shout out at Lin Fan for his duel, but he waspletely ignored.


    Song Shu was still looking at Lin Fan, but now there was a tinge of disappointment in her heart.


    The customers that were still in the store looked at Lin Fan with various kinds of gazes.


    Lin Fan''s eyes swept over them and they all quickly turned away.


    To his side, Ang had somehow lost her cold demeanor and now had a faint smile on her lips. For some reason, she really enjoyed seeing Lin Fan flustered like this. It was almost...cute.


    After that disy from Qiang Ben, she hadpletely treated him as a child andpletely ignored his confession from before. But that didn''t mean that she would give up Song Shu that easily.


    This was just a small interlude in their days of peace.

 276 Chapter 276

    Now that several days had passed without the Jiang Family doing anything, it meant that Lin Fan could finally put the next step of his n in action.


    He knew that there could only be two reasons why the Jiang Family were passive.


    One, they were overwhelmed by the amount of pressure that Lin Fan had put on them and there was nothing they could do.


    Two, they were plotting something and that something was definitely going to be big.


    No matter what the reason was, Lin Fan knew exactly what his next move would be.


    He would be putting even more pressure on the Jiang Family by targeting their true main business.


    On the surface, the Jiang Family''s main business was quite diversified with a few businesses that were a bit darker, but there was actually much more under the surface. The Jiang Family had a business that was so dark that it wouldpletely destroy their reputation if it was ever revealed, but it made up for the majority of the funds and influence that they had.


    On the Blue Star, the itself was mainly ruled by humans and they were fully united by the threat of the beast invasion.


    For humans, what this meant was that they had arge amount of pride as a race and could not stand any human being beneath another.


    While they still epted things like murder and stealing because of the barbaric society, one thing that they didn''t ept was very.


    But that was also the hypocritical part of human society since not only did they allow beasts to be enved as pets, they also allowed the very of different minority races such as elves and dwarves. To them, as long as they didn''t belong to the same race, it didn''t matter.


    But of course, the humans seemed like this on the surface, but it was also not that simple under the surface.


    The main business of the Jiang Family was exactly this, they dealt in very.


    Human very.


    The Jiang Family had created a skewed society system in Rock Mountain City with arge disparity between the rich and poor. It had reached a point where people didn''t even find it strange if a beggar or two were to suddenly disappear from the streets. Everyone just assumed that they had died or moved on, but that was far from the truth.


    The Jiang Family was able to easily collect ves that way by capturing a few of the homeless once a week, before selling them to their clientele.


    Now this wasn''t actually that big of a secret since this was considered an open secret within the upper stratum of the Blue Star. The reason why they could get away with this was all because they had the influence of a Legendary Realm Family.


    In the end, this was a world that was ruled by the strong and there was nothing stronger than the Legendary Realm Family.


    Of course, they hadn''t always been doing this, starting just recently, but now they had made it their main business.


    But the main reason for the fact that everyone epted this was because most of their clients were actually nobles and royals which made up over 80% of the Union Government.


    There were also exceptions to this such as the Mu Family of Green Wood City and the Zhu Family of the Water Pearl City, but that didn''t mean that various nobles and royals in those cities weren''t customers of the Jiang Family.


    Lin Fan wasn''t a saint, so he didn''t want to destroy this business out of the kindness of his heart, but rather because it was what would allow his n to proceed. Of course, if it meant that he could save a few people, he definitely wasn''t against it.


    So after the store closed for the day, Lin Fan once again headed out.


    Ang offered toe, but surprisingly Lin Fan refused this and had her stay with Song Shu.


    He didn''t know why, but there was an uneasy feeling that was in his heart like something was about to go wrong.


    Still, he set off with that feeling in his heart.


    He met up with Jiang Zhi Shu and his elite subordinates and headed out of the city.


    The facility that the Jiang Family was using for this ve trade was found outside of the city.


    While it wasmonly epted by the upper stratum of the Blue Star that the Jiang Family could run their ve business, it still was "illegal". It was best for them if they didn''t do it out in the open, so outside the city was the best choice.


    It was found near a smaller mountain and there was an entire secret base under that mountain.


    The only reason Lin Fan had even been able to find this facility was because the informationwork that he had been trying to set up had actually been starting to take form.<sub> </sub>


    After he had destroyed the businesses of the Jiang Family, there were openings in Rock Mountain City which his informationwork easily took advantage of.


    This was a mountain that looked just like a normal mountain, but when Lin Fan spread his spiritual sense around, he could tell that this mountain was too heavily guarded for a normal mountain.


    All the guard posts had been hidden, either being inside of a hollow tree or inside of hollow rocks. In short, if no one knew what this ce was, they never would have suspected it for what it really was.


    Lin Fan took out a map of the surrounding area and carefully marked all the guard posts that he had found with his spiritual sense before sending off his subordinates to hit these guard posts.


    These subordinates were all elites that had followed Jiang Zhi Shu through many battles, so naturally they were more than skilled enough to find these guard posts and secretly make their way in to incapacitate all the guards. Of course, they didn''t take out all the guards, leaving just a few to hold hostage and check in with the mainmand when asked to check in.


    Just like this, they went around the entire mountain and destroyed all the guard posts around it, creating a so that no one would be able to escape tonight.


    They left several of their members outside in the guard posts to watch out before making their way to the entrance of the mountain.


    When they arrived, they could see two guards standing by an elevator inside this cave.


    Jiang Zhi Shu leaned in towards Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, what should we do here? Do we just go right in and take them all out?"


    Lin Fan knit his brows as he looked at the guards before saying, "Wait, something''s not right."


    Jiang Zhi Shu also knit his brows as he asked, "Not right? What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan was in thought for a bit before saying, "These guards seem like they''re too nervous. It seems like something is happening here tonight."


    Jiang Zhi Shu knit his brows even tighter when he heard this, "Something is happening? Should we abandon this mission then?"


    <o>,m Lin Fan hesitated a bit before saying, "No, let''s watch for now. We have control of the situation outside, so there''s nothing to worry about if we spend a bit of time here."</o>


    Jiang Zhi Shu seemed like he wanted to say something, but seeing that Lin Fan had made up his mind, he swallowed his words and moved back up against the wall.


    They were already used to this, so all the subordinates pressed themselves against the wall as Lin Fan released his shadoww to cover them up.


    While this shadoww wasn''t apletew, it was still much stronger than when Lin Fan had been in the Sacred Rock Realm. Lin Fan had been taking time each day to head to Snow Wind City and suck a bit of Yin''sws for himself.


    Now as long as no one looked at them too closely or if they weren''t in the Legendary Ream, it would be hard to find Lin Fan''s group. To be honest, how likely was it that a Legendary Realm Expert would be passing by here?


    Lin Fan didn''t want to wait long and as fate had it, he didn''t need to wait long for something to happen.


    Ten minutes after they began waiting, there was another group that had suddenlye into the cave.


    This group wasn''t that big and they were heavily cloaked, but Lin Fan felt that there was something familiar about the leader of this group.


    The leader of the cloaked group came up to the elevator and asked the guards, "Has there been any reports?"


    The guard on the right said, "Elder, we haven''t heard anything yet, but we will be sure to maintain our guard."


    The leader of the cloak group nodded before saying in a cold voice, "Remember, this is very important to the family. If you make a single mistake, it will be your head!"


    The two guards immediately lowered their heads to bow as they shouted, "Yes, elder!"


    The cloaked group ignored this and headed to the elevator which the guards opened with their keycards.


    When they went into the elevator, they turned around and suddenly took off their cloaks.


    Lin Fan didn''t recognize the rest of the party, but he definitely recognized the leader.


    It was Jiang Hei, the fourth elder of the Jiang Family!

 277 Chapter 277

    Lin Fan had a cold smile on his face as he watched Jiang Hei''s group head down in the elevator.


    It almost seemed like everything wasing back full circle.


    He wasn''t able to kill him back at the store, but now there was no reason not to kill him.


    Not to mention, if an elder of the Jiang Family were to die, that would definitely be quite disastrous for them.


    As Lin Fan had be stronger, he had slowly developed the pride of an expert and he had never forgotten the way Jiang Hei had treated him back at the shop.


    His main mission was still to destroy this ve trade base, but since Jiang Hei was offering himself, why wouldn''t he take this bait?


    But that was also a strange thing.


    Even if the fourth elder was clearly ipetent, he was still one of the few elders of the Jiang Family. Why would he suddenly appear here for no reason?


    That was unless there was something happening in the Jiang Family.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that unsettled feeling once again.


    After waiting a few minutes, they headed out. It was easy to take care of the guards at the elevator, but the hard part was how to get down.


    Finally, Lin Fan used the same shadowws once again to hide them in the elevator since there was the chance of there being guards at the bottom as well.


    And as expected, his intuition was correct. There were a pair of guards right at the bottom of the elevator just like up top. However, since Lin Fan was prepared, the moment the elevator opened, the guards were confused as they looked in to see no one, but they soon met an invisible fist that knocked them out.


    Not only had they knocked out the guards at the elevator, they had also taken their uniforms and had some of his subordinates change into them. After all, these were only low level guards, it wasn''t like anyone would remember their faces.


    They walked out of the tunnel that the elevator was in and there was another pair of guards standing there, but this time, these guards weren''t knocked out.


    The guards outside the tunnel just looked at these four guards before going back to their own duties.


    These guards tried to interact with each other as little as possible since they did work for a ve trade base. This was something that most of these guards had reservations about since this business was about buying and selling their own race. Of course, they had no choice in this matter since this was a business that paid well and they all had families to take care of. The only thing they could do was separate this business from their lives as much as possible.


    For now, while Lin Fan had information on this base, he didn''t actually have any information on the interior since this was a heavily guarded facility for the Jiang Family. So for now, what he had the four subordinates do was spread out to case out the ce while he moved around with the main group by himself.


    What they needed to know the most was how many troops were actually stationed in this ve trade base.


    Lin Fan was going to destroy this ce, but rushing in without a n was never a good idea. Not to mention that there was something strange that even required an elder


    If there was a need, he could have Brainy contact them with the mice puppets that he had ced on them.


    So just like that, they began moving through the base.


    Lin Fan''s group had to move slowly since they were hiding themselves with the shadoww, but that didn''t matter since there was plenty of information all around them.


    The main hallway was well chiseled, clearly having a lot of work being put into it to make it look as good as it did, but that was where it ended. There were various different doors along this hallway and behind those doors was plenty of damning evidence.


    There was a room filled with cages behind each one and the state of these rooms were abysmal. Each cage only had a bit of straw on the ground and bowls filled with food that seemed to be rotten. The most important thing was that each of these cages contained one person who was covered in rags, lying on the ground without any energy.


    These people varied in terms of age and gender, going from kids that were only a few years old to old people who were clearly about to keel over.


    The only people that were missing were young and beautiful girls, as well as healthy kids¡­


    It wasn''t hard to imagine why those groups would be missing.


    But to not even let off kids¡­


    The people of this world had this kind of preference as shown by before when people had thought that Lin Fan had brought Song Shu home for "that".


    Lin Fan was of course no saint and he definitely wasn''t strong enough to control this entire world, so there was nothing he could do to stop this. That was unless it happened right in front of his face.


    But that was just how this world was, there were plenty of things that Lin Fan couldn''t control right now.


    But even if he didn''t do anything, that didn''t mean that he wasn''t against it.<sub> </sub>


    Not even sparing kids, the Jiang Family really did touch a bottom line for him.


    Thinking of this, Lin Fan turned to look at Jiang Zhi Shu and his eyes were a bit cold this time.


    Jiang Zhi Shu had the same shocked look as his men. He was a smart person, so he could clearly draw the same inferences as Lin Fan just by observing the situation in the cage. He could also feel Lin Fan''s gaze at him and he quickly said, "Boss, I really didn''t know about any of this. When I saw the report, I was just as shocked as you."


    Lin Fan then said, "Who is in charge of this then?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu just shook his head with a deste look, "I really don''t know. If I did, I definitely would have stopped it."


    Lin Fan looked around again and said in a doubtful voice, "Something like this couldn''t have been finished in just a single day, you and I both know that."


    Jiang Zhi Shu of course could hear the implication in his voice, so he said with a serious look, "Boss, I swear on my name that I definitely didn''t know a thing about this."


    Lin Fan looked at him for a bit longer before finally giving a nod.


    It was at this time that Brainy suddenly spoke to Lin Fan.


    "Master, one of my puppets is responding. It seems like one of them has found something."


    Lin Fan immediately said in his mind, "Where?"


    Brainy quickly led Lin Fan through the base based on its spiritual sense and soon they arrived at where the subordinate was waiting.


    Lin Fan tapped the subordinate on the shoulder who immediately tensed up, but then the subordinate realized what had happened.


    The subordinate immediately stood as naturally as he could, but he was also whispering to himself which seemed unnatural.


    The subordinate said, "Boss, I saw the cloaked figures from the elevator go into that room over there."


    Lin Fan nodded before having the rest of his subordinates wait by the wall with the subordinate in uniform. After enveloping them with shadowws, Lin Fan headed off towards the room.


    The door wasn''t even closed, which showed just how confident they were in their own territory. They never would have suspected that a spy would have been able toe in here this easily.


    The fourth elder Jiang Hei and his men were gathered around a table with cards and liquor in front of them. By the way they were acting, it didn''t seem like they were in a ve trade base, it almost seemed like they were just having a friendly poker night.


    But the contents of their discussion was far from friendly.


    When Lin Fan had juste into the room, the fourth elder Jiang Hei suddenly said, "Jiang Zhi Shu."


    Lin Fan was shocked when he heard this, he almost thought that they had been discovered, but then Jiang Hei continued.


    "They think that it was Jiang Zhi Shu who led the attacks on our businesses."


    One of his followers said, "But elder, how could Jiang Zhi Shu beat Jiang Feng? He was expelled from the family long ago and without the resources of the family, how could he reach the point where he could fight Jiang Feng?"


    Jiang Hei shook his head, "I don''t know, but I don''t even think that it''s Jiang Zhi Shu."


    The follower asked, "Elder, who do you think it is?"


    Jiang Hei slightly knit his brows and said, "It''s clearly that Seekers Guild causing trouble and making it seem like it''s an internal struggle. It''s clear that they want to weaken our family to be the strongest family in the city."


    The follower immediately cupped his hands and said, "Elder, I bow in awe of your wisdom."


    Jiang Hei gave a little self centeredugh before saying, "It doesn''t matter, we''ll be teaching them a lesson tonight. Do you remember that trash shop I told you about?"


    One of Jiang Hei''s slower followers said, "Does elder mean the shop where you¡­"


    But the first follower immediately pped his hand over the slower follower''s mouth and said, "Of course, elder."


    Jiang Hei was so proud of himself that he didn''t notice this and continued, "Well, we''re teaching them a lesson tonight."


    At this, Lin Fan immediately knit his brows.

 278 Chapter 278

    Jiang Hei maintained his proud look for a few seconds before he continued speaking.


    In a very conceited voice, Jiang Hei said, "The special squad is heading out to capture the little girl from that shop and hold her hostage. She can only me herself for working at that store. Not to mention that I''ve heard that the Seekers Union''s Qiang You''s grandson has also fallen in love with her. She''s perfect to use as a hostage to take care of both of them."


    Lin Fan''s brows knit even deeper when he heard this.


    He clearly knew who the "little girl" they were talking about was and the fact that they were targeting Song Shu meant that he had already condemned the fourth elder Jiang Hei to death in his mind.


    However, even though he knew their n, he wasn''t worried at all since there was already the perfect guard with Song Shu. He even felt a bit sorry for the people who were sent to kidnap her.


    But even if he did feel sorry for them, he still had no mercy for them since they deserved the death that wasing to them.


    As for the fourth elder Jiang Hei, Lin Fan forcefully calmed himself since there was still more to be done right now. What was most important was discovering what kind of n they had and what exactly the fourth elder was doing here.


    After a while ofughing and praising the fourth elder, the slower follower couldn''t help asking, "But that doesn''t exin what we''re doing here still."


    This time Jiang Hei didn''t miss this, but he didn''t mind it since he also had his own opinion on this matter.


    Jiang Hei gave a snort when he heard this and said, "It''s that brat Qi Tai, he was the one who sent me here. He said something about protecting the base in case someone would attack, but who would be able to attack this base? Most people don''t even know where it is."


    Jiang Hei didn''t give the followers any chance to say anything as he continued, "That brat Qi Tai, he really is going too far. He acts like he already owns the Jiang Family with the way he''s acting, but he''s nothing more than an ignorant junior!"


    The first follower immediately echoed him, but the slower follower couldn''t help saying, "But isn''t he the most talented younger generation? It''s quite clear that he''ll be the next family head, so isn''t it a good idea to start following him now?"


    Jiang Hei''s face turned dark the moment he heard this and he roared out, "You traitor! When did you go to that brat Qi Tia''s side! Do you even have any conscience left in you!"


    The first follower quickly pushed the slow follower''s head down, but Jiang Hei didn''t stop there, "You really think that brat Qi Tai is special? You just wait, the second elder already has a n to take him down!"


    All the followers looked nervous when they heard this and quickly looked around them before letting out sighs of relief after seeing that no one had overheard them. After that, they began paying even more attention to what Jiang Hei was saying since this was actually something quite important.


    Even Lin Fan couldn''t help paying more attention because this was something that he had been trying to get information on the entire time.


    He knew that there was a split in the Jiang Family, but he had never received information on which elders were on which side.


    Jiang Hei had actually drank a bit too much since he was angry and he nned on letting himself go, so his face was a bit red. Otherwise, he would never reveal such important information as easily as this.


    Jiang Hei still had the awareness to lower his voice a bit, but his voice was still quite loud as he said, "In just a few days, the family head is nning on making an important announcement and that is when the second elder is nning to strike. In just a few days, the second elder will take over the Jiang Family and that brat Qi Tai will be nothing. We''ve even convinced all the other four elders to work with us this time, so there''s no chance for the family head''s branch at all."


    Lin Fan slightly knit his brows when he heard this.


    He already had some general information on the Jiang Family, knowing that there were only a total of six elders along with the family head''s branch in the main family. If the second elder and the fourth elder were nning to work with four different elders, that would mean that all the elder branches were nning to go against the family head branch. This wasn''t just a normal dispute, this a full coup!


    It was also at this moment that Jiang Hei finally realized that he had said too much.


    Jiang Hei took another swig of alcohol from the cup in front of him before taking a deep breath. He turned back to his cards and said, "Who''s turn is it now?"


    The followers were still trying to digest the information that they had just heard, it was only the first follower who was still able to react.


    The slower follower wanted to ask another question, but the first follower immediately pped his hand over his mouth without hesitation.


    It was clear that he had already expected the slower follower to say these things, but he had also been using him to probe Jiang Hei. Of course, none of this had escaped Lin Fan''s eyes.<sub> </sub>


    Clearly this follower was quite perceptive and maniptive. He should either be the spy of one of the other elders or even the family head, or he would be someone who was filled with ambition.


    But none of that mattered right now since Lin Fan had condemned all of them to death in his mind already.


    What mattered now was why the fourth elder was dispatched to this ce.


    What was so special about this ve trade base that even an elder was dispatched to protect it?


    But it was clear that Lin Fan wasn''t going to get any more information from them since they had already gone back to their card game. Even after waiting for several minutes, there wasn''t a single piece of useful information that was spoken.


    Lin Fan was contemting what would be his next move, but then he received another message from Brainy in his mind.


    This time, there was another subordinate that had found something else.


    Lin Fan after thinking about it, decided to leave one of Brainy''s special scouts here to watch over Jiang Hei. This was one of Brainy''s most special puppets.


    The other scout puppets were only able to send back simple signals and images, but this Echo Mouse was one that could record entire conversations. It had the special ability to record sound waves and y it back. Then with Brainy''s special parasite seed creating a connection, Brainy could even hear the conversation directly through the spiritual sense connection, which made it a portable wiretap.


    Lin Fan put the shadoww cover over this Echo Mouse and Jiang Zhi Shu''s group outside before following Brainy through the halls of the base again.


    It took less than five minutes to arrive where this other subordinate was.


    This subordinate was standing by a door that was surrounded by a dark energy, looking quite eerie. When Lin Fan tapped him on his shoulder, this subordinate almost pulled out his sword and swung before he reacted to what had happened.


    Only after Lin Fan released his shadoww did that subordinate calm down.


    But that was also strange since Lin Fan could only do it in a ce that had no one around. It was clear that there was something special behind this door, so why were there no guards at all?


    The subordinate was about to exin his findings, but Lin Fan just waved his hand and had him stand guard outside.


    He could tell from the energy that wasing out from the room that this room just might be the answer that he was looking for.


    The one thing that Lin Fan had to criticize about this base was that security was considered quitex. None of the doors had been locked, other than the doors to the ve cages. He had been able to easily move through this base unhindered, which really made him question the Jiang Family.


    But this was also the pride of the Jiang Family. They didn''t think that anyone would ever find this ce, not to mentioning in and sneaking around, so they had never bothered locking anything.


    When Lin Fan came into the room, the first thing he saw was the structure right in the center of the room.


    This was a fountain that could be found in any garden and there weren''t any special decorations with it. The only thing that did stand out was the ck crystal that was floating above the fountain.


    Lin Fan curiously came over and looked into the fountain, finding that it waspletely filled with a ck liquid that was as dark as the ckest night. Lin Fan couldn''t even see the bottom of this pool with how ck the liquid was.


    And as he hade closer, he could tell that the crystal was the same colour of ck as the pool of liquid.


    But then he noticed something strange. There were wisps of ck energy that came from around the fountain that gathered in the crystal.


    It was only at this moment that he looked down around the fountain, finding ten children perfectly spread at equal distances in a circle around the fountain.

 279 Chapter 279

    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows when he saw this.


    Looking closely at these children, he found that they were of equal gender, five boys and five girls creating a circle. They were ced by opposite genders, going boy, girl, boy, girl, and so on.


    And the strangest thing was that each child waspletely naked and all over their bodies were ck veins that seemed to be pulsating. In those ck veins, there seemed to be the ck energy that was being gathered in the crystal flowing through them.


    The ck veins created a like pattern thatpletely spread all over their bodies, but there was onemon thing about them. All of the ck veins seemed to have gathered at a ck diamond on their forehead. It was from that ck diamond that the ck energy gathered in the crystal was being released.


    Lin Fan looked even closer and found that while they had a peaceful smile on their face like they were all dreaming, their skin was incredibly pale, without a single drop of blood. It was almost like they had no energy at all.


    Lin Fan was about to move one of the children when Brainy''s voice suddenly rang in his mind.


    "Master, don''t touch them!"


    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows even deeper as he asked, "Why?"


    Brainy hesitated a bit before saying, "If I''m not mistaken, the lines that are on them should be a kind of array that is draining away their vitality. All that vitality is gathered and collected inside the crystal. As for why it''s being drained, I''m not certain¡­"


    Brainy had also slithered out of Lin Fan''s sleeve at this time to move closer to the children on the ground. It wanted to have a closer look at the lines of this formation.


    As for Lin Fan, what drew his attention more was the crystal that was floating above the waters of the fountain.


    At first he didn''t know what this crystal was, but as he looked at it more closely, it almost felt like there was some kind of strange bond that he had with this crystal. He didn''t know why, but Lin Fan couldn''t help reaching his hand towards the crystal.


    But right when he was about to touch it, there was a voice that suddenly sounded in his mind, "Not yet, it''s too early for you to be here. Turn back now ande back when you reach the Legendary Realm."


    Lin Fan immediately looked around the room, but he found that there was no one else that hade in during this time. After looking around one more time, Lin Fan asked Brainy, "Did you hear that just now?"


    Brainy had been focused on studying the array on the kids, but when it heard Lin Fan talking to it, it suddenly looked up at Lin Fan with a surprised look, "Master, what do you mean? Hear what?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking even more confused as he said, "That voice just now. It spoke quite clearly, how did you miss it?"


    Brainy suddenly looked worried, "Master, are you alright? There was no voice just now."


    Lin Fan paused for a second, but then he said, "It was probably my mistake then, you go back to doing what you were doing."


    Brainy gave Lin Fan another worried look before turning back to the kids.


    Lin Fan had dropped this topic because he had suddenly realized something important. This was a voice that he had heard before, a voice that had left a deep impression on him.


    This was the voice of the strange girl he had met in that mirror world!


    But it didn''t sound as young as that voice, it sounded more mature, like what it would sound like if the girl had grown up. Still, there was no doubt that it was the same voice.


    Why did Lin Fan suddenly hear this voice?


    The most important thing was that it was telling him to reach the Legendary Realm, just like that girl had done in that mirror world.


    Was it just a coincidence or did it actually mean something?


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a few minutes, but then he threw this to the back of his mind. Right now he didn''t have time to think this over, what was more important was to take care of this array that was on these kids.


    Lin Fan moved over to where Brainy was and together, they began trying to decipher the array, looking for a way to break it.


    ¡­


    Moving away from the ve trade base for a bit, this is the story about something else that was happening at the same time.


    Qiang You was rushing through the streets of Rock Mountain City in the middle of the night, heading towards Lin Fan''s residence.


    As the president of Rock Mountain City''s Seekers Union, it naturally wasn''t hard for him to find this address, but there was a different reason why he was heading there today. He had suddenly lost contact with the lookouts that he had ced around Lin Fan''s residence.


    Lin Fan was now one of the most important cooperators of the Seekers Union, so it was natural to put protection around him. However, if he as the Seekers Union president could find out where Lin Fan lived, naturally the strongest force in the city, the Jiang Family would be able to do the same.


    After what had happened with the fourth elder Jiang Heist time, Qiang You knew that this matter wasn''t over. He had even made sure to increase the security around Lin Fan by sending some of his best subordinates on lookout duty.


    The only reason why he would lose contact with them now could only be the Jiang Family finally making their move.<sub> </sub>


    Qiang You was rushing over now in hopes that he would be able to save Lin Fan, but naturally he wasn''t alone. Since the Jiang Family wasmitting to this, he had also brought his strongest subordinates with him.


    Tonight might be the night where they finally fought it out with the Jiang Family. He just hoped that Lin Fan would be able to hold on until he arrived.


    After a few more minutes, Qiang You finally arrived at the street Lin Fan lived on.


    When he arrived, the street itself was just too quiet.


    There was no one in the road and all the windows of the surrounding buildings were tightly shut and locked.


    But none of this was surprising to Qiang You.


    Since the Jiang Family wasmitting to this, naturally they wouldn''t want more witnessesing to this street since that would mean more trouble to handle. They would have definitely made sure to blockade this area.


    As for Qiang You, he had been rushing here and traveling across the roof, so he naturally didn''t see any of that.


    Then there were the people who had tightly shut all their windows, they had done so because the best policy in Rock Mountain City was not to get involved.


    They could naturally tell that something was happening outside, but there was nothing good about getting involved.


    As soon as he arrived, Qiang You immediately put up his guard since he knew that there were enemies in front of him, so he couldn''t just rush in. He slowly moved towards Lin Fan''s residence, but what he saw there shocked him.


    When he came close to the residence, he saw a few dark bundles that were on the ground. Looking closely at those dark bundles, he realized that these were corpses!


    ? Qiang You couldn''t believe this and he even took the time to carefully look over one of these. This was a person that Jiang You was familiar with, it was a member of the Jiang Family''s shadow squad and one of the group leaders.


    The Jiang Family shadow squad were the Jiang Family''s professional hit force and all of them were at least in the Gold Realm. The group leaders were even higher up, one had to be at least in the tinum Realm to be a group leader.


    Looking over these corpses, Qiang You recognized all of them as group leaders.


    That meant that someone had just ughtered several tinum Realm Experts like it was nothing!


    Low tinum Realm Experts weren''t that rare, but they were still experts that would be considered at the top of the Blue Star.


    Qiang You couldn''t imagine what kind of person could kill these group leaders so easily. Even if he was surrounded by them, it would be hard for him to take care of them alone.


    Qiang You slowly made his way over to Lin Fan''s residence where he found a single figure standing among corpses. This was a figure that he was familiar with, it was the girl from Lin Fan''s shop!


    It wasn''t the young girl who his grandson had confessed to, it was the girl that had always followed behind Lin Fan without saying anything.


    When he slowly approached, the girl suddenly looked over at him with ice cold eyes and he felt the aura of death fall over him. Even with his peak tinum Realm cultivation, he knew that he would die with a single move.


    Qiang You immediately raised his hands and said, "It''s me, Qiang You, the president of the Seekers Union!"


    The girl tilted her head to look at him before suddenly raising her hand to throw out a de of wind.


    Qiang You could feel the power that came from this de of wind, it far surpassed just the tinum Realm!


    He wanted to do something, anything just to keep his life, but all he could do was raise his arms in front of him.


    But when he thought that he was dead, he realized that the de of wind wasn''t even aimed at him.


    The de of wind flew right past Qiang You and continued forth, shing a cloaked figure that had been running away from the scene.


    Qiang You''s legs gave out under him and he turned in shock to look at that figure. He could tell from the way the figure was dressed that this person was also a part of the Jiang Family''s shadow squad and from the life energy dissipating from him, he was also in the tinum Realm.


    Qiang You turned back to look at the girl, but she had already moved back into the residence. The moment she opened the door, she suddenly revealed a faint smile, transforming her into apletely different person.


    She had just gone from the messenger of death standing there to what seemed to be an angel.


    It took a long time for Qiang You toe back to his senses, but he now firmly believed in his decision.


    He knew that he could never offend Lin Fan''s store or it might be him who would lose his life next.

 280 Chapter 280

    When Qiang You''s subordinates finally arrived, they were also shocked by the scene in front of them.


    They quickly came over to Qiang You to help him up, but he waved his hand and got up himself. After dusting off the dirt on him, he immediately gave the order for them to scatter.


    He didn''t bother cleaning up the corpses since he knew that the Jiang Family would be sending their people to clean up soon.


    After all, this was a huge disaster for them. With how many of the group leaders from their shadow squad had been killed, this had basically destroyed their shadow squad.


    The shadow squad had been a very sharp tool for the Jiang Family and this loss would definitely hurt them.


    There were many things that Qiang You had to prepare for now that this had happened.


    But outside the city, someone waspletely unaware of what had happened.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan and Brainy worked together to study the array, but there wasn''t a single thing that they could figure out.


    Even with Brainy''s intelligence, it just couldn''t decode the array at all.


    The patterns drawn on the kids seemed to connect, but once Brainy reached the pattern on the third child, it was like the array lines suddenly changed. It was like there were two different arrays between them, but somehow they were working in tandem to create a stronger effect.


    If this was a case of two different arraysing together to form a single array, that would be much easier since there was at least somemon aspect between these two arrays that allowed them to do so. However, if this was two different arrays that were working in tandem, but were still different arrays, that would be much harder since these two arrays would have nothing inmon and that meant that Brainy would have to crack two different arrays.


    But it didn''t stop there since Brainy soon found another problem.


    There was a third array, a fourth array, and a fifth array.


    On each of two of these kids, a boy and girl pair, there was another different array.


    And to make matters even worse, these arrays were clearly all different, but they were working in tandem. This meant that Brainy would have to crack five different arrays if it wanted to stop the draining of vitality from these kids.


    Brainy was actually quite stubborn in this and didn''t like giving up early, but that did make sense since even with how smart Brainy was, it was actually quite young still. In terms of human years, Brainy was actually even younger than Song Shu, even though it acted quite mature.


    But before Brainy could dive head first into this, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Stop, there''s no time for this."


    Brainy looked up at Lin Fan with an unwilling look since it didn''t want to give up that easily and it said, "Master, just a little more time. I can solve this if I just have a little bit more time."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "No, there''s more important things to do now and we don''t have the time at this moment. We''ll take care of it as soon as we take care of this base, alright?"


    Brainy hesitated a bit as it looked at Lin Fan with an unwilling look, but finally it gave up after seeing Lin Fan''s firm gaze.


    Brainy was dejected as it slithered back into Lin Fan''s sleeve.


    But Brainy still told Lin Fan about everything it had learned from the scouts that had followed the other two subordinates in the guard uniform.


    Just from the uniformed subordinates wandering the base, Brainy had basically figured out theyout of the base, as well as where most of the forces were distributed.


    For this ve trade base, secrecy was one of the most important things, so the guards that worked here were only swapped out once a month. Most of the times, the guards slept in a special residential area that was inside this ve trade base. On the plus side, they did only have to work a month before getting the next month off, but that did mean they had to engage in this kind of disgusting trade.


    But since it was also night time, most of the guards were currently resting in the residential area.


    This was part of the arrogance of the Jiang Family, they never expected anyone to attack to base, much less find it, so they were quite ck with their guards during the night.


    In the normal morning, they had full guard shifts, but at night, most of the guards went to rest and they operated with half the normal amount of guards.


    This was a good thing for Lin Fan since all the guards were gathered in the same ce.


    They were all people that were involved in this ve trade, so Lin Fan had already condemned them to death.<sub> </sub>


    So Lin Fan gathered his subordinates who he had left outside the room that Jiang Hei was in to watch over them and brought them all to the residential area.


    During the time that Lin Fan was gone, there had been nothing useful that was said by Jiang Hei''s group. The only thing to note was that they were slowly getting more and more drunk, which should make the following battle much easier.


    They all moved to where the guards were residing and Lin Fan created a barrier with his spatialws. The barrier of spatialwspletely locked in everything of the residential area, including all sound.


    Just like that, Lin Fan''s group went in and went on a rampage, ughtering all the guards that were inside. Most of them were still asleep when they died, not even knowing how they died.


    This was just the first step of Lin Fan''s n.


    The second part was something that was much more troublesome.


    ¡­


    Jiang Hei''s group was still in the middle of their card game when a guard suddenly ran in.


    Jiang Hei turned over to look at the guard and seeing how panicked he was, he immediately knit his brows to ask, "What''s going on? Didn''t I tell you not to disturb me unless it was an emergency?"


    The guard was panting as he tried to speak, but he quickly caught his breath and said, "Fourth elder, this is a big problem, it''s the biggest problem we''ve ever faced!"


    Jiang Hei''s brows knit even deeper as he said, "Well, spit it out then! Tell me what happened!"


    The guard''s face looked very ugly as he said, "I don''t know how, but the ves have escaped."


    Jiang Hei and his followers all revealed shocked looks before Jiang Hei said, "Escaped, what do you mean escaped?"


    The guard hesitated for a bit and when Jiang Hei saw this, he almost flew out of his chair as he roared, "Speak up now!"


    The guard immediately gave a bow and said in a stuttering voice, "We...we don''t know what happened, but...the ves somehow managed to break out of their cages and kill the guards that were outside their cages. Now there''s arge group of them being led by the high ss product that''s trying to escape."


    Jiang Hei immediately said, "High ss product? You mean the one that we captured for the Sikong Family?"


    The guard immediately said, "Yes¡­"


    The high ss product was a very special ve that had been very hard for the Jiang Family to find.


    This high ss product was naturally a very powerful ve that the Sikong Family had specially requested. This high ss product was actually a Gold Realm Expert of the bingo book that had been captured alive.


    They were supposed to put the binding ve cor engraved with the obedience array on this ve tomorrow, but now it seemed to havee back to bite them in the butt.


    Jiang Hei had been a bit tipsy, but the moment he heard about the high ss product, that tipsy feelingpletely disappeared.


    Jiang Hei knit his brows in thought for a few seconds as everyone waited for his orders. After thinking for a bit, Jiang Hei said, "Tu, go and take care of that special product. I don''t care what you have to do, but capture him alive. The Sikong Family is one of our biggest clients and we can''t lose them now. As for the rest of you, go and round up the ves immediately."


    The "Tu" that Jiang Hei mentioned was the first follower who had been controlling the conversation the entire time.


    Jiang Hei didn''t have any problem leaving this mess to his followers because all his followers were Gold Realm Experts. It would be no problem for them to take care of this ve riot.


    The only reason he wasn''t going was that this all seemed like it was too coincidental. There must be someone nning all of this and if that were the case, it would be best for him to stay here if something else happened.


    The followers all cupped their hands and bowed to Jiang Hei as they said, "Yes, fourth elder."


    Then after that, all of them headed out with the guard who led them to where the ve riot was. All that was left in this room was Jiang Hei.


    Now that this room was empty and silent, Jiang Hei sat down once again to think as he poured himself a cup of wine, but what he didn''t notice was that there was actually someone else in the room with him.


    When he did notice it, it was already toote.

 281 Chapter 281

    After pouring himself a cup of wine, Jiang Hei was about to down all of it when he suddenly felt a burst of life energye from behind him.


    As a tinum Realm Expert, Jiang Hei naturally had good reactions and he immediately ducked forward, but he was still toote.


    The dagger that had suddenly appeared went right past his cheek and created a long gash along it before flying forward to embed itself in the wall in front of him.


    Jiang Hei immediately turned around, but he didn''t see anything there. Still that didn''t mean that he let his guard down.


    Jiang Hei immediately released all of his life energy around him as he roared out, "Who is it? Do you not have the courage to face me head to head?"


    There was a coldugh that rang out, but there was nothing else that followed it.


    Jiang Hei was still fully on guard, but there was nothing that he could guard against.


    It was only then that Jiang Hei remembered the dagger that had embedded itself in the wall, but the moment he turned to the dagger, he found that it was already gone.


    Without any hesitation at all Jiang Hei gathered his life energy in his palm and sent out an attack in the direction of the hole where the dagger had been, but still there was nothing for him to hit.


    It was during this time that the white dagger had appeared once more,ing from behind him, aimed right at his head. However, Jiang Hei didn''t panic at all since this was all part of his n.


    In one smooth motion, he continued forward with the palm thrust and suddenly fell down along with it. His palmnded right on the ground and with a flip, the heel of his right foot came up, kicking at where the dagger hade from.


    Jiang Hei knew that staying in the same ce waiting would only be bad for him, so instead of waiting, he decided to use an attack to bait in his attacker. It had worked perfectly, or so he had thought until his foot was caught in the hand of his attacker.


    The only good thing for Jiang Hei in this situation was that his attacker didn''t have a weapon since it had just been thrown out and had gone into the wall in front of him, but when he turned to look, he saw that there was the same white dagger in the hand of his now visible attacker.


    Jiang Hei didn''t hesitate at all to pull out his own weapon to meet the dagger that would certainly being his way.


    The dagger dide out, but it was much stronger than Jiang Hei had even expected.


    He had gathered all his life energy inside the peak tinum Realm Aegis Sword that he had pulled out, but even then, he still couldn''t guard against it.


    The Aegis Sword wasn''tpletely destroyed by the white dagger that was covered in two different glows, but there were cracks that spread all over the Aegis Sword like a web. It was clear that this peak tinum Realm Artifact had been crippled and it was very unlikely that it would ever be repaired.


    But for that to even happen Jiang Hei would have to escape with his life first.


    Jiang Hei was sent flying, mming right into the wall before spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    That attack just now had been too strong, even with his trump card artifact, he had sustained serious injuries from that one single blow.


    But the most important thing about this was that the dagger just now was covered in two single glows. As one of the top experts of the Jiang Family, a family that had ess to information from the upper realm, Jiang Hei naturally knew what that meant.


    Someone who hadprehended two differentws was in apletely different realmpared to him. They were considered a genius even in the upper realm.


    Jiang Hei didn''t dare hesitate as he immediately summoned out his pet.


    It was a mouse that was just like the Rock Nibbler, but it was clear from its aura that it wasn''t a simple Rock Nibbler. This pet was actually in the high tinum Realm just like Jiang Hei, but there was a strangew that was around it.


    This was the evolved version of the Rock Nibbler, this was a rare Rock Eater which could absorb rocks and various other elements to be stronger, simr to how the Iron Eater ate rare metals. Butpared to the Iron Eater that ate rare metal ores, this Rock Eater could eat pretty much everything. Still, by being able to eat everything, it meant that its conversion rate was much lower than that of the Iron Eater.


    Everything had its upsides and downsides.


    Jiang Hei fused with the Rock Eater and immediately pulled out various different types of rocks from his Spatial Ring, swallowing them all.<sub> </sub>


    Once he fused with the Rock Eater, he had ess to the swallowws of the Rock Eater, allowing him to swallow various things to heal himself. That was why Jiang Hei had storedrge amounts of resources in his Spatial Ring, just in case he was ever injured, he could just swallow them to recover himself.


    This was also why Jiang Hei had been made an elder even though he was in the high tinum Realm. With his ability to recover his stamina, he was even able to wear down peak tinum Realm Experts, allowing him to easily defeat them.


    Jiang Hei was preparing for the next attack while swallowing the resources, but it never came.


    When Jiang Hei was pretty much healed, he finally stopped swallowing all the different things he pulled out of his ring and finally saw the true appearance of his attacker. The moment his eyes fell onto his attacker, he couldn''t help saying in a shocked voice, "It''s actually you!"


    Lin Fan had been standing there the whole time watching Jiang Hei, thinking that the pet that he owned was quite interesting.


    It wasn''t just Lin Fan that was interested in the Rock Eater, even his Iron Eater Bone Artifact was interested in it.


    As soon as the Rock Eater had appeared, there was a tremble that came from the Iron Eater Bone Artifact. Lin Fan was spiritually linked to the Iron Eater Bone Artifact, so naturally he could understand what it was thinking.


    The Iron Eater Bone Artifact wanted to absorb the bloodline of the Rock Eater, it was certain that it would strengthen its own absorption power since they came from simr sources.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he had already sentenced Jiang Hei to death and doing so would actually make his own artifact stronger.


    When Jiang Hei finally saw him, Lin Fan said with a smile, "Did you ever expect this?"


    And when Jiang Hei saw the smile on Lin Fan''s face, he couldn''t help trembling. This was the same smile Lin Fan revealed when he met his customers, it was his "best" smile.


    Jiang Hei forced himself to calm down as he said, "Do you know what you''re doing? This is dering war on the Jiang Family!"


    Lin Fan replied with the same smile, "Yes, but who will know what happened if you''re not alive to tell them?"


    Jiang Hei felt a chill run down his spine when he heard this. He already knew from the sh previously that he wasn''t a match for Lin Fan, he even knew that Lin Fan hadn''t been using his full strength yet. The only thing he could do now was find a way to escape, but he needed to stall for time to find a way to escape.


    Jiang Hei asked, "Let me ask you this then, why are you doing this?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said with the same smile, "You''re not the one who gets to ask questions, you and I both know that. Now, tell me what the Jiang Family is nning with the wedding?"


    The only reason Jiang Hei was still alive was because Lin Fan needed information. While he knew that it was unlikely that he would get any useful information from Jiang Hei seeing as he was an elder of the Jiang Family, it was better to try than to do nothing.


    Jiang Hei was confused when he heard these words as he said, "Wedding? What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan said with a snort, "What other wedding do you think I mean?"


    Jiang Hei was even more confused since he thought that Lin Fan would ask about this ve trade base or other parts of the Jiang Family, he never thought that Lin Fan would be asking about Qi Tai''s wedding in a month.


    Jiang Hei calmed himself down and said, "It''s that brat Qi Tai who wanted to have this wedding, what would I know about it?"


    The reason he was so calm now was actually because he had already found his exit.


    Lin Fan said, "You don''t need to know why, you just need to¡­"


    But before he could finish, the floor underneath him had already copsed and Jiang Hei had jumped out the door of this room.


    Lin Fan had actually been caught off guard since he never expected Jiang Hei to be skilled enough in controlling his life energy to destroy the floor under Lin Fan without him noticing.


    He was also caught off guard since he never expected Jiang Hei to run like this, dashing away like a coward instead of acting like the fourth elder of the Jiang Family that he was.

 282 Chapter 282

    Lin Fan had been surprised by Jiang Hei''s sudden actions, but that didn''t mean that he would be caught off guard for that long.


    After being surprised, he immediately came back to his senses and bolted out of the room, chasing after Jiang Hei.


    Jiang Hei didn''t stop for a single second as he continued dashing down the hall, shouting out, "Someone, stop him! I''ll give you any amount of money you want if you stop him!"


    But it was too bad that there was no one there to answer him.


    All along the floors were various corpses just lying there in pools of blood. The onemon thing between them all was that they were all wearing the guard uniform of the Jiang Family.


    When Lin Fan had gone into that room to assassinate Jiang Hei, he had left Jiang Zhi Shu and the rest of his subordinates outside. The weaker ones were sent out to help the ves in secret, killing the guards while following the ves to keep them safe.


    As for the stronger ones like Jiang Zhi Shu, they had followed Jiang Hei''s followers, waiting for the right chance to strike.


    Right now, in this ve trade base, other than Jiang Hei, there was no one else from the Jiang Family that was still left alive.


    Jiang Hei continued to run and surprisingly, he was able to maintain his lead over Lin Fan.


    Jiang Hei was feeling confident as he saw that Lin Fan was always unable to catch up to him, but what he didn''t know was that this was all Lin Fan''s n. He was purposefully falling behind Jiang Hei to see what kind of moves Jiang Hei still had left up his sleeve.


    As they continued through the base, Lin Fan slowly began recognizing the way they were going.


    If they continued along this path, they would reach the room with the strange fountain and crystal.


    Since the path waspletely clear and Jiang Hei was running as quickly as possible, it didn''t take them long to reach that room.


    Jiang Hei burst right through the door and without caring about anything else, he immediately hid behind the crystal as he shouted, "Dark Master, please save me!"


    Lin Fan had arrived at the door just in time to hear this and he immediately knit his brows since he suddenly felt something strangeing from the crystal.


    It was like the crystal had been in a dormant state and it had suddenly woken up as a burst of dark energy suddenly came from the crystal. It filled the entire room and it was so strong that it had even pushed Lin Fan a step back.


    Lin Fan knit his brows since he had felt this kind of aura before, this aura was the aura of a beast and it was quite a powerful one. It might even be on par with the level Jin was at in the nar crack, or even above that.


    But Lin Fan was also strongerpared to before, so he wasn''t that worried.


    He was just wondering what this all meant.


    Did it mean that the Jiang Family had betrayed humanity and was working with the Beast Race?


    After the wave of dark energy was released from the crystal, there was a deep voice that filled the room, "Why have you awakened me! Bring me more sacrifices as we agreed!"


    Jiang Hei bowed down to the crystal and said, "Dark Master, please help me kill this intruder and I''ll get you a thousand sacrifices!"


    It was only then that the consciousness inside the crystal noticed Lin Fan.


    When the consciousness had turned its attention to Lin Fan, he felt a powerful spiritual sensee over him, but he immediately released ayer of spatial energy around him to cut that spiritual sense off.


    When that happened, the voice of the crystal sounded again, "Interesting, interesting. You''re this young and you''ve already mastered spatialws. You would serve me much better than these idiots."


    Jiang Hei quickly said, "But Dark Master, we''ve¡­"


    He didn''t get to say anything else as he was immediately crushed under the dark energy as the voice of the crystal said in a cold voice, "Silence, bug!"


    Then the consciousness in the crystal returned its focus back to Lin Fan as it said, "Well, what do you say?"


    Lin Fan paused for a second with a thoughtful look on his face before he said, "What can you offer me then?"


    The voice of the crystal suddenly gave a resoundingugh that shook the room before it said, "What do you want?"


    Lin Fan casually gave a shrug before saying, "I don''t even know what you are yet, so why don''t you tell me what you have to offer?"<sub> </sub>


    The voice of the crystal was silent for a bit before saying, "You''re smart. Smart people aren''t always good, you and I both know that."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he said, "What do you think I am then?"


    The voice of the crystal took another pause before saying, "You''re also dangerous, which means that it''s better to befriend you than to make you my enemy. So tell me, why are you attacking my servants?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing as he just stood there with a smile.


    The voice of the crystal saw that Lin Fan wasn''t going to exin, so it said, "Alright, to each their own. I can only tell you now that I am a very powerful person and if you follow me, you''ll go far beyond just this simple lower realm. I''ll bring you all the way past the upper realms and into the Ster Kingdoms. All you have to do is follow me."


    Lin Fan still stood there without saying a thing.


    The voice of the crystal had a somewhat helpless tone in its voice as it said, "I can tell that you won''t be moved unless you see some real benefits, so this is for you."


    There was a bit of dark energy that came out of the dark crystal and floated towards Lin Fan. It went all the way in front of him and just remained floating there.


    Seeing that Lin Fan had no intention of doing anything, the voice of the crystal said, "Crush it in your hand and you''ll see what I mean."


    Lin Fan looked over the ball of dark energy for a bit and after getting the all clear signal from Brainy in his sleeve, his right hand finally came up to meet it. He wrapped his hand around the ball of dark energy and after pausing for a second, he crushed it.


    There was a burst of information that suddenly entered his mind the moment he crushed that ball of dark energy. It took him a few seconds to go through that information and then it cleared up to reveal a part of a cultivation technique.


    This was a cultivation technique that was based on spatialws and would be very useful to Lin Fan if he didn''t already have a much better cultivation technique. But the main thing was that thetter half, the more important part was missing.


    Lin Fan looked back up at the crystal, but he still didn''t say a word.


    The voice in the crystal gave anotherugh before it said, "How about it? I''ll give you the rest of this as long as youe to work for me."


    It was only at this moment that Lin Fan finally said something, "Are you the Shadow Lord?"


    The voice in the crystal immediately replied with another question, "Shadow Lord? What is that?"


    Based on the confusion in its voice, it was clear that it didn''t know what the name Shadow Lord meant.


    That only left a single possibility.


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this question as he asked, "Then are you the Beast Race King who fell down to this lower realm?"


    The wave of energy that came from the crystal immediately became much denser as it said in a deep voice, "How much do you know?"


    Lin Fan once again didn''t answer as he asked, "What were you looking for in the lower realm that you disappeared from the Beast Race?"


    The voice of the crystal finally stopped talking to Lin Fan, rather this time it turned its attention back to Jiang Hei, "I''ll kill him, you better keep your promise of the sacrifice."


    Jiang Hei had been listening to the conversation between them with a depressed look since it didn''t seem like it was going the way he wanted, but when he heard these words, his face immediately lit up. Jiang Hei kept nodding as he said, "Of course, of course, Dark Master!"


    The energy that the crystal had released suddenly began to flow in reverse.


    The dark energy gathered around the crystal in a vortex before slowly gathering together to take form.


    At first it was just a thinyer of dark energy around the crystal, but soon it expanded outwards. The expansion continued and continued, growingrger andrger until it took a form that was simr to a human.


    Of course, this form waspletely made of dark energy, so there wasn''t a single feature that a normal human would have on this. The only feature that it had was a single eye that covered the entire area where a normal person''s face should be.


    That eye was narrowed as it looked at Lin Fan and a voice came out from an unknown orifice, "I know I''ll have to sacrifice this crystal to kill you, but at least it''s just one of many. But for you, this is the only life that you have."


    Lin Fan already expected this, so he said with a smile, "Many people have said that before, but I''m still here."

 283 Chapter 283

    Unlike before, this dark figure didn''t hesitate at all as it suddenly swung its hand, causing a de made entirely of the dark energy its body was made of to suddenly form from its hand.


    But the de wasn''tpletely ck. There was a white glow that was surrounding the ck energy that the de was made of.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows since he immediately recognized what this was.


    This was something that he had relied on to defeat all his enemies, it was his ability to use two separatews together.


    Based on the colours of thew energy that were being fused, it seemed like this former King was an expert with thews of light and dark. These were twows thatplimented each other while also opposing each other, allowing them to blend and fight each other to create an even stronger power. The effects of these twowsbining would definitely be much stronger than the random assortment ofws that Lin Fan had.


    But, Lin Fan still wasn''t worried since he didn''t only just have twows.


    The dagger in Lin Fan''s hand quickly changed form and turned into a medium sized sword.


    The dark figure was about to jump forward, but the moment Lin Fan''s sword became bigger, his single eye narrowed once again as he looked it over and said, "An Embryo Soul Realm Artifact, just who are you?"


    Lin Fan just stood there without saying a thing.


    The dark figure only hesitated another second before charging out at Lin Fan with its de drawn over its head, preparing to swing it right down.


    Lin Fan reacted to this by bringing his sword down slightly, preparing to swing right up to meet that de that wasing down.


    As they approached each other, right before they were about to sh, there was a sudden sh of light that came from the dark figure''s de. Lin Fan had no choice but to close his eyes.


    When he was able to open his eyes again, the dark figure was already gone from in front of him. Even with his spiritual sense, he couldn''t find where the dark figure had gone.


    While Lin Fan was looking around for the dark figure, there was a sharp point that was dropping down right on him.


    The dark figure had used thebination of light and darkws to first blind Lin Fan before using darkws to hide above him, waiting for the moment he was distracted after recovering his sight to attack.


    But right before the dark tip of the de could pierce Lin Fan''s head, there was ayer of rock that suddenly appeared above Lin Fan.


    Of course, thatyer of rock couldn''t block the de of twows long enough, but still it was long enough for Lin Fan to react. Lin Fan quickly twisted out of the way of the tip of the de, but that de falling down still scraped the side of his arm as he was dodging.


    For once, Lin Fan''s naturally powerful body wasn''t able to defend against this attack. The de had actually cut right through his skin, leaving a faint streak of blood on his arm.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this since he could tell that this dark figure was in the low Fragmented Soul Realm based on the energy it released. With thebination of its twows, it was much more than just that and with how itswsplimented each other, the might of that de had even reached the high Fragmented Soul Realm,ing close to the peak. As for Lin Fan''s body, it was only at the mid Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan was just d that he had released Rocky ahead of time just in case.


    Rocky had slowly been gaining intelligence, so it could already be considered a living piece of armour. Just by being outside with Lin Fan, it could react to attacks that Lin Fan couldn''t react in time to and use parts of its own body to protect Lin Fan by creating rock shields.


    But in the end, Rocky was still only in the high tinum Realm, It hadn''t reached the point where it could easily block attacks in the Fragmented Soul Realm, even if it was a mutated beast.


    Lin Fan knew that he had underestimated this dark figure. He had thought that it would be easy since this dark figure only seemed to be in the Fragmented Soul Realm, but he hadpletely neglected the fact that it was a fragment of what used to be a King of the Beast Race.


    Kings were rulers of the Beast Race that were on par with the rulers of Ster Kingdoms, this meant that they had to be experts that were near the peak of the Sun Realm.


    Even if this dark figure was weak, its mastery of itsws and on how to use thosews definitely wasn''t shallow. It definitely had the same level ofbat strength that he did, being able to skip several realms above his own and still being able to fight.


    The only good thing was that Lin Fan could tell that this dark figure''s energy was getting weaker with each passing second.<sub> </sub>


    He didn''t know what the story of the crystal was, but he could tell that this King definitely wasn''t at its peak and was relying on this crystal to keep its form or something close to that.


    Lin Fan no longer dared to hesitate as he suddenly released three differentws and those three different coloured energies surrounded his sword.


    The dark figure was immediately shocked when it saw this since this was still considered rare even for the level it was at.


    The dark figure began to rethink his evaluation of Lin Fan.


    The fact that he could have an Embryo Soul Realm Artifact and utilize three differentws on a lower realm meant a lot. If his guess wasn''t wrong, Lin Fan should be some super genius that was either raised by an upper realm or some Ster Kingdom.


    Could it be that he also had the same information that the King had and knew about the special treasure here?


    But there had been only him and that annoying girl who had known about this!


    It really was a pity that the dark figure''s guess waspletely wrong since he could never fathom the existence of the system. No one in this world would have been able to understand the existence of the system.


    Well, not exactly no one since there were also system cultivation novels in this world as well. But out of all the ones that Lin Fan had read, there wasn''t a single one that he couldpare to the ones he read on earth.


    All of these thoughts passed by in a second as the two of them once again charged at each other.


    Lin Fan was prepared this time, but it was too bad that the dark figure didn''t use the same attack.


    As the dark figure swung out horizontally this time, Lin Fan raised his sword to block it, but the dark figure had swung way too strong before he even reached Lin Fan. The dark figure turned and turned with the sword spinning around it, but the strange thing was that it wasn''t approaching quickly.


    As it slowly moved towards Lin Fan, the dark figure began to sink into the ground until it hadpletely disappeared.


    Once again, Lin Fan hadpletely lost track of the dark figure as it hid inside of its darkws.


    Lin Fan immediately turned around since he predicted that the dark figure woulde out from behind him, but then the dark figure jumped out exactly where it had sunk into the ground, being behind Lin Fan now that he had turned.


    Still, what the dark figure never expected was that Lin Fan had done this all on purpose.


    When the dark figure shed down, the dark de was suddenly frozen in the air like it had hit an invisible wall.


    The dark figure narrowed its eyes as it realized that this time it had been baited in, but it also felt shocked by the fact that Lin Fan could actually control four differentws and the fourthw was the rare spatialw.


    Lin Fan didn''t give it a chance to recover as he suddenly disappeared from where he had been standing, appearing again right behind the dark figure, already shing down with his sword covered in three differentws.


    The dark figure knew that it had been caught, but that was to be expected since it had to rush to end this battle as soon as possible before it ran out of energy. But then again, before the battle even started, it had already said that it was prepared to die with Lin Fan.


    Ignoring the sword that was swinging down at it, there were tendrils of darkness that came out of the back of the dark figure, stabbing around the de at Lin Fan. Since it was going to die, it would take Lin Fan out with it!


    But, Lin Fan was also prepared for this as he had created spatial walls around himself,pletely blocking all the tendrils that were aimed at him.


    The de cut right through the dark figure and the moment it did, there was a suction force that drew in the dark figure''s energy andws.


    The moment the dark figure felt this suction force, its eyes immediately opened wide as it said, "You! How do you have this¡­"


    But before it could finish, Lin Fan''s swing had cut right through it and shattered its form, taking all the energy that was left in the crystal. The dark figurepletely disappeared and the crystal that had turnedpletely transparent fell to the ground.

 284 Chapter 284

    Jiang Hei had been on the side watching the entire time, never taking any of the chances that he could have taken to run away.


    Jiang Hei was from the Jiang Family and they had been following this dark crystal for quite a while, so he knew how powerful it was. It was even as powerful as the ancestor that had been cultivating deep down in the depths of the Jiang Family, ignoring all family matters.


    But what he never thought would have happened had happened in the end.


    As the crystal fell to the ground without any life, Jiang Hei had a mouth opened wide enough to stuff the crystal into.


    His legs turnedpletely numb as he fell to the ground, not having any thoughts of resisting or running. Hisst mental pir had been the crystal, but now that it had even been beaten, there was no hope left for him.


    Lin Fan ignored Jiang Hei on the side since he knew there was nothing he could do and walked over to the crystal that had fallen to the ground. He casually picked it up in front of Jiang Hei and he just stood there looking it over without care.


    This would have been a perfect chance for Jiang Hei to escape, but his legs wouldn''t listen to him. This was something that Lin Fan already knew, which was why he did this.


    Lin Fan couldn''t make sense of the crystal in the end, but he didn''t just throw it into his Spatial Ring, he gave it to Brainy since Brainy felt that there was something special with the crystal.


    When Lin Fan was finally prepared to deal with Jiang Hei, there was a sudden cry of pain from the ground. It was only at that moment that Lin Fan remembered that there were still ten kids lying on the ground.


    Lin Fan turned to the kids and with a wave of his hand, there was a butterfly that suddenly appeared beside him.


    The butterfly flew over to where the kids were lying on the ground and it released a powder over those kids. As the powder wafted over them and they breathed it in, slowly their eyelids dropped before closing and they fell asleep.


    This was one of the puppets that Brainy had asked Lin Fan for. This wasn''t a powerful beast, but it was a very useful support beast.


    For Brainy whose main strength was being able to control an entire army, it didn''t just have powerful beasts. It also had support beasts like this Dream Butterfly that could buff or debuff any friends or foe.


    Once the kids were put to sleep, Lin Fan also took out several pieces of cloth from his storage which he ced over the kids.


    Then and only then did he turn back to Jiang Hei, standing over him like he was waiting for something.


    It only took five minutes before there was arge crowd of ves that came to this room, but they were all left outside and only Jiang Zhi Shu came in with a few trusted subordinates, leaving the rest to watch over the ves.


    When Lin Fan saw that Jiang Zhi Shu was here, he first told his subordinates to take care of the kids before waving for Jiang Zhi Shu toe over.


    What Lin Fan did first was not take care of Jiang Hei, but rather he took out the crystal that Brainy had been examining and held it in front of Jiang Zhi Shu as he asked, "Do you know what this is?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu was immediately taken aback, but he still looked over the crystal. After a while, he said in a confused voice, "Boss, what are you showing me this crystal for? Is there something special about it?"


    Lin Fan could see that he was truly confused, so he just gave the crystal right back to Brainy before turning to Jiang Hei and asking, "Is he on your list?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked at Jiang Hei and hesitated for a second before nodding, "Yes, he is."


    Lin Fan nodded before stepping to the side, "Then he''s yours."


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked at Jiang Hei for a bit before saying, "Boss, you kill him."


    Lin Fan shook his head, "No, I promised you that I would help you solve that list of yours and I won''t go back on my word."


    Jiang Zhi Shu naturally knew the enmity between Jiang Hei and Lin Fan since it was something that had been well known in Rock Mountain City. He had even heard of Jiang Hei''s n to take care of Song Shu and Ang, so he knew that Lin Fan would definitely want to kill him.


    Just the fact that Lin Fan was already willing to let him kill Jiang Hei was enough to move his heart, so he didn''t insist on actually doing it.


    But seeing how determined Lin Fan was, Jiang Zhi Shu nodded before raising his spear.


    Jiang Hei was just sitting there in a daze, his mind had been broken the moment he saw the dark figure being defeated and he definitely wasn''t in the right mind to resist.


    Jiang Zhi Shu''s spear quickly pierced right through Jiang Hei''s throat and swept out, cutting off his head.<sub> </sub>


    Jiang Hei was still lost in his own world at the veryst second, not even knowing how he had died.


    In truth, Lin Fan could have brought Jiang Hei back and he actually should have since Jiang Hei was after all an elder of the Jiang Family. No matter how low his position was among the other elders, the position of an elder was still iparably high.


    Just with that position, he would have known quite a few things about the Jiang Family, things that would definitely help Lin Fan.


    But for Lin Fan''s n to work, Jiang Hei had to die here.


    Only the death of an elder would ce enough pressure on the Jiang Family that they would start acting rashly, anything less wouldn''t have the same effect. Even if he were to capture him, that still gave the Jiang Family the hope that he would still be alive, so they would act carefully.


    Only when there was a true threat to their position, such as the permanent loss of an elder would they have to make bold moves to maintain their position.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan hadn''t brought Momonga along to use the soul search on Jiang Hei before killing him. That way, they could have had the best of both worlds.


    But still, it didn''t mean that they would be going back empty handed.


    When Jiang Hei''s followers had left to take care of the ve uprising, Lin Fan had sent Jiang Zhi Shu and his subordinates after them.


    Jiang Hei''s followers had only been in the Gold Realm, so for the tinum Realm Jiang Zhi Shu, it was as easy as waving his hand to capture them alive.


    Lin Fan was nning to bring them back and interrogate them for information since no one would care if they went missing or not.


    The biggest gain there was actually the follower named Jiang Tu.


    Lin Fan had seen how he had acted around Jiang Hei earlier, so he was certain that this Jiang Tu was definitely a spy, either working for the family head''s branch or one of the other elders'' branch.


    Compared to an elder, this spy that spied on elders would definitely have more information since it was his job to gather information.


    So that was the other reason why Lin Fan wasn''t worried about killing Jiang Hei.


    After they finished off Jiang Hei, Lin Fan walked out of the room followed by Jiang Zhi Shu. When he came out, he saw therge crowd standing outside. There were several hundred ves that had been gathered here.


    Lin Fan casually asked Jiang Zhi Shu, "What''s the situation with these ves?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu replied, "Most of them were willing to join us when they heard that we were nning to take down the Jiang Family. After all, they''ve suffered quite a bit at the hands of the Jiang Family."


    Lin Fan then asked in a more serious voice, "Are they trustworthy though?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu hesitated a bit before saying, "I''ll take care of them. Boss, you won''t have to worry about anything."


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before giving a slow nod.


    In his heart, Jiang Zhi Shu had already firmly devoted himself to following Lin Fan. After all the things that Lin Fan had done for him, he no longer doubted Lin Fan like before. He believed that Lin Fan really would be able to take down the Jiang Family and that gave him hope to do his best.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother speaking to the ves at all as he turned to head to the exit.


    Jiang Zhi Shu already knew what Lin Fan wanted, so he had his subordinates lead all the ves along to the exit elevator.


    Lin Fan was the first one to go up and he went up alone since the rest of his subordinates were taking care of ves.


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried about the Jiang Family''s reaction since he knew that they would care more about what happened at his residence than what happened here. With Ang''s personality, she must have ughtered everyone and the ones they sent to deal with him must have been elites, so that would also cause great losses for the Jiang Family.


    In the end, they had dealt quite a heavy blow to the Jiang Family, which was exactly what he nned to do.


    It had been a long night.

 285 Chapter 285

    The next day passed by as normal, but there was definitely a heavy air that hung over Rock Mountain City.


    Not many people knew what had happened, but the Jiang Family had suddenly decided to seal themselves in. Not a single member of the main family came out that day, there wasn''t even a single member of the branch family that came out.


    It was as if the Jiang Family hadpletely sealed themselves off, not interacting with the world at all.


    Since the Jiang Family had been established, this had never happened once.


    Just what had happened for the Jiang Family to suddenly act this way?


    Others didn''t know what had happened to the Jiang Family, but Lin Fan couldn''t be more clear on what had happened.


    The Jiang Family had lost too much in a single night, there was no way they would be able to recover from this in a short period of time.


    First, the Jiang Family had lost their main source of business which generated the majority of their finances. Even if they could salvage their business, they would have lost the trust of many of their loyal customers and without those loyal customers, cracks would form in their business model. Those loyal customers weren''t only big spenders, they were also quite influential.


    Without the support of those influential backers, even if the Jiang Family wanted to continue in this ve trade, they would be putting their own heads on the chopping block.


    Before, with the support of these influential backers, even if they were caught, they could rely on them to suppress the authorities and continue their business.


    It wasn''t hard for these powerful backers to find out what had happened and once there was a crack that was shown, no one would be willing to trust the Jiang Family again.


    With these backers lost, if the Jiang Family continued in this business and were ever caught with their hand in the cookie jar, that hand would be immediately chopped off. Even if the Jiang Family themselves were influential, there was nothing they alone could do against the entire government and the human race. Unless there was a day that the human race suddenly decided that very was eptable which was almost impossible with how united they were against the Beast Race.


    So with this loss, that meant the Jiang Family''s finances were in shambles and they no longer dared to act as arrogantly as before.


    But even with the Jiang Family losing their main business, they were a family that had been around for close to a thousand years. This meant that they had umted quite a bit of resources, so they wouldn''t immediately suffer from this loss of a source of ie.


    The most important loss of all was actually the loss of their shadow squad.


    The ones that had been sent to capture Song Shu had all been the leaders of the shadow squad, so they were all experts in the tinum Realm, making up a total of ten tinum Realm Experts.


    They didn''t know what had happened that night, but when they had seen the carnage of the scene, they knew that they had seriously miscalcted the strength behind Lin Fan.


    With the death of all ten of these tinum Realm Experts, this had dealt a heavy blow to them since this was a permanent loss of strength, unlike losing funds where they could just find new methods of ie. These tinum Realm Experts had been slowly nurtured by the Jiang Family and now that they were dead, it meant that decades of work had gone to waste.


    Then there was Jiang Hei who had also been killed in the ve trade base. That was the biggest blow of all.


    Peak tinum Realm Experts or those that could fight at that level were extremely rare on this Blue Star. Those that were at that level could be counted in the hundreds.


    After all, the Legendary Realm was the peak of this world and there were only less than a hundred of them. Right beneath them was the tinum Realm, or rather the peak of that realm. They were considered the ones that truly ruled this realm since the Legendary Realm Experts usually don''t meddle in mortal affairs.


    The Jiang Family only had six elders in total and losing even a single elder meant that they would be losing a sixth of their entire power, this was definitely a crisis for the Jiang Family.


    In the close to a thousand years they had existed, this was the weakest they had ever been.


    If they didn''t close themselves off at this time, who knows what kind of consequences they would suffer.


    But the fact that they did created a tense atmosphere in Rock Mountain City. There were many powers that were wondering what had happened to the Jiang Family and there were other powers that wanted to take advantage of this. Overall, it meant that everyone was trying to im more power from each other, causing tensions to rise.


    As for the one who caused all this, Lin Fan had spent a boring day watching over his store. Even with how tense the atmosphere in the city was, it didn''t affect his business since there were still plenty of people fighting over his training quota spots each day. The only real problem was that no one bought anything else from him other than the pets.


    On this day, Qiang You hade again, bringing Qiang Ben with him.<sub> </sub>


    Watching Qiang Ben follow Song Shu around, Qiang You leaned up against the counter where Lin Fan was sitting and asked, "Owner Lin, are you rted to what happened yesterday with the Jiang Family''s ''business''?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say a single thing, but there was a smile that hung on his lips.


    Qiang You knew exactly what this meant, so he didn''t dwell on this.


    Instead his eyes narrowed as he asked, "Why are you so focused on the Jiang Family?"


    Lin Fan looked right into his narrowed eyes looking at him with his own narrowed eyes, not moving away from his gaze at all. After a few seconds, Lin Fan casually said, "I have my own reason."


    Qiang You didn''t react at all to this at first, but then he gave a sigh.


    After getting to know Lin Fan over the past few days, he had a good analysis of his personality. Lin Fan was someone who stuck to his word and his mood changed quite frequently.


    If Lin Fan wasn''t willing to tell him, it didn''t matter what he asked since there would be no way for him to convince Lin Fan to speak.


    More importantly, he was scared of the girl who stood by Lin Fan''s side who looked like an angel, but was actually a demon who could ughter without a care.


    Qiang You hesitated a bit more before saying, "Do you at least know when to stop?"


    Lin Fan paused for a second like he was in thought before saying, "I have my ideas of what to do and what not to do. In the end, the Jiang Family is important in holding back the Beast Race, so I won''t go too far."


    Qiang You gave a nod when he heard this. As long as he could get this from Lin Fan, he was satisfied.


    No matter what, in the end, the Jiang Family was one of the only five Legendary Realm Families on the entire Blue Star and one of the main forces of humanity in the fight against the Beast Race.


    Even if the descendants lost control of themselves, it couldn''t be med on the ancestor.


    <o>,m The ancestor of the Jiang Family was the most important person in their entire family since he was their only Legendary Realm Expert. As long as he was alive, the Jiang Family would never truly copse.</o>


    Neither Lin Fan or Qiang You wanted the Jiang Family to copse since in the fight against the Beast Race, every single expert was important.


    The only reason Lin Fan was willing to discuss this was because he could sense thew barrier that Qiang You had ced around them. This was simr to thew that he used to move around undetected, so everyone had just walked past them without any notice of their conversation.


    After getting through the serious stuff, Qiang You changed the topic to some other matters they needed to discuss.


    But before they could even start discussing them, they suddenly heard someone in the shop say, "Did you hear? The Jiang Family is about to hold an announcement ceremony."


    Another person asked, "Announcement ceremony? What announcement ceremony and where is it?"


    The first person said, "They''re holding it for select reporters outside their manor and the broadcast is about to begin."


    Both Lin Fan and Qiang You knit their brows when they heard this.


    They both knew just how dire the situation of the Jiang Family was, so for the Jiang Family to make an announcement now, it was either a final desperation move or they were nning something else.


    Lin Fan immediately turned on the TV that was hanging in the shop which he had bought to watch when he was bored watching over the shop and he quickly found a channel with the program he was looking for. Actually, it didn''t take him much effort since almost all the local channels were broadcasting this live conference.


    There was a person who Lin Fan didn''t recognize who was standing in front of a podium and everyone there was waiting for him to begin.

 286 Chapter 286

    That person answered a few seemingly random questions that the reporters asked first.


    They were simple things from asking about the overall situation of the Jiang Family to that person''s private life.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking Qiang You, "Who is that person on screen? Why is he holding the conference for the Jiang Family?"


    Qiang You exined, "That is Jiang Qi Tai, he''s the current heir to the Jiang Family. He''s probably doing this because the Jiang Family wants to groom him to be the next head."


    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows when he heard this. It wasn''t the part of him being the Jiang Family''s heir that made him do this, rather it was because of his name.


    Jiang Qi Tai was a name that he had definitely heard before because it was a name that Jiang Zhi Shu had mentioned countless times. It was the brother of his that was about to marry his childhood lover.


    This was a name that Jiang Zhi Shu had repeated countless times in front of Lin Fan, so it was close to impossible for him to forget now. It was also the name that was at the top of Jiang Zhi Shu''s list, but not the list of people he wanted to kill. Rather it was at the top of his list and the only name on the list of people that he wanted to question.


    Why?


    Why did he do this?


    Jiang Qi Tai had answered a few random questions of the reporters, but then his tone suddenly changed as he said, "Now, it''s time for me to make the important announcement that I wanted to make."


    When the reporters heard this, they immediately fell silent and focused all their attention on Jiang Qi Tai. They pointed all the recording devices they had at him and just waited.


    Jiang Qi Tai knew what he was doing and took a slight pause to build up tension before slowly saying, "I want to announce that because of personal reasons, me and my fiancee have decided to move our wedding up. It will now be held in a week instead of a month from now. We invite everyone toe and watch as we will be live broadcasting this event."


    All the reporters were silent since they couldn''t make sense of what was happening, but that wasn''t the case with certain people who were watching the live broadcast.


    The reporters didn''t ask any follow up questions because they didn''t know what to ask, but that didn''t matter since Jiang Qi Tai wasn''t finished with his announcement just yet.


    After another pause to bring up tension, Jiang Qi Tai continued, "Moreover, I wish to announce that with the agreement of my father and the various elders, we have agreed that after the wedding, I will be taking over as the head of the Jiang Family."


    This time, the news that was announced caused all the reporters present to take a cold breath.


    This wasn''t a small piece of news, this was a piece of news that would definitely change the entire scene of Rock Mountain City. The family head was the effective leader of the Jiang Family and each family head would bring new rules to the Jiang Family.


    The current family head of the Jiang Family was someone who was more passive, which meant that the Jiang Family hadn''t done much during his rule. Other than maintaining their current businesses, the Jiang Family had never expanded out into new fields and had left much opportunity for the other families.


    But with the change of family heads, no one knew how the Jiang Family would change since they didn''t know what ns the new family head would have.


    This meant that this wedding would be the event that everyone would pay attention to. All the various heads of the royal and noble families would be there because they would do their best to get close to the new Jiang Family head for their own benefits. Even those that were enemies with the Jiang Family would be there since this would be their chance to scope out the new Jiang Family head.


    In short, for one day, all powers of Rock Mountain City woulde together to celebrate Jiang Qi Tai''s wedding.


    This time the reporters all had different questions which they all shouted at Jiang Qi Tai on stage, but Lin Fan didn''t have time to care about this since his phone had started ringing the moment Jiang Qi Tai had given his announcement.


    Unsurprisingly, it was no one other than Jiang Zhi Shu.


    He had broken their agreement and had directly called Lin Fan, which just showed how agitated he was by this announcement.


    But Lin Fan didn''t lose his calm and rejected the call without any hesitation.<sub> </sub>


    At the same time, he had Brainy send a message through their backupmunication line to Jiang Zhi Shu, telling him to wait for him to make his n.


    After several minutes and several hundred attempted calls, Lin Fan directly shut off his calling function without another thought.


    Lin Fan immediately fell into thought the moment Jiang Qi Tai had made his announcement, just like Qiang You beside him.


    For Qiang You, this announcement was definitely something that would affect the Seekers Union.


    The previous Jiang Family Head had never interfered too much in Rock Mountain City, making the Jiang Family keep to itself. This had allowed the Seekers Union to spread into more businesses into Rock Mountain City and make themselves stronger.


    Qiang You had been hoping to continue this, but with the change in family head, that was uncertain.


    Of course, there was no threat of the Jiang Familypletely tearing away all face and starting a full war with the Seekers Union, but this still didn''t bode well for the future prospects of the Seekers Union.


    As for Lin Fan, what he was thinking about was much moreplicated than this.


    The Jiang Family was clearly facing arge amount of pressure both internally and externally from the destruction of their various businesses and the loss of their shadow squad. But for them to announce the changing of leaders, that was definitely a move that seemed strange. That is, unless one knew the inside story.


    Lin Fan actually considered this a genius move, but that was also why it confused him since he didn''t understand who would be able toe up with this move. So far the Jiang Family had reactedpletely the way that he had expected, with the exception of sending out the shadow squad, but that was just an extra boon for him.


    But now they had made such a clever move, it was clear that something had changed.


    The reason why this was such a smart move was very simple, they were able to make up for their previously lost reputation with this one single move.


    First, Jiang Qi Tai wasn''t just someone who had suddenlye out of nowhere and had taken the family head position. Rather he was someone who was famous for being a genius and one of the top younger generations of the Jiang Family. If he were to im that he was number two, there was no one who would dare to im that they were first.


    With this promising new younger generation taking over, it was clear that there would be a revival in the Jiang Family which would restore many people''s faith in them. This would mean that some of the backers lost from the ve trade base incident woulde back.


    But that wasn''t the only thing.


    The Jiang Family would also denounce the now dead fourth elder andpletely split his branch among themselves.


    On one hand, that would make their own branches stronger while it would also restore more faith with their lost backers since they were ming the one who was dead for all the mistakes. Now that he was dead and gone, they could im that the problem was solved and bring back a few more backers.


    While the backers would be skeptical, there would still be a few that would be moved by this along with the change in leadership.


    At the same time, by announcing this change in leadership, they could attract many of the neutral families in Rock Mountain City to their side to bolster their own forces. While these temporary alliances weren''t as powerful as having their own experts like the shadow squad, they would buy the Jiang Family enough time to train up another shadow squad.


    Moreover, by using these temporary alliances, even if these new allies suffered any losses in the rare scenario that they would, the Jiang Family wouldn''t suffer from this at all since they would be losses of these temporary allies and not them.


    Just this single move would solve most of the problems that the Jiang Family was facing right now, giving them new blood, restoring their backers and giving them a chance to restart their ve business again, and also gaining new businesses through their new temporary allies.


    But all of that depended on a single thing, it depended on the wedding going well and the session to happen.


    That was where the crux of this nid since in the end, all this wedding was is bait. It was bait to draw out Lin Fan and the ones who had been targeting the Jiang Family, allowing them to deal with all of their enemies in a single blow.


    The most important thing was that Lin Fan had no choice but to go.

 287 Chapter 287

    It wasn''t just for Jiang Zhi Shu, but rather for his entire n.


    If he were to give up this chance, it would mean the Jiang Family would be able to rise up from this fall and he wouldn''t have a chance to strike them again. After all, after suffering this one loss, their defenses would be much stronger this time.


    With the amount of resources the Jiang Family had, it was not something that Lin Fan could match with his newly built organization.


    While Lin Fan was confident in taking care of them by himself, that was only because of how arrogant the Jiang Family had been.


    Before this, they had beenx with their guard since they never expected anyone to actually target them. This was the lull that came with a false sense of security from a long period of peace.


    But now that they had been alerted, they would definitely prepare all their defenses.


    The only reason Lin Fan could still attack the wedding was because the time was too short, so the Jiang Family couldn''t prepare anything special, so it was still in line with what Lin Fan could deal with.


    But after this wedding, if the Jiang Family were given time to prepare, they would be able to prepare something that would definitely be a problem for Lin Fan.


    So in the end, Lin Fan had no choice but to make a move at this wedding.


    Still, what surprised him the most was why the Jiang Family had suddenly be smart enough to make this move. Before this, all they did was blunder around, not understanding what was going on as they sent useless people to deal with Lin Fan''s attacks.


    This was clearly a sign and it was a sign that Lin Fan didn''t want to ept.


    First, it meant that there was now someone capable who was running the Jiang Family. This would have meant that it would be much harder to deal with them in the future, but it seemed like this person wanted to end it all in one move with Lin Fan''s side, so that wasn''t a problem.


    The problem was the second thing that this meant.


    The second thing was that this person who was now in charge of the Jiang Family suspected that it was Jiang Zhi Shu who was causing these problems for the Jiang Family.


    All these ns were specifically targeted at Jiang Zhi Shu, or rather Yuan Xiang Qin who was his weak spot.


    Lin Fan didn''t have a problem controlling Jiang Zhi Shu now, but if Yuan Xiang Qin was ever involved, Jiang Zhi Shu would almost always lose control. Yuan Xiang Qin was the one heart demon that Jiang Zhi Shu could never get over.


    The Jiang Family would certainly make other countermeasures to deal with them and it was more than likely they would involve Yuan Xiang Qin.


    Lin Fan could feel a headache filling his head as he thought this over since he knew that this situation was definitely hard to deal with.


    It would be best if the second case wasn''t real, but he would still have toe up with ns just in case.


    But right at this moment, Lin Fan couldn''t do a single thing since he was still taking care of his shop and could not leave at the moment.


    Qiang You didn''t say anything else to Lin Fan on this matter and discussed a few random topics before leaving the store with Qiang Ben.


    Time passed slowly as Lin Fan waited for the shop to close so he could go do what he needed to do.


    Finally, when the shop''s closing finally came, Lin Fan didn''t head back to his residence as normal and stayed in the shop a bit longer before sneaking out the back. With his shadow and spatialws, it was easy for him to move around unnoticed.


    He eventually came to another street that was just as bad as the street he had picked to set his shop up on, but there was something familiar about this street. This street was the site of the first business of the Jiang Family that they had attacked.


    Lin Fan went into the bar that had been operated by the gang under the Jiang Family and behind the counter was someone he was very familiar with. It was one of the two lieutenants who had been with Jiang Zhi Shu since the beginning.


    Lin Fan''s subordinates had taken over this bar as their hideout after the first day because there was no ce safer than right under the enemy''s nose.


    The lieutenant had a trace of surprise in his eyes when he saw Lin Fan, but then he returned to tending to the customers like before. But when Lin Fan came up to the counter, he casually lifted up the way into the back for Lin Fan and Lin Fan went into the back room before anyone even noticed what had happened.


    In the back room, there were pieces of broken furniture all over and several people who were surrounding a single chair with a person tied up in it.


    When Lin Fan came in, all these people revealed looks of relief.


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and waved his hand, dismissing them. All of these people gave Lin Fan a bow before heading into another room.<sub> </sub>


    The person who was tied up in the chair was no one other than Jiang Zhi Shu.


    In the afternoon, he had called Lin Fan countless times after he had heard the Jiang Family''s announcement. Even after receiving the message from Lin Fan to wait, he still couldn''t sit still and wanted to charge right to Lin Fan''s store.


    Of course, the others knew that they couldn''t let him do that, so they had all worked together to stop him which had resulted in the scene that Lin Fan saw when he came in.


    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately looked up when he heard the footsteps entering the room and seeing Lin Fan, he immediately opened his mouth to shout, but Lin Fan didn''t give him a chance as he used spatialws to cut off the sound from exiting his mouth.


    Jiang Zhi Shu saw that he made no sound at all and struggled to get out of the chair, but Lin Fan didn''t give him that chance as he immediately restrained him with his power. Lin Fan then walked over to Jiang Zhi Shu and stuffed a cloth into his mouth to gag him.


    Once that was all done, Lin Fan pulled another chair over to sit down in front of Jiang Zhi Shu and said with a calm look, "I''ll remove the gag if you promise to not make any sound and talk normally, we have a lot to discuss."


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked into Lin Fan''s eyes and then he took a deep breath before revealing a determined look and giving a nod.


    Lin Fan took out the cloth and seeing that Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t say a thing, he said, "Good, now that you''re calm, let''s talk. I know what you want to do, but we still have a week before this happens and we need to make ns, or do you n on just sending yourself to die?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu suddenly became depressed when he heard this. He didn''t refute it because he knew that Lin Fan was right, but he also didn''t want to ept it since it meant that he was powerless.


    Jiang Zhi Shu after a long pause then said, "Alright, boss, what do we do then?"


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Well, the n for now is¡­"


    ¡­


    After a long talk, they finally finished nning out their move over the next week. There was no doubt that the wedding next week would be the main event, but there were still plenty of things to take care of before then.


    Lin Fan naturally didn''t have time to stay here and Jiang Zhi Shu had just received the answer he wanted, so he was filled with energy to go out and do what he needed to do.


    But before Lin Fan did leave, he didn''t forget to take out a batch of cookies from his watch''s storage space which he threw over to Jiang Zhi Shu while saying, "Here, these are for you. Eat these and calm down."


    Jiang Zhi Shu was surprised that Lin Fan would suddenly give him cookies, but he still epted them without another word.


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "Next time, don''t lose control and call me at work."


    Then without another word, he walked out.


    Jiang Zhi Shu waspletely confused, but he didn''t have time to think about this. He would only learn the meaning of thister tonight when he finally had time to eat those cookies.


    Those cookies didn''te from a store, but rather they were made by Ang.


    It was a very strange thing since Ang had slowly be good at cooking, but when it came to making sweets, she never made any improvement.


    The only word to describe it was "destructive".


    It seemed like for things that required precision, Ang wasn''t able to follow the instructions.


    And that was the reason why Lin Fan had given these cookies to Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Lin Fan didn''t show this to others, but to the people he was close with, he did have a petty side.


    He was annoyed with how Jiang Zhi Shu had acted this afternoon, so he gave him these cookies as a sort of revenge.


    Of course, he knew that Jiang Zhi Shu would share these cookies with his other subordinates.


    However, the only thing he could do was offer them a prayer.

 288 Chapter 288

    The week passed by very quickly and by the end of it, they were prepared for what was toe.


    During this entire week, Lin Fan never made contact with Jiang Zhi Shu''s group other than that first time.


    One, it was to ensure that everything was kept secret for the time it would be necessary and two, it was because of the cookies Lin Fan gave them.


    While they were angry at Lin Fan for giving them these, they couldn''t do a thing since Lin Fan was their boss.


    Jiang Zhi Shu naturally knew why Lin Fan had yed this trick on him since he heard Lin Fan''s words. But after being together for several months now, the rtionship between them was quite good and a small prank like this wouldn''t ruin it. Not to mention that he was a bit to me for this.


    As for the others, they could only me their bad luck that they followed Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Finally, the day of the wedding came and it was a day that effectively shut down all business in Rock Mountain City. Well, that is with the exception of Lin Fan''s store which still opened in the morning to sell out all their training slots.


    The wedding was being held in the afternoon with the pre wedding ceremonies being held at noon, so there was plenty of time for them to go.


    Lin Fan would be going with Ang as his plus one.


    As for how he had received this invitation, he naturally took one of the invitations the Seekers Union had received.


    Qiang You knew that Lin Fan was going to the wedding for other reasons, but he still gave him the invitation. For one, if Lin Fan did seed, it would definitely be detrimental for the Jiang Family which would be good for him. For two, even if Lin Fan failed, nothing would happen to the Seekers Union since everyone knew about how the Seekers Union cooperated with Lin Fan''s store, so it was natural for them to give Lin Fan a wedding invitation.


    When Lin Fan and Ang arrived, the wedding reception was already packed with people.


    Lin Fan easily recognized some of the people here since a lot of them were actually customers of his. They had even been at his store this morning to drop off their pets.


    None of these people were simple, all of them were from noble and royal families.


    All the people present at this wedding reception all had some form of status in Rock Mountain City. The only exception to this were the reporters that were being kept back by the guards, taking all kinds of pictures and trying to get their stories.


    As Lin Fan and Ang headed in, they were stopped by the guards that were checking each of the guests.


    The guards had a good idea of who would being already since as guards of the Jiang Family, they had dealings with most of the upper ss in Rock Mountain City, so naturally they had already memorized what most of them looked like.


    For an unfamiliar person toe to this wedding reception and act this confident, naturally it created many red gs.


    But when Lin Fan showed the guards his invitation, they immediately backed down and profusely apologized to Lin Fan before letting him in.


    After all, the invitation that Lin Fan had was addressed to the Seekers Union.


    The Seekers Union was without a doubt the second strongest power in Rock Mountain City. Even main members of the Jiang Family would have to show some form of courtesy, not to mention these lowly guards.


    This was an unknown person with an invitation for the Seekers Union, so they didn''t dare neglect this person since they didn''t know what kind of personality he had. If he were to want to take vengeance on them¡­


    Lin Fan wasn''t thinking any of this as he headed into the reception.


    For therge part, he mainly went unnoticed since not many people did know him.


    There were a few of his customers that came up to greet him out of courtesy, but there wasn''t anything else. The only other thing that happened was that there were plenty of eyes that snuck gazes at Ang.


    Lin Fan and Ang were staying in their own little corner waiting for the wedding to start when Qiang You came over with a woman who seemed just too young for him.


    This was a woman who was in her early twenties and was quite the beauty when she was dressed up.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help raising a brow at Qiang You as he asked, "Is this the kind of thing you''re into? Don''t you already have a grandson?"


    Qiang You''s face turned a bit dark as he said, "What do you think?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and didn''t say anything else.


    Qiang You shook his head before saying, "This is Liu Mei, she is one of top seekers of our Seekers Union. I brought her here today to observe and help if you need it."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan released his spiritual sense and he was surprised to find that while this Liu Mei was young, she was already in the tinum Realm. By all rights, she was considered quite the genius just from this, but Lin Fan didn''t need any help today since he was prepared.


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "I appreciate the gesture, but there''s no need for you to do a thing."


    Qiang You looked at him with a gaze of doubt, but he didn''t keep asking since he knew that there was no point.


    He also couldn''t help sneaking a peek at Ang. This wasn''t a gaze that was filled with lust like the others, this was one that was filled with fear since he knew what kind of power she wielded.


    As long as this angel of death was here, Qiang You wasn''t worried about Lin Fan. Rather, he even felt a bit sorry for the Jiang Family.


    But also as a precaution, Qiang You had already reported Ang to the upper realm faction that was behind the Seekers Union. Even now, they still hadn''t responded which didn''t sit well with him.


    Time passed bit by bit and soon it was time for the wedding.


    As soon as the arranged time arrived, there was a sudden fanfare that rang out as flowers began raining down from the sky.


    Everyone turned their gazes to look at the entrance of the hall where the doors had suddenly been flung open to reveal two figures in dazzling clothes walking in. One was a man who was in a pure white tuxedo and the other was a woman in the most stunning wedding dress. The only thing that was strange was the thick veil that was over her face,pletely covering it.


    When Ang saw this dress, her eyes couldn''t help lighting up as she stared at it for a bit before taking a look at Lin Fan, almost suggesting something. It was too bad that Lin Fan didn''t have time to pay attention to this as he had been staring at the groom the entire time.


    The couple walked right down the aisle with the wedding song ying and soon they reached the altar that was at the end of the aisle.


    Both of them stood facing forward for a second before turning to face each other.


    The minister began giving the normal wedding script and everyone in the crowd was silent.


    They all knew that there would be something special happening with this wedding, so the atmosphere was quite tense instead of being a happy and joyous wedding.


    There were even some people that were openly holding their artifacts, as if they were prepared for anything to happen.


    But as the wedding script continued, there was nothing that happened.


    From the opening script of the minister, to the exchange of vows, or rather the vows of only the groom, to the exchanging of rings.


    The entire wedding progressed as normal, with nothing seeming out of ce. Well, not exactly nothing. The one strange thing with this wedding was that the bride had never said a single word the entire time other than "I do".


    Finally, it reached the part before the final pronouncement where the minister asked, "Before we pronounce these two as man and wife, does anyone here have any reason for these two to not be joined in marriage? Please speak now or forever hold your peace."


    The room was silent, that is until the skylights of the church were shattered and a group of cloaked figures jumped down right into the wedding hall.


    Everyone in the hall was surprised to see this, but they all immediately reacted as they moved to the sides of the room,pletely surrounding the cloaked figures.


    There were also a few people in the crowd who had pulled out their weapons and artifacts, aiming them at the cloaked figures.


    Jiang Qi Tai turned to calmly face the cloaked figures that had arrived and said, "May I ask what this is about?"


    The lead cloaked figure came forward and said, "I object to this wedding!"


    Jiang Qi Tai just looked right at that cloaked figure and calmly said, "On what grounds?"


    The lead cloaked figure took off his hood and revealed his face to everyone, causing them all to let out gasps of shock. It was no one else but Jiang Zhi Shu!


    Jiang Zhi Shu said through gritted teeth, "I think you know why."


    Jiang Qi Tai just looked right at Jiang Zhi Shu and after a few seconds, he suddenly revealed a smile.


    It was like he had expected Jiang Zhi Shu to arrive and he had indeed expected him toe.

 289 Chapter 289

    Everyone in the crowd was shocked to a certain extent since they all knew some parts of the story between Jiang Zhi Shu and the Jiang Family.


    That is everyone except for Lin Fan who just sat there with a calm smile on his face.


    If this was a normal situation, he wouldn''t just be shocked, he would also be angry since Jiang Zhi Shu had directly broken the promise between them. However, this wasn''t a normal situation.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by Jiang Zhi Shu''s appearance at all since he was the one who told him toe this way.


    Lin Fan had already guessed parts of the Jiang Family''s n, so he didn''t mind ying along with them. If they had already guessed that Jiang Zhi Shu was involved, there was no need for him to keep hiding himself.


    Rather if he did show himself, this would turn this fight into an internal family struggle which would make it harder for others to interfere.


    Moreover, there were plenty of ns that the Jiang Family designed around Jiang Zhi Shu that they couldn''t use now unless they were to reveal their dirty little secrets. It was fine to use them when Jiang Zhi Shu hid himself since no one could connect the two together, but it was definitely easy to do so once he revealed himself.


    This time, it was Lin Fan''s turn to operate in the shadows.


    Jiang Qi Tai and Jiang Zhi Shu just faced each other for a bit before Jiang Qi Tai took Yuan Xiang Qin by the hand, leading her over to one of his groomsmen standing on the side and having him take her away.


    Jiang Zhi Shu tensed up when he saw this. He clearly wanted to chase after her, but first there was something else he had to do.


    When Jiang Qi Tai turned back to Jiang Zhi Shu, he tilted his head and asked, "It seems like you have something to ask?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu knit his brows as he said one simple word, "Why?"


    Jiang Qi Tai stretched his hands out and said, "I wonder, what do you mean by that?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu couldn''t control his emotions as he shouted out, "You know what I mean! I thought that you were my closest brother, the one that would always be there for me and her!"


    A trace of darkness and hidden bitterness shed in Jiang Qi Tai''s eyes when he heard this, as he said with a bit of emotion in his voice, "What do you understand about me? You''ve never known anything about me and you''re asking me this?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu couldn''t help revealing a hurt look as he said, "She and I both trusted you."


    This time Jiang Qi Tai''s face turnedpletely dark as he said, "Look where that trust has gotten you."


    Without waiting for Jiang Zhi Shu to say a thing, Jiang Qi Tai turned to an old man who was sitting in the first row and said, "First elder, are you sure you still want to go through with your n or are you going to stand up for the Jiang Family?"


    The first elder Jiang Mu sitting in the first row of the wedding hall knitted his brows when he heard this, but he rxed them just as quickly, not allowing himself to show any further emotions.


    He sat there stroking his beard for a few seconds before giving a sigh and saying, "They say the young will surpass the old eventually, you definitely prove that. The Jiang Family will be united in the end."


    Then Jiang Mu turned to Jiang Zhi Shu and said, "Xiao Shu, you know what kind of ce this is, please just leave."


    Jiang Mu was actually one of the elders that had supported Jiang Zhi Shu in the beginning, so he was actually quite close to him. If he had a choice, he would rather end this peacefully than let it escte any further.


    But that wasn''t the case today since Jiang Zhi Shu had no intentions of backing down.


    Jiang Zhi Shu still had respect for his elders as he cupped his hands to Jiang Mu, but then he said, "I''m sorry elder Mu, but I can''tply today."


    Jiang Mu gave a sigh before waving his hand and turned without a word.


    The two guards who had followed Jiang Mu to this wedding came out to grab Jiang Zhi Shu and take him out, but they didn''t even have a chance to approach him before they were sent flying by the rocks that had appeared around him.


    When those rocks appeared, there were many people who knitted their brows to look at Jiang Zhi Shu. After all, these rocks had the aura of an expert in the peak tinum Realm.<sub> </sub>


    If they came from Jiang Zhi Shu himself and he was already in the peak tinum Realm, what kind of concept was this?


    Jiang Zhi Shu was indeed a genius, which was why the Jiang Family had focused much of their resources in nurturing him. However, that had already ended a long time ago and he had been kicked out of the family.


    If he were able to reach the peak tinum Realm during this time without the support of the Jiang Family, he might have been an even greater genius than the Jiang Family had expected. If that had been the case, they might need to reconsider their thoughts.


    But they soon noticed that this power didn''t belong to Jiang Zhi Shu himself, so they calmed down. It seemed like he was borrowing this power from some pet.


    That did make sense since there was no way Jiang Zhi Shu wouldn''t know that the elders woulde to the wedding today. After all, this was a wedding that was being held by the Jiang Family, so he would need at least the ability to fight against a peak tinum Realm Expert if he wanted to aplish anything.


    Even with this disy, Jiang Mu didn''t personally make a move since he was after all the first elder of the Jiang Family. He had his status to uphold.


    Jiang Mu turned to another old man who had been sitting in the first row who nodded back before standing up. This old man was another elder of the Jiang Family, the sixth elder, Jiang Tie.


    Jiang Tie was the other elder who had supported Jiang Zhi Shu when he had been in the Jiang Family, which was why Jiang Mu had chosen him to take care of Jiang Zhi Shu. If it was Jiang Tie, at least he would have some discretion in how he treated Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Aftering forward, Jiang Tie hesitated for a second before summoning out his pet. It was a strange pet, it was a puppet that waspletely made of iron.


    Jiang Tie looked at Jiang Zhi Shu with an awkward look as he said, "Xiao Shu, sorry about this." Then he shouted, "Combine!"


    With a sh of light, the puppet suddenly flew towards Jiang Tie andpletely transformed. It opened up and wrappedpletely around Jiang Tie''s body, like a suit of armour.


    Like his namesake, Jiang Tie was an expert who used this special Iron Golem pet to create a suit of iron armour for himself. Combining his own power with this Iron Golem pet, it allowed him to be a powerful physical cultivator.


    With this Iron Golem pet, he had defeated countless enemies and gained plenty of battle experience which had helped fuel his cultivation, allowing him to reach the peak tinum Realm. So even though he was the youngest out of all six elders, he definitely wasn''t someone who could be ignored.


    Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t worry since he had Rocky behind him.


    This was one of the special trump cards that Lin Fan had lent Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Jiang Zhi Shu knew how powerful Rocky was after fighting with itst time, so he knew that even if he was facing a peak tinum Realm Expert, he would have no problem being able to match them.


    Jiang Zhi Shu pulled out his normal spear and wrapped Rocky''s stonews around it, adopting a ready stance as he faced Jiang Tie.


    Jiang Tie once again hesitated a second, but then he charged out without any hesitation at all. Jiang Tie had raised his fist which had hisws of stone gathered around it, hardening the iron armour around his hand.


    The Iron Golem armour was already strong enough by itself, but after being hardened by stonews, it became hard enough to punch through iron sheets.


    Jiang Zhi Shu still wasn''t worried since he knew that Rocky was a mutated beast.


    Mutated beasts were regarded as the kings of pets since they were beasts that could skip levels to fight. Even if Rocky was only in the high tinum Realm, itsws were more than enough to take on this peak tinum Realm Expert.


    The tip of the spear and the fist collided, bncing for only a single second before the tip of the spear bent slightly and Jiang Zhi Shu had been pushed back by several steps.


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked down at the spear in his hands and knew that he had made a mistake.


    If he had been facing any other elder, it would be fine since Rocky''sws would be strong enough to stop them. But this wasn''t the case with Jiang Tie and his impregnable defense.


    It was so strong that Jiang Zhi Shu''s weapon couldn''tst even if Rocky''sws matched his.


    But Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t panic. He just casually put his own weapon away and pulled out a pure white spear.

 290 Chapter 290

    This pure white spear was the second trump card that Lin Fan had left Jiang Zhi Shu.


    It was nothing other than the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    The moment Jiang Zhi Shu pulled out the spear, Jiang Tie could feel a change in the aura around him, but he still had his own pride. He didn''t believe that just a single spear would be enough to turn the entire fight around.


    It was too bad that his judgement of the situation waspletely off.


    Jiang Zhi Shu once again surrounded the pure white spear with stonews, creating ayer of stone over it as he aimed it at Jiang Tie.


    Jiang Tie didn''t hesitate at all as he charged forth with his iron covered fist, aiming his right one right at Jiang Zhi Shu''s face. He wanted to end it with a single punch that would knock out Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Jiang Zhi Shu didn''t panic at all as he waited for just the right second before swinging the spear up, colliding with the iron covered fist.


    But the difference this time was that the spear didn''t bend at all. Rather without any hesitation, the iron covered fist was easily knocked aside. It wasn''t just knocked aside, there was even ayer of iron that was cut right off.


    The force of the upwards swingpletely changed the direction of momentum for Jiang Tie, causing him to swerve off to the side.


    Jiang Zhi Shu took advantage of this to charge forth past the fist, turning in the air with his spear before mming it down on Jiang Tie''s head.


    If he hadn''t tilted his spear at thest second so the t end of the spear''s de had hit Jiang Tie''s head, with how he had cut through the iron armour earlier, he might have cut Jiang Tie''s head in half.


    In the end, Jiang Zhi Shu still had a bit of an emotional attachment to the Jiang Family since they were the ones who raised him. Even if they had abandoned him and taken away in the end, there were still good memories that existed between him and them.


    Jiang Tie''s armour couldn''t take the force transferred from the spear at all and Jiang Tie was knocked to the ground, not getting up again. The force transferred from the armour was enough to jolt his brain and knock him unconscious.


    Everyone was shocked into silence when they saw this.


    The experts in the room could all tell from Jiang Zhi Shu''s aura that he was only in the mid tinum Realm. Even if thews that he used was a bit stronger than his current realm, he shouldn''t have reached the level where he could take out a peak tinum Realm Expert this easily.


    Even those that weren''t experts could tell that there was a natural difference in strength between Jiang Tie and Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Everyone immediately turned their attention to the spear in Jiang Zhi Shu''s hand.


    The moment the spear had been pulled out, everything had suddenly changed.


    Jiang Zhi Shu was able to easily overpower Jiang Tie with this spear, changing into apletely different person.


    The Iron Eater Bone Artifact was the main reason why Lin Fan was confident in his n in letting Jiang Zhi Shu show himself.


    After the Sacred Rock Realm, the Iron Eater Bone Artifact had already reached the peak Embryo Soul Realm, surpassing the peak of this Blue Star by an entire realm.


    Each minor realm in the Soul Realm was a chasm that was hard to jump, the distance between each major realm was like the distance between stars.


    With just this spear, there was no one present today that could take care of Jiang Zhi Shu unless the ancestor of the Jiang Family were to show himself. But the ancestor of a family wouldn''t join a battle so easily, unless the entire Jiang Family was in danger. The main reason for this was that the ancestor of the Jiang Family was getting close to reaching the end of his lifespan.


    Unless he was able to breakthrough again, his natural limit woulde one day and he would die of old age.


    Of course, by cultivating and locking himself in to maintain a low level of activity could allow him to save some vitality, but that was a low grade move.


    Still, every bit of vitality counted since after all, no one ever wanted to die.


    That was why Lin Fan was confident in Jiang Zhi Shu and his n.


    That was, unless¡­


    Lin Fan who had been silently sitting in the crowd turned to look at Jiang Qi Tai who had been hiding behind the elders.<sub> </sub>


    He could sense a familiar aura from him, but it was alsopletely unfamiliar to him.


    He just couldn''t get an exact sense of what it was¡­


    Jiang Mu who had been looking away couldn''t help turning at thest second when Jiang Zhi Shu overpowered Jiang Tie, knocking him out.


    He never expected Jiang Zhi Shu to be this powerful, but he also narrowed his eyes to look at the spear in Jiang Zhi Shu''s hand. After a slight pause, his pupils suddenly shrank as he revealed a shocked look.


    The current leaders of the Jiang Family were all the descendants of the ancestor, namely the six elders and the family head, they were all brothers. They were the seven sons of the Jiang Family ancestor.


    The family head and the first elder Jiang Mu were specialpared to the rest of their siblings.


    As the first son of the ancestor, Jiang Mu had been carefully nurtured by his father. As a child he had been exposed to much morepared to the rest of his brothers, allowing him to learn much more than them.


    Naturally, that included information on the Legendary Realm.


    He had followed his father once to meet with the upper realm faction that they served and in that encounter, he had encountered an aura that he had never felt before. His father hadter told him that that was a power that was out of reach of the Blue Star, only those that ascended to the upper realm could ever reach that power.


    Unfortunately, the Jiang Family never had the talent to catch the eyes of the upper realm faction, so they never had anyone ascend.


    Even now the Jiang Family ancestor was still stuck in the low Fragmented Soul Realm after several centuries.


    Jiang Mu knew that this spear was from the realm that was beyond the peak of the Blue Star, it was in the realm above his father, it was the Embryo Soul Realm.


    But what he didn''t understand was just how Jiang Zhi Shu had obtained this artifact!


    With the way Jiang Zhi Shu had suddenly be stronger and the fact that he had obtained an item that shouldn''t belong in this realm, could it mean that there was another upper realm faction behind him?


    If that were the case, were they all being used as pawns in an borate chess game?


    But Jiang Mu didn''t have time to think about this, right now what mattered was the Jiang Family. If he didn''t control this situation now, it would spiral out of control and the damage to the Jiang Family would be irreparable.


    Jiang Mu nodded to another two old men who were sitting in the front row and they both came forward. These two old men were respectively the third and fifth elders of the Jiang Family.


    In this scenario, they all knew that if they didn''t stop Jiang Zhi Shu now, it would be toote for the Jiang Family, so there was no time to care about shame.


    With how easily Jiang Zhi Shu took care of Jiang Tie, it was clear that he was much stronger than any one of them alone. Since that was the case, they could only take the insults and send two elders to incapacitate him.


    Well, the best scenario was if they could incapacitate him and they could interrogate him about this spear he was holding, but that seemed very unlikely. It had reached the point where it didn''t matter what they did, they just had to stop him. Even if that meant they had to kill Jiang Zhi Shu to silence him.


    The third and fifth elders were the two elders that got along the best, so theirbination y was close to unstoppable. Still, even with that in their pockets, there wasn''t a single thing they could do to Jiang Zhi Shu.


    At first he did struggle to avoid theirbination attacks, but as the fight dragged on, Jiang Zhi Shu''s situation became better and better.


    Soon it was no effort at all for him to dodge the moves of the elders, rather it almost seemed like he was using them as grindstones to train himself.


    When it finally seemed like he had learnt all that he could learn from them, Jiang Zhi Shu did the same thing he did with Jiang Tie. With two simple sweeps of the spear, the t end of the de hit both of their heads and they were both knocked out, falling to Jiang Zhi Shu''s feet.


    Jiang Zhi Shu never even considered killing them since one, they were still family and two, they were useful as hostages.


    No matter what was said, Yuan Xiang Qin was still in the hands of the Jiang Family, so before she was by his side, he couldn''t take a single risk with her life.


    Jiang Zhi Shu turned to Jiang Mu again after he took care of the two elders and said, "Next."

 291 Chapter 291

    After Jiang Zhi Shu''s words rang through the wedding hall, all that he was met with wasplete silence.


    Neither of the two remaining elders of the Jiang Family moved forward, rather they even took a step back.


    Jiang Mu clearly knew what kind of weapon Jiang Zhi Shu was holding and to deal with it, the only thing he could possibly think of was inviting the ancestor out and that was the one thing the Jiang Family could never do. The ancestor was the crux of the Jiang Family and if something were to ever happen to him, the entire Jiang Family would copse.


    Unless the Jiang Family was certain to die, the ancestor would never be invited out.


    Jiang Mu and the second elder looked at each other before Jiang Mu came forward to say, "Xiao Shu, you''ve done more than enough today, let''s not make this any bigger and have a talk between us."


    Finally the Jiang Family was willing to put down their pride and negotiate.


    Of course, the only reason for this was because it was Jiang Zhi Shu and they hadn''t lost anything substantial. All they had lost was a bit of face from having three of their elders defeated, but none of these elders had lost their lives, so that meant that it could all be ignored.


    Moreover, what Jiang Mu wanted to do was recruit Jiang Zhi Shu back into the Jiang Family.


    He didn''t know where Jiang Zhi Shu had found this backer that had given him this powerful weapon, but if Jiang Zhi Shu was pulled into the Jiang Family, wouldn''t that mean that that backer woulde to the Jiang Family?


    At that time, what couldn''t the Jiang Family do on this Blue Star with two upper realm factions behind them?


    Not to mention that they had the perfect bait to pull Jiang Zhi Shu back into the Jiang Family.


    Why did Jiang Zhi Shu leave in the first ce?


    Wasn''t it just for that girl?


    If they were to ept her and give her back to him, wouldn''t this all go away?


    But before Jiang Zhi Shu could even say a thing, Jiang Qi Tai spoke first, "First elder, what do you think you''re doing?"


    Jiang Mu knit his brows when he heard this since he could tell from Jiang Qi Tai''s tone what he nned on doing.


    Jiang Mu turned to Jiang Qi Tai and said, "Nephew, you should know that the most important thing is the good of the Jiang Family?"


    Jiang Qi Tai looked at Jiang Mu for a second before breaking out inughter, "Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!"


    Everyone in the hall looked at Jiang Qi Tai with strange gazes. To them, it seemed like he had gone crazy by the situation he had been forced into.


    Naturally they knew about the love triangle between the two brothers and now the older brother hade back with such power that even the Jiang Family couldn''t ignore, it was clear that the Jiang Family would side with the older brother. Of course, that meant he also got the girl¡­


    That was just how this world worked, the strong took what they wanted and anything could change at any moment.


    Jiang Mu came forward and raised his hand to tryforting Jiang Qi Tai, as he said, "Nephew, you should know¡­"


    Jiang Qi Tai suddenly revealed a fierce look and pped Jiang Mu''s hand away as he said, "What do you know? You know nothing!"


    Then he turned to Jiang Zhi Shu and then, like changing into a different person, he revealed a calm look and gave a sigh, "I guess I have to do everything myself."


    Without giving Jiang Zhi Shu even a chance to respond, he immediately jumped out, pulling out a dagger that waspletely enshrouded in darkness from his Spatial Ring. This dagger didn''t look all that special, but the aura around it made everyone present immediately look at it.


    This wasn''t just a special aura like the one around the pure white spear that Jiang Zhi Shu had, there was also a sinister feeling that was in this aura that couldn''t help make a chill run down a person''s back.


    The dagger didn''t seem like it was moving, but it did move as it came down to meet the spear tip that Jiang Zhi Shu quickly swept up in response to Jiang Qi Tai''s attack.


    The two weapons shed and the force between them bnced for a bit before both sides were pushed back an equal distance.


    Everyone watching this was surprised, but there were many different people with different reactions to this.


    For those that didn''t know anything, they were just shocked by the shockwave that came from that sh. Just that shockwave alone was enough to tell them just how powerful that sh was, but they had no idea what realm these two were in.<sub> </sub>


    As for those that did know what was going on, they naturally knew what this equal sh meant.


    Even if Jiang Zhi Shu had been caught off guard, not allowing him to use his full power, this dagger had been able to face the pure white spear head on without losing even the slightest bit.


    When the elders had faced Jiang Zhi Shu, they had been very careful not to take a direct hit from that spear out of fear that their artifacts would be destroyed by that spear. After all, that spear had already surpassed the peak of this lower realm, it could easily break their artifacts.


    All this was enough to prove that while this dagger was slightly inferior to the pure white spear, it wasn''t that much weaker. This dagger had probably also surpassed the peak of this lower realm.


    Jiang Mu narrowed his eyes and said, "Nephew, where did you get that dagger?"


    But Jiang Qi Taipletely ignored him as the dark energy of the dagger slowly surrounded him, coating him in its power.


    As it surrounded him, there was a blood red glow that slowly appeared in his eyes. It crept across his iris and across his pupil covering it with an eerie blood red glow.


    Jiang Qi Tai himself had to look down at his hands first to look over his own power before giving augh, "Ha, ha, ha!"


    Then he immediately stoppedughing and said to Jiang Zhi Shu with an ice cold look, "Die!"


    Jiang Zhi Shu was about to raise the spear in his hand to meet Jiang Qi Tai''s attack again, but before he could, there was a white sh of lightning that suddenly flew past him. The bolt of lightning continued forward until it hit Jiang Qi Tai''s dagger, stopping him in his tracks and forcing him back a few steps.


    Lin Fan was already standing as he walked over to Jiang Zhi Shu, reaching his hand out.


    Jiang Zhi Shu naturally knew what was happening, so he immediately handed over the pure white spear.


    Lin Fan took the spear and it immediately changed forms, going from the form of a spear to the form of a sword.


    Jiang Mu looked at Lin Fan with a bewildered look.


    He could tell from the aura of the bolt of lightning that it was only lightningw that was in the medium tinum Realm, but based on the force that it had behind it, he knew that even he might not have been able to take this bolt of lightning head on.


    Then there was the fact that Jiang Zhi Shu had willingly handed over the Embryo Soul Realm Artifact¡­


    Just who was this man?


    It was too bad that none of them had noticed the slight golden and green glow that had been surrounding this bolt of lightning.


    Yes, thew of lightning was in the mid tinum Realm, but there wasn''t just a singlew that made up that bolt of lightning. That bolt of lightning had also been strengthened and sped up by thews of power and wind respectively.


    Jiang Qi Tai clutched his chest and spat out a mouthful of blood before looking at Lin Fan with a wary look as he asked the question in Jiang Mu''s heart, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan ignored him as he muttered to himself, "It''s like light and darkws, but it''s different. That red glow must be the key, but what could it mean?"


    Jiang Qi Tai''s face sunk when he heard this. He knew that he was being looked down on, but he still didn''t dare make a rash move since he couldn''t see through this person.


    Lin Fan then suddenly revealed a look of understanding as he said, "Murder, it''s thew of murder. Isn''t that right?"


    Jiang Qi Tai didn''t react as he casually said, "That''s right."


    Lin Fan nodded as he said, "I get it now, it''s a singlew, but there is more than one side to murder. The murder of viins is justice while the murder of the innocent is evil. They are two sides of the same coin just like light and darkness, that is how you can draw out the powers that should belong to just light and darkws respectively."


    Jiang Qi Tai asked once again, "Who are you?"


    This time, Lin Fan finally answered, but it wasn''t the answer that Jiang Qi Tai wanted. He said while shaking his head, "Who I am is not important, it''s more important to know who you are. Which part of his soul are you?"


    Jiang Qi Tai revealed a terrifying look when he heard this, it was like his tail had been stepped on.


    Lin Fan then revealed a smile as he said, "There''s no need to ask. The fact that you''ve taken over this boy and are trying to take over the Jiang Family, it''s clear that you''re his ambition, isn''t that right?"

 292 Chapter 292

    Jiang Qi Tai immediately calmed down, looking like a different person from the terrifying one that he had been before.


    Jiang Qi Tai revealed a faint smile and spread his hands as he said, "Since you know, you know. What''s the point of hiding it?"


    Lin Fan slightly knit his brows when he heard this since this was not what he had expected.


    He had expected Jiang Qi Tai to curse or shout, evenughing like a maniac would be normal since it would mean that he would be panicking. But since he was this calm, it clearly meant that he still had another n which was not a good sign.


    Lin Fan calmly said, "What are you nning on doing now?"


    Jiang Qi Tai looked at Lin Fan before saying, "What do you think I''ll do?" But before Lin Fan could even respond, Jiang Qi Tai snapped his fingers and several people around them copsed instantly.


    All the people that copsed were people with low levels of cultivation, mainly the staff working at the wedding and a few of the guards.


    However, the moment they did copse, there was a strange red energy that came out of them and floated through the air, moving towards Jiang Qi Tai.


    The red energy seeped into his body and his aura seemed like it was slowly increasing. It grew along with theyer of red energy that was gradually bing more and more visible around him.


    It continued to grow until it formed ayer of armour around his body, an eerie looking blood red armour made of pure energy.


    Lin Fan immediately knit his brows when he saw this.


    Jiang Qi Tai didn''t look worried at all as he casually stood there with the dagger slightly leaning down, almost falling out of his hands as he said, "Did you expect this?"


    Lin Fan could instantly tell what had happened.


    With thew of murder, the more one killed, the stronger one became. Using this, Jiang Qi Tai had ced marks that would explode and kill the targets that he ced them on when he wanted to, allowing him to kill them to increase his own power.


    Judging by how strong the blood red energy armour was around him, Lin Fan guessed that Jiang Qi Tai had already killed around a hundred people. It had even pushed hisws into the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    As for the reason why Lin Fan knit his brows, it wasn''t because he was worried about this. Rather he did this for the amount of innocent people that Jiang Qi Tai killed.


    None of these people deserved to die, but they had died at the hands of Jiang Qi Tai to make himself stronger.


    Lin Fan felt an impulseing from inside that made him want to punish Jiang Qi Tai, butpared to before, it was much weaker.


    Jiang Mu knitted his brows when he saw what had happened and he said, "Nephew, what you just did¡­"


    But before he could even finish, Jiang Qi Tai said, "Shut your mouth. You are not qualified to talk here."


    Jiang Mu knitted his brows even deeper, but he didn''t say anything in response since he could tell from his aura that Jiang Qi Tai was much strongerpared to before. He was right, at this point, Jiang Mu really wasn''t qualified to speak.


    Jiang Qi Tai turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Do you have any other ns? If not, are you prepared to die?"


    Lin Fan didn''t understand why Jiang Qi Tai was this confident, but he knew why Jiang Qi Tai was rushing. The power gained from killing with thew of murder was only temporary, so if he stalled any longer, he wouldn''t have this power any longer.


    There were already faint wisps of red energy that were escaping from the armour that was around him.


    Lin Fan casually said, "You and I both know your time is limited, so why are you wasting time with words?


    Jiang Qi Tai revealed a wicked smile when he heard this as he said, "You really don''t know what''s good for you. In this situation, wouldn''t the right thing to do be to stall for time and not egg your opponent on? Yet you do the exact opposite. Are you just that confident or do you have some kind of n?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug and didn''t reply.


    Actually, he felt it was strange that Jiang Qi Tai was also stalling with words even though his power was temporary.


    The only exnation for this was that he had some other n that he was stalling for time for.<sub> </sub>


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t give him that chance. He would rather face him head on than to give him a chance to devise even more ns. That was just how confident he was in his own ability to face Jiang Qi Tai.


    Jiang Qi Tai still wasn''t in a rush to charge forward as he calmly stood there looking at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan knew that in this situation, the only thing he could do was put pressure on Jiang Qi Tai, so he took the initiative and moved forward.


    When he did, Jiang Qi Tai actually took a step back and raised his hand.


    The moment his hand came up, there were five of the guests that suddenly had red lines appear over their clothes and all around their body.


    The five of them quickly gathered around Lin Fan in a star formation and there was an array that was drawn in between them, surrounding Lin Fan. The array created red walls of energy that trapped Lin Fan in the center of the array, not allowing him to move forward.


    This kind of array wasn''t a killing array, it was a simple trapping array. It wasn''t hard for Lin Fan to break, but it was definitely time consuming. It would take Lin Fan a bit of time before he would be able to break through it.


    But why was Jiang Qi Tai doing all of this?


    First he had a power that was running out of time and yet he was the one that was stalling for time. Just why did he do something this contradictory?


    Jiang Qi Tai just stood there, watching as Lin Fan slowly broke through the array. During this time, he didn''t raise a single finger to attack Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan finally broke through the array, a minute had already passed.


    It was at this point that Jiang Qi Tai threw out several puppets from his Spatial Ring which had jumped forward to attack Lin Fan, holding him back.


    These puppets were all in the peak Gold Realm, so they couldn''t take a single hit from Lin Fan. However, these puppets hade one after the other, so they were effective in taking up a bit of Lin Fan''s time.


    Just like this, Jiang Qi Tai kept moving back while throwing all kinds of different artifacts that slowed down Lin Fan. As time passed, it had been a whole five minutes that had passed before Jiang Qi Tai finally ran out of items.


    When Lin Fan was finally about to reach Jiang Qi Tai, there was a burst of energy that came from the Jiang Manor. This burst of energy was like the wisps of blood red energy that hade from the people Jiang Qi Tai had killed, but it was countless times strongerpared to the energy from before.


    Jiang Qi Tai revealed a faint smile as he muttered, "It''s finally here."


    This burst of energy swirled in the sky above the wedding hall before falling down right onto Jiang Qi Tai.


    Jiang Qi Tai gave another wildugh as he said to Lin Fan, "Do you feel regret now? Who told you to hold back and test me, who told you to not finish me off sooner?"


    Lin Fan could tell that this energy had already surpassed the low and medium Fragmented Soul Realm, it was already approaching the high Fragmented Soul Realm and didn''t seem like it would stop any time soon.


    At first he had been confused why this had happened, he easily understood what had happened.


    The only exnation for this was that something had happened to the Jiang Family''s ancestor.


    Somehow, Jiang Qi Tai had managed to find a way to hurt the Jiang Family''s ancestor and that allowed him to turn this damage into power with hisw of murder.


    Since Jiang Qi Tai was much weaker than the Jiang Family''s ancestor, by hurting someone that was much stronger than him, thew of murder awarded him ordingly. With how his aura was increasing, it was likely he might even reach the peak Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan only had a single question that he asked, "How did you do it?"


    Jiang Qi Tai, or rather the fragment of the Beast King''s ambition was filled with arrogance, so of course he started bragging. Jiang Qi Tai had a wicked smile as he said, "That old coot didn''t let his guard down for a single second, but it was too bad he trusts his own family members too much."


    When Jiang Mu heard this, he immediately knitted his brows and shouted, "Jiang Qi Tai, what did you do?!"


    Jiang Qi Taipletely ignored him as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "Now tell me, how do you want to suf¡­"


    But before he could finish, the burst of energying from the Jiang Family had suddenly stopped.

 293 Chapter 293

    Jiang Qi Tai didn''t know how to react at first, but once he did react, he immediately turned in the direction of the Jiang Family with a look of disbelief.


    Jiang Qi Tai muttered, "What''s happening? How could this be happening?"


    He shook his head in disbelief, clearly still not being able to wrap his head around this.


    Everything had been nned out perfectly, he had locked up the ancestor of the Jiang Family and had been slowly killing him with an array. He had sped up the array so the Jiang Family ancestor would die today, to give him the burst of power that he needed, but that shouldn''t have changed anything.


    So why did that burst of power that he received suddenly stop!


    It was too bad that the piece of the Beast King''s soul that had possessed Jiang Qi Tai only contained its ambition, making it want to be the new main part of the Beast King''s soul, taking over the rest of the other parts.


    Since it was only the ambition part, it didn''t have the same intelligence that the Beast King would have had. Other than having some knowledge that belonged to the Beast King, it didn''t have much else.


    It was only a small portion of the Beast King''s soul, so topare it, it was the equivalent to the soul of a child. That was why it had been so immature and while its ns seemed meticulous, they seemed a little messy.


    Jiang Qi Tai hadpletely lost his calm at this moment, wildly looking around trying to find a way to escape.


    But how could Lin Fan give it a chance?


    Lin Fan knew what the sudden burst of energy meant and for it to suddenly stop like this, it could only mean a single thing. The Jiang Family ancestor had broken free of whatever n Jiang Qi Tai had set up for him and was nowing this way.


    Lin Fan was unclear what would happen since he didn''t know the rtionship the Jiang Family ancestor had with the Jiang Family, but he didn''t want to even try to take that chance. After all, everything he had done had been harmful to the Jiang Family, so he could be considered an enemy to the Jiang Family.


    Lin Fan immediately charged forward and his sword was suddenly covered in three different glows.


    Jiang Qi Tai saw this and he began to panic, but he also swept out his dagger, creating a giant red wave of energy that flew up to create a wall.


    He had already gained the power of the Fragmented Soul Realm already with the first burst of energy that hade from the Jiang Family. Working along with the Embryo Soul Realm dagger, it was more than enough to hold back Lin Fan temporarily even with his increase in power.


    Jiang Qi Tai didn''t hesitate at all as he turned to run away.


    Jiang Mu and the second elder were in his way since they knew that they couldn''t let Jiang Qi Tai go for what he did, but naturally they weren''t a match for him. It only took a single sweep of his dagger to push both of them out of his way.


    p Still, that dy was all that was necessary for a certain someone to arrive.</anda>


    Through the broken skylight, there was a figure that slowly floated down above everyone, putting pressure on everyone present.


    Jiang Qi Tai felt this pressure and tried to run out the back, but unfortunately there was a stone wall that suddenly appeared in front of him, blocking his way.


    Jiang Qi Tai turned to look at the figure in the sky and without any hesitation again, he said with a smile, "Grandfather, you''re finally here!" He immediately pointed at Lin Fan before shouting, "This is the person who has attacked our Jiang Family, please save me!"


    The Jiang Family ancestor Jiang Wan Li looked down at Jiang Qi Tai and gave a snort.


    When he had broken through the killing array that had been arranged around the residence that he had gone into for closed door cultivation, he had felt the trace of Jiang Qi Tai''s aura stuck to the array.


    Unless his head had been kicked in, he knew that Jiang Qi Tai was involved in this.


    Jiang Wan Li didn''t pay any attention to Jiang Qi Tai''s words as he flew down, charging at him with his palm covered in hisw energy raised, preparing to m it down on him.


    Jiang Wan Li was naturally confident, after all, he was one of the five Legendary Realm Experts of the Eastern Continent, one of the few at the peak of this Blue Star. Even if he was slightly injured from the killing array, he was more than confident in taking care of Jiang Qi Tai.


    Lin Fan saw this and he didn''t fall behind as he raised his sword while charging at Jiang Qi Tai.


    Jiang Qi Tai saw both of these threatsing at him and since he couldn''t escape, the only thing he could do was raise his dagger and sweep out to create a wave of red energy that flew out to meet Jiang Wan Li and Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    Both Lin Fan and Jiang Wan Li met this wave of energy with their sword and fist respectively, but then they were pushed back.


    Jiang Wan Li knitted his brows when he was pushed back by this attack since he never expected Jiang Qi Tai to be this strong. It was also at this moment that he noticed Lin Fan, knitting his brows even deeper.


    He could tell that Lin Fan was powerful, to the point where he could even be considered a threat to him, but he definitely didn''t recognize him.


    Jiang Wan Li turned to Jiang Zhi Shu and said, "Zhi Shu, who is he?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu was confused when he heard this, but before he could say a thing, Lin Fan spoke first, "That''s not important now, we should take care of him first."


    Jiang Wan Li narrowed his eyes to look over Lin Fan before giving a nod, "How do you want to do this?"


    Lin Fan said, "If you can hold him, I can knock him out and capture him."


    Jiang Wan Li paused for a second like he was thinking this over.


    Jiang Wan Li couldn''t feel any hostility towards him from Lin Fan, but of course he could feel the hostility Lin Fan had towards Jiang Qi Tai. Based on that, he assumed that Lin Fan was Jiang Qi Tai''s enemy and as the saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.


    Jiang Wan Li gave a nod before saying, "Alright, let''s do this."


    Then he raised his energy and lifted both his hands up.


    The moment his hands came up, there were walls of stone that were lifted up around Jiang Qi Tai, cornering him inside the boxpletely made of stone.


    Jiang Qi Tai immediately fell into a panic and he swept out his dagger to create red waves that mmed into the walls, but they couldn''t break through.


    As Jiang Qi Tai continued attacking the walls, Lin Fan locked onto a position in space. With a single thought from him, he used his spatialws to appear right behind Jiang Qi Tai and using the back of his de, he hit the back of his neck to knock him out.


    Jiang Wan Li gave a nod when he saw this and released the stone walls, revealing Lin Fan and the unconscious Jiang Qi Tai. Then he turned to Jiang Zhi Shu and said, "Zhi Shu, tell me the situation."


    Jiang Zhi Shu was still confused by Jiang Wan Li''s words. After all, he was already no longer a part of the Jiang Family, he had been banished for a long time, so why did the ancestor still treat him as part of the Jiang Family?


    Jiang Zhi Shu asked in a confused voice, "Ancestor, why are you asking me this?"


    Jiang Wan Li also revealed a confused look when he heard this, but he asked, "Aren''t you the current head of the Jiang Family? Isn''t this your wedding? What happened to Qi Tai? Also, where''s Hei?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu couldn''t help asking in a surprised voice, "Head of the Jiang Family? No, I was exiled from the Jiang Family a long time ago."


    Jiang Wan Li deeply knit his brows when he heard this.


    Jiang Wan Li had been in seclusion for a long time and thest time he received any news was when Jiang Zhi Shu was brought to meet him a long time ago. Jiang Wan Li had noticed Jiang Zhi Shu''s talent and Jiang Zhi Shu had made a good impression on him, so he always assumed that Jiang Zhi Shu would be the family head one day, taking over for his father.


    So when he came out and saw Jiang Zhi Shu, naturally he thought that Jiang Zhi Shu had already taken over or was close to taking over and would be able to exin everything to him.


    But before he could continue questioning Jiang Zhi Shu, Jiang Qi Tai woke up.


    However, the one that spoke this time wasn''t the controlled Jiang Qi Tai, rather it was the original Jiang Qi Tai.


    He had a pounding headache and was very dizzy from being hit on the back of the neck, but he did get a good look at Jiang Wan Li and Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Once he saw them, he immediately said, "Ancestor, brother, please kill me!"

 294 Chapter 294

    This time, everyone was surprised by what Jiang Qi Tai had said.


    Everyone just looked at Jiang Qi Tai with confused gazes, that was until Jiang Zhi Shu was the first to realize what had happened.


    Jiang Zhi Shu said, "Qi Tai, is that you? Did you break free?"


    Jiang Qi Tai looked at Jiang Zhi Shu with a look filled with sadness as he said, "Brother, this wasn''t how I intended to see you again, but I ask you to kill me now. Kill me before it takes over again."


    These words had confirmed Jiang Zhi Shu''s doubts.


    Jiang Zhi Shu said in a confused voice, "Qi Tai, what happened to you?"


    But Jiang Qi Tai didn''t have time to answer this question at all.


    His face twisted like he was in pain and he gave a groan before saying, "There''s no time for this now. Kill me before he takes over again!"


    Both Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Wan Li had difficult looks on their faces since they all had reservations about killing him.


    For Jiang Wan Li, Jiang Qi Tai was one of the most talented juniors of the Jiang Family just like Jiang Zhi Shu, so it would be too much of a loss for Jiang Qi Tai to die right now.


    As for Jiang Zhi Shu, even with all that Jiang Qi Tai had done, he was still the little brother that he grew up with. Even if he said that he no longer felt anything for him, that would be a lie after finding out that Jiang Qi Tai had been controlled. Without being able to first determine what had happened, it was impossible for Jiang Zhi Shu to put down all these emotions.


    Seeing that neither Jiang Zhi Shu or Jiang Wan Li was doing a thing, Jiang Qi Tai turned to the other people in the hall. When his eyes fell onto Jiang Mu, he said, "First elder, kill me. You know what kind of things I''ve done, that was why you wanted to incite the coup. This is your chance to kill me now!"


    During his possession, there were times that Jiang Qi Tai knew exactly what he was doing even if he was powerless to stop himself. Of course he would know why the first elder would start a coup.


    Jiang Mu knitted his brows when he heard this, but when he looked at Jiang Wan Li, he didn''t take a single step.


    Jiang Qi Tai saw that nothing was working and he became anxious, but before he could even say another thing, Lin Fan had already knocked him out again.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan in shock, but he didn''t care at all as he said, "Isn''t this the best solution?"


    Then everyone revealed awkward looks, but they decided that Lin Fan was correct.


    Jiang Wan Li nodded to Jiang Mu who went with the second elder to send off all the guests and once all the guests were gone, they began cleaning up the hall and taking care of the other elders.


    Once the guests were gone, Jiang Wan Li brought Lin Fan and Jiang Zhi Shu over to one of the wedding reception tables and they all sat down.


    After a moment of silence, Jiang Wan Li was the first to break the silence as he said, "Zhi Shu, tell me everything that happened."


    Jiang Zhi Shu hesitated a bit before saying, "Grandfather, it is a very long story¡­"


    Jiang Wan Li nodded before saying, "It''s fine, we have the time."


    Jiang Zhi Shu took a deep breath before he entered the story of everything that had happened between him and the Jiang Family. After the main part, he went onto his own story of bing a bandit and how he had met Lin Fan. Finally he ended the story of his attack on the Jiang Family and finally the wedding.


    Jiang Wan Li had been silent the entire time as he listened, but from time to time, he did slightly knit his brows.


    When it was all over, Jiang Wan Li turned to Jiang Mu by his side who hade over after he finished taking care of everything and asked, "When did the Jiang Family be so elite that we can''t marrymoners?"


    Based on the sarcastic tone in his voice, Jiang Mu''s forehead was covered in sweat as he said, "Father, the current Jiang Family isn''t like the Jiang Family of old. We''re one of the five Legendary Realm Families on the Eastern Continent, we have a reputation now that we have to uphold."


    Jiang Wan Li gave a cold snort when he heard this as he said in an ice cold voice, "So once the Jiang Family had a reputation, we didn''t need to obey thews of the human world? We could just trade and sell out fellow humans?"<sub> </sub>


    Jiang Mu began sweating even more when he heard this, "Father, it was necessary for us to build the Jiang Family to where it is now. If we hadn''t done this, who would have known what would have happened to the Jiang Family?"


    Jiang Wan Li didn''t say a thing which was much more terrifying than if he had said anything.


    Jiang Mu didn''t know what to do, but finally he said, "Father, we''ll stop the businesspletely."


    Only then did Jiang Wan Li finally say, "Good, now onto the topic of the crystals. But before that¡­" He turned to one of the pirs in the hall and said, "Qiang You, how about youe out and talk instead of hiding and listening?"


    There was a distortion in the air before Qiang You came out from behind the pir with an awkward smile.


    Jiang Wan Li pointed at the chair beside Jiang Mu and said, "Sit."


    Qiang You cupped his hands and gave a bow before sitting beside Jiang Mu. When he did sit down, he made a face at Jiang Mu which Jiang Mu reciprocated.


    These two were childhood friends who had grown up together, but they had drifted apart once the Jiang Family started messing with shady businesses.


    The Jiang Family hadn''t always been like this, they only started acting this way in thest century.


    Before this, Rock Mountain City was still a poor ce, but at least it was much cleaner and had better orderpared to what it was now.


    Jiang Wan Li took a sip of his tea and said, "Mu, tell me your side of the story. How did you find the crystals?"


    Jiang Mu cupped his hands and stood up as he told his story.


    The Jiang Family found these crystals a hundred years ago and at first, they had used these crystals as a source of knowledge. They interacted with the soul fragments inside these crystals and learned many different things from them which had allowed them to build up their Jiang Family over thest hundred years.


    But of course, those soul fragments had their own n and used the Jiang Family, which was evident by what the different crystals did. The one in the ve trade base used children to restore its own vitality so it could be revived. The one that had taken over Jiang Qi Tai had tried to kill Jiang Wan Li to increase its own power and take over the Jiang Family.


    These crystals had clearly used the Jiang Family for their own purpose, but without anyone pointing it out, no one had noticed a thing. People had just assumed that the Jiang Family had changed.


    All of this started a hundred years ago and it was a hundred years ago when Rock Mountain City had changed.


    After he finished listening to Jiang Mu''s story, Jiang Wan Li first bowed to Qiang You, "Xiao You, it was my fault for not paying attention to all of this and I''ve let down your father."


    Qiang You was taken aback at first, but he quickly stood up and shook his hands, "Lord Jiang, it''s not your fault, it''s not your fault."


    Jiang Wan Li and Qiang You''s father were the ones who had built Rock Mountain City and to hear about what had happened to the city they had built because of his descendants, Jiang Wan Li couldn''t help feeling ashamed and feeling like he let down Qiang You''s father who was his closest brother.


    After his bow, Jiang Wan Li turned back to Jiang Mu and said in a decisive voice, "From this day forth, the Jiang Family will close down all our bad businesses and return to the businesses we held a hundred years ago."


    Jiang Mu revealed an awkward look at this as he said, "But father, if we were to let go of all these businesses, the Jiang Family will copse. Moreover, there isn''t much time left before you¡­"


    Jiang Mu didn''t finish his sentence, but Jiang Wan Li naturally knew what he meant.


    Jiang Wan Li didn''t react at all to this, he just calmly said, "I''ve been selfish and have neglected the Jiang Family for too long. I thought that if I had a bit more time, I could break through, but it''s clear that it''s not possible. I still have a bit more time left, so I wille out and teach Zhi Shu until he reaches the Legendary Realm."


    Jiang Mu clearly looked like he had something else to say, but in front of his father, he couldn''t do anything other than agreeing.


    After that matter was set, Jiang Wan Li turned back to Jiang Qi Tai who was unconscious on the ground and said, "What do we do about Qi Tai?"

 295 Chapter 295

    Everyone was silent in front of Jiang Wan Li''s question since they didn''t have an answer at all.


    That was, everyone except Lin Fan.


    After hesitating for a second, Lin Fan said, "I might have a solution for this."


    Everyone immediately turned to Lin Fan when they heard this.


    Jiang Zhi Shu was the first one to speak as he said, "Boss, is that true? Do you really have a way to solve this?"


    Then after a pause, he said, "Boss, we''re trying to save him, not kill him, you do know that right?"


    Lin Fan softly hit him on the head and said, "Of course I know that."


    Jiang Wan Li calmly said, "Brother Lin, what kind of solution do you have?"


    Lin Fan slowly took out a crystal from his Storage Ring that he put on the table.


    This crystal was simr to the crystal that he had once seen in the ve trade base and that was because it was the same crystal. This was a special crystal that was found in upper realms that could be used to contain soul fragments or a spell from an expert.


    It had once contained a soul fragment from the Beast King, but after Lin Fan had taken it back, Momonga had done a bit of tinkering with it and had put one of his spells inside of the crystal.


    ording to what Momonga told him, it was supposedly a spell that could forcefully separate souls that were stuck together. He had never understood why Momonga had prepared this for him, but Momonga had told him that if he ever had an impulse that he couldn''t resist, he should use this crystal immediately.


    What he didn''t know was that Momonga hadn''t perfected this spell yet, so what he gave Lin Fan was only a weakened version of the spell. It would only temporarily split two souls that were stuck together.


    But it was a good thing that what was stuck to Jiang Qi Tai''s soul was nothing more than a single fragment containing the Beast King''s ambition, so this would be more than enough to take care of this.


    When he took out the crystal, everyone looked over it and their first reaction was: Isn''t this the same crystal that contained the soul fragment that took over Jiang Qi Tai?


    But Jiang Wan Li released his spiritual sense which was much stronger than the rest and he could tell that what was contained inside this crystal wasn''t a soul fragment. Instead it was a power that even he couldn''t understand, it was a power that was far beyond the scope of this lower realm.


    Once he realized this, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look as he fell into deep thought.


    But after a few seconds, he said, "Alright, since Brother Lin is confident, then let''s give it a try."


    Everyone looked at Jiang Wan Li in surprise, but since the leader of the Jiang Family had already spoken, what else could any of them do?


    Lin Fan took the crystal and moved over to Jiang Qi Tai who was on the ground. Raising the crystal that he held in his hand, injecting just a bit of his life energy in, the spell inside the crystal activated.


    There was a wave of dark energy that suddenly came out of the crystal andpletely wrapped around Jiang Qi Tai.


    The moment the dark energy wrapped around him, Jiang Qi Tai''s eyes suddenly popped open as he shouted, "What is this? What is going on?"


    Jiang Qi Tai began struggling, trying to break free of this dark energy, but the more he struggled, the more the dark energy wrapped around him.


    When he found that he couldn''t break free at all, Jiang Qi Tai turned to the people standing around him and shouted, "Help me, you can''t just do this to me! I am a part of the Jiang Family, we are family!"


    But seeing that no one around made a single move, Jiang Qi Tai immediately turned to Jiang Zhi Shu and said, "Big brother, please! I know that I made mistakes, but I promise I''ll make up for them!"


    Jiang Zhi Shu clenched his fists when he saw this and he was about to take a step forward when Lin Fan suddenly said, "Stop, it''s not him, you know that. It''s the soul fragment trying to get you to stop this."


    Jiang Zhi Shu wanted to say something, but then he took a deep breath and gave a nod. Without saying a single word, he turned and walked out of the hall to wait this entire thing out.


    Jiang Qi Tai saw that this wouldn''t work so he began calling out to the various other people present, but not a single person did a thing.<sub> </sub>


    Eventually, hepletely lost consciousness as the dark energy had wrapped him up. The dark energy flowed over his skin for a few minutes before a single ball of light appeared on Jiang Qi Tai''s chest.


    This ball of light had two different sides, one that waspletely blood red and one that was brown in colour. The side that was blood red took arger part of the ball of light, but with the dark energy surrounding it, it was slowly pulled away from the ball of light, letting the brown part berger.


    Eventually, the blood red part waspletely pulled away and there was only a single brown ball of light that was left on Jiang Qi Tai''s chest.


    The dark energy hadpletely surrounded the ball of blood red light which was much smallerpared to before. Then the dark energy moved away from Jiang Qi Tai,ing back to Lin Fan and presenting him with it.


    Lin Fan didn''t raise a hand to take it, rather he asked the blood red ball of light, "Where is the crystal that used to contain you?"


    The ball of light spoke, but this time it was a different voice. It was the same voice that he had heard from the dark figure back in the ve trade base.


    The blood red ball of light said, "Why would I tell you?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug, "Whether you tell me or not doesn''t really matter to me, but you and I both know that if you don''t tell me, this fragment of soul will soon cease to exist. Do you really want that?"


    The blood red ball of light would be sweating right now if it could. Lin Fan had easily called his bluff, so he really didn''t have a choice.


    The blood red ball of light floated down to Jiang Qi Tai''s finger and touching the ring on it, it activated the Spatial Ring to bring out a crystal that was just like the one that Lin Fan had just used.


    Lin Fan picked up the crystal and raised it to the blood red ball of light as he said, "You know what you do."


    The blood red ball of light looked dejected as it moved to the crystal, allowing it topletely suck itself in.


    Once that was over, there was a blood red sh of light that came from the crystal before quickly fading. Once it was over, the crystal changed from its normal colour to a blood red colour.


    Lin Fan waved his hand and put the crystal away before heading back to the others.


    Jiang Wan Li had had his brows knit when he saw what Lin Fan did and he couldn''t help asking, "Brother Lin, that crystal¡­"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "My master will be interested in this."


    He didn''t give another exnation beyond that, but that was more than enough for everyone here.


    Lin Fan had been able to pull all these strange things that clearly didn''t belong to this realm. For that to be possible, it was clear that he had some connection to the upper realm and a master would be the perfect example.


    None of them were crazy enough to offend an expert from the upper realm over something as small as this.


    It didn''t take long before Jiang Qi Tai woke up, but he clearly still wasn''t over the effect of having the Beast King''s soul fragment ripped out of him. He was incredibly weak, not even having the power to say anything.


    Jiang Wan Li had Jiang Mu bring Jiang Qi Tai to the side to heal before he went over to Jiang Zhi Shu who had juste back into the hall and said, "Zhi Shu, do you want to get married?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu waspletely shocked when he heard this, but seeing the serious look on Jiang Wan Li''s face, he gave a serious nod.


    Jiang Wan Li revealed a smile and patted his shoulder as he said, "Good! Everything''s already set up, so we might as well make the most of it!"


    It didn''t take them long to clear out everything and set it all up again. The bride had been held in an array in the back of the wedding hall, so it didn''t take long for her to prepare. As for the guests, even though most of them had been sent away by Jiang Mu, almost all of them were still waiting outside to see the results of this wedding, so it was easy for them to invite them all back in.


    Jiang Zhi Shu and Yuan Xiang Qin had their joyous reunion and then they were rushed into their wedding.


    Jiang Wan Li personally officiated the wedding, which showed that the Jiang Family fully supported this and it meant that Jiang Zhi Shu''s exile was officially over.


    It seemed like everything had ended on a happy ending to the nobles and royals of Rock Mountain City, but there was still plenty of other loose ends that needed to be taken care of under the surface.

 296 Chapter 296

    After the wedding, they all once again reconvened, but this time they all headed to the Jiang Manor.


    They all gathered in a single room in the Jiang Manor with everyone seated at a single table.


    In terms of the people gathered here, they could all be considered as the peak of Rock Mountain City. With the one exception of Lin Fan who no one knew about. But even if that was the case, not a single person in this room dared to look down on Lin Fan now.


    As for Jiang Zhi Shu, he was too busy flirting with Yuan Xiang Qin to notice anything.


    The first one to break the silence was Jiang Wan Li who said, "Brother Lin, just who are you?"


    This was a very blunt question, but it was definitely the question that was on everyone''s mind.


    After all, no one knew where Lin Fan hade from. They only knew that he was someone who had suddenly set up a pet shop in this city and he was someone who could take out these amazing items.


    There was no doubt that there must be something unbelievable behind him.


    Lin Fan tapped his finger on the table before saying, "I''m no one special, I''m just a resident of this."


    Everyone knitted their brows when they heard this, but Lin Fan''s next words changed their expression once again.


    "But I was lucky enough to find a master who could guide me."


    Once this was said, no one else said a single thing since they knew that Lin Fan didn''t want to continue this topic. Moreover, with how strong he was, there was nothing for them to gain if they were to offend him.


    The only important thing was that he didn''t seem to mean them any harm, so that was enough for them.


    After a pause, Jiang Wan Li continued, "Then let''s move onto the main topic then. Let''s discuss the future of Rock Mountain City."


    Once he had heard about what had happened to Rock Mountain City, Jiang Wan Li knew that things couldn''t continue like this. Since he wasing out now, they had to find a solution that would work for everyone and they couldn''t just let Rock Mountain City crumble away like this.


    Everyone at the table was silent when they heard this since they all knew that if they spoke first, they would be ousted by everyone else at this table.


    They all wanted the most benefits for this side, that was except for two people at this table.


    Both Jiang Wan Li and Qiang You just wanted what was best for the city.


    Both of them had the same reason for why they wanted this, it was all because of their individual promises to Qiang You''s father.


    Jiang Wan Li and Qiang You''s father had worked together to build this city, so it was as much his child as his actual children.


    As for Qiang You, he loved the city that his father had created and he had promised his father he would do his best to protect it. To this day, that feeling still hasn''t changed.


    For either of them to aplish this, they would need Lin Fan''s help, but Lin Fan stayed neutral to both sides.


    Jiang Wan Li said, "As I''ve said before, we''ll be giving up all our more shady businesses and will go back to our traditional businesses. Other than that, we will also be opening up all parts of the city to everyone. There will no longer be any separation in this city."


    Everyone was fine with the first part, but once Jiang Wan Li said the second part, there were many people who knitted their brows.


    Jiang Mu took the lead for them and asked, "Father, if we were to do that, it would be bad for the city."


    Jiang Wan Li gave a cold snort and said, "So it''s better topletely ignore the people who need help and only care about ourselves?"


    Jiang Mu didn''t give up as he said, "Father, if we do this, there will be plenty of bacsh from the other noble and royal families. Even if we were to announce this, it doesn''t mean the others will ept this."


    Jiang Wan Li just looked at Jiang Mu with a trace of sadness in his eyes as he said, "Mu, when did you be like this?"


    Jiang Mu was confused when he heard this and he asked, "Father, what do you mean?"


    Jiang Wan Li didn''t continue with this as he gave a sigh and said, "For now, even if the other families don''t agree, we will be doing our own part. We will take down the wall that divides the two parts of the town that we''ve set up, but if they refuse to change their ways, there''s nothing we can do."


    Jiang Mu took a deep look at Jiang Wan Li before cupping his hands to say, "As youmand, father."<sub> </sub>


    This was the bestpromise they could get, so Jiang Mu and the others he represented didn''t mind.


    After all, even if Jiang Wan Li was in the Legendary Realm, it didn''t mean that he would live forever. At best, he would have another fifty years.


    All they had to do was wait for another fifty years and then they would be able to return to the same way they lived before.


    Not to mention that with Jiang Wan Li out of his istion, it would mean they would have plenty of chances to learn from him which would greatly help their cultivation. If one of them could reach the Legendary Realm, which was more than likely with the teachings of Jiang Wan Li, it wouldn''t matter since they would still have a Legendary Realm Expert to support them.


    What they didn''t know was that Jiang Wan Li wasn''t nning on teaching them a single thing. In fact, he was already nning on letting the Jiang Family fall apart and be nothing more than a royal family after his death.


    This wasn''t the family that he had raised, they had changed during the time he had gone into closed door cultivation.


    But that was to be expected.


    After all, they had been controlled by the Beast King''s soul fragments for so long, it had fundamentally changed them. After acting so arrogantly for so long, it had already be their personality.


    To put it simply, the Jiang Family was already beyond saving.


    If that was the case, he would rather let it copse by his hands than to let it copse in any other fashion.


    Still, there was one thing that he couldn''t let copse. He had to at least leave one seed for the future of his family.


    After saying this, Jiang Wan Li turned over to Jiang Zhi Shu who was standing there with Yuan Xiang Qin, whispering into each other''s ears.


    They had been like this sinceing to the Jiang Manor, they had beenpletely lost in their own world.


    Jiang Wan Li gave a cough which brought Jiang Zhi Shu''s attention back and then he said, "Zhi Shu, do you still want to keep working for Brother Lin?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu never expected to hear this from Jiang Wan Li.


    This had actually been a matter on the back of Jiang Zhi Shu''s mind the entire time.


    He knew that with Jiang Wan Li''s appearance, he would be expected to return to the Jiagn Family and be their sessor again, but that was thest thing that he wanted. He wanted to go with Lin Fan since he had already promised his life to him, he didn''t want to go back to that dark family ever again.


    ? But before Jiang Zhi Shu could say a thing, Jiang Wan Li said, "For now, you can keep working for Brother Lin. But remember, no matter how bad it is, the Jiang Family is your family in the end."


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked into the deep eyes of Jiang Wan Li''s that were staring at him before giving a slow nod.


    This was the only thing that Jiang Wan Li could do.


    He knew that Jiang Zhi Shu had found a special opportunity with his encounter with Lin Fan.


    He also knew that with all the changes that were happening on the Blue Star, there was something that was about toe. It would be something that could decide the very fate of the Blue Star.


    If that were the case, Jiang Zhi Shu shouldn''t be forced to stay here.


    There was no future if he stayed in the Jiang Family, so the only way for him to escape was to follow Lin Fan.


    Jiang Wan Li could see that Lin Fan''s destiny wasn''t tethered to this small world, it was only a matter of time before he went to the next world. Lin Fan was only temporarily here until he became strong enough and took care of all his business in this realm.


    If Jiang Zhi Shu could follow Lin Fan to the next realm, it would definitely change his life and define his future.


    Since that was the case, how could Jiang Wan Li keep Jiang Zhi Shu here?


    Once this was all decided, everyone went back on their own and so ended the day that would forever change Rock Mountain City.


    For most people, this was a day without much consequence, but it was different for the Jiang Family.


    For the Jiang Family, it was the day that had sealed their fates.

 297 Chapter 297

    Several days passed and the scene in Rock Mountain City hadpletely changed.


    Just as Jiang Wan Li said he would do, the walls that separated the noble district and themon district in Rock Mountain City were torn down and everyone was free to move between them.


    Of course, the nobles and royals didn''t take too kindly to this, so they used their own guards to keep out most of themoners.


    But they couldn''t keep them all out since the Jiang Family set up special ess areas where the guards of these families were kept out.


    Even with those areas set up, naturally there were people in the Jiang Family who opposed this new system and secretly went against it, keeping themon folk outside of the noble area of town. Of course, those that were caught by those assigned with watching over them by Jiang Wan Li were punished, but currently there were more who supported the side of segregationpared to those that supported unification. It was very easy for these people to escape punishment.


    But this was a system that was still quite early in its development, having only been implemented for a few days, so it was far from being perfect.


    Aside from all of this, Lin Fan''s shop had been functioning normally during these days.


    Rather than operating as normal, Lin Fan''s shop had been much more popr during these days.


    There were many nobles and royals among those that had attended the Jiang Family''s wedding, among them were a few of Lin Fan''s customers.


    With the performance that Lin Fan had put on at the wedding, naturally there were plenty of people who were curious about him. Curiosity was a powerful force and it quickly spread through all the royals and nobles in the city.


    There was nothing that could truly be kept secret in this world, so they easily found Lin Fan''s store.


    As soon as they realized what kind of training Lin Fan''s store offered, they all began sending their subordinates to line up outside Lin Fan''s store trying to get one of the few training spots.


    Other than this, there were also families that had pill businesses where they hired alchemists. After bringing the alchemists from their families to the store, they found out just how special Lin Fan''s pet food was. It only took ten minutes for all of it to be sold out that day.


    Just like this, even without help from the Jiang Family, Lin Fan''s business slowly grew. It turned the street it was on from a street that no one passed through to a street that was almost as popr as the main shopping street.


    It wouldn''t be long before Lin Fan would be able to finish his mission.


    But that was a story for another day.


    After several days had passed since the incident, Jiang Qi Tai finally came to the store to look for Jiang Zhi Shu.


    Since there was no longer a need for Jiang Zhi Shu to hide from the Jiang Family, he began working in Lin Fan''s store full time along with Yuan Xiang Qin.


    If it had been the old Lin Fan, he definitely would have chased them out and cursed them as normies, but now he just felt happy seeing this young couple. Hepletely forgot that they were technically both older than him.


    The only times he wished they would tune it down is when Song Shu was around and they were still flirting. He still firmly believed that she was too young for all of this, even though she secretly peeked at them from time to time.


    But back to Jiang Qi Tai, it had taken him several days to finally recover from the wedding.


    Not only did his soul suffer from having the Beast King''s soul fragment being ripped out from it, it had been his body that had suffered from fighting Lin Fan and Jiang Wan Libined. Even if he had thew of murder protecting him, his body had still suffered quite heavy injuries.


    It was only today that he had been able to get out of bed ande visit.


    The timing that Jiang Qi Tai chose was in the afternoon, when there was the least amount of business.


    There were still a few people who were still walking around the store, but there wasn''t anyone that currently needed service, so all the staff werezing around.


    But the moment Jiang Qi Tai came in, they all turned to look at him.


    Jiang Qi Tai looked around the store before his eyes fell onto Jiang Zhi Shu who was looking right at him. Without any hesitation, he headed right towards Jiang Zhi Shu.


    But surprisingly, there was someone who was following him.


    It was someone that Lin Fan actually recognized, it was Liu Mei from the Seekers Union.


    Based on the way she was following him, it didn''t seem like they had a normal rtionship.


    When the two of them came over, Jiang Zhi Shu and Yuan Xiang Qin had stopped flirting with each other and were standing there facing him.<sub> </sub>


    Neither side said a thing as they stood there, but there was a slight bit of hostility in the air.


    The hostility didn''te from the two Jiang brothers, rather it only came from a certain person. It came from Liu Mei and waspletely directed at Yuan Xiang Qin.


    It seemed like the story between the four of them wasn''t simple.


    Jiang Qi Tai was finally the one who broke the silence by saying, "Can we talk?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu looked at him for a few seconds before giving a nod, "Talk then."


    Jiang Qi Tai didn''t move at all, he just said, "I''m sorry."


    Jiang Zhi Shu kept looking at him as he said, "Is that all you have to say?"


    Jiang Qi Tai looked into his eyes and after a few seconds, he turned to Yuan Xiang Qin, "I loved you."


    Yuan Xiang Qin was surprised to hear this, but then she gave a nod and nothing else.


    It was clear what Jiang Qi Tai had meant by that. He had used the word "loved" instead of "love".


    What had happened before was all a part of the past and now they were heading to the future.


    Jiang Zhi Shu then turned over to Liu Mei and said, "Xiao Mei, will you ever stop being like this?"


    Liu Mei stuck out her tongue at Jiang Zhi Shu, but she didn''t say anything.


    The way they acted made it seem like they were quite close and that was actually true since Jiang Qi Tai, Jiang Zhi Shu, and Liu Mei were childhood friends.


    Back then, the Beast King''s soul fragments hadn''t seeped too deeply into the Jiang Family. They still showed signs of changing, but at least they hadn''t started trading in ves just yet.


    The Seekers Union and the Jiang Family had been quite close during that time and Liu Mei''s dad as a high level member of the Seekers Union was also quite close with the Jiang Family. Whenever he went to the Jiang Family, he would bring Liu Mei along and as time passed they became close friends.


    Liu Mei didn''t fall for the dazzling Jiang Zhi Shu who was always the center of attention, she had fallen for Jiang Qi Tai who always followed behind Jiang Zhi Shu. That was because she knew that under his silent appearance, he had a kind heart that showed more kindness than anyone else.


    She had experienced all of this during her youth and that was how she fell in love with him.


    While it had broken her heart to see the change he had undergone in the past few years, she still chose to believe in him since she couldn''t change her love for him.


    But what broke her heart the most was the moment she found out that Jiang Qi Tai was also in love with Yuan Xiang Qin.


    Before he even knew that he was in love, she had already known since she was the one who paid the most attention to him. She could naturally easily see the slight changes with the way he acted around Yuan Xiang Qin.


    That was why she hated Yuan Xiang Qin, always acting hostile towards her since after all, she was her love rival.


    Even though Yuan Xiang Qin had only ever shown love for Jiang Zhi Shu, she was still worried.


    The third heartbreak in her life was when she heard about Jiang Qi Tai''s wedding with Yuan Xiang Qin. She had begged Qiang You to bring her along, but it took every single bit of will from her to keep herself from breaking down at the wedding.


    The one good thing was that the wedding had been interrupted and now Yuan Xiang Qin was even married to Jiang Zhi Shu. Moreover, the Jiang Qi Tai that she knew was back!


    So even Liu Mei acted naughty, she was just trying to hide the joy that bursted in her heart when she had heard Jiang Qi Tai say "loved".


    During this, Jiang Qi Tai signalled for Jiang Zhi Shu to move to the side while also nodding to Lin Fan.


    The three of them left the two girls to stand there awkwardly as they went off to the side for their own private conversation.


    Once they were on the side, Jiang Zhi Shu asked, "Did you find out why the soul fragment wanted Xiang Qin?"


    Jiang Qi Tai nodded before saying, "Xiang Qin has a specialw contained within her apparently, that was why the soul fragment wanted her."

 298 Chapter 298

    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately knit his brows when he heard this as he asked, "Law, what do you mean by that? What specialw does she have?"


    Jiang Qi Tai shook his head at this, "I don''t know either, that''s the only information that I have. It''s not like the soul fragment ever needed to share information with the body that it was taking over. Those were the only fragments of memories that I had after we were separated."


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with their arguing as he released his spiritual sense to probe Yuan Xiang Qin.


    Yuan Xiang Qin wasn''t someone with a high cultivation. To put it simply, even if she had a spunky attitude, she was someone who wasn''t that talented when it came to cultivating.


    Lin Fan''s spiritual sense easily spread over her and went in to search her body, but he couldn''t find anything in the end.


    As he was thinking about what to do next, Ang suddenly appeared beside him and said, "She has the lifews, that''s why it''s hard to cultivate for her. She isn''t cultivating with the right cultivation technique."


    Lin Fan immediately turned back in surprise and he was so taken aback that he suddenly jumped back a step.


    Lin Fan then said in a stuttered voice, "What, what do you mean? How, how do you know?"


    Ang pointed at herself and said, "I''m sensitive to this kind of stuff."


    Lin Fan suddenly revealed a look of understanding.


    Ang was the Spirit Overlord after all, she was the one who was closest to nature and nature was filled with vitality. She was naturally very sensitive to things like vitality and lifews, as well as inverselyws of death and death energy.


    Then Lin Fan heard something that made him tremble.


    Ang said in a cold voice, "So you like doing stuff like this, using your spiritual sense to look over other girls?"


    Lin Fan''s body immediately turned stiff and he quickly tried to exin, but Ang didn''t give him a chance.


    She just gave a soft snort before turning without saying another word.


    Lin Fan had a sad look on his face as he watched her turn and leave, he knew that he was in for it tonight. At least he had made sure to get afy couch this time¡­


    But afterwards, Lin Fan turned back to the problem at hand.


    Lifews, there was only one thing that everyone knew that lifews were good for, it was for healing.


    Lifews couldn''t bring back the dead, but they could heal most injuries by providing the necessary amount of vital energy to help the body recover.


    It was even said that one could be immortal just with lifews alone¡­


    If the Beast King''s soul fragment wanted to get its hands on the lifews, it was probably trying to use thesews to create a better body with Jiang Qi Tai''s body.


    That was another one of the specialties of lifews, it could be used to manipte bodies freely since it would ensure that the body would be able to stay alive by injecting vital energy.


    There was only a thin line between life and death. If lifews were used the wrong way, they could turn the dead into the undead.


    Jiang Qi Tai and Jiang Zhi Shu were both worrying over this because this concerned the one girl that they both loved. But then they realized that they hadn''t asked Lin Fan about this at all.


    Jiang Zhi Shu turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, do you know what it is?"


    Lin Fan told them what Ang told him and gave a simple exnation based on his small understanding of what lifews were.


    Once they heard this, both of them knit their brows.


    Jiang Zhi Shu immediately asked, "Then is there a chance that the other soul fragments will target her?"


    Lin Fan shook his head, "For now, I would say no, but that isn''t the only danger. Lifews are rare and if they were trained properly, she could be a powerful support expert. As well, there are many who would want to abuse lifews, so if they were to find out¡­"


    Jiang Zhi Shu knit his brows even deeper as he said, "Then what can we do to keep her safe?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "The only way to keep her safe is to let her be stronger since the only power that one can rely on is one''s own power."


    Jiang Zhi Shu asked in a curious voice, "But who can teach her about this?"


    Lin Fan pointed back at Ang and said, "If you can convince her, she would be a good teacher."<sub> </sub>


    Jiang Zhi Shu knitted his brows once again when he heard this as he said, "But¡­"


    Jiang Qi Tai had been silently listening, but this time he came forward and said, "I''ll convince her."


    Then before either Lin Fan or Jiang Zhi Shu could say a thing, Jiang Qi Tai headed off to where Ang had gone.


    It didn''t take him long before he returned with a ck eye.


    Both Lin Fan and Jiang Zhi Shu had to hold back theirughter since they already knew this would happen. It was Jiang Qi Tai''s own fault for going over before either of them could stop him.


    p Once they were done almost breaking out inughter, Lin Fan said with a serious look, "You can''t convince her, you have to leave it to Xiang Qin. Just tell her about what kind ofws are inside her and have her talk to Ang. If nothing goes wrong, Ang should agree to teach her."</anda>


    While both Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Qi Tai had some doubts over this, they still chose to ept it in the end. For now, they wouldn''t tell Yuan Xiang Qin about this and let her enjoy a few days of peace. They would tell her once everything had settled down.


    When Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Qi Tai were prepared to head back, this time Lin Fan was the one that stopped them.


    Jiang Zhi Shu said in a curious voice, "Boss, do you need us for something?"


    Lin Fan looked around a bit before isting them with his spatialws.


    After that, Lin Fan took out a crystal, one that was exactly like the one that had sealed the spell that had separated Jiang Qi Tai''s soul, but both of them knew it wasn''t. This crystal had a faint blood red glow to it, it was a crystal that they both recognized.


    Jiang Qi Tai was the first one to react since he had a deep fear of this thing because it had been the thing that had possessed him for so long, tormenting him for so long.


    Jiang Qi Tai asked while breathing heavily, "Owner Lin, what are you doing with that? Why are you bringing it out now?"


    Lin Fan just casually waved his hand and said, "Don''t worry about it, I''ve had someone take care of it and it''s perfectly tame now."


    Both of them looked at Lin Fan with gazes filled with doubt, but neither of them said a thing.


    Lin Fan just tapped a finger on the crystal and there was a tiny dark figure that appeared. This dark figure was like the one that had appeared from the crystal in the ve trade base, but it was only the size of Lin Fan''s palm.


    It looked around with its single eye and when its single eye fell onto Jiang Qi Tai, it couldn''t help giving a coldugh before saying, "Kid, I never thought that we would be meeting again."


    Jiang Qi Tai had a hostile look as he red right at the dark figure in Lin Fan''s hand, but he didn''t do anything.


    Before the tiny dark figure could continue provoking Jiang Qi Tai, Lin Fan pped it over the back of its head.


    The tiny dark figure immediately turned around and raised its voice as it angrily shouted, "Do you know who¡­"


    But before it could finish, it saw Lin Fan''s face and flinched.


    Momonga''s training had been mainly torture for this soul fragment and every single part of the torture had used Lin Fan''s face. Lin Fan''s face had already be a deep trauma for this soul fragment and whenever it saw it, it couldn''t help feeling a deep fear that came from the bottom of its soul.


    The soul fragment shrank back as it said, "Young master, is there anything I can do for you?"


    Both Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Qi Tai were shocked when they saw this. They never thought that Lin Fan would be able to make this proud soul fragment heel itself so easily.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with dealing with the soul fragment, he just said, "I just want to ask you one thing."


    The soul fragment immediately tried to suck up to Lin Fan as it said, "Young master, if there''s anything I can tell you, I''ll definitely tell you."


    Lin Fan casually said, "Tell me about the Beast King and why he came to this world."


    The soul fragment seemed to hesitate a bit when it heard this.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "You''re not willing?"


    The soul fragment quickly waved its hands as it said, "No, no, it''s not that I''m not willing, it''s just that I don''t have aplete story and it''s already quite long."


    Lin Fan just said, "Tell me what you know, we have time to listen."''


    The soul fragment said, "Well¡­"

 299 Chapter 299

    The soul fragment began telling the story of the Beast King from many generations ago.


    The Beast King was a talented individual, but he hadn''t always been that way.


    The Beast King was a sly person and had slowly made his way up from being a lowly beast, killing various mutated beasts and slowly gathering divine blood until it had be a second mutation beast.


    Once it had be a second mutation beast, its cultivation had soared, but it had always still acted alone, which was why no one was with it when it came down to the Blue Star.


    The Beast King had heard that there was a special artifact that had fallen down onto this human lower realm, so he had snuck down here to try and find it. However, it wasn''t that easy to find and unknowingly, time passed quickly. Before he knew it, he had already spent over ten years on the Blue Star, wandering all over it.


    He had found the general area of the artifact, but he still couldn''t find the specific artifact in the end.


    But he didn''t get a chance to keep searching.


    For someone as high profile as one of the Kings of the Beast Race, naturally there were people who were keeping track on him.


    If he only disappeared for a short period of time, perhaps he could go unnoticed, but the more time passed, the more likely he was to be noticed.


    Ten years was a long time for a lower realm, but for an upper realm with higher levels of cultivation, it wasn''t considered a long time, but it also wasn''t considered a short amount of time.


    Eventually the Beast King was discovered and there were human experts that had descended down from a Ster Kingdom who came looking for the Beast King.


    The Blue Star at that time was still a realm that hadn''t discovered cultivation yet, so all of these experts hid themselves among the normal people, making it hard for them to find each other.


    Finally, the Beast King was revealed because the upper realm experts had used a pet that could track the aura unique to all Beast Race members to find him.


    The one leading the experts from the Ster Kingdom was one of the princesses from the Ster Kingdom. She was one with ambition and she naturally wanted the throne, but that was unlikely in this male dominated society that was the Ster Kingdom that she came from even though her cultivation was much higher than the rest of herpetitors. The only way she would be able to take the throne was if she performed some brave acts and gained merits.


    Taking down one of the Kings from the Beast Race would definitely be a good option.


    But along the way, the princess had also heard rumours about the various questions the Beast King had been asking in this lower realm. It didn''t take much for her to put it together that this Beast King was searching for something special.


    The princess and her group secretly followed the Beast King as he headed to the location he believed the artifact was hidden.


    As for what happened next, the soul fragment didn''t know.


    When the soul fragment suddenly stopped its story, Jiang Zhi Shu couldn''t help saying, "Don''t just stop there! Tell us what happened next!"


    The soul fragment stood there awkwardly for a few seconds before saying, "I can''t, I don''t remember what happened. All I know is that both my main body and the princess mutually destroyed each other and our souls were scattered across this lower realm. After that, the servants of the princess found one of the local upper realms to take over this world while the rulers of the Beast Race felt the disappearance of one of their Kings, sending their forces to investigate. Once they found that my main body''s soul was scattered across this lower realm, they sent their forces in to collect the parts of my soul to bring me back. That was what caused the war between beasts and humans to start in this lower realm."


    Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Qi Tai couldn''t help being awed.


    This was a story that they had heard many times as part of the Jiang Family.


    Even though the Jiang Family hadn''t been around during that time, they were still tasked with protecting this Blue Star. Naturally they would continue passing down the stories from the past.


    Only they never got the full story, they only received a partial recounting which started after the war.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by what he had heard since he already had some idea that this realm was special. He was in deep thought for a bit before asking, "What was the artifact that the Beast King was looking for?"


    The tiny dark figure shook its head before saying, "I don''t remember, but I just know that it was a special artifact. I remembered that it was something that could even tempt Rulers."


    Jiang Zhi Shu and Jiang Qi Tai were a bit confused by these terminology, but Lin Fan wasn''t after his trip to the Sacred Rock Realm.


    He had a good idea of the power structure of this universe and he knew that Rulers were at the very peak of this universe. If even they would have been tempted by this artifact, it must be something very special.


    Then there was the information that there was a Ster Kingdom princess that was behind the various upper realm factions that were on the Blue Star¡­<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had been feeling confident with his increase in power, but now that he knew that there was someone from a Ster Kingdom pulling the strings, his confidence once again deted. It seemed like he still needed to keep his head low, he still wasn''t powerful enough.


    Lin Fan looked at the tiny dark figure in his hand and said, "Is there anything else you know?"


    The tiny dark figure looked awkward as it stood there hesitating.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this and he just gave a soft snort before saying, "It seems like you might need a bit more training."


    The tiny dark figure flinched at this before giving a sigh and saying, "There is something that I''ve noticed recently, but I wasn''t sure if I should bring it up."


    Lin Fan just said in a snappy voice, "Spit it out already."


    The tiny dark figure gave another sigh before saying, "Recently I''ve noticed a stronger connection to the other soul fragments, in particr one powerful one."


    Lin Fan asked, "What does that mean?"


    The tiny dark figure said, "It means that there is probably another fragment that is gathering fragments and gaining power. If I had to say what it is, it should be the main fragment slowly recovering itself by taking in other fragments."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    If this was true, it meant that the Beast King was slowly recovering and if there was a day that it did recover, that would be a bad scenario for the Blue Star.


    If he could, he would want to destroy this main fragment before it could recover¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with this any longer as he let the soul fragment return to the crystal.


    Even though he had just learned the story behind the Blue Star, there was still nothing for him to do right now, so it was business as usual. His current first priority was finishing the mission and seeing what his next mission was.


    In addition to that, he realized that even if was considered the big fish of this small pond, that was all he was in the end. His next hope was that the mission after this current one would bring him up to the next realm since all his hopey in the system and his pet shop. If he didn''t have those, he definitely couldn''tpare to other geniuses.


    It almost seemed like all signs were pointing towards him reaching the Legendary Realm.


    However, he knew that before he could reach the Legendary Realm, there was still something that he had to take care of.


    ¡­


    So time passed and with the help of both of the top powers in this city, Lin Fan''s shop became more and more popr.


    Unlike before, this time he even had a full support team behind him which allowed him to purchase as many advertisements as he needed. After all, all the money that he earned with his other business was naturally used to help him and since his power relied on the shop, there was no reason for him not to spend his money on the shop.


    During this time, Jiang Qi Tai and Liu Mei had also been spending more and more time at the shop, even going as far as helping out with the store.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this since Jiang Qi Tai and Liu Mei were both quite popr in this city, so there were quite a few of their fans that came to see them.


    Even Jiang Zhi Shu and Yuan Xiang Qin all had fans that came since they were all quite beautiful.


    Of course, none of them couldpare to the amount of fans that Ang had.


    If it was the previous Lin Fan, he definitely would have thrown them out since they were all flirting with each other in his store, but now he was different.


    But that flirting did hurt the customers who did see it, especially the lowly dogs. They definitely didn''t like being fed dog food.


    A week passed and another week passed before Lin Fan finally heard the voice of the system that he had been waiting for.

 300 Chapter 300

    It was a boring afternoon when the system''s voice suddenly rang out in Lin Fan''s head.


    "Congrattions host, you have opened three branch stores with the same level of poprity as the main store and havepleted the first main quest."


    "Host please receive the following rewards: Special Talisman, one chance to draw the God Tier Cultivation Technique Lucky Wheel, and one packet of God''s Blood."


    "Host, please ept your second main quest."


    Lin Fan wasn''t able to react right away, but then he was filled with excitement.


    It had finally happened, he had finally finished the main quest!


    Before he did anything else, Lin Fan immediately handed the shop over to Song Shu and Ang before running into a private room in the back. He made sure that no one would be able to disturb him by blocking the door and then he opened up the system interface to check the notifications he received.


    He didn''t even check the rewards that he had received before checking the second main quest.


    He knew that he wouldn''t be able to remain in this realm forever, so he was hoping that the second main quest would be rted to the upper realm, but he was disappointed when he saw it. Rather, he wasn''t just disappointed, he waspletely confused by the description of the quest.


    There was only a single line for the description and it was very simple.


    "Reach the Soul Realm."


    There was no time limit, there was no reward, there was no warning, it was just a single simple line.


    It was almost as if the system was calling Lin Fan weak and wanted him to improve himself as soon as possible.


    But that also did motivate Lin Fan since he had to admit that this was true.


    Since that was the case, he had to prepare to break through and before that, there was one thing he needed to take care of. He would have to take care of it because it was a matter that weighed on his heart and prevented him from breaking through.


    Lin Fan put this matter in the back of his head for now and turned to the rewards that he had received.


    The first item was one that he didn''t understand, but the other two were straightforward enough.


    The God Tier Cultivation Technique Lucky Draw chance was indeed quite a special reward. So far, Lin Fan had only ever had a single God Tier Cultivation Technique which had allowed him to be unparalleled in his realm.


    Lin Fan was only in the first realm of the Nine True Sun Body Art, but his body had been strong enough to match those in the Legendary Realm. Even if Lin Fan hadn''t noticed this at first, how could he have not noticed it after fighting Legendary Realm Experts?


    If just a single God Tier Cultivation Technique, not to mention one that was only a body developing technique was already this strong, what would happen if Lin Fan received a second one?


    Lin Fan had never been able to use this draw because it had just cost too many points. It was like most of the other functions of the store, he was never able to use them since he was just a poor man.


    As for the packet of God''s Blood, Lin Fan was confused at first what it was, but after seeing the description, he knew that this was a real treasure.


    The reason why beasts mutated was to obtain God''s Blood ande closer to their origin, which would allow them to evolve their bloodline and be closer to divine beasts.


    This was where the packet of God''s Blood came in.


    If it was used on a normal beast, it would allow that beast to be a single mutation beast. If it was used one a single mutation beast, it would allow that beast to be a second mutation best. So on and so on.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to call out Brainy after reading this description.


    Brainy had been the beast that had stuck with Lin Fan through thick and thin and was the first beast that he had caught himself. Not to mention that Brainy was the most useful beast out of all the beasts that he had since all the other beasts that he had were power type beasts. Brainy was the only pet that had supreme intelligence.


    If Brainy could evolve and be a second mutated beast, there would be no doubt that this would give it even more special abilities that would be helpful. Since that was the case, Lin Fan had no reason to hesitate.


    Once Brainy knew what this packet was, it immediately swallowed the liquid inside the vial. Once it had drunk all the liquid, it suddenly trembled before slumping down in Lin Fan''s hand.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been worried when he watched it drink the liquid since he had never doubted the system before, but when he saw Brainy slump down, he couldn''t help feeling a little worried.


    Brainy''s exhausted voice suddenly rang in his mind, "Master, it''s fine. I need to go into hibernation to process this and once I''m finished, I''ll be able to evolve."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan rxed when he heard this, but then he thought of another problem as he asked, "What about the puppets that you have, will they be able to break free of your seeds?"


    Brainy said, "Master, it''s fine, I''ve left a seed of spiritual sense in the pet storage space. As long as that doesn''t shatter, it will control all the seeds until I wake up."


    Lin Fan nodded at this before sending Brainy into the pet storage space. Before sending it in, he said, "Sleep well."


    Brainy was too tired to reply as it directly entered the pet storage space. All that met Lin Fan''s words was silence.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind that and turned his attention to the final item, the Special Talisman.


    The description of the system said: "An unknown talisman, it has a special function."


    Lin Fan couldn''t make sense of this and even after pulling it out of the system''s storage space, he couldn''t seem to find anything special about it. The only thing he knew was that the moment he sent his spiritual sense into the Special Talisman, it would be immediately cut off. It was almost as if there was a special world inside the talisman where nothing could escape at all.


    Lin Fan couldn''t make heads or tails of it, so he threw it back into his system storage space for now.


    Next, it was time for the one thing that Lin Fan had been putting off for the longest time. It was finally time for Lin Fan to level up his store.


    Lin Fan had been putting it off for the longest time because each time he did, the system would suddenly spring another special quest on him or something simr, but he had to admit that the first level up did give up quite a few good things.


    The basic store only allowed him to sell pet food and train pets, but once he upgraded the store, it had given him the cultivation farming realms and the pet incubation chambers. It had allowed him to solve two critical parts of his store, the supply line and theck of problems.


    He was hoping that by leveling up the store this time, it would give him something else to sell in his store since he did need points as soon as possible.


    He was limited by the number of things that he could sell in his store and without being able to sell more things, he was unable to get more points.


    Even with four stores, up to this point, after spending all his pointsst time, he had finally saved up another ten million points.


    Those ten million points were everything that he had and he couldn''t just give the store more money for more points even if he was raking in the money.


    Those ten million points were only enough for a single Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact from the system''s store and if he were to head to the upper realm, he definitely needed more than that.


    So, Lin Fan finally decided to steel himself and level up the store.


    "Host, do you confirm that you wish to level up the store?"


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before saying, "Yes."


    "The shop has been upgraded to level 2."


    "The pet essory function has been unlocked."


    "The facilities will now be built."


    This second level had cost Lin Fan 10000 points, ten times what it had cost him the first time, but that was still a small amount for Lin Fan. After all, Lin Fan was now a millionaire when it came to points.


    There was a sudden rumble in the store before it quickly ended.


    The people in the store felt the rumble, but then all of them went back to what they were doing since things like this were natural in a cultivation world.


    The only person who had a different expression was Ang since she could feel the spatialws that came from the store. It seemed like the master of the store was changing things up.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother checking the new facilities just yet, he went back up to the main floor to sit back down behind the counter.


    His quest had beenpleted and he had now upgraded his store, there was only one thing left for him to do now.


    It was time for him to go home.

 301 Chapter 301

    Lin Fan spent another two weeks going in between Rock Mountain City, Water Pearl City, and Green Wood City, taking care of all the things he needed to prepare.


    When he meant going home, he didn''t mean just heading back to Snow Wind City. Lin Fan was finally going to deal with the Lin Family.


    It had been strange for him over the past few months since there hadn''t been a single move from the Lin Family, but now he felt he had finally developed enough power to deal with them. Since that was the case and he had finished off his quest for the system, it was time for him to head home.


    After all, for the next quest, the system was asking him to break through to the Legendary Realm.


    Lin Fan in the process of cultivating had felt that there was something blocking him. He could tell that if he were able to break through to the peak tinum Realm, there would be nothing stopping him to Fragmented Soul Realm, but there was something that was stopping him from reaching the peak tinum Realm.


    That one thing was the Lin Family.


    The way the Lin Family had treated him and his family had left a mark on his heart, not to mention that he had been worrying about retaliation from the Lin Family the entire time. All of this formed a kind of heart demon for Lin Fan and without being able to resolve this, he wouldn''t be able to take the final step in his cultivation.


    Lin Fan during his time in Rock Mountain City had already reached the high tinum Realm with his slow umtion. Now there was only one thing left.


    So after taking care of everything in Rock Mountain City, he left Jiang Zhi Shu in charge of the fourth store before finally heading back to Snow Wind City.


    He could have taken Jiang Zhi Shu and all his subordinates with him and taken on the Lin Family, but then he felt that this method wasn''t right. If he were to do this, this wouldn''t just be a simple internal family struggle, it would actually involve outside forces such as the Jiang Family now that Jiang Zhi Shu had been taken back.


    If that were to happen, there was the chance that the ancestor of the Lin Family would be involved and it would be much bigger than it should be.


    And a small part of him also wanted to be the one that brought his family back to show them off. He wanted to proudly let his father stand in front of everyone else from the Lin Family.


    After handing everything over, Lin Fan took the Any ce Door back to Snow Wind City.


    He left Ang and Song Shu in the store before heading back home.


    He made sure that he attracted no attention by directly using the spatialws to appear in front of his family''s door before walking in with the key he had.


    When he came in, he was surprised to see someone he never thought he would see there.


    Standing in the hallway with a te of freshly cooked food was Luo Qing.


    She was surprised to hear the door suddenly open, but then when she saw Lin Fan standing in the door, she was so shocked that she almost dropped the te that she had been holding.


    There was a voice from the kitchen that called out, "Xiao Qing, who is it?"


    But neither Luo Qing nor Lin Fan answered this voice.


    Eventually, the owner of the voice came out of the kitchen and into the hall to see Lin Fan herself.


    Yue Qingrou was also surprised to see Lin Fan, but what she did first was not greet Lin Fan. She went over to Luo Qing and pinched her thigh gently, waking her up from her shock.


    Luo Qing jumped up slightly before looking at Yue Qingrou who was hinting at Lin Fan with her eyes.


    Luo Qing then reacted to what Yue Qingrou was hinting at and while holding the te in her hands, she lowered her head and said in a shy voice, "Wee home."


    Lin Fan was jolted back from his shock when he heard this and he quickly said, "I''m home." But then he found it strange and he couldn''t help asking, "Wait, what are you doing in my house?"


    Luo Qing blushed even more when she heard this. She lowered her head and didn''t answer as she turned around, heading into the dining room to put down the te in her hand.


    Yue Qingrou looked at Lin Fan with a knowing smile and said, "Did you like what you saw? Your mom has been working hard for you."


    Then leaving Lin Fan behind with three ck lines on his face and no time to respond, Yue Qingrou followed Luo Qing into the dining room.


    Lin Fan just stood there for a bit, not knowing how to react to this.


    There were manyplicated feelings in his heart when he saw this scene, but the one that filled his heart the most was fear.<sub> </sub>


    He knew what Ang would do to him if she were to ever find out about this. Even if she would never show it in front of his mom, he knew that he would be in trouble¡­


    But he also couldn''t help feeling a bit ofplicated feelings towards Luo Qing.


    Even though he had rejected her, here she was¡­


    He really didn''t know what to say, but there were a few feelings that he didn''t want to admit in his heart.


    While he was lost in his thoughts, there was a cold snort that suddenly came from the staircase in the hall that brought him back to reality.


    Lin Fan looked up to find Lin Xue standing there with a look of disdain on her face as she looked at him.


    She saw him look over and said, "Did you enjoy it?"


    Then without giving him a chance to respond just like Yue Qingrou, she turned around and headed back upstairs. After a few seconds, he could hear the mming of her door.


    What he didn''t see was her expression of joy at the fact that he was back and the voodoo doll that she had with a picture of Luo Qing''s face on it, one that waspletely filled with pins.


    Lin Fan really didn''t know how to react to all of this, so he did the only thing that he knew how to do. He threw all of it into the back of his mind and headed into the dining room.


    In the dining room that also had a living room, Yue Qingrou and Luo Qing were setting up the dining table while Lin Ao was sitting on the sofa watching television.


    Lin Ao wasn''t surprised to see Lin Fan since he had already heard themotion outside and the whispers between Yue Qingrou and Luo Qing, so he had already figured it out. The one thing he did do was take out a bottle of his finest wine and he kept it beside him, waiting for dinner to start.


    Lin Fan came over to his father and said, "I''m home."


    Lin Ao just gave a nod and said, "Un."


    It was like he didn''t really care, but one could tell that this was enough for this father and son.


    It didn''t take long before the dining table was finished setting up and dinner was ready.


    Once it was all set up, Luo Qing took off the apron that she had on and put it in the kitchen before going to the door.


    But before she could leave, Yue Qingrou stopped her and said, "Xiao Qing, where are you going?"


    Luo Qing said in an awkward voice, "Aunty, Lin Fan is back, so I''m sure that you want to have a nice family dinner. I''ll just go home tonight."


    Yue Qingrou wouldn''t let her go. She came behind her and pushed her back to the dining table, not taking no for an answer as she said, "Xiao Qing, you know you''re also part of the family."


    After saying this, she looked over at Lin Fan who was trying his hardest to avoid this gaze.


    Yue Qingrou revealed a slightly annoyed look when she saw this, but then she said with a smile, "What are you all doing? Get over here, it''s time for dinner."


    Everyone gathered at the table and Lin Xue also came down after Yue Qingrou called her, but before they could eat, there was another problem to solve. It was where everyone would sit.


    The table that they had was a table for six with one seat at either end and two on the longer sides. That meant that someone had to sit with someone else.


    Before they could even say a thing, Yue Qingrou made the first strike, "Xiao Fan,e and sit over here with your father."


    The spot that Yue Qingrou was putting him in was on one of the sides with two seats, but it was by his father who was at the head of the table, so it did make sense.


    Then before anyone else could say a thing, especially Lin Xue who had already begun moving for the seat beside Lin Fan, Yue Qingrou suddenly said, "Xiao Qing,e and sit beside Xiao Fan. I''m sure you guys also have a lot to catch up on."


    Luo Qing waspletely caught off guard and wanted to reject this, but there was also a small part of her that was unwilling to reject this¡­


    So it was just like that that this awkward seating arrangement was set.

 302 Chapter 302

    After settling the seating arrangements, they all enjoyed a nice meal.


    That was, it was a nice meal from an outsider''s perspective, but there was plenty of conflict that was hidden under the surface.


    Yue Qingrou kept bringing more food into their tes and getting them to talk more even though there was a clear awkward atmosphere in the air.


    Right beside Yue Qingrou, there was Lin Xue who was sitting there with a cold look on her face, clearly showing how unhappy she was with this situation.


    Time passed with this awkward dinner and soon it reached the end.


    When dinner was over, Lin Fan suddenly had a serious look on his face as he said, "Dad, we need to talk."


    Luo Qing immediately recognized that this was serious, so she excused herself from the table and this time Yue Qingrou didn''t stop her. Everyone there could see that there was something important Lin Fan had to discuss and they could tell from the way that he had said those words that it was a family issue.


    After Luo Qing left and Ye Qingrou came back from sending her off, they sat at the table in silence for a bit.


    Seeing that neither Lin Fan or Lin Ao spoke, Ye Qingrou couldn''t help herself as she wanted to ask Lin Fan what he wanted to discuss. However, before she could, Lin Ao raised his hand and stopped her.


    After a few more seconds of silence, Lin Fan finally spoke, "It''s time to go to True Light City."


    Lin Xue was confused by this, but Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou immediately understood what he meant.


    Yue Qingrou immediately knitted her brows and wanted to say something, but Lin Ao raised his hand and stopped her as he said, "How confident are you?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him and gave a slight nod as he said, "I''m confident."


    Lin Ao gave it another few seconds of thought before also giving a nod and saying, "Alright, then let''s go. We''ll have to arrange for a few days off of work and you probably have to arrange things with your store, so we''ll set out in three days."


    Yue Qingrou couldn''t take it anymore and she cut in, "Lin Ao, what are you thinking?"


    Lin Ao turned to her and said in a casual voice, "Our son is taking us on a trip to True Light City, there''s nothing wrong with that."


    Yue Qingrou revealed an angry look as she said, "Are you ying the fool? You and I both know what is in True Light City and you''re agreeing to this trip so easily?"


    Lin Ao gave a shrug and said, "What wille wille. Not to mention that it''s Xiao Fan who''s taking us this time."


    Yue Qingrou stomped her foot and said, "You know full well what will happen if we go there. They''ve left us alone up to this point and now you want to go poke the ho''s nest?"


    Lin Ao nodded at this and said, "Yes, they''ve left us alone for now, but that doesn''t mean they''ll leave us alone forever. Instead of waiting for them to catch us off guard, why not just go to them?"


    Yue Qingrou couldn''t be more angry as she said, "You! Do you know what you are saying? You want to pit our son against them? All this for your pride?"


    Lin Ao''s eyes trembled for a second and there was a trace of dark look that appeared when she said this. After all, by saying this, Yue Qingrou had touched a line in the bottom of Lin Ao''s heart, bringing up something that he didn''t want to face.


    The moment she said this, she realized that she had said something wrong and immediately said, "I didn''t mean that..."


    But before she could say anything else, Lin Ao said, "It''s fine, just let it go."


    Yue Qingrou fell silent after this, but then she still said, "This is too dangerous."


    Lin Ao looked right at her and said, "Our son says that he is confident, the least we can do is support him."


    Yue Qingrou looked stunned when she heard this, but then her expression slowly rxed before she said with a sigh, "But still, I worry."


    Lin Ao took her hand and patted the back of them as he said, "But that''s a part of being a parent, isn''t it?"


    Finally Yue Qingrou conceded and said, "Alright, we''ll follow Xiao Fan''s ns."


    Lin Ao nodded before turning back to Lin Fan and saying, "We''ll set out in three days."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he just gave a nod.


    Lin Xue saw that everything was decided, but she still didn''t know what was going on. She couldn''t help asking, "What is in True Light City."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan turned to look at her before slowly saying, "The Lin Family."


    ¡­


    Those three days passed quickly and they soon were able to take care of everything.


    In truth, after everything that had happened in Snow Wind City, Lin Fan''s parents didn''t actually have to work with the ie that came from Lin Fan and all the various businesses the other families had helped them set up. The only reason they still worked at their old jobs was because they had been used to working those jobs.


    As for Lin Xue, it was easy for her to get a few days off since everyone knew about her brother and she herself was the top student in her academy. There was no one in her academy that would go against her. Not to mention that everyone knew that the principal was close to Lin Fan.


    On the morning of the fourth day, they arrived at the airship station and were seen off by all their friends.


    There were some that were worried since they knew where Lin Fan''s family was heading, but still they didn''t say a thing to stop them.


    There was also Ang, Song Shu, and Momonga who hade to see them off.


    Lin Fan was leaving them all here this time because this was something that he had to do for himself.


    It was his family and he wanted to proudly bring them into the Lin Family. Since that was the case, he couldn''t get any help from anyone else.


    However, none of them were worried for him since they knew just how powerful Lin Fan was when it came to this lower realm. Unless something unexpected happened, even if the Legendary Realm Expert came out, he was still confident in escaping. Not to mention that there was almost no chance of that happening.


    The Legendary Realm Expert of the Lin Family was like the Legendary Realm Expert of the Jiang Family, his natural limit was quickly approaching. He was actually even older than Jiang Wan Li, which meant that he was closer to death.


    At such a point, unless the Lin Family was close to being destroyed, there was no chance that he woulde out.


    As for the rest of them, they would all fall under Lin Fan''s fists.


    It took them two days riding the airship before they arrived at True Light City.


    Since Lin Fan''s pockets were now filled with money, he naturally didn''t mind spending to improve thefort of his family. He had booked them a trip on the most luxurious airship, in the most luxurious room.


    For Lin Ao who hade from the Lin Family and Yue Qingrou who had married him, they weren''t strangers to this. Rather they seemed quite ustomed to traveling like this.


    But for Lin Xue who was born after Lin Ao left the Lin Family, she had never experienced any of this extravagance.


    Even if she had been living in a much better house after the incident with the Feng Family in Snow Wind City, it was only considered a minor luxury. This airship was on apletely different scale.


    Once she stepped on, she couldn''t help staring at all the things around her like a little child with wide sparkling eyes.


    When Lin Fan looked at her, he even felt that she had been like Song Shu when she had first ridden on a luxury airship. As this thought popped into his mind, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    It didn''t take long for Lin Xue toe back to her senses and she immediately noticed the way Lin Fan was looking at her. Her expression immediately turned cold and she headed off towards their room.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a faint smile before going to help his parents.


    This trip didn''t have much excitement like the one Lin Fan had taken with Song Shu. The two days passed quickly and soon they arrived in True Light City.


    After arriving in True Light City, what they didn''t do right away was go and find a hotel to stay in. Rather Lin Fan brought his family and all their luggage to a beast carriage before giving the driver an address.


    His family didn''t know where he was taking them, but they couldn''t help being a little worried. After all, they were currently in the territory of the Lin Family and there were quite a few people who recognized Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou.


    They knew that they were here to cause trouble, but before settling down, causing trouble wasn''t something they should do.


    But they didn''t have a choice in this matter since Lin Fan brought them to where the trouble was.


    When the beast carriage arrived at its destination, they were shocked to see what was outside the window.


    It was a giant mansion and at the gate, there was a que with the word ''Lin'' hanging there.

 303 Chapter 303

    Yue Qingrou immediately took Lin Fan''s arm and said in a worried voice, "Xiao Fan, what are you doing? Do you know where this is? Let''s get out of here before they notice us."


    Lin Ao also knitted his brows as he said, "Xiao Fan, there''s no need to rush. It''s good to take your time sometimes. You shouldn''t underestimate our family."


    Lin Fan looked out the window for a few seconds at the Lin Manor before turning back to say to his parents, "Mom, dad, this is where we''re staying tonight. After all, we dide all this way to visit home."


    Yue Qingrou was still worried as she said, "Xiao Fan, you don''t have to rush this. We can slowly take our time and meet the Lin Family, there''s no need to do things like this."


    Lin Ao was also a bit worried, but he didn''t urge Lin Fan to rethink this n like Yue Qingrou did. Instead, he took a deep look at Lin Fan and after a moment, he said, "Xiao Fan, are you certain about this."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I''m confident."


    Lin Ao nodded before opening the door to the beast carriage that was beside him. He made an inviting gesture to Yue Qingrou and said, "Shall we visit home? We haven''t been here since we were married."


    Yue Qingrou looked at Lin Ao like he was crazy before saying in an anxious voice, "Do you still have time to joke like this? Close that door and let''s go."


    Lin Ao shook his head and said, "This is our son''s time, we should support him as his parents. You and I both know that this day woulde, of course, we never expected it to be like this. Still, we have to support him, isn''t that right?"


    Yue Qingrou hesitated at this, but then she took his hand still and said, "If you''re wrong about this."


    Lin Ao was silent, but he was thinking the same thing. He hoped that his grandfather had been right about this as well¡­


    ¡­


    Bringing their bags along, they came up to the gates of the Lin Manor.


    Naturally, as one of the five Legendary Realm families on the Eastern Continent and the ruler of this city, the guards at the gate of the Lin Manor weren''t normal guards.


    When they saw this familye up with their bags, they couldn''t help being suspicious.


    The guards hadn''t received any notice that there would be guests today and based on their appearance, they didn''t seem like they could qualify to be guests of the Lin Family.


    The beast carriage that they came out of was definitely of the right quality, but just these people alone didn''t have the appearance of someone worthy of visiting the Lin Family. The older of the two men was dressed in simple clothes and even had a limp in his leg. He didn''t even have a single trace of aura that made it seem like he was an expert.


    As for the younger one, they could feel a trace of aura from him, but with how young he was, theypletely disregarded him.


    The only thing of note was that the two girls with them were quite beautiful.


    It was clear by how simr they looked that this was a pair of mother and daughter, but that made it even more enticing for them.


    True Light City was a city filled with sword cultivators since that was what the Lin Family excelled in was with the sword. Most of them didn''t even have pets, they only trained in using the sword.


    However, since they only trained in using the sword, they were actually much more powerful than normal Beast Masters since they had incredible attacking force. That was why even though sword cultivators didn''t have pets to help them, just the force of their swordws alone was enough to deal with both master and pet.


    Because of the Lin Family, sword cultivators filled True Light City, making it the paradise of sword cultivation.


    The guards that were at the gates of the Lin Manor were naturally also sword cultivators. As sword cultivators, they were quite forward with their actions.


    One of the two guards came forward and raised his hand to stop Lin Fan''s family from continuing forward before saying, "Stop, this is private property, leave now or we will have no choice but to detain you."


    The other guard yed right along with the first guard and came forward to check out the two girls before saying, "Of course, if you want to have some fun time with us, we wouldn''t mind."


    Lin Fan and Lin Ao both knit their brows when they heard this.


    They never expected even the guards of the Lin Family to be like this.


    Well, to say that they never expected this was a bit too exaggerated.


    For Lin Ao, he was surprised to see that the level of corruption in the Lin Family had reached this level. When he heard that a sweep of the Lin Family was necessary from his grandfather, he hadn''t believed it, but now it seemed like it was true.<sub> </sub>


    The Lin Family had been too corrupted by the power and status that they enjoyed and they had let it go to their head. It seemed like they were no longer the same Lin Family that they were when Lin Ao was still here.


    For Lin Fan, he only had the experience of his uncle and nephew as his impression of the Lin Family, so this kind of experience from the guards could be considered normal. After all, people that were alike tended to gather together.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother speaking to them at all as he raised his palm and brought it back before sending it forward in a gentle motion.


    However, the force that he sent out wasn''t gentle at all. The golden wave from his palm pushed forward without stop and sted the two guards into the gate, while also forcing the gate to swing open, clearing the way for him.


    Yue Qingrou was shocked when she saw this and wanted to convince Lin Fan to run, but she didn''t have time to do so.


    Thisrge action naturally gathered the other guards that were stationed inside the gates of the Lin Manor.


    There was arge group of them that came forward with their swords drawn. The leader of the group shouted out, "You, drop your weapons this instant and don''t resist arrest! Do you know where you are trespassing!"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother to answer this at all as he raised his palm once again. He brought it back slightly before pushing out once again, releasing another golden wave of energy.


    The golden wave of energy flew out right at the group of guards.


    At first, seeing how slow it wasing, the guards didn''t seem to care since they never put Lin Fan in their eyes based on how young he was and how weak his aura was. However, as the golden energy approached, they realized that they had made a mistake.


    These guards were well trained, so they knew how to work with each other. Grouping behind their leader, they gathered all their life energy together and pushed it towards the leader, creating a formation.


    The leader gathered all the energy of the cultivators behind him and brought it down into a single sh aimed at the golden wave of energy.


    However, they couldn''t break through it at all.


    The golden wave of energy destroyed the sh made of life energy gathered by the array they had formed, smashing into them without pausing for a second.


    This group of guards had formed a triangr shape when they formed their formation, with the guards standing behind the leader.


    Once the golden wave of energy hit them, the leader was knocked back into the two guards standing behind him who were knocked back into the ones standing behind them. Just like this, all of them were knocked back until they all fell to the ground several meters away.


    They had been knocked down like bowling pins.


    The injuries of these guards weren''t light and all of them spat out blood the moment they hadnded.


    The golden wave didn''t just stop when it knocked down all these pins, it continued forward towards the front door of the manor. Unimpeded in its progress, it continued forth until it shattered the wooden door of the manor to pieces.


    ¡­


    Deep inside the Lin Manor, in a hidden room.


    An old man in pure white clothes with white hair and a long white beard suddenly opened his eyes.


    He hadn''t felt a change with the first golden wave of energy, but the moment the second golden wave of energy had been released, he could tell that someone was making a fuss in the Lin Manor.


    Releasing his spiritual sense, he found Lin Fan''s family in the yard of the manor.


    Rather than getting angry that someone was attacking his Lin Family, this old man first had a look of surprise before revealing a smile.


    "It seems like Ao''s kid is finally here."


    This man was the ancestor of the Lin Family, the one that Lin Ao had called grandfather.


    He naturally knew what Lin Fan looked like since it was his n to use Lin Fan to sweep the Lin Family of their unnecessary parts.


    Now that Lin Fan was here, he couldn''t wait to see what would happen next.

 304 Chapter 304

    Of course, there were a few things that did confuse him.


    Last he checked, Lin Fan had only been in the low tinum Realm, but now it seemed like he had already broken through to the high tinum Realm. Moreover, it seemed like he was ready to break through at any moment.


    This kind of speed was already enough for him to be considered an unparalleled genius on the Blue Star.


    Not to mention that he also had never cultivated before, just starting to cultivate less than a year ago.


    The Lin Family ancestor had checked Lin Fan when he had been born and he was the one who had found the cause of his inability to cultivate. He was certain that Lin Fan would never be cured, but now he was proving him wrong by charging into the Lin Family.


    The more important thing was that the Lin Family ancestor could feel a few traces of absorption power that was naturally surrounding Lin Fan. Others might not notice it, but he was very sensitive to this kind of thing.


    "This kid really has inherited the powers of the Lin Family...Good, very good! It seems like the heavens haven''t abandoned our Lin Family yet!"


    "Now, let''s see how he handles this."


    ¡­


    Back in the front of the Lin Manor, it was aplete mess.


    The door had been smashed in and there were guards scattered all over the ground.


    The intense fighting had turned the neatly managed front garden into a warzone,pletely ruining the hard work of the gardeners. If they could see what had happened to their hard work, they would have definitely gone all out against Lin Fan.


    Naturally, thisrgemotion attracted the attention of those inside the manor.


    At first they had thought that it was something the guards could deal with, but once they felt the aura that came from the front, they knew that it definitely wasn''t something Silver Realm guards could deal with. The waves of energy that came from the front were waves of energy from aw.


    <o>,m Those that could usews were only those that were in the tinum Realm or above, this meant that there must be an expert attacking them.</o>


    Still, even knowing all this, none of the members of the main Lin Family panicked. After all, they were a Legendary Realm family with a Legendary Realm Expert backing them, they would be safe even if the sky were to fall on them.


    But how wrong they were.


    Most of the main family members chose to wait and observe the situation since most of them naturally were able to recognize Lin Ao.


    They were all curious why Lin Ao would be back, but they were more curious who the expert he brought with him was.


    Like there were those who were willing to wait, there were also those that weren''t willing to wait. Just like Lin Yu and Lin Jun, the father and son who had gone to Snow Wind Cityst time.


    During this past half a year, they had been thinking of ways to get back at Lin Ao at first, but then there was an announcement from the ancestor that made thempletely forget about this.


    After Lin Yu and Lin Jun hade back, the ancestor had announced that he would be looking for a closed door disciple, the final one that he would take. This was definitely a chance for them.


    Even if Lin Jun didn''t look like it after being beaten by Lin Fan so easily, he was actually one of the top talents of the Lin Family.


    Instead of focusing on trash like Lin Ao who had been kicked out of the family, it was better to focus on getting the attention of the ancestor. So during these past six months, it had been a period of intensepetition in the Lin Family.


    Bing the disciple of the ancestor would be like growing wings, but bing the final disciple of the ancestor would be equal to ascending to heaven. As the final disciple, naturally the ancestor would hold nothing back in his teachings, giving that final disciple everything he knew.


    The infighting in the Lin Fan had been quite intense during this past half a year, there was even one genius that had been seriously injured.


    But what they didn''t know was that this had all been a part of the ancestor''s n¡­<sub> </sub>


    Still, even if Lin Yu didn''t have time to care about Lin Ao before, now that Lin Ao was showing himself at the door of the Lin Family, why wouldn''t he seize this chance to take care of him?


    As far as everyone was concerned, Lin Ao was still exiled from the family. Now that he was here in the Lin Manor, this was a clear vition of his exile and he was surely to be punished for this.


    The family head was his father, so he wouldn''t enforce it and the first elder was someone who didn''t care about worldly matters, only focusing on his own cultivation, so he wouldn''t enforce it either. But it was a different story when it came to the second elder.


    The second elder was the family head''s older brother and he had always thought that he should be the family head.


    He knew that his big brother, the first elder, didn''t care about this position even though he was the strongest because he was a cultivation maniac, so he always assumed that this position would fall onto him. After all, he was the second oldest of the Lin Family second generation and the second strongest. By all rights, the family head position should have fallen onto him.


    However, fate didn''t end that way.


    With the appearance of Lin Ao, the position of his sixth brother, Lin Ao''s father, Lin Jiao had suddenly jumped up.


    Back when Lin Ao hadn''t been exiled and was still in the Lin Family, he had just been too dazzling. Hepletely surpassed his own generation and was a match for the generation above him. His cultivation had even been close to reaching the cultivation level of his own father when he was in his twenties.


    That level of cultivation was something that no one had ever heard of and almost everyone believed that there would be an era where the Lin Family would have two Legendary Realm Experts at the same time. However, that wasn''t to be.


    It was said that Lin Ao had caused an ident where he had been seriously injured and had been crippled, resulting in no cultivation and a limp in his leg, which was why he had been exiled from the family.


    But the strange thing was that Lin Ao''s father, Lin Jiao had never lost his position as the family head after this.


    The second elder had always med Lin Ao for all the misfortune that he had encountered in his life, even though he was from the generation above Lin Ao''s. It was petty, but that was what drove him.


    This had resulted in a hatred of Lin Ao that was no less than the hatred Lin Yu felt.


    Lin Yu naturally hated his bigger brother for being much more talented than him and had lived in the shadow his entire life. This was something that he frequently argued with his father about, driving a wedge in between their rtionship.


    Since he couldn''t see eye to eye with his father, he went looking for someone who hated Lin Ao as much as he did. He abandoned the faction of his father, the family head and joined the second elder''s faction.


    Now that both of them saw that Lin Ao was here, they naturally saw this as a chance.


    The second elder followed behind Lin Yu as they headed out into the yard where Lin Fan''s family was currently standing.


    The door had been blown away by Lin Fan''s attack earlier, so there was no need to worry about opening the door. As they came through, Lin Yu sted away the scraps that were by the entrance and cleared the way for the second elder.


    Their group came out and came down the steps in front of the door before suddenly stopping. The second elder narrowed his eyes as he looked over Lin Fan while Lin Yu red at Lin Ao with a look filled with hatred.


    After a slight pause, the second elder finally turned back to Lin Ao and said, "Lin Ao, you traitor of the family, do you know what you are doing right now?"


    Lin Ao looked at the second elder for a few seconds after hearing this usation before leaning over to whisper in Lin Fan''s ear, "This is the second elder Lin Lei, be careful."


    Lin Fan nodded before turning to the second elder and saying, "What right do you have to say this?"


    Lin Lei looked over Lin Fan for a few more seconds before his expression rxed and he revealed a faint smile, "This friend, I don''t know what this traitor Lin Ao has offered you to do this, but you should rethink this."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he heard this. It seemed like the information of this Lin Lei wasn''t up to date since he wasn''t able to recognize him.


    Lin Yu was naturally able to recognize Lin Fan and he came forward to exin to Lin Lei, but before he could say a thing, Lin Lei raised a hand to cut him off.


    Lin Lei turned back to Lin Fan and said, "This friend, if you''re willing to back down, the Lin Family will consider you a friend and a guest. All you have to do is step away from this traitor Lin Ao and his family right now."

 305 Chapter 305

    Lin Fan just looked back at Lin Lei for a while with a faint smile on his face, but Lin Lei wasn''t worried at all.


    After a moment of silence, Lin Fan said, "That seems like it would be a loss for me, don''t you think?"


    Lin Lei''s smile became wider when he heard this and he immediately said, "This friend, there''s no need to beat around the bush like this. This is the Lin Family, if there are any requests you have, please make them. We can even wee you as a guest to our Lin Family if you want."


    Lin Fan suddenly shook his head as he said, "You really don''t know anything do you?"


    Lin Lei clearly didn''t expect to hear this as he suddenly knit his brows and asked, "This friend, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan shook his head again as he said, "Never mind that now." Then he turned his gaze to Lin Yu and Lin Jun who had followed Lin Lei out and said, "What if I said that I wanted the heads of these two? Would you give it to me?"


    Lin Yu and Lin Jun felt a chill when they saw Lin Fan''s cold gaze fall onto them. The way he was looking at them was the way someone looked at someone who was already dead.


    Lin Fan had left a deep impression on them six months ago back in Snow Wind City, leaving a deep fear of him in their hearts. He was already willing to kill them then and if it wasn''t for Lin Ao stopping him, he might have done so.


    They could tell from his aura that he was even strongerpared to before when they met in his pet shop.


    He could easily injure him then, so wouldn''t he need to flick a single finger to kill them now?


    Lin Yu and Lin Jun both moved behind Lin Lei as they didn''t dare look directly at Lin Fan.


    Lin Lei had knitted his brows even deeper when he had heard this.


    This was the Lin Manor and he was the second elder of the Lin Family. There was actually someone crazy enough to demand the heads of members of the Lin Family in front of him, just who was this maniac?


    Lin Lei said with a dark look on his face, "This friend, I don''t know who you are, but do you know where you are right now? Are you sure you want to do this?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a calm, but cold gaze for a few seconds before suddenly breaking out in wildughter.


    Everyone looked at him in shock, thinking that he had gone crazy, even his own family.


    After a few seconds of wildughter, it suddenly stopped as Lin Fan released a killing intent that even caught Lin Lei off guard.


    Lin Fan''s ice cold gaze fell onto Lin Lei as he said in a voice that froze the air around him, "Who do you think I am?"


    Lin Lei in his head thought, "Who cares who you are, you madman?" But on the surface, he asked with a calm look, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan said word for word, "Lin Fan, son of Lin Ao."


    Everyone, whether they were outside the manor or secretly watching from within were shocked the moment they heard this.


    Blood really did tell, even the son of Lin Ao was such a freak.


    They could tell from the aura that he released that he was already in the high tinum Realm and judging by his appearance, he didn''t even seem like he was in his twenties.


    There were quite a few people who took special note of Lin Fan and they sent out their spiritual sense to check him out, but what they found was that the moment their spiritual sense came near Lin Fan, itpletely disappeared. It was as if there was something that had sucked it all away.


    Lin Lei was in a daze for a full minute before calming himself and saying, "So it''s grand nephew Fan, rather I should just call you Xiao Fan. You should know that I am your granduncle, so there''s no need to be like this. Someone as talented as you shouldn''t be wandering around the world by yourself, you should be with your family."


    Lin Lei''s mind had already begun scheming the moment he had found out Lin Fan''s true identity.


    What was a Lin Yu and a Lin Jun whenpared to this Lin Fan?


    With Lin Fan''s talent, he would definitely be able to be the ancestor''s closed door disciple.


    If that were to happen, if Lin Lei was the one to bring Lin Fan back to the Lin Family, what kind of rewards would he receive?


    When Lin Ao was still at the Lin Family, Lin Jiao had be the family head even though he was the weakest out of all of them.


    Even if Lin Fan brought Lin Ao back to the Lin Family, it didn''t matter since Lin Ao was nothing more than a cripple and easily manipted. Lin Fan wasn''t close to his grandfather since Lin Ao had left the Lin Family at a young age, when Lin Fan still wasn''t aware of anything.<sub> </sub>


    That meant that as long as he could pull Lin Fan to his side, everything would be his.


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before he said, "What about my father?"


    Lin Lei revealed a friendly smile as he said, "Nephew Ao? His crimes will be pardoned for bringing the Lin Family as talented as you. I''m sure that this is what he would want as well. As long as you''re willing toe back to the Lin Family, all of you cane back together."


    Lin Fan became even more hesitant as he fell silent for a bit with a conflicted look on his face. Only after a while did he say, "How can you guarantee this? Am I supposed to just take your word for this?"


    Lin Lei''s smile became even wider when he heard this.


    This Lin Fan was powerful and talented, but he was still a kid in the end. It was easy to manipte a kid like him.


    With Lin Lei''s power in the Lin Family, if he wanted to eliminate Lin Ao and his family without Lin Fan finding out, it would be more than easy. Then he could easily make it seem like an ident and help Lin Fan find the culprit.


    It was almost like he was already the family head.


    Lin Fan then pointed at Lin Yu and Lin Jun as he said, "What about those two? I still want their heads."


    Lin Lei looked at the two before saying without a trace of care, "They''ve offended esteemed grandnephew Fan, they deserve death for this."


    Lin Yu and Lin Jun looked at Lin Lei like the world had copsed around them.


    This wasn''t how this script was supposed to go, now they were being used as sacrifices?


    These two naturally had their own ambitions, so how could they let it end here?


    Not to mention, there was nothing more important to them than their life.


    The two of them had different reactions to Lin Lei''s words.


    Lin Jun immediately began begging for his life as he said, "Second elder, please I can be useful to you..."


    Lin Yu began hinting at the things that the second elder had him do, clearly trying to threaten him, "Second elder, I''ve been by your side for a while and have done quite a few things for you¡­"


    But while they were speaking, Lin Fan suddenly cut in with augh.


    Thisugh was a wildugh that cut through all of their voices, once again stunning them.


    They didn''t understand why Lin Fan would suddenly break out inughter at this point, but then his next words shocked them even more.


    Lin Fan''sughter slowly came to a stop as he said with a taunting smile on his face, "You people really are hypocritical."


    Lin Lei had deeply knitted his brows as he asked, "Grandnephew, what do you mean by this?" There was an unsettled feeling that had also filled his heart.


    Lin Fan looked at him calmly and said with the same taunting smile, "You should know what I mean. Anyway, that''s enough talking for today. All you need to know is that I will be smashing the Lin Manor today."


    Lin Lei''s face turned cold when he heard this.


    He wasn''t someone who kept grasping at straws, he knew immediately that there was only one conclusion that would be possible today.


    He looked at Lin Fan with a dark look on his face as he said, "Do you know where you are? This is the Lin Family, one of the five Legendary Realm families in this world! You might be talented, but don''t let that go to your head! You might be strong, but you are still nothing more than a frog at the bottom of the well!"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "Who knows?"


    Lin Lei''s chest filled with even more rage when he heard this as he roared out, "You think you''re that powerful, you''re nothing more than a child! There''s no need for the ancestor to make a move, just me alone is enough to teach you a lesson!"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother answering this with more words, the time for talking was over.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and just like with the guards, he sent his palm out to create a wave of golden energy. That wave was directly aimed at Lin Lei.

 306 Chapter 306

    Lin Lei''s reactions weren''t slow. He quickly brought his right hand up and with a single flick of his wrist, there was a light yellow de that had appeared in his hand.


    Like his name suggested, he was someone who specialized in cultivating thunderws, using the lightws of the Lin Family as a secondary tool to increase the speed and power of his thunderws.


    There were sparks that coated the de of the sword he pulled out, giving off a strong aura. It was clear that his thunderws were powerful.


    With no hesitation at all, he shed horizontally in front of him, creating a sh of electric energy that flew out to meet Lin Fan''s golden wave.


    Just based on the intensity of the electricity that filled the air around the sh, one could tell that it was definitely powerful. Even those in the same peak tinum Realm would find it hard to resist it.


    However, when that sh of electric energy shed with the golden energy wave, it actually couldn''t evenst a single second before it was scattered apart by the golden energy wave.


    What no one noticed was that behind the golden wave, there was a faint white wave that was thin enough to hide from the naked eye. This was the spatialw that Lin Fan had put behind his golden wave, creating a two fold attack that was far stronger than a normal attack.


    It had already reached the point where it could have been considered an attack at the Legendary Realm and the second elder wanted to block it with just his own cultivation?


    What a joke that was.


    Lin Lei had a confident look on his face when he shed out with his sword, but the moment his attack had shattered, that confident look copsed.


    Lin Lei quickly twisted his sword around for another sh, but there was no opportunity.


    The golden energy wave suddenly sped up as it came closer to him and itpletely caught him off guard, right when he was in the middle of his swing. Of course, he could adapt and use the sword to block it, but the moment it hit his sword, he knew that this wasn''t an ordinary attack.


    Lin Lei forced out all the power that he could wield, but even then, he could feel that it wouldn''t be enough to push back against this golden wave.


    There was a dy of a few seconds, but then Lin Lei was forced back a few centimeters. This continued as he kept being pushed back until Lin Lei waspletely sent flying with a single attack from Lin Fan.


    He flew right through the air andnded on the ground several meters away. He didn''t just stop there as he skipped like a stone on water, bouncing a few times before finally skidding to a stop.


    Once he came to a stop, he suddenly reeled forth and spat out a mouthful of blood right into his hand. He tried to steady his body, but as he held his hand over his mouth, there was still a trace of blooding from in between his fingers.


    When he looked at Lin Fan this time, what was in his eyes was no longer disdain, but rather there was a slight trace of fear.


    He couldn''t even tell what Lin Fan had done, but he knew that Lin Fan was definitely stronger than him.


    Once Lin Lei hadnded, Lin Fan gave a soft snort before taking a step forward towards him.


    Lin Yu and Lin Jun had been standing there in a daze looking at Lin Lei who had been sent flying, but once they noticed that Lin Fan started to move, they immediately took several steps back.


    Lin Lei also noticed this and he pushed himself through the pain to say, "What, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a genuinely confused look and said, "Isn''t it obvious?"


    When Lin Lei heard this, he felt a chill run down his back.


    He forced himself to sit up and scooted back a step, but that didn''t matter since he was much too injured to escape Lin Fan''s grasp.


    He knew that Lin Fan was crazy after that disy from earlier, but he never thought that he would be this crazy.


    This was the Lin Manor, it was a ce that contained a Legendary Realm Expert, but he was crazy enough to kill one of the descendants of that family on the manor grounds. Not to mention that this kid was also his junior.


    But seeing the way Lin Fan casually moved towards him, he had no doubt that Lin Fan would truly go through with his words. There was no hesitation in his steps at all.


    Lin Lei knew that he had messed up today, so he ignored all his pride and honour to turn back to the manor and shout, "Save me! Big brother,e and save me!"<sub> </sub>


    He knew that Lin Fan was powerful, but his big brother, the first elder held a greater position in his mind.


    The first elder was someone whopletely dedicated himself to his cultivation, so he was much stronger than the rest of the elders. It was even rumoured that he was already in the Legendary Realm, but he was just hiding it out of respect for their ancestor.


    <o>,m While the first elder didn''t care about worldly matters, there was one thing that was his soft spot. The first elder was someone who cared deeply about his family, which was the main reason why he stayed out of the struggle for the family head position.</o>


    Lin Lei believed that as long as the first elder came, he would definitely be able to take care of this maniac.


    As he had expected, when he shouted out towards the manor, there was a sudden burst of energy that came from the Lin Manor as a figure jumped out.


    This was a man who was simr to the ancestor in the Lin Manor. He was dressedpletely in white with pure white hair and beard. The way he was dressed made him look like a proper sword immortal.


    This man in white jumped out in front of Lin Lei and stood right in front of Lin Fan, looking him over. After a few seconds, he gave a sigh and said, "We''re all part of the same family, why don''t we just drop this matter and get along?"


    Lin Fan looked over this man in white, releasing his spiritual sense to probe him.


    After a few seconds, he couldn''t help revealing a surprised look as he said, "You''re just a single step away from the Primary Soul Realm? And you seem to be holding yourself back, why?"


    While Lin Fan''s cultivation was being held back by what was in his heart, his spiritual sense didn''t have a problem growing, already reaching the Legendary Realm. He could easily use his spiritual sense to see through the first elder''s cultivation.


    The first elder revealed a surprised look when he heard this, but then he said, "This is for the family, you would understand if youe back."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "How can you expect me toe back to a family like this?"


    The first elder revealed a slightly hesitant look since he knew that Lin Fan was right, but still this was his family and he had no other choice. He then said, "It''s never toote to change it, we can forget that all of this happened. We''re a family, we can work through this."


    Lin Fan shook his head once again and said, "You know in your heart whether that is true or not."


    The first elder gave a big sigh before pulling out his sword.


    This was a sword that waspletely white, it was quite dazzling in the sun.


    The first elder cupped his hands while holding the sword as he said to Lin Fan, "Lin Jian, first elder of the Lin Family."


    Lin Fan was slightly taken aback by this, but then he revealed a faint smile as he returned the gesture. He cupped his hands and said, "Lin Fan, son of Lin Ao."


    He said the same thing that he had said before, but this time it was out of respect. After all, Lin Ao had been the greatest genius of the Lin Family at one time, so being his son was something to be proud of.


    He also returned the first elder''s greetings, which was a sign of respect to him.


    When two masters dueled, they would present their own names.


    After this, Lin Fan also pulled out his pure white sword.


    When this sword appeared, the aura that it brought out made the first elder knit his brows. He could tell that this sword wasn''t normal, but he couldn''t say a thing since it was the weapon of the enemy.


    This was a sign of respect to him as well since he knew that based on Lin Fan''s attack from earlier, he could have beaten him without his sword, but he took out his sword to show that he took this seriously.


    The two of them looked at each other and right in the next second, they both disappeared.


    When they reappeared again, they had swapped positions.


    Nothing seemed out of ce, but after a few seconds, the pure white sword in Lin Jian''s hand had snapped in two while Lin Fan stood there like nothing had happened.

 307 Chapter 307

    Lin Jian turned around with a slightly bitter smile as he shook his head and said, "The young will always surpass the old."


    Lin Fan turned around as well with a faint smile as he said, "Elder, you let me win."


    Lin Jian didn''t say a thing. He knew that if he were to respond, it would hurt his pride even more.


    Lin Fan turned back to Lin Lei and looked at him in disdain. After a few seconds of not saying anything, he finally said, "I''ll spare you today out of respect for the first elder. You better scram right this instant."


    Lin Lei acted like he had just been pardoned and immediately ran off as fast as he could towards the Lin Manor. Of course he wouldn''t forget the humiliation he had suffered today, but right now there was nothing more important than his life.


    Who knew what else this madman would do?


    It didn''t matter if he lost his pride today, he would get it back another day as long as he was alive.


    After all, this madman wouldn''t be able to protect Lin Ao and his family all the time¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with a minor character like Lin Lei, he turned to the Jiang Manor and took a deep breath before raising his voice, "The Lin Manor will be smashed today,e out now and you''ll be spared. If you stay inside, I''ll take that as a sign that you''ll fight to the end!"


    Everyone was shocked when they heard this, they never expected Lin Fan to be this domineering.


    It was fine to take care of a few elders, but there was still their ancestor in the manor. It wasn''t just their ancestor as well, the ancestor was also Lin Fan''s great grandfather.


    Yet here he was dering that he would smash the Lin Manor right in his front yard.


    Wouldn''t this be considered a p to the ancestor''s face?


    But even after Lin Fan had said all of this, not a single person came out of the manor.


    After seeing Lin Fan take care of both the first and second elder, which one of them dared toe out?


    While all of the elders were in the peak tinum Realm, there was a clear difference between them and the first and second elders. If they were to go out now, wasn''t that asking Lin Fan to beat them up?


    Some of the people in the manor did urge the family head, who was Lin Ao''s father and Lin Fan''s grandfather to go out and talk to Lin Fan, but he didn''t have the face to do so.


    When Lin Ao was exiled from the Lin Family, Lin Jiao had stood on the sidelines, not saying a word as he watched his son being exiled from the family. He had done it all for his own position in the family.


    Did he regret it?


    At that time, he hadn''t, but now he couldn''t help feeling that he had done something wrong¡­


    There were also a few people who had sent their own subordinates to where the ancestor was in closed door cultivation to inform him what had happened. After all, the ancestoring out to deal with this maniac was the only choice they had.


    As they were all panicking, Lin Fan was slowly moving towards the Lin Manor,ing closer step by step.


    With each step that he took, it was like someone was taking a step on their hearts. They couldn''t stop their breaths from bing quicker and their hearts from beating faster.


    With the way their hearts were beating, it was almost as if they would jump out at any second.


    In the various hiding spots of the elders, there were simr conversations that could be heard.


    "Elder, that maniac ising closer! Please go out and deal with him!"


    "You want me to deal with that maniac? Are you crazy? You go deal with him!"


    "But elder¡­"


    All around the manor, all the elderspletely refused to go out.


    They were elders of a Legendary Realm family, they weren''t about to risk their necks like this.


    As long as the ancestor was still in the Lin Family, there was nothing for them to worry about.


    Lin Fan continued forward, but the moment he was only a single step away from entering the Lin Manor, there was a sudden change in the air.


    For the people in the manor, their cultivations were too weak and they were too focused on the danger that Lin Fan posed on them, so they didn''t sense it at all.


    Out of all the people present, there were only four people that had suddenly sensed the change around them.


    These four were Lin Fan, Lin Jian, the ancestor, and Lin Ao.


    Lin Fan immediately turned his head in the direction of the disturbance, right as a powerful aura came out of the Lin Manor.


    The eyes of everyone in the Lin Manor lit up when they felt this aura since they immediately recognized it. It was their ancestor!<sub> </sub>


    There was a figure that jumped out of the Lin Manor and as soon as this figure came out, all the people hiding in the Lin Manor came out to greet him.


    "Greetings ancestor!"


    Then after this, the third elder came forward and said, "Father, please take care of this unruly youngster who has gone against his ways. He dares to attack the family that he came from!"


    Lin Fan could tell from this person''s aura that he was in the Legendary Realm, but he could also tell that this person wasn''t anywhere close to being near his natural limit.


    The aura of the Lin Family''s ancestor waspletely different from the aura that the Jiang Family ancestor had. This aura was filled with vitality,pletely unlike someone who was at the end of their lifespan.


    Lin Fan could tell that this ancestor was hiding quite a bit. He definitely wasn''t as weak as he had thought that he had been. If they were to fight for real, Lin Fan wasn''t actually confident in dealing with him.


    But as he was preparing to fight the ancestor, the Lin Family ancestor did something that no one expected.


    The Lin Family ancestor said, "Enough with your squabbling, there''s no time for this!"


    Everyone looked at the Lin Family ancestor with shocked gazes, among them included Lin Fan.


    What did this old man mean by that? Squabbles?


    The fighting between them had only been squabbles?


    The third elder quickly said, "But father, that kid said that he was going to tten the Lin Manor. This is an insult to not just the Lin Family, but also to you."


    The Lin Family ancestor turned to re at the third elder as he said in a cold voice, "That kid? Is that an address that you''re qualified to say?"


    The third elder was taken aback when he heard, "But father¡­"


    He didn''t get a chance to exin at all before the Lin Family ancestor cut him off with a cold snort, "Enough, Xiao Fan is a part of our family no matter what, you should do well to remember that. Now, seal your cultivation and train in the Room of Iron for a year, that is your punishment."


    The third elder waspletely shocked when he heard this.


    His father had not just defended an outsider, he had even punished him, his own son!


    The third elder stammered, "But father¡­"


    Once again, he didn''t get a chance to continue as the Lin Family ancestor said with another cold snort, "Two years."


    The third elder''s words froze in his mouth before he swallowed them back. After a second of hesitation, he said, "Yes, father!"


    Then the third elder headed off without a single moment of dy.


    It was rare to see the Lin Family ancestor acting this way, he had almost never seen his father like this since that incident¡­


    The Lin Family ancestor ignored the third elder and turned back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan prepared himself, thinking that the Lin Family ancestor was about to attack him, but that wasn''t the case.


    The Lin Family ancestor looked past him to look at Lin Ao who was standing there and said, "Ao, you''re the family head from now on. Clean up the mess here and meet uster."


    Everyone was shocked once again, even more shocked than they were before.


    But Lin Jiao quickly came forward and said, "Father, what about me?"


    The Lin Family ancestor shook his head and said, "Jiao, Ao is your son, are you really doing this?" After saying this, he shook his head and said in a mumble that everyone could hear, "What is my Lin Familying to?"


    After a brief moment of disappointment, the Lin Family ancestor steeled his face and said with a serious look, "All of you will listen to Ao''s arrangements. Anyone that disobeys will be severely punished, do you understand?"


    No one dared to speak back to him this time, everyone just nodded and said, "Yes, ancestor!"


    There was only Lin Jian who asked, "Father, is it¡­"


    The Lin Family ancestor gave a slight nod and said, "It is."


    Then without waiting for Lin Jian''s answer he walked past Lin Fan and waved his hand at him, "Xiao Fan, youe with me. We''re going to deal with this situation."


    Lin Fan waspletely confused by how everything had developed. He had no idea what he was supposed to do.


    Lin Fan turned back to look at Lin Ao who gave him a nod and then making up his mind, he followed the Lin Family ancestor out of the Lin Manor.

 308 Chapter 308

    The Lin Family ancestor didn''t hesitate at all to leave True Light City, bringing Lin Fan onto a personal airship that headed off in a northern direction.


    True Light City was in the south with Green Wood City, but it wasn''t as south as Green Wood City.


    The airship they were on was currently heading north, towards the center of the continent since there was a special city in the center of the continent. It was the city that was the center of the Eastern Continent, the city upied by the main branch of the Union Government.


    ? This city wasn''t considered a S Ranked City, rather it had no rank at all since it surpassed the concept of rankspletely. This was a city that was above all the cities since it gathered all the elites of the Eastern Continent.


    On the surface, there were only the five Legendary Realm Experts on the Eastern Continent, but there was actually much more than that. However, those experts couldn''t be considered part of the Eastern Continent since they were a part of the Union Government.


    The Union Government was the organization that governed all of humanity on the Blue Star, so those that worked for the Union Government were a part of all of humanity, not just a single continent.


    Take the general that Lin Fan had met previously on his way to Green Wood City.


    There were many Legendary Realm Experts like him in the Union Government and even though they were born on the Eastern Continent, grew up there, and trained there, they were now part of the Union Government.


    If all the Legendary Realm Experts on the Eastern Continent were counted, it would be more than one could count on two hands alone.


    Along the way, neither of the two said a thing as they sat there in a room, looking at each other and looking out the window from time to time.


    Since they were taking the Lin Family ancestor''s private airship, which was much better than normal airships, being able to travel at four to five times the normal speed, it didn''t take them long to arrive.


    Before they did arrive however, the Lin Family ancestor said, "I know you have a lot of questions you want to ask, but I''ll answer them once we finish this."


    Lin Fan looked at him before calmly giving a nod, not saying a thing.


    The city they arrived in was called Central City, it was one of the five Central Cities of the Blue Star.


    The Union Government had five different branches, one for each of the five continents. All the cities that these five branches were in were all called Central City.


    They were named this because this was the center of humanity on this, since each Central City was where the Union Government was.


    When they arrived, they were immediately greeted by Union Government forces who brought the two of them to the giant tower that was in the center of the city.


    This tower, just like the city, was also called Central Tower. It was the headquarters of the Union Government and where the elites of the Blue Star gathered.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    He wasn''t surprised at the tower that reached all the way into the sky, rather he was shocked by the number of elites that were around.


    There were tinum Realm Experts that were standing all over and only tinum Realm Experts. There was no one under the tinum Realm that was present.


    But not only that, there were five different Legendary Realm Experts also present.


    One of them was someone that Lin Fan recognized, it was Mu Bo Hai from Green Wood City.


    When Mu Bo Hai noticed Lin Fan looking over, he gave him a nod with a smile before turning to head into the tower.


    He had seen that Lin Fan was with the Lin Family ancestor, so he knew that this was no time for polite greetings. Not to mention that important matter that they had all been gathered here for.


    The Lin Family ancestor didn''t wait either, he just led Lin Fan into the tower and soon they were on an elevator that was heading right to the top floor.


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand what was happening here, but he knew that this situation was serious. If it wasn''t, they wouldn''t have gathered five Legendary Realm Experts here. Not to mention that Lin Fan could sense even more of them above them.


    Could it be that it was rted to the phenomenon that he felt before the Lin Family ancestor had appeared?


    But what could cause that kind of phenomenon?


    Lin Fan''s questions were answered quite quickly.


    After they reached the top floor, Lin Fan and the Lin Family ancestor arrived at a conference room where there were already people sitting there.<sub> </sub>


    There were a few people that Lin Fan recognized, all of them were Legendary Realm Experts.


    It was Mu Bo Hai, Zhu Ba Jie, Jiang Wan Li, and the Grand General of the Union Government''s forces.


    However, it wasn''t just them that were gathered here, there were still plenty of other Legendary Realm Experts.


    If one had to describe what this meeting was, the best way to describe it was the elites of elites.


    It seemed that all of the most powerful experts on the Eastern Continent were gathered here today.


    Judging by their expressions, it seemed like this was quite the serious meeting.


    The Lin Family ancestor brought Lin Fan over to a seat with a card that read ''Lin'' in front of it and he sat down. Lin Fan looked around and saw what the other followers were doing, so he stood behind the Lin Family ancestor like the rest of them.


    It didn''t take long before the meeting started.


    The lights in the room dimmed and the position at the head of the table suddenly lit up as a person walked over to take it.


    Judging by his aura, this person was clearly a Legendary Realm Expert, but that wasn''t surprising since almost everyone else present were also Legendary Realm Experts.


    The one thing that was surprising was that everyone seemed to look at him in a respectful manner.


    That person paused for a second before he calmly said, "Everyone, it''s the worst possible situation. It''s a beast horde."


    The atmosphere in the room became heavy the moment he said this.


    Everyone was silent, not a single person said a word. Even if they wanted to, they would have swallowed it back under this pressure.


    They all knew what this beast horde meant even though it was something that had never happened since the establishment of the Union Government. Or rather, it should be said that the Union Government was only formed because the beast horde had happened.


    The beast horde was theplete break of all current nar cracks on the Blue Star, it symbolized an all out invasion by the Beast Race.


    Thest time that this had happened, it was because the Beast Race hade for the fallen Beast King''s legacy.


    The Union Government was subsequently formed by the followers of the princess who had directed the upper realm factions toe down to this lower realm.


    For this beast horde to happen, it would mean that one of their Kings would have to injure their own cultivation to activate a special spatialw array that would allow them to force all the nar cracks to break.


    But for them to do this for just a single lower realm Blue Star, it didn''t make sense at all.


    There were nar cracks all over the Blue Star, but most of them were actually gathered on the Eastern Continent, so this meant that this situation was much worse for them than the other continents.


    It was at this time that they needed to gather all their experts since this was now a full on war with the Beast Race.


    One of the Legendary Realm Experts sitting in the room couldn''t help asking, "How did this happen? Why is this happening? Is there any information at all?"


    The person who was standing at the head of the table shook his head before saying, "We have no idea at all, the only thing we have right now is the influx of spatialw energy which tells us that the nar cracks have broken. As well as various reports of beast waves attacking strongholds all over the continent."


    Everyone knitted their brows when they heard this, especially the five Legendary Realm Experts that weren''t a part of the Union Government.


    There had been nar cracks near their cities and if a break was to happen, they should be there protecting their cities and their families instead of being here. The only reason they came was because of the special summons of the Union Government president.


    The person standing at the head of the table could naturally tell what they were thinking, so he said, "You don''t have to worry, the only strongholds they are attacking are the ones in their way. For some reason, it seems like all the beast waves are gathering in a single position."


    He tapped the table in front of him and there was a map of the Eastern Continent that appeared. All over the map were various red waves that were heading towards a single red dot that was in the southern part of the map.


    It was actually right by Snow Wind City!

 309 Chapter 309

    Lin Fan knitted his brows the moment he saw this.


    He already knew what the target of the Beast Race was. It wasn''t just the corpse and legacy of the fallen Beast King, it was also the artifact that he had been chasing.


    It was clearly a very important artifact if they were willing tounch a full scale invasion for it and it was clear that Snow Wind City was in the way of them achieving this goal. If nothing was done, Snow Wind City was definitely finished.


    The others didn''t really care, but it was different for Lin Fan.


    Even though he had only been in this world for a little over half a year, Snow Wind City was still his home since that was the ce where his family lived. Not only that, it was where quite a few of his closest friends lived, including one figure that for some reason appeared in his mind. He had unknowingly be attached to this city.


    Now that Snow Wind City was in danger, he couldn''t help feeling worried.


    But there was no time for him to worry about this now since the meeting continued.


    The person who was at the head of the table continued on to say, "We''ve already performed some scouting on the situation of each beast wave and we have determined that currently there are only ten King Beasts leading them,ing from various directions. We will need each of you to coordinate with each other to take care of these waves."


    He went on to exin the battle n the Union Government hade up with.


    There were clearly more than just ten waves, since there were over fifty nar cracks alone on the Eastern Continent. However, these ten waves were the top priority since they were waves that were led by King Beasts which were on the same level as Legendary Realm Experts.


    The only ones that could deal with these waves were only the people in these rooms.


    The Union Government''s battle n was to assign two Legendary Realm Experts with Union Government forces to take care of these ten King Beast waves.


    Since generally beasts were more powerful than normal humans, the Union Government chose to send two Legendary Realm Experts to take care of each King Beast. They were just lucky that there were just enough Legendary Realm Experts to take care of all the King Beasts.


    If even one more had shown up, they would have had to send two Legendary Realm Experts to fight King Beasts alone.


    As for the rest of the waves, the Union Government would be sending out their own troops who would be backed by the local troops, such as the royals and nobles who lived all across the continent.


    They were given their status by the Union Government to raise them up as experts of humanity, but that also meant that they were expected to rise up for humanity in such events. Now that the beast horde had appeared, it was their obligation to fight against these waves.


    Of course, there would be those that would dy and think about their own benefits instead ofplying with the summons of the Union Government. As for those people, the Union Government had their own ways of dealing with them.


    At the end of the meeting, someone didn''t forget to ask, "President, what about the upper realm factions?"


    It was only when someone said this that Lin Fan finally learned the identity of the man who was at the head of the table. This man was the president of the Union Government, it could be said that he was the top governing power on this Blue Star.


    The president said, "We''ve already sent word to the various upper realm factions, but as for when reinforcements wille, we don''t have a concrete time. For now, all we can do is hold back the beasts for as long as possible. Hopefully our messages will reach them in time and they''ll be able to rush down to help us."


    No one here was unaware of the existence of the upper realm factions since all of them were at the very top of this Blue Star. Most of them actually had upper realm factions backing them, so they had also used their own methods to send messages up.


    But the response they received was the same as the Union Government. For some reason, there was a dy in the messages and it seemed like it would be hard for reinforcements toe. So the only thing they could do was hold out and hope that their various backup ns would bear fruit.


    As for why the upper realm factions were dyed, it was clear that it was the interference of the Beast Race.


    All of this had happened so suddenly and everyone here was suspicious of this. There were many of them that even thought that there were traitors among them, but this wasn''t the time to think about that now.


    What they needed to do now was defend their homes.


    After this, the meeting ended and everyone headed off in separate directions.<sub> </sub>


    They had all been assigned a different King Beast wave to handle, so they went off in pairs of twos to take care of them.


    The one that the Lin Family ancestor was paired with was Mu Bo Hai since there was a King Beast waveing from the south. Both the cities of the Lin Family and the Mu Family were found in the south, so they were the ideal people to take care of these waves.


    Mu Bo Hai came over with a smile after the meeting was over as he greeted the Lin Family ancestor, "Brother Lin, it truly has been a long time since we''ve met."


    The Lin Family ancestor said, "Brother Mu, let''s go."


    Mu Bo Hai didn''t mind that the Lin Family ancestor''s words were so direct since he already knew what kind of personality he had. Or rather, what kind of personality he showed to others.


    Mu Bo Hai just followed him as the Lin Family ancestor moved to the elevator while hanging back a bit to talk to Lin Fan, "Owner Fan, it''s been a long time since we''ve seen each other."


    Lin Fan returned Mu Bo Hai''s smile as he said, "Elder Mu, it truly has been a long time."


    Mu Bo Hai''s smile became a bit wry when he heard this. These two from the Lin Family, they really were too simr, but that was how he expected sword cultivators to be. That was, he assumed Lin Fan was a sword cultivator as well since Lin Fan came from the Lin Family.


    But after pausing for a minute, he didn''t beat around the bush as he asked, "Are you back in the Lin Family now?"


    Lin Fan also paused for a minute before saying, "Not exactly."


    Mu Bo Hai saw theplicated look that Lin Fan had and decided not to say anything else.


    Their group went down their elevator and were quickly brought to their own airships.


    Mu Bo Hai had alsoe in his personal airship, so he would be going in his airship while Lin Fan and the Lin Family ancestor would be heading off in their own airship.


    Both of them had half of the troops that the Union Government sent with them, with both of them taking a scout who would be guiding them to where the King Beast wave currently was ording to their surveince.


    There wasn''t time to waste with these beast waves since they were moving fast towards their target, so they didn''t waste any words as both of these airships headed off.


    As they left Central City, they saw various different airships heading off in different directions. These were all the airships of the various Legendary Realm Experts and the forces of the Union Government, heading off to their various battlefields.


    Along the way, Lin Fan and the Lin Family ancestor returned to sitting in the same room as before, not talking to one another, just sitting there in awkward silence.


    Before, it was the Lin Family ancestor who broke the silence by speaking first, but this time it was Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan hesitated for a bit before saying, "Ancestor¡­"


    But before he could continue, the Lin Family ancestor cut him off by saying, "I know what you are thinking, but you can''t go to Snow Wind City right now. We need to take care of this beast wave first before we can do anything else, you should know that. Also, call me great grandfather."


    Lin Fan was a bit caught off guard by those final words, but then he gave a sigh as he knew that the Lin Family ancestor was right.


    While the Legendary Realm Experts were strong, what they were facing was a beast wave. There would be countless beasts that would be around the King Beast and the Legendary Realm Experts would be needed to take care of the King Beast.


    It was up to the forces of the Union Government and local troops that they picked up along the way to take care of the beasts in the beast wave, allowing the Legendary Realm Experts to focus on the King Beast.


    They definitely couldn''tck Lin Fan since he was a powerful expert in his own right now. He was actually someone that could match those in the mid to high Fragmented Soul Realm, depending on how powerful thews of the enemy were, so he would definitely be the one leading those clearing the beast wave.


    In the end, no one was strong enough to face endless enemies on their own...

 310 Chapter 310

    It didn''t take them long to reach the King Beast wave.


    After all, the King Beast wave was currently heading north from the southern part of the Eastern Continent, heading towards Snow Wind City that was north of both True Light City and Green Wood City.


    With them heading south and the beast wave heading north, they came closer to each other at two times the normal speed.


    Soon they were gathered at a spot that was still a few dozen kilometers away from the King Beast wave.


    They deliberately chose to gather a few dozen kilometers away to give themselves some time to gather their forces. It would still be another half an hour before the King Beast wave would reach them.


    During this time, they built up temporary defenses for their long range attackers while many different local forces gathered up with them.


    Of course, there were also those that ignored their duties to humanity, but there wasn''t time for them to deal with them right now.


    In name, the forces gathered would be led by themander of the Union Government force, but everyone knew it was the two Legendary Realm Experts who were the ones in charge.


    Under them were the two helpers that they had brought, Lin Fan and Mu Dong Hai.


    Mu Dong Hai hadn''t been at the Union Government meeting since he was preparing a special weapon from the Mu Family on their airship.


    When they had arrived at their destination and came out of the airship, he only gave Lin Fan a simple greeting before heading off to prepare for the fight. Lin Fan didn''t mind since he also had to make his own preparations.


    When push came to shove, humanity did band together. That was the one advantage that the Blue Star Realm had, they were bonded as humanity against the Beast Race since the formation of the Union Government.


    Albeit there were a few cases of traitors here and there, but there was nothing that was perfect in this world.


    As time passed, soon they could hear the thundering sounds of the beast wave and see the clouds of dust that were raised by the millions of beasts that were charging their way.


    ording to the scouts and Lin Fan''s scouting through Brainy, there were close to two million beasts that were a part of this Beast Wave. At a conservative estimate, there were at least a few thousand tinum Realm beasts and tens of thousands of Gold Realm beasts.


    Inparison to this beast wave, the human forces were far from being able topare.


    Adding up all their forces, they barely had a thousand tinum Realm Experts and a few thousand Gold Realm Experts.


    The only thing that they had for them was their intelligence as humans since the only thing the beasts could do was charge forward as a wave. As for humans, they relied on their intelligence to fight, setting up all kinds of traps which was what they had been doing.


    Finally, the first beasts of the beast wave appeared across the horizon and everyone tensed up at this moment.


    They had made all the preparations they could make, but they knew that it would still be a very hard battle to fight.


    Just the first wave of beasts had many beasts in the Gold Realm and even a few beasts in the tinum Realm.


    The defenses of the humans were split into two sides, with the Mu Family''s forces taking the left side and the Lin Family''s forces taking the right side.


    Above them were the airships that they had brought, along with a few privately owned airships of the local families. These airships were floating above the forces, ready to provide air support with their cannons at any time.


    Of course, these airships didn''t dare float too far forward because there were still flying beasts that were a part of the beast wave. If they moved too forward and were swarmed by these flying beasts, it wouldn''t take long before they were brought down.


    On the ground, the front line of the defense were barricade spikes that were made of iron spikes with close range fighters behind them with various kinds of weapons.


    Then behind that front line, there were various towers that were set up for the long range fighters to shoot down and provide support for the close range fighters.


    There were also a few pit traps that were built in front of the front line, but no one expected much from them.<sub> </sub>


    As the beasts approached, there were many that immediately fell into the pit traps and were impaled on the spikes. There were also plenty that fell in and weren''t trampled by the spikes, but they were unable to get out since they were trampled over by the beasts that came from behind them. These pits were quickly filled up with the corpses of beasts that were trampled by the other beasts.


    That was another disadvantage of the beast wave. When a force had too many numbers and all they did was charge, there was no way to ever stop that charge. If there was something that stopped the beasts in front, they would immediately be trampled under the pressure from behind them as countless beasts would smash into them with the force of the entire beast wave.


    Just like that, there were beasts that were taken out without even a single human expert making a move, but the numbers that were taken down were only a drop in the bucket. There were simply just too many beasts and these traps were unable to stop their momentum at all.


    The beasts trampled over their fallenrades and continued forth, charging right at the barricade.


    Lin Fan saw this and was about to make a move, but the Lin Family ancestor behind him took him by the shoulder and brought him back. Lin Fan turned back to see the Lin Family ancestor shaking his head.


    The Lin Family ancestor didn''t doubt that Lin Fan probably had some special moves that would help relieve the pressure the beast wave put on the front lines, but he was also quite experienced in dealing with beast waves. While Lin Fan making a move now would reduce their casualties, sometimes it was better to save these tricks as trump cards. Sometimes, it was necessary to make these sacrifices.


    Lin Fan wasn''t certain that this was the right move since he had his own ideas, but the Lin Family ancestor was many times older than he was, so he chose to follow his orders for now.


    The beast wave was almost about to hit the front line when the second trap suddenly appeared.


    There were giant nts that suddenly appeared out of the ground from behind the front line. These nts were vines that reached up to the sky with a giant head that seemed to be a peashooter.


    Without any wasted time, these peashooters immediately began shooting out giant sized peas at the beast wave, crushing countless beasts under these giant projectiles.


    Lin Fan couldn''t stop his face from twitching when he saw these because they seemed very much like a certain character from a phone game that he had once yed¡­


    These peashooters were the preparations that Mu Dong Hai had been making during the Union Government meeting.


    The Mu Family lived in Green Wood City which was a city surrounded in forests. As a city that was surrounded in forests, naturally there were all kinds of strange fauna that could be found in this city. These peashooters were one such example.


    They were usually used to defend the city walls, but the Mu Family had brought half of their remaining seeds with them this time.


    These peashooters continued sting out giant sized peas that rolled through the wave of beasts, dealing quite a blow to the forces of the beast wave, but still it was only a drop in the bucket.


    Up to this point, the various traps that they had used had only taken out tens of thousands of beasts, but that didn''t matter at all since there were millions of them that were stilling.


    Not to mention that with the level these traps were at, the stronger beasts simply avoided them.


    The Gold Realm beasts jumped over the various pits and caught the peas that the peashooters were shooting out.


    As the lower realm beasts were being culled by these traps, the front line of the beast wave was soon reced by higher realm beasts.


    Soon, most of the Iron Realm beasts had beenpletely killed off. The first wave of this beast wave was soon filled with pure Gold and Silver Realm beasts with a sprinkling of Bronze Realm beasts that had special skills which allowed them to avoid the trap.


    These were the only two sets of traps that the human forces had prepared.


    Once the beasts were through this line of defense, a sh between the human experts and the beasts would be imminent.


    The beasts pushed on through without care for their fallen enemies and soon they entered the range of the long range fighters. Once they did, the long range fighters released their attacks upon these beasts, but they couldn''t do much damage since there were only high cultivation beasts left in this front line.


    Everyone knew that once they entered this range, it would already be toote.


    The beasts pushed right through these long range attacks and soon they were right at the iron spike barricade.


    It didn''t take long before the first beast had reached the barricade.

 311 Chapter 311

    The beasts didn''t hesitate at all as they crashed down on the barricade line of the humans, but it was too bad that they didn''t have any effect.


    The human defenses were filled with fresh fighters while the front line of the beast wave waspletely exhausted by the various traps that they had gone through.


    As the beasts tried to break through the iron spikes that kept them away from their enemies, the various weapons of the humans fell down on these beasts.


    Most of the humans were actually quite weak, but with how worn down most of these beasts were from the traps, they were able to take down beasts that were more powerful than them. Those in the Iron Realm took down Bronze Realm beasts, those in the Bronze Realm took down Silver Realm beasts, those in the Silver Realm took down Gold Realm beasts, and those in the Gold Realm still took down Gold Realm beasts.


    After all, there was just too much of a gap between the Gold Realm and the tinum Realm with the introduction ofws. With that increase in power, the tinum Realm beasts weren''t slowed down by the traps at all and they were still able to fight normally.


    The ones that dealt with these tinum Realm beasts were naturally experts who were also in the tinum Realm.


    Butpared to those beasts that didn''t have the concept of cooperation, the humans working together were able to take care of these tinum Realm beasts rather easily.


    Each of the human tinum Realm Experts had several Gold Realm Experts who were supporting them, allowing them to easily draw the tinum Realm beasts into unfavourable situations that made it easier for them to take them down.


    But as the fighting continued, naturally the humans also became tired since there were endless reinforcements for the beasts. The beast wave numbered in the millions, so there were two beasts to rece every single beast that had fallen.


    Then as more and more beasts died, their corpses were either trampled by theirrades or were used as a barricade by the humans.


    When it seemed like the human experts were about to be overrun by the beasts, the Lin Family ancestor and Mu Bo Hai raised their watches at the same time. Both of them only said a single word.


    "Fire."


    Light suddenly began raining down from the sky as the airships that were above started firing with their cannons, raining down fire on the beast wave.


    The oppressive fire pushed back the beasts of the beast wave, or rather they hadpletely burnt away all the beasts that were currently in the front line.


    Before the airships had fired with their cannons, the human experts had already pushed the front line back a bit so they could retreat. This opened up a space that prevented the mes from the cannon fire from reaching the humans.


    During this slight pause, another wave of human experts from behind this wave came forward to swap ces with those in the front line.


    Once they were in ce, the airships stopped firing their cannons and allowed the beasts to charge forward once again. However, what faced them now was a fresh wave of human experts who easily crushed through them.


    This was the battle n that the human experts hade up with. They didn''tmit their full force to the fight right away, rather they had onlymitted a fourth of their forces.


    This would allow them to rotate out fighters and let their fighters rest, making them much more efficient since after all, they were currently at a numbers disadvantage. There were only a hundred thousand human experts that had gathered in the end.


    Still, against the exhausted beasts, these new humans who were in top form were able to easily crushed through them.


    Again and again, the airships fired to let the front lines swap out and they were able to slowly grind down the beast wave, but that was the strange thing. There were no moves at all from the leaders of this beast wave, the King Beasts.


    During this entire time, Lin Fan and Mu Dong Hai had been waiting with their family''s ancestors, just waiting for there to be any reason for them to make a move, but it never came.


    Slowly but surely, the beast wave was pushed back and their numbers kept decreasing. But at the same time, there were also human experts that fell under the ws of the beasts.


    The human experts had casualties that were over ten thousand, which was already a tenth of their entire force. However, whenparing it to the beast wave that had lost over a million beasts, which was over half their forces, it was definitely a victory.


    Yet even in this situation, there were no movements from the beast wave.


    However, one thing they could feel was the aura that came from the King Beasting from the back of the beast wave. It was a pressure that didn''t lose to the two Legendary Realm Experts present, perhaps even surpassing them.


    There was another period of fighting and another hundred thousand beasts were killed, but they also took out another two thousand human experts.


    In the end, the humans were also getting exhausted even with time to rest.


    With more than half of their numbers culled, the beast wave''s charge became a bit more spread out since they no longer had the same force as when they numbered in the millions.


    It was at this time that there was finally a change in the situation of the battlefield.


    In ten different ces in the defensive lines, there were breaks that suddenly appeared.<sub> </sub>


    Pieces of the iron spikes flew all over as they were shattered apart, creating holes in the barricades. There were ten peak tinum Realm beasts that had personally led the charge to break through their defensive lines.


    There were human experts that were sent flying, some even flew out in pieces,nding on theirrades¡­


    When themand center saw this, the two Legendary Realm Experts immediately knitted their brows. After a second of thought, they gave their orders at the same time.


    "Dong Hai."


    "Xiao Fan."


    "Take care of them."


    It was finally time to release Lin Fan and Mu Dong Hai.


    Both of them gave nods before charging out with their small group of followers.


    These two were definitely the strongest experts under the Legendary Realm Experts present.


    Mu Dong Hai had reached the peak tinum Realm over a hundred years ago and he was currently the strongest expert under Mu Bo Hai in the entire Mu Family.


    As for Lin Fan, there was no need to doubt his strength.


    Mu Bo Hai could tell that even if he were to personally fight Lin Fan, he might not even be able to win.


    The two groups that followed them were special elites trained by the Mu Family and the Lin Family.


    The group that followed Mu Dong Hai were the special elite guards of the Mu Family. They were the strongest experts that would defend the family as a final resort, but now they had been brought out to fight in this beast horde.


    Every single one of their members were in the high tinum Realm.


    As for the group following Lin Fan, they were the personal guards of the Lin Family ancestor. They were all in the high tinum Realm as well, but there were only four of them.


    There were naturally more elites of the Lin Family, but with how much of a mess it was now, the Lin Family ancestor didn''t trust them enough to bring them along.


    For now, he had full confidence in Lin Fan''s strength.


    The Mu Family elites split off into groups of twos and threes to take care of the peak tinum Realm beasts while Mu Dong Hai took care of one himself.


    The Lin Family elites naturally couldn''t do the same since there weren''t enough of them to take care of the four peak tinum Realm beasts they had to take care of, however that wasn''t a problem.


    In a situation like this where the fate of humanity was on the line, Lin Fan didn''t hold anything back.


    He summoned out his four pets, Xiao Huo, Xiao Feng, Xiao Lei, and Rocky, having each one of them follow one of the Lin Family ancestor''s guards to take care of a peak tinum Realm beast.


    Now that Lin Fan had reached the high tinum Realm, the four of them had all broken through to reach the peak tinum Realm.


    Just them alone with their special bloodlines were enough to take care of these four peak tinum Realm beasts, but Lin Fan had them hold back their strength and support the Lin Family elites. Their real strength could be considered one of his trump cards and before this battle was over, it was better not to reveal them.


    As for the final peak tinum Realm beast, he would be handling it himself.


    Even though he was only in the high tinum Realm, there was definitely no problem with him taking care of this peak tinum Realm beast alone with his powers.


    He also had Brainy with him who despite only being in the high tinum Realm as well could take care of this peak tinum Realm beast alone. But he definitely didn''t need Brainy''s help.


    It didn''t take them long to take down these ten peak tinum Realm beasts, but that was only a prelude to what woulde next.


    From the back of the beast wave, there was a powerful aura that suddenly exploded before moving towards them.


    The King Beast was on the move!

 312 Chapter 312

    With the movement of this aura, there was a powerful roar that suddenly cut through the air, creating shockwaves all around it.


    The shockwaves traveled through the beast wave, even hurting the ones that were caught by the full force of it, knocking them all aside. It continued traveling through this beast wave until it reached the human barricades.


    When the shockwave was about to hit the human experts, there was a leaf shield and a white sword beam that suddenly appeared. The white sword beam shattered the roar to pieces while the leaf shield blocked off those pieces, stopping them from hurting the human experts.


    The two who had been sitting still the entire time had finally made their move.


    One that was skilled in offense and one that was skilled in defense, they made the perfectbination, that was if they could cooperate with one another.


    But as a sword cultivator, the Lin Family ancestor didn''t hesitate for even a second as he charged out in front of their forces to face his enemy. He released countless swords made of light that cleared a path in front of him.


    When everyone saw this, they couldn''t help thinking that everything they had done before was a waste.


    As for Lin Fan, his face was also dark, but he was thinking something else.


    After the ancestor had told him to stay calm, it seemed like he couldn''t follow his own advice¡­


    Mu Bo Hai gave a sigh when he saw this, but he also came out with the Lin Family ancestor.


    Both of them had their weapons raised as they looked in the direction of the King Beast aura.


    In that direction, the beast wave parted like the sea did for Moses, creating a path right for the King Beast to walk through.


    Following the direction the aura came from, everyone saw a single beast walking through. However, the moment they saw the beast, they couldn''t help being surprised by it.


    This wasn''t a powerful predator like all the previous peak tinum Realm beasts. This was a little bunny that was hopping along through the crowd of beasts that was cowering in front of it.


    The beasts that were right by it all bowed down, like it was a royal procession.


    The only thing of note was that this bunny was quite chubby. It wasn''t a normal kind of chubby, it was almost like a ball that was rolling along and its feet almost sunk right into its body.


    With how chubby it was, one would think it was more cute than dangerous, but there was no mistaking the aura that it released.


    Well, to say that was the only thing to note was a lie since there was another defining feature of the rabbit that caught people''s eyes right away.


    On the ears of the bunny, there were speakers attached.


    This bunny continued hopping along until it was at the defense line of the humans.


    Everyone had their weapons raised, but seeing the appearance of the bunny, they couldn''t help doubting themselves.


    Was this really a King Beast?


    One of the human experts couldn''t take it anymore and charged forward with his spear, stabbing right at the bunny.


    The bunny tilted its head to look at this human charging at it before taking a breath, raising its head back. Once it finished taking in that breath, it suddenly swung its head back and released a powerful roar from the speakers in its ears.


    Since it was much closer now, the power of the roar couldn''tpare to before when it was still far away.


    Even when it was far away, the power of its roar was more than enough to take care of this human expert, but now that it was close, there was noparison. The only path that was waiting for this human if it was hit by this roar at such close range was death.


    Just as the roar was about to hit the human expert, there were roots that sprouted out of the ground, quickly growing upwards. The roots continued to grow until they formed trunks which created branches which then formed leaves. These leaves had gathered in the form of a shield that blocked off the roar from the little bunny, but quite a few of the leaves of the shield had been blown away by that roar.


    It was clear that Mu Bo Hai''s shield was weaker than the attack of the bunny.


    That human expert didn''t have death on his mind, so the moment he saw that he had survived, he immediately turned tail to run. All of the other human experts nearby also turned to run away, clearing out a patch around the little bunny.


    The two Legendary Realm Experts fell out of the sky andnded right in front of the bunny.


    It really was a strange scene, two old men holding weapons facing a fat little bunny that lookedpletely harmless.


    But these looks were definitely deceiving.


    The bunny took another deep breath and reared back again, like it was preparing to fire another sound st.<sub> </sub>


    The two Legendary Realm Experts didn''t pause for a second once they saw this.


    Mu Bo Hai smashed the staff in his hand into the ground, sending tremors that eventually turned into roots that dug through the ground. The roots continued forward, moving towards the little bunny before springing out of the ground to hold it in ce.


    As for the Lin Family ancestor, he immediately brought out his sword and charged forward, preparing a sh to end the little bunny''s life.


    However, things didn''t go as he nned.


    When the Lin Family ancestor was about to sh down at the little bunny, there was a wolf that suddenly charged out from behind the little bunny, jumping right in between it and the Lin Family ancestor.


    This wolf was only in the peak tinum Realm, so it didn''t pose any threat to the Lin Family ancestor, but it did y another role. It made a perfect human¡­beast shield for the little bunny.


    The Lin Family ancestor was already in mid swing and didn''t have time to adjust for this wolf suddenly appearing. If he shed down now, he would cut this wolf in half, but then he would have to take the full brunt of the attack of the King Beast.


    At this range, even he wasn''t confident in taking such a hit.


    But when the Lin Family ancestor was debating what to do, there was a tri coloured sword beam that suddenly came from behind him.


    Standing by Mu Bo Hai was Lin Fan who had swung his sword to send out this sword beam.


    This sword beam went right past the Lin Family ancestor and cut the wolf beast in half, clearing the way for him.


    In this war that would determine the fate of humanity, Lin Fan definitely wouldn''t hold anything back. He used his full strength to send out this sh.


    Of course, while he didn''t hold anything back, there was still the right timing for him to show his hand.


    The Lin Fan ancestor saw this and didn''t hesitate either as he continued shing down through the halves of the wolf beast, shing down with all his strength at the little bunny.


    The little bunny saw this and knew that just like how it would be bad for the Lin Family ancestor to take its hit, it would also be bad for it to take the Lin Family ancestor''s hit.


    Sword cultivators were known for their destructive might and the Lin Family ancestor was without a doubt the best sword cultivator on this Blue Star.


    The bunny stopped charging up its attack and sent out the roar to meet the Lin Family ancestor''s sh.


    The sound wave shed with the sword, but it was clearly much weaker since the little bunny hadn''t been able to gather all of its strength. After being equal for a few seconds, the sh fell down onto the little bunny.


    The little bunny turned in the nick of time and avoided a fatal injury, but the injury it did receive wasn''t light.


    When the Lin Family ancestor was about to continue chasing, there were several more peak tinum Realm beasts that suddenly came forward to meet him, pushing him back a few steps and making him unable to push forward.


    The little bunny moved back behind its line of troops again.


    <o>,m Once the peak tinum Realm beasts were taken care of and the Lin Family ancestor was about to chase, there was a voice that suddenly came from the beast wave.</o>


    "Che, you damn humans, you really are annoying!"


    Everyone was surprised to hear this voice since it was the voice of a little loli girl.


    They looked around to find the source of this voice, but then they realized that it was the voice of the little bunny.


    Its appearance and its voice, it really didn''t match the tone of the voice it had¡­


    It was like a little girl who always swore¡­


    The fact that this King Beast could speak meant that it possessed intelligence. If it possessed intelligence, there was a chance to talk to it and talking to it meant the possibility of getting information.


    Right now, the most important thing for the Blue Star''s side was information since they didn''t even know how this beast horde had started and what it was for.


    But before either of the Legendary Realm Experts could say a word, the little bunny spoke first.


    "Youzy bum,e out already. It''s tough enough taking on two of them at once!"

 313 Chapter 313

    When the human side was confused by this, there was a change that happened with the beast side.


    There was another powerful aura that suddenly appeared on the side of the beasts and they bowed down once again, as if they were weing the arrival of another king.


    However, that was also true since this aura was clearly the aura of another King Beast.


    From the middle of the group, there was a figure that suddenly appeared out of the ground. It was like a mass of shadows that slowly gained form, taking the form of a giant wolf.


    Unlike the peak tinum Realm wolf from before, this one was a true King Beast that was equal to a Legendary Realm Expert.


    This was bad, there was suddenly another King Beast that appeared with this wave!


    It was already hard enough for the two Legendary Realm Experts to take care of one King Beast, but now there were two of them.


    The wolf stood over the little bunny and looked over at the humans before saying, "It''s too bright out here, it was hard to wake up."


    The little bunny stomped its foot before kicking the wolf in its paw and angrily saying, "You, you, youzybones, you would sleep all day if you could!"


    The wolf just revealed a smile with its terrifying face.


    For everyone looking at it from afar who didn''t know the situation, they definitely would have thought that this little bunny would be eaten by the wolf. However, that wolf did no such thing.


    Rather, the wolf even lowered its head for the little bunny to get on top of it before turning back towards the human experts.


    Only then did the wolf say, "Well I''m here now aren''t I? Let''s hurry up and take care of them, we still have the Shadow Lord''s orders."


    This name meant nothing for the people around, but for people who did know who this Shadow Lord was, they knew that this was a key piece of information.


    For the Legendary Realm Experts, they were in contact with the upper realm factions, so naturally they had information from them on the Beast Race.


    As for Lin Fan, he had first hand information on who this Shadow Lord was.


    He knew that the Shadow Lord held as much influence in the Beast Race as the Gctic Humanity Alliance controlled as an entire group. Rather the Shadow Lord''s influence spread across multiple upper realms just like the Gctic Humanity Alliance, making him much more powerful than just the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Now that this powerful force that was almost at the level of a King had turned his eyes onto the Blue Star, it really was a dangerous situation.


    The wolf turned back towards the human experts and gave a howl of its own, but before the howl even rang out, it was sucked in by the little bunny. After the little bunny sucked in the howl of the wolf, it released it once again through its ears, aiming right at the human experts.


    This amplified that roar by several times and since it was already the roar of a peak Fragmented Soul Realm King Beast, it was already much more powerful than most of the humans here. However when the power of its roar was amplified once again, it had already reached the Embryo Soul Realm.


    Mu Bo Hai immediately mmed his staff down into the ground the moment he saw what these two King Beasts were up to.


    When the staff mmed into the ground, there were roots that sprouted like before, but this time they grew at a speed that couldn''tpare to the speed from before. The roots quickly grew up and formed a trunk and branches, but this time the shield was more than three times thickerpared to before.


    The Lin Family ancestor also jumped behind the shield and used all his life energy to support it with ayer of intense white light.


    This was the most powerful shield that was created with thebination of two peak Fragmented Soul Experts, but even so, it couldn''tpare to the power of the roar.


    The roar mmed right into the shield and scattered itpletely before continuing forward, hitting the two Legendary Realm Experts.


    They raised their weapons to defend themselves, but their shield had only blocked half of the power of this roar. For the rest, they would have to depend on their own bodies to block.


    The roar hit them and they could protect themselves for a few seconds with their life energy shields, but then those cracked and they were pushed back by the residual force. There were two streaks of blood that came from the corner of each respective person showing that they had suffered internal injuries.


    However, it was only light internal injuries and it could have been much worse if they didn''t have the shield to protect themselves with.


    The wolf and little bunny were lookingcent at this, just standing there watching them, not preparing for their second attack. It almost seemed like they were ying with their prey.


    They never would have imagined that Lin Fan would have suddenly appeared behind them.


    Lin Fan had hidden inside the void with his spatialws and once he saw that the attack was over, he immediately appeared behind him with his white Iron Eater Bone Artifact raised, prepared to sh down at them. The Iron Eater Bone Artifact was covered in three different glows as it shed down.


    These two beasts were King Beasts, so naturally they had powerful spiritual senses.


    When Lin Fan appeared behind them, they immediately turned around to face him.<sub> </sub>


    They weren''t afraid of Lin Fan''s power at all since it was at a level that they could handle, but they felt a trace of dangering from the pure white de that he held.


    Without any hesitation, the wolf immediately wrapped both it and the little bunny with its shadowws, sinking into the ground. When they appeared again, they were several meters away from Lin Fan, appearing surrounded by the various beasts.


    Both of these King Beasts had a wary look as they looked at Lin Fan. After a while, the little bunny said, "Are you the reinforcements from the upper realm?"


    But before Lin Fan could say a thing, the wolf said, "That''s impossible, the Shadow Lord sent his two of his Ten Fingers to stall them, how could they break free so easily? There''s no way they would be able to send reinforcements this quickly."


    The little bunny stomped on the wolf''s head and said, "Then how do you exin that weapon?"


    The wolf was silent for a bit before saying, "Kid, who are you? Why are you fighting for this lower realm? You''re clearly not from around here."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I was born here."


    The wolf fell silent before saying, "That''s impossible, how could you have that weapon if you''ve never left this lower realm?" Then after a pause, it said, "Since you''re insisting on fighting us, we''ll take care of you first then!"


    Then without any hesitation, the wolf charged out at Lin Fan with its fangs stretched out, preparing to bite his head off.


    But Lin Fan didn''t ck off, he had already summoned his pets and it didn''t take long to gather them around him.


    As the wolf approached, there was suddenly a wall of rocks that appeared and that wall of rocks was surrounded in fire, wind, and lightning, creating a powerful barrier that cut it off from Lin Fan.


    The wolf hesitated a bit since it could tell that even though thesews separately were only in the peak tinum Realm, whenbined like this, they were not weaker than it. Rather it was even stronger than it.


    The little bunny on its head also saw this and immediately drew in a breath before releasing a roar from its ears. The twobined their attacks and shattered the wall, but all they found was nothing there.


    Lin Fan had already disappeared with all his pets, using his spatialw to reappear by the two Legendary Realm Experts.


    The two of them had already healed themselves up and were prepared toe help Lin Fan, but they stopped the moment they saw Lin Fan appear in front of them.


    Lin Fan dropped down and immediately said, "If you guys can distract one of them, I can take care of the other."


    The two Legendary Realm Experts looked at each other and they could see the worry in each other''s eyes.


    They knew that Lin Fan definitely wasn''t powerful enough to take care of a peak Fragmented Soul Realm King Beast alone, but they didn''t have a choice in this matter.


    At the very least, they knew that Lin Fan could dy it and as long as he could dy it long enough, they could take care of one of the King Beasts.


    That was their only option right now¡­


    So after a second of hesitation, the two of them nodded.


    Lin Fan gave a nod back before saying, "I''ll pull one away with my spatialws, I just need you two to distract them."


    The two King Beasts had already found Lin Fan and were charging over to take care of them.


    The two of them used the samebination move asst time, with the wolf giving a roar and the little bunny using its ears to amplify them.


    However, they weren''t prepared for Lin Fan''s sudden spatialw attack which created a spatial bubble around the little bunny.


    The little bunny had been in the middle of its charge, so it couldn''t dodge this and it waspletely wrapped up by the spatial energy.


    The wolf also noticed this and immediately activated its shadowws, trying to assault the spatial energy bubble, but it didn''t get a chance.


    Before it could do a thing, there were already two attacks aimed at it.


    Seeing the root spears and the sword beaming right at it, the wolf redirected the shadowws that it had gathered to protect itself from these attacks which went right through it.


    But since it couldn''t use its shadowws to attack the spatial orb, the little bunny was pulled away from it using spatial teleportation.


    Lin Fan had used the same spatialws around himself and soon he teleported himself and the little bunny several hundred meters away into the human camp, into a space that was surrounded by reinforcements, but of course he couldn''t rely on them at all.


    Lin Fan created a spatial wall around them that would protect the humans while they escaped before turning his attention to the little bunny.

 314 Chapter 314

    The little bunny looked around at the spatial wall that was around it before looking at Lin Fan.


    The little bunny paused for a bit before saying, "What is your n here? You know that you can''t win."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he asked, "Are you sure about that?"


    The little bunny didn''t say a thing, it just took a deep breath as it prepared to use its roar attack since it knew that there was nothing to gain from talking to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had already seen the effects of this attack, so how could he allow it to happen so easily?


    Lin Fan flew out with his de, covering his pure white sword with the usual three coloured glows.


    The little bunny didn''t worry since it felt that it had plenty of space to prepare its attack, but it never expected Lin Fan to disappear and reappear above it, shing down at it.


    The little bunny waspletely caught off guard and immediately gave up the idea of attack. The little bunny dodged to the side, but it reacted slowly and there was a slight cut that appeared on its fur when it was caught by Lin Fan''s pure white sword.


    After being injured by Lin Fan''s sword, the little bunny didn''t panic like some people would.


    The only thing that confused it was how Lin Fan had suddenly appeared behind it, however, it didn''t take the little bunny long to figure this out. After all, it had just experienced being teleported by Lin Fan just a few minutes ago.


    Lin Fan had his spatialws that could allow him to teleport through space, which was how he had easily gotten behind it.


    But that left another deep impression on the little bunny.


    As a King Beast, naturally it knew a bit aboutws and counting everything that Lin Fan has shown so far, the little bunny could tell that Lin Fan had more than just onew. Based on everything it had seen, Lin Fan had a total of at least four differentws.


    Not only was he able to use all four of thosews at a high level, he was even able tobine them.


    That was something that even the top experts of the upper realm couldn''t achieve. It had only heard of these kinds of things from those geniuses in the Ster Kingdoms.


    Since this kid was able to aplish this, did that mean that he was a genius from one of the Ster Kingdom?


    A Ster Kingdom was definitely something that was out of their expectations.


    Just for this invasion, the Shadow Lord had paid arge price for the aid of a King, but that was only to incite the beast horde and nothing further since the King would be too injured to help at that point.


    If another Ster Kingdom was to get involved, who would they get to fight the experts that came from there?


    The little bunny was cautious around Lin Fan now since it was no longer certain that it could see through this human, but it was certain that it couldn''t look down on this human.


    The little bunny cautiously said, "Why did youe down to this lower realm? Is it because of the artifact?"


    Lin Fan shook his head once again when he heard this and he said, "I was born here."


    The little bunny clearly didn''t believe him as it said, "If you''re willing to cooperate with us, I''m sure the Shadow Lord is willing to owe a favour to the Ster Kingdom you belong to. You should know that there are plenty of Ster Kingdoms that would want a favour from the Shadow Lord."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t give ament since there was nothing he could say.


    While he could have yed along to gain more information, he doubted that this lower rank soldier that was sent as the front line wouldn''t be able to give him any information that he really wanted.


    Besides, this realm was his new home, so what was wrong with him defending his home?


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time, he raised his sword and charged out again.


    The little bunny gave a sigh when it saw this since it knew that there was no use in talking anymore, but that didn''t mean that this little bunny waspletely out of options.


    It raised its head to take in a breath again, but this time it didn''t release it as a roar.


    It quickly released the breath that it took, but it didn''t release the same roar as usual. Rather there was only a low hum that came this time and there were ripples in the air that surrounded the little bunny.


    Lin Fan used the same trick as before, using his spatialws to teleport to the little bunny, but of course he didn''t attack from the same direction. This time he appeared right in front of the little bunny and swung right down at it.<sub> </sub>


    But before his de could even reach the little bunny, the little bunny had disappeared from his sight. The little bunny didn''t appear again in his sight, but with his spiritual sense, Lin Fan could tell that the little bunny was behind him.


    After appearing behind him, the little bunny immediately bit down with its open mouth and its outstretched fangs, aiming it right at his jugr.


    It knew that there was no point in biting anywhere else since its teeth weren''t that strong even with itsws enhancing it, so it aimed for a weak point while Lin Fan was caught off guard.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t really caught off guard since his spiritual energy was considered much stronger than normal people''s.


    He created a spatial wall behind him which the little bunny easily crushed right through, but that didn''t matter since he had only made it as a distraction. During this time, he had been turning around with his sword in a horizontal swinging motion.


    When he finally fully turned around, the sword shed with the fangs of the little bunny and after a few seconds of bncing, it seemed like the fangs of the little bunny were about to win, but that quickly changed.


    The fluctuations around the little bunny began to weaken and it was pushed back by Lin Fan''s sword.


    When the little bunnynded several meters away, it looked at Lin Fan in shock.


    That power that it had felt just now, it had only heard it being described in legends.


    But that feeling of its life energy andws being sucked away couldn''t be faked.


    It was almost like the legendary voidw that it had heard of.


    There was only one ce that the legendary voidw came from and if this kid really were to have the voidw, that would mean something much worse than himing from a Ster Kingdom.


    That was because above the Ster Kingdoms, there were still the empires¡­


    And one of the top empires was where the legendary voidw came from.


    The little bunny knew that this situation was bad and it had to return to make a report to the Shadow Lord, but Lin Fan didn''t give it a chance to escape at all.


    Even with how fast the little bunny was while using its soundws to propel itself at the speed of sound, Lin Fan always caught up to it by using his powerful spiritual sense and spatialws to trap and teleport to it.


    Eventually, the little bunny was worn down by Lin Fan''s attacks with thebination of his absorbing power and it finally ran out of life energy.


    As it was lying there exhausted on the ground, it looked up at Lin Fan with a gaze filled with regret and a slight trace of fear.


    If it knew that Lin Fan was this powerful, it would have ignored those two old men and focused on taking care of Lin Fan first, but it was a pity that it had been too prideful. It hadn''t even considered Lin Fan a threat until Lin Fan took it out in the end.


    <o>,m After the light in the eyes of the little bunny went out, Lin Fan didn''t immediately head back since he knew there was no need. He walked over to the little bunny''s corpse and put his hand onto it.</o>


    There was a slow suction that normal people couldn''t see that drew the remaining life energy out of the little bunny into Lin Fan.


    Slowly but surely, there was another statue that had formed in Lin Fan''s dantian.


    Once he finished sucking thew out and finally formed the statue, Lin Fan headed back to the front lines.


    When he arrived, he could see that the other two were finishing off thest King Beast.


    While this shadow wolf was powerful in its own right, it still couldn''t face off against two human Legendary Realm Experts, especially ones that had a perfectbination of power and defense.


    With Mu Bo Hai covering the Lin Family ancestor, they were able tounch a powerful attack while making sure that the wolf couldn''t hurt them at all, even though they had been slightly injured.


    When Lin Fan came back, the wolf was close to drawing its final breath.


    When the wolf was nearing its end, it saw Lin Fan and it couldn''t help feeling a bit of regret just like the little bunny.


    They had neglected this kid and in the end, he was the one that caused their demises.

 315 Chapter 315

    Once the two King Beasts were killed, the beast wave was like a headless chicken as the beasts lost all guidance. They all began scattering out of fear since they knew that if they were to stay any longer, they would all be killed.


    Of course, the human experts wouldn''t just let these beasts roam around on the continent since each one of them had the potential to cause damage for normal people.


    The human experts ran after the various beasts that scattered in all directions, not caring for anything as their only thought was to cut these beasts down. Of course, the ones in charge didn''t let them chase too far just in case anything were to happen.


    However, none of the beasts had any intentions of fighting. They just ran even though theirrades were being cut down since they werepletely demoralized by the loss of their King Beastmanders.


    Lin Fan came over once the wolf had been taken down, but he didn''t make any move towards the corpse like he had with the little bunny. This was the unwritten rule between humans, they wouldn''t take each other''s loot if they even had a shred of dignity.


    Moreover, it didn''t matter like with the little bunny since thews that this wolf had was something that he could already get from Yin. Once Yin broke through, he was certain that he would be able to get the full set of shadowws from him.


    The two Legendary Realm Experts also ignored this corpse since they had something more important to do.


    They called over themander of the Union Government forces, but it took a while for that person toe over since he had been running deep into enemy forces to cut down the beasts with his soldiers.


    During the time they were waiting, they essed the Union Government''s secret informationwork for any information on what had just happened.


    The Lin Family ancestor also shared what he found with Lin Fan since he realized that he hadpletely underestimated Lin Fan. Lin Fan was already strong enough to defeat a peak Fragmented Soul Realm King Beast that would require him to work with Mu Bo Hai to defeat.


    Didn''t that mean that Lin Fan was already as strong as he was?


    But thinking of the special power that Lin Fan had, it did make sense since that was the greatest secret of the Lin Family¡­


    On the informationwork of the Union Government, it wasplete chaos.


    It turned out that it wasn''t just their beast wave that had two King Beasts, every single beast wave had two different King Beasts leading them.


    This had caught the Union Government off guard and most importantly, it had caught all the experts that had been sent to deal with these beast waves off guard.


    The losses that the Union Government suffered wasn''t light, in fact it could even be considered the worst case scenario.


    There were half of the Legendary Realm Experts that had been seriously injured and the rest had all been injured to varying degrees. There had even been a Legendary Realm Expert who had been killed!


    Of course, it wasn''t all bad news since there were three beast waves that had been stopped.


    It was the beast wave that Lin Fan''s group had been at, the beast wave that was stopped by the Union Government president, and the beast wave that was stopped by the general of the Union Government''s army.


    Those two could be considered the strongest experts on this entire Blue Star, not because of their own cultivation, but because of the special artifacts that they received because of their position.


    However, what this meant was that there were still seven waves that were currently heading right for Snow Wind City and they had less than ten Legendary Realm Experts to deal with them.


    The humans had suddenly found themselvespletely outnumbered by the beasts.


    There were many messages on the secret informationwork that came frommanding officers about this topic.


    To put it simply, many of them were considering just sacrificing Snow Wind City for the good of the entire Blue Star.


    They would let the beast destroy Snow Wind City, leaving the local forces to hold out as long as possible while they waited for the reinforcements from the upper realm.


    Judging by the trend that was appearing on the secret informationwork, it seemed like almost all of the officers were agreeing to this n, there were very few that opposed it.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows when he saw this.


    While his family was no longer in Snow Wind City, that didn''t mean that there was no one he knew there.


    There were still his friends that were still living in the city, unaware of all of this.


    When he paused to think, he also couldn''t stop the appearance of a single girl from appearing in his mind.


    While they were waiting, themander of the Union Government''s forces had finally been pulled back from chasing the beasts and arrived in front of them.<sub> </sub>


    As an officialmander, he clearly had more clearance than everyone else present since they were all only working with the Union Government out of mutual interest. Themander was the one that was rying the official orders of the Union Government to them.


    Themander quickly checked his ownmunication device and after being surprised by what he saw, he slowly said, "Lord Lin, Lord Mu, the orders we have received are to go back to Union Government headquarters to regroup."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even deeper when he heard this since he could hear the underlying implication of this order.


    With how long it would take them to head back to the Union Government headquarters, how long it would take to reorganize, and how long it would take to get to Snow Wind City, it was clear that they wouldn''t make it in time.


    Then there was the fact that there was no order for evacuation given for Snow Wind City at all, it was almost as if they had locked down all information for that city. Without knowing anything, they would have no idea that the beast waves were heading to them.


    While the local forces would have their own informationworks which would allow them to learn about the beast waves approaching them before they arrived, it would definitely be toote for them to evacuate. That would mean that Snow Wind City would have no choice but to fight to survive.


    But would they be able to fight seven different beast waves that contained a total of fourteen King Beasts?


    That would almost certainly seal their doom!


    It was clear that this was a sacrifice move on the part of the Union Government. They were nning on using the lives of the people in Snow Wind City to stall for time for the upper realm reinforcements to arrive.


    They didn''t evacuate them since they couldn''t just let the Beast Race find the artifact after all, so someone had to take the sacrifice to stop them for as long as possible.


    When Lin Fan had thought through all of this, there was a look of rage that appeared on his face as he looked at themander.


    Themander could see this look on Lin Fan''s face and even though Lin Fan was young, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of fear because of the way Lin Fan looked at him. After all, he had been there to see Lin Fan helping the two Legendary Realm Experts fight against the King Beasts, so he definitely didn''t dare look down on Lin Fan.


    Feeling this fear, he couldn''t help raising his weapon as he took a step back.


    The Lin Family ancestor naturally also saw this and he immediately came forward to take Lin Fan by the shoulder.


    The moment Lin Fan felt the hand falling on his shoulder, he turned his gaze to the Lin Family ancestor who could feel the murderous intenting from him.


    When the Lin Family ancestor felt this, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows as well.


    How did such a young man have such a thick killing intent?


    This killing intent that Lin Fan had came partly from the various beasts that he and his pets had fought in the cultivation realms, but it also came from his previous life. He definitely was not someone who had mercy in his previous life.


    But the Lin Family ancestor still said, "It''s not his fault, he''s just the messenger."


    Once Lin Fan heard this, he immediately realized his mistake and retracted his killing intent.


    After standing there in thought for a bit, he said, "I''m going to Snow Wind City."


    The Lin Family ancestor didn''t hesitate as he said, "No, you can''t do that. It''s too dangerous."


    Mu Bo Hai who had been observing on the side also said, "Owner Lin, it is indeed too dangerous." Then after a pause, he said, "Perhaps we can ask your esteemed master to make a move?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this.


    What master? Did he have such a thing?


    It seemed like his lie hade to bite him in the butt in the end.


    But still, Lin Fan said, "It isn''t convenient for my master to act."


    Mu Bo Hai gave a sigh before saying, "Then perhaps it''s best to leave Snow Wind City alone."


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t ept this as he said, "I''m going to Snow Wind City."


    This time, his tone gave no room for discussion.

 316 Chapter 316

    On the way to Snow Wind City, the Lin Family ancestor and Lin Fan once again sat in silence.


    After seeing that Lin Fan was determined to head to Snow Wind City, the Lin Family ancestor knew that there was no other choice, so he decided to take Lin Fan there in his airship.


    As for Mu Bo Hai, while he did feel for the people of Snow Wind City, there was no way he could just give up everything and head there. After all, he was the crux of the Mu Family and he was responsible for them.


    But when Mu Bo Hai separated from them, he did tell Lin Fan that he would try to convince the Union Government as much as he could.


    While they both knew that these were empty words, Lin Fan still thanked Mu Bo Hai.


    While flying across thend, the Lin Family airship dide across two of the beast waves which they avoided.


    These beast waves could only move as fast as their slowest members and they did have quite a few Iron and Bronze Realm beasts among them.


    While they were beasts, so they could move at a decent speed, their cultivations were still too shallow, so it was hard for them to move fast enough. At the very least, they weren''t able to move as fast as the airships and that was for normal airships.


    The Lin Family ancestor''s airship was custom made and was several times faster than normal airships, so it was hard for these beasts to catch it.


    Moving through all these beasts, they finally saw Snow Wind City on the horizon.


    The city was still untouched since not a single beast wave had arrived, but it was a bit too calm.


    It seemed like the city still didn''t have information that the beast waves were approaching them, so they didn''t set up their defenses yet.


    With the way things seemed to be going, it seemed like the city would definitely be destroyed.


    They didn''t waste any time as theynded the airship in the airship yard in the field and quickly headed to Lin Fan''s pet shop first.


    It was already the afternoon, but Lin Fan was certain that the people he needed to see would be gathered there.


    Once he arrived, everyone inside the pet shop was surprised to see him.


    There were all his friends that were inside the store like it was any other day, just hanging out.


    Most of them were surprised since Lin Fan had just set off three days ago, but now he was already back. By normal standards, he shouldn''t be back already since it would have taken him another two days toe back by airship.


    Still, they came over to wee him back even if they were surprised, but Lin Fan didn''t give them a chance to do so.


    Lin Fan immediately found the person he was looking for, Wang Da Dong.


    Ever since the incident with the Feng Family, the remaining three royal families had all treated Lin Fan as one of them even though he was only a single person.


    After Lin Fan had left, while others didn''t pay attention to information on Lin Fan, they had kept track of him the entire time.


    It really wasn''t hard since it was hard to miss news of a pet shop that was as special as Lin Fan''s. So they had a good idea of what Lin Fan had been doing during this time.


    With each story that they heard and with each stronger opponent that Lin Fan defeated, the three royal families fell more and more into line. After Lin Fan had even defeated an upper realm representative, they immediately took Lin Fan''s little pet shop as the number one force in the shop.


    They came together and decided to follow Lin Fan.


    Wang Da Dong was the one who approached Lin Fan first, so the Wang Family behind him profited the most off of this.


    They were now the leading family of the three royal families and Wang Da Dong was regarded as an important person by all three, since he was their contact with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had heard of this from Momonga way back, but he didn''t mind since this meant that Snow Wind City would be united and peaceful, which was good for his family.


    But with how dire the situation was, Lin Fan needed Wang Da Dong to contact the three royal families to gather them all together.


    It didn''t take long for the three royal families to gather. It would have taken longer, but they had been shocked since this was Lin Fan''s first time gathering them all together, so they reacted quicker than normal.


    The family heads of all three royal families gathered in Lin Fan''s shop, sitting around an impromptu meeting hall right in the center of the store. Lin Fan didn''t actually have a table big enough in his shop, so he had to borrow one from the restaurant down the street.


    With all four of them gathered at this table, the heads of the three royal families all looked at Lin Fan with confused looks as they waited for him to start.


    Lin Fan looked around him and after a few seconds, he said with a sigh, "Snow Wind City is about to end."


    All three of the family heads revealed even more confused look as they looked right at Lin Fan, clearly not understanding what he had just said.


    The Wang Family Head asked, "Owner Lin, what do you mean by that?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan paused again before exining what had just happened.


    He started with the Union Government meeting to the fight with the King Beasts to the ambush, and finally he arrived at Snow Wind City''s situation. He clearly told them the Union Government''s n for Snow Wind City.


    The three family heads didn''t know how to respond to this since this was just too much for them.


    There were seven beast waves that contained fourteen King Beasts that were currently heading for Snow Wind City.


    It had to be known, Snow Wind City was only a B Rank City with a few royal families, it wasn''t even an A Rank City. They definitely didn''t have a Legendary Realm Expert and even if they did, what would that do?


    There were basically fourteen Legendary Realm Experts that were heading towards them.


    The first thought they had was to run away, but they knew that it was toote based on what Lin Fan had told them.


    The second thought they had was to give up since they knew that there was nothing they could do.


    The only regret they had was that they couldn''t believe the Union Government that they believed in would just sacrifice them like this. They had faithfully served the Union Government for years and now they were being treated like this.


    But even if they felt wronged, what could they do in this situation?


    Was there even a way to escape this with their lives?


    Seeing that the three family heads had all given up, Lin Fan could tell what they were thinking.


    It was at this time that he said, "I don''t know what you all n on doing, but I n on fighting."


    The three family heads looked at Lin Fan with depressed looks before the Wang Family Head said, "But Owner Lin, how can we take care of all those King Beasts? We don''t even have a single Legendary Realm Expert¡­"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "That''s not true, there''s a few here."


    The three family heads looked around and realized that he was right.


    They had of course done their own investigation into Lin Fan''s store and they knew that the ones that worked here weren''t simple.


    It was clear that there were experts here that they couldn''t fathom, but would that be enough?


    Lin Fan could see their doubts, but he didn''t alleviate them. Instead he looked over at the three family heads and asked, "Will you fight with me?"


    The three family heads immediately fell into deep thought at this as they began weighing the pros and cons.


    If they fought, it meant shing directly against the beast waves and they would have to suffer the consequences of that.


    But if they didn''t fight, while they would be able to bunker down and hope that the beast wave wouldn''t attack them, there was still a very high chance that they would be destroyed when the beast wave came.


    In the end, all three of the family heads were sitting on the fence about this.


    That was until Lin Fan said, "Don''t you want to defend your home?"


    This struck a chord with all three of them.


    Their families had existed before their generations and they had all been born in Snow Wind City, so this city did have a special meaning for them.


    While they could leave this city at any time and resettle in another ce, the city still had a special ce in their heart since it contained most of their memories.


    In the end, people just weren''t willing to see their homes being destroyed.


    The three of them looked over at each other and then with tacit understanding, the three of them said, "We''ll fight."


    Lin Fan nodded when he heard this and then he cupped his hands to the three of them as he said, "Thank you."


    The three of them cupped their hands back.


    Without wasting any more time, they began their strategy meeting.


    This was a meeting that would decide the lives of everyone in the city.

 317 Chapter 317

    It was a meeting in name, but most of the meeting was just the three family heads listening to the strategy of Lin Fan.


    While Lin Fan wasn''t a genius, he did have a genius tactician with him in the form of Brainy.


    Brainy had already formted various ns that depended on how many of the royal families would participate, but of course the best scenario was that they would all participate like they had now. Each of the royal families had umted resources that couldn''t be underestimated and each one that agreed to fight would increase their overall strength.


    But of course, the main force of this fight wouldn''t be the three royal families. Rather, all they would be providing would be cannon fodder that would clear out the normal beasts of the beast waves.


    The main fighters would all being from Lin Fan''s pet shop.


    Lin Fan''s pet shop couldn''t be judged based on the surface.


    In truth, just Momonga or Ang alone would be enough to take care of all the beast waves, but that couldn''t be allowed. If they were allowed to show their strength, it would mean exposing them for who they were.


    Now that Lin Fan had a deeper understanding of the world above, he also had an understanding of the status that both Momonga and Ang had. This made it even more imperative that he hid their statuses or it could start a war that went far beyond the scale that he was at right now.


    So the most power that they could show was the peak of the Fragmented Soul Realm which was the peak of this lower realm. Anymore and it would be too easy for people to be suspicious.


    Then there were the two freeloaders in his shop who had been working hard.


    After being trained by Momonga, Yin had already broken through to the Fragmented Soul Realm and Jin had reached the high Fragmented Soul Realm.


    If they worked together, there would be no problem with them taking out one of the beast waves since Jin was a mutated beast with a specialw, which made him much stronger than most other beasts.


    As for Yin, he would basically be Jin''s backup.


    The shadoww would be considered a specialw, but it had no use here since all of the beast waves had a King Beast that could use shadowws.


    The one that was behind all these beast waves was the Shadow Lord and as the name implied, he was a beast that was skilled in using the shadoww. As such, most of his subordinates were also skilled in using the shadoww even if it wasn''t thew they were born with.


    Just that alone was a total of four Legendary Realm Experts.


    Then there was Lin Fan who could match a King Beast by himself and his four pets who when working together were strong enough to take down a King Beast alone.


    This power was already enough to match the number of Legendary Realm Experts that were publicly advertised on the Eastern Continent. If this was known by others, it would definitely be a force that no one could look down on.


    In fact, the Lin Family ancestor was shocked by the situation of the pet shop.


    There were two people here whose cultivations he couldn''t see through and he was certain that they weren''t weaker than him, so that meant that must have had higher cultivations than him if he couldn''t see through them.


    Then there were the two workers of the store that were clearly in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    What kind of a store was this?


    Even the workers were in the Fragmented Soul Realm!


    But speaking of the Lin Family ancestor, Lin Fan had some doubts about him.


    While fighting that beast wave earlier, since he had finished earlier than the other two, Lin Fan had spent some time watching them fight.


    He could tell that the Lin Family ancestor was clearly hiding something. He had been holding back in his fight against the wolf King Beast. If he hadn''t been holding back, it was clear that he could have fought the wolf King Beast alone, maybe even both of them.


    But Lin Fan didn''t expose this since the Lin Family ancestor had his own reasons for hiding this from everyone and Lin Fan had no reason to expose him.


    But there was also another thing that bothered him, which was his breakthrough.


    ording to what he thought, he assumed that it was the Lin Family holding back his cultivation. If he couldn''t take care of them and pay them back for the past, it would be like a heart demon that stopped him from breaking through.


    However, he had already taken care of the Lin Family, even if it wasn''t as satisfying as he would have liked it to be, but he still had taken care of it.


    Since that was the case, why didn''t he break through?


    Lin Fan still felt like there was something in his heart that stopped him from taking that final step, but right now he couldn''t figure out what it was.<sub> </sub>


    Did he have to destroy the Lin Family?


    No, that didn''t seem right since he had no real grudge against the Lin Family and it was clear that the Lin Family was important to his father.


    So what was it?


    Lin Fan just couldn''t think all of this through, so he had no choice but to forget it in the end and focus on the battle n.


    The battle n that they had was to wait for the beast waves to pass by and see how many woulde to Snow Wind City.


    This wasn''t actually Lin Fan''s n, he felt that this n was too passive.


    This was actually Brainy''s n because it had noticed something.


    The target of these beast waves wasn''t actually Snow Wind City, it was a point near Snow Wind City. All of these beast waves would only be passing by Snow Wind City, so there was no need to engage all of them. After all, they were clearly short on hands.


    Brainy had noticed this through a mix of scouting information from the Union Government obtained from the Lin Family ancestor and its own scouts that it had released on the way. Through all this information, it had been able to pinpoint the exact location that all these beast waves were heading towards, allowing it to determine the exact final destination of all these beast waves.


    It was a point that was just ten kilometers away from Snow Wind City, but it meant that all the beast waves would be passing by.


    Since they were passing by, it didn''t mean that all the beast waves would be attacking Snow Wind City, but that also didn''t mean that there would be no beast waves attacking Snow Wind City.


    These beast waves were definitely controlled by someone, so there was no way that they would leave a threat like this city behind. They would send one of the beast waves to take care of this human stronghold just in case.


    Of course, they would never expect several Legendary Realm Experts to be hiding in this city.


    That was the n that they decided to take because it was the safest n there was.


    If they were to fight every single wave one by one as they came, they would definitely exhaust themselves from continuous fights with beast waves that numbered in the millions.


    Since their n was decided, all that was left was to evacuate all the civilians that were in the city.


    There was no chance that they would be able to hide the fact that all these beast waves would being to Snow Wind City, it would eventually be leaked. Instead of trying to hide everything, it was better to expose this news and try to calm the poption as much as possible to avoid as much panic as they could.


    Of course, there were still a few cases of panic that happened in the city, but they were easily dealt with.


    It wasn''t that the people trusted in the upper management of Snow Wind City, rather they had all given up in despair since they knew that there was no chance. Instead of trying to fight to the end, most of them had epted this fact, so they allowed themselves to be evacuated.


    Snow Wind City as a stronghold naturally had its own evacuation bunkers for their civilians and that was where most of them were packed.


    There were of course also those that chose to fight and they joined the forces of the three royal families on the walls.


    Among them were people that Lin Fan were quite familiar with¡­


    Once they finished the evacuation, all they could do was wait on the walls for the arrival of the beast waves.


    It happened slowly at first, just a few tremors, but as time passed, the tremors became much stronger. They were strong enough for people to mistake it for a small earthquake and there showed no signs of stopping.


    There were clouds of dust that were raised in the distance and there was a dense ck line on the horizon. This was a gathering of beasts that the people of Snow Wind City had never seen before.


    There was more and more fear that filled the guards on the walls as the beast wave approached, allowing them to see the numbers even more clearly.


    This was a beast wave that they had never seen before, they had honestly never seen this many beasts in a single ce.


    But the beast passed right by Snow Wind City, not even stopping for a minute.


    It seemed like Brainy''s appraisal was correct, they weren''t heading right for Snow Wind City.


    At the very least, that was a bit of hope for them.

 318 Chapter 318

    The beasts left as soon as they came and soon everything fell back to silence once again.


    However, that silence didn''tst since there was another wave that was heading their way.


    This beast wave was around the same size as the first one that had passed, but just like the first one, it ran right past Snow Wind City.


    This happened again and again, wave after wave.


    After six different beast waves of varying sizes passed by Snow Wind City, the people standing guard on the walls felt much more rxed, thinking that it would all be fine. However, when the seventh wave came, it was anything but fine.


    This wave was different from all the other waves.


    It was the same in the beginning where they appeared and headed towards Snow Wind City, but unlike the other waves, this one didn''t head straight past Snow Wind City. Rather they were moving right towards the walls of Snow Wind City.


    Seeing this, there were still a few people who wanted to believe that they were going to pass by Snow Wind City, but almost everyone knew what was about to happen.


    However, no one panicked since this was what they had nned for.


    Everyone got into position and prepared their defenses, just waiting for the waves of beasts to approach before making their attacks.


    However, there were a few younger people who had signed up for the defense who weren''t mentally as strong. Seeing therge wave of beasts that came towards the city, a few of the younger ones couldn''t keep their calm and threw the spears in their hands before the beast could enter their range.


    These spears flew out andnded harmlessly some distance in front of the beasts that were at the very front of the beast wave.


    The beastspletely ignored these spears and just charged right on through, but it was too bad for them that there were traps right in front of these spears. So in a sense, these spears had done their jobs working as diversions.


    As for why there were these young cultivators on the wall, it would take some going back in time.


    ¡­


    Close to an hour ago, during the preparations.


    There was a group of young people who had suddenly shown up at the wall asking to join the defense of the city.


    The experts who were present did admire these kids, but they couldn''t make the decision, so they brought this group to themand camp.


    In themand camp was naturally everyone from Lin Fan''s group, Lin Fan, and the three royal family heads.


    The three royal family heads were against this because they believed that these young people would be the future of their city. Of course, they also believed that they would be destroyed in this uing battle, so they wanted to preserve a few good saplings for the future of Snow Wind City.


    But what surprised everyone was that Lin Fan actually agreed to let them join the defenses.


    No one knew what reason Lin Fan had for epting them, but everyone had already epted Lin Fan as their leader so they couldn''t say a thing.


    Among these young people, Lin Fan had noticed Luo Qing.


    Without knowing why, he suddenly had a strange feeling that made him pull himself away from the meeting and he brought Luo Qing into a corner to talk to her.


    Luo Qing was surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden actions, but she still went along with him.


    Everyone who had been in the room revealed a smile when they saw this, that is, everyone except for Ang.


    Even though it was obvious that Ang and Lin Fan were together, this was a world of cultivation. It was a world where the strong ruled, so naturally there was no problem with polygamy.


    They even thought that for someone as strong as Lin Fan, it was normal for him to have more than one girl.


    As for Ang, she didn''t have an angry look like one would expect. For some reason, she had an understanding look as she looked at Luo Qing, it was almost like a look of pity.


    Lin Fan brought Luo Qing to a corner of the city and stood in front of her with a serious look as he asked, "What are you thinking?"


    Luo Qing was surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden question, but then she calmly said, "I''m protecting my city, what do you think I''m doing?"


    By all rights, Lin Fan was the one who approved the young people to defend the city walls, so he should have been alright with this, but there was a strange feeling in him when he saw Luo Qing. It was almost as if there was something inside him telling him that he couldn''t let her onto those walls.


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows as he said, "You know what I mean."


    Luo Qing heard this and she couldn''t help feeling aggrieved, "What does it matter to you what I do? You don''t have the right to say anything after thatst time."


    In Luo Qing''s heart, she could never forget what Lin Fan had said before he left. Even though she tried to push it down in her heart, it had still left a deep wound on her.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was slightly taken aback when he heard this.


    He wanted to say that it was because she was like family that he didn''t want anything to happen to her, but then he felt that this was inappropriate. At the same time, there was a small part of him that was unwilling to say this.


    It was the same part of him that had appeared when he had seen her at his house making dinner with his mother.


    He didn''t know when it had started, but there was a small part in him that gave birth to this feeling.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was struggling to say something, Luo Qing was suddenly filled with a bit of anger.


    She stomped her foot and with a snort, she walked off, heading back to the wall.


    Lin Fan''s hand came up and he wanted to say something, but there really was nothing that he could say.


    For once, he didn''t know how to sort through these feelings of his.


    ¡­


    Back to the present, the beasts charged right through the spears that were in the ground and soon they entered the range of the first wave of traps.


    As soon as they rushed over these traps, they opened and revealed their true form.


    The ground copsed underneath these beasts and opened up to reveal holes that had spikes in them.


    Once again, Lin Fan had used hole traps for these beasts.


    However, just like before, since there were just too many beasts, the holes quickly filled up and the beasts were able to make their way through these traps.


    Unlike before, this time they were defending from a city which actually had city walls around it, creating arge barrier that kept out the beasts.


    These walls were much thicker than the makeshift barricades they had made in the wilds, so the beasts couldn''t break through them. All they could do at first was stand at the bottom as ranged attacks fell down onto them.


    All kinds of spears and arrows rained down, turning these beasts into pincushions.


    Unlike before, there was no need for the humans to work in waves with their overwhelming defensive positioning, so they had as many people as possible on the wall throwing ranged attacks down on the beasts below.


    But these beasts wouldn''t just take these attacks sitting.


    As more and more beasts died, there was a small pile of corpses that had formed at the bottom of the wall. As the corpse pile grew, there were beasts that climbed over their fallenrades and began climbing up the tall city walls.


    But while they were climbing up the walls, all they did was give clear targets for the people on the walls to aim at.


    It was so easy that it even built up confidence for the younger people.


    "Ha, this is so easy!"


    "Ya, what were we worried about?"


    "I''m gonna spear a few more of these beasts and turn in their pelts!"


    Words like these were exchanged all over the walls by the younger defenders, but the older defenders knew that this situation was bad.


    They had taken out all of the ranged weapons in Snow Wind City, this was their entire supply. Once they ran out, they would be out of ranged weapons.


    However, as they threw more and more of their weapons down, they would have less to throw and there didn''t seem to be an end to this beast wave.


    No matter how they looked at it, they were ridiculously outnumbered and at this rate, it would only be a matter of time before they ran out of weapons to stop the beasts. The beasts would reach the top of the wall and once they did, it would mean close rangebat.


    Close rangebat was dangerous because there was limited space on the walls, so there was limited space for experts. It was very easy for them to be outnumbered by the beasts.


    Of course, they could just fight in the city, but that wasn''t something they were willing to do unless it was absolutely necessary because they were trying to protect the city after all.


    However, as time passed, the situation became more dire as the beasts came closer and closer to the top of the wall.


    It was only at this time that the younger defenders noticed what was wrong.


    However, when one of the beasts finally reached the top, there was something that stopped it.

 319 Chapter 319

    Once that beast reached the top, before it could even ce a hand over the wall, there was something invisible that stopped it.


    There was ayer of spatialws that suddenly appeared above the walls, creating a horizontal wall that didn''t allow anything past it. This wall spread all around the city, creating a circle along the edge of the city walls.


    After a slight pause, the wall began moving down towards the ground.


    It pushed down on all the beasts that were climbing on the wall and pushed them all the way down to the ground. The beasts on the wall were crushed into the pile of corpses on the bottom and then along with the pile of corpses, they were crushed into meat patties at the bottom of the wall.


    The pile of corpses had beenpletely ttened and the footholds of the beasts had beenpletely destroyed.


    However, this wasn''t aplete ttening since there were a few things sticking out of the ground.


    These were the spears and arrows that weren''t broken that the humans had shot down at the beasts. They were sticking out through the meat mush on the ground, standing straight up.


    Once everything had been crushed, the spatial wall disappeared and there was a breeze that suddenly appeared.


    It blew inwards towards the city and when it came across these ranged weapons, they flew up into the air. These weapons flew right through the air andnded in piles atop the wall, right in front of the human experts.


    The human experts were naturally shocked, but the older ones among them quickly reacted and picked up those weapons to aim at the beasts that were gathering at the wall once again.


    As they threw their weapons down at the beasts, they shouted at the younger defenders which snapped them out of their daze and brought them back into the fight.


    Just like this, they continued throwing down their weapons, stopping the beasts from climbing up.


    As for how all those beasts were killed and how the weapons all flew back up, that was all because of Lin Fan and Ang.


    The spatial wall was naturally the spatialw that Lin Fan had.


    Creating such a big wall would cost a lot of life energy from Lin Fan, but because of his special God Tier Cultivation Technique and his absorption power, he was able to recover quite quickly. Even so, just that single spatial wall had cost him over half his original life energy.


    As for the breeze that brought the weapons back up, that came from Ang''s windws.


    Normally it wouldn''t make sense for the most powerful experts to do something like this, but this was a special case.


    Instead of being outnumbered fourteen to six, they were actually outnumbering the beast wave in terms of experts, so it didn''t matter if Lin Fan and Ang spent their life energy. There would be someone there to rece them in fighting the King Beasts.


    Rather it was just as important to maintain the number of normal fighters that they had since there was arge number of cannon fodder beasts here as well.


    Even if they were powerful Legendary Realm Experts, they still couldn''t fight an entire army by themselves since they would run out of life energy.


    So it was important to keep their losses to a minimum, so they wouldn''t be overwhelmed.


    So far, the human side hadn''t actually suffered a single loss yet.


    And then the main reason why Lin Fan was so confident in doing this was because Brainy''s scouts had been keeping track of the other beast waves.


    All of those beast waves had gathered at a point that was an hour away from Snow Wind City and they were just standing there, as if they were waiting for something. If it took them an hour toe back, that would be more than enough time for Lin Fan to recover his life energy.


    So, just like this, the humans continued wiping out the waves of beasts that came up the wall. From time to time, they had Lin Fan clear out the beasts with his spatialws and Ang recover their weapons.


    Still, even though they did recover their weapons, it didn''t mean that they recovered every single weapon since some of them did break duringbat.


    But even if that was the case, at the rate they were taking down the beasts, they would be able to finish off the beasts before their supply of weapons ran out.


    While this wouldn''t leave much for the next wave if another wave dide to wipe them out, this was all they could do to keep afloat, so there was no other choice.


    They would burn themselves out with this one fight.


    The beasts continued to reduce in numbers and soon there weren''t even half of the original beasts in the beast wave left.


    The human defenders on the wall were naturally tired, but they were also filled with morale since up to this point, there still hadn''t been a single casualty.


    Right before the beast could reach them each time, the same spatialw wall appeared to knock them all down and crush them.<sub> </sub>


    If one looked carefully, they would be able to see that each and every one of these human defenders were close to making a break through.


    That was the final and most important reason why Lin Fan chose to fight in this way.


    He didn''t crush the beasts because he had to. If Lin Fan wanted, he could have just pushed all the beasts down with his spatialws and let the humans take care of them, but he still used his life energy to crush the corpses of these beasts.


    Why would he waste his life energy to do this?


    It was all to release the life energy that was stored inside the corpse of the beasts.


    By crushing them with his spatialw, it pushed out all the passive life energy that was stored inside them that would have slowly dissipated after their deaths. By pushing all this life energy out, he created an area of high concentration life energy that was considered the perfect cultivation space.


    Of course, he didn''t have the human defenders cultivate in a normal manner, he had them cultivate through battles.


    It was simr to how he trained his pets by forcing them past their limits through battling, allowing them to not only tap into theirtent potential, it also allowed them to wildly absorb the high concentration of life energy in the air. It was simr to using your muscles, by draining all the strength in them, you could allow them to heal to be stronger.


    By draining all the life energy that was in these human defenders, it made them suck in the life energy around them at a faster rate which had boosted their cultivation.


    Why was Lin Fan doing all of this?


    After hearing about how the Union Government would sacrifice Snow Wind City to stall for time, Lin Fan knew that he had to do something.


    This was the city that he had be attached to and if either he or they didn''t be stronger, they wouldn''t be able to defend themselves.


    Since that was the case, why not increase the strength of both?


    But right now he was stuck at a bottleneck that he couldn''t solve, so the only thing he could do was make the people of Snow Wind City stronger.


    That was how he came up with this idea to train the three royal families of Snow Wind City.


    In the beast wave, there were two beasts that were seeing that their numbers were dwindling and they were bing impatient.


    They had wanted toe out earlier when they saw the Legendary Realm spatialw being used, but then they figured that since the other side wanted to wear themselves down, they would let them. However, now that their numbers were dwindling and it didn''t seem like the humans were getting any weaker, they couldn''t help bing worried.


    So without any further hesitation, there were two roars that suddenly came from the middle of the beast wave.


    The two beasts walked out of the beast wave through the path that was created for them,ing to stand in front of the city walls.


    The first thing that one of them said was, "Humans, we have acknowledged that you have fought well. As long as you are willing to submit to us, we can take you in as our ves and not kill you all."


    The Beast Race was a race that was rather simple. While these King Beasts had intelligence and couldmunicate with humans, that didn''t mean that they were smart.


    These King Beasts were more strong than smart, so their first n was a simple lie like this.


    Even if it was a dumb idea, it was still worth a try.


    But on the walls, not a single person took this seriously.


    The humans had seen the cruelty of the beasts before, so naturally they didn''t believe these beasts that easily.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look down at these two beasts for a few seconds before turning to say, "You two, it''s your turn."


    The two figures nodded and said, "Yes." Right after that, they jumped off the walls tond in front of the two King Beasts.


    The two King Beasts were surprised by having two people suddenly appear in front of them, but when they saw who they were, they were even more shocked.


    One of the King Beasts said, "It''s actually you two? How dare you¡­"


    But before he could finish, those two figures already attacked.

 320 Chapter 320

    Jin didn''t hesitate at all as he threw out his spatialw des at the two King Beasts in front of him.


    The two King Beasts didn''t dare look down on these spatialw des because they were made with spatialw. Spatialw was a specialw and possession of this specialw deemed one as an Abnormal.


    Would a specialw that needed its own category be weak?


    Of course not!


    Even though they were a realm above Jin, they didn''t dare look down on him since they knew that with the power of hisw, he would be able to easily cut through their defenses.


    Both of these King Beasts moved in different directions, avoiding the spatialw des that Jin had thrown at them. However, they didn''t stop there as they had moved forward while dodging these spatialw des, heading right at Jin.


    Both of these King Beasts prepared their ws to attack Jin, but before they could even reach him, there was a ck mass of energy that came up to cover Jin. Before they could approach, Jin had already disappeared into the ground where the dark energy hade out of.


    As subordinates of the Shadow Lord, naturally these King Beasts were familiar with the shadowws and it didn''t take them long to recognize the owner of these shadowws.


    Among the various subordinates of the Shadow Lord, Jin and Yin were quite famous mainly because of Jin''s spatialws and his single mutation.


    Even though all of them were King Beasts, only Jin had a single mutation. The two King Beasts that he was facing were just normal King Beasts.


    Mutated beasts were rare since it meant that the beast would have to either take the divine blood from another beast to mutate or purify their bloodline enough to naturally generate it.


    Mutated beasts were much stronger than normal beasts, so it was hard to fulfil the first condition. As for the second method, that was even harder because divine blood was the pinnacle of a beast''s bloodline, how could it be easy to refine?


    Then there was Jin with both the spatialw and a single mutation, which made him countless times stronger than beasts at the same level.


    He was one of the prize gains of the Shadow Lord, one that he wanted to groom.


    When they had heard from the Shadow Lord that he had been lost in this lower realm, they couldn''t help being shocked by this since they never thought that someone who had been trained by the Shadow Lord personally would fall in this lower realm. After all, the only way to remove the bit ofw that was stuck in their heart was either by death or by force.


    No one believed that Jin would be able to remove it by force since that bit of energy came from the Shadow Lord himself. There was no need to mention the difference in cultivation between them.


    So the only option that was left was that he was dead.


    While it was unlikely, it was still more likely than him breaking the bind of the Shadow Lord.


    But now that they saw Jin and Yin in front of them, they realized that they had found some way to eliminate the bind of the Shadow Lord and escaped to this lower realm.


    Still, the two King Beasts smiled when they realized this fact.


    If they were to capture these two and send them back to the Shadow Lord, they would definitely be rewarded by the Shadow Lord.


    Even if Jin was strong, he could only take one of the King Beasts on easily. Since there were two of them, this made it much harder for him to fight.


    As for Yin, he was only in the low Fragmented Soul Realm and he wasn''t a mutated beast or possessed a specialw, so all he could do was support Jin.


    These two King Beasts were both predators, so they were both quite powerful with their attacks. One was a wolf that bit with its fangs and the other was a tiger that shed with its ws.


    Even if Jin''s defense were powerful because of the spatialws, it still couldn''t keep up under the attacks of these two King Beasts. As he condensed more and more spatialw barriers, his life energy was slowly being drained away.


    Slowly but surely, Jin was pushed back by the two of them, giving up more and more ground until he was pushed right up against the wall.


    The two King Beasts looked at each other and with a nod, they jumped out at the same time. Both of them went in a separate direction, attacking Jin with a two pronged attack.


    Jin tried to condense two spatialw barriers, but he only had enough life energy for a single one. Yin saw that Jin didn''t have enough spatial energy, so he immediately came forward and gathered all his shadowws to obstruct the tiger whose attack Jin couldn''t block.


    However, the tiger as a subordinate of the Shadow Lord was naturally familiar with this shadoww, so it easily crushed through this haze, knocking Yin away before heading right at Jin.


    The ws of the tiger were raised and were about to fall down on Jin when a skeleton suddenly appeared out of the ground. The skeleton took the w with its skull head on, but the skull didn''t crack under the force of the w.<sub> </sub>


    As it took this hit, the skeleton also came forward to hug the tiger, keeping it in ce, making it unable to move.


    The tiger was shocked by this andnded a few more w strikes on the skeleton, but no matter where the tiger hit the skeleton on its body that was as dark as obsidian, it couldn''t damage it at all. It was just helplessly being held by the skeleton.


    Jin saw this and instead of revealing a look of joy like he should have, he had a bitter smile on his face.


    He knew that since this skeleton appeared, it meant that he had failed.


    The wolf noticed the skeleton wrapping up itsrade and it immediately came forward to bite at the skeleton, but there was another skeleton that appeared out of the ground and hugged the wolf as well.


    If these two King Beasts had been at full strength, they would have been able to break free of these skeletons, but they had to exhaust quite a bit of their life energy to break through Jin''s defenses. They could only helplessly let themselves be held by those skeletons.


    A figure floated down off the wall,nding by Jin and Yin''s side.


    When Jin and Yin saw this figure, they suppressed the desire inside them to run away and came forward to greet him. Both of them cupped their hands and gave a bow as they said, "Master."


    Momonga looked over his work and shook his head as he said, "You two failed, but you already knew that. Do you know why you failed?"


    Jin and Yin looked at each other and could see the bitter looks in each other''s eyes.


    "Isn''t it because their cultivations were higher than ours?"


    <o>,m But of course, neither one of them dared to say this to Momonga''s face.</o>


    Seeing that neither was willing to say a thing, Momonga just shook his head and said, "If you two were to work together instead of just having Yin support Jin, you could have used your mobility to attack these beasts and trap them, making them unable to fight back. They might have power, but you two have speed on your side."


    Jin and Yin lowered their heads and revealed bitter smiles.


    Momonga paused for a second before saying, "Still, considering the fact that their cultivations were higher than yours, it is an aplishment to be able to drain their life energy by this much." As he said this, Jin and Yin had hopeful gazes appear in their eyes. "But¡­"


    The moment they heard the ''but'', it was like they had fallen down from heaven to hell.


    "...You still failed your assignment, so you have to be punished in the end. I guess it''s back to basic training for the two of you."


    The thing that they had been dreading the most finally came. It was Momonga''s training again.


    They thought that they had finally been free from this, but now it seemed like they would have to start from the beginning.


    Momonga''s training was actually even worse than Lin Fan''s training. If fact, they wished that they could die over and over again, it would still be much better than Momonga''s training.


    Momonga ignored the two of them and looked over at the trapped beasts.


    The two trapped King Beasts looked at Momonga with a trace of fear in their eyes. They could sense the danger that wasing from this young looking man in white, but they couldn''t understand where it came from.


    The wolf King Beast was much more sly than the tiger King Beast, so it said, "We''re willing to serve you like Jin and Yin if you are willing to let us go."


    The tiger King Beast was in a daze for a second before nodding along with the wolf King Beast.


    But Momonga didn''t even care about any of this as he turned back to say to Jin and Yin, "Finish them and take their cores, it''ll help your cultivation." Then without another word, he jumped right back onto the wall.


    Jin and Yin turned back to the wolf and tiger King Beasts with vicious looks in their eyes.


    They wouldn''t show any mercy to these two who had sent them back to training.


    Normally these two King Beasts would be the predator, but now they could only be the prey...

 321 Chapter 321

    Once the King Beasts were destroyed, just like before, the beast wave began scattering.


    What held the beasts together in the beast wave was the power of the Beast King, or normally these beasts that could never work together would nevere to form this beast wave.


    When that core holding them together through fear and instinct copsed, that meant that there was no more beast wave.


    All the beast scattered in different directions, but this time the people of Snow Wind City didn''t chase.


    They had barely survived the attack of the beast wave, how could they even think about chasing after it?


    When the beasts had scattered, there was only one thing left for them to do. Well rather, two things now.


    The first was to clean up all those beast corpses since they were all considered valuable treasures. The corpse of beasts could be used to make various different things, from artifacts to pills to many other items that would help increase their strength.


    Even if they couldn''t make anything with them, the materials from the corpses of the beasts would definitely sell for a good price.


    Then there were the people who were close to breaking through from Lin Fan''s training session.


    Many of them were at the peak of their current realm and with just a bit of cultivating in this high concentration life energy area, they would surely break through. Of course, most of the people that were about to break through were those with lower realms of cultivation.


    For those with higher realms of cultivation, this training session did help their cultivations increase, but they weren''t close to breaking through just yet. At higher realms of cultivation, what decided if one broke through or not was theirprehension ofws.


    This training was only to increase one''s battle strength and one''s life energy absorption, so it didn''t increase one''sprehension ofws.


    So for most of them, they had minor gains, but that didn''t matter.


    Most of them were leaders of smaller forces that brought the experts of their forces here to defend the city. During this defense, there were very few casualties and not a single death on the side of the human defenders. Not only that, most of the human defenders had broken through their current cultivation realm.


    This meant that the overall power of their families had increased which was definitely a good thing for them, so it didn''t matter if their personal cultivation didn''t increase.


    As for Lin Fan''s group, he left the people of Snow Wind City to clear out the beast corpses. Other than the King Beast corpses, nothing else could enter his gaze, so he just left everything to the others since his goal was to make them stronger in the first ce.


    Lin Fan brought his group back to his pet shop to discuss their next ns.


    ording to the n that Brainy devised, there wouldn''t be another beast wave that would attack Snow Wind City after this current wave because they would all bemitted to the item that they invaded the Blue Star for. But just in case, it would be best to bunker down in Snow Wind City and wait for the reinforcements from the upper realm to arrive.


    Once that happened, it wouldn''t matter to the residents of Snow Wind City what happened since the upper realm experts would be taking care of the Beast Race.


    When the upper realm experts came, if they allowed the beasts to do what they wanted and still destroy Snow Wind City, it would definitely be a disgrace to them. They definitely wouldn''t let any harm befall Snow Wind City at that time.


    Brainy had already sent out its scouts to watch the beast wave and they all seemed to be gathering at a point that was ten kilometers away from Snow Wind City. None of the beast waves seem to be making a move, but the aura that came from them gathering together showed that there were many powerful King Beasts present in those beast waves.


    The three royal family heads had been talking the entire time, giving many suggestions on what they should do next. From time to time, Jin and Yin would throw in their suggestions which the three royal family heads jumped one.


    They knew from the fight that these two strangers were clearly Legendary Realm Experts as well, so they tried their best to leave the best impression they could on them.


    As for the other four at the table, none of them said a single word.


    Momonga and Ang were just bored because for powerful beings like this, the things that were happening on the Blue Star were just games for them. The only thing they cared about was this shop, the master behind it, and Lin Fan who they had slowly be close to.


    They were more than powerful enough to protect all three, but there wasn''t really a need for them to do anything. They knew that as long as this pet shop was here, there was no real danger to Lin Fan and the Blue Star.


    After all, the real master of this shop was a God Realm Expert!<sub> </sub>


    For Lin Fan, he was only listening half heartedly, giving a response from time to time. It was clear that he was lost in deep thought over something and he was hesitating.


    For the Lin Family ancestor, he had been watching Lin Fan this entire time. He didn''t show any expressions on his face, but based on his deep eyes, it was like he could see through everything.


    The Wang Family Head said, "I think that we should ce guards on the walls on rotation and if everyone here takes a shift with the guards, we should be able to hold¡­"


    But before he could finish, the Lin Family ancestor cut in, "You want to go don''t you?"


    The three royal family heads were confused by this, but naturally they didn''t say a thing.


    They knew that they were the weakest ones here and yet they were the only ones talking. That was because they knew that the strong gave them that chance to talk because they couldn''t be bothered. However, once the strong did talk, they would have to move to the side immediately.


    Lin Fan was snapped out of his daze and looking into the Lin Family ancestor''s eyes before saying, "Go? Go where? I don''t know what you mean."


    The Lin Family ancestor just ignored this and said, "Go if you want to go, I know that you want to."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and he said, "But what about the city? I can''t just leave the city in a dangerous time like this."


    The Lin Family ancestor shook his head before saying with a sigh, "I can''t stop you and you know that there''s no real danger here. But if you''re really worried, I''ll stay here with those two." At this, he pointed over to Jin and Yin before continuing, "As long as we''re here, there should be no problem with the city."


    After stopping, he also turned over to Momonga and Ang before saying, "Anyway, these two will be going with you, so I don''t need to worry about you."


    He said this because the Lin Family ancestor actually couldn''t see through these two.


    To be honest, the Lin Family ancestor was indeed hiding a secret, one that made him stronger than the experts of this realm. But even with that being the case, he still couldn''t see through the cultivations of Momonga and Ang, yet he could definitely feel thews that wereing from them.


    It was clear that they were definitely stronger than him.


    Lin Fan hesitated when he heard this. He knew that the Lin Family ancestor was right, but he also felt that if he left now, he would be abandoning his duty.


    But in the end, his curiosity won out and he gave a slow nod.


    What Lin Fan wanted to do was head to where the beast waves were gathered and see what the situation was.


    For the Beast Race to invest all these resources into invading a lower realm, there must be something special. It was so special that even a King of the Beast Race had fallen in this realm.


    To elicit these kinds of reactions from all these different experts, it had to be something that was at the peak of the Sun Realm or even reaching into the domain of Rulers.


    That was something that could even move Lin Fan since he knew just how powerful Rulers were after going to the Sacred Rock Realm.


    If he could obtain this artifact, it would definitely help him in the future. That was why he wanted to head to the location the beast waves were gathering.


    But his one scruple had been leaving Snow Wind City here.


    Snow Wind City was a ce that he had attached himself to and leaving just like this for treasure seemed like he was abandoning all his friends and the people he cared about.


    However, now that the Lin Family ancestor had offered to stay, Lin Fan knew that there wouldn''t be a problem since the focus would be on the prize hidden in this realm. No one would have time to deal with this insignificant city.


    So with that, Lin Fan brought Momonga and Ang to the personal airship of the Lin Family ancestor which he had let Lin Fan use for now and they set out from Snow Wind City.

 322 Chapter 322

    The airship carrying Lin Fan''s group didn''t head out long before stopping.


    The airship was just too big and too eye-catching. If they were to fly that thing in there, it would be strange if they weren''t immediately shot down by the beasts.


    So theynded it just a kilometer away and got out, using their own life energy to fly the rest of the way.


    Momonga''s darkws could also be used as a cover like the shadowws and while it was weaker than the shadowws, with how strong Momonga''sws were, there was no problem hiding themselves from the senses of the beasts at all.


    The beasts were all gathered around, forming a circle with a wall of bodies.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that they could fly because of their cultivation, there was no way for them to break through this wall of pure beast muscles. The only other way would have been to find a secret passage and with how unlikely that was, it would have been a fool''s dream.


    With Ang''s windws around them, they controlled the wind so it wouldn''t alert the beasts that were flying around them and they made their way over the wall.


    Once they were past the wall, there wasn''t much that they could see other than a few beasts that were in the peak tinum Realm that were standing around a building. This was a building that waspletely dpidated, clearly it hadn''t been in use for countless years, but yet it still remained standing.


    With the way they were standing around it, it seemed like they were guarding it, but for what reason, that was anyone''s guess.


    But it was clear that they weren''t taking this task seriously since they were all scattered around the building, not even standing guard. They were just lying there, enjoying the sun and giving yawns like they werepletely bored.


    There wasn''t even a single beast that was standing at the door.


    It didn''t take Lin Fan''s group any time to sneak past them and enter the building, but there was still nothing interesting in the building.


    The only strange thing was that this room was actuallypletely decorated with pure white furniture that was in perfect condition even though the rest of the house looked like it was falling apart.


    Lin Fan came over to the table in the dining room to see what kind of material it was made of while Momonga just wandered into the kitchen.


    After seeing that he couldn''t see through this table, Lin Fan also headed over to the kitchen to join Momonga who had been looking at the counter, or more specifically, the floor by the counter.


    Lin Fan came over and asked, "Did you find anything?"


    Momonga didn''t reply right away as he was deep in thought, but after a while, he said, "This ce is interesting, it''s made of Luminite."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he asked, "What is that?"


    Momonga kept looking around as he casually said, "It''s a special material. It isn''t special because of how strong it is, but rather it''s special because of how it can maintain its form for a long period of time without any maintenance."


    Lin Fan pulled out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact and said, "Then that means that it''s a rare metal?"


    Momonga didn''t answer this time. Instead he went under the counter and moved his hand around a few times before a "click" sound suddenly rang out. There was a shift in the floor as a staircase leading down suddenly appeared.


    Momonga revealed an excited look as he said, "Finally found it, that took a bit."


    Lin Fan had been poking the furniture in this kitchen with his Iron Eater Bone Artifact, but nothing had been happening the entire time. When he heard the sound of the staircase being revealed, he turned over to look at Momonga as he said, "What is going on?"


    Momonga had also turned over to see Lin Fan poking at the furniture with his Iron Eater Bone Artifact as he asked at the same time, "What are you doing?"


    Both of them just looked at each other, but Lin Fan was the first to speak because with how Momonga looked at him, it was almost like he had been caught doing something embarrassing.


    Lin Fan scratched his head and said, "You said that this is a special material, so I thought that I could absorb it with my artifact."


    Momonga shook his head as he gave augh, "It is a special material, but it''s not a rare metal. This is a metal, but its specialty is because of its ability to maintain its form even after millions of years. It doesn''t require any upkeep and that''s because of the special energy this Luminite contains. It doesn''t actually have any special metallic characteristics, so your artifact can''t absorb it."


    Lin Fan looked back in a daze as he said, "Oh."


    Then after a few seconds, he turned back to the staircase and asked, "Then what about that?"


    Momonga stretched his hands out and said, "If I knew that, we wouldn''t be here, wouldn''t we?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan paused for a second before giving a nod of agreement. That was right, if Momonga did know what this was, why would they be here?


    During this entire time, Ang had been standing there watching them.


    She didn''t really care about what they were doing here, the only reason she came was because Lin Fan was here.


    Since there was nothing of interest in the house, they didn''t bother with touching anything there as they headed down the staircase.


    During their descent, Momonga made sure to cover them with his darknessws again because the staircase had made quite a bit of sound when it had appeared.


    Normally this would have been a problem, but Lin Fan had used the sound ofw that he had just obtained to create a soundproof space around them. It had ensured that all the sounds that were in the house didn''t spread outside, so they had been able to talk without any problem during their time in the house.


    As they descended, they continued down the stairs into pure darkness.


    Both Momonga and Ang had night vision, so they could clearly see what was in front of them, but Lin Fan had to rely on the tiny bit of light that wasing from above,ing from the house.


    But the staircase led down quite a bit and soon that light also disappeared. The only thing that Lin Fan could do was take Ang''s hand as she led him down.


    After walking down the stairs for a few minutes, they finally saw a bit of lighting from below, but when they did see this light, they immediately slowed down and raised their guard.


    The beasts outside had clearly been guarding this house and there was the fact that there were no King Beasts around, there was only one possibility for that. It meant that all the King Beasts were already down here and it was likely this light came from them.


    But as they slowly approached under the cover of Momonga''s darknessws, they found that this was nothing more than a torch on the wall of a corridor that appeared in front of them.


    There were several torches that lined the walls of the corridor, lighting up their way.


    With how this corridor was shaped and what materials the walls were made of, this ce was clearly man made, however, it was also quite a simple ce.


    There were no decorations on the walls at all, it was just a single corridor that led straight forward without an end in sight.


    Of course, now that they were deep into unknown territory, Lin Fan''s group didn''t dare be negligent.


    They slowly made their way forward in the corridor with their guard up, but as they continued along, there was nothing for them to find. There was only this corridor for as long as they could see.


    But all things dide to an end eventually and they made their way to the end of the corridor.


    At the end of the corridor, there was a wall with arge door in it that waspletely pushed open. It was very clear that someone had been here before, but when they looked into the room, they couldn''t find anything.


    This room wasn''t that much different from the corridor that they had just been in since there wasn''t much here either. The only difference was that this room had a statue in it, as well as two more corridors behind the statue.


    This was a statue of a woman who had wings on her back with her hands spread in front of her.


    They had to admit that this statue was quite beautifully made and the model for the statue was also quite beautiful. In terms of her appearance, she might even be a match for Ang.


    When Lin Fan saw this statue, he couldn''t help thinking that this statue was a bit familiar looking, but he couldn''t tell where it was from.


    But that wasn''t the important thing, the important thing was the que that was at the base of the statue.


    The que read: To the weary travellers that have made it this far, congrattions on arriving here. Those that are lucky enough to make it here have a chance, please pick a path and test your luck.


    Other than that, there was nothing else there for them.


    They knew that the King Beasts must have already gone forward, but this was a test of luck and when it came to luck¡­


    Both Momonga and Lin Fan turned to look at Ang.

 323 Chapter 323

    Ang hadn''t been paying attention the entire time, she had been looking at the statue.


    For some reason, she also felt that this statue was familiar looking and she had been lost in its face. She wanted to remember who this was, but she just couldn''t think of a name to match this face.


    Lin Fan saw that she was in a daze and said, "Ang, what''s wrong?"


    When she heard Lin Fan''s words, Ang snapped back to focus and after a slight pause she said, "No, nothing."


    This was the first time since Lin Fan met her that she had been in a daze like this. It was clear that whatever she had seen, it had affected her quite a bit.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t ask her about this. Just like before, whenever she didn''t seem to want to talk about something, Lin Fan never bothered asking.


    If she ever wanted to talk about it, she would speak up, but before then, he wouldn''t force his way in.


    Lin Fan just asked, "Which way do you think we should go?"


    It was only then that Ang realized that there were two paths in front of them.


    After a bit of a pause, Ang pointed to the path on the left.


    Lin Fan and Momonga looked at each other and without any hesitation, they walked towards the left path.


    Ang stopped for another second to take one final look at the statue before following Lin Fan and Momonga through the corridor on the left.


    They continued on through this corridor at a cautious pace since they didn''t know what was ahead of them, they just knew that the King Beasts had arrived before them and they definitely had a lead.


    While it wouldn''t be a problem for them to kill the King Beasts, the only problem would be the consequences afterwards. Everyone would be doubtful as to how Lin Fan''s group had ughtered twelve King Beasts with just three people. This would definitely draw attention and people would start digging into their backgrounds, which was thest thing that Lin Fan wanted.


    So for now, they would try to avoid the King Beasts as much as they could while trying to find the artifact, or even some information as to what the artifact was.


    They continued through this normal looking hall under Momonga''s darknessws, being ever vignt of anything that mighte up, but there was nothing that did.


    Eventually, they arrived at another room that was just like the previous one, but this time, there wasn''t the same statue that was in the center of the room. This was just a room with three different exits this time.


    Lin Fan and Momonga both turned to Ang again.


    Lin Fan asked, "Which way should we go this time?"


    Ang paused for a second to look at the center of the room before pointing at the middle corridor and saying, "That way."


    They noticed the strange way Ang was acting, but still Lin Fan and Momonga followed her direction without any hesitation.


    Momonga might have doubted it before, but after seeing it in action in the Sacred Rock Realm, he no longer had any doubts.


    They moved down the same corridor as before and once again they came into another room.


    This was another room that didn''t have the statue in it, but there were four exits in front of them.


    Just like this, they continued following Ang''s direction to move through the various rooms with increasing amounts of exits. So far, they hadn''t encountered anything, which meant that it seemed like they were on the right path, but they weren''t sure either.


    If they were on the right path, something should have happened or they would have escaped this infinite loop of rooms, right?


    But still they continued on in this infinite loop of rooms.


    Two exits turned to three, three exits turned to four, four exits turned to five, five exits turned to six, and so on and so on.


    It seemed like they would never reach the end until something finally changed.


    As they were walking through the corridor to their next room, they suddenly found something that shouldn''t have been there.


    On the floor of the corridor, there was a skeleton with a de right beside it.<sub> </sub>


    Neither the skeleton nor the de had anything special about them, they didn''t even give off an aura which would be normal for the corpse of an expert.


    As far as they could tell, this was the corpse of apletely normal person, but how would this person havee this far to leave a corpse here? Unless it was a human that had incredible luck.


    Lin Fan''s group came over to look at the skeleton and the de.


    As far as Lin Fan could tell, it wasn''t something that he had seen before and it was clearly not something that didn''t seem important.


    But when Momonga looked over the corpse, especially seeing the mark that was on the de, he couldn''t help knitting his brows. He carefully looked over the de and the more he looked over it, the deeper his brows knitted.


    It was clear that he recognized this de and probably the owner, but since he was still checking the body, Lin Fan decided to leave him be for now.


    That was until Momonga suddenly turned to Lin Fan and said, "Bring out one of the Desert Horrors for me."


    Lin Fan was confused why Momonga suddenly asked this of him, but he still brought one of the giant ants out.


    When the giant ant came out, it was surprised and confused why it was called out, but it didn''t have much time to feel this way. Momonga suddenly tapped it on its forehead and the light in its eyes disappeared as it crumpled to the ground.


    Lin Fan was surprised by this sudden action, but when Ang saw this, she also suddenly knitted her brows.


    Lin Fan asked, "What did you do that¡­"


    But before he could finish, Momonga raised his hand and made a "shh" gesture, telling him to be quiet for a bit.


    Lin Fan was confused, but still he listened to Momonga and sat there in silence watching the Desert Horror. However, no matter how he looked at the Desert Horror, he couldn''t understand what was happening.


    However, based on how Momonga and Ang were looking at the Desert Horror, he knew that there must be something wrong.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally noticed what was wrong.


    As he looked over the Desert Horror corpse, he couldn''t feel a single thing from it. It was just like it was an empty husk, not the corpse of a Silver Realm beast that had just died. All of the life energy that should have been in the corpse had already been drained away by an unknown thing.


    When he realized this, Lin Fan couldn''t help turning back to look at the skeleton and the de on the ground.


    Momonga gave a thoughtful hum before saying, "This ce seems to be more dangerous than I thought."


    When Lin Fan saw that Momonga was finally willing to talk, he asked, "What is going on here?"


    Momonga looked up from the Desert Horror to look at the skeleton again and the de before saying, "To tell you that, I have to tell you about this skeleton first."


    <o>,m Lin Fan looked back at the skeleton and asked, "What about it?"</o>


    Momonga paused for a second before giving a sigh, "There''re many people who wouldn''t remember him, but I''m one of those that do. This is the corpse of a rather well known Ruler from back in the days, but he suddenly disappeared one day. Everyone assumed that someone took care of him, but no one would have expected his corpse to be here."


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this.


    If this had been before the Sacred Rock Realm, Lin Fan wouldn''t have known what this was, but after the Sacred Rock Realm, he had a deep understanding of Rulers. They were the ones that stood at the top of all the realms in this universe, being far above even the upper realms and the Ster Kingdoms.


    For a Ruler to fall in this lower realm, it must mean that there had to be something special here. For a Ruler''s corpse to bepletely drained of all its life energy, that must mean that something must be quite dangerous or mysterious¡­


    Lin Fan then asked, "How do you know that this is the corpse of a Ruler when it has no life energy?"


    Momonga pointed at a mark on the de and said, "This is a special mark that only belonged on the weapon of this Ruler, no one else would ever be able to use this mark because it was a mark that was linked to his Realm. Even if he dies, with the imprint his Realm left on this world, it would have been impossible for anyone to copy it unless they were even stronger than him. So it''s very likely that this is the original which makes it easy to recognize him."


    Lin Fan finally knitted his brows when he heard this, "Does that mean that whatever is here is at the same level as Rulers or even higher?"


    Momonga finally revealed a faint smile, "Isn''t it exciting?"


    As he said this, Momonga had slowly raised his hand and there was a seal that had formed in his palm as he watched Lin Fan''s expression. He waspletely tense, ready to make a move at any second.

 324 Chapter 324

    Lin Fan didn''t notice this as he had been staring at the mark on the de the entire time.


    This was a mark that was like a lotus that was imprinted on the guard of the de.


    As he stared at this mark, even though there was no residual life energy in it, he could feel a unique sensationing from it. This should have been the imprint of the Realm that Momonga had mentioned before.


    As he felt this sensation, there was a strong yearning for power that filled him. He wanted to reach the realm that this mark was in, he wanted that power to make all that he wanted his.


    This impulse became stronger as a look of greed filled Lin Fan''s face.


    Momonga knitted his brows when he saw this.


    He had said all this because he wanted to test Lin Fan. He could still see that there was some kind of split in Lin Fan and he wanted to see just how bad the split was.


    Lin Fan also felt this impulse for a few seconds, but then he slowly drew it back in and calmed down again as the look of greed disappeared from his face.


    After going to the Sacred Rock Realm and hearing Momonga mention this to him, he could now feel the split and he was slowly learning to control it. However, that was easier said than done¡­


    Momonga saw that the look on his face was disappearing, so he slowly lowered his hand with the seal in it as he calmed down.


    It seemed like Lin Fan was slowly getting much better at controlling himself, that was a relief, but it still didn''t mean that the problem was solved.


    While Momonga didn''t mind the part of Lin Fan''s soul that wanted to help people, he could feel a kind of darkness from the part of the soul that ughtered people without any hesitation. A soul like that could easily fall into darkness and be corrupted. Once that happened, there would be no saving him, just like what happened in the past¡­


    After a slight pause, Lin Fan turned to ask Momonga, "What do we do now?"


    Momonga looked down at the corpse for a few seconds before saying, "Let''s bring it along. To a certain extent, we had a bit of a rtionship, so I know where to send his corpse. That''s the least I can do with the karma between us."


    Lin Fan nodded before taking the corpse and sword into the system''s storage.


    The moment the corpse and sword entered the system storage, there was a sudden notification from the system.


    "A Law Realm has been discovered. Does the host wish to absorb this Law Realm to unlock a new function of the shadow cultivation room?"


    Lin Fan was surprised the moment he heard this.


    While he had heard Momonga mention a Realm before, he was surprised to hear this term Law Realm from the system now. It seemed like this Law Realm was something special if even the system was acknowledging it and using it to improve itself.


    But he had seen how Momonga had looked at the de, it was clear that this was someone from Momonga''s past.


    He wasn''t going to arbitrarily decide to sacrifice the weapon to the system, he would at least discuss it with Momonga before doing so.


    But in the end, he was still nning on sacrificing it.


    So the corpse and de just remained in the system''s storage as they moved forward once again.


    It was the same as before, with more and more passages that appeared in front of them, seeming like there was no end.


    Finally when they arrived at a room with a hundred passages and went through one of them, what they were led to wasn''t another room with one hundred and one passages.


    Rather they were led into thisrge open room with a fountain right in the middle of the room. In the center of that fountain, there was the same statue that they had seen in the first room.


    However, that wasn''t all that was in this room.


    In the center of the room, gathered around the fountain, there were several King Beasts standing in a circle. But that wasn''t the most surprising thing, the most surprising thing was what was standing in the center.


    In the center of the circle of King Beasts was a human standing there. It wasn''t a human that seemed very special, but Lin Fan recognized this human since he had just seen him not that long ago.


    This was one of the Legendary Realm Experts of the Union Government and the one that had died fighting against the beast wave.


    But what was going on? Why was he standing here in the center of all these King Beasts like nothing was wrong?


    Just based on the way they were treating him, it was almost as if they were following his orders.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Could it be that he was a traitor all along?"


    Momonga looked at the human in the center before saying, "Things aren''t as simple as you think they are, you don''t know the true power of the differentws yet."


    Lin Fan was confused as he asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    Momonga didn''t respond and just pointed at the center of the room.


    The one thing of note was that they were currently covered in Momonga''s darknessws, just like they had been when they had entered any room. So even though they were just standing there watching them, none of the King Beast noticed them.


    The human expert in the center of the room raised his hand and created a ball of darkness in his palm. After this ball of darkness had formed, there was a crystal that suddenly popped out of it, falling into his other raised hand in front of him.


    As far as Lin Fan remembered, thew that this expert had used was the waterw, he had never heard of this expert being able to use any darkness basedws before. What did this mean?


    Momonga could see that Lin Fan was confused, so he exined, "As you be stronger and your understanding ofws bes better, you will learn how to use the attributes ofws in different ways. For this shadoww, its main attribute is division. Shadows are another part of you, or to be urate, another version of you. When that is used, these shadows can be an avatar."


    Lin Fan still didn''t understand what that meant.


    Momonga continued, "That human is dead, but his corpse is now being controlled by this avatar. There''s no need for me to tell you whose avatar it is, right?"


    Once it was put in such simple words, naturally it became easy for Lin Fan to understand.


    Other than the Shadow Lord, who else would be able to control shadowws like this?


    It was inconvenient for the Shadow Lord to descend personally since in his conquest, he had offended plenty of people and had made plenty of enemies. If he ever left his territory, these people would immediately capitalize on this, so there was no way that would ever happen.


    But if he were to just send a shadow clone, that wouldn''t draw enough attention to have anysting effect.


    That was also the reason why he needed this human expert''s corpse.


    A shadow was just a shadow in the end and without a physical body, it wasn''t that strong. But with this human corpse, by binding to it, the shadow body now had a physical body that it could use, making it much more stable and powerful.


    As for the crystal that had juste out of the ball of darkness in the human expert''s hand, it was a crystal that both Lin Fan and Momonga were familiar with.


    This was a crystal that they had seen many times back in Rock Mountain City, so there was no way they would mistaken it.


    Lin Fan asked, "That is¡­"


    Momonga just nodded and said, "Let''s watch and see how it goes right now."


    The crystal then floated out of the human expert''s hand and floated there in the air, gathering dark energy.


    Eventually that dark energy gathered to take form around the crystal, taking the form of a human body.


    Unlike before, this body made purely out of dark energy wasn''tpletely made of pure dark energy. There were actual limbs that took form, taking the form of human arms and legs.


    On its head, there wasn''t the same eye, but rather there was only a single smile made of pure white teeth.


    The energy that it gave off was much stronger than the figure of dark energy that had formed in the ve trade base of the Jiang Family. It was clear that this figure was much morepletepared to that figure.


    Lin Fan suddenly remembered the information that he had tortured out of the soul fragment that he had extracted from Jiang Qi Tai.


    It had said that there was a fragment that had already gathered several fragments, being much stronger than the rest.


    Based on howplete this dark figure''s form was, this should be the one that the other fragment had been talking about¡­


    When the dark figure appeared, the human expert came forward and bowed along with the other King Beasts before saying, "Master, we''ve reached the second stage, but we don''t know how to move on from here."


    The dark figure looked around, looking at the statue first before suddenly slightly knitting the ce where his brows would be before looking around again.


    The dark figure said in a deep voice, "Something is off here."

 325 Chapter 325

    The human expert immediately panicked as he asked, "Master, what''s wrong? Please tell your disciple and I''ll immediately fix it."


    The word "disciple" was something that Lin Fan immediately focused on.


    That exined quite a bit.


    It exined how the Shadow Lord had be so powerful, while also exining why they were so insistent ining to this realm. It seemed like they weren''t just enticed by the artifact on this realm like it had told its subordinates. It seemed like it had been working with the Beast King that had fallen in this realm the entire time.


    The dark figure kept looking around like there was a problem, but he couldn''t find the solution. After a while, he finally said in the same deep voice, "There''s a fragment of my soul here, but I can''t tell exactly where it is. However, I can tell that it is close."


    The human expert and the King Beasts all looked around in a confused manner, not seeing anything that was simr to the crystal.


    The human expert tentatively asked, "Master, are you certain?"


    The dark figure kept looking around without caring for them as he said, "Do you think I would make a mistake?"


    The human expert trembled at this before turning to the King Beasts and shouting, "Spread out and search, it''s a precious fragment of master''s soul!"


    Lin Fan felt that something was off, why would the Beast King''s soul fragment suddenly mention that there was a soul fragment nearby?


    Could it be that there really was one that had remained here after the Beast King had fallen, or could it be¡­?


    Lin Fan paused for a second before he took out the soul fragment that he had been keeping in his Spatial Ring.


    The moment the crystal containing the soul fragment appeared, the dark figure suddenly looking in the general direction of Lin Fan''s group.


    He stared right into space, right at where Lin Fan''s group was standing while being covered in Momonga''s darknessws, hiding them, almost as if he could see them.


    That confirmed what Lin Fan was thinking.


    Even though he had stored this soul fragment in his Spatial Ring which was considered a different space from the outside world it was currently in, which was simr to a smaller realm, the dark figure had been able to sense it. The moment it came out, the sensation became even stronger.


    Without any further thought, Lin Fan immediately put the soul fragment into the system''s storage.


    The moment the soul fragment entered the system''s storage, the dark figure''s crease above where the dark figure''s eyes would be became even deeper.


    The dark figure ignored everyone around it as it moved towards where Lin Fan had been standing.


    Had been as in they had casually moved out of the way once they saw the dark figure moving towards them.


    Even if the dark figure had been at its peak as a Beast King, it still wouldn''t have been able to break through Momonga''sws since Momonga was at a level that was higher than it to begin with.


    That allowed them to easily avoid being detected by anyone present.


    The human expert noticed that something was off with the dark figure, so he came over to ask, "Master, what is it?"


    The dark figure didn''t look at the human expert as it continued staring in the direction Lin Fan''s group had been while saying, "The sensation of the soul fragment suddenly disappeared. It''s as if something suddenly covered it."


    The human expert was surprised at first, but then he asked, "Perhaps you only made a mistake?"


    When Momonga had heard this conversation between them, he couldn''t help being a bit surprised as well.


    As far as he knew, the soul was a very mysterious thing and as one''s cultivation became stronger, so did one''s soul. This was what allowed many higher realm experts to survive even when their bodies were destroyed.


    But as these souls became stronger, it meant that they were tightly knit together even when split into fragments. There would be a powerful bond between each soul fragment which drew them to each other. This was what had allowed the dark figure to sense its soul fragment even when it was inside Lin Fan''s Spatial Ring.


    A Spatial Ring was only a minor application of spatialws and even if it was a separate space, the bond between a soul was stronger than this.


    Not to mention that with the level that the Beast King''s cultivation was at, it would have been even hard for a Ruler to hide a soul fragment of this level at such close range.


    Yet somehow Lin Fan had done it.


    It seemed like the master of the shop had indeed given Lin Fan quite a few special things and that meant that Lin Fan''s position in the master''s mind wasn''t normal.


    The dark figure said, "Do you really think¡­" But before it could even finish, it suddenly looked back in the direction of the corridor that led to this room.<sub> </sub>


    The dark figure just stood there for a few seconds in silence before suddenly waving its hand at all the other King Beasts and said, "We''re leaving, the human reinforcements areing."


    The beasts all looked at each other before quickly gathering up where the dark figure was.


    Without any hesitation, they followed him over to the fountain and then they dove right into it, disappearing into the bottom of the fountain.


    It seemed like the fountain was hollow and there was a passage underneath it that led to the next room.


    However, Lin Fan''s group didn''t continue forward.


    They had heard what the dark figure had said and they were curious about who wasing.


    After all, if they were human reinforcements, that would mean that they would be on the same side since they were after all humans. If they were human reinforcements, they should be the forces that came from the upper realm to help the Blue Star.


    It didn''t require them to wait long before they heard the sounds of footstepsing from this corridor.


    It wasn''t just a single set of footsteps, it was arge group of footsteps.


    When they came out, there were the Legendary Realm Experts from the Union Government, as well as several other people that Lin Fan didn''t recognize. It was clear that these people were the experts from the upper realm.


    When they came out of the corridor and saw Lin Fan standing there, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    There were a few of them that revealed concerned looks, naturally those were the people who were close to Lin Fan.


    The Union Government president was leading this group, but it was clear that he wasn''t the one leading them.


    The Union Government president came over and asked, "Are you here alone?"


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "I went to Snow Wind City first beforeing over here."


    The Union Government president wanted to say something else, but before he could, one of the upper realm experts came forward and said, "What are you wasting time with him for? If we stall for any longer, the beasts will already reach the artifact."


    The Union Government president then asked, "What do you want to do with him then?"


    The upper realm expert looked at Lin Fan and seeing through his cultivation, he gave a cold snort, "I''ll finish him off, it''s nothing more than a kid in the tinum Realm."


    That upper realm expert raised his hand and moved towards Lin Fan, but before he could make a move, there was a childish voice that rang out, "Stop, this isn''t the time for that. He was able to make it here which means that his luck is good, but as for whether he is a traitor or not, we can take care of thatter."


    The upper realm expert immediately stopped and turned to bow down to a little girl who had been standing in the middle of the group as he said, "But Princess, we can''t just leave him here. It would be dangerous for us."


    The little girl had a thoughtful look before saying, "I''ll take care of it with my illusionws. Once we finish taking care of the beasts, we''lle back and take him with us. I can feel something special from him and it would be a waste to just finish him off here."


    The upper realm expert immediately knitted his brows as he said, "Princess, are you really nning on¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words, but the meaning was clear to everyone.


    The little girl gave a shrug and said, "There''s no harm in trying."


    The upper realm expert clearly looked like he had something else to say, but he swallowed his words in the end.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this. They were talking like this in front of him, it was like he didn''t even exist to them.


    Lin Fan said, "What do you mean¡­"


    But before he could finish, the little girl had already appeared in front of him with her hands ced in front of his face.


    She said in a soft voice, "Sleep. When you wake up it''ll all be over."


    Lin Fan immediately felt a strong exhaustione over him as his eyelids began to droop. He tried his best to keep them up, but he couldn''t do it in the end.


    His eyelids kept drooping until they came over his eyes and he fell onto his back, falling into a deep sleep.

 326 Chapter 326

    Thest thing that Lin Fan thought was why Momonga didn''t help him.


    When the upper realm experts came into the room, the only one they saw was Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan naturally knew to keep a few cards hidden just in case, so he had Momonga and Ang hide themselves with Momonga''s darknessws ahead of time. They had been standing on the side observing the whole conversation.


    It wasn''t that they didn''t want to act, or rather it wasn''t that Ang didn''t want to act.


    She was about to stop the little girl from putting Lin Fan to sleep, but Momonga suddenly reached out to grab her hand and stop her.


    She had red at Momonga, but he had shook his head with a rare serious look.


    Normally she wouldn''t have cared and would have still helped Lin Fan, but seeing that rare serious look, she knew that this might not be the time.


    Momonga had felt thatws that the little girl used and he knew that they were the rare illusionws.


    Thesews drew upon the deepest parts of the enemy''s souls to create illusions for them, making them face the things hidden deepest inside of their souls.


    For someone like Lin Fan who clearly had a split soul, this was probably the best thing.


    If he could face this problem in the illusion, it would help him solve this problem and maybe fix his soul.


    So Momonga wanted to use this opportunity to see if it would do anything to Lin Fan.


    Of course, he wouldn''t put Lin Fan in danger since Lin Fan was important to him.


    Putting aside his own personal feelings, there was still the master behind Lin Fan which was the most important thing. He had been cultivating for all these years, but he had never seen through the way forward.


    Now that he had finallye in contact with something that could give him a clue, he naturally wasn''t willing to give it up.


    Whether that was for his own goals or for his own personal path of cultivation, it was something that he desired deeply.


    After putting Lin Fan to sleep, the group from the upper realm headed over to the fountain and dived deep into the bottom.


    Before they left, the experts that knew Lin Fan all couldn''t help taking onest look back at him. Those that knew about his shop knew that this would be a terrible decision, but what could they do against the experts of the upper realm?


    They just hoped that Lin Fan wouldn''t hold it against them for saving themselves¡­


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan woke up again, he found himself back in the pet shop in Snow Wind City, sitting right behind the counter.


    The store was filled with customers that were wandering around looking over the products and in the store, there were the various employees that he had employed during his time here.


    While it didn''t seem strange to him, what he should have noticed was that all the workers were actually workers from the various branch stores. Instead of being in those branch stores, they were currently all working in the Snow Wind City store.


    Ang and Song Shu were sitting nearby talking about something when they saw him wake up.


    They came over with smiles on their faces and Song Shu asked, "Big brother Lin, you''re finally up?"


    Lin Fan looked at Song Shu and what he saw wasn''t the same young Song Shu, but rather a fully grown Song Shu who had matured into a radiant beauty. With her pure white and smooth skin and her figure that had filled out, she was a beauty that was on the same level as Ang.


    But for some reason, Lin Fan only knitted his brows for a second before epting all of this.


    Ang noticed this and immediately asked, "Are you alright?"


    Even this Ang was different. Instead of being the same cold and silent beauty, this Ang was kind, caring, and very outspoken.


    Lin Fan also looked at her in a daze for a second before saying, "No, it''s nothing. I just thought of something, but it doesn''t matter right now."


    Ang revealed a smile as she said, "That''s good then. What are you thinking about getting for lunch?"


    Just like that, the time passed in their normal lives.


    Lin Fan lived in this alternate world, living life like normal.


    Even though everyone waspletely different from their counterparts in the real world, Lin Fan didn''t find a single thing strange.


    He lived a happy and peaceful life,pleting missions for the system and slowly expanding the pet shop.


    In the first year, he expanded to the first branch in Green Wood City, sending a few workers there to manage it.<sub> </sub>


    In the second year, he expanded to two more branches in Water Pearl City and Rock Mountain City.


    In the third year, he expanded to all five of the main cities and even managed to expand into a branch in Central City.


    In the fourth year, he had expanded onto the Central Continent.


    In the fifth year, he had expanded into the Western, Northern, and Southern Continents, covering the entire Blue Star with his brand of pet shops.


    He had be the richest man on the Blue Star, but for some reason, he still felt empty inside.


    But on the final day of the fifth year, the system suddenly announced that he had finished all the missions that it had for him and that he had gained the right to travel back to earth.


    The system exined that it was created to build the culture of this and Lin Fan had been chosen as the host because of all the work he had done for pets back on earth.


    In this reality, Lin Fan''s past life on earth was as an animal activist who had saved millions of abandoned pets, giving him the right toe to this world.


    Now that he hadpleted the missions of the system, he had earned the right to return to earth and be resurrected. In a sense, this was a test to see if he was worthy of being given a second chance and he had passed this test.


    When the system had announced this, there was a portal that had appeared inside the Snow Wind City pet shop, right in front of Lin Fan.


    There were naturally many cultivators who were surprised by this, but they were also drawn by the energy that came from the portal. Anything that could give off this kind of aura was definitely not a normal thing and if they were willing to take this risk, they would definitely gain something worthwhile.


    However, when the cultivators came forward to enter the portal, the moment they made contact with the portal, they were sted away with a sh of light. There was a strong force that knocked away anyone that touched the portal, throwing them into the wall.


    Only when Lin Fan approached was there no reaction from the portal.


    But when Lin Fan approached, there were many people that suddenly came out.


    Song Shu was the first toe forward as she asked, "Big brother Lin, what are you doing? Are you going somewhere?"


    Ang also came forward and asked, "Ah Fan, what is this thing?"


    Then, the door to the shop suddenly opened and Lin Fan''s family in this world also came in.


    They all asked him about what this thing was and what he was about to do.


    Lin Fan didn''t know how to feel at first, but shock was definitely the first emotion he felt. He was so shocked that he didn''t hear what anyone had said as he stared right at the portal.


    In truth, since he hade to this world, he had been thinking about heading back to earth.


    This was a world of cultivation and things like spatialws, so there must be something that could bring him back to earth.


    He always thought that it would take a long time for this to happen and he would have plenty of time to prepare, but he never thought that the system would directly offer him this option. It would even open up a portal right in front of everyone, as if it didn''t care about revealing its existence which went against all its actions from before.


    After being in a daze for a bit, he made his decision.


    After all, he was someone that didn''t belong to this world, so if he had the option, was there a reason to stay?


    Even if he had made a ce for himself in this world, he was still filling someone else''s shoes. The one that they wanted was already gone and he had done enough as their recement to give these people good lives, so was there anything else he had to do?


    He should go back to the world that he came from, right?


    But the moment that came to this decision, there was also another voice that whispered in his mind.


    It said, "But what was there on earth for him to go back to?"


    The moment this whisper appeared, Lin Fan waspletely thrown into chaos.


    That was right, he had never thought of this before, but his life on earth wasn''t perfect either.


    The only family member he had cared about was gone and his parents were cold and uncaring to him.


    As soon as he remembered this, Lin Fan also realized that something was wrong.


    The system had told him that his parents were hard working people who had cared about him, providing him with a foundation that allowed him to save all those animals.


    But even if that was the case, his memories told him a different story.


    This entire time, Lin Fan had never had a reason to think about this, but once he did, everything seemed like it had copsed.

 327 Chapter 327

    Lin Fan suddenly deeply knitted his brows as he began going through the various memories in his mind.


    Everything that he seemed to have treated as natural now seemed foreign and strange for him.


    There were many things that didn''t match his memories and there were many other things that just didn''t make sense.


    When Lin Fan turned back to look at the people that he thought he knew that were now standing in this store, he felt that he didn''t know any single one of them.


    Lin Fan turned back to look at the portal in front of him and felt that there was something important on the other side. It was calling to him, as if it could give him the answers.


    But he also felt that he couldn''t just leave without saying a thing, so he turned back to the people he thought he knew and said, "I''m leaving, I''m going back to the ce that I belong."


    Everyone immediately started pleading with him, asking him not to leave.


    Song Shu came forward with tears in her eyes as she took Lin Fan''s arm and said, "Big brother Lin, why are you leaving? Are you not happy being here with us?"


    Ang came forward with a hurt look as she said, "Is there something wrong with us? Did I do something wrong?"


    There were all kinds of pleading and questions asking him if they had done something wrong, but Lin Fan didn''t seem to feel anything from them. As he watched them, he almost felt that this didn''t seem real.


    But to say that it didn''t affect him at all would be considered a lie.


    When he saw the way Ang looked at him, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a tinge in his heart.


    But in the end, he still decided to go through since this didn''t seem right. In his heart, he felt like going through would give him the answer that he wanted.


    At the same time, it would finally end the battle inside his mind that kept fighting over whether he should return to earth or not.


    So he cast aside all of them and moved over to the portal. Turning onest time as he said, "Goodbye."


    As soon as his voice fell, he walked right into the portal, disappearing from the pet shop that he had just spent five years with.


    When he walked through, there was a sense of losing his bnce as it seemed like he stepped on nothing, falling into the great beyond. At the same time, he really wasn''t falling since he seemed to be floating in space.


    What appeared in front of him was a space that waspletely white and the only thing there was a figure that was standing there waiting for him.


    That figure''s appearance waspletely blurred out to him, he couldn''t see what this figure looked like at all, but even then, he felt that it looked familiar.


    It was like looking at something that he had seen his entire life, something that he almost couldn''t know any better.


    When the figure saw him appear, it seemed to reveal a smile as it said, "You''re finally here, that took long enough. Five years, you really did take your time, didn''t you?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, even the voice was familiar to him.


    Lin Fan cautiously looked at the figure before asking, "Who are you?"


    The figure just stood there and asked back, "Who do you think I am?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even deeper as he asked, "Do you think that this is a game?"


    The figure just shook their head and said, "There''s no meaning if you don''t figure it out. This is something you have to do or else it won''t work."


    "Work? What do you mean by work?" Lin Fan asked in a confused voice.


    "Search your memory and you will know."


    Lin Fan began searching through his memories and he still found no trace of this figure, but he did find something else. That was that his memories didn''t match up to the reality that he had just lived.


    Aftering through this portal, there were many things that werepletely different with the memories that he had once had. All the people that were in his memories werepletely different from the world that he had juste from.


    As he continued to think, he suddenly remembered more and more about this world in his memories. These memories continued to y until it reached the final scene of him meeting the reinforcements from the upper realm, when he had been put into this world of illusions.


    It was at that moment that he realized where he was, but there was still one thing that confused him.


    Just who was this person that was in front of him?


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at the person in front of him.<sub> </sub>


    He was familiar even though he waspletely covered up.


    If he had to match this person with someone, he would have matched him with himself.


    But at the same time, it felt like this person waspletely different, like he was theplete opposite of him at the same time.


    It took him a while, but Lin Fan suddenly realized who this person was.


    It was no one else, it was him, but also not him.


    The moment he realized this, what was blocking the appearance of the figure in front of him disappeared and what appeared in front of him was another version of him. However, unlike the current him, this one had a faint smile on his face that made him look very friendly, like he couldn''t hurt a single butterfly.


    Lin Fan looked at this "other" him and said, "But you disappeared from this world. How are you still here?"


    The other Lin Fan said, "While it''s true that I was on the verge of disappearing when you came into this world, there was a portion of my soul that was preserved when you came. This caused a fusion between our souls when you arrived, which created the current us."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows for a bit before saying, "Then which one of us is the real one?"


    The other Lin Fan said with a smile, "Is there a need for a real one? We''re just us, aren''t we?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback when he heard this, but then he said with a smile as well, "That''s right, we''re just us."


    The moment he said this, it felt like all the shackles in his heart had disappeared and he finally could see through everything that had been in his heart.


    This entire time, it was just like in the illusion world. He had thought of himself as an outsider in this world and while he did slowly make a life in this world, he knew that one day that he would have to go back to earth.


    That was what had held his heart back and didn''t allow him to make his breakthrough. In the end, he knew that he would leave all of this, but he really wasn''t willing since he had be attached.


    But the words that this other Lin Fan had just said had cleared up all his thoughts.


    That was right, there was no Lin Fan from earth and Lin Fan of the Blue Star, there was just Lin Fan now. He was him, so what was the reason he had to return to earth?


    For the current him, his life on the Blue Star was just as much his as his life on earth. For the current him, he was also a resident of this world.


    If he were to be strong enough to travel back to earth, that would also mean that he would be strong enough to travel back to this cultivation world.


    Since that was the case, why would he stay on earth then?


    He would go back to earth to finish off his unfinished business, but staying there? That wasn''t in his future.


    For now, his futureid on this world with the new family and friends that he had found. He was no longer the same person from before who rampaged all over from ack of attention.


    Lin Fan looked at the other Lin Fan and asked, "So now the important question is, are you the good one or the bad one?"


    The other Lin Fan just smiled and said, "Isn''t it clear?"


    Both Lin Fans broke out inughter without saying a single thing.


    Then the other Lin Fan said, "But that doesn''t matter now doesn''t it?"


    Lin Fan nodded and reached his hand out as he said, "Then shall we do this together?"


    The other Lin Fan nodded as well and took his hand as he said, "Together."


    Then with a sh of light, they disappeared from this world.


    The other Lin Fan was a fragment of the soul from the original Lin Fan, which had created the friction in Lin Fan''s soul. One of them had been good and one of them had been evil, it wasn''t hard to tell which was which.


    But both had their own faults in their actions.


    Neither pure good nor evil could exist by itself in this world, they needed each other to create a bnce which was exactly what had happened in Lin Fan''s soul now.


    It was all very simple, there weren''t two Lin Fans, there was only one Lin Fan.


    I am me and me am I, there was only one.

 328 Chapter 328

    When they took each other''s hands, there was a sh of light before the world before them had disappeared.


    When the sh of light had cleared up, there was only Lin Fan who was back in the real world, in the same room with the fountain.


    He had been ced against the wall, with Momonga and Ang watching over him, waiting for him to wake up.


    But there was no time for him to care about this because he finally felt the shackles in his heart loosening. There was a surge of life energy that appeared around Lin Fan, but this wasn''t a surge of energy that came from him, rather it was a surge of energy that suddenly entered his body in a swirling pattern.


    At the center of his body, deep inside his dantian, that ck hole was starting to increase in size. It slowly became bigger and bigger, taking up more and more space inside his dantian.


    The various statues that had been inside also floated up in the space in his dantian, floating around therge ck hole that had now appeared. It was almost like the ck hole was the sun and the various statues floating around it were thes in orbit.


    And then there was the single sun that had formed in his dantian. As more and more energy was drawn into his dantian by the ck hole that was in the center of his dantian, the bigger the sun became.


    It moved right into the center of the ck hole and then floating there, it created the singrity of the ck hole.


    As it continued to grow bigger, it continued to grow in size before it suddenly pinched in the middle, creating two halves of that one sun. After being pinched in half, they then formed two different suns, floating there in the center of the ck hole.


    It was only then that everything had calmed down.


    Lin Fan had not only broken through to the Legendary Realm, he had broken through to the second level of his God Tier Cultivation Technique.


    He had formed the second sun of the Nine True Sun Body Art.


    The amount of energy that swelled from the two suns was much more than just double the output of the single sun from before. It hadn''t increased by just three or four times either, it had increased by several dozen times.


    Lin Fan could tell that with his current body, even his Iron Eater Bone Artifact might not be able to cut through him.


    That was a weapon that was in the Embryo Soul Realm, a whole realm above the Fragmented Soul Realm that he had just entered.


    However, there was no time for him to worry about this since there was something else he needed to handle first.


    When anyone broke through to the Legendary Realm, it meant that they would have to go through the tribtion of the heavens, which came in the natural form lightning that fell down from the heavens.


    However, what they were currently in was an unknown ruin from an unknown time, but the one thing that it could do was actually keep out the heavenly tribtion, which meant that no natural lightning could rain down.


    Of course, there was nothing in this world that could stop the will of the heavens, which was the will of the world.


    Thews in the room began gathering and they formed dark clouds above Lin Fan, clouds that began booming with thunder.


    Being able to keep out the tribtion clouds was not a good thing because that meant going against the heavens, drawing in the wrath of the heavens. By doing this, one would only make their tribtion even stronger.


    When it came to the lightning tribtion that one had to undertake, there were different levels of tribtion that coulde.


    The most basic kind of tribtion was the normal yellow lightning that fell from the sky. This was the mostmon kind of tribtion there was, only falling for those that had relied on luck to reach the Soul Realm instead of actual talent.


    The next mostmon was the blue lighting tribtion, which was known as the Tribtion of Fortune. Those that receive this tribtion were considered those that had talent, but not enough talent to trample all others. Still, they would go further than most other Soul Realm Experts.


    After that came the purple lightning tribtion which was known as the Tribtion of Blessing. Purple lightning was the sign of a genius among geniuses, one that would lead their generation and excel above all others.


    Then came red lightning tribtion which was known as the Tribtion of Era Defining. Red lightning only fell upon those that could lead their era, being monsters that excelled over all other geniuses, one that no one in the same era couldpare to.<sub> </sub>


    This was the tribtion that most of the current Rulers had undergone when they had broken through to the Souls Realm, which showed just how rare this kind of tribtion was.


    Finally, there was another kind of tribtion that was rumoured to exist, but there were no written records of this ever. That was because the ck lightning tribtion which was known as the Tribtion of Death was one that no one had survived before.


    The Tribtion of Death was for those that had truly offended the heavens or were too heaven defying for the heavens to allow to exist. The ck lightning was much stronger than an expert that was just entering the Soul Realm, which made it impossible for them to survive.


    Right now, the lightning that filled the clouds that were above Lin Fan werepletely ck in colour.


    Since he had caused the lightning tribtion to manually form, it meant that he had provoked the heavens into increasing the difficulty of his tribtion, forcing it to reach the Tribtion of Death level.


    Seeing this, Momonga and Ang couldn''t help feeling worried for Lin Fan, but there was also nothing that they could do.


    One''s tribtion had to be passed by themselves, or there would be terrible consequences. The moment they entered the tribtion with Lin Fan, the difficulty would double since the tribtion would double.


    Momonga and Ang definitely had never faced the ck lightning tribtion before, but they were also certain that it definitely was not something that they could face.


    Ang had undergone the red lightning tribtion when she had broken through and Momonga had only undergone the purple lightning tribtion, but he had still been human when he had undergone his tribtion. If he were to take his tribtion again now that he had be an undead, it would definitely have reached the red lightning tribtion level.


    They could only stand there watching, but they were hopeful since Lin Fan had a mysterious master behind him.


    The God Realm was something mysterious that they had no knowledge of, but everyone knew that the gods ruled the heavens, so naturally they would have a way to defend against this. They hoped that the old master had prepared something for Lin Fan for his tribtion.


    Lin Fan looked up at the clouds that had formed above him. He knew about the level of the lightning that could appear in the tribtion, but he wasn''t worried when he saw the ck lightning. That was because he had his gold finger, the system.


    The system had given him a God Tier Cultivation Technique in the beginning and now that he had broken through to the second level of that cultivation technique, he was feeling much more confident.


    It wouldn''t be called a God Tier Cultivation Technique if it wasn''t broken, so Lin Fan was filled with confidence.


    The first bolt of ck lightning fell right down on Lin Fan, but all he felt was a tingle that ran over his skin.


    This lightning couldn''t do a single thing to him, it almost felt like he was receiving a full body massage.


    As the lightning coursed through him, Lin Fan activated his absorption force and began taking all that lightning into his dantian.


    Once the lightning was absorbed, it filled his dantian and began feeding the lightning bolt statue that was there. As the lightning was fed into the lightning bolt statue, Lin Fan could feel hisws quickly growing stronger.


    It had only been in the low Fragmented Soul Realm before, but once it absorbed the heavenly lightning, his lightningws quickly reached the mid Fragmented Soul Realm and it showed no signs of stopping.


    As if it could tell that Lin Fan was disrespecting it, the cloud above him began to fume as the lightning inside of it became even stronger.


    What Lin Fan was doing was actually stealing from the heavens, so how could they take that from this lowly mortal?


    The second bolt of lightning wasn''t just twice as strong, it had grown more than ten times in size and over a hundred times in power, but Lin Fan only felt a tingle from it still.


    His body had be much stronger now that he had broken through to the second level of his cultivation technique and with his absorption force, he was able to negate arge part of it by making it into his own power.


    Lin Fan was able to easily make it through the first two bolts of his tribtion, but there were still seven more toe. Lightning tribtion into the Soul Realm always had a total of nine bolts of heavenly lightning.


    But it didn''t seem like the heavens were going to make it easy for him as the clouds continued to grow bigger and bigger and more lightning filled those clouds.

 329 Chapter 329

    The clouds continued to grow and when the third bolt of lightning came down, it was much bigger than the second bolt.


    It had grown twenty times in size and over three hundred times in power, but even then, Lin Fan only felt a slight tingle.


    His lightningws were increasing at an incredible rate, which increased his resistance to lightningws. With each bolt that hit him, it actually affected him less and less since he was growing stronger along with each bolt.


    It wasn''t just his lightningws that were bing stronger, Lin Fan was also using the energy in the lightning bolts to feed the suns in his dantian. As the suns were fed this energy, they also released energy that helped nurture Lin Fan''s body, making it even stronger.


    With each bolt of lightning, Lin Fan became stronger and stronger.


    Even though he had technically only broken through to the Fragmented Soul Realm, he was already close to breaking through again to the mid Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Looking up at the cloud that was growing in size, Lin Fan couldn''t wait for the rest of the lightning to fall down on him.


    But how could the heavens take this kind of insult?


    The fourth bolt of lightning was the same, growing in size and power, allowing Lin Fan to increase his cultivation again, but the cloud began changing when it came to the fifth bolt of lightning. Instead of growing in size, this time the lightning gathered underneath the cloud.


    The lightning began gathering under the cloud,ing together to take a specific shape.


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but there was someone here who knew what this was.


    Ang was the newest Spirit Overlord, so she wasn''t born that long ago and her knowledge wasn''t that deep, but Momonga was a different case. He was the King of Death, the Lich King who had lived for eons, so naturally his knowledge was deep.


    Even though he had a deep knowledge, this was something that had only happened once in the entire history of this universe. It was what had happened with the one and only recorded person who had ever reached the God Realm and ascended to the heavens.


    This was the tribtion of the five sacred beasts.


    It was said that this world was created by the five sacred beasts, the four cardinal beasts of the Azure Dragon, the Phoenix, the White Tiger, and the ck Turtle who had created the world and the one beast above them, the Qilin who created the heavens.


    As the creators of this world, it was natural that they ruled the heavens and when one truly went against the heavens, their figures would appear as part of the tribtion to punish the offender.


    There was no doubt that by borrowing the power and likeness of the five sacred beasts, the lightning would reach apletely new level of power, it was definitely not something that Lin Fan could easily pass even with all the cheats that he had.


    The first sacred beast to appear was the ck Turtle.


    The ck Turtle was said to have the greatest defensive abilities, but there was nothing special about its attack abilities, so it was considered the weakest among the five sacred beasts.


    This lightning that took the form of ck Turtle didn''t hesitate as it went into its shell and began spinning as it fell down towards Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan knew that this waspletely different from the previous bolts of lightning.


    Lin Fan gathered hisws in his fist, but this time it wasn''t just the same threews, but he gathered five differentws all together to create an even stronger glowpared to normal. His body had been strengthened after he had broken through to the secondyer of the Nine True Sun Body Art, which allowed him to endure the stress that was caused by the mixing of even morews.


    He didn''t hesitate at all as he threw his first out towards the spinning turtle shell that was flying right at him.


    As soon as his fist made contact with the turtle shell, he felt like he had just punched a rock, causing his hand to turn numb.


    In truth, if Lin Fan hadn''t taken the initiative to attack the turtle shell, he would have been able to clear this bolt of lightning easily.


    The main power of the ck Turtle was its defensive abilities and what came with it was the ability to reflect attacks.


    If Lin Fan had just passively epted this bolt of lightning, it would have harmlessly passed through him like all the other bolts. However, since he chose to attack, the turtle shell had reflected his attack with the added power contained in the bolt of lightning, which made it much stronger.


    It was just a good thing that Lin Fan still had his absorption power and his two suns in his dantian.


    The absorption power negated a part of that reflected attack while the two suns continued spitting out energy that kept healing him, making his body stronger. It was the same principle as exercising, healing the muscles again and again made it much strongerpared to before.


    Unlike the previous bolts of lightning, Lin Fan actually had been forced a step back by this bolt. He had been pushing hisws on full force during this which did take quite a bit of energy, but he also gained a lot of energy from scattering the bolt of lightning that also contained much more energypared to before.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t have a single moment to rest as the next bolt of lightning was already prepared.


    This bolt of lightning had taken the form of a Phoenix.<sub> </sub>


    The Phoenix bolt of lightning spread its wings as it charged right at Lin Fan, just like the spinning turtle shell.


    Lin Fan once again gathered hisws in his fist and punched out against the Phoenix, but this time he found that it was much easier to scatter itpared to the ck Turtle.


    But then he realized what was wrong.


    Even though he had scattered it, the lightning didn''t dissipate.


    The power of the Phoenix was in its vitality and its ability to regenerate even after death, so even when the lightning bolt was dissipated, all the scattered lightning remained around Lin Fan, slowly burning him.


    He could feel the lightning coursing over his skin, wreaking havoc across his body. It burnt his skin wherever it flowed, not stopping for a single second.


    If this continued, he would be slowly burnt to a crisp by the lightning, but Lin Fan still had his secret trump card.


    The suns in his dantian spewed out energy at full force to heal every bit that was burned while the absorption power sucked up the energy of the scattered lightning running across his skin. It was a fight of endurance as Lin Fan continued to heal while weakening it.


    Eventually, the lightning reached a point where it could no longer burn him and he was finally able to slowly absorb the rest of the lightning to heal himself.


    He could feel his powers surging from absorbing all of this, but it was taxing on his body. It drained away at his vital energy bit by bit since he was forcefully healing himself, but it was also a good thing that the two suns in his dantian were slowly replenishing that vital energy.


    Once he finished absorbing the remnant lightning, once again, there was no time for him to breathe as the next bolt of lightning fell down.


    This bolt of lightning took the shape of an Azure Dragon.


    Unlike the previous two bolts, the Azure Dragon didn''t charge forward with just its body, it created a wave of lightning that followed behind it like a wave on the sea as it crashed down on Lin Fan.


    Unlike before, this wave didn''t hit Lin Fan head on, but ratherpletely avoided his punch and wrapped around his body.


    There was so much lightning around him that it even burnt the air around him, making it hard to breathe. All that lightning had created a cage that hadpletely surrounded Lin Fan, trapping him, making him unable to move a single muscle.


    It was another battle of endurance since this lightningpletely surrounding him was burning him away. It also burnt away all the oxygen from around him, so that he couldn''t breathe at all.


    Even if Lin Fan had broken through to the Soul Realm, he was still human in the end and required oxygen. If he didn''t take care of this soon, he would suffocate to death.


    Just like with the previous bolts of lightning, Lin Fan''s solution was the same. He used the absorption power while healing his body with the suns in his dantian. Once again, he was able to break free just like this.


    At this point, Lin Fan experienced another breakthrough, reaching the high Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Normally it would take a Soul Realm Expert several decades to have this kind of progress after breaking through to the Soul Realm, but Lin Fan broke through again and again while undergoing his tribtion.


    The next bolt of lightning was naturally in the form of the White Tiger.


    There was no trick this time, the White Tiger prided itself in its ability to attack, so it focused all the energy in the bolt of lightning into a single point.


    When that bolt of lightning hit Lin Fan, it pierced right through his knuckle, going into his hand and burning right into his arm where it finally stopped.


    It had cracked through all of Lin Fan''s defenses and pierced right through him, but Lin Fan had acted quickly.


    He used his absorption power to gather all of the scattered energy into a single point, shing against the tip of the lightning bolt. Neither side gave away and Lin Fan kept healing himself with the energy from the suns in his dantian to keep up this defense.


    Of course, during this entire process, Lin Fan felt unimaginable pain. After all, there was a bolt of lightning that was stuck in his arm¡­


    But the bolt of lightning eventually stopped going forward and was slowly pushed out of Lin Fan''s arm.


    That was the difference between the two sides, Lin Fan could continue gathering energy to support himself while the bolt of lightning only had the power that it had gathered in the beginning. Once it was stopped, it couldn''t gather more energy to fight back, so it would slowly dissipate away.


    Finally, Lin Fan was able to push the bolt of lightning out of his arm, but there was a smoking hole that was in his right hand where the middle knuckle was. If one peered in, they could see all the bones and sinew that were in Lin Fan''s arm.


    He had defeated four of the five sacred beasts, but there was still one bolt left.

 330 Chapter 330

    But this time, the fifth bolt of lightning didn''t follow the precedent of the previous four.


    This bolt of lightning that took the form of a Qilin stayed in the air, watching over Lin Fan.


    It had long formed and had stopped gathering its power, but it just floated there without making a move.


    Lin Fan used his powers as fast as he could to force the hole in his hand to heal, but he also focused all his attention on the Qilin that was just floating there in the air.


    After a while, the Qilin finally made its move.


    With a single roar, all the clouds that were above it began entering the lightning body of the Qilin, creating a wrapping around it. It continued to pad the body of the Qilin until the Qilin waspletely covered.


    However, it didn''t stop there. Once all the clouds had gathered around the body of the Qilin, it continued to change form. At first it took the shape of a cloud QIlin, but then it began warping.


    The clouds became thinner and longer, taking a specific shape with the Qilin at its core.


    Once the clouds had finished changing their shape, they had taken the shape of a giant sword in the sky that hung above Lin Fan. Just hanging there in the sky, it was almost like it was the sword of the heavens, here to bring down heavenly punishment on Lin Fan.


    When the sword had fully formed, the Qilin didn''t waste anymore time as it raised its head and brought it down with a roar.


    The sword fell right down above Lin Fan with the might of the heavens, just like the Sword of Damocles, as if it could cleave through anything in its way.


    It had far surpassed the level of a normal tribtion, it had even surpassed the Embryo Soul Realm, reaching the Child Soul Realm that was in the middle of the Soul Realm.


    Each level in the Soul Realm was arge step and there was no way for those that weren''t in the same level to match each other. Not to mention skipping two levels from the Fragmented Soul Realm to go directly to the Child Soul Realm.


    This time, Lin Fan might really be in trouble¡­


    When Ang saw this, she almost couldn''t stand still anymore.


    She had been able to maintain her calm before because she knew that with the master of the shop, Lin Fan should have some way of passing through the legendary Tribtion of Death, but seeing this now, how could she keep calm. She had never seen this kind of tribtion before, but she could feel the heaven''s might that wasing from it.


    She was ready to disregard her own life to take the tribtion with Lin Fan.


    But before she could go, Momonga suddenly grabbed her by the shoulder and asked, "What do you think you''re doing?"


    Ang just red at him, but she didn''t say anything.


    She was about to break free and still head over when he said, "Do you think he would want that?"


    Ang suddenly trembled when she heard this.


    She knew that it meant to take someone''s tribtion with them.


    She would make it twice as strong for Lin Fan, but the most important thing was that the tribtion adjusted itself based on the cultivation of the one who interfered. That meant that if she were to interfere, the tribtion that she would have to take along with Lin Fan would be greater than her actual cultivation level.


    There was no way that she would be able to break through this, she could already tell from the aura of the tribtion that this was far beyond a normal tribtion. This tribtion contained the fury of the heavens themselves, if she were to take this, she definitely wouldn''t be able to survive.


    However, if she were to enter this tribtion, with her cultivation realm, she would be able to easily block Lin Fan''s tribtion for him.


    What she basically wanted to do was sacrifice her own life for his¡­


    ? But Momonga was right, would Lin Fan want that?


    Ang still shook her head in the end and said, "Is there meaning to living if I let him die?"


    Momonga gave a sigh before saying, "Why can''t you just trust him?"


    Ang bit her lip as she looked back at Lin Fan.


    While he had surpassed the four bolts of lightning from before, he looked very battered at this moment. It was very clear that he waspletely exhausted and his chance of passing this tribtion was very low.


    Ang wanted to believe, but seeing this, she really couldn''t.


    She once again took another step back, but this time there was a skeleton that appeared in front of her.<sub> </sub>


    Ang turned back to look at Momonga, but this time the look in her eyes waspletely different. This time, they were filled with hostility, "What do you mean by this?"


    Momonga shook his head before saying with a sigh, "I can''t just watch you throw away your life like this."


    Wind gathered around Ang and she returned to looking like how Lin Fan had first met her, an ice cold angel. She red right at Momonga and said, "Do you really want to do this?"


    Momonga had a bitter smile on his lips as he said, "Of course I don''t want to do this, but¡­"


    However, before he could even finish his words, the Qilin had finished gathering its strength. It had formed a giant sword in the sky and the Qilin was embedded into the hilt, just like a gem.


    With a roar from the Qilin, the sword suddenly began to fall and in an instant, it was already right in front of Lin Fan''s eyes.


    Lin Fan didn''t dare be negligent as he immediately pulled out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    He hadn''t done this before because he didn''t want to risk breaking the Iron Eater Bone Artifact. He also wanted to use his body to resist the lightning because it also greatly helped his cultivation to resist it with his body.


    Just from the eight bolts of lightning, he had gone from the low Fragmented Soul Realm to the High Fragmented Soul Realm.


    However, he knew that this final bolt was different. If he didn''t pull it out now, he might not have a life to swing that sword any longer.


    Between losing an artifact and losing his life, the former was clearly better than thetter.


    Besides, the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was binded to him, so if he died, it meant that the Iron Eater Bone Artifact would lose its spirituality. They were deeply linked, so instead of letting Lin Fan die alone, Lin Fan was certain that the Iron Eater Bone Artifact would want to die with him.


    If only Lin Fan knew what the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was really thinking¡­


    It was still an artifact that had newly gained intelligence, so it was on the level of a child, but there was only one thing in its mind right now.


    It was saying, "SCARY!".


    It didn''t want to die with Lin Fan!


    If it survived, it at least had a chance to gain spirituality again, but if it died, it was all over!


    Still, it couldn''t do a thing as it took the blow of the sword of heaven with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan swung the Iron Eater Bone Artifact with all his might, using every singlew that he had in him to boost his power as much as possible. The might of thebination of the sixws were powerful, so powerful that it created an intense strain on his body, but that didn''t match the strain that came from taking the mighty blow of the sword of heaven.


    Lin Fan was continuously pushed back by the might of the heavens.


    First he was pushed a step back, then two steps, then three, then four, and so on and so on.


    The one thing was that the sword of heaven had fallen on him from above, so instead of pushing him backwards, it was pushing him further and further into the ground.


    As the sword continued to fall, there was a hole that was created under him that continued to grow in size.


    Lin Fan could feel the ck hole and the suns in his dantian spinning and churning out energy at full force, but it still wasn''t able to keep up with the mighty sword of the heavens. At this rate, it really seemed like the sword would crush him.


    Ang on the side saw this and she immediately used all her power without care of where she was. Shepletely ignored the fact that she was in a lower realm and pulled out the full might of her Immortal Realm cultivation.


    Momonga deeply knitted his brows when he saw this and he reached into space to pull out a staffpletely made of gold with seven serpents at the top forming a crown with seven different gems in their mouths. He also gathered his full strength to stop Ang.


    They were just lucky that the ruins that they were in were special, which meant that the energy they released couldn''t escape from around them, so no one could tell that they were here.


    Ang narrowed her eyes when she saw this and shouted, "Move!"


    But before either side could do anything else, there was another sensationing from Lin Fan.


    This feeling, it was one that they had felt before when they first met Lin Fan¡­


    It was the feeling of a God Realmw!

 331 Chapter 331

    This was a new kind of energy thatpletely wrapped around Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had no idea where this energy had suddenlye from, but when it wrapped around him, it reduced the pressure that he felt from the sword of the heavens falling down on him. Lin Fan was finally able to look up again and see that there was a green glow that had wrapped around him.


    The Qilin that was in the hilt of the sword was clearly surprised to see this green energy suddenly appear and it almost stopped for a second, but then it continued pushing down, nning on using even more forcepared to before.


    But before that could happen, there was a voice that suddenly rang out, "Qilin, old friend, stop already."


    The Qilin had a look of surprise that suddenly appeared on its face that waspletely made of lightning. It was so surprised that it actually stopped attacking and Lin Fan felt the pressure suddenly disappear from above him, but that didn''tst long.


    But still, the pressure came down once again, though it wasn''t as powerful as before.


    During this time, the Qilin also let out a roar, as if it was trying to say something.


    After this roar, the voice sounded again, "Who do you think it would be if it wasn''t me? I only left a fragment here, but it''s still enough to match you. Still, there''s no reason for us to fight since this boy is the one."


    The Qilin gave a confused roar this time.


    The voice said, "Yes, he''s the one, can''t you feel the system on him?"


    The Qilin gave an intense look at Lin Fan before suddenly revealing an even bigger look of shock on its face.


    The Qilin suddenly roared out several times in a row as if it was saying something important.


    The voice didn''t respond right away and after a period of silence, it said, "It''s not the right time yet, but it will be soon. For now, he needs to develop and he can''t do that if you''re here trying to kill him, right?"


    The Qilin gave an aggrieved roar before suddenly pulling back the sword of the heavens.


    The Qilin took one more look at Lin Fan before giving a nod and what seemed to be an encouraging roar. Then it scattered the clouds that were around it, allowing it to surround Lin Fan, but these clouds didn''t hurt him this time.


    Rather they seemed to be offering their energy to him, as if they wanted to be absorbed by him.


    Lin Fan had looked down to look at the clouds with a confused look, but when he looked back up, the Qilin made of lightning had already disappeared.


    Seeing that there was nothing else for him, Lin Fan could only start to absorb the clouds and scattered fragments of lightning that were around him.


    The energy contained in these fragments was nothing like the lightning he had been struck by before. Those bolts of lightning from before were simply appetizerspared to these fragments.


    As he continued to absorb the fragments of lightning around him, he felt his cultivation and his lightningw surging. Both of them continued to grow stronger and stronger, as if he was suddenly soaring into the heavens.


    Finally, Lin Fan made another breakthrough in his cultivation, reaching the peak Fragmented Soul Realm, almosting close to reaching the Embryo Soul Realm. He might have been able to break through if it wasn''t for the fact that he was on this lower realm which capped cultivation breakthroughs to the peak Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan looked down at himself and even though he looked battered from his tribtion, he felt amazing since he had broken through three times in such a short period of time.


    But after getting over this, Lin Fan suddenly remembered something.


    There was still that voice and that energy that had surrounded him. No, it wasn''t "had" surrounded him, it was still currently surrounding him.


    That green energypletely wrapped him up like a nket and he could feel that it was slowly healing him.


    Lin Fan looked around, but he couldn''t see a single figure. He then tentatively asked, "Hello, are you there?"


    There was a bit of silence for a second which made him feel like an idiot, but then the voice responded, "So you finally remembered that I was here?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this voice as he said, "Hel, hello, who''s there?"


    The voice didn''t respond right away, but then it said, "It seems like you''ve finally reached the Soul Realm, but I can''t really say that you did it quickly, you did itter than we expected." The voice paused before saying, "But still, you did reach it in the end."


    Lin Fan looked around again and still seeing no one, he asked, "Where are you?"


    The voice said, "Don''t mind that, for now, let''s see how you''re doing." After another pause, the voice said, "It seems like you managed to fix your soul already, you really are quite something. We had nned something else, but now it seems like it''s not necessary. It''s really hard to tell what will happen with the system, but that''s what makes it interesting."


    Lin Fan immediately asked, "You know about the system?"<sub> </sub>


    The voice didn''t say anything this time.


    Lin Fan then asked, "Did you make the system? If so, why did you make it and bring me here?"


    The voice gave a sigh before saying, "Young man, it''s still too early for you to learn about this. Why don''t you think about the readers first? You''re ruining it for them by trying to learn all this, you have to build up suspense first with stuff like this, don''t you know that?"


    Lin Fan didn''t understand what this meant at all, so he asked, "What readers? What do you mean by all of that?"


    The voice gave a giggle before saying, "Oops, that was a slip of the tongue, you weren''t supposed to know about that. Forget it, forget it."


    Lin Fan had dark lines that appeared above his head as he thought, how can you just tell me to forget it after saying all that?


    There were still many things that Lin Fan wanted to ask, but before he could, the voice said, "Oh, it seems like time is up. Anyway, young man, there are still many things that you don''t know yet, but keep working hard and you''ll learn about them one day." After a pause, the voice lost its yful tone and it said, "We''re all depending on you."


    As soon as the voice fell, the green energy around Lin Fan had disappeared and the system''s voice rang in his mind.


    "Special Talisman has been used. There are still 2/3 uses left."


    "Congrattions to the host on finishing the main quest and reaching the Soul Realm."


    "The host has received the following rewards: Mysterious Pearl and Mysterious Egg."


    "The next mission has been released."


    But other than the first line, Lin Fan didn''t care about the rest.


    This Special Talisman, it had been something that he received when he had finished the branch shop quest. It hadn''t told him what its use was, but now it had suddenly summoned a voice that seemed to know everything.


    Lin Fan had been in deep thought about that voice since it had appeared because it was familiar, but only after it had left did he finally remember who it was. It was the voice of the girl he had met in the Mirror of Regret!


    She seemed like she had known many things about the system and this voice had proven one thing, it was like she was the creator of the system.


    If that was the case, why did she bring him to this realm and give him this system?


    What purpose did he serve and what did she mean by they were counting on him?


    Lin Fan was very annoyed by this because it seemed like he was being used as a piece in arge chess game and he didn''t like being controlled like this, having his fate predetermined for him.


    Lin Fan secretly made up his mind to find this girl again.


    If she had been able to bring him to this world, perhaps she would be able to bring him back to earth¡­


    This was the only clue that he had received since he had transmigrated to this world on the reason for this transmigration and he wasn''t about to let it go that easily.


    But before he could do a single thing, there was something that had suddenly hit him.


    It wasn''t an attack per say, but it was definitely that had damaged him.


    There were two mounds that suddenly hit his head as a pair of arms wrapped around him, the big mounds really made the blood surge to his nose and a bit of it came out¡­


    It was Ang who had suddenly thrown herself at him.


    Lin Fan was shocked, but then seeing the look on her face, his heart turned soft as he put his arms around her as well, taking her in his embrace. She pushed her head into his chest and didn''t say a word.


    After a few minutes, she finally said, "If you do something like that again, I won''t forgive you."


    Lin Fan just revealed an awkward smile.


    It wasn''t like he had chosen to do this, it was just something that had happened. Moreover, why would he ever want to do something like that again?


    But he didn''t say anything and just gave a nod with a smile.

 332 Chapter 332

    Momonga had a bitter smile on his face as he watched the two of them.


    Momonga actually looked worse for wearpared to Lin Fan.


    When he had been trying to stop Ang, he hadn''t been attacking for real, so he was definitely on the back footpared to her who was doing everything she could to reach Lin Fan. She hadn''t held back at all and had hit him quite a few times, injuring him quite a bit.


    But it should be said that she did have her discretion since these were only minor injuries that he could heal instantly, but they definitely made him look much worse than before. Especially that big ck eye that was on his face¡­


    After letting the two have some time to themselves, when he finally saw Ang move away from Lin Fan, he couldn''t help asking, "Lin Fan, what was that green glow that surrounded you just now? Was it something that the master of the shop gave you?"


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward look when he heard this.


    He wanted to know what it was as well since it was a clue to going back to earth for him, but he didn''t know anything.


    In a sense, it could be considered from the master of the shop since it came from the Special Talisman that the system gave him and technically, the system was his master. But how could he exin this?


    Before he could think of an answer, Lin Fan suddenly realized that something was off.


    Instead of caring about what the energy was, shouldn''t they care more about the voice that had suddenly rang out in the room? That definitely should have been more interesting than just the green energy.


    Lin Fan turned to Momonga and asked in a confused voice, "Shouldn''t you be more concerned about what that voice was just now?"


    But what he was met with was another confused look from Momonga who just asked, "What voice? There wasn''t a voice just now. All that happened was that the green glow appeared around you and it shattered the sword of the heavens before disappearing."


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He also looked down at Ang and in her slightly red eyes, he could tell that she was just as confused as Momonga.


    It was clear by their reactions that they had clearly seen somethingpletely different than him, but why?


    Could it be that the green energy had an illusion effect that masked the truth?


    Perhaps the green energy was trying to hide the existence of the system, but that also didn''t make sense since Momonga and Ang were technically hired by the system, so they should have some awareness of it.


    Just what was the point of all of this?


    Lin Fan paused for a second and then without answering Momonga''s question, he suddenly asked, "Do you know anything about a goddess that has turquoise hair and emerald green eyes?"


    Momonga knitted his brows in thought for a bit before saying, "I''ve never heard of anyone like that before. But what I want to know more now is how you managed to resist the power of the five sacred beasts?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I really don''t know either."


    Momonga clearly couldn''t ept this answer, but since Lin Fan wasn''t willing to talk, there was nothing he could do.


    He still needed Lin Fan, or rather the master behind him to reach the God Realm, so he could only ept it for now. Moreover, it really did seem like Lin Fan didn''t know a thing.


    It seemed like he had to re-evaluate the master that was behind Lin Fan, even a casual item that he gave Lin Fan could resist the might of the five sacred beasts. This meant that the master of the shop definitely wasn''t a normal God Realm Expert. It was very likely that he was one of the top experts in the God Realm.


    But if that were true, for him to fall all the way down to this lower realm¡­


    Then there was how the God Realm suddenly cut off all interaction with their realm all those years ago¡­


    Could it be that something had happened that even those almighty God Realm Experts couldn''t deal with?


    If that were true, that would be a terrifying thought¡­


    Lin Fan on the other hand was thinking about what to do next.


    While he did want to go after the Beast Race and human experts, that tribtion had definitely drained a lot out of him.


    Even if he was stronger, there were still plenty of injuries that covered him, not to mention there was a hole in his right hand. However, it wouldn''t take him much to recover since his body cultivation technique helped with healing his body, he could even feel that hole that was closing in his arm.


    It would only take him a few minutes to heal uppletely.<sub> </sub>


    As they were deciding what to do, there was a sudden change in the air as there was a strange energy that filled it.


    There was no mistaking what kind of energy it was since it was clearly something that they had just felt. This strange energy that had suddenly filled these ruins was energy at the God Realm.


    It was a surge of energy thatpletely filled the ruins, unlike just the wisp of energy that had surrounded Lin Fan to stop the tribtion.


    Whatever it wasing from, it was clearly something that was filled with God Realmws.


    It seemed like the origin of these ruins had far surpassed what Momonga had even thought. When he had seen that Ruler''s corpse before, he had thought that the owner of these strange ruins was at the peak of the Ruler Realm, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case.


    If he had to guess now, he would definitely think that the owner of these strange ruins would be in the God Realm!


    But Lin Fan was clearly in no condition to move right now.


    Momonga turned back to ask Lin Fan, "How long will it take?"


    Lin Fan turned to Ang and asked, "Can you help heal me?"


    Ang gave a nod and Lin Fan turned back to say, "Give me five minutes and I''ll be ready."


    Momonga gave a nod as well, but it was clear by the expression on his face that he was anxious to go since if it really was a God Realm Artifact that was down here, it might give him some clues that he desperately wanted.


    Normally Ang would be as anxious as him, but she hadn''t lived as long as him, so her yearning wasn''t as strong as his. Moreover, there was something else that had her attention at this moment.


    She carefully used her windws to heal Lin Fan.


    But what no one knew was that Lin Fan was the most anxious out of all of them. That was because he could tell from the faint God Realmw that filled the air, it was something he couldn''t be more familiar with.


    It was the samew that had suddenlye out of the Special Talisman and had saved him.


    Just what was going on today? Why did this God Realmw seem to be appearing everywhere?


    Five minutes passed very slowly for them, but Lin Fan had kept his promise and forced himself to heal up.


    In truth, he wasn''tpletely healed, he just forced his body to heal up enough so that he could move and fight if necessary, but if he did fight, he would definitely suffer more injuries in the process of fighting than actually being injured by the enemy.


    He was like a porcin jar, just a single tap would shatter him.


    They went through the fountain and quickly swam through the tunnel that was underneath it.


    Fortunately for them, this tunnel wasn''t that long, but the bad part was that it was made of the same material as everything else in this ce. Even if they sent their spiritual sense forward, there was a certain limit that it could reach and they couldn''t tell what was in front of them.


    Eventually, they came to the end of the tunnel and came out of a pool that was inside this damp cave with nothing else in it other than another tunnel leading forward.


    Once again, after drying themselves off with theirws, they headed down this tunnel.


    This tunnel wasn''t that long either, so it didn''t take long for them to traverse it, but this time there was actually something at the end.


    When they saw the end of the tunnel, Lin Fan immediately had Momonga cover them with his darknessws since there were still the two groups that had gone ahead of them. With Lin Fan''s encounter with both, he knew that neither side was friendly with him, so it was better to hide and y the oriole that hid behind the mantis stalking the cicada.


    When they came into the room, they saw many of the beast experts and the human experts fighting with each other, but that wasn''t what caught their attention. What caught their attention was an altar that was in the center of the room where a crownid covered in green energy, the same green energy that had just surrounded Lin Fan.


    The crown had been passive while the two sides fought, but the moment Lin Fan''s group came into the room, there was a voice that rang out that stopped everyone''s actions.


    "I feel it, it''s a trace of myws¡­"


    No one else recognized this voice, but Lin Fan couldn''t be more familiar with it¡­


    It was the same voice he had heard again and again!

 333 Chapter 333

    The voice paused before sounding once again, "But where is iting from?"


    The crown suddenly floated up in the air and began turning around, as if it was looking across the room.


    When the experts that had been fighting saw this, they immediately stopped and gathered together with their own group as they stared at the crown, waiting for something to happen.


    But during this entire time, the crown just floated there without doing a single thing.


    Finally a few of the subordinates couldn''t take it as two King Beasts and two upper realm experts came forward.


    The two King Beasts didn''t try to talk to the crown at all even though they knew that it had intelligence, they just charged forward to grab at the crown.


    After all, these were beasts and they had their instinct. The most primal instinct that they had was to gain as much power as they could to rule over others.


    But before either of them could even touch the crown, there was a pressure that suddenly fell over them. The pressurepletely mmed them into the ground, creatingrge craters.


    One thing to note was that during all that fighting, there wasn''t a single scratch on the floor or the walls. They hadn''t been able to make a single dent in it when the energy scattered from their fighting earlier.


    Of course, it wasn''t the stronger experts that were fighting, it was only a few of the experts with lower cultivation fighting, but they were still all in the Legendary Realm. They were considered at the peak of this lower realm, but there was something in this lower realm that could block all their attacks.


    Another funny thing was that everyone here was in the Legendary Realm, even including Lin Fan now.


    The two King Beasts immediately spat out blood before fainting on the spot. Just from the pressure that the crown had put out, it had heavily injured these two King Beasts.


    The two human experts were much more cautious as one of them came forward and said while cupping his hands, "Great expert, may we ask who you are?"


    But that question wentpletely unanswered as the crown floated right past those two human experts as if it was still searching for something.


    It didn''t take long before the experts from both sides became even more impatient.


    They could tell from this aura that this crown was a supreme treasure, but there it floated in front of them, just taunting them. It was like they weren''t able to get it at all.


    It naturally ate on the patience of the experts and soon even those that were stronger couldn''t helping forward.


    It was the Beast King and the Princess who both came forward, but even they were ignored by this crown.


    The Beast King wouldn''t give up as he said, "Your excellency, I can give you what you want as long as youe with me. You can see what kind of talent I have, I''m sure you know what will happen if youe with me."


    This was justmon sense.


    For this kind of treasure to appear here, it was clear that it was either a relic that had belonged to a fallen expert or it was a trial that was left by an expert to find a sessor. In both cases, his words fit the situation perfectly.


    He naturally believed in his own talent because he had been the youngest Beast King of the Beast Race, one that had stood above all others. If even he couldn''t match the high standards of this expert, then there was no one else who could.


    The crown didn''tpletely ignore him once again, rather it turned to him with the gem that was on the front of the crown and looked at him for a bit.


    Seeing this, the Beast King''s hopes were brought up. He even tried to lift his head to show off his face, but he forgot that he currently didn''t have a human form. All he was was a blob of dark energy that had gathered together to take a human form.


    When his hopes were high, he was suddenly thrown from heaven to hell when he heard, "Humph, trash like you? Silence!"


    Then before he could even react, he was also mmed into the ground like the King Beasts from before.


    This was something that instantly made everyone cautious.


    Even if this fragment of the Beast King''s soul wasn''t as strong as it was when it was at its peak, it had gathered quite a few of its fragments together, so it was considered quite strong. If one had to measure it, it was already as strong as the leaders of the ruling factions of upper realms, so no one dared to underestimate it.<sub> </sub>


    Perhaps the only one that could face it right now was the reincarnated Princess, but the Princess had learned from his mistake and moved aside. She knew that in front of this peerless expert, there was no pride that she could show.


    The crown continued wandering around a bit longer before saying, "What''s the point in hiding?"


    As soon as it said that, it turned in Lin Fan''s direction and released a wave of green energy.


    That green energy swept over Lin Fan''s group andpletely pushed away the darkws that Momonga had wrapped around them, making them visible to everyone.


    When everyone saw this, they all had different reactions.


    The beasts were shocked since someone who they had never seen before had suddenly appeared, but it waspletely different for the humans.


    For those that knew who Lin Fan was, they could now feel that aura that wasing from them and they were filled with regret.


    Lin Fan had just been in the tinum Realm, but now he was already at the same level of cultivation as them in just a few minutes. Just what had happened to him?


    Then there was the fact that he had been able to hide from their senses. If he had wanted, couldn''t he have killed them all?


    Finally there was Mu Bo Hai who felt a very different emotion when he saw the two who were with Lin Fan. When he had been in Snow Wind City, he had felt the wrath of the girl who was with Lin Fan and he knew that she was someone that was far beyond him. Perhaps even the Princess wouldn''t be able to do anything to her.


    As for the upper realm experts, they were just shocked that someone had been able to hide from them like this. It had to be known that they were much stronger than the peak of the Blue Star, several of them were in the Embryo Soul Realm and there were those in the Child Soul Realm.


    Yet none of them had even noticed Lin Fan''s group¡­


    Finally, there was the Princess who stared at Lin Fan in absolute shock.


    She knew how powerful the illusionws that she had used were and she knew how powerful her spiritual senses were. Even if she had been weakened, her spiritual sense was tied to her soul, so it shouldn''t have been that much weaker than what she had when she was at her peak.


    Still, this boy had been able to break through these illusionws and had been able to hide from her spiritual senses along with those two others. Those two others, they didn''t seem weakerpared to her.


    In truth, she couldn''t even see through these two, so they were probably stronger than her.


    What was someone like this doing on a lower realm?


    The Princess couldn''t help stuttering as she asked, "Who, just who are you?"


    But before Lin Fan could even say anything, the voice came from the crown to say, "Do you think you''re qualified to ask that? Now move to the side little girl."


    Before the Princess could even react, there was the same pressure that had fallen on the Beast King that had fallen on her. She was mmed into the ground and made her own little crater, but it really felt awkward seeing a little girl like her being mmed into the ground. Based on her appearance, she seemed like she was no older than five years old, but one definitely couldn''t judge her just based on her appearance.


    But the crown didn''t care at all as it floated over to float right in front of Lin Fan.


    It seemed like it was looking over Lin Fan the way the gem on the crown moved before it seemed like it was giving a nod as it said, "Not bad, you already reached the Soul Realm. We really thought that it would take a bit longer, but it seems like you''re quite good."


    That was strange because the other voice had called him slow, but now this voice was calling him fast.


    Were they two different people?


    But they had the exact same voice.


    There was a sh of green light that came from the crown before it suddenly spread underneath the crown, taking the form of a human. It took the form of the same girl that Lin Fan had met in the realm in the Mirror of Regret, the same girl who he had just decided to look for.


    That girl leaned forward to look at Lin Fan''s face before saying, "Well, it seems like you have something you want to ask, so how about you ask it? This is your special reward for reaching the Soul Realm."

 334 Chapter 334

    Lin Fan waspletely taken aback when he heard this.


    When he had met this girl and her voice the past two times, she had actedpletely mysterious and had avoided all his questions. But now she was finally willing to answer his questions?


    Was this some kind of trick?


    The girl saw that Lin Fan was confused and revealed a faint smile before saying, "Come now, I don''t have all day. It takes quite a bit of energy to maintain this form, don''t you know?"


    This snapped Lin Fan back from his daze, but once again, before he could even say a thing, there was someone who had interrupted him. It was one of the people from the upper realm.


    That person came forward and said, "Are you even qualified to talk to this supreme master? Do you even know what your ce is? You''re nothing more than a bug from a lower realm and you dare act this way!"


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at this one person like his brain had been run over by a truck.


    Didn''t he just see that their leaders were smashed into the wall and floor respectively by this crown? What gave him the confidence to say such things?


    It was clear that he was an idiot, but what this idiot was thinking was that he was a genius.


    It was clear that if he used this lower realm brat as a stepping stone, he would be able to showcase himself in front of this supreme expert. After all, this was just a lowly kid from a lower realm, how could he do anything to someone from the upper realm like him?


    And as everyone expected, thedy in the crown turned to look at him and after narrowing her eyes to look at him, she just gave a cold snort without saying another word. However, that was more than enough since there was a pressure that suddenly fell onto the upper realm expert.


    Before he could even react, he was mmed into the ground and pressed into a pancake.


    This time, the girl didn''t hold back at all as she ttened him into a meat pancake.


    Now no one dared to interrupt, rather most of them even took several steps back just in case they did anything wrong by ident.


    With the rest of the people here all moving back, there was only Lin Fan and thedy in the crown floating there that were in this space.


    Lin Fan ignored what had just happened and asked the most basic question, "Who are you?"


    The girl floating there didn''t say a thing, she just revealed a knowing smile for a while before finally saying, "You know you can''t ask that question."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows before raising his hand.


    The moment his hand came up, there was a spatial wall that suddenly surrounded him that was also covered in soundws. As soon as it came up, all the sounds that they were making were locked in the space around them and no one else could hear a word they were saying.


    Once he was sure that all the sound had been trapped, Lin Fan calmly asked, "What is the system?"


    This time, the girl didn''t give a direct refusal, but it was still a refusal, "You should also know that question is a no no, but I can tell you one thing about the system. It is something that only belongs to you, so you don''t need to worry about anything else."


    Lin Fan quickly followed up, "Did you make the system?"


    The girl tilted her head to think before saying, "Not exactly, it wasn''t me per say, but I was involved in making it."


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this, he was actually finally getting some answers.


    Based on what she was willing to answer, it seemed like as long as he didn''t ask who she was and what the purpose of the system was, there were things that she was actually willing to answer¡­


    That made it much easier then since he knew exactly what his next question was.


    "Why was I brought to this world?"


    The girl revealed another smile and just looked at Lin Fan for a while without saying a thing. It was only after a moment of silence that she said, "It seems like the soul has binded together better than we thought. We won''t need to use that n after all which is good, but it really is interesting why your soul binded so quickly. Is it because we used two pr opposites that it binded so readily?"


    The old Lin Fan would have been confused by these words, but after meeting the other half of his soul, he knew exactly what this meant. Since he had his memories from earth, it was clear which one he was.


    If this had been before, it would have been hard for Lin Fan to ept because his life waspletely different from what it was before, so he would have doubted if he was worthy of living this life. But now, he knew that it was just him, this life was his and that was all that mattered.


    Lin Fan just remained silent since the girl hadn''t answered his question yet.<sub> </sub>


    The girl finally came out of her train of thought to say, "It seems like you already knew, but of course that''s to be expected since you were able to bind your soul. So which one were you originally?"


    Lin Fan looked back at her calmly and said, "Aren''t you the one who''s supposed to be answering my questions?"


    The girl gave augh when she heard this. Theughter that came from them was like bells chiming, it really was pleasant to the ears.


    Then she looked back at Lin Fan and said, "Alright, you really are less fun now that you''re here instead of on earth. I kind of liked the bad boy side of you better, but now you''re so tame."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even deeper when he heard this and he said, "Just answer the question."


    The girl pouted her lips to say, "Boo, you''re no fun now."


    But then she revealed a serious look and she said, "You should know why you were brought here from earth since you''re the half from earth."


    This time it was Lin Fan''s turn to reveal a wry smile as he thought. "You kidnapped someone just for that reason?"


    But of course he wouldn''t say it.


    Instead he said, "Is there a way for me to go back?"


    The girl didn''t answer this directly, rather she told Lin Fan a story, "Do you know what the origin of this Blue Star Realm is?"


    Lin Fan was confused why she would suddenly bring this up, but he still shook his head.


    He had heard some parts of the story, but it was clear that this girl wasn''t nning on telling him that story.


    The girl just casually said, "It''s a very simple story. We needed a ce to run our experiments and then there was this."


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows once again when he heard this, but he knew that it wasn''t over.


    The girl had deliberately paused after this as a test and seeing how calm Lin Fan was, she gave a satisfied nod before continuing, "Since we can do all of this and bring you here, you can imagine what else we can do. If you follow the mission in the system, it''ll eventually lead you to us."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this. While it wasn''t a clear answer, it was still an answer.


    The system was his way to the people who had brought him here and since they had brought him here, there was definitely a way for them to bring him back¡­


    That meant that his goal was still the same as before, to be stronger with the system.


    Before it was just to protect the people he cared about, but now it seemed like there was a meaning to all the missions the system gave him. As long as hepleted them, he would be able to meet these people.


    Of course, he couldn''t stay at the same level of cultivation, he had to be stronger if he wanted to be qualified to negotiate with them. Just based on what he had seen today, it was clear that the people who had kidnapped him were at an incredible level of cultivation and if he couldn''t even match them, how could he even have the right to speak in front of them?


    If he didn''t be stronger, he would just be a pawn to them.


    Lin Fan was about to ask another question, but the girl suddenly raised her hand to stop him which made him reveal a confused look.


    The girl counted a few times with her fingers before saying, "Time is up, so let me just leave you with onest thing. Be stronger and find us, we''re all waiting for you. You''re the one that holds all our fates in your hands."


    After saying this, she turned to look upwards before raising her hand and flicking with her finger.


    There was a mirror that suddenly appeared in this room, flying through the cave toe into this room, stopping in front of her.


    She said, "This Mirror of Regret, it doesn''t belong in this mortal world, so I''ll be taking it back with me."


    As soon as her voice fell, there was a beam of light that fell through the ceiling, covering both her and the crown.


    With onest smile at Lin Fan, there was a bright sh of light that blinded everyone in the room.


    When the light cleared, both the crown and the mirror had disappeared and all the energy that filled the room was gone.

 335 Chapter 335

    There was only silence in the room since no one could understand what had just happened.


    There had been this incredible treasure that had been in front of their eyes and before they could do a thing, it had just disappeared from in front of them. They were just left standing there with tears in their eyes.


    Several of them had been heavily injured and there was nothing to show for it, how could they not feel bad?


    Many of them turned their gazes towards Lin Fan''s group because it was clear that their group had some kind of rtion to the treasure. It had also disappeared after it had finished talking to Lin Fan, a conversation that they had been unable to hear.


    They were even thinking that Lin Fan was ying a trick on them, making it seem like the treasure had disappeared when he had secretly stashed it away for himself with some strange techniques.


    At this point, the two leaders of the group were slowly recovering from the attacks that they had suffered at the hands of the expert and now they were turning their attention to Lin Fan. Even they thought that Lin Fan had a hand in making that treasure disappear, so naturally they had their own grievances with him.


    For the Beast King, it was something that he had spent so much time searching for and for it to disappear in front of him like this, how could he be willing?


    For the Ster Kingdom Princess, she had even sacrificed her own body to take down the Beast King to stop him and had led all those upper realms to develop this lower realm, it was also for the treasure. Now that it disappeared like this, she definitely felt unwilling as well!


    At this moment, everyone was focused on Lin Fan who was just standing there in a daze thinking about what he had just encountered.


    But of course, time stopped for no man and eventually all things had toe to an end.


    The first one to make a move was one of the experts from the upper realm who came towards Lin Fan and grabbed him by the shoulder.


    But the moment that he did, he found that it felt like he was grabbing a chunk of steel, unable to move it at all.


    This expert was only in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm. He was one of the younger experts that came down as reinforcements, being only under a hundred years old which was still considered a junior in the upper realm.


    The beginning lifespan of the Legendary Realm was a thousand years and it only continued to grow as one increased their cultivation, so being considered young at a hundred was normal.


    The family behind him had sent him down with the princess to see if he could gain any fortuitous encounters from her expedition, but he never thought that he would kick a steel wall. What kind of body did this guy have that he couldn''t do a thing to him?


    Lin Fan had been deep in thought, but he noticed that someone was trying to grab him, so he turned to look at that person.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see that someone was right beside him and he asked, "Can I help you?"


    It was those words that brought the young upper realm expert back from his shock, rather it was the tone those words were said in. It was almost like this lower realm bug was looking down on him, how could he take this?


    The young upper realm expert immediately flew into a rage as he shouted, "Do you know what you''ve done? Do you know who you were just talking to? What gives you the right to¡­"


    But before he could even finish, Lin Fan had already raised his hand to p that expert across the face.


    The upper realm expert couldn''t react at all as Lin Fan''s hand came right across his face, pping him and sending him flying into the wall. There were even several teeth that were knocked out and fell to the ground.


    No one could understand what had just happened.


    They could tell that Lin Fan hadn''t gathered any life energy, so that meant that just with his physical body, he had sent a peak Fragmented Soul Realm Expert flying with a single p.


    What kind of monster was this?


    Just how strong was his physical body to do this?


    How could this kind of body appear on a bug of the lower realm?


    While everyone was shocked by this disy, Lin Fan was looking at his own hand in surprise.


    He had just pped that person out of instinct since he was the kind of person that he hated the most, an arrogant idiot, but he had been shocked by his own power. He never expected to send that person flying just like that.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that his body had been baptized by the lightning of his tribtion which made it countless times stronger. At this point, even his artifact might not be able to make a mark on his body even if he didn''t put up his defenses.


    It had to be known that the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was already in the peak Embryo Soul Realm!<sub> </sub>


    That just went to show what kind of monstrous physique Lin Fan had.


    Combined with his powerfulws that he couldbine, he might even be able to skip an entire cultivation realm and fight those in the Child Soul Realm.


    There was only one way to describe the current Lin Fan, a monster!


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan in shock because the strongest among them excluding their leaders were only in the Embryo Soul Realm and even then they didn''t feel confident in fighting Lin Fan.


    As for the leaders, they were capable of fighting Lin Fan, but they also hadn''t recovered most of their cultivations, so it would definitely cause them to struggle a bit to defeat Lin Fan.


    Since it was one of her subordinates who had been pped, naturally the princess couldn''t just stay in the back and watch.


    But when she came out, she finally had a chance to see Lin Fan''s appearance in full.


    Earlier when she questioned him, she didn''t have time to look at him properly because of the crown, but now she finally had time to look him over. When she did, there was a faint blush that appeared on her face.


    The reason?


    It was because she had never seen anyone as handsome as him!


    Lin Fan had always looked good before, he was considered more handsome than most people, but that was just in terms of mortals. He was on par with some of the higher realm cultivators who had their bodies purified by their cultivation, making them more beautiful.


    But now that Lin Fan had passed his tribtion and had been baptized by the heavenly lightning, he had gone through aplete transformation and lookedpletely differentpared to before.


    If Lin Fan was a 9 before, now he had been upgraded to an 11 or even a 12.


    He was like an immortal that had descended to earth, like a godking who would rule over all. He was just the princess'' type!


    But now wasn''t the time for that!


    She quickly gathered her thoughts and steeled her expression, but there was still a faint blush on her face as she said, "If you want to beat the dogs, you still have to ask the master. Do you have a reason for doing this?"


    Lin Fan looked at them and seeing the aggressive stance that they had, he didn''t panic at all.


    He could tell that after what had happened, he would definitely be med for the disappearance of the crown.


    In this situation where he had a smaller group and he was surrounded, didn''t that mean that they would all turn on him?


    But he wasn''t worried at all since he had now broken through.


    He was certain that he would be able to take care of them and if he couldn''t, he could always have Ang and Momonga help.


    He was no longer fearful of the upper realm like he had been before. After the binding of his soul, Lin Fan felt like there were much fewer worries that were in his mind and he was much more decisivepared to before.


    After all, the best way to silence someone was to make sure that they could never speak again and this was the best ce to do it since this seemed to be a God Realm ruin, which had hidden everything from the outside. It would be a perfect murder room mystery as long as he killed everyone present¡­


    As for the beast side, they stood patiently there watching the humans fight among themselves.


    Naturally the Beast King also wanted to attack Lin Fan to force him to bring out the treasure, but since the humans took the initiative to do this, he would just sit back and watch. Instead of putting in effort doing things himself, it was better to watch the humans fight.


    But he didn''t get his wish since there was someone who had suddenly appeared in front of Lin Fan, a dark figure that had suddenly appeared out of thin air.


    This was someone that no one had ever seen before, but based on his stance, it was clear that he was here to protect Lin Fan.


    He made it even more clear with his next words, "I have to ask you all to back down for now."

 336 Chapter 336

    Everyone was shocked to see this person appear, but for those that were in the know, they could tell what kind of cultivation he had.


    Both the princess and the Beast King had both once surpassed the Soul Realm, so naturally they could tell that this was a man who was in the Star Realm or maybe even above that.


    For him to suddenly appear and protect Lin Fan, it was clear that this young man wasn''t someone normal.


    Not to mention the battle prowess that he demonstrated, it is clear that someone of this level was clearly someone who had a powerful backing.


    The princess was someone who was only from a low tier Ster Kingdom, so while she was considered someone with influence in the upper realm, it didn''t mean that she had influence when it came to other Ster Kingdoms. Rather, the Ster Kingdom that she had been from was actually one that was at the bottompared to all other Ster Kingdoms, so they tried to avoid provoking all other Ster Kingdoms as much as possible.


    The Beast King was someone who was highly regarded by the Beast Race, but he was a loner in the end. While he was important to the Beast Race as a whole, since he didn''t join any specific power, he didn''t have anyone that would back himpletely. The Beast Race experts might help him if he was nearby and it was something that they could solve without suffering many losses, but that was it. This meant that even though he had the power of a King of the Beast Race, he still wouldn''t be able topare to a top tier Ster Kingdom with all their experts.


    Even if they wanted the treasure that was in this realm, they still wanted to keep their lives. After all, their lives were the most important thing.


    The Beast King didn''t make a move, but the princess came forward and asked, "This senior, may I ask who you are?"


    The dark figure looked at her and said, "That''s not important, what is important is that this matter will end here today. Do you understand what I mean?"


    The princess fell silent at this, but the people behind her weren''t willing to see it end just like this. They had the advantage in numbers and the princess was clearly a top expert that surpassed the limits of this realm.


    No matter how strong this kid was, it was impossible for them to fight them all even if he had someone backing him up.


    That was just the pride that they had as upper realm experts in this lower realm.


    They didn''t even stop to consider that this dark figure that had suddenly appeared was someone from a realm that they could never dream of, they thought he was just reinforcements that Lin Fan had brought.


    One of the experts from the upper realm came forward and said, "Who do you think you are talking to our princess like this? Do you know who our princess really¡­"


    But before he could finish, the princess had alreadye forward to p that person across the face, sending him sprawling to the ground before cupping her hands and giving a slight bow to the dark figure.


    That person justid there on the ground with a hand on his cheek, looking at the princess in shock. He was confused and aggrieved because of the princess'' p, but there was nothing that he could do.


    The princess didn''t even spare that person a nce as she said, "This senior, I''m very sorry about this idiot. Please ept my sincere apology."


    The dark figure just stood there without making a sound, but it was clear from his aura that he didn''t pay attention to this. Sensing this, the princess let out a sigh of relief on the inside.


    After hesitating for a bit longer, she finally said, "As for the matter of this realm, we will follow the words of the senior and leave it at this."


    Once she said this, she waved her hand at the people behind her and led them out towards the entrance to this room.


    On the way out, she couldn''t help taking another look at Lin Fan as a blush came over her face.


    This was the kind of man that she had dreamed of meeting. Lin Fan was the perfect one for her, he was handsome, powerful, and had a powerful backing, she wouldn''t mind even giving her own body to him if it meant being able to win him over to her Ster Kingdom.


    Of course it was just for her kingdom, it wasn''t because he was handsome or anything.


    As she thought as the blush on her face became even brighter.


    When she passed by Lin Fan, she stopped and turned to look at him.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he put his guard up since he thought that she might suddenly sneak attack him. However, all that came was an object that flew through the air towards him.


    It was easy for Lin Fan to catch it with his instincts even if it had been suddenly thrown at him.


    When he caught it, he was surprised by what it was.


    What was in his hand was a token with a lotus that was carved into it. This was a pure gold token that seemed to contain a strong aura to it.


    Lin Fan was confused by why the princess had suddenly thrown this token to him, but when he heard her next words, he couldn''t stop a few ck lines from appearing on his face.


    The princess said, "This young master, my name is Bi Lian, the eldest princess of the Bi Ster Kingdom, I hope that I can get to know you better in the future. This token is my personal token, you can use that to find me if you are ever in the area of the Bi Ster Kingdom. I promise to show you around personally."<sub> </sub>


    ? ¡­


    ¡­


    ¡­


    Those were the only thoughts that were in Lin Fan''s mind when he heard this.


    Please, weren''t you just threatening me just now, why are you suddenly doing this?


    For once, Lin Fan wasn''t as dense as he usually was and immediately picked up on the deeper meaning in Bi Lian''s words, but then again, it wasn''t hard when she was this forward.


    Instead of replying, the first thing Lin Fan did was turn to look at Ang and as expected, she had an ice cold look on her face.


    It seemed like he would suffer today¡­


    Bi Lian also felt that chilling from Ang, but she held her head proudly up high. Even if the Bi Ster Kingdom was weak, they were still a Ster Kingdom at least, so she had her pride.


    She could see that this beautiful girl by Lin Fan''s side was also powerful, but she had confidence in herself.


    She believed that she was the only one who could stand by this handsome young master''s side.


    Of course, it was all for her kingdom.


    Un, nothing more than for her kingdom.


    It definitely wasn''t because he was handsome, alright?


    Once they left the room, the upper realm expert that had been pped to the ground finally recovered from his daze and quickly got up, running to follow in the direction of the princess'' group.


    When they had passed by earlier, many of the upper realm experts had looked at this upper realm expert in pity, but also with a bit of gratitude. They had felt that same way towards the dark figure, but it was a good thing that this person took the brunt of the princess'' wrath.


    After all, they were only from an upper realm, they couldn''t take the wrath of a princess of a Ster Kingdom.


    That person quickly took onest unwilling look towards Lin Fan''s group before disappearing into the corridor.


    Now there was only the Beast King''s group that was still here.


    The instincts of beasts were much stronger than that of humans, so these beasts felt instinctive fear towards this dark figure. Unlike those idiot humans, they clearly knew that this was someone that could kill them at any moment, so they didn''t dare make any rash moves.


    Most of them went behind the Beast King, trying to hide behind him, which even included the body that the Shadow Lord possessed.


    The dark figure looked at the Beast King for a few seconds before asking, "Well?"


    The Beast King was clearly unresigned, but he still gave a sigh before saying, "Alright, we''ll leave as well."


    But right after saying this, he still turned to Lin Fan and said, "I think you still have something that belongs to me."


    He wasn''t referring to the treasure that had just disappeared, it was clear that he meant something else.


    Lin Fan looked right back at him before taking out a crystal from the system''s storage which he threw over to the Beast King.


    There was an unwilling cry from the crystal, but everyone ignored it as the Beast King took this crystal, shattering them and sucking in the energy that was contained within.


    The Beast King''s aura became a bit stronger after this, but it was still clearly not enough to take them on, so he also waved his hand and brought his group out.


    Just like that, there was only Lin Fan''s group who were left in this room along with this dark figure that just silently stood there.

 337 Chapter 337

    There was a moment of silence before Lin Fan came forward and cupped his hands to the dark figure as he said, "Senior, thank you for your help."


    The dark figure quickly waved his hands and said, "Young master Lin, I don''t dare take this gratitude."


    Who was he kidding, this was the person that the princess had specially told him to protect which meant that he was clearly someone important. Since he was someone important, of course he couldn''t take this gratitude.


    Lin Fan was confused when he saw this since he clearly didn''t know why this person would treat him with this kind of respect. He could tell that this person was as strong as the people he had met in the Sacred Rock Realm, which meant that he was clearly from a Ster Kingdom.


    This dark figure was no one else than that person who had been with Zi Ling, the one that she had left to protect Lin Fan.


    He had been following Lin Fan this entire time, but he had never appeared because of the instructions of the princess. Unless Lin Fan''s life was in absolute danger, he shouldn''t reveal himself.


    In this situation where he was surrounded by these experts at the level of Ster Kingdoms, it would be hard for him to escape, so this dark figure had no choice but to reveal him.


    It was too bad that he didn''t know about Lin Fan''s real power. It could even be said that he had saved those beasts and those upper realm experts.


    Lin Fan didn''t remain on this and moved on from this as he changed the topic by asking, "This senior, may I ask who you are?"


    The dark figure just calmly said, "Young master Lin, who I am is not important. What is important is that young master Lin knows that my master is looking out for you."


    After saying this, the dark figure took out a token that he threw over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan easily caught it and when he looked it over, he found that there was a purple fairy that was carved on this pure gold token. As well, he could feel a kind of aura that wasing from this token which seemed somewhat familiar.


    The dark figure continued after throwing this token to Lin Fan, "Young master Lin, when there is a chance, pleasee to our Ster Kingdom with that token and meet our youngdy. She is looking forward to seeing you."


    Then before Lin Fan could say a thing, that dark figure had disappeared.


    When the dark figure had given this token to Lin Fan, there was a single thought in his mind. He wanted to build a good rtionship between this young man and his young miss since it was clear that this young man was quite good.


    Or to put it more specifically, he was quite handsome.


    If he could be more direct, he would even say that this young man resembled himself when he was younger.


    This dark figure was someone who had watched Zi Ling grow up, so naturally he cared for her very much and one thing that he especially cared about was the biggest matter in her life. There were many flies that kept crowding around his young miss, but there wasn''t a single one that he was satisfied with since in the end, they were all trash that only wanted her for her beauty and status. None of them even cared about the real Zi Ling.


    For him, someone that was worthy of the young miss had to be stronger than him, as handsome as him, and of course someone that the young miss cared about.


    The fact that the young miss had asked him to watch over Lin Fan was clear that her feelings for him weren''t normal. As for strength, while he wasn''t strong enough right now, he had been able to see through Lin Fan''s body earlier and could see that talent that resided in him. If he was given time, Lin Fan would clearly be a peak expert.


    Then when it came to handsomeness, there was nothing toin about.


    He was already handsome before, but now that he had undergone his tribtion, he had reached a point where even this dark figure had to admit that he was more handsome than he was when he was younger. But that was only admitted in secret and he would never say it out loud. He would still say that he was the more handsome one when he had been younger.


    So just like that, he gave Lin Fan the token that Zi Ling had ordered him to give Lin Fan.


    He had never given this token before because he wanted to see if Lin Fan was worthy of it, but now he finally acknowledged him.


    After giving him that token, the dark figure went back into hiding to watch over Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    But in truth, he wasn''t watching over Lin Fan by following him and watching over him every second. He had left a trace of his spiritual sense on Lin Fan that would tell him when Lin Fan was in danger, but that was it since of course he was also a busy person.


    There were many things that he hadn''t seen, such as Lin Fan''s tribtion from earlier.


    If he did, he would definitely be saying many different things now.


    After the dark figure was gone, there was only Lin Fan''s group that was left in this room.


    Of course, since there was nothing left for them here either, they also left these ruins.


    When they came all the way out, all the beasts that had been surrounding these ruins had disappeared and all the experts of the human realm were also gone. There wasn''t a single living soul that was surrounding the building that the ruins were built on.


    Lin Fan and his group headed over to where the Lin Family ancestor''s private airship had been parked and they headed off back to Snow Wind City since this matter had been settled.


    If this was any other situation, this matter wouldn''t have been settled so easily, but since the artifacts were gone, there was nothing left for them to do.


    Without enough benefits, there was no reason for those upper realm factions to remain in this lower realm any longer. Moreover, they were weary of Lin Fan, so instead of provoking him by staying and watching over him, it was more likely they would send a delegate in a few days to smooth things over with him after all the tension in the ruins.


    Of course, that only applied for the humans. The Beast Race and the humans were still enemies, so of course they couldn''t send a delegate to pull Lin Fan to their side.


    Not to mention that the Shadow Lord had invested quite a few of his forces into creating that distraction that had pulled the upper realm away, preventing them from sending stronger reinforcements. If he didn''t take the time to recoup and continued to attack the Blue Star, the losses that he suffered would be too heavy.


    Since both sides pulled back now, that meant that they had lost interest in this realm and other than posting a few scouts to see if they could still find the artifacts, they would be moving most of their forces back to the respective realms.


    That meant that the Blue Star Realm was now nothing more than an ordinary realm.


    All the upper realm forces that had invested here wouldn''t pull out all their investment, but they would definitely reduce the amount they invested here. Other than drawing in a few talented people from time to time, this lower realm was nothing more than a farm to them now.


    But it was all a pity to them since Lin Fan didn''t n on staying here either.


    Now that he had finally broken through, he had surpassed the limits of this realm and it was time for him to explore the upper realm.


    The upper realm would definitely have more resources for him and his pet shop. To achieve his goal of finding the ones that brought him here, he wouldn''t shy away now, he would charge straight up to the upper realm.


    It didn''t take him long to return to Snow Wind City where everyone was waiting with bated breath for his return.


    Even though they had received news from the Union Government that everything was over now, the Union Government''s approval rating was abysmal in Snow Wind City. But that was just the consequences that one suffered when they decided to sacrifice an entire city.


    Still once Lin Fan confirmed that everything was indeed over, everyone that had been on the defensive wall broke out in cheers.


    Contrary to the Union Government, Lin Fan''s approval rating was through the roof since he was the only person that had been willing toe to their rescue.


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to care about them since he was in a rush to handle his own affairs. He didn''t have much time before he would ascend to the upper realm.


    After a few perfunctory words for the various forces of Snow Wind City, he headed back to the pet shop to prepare a few things before heading back to True Light City with the Lin Family ancestor. His family were still with the Lin Family right now.


    But before any of that could happen, the Lin Family ancestor received news that shocked both of them.

 338 Chapter 338

    The Lin Family ancestor suddenly received a call and he was surprised to find that it was from Lin Jian.


    When he picked up, he just casually said, "Jian, it''s already over, so what are you in a rush for?"


    He still had something else to say, but before he even could, Lin Jian suddenly cut him off by saying, "Father, it''s urgent, pleasee back as soon as you can."


    The Lin Family ancestor slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Urgent, what could be more urgent than the destruction of the entire realm?


    It seems like these kids really were too anxious. He would have to teach them a good lesson once he headed back.


    But then Lin Jian''s next wordspletely shattered that thought.


    Lin Jian said in an even more anxious voice, "Father, it''s the young master from the Liao Family. The scouts have told us that they just arrived in True Light City and are about to head our way."


    The Lin Family ancestor was no longer as calm as before as he suddenly deeply knitted his brows and he said, "Did they find out about the matter with Ao?"


    Lin Jian gave a sigh before saying, "Other than that, they have no reason toe here. Did you hear any news about theming down as reinforcements?"


    The Lin Family ancestor checked the report on the Union Government''s private informationwork. They had published a report on the beast horde, which listed all the upper realm factions that hade down as reinforcements.


    Naturally the Union Government knew that their reputations had suffered arge blow with the way the beast horde had turned out, so they were trying to use this as a way to improve their own reputation. After all, having the support of various upper realm factions, what could be better to raise belief in their power?


    But the Liao Family was one of the forces that weren''t included in the list of upper realm factions that hade as reinforcements. For them to suddenly appear in True Light City at this time, would there be another reason?


    Lin Fan came forward and asked, "Ancestor, is there a problem?"


    The Lin Family ancestor immediately stood up and said, "We need to go now, there''s something that''s about to happen to the Lin Family."


    Then he turned back to his wrist and said to Lin Jian, "Tell Ao and his family to hide right away and stall the Liao Family for as long as you can. I''lle back as soon as I can."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he immediately knitted his brows as well.


    If this was something that only affected the Lin Family, he wouldn''t care as much. He would still care since the Lin Family was his father''s family and he still cared for them, but beyond that, he didn''t have any personal feelings for them.


    But now that he had heard that this was rted to his parents, naturally he couldn''t sit still.


    They were the first people he had bonded with on this, so their position in his heart couldn''t be measured.


    The Lin Family ancestor and Lin Fan didn''t waste any time in heading out to the airship once again to rush to True Light City.


    As for Momonga and Ang, they were staying this time.


    This was a matter that involved Lin Fan''s family and they had something else to do.


    They had seen the God Realmws and just seeing them was more than enough of a stimulus for them. They had to go and stabilize their learnings from the God Realmws, so they didn''t want to run around if they didn''t have to.


    But the most important reason was that Lin Fan had already broken through, so he was more than capable of taking care of himself on this lower realm. There was no chance that the real experts of the upper realm woulde down now that the treasure was gone, so Lin Fan was definitely more than enough to take care of those weaker experts that came.


    Since that was the case, they might as well let him fight to help him stabilize his realm.


    On the trip to True Light City, neither one of them talked just like usual, but the Lin Family ancestor had been monitoring his watch the entire time for any information.


    As they were about to arrive, Lin Fan suddenly turned to the Lin Family ancestor and said, "If anything happens to my family, I won''t forgive the Lin Family."


    The Lin Family ancestor gave a sigh and shook his head, "You don''t have to view the family with such hostility, we are your family too after all. More importantly, Ao is more capable than you think, that is why I have such faith in him."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this from the Lin Family ancestor, especially since he was the one who had seemingly abandoned their family¡­<sub> </sub>


    In the end, Lin Fan just turned to the side and gave a soft snort, without saying a thing.


    The Lin Family ancestor looked calm on the surface, but he did give a sigh deep down.


    It seemed like it wouldn''t be easy winning over the heart of this young man, but he had no choice in this matter. This young man had that special physique, so as long as nothing happened, which he wouldn''t let happen, this young man would be the one in charge of the Lin Family in the future. Not just this Lin Family in this lower realm¡­


    Once again, it didn''t take them long to arrive, but the moment they did, they didn''t even pause for a second as they rushed off towards the Lin Manor.


    They could tell from the life energy that filled the air that there was a spiral gathering above the Lin Manor, as if someone was purposefully releasing their energy as provocation. But that ce was the Lin Manor, who would dare do such a thing?


    No one, that is no one in this lower realm.


    But the Liao Family came from the upper realm, so that rule didn''t apply to them.


    When they arrived, they saw that the gate had been kicked in and the yard was in a mess.


    There were six people standing right in front of the Lin Manor, releasing their auras, which were all in the peak tinum Realm. But another thing that they all had inmon was that they had varying degrees of injuries covering them.


    It was clear that all six of them had just fought a fierce battle.


    These six were none other than the six elders of the Lin Family.


    Even the second elder hade out at a time like this.


    Even though he wanted the title of family head, it meant nothing if there wasn''t a family for him to be the head of, so naturally he came out at this time.


    Even if the Lin Family had their internal squabbles, they stood united when facing an outside threat like all other families.


    But they weren''t the main characters of this scene.


    On the other side, there was an old man who had his hands crossed behind his back, looking quite rxed. He clearly didn''t look like he had just fought a battle, but with the aura he released, it was clear that he was the one that had just faced the six elders.


    The aura he released wasn''t normal, it was the aura of a Legendary Realm Expert!


    But even with this aura, he also wasn''t the main character in this act.


    The two main characters were standing right in the center, facing each other.


    One was a young man who Lin Fan had never seen before, but the one standing in front of him was one that Lin Fan could easily recognize. After all, it was his father Lin Ao facing this unknown person.


    Lin Ao wasn''t as injured as the other elders, but he still did have a few scrapes on him.


    When the Lin Family ancestor arrived, naturally he attracted the attention of everyone present since this was the arrival of a Legendary Realm Expert, the peak of the Blue Star.


    But soon after, the two in the middle continued their conversation.


    The unknown young man looked at Lin Ao in disdain and said, "Lin Ao, I never thought that you would still struggle this much. You were nothing more than a lower realm worm back then and now you''re even worse offpared to before. At least back then you were still the proud son of heaven, but what are you now? Nothing more than crippled trash."


    Lin Ao looked right at this young man and said, "Liao Ping, you were the loser dog that could only bark back then and I never thought that your barking skills would be even better."


    The young man who had been called Liao Ping immediately flew into a rage when he heard this and he released his cultivation.


    It was clear that he was less than fifty years old and he was already in the peak tinum Realm which could be considered a genius if he was in the lower realm, but even in the upper realm, he would still have been considered a talented person.


    Liao Ping said through gritted teeth, "I don''t know what despicable methods you used to trick little sister Rou''er back then, but it won''t be the same anymore since you''re nothing more than trash now!"


    As soon as he said this, he sent out a palm that was aimed right at Lin Ao.

 339 Chapter 339

    Lin Ao didn''t look at this palm that was heading towards him, but rather he had been looking at Lin Fan who had juste in.


    He took a deep look at Lin Fan before revealing a trace of surprise in his eyes.


    For once, he actually couldn''t see through Lin Fan''s cultivation.


    This meant that there was no need for him to worry since he would finally be able to protect what was important to him, his family!


    Lin Ao took a single step forward and shed out with his hand like a sword.


    The moment he did, his aura suddenly began to increase. It continued to surge and grow until he was in the peak tinum Realm.


    With his hand cutting through the air, there was sword energy that gathered around it before being sent out as a sh thatnded right on Liao Ping''s palm.


    Liao Ping was surprised to see this, but then that surprise turned into shock when he felt the power that was contained in Lin Ao''s attack.


    At first, the two of them had been even, but after time passed, Liao Ping found that he was unable to take Lin Ao''s attack. It was an inch at first, but then he was slowly pushed back as the sword energy shed through his palm. It created a bloody line in his palm as he was pushed back several steps, while a sliver of blood came out of the corner of his mouth.


    It was clear that he hadn''t just suffered external injuries from this attack, he had also suffered internal injuries and they didn''t seem light.


    When Liao Ping stabilized himself, the way he looked at Lin Ao had changed.


    Lin Ao had just attacked with his bare hands, not even holding a sword as he released his de ofws. If that was the case, just how terrifying would he have been if he actually had used a sword artifact?


    It was clear that they weren''t on the same level at all.


    Moreover, it seemed like Lin Ao had hidden himself deeply, lying about losing his cultivation, having hid his powers quite well.


    It seemed like he would have to pull out his trump card today or he wouldn''t be able to do anything.


    The old man who had been behind Liao Ping was about to make a move, but the Lin Family ancestor came forward to stop him, saying with a smile on his face, "Brother Liao, this is a matter between the younger generation. I don''t think it is appropriate for us to make a move."


    But then the old man also revealed a smile as he just stood there without saying a thing.


    The Lin Family ancestor immediately felt that something was off.


    Liao Ping revealed a smile as he looked at Lin Ao and said, "You really think that you''ve won with just this? Let me show you the difference between us."


    Then he looked up and shouted, "Elder Yue, I ask for your help now."


    As soon as he said this, there was another figure that had appeared out of thin air,nding right beside Liao Ping.


    The Lin Family ancestor could feel this person''s aura and immediately knitted his brows. He was about to make a move, but then he felt the life energy from behind him stopping him.


    The old man surnamed Liao also said, "My apologies brother Lin, but I have to ask you to stay here for a bit."


    The Lin Family ancestor still knitted his brows, but he didn''t make a move as he watched the person who was called Elder Yue standing with Liao Ping.


    Lin Ao clearly recognized this person as he narrowed his eyes the moment he saw who this person was.


    The man called Elder Yue revealed a smile as he looked at Liao Ping and said, "Nephew Liao, just leave this to this old man."


    Then when Elder Yue turned to Lin Ao, he immediately revealed a stern look, "It seems like you''re still well. Where is Rou''er?"


    Lin Ao looked right into his eyes before saying, "Are you worthy of calling her by that name?"


    Elder Yue''s eyes revealed a trace of anger as he said, "She is my niece, who else is qualified if not me to call her by that name? If it wasn''t for trash like you, she wouldn''t have been brought down to this filthy lower realm!"


    Elder Yue didn''t stop with just that, he immediately raised his palm and sent a blow out at Lin Ao, knocking him back two steps.


    Judging by his aura, he was clearly in the Legendary Realm and if he had been serious, he could have easily killed Lin Ao with this attack. The fact that it only pushed Lin Ao back by two steps made it very clear that he had held back.


    Even though Lin Ao had been injured, he didn''t back down at all as he red right at Elder Yue.


    When Elder Yue saw that gaze, he did feel a bit of regret since he had to admit that this was an outstanding young man, but he had no choice since the circumstances of this matter were like this. So he steeled his heart and continued.<sub> </sub>


    Elder Yue said in a stern voice, "Where is Rou''er? I will not ask a third time."


    As he said this, he had raised his palm again, but this time the energy he had gathered was much strongerpared to before.


    But before he had a chance to release this, there was someone who suddenly rushed out of the manor.


    The six elders immediately turned in shock and when they saw who it was, they all tried to stop her, but not a single one of them could catch her. That was because this person actually had a cultivation in the peak tinum Realm just as well and she wasn''t injured like them.


    This person was Lin Fan''s mother, Yue Qingrou, who had rushed out in a matter of seconds to appear in front of Lin Ao as she said, "Uncle, stop!"


    When Elder Yue saw Yue Qingrou, he put down his palm and he said in the same stern voice, "Rou''er, that''s enough of your ying, it''s time toe home."


    Then Liao Ping said with a bright smile, "Rou''er, I''m here to take you back. I know you must have suffered in this lower realm, but you don''t have to suffer any longer."


    Yue Qingrou ignored both of them and turned to Lin Ao, looking over him with concern as she said, "Big brother Ao, are you alright?"


    This had been how she had addressed Lin Ao when they were younger, when they were more free and this was how she addressed him when she showed her affection.


    When Liao Ping heard her say this, he began to remember everything that had happened in the past and a vein popped out on his forehead.


    Without any hesitation, he raised his palm again and gathered his energy as he roared out, "Lin Ao, you!"


    But then in a development that no one expected, Lin Yue suddenly charged out and said, "Don''t you dare hurt my parents!"


    She had suddenly run out of the Lin Manor and had gone past the six elders who had been too focused on the situation in front of them that they hadn''t noticed her. After all, even if Lin Yue was a genius in cultivating, she was still only on the Silver Realm, so no one had expected her toe out.


    But the moment that she revealed herself, everything had changed.


    Liao Ping had only been slightly angry when he heard how Yue Qingrou had addressed Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou.


    This was his fiancee, the one that he had loved!


    He was fine with her being living with Lin Ao in this lower realm and he was willing to move past that since he had loved her, but now they had brought out a child to show off in front of him?


    Wasn''t this a p to his face?


    Wasn''t this putting a green hat on his head?


    Even if he could ept a few things, this was not something that he could ept!


    Elder Yue''s face turned dark when he saw this.


    He knew that this situation was as bad as it could get and if he didn''t do something, this would be very bad for the Yue Family.


    He red at Yue Qingrou and said, "Rou''er, you actually dare to do something like this? What did our Yue Family raise you for?"


    Yue Qingrou looked right back at him and said, "Did the Yue Family raise me or did they just raise a chip that they could trade for benefits?"


    Elder Yue flew into a rage when he heard this, he had never thought that Yue Qingrou would be this unfilial!


    The amount of resources the Yue Family had invested on Yue Qingrou had been enough to train several geniuses, but they had done it willingly because she had been one of the best in the Yue Family.


    She had even managed to catch the eye of the Liao Family''s scion, which filled the Yue Family with joy.


    If they could use this marriage as a way to build an alliance with the Liao Family, it would have all been worth it!


    But then she suddenly ran off with trash from this lower realm and had disgraced them all!


    It was lucky that the Liao Family had chosen to forgive them for this and gave them a chance to make up for this mistake, but they never thought that Yue Qingrou would do something like this!


    It seemed like the Yue Family really was doomed to be destroyed...

 340 Chapter 340

    While Elder Yue was filled with despair over this situation, Liao Ping had slowly forced himself to calm down.


    He knew that anger wasn''t the right choice in this situation, so he had to look at this calmly first.


    Even if he wasn''t as talented as Lin Ao, he was still the scion of the Liao Family from the upper realm, that wasn''t an empty title. He had been strictly trained since he was young and that just wasn''t in terms of cultivation, he had been molded by the leaders of the Liao Family and was in fact quite an intelligent person.


    While the way he acted before made it seem like he was an idiot, it was only Yue Qingrou who could make him act this way.


    From the first moment he had seen her, he knew that she was his goddess, but now¡­


    Now that goddess had been defiled and his heart had been shattered.


    No matter how he had denied all of this during the years he had been looking for her, the facts were in front of him right now and he had no choice but to ept them.


    But since those feelings were dead, they gave birth to new feelings.


    Since he couldn''t get what he wanted, how could he let others live a happy life?


    His mind began to turn and he turned his attention to Lin Yue who stood in front of Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou. As he looked at her, he began looking over her and he had to admit that she was quite beautiful.


    She had inherited the genes of both Yue Qingrou and Lin Ao who were quite beautiful themselves and they had given birth to Lin Fan who was so handsome that he had charmed two princesses...If she wascking, that really would have been letting down their genes.


    His mind turned and he began to think of revenge.


    If he were to take both Yue Qingrou and her daughter away from Lin Ao, ying with them night and day, wouldn''t that be the perfect revenge?


    No, the perfect revenge would be to make him watch and then kill all three of them together, but he knew that wasn''t possible with the Lin Family ancestor here.


    Of course, this wasn''t just because it would be quite nice to enjoy two beauties like this at the same time. It was naturally all because of revenge.


    For a second, there was a lewd smile that appeared on Liao Ping''s face, but he quickly suppressed it.


    Since that was the case, he would just have to make do with what he could get.


    Elder Yue was about to make a move when he suddenly heard Liao Ping give a cough from beside him.


    Elder Yue immediately turned and asked, "Young master Liao, is there anything I can do for you?"


    His tone had immediately changed because of the situation. With how bad the situation was, it was only natural that he would be more respectful when talking to Liao Ping.


    Liao Ping gave a nod of acknowledgement and after a second, he said, "I''ll take both the mother and daughter, that''ll be enoughpensation for me."


    After saying that, he turned away without even looking back, leaving this matter to Elder Yue.


    Elder Yue naturally understood what he was talking about and while that did make him grit his teeth a bit, he still had to ept this since this was the only path for the Yue Family that was left.


    He did have some familial feelings for Yue Qingrou since he had watched her grow up, but right now, the survival of the Yue Family meant more than this.


    So he turned back to the three in front of him and said, "Rou''er, you''reing back to the family and you''ll bring your daughter along with you."


    Lin Ao was immediately filled with rage the moment he heard this, releasing all his energy all at once, but that still wasn''t enough since the person in front of him wasn''t a weak expert from the lower realm.


    When Elder Yue sensed this aura that came from Lin Ao, he just gave a soft snort and released his own life energy whichpletely dominated Lin Ao''s. His life energy even surpassed the limits of this lower realm, reaching the Embryo Soul Realm.


    This was a realm that couldn''t be achieved in the lower realm since the concentration of energy in the air in the lower realm wasn''t enough to support this kind of cultivation. To reach this cultivation, one had to reach the upper realm which was the dream of countless experts of the lower realm.


    Even with this kind of pressure on him, Lin Ao refused to lower his head, but it was clear that he wouldn''t be able to keep this up.


    On the other side, the elder from the Liao Family had his guard up as he continued to watch the Lin Family ancestor.


    To be honest, he waspletely confused why the Lin Family ancestor wasn''t making a single move.


    Back when they had captured Lin Ao before, this man had ughtered his way into their stronghold alone and had taken Lin Ao back. It was more than enough to show that this man was hiding his cultivation and staying in this lower realm.<sub> </sub>


    For what reason, they didn''t know, but his power was more than enough to make them wary.


    They had invested many Embryo Soul Realm Experts and even a Child Soul Realm Expert, but they had all fallen at his sword. That was a loss that was hard for them to recover from.


    The only reason they hade down this time after learning of Yue Qingrou and Lin Ao''s location was because they had brought along the Yue Family as cannon fodder. They were going to let the Yue Family weaken the Lin Family before working together to take down this monster.


    But that n didn''t work out since from the beginning, this monster hadn''t made a single move.


    But then there was also Lin Fan that everyone had ignored.


    Now that he had broken through, he knew what the limit of his powers were after encountering the upper realm reinforcements. For someone like Elder Yue who was only in the low Embryo Soul Realm, Lin Fan was more than enough to deal with him.


    The only reason he had been standing on the side the entire time was because the Lin Family ancestor had used powers that surpassed the Embryo Soul Realm to convince Lin Fan from going forward. But Lin Fan couldn''t take it anymore.


    The Lin Family ancestor could naturally see that, so he reached out and took Lin Fan by the shoulder, using powers that were beyond the Embryo Soul Realm to push down and stop him from moving forward.


    But even then, with Lin Fan''s strengthened body, he could still push forward if he wanted.


    The Lin Family ancestor revealed a bitter smile at this and he had no choice but to say, "It''s not your turn yet. This is your father''s matter."


    It was at this that Lin Fan finally stopped.


    The couple facing Elder Yue heard this voice and looked over to see the Lin Family ancestor with Lin Fan.


    Without any hesitation, Yue Qingrou came forth and said, "I''ll go back!"


    Even if he was unwilling, Lin Ao didn''t stop him since he knew that this was the best way to end this.


    Liao Ping had gone crazy after just finding out that Yue Qingrou had a single child, so how would he react if he found out that they already had two children?


    Both of them could tell that Lin Fan had already broken through since they could no longer sense his aura if he didn''t release it, which meant that he clearly had a higher level of cultivation than them. The only realm that was left was breaking through to the Legendary Realm.


    But even so, that didn''t mean that he would be able to fight these people since they were experts that came from the upper realm. The Fragmented Soul Realm was just the beginning of cultivation in the upper realm and these people were far beyond the peak of this lower realm.


    That meant that the only way they could keep him safe was by letting Yue Qingrou sacrifice herself.


    Elder Yue stopped releasing his aura when he heard this as he said, "Alright, let''s go then."


    On the inside, he let out a sigh of relief since their Yue Family had just avoided destruction.


    Lin Ao looked at Yue Qingrou with conflicted eyes before saying, "I''lle for you."


    Yue Qingrou looked right back and said, "I''ll be waiting."


    Then she stood up with Lin Yue and headed towards Elder Yue.


    But Elder Yue wasn''t done yet.


    He had seen this and to be honest, he was a bit afraid of Lin Ao''s talent. The entire Yue Family was.


    He had already broken through to the Peak tinum Realm at his age, if they were to allow him to live, wouldn''t that be leaving a big liability for them?


    Elder Yue waited until Yue Qingrou had moved away before suddenly raising his palm and with all his strength, he pped out at Lin Ao.


    This was the full strength of an Embryo Soul Realm Expert, so how could Lin Ao possibly dodge this?


    As the palm approached, Lin Fan wanted to rush forward to stop it, but he felt the pressure on his shoulder disappear as the figure beside him also disappeared.


    There was a single sh as the palm was shattered to pieces.

 341 Chapter 341

    The sh didn''t just shatter the palm attack, it went straight through it to hit Elder Yue in the chest, creating a streak of blood on his chest.


    When Elder Yue took this blow, he was sent flying into the distance, skipping like a stone on water before skidding to a stop.


    The Lin Family ancestor was standing firmly in front of Lin Ao with his hand up surrounded in swordw.


    He hadn''t even used a weapon and the Lin Family ancestor was already this strong, just what kind of monster was he?


    The elder from the Liao Family had his eyes wide open since he had been focused on the Lin Family ancestor the entire time, but he hadn''t been able to see him move at all.


    It had to be known that this elder from the Liao Family was in the Child Soul Realm, far beyond the Embryo Soul Realm and even then he still wasn''t able to see the movements of the Lin Family ancestor. Just how powerful was the Lin Family ancestor?


    Even Lin Fan had his guesses confirmed by this.


    There was no way this old ancestor was someone from the lower realm, he was clearly hiding his cultivation and staying here for some reason, but just what was that reason?


    Still, if the Lin Family ancestor didn''t want to talk about it, there was nothing that Lin Fan could do.


    He just hoped that the Lin Family ancestor had the same goals as him, otherwise that would be troublesome.


    The Lin Family ancestor looked down at Elder Yue who was on the ground and said, "This is still my territory, I think you should remember that. This might be the business of your Yue Family, but if you touch my people, I won''t hold back."


    Then he turned to the elder from the Liao Family and said, "Take them and leave."


    Liao Ping naturally had something to say about this since he had never been treated like this by lower realm trash like this, but the elder from the Liao Family immediately appeared behind him and covered his mouth to stop him from talking. Then he cupped his hands and gave a slight bow to the Lin Family ancestor before taking everyone away. That naturally included Yue Qingrou and Lin Yue.


    Once they were all gone, there was a heavy feeling that hung in the air.


    The Lin Family had suffered a great loss from this.


    While there was internal struggle in the Lin Family, what made them a family was that they stuck with each other in the end, but now they had let two of their members be taken like this. It was without a doubt a p to the face of the Lin Family.


    Lin Fan was especially angry since those two were his two closest rtives.


    Lin Fan still didn''t feel that same way towards the Lin Family that his father did, but this was different since these two were part of the new family that he had found in this world. This was his precious family and they had been taken just like this!


    At this, Lin Fan couldn''t help ring at the Lin Family ancestor who had stopped him the entire time.


    The Lin Family ancestor could naturally see this and he gave a bitterugh deep down.


    All these different things, they were all cutting into his own ns and making it hard for him¡­


    But he had no other choice since he was alreadymitted and this was his family after all.


    The Lin Family ancestor turned to the six elders standing there and said, "All of you can go and rest up. Everyone hiding in the manor will help with the clean up."


    After saying this, he turned to Lin Fan and said, "Xiao Fan, you and Ao wille with me. We''ll talk in the inner room."


    Without waiting for anyone to respond, the Lin Family ancestor began walking into the Lin Manor.


    Everyone clearly had more they wanted to say, but this was the Lin Family after all. In the Lin Family, their ancestor had the final word, so they all went to follow his orders.


    The six elders were actually all suffering from quite heavy internal injuries, so what they needed the most was to rest right now. The only reason they hadn''t gone earlier was because of the face of the family.


    There were quite a few people who were outside looking in on the Lin Family¡­


    As for Lin Fan, he followed along with the Lin Family ancestor''s orders because he knew that this was the only way he would get the information that he wanted.


    So after the Lin Family ancestor walked away, Lin Fan came over to help his father up before following the Lin Family ancestor into the manor.


    They continued in until they reached a room that was in the very depths of the Lin Manor, a room that was perfect for secluded cultivation. This was the room that the Lin Family ancestor spent most of his time in.<sub> </sub>


    In that room, there was only a simple mat on the ground, but someone had brought in a table before they had arrived since they knew that the Lin Family ancestor was using this room to hold a meeting.


    The Lin Family ancestor took one of the seats before pointing for Lin Fan and Lin Ao to sit down.


    After sitting down, there was a period of silence as the Lin Family ancestor looked over them, but then he suddenly said, "Ao, are you confident in getting them back?"


    Lin Ao had been in a daze the entire time, but hearing this voice, he looked up at the Lin Family ancestor. After staring at him in a daze for a bit, he gave a firm nod.


    The Lin Family ancestor gave a nod back to him before saying, "Alright, you can go and get ready then."


    Lin Ao didn''t waste any time as he got out of his chair and headed out, leaving only Lin Fan and the Lin Family ancestor in the room.


    Once he was gone, Lin Fan was about to speak, but the Lin Family ancestor raised his hand first to stop him as he said, "First, let me speak."


    After a pause, he said with a sigh, "I know that you''re feeling annoyed that I stopped you, but there''s a reason for that."


    Lin Fan just gave a soft snort in response to this.


    The Lin Family ancestor ignored him and asked, "Even if you were strong enough to stop him, would that have been the right choice?"


    Lin Fan wanted to argue back, but then he saw the way the Lin Family ancestor looked at him and he swallowed his words, sitting back down in daze.


    The Lin Family ancestor nodded when he saw this, this was the reaction that he had wanted.


    He paused for a bit to let Lin Fan mull it over before continuing, "You''re his son, if you were to help him like that¡­"


    Once again, he left it open for Lin Fan to think it over, but with how clear he had been, there wasn''t much else he needed to say.


    Lin Fan eventually gave up and let out a sigh as he knew that the Lin Family ancestor was right. If he had interfered earlier, he would have caused cultivation deviation for Lin Ao.


    It wasn''t just talent that was important for cultivation, it also depended on one''s mentality.


    Lin Ao was a man after all and if he had to rely on his son to protect his family, what kind of a man would he be?


    While his family would have been safe, it would have crushed his spirit and created a heart demon for him, negatively impacting his future cultivation.


    He was already in the peak tinum Realm at his age, which was enough to prove his talent. If he were given a bit more time, he would definitely be able to break through to the Legendary Realm and take back everything that was his.


    But if Lin Fan were to crush his spirit before then, creating a heart demon for him, he would never be able to break through for the rest of his life.


    So in the end, the Lin Family ancestor''s actions had been correct even if Lin Fan couldn''t ept the results.


    The Lin Family ancestor saw this and knew that he was past the hard part, so now there was only one thing to do.


    He knew that it was impossible for Lin Fan to stay in this lower realm and the fact that he had already broken through meant that he would be heading to the upper realm soon. This was something that the Lin Family ancestor approved of since he knew that Lin Fan would need that room to grow.


    But that didn''t mean that he would just let Lin Fan go off without ensuring some basic form of safety for him.


    While the upper realm was filled with opportunities, it was also filled with danger. If he didn''t go to the right ce, he might not even know how he died.


    So the Lin Family ancestor asked, "When are you nning on going to the upper realm?"


    Lin Fan thought about it for a bit before saying, "I''m not sure yet."


    He had received a mission from the system, but he hadn''t had time to look over it yet. He just knew that it was rted to the upper realm since he saw those two words in the mission.


    But there was something else more important to him first.


    Lin Fan looked right at the Lin Family ancestor and asked, "Who were those people that came today?"

 342 Chapter 342

    The Lin Family ancestor had been trying to avoid that since he knew that if he told Lin Fan about this story, Lin Fan would definitely chase after in revenge, but that was too dangerous for him since these were true upper realm factions.


    The power that they had behind them was not something that Lin Fan could take on right now with his current power.


    But he had no choice since the Lin Family ancestor still had to win Lin Fan over, so he couldn''t withhold information from him like this if he wanted him to trust him.


    In the end, it was all his fault since he had gone into closed door cultivation all this time, not paying attention to this matter. If he had learned of Lin Fan''s abilities sooner, he would have been able to bring him back to the Lin Family much sooner than this.


    But that also was strange to him since he had been the one who had checked Lin Fan back when he was born. He had been certain that this child had a severed meridian which didn''t allow him to cultivate and it was something that no one could cure, or at least no one in this lower realm.


    So just how had Lin Fan been able to cure his body and walk the path of cultivation?


    Could it be that he really had met an expert like everyone else was telling him?


    But for now, that was thrown to the back of his mind since he still had to answer Lin Fan''s question.


    The Lin Family ancestor hesitated a bit before saying, "Your mother''s name is Yue Qingrou and that person was called Elder Yue, so that should be clear. As for Liao Ping and that other elder, that is a long story."


    Lin Fan sat back in his chair and said, "We have time."


    The Lin Family ancestor revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he still went right into his story.


    This was a story from a time before Lin Fan was born, this was a story of two young lovers that ended in tragedy.


    Lin Ao was the greatest genius of the Lin Family after their ancestor. In the eyes of everyone, he would definitely be the second Legendary Realm Expert of the Lin Family and bring them glory. But before he could mature, he was crippled, or at least that was what the story was.


    After what had happened just now, it was clear that there was more to this story.


    Back when Lin Ao was still young, he had qualified to join the upper realm''s joint training session.


    This was a joint training that the upper realm gave the lower realm quotas too, allowing their talents to see a broader world. For this training, the upper realm even opened up an Inheritance Realm for these talents to explore, as well as allowing them to keep everything that they found.


    This was a joint training session that happened once a century, so that was why Lin Fan had never heard of it.


    The next joint training session would be held in another few decades, but Lin Fan had already surpassed the criteria for joining.


    Lin Ao hadpletely dominated in this realm since all the geniuses that were sent in were below the Legendary Realm.


    At that time, Lin Ao had only just reached the tinum Realm and he was already able to fight those in the peak tinum Realm with his artifact.


    It was this talent that had caught the attention of Yue Qingrou, a talented young miss from an upper realm family.


    The Yue Family and the Liao Family were both families that came from a single faction in the upper realm, the True Spirit Sect, which was one of the twelve factions that had ruled the Gctic Humanity Alliance. But of course, there was arge disparity of strength between them.


    It was because of this disparity that the Yue Family had gone against the wishes of Yue Qingrou and engaged her to Liao Ping.


    In this joint training session, Yue Qingrou began following Lin Ao around after an encounter with him. In truth, it was an encounter of the hero saving the beauty which led to her slowly falling in love with him.


    At that time, Liao Ping had also been with them since he had followed Yue Qingrou since the beginning, but he had been too weak to save her. He had also been saved by Lin Ao in the end, but of course he could see how Yue Qingrou looked at Lin Ao and he challenged Lin Ao.


    In the end, Liao Ping was beaten up and left behind while Yue Qingrou explored the Inheritance Realm with Lin Ao.


    It was during this adventure that the two of them had fallen in love, but it truly was not meant to be since their statuses were just too different.


    But then something happened that no one had expected.


    Yue Qingrou ran away from the upper realm and eloped with Lin Ao!<sub> </sub>


    It was hard for the lower realm experts to ascend to the upper realm, but it was quite easy for the upper realm experts to descend into the lower realm. So without any challenge, Yue Qingrou and Lin Ao had run away to the Blue Star and hid their identities, trying to live a normal life.


    Still, how could the upper realm factions take this kind of humiliation?


    How could Liao Ping take this humiliation?


    A piece of trash from the lower realm had stolen his wife, would he still be a man if he just epted this?


    The Liao Family forced the Yue Family to act and together, they sent experts tob the Blue Star in search of Yue Qingrou and Lin Ao.


    It didn''t take them long to find the two and they were both dragged into the upper realm.


    Yue Qingrou was locked under house arrest and Lin Ao was ced in the dungeons where he was tortured.


    Finally, one day, they brought him out and in an execution ceremony where they forced Yue Qingrou to watch.


    In front of everyone, they first crippled him by shattering his dantian before slowly torturing him to death.


    It was at this time that the Lin Family ancestor had arrived in the upper realm and cut his way through the experts of the Liao Family to bring Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou away, bringing them back down to the Blue Star.


    The Liao and Yue Family had never chased after them because they were afraid of the Lin Family ancestor.


    The day he cut his way into the Liao Family, he had in experts in the Fragmented Soul Realm, the Embryo Soul Realm, and even an expert in the Child Soul Realm. These were heavy losses for the Liao Family and they couldn''t easily make a move.


    They nned on waiting for the crippled Lin Ao to die beforeing down to demand Yue Qingrou from the Lin Family. After all, there was no reason for the Lin Family to involve themselves if Lin Ao was dead.


    But they never heard the news of this and time passed slowly.


    Lin Fan had just turned neen, it had been twenty years since Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou had escaped from the Liao and Yue Families. Naturally they were getting impatient.


    As for how the rest of that story went, Lin Fan had just seen the ending, so there was nothing that needed to be said.


    Lin Fan picked up on two key things during that story.


    The Lin Family ancestor clearly had a deep past since he was even able to kill Child Soul Realm Experts¡­


    But he was also clearly unwilling to talk about it, so Lin Fan wasn''t going to push since the Lin Family ancestor at least seemed to be on their side for now.


    The other key thing was¡­


    Lin Fan was in thought for a bit before asking, "How did my father recover his cultivation?"


    The Lin Family ancestor exined, "Ao has a special physique where he was born with two dantians. So even if they crippled one of them, he''s still able to cultivate with the second. Of course, he doesn''t have the same advantage he had before where his life energy was twice that of his opponents, but he makes up for that with hisprehension. Ao has one of the strongestprehension abilities I''ve ever seen, that was how he was able to break through so fast all those years ago."


    Lin Fan nodded in response before asking, "Where is the True Spirit Sect?"


    The Lin Family ancestor''s expression turned dark when he heard this and he quickly said, "Don''t even think about picking that fight. The True Spirit Sect is one of the twelve factions that rule over the Gctic Humanity Alliance, they clearly have peak experts. Even if you don''t fight them, you still aren''t able to fight the Liao Family since they have one of the True Spirit Sect''s elders in their family. They have more than ten Child Soul Realm Experts in their family just because of that."


    Lin Fan had some understanding of the divisions of the Soul Realm because of Momonga, so he knew that the Lin Family ancestor was right.


    But that didn''t matter since he could go there in time since he had a cheat system.


    As long as he had time, he would be able to be stronger and take them down one day.

 343 Chapter 343

    Lin Fan ended the conversation with the Lin Family ancestor there.


    He could at least tell that the Lin Family ancestor was indeed on his side, though he was unclear what his goals were for now.


    Before he left the Lin Family to prepare for his ascension to the upper realm, the Lin Family did have one thing to add. Or rather, the Lin Family ancestor had one thing to give him.


    What he handed Lin Fan was a simple token with the word ''Lin'' on it, there wasn''t even any special auras that came from it like the other tokens he had received from the Ster Kingdom experts. No matter which angle he looked at it from, it just looked like a normal token to him.


    But what mattered was what the Lin Family ancestor said to him, "Xiao Fan, you have to remember that no matter what, you are a member of the Lin Family. As a family we have to look out for each other, but also know that I and the entire family will have your back no matter what."


    Lin Fan didn''t know why the Lin Family ancestor did all of this for him, but at the very least it did move him.


    While it didn''t make him feel that the Lin Family was his family, he could at least feel that the Lin Family ancestor was like his grandfather after all he had done for him.


    Lin Fan looked at the token in his hand in a daze for a few seconds before saying with a nod, "Un, I will."


    The Lin Family ancestor gave a nod and said, "Good, then be on your way."


    Without another word, the Lin Family ancestor went back into the room and Lin Fan also left the Lin Manor.


    There was no one else here for him in this Lin Manor, so there was no need for him to say goodbye to anyone. The only one that he would have to say goodbye to was Lin Ao, but there was no time for that either since Lin Ao had gone into secluded cultivation.


    In this trip, Lin Ao would stay on the Blue Star until he broke through to the Soul Realm. After being incited by what had just happened, he would break through soon. Once he did, he would catch up with Lin Fan in the upper realm.


    Lin Fan went off to the airshipnding site, but then he realized that he had made a mistake.


    This was True Light City, he didn''t have a branch store here, so he couldn''t use the Any ce Door. At the same time, he didn''t have the special airship that the Lin Family ancestor had, so if he took the normal airship, it would take him at least two days to reach Snow Wind City.


    After thinking through his options, Lin Fan realized that the only thing left for him was to use his own cultivation to fly to Snow Wind City.


    But right before he could fly into the sky, there was someone who ran towards him calling out, "Young master Lin, please wait!"


    Lin Fan turned to look in the direction of the voice and saw an unfamiliar middle aged man running towards him. He had no memories of this person and didn''t know why he would be calling out to him, but that didn''t mean that he couldn''t hear him out.


    After all, he had already surpassed the limits of this realm with his cultivation, so there was nothing that he needed to fear in this lower realm.


    The middle aged man stopped in front of Lin Fan and bent over panting as he tried to speak, but words just wouldn''te out.


    Lin Fan looked over him before saying, "Is there something you need with me?"


    It took the middle aged man some time to recover from his run, but then when he looked up to speak, Lin Fan finally recognized him.


    He was the captain for the Lin Family ancestor''s private airship.


    But why did he suddenly stop Lin Fan for?


    The captain said, "Young master Lin, the ancestor has given the orders to let you use his personal airship until you ascend. Please have a look and confirm his orders."


    The captain took out his watch and showed the message from the Lin Family ancestor to Lin Fan.


    It read, "Xiao Fan, use my airship for now, it should help you until you ascend."


    Lin Fan hadpletely forgotten about this and the Lin Family ancestor had helped him remember. It was almost like he was an elder from the family that was looking out for him.


    Wait, he was an elder since he was technically Lin Fan''s great grandfather¡­


    Still, Lin Fan was thankful for the Lin Family ancestor''s care for him and he wasn''t going to shy away from using this since he did need this airship.


    So without any hesitation, Lin Fan took the airship to Snow Wind City.<sub> </sub>


    The first thing that Lin Fan did was immediately head off to his pet shop since that was his main priority before leaving this world.


    His pet shop was the basis of his strength, it was his golden finger. As long as he had the ie from the pet shop, he could slowly increase his cultivation by finishing missions and getting new things with his points. Even though he hadn''t been using his points much¡­


    But this upper realm would be an unknown world to him, so it would be better to have as many points as he could get.


    That meant he would have to make sure that the stores on this Blue Star would be able to function even if he was gone.


    For the main store in Snow Wind City, it was currently being managed by Momonga and his ghost maids, but since they would being up to the upper realm with him, he would have to find someone else to manage it.


    That was where his friends came in.


    Wang Da Dong spent most of his time in the store anyway, so he was naturally Lin Fan''s first choice when it came to a recement.


    The Wang Family were overjoyed when they heard this because they now knew just how powerful Lin Fan''s pet shop really was. A pet shop that could have several Legendary Realm Experts definitely wasn''t normal, so having Wang Da Dong work there and create a rtionship with them would definitely create arge backer for the Wang Family.


    The other two royal families also tried to get their descendants in and Lin Fan naturally epted them since more workers were better. The most important thing was that they weren''t even asking for that much when it came to pay¡­


    Of course, they would be starting at a lower position than Wang Da Dong since they were just learning the job still.


    As for Jin and Yin, Lin Fan was leaving them here on the Blue Star for now.


    This trip for him was just to build up his foundations in the upper realm, so before he could, it was better for him to travel alone since that meant more flexibility. Once he finished establishing his foundations, he would bring up all his subordinates since he needed them to expand his influence in the upper realm.


    That naturally included Jiang Zhi Shu and the kids over in Green Wood City.


    The two orphan kids that he had left in Green Wood City had never stopped cultivating and they had grown quite a bit, reaching the Silver Realm and Bronze Realm respectively.


    But that was also natural since Lin Fan had given them cultivation techniques from the system¡­


    With that cultivation and their age, they could definitely be considered geniuses and Lin Fan would need them in the upper realm.


    So after taking care of the store in Snow Wind City, Lin Fan went to take care of the stores in Green Wood City and Rock Mountain City.


    The kids would be leaving, so that meant that he needed to prepare extra workers to take over when he brought them up.


    Lin Fan went to the Mu Family and got some workers from them.


    Of course, it was impossible for the Mu Family to have the same rtionship with Lin Fan as before after what had happened in the ruins.


    While he still had a friendly attitude towards them, they were no longer as close as before after the ruin incident.


    It was the same with the Jiang Family in Rock Mountain City, but since Jiang Zhi Shu still followed Lin Fan, their rtionship was still better.


    Lin Fan just left the management of the store to Jiang Qi Tai since he had already been helping and was quite proficient in managing the store.


    As for Water Pearl City, Lin Fan left the management of the store to Zhu Tie since he wasn''t bringing Zhu Tie up with him. Zhu Tie was never that good at cultivating and he surprisingly had a talent for managing a business.


    When Lin Fan saw the reports that Zhu Tie had given him and matched it with the information from the system, he immediately decided to leave the store to Zhu Tie.


    With all four of his stores taken care of, Lin Fan didn''t go back to Snow Wind City.


    Rather he headed right to Central City where the portal to the upper realm was.


    But back in Snow Wind City, there was a certain someone who had just received a letter from him.

 344 Chapter 344

    That certain someone was Luo Qing.


    Before Lin Fan had taken the Any ce Door to the various stores, he had left a handwritten letter with Wang Da Dong that he asked him to hand to Luo Qing.


    When Luo Qing opened the letter and she saw the words written in them, her eyes couldn''t help being filled with tears.


    On the letter, there was only one sentence written, but it was firm like a decree.


    "Luo Qing, there is no future between us."


    Lin Fan used to feel something for her, but now there was nothing that he felt since there were more pressing matters for him. He did not have time to continue this and he didn''t want to keep dragging her on, so he wrote this letter to help her move on.


    In the end, it was because the scale of their worlds were too different.


    Lin Fan was never someone who would be limited to just the lower realm and Luo Qing was not talented enough to ever make it to the upper realm.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan headed to Central City because that was where the stable portal to the upper realm was.


    The Lin Family ancestor was the one who had told Lin Fan about this.


    Legendary Realm Experts could ascend to the upper realm at any time, but by doing so, they would have to face the tribtion of traveling through space until they reached the upper realm. Thews of the world would guide them to the upper realm, but traveling through space made for a dangerous journey.


    That was where the portal came in.


    ? The portal was something made by the upper realm that stabilized space travel, stabilizing the wild spatial winds that existed betweens.


    As long as they had this portal creating a passage for them, they could be protected against the spatial winds which greatly decreased the fatality rate of ascending to the next realm. However, the upper realm forces didn''t do it out of the kindness of their heart.


    They naturally had their own goals in building this portal.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the Union Government headquarters in Central City, he was blocked from going in.


    That was because he didn''t have any fame, so even after bing a Legendary Realm Expert, no one knew him, so they just didn''t let him in.


    However, as a Legendary Realm Expert, there was an easy fix to this.


    Lin Fan released his aura, drawing the attention of everyone around him.


    The two guards who had stopped him suffered the brunt of his aura, being forced down to their knees with looks of fear. They had unknowingly offended a Legendary Realm Expert!


    That was the one thing they should never do!


    But while they were filled with fear and despair over their future, there were three people who came out of the Union Government building.


    Two of them were people that Lin Fan recognized, who was the president and the general, but thest one was someone Lin Fan had never met before. But since he came out with the president and the general, it was clear that he was someone powerful.


    When the president and the general came out and saw Lin Fan, they couldn''t help revealing bitter looks.


    They had seen Lin Fan''s disy in the ruins and knew that they were no longer a match for him.


    Moreover, after how they had treated him in the ruins, they could clearly imagine that he held a grudge against them.


    But Lin Fan''s next words shattered all those thoughts.


    Lin Fan looked at them and calmly said, "I want to use the portal."


    The three of them were all taken aback by this, but they all felt relieved deep down.


    Lin Fan was clearly much stronger than anyone else on the Blue Star and if he were to create trouble for them, it would be hard for them to stop him. Not to mention that after the previous incident, the upper realm no longer cared about the Blue Star as much.


    They couldn''t care who was in charge, as long as they received the offerings that the lower realm offered for protection, the only other thing would be taking in geniuses from these lower realms from time to time.<sub> </sub>


    Before the experts of the upper realm came down more often because of the special artifact that had caught the attention of the Ster Kingdom princess, but now this Blue Star would be just like the rest of the lower realm under the upper realm. There were quite a few of those that existed.


    That was also what they couldn''t understand.


    Even if this was a lower realm, a lower realm did still have quite a few resources.


    With Lin Fan''s strength and theck of care from the upper realm, it was now easy for him to take over and build up the Lin Family, yet he was rushing into the upper realm right after breaking through?


    Still they didn''t have to care since this was good for them.


    So the three of them revealed friendly smiles and led Lin Fan to the center of the Union Government building where the portal to the upper realm was ced.


    For the president and the general, they both felt regret over what had happened in the past. If they knew that Lin Fan would be this powerful, they would have done everything they could have to pull him into the Union Government.


    But there was no pill for regret in this world¡­


    Soon they were there and the three of them left Lin Fan alone after opening it up for him.


    As high level members, they were naturally busy people and they didn''t have all day to stand around and entertain Lin Fan.


    After they were gone, Lin Fan stood in front of the portal with Momonga and Ang.


    He was bringing these two along since they were more than capable of taking care of themselves and most importantly, Momonga would have plenty of information for him.


    So with one final look backwards, Lin Fan walked right into the portal that was in front of him. It was a simple portal that was an arch with ayer of energy in between that arch which symbolized the portal.


    As soon as he stepped into the portal, he felt himself being pulled up by a force that had suddenly appeared, but he didn''t feel contact with anything. It was like he had slipped through the roof above him and was thrown into space as the stars suddenly appeared around him.


    But he could also tell that he was still in the spatial tunnel since there was a thinyer of energy that surrounded him and guided him, taking the form of a tube around him.


    This tube continuously exerted a suction force on him that drew him further and further into space, while also guiding him along.


    Eventually, there was a that appeared in the line of sight of Lin Fan and the tube that was around him was leading him to this. This was so big that Lin Fan couldn''t even see the other side of the. It was definitely much bigger than the Blue Star, not just by several times, but by several dozen times.


    Lin Fan slowly approached the surface of this and when he came closer, he saw that he was being pulled towards a city that was much bigger than any city he had seen on the Blue Star. However, when he got closer, he could feel that the concentration of life energy in the air was much stronger than on the Blue Star.


    This really was worthy of being the upper realm, not mentioning everything else, just the simple concentration of life energy in the air was already enough for people to cultivate several times faster.


    Of course, this was no match for the various cultivation realms that Lin Fan had at his disposal since they were all high ss cultivation realms.


    As he approached the city, he flew across it until he was at the center of the city, falling down until hended on a tform that was inside of a building.


    When he looked around he saw that there was nothing in this room other than the portal that was right in the center.


    Lin Fan was about to walk around, but then the door suddenly opened and there were two armed men who walked in.


    Both of them were clearly surprised to see Lin Fan''s group appearing in this room, but then they raised their weapons and said, "Follow us, you''ll need to register first."


    Lin Fan casually followed behind them since he had already heard about this before.


    The destination of the portal was Harmony City, a city that was founded by the twelve factions of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, which took in the experts that had ascended from the various lower realms that they controlled and set up portals in.


    Of course, there were those that ascended by themselves since there were benefits in doing that as well, but most of them ascended with the portals set up by the upper realms.


    Lin Fan''s group was led to another room where there were people who looked like officials waiting for them.


    The first thing the officials asked them was where they came from and they didn''t need to do anything else after stating that they were from the Blue Star.


    As one of the lower realms under the upper realm, naturally they knew what the Blue Star was and were used to people ascending from there.


    So after settling everything, the clerk asked, "Do you have your fee?"

 345 Chapter 345

    This was one of the traps that the upper realm had set up for the lower realm.


    When Lin Fan heard the clerk ask this, he asked back, "How much is the fee?"


    The clerk looked at Lin Fan with a gaze field with disdain the moment he heard this, but he still said, "It''s five spirit stones."


    Spirit stones, that was the currency used in the upper realm and it was a currency that could only be obtained in the upper realm.


    It was the concentrated form of crystals which were used as currency in the lower realm.


    Which was why this was a trap.


    The upper realm factions naturally wanted more talented people to work for them, so they tried to recruit from these lower realms. However, which genius was willing to work for others?


    Every talented person naturally had their own ambition and they weren''t willing to work for others that easily, which was why the upper realm factions had set up a trap for them.


    They could have easily epted lower realm resources as payment since it didn''t cost them much to maintain these interster portals, but they insisted on making the lower realm experts pay with spirit stones, a currency that could only be found in the upper realm with its higher concentration of life energy.


    Since the lower realm experts were unable to pay, that would mean that they would either have to fight their way out or they would have to ept different terms. Namely, they would have to pay with service instead of with goods.


    The twelve upper realm factions that ruled over the Gctic Humanity Alliance took turns guarding the portal, which meant that they all had an equal chance of obtaining experts. But at the same time, they also had an equal chance of obtaining a monster, which was how a slow disparity had begun to form between those twelve factions.


    A faction could never continue without new blood and those geniuses from the lower realm were considered new blood.


    That was why they had to sign employment contracts with the upper realm factions. They would have to work for the upper realm factions for a certain period of time before they were free to go. Of course, they were free to stay in those upper realm factions as well.


    That all depended on how the upper realm factions treated those experts, but in these starting contracts, they gave them the most basic treatment possible.


    However, the upper realm factions were also quite greedy, only offering them one spirit stone a year.


    For the experts that came from the lower realm, of course they didn''t know any better when they first signed these contracts, but everyone who did felt like they had been cheated by the upper realm factions.


    Now, it was Lin Fan''s turn to experience this.


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this and he asked, "Is there no other way to pay? I have some herbs and pills that I can use."


    The clerk''s eyes filled with even more disdain when he heard this and he said with a soft snort, "You think we care about your lower realm resources? Your only option is to pay the fee for using the portal with spirit stones."


    Then after pausing, he drew out his words as he said, "Of course, there are other ways that you could pay the fee."


    As he said this, he also took out a piece of paper from the desk to his side.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked, "What is that?"


    The clerk curled his lips and said, "This is your other way of paying the fee. As long as you sign this contract, you won''t have to worry about a thing for the next five years."


    Lin Fan took the contract and looked it over before revealing a cold smile.


    He had already heard about this "ve" contract, but seeing it now, he really couldn''t help finding it funny.


    The terms of the contract were worse than if he had sold himself, but that was also part of the upper realm factions'' n. By making it seem much worse than it actually was, even the smallest kindness could be seen as bigger than it actually was.


    Naturally the upper realm factions would treat these geniuses well since they would want them as part of their factions.<sub> </sub>


    The fact that this contract was nothing more than shame wasmon knowledge in the upper realm, but this wasn''t as known in the lower realms. The geniuses that came up from the lower realms were fully integrated into the upper realm factions, so they had no reason to expose these contracts since they benefited the new factions that they considered themselves a part of.


    The clerk sitting there wasn''t worried at all since he had seen this many times, he was just waiting for Lin Fan to sign.


    However, that never came since Lin Fan already knew what this was about and was prepared for this.


    Lin Fan casually waved his hand and there were five stones that came out of his Spatial Ring. These were the spirit stones that he had received from the Lin Family ancestor who had exined everything to him.


    Once the spirit stones were on the table, Lin Fan looked at the clerk and asked, "Is everything in order now?"


    The clerk was stunned when he saw this, but then he immediately came forward to look over the spirit stones. Not for a single second did he believe that these were real spirit stones because the consequences he would suffer if they were real were much worse than if they were fake.


    But no matter how he looked at them, he could tell that these were definitely not fakes, which was definitely the worst case scenario for him.


    But then he remembered that there was a straw for him to grasp as the clerk said, "This is enough for you, but there''s three of you here, so the total is fifteen spirit stones. If you can''t pay that, I suggest that you sign this contract since it''s the best way for you. I can even talk to my superior and offer you better terms for this contract."


    The tone of the clerk had changed very quickly because he knew what a lower realm expert having spirit stones meant. It meant that this lower realm kid was actually rted to one of the upper realm factions, which was why he had these spirit stones.


    They had given these spirit stones to him to allow him to easily pass through this and they were probably waiting for him, but if this clerk was able to poach this young genius that had even moved one of the upper realm factions, it would definitely be a great aplishment on his part.


    It was said that great rewards came from great risks and doing this would clearly offend this lower realm expert that was so powerful that he was scouted already, but in reverse to this, if he were to bring him back to the force that he worked for, he would surely be rewarded. He was also confident in his force being able to win this young expert over since they were no weaker than the one that invited him and they had made the first move.


    Once that day came, this young expert would even feel gratitude towards him for bringing him to their force.


    It was too bad that what happened next shattered this dream once again.


    Momonga came forward and with a wave of his hand, another ten stones appeared on the table, stones that looked exactly the same as the ones from before. However, when one looked at them closely, they could tell that these spirit stones had a higher concentration of life energy in thempared to the ones that the Lin Family ancestor had given Lin Fan.


    The moment they appeared, the clerk realized that he had been yed and he knew that this situation was bad for him.


    These people clearly had enough spirit stones to begin with and with how easily they took it out, they were clearly judging him. Now that he had let his greed take over, he hadpletely offended them.


    The only way out for him was to¡­


    The clerk immediately revealed a smile and pped his stunned subordinates in the back of the head before saying, "Can''t you see that our honoured guests haven''t even been served tea yet? What kind of idiots are you?"


    Then the clerk immediately turned back to Lin Fan and said, "This young master, I''m very sorry for taking up your time. We''ll process your entry as soon as possible."


    Lin Fan looked at him for a second before waving his hand at them.


    The clerk looked like he had just received a pardon for a death sentence as he revealed a look of joy.


    The clerk began rushing his staff to get the paperwork finished as soon as possible.


    For all three of them to have enough spirit stones, this was clearly arge incident.


    Upper realm forces being willing to give spirit stones to bring geniuses up were already rare, but they almost always came alone. However, this time, this group hade in a group of three and they were all able to pay. That meant this must be a special group that an upper realm faction had found and brought up.


    This was clearly a hot potato and the sooner it was out of his hands, the better.


    In no time at all, Lin Fan was let out into the streets of Harmony City and he had even obtained a map from the clerk before being sent out.

 346 Chapter 346

    Lin Fan actually let out a sigh of relief when he came out of the building.


    Lin Fan had no idea what would have happened earlier if Momonga hadn''t pulled out the spirit stones. He had thought that it would be only five spirit stones for a single group, he never thought that it was five per person.


    The Lin Family ancestor had only given him six spirit stones, five for the fee and one to spend on his first night in Harmony City.


    If Momonga hadn''t pulled out these ten spirit stones, there might have really been a problem.


    Lin Fan turned to Momonga and said, "I''ll pay you back."


    Momonga just waved his hands as he casually said, "It''s fine, it''s nothing more than pocket change."


    In fact, this was indeed just pocket change for Momonga.


    Each realm that was above another had a different currency, so for Momonga, the currency used in this lower realm really was considered pocket change for him. It was such a small amount that he normally didn''t have any in his Spatial Ring, but it was lucky that he kept some because he liked to always be prepared.


    Not to mention that his Spatial Ring was quiterge to begin with, so he was free to y around and put as much junk in there as he wanted.


    Lin Fan had been with Momonga for some time, so he knew that there was no need to feel awkward around him. Lin Fan just gave Momonga a nod before turning to look at the map that the clerk had given him.


    The clerk naturally wanted to repair the damage that he had done by offending Lin Fan, so he had given him this map which was the most detailed map that he had.


    It was too bad that he didn''t know that Lin Fan didn''t care about him at all. He just thought that everything that had happened was normal procedure, so he had long forgotten about everything.


    It was also because he didn''t want to cause any trouble right now since he was new to this upper realm.


    Before he could get his footing, it was best to act as lowkey as possible.


    Too bad that he had drawn plenty of attention by paying with spirit stones.


    The fact that he had paid with spirit stones couldn''t be hidden and this was indeed a very rare event where three people in a group would be able to pay off their fees.


    So without Lin Fan even knowing, there were already forces that were looking into him.


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to care about that right now, what he needed to do first was to take care of his food, clothing, and shelter.


    All he had to his name was nothing more than a single spirit stone and that wouldn''tst him long.


    While spirit stones were considered medium ss currency, a single one wasn''t considered much.


    The upper realm also used crystals as theirmon currency, but Lin Fan didn''t have much of those either.


    It wasn''t because he wascking in crystals in the lower realm, rather it was because he had no way of bringing them up with him. There was a limit to his Spatial Ring and he was unable to bring everything that he had in the lower realm with him.


    The Spatial Ring that he had right now only had a storage space of two square meters, which was barely enough to bring certain things that he wanted. Of course he couldn''t stuff his Spatial Ring full of crystals.


    Then there was the fact that the lower realm''s financial system wasn''t linked to the upper realm''s. The lower realm naturally wanted to link them, but the upper realm didn''t want to spend this effort, so it was never done.


    This meant that all the crystals that Lin Fan had stored in the lower realm financial system were stuck there. He would be unable to ess them at all.


    So the first thing he needed to do now was earn more money.


    While he wasn''tpletely poor because he still had some crystals in his Spatial Ring, this didn''t mean that he had enough to do what he wanted to do.


    The key to Lin Fan''s power was his pet shop, so the first thing he had to do was naturally set up his pet shop in the upper realm. Not to mention that this was also his next mission from the system.


    "Host, please open a store in the Gctic Humanity Alliance within a month."


    "Rewards: ???"


    This was one of the simplest missions that the system had given him, but Lin Fan was fine with it. However, what surprised him was that the system didn''t tell him what the reward was or give any notice of a punishment for failing.


    Perhaps it knew now that Lin Fan was looking forward to the missions that it didn''t need to use this carrot and stick method anymore¡­<sub> </sub>


    After all, Lin Fan''s strength depended on the system and there was something important that he had to do now, so he wanted to be as strong as possible¡­


    But what could Lin Fan do in this city to earn money right now?


    This city that he had just arrived in was called Harmony City, it was a city that was built by all twelve factions of the Gctic Humanity Alliance. On the surface, this city was built together by them to promote harmony among the humans, but in truth, this city was made just for the various factions topete against each other.


    Because of that, the prices in Harmony City were much higher than other ces and that was why plenty of people were willing to live here.


    As long as you had a good product and you were willing to sell, you could earn enough to live several lives from the fighting of the various factions.


    Factions cared quite a bit about their reputation and they weren''t afraid to pay for it. So if there was something that waspeted for by two factions, there would usually be an auction for it.


    Anything that can catch the eyes of two of the twelve factions definitely wasn''t a normal thing, so that was also a big advertisement for that shop.


    Of course, there were also downsides to living here.


    One of the biggest downsides was that you could lose your life at any moment.


    Not allpetition between the various factions were openpetition, there were plenty of fights that happened under the surface of the city. If one was caught in any of those fights, it was hard to guarantee that they would be able to keep their lives.


    So that was why Harmony City was considered the safest city and also the most dangerous city. But for the money that they could make, there were still plenty of people that came.


    Lin Fan had his specialties, but without being able to open up a shop first, there was no chance that he would be able to get any customers.


    As he walked around the city, learning theyout of it, he found that there weren''t any stalls that were in the streets at all.


    After asking around, he had learned that the twelve factions wanted to make their city look prosperous, so they eliminated things like stalls. If a person was ever caught setting up a stall, they would be taken away to the correctional facility and normally they were never seen again.


    The safest way to earn money was definitely to buy and open a shop, but these shops weren''t cheap.


    The upper realm factions weren''t just taking in lower realm experts, they were also raking in the money by charging rent. Or to put it more bluntly, they were charging protection fees for the people who opened a shop.


    So while shops were a good way to earn money, they also bled one dry if one''s business wasn''t good.


    In the end, Lin Fan only had a single word to describe the twelve factions: Greedy.


    But this was their territory and there was nothing he could do.


    For now, he would have to find another way to earn money.


    The next best way to earn money after opening a shop was bing a Seeker or rather, bing a Hunter.


    The Seekers Guild was the same as the lower realm, they were a group that organized people who were willing to do missions for people for money, but the Hunters were different.


    The Hunters were the ones that ran the Seekers Guild and the Seekers Guild was actually just a ce filled with people that failed to be Hunters.


    The Hunter Organization was a ce that only epted the elite of elites and they were all people that desired something.


    A Hunter was like the name implied, it was someone who hunted something.


    To be epted into the Hunter Organization, all one had to do was want to hunt something, be it food, materials, art, or even diseases.


    It was a ce filled with strange people, but they couldn''t be underestimated because every single one of them was an expert.


    Only the most powerful people could sessfully hunt their prey, which was why the Hunters Organization only gathered the most elite people.


    The Hunters Organization was the dream of everyone since not only did they have experts, they also had influence. After all, the Hunters Organization was also one of the twelve factions and the faction that ran the Seekers Guild down on the Blue Star.


    It was also the organization that Lin Fan wanted to join to earn as much money as possible.

 347 Chapter 347

    Lin Fan was a cautious person by nature, even if his split personality did make him a bit impulsive at times.


    He had learned about the upper realm factions before evening to the upper realm, so he knew exactly what he wanted to do.


    The Hunters Organization was also defined by a third thing and that was money.


    They dealt with the most elite people since Hunters needed clients and only the most elite clients could pay for their services. Naturally, the services they provided weren''t cheap since they were the best of the best, so people were happy to pay thisrge amount.


    Only a small amount went to the Hunters Organization, but just that small amount was already enough to make the Hunters Organization the third richest faction of the twelve factions.


    Of course the richest faction was the Alchemy King Hall.


    No matter where one went in this cultivation world, the most lucrative job would always be alchemy.


    Then it was followed by the Beast King Hall, which was the upper realm faction that was behind the Monster Trainer Union, which was also one of the twelve factions.


    This was a faction that was dedicated to training pets, so in this pet based cultivation world, training pets would definitely be a lucrative job as well.


    If only a small amount going to the Hunters Organization was enough for it to be the third richest, one could imagine just how much the Hunters themselves were making. That was why Lin Fan wanted to join this organization.


    It was the quickest way to earn money and the title of a Hunter would be helpful in his future endeavors, but mainly, Lin Fan was confident in his own abilities.


    But before he could be a Hunter, Lin Fan had to be a Seeker first.


    The only way to qualify for the yearly Hunter exam was to be one of the top Seekers.


    It would take too much effort for the Hunters Organization to vet all the various applicants, so they chose to do it in a very simple manner. Only those that were at the top of the Seekers Guild board at the end of each year would qualify to join the Hunters exam.


    That meant that all the Hunters that were a part of the Hunters Organization had been a Seeker at one point, but that didn''t mean that all Seekers could be Hunters.


    After all, the Hunters Organization was a gathering of the elite and the Seekers Guild was just a way for anyone to make money.


    So with this mindset, Lin Fan headed off to the Seekers Guild.


    The Seekers Guild in the upper realm was different from in the lower realm.


    The Seekers Guild in the lower realm worked with the Union Government since the Union Government was the organization that ran the Blue Star, but that wasn''t the case in the Gctic Humanity Alliance. Here, there was a council that was made up of the twelve factions that ran the joint, which meant that there wasn''t a single government for the Seekers Guild to work with.


    Not to mention that the Seekers Guild did serve one of the factions of the council, which meant that they couldn''t just listen to the entire council. The Hunters Organization wasn''t dumb enough to let everyone put a finger in their pie.


    When Lin Fan entered the Seekers Guild building in Harmony City, he was greeted with quite a sight.


    There were people sitting at tables set up all over the lobby and most of them had drinks in their hands. There were even a few that were straight out fighting with each other, starting drunken brawls.


    This ce didn''t seem like the same Seekers Union that was organized on the Blue Star, rather this ce seemed like a pub more than anything, but this was also something that filled Lin Fan with a bit of excitement. He had read about this scene in many isekai novels, it was the basis of all adventures¡­


    This ce was exactly like the adventurers guild!


    Ignoring all the fighting that was going around him, Lin Fan headed right to the counter in the center of the room where there was a beautiful receptionist waiting for him.


    It was just like the novels that he read. Maybe that would mean that one day, this receptionist and him¡­


    But before his thoughts could wander anymore, there was a chill that suddenly came from behind him.


    He didn''t even need to turn around to know who this cold look wasing from, but it definitely woke him up from his fantasy. It was so cold that it almost felt like he had been frozen alive, causing a chill to run down his back.


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile when he felt this, but he didn''t have time to turn around to address it since the receptionist had also noticed him.


    She was about to say something, but then when she saw Lin Fan''s face, she immediately swallowed those words back.


    It took her a full three seconds before her professionalism came into effect and she said with a smile, "How can I help you today?" Of course, the smile on her face was much brighterpared to before.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile as he said, "Mypanions and I would like to register as seekers. Can you help us with that?"


    The receptionist immediately took out a form and said, "Please fill out this form." Then after a pause, she added, "There''s also a fee of one spirit stone."


    Lin Fan revealed a wry smile at this.


    He was about to take out hisst spirit stone when he heard the receptionist say, "Each."


    The smile on Lin Fan''s face froze at this.


    He only had a single spirit stone on him, so he wouldn''t be able to pay this and he didn''t want to keep asking Momonga for more spirit stones. Even if they were close, it just didn''t feel right.


    So Lin Fan fixed his smile as he said, "Miss, can you tell me what the conversion rate for crystals to spirit stones is?"


    The receptionist had turned around to deal with something and when she turned back to see Lin Fan''s smile, the smile on her face froze.


    Lin Fan was handsome, there was no doubt about that, but when he smiled¡­


    That smile had sent a chill down her back and every nerve in her body told her that this man was a scammer, but still, she had her professionalism.


    The receptionist gave a soft cough before saying, "Sir, the current exchange rate is two hundred crystals for a single spirit stone."


    Lin Fan let out an internal sigh of relief when he heard this. It was a good thing that this was still a price that he could pay, but of course, it was slowly chipping away at his savings.


    He had only brought a thousand crystals with him since that was all he could fit and he had thought that it would be arge amount, but now it seemed like it was nothing.


    Lin Fan shed a tear on the inside as he took out four hundred crystals as well and said, "I didn''t bring enough spirit stones with me today, is it alright if I pay in crystals?"


    Normally this receptionist would have chased anyone who wanted to pay like this away, but it was different today. After all, the one in front of her really was too handsome.


    She leaned in to collect the crystals and she didn''t forget to brush her hand against Lin Fan''s arm before saying, "We don''t normally do this, but I''ll make an exception just for you." Of course, when she moved away, she also didn''t forget to throw a wink in Lin Fan''s direction.


    It didn''t take her long to finish the registration for the three of them.


    Once she was done, she came back with three simple cards for them.


    She just put the other two cards on the table for the others to take, but as for Lin Fan, she made sure to personally hand it over to him. Along with the card, there was also an extra piece of paper that she was passing him.


    She leaned in and said, "This is my number, you can call me when you have some free time."


    But as soon as her voice fell, there was a sudden p that came from the counter beside her that created a like pattern across the pattern. It could be seen from the damage just how strong this p was.


    The receptionist was so scared that she took two steps back and almost stumbled over as she looked in the direction of the sound.


    There she saw the most beautiful female face that she had ever seen, so beautiful that even she had to admit defeat even though she knew that she was also quite beautiful¡­


    That beautiful face had a cold look on it as she said, "He''s busy."


    Then Ang took Lin Fan by the hand and pulled him away.


    The receptionist patted her heart to calm herself down since even though this was the upper realm, her cultivation was only in the Gold Realm.


    Momonga revealed a faint smile beforeing forward to take his card as well and saying, "I''m sorry about that, you know how some girls are."


    Then without waiting for a response, he followed the two of them.


    On the balcony above the counter on the second floor, there was someone leaning over looking at the state of the counter. After a few seconds, their lips curled and they said, "Interesting."


    After their voice fell, this figurepletely disappeared from the spot.

 348 Chapter 348

    Ang didn''t hold back at all with the way she grabbed Lin Fan''s hand. If Lin Fan''s body hadn''t be stronger, his hand definitely would have been crushed by her grip.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind since it warmed his heart that she would act this way.


    In her own way, this was how she showed that she cared.


    But Lin Fan also felt despair since he knew that he would be in trouble tonight¡­


    Momonga just watched the two of them with a faint smile.


    He might have been a lonely dog for thousands of years, but he definitely didn''t mind eating dog food. It had even be his own kind of entertainment.


    But that didn''t mean everyone else around them enjoyed it just like him.


    When they saw Ang''s beauty, it was like being dazzled by a spotlight, but no one came forward in the end. That was because they all saw how handsome Lin Fan was as well.


    Even the most prideful man didn''t dare take a step forward because he knew that he couldn''tpare to Lin Fan''s looks.


    Not to mention that no one here could see through their cultivations.


    Most of the people that were in the hall of the Seekers Guild were in the tinum Realm and there were a few that were in the Soul Realm. However, even with that being the case, they still weren''t able to see through the cultivations of these youngsters.


    That only meant that they were far more powerful than them and with their age, it would be crazy if they didn''t have a backer.


    The upper realm was definitely more dangerous than the lower realm, especially in Harmony City. If one made even a single wrong move in Harmony City, they wouldn''t know how they even died.


    Lin Fan was pulled by Ang over to therge board that was ced on the left wall, right in the middle of the exit and the counter.


    This giant board was the list of requests that the Seekers Guild received and the seekers that registered with the guild were free to choose a request to finish. Of course, just being a seeker didn''t mean that one would be able to take any request.


    Just like in the adventurers guild from the isekai novels that Lin Fan had read, the Seekers Guild had a simr system.


    The seekers that registered with the guild would be given a grade from F to A, with S to SSS ranks being awarded only to the leader of the rankings.


    Naturally as new seekers, the rank that Lin Fan''s group had all received was F rank.


    There were some new seekers that could receive special treatment if they joined with an introduction letter, bumping them up to C rank or even B rank, but of course that wasn''t the case for Lin Fan. He was nothing more than a new Soul Realm Expert from a lower realm, what kind of backing could he find?


    That meant that he would have to start his way from the bottom with F rank requests, but that was also the problem. F rank requests were at the very bottom of thedder, so naturally that meant that they had the lowest reward and the lowest point value.


    It took a hundred credit points to move up from F rank to E rank and each F rank mission was worth around 1 to 10 points, so that meant that it would take from 10 to 100 missions just to reach E rank.


    Not to mention the fact that Lin Fan had to reach S rank within two weeks to qualify for the yearly Hunters Organization exam. If he wasn''t able to qualify for this exam, he would have to wait an entire year before he would be able to qualify again.


    Then there was the fact that it cost ten times as many points to go from E rank to D rank. It cost ten times the amount of points for each rank increase, which meant that it would just be harder and harder to reach S rank.


    There was also a hundred times increase when going from A rank to S rank, which meant that in total, it would take a total of a billion points just to reach S rank. This seemed like an impossible task, but Lin Fan had no choice.


    The only saving grace was that seekers were allowed to take missions that were two times higher than their rank when they were in F-C ranks and missions that were one rank above their own when they were B rank. Only A rank were forced to stay within their own rank because S rank quests were only for the monsters that were able to reach S rank or those that received special permission. This meant that bypleting these higher tier missions, they would be able to quickly gather points and move up thedder much faster.


    Of course, this was only a rule that the Seekers Guild had provided for those that were truly monsters. For most of the normal seekers, they didn''t dare take this path because it was a path of suicide.<sub> </sub>


    Most of them were only normal experts, they had no way of fighting those that were above their own level, which is what it usually meant to skip ranks in epting missions.


    The missions starting from C rank all involved Soul Realm targets, so for those that were in the tinum Realm like most of the people here, it would be impossible.


    Of course, that wasn''t a problem for Lin Fan''s group.


    They quickly picked out ten D rank missions that were in the same area and registered them at the counter.


    The one strange thing that happened at the counter when they went there was that the receptionist there didn''t stop them at all.


    Normally, when people took missions that were above their own ranks, they would receive a warning from the Seekers Guild since the Seekers Guild didn''t want them to walk to their own deaths.


    But there wasn''t a single warning for Lin Fan''s group at all.


    The receptionist just said with a warm smile, "Good luck on your journey" before sending them off.


    But what no one noticed was that under the counter, there was actually a piece of paper that had the names of Lin Fan, Ang, and Momonga printed right at the top of it.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan''s group quickly left Harmony City and made their way into the wilderness outside.


    Their goal was a forest that was several dozen kilometers away called the Green Mist Forest.


    This was a ce that was filled with powerful beasts and rare herbs, which was what their targets were this time.


    It was too bad that they were only able to ept D rank quests, which meant that their opponents were only in the tinum Realm. For these three that were already in the Soul Realm and two that were far beyond that, it was as simple as flipping their hands to finish these missions.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the Green Mist Forest with their flying speed and they immediately charged in without caring for anything else.


    The Green Mist Forest had received its name from the ruler of the forest, which was a True Illusion Python. It was a beast that had already reached the Child Soul Realm and was on the verge of breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm, so it was considered quite powerful. However, in this human dominated realm, it wasn''t that powerful either.


    Since this was a human dominated realm, it meant that there weren''t any void cracks like on the Blue Star from the Beast Race invading. When the Beast Race did invade, they attacked this from off the and were kept away by the experts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    However, this was also a world that had a rich concentration of life energy, which made it very easy for beasts to evolve.


    The only reason why these beasts hadn''t all been destroyed was because they were more valuable as farms. Instead of killing them and harvesting their materials in one go, it was better to keep them alive and let them procreate, creating even more materials.


    That was why there were beast areas found all over the Gctic Humanity Alliance. They were allowed to stay there and humans went to kill beasts for materials from time to time.


    Of course, this was a world where the strong ate the weak, so there was no vengeance when beasts killed humans that wandered into their territory.


    Still, the humans had the bigger fists and those from stronger factions had tokens with the aura of those factions. When the beasts sensed the aura from those tokens, they would immediately know that these humans were ones that they couldn''t kill.


    It was a system that had a delicate bnce, but it was also a system that had been developed over thousands of years, so it had reached an equilibrium.


    Lin Fan''s group quickly made their way through the outer ring of the forest which only had weak beasts and soon reached the middle ring. Once they reached the middle ring, they longer went any further because there were only beasts and materials that were in the Soul Realm and above there. For now, they only had to deal with tinum Realm items, so there was no point in going in any further.


    But when they were about to start their search, they suddenly heard a voice call out, "Help!"

 349 Chapter 349

    As Soul Realm Experts with developed spiritual senses, it didn''t take them long to find the source of this voice.


    It was a group of kids who were facing a tinum Realm tiger beast. With their numbers, they should have easily been able to take care of a single beast, but it was too bad that these kids were all in the Gold Realm.


    Even if they worked together, it was impossible for them to take this tinum Realm tiger down, not to mention that two of them were already heavily injured. There was only one person who was facing down the tiger beast while the other two were tending to the two who were heavily injured.


    Momonga turned to look at Lin Fan in this situation, waiting for his reaction.


    He had seen that since Lin Fan recovered from the illusion, the split in Lin Fan''s soul seemed like it was much better than before. He wanted to use this situation to see just how much it had improved by.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before saying, "Let''s go save them."


    Momonga knitted his brows when he heard this and he replied, "Is there any point in saving them?"


    Lin Fan surprised him by saying in a very casual voice, "We can get information from them if we save them since we know nothing about the upper realm. Moreover, we don''t have to save them right away since they are not in any immediate danger, so we can see what kind of trump cards they are hiding to make it safer for ourselves."


    Momonga''s brows rxed and he nodded when he heard this.


    Lin Fan''s words were correct, they didn''t have a good understanding of the upper realm, so information was always good.


    Momonga and Ang were from a much higher realm, so they never paid attention to a low realm like this and naturally had no information.


    Lin Fan was from the lower realm, so he naturally didn''t have ess to information on the upper realm to begin with.


    Wandering around this realm without proper information definitely was not a smart move, so if they had a chance to obtain information, they definitely should take it.


    But Momonga was also able to see a trace of a different emotion in Lin Fan''s eyes when he said that they should save them.


    Still, it meant that the splitting of the soul was getting better and Lin Fan''s mind wasn''t as affected by it as before.


    This could be considered taking a step forward.


    After thinking this, Momonga gave a nod and they quickly headed off in the direction of the group.


    Once they arrived, they saw that the tiger was slowly approaching the group of kids, but they didn''t make a move yet since the kid that had been fighting the tiger was still standing strong.


    That kid had his sword at the ready and he didn''t look afraid, but it was clear that he was worried about his teammates.


    The tiger slowly moved forward and tried to avoid the kid that was standing in front of it to reach the easy prey, but the kid wouldn''t move out of the way. No matter how the tiger tried, the kid was surprisingly able to keep up with it the entire time.


    Seeing that it had no other choice, there was a gust that suddenly gathered around the paws of the tiger, creating wind armour around it. Before anyone could react, the tiger suddenly shed out with those paws, creating des of wind that flew out at the kid in front of it.


    When the kid saw this, he didn''t panic at all.


    There was a blue glow that suddenly appeared from his de before he shed out with his own des of water that shed against the des of wind.


    Both the des of water and the des of wind, when they shed with each other, they suddenly canceled each other out. It created arge spray of water and a st of wind in the surrounding area, falling over the kid and the tiger.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this since this was a simple application ofws, but this kid was only in the peak Gold Realm. If he was able to usews in the Gold Realm, then he really did defy all logic.


    But then Lin Fan noticed a pair of wings on the hilt of the kid''s de.


    It seemed like his pet hadbined with his weapon and it was the one that was supplying the waterws.


    This was a pet that was in the tinum Realm just like that tiger, so it could be understood why this kid was so confident, but their situation really wasn''t good.


    There were two of them that were heavily injured and the other two were only supporters that wouldn''t help much during this fight since there was too much of a disparity in strength.


    There was only this kid with his tinum Realm pet that had a chance against this tiger, but it was too bad that this tiger was in the mid tinum Realm and his pet was only in the low tinum Realm. Even if the kid wanted it to be stronger, it couldn''t be any stronger because it was being limited by the kid''s cultivation.<sub> </sub>


    It was clear that if they were in good condition, the group of kids would have been able to at least flee with the leader holding off the tiger, but it was impossible for them with their current condition.


    The tiger slowly whittled down the leader of the group until he had suffered several wounds.


    But as the tiger was about to bear down on them, there was a pure white dagger that suddenly flew through the air, aimed right at the head of the tiger.


    Before the tiger could even react, the dagger had pierced straight through the top of its head, piercing through its brains. Then without any dy, the tiger crumpled right onto the ground. Even in death, the tiger didn''t know what had happened to it.


    The kids immediately looked around with their guards up.


    This Green Mist Forest was considered a semiwless ce since it was quite remote. What happened here usually stayed here, so there were many instances of teams suddenly disappearing.


    Lin Fan had a smile on his face when he saw this and he floated out saying, "Do you really think I would need to ambush you to kill you?"


    Seeing him flying, they knew immediately that he was in the Soul Realm, so they let down their guards a bit. Lin Fan''s words were true, if he really wanted to kill them, he wouldn''t have bothered killing the tiger for them.


    With a flick of his hand, the dagger came out of the head of the tiger and appeared back in Lin Fan''s hand. When they saw this, they immediately let down their guard since this confirmed it.


    The leader of the kids came forward with cupped hands and said, "Thank you senior for helping us. This lowly one''s name is Xu Lin, may I ask what this senior''s name is?"


    Lin Fan just waved his hand and said, "You can just call me senior Lin."


    Xu Lin nodded before turning back to head over to his teammates.


    While it was important to show reverence to this senior that could kill them all, he was the leader of this team, so he also needed to take care of his teammates.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he liked someone like this, someone who took care of his own friends.


    When Xu Lin saw the wounds on his two teammates, he deeply knitted his brows.


    He knew that with these wounds, it would be hard for them to even survive, not to mention getting out of this forest. The worst part was that they hadn''t even reached their goal yet before they suddenly ran into this tinum Realm tiger.


    Even if they had double the guts, they wouldn''t dare take this tinum Realm tiger from Lin Fan since he was the one who had killed it. Without him, they might not have even been able to survive.


    Xu Lin wanted to ask Lin Fan for help with his teammates, but he couldn''t bring himself to say it.


    If Lin Fan was able to escort them out, they would be able to survive, but in the end, they didn''t know each other.


    Lin Fan had already shown them kindness by saving them from the tinum Realm tiger, but to ask him to escort them out...No matter how one looked at it, that was an excessive request.


    The upper realm was a dog eat dog world and those that let their guard down would be eaten.


    While Xu Lin was hesitating over what to do, Lin Fan just looked at him with a smile.


    He could easily see through what Xu Lin was thinking, but he still didn''t say a word.


    He wanted to put the pressure on Xu Lin to make negotiations easierter.


    The more pressure Xu Lin was under, the more likely he would agree to Lin Fan''s request.


    But of course, Lin Fan had his limits since this did involve human lives.


    After waiting a few seconds, Lin Fan said, "It isn''t impossible for me to help you, but there are conditions."


    Xu Lin was shocked to hear this, but then he immediately said, "Senior Lin, please tell me your conditions."


    Lin Fan revealed what he considered a bad smile as he said, "How about everything you have?"

 350 Chapter 350

    Xu Lin''s group were stunned when they heard this.


    They weren''t stunned because of Lin Fan''s request, rather they were stunned by Lin Fan''s smile.


    Compared to his usual smile, this "bad" smile was like night and day.


    The smile didn''t look evil at all, rather it made Lin Fan look even more handsome than he already was. Not to mention that he was already quite handsome¡­


    When they saw this smile, they couldn''t help being stunned by it.


    Even Xu Lin, who was a man, felt a strange emotion fill his heart when he saw this smile.


    Not to mention the two members of his party that were still standing. Both of them were girls¡­


    Girls naturally liked handsome guys and the moment these girls saw this smile, they were almost willing to give Lin Fan everything, even themselves.


    After all, he was just too handsome.


    But then Xu Lin came back to his senses and revealed a difficult expression as he said, "Senior Lin, do you really mean this?"


    Lin Fan saw this and he immediately gave what he considered was an "evil"ugh, but it was the same asst time.


    It was like a flower blooming on a bright summer day, it was too dazzling to look at for the girls and their faces turned red immediately.


    <o>,m With that "evil"ugh, Lin Fan said, "What do you think?"</o>


    Xu Lin was once again stunned by this, but then he revealed a difficult look, "Senior Lin, this is a bit¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words and just trailed off, but it was clear what he was thinking.


    Lin Fan then burst intoughter, but it was different from the "evil"ugh that he had shown before. Instead this was sincereughter that came from Lin Fan''s heart.


    He wiped a tear from the corner of his eye before saying, "Now, there''s no need to be that stiff. It was just a joke."


    Xu Lin''s expression froze on his face and his cheek couldn''t help twitching a few times as he shouted on the inside, "What kind of a joke is this!?"


    But of course, he would never say it out loud.


    Xu Lin just revealed a smile and said, "Senior Lin truly has a great sense of humour, but this does involve the lives of myrades, so¡­"


    Lin Fan stoppedughing and looked back at Xu Lin with a look of praise.


    This was a good leader, he cared very much for his subordinates, even though it was clear that this was a very bad situation for him.


    Lin Fan then revealed a serious look and said, "Alright, that''s not a problem. The thing is, I don''t have as much information as I want on this ce, so there are a few questions that I want to ask you. As long as you promise to answer my questions to the best of your ability, we''ll help you."


    When he heard this, unlike the happy or relieved look that Lin Fan thought Xu Lin would reveal, he knitted his brows even morepared to before. It was clear that he had some problem with this.


    Xu Lin hesitated a bit before saying, "Senior Lin, giving you information is fine, but can you please tell me what kind of information you''re asking for?"


    Lin Fan looked at Xu Lin for a bit after hearing this before shaking his head in disappointment.


    He thought that Xu Lin was someone that he would like based on how he had done his best to protect his teammates earlier, but it was clear that this wasn''t the case. He was still someone who cared about his own benefits in the end.


    But that did make sense since that was how the cultivation world was.


    In the end, the most important thing was one''s life and it was clear that Xu Lin was hiding some important information.


    During the fight, the two girls had looks of surprises on their faces as Xu Lin fought with the tinum Realm tiger. This clearly showed that they didn''t know about his tinum Realm pet, which meant that he had something he couldn''t reveal to others.


    Still, Lin Fan said with a serious look, "No, the deal is very simply put in front of you. You can either answer the questions or we''ll be on our way."


    Xu Lin felt a chill run down his back when he heard this.


    This voice was different from the friendly voice that Lin Fan had been using the entire time, this voice finally showed his prestige as a Soul Realm Expert.


    The tone of Lin Fan''s voice made it very clear, he could either answer the questions or Lin Fan had no reason to stay.


    That was the truth of this world, with power, one could act willful.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan wasn''t a charity, he had already saved their lives once, there was no reason for him to continue saving them.


    On the side, Momonga gave an approving nod.


    It seemed like his n had worked in the end, this Lin Fan waspletely different from before.


    Finally Xu Lin gave a sigh and said, "Senior, we ept your deal."


    To put it simply, he had no other choice in this matter.


    If he rejected this deal, even if he abandoned the rest of his team, it would be hard for him to escape. There were still plenty of tinum Realm beasts around and there was a very likely chance that he would since he had already spent most of his power fighting the tinum Realm tiger.


    Lin Fan gave a nod, but he was no longer as friendly as before.


    In the end, Xu Lin had let him down and he was no longer as interested in him as before. The only thing that Lin Fan cared about was the information he could get from him.


    Lin Fan turned to Ang and said, "Can you heal them?"


    Ang looked at the two injured kids on the ground and with a wave of her hand, a gust of wind came over them. As soon as the wind made contact with them, their wounds healed at a visible rate until theypletely disappeared.


    The other three kids were shocked when they saw this, but then they came to ept it.


    There were all kinds of abilities when it came to cultivation since the great path was filled with many different paths to travel. There was no set path to the great path, since all paths eventually led to the great path.


    It didn''t take long for the two injured kids to wake up, but they woke up at the wrong time.


    Once they woke up, Lin Fan turned to look at Xu Lin and said with a smile, "Now I think it''s time for you to pay up."


    This smile wasn''t the same "evil" smile from before, this was his normal smile. The smile that made him look like the definition of a scammer.


    Xu Lin revealed a bitter smile when he saw this, but he knew that he had no choice since he couldn''t beat Lin Fan, so he said, "Senior Lin, please ask any questions you have."


    Lin Fan nodded before asking, "First, tell me about theyout of the Green Mist Forest."


    Xu Lin was taken aback when he heard this. He took a minute to look over Lin Fan and when he saw that Lin Fan wasn''t kidding, he couldn''t help asking, "Senior Lin, is this a serious question?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this since he could tell something was off, but he still said, "Why do you say that?"


    Xu Lin took out a map from his Spatial Ring which he handed to Lin Fan and said, "That''s because this is something that everyone has ess to. It''s freely given out by most organizations since this is a public resource area."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked over the map and he could tell that it was indeed quite a detailed map of the area. He was able to easily find the area that they were currently in based on their surroundings.


    Lin Fan''s lips couldn''t help twitching as he asked, "Does that include the Seekers Guild?"


    Xu Lin was even more confused when he heard this, but he still said, "The Seekers Guild should give out the most copies of this map since the seekers from there are the ones that enter these forests the most. In fact, we''re seekers ourselves and we got our map from the Seekers Guild in Harmony City."


    Lin Fan had three ck lines appear on his head as he cursed the receptionist that he had met at the Seekers Guild.


    Back at the Seekers Guild, that same receptionist suddenly gave a sneeze.


    One of her coworkers asked, "Are you getting a cold?"


    That receptionist rubbed her nose before saying, "Could it be that someone is talking about me behind my back?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with this anymore and just took the map. Xu Lin was happy to hand it over since they still had more copies in the Spatial Rings of his teammates.


    Lin Fan continued asking several more questions, but they all took Xu Lin by surprise because they all involvedmon knowledge in this upper realm. It was something that everyone knew already¡­


    Could it be that this senior had been in closed door cultivation this entire time and literally lived under a rock?


    Lin Fan nodded as he listened to the answers, they provided quite a bit of information for him and how he wanted to act in the future.


    But then he decided to punish Xu Lin since he was acting like he was a bumpkin the entire time, even though he technically was.


    Lin Fan asked, "Well, this is a question you won''t want to answer, but what is with your pet?"


    At this, Xu Lin''s expression changed.

 351 Chapter 351

    Xu Lin already knew that this question would being eventually, but he held onto the faint hope that the senior had forgotten.


    But in the end, it still came like he had expected.


    Xu Lin revealed a difficult look since it was clear that it was something he wanted to keep secret, but Lin Fan pretended like he didn''t notice any of this.


    Finally, Xu Lin said with a sigh, "Senior Lin, it isn''t that I don''t want to tell you, but this involves a secret of my family. I do not want to involve you in my matters."


    Lin Fan just smiled as he said, "I think it''s already toote for that."


    Then with a wave of his hand, there was a green de that suddenly flew out into the forest.


    Instead of meeting no resistance at all and just flying through the forest, there was a suddenly shing sound, like the de of wind had hit a metal de.


    As this sound rang out, there was a figure that was knocked out of hiding in the woods and sent into the sky. That figure flipped twice in the air before suddenlynding in an open space.


    The moment Xu Lin saw this figure, he immediately narrowed his eyes and said, "It''s you!"


    The figurepletely ignored Xu Lin and just stared at Lin Fan with a cautious gaze before saying with cupped hands, "This senior, I don''t think that there''s any grievances that our organization has with you. Is there a reason that you are making a move today?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother answering this question as he directly said, "What are you offering me then?"


    Both Xu Lin and the figure were both shocked when they heard this as they looked at Lin Fan in disbelief.


    Xu Lin wanted to say something, but the figure was faster than him.


    The figure said, "Senior, if you''re willing to join us, we can give you the seat of an elder in our organization."


    It was clear that by the way this young expert usedws, he was clearly a Soul Realm Expert and with how young he was, he was clearly a very talented person. But the thing was that this figure had never heard of this person before.


    There were only two cases for that.


    One was that this young expert was a special genius trained by one of the twelve ruling forces or that this young expert was a true genius who had made his way up from the lower realm, meaning that he wasn''t affiliated with anyone.


    If it was the former, it was fine since this would mean that they would be able to be affiliated with one of the twelve great factions. If it was thetter, then it was even better since this meant that before anyone else found him, he would be able to bring this young expert to his faction to groom. As long as they were able to groom him, he would definitely lead them to greatness in the future.


    No matter how he looked at it, it was clear that he had given the better offer since in terms of power or the force behind him, it was all better than the kids.


    That was, unless the kid was willing to give this young expert "that".


    But that was even more unlikely since that kid''s family had been willing to die just to protect "that".


    Lin Fan stroked his chin before turning to Xu Lin, "You heard his offer, do you have anything to say in response to that?"


    Xu Lin had a very conflicted look on his face when he heard this.


    He knew that based on the current situation, if he were in Lin Fan''s shoes, he definitely would choose to ept this offer since an organization that could have a tinum Realm Expert as an assassin was definitely headed by a Soul Realm Expert.


    Other than the twelve great factions, Soul Realm Experts were considered powerful experts that led smaller factions that had influence in various parts of the city. To use aparison, the Soul Realm factions were like the nobles on the Blue Star.


    That also meant that each of their factions received quite a bit of resources.


    Compared to a kid that he didn''t know, what could Xu Lin offer him?


    Finally, Xu Lin took a deep breath and said, "Senior, are you willing to listen to my story?"


    Lin Fan maintained the same expressionless face, but he couldn''t help smiling deep down.<sub> </sub>


    Compared to that tinum Realm Expert, Lin Fan was much more interested in Xu Lin.


    The tinum Realm Expert only offered Lin Fan an elder position which Lin Fan definitely wasn''t interested in.


    Lin Fan was confident in his own strength and based on the fact that only a tinum Realm Expert was sent, it was clear that the leader of this organization wasn''t that strong. Lin Fan was confident in his ability to wipe them out since he had some understanding of the upper realm factions after listening to Xu Lin.


    At best, all this organization had was an Embryo Soul Realm leader to rely on and that was something that Lin Fan was certain he could beat.


    So if the figure had offered Lin Fan the leader position, he would have been more interested, but they didn''t so Lin Fan didn''t even consider it.


    Instead, what Xu Lin was hiding was definitely a treasure.


    For them to be willing to send a peak tinum Realm Expert toe and capture Xu Lin, it was clear that he was hiding something valuable.


    Plus there were Lin Fan''s own feelings. If he was to work with someone, he would choose to work with someone with Xu Lin''s personality instead of that idiot tinum Realm Expert who didn''t even bother hiding his killing intent.


    Xu Lin saw that Lin Fan didn''t say anything, so he continued, "I came to this Green Mist Forest to find a special herb to cure my father. As long as my father is cured, they won''t dare do anything to us."


    Then he turned and looked at the figure, "As for why my father was poisoned, it was all because they wanted something from our family, a special treasure that we passed down for generations. Senior, as long as you''re willing to help me find the cure and help our family destroy their organization, we can give you that treasure."


    Lin Fan looked at both of them for a few seconds before saying, "Not good enough. Be my subordinates and I''ll consider it."


    The first thing Lin Fan had to do was build his pet shop in the upper realm and the second thing he had to do was develop his forces. Since there was a chance to do so right now, why would he turn it down?


    But of course, he couldn''t just be partial towards Xu Lin because of his personal feelings.


    He turned back to the tinum Realm Expert and said, "The same to you, as long as you give me the leader position, I can consider working with you."


    Both of them revealed difficult looks because they never expected Lin Fan to be this greedy.


    But this was also just a part of the upper realm, everyone cared about themselves and greed was just second nature up here.


    This time, it was the tinum Realm Expert who was the first one to speak, "Senior, is there any other way? If you were to meet our leader, you would know that giving you the title of elder is already being very generous. I hope that you can understand that."


    There was a clear underlying threat in his voice, but that just had the opposite effect on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort before saying, "I''ll give you a minute to think it over. This is a one time offer."


    Just like that, the surrounding area fell into silence.


    A minute didn''t take long to pass, but before the minute did pass, there was a beeping sound that came from the tinum Realm Expert.


    When he heard this sound, he took out a token from his chest and seeing the glow that came from it, he suddenly revealed a smile.


    When the minute was over, Lin Fan looked at both of them and said, "Well?"


    Neither one of them said a word, but then after a few seconds of hesitating, Xu Lin asked, "Senior Lin, I can''t make a decision for my entire family, but if you can help us, we can definitely make it worth your time."


    Lin Fan shook his head at this before turning back to the tinum Realm Expert, but the tinum Realm Expert didn''t have the same difficult look on his face like before. Instead there was a calm smile as he said, "This kid, I suggest you put away your pride and consider joining us. The elder offer is no longer on the table, but if you work hard for us, we can guarantee that you''ll be able to be an elder one day."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but before he even had a chance to say a thing, there was a figure that fell down at him right from above. This figure moved at such a speed that the kids and the tinum Realm Expert couldn''t see him clearly, but that didn''t mean Lin Fan couldn''t.


    This figure didn''t hold back at all as he attacked Lin Fan.


    But before he could even hit Lin Fan, Lin Fan had already grabbed him by the neck.

 352 Chapter 352

    There was only silence in the air with the appearance of this figure.


    With the speed this figure had moved at, it was clear to everyone that he was in the Soul Realm.


    But before that person could even react, Lin Fan had easily caught him.


    Lin Fan turned back to the tinum Realm Expert and said, "So you were saying?"


    The tinum Realm Expert just looked at Lin Fan in disbelief. He couldn''t even say the words that were at the tip of his tongue as he could only stare at Lin Fan in a daze.


    That Soul Realm Expert that Lin Fan caught was caught off surprise, but he also immediately recovered and wanted to make a move, but he found that couldn''t move a single muscle. All he could do was stare down at Lin Fan in disbelief.


    This Soul Realm Expert was only in the low Fragmented Soul Realm, so naturally he wasn''t a match for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was already in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm and with his physique, he could easily take on those in the Embryo Soul Realm. He would even be able to match those in the Child Soul Realm if he went all out.


    It was no problem for him to use his life energy topletely trap this Fragmented Soul Realm Expert.


    But of course, this was something that no one had expected.


    While they knew that Lin Fan was in the Soul Realm, all of them thought that he was just a newly advanced low Fragmented Soul Realm expert at most with his age. They never thought that he would be able to subdue an expert who had been in the Fragmented Soul Realm for a long time with such ease.


    For Lin Fan, seeing the appearance of this Fragmented Soul Realm Expert, it made him even more excited.


    The appearance of this expert made it very clear, this was not something that was normal if they were willing to send this Fragmented Soul Realm Expert to capture this Gold Realm kid.


    It seemed like Lin Fan really had hit the jackpot.


    For the Fragmented Soul Realm Expert, there was one thing he couldn''t understand.


    He had clearly sensed that this kid was only in the low Fragmented Soul Realm just like him and his cultivation wasn''t as deep as his, so how could this kid catch him this easily?


    What he would never know was that this was done deliberately by Lin Fan.


    With his breakthrough in his cultivation technique, his body was much strongerpared to before.


    With such a powerful vessel containing his cultivation, there was no leakage at all. Unless Lin Fan decided to release his full aura, others would not be able to see through his cultivation at all.


    During this entire time, the cultivation that Lin Fan had been revealing was in the low Fragmented Soul Realm, which was why the Fragmented Soul Realm Expert had been so confident.


    It was too bad that Lin Fan was ying the pig to eat the tiger.


    When Xu Lin saw this, he immediately knew that this "Senior Lin" was not as simple as he seemed. He had seen through everything and controlled everything in the palm of his hands. Perhaps following him would turn out to be a good choice.


    After all, he clearly didn''t have fame in the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but he was trying to set up a faction around himself. If Xu Lin could join early, it would mean bing one of his closest followers.


    Of course, the inverse could also happen if Lin Fan wasn''t strong enough, but what he had shown was already more than enough to convince Xu Lin.


    Xu Lin came forward and kneeled down as he cupped his hands while saying, "Senior Lin, Xu Lin is willing to follow you and trying to convince the Xu Family to follow you."


    Then he quickly signaled with his head to the others behind him and they learned quickly as they also kneeled down, pledging the same thing to Lin Fan.


    The tinum Realm Expert saw this and knew that this situation was bad for him, but when he came forward to say something, he never would have expected Lin Fan''s next move.


    Lin Fan didn''t seem to pay any attention to the kids kneeling in front of him as he turned to look at the tinum Realm Expert.


    The tinum Realm Expert who had been about to say something saw this and thought that this was a good turn for him, but he never expected a piece of stone to fly right through his forehead. It pierced right through his skull and his brain before his body crumpled onto the ground.<sub> </sub>


    For Lin Fan, this tinum Realm Expert no longer had a role to y, so there was no reason for him to live. After all, he clearly didn''t bother hiding his killing intent earlier¡­


    The Fragmented Soul Realm Expert still being held by Lin Fan panicked when he saw this. He hadn''t even been able to see the stone fly out, which proved to him that Lin Fan was clearly much more powerful than him.


    But before he could say anything as well, Lin Fan tightened his grip around his neck and knocked him out before throwing him over to Momonga. Then he said, "You know what to do."


    Momonga took a deep look at Lin Fan before giving a nod.


    After the Fragmented Soul Realm Expert was pulled aside by Momonga, Lin Fan finally turned his attention back to the kids still kneeling on the ground.


    Looking down at them, he said, "As long as you truthfully tell me what you know, I won''t be against taking you in. But you should know what happens if you try to aim your fangs at me. I hope that you won''t have any ideas like that."


    Ideas about betraying him? How could they have those ideas after seeing everything that had happened?


    Seeing that none of them had any thoughts of this, Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod before turning back to Xu Lin to ask, "What is the artifact that your family has?"


    Xu Lin no longer hesitated likest time, he had beenpletely subdued by Lin Fan''s power. Xu Lin directly said, "It''s not really that high level of an artifact, but it holds quite the symbolic power."


    Then after pausing, Xu Lin entered his story, "The artifact that our Xu Family holds is only a Nascent Soul Realm Artifact, but this artifact once belonged to one of the elders of the twelve factions. The elder even dered that any who possesses this artifact would have the right to be the elder''s disciple."


    Lin Fan fell into thought once he heard this.


    It was even moreplicated than he had thought.


    If it was a simple artifact, he could just take it and destroy the other force, but if it was just a normal artifact that had a different meaning, then it was a different story.


    After all, Lin Fan wasn''t looking to join any of the twelve factions and getting involved in the fight of this upper realm.


    The only reason he wanted to be a part of the Hunters was because of the freedom that the Hunters Organization offered. The Hunters Organization allowed one to leave at any time and they never restricted one''s movements. One would forever remain a Hunter once they passed their exam and the only way to lose the qualification to be a hunter was to lose their license.


    For the Hunters Organization, the license was everything.


    It was even said that a Hunter''s license could bring one enough wealth to live several lifetimes if it was sold, it was even enough for an average person to be a Child Soul Realm Expert or even a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    It could be seen just how expensive and important a license was.


    But of course, no one would give it up since the benefits of a license were worth much more than what one could gain from selling it.


    Since that was the case, there was no need for Lin Fan to personally take the artifact, but he could help raise someone who would help him control one of the twelve great factions from the inside.


    Xu Lin was definitely the best choice since this artifact belonged to his family and he was someone with decent talent.


    He was a Gold Realm Expert that could control a tinum Realm pet, that kind of talent wasn''t thatmon. It meant that he already had a certain amount of control overws even in the Gold Realm.


    As long as he reached the tinum Realm, he would definitely be much stronger than all hispanions in the same realm.


    After Xu Lin exined what the artifact was, he continued, "Because of this artifact, their One Shadow Organization targeted our Xu Family for the artifact. To get it, the leader of the One Shadow Organization even went as far as poisoning my father, which is why I''m here. As long as I''m able to find the Cloud Lingzhi in this Green Mist Forest, I will be able to cure him."


    He didn''t say anything else, but with his pleading look, it was clear what he was asking of Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan didn''t promise him anything as he continued in his thoughts.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally came out of his thoughts and turned to Xu Lin to ask, "Xu Lin, how would you like to be the disciple of an elder of one of the twelve great factions?"

 353 Chapter 353

    Xu Lin looked at Lin Fan with a confused look for a bit before suddenly revealing a look of understanding.


    Lin Fan was going to give his family''s artifact to him?


    But didn''t he just say that he wanted it? Why did he suddenly change his mind?


    This was the chance to be the disciple of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, one of the elders of the twelve great factions! This was not a chance that presented itself that often and he was giving it up?


    Why?


    The Soul Realm was divided into five realms and one pseudo realm. Respectively, they were the Primary Soul Realm, the Fragmented Soul Realm, the Embryo Soul Realm, the Child Soul Realm, the Nascent Soul Realm, and the True Soul Realm.


    What one was trying to achieve in the Soul Realm was to refine a new soul for themselves, one that was much stronger than their old souls.


    The Primary Soul Realm was when one was able to condense a single fragment of their new soul, which signified that they had taken a step into the Soul Realm. It was the pseudo realm that one stepped into before fully breaking into the Soul Realm.


    One was recognized as a full Soul Realm Expert once they broke into the Fragmented Soul Realm where one had various fragments of their new soul.


    As they continued to increase their cultivation, gathering more and more fragments in the Fragmented Soul Realm, it would eventually be an embryo soul. This embryo soul would continue to grow until it became a child, an adolescent, and then an adult, which were respectively the Child Soul Realm, the Nascent Soul Realm, and the True Soul Realm.


    The True Soul Realm was the peak of what one could reach in the upper realm. Once one reached that point, they were qualified to start creating a realm of their own, which qualified them to move up to the Ster Kingdoms.


    That meant that all the leaders of the twelve great factions of the Gctic Humanity Alliance were in the True Soul Realm.


    Below those leaders were the various elders of the twelve great factions and naturally that also meant that they were a bit weaker than the leaders. All the elders of the twelve great factions were all in the Nascent Soul Realm, one step from the peak of the upper realm.


    The Gctic Humanity Alliance was several times bigger than the Blue Star and even the Blue Star had a poption that numbered in the tens of billions.


    That meant that the Gctic Humanity Alliance had a poption of hundreds of billions of people.


    Out of all those billions of people, the number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts could be counted in the thousands.


    It could be seen just how hard it was to be a Nascent Soul Realm Expert and how rare it was to have a chance to encounter one, not to mention having the chance to be their disciple.


    There was a chance that was now ced in front of Lin Fan''s face, but he was turning it down?


    If everyone in Harmony City were to learn of this, with just a single drop of spit from each of them cursing Lin Fan, it would be enough topletely drown him.


    But for Lin Fan, he didn''t want to be pulled into a faction that would force him to y the game of politics. All he wanted to do was just run his shop and earn more points for him to increase his cultivation with.


    There was still something else that he needed to do, so his final goal wasn''t just this upper realm.


    When Lin Fan saw that Xu Lin wasn''t saying anything, he said, "If you''re not willing, then¡­"


    But before he could finish, Xu Lin immediately said, "I''m willing, I''m willing!"


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Good, now show me the way."


    Xu Lin was confused for a second as he asked, "The way? Senior Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "What else could I mean."


    After Xu Lin thought about it, he suddenly understood.


    With an excited look, Xu Lin immediately headed off in a direction into the forest as he said, "Senior Lin, please follow me!"


    The other four kids also quickly ran off after Xu Lin.


    As for Lin Fan''s group, they slowly followed behind him, but they kept up with rtive ease. After all, there was such arge difference in cultivation, so there was no way that the speed they traveled at would ever be the same.


    Along the way, Lin Fan asked Momonga, "Did you find anything else?"<sub> </sub>


    Momonga just gave a shrug without saying anything else.


    There was nothing else to add since the kid Xu Lin had already said everything, but at least this proved that he did have sincerity, which was half of what Lin Fan needed to cooperate with him. The other half would depend on what he would do next.


    As for the Fragmented Soul Realm Expert, his corpse would make good fertilizer for the nts that grew out here.


    It didn''t take them long traveling since they were still quite fast as they were still in the Gold Realm.


    It took them half an hour to arrive at a waterfall that was covered in mist.


    When they arrived nearby, Xu Lin turned back to Lin Fan to say, "Senior Lin, this is where the Cloud Lingzhi is said to be. It''s said that it''s guarded by a tinum Realm Cloud Serpent, but I''m sure that it won''t be a problem for Senior Lin."


    Lin Fan ignored him as he looked into the sky, where there were ck clouds that were currently gathering above the waterfall.


    Xu Lin saw that Lin Fan wasn''t moving, so he continued, "Senior Lin, if you go through the waterfall, there should be a cave where the Cloud Lingzhi¡­"


    But then Lin Fan suddenly raised a hand to cut him off before saying, "Be quiet."


    Xu Lin immediately closed his mouth and moved to the side even though he didn''t understand what was going on.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything else as he just stood there watching the clouds gather above the waterfall.


    After half an hour, the clouds had fully gathered and the sky had turned dark. It really seemed like it was about to rain.


    This made Xu Lin''s group of kids even more confused. They were all experts, what did they care about a little rain for?


    But since they were only in the Gold Realm, they didn''t know what the true form of those dark clouds were.


    For Lin Fan who had just broken through a few days ago, he couldn''t be more familiar with them.


    They were the clouds of tribtion that appeared when a tinum Realm Expert broke through to the Soul Realm. It seemed like the information here was only half correct. The Cloud Serpent was indeed in the tinum Realm, but it also seemed like it was about to break through to the Soul Realm.


    Even if it did break through, it still wouldn''t be a threat for Lin Fan''s group, but why waste effort when you could just not?


    With a snap of his finger, Lin Fan called out a small bird, a little dog, a little lizard, a small pile of rocks, and a little white tiger. They were none other than the pets that he had, excluding Brainy and Shiro.


    Brainy was still at the edge of breaking through since Brainy focused more on its spiritual energy cultivation than its normal cultivation, making its cultivation speed much slower than the rest of Lin Fan''s other pets.


    Shiro was still sleeping in the pet space. She had been sleeping the entire time and yet her cultivation grew, but it also grew slowly. ording to Jin and Yin, Shiro had been sleeping for the longest time and she still rarely woke up.


    They also said that she had suffered some injuries while protecting them, which was why she slept so much. She had to slowly recover her strength.


    Lin Fan had tried looking for something in the system to help her, but without knowing specifically what was wrong, the cure all just cost too much, so that was why she was still sleeping.


    The moment these five pets appeared, Ang ignored everything and went over to pick up the little white tiger. The little white tiger didn''t resist and just let her pick it up as it snuggled into her embrace.


    This was Xiao Bai who Lin Fan had saved all that time ago, but had never summoned into battle since it had been cultivating the entire time. It took a long time for it to finally digest the divine beast bloodline it had received and now it had finally caught up to the rest of its peers.


    When the pets were summoned out, they all looked around for their enemies since that was usually what happened. But when they didn''t see any enemies at all around them, they all looked at Lin Fan with confused looks.


    With their tiny forms, they looked quite cute.


    As for why they were in tiny forms, now that they were close to reaching the Soul Realm and bing King Beasts, they were slowly getting more proficient with using the transformation technique.


    But of course, before they became King Beasts, they still wouldn''t be able to transform into humans.


    Lin Fan said with an "evil" smile, "It''s time for all of you to break through."

 354 Chapter 354

    The pets that Lin Fan had were all still in the peak tinum Realm, ready to break through to the Soul Realm at any time.


    The only reason they hadn''t broken through yet was because they hadn''t undergone their tribtion yet.


    Lin Fan didn''t let them out on the Blue Star for their tribtion because that would have drawn too much attention to them.


    Five tribtions alling from Lin Fan''s store?


    There was no better way to draw more attention to himself than that and he had already drawn enough attention to himself on the Blue Star.


    Instead he had kept them in the tinum Realm until they had reached this upper realm.


    Then again, it wasn''t like Lin Fan actually needed them to help him fight back on the Blue Star after he had broken through. Just with his power alone, he was already the strongest person on the Blue Star.


    Lin Fan''s pets were confused at first, but then they could sense the tribtion clouds that were above them and they immediately understood what was happening.


    The pets all happily ran off towards the waterfall, but they were doing it in their small forms. Looking at them running through the forest like this, one really expected a predator to suddenly show up and carry them off. However, that would never happen because the aura they released from their bloodlinepletely suppressed all the surrounding beasts.


    That was, except for the Cloud Serpent who waspletely focused on its cultivation.


    Lin Fan''s pet arrived at the pool underneath the waterfall and they yed around in the water for a bit.


    On the side, Xu Lin and his group watching this couldn''t help having looks of doubt on their faces.


    Xu Lin couldn''t help asking, "Senior Lin, this is?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a mysterious smile and said, "Just wait and see. This isn''t a chance you get to see everyday, so watch carefully."


    Xu Lin was still confused by this, but he still turned back to look at the pets in the pool.


    After ying around for a bit, the pets suddenly started to expand, growing to several times their original size.


    Once they finished expanding, they looked like powerful beasts. Beasts that no one would dare mess with.


    The five of them suddenly split out around the waterfall in different directions, forming a pentagon with the waterfall right at the center.


    Once all five of them were in position, they released their aura and the clouds in the sky became even darker. It continued to grow darker as the aura around the five of them became stronger and stronger.


    While outsiders weren''t allowed to interfere in lightning tribtions, something interesting happened when multiple experts underwent their tribtion in the same general area.


    What happened was that the force of the lightning tribtion stacked and those undertaking tribtion would take that tribtion together.


    There would be pros and cons for both those with greater talents and lower talents.


    Those that were more talented would have their tribtions weakened which would make it easier for them to pass their tribtion, but they didn''t get the powerful cleansing effect that came with the tribtion lightning.


    Those that were less talented would find their tribtion harder, but they would gain much more than if they passed the tribtion normally since they would be cleansed with a higher tier of lightning.


    The saying went, rewards came from risks and there were no rewards if there were no risks.


    Of course, with the bloodline of Lin Fan''s pets, naturally they were all undergoing the highest grade of tribtion, the Tribtion of Death.


    The ck lightning rumbled in the clouds, as if it was building up more and more power.


    Even with them bringing the Cloud Serpent along with their tribtion, it didn''t affect it at all.


    With all five of them present, the diminishing effect of the Cloud Serpent was almost negligible.


    The five of them were gathered in a pentagon formation around the waterfall not just to keep the waterfall right in the center, but rather because they had formed a formation.<sub> </sub>


    Because of Lin Fan using them tobinews previously, they had gradually learned to work with each other and slowlybine theirws. Then there was Xiao Bai and Rocky who cameter, but the three older pets taught them how tobinews since they had already learned how to do it previously.


    Any single one of them was already talented enough to break through the ck lightning tribtion by themselves, but now that they had formed an array to break through together, it was much too easy for them. They could even take a nap while this tribtion was going on.


    As time passed, the clouds became darker and darker.


    Inside the waterfall, the Cloud Serpent was confused as it thought to itself, "Strange, why is the tribtion taking so long? It should have already happened, but the lightning still isn''ting down."


    An entire half an hour passed before Lin Fan finally said, "It''s time."


    Xu Lin and the others had been bored waiting, so they had gone off to the side to see if they could find any beasts to hunt, but strangely they were able to hear Lin Fan''s voice even though they weren''t anywhere near him.


    As soon as they heard the voice, they immediately came back to the waterfall and they arrived just in time to see the first bolt of lightning fall down.


    The moment the lightning appeared, the kids werepletely filled with shock.


    ck lightning, they had never heard of a ck lightning tribtion before. But they could sense the power that was contained within the ck lightning, just a single wisp from thatrge bolt of lightning was already enough topletely destroy them.


    The ck lightning fell down right in the center of the array and it passed right through it, falling down on the waterfall.


    The reason why the Cloud Serpent had chosen to undergo the tribtion in this waterfall was because it had also set up an array around the waterfall. It took it several hundred years toplete this array since it was made from the cores of various tinum Realm beasts just like itself.


    If this array was released at full power, it would definitely be able to even block the attack of a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert.


    But the moment the ck lightning fell down on the array, it shattered the array without any resistance andnded on the Cloud Serpent.


    The Cloud Serpent had also never heard of a ck lightning tribtion before and it was shocked when it felt the power of the lightning bolt. Even after using all of its strength, the Cloud Serpent was still being slowly cooked alive by that ck bolt of lightning.


    Bit by bit, its skin was being charred and soon the meat underneath that skin would bepletely cooked.


    The Cloud Serpent didn''t have any idea what was going on, but it had no choice at all in this matter.


    With a roar, there was a pair of horns that suddenly appeared on the Cloud Serpent''s head.


    Lin Fan on the side was surprised to see this. He never expected that this was a snake that had jumped through the dragon''s gate and had developed drops of dragon blood.


    This was a pleasant surprise, but it posed no threat to Lin Fan at all.


    Even with the horns that appeared on its head, the Cloud Serpent still wasn''t able to block the full force of the lightning at all.


    As it became more and more charred, it couldn''t help wondering what it had done to offend the heavens that caused them to send down this kind of punishment. It definitely couldn''t be that he had developed a trace of dragon''s blood because this wasn''t heaven defying enough for the heavens to want to punish him. There were plenty of other beasts in this forest that had developed dragon''s blood that had still undergone normal lightning tribtions.


    The Cloud Serpent was about to curse the heavens with itsst words, but then it felt something change. The bolt of lightning was no longer as strong as before and slowly it was able to use its power to block it.


    This change naturally wasn''t because of the Cloud Serpent itself, it was because the five outside had finally used their powers to block the ck lightning tribtion. Before this, they had allowed the ck lightning tribtion topletely fall through their array to hit the Cloud Serpent alone, letting it take the brunt of the tribtion.


    The Cloud Serpent had to bemended since it was able tost that long under the might of sixbined tribtions alone, not to mention tribtions that had ck lightning.


    The Cloud Serpent knew that something was clearly off, but it didn''t have time to think at all as the heavens had already sent the second bolt of ck lightning down at it.


    The ck lightning fell right through the array again andnded directly on the Cloud Serpent.


    It had just been able to molt after being refined with the power of the heavenly lightning, turning back to its beautiful white colour, but it was burnt to a crisp once again by the heavenly lightning.


    Even the single tear that came out of the Cloud Serpent''s eye immediately evaporated.


    But the same thing happened again like with the first bolt of lightning, the power suddenly cut off when the Cloud Serpent was about to die.

 355 Chapter 355

    After experiencing it twice, the Cloud Serpent naturally knew that there was someone messing with it. They were using the power of the tribtion to weaken it, but there was nothing the Cloud Serpent could do.


    If the Cloud Serpent divided its attention for a single second, it would immediately be burnt to a crisp and would never even have the chance to find out who did this to it.


    So the only thing the Cloud Serpent could do was try to recover as fast as it could and try to break through this tribtion.


    Based on how that unknown person was ying with it, the Cloud Serpent would be in danger when it came to its final bolt of tribtion lightning.


    It was clear that the unknown person was using the tribtion lightning to weaken the Cloud Serpent before finally taking it out, so thest bolt of lightning would be the moment that unknown person struck.


    For that moment, the Cloud Serpent had to gather as much of its strength as it could to be able to defend itself.


    But the Cloud Serpent also couldn''t help feeling a bit of fear towards this person. After all, someone who was able to control the lightning tribtion definitely wasn''t normal. At least it wasn''t something someone who was in this upper realm could easily do. Only those at the very top of the upper realm could do something as crazy as this.


    That still didn''t make sense since why would theye all the way here just to deal with it? It was nothing more than a peak tinum Realm Cloud Serpent that had just broken through to the Soul Realm, there was nothing valuable that it had!


    The Cloud Serpent didn''t have time to think about all of this because the bolts of lightning were still falling.


    Just two bolts of lightning were already enough to put it in this condition and they were the weakest two bolts of lightning. Would it even be able to survive what woulde next?


    Survive!


    It had to survive just to show these people how strong it was!


    That was the little bit of pride that it had left.


    As for Lin Fan''s pets, they were sitting in their positions in their array, watching the Cloud Serpent''s performance.


    They couldn''t help finding it funny how hard the Cloud Serpent tried, but they also felt a bit of admiration for it. After all, it definitely wasn''t easy to pass through the ck lightning tribtion, especially with five of them stacked together.


    But what the Cloud Serpent didn''t know was that if it didn''t try so hard, it would suffer much less since Lin Fan''s pets would have taken the tribtion for it.


    Still, at the same time, since it was taking the ck lightning tribtion instead of its normal blue tribtion, it would be much strongerpared to before since it was receiving a higher level of cleansing from the tribtion lightning.


    It continued like this, the bolts of lightning fell down through the array of Lin Fan''s five pets,nding on the Cloud Serpent. The Cloud Serpent would take the lightning tribtion for as long as it could before the five pets released their array to block the lightning tribtion for it.


    However, with each bolt of lightning that fell down, the Cloud Serpentsted less and less time.


    Soon it was time for the final bolt of lightning, but this time the Cloud Serpent couldn''tst at all. As soon as the bolt of lightning fell down, the array immediately activated to block this for the Cloud Serpent.


    The Cloud Serpent was shocked and it was even more confused.


    It had thought that whoever was messing with it wanted to use the lightning tribtion to weaken it before killing it with the final bolt of lightning, but now they took the final bolt of lightning for it?


    What did all of this mean?


    Even though the final bolt of lightning was blocked for the Cloud Serpent, it had still gained quite a bit from this tribtion.


    It smoothly broke through into the Soul Realm after the final bolt of lightning and it took a few minutes to consolidate its realm before flying out of the waterfall and flying into the sky.


    The Cloud Serpent roared out, "Who dares mess with this king!"


    It addressed itself as a king now since it had broken through to the Soul Realm, so now it was officially a King Beast, so it could call itself a king.


    But when it did fly out, it suddenly felt the five other auras that were surrounding it.


    These auras weren''t weaker than it at all and at the same time, there was a strange sense of suppression that came from these auras. It was a suppression that wasing from its bloodline.


    That feeling was especially strong for the aura that was directly north to it.


    The Cloud Serpent was about to run, but then it felt those five different auras approaching it and it could only stand firm. After all, it waspletely surrounded by these auras that were approaching it.


    Since it had no choice, it could only fight.


    But as the auras approached, the Cloud Serpent couldn''t see any beasts that were approaching it. When they finally reached the Cloud Serpent, all it saw were a few small specks thatnded near it.


    Respectively, they were a chicken, a lizard, a dog, a tiger cub, and a pile of rocks¡­


    Just what was going on here?<sub> </sub>


    The proud Cloud Serpent was feeling pressure from these tiny little animals?


    The Cloud Serpent couldn''t help feeling a bit of shame at this which it immediately tried to take out on these small animals.


    However, before the Cloud Serpent had a chance, these small animals suddenly transformed into five little kids.


    They were all little kids who weren''t even a tenth of the Cloud Serpent''s size, but the pressure became even stronger after they had transformed.


    The Cloud Serpent began to panic as it felt all this pressure and it roared out at the kids, "You dare provoke this king? Do you want to die?"


    As it hissed at the kids, opening its mouth and showing its fangs to scare the kids, one of the kids, one that was dressed in an azure robe that was clearly too big for it, suddenly reached out its hand to p the Cloud Serpent.


    The Cloud Serpent couldn''t resist at all as it was pped right to the ground.


    When it finally reacted to what had happened, it turned to look at that kid in the azure robe with a terrified look.


    The Cloud Serpent stuttered as it said, "You, just what are you?"


    But the kids didn''t bother answering this at all as they all jumped out to beat on the Cloud Serpent.


    The Cloud Serpent could onlyy there and take its beating¡­


    On the side, Xu Lin''s group were stunned as they watched a group of kids that were even younger than them beat down on this Soul Realm Cloud Serpent. They couldn''t believe their eyes when they saw this.


    But the emotion they felt the strongest was a strange feeling.


    They couldn''t tell exactly what it was, but they just found it strange watching these kids beat up this Cloud Serpent.


    As for Lin Fan, he couldn''t help putting his head in his hand.


    He felt like he didn''t teach these kids well enough since their first reaction was to hit this Cloud Serpent.


    Lin Fan always considered himself quite the civilized person, he would never do something like this.


    If all of the people that Lin Fan had fought before had heard this, they definitely would have cursed him out.


    After beating up the Cloud Serpent, the kids lifted the spread out Cloud Serpent together, bringing it over to where Lin Fan was watching from.


    When the kids appeared in front of Lin Fan, they all ran forward with a smile while lifting up the Cloud Serpent, just like kids that were showing their parents a proud achievement of theirs.


    They even shouted, "Dad, dad, look what we brought back!"


    Lin Fan''s face had three dark lines appear when he heard this.


    He was still a young man, how did he suddenly have five kids?


    But all of his pets were just born a few months ago, so they were indeed still kids. Even if their cultivation grew quickly, they were still kids mentally. That was why they had taken the form of kids when transforming into humans.


    The kids threw the Cloud Serpent right in front of Lin Fan and then Ang came over to give them all pats on the heads.


    For some reason, whenever Ang came in contact with kids, it was like a switch was turned on and she turned into a different person.


    She was theplete opposite of the cold person she normally was, she was a kind and caring person towards these kids.


    Lin Fan even thought that this was her true personality.


    Xu Lin had been silent on the side, but seeing thisrge Cloud Serpent being dropped in front of him, he couldn''t help asking, "Senior Lin, what are you nning on doing with this Cloud Serpent? SInce it''s a King Beast, the materials from it should sell well."


    Lin Fan turned back to Xu Lin and said, "I''m not selling it."


    Xu Lin''s mind turned quick and he said, "Then senior, are you nning on using its materials to create artifacts? I know a few good cksmiths."


    Lin Fan revealed a mysterious smile at this, "I''m not using its materials for that either."


    Xu Lin was confused, "Then senior, are you going to tame it? But it''s much inferior to your current pets."


    Lin Fan''s mysterious smile became wider as he said, "I''m not taming it¡­" Then after a pause, he said, "You are."

 356 Chapter 356

    "Ha?" Xu Lin said in a shocked voice.


    He couldn''t understand what Lin Fan had just said.


    After all, he was still only in the Gold Realm, there was no way that he could form a contract with this Soul Realm King Beast. He had only been able to barely form the contract with the tinum Realm pet that he currently had.


    If it wasn''t for his family using a special method to help him control it, he definitely wouldn''t have been able to tame it by himself.


    Xu Lin then got over his shock and said, "Senior Lin, you must be joking. No matter how you look at it, it''s impossible for me to tame this Soul Realm beast!"


    But Lin Fan didn''t act like it was a joke at all.


    With a wave of his hand, there was a blood red needle that appeared in his hand.


    Once this needle appeared, Lin Fan said with a confident smile, "With this, it''s possible."


    Xu Lin looked at the needle for a bit before saying, "But that''s just a normal needle, how can it help me tame this?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Why do you think it''s a normal needle? Use your spiritual sense."


    Xu Lin listened to Lin Fan and released his spiritual sense. The moment his spiritual sense made contact with the needle, it was like there was an intense power that met it. It was almost as if this intense power was about to subdue his spiritual sense.


    Xu Lin had no choice but to quickly pull his spiritual sense away since it almost felt like he was about to lose control of it.


    Xu Lin looked at the little needle in Lin Fan''s hand with a bit of fear as he asked, "Senior Lin, what is this thing?"


    Lin Fan had the same confident smile as he said, "It''s a special item that I have that can allow you to tame this Cloud Serpent, there''s nothing else you need to know."


    Xu Lin was naturally still curious, but he also knew where to draw the line. Which expert didn''t have their own secrets?


    If he pushed too much, it might hurt him instead.


    So Xu Lin just calmly epted this and waited for Lin Fan to do his thing.


    Lin Fan went over to the Cloud Serpent that was unconscious on the ground and pped its face until it woke up.


    The moment the Cloud Serpent woke up, it immediately attacked out of instinct, but it was pped down again by Lin Fan.


    The Cloud Serpent had an aggrieved look on its face as it looked around, trying to figure out where it was.


    Lin Fan looked over the Cloud Serpent and felt that it wasn''t bad. It was nothing more than a normal beast, but it was able to somehow develop a few drops of dragon blood which meant that it had some talent. It would be able to protect his investment.


    The needle that Lin Fan took out was a special needle from the system called the Servant Needle.


    It would forcefully create a master and servant contract where the beast would be freely under the whims of the master. But the key thing about this contract was that the cultivation of the beast didn''t matter, it could force even those that were stronger than the master to be their pets.


    Of course, there would be a limit on this heaven defying item. The Servant Needle would only work on those beasts at most in the Soul Realm.


    Anything that was beyond the Soul Realm would just be too hard for the Servant Needle to tame.


    Lin Fan looked up at the Cloud Serpent who was looking around in a daze and felt strange to be looking up, so he jumped up and put his foot on the Cloud Serpent''s head, forcing it to the ground.


    The Cloud Serpent felt the force of his foot on its head and it couldn''t resist at all as it was forced down onto the ground, no matter how hard it tried to resist.


    When it was forced onto the ground, it looked up at Lin Fan with a bit of fear.


    The Cloud Serpent still didn''t know what was going on and it had been forced to the ground like this, naturally it would be afraid.


    Lin Fan could see this and he said with a smile, "Don''t worry, I don''t want to do anything bad. I just want to make a deal with you."


    But this wasn''t the handsome smile that he had, rather it was the same smile he normally had in his store¡­<sub> </sub>


    The Cloud Serpent almost burst out into tears when it saw this as it asked in a stuttering voice, "What, what kind of, of deal are you offering?"


    Lin Fan said with the same smile as he pointed at Xu Lin, "You just have to follow and protect my friend here for a bit, it''ll be helpful to your cultivation."


    The Cloud Serpent looked at Xu Lin and could instantly see through his cultivation. It said in a doubtful voice, "But he''s only in the Gold Realm, how will he make a contract with me?"


    Lin Fan raised the needle in his hand and said, "As long as you let me poke you with this needle, you''ll see what I mean."


    The Cloud Serpent felt like something was wrong and couldn''t help trying to wriggle back, but Lin Fan''s foot was still on its head, so it couldn''t move at all.


    It had no choice but to let Lin Fan poke it with the needle.


    If anyone who didn''t know what was going saw this scene, they would have felt something different from seeing this scene. It was almost like someone luring a little child with candy¡­


    After the needle poked the Cloud Serpent, there was a red burst of energy that came out of the needle and created a symbol on the Cloud Serpent''s head.


    When this symbol was made, Lin Fan waved his hand at Xu Lin toe over as he said, "Put a drop of your blood on this."


    Xu Lin bit his finger and dripped a drop of blood onto the red circle. As soon as the blood touched the red circle, there was a red energy that came out of it and went right onto the back of the hand the drop of blood came from. It created the same symbol that was on the Cloud Serpent''s forehead.


    Xu Lin was shocked when he saw this, but then he felt the sensation from the red circle on his hand. Through that red circle, it felt like he couldpletely control the Cloud Serpent.


    As for the Cloud Serpent, it knew that it had been tricked, but there was nothing that it could do since the contract had already been formed.


    Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod at this and then he said to Xu Lin, "Give me a part of your soul."


    Xu Lin was shocked when he heard this, "Senior Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan said, "You''ll be working for me, but how long have we known each other?"


    Xu Lin immediately understood what Lin Fan said, but was there anything he could do in this situation?


    Still, Xu Lin wasn''t in the Soul Realm and he wasn''t able to easily manipte his soul, so he said, "Senior Lin, how do you want me to give you a piece of my soul, I can''t freely manipte it."


    Lin Fan turned to Momonga who immediately came forward and reached out his hand towards Xu Lin before saying, "Give me your hand and don''t resist."


    Xu Lin didn''t know what was going on, but he followed Momonga''s reaction and gave him his hand.


    Once his hand was ced in Momonga''s hand, there was a burst of dark energy that suddenly appeared, wrapping around Xu Lin''s hand. That dark energy suddenly entered Xu Lin''s hand and Xu Lin could feel this intrusion into his body.


    He could tell just how powerful it was and even if he wanted to resist, he wasn''t able to, but he didn''t resist.


    It felt like something was ripping a piece of him out as the dark energy spread through his body and after some time, the dark energy came out, but there was something that was wrapped up inside of it. This was a mass of blue energy that waspletely wrapped up inside of this dark energy, but there was a strange resonance between it and Xu Lin.


    Well it wasn''t a strange resonance, it was because this was a part of Xu Lin to begin with. This was a part of Xu Lin''s soul.


    If Xu Lin ever betrayed Lin Fan, he would be able to crush this piece of his soul and seriously injure him or even kill him.


    Momonga then sent that blue mass of energy into Lin Fan''s hand and he put it away inside a crystal before putting it away in his Storage Ring.


    This was the crystal that had contained a piece of the Beast King''s soul before Lin Fan had destroyed it, so it would definitely be able to contain Xu Lin''s soul since that was what it was made for.


    Xu Lin naturally felt a bit off after having a piece of his soul ripped out of him, but he quickly epted it since he had already made his decision to be loyal to Lin Fan.


    Since that was the case, there was no use crying over spilt milk.


    All he needed to do was enjoy the benefits since after all, he had made a contract with a Soul Realm beast.

 357 Chapter 357

    Since this matter was settled, there was nothing the Cloud Serpent could do except ept this.


    Once that was settled, Lin Fan let the Cloud Serpent get up and the Cloud Serpent went over to Xu Lin.


    Even if it had no choice but to ept this, it still couldn''t help testing the boundary of this new seal that was ced on it. When everyone turned away, the Cloud Serpent tried to attack Xu Lin, but that didn''t go well.


    The red mark on its head suddenly lit up and there was a wave of red electricity that swept through its body, shocking it until it couldn''t move at all. Finally, the red electricity stopped and the Cloud Serpent fell to the ground.


    Lin Fan saw this and revealed a cold smile, but he didn''t say anything else.


    This Servant Needle was something that came from the system, would it really be that easy to break?


    It was something that had cost him a million points which at this point was considered a lot for him.


    After buying everythingst time, he had only managed to save another five million points, so this item had cost him a fifth of the points that he had.


    It was a good thing that the shops on the Blue Star were still running and providing him with more points, but there was a limit to how many points they could provide him each day. He didn''t know what he would be facing in this upper realm and before he set up a shop here, he should be saving his points just in case¡­


    Still, this was an investment that he was willing to make since this involved one of the twelve great factions. This was just how much influence they had on this upper realm.


    Lin Fan brought this group running around in the Green Mist Forest because they had epted quite a few missions with the Seekers Guild back in Harmony City which was all for the Green Mist Forest. Lin Fan''s original goal was to finish all these missions, but then he got caught up in the plot against Xu Lin''s family which took up his time.


    Now that was over with, Lin Fan was going back to his original n to gather the materials needed for his missions.


    Since they were all Soul Realm Experts, it didn''t take them long to find the required things, especially since they had the Cloud Serpent who was considered a local.


    The Cloud Serpent had been living in the Green Mist Forest for quite some time now, it had taken over a thousand years for it to finally break through the Soul Realm. So it could be said that it knew theyout of the Green Mist Forest quite well.


    With their powerful spiritual senses as Soul Realm Experts which allowed them to cover several kilometers at a time, they quickly found the materials and also quite a few powerful beasts that were hidden away cultivating.


    While they were gathering these materials, Lin Fan had let out his pets to have some fun. They had just broken through to the Soul Realm, so they were raring to fight, which Lin Fan didn''t mind. He would need the corpses that came from their fights for something elseter anyway.


    That was, everyone was allowed to go except for Xiao Bai who Ang had trapped.


    Xiao Bai was forced to take its little tiger form and was being held by Ang the entire time. Xiao Bai was like the one kid whose mother didn''t let them go out to y.


    "Not bad, but you need to learn how to control that power better." A beautiful woman in a pure white cloud embroidered dress said.


    Xu Lin was panting as he faced the tinum Realm beast that was standing in front of him. He didn''t even get the chance to reply as the tinum Realm beast charged at him again.


    Xu Lin used his de covered in blue energy to sh out at the tinum Realm beast that charged at it, but the tinum Realm beast used its ownws to block this attack before wrapping around to attack Xu Lin from behind. Xu Lin quickly turned and shed out once again to block this attack, creating arge shockwave as the two sides shed.


    "Keep going, you''re almost there." The woman in the white robe casuallyid down on her side, watching over Xu Lin''s fight.


    Xu Lin had a bitter smile on his face when he heard this, but there was nothing he could do since this woman in the pure white robe was in the Soul Realm. Well, it wasn''t that he couldn''t do anything, but rather this was what he needed to do to finish his training.


    While the woman in white justzilyid there, there was someone who walked up from behind it and asked, "How''s he doing?"


    The woman in white began by saying, "He''s fine. He''s actually quite talented¡­"


    But then she immediately jumped up and no longer acted the same way as she respectfully said, "Senior, this is the fifth tinum Realm beast he''s fought, so he''s slowly adapting. He should be able to beat it this time."


    ''


    The one who came up from behind was Lin Fan, he hade back from searching for materials.<sub> </sub>


    On the side were the kids that came with Xu Lin, watching with bated breath as Xu Lin fought the tinum Realm beast.


    It had to be known that this tinum Realm beast was as strong as the one that had almost killed them earlier.


    As for the woman in the white robe, she was the Cloud Serpent after she had taken her human form.


    Earlier, Lin Fan had pped it on the head and said, "You''re too big, turn into your human form."


    Since then, the Cloud Serpent hadn''t dared to turn back into its giant serpent form.


    Of course, since it had lived its entire life as a beast, it still wasn''t used to being in human form. All of its actions were quite crude and not something that a properdy would do at all.


    Lin Fan nodded before saying to Xu Lin, "You have five more minutes. Finish up now we''re heading back."


    Xu Lin''s bitter smile became even wider when he heard this.


    This senior Lin, he really didn''t know what moderation was¡­


    This was a tinum Realm beast that was much stronger than him and he wanted him to finish it in just five minutes?


    But Xu Lin didn''t have a choice, so he used all the life energy inside him and pulled some out of the Cloud Serpent as he shed down once again at the tinum Realm beast.


    The tinum Realm beast was unable to block it this time since this attack contained the power of the Cloud Serpent, a King Beast. It was smashed into the ground like the four previous tinum Realm beasts.


    Since Lin Fan had aplished all his goals, he immediately called back all his pets and put them away along with the beast corpses they had brought back. That is, all of them except for Xiao Bai who Ang refused to part with.


    In the end, Ang was still the one person that Lin Fan could never deal with, so he just left Xiao Bai outside in Ang''s hands.


    At first, Xiao Bai had enjoyed being in Ang''s hands, but after the constant petting and ruffling of its fur, it looked at Lin Fan with a look of entreaty. However, Lin Fan turned away when it looked at him like this.


    Lin Fan was definitely a whipped man in this rtionship¡­


    It didn''t take them long to return to Harmony City and before heading to the Xu Family, they headed to the Seekers Guild since Lin Fan wanted to turn in his missions first.


    When they arrived, it was already night time since they had spent the entire day wandering around in the Green Mist Forest.


    The Seekers Guild operated on a 24/7 basis, with rotating shifts since seeker work was very unstable. There were plenty of seekers that went out in the middle of the night because there were some nocturnal beasts that only came out at night. As such, there was a need for someone to be on duty during the night.


    Since it was night time, the bar in the Seekers Guild was much more livelypared to during the day time. Along with this change, the receptionist behind the counter had also changed.


    Lin Fan went straight up to the counter and with a wave of his hand, he brought out all the materials needed for his missions and then took out his seeker license.


    The receptionist was surprised, but being the professional that she was, she quickly took care of the processing for this.


    In just a single day, Lin Fan had jumped up from a F rank to a D rank. These D rank missions that he finished were all worth around a hundred points and he had finished around ten of them, giving him the thousand points that he needed to reach D rank.


    This was very fast progress, but it wasn''t the fastest progress recorded.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t just done with handing in these quests, there was something else he had to do.


    Lin Fan asked the receptionist, "Do you know where the guild''s beast sale counter is? I took care of some beasts on my way back and I want to sell them to the guild."

 358 Chapter 358

    The Seekers Guild not only provided seekers with missions, they also bought beast corpses. However, even though they bought beast corpses, the price they paid was much worsepared to outside.


    Instead of offering the same amount as others would offer for the same grade beast corpse, the Seekers Guild paid less than half of that amount. Normally it wouldn''t even be 25% of the price offered outside.


    Instead of paying with money, what the Seekers Guild did was pay in points.


    They would match the rest of the price outside with points instead of paying in spirit stones.


    Each spirit stone would be converted into one point, so it wasn''t that easy to earn points this way either.


    But that only applied to beasts that were below the Soul Realm.


    The receptionist was surprised to hear this, but then she said, "You can sell beast corpses over at that counter."


    The receptionist pointed at a counter that was right beside the mission board where there was a rough looking man who was almost half asleep waiting there.


    The receptionist had been surprised since most people didn''t even consider selling beast corpses to the Seekers Guild since they could earn much more money from selling it outside. All the points were good for was to increase one''s ranking, the points couldn''t even be exchanged for anything.


    Most people would be able to slowly gather points and increase their ranking anyways, so there was no one that would choose to use this method.


    After all, money was the best thing that one could have in this upper realm. Money was the only thing that one could really trust.


    With money, one would be able to live anywhere. With money, one would even be able to escape Harmony City¡­


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and said thanks before heading over to that counter.


    The man who was on duty didn''t even notice this since he was about to fall asleep. He had been there the entire day and not a single person hade over to the counter.


    It wasn''t just today, this was the same story every day, which was why he enjoyed his job. He just got to sit at a counter all day and he was paid for that.


    Only when Lin Fan rang the bell that was ced on the counter did that man finally wake up and see him.


    The man looked at Lin Fan in surprise as he asked, "Do you need help? Are you lost? If you are, go to the counter with the cute girl over there, she''ll be able to help you."


    Lin Fan didn''t respond to this, instead he said, "I''m here to sell some beast corpses. Thedy at the counter said that this was where I should go."


    The man looked at Lin Fan like he wasn''t even speaking the samenguage before repeating, "You''re saying that you want to sell beast corpses? Why?"


    Lin Fan didn''t reply to this either as he just said, "Is there a ce for me to take them out or can I just put them on this counter?"


    The man still didn''t fully believe that Lin Fan wanted to sell beast corpses, but since it was his job, he had no choice but to bring Lin Fan into the back where there was a storage space set aside for this. Once he arrived, he motioned for Lin Fan to bring out the beast corpses in the center of this room and what he received was a shock that he had never received before.


    With a single wave of Lin Fan''s hand, there were ten corpses that appeared and while they weren''t big, that didn''t mean that they weren''t shocking. After all, all of these corpses were all peak Fragmented Soul Realm beasts.


    Even a normal Fragmented Soul Realm beast corpse was considered rare, not to mention ten of them.


    It had to be known that most of the seekers in the Seeker Union weren''t even in the Soul Realm, most of them were either in the Gold Realm or the tinum Realm, only those that were at the peak of the rankings were in the Soul Realm. But even then, most of them were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Those that were stronger had all gone on to pass the Hunter''s exam and be Hunters.


    This was just the reality of the upper realm.


    This Seekers Guild was just a ce for the Hunters Organization to take in new talent, so most of the people that were stuck here were the untalented, but they still yed an important role. They did all the grunt work of the Hunters Organization through missions that the Hunters Organization issued.


    It was the same for most of the other factions.


    Those that were powerful enough were at the top and the normal people who lived in the realm would never be able toe in contact with things that were in the Soul Realm or above.


    Take the man who worked this counter, he was only in the tinum Realm, so he was only able to run a counter here, but he would have been able to run an entire family on the Blue Star.<sub> </sub>


    That was the difference in quality when it came to life energy concentration.


    The man couldn''t help moving up and looking over the corpses that Lin Fan brought out. It wasn''t that he doubted their authenticity since he could feel thew energy that came from them, but it was just too hard to believe it.


    Each of these corpses on the outside would be able to sell for tens of thousands of spirit stones and yet there was someone selling them here where they wouldn''t even receive half that amount, there was no sane person that would do that.


    The man hesitantly looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Are you sure you want to sell these here? There are plenty of other ces where you can sell these for a higher price."


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with this and just said, "Just ring me up."


    The man saw that Lin Fan was determined, so he didn''t bother saying anything else and went over to the counter and began making his calctions. After making his calctions, he came back to Lin Fan with a receipt for his items.


    The ten corpses sold for a total of one hundred and eight thousand spirit stones. Then with the percentage that the Seekers Guild would take, Lin Fan would be receiving twenty seven thousand spirit stones while he would be receiving eighty one thousand points.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t finished there as he took out another fifty high Fragmented Soul Realm beast corpses.


    The man was shocked once again, but he still did his job. However, this time, he didn''t dare treat Lin Fan the same way as before and treated him with the utmost respect now.


    After counting everything and checking the condition of the corpses, the fifty corpses all sold for around ny thousand, but the man rounded it up to two hundred thousand with Lin Fan''s other sale.


    That meant that in a single day, Lin Fan had earned a hundred and fifty thousand points, one hundred and fifty one thousand if he included the points from his mission, which was enough to push Lin Fan right up to B Rank. This was one of the fastest rises in rank in almost the entire history of the Seekers Guild, but normally no one would do this since they would lose too much from this.


    After taking care of Lin Fan''s transaction, the man said, "The Seekers Guild doesn''t have that many spirit stones on hand, so we''ll do a wire transfer to you instead. Show me your watch and I''ll do the transfer for you."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile at this and said, "I actually don''t have an ount open, so I can''t do a transfer. Is there a way for me to set one up here?"


    Not only the man in charge of this counter, but even Xu Lin''s group who had followed along were shocked by this.


    Someone that wasn''t registered to thework of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, there was only one possibility. Well, two if one added in the other possibility that was close to impossible.


    One possibility was that they had been living under a rock forever, so they never registered, which was close to impossible since it was impossible to not live under the influence of one of the twelve factions in this realm.


    The only other possibility was that they came from a lower realm, which was why they had never registered.


    Even if they came from another upper realm, they would still be registered in this system since it was a shared system between upper realms.


    But someone who was this powerful came from a lower realm?


    That was impossible!


    The man hesitantly asked, "Are you someone who has been in closed cultivation since you were born?"


    Lin Fan was confused as he said, "No, why would I do that?"


    The man then asked, "Are you from a lower realm?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and asked, "Yes, what''s wrong with that?"


    The man swallowed a mouthful of saliva with difficulty before saying, "Nothing, nothing, I''ll set you up right now."


    The man quickly helped Lin Fan set up a new ount, not just Lin Fan, but also Ang and Momonga since neither of them had ounts either.


    Once they were done, he transferred the amount that Lin Fan was owed.


    This service was very quick, which Lin Fan was very satisfied with. In the end, he even gave the man a tip of a few spirit stones.


    After Lin Fan''s group left, the man quickly came out of his daze and was about to run to the second floor, but there was a figure that appeared behind him.

 359 Chapter 359

    The man was shocked to sense that person behind him, but when he quickly turned around to see who it was, he was even more shocked.


    The man said, "President, what are you doing here?"


    The president just smiled without saying a thing.


    The man then said, "President, those kids that just left now, they are¡­"


    The president raised a hand to cut him off and said, "I know. I already have people looking into them. If they are what I think they are, this year''s Hunters exam will really be interesting. If they even make it through, I might be able to receive a good bonus from the Hunters Organization¡­" After saying this, the president revealed a faint smile.


    The man fell into a daze when he saw this smile since it was a smile that was like a flower blooming.


    After the president came back from their fantasy, they said, "For now, just keep this information to yourself. The less people that know about this, the better, understood?"


    The man gave a gulp when he saw the cold way the president was looking at him and he quickly nodded as he said, "Yes, president!"


    But when he said this, the president had already disappeared.


    The woman that he had called president was the president of the Seekers Guild, someone who had quite a high position in this Harmony City. But not only that, she was known as one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City.


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan''s group left the Seekers Guild, Lin Fan said, "Let''s go to your Xu Family now."


    Xu Lin''s eyes lit up as he said, "Yes boss!" He had been waiting for Lin Fan to say this the entire time.


    Now that he had obtained the Cloud Lingzhi, all that was left was to feed it to his dad to cure his poison and the One Shadow Organization was finished.


    Xu Lin didn''t wait at all as he called a beast carriage over.


    While there were cars in this world, most people didn''t use them since beast carriages were actually much faster than cars. Not to mention that there were also beast carriages that used flying beasts, which meant that they could go ces that normal cars couldn''t go.


    Cars were generally only used in the lower realm or by those without any cultivation or had low levels of cultivation.


    While Harmony City was called a city, it was actually much bigger than a normal city. It was even bigger than Supreme City back on the Blue Star.


    If Lin Fan had topare it to something, it was even bigger than the municipalities from China on earth. It was actually almost as big as the Guangdong Province from earth, but it was also tightly packed with people and buildings, giving it a poption of over a billion people in this city alone.


    But Harmony City was also the biggest city in the Gctic Humanity Alliance since it was a city that was built by all twelve factions together, which was why it upied such arge area and had so many people.


    Normal cars definitely wouldn''t be able to transport people across thisrge city.


    The beast carriage that Xu Lin hired quickly drove its way through the streets of Harmony City and they soon arrived in a smallmunity. This was amunity in name, but it was already the size of a municipality from earth.


    At the very center of thismunity was the Xu Manor who ruled over this area.


    The Xu Family had an Embryo Soul Realm Expert at the helm, so it was able to easily control this area, but when it came to the entirety of Harmony City, he was only considered a local tyrant.


    Once the beast carriage arrived at the Xu Manor, Xu Lin wanted to quickly head in, but Lin Fan slowly came out of the carriage. He even took the time to turn and help Ang down. Even if Xu Lin was anxious, there was nothing he could do in the end since he already decided to follow Lin Fan.


    Once they all got out of the carriage, Xu Lin quickly led them up to the gate.


    When the guards at the gate saw this group approaching, with how dark it was, the first thing they said was, "Please turn back, this is private territory. If you don''t turn back, please don''t me us for being impolite."


    Normally they wouldn''t act like this, but with the situation of the Xu Family, they had received orders to turn away all visitors and they had been given permission to use force.


    But before either of the guards could even raise their weapons, Xu Lin had alreadye forward with a token in hand as he said, "Where are your eyes? Don''t you even see who I am? Move out of the way, now!"


    Instead of how he normally acted, Xu Lin now had the aura of a young master.


    When the guards saw Xu Lin and the token he held, they immediately changed their tone. One of the guards said, "Young master, you''re finally back! Please hurry and see the old master, he doesn''t have long."<sub> </sub>


    Xu Lin was shocked when he heard this. He immediately grabbed the cor of the guard who had said that and said, "What do you mean by that? Tell me right away!"


    The guard shrunk back at this, but he said, "Young master, there''s no time for this right now. Please go and see the old master."


    Xu Lin could tell that his tone wasn''t normal, so he let go and immediately went in.


    When the rest of them tried to go in, the guards moved forward to stop them. Seeing this, Xu Lin said, "They''re with me, back to your positions."


    The guards immediately gave a salute and said, "Yes, young master."


    Based on how they acted, it was clear that Xu Lin''s status in the Xu Family wasn''t low. Then there was the fact that he had been given a tinum Realm pet to protect himself with.


    They went right through the gates and headed into the depths of the Xu Manor.


    Along the way, there was almost no one in the halls other than a few guards.


    Finally, when they arrived in the deepest room in the manor, there were plenty of people gathered outside that room. Looking carefully, they all looked somewhat simr to Xu Lin.


    When they arrived, everyone turned to look at them and a few of them came out of the center to where Xu Lin was.


    These were all old men and one of them asked, "Xiao Lin, did you get it?"


    Xu Lin took out the Cloud Lingzhi and said, "Second uncle, I got it."


    <o>,m When they saw the Cloud Lingzhi, every single one of these old men let out a sigh of relief.</o>


    This was the Cloud Lingzhi that Xu Lin had gotten from the Green Mist Forest, rather it was the Cloud Lingzhi that he got from the Cloud Serpent''s home. It turned out that the Cloud Lingzhi was something that only grew from the waste of the Cloud Serpent, so without the Cloud Serpent, there would be no Cloud Lingzhi.


    That also meant that since the Cloud Serpent hade back with Xu Lin, the Cloud Lingzhi was now something that he could farm.


    The Cloud Lingzhi was considered a rare medicine, so it would definitely sell well.


    The old man who had just spoken waved his hand and said, "Clear the way, clear the way!"


    As he said this, all the people gathered outside the door immediately parted like waves, creating a path to the door for Xu Lin.


    The old man turned back to Xu Lin and said, "Xiao Lin, hurry up and feed this to your father, he can''t hold on any longer."


    Xu Lin heard this and knitted his brows even more, but he still gave a nod and headed right down the path to the door.


    Lin Fan was about to follow him, but Xu Lin''s second uncle came forward to stop him as he said, "I don''t know who you are, but this is Xu Family matter. Please respect this and stay back."


    Xu Lin had been heading forward, but when he heard this, he immediately turned around and stopped his second uncle as he said, "Second uncle, this is Senior Lin. He was the one who helped us get the Cloud Lingzhi and he might be able to help father."


    Xu Lin''s second uncle hesitated a bit, before relenting.


    The main reason he was relenting was that he couldn''t sense Lin Fan''s cultivation at all and he was a peak Fragmented Soul Realm Expert. That meant that Lin Fan was probably in the Embryo Soul Realm just like the family head¡­


    This kind of an expert was not someone their Xu Family could offend right now.


    So Xu Lin and Lin Fan went into the room while everyone waited outside. The kids were unable to help and Momonga and Ang just weren''t interested.


    When they came into the room, they saw a man who was an older version of Xu Lin lying in bed with a face that waspletely dark. It was clear that the poison he was suffering from was very strong and that he didn''t have much time left.


    Xu Lin quickly came forward and without any hesitation, he stuffed the Cloud Lingzhi in the man''s mouth.


    When he felt something in his mouth, the man suddenly woke up and looked up in surprise, but seeing that it was his son, he began chewing the thing in his mouth.


    But even after he ate the Cloud Lingzhi, his face was still as dark as before.

 360 Chapter 360

    The man could naturally feel the situation with his body and knew that there was nothing that could be done, so he said, "Ah Lin, it''ll be up to you to run the family from now on."


    Xu Lin''s eyes filled with tears when he heard this and he said, "Father, no, it''s not your time yet. There''s still more, eat some more and it''ll work."


    After saying this, he brought more Cloud Lingzhi out of his Spatial Ring which he ced in front of his father, but his father just shook his head.


    Xu Lin''s father said, "There''s no point, I know my body''s condition. You should save these for the future."


    Xu Lin wasn''t willing to give up as he said, "Father, you can''t give up now. I need you, the Xu Family needs you, we all need you."


    Xu Lin''s father gave a sigh before saying, "I never thought that our Xu Family would end like this, but there''s still a bright side. I''ve already talked to your uncles and they''ve all agreed to abandon this ce and bring you to the True Spirit Sect to meet the elder. As long as you have the artifact, you''ll be able to be the disciple of the elder. With your talent, I believe that you''ll be able to get revenge for us one day."


    Xu Lin shook his head and said, "Father, what are you saying? You can''t just give up like this."


    Xu Lin''s father was silent for a bit before finally noticing Lin Fan. He gave an awkward cough before saying, "This friend, I''m sorry that I wasn''t able to greet you properly. May I ask who you are?"


    Xu Lin also realized that Lin Fan was in here with him and he hadn''t introduced him at all, "Father, this is Senior Lin. He was the one who saved us in the Green Mist Forest and helped us obtain the Cloud Lingzhi¡­"


    But then Xu Lin''s tone suddenly changed as if he had realized something, "Senior Lin, do you have a way to save my father? Without my father, there is no Xu Family and there''s nothing for you to obtain."


    Xu Lin''s father was confused by this as he asked, "Ah Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    But Xu Lin didn''t have time to care as he waspletely focused on Lin Fan''s reaction.


    Lin Fan had been silent on the side the entire time since he had been observing Xu Lin''s father''s situation.


    The way the poison moved around his body, it was something that Lin Fan had read about before.


    Without saying a word, Lin Fan turned and headed to the door.


    Xu Lin was shocked at first, but then he quickly followed behind Lin Fan, leaving his father to sit there in a daze, wondering what was happening.


    When Lin Fan came out of the room, everyone turned to look at him, but seeing who he was, they all felt disappointed and returned to their matters.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about them either as he headed over to where Momonga was and asked, "Do you remember the recipe for the Cleansing Cloud Pill that you tried to teach me before? Give it to me again."


    Momonga was surprised to hear this at first, but then he remembered something and he gave a nod before taking out a piece of paper and a pen.


    This was a pill that Momonga had tried to have Lin Fan make when he had been teaching him alchemy, but since they didn''t have the ingredients back then, they hadn''t been able to make it. Since that was the case, they could only forget about it.


    The main problem was that the ingredients needed for this pill were mainly found in the upper realm and they were hard to obtain in the lower realm. However, now that they were in the upper realm, that wasn''t a problem.


    Especially since they had already obtained the main ingredient, the Cloud Lingzhi.


    It was only then that Xu Lin came out of the room as well.


    This time, the crowd outside the room reactedpletely differently to when Lin Fan hade out.


    Xu Lin''s second uncle immediately came forward and asked, "Xiao Lin, how is your father? Did you cure the poison with the Cloud Lingzhi?"


    Xu Lin had been focused on Lin Fan, so he was surprised when he heard this, but then he said while shaking his head, "It didn''t have any effect¡­" After saying this in a sort of a daze, he turned his attention back to Lin Fan.


    While his family members were anxiously discussing what to do now that their only hope had failed, Momonga had finished writing down the recipe.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan took it and went over to the crowd, moving through it until he was right beside Xu Lin. It was then that he said, "Find me all the ingredients on this, do it as quickly as you can if you want to save your father."


    Before Xu Lin could even say a thing, his second uncle came forward to point his finger in Lin Fan''s chest and said, "That''s enough out of you. We''ve already been kind enough to let you in here, but now you''re making these ims that you can save the big brother? I won''t let you get away with things like this even if you did save Xiao Lin."


    Lin Fan gave a sigh as he looked at the second elder before he prepared to turn to leave. Since that was the case, there was no need for all this trouble. Anyway, when the Xu Family was destroyed, he could stille back and take what was his, there was no need for him to put in all this effort.


    Though, there was a bit of pain in his heart since that Servant Needle had cost him quite a bit.


    If he could, it would be best if he could take the artifact and send Xu Lin to where the elder was.


    Besides, it seemed like the elder was in the True Spirit Sect, right where Liao Family was...That would be quite the chip to have¡­


    But before Lin Fan could leave, Xu Lin suddenly came forward and said, "Second uncle, I won''t let you do this."


    Xu Lin came in front of Lin Fan and said, "Senior Lin is the one who saved my life and he already promised that he would help our Xu Family. If we turn him away now, where would our face go?"


    The second uncle had a vein pop out on his forehead as he said, "Xiao Lin, you¡­you...you unfilial son! You''re colluding with outsiders now? After all our Xu Family has given you? Do you even remember that the one lying in the bed in that room is your father!"


    Xu Lin''s face was covered with sadness when he heard this before he said, "Second uncle, it''s because it''s my father in there that I have to do this. I''ve seen Senior Lin''s abilities before and I know what he can do, that is why I''m doing all this. I beg you to believe in me this one time." After saying this, he gave a bow to his second uncle.


    His second uncle just looked at him with a shocked look and said, "You...you...you¡­"


    While this was happening, the other old men on the side began trying to convince the second uncle as well.


    "Old second, this is the first time Xiao Lin has asked for anything. Let''s trust him this time."


    "Old second, you know what kind of person Xiao Lin is. He wouldn''t joke about something like this."


    "Old second¡­"


    The second uncle looked at all of them and slowly his firm look fell apart.


    That was the thing with the Xu Family, unlike those families with true power, because they were a family without that much power, there wasn''t as much infighting amongst them. There might be a few people in the same generation who were rivals with each other, but they never developed any animosity between them.


    The second uncle finally gave a snort and said, "Do what you want!"


    But after that, he didn''t forget to re at Lin Fan and say, "I''ll be watching you carefully. If you dare do anything to betray Xiao Lin''s trust or hurt big brother, I won''t let you off, even if it means dying with you!"


    Then he was about to storm off, but then he realized that he wouldn''t be able to watch over Lin Fan if he did, so he came back and stood on the side with a grumpy look on his face.


    Xu Lin just had a bitter smile on his face.


    He wanted to trust Lin Fan, or rather, he had no choice but to trust Lin Fan since Lin Fan was holding a piece of his soul.


    While that piece of his soul being destroyed might not kill him, there was still a very good chance that it wouldpletely cripple him¡­


    Xu Lin turned back to Lin Fan and said with cupped hands, "Senior Lin, please help my father."


    Lin Fan had already stopped and turned around to watch all of this. He did feel a bit emotional since he had to admit that the Xu Family was a good family, even if the second uncle was a bit stubborn, it still meant that he was thinking about his big brother.


    Lin Fan just pointed at the paper and said, "Get the ingredients that I need and then we''ll talk."

 361 Chapter 361

    It didn''t take long for the Xu Family to prepare these items.


    They had been a family that had a long history of several thousand years, so they had a bit of resources umted.


    Not to mention that the ingredients that Lin Fan needed weren''t considered very rare. They were rare, but they were only slightly rare.


    Most of them were already in the Xu Family''s storage and the ones that weren''t were easily brought over from stores that were under the Xu Family''s management.


    Xu Lin had the subordinates of the Xu Family bring all the ingredients to a quiet room that he had prepared for Lin Fan.


    All of this had only taken fifteen minutes, but during those fifteen minutes, Xu Lin''s father had fallen unconscious again.


    While most of the elders were watching over him, Xu Lin, his second uncle, and his fourth uncle all came to watch over Lin Fan.


    But when they were about to enter the room, Lin Fan suddenly stopped them and said, "You can''te in and watch my refining process."


    The two elders immediately knitted their brows when they heard this.


    The second uncle came forward and said, "How can you expect us to trust you if you''re not even willing to let us see what you make? I will not let you feed whatever you make to big brother like this! Who knows if it is poisoned or not!"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "This is my recipe, you should know what that means."


    The second uncle wanted to say something else, but he swallowed his words since he knew what Lin Fan meant by these words. This was a principle that hade from the Alchemy King Hall, but it had spread all over the upper realm.


    Most alchemists had their own private recipes which they relied on to make money, or rather most of the famous ones.


    Since that was the case, if they were to allow others to watch them refine pills, that would be showing their recipes to them which they definitely could not allow. It would be equal to taking away their livelihoods.


    Even though he understood, the second uncle seemed like he still wanted to argue, but Xu Lin came forward to say, "Second uncle, there are enough ingredients here to refine more than one pill and I''m sure there won''t be just a single pill in each batch, isn''t that right, Senior Lin?"


    Lin Fan looked at him for a bit before giving a nod.


    Xu Lin then continued, "Since that''s the case, how about we test one of the pills before feeding it to my father?"


    The second uncle looked like he still didn''t want to agree, but this was the bestpromise for everyone, so he had no choice but to agree.


    Since that matter was settled, Lin Fan went right into the room and closed the door.


    It didn''t take him long to finish refining this pill, but during the process, there was a lot of heat and sound that came from the room. It almost sounded like he was fighting a battle in there.


    But once he opened the door and appeared again, Lin Fan shocked everyone who had been waiting there.


    It wasn''t his appearance that shocked him, but rather the appearance of the pills that were floating in his hands covered in mes.


    When he took the first step out of the room, the mes around the pills dissipated and they fell down into Lin Fan''s palms.


    The three people waiting outside couldn''t help rubbing their eyes before moving forward to look at the pills in Lin Fan''s hand. When they saw the pills in full, they were shocked once again.


    It hadn''t been a mistake, they had actually seen the pill line on the surface of the pill.


    The grades of pills used in the lower realm were only for pills that hadn''t reached the Soul Realm yet, but once a pill reached the Soul Realm, it was no longer ssified with the same grading.


    Once a pill reached the Soul Realm, it was graded with pill lines that formed on the surface of the pill.


    There were a total of nine pill lines that could form on a pill and the limit of the Soul Realm was three lines, but just forming a single pill line was already hard enough. Those that could surpassed the normal grading for alchemists, reaching the level of Pill Line Alchemists.


    There were few Pill Line Alchemists in the entire upper realm, almost all of them were in the Alchemy King Hall.


    That was because to push a pill to the Pill Line Grade, it required not only one to have a powerful cultivation, but also incredible skill in refining pills.


    Most people only focused on one thing or the other, no one usually mastered both to the level of bing a Pill Line Alchemist.


    The status of a Pill Line Alchemist was much higher than normal experts since they were much rarer.<sub> </sub>


    But one couldn''t look down on Pill Line Alchemists either since they definitely weren''t weak either. After all, these Pill Line Alchemists needed high enough cultivations to refine their mes to the point where they could refine Pill Line Grade Pills.


    While the other three people looked at Lin Fan in shock, Lin Fan himself was quite a bit disappointed.


    When he saw that there was only a single pill line on the pill that he had refined, he was filled with disappointment since he had expected it tok form at least two pill lines. But Lin Fan really was expecting too much since his spiritual sense had just reached the bottom line to refine Two Pill Line Pills.


    After they were shocked for a while, they suddenly heard the boom of thunder over them.


    Everyone with a bit of knowledge on alchemy knew that this was the thunder tribtion that was caused by the formation of a Pill Line Pill.


    The three people surrounding Lin Fan backed away and Lin Fan looked up at the thunder cloud above him with a look of expectation.


    After his tribtionst time, he hadn''t been able to find a way to provoke lightning to fall down on him again. After all, he had gained quite a bit from his tribtionst time, so now he had be somewhat addicted to being hit by lightning.


    It didn''t take long for the lightning bolt to finish gathering since this was only a weak tribtion for a One Pill Line Pill, which should only be in the peak of the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    But before the bolt of lightning fell down, it was almost as if the lightning cloud could feel how heaven defying Lin Fan naturally was, so it suddenly gathered even more lightning. The lightning continued to churn in the cloud until it reached the level of a Two Pill Line Pill lightning tribtion, which was equal to the Child Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan''s body was currently only at the level of the Embryo Soul Realm¡­


    Once it finished gathering, the lightning fell right down onto Lin Fan, but surprisingly, it still couldn''t do a thing to him.


    That was because Lin Fan had used his absorption force to take away most of the power behind the bolt of lightning, making it weak enough for him to resist it with his body alone.


    As his body was hit by the lightning, he slowly refined its power to make his body stronger and stronger.


    Finally, the bolt of lightning disappeared,pletely being absorbed by Lin Fan, but he still wasn''t able to break through with this bolt of lightning.


    After that bolt of lightning finished, the clouds dissipated in front of Lin Fan''s disappointed gaze.


    He couldn''t help thinking, "Why is there only one bolt of lightning? Shouldn''t there be nine of them?"


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that Pill Line Pill Lighting Tribtion waspletely different from the tribtion one went through when breaking through to the Soul Realm.


    This tribtion only sent the same number of bolts of lightning as the number of pill lines on the pill, unlike the nine nine tribtion one faced when breaking through.


    While Lin Fan looked at the dissipating clouds with a disappointed gaze, the other three looked at Lin Fan with gazes of shock that had traces of fear in them.


    Xu Lin''s second and fourth uncle were experts that were in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm, but even then, they could tell that they couldn''tst a single second under that bolt of lightning.


    However, Lin Fan had been able to take it head on with his body and he acted like it was nothing to him¡­


    What kind of a monster was Lin Fan?


    p Wouldn''t he be able to easily destroy their Xu Family by himself?</anda>


    Why was he doing all of this?


    Lin Fan finally put away his look of disappointment after the clouds had fully dissipated and he turned back to look at the three staring at him in shock. He calmly said, "Well, shall we go?"


    Only when he said this did the three of them finallye back to their senses.


    But when they dide back to their senses, the second uncle immediately said, "Not so fast, we still have to test this pill first! I''ll personally test it and if anything happens to me, you better forget¡­"


    Before he could even finish, Lin Fan flicked his finger and one of the three pills that were refined flew into the second uncle''s mouth.


    He couldn''t help swallowing it from the force it was flicked into his mouth at.


    But when he did, the second uncle''s expression suddenly changed.

 362 Chapter 362

    Xu Lin''s fourth uncle immediately came over and asked, "Old second, what''s wrong?"


    But the second uncle didn''t say a thing as he stood there in ce,pletely frozen.


    The fourth uncle turned to point his finger at Lin Fan as he said, "What did you do to old second?"


    Lin Fan just stood there without saying a word, with an expression on his face that seemed to be saying "just wait and see".


    The fourth uncle was about to charge over and grab Lin Fan''s cor when the second uncle suddenly bent over, holding his stomach.


    The fourth uncle saw this and quickly bent over as well to look over the second uncle as he said, "Old second, what is it? Don''t just stay silent like this, tell me what''s wrong!"


    The second uncle then suddenly sat down cross legged,pletely ignoring everything as he began to cultivate.


    The fourth uncle waspletely confused when he saw this, but he could also tell that the pill didn''t seem like it had done anything bad to the second uncle. So in the end, he chose to move back and watch over the second uncle.


    The pill that Lin Fan fed wasn''t a pill that was made for cultivating, it was a pill that was made specially to cure poison. However, this pill was made from Soul Realm Ingredients and it was a Pill Line Pill after all, so the medicinal effects in the pill were still quite strong. Not to mention that it was a pill that had 100% purity, meaning that it had kept all the medicinal power of its ingredients.


    With all this medicinal power concentrated into a single pill, it didn''t matter what the intended function of the pill was, it was still very helpful to one''s cultivation.


    As the second uncle sat down, there was a vortex of life energy that suddenly gathered around him, drawing in more and more life energy into his dantian. It was so powerful that even the people around him benefitted from the residual life energy that was around him.


    The fourth uncle could feel what was happening to the second uncle and he looked at him with a gaze filled with envy. If only he had been the one to step up and volunteer to test the pill, the one who would be breaking through now would be him¡­


    But there was no pill for regret in this world, so there was nothing he could do. He could only watch as the second uncle came closer and closer to breaking through¡­


    The second uncle could feel that with just a single push that he would break through, but then his speed in drawing in life energy began to slow down.


    He did his best to draw in as much life energy as he could, but in the end, he was just a single step too short from being able to break through.


    When he ended his cultivation, the second uncle could feel that he was only a single step away from breaking through to the Embryo Soul Realm.


    When he opened his eyes, he couldn''t help looking at thest few pills in Lin Fan''s hand.


    Lin Fan had been able to make three pills with the ingredients that he had received, putting aside the one that would be needed to cure Xu Lin''s father, there was still a single pill that was avable for him.


    He was certain that as long as he was able to take this pill as well, he would definitely be able to break through to the next realm¡­


    But there was also the rule of the alchemists that was set in the upper realm. Before making the pills, the share that those that made the request received was set and anything extra that was made would be the share of the alchemist.


    Since they didn''t believe in Lin Fan''s abilities, they had only asked for two of the pills. One to cure Xu Lin''s father and the other to test with before feeding the pills to Xu Lin''s father.


    So now that the second uncle had realized the power contained in these pills and that they could help him with his breakthrough, he really wanted it. It was too bad that they technically belonged to Lin Fan.


    Perhaps he could have taken it by will with his cultivation if it was anyone else, but Lin Fan was a Pill Line Alchemist and that title meant something. Not a single Pill Line Alchemist was weak, so the second uncle wasn''t actually certain that he would even be able to beat Lin Fan.


    The second uncle looked at Lin Fan with an awkward smile and asked, "This, Brother Lin, may I ask what you''re nning on doing with that third pill?"


    Lin Fan looked at him and while he had no expression on his face, he gave a cold snort in his heart. He had the nerve to crawl in front of Lin Fan and ask for this pill after everything that happened?


    Lin Fan still had his pride.


    So Lin Fan just ignored this question and turned to Xu Lin as he said, "Then, shall we go and heal your father now?"


    Xu Lin had been in a daze over what happened, but when he heard what Lin Fan said, he immediately came back to his senses and said, "Yes, senior."


    Without another word, he led the way back to the room that his father was in.


    As they walked away, the second uncle didn''t say anything this time.<sub> </sub>


    This was a Pill Line Pill, if it couldn''t cure the poison that Xu Lin''s father was inflicted with, there was nothing they could get that could cure it.


    He had already been subdued by Lin Fan''s abilities, it was just too bad that he had offended Lin Fan and his path to his breakthrough had fallen short.


    The fourth uncle saw this and patted the second uncle on the back before following them.


    He had secretly made up his mind to suck up to Lin Fan as much as possible.


    This was a Pill Line Alchemist, if he could get on his good side, he might even be able to get a few Pill Line Pills that would let him break through. He had already learned from the example that the second uncle had set.


    But the second uncle was rather shameless, so he also followed along with the intention of ttering Lin Fan. In front of his breakthrough, a little bit of his face didn''t matter.


    When Xu Lin led Lin Fan back, the crowd outside the room were still distrusting towards Lin Fan even though not a single person said a thing.


    They were about to stop Lin Fan from going back in when the second uncle suddenly came forward and said, "All of you clear the way for Brother Lin."


    Then after saying this, he turned to Lin Fan and said, "Brother Lin, please save big brother." Then after a pause, he also said in a shameless smile, "If there is a chance, can we discuss the price of the other pill? I''m willing to pay you twice what it is worth."


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this, but he let the second uncle do his thing. After all, with the second uncle clearing the way, it was much easier for him to do what he needed to do.


    When they came back into the room, Xu Lin''s father was still unconscious.


    Xu Lin quickly came over to the side of the bed because he could tell from his father''s aura, it didn''t seem like he wouldst much longer¡­


    Xu Lin turned to Lin Fan to say something, but Lin Fan just pushed him out of the way.


    Lin Fan injected some life energy into the veins of Xu Lin''s father, which roused him enough for him to wake up. But when he did wake up, his face was pale with a dark colour over it, making it clear that he was at his final moments.


    Xu Lin''s father gave a cough before saying, "Ah Lin, you''re finally back. I wanted to talk to you before my final moments."


    There was a mist that appeared in Xu Lin''s eyes as he said, "Father, don''t say¡­"


    But Lin Fan didn''t let them go on this time since there really was no time.


    Lin Fan took Xu Lin''s head and pushed him to the side.


    Xu Lin''s father was surprised when he saw this, but then he was even more surprised when there was a pill that was suddenly forced into his mouth.


    With how sudden it was and how weak he was, he waspletely unable to resist swallowing the pill.


    After he swallowed the pill, he immediately said, "What are you doing?"


    But Lin Fan didn''t answer as he just stood there watching him.


    After a few seconds, Xu Lin''s father immediately knitted his brows.


    Xu Lin saw this and immediately said, "Father, what''s wrong?"


    But Xu Lin''s father really couldn''t say a single thing with how he was feeling. He just leaned over and grabbed his chest, as if there was something that was hurting him.


    Xu Lin turned to Lin Fan and said just as quickly, "Senior Lin, what''s wrong with my father? Didn''t you say that you were going to cure him?"


    Lin Fan just pointed at Xu Lin''s father and said, "Wait and see."


    After a few more seconds, Xu Lin''s father''s cheeks suddenly swelled up before he spat out arge mouthful of blood.

 363 Chapter 363

    Xu Lin immediately came forward to help support his father as he shouted, "Father!"


    The blood that covered the floors really was a terrifying thing to look at, but after oveing his shock, Xu Lin realized something. All the blood on the floor waspletely ck like bile, it was almost as if it was the dirtiest thing in the world.


    Then when he looked back at his father, he saw that while his face was still pale from losing all that blood, it was no longer as dark as before. It was almost as if all the dark colouring in his face waspletely gone.


    After spitting out thisrge mouthful of ck blood, there was a surge of life energy that suddenly appeared, gathering around Xu Lin''s father.


    That surge of life energy swirled around before beingpletely sucked in by Xu Lin''s father.


    Xu Lin''s father immediately sat cross legged and began using his cultivation technique to absorb all this life energy.


    Just like with the second uncle, this was a Pill Line Pill, so the medicinal energy contained within it wasn''t normal. Not to mention that it was a 100% purity pill, which meant that all the medicinal power of the ingredients had been preserved in the pill.


    This allowed Xu Lin''s father to immediately recover his cultivation after spitting out all the poison just now, but that was just it. It didn''t help him increase his cultivation, but he quickly recovered to the peak of his previous cultivation. It didn''t take him several weeks just to return to his previous condition.


    It didn''t take long before Xu Lin''s father had finished his cultivation and stood up. When he did, he gathered his life energy around his fist and suddenly clenched it, creating a powerful aura that spread all around.


    The people outside were shocked when they felt this, but they could feel how familiar it was, so they knew exactly who it was.


    But this made them even more shocked.


    Who was this young man that had actually cured the family head of his poison?


    Wasn''t this just too amazing?


    Back inside the room, once Xu Lin''s father had finished recovering and testing his abilities, he turned to Lin Fan and cupped his hands, "Brother Lin, thank you for your help. This Xu was almost certain that I was about to die, but it''s thanks to Brother Lin that I was able to survive."


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and said, "It was nothing."


    Xu Lin''s father didn''t let him remain humble as he said, "How could that be? Brother Lin, you saved my life. While that doesn''t mean much to others, that does mean something to me." After saying this, he came forward and pped Lin Fan on the back before saying, "Brother Lin, if there''s anything that you want, just tell me."


    Lin Fan looked at Xu Lin with a gaze that had an implied meaning behind it.


    Xu Lin naturally knew what this gaze meant, so he came forward and said, "Father, I''ve already promised Senior Lin a few things when he agreed to save you."


    Xu Lin''s father turned to look at Xu Lin and he said, "Oh, what kind of things did you already promise him? Since you already promised him these things, it wouldn''t do for our family''s face if we don''t give him these things."


    Xu Lin had an awkward look as he said, "I promised him the artifact and that the Xu Family would follow him¡­"


    Xu Lin''s father''s smile turned stiff when he heard this.


    If it were just simple material goods, he would have no problem backing Xu Lin up to give them to Lin Fan, but he never expected Lin Fan to be this greedy.


    But of course, with his abilities, he could hear the whispers that wereing from outside. Rather he could even hear them even if his hearing wasn''t as good with his cultivation.


    He could clearly hear the words Pill Line and alchemist.


    If this was true, then it wouldn''t be impossible for him to agree to Lin Fan''s conditions.


    To align themselves with a Pill Line Alchemist was definitely something that would be beneficial to the Xu Family, not to mention that this Pill Line Alchemist was taking the initiative to make contact with their Xu Family.


    Right now, their Xu Family was in a very bad position because of the One Shadow Organization, so they definitely needed a backer.


    But this was a decision that would affect the entire Xu Family, so Xu Lin''s father as the family head couldn''t rush into this decision.


    Seeing that his father was silent for a bit, Xu Lin said, "Father, this¡­"<sub> </sub>


    However, before he could finish his words, Xu Lin''s father suddenly raised his hand to cut him off.


    Xu Lin''s father took a deep look over Lin Fan and was silent in thought. Lin Fan just calmly matched his gaze, but deep down, his opinion of Xu Lin''s father improved.


    It seemed like while he was a very open person, he was also someone who seemed like he could use his brain at least.


    Xu Lin''s father took several minutes before asking, "Brother Lin, may I ask what kind of pill you used to save me?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing, he just pulled out thest pill that he had.


    Xu Lin''s father carefully looked over the pill. He didn''t just stop after seeing the pill line that was on it, he also took in the other features of the pill.


    While Xu Lin''s father wasn''t an alchemist, as a family head, he did have some dealings with these kinds of things. Pills were important for any family since they were used to nurture not just new talents, but also helped their experts grow stronger. As the family head, he had to learn how to recognize a good pill to maximize benefits for his family.


    After a few minutes, Xu Lin''s father revealed a shocked look on his face.


    p Not only was this a One Pill Line Pill, it was also a pill that had 100% purity!</anda>


    Most of the famous Pill Line Alchemists were only able to refine pills that had 90% purity at max. That was considered the limit for Pill Line Pills of this Gctic Humanity Alliance since they weren''t able to obtain a better alchemy refining technique.


    But now there was a pill that had 100% purity that was ced right in front of him.


    This was definitely a big discovery since he was certain that this man in front of him definitely wasn''t from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, or if he was, he would definitely be a famous person within the Gctic Humanity Alliance. He was certain of this because of this 100% purity pill.


    If he wasn''t from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, he was probably from an even stronger upper realm since he had an alchemy refining technique that allowed him to refine 100% purity pills. If he was from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, he must have found a vestige which had an alchemy refining technique that allowed him to refine 100% purity pills. Just that would be enough for him to pave a steady rise for himself on this Gctic Humanity Alliance, especially if he were to join the Alchemy King Hall¡­


    Since that was the case, if he were to attach the Xu Family to this man as soon as possible, they would be one of the closest followers to this man. The Xu Family would definitely be able to gain quite a bit being the first followers of this man.


    Xu Lin''s father had made his decision with just this, but before that, he still had to negotiate with this person. After all, as the family head, it was his job to gain as many benefits as possible for his family.


    So after a long pause, Xu Lin''s father finally said, "It isn''t like we can''t agree to those terms, but there are some conditions that need to be added in before we can agree to this."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but this was a good thing for him since it meant that there was at least room for discussion with the Xu Family.


    Lin Fan pointed at a table and on the side and it was easy to understand what he meant by that.


    Xu Lin''s father stood up and moved over to the table, sitting down before gesturing for Lin Fan to sit in front of him.


    Once Lin Fan sat down, Xu Lin''s father said, "Well, for starters, the first condition that I have is¡­"


    ¡­


    It didn''t take them long to finish their negotiations and when Lin Fan came out of the room, there was a faint smile on his face.


    The people outside saw Lin Fane out and they all looked at him differently. Before there were looks of distrust, but now there were looks of respect.


    They didn''t know how he had done it, but he had somehow cured their family head.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with them at all as he left under the lead of Xu Lin, bringing his group out of the Xu Manor with him.


    No one tried to stop him other than the second uncle, but then the family head came out of the room.


    He knew what the second uncle wanted, so he said, "Old second, don''t worry about it now. I''ve already talked to Brother Lin and you''ll get what you need."


    Then without caring about what he thought, Family Head Xu turned to the rest and said, "We''re entering a new stage of the Xu Family, I need you all to¡­"

 364 Chapter 364

    There was a meeting that was held in the Xu Manor after Lin Fan left, but that didn''t matter to him at all since he had alreadye to an agreement with Xu Lin''s father.


    Where he was going now was a residence that Xu Lin''s father had offered Lin Fan.


    The problem of a residence was not something that Lin Fan had thought about until now.


    While it was easy for him to rent a hotel room with his money, even having no problem renting the more expensive ones, there was still a need for him to find a residence as a base of operations. Eventually, he would be bringing the people that he had trained up since he still needed them for what he was nning in this upper realm.


    The Xu Family had quite a few free residences that had opened up since people had left their territory after what had happened to the family head. Since that was the case and since they were working together now, Xu Lin''s father had basically insisted that Lin Fan take one of these residences.


    Keeping Lin Fan close would definitely be beneficial for the Xu Family.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the residence that Xu Lin''s father gave him, he could feel the sincerity of Xu Lin''s father. This was a residence that definitely was not worth a small amount with how big it was.


    This was an ancient styled residence with several different courtyards, but the buildings inside were designed with very sleek and modern designs. It was clear that these were high end residences.


    The only problem that Lin Fan had with this was the wall that waspletely made of ss, in the living room, but that wasn''t really a problem since this was a private courtyard that was separated with an outer wall. If he had to say what was wrong with it, it was just that this didn''t suit his taste.


    Even back on earth, he didn''t like this kind of design.


    As soon as they finished settling in, Xu Lin led his friends away and they were free to rx.


    Momonga naturally didn''t stay in the same house that Lin Fan chose and went to one of the other buildings in this residence. He was someone who liked his own space, but the main reason for this was that he needed a ce to store all his goods.


    He had brought all the goods that he had collected in the Blue Star with him, he even had a body pillow of his ''waifu''...


    Lin Fan really suspected that he was someone who had reincarnated from earth just like him, but he never found a chance to discuss this with him. Especially since Momonga had avoided all the cues he had dropped in conversation.


    p Perhaps it was part of the memory that Momonga erased every few millennia to avoid filling up his mind?</anda>


    In their residence, Ang didn''t hesitate at all to take all of Lin Fan''s pets in their human forms with her into the master bedroom before locking the door on Lin Fan. When Lin Fan saw this, he could only reveal a bitter smile.


    Once the kids came, Lin Fan was thrown away¡­


    If this was before, he would at least have a chance to sleep with her in the master bedroom, but now¡­


    It was only a good thing that this house was big and had a guest bedroom, or he would be stuck on the couch again. But it also wouldn''t have mattered since Lin Fan was already used to the couch¡­


    ¡­


    The next morning, everyone woke up refreshed.


    This house had beenpletely decorated with all the best furniture and naturally that included the bed. Even the guest beds were high quality goods.


    Even though they really didn''t need to sleep at their level of cultivation, it was still good to sleep from time to time. Especially after how tiring it was toe up from the lower realm.


    Now that Lin Fan had found a residence in the upper realm, the only thing left was being able to open a store.


    While he could have gotten a store from the Xu Family, what Lin Fan wanted was a store in the center of Harmony City and the properties that the Xu Family had wasn''t anywhere near that. While the Xu Family did have some influence in Harmony City, they were only a small family in the end.


    The only forces that could have stores in the center of Harmony City were the twelve great factions, so what Lin Fan needed right now was to get his Hunter license before he could open that store.


    Even if he reached an agreement to work with the Xu Family, the Xu Family still needed a few days to prepare themselves, so Lin Fan had some free time right now.


    Since he had free time, the most important thing for him at this moment was to earn the qualifications to enter the Hunter Exam.


    The Hunter Exam wasing up soon, but Lin Fan was still only a B rank seeker. To be qualified for this exam, he would have to reach the top of the A rank rankings or even reach the S rank and there wasn''t much time for him to aplish this.


    With this short deadline, he had to make the most of his time and do as many missions as he could. He even debated whether to just take his pets and go on a ughter in one of the resource areas.


    But he gave up that idea in the end since such arge ughter would catch the attention of some powerful forces. He had already been pushing itst time in the Green Mist Forest.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan quickly took a beast carriage back to the Seekers Guild, but the moment he walked in, the reception he received was much different.


    When he came in, everyone turned to look at him before the receptionist suddenly came over, who was the same receptionist from yesterday.


    When she came over, she didn''t even try to hide her flirting as she directly opened one of the top buttons in her shirt and said, "Big brother Lin, you''re finally back." After saying this, she gave him a wink.


    Lin Fan didn''t know why there was such a difference in treatment, especially with all the people muttering around him.


    This receptionist definitely was pretty and was quite popr among the seekers, but not a single one of her fans was saying a thing at this moment. It was almost as if they were approving of her chasing him.


    But before Lin Fan could say a thing, there was a chill that suddenly came over the receptionist. She couldn''t help taking a step back as she broke out in a shiver.


    The chill was so strong that even the people around them couldn''t help shivering.


    However, not a single person was able to figure out where it came from, that is except for Lin Fan and Momonga.


    Momonga had a smile as he watched over all of this and while Lin Fan had a smile as well, it was much more bitter inparison to Momonga.


    Both of them were looking at Ang.


    Still, even with how Ang acted, Lin Fan still raised his hand out to stop her as he politely said, "Hello, how can I help you?"


    When she heard this voice, the receptionist came out of her daze.


    When she spoke, there was a slight shiver to her voice that showed that she was still frozen, but she said, "Ac, actually, you have a special meeting. Someone is requesting to see you, it sounds like they have a special mission for you."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look, "Requesting to see me? But I''m nothing more than a new seeker who just signed up yesterday? Why would they be requesting me?"


    The receptionist revealed a mysterious smile as she said, "Well, you''ll see when you get there. Can you follow me? I''ll bring you there now."


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before saying, "Alright."


    Someone had requested him?


    Even though he had reached the B rank yesterday, that still didn''t change the fact that he was still a new seeker. He was sure that there were plenty of other seekers at the same rank that had much more experience.


    Was it because they thought he would be cheaper since he was a new seeker?


    The receptionist brought Lin Fan to the second floor where there was a private room waiting.


    She didn''t go inside, but when she left, she didn''t forget to lean into Lin Fan and say, "I almost forgot, but I still haven''t told you my name yet. I''m Xiao Ling, if you ever want to have some fun, just call me."


    After saying this, she ran off again since she felt the same chill as before, but it was much stronger this time.


    After she was gone, Lin Fan reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper with a string of numbers on it. With how it was arranged, it was clear that it was a phone number. There was no need to guess who it was from, there was only one person that could have slipped this in.


    While Lin Fan had a bitter smile, Ang on the side gave a soft snort.


    With that soft snort, there were tiny wind des that cut the piece of paper into millions of pieces. There were even a few des that cut Lin Fan''s finger, but he had no choice but to ept it.


    Ang then looked at Lin Fan and said, "Are you happy?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''m not."


    Then without waiting for her response, he pushed open the door and entered the room.


    When he came in, he found that someone was sitting inside, someone he didn''t recognize.


    However, this person was someone who recognized Lin Fan''s group.

 365 Chapter 365

    It was the president who had been hiding in the shadowsst night.


    When Ang saw that it was another beautiful woman who had requested Lin Fan, she couldn''t help giving another snort as a chill ran down Lin Fan''s back.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling wronged, but there was no one he couldin to.


    So Lin Fan said with an awkward smile, "This miss, I''m not sure we''ve met before. Can you please tell me why you requested me?"


    The president looked over Lin Fan for a bit before pointing at the chairs across the table in front of her and saying, "Sit, we''ll talk after you sit down."


    Since she had said this and nothing else, Lin Fan''s group couldn''t just leave. After sitting down, there was still an awkward silence that filled the air.


    Lin Fan finally couldn''t take it as he said, "Can you tell me why you requested me now? I''m certain that we haven''t met before."


    After all, this woman was quite the beauty. Lin Fan would have been certain that he would remember her if they had met before.


    The woman still didn''t say a word as she sat there looking at Lin Fan for a bit. It was after a prolonged pause that was quite awkward that she finally spoke, "I have a special mission for you that I know you''re the right person for. It''s a S rank mission."


    Lin Fan was still confused, but when he heard the words S rank, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    S ranks were at the top of the rankings for the Seekers Guild and Lin Fan was only a B rank seeker. Not to mention that he had only gotten that rank yesterday.


    But the fact that this person was able to issue a S rank mission was something that piqued his interest. After all, there was no way that this was a lie since the receptionist was the one who brought him here and there were plenty of ways for him to check what kind of mission it was, even if he rejected it.


    Still, Lin Fan asked, "I''m honoured, but why me?"


    The woman revealed a smile and said, "I''ve been watching you and I think you have what I''m looking for. If you pass this test of mine, I can help you with many other things. Isn''t that a good enough reason?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this. After a bit of thought, he asked, "Who are you though?"


    The woman had the same smile as she said, "Pass this test first and you''ll find out."


    Lin Fan didn''t say a single word in response to this.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, the woman added, "If you do well, there might even be extra rewards waiting for you."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more as he asked, "What kind of rewards?"


    The woman had a teasing smile on her face as she said, "How about me?"


    The woman was about to keep teasing, but then she felt a chill run down her spine.


    Her cultivation definitely wasn''t low and yet she could even feel a chill, this definitely wasn''t normal.


    The woman couldn''t help looking around, but seeing that there was nothing around her, she couldn''t help being confused.


    Where did that feelinge from?


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he said, "If that''s all, then I''m afraid I have to decline."


    This seemed like it was too good to be true, rather it almost seemed like a trap. While Lin Fan wanted to increase his ranking so he could qualify for the Hunter Exam, he didn''t want to draw attention yet either since it wasn''t the right time for him just yet.


    As Lin Fan was about to stand up and leave, the woman suddenly said, "Stop."


    Lin Fan froze in his actions and turned to look at the woman who now had a serious expression on her face.


    The woman said, "You can consider this as a test from the Hunters Organization. You want to join them, but the way you''re acting is too suspicious. If you can prove your strength, they can overlook this. Otherwise, you should give up on qualifying for the Hunter Exam."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows once again when he heard this.


    He knew that his selling of the beast corpses was too conspicuous.


    After hearing the exnation of the person at the counter, the fact that he still sold it showed that he was in a rush for something.


    While the Hunters Organization was one that advocated freedom, it was also an organization in the end. If they were to allow dangerous elements to join them, they definitely wouldn''t have been able tost long enough to be one of the twelve great factions.


    But of course, in this upper realm, what was most important was strength.


    If he had enough strength, it would prove that he was qualified to join them even though he might be working for other forces. That was how several Hunters who were clearly affiliated to other forces were still able to join.<sub> </sub>


    The benefits outweighed the losses in those cases because strength was a very good deterrent. At least it was in thispetition filled upper realm.


    After Lin Fan had thought this through, he sat back down and tapped his finger on the table in front of him for a few seconds before he asked, "What is the mission?"


    The woman suddenly revealed a smile once again as she said, "Oh, so you''re interested in the mission now?"


    Lin Fan just had a calm look on his face as he sat there without saying a word.


    The woman wanted to tease him again because of this, but remembering the chill that she had felt earlier, she decided against it.


    So instead, the woman said, "There''s something that we need you to get, something that normal people can''t get."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this and he asked, "What is it?"


    The woman said, "It''s actually quite a simple mission. There''s something that we need from a ce and you''ll be the one that''ll get it for us."


    Lin Fan still had knitted brows as he asked, "Where?"


    The woman said, "It''s nothing much, we just need some simple ginseng from a mountain."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    It was clear that this woman was hiding something, something that would be very important to know.


    Lin Fan kept asking, "Is there anything special about this ce?"


    The woman casually stretched out her hands and said, "Nothing special as far as I know."


    Lin Fan raised a brow and asked, "Nothing special for you, but what about for normal people?"


    The woman''s smile became even wider when she heard this.


    She had definitely dropped plenty of clues, much more than she should have, but she didn''t mind since she did feel partial towards Lin Fan''s group.


    The woman just said, "That''s for you to find out, isn''t it?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows in thought for a bit, weighing out the pros and cons in his mind.


    If he were to take this mission, he would definitely be able to reach A rank since a single S rank mission would give up a million points. After all, it took several tens of millions of points for an S rank seeker to reach the next rank, so each mission giving a million points was normal.


    But this woman was clearly hiding something, which meant that this wasn''t as simple as it seemed.


    It was quite clear that there was a beast guarding this ginseng that she wanted, but as for what the cultivation of the beast was, it was hard for Lin Fan to guess.


    With all his current abilities, Lin Fan didn''t have to fear anyone in the Embryo Soul Realm, but if he were to fight those in the Child Soul Realm, that would be a bit hard for him.


    If only this woman knew what Lin Fan was thinking.


    In truth, what was guarding the ginseng was only a beast in the Embryo Soul Realm and it wasn''t even in the peak of the Embryo Soul Realm. It was just a beast that had only broken through recently.


    But this was already past the scope of a S rank mission. In truth, this should be close to a SS rank mission since Embryo Soul Realm seekers were already rare. The ones that had reached the Embryo Soul Realm had already be Hunters.


    If she knew that Lin Fan was even thinking about fighting those in the Child Soul Realm, she definitely would have pped him silly.


    After a long period of thought, Lin Fan finally decided to take this risk. In a worst case scenario, even if he couldn''t fight those in the Child Soul Realm, he would still be able to run away.


    Lin Fan said, "Alright, I''ll do it."


    The woman''s smile became even brighter like a flower blooming as she said, "Great! Then I''ll give you a map and an illustration of the ginseng. I wish you the best of luck!"


    She didn''t keep them in this room for another second longer, after giving them the two sheets of paper, she waved them out.


    Of course, when she watched them leave, she couldn''t help looking at one of them with a different kind of emotion as a blush appeared on her face.


    It was almost as if what she said before about "offering herself as a reward" wasn''t a joke...

 366 Chapter 366

    After Lin Fan''s group was chased out, they came back down to the first floor.


    The first thing Lin Fan did was not head out, but rather he went over to the receptionist desk.


    As Lin Fan walked through the hall, he could feel all kinds of strange gazes looking at him.


    Finally, Lin Fan came in front of the receptionist desk, but before he could say a thing, Xiao Ling spoke first.


    She said, "So you chose to ept the mission after all."


    Lin Fan was confused when he heard this and he asked, "How did you know about that?"


    Xiao Ling revealed a smile as she pointed at the crystals that were ced by the desk and said, "These are special signal crystals that are connected to the upper floor rooms. Those rooms are only used when special missions are given, generally all of which are S rank missions. For the sake of privacy, we use these crystals tomunicate. They will shine green when the mission is epted and they will shine red when the mission is rejected. We received a green glow just now, so we know that you epted the mission."


    Lin Fan looked over at the crystals with interest, but he also quickly lost interest since they were just simple crystals sitting there.


    Lin Fan turned back to Xiao Ling and asked, "Since you know about the mission, can you please exin what the details are? The client up there didn''t really tell me anything."


    Xiao Ling revealed an awkward smile as she said, "I don''t know what the details are either. Since S rank missions are all special missions, we just record them as S rank missions without actually getting the details, that''s one of the special perks that is offered to those that want tomission a S rank mission. Of course, there are those that do share the details, but they weren''t shared this time."


    Lin Fan thought about it and felt that this did make sense. Those that could offer S rank missions definitely didn''t have normal identities, so it was normal for the Seekers Guild to offer them this perk where they could hide certain pieces of information, or even all the information.


    But of course, if they did, the people who offered the mission would have to give the information to the seekers personally since the seekers can''t do anything if they didn''t know what they needed to do.


    Lin Fan didn''t continue with this topic and took out the map that the woman had given him back in the room before asking, "Do you know any ce that has an area that is simr to this."


    Xiao Ling looked over the map and she was confused for a bit, but then it was like she recognized something as she said, "This!"


    Lin Fan wanted to see if she would say anything else, but then she quickly turned around and began rummaging around in the area behind the counter. It didn''t take her long to find what she was looking for and she quickly spread it across the counter in front of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked down at it and found that it was a detailed map, along with an area on the map that was just like the area on the map that he received upstairs.


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he looked at Xiao Ling and asked, "What is this ce?"


    But Xiao Ling acted like she didn''t hear this as she muttered to herself, "For her to send you to this ce¡­Just what is she thinking?"


    Lin Fan took note of these words and judging by the way she was reacting, it was clear that Xiao Ling knew something.


    Lin Fan then asked, "What do you know about this?"


    Xiao Ling was pulled out her thoughts when she heard this and she realized her mistake. She quickly covered her mouth, but then knew that there was no point since she had already said what she had already said.


    She revealed a difficult look as she looked back at Lin Fan and said, "Please, don''t make this hard for me. I can''t tell you this."


    Lin Fan looked at her for a bit before asking, "Alright, then what is this ce?"


    When Xiao Ling heard this, this time she didn''t hesitate.


    "The ce that you''re being sent is called the Kunlun Mountains, they''re one of the special resource areas, just like Green Mist Forest that you went to before. This is a mountain that is filled with dangerous beasts, but there are also plenty of resources to obtain. However¡­"


    After saying all this, it seemed like Xiao Ling was hesitating to say something.


    Lin Fan said, "However?"


    Xiao Ling gave a sigh and then said, "The location on your map is a ce that isn''t quite well known in the Kunlun Mountains, but recently there have been more reportsing in from there. It''s because there''s been reports of an Embryo Soul Realm beast that has taken up residence there that has been causing trouble for people."


    Lin Fan immediately asked, "Embryo Soul Realm, are you sure it''s in the Embryo Soul Realm?"


    Xiao Ling misunderstood his words and gave a nod as she said, "That''s right, it''s in the Embryo Soul Realm. Even though it''s only in the low Embryo Soul Realm, it is still an Embryo Soul Realm beast." After saying this, she didn''t forget to mutter, "I really don''t know what that crazy woman is thinking, sending my honey there."


    Lin Fan felt like he had heard something strange, but he chose to ignore it.<sub> </sub>


    It was too bad that Ang didn''t ignore it.


    She ignored most of the other things that Xiao Ling said, but she did pick up on the words "honey"...


    It seemed like Lin Fan would be suffering a few more days¡­


    But what Lin Fan was feeling right now was actually relief.


    He had been worried that it might be a Child Soul Realm beast or a Nascent Soul Realm beast that he was being sent after, but now that he found out it was only an Embryo Soul Realm beast, he felt much more rxed.


    If the people around him were to know what he was thinking, they definitely would have cursed him until he drowned in a sea of spit.


    Only an Embryo Soul Realm beast?


    Unless one was from one of the twelve great factions, Embryo Soul Realm Experts were extremely hard to meet. Just a single Embryo Soul Realm Expert was already enough to support a small family that could control an area of the city, like the Xu Family.


    Yet Lin Fan was saying "only" an Embryo Soul Realm beast?


    Lin Fan actually had a misunderstanding of the power structure of the upper realm.


    Experts gathered with other experts and those that were weak would fight over the scraps.


    Naturally in a realm that was filled with crouching tigers and hidden dragons, it was the safest idea to find some form of backer. That was why it was impossible to see a single Child Soul Realm Expert that wasn''t affiliated to a faction.


    So in this kind of situation, it was rare to see an Embryo Soul Realm Expert that was on their own.


    Lin Fan was the outlier since he was strong enough to fight a Child Soul Realm Expert and was wandering alone.


    Unless he offended one of the twelve great factions, it was very unlikely he would even meet a Child Soul Realm Expert, not to mention a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    So in the end, all of Lin Fan''s worries were for nothing.


    Lin Fan was much more rxed now that he knew how strong his opponent would be and the fact that it was weaker than him was just a bonus.


    He might even throw his pets at this Embryo Soul Realm beast to see how strong they were.


    After confirming this, Lin Fan wanted to head off right away to finish this mission as soon as possible.


    Since this was a ce that had an Embryo Soul Realm beast, there must be other Soul Realm Beasts around that he could attack. He still needed more corpses to increase his rank as quickly as possible.


    So Lin Fan wanted to leave, but Xiao Ling suddenly called out to stop him, "Lin Fan, why are you in such a rush? Did you not hear what I just said? This is an Embryo Soul Realm Beast."


    Lin Fan wanted to leave, but he also didn''t want to ruin his rtionship with Xiao Ling by suddenly ditching her. After all, she had given him quite a bit of information, information that wasn''t in the scope of her job.


    Since she had treated him well, he would at least try to treat her well.


    Lin Fan said, "I have my ways of dealing with these beasts."


    As he said this, Lin Fan also revealed what he considered his "bad" face.


    But Xiao Ling waspletely stunned when she saw this as a blush quickly came over her face.


    After a few seconds, she quickly covered her face and said, "Un, I believe you. But when youe back, do you have time to¡­"


    Before she could even finish, Lin Fan felt a sudden paining from his ear.


    He could only reveal a bitter smile at this as he allowed himself to be pulled away.


    Just like this, Ang pulled him out of the doors of the Seekers Guild by the ear, dragging him into the distance in front of a stunned Xiao Ling who wasining deep down.

 367 Chapter 367

    With the map that Xiao Ling gave him, it didn''t take Lin Fan''s group that long to travel to the Kunlun Mountains.


    Now that his pets had broken through and mastered their transformation abilities, they could easily transform into afortable size for Lin Fan to ride. As well, since they had broken through to the Soul Realm, it meant that their speed couldn''tpare to before. They could even fly faster than the Lin Family ancestor''s custom airship.


    It only took them less than an hour to reach the Kunlun Mountains since it really wasn''t far from Harmony City.


    Most of that time was actually spent getting out of Harmony City since it was just too big.


    When they arrived in the Kunlun Mountains, there wasn''t a single sound around them.


    It would have been strange if it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s pets.


    They had been letting out their auras and now that they were King Beasts, they created a natural deterrent against weaker beasts. As well, they had powerful bloodlines which scared even beasts at the same level of cultivation.


    Most of these beasts were smart enough to avoid Lin Fan''s group, that was why it was so silent around them. It was almost too silent¡­


    Once they arrived, Lin Fan had Xiao Huo under him stop as he unrolled the map to check his location.


    The area where the special ginseng that the woman wanted was in the middle ring of the Kunlun Mountains and the area that they were in was currently the outer ring, but before making his way to the middle ring, there was something else he wanted to do first. After all, these Kunlun Mountains were filled with various King Beasts and if he were to bring their corpses back to the Seekers Guild to sell, he might be able to reach the top of the A rank and reach the point where he would qualify for the Hunters Exam.


    Lin Fan slowly made his way around the outer edges of the Kunlun Mountains, slowly looking for King Beasts. It didn''t take him long since his spiritual sense was much strongerpared to before and most of these King Beasts had set up territories for themselves.


    These territories had clear markers and just a single tracking beast from Brainy was enough for Lin Fan to find them.


    Then his spiritual sense was more than enough for him to pin down their exact location since the territory held by these King Beasts weren''t that big.


    Lin Fan wanted to make this quick, but his beasts begged him to let them fight since they hadn''t had their fill in the Green Mist Forest yesterday.


    If it was just the kids themselves, Lin Fan would have no problem saying no to their faces, but it wasn''t just them. Behind them was Ang who was ring at Lin Fan, pressuring him to say yes.


    Lin Fan had no choice in the end but to ept this.


    All of the pets were sent out to fight, that is with the exception of Brainy who was still in the Primary Soul Realm. Brainy mainly focused on spiritual sense cultivation, so its normal cultivation was much slower. This meant that Brainy still hadn''t undergone its lightning tribtion yet.


    However, that didn''t really dy them by that long since even though his pets were only in the low Fragmented Soul Realm, with their bloodline and Lin Fan''s ''training'', they were all a match for beasts in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm. When they fought these beasts, it almost seemed easy.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t satisfied with just these since they were nowhere enough to helping him reach the top since ten of them would only be around a hundred thousand spirit stones, which was only around eighty thousand points. That would only make a small dent in his point total since it required just a million points alone to reach the A rank.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan stopped going around the outer ring and made his way towards the middle ring, heading towards the area that was marked on the map.


    Before they entered the middle ring though, Lin Fan''s group stopped to spend the night.


    It had been around noon when they left Harmony City and with all the various fights they had undergone, the sun was getting ready to set.


    There was no rush for them to finish this mission and no one would expect them to finish in just a single day.


    Lin Fan wanted to stay here for the night and do some reconnaissance for tomorrow, so he had Brainy send out more seeds and more scouts into the middle ring. He wanted to find some Embryo Soul Realm beasts for tomorrow.


    The Embryo Soul Realm and the Fragmented Soul Realm werepletely different concepts, so the price of a corpse in the Embryo Soul Realm would definitely be worth much more than a corpse in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Plus, Lin Fan had found some interesting people heading their way, so he wanted to have some fun with them first.


    After they set up their camp, all of them sat around the campfire and not a single person was speaking.


    Momonga and Lin Fan were both indoor people, so they didn''t really enjoy being out in the open like this, but it was a good thing that the technology in this world was also quite advanced.


    With the watches that they had, they were able to ess the web and they were even able to y virtual reality games, which was what Momonga was currently doing.


    In this realm, the most popr game was called Tower of Heaven, which was what he was currently ying.


    As for Ang, she had no problems since she had five cute little kids currently in her hands. Her hands continued to move as she patted them one by one, pampering them with a smile on her face.


    It was at this time that there was a crack in the forest, but none of them made a move.<sub> </sub>


    They had already sensed the approach of this group and they knew exactly what they were nning, so they just let theme to their camp.


    After that crack, there was a person who slowly walked up to Lin Fan''s camp, looking very confident.


    The Kunlun Mountains was a ce that was rich in resources, so naturally there would be many people drawn to it.


    In this upper realm, there were many different kinds of people, so the people who came here had all different kinds of goals.


    Some came here on missions for others, some came here to find resources for their own cultivation, and of course there were those that were here to steal from others since it was easier for them.


    But those that came to steal were all confident in their power, so they definitely weren''t pushovers.


    At least the person who walked up wasn''t.


    Judging by his aura, he was in the tinum Realm which was considered quite strong among normal people.


    The only problem with him was his appearance.


    This was a person with yellow hair that was standing straight up in a mohawk, face that was painted white with yellow eyeliner around his eyes, and for some reason, he was dressed in all leather with a style that almost screamed BDSM.


    When Lin Fan saw this person, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    Why did this guy look like a generic bad guy from the Fist of the North Star?


    He just screamed bandit no matter how anyone looked at him¡­


    ? That person came towards the campfire with a smile and said, "Hello friends, I''m a little bit lost. Can Ie and take shelter at your campfire?"


    Lin Fan looked at him before pointing at the log that was opposite of him without saying a thing.


    That person gave a nod and said, "Thank you, you really are a kind person."


    Then when he came up to the campfire, there was a flick of his hand as a dagger suddenly appeared, stabbing at Lin Fan who he had just passed. While stabbing with this dagger, he said, "It''s too bad that kind people don''t live long in this world!"


    Lin Fan gave a soft snort and just raised his hand, putting up a single finger.


    The dagger was stabbing down at Lin Fan, but when it was about to stab him, the finger that came up suddenly touched the tip of the dagger to stop it.


    The man with the yellow mohawk was shocked when he saw this and he tried pushing the dagger forward with all his strength, but the dagger wouldn''t move a single inch.


    Seeing that it wasn''t as easy as he had thought it would be, the man with the yellow mohawk suddenly jumped back and gave a bird''s cry before shouting, "Come out and y!"


    It was at this time that several other figures came out of the forest.


    Every single one of them had mohawks with full leather apparel and scars all over them.


    There wasn''t a single one of them who didn''t look like a generic bad guy from the Fist of the North Star¡­


    The only thing that they were missing were the motorcycles.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he almost felt too embarrassed to fight them because of an incident in his past.


    When he had read that manga back then, he had been so inspired that he had even hired several actors to fight with him dressed like this¡­


    If he were to fight them now, it would almost feel like reliving that shameful past¡­


    So Lin Fan didn''t bother and just released Brainy.


    "They''re all yours."

 368 Chapter 368

    All of the punks that surrounded Lin Fan''s group were in the tinum Realm.


    That was considered quite powerful in the outer ring, it was just too bad they chose the wrong target to rob.


    The reason why Lin Fan released Brainy was because Brainy was the best pet he had to deal with this situation.


    In truth, since he had broken through, he rarely took out Brainy to fight anymore. The only times that he took out Brainy was to use its puppets to scout out an area or to find something.


    Because of thisck ofbat, Brainy now didn''t have as many strong puppets that it could use.


    While these tinum Realm puppets wouldn''t be much, Brainy would still have a use for them because of their appearances. They had the right appearances for certain uses, so Brainy didn''t mind keeping them.


    With a single thought, Brainy suddenly pulled out several tinum Realm puppets, as well as several hundred Gold Realm beasts that it suddenly sent out at the more than ten thugs that had appeared.


    Brainy could have sent out more puppets, but it also jumped out to attack these thugs.


    Since Brainy had broken through to the Primary Soul Realm, its body did be much stronger. It wanted to see just how strong its body was.


    The thugs were shocked when they saw these puppets, but seeing how sluggish they moved, they realized that they were nothing more than puppets.


    These corpses all seemed quite well preserved and if they could take them, it would earn them quite a bit.


    So even though they were clearly outnumbered, not a single one of these thugs ran away. All of them released their auras and charged forward at the puppets that had appeared in front of them.


    All of them except for a group of five that had gathered together to face Brainy.


    These five were the five with the highest levels of cultivation and they were the strongest five in this entire group.


    The reason they grouped up was not just because they were the strongest, but rather they had a great synergy between them that allowed them to use power that was several times stronger than normal. This was because they had all studied under the same master who they had killed for his secret technique, which was a formation that only the five of them could use.


    If they used this array together, they would even have the chance to stop a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert. However, it was still impossible for them to defeat one since there was just a big gap between the tinum Realm and the Soul Realm.


    It was too bad that their opponent was Brainy who was not only in the Primary Soul Realm, but also an expert in trapping techniques which was the exact counter to their array.


    The array that the five of them used allowed them to gather their power into a single attack, but that was just it and it consumed a lot of their life energy to use each time.


    After Brainy had mutated once again to be a double mutated beast, its body had be much strongerpared to before. Even though it was only in the Primary Soul Realm, its body was already a match for those in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Even with the five of these punks working together, all they could reach was the low Fragmented Soul Realm, how could they match Brainy''s body in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm?


    Since that was the case, Brainy was able to easily trap with them its vines that wrapped around them until they had nowhere left to go.


    As for the rest of the punks with mohawks, Brainy''s puppets took care of them by overwhelming them with numbers.


    Soon there were only the five of them in the formation left.


    The shortest one among them turned to the tallest one and said, "Boss, what do we do?"


    The tallest one bit his lips for a bit before shouting, "We surrender. If you don''t kill us, we have some good information for you that we''re sure you''ll like!"


    Lin Fan heard this and raised a hand. When he did, the vines that Brainy controlled stopped moving and he asked, "What information do you have?"


    But then he also gave a snap and one of the vines pped down right in front of them. It moved so fast that not a single one of them had been able to see what the attack was.


    It was only at that moment that they realized something important.<sub> </sub>


    It wasn''t that this snake made of vines wasn''t able to take care of them, it was that it had been ying with them the entire time. It could have finished them off at any moment, but it chose to let them fight¡­


    All five of them swallowed a mouthful of saliva with difficulty before the tallest person said, "There''s a prime target just a few kilometers away from here. As long as you spare us, we''ll work with you to take them down and you can keep all the treasure that we would get."


    Lin Fan gave a thoughtful nod before saying, "It''s too bad that that proposition has no merits for me. Sure I can rob them, but it''s easy for them to track me down afterwards. Not to mention that if they have treasures, they must have some powerful force backing them. You think I''m stupid enough to risk my life?" At this, his eyes turned cold as he looked over the five of them.


    All of them felt the chill run down their backs as they couldn''t help shivering.


    The tallest one had been too greedy. He wanted to use Lin Fan to attack this group because he knew about Lin Fan''s power. As long as he made it seem like there was a powerful expert protecting their group, no one would dare to mess with them in the future. It was worth it giving up the fat sheep that they had been stalking the entire time.


    However, Lin Fan was right, without being able to hide his identity and stopping them from tracking him down, all of it would be for nothing.


    Of course, the tallest person had also nned for this.


    He was hoping that Lin Fan wouldn''t think of this so that he could throw Lin Fan under the bus, but since he did, there was a way for him to get out of this.


    His group had been able to attack all those people and get away, it wasn''t just because of luck.


    Some of the people that they robbed really did have powerful backers, so it would have been easy for them to track them down, that was if this group didn''t have a way to deal with this. However, the leader of this group did have a way to deal with this.


    He dug into his chest and took out a small totem.


    When Lin Fan saw this, the first thing he thought of were therge tiki heads that were on Easter Ind on earth. After all, this thing was a perfect replica of it.


    The tallest person said, "This is a special artifact that we use to hide ourselves, otherwise it would be impossible for us to do everything that we do. As long as we use this, there is no chance of you being found."


    Lin Fan thought about it and felt that he was right. These people clearly didn''t seem poorly armed since most of the tinum Realm Experts from earlier had pulled out Soul Realm Artifacts, which meant that they should have been a sessful band of robbers.


    Lin Fan reached out his hand and said, "Let me see it and I''ll consider it."


    All four of the shorter bandits looked at the tallest bandit who had a difficult look on his face, but after a few seconds of thought, he still handed the small tiki head over to Lin Fan.


    It wasn''t like he had much of a choice since Lin Fan held all the power here. If he didn''t give the artifact to Lin Fan, he would be killed since there was no chance that Lin Fan would trust him. If he at least gave the artifact to Lin Fan and he realized that it was real, there was a chance of him surviving.


    That was the mentality that these upper realm people had.


    In front of benefits, anything could be negotiated. Even people who had been bitter enemies one day had a price for the day they would be friends.


    But it was too bad that Lin Fan didn''t have the same mentality. Especially since he knew who the fat sheep that these bandits mentioned were.


    After Lin Fan looked over the artifact, he revealed a thoughtful look like he was considering something.


    When the bandits saw this, there was a hopeful look on their faces. As for the tallest one, he had more of a look that said he expected this. After all, in front of benefits, no one could resist.


    But seeing that Lin Fan still wasn''t saying a word, the tallest one couldn''t help asking, "Senior, are you interested in working with us¡­"


    Before he could even finish, Brainy''s vine had already fallen down onto his head, crushing his skull.


    Even in hisst moments, he didn''t expect that he would die like this.


    The others just watched as that headless corpse fell to the ground before looking at Lin Fan in shock.

 369 Chapter 369

    None of them could believe what had just happened. It already seemed like it was a done deal, why did this person suddenly change his mind?


    They looked at him in pure shock, but Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile.


    They knew that there wasn''t a chance of surviving if they didn''t do anything, so they immediately turned to run, but it was too bad that Brainy was already expecting this. Brainy''s vines were already behind them and as soon as they turned, Brainy''s vines fell down on their heads just like with their boss.


    There were four more headless corpses that fell to the ground just like that.


    Lin Fan put away the tiki head statue that he had received and had Brainy clean out the rest of the corpses. After all, even if they were bandits, they did have quite a few nice things that he could use in the future.


    Then it was all about cleaning up the corpses.


    After all, they had already set up camp and it would be too annoying to move again. But if they just left the corpses there, it would attract beasts and unwanted attention, so they couldn''t just leave them there.


    However, it was a good thing that Brainy had a use for these corpses.


    Most of these corpses had their appearances intact, which meant they were useful to Brainy.


    While their cultivations were a bit low, all that mattered was the way they looked. Brainy would definitely have a use for puppets that looked like this in the future.


    As for the five that had their heads destroyed, since their heads had been destroyed, they didn''t suit the role that Brainy wanted them to y and Brainy couldn''t extract the formation from their brains. At the very least, Brainy could use their bodies to perform the array and decipher it from there.


    Brainy''s intelligence had gone up quite a bit since it had be a second mutation beast, it was on apletely different level from before and it was already quite smart before.


    After that was taken care of, Lin Fan''s group went back to what they were doing before, sitting around the campfire.


    Before long, the sky above them waspletely dark and it was the middle of the night.


    Seeing that no one wasing, they all went into their tents and settled in for the night.


    When morning came, there was still no one that hade to their camp.


    It seemed like the lesson that they taught the people around themst night had sunk in and not a single one of them dared to make a move against their camp during the night.


    So when they woke up the next morning, Lin Fan''s group didn''t waste any time at all as they headed deeper into the Kunlun Mountains.


    Following the map that they received from the Seekers Guild, they quickly made their way into the middle ring of the Kunlun Mountains.


    Once they entered the middle ring, they could tell that this ce was different from the outer ring. First, there was the concentration of life energy in the air, it was more than ten times thickerpared to the outer ring. Second, there was a clear difference in the grade of beasts that were living in the middle ring.


    In the outer ring, there were all kinds of beasts walking around, even beasts that were just normal beasts without any cultivation at all.


    But in the middle ring, there weren''t any of those at all. The weakest beasts that were walking around were all in the Silver Realm and there were plenty of Gold Realm beasts walking around as well.


    This was definitely not a ce that everyone coulde to, even those in the tinum Realm wouldn''t be safe.


    But for Lin Fan''s group who were all above the Soul Realm, it was like taking a walk in the park.


    As Lin Fan rode Xiao Huo through the air, there were no beasts at all that came out to attack them since not a single one of them felt like they could. That was just the pressure that beasts with higher tier bloodlines put on beasts with lower tier bloodlines.


    Even if there was a disparity in cultivation, the beasts with the higher tier bloodlines would still be able to pressure the beasts with lower tier bloodlines.


    The ce that the item they were after was actually quite deep into the middle ring, but there was a path that had been carved out by humans who had gone previously.


    The ginseng that the client wanted was actually a farmed resource by humans, so there was a path that led to this ce. It was just too bad that there was an Embryo Soul Realm beast that suddenly decided to take residence in this ce.<sub> </sub>


    As they went through the middle ring, they actually found quite a few Embryo Soul Realm beasts along the way which Lin Fan took note of. He also had Brainy send out its scouts to see if it could find any other Embryo Soul Realm beasts a little further away.


    No one expected Lin Fan''s group to finish this mission in just two days and Lin Fan wasn''t nning on doing that. He was actually nning on going around to find some Embryo Soul Realm beasts to test his strength and farm out a few corpses to sell to the Seekers Guild.


    The Hunters Exam wasing up in just a few weeks, so the pressure was on.


    A few Embryo Soul Realm beast corpses would definitely be enough to let him qualify.


    Eventually, they arrived at the mountain the Nine Star Ginseng that they were looking for was at.


    When they first scouted the mountain, it was very clear that there was an Embryo Soul Realm beast that was on this mountain. The Embryo Soul Realm beast was fully releasing its aura, it wasn''t trying to hide itself at all.


    The strange thing was that there was no other beast that challenged it for this territory even though it was only in the low Embryo Soul Realm.


    But in that aura, Lin Fan also felt something familiar. It was like the feeling that he got from Xiao Feng.


    Originally, Lin Fan had nned to take care of this beast himself to test his own strength, but that n had already changed after his pets had begged him to let them fight instead.


    They had already gotten bored of fighting peak Fragmented Soul Realm beasts and they wanted to test out fighting an Embryo Soul Realm beast.


    Lin Fan normally would have rejected this since he didn''t have a problem saying no to kids, but it was too bad that Ang was a different case. Ang was weak towards the cuteness attack of the kids and she had no way of saying no to them, so in the end, Lin Fan was forced to let them go first.


    The kids all ran out in their human forms, running off in five different directions.


    Even if they did have superior bloodlines and battle strength that far surpassed their level of cultivation, that didn''t mean that they could skip all the way to the Embryo Soul Realm.


    This was an entire realm and they didn''t have as many cheats as Lin Fan did, so they could only use the one thing that they had.


    All five of them gathered in a pentagon around the mountain in the center before suddenly releasing their life energy. All that life energy gathered into an array that appeared above the mountain.


    When this array appeared, the aura of the Embryo Soul Realm beast inside the mountain also changed.


    It didn''t take long before there was a figure that suddenly flew into the sky above the mountain and floated there. Looking carefully at it, it was actually an azure dragon that was floating there.


    That azure dragon did a full spin and took a look at all five of Lin Fan''s pets before saying, "You actually dare to challenge me with just this? Even if you all have superior bloodlines, you think that you can beat me?"


    As it said this, it also revealed a greedy look while looking at Xiao Feng.


    For beasts to increase their bloodlines, there were two ways.


    One was to work for them to work hard and slowly refine their blood until it reached a certain point where they would mutate.


    The second was to find a beast with a superior bloodline and kill them to steal their bloodline for themselves. Bloodlines were easy to incorporate for beasts, so as long as they could find a superior bloodline, they would have no problem switching to it.


    Now that there was a superior dragon bloodline that had appeared in front of it, how could this azure dragon not be excited?


    It had been a long time since it had broken through and it had been feeling its threshold for a long time as well, so it was actually quite stumped. It hade to this mountain because the Nine Star Ginseng were said to have some effect on inciting epiphanies, but it hadn''t done anything for it yet.


    Since this weak little dragon with a higher grade bloodline was sending itself to its door, it wouldn''t say no.


    But before the azure dragon could do a thing, the array above it suddenly lit up. As the light became stronger and stronger, there was then a beam of light that fell down right onto the azure dragon.

 370 Chapter 370

    The azure dragon didn''t panic at first since it didn''t think that this beam of light would be that powerful. It calmly released its life energy and gathered a wall of water around itself, preparing to take it head on.


    However, when the beam of light came closer and closer, it realized that something was wrong.


    This beam of light was actually as strong as a full power strike from it and this wall of water it generated was definitely not enough to block this.


    However, it was already toote for the azure dragon to change its mind.


    But of course, as an azure dragon, who were the rulers of the sea, it didn''t have a problem gathering more water.


    More and more water entered the wall of water that it had created, creating arger andrger barrier in front of it.


    When the beam of light hit that wall of water, there was a burst of smoke that suddenly appeared around the azure dragon flying in the air. After the burst of smoke cleared, there was the azure dragon that was flying in the air with a very thinyer of water around it.


    "That was close, if I hadn''t used all thoseyers, that might have really hid me!" That was what the azure dragon was thinking.


    In truth, there was actually only a singleyer of water left between the azure dragon and the beam. If it hadn''t gone all out in gathering its waterws just now, it definitely would have been heavily injured by the beam.


    But that didn''t mean that the life energy consumption of this was low. To counter that beam of light just now, the azure dragon had used a third of its total life energy. That was more than enough to show it how dangerous it was.


    After being scared by the fact that it had almost lost its life, the azure dragon roared out, "You brats, you dare to do this to your father! I will kill you all right now!"


    But before it could even do a thing, there was another sh of light that appeared.


    This time, the beam of light didn''t fall right down onto it, rather it came from right in front of the azure dragon.


    The azure dragon didn''t have time to react at all, it just immediately ducked to the side to avoid this beam of light.


    The beam of light continued flying forward until it hit the wall of the array, being absorbed back by the array.


    The azure dragon had never seen anything like this, it never knew that there was such a flexible array. The arrays that it had heard of were all those that only affected a certain area they never had this kind of flexibility.


    But those arrays that it had heard of were formed by those that only had an average level of spiritual sense.


    This array was the product of five beasts with the highest grade bloodlines working with a sixth beast that had a very special cultivation method. That sixth beast was naturally Brainy with its spiritual sense cultivation.


    The power of arrays were determined by the spiritual sense of the oneid them down because it all depended on details. With finer details, the power of the array would increase because the array would be moreplete.


    But that didn''t mean that alone was what determined the power of an array.


    There was something that most people didn''t know actually determined the power of an array, which was the spiritual sense of the one controlling it.


    The more powerful the spiritual sense of the person controlling it, the more flexibility and power could be brought out of the array.


    Normally the array that the five of them were using would only allow them to rain down theirbined power onto the enemy since it was just that kind of simple array. However, with the spiritual sense of Brainy controlling the flow of life energy in the array, it allowed the array to create a box to function in. In the space of that box, the life energy could form beams of light from any direction to attack the azure dragon, giving them much more flexibility in their attacks.


    The azure dragon had been able to dodge to the side, but that didn''t mean that it was safe just yet.


    With Brainy''s spiritual sense, the life energy quickly flowed and there was another beam of light that suddenly appeared in another direction.


    The azure dragon was still trying to catch its breath when there was another sh of light that appeared. However, what it didn''t expect was that there would be two beams of light that would be shot at all.


    With Brainy''s powerful spiritual sense, it was able to make up for the deficiencies of the array.


    The array that they used was one that gathered the life energy of all the users of the array into the array to create a single attack, but that wasn''t fully effective, so there was arge part of the life energy that was lost. Large part actually meant close to half of it was lost.


    But with the control of Brainy''s spiritual sense, this array was now 100% effective, which meant that not a single bit of life energy was lost.<sub> </sub>


    This life energy was perfectly stored in the array and only expelled when it was used as an attack, but this array had been able to reach that level of power before with only 50% of the life energy. Now that 100% of the life energy was preserved, it meant that there could be two attacks of the same intensity sent out by the array. That was the main advantage of using Brainy''s spiritual sense to control the array.


    There were two beams of light that wereing in different directions at the azure dragon and it could tell that these two were both as powerful as the beam of light that had shattered its defenses before. That meant that the azure dragon definitely couldn''t block this either.


    It used all its life energy to speed up as much as possible, to avoid it since it had already given up all thoughts of defending or attacking.


    Right now, all that mattered was dodging these attacks and finding a way to escape.


    With all its life energy being used to increase its speed, it was able to avoid the beams of light, but of course it was only able to barely avoid it.


    Then came the second advantage of using Brainy''s spiritual sense to control the array.


    With Brainy''s spiritual sense controlling the array, the array was able to form a box around the azure dragon to shoot from any direction. However, because of that box, the array was also able to reabsorb the life energy from the missed shots and use them once again.


    As soon as the beams of light hit the walls of the box of the array, they were immediately sucked in and channeled elsewhere. When it reached its new location, it was expelled once again as a beam of light at the enemy.


    With this system in ce, that meant that there was very little consumption needed to run this array. As long as the enemy continued to dodge, it meant that the array could attack infinitely.


    Well, not exactly infinitely since there was something being consumed with each shot.


    Brainy''s spiritual sense was being consumed to control this array and each shot did have a bit of a burden on it, but it wasn''t something that it couldn''t handle.


    The azure dragon''s life energy continued to drain from dodging these beams of light and it couldn''t find a single way out of this formation.


    Finally, the azure dragon made a mistake and it found that it couldn''t dodge the next beam of light.


    ? Faced with no other choice, the azure dragon did the same thing as the first beam of light and it started gathering water around itself. A thickyer of water quickly surrounded the azure dragon as the beam of light reached it.


    With the same burst of smoke, the azure dragon was able to barely avoid being hit, but this time there wasn''t a singleyer of water around it at all.


    The azure dragon was panting at this point since it had already consumed all of its life energy, it didn''t even have the life energy needed to continue dodging the beams of light.


    Seeing this, Brainy and the others were in no rush to shoot it again.


    The azure dragon finally got a break to catch its breath and as soon as it did, it shouted, "Who are you guys? Why are you even doing this? There''s no grudge between us, you can just let me go!"


    It no longer acted as arrogantly as before since it knew that it was in a very bad situation.


    In this situation, its pride no longer mattered in front of its life.


    As long as it was able to escape, it would have done anything.


    But there was no chance at all.


    All it heard was the giggle of a few kids around it before there was another sh of light that appeared in front of it.


    This time, the beam of light didn''te out immediately as the light in front of it became brighter and brighter.


    The azure dragon could tell that this attack was not like the ones from before, this one would definitely be much stronger. However, it didn''t have the power to block or dodge this anymore. All it could do was wait for death.


    Finally, the light stopped increasing in intensity before shooting out a beam of light that was bigger than the ones from before.


    It became bigger and bigger in the azure dragon''s eyes until itpletely filled its vision, but at this time, there was a figure that suddenly fell down in front of the azure dragon.

 371 Chapter 371

    That figure was a tall man in an azure robe.


    Without saying a thing, that man raised his hand and suddenly pped the beam of light that was approaching, pping it right into the ground.


    The beam of light immediately shattered as soon as it touched the ground, being shattered by some foreign energy that stopped it from being reabsorbed back into the array.


    After this, the tall man in the azure robe looked around the array as if he was looking for something.


    The azure dragon that had been so stunned that it was unable to do a thing finally noticed the man in the azure robe and shouted, "Daddy, you''re finally here!"


    Then the azure dragon wrapped up around the arm of the man in the azure robe before saying, "Daddy, they''re all bullying me! You have to get revenge for this treasure!"


    The way the azure dragon spoke, it sounded like a naughty kid running to their parents after being caught, but this was no joke. The aura that the man in the azure robe gave off truly was dangerous.


    The man in the azure robe said, "Un." Then he patted the azure dragon who had taken a smaller form now to look more pitiful on the head before turning to look at Lin Fan''s group.


    Hepletely ignored the array that was around him and directly focused his attention on Lin Fan''s group.


    The moment his gaze fell onto them, Lin Fan felt an aura that he had never felt before, but he could tell that this definitely wasn''t normal.


    This aura was even strongerpared to the aura of the Child Soul Realm elder from the Liao Family who hade down with Liao Ping. If Lin Fan had to guess, this aura should be the aura of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert or even a True Soul Realm Expert who was at the peak of the upper realm.


    Why would this kind of expert suddenly appear here in the Kunlun Mountains.


    However, even with the appearance of this expert, Lin Fan didn''t run.


    That was because he knew that in a pinch, there was still Ang and Momonga who could save him.


    Rather, he felt a bit of excitement at trying to fight this expert even though he knew that he wouldn''t win.


    As for the man in the azure robes, he could naturally feel the strange feelinging from Ang and Momonga, so he knew that this wouldn''t be a simple case.


    But before either side could make a move, there was a scale that suddenly came out of Lin Fan''s Storage Ring and flew into the air as a voice said, "Xiao Ao, is that you?"


    When that voice cut through the air, Lin Fan just revealed a surprised look since he never expected this person toe out. As for the man in the azure robe, he immediately revealed a look of shock and disbelief, standing there for a long time in a daze.


    Finally the man in the azure robe said, "Uncle Hong, is that you?"


    That was right, the scale that had suddenly floated into the air was the scale that contained the soul of Hong Long, the fifth elder of the Dragon Race.


    After Hong Long''s soul had been stored in Xiao Feng''s scale, it had fallen into a slumber to adjust to its new housing. Even after it awoke from that slumber, Hong Long''s soul had been slowly recovering its power from its peak.


    Right now, Hong Long had only just reached the Fragmented Soul Realm, which was considered quite fast, but that was still too weak to help Lin Fan. That was why Hong Long hadn''t been let out this entire time, until Hong Long himself suddenly decided toe out.


    The only reason Hong Long''s cultivation had recovered this quickly was because Xiao Feng was of the true dragon bloodline, which meant that the power contained within the scale alone was very useful in helping Hong Long recover from his wounds.


    There was a sh of red light before there was a figure that suddenly appeared around the scale that had floated out.


    Instead of taking dragon form like when Lin Fan first met him, this time Hong Long appeared in the form of arge man with fire red hair in a fire red robe. Even though he was an elder of the Dragon Race, this man looked like he was only in his mid thirties.


    But when the man in the azure robe saw this figure, there were tears in his eyes before he quickly came forward to kneel in front of Hong Long.


    "The Qing n''s Qing Ao greets Hong Long, chief of the Red Dragons and fifth elder of the Dragon Race." The man in the azure robe said in a solemn voice as he fell to one knee in the air and cupped his hands towards Hong Long.<sub> </sub>


    The little azure dragon that was wrapped around the man in the azure robe''s arm suddenly looked up at the man in the azure robe with a shocked look before asking in a confused voice, "Daddy, what are you doing? They are the people who bullied this treasure, why are you kneeling to them?"


    The man in the azure robe smacked the little azure dragon on the head and said, "Mind your manners, don''t make me punish youter."


    The little azure dragon looked up with an aggrieved look before bursting out into tears, "Daddy doesn''t love me anymore!"


    The man in the azure robes revealed a bitter smile when he saw this, but he couldn''t bear to actually do anything. In truth, this was his first child, so he spoiled them quite a bit. He had never been able to do anything to them and had actually spoiled them rotten, which was why this little azure dragon had this kind of personality.


    Hong Long looked at the crying little azure dragon before giving a loudugh, "Ha, ha, ha, I never expected that you would be such a doting parent, especially with how much you hated kids in the past." After saying this, he stoppedughing as a trace of sadness appeared in his eyes and he continued, "It seems like a long time really has passed. Even you kids are growing up and having kids now."


    The man in the azure robe quickly asked, "Uncle Hong, where have you been this entire time? My father and the Dragon King have been looking everywhere for you. We knew you weren''t dead yet because your soul jade hadn''t shattered, but we couldn''t find you after all this time."


    Hong Long just gave a sigh and said, "It''s a long story and one that we can talk aboutter. For now, I need to talk to you about something important."


    The man in the azure robe immediately nodded and said, "Uncle, please."


    Hong Long pointed in the direction of Xiao Feng and asked, "What do you think about that little dragon over there?"


    The man in the azure robes looked over in Xiao Feng''s direction and gave a quick look over Xiao Feng before saying, "Isn''t it just a beast with a dragon bloodline? The bloodline does seem quite pure, but¡­"


    Before he could finish, his eyes suddenly narrowed as if he had realized something and he took a closer look at Xiao Feng before turning to Hong Long in disbelief. It took him quite a while before he was able to say, "Is it really that?"


    Hong Long nodded before saying, "It''s exactly what you think it is."


    The man in the azure robe immediately revealed a serious look as he turned back to look at Lin Fan and asked, "This man is the master of this little dragon?"


    Hong Long gently hit his head and said, "Don''t even think about it."


    The man in the azure robe wasn''t displeased from being hit, but he still said, "Uncle, we can''t leave the hope of our Dragon Race in the hands of an outsider! We have to bring this little dragon back to the n!"


    Hong Long didn''t reply to this, but rather he pointed at Xiao Huo, Xiao Lei, and Xiao Bai as he said, "Look at them first before you make that decision."


    This time, the man in the azure robe wasn''t negligent and carefully looked over the three of them. It didn''t take long before he revealed the same shocked look as before as he stammered, "They, they, they all have, have the sacred bloodlines!"


    Hong Long gave a nod before saying, "That''s right, now do you get what I mean? There is a master behind this kid who gave him all these pets, do you really want to mess with someone like that?"


    The man in the azure robe had a difficult look on his face as he said, "But uncle, you know what this means for our Dragon Race¡­"


    Hong Long nodded again before saying, "I know, that is why I''ve approached this kid, even letting him hold my soul fragment. He''s already said that he would bring that little dragon to the Dragon Race, so we have to just wait for that day."


    The man in the azure robe still said, "But uncle, how are we to trust the words of a human?"


    Hong Long gave a soft snort, "So what if he''s human? You should know better than that already."


    Then he didn''t give the man in the azure robe a chance to speak as he said, "For now, with the backing that he has, we can only be his friends and never his enemy, do you understand?"


    The man in the azure robe clearly had something else to say, but he still swallowed those words as he said, "Yes uncle."


    Hong Long nodded before saying, "Alright,e with me. I''ll introduce you."

 372 Chapter 372

    When Hong Long and the man in the azure robe had been talking, they had lowered their voices so that Lin Fan couldn''t hear what they were saying. Of course, he could hear a few things when they raised their voices, but beyond that, he didn''t really hear the bulk of their conversation.


    It wasn''t that Lin Fan wasn''t interested, it was just that he trusted Hong Long since they had also spent quite a bit of time together.


    Along with Momonga, Hong Long had also taught him quite a bit since they were both body cultivators. As well, since Hong Long was a Dragon Race Expert, he had also been teaching Xiao Feng quite a bit.


    So when Hong Long and the man in the azure robe came over, Lin Fan didn''t put his guard up because of his trust in Hong Long. However, it wasn''t just his trust in Hong Long that caused him to make this decision. It was also the fact that the man in the azure robe didn''t have any hostility at all.


    The little azure dragon around his arm on the other hand was another question, but in this ce, it couldn''t do a thing. Almost everyone here was more powerful than it, so it could only silently re at Lin Fan''s group.


    When Hong Long and the man in the azure robended in front of Lin Fan''s group, Hong Long revealed a smile and said, "Xiao Fan, I want to introduce someone to you. This is Qing Ao and his child, they are rtives of mine. All of this has been a misunderstanding and I''ve already cleared all of this up, so there''s no need for you all to fight anymore."


    The man in the azure robe introduced as Qing Ao cupped his hand and said, "Little friend Lin, it is a pleasure to meet you."


    Lin Fan looked at Hong Long for a bit before giving him face and also cupping his hands to Qing Ao, "Senior, it is a pleasure to meet you as well."


    Hong Long nodded when he saw this before saying, "Now that we''re all acquainted with each other, let''s have a talk."


    Lin Fan and Qing Ao were both confused when they heard this, but Qing Ao quickly followed up by bringing out a set of pure jade furniture that he ced in front of him for everyone to sit at.


    After everyone took a seat, they all just sat there in silence until Hong Long said, "Xiao Fan, if I were to have Xiao Ao guard you, what would you say?"


    Once again, both Lin Fan and Qing Ao looked at Hong Long with confused and shocked looks. Neither of them knew what was going on right now, but that didn''t stop Hong Long.


    While Lin Fan was deep in thought, Qing Ao looked like he wanted to say something, but Hong Long sent him a secret message with his spiritual sense, "Just follow along with my n."


    Qing Ao looked at Hong Long with a doubtful gaze, but he still decided to follow along with Hong Long and just sat there waiting.


    Lin Fan on the other hand had been in thought for a quite a bit before looking right at Hong Long and asking, "This is for Xiao Feng, isn''t it?"


    Hong Long gave a nod of appreciation before saying, "But it''s also beneficial for you since Xiao Ao is a True Soul Realm dragon, which definitely has some weight in this upper realm. After all, there''s nothing wrong with making more friends, don''t you think?"


    Lin Fan looked at Qing Ao in surprise when he heard this.


    The True Soul Realm, that was the realm that all the leaders of the Gctic Humanity Alliance were at. This was a very important realm of cultivation in this upper realm, so this Qing Ao must be someone who also had quite a bit of influence in this upper realm.


    If Lin Fan were to be close with Qing Ao, that would definitely give him some firm backing, but there was also the fact that Qing Ao was a dragon. While he was powerful, he was still a beast in the end, so coborating with him was a bit¡­


    Still, for now, Lin Fan didn''t have to reveal his rtionship to Qing Ao since there was no need for a True Soul Realm Expert right now. But building this rtionship meant that he would have the protection of a True Soul Realm Expert in the future.


    In the long run, this was definitely a good deal for him.


    After a bit of thought, Lin Fan gave a nod in the end.


    When Hong Long saw this, he gave a p and said, "Very good, then that''s settled." Then he changed his tone and said, "To be honest, if we''re converting the ages, Xiao Ao should be around the same age as Xiao Fan, though he would be considered a bit older than you in human years. Xiao Fan, how about you and Xiao Ao be sworn brothers? That would definitely help you in the future since that would make you a part of our Dragon Race. Also Xiao Ao has always been saying that he wanted a little brother."


    Lin Fan and Qing Ao were once again shocked when they heard this, but this time they found it much easier to ept.<sub> </sub>


    In the beginning, Lin Fan had already decided to get closer to the Dragon Race since no matter which realm it was, dragons were one of the most powerful races. With them as his backer and with what they knew, they definitely would be able to help him.


    As for Qing Ao, while he didn''t have any impression of Lin Fan, he knew how important Xiao Feng''s existence was to the Dragon Race, so he would follow his Uncle Hong''s suggestion in the end.


    Lin Fan waved his hand and brought out a bottle of wine with two cups before saying, "Brother Qing, if you would please."


    Qing Ao gave augh and said, "Brother Lin, you are too polite. It is an honour to be sworn brothers with you."


    But before they could go through with it, the little azure dragon jumped onto the table and fell down on its back as it threw a tantrum, "No, no, no, this treasure doesn''t want this! Daddy, they were the ones who were bullying me, you can''t just let them go that easily! You have to take revenge for this little treasure!"


    Qing Ao had an awkward look on his face when he saw this, but he also quickly stood up and rapped the little azure dragon on the head as he said, "What are you doing? Get off the table right now or I swear I will punish you!"


    The little azure dragon was taken aback by this since it had never been spoken to like this. Before, no matter what it did, its daddy would have spoken to it in a gentle voice and softly guided it instead of using this sharp voice.


    The little azure dragon gave another sniffle as it said, "Daddy doesn''t love me anymore!" But seeing the stern look on its father''s face, it still got off the table in the end. It stood on the side looking aggrieved.


    Qing Ao then said, "What are you doing staying in your dragon form still, don''t you see that everyone else is in human form?"


    The little azure dragon still had the same aggrieved look, but it also began changing. The little azure dragon''s figure changed until it became a child that was around the same age as Lin Fan''s pets, though it did look a year or two older.


    The surprising thing was that with how naughty it was, Lin Fan was certain that it would be a boy, but it turned out to be a little girl who was like a porcin doll in a small azure dress.


    Qing Ao then turned back to Lin Fan and said in an apologetic voice, "Brother Lin, I''m very sorry about this. It''s my fault for not being strict enough with her, that''s why she turned out this spoiled."


    The little girl had a look like she had been betrayed by the most important person in her life when she heard this.


    Lin Fan just waved his hand with a smile and said, "It''s fine, it''s fine. Brother Qing, shall we?"


    Qing Ao nodded as he picked up his cup of wine, "Of course, it''s an honour Lin."


    The ceremony didn''t take long and soon after, they had be sworn brothers.


    Since this was a joyous asion, they continued drinking the wine that Lin Fan brought out and chatting with each other.


    During this chat, Qing Ao also introduced the little girl to Lin Fan. The little girl''s name was actually Qing Bao Lan, which was why she kept calling herself this treasure the entire time. Of course, the way she acted was theplete opposite of how she was named.


    One gave the name Lan in hopes their child would turn out elegant and graceful, but she was the exact opposite of that¡­


    During their talk, it turned out Qing Ao was a very poor drinker and it didn''t take him long to be drunk. He was also a drunk that liked toin, so heined about Qing Bao Lan the entire time.


    ? After hisints, Lin Fan asked with a smile, "Brother Qing, I actually run a pet training store. How about you let me help you discipline her a bit?"


    It was too bad that the smile he revealed was his normal smile.

 373 Chapter 373

    When both Qing Ao and Qing Bao Lan saw this smile, there was a chill that ran down their backs.


    Qing Ao quickly sobered up and said, "Brother Lin, how could I impose? This is something that I should do as the parent, how could I trouble Brother Lin with this?"


    As for Qing Bao Lan, when she saw that smile, she instinctively took a step back. It was like there was a natural fear of Lin Fan that came over her.


    Of course, that natural fear didn''te from nothing. Rather it was formed by all the different pets that had cursed Lin Fan, giving him a terrifying aura.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother pursuing this topic since he was just getting a little revenge on the little dragon girl.


    In the beginning, he was supposed to kill her and take her corpse back to the Seekers Guild to sell since he needed the points, but now he couldn''t do that. After all, now she was his sworn brother''s daughter, which also made her his niece.


    If he were to kill his niece, that definitely wouldn''t be something that he could live down.


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and changed the topic.


    Qing Ao was happy to continue with this since at least this topic didn''t involve his daughter, but Qing Bao Lan wasn''t happy to leave it at that.


    She had been wronged all these times during this period and she couldn''t take it anymore. She really wanted to get revenge for all the wrongs that she had suffered, but no one did a thing for her.


    All of the adults just ignored her like a little child who was throwing a tantrum as she cried by a tree that was on the side of the area that the table was in. From time to time, she even cried out louder to make sure that the adults could hear her, but not a single person came over tofort her.


    As this continued, Qing Bao Lan felt more and more aggrieved until she actually started crying for real.


    Other than this meeting between the adults, there was also another meeting that was being held. It was a meeting between kids.


    Lin Fan''s pets were all gathered around Brainy in their human forms, discussing how the battle had gone today. They weren''t satisfied with how they had performed since it had taken them that long to take care of Qing Bao Lan and at the same time, Qing Ao had easily destroyed theirbined attack.


    As beasts that had supreme bloodlines, they couldn''t ept being bested like this. They had to find a way to take revenge on Qing Ao!


    While they were holding their meeting, they also snuck looks at Qing Ao from time to time before pointing at the drawings they had made on the ground. It looked like they were already thinking of a way to deal with him.


    On the side, Ang watched over them like a proud mother, gushing over how her little kids were growing up even though they were nning on beating someone up¡­


    But what she didn''t notice was that one of the kids had moved away from the group during this time and had moved over to where Qing Bao Lan was squatting on the ground crying. This was a little boy who had pure azure hair, piercing azure eyes, and a flowing azure robe. Even though he was a little boy, every part of him screamed handsome. He would definitely grow up to be a handsome guy in the future, but for now he was quite a cute boy.


    That little boy with the piercing azure eyes came over to where Qing Bao Lan was crying, but since she was too focused on her crying, she didn''t notice him at all.


    The little boy hesitantly walked up to her and at first didn''t know how to approach, but then he put a hand on her back and patted it.


    When Qing Bao Lan felt the hand on her back, she immediately turned around with a hopeful look, but then that hopeful look turned to disappointment when she saw the little boy. However, after a few seconds, she took a closer look at the little boy and she couldn''t help falling into a daze.


    The little boy saw that she suddenly turned around and was a bit surprised before he asked, "Alright?"


    Qing Bao Lan was even more surprised when she heard this because she never expected this little boy tofort her, after all¡­


    The little boy was Xiao Feng, one of Lin Fan''s pets that had just been fighting her.


    Xiao Feng spoke in broken words because he had only gained intelligence just a few months ago. While he was able to speak in full sentences when it came to thoughts since thoughts directly converted what he said into words, it was hard for him to speak with this human body since he was still learning how it worked.


    But with the cute little appearance that he had, speaking in fragmented sentences actually worked in his favour.


    Qing Bao Lan didn''t know what to say as she just looked at Xiao Feng who kept patting her on her back.


    After a while, Qing Bao Lan finally said, "I''m alright now. Thank you."


    When she said this, there was a faint blush that appeared on her face and she couldn''t help lowering her head slightly.<sub> </sub>


    Xiao Feng gave a nod and said, "Un."


    Then he turned around and headed back to where the other kids were, but before he could take a single step, there was a hand that suddenly grabbed his hand to stop him from moving. As this hand grabbed his hand, there was a soft voice that came from behind that said, "Wait."


    Xiao Feng was confused as he turned around to see Qing Bao Lan acting shy while holding his hand.


    Xiao Feng couldn''t help asking, "Need something?"


    When he said this, the way he looked, the cuteness of it all was like an arrow that pierced Qing Bao Lan''s heart.


    Qing Bao Lan was a child that had been rather spoiled, so her personality had turned out quite domineering. She was someone who knew what she wanted and when she set her heart on something, she wouldn''t hesitate to take it for herself.


    As for what her heart had set itself on this time¡­


    Qing Bao Lan hesitated as she said, "Can, can you, youe with me, me for a second?"


    The strong tone that she had made it sound like a statement, but the slight upwards intonation at the end showed that it was a sentence.


    Xiao Feng looked back at the meeting that the other kids were holding and seeing that nothing was going on, he just gave a nod and said, "Un, alright."


    Xiao Feng had actually onlye over because he had felt that this little dragon girl had looked quite sad as she was crying by herself.


    Out of all the pets that Lin Fan had, Xiao Feng was the one with the kindest personality.


    As for the others, Xiao Huo had a fiery personality as dictated by his attribute, Xiao Lei had a very explosive personality that was like a bolt of lighting, Rocky was was quite calm and sedentary, and Xiao Bai was as calm as a pool of water, but there were ripples under that calm surface.


    Only Xiao Feng was as gentle as a breeze.


    When Qing Bao Lan heard Xiao Feng''s response, she revealed a happy and excited look.


    She took him by the hand and dragged him over to where the adults were still talking.


    It had been a while, so all of them were a bit drunk, except for Ang who had been watching over the kids the entire time. Though how a soul fragment like Hong Long was able to get drunk, that really was a mystery¡­


    They didn''t see Qing Bao Lan approach at first, but then she suddenly jumped onto the table right in front of them, so they had no choice but to acknowledge her. After her previous disy, all of them had already expected something like this, but for a strange reason, she was dragging Xiao Feng along by the hand with a blush on her face.


    Qing Ao was the first to respond and even though he was drunk, he still said, "Qing Bao Lan, what are you doing? Stop acting up already and get off the table!"


    Qing Bao Lan revealed pouted lips as she said, "But daddy, I have something important to say!"


    <o>,m Everyone was surprised by the way she said it. Compared to the domineering way that she spoke earlier, it almost seemed like she was being shy, even though she was still shouting.</o>


    Qing Ao was about to say something, but Lin Fan said, "Brother Qing, how about we listen to what Xiao Bao Lan has to say?"


    To be honest, Lin Fan was curious why Xiao Feng had been dragged along by Qing Bao Lan, so he wanted to hear what she wanted to say.


    Hong Long then followed up and said, "That''s right, Xiao Ao, you''ve always been too hasty. Let''s hear what Xiao Bao Bao has to say."


    Hong Long might seem like a rough person, but he actually had quite the soft spot for kids.


    In the end, Qing Ao could only give a sigh and say, "Alright, Xiao Bao Bao, go ahead."


    Qing Bao Lan pulled Xiao Feng who had been standing a bit behind her forward and when they were standing side by side, she suddenly said, "I want to mate with him!"


    All the adults immediately spat out the wine that they had been drinking.

 374 Chapter 374

    There was a deathly silence that filled the air for a while. There wasn''t a single person who was speaking.


    All the adults had dark looks on their faces, that was with the exception of Momonga who was covering his mouth with one hand, looking like he was about to break out intoughter.


    No matter how one described this scene, it could only be described with the word ''ridiculous''.


    This little girl who was barely a meter tall standing on the table had suddenly shouted that she wanted to ''mate'', this was something that was too hard to swallow for anyone.


    Lin Fan was shocked because he hade from earth and while there were many doujins that had depicted this situation, that was all fiction. When he was seeing it in real life, his moral codes couldn''t help objecting to this.


    Qing Ao was shocked not because of the face that he was losing in front of everyone else with his daughter''s disy, but rather he was shocked by his daughter''s words. He was someone who hadpletely spoiled his daughter rotten and someone who did that was naturally someone who loved their child. After all, this was his only daughter, so he couldn''t help loving her.


    When she was younger, he had already thought about this day and he decided that he would do everything he could to make her want to marry daddy when she grew up, so she would never be taken away by anyone else.


    He never thought that he would have to face this kind of a day so soon¡­


    He wanted her to be his good little girl for a bit longer, but now it seemed like that wasn''t possible.


    Qing Ao also couldn''t help ring at Xiao Feng after thinking this as he thought, "It''s all this brat''s fault for seducing my daughter!"


    Finally there were the two who found this idea interesting.


    Momonga was just having fun with this, but it was different with Hong Long.


    At first, Hong Long had been caught off guard by this, but then he felt that this might actually be a good idea. After all, the Dragon Race was depending on the bloodline that Xiao Feng possessed to rise up and if they were to pull him in with a wife, why wouldn''t they do so? Sometimes it was the honey trap that was the most effective.


    But before anyone was able to say a thing, Ang immediately came over and pped Qing Bao Lan''s hand, making her release Xiao Feng. Of course, she didn''t p too hard since Qing Bao Lan was still a child.


    After Qing Bao Lan let go of Xiao Feng''s hand, Ang quickly picked him up and walked over to where the other kids were standing who hade over to see what themotion was. Once she put her down, she turned back to Qing Bao Lan and red at her.


    Qing Bao Lan immediately revealed an angry look and shouted, "Hey, you old hag, what do you think you''re doing? Give me my honey back right now!"


    Everyone was shocked once again hearing this and that even included Ang.


    She had never been called "old hag" before since she was actually still quite young. In fact, when the age of spirits was converted to the age of humans, she was still considered a teenager who was the same age as Lin Fan.


    When Ang came back to her senses, she just red at Qing Bao Lan before giving a softugh that was filled with disdain.


    Qing Bao Lan jumped up and down on the table before pointing at Ang as she shouted, "What is that supposed to mean, you dried up old bag?"


    Ang just had the same smile of disdain as she looked at Qing Bao Lan and said, "You should know in your heart whether you can match up to our Xiao Feng or not."


    Qing Bao Lan muttered to herself, "So my honey''s name is Xiao Feng¡­" Then she continued in her aggressive voice, "You think you know what''s best for him? I''m what''s best for him!"


    Lin Fan almost wanted tough at this.


    It seemed that no matter which world it was, the struggle between a daughter inw and a mother inw still existed.


    Qing Bao Lan jumped off the table and walked over to where Xiao Feng was, but she couldn''t get to him since the other kids were surrounding him, keeping her away from him.


    While they didn''t know what was going on, they did know that they should keep Qing Bao Lan away from Xiao Feng since it seemed like she wanted to be kind to him. And then there was the fact that she was the one they had just been fighting.


    Of course, Brainy did have a better understanding of this sincepared to the other kids, it was a bit older.


    So when the other kids asked Brainy why they were doing this, Brainy had told them that this little girl wanted to "eat" Xiao Feng, so that was why they should keep her away from him.


    They didn''t want their brother to be "eaten", so the kids formed a human shield with their bodies, keeping Xiao Feng away.<sub> </sub>


    If an adult were looking at them, they would definitely thought that these kids were cute with how they were acting.


    After jumping off the table, Qing Bao Lan came over to the blockade of kids, but seeing that she couldn''t get past them, she said, "Xiao Feng, do you think I''m pretty?"


    Xiao Feng poked his head out when he heard this and with a tilt of his head, after a bit of thought, he gave a nod as he said, "Un."


    Qing Bao Lan''s face turned a bit red when she heard this, but she didn''t stop as she said, "Then if we get together, you can see my pretty face all the time."


    Xiao Feng tilted his head again before saying, "But pretty face not as good as delicious food. Master has delicious food, so Xiao Feng stay with master."


    Qing Bao Lan gritted her teeth and said, "I have delicious food too, if youe with me, I''ll give you all the delicious food you want!"


    Xiao Feng''s eyes lit up when he heard this and he asked, "Really? What delicious food?"


    Qing Bao Lan took out a fruit from her Storage Ring and held it up, "The most delicious sweet fruits are all yours if youe with me!"


    Xiao Feng took a sniff before saying, "No thanks, fruit not that delicious."


    Qing Bao Lan really wanted to cry when she heard this. No matter what, she was a cute girl and she was even offering herself to him, yet he was saying no!


    How could she take this!


    But seeing Xiao Feng''s cute face popping out, she sucked it all up and continued trying to coax him.


    Finally, Qing Ao couldn''t keep watching this any longer and he came out to pick Qing Bao Lan up as he said, "Sweety, where did you learn these kinds of words? You can''t call someone "honey" that casually."


    Qing Bao Lan pouted her cheeks at being picked up so suddenly and she kicked out at Qing Ao''s face who just took it while shouting, "Let me go, let me go, I have to win over my honey."


    Qing Ao''s face looked very awkward as he said, "Sweety, I told you that you can''t call people "honey" that casually. Where did you learn this?"


    Qing Bao Lan then said, "But mommy always calls daddy honey, why can''t I call my Feng Feng honey?"


    Qing Ao''s face looked even uglier when he said this.


    It seemed that kids really learned anything that was put in front of them fast. He never expected his daughter to learn all this just by watching him¡­


    Qing Bao Lan took advantage of this moment to escape from Qing Ao''s grasp and jumped down onto the ground. She quickly made her way back to the blockade of kids and took out all kinds of food items to coax Xiao Feng over with.


    It had to be known that Qing Ao spoiled Qing Bao Lan rotten, so the things that were in her Spatial Ring were all rare items in this upper realm. They were things that couldn''t be bought with just money, it also depended on one''s luck.


    Qing Ao was about to go forward again to try and convince Qing Bao Lan, but Hong Long hade over and he put his hand on Qing Ao''s shoulder as he said, "It''s fine, it''s fine, kids these days can decide who they want to marry."


    Then in a secret message, he said, "Besides, if Xiao Bao Bao marries Xiao Feng, that means that we can bring him back with us to meet the family since he will be marrying into our Dragon Race. This will make things easier for us in the future."


    Qing Ao knew that this was true, but this was his only daughter, so he still wasn''t willing to lose her just like this.


    Hong Long patted him on the shoulder and said in aforting voice, "Kids will leave the nest one day. Look at my three daughters, didn''t they all get married in the end?"


    Qing Ao still wanted to say more, but Hong Long wouldn''t listen to him any longer.


    Hong Long had turned over to Lin Fan and he asked, "Xiao Fan, do you want to let them be engaged for now?"


    Lin Fan looked at the kids bickering and he didn''t know how to feel about this.


    Finally he said, "If Xiao Feng agrees, then it''s fine, but if he doesn''t, there''s nothing I can do about it."

 375 Chapter 375

    Hong Long clearly had something else to say, but since Lin Fan had already made apromise, he chose to ept it.


    Hong Long gave a nod and said, "It''s best if the kids cane to an agreement themselves."


    Then he turned to pat Qing Ao on the shoulder again as he said, "It''ll all depend on Xiao Bao Bao in the future."


    Qing Ao still had a tearful look as he said, "Uncle Hong¡­"


    Hong Long just smiled and said, "It''s for the future prosperity of the Dragon Race."


    Qing Ao still didn''t look convinced, but there was nothing else he could say since Hong Long had already brought out the future prosperity of the Dragon Race. As one of the members of the Dragon Race, this was naturally what he wanted as well and he couldn''t just go against his elders like this.


    But still, that was his only daughter¡­


    Hong Long walked over to where Qing Bao Lan was and said, "Xiao Bao Bao, do your best. Uncle Hong is rooting for you."


    Qing Bao Lan turned around with a hopeful look and said, "Great uncle!"


    But then she immediately revealed a sweet smile and said, "Great uncle, since you''re rooting for me, you must have some things to help me, right? I need some good delicacies to give to my honey, I''m sure great uncle will give them to me, right?"


    Hong Long''s face turned stiff, it seemed like he had underestimated this little girl.


    Not only was she spoiled rotten, she was also quite sly.


    Hong Long could only say with a cough, "Ke, your Uncle Hong doesn''t have anything right now since I''m just a soul fragment. When I get back into my body, your Uncle Hong will get you anything you want."


    Qing Bao Lan just looked disappointed before saying, "Oh, never mind then."


    As soon as she said this, she stopped paying attention to Hong Long and went back to trying to coax Xiao Feng out.


    Hong Long was just left there with a look on his face like he was about to cry. He had never met this kind of little girl before¡­


    Hong Long turned back to Qing Ao who had an awkward look on his face as well before saying, "You really have a special way of teaching your daughter."


    Qing Ao just revealed a bitter look, but he didn''t say anything since there was nothing else to say.


    Since they decided to leave this matter to the kids, they just ignored Qing Bao Lan and what the other kids were doing. Of course, not everything was good with Lin Fan since he could see res from Ang which he tried to ignore as much as he could.


    After a little bit longer, Lin Fan got into the main topic.


    Lin Fan tapped the table and said, "Brother Qing, since this is your territory, do you know if there are any Embryo Soul Realm beasts that are nearby?"


    Qing Ao was surprised to hear this, but then he said, "There are a few nearby. Brother Lin, why are you asking this?"


    Lin Fan paused for a second before saying, "Well, I need a few Embryo Soul Realm beast corpses for my own needs...So I was wondering if Brother Qing could bring me around to kill a few Embryo Soul Realm beasts."


    Qing Ao was shocked when he heard this.


    While he hadn''t been the king of these Kunlun Mountains for long, he was still the king here. Since he was the ruler here, that meant that the beasts that were here looked to him for protection.


    Now Lin Fan was asking him to sacrifice a few of them¡­


    This really put Qing Ao in a hard spot, that was if he didn''t know about Xiao Feng.


    Since there was the existence of Xiao Feng, everything else could be negotiated, especially the lives of the lower realm beasts. For him, he was only temporarily protecting them and it didn''t matter if a few of them died since none of this would ever reach the Dragon n which was what really mattered. All that would matter was if he was able to bring Xiao Feng back or not.


    So this was really a small price to pay to be friends with Lin Fan and Qing Ao didn''t hesitate to pay it.


    But since this was an opportunity for the kids as well, Qing Ao said, "Brother Lin, how about we let the kids take care of the Embryo Soul Realm beasts by themselves and only step in when we need to? It would be good training for them."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin and considered it before giving a nod.


    While it might take a bit longer to take care of the Embryo Soul Realm beasts like this, he was right about it being a good chance for the kids to have some training. Lin Fan had seen how hard they had worked earlier and how disappointed they were when they had been stopped by Qing Ao, this would be a good chance to rebuild their confidence.


    So it was decided just like that, but it was too bad the beasts of the Kunlun Mountains didn''t know that they had just been sacrificed. If they did, they would have cried until there were no tears left since the king that they trusted to protect them had just thrown them away.


    Once that was settled, Lin Fan took out the map that he brought and Qing Ao marked several spots. Before doing so, he asked Lin Fan how many Embryo Soul Realm beasts that he wanted and after Lin Fan thought about it, he asked for ten.


    Ten, a whole ten Embryo Soul Realm beasts!<sub> </sub>


    In Harmony City, a single Embryo Soul Realm Expert was able to lead an entire family like the Xu Family, but now Lin Fan was asking for the corpses of ten Embryo Soul Realm beasts.


    If this was known by anyone else, they definitely would have scolded him until he drowned in spit.


    But for Qing Ao, he agreed quite readily.


    That was because he was expecting much more than just ten.


    For Qing Ao who came from an even higher realm, ten Embryo Soul Realm beasts were nothing.


    If people knew what these two were thinking, they definitely would have cursed them out as wastrels!


    So just like that, after packing up everything, they began moving through the forest towards the den of the first Embryo Soul Realm beast.


    Along the way, the kids excitedly asked Lin Fan what they were doing and when Lin Fan exined, they became even more excited.


    While they may look like cute kids, these kids were actually beasts with an instinct to fight stronger opponents to be stronger. Now that they were given that chance, how could they not be excited?


    Of course, the only downside was that they were told to bring Qing Bao Lan with them.


    Qing Bao Lan was still chasing after Xiao Feng, but she was being kept away by the rest of the kids still, so there was a slight hostility between them.


    Of course, even if there was that hostility, Qing Bao Lan knew that if she was to be Xiao Feng''s wife, she would have to be inws with these kids, so she tried her best to win them over as well.


    It was too bad that they weren''t as easy to win over as Xiao Feng.


    Well that is except for Rocky who was kind of a scatterbrain.


    With just a simple shiny pebble, she was able to win him over.


    They kept moving along until they arrived at the den of the first Embryo Soul Realm beast.


    The kids didn''t waste any time at all as they all ran into position to release their array.


    Qing Bao Lan wanted to follow Xiao Feng, but Brainy didn''t let her do that. Brainy was the one in charge of this array and it knew that Qing Bao Lan as an Embryo Soul Realm beast wouldn''t be able to cooperate with the rest of the kids.


    The key of this array was having bnced life energy output from each corner of the array and since Qing Bao Lan''s cultivation was higher than theirs, it would be harder for her to match the others.


    So in the end, Brainy directly sent Qing Bao Lan into the center of the array to directly attack the Embryo Soul Realm beast.


    While they were setting up, the adults also sat on the side watching them.


    It was like adults that were chaperoning a field trip, but this field trip involved fighting wild beasts.


    Ang looked so much like a doting mother that she even opened up the camera function of her watch and was prepared to take pictures.


    While they were standing there watching, Hong Long was talking to Qing Ao in secret messages.


    Hong Long''s first message was, "Why did youe down to this lower realm?"


    Qing Ao was silent for a bit before giving a sigh and replying, "I was forced down."


    Hong Long immediately asked, "Was it your brother?"


    Qing Ao was silent again before saying with another sigh, "Yes."


    Hong Long immediately knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Qing Ao''s brother was always a problem in Hong Long''s eyes, even when he had been with the Dragon Race.


    This was a child that always spouted out nonsense that the Dragon Race was supreme and every other race should bow down to them.


    Qing Ao on the other hand might have been cold, but he was a kind child in the end.


    But now that Qing Ao had been chased away, this could mean that there was a change in the Dragon Race...

 376 Chapter 376

    Hong Long then said, "How bad is the situation right now?"


    This time, Qing Ao''s words weren''t as depressing as before, "For now, father is still in control of the Azure Dragon Tribe, but brother is slowly gaining strength. The pro war faction is trying to prop him up to take over the Azure Dragon Tribe so they can swing the vote in their favour."


    Race supremacy wasn''t something that waspletely, it was something that had existed in the Dragon Race for a long time. After all, the Dragon Race were simply just too powerful.


    The Dragons could gain power that matched the top experts of the universe just with the power of their bloodline, which was something that quite a few dragons were proud of, especially the pureblooded dragons.


    There was even a niche group of these race supremacists who believed that pureblooded dragon bloodlines should be preserved and those that had a pure bloodline shouldn''t mate with other beasts. It would corrupt their noble blood.


    Of course, this was a minority, but they were right that pureblooded dragons were the strongest, so they made up the majority of the experts of the Dragon Race. This meant that they had quite a bit of influence even though they were a niche group.


    It was just a good thing that the majority of the leaders and the other dragons believed that peace was the best ideal and that all bloodlines should be wee, so currently the Dragon Race was controlled by the peace faction, but the margins were slim. Just a single dragon tribe that changed sides would be able to tip the scales.


    There were a total of eight tribe that made up the Dragon Race and while they weren''t aggressive to each other, they were still split into different sides. Currently the pro peace faction was leading with five tribes, but each of those tribes had fewer experts than the tribes of the pro war faction.


    If even a single tribe of the pro peace faction swapped sides now, it would definitely push the Dragon Race into a pro war stance which would be detrimental for the Dragon Race. Even if the Dragon Race thought that they were the strongest race, they definitely were not the strongest.


    So that was why the fact that Qing Ao''s brother sending him down was a very important matter.


    After all, Qing Ao was firmly on the pro peace faction and his brother was firmly on the pro war faction. The two of them were the prime candidates for taking over the position of the Azure Dragon Tribe, so Qing Ao being plotted against like this definitely wasn''t a good thing.


    Moreover, the Red Dragon Tribe was closely rted since thest generation of chiefs were brothers. Namely Hong Long and Qing Ao''s father.


    There was no real concept of incest and there were plenty of bloodline marriages in the Dragon Race, so most dragons were actually closely rted. That was why even though Hong Long and Qing Ao''s father were brothers, they had be leaders of two different tribes.


    In truth, the dragons didn''t know why they were split into eight tribes since there was only a single dragon bloodline, but they were still separated in the end. Each tribe was separated based on the colour of their scale which also determined their elemental affinity.


    The elemental affinity of dragons were actually randomly assigned based on genes, so even though Hong Long and Qing Ao''s father''s parents were a Gold and ck Dragon, they had turned into a Red and Azure Dragon.


    Currently, the Red Dragon Tribe was weak since they had lost their chief who was Hong Long, so they depended on the Azure Dragon Tribe a lot. Currently they were the weakest out of all eight tribes.


    This was something the pro war faction naturally paid attention to.


    They knew that if they could turn the Azure Dragon Tribe, they could also pull the Red Dragon Tribe over, so that was why they supported Qing Ao''s brother.


    "Father is still able to hold on, that was why he sent me down to this lower realm to try and find a certain thing, but being able to find Uncle Hong is definitely a better surprise." Qing Ao said.


    Hong Long stroked his chin as he looked at Xiao Feng in one corner of the array before saying, "How long can hest?"


    Qing Ao also looked in the same direction and after a bit of thought, he said, "A few decades, but brother is receiving a lot of resources from the pro war faction, so he''s getting much stronger. It won''t be long now before he can match father¡­"


    Hong Long nodded before saying, "Then that''s fine. Let your father take care of the problem back at the Dragon Race and we''ll take care of the matters here. As long as we can bring Xiao Feng back, we''ll be able to overturn the situation. It''ll all depend on your daughter now."


    Qing Ao revealed a bitter smile, but he did know the consequences Hong Long was cing before him, so he didn''t say anything else.


    While they had been talking, the kids had been focused on fighting the Embryo Soul Realm beast.<sub> </sub>


    The beast that they were fighting was actually a tiger, which was what the previous ruler of the Kunlun Mountains was before Qing Ao had taken over.


    Of course, that previous ruler was no longer in this world since taking over means taking their lives as well.


    Qing Ao was from a world with a Ruler, so the techniques that he learned couldn''tpare to the techniques of a mere upper realm. He had taken care of that tiger in just a few moves.


    The n the kids had to fight this tiger was to use the same array that they used to take care of it, but this time they also had to add Qing Bao Lan to this n.


    Since Qing Bao Lan was a pure blooded dragon and in the Embryo Soul Realm as well, she was actually stronger than the tiger. Normally she would have been able to take care of this tiger herself, but that wasn''t the case when she was inside the array.


    It didn''t happen whenever she tried to make a move, but from time to time, there would be an attack that woulde very close to hitting her after grazing the enemy. It almost seemed like they weren''t aiming at the enemy, but rather they were aiming at her.


    Finally, she couldn''t take it anymore as she shouted, "What kind of aim do you have? You almost hit me over fifty times now!"


    None of the pets cared about this except for Xiao Feng since he felt that Qing Bao Lan was a nice person since she kept trying to give him food. Also, a part of him felt that she really was a pretty girl¡­


    Xiao Feng asked Brainy in his mind, "What are you doing? Are you really trying to hit her?"


    Brainy replied, "It''s an ident, she''s the one who''s misunderstanding me. This beast is much stronger than us so it keeps dodging our attacks at thest second. Because of that, it''s diverting them towards her after dodging the attacks."


    Xiao Feng felt that something was off, but he still chose to ept this since he believed in Brainy more than Qing Bao Lan. They had been together since the beginning, so Xiao Feng was quite close to Brainy.


    Brainy didn''t forget to add, "Why don''t you cheer her on? She''s working so hard to help us after all."


    Xiao Feng gave a nod when he heard this and cheered, "Bao Lan, doing great!"


    Qing Bao Lan heard this and there was a blush that appeared on her face, but she burst with life energy as she began attacking the tiger to show off as much as possible.


    It was too bad that Brainy had expected all of this.


    Brainy made sure that its attacks were even more urate and this time some of them even hit Qing Bao Lan.


    By the end of it, the tiger was beaten to a pulp and Qing Bao Lan dealt the final blow, but there were several bruises all over her body that were quite noticeable.


    At first Qing Bao Lan wanted to get angry, but then Xiao Feng came over and patted her injuries, saying, "Pain, pain, go away."


    When Xiao Feng did all this, Qing Bao Lan couldn''t just get angry. Rather she even had a shy look on her face as she raised the parts of her with bruises in front of Xiao Feng to let him do the same for them.


    In the end, Brainy''s sneak attack had actually brought them closer together, but there was no time to feel sad about this failed n since they still had other Embryo Soul Realm beasts to take care of.


    The adults on the side had clearly seen all of this, but not one of them did a thing since this was a matter between the kids. It would be a blow to their prestige as adults if they had to intervene in such a petty matter.


    Lin Fan came forward to collect the corpse before they all headed off to the location of the next Embryo Soul Realm beast.


    They still had nine more beasts to take care of today since Lin Fan was nning to head back to Harmony City tomorrow. There was still the deadline for the Hunters Exam that wasing up after all.

 377 Chapter 377

    It didn''t take the kids long to take care of all ten Embryo Soul Realm beasts sincepared to them, they were much weaker.


    But during this process, Qing Bao Lan had been beaten several times per fight all because of Brainy''s secret meddling.


    Of course, with Xiao Feng''s cheering and care, she was able to endure all of this since it really felt good being cared for by the one she liked.


    In fact, Xiao Feng also surprisingly quite liked taking care of Qing Bao Lan. Even though he was still young, it ignited the protective feelings that a man should have towards women, though technically she was stronger than him still. But that wouldn''t be a problem with how fast Xiao Feng cultivated and the purity of his bloodline.


    Even if Xiao Feng didn''t cultivate, he would still be able to reach a higher realm than Qing Bao Lan faster just because of his special bloodline.


    However, that wouldn''t do for Lin Fan since he needed Xiao Feng to be as strong as possible, so Xiao Feng would never be able to escape being forced to cultivate.


    That was also the strange thing with the rtionship between Lin Fan and his pets.


    Lin Fan''s training method was sacrificing his pets and letting them die again and again, which should have been something that should have scared his pets, making them fear him. However, for some reason, these pets even developed Stockholm Syndrome and went as far as calling him dad.


    It really was hard to understand what was going on in the heads of these kids.


    Perhaps it was imprinting since he was the one who took care of them the entire time after they had developed intelligence.


    Since they were finished with these ten Embryo Soul Realm beasts and Lin Fan had already collected their corpses, there really wasn''t anything left for them to do now.


    However, it was gettingte, so Qing Ao invited them all to his cave. While his home was in a cave, what was actually in that cave was a giant luxurious pce.


    They spent a very rxing night there, it was even better than the modern residences that the Xu Family had given them.


    Of course, there was nock of escapades during the night as Qing Bao Lan tried to sleep with Xiao Feng, but she was dragged away by her mother in the end.


    It seemed like the mother was the one who wore the pants in this rtionship, even Qing Ao was a bit afraid of her.


    It was interesting to note that Qing Ao''s wife was actually a pureblooded Gold Dragon who had left the Dragon Race with him toe down to this lower realm. That meant that the dragon bloodline that flowed through Qing Bao Lan was a pure dragon bloodline.


    In fact, before they had left Qing Ao and his wife had tested Qing Bao Lan''s bloodline purity and they found that it was much purer than any offspring the Dragon Race had previously.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that Xiao Feng had appeared, Qing Bao Lan would have probably been the future of the Dragon Race.


    When Hong Long learned about this, he supported Qing Bao Lan getting together with Xiao Feng even more and started teaming up with Qing Bao Lan to help her get closer to Xiao Feng to the dismay of Qing Ao.


    As for Qing Ao''s wife, she decided to let her daughter find her own happiness since that was what she did with Qing Ao. She was someone who had run away from her tribe just to marry Qing Ao since the tribe had wanted her to marry another pureblooded Gold Dragon.


    Although there was plenty of action in the night, Lin Fan''s group got a very good sleep and were refreshed as they prepared to head back to Harmony City.


    Lin Fan had gotten plenty of Nine Star Ginseng and he had those ten Embryo Soul Realm beast corpses, so he was certain that he would be able to reach the top of A rank or even reach S rank to qualify for the Hunters Exam.


    Since that was the case, there was no reason for him to stay in these Kunlun Mountains any longer. Especially since there was still the problem of the Xu Family that he needed to help take care of.


    So as soon as the sun rose, Lin Fan''s group was prepared to head back to Harmony City, but they couldn''t leave as smoothly as they thought they would be able to.


    That was because there was a little dragon girl that had caught them as they were leaving and now she was throwing a tantrum.


    "I want to go, I want to go, I want to go! You can''t separate me from my honey!" Qing Bao Lan was lying on her back waving her arms and legs around as she shouted this while crying. To put it in earth terms, it was the equivalent of a child throwing a tantrum for that toy they wanted¡­<sub> </sub>


    Qing Ao and Qing Ao''s wife both had awkward looks on their faces as they tried to persuade their daughter to give up this idea.


    That was because they were unable to enter thends of the humans since after taking over these Kunlun Mountains, that was the deal they had reached with the humans.


    Qing Ao as a True Soul Realm dragon was a very powerful expert, but there were still others in this realm that were at the same cultivation realm as him. To put it simply, there were twelve of them, one for each of the twelve great factions.


    While Qing Ao was a dragon with a pure bloodline, making him stronger than normal experts at the same level of cultivation, there was still only one of him. He might be able to fight one, or two, or three, or even four of these True Soul Realm Experts at the same time, but if there were five, or six, or even twelve of them, that was where he would be stopped.


    Plus, it wasn''t just the twelve True Soul Realm Experts that were in this realm, there were also plenty of other hidden human True Soul Realm Experts who were cultivating in peace to reach the next realm.


    If Qing Ao were to break this treaty and leave this territory, he would be immediately chased by the humans.


    To put it again in earth terms, Qing Ao would be the equivalent of a nuke. If that nuke were to ever be moved on earth, you can be certain that there would be plenty of other countries that would closely monitor that nuke.


    After all, just a single lost nuke could mean the end of the world.


    So Qing Ao was forced to stay in the Kunlun Mountains for now, at least without reaching another deal with the human experts, he wouldn''t be able to leave in a short period of time.


    Naturally he wasn''t confident in letting his daughter leave alone, especially with how much he spoiled her. So he was doing his best to convince his daughter to stay and give up this idea of hers.


    But no matter what he said, she continued throwing a tantrum on the ground shouting, "I want to go, I want to go, I want to go."


    With how awkward the situation was, it was hard for Lin Fan''s group to just leave since they were the ones causing this problem. Especially now that Lin Fan and Qing Ao were sworn brothers.


    Finally, Lin Fan could only bring some wisdom from earth to try to convince this child, "Xiao Bao Bao, you know that they say that absence makes the heart grow fonder."


    Qing Bao Lan immediately stopped crying and looked at Lin Fan with a confused look when she heard this. She didn''t know exactly what it meant, but it sounded very profound which attracted her attention, so she asked, "What does that mean?"


    Lin Fan said in a thoughtful voice, "It means that the longer you don''t see each other, the more you miss each other. So if you and Xiao Feng were to spend some time apart, it would make you think of each other more and would help your rtionship, don''t you think so, Brother Qing?"


    Qing Ao immediately caught on and said, "Right, right, right, Xiao Bao Bao, just think of it as spending some time apart to prepare yourself as a bride. Then when you meet again, you''ll dazzle him with your abilities and make him fall in love with you again, won''t you?"


    Qing Ao truly was desperate for him to say these words that actually hurt him as he said them, but he had no choice.


    Qing Bao Lan tilted her head slightly to think about it and she realized that they were right.


    After a while, she gave a shy nod before turning to Xiao Feng and saying, "We might not be able to be together, but we''ll definitely see each other soon."


    Xiao Feng didn''t really understand what was going on, but he did be friendly with Qing Bao Lan during this time, so he also gave a nod and said, "Un."


    Qing Bao Lan''s heart soared when she heard this and she immediately put her head in her hands.


    It was at this moment that Lin Fan immediately called back all his pets and dashed away from Qing Ao''s pce.


    By the time Qing Bao Lan looked up again, they were already gone.


    This was the only way they could get out without a fuss.

 378 Chapter 378

    Even though they had gone into the center zone of the Kunlun Mountains, it didn''t actually take Lin Fan''s group that long to head back to Harmony City since with their cultivations, they moved quite quickly.


    When they came into the city, it was already noon and that was just to enter the city.


    Since it was tiring traveling, Lin Fan hired one of the beast carriages that was waiting at the entrance of the city to take them to the Seekers Guild.


    However, along the way, they decided to stop at one of the many shopping streets in Harmony City to have a meal.


    While at their level of cultivation, there was no need for them to eat or drink since they could survive on life energy alone, eating and drinking was one of the few joys of being human. That was why even though there were plenty of cultivators in Harmony City, there were also plenty of restaurants that were found all over the city.


    After having their meal, they got back into the beast carriage that Lin Fan had paid to wait for them outside.


    If this was before, Lin Fan definitely wouldn''t have had enough money to do this, but now he had plenty of spirit stones after selling the beast corpses to the Seekers Guild.


    It was a leisurely ride for them since they were all somewhat tired after having a meal and it would take some time for them to reach the Seekers Guild.


    That was the one problem with having arge city, it took quite a bit of time to reach different parts of it.


    However, since that was the case, they could also take a quick nap before reaching the Seekers Guild.


    While everything was silent as they were heading to the Seekers Guild, there was a suddenmotion that came from outside that drew their attention. It was so loud that the beast carriage had even slowed down since there were several beast carriages that had stopped in the road, so it had to slow down to go around them.


    When Lin Fan peeked his head out, he saw that there was a crowd gathered, but that wasn''t important. What was important was the people that were in the center of the crowd.


    Right in the middle of the crowd, there was an old man who was shaking as he leaned on his cane and right in front of him were several strong men bearing down on him, shouting at him.


    One of them shouted, "Old man, you really think you can get away from us?"


    Another one of them shouted, "After all your son owes us, you really think you can get away now?"


    When Lin Fan heard these voices, he couldn''t help knitting his brows as he revealed a frown.


    This was really like the most cliched scenario that was found in almost all the novels, but for some reason, Lin Fan couldn''t help being moved by it. Seeing the fragile old man standing there while being bullied by those strong men, it ignited a sense of justice in him.


    Maybe that was why it was found in all those novels, it was actually quite the effective tool.


    Even Ang and Momonga couldn''t help turning to look at the frail old man standing there surrounded by those thugs.


    So this time, they didn''t say anything when they saw Lin Fan was about to make a move.


    Finally, Lin Fan called out to the driver and had the beast carriage stop on the side of the road before getting out.


    Lin Fan calmly walked over to the crowd and without any impediment, he walked right through the crowd until he was right beside the scene.


    Most people in the crowd only had normal cultivations in the Silver and Gold Realm, so they didn''t dare interfere when they could tell that these men were all in the tinum Realm.


    But it was also because of that that they didn''t notice Lin Fan''s life energy gently nudging them to the side to create a path for him.


    Lin Fan calmly walked over and stood in front of the old man before asking, "Is there a problem here?"


    The strong men standing around the old man were surprised to see Lin Fan suddenly appear, but they were also vignt since they couldn''t see through Lin Fan''s cultivation. In scenarios like this, it usually meant that this person was someone with a cultivation that was higher than theirs or it meant that this person didn''t have any cultivation at all.


    But with the way Lin Fan carried himself, it was more likely the former than thetter.


    If that was the case, that would mean they would have to be careful since Lin Fan was just too young. Having this kind of cultivation clearly meant that he had some kind of backing behind him or he might be an old monster in disguise.


    Either way, this was someone that they didn''t want to mess with if they didn''t have to mess with him.


    Still, that didn''t mean that they panicked since they were justified in what they were doing. After all, this old man did owe them a debt, or at least the old man''s son did.


    One of the strong men came forward and said, "This little friend, this is something that doesn''t concern you."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t act impulsively as he said, "You''re a bunch of strong men who are surrounding a frail old man, I don''t think you have the right to say that."<sub> </sub>


    That man who spoke also knitted his brows, but he wasn''t as calm as Lin Fan. He was someone who ruled the underground, why had anyone ever dared to talk to him like this?


    So that man took out a piece of paper from his chest and put it in front of him, holding it out for Lin Fan to see as he said, "Do you see this? This is a contract that this old man''s son signed himself, so we have all the justification that we need to do this. As long as he doesn''t pay, we can do whatever we want, so what will you do about it?"


    That man also didn''t forget to say to the old man, "Old man, because of this hero, we''ll take your granddaughter as well and give her a good ce to work. Remember, it''s all because of this hero."


    Lin Fan coldly looked at this man, but he still didn''t act impulsively. Instead, Lin Fan said in a cold voice, "How much?"


    That man and the other men around him were all snickering over what that man had said, but that suddenly stopped when they heard Lin Fan''s words. They all looked at Lin Fan with looks of surprise before that man asked, "How much for what?"


    Lin Fan said in the same cold voice, "To pay off this old man''s debt."


    "Ha, ha, ha, ha!" All the men burst intoughter when they heard this as if this was the funniest joke they had ever heard.


    Then that man said, "You want to pay off this old man''s debt? Why would you do that?"


    Lin Fan just said, "Just tell me how much."


    That man paused for a second before raising one hand, "Fifty spirit stones."


    These men couldn''t understand why Lin Fan would butt into the business of someone who wasn''t rted, but their job was to get the money, so if they could, why would they care where it came from?


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear that it was only fifty spirit stones since this seemed a bit too cheap for him, but after thinking about it, he found that it seemed right.


    This amount was only low to him because he was someone who possessed a lot of spirit stones, but for an ordinary old man like this, it was definitely arge amount. That was because spirit stones were a currency for cultivators just like crystals back on the Blue Star. On earth, it would be the equivalent of hundred dor bills.


    Lin Fan had gotten too used to being with cultivators that he forgot about what it was like for normal people.


    In the end, he had to me the system for this since the system only took crystals as payment¡­


    Still, this wasn''t a problem for him since it was actually quite cheap.


    Lin Fan flicked his hand and there were fifty spirit stones that were pulled out of his Storage Ring, being thrown onto the ground in front of these men.


    After doing that, he turned to help the old man who had been knocked down by these people and said, "Grandpa, are you alright?


    But before the old man could answer, the man from before came back from his daze and shouted, "Do you really think that''s enough?"


    Lin Fan turned back to look at them with a cold look and asked, "Isn''t it fifty spirit stones?"


    That man just said with augh, "But what about the interest?"


    Perhaps he might have let them go if Lin Fan hadn''t provoked him earlier, but now he wasn''t willing to let it go that easily.


    The only reason he was this confident was because they were in Harmony City. If this was any other ce, this man wouldn''t be confident in provoking someone with Lin Fan''s power and possible backing.


    Harmony City was established by the twelve great factions, so they cared very much about public order because it was equal to the face of the twelve great factions. So they invested heavily inw enforcement to ensure that Harmony City was clean on the surface even though there were plenty of back room dealings.


    If Lin Fan was to make a move, this group of men would be considered the victims and Harmony City''s public security force wouldn''t take this standing down.


    So the man had no problem provoking Lin Fan since he wanted Lin Fan to attack him.


    Lin Fan could only me himself for provoking him when he had nothing to provoke him with.


    Lin Fan could naturally see through what was going on, so he revealed a cold and evil smile.


    The moment he did, it was like a flower that bloomed as all the girls around suddenly felt their hearts skip a beat. There were even some girls that fainted on the spot. There were even some men who had their hearts skip a beat¡­


    Lin Fan just gave a coldugh before suddenly releasing his killing intent to smother these men.


    The moment they felt this killing intente over them, they were immediately ttened to the ground.

 379 Chapter 379

    Killing intent was different from the aura of an expert.


    Instead of it being a representation of how powerful the expert was, killing intent was a representation of their intention to kill.


    Unlike aura that increased with the cultivation of an expert, killing intent was only developed by killing people.


    The killing intent that Lin Fan had was so intense that these men couldn''t move even though they were tinum Realm Experts. Just how many people had Lin Fan killed to develop this killing intent?


    Well, Lin Fan''s killing intent didn''t just develop from killing people, it was more developed by killing beasts.


    Lin Fan''s main training was fighting against beasts in the cultivation realms that the system gave him, which allowed him to draw out potential throughbat. The number of beasts that Lin Fan has killed with his pets were already too hard to count.


    Then there was the fact that he owned various cultivation realm farms where he ughtered a majority of the beasts that lived there to create farms for himself. Though he didn''t directly kill these beasts and used units that he created to do so, they all had a trace of his spiritual energy in them that connected them to him. So every beast that they killed in the end was indirectly caused by Lin Fan which increased his killing intent.


    After ughtering over four worlds of beasts, it would be hard for Lin Fan to have a weak killing intent.


    The men looked at Lin Fan with terror, but they couldn''t do a thing since this wasn''t technically against thews of Harmony City.


    Intent didn''t mean anything would happen, so there was no punishing intent. That was the loophole with this rule.


    Besides, if the public security officers wanted to deal with anyone, it would be these men who were bullying this old man.


    That man in charge looked up at Lin Fan and said, "You¡­"


    Lin Fan just looked back with a smile and asked, "Me what?"


    The man wanted to say something, but the killing intent pressed down even harder on him, forcing his head to the ground. It was at this moment that he finally felt a bit of regret for his actions, but he also felt fear because he knew that this kind of killing intent wasn''t normal.


    Could it be that he really kicked his foot against a steel wall?


    But before Lin Fan could do anything else, there was a voice that called out, "Stop!"


    Everyone turned to look in the direction of this voice and they saw a young man in a white suit walking over.


    This man in the white suit came in front of the men Lin Fan was suppressing with his killing intent and he released his own aura which shocked everyone.


    This young man in the white suit was actually a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert and Lin Fan could tell that he wasn''t weak since he was already in the mid Fragmented Soul Realm.


    The men on the ground looked up and when they saw this man, they all revealed looks of hope, "Boss!"


    The man in charge however acted differently as he said, "Boss, this kid¡­"


    But the young man in the white suit raised his hand to cut him off before turning back to Lin Fan and saying with a smile, "This young friend, it seems like there''s been some misunderstanding. Perhaps we cane to an agreement and we can leave it here for today?"


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort before saying, "I''ve already paid, so leave the contract and we can talk."


    The smile of the young man in the white suit became awkward as he said, "Unfortunately, we cannot do that."


    If they were to ept Lin Fan''s demand like this, where would their face go?


    For their line of work, reputation was quite important since reputation was what decides if people paid or ran away. If people weren''t scared of them, they were more likely to run away from their debt than to pay it off.


    With how many people were gathered around this area now, it would be arge blow to their reputation if they were to back down now.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t give them a way out as he said, "I''ve already given you the choice, now choose."


    The young man in the white suit gave a sigh before moving forward to pick up the contract, but right before he did, he suddenly dashed forward with one palming up.


    This young man in the white suit had actuallyunched a sneak attack against Lin Fan! Even though he was in the mid Fragmented Soul Realm!<sub> </sub>


    That was the sensation of danger that this young man in the white suit felt from Lin Fan.


    Even though this young man in the white suit thought that Lin Fan was only suppressing his men with his aura earlier, which meant that his cultivation was probably in the peak tinum Realm or even in the Primary Soul Realm. What he never thought was that Lin Fan would actually be using killing intent to suppress his men.


    To have that kind of killing intent, just the amount of people that had to be killed to develop it to this degree...He never would have imagined that Lin Fan would have killing intent at this level.


    But it was too bad that there was one thing that he neglected.


    If Lin Fan had been using his aura, wouldn''t he have been able to sense it and see through Lin Fan''s cultivation?


    So this young man in the white suitunched his sneak attack and even though he didn''t have time to gather all his strength since it was a sneak attack, this was still an attack with 50% of the power of a mid Fragmented Soul Realm Expert. This definitely wouldn''t be something that someone at the level of cultivation he thought Lin Fan had would be able to resist.


    It was too bad that everything he had assumed was wrong.


    Lin Fan gave a coldugh before raising his hand as well, but all he gave was a simple punch.


    It was a simple punch to Lin Fan, but it was something that went far beyond a simple punch for the young man in the white suit. It was a punch thatpletely scattered his palm attack and crashed through all his defenses. He couldn''t even resist the slightest bit as he was smashed into the ground just by the wind of the fist.


    As the young man in the white suit was smashed into the ground, creating a small hole there, everyone looked on in shock at Lin Fan. They couldn''t feel any life energy from him, so they knew that Lin Fan had punched the young man in the white suit into the ground with just the power of his body alone.


    What kind of terrifying physique did Lin Fan have to aplish this.


    While they were all shocked by what Lin Fan had just done, Lin Fan slowly walked up to the man in the white suit stuck in the ground before bending over to pick up the contract. Then he turned to look at the other men on the ground and burned that contract with a wisp of his mew right in front of them.


    All they could do was watch as the contract turned into ashes before Lin Fan said, "This ends here. Take the money and you will no longer bother this old man anymore, understood?"


    The man that was in charge of them looked at his boss in the ground before swallowing a mouthful of saliva and looking up at Lin Fan to give a nod.


    Once Lin Fan saw this, he didn''t care about them any longer as he turned around to move back to the old man. Aftering to the old man''s side, he asked, "Old man, let me help you home. I''m sure this has been hard on you."


    But the old man waved his hand and said, "No, no, no, I can''t trouble you any longer. You''ve done this much for this old man, I can at least get home myself."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows and said, "But¡­"


    The old man suddenly raised his hand to cut him off and said in a firm tone, "No, I can''t make you do that."


    Lin Fan knew that there was nothing else he could say, so he just said, "Alright."


    But before he could leave, the old man also grabbed his sleeve and said, "Young man, could you give me your contact information? I want to repay my saviour."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this, so he exchanged contact information with the old man.


    The old man took a look at Lin Fan and gave a nod before saying, "You really are a good young man, you''d make a good match for my granddaughter."


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say when he heard this, so he just gave a nod before heading off.


    While everyone was focused on Lin Fan, they didn''t notice that the young man in the white suit was carried off by his men or that the old man had all disappeared.


    Once the old man was away from the crowd, he suddenly disappeared on the spot.


    When he reappeared again, he was no longer using the cane and was twirling it as he stroked his beard in thought.


    Behind him were the men who had just tried to take money from him, but were stopped by Lin Fan.


    It almost seemed like they were here to take their revenge, but before any of them made a move, all of them fell to one knee behind the old man and all respectfully greeted him, "Senior!"

 380 Chapter 380

    The old man ignored them as he continued thinking about something while stroking his beard.


    Even though these men were being ignored, not a single one of them dared to say a thing as they all waited on one knee with their heads lowered.


    It was apletely different scene from before, none of them dared to be disrespectful towards this old man at all, they all treated him with the utmost respect.


    After a while, the old man finally came back from his thoughts and turned around to see the men on one knee. As soon as he saw them, he said, "Oh, when did you alle back?"


    Even if they secretlyined, none of these men dared to say a single thing. The young man in the white suit said, "Senior, we''ve just arrived and were waiting for your instructions."


    The old man gave a nod when he heard this and then he said, "Very good, you''ve all done what I''ve requested, so of course you''ll receive your rewards. I''ll have someone deliver them to you in a few days."


    But then before he left, he also pped the man who had been leading the group on the face and said, "Learn to have limits. If you said one more thing about my granddaughter, you would have died on the spot."


    With a cold snort, he disappeared from the spot.


    Even after he disappeared, not a single one of them dared to stand up or even move. All of them just stayed there on one knee with their heads down, not even daring to breathe too loud.


    The only change with them was that swelling on the face of the man who had been hit.


    The old man didn''t even use his life energy in that hit, but that man hadn''t dared to block it and just let the old man hit him.


    That was more than enough to show how much they were afraid of him.


    After a while, when they were sure that old man was gone, they finally let out a sigh and fell down on their butts.


    This group was actually quite a well known loan shark group in this area, which was why they had attracted that much attention.


    But even with this reputation, even with a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert on their side, they were like children in front of the old man. They didn''t dare make a sound out of fear of angering him.


    ¡­


    After taking care of that side stop, Lin Fan had the beast carriage continue along the way back to the Seekers Guild.


    There was nothing else that stopped them along the way, it was actually quite a smooth ride. It was just too bad that Ang had heard everything that the old man had said about his granddaughter, so Lin Fan had to deal with a cold stare the entire time, but at least this was better than before when she used to beat him up.


    Once the chilly ride was over, Lin Fan''s group went straight into the Seekers Guild and found Xiao Ling at the counter. It had already been several days since they set out, so it wasn''t that strange to see her there since she must be taking another shift.


    Though Xiao Ling was surprised to see them appear as she said, "Why are you all back so soon?"


    Lin Fan was only surprised when he heard this, "What do you mean by soon? Didn''t I take quite a bit of time to get back?"


    "Ha?" Xiao Ling said in a confused voice.


    It seemed like there was a big disconnect here.


    For most normal seekers, a trip into the Kunlun Mountains would take them at least two or three weeks. That was not to mention that Lin Fan''s group had been sent to deal with an Embryo Soul Realm beast.


    But Lin Fan''s group had returned after just two days, that really was a bit too hard for her to ept.


    However, since they were able to bring out the Nine Star Ginseng in the end, Xiao Ling had no choice but to ept it.


    After Xiao Ling recovered from her surprise, she looked at Lin Fan for a bit before saying, "You''re lucky since your client is here today. I''ll go prepare the room for you."


    It didn''t take her long to finish this and soon she came back down to bring Lin Fan''s group upstairs. However, this time they didn''t go to the same room, they went down two doors.


    When they came in, they saw apletely different room. Well, it wasn''tpletely different, it was actually the exact same design, just with a different colour scheme.


    Sitting in the middle waiting for them was the same woman asst time.


    Once Xiao Ling showed them in, she closed the door firmly behind them.


    The woman saw that they had arrived, so she lifted her hand and invited them to sit down.


    Just like the first time, there was no one that spoke as they both stared at each other.<sub> </sub>


    It was only after a while that the woman said, "I''ve heard that you''ve finished my quest already. Can you take out the item for me?"


    Lin Fan nodded and with a wave of his hand, the Nine Star Ginseng appeared on the table in front of the woman.


    She leaned over and began looking over it.


    Her expression was calm at first, but then slowly she began to knit her brows as she looked over it. Finally, there was a bit of agitation in her voice as she asked, "How did you get this?"


    Lin Fan was confused by this question as he said, "I went to the ce you wanted me to go and obtained it. How else would I have gotten this?"


    The woman didn''t realize what was wrong with her words as she continued, "But there was an Embryo¡­"


    Before she finished, she suddenly covered her mouth because she realized that she had said the wrong thing.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile at this. It seemed like it really was as he suspected, they did know about it and had sent them anyway.


    Once he learned this, he did feel a bit of gratitude towards Xiao Ling because she had been the one to warn him about this.


    Lin Fan just said with that faint smile, "You mean the Embryo Soul Realm beast?"


    The woman had an awkward look on her face when she heard this, but she still gave a nod.


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug as he said, "What else could I have done? I beat it up and took this Nine Star Ginseng."


    "Ha?" The woman was clearly shocked when she heard this.


    This was an Embryo Soul Realm beast, it was something that had caused quite a bit of trouble for the Seekers Guild, but she never thought that he would directly beat it up.


    But what was even more surprising was the hidden implication of this.


    This young man was basically saying that he was able to fight those in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    Those kinds of experts that weren''t rted to any forces were rare and yet there was one in front of her. If she was able to pull him to the Hunters Organization, she would definitely be rewarded for her work.


    At the same time, she couldn''t help taking a slight peek to the side as a blush came over her face.


    The woman gave a cough and calmed herself before saying, "Well, it seems like you''re much more powerful than I thought you were, but that''s a good thing. So what did you do with the Embryo Soul Realm beast after you beat it?"


    Lin Fan gave another shrug as he said, "What else could I do, do you know what identity that Embryo Soul Realm beast has?"


    The woman revealed a curious look, "What identity?"


    "It''s the daughter of the ruler of the Kunlun Mountains, do you really think I would be able to kill someone like that?"


    The woman knitted her brows when she heard this, "That, that really is hard to deal with. But we still need these Nine Star Ginsengs, so in the future¡­"


    Lin Fan waved his hand, "It''s fine, I''ve already discussed it with the ruler and he''ll let humans harvest the Nine Star Ginsengs."


    This was a straight lie, but it was also a simple matter for Lin Fan since he was now Qing Ao''s sworn brother. It would take just a single message to Qing Ao to arrange this, so there was no problem telling this lie.


    The woman looked at Lin Fan doubtfully, but after a while, she gave a p and said, "Very good, that can be considered a great merit to the Seekers Guild."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he said, "Then does that mean I passed the test, miss president?"


    The woman was taken aback when heard this, but then she also revealed a smile as she asked, "When did you find out?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "It''s not hard if you put the clues together."


    The woman was about to say something, but then there was a strongugh that came from the ceilings.


    Neither side could find where theughter came from as they looked around, but after a while there was a figure that fell down in front of them, one that caught both of them off guard.


    That figure had a smile on his face as he asked Lin Fan, "How about it, do you want to marry my granddaughter now?"

 381 Chapter 381

    There was only silence that met this voice, but then the president was the first one to react.


    The president jumped out of her chair and shouted, "Grandfather, what kind of nonsense are you saying?"


    The old man just gave augh as he said, "Xiao Fei Fei, you''ve always been too picky, you''ll never get married at this rate. Not to mention the fact that you have your mother''s temper...Ze, ze, grandfather is just trying to help you save a bit of effort."


    Lin Fan just stared at this old man since this old man was someone he recognized.


    It was the same old man he had just saved on the road, the one that had been surrounded by loan sharks.


    He hadn''t been able to feel any cultivation from this old man before, but now this old man actually had an unfathomable aura around him.


    This was something that Lin Fan had only felt from Qing Ao before, though Qing Ao''s aura had been a bit stronger than this old man''s.


    Could it be that this old man was also a True Soul Realm Expert?


    But the most important thing was that this old man was the grandfather of the president.


    For someone to be able to take the position of the president of this Seekers Guild branch in Harmony City, they must have some pretty strong backing. It was very likely that this old man was some high level member of the Hunters Organization.


    The two of them continued to bicker back and forth until the old man just turned to Lin Fan and said, "Young friend, take a look at my granddaughter, she''s quite a beauty, don''t you think? Also from what I''ve heard, she''s been looking into your background. If that doesn''t mean she''s interested in you, I don''t know what else it could mean."


    Then he came forward and nudged Lin Fan as he said, "You''re not that bad yourself, you''re handsome and have a good personality, you really remind me of myself when I was younger. I don''t have to worry about Xiao Yi Fei if someone like you marries her. Instead, you might be able to keep her at home instead of letting her run around all day."


    The president Qiao Yi Fei finally couldn''t take it as she said, "Grandfather, he''s not the one!"


    The old man was surprised when he heard this as he stopped mid sentence to turn back and look at Qiao Yi Fei before saying, "What do you mean by he''s not the one? Isn''t he the one that you were looking up before? Who else¡­"


    It was only then that the old man realized that there were other people in the room who hade along with Lin Fan.


    The first person he looked at was Ang and his eyes trembled when he saw her.


    The old man slowly turned back to look at Qiao Yi Fei and said, "Could it be that you are interested in¡­"


    Qiao Yi Fei followed the gaze of the old man and while she was equally as surprised as the old man by Ang''s appearance, her face also turned red and a bit of anger appeared as she red at the old man.


    She said in a low voice, "Grandfather, what kind of things are you thinking?"


    The old man revealed an awkward smile before finally turning to thest person in the room and asking, "Then you mean¡­"


    Qiao Yi Fei lowered her head in a shy manner at this before giving a slight nod.


    The only person left in the room that wasn''t mentioned was Momonga.


    The old man looked over him for a few seconds before shaking his head and saying, "No, he is the only one that I will not ept. Your father and mother will say the exact same."


    Qiao Yi Fei immediately looked up with an aggrieved look as she asked, "Why?"


    The old man looked back at Momonga and said, "Look at him, it''s clear what kind of person he is. Someone like him is clearly the calcting type that always plots against others, he won''t be able to give you the happiness you deserve!"


    Qiao Yi Fei didn''t give up as she said, "You don''t know my Diabolis at all, you can''t say that about him!"


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this.


    The old man turned to look at Momonga before asking, "Your name is Diabolis?"


    Momonga was just as confused as he shook his head and said, "No."


    Once he said this, everyone turned back to look at Qiao Yi Fei who had covered her mouth and had a blush that covered her face as she looked down. It was clear that she had made a mistake just now.<sub> </sub>


    But since she did, there was no going back for her.


    So with a sigh, she tapped her watch and there was a holographic picture that appeared. Judging by the style of the picture, it was clearly an illustration from a novel.


    However, the strange thing was that the man in the illustration looked exactly like Momonga, albeit there was theck of horns in his hair and his eyes were a bit sharper. But the general look of him was the same and he had the same white hair, as well as wearing a white suit.


    When that picture appeared, Qiao Yi Fei''s eyes turned starry as she looked at the picture and looked back at Momonga,paring the two. As she keptparing the two, her eyes began to glow more and more as she saw more and more simrities between them.


    Only after a while did she say, "My Diabolis might seem like a cold person, but he''s actually a kind hearted person who cares deeply about his friends. So you can''t just judge him by his appearance!"


    The old man couldn''t help revealing an angry look as he pointed at Qiao Yi Fei and said, "You, you, you! Your parents and I really have given you too much freedom!"


    But Qiao Yi Fei acted like she didn''t hear any of this as she continued, "Plus look at those eyes, that perfect skin, and that white hair. It just melts my heart!"


    The old man took a deep breath before saying, "Enough! If I let you keep acting like this, I really will be angered to death! I''m taking you back home tonight and your parents and I will be teaching you a lesson!"


    Only when she heard this did Qiao Yi Fei finally snap out of that state.


    If anyone in this city were to see Qiao Yi Fei, one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City acting like this, their hearts definitely would have been crushed. Such a beauty was actually acting like an otaku and a fangirl, it really was off putting with how obsessed she was over this character¡­


    Of course, there would also be those that would be into it, but it would be hard to say if Qiao Yi Fei would be interested in them.


    The old man ignored Qiao Yi Fei''s protest and turned to Lin Fan, "Young man, how about youe with us and have dinner at our ce? I''m sure Xiao Yi Fei''s parents would love to meet you."


    When this was said, there were two pairs of cold eyes that red right at Lin Fan.


    One came from in front of him,ing from Qiao Yi Fei who looked at him like he was an enemy since technically he was. He was the one that her grandfather chose and was the one that stopped her from being with the one she wanted to be with.


    The other set of eyes came from a certain girl behind Lin Fan, ring at him.


    Lin Fan really wanted toin since it wasn''t his fault, but before he was strong enough, there really was nothing he could do against her. And even if he could, his heart wouldn''t really let him do it in the first ce.


    She was the one person that he couldn''t say no to.


    So Lin Fan said, "Senior, I don''t think I can since I''m busy tonight. Perhaps another time?"


    Of course Lin Fan wouldn''t directly reject him since this was a good chance to build a rtionship in this city where he had nothing. Not to mention that this person was probably a high ranking Hunter, which would make it even better for him.


    The old man waved his hand when he heard this and he said, "There''s no need for you to call me senior, just call me grandfather like Xiao Yi Fei does."


    Lin Fan felt the two res bing even more sharp and he could onlyin in his heart, but he couldn''t actually say anything.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "How could I do that, senior? That isn''t appropriate."


    The old man gave augh before saying, "How so? You''ll be a part of the family sooner orter."


    Lin Fan had a bitter smile as he acted ignorant and asked, "What do you mean by that senior?"


    Finally, the old man stopped smiling and revealed a serious look as he said, "We know that you''re nning on taking the Hunters Exam, that''s why you''re doing all these missions. But did you know that you''ve already caught the attention of the Hunters Organization?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows as he asked, "Is that good or bad?"


    The old man continued, "It would be bad if the results of your background check were poor, but you passed, so the Hunters Organization has decided to let you join."


    With a wave of his hand, there was a token that suddenly flew out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was confused when he caught it, but the old man exined, "That is your qualification for the Hunters Exam, plus it''s a special rmendation qualification. As long as you have that, you can skip the first round."

 382 Chapter 382

    The old man saw the confusion on Lin Fan''s face and continued to exin, "That''s just how highly the upper ranks think of you. You''ve shown them enough to make them invest all this in you. After all, it really was surprising where you came from¡­"


    Qiao Yi Fei had been curious about this since she heard this and she couldn''t help asking, "Grandfather, where are they from? Why couldn''t I find anything about this during my investigations?"


    The old man turned to look at Qiao Yi Fei and shook his head, "This isn''t something you should know. Even I was barely qualified to know about this, so just don''t ask about this for now."


    Lin Fan looked down at the token in his hand with a surprised look before looking back at the old man.


    Even though he didn''t know if the old man was involved in this or not, he had a feeling that he was. After all, even if he did have the potential and talent that the Hunters Organization was looking for, there was still too much that was uncertain about his identity.


    Without someone vouching for him, there was no way they would have taken the initiative to make this first move.


    He was certain that it was this old man, but as for why this old man would help him, it was unknown to him.


    If it really was just to get him to marry his granddaughter, there really was nothing he could do. But of course, he could look into helping his granddaughter get closer to Momonga.


    When Momonga saw Lin Fan looking at him, even though he was the Undead King that had lived for countless years, he still felt a chill run down his back from that gaze.


    After bickering for a bit, the old man finally said, "The Hunters Exam will be in two weeks, so take care of your business before then. Of course, since you are skipping the first round, you''ll get another two extra days to prepare before having toe."


    Then he turned over to Momonga and Ang, narrowing his eyes for a bit before saying, "As for your friends...The higher ups decided to let them take the exam as well, but you will be their guarantor since we weren''t able to find out as much as we would like¡­Just use your token and you''ll all be allowed to join the exam, understood?"


    Lin Fan had thought that he would be alone in the Hunters Exam, but now it seemed like both Momonga and Ang were able to go with him too.


    Lin Fan took a deep look at the old man and he didn''t know how to feel about this. It would be almost impossible for them to find any information on Momonga and Ang since that information existed in a realm that far surpassed the reach of the Hunters Organization. For them to be able to participate in the Hunters Exam as well, the old man must have paid quite a heavy toll to help them.


    Lin Fan was even more doubtful when he learned this, but he still had to feel grateful to the old man since he had done much more than anyone to help Lin Fan since he came to the upper realm. Moreover, Lin Fan could tell that the old man treated him sincerely, like his own grandchild.


    While that did put Lin Fan in an awkward spot, he did appreciate it.


    Lin Fan just gave a nod and said, "Senior, thank you for your help."


    The old man knitted his brows and said, "There you go again, I told you to call me grandfather already."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward look, but then he said, "Yes, grandfather."


    The old man immediately revealed a smile and said, "Goodd. Alright, you can go now. Xiao Yi Fei will contact you in two weeks about the Hunters Exam, so just focus on getting ready for now. The Hunters Exam isn''t as easy as you think it is."


    Then the old man turned to Qiao Yi Fei and said, "Xiao Yi Fei, help look over Xiao Fan over the next two weeks and help him prepare, understood?"


    Qiao Yi Fei red at Lin Fan at first since she thought that Lin Fan was slowly being won over by her grandfather.


    Lin Fan''s awkward smile became even more awkward when he saw this.


    The only reason he had called the old man "grandfather" was out of respect for everything the old man had done for him, Lin Fan had no intentions of marrying Qiao Yi Fei at all. Even if he did, there would be a certain girl behind him who would beat him up until he wouldn''t be able to move if he even had that thought.


    So he could only stand there with an awkward smile.


    But then Qiao Yi Fei seemed like she realized something as she suddenly revealed a smile at Lin Fan and said, "Big brother Lin, please take care of me."


    After all, since Momonga was Lin Fan''s friend and went around with him, if she spent more time with Lin Fan, that would also mean spending more time with Momonga. As they said, the friend of a friend was a friend and if she used this rtionship, she would definitely be able to get closer to Momonga.


    Lin Fan still had an awkward smile as he said, "Little sister Qiao, please take care of me as well."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan''s usually dense brain picked up a hint here since this was something that he had learned the hard way on earth.


    Even though Qiao Yi Fei was clearly older than her, she still called him big brother. This was something that women loved to do, even if they were older, they liked to appear younger.


    In Qiao Yi Fei''s mind, she was forever seventeen, so Lin Fan who was clearly eighteen or neen years old was her big brother¡­


    The old man watching this revealed a smile and gave a nod.


    It seemed like his n was going well.


    He was certain that with how outstanding Lin Fan was, it wouldn''t take much for his silly granddaughter toe back from her lost ways and finally realize what a good grandson inw would be. He was already looking forward to the day when he could hold his great grandson.


    Of course, he knew that it wouldn''t be that simple, so he would also be making his own ns.


    Just like that, everyone began making their own plots in this messy rtionship, but of course, none of them had any hostility in them. No matter what happened in the end, since the old man had already shown his sincerity, both Lin Fan and the Qiao Family wanted to remain on good terms if possible.


    ¡­


    In another part of the city, it wasn''t just them who were plotting.


    In a dark hall with a single throne in the middle, there were several figures that were on one knee in front of that throne, waiting for the orders of the person in the throne.


    That person was silent for a bit before saying, "Are you certain that the information you received is reliable?"


    One of the people kneeling suddenly stood up and with cupped hands and a slight bow, they said, "One Shadow, this is information that we received from our spy in the Xu Family, so there is no mistake. The Xu Family Head should be passing at any moment."


    The person in the throne stroked his chin as he was lost in thought before saying, "It came a little sooner than I expected, but I guess he wasn''t as strong as I thought he was. But still, this is better than battling it out with the Xu Family."


    Then there was a change in his tone as he said in a serious voice, "What about the artifact, do you have any information on that?"


    The person who spoke shook their head as they said, "One Shadow, our spy has tried everything, but only the elders and the family head knew where the artifact was kept and now the Xu Family is on lockdown. If we want to get the artifact, we need to go to the Xu Family and personally take it, but that shouldn''t be hard since they no longer have an Embryo Soul Realm Expert behind them."


    The person in the throne asked, "What are they going to tell the public? Will there be anyone who will interfere in our n?"


    The person who had their head bowed slightly said, "No. From the information we received from our spy, the Xu Family will be announcing that their family head will be going into closed door cultivation in a few days. They want to try to keep the illusion up as soon as possible to let one of the elders break through. It seems that they received some kind of special pill and the first elder is close to breaking through."


    The person in the throne narrowed his eyes as he said, "What kind of special pill?"


    The other person replied, "There are rumours that it is a Pill Line Pill, but¡­"


    The person in the throne suddenly rxed as he gave augh, "A Pill Line Pill? If they want to lie, at least make it believable. How could the small Xu Family possibly get a Pill Line Pill?"


    Then the person suddenly stoppedughing as he gave his order, "Prepare the troops, we''ll make an attack in three days. That should be enough time for that old fool to die and for them to let down their guards in grief."


    All the people kneeling suddenly got up and said, "Yes, One Shadow!"


    After that, they all left the room, leaving the person in the throne alone in the room.


    That person had a faint smile as he said, "This time, that artifact will be mine."

 383 Chapter 383

    After that meeting upstairs, Lin Fan came back down into the main hall.


    He still had other things to do, so he was nning to leave right away, but before he could, Xiao Ling stopped him.


    Xiao Ling pulled him over to the counter and made him stand in front of it as she asked, "How did it go? What did the president want?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he heard this, "So you knew after all."


    Xiao Ling also revealed a smile as she said, "You shouldn''t underestimate the information system of a girl. But of course, I''m the one who gave you the mission wasn''t I? If I didn''t know, that really would be too negligent."


    Lin Fan felt it was right, Xiao Ling should have known about this already since she worked for the Seekers Guild. Of course, she never told him also because of the rules of the Seekers Guild, but if he already knew, there was no need for her to keep a secret anymore.


    Lin Fan then asked, "Why are you so curious about this?"


    Xiao Ling muttered, "Well I want to make sure that I keep my investment." But she said it in a low voice that Lin Fan couldn''t hear.


    Then she said in a normal voice, "It seems like the Qiao Family has already gotten to you. It should be qualifications for the Hunters Exam like you wanted with how rxed you seem, but to do that¡­"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this since this definitely wouldn''t be in the information that the Seekers Guild gave Xiao Ling. So how did she learn this? Or was she just that smart that she was able to guess it?


    Lin Fan asked, "How do you know all of this?"


    Xiao Ling once again said with a faint smile, "Don''t worry about it. I told you, you shouldn''t underestimate the information system of a girl."


    Then she began talking to herself again, "But to do all this, it must mean that they brought out a Star Hunter. To even bring out a Star Hunter, they must really be investing in you or they would want something else¡­" After saying this, she turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Tell me, is there anything else they wanted from you? Anything in particr?"


    Lin Fan had to admit that the senses of a girl were quite sharp.


    After giving an awkward cough, Lin Fan didn''t answer this question as he tried changing the topic. There was something that he was actually interested in from what Xiao Ling said just now, "Star Hunter? What is that?"


    Xiao Ling looked at Lin Fan in surprise and seeing that real confused look on his face, she realized that he wasn''t joking and she was even more surprised.


    Xiao Ling said in a voice filled with disbelief, "You''re telling me that you want to take the Hunters Exam and you don''t even know what the Star Hunters are? Are you joking or are you actually serious?"


    Lin Fan just gave a small nod and said, "I really don''t know."


    Xiao Ling put her head in her palm before asking, "You don''t even know about this?"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod with an awkward look on his face.


    Xiao Ling shook her head and gave a sigh before saying, "You''re trying to take the Hunters Exam without even knowing this, you really are something. Well, to put it simply, the Star Hunters are those that have excellent records in their fields and because of that, they will receive up to three stars based on how much they''ve aplished. They are considered the most elite members of the Hunters Organization."


    Lin Fan gave a nod to show he understood, but he still didn''t fully get it.


    Xiao Ling saw this and continued, "Don''t look down on them just because they are focused on their fields. To reach the peak in one''s field requires one to have enough abilities to reach that peak, so not a single Star Hunter is weak. The Three Star Hunters are the best of the best in the Hunters Organization and are the ones who make up the council that run the entire organization. Since they are the ones that run the organization, you can be sure that not one of them is weak."


    Lin Fan finally seemed to understand how this Hunters Organization worked and he had to admit that it seemed better than the other organizations.


    Instead of being like the other organizations where there was a single sect master or leader, this Hunters Organization allowed those that were skilled to directly rise to the top of the organization.


    It was almost like the democratic system on earthpared to the dictator system that most of the forces in this world followed.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Then do you know what level the backer of the Qiao Family is at?"


    Xiao Ling looked at Lin Fan with a bit of surprise when she heard this before lowering her voice, "This isn''t considered ssified information, but this definitely isn''t information that is freely avable. It''s not something that I can give you that easily for free, you should know what I mean, right?"


    Lin Fan knew that this wasing when he asked this, so he asked, "What do you want?"


    Xiao Ling once again revealed a smile as she said, "You''re as smart as you are handsome, I like that about you. Very good, I just want you to protect me or my family once if the need everes up. With how talented you are, there''s no doubt that you''ll be an expert, so investing in you early is always a good idea."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan thought about it before giving a nod. Even if she didn''t ask for this, Lin Fan was willing to help Xiao Ling because of all the help she had given him previously.


    Once Xiao Ling got this promise from Lin Fan, she immediately said with a smile, "You really are something special, I wouldn''t mind giving myself to you."


    It was too bad for Lin Fan that Ang had really sharp hearing, so he immediately felt a chilling from behind him.


    Lin Fan only revealed a bitter smile before saying, "Please stop teasing me."


    Xiao Ling gave a wink and said, "Who said I''m teasing?"


    Lin Fan gave an awkward cough and said nothing else.


    Xiao Ling saw that it wouldn''t work anymore, so she went into the main topic.


    Xiao Lin revealed a serious look as she said, "As far as I know, the Qiao Family has quite a powerful person backing them. It''s said that the previous generation family head was a Two Star Hunter and a Nascent Soul Realm Expert."


    Then she paused before saying, "Well, "was" is the wrong way to put it since they are still an active hunter. The previous generation family head used to be a Food Hunter and it''s said that he loves finding new dishes all the time, which was why he gave the position of family head to the current family head. He spends most of his time traveling around the realm, finding new delicacies."


    Lin Fan fell into thought when he heard this and the person that appeared in his mind right away was Qiao Yi Fei''s grandfather, the old man.


    While he seemed like a carefree person, Lin Fan could tell that he was an expert from his aura. It was the second strongest aura that he had felt in this realm, only being below Qing Ao, though it wasn''t that much lower.


    Lin Fan even believed that this information was wrong and that the old man had already broken through to the True Soul Realm, but he had no proof of this at all.


    Lin Fan didn''t say much in response to this and seeing this, Xiao Ling also remained silent.


    After finallying out of his thoughts, Lin Fan said, "Thanks, that really is helpful." And then he immediately turned to leave, leaving behind a stunned Xiao Ling.


    She couldn''t help pouting her lips a bit when she saw this.


    No matter what, she was still considered a beauty, but Lin Fan was leaving her just like this?


    How could she ept this?


    So Xiao Ling pulled on Lin Fan''s sleeve and stopped him.


    Lin Fan turned around with a confused look.


    Xiao Ling revealed what she considered her most beautiful smile and said, "Are you really just going to leave just like this? You''re not going to give me a special goodbye at all?"


    Lin Fan was even more confused, "Special goodbye? What do you mean?"


    As Lin Fan was confused, Xiao Ling took the chance to lean in, bringing her lips close to Lin Fan''s face. However, before she could truly make contact, there was a chill that fell over her that pushed her back in her seat.


    It was so overpowering that she couldn''t help even taking a step back.


    Looking around, Xiao Ling couldn''t find where it wasing from at all, but she knew that the source of this chill was nearby.


    So since she had no chance to take advantage of this situation, she could only give up.


    But she wasn''t someone that gave up too easily, so she threw behind a few words to Lin Fan, "Even if you have a girlfriend or a fiancee, I''m more than willing to be a mistress if you''re willing."


    There was no doubt that she was hit with the same strong chill again and this time, the danger Lin Fan felt was even greater than before.


    Lin Fan quickly gave a nod to Xiao Ling before dragging Ang out of the Seekers Guild before she killed Xiao Ling.

 384 Chapter 384

    Aftering out of the Seekers Guild, it took Lin Fan quite a long time before he could calm Ang down.


    In the end, he had no choice but to bribe her with some cake from a cake shop nearby and they spent an hour eating cake before they could finally leave. Of course, it didn''t take them an hour to eat cake, it was just Ang eating cake for an hour.


    But in the end, he was able to cate her and they were finally heading back to the home that the Xu Family provided for them.


    When they arrived, there was already someone waiting outside the door for them.


    As they approached, they saw that it was Xu Lin along with one of the elders of the Xu Family.


    When Xu Lin and that elder saw the beast carriage approaching, they didn''t mind it at first, but once they saw Lin Fane out of the beast carriage, they immediately came over to him.


    Xu Lin immediately said, "Senior Lin, you''re finally back. We''ve been waiting for you the entire time."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this and he asked, "What is it? Did something happen?"


    Xu Lin looked around before saying, "Pleasee with me, it''s not safe to discuss this here."


    Lin Fan nodded since this involved his investment, so it wasn''t a bad idea to be safe.


    Xu Lin brought them through a secret entrance into the Xu Manor and they were led to a meeting room where all the high level members of the Xu Family were gathered around a table with the Xu Family Head sitting in the middle.


    Once Lin Fan came in, all of them revealed looks of relief because even though they didn''t know exactly how strong Lin Fan was, just his identity as a Pill Line Alchemist was enough to give them confidence. Just a few Pill Line Pills would be enough to let them break through, not to mention what kind of pills he could give them in the future when he became stronger.


    When the Xu Family Head saw Lin Fane into the room, he immediately turned to him with a wide smile and said, "Brother Lin, you''re finally back! We''ve been waiting for you for over a day now, we were getting worried."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this before asking, "Is something the matter, Brother Xu?"


    Lin Fan could understand why he was so anxious because this was a matter that involved the survival of the entire Xu Family. Previously, the One Shadow Organization had already pushed them against the wall and now that they were finally seeing some form of relief, they didn''t want to lose it.


    It was only a single day for Lin Fan since he had no stakes in this other than some investment, but for the Xu Family, it was enough for them to think that Lin Fan had abandoned them.


    Without the support of a Pill Line Alchemist like Lin Fan behind them, they definitely weren''t as confident in dealing with the One Shadow Organization.


    The Xu Family Head revealed a serious look as he said, "Brother Lin, we''ve already received information from our source in the One Shadow Organization that they are nning to attack us soon."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before asking, "They''re already taking the bait so soon?"


    This was the n that Lin Fan had given to the Xu Family Head before heading off on this mission.


    He had the Xu Family Head leak details about his imminent demise while locking down all information that he had been cured. The Xu Family Head had mobilized all the resources of the Xu Family to achieve this, even capturing the spy of the One Shadow Organization and feeding them false information.


    On that topic, the identity of the spy was actually quite shocking for the Xu Family since it was actually one of their talented younger generations. He had been tempted with promises of bing the disciple of the One Shadow himself if he switched sides. As someone with ambition, naturally this resonated with this person who didn''t want to be stuck as just a young talent from the Xu Family with limited resources.


    Lin Fan thought for a bit before asking, "Do you have information on when they are attacking?"


    The Xu Family Head picked up one of the documents in front of him and slid it over to Lin Fan before saying, "ording to our information, they are nning to attack us in three days. This is a list of the forces that they have gathered so far."<sub> </sub>


    Since the One Shadow Organization had a spy in the Xu Family, naturally the Xu Family also had a spy in the One Shadow Organization.


    It was one of the people who had been kneeling in front of the One Shadow earlier, listening to his orders. As soon as he could, he had sent this information to the Xu Family through a secure line.


    The one difference between the One Shadow Organization and the Xu Family was how much they invested in their intelligenceworks.


    Because of this difference, there was a different level of security when it came to their private lines. In the end, this difference in security was what caused the One Shadow Organization''s spy to be caught while the Xu Family''s spy waspletely undetected.


    Lin Fan tapped his finger on the table as he read over this material. Based on what he could see, it seemed like it would be quite simple for the Xu Family to take care of the One Shadow Organization, but he didn''t think so.


    After all, reports like this never showed the trump cards that these organizations were hiding since only the leaders would know about this. Without information on these trump cards, there was still plenty of uncertainty with this fight.


    But Lin Fan was also confident that even if there were a Child Soul Realm Expert that came, he would be able to deal with it. Not to mention that that would be close to impossible since there was basically no Child Soul Realm Expert that was rted to any smaller forces. This was something that he had learned from various sources aftering to this upper realm.


    So the only thing Lin Fan needed to care about now was how much he could get out of this.


    Lin Fan closed the file that he received and put it back down on the table before tapping on it a few times. After tapping on the table for a bit, Lin Fan turned to the Xu Family Head and said, "It isn''t impossible for me to help you guys with this, but before we decide anything, there is something else we need to discuss."


    The Xu Family Head was a bit nervous as he asked, "Brother Lin, what is it?"


    Lin Fan deliberately paused to put them on edge for a bit before saying, "Well, it''s very simple. Because of these extra variables, it''s clear that I will be doing extra work, so of course I think we should renegotiate the percentage that I will be taking."


    The Xu Family Head rxed a bit since this was different from what he was expecting to hear, but he still had a difficult look on his face as he asked, "Brother Lin, how much are you expecting? If you don''t mind, we can add another 10% to your share."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile which lured the Xu Family Head into a false sense of security before suddenly saying, "20% more or you can do this alone. I''ll just provide you with a few pills to help you with this fight."


    All the members of the Xu Family took a cold breath when they heard this.


    It had to be known that Lin Fan''s current share was already 30%, which was a show of the Xu Family''s sincerity and how much they valued him. If he were to receive another 20%, that would mean that he would be receiving a full 50% of the loot that they would receive, which was equal to what the Xu Family would be receiving as a whole.


    Just a single Lin Fan would be receiving as much as the Xu Family as an entity. For the Xu Family Head to exin this to the rest of the family, it would be a bit hard.


    He was willing to offer Lin Fan that extra 10% because he wanted to give his own shares to Lin Fan as goodwill for saving his life, but who knew that Lin Fan would suddenly ask for 20%. This was just too much for him to ept.


    After thinking about it, the Xu Family Head said, "I can''t do 20%, but will you ept 15%?"


    This was his limit since this was already taking into ount his second brother''s share as well. His second brother would definitely be willing to give up his portion after what Lin Fan had done for him, so he was certain that he could get this 15% if Lin Fan agreed. He just hoped that Lin Fan would agree.


    Lin Fan pretended to think for a bit by tapping his fingers on the table before saying, "Alright."


    Lin Fan''s goal was 15% to begin with, he had only given 20% because he wanted to use this higher price point to slowly negotiate down to what he wanted. Moreover, if they wanted to give him more than what he was looking for, he would have no reason to turn it down.


    After deciding this, everyone gathered around the table as the Xu Family Head said, "Our n is¡­"

 385 Chapter 385

    After deciding their next course of action, Lin Fan''s group left the meeting room since they were no longer needed there.


    There were still some other things that needed to be decided, but that was up to the Xu Family and had nothing to do with Lin Fan.


    All Lin Fan was responsible for was providing some muscle to take down any experts that might be behind the One Shadow Organization. As for those normal rank and file soldiers, the Xu Family could take care of them by themselves.


    Not to mention that this whole operation wouldn''t be held today. There was still time before the attack of the One Shadow Organization, so they would take some time to gather their forces before heading out.


    Right now, all Lin Fan cared about was getting some rest since he had been camping in the forest for two days now. Although he had been in Qing Ao''s castle, it wasn''t like that castle was designed for humans.


    Even though beasts liked to copy the human style of living since they found it much more elegant than their barbaric natural way of living, it didn''t mean that they were good at it.


    While the beds in Qing Ao''s castle looked beautiful, they were crudely made. They were made out of cloth that simply had straw stuffed in them instead of having a proper mattress made of down and spring.


    That was the one problem with beasts, they weren''t able to make the same things as humans.


    So finally having the chance to sleep in a normal bed was something that Lin Fan was looking forward to. Even though he technically didn''t need to sleep¡­


    There was nothing else that came up for Lin Fan during that night, but in another part of Harmony City, in a luxurious manor.


    ¡­


    "Mom, dad, don''t you see how handsome he is?" Qiao Yi Fei said while pointing at a blown up picture that she was disying.


    That picture was from the game that she adored, it was a blown up picture of Diabolis¡­


    Her parents just looked at her with a concerned look since they were afraid that she was going to spend the rest of her life in the 2D world instead of the 3D world.


    Qiao Yi Fei''s grandfather was sitting at the head of the table, watching this with a disappointed look. After a while, he finally couldn''t take it and turned to his son and said, "It''s all because of how much you spoiled Xiao Yi Fei that she turned out this way. If you properly disciplined her, we wouldn''t be in this situation."


    Qiao Yi Fei''s mother and father looked at each other before revealing bitter smiles.


    They were thinking that this old man spoiled Qiao Yi Fei more than anyone. Whenever they tried to discipline her, he was the first one to scold them to make them back off¡­


    But of course, they couldn''t say that out loud since this was their father and father inw after all.


    Still, even with this vibe in the room, it was clear to Qiao Yi Fei that she was losing the support of the room, so she turned to thest person sitting at the table. She said to this old woman who was also her grandmother, "Grandmother, you should be able to see how handsome he is, right? And it''s not just that, he might seem cold, but he has a kind personality deep down. He''s the perfect prince for me!"


    The old woman didn''t say a thing as she seriously looked over the photo that Qiao Yi Fei was showing her.


    In terms of who spoiled her the most, there was no one that couldpare to Qiao Yi Fei''s grandmother. So if this was what Qiao Yi Fei wanted, the old woman would do her best to support Qiao Yi Fei.


    That was just how it was when it came to an only child. Qiao Yi Fei was the only child and grandchild in the entire Qiao Family, so they couldn''t help spoiling her. Not to mention that even though she was acting this way right now, normally she was a very obedient and filial granddaughter, which made them love her even more.


    But in the end, she still couldn''t do it since this was an important event for Qiao Yi Fei and she didn''t feel that this person was a good match for her. Rather, she was like the old man, she was also a firm believer that Qiao Yi Fei should marry Lin Fan.


    But before anyone else could even say a thing, there was a knock that suddenly came from the door.


    This was their private dinner, so everyone in the manor knew not to disturb them. But that also meant the inverse which was that if someone did disrupt them, it would be for a very important reason.


    All the adults in the room knitted their brows before the old man said, "Come in."


    A person in full armour came in and kneeled down in front of the table, panting as he tried to catch his breath.


    The old man looked at him with a cold look and said, "Tell me, why did you disturb us?"


    The person in full armour dug around in his chest before taking out a scroll that he lifted up and said, "This is a report about that person you asked us to watch over."


    The old man knitted his brows even deeper when he heard this.<sub> </sub>


    It was no one else, the person that they were looking over was naturally Lin Fan.


    If it wasn''t something important, they naturally wouldn''t bother them, but since they did, it meant something serious was about to happen to Lin Fan.


    But the old man didn''t take the scroll and said, "What happened?"


    The person in full armour bowed his head again before saying, "The Xu Family that person is staying at will be attacked by the One Shadow Organization."


    The old man asked, "How strong is the One Shadow Organization?"


    The person in full armour said, "The strongest expert in the One Shadow Organization is in the low Embryo Soul Realm, but there is an expert that was invited by the leader of the One Shadow Organization to help them. It''s actually one of the candidates for the Hunters Exam and the older brother of the leader of the One Shadow Organization, the One Shadow. That person is in the peak Embryo Soul Realm."


    Qiao Yi Fei immediately revealed a concerned look when she heard this and she quickly turned to the old man to say, "Grandfather, you have to do something!"


    The peak Embryo Soul Realm was considered the strongest among the rogue cultivators since anyone past that would normally be swallowed into one of the twelve great factions. Anyone who was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm wasn''t easy to deal with, so Qiao Yi Fei didn''t believe that Lin Fan''s group would be able to take care of them.


    But the old man just revealed a smile before waving his hand to dismiss the person in full armour without saying a thing.


    Qiao Yi Fei saw this and immediately said, "Grandfather!"


    The old man turned to Qiao Yi Fei after this and said with a smile, "Are you worried about Xiao Fan?"


    Qiao Yi Fei gave a soft snort before saying, "I''m worried about my Diabolis."


    The old man revealed a frown and said, "You really will be the death of me one day, this little girl¡­"


    ? Qiao Yi Fei still said with a worried look, "Grandfather, you know that they can''t deal with someone like this. You have to send someone to help them."


    But the old man said, "It''s fine, if he can''t even deal with someone in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, he isn''t qualified to be the Qiao Family''s son inw. After all, strength is everything in this upper realm."


    Qiao Yi Fei knitted her brows even more as she said, "But my Diabolis¡­"


    The old man looked at her before giving a sigh, "You don''t have to worry about him at all, he''s much stronger than you think."


    Qiao Yi Fei''s eyes lit up at this, "Then is he strong enough to marry into our Qiao Family."


    The old man revealed an angry look and said, "It''s not all about strength, it''s also about character as well."


    Qiao Yi Fei revealed a frustrated look as she said, "But you just said that it was all about strength."


    The old man said with the same angry look, "That is that and this is this. Those are two different things. After all, that Momonga, he''s even stronger than me. If you married him, you would be caught up in all kinds of different things and I can''t bear to see that happen to you."


    Qiao Yi Fei was taken aback when she heard this, "Stronger than you? Are you kidding, grandfather?"


    The old man shook his head and said, "No, he''s really stronger than me, I can''t see through his cultivation at all."


    Qiao Yi Fei was still shocked as she said, "But you already broke through¡­How is he still stronger than you?"


    The old man''s expression became serious as he said, "Don''t ask about this, it''s not time for you to know this. However, that kid Lin Fan, since he was able to make someone like that follow him around, it''s clear that he must have some influence. It would be best if you could marry him."


    Qiao Yi Fei pouted her lips and said, "I already said that I will marry my Diabolis."


    The old man ignored this and gave a sigh as he thought, "First it''s those fellows from the Ster Kingdom and now this...It really seems like a storm ising¡­"


    Just like that, they continued arguing over this for the rest of the night.

 386 Chapter 386

    The night passed just like this without much happening because both sides were still making preparations.


    Most of the next day also passed by without much incident since they were still making preparations, but something suddenly arrived the next night.


    While Lin Fan''s group were resting at the residence that the Xu Family had given them, there was someone that suddenly visited them. It was no one else but Xu Lin with one of the elders.


    Once again, they were led through the secret passage into the private meeting room inside the Xu Manor where all the higher ups of the Xu Family had gathered again.


    When Lin Fan''s group arrived in the room, they had all been silent, but seeing Lin Fane in, the Xu Family Head immediately came over to say, "Brother Lin, we have a problem."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows as he could sense the feel of this room, so it didn''t seem like a small matter. Lin Fan asked, "What is it?"


    The Xu Family Head went back to his seat to pick something up before giving it to Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan looked down at it, he slightly knitted his brows at first when he read the contents before rxing them once again. He even couldn''t helpughing when he read what was written on this sheet of paper.


    Seeing Lin Fan suddenly break out inughter, the Xu Family Head had a strange look on his face as he asked, "Brother Lin, what are youughing at?"


    Lin Fan pointed at the paper in his hand and said, "This thing, how can you notugh at it?"


    The Xu Family Head was even more confused because this piece of paper was exactly what he had been worried about. It was also the reason why this meeting had even been called.


    On this piece of paper was an invitation from the One Shadow Organization to meet for negotiations tomorrow night.


    This hade this afternoon after the Xu Family had mentioned through several channels that their family head had gone into closed door cultivation.


    It was clear what the intentions of the One Shadow Organization were, but they were different from what they had expected with the information that they had received, which threw them off. So they held this meeting to counter this situation while also inviting Lin Fan to see what his thoughts on this were.


    But no one would have expected Lin Fan to burst intoughter when he saw this invitation.


    The Xu Family Head was still confused, but since this was a serious meeting, he had to act the part, so he said, "Of course I can''tugh at this invitation, this is a serious matter for our Xu Family."


    Lin Fan stoppedughing and put the piece of paper back down on the table before saying, "This thing isn''t a problem, it just means that the situation has changed a bit."


    Everyone was once again confused by Lin Fan''s words.


    The Xu Family Head took the lead and asked, "Brother Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this question, but rather he answered it with another question, "If you were able to get something without fighting for it, wouldn''t you want to take that path?"


    The Xu Family Head didn''t understand why Lin Fan asked this, but he still nodded as he said, "Of course, anyone would want to get what they want with as little effort as possible."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and tapped on the invitation that was on the table as he said, "That is what this is. They''re assuming that we don''t know about their nned attack, so they want to use this invitation as a way to make us let our guard down while also trying to see if they can get us to give up. If we do give up, wouldn''t that be much easier for them?"


    The Xu Family Head paused to think about it and after a bit of thought, he realized that Lin Fan was right. There was no reason for them to do this since they should have thought that they had the element of surprise with their attack, so why would they suddenly make a move now?


    Unless they wanted to see if they could handle this matter without any bloodshed at all.


    There was nothing to lose for them if they tried this since they knew something that others didn''t. They knew that the Xu Family Head should have sumbed to the poison, which was why the Xu Family had announced that the Xu Family Head was going into closed door cultivation. This was a way for them to hide this fact.


    But after thinking about it for a bit more, the Xu Family Head also realized that something else was off.


    While this would make them let their guard down since they would never expect an attack right after the meeting, this would still make the Xu Family more vignt overall, which would make them harder to attack.


    That would be something that was bad for them, so there was nothing to gain from sending this invitation.


    If anything, they should have sent the invitation right before their attack to give them no time to raise their guard, but they set it a day before the day of their attack.


    The Xu Family Head knitted his brows once again and said, "But this doesn''t make sense still, why would they send it for a day before their attack?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he heard this as he had been waiting for someone to notice this, this very tiny w in this n.


    Lin Fan had the same smile as he said, "It''s very simple, they''re confident."


    The Xu Family Head had a puzzled look as he asked, "Confident, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan''s smile disappeared as he said with a serious look, "It means that the situation has changed and they must have gotten some support. Based on the fact that they made this move, it shouldn''t be a normal expert. By my calctions, it should be someone that''s beyond the low Embryo Soul Realm."


    Everyone in the room knitted their brows at this as they began discussing this. The Xu Family Head said in a worried voice, "Beyond the low Embryo Soul Realm? Just how strong would they be?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug at this, "I know as much as you do, but I''m certain that they''re still in the Embryo Soul Realm at least."


    This was what Lin Fan had slowly learned from being in this upper realm for a while now. He learned the spread of experts among the forces in this upper realm.


    In these smaller forces, it was impossible for there to be an expert in the Child Soul Realm since they would have been swept into one of the twelve great factions already, so the strongest this person could be was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm. That was also why Lin Fan was confident.


    With his current strength, he could even fight against those in the Child Soul Realm. While he might not be able to win, he would still be able to defend himself and escape if necessary.


    Someone with this kind of power definitely didn''t need to fear anyone in the Embryo Soul Realm unless that person had a special ability to allow them to match those in the Child Soul Realm. But even then, Lin Fan had a trump card that he had been saving for those situations.


    The Xu Family Head began to worry even more.


    If it was someone in the mid Embryo Soul Realm, perhaps he would be confident since there was another trump card hidden in the Xu Family, but if it was someone that was beyond that¡­


    He never expected that things would change in these final moments, but there was nothing he could do except ept them since there was nothing he could change about it. No matter what, the One Shadow Organization would still be attacking in the end and no matter what, this would involve the survival of the Xu Family.


    There was only one thing they could do, face them head on and hope that they could win.


    But at the very least, there was something that could give him a bit of confidence. Rather, there was one person who had been rxed and confident the entire time.


    The Xu Family Head turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Brother Lin, how confident are you in handling this?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "If you''re willing to pay, I can take care of this for you."


    The Xu Family Head knitted his brows as he asked, "How much?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Who knows, I might be wrong and there might not be this expert at the One Shadow Organization. But if there is, I''ll take an extra 5% to deal with him. What do you think?"


    The Xu Family Head was surprised when he heard this, but then he immediately said, "Alright!"


    Just an extra 5% to deal with an expert that no one else could deal with? That was a bargain!


    The Xu Family Head was this confident in making this deal because he knew that Lin Fan was more powerful than him. Even though he had already recovered his cultivation and was back to his peak in the low Embryo Soul Realm, he still couldn''t see through Lin Fan.


    He knew that Lin Fan was definitely more powerful than him or this wouldn''t happen.


    But what he didn''t know was that Lin Fan''s cultivation was actually still below his, being in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm. It was only because of Lin Fan''s special physique that he could hide his cultivation.


    As for Lin Fan, the only reason he offered such a cheap price was because he wanted 50% at most. If he took anymore, that would negatively impact the Xu Family''s development and he didn''t want that.


    After all, the Xu Family had already sworn to follow him and as their boss, he would need to develop them in the future.


    There was no man that could do things on his own and he would need manpower to take care of things in the future, the Xu Family was a great choice for this. Lin Fan could see that they were a close family and there wasn''t much plotting among them, albeit there was still a bit, but it was on the low side for normalrge families like this.


    Not to mention that the family head had a personality that Lin Fan liked, so there was no reason why he shouldn''t help them develop.


    Once that was decided, they went back to another topic which was their attack on the One Shadow Organization.

 387 Chapter 387

    Lin Fan''s group didn''t stay for the rest of the meeting since it was just a simple discussion on how to attack the One Shadow Organization.


    When Xu Lin came to report on the results of the meeting, Lin Fan learned that they would be attacking at the same time as the meeting.


    Xu Lin''s second uncle would be the one leading the delegation to the meeting while Lin Fan would be going with the Xu Family Head to attack the One Shadow Organization''s main base.


    With the n set, there was nothing else for them to do except wait for the time toe.


    So the night and the next day passed without much incident.


    Finally, it was time for the meeting set up by the One Shadow Organization and they split off into two teams.


    There was the team led by the first elder who would be going to meet the One Shadow Organization delegate and there was the team led by the Xu Family Head who would be attacking the One Shadow Organization.


    Lin Fan made sure to cover up and followed the Xu Family Head''s group since he was nothing more than an observer. So unless there was a need for him to interfere, he wouldn''t make a move.


    ¡­


    The first elder led his group to the restaurant that the One Shadow Organization had prepared for the meeting. This was a ce that was rather well known in Harmony City and there were plenty of witnesses around just in case, so it seemed like it would be a safe ce to meet.


    The only thing the Xu Family group was worried about was if there were any hidden tricks that the One Shadow Organization would be ying.


    Since they had arrived early, there was no one at the appointed meeting spot, but it didn''t take long for the One Shadow Organization to arrive. At the very least they arrived at the specified time which was a sign of respect.


    The one thing to note was that neither of the parties had their leaders with them, but that wasn''t strange either.


    The Xu Family Head had just announced that he was going into closed door cultivation, which meant that he wouldn''t be here. It was already showing quite a bit of respect for the first elder of the Xu Family to be here.


    As for the One Shadow Organization side, they had sent their grand protector who was the right hand man of the One Shadow. But in truth, this was an attempt to shame the Xu Family and pressure them.


    Since they knew what the situation with the Xu Family was, the One Shadow Organization knew that the first elder was basically the leader of the Xu Family now. However, even though the Xu Family had sent their leader, the One Shadow Organization had only sent an elder to negotiate with them¡­


    It could be seen how disrespectful they wanted to be.


    But neither side chose to mention this.


    When they arrived in the room they had booked, there was a tense atmosphere that filled the air as both sides sat there just staring at each other.


    They were both sizing up the other side.


    The Xu Family''s first elder noticed that something was off since he recognized most of the people that the One Shadow Organization had brought, but there was a single cloaked figure that he couldn''t recognize. That person even had an aura that he had never felt before.


    However, right now, what they needed to do was buy time for the main force to attack the One Shadow Organization, so that was what they were nning on doing.


    There was a silence that filled the room as no one said a single thing while facing each other. This silencested over ten minutes before it was finally broken by the One Shadow Organization''s side.


    The grand protector looked right at the first elder and said, "I think you should know why we invited you here tonight."


    The first elder stared right at him before picking up a menu and saying, "Shouldn''t we get some food first?"


    The grand protector was taken aback by these words at first, but then he revealed a smile since he could tell what the first elder was trying to do.


    In a situation where they had clearly lost the pir that held their family up, they needed to remain strong or else the other forces that were eyeing them would rip them apart.


    Of course, this wouldn''t work against the One Shadow Organization that already knew everything.


    The One Shadow Organization was making the first move ahead of everyone because of this information and because they wanted the biggest piece of the slice. They wanted the prize that they knew that Xu Family had and after that, they would leave the scraps for the rest of the forces eyeing the Xu Family.


    After all, the One Shadow Organization was still a small group whenpared to the entire Harmony City and they weren''t strong enough to fight everyone. The only way they would survive would be to share with others to make sure that no one turned against them.<sub> </sub>


    But that was only until they recovered the item that they wanted. Once the One Shadow was able to make an impression on that Nascent Soul Realm elder of the True Spirit Sect and be their disciple, naturally everything would also change for the One Shadow Organization.


    ? The grand protector also picked up a menu since he didn''t mind at all, since he had also brought along a secret weapon that the One Shadow had given him. It was a bit too early to reveal this secret, so he was willing to go along with the first elder.


    Both of them ordered a few dishes, making sure to order the dishes that the other person hated the most.


    Both of their organizations had spies in the other organization, so investigating something as trivial as this was nothing for them.


    They also ordered wine with their meals, but not a single person let a single drop of wine pass through their lips because they knew what kind of a ce they were in.


    With this tense atmosphere in ce, the two sides stared each other down as they finished their meal.


    Finally, once they were done, the grand protector said, "Now, I think we should get down to business."


    The first elder didn''t say a thing, but he gave a nod.


    The grand protector didn''t mind as he continued, "Surrender the entire Xu Family to us and we''ll let you serve us. I think it''s quite a fair deal, don''t you?"


    The first elder gave a cold snort as he said, "Fair deal, do you even know the meaning of those words?"


    The grand protector revealed a smile as he said, "You really don''t know what kind of position you are in, do you? You think that there''s anything you can do to stop us?"


    The first elder said, "I can try at the very least, can''t I?"


    The grand protector gave a sigh before turning to the mysterious cloaked figure and saying, "Senior, I think it''s your turn."


    That mysterious cloaked figure stood up and walked out in front of the table, facing the Xu Family group. After standing there in silence for a bit, that figure suddenly said in a deep voice, "Submit or die."


    The first elder immediately stood up and released his aura as he said, "You really think that you can win with just¡­"


    But before he could finish, the mysterious cloaked figure had also released their aura.


    This aura was one that he had felt before, it was just as powerful as the Xu Family Head when he released his cultivation.


    That meant¡­


    This was an Embryo Soul Realm Expert!


    The first elder gritted his teeth and said, "I never thought that your One Shadow Organization would be so shameless. The leader woulde and hide his identity just so he could attack us all!"


    The grand protector revealed a faint smile as he said, "You''re mistaken there. You really think that we''re the same as your Xu Family? This is what''s called having connections. This isn''t our leader, but rather a helper that our leader invited to help us bring you all down. Did you really think that you had a chance at all?"


    The first elder said, "You really are shameless, telling a bold faced lie like this. If your leader could invite such an expert to help him, why didn''t he attack our Xu Family all those years ago?"


    The grand protector ignored this and said, "I''ll give you a chance to give up now. If you do and agree to serve my One Shadow Organization, we can let you go. All you have to do is get what we want for us."


    The first elder spat out at the grand protector and said, "We''ll never submit. You can go to hell."


    The grand protector gave a sigh and shook his head, "What fools." Then he turned to the mysterious cloaked figure and said, "Senior, please capture them alive, but if they struggle, feel free to kill the troublesome ones."


    After that, he turned back to the first elder and said, "At the very least, I''ve given you ast meal, right?"


    The mysterious cloaked figure came forward and raised his palm, preparing to attack, but before he could, there was another aura that appeared.


    The first elder had fully released his aura and this aura was simr to that of the mysterious cloaked figure.


    It was the aura of the Embryo Soul Realm!

 388 Chapter 388

    The grand protector immediately had a look of shock on his face as he said, "You, you, how?"


    The first elder gave augh and said, "Don''t think that you''re the only one with secrets."


    But it didn''t take long for the grand protector to calm down, especially after hearing what the mysterious cloaked man said, "He has only just broken through, there''s nothing to fear."


    That was right, the mysterious cloaked man was someone that had been in the Embryo Soul Realm for a long time while the first elder of the Xu Family was someone who had just broken through.


    Even if the first elder was able to consolidate his cultivation in this short period of time since he had broken through, there was no possibility that he would be able topete with someone who had broken through to the Embryo Soul Realm a long time ago. Even if they were both in the low Embryo Soul Realm, that didn''t mean that they would be at the same level ofbat strength.


    There was arge difference that came with experience.


    After thinking this through, the grand protector gave a snort and said, "Are you done with your desperate struggle? Seeing as you''ve broken through, your value has increased. As long as you listen to our boss, I''m sure that you could even get a position that is only second to mine."


    The Xu Family first elder gave a cold snort at this before saying, "Why waste words? You already know what''s going to happen."


    The grand protector gave a shrug before saying, "At least it was worth giving it a shot."


    Then he turned to the mysterious cloaked figure and said, "Senior, if you may."


    The mysterious cloaked figure gave a nod before raising his palm again before pushing it out to attack.


    But this time, the first elder also raised his palm to push out to meet this attack.


    Their palms shed in the air and there was a shockwave that pushed everyone back as they were in bnce for a few seconds before both of them were pushed back at the same time.


    This time, there was no longer the same calm as before from the One Shadow Organization side.


    p Even though the Xu Family first elder had only just broken through to the Embryo Soul Realm, he was a match for the Embryo Soul Realm Expert that they had specially invited over to help them.</anda>


    Even that mysterious cloaked figure couldn''t help revealing a look of shock in the eyes that were revealed through the cloak.


    The grand protector looked at the first elder with a terrified look as he stammered, "You, you, how did you be, this strong?"


    The first elder didn''t bother replying as he looked up at the mysterious cloaked figure.


    It seemed like even though he had used his full strength, he couldn''t match this mysterious cloaked figure. That was his own fault for not consolidating his cultivation enough and rushing out to this fight.


    The main deciding factor in the difference in power between the two was the level of talent that they had.


    While the first elder had been stuck in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm for a long time, it wasn''t because he wasn''t talented.


    In the past, when people mentioned the Xu Family, they mentioned the twin lions of the Xu Family, who were the oldest brother and the second oldest brother of that generation. Namey, they were talking about the current Xu Family Head and the first elder.


    But then there was the reason why only the Xu Family Head broke through and not the first elder.


    To put it simply, it was because the Xu Family was poor.


    They couldn''t afford to train two experts, so they had no choice but to focus all their resources into one person.


    As the second eldest, the first elder knew what his responsibilities were and had willingly chosen to give his resources to his oldest brother, the current Xu Family Head.


    But now that he had finally broken through, that didn''t mean that everything he had before was gone. That same talent that existed in him when he was younger was still in him, allowing him to jump levels to fight stronger experts.


    So even if this mysterious cloaked figure was someone who had consolidated his cultivation for a long time, being very close to reaching the mid Embryo Soul Realm, the first elder was still able to fight evenly with him. Even though he had only just reached the Embryo Soul Realm, he was able to fight with an expert that was close to the mid Embryo Soul Realm. What a concept that was, but it shows just how terrifying his talent was.


    If only the Xu Family had enough resources back then, perhaps they would have be a family that had two Embryo Soul Realm Experts sitting at the helm and expanded their influence much more already. Perhaps they would have be a family the One Shadow Organization never would have dared to offend.


    Seeing that the Xu Family''s first elder was able to match him, the mysterious cloaked figure immediately knitted his brows before waving his hand to pull out something from his Storage Ring.


    The thing that he pulled out was very strange because it was by no means a normal weapon. What had appeared in the hand of the mysterious cloaked figure was an ice pick.


    He held that ice pick with three fingers, the index and middle finger on top while the thumbid on the bottom holding it in ce.<sub> </sub>


    It was a very strange weapon, there was no doubt of that, but that wasn''t what surprised everyone. They could feel the fluctuations that wereing from this ice pick and it was easy to tell that it was a peak Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact.


    This was considered a very rare artifact for these two families.


    An Embryo Soul Realm Artifact could only be made with the best weapon smith and several pieces of Embryo Soul Realm materials. To get these Embryo Soul Realm materials, it would naturally mean attacking Embryo Soul Realm Beast Kings.


    For these two organizations that were only being supported by a single Embryo Soul Realm Expert, naturally they wouldn''t risk the lives of these experts just to gather these materials.


    So for these two organizations, the highest grade artifact that they had was a single peak Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact and there was no doubt that it was held by the leader of these organizations.


    That meant that what the first elder had was not a peak Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact, but rather a high Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact.


    Once again, the momentum returned to the side of the One Shadow Organization.


    However, the strange thing was that the first elder suddenly gave augh when he saw this artifact appear before saying, "Are you done with your desperate struggle? As long as you listen to our boss, I''m sure that you could even get a position that is only second to mine."


    Hearing the same words that they had said being used against them, all the members of the One Shadow Organization were filled with rage. Especially since they were clearly the ones that had the momentum here.


    Even the mysterious cloaked figure couldn''t help knitting his brows since he couldn''t understand why this person was so confident.


    But that didn''t matter to him. He had already made a deal with the backer of the One Shadow Organization, so he only needed to care about fulfilling that deal. As for what happened between these two organizations, it was none of his business.


    The mysterious cloaked figure immediately dashed out with his ice pick, thrusting it right at the first elder''s jugr without any hesitation.


    The ice pick flew right through the air and when it was about to hit the first elder, there was a sudden burst of energy that came from the first elder that blew it away.


    The mysterious cloaked figure looked at the first elder in shock, or rather he looked at the weapon that had suddenly appeared in the first elder''s hands in shock.


    This was a sword, a very normal looking sword that didn''t have any decorations at all. Other than a simple hilt and guard, there was nothing special about this sword. That was, there was nothing special about the appearance, but the aura of the sword was apletely different matter.


    The mysterious cloaked figure immediately knitted his brows when he felt this aura.


    It was actually an Embryo Soul Realm Artifact!


    This was an artifact that even he couldn''t get after all his years of struggle after breaking through to the Embryo Soul Realm, but this elder from a lowly family was able to have one.


    There was a look of greed that appeared in his eyes, but then he remembered how strong the first elder was and that look disappeared. He even began considering running away as he tried to find an escape path.


    It was too bad that the first elder didn''t give him that chance as he charged forward with the Embryo Soul Realm Sword, shing down again and again until the mysterious cloaked figure was knocked to the ground, unable to resist at all.


    After knocking him down, the first elder waved his hand and had the rest of the members of the Xu Family tie all of these people up. After all, they would have more use alive than dead.


    In his heart, he couldn''t help praising Lin Fan for his insight in predicting all of this.


    Naturally it was Lin Fan who had helped him break through as well as giving him this Embryo Soul Realm Artifact.


    After helping the Xu Family Head, Lin Fan had also given thatst Pill Line Pill to the first elder which had allowed him to break through to the Embryo Soul Realm. This was on the first day that Lin Fan had appeared in the Xu Family. After having a few days to consolidate his realm, naturally he was much stronger than when he just broke through.


    Then there was the Embryo Soul Realm Artifact which was actually pleasant surprise to Lin Fan as well.


    When he had killed those ten Embryo Soul Realm Beast Kings, he had also ransacked their nests and in one of them, he had found this artifact.


    Since Lin Fan already had his own artifact that was stronger than this sword, he decided to loan it to the first elder temporarily since he already expected something like this to happen in this meeting.


    Or rather, it was Brainy who had nned all of this.


    Brainy was a pet with supreme intelligence and would always be Lin Fan''s strategist, so Lin Fan trusted Brainy''s ns, which was why he had given the Embryo Soul Realm Artifact out.


    With that, the situation with this meeting had been settled.


    The only thing left was the raid on the One Shadow Organization''s headquarters.

 389 Chapter 389

    On the other side of this operation, there was the attack group that was being led by the Xu Family Head which had Xu Lin and Lin Fan among them.


    This attack group had all the elites of the Xu Family, bringing along several elders and their elite squad. This attack group consisted of 80% of the Xu Family''s experts.


    It could be said that the Xu Family was going all out against the One Shadow Organization this time.


    However, even though they had brought all their experts, it wouldn''t mean a single thing if there was a supreme expert on the other side, which was why Lin Fan was there.


    The Xu Family Head was unable to see through Lin Fan at all, that was what gave him the confidence that they would be able to deal with anything that came.


    The Xu Family group made their way through the streets of Harmony City until they arrived at the entrance to the One Shadow Organization''s headquarters. What was right in front of them was a hotel.


    It wasn''t the hotel per say that interested them, but rather what was under the hotel.


    The One Shadow Organization hadn''t spared any expense with their headquarters, building an entire base in the ground under the hotel.


    Of course, this city was a ce that was run by the twelve great factions and nothing could be done here without their approval, especially a giant underground base like this. So before building this giant underground base, the One Shadow Organization had gotten permission from the great faction that was in charge of this area, which was the Hunters Organization.


    Thoserge organizations didn''t care about these small factions, so with just a few simple bribes, the Xu Family was able to easily find the entrance to the One Shadow Organization''s base.


    In the end, reporting it to the great faction was actually their downfall, but the consequences would have been much worse if the great faction had ever found out about something that hadn''t been reported.


    The Xu Family group split up into three different teams since there were three different entrances to this underground base. They were going to split into three teams to make sure that no one escaped through the side entrances, but the main forces would still be concentrated on the main entrance.


    After going into the inn, they released a sleeping incense that made sure that none of the customers would interrupt before moving right to the counter.


    Before the receptionist at the counter could even react, he was knocked out with a single punch from the Xu Family Head.


    They moved behind the counter and right under it, there was a hatch door that was hidden away by the counter. However, the first thing they did was not open the hatch door, but rather the Xu Family Head used his spiritual sense to check it. As they had expected, there was a trap that was hidden underneath the hatch door.


    If this hatch door was opened without using the proper method, the trap under the door would have activated and released a signal that would have told everyone in the base that intruders wereing.


    Normally, this would be a bad thing to find since they wouldn''t be able to disarm this and go in undetected, but that was if there weren''t spies.


    Discovering this was actually a good sign for the Xu Family since it showed that the information that their spies had given them were reliable, since the report that they had received had mentioned this trap. Of course, since the trap was mentioned, the method of disarming this trap was also included in the report.


    After quickly disarming the trap, the Xu Family group moved straight down into the depths of the One Shadow Organization''s base.


    This was a ce that was rather dark, but since they were all experts, it wasn''t a problem for them if this ce was a bit dim. Cultivation wasn''t just a way to improve your body, it also helped build up the other parts like your eyesight.


    Making their way through the dark halls of the One Shadow Organization''s base, they made sure tob through the various rooms that they passed to see if any people were there.


    Of course, since it was the night before the One Shadow Organization''s attack, most of them weren''t actually in the base since gathering then would seem suspicious. Most of them would be gathering in the morning before the attack to ensure that no one would notice them. At the same time, they had been given the night off to rx, so they could prepare themselves for the fight tomorrow.


    So there were only a few people in the rooms that they had passed who they easily took care of.


    Along the way, Xu Lin couldn''t help feeling a bit strange and a bit nervous. Even though he had grown up in a family with an expert, he was someone who hadn''t really killed other people before since he was still too young and weak to be involved in this. Most of the killing that he had done before were killing beasts to help with his cultivation, so this was all new to him.


    That was also one of the reasons why the Xu Family Head had brought Xu Lin along, it was to give him experience in this field for the future.<sub> </sub>


    Everyone had already agreed to give Xu Lin the artifact and to send him to the True Spirit Sect, but the sect was an even more dangerous ce than the Xu Family. The True Spirit Sect would be filled with plotting and Xu Lin would see even more of that if he became the disciple of a Nascent Soul Realm elder. If he wasn''t able to finish what he started, that would leave many hidden dangers for him.


    So that was why he needed to learn quickly.


    As they were moving through, Xu Lin saw that Lin Fan wasn''t fazed at all by all the killings around him and he couldn''t help asking, "How are you dealing with this?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him and said, "It''s all a part of life, you just have to ept it."


    Xu Lin couldn''t help being surprised by Lin Fan''s calm response. He never thought that this person he called "senior" who was actually younger than him would be this calm in the face of killing people.


    What Xu Lin didn''t know was that Lin Fan had killed his fair share of people already.


    It wasn''t just back on the Blue Star, it was even back on earth when Lin Fan was that rampant young master. As a young master from the richest family, naturally he had his ways of disposing of the evidence, so he had long be used to killing people.


    Of course, when he had done it for the first time back on earth, Lin Fan had certainly puked and fell into a daze like what people normally felt. But after a while, he just became numb to all of it.


    The Xu Family group moved slowly through this base, clearing out the various rooms that they found as they made their way deeper and deeper.


    Eventually, they had cleared out all the various rooms that were present and there was only the inner sanctum of this base that was left.


    Once they arrived in the inner sanctum, they met up with the two other groups that came from the two other entrances.


    Both of those entrances had also had traps, but those were also mentioned in the report along with the method of disarming them, so the other two groups didn''t have a problem with them at all.


    Of course, there were a few members of all three groups that were missing and they were the members that had been left at the three different entrances to prevent anyoneing in and anyoneing out.


    Since they were all gathered, therge Xu Family group slowly made their way into the inner sanctum.


    This inner sanctum was the same as the previous halls, but there were definitely more people here.


    All of these people were the trusted members of the One Shadow Organization, so they had remained behind to n for the attack tomorrow. Since they were all trusted members, naturally their cultivations were also much higher than the ones outside, but they had been caught off guard and they were outnumbered, so there wasn''t much resistance in the end.


    It didn''t take the Xu Family group long to clear out most of these groups since they had so many people inparison, but since they were stronger, there were a few people who had been injured.


    After clearing out all of these inner rooms, there was only a single door left for them to enter.


    It was arge double door that was luxuriously decorated, clearly being at a different level than the others.


    It made one thing clear, this was definitely the residence of the leader of the One Shadow Organization, the One Shadow.


    Lin Fan used his soundws to iste the sound of the door opening, but when they did, there was a conversation that came from inside.


    "Big brother, what are your ns after this?" This first voice was one that most people here could recognize since it was the voice of their sworn enemy, the One Shadow.


    The next voice was one that they didn''t recognize which said, "I have the Hunters Exam after this and once I''m done, I''lle see if I can help you at the True Spirit Sect."

 390 Chapter 390

    This was a voice that no one could recognize, but the words that he said had a special meaning.


    p It was someone who was connected to the Hunters Organization, which means that the One Shadow Organization must have some connection as well.</anda>


    While he was still only taking the Hunters Exam, the fact that he was able to get in meant that he was either powerful or he had some connection with someone with power in the Hunters Organization. It didn''t really matter which one it was, they were both bad for the Xu Family.


    But Lin Fan didn''t panic at all since he knew that it wasn''t a problem for him to take this person.


    He could tell from this person''s aura that he wasn''t in the Child Soul Realm, so that meant that there was no threat to him at all.


    Even if the Hunters Organization wanted to interfere, Lin Fan also had his own connection with the Hunters Organization since he was also qualified for the Hunters Exam. Not only that, he was qualified to skip the first round of the Hunters Exam, which meant that the person who was backing him didn''t have a low status.


    While he felt bad about letting the old man protect him, the logical side of him knew that this was the right move.


    The Xu Family Head was hesitant after hearing what was discussed in the room, so he turned to look at Lin Fan with a questioning gaze.


    Lin Fan looked at him before giving him a nod to assure him.


    With this promise, the Xu Family Head cast aside his hesitation and moved into the throne room.


    Everybody followed him in, but it didn''t take long before the conversation in front of them suddenly stopped.


    The One Shadow''s voice suddenly asked, "What''s going on?"


    The other voice said, "Someone''s here."


    The One Shadow revealed a confused look as he asked, "What do you mean?"


    The other voice said with a smile, "It seems like the easy prey that you mentioned isn''t that easy after all. They seem to have quite the bite."


    The One Shadow turned in the direction that other person was looking in and soon he saw what wasing towards him. As soon as he did, he narrowed his eyes and said, "It''s you!"


    The Xu Family head didn''t hide in the shadows, he walked straight up towards the One Shadow with the other Xu Family experts following behind him.


    The Xu Family Head looked right at the One Shadow and said, "It''s me, what are you going to do about it?"


    The One Shadow was surprised to see that the Xu Family Head was so confident, but then he burst out inughter before saying, "You really have changedpared to before."


    Then he suddenly narrowed his eyes and red right at him as he said, "I wonder what has changed."


    The Xu Family Head just gave a shrug and said, "Why don''t youe and find out?"


    The One Shadow looked at him for a bit before saying, "I''m sure that you think that I''m alone since you killed off all the ones outside, but I assure you that you don''t know anything."


    He suddenly gave a snap and there was a change in his shadow. There were several forms that suddenly came out of his shadow and appeared around the One Shadow.


    The name the One Shadow Organization had really was well named since these elite troops that they trained were all like shadows.


    These people were the true elites of the One Shadow Organization and they were the personal guards of the One Shadow Organization.


    Of course, it wasn''t them that had the shadowws, but rather the One Shadow did. He used those shadowws to keep them in his shadow at all times just in case that he was attacked and he only sent them out on truly important missions.


    Each one of these shadows were in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm and there were ten of them present.


    All of these shadows were the final fighting force, the ones outside were actually more strategy officers than actual experts, so killing them didn''t really bring any harm to the One Shadow Organization.


    But even after these appeared, the Xu Family Head didn''t panic at all.


    He just had the elders that hade with him step forward and prepare to fight these shadows.


    In terms of peak Fragmented Soul Realm Experts, the Xu Family was at a disadvantage since they didn''t have as many of them. However, they made up for that in terms of numbers.


    There were enough high Fragmented Soul Realm Experts to make up for this by ganging up to hold off the peak Fragmented Soul Realm Experts.


    As for the others, the only thing they could do was provide ranged support, but in a battle between experts, just a single distraction was fatal. If they were to make a single mistake during this fight, it could cost the life of one of their experts, so the weaker people just stayed back and watched the fight.


    The Fragmented Soul Realm Experts of the two sides shed with each other in their own spaces all around the throne room, leaving the Xu Family Head and the One Shadow to stare at each other.<sub> </sub>


    Behind them were two cloaked figures, one of them being Lin Fan and the other being the Hunters Exam examinee that the One Shadow had found.


    Seeing that the fight between the Fragmented Soul Realm Experts wasn''t going anywhere, the Xu Family Head looked right at the One Shadow and said, "Shall we get started as well?"


    The One Shadow looked at the Xu Family Head for a bit before suddenly giving augh. After thatugh, he said, "You really think that I would fight you myself?"


    He turned to the cloaked figure beside him and said, "Senior, if you would."


    The cloaked figure gave a nod beforeing forward to stand in front of the One Shadow as he said, "Un."


    Then he raised his palm as he prepared to attack the Xu Family Head, but something happened before that that suddenly caught him off guard.


    Before he could attack, there was a spatial rift that suddenly appeared in front of him before Lin Fan popped out of there, grabbing him by the cor. Lifting him up by that cor, Lin Fan swung him before throwing him right into another spatial rift that appeared behind him.


    Before anyone else in the room could react, the cloaked figure had disappeared and Lin Fan had also disappeared in the spatial rift.


    The One Shadow stared at the location of where they had disappeared in a daze for a bit before suddenly shouting, "What happened? Who was that!"


    The Xu Family Head on the other hand had a rxed smile as he said, "You think you''re the only one who can hire helpers?"


    The One Shadow trembled when he heard this and for the first time, he didn''t feel as confident. He felt that something might go wrong and everything would end here¡­


    But he couldn''t allow himself to be weighed down by such thoughts, so the One Shadow shook his head and pulled out his weapon. The weapon that he pulled out was a dagger that was shrouded in daggers.


    The One Shadow stared right at the Xu Family Head and shouted, "Let''s settle this then!"


    The Xu Family Head also took out a giant two handed sword with a wave of his hand and said, "Just what I wanted."


    After that, the two of them charged right at each other.


    ¡­


    In another part of the underground base, in another room that was even bigger than the previous throne room, Lin Fan and the cloaked figure appeared.


    After appearing, Lin Fan threw the cloaked figure across the room beforending on the ground.


    The cloaked figure did a turn in the air before sliding to a stop on the ground.


    The room that they were in was a training room for the One Shadow Organization that was near the throne room. Brainy had found this room earlier with its spiritual sense as they had been moving through the base and Lin Fan had asked it to create a spiritual sense mark for Lin Fan.


    Using that, Lin Fan had teleported both of them here with the spatialws.


    After all, the room that they had been in before was filled with people and if he was to fight this person there, it would be hard to protect the rest.


    As for taking care of the One Shadow, Lin Fan had confidence in the Xu Family Head. After all, he had also given him another trump card as well.


    Afternding, the cloaked figure stood up straight and in a surprise move, they suddenly took off their cloak to reveal their true appearance.


    This cloaked figure was arge man with a bald head and bulging muscles. He looked like the definition of a bodybuilder.


    After taking off his cloak, therge man said, "That feels so much better, that cloak felt so restrictive."


    After stretching himself out, therge man looked at Lin Fan and said, "I''m Yin Qiang, who are you?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this direct introduction before asking, "What are you up to?"


    Yin Qiang just gave augh and said, "I''m not really into that being mysterious stuff, it''s easier if I''m direct. So, what''s your name?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being speechless. This man really was something¡­


    But of course, Lin Fan had no intentions of ying along as he said, "Does it matter when you''re about to die?"


    Yin Qiang said, "Ze, ze, you really are a hasty young man."


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort before five balls of light suddenly shot out in five different directions around him.

 391 Chapter 391

    The five balls of light that suddenly shot out from Lin Fan were the five pets that he had.


    The five balls went into different corners of the room, avoiding Yin Qiang before they were evenly spread out all around Lin Fan.


    Once they were evenly spread out, there was a burst of energy that came from them as they created a formation.


    Yin Qiang looked at them before revealing a taunting smile and saying, "Only in the Fragmented Soul Realm? These things aren''t any threat to me at all. What are you nning on doing with these things?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing in response to this.


    All that Yin Qiang received in response was a sudden burst of energying from the array as the five pets all released their life energy. It was all gathered by Brainy who was currently controlling the formation from Lin Fan''s sleeve, gathering all that energy into one spot on the array.


    Once all that energy was gathered, it was fired off as a single shot, but the trajectory wasn''t as what one would suspect.


    The ball of light that had gathered all the life energy of the five pets together was actually falling down right above Lin Fan. It continued to fall until the ballnded on Lin Fan.


    Yin Qiang couldn''t help being surprised as he asked, "What are you doing? Did you go crazy?"


    But once again, Lin Fan said nothing in response.


    All Lin Fan did was raise his hand to meet that ball of light.


    As soon as his hand came into contact with that ball of light, there was a suction force that suddenly came out, sucking up the life energy that was contained within this ball of light.


    Or rather, he didn''tpletely suck it up and the five different kinds ofws in this ball of lightpletely ran down his arm to surround it in ayer of five differentws. It was almost like when Lin Fan used hisbination of fivews attack normally, but instead of thewsing from inside of him, it came from an external source.


    This was the new attack that Lin Fan had created with his absorption power after his pets had learned this formation attack.


    To put it simply, with the absorption power controlling the power of the fivews that came from the array, it allowed Lin Fan to control them without having to withstand the strain of fivews. That was because the absorption power kept thews outside of his body, so they didn''t physically have any strain on them.


    However, what was holding them together was spiritual sense and the absorption power. If that wasn''t strong enough, the power of thews would dissipate and it wouldn''t wrap around Lin Fan like this.


    The final deciding factor in this was actually Brainy.


    Lin Fan''s spiritual sense just wasn''t strong enough to hold all of this together by itself. If it wasn''t for Brainy''s spiritual sense that was stronger than his helping him hold it all together, it would have been hard for Lin Fan to concentrate these fivews around him.


    But then again, since these fivews didn''t ce any strain on his body since they were being controlled externally, Lin Fan was actually free to do something else.


    With a roar, Lin Fan suddenly started releasing his own life energy which gathered in the forms ofws around him.


    Lin Fan continued gathering thesews until they formed the normal fiveyersw around him.


    Once those fiveyers had formed, they ovepped with the fiveyers ofws that were already surrounding him. When it allbined, there were over ten differentyers ofws that were around him.


    Of course when all thesews interacted with each other, the strain from them was incredibly heavy, almosting to the point of tearing Lin Fan apart. Of course, it was still only almosting to that point, so Lin Fan was able to hold on.


    The key factor in this was that five of thesews were outside of his body and were mainly being controlled by Brainy''s spiritual sense, rather than by his own powers. Since that was the case, Brainy was actually handling most of the pressure that came frombining thosews.


    But of course, Lin Fan also felt a part of this strain because thosews were interacting with thews that came from his body.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that he made a breakthrough with his cultivation technique and strengthened his body, he might not have been able to withstand the strain of this new technique.


    However, since he was able to withstand the strain, Lin Fan was able tobine tenws into a single attack.<sub> </sub>


    Even Lin Fan had no idea how powerful this was becausebiningws together wasn''t just a simple addition of their power. It was an exponential multiplication of this power that was hard to estimate.


    This was also why Lin Fan wasn''t even afraid of Child Soul Realm Experts. He was certain that with this power, he would be able to at least match them or at least run away from them.


    When Lin Fan fully released all his power, Yin Qiang immediately knitted his brows.


    He didn''t know what kind of power Lin Fan was using, but he never would have dared to imagine that it wasbiningws. Because if it wasbiningws, with how many different types of energy he could feel, Lin Fan would be an absolute monster.


    He had heard of people who couldbinews before, but for someone tobine ten differentws into one attack, the word human wouldn''t be able to describe that person anymore. The only thing they could be called was freak!


    So pushing away this correct guess, the only thing that Yin Qiang could think of was that this array was a support array that gathered all the power of Lin Fan''s pets into him. This was definitely something that had been used by many people and was amon thing, rather it was something that he could ept¡­


    Yin Qiang red right at Lin Fan and said in a serious voice, "Just who are you?"


    Lin Fan finally looked at Yin Qiang to say, "A dead man doesn''t need to know."


    Yin Qiang''s face contorted with anger, but there was nothing he could say in response to this since he could feel the sense of dangering from Lin Fan. If he didn''t take this seriously he would definitely die.


    With a wave of his hand, Yin Qiang pulled out a normal sized sword, but based on the aura that came from that sword, it was clear that it was an Embryo Soul Realm Artifact.


    He just didn''t have a choice, if he didn''t fight for real, there was no chance that he would win. That was what every instinct in his body was currently telling him.


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure just how strong Yin Qiang was, but he was certain that he wasn''t in the Child Soul Realm since he didn''t have the same aura as the Child Soul Realm Experts that Lin Fan had met before. However, even if Yin Qiang wasn''t as strong as Lin Fan wanted him to be, it was still more than enough for him since he wanted to test just how powerful he was with a full force strike.


    With a wave of Lin Fan''s hand, there was a pure white sword that suddenly appeared in his hand.


    Lin Fan transferred the ten folded glow onto the sword and brought it up to prepare to swing it down at Yin Qiang.


    Yin Qiang also prepared his sword to sh at Lin Fan.


    After a moment of hesitation, both sides charged at each other, swinging their sword at the other person.


    They came closer and closer until the two swords shed with each other.


    Once the swords made contact, there was no dy at all as Lin Fan''s sword cut right through Yin Qiang''s sword to sh right through him.


    Yin Qiang immediately spat out a mouthful of blood and was sent flying until he mmed into the wall that was behind him.


    Yin Qiang looked at Lin Fan with a look of shock since he never expected Lin Fan to be this powerful. He was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, but even then, he still couldn''t resist at all.


    In truth, with thebination of the tenws, Lin Fan was already more than a match for those in the low Child Soul Realm and could even match those in the mid Child Soul Realm. The only problem was that he had never fought anyone in those realms at full force, so he didn''t know just how strong he was.


    After sending Yin Qiang flying, Lin Fan walked towards him at a slow pace with his weapon raised.


    When Yin Qiang saw this, he endured the pain from his wounds and immediately dug in his chest to pull out a token that he held up in front of him as he shouted, "Do you really know what you are doing? I''m one of the special candidates the Hunters Organization has chosen for their exam! If you do anything to me, do you know what will happen to you?"


    Lin Fan looked at this token and found that it was the same as the one he had received from the old man from the Qiao Family.


    It seemed like they were at the same level and now that he had proven himself stronger, it should mean¡­


    Since that was the case, he didn''t need to fear this man at all.

 392 Chapter 392

    As Yin Qiang continued to shout about how important he was, Lin Fan just looked at him as he stopped moving. He also lowered his sword like he was about to stop attacking.


    Yin Qiang saw this and said, "It''s good that you understand your position! As long as you''re willing to serve...No, as long as you''re willing to work with me, I''m sure I can also get you a position in the Hunters Organization as well. When the timees, we''ll be unstoppable!"


    Yin Qiang could already imagine it. He knew that someone as powerful as this was definitely not someone the Hunters Organization was willing to give up, it was his lucky day to find him before any force had imed him.


    Someone was powerful as this was a waste for the Xu Family, so it would be easy for him to bribe this person toe to his side. He could already see the bright future that was in front of him.


    It was too bad that it didn''t go the way he wanted it to go.


    Lin Fan had stopped, but that was to raise his other hand as he gave a wave. When he did, there was a token that appeared in his hand whichpletely shocked Yin Qiang.


    Yin Qiang stared on in shock as his view had suddenly changed.


    When he realized it, he was already looking at Lin Fan who was standing upside down.


    Yin Qiang asked, "How did you turn upside down so fast?"


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "I didn''t. You should know that you''re not the only person with this token."


    Yin Qiang then realized what had happened as his head touched the ground.


    He couldn''t feel his body at all and that was because his head was no longer attached to his body.


    With a single flick of his wrist, Lin Fan''s sword hade up in a shing motion, cutting right through Yin Qiang''s neck and severing his head from his body.


    It had turned upside down in the air before falling right down at the feet of his body. After that, it rolled once before turning it so that the severed head was looking right at its previous body.


    Only when Yin Qiang saw his own severed body did he realize that he had beenpletely mistaken.


    He had thought that Lin Fan was easy prey for him, but he never thought that Lin Fan would actually be the predator.


    In his final moments, the only thing he felt was endless regret.


    But none of that mattered for Lin Fan.


    As soon as Yin Qiang was dead, Lin Fan immediately came up to loot the body.


    While he couldn''t get the things that were stored in his wrist watch, he could still loot all the things that were inside his Spatial Ring.


    In the upper realm, all the experts had Spatial Rings because that was where they kept their most valuable items. After all, the safest ce was one''s own hands.


    It wouldn''t take long for Lin Fan to break the spiritual sense seal on the Spatial Ring, but he also didn''t go through it right now because there was something else he had to handle first.


    Of course, before he could even use hisws, Lin Fan suddenly sat down cross legged as he began stabilizing himself.


    If it was said that using that formation in battle hadn''t affected him at all, it would be a lie. No matter what, the strain that came from using multiplews was something that was incredibly powerful.


    While Lin Fan was stabilizing his condition, the battle was still ongoing in the other room.


    Since the Xu Family side had the advantage in numbers, they were able to keep back the private guards of the One Shadow. However, that was all they were able to do and the two sides continued to sh with one another.


    As for their leaders, it was also an even battle for them because they were both holding back, waiting for their helpers toe back.


    However, after a sudden burst of energy from nearby which they assumed was the final sh in the battle between their helpers, it would also mean that battle was over. The one problem was that no one wasing back, so they knew that whoever survived must be heavily injured.


    In this scenario, if one of them were to die, they would be at least able to match that helper and keep their side safe.


    So in order to be safe, both of them suddenly revealed their trump cards.


    The One Shadow tapped the ground before shadowy figures suddenly appeared behind him.


    There were a total of two figures that suddenly appeared that both had the same appearance as the One Shadow, albeit they werepletely dark.<sub> </sub>


    This was the secret technique that the One Shadow had cultivated, the Shadow Clone Technique. It allowed him to create two Shadow Clones that would have the same power as him, but it consumed quite a bit of his life energy to maintain these. This wasn''t suited for a long fight and if it wasn''t for the fact that he might be in danger, he wouldn''t have used this at all.


    So after summoning out these Shadow Clones, the One Shadow jumped out with both of them, charging at the Xu Family Head. He didn''t have any time to waste, so his first instinct was to attack right away.


    It was too bad that the trump card that the Xu Family Head had been holding was something that was far beyond what he expected.


    The Xu Family Head suddenly burst forth with energy and he could feel that the Xu Family Head''s cultivation was growing stronger.


    The One Shadow had a look of shock as he stared at the Xu Family Head, feeling his cultivation break through from the low Embryo Soul Realm to the mid Embryo Soul Realm.


    Every single breakthrough in the Soul Realm, even if it was going between realms, was like heaven and earth.


    Even if there were three One Shadows currently, he still couldn''t beat the Xu Family Head.


    The Xu Family Head looked at the One Shadows standing there and asked, "Are you surprised?"


    The One Shadow didn''t reply as he looked at him in a daze.


    The Xu Family Head had actually just broken throughst night, so he still hadn''t stabilized his realm yet, but that was still enough for him to beat the One Shadow. After all, he too had been a peerless genius and had been able to fight enemies that were at a higher level of cultivation before.


    If the One Shadow Organization hadn''t poisoned him, even if he was at the same level of cultivation as the One Shadow, he would have won a fight between them.


    The reason why he had broken through was all because of Lin Fan.


    Since they knew that Lin Fan was a Pill Line Alchemist, the Xu Family had gathered all their resources for Lin Fan to refine another pill.


    This pill had been finished just yesterday and the Xu Family Head had used it to break through justst night.


    The Xu Family Head looked right at the One Shadow and said, "Are you going to give up now?"


    The One Shadow red right back at him and hesitated before saying, "You think that your helper is able to beat my big brother? My big brother is one of the candidates for the Hunters Exam, he''s someone even the Hunters Organization cares about, you''re all dead meat if something happens to him."


    The Xu Family Head did hesitate a bit when he heard this since the Hunters Organization was too powerful of a deterrent.


    Just a single expert from the Hunters Organization was enough to wipe out the entire Xu Family.


    But as he was hesitating, there was a spatial warp that had suddenly appeared.


    When the Xu Family Head and the One Shadow saw this, they felt different feelings.


    The One Shadow was worried because he knew what kind ofws his big brother used and spatialws wasn''t one of them. Since there was this spatial warp, it meant that the oneing back wasn''t his big brother¡­


    The Xu Family Head was happy to see this since he knew Lin Fan had spatialws, but he was also worried since he didn''t know if the other side also had spatialws.


    After a few seconds, Lin Fan came out of the spatial warp andnded in front of everyone, causing them to stop fighting.


    The One Shadow immediately shouted, "Where''s my big brother?"


    The big brother he was talking about was Yin Qiang. The One Shadow''s name was Yin Yi and Yin Qiang was his biological brother, which was why he was willing to help the One Shadow.


    But for Lin Fan to appear now, the One Shadow could only assume the worst.


    Lin Fan looked at him and asked, "What do you think happened to him?"


    This caused the One Shadow to turn numb, but he also quickly recovered as he broke out inughter, "Do you know what you''ve all just done? You''ve killed one of the prime candidates for the Hunters Exam! He was someone in the peak Embryo Soul Realm and someone the Hunters Organization personally recruited, you think you can get off scot free after killing my big brother?"


    He could onlyugh like this to hide his sorrow since he was quite close to his big brother, but he didn''t have time to mourn for him right now. The only thing he could do was curse his enemies to death.


    Lin Fan waved his hand and took out the token again before saying, "You think so?"

 393 Chapter 393

    The One Shadow was about to say something else, but then he suddenly saw the token in Lin Fan''s hand and he immediately swallowed his words.


    With a difficult tone in his voice, the One Shadow asked in a stuttering voice, "Where, where did you, you get that?"


    Lin Fan looked at him and asked with a smile, "Where do you think I got it?"


    A chill ran down the One Shadow''s back the moment he heard this, but even if the voice in his heart was telling him one thing, he refused to believe it. After shaking his head, the One Shadow said, "Do you really think that you can get away with stealing my big brother''s token? The Hunters Organization is smarter than you think!"


    Lin Fan gave a coldugh and said, "Do you really think that or are you just stupid?"


    The One Shadow''s forced calm slowly copsed as he began to break out in a cold sweat. He continued to sweat more and more until he finally couldn''t take it and shouted, "How could that possibly be real! You will suffer the consequences of offending the Hunters Organization, make no mistake about that!"


    Lin Fan chose to ignore him this time as he turned to the Xu Family Head and said, "Do you want to take care of him or do you want me to do it?"


    The Xu Family Head had been in a daze the entire time since he honestly didn''t expect to see this. Lin Fan had just fought a battle against the expert invited by the One Shadow Organization, but there wasn''t even a single speck of dust on him. No matter how the Xu Family Head looked at Lin Fan, it didn''t seem like he had just fought a battle.


    However, that would be even more shocking because ording to the One Shadow, the person that Lin Fan fought was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm and someone that had caught the attention of the Hunters Organization, which meant that he was by no means a normal expert.


    He would definitely be someone that was considered a genius among experts in the same realm of cultivation, which meant that he would be much stronger than a normal expert in the peak Embryo Soul Realm. While he wouldn''t be someone that could defeat those in the Child Soul Realm, he definitely would be someone who would have no problems running away from them.


    Lin Fan had actually defeated a person like this?


    Could it be that Lin Fan was actually in the Child Soul Realm and he had hidden his cultivation the entire time?


    If that was the case, just how many secrets was Lin Fan hiding?


    As the Xu Family Head had this thought, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a look of pure admiration and shock.


    He could see how young Lin Fan was and if he really was in the Child Soul Realm at such a young age, he far surpassed all other geniuses in this upper realm.


    After thinking this, the Xu Family Head couldn''t help looking at Xu Lin on the side who was looking at Lin Fan with an excited look and he also couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    It really was better not topare what others had to what one had, otherwise one would only feel sadness.


    But in the end, the most important thing for the Xu Family Head was that he felt happy about his decision in the beginning.


    Not only was Lin Fan a Pill Line Alchemist, he might potentially be a Child Soul Realm Expert, and based on the token that he pulled out, it was also very likely he was rted to the Hunters Organization.


    Any one of these identities would be enough to bring the Xu Family to greater heights, but following someone with all three¡­


    It was certain that Lin Fan would reach a peak that none of them would ever even be able to touch, but that didn''t mean they werepletely out of reach of it.


    As long as they followed Lin Fan, even if they were able to get a bit of his leftovers, they would surely reach a level that they never would have done before. If possible, they might even be able to be more than just a part of the twelve great factions.


    After thinking this through, the Xu Family Head had once again made the decision to follow Lin Fan. It didn''t matter what he would want them to do, they would do it for him. They would be his most faithful followers, following him through fire and ice, walking over a mountain of des for him.


    Once he was done making this vow, the Xu Family Head came back from his thoughts and said, "I''ll do it."


    The Xu Family Head didn''t even hesitate at all as he jumped forward, charging out at the One Shadow with renewed vigor.


    The Xu Family Head didn''t hold anything back this time, releasing his full cultivation.<sub> </sub>


    The One Shadow did all he could with the three Shadow Clones that he had made, but in the end, he still wasn''t able to fight back under the attacks of the Xu Family Head. It only took a single minute before the One Shadow fell under the Xu Family Head''s de.


    As he died, the One Shadow''s eyes were filled with regret and unwillingness as he stared at Lin Fan.


    Everything had been perfectly nned, but then this unknown kid had shown up and ruined everything. Just who was he and where did hee from?


    How could he ruin his carefully plotted n just like that?


    As these thoughts ran through the One Shadow''s mind, his eyes dimmed until they no longer had any light in them and he copsed on the ground, taking his final breath.


    Just like this, the disaster of the Xu Family had been taken care of.


    Lin Fan didn''t even bother looking at the One Shadow, he was just looking over the other Fragmented Soul Realm Experts from the One Shadow Organization thinking about something else.


    It would have been more than easy for Lin Fan to take care of the One Shadow since even without using his new attack thatbined tenws, he could still take care of someone in the Embryo Soul Realm with just his normal attacks. He could even take care of the Xu Family Head with just his normal attacks since his physique was just too terrifying.


    But he had exhausted his power testing out that new power and he didn''t want to strain himself, so he left it for the Xu Family Head.


    When the rest of the Fragmented Soul Realm Experts from the One Shadow Organization saw the One Shadow being killed, they all looked at each other and released their full energy as they tried to escape.


    However, Lin Fan wouldn''t let them get away because he needed them for something else.


    With a flick of his hand, there was a white dagger that suddenly appeared. Then with another flick of his hand, the white dagger flew out at the Fragmented Soul Realm Experts that were trying to escape.


    Working with the Fragmented Soul Realm Experts from the Xu Family who held them down, Lin Fan controlled his pure white dagger to stab them from various different directions to end their lives.


    In the end, there were another nine corpses that suddenly joined the One Shadow on the ground of this throne room.


    With that, all the experts from the One Shadow Organization had been taken care of.


    After this, the Xu Family Head came up to Lin Fan and cupped his hands, which he had never done before and said, "Young master Lin, what should we do now?"


    The Xu Family Head had already changed the way he addressed Lin Fan since he knew that Lin Fan definitely wouldn''t be a normal person in the future, he would definitely be someone who would be above the Xu Family Head. Since that was the case, it was better to suck up to him early.


    Lin Fan noticed this, but he still said, "Brother Xu, please take care of gathering all the assets of the One Shadow Organization. As for these bodies, I''ll take care of them. I have a need for them for something else."


    The Xu Family Head was surprised by this, but then he said with a smile, "No problem Brother Lin, we''ll make sure to give you the first pick from these assets."


    With a wave of his hand, the Xu Family forces spread out to search this base for the assets of the One Shadow Organization, leaving Lin Fan alone in this throne room.


    Once they were gone, Lin Fan came forward to gather up all the corpses in this room to ce in his Spatial Ring. Since they were Fragmented Soul Realm corpses, they wouldst much longer than normal corpses, so he didn''t need to worry about them.


    Lin Fan was naturally collecting these corpses to give to Brainy to turn into puppets.


    Other than the corpses of the bandits that attacked him before, Lin Fan didn''t dare take any other corpses because he wasn''t sure what forces might be behind them and if he would be able to fight them. So before he knew that the situation of the upper realm was, he didn''t dare take these risks.


    But now that he had a better idea of the situation in the upper realm, Lin Fan didn''t mind taking a few corpses to help Brainy build up its army.


    Lin Fan was certain that he would have a need for something like this in the future.

 394 Chapter 394

    While Lin Fan would have preferred to keep these experts alive since turning living humans into puppets was always better than using corpses, he couldn''t do that in this situation.


    Who knew how long it would be before the Hunters Organization acted and if they were to ask for these experts from Lin Fan, Lin Fan would find it hard to say no.


    They would be hidden dangers for him if they were released, so instead of having that possibility, it was better to kill them all off now.


    As for why living beings were better than corpses, living beings still had wills even after being turned into puppets by Brainy, so they could still think for themselves. It was much better than having mindless puppets that Brainy would need to control itself.


    But the problem was that it would take too much time since Brainy couldn''t forcefully turn the puppets. Or if it did, it would take a while to corrode the mind of these experts.


    In the end, it just meant that Brainy''s cultivation was too low.


    Even now, Brainy only had a few Fragmented Soul Realm puppets and they were almost all made from corpses.


    p Lin Fan fell into thought once again after collecting the corpses and waiting for the Xu Family forces toe back.</anda>


    He would have to find some time to help Brainy increase its cultivation and make the breakthrough into the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Only when Brainy broke through, would Lin Fan be able to start creating a loyal intelligencework under him and get the information that he wanted.


    While Lin Fan was waiting, the Xu Family made their way through the entire base, not finding anything that was too valuable. They were all dejected when they came back, that was until they found a secret room behind the throne.


    In the room that was hidden behind the throne, there were several Storage Rings that were ced there.


    When they went through these rings, they were shocked to find the amount of resources that were held in them. It was much more than the Xu Family had expected to find, it was even more than what the Xu Family had.


    But that didn''t make sense since if the One Shadow Organization had this much funds, why was their spywork sox?


    Were they just looking down on the Xu Family or were they just dumb?


    Still, since they were finished now, that meant that all their assets now belonged to the Xu Family.


    After taking these Storage Rings, the Xu Family group didn''t bother dividing them up now because they were certain that the Hunters Organization would send someone to investigate. After all, there was one of their prime candidates that had died here, so it would be strange if they didn''t care.


    Since that was the most likely case, it was better for them to leave as soon as possible.


    But what they didn''t know was what kind of storm they had created.


    ¡­


    In another part of the city, in the Qiao Manor.


    The door to the study of the Qiao Family''s master was suddenly pushed open as another old man suddenly came into the room.


    Old man Qiao looked up from the document that had been in his hands in surprise and he was even more surprised to see who had suddenlye in. However, even if he was surprised, he didn''t look like he was about to make that person leave at all. Rather he revealed a faint smile of pleasant surprise as he said, "Old Fu, what are you doing here?"


    The old man called Old Fu didn''t have the same smile as old man Qiao as he came up to the table and sat down without any courtesy, saying with slightly knitted brows, "Did you send your kid after mine?"


    Old man Qiao revealed a confused look as he asked, "What do you mean?"


    Old Fu said with a bit of anger, "Don''t try lying to me, I already know that kid has a token from you and he still came after the one I gave my token to. You''re telling me that you don''t have any grudges against me?"


    Old man Qiao had to think about it and then he realized what Old Fu meant.


    He had already received the report that Lin Fan would be attacking the One Shadow Organization and there was someone backing the One Shadow Organization, that person was the one who had received a token from Old Fu.


    But this didn''t make sense still because conflict like this was verymon in the upper realm. Since they had some conflict, it didn''t matter if they fought. Strength was all that mattered in this upper realm, so what Old Fu was doing didn''t seem right.


    Old man Qiao said, "So what if he attacked your kid? It just means he''s stronger than him? Why are youing here toin to me? This is something very normal."


    There was a vein that popped out on Old Fu''s forehead as he said, "Normal? You call something like this normal? Your kid killed my kid."


    Old man Qiao was immediately taken aback when he heard this as he repeated, "Killed? What do you mean by that?"<sub> </sub>


    Old Fu was also surprised when he heard this as he asked, "You didn''t know anything about this?"


    Old man Qiao shook his head and said, "I just knew that he had some conflict with your kid''s little brother, so I knew that they would fight, but I never expected him to be this ruthless."


    Old Fu gave a sigh when he heard this before saying, "Your kid really is something. It seems like my kid couldn''t even fight back and was killed in a single sh. It really was quite the gruesome scene. Your kid didn''t even hesitate to kill him."


    Old man Qiao revealed a smile when he heard this and he said, "I guess I just have better eyes than you."


    Old Fu gave a chuckle before saying, "You''re bragging like you''re talking about yourself. It was all that kid in the end."


    Old man Qiao just smiled without saying a thing.


    The way they acted was like they didn''t care at all that Yin Qiang had died, but that did make sense as well.


    Once a person died, it meant that they no longer had any value to these experts. It also didn''t matter to them since these people they gave their token to weren''t rted to them, they were just people that these experts felt admiration for. Since they were dead, it meant there was no use crying over spilt milk since there were still plenty of other talents out there.


    Moreover, a dead talent was the best way to highlight the talent of the one that killed them since it meant that they were stronger than the one who died.


    This raised the evaluation of Lin Fan in old man Qiao''s mind.


    He was very happy with his decision back then.


    While old man Qiao was feeling happy, Old Fu suddenly said, "You still have topensate me for this."


    Old man Qiao gave a snort and said, "Compensate my ass, your kid just wasn''t strong enough, how can you me that on me? You can just go and find someone else."


    Old Fu revealed a smile as he said, "Oh I did."


    Old man Qiao was confused as he asked, "Who?"


    Old Fu said with a bit of slyness in his smile, "Your kid, give him to me."


    Old man Qiao said, "Ha? What do you mean?"


    Old Fu said, "Exactly what I said. I''ve heard that your kid is quite handsome and with how strong he is, I''m sure my Ling Ling will like him."


    Old man Qiao immediately jumped out of his seat and said, "You''reing here and trying to steal my future grandson inw?!"


    Old Fu said, "You can find someone else, you know how hard I''ve been trying to find one for my Ling Ling. Just give him to me this time, I''ll pay you back next time."


    Old man Qiao gave a snort and said, "Dream on, you already know how hard it is for me to find someone good for my Fei Fei and I''ve finally done it. I''m not going to let you steal him from me this time."


    Old Fu said, "How stingy. How about this, do you remember that Ice Soul that you liked so muchst time? I''ll give it to you in exchange for him."


    Old man Qiao gave another snort and said, "In your dreams."


    Just like this, the two old men continued to bicker like children over Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan never would have imagined that by killing Yin Qiang, he would catch the attention of someone else that wanted to marry their granddaughter to him¡­


    Moreover, based on how this Old Fu was able to talk to old man Qiao without any courtesy, it was clear that he should have the same status as him. This Old Fu was actually another Two Star Hunter that was affiliated with the Hunters Organization, which meant that he was also a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    These two old men didn''t care about any face at all as they argued over whose granddaughter would marry Lin Fan.


    It was too bad that they didn''t even consider how Lin Fan felt.


    Moreover, if Ang were to learn of this¡­


    In short, this was a very bad situation for Lin Fan overall.


    Just like this, these two old men argued all night over whose granddaughter Lin Fan would marry.

 395 Chapter 395

    Just like this, the night passed and Harmony City continued on as normal.


    While the One Shadow Organization was an organization that was as big as the Xu Family, on therge scale of Harmony City, it was nothing more than a small organization. Fights between groups like this weremon because everyone wanted more resources for themselves.


    But what Lin Fan and the Xu Family were worried about was the retaliation of the Hunters Organization since one of the people that Lin Fan killed was tied to them. He was one of the special candidates that Hunters Organization had found for their exam, but he had died before he could even take the exam.


    There would surely be someone that woulde looking for him and when they did, they would find that Lin Fan killed him.


    Even if Lin Fan was also one of the candidates for the exam, he was certain that they would still get some form of revenge on him since he did technically hurt the Hunters Organization by killing one of their talents, so they would be sure to take some revenge on him.


    However, to the surprise of both the Xu Family and Lin Fan, there was no one that came.


    It was almost as if the entire incident had been swept under the rug as there was no news from the Hunters Organization at all.


    Lin Fan thought about it and it seemed that the Hunters Organization wasn''t as unified as he had thought that it was.


    The morning came and passed and there was still nothing that came from the Hunters Organization.


    But there was something else that came.


    It was Xiao Ling from the Seekers Guild who hade with a message for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see Xiao Ling suddenly knocking on his door, but he still went to see her since it seemed like she had something important to say.


    As he had expected, Xiao Ling hade with a special message from the president of the Seekers Guild. The president wanted to see Lin Fan about some matters with the Hunters Exam, but Lin Fan''s guess was that it would be about what had happenedst night.


    There was no way that the Hunters Organization would let him go after what had happenedst night. The only other possible option was that someone had been helping him from within the Hunters Organization.


    There was only one person that Lin Fan could think of¡­


    So Lin Fan epted Xiao Ling''s invitation and headed off to the Seekers Guild together.


    Of course, Xiao Ling had also made sure that Lin Fan''spanions were also brought along as per the president''s request. The strange thing was that it almost seemed like the president was warning her that if she came back without Lin Fan''spanions, she would be punished¡­


    Why did the president care this much about Lin Fan''spanions?


    After arriving at the Seekers Guild, they were shown right to the second floor where the president was waiting for them in another room. Once again, this room was the same as the previous ones, but it was in another different colour.


    Seeing the president sitting there, Lin Fan didn''t show any courtesy and sat down right in front of her. After all, with the rtionship they had now, it didn''t seem like there was a need.


    Naturally the president didn''t mind either, but it wasn''t for the same reason as Lin Fan. She had been staring at Momonga the entire time.


    Finally her grandfather wasn''t here, so she could do what she wanted.


    But it was too bad that a certain someone wouldn''t give her the chance. It wasn''t even anyone in the room, it was someone who had suddenly barged in after Xiao Ling left, right when she was about to close the door to the room.


    This was a short girl who suddenly burst into the room and appeared in full view of everyone.


    Lin Fan''s group looked at this little girl in surprise since they never expected someone to burst in like this.


    This was a short girl who didn''t have any curves on her body with two her hair on both sides of her in pigtails. This was a girl who was the very definition of a little girl, but the one thing different about her was that she didn''t look like a normal little girl. Her skin was as smooth and white as jade and her eyes wererge as they sparkled like the stars in the sky.


    If one looked at her, one would immediately think of a porcin doll because that was what she looked like.


    She was almost as beautiful as Song Shu who was the very definition of a porcin doll.


    But unlike her looks, her personality waspletely different. She wasn''t a cute and innocent little girl, but rather she was as foul mouthed as the most seasoned biker.<sub> </sub>


    As soon as she came in, she shouted, "Hey Xiao Qiao Qiao, I''ve heard that you got a new boy toy! Wasn''t it justst month that you were with the Wang Family kid? How did you change your boy toys so fast?"


    Qiao Yi Fei immediately knitted her brows when she heard this.


    As far as she knew, the one who had the boy toy from the Wang Family was this girl standing in front of her, but she was calling her out on it.


    Everyone in Harmony City knew that Qiao Yi Fei was known as the Ice Queen because of how she scared off all the men that approached her with her ice cold re, but now she was saying that she was someone who yed around?


    Normally Qiao Yi Fei wouldn''t care since she and this girl actually always butted heads when they met, but for her to nder her in front of her Diabolis, how could she ept this?


    She immediately countered by saying, "Who let this little girl into my Seekers Guild? The toy shop is across the street if you''re looking for toys."


    The little girl became even more enraged when she heard this since this was the one thing that she hated hearing the most. She was even older than Qiao Yi Fei, so she hated when people treated her like a little girl.


    The little girl immediately jumped up and said, "You b*tch, you think that you can treat me this way!"


    Then she came forward to where Lin Fan was sitting and she leaned in as she said, "Big brother, how about youe and y with me instead? You can leave this old hag to her own devices. I can also get you a token for the Hunters Exam."


    As she leaned in, the front of her shirt also fell forward, giving Lin Fan a sneak peek down her valley. It was too bad that there was no valley at all to tempt Lin Fan with, it was nothing more than t prairiend.


    But that was the least of Lin Fan''s problems.


    He waspletely confused as to what was going on here or who this girl even was. Why did she suddenly act this way as soon as she met him?


    Qiao Yi Fei saw this and naturally knew what was happening.


    This girl''s name was Fu Ling and her grandfather was the Old Fu who had visited her grandfatherst night.


    This morning, her grandfather had already told her about Old Fu''s visit and how he wanted Lin Fan aspensation from her grandfather.


    While she was happy since she didn''t want to marry Lin Fan in the first ce, she still wasn''t willing to give him up to this Fu Ling since they could be considered arch rivals.


    To put it shortly, Fu Ling was also one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City and she deserved this with her beauty, but the problem was that she didn''t hesitate to use that beauty to get what she wanted. She was someone who yed around with plenty of men. In short, she was a b*tch, which was the kind of person that Qiao Yi Fei hated the most.


    As for Fu Ling, the reason she hated Qiao Yi Fei was simply because she was the exact opposite of her.


    While she was someone who didn''t have any qualms about using her feminine charms to get what she wanted, Qiao Yi Fei was someone who absolutely avoided all men, driving them off with her ice cold re.


    Whenever Qiao Yi Fei looked at Fu Ling, it almost seemed like she was looking down on her, which was something Fu Ling couldn''t take.


    Then add in Qiao Yi Fei''s figure, it wasn''t hard to figure out why Fu Ling hated her.


    Qiao Yi Fei gave a cold snort and said, "His taste in women isn''t that bad that he would resort to going after you."


    There was a vein that popped out on Fu Ling''s forehead as she quickly turned around and said, "You think that he would be interested in a cold b*tch like you? Look at how old and fat you are!"


    Qiao Yi Fei just casually responded, "You''re older than me."


    Fu Ling this time didn''t erupt, but casually said with a smile, "I''m forever eighteen, don''t you even know something as simple as that?"


    Qiao Yi Fei muttered, "I think you''re missing a few digits."


    Fu Ling immediately exploded, "Why you!"


    At the same time, Lin Fan didn''t have time to process this fight between the two girls because there was a sharp chill that was poking his back...

 396 Chapter 396

    The two of them continued to argue just like this while Lin Fan''s group awkwardly sat there.


    It was even more awkward for Lin Fan since Fu Ling was still stuck to him, rubbing up against him, using her body to try to seduce him.


    Of course, Lin Fan wasn''t interested in this.


    While there were those that were a part of the itty bittymittee, Lin Fan wasn''t one of those. He also didn''t want them to be too big because he felt that was smothering to him, so he liked those that were just right.


    But that was the least of his concerns.


    The main concern that he had was the chill that was assaulting his back,pletely freezing it and poking it full of holes.


    Finally, the two of them stopped arguing and Fu Ling let go of Lin Fan.


    This was a very wide table, so they went to opposite sides and sat down, but they also made sure that they were facing Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan saw that their fight was over, he gave a cough and asked, "President, can I ask why you invited me here today? Is there another mission that you want to give me?"


    Qiao Yi Fei took a deep breath and calmed herself before saying in a casual voice, "Actually, it''s about what my grandfather mentionedst time. Do you still remember?"


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he said, "What did the senior sayst time?"


    Fu Ling didn''t miss the word "senior" that came from Lin Fan. It seemed like the Qiao Family still hadn''t fully won this young man over yet.


    She could tell that he was powerful, not to mention the two that came with him. It was clear that he had quite the background if these two experts were staying with him at all times.


    She liked people like this the most. They liked feeling powerful and with her appearance, it was quite easy for her to delude them into wanting to protect her. She loved feeding on these kinds of young men.


    Qiao Yi Fei didn''t notice the change in Fu Ling''s eyes, she just continued, "The Hunters Exam, did you already forget?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think about it and then he realized that the old man had indeed mentioned this before. He had said that Qiao Yi Fei would be giving him the information that he needed for the Hunters Exam when the time came.


    However, when he thought about it again, he felt that it was too early.


    He had been told that the Hunters Exam wouldn''t be for another three weeks or so, so why was she telling him about this now?


    Qiao Yi Fei saw the change on Lin Fan''s face and said, "It is quite a bit of time before the Hunters Exam, but seeded candidates like you get information ahead of time. What? Do you not want it?"


    Lin Fan immediately shook his head and said, "No, I do."


    This was information that would make it easier for him in the Hunters Exam, Lin Fan would be a fool if he didn''t ept this.


    At the same time, the fact that he was still given this information after what he had done clearly meant that the old man must have covered for him with the Hunters Organization.


    If only Lin Fan knew the truth.


    Not only did the old man not do anything, there were actually other Hunters that had praised him for finding such a good seed. In fact, the old man didn''t suffer at all, but rather Old Fu kept offering him more and better items just to take Lin Fan away from him.


    Qiao Yi Fei actually found it a bit funny how quickly Lin Fan replied and revealed a smile, but then she realized something and quickly shook her head.


    She calmed herself and revealed the same ice cold look as she said, "The Hunters Exam isn''t the same as the other exams you''ve taken before, it''s much more chaotic than you think."


    Lin Fan was confused as he asked, "Chaotic? What do you mean by that?"


    Qiao Yi Fei casually exined, "It''s very simple, there''s no set examiner for this exam each year, so the content of the exam is different every time. It all depends on the examiner who will be administering the exam."


    Lin Fan then asked, "Then who are the examiners? How are they chosen?"


    Qiao Yi Fei said, "There are no fixed examiners because that''s how the Hunters Organization is. The examiners will always be Hunters, but Hunters are very busy people because they chase after the things they are interested in. Sometimes it might take them several decades just toplete a hunt, so it''s usually whoever''s free that is chosen to be the examiner."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows slightly when he heard this and asked, "But why would they choose to ept this job as an examiner? Wouldn''t this take away time from their hunt?"


    It was at this point that Fu Ling cut in, "Even if the Hunters Organization is very rxed in their organization of their members, they are still an organization in the end. Of course they would have some rules, or how could they be one of the top factions in this upper realm? Each Hunter has an obligation to be an examiner when they be a Hunter, so they have to do it at least once."


    Qiao Yi Fei ignored Fu Ling and continued, "There''s usually three to five rounds in the Hunters Exam, it all depends on how many people are dropped in the various rounds. If they don''t have enough people for a fourth round, they will usually end it in the third round. After all, everyone is busy, so the sooner they end it, the better."


    Lin Fan nodded before asking, "Then what''s the first round?"<sub> </sub>


    Qiao Yi Fei revealed another smile at this before saying, "Why are you asking about the first round?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback at first, but then he said in a confused voice, "Why wouldn''t I ask about the first round if I''m taking the Hunters Exam?"


    Qiao Yi Fei''s smile became even wider and she finally couldn''t help breaking out inughter. On the other side, Fu Ling was the same.


    But after they heard theughtering from the opposite side of the table, they locked gazes before turning and both giving a soft snort.


    Of course, this was the power of handsomeness.


    Just because Lin Fan was handsome, these girls were more willing to go along with his dumb questions.


    If he was ugly, Qiao Yi Fei would have immediately called him an idiot and lost her patience with him. It didn''t matter if her grandfather had a good impression of him, she would be impatient since she wouldn''t want to look at him if he was ugly.


    Lin Fan just waited patiently for them, though he was confused why they wereughing at him.


    After a bit of silence, Qiao Yi Fei turned back and said, "Did you forget that you can skip the first round with the token grandfather gave you?"


    Lin Fan thought about it again and then he realized that this was true. The old man had told him about thisst time and Lin Fan hadpletely forgotten.


    Seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, Qiao Yi Fei could immediately tell what had happened.


    She revealed another smile because she couldn''t help finding it funny. She even felt that Lin Fan''s confused look actually looked a bit handsome.


    But then she quickly caught herself and shook her head.


    What was she doing?


    She only had Diabolis in her heart.


    But...He really was too handsome...It wasn''t fair.


    Qiao Yi Fei gathered her thoughts and gave a cough before saying, "Since you''re asking, I''ll tell you anyway. Every year, the first exam is always the same topic, but never the same in terms of content. It''s always a test of endurance."


    Lin Fan was surprised before asking, "Endurance?"


    Qiao Yi Fei nodded before saying, "Endurance is the foundation of everything. No matter what you''re hunting, you need the endurance to continue the hunt, don''t you think?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before giving a nod.


    While he was happy about skipping this since it seemed like it would be tiring, he didn''t feel that it would be a problem for him.


    Then Lin Fan asked, "What about the second round?"


    Qiao Yi Fei paused for a bit before hesitantly saying, "I can''t tell you exactly what is in the second round, but I can tell you who will be administering the second round."


    Lin Fan was confused again as he asked, "How would that help me?"


    Fu Ling once again cut in by saying, "Of course it would help. The person in charge of that round will be the one who will set the content, so that means that by knowing what kind of Hunter they are, you can at least expect what kind of exam it would be. Take a Food Hunter for example, they would definitely set up an exam that has something to do with food."


    Lin Fan suddenly understood and gave a nod as he said, "Oh!"


    Qiao Yi Fei once again ignored Fu Ling and said, "The examiner for the second round will be Shi Yan, he''s a Ruins Hunter. I''m sure you can tell what kind of things he hunts after."


    Ruins Hunter.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling at this since it was right in the name.


    Lin Fan then asked, "What about the third round?"


    At this, both Fu Ling and Qiao Yi Fei knitted their brows.


    Qiao Yi Fei hesitantly said, "The third examiner...That one is a bit tricky¡­"

 397 Chapter 397

    "Tricky?" Lin Fan asked in a confused voice, "What do you mean by that?"


    As Qiao Yi Fei hesitated, even Fu Ling who was normally very direct hesitated to cut in.


    Both of them knew who it was, but neither of them wanted to say who it was.


    Lin Fan could naturally see this, so he asked, "Is it really that bad?"


    Qiao Yi Fei could tell that Lin Fan was starting to get a bit worried, which was not what she wanted, so she said, "It''s not that bad, it''s just that this person is not the easiest to get along with."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin in thought before saying, "Well, I''ll deal with it when ites, that''s the only thing I can do."


    Qiao Yi Fei and Fu Ling both suddenly realized something.


    They stared at Lin Fan''s face for a bit before turning to look at each other. For once, instead of breaking out in a fight, both of them just revealed bitter smiles as they stared at each other.


    After a bit, Qiao Yi Fei turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Never mind, it should be fine for you."


    Then she changed her tone and said, "The third examiner will be Bi Lan. She''s what she calls herself a Cuteness Hunter, but in reality she''s actually a Fashion Hunter. It might sound easy based on what kind of Hunter she is, but she''s much more intense than you can think."


    In her mind, she felt sorry for all those that would be taking part in Bi Lan''s test.


    Bi Lan was one of the Five Beauties of Harmony City just like Qiao Yi Fei and Fu Ling, but she was very different from them.


    First, she was the oldest member of the five beauties and that put quite a bit of pressure on her. Namely, everyone that was the same age as her was already married and she was the only one left behind.


    The only problem was her picky tastes.


    She loved handsome men, but it wouldn''t be that bad if it was just that. The handsome men that she loved were all men that were much more handsome than other men, the cream of the crop.


    If it was just that the men that she liked all fit into a certain category, they had androgynous appearances.


    Like her title suggested, she was someone who loved looking for cute things and she liked to dress up the men that she dated in "cute" clothing. Most of the time, it would actually be female clothing that she dressed them up in¡­


    The worst part of it all was that she was quite intense about dressing up people to look cute, so it was very hard to go against her once she set her mind on something. Instead of being graceful like her name suggested, she was actually quite direct and intense.


    As for people that were ugly, shepletely ignored them and even beat them up if they approached her.


    This kind of examiner would be the worst since she would bepletely willful and do whatever she wanted, so naturally the two of them felt sorry for everyone that took part in her exam.


    The final nail in the coffin was that Lin Fan had just the right appearance that Bi Lan loved, which meant that she would definitely target him.


    At least that would mean that she would take it easier on him, but that also meant that she would target him and she was not someone who gave up easily¡­


    They could only silently mourn for Lin Fan.


    But for now, they just told him about the other two examiners.


    After they were finished, Lin Fan was in deep thought over what he had just heard. This was something that was very important for his development path in this upper realm and if he couldn''t pass this exam, it would be a veryrge setback for him.


    But there was nothing he could do right now since he could only trust that he was strong and smart enough to handle this.


    He thanked both Qiao Yi Fei and Fu Ling for the information they gave him and prepared to leave since he had other business to take care of.


    Qiao Yi Fei just let him leave, but not before telling him toe back in another three weeks. The day before she wanted him toe would be the day of the first round and the day she wanted him toe was the day of the second round.


    Lin Fan asked her how they would get there since he knew that it wouldn''t be held in Harmony City, but all Qiao Yi Fei said was "It''s a surprise." As she said this, she didn''t forget to reveal a faint smile.


    Lin Fan was curious, but he knew that she wouldn''t tell him a thing, so he just epted it and turned to leave.<sub> </sub>


    However, when he did leave, Fu Ling also stood up and hooked her arm around Lin Fan''s arm as she said, "Big brother Lin, how about we go and have some fun without this granny now? I know a very good¡­"


    But before she could finish, she suddenly felt a chilling from behind her. She looked around, but she couldn''t find where it wasing from.


    This was the same chill that Xiao Ling had felt every time she had tried flirting with Lin Fan, it was a chill that felt like suddenly being thrown into ice cold water and having no way out.


    She immediately let go of Lin Fan''s arm and only then did she feel the chill suddenly subside.


    She didn''t know where it wasing from, but it seemed like there was a dangerous foe for her. If she wanted to get Lin Fan, she would have to find a way to deal with this rival first.


    It seemed like she would have to report to her grandfather first before doing anything.


    So Fu Ling didn''t stay a moment longer, she waved her hand to Lin Fan and said, "Big brother Lin, I suddenly remembered something I have to take care of, so I''ll be leaving first."


    Right after saying that, Fu Ling immediately ran out of the room.


    Qiao Yi Fei who had been watching from the corner of her eyes revealed a faint smile when she saw this, but she didn''t say anything else.


    Just like this, Lin Fan''s group made their way out of the room and went back downstairs. They were about to leave the Seekers Guild, but Xiao Ling stopped them right before they could.


    She actually had some special missions that she wanted to rmend to Lin Fan, but Lin Fan just rejected them all. He gave the excuse that he wanted to prepare for the Hunters Exam to reject them and Xiao Ling knew that Lin Fan was one of the seeded candidates, so there was nothing she could say.


    Before leaving though, she said with pouted lips, "You owe me one."


    Lin Fan nodded with a smile before heading back to the Xu Family.


    During the next three weeks, Lin Fan didn''t go out at all. He just locked himself in and focused purely on three things, training his pets, cultivating, and refining pills.


    The third thing was mainly for the Xu Family since they needed pills to continue getting stronger.


    There were quite a few ingredients in the stores of the One Shadow Organization, which was mainly what the Xu Family took. After getting those ingredients, they brought them all to Lin Fan to turn into pills because what they needed right now was to increase their strength as much as possible.


    All the elders had received a Pill Line Pill and immediately went into closed doors cultivation to break through.


    As for Xu Lin and the Xu Family Head, they packed up their things and immediately headed off to the True Spirit Sect.


    While there was no evidence that it was done by the Xu Family, everyone could clearly put the pieces together and tie the One Shadow Organization''s disappearance to the Xu Family since they had a grudge previously.


    The Xu Family was even able to destroy the One Shadow Organization that was very powerful in this group and was rumoured to have ties with the Hunters Organization¡­


    After they had done this, there was no one that dared to provoke the Xu Family. There were even several other forces that brought gifts for the Xu Family as a sign of friendship.


    Of course, the Xu Family Head never showed himself since it was said that he was still in closed door cultivation. No one believed this, but they didn''t dare poke through this since there was no merit for them.


    In truth, once this matter was over, the Xu Family Head immediately headed off to the True Spirit Sect with Xu Lin and the artifact.


    It was during this time that no one would mess with the Xu Family that it was the safest time to go.


    Before leaving, Xu Lin vowed to Lin Fan that he would definitely be strong enough to fight by his side one day.


    Lin Fan epted this, but in truth, Lin Fan had another way that Xu Lin could help him.


    He actually secretly passed a note to Xu Lin before Xu Lin left, telling him to read it once he arrived at the True Spirit Sect.


    After Xu Lin and the Xu Family Head left, Lin Fan just silently cultivated for three weeks until it was the day of the exam.

 398 Chapter 398

    When the day finally came, Lin Fan packed up everything he needed before heading off to the Seekers Guild to meet Qiao Yi Fei.


    That was where they had decided to meet up and that was where Qiao Yi Fei said she would be sending him to the Hunters Exam location from.


    While Lin Fan was skeptical over how Qiao Yi Fei would do what she had promised, he still headed to the Seekers Guild early that morning.


    Lin Fan hade alone because there was only a single token, which meant that there was only a single spot in the Hunters Exam for him. Even if he brought along Momonga and Ang, they would have still gone back since there was nothing for them here.


    When Lin Fan came into the Seekers Guild, for once, Xiao Ling wasn''t there.


    Instead of Xiao Ling, there was another receptionist who seemed to have been waiting for him the entire time. She looked like a very professional secretary and when she saw Lin Fane in, she immediately gave Lin Fan a respectful bow before saying, "Young master Lin, pleasee with me."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this kind of wee because it went against this normal view of the Seekers Guild, but he still followed her.


    Along the way, he heard quite a few interesting things from the people in the hall who even though it was morning were still drinking alcohol.


    "Do you see that? That''s the president''s personal secretary leading the new kid?"


    "Is the new kid in trouble? He hasn''t been here for a few weeks now, so I''m sure that he must be in trouble for something, right?"


    "No, don''t you see how respectful she''s acting towards him? It''s clear that she''s treating him like a special guest. But why would the secretary of the president treat the new kid like this? Could it be¡­"


    There were all kinds of spections that filled the room, but Lin Fan didn''t care about any of them.


    The only thing that Lin Fan did pay attention to was what they said about the girl in front of him.


    This was the private secretary of the president, but Lin Fan could tell it wasn''t just as simple as that. To put it simply, he could tell that the girl in front of him was an expert and not just a normal one.


    That aura that she released, it was almost like the aura of the Child Soul Realm Experts that he had felt before.


    This must be someone that was ced by Qiao Yi Fei''s side by the Qiao Family to watch over her. After all, Qiao Yi Fei was the only sessor to the Qiao Family, so naturally they would want to keep her safe.


    Unlike all the previous times, the girl didn''t bring Lin Fan to the second floor.


    They went behind the counter where the girl led him to another door. After going through that door, Lin Fan found a set of stairs in front of him, but instead of leading up, they led down.


    After going down those stairs, what appeared in front of Lin Fan was a room with a round arc in the center.


    Based on the fluctuations of life energying from it, it was clear that this was a teleportation portal. Lin Fan had taken one of these before back in the Sacred Rock Realm, but this was much more simplepared to that one.


    Lin Fan could tell from the fluctuations of the spatialwsing from it that it wasn''t as deep as the ones from the portal that was on the Sacred Rock Realm.


    Lin Fan was right, this was nothing more than a crude device.


    The one from the Sacred Rock Realm hadws that were at a much higher level, which allowed it to have much more flexibility. That portal was able to connect to many different ces to bring people all over.


    As for the one that was in front of him right now, this was nothing more than a simple application of the spatialws.


    Instead of allowing free transport, it only allowed one to be transported to a set target location. To put it simply, it was like creating a tunnel to one specific location that couldn''t be changed, so it just required energy to maintain that connection.


    Qiao Yi Fei was waiting in front of the portal and once Lin Fan appeared, she waved her hand at the girl who had brought Lin Fan here. After seeing this, the girl immediately bowed to both Qiao Yi Fei and Lin Fan before leaving.


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at Lin Fan before looking around and asking, "Where are the other two?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this, but then he asked, "They aren''t taking the exam, so why would theye with me?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was also surprised, but then she realized that Lin Fan was right.<sub> </sub>


    It was just that during these three weeks, whenever she went to check on Lin Fan or called him to the Seekers Guild, he always had the other two with him. After all this time, she was just used to seeing all three of them together, so it was strange seeing Lin Fane alone.


    Qiao Yi Fei gave a disappointed sigh before moving to the portal. As she was moving, she waved her hand behind her and said, "Well,e on, let''s go. You should already know what this is."


    Lin Fan gave a nod even though she couldn''t see it and followed Qiao Yi Fei through the portal.


    There was a sh of white light, but when it disappeared, they appeared inside of another ce. It was simr to the ce that they had just left and if Lin Fan hadn''t felt the space around them warp to transport them, he would have thought that they were still in the same ce.


    But after leaving that room, he was certain that they were in another ce since the outside of this room waspletely different.


    They came out into a long hallway with no one there, but after following Qiao Yi Fei for a bit, they came to a receptionist desk at the end of the hallway.


    The person at the desk looked up at the two of them before asking, "Identification?"


    Qiao Yi Fei took out a token that she shed to that person before saying, "He''s with me."


    Then after this, she walked past this person and headed towards the stairs that were behind them.


    That person was surprised to see this token, but then they went back to what they had been doing before. It was like nothing had happened just now.


    Lin Fan saw this and knew that this must be a normal procedure, so he continued following Qiao Yi Fei up the stairs.


    As for that person at the reception desk, although they seemed normal, they were panicking inside. That was all because of the token that Qiao Yi Fei had shed at them.


    The token of the Qiao Family was one that was considered very prestigious since they were a dominant force in the Hunters Organization. Even though the head of the Qiao Family was only a Two Star Hunter, he was someone who had rtionships with all the top Hunters since he was the one who raised most of them. Of the current Three Star Hunters, he was the one that had guided half of them.


    The number of Hunters that owed him favours couldn''t be easily counted.


    Not to mention that he was a Food Hunter, someone that everyone wanted to get close to because food was one of the most basic needs of being a human.


    This gave him great influence not just in the Hunters Organization¡­


    He went through his mind, trying to think if he had done anything to offend that person. Only after making sure that he had done nothing did he finally let out a sigh of relief.


    What this person didn''t know was that Qiao Yi Fei and Lin Fan didn''t pay any attention to him. They even forgot about him the moment they left the underground area.


    Aftering up the stairs, what appeared in front of Lin Fan was a giant atrium of a giant building.


    If Lin Fan had to make a guess, he would say that this was the main headquarters of the Hunters Organization.


    Qiao Yi Fei saw how he was looking around and couldn''t help revealing a smile before saying, "You''ve probably guessed that we''re in the Hunters Organization main headquarters. From here, you''ll be sent directly to the location of the second round. They''ve already set up a portal there and we''ll be taking the one in the Hunters Organization to head there."


    Lin Fan thought about it and he found that it made sense.


    After the examinees failed the round, how would they be brought back?


    They were here for the Hunters Exam, so to a certain extent, the Hunters Organization was responsible for them. While they could die in the exam, that didn''t matter since that was part of the exam. As for after they failed, the least the Hunters Organization could do was send them back, which was the main reason for this portal.


    Qiao Yi Fei brought Lin Fan to the second floor of this building and they came to a special room prepared.


    When they came in, there was no portal in the room, but rather there were several other people waiting there.


    One of them turned to Lin Fan and narrowed his eyes before saying, "Oi, even a kid like this can participate in this exam? What kind of a ce is this?"

 399 Chapter 399

    Both Lin Fan and Qiao Yi Fei immediately knitted their brows when they heard this.


    They turned to look at the person who had just said this and when they saw what he looked like, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    It wasn''t that they were actually surprised, but rather they found it funny because he looked exactly as they had expected him to look.


    This was a person that was covered in muscles with a bald head and a big beard. There was even arge axe that was on his back, strapped to him.


    The only thing that was considered missing was the fact that he was wearing normal clothes instead of clothes that were made from the pelt of an animal. Otherwise he would have been the perfect example.


    But before either Lin Fan or Qiao Yi Fei could speak, there was someone who came over from the front of the room and said, "Is there a problem here?"


    The muscr man revealed a smile when he heard this and he turned to the person that hade over as he said, "Yes, there''s a kid who wandered in here without knowing what¡­"


    Before he could finish, the person that hade over had already raised his hand to p this muscr man across the face. The muscr man didn''t even have a chance to resist before he was sent flying across the room. He didn''t stop until he mmed into the wall, creating arge hole in it before breaking through to the other room.


    It was a good thing that there was no one else in the other room, otherwise it definitely would have scared them.


    But the fact that he was sent with enough force to break the wall was already shocking enough.


    This was the headquarters of the Hunters Organization which meant that this definitely wasn''t a normal wall. This building was made with the best materials that had defensive abilities where even a peak Fragmented Soul Realm Expert wouldn''t be able to make a dent in the wall. Even those in the Embryo Soul Realm would find it hard to break this wall.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking another look at this person.


    This person was someone who had long blonde hair that reached his waist and eyes that were just slits that never opened, but he definitely looked handsome. Then adding in the suit that he wore, it definitely gave him a handsome look.


    He seemed to be in his early twenties, so he definitely was considered young, but the feeling that he gave Lin Fan was that of the Child Soul Realm.


    That did make sense with how he had thrown that muscr man like he was nothing more than a toy.


    That person didn''t even look in the direction of the muscr man as he said, "I wasn''t talking to you, you''re not even qualified to speak in this situation."


    Then after that, he turned to Qiao Yi Fei and revealed a bright smile as he said, "It''s an honour to have young miss Qiaoe here."


    Then he turned to Lin Fan and said, "May I ask who this honoured one is?"


    When Lin Fan heard the change in tone when this person turned to him, he could tell that there was another meaning in his voice.


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at this person before giving a cold snort and leading Lin Fan into the room.


    Lin Fan looked back at this person before following Qiao Yi Fei in.


    It seemed like Qiao Yi Fei had quite a few admirers and they weren''t weak.


    This person should be a Hunter who was helping out with the exam since he was someone in the Child Soul Realm. He definitely wasn''t someone who could be looked down on.


    After Qiao Yi Fei entered the room, there were many people who turned in her direction and began whispering.


    Lin Fan heard the various whispers and learned quite a bit.


    "That''s the Qiao Family''s young miss, one of the Five Beauties of Harmony City, what is she doing here?"


    "It seems like she''s guiding someone to the exam? Does that mean that this person is sponsored by the Qiao Family?"


    "Is he the disciple of the Bottomless Void Chef? But why have we never heard of him before?"


    "It doesn''t matter if we''ve heard of him or not, he''ll definitely be targeted by all the fans of young miss Qiao during this round. Let''s say a prayer for him."


    Lin Fan could sense the various gazes with bad intentions looking at him, but he also wasn''t worried.


    Aftering in, Lin Fan and Brainy in his sleeve had spread their spiritual sense to check out everyone else. Not a single person had the same aura as Yin Qiang, which meant that the strongest person here was probably in the high Embryo Soul Realm.


    If they weren''t even as strong as Yin Qiang, Lin Fan was certain that he would be able to easily defeat them.<sub> </sub>


    The only one that he was worried about was the Hunter examiner who was ring at him.


    Qiao Yi Fei brought Lin Fan to one of the corners and they sat down together, waiting for things to start.


    After a few minutes of waiting, the man with the long hair looked at his watch before saying, "Everyone gather up, we''re sending you off now."


    Everyone who had been waiting in the room suddenly turned to the front where the man with the long hair had been standing and in front of them, there was a portal that had suddenly appeared.


    Once this portal had appeared, there was a person who had walked out of it. This was a woman who had bright white hair which was the first thing that attracted the eyes. Other than that, she was just a normal beauty.


    This woman came out and looked around before asking, "Why are we short one?"


    The man with the long hair looked over and said, "He dropped out."


    The woman revealed a confused look as she asked, "Dropped out?"


    Then she turned to the corner and saw Qiao Yi Fei before revealing an understanding look, "Oh, dropped out. It seems like you didn''t hold back at all."


    A chill suddenly came from the man with the long hair as he said, "Is that any of your business?"


    The woman just ignored the man and said to everyone in the room, "Come forward and step in the portal, it''s set to bring you to the location of the second round."


    Everyone suddenly came forward as if they wanted to be first, but the woman suddenly released her aura and pushed them all back before saying, "Line up, one at a time. Don''t you even have thismon sense?"


    After that, all of these people lined up before going in one by one.


    Over where Lin Fan was, he didn''t rush to go into the portal, rather he slowly walked to the back of the line. While he was walking over, Qiao Yi Fei came along with him, but she didn''t say a thing.


    The line slowly progressed and all the people disappeared until there was just Lin Fan and Qiao Yi Fei waiting.


    The woman with the white hair came over and said, "Fei Fei, what are you doing here?"


    Qiao Yi Fei turned to his woman and said, "I''m bringing the one my grandfather rmended over. I''ll be leaving soon."


    The woman with the white hair looked over Lin Fan before saying, "So this is the one that your grandfather chose for you?"


    Qiao Yi Fei red at this woman, but she didn''t care at all as she gave augh. Then she said to Lin Fan, "Young man, break a leg out there. I hope that when I see you next time, you''ll have your Hunters License."


    On the side, the man with the long hair was ring at Lin Fan, not hiding it at all. There was a strong killing intent alsoing from him¡­


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at Lin Fan for a bit before saying, "Break a leg."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before walking through this portal.


    This portal wasn''t created as a set point since it would cost too much to create this kind of portal for the Hunters Exam each year. Rather this was a portal that was made with the spatialws of the white haired woman.


    Instead of creating a stable tunnel between two spots, this was an unstable tunnel that was created as a one use tunnel with the white haired woman''s spatialws.


    That was also why they had to go one by one since it would have copsed if they all rushed into the portal at once.


    The trip was different from the first portal that he took, rather this trip was much more rough. However, when it was over, Lin Fan was still able tond firmly on his feet.


    The other candidates that had been in the room with Lin Fan mainly had clean clothes, but there were a few that had mud on their clothes from a roughnding since they couldn''t adjust to the rough journey of the portal.


    Lin Fan looked around and found that there were even more people here, people that hadn''t been in the room before. These should be the people who had passed the first round.


    All around them was a swamp that waspletely filled with mud, so that was why most of them were just covered in ayer of mud.


    While Lin Fan was looking around, there was a voice that suddenly called out, "Everyone gather up, we''re about to start the second round!"

 400 Chapter 400

    When that voice called out, everyone turned in the direction that it wasing from.


    They saw a man who was standing on top of arge piece of rubble that was trapped in the mud of the swamp, looking over them.


    This was a man who was wearing a purple suit with a purple tophat and ck cane. This man hadbed back hair, a monocle, and a moustache that was curled into spirals at the end. If one looked right into the spirals of his moustache, they would find themselves falling deeper and deeper in until they lost themselves.


    But that wasn''t the most conspicuous thing about this person, that would have been the cup of tea that was floating around him at all times. Judging by the vapour that wasing from it, it was clear that it was fresh tea.


    Just where had he gotten this in the middle of a swamp?


    Of course that didn''t matter right now since it was clear that this person was their examiner.


    That man looked over at the people that had suddenly appeared before saying, "Wee everyone to the second round, my name is Shi Yan and I will be your examiner. Before we start, we will take a break for a few minutes while we prepare something to give everyone a chance to catch their breaths first."


    Then after that, without even caring about what the examinees thought, Shi Yan jumped off the piece of rubble and disappeared into a building that was set up nearby.


    There were a few people who tried to go into the building after he had disappeared, but they found that they weren''t able to open the door at all.


    Since this was the situation, everyone just decided to take what he said at face value and several of them went to find ces to copse. All of them were people who had taken the first round.


    Based on how tired they looked and how they were drenched in sweat, it was clear that the first round had been hard on them.


    There were also several people who approached the people that had appeared for the second round. After all, these people were the seeded contestants, which meant that not a single one of them was weak. If they were able to get close to these seeded examinees, it would mean that they would be able to make it through this second round much easier.


    Of course, that was on the premise that they could work together in this second round.


    There were a few people that also approached Lin Fan, but Lin Fan didn''t mind since he also wanted to get some information from them, such as why they were all covered in mud andpletely exhausted.


    After asking a few of them, Lin Fan learned that the first round that they had gone through was a run through these swamps to reach this point. In just a single day, they had crossed over three thousand kilometers ofnd to reach this location.


    If it was just normal three thousand kilometers, it would be easy for them since they were all Fragmented Soul Realm Experts, but this ce was far from normal.


    This was a ce with gravity that was several times greater than normal which was caused by the unique nts located in this area. So even though they were Fragmented Soul Realm Experts, it was hard for them to move here, not to mention flying. Instead of flying the entire way, they had been forced to run on their own two feet, something they hadn''t done in a long time.


    After learning what had happened, Lin Fan understood why they were all so tired. If he released his spiritual senses, he could feel certain nts around him that were releasing gravityws which increased the gravity in this area.


    Since his body was at a much higher level than his cultivation, he was able to easily stand here, but it definitely would have been hard for a normal Fragmented Soul Realm Expert.


    After answering Lin Fan''s questions, a few of these people tried to group up with him, but Lin Fan rejected them all.


    They looked at Lin Fan with gazes that were filled with a bit of hatred, but none of them wasted any more time with him. They had already spent quite a bit of time answering his questions, so there wasn''t much time left before the second round started. Instead of wasting time being angry at him, it was better to go around and see if there was someone else they could tag along with.


    As for Lin Fan, there was no reason for him to bring them along because any one of his pets were stronger than them. If he were to bring them along, they would clearly be burdens for him.<sub> </sub>


    Another half an hour passed before Shi Yan finally came out of the building.


    When he did, everyone immediately came up to the building that he was standing in front of and waited for him to speak.


    Shi Yan just stood there for five minutes without saying a thing, taking sips from the teacup that was floating around him from time to time, as if he was just having afternoon tea at his own leisure instead of running one of the rounds in the Hunters Exam.


    Then after he finished his cup of tea, he turned to the people standing in front of him. As if he had suddenly remembered something, Shi Yan suddenly said, "Oh." Then he turned back to the building behind him and opened up the door again.


    After opening the door, Shi Yan said, "This is your second round. There''s a newly excavated ruin under this ce and anyone that can bring back one piece of treasure that is B Grade or above will pass this round."


    Once he finished saying this, Shi Yan took out a board that listed the grades of treasures.


    This was a ranking system that was only used by Ruins Hunters or excavators of ruins, so it was definitely a system that most people here were unfamiliar with. Everyone immediately crowded around the board to see just what qualified for a B Grade Treasure.


    ording to the board, anything that was a Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact was considered a B Rank Treasure. Forparison, anything that was a Child Soul Realm Artifact or equivalent was considered an A Rank Treasure. As for S Rank Treasures, those were only for the best of the best¡­


    A Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact, that seemed easy for them since they were all in the Fragmented Soul Realm, but this was a newly excavated ruins, so who knows how many treasures there were inside.


    Most of them only had a single Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact, which was the nascent artifact that they had used since they started cultivating, reaching the Fragmented Soul Realm with them. So these artifacts were equal to their own life since these artifacts were bonded to them. If they ever lost these artifacts, their cultivation level would definitely suffer.


    This showed just how rare Fragmented Soul Realm Artifacts were. To get one, it would mean a dead Fragmented Soul Realm Expert.


    That meant that there would surely be a limited amount of these artifacts and there would only be a certain amount of people that would pass. This meant that everyone here was an enemy¡­


    They all began moving into groups as they knew that they would have topete with each other. There were also those that stood by themselves and all of them were people from the seeded candidates. These were people who were confident in their own strength.


    Naturally Lin Fan was included among those people.


    Shi Yan had paused deliberately since he knew that everyone would be splitting up after hearing what he said. Once he gave them enough time to split up, he said once again, "There will be many dangerous traps inside of these ruins, but since you''re all willing to take this Hunters Exam, I''m sure that none of you are going toin about losing your lives. However, if you do want to forfeit, we as the Hunters Organization do have some responsibility to help you leave safely."


    After saying this, he turned to a box that was covered in a cloth that everyone had been curious about. He pulled off the cloth to reveal that it was filled with blue marbles.


    He picked up one of the marbles and said, "These are special life saving charms that the Hunters Organization have prepared for you all. As long as you crush them, the spatialws contained within will bring you out of the ruins. They will also be automatically broken the moment the exam is over and will bring you out of the ruins."


    Then after another pause, he didn''t forget to add, "Of course, you could always leave early by retracing your steps and reaching the exit if you''ve already found what you need to pass the exam. There''s no requirement that says that you have to stay in the ruins for the entirety of the exam. However, if you do find anything other than what you need to turn in to pass the exam, you''re free to keep it."


    Everyone''s eyes lit up after that. This wasn''t just an exam, this was also a chance for them to explore these newly excavated ruins that the Hunters Organization had just found. There would surely be treasures hidden in these ruins¡­


    Once he was done exining the rules, Shi Yan said, "You have twelve hours for this exam, the entrance is inside this building."


    After a moment of silence, everyone realized that the exam had started and they all rushed into the building.

 401 Chapter 401

    While everyone was rushing into the building, Lin Fan was casually standing on the side watching.


    As he looked around, he saw that there were quite a few other people also standing around waiting for everyone to rush in before going into the building.


    It was clear that these people were thinking the same thing, there was no reason for them to rush since there were no benefits to going in first.


    While it seemed like in this situation the early bird got the worm, it was very much the opposite of that since going in there first meant having to deal with the traps that guarded the artifacts. At the same time, they needed to worry about how to get out of the ruins alive with the artifact.


    If they went in first and got the artifact right away, it didn''t mean that they would pass the test since there was no guarantee that they would be able to survive. For them to pass the test, they would have to find a way to escape with the artifact or find a ce to hide until the test was over.


    These ruins were a ce without any supervision, which meant that anything was allowed in this round. This was one of the hidden rules of the exam.


    This basically meant that this round was apletely free battle royale where everyone could do whatever they wanted to pass since there was no one that would be watching them¡­


    Going in first was definitely not a good choice¡­


    In the end, whether one passed this exam or not would depend on how they managed their consumption of energy and how much they trusted other people, which they shouldn''t be doing at all.


    There would be many different strategies that would be used in this exam.


    There would certainly be people who would camp out the entrance, waiting for people with artifacts toe to ambush them right before they could leave. That way they wouldn''t have to go that far to get these artifacts and would be able to safely leave right away after iming them.


    Of course, the w with that would be that if no one chose toe to the entrance early and chose to hide to wait out the time, it meant that they wouldn''t ever get a chance to attack anyone and that would mean they would fail.


    There would also be people who would try to hide in the ruins after getting the artifact, waiting down the clock before being teleported out by the beads that the Hunters Organization provided.


    The w with this was that there was no guarantee there would be a hiding spot in these ruins since they had never explored them before. At the same time, there was no guarantee that the hiding spot would be safe, because these ruins were filled with all kinds of different dangers.


    Then there was the hidden rule of the exam, which was the most bloody way of getting an artifact.


    The key was in the words artifacts that came from the ruins.


    That meant that people couldn''t take artifacts that they brought in with them and turn those in to pass the exam since those artifacts were already registered with the informationwork of the Gctic Humanity Alliance. This was just one of the rules of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, it was that all artifacts found had to be registered so they could keep track of what kind of power each force had.


    This was mainly for the twelve great factions to keep eyes on the smaller forces, while also being able to keep each other in check.


    As one the twelve great factions, the Hunters Organization would be able to easily dive into those records, finding which artifacts had been registered before.


    However, it was the existence of this system that created a loophole in this exam.


    There was one kind of artifact that wasn''t registered, which was the nascent artifact that most cultivators had.


    Those artifacts couldn''t be used by anyone else and were part of the secret trump cards that every single expert had, so they were not tracked since experts had the secret understanding that they would all have the right to keep their secret trump cards.


    But the fact that these artifacts weren''t registered meant that they were free game in terms of being turned in for this exam.


    If someone were to kill another examinee and take their nascent artifact, they would be able to turn it in for the exam¡­


    This truly was a dangerous and bloody exam, it was just too bad that the people who rushed in first weren''t able to understand that. Most of them would be the people sacrificed in the end by the smarter people to get out the artifacts from the traps before being taken down by these people.


    In other words, they would be the mantis that was unaware of the oriole behind them.<sub> </sub>


    But to be honest, this exam truly was one with a strong push for the examinees to attack each other. It was almost as if they were purposefully trying to forcefully cut down the number of examinees, but this was also the rule of the upper realm. It was thew of the jungle, survival of the fittest.


    The Hunters Organization only needed the best talents for their ranks and this was one of the best ways to weed through everyone.


    But the content of the exam also depended on the examiner.


    There would be examiners who would give easier tests without forcing people to kill each other and there were those that wanted a bloodfest.


    It seemed like Shi Yan, under that gentlemanly appearance, was actually quite a bloodthirsty person¡­


    Lin Fan and the others just casually watched as everyone pushed their way in and it didn''t take long before the first person was forced out of the ruins. In the end, they had no choice but to pop the safety charm that the Hunters Organization had given them.


    When that person came out, there was still a look of shock on his face as he just stared forward without turning. It was as if there had been something that hadpletely shocked him in the ruins.


    There were a few people who were about to move over, but before they could, Shi Yan came over to escort that person away.


    There were still some people that tried to approach that person even though Shi Yan escorted him away, but they were immediately scared off by a single re from Shi Yan.


    No matter what, Shi Yan was the examiner and they didn''t want to be disqualified for nothing.


    But the fact that someone was already out this early had proved that their guesses were correct, the traps inside these ruins definitely weren''t normal. Perhaps the best way really was to hunt other examinees down¡­


    There were some people who hesitated on whether to go in or not, but there were some that bit the bullet and went right in, among them were a few of the seeded candidates. Before this, not a single seeded candidate had gone in because they knew that it was a waste of energy to go in this early, but now that they saw someone being eliminated this fast, they began to feel afraid.


    It seemed that they had underestimated the level of the traps in these ruins and if they waited too long, there might not be any prey left for them. It would be a better idea to go in now and try to get as much as they could before all the prey disappeared. After all, if they could get a few more of them, the exam rules didn''t state that they had to turn in everything that they obtained from the ruins¡­


    These people were quite greedy after all¡­


    As for Lin Fan, he still chose to watch since he knew that there was no harm for him to do so. He was someone who was much stronger than everyone else and he was someone with a pet with powerful spiritual senses.


    As long as he didn''t wait for too long, it wouldn''t be a problem for him to find one artifact.


    But after waiting for a bit longer, there were more people that were sent out of the ruins. This time, it was arge group of five who were all seriously injured.


    As Shi Yan came over to take them away, one of them suddenly rushed forward to grab Shi Yan by the cor as he shouted, "What kind of joke are you ying on us? How are we even supposed to beat a monster like that?"


    Shi Yan didn''t say a thing as he pped the hands holding his cor aside.


    But that person wouldn''t give up as he turned and shouted at the people still waiting outside, "Don''t go in there, it''s hell in there! That monster in there, it''s not a monster that we can beat! It''s a True Soul¡­"


    But before he could finish, Shi Yan had already hit him in the back of his head to knock him out.


    It was too bad that Shi Yan had been toote and they had all heard the final words of that person.


    True Soul Realm, that was the realm that was at the peak of this upper realm and this person was saying that there was a monster like that inside these ruins?


    Just what was the Hunters Organization thinking if that was true?

 402 Chapter 402

    While everyone was worrying about whether to go in or not, there was someone who suddenly approached Lin Fan.


    This was a short young man with arge cap that had goggles on his head with scruffy hair underneath, which made him almost look like an orphan, but no one should look down on him because he was actually in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    This young man was actually one of the few seeded candidates that had appeared in the second realm.


    Lin Fan noticed him, but he didn''t say a thing as he just watched the people hesitating on whether to go in or not.


    Finally, that young man was right beside Lin Fan and he said, "How about we work together to take down that True Soul Realm monster?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but he still turned to look at that person and asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    That young man had a smile as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "If I told you that I had a way of weakening the True Soul Realm monster so that you could kill it, would you be willing to work with me?"


    Lin Fan raised a brow in doubt, but he still asked, "Tell me, what kind of power do you have that can do that? If it sounds feasible, I''ll consider it."


    The young man didn''t respond right away, but rather he reached out a hand and said, "I''m Mo Ze Chen, what''s your name?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at this person, but he didn''t take his hand as he said, "Lin Fan."


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t mind this as he said, "Well, let''s just say that I have a special ability that would let me weaken the True Soul Realm monster. As long as you''re willing to work with me, I''m sure we can both benefit from this."


    Lin Fan didn''t agree right away, instead he said, "Show me your power then."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an awkward look as he said, "I can only use this power once, so I can''t really show it to you now. But if you believe me, I promise that you won''t regret it."


    Lin Fan looked at him for a bit before turning and walking away.


    Mo Ze Chen was actually surprised when he saw Lin Fan turn and he quickly came forward to say, "Wait, I promise that you won''t regret it. Just give me a chance."


    But before he could grab the hem of Lin Fan''s clothes, Lin Fan had already disappeared from his line of sight.


    He looked all around, but he couldn''t find a trace of Lin Fan at all. Instead of being disappointed, Mo Ze Chen revealed an excited look.


    From the moment Lin Fan had appeared, Mo Ze Chen knew that he wasn''t a normal person. He knew that as long as he found a way to attach himself to Lin Fan, he would definitely be able to go far.


    Mo Ze Chen wasted no time to go looking for Lin Fan, it was just too bad that he wouldn''t be able to find Lin Fan at all since Lin Fan was using his shadowws to hide.


    Of course, Lin Fan''s shadowws alone wouldn''t have been enough to hide him, so he also hid inside of a void in space to avoid detection. With these twows working together to hide him, there was no chance that anyone in the Embryo Soul Realm would be able to find him.


    Though when he did use this, he also drew the attention of Shi Yan who had been ushering along the people who had juste out of the ruins.


    He narrowed his eyes in the direction Lin Fan was hiding since he had never expected someone to have multiplews like this. Not to mention how skilled Lin Fan was in controlling this, it was clear that he wasn''t a novice at this.


    Shi Yan even wanted him for a few of his hunts because hisws would definitely be useful, but before that, this kid had to pass the Hunters Exam. Though Shi Yan did decide that he would try to contact this kid after the exam was over, whether he passed or not.


    After this interlude, Lin Fan went back to waiting, but that didn''tst long since there were more and more teams that were being forced out. They all said the same thing, that there was a True Soul Realm monster that was hiding inside these ruins.


    At this time, more and more of the seeded candidates were getting worried about whether or not they should head in or not.


    The only thing that kept them going was that there was no seeded candidate that had gone in that had been forced to leave.


    Maybe they had died, but they chose to believe that the seeded candidates had some way of escaping the creature, which meant that they must have some chance as well. As long as there was this hope, there was still the chance that they could pass this exam.


    However, that hope was getting smaller and smaller the longer they waited.<sub> </sub>


    Finally, the people waiting had no choice but to go in as well and test their luck, otherwise there wouldn''t be enough time to do this.


    More and more seeded candidates went in, but Lin Fan still waited outside.


    He waited another ten minutes after thest seeded candidate went in before looking at his watch. It showed that two hours had already passed and there were only ten hours left.


    At this point, there were only two people who hadn''t gone in just yet. They were Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen respectively.


    After looking at his watch, Lin Fan looked around himself once again before standing up and moving towards the building. No one noticed him since he had still wrapped himself up in hisws, no one except for Shi Yan that was.


    He watched as Lin Fan made his way into the building before waiting five minutes and then turning to Mo Ze Chen who was still walking around looking for Lin Fan.


    Shi Yan said, "Hey kid, you''re thest one left. Are you going in or not?"


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised when he heard this and when he realized that it was Shi Yan, he was even more surprised. But even though it was Shi Yan, Mo Ze Chen said, "But I''m still looking for someone. Wait,st person? What happened to the person who was with me earlier?"


    Shi Yan calmly said, "He already went in. Aren''t you going in as well?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a shocked look when he heard this, "Went in? Are you sure? I didn''t see anything at all."


    Shi Yan didn''t bother saying anything else after that, but Mo Ze Chen didn''t mind.


    Rather, he was quite excited when he thought about it. Lin Fan had the ability to sneak around like this, he must be someone who had powerfulws or some kind of powerful artifact. There was definitely no harm in trying to get close to someone like that¡­


    So Mo Ze Chen didn''t hesitate at all as he ran into the building. His first target wasn''t to get an artifact, but rather his first target was to find Lin Fan.


    As for Shi Yan, he secretly revealed a smile as he watched Mo Ze Chen go in.


    He had felt something specialing from this kid, so he knew that he must have some special power. Perhaps he could work with the other kid to take care of the nuisance that was bothering him inside these ruins.


    That nuisance was the main reason why he had been unable to fully excavate these ruins, which was also why he brought these kids here. If they were able to take care of it for him, that would be killing three birds with one stone.


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan headed into the ruins, he immediately felt the change in the atmosphere around him.


    The first change he noticed was the change in quality of the air. As soon as he entered the ruins, he could smell the mold that filled these ruins.


    It was clear that there hadn''t been anyone in these ruins for a long time, but that also meant that there must be some things that were quite old in these ruins. The inheritance from these ancestors was always something that was weed because they usually had quite powerful things.


    Lin Fan made his way forward aftering into the ruins and as he spread his spiritual sense around him, he could sense the people who were hiding around the entrance. These must be the people who were going with the strategy of waiting to ambush those that left with artifacts.


    Based on how they were anxiously pacing back and forth and the twitches that they had, it was clear that they were getting impatient. After all, they had waited all this time and there was no one that hade.


    It was too bad that they didn''t know anything about what was happening outside.


    Lin Fan ignored these people and these people ignored Lin Fan, but of course that was for two very different reasons.


    Lin Fan ignored them because there was nothing for him to gain from them and they ignored him because they couldn''t sense him at all.


    But after Lin Fan took a few steps into the ruins, there was a roar that suddenly came from in front of him.

 403 Chapter 403

    When Lin Fan heard this roar, he immediately raised his guard and covered himself with his spatialw and his shadoww. That was because he could tell from this roar that it wasn''t from a weak beast.


    While the life energy contained within this roar had mostly dissipated since it was quite far from where Lin Fan was currently standing, he could tell by how concentrated thews were that it was definitely a powerful beast.


    Thesews were weaker than thews he felt from Qing Ao, but not by much. They were also just a bit weaker than thews from the Qiao Family''s old man.


    If Lin Fan had to guess, he wouldn''t put this beast in the True Soul Realm, but rather in the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, close to breaking through.


    But even if it was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, that didn''t mean that this was a beast that could be underestimated. A beast in the Nascent Soul Realm was still more than enough to take care of everyone that had participated in this exam.


    However, the fact that there was a Nascent Soul Realm beast down here did raise a question in Lin Fan''s mind. Just what was the Hunters Organization nning on doing here?


    Were they nning on using them to draw away this Nascent Soul Realm beast under the guise of an exam or was there something else nned?


    Lin Fan only thought about this for a second before turning his attention back to the exam.


    He ignored the beast that this roar came from since he could feel from the life energy fluctuations that this beast was still far away from him. Also judging by those life energy fluctuations, it almost seemed like someone was currently fighting it.


    Were there people crazy enough to fight a Nascent Soul Realm beast?


    As Lin Fan continued moving forward, he suddenly felt those life energy fluctuations stop.


    It seemed like the fight was over and there was no need to guess, it was clear that the Nascent Soul Realm beast had won since there were only faint fluctuations of life energying from it, but that also disappeared quite quickly.


    The Nascent Soul Realm beast seemed like it was on the move, which was definitely bad news, but it was a good thing that Lin Fan had something that no one else had.


    While moving along in the ruins, Lin Fan began scattering different small beasts that he had stored for Brainy, letting them move all over. Brainy linked to all of them and began scouting out the area for Lin Fan.


    The moment the Nascent Soul Realm beast even came close, Brainy would notice it immediately and tell Lin Fan its location.


    That was why Lin Fan was able to boldly move through the halls of the ruins.


    Well, boldly was a bit of an exaggeration since he had covered himself in his shadowws the entire time, but at least he wasn''t moving at a snail''s pace.


    As he continued along, he saw many traces of triggered traps and traces of blood in the ground. It was clear that these were left behind by the first examinees that had gone into the ruins first.


    They had triggered these traps and judging by the blots of blood that covered the ground, it had caught them off guard and injured them. It might have even injured them enough for them to use their safe charm and exit the ruins.


    Of course, it wasn''t only blood that he found, he also found a few corpses that were scattered along the way that were quite fresh¡­


    Lin Fan was tempted to take their corpses for Brainy, but he went against that thought since he was certain that it would bite him in the butt in the future. After all, these ruins were controlled by the Hunters Organization and would be monitored by them, so he wasn''t sure if they would know if he took these bodies or not.


    If they did find out about that, they might dig deeper and expose one of his greatest trump cards in Brainy.


    Brainy was a mutated beast with a special skill that allowed Lin Fan to create a giant army, it was definitely not a pet that everyone had. Unless it was absolutely necessary, he didn''t want to reveal it in this upper realm just yet.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that Lin Fan didn''t take the artifacts from these corpses. These artifacts were left behind after they had died and they were just what Lin Fan needed to pass this exam, so why would he just leave them here?


    But there were still the active traps that they had died in that got in Lin Fan''s way. Still, with how powerful Lin Fan was, it wasn''t hard for him to get rid of those traps at all to move these corpses away.<sub> </sub>


    After looting them, Lin Fan put these corpses on the side. At the very least, he could give them some semnce of a burial by making a small tombstone from the shattered pieces of the wall to ce beside their corpses. He hoped that just this little act of kindness would give him enough karma that they wouldn''t haunt him for looting their corpses.


    It was too bad that Lin Fan wasn''t a bit bolder since the Hunters Organization wouldn''t have cared if he did take these corpses since there was no reason for them to care about dead people. The only thing they did care about in these ruins was the same thing that Lin Fan cared about.


    These ruins were guarded by a Nascent Soul Realm beast that patrolled it, it clearly had something special hidden within.


    Lin Fan was now more than certain that the test was just a ruse for them to use their lives to explore these ruins, but what he didn''t know was whether this was Shi Yan''s idea or the Hunters Organization''s ideas¡­


    Still, that didn''t matter to the current Lin Fan since his only thought now was to explore and find the secrets of these ruins.


    Lin Fan left these corpses behind and continued forward, moving deeper and deeper into the ruins.


    Lin Fan could also feel that the floors beneath him were also slightly nted, which meant that he was going deeper and deeper underground. Along the way, he also didn''t forget to have Brainy leave a few vines behind them to mark the way they came in just in case he needed to make a quick getaway.


    As he went deeper and deeper in, there were less traces of fresh exploration, but there were corpses that were lining these halls.


    Well, to call them corpses would have been a bit too much because there was no flesh left on them at all. They were only skeletons that were made of pure white bones that lined these hallways.


    It was clear from the cobwebs and dust that covered them that they had been here a long time. Moreover, it wasn''t just a normal definition of a long time since these bones were still filled with life energy, which was why they hadn''t decayed yet.


    The corpses of Soul Realm Experts were different from those of normal people because fundamentally, those bodies had been changed because of the soul being refined, which made them much more powerful than normal bodies. It also allowed their bodies tost longer even after death because they were better at keeping in life energy.


    But even with these powerful bodies, these corpses all around Lin Fan had still been reduced to nothing but bones. It was enough to show just how long these corpses had been here.


    That also raised even more questions for Lin Fan since it was clear that there was a past excavation of these ruins, but the Hunters Organization, or rather Shi Yan was iming that this was a newly discovered set of ruins.


    Just what were they hiding?


    Lin Fan continued to look around at these corpses, finding slight traces of remainingws that stuck to the bones. Judging by how powerful these fragments ofws were, it was clear that these corpses weren''t weak when they had still been alive.


    This should have been an elite excavation team from one of the twelve factions, most likely the Hunters Organization that came here in the past¡­


    It seems like there were quite a few secrets that were hidden in these ruins.


    Lin Fan was about to keep searching through them since he hadn''t found any artifacts or anything valuable among them yet, but then he heard a scream in the distance.


    "Help!"


    This was a shrill cry from a girl that came from further into the ruins.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but then he charged forward towards the sound of the cry for help.


    It didn''t take long for Lin Fan to arrive in a room where there was a barrier in the center of the room, being surrounded by various spiked traps. Inside that barrier was a girl who was cowering with her hands over her head as she kept screaming for help.


    Lin Fan was still wrapped up in hisws, so the girl didn''t notice him when he came in, but he released hisws in the end and said, "Are you alright?"


    When the girl heard this voice, she immediately looked up and saw Lin Fan, revealing a look of hope as she said, "Help me! Get me out of here right now!"

 404 Chapter 404

    Lin Fan didn''t move immediately as he stood there looking over the trap.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t doing a thing, the girl inside the barrier became even more anxious as she shouted, "What are you doing just standing there? Can you not hear me? Help me, I''m about to die!"


    But even then, Lin Fan still didn''t make a move as he continued the watch.


    The girl''s screams became more and more panicked as the trap began encroaching on the barrier that was around her,pressing it more and more around her. If this continued on, there was no doubt that she would be squashed into a pancake or if the barrier broke, she would be cut into a thousand pieces.


    There was a hateful look in the girl''s eyes since she already had an idea of what Lin Fan was doing.


    If it was her, she would probably do the same thing since they werepetitors, but she still couldn''t help hating him for doing it.


    As the girl''s barrier became smaller and smaller and her voice became softer and softer as she began to lose hope.


    She knew what kind of a ce this upper realm was, it was a ce where the strong ate the weak. She could only me herself for not being strong enough.


    When she was about to lose all hope and when the barrier was about to break, Lin Fan suddenly flicked his hand, sending out a white blur.


    That white blur flew through the air andnded right on the de that was about to pierce through the barrier around the girl. After hitting that de, it knocked the de back into another de behind it while ricocheting in another direction to hit another de that was about to pierce the barrier.


    Just like this, this white blur continued to ricochet around inside that trap, knocking the various des that approached into each other. All the various des continued hitting each other until they started to break.


    It was one at first, but then there were two, three, and more and more that broke until the trap hadpletely shattered.


    The girl had resigned herself to death, but then she suddenly heard the loud nging that was around her. She looked up with a curious gaze to see all the des exploding around her until they were all gone.


    Even after they were all gone, she just stood there in a daze looking up at the sprinkles of iron sand that fell down all around her. She couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    As for that white blur, after hitting thest de, it ricocheted right back into Lin Fan''s hand where it revealed its true form. It was the Iron Eater Bone Artifact transformed into the shape of a dagger.


    It was actually the Iron Eater Bone Artifact that did most of the work in shattering the des of the trap.


    Whoever had set these traps had really cared about the quality of their traps, so the des they had used were all top quality items. Since that was the case, all of them were made from a rare metal and since the Iron Eater Bone Artifact fed on rare metals, it was easy to see how it had destroyed them.


    The Iron Eater Bone Artifact had swallowed bits of the rare metal whenever it had made contact with the des, weakening all the des that it had touched. While ricocheting, it had been sure to touch every single one of the des once and had swallowed quite a bit of the rare metal.


    But that wasn''t the important part. The important part was that the rare metal was what gave the des their sharpness and durability and since it had been drained out of the des, they became very dull and fragile. When they shed with each other, there was no doubt over how easily they would shatter.


    After taking care of these traps, Lin Fan ignored the fragments of the des on the ground because he knew that they were worthless now and came up to the girl.


    She was still standing there in a daze as she looked up, but there was already nothing left for her to see since the iron sand had all fallen to the ground already. It took her a while before she was able to react.


    It was only when Lin Fan spoke that she finally came back to her senses. Lin Fan asked, "Are you alright?"


    As he asked this, he reached his hand out to her.


    The girl turned to look at Lin Fan and this time, she was finally able to take a closer look at him.


    With how close Lin Fan was, there was nothing to guard her against his face at all. As soon as his face entered her line of sight, her heart skipped several beats before beating much faster than before.


    As this happened, there was a blush that came over her face as she shyly turned her head and said, "I''m alright."


    She let Lin Fan take her hand and help her up before walking away from the trap with Lin Fan.


    Even if Lin Fan had already destroyed the mainponents of the trap, there was still the chance that there was some backup trap, so it was best not to remain in this area.


    Lin Fan immediately brought the girl away from this room and went down another corridor, only finally stopping after walking for several minutes.<sub> </sub>


    They were still in the corridor when they stopped, but they had stopped by one of the torches on the wall.


    Lin Fan knew that this girl must have suffered a shock from the trap just now, so he gave her some time to rest. While he was doing so, he walked around the corridor, looking for anything new.


    In the end, Lin Fan didn''t find anything, so he went back to the girl who had recovered to ask her, "What happened back there?"


    The girl looked up at Lin Fan and another blush came over her face before she said, "I was trying to go deeper into the ruins to find some good things, but then I was suddenly caught in that trap. I thought that I was dead, but I never expected you toe along and save me."


    Lin Fan nodded before he asked, "So how far did you go? What did you find out?"


    Even though this girl was also a beauty, Lin Fan wasn''t affected by her beauty at all sincepared to the beauty of some girls that he had seen before, she couldn''tpare.


    She couldn''t evenpare to what Lin Fan considered second ss beauties like Qiao Yi Fei and Fu Ling, so there was no chance that anything she did was able to ensnare Lin Fan, even though she tried her best.


    The girl lowered her head and said, "Before that, shouldn''t you introduce yourself first?"


    Lin Fan looked at her before saying, "It''smon courtesy to give your name before asking for another''s."


    The girl looked up with a shy look before saying, "But it''s embarrassing, don''t you know."


    Even though she did all this, all that she got was a cold stare from Lin Fan.


    After a while, she finally said in a small voice, "My name is Li Fei Fei, what is your name, big brother?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "Lin Fan."


    The girl was taken aback by how cold he was, but then she said, "Big brother Lin Fan, can youe a bit closer, I have something I want to share with you."


    She was confident in this move because all guys loved weak girls and she was the perfect example of that right now.


    As she had expected, Lin Fan did move in, but what happened next was not what she had expected.


    As soon as Lin Fan came in, she immediately stabbed out with a dagger that she had hidden in her sleeve.


    In this upper realm, it was thew of the jungle where the strong ate the weak, so before Lin Fan could do that to her, she would do that to Lin Fan.


    She didn''t know what Lin Fan''s ns were, but before he could do anything, it was better to take him out.


    That was the kind of life that she had lived before and this was the kind of life that she would continue living.


    It was just too bad that she had chosen the wrong target for this.


    The moment the dagger came out, Lin Fan''s hand was already right in front of his throat where the dagger was aimed, catching it without any effort at all.


    When Li Fei Fei looked down at her dagger in Lin Fan''s hand, she suddenly felt a pain in her own neck. Looking slightly to the side, she saw the white dagger that was stabbing into her own throat.


    It seemed that Lin Fan was already prepared for her next move and had already made his own move. She couldn''t help looking at him with an unwilling look as her eyes dimmed since if she died here, who would look after¡­


    But there was no one to hear these final words that she had as she started to choke on the blood that filled her throat.


    Finally, her eyespletely dimmed and she fell down to the ground without a trace of life.


    As for Lin Fan, he didn''t feel bothered at all.


    He was no longer the same Lin Fan that was controlled by that impulse to save everyone that needed help. He was now someone who could think calmly and rationally to deal with every situation, even if he needed to be cold in that situation.

 405 Chapter 405

    After Li Fei Fei''s corpse copsed onto the ground, Lin Fan searched through it without any scruples.


    Li Fei Fei was able to make it this far down because she definitely wasn''t weak. She was actually in the Embryo Soul Realm and was one of the seeded candidates, but she was only in the low Embryo Soul Realm, so she was still not a match for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with the small things, he just took her artifacts and her money before heading off deeper into the ruins.


    However, before he could go any further, there was a voice that suddenly sounded by him.


    "Woah, what happened here?"


    Lin Fan suddenly turned around in surprise since he didn''t notice anyoneing up from behind him, but somehow there was someone that had done so.


    When Lin Fan did turn around and see who it was, he was even more surprised by who it was.


    It was Mo Ze Chen who had been bothering Lin Fan outside, but the fact that it was him made Lin Fan more wary.


    After all, Mo Ze Chen had been the one who hade up to him with a deal that had seemed strange to him at first, but now it seemed like perhaps he really did have some secret power that he was hiding. However, if he did, that raised the question of why he approached Lin Fan and what goals he had.


    Lin Fan was more than capable of taking care of himself here, but if he brought along someone whose motivations that he wasn''t clear on, that would just be bringing danger to himself.


    Mo Ze Chen could naturally see the wary look that Lin Fan had, but he still said with a smile, "You don''t have to worry, what I want is very simple."


    Lin Fan just replied, "People who say that there''s nothing to worry about are usually the ones that you''d have to worry about the most, don''t you think?"


    Mo Ze Chen just said with a smile, "If there was something to worry about, I would have already done something, wouldn''t I?"


    Lin Fan smiled in response to this and said, "That depends on if you have the ability to do that, which is probably why you want to work with me, isn''t it?"


    Mo Ze Chen''s smile turned bitter when he heard this and he shook his head as he muttered, "It seems like I really can''t hide anything from you."


    Lin Fan also had a bitter smile as he said, "If you couldn''t hide anything from me, we wouldn''t be here now, would we?"


    Neither of them said a thing as they looked at each other before breaking out inughter at the same time.


    It was clear that neither of them trusted each other as far as they would throw the other, but at least they were past the awkward part where they still didn''t know each other yet and could actually get into the real negotiations.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t waste any time after they stoppedughing as he said, "I want to offer the same offer as before, I want to work with you to kill the guardian of these ruins."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "What do you want out of it though?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed another smile as he said, "Would you believe me if I said nothing?"


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before slowly giving a nod, "Well, there''s definitely no merit for you to kill this guardian, so I would say that I would believe you. If I had to guess, you just want to use me to pass through the next few exams and be a hunter, isn''t that right?"


    Mo Ze Chen had the same smile as he said, "It''s always good to deal with smart people, it really saves quite a bit of time. That''s right, I just want your help to get through these exams and you can keep everything that we find after we defeat the guardian. This is a guardian that is in the True Soul Realm, so you can imagine what kind of treasures it might be hiding."


    Lin Fan was in thought for a bit before saying, "First, your information is wrong, it''s only in the Nascent Soul Realm, so there wouldn''t be as much treasure as you think there is, which only decreases the value of your deal. Second, there''s no guarantee that we will be able to kill it in the first ce, so your words basically hold no weight at all, that is unless you''re willing to tell me what methods you have for killing it. And third, you''re asking me to carry you through the rest of the exams, but we have no idea how difficult the next exams will be or if we can even work together, so it''s hard to judge how much to charge you for this."<sub> </sub>


    After a pause, Lin Fan then said, "In short, there are more demerits that merits to your n, so there doesn''t seem to be a reason for me to ept, is there?"


    Mo Ze Chen paused for a second before saying, "How about I tell you how I snuck up on you then?"


    Lin Fan revealed a slightly interested look because he had been wondering this question the entire time, but then he still shook his head and said, "There''s nothing for me to gain from that. If you were to offer me the artifact that you used or the technique that you used, perhaps that would be a different story, but right now there''s no benefits to this."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a difficult look, but before he said anything else, Lin Fan once again said, "I can pretty much guess what you n on using. Your cultivation isn''t that high, so it''s clear that you''re depending on artifacts to take care of it, but if you aren''t willing to trust me, there''s nothing I can do. And I''m sure there''s nothing you can do since you depend on artifacts, which means that you don''t have one that''s strong enough to defeat a Nascent Soul Realm beast, isn''t that right?"


    In the end, Mo Ze Chen gave a sigh before saying, "It is much easier discussing with someone who is smart, but it''s also much more difficult to get a good deal, isn''t it?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response this time as he waited for Mo Ze Chen''s response.


    In the end, Mo Ze Chen gave another sigh before digging into his pocket before pulling out a ring. He put that ring on and with a wave of the hand that had the ring on it, there was a ball that suddenly appeared in his hand.


    Mo Ze Chen held it up for Lin Fan to look at as he said, "This is my special item that I''ll use to hold the guardian in ce. It also has the effect of reducing their cultivation, so that it won''t be higher than the Child Soul Realm, but that''s still too strong for me to beat, which is why I need your help."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin in thought as he had Brainy check the artifact with its spiritual senses. After a bit, Brainy reported that it did indeed seem like an artifact with the ability to trap things based on thews that were contained within it.


    Lin Fan could tell that Mo Ze Chen should be telling the truth since it would be very easy for him to find out if he was lying, so there was no need for Mo Ze Chen to lie here, unless he was stupid, but he clearly wasn''t.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan was tempted because he wanted to know what kind of things were hidden in these ruins that even a Nascent Soul Realm beast was guarding it. It had to be something special if that were the case¡­


    After considering it, Lin Fan said, "I can work with you, but you have to add one more condition in."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an excited look when he heard this and he quickly said, "What is it? Just tell me."


    Lin Fan reached out with his hand and said, "If you give me your artifact for hiding right now, I can work with you."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an ugly look at this because he knew what Lin Fan was trying to do.


    Just in case anything bad happened during their n, without the hiding artifact, there was no chance Mo Ze Chen would be able to escape since he had already experienced Lin Fan''s ability to hide firsthand. It was so good that his detection artifacts couldn''t even find a thing.


    So he was clearly trying to ensure that Mo Ze Chen would be the one who drew the beast''s attention if they ever needed to escape¡­


    But Mo Ze Chen naturally valued his life and didn''t want to do something like this, so he countered, "Is there any other way?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "Well, it''s not like there isn''t another way¡­"


    He drew out his words as he tugged on Mo Ze Chen''s hopes.


    As he said this, his hand drew back into his sleeve and when it appeared again, there was a seed that was in his hand.


    He brought his hand up right in front of Mo Ze Chen so he could see that seed before saying, "If you eat this and don''t resist, I can consider it."

 406 Chapter 406

    This seed was naturally a seed that came from Brainy, but it wasn''t just a normal seed.


    After Brainy had undergone its second mutation, it had gained more skillspared to before. One of which was the ability to augment the seeds that it generated.


    The seeds that Brainy created were no longer just parasite seeds, but there were also seeds with various different effects.


    Take the seed that Lin Fan was currently holding, it was an Explosion Seed.


    As the name suggests, after this seed was swallowed, with just a single bit of spiritual sense injected from Brainy, it would create an explosion. However, it was different from the previous parasite seeds because the explosion generated from this Explosion Seed was several hundred times stronger.


    That was because this seed had a gigantic amount of life energypressed into its tiny shape, which gave it much more power than the normal parasite seeds.


    With Brainy''s current cultivation of the Primary Soul Realm, the explosion of the seed was actually strong enough to prate the defenses of someone in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    Of course, it took a long time to create even a single one of these seeds, so they were not things that Brainy used normally or even created. They would only be used when Lin Fan had a need for them, such as making sure that someone he was working with wouldn''t betray him.


    Mo Ze Chen sent his spiritual sense into the seed and he could tell that there was a powerful concentration of life energy inside this seed. Even he wasn''t certain if he could withstand an attack of that concentration, not to mention if it was inside of him.


    But there was no other choice for Mo Ze Chen right now¡­


    In the end, Mo Ze Chen gave a sigh as he took the seed and swallowed it.


    He could feel it traveling through him until it reached his head, resting just under his brain.


    He could tell that with a single thought, this seed would detonate and would kill him, even eliminating his soul with thews that were contained within.


    That would mean true death for him, not just the death of his body.


    Still, he had no other choice right now.


    After swallowing this seed, Mo Ze Chen asked, "Will this do?"


    Lin Fan confirmed with Brainy that Mo Ze Chen did indeed swallow the seed before saying, "What is your n for doing this then?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a smile and gave a shrug before saying, "It''s very simple, I never had a n to begin with."


    Lin Fan had dark lines that appeared on his face as he realized that he had overestimated this Mo Ze Chen.


    He believed Mo Ze Chen when he said that he didn''t have any ns at all because he could tell by the way Mo Ze Chen rxed after eating the seed that it seemed like he had aplished his goals. He only wanted to find a way to grab onto Lin Fan''s leg and as for everything else, he would leave it to his new boss.


    But Lin Fan had to admit that Mo Ze Chen was quite good at acting and making quick decisions, which meant that he was someone who had a good head on his shoulders. At least this meant that he could be trained and help Lin Fan''s other subordinates when they came up.


    Lin Fan had already started treating Mo Ze Chen as a subordinate since he had gotten him to eat the seed.


    Since he was willing to hug Lin Fan''s leg, he wouldn''t say no.


    Not to mention that Mo Ze Chen seemed to have this special ability to find artifacts, that was always useful.


    The one thing that Lin Fan''s organization back on the Blue Starcked were pills and artifacts. That was because most of the people that he had managed to recruit were those that had fighting potential or those that were good at business. He had never been able to recruit any alchemists or cksmiths because his organization had been focused on other kinds of development, so that was a weak point for them.


    He would have to start patching up those weak points now that they had developed to a certain extent and someone like this Mo Ze Chen would be a good start. Now all Lin Fan had to do was find a good alchemist and that would solve the holes they have right now.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, Mo Ze Chen wasn''t actually worried because he saw that Lin Fan didn''t seemed worried. If Lin Fan was worried, maybe he would be worried, but he could tell that his new boss was a smart person and was developing a n, so he silently waited.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan finally said, "Let''s keep exploring these ruins then."


    Mo Ze Chen was taken aback when he heard this. After all this time, the only n that Lin Fan had managed toe up with was to continue exploring?


    Even he could havee up with that kind of n.


    But as he thought about it, he realized that Lin Fan was right.<sub> </sub>


    Instead of going around searching for the Nascent Soul Realm beast, running into all kinds of unknown traps, it was better to move forward and try to find what the Nascent Soul Realm beast was trying to protect.


    That way, they would draw in the Nascent Soul Realm beast, while also being able to know the terrain of the area they would fight in. If they knew the terrain since they would already be exploring it, at least that would mean that they wouldn''t have to deal with the various traps.


    Mo Ze Chen was about to say something, but then he noticed that Lin Fan was already moving forward without him.


    He gave a bitterugh as he thought that he had chosen to follow a selfish fellow, but then he followed behind Lin Fan.


    When they came out of the corridor that they had been in, they arrived in a room that was brightly lit, but unlike before, the room wasn''t lit by the torches on the wall. Instead of being lit by torches, right in the center of the room was a tree that glowing with light.


    It wasn''t a big tree since this wasn''t a big room, it only reached a height of three meters, but the light it gave off was almost too bright to look directly at.


    When they came into the room, the first thing Mo Ze Chen did was immediately run up to the tree and start climbing onto it, trying to find why it was glowing.


    That was the one special thing about Mo Ze Chen, he waspletely obsessed with things that went against normal convention. In short, he was an ult maniac, which was why he was aiming to be a Ruins Hunter just like their examiner Shi Yan.


    But because of how much it went into exploring ruins, he was constantly getting into and getting out of debt, which was what led him to be a Hunter.


    He didn''t want to give up his goal, which was why he came up with the idea of grabbing onto the leg of someone powerful like Lin Fan.


    In the future, he woulde to regret this decision, but for now, he was happy with the results.


    Lin Fan slowly walked into the room after being in a daze for a bit. He came up to the glowing tree and in front of that glowing tree, there was a podium with an inscription on it.


    But Lin Fan didn''t immediately look at the inscription, rather he turned to the tree since it seemed like it might be something valuable.


    Both him and Brainy sent their spiritual sense into the tree and it didn''t take them long for them to determine why this tree was glowing.


    It was very simple, it was just an injection of lightws into the normal tree that was nted here, but there was something strange about it.


    Normal lightws wouldn''t havested this long since they could tell that this tree was over ten thousand years old. For lightws tost this long, it far surpassed the highest cultivation realm in this upper realm.


    Just who had left these ruins here?


    Lin Fan immediately turned his attention to the podium with the inscription after determining this, but he found that the inscription didn''t make much sense either.


    The inscription was very simple, it was a few simple lines describing something that Lin Fan couldn''t understand.


    "The outsider will arrive to change this world and when he arrives, the light will guide his way."


    "For all those lost in the light, your salvation will be this outsider."


    "The outsider who will be the king of all beasts."


    "One day he will have to lose everything."


    This didn''t make any sense to Lin Fan, but this was the only clue that he got since there wasn''t a way forward in this room.


    They didn''t notice this when they first came in because they were distracted by the glowing tree, but it turned out that there wasn''t another passage for them to continue through in this room.


    But that would be strange since this was the only room that led further down into the ruins¡­Or could it be that this was already the bottom?


    Lin Fan didn''t believe so since he could feel something from beneath them, so he continued to look over the podium.


    After carefully looking at it, he found that there was another inscription underneath the one that he had already read. He had missed it at first because it was very faint and the room was so bright.


    However, when he did see it, he couldn''t help being surprised by it.


    After all, it was written in Chinese.

 407 Chapter 407

    Aftering to this world, it had been a long time since he had seen Chinese letters.


    This world used anguage that was simr to English, but it had a different alphabet system. The only reason Lin Fan was able to understand thenguage of this world was because he had been imbued with the memories of the other Lin Fan.


    So thenguage that Lin Fan had been using on a daily basis until now was actually themonnguage here in this universe that he transmigrated to. There were still things like local dialects, but with how humanity was rted, all of those local dialects were a branch of the mainmonnguage.


    It wasn''t like earth where there were differentnguages for each country.


    But the strange thing now was why were there Chinese letters on this podium?


    Could it be that these ruins were left behind by another transmigrator that came before him or was it something else?


    Was it rted to that girl he kept seeing who told him that she would have answers for him in the future?


    Before Lin Fan did anything else, he called out to Mo Ze Chen who was still climbing all over the glowing tree. After calling him over, he pointed at the line that was written in Chinese and asked Mo Ze Chen, "Do you know what this says?"


    Mo Ze Chen looked at where Lin Fan was pointing at the podium before slightly knitting his brows. After a moment of hesitation, he came closer to the podium to carefully look over it.


    At first Lin Fan felt this was a good sign since it seemed like Mo Ze Chen was seriously looking over it, but Mo Ze Chen''s next words made Lin Fan stunned.


    "Brother Lin, what do you mean by that? I don''t see anything there at all."


    Lin Fan was taken aback when he heard this, but he quickly went back to the podium and pointed at the line written in Chinese underneath the main verses before saying, "Right there, don''t you see what''s written right there?"


    Mo Ze Chen looked again at where Lin Fan was pointing, but after a bit, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a worried look as he said, "Brother Lin, are you alright? Are you sick or is there something wrong with you?"


    The way Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan made it clear that he thought Lin Fan was crazy, but that was normal when people started asking about things that others couldn''t see. However, Lin Fan was certain that he could see these words because it was clear in his eyes.


    Lin Fan ignored Mo Ze Chen and turned back to the podium, looking at those words in Chinese.


    The words written were very simple, they just said "Press here".


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure what would happen, but since it was a special message that was written in Chinese that only he could read, he was willing to take the risk that it was something special.


    So Lin Fan raised his hand up to the podium and pressed right on the letters.


    The moment his finger touched that line, there was a sudden tremble around them as the room began to shake.


    Mo Ze Chen started to panic the moment the room began to shake as he said, "Brother Lin, what''s happening?"


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to care about him because he was focused on the specific changes of the room.


    As the room continued to shake, there was the sound of rock grinding on rock as a piece of the wall suddenly slid to the side. Once it finished sliding to the side, it revealed a passage with a set of stairs going down.


    Once the passage was revealed, the shaking stopped and the room turned silent once again.


    Mo Ze Chen turned to look in the direction of the door that was just revealed and he was shocked when he saw the stairs leading down. He quickly turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Brother Lin, what did you just do?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother exining to him since he felt it was a waste of time, rather Lin Fan came to the stairs and sent down his spiritual sense along with Brainy.


    After breaking through to the Fragmented Soul Realm, Lin Fan''s spiritual sense was quite powerful, being able to spread over several kilometers. However, even with that being the case, he couldn''t find the end of these stairs.


    Brainy had a stronger spiritual sense than Lin Fan since it specialized in cultivating its spiritual sense, but it also couldn''t find the bottom of these stairs.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows in thought for a bit, but he still chose to go down the stairs in the end.


    Mo Ze Chen saw that Lin Fan was heading down and he didn''t hesitate to follow him since he had already put his chips down in Lin Fan''s corner. Wherever Lin Fan went, that was where he went.


    Not to mention that if he did betray Lin Fan, he would be blown to pieces.


    Sometimes, not dying was the best motivator.<sub> </sub>


    As they continued down these stairs, what Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t know was what kind ofmotion they had caused for the rest of the people in the ruins.


    ¡­


    The shaking of the ruins wasn''t just in the lower part of the ruins where Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen was, rather the shaking of the ruins had urred throughout these entire ruins, which meant that everyone had felt it.


    Many of the examinees were confused as to what had happened and thought that perhaps it was caused by the True Soul Realm beast that was lurking in these ruins. A few of the smarter people knew better than this and they could guess what it really was.


    For something that could affect the entire ruins, it must be someone who had found some form of fortuitous encounter and it definitely wasn''t small. If they were able to take this from whoever had found it, it definitely would be good for them.


    There were many of the examinees who had greedy looks in their eyes as they began making their way deeper into the ruins.


    Among them were seeded candidates who had pulled in all the weaker examinees that they had found along the way. They drew them in with sweet words, saying that they could all work together, but they only drew them in for one thing¡­


    They would be bait used to clear the traps that were in front of them.


    The shaking of the ruins wasn''t just strong enough that everyone in the ruins felt them, they were so strong that even the people above could feel the shaking through the ground.


    When this shaking appeared, Shi Yan who had been guarding the entrance immediately knitted his brows.


    He had never found anything like this when he had been exploring these ruins, but that was also because he kept being driven off by that Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    Now these ruins had suddenly started to shake and they were so intense that they had reached the surface. Could it be that someone had gotten past that Nascent Soul Realm beast and had gotten to the true depths of the ruins?


    Shi Yan had a slightly dark look in his eyes as he pondered this.


    After thinking for a bit, he lifted his wrist with the watch on it and pressed a few buttons before there was a connection tone. Once he was connected, Shi Yan said a few whispered words before suddenly hanging up again.


    He had already reported it, so now all he could do was wait.


    As Shi Yan was wondering who had caused this change in the ruins, he couldn''t help thinking of Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen. Those two were the most special candidates out of the bunch, so they were the greatest suspects in this case.


    Deep in the ruins, there was another creature that was stirred by the shaking of these ruins. It was the Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    As a Nascent Soul Realm beast, naturally it had developed its intelligence and it could tell just what this shaking of these ruins meant.


    Could it be that someone had been able to open the vestige of its master?


    But its master had told it that unless it was the destined person, they wouldn''t be able to open these ruins. So far, it hadn''t been able to find anyone special among all the people that hade in, could it be that it had missed something?


    The beast suddenly kneeled down and spat out something round onto the ground.


    This was a ball that waspletely made of ss and see through. Normally this ball of ss would bepletely empty, but at this moment, there was something that was inside of it.


    The Nascent Soul Realm beast leaned in more to get a closer look and when it saw what was inside the ss ball, its eyes couldn''t help popping out.


    There was a green wisp of energy that was inside of the ss ball.


    This was the signal that its master had told it would appear in the ss ball if the destined person had appeared and now it had actually appeared.


    The Nascent Soul Realm beast didn''t waste any more time here as it quickly swallowed the ball before heading down into the depths of the ruins.


    The destined person was already here, it couldn''t waste any more time with all the trash that had charged in.


    But before it left, it didn''t forget to give another loud roar.


    This time, the roar was different since it wasn''t just a threatening roar.


    Instead, it was a gathering roar that had invoked a wave of beasts in these ruins, hunting down the intruders.

 408 Chapter 408

    Unaware of everything that was going on around him, Lin Fan continued down the passage that was in front of them.


    Compared to thest room that they had been in, this passage waspletely dark. It was almost like it was the opposite of thest room and waspletely filled with darknessws. However, Lin Fan couldn''t find anything, so he knew that this was just a natural darkness.


    Even with his spiritual sense that could spread several kilometers, he hadn''t been able to see the bottom of these stairs, so he wasn''t surprised that he didn''t reach the end even after several minutes.


    While Lin Fan was calm and didn''t mind this slow walk down, Mo Ze Chen was feeling quite impatient because he was actually quite the impulsive person. While he could force himself to calm down when acting, his true nature was one of following his impulses.


    Lin Fan found it annoying how he kept asking if they "were there yet" like a child, but at the same time, he didn''t mind someone like this because they were usually not one to lie unless it was absolutely necessary.


    But as they continued along the passage, moving down those stairs, they could hear some sounds that wereing from in front of them. Listening carefully, they could hear the sounds of moaninging from in front of them. These were clearly the moans that came from human voices, but why would there be humans in these ruins?


    Unless the other examinees had already reached this ce before them and it was their voices that they were hearing in front of them, that wouldn''t make sense since Lin Fan couldn''t sense anythinging from in front of him.


    It was almost as if there were no living people in front of him.


    Could that mean that there were people that had survived in these ruins all the time?


    Or rather would they be ghosts that had been trapped in here?


    As they went further down these stairs, the moans continued to grow in volume until they seemed like they were right in front of them. But that wasn''t the only thing that appeared, there was also a light that came from the bottom of the stairs.


    The closer they came to it, the more light came from the bottom of the stairs until it was almost as bright as the room they had just been in.


    Once they came through the exit, the first thing that appeared in front of them was another tree that was glowing with lightws, but this one was much more differentpared to thest one.


    After all,pared to thest one, this one was on apletely different scale.


    The tree that appeared in front of them was more than ten times, more than a hundred times, even more than a thousand times biggerpared to the previous tree.


    This tree was like the sacred world tree that Lin Fan had heard about in myths before, as it sprinkled its light all over this space.


    Of course, a space that was able to hold a tree that was over three thousand meters tall definitely wasn''t small.


    In front of Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen was a giant space, so big that they couldn''t even see the end of it. In that space, there was a city that was at the trunk of the tree, spreading across several dozen kilometers, maybe even more because they couldn''t see the end of it.


    In this city, walking through the streets were people who just moved along at a snail''s pace, aimlessly wandering around.


    Mo Ze Chen had been shocked at first, but after oveing his shock, he shouted, "What is this ce¡­Mm?"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan had already covered his mouth and brought him behind one of the buildings that was in front of them.


    There were a few of these people who had turned in the direction of this sound, but seeing that there was no one there, they went back to wandering around the city aimlessly.


    Lin Fan looked down at Mo Ze Chen who had a confused look on his face with an angry look as he said, "Are you going to be quiet?"


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t say anything, so he just gave a nod.


    After seeing this, Lin Fan hesitated a bit before removing his hand from Mo Ze Chen''s mouth.


    Mo Ze Chen had an aggrieved look as he asked, "Brother Lin, what was that for?"


    Lin Fan red at him as he said, "Are you an idiot? How do you know that they won''t attack us?"


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised, but then he realized that he had let his emotions take over and he had lost his cool.


    Mo Ze Chen was a qualified ruins explorer, so he knew that he should always be careful when exploring anything new, but he had forgotten this when he became too emotional and made this loud noise.<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an awkward look as he said, "Sorry about that."


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with him as he turned his attention to these people.


    These were clearly people, but for some reason, he couldn''t sense any signs of vitalitying from them with his spiritual sense. Even when they wereing down and he heard the moans, he hadn''t been able to find anything.


    Actually, when they were on the stairs, there was a kind of barrier that was at the exit of the stairs that had blocked his spiritual energy, so he hadn''t been able to see what was actually inside. When he walked through the exit, he had been as surprised as Mo Ze Chen, but Lin Fan could recover faster because he had much more experiencepared to Mo Ze Chen.


    After using his spiritual sense, Lin Fan focused on these people and found that they were a bit see through.


    Could it be that his first guess had been correct?


    Were these people all ghosts that were trapped down here after these ruins were sealed?


    While this question was on his mind, Lin Fan chose to ignore it first and decided to explore the building that they were hiding behind.


    Mo Ze Chen had seen that Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything, so he had also been looking around at these people, but then he saw Lin Fan suddenly move, so he followed behind him.


    The two of them made their way to the entrance of the building and Lin Fan slowly opened the door. Once it was open, they slowly peeked in to see if there were any people inside, but what they found was nothing at all.


    After this, they moved into the building and found that it waspletely empty from top to bottom. There wasn''t a single piece of furniture or any items in these buildings, there was just an empty building.


    But the strange thing was, when Lin Fan tapped on the walls, he could feel some kind of strangew that wasing from it.


    Lin Fan focused his life energy into a single point on his finger before tapping the wall, but there was a strange life energy that had repelled this single point attack.


    It had to be known, this single point attack hadbined threews, so it was able to easily defeat someone in the Embryo Soul Realm, but this wall that seemed quite flimsy had been able to stop that attack.


    Just what were these buildings made from?


    Mo Ze Chen also saw this and tried hitting the wall with his own tests, but he also found that he couldn''t make a dent to the wall at all.


    After seeing this, Mo Ze Chen''s eyes lit up and he took out a dagger.


    Lin Fan could feel a familiarwing from it and when he looked carefully, he found that this was a dagger that was covered in spatialws.


    Mo Ze Chen took that spatialw dagger to the wall to try to cut out a piece of it for his collection, but the moment the spatialw dagger made contact with the wall, he found that he could cut through it at all. However, Mo Ze Chen wasn''t willing to give up, so he drew back the de and used more strength to try and cut through the walls again.


    It was too bad that these walls still wouldn''t budge.


    It was even worse because when Mo Ze Chen''s spatialw dagger made contact with the wall, there was a sudden "snap" sound as the de of the dagger suddenly broke. It flipped several times in the air before falling to the ground where it was unable to cut through the floors as well. It bounced several times beforending t on the ground.


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen looked at the spatialw dagger in surprise.


    It wasmon knowledge that spatialws were the best for cutting things because they separated the space in between items, cutting them on apletely different level.


    Yet somehow, this wall had been able to resist the spatialws of the dagger and had even snapped the dagger clean in half when Mo Ze Chen used more strength in his stab.


    Just what kind of material was this wall made of?


    Or rather, the better question was, what kind ofw did this wall contain?


    Mo Ze Chen on the other hand had tears in his eyes because he had lost his precious spatialw dagger.


    Any spatialw item definitely wasn''t cheap.

 409 Chapter 409

    As Mo Ze Chen was crying over the loss of his dagger, Lin Fan once again came forward to inspect the walls.


    He could tell that thews inside the walls weren''t normal and there was a familiar feeling that came from them. As he analyzed them more, Lin Fan realized what that familiar feeling was.


    He couldn''t tell before because he didn''t spend that much time on it, but now that he was carefully looking at it, he could see why thesews were special.


    It was because it wasn''t just a singlew that was inside these walls, it was abination of differentws, just like how Lin Fanbinedws. But even withoutbining thesews, he could tell that they were already stronger than their current realm.


    Not to mention that based on the different objects in the surrounding areas, it was easy to tell the age of these ruins were in the five figure number. For thesews to still be this strong after decaying for who knows how many years, it really was hard to imagine just how powerful they had been when they had just been ced.


    Then again, there was the fact thesews were contained in every single building of this city that was several dozen or even over a hundred square kilometers wide. To have that much power to imbue all these buildings with thesews, whoever did it definitely wasn''t simple¡­


    After seeing this, Lin Fan patted Mo Ze Chen on the shoulder before having him put away the scraps of his dagger and heading out. There were still plenty of things in these ruins that they needed to explore, there was no time getting stuck on a single thing. Not to mention the giant glowing tree that was right in the center of the city.


    Once they were out of the building, they once again hid in the corners of the building since there were still the ghosts that were patrolling the streets.


    But this time, while they were hiding, Lin Fan waved his hand to bring out a rat.


    This was one of the puppets that Brainy controlled, but it wasn''t one that had been converted from a corpse. Rather this was a living being that was infected by Brainy''s parasite seed.


    After bringing out this rat, Lin Fan released it and had Brainy control it to run around the city. The moment the rat ran through the streets in front of the ghosts, it was like they had suddenly sensed something as they all turned in the direction of the rat that was running through them.


    There was only a second of hesitation before they all suddenly started dashing in the direction of the rat. The speed that they ran at was surprising because before this, they had only been walking around at a snail''s pace, but now they were making a mad dash at the rat.


    It was a good thing that this rat was still a spirit beast and could run faster than all of these ghosts. But that wasn''t the only reason, it was also because most of these ghosts didn''t have the same muscles as they did when they were human,so it was hard for them to run.


    When they ran, it almost looked like children that were learning to run for the first time.


    Lin Fan had Brainy control this rat into running a circle around the entire area that they were currently in until it had drawn in all the ghosts that were walking around. After drawing all of them in and creating the horde, it left arge gap in the streets of the city.


    Mo Ze Chen''s eyes lit up when he saw this and when he was nning to make a run for it, Lin Fan grabbed him and brought him back to the ground.


    Mo Ze Chen rubbed his butt in pain as he looked at Lin Fan with a confused gaze and asked, "Brother Lin, why did you do that?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother answering him, he didn''t even bother turning to look at Mo Ze Chen on the ground. Rather he waspletely focused on the horde that was chasing the rat.


    Once he was certain that he had pulled in every ghost and hadn''t missed a single one, he had Brainy slow the rat down until the ghosts were finally able to catch up to it. The ghost that was in front pounced right at the rat and grabbed it in both hands.


    Then without any hesitation at all, it brought its mouth down onto the rat, biting right into its neck.


    However, there was no blood that came out, there was only a white glow that appeared from the neck of the rat that slowly flowed into the mouth of the ghost that bit into it.


    After the first ghost bit into the rat, there were others that followed it and they all bit into the rat, causing a flow of white light toe out of the rat and into their mouths.


    Mo Ze Chen was shocked when he saw this and he couldn''t help asking, "What''s happening?"


    In front of them, as the ghosts bit into the rat and sucked that white light out, the rat was slowly aging. As it got older and older, its vital signs became weaker and weaker until theypletely disappeared.


    Once they disappeared, the white light that wasing from the rat stopped.<sub> </sub>


    After this, the ghosts released the rat and went back to their wandering. Some of them stayed in the same location, while others wandered back to the location that they hade from.


    It was only after they had gone away that Lin Fan said, "They were sucking away the rat''s life force."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an even more shocked face as he asked, "Life force, they can do that?"


    Life force was a very powerful and mystical thing, it was something that was very hard to manipte since it dealt with the natural fundamentalws in this world. After all, all things were destined to die and to go against that meant going against the will of the heavens. Without being strong enough to do so, one could never touch life force.


    While sucking out life force seemed easier than gaining life force, it was just as hard because one had to have the ability to manipte life force to do this. If they could manipte life force, they could also take the life force of others to live longer, which was just as heaven defying.


    So the taboo of the heavens was anything that allowed the increase of lifespan.


    That was unless it was something like pills which didn''t technically increase lifespan, but rather just increased the current lifespan.


    There was something called the absolute limit for people and unless they broke through with their cultivation, they wouldn''t be able to break that limit. Life force maniption dealt with that limit which was set by the heavens themselves for each person which meant that it was going against the heavens.


    Pills didn''t give you life force, it drew out the remaining life force that you had, which brought you closer to your absolute limit since most people couldn''t live to reach that absolute limit. So what pills gave you was drawing out the life force that was already inside of you, but you couldn''t ess because of various different reasons.


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this as he continued looking over the ghosts that had just attacked the rat.


    There was no change for the ones that had arrivedte and couldn''t touch the rat, but for the ones that had actuallyid their teeth into the rat, he could clearly see that they were filled with more vitalitypared to before.


    Lin Fan fell into thought once again before raising his hand to bring something else out.


    There was another rat that appeared in his hand, but unlike thest one, this one had eyes that were misted over.


    Lin Fan released this rat just like with the other one and it ran to the ghosts that were wandering in front of him. However, this time, the ghosts didn''t act the same way as before.


    Even after the rat ran a circle around them, these ghosts didn''t react at all to the rat.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows before giving Brainy amand in his mind.


    Brainy received this and gave orders to the rat who immediately jumped up to attack the ghost that was in front of it.


    The ghost didn''t react at first, but when the rat was about to hit it, it suddenly raised its hand to smack the rat to the ground. With just a single smack, the rat exploded to pieces, leaving bloody chunks all over the ground, but not a single one of the ghosts cared about it. Even the ghost that had smacked it into a bloody paste ignored it as they continued wandering around.


    Mo Ze Chen also noticed the difference this time and he asked, "Brother Lin, why didn''t they chase it this time?"


    Lin Fan was lost in thought for a bit before saying, "It''s life force. That one was a dead corpse turned into a puppet and the first one was a living beast that was being controlled."


    Mo Ze Chen knitted his brows before asking, "You''re saying that these ghosts react to life force?"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod without saying a thing.


    It would have been hard for them to explore these ruins before with all these ghosts wandering around, but with this discovery, it suddenly became much easier.

 410 Chapter 410

    These ghosts chased after anything that had life force, which meant that as long as there was something fast enough to bring them away, it was easy to lead these ghosts in a circle.


    As for why Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t want to fight them head on, that was because the cultivations of each of these ghosts weren''t low.


    When they had been chasing after the rat earlier, the ghosts had revealed their cultivation while running.


    The shocking thing was that every single one of these ghosts was in the Embryo Soul Realm, at different levels of the Embryo Soul Realm. Some were in the low Embryo Soul Realm, some were in the mid Embryo Soul Realm, and there were a few different looking ones that were in the high Embryo Soul Realm.


    As for the peak Embryo Soul Realm, Lin Fan hadn''t seen one so far.


    To fight against all of them, with these kinds of numbers, perhaps even someone in the Child Soul Realm wouldn''t be able to take them all on.


    While Lin Fan was certain that he would be able to run from someone in the Child Soul Realm, there was no way for him to fight someone in the Child Soul Ream head on, or at least that was what he thought.


    There was even less of a chance for Mo Ze Chen who was in the low Embryo Soul Realm to win. That was because Mo Ze Chen wasn''t actually abat expert, rather he was an expert in escaping which was a more useful technique when it came to excavating ruins.


    The only thing that Mo Ze Chen had going for him were his artifacts, but those came in limited quantities and there were definitely too many ghosts for him to deal with with just the amount of artifacts that he had now.


    Once he didn''t have any artifacts left, Mo Ze Chen would actually be weaker than a normal expert since he didn''t have any realbat skills.


    That meant that Mo Ze Chen would only be a burden at that point.


    This was why this discovery was important because it allowed them to avoid fighting these ghosts all around them.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time as he released another rat and threw it into the distance.


    As soon as the ratnded, it began running through ghosts, drawing all the nearby ones to chase after it as it led them on a wild goose chase.


    There wasn''t a single ghost that was able to keep up with the rat and soon the path in front of them was cleared. However, Lin Fan didn''t stop it there as he pulled out several more rats that he threw out in different directions.


    These rats all ran off to pull in their own group of ghosts, creating arge area around them that waspletely empty.


    Brainy controlled these rats to continue running around in circles while also moving forward. As they went along, the hordes that were following the various rats also becamerger andrger.


    This seemed like it was very risky because once they lost control of these hordes, it would mean that they would be surrounded by ghosts, but actually it was very safe since none of the ghosts could keep up to the rats. They weren''t even as fast as the rats, so the rats were able to maintain a steady pace as they led the ghosts in circles.


    Just like this, they moved closer and closer to the giant tree of light that was in the center of the city. It almost seemed like they were about to reach it without any consequence, but then there was a sudden explosion that came from nearby.


    Brainy immediately turned its head in the direction of the explosion and Lin Fan could tell that something was wrong.


    Lin Fan asked in his mind, "What is it?"


    Brainy was silent for a bit before saying, "There''s something that suddenly showed up and destroyed one of the puppets. It happened too fast for me to see what it was."


    Lin Fan also knitted his brows when he heard this since this wasn''t good news. It meant that there might be something more dangerous than the ghosts in this city.


    Lin Fan asked, "Can you find out what it is?"


    Brainy gave a nod before saying, "I''ve already sent the other puppets over, it won''t take long before I can see what is happening there."


    Not long after, Brainy could see what it was, but it also couldn''t help knitting its brows.


    Lin Fan could sense this feeling from Brainy and he asked, "What is it?"


    Brainy was about to say something, but it suddenly stopped as it turned in the same direction again. As if on cue, there was another explosion that suddenly rang out once again.


    Brainy focused on controlling its puppets and only after a bit, did Brainy let out a sigh.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan saw that it had finished with what it had been doing, so he asked, "Just what is it?"


    Brainy gave another sigh before saying, "It''s another ghost, but this one is in the peak Embryo Soul Realm. Not only that, it''s much faster than all the other ghosts, so it was able to catch up to my puppets. I had to use the others to take the rest of the horde from the ones that were destroyed, but it''s really pushing it. I''ll need a few more puppets for this, but that''s not the main thing. I''ll need that¡­"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear Brainy suddenly mention that, but he still gave a nod and pulled out the puppets that Brainy needed.


    Mo Ze Chen was confused as to what was happening, but seeing that Lin Fan was clearly taking care of something, he didn''t say anything.


    When Lin Fan pulled out the puppets, what came out were a few more rats, but also a bunny.


    This bunny was very cute and seemedpletely harmless, but the aura that it gave stated otherwise. This bunny was actually in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan threw out the puppets and they all ran off in different directions. As for the bunny, it ran off in the direction of the explosion with Lin Fan following behind it.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw this, he couldn''t help asking, "Brother Lin, isn''t that the direction where the explosions areing from? Shouldn''t we be avoiding that direction?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother exining as he just said, "You can stay if you want, or you can follow me to see what the cause of those explosions are."


    After saying this, Lin Fan didn''t wait at all as he headed off in that direction.


    Mo Ze Chen was left there with a bitter smile, but then he still followed Lin Fan.


    If he were to stay here, who knows what kind of things woulde out to attack him. He knew that it was Lin Fan that was keeping away the ghosts and if he didn''t stay near Lin Fan, there was no guarantee that ghosts would still stay away.


    So stay here and die? He would rather follow Lin Fan into uncertain danger than stay here waiting for certain death.


    Just like that, they travelled off in the direction the explosion came from.


    As they were walking, there were several more explosions that rang out, but this time Brainy didn''t react to them.


    Since Brainy didn''t react, it must mean that there wasn''t anything special that happened.


    Soon, they came closer and closer and they were able to see the explosions in the distance. The longer they had walked, the more frequent the explosions came. It was almost as if whatever was causing it was getting impatient.


    When they finally arrived, they jumped up onto the roof of one of the buildings to get a better look and they saw the bunny running around with arger ghost chasing it. This ghost clearly had a stronger cultivation than the others, but even then, it still couldn''t catch up to this bunny.


    This bunny was one that Lin Fan had caught back in the Kunlun Mountains and it wasn''t a beast that was good for fighting.


    It was a beast that excelled in running, so even though this bigger corpse was faster than the other ghosts, faster than the rats, it still wasn''t able to catch up to the bunny.


    The bunny was even faster than Lin Fan when it came to burst speed, but it''s weakness was in stamina.


    However, even without going max speed, the bunny was able to easily outrun the bigger ghost.


    Even Lin Fan would have been able to outrun the bigger ghost since it wasn''t moving at that fast of a speed. After all, it was still a corpse that was rotten to a certain degree, so its movements were still impacted.


    Mo Ze Chen watched on in amazement at this scene. He knew that he wouldn''t be able to even take a single hit from this peak Embryo Soul Realm ghost, but this bunny was easily able to dodge the attacks from it.


    As Lin Fan was watching the bunny move around with the ghost, he also pulled out a white dagger with a wave of his hand.


    He continued to watch the ghost chase the bunny around until he suddenly saw his chance.


    With a single flick of his wrist, he threw out the white dagger right at the ghost.

 411 Chapter 411

    The white dagger flew straight through the air, aimed right at the head of the ghost, or rather right where the ghost''s head would be when the dagger approached.


    Lin Fan hadn''t killed one before because he never thought that he would need to, but this sudden appearance of this boss ghost made him want to analyze them closer, so he chose to attack this. Since he hadn''t killed one before, he wasn''t sure how to kill it, so he followed the rule of every zombie movie and aimed right at the head.


    The ghost didn''t seem to notice the dagger that had suddenly appeared until it was toote and it was already about to pierce the ghost''s temple.


    This told Lin Fan that these ghosts must have had weak spiritual senses since they were only able to detect the attacks that were aimed at them at the veryst second. This was the case with the attack of the dead rat before and this was the case now with the white dagger that Lin Fan threw out.


    It was already toote by the time the ghost had noticed the dagger, so the only thing it could do was raise its hand to try and block it. Thew that covered the hand seemed strange at first, but when Lin Fan closely looked at it, he realized that it was like thews that were inside the walls of the buildings.


    It wasn''t just a singlew, but rather it was a mix ofws that gathered around the hand of the ghost.


    This hand that was covered inws came up to meet Lin Fan''s white dagger that was also covered in a mixture ofws.


    Compared to before, Lin Fan was much more skilled in usingbinations ofws, so there were currently five differentws that werebined in the white dagger.


    The white dagger met the hand that was outstretched and without any resistance, it cut right through the hand and hit the ghost right in the head.


    If this had been before, perhaps Lin Fan would have struggled a bit, but it was different now since the Iron Eater Bone Artifact had made a breakthrough.


    Earlier when it had devoured the des in the trap, the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was already close to making a breakthrough. It just needed a little bite more and it would have been able to do this.


    This had been on the back of Lin Fan''s mind the entire time since he knew that it would be arge boost to his power if he were to increase the realm of the Iron Eater Bone Artifact. After all, it wasn''t a small increase in cultivation, it was a giant leap going from the peak Embryo Soul Realm to the Child Soul Realm.


    He had found this chance when they had been walking through this city.


    Lin Fan had remembered how hard the buildings were even without thews that flowed through them, which meant that they must have been made from some special material. Since that was the case, wouldn''t it make sense that the Iron Eater Bone Artifact would be able to swallow it.


    As it turned out, it was indeed able to absorb the essence of these buildings and it had made a breakthrough to the Child Soul Realm.


    Without this breakthrough, Lin Fan''s attack wouldn''t have been able to break through the defenses of the ghost so easily.


    Thews that the ghostbined were actually a mix of threews, so while it wasn''t multiplied as much as thebination of fivews, the ghost had a higher cultivation realm with strongerws. So that meant that thebination of thesews would have been able to match Lin Fan''sws.


    The only problem was that Lin Fan''s artifact had been upgraded to the Child Soul Realm, so its sharpness wasn''t a joke and had easily cut through the body of the ghost that was only in the peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    The dagger went right through the hand of the ghost and stabbed right through the temple of the ghost''s head, piercing through its skull tond on the ground on the other side of the ghost.


    The ghost didn''t even have time to process what happened before it fell to the ground.


    p If the ghost had been able to feel emotions, it definitely would have had a feeling of confusion and regret since it wasn''t even able to tell why it had lost.</anda>


    But that wasn''t that strange thing with this situation.


    The strange thing was that as soon as the peak Embryo Soul Realm ghost had been killed, all the other ghosts that had been in the area suddenly stopped moving.


    They turned to look in the direction of the ghost that had just fallen before giving screams and running off in fear.


    Lin Fan was confused when he saw this at first, but putting the pieces together based on what he had seen before, he guessed that this peak Embryo Soul Realm ghost was actually themander of the ghosts in this surrounding area.


    Once they had lost theirmander, of course the other ghosts would scatter.<sub> </sub>


    As for why they screamed, that was still a mystery to Lin Fan, but he didn''t have time to worry about it now.


    After all, thismander ghost had only appeared after they had approached the tree of light, which meant that they must be scattered around the tree of light guarding it. It wouldn''t just be a singlemander ghost that was here because this area was too big for a single one to guard, so there must be othermander ghosts as well.


    The one thing that they had to do now was get away from this area before the othermander ghosts showed up.


    Lin Fan jumped down and put the ghost''s corpse into his Storage Ring before quickly running off.


    While they were running away, Brainy also had sent out the puppets to ensure that there was a buffer zone around them, but it also made it much smaller to ensure that they didn''t draw attention.


    Instead of running towards the tree of light, Lin Fan moved further away from the tree of light just in case there were other strong creatures that were waiting around the base of the tree, guarding it from intruders.


    It was a good thing since after he left the area, there were tworge ghosts just like the one that he had taken care of that hade to this area.


    They couldn''t find the corpse of the ghost that had been killed, but they moved around the area where the corpse had just been, screaming at each other like they weremunicating something.


    After screaming for a bit, both of them turned in separate directions and jumped off.


    After moving away from the area that he had just been in, Lin Fan took out the corpse of the ghostmander again and began looking over it.


    There wasn''t much special about this corpse, except that it was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, so the life energy that was slowly radiating from it was definitely powerful.


    But that wasn''t what Lin Fan cared about.


    What he cared about was what he found inside the head, or rather what he found ack of.


    This corpse was missing a soul¡­


    The soul was the most important thing for any living being, it was what defined what was considered a living being.


    A body without a soul was nothing more than a pile of flesh without any essence, which meant that such a body shouldn''t have been capable of more than just simple movements.


    However, this ghostmander had shown the ability tomand the surrounding ghosts and had the ability to think independently, being able to find the puppets that Brainy had been using to lure away the ghosts. These weren''t the signs of a puppet that had lost its soul, this was the sign of something that was still in full control of itself.


    As Lin Fan looked closer, he couldn''t tell why the soul was missing, but he had found an array that was carved into the back of this corpse''s head.


    Lin Fan could sense a faint connection that wasing from the array that seemed to be connecting to something. If Lin Fan had to guess, it should be the soul that was originally in this body¡­


    But how could someone even remove it and still connect it to the body like this?


    Also, what would happen to the soul after it returned to the body that Lin Fan had just destroyed?


    There were many questions in Lin Fan''s mind over what this was, but he couldn''t find the answer to these at all.


    All Lin Fan knew was that whoever did this was definitely an expert that was far beyond hisprehension because souls were another one of the fundamental things in this world that was ruled by the heavens. For someone to y with souls like this, on top of life force, they must be someone who was far beyond hisprehension¡­


    The only reason Lin Fan knew about all of this was because he had asked Momonga about souls before when he was dealing with the soul fragments of the Beast King on the Blue Star. He had learned plenty of things about souls after this.


    But while he did learn many different things here, one thing that he did know was that everything should be connected to the giant glowing tree in the middle.

 412 Chapter 412

    Lin Fan brought out several more rat puppets after deciding to head to the tree in the middle.


    Last time they had created toorge of a horde which had been too risky, so this time Lin Fan decided to bring out some more puppets to ensure that the hordes wouldn''t get too big and unmanageable.


    After all, if these puppets were taken out again and if the horde was too big, it would be troublesome to fight both the horde and the ghostmander at the same time since these ghosts were just too strong individually. As a mass, they created a powerful death ball that even Lin Fan found hard to fight.


    At the same time, Lin Fan also left the bunny that he summoned out just in case it was needed for anything.


    The bunny was kept near Lin Fan, inside the open space that they created with the puppets. That way, it could react in any direction if there was a need for it to go out to distract anything.


    Lin Fan wasn''t certain how many ghostmanders there were, but after walking around a bit and searching for the best way in, Lin Fan decided to take the same path as before.


    This was a bit of luck on his part because he had chosen to take this path right after the two ghostmanders who hade to look for the corpse of the ghostmander that Lin Fan took out decided to leave. That meant that there was a gap in the defenses that Lin Fan took advantage of and was able to easily make it to the tree of light.


    When he arrived, he made sure to clear out a space around him near the base of the tree of light before walking over to examine it.


    When he and Mo Ze Chen came over, Mo Ze Chen did the same thing as before, trying to climb the tree to see what was special about it. However, this time the tree was much bigger and it was a straight climb up for Mo Ze Chen if he decided to climb it.


    Even if he was strong, he wasn''t able to do that with his body since he was someone who didn''t train his body when cultivating. He would be able to climb up to a certain point, but then he wouldn''t have the energy to climb up the rest of the way.


    Since that was the case, Mo Ze Chen chose to forcefully climb up the tree.


    He took out a pair of climbing axes and moved right to the trunk of this tree of light, bringing them back before swinging it at the trunk to climb up. However, the moment the climbing axes made contact with the trunk of the tree, the des of the axes immediately shattered to pieces.


    Mo Ze Chen looked at the climbing axes in his hands in shock before turning to look back at the trunk of the tree in disbelief.


    That was because the climbing axes in his hand had been a pair of special artifacts that he had been using for the longest time. They were one of the first artifacts that he had ever found and they had never let him down.


    These climbing axes were imbued with piercingws, which meant that they were much better at digging into surfacespared to normal climbing axes. They had never failed him before, but today they had been shattered the moment they tried to pierce the tree.


    Just what was this tree?


    While Mo Ze Chen''s heart broke over another one of his artifacts breaking, Lin Fan had been at the trunk of the tree looking it over.


    This was the tree that everything in this city had been guarding, so it must be something special.


    However, when Lin Fan tried to send his spiritual sense into it, he found that he was unable to do so at all. It was like this tree was made of imprable steel and his spiritual sense was like an egg. The moment that his spiritual sense hit the tree, it immediately scattered and dealt bacsh to him.


    Of course, Lin Fan had only used a small bit of his spiritual sense as a probe, so the bacsh he felt wasn''t that strong, but he still couldn''t help wondering just what this tree was made of.


    Lin Fan thenbined his spiritual sense with Brainy and tried to break through again, but they found that they still weren''t able to break through. Once again, the spiritual sense scattered and they suffered bacsh together, but Brainy''s spiritual sense was much stronger, so it was able to easily deal with this bacsh.


    Lin Fan gave up the idea of using his spiritual sense to check the tree and put his hand on it, using his absorbing power to see if he could suck out a wisp of thew. However, once again, it was the same result as the spiritual sense as the trunk of the tree kept thew safe inside the tree and scattered Lin Fan''s power, but there was something that was different this time.


    The absorption power was able to draw thews that were hidden deep inside the tree up to the surface, so Lin Fan was able to sense what kind ofw it was.


    It was without a doubt lightw, but the power that was contained within it was something that Lin Fan couldn''t begin to fathom. It was at a level that was far beyond anything that Lin Fan hade in contact with before, it was even at a level that was beyond Qing Ao who was the strongest person that he had met in this upper realm.


    For this tree of light to have such power, it must be a very special existence that came from a very special expert.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan even began doubting whether this was something that came from someone that was on the same level as Momonga and Ang. Perhaps this was something that was left behind by a Ruler, one of the true experts of this universe.


    If that was the case, just what would be hidden inside of it?


    But before he could even start thinking about that, what Lin Fan had to do first was find a way to get into the tree.


    There was no way that they would be able to break through since Lin Fan had already seen how hard it was, being demonstrated by both Mo Ze Chen''s climbing axes and how it had scattered Lin Fan''s spiritual sense.


    As Lin Fan was considering it, he suddenly noticed something on the tree out of the corner of his eyes.


    He didn''t think much of it at first, but then he realized that something was wrong. When Lin Fan turned to look carefully at it, he realized that just like before, this was a message that was written in Chinese.


    It was a very simple message, there were just the words "this way" along with an arrow pointing to the right underneath it.


    Lin Fan immediately called Mo Ze Chen over and asked, "Can you see this?" As he asked this, he pointed at the message in Chinese.


    Mo Ze Chen looked in the direction that Lin Fan was pointing in and knitted his brows again as he said, "Brother Lin, what are you talking about? There''s nothing there."


    It was the same phenomenon as before, this was another message that only Lin Fan could see and it was a message that was written in Chinese.


    Mo Ze Chen went closer to where Lin Fan was pointing and carefully looked at the trunk of the tree, but he still couldn''t see anything. However, he no longer doubted Lin Fan like before because after Lin Fan had asked this questionst time, he had suddenly pushed something on the podium and the door had opened.


    It was clear that there must be some secret message that only Lin Fan could see, but why was Lin Fan the only one that could see it?


    This lit the spark of curiosity inside of Mo Ze Chen and he wanted to continue examining this, but Lin Fan didn''t give him the time.


    Last time the message in Chinese had helped him discover the true face of these ruins, so perhaps this time that message would help him too. Perhaps, it would also lead Lin Fan to the one that had written this message.


    For it to be written in Chinese, it must mean that there was someone who knew about his previous world, or perhaps it might even be his transmigration senior¡­


    Either way, Lin Fan just wanted to find someone to talk about earth to.


    So Lin Fan dragged Mo Ze Chen along to the right.


    ¡­


    While Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were looking for a way into the giant tree of light, there was some movement that came from the entrance to this ce.


    After the sound of a few footsteps, there was a group of people that had suddenlye out of the passage down into this city.


    This group consisted of five humans, three males and two females, but two of the males had chains around their necks which thest male was holding the end to and following behind the three others.


    The two girls looked around the city before saying, "Wow, you''d never think that there would be such a ce down here."


    The male who was holding the chains also looked around before saying with a greedy smile, "Since there''s such a ce down here, there must also be treasures for us to take."

 413 Chapter 413

    Of course, there wasn''t a single one of them that rashly moved in.


    This party of five slowly made their way into the city, hiding in the corners of the buildings while looking over the ghosts that wandered around the city.


    It was clear that these ghosts were normal since they were able tost in this kind of ce for so long and then there was the giant tree of light. For this tree of light tost in this ce for this long, it must be something special. Since that was the case, the best loot must be there.


    As they were moving along the city, they found that there was a part of the city where there were fewer ghostspared to the other parts of the city. It seemed like it was creating a straight line right to the tree of light in the center.


    The man who was holding the chains was called Dugu Xiao, he was one of the seeded candidates for the exam and the one that was leading this group.


    In the group that he led, there were the two girls who had passed the first exam who he had taken in before the second exam. As for the other two men that had chains around their necks, they were people who had passed the first exam that were unfortunate enough to run into Dugu Xiao during this exam. Dugu Xiao had immediately beaten them and sealed them up with chains.


    If this was anywhere else, this wouldn''t have been allowed, but in this ce where there were no rules at all, he was free to do as he pleased. He chained them up to force them to follow him and he had full ns on using them as cannon fodder.


    Such as in this situation.


    Dugu Xiao looked at the area where there was a distinctck of ghosts before turning to the two girls and saying, "It seems like someone else has already made their way down here and it seems like they''ve found a way to lure the ghosts away. Since that''s the case, there should be a way for us to do the same."


    One of the girls looked at the two men who were chained up and said, "How about we use them to lure the ghosts away?"


    Dugu Xiao looked at them as well with a thoughtful gaze before saying, "I was thinking that as well, but the moment we let them go, who knows if they''ll lead the ghosts back to us as well. We don''t know how strong the ghosts are, so I can''t take that risk."


    After a pause, Dugu Xiao took out his de and put it at the neck of one of the chained men before saying, "Summon out your pet."


    Seeing the de at his neck, that man immediately called out his pet which was a bright red bird. This bird was a Fire Finch, one of the fastestmon pets out there.


    Dugu Xiao''s eyes lit up when he saw this sincest time, he didn''t get to see their pets. When he had caught them and chained them up, it only took a single swing of his sword to scare them into submitting. After all, seeing yourrades being cut in half in front of you was definitely a terrifying thing.


    These two that had chosen to be chained were the smarter ones because the ones that had chosen to resist all had their heads cut off.


    If they submitted, they would at least be able to keep their lives and have a chance to find a way to escape.


    Dugu Xiao pointed at the ghosts that were in front of them and said, "Send your pet out there and draw away all the ghosts in front of us. If you dare make one wrong move, know that it''ll be your head that flies."


    That man looked up at Dugu Xiao and gave a nod before sending his pet out there.


    The Fire Finch quickly flew up to the ghosts and the moment it flew past them, the ghosts immediately reacted to it. Just like with Lin Fan and his rat puppets, they immediately started chasing the Fire Finch, but the Fire Finch was much faster than the rats, so it was able to easily keep the ghosts behind it at a steady pace.


    Seeing this, Dugu Xiao narrowed his eyes.


    He didn''t narrow his eyes because of how fast the ghosts were, but rather because of the aura that came from them. The moment the ghosts started chasing the Fire Finch, they immediately released their aura, which showed that they were in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    They were in different levels of the Embryo Soul Realm, but Dugu Xiao himself was only in the mid Embryo Soul Realm, so he definitely wasn''t able to take them on. Especially after he saw the high Embryo Soul Realm ghost that was chasing the Fire Finch.


    Even Dugu Xiao who was in the Embryo Soul Realm had such a strong reaction after seeing the cultivation level of the ghosts, so there was no need to mention the others.


    The two girls immediately came forward and rubbed their bodies against Dugu Xiao as they said, "Xiao Xiao, we''re scared."<sub> </sub>


    These two girls were quite scantily d and showed quite a bit of skin, which was the main reason why Dugu Xiao had even let them tag along. After all, Dugu Xiao was a man and he had his instincts. If women were to throw themselves at him, there was no reason for him to resist.


    Dugu Xiao revealed a smile and said, "It''s fine, I''ll take care of you."


    As he said this, his hands came forward to squeeze their chests which caused a blush toe over their faces, but they didn''t resist at all.


    For Dugu Xiao, he was fine with keeping them with him, but that would all change if it was a dangerous situation. He wouldn''t hesitate to throw them away if there was any danger to his own life because his life was the most important. However, seeing how easily the Fire Finch was able to keep the ghosts at bay, he knew that there wouldn''t be any danger here.


    Dugu Xiao had some fine with the girls while the two men in chains turned around, not daring to watch. After all, thest person who had dared to watch had already lost their head and they didn''t want to lose their heads yet.


    Dugu Xiao was already certain that he would be able to easily make his way to the giant tree of light in the center and he would get quite a few treasures, that was just the pride that he had as a young genius who had never suffered a setback before. That was also why he didn''t mind having a bit of fun with these girls even though this was a very dangerous ce.


    But what Dugu Xiao never expected happened next.


    As they were about to start their fun, there was a sudden boom that came from behind them and the ground shook.


    Dugu Xiao, the girls, and the two men all turned to look in the direction of that sound, but before they could see a thing, there was a wall of dust that suddenly hit them right in the face.


    Everyone was pushed back by that wall of dust and it took them a bit of effort to stabilize themselves, but Dugu Xiao who had stabilized himself first looked in the direction the cloud of dust came from and he was shocked.


    When the rest of them turned, they were also shocked to see what it was.


    That was because there was a giant beast that had suddenly appeared at the entrance. Under the feet of that beast were pieces of stone and when they looked up, they found that there was a giant hole in the ceiling.


    This giant beast had suddenly fallen down and had created this giant cloud of dust that had almost blown them all away. Just how heavy was this beast?


    But they didn''t have any time to react since the beast was already making its own move.


    The beast took a sniff of the air before suddenly turning in the direction of Dugu Xiao''s group. The moment it looked over, there was a mountain-like pressure that suddenly fell over them and not a single one of them was able to make a move. To them, it was like there was a scythe that was ced at their necks and they would die at any moment.


    Then in the blink of an eye, the beast suddenly disappeared from where it had been.


    They were about to look around for the beast, but then their area suddenly became much darker. Everyone looked up to see the beast on the roof of one of the buildings that created this alley.


    This beast was looking right down at them before it suddenly opened its mouth to say, "What are you all doing here?"


    As it said this, there was a cold sweat that broke out on Dugu Xiao''s back because he could sense thews that were contained within its words. Just a few words would have already been enough to crush him.


    One of the men that were chained couldn''t take it anymore and he screamed, "I don''t want to die!"


    After that, ignoring the chain that was around his neck, he immediately ran off towards the entrance of the alley.


    It was a good thing that Dugu Xiao was too stunned to pull on the chain and it was yanked out of his hand. The bad thing was that the beast suddenly raised its paw and smacked down, turning that person into a pool of blood in the ground.


    After turning that person into a pool of blood in the ground, it licked its paw before saying, "Now, how about you answer my question?"

 414 Chapter 414

    This period of terror didn''tst long for this group and when it was over, there were four more pools of blood that were on the ground.


    Naturally these were the other four members of Dugu Xiao''s party, including Dugu Xiao himself.


    On the roof, the beast was still casually licking its paw as if nothing had happened at all.


    The strange thing was that the ghost that normally would have ignored everything hade over to see what themotion was, but the moment they saw the beast, they just gave it a bow before leaving.


    The beast didn''t even bother looking at them as it turned its head in the direction of the tree of light. It didn''t take long before there were two more ghosts that had appeared, but these ghosts were different from the normal ghosts that had all run away. These two ghosts were actually the ghostmanders that had appeared to investigate the disappearance of the one that Lin Fan killed.


    The beast turned to look in their direction before saying, "Did you find the one?"


    The two ghosts shook their heads before one of them said, "We looked in the area, but we couldn''t find them."


    The beast didn''t bother answering as it said, "Then they must have headed to the tree¡­"


    Without another word, the beast suddenly jumped out and flew off in the direction of the tree of light.


    Since the two ghosts had lower cultivation levelspared to this beast, they could only look at each other with bitter smiles before following behind the beasts.


    As the beast flew through the air, there were more and more ghostmanders that gradually began following it as it flew through the air.


    Their destination?


    It was without a doubt the giant tree of light in the middle.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had walked around the edge of the tree, following the arrows that lined the trunk for over half an hour before they finally arrived at what the arrows were pointing at.


    At first they weren''t sure what this was, so they continued forward, but once they went past a certain point, there were arrows that now pointed to the left. Since that was the case, what the arrows were pointing at was the ce that they doubted the most.


    To call it an entrance would be a stretch because it was nothing more than a small hole in the side of the trunk of the tree. When they looked in, all they saw was a small burrow inside of the tree of light that was strangely dark, but they didn''t think too much about it.


    No matter how they looked at it, it didn''t seem like it was a special ce.


    However, the arrows were pointing to it in the end, so there must be something special about it.


    Or at least that was what Lin Fan thought.


    When Mo Ze Chen stared at this empty little burrow, he couldn''t help thinking that Lin Fan was ying a trick on him.


    But that all changed when they came back to the burrow.


    After deciding to follow through with this, both of them entered the burrow through the little hole in the side of the tree. The little hole was so small that all they could do was crawl their way in.


    Once they were inside, the spacing situation wasn''t much better. If they stood up, they found that their heads reached the top of this burrow and they would hit it if they stood up straight. So they had no choice but to stand with a slight slouch.


    Aftering into the burrow, they walked around looking for something special about this ce, but they couldn''t find a single thing.


    That was until Mo Ze Chen was about to leave the burrow, it was only at that moment that Lin Fan found a golden acorn that was hidden in the corner of the burrow, underneath some trees.


    Mo Ze Chen saw the glow suddenly appear in the burrow and he immediately came over to look at what Lin Fan was holding, but he was disappointed when he saw that it was nothing more than a golden acorn.


    Mo Ze Chen said with a depressed look, "What are we supposed to do with this?"


    Lin Fan pointed right behind Mo Ze Chen without saying a word.


    When Mo Ze Chen turned around, he suddenly saw that there was an acorn shaped hole that was in the wall of the burrow. It couldn''t be more clear what this hole was for.<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen moved aside to let Lin Fan pass even though he wanted to be the one to put the acorn into the hole, but still it was Lin Fan''s right since he was the one that had found it in the first ce.


    p But Lin Fan didn''t do this and held the acorn up in front of Mo Ze Chen.</anda>


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised when he saw this before he asked, "Are you sure?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod.


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an excited look before saying, "Brother Lin, it was the right choice following you!"


    What Mo Ze Chen didn''t know was that Lin Fan was actually just using him since he wasn''t sure what would happen if he put this acorn in. Since that was the case, it was better to use the convenient scapegoat that he had brought with him.


    But none of this was on Mo Ze Chen''s mind since he could smell the scent of mystery in the air and it made his blood boil. This was why Mo Ze Chen had chosen to get into ruin hunting, even if it was dangerous.


    Mo Ze Chen came up to the wall and slowly brought the acorn up to the hole. As he held it in front of the hole, he also brought his head forward to make sure that the acorn was just the right size for the hole, but he found no problems there.


    The moment the acorn touched the hole, it was almost as if there was an invisible force that had sucked it in. Even if Mo Ze Chen wanted to keep hold of this acorn, he wasn''t able to do so since the force sucking it in was too strong.


    The acorn fit perfectly into the hole and after a slight pause, it was pulled right into the hole and disappeared.


    Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan both looked around expectantly when they saw this, but to their disappointment, there was nothing that changed in the burrow.


    That was, until a full minute after the acorn had disappeared.


    During this entire minute, they had heard the sound of something rolling through the burrow around them, but they weren''t sure what it was.


    But once a "click" sound rang out and the burrow shook, they knew what it was. It seemed like the acorn had been rolling around inside the walls until it reached a certain mechanism that unlocked something.


    As if to confirm their guess, there was a sliver of white that suddenly appeared in the wall of the burrow as it became wider and wider until it revealed a passage into another room.


    Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan both carefully came up to this passage and sent their spiritual sense inside first, but after making sure that there was nothing dangerous inside, they slowly went in.


    Aftering through this passage, they appeared inside a room that waspletely white. There wasn''t a single part of the room that was different, that is except for the passage behind them that still led to the burrow. That was the only part of the room that was a different colour.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen both came up to the walls of the room and felt the material. This room was made of a pure and smooth white marble thatpletely covered every part of the walls, roof, and floor, but that was strange. Why was there a room that waspletely made of marble inside this giant tree?


    Was it something that formed naturally or was it the more likely choice that it was something that someone had built in here?


    But if they did build it inside this tree, what was the purpose of this room?


    As they wandered around the room, before either of them could even react, the passage behind them had suddenly closed.


    Both of them turned back to look at where the passage had been where there was now a white wall just like the rest of the room.


    It seemed like they were trapped in here¡­


    But neither of them panicked as they continued looking over the walls of this room.


    Mo Ze Chen no longer rushed to pull out an artifact to attack anything in these ruins since he had already lost two artifacts like that. Rather, he was waiting for Lin Fan to make a move.


    As for Lin Fan, he had pulled out his white dagger and had ced it on the wall.


    These ruins had been a gold mine when it came to rare minerals for him, so he was also hoping that the marble walls here would also be made from a rare metal. After all, the stronger that his weapon became, the better it was for him.


    It was too bad that there was no reaction that came from the white dagger at all.


    So while Lin Fan was considering what to do, there was a sudden sh of light that appeared in this room.

 415 Chapter 415

    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen turned in the direction of the light, but it was too intense for them to see anything.


    After the light had appeared for a few seconds, it slowly began to dim until they could see what the source of it was.


    Out of the marble wall, there was a figure that had formed, taking the form of a woman with wings on her back. This was a woman madepletely out of marble which made her skin pure white, but it wasn''t just this that made her seem pure and innocent. Her face was the very definition of pure and innocent with baby soft cheeks and wide pure blue eyes. If one looked at her, they would immediately think of an angel.


    However, if they looked down even slightly, they wouldn''t think the same because that face really didn''t match that body.


    This was a face that was like an angel, but her body, those curves were like the demon''s.


    Neither Lin Fan nor Mo Ze Chen said a thing as they watched that figure slowlye out of the wall until she was perfectly standing in front of the wall like a statue.


    This woman didn''t say a thing either as she looked over the two of them.


    It was only after a long period of silence that Mo Ze Chen worked up his courage to ask, "Are you single?"


    This created another span of silence that was much heavier than the silence from before.


    Both Lin Fan and the woman looked at Mo Ze Chen with a confused look, thinking to themselves if this person''s mind was already. But for Mo Ze Chen, his gaze was firmly on the woman in front of him.


    This woman was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, it was as if every cell in his body was telling him to make her his.


    The sad thing was that Mo Ze Chen wasn''t as handsome as Lin Fan, he wasn''t even half as handsome as Lin Fan.


    Mo Ze Chen was someone who could be described as a round ball since he was quite chubby. He had chubby cheeks and a round nose, which did make him look a bit cute, but then there was the mess of hair on his head that ruined it all. It hung over his eyes like a mop on his head, whichpletely ruined his entire style.


    Then there was the fact that he liked to wear the uniform of an archeologist with a trench coat over it, but it didn''t fit him at all since he stretched it out too much with his figure.


    If Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were standing side by side, every single girl with normal tastes would choose Lin Fan every time.


    After a long period of silence, Mo Ze Chen asked, "Is that a no?"


    The woman looked at Mo Ze Chen with a sad look before asking him, "Are you the chosen one?"


    Mo Ze Chen immediately revealed a confused look when he heard this and he asked, "Chosen one? What is that?"


    The woman gave a sigh before saying, "I and everyone else are trapped in here and without the chosen one to release us, we have no rights to choose anything, including the ones that we will be with."


    Mo Ze Chen knitted his brows when he heard this, "Then where do I find this chosen one?"


    At this, the woman suddenly revealed a confused look, "Logically speaking, this ce should only be open when the chosen one appears, so that means that the chosen one is already here. However, I can''t sense the energy of the chosen one at all."


    At this Mo Ze Chen turned to look at Lin Fan.


    After all, Lin Fan was the one who could see all those things that he couldn''t see and it was because of him pressing something on the podium that the passage opened in the first ce.


    Could it be that Lin Fan was the chosen one?


    But that wouldn''t make sense either since she said that she couldn''t sense the energy of the chosen one. With how close Lin Fan was right now, it wouldn''t make sense that she wouldn''t be able to recognize the energy in him.


    What he didn''t know was that Lin Fan''s physique was unique. As long as he didn''t want his energy leaking out, it wouldn''t, which was why the woman didn''t sense anything from Lin Fan.


    As for Lin Fan, he could guess what was happening here, but he didn''t understand what his transmigration senior would do such a thing¡­


    Perhaps this wouldn''t turn out the way he wanted, perhaps the transmigration senior that had left these ruins was evil. There were plenty of stories where seniors lured unsuspecting juniors into their ruins to try and steal their bodies, was this one of those cases?


    Lin Fan didn''t know how he should continue with this¡­


    Mo Ze Chen wasn''t discouraged by this as he asked, "Then, can I ask you if you''ve ever had a boyfriend before?"


    The woman was taken aback when she heard this, but she still honestly shook her head and said, "No, even before I was turned into this, I never had a boyfriend before¡­"


    As she said this, she shyly looked down. If she could, she definitely would have been blushing at this moment, but she couldn''t with her body that was made of stone.<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen turned around to quickly give a fist pump before turning back to ask, "Then when you are freed, can I take you out on a date?"


    The woman once again lowered her head even deeper than before, looking like she was very embarrassed. After a while, she said in a low voice, "Alright."


    Mo Ze Chen''s face bloomed into a smile when he heard this.


    As for the woman, before any of this had even happened, she had rarely talked to me, much less gone on a date. The only men she had ever even talked to was her father and her cousin.


    Now that there was someone who was asking her out this openly, of course she would be embarrassed.


    However, her heart couldn''t help being touched by this since she knew what she was right now. For him to not even care and still ask her out on a date, there had to be something special there.


    But it was just the delusion of a girl who had never been in love before.


    Mo Ze Chen had simply fallen in love at first sight with her appearance, nothing more, nothing less.


    Still, sometimes that was all it took for love to blossom. Just a simple misunderstanding like this would be enough.


    Mo Ze Chen then said with a serious look, "You said that the chosen one would set you free? How would he do that?"


    The woman slowly came back from her shyness and looked back up, this time with a serious look as she said, "I don''t know exactly how they will save us, but that''s what we were told by the one who trapped us here."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a confused look, "He trapped you here, but he also told you about the chosen one that will save you. Just what is he trying to do with this?"


    The woman shook her head and said, "I don''t know, this was all they told us."


    Mo Ze Chen fell into deep thought after this.


    Lin Fan had been in deep thought the entire time, but he hadn''t been able to think this through, so he actually gave up trying.


    This was definitely a trap no matter how he looked at it, but sometimes there were benefits to traps. After all, this was someone who could write in Chinese, so they must be connected to earth somehow and that was what Lin Fan wanted to know the most.


    Because if they could write Chinese letters, perhaps they would know a way back to earth¡­


    After Mo Ze Chen came back from his thoughts, he suddenly asked, "So what do we do now?"


    The woman turned to the side and tapped the wall, causing a hold to suddenly appear in that wall.


    The hole in that wall opened to reveal a whole other scene inside of the tree. The space that appeared in front of them was just like the city outside, but on a smaller scale.


    The only reason they knew that it was inside the tree was because they could see the trunk that was surrounding the tree.


    The woman pointed at it and said, "Inside there is a trial for the chosen one and only the chosen one can bring back the special item. As long as they pass this trial, we will all be freed."


    Mo Ze Chen looked into the hole before giving a nod and saying, "I promise you that we''ll finish this trial."


    Then without waiting at all, he suddenly grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder and started pulling him into the hole.


    But right before he entered, Mo Ze Chen realized something and he turned back to ask, "Your name, you never told me your name!"


    As he said this, his foot had already passed through the threshold and the hole around him was starting to close.


    The woman looked at him for a second before saying with a smile, "Lulu, my name is Lulu."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed what he considered a brave smile as he said, "Lulu, I''ll be back for you."


    After saying that, the hole closed behind them and they disappeared from that white room.


    Lulu was left there on her own and after a few seconds, she gave a nod with a bitter smile and said, "Un."


    After saying this, she melded back into the wall and disappeared with another sh of light.

 416 Chapter 416

    When they went through the hole, Mo Ze Chen didn''t forget to look back, but all he saw was inside of the trunk of the tree behind him. The hole hadpletely closed and there was no sign of that room of white anymore.


    Mo Ze Chen gave a sigh in the end before turning to Lin Fan to ask, "Boss, do you know anything about the chosen?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by what Mo Ze Chen called him.


    Before this, Mo Ze Chen had called him "Brother Lin", but now he had suddenly changed to "boss".


    It was clear what he was thinking¡­


    Well, it didn''t take a lot of brain power to understand that Lin Fan''s ability to read words that he couldn''t see was an indication of something. It was very likely that Lin Fan was the chosen one that they talked about.


    Since that was the case, if the chosen one was the one who would be able to save the girl of his dreams, there was no doubt what he should do. For the girl of his dreams, there was no need for his dignity either.


    He was even willing to sell his soul to the devil, which was Lin Fan in this case¡­


    Though Lin Fan would probably resent being called the devil in this case¡­


    Still, this was fine with Lin Fan since he had already nned on bringing Mo Ze Chen into his fold.


    He had seen all the artifacts that Mo Ze Chen had and since he had already ced a seed into Mo Ze Chen, it wasn''t like Mo Ze Chen would have had much choice.


    Of course,pared to someone he forced under him, he preferred someone who followed him out of their own free will. The chance was in front of him now, so how could he just let it go?


    Lin Fan paused for a second before saying, "I can''t tell you exactly why I can see these things that you can''t and I can''t tell you why I can understand them, but I can tell you that if you follow me, you should be able to get what you want. Can you ept those terms?"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod without any hesitation as he said, "As long as you can help me save Lulu, I can even give you my soul."


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitterugh, "There''s no need for that. As long as you''re willing to follow me, naturally I will help you with this."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a teary look as he said, "Boss, you really are a good guy."


    As he said this, Mo Ze Chen was about to jump forward to hug Lin Fan, but Lin Fan quickly raised his hand to stop him as he said, "There''s no need for that."


    Please, Lin Fan didn''t need any good guy cards, especially from other men¡­


    Mo Ze Chen stopped for a second after Lin Fan cut him off, but then he swore, "Boss, as long as you can help me get together with Lulu, I swear that I''ll follow you to the ends of the world!"


    While Lin Fan didn''t get why Mo Ze Chen was so infatuated, he still chose to ept this since it was an easy way to control Mo Ze Chen which he already nned on doing.


    At the same time, he couldn''t help thinking how Mo Ze Chen would act if he was to see Ang...Would he have to beat Mo Ze Chen in the end?


    After settling this, the two of them started heading into the city that was in front of them.


    ¡­


    Outside the tree of light, even though Dugu Xiao''s first party had been smashed by the beast that had suddenly appeared, there were still more examinees that made their way into the city.


    They were all groups that had seeded candidates, so they were careful as they made their way through the city.


    There was even one group that had found the pools of blood that Dugu Xiao''s group had left and they immediately avoided that.


    There were traces of residual life energy that was left in those pools of blood. Based on those residual traces, they were able to estimate just how strong the one who created these pools of blood were.


    If whatever created the pools of blood were still here, it was best for them to leave as quickly as possible.


    But of course, all of them were smart people or they wouldn''t have been designated as seeded candidates. Even if they weren''t smart, it didn''t take a genius to tell where the true treasures of these ruins would be hiding.


    Naturally they would be in the giant tree of light that was right at the center of the city.


    Slowly but surely, the various teams began to make their way towards the giant tree of light.


    Some of them had chosen to use chained captives to lure these ghosts around to clear a path for themselves.


    Some of them chose to use their own pets since they didn''t have any chained captives with them.<sub> </sub>


    And finally there were those rare ones that weren''t in groups at all, but rather travelled alone that slowly made their way to the center of the city. Along the way, they lured in the ghosts one by one to fight against them.


    The ghosts were actually much stronger than normal experts because they had the ability tobinews. While it was only twows that they were able tobine, it still made them stronger than experts at the same level.


    However, the ones that chose to move alone were those that were much stronger than those at the same level, they were the ones that were considered peak geniuses. It was no problem for them to take out the ghosts.


    Rather, they took their time to fight the ghosts because they considered it a form ofbat training which was much more valuable than any treasure they would find.


    But they also did find a strange thing with the ghosts.


    In thebinedws that the ghosts used, there was always only a singlew that was constant among these ghosts and the otherw would differ between ghosts. It was almost as if each ghost had their own attributes which determined whichws they used.


    But what about the firstw, the one that wasmon among them?


    Where did thate from?


    p Still, they didn''t have time to consider that since they were on a time limit.</anda>


    It had already been close to six hours since they had entered these ruins, which meant that they would only have six hours left. If they didn''t take advantage of this time, there would be many benefits that they would be missing out on, so they didn''t have time to consider all of this.


    ¡­


    Inside the tree of light, in another room that waspletely white, there was a sh of light before Lulu appeared.


    When she appeared, she was surprised to see who it was.


    It was the beast that had killed Dugu Xiao''s group as well as the ghostmanders.


    She looked at the beast with a curious gaze as she asked, "What are you doing here?"


    The beast licked its paw before saying, "Since this ce is open, you should know what that means."


    She still asked, "Why are you here?"


    The beast looked at her with narrowed eyes before saying, "What are you hiding?"


    Lulu was taken aback when she heard this, but then she asked, "What do you mean by that? How could I have anything to hide when I''m stuck here all day?"


    The beast didn''t respond to this and turned to look around the room. After a while, it finally said, "Did they already pass by here?"


    When she heard this, Lulu actually revealed a slightly nervous look.


    In truth, Lulu rarely interacted with this beast even though they had both been trapped in here for the longest time. However, the one thing she did know about this beast was that it had been the pet of the one who had trapped them in here¡­


    She wanted to believe in Mo Ze Chen and she didn''t know what this beast would do if it found them, so she had tried to cover up their arrival in this tree. However, she never expected the beast to see through her so easily¡­


    Lulu calmed herself down and then asked in a confused voice, "They? Who do you mean?"


    The beast looked at her with narrowed eyes before giving a chuckle, "You really think you can hide this from me?"


    Lulu then narrowed her eyes as she looked at the beast with a trace of hostility in her eyes, "What do you want to do?"


    The beast gave a shrug with its paws before saying, "Who knows?"


    Lulu revealed even more hostility in her eyes when she saw this and she said, "If you want to¡­"


    The beast suddenly cut her off as it said, "Now, now, you don''t need to worry. I just want to know if they''ve passed through here already, I''m not going to do a thing. After all, if they can pass through here, it means that they qualify by my master''s standards and they have a chance of passing the trial."


    After a pause, the beast said, "Finding someone that can pass the trial is the wish of my master, so of course, I''ll see it through to the end."


    Lulu felt that she should have calmed down after hearing this, but she was actually more worried since the beast had given up too easily.


    Just what was it hiding?

 417 Chapter 417

    As Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen made their way through the city, they noticed that it waspletely different from the city outside.


    The first major difference was that there weren''t any ghosts that were wandering around the city.


    Lin Fan had been careful by sending out Brainy''s rat puppets made of corpses since with how sensitive the ghosts were to life force, the living puppets would have been discovered quite easily. But that was an unnecessary worry because there were no ghosts to be found.


    As they carefully made their way through several streets, there wasn''t a single ghost that had been found.


    It was like this city waspletely abandoned.


    However, after searching for ghosts, the second thing Lin Fan did was check out the buildings that made up this city. The inside of the buildings were also differentpared to the outside city.


    Instead of beingpletely empty like it had been with the outside city, the inside city''s buildings were all filled with furniture and various other items that made it seem like there were still people living here. Even in one of the buildings, Lin Fan had found a table that still had warm food on it, meaning that there had been someone cooking not that long ago.


    Could it be that there were other people in this city still?


    Lin Fan immediately released even more puppets when he saw this and did a full sweep of the area, but Brainy was still unable to find a single thing.


    Without being able to find a thing, Lin Fan was very unwilling to move from this spot even though Mo Ze Chen was clearly getting impatient. However, since Mo Ze Chen had already swore to follow Lin Fan, he had no choice but to sit there and wait.


    Mo Ze Chen might have been impulsive, but that didn''t mean he was an idiot. He at least knew that the warm food here meant.


    But after thirty minutes, they still couldn''t find anything.


    It was only then that Lin Fan suddenly realized something.


    When he went back to check the food, he found that it was at the exact same temperature that it had been when he had first checked this food.


    As he sent his spiritual sense in to verify, he was certain that there wasn''t a single degree drop in the temperature.


    But how has it been able to remain the same for this long?


    Not to mention that it shouldn''t have just remained like this for the time they had been here, it should have been like this much before they arrived. Perhaps even for thousands of years it has been like this¡­


    After a pause to think, Lin Fan reached out to grab the bowl of soup that was ced on the table in front of him, but there was a surprise waiting for him when he tried to pick it up.


    As soon as his hand grabbed it and he lifted up, he was met with a force that he couldn''t match at all. No matter how much force he used on the bowl of soup, it wouldn''t budge at all. There wasn''t even a single ripple on the surface of the soup itself as it hadn''t moved at all.


    Lin Fan looked down at the soup with a confused look before suddenly covering his hands with three differentws and trying to lift the soup.


    The moment the glows of the three differentws appeared on Lin Fan''s hand, there was a silver glow that suddenly appeared around the bowl of soup that protected it from Lin Fan''sws.


    Lin Fan carefully looked at it and after a bit, he revealed a surprised look since there was a familiar feeling that came from this silver glow. It was a feeling that he had felt many times before since it had always been there when he had died.


    This silver glow was the glow that came from the use of timews, which meant that timew had been infused into this bowl of soup which was why it was frozen in ce. That meant that as long as Lin Fan didn''t use aw that was stronger than the timew infused into the bowl of soup, he wouldn''t be able to do a thing to it.


    After debating what to do, Lin Fan withdrew the threews back into his body and began using a different power. There was a suction force that suddenly came from his hand that was holding the bowl of soup.


    However, the moment the suction force touched the bowl of soup, Lin Fan felt a strong bacshing from it and he was forced to stop using the suction force.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at this bowl of soup in shock.


    Thest time he had felt bacsh like this was when he tried to absorb thews of Momonga and Ang. This bacsh came from trying to absorb the power ofws that were much stronger than his own power, which meant losing control over them and causing them tosh out at him in self defense since he was trying to suck them in.<sub> </sub>


    However, that was only when Lin Fan had tried to suck in a sliver of thews that Momonga and Ang had, which was much weaker than their real power.


    Still, thews in this bowl of soup was enough to match the bacsh that the two of them had caused Lin Fan, which meant that whoever put thews into this soup was beyond the realm of this upper realm.


    Lin Fan gave up on the soup and immediately went around looking at all the different pieces of furniture in this building. As he walked around, he found that not a single piece of furniture had a single speck of dust on them. It was almost as if they had beenpletely sterilized, but that also didn''t make sense since there weren''t any panes on the windows of the building. Even now, Lin Fan could feel a wisp of wind blowing into the building.


    With the ground outside, it was impossible for dust to not be blown into this room, which meant there had to be something that was stopping it fromnding on the items in the room.


    As Lin Fan was carefully looking over the furniture, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help thinking that Lin Fan had gone crazy. As far as he could tell, all the things here were just normal pieces of furniture, so what was Lin Fan doing?


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help moving over to where Lin Fan was and asking, "Boss, is there something wrong?"


    Of course, what he meant to say was "is there something wrong with you?", but he couldn''t say that to Lin Fan''s face.


    Lin Fan didn''t respond at all to this, he didn''t even notice Mo Ze Chen speaking since he was focused on studying the furniture in front of him.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help being more worried when he saw this. After all, he was depending on Lin Fan to free the girl of his dreams from her prison, so he needed Lin Fan''s help and not for Lin Fan to lose his mind in the middle of this.


    Mo Ze Chen kept asking Lin Fan questions, but hepletely ignored Mo Ze Chen.


    After looking over the various pieces of furniture, Lin Fan finally raised his hand and released the suction force from it. As soon as the suction force came into contact with the chair that was in front of him, there was a silver glow that appeared around the chair.


    Once again, Lin Fan felt the same bacsh as he had felt when he had tried to draw in thews that were contained inside the bowl of soup. However, Lin Fan had learned his lesson and weakened his suction force, so the bacsh wasn''t as strong.


    After doing this with the chair, Lin Fan continued forward without any hesitation and did the same thing with various other objects in the building.


    Even if Mo Ze Chen was worried, he could still see that something was up when he saw the same silver glow appear around every single object that Lin Fan touched, so he fell silent and watched.


    After a while, Lin Fan didn''t stay in this same building and immediately moved to the next building.


    When he arrived in this building, Lin Fan went to the first object he could see and used his suction force. Once again, there was the same reaction as the building that he had just been in.


    The same silver glow and the same bacsh.


    Lin Fan threw that object away immediately, moving on to the next object in the house.


    He went through the same process with several different objects before moving onto the next house.


    Just like this, again and again, he used the same method to test the objects in every single building that he visited and again and again, he received the same reaction.


    The same silver glow and the same bacsh.


    It seemed like every single object in this city had been infused with timew and frozen in time.


    But who would do such a thing and who was strong enough to cover a whole city in timews just like this?


    Based on what Lin Fan had felt, he was also certain that thews contained within each item wasn''t weak. At the very least, it had surpassed what the limits of this upper realm should be.


    Just what was this city?

 418 Chapter 418

    But Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen couldn''t stay hung up on this, so they began wandering around the city, going further than they had already gone.


    They went along the road looking for any signs, but they couldn''t find anything in the end.


    Since there was nothing else for them to do, they just followed the road to the center of the city.


    Since the giant tree of light had been in the center of the city outside, perhaps there was something at the center of this city. As expected, there really was something that was in the center of this city, but it wasn''t what they had expected.


    Instead of another tree of light, there was a fountain that had a statue in the middle of it. It was a statue of a woman, but it wasn''t Lulu from before, it was apletely different woman.


    Also different from Lulu, this statue was madepletely of stone and wasn''t glowing or alive.


    However, none of that mattered since the clue that they were looking for wasn''t actually with the fountain. Rather there was a podium right in front of the fountain with the information that Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen needed.


    This podium didn''t have words like the other podium in front of the tree of light. Instead, this podium had a map on it with four different points marked.


    Based on the waypoints that they had just passed, they could tell that this was a map of the city they were currently in.


    As for these four points, if someone was to mark them, it was clear that there must be something special there. Perhaps it was the chosen trial that Lulu had mentioned before.


    Looking at this map, all the points that were marked were all equidistant from each other and right at the center of them was the fountain that they were currently at. That definitely had to mean something¡­


    Still, this was the only clue that they had for now, so they could only slowly go to each point and find out what it meant.


    So the first one that Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen chose was the one that was to the north of them. This was the one that was in the exact direct opposite direction of the entrance they hade in, so they chose that way so they could explore more of the city.


    However, there wasn''t much of the city for them to see since the city was the exact same thing as before. All of the buildings had the same timew flowing through them, freezing them in ce.


    Still because everything was the same, it made it easier for them to find what they were looking for. After all, there was only one thing that was different from the other buildings around, which was a building that looked like a school inside of the square in the middle of the buildings.


    In front of that building that looked like a school, there was a podium that was ced right in front of the entrance.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen came over and read what was written on it, "To find what you seek, go into the past and eliminate the ghosts that hide there."


    Mo Ze Chen immediately revealed a confused look when he read this and he asked, "Boss, what does this mean?"


    Lin Fan was also confused since this really didn''t mean anything to him, but there was something special that only he could read at the bottom of the podium once again. There hadn''t been anything on the podium that was in front of the fountain, but there was one here.


    At the bottom of this podium, there was a single word that read "Pen".


    Lin Fan was even more confused as to what this meant, but so far that messages that only he could see and read had guided him well, so he had no reason to doubt it.


    After throwing this word to the back of his mind and making sure that he remembered it, Lin Fan headed off into the school with Mo Ze Chen following closely behind him.


    The moment they went through the door and walked along the hallways of the school, the scenery around them began to change.


    When they first entered the school, it looked quite dpidated which was surprising since all the other buildings had been kept in ce with timews, remaining perfect after all these years. However, this ce was the exact opposite of the buildings outside.


    This ce was run down to begin with, but with every single step that they took, it was almost as if time flowed backwards. Every part of this building became newer and newer until it looked like it had just been made.<sub> </sub>


    But this wasn''t all that happened as they walked along the corridor of the building. As they went along, they began hearing sounds around them.


    When they looked around, they found that there were people who had suddenly shown up inside the various ssrooms that were in this school. These people were mainly children who were sitting and listening attentively to the one adult, who was clearly the teacher standing in the front of the room giving a lesson.


    As they continued along, there were kids that also appeared in the corridor that they were walking in, running in different directions, passing right by them.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Boss, where did theye from? Did we go back into the past?"


    Lin Fan looked at the kids who ran past and walked into one of them, but right when they were about to make contact, the kid ran right through Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan decided to stop moving right at the moment that the kid was inside of him and he found that everything stopped moving when he did.


    Looking around at all the various kids that were around him, Lin Fan knitted his brows to think for a bit before saying, "It''s an illusion."


    Mo Ze Chen had also stopped when Lin Fan stopped, so he had seen everything that Lin Fan did. After seeing this, he also reached his hand out to put through one of the kids beside him and he found that his hand went right through the head of the kid. The kid didn''t disappear, but his hand disappeared inside of the kid and he couldn''t see it anymore. After pausing for a second, Mo Ze Chen pulled his hand back and he saw ite out of the kid like nothing had happened.


    After this, Mo Ze Chen asked again, "Boss, why is there an illusion array in a ce like this? Also, what about the building itself?"


    Lin Fan had also been looking around when Mo Ze Chen had asked that and after a bit, he said, "The building seems to be the work of timews, so it''s actually going back in time. As for why they would put an illusion array here, what are you asking me for? Would I know that?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an awkward smile as he realized that his question was a bit dumb. He just gave a chuckle, but he didn''t say anything else.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about him since he had finished examining their surroundings and standing here wasn''t going to do a thing. Once he was done examining the area, Lin Fan started walking down the corridor again with Mo Ze Chen following close behind him.


    This hallway was surprisingly long even though the building didn''t seem that big from outside. It was clear that there should be some use of spatialws to make the area wider than it was.


    As they continued along, the kids in the hallway slowly began disappearing and soon they saw a light at the end of the corridor.


    When they came out of the exit of the corridor, they found that they were inside of a courtyard that was right in the center of the school. When they looked around themselves, they found that there were ssroom windows all around them and they could see the kids learning inside.


    But the strange thing was that not a single person noticed that they were outside the window.


    That was until there was a school announcement that came on.


    There was a voice that suddenly said, "Attention all students, there are guests that have arrived in the courtyard, please turn your attention to them now."


    As if there was a tacit understanding, all of the students and teachers suddenly stopped their lessons to turn their heads in the direction of the window. All of them turned to look right at Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen who were standing in the courtyard.


    Seeing this scene would definitely disturb most people and that included Mo Ze Chen.


    When he saw this, the first thing he did was turn to Lin Fan and ask, "Boss, what is going on here?"


    But Lin Fan didn''t answer him at all as he tried to find the source of the voice, but he couldn''t see where it wasing from at all. There were no speakers or anything that were on the walls in this courtyard.


    They didn''t have time to react to this as the voice then said, "Please give them our warmest wee."


    As soon as the voice finished speaking, all of the kids came to the window and opened them up as they stuck their heads out and said, "Big brothers, do you want to y?"

 419 Chapter 419

    After they said this, the children and the teachers all began to change.


    Their flesh began to rot and their eyeballs all disappeared until there were only holes in their faces where their eyes should have been. Looking right into these holes where their eyes should have been, it was almost as if one was looking into the dark abyss, almost as if they were looking into dark souls.


    These kids continued to change until they all looked like the ghosts that had wandered around the city outside.


    After that, they suddenly jumped out of the window, running right at Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen.


    At first Mo Ze Chen had been shocked, but then he remembered that they were nothing more than illusions, so there shouldn''t be anything to worry about. However, that wasn''t the case.


    Lin Fan had immediately released his spiritual sense when the kids charged at them and when it hit the kids, he found that these were no longer illusions, these were actual ghosts that were running at them.


    Without even thinking, Lin Fan immediately grabbed Mo Ze Chen by the cor and ran off in the opposite direction they were looking in, but when he did, he realized that there were kids running from that direction as well.


    They had been right in the center of the courtyard with ssrooms all around them, that meant there were little kid ghosts pouring out of the building all around them, trapping them in the center.


    As they were running away, the little kid ghosts threw their writing utensils right at them.


    Mo Ze Chen pulled out a dagger and brought it up to block the pencil that was aimed right at his face out of habit, but the moment the pencil made contact with his dagger, he could feel the weight behind the thrown pencil. Mo Ze Chen had to quickly bring strength into his hand to block this and he was barely able to knock it away.


    As for the rest of the writing utensils, Lin Fan had released his forcew in a barrier around him which had pushed them all the projectiles aimed at them away.


    Mo Ze Chen looked down at his dagger and it took him a while to react to what had just happened. The moment he did react though, he suddenly shouted, "Weren''t they supposed to be illusions? Why could I feel that just now?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother exining to Mo Ze Chen since he didn''t know what was going on either. He just pulled him along as he rang towards the wave of little kid ghosts in front of him.


    As he ran, he also raised his free hand and gathered three different coloured glows around it. Once he had finished gathering strength in his hand, he suddenly punched out at the wave of kids in front of him.


    The power contained within his punch flew forth and knocked aside all the little kid ghosts in front of him, creating a hole in the wave of ghosts.


    It was just a good thing that these little kid ghosts weren''t as strong as the adult ghosts, only being in the Fragmented Soul Realm. A Fragmented Soul Realm Expert in front of Lin Fan was no different from a sheet of paper, so it was easy for him to knock them away.


    If it was a wave of Embryo Soul Realm Experts, that would have been a different story because Lin Fan wouldn''t have been able to knock them away with just threewsbining. But then again, Lin Fan also didn''t use his full strength¡­


    As soon as the hole was created, Lin Fan immediately dashed forward as fast as he could, charging right through the hole that he had made. As he ran through the wave of little kid ghosts, he could hear that they were singing some kind of nursery rhyme, but they seemed to be singing in anguage that he had never heard before.


    But no matter what kind ofnguage it was, being surrounded by kid ghosts like this while listening to them sing a nursery rhyme was definitely unsettling.


    Lin Fan didn''t pause for a second, but Mo Ze Chen had much more time to look around since he was being pulled along by Lin Fan.


    As he was being pulled along, he could see that all the ghosts all had the same feather somewhere on their bodies. It was a feather that looked like a eagle feather, but there seemed to be some kind of energy that was surrounding it that he couldn''t understand.


    After making it through the wave of little kid ghosts, Lin Fan didn''t stop as he ran right into the building in front of him.


    He didn''t know what his goal was, but he knew that there was no way they could stay out in the open like that. If they did, it wouldn''t take long before they would be swarmed. He had even seen some of the little kid ghosts that he had knocked out slowly getting back up, which meant that they must have some kind of array here that was healing them.<sub> </sub>


    While Lin Fan wasn''t scared of fighting these kid ghosts, that didn''t mean that he wasn''t scared of running out of stamina, especially since he used thebination ofws which drained his life energy much faster than normal.


    As they were about to enter the building, there was another ghost that suddenly came out, but this one wasn''t a child like the rest of them, this one was an adult ghost that was in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    <o>,m Lin Fan knew that this one would be much harder to deal withpared to the kids, so this time he didn''t only gather threews around his fist. There was a fusion of fivews that suddenly appeared and once he gathered his energy, he punched out at that adult ghost.</o>


    The adult ghost used all of its strength as well, but it was still blown right into the wall by the door from the force of Lin Fan''s punch.


    After that punch, Lin Fan let out a long breath, but he still didn''t stop moving.


    Lin Fan quickly headed to the door and found that there were still ghosts that were moving along the halls. Before those ghosts could even react to him, he suddenly used his spatialw to teleport to the end of the hall where there was a set of stairs.


    Before any of them even knew what happened, Lin Fan flew up those stairs and arrived on the second floor which was surprisingly empty.


    As he had been jumping with the spatialws, he had also released the live rat puppets that Brainy controlled behind him.


    Since the ghosts outside seeked out life force, perhaps these would be the same.


    As he had expected, Brainy told him that the ghosts were chasing the puppets and not a single one of them hade up to the second floor.


    Lin Fan immediately headed into one of the rooms and blockaded it off with the desks that were inside. Unlike the other buildings, the desks in this ce could be moved, so he created arge pile of them right in front of the door.


    Once that was done, Lin Fan sat down in one of the chairs and let out a long breath since he had used quite a bit of life energy just now. He had been dashing with all his strength the entire time and he had punched out with his full force with the fivews, as well as using the spatialw to teleport that long distance. He would have been fine if he used them separately, but using them in session was arge drain on his life energy.


    While Lin Fan was recovering from this, Mo Ze Chen had already moved over to the window. He took out a pair of binocrs and began looking down at the courtyard outside.


    In the courtyard, there were waves of little kid ghosts that were being led around by the rats, but there were also stragglers that moved on their own. For now, it seemed that none of them wereing up to the second floor, so it seemed like they would be safe.


    After seeing this, Mo Ze Chen quickly came over to Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan didn''t reply right away since he was still catching his breath, but once he did, he said, "I don''t know either."


    Mo Ze Chen had been waiting patiently with a hopeful look on his face since it always seemed like his boss knew what to do, but this time his boss had told him that he didn''t know either.


    Mo Ze Chen had an awkward look on his face after hearing this, but he didn''t let it bring him down since there was a special someone on his mind.


    After hearing this, Mo Ze Chen didn''t wait any longer as he began moving around the room looking for a clue.


    The room that they were hiding in was clearly a ssroom and based on the piano in the corner, it should have been a music room.


    At the very front of the room was a ckboard and the teacher''s desk which was what Mo Ze Chen started going through. At first it didn''t seem like there was anything, but then he pulled out a piece of paper which he looked at for a bit before suddenly knitting his brows.

 420 Chapter 420

    Mo Ze Chen took a while to read over the paper again beforeing over to Lin Fan waving it as he said, "Boss, this seems like it''s something important."


    Lin Fan came out of his meditative state and turned to look at Mo Ze Chen, seeing the piece of paper he was waving. He reached his hand out and Mo Ze Chen handed it over for him to take a look at.


    <o>,m This piece of paper was actually aplete newspaper, but it wasn''t a normal newspaper.</o>


    This was an issue of the school''s newspaper and most of the articles were written by the kids. Most of the articles involved the various matters around the school and didn''t have much to do with Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen, but there were a few articles that had caught Lin Fan''s attention.


    There were a few articles that reported on the various events that were happening around the city, events that were big enough to affect the entire city. For example, there was an article that talked about the reveal of the newly built fountain in the center of the town.


    ording to the article, this fountain was built in honour of their saviour that had just saved them all from a disaster. The opening ceremony would be held in just another week.


    But what Lin Fan cared about the most was the picture of the statue in the fountain. He hadn''t been looking carefully the first time, but now that he was looking at a picture of it, he realized that while the body was different, the face was one that he recognized. This face came from one of the most famous statues on earth, the Venus De Milo.


    He had seen it several times back when he was on earth and he had even secretly plotted to steal it before, but that was quickly shut down by his father...Of course, that''s a story for another time.


    The fact that this statue had the face of the Venus De Milo made Lin Fan even more certain that this saviour that was mentioned in this article was definitely from earth. But if he had saved them from the disaster that gued them, why did he suddenly disappear and leave all these secret messages in these ruins. At the same time, how did all the people of this town suddenly turn into ghosts?


    Was there something else that he didn''t know about or was there another disaster that befell these people that his reincarnation senior couldn''t deal with?


    However, no matter how many clues of the past there were in this newspaper, there wasn''t a single clue to how to solve their current predicament. After all, there was nothing that told them what they were supposed to do or how they would be able to stop the ghosts.


    Would they have to fight their way through the ghosts until they eliminated all of them?


    But that wasn''t possible either since Lin Fan had seen ghosts that he had been certain were deade back to life and start chasing them again.


    He could feel that there were faint wisps of life energy in the air, which meant that there was most likely an array that was set up around the school to heal these ghosts.


    If that were the case, how could he defeat them all?


    Then there had to be another way to solve this.


    Lin Fan went back into reading the newspaper while Mo Ze Chen went back to searching the desk in front since there were still more pieces of paper in it. He had seen that Lin Fan hadn''t been able to find anything, so he had gone back to searching for any clues.


    As Lin Fan was about to give up, he suddenly noticed something out of the corner of his eyes.


    It was another article that had caught his attention, but unlike the previous articles that were about various events found throughout the city, this one was actually about the school itself.


    This was an article that had an interview with the principal of the school.


    It wasn''t the article that caught Lin Fan''s attention, but rather what it focused on. In the interview, the principal introduced his special pen to the students that interviewed him.


    He had said that this pen was something that had been passed down to him from the previous principal and it had been passed down through seeding principals for generations. It was the most valuable thing in his opinion in this entire school, even though the pen itself was only a cheap gold pen.


    The principal said that this pen had been used to sign all the important documents of the school and it embodied the spirit of academics in this school, but based on how the article slowly trailed off in the end, it was clear that the kids became tired of writing this article since it was too boring for them.


    But that didn''t matter to Lin Fan because he had found the information that he had needed.


    When Lin Fan thought of this pen, he remembered the word that had been left for him on the podium in the courtyard. That one word that was written in Chinese said "pen", so it must have meant something special.<sub> </sub>


    This was the only clue rted to a pen that he had found in this school and it was the pen of the principal, who was technically the highest authority in a school, so it should be referring to this.


    So far, the mysterious Chinese words that only he could see hadn''t led him wrong just yet, so Lin Fan was willing to take this risk.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan turned to Mo Ze Chen and said, "Did you find anything rted to the principal''s office?"


    Mo Ze Chen had been focused on digging through the desk and searching through all the materials, so he was caught off guard when he heard this. However, after he recovered, he suddenly turned to look at Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, what do you need information on the principal''s office for?"


    Then after a pause, Mo Ze Chen suddenly looked like he realized something as he said, "Did you find a clue?"


    Lin Fan ignored his questions and just said, "Did you find anything on the principal''s office?"


    Mo Ze Chen pouted his lips since Lin Fan didn''t answer his question, but he still went to the documents that he had ced on the table.


    For someone that was quite impulsive, Mo Ze Chen was surprisingly good at keeping things organized. He had ced all the different documents that he had found in piles on the table, splitting them based on what they were about.


    The pile that he picked up was a pile of documents rted to the school that he had found. He dug through this pile until he found a certain piece of paper which he brought over for Lin Fan to read.


    As Lin Fan read it over, he saw that it was a letter from the principal''s office to the teacher of this ssroom, talking about a certain student. However, the one thing that he needed wasn''t here.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at Mo Ze Chen, "Do you see the location of the principal''s office on here?"


    Mo Ze Chen shook his head and said, "Why would we need that?"


    Lin Fan pped the top of Mo Ze Chen''s head and said, "Why else would I be asking you about the principal''s office?"


    Mo Ze Chen rubbed his head as he muttered, "But you didn''t say anything like that, you just said that you wanted information on the principal''s office."


    Lin Fan was surprised for a bit and he thought about what he said before realizing that Mo Ze Chen was right. He had never asked about the location of the principal''s office.


    Lin Fan felt a bit awkward on the inside, but he still had a calm look on his face as he said, "Well I''m telling you now that I want the location of the principal''s office."


    As the boss, naturally Lin Fan had his image to care about, so he couldn''t easily admit his mistake. The only thing he could do now was double down.


    Mo Ze Chen heard this and gave a nod before falling into thought. After a bit of thought, he went over to another pile of documents, but this time this pile was filled with various misceneous documents.


    After looking through them, Mo Ze Chen suddenly pulled out one that was rather big before bringing it over for Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan looked at it, he was surprised to see what it was.


    It was actually a map of the entire school and based on the map, the school was quiterge. It was perhaps just asrge as the campuses of universities back on earth.


    Lin Fan was confused why there would be this kind of map in this ssroom, but after seeing the various markings that were made on it, he came to a conclusion. This was probably the ssroom of a teacher that was rather clumsy, so they must have easily gotten lost, hence the map.


    But that was a good thing for Lin Fan since with this map, he was able to easily find the principal''s office.


    Surprisingly, the principal''s office wasn''t on the first floor, but rather it was on the second floor with them. In fact, it was actually quite close to Lin Fan''s current location!

 421 Chapter 421

    Even though the principal''s office was on the same floor and it wasn''t that far away from them, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit of disappointment.


    When he hade up to the second floor, he had noticed that there wasn''t anything up here with them at all. There wasn''t a single ghost that wandered the hall just like with the first floor.


    In fact, he could still see most of them running around in the courtyard, being distracted by the rats or looking around for them, but finding nothing at all.


    It seemed like while these ghosts were powerful, their minds weren''t fully developed yet, but that also did make sense since all of them were kids. It seemed like before they had fully developed, they had been turned into ghosts¡­


    As for why, that was up to anyone to guess.


    But looking at them running around chasing the rats like they were ying a game, Lin Fan felt a bit of pity for them. After all, it wasn''t like they had asked to be turned into this¡­


    Still, that was the least of Lin Fan''s worries right now.


    The main thing was the slight disappointment he felt over how this school had been designed.


    The way that it seemed like it was supposed to go was that after activating the little kid ghosts, the people that entered the school would have to find clues until they were able to find what they were looking for. It was almost like the dungeons in the online games that he had yed before.


    That was, it would have been if he didn''t already get a clue that led him in the direction of the item he was supposed to get.


    With that clue, it meant that he didn''t have to search through all the different rooms which kind of ruined the fun.


    At the same time, there would normally be a boss that would be guarding the final item, but that didn''t seem like it was the case here since it seemed like the second floor waspletely empty. Lin Fan just hoped that there would be ast second boss reveal at the end when he entered the principal''s office or he would bepletely disappointed with this.


    But at the same time, it also made him consider what this trial was.


    This was designed like the dungeons from video games back on earth, so did that mean that his transmigration senior had designed all of this? If that was the case, did that also mean that he was responsible for turning all these people into ghosts?


    Just why would he do that then?


    And the bigger question was, if he did do all of this, would Lin Fan still want to meet him?


    Lin Fan had to pause to think about this, but Mo Ze Chen thought that he was thinking for a different reason, so he asked, "Boss, did you find something?"


    Lin Fan didn''t hear him at first, but then he realized Mo Ze Chen was looking at him, so he asked, "Sorry, did you say something?"


    Mo Ze Chen repeated, "Boss, did you find something?"


    Lin Fan once again hesitated a bit before saying, "Maybe, but I''m not sure."


    Mo Ze Chen could see the strange look on Lin Fan''s face, so he had his own guesses as he said, "Did you see something hidden again?"


    Lin Fan paused once again before giving a nod and saying, "The clue that I have is telling me that we should go to the principal''s office since there''s something important there."


    Mo Ze Chen stroked his chin in thought for a bit before saying, "Well since we''re in a school, it should make sense that we would go to the principal''s office since that''s the most important ce. Let''s just hope that we won''t find any surprises there."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he said, "I''m actually hoping to find a bit of a surprise there."


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan with a confused look, but he didn''t say anything else after that.


    They didn''t head off right away since it wouldn''t have been a good idea to head off without scouting first.


    Lin Fan released the dead rat puppets and had Brainy control them to scout out the second floor.<sub> </sub>


    While Brainy''s puppets were running around, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen went through the rest of the documents. After all, these were documents that were ced here as part of the trial, perhaps they would have been able to find some clues from these pieces of paper.


    It was just too bad that there wasn''t any information for them here at all since most of these papers talked about mundane things, without mentioning the principal''s office once.


    But at least Brainy''s puppets had finished scouting out the second floor when they were done.


    As far as Brainy could see through the puppets, it hadn''t been able to find anything on the second floor. It had also searched the principal''s office, or rather the area around it and it wasn''t able to find anything.


    The strange thing was that Brainy had been unable to scout out the principal''s office itself since there was something that seemed to be blocking out its puppets. Every time it tried sending puppets into the office, they were repelled and destroyed by some kind of barrier around it.


    In the end, Brainy had no choice but to stop trying since it knew that there was no point in wasting more puppets trying to break through into the principal''s office.


    Lin Fan was very interested when he heard that there was a barrier around the principal''s office since this was also a scenario that he had seen many times before. It was amon trope that was used in many video games and fantasy novels, it was that there was a final barrier in front of the boss'' den.


    To gain ess to the boss'' den, they would have to destroy either a key item that was powering the barrier or destroy an enemy that was keeping the barrier up.


    But before doing any of that, Lin Fan wanted to see the barrier for himself, so he stood up and walked out of the room with Mo Ze Chen following closely behind him.


    Lin Fan was quite rxed as he walked through the halls since he trusted Brainy, but that wasn''t the case for Mo Ze Chen. Even though Lin Fan had told him that there was nothing to worry about, Mo Ze Chen still warily looked around him for any signs of enemies.


    Of course, there wouldn''t be since Brainy was very good at doing its job and if it said there was nothing, there was nothing.


    With all the various puppets that it had, Brainy had even checked the various ssrooms around them and posted puppets to watch all the stairs. If there was even the slightest bit of movement, Brainy would know about it immediately.


    It didn''t take long for them to arrive at the principal''s office since it really was just right by them. It was only a few doors down from the ssroom that they had been holding up in.


    When they arrived, Lin Fan could easily see the barrier that was surrounding the door, it wasn''t even being hidden. They were making it clear that there was something hidden behind this door and that the barrier had to be broken first before they could enter.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan felt even more excited because this seemed more like a proper dungeon.


    Encountering something that reminded him of his past world, Lin Fan couldn''t help getting caught up in it. While he didn''t know what the purpose of this was, he was still happy to y along since he didn''t feel any sense of danger.


    It might have been different if he was threatened, but there was nothing here that could actually hurt him if he used his full power, so Lin Fan felt like he was ying around.


    Lin Fan went up to the barrier and reached his hand out to touch it to examine it, but the moment his hand made contact with the barrier, he received a surprise.


    He didn''t get pushed away like the puppets that Brainy had thrown at it, rather the moment he made contact with the barrier, there was ayer of light that suddenly appeared around Lin Fan.


    This light spread across him, but it didn''t seem like it wasing from him. It went through him and gathered in his hand before spreading from his hand onto the barrier, going all through the barrier until it shattered to pieces. There were fragments that were blown away in the wind before disappearing into nothing.


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan with a shocked look, but there was also a trace of admiration in his hand.


    He hadn''t been able to sense any life energy from Lin Fan just now, which meant that that should have been a special power that Lin Fan had used.


    He could tell that he would have been unable to break that barrier on his own since it was much more powerful than him, but Lin Fan had done it with a single touch. It really wasn''t a mistake choosing to follow Lin Fan.


    As for Lin Fan, he was confused as well when he saw the barrier suddenly shatter apart.


    This wasn''t how the script was supposed to go?


    Wasn''t there supposed to be a mini boss or an item that he had to find before the barrier to the final boss shattered apart?

 422 Chapter 422

    Lin Fan was naturally disappointed in how things turned out, but he couldn''t let his disappointment hold him back.


    Since the door was already open for him, that meant that all he had to do was fight the boss and im the quest item before this would be over. Still, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit worried.


    He wasn''t worried about the boss being strong, but rather he was worried that there wasn''t going to be a boss.


    After all, everything seemed like it wasing naturally to him and there were no signs that anyone had been around, so it seemed likely that there was no one in this room.


    But when he opened the door, he wasn''t disappointed right away since there was someone inside. It was only when he saw that person that he was disappointed.


    The person inside was an old man who was sitting at the desk, leaned back in the chair as he had his head back and was snoring. On the desk in front of him was a box and inside the box on a satin pillow was the golden pen.


    Lin Fan was disappointed because he couldn''t sense any powering from the old man at all, like he didn''t have any cultivation. Though, he didn''tpletely let his guard down and waited since this was also a trick that bosses normally used.


    As for Mo Ze Chen, when he came into the room, the first thing his eyes fell onto was the golden pen on the table.


    This was one of his bad habits from his treasure hunting days. The moment he saw the treasure, there would be a split second where he forgot everything and would focus on the treasure.


    As soon as he saw the golden pen on the desk, Mo Ze Chen shouted, "Boss, look, there it is!"


    The moment these words came out of his mouth, the old man in the chair suddenly opened his eyes and stared at the two of them. At first his eyes were sharp, but then they rxed as they suddenly revealed a confused look.


    The old man turned to look down at his desk, specifically at a crystal that was lying on the right side of the desk.


    When he saw that this crystal was still glowing, he couldn''t help being more confused as he turned back to Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen and asked, "How did you two get in here?"


    Mo Ze Chen realized that he had made a mistake as he looked at the old man first before turning to Lin Fan with an awkward look.


    Lin Fan on the other hand was happy that it had happened since it meant that this wouldn''t be boring for him. This old man was clearly different from the other ghosts with how he was asking them questions, which showed a higher level of intelligence.


    Since that was the case, perhaps he would also be able to find out just what this ce was from this old man as well.


    But the old man made it clear that he had no intentions of talking this out as he suddenly released his aura.


    Mo Ze Chen was instantly overwhelmed by this aura since it was much stronger than the auras of all the other ghosts, including the ghostmander that they had met before.


    The ghostmander was already in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, which meant that this principal must have broken past that limit and was in the Child Soul Realm.


    While Mo Ze Chen was certain that he and Lin Fan were both in the Embryo Soul Realm, with Lin Fan being much stronger than him, being at the peak Embryo Soul Realm, he knew that they wouldn''t be able to defeat this ghost in the Child Soul Realm with just this.


    The concept of the Embryo Soul Realm and the Child Soul Realm was like heaven and earth. This was something that was true for every jump in the Soul Realm.


    But while Mo Ze Chen had a look of despair on his face, Lin Fan had a look of excitement since he could also feel how strong his opponent was.


    His weapons had be stronger and he could feel that there was only a single step before he broke through as well, so he wanted to use this battle as that catalyst.


    The principal had looked like a normal old man at first, but once he released his aura, his body began to change. His skin rotted and his eyes disappeared, as he began looking more and more like the ghosts that were wandering outside.


    After he had finished changing, hepletely ignored Mo Ze Chen because he could tell that the most dangerous one out of the two of them was clearly Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had been waiting for the ghost principal to power up since he wanted to fight him at his most powerful.


    At the same time, he had also released his pets and they had gone to the walls in this room, creating another array. Although it wasn''t as big as the one that they had set up before, it was still as powerful.<sub> </sub>


    The energy concentrated into a single shot which once again fell down onto Lin Fan''s sword, covering it with five different coloured glows.


    Then after that, there were six different coloured glows that came out of Lin Fan himself as they all wrapped around his sword, finally settling to create a nine coloured glow around Lin Fan''s sword.


    What kind of a concept was this?


    ? This was nine differentws all gathered around a single sword, the power contained within it was impossible to imagine.


    The only thing that was keeping it stable was Lin Fan''s absorption power which helped him redirect a lot of theshback that came frombining these ninews together.


    If it wasn''t for this power, Lin Fan''s ninews would have definitely shed against each other and exploded, creating a crater that would have destroyed the entire school, as well as most of the city around them. It might have even taken out a chunk of the tree they were currently in, though it wouldn''t have been able topletely burn through the tree''s trunk.


    Mo Ze Chen had a look of terror when he stared at Lin Fan. He knew that Lin Fan was powerful, but he never thought that he would be this powerful¡­


    Lin Fan had only used a single strike before, so he hadn''t been able to see Lin Fan''s full strength, but seeing the nine coloured glows around Lin Fan''s sword, there was no mistaking it.


    He had never heard of anyone with this kind of power in the upper realm before, so he knew now that his decision was definitely correct when he chose to follow Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time since even though he could use the absorption power to keep this mass ofws stable, it was definitely draining holding this. Lin Fan couldn''t waste any time while he had this around his sword, he had to finish this fight as soon as possible.


    It was a good thing that the principal had the same idea the moment he saw Lin Fan release his power.


    He could feel the danger that wasing from the sword and he knew that if he held back in the slightest, he would die in a single blow.


    The ghost principal gathered all his strength into his fist and punched out right at Lin Fan''s head.


    Lin Fan wasn''t slow to react and he immediately raised his sword before shing it down with all the power that was contained within it.


    Before they even shed, thew energy that they released shed against each other, creating pressure that filled the air. There were even small sparks that appeared around them even though there was nothing shing.


    As they approached, both of them steeled their hearts and pulled out every single drop of power that they had into this single strike since they knew that it would decide the fight.


    However, before Lin Fan''s sword could make contact with the ghost principal''s fist, there was something that happened to Lin Fan first.


    As he was charging out, there was a wisp of gold that suddenly appeared on his forehead. The moment this wisp of gold appeared, it quickly spread all over him, including covering his sword.


    The ghost principal was surprised to see this, but it was already toote to hold back, so his fist met the sword head on.


    There was no dy in this sh, there wasn''t even a slight pause as Lin Fan''s sword covered in the golden glow cut right through the fist of the ghost principal, shing down his arm until it reached his shoulder beforeing out, dropping half of his arm onto the ground, while burning the rest of it.


    The ghost principal looked at his arm and looked back at Lin Fan before muttering, "The light of the saviour¡­It''s you¡­"


    Then without another word, the same golden glow suddenly exploded around the ghost principal,pletely covering him.


    It was clear by how he faded that this ghost principal was disappearing, but even though his death was upon him, the ghost principal still had a smile on his face as he looked at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at his own sword in shock as he didn''t know where this golden glow hade from, but he also turned to the ghost principal to watch his final moments.


    As the ghost principal was burning away, he looked Lin Fan right in the eyes before saying, "We''re counting on you."


    Then hepletely disappeared into a pile of ashes.

 423 Chapter 423

    Lin Fan couldn''t help staring at the golden aura around his de.


    He did have a gold glow around it since it was thew of power that he had, but he was certain that this extrayer of golden light didn''te from him.


    As he was looking at it, after the ghost principal had turned to ashes, the golden glow slowly disappeared from his de and crept back into him.


    Lin Fan could see it creeping back up the de towards the hilt where his hand was and once it reached the hilt, it crawled up his hands towards his head. It slowly crawled all the way up his hands and reached his neck before going further up, but Lin Fan couldn''t see where it was going because it went right to his head.


    Lin Fan saw that Mo Ze Chen was looking at him, so he asked, "Where is the golden glow going?


    Mo Ze Chen had been in a daze as he watched Lin Fan cut down the ghost in a single sh. Even after pping himself and feeling the pain, it still didn''t seem real to him, but the scene in front of him didn''t change.


    It ended with the ghost principal disappearing into a pile of ashes and Lin Fan standing there covered in golden light.


    But when Lin Fan called out to him, Mo Ze Chen trembled beforeing out of his daze.


    He looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, did you say something?"


    Lin Fan said once again, "Where is the golden glow going?" But this time, his tone was much sharper.


    Mo Ze Chen could hear this tone in his voice and quickly followed the golden glow that was retreating from Lin Fan''s body, following it until it reached a point on his forehead and disappeared.


    After seeing this, Mo Ze Chen said, "Boss, it went into your forehead and disappeared."


    Lin Fan couldn''t see his own forehead, so he didn''t bother looking up. However, he did fall into deep thought as to what this golden glow could be¡­


    He was certain that it wasn''t power that belonged to him because he hadn''t been able to control it at all, so it had to have something to do with these ruins.


    As he thought about it, he realized that he had seen this golden glow before. It was the exact same golden glow that was around the Chinese words that only he could see. Did that mean that this golden glow came from them?


    But then what did the ghost principal mean by calling him their "saviour"?


    What did the people trapped in these ruins need to be saved from?


    As Lin Fan fell into deeper thought, he was suddenly snapped out of it from the wails that came from outside.


    It was as if the ghosts outside had sensed the death of the ghost principal and were losing themselves in grief.


    Lin Fan checked with Brainy on the situation and Brainy said, "I can''t control them anymore. They won''t follow my puppets, they seem like they''reing here."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but he also quickly turned to look at the golden glowing pen that was on the table. This was what they came for after all and if they took it, this trial should end.


    Lin Fan moved over to the table and reached out his hand to grab the golden glowing pen, but right before he touched it, he suddenly stopped his hand from reaching forward.


    Mo Ze Chen saw this and he revealed a nervous look.


    He could naturally hear the sounds of the ghosts wailing outside and judging by how they were slowly getting louder, he could also tell that they were approaching them.


    Mo Ze Chen knew that if all the ghosts from before were to arrive, they would have no way out since this principal''s office actually didn''t have a single window. If they were trapped, even if Lin Fan was powerful, they definitely wouldn''t be able to push their way out.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan must have spent quite a bit of energy taking care of the ghost principal just now.


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan standing there hesitating and he couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan didn''t register what Mo Ze Chen said at first since he was still thinking, but then he turned to Mo Ze Chen and said, "You take the pen." After saying this, he took a step back and brought his hand back to his side.


    Mo Ze Chen was taken aback when he heard this and then when he saw Lin Fan just standing there looking at him, he couldn''t help revealing an even more confused look.


    Now that they were here, did it matter who took the pen?


    They should take it and get out of here while they still could.


    As soon as this thought passed through Mo Ze Chen''s mind, he immediately turned away from Lin Fan to look back at the golden glowing pen and reached out to grab it.<sub> </sub>


    However, what he expected didn''t happen.


    The moment he grabbed the golden glowing pen, there was nothing that changed around them. He could still hear the wails of the ghosts and he could hear that they were getting closer.


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a stunned look as he turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan ignored him again and continued to watch the golden glowing pen. However, in the end, he didn''t see anything change with it.


    Since he couldn''t see anything, Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "Give me the pen."


    Mo Ze Chen was confused why Lin Fan would say this since he didn''t think that it mattered who took the pen. He was certain that the same thing would happen when he gave the pen to Lin Fan, but he was proven wrong in the end.


    The moment the pen touched Lin Fan''s hand, there was a different reaction. There was a wave of golden light that suddenly spread out all around them before all the ghost wails suddenly fell silent.


    There was only silence around them, but they didn''t have time to care about that right now.


    When Lin Fan''s hand had made contact with the pen, the golden glow around the pen also began to change. The golden glow suddenly began to flow around the pen before creeping up Lin Fan''s hand.


    In fact, this was what had happened to all the golden glow that Lin Fan had seen before, starting from the first time when he pressed on that podium to open the door to these ruins.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had never paid any attention to this and hadn''t seen the golden glow flow into his head, so he didn''t know about it until now. Seeing this giant patch of light slide up his arm to reach his head, it would be hard to miss. As the golden glow went past his eyes, all he could see was gold in the end.


    But while he only saw gold, he also saw a few scenes appear in front of his eyes, a few scenes of the past¡­


    When the golden glow had disappeared, Lin Fan''s expression hadpletely changed.


    Mo Ze Chen saw this and he couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what happened?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything though since he was still processing what he had just seen.


    If that was what was going on here, then what were they doing designing all these trials?


    Why didn''t they just let these people go free?


    When Lin Fan came back to the senses, he ignored Mo Ze Chen and walked out of the door into the hallway. Once he came out, he saw all the kids in front of him and he immediately stopped.


    Mo Ze Chen had been following behind Lin Fan when he suddenly noticed all the kids standing in the hallway. As soon as he did, he immediately stopped and raised his weapon, but he also couldn''t help taking a step back since there really were just too many of them outside.


    But it was a good thing that they didn''t mean any harm to the two of them.


    The kids had already changed back from their ghost forms.


    The kids looked at Lin Fan and they could see the faint golden glow around him.


    One of the kids came forward to stand in front of Lin Fan and he looked up at him as he asked, "Big brother, will you save us?"


    Lin Fan looked down at the little kid and patted him on the head before saying, "I will."


    All the kids looked up at Lin Fan with bright smiles as they said, "Thank you, big brother."


    Then they all ran off in different directions and disappeared from Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen''s sight.


    When they reacted again, all the kids and teachers were gone and there was no one left in front of them.


    Mo Ze Chen turned back to look at Lin Fan as he asked, "Boss, what was that?"


    Lin Fan just looked down at the pen in his hand before throwing it to Mo Ze Chen and walking off.


    Mo Ze Chen looked down at the pen and after a few seconds, he put it away in his Storage Ring before following behind Lin Fan.


    Once they came out of the school, it suddenly copsed behind them and turned into rubble.

 424 Chapter 424

    After the school copsed behind them, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t waste any time as they headed off to the second location to the east.


    This was a short walk since these locations weren''t that far away from each other, but along the way, Mo Ze Chen didn''t stop asking Lin Fan questions about what had just happened. After all, all the kid ghosts had been trying to kill them just a few seconds ago, but then they all suddenly returned to normal and asked Lin Fan to save them. Only a fool would think that there was anything normal about that and Mo Ze Chen wasn''t that fool.


    It was too bad that Lin Fan didn''t answer any of Mo Ze Chen''s questions.


    Even when he kept pushing and continued to ask questions, Lin Fan just red at him which made him fall silent. After all, he had also seen how powerful Lin Fan was, so the position that Lin Fan had in his heart was much higherpared to before.


    Lin Fan was someone who could fight a ghost in the Child Soul Realm, which meant that he must also be in the Child Soul Realm at least.


    All the other candidates were only in the Embryo Soul Realm at best, there wasn''t a single person that surpassed this realm. Which meant that as long as Mo Ze Chen stuck with Lin Fan, he would definitely be the follower of one of the strongest candidates here. He was certain that Lin Fan would carry him to get his license.


    There was no need to ruin a good thing, so Mo Ze Chen didn''t push too hard.


    As they walked along, Lin Fan had aplicated look in his eyes the entire time.


    Ever since seeing the scene in the golden glow, Lin Fan had been in deep thought the entire time. It was clear that he had seen something special in the golden glow, but as for what, that was something that was between Lin Fan, the golden glow, and no one else that was still living.


    After traveling for a bit, they finally arrived at their destination which was the second location marked on the map at the fountain.


    When they arrived, they found that this ce was theplete opposite of the school. The ce that was in front of them right now was actually a prison.


    Instead of a ce that nurtured young minds, this was a ce that trapped those that had criminal minds and wanted to hurt others.


    This ce would definitely be the most dangerous because it was filled with dangerous people. As well, now that they had been turned into ghosts, or they should have been turned into ghosts, they would just be even more dangerous.


    This would definitely be one of those trials where they would have to fight their way to the end.


    When this thought passed through Mo Ze Chen''s mind, he couldn''t help giving a shiver before asking, "Boss, how about we leave this one forst?"


    Lin Fan looked at the prison for a bit before slightly knitting his brows like something was wrong.


    Mo Ze Chen saw this and asked, "Boss, what is it?"


    Lin Fan had been lost in thought the entire time since they came out of the school and it was only now that he reacted, but his reaction was definitely strange.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before saying, "It''s nothing."


    But that wasn''t what he was thinking deep down.


    In the shbacks that he had seen, he had never heard of any mention of a prison before. As far as he knew, this was where the city''s hospital was supposed to be, so why did it suddenly be a prison?


    Or could it be that this was the hospital, but it looked like a prison from the outside?


    Still, sitting here waiting wasn''t something useful, so he still headed towards the entrance of the prison with Mo Ze Chen closely following behind.


    When they entered, it didn''t look the way they thought that it would.


    What appeared in front of them was an area that was pure white, with clean walls and a desk right in the middle.


    In the middle of this lobby was a podium, but that wasn''t their first concern right now.


    They knew fromst time that the moment they read the podium, it would definitely trigger something. So before that happened, it was better for them to look around a bit before they were attacked.


    But at the same time, as a precaution, Lin Fan also had Brainy release several live rat puppets and stationed them around them just in case they needed them.<sub> </sub>


    Moving past the podium with a faint golden glow on it that only Lin Fan could see, the two of them made their way to the front desk.


    In ces like this, the front desk was usually where they kept most of their information, either on their patients or their inmates.


    There was nothing that was behind the desk itself, but there were cabs in the corner which did make sense.


    This was an ancient civilization that Lin Fan had no idea when it disappeared, so it was definitely from a time that was past technology, or there would be records on them. Since that was the case, it made sense that they would rely on writing down all the information that they needed.


    There were several steel cabs ced against the wall and after Lin Fan reached out to grab them, he found that they weren''t locked and they easily opened.


    But as for the content inside the cab, a lot of it was already damaged by the annals of time, either through mold or through other things.


    While paper was something that couldst a long time, it was very unlikely that it would be able to survive several thousand years. The ones that did could already be considered a miracle since they hadn''t been protected at all.


    Lin Fan pulled out one of the few files that were still intact and began going through it.


    He found that it was a medical record for a young man named Faust which meant nothing to him, but what he read afterwards was definitely interesting enough to catch his eyes.


    Other than his basic information, there was also other information on this Faust person that could be seen from the notes that the doctor made.


    Based on the notes of the doctor, this Faust person had been deemed mentally ill and was to be isted the following day, but then there was a sudden change in the next note.


    This Faust had been able to gather the other mentally ill patients in the area that he had been contained in and they started a riot in the hospital. The note also stated that they had already sent in the security in the hospital and that everything would return to normal soon, but that wasn''t the case in the next note.


    In the next note, it stated that this Faust had killed most of the security guards that had been sent and there were also several that had been taken hostage. It was decided by the chief that they would abandon this hospital and lock it up to starve them out instead of losing even more members of the tribe.


    After that, there wasn''t another entry.


    Lin Fan was right in the end, this ce had been a hospital before it had be a prison.


    The reason why Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had thought that it was a prison was because of all the bars in the window. Without that, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen might have thought that it was a hospital.


    It seemed like the crux of this stage was this Faust person and Lin Fan had been quite lucky to find it with the first document he checked.


    ? Lin Fan continued to move through the rest of the documents, but he also told Mo Ze Chen who was checking the other cabs to alert him immediately if he found anything on this Faust person.


    They continued looking through the various records, but they couldn''t find anything that was truly useful.


    A lot of these documents had already crumpled away with time, turning into nothing but dust. There were only a few documents that were still safely stored inside these cabs, but none of them had any meaningful information on Faust.


    However, it wasn''t allpletely useless because they were all patient records for the people that had been manipted by Faust into following him. Or at least that was what the doctor had written for these people in their files.


    If Lin Fan had topare it to something, it was almost like those files that one would receive before an action game to debrief you on targets¡­


    And the strangest thing was that the files that remained were all clearly made from the same material as the other documents that had been destroyed, but they were the ones that remained in near perfect condition.


    If there wasn''t an outside force that had been preserving them, it was hard to exin what had happened to them.


    This felt more and more like the preparation for an action game, but Lin Fan didn''t have time to think about that now. He was much more serious nowpared to when he went to the first location.


    After looking over them and finding that there was no use in reading them any further, Lin Fan headed to the podium in the center of the room.

 425 Chapter 425

    When he came to the podium, he found that it was the same as the one that he had seen at the school.


    On it was a cryptic message and there was a word that was written underneath in a golden glowing Chinese letter.


    The message read, "The madness reigns supreme, but in the darkness there is a clear light."


    Then right underneath it, the Chinese letter read, "Doll."


    But that was the least of Lin Fan''s concerns since everything started to change once he read this.


    Instead of getting newer like with the school, the hospital actually became more and more dpidated. There was graffiti that suddenly appeared along the walls and there were pieces of broken furniture that seemed to have formed out of nothing.


    There was one good thing that happened though, the lights in the hospital suddenly lit up. It was a bit dim here since there were few windows in the main lobby, so it became much brighter the moment the lights came on.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that there was also only a single window in all the rooms of the hospital, as well as bars that were on them, so the entire hospital was very dim.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised the moment the lights turned on, but he also knew what to expect after going through the school the first time.


    Without a word from either of them, they immediately went deeper into the hospital.


    Since they were after information on the patients, the first ce they headed was the records room.


    But it was by no means a smooth journey.


    Lin Fan was as cautious as always as he released Brainy''s puppets all around him to scout the area.


    After all, as soon as the hospital''s appearance had changed, he had also heard all kinds of sounds from around him. There were moans, screams, and all kinds of other sounds echoing all around them. It was clear that there were things that were all around them.


    It was just a good thing that when he sent Brainy to check, he only found ghosts wandering alone.


    Even if the ghosts were much strongerpared to the kid ghosts, there weren''t as many of them, which made it much easier for Brainy''s puppets to lead them around.


    It was also a good thing that there were signs that were all along the hospital that showed where to go, but it was too bad that there wasn''t a single sign that led them to exactly what they needed. Of course, that made sense since the room of records was a ce that only people who worked there could ess, so there was no need for them to create a sign for people wandering the halls since they normally wouldn''t be going there. The signs that hung up on the walls were mainly for different departments of the hospital and special rooms.


    However, since there were these signs, it wasn''t hard for Lin Fan to figure out which ways he shouldn''t go since there was only so much space in this hospital.


    With Brainy mapping out the various parts of the hospital based on the signs that it could see, soon Lin Fan had a working map of the various parts of the hospital.


    There was only one ce that was nk on the map that Lin Fan drew with Brainy''s instructions, this meant that this was the only ce where the room of records and the administration office could be.


    It was in the left wing of the hospital, but there wasn''t much in between them and that ce.


    The strange thing about the distribution of the ghosts was that most of them were found in the right wing of the hospital, but that was also where the psych clinic was found. That was most likely where most of them had been held, so it made sense that they would be there.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother fighting any of the ghosts that were in his way because there was no reason for him to fight them.


    There wasn''t a single ghost that was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, which meant that there wasn''t a single ghost that could catch Brainy''s puppet. It was quite easy for Brainy''s puppets to lure the ghosts away from the path they took before losing them.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen smoothly made their way to the administration office with the files that they were looking for, but they didn''t find what they wanted, rather they received quite the surprise.


    The moment they arrived, they saw the office and they were caught off guard by what they had seen.


    There were no ghosts around since Brainy''s puppets had led them all away, but that didn''t matter since the office was already trashed.


    There was furniture smashed all over the ground and there was a small pile of paper that was burning in the center of the office. It was clear that someone had destroyed this ce and they had done so without holding back.<sub> </sub>


    It wasn''t hard to figure out who had done this with the situation that was happening in this hospital.


    After they were freed, the mental patients must havee here first looking for the people that had locked them away, or at least the ones with clear enough minds led the ones that didn''t to this ce to take revenge.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what kind of things the doctors did to treat them, but it was clearly bad enough for them to do all this¡­


    Still, it wasn''t Lin Fan''s ce to judge since this was something that happened in the past.


    The hospital was clearly under the influence of timews just like the school, which was why it had changed like this.


    Lin Fan waved his hand and put out the mes, but he found that the documents that had been burned couldn''t be read at all, so he gave up and headed into the records room.


    The records room was a mess, but most of the records were still intact. They had only taken a few of the records to create the burning pile outside, most of the other records were still kept safe inside the room, though they were scattered all over the ce since most of the shelves that were holding them had been tipped over.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen wasted no time going through the records that were there, looking for the one that they wanted, the one on the patient named Faust.


    While they were searching, they did find records on some of the other mental patients, the people whose documents Lin Fan had found at the front desk. Lin Fan ced them on the side for Mo Ze Chen to read through while he continued searching through the records.


    After what seemed like a long time, Lin Fan finally found the file that he was looking for.


    ording to the information on the file, this Faust was someone who wasn''t actually a member of this tribe, he was someone who had wandered into theirmunity.


    He had lived among them for some time as a normal person, but then that all suddenly changed one day.


    One day, they found that there were some kids missing and there were clues that led them to believe that Faust was the one who did it.


    After raiding his house, they found that the kids were half dead as they were ced inside an array that Faust had made in his basement. Faust had been on the side, looking like he was conducting some ritual, but they immediately stopped him and were able to save the kids.


    Though the kids were also sent to this psych ward because of the trauma, that was a different story.


    During the trial, Faust made it clear that he was mentally unstable, so the decision was made to send him to this psych ward. As for the rest, it was clear to Lin Fan since he had already read the notes at the front desk.


    After reading that Faust was someone who didn''te from this vige and was an outsider, Lin Fan began to think if he was his transmigration senior, but the notes on the file disproved this.


    The notes in the file had included a newspaper article on how Faust had been caught.


    After defeating several experts of this vige, finally their saviour was the one who had stopped him.


    This saviour was someone that Lin Fan was familiar with since he had seen plenty of stories about him, so he knew that this saviour was actually his transmigration senior.


    Since they were two different people, Lin Fan knew that Faust wasn''t a transmigrator at all. But still, where had this Fauste from?


    Lin Fan only thought about this for a bit before he continued looking through Faust''s records, but he still couldn''t find anything rted to the clue that he got.


    That was until he saw a list of items that had been confiscated and brought in with Faust, ones that were considered not dangerous by the council that had tried him. Among these items, there was one that had caught Lin Fan''s eye.


    It was a doll.


    As for why Faust had a doll in his possessions, that was something that Lin Fan wasn''t clear on, but he knew that this doll must be what he had to get.


    After all, the clue that he had received had clearly stated the word "doll".

 426 Chapter 426

    There was nothing else that was useful in these records, so Lin Fan stopped looking through them and began moving through the hospital once again.


    He knew where he had to go, but the ce that he had to go was also the ce that was filled with the most ghosts. There were only two ways for him to make his way to his destination.


    One was by using force and destroying all the ghosts in his way as he made his way there.


    The other was by using something to lure the ghosts away from his destination, clearing a path for him to reach it.


    But of course there were problems with both of these methods.


    If he used force, he would have to fight his way through all the various ghosts and that would force him to consume all his life energy. He was certain that he would have to fight this Faust and some of the patients that were mentioned at the front desk before getting the doll that he needed.


    Not to mention the fact that Lin Fan wasn''t certain if he could keep the ghosts down. After all, back at the school, there had been an array that had been healing the ghosts that Lin Fan beat, so he couldn''t clear out the waves chasing after them. If there was something simr here, that meant that there was no chance to use this force method.


    As for luring them away, this was clearly the better of the two options since it was a method that was tried and tested, as well it would save Lin Fan quite a bit of trouble.


    The only problem was that Lin Fan wasn''t certain how strong the special patients that would be blocking his way would be. These people would definitely be stronger than normal ghosts if they were specifically mentioned by the trial.


    Just ghosts that were in the peak Embryo Soul Realm would be fast enough to catch the rat puppets and if they were even stronger, there was a chance that they would be able to outrun the rabbit puppet. If that was the case, that would be bad since that was a special puppet that Lin Fan had worked hard to find and he wouldn''t want to lose it like this.


    But after debating it, Lin Fan decided that he would do a mix of both strategies.


    Lin Fan released even more rat puppets to start luring all the ghosts that were in this wing away while started to move to the center of the hospital. As he continued along, he noticed that there were more and more ghosts that were wandering the halls, but they were still manageable since he had released more rats.


    Unlike the school where a single rat was enough for several dozen kid ghosts, these ghosts all wandered around by themselves, so Brainy had to use more rats to lure them in before putting them into packs that it had created.


    Doing this naturally meant that more time was taken since they had to lure in all the stragglers and put them into a pack, but this was definitely safer than leaving them behind.


    Along the way, they also noticed that the ghosts they met were slowly bing stronger.


    The ones that they had encountered in the left wing were mainly in the low Embryo Soul Realm, with a few of them actually being in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm. Now that they had made their way into the center part of the hospital, the ghosts here were now in the low to mid Embryo Soul Realm.


    While there hadn''t been a high or peak Embryo Soul Realm ghost that had shown up yet, Lin Fan knew that it was only a matter of time.


    He wasn''t worried if they were high or peak Embryo Soul Realm since he would be able to deal with them. The only thing he had to worry about were the ghosts that were in the Child Soul Realm. Those were the ones that could pose a threat to him.


    But then Lin Fan suddenly remembered what had happened in the principal''s office back at the school and he couldn''t help suddenly stopping.


    Mo Ze Chen who had been following Lin Fan suddenly saw Lin Fan stop and he couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what is it?"


    Lin Fan was in thought for a bit, so he didn''t say anything, but once he finished thinking, he waved his hand at Mo Ze Chen and said, "Follow me."


    Mo Ze Chen was confused why Lin Fan had suddenly stopped and was now telling him to follow him, even though Mo Ze Chen had been following him the entire time. However, Mo Ze Chen was also slowly getting used to Lin Fan''s quirks since he had been dealing with them the entire time. He knew that Lin Fan suddenly had these ideas from time to time, so the only thing he had to do was follow Lin Fan since most of the time those ideas were very good.


    It was too bad that this time, that idea involved him and it wasn''t involving him in a good way.


    Lin Fan made his way through the center of the hospital, moving closer to the right wing, but he didn''t get too close.<sub> </sub>


    Hebed the various halls like he was searching for something, but as they continued along, he wasn''t able to find a single thing. That was until they came to this one department that was near the right wing.


    This department was for electrotherapy, so it was a ce that the mental patients were likely to have been brought to be treated.


    Since that was the case, the ghosts here were actually stronger than the ones outside.


    Most of the ghosts here were in the mid Embryo Soul Realm and there were a few ghosts that were in the high Embryo Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan had Brainy use the rats to lead the mid Embryo Soul Realm ghosts away while also bringing the high Embryo Soul Realm ghosts towards them.


    Mo Ze Chen was confused why Lin Fan had suddenly stopped moving after they reached this room, but then he heard the sounds around him and how they were getting closer and he couldn''t help revealing a nervous look.


    Then when there was a rat that suddenly appeared around the corner of the hall before a ghost followed it over to where they were, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what is going on? Weren''t you leading them all away from us? Why did ite here?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything, he just turned his wrist and made a white sword appear which he immediately threw to Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised to have this white sword thrown at him, but he was still an expert in the Embryo Soul Realm, so he was able to smoothly catch this sword.


    Even though he was able to catch it, he was still confused as to why Lin Fan had thrown it to him.


    When Mo Ze Chen was about to look back at Lin Fan, he suddenly felt a push from behind him and he was pushed towards the ghost.


    Mo Ze Chen turned to see Lin Fan pushing him and he immediately revealed a confused look, but he still wielded the sword that Lin Fan gave him as he charged forward at the ghost that the rat puppet was leading at them since he couldn''t stop himself.


    With a single sh, the sword cut right through the arm of the ghost and sent it flying.


    It was by no means that the ghost was weak, since it was a ghost in the high Embryo Soul Realm with two differentws that it couldbine and Mo Ze Chen was only in the low Embryo Soul Realm. It was just that the sh from Mo Ze Chen was too strong that the ghost couldn''t resist at all.


    Mo Ze Chen knew that he wasn''t this strong, so he couldn''t help looking down at the sword that Lin Fan gave him. When he looked closely, he found that thews surrounding this weapon weren''t normal. At the very least, they were far beyond what he could release at his realm, which meant that this weapon¡­


    Mo Ze Chen looked back at Lin Fan with a look of gratitude, but Lin Fan didn''t look back at him at all. Rather, Lin Fan had been watching the ghost the entire time.


    Even though it had its arm cut off, the ghost still wasn''t dissipating just yet and it was still twitching on the ground.


    With Lin Fan watching it, the arm of the ghost suddenly moved back to where it had been cut off and almost as if there were tentaclesing out, the flesh slowly reconnected the arm until it was a part of the body once again.


    After a few more seconds, the arm waspletely reattached and the ghost used it to push itself up again.


    Once it was up, it looked right at Mo Ze Chen with a re that was filled with hatred before charging out at Mo Ze Chen again.


    Mo Ze Chen also suddenly noticed that something was off, but he reacted toote since the ghost was already charging right at him.


    When Mo Ze Chen had turned around, the ghost was almost in front of him with its hand out in the form of a w, flying towards Mo Ze Chen.

 427 Chapter 427

    Mo Ze Chen watched the ghost''s w approaching him and he saw his life shing in front of his eyes.


    He knew that with his cultivation, it was impossible for him to react in time and it was impossible for him to block the attack of the ghost, so the only path left for him was death.


    He had been toocent at thest second, letting his guard down since it seemed like he had beaten his enemy. That was mainly because he was someone who didn''t fight regrly, so his battle sense wasn''t as developed, even though his cultivation definitely was higher than more normal people.


    But in the end, it was his own fault since he had let his guard down. If he wanted to me anyone, he could only me himself.


    Though there was a small part of him that med Lin Fan in the end since Lin Fan was the one that pushed him out to fight.


    Still that was countered out by the fact that Lin Fan had given him a Child Soul Realm artifact for him to fight with. Along with the fact that they were in a ruin and that it was generally established that everyone should take care of themselves in ruins.


    Now that he was about to die from his own mistake, he couldn''t really me anyone¡­


    But he wasn''t destined to die today since Lin Fan had already made a move.


    Before both the ghost and Mo Ze Chen could even react, Lin Fan''s hand hade out in front of Mo Ze Chen and grabbed the ghost by the face. Before the ghost''s w could reach Mo Ze Chen, it stopped right in front of his face.


    Mo Ze Chen had a look of shock as he stared right at the w that was in front of him before looking up at Lin Fan with a gaze of gratitude, but Lin Fan wasn''t looking back at him at all.


    Lin Fan was staring forward at the ghost that was struggling as he grasped it in his hand.


    The ghost even tried to bite Lin Fan''s hand, but he had wrapped it up in the protection of hisws, so the ghost couldn''t bite him.


    Lin Fan looked at the ghost for a few seconds before suddenly punching out with his other hand, sending it tumbling to the ground.


    Without another word, he reached down and took the Iron Eater Bone Artifact out of Mo Ze Chen''s hand and charged forward at the ghost.


    With the way Mo Ze Chen was looking at Lin Fan, if he had been a girl, he definitely would have fallen in love with Lin Fan. No, even as a guy, he would have fallen in love being saved like this by someone as handsome as Lin Fan. That is if he already didn''t have someone else in his heart like he did.


    But that didn''t stop him from being grateful to Lin Fan, to the point where he swore that he would follow Lin Fan to the end.


    Lin Fan wasn''t aware of any of this since he waspletely focused on the ghost.


    It wasn''t that the ghost was strong enough to push him into using his full power, but rather he was looking for a way to kill the ghost.


    It was as he had suspected, there was indeed an array that was ced around this ce just like the school which healed the ghosts whenever they were fatally injured. As long as this array was in ce, it was impossible for Lin Fan to destroy these ghostspletely as it had been shown with how quickly the ghost had reattached its arm.


    So Lin Fan had to find another way to deal with them since he was certain that there was a boss that he would have to fight in the end.


    Lin Fan had thought of this when he remembered what had happened with the ghost principal, so now he was just testing out different ways to deal with the ghost.


    Right now, Lin Fan was focused because he was trying to incapacitate the ghost to the point where it couldn''t move, but also where the array didn''t kick in and heal it. To control his power to this extent was definitely taxing on the mind.


    With Lin Fan''s first sh, he cut off the left arm of the ghost just like Mo Ze Chen had done, but he made sure that it was a clean cut so it wasn''t fatal. He had even released Xiao Huo before charging out just so he could have some mews covering his sword to cauterize the wound so that the ghost wouldn''t bleed out. Though bymon logic, ghosts wouldn''t have blood in the first ce, right?


    Still, Lin Fan cauterized the rotten flesh and it waspletely sealed.


    After that, Lin Fan ducked and weaved as he dodged each blow from the ghost while watching the wound.


    After a few minutes, Lin Fan found that there wasn''t a single movement from the arm that was on the ground or the wound on the ghost. It seemed like as long as it wasn''t fatal, the array wouldn''t kick in.


    But how much could Lin Fan do to the ghost before it was considered fatal?


    Once he had confirmed that nothing would happen, Lin Fan swung out with his de again to chop off the ghost''s other arm. He did the same thing asst time and cauterized the wound, so there was no bleeding at all.<sub> </sub>


    After getting itsst arm chopped off, the ghost struggled to get up for a bit before finally getting up. Even with both of its arms chopped off, the ghost didn''t give up at all as it continued charging at Lin Fan, biting at him again and again, but Lin Fan was able to easily dodge these since the ghost was clearly exhausted from having two arms chopped off.


    After waiting another few minutes, Lin Fan saw that there wasn''t any movement from the second arm chopped off.


    Seeing that nothing seemed off, Lin Fan swung out again and cut off the left leg of the ghost.


    The ghost immediately fell to the ground again and it was very difficult for it to stand up, but it somehow managed to do so in the end.


    Hobbling on one leg, it hopped at Lin Fan, trying to bite him still, but there was no chance of this happening since it was after all it was only one a single leg.


    Lin Fan was able to easily dodge all the attacks of the ghost.


    It was very simr to something that Lin Fan had seen in his past life, it was a specific scene from a movie¡­


    One about a knight in ck armour¡­


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t show any mercy to this ghost as he didn''t waste any time in cutting off the final leg and the torso of the ghost dropped right to the ground, not moving at all other than the head. And that head continued to bite around itself even though there was nothing there.


    Lin Fan waited a few more minutes and seeing that nothing was happening to the ghost, he walked back to Mo Ze Chen who was still sitting on the ground.


    After helping Mo Ze Chen up, Mo Ze Chen hesitantly came over to where the ghost torso was lying and he looked over the ghost torso as it continued trying to bite at him without seeding.


    After looking at it for a bit, he turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, what do we do about this one?"


    Lin Fan looked at it and said, "Do we need to do anything or did you forget about what happenedst time?"


    Mo Ze Chen naturally wouldn''t forget about what happenedst time, so he just left the ghost torso there beforeing back to where Lin Fan was standing and asking, "What do we do now?"


    Lin Fan looked at the end of the hall and didn''t say a thing.


    Mo Ze Chen looked over to find that there was another rat that was running towards them with a ghost following it.


    Now that he knew how to take care of the ghosts, he wanted to try it himself since he knew that he wascking in battle experience and the road ahead definitely wouldn''t be easy.


    With this decision made, Mo Ze Chen reached his hand out towards the sword in Lin Fan''s hand. He knew that without this sword, he wouldn''t stand a chance against this ghost that was in a higher realm of cultivationpared to him.


    However, before he could take the sword, Lin Fan moved it away from him.


    Mo Ze Chen looked up at Lin Fan in surprise as he thought, "Is boss going to make me fight it without the sword?"


    But before Mo Ze Chen could say a thing, Lin Fan had already jumped forward.


    His first hypothesis had worked and now it was time for his second hypothesis.


    Instead of covering his sword withws like before, Lin Fan charged forward with just his sword alone.


    Instead of gathering his life energy asws, Lin Fan was focusing on pulling something out of him, something that he thought he couldn''t control.


    Eventually, when he was right about to sh with the ghost, there was a golden diamond mark that appeared on his forehead.


    With the appearance of the golden diamond mark, there was a golden glow that wrapped up around him.

 428 Chapter 428

    The golden glow spread across Lin Fan''s sword until it waspletely covering it.


    The moment the sword covered in the golden glow came into contact with the ghost, the ghost started writhing in pain as it tried to get out of the way, but there was too much momentum for it to stop. The sword continued to cut right through the ghost like there was no resistance at all until the ghost waspletely cut in half, unable to do a thing.


    Unlike before, where the separated parts would have grabbed out at each other, this wasn''t the case this time.


    The ghost started to dissipate the moment Lin Fan''s sword cut through it and it couldn''t even do a thing when it turned into ashes just like the ghost principal from before.


    However, unlike the ghost principal from before, this ghost wasn''t coherent enough to say anything to Lin Fan before disappearing. All it did was scream out in pain until itpletely dissipated into ashes.


    After it disappeared into ashes, Lin Fan didn''t bother looking at the pile of ashes that was left behind by the ghost that he had just smited, rather he turned to the end of the hallway where there was another rat bringing in another ghost.


    This was another ghost that was in the high Embryo Soul Realm like the previous two and Lin Fan didn''t waste any time in charging forward.


    Gathering all his focus to the center of his forehead again, he swung out with his sword without anyws gathered around it.


    As he approached, once again, there was the golden diamond that appeared on his forehead that once again released a golden glow that wrapped up around his sword. When he swung down with that sword, the same thing happened where the ghost was unable to resist the golden power that surrounded the sword. The ghost was shed right in half and before it could even react, it had already dissipated into ashes.


    Just like this, Lin Fan had easily cleared out two ghosts that should have been invincible in this space.


    Lin Fan didn''t feel any sense of aplishment as he looked down at his sword that was no longer covered in the same golden glow. After all, this golden glow wasn''t one of his abilities and came from an external source, so it didn''t feel like an aplishment at all.


    But that didn''t mean a thing since he had found a way to take care of the ghosts. As long as he was able to use this golden energy, he would be able to take care of all the ghosts here without worrying about them reviving.


    However, the one problem was that he wasn''t able to control it.


    This was an external power after all, so he didn''t have control over it at all.


    Based on what he had just seen, it was clear that this power had some requirement for it to be activated and it wasn''t hard to guess what it was.


    When Lin Fan had charged at the ghosts, he hadn''t covered himself in any of hisws.


    If he were to take a single hit from the ghosts, there was no chance that he would have made it out unscratched, which meant that he was risking his life.


    It seemed like the condition of the golden glow appearing was that his life was at risk, but that was also strange since Lin Fan''s life wasn''t at riskst time when he faced the ghost principal¡­


    Perhaps there were more than one condition for this golden glow to appear, but for now, the most consistent method was to use his life as a gamble.


    Lin Fan looked up from his sword and looked to the end of the hallway where there was another ghost being led over by a rat puppet.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all as he charged out at the ghost with his sword already in mid swing.


    Just like this, Lin Fan continued to test the conditions of disabling these ghosts.


    He even gave his sword to Mo Ze Chen a few times to let him learn how to disable the ghosts like he had done the first time.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t have mews like Lin Fan did, so instead he pulled out a jewel that he wrapped on the hilt of the de, which imbued it with mews that were strong enough to burn the flesh of the ghosts.


    While the two of them were inside this hospital ying around with the ghosts, testing the limit of their durability, things were also happening outside.


    ¡­


    It had already been an hour, close to an hour and a half since Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had entered the city inside the giant tree of light.


    During this time, there had been quite a few examinees that had slowly made their way into these ruins through the entrance that Lin Fan had left open.<sub> </sub>


    Most of them were shocked the moment they had entered these ruins, but they didn''t have time to remain shocked for that long since there were still ghosts all over the city. Those that were unlucky had been caught by the ghosts and had their life energypletely sucked out, killing them in the process.


    After all, most of these examinees were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm and these ghosts were in the Embryo Soul Realm, so they had no chance of fighting back.


    Though most of them were faster than these Embryo Soul Realm ghosts with their rotten bodies that were incredibly slow.


    As for how they were caught, most of them had let their guards down when they thought they had been safe and were caught by the ghosts.


    They didn''t know that these ghosts were able to sense life force and could find them even when they were hiding.


    Those that were smart had used the gaps in the routes of the ghost created by those people who were unlucky enough to get caught to make it deeper into the city. Those included those seeded candidates that had skipped the first round just like Lin Fan.


    There were two groups among these people, those that had arrived first and those that arrivedter because they had to deal with the traps that were in their way.


    The ones that had arrived first were already at the tree of light, but unlike Lin Fan who was able to see the clues that were left there for him, they were unable to find the entrance at all.


    There were some that had be dissuaded once they were unable to find anything, those people began wandering around the city, looking to see if they could find any other treasures.


    As for the ones that did stay at the tree, they began walking around the circumference of the tree, looking for anything that stood out, but so far no one had seen anything.


    Of course it didn''t help that all the ghosts that were around the tree were all much more powerful than the ones that were scattered around in town.


    This was a clear indication that they had to be guarding something special if the guards that were here were stronger than normal, which made some of these people even more certain that there had to be something special here.


    What they didn''t know was that atop the tree, there was a beast who was looking down over them with several ghostmanders standing behind it. That was the reason why the casualties had been rather low for what they should have been, most of the ghostmanders were here instead of being down there hunting people.


    The beast was looking down on the city, looking down on the humans and instead of looking at them like equals, it looked down on them like ants.


    It had been watching the humans running around with the ghosts for a while, but it didn''t do a thing as it justid there atop the tree.


    The ghostmanders also looked indifferent as they looked down at these humans.


    After a few more minutes, the beast finally said, "Go and test them."


    The ghostmanders all gave a bow to the beast before flying off the tree in different directions.


    Every single ghostmander headed off in the direction of a human and each of these humans were in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    They didn''t immediately fall down, but rather they floated there in the air for a bit while watching over them.


    Though not every single ghostmander was as patient.


    There were two of them that only stayed in the air for a minute before dropping down in front of their target.


    These two were clearly shocked by the sudden appearance of this ghostmander, but they didn''t panic either since both of them were in the mid Embryo Soul Realm.


    They could tell that these ghostmanders were in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, but that didn''t matter to them since they were able to fight normal peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts to begin with. This was the advantage that they had as geniuses, which was that they were much stronger than normal experts at the same level. They were so strong that they could match those experts that were even stronger than them.


    Both of them pulled out their artifacts and charged out at the ghostmanders, but the ghostmanders weren''t afraid.


    They looked at the kids charging at them before suddenly punching out.


    In two different locations, there were two figures that suddenly flew out and mmed into walls.

 429 Chapter 429

    There was no movement from the holes in the shattered walls, there wasn''t even a single sound that came from them.


    It was clear that whatever had just been smashed through them wasn''t alive any more.


    But then again, for these people who had been sent flying to break the walls, it was clear how much force they had been sent flying with.


    After all, these ways had been strong enough to resist Mo Ze Chen''s spatialw dagger, so for these bodies to break through them, the force had to be ridiculous. There was no need to mention if those bodies that had broken through the walls were alive anymore¡­


    As blood dripped out of the crater that had formed in the wall, the people who were watching from around all revealed looks of terror. They all knew how powerful the two who had been smashed into the walls were, so they knew that there was no chance to defeat these ghosts that had suddenly shown up.


    Since they couldn''t defeat these ghosts, there was no need for them to sacrifice their lives in holding them off. There were plenty of people around them for that, so it was better to run as far as they could before these ghosts started chasing them.


    But as for the ghostmanders, they just had disappointed looks as they stared at the craters in the wall that they had created. They didn''t make a single move to chase everyone who was running away, rather they just gave a sigh and shook their heads.


    After a minute, the ghostmanders waved their hands and as if they had received an order, the ghosts around them suddenly charged out in the directions the people that had fled ran off in.


    As for the ghostmanders themselves, they jumped into the air again and flew off in another direction of a human in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    After the explosion that they had caused, there was no way for the rest of them to continue hiding, so the other ghostmanders descended onto their chosen human Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    Among these chosen experts, there were some that were just as weak as the two who had been smashed, but they weren''t instantly killed. Rather the ghostmanders that they faced jumped around them, dodging their attacks with ease. It was almost as if they were testing them.


    But this wasn''t enough to bring them down as many of them released their ultimate skills. It was just too bad that not a single one of them was able to defeat their opponents.


    Then there were nine clear different cases where they were able to match the ghostmanders.


    These nine were the Decagram Geniuses of the younger generation of Harmony City, they were all talents that had been raised by the other twelve great factions. As for why they were named the Decagram, that was because only the top ten geniuses were chosen for this title.


    That meant that there would always be one faction that was left out of this since the Hunters Organization didn''t actually have any younger generation talents of their own.


    The reason these Decagram Geniuses had been allowed to enter the Hunters Exam was because they were a way for the other eleven factions to build rtions with the Hunters Organization. After all, it wasn''t a negative to get a Hunters License, in fact most of the upper ranked members of the various eleven other factions also had these licenses. That was because these licenses really did have quite a few uses and it also built trust between these factions and the Hunters Organization.


    Of course, they weren''t expected to be loyal to the Hunters Organization since they belonged to the other factions. This was nothing more than a symbolic gesture.


    As for why they were called the Decagram even though there were only nine of them present, that was because one of them was already dead.


    The one that was dead was Dugu Xiao who had been killed by the beast when he was the one to arrive after Lin Fan.


    Dugu Xiao was able to take this title even though he was much weaker than the rest of the Decagram all because of the expert who served him, the expert who was the real Decagram Genius.


    Since this expert belonged to a family that had served the Dugu Family for generations, he had purposefully lost to Dugu Xiao just so he could give him the title of Decagram Genius. Then when anyone tried to challenge Dugu Xiao for this title, that expert had taken care of everyone who hade, meaning that Dugu Xiao was able to keep that title without any worries.


    As for why that expert wasn''t with Dugu Xiao this time, even though he was fiercely loyal to him, it was because Dugu Xiao had snuck off, while also making his father give that expert a mission that would keep him upied. Dugu Xiao had wanted to y around a bit instead of listening to that expert nagging him all the time, so he had sent him off.


    It was too bad Dugu Xiao didn''t know that this had indirectly caused his death.


    No, even if that expert was here, both of them would have died since what they were facing was a beast in the Nascent Soul Realm and both of them were still in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    As for the other nine Decagram Geniuses, they were able to hold their ground against the ghostmanders that hade after them, though some of the lower ranked ones had a bit of a hard time keeping up.


    As for the number one ranked Decagram Genius, Wang Jian, he wasn''t having a good time either.<sub> </sub>


    Wang Jian was from the Myriad Sword Hall and he was a perfect example of a sword cultivator. He had moved straight forward since entering this city, cutting down all the ghosts that had attacked him.


    Of course, while these ghosts were weakpared to him, there were still quite a few of them, which meant that he had spent quite a bit of energy. He wasn''t even at half his normal strength right now, so it definitely would have been hard for him to fight the ghostmander that had appeared.


    But it was a good thing that the ghostmander didn''t attack.


    Rather, when the ghostmander appeared in front of Wang Jian, he just looked at him for a bit before floating down to the ground and asking, "You want some time to recover?"


    Wang Jian was surprised to hear these words from this ghost, rather he was surprised to hear any words from a ghost because all he had heard this entire time from them were moans and screams.


    But of course, Wang Jian wasn''t easily fooled.


    There was no way that the enemy would just let him recover like this.


    Wang Jian raised his guard and brandished his sword which he pointed at the ghostmander as he said, "What kind of tricks are you up to?"


    The ghostmander looked at Wang Jian and instead of getting angry, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile as he said, "You really need to not take things so seriously sometimes. I just want to test how strong you are and it wouldn''t be as fun if you weren''t at full strength, so I''m giving you that chance. I suggest you don''t waste it."


    Wang Jian was taken aback by what the ghostmander said at first, but then he still raised his sword as he said, "I''d be a fool if I believed you like this, so do you take me for a fool?"


    The ghostmander gave a sigh this time, but he also didn''t say anything as he gave a wave of his hands.


    As if they had been given orders before, all the ghosts around them suddenly charged in their direction in a wave.


    When Wang Jian saw this, he knew that even if he was at full force, to break through a wave like this was impossible. At the very least, he would take a few of them out with him before dying.


    But before he could do a thing, the ghost wave suddenly stopped in a circle around him, catching him off guard once again.


    Wang Jian looked all around him and saw that he waspletely surrounded in a wave of ghosts before turning back to the ghostmander to ask, "What is this?"


    The ghostmander said, "I just gave you a reason to trust me like you asked for."


    Wang Jian looked around him again before turning back to the ghostmander, "What happens to them after you die?"


    The ghostmander wasn''t able to react immediately to this, but then he suddenly broke out inughter before saying, "If you can kill me, they''ll disperse as I''ve given them the order already. These low tier ghosts will follow my orders even after I''m dead, so you don''t have to worry."


    Wang Jian couldn''t help saying with a bitter smile, "I''d feel much better if they could leave right now."


    The ghostmander said with a faint smile, "Young man, you should know that you should trust people sometimes."


    Wang Jian said, "I don''t think I''m that young."


    The ghostmander said with a smile, "Compared to me, you definitely are."


    Wang Jian didn''t say a thing as he sat down and began meditating, getting into his best state.


    Since he had no other choice, he might as well take this gamble.


    Not to mention that he felt very close to breaking through and this fight would definitely help him.

 430 Chapter 430

    It didn''t take long for Wang Jian to recover his strength and the two sides shed.


    In the end, by a narrow margin, Wang Jian was able to defeat the ghostmander.


    The ghostmander had kept his word and the moment he died, the ghosts around them immediately scattered, not leaving a single one in the area.


    But before the ghostmander died, he didn''t forget to look right into Wang Jian''s eyes and say, "You''re definitely strong and that will attract a lot of attention. I hope that you''ll be able to survive what wille."


    Wang Jian couldn''t understand what the ghostmander meant by that, but that didn''t stop a chill from running down his spine.


    Still, there was nothing that Wang Jian could do now, so he continued moving forward towards the giant tree of light in the center of the city. Of course, he no longer pushed himself forward without any care now that he knew that there were powerful ghostmanders like this.


    He didn''t know if the next one would be as kind as this one if he pushed forward like this.


    But he couldn''t help wondering, why were there intelligent ghosts like this here?


    As for the other eight Decagram Geniuses, they all met their own ghosts to fight and all of them came out on top, though two of them were basically half dead. If it wasn''t for their followers bringing them away, perhaps the next straggler ghost that passed by might have killed them.


    The beast atop the tree had seen everything from its position high up, but it didn''t look interested in any of this at all as it watched with an indifferent look.


    But there was a glow that was found in the bottom of its eyes.


    ¡­


    Back inside the city in the tree, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had tested out their strength on ten different ghosts that Brainy''s rat puppets had led over before finally stopping. There were piles of ashes and three ghosts that had been cut to pieces on the sides of this corridor that they were in.


    In fact, Lin Fan wanted to continue killing these ghosts, but it was too bad that Brainy''s puppets were unable to find anymore at this level. They had basically killed all the ghosts that were in the high Embryo Soul Realm around them and there weren''t any ghosts in the peak Embryo Soul Realm here.


    After cutting down these ghosts, Lin Fan had a good idea of how to deal with them even with the array present. Though, his method of dealing with them could be considered dangerous since he was technically putting his life on the line to use them.


    Still, this gave Lin Fan much more confidence in dealing with what woulde as he came closer to the right wing of the hospital.


    Since there was nothing else for them to do here, Lin Fan led Mo Ze Chen to the right wing, but of course he made sure to release Brainy''s puppets to scout the way.


    As he went along, he made sure to keep an eye as to when they entered the right wing. It was a good thing that it was made very clear by the sudden change in surroundings. The right wing lookedpletely different from the rest of the hospital since there was graffiti all over the walls and all kinds of other things. There were even burning piles of clothes that were randomly scattered.


    There was no pattern to this chaos, it was just chaos created for the sake of chaos, but since this was done by mental patients, it did make sense.


    But it wasn''t just that, as soon as they arrived in the right wing, all the weaker ghosts had disappeared.


    The weakest ghost that was wandering around was in the high Embryo Soul Realm and there were a few scattered peak Embryo Soul Realm ghosts that were among them.


    If this was a game, he would have just gone from the mid game zone to the end game zone, where all the mobs were much stronger than normal mobs. There would also be end game bosses found here that would also be much stronger than the bosses he had fought in the middle section.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried about this at all because he had already made his preparations. If he didn''t know how to take care of these ghosts, perhaps he might have panicked, but now he had no worries.


    The first thing he did was follow the map of the right wing that he had found in the records room.


    That was actually the most important piece of information he had found this entire time and it showed by how it had directed him.


    Since it was a map from the room of records, it also listed every patient who was put in each of these rooms by number, making it much easier for Lin Fan to find Faust''s room.<sub> </sub>


    However, before that, Lin Fan wanted to check out a few other rooms.


    Namely the rooms for the patients whose files had been left at the front desk.


    These were patients that the dungeon felt important enough to give people information on, so there must be something special about them.


    This was something that Lin Fan hadpletely missed at the school because he had gotten the clue which had allowed him to find the final boss right away, instead of having to fight his way through the mid area bosses to open the gate to the final boss.


    Lin Fan wanted to do things properly this time to see if there was anything special that would drop from the mid area bosses.


    As they made their way through the right wing, they quickly arrived at the room of the first named patient.


    This was a patient who had suffered from schizophrenia and had a tendency to be violent, so he had been locked up in a special padded room to make sure that he couldn''t hurt himself or the people around him.


    As for what happened after the patients rioted, it was hard to tell and as for whether this person was still in his room or not, Lin Fan wasn''t sure, but this was the only clue that he had.


    It was a good thing that his intuition was right since there were scattered pieces of furniture and blood spots all over the corridor outside the room of this patient.


    Following this trail of destruction, there was arge patch of blood right outside the door, as well as several ghosts that had been ripped apart lying there.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan pulled out another rat and threw it over to where the door was.


    The scattered pieces of the ghost were still alive, but theypletely ignored this rat since it was a corpse puppet that didn''t have any life force.


    After the corpse puppet entered the room, it quickly ryed information on the situation inside the room to Brainy who passed it to Lin Fan.


    ording to the corpse puppet, there was a single ghost that was sitting inside the room with a straitjacket on, sitting in the middle of the room while chewing on something. When the corpse puppet came closer, it found that this ghost was actually chewing on parts of the ghosts that were left outside.


    While it couldn''t be considered cannibalism since they were both corpses to begin with, it was still disturbing to see a ghost eating another ghost¡­


    Lin Fan could tell that this ghost was definitely dangerous, but since it was only in the Child Soul Realm, he also knew that he was able to take care of it just like he had taken care of the ghost principal.


    Lin Fan released his pets who gathered around him and then he quickly used his windws to push the pieces of the ghosts that were in front of the door out of the way.


    The ghost inside could naturally feel the windws that were outside the door and it stood up immediately, standing up quite smoothly even though it had a straitjacket on. It made its way towards the door, but what it encountered was Lin Fan''s sword that was swinging through the door frame.


    This sword was covered in nine different coloured glows as it fell down on the ghost, but the ghost was able to react in time to gather itsws to block this.


    However, unlike what had happened with the ghost principal before, there wasn''t the golden glow that hade out of his forehead to wrap around him.


    Instead, the two sides shed with each other and there was a bnce for a few seconds before the ghost in the straitjacket was sent flying into the wall.


    Even though the wall was padded, it didn''t stop the ghost from crashing right into it and creating a hole, flying into the next room.


    There was no ghost in that next room, so there was nothing else that Lin Fan had to deal with, but that didn''t mean the ghost in the straitjacket was done yet.


    The ghost in the straitjacket stood up and the cut that had been across its chest immediately healed, while at the same time, that sh had cut through the straitjacket, so the ghost was now free.


    Making use of its freedom, that ghost used surprising agility to jump around the room, bouncing off the walls to go faster and faster until it suddenly flew out at Lin Fan.

 431 Chapter 431

    As the ghost approached, Lin Fan didn''t panic at all as he began moving forward to meet it head on.


    Lin Fan still had nine different coloured glows around his sword as he swung it out to meet the w of the ghost in front of him. The two shed in the center and there was another shockwave before the ghost was sent flying once again.


    It was clear that Lin Fan at full power was stronger than the ghost, even though it had two differentws surrounding its ws.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan was unable to break through its defenses to hurt it.


    Lin Fan had been able to send it flying, but he had been unable to cut through itsws to deal any damage to it. So even though it had been sent flying twice, there were only some slight wounds on the ghost.


    At this rate, Lin Fan would be the one to run out of power first because the way he fought was just too draining on him. It took a lot of life energy and concentration to be able to gather the ninews together like this without them going wild, so naturally Lin Fan was consuming energy at an intense rate.


    If this continued, Lin Fan would be out of power in just five minutes.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan knew that he had to do something about this since he couldn''t break through this situation like this.


    After making up his mind, Lin Fan charged out at the ghost again who had been in a daze after being knocked back, but it quickly reacted as well. The ghost didn''t hesitate at all as it released another w attack to match Lin Fan''s sword sh.


    But this time, instead of being silent as he shed, Lin Fan roared out with all his might.


    It was almost as if he was trying to release all the power that he had with this roaring, but it was still the same attack that he had unleashed earlier. While he was able to send the ghost flying again, it didn''t achieve the effect that he wanted to achieve.


    After all, the golden diamond didn''t appear on his forehead.


    Lin Fan had thought that he would be able to force it out with this roar concentrating all his energy into this single swing, but he wasn''t able to do it in the end.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan knew that there was only one other choice for him.


    After pausing for a second, Lin Fan released the array and the glow of the nine differentws around him, leaving himself vulnerable.


    Mo Ze Chen saw this and was confused as he shouted, "Boss, what are you doing?"


    Since Mo Ze Chen was able to see this, naturally the ghost was able to see it as well.


    The ghost didn''t hesitate at all as it jumped onto the wall, bouncing from surface to surface, going even faster than it had gone before. Finally, it reached a point where Mo Ze Chen wasn''t able to keep up with it anymore and it jumped out to attack Lin Fan.


    It was too bad that Lin Fan''s spiritual senses were much stronger than other people''s, so he was able to keep track of this ghost easily.


    As the ghost came at him, Lin Fan quickly turned and swept out with the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    This time, he wasn''t disappointed as right as the ghost''s w was about to hit his sword, there was a sudden golden glow that spread around him.


    The golden glowpletely wrapped around Lin Fan''s sword, giving him the power to defeat the ghosts.


    But unlike the other ghosts, this Child Soul Realm ghost seemed to recognize this glow as it turned at thest second. Since it had turned at thest second, its hand just barely made contact with this glow, but the part that did had directly turned to ash as it scattered from the rest of the ghost''s hand.


    The ghost jumped back and looked at Lin Fan with a gaze that was filled with caution.


    After a few seconds, it said in a raspy voice, "It''s you, you actually came¡­"


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were taken aback when they heard this.


    p But Lin Fan reacted quickly and asked, "What do you mean by that?"</anda>


    But the ghost acted like it didn''t hear him at all as it whispered to itself, "That light, that ursed light is here once again to take everything away from us...But we won''t let it, will we?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan could tell that something was about to happen, so he released his spiritual sense in full.


    The ghost knew that it couldn''t beat Lin Fan in a head on fight, so it decided to target the one thing that it knew it could touch, which was Mo Ze Chen in the back.


    It wasn''t sure whether Mo Ze Chen was weak or if he was waiting for his chance to attack as well, but it knew that it couldn''t leave Mo Ze Chen be since he was nothing more than a hidden danger for him. If he couldn''t beat Lin Fan, what he could do was run since there were plenty of other ghosts here. As long as he used those mindless ghosts to stop Lin Fan, it was easy for him to run away.


    So the first thing to do was to take care of Mo Ze Chen.


    But how could Lin Fan not see through the ghost''s n when it made it that easy to see through with how it had been looking at Mo Ze Chen.


    Once the ghost made up its mind, it didn''t hesitate at all as it began jumping on the walls, going back and forth between the different surfaces as it began increasing in speed.


    It kept bouncing around until it was even fasterpared tost time.


    Mo Ze Chen had no idea what was happening, but he could sense the danger that was aimed at him, so he couldn''t help taking a step back.


    As for Lin Fan, he didn''t mind the movements of the ghost at all as he slowly began walking towards Mo Ze Chen.


    The ghost reached the peak of its speed where if it went any faster, it wouldn''t have been able to control itself anymore, so with thest jump it made, it charged right at Mo Ze Chen.


    With the way Lin Fan was moving, it seemed like the ghost was approaching from his blind spot and he wouldn''t be able to react in time, but that wasn''t what happened at all.


    While it seemed like Lin Fan couldn''t see anything, he had created a zone of spiritual sense all around him that would intercept the ghost no matter which direction it approached from. It was almost like a field that would immediately pick up on any foreign objects that entered.


    Lin Fan normally wouldn''t fight like this since he preferred using the power of hisws to match the enemy, but this time it was different. After all, he couldn''t use thews since he had to put himself in danger to activate the one thing that could kill these ghosts.


    Since that was the case, he had to leave himself vulnerable and only strike at the final moment.


    The ghost actually came from right behind Lin Fan and it was nning on passing right by him, making him put up his guard just so it could attack Mo Ze Chen without any hindrances.


    However, when the ghost was right about to pass by Lin Fan, Lin Fan suddenly raised the white sword in his hand until it was horizontal.


    The ghost raised its hand to form a w just in case, but it was still nning on flying right by Lin Fan.


    It was too bad that right at the moment when it was side by side with Lin Fan, the sword suddenly swung out and appeared right in front of the ghost.


    The ghost waspletely unable to react in time since it couldn''t understand how Lin Fan even knew that it was there. Still, since this was the case, the ghost could only do one final thing which was to raise its power as much as possible.


    The ghost surrounded its hand with all of its life energy in the form of the twows mixing together, attacking with all the strength that it had.


    It was too bad that the moment that the ghost''s w approached the sword, it was suddenly met with a golden glow that wrapped around the sword.


    There was no dy at all, as soon as the golden glow met the w, the w suddenly turned to ashes.


    It was a good thing for the ghost that Lin Fan had swung the sword, so there was actual force behind the sword which had propelled the ghost out of the range of the golden glow. However, that wasn''t before the glow had already imed most of its arm and even part of its chest.


    It was like there was arge part bitten out of the ghost as it could barely remain standing there.


    The ghost looked at the glow around Lin Fan one more time and cursed, "Damn light."


    After cursing, the ghost suddenly copsed onto the ground and started turning into ashespletely.


    Lin Fan looked at the ghost for a bit before walking out of the room with Mo Ze Chen.

 432 Chapter 432

    After taking care of this ghost, Lin Fan didn''t immediately head off to the next room.


    After all, he had spent quite a bit of energy in the end to take care of just this one single ghost and there were plenty more just like this ghost that was waiting for him. If he had to spend the same amount of energy to take care of them all, he definitely wouldn''t be able tost.


    At the very least, he would have to rest before going anywhere else first.


    At the same time, there was also the need to check the room that the ghost had been in earlier.


    Lin Fan was doing this because he wanted to see if there was anything to gain from defeating a side boss like this, so the first thing he would have to do is naturally check the room that the boss had been in to see if there were any rewards.


    There also didn''t seem to be any ghosts wandering around this ce ording to Brainy. The puppets that Brainy had sent out hadn''t seen a single ghost wandering around.


    It was most likely because of the scene that Lin Fan had seen in front of the door beforeing here.


    The ghosts most likely already knew that this ce was dangerous for them, so they chose to avoid this ce.


    That was something that Lin Fan could use since he needed a quiet ce to catch his breath first.


    Aftering into the room, Lin Fan had Mo Ze Chen look around for anything special while he sat down cross legged on the padded floor to start using his cultivation technique to heal. The suns inside his dantian began to turn and they quickly provided him with plenty of energy.


    This was the one advantage of Lin Fan''s God Tier Cultivation Technique, it gathered life energy much faster than a normal cultivation technique. Not to mention that there was the ck hole in his dantian as well which drained all the life energy from around him.


    It didn''t take long before Lin Fan was back in perfect condition.


    As soon as he finished gathering life energy, Lin Fan went over to Mo Ze Chen who was just standing there in a daze and asked, "Did you find anything?"


    When Mo Ze Chen heard this, he came out of his daze and said, "Boss, there''s nothing here at all."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he asked, "You didn''t find a single thing?"


    Mo Ze Chen shook his head and pointed in front of him, "There''s nothing here at all, you can see for yourself."


    Lin Fan didn''t bother responding as he looked around the padded room, but he saw that Mo Ze Chen was right. There wasn''t a single thing here, the ghost that had lived here didn''t keep a single belonging.


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he saw this, but as he was about to go forward to look, there was a golden sh that came from the corner of his eyes.


    Lin Fan turned in that direction and saw that it wasing from the next room over.


    Without waiting for a second, Lin Fan walked over to the next room that he had juste from and found that there was a golden glowing object in the pile of ashes on the ground.


    The pile of ashes came from the ghost that Lin Fan had defeated and as for this golden glowing object, from what Lin Fan could see, it was a ring.


    Even though there was the object right in front of him, Lin Fan didn''t go over to it right away. Instead, he waved his hand behind him and called Mo Ze Chen who had followed him after seeing him walk back to this room.


    Mo Ze Chen came to Lin Fan''s side and while looking at the golden glowing object on the ground, he asked, "Boss, what is it?"


    Lin Fan didn''t look at him either and was also looking at the golden glowing object before pointing at it while saying, "Go and pick it up."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised to hear this, but he still went forward in the end.


    Though there was still one thing that was on their minds, just where had this golden glowing objecte from?


    When they had been in that room, they definitely hadn''t seen it and it had only appeared after they had left.


    There was one thought that appeared in Lin Fan''s mind as he saw this.


    Was it like a drop system, did the ghost only drop it after it had died?


    But then who had put the item in the ghost in the first ce for it to drop?


    Mo Ze Chen came up to the ring and hesitantly reached out towards it before picking it up.


    Unlike before with the golden pen where the golden glow didn''t enter his body, this time the golden glow crawled up Mo Ze Chen''s arm until it reached his forehead where it created a small golden diamond beforepletely disappearing without a trace.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes the moment he saw this.


    Why didn''t this golden glow enter Mo Ze Chen before with the golden pen? Why did it only enter his body now?


    Lin Fan had to think for a bit before finallying to a conclusion.


    The boss items were probably special and had an anti cheat system that came with it.


    The normal drops from the mid area bosses allowed one to gain the golden diamond that would store the golden glow that each of the special items had.


    Last time, Lin Fan was able to directly bypass the mid area boss to reach the final boss room which broke the normal progression. At the same time, Mo Ze Chen never got the golden diamond which would allow him to store this golden glow, which was why there was nothing that happened when he had touched the golden pen.


    However, this time was different since they hadn''t gone right to the boss in the beginning, which meant that Mo Ze Chen was able to get this golden diamond. From now on, Mo Ze Chen should have the ability to kill the ghosts as well.


    But after thinking about it for a bit, Lin Fan couldn''t help finding a w with this system.


    After all, there was still the array that was present in this ce.


    Without the golden glow, one wouldn''t be able to kill these ghosts and without killing the ghosts, it was impossible for the golden item to drop. This created a paradox since one couldn''t get the golden glow without killing a ghost for the golden item, but they couldn''t kill the ghost in the first ce without the golden glow.


    It was a case of what came first, the chicken or the egg.


    It also meant that Lin Fan must have missed a step because it would be impossible that the creator of this ce wouldn''t have thought of this. Even Lin Fan could have thought of this with just a few seconds of thought, it wouldn''t be possible for the creator of this ce to miss it.


    However, there was no way to Lin Fan to think this through, so he decided to not think about it.


    After seeing Mo Ze Chen acquire this golden glow, he released a few more puppets for Brainy who had those puppets run off.


    After a few seconds, there were the sounds of ghost wails that came from the end of the corridor as one puppet came back with a ghost following behind it.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother saying anything as he grabbed Mo Ze Chen by the back of the cor and threw him right at the ghost.


    This time, he didn''t even give Mo Ze Chen anything to defend himself with.


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan with a shocked look. Could it be that this boss of his was finally getting rid of him?


    Mo Ze Chen knew that he was nothing more than a burden for Lin Fan, but he never expected his boss to suddenly betray him like this.


    As he looked at Lin Fan with a wronged look, the ghost immediately came right up to him with a wide open mouth.


    Mo Ze Chen knew that there was no way for him to react in time because unlike before, this ghost was actually in the peak Embryo Soul Realm. This was a realm that was just much too high for Mo Ze Chen to deal with.


    All Mo Ze Chen could do was ept his fate.


    However, his fate wasn''t what he expected it to be.


    The teeth of the ghost approached Mo Ze Chen, but right before they could bite into him, there was a golden sparkle that appeared.


    Starting from the golden diamond that appeared on his forehead, the golden glow spread all over Mo Ze Chen until itpletely covered him.


    As the ghost bit down, the first thing it felt was a burning sensation before painpletely filled its mouth.


    It didn''t even have a chance to stop as all the teeth in its mouth turned into ash. However, it didn''t just stop there as the burning sensation continued to spread, going all the way through the ghost''s head until the entire head had been turned into ash.


    Just like that, the ghost didn''t even know what had happened as it died.


    Mo Ze Chen flew right through the ashes until hended on the floor covered in ash.


    After he came out of his daze, he looked down at himself and realized that he waspletely fine.

 433 Chapter 433

    Mo Ze Chen looked around him, but the golden glow had already disappeared, so he had no idea what had happened. As he had been flying towards the ghost, he had closed his eyes when he had epted his fate, so he hadn''t seen the golden glow wrap around himself.


    All he knew was that there was a sh of light before hended on the ground. He had seen that sh of light even though he had closed his eyes, which showed just how bright it had been.


    Mo Ze Chen looked around at the ash around himself and remembered what had happened when his boss had fought those ghosts before.


    After remembering this, Mo Ze Chen turned to look at Lin Fan with grateful eyes.


    Adding up everything, it was clear that Lin Fan was the one who had saved him since he knew that he didn''t have this same power. It was too bad that he was wrong.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about any of this as he continued looking at Mo Ze Chen.


    Lin Fan had thrown Mo Ze Chen because he wanted to see what would happen after the golden glow had entered Mo Ze Chen, but of course he was also prepared to save him if anything happened since Mo Ze Chen was still important to him.


    The most important thing right now to him was seeing how this golden glow worked because it seemed to be the key to everything here.


    There were two important things that had just been confirmed for Lin Fan just now.


    The first was that Mo Ze Chen indeed had the golden glow after the golden glow around the ring had entered him. Just like Lin Fan, there was now a golden diamond that had appeared on his forehead where the golden glow came from.


    The second was that the golden glow around Mo Ze Chen was much thinnerpared to the one that was around Lin Fan. However, that also made sense since Lin Fan had sucked in more of this golden glowpared to Mo Ze Chen, as well as absorbing something of higher quality like the pen from the school.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this, but what he did care about was if this golden glow around Mo Ze Chen could be even thicker.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan decided that there was no point in wasting any more time since he couldn''t make sense of the ring at all, so it was better to find another ce to test his theory. After all, he was slowly running out of time.


    Lin Fan had been keeping track of the time and after spending around an hour in this hospital, there was only five hours left in their trial. If he didn''t seize his time, he might lose his chance to solve the mystery of the ruins.


    For him, solving the mystery of the ruins was secondary to passing the Hunters Exam, so there was no way for him to get rid of the teleport pearl that he was given. Even if he couldn''t solve the mystery in the end, he would still let himself be teleported out.


    Lin Fan led Mo Ze Chen down the hallways until they came to another special room.


    Unlike thest one, this one didn''t have scattered body parts of ghosts outside the door, but rather there were plenty of bowls that were ced there.


    It seemed like the ghost that was inside this cell ate quite a bit, but that was also strange for Lin Fan since he had never seen the ghost eat anything. Well, that is they hadn''t eaten any food, though he did see the ghosts sucking away life force from Brainy''s puppet earlier.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering how these ghosts got nutrients, but he also threw that thought quickly into the back of his mind since that wasn''t important.


    Lin Fan went up to the door and peeked in to find even more bowls. It was almost as if every part of this room was covered in bowls and there didn''t seem to be any free space at all.


    Well, there was one part of the room that wasn''t covered in bowls.


    The only part of the room that wasn''t covered in bowls was right in the center where there was a fat ghost sitting there with a bowl in his hand, eating something out of it.


    It seemed that even after bing a ghost, this ghost didn''t stop eating.


    Though as for why it was fat, it was strange since Lin Fan couldn''t remember seeing a single fat ghost on his way here. Even among the giant crowd of ghosts that he had witnessed with the ghostmander, he hadn''t seen a single fat one.


    Could it be that these ghosts evolved based on their cultivation realms and they were all the same until they reached a certain realm?


    Then if they continued growing their cultivation, would they keep evolving?<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was certain that they were evolving since he could tell that this ghost had a cultivation in the Child Soul Realm just like thest one.


    Only those that seemed to be in the Child Soul Realm had something different with them, just like the principal ghost and the straitjacket ghost from before.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan didn''t waste any time heading into the room with the fat ghost.


    He didn''t pause for even a second as he charged in with his sword drawn, but he was surprised by this fat ghost.


    Seeing how fat it was, he wouldn''t have thought that it was nimble, but that was where he was wrong. When this fat ghost noticed Lin Fan, he immediately jumped up and bounced around the room,nding on the bowls before jumping from them stack by stack. As he jumped from stack to stack, there wasn''t a single bowl that fell down or broke under his weight.


    Looking at him, it was almost as if he didn''t weigh a single thing as he jumped from stack to stack.


    Lin Fan was surprised, but that didn''t mean that he wasn''t able to keep up. However, the problem was that the bowls kept getting in his way since he couldn''t jump over them like the fat ghost was doing, the only thing he could do was charge through them.


    In the end, Lin Fan gave up. He changed his sword into the giant sword and with one big swing, he shattered all the bowls in the room, causing the shattered pieces to m into the walls and gather as fragments on the corner of the room.


    With the giant wind that was raised by the sword, the fat ghost was like a feather that was blown right into the wall, but there was no impact at all since the fat ghost didn''t have any weight at all.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan could easily tell that this fat ghost was making use of gravityws to control its weight, which was why it was able to move as freely as this.


    The fat ghost looked at the shattered fragments on the ground and shook its head before jumping off the wall into the air. Once it was in the air, it flipped once before turning to face Lin Fan with a w pointed right at him.


    The fat ghost just floated there for a few seconds before suddenly falling down, increasing its speed with every second that it fell.


    This room was actually quite bigpared to the other rooms, so there was enough space for this fat ghost to fall. It continued to fall faster and faster until it reached a speed that was even faster than the straitjacket ghost from before.


    Being right under the fat ghost, Lin Fan could feel the pressure that wasing from it since itsws of gravity also affected those under it.


    However, even under that pressure, Lin Fan drew back his sword over his head to prepare for a single sh.


    The fat ghost was surprised to see that Lin Fan didn''t gather a singlew, but it was also confident in its strength as it continued to gather speed.


    It was like a minget that was falling down to earth as it fell down above Lin Fan, but Lin Fan didn''t panic at all as he looked right at it. At thest second, Lin Fan suddenly swung his sword over his head.


    The moment right before the sword made contact, there was the same golden glow that came from Lin Fan''s forehead topletely wrap around the sword, covering itpletely.


    The fat ghost''s expression changed the moment it saw this, but it didn''t have any time to do a single thing or even say anything as Lin Fan''s sword had already met it head on. The sword didn''t feel any resistance at all as it cut right through the ghost''s w and continued to cut through the fat ghost until it had been split cleanly in half.


    The two halves fell to both sides of Lin Fan and when it hit the floor, there was a strong impact sound as a crater formed in the ground. It was a good thing that they were on the first floor, or else the floor under Lin Fan definitely would have crumbled away.


    But based on how wide the holes were, it was clear just how heavy the fat ghost had made itself with its gravityws.


    Lin Fan didn''t do a thing as he stood there watching the ghost as it turned to ash.


    The two sides of the ghost''s mouth still moved as if trying to say anything, but since its vocal cords had been burnt away, it couldn''t say a thing.


    Once the ghost hadpletely disappeared into ashes, there was a golden ring that suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

 434 Chapter 434

    Lin Fan didn''t worry about where the ring came from first, instead he signaled for Mo Ze Chen toe over.


    Mo Ze Chen naturally understood what Lin Fan was asking of him, so he went over to the gold glowing ring and picked it up.


    The moment his hand touched the ring, the same thing happened with the other ring. The golden glow immediately flowed into Mo Ze Chen and entered the golden diamond that was on his forehead. However, once it did enter that golden diamond, there was nothing else that changed.


    After the golden glow around the ring had entered Mo Ze Chen, the ring was like a normal ring as itid there without moving at all.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with the ring first because there was something else he wanted to test first.


    Lin Fan once again came up behind Mo Ze Chen as he was checking his own body and grabbed him by the back of his cor.


    At the same time, at the end of the hall that was outside the room, around the corner came a rat running over to the room they were in. Right behind this rat was another ghost that was chasing it.


    Lin Fan picked Mo Ze Chen up and carried him out of the room.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised at first and wanted to ask what was happening, but then he saw the rat leading the ghost over from the end of the hall.


    Mo Ze Chen''s eyes opened wide as he felt a sense of deja vu. It was like this had already happened once.


    Well it did happen and it happened less than ten minutes ago, but he had chosen to block that memory because he decided to follow Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan lifted his hand and prepared to throw Mo Ze Chen. The moment he was lifted up and he saw Lin Fan''s actions, the memories quickly unlocked and his survival instincts kicked in as he said, "Boss, wait, don''t¡­"


    But before he could even finish, he was already being thrown at the ghost.


    The ghost had been focused on chasing the rat puppet, so it didn''t notice that something had been thrown at it at first. However, once Mo Ze Chen came closer, it could naturally sense the life energy that came off Mo Ze Chen and immediately shifted its direction from the rat to Mo Ze Chen.


    Comparing life force, there was no doubt that Mo Ze Chen had much more life force than the rat. Not to mention that he definitely looked tastier since he was a little chubby, which meant more fat on his bones.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t react at all since Lin Fan had thrown him with too much force and before he could do a thing, he could already see the teeth of the ghost approaching him.


    But he also remembered thatst time, Lin Fan had saved him at thest second.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t believe that Lin Fan wouldn''t save him now since there was no reason for him not to save him. Not to mention that Mo Ze Chen hadpletely made up his mind to follow Lin Fan, so he had no choice but to believe in Lin Fan.


    Instead of closing his eyes this time, Mo Ze Chen kept them wide open as he watched the teeth approaching him. At the final moments, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help feeling a bit of worry¡­


    But at the veryst second, there was a golden glow that appeared in front of his eyes that instantly made his heart that was in his throat fall back down into his chest. He watched as the ghost''s teeth were turned into ash the moment they made contact with the golden glow and then the rest of the ghost was slowly turned to ash along with its teeth.


    The ghost felt the danger and even had a look of terror on its face when it faced that golden glow, but it was no use in the end as it waspletely turned into ash.


    Since Mo Ze Chen had his eyes open, the ash that appeared in front of him got into his eyes, so he quickly closed them. However, since he closed his eyes, he mmed face first into the floor and slid across the floor like this until he slowly came to a stop.


    Lin Fan had been watching Mo Ze Chen the entire time, or specifically, the golden glow that had appeared around him the moment that he had been in danger.


    Lin Fan had carefully noted the thickness of this golden glow the first time, just so he couldpare it this second time after Mo Ze Chen had absorbed more of it from the ring.


    As far as Lin Fan could tell, the golden glow around Mo Ze Chen had grown in thickness by a few millimeters, but as for whether that was good or not, he wasn''t certain.


    Though,pared to the golden glow that appeared around him, it was far from being able topare, so he chose to assume that it was bad.<sub> </sub>


    It seemed like there was no use bringing Mo Ze Chen around getting all these small items with a golden glow since they wouldn''t increase the golden glow around him by much. Since that was the case, there was no need for them to continue attacking the various mid area bosses hoping for drops.


    If that was the case, it would be better for them to directly head to the end game boss and take care of him.


    Lin Fan was curious how much the item dropped by the final boss would strengthen the golden glow around them.


    Mo Ze Chen had seen what had happened this time, so he knew that there was a special power that he had gained that was simr to the golden glow that his boss had.


    It didn''t take much thinking for him to realize that this golden glow came from the golden glowing objects that his boss made him touch. Then when his boss had thrown him at the ghosts, he was testing how strong the golden glow that Mo Ze Chen had.


    Mo Ze Chen knew that with this power, he had gained a new protective charm inside this ruin and he was excited about that. He looked down at his hand and tried to pull out the energy with all his focus, but there was nothing that came out in the end.


    In the end, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan and asking, "Boss, how do I use this power?"


    Lin Fan had been watching Mo Ze Chen trying to control this power, seeing if he could find anything else about it. However, he was disappointed with how fast Mo Ze Chen, so he said with a bit of teasing in his voice, "Risk your life."


    "Eh¡­" Mo Ze Chen''s expression immediately froze before turning awkward and he didn''t know what else to think. However, after he thought about it, he realized that his boss wasn''t teasing him, but rather it was the actual answer that he was looking for.


    After all, based on what he had seen before, it seemed like this power didn''te out unless the person who possessed it was in danger. This was the case thest two times when Lin Fan had thrown him at a ghost and the power had suddenly activated to save him. It was also the case when Lin Fan fought the ghosts, since he had seen that Lin Fan hadn''t wrapped himself in hisws at all.


    Normally if he took a single hit from these ghosts without anyws protecting him, there was no doubt that he would bepletely smashed into the ground.


    However, the golden glow had activated at thest second every time to save him from the ghosts.


    This must mean that there must be a corrtion between danger and the appearance of the golden glow.


    Mo Ze Chen was about to ask Lin Fan more about this, but then there was a cold chill that had run down his back.


    After all, Lin Fan had already used him to test this golden glow twice without even telling him a thing. Now that Mo Ze Chen knew about this, how far would Lin Fan take it this time?


    Sometimes it was better to not talk about something if one didn''t want to walk on the path of death.


    So after swallowing his words, Mo Ze Chen paused for a few seconds before asking, "Boss, where do we go now?"


    This seemed like a better way for him to get what he wanted since he now knew that killing these special ghosts that were mentioned at the front desk would give them golden rings. He had also carefully read over the documents at the front desk, so he had a good idea of who they were and a good idea of where their rooms were.


    He could have gone off by himself, but he knew that it was much safer with Lin Fan since he hadn''t even been able to follow these special ghosts with his eyes. It would mean nothing but death if he were to fight them himself, even with the golden glow protecting him.


    He wasn''t sure if his golden glow would even work against those stronger ghosts¡­


    So instead, he would use a more subtle method to get Lin Fan to go where he wanted.


    After all, if he were able to strengthen his golden glow, that would mean that he would be safer here.


    It was too bad for him that Lin Fan didn''t respond the way he wanted him to.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "A special ce."

 435 Chapter 435

    Mo Ze Chen didn''t know how to react to this at first, but then he felt a cold chill run down his back as he had a feeling that this wasn''t a good thing.


    After this chill ran down his back, Mo Ze Chen immediately asked, "What special ce are you talking about?"


    In response to this, Lin Fan just revealed a smile without saying a thing.


    But all that did was send another chill down Mo Ze Chen''s back which made him quickly ask, "Boss, what''s special about this ce you''re talking about?"


    Lin Fan said with a faint smile, "You''ll see soon."


    Still, once again, this didn''tfort Mo Ze Chen at all. However, there was nothing that he could do since he had alreadymitted to following Lin Fan.


    That meant that even if it meant walking into death, at least he would have a chance to survive if he followed Lin Fan. After everything that Lin Fan had shown him, he already knew that Lin Fan definitely had some special connection to these ruins which gave him some kind of advantage here.


    So when Lin Fan walked out of the room, Mo Ze Chen had no choice but to follow.


    Still he had to admit that just with the puppets that Lin Fan controlled that had cleared the ghosts out of their way, it was more than worth it for him to follow Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan led Mo Ze Chen through the halls in the north wing and each time Mo Ze Chen got his hopes up that they would be heading to another special room, he would always be let down. They woulde so close to the room before turning in another direction.


    With how close they came each time, it was almost as if Lin Fan was taunting Mo Ze Chen, but there was nothing he could do about it. He knew that the moment that he split off from Lin Fan, even if he somehow made his way through the ghosts in the hall without Lin Fan luring them away, it was impossible for him to defeat the ghosts in those rooms to get the ring.


    But as they continued deeper into the right wing, Mo Ze Chen also felt a bad feeling.


    After all, Mo Ze Chen had also memorized the map that they had found and knew which ways led to which rooms.


    The path that they were currently taking was indeed leading them to a special ce, but it was the one ce that Mo Ze Chen didn''t want to go right now.


    This was the ce that had the same concept as the principal''s office in the school, this was the ce where the final boss for this area would be. But Mo Ze Chen also could tell that the final boss here would be different from the school.


    The ghosts that wandered these halls were already in the Embryo Soul Realm and the area bosses were in the Child Soul Realm, so what would the final boss be at?


    At the very least, the final boss would be in the mid Child Soul Realm or even in the high Child Soul Realm.


    While he knew that Lin Fan was strong enough to fight those in the low Child Soul Realm, he had also seen how Lin Fan always had to rest up to recover after fighting them. There was no doubt that it was draining for him to fight these Child Soul Realm ghosts, so it would definitely be hard for him to fight this final boss. He might not even be able to take a single hit from the final boss¡­


    Each single step in the Child Soul Realm was like a ravine that was iparably deep, it was just like the distance between heaven and hell. It would definitely be hard for Lin Fan to surpass this gap.


    At the very least, if they gathered more golden glow from the area bosses, there was a chance for Lin Fan''s golden glow to be stronger and give him a fighting chance. They still had time as far as Mo Ze Chen was concerned since there was still over five hours left¡­


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about any of this and headed straight to the final room.


    This was a room all the way to the right of the right wing, in the most secluded ce in the entire hospital.


    Faust had been put here because everyone knew of how dangerous he was, so they had done their best to lock him away and forget about him. It was just too bad that he had found a way to convince all the other mental patients to follow him, which meant that he was definitely smart, even if he was crazy.


    They made their way through the halls and with Brainy''s puppets clearing out their path, there were no idents at all as they smoothly came to the hall where Faust''s room was located.<sub> </sub>


    The first thing Lin Fan did was make sure to clear the entire surrounding area of ghosts while also creating a line of puppets that surrounded this area just in case there were any ghosts that wandered in. He wanted to make sure that there would be nothing that came to disturb him when he was fighting Faust.


    They had already seen that there was a golden barrier around the door to Faust''s room when they had first arrived, but Lin Fan didn''t take the time to examine it at all since he was taking care of deploying the line of puppets. However, Mo Ze Chen wasn''t upied with this at all, so he had been at the door looking for a way to get in.


    Of course, Lin Fan knew that there was a high chance that he wouldn''t need to find the way to get in, rather he would be able to go in without having to clear the conditions that were ced on the door in the first ce.


    While searching, Mo Ze Chen had found a panel that was right by the door with ten different grooves in it that were ced in the shape of a circle. Looking at these various grooves, he saw that they were all in the shape of rings, which made him think of the glowing rings that he and Lin Fan had found after defeating the special ghosts.


    Mo Ze Chen had been the one holding onto them since Lin Fan was toozy to care about them, so he took them out and ced them into the grooves.


    When he tried to ce the first ring into the top groove, he found that he couldn''t push it in no matter how he tried.


    After giving it a few tries and even trying to use force, he gave up on the top groove and began with the second groove. It was the same result and he was unable to push the ring in at all.


    However, he didn''t give up and tried these rings with each of the grooves. Eventually, he finally got the ring into the fifth groove he tried and unlike before, there was no resistance at all as it slid right into the groove.


    As soon as it slid into the groove, there was a faint golden glow that appeared around the ring that after glowing for a bit, entered right into Mo Ze Chen''s body.


    Mo Ze Chen could feel a slight warmth on his forehead and he knew that this must be the same phenomenon as when he touched the golden glowing rings. By putting them in the groove, there must have been some kind of golden glowing energy that was bestowed upon him.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t hesitate to bring forth the second ring and tested it with all the different grooves, starting from the top until he finally pushed it into the seventh groove that he tried.


    Just like with the first ring, the ring immediately let out a golden glow when it entered the groove which quickly entered Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t mind this as he continued studying the pattern that was in front of him and fell into deep thought.


    Based on what he could remember, there had been ten files at the front desk¡­


    There were also ten grooves in this pattern, which should mean¡­


    If they wanted to open this barrier, it seemed like they would need to collect all ten rings and put them into the grooves of this pattern.


    The moment this clicked in his mind, Mo Ze Chen was filled with happiness because this was exactly what he had wanted.


    He wasn''t sure if they would be able to defeat the boss that was inside, so he wanted to go around collecting the rings first just to make themselves stronger.


    Now it seemed like there was no choice but to go and collect the rings.


    Even if Lin Fan wanted to go in, there was a barrier blocking them, so of course they would have no choice.


    Mo Ze Chen could feel the same aura from the barrier as he had felt from the special ghosts that they had fought. In fact, this aura was even stronger than the special ghosts, which meant that this barrier had to be stronger than them. At the very least, it should be a barrier in the mid Child Soul Realm.


    ? No matter how strong Lin Fan was, he couldn''t break through this barrier that was blocking their way.


    But after Lin Fan finished putting up his detection line and came back over, he immediately proved Mo Ze Chen wrong.

 436 Chapter 436

    Lin Fan walked up to the barrier and looked at it for a bit in silence.


    Mo Ze Chen made use of this time to say, "Boss, look at what I''ve found over here."


    Lin Fan had been in thought when he heard this, but he still turned to look in Mo Ze Chen''s direction since he was curious what Mo Ze Chen had been spending all this time doing.


    When he turned over, he saw the pattern with the ten grooves that had two rings currently in it and it didn''t take him long to realize what this was.


    But when he saw it, he also revealed a faint smile.


    Mo Ze Chen felt a cold chill run down his back when he saw this smile, but he didn''t waste any time in saying, "Boss, it seems like we have to collect those rings after all. We can''t get rid of this barrier without it."


    Then he turned to point at the barrier as he said, "You can feel the auraing from it yourself, it''s even stronger than the ghosts we''ve fought before. I''m sure you''re strong, but there''s no way for you to break¡­"


    While Mo Ze Chen had been speaking, Lin Fan had already walked over to touch the barrier.


    Instead of pushing him away as one would suspect from a barrier set up to protect a ce, the moment Lin Fan''s hand made contact with the barrier, there was a crack that suddenly appeared.


    That crack didn''tst long because it quickly spread across the entire barrier, causing it to look like a spider''s web before it suddenly shattered to pieces.


    The golden glowing pieces scattered all around them as Mo Ze Chen''s jaw dropped in shock and his eyes were filled with disbelief.


    He couldn''t understand what had just happened, but his final hope had been dashed just like this.


    No one had been able to see that after the fragments of the golden glowing barrier had disappeared, they turned into an invisible energy that flowed into Lin Fan.


    Of course, the energy that flowed into Lin Fan flowed through his body until it gathered at the golden diamond that was on his forehead.


    The moment the barrier had shattered, the person inside the room looked up at the door for a bit, but then turned right back to the book that he had been reading.


    Lin Fan looked at Mo Ze Chen and seeing that he was still standing there in a daze, he flicked Mo Ze Chen on the forehead.


    Mo Ze Chen felt the pain on his forehead and was snapped out of his daze, turning to look at Lin Fan with a shocked gaze as he asked, "Boss, what just happened?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him and gave a shrug.


    Please, this was what he wanted to know as well, alright?


    This had already happened twice to him now and he still didn''t know how to exin it.


    First it had happened with the golden barrier at the school and now it happened here.


    But still, Lin Fan wasn''t against this since there was no time for him to begin with.


    He wasn''t sure how long the other two ces would take, but he didn''t want to take that risk and wanted to finish what he could as soon as he could.


    So without waiting for Mo Ze Chen to say anything else, Lin Fan walked up to the door and slowly pushed it open to reveal a simple looking room inside.


    This was a room that was very simply decorated, with just a single desk, a chair, and a bed. For a room that was in a mental hospital, it definitely didn''t fit the picture, but that wasn''t the first thing that drew Lin Fan''s attention.


    The first thing that Lin Fan''s eyes immediately gravitated towards was the person who had been sitting on the bed reading a book that was in his hand.


    When Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen came in, that person didn''t react at all as he continued reading the book. However, for Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen, the moment they saw him, they felt that aura of death around him. It was so strong that it even felt like there was a scythe that was ced right at their necks, prepared to take their heads at any time.<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen''s legs immediately crumpled under him and he almost fainted, but there was a faint golden diamond that appeared on his forehead at thest second to give him strength. The moment the golden diamond appeared, there was a warm flow that filled his entire body and gave him a strange strength, but that still wasn''t able to fully negate the effects of the aura of death.


    In the end Mo Ze Chen was able to slowly inch himself out of the room on his butt. The moment he went out the threshold of the door, he was able to finally breathe normally, but he still looked at the person sitting on the bed with eyes filled with fear.


    That kind of aura of death definitely wasn''t something that anyone normal could have, that kind of aura of death...Just how much death did he cause or how much death did hee in contact with?


    As for Lin Fan who was still in the room, the golden glow didn''t appear for him because he had activated something else instead.


    The ck hole in Lin Fan''s dantian was turning at full speed and sucking in the aura of death that was around him as quickly as it could. It slowly swallowed all the aura of death that was around Lin Fan, which helped ease the pressure that fell upon him, but the aura of death that was around him was just too powerful that Lin Fan couldn''tpletely negate it.


    At the very least, Lin Fan had the ability to stand there firmly and breathe as normal, but his body felt very heavy and slow. It was almost as if there were weights tied to chains which were locked to his body.


    But as the ck hole in Lin Fan''s dantian continued to turn, it swallowed more and more of the aura of death that had been surrounding Lin Fan, gathering it inside his dantian.


    As more and more of that aura of death was swallowed, it slowly began taking form as a statue inside Lin Fan''s dantian. This statue was different from all the other statues that were simple in nature, this was a statue that had multiple skeletons wing at each other, as if they were trying to escape, but they couldn''t. To put it simply, it was a scene of pure despair.


    But that didn''t matter to Lin Fan since he could feel the neww that had appeared in his dantian. This was aw that was rted directly to death and with just a bit of thisw, he could easily destroy a person''s soul, killing them forever.


    At the same time, with the appearance of this neww in his dantian, the two suns in his dantian also began turning and releasing energy. That energy filled his body and refined it again and again. Lin Fan could easily feel himself bing stronger and stronger.


    However, before he could make that final leap that he wanted, the suns and the ck hole stopped turning and returned to a passive state.


    Lin Fan knew exactly why this had happened.


    They had stopped because Lin Fan had already adapted to the aura of death that was around him. It had taken him ten minutes to do this, but he had sucked enough aura of death to grasp thew and stand under this aura of death like it was nothing.


    Near the end of this process, the man on the bed had suddenly looked up from his book to look at Lin Fan with a curious gaze.


    When the suction force disappeared and Lin Fan just stood there casually, the man revealed an interested look in his eyes as he said, "Interesting, you really have an interesting body."


    Lin Fan had heard this and was surprised, but he still didn''t let his guard down since he didn''t know what this man wanted to do.


    However, the man just sat up in the bed and continued looking over Lin Fan like he was looking at a test subject.


    After another five minutes, the man finally said, "Well, aren''t you going to introduce yourself?"


    The moment he said this, the tension that had been in Lin Fan the entire five minutes he had been waiting had snapped and he fell apart. Though he didn''t fall to the ground, his mind did rx a bit creating a slight moment where his defenses were down.


    Even then, the man in front of him just sat there on the bed looking at Lin Fan without any intention of attacking.


    This didn''t make any sense to Lin Fan.


    ording to what he had read from Faust''s file, he was someone who was very violent and erratic, so why was he acting like this?


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t take the time to get into this because right now he needed to keep his mind sharp to deal with Faust.


    Lin Fan also had Brainy link up to his mind so that it could give him advice at any time. Lin Fan had to admit that Brainy was indeed smarter than him, but that was just the benefit that Brainy''s skill brought.


    Lin Fan paused for a bit before saying, "Aren''t you supposed to give your own name before asking for someone else''s?"

 437 Chapter 437

    "Well, I guess you''re right."


    Faust surprisingly didn''t respond in the way that Lin Fan had thought he would.


    With how he had been releasing the aura of death, anyone would have thought that he would be much violent or unstable, but no matter how Lin Fan looked at him, he didn''t seem like that.


    To Lin Fan, he looked no different from a normal friendly person that he would meet on the street.


    Of course, for him to release that kind of aura of death, it was clear that things weren''t as simple as they seemed, so Lin Fan didn''t let his guard down for even a second.


    After a slight pause, Faust''s voice suddenly fell and he said in a voice that was so cold that it felt like being dragged into the deepest parts of hell, "But it''s too bad that you''re not qualified to know my name."


    Lin Fan immediately raised his hands and there was a pure white sword that suddenly appeared in them. He didn''t let his eyes wander at all as he kept them on Faust the entire time.


    There was a tense atmosphere in the air for the longest time before Faust suddenly gave augh and asked, "Why so serious?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback the moment he heard this because the way he had said it had been exactly like a character that he had seen in a movie back on earth, one who always asked people about how he had gotten his scars.


    That character was someone who had beenpletely mental, so at least they had that inmon. However, if Faust was just as smart as that character, it really would mean trouble for Lin Fan¡­


    But before Lin Fan could do a thing, Faust had waved his hand and the chair by the desk was pulled out by an invisible force beforeing to a stop right in front of Lin Fan.


    After the chair stopped there, Faust asked, "How about we have a talk before our life and death showdown? I''m sure that you have some questions for me, just like I have some questions for you."


    Lin Fan looked at the chair, but when he looked back up, Faust was already leaning back in bed again, looking quite rxed. This didn''t seem like the stance of someone who wanted to fight at all.


    After hesitating for a bit, Lin Fan sat down in the chair, but he had also changed the Iron Eater Bone Artifact into a little white dagger that he ced in his sleeve just in case. If Faust made even a single move, Lin Fan would be able to pull it out and protect himself at any time.


    But after sitting down, Faust didn''t say a single word as he just sat there looking at his book. It was almost as if he hadpletely forgotten about Lin Fan.


    There was an awkward silence that filled the air.


    When Mo Ze Chen who was outside saw this, he wanted toe forward to say something to Lin Fan, but the moment he reached the threshold of the door, it was like there was an invisible barrier that was in front of him.


    Even when he tried to talk, it was like Lin Fan couldn''t hear him at all.


    That was because Lin Fan indeed couldn''t hear him.


    Even with Mo Ze Chen hitting the barrier in front of him and shouting at Lin Fan, the inside of the room waspletely silent.


    Mo Ze Chen was nning on bringing out his weapon to attack the barrier, but he suddenly felt a gaze fall onto him. The moment this gaze fell onto him, it felt like being crushed by a mountain as he crumpled to the floor, finding it hard to even breathe.


    Mo Ze Chen had been able to track the source of this gaze and he found that it was the person sitting on the bed.


    That person had raised the book in just the right way so that his face was blocked from Lin Fan''s gaze, but Mo Ze Chen could still see him.


    That person had one finger to his lip and a cold look in his eyes, almost as if he was telling Mo Ze Chen to be quiet or he would die.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t have time to see anything else as he was crushed into the ground and he lost consciousness.


    Once Mo Ze Chen was out of the picture, the person behind the book turned his gaze back to Lin Fan. Even though there was the book blocking him, the way he was looking at Lin Fan was like he could see him through the book.


    After another minute of silence, the person behind the book suddenly revealed a smile and said under his breath, "Soon."


    Eventually, Lin Fan couldn''t take it and he asked, "Are you going to say anything?"


    Faust lowered the book and revealed a smile as he said, "Well, isn''t it polite for the person asking to answer first?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback since he never expected his own words to be used against him.


    Faust saw this and shook his head with a smile before saying, "How about we y a game then?"


    Lin Fan was even more surprised, but he still asked, "What kind of game?"


    Faust looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and said, "It''s a simple game, we''ll take turns asking questions and the first one to stop will be the loser. Are you interested in ying?"


    Lin Fan didn''t turn his gaze away as he looked right into Faust''s gaze.<sub> </sub>


    After looking for a bit, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling even more doubtful since he couldn''t sense any hostility from that gaze at all. It was almost as if there was a kind of a familiarity that was in that gaze¡­Almost a kind of love¡­


    Lin Fan felt a chill when he realized this.


    Although he had to admit that Faust was a good looking person, Lin Fan definitely wasn''t into that kind of stuff.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t look away as he said, "How do we decide who starts?"


    Faust didn''t answer right away and after a pause, he said, "Well, seeing as you are the guest, how about I let you start?"


    Lin Fan also paused before asking, "Who are you?"


    Faust shook his head when he heard this question before saying, "You''re asking something you already know, that really is a waste of a question."


    Lin Fan then said, "Then I''ll ask another question."


    But Faust suddenly raised his hand and said, "Nope, you''ve already asked your question, so you can''t change it now. Yes, as you''ve already guessed, my name is Faust."


    Lin Fan nodded, but he didn''t say anything.


    Faust didn''t mind this at all as he suddenly revealed a smile and asked, "Then how about you introduce yourself as well?"


    Lin Fan hesitated before saying two simple words, "Lin Fan."


    Faust just smiled without saying a thing.


    Lin Fan then asked, "What are you nning?"


    Faust said with a smile, "Something big."


    Lin Fan had three dark lines appear on his face as he asked, "Is that it? I think I''ve won this game then."


    Faust raised a finger and wagged it as he said, "The only rule here is that we have to answer the question and we would lose if we couldn''t. No matter how vague it is, that is still an answer, don''t you think?"


    Lin Fan''s face turned darker when he heard this, but he couldn''t refute this. Faust had used this loophole to hide his real secrets. Still, this also meant that Lin Fan could give his answer in a different way if he didn''t want to reveal anything.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''tining, Faust gave a nod of praise before asking, "How are you rted to Huang Di?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this.


    Huang Di, that was the name of his transmigration senior, the one that was hailed as a saviour in this vige.


    When Lin Fan had first seen this name, he almost couldn''t believe his eyes because he knew for sure that wasn''t his person''s real name. After all, there was no one who dared to name their child this and no government official would even approve it.


    This was the title of the legendary Yellow Emperor from Chinese mythology, so while it didn''t mean anything to the people of this world, it meant something for anyone who came from earth.


    But to Lin Fan, the only feeling he had was shame.


    Not shame for himself, but rather shame for his transmigration senior.


    It seemed like his transmigration senior had quite the case of Eighth Grade Syndrome¡­


    Faust had been carefully watching Lin Fan the entire time and he could see his reaction to this, but strangely it was a kind of reaction that he wasn''t expecting. After all, it seemed like he was reacting more to the name than the person that it represented.


    After another pause, Lin Fan said, "I''m not."


    Both of them had been using their own techniques to check if the other person was lying since this was just that kind of game. However, when Faust used his technique on Lin Fan when Lin Fan had said this, he could clearly tell that Lin Fan wasn''t lying.


    But what about that reaction when Lin Fan had heard the name?


    What was that about?


    Still, while Faust was curious, he didn''t push it since he knew that he still had time.


    The game was just starting.

 438 Chapter 438

    After another pause, Faust raises his hand to give an inviting gesture.


    Though he didn''t get the answer that he wanted, that didn''t mean that he had to lose all face with Lin Fan right now.


    Lin Fan could naturally tell what Faust was thinking and knew what kind of game this was.


    The goal of this game was to get as much information from the other side without revealing too much about yourself.


    The first few questions had been asked to wade the waters, to test the limits of what the other side was willing to say, while also establishing some base rules.


    Next, it was time for them to start ying for real.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at Faust for a bit before asking, "What is your rtionship with Huang Di?"


    It was the exact same question that Faust had just asked, but it held apletely different context.


    Faust looked right at Lin Fan for a bit before giving a shrug and saying, "There is no rtionship at all."


    Lin Fan waited for a response from his sleeve and when he received it, while he felt surprised deep down, he didn''t show it on his face.


    Brainy had been using its spiritual sense to monitor every single movement that Faust made. The moment that he made a single movement that he wasn''t supposed to, Bring would see it and tell Lin Fan.


    However, even with all of this, Brainy hadn''t been able to find a thing.


    Lin Fan was then confused as he thought, "Could it be that this really wasn''t rted to him?"


    But based on what he had seen in the memories that he had been shown back in the school, that didn''t seem like that case. After all, he knew that all of this was rted to the ns of Huang Di¡­


    As for how this was all rted, he didn''t know, but he knew that the ones guarding the four locations should be those that were rted to him.


    Yet, the boss of this location was saying that he wasn''t rted at all¡­


    While Lin Fan was lost in thought over this matter, Faust had already moved on and asked his question, however Lin Fan didn''t hear it at all.


    The moment this question was asked, Lin Fan only heard the words being said, but he didn''t hear the exact content of these words. However, they were enough to pull Lin Fan out of his thoughts as he asked, "Huh? What did you just say?"


    Faust didn''t seem disturbed at all as he calmly repeated his question, "What year is it right now?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this question since he didn''t expect this kind of awareness from someone who was trapped in these ruins. There was no reason for him to answer this question with a false answer or a vague answer, so Lin Fan just replied honestly.


    Faust fell into thought when he heard this answer and he muttered under his voice, "It''s already been over ten thousand years, I wonder if the prophecy hase true yet¡­"


    Lin Fan clearly knew that this had something to do with the reason why these ruins were built, but he didn''t rush into it because he knew that he wouldn''t be able to gain any information.


    Instead of getting information right now, he needed information that would allow him to get this information.


    So Lin Fan didn''t waste any time as he asked, "Aren''t you supposed to be a patient in this hospital? Why do you seem normal?"


    This sounded like a provocation because that was exactly what it was.


    When people lost themselves to anger, it was very easy for them to make a mistake and that was what Lin Fan was trying to use.


    However, it didn''t have any effect at all as Faust answered in a calm voice, "Why do you think that I shouldn''t be here?"


    Lin Fan said, "Compared to the others, you don''t seem like you belong here."


    Faust revealed a faint smile at this as he said, "That is awfully kind of you to say¡­" Then his expression immediately changed as he said, "But sometimes you shouldn''t judge a book by its cover."


    Lin Fan would have felt a chill from this, but his body had already adapted to the aura of death that was around Faust which made it a bit easier for him.


    Faust didn''t bother waiting for Lin Fan to answer as he directly asked, "What is your name?"


    Lin Fan had been lost in thought as he heard this question, so he answered right away, "Lin Fan."


    But the moment he did answer this, there was a wide smile that appeared on Faust''s face.<sub> </sub>


    After all, the question that Faust had asked hadn''t been asked in themonnguage of this universe, but rather in Chinese. Lin Fan had been too upied with his own thoughts that he hadn''t realized this fact, he had just answered normally.


    But right after he answered, Lin Fan realized that something was wrong and realized what he had done.


    The moment he realized this, he looked at Faust with a shocked expression since he never expected Faust to also speak Chinese¡­


    Though before he could ask Faust if he was also from earth, Faust suddenly said, "So you can speak thenguage too. You must be the saviour that we''ve all been waiting for."


    Lin Fan could understand the meaning inferenced from these words, but that would be strange since how could Faust speak Chinese?


    He had just denied that he had a rtionship with Huang Di, so it was impossible for him to learn from him, but how else would he have learned Chinese?


    But then again, Brainy was certain that he wasn''t lying. So could it be that Brainy had made a mistake?


    There were all kinds of questions that filled Lin Fan''s mind, but Faust naturally didn''t give Lin Fan any time to recover as he said, "Isn''t it time for you to ask your question? Or are you already out and I''ve won this game?"


    This wasn''t a rule that they had established, but both sides silently epted this as one of the rules because they knew that whichever side stopped asking questions first would be the side that had lost their momentum. Once their momentum was gone, there was no way for them to stop the other side.


    But of course, Lin Fan didn''t panic since he had someone else helping him think of these questions as well while he analyzed the answers that Faust gave.


    Brainy had also been analyzing the situation and thinking what the best questions to ask were. Since Faust had already been able to throw off Lin Fan like this, unless they had something good to throw him off as well, it would almost be certain that Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to keep up with him.


    However, they didn''t know anything about Faust other than the information from the files that they had found on him, so there really was nothing for them to ask.


    That was, there wasn''t anything particr that they could ask about.


    However, there was one thing that they could gamble on since it was something that hadn''t let them down the entire time. It was the thing that was supposed to be their goal for this round and the thing that only Lin Fan could see.


    It was the Chinese letter that had said doll that had been carved on the pedestal.


    As far as they knew, this was the only thing that they held in their hands, so they might as well ask about it. After all, there was nothing to lose from asking.


    However, they didn''t know just how wrong they were.


    Lin Fan didn''t wait any longer as he asked, "Do you know anything about a doll?"


    The moment the word doll was said, the expression on Faust''s face hadpletely changed.


    Before this, the only expressions that he had shown before were a look of calm and a cold look. Other than this, it was like there was nothing that could faze him and he waspletely unmovable.


    However, the moment the doll was mentioned, there was a look of rage thatpletely took over Faust''s face.


    He immediately stood up and said, "What do you know about this doll!"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help flinching back slightly when he saw this, after all, this was just too much of a difference.


    ? Before this, it was like Faust had been controlling everything in the palm of his hands, but now it seemed like he waspletely losing control of everything.


    It had changed so quickly that it almost didn''t seem real.


    Lin Fan didn''t get a chance to say anything as Faust suddenly began to change.


    His entire body changed until he looked like all the other ghosts with empty eyes and rotten skin, but the only difference was that there were purple mes in those empty eyes. Those purple mes seemed to burn with an intensity that normal mes didn''t burn with, they were like mes that burned from the very depths of his soul.


    Faust didn''t waste any time after changing as he just waved his hand.


    The moment he waved his hand, there was a dark energy that came out of him and entered the ground.


    The moment that energy touched the ground, there were skeletal hands that poked out of the hand.


    To Lin Fan, this almost seemed like the beginning of a horror movie...

 439 Chapter 439

    Then without any hesitation, those skeletal hands came out of the ground with the rest of those skeletal bodies, jumping out in front of Lin Fan.


    These were skeletons made ofpletely white bones that suddenly jumped out of the ground. Lin Fan wasn''t sure where these bones hade from, but they definitely weren''t an illusion as the skeleton charged out at Lin Fan.


    These skeletons were different from just normal skeletons, some of them were actually wearing armour and there was even one in the center that had a robe around it.


    As the first skeleton approached, Lin Fan raised his sword to block the bone sword that was approaching him.


    The moment the bone sword came down and met his white sword, there was only a single second of pause before Lin Fan was sent flying from the chair. Lin Fan flew through the air and mmed into the wall behind him.


    With the force that he had been sent flying at, Lin Fan should have broken the wall and flew through it to the next room, but there seemed to be some kind of energy that was protecting it which stopped that.


    Though even if there was some form of energy protecting the wall, that didn''t mean that there was something to protect Lin Fan.


    He had been caught off guard and hit with a force that far exceeded what he had expected, there was no doubt that he would be injured from that.


    There were two factors that stopped Lin Fan from suffering even heavier injuries.


    One was the suction force that Lin Fan had. At the veryst second, Lin Fan had released this power to protect himself, enabling him to negate some of the power behind the strike that should have hurt him.


    The second was his naturally strong body that was at a higher levelpared to his cultivation. With those stronger body, it meant that he was much tougherpared to other cultivators at the same level, which had helped him resist part of the force as well.


    Lin Fan looked at the skeleton that had hit him with a surprised look. This skeleton was actually in the Child Soul Realm!


    While it was only the low Child Soul Realm, that was still shocking enough. That was because there wasn''t just a single one of these skeleton warriors.


    There were four identical skeleton warriors and there was another one in a robe that hadn''t made a move yet.


    Even without them making a move, Lin Fan could tell just from the aura that they released that all of them were in the low Child Soul Realm.


    For Faust to control this many skeletons in the low Child Soul Realm, he had to be at least in the mid Child Soul Realm, but Lin Fan suspected that his cultivation was even higher than that.


    That wasn''t good for Lin Fan because while he was confident in fighting those in the low Child Soul Realm, to fight all these skeletons along with Faust at the same time, it would be without a doubt quite draining on him.


    But it wasn''t like Lin Fan had a choice since he knew that the current Faust wouldn''t let him go.


    The current Faust was like a mad dog that wanted nothing more than to bite Lin Fan. He was also muttering something under his breath, but Lin Fan didn''t have time to hear what it was since the skeletons started moving towards him.


    The skeletons weren''t like the ghosts, which meant that at the very least, Lin Fan could use hisws to fight them.


    Lin Fan released his five pets who immediately took off in different directions.


    Faust also saw them, but hepletely ignored them as he focused on Lin Fan, sending the skeletons only after Lin Fan.


    The five pets immediately released their life energy and created the array around Lin Fan, injecting them with the energy of theirws.


    Lin Fan released his ownws, but unlike before, there was also something different about him. This time, there was a tenthw that he could release to go along with the rest of hisws.


    When Lin Fan released this new deathw, he immediately felt the pressure that came with adding this neww. It had already been hard enough on his body before with ninews, but now this tenthw created a pressure that was unlike anything that Lin Fan had felt before.


    This pressure was almost strong enough topletely make Lin Fan copse if it wasn''t for something that suddenly happened.


    With this pressure on Lin Fan, the two suns in his dantian wildly released energy to repair his body. It was during this process that Lin Fan felt his bottleneck loosen.


    As the pressure fell on him, the bottleneck slowly loosened until it finally just broke and Lin Fam broke through to the next realm.<sub> </sub>


    There was arge swirl of energy that appeared with Lin Fan in the center, wildly pouring into his body as his cultivation rose into the Embryo Soul Realm. At the same time, there was a wild burst of burning energy that came from the suns in his dantian which refined Lin Fan''s body until it reached the next realm.


    Just standing there under the pressure of the tenws, Lin Fan broke through to the Embryo Soul Realm while his physique reached the Child Soul Realm.


    Just like that, the pressure on him slowly disappeared.


    Well it didn''t justpletely disappear since the pressure frombining tenws was immense, but it was much smallerpared to before.


    Lin Fan looked down at his own hands before turning to the skeleton that was approaching him.


    When Lin Fan had broken through, the power that entered him had pushed away the approaching skeleton, but now that that had stopped, the skeleton warrior wasing at him once again.


    However, the skeleton seemed to be moving much slowerpared to before.


    With a single sweep of his sword, Lin Fan easily stopped the bone sword with his own sword. Not only that, with a single sweep, he blew away the skeleton just like he had been blow away earlier.


    The skeleton mmed into the wall like he had and unlike Lin Fan, this skeleton wasn''t able to resist the power behind Lin Fan''s sh. The moment the skeleton hit the wall, it shattered to pieces and the various bones dropped to the floor.


    The other skeletons didn''t show any fear even after seeing what had happened to theirpatriot and continued charging at Lin Fan. They surrounded him and attacked him at the same time, but their fates were no different from the other skeleton earlier as they too were swept away with a single sh. Not only that, they were all swept away with the same sh.


    While they were attacking, the one skeleton in the robe also made its move.


    It had gathered a ball of me in its skeletal hand which it threw out at Lin Fan.


    With his spiritual senses released around him, naturally Lin Fan has noticed this and he dealt with it with ease. All it took was a single sh for Lin Fan to cut through this ball of me and not only that, Lin Fan also released a sh of energy out with this sh that was targeted at the skeleton in the robe.


    The skeleton in the robe created another ball of mes that it threw at the energy sh, but the energy sh cut through it like it was nothing as it continued forward at the skeleton in the robe. Finally it hit the skeleton in the robe and this skeleton wasn''t even sent flying as it was turned to pieces by this sh.


    With just three simple shes, Lin Fan has taken care of five skeletons that were in the Child Soul Realm.


    Of course, these skeletons weren''t as strong as normal experts in the Child Soul Realm since they were nothing but mindless undead that followed orders. They weren''t able to fight as well as experts that could freely think, so they weren''t as flexible even if their life energy was in the Child Soul Realm.


    But of course, it wouldn''t end there.


    This was where the specialty of a necromancer came into y.


    While these skeletons were weaker than normal experts at the same level, they had one thing going for them which normal experts didn''t have. It was that after they were defeated, they had the ability to regain their strength.


    These skeletons were summoned with the life energy of Faust, so as long as he had more life energy, he would be able to summon them again and again without fail.


    Skeletons at this level were nothing for Faust, so he waved his hand and more skeptics instantly appeared.


    Unlikest time, there weren''t just five skeletons that appeared, this time there were twenty skeletons that appeared.


    Another thing different was that there weren''t just sword skeletons and the skeleton in the robe, this time there were skeletons with shields and skeletons with bows.


    With theirposition, it was almost like an entire army, though their numbers were a bit low for it to be called an army.


    Nevertheless, it was clear that this group of skeletons would be different from before. The group that had been summoned before should have been a test for Lin Fan. This time, it seemed like Faust was fighting with a proper n.


    Still Lin Fan wasn''t worried.

 440 Chapter 440

    Lin Fan faced the shield wielding skeletons head on as they approached him.


    Without any hesitation at all, he swept out with the white sword in his hand. The moment the sword came in contact with the bone shield that the skeleton was wielding, it cut right through it like a hot knife through butter.


    This bone shield that the skeleton had wasn''t made from its own bones, but rather the bones of the enemies that it defeated, so it was much weaker than the skeleton itself. This shield was only an artifact in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, so when facing Lin Fan''s sword, it couldn''tst for a single second.


    The sword continued forward after shing through the bone shield and continued forward towards the skeleton behind the shield. Just like with the previous skeletons, this one waspletely swept away by the force that was contained in the sh and was sent flying at the other skeletons that had been raised.


    The sh had crushed right through this skeleton and turned it into pieces which hit the rest of the skeletons raised, but the two remaining skeletons with shields quickly came forward to block this.


    They were able to stop the fragments from hitting the backline since the skeleton itself had taken most of the force behind Lin Fan''s blow, making the pieces that flew out much weaker inparison.


    After blocking this, there were skeletons with bows and robed skeletons that came up behind these shield skeletons, raising their bows and balls of mes in their hands, aiming them at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time in releasing another sh which created an energy wave that flew out at the attacks of these skeletons. This sh crushed right through the arrows and the balls of mes, but it was blocked by the shield skeletons that were in front.


    The sh had been weakened enough that the shield skeletons were able to block them with their shields, but it did take them a bit of effort.


    With all these skeletons working together, they were starting to be able to match Lin Fan''s attacks which allowed them to start pushing him back. This was not good for Lin Fan since his techniques required him to consume arge amount of life energy, so he was fighting against the clock.


    Lin Fan knew that if he used these long range tactics, it wouldn''t work since his attacks would be whittled down, so he charged forward without any hesitation.


    Lin Fan charged right up to the shield line, using the life energy around him to protect against the arrows and the balls of mes. They just bounced right off theyer of life energy around him like eggs against a brick wall, shattering to pieces without doing a single thing to him.


    Lin Fan came up right in front of the wall of shields and shed out in front of him, cutting the twost shield skeletons down and breaking through the defensive line.


    However, at thest moment, there was a sudden spike made of bones that flew out through the army of skeletons at him.


    Lin Fan twisted and raised his sword to block it, using all his life energy, but even then, he was still sent flying.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan released his life energy at full which allowed him to block it in the end, but that didn''t stop him from being sent flying by that bone spike.


    Lin Fan went all the way back to his starting position by the wall, but he wasn''t mmed against it like he had been before.


    Lin Fan looked at the source of the bone spike and saw Faust standing there with his hand raised, pointed at where Lin Fan had been standing.


    This bone spike had been stronger than anything that Lin Fan had been hit with before, so he could tell that it was a special attack used by Faust, however, Lin Fan wasn''t worried when he saw this. Rather, Lin Fan revealed a faint smile.


    Normally the special part of being a necromancer was having minions that would do all the work for you, so you wouldn''t have to do a thing. That was because unlike normal cultivators, necromancers had much higher spiritual senses, allowing them better control of their life energy. Unless there was a need, they wouldn''t directly attack because it was better for them to whittle down their enemies with the difference in life energy until the enemypletely ran out of strength.


    For a necromancer to directly attack, it meant that they were desperate or they had lost control of their emotions and wanted to attack directly.


    For this scenario, it clearly wasn''t the former, it was thetter.


    Faust had lost himself in his emotions as he red at Lin Fan, preparing to send out another bone spike.


    However, if Lin Fan wasn''t caught off guard by it, that meant that it wouldn''t hit him since he could easily follow the trajectory of this straight projectile.


    Lin Fan stabilized himself before dodging the arrows and balls of me that were thrown at him, charging out once again at the skeletons.<sub> </sub>


    Since all the shield skeletons had been taken care of, the ones that came forward to meet Lin Fan were the sword skeletons, but they didn''tst that long either since each of them could only take a single sh from Lin Fan.


    They were swept away with a single sh and there were more arrows and balls of me that flew out at Lin Fan, but he easily dodged them since he had gotten used to the speed that they came out. Even the one bone spike that flew out at him was easily avoided by him since he could easily keep up with the speed that it came at him.


    It didn''t take Lin Fan more than a few more swings to take care of the rest of the skeletons, leaving a bunch of bones on the ground along with Faust standing with him in the room.


    Faust was lost in his rage, but his mind was still functioning, so he could tell that it wouldn''t be of any use if he continued summoning skeletons to help him.


    <o>,m But he also didn''t want to let Lin Fan go since this was rted to her, so there was only one thing that he could do.</o>


    Faust suddenly created a dagger made of bones that he held in his right hand which he just as suddenly stabbed into his left hand before chanting something.


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand what he was chanting, but he knew that it wouldn''t be good for him to finish this chant, so Lin Fan charged right at Faust.


    However, before he could take a single step, there were hands that grabbed at his legs.


    Turning down, Lin Fan saw that there were skeletal hands that hade out of the ground that were dragging him downwards. Lin Fan tried to pull away, but these hands seemed like they had the strength of hell as they pulled him down.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all to sh down at these skeletal hands, destroying them and freeing himself, but it was already toote for him to stop Faust.


    After Faust finished chanting his spell, he roared out, "Come forth, King of Death and strike down my enemies. Their souls will be your offering."


    As soon as his voice fell, there was a dark vortex that appeared underneath his feet where there was a skeletal hand that reached out, but this time, the aura waspletely different.


    This aura was one that seemed very familiar to Lin Fan, but he couldn''t tell exactly what it was.


    However, when the skeletal figure appeared out of the hole, Lin Fan was taken aback because this was a very familiar figure.


    This was a skeleton that was in a dark robe with a golden crown on his head with pure purple eyes that seemed like they could stare right into one''s soul.


    This was a figure that Lin Fan hadn''t seen in a long time since the person that he knew that had this same figure had changed into another appearance a long time ago. Since then, that person hadn''t ever turned back to this form.


    But there was no mistaking it because this form had left a deep impression on Lin Fan, especially considering how they had met the first time.


    When that skeletal figure appeared, it turned to look at Faust first before saying, "Little Faust, why did you summon me again? Don''t you know that I''m very busy?"


    Faust answered as he pointed at Lin Fan, "Teacher, please help me take care of him. I can''t take care of him alone and it''s very important for me that I have his body."


    The skeletal figure turned to look at Lin Fan and didn''t care about him at first, but then it was as if it had suddenly sensed something as its purple eyes flickered. It took a deeper look at Lin Fan before saying, "Yi? Why do I feel something familiaring from you?"


    Both Lin Fan and Faust were surprised when they heard this, but neither of them could react in time as the skeletal figure suddenly appeared in front of Lin Fan.


    He was floating in front of Lin Fan as he looked him over, as if he was looking for something.


    After a few seconds, he said, "Oh, it''s the aura of the main body."

 441 Chapter 441

    Then the skeleton didn''t bother looking over Lin Fan any longer as it went right back to where Faust was standing and said, "Little Faust, not this one."


    Faust''s face sunk when he heard this, but he still wouldn''t give up as he said, "Teacher, please, this is the only thing I''m asking of you. I need his body to revive her."


    The skeleton shook his head and gave a sigh before saying, "Little Faust, I really can''t do anything this time. I can only tell you that my main body has its own n and I can''t interfere with it. If you really insist, I might even have to take care of you."


    Faust couldn''t help taking a step back when he heard this.


    In all his years of learning from his master, he had never heard such words from him. Normally his master was yful and teased him quite a bit, but he had never heard a threat like this before¡­


    Faust couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan and wondering just what was so special about him that even his teacher wouldn''t touch him, but there was nothing he could do since there was no way for him to force his teacher into killing him.


    In fact, Faust had been lucky enough to identally summon his teacher in the past which was something that could be considered the luck of nine lifetimes.


    His teacher had been the one who had taught him all that he had known about summoning the undead and had been the one that made him what he is today. If it wasn''t for his teacher helping him, he would have died countless times already.


    In his heart, there was only one person who had a higher position than his teacher, so normally he would have definitely listened to the words of his teacher. However, this involved that one person who was higher in his heart, so he had no other choice,


    Faust didn''t give up as he pulled out a sword that was made of bones from the ground before turning to Lin Fan. Judging by the look on his face, it seemed like he was going to go all out, but that was fine for Lin Fan as well since he was also running out of life energy.


    Faust went right past the skeleton in the dark robe who didn''t do a thing as he watched Faust run out. In the end, while he knew that Lin Fan was involved in the ns of his main body, he had been with Faust for some time now, so it was impossible for him not to feel a single thing towards him. So while he couldn''t do a thing towards Lin Fan, that didn''t mean that he couldn''t stand aside and do nothing. Not to mention what had already happened to Faust¡­


    Faust charged forward at Lin Fan with his white sword wrapped in the ck energy of death. He had gathered all his energy for this one single strike, causing the ck energy around his pure white sword to take the form of a skull that was like the reaper of death.


    Of course, this was exactly what Lin Fan wanted since he knew that he wouldn''t be able tost much longer with these tenws. Faust didn''t know this and if he had been slightly more patient, he could have waited out Lin Fan to take him down. It was just too bad that he had been too agitated and chose to use this heads on confrontation method in the end.


    The one problem for Lin Fan was that Faust was a ghost in these ruins, which meant that there was the protection of the array for him. Even if Lin Fan defeated him with his full force, without using the golden energy, it was impossible for him to truly kill him.


    As of right now, the only way that Lin Fan knew of to use that golden energy was to put his life in danger and it would appear at thest second, but using his life energy like this would ensure that he would be safe, so it wouldn''t appear.


    Still, that was a bridge that Lin Fan would deal with when he crossed it since for now, all he needed to do was take down Faust, otherwise he might really be in a bad situation.


    So Lin Fan also raised all hisws to the max and gathered all the energy he had into a single sh.


    Both of them advanced towards each other, letting out roars as they gathered all their energy.


    Finally they shed right in the center of the room, but this sh didn''t evenst a single second before breaking up.


    It was something that neither side had expected, but it had happened in the end.


    ? Just like with the ghost principal, when Lin Fan''s sword shed with Faust''s sword, the second before the collision, there was a golden glow that suddenlypletely wrapped around Lin Fan.


    With this golden glow that appeared, there wasn''t even a single second of hesitation as Lin Fan''s sword cut right through Faust''s sword and continued forward before cutting him right in half.


    The two sides of Faust''s body flew through the air beforending on separate sides of Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan looked down at his sword, seeing the golden glow quickly retreat back to his body, heading to the golden diamond on his forehead.


    He couldn''t understand just what caused this golden glow to appear. He had thought that he had figured it out before, but now it just confused him more because it had suddenly appeared without his intention at all.


    The upper part of Faust with his head was staring right at Lin Fan, or rather the golden glow that surrounded him with aplicated look in his eyes. It was a mix of yearning along with a hatred towards that golden glow.


    Since Faust had been cut down, his summons would have normally disappeared, but the skeleton in the dark robe just stood there on the side watching everything without showing a single sign that he would be disappearing.


    Lin Fan turned back to Faust and asked, "Where is the doll?"


    After all, this was the most important thing to him right now.


    Faust looked at Lin Fan with an even moreplicated look, but in the end, he dug into his chest and took out a golden glowing doll. This was the doll that had been described in the folder, but when Lin Fan saw it, he saw that the file really didn''t do it justice.


    This was a doll that waspletely life-like and it wasn''t a doll of something random, it was a doll of a woman and it was a very beautiful woman.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything for a while as Faust began dissipating into ashes and it was Faust who broke the silence in the end by saying, "Do you want to hear a story?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to suddenly hear this and while he was thinking about this, the skeleton on the side suddenly said, "Listen to him, it''ll be good for you."


    Lin Fan looked at the skeleton on the side and after another bit, he gave a nod to Faust.


    Faust started by saying, "Beforeing here, Gretchen and I were wanderers. We weren''t rich, but we were happy with our simple lives of wandering. However, aftering here, it all changed¡­"


    Faust stopped after saying this and he gave a sigh as he looked at the doll that he was holding. Then after another pause, he said, "It was all that b*stard''s fault that everything turned out this way, if it was possible, I wish that we never came here in the first ce."


    Lin Fan was about to ask a question, but Faust suddenly raised his hand and said, "Don''t interrupt just yet, let me finish."


    After saying this, he continued, "In the end, he used these people to trap us and he took her away from me. Before I could do anything, she was already dead...and it was all my fault."


    There was a single tear that came out of the corner of his eyes when he said this and then he said, "I was able to summon teacher here and he taught me the way to preserve her body, but the soul, the soul, it was still the one thing missing. For the soul to be summoned back, there needs to be a sacrifice. Something of equal value¡­"


    Then Faust turned to look right at Lin Fan and pointed at his forehead, "That power that you''ve been given, that is the key to all of this. As long as I can get it, I''ll be able to summon back her soul."


    Seeing the desire in Faust''s eyes, Lin Fan raised his guard, preparing to block any attacks that woulde his way.


    Seeing this, Faust revealed a faint smile and waved his hand before saying, "Calm down, there''s no way for me to take it from you now. You can see what kind of condition I''m in, do you really think I can still do anything?"


    Then there was another pause before Faust gave a sigh and revealed a smile, "No, it''s time for me to rejoin her in the afterlife, but before I leave, I want to give you a warning." After saying this, there was a serious look that appeared on Faust''s face, "You say that you don''t know that Huang Di, but I can tell that you''re rted to him in some way. Just be warned, you shouldn''t trust¡­"


    Before he could finish, there was a beam of golden light that fell down right on top of him.

 Chapter 442 Necromancer (8)

    When the beam of golden light fell down onto Faust, no one in this room was able to react. Well, it wasn''t no one at all, but the person who could act didn''t want to act.


    This was supposed to happen, so naturally it wouldn''t be in his best interest to go against fate, even if he was a bit unwilling to ept it.


    Faust didn''t even have time to react as the beam of golden light fell onto him, he didn''t even have time to make a sound. At the very least, that meant that he didn''t feel any pain at all as he turned into ashes, disappearing without leaving a trace.


    Though for Lin Fan, this wasn''t what he wanted to see since Faust had been just about to say something that he felt was important. But at the veryst second, this strange beam of golden light fell down on him and turned him to ashes.


    After Faust had disappeared, the beam of golden light also disappeared.


    The surrounding area turned silent and it was like nothing had happened at all.


    The only thing that still signified that something had happened was the life-like doll that was now covered in a golden glow that fell to the ground.


    If one looked at it carefully, they would have seen something that was like a tear that fell from the face of the doll.


    Lin Fan didn''t immediately go pick up the doll, rather he looked up at the ceiling where the beam of golden light had fallen down from. When he looked at the ceiling, he saw that there was nothing that had changed about it, it was still the same ceiling as before. It was almost as if that beam of golden light had fallen right through the ceiling without even touching it.


    He could tell that the beam of golden light was like the golden glow that came from the diamond on his forehead, as well as the golden glow that surrounded him when he fought. He had also seen this when it hadpletely turned Faust into ashes, however it had happened much faster than when he used his golden glow.


    It was clear that whatever used this golden glow had much more control than him and the golden glow that was used was much stronger than his.


    As for who that person was, that was something that Lin Fan didn''t know.


    But someone that could control that much of the golden glow, unless they were rted to the origin of these ruins, it was impossible for them to control all of this¡­


    Since that was the case, could it be that the person that made these ruins were still alive?


    That person was most likely Huang Di who was Lin Fan''s transmigration senior. But then again, if it was, why was he hiding here and what did he make this round for?


    He was supposed to be the saviour of these people, but it almost seemed like he was the one that was currently trapping them¡­


    Then there was the fact that Faust had been trying to warn Lin Fan not to trust someone before he was hit by that beam of golden light¡­


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t have all the clues that he needed to draw a conclusion right now since for all he knew, there was a chance that Faust had been lying to him. Or there might be someone else who was controlling this realm from behind the scenes.


    Lin Fan stopped thinking about this and turned to pick up the doll, but there was a familiar voice that came from behind him that said, "How about we have a talk now?"


    Lin Fan stopped when he heard this and he turned around to look at the skeleton that was standing there with a confused look.


    Normally, when the summoner disappeared, the undead would disappear with that summoner, but this skeleton was still here.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "How are you still here?"


    The skeleton in the dark robe revealed a faint smile as a sparkle appeared in his purple eyes, "Do you really think that he was strong enough to summon me on his own?"


    Seeing that Lin Fan suddenly understood, the skeleton continued, "It was a two sided contract that we formed, so even if he dies, I can stay here since I was summoned using my own life energy. As for how long I can stay...That is apletely different story."


    Lin Fan paused before hesitantly asking, "So, what do you want with me then?"


    The skeleton looked over Lin Fan and with how deep his eyes were, it was almost as if he was looking right into Lin Fan''s soul. Though in reality, he was actually looking in Lin Fan''s soul since there was a part of Lin Fan''s soul that contained a bit of energy that wasn''t his.


    Seeing that the skeleton wasn''t saying a thing, Lin Fan revealed an awkward look, but he also chose not to say anything since he knew what kind of personality the main body of this skeleton had. Since he wasn''t saying anything yet, that meant that he was still thinking about something.


    After a while, the skeleton finally asked, "How is the main body doing?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was visibly surprised since he clearly never expected the skeleton to suddenly ask him this, but he still said, "He''s doing fine. Sometimes I really wonder if he''s even worthy of the identity that he has."


    The skeleton suddenly gave augh before saying, "You sure you should be saying that to me?"


    Lin Fan wasn''t scared as he revealed a smile and said, "You''re thinking the same thing aren''t you?"


    After being with the main body of this skeleton for a while, Lin Fan knew how to get along with him and he wasn''t scared of him like he had once been. He figured that since this was a clone of the person he knew, their personality should be simr.


    He wasn''t disappointed as that skeleton gave anotherugh before saying, "Well, that''s good to hear."


    Then the smile disappeared from the skeleton''s face as he said with a serious look, "You better be careful in here. I have some understanding of what happened here and I can say that it''s not good that you have what you have. It means that you''re being targeted."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows the moment he heard this and he immediately was about to ask something, but before he could even say a thing, the skeleton raised his hand to stop him.


    The skeleton looked up at where the beam of golden light had fallen down with a smile before saying, "I''ve already said too much. This ce isn''t as simple as you think, even I have to be careful here. Not to mention that the fellow here is ring at me and he has the power of destiny on his side. The power of destiny is not something that even I dare mess with easily. This ce definitely won''t have a good ending."


    Lin Fan clearly had more things to say, but he knew that he wouldn''t be able to get anything out of the skeleton since his words weren''t light.


    The skeleton gave a nod to Lin Fan and said, "Good luck." After that, he disappeared without a trace.


    Lin Fan looked back at the ceiling once again feeling aplicated feeling, but that quickly faded since he knew that the only way forward was to still follow this path.


    ¡­


    On the giant tree of light outside, at the top of the tree, there was a beast that was licking its paws as it looked down.


    Instead of looking down at the various humans that were moving through the city, it was looking right down at the tree below it. It was almost as if it was looking right through the tree to look at the city in the center.


    As it was licking its paws, it suddenly gave a hiss like something had annoyed it.


    When they heard this, all the ghostmanders that were nearby couldn''t help jumping back.


    Even though they all respected this beast, it was also clear that all the ghostmanders also feared this beast.


    The beast suddenly said, "That damn Faust, he dares to ruin master''s n? Wait until I get my hands on him!"


    ? All the ghostmanders looked at each other withplicated looks in their eyes, but they didn''t say anything in the end.


    The beast raised its paw and there was a ball of golden light that suddenly appeared. With a single wave of its paw, the golden light suddenly fell down into the giant tree of light and disappeared.


    After throwing down this ball of golden light, the beast licked its paw again before saying, "You have to pay the price if you want to betray the master."


    Then after this, the beast turned back to the ghostmanders and asked, "How is it going with the humans outside?"


    All the ghostmanders looked at each other, but finally one of them came forward to say, "So far there are only eleven who have passed the test and received the mark."


    The beast kept licking its paw for a bit like it was in thought before it finally said, "Open it and let them in, the more holders, the more likely the master''s n will seed."


    The ghostmanders all gave a bow before several of them suddenly jumped off the tree and into the city below them.


    The beast didn''t care about them at all as it licked its paw and said, "Soon¡­"

 Chapter 443 Fishing Docks (1)

    Once the skeleton disappeared, Lin Fan turned to where the golden glowing doll was lying and he slowly walked over to it.


    The moment he touched it, the golden glow around it suddenly disappeared and flowed through his hand to the golden diamond that was on his forehead.


    During this process the golden glow flowed over his eyes and he was able to see a few memories that were trapped in them, just like what happened when he had picked up that golden pen back in the school.


    There were scenes that were simr to the ones he had seen when he had picked up the pen, but there were also a few scenes that were different.


    These scenes definitely weren''t a part of what was supposed to be shown to him since they disyed some facts that were rather incriminating¡­


    If Lin Fan had to guess where they came from, they should have been scenes that came from the doll that he was holding in his hand. After all, among those scenes, there was one that was of Faust and a beautiful woman, happily holding themselves in each other''s hands. As for the appearance of the woman, it was almost identical to the doll that Lin Fan was holding in his hand.


    After the golden glow hadpletely flowed into the golden diamond in his head, Lin Fan looked down to find that there was a smile on the face of the doll in his hand.


    Then as if there was a breeze that suddenly blew past him, the doll in his hand began scattering on the wind into ashes.


    By the time that Lin Fan could react, the doll hadpletely disappeared¡­


    This wasn''t what had happened with the golden pen which Lin Fan still had, but Lin Fan was fine with this since he felt gratitude towards these two who had risked their lives to give him the information that he now had.


    At the very least, he hoped that they were happy together in the afterlife¡­


    After taking a minute to gather himself, he moved over to the entrance of the room where he saw Mo Ze Chen crumpled on the ground in a deep sleep. It was like he didn''t have a single thing that he was worried about even though he was inside these dangerous ruins. Mo Ze Chen was even drooling as he muttered, "Um, give me some more please."


    Lin Fan held back the urge to kick Mo Ze Chen.


    It was a good thing that he had sent out the puppets to lure out the ghosts in the surrounding area, otherwise with how much noise they had been making, they definitely would have attracted a horde over that would have killed Mo Ze Chen.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that Faust had actually put up a sound proof barrier, so no matter how much noise they had made earlier, none of the ghosts had heard a thing.


    There wasn''t even any damage that went outside of the room because of the barrier keeping everything inside.


    But Lin Fan didn''t hold back when waking up Mo Ze Chen, so while he didn''t kick him hard, he still kicked him awake in the end.


    Mo Ze Chen slowly woke up and looked around himself for a bit before suddenlying back to his senses. When he saw Lin Fan, he jumped up and grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulders before saying, "Boss, where''s that guy?"


    Lin Fan held back the urge to p him and put his head in his palm as he said, "It''s already over. You''ve been sleeping the entire time."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a stunned look as he looked at Lin Fan in a daze for a few seconds before asking, "It''s all over?"


    Lin Fan didn''t hold back this time because he actually had an excuse as he brought his hand up and gave a crisp p across Mo Ze Chen''s face.


    It rang out true and Mo Ze Chen''s face turned to the side as he revealed a stunned look.


    Lin Fan just asked with a smile, "Does it hurt? Guess that means that this isn''t a dream then."


    Mo Ze Chen reached his hand up to touch his cheek and indeed it did hurt since Lin Fan hadn''t held back. With Lin Fan''s physique also breaking through, the amount of strength that he could use was much greaterpared to before. Even before, it was at a level that Mo Ze Chen couldn''t resist and now, it was at a level that Mo Ze Chen couldn''t resist even more.


    But Mo Ze Chen couldn''t say a thing as he just revealed a bitter smile since this was technically his fault. He was the one who had lost consciousness in the end and had been a burden for Lin Fan.


    Still there was nothing they could do now except move on.


    They had already taken care of two of these locations and now there were only two more locations left for them.<sub> </sub>


    As for what would happen after they took care of thesest two locations, that was not something that they knew. However, they had no other clues right now, so they just had to do it.


    At least there was no need for them to face all the ghosts that should have been in the hospital on their way out. Just like with the school, the waves of ghosts had all disappeared the moment that Lin Fan had touched the dolls.


    This was what Lin Fan had learned from Brainy''s puppets after Brainy checked in with all the puppets that were around them.


    They made their way out to the front of the hospital and just like with the school, the hospital also crumbled behind them the moment that they came out. It happened the second that they took their final step out of the building.


    As soon as they did, the bricks began falling behind them and they had to run out of the way to avoid being crushed.


    But neither of them looked back since they already knew where they were heading.


    They made their way through the town to the third location and when they arrived, they found that it waspletely different from thest two locations that they had been. Instead of being in a building this time, the location that they arrived in was an open harbour that was beside an endless ocean.


    But that didn''t make sense either since they were inside of a tree. How could there be an ocean here?


    When they looked closely, they found that the sea on the horizon was actually just painted onto the trunk of the tree and it was painted in such a life-like manner that they thought that it was real. However, no matter how they looked at it, it was still only just a smallke that was here that went all the way to the trunk.


    Still, that was strange because where did thiskee from?


    But then again, where did this entire town inside of the treee from? That seemed like the more important question.


    They didn''t have time to think about this since there were still other things they had to do first.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen made their way down to the docks and they found the same old podium that was right at the entrance to the docks, but of course there was a different message for them this time.


    The podium in front of the docks read, "In the darkest times, there will be a light thates from the depths."


    At the bottom of the podium read the golden word "heart".


    As per usual, they didn''t know what this was referring to since they didn''t know anything about these docks, so they didn''t stay here for long as they began heading down to the docks.


    When they arrived, they saw that there were a bunch of ships that were docked there and all of them seemed to be fishing vessels based on thes that were on the side of them. However, it wasn''t just these boats that were there, there were also ghosts that were wandering around the deck of the fishing vessels.


    With how open this harbour was, it was easy for them to spot the ghosts that were wandering around, but it was also easy for the ghosts to spot them.


    Or it would have been if Lin Fan didn''t have aw that helped him with this.


    Since this was an open area, there were plenty of ces that were put under shade to keep cool from the sun, so there were plenty of shadows for Lin Fan to use.


    Wrapping them up with the shadoww, Lin Fan was able to keep the ghosts from noticing them.


    But using the shadoww to keep them hidden wasn''t something that they wanted to do either since staying put here meant not doing anything.


    There weren''t many buildings that were a part of this harbour, other than a few that looked like restaurants and one that looked like a building.


    After looking around to see theyout of the ghosts, Lin Fan released his puppets to begin leading them around.


    Once the ghosts around them were being led around by the rats and the path was clear, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen decided to head to the office.


    When they arrived, Lin Fan also threw a few rats inside to draw out the ghosts that could be hiding in there, but he was surprised by what he found.

 Chapter 444 Fishing Docks (2)

    The moment the rats went in, they found that there was only a single figure that was standing in the room. However, even though this figure was alone, it wasn''t someone that could be underestimated.


    The moment the rats went in, Brainy was able to sense the aura of the figure that was inside and it immediately made it decide to pull the rats out. It was just too bad that the figure inside didn''t n on letting them go.


    Because of how small the room was, as soon as the rats entered, the figure was able to detect them.


    The figure inside moved at a speed that the rats couldn''t keep up to and in a sh, all the rats were being held in the figure''s hand.


    When it was all over, the figure looked down at the rats in its hands and couldn''t help being surprised to see rats present, but still it didn''t think too much about it. With its other hand, it swiped out across the rats that it was holding in its hand and they all went limp, but there wasn''t a single drop of blood that was spilled since it had only knocked the rats out.


    Then it picked out one of the rats that it was holding and brought it to its mouth before biting down. At a visible rate, the rat began developing wrinkles all over its body until it became a shriveled up husk of what it once was.


    This was the special ability of the ghosts, their ability to suck up all the life force inside a living being.


    Yes, what was inside the room was a ghost, but it wasn''t just any ghost. This was a ghost that was in the Child Soul Realm, which meant that it was a cut above all the other ghosts that were wandering around this area.


    If this ce followed the same rules as the other ces, this should mean that this Child Soul Realm ghost was a mid area boss and would drop something that they would need to fight the final boss.


    At the very least, if they defeated this Child Soul Realm ghost, they would receive some kind of clue as to what to do here.


    But they also couldn''t just rush in without any preparations since that wouldn''t be effective.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan pulled out another few rats that he slipped through the window and once Brainy confirmed that the ghost was focused on the rats, he burst through the door. The moment he went through the door, he saw the surprised ghost look in his direction.


    When the ghost turned, he even had a rat that was still in his mouth that was in the process of having its life force being sucked out.


    But still, as a Child Soul Realm ghost, the ghost naturally reacted quickly and immediately threw the rats at Lin Fan to distract him.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all to knock them aside with his free hand as he swept out with the sword in his other hand.


    The Child Soul Realm ghost might have been caught off guard, but it definitely wasn''t unable to fight back at all, especially since the de that wasing at it didn''t have a singlew surrounding it.


    When it saw what this human was using to challenge it, it couldn''t help feeling surprised since this human didn''t seem to be using anything that could contest it. While the de that the human used was considered a strong artifact, that still wasn''t enough to deal with it.


    Still, he wasn''t responsible for humans that seeked their own deaths so he raised his w and aimed it right at the human.


    What he never expected was that the moment before his w could reach the human''s de, there was a sudden golden glow that suddenly surrounded the human''s de.


    The ghost''s eyes immediately narrowed once it saw this glow since it knew exactly what it was, but it was already toote for it to do a single thing¡­


    The only thing that the ghost could do was twist its body at the veryst second, but Lin Fan had also predicted this from fighting all the other ghosts, so he had tilted his sword as well to match this. The moment the ghost twisted, the sword also followed it down and shed right through the ghost''s arm before cutting through its body as well.


    The ghost was cut right in half down the middle and it fell down in two different parts. Everything from the torso down fell down right in front of Lin Fan while everything from the torso up flew a few meters beforending at the door where Mo Ze Chen was standing.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help taking a step back when the ghost''s top half suddenlynded in front of him, but the ghost didn''t have time to care about that.<sub> </sub>


    With thest bit of energy that the ghost had, it looked back at Lin Fan, in particr, the golden glow that was around him. There was a bit of hope that appeared in his eyes before he slumped down and let himself be turned into ashes.


    After the ghost''s body hadpletely turned into ashes and disappeared, but unlike before where only one thing dropped, there were two golden objects that appeared where the legs of the ghost had been.


    Neither of these objects were normal objects. One of them was a rudder which seemed to be for a ship and the other was a children''s book.


    Lin Fan ignored the rudder first and reached out to take the children''s book.


    When he picked it up, the usual thing happened where the golden glow around the book entered the golden diamond on Lin Fan''s forehead, but he ignored this and focused on the content of the book.


    The book had an interesting story for a children''s book, but Lin Fan still didn''t know how it applied to this situation. The one thing that Lin Fan did have to criticize about the book was the ending, which was clearly too grim for a children''s book.


    The book was about the story of a little girl and the whale that she met.


    One day, the little girl was walking along the beach until she found a whale who was swimming off the surface of the coast. The little girl was amazed that there was such arge creature out in the world, so she waved out to it and surprisingly, the whale came over to where she was.


    The whale as it turned out wasn''t a normal whale, but rather a special beast that had developed intelligence, but had been separated from its pack. It had been wandering all alone ever since.


    It had tried to make friends, but everyone that tried to talk to in the sea had run away after seeing it. So when it had finally found someone willing to talk to it, it was naturally very happy.


    The two of them spent several afternoons together and soon became close friends.


    Of course, the people from the little girl''s vige wondered where she went all these days, so her parents asked her about it.


    The little girl told the wonderful story of her whale friend, wanting to share the amazing story of how she had be friends with a whale, but no one in the vige believed her. That was until the day someone had followed her to the beach and had found her ying with the whale in the water.


    The people of this vige lived by the sea, so naturally they were people that relied on fishing as their main source of ie. For them, a whale was considered a jackpot, one that would bring prosperity to the entire vige.


    So after confirming that the little girl wasn''t lying about the whale, they told her that they wanted to meet her whale friend too. Of course, they didn''t tell her the real reason why they wanted to meet her whale friend.


    The little girl remembered how her whale friend had told her that it had wanted to make new friends, so the little girl agreed to the requests of the vigers.


    The next day, the little girl led a few of the vigers to where she would be meeting her whale friend, but what she didn''t know was that the other vigers had sailed fishing boats out to surround the area the whale would be appearing in.


    The whale was still young, so it was still naive. While it had been suspicious at first when the little girl showed up with all these people, it still trusted them in the end since they were rtives of the little girl. The whale had let down its guard and in the end, that was what finished it.


    While it was being distracted by the vigers that hade with the little girl, the boats had already silently surrounded it and had aimed their harpoons at it.


    When the whale stopped moving to let one of the vigers ce a crown of flowers on it, the boats fired their harpoon.


    Before the whale even knew what was going on, the harpoons had already pierced its body. Even with all the blubber that a whale had, with all these harpoons piercing it, there was no chance of it surviving.


    But the worst wound that it received wasn''t from all these harpoons, the worst wound was from a single harpoon that pierced right into its heart, sttering its blood onto the little girl.

 Chapter 445 Fishing Docks (3)

    Even in its final moments, the whale didn''t struggle against the people that it had thought it was friends with.


    However, it did see that it was the humans that were controlling the boats that had attacked it, whichpletely shattered its heart.


    In its final moments, the whale turned to look at the little girl with a betrayed look in its eyes as they dimmed.


    The little girl saw this and her heart broke, as her world copsed around her. Everything that she thought that she could believe in was suddenly gone and all she was left with were people that seemed like wild animals as they butchered the corpse of the whale.


    They cut the whale up into smaller and easier to carry pieces which they brought back to the vige.


    The entire vige held a feast to celebrate the sessful whale hunt, naming the little girl their hero. They didn''t care about the emotional damage that they had caused her, rather they just cared about what they had gained. The reason why they even named her their hero was to give her parents some credit since they wanted more rewards for hunting the whale since it was their daughter who had led them to it.


    As the vige prepared for the celebration, the little girl wandered around in the vige and watched them. Looking around, all she could see were beasts in human skin, she could no longer see them as humans after what they had done.


    Disillusioned by everything she had seen, the little girl wandered out into the sea and disappeared.


    That would have seemed like where it would have ended, even though it would have been a very bad ending, but that wasn''t where it ended. The story took a much stranger turn after that.


    After the girl disappeared, the people of the vige continued holding their party without caring that she wasn''t there. The people of the vige knew how against this party the little girl was, so they thought that it was natural that she didn''te.


    Of course, that didn''t stop them from arguing over how the whale carcass should be divided. No one held back as they all tried to get as much of the whale meat as possible, not even blood rted rtives held back against each other.


    This was a scene of people who werepletely swallowed by greed.


    It was at this time that there was a giant wave that came from the sea that crushed the vige underneath it.


    Even before they died, these people didn''t stop arguing for even a single second, but that was because they weren''t aware they were about to die.


    But even in death, not a single one of them had regretted what they had done. It was just too bad that not a single one of them knew that this was their punishment for what they had done to the whale.


    The whale was actually the son of a sea goddess who had sent her son to the humans to test theirpassion. She had seen the greed that was lurking under the surface of the vige and wanted to give them onest chance at redemption, but it seemed like the vige was just too far gone in the end.


    She had sent that final wave to wipe out the entire town for their sins and to start anew.


    That was where the story chose to end itself, after the sea goddess had wiped out everyone in the town.


    While this story was quite well written and it did teach a good lesson about excessive greed, the content of the story itself left a bad taste in the mouth.


    After all, in the end, both the little whale and the girl had died and while the vigers were punished, they also all died in the end. There was no after story that followed this that gave a sense offort after all the tragedies that happened. Once one finished reading this story, all that one felt was a sense of sadness that didn''t go away.


    Lin Fan felt the same after he finished reading this story, but that wasn''t what he was paying attention to.


    What was the reason for the ghost to drop this story along with the rudder?


    Could it be that this story was a story of the past and this vige was the vige that had settled here after this story?


    Then did that mean that there was actually a sea goddess that was here?


    Mo Ze Chen had been reading the story over Lin Fan''s shoulder and he was someone who let his emotions show when he felt them, so there were tears that were dripping down his face once he finished reading.


    He put his hand on Lin Fan''s shoulder and said, "Boss, this story is just too sad."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just ignored him as he continued looking at the book lost in thought.


    After all, there was actually a clue that he had found when he had been reading.


    When the girl had been sttered by blood, it mentioned specifically that it was blood from the heart of the whale. Why would the author of the book take the time to add in the extra words to describe the blood of the heart if it didn''t mean anything?


    Not to mention that the podium that he had seen in front had mentioned the word ''heart'', so there had to be some significance¡­


    Could it be that the whale and the girl were still alive out there somewhere and they had something to do with the heart?


    As he thought about it, the more likely that it seemed that they would have to go looking for them. After all, why else would the ghost have dropped the rudder of a boat if it wasn''t designed for them to go out to sea to look for them?


    But even if it was a small area since this wasn''t aplete sea, it was still not a ce that they could search easily. Not to mention that this was on the sea, which would make it even harder for them to find since they wouldn''t be able to dive that deep.


    While reaching the Soul Realm meant that they were able to live up to a thousand years and survive for months without eating, they still needed air which was why they couldn''t freely travel across the void. So even if they could dive into the water, they would need to breathe eventually which was what restricted them.


    Still, there were no other clues than this right now, so Lin Fan had to assume that their final goal was to head into the sea¡­


    But before that, it seemed like there were still other things that they had to collect since they wouldn''t be able to sail a boat with just a rudder.


    When they had looked over the boats that had been docked, they had seen that most of them were in various degrees of disrepair, which meant that not a single one of them could be sailed out.


    However, there had been one that was in the center that was the least damaged out of all the boats. That was the only one that could be sailed, if it wasn''t for the fact that it was missing a few parts.


    When thinking back on it, he remembered that in total, there seemed to be five different parts that were missing.


    Including this rudder, it meant that there were still four other parts that they had to find before they would be able to assemble the ship and sail out.


    That meant that there would be at least four more bosses that they would have to find and defeat before they would be able to move onto the next part of this stage.


    This really was annoying because unlike the previous stages, it meant that they would have to defeat all the mid area bosses before moving onto the next area.


    There were only two of them and there were four bosses that they had to find and defeat. With their limited time, it would be almost impossible for them to do this quickly. At the very least, Lin Fan suspected that it would take another two hours for them to finish.


    If that was true, that would mean that they would have less than three hours to finish the rest of this realm and who knows how long thest location would take. Then after that, there would surely be something else that they would have to undertake, so this was by no means the final stage for them.


    Since that was the case, that meant that Lin Fan had to do something to make sure that they would be able to finish on time.


    After thinking this through, the first thing that Lin Fan did was release a bunch of rats, both living and dead all around him. As soon as those rats fell to the ground, they ran off in all different directions under Brainy''s control and disappeared instantly.


    Outside, there were the sounds of ghosts growling, but those sounds also quickly faded as the rats pulled the hordes of ghosts away from their location.


    Mo Ze Chen wasn''t surprised by this as he knew that their cue to leave, but then before he could move, Lin Fan suddenly turned around to look at him with a smile.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw this smile, he felt a chill run down his back.


    This was a smile that he had seen before and it was never good when he saw this smile.

 Chapter 446 Fishing Docks (4)

    Mo Ze Chen was right to feel worried because what Lin Fan nned for him definitely wasn''t a good thing.


    Well, it was a good thing since it did make him stronger, but it wasn''t a good thing for his mentality.


    Lin Fan picked Mo Ze Chen up and brought him over to where the golden glowing rudder was before setting him down.


    Mo Ze Chen was confused at first, but then seeing the golden glowing rudder, he was surprised. He could understand why Lin Fan had brought him over to this rudder, but he was surprised that Lin Fan would give this chance to him.


    After all the experimenting that they had done, Mo Ze Chen knew that this golden glow was a very important kind of energy. It was the only thing that would allow them to take care of ghosts since there was an array that was present that healed them whenever they were attacked.


    Each golden glowing item was the key to making one''s golden glow stronger, so each single item was very valuable.


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan with a gaze filled with emotion as he was touched by the gesture that Lin Fan was showing him, it was just too bad that this gesture wasn''t designed to help him, but rather to achieve Lin Fan''s goals.


    After Mo Ze Chen had finished drawing in the golden glow of the rudder, Lin Fan called out Xiao Huo and had it pick up Mo Ze Chen before heading off in one direction.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t even have time to react as he was picked off the ground and was flown away.


    The direction that Xiao Huo was taking Mo Ze Chen was in the direction of one of the Child Soul Realm ghosts that Brainy had found while Lin Fan had been reading the book.


    Since he couldn''t take care of it all by himself, he would just split them up and let Mo Ze Chen handle a few of them. After all, he had absorbed the golden glows of quite a few items now and Lin Fan was sure that it would be able to take down one of the Child Soul Realm ghosts.


    But of course, that wasn''t the only source of Lin Fan''s confidence.


    The main source of Lin Fan''s confidence was that Mo Ze Chen wouldn''t be the one fighting, rather it would be Xiao Huo.


    He knew how fast the Child Soul Realm ghosts could fight and he knew how fast Xiao Huo was. As long as Xiao Huo didn''t intentionally slow down, it would be almost impossible for the ghosts to catch it.


    The only problem was that Lin Fan didn''t have a way for Xiao Huo to take down the ghost.


    That was where Mo Ze Chen came in.


    In the end, Mo Ze Chen would be used as a weapon like a sword for Xiao Huo, being used as a golden glowing sword to cut down the Child Soul Realm ghosts.


    After sending them off, Lin Fan didn''t worry about them any further and began focusing on finding the other three ghosts.


    He had sent out more than enough rats to cover the entire harbour since this harbour was actually quite smallpared to the hospital and the school. It didn''t even take up a tenth of the space those two ces had taken.


    The rest of the space for this stage was actually taken up by the sea that stretched all the way to the trunk.


    It didn''t take Brainy long to find the next Child Soul Realm ghost because there was only so much space here and the buildings were actually quite close together.


    After finding the next ghost, Lin Fan didn''t waste any time in heading out to the location.


    Just like this, the two of them worked through the four Child Soul Realm ghosts quite quickly.


    ¡­


    Deep down in the sea, in a hidden cave.


    There was a giant whale that was lying on the floor of the sea, but it suddenly opened its eyes as if it had sensed something and looked up at the surface.


    When it suddenly moved, the little girl that was sitting on its back noticed this as well and looked down to ask, "Xiao Jing, what is it?"


    The whale didn''t say anything at first, but then it gave a supersonic cry that shook the area around them.


    The little girl heard this cry even though humans shouldn''t have been able to, but she didn''t say anything either as she waited for the whale to finish.


    Once the whale was finished with this sonar, it said in a deep voice, "It seems like we have guests who areing."<sub> </sub>


    The little girl looked up at the sun through the water and said, "Are they the ones that we''ve been waiting for?"


    The whale paused for a second before saying, "I can''t tell, but I can tell that they are at least able to take down those ghosts."


    The little girl had a sparkle appear in her eyes, but then they dimmed once again before she gave a sigh.


    The whale saw this and said, "You shouldn''t give up hope that easily."


    The little girl shook her head and said, "It''s never a good idea to have hope in humans, you and I both know that."


    <o>,m The whale didn''t say anything at first, but then it said, "It''s been a long time, perhaps they''ll be different."</o>


    The little girl didn''t respond to this at all. Instead, she said, "What do you want for dinner tonight?"


    The whale had a sad look that flickered in its eyes, but then it said, "I''ll let you choose."


    The little girl jumped up on the whale''s back and said, "Let''s have some tuna, it''s been a long time since we''ve had that!"


    Just like that, the two of thempletely forgot about what they had just been talking about and began discussing their dinner.


    But before the whale moved out of the cave to go find dinner, the little girl suddenly turned into a golden glow that disappeared into the whale. The golden glow went right through the flesh of the whale and reached the heart of the whale which was covered in the same golden glow.


    ¡­


    Back on the surface, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen met up half an hourter after taking care of all the Child Soul Realm ghosts.


    Lin Fan looked the same as usual, but Mo Ze Chen lookedpletely ragged.


    There were cuts and bruises all over him, like he had been thrown around by something. Well, instead of being thrown around, it was better to say that he had been swung around like a sword.


    When facing their Child Soul Realm ghosts, Xiao Huo had held Mo Ze Chen in its mouth like a sword and had flown down, swinging it at the ghost.


    Since Mo Ze Chen couldn''t stop this, he could only ept it without releasing any life energy since he knew that it was better this way. If he did release life energy, it would mean that there was something that was protecting him and any hit from the ghost wouldn''t be fatal. If it wasn''t fatal, it wouldn''t activate the protective golden energy and he would have to defend against the attack of a Child Soul Realm ghost with his own energy.


    If he had to do that, he would definitely be seriously injured, which was definitely worse than dying in this realm.


    Since he had no other choice, he just went limp and let Xiao Huo do what it wanted with his body.


    As expected, when Mo Ze Chen used his body against the ghost, there was always theyer of golden protective energy that came up at thest second.


    The ghosts never expected it and when they saw the golden energy, they couldn''t do anything since it was already toote. The golden energy always cut right through the ghost, so there wasn''t a single moment of suspense in these battles as Xiao Huo cut right through the ghost with its Mo Ze Chen sword.


    The strange thing was that for every ghost that they defeated, there were always two items that dropped. One was theponent for the ship that they needed and the other was the same children''s book that they received from the first ghost.


    Both of them had a golden glow around them, but only theponent was different. Every single one of the books had the same story in them, told in the exact same way, word for word.


    Lin Fan held all the books in his hands and looked over them, but he couldn''t find a single thing that was different between them.


    Since that was the case, he just tossed them into his Spatial Ring and turned his attention back to the boat that was in front of them.


    This boat was the one that was missing all theponents and based on what he could see, it seemed like they had all collected all theponents.


    He pulled out all the ones that he had and Mo Ze Chen also pulled out all the ones that he had, but of course, Mo Ze Chen didn''t forget toin about how he was treated first. In response to this, Lin Fan just pped him in the back of the head and he fell silent.


    After the fiveponents were pulled out, all of them magically floated into the air and were pulled right to the ship, fitting into ce perfectly.


    Just like that, the boat had been finished.

 Chapter 447 Setting Sail (1)

    In front of them was aplete boat, but neither Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen walked onto it right away since there was something else that caught their attention.


    When the boat had been finished, there was a sudden burst of golden energy that appeared around the boat, pulsating a few times before it suddenly stopped.


    That also wasn''t what caught their attention, rather it was what was behind them that caught their attention. As soon as the boat radiated golden light, there were the sounds of moans that came from behind them.


    Turning around to take a look, they found that the ghosts that they had been luring around with the rat puppets had suddenly stopped to turn in the direction of the boat. Even if Brainy brought the rat puppets closer to pull them in, the ghosts justpletely ignored the rat puppets.


    Every single ghost that was on the dock was staring at the golden glow that surrounded the boat.


    After a single moment''s pause, all of them suddenly dashed forward and their target was the boat.


    On the dock in front of the boat, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen saw the waves of ghostsing at them and they didn''t hesitate at all as they turned to run at the boat.


    While it was easy for them to take care of this wave of ghosts with their strengthened golden glow, it definitely wouldn''t have been easy for them. After all, this wave was even greater than the wave of little kids that had charged at them in the courtyard at the school. They couldn''t even count how many there were charging at them, that was just how dense this wave was.


    As soon as they got onto the boat, there was another problem that they discovered.


    It was that they didn''t know how to sail this boat.


    Both of them did have experience with boats before and had even sailed boats, but that was in a society that was technologically advanced.


    Before transmigrating to this world, Lin Fan had been a rich second generation young master, so sailing speed boats all day was something that he had done before. But those were all modern boats that ran on electronics rather than normal wooden boats that relied on sails to sail.


    It was the same with Mo Ze Chen.


    As a ruins explorer, naturally he had experience with all kinds of different vehicles back when he was weaker, though now all he did was use his body or beast carriages to travel. So naturally he had experience sailing a boat as well, but since this world was also a world that had achieved a certain level of technology along with cultivating, it meant that the boats that he had used before were all electronic as well.


    The two of them didn''t have any clue on how to operate a normal wooden boat.


    Still, even if they didn''t know how to operate it, that didn''t mean that they could just wait here for the horde of ghosts to catch them on this ship. At the very least, they had to make ast ditch effort.


    Mo Ze Chen turned to face the ghosts and while he was afraid, he did put on a stance like he was about to make hisst stand.


    As for Lin Fan beside him, he wasn''t ready to make thatst stand just yet.


    Lin Fan looked around the boat a bit until something finally caught his eyes.


    With a single flick of his wrist, there was a pure white dagger that suddenly flew out across the air, aimed right at the sail that was furled up by ropes. The dagger flew right through the air and in the end, it cut right through the ropes that were holding the sail up.


    The moment the ropes were cut, the sails immediately unfurled themselves and they were suddenly moving forward like there was an invisible breeze that was blowing through them. However, even though there was a breeze blowing through them, the boat still didn''t move at all.


    But that wasn''t a problem since Lin Fan already knew why this was.


    Boats don''t naturally stay at harbour, they had to be held there by something, either being tied down or having something keep it there. Naturally, this boat also had something simr.


    Beforeing onto the boat, they had already untied the rope keeping it at the harbour, so the only thing left was the anchor and Lin Fan had already found the capstan on the deck.


    After throwing the white dagger out, Lin Fan was already running towards the capstan and with how strong he was, it shouldn''t have been a problem for him to push it to pull the anchor up.<sub> </sub>


    However, the moment he touched the capstan, he found that he was unable to move it at all. That was until the moment the golden glow suddenly appeared around him and infused itself with the capstan. Only when the golden glow was surrounding the capstan did it finally turn to pull the anchor up.


    Once the anchor was pulled up, Lin Fan didn''t spend any time thinking about what had just happened and turned to pick it up to ce on the deck.


    The moment the anchor was pulled in, the boat suddenly began to move forward into the seas, but that shouldn''t mean that they were safe just yet. After all, it was just a little bit of water that was keeping the ghosts away from him.


    It was a good thing that they had set off early, otherwise the ghosts might really have caught up to them. Since they had already set off, there was a gap that appeared between the boat and the dock and with the appearance of that gap, there was a strange phenomenon that also urred.


    The moment the ghosts were about to jump off the dock, they all suddenly stopped in perfect coordination as they stared at the boat, but not a single one of them were willing to jump into the water.


    It was as if there was something in the water that they wanted to avoid, so not a single one of them were willing to touch the water, even though it was only a little water that kept them away from their target.


    In the end, the ghosts just stood on the dock watching the boat disappear into the sea.


    After a while, the dock and ghosts hadpletely disappeared from Lin Fan''s line of sight from the boat.


    He hadn''t thought that these seas would be that wide, but it was surprisingly wide enough that he couldn''t see the docks anymore.


    Still, since they had avoided the ghosts, now there was a problem of finding what they needed to find.


    All around them was nothing except open seas, so there was nothing for them to do right now. After all, the only clues that they had was that there was something in the sea, but they had no idea where it was.


    After sailing for a bit, Lin Fan decided to stop the boat by furling up the sails and dropping the anchor which surprisingly worked.


    Of course, the strange thing about this boat was that the boat''s speedpletely depended on how much the sails were unfurled. The boat traveled at a constant speed, as if there was always wind, so the only difference was how wide the sail was and how much wind was caught by the sail.


    But as for where the wind came from, that was something that neither Lin Fan or Mo Ze Chen could figure out.


    They had already climbed the mast and put their hands in front of the sails, but there was no wind that could be felt at all.


    Still, it didn''t matter how the sails or the boat worked, all that mattered to them was that they worked and they could travel on these seas.


    After stopping the boat, Lin Fan turned to Brainy.


    Brainy was Lin Fan''s go to pet for situations like this since Brainy really had a versatile toolkit.


    Brainy didn''t just have scout puppets that could be used onnd, it also had scout puppets for the air and the water.


    Lin Fan pulled out several fishes of varying species from the system''s pet storage space and threw them all into the water.


    These fishes all swam out in different directions and began searching for something, anything at all, but in the end, all they could find was an empty sea. There weren''t even any fishes that were naturally swimming in this area, or at least fishes that they could see. Perhaps they were hiding since there were new fishes that had entered their space, but at the very least, Brainy''s puppets weren''t able to find them.


    After searching for ten minutes, Lin Fan decided that it wouldn''t work to only rely on Brainy''s puppets and he should see if there was anything else they could find.


    Since they had more time now, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen began searching through the boat that they were on. They had been in such a rush to get on the boat earlier on the dock that they hadn''t had time to search it before heading off. At the very least, there wasn''t a single ghost that was hiding under the deck of the boat. That would have been bad since they hadn''t had time to clear it out.


    But after they finished searching the boat, they werepletely stumped since all they had in front of them was the wide open seas and they didn''t know where to go.

 Chapter 448 Setting Sail (2)

    After thinking for a while, Lin Fan suddenly thought of the five books that they had received from defeating the Child Soul Realm ghosts.


    Other than telling them the story that was inside, they had yed no other functions. However, if they were just telling the story, why was there a need for five different copies then?


    But even if it was strange that there were five different copies, it still didn''t make any sense since all the copies all looked exactly the same.


    Lin Fan went across the front and the back of the book before diving into the contents of the book itself, but he still couldn''t find a single thing to help him in the end. After all, there was absolutely nothing that seemed out of ce with this children''s book. As far as he could tell, this was an absolutely normal children''s book.


    Well to call it normal was a stretch considering where he had found it, but there were no clues for him at all.


    He went over all four other books in the same manner and there were still no clues that they could find.


    During all of this, Mo Ze Chen had been in the crow''s nest up above, looking around them over the sea all around, trying to find any clues ornd that he could see. They had already moved far away enough that they couldn''t see the shore with the docks anymore.


    But even looking around, he couldn''t find anything at all since there was just nothing around them at all.


    There wasn''t even a ripple on the water, it was almost like this entire body of water waspletely isted from the rest of this ce.


    However, as Mo Ze Chen continued looking around, he eventually got bored and looked into the sky. There was nothing in the sky since they were inside of the giant glowing tree outside, but there was the painted sky and a ball of light in the center that acted like a sun to simte the sky.


    When Mo Ze Chen looked at the clouds, he couldn''t help thinking that they looked simr. Once he had this thought, he focused his mind to look at the clouds painted in the sky and realized that they were in a pattern that he had seen before.


    Still, no matter how he turned his mind, he still couldn''t remember where he had seen this pattern before.


    That was until he looked down at Lin Fan on the deck preparing to ask him about it. It was at that moment that he realized where he had seen this pattern before because he saw it once again.


    On the cover of the book that Lin Fan was holding, there was a part of the pattern on the cover that looked just like the pattern that was painted in the sky.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t immediately call out to Lin Fan after noticing this, rather he looked up at the sky and followed the pattern. As he followed the pattern, he realized that the book in front of them was a map of the patterns in the sky above them.


    Once he realized this, Mo Ze Chen immediately flew down from the crow''s nest and said, "Boss, I found something."


    Lin Fan had been looking over the books when Mo Ze Chen suddenly came down, so he was caught off guard by him suddenly appearing beside him, but he also didn''t take long to react to this. After hearing what Mo Ze Chen said, he asked, "What did you find?"


    Mo Ze Chen first pointed at the sky and asked, "Do you see anything different up there?"


    Lin Fan looked up and was confused at first, but it didn''t take him long to realize what Mo Ze Chen was trying to point out. Or rather, it was Brainy that had noticed this right away.


    Lin Fan ignored Mo Ze Chen who was trying to have fun with this and immediately looked down at the books. He picked up one of the books and brought it up, putting it up against the sky above them as he followed along with the pattern.


    But even after seeing that this pattern matched the one that was on the cover of the book, Lin Fan still knitted his brows.


    Mo Ze Chen had seen this and thought that Lin Fan didn''t understand what it meant, so he said, "Boss, don''t you see that it''s a map?"


    Lin Fan heard this and he was strangely annoyed, after all, it was a weird feeling to see Mo Ze Chen treat him like a fool.


    Lin Fan gave a soft snort and said, "It might be a map, but do you know where the end point on that map is?"


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised by this question since he hadn''t actually thought of that yet. He had thought that since it was a map, the map would lead them to where they would need to go, but then he realized that Lin Fan was right.


    Mo Ze Chen came over to look at one of the books that Lin Fan had ced on the ground and found that while the pattern matched, there wasn''t any indication of where they should go.<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen began frantically looking over the cover of the book, trying to make up for his mistake, but there was no solution in sight.


    After realizing that he had just made a fool of himself, he stood there with an awkward look on his face, but Lin Fan didn''t have time for him right now. Lin Fan was more focused looking over the covers of these books to see if there was anything else that they could use, but there was nothing.


    That was until Lin Fan realized something.


    Why would all these books be the same if there wasn''t a reason?


    Then he looked at the corners of the cover and found that they were all covered with the same cap.


    Lin Fan looked at it for a bit before suddenly thinking of something.


    Without saying a word, he grabbed the book that Mo Ze Chen was awkwardly holding and picked up the rest of the bookies before putting them all together.


    When they all came together, they formed arger version of the same pattern, but there was now a mark right in the center of that. The four corners of the four books came together to make a X marker right in the center of the map.


    But there were still two problems with this.


    One was that there was a fifth book that was the exact same as the others.


    What purpose did this fifth book serve if they could form the map with just four books?


    Did that mean that Lin Fam has missed something when he put this map together? Or perhaps there was something that the fifth book would show him if he put it together with the rest of the books?


    However, no matter how Lin Fan arranges the books, he couldn''t find a way to integrate the fifth book. Even when he put it on the other books and moved it around, there was nothing that seemed different.


    The second problem was that since the overall map was just four patterns that came together as one, it was hard for Lin Fan to pinpoint where they currently were on the map. After all, there were four of these same patterns and just relying on the pattern in the sky, there was no way to determine where they were since there were four possible locations that they could be.


    Without knowing where they were exactly, it would be hard for them to navigate to the center of the map where the X was.


    But there was a very simple solution to this problem, albeit that it was one that would waste time. It was simply put, the lowest IQ solution to this problem since it just involved using pure brute force to solve the problem.


    The most simple solution was to just sail in one direction until you reached the end of one pattern. If what followed after was another pattern, that would mean eliminating two options directly.


    For example, if you sailed to the right,which was to the east and you saw another pattern, that would immediately mean you were on one of the two books on the left. If you didn''t see a pattern at all, that would mean that you were on one of the two books on the right.


    Then after that, all they had to do was either sail north or south.


    If they sailed south and met another pattern, that would mean that they would be in the top half of the map, which was one of the two top books.


    This method was very simply put starting from the edges of the map and making their way inward.


    Starting from the corners, that was the most effective method when it came to jigsaw puzzles and it was also the most effective method now.


    The one slight problem was navigating, but that really wasn''t a problem when there was a giant pattern in the sky above you.


    Not to mention that as someone who explored ruins, Mo Ze Chen had a variety of tools for exploring. This not only included apass, but also more old fashioned tools like a sextant and an astrbe, even though those didn''t really y a role here.


    So with map andpass in hand, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen chose a direction and started sailing off.

 Chapter 449 Setting Sail (3)

    Following the pattern in the sky, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had turned their ship to the east and started sailing in that direction.


    The location that they were right now was to the south of the city.


    They had started in the north location and had slowly gone clockwise, so now they were in the location to the south of the city.


    This ce had been close to the entrance that they hade from, but somehow they hadn''t been able to see this sea when they had been thrown into the tree.


    Now, one would normally think that the coastline that they came from would be one of the edges of the map, but which edge would it be?


    There was the possibility that they had gotten the direction of the entire map wrong and it might not follow the cardinal directions at all. Perhaps what they thought was north was actually west and they didn''t know it.


    However, even if that was the case, at the very least they had this map.


    The other method that Lin Fan could have used was let Brainy release its fish puppets and swim as far as possible to see if they could find the right location for him, but that didn''t work either because of various factors.


    One was that they didn''t know how far the ce that they were looking for was. While Brainy was much strongerpared to before, there was still a limit to the reach of its spiritual sense.


    While it wouldn''t take any spiritual sense to let the seed lie dormant with a fewmands left in the puppet, to scout out areas, Brainy had to actively control the puppet with its spiritual sense. If the puppet went out of the range of Brainy''s spiritual sense, it would be a mindless puppet again that could only act out a few orders until Brainy was in range again.


    Since they didn''t know how wide this body of water was, it was impossible for Brainy to send out puppets to search for the location they were looking for. Even now, the puppets that Brainy had sent out earlier still hadn''t reached an end or found anything yet.


    As they continued along, the only thing that they could gauge their progress on was the pattern on the roof, so their heads had been looking up most of the time. Of course they still had to look down from time to time to make sure that the path in front of them was clear, but every time they moved through the water, there was nothing in sight.


    Eventually, they arrived at the edge of the pattern and saw that there was another pattern that linked up to the pattern that they had been following.


    The moment they came to the edge of the pattern, they weren''t certain that they were at the edge at first. It was only when Lin Fan had carefullypared it that he realized that they were indeed at the edge.


    That was because the pattern was the same on both sides, so they perfectly blended with each other when they met at the edge.


    But Lin Fan could tell where the line was since he had the book that showed the edge of the pattern. With that book, Lin Fan was able to move along the pattern until he reached the end of it.


    Since there was a continuation of the pattern, that meant that they were on the left side of the map since they had sailed east. Then all that they needed to do now was whether they had been on the top or bottom half of the map.


    ? As long as they followed this line in the pattern, they would reach the center of the map. However the problem is whether the center was to the north or to the south of them.


    This was one of the situations where they had to take a risk, that was if it wasn''t for the fact that Brainy was here.


    After that previous bit of sailing, Brainy had a good idea of the distance that each pattern in the roof took up. With that distance in mind, Brainy was now sure that it was able to send puppets to the end of the pattern to see where the location of the X was.


    When Brainy told Lin Fan about this, he was pleasantly surprised since he knew that he had been lucky this time, but he might not be as lucky next time. Instead of leaving it to luck, it was much better to have a guarantee.


    While waiting for Brainy, he couldn''t help thinking about how strange this sea was.


    This ce seemed much bigger than it should be because they had gone around the tree outside and they knew that it wasn''t this big.


    As he was waiting, Lin Fan closed his eyes and began feeling the space around himself.


    It didn''t take him long to find something familiar in the air.


    This wasn''t something tangible, but there was a trace ofw energy in the air that was being used in an array.<sub> </sub>


    As a user of arrays himself, naturally he was sensitive to the existence of arrays around him. However, what made it easier for him to notice was the familiar feeling that he got from thew around him.


    Not only did Lin Fan have thisw himself, this was aw that he had felt a stronger version of, which thisw was simr to.


    Naturally since it was an array that messed with the space inside of it, it was an array that used spatialws. This array contained spatialws which stretched only the space that was in the area that the array covered. This meant that underneath them, under the sea, there was a giant array that was there.


    This was something that wasn''t new to Lin Fam since he had seen it before in both the school and the hospital, but he didn''t have the time to stop and think about it before like he did now.


    To be honest, the quiet seas around him really were good for his mind since it allowed him to calm down after everything that happened. Now that he finally had time to think, the facts about this ce finally sunk in.


    Whoever created this ce was able to utilize both time and spacews at such a level, so what purpose did they have in creating this?


    While Lin Fan has some clues because of the memories that he saw, it still didn''t give him a full picture.


    But at least he knew that this wasn''t as simple as it seemed.


    Lin Fan turned to look at Mo Ze Chen who was nearby looking over the books and he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    Mo Ze Chen has asked him to help him save Lulu from these ruins, something that Lin Fan felt might be easy, but now he wasn''t so certain. For one, he didn''t even know how to go about that since he didn''t know if they could even be saved.


    Normally in situations for living beings trapped inside ruins like this, they wouldn''t be rescued, but rather they would disappear with the ruins themselves.


    Lin Fan had a fairly good idea that that was going to happen once they cleared these ruins.


    The one bright side was that they might not even get a chance to do so since it seemed like time really was against them.


    It had taken them half an hour to sail through these seas, so they were sitting at just a little over four hours now.


    Still, there really was nothing else left for them since the rules of this round was that they couldn''t return by the gem, they had to return through the entrance with their own two feet. As for how to get back to the entrance, that was something that Lin Fan had no idea about.


    So the only thing they could do was wait for the gems to automatically activate once time was up.


    After a bit of waiting, which wasn''t that long at all since Brainy''s puppets were all fast swimmers, Brainy had found their target.


    Or rather, Brainy had sent puppets off in both directions, so it had found the end of the pattern in one of those directions, so it knew which way was the right way.


    But in the location that they were supposed to go to, it had been unable to find a single thing. There wasn''t even anything hidden under the water.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but then he turned back to the books and had an idea. Perhaps the books were needed to activate this event, which was what the fifth book was for?


    But since they had found the ce they needed to go, they immediately set sail and headed off in that direction.


    It didn''t take long this time since they were already used to sailing with this boat and they quickly arrived at where all four different patterns intersected in the sky. It only took them around five minutes to do so,pletely different from the fifteen minutes it took them to sail to the end of a pattern before.


    That was because this time they weren''t taking it slowly, trying to figure out where to go.


    However, when they did arrive at where the four patterns intersected, which was seemingly perfect even though it was four different patterns, they found that there was nothing there at all.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen both looked around for a bit before Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Is that it?"

 Chapter 450 Strange Encounter (1)

    There was nothing for Lin Fan to respond to this with because he was thinking the exact same thing.


    They had made it all the way to the location on the map, but there was nothing here waiting for them.


    Could it be that they had made a mistake?


    Or was there something else that they just weren''t seeing?


    Lin Fan pulled out the books again and matched them together before looking up at the sky. As he looked up, he saw that the pattern above them perfectly matched the pattern that was on the books as they converged in the center of the map.


    Since that was the case, why wasn''t there anything here?


    Perhaps they had to do something with the books before it triggered this event?


    Was it the reason why there were five books?


    As Lin Fan was thinking about this, he pulled out the fifth book and started fiddling with it.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw this, he also had the same thought and came over to help Lin Fan look over the book.


    However, even with both of them looking it over, they couldn''t find anything special about this fifth book at all. It was the exact same as the other four books that wereying there on the deck.


    At the same time, they had also tried to see if they could integrate the fifth book into the map made of four books since it might have been a mistake on their part. This might not be the real map at all, it was just what they thought was the map. After all, there was an extra book here.


    But as they were looking this over, they suddenly heard the call of a whaleing from behind them.


    They didn''t react at first since they assumed that this was normal since they were on the seas, but then they came back to their senses and realized why this was abnormal.


    During their entire trip, they hadn''t found a single living creature that had been in the ocean, but now there was actually something there. Not to mention that it was a whale, just like the one that they were looking for.


    However, when they turned to look in the direction that the whale call hade from, they saw something that had caught them off guard.


    It wasn''t because there was a whale there at all, rather there wasn''t a whale at all. Instead of there being a whale, there was a little girl who was strangely floating on the water.


    Floating wasn''t the right word for it, rather it was better to say that she was defying allws of nature by standing on the water.


    As the two of them were caught off guard, the little girl on the water walked across it towards their boat before jumping onto the deck.


    Once she was on the deck, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen snapped out of their daze and put up their guards. This was something that they had encountered many times now, so they knew that there would most likely be a hard battle ahead of them.


    In an instant, Lin Fan had pulled out his pure white sword while Mo Ze Chen had moved behind Lin Fan, hiding behind him.


    Lin Fan would have said something about this, but this wasn''t the time to deal with Mo Ze Chen right now as he waspletely focused on the little girl.


    When the little girl saw this, she didn''t get mad or be surprised, rather she just gave a giggle and said, "Big brothers, there''s no need to be worried. I''m just here to talk."


    Lin Fan looked at her before giving a cold snort and saying, "If you were here to talk, would you have snuck up on us?"


    The little girl gave a shrug and said, "Is it our fault that you were so focused on your books that you didn''t notice us?"


    Lin Fan was about to say something else, but then he noticed something about what the little girl had just said.


    She was clearly here alone, so why was she saying "us"?


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "What do you mean when you say "us"?"


    The little girl tilted her head like she was confused before asking, "What else could I mean by that?"


    Then after thinking about it, it looked like she realized that she had made a mistake as she tapped her right hand into her left palm before saying, "Oh, that''s right!"<sub> </sub>


    Before Lin Fan or Mo Ze Chen could even react, she said, "You haven''t met Xiao Jing yet."


    Then once again, before either of them could say a thing, she turned to the side of the boat and waved her hand out at the sea as she said, "Xiao Jing,e up and introduce yourself."


    Once her voice rang out over the seas, there was another whale call before a sudden burst of water came out of the surface of the seas. It was first a column of water before a giant ssh that pushed water all around this one giant figure.


    When the water fell back down, it revealed a giant gray figure that was floating in the water. This giant gray figure was even bigger than the ship that they were currently on.


    This giant gray figure was without a doubt a whale.


    Even the eye of the whale alone was almost as big as the ship itself.


    When this giant beast appeared, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen became even more wary.


    They knew that with just a single p of its tail, this giant whale would be able topletely sink their ship and they would have no way of fighting back.


    Perhaps if they were onnd, Lin Fan would be able to fight off this whale with his speed since he was a hard target for the whale to hit, but in the water, that was a different case. The whale was able to move much more freely in the water and Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to chase it as he would want since he would be restricted in the water unlike the whale.


    When the little girl saw the expressions on their faces, she gave another giggle before saying, "Big brothers, you don''t need to worry about Xiao Jing, he''s very friendly."


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen both rolled their eyes at this.


    This was a giant beast that was even bigger than their ship and could destroy it with a single p of any of its limbs, thest thing that this giant beast seemed like was friendly.


    Still, they couldn''t just provoke it since this giant beast was capable of destroying their boat at any time. In cases like this, the best choice was to settle this matter peacefully if it was possible.


    Lin Fan paused for a minute before asking, "What do you want with us then?"


    The little girl revealed a faint smile and said, "Aren''t you the ones looking for us?"


    As she said this, she was pointing at the five books that had been left on the deck.


    Lin Fan immediately raised his weapon when he heard this. After all, based on the clue that he had, he knew that he had to take care of this whale somehow since what he needed to take from this whale was its heart. He was certain that this giant beast wouldn''t just roll over and let him take its heart.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was prepared to fight, the little girl shook her head before signalling to Lin Fan with her hands to put down the weapons.


    Seeing that he still didn''t put them down, she gave a sigh and said, "I''m not here to fight, I''m serious."


    Lin Fan looked at her with a gaze of suspicion, but he decided to give her the benefit of the doubt. After all, if she dide with hostile intentions, there was no need to wait for this long to attack them since they hadn''t even been able to sense her when she appeared, which was a strange thing.


    Even if they hadn''t been able to sense her, Brainy would have been able to do so since Brainy had puppets deployed all around them looking for anything that had happened. After all, before she arrived, they weren''t even sure that they were in the right ce.


    Not to mention that since they couldn''t sense her at all, if she had the whale make a move while they were unaware, she could have destroyed their boat already. It would have taken just a single fin p from under the water to crush their boat.


    After a few seconds of leering at her, Lin Fan slowly lowered his hand holding his weapon.


    Mo Ze Chen tugged on Lin Fan''s arm when he saw this, wanting to urge Lin Fan not to be fooled by this, but he didn''t have time to say a thing before the little girl made her move.


    When the little girl saw Lin Fan lowering his weapon, she revealed a bright smile before turning to shout, "Xiao Jing!"


    The whale gave another call and with a single burst from its blowhole, the air was filled with mist.


    It didn''t stop there since the whale suddenly pped its tailfin and created a plume of water that soared into the sky, slowly raining back down around them.


    However, as the water fell down, it didn''tnd on the boat at all since the mist that had been released hadpletely enveloped it. The mist around the boat caught the water until it created a water barrier around the boat.

 Chapter 451 Strange Encounter (2)

    After this barrier of water had formed around the boat, the little girl turned back to Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen with a smile as she said, "Now we can finally have a private talk."


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were both looking at the barrier of water that had formed around them before turning back to the little girl.


    They could tell that this barrier was at the level of the Child Soul Realm and unless Lin Fan charged at it with his full power, it wouldn''t break that easily. However, if he were to do that while they were on this boat, it would definitely destroy the boat as well.


    While this could be considered a barrier that blocked off outside interference, it could also be considered a barrier that trapped them inside. If this little girl wanted to do something to them, they definitely would be in for a hard time.


    Of course, since Lin Fan had the spatialws, he could still escape from this ce as he wished, but he definitely wouldn''t be able to bring Mo Ze Chen along. For him this would be considered a worst case scenario since he had already epted Mo Ze Chen as a subordinate.


    Lin Fan was greedy that way, at the very least he didn''t want to lose the things that he owned.


    Seeing how tense Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen looked after the barrier came up, the little girl revealed a faint smile and said, "Why are two grown men like you so afraid of a little girl like me?"


    Hearing this teasing, Mo Ze Chen felt a bit awkward, but Lin Fan knew better. After all, the story about the little girl and the whale should have been long before the formation of the society that lived in the city that they were in. This society was something that even predated the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so it was safe to say that it was quite old.


    For the little girl and the whale tost all this time, it was clear that they were quite ancient and she shouldn''t be referring to herself as a little girl at all.


    Lin Fan could understand how the whale had lived this long since it was a special beast that had reached at least the Child Soul Realm since that was how powerful this barrier around them was.


    For a beast at that level of cultivation, it was easy for it to live up to a hundred thousand years.


    That was the difference between beasts and humans, most beasts had a much longer lifespan than humans and they naturally gained their power from their bloodlines instead of cultivating.


    While this meant that beasts could cultivate without doing anything, it also meant that bloodlines were the most important things for them. Unlike humans who all had the chance to be experts with their cultivation techniques.


    So while beasts had experts that lived longer and were stronger than normal cultivators because of bloodlines, humans could produce more experts with their cultivation techniques.


    The little girl could see that Lin Fan wasn''t amused by this joke, so she put away the smile that was on her face and had a serious look as she said, "At least this way, they won''t be able to hear what we say. I want a private conversation."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes the moment he heard this.


    As he had suspected, there was something that was nning everything from behind the scene. At least that made it more reasonable since that exined a lot of what Lin Fan had seen.


    But even with this information, he wasn''t sure who it was since there were many different shing clues that he had received.


    At the same time though, that wasn''t important because this girl had revealed something with her words, which was that she knew who this person was.


    As long as she was willing to talk, Lin Fan would be able to learn much more about these ruins.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan asked, "Who is behind all of this?"


    He didn''t dy because he knew that if what she said was true, they wouldn''t have much time left. After all, he knew that whoever was controlling this realm didn''t like people sneaking around their back and revealing things that should be kept hidden. This was clear by how they had immediately destroyed Faust the moment he had tried to warn Lin Fan.


    As soon as the little girl heard this question, she gave a sigh and shook her head before saying, "That is the one thing that I can''t answer since there''s a restriction on me for that information. I can answer almost everything else about this, I just can''t tell you who''s behind all of this and what their goal is."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he also didn''t dwell on this since he knew that there wouldn''t be much time left.


    So Lin Fan asked, "What do you want to talk to me about then?"


    The little girl didn''t answer right away as she seriously looked at Lin Fan for a bit before saying, "You''re from over there as well, aren''t you?"


    Lin Fan was shocked the moment he heard this.


    It wasn''t because of the words she had said, but rather thenguage that she had said it in. The little girl had just spoken fluent Chinese, which was something that Lin Fan hadn''t heard in a long time.


    Earlier when Faust spoke in Chinese, it was more broken, like it was being said by a foreigner. But now, the Chinese that the little girl had said waspletely fluent, it was almost like she was from earth.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan paused as he didn''t know how to respond to this, but when the little girl had asked this question, she had also noted the reaction that Lin Fan had to this, so she already got her answer.


    After pausing for a bit as well, the little girl asked again, "Are you the same as him?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but this time he said, "I don''t know who he is, but I''m certain that I''m not like him."


    The little girl looked into Lin Fan''s eyes and after a moment of silence, she suddenly revealed a smile and said, "I believe you."


    For her, this was already enough because she could see in Lin Fan''s eyes that he was being serious.


    But of course, Lin Fan couldn''t just leave it at this since there were still many questions in his heart. The biggest one was naturally, "How do you know how to speak thisnguage?"


    The little girl had the same smile as she asked back, "Is it that strange for me to know thisnguage?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he said, "Do you really need me to answer this?"


    The little girl gave a giggle before saying, "I know what you''re thinking, but it''s not what you''re thinking."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even deeper when he heard this as he asked, "Then what is it?"


    The little girl gave a sigh before saying, "This will take a long time to exin, but we don''t have that time right now. The only thing I can tell you is that the gods themselves are involved in this matter and it isn''t something that can be talked about easily."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows so much that he was almost scrunching his face as he asked, "Can''t or won''t?"


    The little girl just smiled without saying a thing.


    Lin Fan stared at her for a bit, but he knew in his heart that he wasn''t going to get the answer that he wanted.


    After another bit of silence, the girl changed the topic by saying, "Now, let''s talk about why you''re here. You want Xiao Jing''s heart, don''t you?"


    Lin Fan felt a chill run down his back even though this little girl had said this with a smile on his face. He knew from the beginning that to get what he needed there would be a fight in the end. After all, it wasn''t like the whale would offer its heart to him, would it?


    But the little girl asked in a confused voice, "Why are you getting all hostile? I was just asking a simple question."


    Lin Fan was also confused when he heard this, after all, it didn''t seem like it was a threat. But that was strange since Lin Fan wanted the heart of the whale that was this little girl''s friend.


    Without a heart, how could the whale still survive?


    Lin Fan tentatively asked, "What if I said that I did?"


    The little girl nodded before saying, "Well, that''s the reason why you''re here, so I would say that it''s strange if you don''t want it."


    Lin Fan was even more confused as he asked, "Then you''ll give it to us?"


    The little girl nodded and said, "Why wouldn''t we give it to you?"


    Lin Fan just didn''t know what to say in response to this since he couldn''t understand why this little girl would say such cruel things about her friend.


    But in the end, the little girl realized that there was a mimunication here and gave a giggle before saying, "You thought that I would kill Xiao Jing to give you his heart?"


    Lin Fan was confused as he asked, "Then how are you nning on giving me his heart without taking it out?"


    The little girl revealed a mysterious smile when she heard this.

 Chapter 452 The Gods Are Watching (1)

    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were both confused by this.


    After all, if she really did give the heart, that would mean death for the whale, but the way she put it, it seemed like that wasn''t the case. Could it be that she never learned biology when she was younger?


    But of course, it was impossible that she wouldn''t know that the whale would die without a heart.


    So just what was she nning.


    After revealing that mysterious smile for a while, she didn''t say anything to exin to Lin Fan or Mo Ze Chen as she turned back to the whale that was in the water and shouted, "Xiao Jing, show them what I mean."


    The whale came out of the water again, but this time its mouth was right by where the little girl was standing.


    Aftering out of the water a bit more, it suddenly opened its mouth and began moving towards the little girl on the deck of the ship. From any angle one looked at it from, it almost seemed clear that the whale was about to eat the little girl. Even Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had this doubt.


    However, before the mouth reached the little girl and closed on her, it suddenly stopped right behind her in the air. After stopping, the tongue suddenly came out with something that was covered in a golden glow on it.


    When Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen looked more closely, they found that it was nothing more than a simple pebble, but the fact that it had a golden glow around it meant that this pebble was anything but normal.


    They knew that in these ruins, this golden glow was the most important thing since it was the only thing that could defeat the ghosts. But at the same time, there were only a few items that had this golden glow around it, so it wasn''t something that was easy to get.


    The little girl saw the way Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were looking at the golden glowing pebble and said with a faint smile, "Can you guess what this is?"


    Lin Fan looked at the little pebble for a bit before saying, "The whale''s heart?"


    The little girl gave a nod before shaking her head and saying, "Yes and now. It''s not Xiao Jing''s heart to be precise, but rather the energy from Xiao Jing''s heart ced into amon pebble."


    Lin Fan was confused when he heard this, but he also quickly put the pieces together. After all, there must be a reason why these items had a golden glow around them since it wasn''t like they were naturally urring objects. Especially the doll of Faust''s loved one, there must have been something that injected the golden energy into that doll.


    Since that was the case, it shouldn''t be strange that the little girl and the whale were also able to control this energy.


    But that didn''t exin what this energy was exactly.


    The little girl could see the look of thought on Lin Fan''s face, but after looking up at the barrier, she said, "Take it quickly before someone tries to interfere with this."


    Lin Fan could see the urgent look on her face, so he didn''t ask anything and came forward to take the pebble.


    The moment he did, the energy of the pebble flowed through his arm and into the golden diamond that was on his forehead. Once again, there were scenes that appeared in front of his eyes, scenes simr to the ones that he had seen before, but also scenes from the memories of the little girl and the whale.


    They didn''t give him any more clues than he already knew, but it did show him what happened after the ending of the story.


    The little whale had been saved by his mother in the end, reincarnated into a new body.


    The little girl was also saved by the sea goddess, bringing her out of the sea after she had walked into it looking for forgiveness from her whale friend.


    However, the sea goddess wasn''t able to save the little girlpletely, since she was already weakened by the sea before the sea goddess found her. After all, she had been a little girl without any cultivation at all that had drifted in the sea for close to an hour before being found. It was more than enough to destroy a grown man''s body, not to mention a little girl''s body like this.


    So while the sea goddess brought her back, she couldn''t save herpletely.


    In the end, the little whale was the one that hade up with the solution to this problem.


    Even if they couldn''t save the body of the little girl, they could still save her soul. That meant that the soul could be injected into something new, something that would have a highpatibility with her, so it wouldn''t reject. The little whale''s new body was perfect for this since it was made to ept souls.


    The sea goddess wasn''t certain about this at first, but seeing how determined the little whale was, she decided to follow his suggestion.


    The soul of the little girl was ced in the little whale''s body and after a bit of time, they merged together into one.


    The heart of the whale, which was the core of the new body, now housed two different souls that worked together as one.<sub> </sub>


    So in the end, the little girl got her wish to be reunited with the little whale, but it was a bit different from what she imagined. After all, she now shared a single body with the little whale.


    But the two of them remained best friends even after all of this.


    However, as for why the two of them were here, that wasn''t something that was shown to Lin Fan.


    The final scene that he saw was a conversation between the little girl, the whale, and the sea goddess.


    The sea goddess was surprisingly able to control this golden energy and showed it to the two of them before saying, "When someone shows up with this golden energy in the future, be sure to help them because they are the hope of us gods. We need to watch over that person until they develop and can fulfill the dream that we have."


    The little girl and the little whale were confused when they heard this, but this was a task that was given to them by their mother, so they chose to ept it.


    Now that the little girl had been united with the little whale, she had taken the sea goddess as a mother as well and the sea goddess didn''t mind since she always wanted a daughter as well.


    That was where the memories ended and Lin Fan appeared in the real world again.


    The little girl could see that Lin Fan still had many other questions, but before either of them could speak, there was a sudden beam of golden light that fell down onto the barrier around them.


    This was the same beam of golden light that had fallen down in the hospital, the one that hadpletely wiped out Faust.


    However, the results of this beam of golden light falling down this time was different.


    Unlike before where the beam of golden light wiped out everything that it wanted to wipe out, when it collided with the barrier, there was only a single second of dy before the beam that collided with the barrier scattered. While the barrier did flicker and be weaker momentarily, it still remained in ce and held out the beam of golden light.


    The little girl looked up at the beam of golden light above them and slightly knitted her brows.


    This was Lin Fan''s first time seeing this kind of look from the little girl.


    While she always smiled and didn''t seem like she cared about anything, she did have her serious side from time to time.


    However, no matter what expression she had, there was one thing that had never appeared.


    But now Lin Fan was seeing this emotion for the first time on her face.


    It was worry, there was a bit of worry that had appeared on her face.


    ¡­


    At the top of the tree, the beast was still sitting there, but it was no longer looking down at the humans. Instead, it was once again looking straight down the tree, in the direction of the south of this time, looking right in the direction of the sea that the boat was on.


    The beast muttered under its breath, "First it''s that damn Faust and now it''s that damn whale, does everyone want to go against the master?"


    The beast licked its paws a few times as it decided what to do.


    The surrounding ghostmanders could tell that the beast wasn''t in a good mood and none of them wanted to go forward to say anything, but they knew that if they didn''t, it also wouldn''t end well for them.


    This beast was very moody and at any time, it could snap, which was never a good thing.


    So finally after choosing among themselves by looking at each other, one of the ghostmanders finally came forward.


    The ghostmander came up to the beast who was lying down on one of the branches and said, "Should we send someone in there to deal with the whale?"


    When the beast heard this, it turned in the direction of the ghostmander and narrowed its eyes as it looked at that ghostmander.

 Chapter 453 The Gods Are Watching (2)

    The beast looked at the ghostmander for a bit before slowly raising the paw that it had been licking.


    The ghostmander didn''t even have a chance to react as the paw suddenly fell down and cut right through the ghostmander. The ghostmander wasn''t able to fight back at all as the golden glowing w cut through it like a hot knife through butter.


    In the end, the several parts of the ghostmander had fallen to the ground and began turning into ashes.


    All the ghostmanders around had seen this, but not a single one of them dared to look directly at the corpse of theirrade on the ground. To them, it was like this ghostmander that was slowly turning into ashes didn''t exist at all.


    As for the beast, naturally it didn''t care about the ghostmander at all, as shown by how it had killed it without a single bit of hesitation.


    It didn''t look at the ghostmander that was disappearing on the ground as it looked over the ghostmanders around it before saying, "Now, do any of you have any real ideas for me?"


    As the gaze of the beast fell over the various ghostmanders gathered here, all of them turned away from that gaze. With the way that they were reacting, it was almost like the gaze of the beast was like the gaze of a predator falling over them.


    Seeing that not a single one of them said a thing, the beast didn''t care about them any longer and turned back to looking downwards at the tree.


    After another few seconds passed, it gave a sigh before muttering to itself, "Master''s n already ounted for this, so this should be fine. After all, the whale itself is restricted by the gods on what it can tell him. As long as it isn''t willing to risk its life and tell that kid everything, it should be fine."


    After thinking for a few more seconds, it turned to the ghostmanders and asked, "Have you gotten the other candidates in yet?"


    The ghostmanders looked at each other, before one of them came forward and said, "The door is opening right now, they will be inside very soon."


    The beast was silent for a bit before saying, "Hurry it up. I want them inside as soon as possible."


    The ghostmander nodded before saying, "Yes, we''ll go as fast as we can."


    After that, bringing several other ghostmanders with him, this ghostmander jumped off the tree.


    The beast just sat there with a thoughtful look in its eyes, but it didn''t do anything else this time.


    The ghostmanders looked like they had all been pardoned when they saw this. Without making a sound, they all moved away from the beast, but they still stayed in the branches of the tree. They tried to put as much space as possible between them and the beast.


    The beast didn''t care about them previously, so it didn''t care about them now either.


    After they were all gone, the beast muttered to itself, "Master''s n was so simple, but now it''s all soplicated. Just what went wrong?"


    ¡­


    After the golden beam of light fell down on the barrier, itsted a few more seconds before it finally disappeared.


    Even after it disappeared, the barrier still remained in ce, butpared to before, it was clearly much more transparent.


    But still, it was able to stay in ce.


    After the beam of light disappeared, the little girl''s expression returned to normal as she turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "So, what are you nning on doing now?"


    Lin Fan looked at the pebble in his hand before asking, "Is there no way to stop all of this?"


    The little girl looked at Lin Fan for a bit before giving a sigh and shaking her head, "This is all part of the n, there''s no going back now since you already have all of this. After all, this is something that is on apletely different scale. But I''m certain that you''ll know what to do."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and he asked, "Why are you certain about that?"


    The little girl looked at him with a sweet smile before saying, "Just a feeling."


    Lin Fan felt doubtful about this, but he didn''t choose to continue arguing about that since it didn''t matter. What mattered instead was rather something else that Lin Fan had his doubts about.


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before asking, "You can control this energy, so just where does this energye from?"


    The little girl didn''t answer right away this time, but rather she looked at Lin Fan with a deep look as if she was debating on whether she should speak or not. In the end, she opened her mouth before closing it and giving a sigh before opening her mouth again.


    She repeated this a few times, but she still didn''t say anything in the end.<sub> </sub>


    That was until the whale behind her suddenly called out.


    When she heard this call, she turned around to look at the whale in surprise before saying, "Xiao Jing, are you serious? If we tell them, mother will be angry with us."


    The whale called out again, but this made the little girl knit her brows even more as she said, "I know that they are good people, but this involves secrets that are far beyond them."


    The whale called out one more time and this time the little girl had a look ofplete disbelief on her face as she immediately turned back to Lin Fan to look him over before turning back to ask, "Are you serious about this? You know that this isn''t something that you can joke about, right?"


    The whale suddenly blew out a spray of water from its blowhole, almost as if it was protesting the doubt that the little girl had towards it.


    The little girl also pouted her lips and said, "You know that how serious this is, can you me me for having my doubts?"


    The whale called out again before pping its fin, creating a wave that rocked the boat.


    Well, rock the boat was putting it gently since this was a whale that was much bigger than the boat. The moment the waves that the whale created hit the boat, it came very close to tipping over, but it fell back at the veryst second.


    When Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen saw this, they couldn''t help getting worried, but also they gave a bitterugh in their heart. After all, if they were to be capsized because of an argument between a little girl and a whale, they really wouldn''t know who to exin it if anyone ever asked. Though it would be strange if someone did ask.


    Seeing that they weren''t nning on stopping, Lin Fan came forward and said, "What are you two talking about?"


    The little girl and the whale jolted when they heard this, but it also stopped their argument since they realized where they were.


    The little girl revealed an awkward smile which looked like a little girl who had been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. But after that awkward smile, she said, "Well, it''s hard to answer your question, but Xiao Jing has given me an answer."


    Seeing that she wasn''t saying anything after that, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What is that answer?"


    The little girl hesitated once again to speak, but this time she didn''t just stop. After a pause, she said, "I can''t tell you what kind of power this is, but I can tell you where this poweres from. The golden energy, it''s a power thates from the gods themselves. It''s a power that only the gods can control."


    "Gods?" Lin Fan muttered to himself.


    Gods, the peak of cultivation in this universe.


    He had heard the word god being used many times, but he had never learned exactly what they represented.


    However, a power that only the gods can control, this definitely wasn''t anything simple.


    But if this was a power that only the gods could control, why did it appear in these ruins?


    Could it be that the gods were behind this?


    Lin Fan had a confused look on his face and it was clear that he still wanted to ask more things, but the little girl didn''t give him a chance.


    When he was about to ask something, the little girl raised her hand to cut him off and said, "It''s about time for you to leave."


    Then after pausing, she added, "But before you go, I want to tell you that the gods are always watching over you."


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this and he asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    The little girl looked at him and said in a serious voice, "It''s exactly what it means."


    Lin Fan was about to ask something else, but before he could talk, the little girl had already jumped off the ship.


    p The whale had dived back down while they were talking, so when she jumped off the ship, shended right on the back of the whale.</anda>


    She looked up at Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen looking down from the deck at them before saying, "If you need help, we''lle, but we can only help you once."


    After that, there was something that came out of the water.

 Chapter 454 The Final Location

    The thing that came out of the water was something giant, so big that it couldpletely cover up the ship.


    What came out of the water was the tail fin of the whale.


    It came up above the surface of the water, but it didn''t touch the boat at all. The tail fin was just a little bit away from the boat and if it was just a tiny bit closer, it definitely would have tipped the boat over.


    The tail fin came high up into the sky, way up above the boat. It continued all the way up until it couldn''t go up any further.


    The tail fin of the whale stayed up in the air for a few seconds before it suddenly changed directions and started falling down.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had been confused why the tail fin of the whale had suddenlye out of the water, but the moment they saw it reach its peak, they immediately understood what the whale was nning to do.


    Both of them immediately turned to the little girl looking at them from the back of the whale and shouted, "Stop..."


    But before they could say the rest of what they wanted to say, the tail fin of the whale had already hit the water.


    There was a big ssh, but from the point of view of Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen on the boat, it was more like a tidal wave from a tsunami. This giant wave of water washed over the boat andpletely swept it away, moving at high speeds in the direction of where the harbour would have been.


    In just a few seconds, the wave that carried the boat and the passengers of that boat hadpletely disappeared along the horizon.


    Even after the boat was gone, the little girl continued looking in that direction with eyes that were zed over.


    The whale seemed like it was worried about the little girl and it was about to call out again, but the little girl suddenly revealed a smile as she said, "Xiao Jing, it''s fine. We''ll meet again when the time is right. For now, let''s go back to catching our dinner, alright?"


    The whale didn''t seem like it fully believed her, but without saying a word, it still sank into the water with the little girl.


    The little girl had been staring in the direction that the boat had disappeared up to thest second when the whale sank down into the water.


    When only her head was above the water, her lips mouthed without making a sound, "See you soon, big brother."


    With that, the two of them disappeared into the sea.


    ¡­


    The wave continued traveling at high speeds until it came right up to the shore.


    Only when it was near the shore did the wave finally weaken and slow down. Eventually it slowed down enough where it just washed up on the beach of the shore like a normal waveing in from the sea.


    However, this wave definitely wasn''t a normal wave because of what it was carrying.


    When the wave hit the beach, it gently deposited the boat that Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had been on onto the beach. Then after the wave receded, it was like nothing had happened at all.


    There was a few seconds of calm before Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen suddenly stood up from the deck, gasping for air. After all, they had beenpletely submerged underwater while the ship had been pushed along by the wave.


    Even if the wave had traveled at high speeds, this was a distance that wasn''t easily traversed. Before the wave had reached the shore, it had traveled for over five minutes, which meant that they had been underwater the entire time for five whole minutes.


    A normal person might have been able to hold their breath for a minute and while cultivating made their bodies stronger than the bodies of average people, it still didn''t mean that they could avoid breathing.


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had simr levels of cultivation and even if Lin Fan''s body was stronger, that didn''t mean that he was much better than Mo Ze Chen. Still, in terms of breath, he could have held his a bit longer and Mo Ze Chen was close to passing out.


    But that wasn''t that strange thing.<sub> </sub>


    The strange thing was that the moment the wave had hit the ship, the ship was suddenly covered in a very thinyer of golden energy that had blocked the impact of the wave. This golden energy had appeared out of nowhere, but it was the exact same energy that all the important objects that Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen collected had.


    Then when the shipnded on the beach, the golden glow had suddenly disappeared like it hadn''t existed at all.


    Of course, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t have time to see this since they were busy holding onto the boat to make sure that they weren''t swept away by the water.


    After theynded on the shore, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen got off the ship to look around the beach around them. This was the beach that the harbour had been on, but the harbour had already disappeared.


    Just like with the other two locations, after they had gotten the item that they were looking for, the locations had copsed the moment that they had walked out. Since they weren''t here when they collected the item, these harbours had copsed on their own.


    But that was a good sign since it meant that what the little girl said was true. It seemed like even without getting the object, as long as they collected the energy that should have been in the object, it would consider it a pass. With it being whatever person or system that was running these ruins.


    That also raised another issue which was that someone was watching and listening to their every move¡­


    Still, they would deal with one problem at a time.


    After getting off the boat, the boat also copsed just like the rest of the harbour, turning into rubble behind them. However, after going through it all these times, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were used to it and didn''t even look back.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking that for whoever was watching them, would it be like an action movie scene for them with how they didn''t look back after the explosion? Would it have been even cooler if they both had sunsses on?


    Still, continuing on like this, they moved through the rubbles of the copsed harbour until they reached the entrance, or in this case, the exit that led back to the main city.


    They didn''t stop once they came out of the rubbles of the harbour because there was only one ce that was left for them to go.


    They had gone in a clockwise direction, that meant that the only location left was the location in the west.


    As they headed through the town, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Boss, do you think it''s even possible to save Lulu?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this from Mo Ze Chen since he knew that the main reason Mo Ze Chen was doing this now was to save her. He had always firmly believed that he would be able to do it, but now he was actually expressing his doubt. Just what had happened during this time?


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that while they had been separated, when Mo Ze Chen had been used to attack the Child Soul Realm ghosts by Xiao Huo, he had seen some things.


    It had been the fifth glowing item that he had touched, when the golden glow from that item crawled up his arm to the golden diamond on his forehead, it had done something that it had never done before. As the golden glow passed by his eyes, it showed him a scene just like it had done for Lin Fan.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw this scene, he learned a little about what the history of these ruins were, while also learning that he was out of his league. This was something that was definitely on a whole other scale for him and even if he was confident in Lin Fan, he wasn''t certain that he would be able to do this. Perhaps in another few years when Lin Fan matured and reached his full potential, he would be able to solve the problem of these ruins, but before that¡­


    But this was also the only chance that they would get since these ruins belonged to the Hunters Organization and even if Lin Fan became stronger, it would be hard to say that he would have another chance toe here again.


    After all, once the Hunters Organization learned of what was down here, they would definitely send in peak experts. Those people definitely wouldn''t care if Lulu was saved or not.


    It seemed like they weren''t destined to be together.


    Lin Fan didn''t know why Mo Ze Chen asked this, but he still had his pride, so he said, "I''ll do what I promised you."


    Mo Ze Chen heard this and didn''t feel confident, but he still gave a nod.


    After that, the two of them continued walking in silence until they finally reached the final location.


    What appeared in front of them was a ce that seemed natural for ghosts to wander around. What appeared in front of them was a giant cemetery.

 Chapter 455 Crypt (1)

    As expected, in the cemetery that was in front of them, there were ghosts wandering around.


    However, these ghosts were just like the rest of the ghosts, easily herded with just a few simple puppets.


    But unlike the other locations, since this was a ce where they should naturally ur, there were much more ghosts that wandered around. When they were all gathered by the puppets, it seemed like a horde was following them.


    If one didn''t know what was happening, to see this horde chasing after them would make it seem like they were in a zombie survival movie.


    Still, after seeing the ghosts for this long, both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had be used to them, so they didn''t care at all as they let the puppets handle distracting all the ghosts that wandered around.


    They came to the podium that was ced at the entrance, where it had just been surrounded by ghosts a few minutes ago.


    The podium had the same poem that all the other podiums had and it made as much sense to Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen as the other ones.


    The podium read, "From the pastes the knowledge that will guide the future."


    At the very bottom was the same golden glowing word that had been on the rest of the other podiums, but the strange thing was that Mo Ze Chen could also see it this time.


    As Lin Fan was looking at it, Mo Ze Chen also looked down and was surprised by what he saw. He immediately came forward to look at the golden glowing letter more closely, but when he did, his head immediately blocked Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind this, rather he was surprised by Mo Ze Chen''s sudden action.


    After all, the location of his head had perfectly fallen on where the golden word was ced, blocking Lin Fan from seeing it. This could only mean one of two things, he was just very lucky or he could see that golden word.


    Lin Fan didn''t immediately ask anything as he watched Mo Ze Chen look over the letter, waiting for his reactions. Seeing that he was looking more and more confused as he looked over the letter, Lin Fan was more certain about his guess.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally asked, "What do you see?"


    Mo Ze Chen seemed like he had been pulled out of his thoughts as he suddenly jolted after hearing Lin Fan''s words. After hearing Lin Fan''s words, he remembered where he was and immediately turned around to face Lin Fan while his finger was pointing at the golden word at the bottom of the podium.


    He asked in a hopeful voice, "Boss, do you also see this?"


    Lin Fan could see where he was pointing and he revealed a faint smile when he saw this. However that smile didn''tst long because he realized that there was something else that this represented.


    Mo Ze Chen hadn''t been able to see this previously, so why could he suddenly see it now?


    Had something changed during the time that they had been here?


    But as Lin Fan thought about it, he realized that it must be because of the umtion of golden energy that was inside of the golden diamond on Mo Ze Chen''s forehead. It must have allowed Mo Ze Chen to suddenly see this word.


    However, the more he thought about it, the deeper that Lin Fan got into this.


    After all, the little girl had just told him that this was the energy of the gods.


    Lin Fan had been able to see this golden word before even receiving this golden energy, so that must have meant that there was this golden energy that was in him before that allowed him to see it. However, Lin Fan didn''t have anything that was rted to the gods, unless¡­


    The one thing that had been with him since he had appeared in this realm, the system that came with his pet shop!


    ording to what Ang and Momonga had felt before, this system was able to use the God Realm Laws, which meant that this system must be rted to the gods. Could it be that the system was what had given him the golden energy to see these words to begin with?


    Then did that mean that this was a clue to the origin of the system?


    Lin Fan had found clues to the origin of the system, namely the girl with green hair, but there was nothing that he could pursue there since he didn''t even know where to start looking for her. But now there was another clue that had suddenly appeared in front of him, so how could he let this go?


    At first he was only interested in these ruins because they were created by his transmigration senior, but now it seemed like there was something even more interesting for him to dig out.


    However, this also implied that his transmigration senior was rted to the gods and even possibly the system.


    Then could it be that his transmigration senior had had his own system before?<sub> </sub>


    Then why did he fall?


    Was there something that was waiting ahead of him that could cause the same fate for him?


    As he thought of this, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his back.


    Just what had the gods summoned him here for?


    Mo Ze Chen saw that Lin Fan had just smiled without saying a thing, so he couldn''t help being confused as he asked, "Boss, what''s wrong?"


    When Mo Ze Chen said this, he snapped Lin Fan out of his thoughts and Lin Fan said, "It''s nothing."


    Then turning back to the golden glowing word that Mo Ze Chen was pointing at, Lin Fan asked, "Do you know what it says?"


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t immediately react to the implication in Lin Fan''s words as he said, "Boss, you really can see it!"


    Then after a pause, he suddenly reacted as he asked, "Boss, you know what it means?"


    Lin Fan looked at him for a second before saying with a nod, "It says book."


    Mo Ze Chen turned to look at the podium, but no matter how he looked at it, he couldn''t understand how this strange letter meant the word "book".


    But the podium didn''t give him any more time to study it. The moment that Lin Fan said the word, the golden glow suddenly disappeared from the podium and moved in the direction of Lin Fan, entering into the golden diamond on his forehead.


    After all the golden energy had entered Lin Fan''s forehead, the podium had lost all its splendor and was nothing more than a piece of wood.


    Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan knew that there was nothing left for them to do here, so they immediately headed off deeper into the cemetery to look for clues. After all, staying here wasn''t the best choice for them since they were currently surrounded by a horde of ghosts. Even if the puppets were currently leading them in circles, that didn''t mean that this would be safe.


    After all, there were ghosts that could ignore these puppets and there were ghosts that could catch these puppets.


    If any of them showed up at this time, it would be bad for the two of them.


    But even though they headed deeper into the cemetery, there wasn''t anything for them to find. All that they could see around him were gravestones thatpletely surrounded them, there wasn''t a single building that was in sight.


    After walking for a bit, Lin Fan finally decided to stop.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t understand what Lin Fan was nning on doing, but he immediately understood after seeing what Lin Fan did.


    Lin Fan moved over to one of the gravestones and leaned down to see what was written on it, but that didn''t help them in the end. All that was engraved on the tombstone was a single line that read "a father". There wasn''t a name or a date of birth or date of death at all like normal tombstones would have.


    Lin Fan didn''t give up with this one and moved on to the next one, but this one was still the same as thest one.


    There was only a single line on it, but this time it wrote something different. This time, what was engraved on the tombstone was "a son".


    It was clear that these two graves must have belonged to a father and son that was buried together. While that might have been moving to people who knew the situation, it meant nothing to Lin Fan at all. Rather it annoyed him how there wasn''t a single piece of information that he could get from it.


    On the other side, Mo Ze Chen had also started looking at tombstones and he was getting just as annoyed with them as Lin Fan was.


    All of these tombstones were the same, all they had was a single description of what the person was and they didn''t give them any useful information at all.


    After going through a few of these tombstones, Lin Fan stopped looking over the rest and began thinking of a new strategy.


    If these tombstones wouldn''t give him any information, there was only one other ce that he could look for information in this ce without any other buildings.


    While Lin Fan was considering whether to dig up the graves and inspect the coffins, he suddenly received a surprising piece of news from Brainy.

 Chapter 456 Crypt (2)

    When Lin Fan was about to pull out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact in the shape of a shovel, Brainy''s voice suddenly rang out in his mind.


    Along with sending out living puppets to distract the ghosts that were around them, Lin Fan also had Brainy send out dead puppets who could move through these ghosts to search around the perimeter.


    These puppets had been running around the area around them the entire time, looking for anything that would seem useful. They hadn''t found a single thing up to this point, that was until the moment Lin Fan decided to dig up the grave.


    Brainy suddenly said, "Master, there seems to be a crypt here."


    Lin Fan''s hand that had been in the air suddenly stopped, but it didn''te down right away. After a slight pause, Lin Fan brought his hand down.


    Even if Lin Fan was now someone who was cold and decisive, there were still lines that he didn''t want to cross.


    He didn''t believe in things like the afterlife, but he did know that there were indeed things like souls that existed in this world since he had seen them in front of him. At the very least, he didn''t want these souls to haunt him for no good reason.


    Though deep down, it was more that he just didn''t want to do this since he didn''t believe it was the right thing to do.


    Though thebining of the two souls had made Lin Fan much more neutralpared to the impulsive behaviour he had before, it also meant that he acted much more logically.


    Logic told him that it was better to pursue all avenues and see if there would be a clue, but that wasn''t all that was in his heart. Other than logic, there was still a voice of good and evil deep down that guided him.


    When he faced his enemies, that evil voice told him to show no mercy. When he faced people that didn''t do anything wrong, that good voice guided him the other way.


    After that pause, Lin Fan brought his hand down and asked Brainy, "Where is it?"


    Brainy had noticed everything that Lin Fan had done during this time and with its intelligence, it wasn''t hard for it to predict what Lin Fan was thinking.


    Brainy was someone who spent quite a bit of time with Momonga and with how smart it was, Momonga liked interacting with this little vine since he could have intelligent conversations with it. Since that was the case, he had also told Brainy a few of his worries about Lin Fan.


    Brainy had taken it upon itself to watch over Lin Fan after hearing these worries and it knew that what had just happened was because of this problem.


    While Lin Fan''s soul had shown signs ofing together, there were still times when he had these extreme thoughts.


    But seeing that Lin Fan could control himself, Brainy chose to let this go for now.


    Brainy called back one of the puppets that he had left outside the crypt and had it bring Lin Fan to the location of the crypt.


    The crypt wasn''t actually that far away from the entrance. In fact, this entire cemetery wasn''t that big.


    Compared to the rest of the other locations, this would be considered the smallest. However, even if it was the smallest location out of all four locations, it was the ce with the highest concentration of ghosts.


    When Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had arrived at the outside of the crypt, they werepletely surrounded by ghosts.


    There wasn''t a single free space other than the several hundred meter area around the entrance of the crypt that they were currently at. There was just no way for them to sneak into the crypt with how dense the area around them was.


    Anyone could tell that thisrge horde of ghosts that were gathered around the crypt entrance wasn''t natural. The only thing that could stir up this kind of crypt was an intruder.


    That meant that whoever was waiting for them inside the crypt would definitely be able to see them approaching. With how big the building was, it was clear that there wasn''t much space inside of the crypt, so unless the crypt led deep into the ground, there would only be so many rooms inside. There was no doubt that whoever was in charge of this ce would definitely see theming.


    However, they had no choice because with how many ghosts there were, Brainy had had no choice but to pull out even more puppets to lure them around. With more and more puppets being released, Brainy''s spiritual senses had been stretched very thin.<sub> </sub>


    While Brainy''s spiritual sense was much stronger than when they had been on the Blue Star, this still went beyond the control the Brainy had. The most important thing was that Brainy hadn''t found an intelligent puppet to act as amander for his scouting puppets, like how the ant queen controlled the Desert Horror colony, so Brainy only had to control the ant queen.


    As Brainy had to control more and more puppets, the range of its spiritual sense had decreased, which was why there was only a space of around several hundred meters around them that was empty.


    If Brainy had sent its puppets further out, they would have immediately left its area of control and would have copsed on the ground since the seeds inside them would lose effect. That would be no different from sending them into the waiting mouths of the ghosts.


    So this was the only thing that Brainy could do.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind at all since after breaking through, he was much strongerpared to before.


    Lin Fan was only worried on the sea since it was a different environment, but being onnd, Lin Fan wasn''t worried about those Child Soul Realm ghosts at all since he was stronger than them now. The only thing that he still had to worry about was the final boss of this ce that would most likely be as strong as Faust.


    He didn''t have to worry about Faust since Faust wasn''t a physical fighter like him, so he had used his physique to overwhelm him. However, if there was another physical fighter like him here, the problem was that he had stamina problems. He just couldn''t keep fighting as long as another expert because his techniques were just too draining on him. Even with the increased life energy that he got from his cultivation technique, it still didn''t matter.


    But this was thest ce that he had to go to, so he had no choice but to go into the crypt.


    Leaving a few puppets outside, they moved into the crypt, but it wasn''t as small as they thought it would be.


    The moment they went in though, the door immediately closed behind them and Brainy had lost all of its spiritual sense connections to the puppets outside.


    Based on the sounds outside, it was a massacre and it definitely was a loss for Brainy since each of these rats had been beasts that it had found, so they weren''t as easily reced. Brainy had only chosen the best ones, so it would be hard to rece them, but there was nothing that Brainy could do.


    It had tried sending out its spiritual senses, but the moment they touched the walls of the crypt, it was as if there was some special energy that repelled it and kept it inside. Brainy couldn''t break through no matter how many times it tried.


    So in the end, Brainy had no choice but to give up since each of these attempts did take quite a bit of energy from it.


    After finally giving up, Brainy went into Lin Fan''s sleeve to rest up and recover some spiritual sense.


    As for the puppets that were at Lin Fan''s feet, they didn''t go limp as soon as Brainy cut off its spiritual sense connection. Rather, there was another spiritual sense that started controlling them, one that came from Lin Fan.


    As Brainy''s master, Lin Fan was naturally able to control the seeds that Brainy imnted into its puppets with his spiritual sense as well, but he was much weaker at controlling these puppetspared to Brainy. Whether it was the number of puppets he controlled, the distance that he could send them, or even the degree of controlling the movements, he was no matchpared to Brainy.


    But still, to use these puppets to scout this ce out, he was still more than skilled enough.


    After Brainy went into Lin Fan''s sleeve, Lin Fan turned back to look at what was in front of him.


    Mo Ze Chen had already gone forward while Lin Fan was talking to Brainy about the puppets outside and was already looking over what was in front of them.


    This room was definitely much smaller than they had expected because this was nothing more than a simple room with one thing in it. The dimensions of the room were even much smaller than the dimensions of the building itself.


    The one thing that was in front of them was a set of stairs that led further down into the crypt, but looking down the stairs, all they could see was darkness.


    There weren''t any windows in this room either, but they were able to see what was in this room because there were torches that were ced along the walls.


    Lin Fan walked over to where Mo Ze Chen was and they both looked down into the darkness below them.

 Chapter 457 Crypt (3)

    Looking right down, it was like looking down into the pits of hell, but they weren''t able to see a thing.


    It was just pitch ck down there without a single light. It was so dark that it almost seemed like it would swallow any light that entered it.


    Mo Ze Chen had been trying to figure out how deep these stairs went and also what might be at the bottom, but he had had no luck at all.


    In the end, he chose to pull out a glow stick that he lit up before throwing it right down into the darkness of the stairs. However, the moment the glow stick was thrown down, the light that should havee from it seemed like it was being sucked away by something that was around it.


    It didn''t take long before that strange suction force had sucked all the light of the glow stick away.


    In the end, the glow stick had only travelled less than a meter before all of its light was sucked away, but it didn''t stop travelling since neither of them had heard the sound of it making contact with something.


    Lin Fan was much more sensitive to sound because of his soundws, but even then, he wasn''t able to hear a thing.


    This glow stick continued falling out of sight and it took a whole minute before there was any sound that came from the stairs, but there was a sound that rang out in the end. This sound was very soft and it was very easy to miss, if Lin Fan hadn''t been using his soundws to listen for the vibrations, he would have missed it just like Mo Ze Chen beside him.


    Mo Ze Chen had been standing there with a dazed look on his face as he was focused on listening for the sound, but he couldn''t hear it in the end.


    But Lin Fan had his soundws, so he made up for him. With his soundws, Lin Fan could tell from the way the sound travelled that there wasn''t a small distance that was in front of them.


    At the same time, based on the way the sound echoed down there, it was clear that what was underneath them wasn''t a small space.


    It seemed like it had been as he had suspected, instead of this ce all being above ground, the majority of it was actually underground in this crypt.


    But before they could move forward, there was still another problem that they had to solve which was the fact that there was something sucking away the light that they had.


    Perhaps it wouldn''t be as bad if this ce was above ground and there were windows, which would give them at least a small amount of light. After all, no matter how strong thews in this ce were, it wouldn''t be able to suck away the endless source of light that lit up this entire city.


    So even if the ce was a bit dim, with Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen''s cultivations, that wouldn''t be a problem since their eyes had been strengthened to the point where they could see a de of grass a thousand meters away.


    However, this ce had to be underground without a single window, which meant that no matter how good their eyes were, they still wouldn''t be able to see a thing. That was because they hadn''t reached the point where they could see in the dark just yet and it would be dangerous to rely on spiritual sense alone.


    Since that was that case, they had to find some source of illumination to light the way for them.


    Lin Fan thought for a minute before suddenly calling out Xiao Huo who perched himself on his shoulder.


    With a single thought, there was a ball of mes that appeared by Xiao Huo and started moving under Xiao Huo''s control towards the dark abyss of the stairs. It flew forward and the moment it crossed the threshold of the stairs, there was an invisible force that suddenly started sucking away at the light that it produced.


    When this started, Xiao Huo suddenly knitted his brows and gave a grunt since it was much stronger than he had expected, but he continued pouring more life energy into the ball of fire to maintain it. With this sudden injection of life energy, this ball of fire was able to continue burning, but it was clearly shrinking at a visible rate.


    There was no doubt that the force that was sucking away at the light of the mes was much stronger than the life energy that Xiao Huo kept injecting into the me. At this rate, all that would happen is Xiao Huo would run out of life energy to sustain the ball of fire.


    Lin Fan could also tell from his connection with Xiao Huo just how straining it was for Xiao Huo to keep the light of the mes in the mes, so it was enough to show how strong the suction force in this stair corridor was.


    So Lin Fan told Xiao Huo to stop supplying the ball of mes with life energy.


    The moment Xiao Huo cut off the life energy supply to the ball of mes, the ball of mes almost immediately disappeared since it was already small enough to be swallowed right away.<sub> </sub>


    Xiao Huo looked at Lin Fan with an unwilling look since he didn''t want to give up this easily, but Lin Fan knew that there was no other choice since Xiao Huo just wasn''t strong enough.


    Xiao Huo and his other pets were all still in the low Fragmented Soul Realm in the end and they hadn''t been able to break through since Lin Fan hadn''t been able to set up the shop yet, so they weren''t able to go into the cultivation realms to train.


    It seemed like Lin Fan would need to set up a shop as soon as possible because it seemed that he was still much too weak¡­


    Still, Lin Fan sent Xiao Huo back into the pet space and began looking around himself.


    Since this crypt had been built as part of this trial, there must be some way to pass through this. After all, there was no way that whoever made these ruins and these trials wouldn''t also leave a way to pass them since that seemed meaningless.


    Lin Fan began walking around the small room that they were in, looking for a way to head down.


    Mo Ze Chen had already figured out that Lin Fan had already heard the sound of the glow stick falling and he had alsoe to the same conclusion as Lin Fan about the light, after all, he had been watching as Xiao Huo sent the ball of me into the stair corridor. He knew that without a proper source of light, it would be unwise to head down since it was too dangerous.


    So following Lin Fan''s example, Mo Ze Chen also started moving around the room, looking for something that they could light their way.


    But even after searching the room for a few minutes, the two of them couldn''t find a single thing since this was nothing more than a small and simple room.


    It wasn''t until Mo Ze Chen started getting frustrated and tinkering with all the things in the room did they finally get a clue.


    There wasn''t much in this room, but there were light sources in this room that lit up the room. There were a few torches that were hanging on the walls, attached to the walls by holders.


    Mo Ze Chen went over to one of the torches and began pulling on it, trying to see if he could find some kind of hidden passage since that was somethingmon in ruins like these. The mostmon pattern for opening these hidden passages was generally a torch on the wall, a book in a bookshelf, or some kind of hidden button.


    Since there were no bookshelves here and a hidden button would be too hard to find since it was a "hidden" button, Mo Ze Chen chose to try the torch method.


    When he pulled on the torch, it did start moving, but it didn''t do what he wanted it to do. Instead ofing back with the holder on the wall, the torch came right out of the holder.


    In the end, instead of opening a hidden passage like Mo Ze Chen wanted, he was just left standing there with a torch in his hand.


    Lin Fan had seen him doing this and then he realized something. These torches, weren''t they lighting up the room that they were currently in?


    Looking over at the stairs, Lin Fan found that past the threshold, there was a bit of light that reached down into the stairs and allowed him to see a few steps in front of him.


    But that shouldn''t be the case since when Xiao Huo had tried to send his ball of fire down the stairs, he had immediately been met with this powerful force that had sucked away all the energy that was inside that ball of fire.


    The strange thing now was that this strange energy didn''t suck away the light that came from the torches.


    Could it be that these torches were the key?


    Lin Fan thought about it for a bit before saying to Mo Ze Chen, "Hand me that torch."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised to hear this, but he still handed the torch over.


    With this torch in hand, Lin Fan approached the stairs.

 Chapter 458 Crypt (4)

    Lin Fan came over to the stairs and reached out with the torch.


    The moment the torch crossed over the threshold of the stairs, there was nothing that happened. The light that came from the torch lit up the space in front of Lin Fan and showed the steps that were in front of them.


    The steps were the same as the ones that Lin Fan could already see, but this wasn''t the important thing.


    What was important was that for some reason, the force that was on these stairs didn''t seem to be attacking the light that came from the torch. The torch that was across the threshold just swayed like normal, but there was nothing else that was pulling at it, pulling the light that it had.


    ? The light that it released went through the air like normal and revealed the area in front of Lin Fan, allowing him to see even further down the stairs. However, there wasn''t much to see since these were nothing more than simple stairs that looked just like the part that Lin Fan could already see.


    Still, this was a very important discovery since they now had a source of light that they could bring along with them.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and covered it with his life energy as he moved it towards the me. When his hand entered the me, he was surprised since he didn''t feel anything at all. There was no heat that came from the me, it was almost like there was nothing there at all, that was if he didn''t feel a slight chilling from where the me was.


    Lin Fan could tell that this me must be an application of somew that allows it to maintain its form like this, but he couldn''t tell what it was. He just knew that it had to be powerful to go against the suction force that was on these stairs.


    Just to be sure, Lin Fan created a tiny me with his life energy and threw it past the threshold of the stairs.


    The moment the me passed through that threshold, it immediately disappeared as if it had been sucked up. There wasn''t a single trace left of it, not a single spark that remained.


    The strange force that was on the stairs was still there, so that meant that there was something special about this torch.


    Mo Ze Chen had been watching Lin Fan experiment with the torch that he had taken away from him and seeing that it wasn''t affected by whatever power was on the stairs, Mo Ze Chen became curious about what it was.


    While Lin Fan was thinking, Mo Ze Chen came closer to the torch to look over it, bringing his face right up to it. The problem with that was that Lin Fan was still holding the torch.


    For Mo Ze Chen toe this close to the torch, it meant that he was also ufortably close to Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan felt Mo Ze Chen leaning on him with his heavy body, Lin Fan was snapped out of his thoughts. Turning to see how close Mo Ze Chen was to him, Lin Fan raised his hand and without any politeness, he pped Mo Ze Chen''s head.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t expect this since he was focused on studying the torch that was in front of him, so he didn''t dodge at all. Though with the difference between their levels of cultivation, it wouldn''t have mattered even if Mo Ze Chen had tried to dodge since he wouldn''t have been able to dodge it.


    Mo Ze Chen was pulled out of his thoughts when this p hit him and he rubbed the back of his head where he had been hit as he asked with an aggrieved look, "Boss what did you do that for?"


    Lin Fan red at him before saying, "There are other torches over there."


    Mo Ze Chen turned to look at the other torches and revealed an awkward smile.


    That was right, there was no need for him to crowd Lin Fan since there were clearly other torches here, but still he felt that Lin Fan didn''t need to be this mean to him. After all, they were like brothers now after everything that they had gone through together, or at least that was what Mo Ze Chen thought.


    It was too bad for Mo Ze Chen that Lin Fan thought of him in another way.


    To put it simply, Mo Ze Chen was like a ve for him, just like Jiang Zhi Shu had been on the Blue Star.


    Lin Fan was definitely going to make full use of Mo Ze Chen, though if it was said that he didn''t consider him a brother, that would have been a lie.


    Still, that didn''t mean that he wanted to get close to another man like this.


    Mo Ze Chen was a bit dejected as he went over to another torch which he pulled right off the wall. Once he did that, he began focusing on studying it once again.<sub> </sub>


    As for Lin Fan, he didn''t have anything else to do, so he suddenly summoned out two puppets, but this time they were rat puppets.


    This time they were Fragmented Soul Realm beasts that had taken human form, so they were just two humans that suddenly appeared. Both of them were young girls who were in maid outfits, which definitely was strange.


    Mo Ze Chen had been looking at the torch and suddenly noticed the appearance of the two maids and he couldn''t help being surprised. After looking over the outfits of the two maids and seeing how finely made they were, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look as he asked, "Boss, is this the kind of hobby that you enjoy?"


    Lin Fan had ck lines appear on his head.


    This wasn''t the kind of hobby that he enjoyed, but rather the kind of hobby that Brainy enjoyed.


    Since Brainy had been spending so much time with Momonga, he naturally picked up a few of his bad habits, which were mainly his otaku habits. One of the bad habits that Brainy had picked up was an unhealthy appreciation for maids.


    It had reached the point where if the human form of Brainy''s puppets was ever a young girl, it would immediately make a maid outfit for them to wear.


    Surprisingly so, Brainy was actually quite good at weaving these maid outfits. It was mainly because it was able to control the fibre just like it controlled vines, which made it much easier for Brainy to weave these outfits. Brainy had even gone as far as making sure that every detail of the outfit was perfect¡­


    The strange thing was that while Brainy was into maids, it couldn''t get into butlers the same way when Momonga tried to introduce them to Brainy.


    But Lin Fan had another reason for calling these two girls out.


    The true form of these two girls were twin Azure Turtles, which was a species that had both the bloodline of the Azure Dragon and the ck Turtle. Still, since they were turtles, what they specialized in was defense.


    These turtles could immediately hide in their shells and be resistant enough that even those in the Child Soul Realm would have a hard time hurting them. However, because their defenses were so strong, their attack power wascking.


    The attacks that these turtles used weren''t even as strong as someone in the tinum Realm, at best they could only match someone in the Gold Realm.


    But that didn''t matter since Lin Fan called them out only for their defenses.


    In their human forms, they could utilize the same power as going into their shells without actually shrinking into their shells, but the downside was that they couldn''t move since they would need to concentrate their energy to maintain those defenses. However, while they couldn''t move, that didn''t mean that they couldn''t hold things.


    To put it simply, Lin Fan was going to use them as walking torch stands.


    There were a total of eight torches in this room, two for each of the four walls around them.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen both held one torch in their hands while Lin Fan had the two maid girls hold two torches in each of their hands.


    With the way the girls stood behind them with the torches in their hands, it really made their party look quite awkward. If people didn''t know what was happening, they would have thought that Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had captured these girls and were forcing them to do these things.


    Even Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen felt awkward with the two girls holding the torches high up walking behind them.


    Still, there was no better way for them to hold these torches since they would need to free their hands if there was ever a fight.


    Lin Fan had considered using Mo Ze Chen as a torch stand before calling out these two maid girls, but after how much golden energy he had absorbed, Lin Fan decided that it was better to have him as a fighter. Or rather, Lin Fan was nning on using him as the tool of a fighter since Rocky could always use him like a club like Xiao Huo had done.


    With the group of four like this, they started heading down the stairs with Lin Fan in the lead, Mo Ze Chen in the middle, and the two maid girls following behind them.

 Chapter 459 Crypt (5)

    As they continued down the stairs, there wasn''t anything special that was around them.


    It was like the special energy that had sucked away all the light from all the different light sources that they had used before didn''t exist at all.


    Or at least that was the case for the other three, but Lin Fan felt something strange as he walked down these stairs.


    For some reason, the ck hole that was inside his dantian began turning and sucking in the energy that was around him even though he couldn''t see where it was. As the energy that was around him was sucked in, Lin Fan could feel that this sensation was different from before.


    Instead of condensing another statue inside of his dantian, as the energy was swallowed by the ck hole, the ck hole seemed like it was gettingrger. Not only did it berger the more energy it swallowed, the suction force that it released also became stronger and pulled in more of this energy Lin Fan couldn''t see.


    Lin Fan didn''t know where this energy came from or what kind of energy it was, but all he knew was that it waspatible with the ck hole that was in his dantian.


    During this entire time, there was only one other time that the ck hole had reacted to allow Lin Fan to absorb a neww.


    In fact, Lin Fan could have freely absorbed thews here since there were plenty of them at the Soul Realm level, but the reason he didn''t do that was because it wouldn''t have helped him if he did.


    To put it simply, even if Lin Fan wanted morews, he had to consider the bnce of power that was inside of his dantian. If he overwhelmed that, it would mean using more energy to control all thews that were inside of him.


    If that energy cost surpassed the energy that they provided him, it would mean that to keep thisw, he would have to spend energy to control it which would decrease his power overall.


    Take the yinws that the ghosts all had, this was something that Lin Fan could have easily absorbed and made his own this entire time since there were plenty of ghosts to absorb thisw from. Even the Child Soul Realm ghosts had thisw, so if Lin Fan had wanted it, it would have actually been stronger than all the currentws that he had.


    The problem with this was the two suns that were currently in his dantian.


    These suns, or rather the cultivation technique that he practiced was a cultivation that had changed his physique into that of pure yang, which was the exact opposite of yin energy. This made his body very ipatible with all yinws.


    If Lin Fan was to suddenly develop yinws, this would create a sh inside his body which would drain his energy instead of providing him energy since he would need to use more energy to control thisw than to use it.


    Of course, that could also be fixed depending on Lin Fan''s grasp of thews, but that was apletely different story.


    After all, absorbing and developing thesews was apletely different story of actually mastering them.


    If Lin Fan could take it a bit further andbine yin and yangws together, that would have taken him to another level. By mixing yin and yang he would have been able to develop the Yin Yang Bnce Physique, which was considered one of the supreme physiques in this world. Just possessing any one of these physiques would have made one an unparalleled genius, not to mention the other things that Lin Fan had¡­


    By the time that they reached the end of the stairs, which took them around ten minutes, the ck hole in Lin Fan''s dantian had almost doubled in size. However, that was only temporary as it suddenly started copsing in on itself before reforming to around the same size as before.


    Even though it was the same size as before, Lin Fan could feel the density of the suction force that it released now. Lin Fan could tell that this wasn''t just double the power from before, it was even more than three or four times. This increase in power was close to ten timespared to before.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking behind him at the stairs and wondering just what kind of power was left here, as well as who was the one that had left it.


    Lin Fan had always wondered about the power of the ck hole in his dantian, but he had never been able to find a straight answer. When Lin Fan tried to ask Momonga about it, he would always escape without giving an answer.


    Still, Lin Fan threw this thought to the back of his mind once they came down since this was not something that he needed to worry about here.


    When they arrived at the bottom of the stairs, they arrived in a corridor with many rooms that waspletely dark, but the torches that they had brought with them had lit the way.<sub> </sub>


    But there was something else that Lin Fan wanted to test.


    Lin Fan had Mo Ze Chen pull out another glow stick, which was something he didn''t want to do since these weren''t normal glow sticks.


    The glow sticks that Mo Ze Chen used were special custom glow sticks that were much harder than normal glow sticks, making them harder to break, which was perfect for exploring ruins. However, to make these harder glow sticks, there was a special material that had to be used and it definitely wasn''t something cheap. Each one of these glow sticks cost Mo Ze Chen a small fortune and he had thought that he would be able to reuse the glow stick from before, which was why he had pulled it out.


    Now that he knew that they would be rendered useless in this ce, he didn''t want to pull out another one since he was certain that it would be broken as well.


    Still, he had no choice since he had already taken Lin Fan as his boss...But that didn''t mean that he wouldn''t try to stall for as long as possible trying to convince Lin Fan against this.


    The two maids on the side were watching them and one leaned in to whisper into the other one''s ear before both of them gave a giggle with a bit of a blush on their faces. Looking at the direction they were looking in, it was clear that this blush was caused by Mo Ze Chen.


    This was just their strange taste, they liked men who were a bit chubby and Mo Ze Chen fit that bill perfectly. As well, since they were twins, that meant that they didn''t mind sharing if they had to¡­


    But Mo Ze Chen didn''t know any of this as he was still trying to convince Lin Fan against this idea.


    These two girls were puppets, but they weren''t the same as the other puppets that Brainy used. These two girls were actually puppets that had their own free will and thinking, the only thing that Brainy used the parasite seed in them for was to instill loyalty into them. After all, there was nothing that made one more loyal than holding their lives in your hands.


    But of course, since these two girls could think, it meant that they were also able to have emotions and other feelings. This was crucial since puppets with free will would be much more flexible than puppets without and coulde up with ideas on their own. Sometimes the puppets might evene up with better ideas than their masters might.


    Of course, that wasn''t the case with these two girls since they were a bit more on the ditzy side.


    Seeing that Mo Ze Chen wasn''t making any progress, one of the two girls couldn''t help saying, "Master, maybe we can use something else¡­"


    But before she could finish, she saw Lin Fan looking over at her and she immediately flinched before turning her gaze away.


    It wasn''t just Brainy that had full control of her life, Lin Fan also had this same ability since he was Brainy''s master, so he could control these parasite seeds to a certain extent. Naturally since Lin Fan was also using the puppets, it would mean that he would be able to control their lives.


    Mo Ze Chen saw that Lin Fan was in no mood to negotiate, so he gave a sigh and prepared to pull out the glow stick. However, before he did, he didn''t forget to look at the two maids and give them a grateful smile.


    When the two of them saw this, there was a blush that suddenly came over their faces and they couldn''t help looking down shyly.


    But of course, Mo Ze Chen had already turned away.


    Mo Ze Chen was someone that was actually quite devoted. Since he had already decided to chase after Lulu, he didn''t pay any special attention to any other girls.


    But it also had to be said that these girls really did have strange tastes.


    There was Lin Fan beside Mo Ze Chen who was so handsome that even men couldn''t help falling for him, but they chose to slightly chubby Mo Ze Chen¡­


    Love really was unpredictable at times.


    Mo Ze Chen had a bitter helpless smile on his face when he pulled out the glow stick, but the moment that he did, there was a surprised look that suddenly wiped out that bitter smile.

 Chapter 460 Crypt (6)

    When Mo Ze Chen pulled out the glow stick, he found that what he had expected to happen didn''t happen.


    The light of the glow stick remained inside the glow stick and wasn''t sucked out of it like the other glow stick that he had thrown previously.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help looking around and he found that the first glow stick that he had thrown wasn''t that far away from him.


    These glow sticks of his were made of a special material, which meant that it was much harder than normal glow sticks. It wasn''t strange that this thing was still intact after falling down all those stairs, but this glow stick no longer lit up.


    Mo Ze Chen looked closer at the glow stick and found that there wasn''t anything wrong with the glow stick itself, the only thing that was wrong with it was that it wouldn''t light up at all. It was almost as if there was something that had sucked out the essence of the material inside that glowed, so that it no longer glowed.


    But the good thing was that if it was only the thing inside that was broken, then this was easy to fix and that meant that Mo Ze Chen wouldn''t have to spend a fortune to rece it.


    What Lin Fan cared about wasn''t this, but rather he was looking at the still glowing glow stick in Mo Ze Chen''s hand.


    It seemed like whatever the force was in the stairs clearly wasn''t present in this hallway, which meant that there was nothing stopping them from pulling out lights to use.


    But that was strange since why would there only be this force on the stairs, why did it suddenly disappear once they finished descending these stairs?


    Could it be that there was something else to the stairs that they hadn''t seen?


    Could it be that there was a trap that was only activated in darkness?


    If that was true, they really had dodged a bullet there since if they couldn''t find anything to light the way, Lin Fan had almost considered going down in the darkness and finding some way to get some light once they were down.


    But since there was no need for the torches anymore since they could bring out the newest tracking lights that Mo Ze Chen had, Lin Fan was about to put the two maids back into the pet space.


    However, before he could do that, one of them suddenly asked, "Can we stay out here with you, master?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but seeing the way that they were looking at Mo Ze Chen, it wasn''t hard for him to figure out what they were thinking. Though once he did realize this, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a strange look as he turned to look at Mo Ze Chen.


    Not only Lulu, it seemed like he had also somehow attracted these two maids of his¡­


    Just what was it about this little fatty that was so attractive?


    Though Lin Fan thought this, he wasn''t jealous of Mo Ze Chen at all. Rather, he didn''t dare to be jealous knowing who was waiting for him.


    Instead, he decided to have some fun at Mo Ze Chen''s expense. It definitely wasn''t like he was jealous at all.


    Not to mention that these girls were definitely a better choice than having the tracking lights since those tracking lights were quite weak. It was quite easy to destroy those tracking lights, so instead of using them, it would definitely be better to have these girls follow with torches since they were much better at defending themselves.


    So with that, Lin Fan decided to let the girls follow them, but they did stick a bit too close to Mo Ze Chen who didn''t seem to notice.


    Well, it was a lie to say that he didn''t notice at all since they were so close that they cut into his personal space, but they were maids that served Lin Fan, so he couldn''t say anything. After all, just like the maids, he was a bit afraid of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was secretly enjoying it, but at the same time, he moved to the first doors that were in front of him.


    This was a ce that was filled with many doors and there were two right across from each other that were right in front of him. After thinking about it, Lin Fan chose to go to the room on the right.


    There wasn''t any opening in the door that they could look through and when Lin Fan tried to send his spiritual sense in, it waspletely blocked off by the door, or rather some kind of energy barrier that was around the door.


    It seemed that unless he opened the door, he wouldn''t be able to find out what was inside.<sub> </sub>


    So with no other choice, Lin Fan slowly pushed open the door, allowing the light of the torches to enter the room.


    The room was the same as the one that they had been in previously beforeing down the stairs, being just as small, but there were differences. Unlike the room before, it wasn''t lit up with torches and it wasn''tpletely empty.


    In the ce where the stairs should have been, there was a coffin thatid there with its lid firmly shut.


    There wasn''t any identifying detail that was present on this coffin, so they couldn''t tell who was in there, but they could feel some energy seeping out of the seams of the coffin. There was no mistaking it, there was definitely someone who was in this coffin.


    Perhaps it would have been better to leave this coffin alone, but Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t have time for that since they were fighting against the clock. They had to quickly finish the trial in thisst location and move on, but they didn''t have any clues so far.


    As the saying goes, there was no reward without taking any risks.


    So cautiously, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen moved towards the coffin that was in the center and moved to the sides of it to surround the coffin. As for the two maid girls, they stood by the entrance of the room, holding their torches to light up the room. Since this was a small room, it wasn''t hard for them to light it up with just two torches.


    Aftering to both sides of the coffin, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen began looking it over just to find nothing special about it.


    It was just a simple coffin that didn''t have any decorating features on it at all, so there was nothing that they could gather from this.


    It was clear that they had no choice but to open it to see if there was anything useful inside.


    After confirming this, the two of them looked at each other and they didn''t say anything as Lin Fan raised his hand towards the lid of the coffin. Once his hand was on the lid of the coffin, Lin Fan didn''t open it right away as he looked at Mo Ze Chen to give a nod before turning back down and starting to count.


    "3, 2, 1."


    At the end of this count, Lin Fan suddenly pulled up the lid of the coffin.


    Both of them had their guard up when this happened, but they were still caught off guard by what had popped out.


    It wasn''t some monster that was trapped inside this coffin, it was a human corpse, but this wasn''t just a simple human corpse. The corpse that was inside was just like the ghosts that had wandered outside, but it was clearly much stronger, being at the peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    The moment that the coffin lid was pulled off, there were two hands that suddenly stabbed out at both their faces on the sides of the coffin. These two hands came up with the lid, but it came out from the sides at a speed that was faster than the lid being lifted up.


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had been prepared, so while they were surprised by the ws that had suddenly appeared, neither of them stayed in a daze for long as they pulled out their weapons to block it.


    Since Mo Ze Chen was weaker, he wasn''t able topletely block the attack and had been sent flying into the wall of the room. As he hit the wall, he couldn''t help spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    As for Lin Fan, he was much stronger than Mo Ze Chen, so he was able topletely block this attack and he did it with rtive ease. He was already at the level of the Child Soul Realm, so this wasn''t much for him.


    However, it didn''t stop there as the ghost that had sat up as it attacked suddenly twisted its upper body to attack at Lin Fan again.


    Since they had been attacked so suddenly, both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had released theirws instinctively. With thews released, their lives weren''t at danger, which was why the golden glow hadn''t activated.


    But now that Lin Fan had already gathered himself after his surprise, he released thews that had been around his sword.


    After dodging the attack of the ghost by the narrowest of margins so that it nicked him, Lin Fan swept out with his sword. By dodging by just the narrowest of margins, the golden energy had appeared around Lin Fan''s sword and while being coated, it cut right through the ghost.


    Just like with all the other ghosts, this ghost had been turned into ashes with just a single sweep of Lin Fan''s sword.

 Chapter 461 Crypt (7)

    The ghost didn''t even have time to react as it was turned to ashes. All that happened was that the light in its eyes had dimmed as the top part of its body fell down, while the bottom half of its body remained in the coffin.


    With these two halves lying there, starting from where Lin Fan had cut it, the body of the ghost started to disintegrate into ashes.


    It didn''t take long before the two halves of the ghost hadpletely turned into ashes and floated away, even though there was no breeze in this enclosed room.


    All that it left behind was a coffin and that coffin waspletely empty.


    Lin Fan began looking around the coffin while the two girls had moved over to where Mo Ze Chen was sitting by the wall, with concerned looks on their faces.


    Lin Fan had noticed it out of the corner of his eyes, but he decided to pretend like he didn''t see anything since it technically didn''t involve him.


    But as he tried looking through the coffin for anything, there was nothing for him to find.


    The coffin itself was just as simple as this room, there was only a space for the corpse to lie in and there were no hiddenpartments at all. In that space for the corpse, there wasn''t even the ash of the ghost that hadid there, it waspletely empty.


    Lin Fan didn''t need to look around the room again since he knew that there was nothing that was here.


    Based on his previous experience, every ghost that had dropped a clue would be in the Child Soul Realm and the one that had been in this coffin had only been in the peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    Since that was the case, that meant that there wasn''t anything here for him.


    But thinking of all the various rooms that were in the hall outside, he couldn''t help feeling his head ache.


    There was no way of telling what hid behind each of those doors, but if they were all like this one where he couldn''t see what was inside with his spiritual sense, so there was no way of telling which room contained a ghost that was in the Child Soul Realm that would give him a clue.


    If he had to go through each of these rooms and if they were the same as this one, it would definitely wear down on him if he had to defend against attacks like this over and over again.


    Not to mention that he didn''t have the time to do this with his clock that was running down.


    With how long he had spent with all the other stages, he had a little over three hours left before the bead would activate to pull him out of these ruins¡­


    He still needed to pass the Hunters Organization exam to get his Hunter License so he could open up a shop in Harmony City where he wanted to open one. Without that Hunter License, it would definitely be detrimental to his future ns, so he had to finish the Hunters Exam.


    But if he didn''t go through each one of these, there was no way of finding out which ones would have the Child Soul Realm and find the clue.


    Still, that meant that he would have to find a way to find what he needed. He couldn''t be wasting all this time trying to go through every single room. But to prove his point, Lin Fan called the girls and Mo Ze Chen before heading to the room across the hall.


    When Lin Fan opened the door, what appeared in front of him was the same room as before with the very same coffin.


    This time, Lin Fan didn''t have Mo Ze Chene over as he had the three of them stay by the door with the torches.


    Lin Fan stood by the coffin by himself with his sword already raised in one hand while the other hand was on the lid, preparing to open it.


    The moment he did, the same thing had happened as in thest room, but this time there were a pair of ws that flew out at his face, rather than just a single w. This time, there wasn''t another person for this ghost to target, so it was focusing all of its attention on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he already expected this, so he parried both of them with his sword before going in for the kill, but the ghost quickly twisted and used the momentum to attack again. Its hands had been swept to the side by Lin Fan''s sword, but using that momentum, it grabbed the side of the coffin and twisted to lift its legs up, kicking out at Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    But of course, Lin Fan was able to react to this with plenty of time to spare, though he didn''t move right away. It was only at thest second that Lin Fan went a bit lower to let the legs sweep over his head before he swept with his sword to cut the ghost in half.


    After that close dodge, there was a golden glow that had appeared on Lin Fan''s sword and as per usual, the ghost was turned directly into ashes.


    The ashes fell down over Lin Fan as the two halves of the ghost fell to either sides of him, thudding to the ground and twitching before going prone.


    If it had been a human that was cut in half by Lin Fan, the blood would havepletely covered him and he would be soaked in it, but this was a ghost which had lost all its blood already. All that fell down on Lin Fan was the ashes that the ghost had been turned into and even those didn''t remain as they had disappeared like all the other ashes of ghost.


    Lin Fan didn''t have any idea where these ashes went, but they always disappeared without a trace.


    Still, that wasn''t what Lin Fan cared about as he ignored the corpse of the ghost that quickly disappeared anyway. Instead, Lin Fan went to the coffin and looked inside to see that there was nothing there at all.


    It seemed like his guess was right, to find clues, he would have to go through each of these rooms until he found the one that held the clue that he was looking for, but as for how many rooms there were, no one knew.


    Lin Fan had actually checked in the hall with his spiritual sense to see how wide these crypts were and he hadn''t been able to find the end with his spiritual sense.


    While Lin Fan''s spiritual sense wasn''t as strong as Brainy''s, it was definitely still quite strong and could reach quite far. If he couldn''t even find the end of this crypt with his spiritual sense, it was clear that it upied quite a wide space.


    Since it was underground, there was even the chance that it might run through the entire city¡­


    But every door here was a meter apart and to check every single door¡­It would be hard to imagine just how long that would take¡­


    There had to be another way of doing this, perhaps there was something that they had missed.


    Lin Fan went back out into the hallway and looked around for anything that he could use. He began walking down the halls and seeing if there were any doors that were different. However, as he continued along, he found that there was nothing special about these doors other than the fact that they all lookedpletely the same.


    There was nothing different about this corridor that Lin Fan could find at all, so the only thing he could do was continue on and hope that there was something further along. At least that was better than going through each of these doors one by one, hoping that something inside was different.


    Mo Ze Chen and the two maids just followed behind Lin Fan, watching as he went door to door like a madman.


    To be honest, Mo Ze Chen was also happy that there were other people here since Lin Fan wasn''t the easiest person to approach, especially when he got like this. Normally when Lin Fan was lost in thought like this, Mo Ze Chen could only silently follow along since he knew that nothing he said would get through to Lin Fan. But now there were other people here that he could talk to.


    Mo Ze Chen was someone who was quite social, so he wanted to talk to people and being in silence just felt awkward to him. As they followed Lin Fan, he asked the two maids, "So how do you know the boss?"


    The two maids looked at each other before saying with awkward smiles, "He caught us and now we''re following him."


    When Mo Ze Chen heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a strange look as he asked, "Caught you? What do you mean by that?"


    The smile of the two maids became even more awkward as one of them said, "It''s exactly what it means."


    There was a misunderstanding that appeared in Mo Ze Chen''s heart since he didn''t think that these two girls were beasts, rather he thought that they were actual humans because of how good their transformation skills were.


    The boss that he chose to follow, he seemed like he was quite the dangerous person¡­


    After all, he had captured two cute girls like these and had turned them into ve maids...

 Chapter 462 Crypt (8)

    Mo Ze Chen didn''t even think about how Lin Fan had suddenly summoned these two girls to his side, after all, that wasn''t something that could be done with normal people.


    For some reason, humans hadn''t figured out how to store living beings in storage spaces other than beasts. It was unclear what it was but for some reason, the beasts didn''t need oxygen when they were put into the pet storage spaces.


    The pet storage spaces that were created by humanscked oxygen for humans to breathe in, which was the main reason why living beings like humans couldn''t stay inside.


    But once an expert reached a certain point, they would be able to create a whole world where they could keep people inside, though that was far above the level of this upper realm.


    Mo Ze Chen just knew that Lin Fan had some amazing backing, so he must have some kind of special items on him. That was why Mo Ze Chen assumed the two girls were human.


    Lin Fan wasn''t aware of this misunderstanding that had appeared in Mo Ze Chen''s mind and the two girls didn''t mind talking to Mo Ze Chen.


    After Mo Ze Chen knew about this, he immediately changed the topic since he knew it was awkward for the two girls, but it was definitely something that lingered in the back of his mind.


    Lin Fan led them down these halls, not stopping for any of the doors that were on the two sides of them. All of these doors were the exact same as the first doors, it was almost as if they were cut from the exact same molds.


    As they walked for over five minutes, they had passed by over five hundred doors on both sides for a total of over a thousand doors, but there wasn''t a single one that was different. At the same time, they hadn''t been able to find a single door that was different from the rest of the doors.


    But even as they continued walking, it was almost as if there was no end in sight.


    Along the way, to make sure that they weren''t missing anything, they went into rooms once in a while to make sure that they were the same as before.


    Each time, Lin Fan was ambushed by the same ghosts inside the coffins and each time, he easily cut them down, turning them into ashes. The only problem was that not a single ghost left a clue for him.


    So with no other choice, even after going past easily over a thousand doors, they still continued forward.


    They continued forward for another five minutes or so until Lin Fan finally seemed to have sensed something.


    Ahead of him, there was a faint reaction like his spiritual sense was hitting something in front of them. As they continued forward, this reaction got stronger and stronger until Lin Fan finally noticed that there was a dead end in front of them.


    This was finally something different and it was definitely better than endlessly walking. Lin Fan''s group had already been walking for over ten minutes now and had gone past over two thousand of these doors, yet they still were no closer to finding a single clue at all.


    Since that was the case, perhaps this was just what they needed.


    Lin Fan began moving faster and the three others noticed this, so they also moved faster to match his pace.


    The distance that they went was close to a thousand and five hundred doors, but they traveled this distance in just two minutes since they had picked up the pace. When they arrived at the end of the corridor, they finally saw something different.


    At the end of the corridor, there was a door that was much bigger than the other doors. Instead of calling it a door, it was more reasonable to call it a gate since it was like the gate of a castle.


    This gate was more than twice as high as all the other doors and wouldn''t have fit in this hallway normally. However, when Lin Fan looked up, he noticed that right before the gate, the ceiling of this corridor suddenly curved up so that it created more space to allow this gate to exist.


    But this wasn''t the only thing that was different from the gate. Right at the center of the gate, there was a steel skull pattern that was engraved right onto the gate itself, which made it look quite ominous. As well, this door was clearly made of a different kind of woodpared to the rest of the other doors, which seemed much sturdier than the other doors.


    Based on Lin Fan''s years of gaming experience, if he had to describe this with words, he would have thought "boss room" because every part of this gate screamed the door before the final boss.


    However, the biggest giveaway was actually the golden barrier that was in front of the door.


    This golden barrier was something that Lin Fan was familiar with since he had already seen it twice in two different locations.<sub> </sub>


    For each of those locations, this golden barrier had been the symbol of the final boss that they needed to defeat. Once they defeated the final boss, they would be able to finish the quest in this location by getting the final item.


    But speaking of finishing the quest, there was something that lingered on Lin Fan''s mind.


    Every time they had finished the quest in a location, that ce would always copse on them¡­


    If it were to happen again with this ce, that definitely would be bad. The other locations they could easily avoid the copsing rubble since it was a building that was above ground. Since it was a building, all they had to do was get out of the building to avoid the rubble.


    But in this ce, which was a crypt under the ground, if it copsed, wouldn''t they bepletely buried underground?


    Lin Fan couldn''t help worrying since that was a very realistic possibility. As Lin Fan continued to ponder this possibility, he couldn''t help thinking of ways to lure the final boss to the surface. After all, from what he could tell, the final item would drop where the final boss was defeated, so it didn''t matter if they stayed here or not.


    Not to mention that along this entire hallway, they hadn''t encountered a single ghost since all the ghosts were inside their coffins in the rooms that lined the hallway. Since that was the case, it would be easy to lure the boss inside this room up to the surface.


    But how would he do it?


    Not to mention the fact that he still didn''t even know what the boss was like.


    Perhaps they were friendly like the little girl and the whale?


    As these thoughts passed by Lin Fan''s mind, Mo Ze Chen had already moved over to the gate with the golden barrier around it, looking around for clues to get in.


    As he looked around, he found that there was a panel on the wall that was simr to the one that was in the hospital. However, the one difference was that instead of requiring ten different rings, it seemed that what was required were four different cubes.


    As for where they would get those cubes, Mo Ze Chen had an idea, but he knew that it wouldn''t be good for them. After all, he had been watching Lin Fan as they walked through the corridor and he could guess most of the problem with this location. Even Lin Fan wasn''t able to differentiate the rooms and find the Child Soul Realm ghosts that they would be looking for, so how could he do it?


    Seeing that there was nothing else that he could do, Mo Ze Chen turned to ask Lin Fan, "Boss, what do we do now? It seems like we need to find four items to open this door."


    Lin Fan had been in thought, but he was pulled out of it when he heard Mo Ze Chen calling to him.


    Lin Fan looked over to where the panel beside the door was and he revealed a smile when he saw the four grooves on it.


    After what had happened with the other golden barriers, Lin Fan''s confidence in dealing with them was very high.


    Mo Ze Chen was confused when he saw that smile at first since he had already forgotten after what had happened at the harbour, but when he saw Lin Fan approach the gate, he felt that it seemed very familiar. When Lin Fan was standing right in front of the gate, or rather right in front of the barrier, Mo Ze Chen seemed to have suddenly remembered something as he gave an "oh" sound.


    Before he could react, Lin Fan had already reached out to touch the barrier and without any suspense, the barrier had already shattered apart.


    The two maids on the side were shocked to see this because they could tell how powerful this barrier had been. It was something that they definitely wouldn''t have been able to deal with, but Lin Fan had shattered it just by touching it.


    As for Mo Ze Chen, he only had a bitter smile on his face as he thought, "This monster."


    To him, Lin Fan really was a monster who did all kinds of things that he never expected. After everything that had happened, it could be said that Mo Ze Chen had slowly gotten used to it.


    All he could say was that Lin Fan definitely wasn''t like the others.

 Chapter 463 Five Coffins

    After the barrier was shattered, just like before, the golden glow from the barrier had turned into energy that couldn''t be viewed by the naked eyes as it flowed into the golden diamond on Lin Fan''s forehead.


    Mo Ze Chen just said with a bitter smile, "Well, should we go in now, boss?"


    Lin Fan paused for a second before moving away from the door and saying, "Give me a minute."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised since based on his understanding of Lin Fan, Lin Fan never backed away from anything and faced everything head on. But now, he was actually stopping to make preparations before going into this room.


    Could it be that he had sensed something special in this boss room?


    After this thought passed in his mind, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help feeling more anxious about going in and he sat down on the side to make his own preparations. But in reality, Mo Ze Chen didn''t have much to make since he had lost quite a few artifacts in these ruins already and he hadn''t found anything to make up for it just yet¡­


    Even if he wanted to prepare, he didn''t have much left, unless he was going to tap into his trump cards.


    While Mo Ze Chen was sitting there debating whether to pull out his trump cards or not, Lin Fan was standing there looking at his sleeve.


    Lin Fan had indeed stopped to make his preparations, but it was for apletely different reason than what Mo Ze Chen thought.


    He had allowed Brainy to rest up during their time in the crypt, but now he needed Brainy''s power again. There were thousands of ghosts that were here and he wasn''t foolish enough to believe that they wouldn''te alive at the most crucial moment.


    It wasn''t possible for Lin Fan to fight the boss while controlling puppets to distract the ghosts that could possiblye, so without Brainy there to help him, they would definitely be swarmed by ghosts and that was something that Lin Fan definitely wanted to avoid.


    But when he asked Brainy what its condition was, Brainy said that it still hadn''t finished recovering yet.


    Brainy had been constantly using spiritual sense to control the puppets to lead the ghosts away and this expenditure wasn''t low, even if Brainy''s spiritual sense was much more powerful than Lin Fan''s. Not to mention that it wasn''t a single puppet, but rather several dozen of them which each required a single spiritual sense link.


    It was equivalent to splitting its mind into several dozen parts and using all of them to control the various puppets, this definitely was not something that normal people could do. Only Brainy with its special bloodline designed for this was able to do this.


    But the one good thing toe out of that was that because of the strain of stretching its spiritual sense thin, Brainy had slowly developed it and was now close to breaking through. Brainy was thest of Lin Fan''s pet that hadn''t broken through to the Soul Realm and once it did, that would also mean a great increase to Lin Fan''s strength, whether it was in terms of the size of the army that it could control or the way it could help him control the power of the array.


    So Lin Fan decided to wait a few minutes to let Brainy rest up. Brainy had promised that it would take no longer than five minutes which was an amount of time that Lin Fan was willing to wait.


    Five minutes passed and Lin Fan could tell that Brainy wasn''t in perfect shape because of their bond, but he knew that Brainy was pushing on for his sake, so he didn''t say a thing.


    After the five minutes passed, Lin Fan suddenly stood up which surprised Mo Ze Chen and the girls sitting on both sides of him. They had been slowly working up the courage to lean against him when Lin Fan had suddenly stood up, making all three of them jump.


    Mo Ze Chen had been focusing on what to do for the next room and the two girls had been slowly moving towards him, focusing on getting closer, which was why they had suddenly jumped.


    Lin Fan turned to Mo Ze Chen and said, "Let''s go."


    Mo Ze Chen gave a gulp, but he also nodded without saying a word as he followed behind Lin Fan.


    As for the two girls, they could tell that the room that they were about to enter was dangerous, so they were prepared to activate their defenses as soon as they entered the room.


    Pushing the door open, Lin Fan was surprised to see that there was actually light inside this room which was the exact opposite of the dark crypt outside.<sub> </sub>


    Inside of thisrge room that was like a meeting hall were several coffins that ruined the vibe of this room. Other than these coffins, there wasn''t a single other thing inside of this room. This room was just like the other rooms in this aspect, only it was much bigger than all the other rooms.


    There were five coffins in total that were arranged in a half circle on the other side of the room.


    There wasn''t even a moment''s pause because as soon as Lin Fan''s group had walked into this room, there was a sound that came from the other side of the room.


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen raised their guard while the two maids without any hesitation held the torches high up as they released a green glow. This green glowpletely surrounded them and formed a green barrier that wrapped them up without leaving a single hole.


    Looking carefully, one would see that these girls weren''t moving a single inch. They weren''t even trembling even though they were holding their torches high up.


    But no one paid attention to this since everyone''s attention was on the coffins on the other side of the room.


    The sound that came from the other side of the room came for the hands that had suddenly poked out of the coffins. Out of each coffin, there was a hand that pushed up the lid and grabbed it, slowly pushing it to the side to reveal what was inside.


    The hands that came out were all the same, they all had the rotten flesh of the ghosts, so it was clear what was going toe out.


    All of these hands had appeared at the same time, as if they had received some kind of cue. As for what that cue was, there was no doubt that it was when Lin Fan had walked into the room.


    But the most shocking thing about this wasn''t the hands that had suddenly poked out, rather it was the aura that leaked out of the coffins that was more shocking. Each one of these coffins released a powerful aura that was far above any of the ghosts that Lin Fan''s group had met in this crypt.


    This was an aura that was equal to the aura that Faust had and it wasn''t just one of these auras, but rather there were five of them. That meant that there were most likely five different ghosts that were all in the Child Soul Realm, but not just in the Child Soul Realm, in the mid Child Soul Realm just like Faust.


    It had already taken everything that Lin Fan had to deal with Faust back at the hospital and the only reason that he had won was because Faust had one fatal personality w. If it wasn''t for the strange anger that Faust had that drove him to rush the fight, with Faust''s endurance as a necromancer, Lin Fan definitely would have lost since he would have lost all his energy first.


    While Lin Fan did be stronger since then, that didn''t mean that he could take on five different experts that were all at the same level as Faust.


    This was without a doubt the most dangerous boss battle out of all four locations that Lin Fan had been to, but what choice did he have?


    If he didn''t finish this and get the item that he needed, that would mean that he wouldn''t be able to solve the mystery of this realm, finish this trial, and help Mo Ze Chen save his girl.


    Well, thest one wasn''t really that convincing for him, but still he wanted to help Mo Ze Chen.


    What really drove him was the so called energy of the gods that the little girl had talked about. This was the first hint that he had received on the origin of the system.


    As the hands pushed the lid to the side, more of the aura leaked out and Lin Fan was certain that these ghosts weren''t just at the same level as Faust, they were far above him.


    If he had to guess, each one of these ghosts should be at the high Child Soul Realm, being close to reaching the peak.


    There was also one that waspletely different from the others. The one ghost that came out of the coffin in the center, the moment its lid had been pushed off, the aura of the ghost far surpassed the four ghosts around it.


    Lin Fan could tell that this ghost in the center was even stronger than the other four ghosts, most likely being in the peak Child Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan simply had no confidence in facing these ghosts at all, but he had no choice as they were alreadying out of their coffins.

 Chapter 464 Passed Down Knowledge (1)

    When the lids of the coffins were fully pushed off, the true appearance of the ghosts were revealed.


    The ghosts that sat up in the coffins were all elderly ghosts that clearly didn''t seem like they had much time left, that was if they weren''t ghosts. Their skin was much more rottenpared to the other ghosts and four of them didn''t have hair, while thest one only had a few strands of white hair left.


    When the five of these ghosts sat up, they looked around themselves first before immediately noticing Lin Fan''s group standing there.


    However, even after noticing that Lin Fan''s group was there, they didn''t immediately turn their attention to Lin Fan''s group. Instead, after just taking a quick look at Lin Fan''s group, the five ghosts suddenly looked up at the ceiling like they had sensed something.


    While looking up at the ceiling, from time to time, they would look down to exchange looks with each other as if they weremunicating something, but there wasn''t a single word that was said.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t pick anything up, but Lin Fan was able to feel a slight wisps of energy in the air.


    This was something that experts at a certain level were capable of, they weremunicating using their life energy to convey their voices. That way only the people that were meant to hear what they were saying would hear it and everyone else wouldn''t hear a thing. It would almost seem like they were talking with their minds.


    Of course Lin Fan couldn''t hear what they were talking about, but based on the way that they were looking above them, it seemed like they were talking about the situation outside.


    If that was the case, just how strong was their spiritual sense?


    Even with Lin Fan and Brainy''s spiritual senses that were stronger than normal experts at the same level of cultivation, they weren''t able to pierce through the ground that was between them and the surface.


    If they were able to see what was above, that meant they had even stronger spiritual senses than Lin Fan which was something that Lin Fan also relied on to gain an advantage when fighting opponents.


    After all, by having the stronger spiritual senses, he was able to read through the opponents move and easily dodge out of the way when necessary. If he didn''t have that, the opponent would be able to read through his moves and negate them before he could read through theirs.


    Once that happened, all Lin Fan would have was hisbination ofws, but he definitely wasn''t feeling confident in facing these ghosts head on in terms of power.


    So before they made a move, Lin Fan didn''t n on making a move either.


    It took them a few minutes of just looking at each other before they finally stopped looking up and turned back to where Lin Fan''s group was standing.


    The five elderly ghostspletely ignored the two maids surrounded in the green glow holding up the torches and Mo Ze Chen who was standing beside Lin Fan. Well, standing beside Lin Fan was a bit of a stretch since half of him was actually behind Lin Fan already.


    All of their eyes were on Lin Fan and all of them had narrowed their eyes as if they had seen something interesting.


    They continued to look at Lin Fan without saying a word for a while.


    If there was anyone else in this room, they definitely would have been able to feel the tension in the air. It was so thick that it could be cut like butter.


    But that also didn''tst long since they suddenly burst out inughter.


    Everyone in Lin Fan''s group couldn''t help letthing their guards down as they looked at this group of elderly ghosts with surprised looks.


    The elderly ghosts continuedughing until the one in the middle with the white hair looked at Lin Fan and asked, "What are you on guard for? Didn''t youe here to meet us?"


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this.


    Seeing the confused look on Lin Fan''s face, the elderly ghosts looked at each other and pointed at each other''s faces with smiles before the white haired ghost asked, "Is it our appearance? Well, we definitely don''t look like we used to, so you must be confused."


    After he said this, all five of the ghosts put their right hand to their face and in an instant, they all changed appearances.


    It had to be said that these five ghosts really were shameless.


    Even though they were old men, they didn''t hesitate to change into handsome young men. All of them looked like they could be idols that would sell millions of copies of singles and they were all handsome young men of different tastes.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, they didn''t suit the tastes of the two maid girls, that was none of them except for the one on the far left who was a little chubby.


    When the two maid girls saw his face, they couldn''t help blushing a bit.


    When they waved to him, it also showed how shameless these old ghosts were because that one slightly chubby one on the left revealed a smile and waved back at them with a smile.


    The two girls couldn''t help blushing a bit more when they saw this.


    Lin Fan naturally also saw this and he couldn''t help feeling like his world view was copsing.


    These elderly ghosts who had seemed like serious people were now revealing characters that werepletely opposite of what they had just shown. Lin Fan almost couldn''t help thinking that he was worried about nothing, but that didn''t mean that he let down his guard.


    After they had finished transforming, the lead ghost who was now a handsome young man with red eyes and dark hair who looked even younger than Lin Fan, so young that he almost seemed illegal...looked at Lin Fan and said, "How about now, do you recognize us now?"


    Lin Fan still had the same confused look on his face when he heard this.


    Recognize them?


    Why would he recognize them?


    He hadn''t even heard about these ruins beforeing here and he had learned parts of their history for less than a day. There was no way that he would know any of them.


    Seeing that Lin Fan still looked confused and still had his guard up, the five of them couldn''t help looking at each other with confused looks as well. After what seemed to be around a minute of secret discussions, they finally turned back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had his guard up the entire time, but he couldn''t react to what happened next.


    The ck haired young man in the middle suddenly disappeared before reappearing in front of his eyes, but this time he was much closerpared to before. He was standing so close that his face was almost touching Lin Fan''s.


    After looking for a second, the ck haired young man suddenly took a step back and raised his right hand right over Lin Fan''s face.


    Lin Fan had already started moving the moment that he had seen this hande up and was about to dodge out of the way, but then he realized that there was something that was keeping his foot locked in ce. When he looked down, he saw that there were thick vines that were already wrapped around his feet and he couldn''t move at all.


    The vines didn''te from the ck haired young man who was in front of Lin Fan, but rather the slightly chubby young man on the left who had raised his right hand a bit.


    The vines were thick, but Lin Fan could cut them. However, at the same time, Lin Fan didn''t have time to cut them since there was ck haired young man who was standing right in front of him.


    Since he couldn''t evade it, Lin Fan decided to charge forward. After all, instead of standing there and letting the ck haired young man do what he wanted, it was better for him to at least fight back.


    Lin Fan raised the white sword that was in his hand, but before he could even swing it, the ck haired young man had already raised his left hand. With a simple p, the ck haired young man''s left hand didn''t even have to touch Lin Fan''s hand. Just with the wind pressure that it generated, Lin Fan almost felt like his wrists were being pulled out of the socket, but they still stayed in the sockets in the end.


    However, that didn''t mean that his sword was the same. The wind pressure of the sword forced Lin Fan to lose his grip on his sword and it was blown right out of his hands, falling to the ground.


    Lin Fan didn''t worry about that since the Iron Eater Bone Artifact was linked to him, so he could summon it back at any time. Rather he was more worried about the force that the ck haired young man had generated with a single p.


    Lin Fan could tell that it was even stronger than his max strength when he was using all tenws, which meant that even if he wanted to fight back, he might not be able to.


    Still, Lin Fan wasn''t about to give up just because his weapon had been blown away.


    He turned right back to look at the ck haired young man and brought up his hands to attack, but then he saw something that made him stop moving andpletely shocked him.

 Chapter 465 Passed Down Knowledge (2)

    The right hand of the ck haired young man was still in front of Lin Fan''s face, but that wasn''t what was strange.


    Well, it was rted to the hand of the ck haired young man, but it also wasn''t.


    For starters, as the right hand of the ck haired young man was held in front of Lin Fan, there was something that came out of his forehead. It was a golden glow that came out of the golden diamond from Lin Fan''s forehead, the mysterious energy that had allowed Lin Fan to defeat the ghosts.


    But right now, instead of defeating the ghost that was in front of him, that golden energy was making direct contact with the ck haired young man''s hand and it didn''t do a single thing to him. It touched the hand, but it didn''t turn it to ashes like all the other ghosts.


    Lin Fan looked at this in shock as he couldn''t understand what had happened.


    This golden energy was what he had been relying on to make it through these trials and he had considered it his final weapon. In fact, he had been relying on this golden energy to make it through this one as well since he thought that he would be able to defeat the five elderly ghosts with them since after all, they were ghosts as well.


    But there was the ck haired young man who was a ghost that was holding it in his hand like it was nothing¡­


    Lin Fan was at aplete loss as to what to do now.


    But in his shock, he also realized something that was even more shocking.


    It wasn''t the fact that this ck haired young man who was a ghost was able to touch this golden energy, rather it was the fact that he was able to control it that had shocked him.


    The little girl with the whale had said that this energy was the energy of the gods, so for this ck haired youth to control it, did that mean that he was a god?


    The energy of the gods was the only clue that Lin Fan had as to the origins of his system, so did that mean that this ck haired young man was rted to the creation of his system?


    Lin Fan didn''t try to resist at all as he looked at the ck haired young man and asked, "Who are you?"


    But the ck haired young man didn''t reply, instead his eyes were focused on the golden energy that was in his hands.


    He carefully looked over the golden energy as if he was looking for something and after a while, he suddenly revealed a look of understanding as he said, "I see, so it''s like that¡­"


    But even after that, he didn''t say anything to Lin Fan as he turned back to the other four that were standing behind them. Based on the looks on their faces, it was clear that they were talking to each other in their minds.


    They didn''t continue talking for long before the ck haired young man turned back to look at Lin Fan. This time he didn''t look at the golden energy that he had pulled from Lin Fan''s forehead, rather he looked right at Lin Fan''s face. After looking for a bit, he revealed a look that showed that he didn''t recognize it.


    The ck haired young man carefully looked at Lin Fan for a bit before asking, "Are you not from our Antis Vige?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised when he heard this and it wasn''t for the reason that normal people would have thought it was for. After all, Antis was quite famous on earth where he came from and for this to be called Antis, it really was quite the coincidence¡­


    After all, both the city of Antis and this Antis Vige were both lost to the outside world.


    But after getting over his surprise, Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''ve never even heard of your Antis Vige before."


    The ck haired young man looked at Lin Fan for a bit. Based on his expression just now, he could tell that he wasn''t lying, so what could this mean then?


    After thinking about it, all five of the ghosts suddenly looked like they had realized something. The ck haired young man turned to look at the other four and seeing that they all gave nods, he turned back to Lin Fan. After looking at Lin Fan for a bit, he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    Then after a long pause, he said, "The fact that you''ve shown up here isn''t a good sign. This isn''t just bad for you, but also bad for us¡­"


    Then his eyes turned sharp as he looked at Lin Fan and muttered, "Perhaps it''s better if we take care of you right now¡­"


    Lin Fan immediately fully went on guard and prepared himself for a fight as the bone white sword once again appeared in his hand.<sub> </sub>


    Seeing him act this way, the ck haired young man didn''t mind it and just muttered to himself for a bit longer before saying, "No, it''s not worth it killing you now. Plus, there will be that beast that will interfere if I go too far¡­"


    Then with a wave of his hand, the golden energy returned back into the golden diamond on Lin Fan''s forehead, while also a bit of ck energy came out of his hand to hit the vines that trapped Lin Fan''s feet, freeing him.


    Lin Fan was confused as he watched the ck haired young man take a few steps back, but then the ck haired young man stopped and asked, "Well, is there anything you have to ask?"


    Lin Fan was stunned when he heard this. There had been just too many changes in thest few minutes that he couldn''t keep up with any of this. One second they wanted to talk, the next they wanted to kill him, and then they changed back to wanting to talk.


    Could they just make up their mind already?


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t stay in his daze for long as he looked at the ck haired young man and asked again, "Who are you?"


    The ck haired young man revealed a faint smile and said, "Are you sure that''s what you want to ask first?"


    But seeing that Lin Fan''s expression didn''t change at all, the ck haired young man''s smile disappeared as he said with a serious look, "We''re the elders of this Antis Vige."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but he wasn''t too surprised since he had already made his own guesses.


    These people were far stronger than any of the other ghosts that he had encountered, so unless they had some special identity, it wouldn''t make sense for them to be here. If they were the elders of this vige, it would all make sense.


    After all, Lin Fan had already guessed that these ghosts that wandered around should be the people that had once lived in this vige in the past. But he still wasn''t sure why they had turned into these ghosts.


    He was also curious why these elders would be kept in coffins in this crypt, but that was a question for another time since he had something else he wanted to ask first.


    Lin Fan looked right into the ck haired young man''s eyes and asked, "What is this golden energy and how can you control it?"


    When these words were said, there was a silence that filled this hall. All of the elders had surprised looks on their faces since it was clear that not a single one of them had expected Lin Fan to ask about this.


    After all, there were many other things that he could have asked about and many of them seemed much more important to thempared to this.


    But since Lin Fan had already asked about this, they had no choice but to answer since they wanted to build a rtionship with Lin Fan.


    After a pause, the ck haired young man said, "It''s the energy of the gods, but I think that you should already know that since you''re asking about this. As for what it specifically is, that isn''t something I can tell you. Then as for how we can control it, that''s because of the special teachings that we received which allows us to control it."


    Lin Fan fell into deep thought for a bit before asking, "Who did you learn this from?"


    The ck haired young man revealed a bitter smile and asked, "Who else do you think it''s from?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this. The more that he heard, the more it seemed likely that the worst case scenario that he thought was the truth seemed more likely. But if that was the case, he would definitely be the one that was in the most danger right now.


    Lin Fan then asked, "Is he still alive right now?"


    The ck haired young man was about to say something, but then there was a pressure that fell down from above, pushing him right into the ground.


    The same pressure fell onto the four other elders who had been standing beside him, but it came a bitter than when it fell down on him. The elders had seen this pressure fall and were about to say something before this pressure also fell down on them.


    Then in the space around them, there was a voice that said, "That''s enough."

 Chapter 466 Passed Down Knowledge (3)

    When this voice rang out, Lin Fan and the other three all looked around the room, looking for the source of the voice, but they weren''t able to find a single thing.


    Mo Ze Chen and the two girls had been silently watching the entire time because they could tell that this was something that waspletely out of their level, so they just wanted to see if they could figure anything out from the conversation that they had.


    But hearing the bits of conversation that they did have, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help forming another misunderstanding.


    Back on the ship, he had heard the little girl mention that this energy was the energy of the gods which was something that he had put in the back of his mind.


    Even in this upper realm, the concept of gods was something that was far away from them, but it was also something that they all yearned for because it seemed like that was the ultimate goal of cultivation to them. After all, the gods were all powerful and ruled over this world, allowing them to do whatever they want, so who didn''t want to be a god?


    But listening to this conversation now, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help thinking that Lin Fan had something to do with these gods with how casual he was when he heard the mention of the energy of the gods, as well as how casually he had brought it up in conversation.


    It was like the gods didn''t mean anything to him¡­


    As the voice rang out in the room, everyone was stunned and pulled out of their thoughts, but Mo Ze Chen also couldn''t help asking, "Boss, shouldn''t we run?"


    Seeing that the elders were being this unknown pressure, Mo Ze Chen felt that it was a good chance for them to leave this ce. After all, he had seen how random these elders had acted, one moment talking to them in a friendly tone before suddenly attacking them the next.


    But Lin Fan shook his head since he could tell that it wasn''t that simple.


    The pressure that suddenly fallen when Lin Fan had asked about that person, which meant that it must have something to do with that person. Perhaps that person might still be alive and was in charge of this ce¡­


    But why wouldn''t he want them to talk about him at all?


    After a while, the pressure finally disappeared from the room and the five elders were free to stand up again.


    Lin Fan looked at them and said, "If there''s anything you can''t tell me, you can just shake your head."


    The elders looked at Lin Fan with a grateful look, but there was a bit of reluctance in their eyes like they resented being controlled like this. However, it was clear that they had no choice in this matter based on what had just happened.


    Lin Fan put aside thest question he had asked since he had basically gotten his answer from what had happened and he moved on to his next question.


    ¡­


    Outside the tree, at the very top branches, the beast stillid there licking its paws.


    It had been the one that had sent down the pressure that had silenced the five elders and it still had a displeased look on its face as it muttered, "It seems like everyone is intent on betraying my master¡­"


    The ghostmanders around it had already all disappeared since they had all gone off to handle the task that the beast had given them, but if they were here, they definitely would have run away as well.


    The aura that was currentlying from the beast, it was much more ominous than anything that it had ever released before. It was almost as if it wanted to kill the entire world¡­


    But that aura soon calmed down before disappearing.


    There was a difference between the cases from before and the cases now.


    No matter what, in the end, both the girl and the whale and Faust were outsiders, so the beast didn''t care about what happened to them. As long as they were stopped from revealing the secrets that its master wanted to keep, it didn''t matter what happened to them.


    However, it was different for the ghost elders since they were the people that originally came from the vige.


    Back when the master still lived in the vige, he had taken the vige as his ce, so the people there naturally belonged to its master. Before its master came back, there was no need for it to eliminate the people that belonged to this vige because they would still have a use to y.


    That was why the beast had only given the elder ghosts a warning instead of sending down the pir of golden light on them.


    But that didn''t stop it from being angered by what the ghost elders had tried to do.<sub> </sub>


    It would remember this, but in front of the master''s n, it meant nothing.


    So for now, the beast continued to stew in its anger as it watched the scene unfold.


    After a moment''s pause, the beast said, "Soon¡­"


    ¡­


    Lin Fan had asked the ghost elders quite a few questions and the strange thing was that they had answered them all.


    For people who had been listening in, they definitely wouldn''t have understood why Lin Fan had asked these questions because the questions that he had asked were all very simple questions. Only people who understood what the situation of these ruins were and had some understanding of the past would understand what he meant.


    But he had been so vague that even Mo Ze Chen who did have all of this still couldn''t understand everything.


    Still, the answers had cleared up quite a few things for Lin Fan, especially what he had to do now.


    Lin Fan looked back up at the ck haired young man in front of him and asked in a serious voice, "Do you want me to save you all?"


    All of the elders revealed a bitter smile when they heard this.


    Perhaps if someone had asked this a long time ago, maybe they would have said yes, but it really had just been too long. At this point, all they wanted to do was return to the earth and find eternal peace instead of struggling in this life any longer.


    However, they didn''t say no immediately either because there was still something that kept them attached to this world. It had kept them attached to this world for thousands of years and it would still keep them attached to this world.


    This attachment that they had was the responsibility they had to the people of their vige. Before they were saved, they wouldn''t be able to rest at peace.


    But in the end, it was not that simple for them, so the ck haired young man said after a pause, "There is no salvation for us, but if you can free us, then we will be grateful."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows slightly since that wasn''t exactly what he wanted to hear, but there was something that he did want to hear in that, so he chose to ept it in the end.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything else on this topic and instead asked, "Then can you teach me how to control this energy?"


    The ck haired young man revealed a smile, a true smile this time. All of the elders revealed this same smile because this was what they had wanted to hear.


    After all, to aplish what they wanted him to do, he would have to control this golden energy since it was the most important thing in this realm. Without being able to control it, there was nothing he could do in the end.


    The ck haired young man reached behind him and pulled out a golden glowing book which he held in front of Lin Fan. After wiping off a bit of the dust on it, he said, "This is what you''re looking for. As long as you read this, you''ll be able to understand the techniques that we use to control this golden energy."


    Lin Fan looked at the book in front of him and couldn''t help thinking of the podium that he had seen at the front of the graveyard. On it had been the word "book" that was just like the clues that all the other podiums had. That word was most likely referring to the book that was in front of him.


    Once he took this book, it would mean the end of these trials because this was thest location that was marked on the map by the fountain. He could guess what might happen once he did take the book, which was why he was hesitating at this moment.


    If his guess was right, then there would be a huge twist in the end that he might not be prepared for.


    But then after thinking about it, he suddenly remembered that he had something that normal people didn''t, his system.


    Even though he didn''t have a shop open in this upper realm, he could still ess the system''s store and utilize the points he saved to buy items to help himself with. Not only that, he could still see his point value increasing since the four stores that were on the Blue Star were still operating.


    As long as he had this, Lin Fan wasn''t worried since the system came from the same ce as this energy of the gods, so Lin Fan was certain that he would be able to deal with whatever came at him.


    With this thought, Lin Fan ced his hand on the book and allowed its golden glow to enter his body.

 Chapter 467 Arrogant Young Masters (1)

    The moment his hand came in contact with the book, the golden glow of the book crawled up his arm to his forehead just like normal.


    When this golden glow passed by Lin Fan''s eyes, it revealed the same scenes as the other golden glows, while also showing him a few extra scenes.


    These scenes were from the view of the elders, it was their memories that they had added in.


    Even though they couldn''t directly tell Lin Fan what happened because of the one watching above them, they still had their own ways. They had been taught how to control the golden energy, so naturally knew how to add something extra into the golden energy to show what they wanted to show without being caught, which was what Lin Fan was currently seeing.


    Of course, they didn''t dare add too much or it would take too much time for Lin Fan to digest the information which would draw suspicion.


    In the end, it took Lin Fan just a bit longerpared to before to finish sorting through the memories contained within the golden energy, but when he looked at elders, there was a different look in his eyes.


    He nodded at the elders and said, "I will do what I can, but I hope that you will help me when the timees."


    The ck haired young man represented the others to say, "We can only give you what help we can, but you should also know that we''re restricted in what we can do."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this and he said with a nod, "It''s enough for me that you''ve said that. Thank you."


    The ck haired young man gave a nod and said, "Good luck."


    Then without any other words, he along with the other four elders all headed back to their coffins andid back down. Once they were all settled, it was like something mechanical was controlling the lids as they went back in ce.


    With a "thud" sound, the lids of the coffin closedpletely and all the pressure that they had felt before was sealed, as the room fell intoplete silence.


    Mo Ze Chen saw that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, so he came forward to say something, but Lin Fan turned first and said, "Let''s get out of there, there''s no time left."


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan with aplicated look, but he still followed him in the end for a variety of different reasons. The most important being that it would be dangerous to stay here any longer after what had happened with the other locations.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t waste any time as they moved through the corridors. In fact, Lin Fan didn''t even run himself since he knew it would be too slow, so he called out Xiao Feng and they rode on his back as he flew through the corridors.


    As for the two maid girls, they were pulled back into the pet space since there was no need for them to be out here anymore. After all, they weren''t nning on fighting anything, so Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen took the torches from them before they were pulled back in.


    But before leaving, they didn''t forget to give Mo Ze Chen a meaningful look. In fact, they had wanted to kiss him goodbye, but they couldn''t work up the courage in the end and there was Lin Fan present, which made it much worse.


    Once they were gone, Xiao Feng rushed through these tunnels at his max speed, going the distance that had taken them over twenty minutes in less than five minutes. The main difference was that this time they weren''t carefully looking over each door and were just trying to get out as soon as possible, so naturally they went much faster.


    Once they came up the stairs and out of the crypt, the entire area around them began to tremble.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen naturally knew what was going to happen, so without wasting any time at all, they immediately had Xiao Feng fly into the sky to avoid the copsing ground underneath them.


    When they made it into the sky, the ground underneath them began to copse and it created arge hole underneath, but it wasn''t just a normal hole. Instead of being a big round hole, it copsed in the shape of tunnels, revealing the crypt that had been kept underground. It hadn''t been in a single straight line like the one tunnel that Lin Fan had been in, but rather there were four different side tunnels that could be seen.


    It seemed like there were doors along the path that led to these side tunnels and that should have been where the area bosses that held the four items to unlock the barrier were.


    But neither Lin Fan or Mo Ze Chen were in the mood to look at this because there was something else on their mind.


    They had finally finished clearing out all four locations and getting the items that they needed from those ces, so there was only one ce that they had to go now. From the sky, they could see the spray of water that came off the fountain in the middle of the city, but what they cared about more was the faint golden glow that wasing from it.


    It seemed like something had changed there, but as for what, they would have to go there to take a look.


    However, before they could make their way there, they suddenly heard someone calling out to them from below.<sub> </sub>


    Turning in the direction of the voice, they saw that it was a group of actual humans which surprised them.


    After all that they had gone through in this ce, it was strange for them to see humans since it had been such a long time since they had seen a normal human. They could tell from the auras of these people that they were normal people and Mo Ze Chen even recognized them since they were also candidates of the Hunters Exam.


    Lin Fan of course didn''t recognize them since barely any time had passed since he came up to the upper realm, so he naturally didn''t have the time to find out about other talented people.


    Mo Ze Chen knew this and quickly exined to Lin Fan who they were before asking him, "Boss, what should we do? Should we bring them along with us?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he thought about something.


    He didn''t care about bringing them along, rather what he cared about was how they had gotten in here.


    To get in here, you had to have the golden energy which allowed you to see the words that were written on the golden tree, but that wasn''t the strange part. After all, there were ways to get this golden energy in here as demonstrated by Mo Ze Chen, so there had to be a way to get some outside.


    The strange thing was how they had understood what the word carved onto the tree had meant. After all, the word that had been carved along the tree was written in Chinese.


    Could it be that there was another transmigrator among these people?


    Having this thought in mind, Lin Fan paused for a second before giving a nod and shaking his head, "We don''t need to take them along with us, but let''s see what they want first."


    Mo Ze Chen nodded to this.


    With a thought, Lin Fan had Xiao Feng fly down to where these people were standing.


    When they came closer, Lin Fan got a better look at this group.


    It was a group of five people, but it was clear who their leader was.


    It was a young man who was standing in front of the other four who were all girls and looked at the young man with eyes filled with admiration.


    Seeing the way the girls treated the young man, it was clear what kind of person he was and both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen felt a bit of disgust towards him. However, they didn''t judge him before this and gave him the benefit of the doubt.


    Mo Ze Chen was the one who came forward to greet them since out of the two of them, he was the better choice.


    Lin Fan was someone who was quite cold when he spoke and Mo Ze Chen was someone who worked in excavating ruins, a job that definitely couldn''t be done alone and required connections, and was naturally better at talking to people.


    Mo Ze Chen came forward with a smile as he said, "Hello, we haven''t met before, but it''s always nice to see another candidate for the exam¡­"


    But before he could finish, the young man who led the other group suddenly raised his hand to cut him off.


    The young man''s eyes swept over him before he snapped his fingers in his face and said, "Alright, that''s enough out of you."


    Both Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan were surprised when they heard this.


    Out of all the responses that they had thought was possible, this definitely wasn''t one of them.


    After all, they were acting friendly to this person and he suddenly cut them off in this rude manner, this definitely wasn''t a normal response.


    After cutting Mo Ze Chen off, the young man looked at them with eyes filled with disdain as he said, "Tell me what you know about this ce, now."

 Chapter 468 Arrogant Young Masters (2)

    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen knitted their brows when they heard this.


    They had met people that were arrogant before, but they had never met anyone as arrogant as this. Not to mention that this person was much weaker than Lin Fan and was only a bit stronger than Mo Ze Chen.


    To put it simply, he just didn''t have the ability to be this arrogant towards Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen.


    The thing was that Lin Fan had the aura of a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert and Mo Ze Chen was only in the low Embryo Soul Realm which was lower in cultivationpared to this young man who was in the high Embryo Soul Realm.


    So the young man was mistaken as to how hepared to the two of them.


    This young man was actually one of the rising stars that had his eyes on a position in the Decagram and he was recognized as one that would be joining them eventually, so he always thought that others were below him. Other than recognizing the ten people in the Decagram and a few of his rivals, all other people were not worthy of his attention.


    That was how he had developed this kind of arrogant attitude which made him talk down to everyone else.


    It also helped that he had a powerful organization that was behind him, one that was almost on par with any of the twelve great factions. No one was willing to mess with someone that had this kind of organization behind him if they didn''t need to, so most of the time they yielded to him.


    For this young man named Gui Feng, it was just the way the world was naturally.


    It was too bad that he had kicked a steel te while meeting Lin Fan today.


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort and turned to leave.


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an awkward look since he was the one that had approached Gui Feng''s group first, so it was his face that was being thrown away, but he still chose to follow Lin Fan in the end. If his face wasn''t a bit thick, he wouldn''t havee up to Lin Fan in the first ce.


    Seeing that they were ignoring him and leaving, Gui Feng immediately revealed an angry look as he came forward and said, "What do you think you''re doing? I''m asking you a question here!"


    But even though he said this, neither Lin Fan or Mo Ze Chen turned to give him any attention. It was like they were dealing with a child that was throwing a tantrum, they hadpletely ignored him.


    Seeing that they didn''t pay him any mind, Gui Feng was filled with rage from being shamed like this and he didn''t hesitate as he raised his palm to send an attack at Lin Fan.


    It was hard for Lin Fan to miss this with therge amount of energy gathering behind him, so he was already prepared. With a single turn on his heel, he neatly avoided the palm attack that was aimed at his back.


    Gui Feng was surprised when he saw this, but as an expert, he was naturally able to quickly react to this. As soon as he saw that his first attack missed, Gui Feng raised his other hand and prepared to send a barrage of palm attacks at Lin Fan.


    It was too bad that Lin Fan didn''t give him this chance as he used the momentum of his spin to fly out at Gui Feng.


    With a single sweep of his sword, Gui Feng''s eyes were open wide as his head had been separated from his body. It turned twice in the air beforending in the arms of one of the girls that followed him.


    The girls were also Soul Realm Experts, but they were just simple followers of Gui Feng and didn''t actually have any realbat abilities. They had only reached the Soul Realm by following Gui Feng and receiving pills from him, so when it came to fighting, they were much weaker than normal experts.


    When the girl looked down to see Gui Feng''s wide eyes, she paused for a second before screaming and throwing the head into the air. The head spun another time beforending in the arms of another one of these girls, who also screamed out and threw the head.


    This head was thrown around like a hot potato until it was finally dropped onto the ground.


    The girls didn''t know what to do, but then they remembered that Lin Fan was still there.


    He had been standing there watching the girls freak out like this, but once they remembered that he was still there, he immediately swept out with his sword. Without a single warning, the heads of all four girls were cut off and dropped to the ground along with their headless corpses.


    Lin Fan normally would have left these girls alive, but it was different this time since they had seen what he had done.


    Mo Ze Chen came over and looked at Gui Feng''s corpse. After finding a token, he had a good idea of who this person was. Mo Ze Chen was someone who relied on information and rtionships to get what he wanted since most of these ruins were upied byrge forces. He had memorized most of the famous geniuses from these forces and it wasn''t hard for him to recognize Gui Feng.


    Just like everyone else, he was worried about the force that was behind Gui Feng because they really weren''t pushovers¡­<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, what¡­"


    Lin Fan raised his hand and said, "Nothing happened."


    Mo Ze Chen turned to look at the corpses on the ground before turning back to Lin Fan with a nod.


    This was the main reason why Lin Fan had also killed the girls, he needed to silence the witnesses.


    Currently they were in these ruins without contact with the outside world. As long as everyone who had seen what happened didn''t talk or was dead, this matter would never be known. All that people outside would think was that Gui Feng had died to something inside the ruins.


    In the end, Lin Fan was justified because Gui Feng had attacked first, but the reason he killed him was because no matter how this ended, they would have offended Gui Feng. Instead of leaving an enemy for the future, it was better to kill him now.


    They quickly looted the corpses and took everything valuable before heading off.


    Only when they were away from the body did they finally slow down.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been able to get the answer that he wanted from Gui Feng, but that didn''t matter since there were plenty of other people to get the answer from.


    With his spiritual sense, Lin Fan could sense the aura of several experts walking around this town, all heading towards the fountain in the center.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what had changed, but it seemed like something had changed in this realm and everyone had been allowed inside this tree.


    Whether that was a good thing or not, it was hard to tell now, but Lin Fan was certain that everything would be moreplicated.


    But for now, the only thing that he had to do was head to the fountain that was right in the center since that was where everything started and where everything ended.


    Once they approached they saw that there were already several groups that had gathered nearby, but not a single one of those groups approached. They all stood guard around the fountain, waiting for someone else to approach first.


    After all, no one knew what the fountain in the middle was, the only thing that they did know was that it wasn''t normal based on the golden glow that it had. Since they knew it wasn''t normal, of course there must be some kind of treasure hidden there.


    However, since there were all these people here as well, no one was willing to make a move first.


    No one knew what kind of traps were hidden here and no one was willing to make the first move to let the others gain benefits from. This was what caused this scenario where all these various groups were waiting for all the other groups to make a move.


    But Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t have time to wait for this, so they directly headed towards the fountain without caring about any of the groups that were camped around it.


    When these people saw Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen heading right through them to the fountain, they were surprised and hesitated, but in the end, they just allowed Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen to make their way through their blockade.


    However, that allpletely changed when they saw that there weren''t any traps that were triggered. It was like there was nothing guarding the fountain at all.


    Since that was the case, how could they let Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen take everything that they had already imed as their own?


    If they didn''t make a move now, it would definitely be toote.


    So without waiting any longer, all the groups waiting around the fountain looked at each other before running forward towards the fountain.


    But none of them were able to match Xiao Feng''s speed.


    Lin Fan was the first to arrive at the fountain, but what he had found had surprised him.

 Chapter 469 Arrogant Young Masters (3)

    When Xiao Fengnded in front of the fountain, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen jumped off his back right away tond in front of the fountain.


    However, when they looked at the fountain, they found that nothing had changed with it. Well, it wasn''t that nothing at all had changed. The water inside the fountain was now glowing golden, but other than that, there was nothing else special.


    Even the map that had been at the fountain had disappeared.


    Lin Fan looked around the fountain and found that there was nothing else there at all. Even when he used his spiritual sense, he couldn''t find any special energy fluctuations that drew his attention.


    To put it simply, this was just a normal fountain.


    Could it be that all of this had been a trap and there was nothing here?


    No, Lin Fan wouldn''t believe that it was all for nothing since he had seen quite a few things during his trip to the four locations.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t given the time to think this over as the other groups started arriving.


    They weren''t able to keep up to Xiao Feng and Lin Fan had pushed past them, so they arrivedter, but that didn''t mean that they were slower than each other. The moment that one group arrived, the rest of the groups had all arrived.


    All of them were looking at each other with vignt gazes and no one paid any attention to Lin Fan.


    That was until they all suddenly remembered him.


    They could feel that he wasn''t stronger than them, rather he was only in the Fragmented Soul Realm, which was the cultivation that Lin Fan purposefully released to appear weaker than he actually was.


    All of them were either in the mid Embryo Soul Realm or the high Embryo Soul Realm, only a few of them were in the peak Embryo Soul Realm, so a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert wasn''t worth anything here. For them the only ones that they had to worry about was each other.


    But of course, there were some that had lost their patience and went looking for Lin Fan since they were confused as to why he was even in this ce.


    Most of them had seen each other when they came into the tree since all of them had taken entrances close to each other, but not a single one of them had seen Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen before. After all, Lin Fan was quite easy to remember because of how handsome he was, even some of the male experts among these people were considering taking Lin Fan back with them¡­


    Finally, one person came forward to where Lin Fan was standing and said, "Hey, what do you know about this ce?"


    Lin Fan hadn''t been focused on these people since he knew that there was nothing special about them, instead he had been trying to figure out the secret of the fountain, so he didn''t hear this person who shouted at him.


    Seeing that Lin Fanpletely ignored him, this young master was filled with rage from shame.


    In front of all these other young masters, this weakling dared to ignore him?


    This was simply a p to his face.


    He was someone who everyone had looked up to and treated with respect, even these fellow young masters didn''t dare disrespect him like this. After all, they all knew the backing that they all had and no one would dare offend each other for no reason, that is unless they had a life or death grudge or their two factions were at war.


    For this arrogant young master, to be treated the way that Lin Fan was treating him, he definitely wasn''t going to take this sitting down.


    He immediately came forward and grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder, intending to pull him around to face him, but he revealed a look of shock the moment he tried pulling.


    It was like trying to pull at a block of steel, he couldn''t move Lin Fan at all.


    No matter how hard he tried to pull on Lin Fan, Lin Fan''s body was like it was bolted to the ground as it didn''t move a single inch.


    At first, Lin Fan didn''t even notice what was happening since he was focused on searching the fountain with his spiritual sense, but eventually he noticed since there was a slight force that came from his shoulder that pulled him out of his thoughts.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what it was, so he turned to see where that force wasing from. Just with that slight force, he was able to send that young master who was pulling on his shoulder flying.


    It was abination of both the force of the young master pulling and the force of Lin Fan suddenly turning which had done it.


    The young master was caught off guard since he felt the immovable force disappear and since he had been using too much strength, he had sent himself flying. Then with the force of Lin Fan turning added to this, it was too much for him to stop, so he couldn''t stop himself.<sub> </sub>


    As Lin Fan turned, the young master was picked off his feet and thrown right through the crowd of young masters behind him. He continued flying forth with a force that was hard for him to stop until he mmed into one of the buildings in the distance.


    It was a good thing that this building was covered in thews of time, so it was strong enough to stop him from flying any further, but at the same time, that was also a bad thing. Because of how firm it was, it reflected the force that he had hit the wall at right back into his body, causing serious internal injuries.


    ? The only reason the young master was able to stay conscious was because of his strong will, but he fell down onto one knee and clutched his chest as he looked at Lin Fan with a bit of fear in his eyes. The young master couldn''t help saying in a trembling voice as he looked at Lin Fan, "Who are you?"


    After saying these words that seemed to take all his strength, he copsed onto the ground and fainted.


    Everyone was stunned when they saw this.


    Just who was this person that none of them had recognized?


    He was so strong that he had sent someone flying with just a single turn?


    What kind of monster would he be if that were true?


    Many of them didn''t want to believe this, but the facts had been ced right in front of their faces and it was hard for them to deny it.


    It seemed like this person who they thought was a nobody was not actually someone that they could offend easily. This was made clear by the one person who had taken the risk to test this person out for them.


    But when they thought about it, they couldn''t help realizing that this was the truth. After all, how had he been in this ce if he wasn''t special?


    Perhaps it was better to get on this person''s good side and work with them as equals.


    As many of these young masters were pondering this, there was one person who had a smile on his face as he approached Lin Fan.


    This person was Wang Jian.


    The way that he approached Lin Fan wasn''t hostile, but it also definitely wasn''t peaceful since he was covered in battle intent. It was clear that he wanted to fight Lin Fan, but the way he showed his intent to fight didn''t have any ill will towards Lin Fan.


    To put it simply, he wanted nothing more than to challenge Lin Fan to prove his own might.


    He could tell from the force that the young master had been sent flying that Lin Fan was definitely strong, perhaps even stronger than him.


    While he didn''t want to acknowledge that anyone was stronger than him, he had no choice in this matter. However, all that did was make the desire to challenge Lin Fan dwelling inside of him even stronger.


    For Wang Jian, the only thing that mattered to him was bing stronger and a strong opponent would definitely be the push that he needed to be stronger. He didn''t even care about these ruins, he didn''t care about the exam, all he cared about was strength.


    The other young masters around naturally recognized Wang Jian since he was famous for being a battle junkie. Many of them had even received challenges from him and had suffered at his hands before.


    He fully deserved his title as the strongest member of the Decagram.


    But since they knew that he was a battle junkie, they knew that this was a chance for them.


    After all, with the strength that Lin Fan had shown, Wang Jian wouldn''t be able to control his desire to fight and would challenge Lin Fan.


    They all wanted to dig deeper to expose Lin Fan''s identity since he was just too much of a mystery, but none of them wanted to volunteer for that job after seeing what happened to that first young master.


    Since this battle freak Wang Jian was willing to test the waters for them, there was no reason for them to stop him.


    However, they couldn''t help wondering if this battle freak Wang Jian would even be able to beat this mysterious person¡­


    If he couldn''t, what chance would they stand against him?

 Chapter 470 Secret Entrance (1)

    Lin Fan didn''t go right back to studying the fountain, but rather he turned his attention to the group of young masters that were standing around him before finally turning his attention to Wang Jian.


    He could tell that this person didn''t have any ill will, but he also didn''t want to deal with him right now since there was something more pressing. However, based on the battle intent that he was releasing, it was clear that he wouldn''t back down that easily.


    There was still one thing that was on the back of his mind, he wanted to know how they hade into this ce in the first ce.


    Could it be that there were those among them that knew how to read Chinese?


    If that was the case, how were they able to learn thisnguage?


    This was rted to the very reason that Lin Fan was brought to this world for, so naturally he would be very curious about this.


    As Wang Jian approached Lin Fan, he could feel the pressure that came from him.


    It wasn''t a pressure that came from his cultivation since as far as Wang Jian could tell, Lin Fan''s cultivation was below his. This was a kind of cultivation that came naturally in terms of battle intent.


    As someone who craved battles, Wang Jiang naturally had a strong battle intent that he could use to pressure other people, but Lin Fan was on apletely different level. He could tell that he definitely would never reach the same level as Lin Fan because to reach Lin Fan''s level, he would have had to start fighting even before he was born.


    As for how Lin Fan got that battle intent, it was the same as his killing intent, it had been trained in the many battles that he had undergone in the cultivation realms.


    In terms ofbat experience, there were few people that could match him since there were few people that fought as many battles as him. Most people spent their time cultivating and even those that did fight battles continuously, most of them wouldn''t survive to reach the same level as Lin Fan.


    Of course, there were a few that did and they were known as some of the strongest experts in the entire universe¡­


    Rather than feeling pressured, Wang Jian was filled with excitement the moment he felt this pressure. He could tell that this was someone who he could go all out against, someone who could push him to his limits and let him break through to the next realm, which was what he craved with each battle.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan wasn''t in the mood to fight at all.


    Mo Ze Chen could clearly tell what Lin Fan was thinking since he had gotten better at reading Lin Fan after everything that they had gone through together. So he came forward and said with a smile, "This brother, how about we talk¡­"


    But before Mo Ze Chen could even finish, Wang Jian had already pulled out his sword and jumped into the air, shing down at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at him and it was like he was moving in slow motion, so Lin Fan was able to easily move to the side to dodge this. However, this was exactly what Wang Jian had expected Lin Fan to do.


    As soon as his sword came down, his wrists immediately twisted and another sh came right back up, perfectly aimed at Lin Fan''s neck with a speed that was even faster than the downwards sh.


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he saw this.


    He had to admit that this kid was better than he had expected and it seemed that he had to get a bit more serious.


    He also had the right to call this young man a kid because mentally, he was twice his age since he had the memories of two lives, both of which had lived to around the same age.


    So put together, his mental age should be considered over forty years old which he considered to be middle aged ording to the age standard of earth.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all as he brought his right hand up to where his neck was and when it came up, there was a pure white dagger that appeared in his hand.


    When the giant de that Wang Jian was holding shed with the tiny dagger that Lin Fan was holding, there was a powerful shockwave that spread out around them. Thissted for all of two seconds before Wang Jian was suddenly forced back two steps while Lin Fan just stood in ce, like he wasn''t affected by Wang Jian''s attack at all.


    After taking those two steps back and stabilizing himself, Wang Jian suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood onto the ground.


    When all the young masters around saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked by this.<sub> </sub>


    That was right, with just a single blow, Wang Jian had suffered internal injuries while Lin Fan stood there like nothing was wrong.


    They couldn''t help worrying after seeing this since if even the strongest of them couldn''t stop Lin Fan, what would stop Lin Fan from taking care of all of them if he really wanted to?


    The third ranked member of the Decagram was even more anxious because for him, Wang Jian had been his goal. Ever since he had fought him for the first andst time, he had set Wang Jian as his goal since that was how deep of an impression Wang Jian left on him. It wasn''t just fear, but also admiration that he felt for Wang Jian.


    But now that he was seeing Wang Jian being pushed back, he couldn''t stop the conflicted feelings inside of him froming out as he shouted, "Wang Jian, what are you doing? This isn''t the normal you? Why aren''t you taking him down with a single swing?"


    But Wang Jian didn''t have time to care about this person, in fact he didn''t even remember him since he had fought too many people. Anyone that was in the Decagram with him wasn''t even worth remembering for him since they were just too weak.


    However, this man in front of him was different because for the first time, he felt something different. Instead of being able to dominate this person easily, he was actually the one being dominated.


    This feeling was strange, but also exciting.


    It was definitely not a feeling that he had ever felt before.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t feeling that same way.


    To him, it was a waste of time for him to fight Wang Jian since he was still technically on a clock. After the time wasted in the crypt, there was only a bit over two hours left before they were automatically pulled out of this ce.


    However, even with that clock running down on him, Lin Fan hadn''t been able to find a way to progress at all.


    Instead of wasting time with Wang Jian, he wanted to keep studying this fountain to see if he could find any clues.


    After Wang Jian had stabilized himself, Lin Fan actually took the initiative to speak as he said, "There''s no reason for us to fight right now."


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this since for most of them, it was the first time that they had heard Lin Fan speak. For a few of them, they had noticed when Lin Fan hade into the room with Qiao Yi Fei and had heard his voice when he said a few words to her.


    They had thought that he was just a simple nobody that she had been forced to escort, but now it seemed like he deserved having such an escort.


    But Wang Jian of course wasn''t in a mood to listen to any of this.


    He had finally found someone who was worthy of being his opponent, someone that could make his blood boil like this to fight, so how could he let him go?


    Wang Jian wouldn''t have any of it as he said, "None of this is important." After saying this, his eyes turned sharp as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "All that I care about right now is fighting you."


    Seeing that look that Wang Jian had, Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a sigh since he knew what it meant. He had seen plenty of people like this back on earth, but it was too bad that he didn''t have security to deal with them here.


    Since that was the case, the simplest thing that Lin Fan could do was restrain Wang Jian so he wouldn''t be a problem anymore.


    But before that, he would make sure that he would have a little soak first to cool down that temper of his.


    With this idea in mind, Lin Fan just stood there waiting for Wang Jian toe, but Wang Jian didn''t charge forward right away. Rather, he took a step back and raised the sword parallel to his face, pointing the tip of the sword right at Lin Fan.


    As he stood there, he gathered all the life energy that he had into his sword, creating physical wisps of sword energy that even people without cultivation could see. It was clear how much he had dedicated his life to the sword and how deep his understanding of swordws was, so it could be imagined how sharp this single stab would be.


    After he finished gathering all his energy, Wang Jian took a step forward and instantly disappeared.

 Chapter 471 Secret Entrance (2)

    When Wang Jian appeared again, he was just a single step away from Lin Fan.


    The sword that he had raised was already stabbing forward, aimed right at Lin Fan''s heart and it moved at a speed that most of the young masters around them couldn''t see.


    However, even if the young masters around them couldn''t see it, that didn''t mean that Lin Fan couldn''t see it.


    He could easily see the sword that came ever closer to his body and at the veryst second, he moved at a speed that was even faster than Wang Jian.


    Just by taking a single step to the right, the sword went right past Lin Fan harmlessly. However, after dodging the sword, Lin Fan didn''t stop moving.


    With a quick spin on one foot, he brought his hand behind Wang Jian and pushed him right past him. Wang Jian had wanted to stop as soon as he saw that his attack missed and to spin around to attack Lin Fan again, but he wasn''t able to stop with the added momentum from Lin Fan''s p on his back.


    With that added force, Wang Jian flew right past Lin Fan, right past Mo Ze Chen, and headed right at the fountain that had been behind Lin Fan. That was the main reason why Lin Fan had stood where he had been standing, it was all because there was the fountain behind him.


    As for why he needed that fountain, he felt that Wang Jian needed to cool his head in the water.


    As Wang Jian flew forward, he slightly went up in the air since Lin Fan had aimed to send him a bit up into the air beforending right into the fountain. There was arge ssh where he hadnded, but then there was nothing else.


    Everyone was surprised since they had all expected Wang Jian toe out immediately, but after waiting for a few seconds, it was clear that he wasn''ting up.


    Lin Fan was also surprised when he saw this because he thought that Wang Jian would immediately jump out of the fountain to attack him again, but it didn''t seem like he was going to do that which was a pleasant surprise for Lin Fan. But of course he didn''t let his guard down since this might have also been a ploy from Wang Jian to make him let down his guard. He wasn''t certain because he didn''t know Wang Jian that well, so naturally he wasn''t certain what kind of fighting style he had.


    After waiting a full minute and seeing that Wang Jian still wasn''ting out, everyone started getting doubtful.


    Even if Wang Jian wanted to hide in the fountain and ambush Lin Fan, he should have known that this didn''t work after not seeing Lin Fan approach for this long. So why was he still staying in the fountain?


    That was, unless something had happened to him?


    When this thought came into their minds, no one made a move and they raised their guards against the fountain, that was everyone except for the other people from the Myriad Sword Hall.


    While Wang Jian was a lone wolf who went by himself, the Myriad Sword Hall definitely wouldn''t just send him alone to this exam. There were other groups that had members from the Myriad Sword Hall that were present.


    To these members of the Myriad Sword Hall, they were even more in awe of Wang Jian because in their faction, Wang Jian was like a god. He was the number one expert of their generation and it was because of him that they could raise their heads up high when facing the other factions.


    If something were to happen to him, it would not only affect their faction, but also themselves since the elders would definitely me them for letting something happen to Wang Jian.


    Those juniors from the Myriad Sword Hall immediately ran past Lin Fan and went over to the fountain, looking into the fountain for Wang Jian.


    However, when they looked in, they couldn''t find a single thing.


    There was no sign of Wang Jian in the fountain at all, it was like he hadpletely disappeared without leaving a trace.


    Seeing this, the juniors of the Myriad Sword Hall couldn''t help feeling worried because it seemed more and more likely that something had happened to Wang Jian.


    They began moving around the fountain and trying to find Wang Jian in the waters, but even after circling around, they couldn''t find a trace of Wang Jian. There wasn''t even a single wisp of his life energy that was left in these waters.


    Feeling the weight of this anxiety looming over them, one of these Myriad Sword Hall juniors finally couldn''t take it and reached his hands into the water out of desperation, trying to create waves to see if anything would happen. However, when this Myriad Sword Hall junior put their hands into the water, there was a strange force that suddenly appeared.


    Before the Myriad Sword Hall junior could even react, he had been pulled into the water by some strange force and had disappeared just like Wang Jian.<sub> </sub>


    The other Myriad Sword Hall juniors and all the young masters stared at this fountain in shock. Even Mo Ze Chen was staring in shock at the fountain since he couldn''t understand what was happening.


    There was only a single person that had a different expression here, which was Lin Fan who had his brows knitted.


    The reason why he had knitted his brows was because there was a familiar sensation that came from the fountain the moment the Myriad Sword Hall junior was pulled in. This was a sensation that he was familiar with since it was aw that he had control over.


    What came from the fountain was the sensation of spatialws.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been able to sense it the first time since he had been focused on Wang Jian, but this second time, he had been able to easily sense it.


    <o>,m While everyone was in shock over what had happened, Lin Fan went over to the fountain and sent his spiritual sense into the water. However, when his spiritual sense went into the water, the same thing happened as before as it was able to reach the bottom of the fountain like nothing was different about it.</o>


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan waved his hand and pulled out a rat which he dropped right into the fountain.


    As soon as the rat touched the fountain, there was a golden glow that appeared in the water as the sensation of spatialws appeared again. There was the same force that pulled the Myriad Sword Hall junior down that appeared again, pulling the rat into the water before the rat disappeared without a trace.


    It was clear that there was something in the fountain that was activating the spatialws to pull whatever entered away and it only activated for living beings. But that didn''t mean that Lin Fan could easily enter it. After all, it was very likely that there were other traps waiting for him on the other side.


    That was the main reason why Lin Fan had pulled out the rat since he wanted to use it to test this fountain.


    Once the rat was gone, Lin Fan asked Brainy in his mind, "How is it?"


    Brainy was silent for a bit at first, but then it said, "It''s no good. I don''t know where it went, but it went far away where the spiritual sense connection was severed. I can''t see a thing."


    Lin Fan wasn''t too disappointed or surprised since he had already expected this.


    Since spatialws were being used to teleport something away, then they must be taking the people to a special ce. Naturally there would be barriers around that special ce to prevent people from peeking in with spiritual sense.


    Seeing that there was no way of seeing what was beyond this portal, Lin Fan knitted his brows once again.


    It was clear that this should be the next step in this trial since as far as he remembered, there wasn''t this golden glow with that water previously, so this should have been something that appeared after the trials wereplete.


    Mo Ze Chen saw Lin Fan looking at the water and knew that Lin Fan was definitely nning something crazy, but he had already stuck with Lin Fan all this time, so he wasn''t nning on leaving him just yet.


    Since he could pretty much guess what Lin Fan was thinking, he had already moved closer to where Lin Fan was standing.


    After another minute of pause, Lin Fan turned to see Mo Ze Chen beside him and he revealed a faint smile of pleasant surprise.


    Mo Ze Chen had already guessed what wasing, but that didn''t mean that he didn''t regret his choice. It was just too bad that it was already toote to regret all the bad choices that he had made during this time.


    Lin Fan didn''t grab Mo Ze Chen''s hand, but rather he grabbed Mo Ze Chen by the back of the cor and threw him right in.


    After therge ssh that Mo Ze Chen''s slightly chubby body made, it was Lin Fan''s turn. Without even turning to look at the young masters that were behind him, Lin Fan stepped up to the fountain and put one foot on the edge before jumping right in, creating his own ssh.


    All that was left after that were the stunned young masters standing there, still unclear of what just happened.

 Chapter 472 Palace (1)

    When Lin Fan jumped into the water, there was only a second where he was in the water before there was a force that pulled him under.


    This force didn''t pull him into the fountain, but rather a hole that was waiting for him.


    As he fell into this hole, Lin Fan could feel the fluctuations of spatialws around him. This confirmed his guess, there was something hidden in the fountain that activated spatialws to move whoever jumped in.


    But he still didn''t know where this wormhole would take him.


    It was just a good thing that he didn''t have to wait long to see where it did take him. It was a very short fall and when Lin Fan came to the bottom of the hole, he fell out in the middle of the air.


    However, with Lin Fan''s reactions, it didn''t take him much to do a flip in the air to negate some of the force of gravity beforending on the ground. But the same couldn''t be said about Mo Ze Chen who had fallen into the wormhole before him.


    Mo Ze Chen was sprawled on the ground beside him, having left a slight crater in that ground.


    Mo Ze Chen might have been able to react in time if he had jumped himself, but since he had been thrown in by Lin Fan, it was a different story. Because he had been thrown in by Lin Fan, as he fell through the spatial tunnel, he was spinning again and again which made him lose all sense of direction. Once he came out of the tunnel, it was hard for him to regain his sense of direction in time, so he fell sprawled onto the ground.


    But of course he was tough, so he didn''t feel anything from mming onto the ground. After a few seconds, Mo Ze Chen stood up and dusted himself off before looking around him along with Lin Fan.


    What the two of them saw was a giant pce.


    This was a pce that waspletely underground, which could be seen by the dirt above them. The only reason they could see perfectly in this ce was actually because of the ball of light that was shining above them. This was the same ball of light that had been present in the city inside of the giant glowing tree.


    This pce was very big, but there weren''t that many decorations on it. It was a simple ck and red, instead of being gold like most pces, but it was definitely still very awe inspiring.


    That was, it was awe inspiring for most people of this universe, but for Lin Fan who came from earth, it was anything but that. To put it simply, the design of the pce seemed like something that a child who was full blown infected with Eighth Grade Syndrome woulde up with¡­


    Still, Lin Fan chose not to judge since he knew that this wasn''t what he was here for.


    Rather, what Lin Fan turned his eyes to was someone else who was already here ahead of him. It was someone who was sitting cross legged not that far away with someone standing over him, looking back at Lin Fan with a vignt look.


    This person was the one who had been dragged into the fountain first, it was Wang Jian from the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Of course, the person that was standing guard over him was the other Myriad Sword Hall junior that had been pulled in after him.


    Wang Jian was sitting down like this because he had used all his energy in his attack just now, so he waspletely exhausted. Not only that, with how easily Lin Fan had dodged his attack, it had created a mental demon in his mind. If he didn''t take the time to stabilize his cultivation and recover, it was very likely that his cultivation would fall from this mental demon.


    After seeing that Wang Jian wasn''t going to do anything, Lin Fan didn''t bother with him any longer and turned away to look back at the pce.


    When he saw Lin Fan turn away, the Myriad Sword Hall junior couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief. After seeing how easily Lin Fan had taken care of Wang Jian, it had left a deep impression on him and there was a bit of fear in his heart.


    Lin Fan walked over to the entrance of the pce which was still firmly shut. There was also a podium that was in front of the entrance, but there wasn''t a single thing that was written on it nor were there words written in a golden glow waiting for him.


    Looking around, there were no entrances that were open for him at all.


    It was almost like there was still something missing.


    As Lin Fan was looking around, there was a sound that suddenly came from above. When Lin Fan looked up, he found that there were more people falling down from the ceiling.


    Lin Fan had already moved away from where the entrance was, so they weren''t right above him, but he could still see them falling from right above him. It didn''t take long before theynded right where Lin Fan had been standing before.<sub> </sub>


    It took them a while to get used to their new surroundings, but the first thing they saw was clearly the giant pce that was in front of them. Then the next thing they saw was Lin Fan which immediately made them raise their guard.


    This man was still a mystery to them and now that they were isted from the main group, they didn''t know what he would do to them.


    But it didn''t matter if they raised their guard or not since Lin Fan wasn''t interested in them to begin with.


    Lin Fan had only turned to look at them since they had suddenly appeared, but once he knew what happened, he turned back to the pce gates and the podium in front of him. However, this time he noticed something was different.


    On the gate in front of him was what he now realized was a disy that seemed to have some numbers in it. When he looked carefully, he saw that the number that was being disyed was the number of people that were present. Then beside that, there was another number that was there.


    It seemed that this was a disy counting the number of people present, while also seeming to imply that a certain number of people was required before these doors would open¡­


    If that was the case, how much time would they have to wait for those people toe?


    ¡­


    Outside of this underground pce, all the young masters were still standing there looking at the fountain, hesitating on what to do.


    There were a few that had jumped in to see what would happen after seeing Lin Fan jumped in, but the fact that there had been no signs afterwards made many of the other people here hesitate.


    Right now, it was aplete gamble for them if they were to go into this fountain. After all, there was the chance that it had taken them to some ce special with fortuitous encounters, but there was also the chance that it took them to a trap where they had all been killed¡­


    While they were powerful experts that didn''t fear death, in the face of the uncertain like this, they were definitely afraid. Dying in battle wasn''t something shameful, but they weren''t willing to ept dying in a trap without leaving their mark on this world.


    But as more and more time passed, the young masters were more anxious because they knew that they were running out of time. Just like Lin Fan, they all knew that they were fighting the clock right now and if they didn''t do anything, they would lose their chance.


    So after a while, the young masters gathered together without their followers and started discussing what to do.


    After a few minutes of discussing, they all went back to their own groups like they had a tacit understanding.


    The followers were surprised to see the young masterse back and they were about to ask them what their next moves were when the young masters all suddenly picked up one of their followers. The other followers were surprised, but they didn''t say a thing since they were just d that it wasn''t them. The one follower that was chosen all had a bad feeling and they tried to break free, but they weren''t able to since they couldn''tpare to these young masters.


    The followers were all brought over to the fountain by the young masters and then in one fluid motion, they were all thrown into the fountain by the young masters.


    The same thing that happened to the people who fell into the fountain before happened to these followers and they all disappeared without a trace.


    However, when the final follower disappeared into the fountain, something strange happened. The moment the follower disappeared, the golden glow of the water suddenly disappeared as well and the fountain turned back into a normal fountain.


    It was hard to miss such a big change and the young masters thought that it was a good turn for them. Perhaps this meant that the trap that was set had been filled and now they were able to move on to the next stage.


    But as they waited, there was nothing that happened around them.


    Finally, one of them couldn''t wait any longer and went over to touch the water in the fountain, but nothing happened to that person at all.


    After seeing this, the young masters all looked at each other with confused looks as they all had one thought on their minds.


    Now what?

 Chapter 473 Palace (2)

    As those young masters stood there in a daze, what they didn''t know was that they had given up their opportunity to their followers just like this.


    The portal was designed to only take a certain number of people and it was based on a firste first serve basis.


    The pce was the next step in this trial and a ce that was filled with treasures, so naturally it was a great opportunity for them if they had gone. It was just too bad that they had thought only of themselves and failed to take a risk, giving this chance to their followers in the end.


    As the saying went, there''s no reward without taking risks.


    It would be hard to imagine the pain they would feel in their hearts if they knew the truth.


    But seeing that there was nothing else for them here, the young masters decided not to waste any time and began exploring the city. After all, they had just arrived in this city, so they didn''t know what was in it.


    They were still hoping that there would be treasures lying all around the city, but they were destined to be disappointed in the end.


    In the end, it was their caution that had cost them the chance of a lifetime.


    ¡­


    Back underground, Lin Fan had been anxiously waiting for more people toe down when there was a sudden flux of people that fell down into a pile on the ground.


    These were the followers that the young masters had all thrown down at once. Since they had all fallen down at once, they had knocked into each other which created thisrge pile of bodies on the ground.


    Of course, they were all Fragmented Soul Realm Experts, so they were much tougher than normal people. It didn''t take them long before they recovered, but once they did and saw who was in front of them, they revealed bitter looks again.


    The people in front of them were the mysterious Lin Fan and Wang Jian who was recognized as the strongest among the Decagram, they wouldn''t stand a chance if there was a fight that started here.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t have time to give them any attention as the gates that were now behind him since he had turned around started making noise. The moment it did, Lin Fan immediately turned back to see the pce gates slowly opening.


    Those gates only held his attention for a few seconds because there was something else that drew his attention right away, it was something that had a golden glow right in front of him.


    Lin Fan looked down at the podium that had suddenly filled with words and saw that there was a simple message on it.


    "Come and find me to gain my inheritance."


    It was just these simple eight words, there weren''t any other golden glowing words that were on this podium.


    This all seemed a little too straightforward which made Lin Fan think that it was a trap, so he wasn''t in a rush to head into the pce. Instead, he released a few rat puppets and let them go in first while he turned back to look at the people who had pulled themselves out of the human pile.


    After seeing that they had organized themselves, Lin Fan took a step towards them which they immediately noticed. All of the followers couldn''t help taking a single step back when they saw Lin Fan approach them. After all, they had no idea if Lin Fan had any hostility towards them and they knew that they couldn''t match him since he could even dominate Wang Jian.


    Lin Fan saw this and he almost wanted tough. He hadn''t even done anything yet and they were already this scared.


    Seeing how scared they looked, Lin Fan almost wanted to suddenly take a step forward and say "boo", but he held back this urge.


    After a pause, Lin Fan said with a smile, "I just want to ask you all a few questions, nothing more."


    None of the followers let down their guards when they heard this, it was clear that not a single one of them believed what he said.


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "It''s up to you to believe me or not." But then his eyes turned sharp as he looked at them and said, "But you think that I would wait if I wanted to make a move on you?"


    All of the followers felt a chill run down their backs, but they couldn''t refute what Lin Fan had just said.


    With the power that Lin Fan had, it would be easy for him to clean them up, so there was no need to wait.


    So they all looked at each other until one of them came out.<sub> </sub>


    This person was in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm and could be considered the strongest one among them, so he had been chosen as their leader.


    That person took a step forward and looked at Lin Fan with a vignt look as he asked, "What do you want to ask?"


    Lin Fan didn''t care who he was talking to, he just asked, "How did you get in here?"


    That person revealed a confused look as he answered, "We came in the same way as you, we fell into the fountain and were brought here."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes slightly as he said, "I don''t mean that."


    That person revealed an even more confused look as he asked, "What do you mean then?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a sharp look and said in a cold voice, "How did youe into this tree and find this city?"


    That person felt another chill run down his back when he heard this, but then he said, "Didn''t youe the same way?"


    Lin Fan''s gaze turned even sharper and that person felt like he had fallen into ice. At the same time, Lin Fan said, "This isn''t a ce for you to ask questions."


    That person''s legs turned soft when he was exposed to Lin Fan''s aura. It was like being thrown into a blizzard without any underwear, it was so cold that he almost felt like he was trapped in ten thousand year old ice.


    That person immediately said, "The young master that I was following defeated one of the ghosts and it dropped apass for us that led us here."


    Lin Fan didn''t bother looking at him any longer and turned to the rest of the followers standing behind him.


    All of the other followers started nodding along and saying the same thing the first person had said.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this though.


    It seemed like this was the proper way to get into the tree and the way that he had taken was a shortcut that only came from being a transmigrator.


    Since that was the case, it seemed like these people didn''t know Chinese like he had suspected which was a bit disappointing, but also a bit relieving. If these people knew Chinese, then this conspiracy might be even bigger than he thought.


    Since they didn''t know a single thing, there was no need for him to continue threatening them after all, he had already received reports from the puppets that he had sent in.


    Now that this question that was in the back of his mind had been answered, he could finally focus on the task in front of him. However, before he went in, there was something that he had to say first.


    <o>,m Lin Fan looked at the group of followers in front of him and said, "You''re not the unlucky ones, the ones that are unlucky are the ones who threw you in here as a test. This ce is the final stage of this trial and if you can make it to the end, you''ll receive the inheritance of a long dead expert."</o>


    The group of followers looked at Lin Fan cautiously as they didn''t understand why he would tell them this at first, but they quickly figured it out.


    To put it in and simple, Lin Fan didn''t know what kind of danger was hidden in this ce even after he had searched through it with his puppets, so of course he would want other people to go in along with him to take some of the traps for him.


    But for these people, this was a chance since this was indeed the resting ce of an expert that had fallen, they could tell from the aura of the pce. This ce was and of opportunity for them and the fact that Lin Fan was willing to let them in was already enough for them to feel grateful.


    After all, Lin Fan could have just captured them all and used them as guinea pigs, but instead he respected them and gave them this opportunity to explore on their own. That was already enough for them to understand what kind of personality he had and it also filled them with admiration for him.


    After a slight pause, the group of followers cupped their hands to Lin Fan and said, "Thank you young master."


    Then without wasting another second, they all ran into the open gates of the pce, looking for their opportunity. That was, all of them except for Wang Jian and that one Myriad Sword Hall junior guarding him, but Lin Fan didn''t care about him.


    Lin Fan moved to the side for this group to go past him before casually walking forward to the gate with Mo Ze Chen following him.

 Chapter 474 Palace (3)

    As soon as they walked past the gate, they arrived in a long hall that was filled with pirs that reached the sky. However, other than those pirs, there wasn''t much else that was in this hall.


    The only thing that was surprising about this ce was that it was filled with doors.


    These doors lined both sides of the hall and every single door had a different designpared to the rest of the doors.


    As Lin Fan walked into the hall, he wasn''t in a rush to go into any of these doors and he just watched as the group of followers in front of him went to pick out their doors.


    There were a total of 46 of them since there was a maximum capacity of 50 people in this round. Other than Lin Fan, Mo Ze Chen, Wang Jian, that other Myriad Sword Hall junior, and two other people, the rest were all followers, but that didn''t mean that they didn''t have their ambitions.


    They had been forced to follow others because of theirck of talent, but with their cultivation, they could still be considered experts who had their own pride.


    None of them were willing to toss aside this chance that they had been given.


    So all of them were already moving through this hall and there were a few that had chosen doors.


    Lin Fan had been watching them as they went into the doors and based on what he could see from behind them as they entered, it seemed like the doors all led to different kinds of ces. Some led to rooms filled with snow, some led to rooms filled with mes, and there were all kinds of other rooms.


    It seemed like there was a different trial that was hidden behind each door.


    However, after the door was closed behind them, the doorspletely disappeared from the hall.


    It seemed like each door was only for one person or one group to undertake and it would close before anyone else could go in.


    But in the end, none of that told him which door was the correct door to go through.


    So Lin Fan didn''t rush in picking any of the doors to enter first, rather he kept an eye on the people who went in while also looking around the hall. With how long this hall was, it took him a few minutes of walking before he reached the end.


    At the very end of the hall, it wasn''t as empty as it was at the beginning since there was a gate waiting for him. Above that gate, there was a giant countdown clock ced there.


    Just like before, it was a countdown from 50, but there wasn''t a single figure in the countdown filled. It was still at 0 out of 50.


    Based on the fact that Lin Fan was here, it seemed like it wasn''t as simple as just gathering enough people here, but rather there was another condition needed to open this gate. Then based on the fact that there were all these doors around them, the most likely conclusion was that they needed to clear 50 of these rooms before the door opened.


    But Lin Fan hadn''t been inside a room yet, so he didn''t know how hard each room was. Based on just the cultivation of the people who had gone in, Lin Fan didn''t feel that confident they would be able to clear it in the end.


    As for him clearing out the fifty rooms himself, he was even less confident that he would make it in time¡­


    If there wasn''t something he could do to push that number up by himself or make everyone much stronger than they were right now, there was no way that they would be able to finish.


    So Lin Fan turned back to the people who were still wandering looking for doors and was about to say something, but then there was a sound that came from behind him.


    When Lin Fan turned around after this ''beep'' sound, he saw that the countdown had already gone up by one. However, when he looked around, he didn''t see a single person who hade out from their door.


    He had left puppets at each of the doors that had disappeared just to make sure that he could monitor everything, so he knew that there wasn''t a door that had appeared.


    If that was the case, could it be¡­


    Could it be that by dying inside the trial, it still counted as being cleared?


    If that were the case, wouldn''t it mean that he could move forward by sacrificing everyone here?<sub> </sub>


    While that would definitely be the fastest way, Lin Fan didn''t feel right doing it since these people didn''t have any ill will towards him and he wasn''t someone who killed people randomly. If he was going to kill someone, he would make sure that they deserved it first.


    Since that was the case, it seemed like he would have to find another solution.


    As he was thinking, Lin Fan began wondering what counted as a person taking the trial.


    If it was possible, perhaps he would be able to substitute the people taking the trial with something else? Something where it didn''t matter if they died or not?


    As he was thinking, there were people that were about to enter the rooms, but Lin Fan sent Mo Ze Chen to stop them.


    These people were confused as to why Mo Ze Chen was stopping them, but they also recognized Mo Ze Chen since he was the one who had been following Lin Fan the entire time. Mo Ze Chen also said that he was stopping them on behalf of Lin Fan, so they had no reason not to listen to him.


    After stopping them, he led them all to the end of the hallway where Lin Fan was standing while looking up at the countdown.


    The number was already higherpared to before, going from one to three. It seemed like there were three people who had failed their trials, but there were much more than that missing.


    There were ten people missing from this group. These ten were the ones that had rushed into a door during the time that Lin Fan had been checking out this hall. However, even though there were ten people missing from this group, there were only seven doors that had disappeared.


    That was because these doors didn''t seem to have a limit on how many people could go in, it was just that once the door closed, it disappeared from the hall.


    One of these doors that were gone contained a group of three that had gone in together.


    It was unknown if this group of three died in the trial yet, but they definitely hadn''te back from their door yet. Not a single person hade back just yet.


    While Mo Ze Chen exined everything to the rest of the people here, Lin Fan was focused on the door that was in front of him.


    He had already drawn his conclusions, now it was time to see if his theory would work.


    Lin Fan summoned out one of the dead rat puppets in front of him and opened the door for the dead rat puppet to go through. After the door was opened, the dead rat puppet went right in and Lin Fan closed the door behind it.


    Once the rat puppet had gone in and the door was closed behind it, the door disappeared. Along with the door disappearing, Brainypletely lost its spiritual sense link with the puppet and wasn''t able to control it anymore.


    This would have been a problem, but Brainy had already given instructions to the puppet before sending it into the room, which allowed it to continue moving for a certain amount of time.


    This was the main difference between live puppets and dead puppets, it was that live puppets still had consciousness. As long as these puppets were still alive, it meant that even without Brainy''s spiritual sense controlling them, they would be able to move for a certain amount of time on their own. For the dead puppets, they wouldn''t be able to move unless there was Brainy''s spiritual sense controlling them. That is, unless they received instructions via spiritual sense before the connection was cut.


    However, even if the spiritual sense link was cut, Brainy was still able to tell whether the puppet existed or not because of the parasite seed that was inside the puppet. It didn''t matter if the spiritual sense link was cut or not when it came to the parasite seed because it was inherently linked to Brainy. It didn''t matter the distance, as long as the parasite seed existed, Brainy would be able to sense it.


    That also meant that if the parasite seed was destroyed, Brainy would immediately know. That was the main reason why Lin Fan was doing this experiment.


    After the door was closed, it didn''t take long before Brainy suddenly felt the destruction of the parasite seed that had been inside of the dead rat puppet that had gone into the door. However, the destruction of the parasite seed inside the dead rat puppet wasn''t surprising, rather it was what Lin Fan had expected to happen.


    As soon as Brainy told Lin Fan about this, the first thing he did was turn back to look at the countdown that was above the gate.


    As he had expected, the countdown had gone up.


    Lin Fan had waited until it had been at 7 out of 50 before doing this experiment and now it had gone up by one to 8 out of 50.

 Chapter 475 Palace (4)

    The moment he saw that number go up, Lin Fan''s lips curled into a faint smile.


    It seemed like the rooms didn''t care if it was a human that went into them, as long as there was someone that went in to take the trial and they either passed or failed, it would count towards the counter. It didn''t matter if it was human, beast, or puppet, it just needed a body to enter the door.


    It seemed like there was still a way for Lin Fan to finish this first trial without losing too many of the group and taking up too much time.


    But there was still something that Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering about.


    Since there were all these doors set up, there must be a purpose for them. There would be no meaning if they were just there for people to fail or die in.


    As Lin Fan had this though, he moved towards one of the doors that was in front of him.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw Lin Fan moving towards the door, he couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan turned and said, "Watch over everything here for a few minutes, I''ll be back soon."


    Mo Ze Chen was about to say something, but before he could say a single word, Lin Fan had already opened the door in front of him and walked in. Mo Ze Chen was just left standing there with his mouth wide open, which soon turned into a bitter smile on his face.


    He knew that Lin Fan was strong, but no one that had gone through these doors hade back just yet, so he couldn''t help feeling a bit worried.


    However, since Lin Fan had already gone through the door, there wasn''t anything he could do. He turned to the others and said, "Just wait here for a bit. The boss will be back soon."


    But even as he said that, there were quite a few of the people behind him who revealed looks of doubt. It was clear that none of them believed what he said, but they weren''t wrong to not believe him. After all, the facts were just too against him.


    Still, there was nothing they could do except wait since none of them were willing to sacrifice their own lives.


    As for Lin Fan, once he went through that door, he found that what was waiting on the other side wasn''t as terrifying as he thought it would be. Once he went in, it took him no longer than five minutes to clear the trial that he was given.


    It was very unlikely that he was given an easier trial since all the doors had random designs and he had picked out a door randomly in the end.


    But if he hadn''t been, he was surprised by how fast that trial went. He couldn''t help wondering why the others had failed their exams.


    What he didn''t know was that these trials were designed for people in the Embryo Soul Realm, which was why he had been able to easily clear his. All the other people who had gone in had all been in the Fragmented Soul Realm and they were only normal experts since they were people who followed the real experts.


    Lin Fan just felt it was too easy because he was too strong now.


    After taking care of the trial, Lin Fan saw the door reappear where he hade in from and in front of the door was a podium. Atop that podium, there was a bead that was surrounded in a golden glow.


    Lin Fan walked up to the bead and reached out to touch it. The moment his hand made contact with the bead, the golden glow spread across him and entered into the diamond on his forehead.


    The only difference this time was that when it went past his eyes, he didn''t see any memories or any other scenes.


    All that he saw was a sh of light as the golden glow passed right in front of his eyes.


    After that was done, the entire space that he was in fell silent and turned dark, only leaving the door that was in front of him.


    Since there was nothing else left for him here, Lin Fan had no other choice but to go through the door to appear in the hall again.


    When he appeared, he saw the crowd that was waiting for him outside of the door that he had gone into. However, when he looked closely, he found that there were a few members of this crowd that were missing.


    Turning to look at the countdown, he saw that the number had also increased which matched the number of people that were missing, as well as including the one door that he had just cleared.


    It seemed like there were people who were too anxious and couldn''t wait for Lin Fan. It was just too bad that that decision was the one that had most likely cost them their lives.<sub> </sub>


    Based on his experience with the trial behind the doors, it didn''t seem like there was a chance to live if they failed the trial.


    Mo Ze Chen was the first one toe over as he asked, "Boss, how was it?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "Not bad, it''s just that there''s nothing worth it behind these doors."


    All the other people had been listening carefully and when they heard what Lin Fan said, they couldn''t help revealing doubtful looks. It seemed like while this person didn''t have any ill will, it also didn''t seem like he was willing to help them.


    Most of them were convinced that there were opportunities that were hiding behind the doors and this person just wanted to keep them for himself, which was why he had downyed it.


    So even though none of the other people who had gone into these doors hade back, they were still tempted to go in. There were already a few that were inching towards doors when Lin Fan said this, but of course it was hard for him to miss them.


    Without waiting for Mo Ze Chen to say anything, Lin Fan said in a cold voice, "All of you, stay still."


    When Lin Fan said this, there was a chill that filled the air and not a single one of them was able to move any further. The ones that had already moved a bit away from the group suddenly took a step back, but none of them dared to look back in Lin Fan''s direction.


    It seemed like they had been wrong about this person. They thought that he was a kind person, but now it seemed like they had just been his pawns.


    However, not a single one was disappointed with Lin Fan since they knew that this was just how this world went. The powerful people could do what they want and the less powerful had to just follow their will. This was a dog eat dog world.


    Lin Fan could naturally tell what they were thinking based on their expressions, but he also didn''t care since he knew that exining it to them wouldn''t work. Lin Fan just went back to the gate and forced them all to follow him.


    When he was in front of the gate, Lin Fan raised his hand and was about to summon the puppets when a voice suddenly came from behind him.


    That voice said, "Wait."


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this voice since they all recognized it and when they turned around, they saw Wang Jian standing there.


    Lin Fan also turned around to look at Wang Jian, but he didn''t say a thing as he waited for Wang Jian to continue.


    Wang Jian also ignored the crowd and had been focused on Lin Fan the entire time. Looking right into Lin Fan''s gaze, he said, "Let me give it a try first."


    Lin Fan looked at Wang Jian for a few seconds before raising his hand. However, this time, his hand wasn''t raised to call out the puppets. Rather his hand was stretched out in an inviting manner, as if he was letting Wang Jian do what he wanted.


    Wang Jian saw this and cupped his hand to Lin Fan before moving to the door closest to him. Without any hesitation, he pulled open the door and went right through. Of course, the Myriad Sword Hall junior who had been following behind Wang Jian also followed him in without any hesitation.


    He knew that in this unfamiliar ce, the safest ce for him was to follow Wang Jian who was like a god to him, even if that meant going through this potentially dangerous and unknown door.


    After Wang Jian disappeared, Lin Fan looked over the group and said, "You can go pick a door if you want, but you should know that you''ll die if you do."


    Everyone in the group felt a chill run down their backs when Lin Fan said this, but there were a few that also moved towards the doors since they still believed that there were opportunities hiding behind the doors for them.


    After reaching a door, those people all looked back at Lin Fan, as if waiting to see if he would make a move. However, Lin Fan just stood there and watched them with looks of pity, as if he was looking at people who had chosen to die.


    These people were confused, but since Lin Fan didn''t seem to be making a move, they decided to quickly enter before he changed his mind.


    To these people, what they thought Lin Fan had meant by them dying was that he would kill them if they entered these doors.


    It was too bad what they didn''t know was what Lin Fan actually meant was that there was only death waiting for them behind these doors.

 Chapter 476 Palace (5)

    There were a total of ten people who had gone in and taking away the four that had gone into doors while Lin Fan had been away, as well as Wang Jian and his follower who had also gone into a door, there were only twenty people left standing here including Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen.


    It wasn''t that these people didn''t also believe that there were opportunities behind these doors for them, it was just that they were too afraid of Lin Fan to move.


    These people were all followers, so they had the mentality of following and submitting to the strong.


    The people who had gone just now were people with high ambitions that allowed them to ovee their previous mental dispositions towards experts, but it was too bad that they didn''t know that this was what had determined their deaths.


    The ones that had chosen not to go against Lin Fan''s words and stood there waiting had actually made the right choice.


    Six minutes passed and there was a door that had opened.


    This was the second trial that had been cleared and naturally the one who had done it was Wang Jian.


    When he came out, he didn''t look any worse for wear, but he did have a disappointed look on his face. Opposed to him, there was the Myriad Sword Hall junior who was walking behind him looking quite sorry with a bitter look on his face.


    It was clear that one of them had a worse timepared to the other, but that was just the difference in strength.


    Wang Jian walked over to the group again and looked at Lin Fan before saying, "Do you have a way to clear this round?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him and just gave a nod.


    Wang Jian didn''t ask anything else and stood with the crowd, but it was clear that he didn''t n on going into any more doors and that he was nning on going with Lin Fan. This made it even harder for them to break off and go through the doors themselves.


    After another minute of waiting, Lin Fan didn''t wait any longer.


    The countdown still didn''t match the number of people that had gone in, so there were still people who were still alive, but Lin Fan gave up on them. After all, he wasn''t a saint that would wait for everyone, he just needed to go to the next round. Not to mention that they were running out of time.


    Waiting for everyone like this had drained half an hour from their two hour time limit, so they really were pushing it.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan raised his hand and summoned out the dead rat puppets that all lined up in front of a row of doors.


    He came to the end of this row and opened and closed the doors one by one, sending the rat puppets in.


    In less than a minute, the countdown above the gate started going up. The number continued to soar until it reached the required number.


    But right before anything else happened, the number suddenly went up to 51, going above the number that they needed.


    Right after that, there was a clicking sound before the door unlocked and swung open to reveal a corridor that didn''t seem to have an end in sight.


    But that wasn''t the first thing that Lin Fan cared about, what he cared about more was the number of the countdown. It seemed like it was possible to exceed the number needed by sacrificing people and they didn''t need to wait for the trial of others to finish before unlocking this gate.


    That meant that if the people who were still trapped in the rooms were to survive and pass their trials, they would be able to catch up to them in the next trial.


    Though that was what this should have meant, that didn''t mean that Lin Fan would wait for them.


    While Lin Fan stood there in thought, Wang Jian was the one who took the lead by walking right down that hall without any fear. He went at a steady pace and was soon already getting further and further away from them.


    Of course following behind him was that other Myriad Sword Hall junior.


    When the other people in the group saw this and saw that Lin Fan still wasn''t moving, they couldn''t wait any longer and ran down the corridor, chasing after Wang Jian.<sub> </sub>


    After all, Lin Fan wasn''t the only expert here. Wang Jian might have lost to Lin Fan, but that didn''t mean that he wasn''t an expert in his own right. Between following Wang Jian and following Lin Fan, it really didn''t matter to them since both of them would treat them as pawns.


    At the very least, Wang Jian was the one moving forward right now and these people couldn''t wait.


    Soon, it was only Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen who were left in this room.


    However, even though it was only the two of them in this room, neither of them made a move.


    Lin Fan had still been in thought while Mo Ze Chen just stood there waiting for Lin Fan toe back to his senses.


    It didn''t take Lin Fan long toe back to his senses since in the end, there was nothing he could do for the people that chose to follow their own desires. In the end, they were the ones that made the choice, so they would have to face the consequences.


    If they could make it out ande to the next round, that was good for them, but if they couldn''t, that was just fate.


    After thinking this, Lin Fan started moving through the gate and heading down the corridor with Mo Ze Chen following behind him. As they went along, Mo Ze Chen took onest look behind them before following Lin Fan down the hall.


    Eventually they had gone far enough where they couldn''t see the gate behind them anymore.


    When this happened, what they didn''t see was that the gate had closed behind them. At the same time, the countdown increased by the remaining number of people that had been inside the doors, but there wasn''t a single door that had opened to let anyone out¡­


    As Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen continued down the corridor, they noticed that the area in front of them was perfectly lit even though there wasn''t a single torch that was by them. As they realized this, they began looking around for the reason and when they looked up, they found that there were tiny lights that were like the giant sun that was above the pce outside.


    All of these tiny lights were sparkling in the sky above them, but when Lin Fan looked closely at them, he couldn''t help feeling a familiar auraing from them. Looking more closely, he could see that there was a faint golden glow around these lights.


    Could it be¡­?


    Lin Fan stopped moving and Mo Ze Chen turned to look at him before also turning to look at the lights with an intrigued look.


    After a pause, Lin Fan suddenly called out Xiao Feng and jumped onto his back. When Lin Fan had jumped onto Xiao Feng''s back, Mo Ze Chen also jumped right on without a word.


    Both of them rode Xiao Feng just like this as he flew up to the ceiling above them, but before they could reach the small lights that were above them, there seemed to be a kind of invisible barrier that was stopping them from going any further. Xiao Feng tried pushing through, but he wasn''t able to break through it at all no matter how hard he had tried.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this and he raised his hand to gather his power, but then he felt a hint of danger from in front of him. It was as if he made a move, there would be something that would be some powerful force that would strike him down where he stood.


    Lin Fan wasn''t certain of this, but he didn''t doubt his instincts in this situation because it seemed too likely that this was the case.


    However, when he looked at the lights that were in the ceiling, he could tell that these lights were all made of that golden energy that was special in this realm. Looking at all these lights that were in the ceiling, it was clear that there was a giant amount of that golden energy that was stored here.


    Lin Fan wanted this energy since he knew that this golden energy was important in this realm, but at the same time, there was a chill that ran down his back.


    He didn''t know specifically what this kind of energy was, but ording to the little girl, this was the energy of the "gods". If that was the case, someone that could control this much of this energy, just how powerful could he be?


    Lin Fan already had some idea what the purpose of these ruins were and with this clue added in, he felt an even stronger chill run down his back.


    But still, there was nothing he could do but continue forward.


    So Xiao Feng came back down to the ground and they continued forward down this corridor.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the end of this corridor, but when the walked through the end, they couldn''t find anyone there.

 Chapter 477 Palace (6)

    The room that they came into was a very small room that didn''t have much in it.


    Compared to the hall from before, this room waspletely different because this room was so small that no more than ten people could fit in here and that was on the basis that they stood side by side. If they forced it, they might have been able to put another person in, but that definitely would have been the limit.


    However, the group that hade here before was definitely bigger than that, there were at least twenty of them and they definitely wouldn''t have fit in this room. But then there was the strange part because there wasn''t a single person here and this was a dead end.


    There was nowhere else that they could have gone but this room and Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen didn''t meet them along the way, so where had they gone?


    p They couldn''t have just disappeared from this ce like that, right?</anda>


    Unless there was something that they had missed along the way because they had been distracted by the lights in the ceiling¡­


    Still for now, Lin Fan put those thoughts in the back of his mind and began walking around this room, looking for any clues at all.


    To say that this room waspletely empty would be a lie since there was indeed still one thing that was in it. On the exact opposite side of the room, there was a wooden sign that was stuck in the ground.


    Looking closely, Lin Fan could see that there was something written on it, but there wasn''t anything special about these words since they weren''t covered in a golden glow.


    But after looking around the entire room, Lin Fan wasn''t able to find a single thing in the end, so he had no choice but to look at the wooden sign.


    What was written on the wooden sign was very simple, but it also didn''t make any sense to Lin Fan since it was talking about something that Lin Fan couldn''t see.


    The wooden sign said, "Make it to the end of thebyrinth to find what you seek."


    However, the moment that Lin Fan finished reading the wooden sign, there was a sh of golden light that appeared in front of him. As if it was triggered by him reading it, the words on the wooden sign were now covered in a golden glow.


    That golden glow became stronger and stronger until it blinded him.


    Then before he could even react, the floor under him seemed to copse and he began falling.


    During this entire time, Mo Ze Chen had been looking around the room and when the words on the wooden sign started glowing, he hadn''t been able to see a single thing. Even when Lin Fan had suddenly fallen down that hole, Mo Ze Chen hadn''t heard a single thing.


    When Mo Ze Chen finally turned around, he saw that Lin Fan had disappeared from the room they had just been in.


    Mo Ze Chen immediately looked around himself, but he couldn''t find Lin Fan at all, so he couldn''t help asking, "Boss, where are you?"


    However, all that he was met with was silence since Lin Fan had long disappeared from this room. Lin Fan had fallen down into the tunnel underneath him and had been brought to a different ce.


    Seeing that there was nothing else he could do, Mo Ze Chen also came over to the wooden sign as well and started reading it. Once he finished, the same thing happened where the words were suddenly covered in a golden glow and he fell down as well.


    Once he was gone, the room fell silent and it was once again emptied.


    ¡­


    After falling down, Lin Fan continued to fall for a few minutes before he finallynded on solid ground.


    Looking around himself, he could see that he was surrounded by walls that reached high up above him, going all the way to the ceiling, blocking off certain directions around him. In front of him was a passage and all around him in the other directions were walls that had cut him off.


    It seemed like there was only one way for him to go, but Lin Fan didn''t move forward just yet.


    The first thing he did was search around his surroundings to see if there were any signs of people.<sub> </sub>


    Since he had been dragged into thisbyrinth after reading the wooden sign, he could only assume that the others who had gone in before him had experienced the same thing. If that was the case, he should be able to find a trace of people passing by in this area.


    Lin Fan looked around the area around him with a few puppets that he released, but even after searching the smallest corners, he wasn''t able to find a single thing. It was as if there wasn''t a single trace of human interaction in this ce.


    Then could it be that they were all sent to different starting points?


    That would seem like the only logical exnation that was left.


    If that was the case, that would make sense since Mo Ze Chen wasn''t sent to the same ce as him even though they had been together.


    This was actually a good guess on Lin Fan''s part because in another part of thebyrinth, Mo Ze Chen was actually panicking since he had been separated from Lin Fan.


    He knew how strong he was and he knew how dangerous it was for him to go through thisbyrinth without Lin Fan, so the first goal that Mo Ze Chen had set for himself was to find Lin Fan. It was just too bad that it was too hard for him to take that first step.


    Just like Lin Fan, he had been put into a ce where there were three walls around him and only a single corridor in front of him, so he had no choice but to move.


    After a while, Mo Ze Chen still decided to head forward because he figured that it would be more dangerous to stay in this location because he didn''t know what was lurking inside of thebyrinth. At the very least, if he continued forward, he wouldn''t be trapped in a dead end and would have a chance to escape if he needed it.


    Back on Lin Fan''s side, he still didn''t move after searching the area around him because this time he sent out the puppets to search out the area in front of him.


    The puppets continued forward down the only path until they came to a split in that path. Once they arrived at this split, they separated into even groups and both groups headed down a separate path.


    As the puppets continued further and further,they were met with more and more splits in this path until they were all separated and went alone. Like this, as the puppets met more splits, Brainy had no choice but to let them go down only one of the paths and ignore the other.


    It didn''t take long before Brainy found that there was something strange in thisbyrinth.


    First, no matter which direction Brainy sent the puppets down, they never seemed to have met a dead end. It was as if there were infinite directions to go in and there didn''t seem to be an end in sight.


    To test this, Brainy had sent one of the puppets down only the left path so that it would continue in a circle until it reached its starting point. However, even after five left turns, the puppet still wasn''t able to reach its starting point.


    Brainy was certain of this because it had pulled back one of the puppets to where this puppet was so that it could act as andmark, but Brainy could tell that these two puppets were in different corridors.


    Brainy didn''t give up right away on this and continued to send that puppet down the left path, but there wasn''t an end in sight.


    The only thing that Brainy knew was that somehow, even after all the distance that it had traveled, it was still able to remain in its spiritual sense range even though it should have been out of it based on how far it had walked.


    Seeing that there was no end, Brainy decided to try and bring back one of the puppets to see if that would work, but that failed in the end as well.


    It had worked for the other puppet because they were closer together, but when Brainy tried to pull one of the puppets back to the starting location where Lin Fan was, no matter how it tried, it could never reach it. Even though it followed the exact same path as it went, it couldn''t reach where Lin Fan was.


    It even seemed like the puppet was getting further and further away from Brainy because Brainy could feel that the spiritual sense link was getting weaker.


    Finally, Lin Fan decided to end the scouting there because it seemed like they wouldn''t be able to get any useful information from it.


    Brainy looked depressed because this was the one thing that it was good at and now that it had failed, it seemed to take it personally.


    Lin Fan saw this and patted Brainy on the head to indicate that it shouldn''t worry about this before putting Brainy back in his sleeve.


    Then after that, he faced the path in front of him and started moving forward.

 Chapter 478 Palace (7)

    As Lin Fan headed forward, he looked around himself to see if he could find any clues, even though Brainy''s puppets hadn''t been able to find anything.


    He just wanted to see if there was anything that they might have missed since they weren''t able to see it, things that might have been written in golden words. However, as he continued along, he wasn''t able to find a single one of these things.


    As he continued along, Lin Fan also began thinking about the secret of thisbyrinth.


    It was clear that there was something here that was obstructing the senses of the people that went through thisbyrinth, but as for what it was, Lin Fan wasn''t certain. However, Lin Fan did have two guesses as to what it might be.


    One was that there were illusionws that were carved into the walls of these ruins and the second was that there were spatialws that were inside of these ruins that changed them.


    Either one of these was something that Lin Fan would find hard to deal with.


    The illusionw would interfere with how he perceived thebyrinth and Lin Fan didn''t have aw to deal with this, otherwise this wouldn''t be a problem.


    As for the spatialw, while Lin Fan''s control of spatialws as well, his understanding of spatialws was much weaker than whoever created thisbyrinth. The spatialws would twist the space around him, making him go around in circles without him noticing.


    Either way, without some kind of way to deal with whatever was in thisbyrinth, there was no chance of Lin Fan making it to the end. So the only thing he could do now was move forward and see if there were any clues that he could see that the puppets weren''t able to find. Namely, clues that were covered in a golden glow.


    Lin Fan made his way through the passage in front of him and even when he reached the first turn, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    When he arrived at the first turn, he looked around himself, but he still wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    He had already sent puppets down both of these ways, so he knew that neither of them was the right way to go, but there was no other way for him to go. He could have tried to jump the walls or break through them, but that didn''t work at all.


    The walls went from floor to ceiling, so there was no way for Lin Fan to go over the walls.


    He couldn''t go under or through the walls either since he couldn''t make a scratch in either the wall or the ground when he tried to dig with his Iron Eater Bone Artifact transformed into a shovel. It was the same situation with the buildings outside, there was the timew that was covering it that made it impossible for Lin Fan to make a single scratch.


    Then again, with the timew that was covering it, even if he had been able to make a scratch, it definitely wouldn''t havested long since it would have been repaired by the timews.


    Seeing that this was the case, Lin Fan had no choice but to go in one of the directions. However, he did something that he didn''t dost time, which was an idea that he stole from a child''s fairy tail.


    Lin Fan always kept a store of food in his Storage Ring and the storage of the system just in case, both for when he was exploring and for when he was in the cultivation realms.


    He reached into his store of food and pulled out a loaf of bread before he started moving forward.


    Lin Fan chose to go down the right path and as he continued forward, Lin Fan began leaving bread crumbs behind him. However, these weren''t ordinary bread crumbs, rather they were bread crumbs that had Brainy''s parasite seeds in them, which allowed it to track them with its spiritual sense.


    Since Brainy''s parasite seeds were inherently linked to it because they came from it, it could track them even when being influenced by otherws. Only when thews used were much stronger than Brainy would it be unable to track these seeds anymore, but it had been able to track the seeds in the puppets earlier, so it wasn''t worried.


    As Lin Fan continued down the corridor, he came to the next fork in the road.


    However, this time, Lin Fan didn''t continue forward, but rather he immediately turned around to look at the trail of bread crumbs behind him.


    Lin Fan wanted to test how strong thews that were making people lost in thisbyrinth was, which was why he had immediately turned around since that was the best way to engage it. If he turned around, it would definitely activate because thebyrinth wouldn''t want him to retrace his steps.


    As he expected, while following the bread crumbs, he soon lost track of them and couldn''t see them anymore. Even though Brainy could sense them, it could also tell that they were strangely getting further away from where they were, as if there was a strange force moving them.<sub> </sub>


    Once they felt this force acting on them, Lin Fan immediately stopped moving and tried to sense what kind ofws were contained within thisbyrinth.


    As soon as he did, there was the same familiar feeling that he had felt when he had been dropped into the fountain, immediately telling him what kind ofws they were. It was clear that thisbyrinth was filled with spatialws that were misleading the people inside.


    But even if he knew what kind ofw it was, it didn''t matter since Lin Fan wasn''t able to do a thing against this spatialw. He could tell from the aura that it gave that it was at a much higher level than he was.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t give up as he began forcefully making his way back towards his trail of bread crumbs that he had left.


    It was just too bad that this spatialw wouldn''t let him no matter what he did. The more he tried pushing against this spatialw, the more lost he became until it reached the point where the bread crumbs were pushed out of Brainy''s spiritual sense range.


    At this time, Lin Fan finally chose to stop because there was nothing left guiding him.


    After going through thisbyrinth for so long, there hadn''t been a single clue that Lin Fan had found, which meant that he was nowpletely lost. He couldn''t even find where his other puppets were, they had all been pushed out of Brainy''s spiritual sense range.


    Brainy could only feel that they still existed, but beyond that, the feeling was too faint for it to find where they were.


    As Lin Fan was about to give up, he suddenly saw something in the corner of his eye.


    Lin Fan immediately turned in the direction of the thing he saw, which was a faint golden glow. It was a faint and small golden light in the distance that seemed to be beckoning towards him, but all of Lin Fan''s instincts told him that this seemed to be a trap¡­


    After all, for a light like this to appear when Lin Fan was the most lost, what else would it be if not a trap?


    So with this thought in mind, Lin Fan turned in the exact opposite direction and started walking without even turning back.


    However, as he continued forward, he could feel the spatialws around him acting on him, causing him to get more and more lost in thisbyrinth. Still, it was better than going into the obvious trap that was waiting for him in that light.


    The strange thing was that as he became more and more lost, the strange light suddenly began glowing brighter and brighter.


    It had gone from a faint and small golden light at first, but as Lin Fan continued walking along, it grew in size and brightness until it reached a point that was hard for Lin Fan to ignore. Looking back at it, it was like one direction waspletely bathed in golden light while the other waspletely bathed in darkness.


    But, no matter how Lin Fan looked at that golden glow, it seemed like an obvious trap to him.


    After all, for this golden glow to appear when he was at his lowest point, that was definitely suspicious.


    Still, it wasn''t a way to continue walking in the opposite direction because all that did was get him more and more lost.


    In the end, Lin Fan finally gave up and decided to take the path that was lit up by the golden glow.


    As he walked through the golden glow, he could see that bits of it were peeling off the walls and entering into his body, strengthening the power inside the golden diamond on his forehead. This was the same process as when he received power from the various objects in the trials, but the power contained in these walls far surpassed the power contained in those objects.


    Just by walking down this hall, Lin Fan felt that he had obtained at least ten times more golden energypared to all the items that he had gained.


    At the same time, as he continued down the hall and absorbed the golden glow, the light around him became dimmer and dimmer until itpletely faded away.


    The trap that Lin Fan expected toe never came, but something else did appear.

 Chapter 479 Palace (8)

    Even as the golden light around him dimmed, there was nothing that really changed with thebyrinth. That was until the golden light hadpletely disappeared.


    Once that golden glow was gone, there was a light that appeared at the end of the corridor that reced it.


    The light wasn''t strong, it was a gentle kind of brightness that soothed the eyes, but it was still bright enough that Lin Fan couldn''t see what was ahead of him.


    When this appeared, naturally the first thing Lin Fan did was pull out his weapon before moving any further and of course he also spread out his spiritual sense in front of him, trying to see if he could sense what was there. However, just as he had expected, there was some kind of force that was covering up the space in front of him, blocking off his spiritual sense.


    So since he had no other choice, he started moving forward.


    It would seem smart to pull out the two maid girls in this situation since he could use them as shields, but the only problem was that they were unable to move while they were in a defensive state. If he were to pull them out, he would have to use both hands to hold them up and that would mean not having enough hands to hold his weapon.


    If he held only one of them in his hand while holding his weapon in the other, that would be awkward for Lin Fan because he never trained in using a shield and using it now would be dangerous.


    Then there was the option of having other puppets hold these girls while standing in front of him, but there was also the fact that the corridor was too crowded for them to all fit.


    So in the end, the best choice was to move forward alone.


    As he approached the light at the end of the tunnel, Lin Fan still didn''t sense any signs of danger in front of him and thatsted until he went right through the end of the corridor,ing out into a hall.


    The hall was quiterge, but it definitely wasn''t empty since there was a throne that was at the very end of the hall. At the base of that throne, there was a coffin lying there.


    Then when he looked around, he saw that there was already someone else who had arrived before him.


    It wasn''t someone who he was unfamiliar with, but the moment that person saw him, he revealed an ugly look because it was clear that he didn''t want to see Lin Fan here at all.


    This person wasn''t Mo Ze Chen as one would expect since Mo Ze Chen was the person with the second most amount of golden glow, or at least that was what Lin Fan thought since he knew that the people who came in after only got one injection of it before being able toe into this tree of light.


    But still it was Wang Jian who had arrived before Lin Fan.


    However, there wasn''t that Myriad Sword Hall junior that was following behind him. Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this though since he knew that they most likely were split when they fell into thisbyrinth since that was how thisbyrinth worked.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with Wang Jian since he knew that it was his luck and ability that had brought him here, so there was nothing for Lin Fan to criticize. Instead, what he cared about was the room itself, or rather what danger was hidden in this room.


    But before he started doing that, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile and shaking his head as he thought about the design of thebyrinth.


    The person who designed thatbyrinth was definitely someone who liked to y jokes because thatbyrinthpletely went against the rules of these trials.


    To put it simply, the more lost you became the easier it was to find the exit, that was the gimmick of thisbyrinth.


    If you continued forward and tried to find the exit by taking either of the paths offered to you, that golden glow would never appear for you because you were still moving forward, with a chance to reach the exit. However, if you went in the direct opposite direction and continued retracing your steps, that was forcing thebyrinth to keep you from going back and making you more lost, while also giving up on the chance of finding the exit by going forward.


    Once that was the case, the golden glow would appear in front of you and lead you to the exit.


    However, that wasn''t what broke the rules of these trials.


    Rather, what broke the rules was that the longer you refused to turn around and go down the right path, the stronger the golden glow down that path became. There didn''t seem to be a limit as to how strong it could be and based on how much Lin Fan had received, it would definitely allow anyone to surpass whoever had the most golden glow in these entire ruins instantly. After all, Lin Fan could tell that the amount that he had now was easily more than ten times what he had before¡­<sub> </sub>


    Whoever designed thisbyrinth really didn''t y fair¡­


    Still, now that it was over, it was time to focus on the next phase since they only had an hour left.


    Within thisst hour, Lin Fan had to make sure to get to the bottom of these ruins, but he wasn''t sure how many trials would still be left.


    Since Wang Jian didn''t want to talk to him, Lin Fan walked around the room and saw that there were many different doors that lined the walls, but there were only two doors that were open. There was only the door behind Wang Jian and the door that he had juste through that had been opened.


    It seemed like these doors connected to thebyrinth and it also seemed like they were the only two that had made it.


    ? There was a trace of concern for Mo Ze Chen that appeared in his heart since it would be false to say that they hadn''t gotten closer during this trip, but there was nothing he could do.


    At the very least, he knew that Mo Ze Chen was much strongerpared to before since he had absorbed all that golden energy, so he should be safer. At the same time though, Lin Fan also didn''t know what exactly was hidden in thebyrinth since he had identally figured out the answer too quickly.


    But as he thought of this, he suddenly realized something as he turned to look at Wang Jian.


    Just how had Wang Jian gotten here so fast?


    Even if he had entered thebyrinth before Lin Fan, he shouldn''t have been able to figure out the secret so fast, unless¡­


    Lin fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at Wang Jian and Wang Jian could naturally sense that Lin Fan was looking at him, so he couldn''t help flinching a bit. Even if he had been able to stabilize his heart, that didn''t mean that there wasn''t a little heart demon still left that caused him to feel fear towards Lin Fan.


    Now that Lin Fan was staring at him just like this, that fear became even stronger.


    Wang Jian wanted to say something, but he wasn''t able to in the end, so there was an awkward atmosphere that filled the hall.


    However, that was broken in the end when Lin Fan said, "How did you finish thebyrinth so fast?"


    Wang Jian clearly wasn''t expecting Lin Fan to ask this, so he looked quite surprised. Still, he was able to quickly gather his mind and he said, "Was it that hard? I just walked around for a bit and I found the exit after seeing the golden glow."


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this, but then when he thought about it, he felt that it seemed right.


    To put it simply, based on what he knew about Wang Jian, he was a very straightforward person like with most of the sword cultivators that he had seen. But to put it in other words, it could also mean that Wang Jian''s mind was a bit "simple".


    Since he was simple, he was easily influenced by the spatialw in thebyrinth. At some point, it must have turned him around without him noticing, so he started moving in the wrong direction which should have triggered the exit since he did mention seeing a golden glow.


    Lin Fan looked at Wang Jian with a bit of pity since he knew that Wang Jian had missed an opportunity by following the golden glow as soon as it had appeared.


    When Wang Jian saw this look, he couldn''t help being even more confused, but he definitely wasn''t going to say anything.


    Lin Fan was about to say something else when there was a sudden sound that came from their side.


    When they turned in the direction of the sound, they not only saw one of the doors open, they also saw a bright glowing from the corridor that the door revealed. It was so bright that they couldn''t see through it to see what was on the other side, but unlike before when they were in the corridor with the bright light, they were able to send their spiritual senses through.


    They could tell that there was someone walking out of the corridor, but as for who it was, they didn''t know.

 Chapter 480 Inheritance (1)

    After a few more seconds, that person walked right through the light and appeared in front of them.


    When they saw this person, they both revealed different expressions in response to it.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile while Wang Jian slightly knitted his brows.


    When that person came through, he also looked around the room first before noticing that there were two people standing in the room.


    The first person he saw made him knit his brows, but the second person he saw immediately made him release those knitted brows and break out in a smile.


    Walking past Wang Jian who wasn''t looking at him, but rather turned back to Lin Fan, that person came up to Lin Fan and waved his hand as he said, "Boss, I finally found you!"


    Lin Fan had a faint smile as he said, "You''re finally here."


    That person was without a doubt Mo Ze Chen who had finally made his way through thebyrinth.


    There shouldn''t be any doubt of this since after Lin Fan, Mo Ze Chen was the person with the second most amount of golden energy, so he should have been able to easily see the golden glow in the corridor. Not to mention, it had been Mo Ze Chen who had found a lot of their clues and he was someone who explored ruins, so this should be easy for him to find.


    Mo Ze Chen said with an aggrieved look, "Boss, this ce really is strange. I couldn''t get anywhere in the beginning and I was only able to find the exit when I started going backwards."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he reached his hand out in front of Mo Ze Chen''s forehead and slowly he began using a bit of his life energy.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised, but he didn''t resist as Lin Fan''s life energy triggered the golden diamond that was on his forehead. Once it was triggered, it started releasing golden energy that gathered in Lin Fan palm.


    When that golden energy came out, Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan in surprise, but he still didn''t do anything in the end.


    After a few seconds, Lin Fan released his life energy and the golden energy went back into the golden diamond.


    Mo Ze Chen''s back had been turned to Wang Jian and Lin Fan''s hand had surrounded the golden energy, so Wang Jian hadn''t seen anything, but he could feel a strange sensationing from that direction. Still, he didn''t dare do anything because of the heart demon that Lin Fan had created in him.


    This ability that Lin Fan had just used was one that he had learned from the book that the elders had given him, it was one of the few techniques that was included that would allow him to control this golden energy.


    After checking the golden energy in the golden diamond on Mo Ze Chen''s head, Lin Fan shook his head and asked, "Did you follow the golden glow as soon as it appeared in the tunnel?"


    Mo Ze Chen''s expression was filled with even more surprise as he answered with a question, "Boss, how did you know that?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and gave a sigh when he heard this.


    When he had checked the golden energy inside the golden diamond on Mo Ze Chen''s head, he could tell that it wasn''t much strongerpared to when they were togetherst. It was clear that he hadn''t received the wave of golden energy that would havee if he had just waited.


    Still, at the very least he got some and cleared thisbyrinth unlike the rest of the people who were still stuck here.


    But even with him here, there was nothing they could do since there was no change in this room.


    Was this room like the others where they had to meet a certain criteria as a group before they would be able to move on?


    If that were the case, just how many more of these trials would there be?


    While Lin Fan was thinking this over, something was happening way up above them at the very top of the tree.


    ¡­


    At the very top of the giant glowing tree, the beast that had been lying there the whole time had finally stood up as a hint of excitement filled its eyes. It was almost as if what it had been waiting for the entire time had finally happened.


    As soon as it stood up, all the ghostmanders that had been wandering around immediately came back without even receiving an order, it was as if they had instinctively felt something that had summoned them back.<sub> </sub>


    When they all arrived, the beast didn''t bother turning to look at them as it said, "The time is here. All of you take your positions and make sure that nothing goes wrong, or else you all know what will happen."


    When the beast said this, all of the ghostmanders felt a chill run down their back. They naturally knew what the beast was talking about and they knew how serious this was because this was something that they had been preparing for for a long time.


    With a nod and a bow from all the ghostmanders, they all jumped off the tree and flew out in different directions.


    When they flew off the tree, they left different coloured lines in the air behind them.


    Those lines crossed each other in the air until they seemed to form a giant formation in the sky above the ruins. As soon as all their lines were drawn, the different lines lit up with different coloured glows and there was a pressure that suddenly fell over the city.


    None of the ghosts inside the city was affected, but all the humans that were still left outside of the tree of light felt this pressure fall down on them.


    While the pressure wasn''t strong enough to render them unable to do anything, it definitely had some effect on them since they could feel their movements be more sluggish.


    Some of these humans were smart enough to withdraw from the city the moment this pressure had fallen down on them, but as for the rest¡­


    They were arrogant young masters who felt that they would be able to break through whatever strange phenomenon this was, so they continued pushing forward. But of course, the main reason for them doing this was naturally because of their greed. They weren''t willing to leave these ruins before they obtained the treasures that they believed they were entitled to.


    It was just too bad that this was thest bad choice in their life.


    Other than the ghostmanders that had flown out into the air, there were a few that hadnded on the ground and had gatheredrge hordes that followed behind them. These ghostmanders led their hordes to hunt down their prey, namely the humans that still hadn''t left these ruins just yet.


    With the pressure on them, they were unable to fight at their full power, but even if they could, they still would have been overwhelmed by these ghost hordes. After all, the strongest of them had already entered the tree and the ones that were left were mid tier geniuses.


    The strongest among them was only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm, far from being able topare to the ghostmanders, not to mention the ghosts of the hordes since even the weakest ghost was also in the Low Embryo Soul Realm.


    It didn''t take long before these ghostmanders had swept through all the humans left in the city like a scythe cutting through wheat. All that was left was the dried out corpses of these humans, having been sucked dry of their life force.


    This whole process took no more than five minutes and when it was done, the beast that had been standing above in the tree watching all of this gave a satisfied nod before turning to look down at the tree.


    It looked straight down for a bit before suddenly turning into golden light that disappeared from the spot that it had been standing in.


    This golden lightbined with the tree and quickly traveled down the trunk before disappearing into the tree itself.


    When this golden glow appeared again, it had appeared far under the tree.


    ¡­


    After Mo Ze Chen had arrived, there still hadn''t been a change in the room, so all three of them decided to look around for anything that would give them a clue.


    However, after searching the room for five minutes straight, they still weren''t able to find anything.


    There wasn''t a countdown like with all the rooms previously and all that was present was the throne with the coffin underneath it.


    Just to see if there was anything special in the coffin, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had gone over to try and lift up the lid, but they weren''t able to do it no matter how hard they tried. It was almost as if the lid was glued to the coffin or as if the lid didn''t exist and it was all part of the same statue.


    In the end, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen stood in front of the throne, trying to see if there was anything special about it.


    It was at this moment that Lin Fan decided to sit down on the throne, but the moment he did, something had finally changed.


    There was a golden glow that suddenly appeared in the center of the room.

 Chapter 481 Inheritance (2)

    This golden glow grew in intensity until it suddenly started taking form.


    It began taking shape, changing from just a ball at first to a shape that almost seemed like a cat.


    At first it was a small cat, but then it slowly grew and grew until it was the size of a lion, but even then it still didn''t stop.


    It continued to grow until it was more than three meters tall and was even bigger than a normal elephant, but even with how big it was, it had maintained the same shape as before.


    But when Lin Fan saw this shape, he couldn''t help knitting his brows since he had seen this figure before...though he hadn''t seen it directly.


    It had been when they had first entered the ruins and they had avoided this beast, or rather they were trying to track it to take it down. Lin Fan had sent out Brainy''s puppets to find it, but they had all been crushed in the end which was why they hadn''t been able to find it. However, before they were crushed, they did ry information back to Brainy on what it looked like.


    It was a giant cat, the Nascent Soul Realm beast of this realm was a giant cat.


    However, this giant cat had been attacking the people who had entered the ruins, which meant that it definitely wasn''t friendly.


    After a slight pause, Lin Fan immediately raised his guard, pulling out his weapon as he warily looked at the beast that was slowly taking form.


    The other two were also stunned at first, but just like Lin Fan, they pulled out their weapons because that was usually the best choice in a situation like this.


    Slowly the cat beast took form until the golden light around it dissipated and it appeared in full in front of the three of them, softlynding on its paws on the ground.


    When itnded, it first looked around at the three who were looking at it warily without saying a thing and then it revealed a smile, or at least what could be considered a smile with the face that it had.


    It wasn''t in a hurry to speak as it raised its paw to lick it, but the pressure that it released couldn''t be faked.


    For Wang Jian who was from one of the twelve great factions, he was familiar with this kind of aura since he felt it from his elders before. There was no doubt that the aura that this beast was releasing was in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    For Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan, they already knew this, so they weren''t surprised by this at all. However, it was a different story for Wang Jian.


    Wang Jian knew that none of them was a match for this beast, they wouldn''t even be a match for an expert in the Child Soul Realm since they were all in the Embryo Soul Realm. This was a gap of almost two full realms, it was not something that could be easily crossed.


    The only thing they could do now was run, which was what Wang Jian was already considering. His hand behind him was already holding the escape pearl that they had received in the beginning.


    It was a different situation for Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen because they were already aware of it and were already preparing to hunt this Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    But before any of them could make a move, the beast suddenly said, "Why are you all like this? There''s no need to be this wary."


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this.


    They weren''t surprised that this beast could talk, but rather that it was choosing to talk to them now.


    When they had encountered it previously, it had been ughtering everyone that it had met, but now it seemed like apletely different beast.


    Wang Jian didn''t trust this beast and took a step back. Even Mo Ze Chen didn''t trust it and didn''t let his guard down, but Lin Fan asked, "Then why shouldn''t we be wary of you?"


    The beast immediately turned to Lin Fan and there was a look of appreciation in its eyes as it looked at him for a few seconds before it said, "Because it''s very simple, you''re the ones that have passed master''s test and will receive his inheritance."


    All three of them were stunned when they heard this even though not a single one of them believed what this beast was saying.


    After all, there was no indication of this from the ruins themselves and it was just the words of this beast that had been killing everyone else before, so it would be hard for a normal person to believe this. However, the beast didn''t care as it just looked at them with the same ugly smile.<sub> </sub>


    After another pause, Lin Fan then asked, "There''s three of us here, how are you nning to give this inheritance to us?"


    The beast didn''t hesitate at all as it said, "Of course you''ve all been ranked based on your aplishments in these ruins. Did you think that we haven''t been watching the entire time?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes trembled when he heard this because he already knew that this was the case based on the actions of the little girl with the whale, after all, she had set up a giant barrier just to keep out unwanted attention¡­


    Seeing that no one was saying anything, the beast didn''t mind as it started moving towards the coffin and the throne.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were in the way, so they moved out of the way, giving the beast a wide berth as it walked over to the foot of the throne. After it reached the foot of the throne, the beast suddenly started changing form as it began to shrink.


    It continued to shrink until it reached human size, but not only was it human size, it also took human form.


    In its human form, it took the form of an elegant man with pure blonde hair that reached all the way to his waist and he was wearing a pure ck suit with a monocle on one eye.


    The best way to describe him would be that he was a perfect example of a butler.


    Once the beast had taken human form, it came in front of the coffin and kneeled down to it before pushing it open.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were surprised when they saw this because this coffin had been sealed shut for them. No matter how they had tried pushing the lid earlier, they hadn''t been able to budge it at all, but now this beast was able to easily open the coffin.


    After the coffin was opened, it revealed a person who was sleeping inside the coffin. Or at least he looked like he was sleeping, but since he was in this coffin, it was most likely that he was¡­


    When the beast saw this person in the coffin, it immediately revealed a different expression as a tear came to its eye, specifically only the right eye. It looked very strange how there was only one stream of tears that came from the right eye while there was nothing that came from the left eye, but there was no exnation for it.


    After it shed that one tear, it stood up and leaned in over the corpse that was in the coffin before it began to shake it as it said, "Master, it''s time to wake up."


    The other three in the room were confused why the beast was doing this and even thought that the best had lost its mind from its grief, but before they could say anything, there was a transparent figure that appeared above the coffin.


    Looking carefully at this transparent figure, it looked exactly the same as the one that was lying inside the coffin.


    That transparent figure had its eyes closed at first and they slowly opened as it gave a yawn. Once it finally opened its eyes, it looked around itself before turning to the beast that had now gone back to kneeling.


    After a slight pause, the figure suddenly asked, "How long has it been?"


    ? The beast revealed a smile as it looked up and said, "Master, it''s been a thousand years since you''vest woken up."


    The figure just said "oh" before it then said, "So what did you wake me for this time? Are there more intruders?"


    The beast shook his head before turning to gesture at Lin Fan''s group of three, "Master, it''s finally time. These are the ones that have passed your trial to earn your inheritance."


    The figure couldn''t react at first, but then it suddenly revealed a look of understanding as it quickly turned to look at Lin Fan and the others. After looking at them for a bit, the figure suddenly said, "So you''re the ones that have cleared my trial?"


    After it said this, it burst out inughter before saying, "Good, good, it''s been too long! Now I can finally rest easy!"


    When it burst out inughter, there was a powerful aura that spread from it, showing that it had power that was far from what Lin Fan and the others couldpare to. If it wanted, it definitely would have been able to easily take care of them.


    But now it seemed that it wanted to give its inheritance to them which was definitely a good thing.


    However, Lin Fan knew that it wasn''t a good thing.

 Chapter 482 Inheritance (3)

    The transparent figure didn''t care about how they reacted as it turned to the beast and asked, "So, what''s the ranking here?"


    The beast first turned to Wang Jian and said, "This one is the one who ranked third, so he will receive his reward first."


    Wang Jian slightly knitted his brows when he heard this and he couldn''t help asking, "Why am I third?"


    While he didn''t mind being ranked behind Lin Fan since he knew that he couldn''tpare to him, he wasn''t willing to ept being ranked behind Mo Ze Chen because he knew that in every way, he was better than Mo Ze Chen.


    It was too bad that he didn''t know what the rankings were based on, which was why he didn''t know he was ranked third.


    While it was true that in terms of every other factor, he was above Mo Ze Chen, but there was one factor that he wascking in.


    Mo Ze Chen had been following Lin Fan the entire time, so the benefits that he gained weren''t small. While they had all been outside trying to find a way in, Mo Ze Chen had received special items from each trial that Lin Fan gave him.


    This made him much stronger, or at least much stronger when it came to the concentration of golden glow that was in his forehead. When it came to that, it was the one ce that Wang Jian couldn''tpare in.


    It was just too bad that neither of them had taken advantage of the game breaking mechanics of thebyrinth, which would have even allowed them to surpass Lin Fan.


    It wasn''t the transparent figure that exined the reason to Wang Jian, he was toozy to even look at him. Rather it was the beast who looked at Wang Jian with a gaze like he was looking down on an ant as he said, "You have the lowest achievements, so you are ranked third. Do you not understand simple words?"


    Wang Jian might have been able to ept it if he had been given a reason at least, but the words that the beast used were just too ugly and it hurt his pride.


    Wang Jian revealed an unwillingness to submit as he said while pointing at Mo Ze Chen, "No matter how you look at it, I should be above him."


    The beast looked at Mo Ze Chen and turned back to Wang Jian before saying, "No, his achievements are greater than yours."


    Having it put so bluntly was another blow to Wang Jian and it stung his pride. He could almost feel his face stinging like he had just been pped there.


    This time, Wang Jian didn''t waste any words and just asked, "Why?"


    The beast revealed a smile when it heard this and it gestured behind itself at Lin Fan as it said, "Because he followed him the entire time."


    When Wang Jian heard this, he turned to look at Lin Fan with aplicated look. After all, Lin Fan was the source of the heart demon inside his heart and even if he wanted to say something, it was still affecting him.


    Wang Jian still had that unwilling look on his face, but he struggled to say anything.


    As the beast was about to say something else, the transparent figure reached out and hit the beast on the back of the head before saying, "That''s enough teasing for now."


    The beast stuck out its tongue, but it didn''t say anything else beyond this.


    The transparent figure raised a hand and there was a golden glow that appeared at the end of his finger as he said, "Young man, there''s no need to worry about this now. Even if you lose today, that doesn''t mean you will lose tomorrow."


    When Wang Jian heard this, there was a grateful look that appeared in his eyes. He had no way of refuting the beast since it involved Lin Fan and the mark that Lin Fan had left on him was just too profound for him to deny.


    Now that this transparent figure had offered him a way out, naturally he was grateful so he said, "Thank you senior."


    The transparent figure raised his finger and there was a ball of golden light that came out of his finger, floating in the air. After this ball of light came out, the transparent figure said, "Will you ept my inheritance?"


    Wang Jian naturally had his own doubts about this, but he also took a look at Lin Fan with aplicated look when the transparent figure asked this. As he looked at Lin Fan, the emotions in his eyes changed a few times before he turned back to the transparent figure.


    Looking right at the transparent figure, or rather ball of golden light that was floating in front of him, he hesitated once more before saying with a nod, "Senior, please give me your inheritance."<sub> </sub>


    Naturally knew that there was danger in this since there was the chance that this senior he didn''t know had bad intentions, but there were rewards that came with risks. If this was a proper inheritance though, it would certainly make him stronger based on how strong this person was.


    Wang Jian could tell that this transparent figure was much stronger than the beast, it was even stronger than his own master. He even felt that this transparent figure was even stronger than the sect master of the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Just who was this person and why had he never heard of him before?"


    The transparent figure gave a nod and with a single flick of his finger, the ball of golden light flew through the air towards Wang Jian. It floated slowly through the air until it arrived right in front of Wang Jian.


    When Wang Jian was thinking about how to integrate it into himself, it suddenly moved up to his forehead. As if incited by something, the golden diamond that was on his forehead suddenly appeared before it epted the ball of golden light.


    The moment that the ball of golden light entered Wang Jian''s forehead, he immediately knitted his brows like something was wrong.


    When Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen saw this, they immediately raised their weapons and looked warily at the transparent figure, but that transparent figurepletely ignored them. Instead it was the beast that came forward, standing behind the transparent figure looking at Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen with a smile on its face, but it didn''t seem like it was nning on attacking them.


    However, it was clearly a different story if Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were to make a move.


    While they had been nning on taking care of this Nascent Soul Realm beast, the situation had now changed with the addition of the transparent figure. While Mo Ze Chen might have an artifact that could be used to deal with the Nascent Soul Realm beast, he didn''t have one to deal with the transparent figure.


    Lin Fan was someone who had also met experts that were at the peak of this realm and the aura that the transparent figure was giving off was even stronger than Qing Ao.


    Could it be that this person was someone who was even stronger than Qing Ao?


    But Qing Ao was already at the very peak of this realm, so for this person to be stronger than him, it would mean¡­


    Still, before they did anything, they were nning on observing him since that was the best move for them. Before they knew what this transparent figure''s real intentions were, they wouldn''t make any rash moves.


    So after looking at the transparent figure for a bit, they turned back to observe Wang Jian.


    The expressions on Wang Jian''s face began changing as different emotions came out. Not a single one of the expressions was the same as they continued to change for a minute before his face finally rxed and returned to normal.


    His eyes closed and it was like he was in a trance, almost as if he was sleeping while standing.


    After another minute of this, there was no change at all.


    When they turned to look at the transparent figure, they saw that he was doing the same thing as Wang Jian. He was just floating there with his eyes closed and a rxed look on his face.


    The beast standing behind it had clearly seen this as well, but it just stood there with a smile on its face as it watched Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen.


    This stalemate continued for another three more minutes before there was finally a reaction that came from Wang Jian.


    Starting from the golden diamond that had been on his forehead the entire time, there was a golden glow that spread from it all across his body. It started from his forehead and continued down his body until itpletely covered him in that golden glow.


    Then once he was covered, the golden glow around him became stronger and brighter until he suddenly released it all at once with a single roar.


    With that roar, the golden glow scattered around him, but based on his aura, it was clear that he was much strongerpared to before.


    Before this, Wang Jian had only just reached the peak Embryo Soul Realm, but in an instant, he was now at the very peak of the Embryo Soul Realm. It was almost as if he was missing that onest thing to incite him into breaking into the Child Soul Realm.

 Chapter 483 Inheritance (4)

    Once that golden glow around Wang Jian was scattered, he didn''t react at first as he looked down at his own hands like he wasn''t sure of his own power.


    However, after he was certain that it was his own power, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    Then once he was done checking the situation with his body, he turned to the transparent figure that was floating above the coffin. He cupped his hands and gave a slight bow as he said, "Thank you, master."


    The transparent figure had opened its eyes the same moment that Wang Jian had opened his eyes and had been watching him the entire time. After hearing what Wang Jian said to him, he just gave a simple nod without saying a thing.


    After that, the transparent figure turned around to look at the beast that had turned around during this time and asked, "Who''s next?"


    The beast raised his hand and pointed right at Mo Ze Chen as he said, "This one was ranked second ce, so he''s the next one to receive the inheritance."


    The transparent figure gave a nod and then raised his hand again likest time, creating another small ball of golden light at his fingertip.


    As he created this, he turned to look at Mo Ze Chen and said, "Are you ready?"


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan before turning back to the transparent figure and giving a nod.


    Seeing this, the transparent figure didn''t say anything else, it just flicked its finger and sent the ball of golden light at Mo Ze Chen.


    The ball of golden light did the same thing as with Wang Jian and floated over to Mo Ze Chen''s forehead before integrating into the golden diamond there.


    As soon as the ball of golden light entered the diamond on Mo Ze Chen''s head, the same thing happened to him as Wang Jian. The expressions on his face kept fluctuating until it finally rxed, as he closed his eyes.


    Once again the same thing happened with the face of the transparent figure as well as he stood there with his eyes closed.


    Lin Fan had his suspicions about this inheritance and it had only gotten stronger since Wang Jian finished epting his inheritance.


    It was clear that there was something else going on based on how Wang Jian had acted earlier.


    First, there was how right after Wang Jian had finished breaking through, the first thing he had done was cup his hands to thank the transparent figure. While it was normal to give thanks, but the fact that he had addressed him as master had been something that was strange.


    For people like this, they only had one master in life and they would never betray that master, unless they were betrayed first. For Wang Jian to address the transparent figure as master, there must have been something that happened in the space that the transparent figure had set up for them.


    Not to mention that while it had been faint, Lin Fan had been able to catch it. As soon as Wang Jian was finished, the transparent figure had lost all interest in him. While he had still nodded, it was clear based on the slight gestures that he made that he waspletely done with Wang Jian.


    All of these signs pointed to the conclusion that the transparent figure was doing something to the people that received his inheritance, but still Lin Fan didn''t stop Mo Ze Chen from receiving it.


    It was very simple, he was making a gamble.


    While it was possible for them to escape if they used the pearl that they were given in the beginning, that would mean leaving behind this powerful enemy that would definitelye out now that he was discovered. With how powerful they were, they definitely would be able to establish their own space and gather people to track him down.


    <o>,m Right now he didn''t have anything prepared in this realm and if he made such a powerful enemy, it definitely wouldn''t be to his advantage.</o>


    Which meant that the only option for him was to take care of them here before anything else could happen.


    While other people might not be confident in doing this with therge gap in power, Lin Fan was confident because he had something that no one else had. As long as he had this thing that couldn''t be exined by the normalws of this world, he was certain that he would be able to take care of this transparent figure. That was the main reason why he had sacrificed Mo Ze Chen even though he knew that this inheritance was a trap.


    It was all to make the transparent figure let down their guard for him to make his move.


    Mo Ze Chen naturally had been able to see that there were things that were wrong when Wang Jian finished receiving his inheritance, but when he saw Lin Fan give him that look, he chose to believe in Lin Fan and ept this inheritance.


    It took the exact same amount of time for Mo Ze Chen to ept the inheritance as Wang Jian, but something happened during this time.


    Wang Jian just nkly stood on the side watching over Mo Ze Chen epting his inheritance, but based on the fluctuations that came from him, it was clear that he was stabilizing his realm.<sub> </sub>


    That wasn''t important since the beast had done something during this time.


    The beast looked right at Lin Fan and after a slight pause, he suddenly asked, "What did she talk to you about?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback when he heard this since he clearly didn''t expect the beast to be this blunt, but he turned back and asked, "What do you mean?"


    The beast looked at him before saying, "You can y dumb if you want, but you already know what will happen. So what will you do?"


    Lin Fan looked right into the beast''s eyes and said, "I''m here to ept the senior''s inheritance. Is there something else I should know about?"


    The beast narrowed his eyes since it was clear that he never expected Lin Fan to say this, but he didn''t say anything else as he looked at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly turning away.


    Lin Fan acted like he didn''t see anything as he continued to watch Mo Ze Chen.


    In the end, Mo Ze Chen had the same reaction as Wang Jian as he was covered in that golden glow which first covered him before he released it. Right after he released this golden glow, he broke through to the high Embryo Soul Realm.


    Mo Ze Chen had been slowly umting battle experience during their excursion in the ruins and he had reached the point where he was able to break through, but he never got the stimulus to do so. This time, the golden energy that had appeared had been enough to push him right into the next realm.


    Right after breaking through, he did the same thing as Wang Jian. Mo Ze Chen turned in the direction of the transparent figure and cupped his hands along with a slight bow before saying, "Thank you, master."


    The transparent figure gave the same nod before finally turning to look at Lin Fan.


    When his eyes fell onto Lin Fan, there was no way to hide the hint of excitement that appeared in his eyes.


    But still, he yed his role properly as he turned to the beast and asked, "Is he the next one who will receive the inheritance?"


    The beast had knitted brows at first, but hearing the transparent figure''s voice, he suddenly said, "Yes master. This person was the one who ranked first, so he will be receiving master''s final inheritance."


    The transparent figure nodded before raising his hand to gather that ball of golden light. The only difference this time was that the ball of golden light that was gathered was much bigger than thest two times.


    Lin Fan could even feel a strange sensationing from this ball of golden light that made his heart tremble, but his expression was calm on the surface the entire time.


    The transparent figure looked at Lin Fan and asked him, "Are you willing to ept my inheritance?"


    Lin Fan knew that at this point, this question was just rhetoric.


    Even if Lin Fan were to say no, would that make a difference?


    With how he controlled Wang Jian and Mo Ze Chen, Lin Fan was already truly alone here.


    It was still possible for him to escape because he had that trump card from the system, but he wasn''t willing to leave Mo Ze Chen here. As for Wang Jian, well that was a different question¡­


    So Lin Fan just gave a nod in response.


    The transparent figure clearly couldn''t hide the excitement that he felt as his fingers trembled when Lin Fan nodded, but it was such a small tremble that no one had noticed it.


    He didn''t say anything else as he just flicked his finger, sending the ball of golden light out in Lin Fan''s direction.


    That ball of golden light came in front of Lin Fan, but it was so big that itpletely covered his field of view and he was only able to see that golden light. It was just a good thing that the golden light that it released wasn''t that strong, so he wasn''t forced to close his eyes.


    After that, the ball of golden light came to his forehead and entered it.


    The moment it did, everything in front of Lin Fan had turned dark.

 Chapter 484 Inheritance (5)

    Lin Fan wasn''t aware of what was happening outside because the moment the ball of golden light had entered his forehead, he had been pulled into another realm.


    It wasplete darkness around him for a few seconds before there was a golden glow that appeared in front of him.


    This golden glow started out as a ball and it gave off the same strange feeling as the ball of golden light that had been flicked to him, but then it quickly changed forward. It continued to grow in size until it took the form of a human.


    This figure was very familiar because Lin Fan had just seen it outside.


    This was the transparent figure that had been floating above the coffin outside in the main hall. However, the one thing that was different was that this figure was much youngerpared to the one that was outside.


    The one that was outside was already in their mid fifties, already looking like they were in their twilight years, but now this figure in front of him looked to be around twenty years old, in the prime of his life.


    That figure had a smile on his face as he asked, "Well, are you surprised by what you see?"


    Lin Fan had a calm look on his face as he asked, "Senior, what is this inheritance that you are giving me?"


    The figure had the same smile on his face as he said, "Well, to put it simply, I''m giving you a chance."


    Lin Fan purposefully revealed a confused look as he asked, "A chance? What do you mean by that?"


    The figure replied, "To put it simply, I''ll give you a piece of my essence soul and how much you can understand from it will depend on you."


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort, but he revealed a grateful look as he asked, "Senior, you''re willing to do this for me?"


    The figure''s smile became even brighter as he said, "There''s no use in me keeping this anymore since my time has already passed. As long as you''re willing to do one thing for me, I don''t mind leaving my inheritance to you."


    Lin Fan immediately asked, "What do you need me to do?"


    The figure''s smile disappeared when he heard this and he gave a sigh before saying, "As you can see, there was a disaster that befell this realm. As long as you promise to help me solve this disaster and save the people of this realm, I will dly leave my inheritance to you."


    Lin Fan gave a coldugh on the inside once again, but he gave a nod and said, "Of course. I have seen what has happened to this realm and I want to help these people."


    The figure once again revealed a smile and gave an appreciative nod before saying, "I want to thank you on their behalf. Now, I''ll give you my inheritance."


    But before the figure could do a thing, Lin Fan suddenly asked, "Senior, if I may, can I ask what your name is?"


    The figure was caught off guard by this, but he didn''t seem to see any danger in revealing his name, so he said, "My name is Qin Shi Huang."


    Lin Fan gave a nod on the surface, but deep down he almost couldn''t help breaking out inughter.


    This name didn''t have a meaning in this world, but in Lin Fan''s previous world, it was a name that everyone in his country knew since it was the first emperor of that country. It was a name that people feared and respected, which was why it had been passed down through the ages.


    But here, there was no meaning to it which was why this figure wasn''t afraid to say it.


    Rather, the figure had been watching Lin Fan''s face to see if there was a reaction after he had said this, almost as if he was expecting something. However, Lin Fan was able to keep his calm, that was until he said something else.


    Lin Fan looked right at the figure in the air with a calm look that didn''t show anything, so the figure couldn''t see anything, but then he said, "Should I address you as Huang Di as well then?"


    Instead of being surprised, that figure that had called himself Qin Shi Huang looked at Lin Fan with a faint smile and said, "You can call me that. So what should I call you then?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile as well as he said, "You can just call me Cao Cao."


    The figure looked at Lin Fan for a bit before breaking out inughter and saying, "I never thought that I would meet arade in a ce like this."


    p Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing.</anda>


    After the figure hadughed for a bit, his eyes suddenly turned sharp as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "So how much do you know?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing, but he could feel that there was a tense atmosphere that appeared around him.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t willing to talk, that person wasn''t disappointed as he began talking to himself, "Well, I''m sure you know that I''m your senior already, but you don''t seem that surprised at all. Shouldn''t you be more in awe at the fact that there is someone else from your old world that''s here with you?"


    Lin Fan still didn''t say anything as he watched the figure floating there talking to himself, but during this time, he had already clenched his fists and had started gathering hisws like he was prepared to fight.


    Seeing that Lin Fan still wouldn''t say a thing, that person no longer kept talking to himself and turned to Lin Fan. After a moment''s pause, he said with a serious look, "I need your body."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by how easily this transmigration senior of his had admitted it, but he had already expected that this was the case which was why he wasn''t fully surprised.


    Lin Fan then asked, "What do you need it for?"


    The figure said, "To take revenge on the gods of course."


    Lin Fan waspletely taken aback this time since he couldn''t even begin to understand what this transmigration senior of his had said.


    Seeing how confused Lin Fan was, the figure started saying, "It''s very simple, I want to take revenge on the people who brought me here, used me, and then threw me away." There was a bitter look that appeared on his face when he said this, but then he said to Lin Fan, "I suggest you join me before they use and throw you away as well."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "It was the gods that summoned us here?"


    The figure shook his head when he heard this and said, "You don''t even know this? It''s really strange what kind of things you do know and what you don''t."


    Then after a pause, he said, "Yes, it was the gods of this world that summoned us and they''re the same gods that sealed themselves off from the rest of the world. They have something nned, something big and we''re the key to all of that, that''s why they gave us tools to help us be stronger."


    The figure looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and said, "You have one too don''t you?"


    Even if Lin Fan didn''t say anything, the figure could tell from the look that appeared in Lin Fan''s eyes that he knew what he was talking about.


    Seeing this, the figure continued on to say, "As long as we follow the tool that they sent down to guide us, eventually we''ll be led to them, but that isn''t a good thing."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    The figure gave a sigh, but he also didn''t answer the questions as he asked another question, "How many times do you think someone has been summoned from our world?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this, but he didn''t say a thing.


    The figure didn''t mind as he continued, "Including you, it will have been ten times. Now, how many do you think they''ve taken the systems back from?"


    Lin Fan once again didn''t answer, but there was a bad feeling that came from the bottom of his stomach.


    The figure once again didn''t mind as he continued, "Excluding you, it will have been nine times."


    At this, his eyes became very serious as he said, "What do you think happens to all the people who have their systems taken from them?"


    Lin Fan felt a chill run down his back as the feeling became even worse in his stomach.


    The figure didn''t need to give Lin Fan an answer this time since he could see that Lin Fan had figured it out for himself. Instead, the figure asked, "Now that you know all of this, are you willing to help me take down those selfish gods?"


    If it was anyone else, perhaps revealing all of this would have been useful, but Lin Fan had much more information than other people. When he talked to the little girl and the whale, as well as the elders, he had learned quite a bit about this person in front of him, which included his personality¡­


    Seeing that Lin Fan was hesitating, the figure had a hopeful look, but thatpletely disappeared with Lin Fan''s next words.


    Lin Fan asked, "Then if I were to give you my body, when would you give it back?"

 Chapter 485 Inheritance (6)

    There was a silence that filled the air, a silence where all sound died, a silence that was almost oppressive if it wasn''t just the two of them that were there.


    This silencested a while before there was a crispugh that suddenly cut right through it.


    This was augh that wasn''t bitter or full of ridicule, it was a pureughter that was filled with genuine enjoyment, as if the person that was giving thisugh was fully enjoying the scene in front of him.


    This was augh that came from the figure that was floating in the air.


    Lin Fan just watched him with a calm look, but he could tell that something bad was about to happen, so he raised his guard.


    Thatugh continued for about a minute before the figure suddenly stopped and looked right at Lin Fan, saying in a voice that was so sharp that it was like a mountain of swords, "So you knew all along."


    If Lin Fan hadn''t been prepared, he might have been cut just by how sharp this voice was.


    The figure then tilted his head and asked, "So, what do you have nned?"


    Lin Fan didn''t move when he heard this, rather he just stood there looking at the figure.


    The figure gave a chuckle and said, "So you want me to make the first move? That''s fine, here Ie."


    The figure raised its right hand and there was the same golden glow that had been found all over these ruins that appeared, the so-called energy of the gods. With a single flick of his finger, there was a ball of golden light that flew out right at Lin Fan.


    This ball of golden light wasn''t moving that fast, but Lin Fan didn''t seem to have any intentions of dodging it. Even when it was right in front of his face and was about to hit him, Lin Fan didn''t move a single muscle.


    When the figure in the air saw this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows since this didn''t make sense.


    Lin Fan had gone all out by revealing everything and going against him, but now that they were actually fighting, he didn''t n on doing a thing?


    What was the meaning behind this?


    Could it be that he had given up after seeing the difference in power or could there be another reason¡­


    The figure just carefully watched as the ball of golden light reached Lin Fan,ing just an inch away from him.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan suddenly crushed something that had appeared in his hand.


    There was a wisp of illusory life energy that suddenly came out of Lin Fan''s hand and came in front of him to form a barrier.


    Once that ball of golden light hit the barrier that was in front of Lin Fan, it wasn''t able tost a single second as it was scattered by the shockwave of the barrier. The wisps of golden energy onlysted a single second before they hadpletely disappeared.


    However, even after blocking that ball of golden energy and scattering itpletely, the wispy illusory life energy didn''t disappear right away, but it also didn''t continue maintaining the form of a barrier in front of Lin Fan.


    If that was all that this thing had done, Lin Fan would have felt a pain in his heart over the amount of points that he had spent in buying this.


    This was without a doubt a special item from the system''s point shop, but it wasn''t just any item, it was an item that specialized in dealing with fragments of souls like this figure that was in front of him right now. The only reason that Lin Fan was able to buy it was because it was a defensive item.


    In the system''s point store, the items that were the most expensive were naturally the special items or those items with offensive capabilities. That also meant that the items that were consideredmon or were more on the defensive side were much cheaperpared to the other items in the store.


    This talisman that Lin Fan had crushed was one of those items.


    But the one special thing about this talisman was that not only was it a defensive item that protected him from an attack, it was also a sealing item that could be used to seal evil soul fragments which was exactly what was happening now.


    The wisps of illusory life energy that had been wrapped around Lin Fan started moving in the air, heading in the direction of the figure in the air.


    While these wisps of illusory life energy moved slowly, they released a pressure that while normal people couldn''t feel, it was something that affected the figure in the air quite heavily.


    That was because these wisp of illusory life energy were specially made to suppress soul fragments, so to put it in other words, it was made just to work on this figure.<sub> </sub>


    But the figure didn''t panic at all when he saw these wisps of illusory life energy moving towards him. He didn''t even bother dodging out of the way even with how slow they were.


    Rather, he just raised his hand and gathered the same golden energy as before into another ball, but this time he didn''t release it right away.


    Watching the wisps of illusory energy approach him, that figure just had a calm smile on his face as he waited until they were right in front of him before pushing his hand out. As he pushed his hand out, the ball of golden energy that he had gathered this time wasn''t scattered by these wisps of illusory energy, rather there was a bnce between the two sides that was established.


    However, this bnce of power didn''tst long before the ball of golden energy started pushing back the wisps of illusory life energy that it faced. This continued until the ball of golden energypletely pushed it away and caused all the wisps of illusory energy to scatter.


    After this had happened, the ball of golden energy came back to where the figure was standing and floated in front of him before he scattered it with a flick of his finger.


    There was only silence that was left after the ball of golden energy scattered.


    Unlike before, Lin Fan no longer had the same calm look on his face, instead there was a look of disbelief that was there.


    How could this happen?


    The things that the system gave him were always of the highest quality, they were items that far surpassed the standards of the realm he was in, so he had full confidence in them. But now the item that he had used most of his points to buy had actually failed¡­


    What was he supposed to do now?


    Lin Fan was certain that he wouldn''t be able to stop this figure''s assault without the help of the system, but what else could he do now?


    Lin Fan then asked the system in his mind, "System, are you really going to watch as this happens?"


    But even when Lin Fan called it out, there was no response from it at all.


    Lin Fan gave a bitterugh deep down.


    It seemed like what this figure had said was true. It didn''t matter if he was here with the system or not, after all, they could just summon someone else with a new system to take his ce.


    The figure in the air didn''t immediately move on Lin Fan after the silence was broken, rather he just floated there with a smile as he enjoyed the expression on Lin Fan''s face.


    After another minute of this, the figure in the air finally said, "Now are you willing to submit and give me your body? I can promise you that I''ll take your share of revenge on the gods as well."


    Lin Fan didn''t immediately respond to this as he began searching the point store in his mind, looking for a way to get out of this. However, no matter how he looked, he couldn''t find a single thing.


    Or rather, it wasn''t that he wasn''t able to find a single thing, he just wasn''t able to find a single thing that he could afford.


    In the end, Lin Fan asked, "How did you do it?"


    The figure in the air had a look of victory on his face, so he said without any worry, "It''s very simple, where do you think the system gets its power from?"


    Lin Fan thought about it and then he realized something as the shocked look on his face became even greater.


    The system was something that the gods gave them and if that was the case, what it was made of should be the energy of the gods that the little girl had told him about, which was this golden glow.


    This transmigration senior of his was clearly proficient in controlling this golden energy based on everything that he did, so he must have had a way to dispel the powers of the system.


    Lin Fan knew that even if the system was willing to help, there was nothing it could do and he could only ept his fate¡­


    But even if he had no other choices, he still wasn''t willing, alright?


    This was his precious second life where he was finally going to live the life that he wanted, how could he ept it was over just like this?

 Chapter 486 Inheritance (7)

    But it didn''t matter if he wasn''t willing because he didn''t have a way to deal with this person.


    Even if he wanted to fight, he wouldn''t be able to use most of his power because this was a space that this figure had created inside his mind. For him to fight at full power, he would have to use his pets in that array, but he wasn''t able to summon them at all.


    Then again, even if he was able to summon those pets, it wasn''t guaranteed that he would be able to win.


    This was a person that was even able to cancel out the power of the system, so he was definitely powerful. Or at least he was at a level that Lin Fan couldn''t match right now.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking a step back, but when the figure saw this, he knew that it was time.


    The figure didn''t waste any time at all as it suddenly charged forward, flying out at a speed that even Lin Fan found hard to match. In just a split second, it was already in front of Lin Fan with his hand in front of his face, revealing a wide smile on his face.


    As he had this smile on his face, he looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Anyst words?"


    Even if Lin Fan wasn''t willing, he knew that he didn''t want to give this figure any satisfaction, so he just stared right into his eyes without saying a word.


    The figure gave a nod before saying, "Alright, your loss. Then again, it wasn''t like I would have passed them on for you since I''ll be pretending to be you."


    As soon as his voice fell, there was a golden glow that appeared in his hand in front of Lin Fan''s face.


    That was thest thing that Lin Fan saw before losing consciousness.


    As he was fading into the darkness, there was one thing that appeared in his mind, or rather there was only one face that appeared on his mind.


    It was one of the first faces that he had seen and it was still the most perfect one that he had ever seen.


    His only regret was not realizing how he felt sooner and telling her. At least they would have spent a bit more time together.


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan lost consciousness, the figure was able to easily enter his soul and entered into the core of his soul.


    At the very core of his soul, there was a pce which represented the very foundation of what Lin Fan was. As long as this pce was destroyed, it would mean that the very thing in his soul that defined Lin Fan was gone, which meant that it was what this figure was aiming for.


    But the moment that this figure appeared in the very core of Lin Fan''s soul, he couldn''t help muttering in a surprised voice, "What is going on here?"


    Looking around him, he couldn''t understand what he was seeing because this was something that shouldn''t be possible.


    Each person would only have one single pce in their soul because that was the norm.


    If a person went against this norm and had two different pces, it would either mean that there were two souls inhabiting the same body, or they cultivated a secret technique which allowed them to split their soul in two, doubling the power of their soul.


    But there had never been a case where there was someone who had been able to split their soul in three parts. Not to mention having three different fragments of souls inside one single soul.


    If it was three different soul fragments that were all gathered together inside one soul, it was no longer as simple as the sum of three souls shing against each other, but rather it would be an exponential amount of pain.


    But no matter how he wanted to believe that what he saw wasn''t true, the facts had been ced right in front of his eyes.


    In front of him right now, there were three different pces that were erected in the core of Lin Fan''s soul.


    Still, even if the facts were in front of him, that didn''t matter to him right now. He hade here with a goal and instead of wasting time pondering what he was seeing, he should focus on what he should do.


    The most important thing was that even though Lin Fan had three different pces in his soul, which should mean that his soul power was three times stronger, that wasn''t necessarily the case.<sub> </sub>


    With three different pces in his soul, it meant that there would be a lot of shing between these three pces because the most natural state that a soul had was just having a single pce. These three pces all represented a single different unique consciousness, which meant that the differences between them would be the conflict between souls and would decrease Lin Fan''s overall soul power.


    With his soul that had been developed for several thousand years, there was no chance that Lin Fan would be able to match him as he destroyed Lin Fan''s soul pces.


    So with this thought in mind, the figure started moving forward towards the center pce as he said, "Let''s get this over with."


    Out of the three pces that were in Lin Fan''s soul, two of them looked normal, but there was a single one that looked much more magnificent. It even had a faint golden glow around it which was a familiar glow to this figure. After all, it was the same golden glow that he had been using the entire time.


    Based on this, he knew that the center pce which was covered in this golden glow should be the main part of Lin Fan''s soul, which was also why he headed towards it.


    Ignoring the other two pces, the figure came up right in front of the golden glowing pce and raised his right hand to gather the golden energy that he had been using the whole time, but this time he didn''t release it as a ball of light. Rather, the golden energy gathered in his palm for a bit before he suddenly turned his hand towards the golden pce.


    Right before doing anything, the figure muttered to himself, "Transmigration junior, friend from the same world, I''ll make good use of your body. Please don''t me me for this, please me the gods for forcing me to do this."


    Then after he said this, his hand suddenly turned around and he released a beam of light right at the golden pce.


    That beam of light flew out and lit up this dark space around him, but the moment it did, the figure had seen something terrifying.


    In the background of the core of Lin Fan''s soul, there was an entire world that was hidden in the darkness.


    Normally a person''s soul would just have a few buildings in the background at most, but this was an entire world that was filled with various cities, forests,kes, and other natural scenery. The only thing that was missing were the living beings to inhabit this world and a source of light for this world.


    The reason why a normal person''s soul only had a few buildings at most was that their soul wasn''t strong enough to sustain anything greater than that.


    In the upper cultivation realms, the main goal that one tried to achieve was to build an entire realm in their soul because that realm would be the foundation of thew that they created. To put it simply, the path to be a god was to be the ruler of aw and be the embodiment of thatw, which was why one had to create a realm as a foundation for this in their soul.


    For what existed in Lin Fan''s soul to exist, there was only one possibility¡­


    The figure immediately looked at the golden pce in front of him and said, "Just what are you¡­"


    But before he could even finish his sentence, there was a wave of golden energy that erupted from the golden pce that destroyed the beam of light that he had shot at the golden pce. The wave of golden energy didn''t stop there as it continued on until it hit the figure right in the chest, sending him flying several meters before he was mmed right into the ground.


    If this wasn''t the core of Lin Fan''s soul, with how strong he had been mmed into the ground, there definitely would have been a crater that was created around him.


    After being mmed into the ground, the figure was in daze until he suddenly felt a sweet taste appear in his mouth. He tried his best to push it down, but he was forced to spit out a mouthful of blood.


    Seeing this, the figure knew that he had been seriously injured with just that single shockwave and he didn''t even know how it had happened.


    When he realized this fact, the figure couldn''t stop a trace of panic from shing in his eyes, but he forced himself to remain calm.


    Seeing that nothing else was happening, the figure suddenly called out, "If you''re going to hide, why bother attacking? Aren''t you going toe out to introduce yourself!"


    Though as he said this, there was a slight tremble that was in his voice.


    He was someone who was used to controlling everything and he would panic if he ever felt that he wasn''t in control.


    Thest time he felt this way was that time¡­


    After the figure shouted this, there was a glow that suddenly came from the golden pce.

 Chapter 487 Inheritance (8)

    As the glowing from the golden pce became stronger, it finally started taking the form of a ball of golden light.


    This ball of golden light separated itself from the golden pce and floated in the air for a few seconds before once again changing shape. It went from the shape of a ball to the shape of a human.


    When the figure saw this person appear, he was surprised because it was someone he was familiar with.


    This was the person whose soul that he should have already shattered, but here he was standing in front of him once again.


    This person looked exactly like Lin Fan, just with a golden glow around him.


    As the figure saw this person appear, he couldn''t help saying, "How stubborn you are. Why won''t you just let me have your body already?"


    When the figure saw that this golden ball of light had taken the figure of Lin Fan from before, he figured that this was anotherst ditch attempt to fight him off from Lin Fan. After all, if it was anything else, he wouldn''t dare believe it because that would be too unbelievable¡­


    Even though the evidence that this was something else was all around him in the form of the realm inside Lin Fan''s soul.


    But the golden figure in the shape of Lin Fan didn''t say a single thing, he didn''t even bother looking at the figure that was in front of him.


    He turned to the pce that was to the right of the golden pce and knitted his brows, but he still didn''t say a single thing.


    Seeing that the golden Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, the figure couldn''t take it anymore and said, "You think that thisst ditch effort of yours will work?"


    After saying that, he raised his hand and gathered even more golden energy in his palm, creating a vortex of it in his palm. This waspletely different from the ball of golden energy that he gathered before which he shot out as a beam, this was much more powerful.


    The beam attack that he had sent out before wasn''t his full power because he believed that it wouldn''t take much to destroy Lin Fan''s soul pce, but now that he had been seriously injured, he couldn''t control his rage as he gathered all his power just to destroy Lin Fan.


    After gathering the golden energy in his hand for a bit, he suddenly raised his arm right at the golden Lin Fan floating in the air, sending out a beam that spun as it flew out. As he shot this beam out, he also roared, "Go and die!"


    This beam had a fierce appearance and an even more fierce aura as it flew through the air, but the golden Lin Fan in the air still didn''t pay any attention to it as it flew towards him.


    Only when it was about to hit him did the golden Lin Fan in the air suddenly turn to the spinning golden beam.


    He just narrowed his eyes before raising a single finger. Then with a single flick, the beam of light was destroyed and turned into tiny sparks of energy that soon disappeared as well.


    But that wasn''t all that happened with this single flick of his finger.


    There was an invisible energy that traveled the same path as the spinning beam of golden light until it reached the figure that had been on the ground. The moment that invisible energy hit the figure that was on the ground, he was smashed down into the ground once again and spat out another mouthful of blood.


    As the blood came out of him, the figure looked at the golden Lin Fan in the air with a terrified look.


    He had tried to deny it as much as possible, but there was no way for him to deny it any longer after feeling that kind of power. He knew that no matter how hard he tried, he wouldn''t be able to defeat this person in front of him.


    This time, with a tremor in his voice, the figure asked, "Who are you?"


    And this time, the golden Lin Fan in the air didn''t ignore this figure as he said, "Huang Xiao Hou, you really think that you can get away with what you''ve been nning behind the gods'' back all these years?"


    When the figure that had been called Huang Xiao Hou heard this, the strong facade that he had maintained the entire time hadpletely copsed. It was all because this person knew his name.


    This was a name that he had never told anyone after he had transmigrated since he always used different names.


    The reason?


    It was very simple, it was because it was a bad name!


    Even when he had been on earth, he had tried to use this name as little as possible, going by different nicknames.


    While he had been a filial person on earth, he still med his parents for giving him this name.<sub> </sub>


    However, they did have a reason because when he had been on earth, he had been born withrge monkey ears which was the first thing that his own mother had thought when she had seen him.


    There was the crux of why he was shocked, no one in this new world should have known his name, that is except for the people who had brought him here. And now this kid who had been his transmigration junior had three pces in his soul and had a golden version of himself that knew his real name, there was no exnation for this¡­


    Huang Xiao Hou roared out, "Just who are you!"


    But the golden Lin Fan just said, "You might be able to control the energy of the gods, but you have to remember that this is an ability that we gave you. You are far from being able to reach the realm of the gods."


    Huang Xiao Hou wouldn''t give up as he gathered his golden energy once again around him, preparing to attack the golden Lin Fan in the air as he roared out, "You think you know me! You don''t know anything about me!"


    But the golden Lin Fan in the air didn''t care as he simply waved his hand.


    With that wave of his hand, there was a wave of golden energy that suddenly came from the golden pce in the middle, spreading until it hit Huang Xiao Hou.


    Huang Xiao Hou didn''t even have a chance to fight back as his soul began to dissipate.


    Even in hisst seconds, he couldn''t believe what had just happened and there was an unwilling look on his face.


    But there was nothing that he could do since the wave of golden energy had already scattered his soul.


    In his final seconds, he called out, "I curse you gods, I curse you and your game!"


    Then with that, the final fragments of his soul had disappeared.


    The golden Lin Fan in the air watched those fragments disappear before saying, "You betrayed the gods by trying to be something that you shouldn''t have, but in death, know that the gods forgive you."


    After he said this, he didn''t bother looking at where Huang Xiao Hou had been as he turned to the pce that was on the left and said, "Come out."


    There was a moment of silence before the pce on the left also lit up with a golden glow and there was another Lin Fan that appeared.


    This Lin Fan was different from the golden Lin Fan, he was even different from the main Lin Fan. This Lin Fan had a much more gentle look on his facepared to the calm main Lin Fan and the indifferent golden Lin Fan.


    This Lin Fan was the owner of this body, the one that had died before the earth Lin Fan had arrived.


    Looking at where Huang Xiao Hou had been, the previous host Lin Fan asked, "Is it over?"


    The golden Lin Fan just gave a nod before saying, "It seems like we still haven''t made enough preparations just yet. Even this soul fragment was even able to pose a threat to our n."


    The previous host Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "Who would have expected it? What can you do?"


    The golden Lin Fan waved his hand and suddenly the system interface appeared, but this was a different interfacepared to the one that Lin Fan normally saw. If one looked closely at the interface that was in front of him, they could tell that it was the same interface, but what he was currently seeing was the admin ess.


    The golden Lin Fan scrolled through the backend of the system before finally stopping on something that caught his attention.


    Opening up a window, there was a list that appeared in front of him and right at the top of that list was the word "missions".


    Stroking his chin, the golden Lin Fan said in a thoughtful voice, "I thought that this would be enough to prepare him, but it seems like it was far from being enough."


    Then after saying this, the golden Lin Fan raised his hand to tap the list of missions and created several empty slots.


    After these empty slots had been created, there was a keyboard that also appeared which he used to fill in these empty spots.


    After all the empty spots had been finished, the golden Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod before saying, "Good, this should be enough to make him grow the way we want to."


    With that, he waved his hand and the system interface disappeared.

 Chapter 488 Returned Souls (1)

    After the system interface disappeared, the golden Lin Fan gave a yawn before saying, "It seems like I pushed it too hard this time."


    Then he turned to the previous host Lin Fan and said, "I''m going to sleep for a bit, help me watch over him for now."


    Without even waiting for a response, the golden Lin Fan turned back into a ball of light before disappearing back into the golden pce.


    The previous host Lin Fan just stayed floating there looking at the pce that was on the right.


    When he had shared his memories with the earth Lin Fan, he had shared everything except for a single memory that he kept hidden. It was a memory from the moment before he died, when there was a golden figure that had appeared in front of him.


    The moment right before the previous host Lin Fan died, there was this golden figure that had appeared in front of him like a ghost. There were many things that this golden figure had told the previous host Lin Fan which made him ept the concept of death since it meant that his death would contribute to something greater than him.


    But this golden figure had also told the previous host Lin Fan to keep this matter a secret from the earth Lin Fan because it was something that he couldn''t know about it.


    When they had fused together, the previous host Lin Fan had made sure that this was the only memory that wasn''t passed on to the earth Lin Fan.


    After thinking for a bit, the previous host Lin Fan also gave a sigh before returning to his own pce.


    Once both of them were gone, the golden pce suddenly started to move. The golden pce floated into the air and then went to the right, changing ces with the pce that had been on the right.


    After these pces had changed ces, the other two pces went dim while the pce in the middle lit up again.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan woke up, he was confused by what he had seen.


    He was certain that he had lost in the battle against the figure in his mind, so why was he suddenly released?


    When he opened his eyes, he saw the beast looking at him with an expectant look along with Mo Ze Chen and Wang Jian standing on both sides of him.


    When the beast saw that he had opened his eyes, he came forward and asked in a concerned voice, "Master, how are you?"


    Lin Fan was caught off guard when he heard this, but then he realized what the beast was thinking.


    It knew that it was impossible for Lin Fan to fight against its master and resist being taken over, so it was assuming that the one who woke up now was its master.


    But that wasn''t the only thing that Lin Fan had seen. As he looked at the two standing behind the beast, he could tell that they were no longer under the control of the figure like they were before. Based on the clear look in their eyes, it was clear that they were in control of their own wills again.


    Even if they were in control of their own wills again, neither of them said a thing as they stood behind the beast since they knew that there was no chance that they would be able to defeat it, so they had been waiting for Lin Fan to make a move as well.


    However, that was on the basis that Lin Fan hadn''t been taken over as well, so they were both pretending to be under still.


    Lin Fan turned back to the beast and after pausing for a bit, he didn''t know why, but the name of the beast had appeared in his mind.


    Lin Fan looked at the beast and asked, "Xiao Hei, where did you ce the souls?"


    This was also strange for Lin Fan when he asked this because for some reason, he had inherited all of Huang Xiao Hou''s memories. He didn''t know what had happened, but for some reason, all of Huang Xiao Hou''s memories were now his and he knew the full story of what happened in this vige.<sub> </sub>


    The beast that was called Xiao Hei was surprised when he heard this, but he knew that it was impossible for Lin Fan to know about something like this, so it had to be his master that was asking this. After this thought passed in his mind, he revealed an excited look and said, "Master, the souls are being stored in the treasure room. Do you want me to get it?"


    Lin Fan paused for a second before giving a nod.


    Xiao Hei didn''t question Lin Fan once he received this order even if he found this strange and with a flicker, he disappeared from where he had been standing, leaving the three of them standing there.


    But even though there were only the three of them left there, Lin Fan didn''t talk to the other two. He was too busy sorting out the memories that were inside his mind.


    It didn''t take him long to do so, but when he did, he couldn''t help thinking that this Huang Xiao Hou really was too daring.


    In his memories, this Huang Xiao Hou had found out the truth behind the system and was afraid of being sacrificed as a pawn in the game of the gods, so he decided to rebel against them. He didn''t do it secretly, but rather he went to attack the gods through a secret passage that led to their realm.


    Naturally he had failed since he had tried to bite the hand that had fed him and the gods removed his system, but he had been able to escape since he had gotten an item from the system before it was removed.


    As he escaped into the copsing passage, he was thrown onto this world that was far away from the territory of the gods.


    When he had been thrown here, this ce hadn''t been settled by the Gctic Humanity Alliance yet and was still the home of the people of these ruins. It could be said that they were the original inhabitants of this.


    He had tricked them into bing his forces by lying of a great cmity that woulde, but in truth it had been him who had been behind all the signs that they received.


    In the end, he was able to take their souls and turned them into his loyal soldiers, trapping them forever under his control.


    It was just too bad that the cmity that he had lied about became a reality when the forces of the gods had attacked him, finally killing him in his weakened state.


    But he wasn''t willing to disappear like this, so he sealed a fragment of his soul along with this realm, in hopes of finding a way to gain another body one day. The one body that he hoped for was the next transmigrator that would be summoned because that would allow him to obtain another cheat system and be strong again.


    His wishes hade true and Lin Fan had been pulled in, but right as he was about to achieve his goal, the memories suddenly cut off.


    This was the one memory that Lin Fan cared about the most because he wanted to know what had saved him in the end. It was clear that something had saved him and it wasn''t something that was inside of him, so he wanted to know just what this something was.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that the golden version of him had given him these memories on purpose just so Lin Fan would be more curious of the gods, fueling him in his chase of them. After all, the goal of the system was to turn Lin Fan into a tool that the gods could use and chasing after them was the best way to drive his thirst for power since he would realize therge gap between him and the gods.


    Of course, he had also wiped the parts of Huang Xiao Hou''s memories about him since he didn''t want Lin Fan to know about him yet.


    After sorting out his memories, Lin Fan knew what he had asked of the beast named Xiao Hei. The souls were the souls of the people of these ruins, the ones that had been turned into ghosts with the yinws of Huang Xiao Hou.


    As long as they didn''t have their souls, they would continue as ghosts manipted by Lin Fan, but once they got back their souls, they would be able to return to being humans again. So as long as Lin Fan got the souls from Xiao Hei and released them, he would be able to free the people of these ruins, the ghosts that were wandering around. As well, he could fulfill his promise to Mo Ze Chen and free Lulu.


    Lin Fan also finally realized why Lulu and the elders in the crypt had called him their saviour.


    An interesting fact was that Xiao Hei was a pet that Huang Xiao Hou once had, but after he had been thrown into this lower world with most of his cultivation sealed, it had be one of his most important tools.


    Xiao Hei had turned from a pet that he had kept because he was cute to his right hand man who had helped him enve the people of this world since all those years ago, this world didn''t even have a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, much less a True Soul Realm Expert.


    While Lin Fan was lost in thought, there was a figure in a butler''s uniform that came back.

 Chapter 489 Returned Souls (2)

    When Xiao Hei came back, the first thing he did was take a look at the other two who had been standing on the side, but when he saw that they still weren''t doing anything, he turned back to Lin Fan.


    When he arrived, he had felt that there was something off with the two of them, but that feeling had quickly disappeared.


    Since it didn''t seem like there was anything wrong, Xiao Hei didn''t mind it.


    The main reason was because he was confident in his strength.


    Even if something had changed, it didn''t matter since he could easily destroy two kids like this with his strength as a Nascent Soul Realm Expert. The most important thing was that his beloved master was finally back.


    The master was the one who had raised him when he had been abandoned and he was the one that he had swore loyalty to for the rest of his life.


    While it did seem strange that the master wanted the orb containing the souls of these lowly tools, it wasn''t his ce to question that master.


    Xiao Hei gave Lin Fan a bow before bringing out a small orb that was glowing and saying, "Master, the item that you requested."


    Lin Fan looked at the orb that was in the hand of Xiao Hei and without saying a thing, he reached out his hand to take it.


    However, before his hand could reach it, Xiao Hei suddenly moved his hands so that it was just out of Lin Fan''s reach.


    Lin Fan looked at Xiao Hei who was also looking right back at him, but still he didn''t say anything first.


    The reason why Lin Fan didn''t speak was because he knew that he wasn''t this beast''s master in the end. If he spoke too much, it would be quite easy to break through his disguise and if that happened, this would be much harder for him.


    Xiao Hei looked at Lin Fan for a few seconds before saying with a smile, "Master, it truly is an honour to wee you back to this world." After saying this, Xiao Hei gave another bow to Lin Fan.


    Still Lin Fan didn''t say a thing and just gave a nod in response to this.


    Then Xiao Hei stood straight again, but it was clear that something had changed.


    After Xiao Hei had gotten over his initial happiness, he was able to notice all the strange signs with Lin Fan, or rather with his "master".


    With the time that he had had to think while getting this orb, it was clear that there was a seed of doubt that had taken root in his heart.


    After another slight pause, Xiao Hei asked, "Master, do you remember that night before the cmity when we were watching the stars? Do you still remember what we had vowed together?"


    Lin Fan looked calm on the surface, but he was panicking deep down.


    Even if he had gained Huang Xiao Hou''s memories, that didn''t mean that everything was passed down to him. Most of the memories were of the important times in his life and naturally something as small as this wasn''t important enough for Huang Xiao Hou to remember.


    If it was the real Huang Xiao Hou, he would have a way of dealing with this, but Lin Fan clearly didn''t.


    Of course, Lin Fan also felt sorry for Xiao Hei because it was clear by Xiao Hei''s expression that this was an important moment for him. It was a shame that Huang Xiao Hou hadn''t thought the same since he had already forgotten this memory.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, the seed of doubt in Xiao Hei''s heart began to spread its roots and started to sprout. There was a thought that appeared in Xiao Hei''s mind, but it was a thought that he didn''t want to be true.


    As he said his next words, there was a single tear that came out of his eye, "Master, do you still remember when you found Xiao Hei, what you promised Xiao Hei?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh when he heard this because he knew that this charade was over, there was no way to recover from this, so the least he wanted to do was show sympathy for this beast.


    He had loyally waited for his master for so long, guarding him all this time, but it was clear that he was nothing more than a tool for his master.


    The difference was that if it was Huang Xiao Hou, he would have been able to talk his way out of this because Xiao Hei was a tool that he had used for so long. Lin Fan couldn''t do the same since while he had the memories of Huang Xiao Hou, Xiao Hei rarely appeared in them, showing just how important he was. At the same time, Lin Fan didn''t know what kind of personality Huang Xiao Hou had in the first ce, so it wasn''t possible for him to talk his way out of it like the real Huang Xiao Hou would have.


    Lin Fan paused for a second before giving another sigh and saying, "Can you please just give me that bead? As long as you do, we can end it here."<sub> </sub>


    There was another tear that came from Xiao Hei''s eyes when he heard this, but he didn''t let himself cry in the end.


    Lowering his head to wipe that tear, he then burst out intoughter.


    Afterughing like a madman for a while, he finally looked at Lin Fan with a crazed smile and said, "End it here? What ending would there be for me then?"


    Lin Fan said, "As long as you''re willing, you cane with us. You won''t be trapped down here anymore and you''ll be able to explore the wide world."


    Xiao Hei looked like he was taken aback when he heard this and after a pause, he said in a trembling voice, "You''re willing to take me with you? Even after¡­..even after everything that happened?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "As long as you''re willing, we can take you away."


    Xiao Hei hesitated a bit before saying, "That¡­"


    As it seemed like he was about to ept, Xiao Hei suddenly broke out inughter and said, "I really wish you could see the look on your own face. Did you really think that it would be that easy?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows, but he didn''t say anything since this was also within his scope of expectations, so he wasn''t surprised. As for why he knitted his brows, that was because he felt a bit of pity for Xiao Hei.


    It seemed like the loyalty that it felt towards Huang Xiao Hou really did run deep.


    Xiao Hei stoppedughing and then looked at Lin Fan with a dead serious look as he said, "Do you really think that you''ll be able to get out of here?"


    As soon as his voice fell, there was a sudden explosion.


    Well, explosion wasn''t the best way to describe it since it wasn''t an explosion in the traditional sense.


    This was an explosion when it came to Xiao Hei because it suddenly swelled and took the form of the giant cat once again.


    It was clear that it was going into battle form and was preparing to attack Lin Fan, but seeing this, Lin Fan didn''t have a surprised look. He looked just as calm as ever as he faced this giant cat that had appeared.


    He was even calm when he felt that Nascent Soul Realm aura that came from the giant cat.


    As for Wang Jian on the side, he was forced back a step because of the sudden appearance of this giant cat and the aura that came from it. Then after that step, he couldn''t help taking another step back because of this aura.


    He knew that since this giant cat was in the Nascent Soul Realm, it was a beast that none of them here could face.


    At the same time, while time was running out and they had the chance to escape, there was still a bit of time left before the orbs teleported them out of these ruins. That was more than enough time for this Nascent Soul Realm beast to kill them all which seemed very likely with how emotionally unstable it was¡­


    But it was a different case for Mo Ze Chen.


    When he had heard what Xiao Hei had suddenly said, he knew that Lin Fan''s n to act as its master definitely wasn''t going to work, so he had been secretly preparing.


    While he had also been forced to take a step back by the sudden explosion of the giant cat''s aura, he also stood firm as he gripped something in his hand. This was the secret weapon that Mo Ze Chen had been holding the entire time while waiting for this situation to copse.


    After the Xiao Hei had finished transforming back into its giant cat form, before he attacked, he said to Lin Fan, "Do you have anyst words?"


    Lin Fan looked right at Xiao Hei and gave another sigh before saying, "Is your master really worth¡­"


    Before he could finish, there was a loud screech that came from Xiao Hei and he revealed a look of anger that far surpassed any other emotion that he had shown before. With this look of anger, he roared out, "You aren''t qualified to say a single thing about my master! I''ll bury you with my master right now!"


    But before it could do a thing, Lin Fan shook his head and said, "You really should pay attention to your surroundings."

 Chapter 490 Returned Souls (3)

    Even with Lin Fan saying this, Xiao Hei didn''t hesitate as he raised his w to sh down at Lin Fan.


    He was certain that there was nothing here that could pose a threat to him, so he was certain that Lin Fan was just trying to bluff his way out of this.


    It was too bad that this wasn''t the case.


    As Xiao Hei was focusedpletely on Lin Fan, Mo Ze Chen started running forward and had his arm behind him before bringing it forward in a swinging motion. This continued until it was right in front of him and he threw out the item that he had been holding the entire time.


    This was the item that Mo Ze Chen had been talking about when he met Lin Fan, the method that he could use to take care of the Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    The item was nothing more than a little bead that was no bigger than a marble. This bead flew through the air, aimed right at Xiao Hei.


    When it was right about to reach Xiao Hei, it also finally entered the range of Xiao Hei''s detection. Xiao Hei had beenpletely focused on Lin Fan in front of him as he had lost himself in his rage, so his detection waspletely focused on everything in front of him. So when it came to things that were behind him, it would be toote by the time that he noticed them.


    Of course, he didn''t mind this thing that Mo Ze Chen had thrown because he couldn''t feel any special energying from it, so it seemed to be nothing more than a distraction that Mo Ze Chen was using to pull Xiao Hei away.


    However, the truth of the matter was that it was anything but that. It was actually the main weapon that both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were relying on to take care of Xiao Hei.


    Right before it reached Xiao Hei, the bead suddenly burst open.


    The bead itself was nothing more than a shell, what was really important about this bead was actually what was contained within the bead.


    When the bead burst open, it suddenly revealed a small piece of twine.


    This piece of twine was only normal for a single second before it was as if it had suddenly started drawing in some kind of invisible energy around itself. Once it drew in enough energy, it started to release a white glow and quickly changed form.


    The moment it changed form, Xiao Hei couldn''t help reacting to it because there was a sense of danger that came from the direction of the piece of twine that he couldn''t ignore.


    As he turned, he couldn''t help saying, "What is this¡­"


    But he didn''t have time to finish that sentence as that twine had already transformed into a white glowing that was already surrounding him.


    Xiao Hei didn''t keep going forward with his w raised to attack, but rather he immediately turned around and shed at the white glowing.


    His ws cut right through the rope of the, but that didn''t matter because the rest of the rope suddenly expanded to take the ce of the cut. Within a single second, the part of the that had been cut had already been repaired.


    When Xiao Hei was preparing to release a second attack, the white glowing was already all around him and he was trapped inside.


    The white glowing had formed a bubble around Xiao Hei, trapping him in the center while releasing this white glow. Xiao Hei could feel a suppressive forceing from this white glow that made him unable to release his full power.


    But even if he couldn''t use his full power, Xiao Hei didn''t give up as he continued to sh at the with his ws.


    At first, the ropes of the were cut apart by his ws, but it kept repairing itself faster than he could destroy it. As he continued shing at the, he found that he was just doing less and less damage to the itself until he couldn''t sh the at all.


    The reason for this was two different factors.


    The first was that by continuously using his full power attacks, he was naturally draining his own power until it reached the point where he couldn''t use full power attacks anymore.


    The second was that the had been slowly increasing in suppressive force which pushed down more and more of his power.


    This was the secret weapon that Mo Ze Chen had found in one of his ruin dives a long time ago, but there was a clear downside to it.


    While it was very powerful in terms of suppressive powers, it had one fatal w. It was an item where Mo Ze Chen had to put all his energy into it before he was able to use it, which meant that while he was using it, he didn''t have a way of doing anything else.<sub> </sub>


    That meant that while he could trap the Nascent Soul Realm beast, he wouldn''t be able to harm it.


    Then again, even if he had been able to move, he wouldn''t have been able to harm it since he didn''t have an artifact that could cut through the defenses of a Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    While he had broken through, that still didn''t mean that he would be able to break the defenses of the Nascent Soul Realm beast alone since there were still several realms between them. It wasn''t just several realms, but rather two full major realms.


    Any single major realm would be a gap like that of heaven and earth, not to mention two full major realms.


    Even if Mo Ze Chen was able to attack the Nascent Soul Realm beast all day with his full powered attacks without running out of energy, he still wouldn''t be able to break through the beast''s defenses.


    That was the main reason why he had proposed working with Lin Fan way back then. He could tell that Lin Fan was powerful, more powerful than he was and that he would most likely be able to break through the defenses of the Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    Of course, that n had changed countless times with all the changes in the realm, but now that there was only this Nascent Soul Realm beast left, they were back to the original n.


    Mo Ze Chen gritted his teeth as he said, "Boss, you want to take care of this quickly? I can''t hold on for that much longer."


    Lin Fan walked up to Xiao Hei who was trapped in the cage of white glowing rope and he looked at him with aplicated look.


    Right when he was about to say something, Xiao Hei said first, "Don''t look at me like that, I don''t need your pity. My master and I were happy, but it was the fault of all those gods that tore that happiness away from us. I don''t me you, but I curse those gods with thest bit of my being."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "It isn''t theplete fault of the gods, your master was also at fault¡­"


    Xiao Hei immediately roared out, cutting him off, "You think you know anything about my master! Don''t you dare say¡­"


    But Lin Fan also stared right at him with a serious look and cut him off, "You think you knew anything about your master? Don''t just look at the parts you want to look at and ignore the parts that you don''t want to look at."


    Xiao Hei fell silent when he heard this, but then he said in a dejected voice, "Just end it. At least I''ll be with my master in death."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Your loyalty is good, it''s what every pet owner would want to see. It''s just a pity that you took it in the wrong direction."


    Without saying another word, Lin Fan raised his sword and gathered all thews that he could.


    This white glowing was designed to keep things in, it wasn''t designed to keep outside things from going in.


    With a single swing, Lin Fan''s sword released a multi coloured sword energy that went right through the gaps of the rope that was surrounding Xiao Hei. That sword energy went right through the gaps in the white glowing and flew right at Xiao Hei''s neck.


    Since Xiao Hei had already given up and with how weakened he was from the suppression of the, this sword energy was able to easily pierce through his body and sever his head from his body.


    That head fell down into the and dyed it with the blood that came from it.


    But as soon as Mo Ze Chen saw Xiao Hei''s neck being cut off, he let out a sigh of relief as he released the.


    The disappeared and it was at that moment that Xiao Hei''s body finally crumpled onto the ground.


    Lin Fan walked forward and seeing this, Xiao Hei said, "Boss, be careful, we don''t know if it''s dead or not yet."


    But Lin Fan just turned to him and shook his head before moving towards the corpse.


    When Lin Fan came closer and he could see the unwilling look on Xiao Hei''s face, he reached down to close Xiao Hei''s eyes as he said, "In the end, you served the wrong master. I hope that you will find someone better in your next life."

 Chapter 491 Returned Souls (4)

    Xiao Hei had done many terrible things, such as helping Huang Xiao Hou steal the soul of this entire vige, the things that he had done to Faust and his wife, and all the other things that he did.


    But in the end, was the pet responsible for the evil actions of its master?


    Xiao Hei was taught to act this way and was ordered to do all those things because of Huang Xiao Hou, so could he take responsibility for everything.


    In a sense, the pets that the people of this universe raised were simr to children and they depended on their masters to teach them right from wrong. It was clear that in Xiao Hei''s case, he had been taught all the wrong things.


    This was a very delicate issue with many different factors.


    Would a child be punished for the crimes of their parents?


    Most people would say no in a situation like this because the child and the parent are two different people. Not to mention that the child''s mind hadn''t developed properly, not having their own sense of morals yet because that was something that they slowly learned from their parents.


    However, what if the child was the one whomitted the acts of evil because their parents ordered them to do so?


    Would one say that the child was wrong for choosing to follow the orders of their parents, or would one say that the child wasn''t to me because they didn''t know any better?


    There were many intricate details that would change this kind of judgement in the end.


    However, now wasn''t the time to worry about this since both the child and the master were dead.


    The only thing that Lin Fan needed to do was not judge and hope that Xiao Hei would meet someone better in his next life.


    While Lin Fan did close Xiao Hei''s eyes, that didn''t mean that he wouldn''t take his body since this was the corpse of a Nascent Soul Realm beast. This was a corpse that had a value that was hard to estimate since it was something that was rarely put on the market.


    Lin Fan would make sure to put this corpse of Xiao Hei to good use to honour his memories.


    After putting away Xiao Hei''s corpse, Lin Fan turned his attention to the bead that was on the ground.


    This was the bead that Lin Fan had asked Xiao Hei to get and he had gotten it in the end.


    During their showdown, Xiao Hei had been holding it in his human hands, but the moment that he had turned back into his beast form and lost his human hands, this bead had slid out of his beast paw andnded on the ground.


    This bead looked quite fragile and seemed like it would have cracked with just a single tap, but it withstood the drop from Xiao Hei''s beast paw to the floor and didn''t have a single scratch on it.


    Lin Fan picked it up and looked it over. No matter how he looked at it, it looked no different from a normal marble bead. However, when he looked more closely, he could see there was something that was inside of the bead.


    As he looked closer, he found that there seemed to be some kind of liquid that was right in the center of the bead that seemed to be churning. When he looked at it though, he could feel an intense power that came from it.


    This kind of power clearly wasn''t just the power of a single person, but rather the power that came from thousands of people put together.


    This wasn''t without a doubt the bead that contained all of the souls of the people of this vige that Huang Xiao Hou had stolen. The only problem that Lin Fan had now was how to release all of these souls.


    Mo Ze Chen could tell that this bead that Lin Fan was holding was something special, he even had a feeling that this bead would be answer to the one desire that he had from this realm, so he asked, "Boss, what do we do with this thing?"


    Lin Fan had been lost in his thoughts while looking at this bead, but when he heard Mo Ze Chen speak, he was pulled out of those thoughts. He turned to look at Mo Ze Chen who had an expectant look on his face and then he said with a serious look, "I don''t know."


    Mo Ze Chen who had been waiting for his answer didn''t know how to react at first, but then his expression copsed as he said with a stunned look, "Eh?"


    Mo Ze Chen really didn''t know what to say in this situation because when he had been following Lin Fan before, no matter what situation they encountered, Lin Fan seemed to have the solution. However, now that they were at the end of their journey, right before he could get what he wanted, Lin Fan finally didn''t know what to do.


    After taking a moment to calm himself, Mo Ze Chen then asked, "Boss, what do you mean by that? What do you mean by you don''t know?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "It means what it means, what else could it mean? I really don''t know how to handle this thing because I''ve never dealt with it before."<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t know what to say as he couldn''t help saying the same thing once again, "Eh?"


    Lin Fan didn''t have anything else to say because this was his first time encountering something like this and it was too far out of his normal range to understand what it was. Even when he tried asking Brainy about it, Brainy didn''t know anything about it either.


    Even if Brainy had spent a lot of time with the crystallization of wisdom that was Momonga, it didn''t mean that it knew everything. After all, Brainy had just been a pet with a single mutation when Lin Fan had first encountered it on the Blue Star.


    Even if it was a double mutated beast now, that didn''t mean that it knew everything since most of its experience was limited to the Blue Star and this upper realm.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help bing impatient because this was the final thing that was standing between him and a happy new springtime, but now he couldn''t find a way to solve it. Not to mention that time was slowly ticking down.


    That entire inheritance ceremony and thebyrinth itself had taken most of their time and they were only left with less than half an hour.


    When Mo Ze Chen was about to lose it, there was a voice that suddenly spoke up, a voice that no one had expected.


    "How about you just break it, wouldn''t that work?"


    Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan were both surprised when they heard this voice and they turned to look in the direction of that voice which came from Wang Jian.


    Mo Ze Chen was the first to react as he said, "You''ve seen this thing before at your Myriad Sword Hall?"


    Wang Jian turned to Mo Ze Chen and said while shaking his head, "No, but it seems like something that you would break, doesn''t it? If you break it, it would release whatever is inside just like the bead that you just threw, right?"


    Mo Ze Chen had a vein pop out on his forehead when he heard this.


    He couldn''t believe what this person was saying.


    He had thought that there would be some kind of logic behind his suggestion, but now it seemed like he wasn''t thinking at all¡­


    While Mo Ze Chen was a bit simple, that didn''t mean that he was a fool. He just wasn''t smart in the traditional way and was smart in a more instinctive way.


    That was also the reason why he couldn''t get along with simple muscle heads like this who didn''t think about a thing before they acted.


    While it might seem like this would be a simple fix for someone who didn''t think, what if this wasn''t the case? What if actually destroying the bead destroyed all of the souls that were contained within it?


    What if this was a special item that needed a special way of using it to release all of the souls that were contained within?


    To simply smash it would be negligent and it was very likely to end in disaster.


    So Mo Ze Chen couldn''t stop the anger in his heart from swelling as he roared, "Are you stupid? Do you really think that it would be that simple? Just destroying it would release all the souls trapped inside? Can you please stop and think¡­"


    But before Mo Ze Chen could finish berating Wang Jian, he suddenly heard a smashing sound from behind him.


    When he turned around in a daze to look at what that smashing sound was, he waspletely shocked by what he had seen.


    There was Lin Fan with a throwing stance with his hand aimed at the ground. On the ground by his feet, there were tiny shards of ss that looked like there was something made of ss that had just been shattered to pieces.


    Mo Ze Chen asked in a daze, "Boss, what did you just do?"


    Lin Fan looked right at Mo Ze Chen and said, "I smashed it."


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t believe that these words came out of Lin Fan''s mouth since Lin Fan had always seemed like a smart person to him, even if he was a bit impulsive¡­

 Chapter 492 Returned Souls (5)

    There was a silence that filled the room as they all looked down at the fragments of ss that were on the ground, waiting for anything to happen.


    As they waited, it seemed like there was nothing that was going to happen as no signs came from the smashed ss bead.


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen had bad feelings since they could tell that it wasn''t working and they had no idea what happened to the souls that had been trapped inside the ss bead. Could it be that they had all been destroyed along with the ss bead?


    As for Wang Jian, he really didn''t care since he didn''t really understand what was going on, but it didn''t seem like the right time for him to say anything, so he kept silent in the end.


    After another period of silence where nothing changed, Mo Ze Chen finally couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan had a bitter smile on his face since he didn''t know what to do, but he had been secretly nning to me Wang Jian the entire time.


    The only reason that he had listened to Wang Jian was because he believed that sometimes intelligent people tended to overthink things. He had thought that this was one of those situations where they had been overthinking it, so he decided to use the most simple method of shattering it.


    But now it seemed like that wasn''t the right solution, but he also really couldn''t take this back since he had already shattered the ss bead.


    What could they do?


    What they didn''t know was that during the silence between them, unbeknownst to them, there were wisps of energy that had been released from where the orb had been shattered and had flown out in all directions.


    These wisps of energy were the souls that had been contained inside the ss bead and they were flying off back to their owners.


    Souls were things that were inherently mysterious and not things that normal people could interact with, so they were things that normal people couldn''t see without special methods.


    Unless one had a special bloodline, a pair of special eyes, or practiced a special technique, there was no way for them to see the normally invisible souls. That was why even after smashing the bead and releasing these souls, they weren''t able to see a single thing happening.


    What they didn''t know was that the entire ruins all around them were changing as the souls were returning to their rightful owners.


    ¡­


    Out in the city outside of the giant glowing tree, there were still people who were running away from the ghosts and people who were locked inbat with the ghosts.


    But at this moment, when those wisps of energy entered the bodies of the ghosts, they suddenly crumpled onto the ground.


    All around, there were people who were asking, "What''s going on here?"


    But then their questions were answered by the ghosts that had just fallen. After a slight pause, the ghosts that had just fallen stood up once again, but they were no longer the same ghosts as before.


    When they stood up again, they hadpletely turned into humans.


    Some of them had clothes that were a bit tattered and showing some ces that couldn''t be shown, so they immediately squatted down again and covered themselves. However, most of the people were walking around in a confused manner.


    When the examinees saw this, they couldn''t help being surprised since they couldn''t understand why these ghosts that they were hunting had turned into normal humans.


    One of the ghosts that had turned back into humans noticed the examinee that was near them and he came over to ask, "Hello. Can I ask where we are right now?"


    The examinee was confused by this question, but he didn''t take it to heart since there was something else that he took notice of. As he looked at the ghost turned human in front of him, he paused for a second before suddenly stabbing out at this ghost.


    The ghost turned human was surprised, but he was able to dodge in the end.


    The ghost turned human turned to the examinee in shock and couldn''t help asking, "What are you doing? Are you crazy?"


    The examinee just looked at his own sword and at the ghost turned human before breaking out inughter.


    He wasughing because he couldn''t believe his good luck.


    Just a minute ago, this ghost had been torturing him by chasing after him, but now that it had suddenly changed into a human, it was finally time for him to take revenge. When the ghost had turned into a human, his cultivation had be much weaker and now he was only in the low Fragmented Soul Realm, which was easy for someone like him who was in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm to deal with.<sub> </sub>


    As a young master, naturally he had his pride and being chased around by the ghost like this had damaged that pride.


    Now it was time for him to pay this ghost back ten fold all the wrongs that he had suffered just now.


    The examinee raised his sword again and was about to stab out at the ghost turned human one more time.


    Seeing that the young man in front of him had raised his sword again, the ghost turned human immediately turned to run, but it wasn''t necessary in the end.


    Before the examinee could stab out with his sword, there was a sh of golden light that appeared in front of his face. At a speed that he couldn''t react to at all, this ball of golden light had hit him right in the face and knocked him out.


    Without even understanding what had just happened, the examinee lost his consciousness and copsed onto the ground.


    The ghost turned human had been running away, but seeing that no one was chasing him, he stopped and turned to look at the examinee that was on the ground.


    He didn''t know what had just happened, but in the end, the ghost turned human chose not to get closer to the young man that had attacked him, even though he was knocked out on the ground. Instead, the ghost turned human headed off in a different direction to find the answers that he was looking for.


    As he left, he couldn''t help muttering to himself, "Strange, what is going on here?"


    All over the city, there were simr scenes happening.


    There were young masters that all attacked the people who had reverted back into normal humans after regaining their souls since they were much weaker now.


    When Huang Xiao Hou turned these people into ghosts, he had used a special technique to increase their power by stuffing yin energy into their bodies. Now that they had recovered their souls and had reverted back into living being, that yin energy that had been preserving their bodies had been pushed out. However, as the yin energy was pushed out, their cultivations decreased since they had lost the energy that had forced their cultivations to increase.


    But even after the yin energy was pushed out, their cultivations were much strongerpared to before they were turned into ghosts. That was because the yin energy that had forcefully increased their cultivation had also helped to nurture theirws and increase their foundations, which brought them up to the level that they were currently at.


    Still, that wasn''t enough to bring them to the level they had been forced to reach, so they were still weaker than before.


    It was just a good thing that there were these balls of golden light that appeared out of nowhere, knocking out all of these examinees that attacked the people that had turned back into humans.


    Atop the giant golden tree in the middle, there were themanders from before, but they had also turned back into humans. But even after they had turned back into humans, they were still on the edge of the top of this tree, standing on the branches.


    In the center were five people, with one of them having their hands raised.


    If Lin Fan could see these five people, he definitely would have recognized them because he had just met them not that long ago.


    These five people were the elders of this vige that had been sealed inside of the crypt, waiting for their time.


    The moment that they had felt their souls return to them, they immediately jumped out of the crypt and flew to the very top of this tree. They had been watching the situation develop and as soon as one of the examinees made a move, the great elder immediately raised his hand to send out that ball of golden light.


    Not only that one ball of golden light, he sent out multiple balls of golden light that flew across the city, hitting the various examinees in the face.


    In an instant, the city became much more quiet.


    After that, the great elder turned to look at themanders who had been waiting while kneeling down around them and said, "Go, do what you need to do."


    All themanders cupped their hands before saying, "Yes, great elder!"


    Then after that, they all flew off the tree, flying out in different directions.


    Once all themanders were gone, there were only the elders that were left at the very top of the tree.


    When they were alone, the slightly chubby elder asked, "Weren''t your moves too light? It would have been better just to kill them all."

 Chapter 493 Returned Souls (6)

    When the great elder heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    After smiling like that for a bit, the great elder said, "Well, they''re people who came in with the saviour, so we can''t just kill them that simply, can we?"


    The slightly chubby elder thought about it before giving a nod.


    But then he still asked, "Still, we can''t keep them in here can we?"


    The great elder smiled at this and with a wave of his hand, there was a small bead that appeared in between his fingers.


    This bead was one of the ones that the examinees had, it was the bead that was given to them before they entered this ce and their own lifeline.


    The great elder raised it up for the other four to see as he said, "This thing will send them out when the timees, so there''s nothing for us to do."


    The other elders all came forward to look at the bead that was in the great elder''s hand and they were all nodding as they looked at it. However, after a few seconds, they suddenly knitted their brows.


    Seeing the looks on their faces, the great elder also revealed a serious look as he said, "I''m sure you can sense it too, thisw that''s inside of this bead¡­"


    p The other elders knitted their brows even more when they saw this, but not a single one of them said a thing.</anda>


    It was clear to them what the great elder was trying to say once they sensed the power of thew that was stored inside of the bead. If what they were sensing was correct, this was most likely the real reason why the great elder didn''t kill these kids.


    Inside of this little bead was of course spatialws, but that wasn''t what was surprising. Rather it was the power of the spatialws that were surprising.


    As experts that had plenty of experience, they knew just how powerful the spatialws inside the bead were and these spatialws were at the level of the True Soul Realm¡­


    No matter how strong they were, this realm had actually been weaker before the Gctic Humanity Alliance had taken over, which was also the main reason why Huang Xiao Hou had been able to take this realm from them.


    They were just a lowly realm that had been battered by the Beast n, so the strongest expert that they had was the great elder who was in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    So to put it simply, they just weren''t able to offend a faction that had a True Soul Realm Expert behind it¡­


    After looking at the bead for a bit, they couldn''t help giving a collective sigh.


    It seemed like they were still weak even after all this time, but there was nothing that they could do about this.


    The only thing that they could do now was¡­


    With a flick of his hand, the bead disappeared from the great elder''s hand and returned to the person that he had taken it from. He had no use for this and if he were to take this, there would be one person who wouldn''t be sent away, which they couldn''t allow.


    Right now, the thing that they had to do first was lock themselves away to increase their own power before interacting with the outside world, otherwise they would be nothing more than easy prey for all the factions outside.


    To do that, they had to send away everyone who had intruded in their home and then seal themselves up.


    After sending the bead away, the great elder leaned down and with a golden glow around his hand, he touched the top of the giant golden glowing tree underneath him. As soon as his hand made contact with the bark of the tree, there was a split that appeared under their feet and they immediately dropped down.


    Without any worries, the five of them dropped down into the city that was below them. While falling down, the great elder raised his hand again and a golden glow appeared around it.


    After a second of pause, the same thing as before happened where he shot out countless balls of golden light that fell down onto the city beneath him.


    These golden balls of light were aimed at the people who had been unable to reach the final round.


    These people who hadn''t been able to make it through the fountain had been wandering around the city the entire time, looking for any treasures that they could take back with them.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had already cleaned out the city.


    Other than in the four locations that Lin Fan had already cleared, there wasn''t a single piece of loot left for these young masters to take.


    It was even more unlucky for them as the balls of golden light fell down from above, hitting them right on the head and knocking them all out.


    As the young masters crumpled onto the ground, they didn''t know how they had even been knocked out.<sub> </sub>


    In the end, they were unlucky because they had been unable to enter the final round and they had been unable to find a single piece of treasure to take back.


    Well, it can''t be said that they werepletely unlucky because as of now, there was no clue if the followers that had gone into thebyrinth with Lin Fan''s group had even survived¡­


    After taking care of all these young masters, once again the great elder covered his hand in a golden glow.


    Instead of taking the fountain like Lin Fan''s group had done, the great elder shot a beam of golden light right down into the ground, causing another fissure to appear.


    The five elders dived into this fissure without any hesitation and when they appeared on the other side, they were right in front of the pce that Lin Fan and the others had entered.


    But of course they didn''t stop there as they rushed right into the pce, charging into the depths.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were both still staring at the shards of broken ss on the ground, not knowing what to do¡­


    After all, they had waited all this time and it didn''t seem like anything was going to happen¡­


    At the same time, Lin Fan had also started inching closer towards Wang Jian, as if he was going to catch him and use him as a scapegoat¡­


    But it didn''te to this in the end as someone had suddenly appeared in this room.


    It wasn''t the five elders who were still currently rushing through thebyrinth, but rather it was a slender figure that Mo Ze Chen dreamed about.


    She came out of the ground and flew right into the air beforending in front of Lin Fan. She looked at him with an emotional look before hugging him and saying, "You did it!"


    Neither Mo Ze Chen or Lin Fan could react to this, but then Mo Ze Chen immediately red at Lin Fan as Lin Fan revealed an awkward look.


    He was someone who believed in boundaries between friends and also he knew what would happen if a certain someone found out about this.


    Though between the two, his fear for that certain someone was much stronger than his respect for his friends¡­


    Lulu also realized what she had done wrong and immediately let go of Lin Fan. She had been overwhelmed by her emotions and she had hugged Lin Fan before she could even stop herself.


    Of course, there was no love in this hug, it was just a hug that came from overwhelming happiness.


    Mo Ze Chen of course knew this and came over with a smile as he said, "I also helped."


    It was three simple words, but there was a blush that came over Lulu''s face, which waspletely different from her reaction with Lin Fan.


    It was only Mo Ze Chen who could make her feel this way with how aggressive he was, but she wasn''t against it since she had been watching over them as much as she could the entire time. She had seen how hard Mo Ze Chen had worked and she naturally knew the reason why, which was why her heart had slowly melted as time passed.


    Lowering her head, she couldn''t help hesitating a bit before softly punching Mo Ze Chen''s shoulder.


    But when she did, Mo Ze Chen was surprised as he felt a sharp pain in his arm and he couldn''t help taking a step back from it¡­


    It seemed like his angel was much stronger than he thought¡­


    Still, that didn''t stop him from loving her since she was the most beautiful girl he had seen in his life.


    Lin Fan didn''t feel awkward being a third wheel since he was happy to see his friend finding his happiness, but that wasn''t the same for Wang Jian.


    He was someone who had been focused his entire life on cultivating with his sword, so he had never experienced any kind of love before. In fact, he was someone who was quite shy, so seeing them flirt like this, it made it very awkward for him.


    Finally, after a bit of time, Lulu seemed to have worked up her courage and she moved towards Mo Ze Chen while muttering, "You did work hard¡­"


    Mo Ze Chen''s heart skipped a beat when he saw her doing this, but he didn''t say no as he stood there facing her.


    It was too bad that before she coulde in, there was a voice that said, "What is going on here?"

 Chapter 494 Returned Souls (7)

    This was a voice that was ice cold and filled with an underlying rage, but it was also a voice that was familiar.


    When everyone turned to look in the direction that it came from, they saw a young ck haired man standing at one of the doors that led into this room. Behind him were four other people who all had their hands over their mouths as they tried to cover up theirughter.


    Lin Fan''s group of three were confused why the great elder had this kind of tone with them becausest time, he was very friendly.


    But they were only confused for a second because Lulu gave them an exnation right away.


    After being surprised for a bit, she suddenly said, "Daddy, what are you doing here?"


    When they heard her say the word "daddy", they immediately understood what was happening. However, when they looked at the great elder, they really couldn''t imagine him being anyone''s dad because he looked so young.


    When the great elder heard Lulu calling out to him, he immediately turned to her with a smile and said, "Baby, you must have been afraid. Come and let daddy hold you."


    Without even looking at Mo Ze Chen, he pushed him aside and went forward to take Lulu in his arms.


    Lulu also reciprocated this hug because it had been a long time since she hadst seen her dad, but then she realized how embarrassing it was and tried to break free as she said, "Daddy, stop it. There are other people here."


    The great elder gave a soft snort and said, "What''s wrong with a dad showing concern about his daughter?"


    But in the end, she still broke free.


    After breaking free, she awkwardly stood there for a few seconds, but then she still went over to where Mo Ze Chen was lying on the ground. She reached out her hand and said, "Are you alright?"


    Seeing this, Mo Ze Chen revealed a smile and said, "I''m alright."


    But when he reached his hand out to take Lulu''s outstretched hand, the great elder immediately came between them and pped Mo Ze Chen''s hand away.


    Lulu was surprised by the great elder appearing in front of her, but before she could say a thing, the great elder said, "You shouldn''t pick things off the ground, they''re dirty."


    After saying that, the great elder turned to Mo Ze Chen with a cold look, but he still didn''t say anything.


    Mo Ze Chen could guess what he wanted to say, but he could only reveal an awkward smile.


    In the end, it was Lulu who broke the silence by saying, "Daddy, I''ll get angry."


    When the great elder heard this, his cold expression immediately copsed as he said with a fearful look, "Baby, don''t be angry. Daddy was just doing what was best for you."


    Lulu pouted her lips and turned her head without saying a thing.


    During this time, the great elder coldly red at Mo Ze Chen, but then he immediately went back to trying to coax Lulu to stop being mad at him.


    On the side, the four elders, Lin Fan, and Wang Jian were all just watching the fun.


    But of course, that didn''tst long since the great elder knew that he couldn''t keep doing this since there was something else that he had to do first.


    Once he stopped trying to coax Lulu, he turned to look at Lin Fan and Wang Jian and without a word he raised his hand covered in a golden glow. That golden glow quickly turned into a ball of golden light that suddenly shot out in their direction.


    It had been so sudden that neither Lin Fan or Wang Jian could react to it and when they did react to it, it was already toote.


    That ball of golden light smashed right into Wang Jian''s face and without any pause, he copsed onto the ground, losing consciousness.


    Lin Fan raised a brow at this, but he could understand why the great elder did this.


    As far as he was concerned, he didn''t care what happened to the rest of the people here since most of them were hispetitors and they had their own agendas. As long as he and his people were safe, that was fine to him.


    Well, it would be hard to say if Mo Ze Chen would be safe against the great elder, but he seemed safe for now.<sub> </sub>


    Once Wang Jian was knocked out, the great elder asked Lin Fan, "What are your ns now?"


    Lin Fan thought about it for a bit before saying, "How many experts do you have?"


    The great elder revealed a smile and said, "That depends on how many True Soul Realm Experts are out there."


    Lin Fan also said with a smile, "Too many to deal with."


    The great elder gave a sigh while shaking his head before saying, "Our ns now are to seal ourselves off to give ourselves time to be stronger, so whatever you have in mind, we won''t be able to help you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "That''s perfectly fine because I need some time to build up my power as well. Before that, there won''t be anything for you to do. I just hope that you''ll help me when the timees."


    The great elder gave a nod and said, "As long as you can help our vige find its ce in the world."


    With that, the pact between them was sealed.


    Right now, the only experts that this vige had were the five elders in the room, the rest were all either in the Embryo Soul Realm or the Child Soul Realm. As for the five elders in the room, only the great elder was in the peak Nascent Soul Realm, as for the rest, they were all in the low Nascent Soul Realm except for the slightly chubby elder who was in the mid Nascent Soul Realm.


    These elders had increased their cultivation after expelling out the yin energy because they were different from the normal ghosts. The yin energy that had been ced into them had actually been put there to restrict them instead of increasing their cultivation since they were already strong enough to begin with. In fact, they had been too strong for Huang Xiao Hou to control properly, which was why he had given them this yin energy.


    The yin energy shed with their existingws and decreased their cultivation until they had reached the level they had been at as ghosts.


    However, now that they had been freed of this yin energy, they had been able to absorb the yin energy which had not only helped them recover their cultivation, it also helped their cultivation be stronger.


    Right now, it would only take a bit more for the great elder to break through into the True Soul Realm.


    As long as they had one single True Soul Realm Expert, it would be enough for them to negotiate with the other forces outside. It was just like the situation with Qing Ao, as long as he as a True Soul Realm Expert existed, no one was willing to invest into dealing with him and they gave him some territory to cate him.


    So what this vige needed most was time for the great elder to reach the True Soul Realm.


    But the elders could also feel the potential that Lin Fan had since he had defeated someone who they never thought they had a chance against. Not to mention that they had seen his potential in the trial earlier, so they knew that he was much more talented than any one of them.


    As long as they followed him, they were certain that he would bring them far beyond just this upper realm.


    So they had already secretly made the decision to follow Lin Fan just like Mo Ze Chen had already done.


    But after this was decided, the great elder went back to trying to coax Lulu, but when he turned around, he found that she was gone.


    When he turned back to Mo Ze Chen, he found that he was gone as well.


    Looking around, he saw the two of them in a corner by themselves and Lulu had taken some gauze as she began helping Mo Ze Chen patch up his wounds.


    There weren''t that many wounds since there wasn''t anything physically dangerous in this final trial, but Mo Ze Chen was ying it up by acting much more injured than he actually was.


    The entire time, Lulu had been carefully wrapping the gauze up over his "injuries", even though she already knew that he wasn''t injured. However, this was her first time being this close with a man and naturally she was curious about the other gender since she was in the prime of her youth.


    She might have been over a thousand years old chronologically, but she had been sealed most of the time which had slowed down the development of her body, so she was around the same age as Mo Ze Chen. However, she had never had a rtionship with a man because of her father, so this was her first time seeing something like this.


    When the great elder saw this, he immediately came over to separate them and he began treating Mo Ze Chen even worse.


    However, Mo Ze Chen didn''t fight back and just epted this because he wanted the great elder''s approval.


    After all, he wasn''t just nning on dating Lulu, he was nning on marrying her!

 Chapter 495 End Of The Second Round

    There was still some time before the spatialws inside the beads were activated, bringing them back to the surface, so before then, there was time for them to rx.


    Lin Fan moved over to the other elders while the great elder was going all out in disrupting the rtionship between Mo Ze Chen and Lulu.


    Once it was around time, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen gathered in the center with the elders and the great elder who said, "We will be sealing ourselves up now, so we won''t be making any contact until the time is right. I will personally be going into closed door training to break through to the next realm."


    At this, Lulu revealed an unwilling look as she turned to Mo Ze Chen.


    Seeing this, the great elder red at Mo Ze Chen who just awkwardly stood there.


    Lulu knew that it was no use looking to Mo Ze Chen since he wasn''t able to convince her father, so she turned to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile. He didn''t want to involve himself in this matter since this was a matter between them, but seeing the look from Lulu and the look that Mo Ze Chen gave him, he felt like he should do something for his friend.


    Lin Fan gave a cough before saying, "Great elder, that doesn''t seem like the right choice either."


    The great elder slightly knitted his brows and asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan replied, "If youpletely iste yourself, how will you know about what the outside world is like? I''m sure that there''s a way for you to send people out to gather information as well and if you do, they can stay with me for now."


    The great elder knitted his brows deeper when he heard this and while he was thinking, Lulu revealed an excited look as she grabbed the great elder''s arm and said, "Daddy, he''s right, we can''t just lock ourselves away or we won''t know anything about this world once we go out. It''ll be much more dangerous for us if we don''t have some understanding of the world outside."


    The other elders didn''t say a thing, but based on the look on their faces, it was clear that they agreed with what Lin Fan was saying.


    But even with everyone against him, the great elder didn''t agree to Lin Fan''s suggestion right away. Even though he himself agreed with what Lin Fan was saying.


    The one problem with this n was that they just didn''t have the people needed to execute this since they had lost most of their geniuses over the years and there was no one to spare. Well, it wasn''t like there wasn''t anyone at all, but rather his personal feelings got in the way for this one person.


    The great elder looked at Lulu and then he looked at Mo Ze Chen, but this time his eyes were much more rxed and not as cold as before.


    While he had been getting in their way, he had also been observing Mo Ze Chen. Based on the way Mo Ze Chen treated him, he could tell how serious Mo Ze Chen was about Lulu. Also based on what he had seen from Mo Ze Chen during the trials, he could tell that he was a good kid.


    So deep down, he had already started to ept Mo Ze Chen in his heart¡­


    After a while, he finally gave a sigh and said, "Young master Lin, your idea is correct and it is possible for us to send someone out of these ruins, but¡­"


    Lulu''s eyes had lit up in the first part, but they dimmed once again after hearing the second part. She couldn''t help asking, "Daddy, but what?"


    The great elder looked at Lulu for a bit before giving another sigh and saying, "Baby, you''re the only one left that is strong enough to go out and daddy really isn''t willing to let you go."


    Lulu revealed a sad look, but then she revealed a determined look and said, "Daddy, I want to do this."


    The great elder gave a nod before turning to Mo Ze Chen and saying, "Take care of her. If you ever make her cry, I will being for you."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised by this sudden change in attitude from the great elder, but then he also said with a determined look, "I would rather die first than to let her cry."


    The great elder looked at the two of them before bringing them together and patting them on the shoulder.


    During this, Lulu couldn''t stop the tears and she came forward to hug the great elder.


    The great elder also had a teare out of his eyes as he tightly held her.


    After that, it was about the time for them to leave, so Lulu came over to where Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were standing. After wiping the tears from her face, she looked at Mo Ze Chen with a smile as she said, "Shall we go then?"


    Mo Ze Chen just gave a nod in response.


    It was at that moment that Lin Fan broke this atmosphere by saying, "You''re noting with us though."


    Both Mo Ze Chen and Lulu had stunned looks on their faces before Mo Ze Chen said, "Boss, how can you go back on your word like this?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile before saying, "That''s not what I meant. Think about how we''re going to go back, do you think that she can go with us?"<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen thought about this and then he realized that Lin Fan was right.


    They were going to be automatically transported back by the beads, but that wouldn''t work for Lulu since she didn''t have one.


    Lulu also realized this same fact and she turned to look at Wang Jian who was lying on the ground. After a moment''s pause, she started moving towards him, but the great elder stopped her.


    The great elder said, "Baby, you can''t take it from him or he won''t be able to get out."


    Lulu looked back at the great elder with an aggrieved look and said, "But daddy¡­"


    The great elder patted her head and said, "We have our own way of getting out, you need to let him leave or we can''t seal up the realm."


    Lulu and Mo Ze Chen gave one sad look to each other before Mo Ze Chen said, "I''ll be waiting for you."


    Lulu gave a nod and didn''t say anything else.


    Lin Fan turned to the great elder and said, "I don''t know where she''lle out when she doese out, but tell her toe to Harmony City to find me. My store should be up by the time shees, so it''ll be easy for her to find me when she arrives."


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Boss, you''re in Harmony City?"


    Lin Fan looked at Mo Ze Chen and asked, "You''re not?"


    But before Mo Ze Chen could answer, there was a white light that suddenly covered them. Before either of them could say a thing, they disappeared from the spot.


    Wang Jian who had been on the floor was also covered in a white light before disappearing from the spot he had been in.


    The elders all turned to Lulu who was looking at where Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan had been standing. The great elder was about toe forward andfort her, but Lulu suddenly turned around and said, "Shouldn''t we start getting ready to seal this ce?"


    The elders were all surprised when they heard this, but then they immediately understood after hearing what she said next.


    Lulu said with a smile, "The sooner we seal this ce, the sooner I can leave, isn''t that right?"


    The great elder didn''t know whether tough or cry when he heard this as the other elders all patted him on the shoulder.


    Without caring about what they thought, Lulu just turned around and walked off with a happy smile on her face.


    ¡­


    After that sh of white light, the scene in front of Lin Fan had changed.


    He was no longer in the ruins, but rather he appeared in front of the house that was above those ruins.


    When he saw the people waiting outside, they seemed a bit unfamiliar to him since it felt like a long time since he had seen them, even though he had only been in the ruins for half a day.


    Shi Yan watched as these people appeared and then he said, "Do you have what you need?"


    The people who had been teleported out of the ruins were mostly unconscious since they had been knocked out by the great elder''s balls of golden light.


    However there was this strange tone in Shi Yan''s voice where when they heard it, they were suddenly jolted awake.


    Most of these examinees didn''t know what was happening, but that didn''t matter for Lin Fan or Mo Ze Chen.


    Both of them came forward and they both waved their hands to pull something out of the Storage Rings. Both of them had pulled out a sword that ttered to the ground in front of them.


    Shi Yan looked at the swords that appeared before giving a nod and saying, "Alright, you both pass."


    After that, Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen both started moving to the side, away from the main group since they no longer had to care about anything else for this second trial.

 Chapter 496 Moving Onto The Third Round

    But that didn''t mean that Shi Yan was done with them just yet.


    Shi Yan said in a calm voice, "Wait, I still have something to talk to you about."


    While he had said it in a calm voice, one could clearly hear the slight agitation that was also in his voice. At the same time, there was a firm tone in his voice which showed that he wouldn''t ept any excuses at all.


    Lin Fan wasn''t afraid of Shi Yan because he knew that he would be able to fight him, but there was still the issue of the Hunters Exam.


    Shi Yan by all rights was an examiner in the Hunters Exam, who also represented the Hunters Organization to a certain extent. If Lin Fan were to ignore him just like this, there definitely wouldn''t be any benefits to this.


    However, Lin Fan also had a good idea of what Shi Yan wanted to talk to him about, so he also didn''t want to talk to him since he knew what would happen once Shi Yan didn''t get the information he wanted.


    Still, he had no choice, so he and Mo Ze Chen followed Shi Yan into the house that was above the entrance of the ruins.


    Before going in, Shi Yan also turned around and said, "The rest of you, gather your mind and bring out the items that you need to pass."


    Without even caring about their response, Shi Yan went right in with Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen.


    Lin Fan had already been herest time when he entered the ruins, but he hadn''t looked too closely since he was more focused on the stairs in the ground that led down. Now that he had some time to look around, he found that this ce was quite well stocked for a ce that was just used as an entrance to the ruins.


    Thinking about it, he realized that it made sense since they most likely had people guarding it. Since there was also a building atop the entrance, it didn''t make sense not to just use the building as an outpost.


    Shi Yan walked over to the table that had been ced there and pulled out one of the chairs to sit down before gesturing at the other chairs in front of him for Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen to sit down.


    Both of them didn''t hesitate at all as they sat down and then there was a silence that came over them. During this time, Shi Yan had been carefully looking at them, as if he was searching for something.


    Finally Shi Yan was the one who broke the silence as he said, "What did the two of you find down there?"


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were silent when they heard this because there were clearly things that they didn''t want to say.


    When Shi Yan saw this, he tapped his finger on the table and said, "You should know that this ce is special to the Hunters Organization and as long as you provide enough information, I''m sure that will help your exam results."


    Even after he said this, neither Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen said a thing still as they just sat there watching him.


    Rather, Lin Fan had an interested look as he looked at Shi Yan.


    If it was just important for the organization, Shi Yan clearly wouldn''t be trying this hard to get the information since that was just the nature of the Hunters Organization. It was a very loose organization and every member was free to do what they wanted as long as it didn''t involve the very existence of the organization.


    So even if something was important to the organization, most people wouldn''t actually be that invested. That was unless they had a personal stake in whatever they were looking for, which was what Shi Yan clearly had right now.


    Shi Yan saw that his words weren''t working, but he didn''t say anything else because he knew that doing this would have more pressure than if he actually said anything.


    After all, the backing that he had brought out wasn''t a normal backing, it was the Hunters Organization.


    This was one of the twelve great factions of the Gctic Humanity Alliance and there was no greater threat than one of these twelve factions since they were ones that ruled this realm. As long as it was someone who lived in this realm, they would know what one of the twelve great factions could do to them, so they would definitely submit.


    But that was the thing, Lin Fan didn''t seem nervous at all.


    In the end, Lin Fan said, "I really don''t know what you want, there''s nothing I can tell you. It was a normal realm with a normal trial and we were teleported out in the end."<sub> </sub>


    Shi Yan knitted his brows when he heard this and he was about to say something else, but then there was a knock that came from the door. He turned to look at the door which had already been opened and found that it was someone he was familiar with.


    Shi Yan was surprised when he saw that person and he couldn''t help asking, "Why are you here?"


    The person who came in was an old woman. This old woman''s face was covered in wrinkles and she was bent over her cane, looking like she would fall down at any moment, but there was also a strange power that came from her that made it feel like she was invincible.


    The old woman revealed a kind smile and said, "There was a problem with the transport for the next round, so I came here to give the ones that passed a ride."


    Shi Yan knitted his brows even deeper and he took a look at Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen before saying, "Alright, we were just finishing up here. I''lle and grade the others, then you can be on your way."


    Shi Yan stood up and walked past Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen, but as he was walking past, he didn''t forget to say in a voice that only Lin Fan could hear, "This isn''t over yet. I''ll find you after the exam."


    He went past the old woman who was standing at the door and then went out to judge the rest of the examinees who had woken up now.


    ? The old woman looked at Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen and revealed a smile before turning to walk out without saying a single thing in the end.


    Once they were both gone, Mo Ze Chen let out a long sigh of relief.


    But when he was about to say something, Lin Fan raised a finger to his lips and shook his head.


    There was no guarantee that there wasn''t some kind of listening device that was left in this room, so it was better not to say anything right now.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised at first, but he quickly caught onto what Lin Fan meant by this and shut his mouth.


    The two of them walked out of the room and stood on the side, waiting for the judging of this second round to end.


    At the same time, Lin Fan looked around for the other people who had entered the pce with him.


    As his cultivation grew, Lin Fan''s memory skills also became better, so he had been able to memorize each of their faces. As he looked around, other than Wang Jian, he couldn''t see anyone else that he recognized as having been in the pce with them.


    It seemed like other than the three of them, all the other forty seven people had died in that pce¡­


    After receiving the Fragmented Soul Realm Artifacts from all the people who had one, Shi Yan nodded to the old woman. Shi Yan himself just went forward to pick up the Fragmented Soul Realm Artifacts while the old woman waved her hand and said, "Alright, all of you that passed,e with me. As for the rest, there will be someone to pick you up afterwards."


    After she said this, there was an airship that suddenlynded right by her, putting down a ramp for them to enter from.


    The ones that passed quickly made their way into the airship and there were a few that didn''t pass that tried to sneak on, but they were quickly dealt with. Before they could even take a single step onto the airship, there was a pressure that fell onto them and they copsed before they could take a single step. The only thing they could do was breathe as they were mmed into the ground by the pressure that had fallen onto them.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen made their way onto the airship, but when they passed by the old woman, she said in a voice that only the two of them could hear, "Xiao Yan is a cruel person who will stop at nothing to get what he wants, you should be careful."


    Both Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen looked at the old woman with surprised looks, but all that met them was a kind smile.


    Seeing that, neither of them said a thing and they walked onto the airship.


    The old woman waited until everyone was on the airship before walking up the ramp herself. As soon as that ramp was brought back up, the airship didn''t even wait another second as it immediately took off.


    As she was walking into the interior of the airship, the old woman muttered under her breath, "It seems like the one that old Qiao has his eyes on is a real treasure."

 Chapter 497 Interrupted Exam

    But then she knitted her brows as she also muttered, "It seems like Shi Yan really was doing something under our noses¡­I''ll have to tell the others to look out for him."


    This old woman was actually in disguise, but it was a disguise to only those that weren''t hunters. All the hunters recognized this disguise since this was the form that she normally took when she was in the Hunters Organization.


    As for what she really looked like, that was a mystery to most of the people in the Hunters Organization.


    Her true identity was a terrifying one, she was one of the only few Three Star Hunters and the current president of the Hunters Organization, Hai Yin.


    She raised her wrist to her mouth and said a few things to an unknown person before heading back into the main area of the airship.


    In that main area, the various examiners that passed were all standing and waiting around in groups. Most people were in smaller groups of two or three or standing alone, while there were also fourrger groups that also formed.


    Surprisingly Wang Jian was one of those people who were alone.


    Back in the ruins, when Wang Jian had been pulled into the fountain, leaving those other Myriad Sword Hall juniors alone in that city, they had been targeted by everyone and wiped out in the end.


    While Wang Jian had travelled alone previously, just him being in the realm was enough pressure on the others that no one dared to move against those from the Myriad Sword Hall.


    However, when he had fallen into the fountain, everyone had assumed that he was dead, which had relieved the pressure that he had ced on them by just being there.


    There were those that immediately had the idea of taking care of those Myriad Sword Hall juniors since there was no one protecting them and they were in these ruins where no one would know who killed them. Even if they turned in the artifact to pass this exam with, they could just say that they had found it or taken it from the actual killer and no one would be able to say a thing since this was just what wasmonly epted.


    But that changed when Wang Jian hade back alive¡­


    Not a single person had dared to turn in the Fragmented Soul Realm Artifacts that they had gotten from the Myriad Sword Hall juniors and it was all out of fear of Wang Jian.


    He was a famed maniac, someone who did whatever he wanted in pursuit of his own strength, so there was no one that would stop him if he wanted revenge since this was a matter between the younger generation.


    The other one thing he was well known for was how protective he was of his people, even if he didn''t seem to show it, but they were certain that he would take revenge for the ones that they killed if he found out.


    That was why there were some people who tried to approach Lin Fan, trying to pull them to their side.


    They had seen the fight between Lin Fan and Wang Jian, so they knew that Lin Fan was stronger than Wang Jian.


    For someone this young to be this powerful, there had to be some kind of backing behind him, one that wasn''t even weaker than Wang Jian''s, which was most likely why he wasn''t afraid to fight Wang Jian.


    Since that was the case, it would be in their best interest to befriend Lin Fan since he would be the only thing that could keep Wang Jian off their backs.


    Many of these people came over to try and talk up Lin Fan, but all that they were met with was an ice cold wall. Still, there were some that persisted even in the face of this ice cold wall, it was just too bad that none of them had seeded.


    Finally they could only give up, but many of them still stayed close to where Lin Fan was since they could see the look that Wang Jian looked at Lin Fan with.


    It was a look that had a trace of fear, one that they recognized because it was the way that they looked at Wang Jian.


    This all happened while they were waiting in the main hall of this airship, but that all came to an end when the old woman came into the main hall.


    She looked over the hall and her eyes stopped on a few of them before she suddenly gave a p and said with a faint smile, "Why are you all so nervous? You''ve passed the second round and you''re on your way to the third round, so you should be happy."


    But when she said this, no one had let down their guard,


    The only reason they had followed her was because Shi Yan had been respectful to this old woman, but that didn''t mean that they would let down their guard so easily. As far as they were concerned, it was likely that this was already the third exam and this old woman was already watching how they would react to grade them.<sub> </sub>


    The old woman didn''t mind that they were all on guard, rather she just gave a shrug and said, "It''s fine if you don''t believe me, but we''ll be reaching the third stage in another two hours, so you have time to rx before we arrive."


    p Once again, no one let their guard down, but there was someone who raised their hand and asked, "What''s waiting for us at the third exam?"</anda>


    The old woman revealed a faint smile and just shook her head as she said, "That''s for you to find out, isn''t it?"


    That person put their hand down and didn''t keep pushing it.


    Everyone had seen the people who had been smashed into the ground by some kind of pressure and they could feel a strange auraing from this old woman. Based on how she talked, it was clear that she didn''t have a good temper, so if they pushed it, who knew what would happen.


    There was nothing to gain from annoying this old woman, so they immediately stopped asking.


    However, it was at this time that Lin Fan suddenly said, "But that isn''t a no, is it?"


    The old woman turned in Lin Fan''s direction and gave a nod with a faint smile before saying, "Then how about we y a game?"


    Everyone was taken aback when they heard this since they had all assumed that this old woman wouldn''t tell them anything, but now it seemed like the situation was changing?


    The old woman raised her hand and with a flick of that hand, there was a ball that appeared in her hand. This was a simple looking red stic ball that didn''t have any special features. There wasn''t even a special aura that came from this ball.


    The old woman held this ball as she said, "There''s ten of these balls that are hidden on this ship. The time limit will be when wend. If you''re holding one of these balls when time is up, you''ll win a special prize."


    Then she turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Is that enough for you?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows before asking, "What are the rules then? It can''t be that there are no rules, right?"


    The old woman gave a nod before saying, "You''re right, there are rules in all things, so how could there not be rules here? It''s very simple, you''re free to do what you want, but let''s avoid taking things too far. You''ll be considered out if you cause serious injuries to someone or kill someone, but you''re free to hinder people however you want."


    Then the old woman pointed at something on the ceiling and said, "There are cameras all over this ce, hidden and not hidden. If you''re caught breaking the rules, you''ll be immediately disqualified."


    Lin Fan calmly asked, "Then to confirm, this isn''t the third round, right? Also, will we be disqualified from the exam or just the game?"


    The old woman didn''t reply this time, she just stood there with a smile on her face as if everything was obvious.


    But it was obvious to those that had picked up on the clues.


    First, based on how they were being transported by this old woman instead of the normal transport and based on how she said that there was trouble, it seemed like there was a problem with the third round, which was why she most likely came here to stall.


    There were people who could tell that this wasn''t the max speed of this airship since they knew what the max speed of this airship model was, so they could tell from the beginning that something was off.


    Second, this old woman was now offering a game to keep them distracted, so it was clear that they didn''t want to give people time to think and figure out that something was wrong.


    However, that just told the people who were insightful that something was off.


    Still, even if that was the case, there was no harm in joining this game because they would most likely give a good prize at the end of this game, one that would make up for the dy.


    If anything, it would most likely be some kind of advantage in the third round¡­


    Since that was the case, there were people who started getting excited for this game.

 Chapter 498 Hide And Seek (1)

    When the old woman saw the change among these examinees, she revealed a smile and said, "Well, what are you waiting for? The clock is already ticking."


    Once she said this, there were some people who couldn''t wait as they charged right into the corridor of the airship, looking to find those red balls.


    But there were also people who stayed in the room, as if they were waiting for something.


    Of course, there was one thing inmon between these people who stayed. They all looked at the people who had run off like they were looking at idiots.


    They had a reason for this. To put it simply it was because those people were too dumb to realize the crux of this game.


    This airship itself wasn''t that big, which meant that it wouldn''t be that hard to find the red balls. The main problem wasn''t with finding the red balls themselves, but rather being able to keep them.


    The key to this was the fact that there was a two hour limit to this game and that interference was allowed. To put it simply, with how easy it was to find the red balls, it was almost as if the rules of the game were encouraging people to steal red balls from each other.


    That was the second reason why they looked at these people like they were idiots. Even if you found the ball in the beginning, would you be able to keep that ball all the way to the end?


    The first important thing was the fact that one could steal balls, but the second and more important thing was that there was a time limit, so getting the balls right away wasn''t the smart thing to do. After all, even if a person was powerful and could keep others from stealing their balls, if they got the ball right away, they would have to keep fending off people who would be trying to steal their ball the entire time.


    Even if one was powerful, would they have the stamina tost that long?


    The only difference was if someone had a powerful enough hiding technique, but that wasn''t very likely because of how small the ying field was. Even if this airship was bigger than most other airships, that still didn''t mean that it was big enough for them to freely run and hide on.


    So with no viable strategies to keep the ball safe, it was better to wait and steal a ball in the end.


    But while there was nock of smart people in this room, there was one person whose instincts had surpassed the wit of everyone who was still left in the room. Sometimes when people wanted to consider every possibility, there were many times where they tended to overthink things and miss the obvious solution.


    Wang Jian walked up to the old woman and asked, "Can I please have that red ball in your hand?"


    The old woman looked at Wang Jian with a smile before throwing the ball at him without saying a thing.


    As soon as that had happened, everyone realized that they had made a mistake. Even Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised by Wang Jian''s instincts.


    They had all assumed that the red balls were all hidden around the airship and they wouldn''t be in in sight like the one that had been in the old woman''s hand. They had even assumed that the red ball that had been in the old woman''s hand had been a demonstration ball and wasn''t included in the ten that they could find, so they hadn''t bothered with it.


    But now they realized that this ball was actually one of the ten that they could get. Not only that, with how easily Wang Jian had gotten, they realized that any of them could have secretly gotten this ball and escaped while everyone had been distracted.


    The good thing was that Wang Jian had taken the ball in such an open manner that everyone had seen, so now they knew that this red ball was on the table.


    The bad thing was that the one who had gotten it was Wang Jian and they definitely weren''t confident in stealing that ball from him.


    The old woman noticed how everyone was looking over and she turned back to Wang Jian to say, "Manners do pay off sometimes. It''s good you know to say please."


    When she said this, everyone was stunned once again.


    They had thought that they already had an idea of this old woman''s personality, but now it seemed like they had no idea what it was at all. One moment she was cold and then the next she was a kind old woman¡­


    Please just pick a personality and stick to it, alright?


    That was what echoed inside everyone''s head.<sub> </sub>


    Well, that was everyone except for Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen since they were a bit mentally prepared when she had given them that warning. They had an idea of what kind of personality she had and what she did just now fitted that personality that they thought.


    But of course, no one had time to think about the personality of this old woman, there was something more pressing that they had to take care of.


    While they didn''t want to take the red ball from Wang Jian right now, the fact that there was a red ball that was right in front of them meant that they had a target to focus on.


    There were several small groups that gave each other looks and then they began moving, surrounding Wang Jian''s position in groups.


    Since they knew that they wouldn''t be able to take Wang Jian on alone, they made sure to team up first so they would be able to deal with him. Then they started moving around him to make sure that he wouldn''t be able to escape from them.


    But Wang Jian didn''t n on escaping at all as he just stood there with the red ball in one hand and the sword in his other.


    While everyone moved around Wang Jian, there were a few groups that had also moved towards Lin Fan. They gave him questioning looks as if trying to find out what he was thinking, as well as trying to lure him over to their side, but he ignored every single person that came close to him.


    Finally, there was one person who couldn''t take it anymore and came right up to where Lin Fan was standing.


    Mo Ze Chen was about toe forward to say something to stop him, but Lin Fan gave him a look and he moved back to where he had been standing.


    The person that came over was another young master, but he wasn''t from one of the twelve great factions. He was a young master that came from one of the cultivation families from a city under one of the twelve great factions, so while he had some position, his position wasn''t that high either.


    That was why he wanted to show off in this Hunters Exam and catch the attention of certain people so they would invite him to their factions.


    The one problem was that he hadn''t made it into the city in the giant golden glowing tree, so he didn''t know how strong Lin Fan really was or what kind of personality he had, he just knew that since everyone was looking at Lin Fan like this, he had to be someone important.


    He had his ambitions and he wanted to hug the biggest leg, so of course he chose toe talk to Lin Fan.


    The young master came up to Lin Fan and said, "How about we work together to take down Wang Jian? If we work together, my family will definitely remember this favour¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan had already punched out.


    He knew that if he didn''t set an example, there would be other people who would think the same as this person and he wasn''t in the mood to deal with all of them. Well, to be fair, he was never in the mood to deal with these kinds of people because they were the kind of people that he hated.


    These people only cared about their own benefits and there was nothing to gain from cooperating with them. Even if Lin Fan didn''t have anything in this realm that he could consider his.


    The young master clearly didn''t expect Lin Fan to suddenly punch at him, but he had quick reactions since he was skilled enough that his family had sent him to take this exam. Still, he had clearly underestimated how strong Lin Fan really was.


    It didn''t matter if he could react in time because even if he could see it, that didn''t necessarily mean that he could dodge it.


    The punch was already in front of his face when he had reacted and when he tried to move, the full force of Lin Fan''s fist hit the young master right in the face, sending him skidding across the floor before he lost consciousness.


    Lin Fan had made sure to hold back since there had been clear rules established, but he also made sure that he could inflict as much damage as possible within the rules to show an example to the others.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with shocked looks, but not a single person dared to say a thing.


    Beside him, Mo Ze Chen looked at the young master who had been sent flying with a look of pity since he had already expected this when Lin Fan stopped him.


    As for Lin Fan himself, he hadn''t even looked at the young master once, as his eyes had been looking in Wang Jian''s direction the whole time.

 Chapter 499 Hide And Seek (2)

    Though Lin Fan had been looking in Wang Jian''s direction, there wasn''t any hostility in his eyes at all. Rather there was a look of appreciation in them instead.


    The other people in this room, Lin Fan didn''t care for because he knew what kind of people they were based on the way they looked at him. They only wanted to use him for their own benefits and that was the kind of people that Lin Fan hated the most.


    But Wang Jian was different.


    To put it simply, he wasn''t smart enough to think of something like that. He just treated people depending on how they treated him and so far other than wanting to fight Lin Fan to prove his strength, he hadn''t actually done anything bad to Lin Fan.


    Although Lin Fan did find the personality of a battle junkie a bit hard to deal with sometimes, it was still much better than dealing with these people who could lie right to his face.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan had already left a deep impression on Wang Jian''s heart, which would make it easier for them tomunicate in the future.


    Easier for Lin Fan, Wang Jian, not so much¡­


    But this wasn''t the only reason Lin Fan was thinking about doing what he wanted to do.


    He was in an upper realm where he didn''t have any friends or backing, so it was better for him to make more friends than enemies, especially since he had plenty of enemies to begin with.


    So far, Lin Fan hade into contact with half of the twelve great factions already, four of them back on the Blue Star and two of them aftering to the Gctic Humanity Alliance. The six that he hade in contact with were the Dian Family, the Ying Family, the Alchemy King Hall, the True Spirit Sect, the Hunters Organization, and the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Out of those six, it was most likely that there were three of them that would have hostility towards him.


    There was no need to mention the True Spirit Sect since that was a ce that Lin Fan had already condemned to death.


    As for the Dian and Ying Families, Lin Fan had met their juniors in the Inheritance Realm all the way back on the Blue Star. Back then, they had given him tokens to their families to invite him to join them, but Lin Fan hadpletely forgotten about them until now.


    The fact that he was already in the upper realm and he still hadn''t contacted them would surely create friction in their rtionship since the Dian and Ying Families wererge factions that would care about their reputation.


    For Lin Fan topletely ignorerge organizations like this ande to the upper realm alone, that was already bad enough, but now he was joining the Hunters Organization instead of them? Wasn''t this a direct p to their face?


    Forrge factions like this, what was most important to them wasn''t actually the number of experts they had or the resources they had, the most important thing was their prestige.


    Prestige was very powerful when you had a lot of it. Prestige made sure that no one dared to attack your faction which saved you from wasting resources and at the same time, people would be willing to pay you resources to keep them safe and the more prestige you had, the more resources you received.


    At the same time, prestige was very easy to lose, while being hard to gain.


    With the way Lin Fan treated them, if it was known, the Dian and Ying Families would surely lose a lot of prestige which would hurt them in the long run.


    Since that was the case, they would make sure to silence Lin Fan so that no one knew about this¡­


    That meant, in the future, the Dian and Ying Families would most likely be his enemies¡­


    His only ally right now was the Alchemy King Hall because he had a contact there. It was Song Shu who had gone to train there and more importantly, Elder Fu who cared for Song Shu.


    As one of the elders of the Alchemy King Hall, Elder Fu would naturally hold plenty of influence, so he could assume that he would have some support from the Alchemy King Hall.


    While the Hunters Organization was powerful, it was also a very loose organization, so Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to count on its help when the time came.


    That only left the Myriad Sword Hall out of all the factions that he had alreadye in contact with.


    Right now, he had more enemies than he had allies, so it wouldn''t hurt him to make more allies¡­


    He had already heard from Mo Ze Chen that there wasn''t any rtionship between the Myriad Sword Hall and the True Spirit Sect. While they were both sects where people cultivated, their cultivation techniques differed greatly and the personality that developed from those cultivation techniques also differed. So in the end, they mostly kept to their own and didn''t interact with each other.


    Now as for how to be friends with Wang Jian, he had his own ways. Worst case, he could just use fear since he had already ced a seed of fear in Wang Jian''s heart.


    So in front of everyone shocked looks, he did something that shocked them even more.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t care about anyone who was in his way and everyone that was in his way cleared a path for him as he started walking down that path towards Wang Jian.


    Wang Jian had been on guard against the various groups that had surrounded him, holding his sword in front of thim, but the moment he saw Lin Fan, the expression on his face turned grim.


    He still remembered how Lin Fan had beaten him inside the ruins and even if it had been weakened, that heart demon still existed in his heart. As that fear came from his heart, he couldn''t stop cold sweat from covering his back as a slight tremble came over him.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t stopping as he came closer and closer, Wang Jian raised his sword and asked in a wary voice, "What are you doing?"


    Still Lin Fan didn''t stop moving nor did he say a word. Based on how he was acting, it almost seemed like he was prepared to have a final confrontation with Wang Jian, which was also why Wang Jian was feeling very tense.


    However, this was also a chance for the people who were gathered around them, watching the scene develop between the two of them.


    They couldn''t defeat Wang Jian or Lin Fan alone, so if the two of them fought each other and took each other out, that would be even better for them. This was a situation of the mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it.


    Or at least that was what they had thought.


    They didn''t doubt this because they knew that Lin Fan was a smart person and could tell that the only threat to him was Wang Jian. The sooner he eliminated him, the more time he had to recover and prepare for the final part of this game.


    That was why more groups had started gathering together, forming severalrge groups instead of many small groups scattered around.


    They were all nning on gathering together to take out the exhausted Lin Fan and Wang Jian once their fight was over.


    It was just too bad that all of them hadpletely misread the situation, even Wang Jian himself had misread the situation.


    The only ones that had a smile on their faces were Mo Ze Chen and the old woman.


    Mo Ze Chen had been with Lin Fan through quite a bit, so naturally he had started understanding how Lin Fan thought. No matter how others wanted him to act, he would almost always break those expectations.


    As for the old woman, she could tell a few things from the way that Lin Fan was walking towards Wang Jian.


    Even though he made it seem like he had hostility towards Wang Jian to fool the people watching, she could tell that it was all fake. This was just the ability that came naturally with the passage of time and experience.


    When Lin Fan came closer, he deliberately slowed down his step, going one step at a time towards Wang Jian.


    Seeing this, everyone around them became very tense as with the way Lin Fan walked, it was almost as if he was walking on their hearts.


    Finally when Lin Fan was almost right in front of Wang Jian and Wang Jian couldn''t help taking a step back.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked with a smile, "Why are you so tense?"


    Wang Jian screamed inside, "You think that I shouldn''t be tense with the way you''re acting?"


    But on the outside, Wang Jian forced himself to stay calm as he asked, "What are you nning on doing?"


    Lin Fan looked around at the people surrounding them before turning back to Wang Jian and saying, "How about we give them a show?"


    Wang Jian felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up the moment he heard this and he immediately raised his sword, putting up his guard.


    Lin Fan shook his head when he saw this and then said with a sigh, "Like I said, why are you so tense? I''m not here to fight."


    Wang Jian didn''t say a thing in the end since he was focused on watching for any movement from Lin Fan. It was clear that he didn''t believe Lin Fan''s words.


    Finally Lin Fan said, "How about we work together?"

 Chapter 500 Hide And Seek (3)

    It wasn''t just Wang Jian, everyone who heard this immediately revealed shocked looks.


    They couldn''t believe what they had just heard from Lin Fan.


    <o>,m Did Lin Fan just say that he wanted to cooperate with Wang Jian?</o>


    Who would believe that?


    Wang Jian narrowed his eyes and looked right into Lin Fan''s gaze as he asked, "Are you kidding?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said in a serious voice, "I''m very serious. I think that you and I should work together."


    Wang Jian kept staring right into Lin Fan''s eyes and he could tell that he was indeed being serious, but that confused him even more. Even if he had been beaten, he was the one who had attacked him first, so normally wouldn''t that mean that there would be some kind of hostility between them.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t show any of that.


    Rather, it almost seemed like he wanted to be his friend instead which was just too confusing.


    Still, Wang Jian didn''t do anything right away as he looked at the people around them. Then he turned right back to Lin Fan and asked, "Why?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "It''s better than working with the people you see around you, don''t you think?"


    Wang Jian was taken aback, but then he started chuckling before breaking out inughter. Once he was doneughing, he said in a calm voice, "Isn''t it too much if you''re being this direct with them?"


    Lin Fan said with the same faint smile, "I don''t think so, do you?"


    Wang Jian paused for a bit before shaking his head. Once he finished shaking his head, he fell into deep thought.


    While he was afraid of Lin Fan because of the fight between them that caused his heart demon, he also knew that he was different from the people that were surrounding them. Unlike them who only cared about themselves, he was someone who at least showedpassion to people and tried to help them, even if they didn''t appreciate it.


    He had seen this during the trial in the ruins, when he had offered a chance at salvation to the people who had been dragged in with them. Even if they didn''t take that chance, he had at least given them that chance, which was something that these people definitely wouldn''t have done.


    Then there was the fact that Mo Ze Chen followed him this closely and was willing to follow him.


    Wang Jian had actually met Mo Ze Chen before, even if Mo Ze Chen wasn''t aware of this.


    Mo Ze Chen to a certain extent was famous because he was the man who was crazy about ruin excavations. As long as there were ruins, he would be the guy who would go into them, looking for any artifacts that he could find.


    Wang Jian had run into Mo Ze Chen during one of his runs into the ruins and he had been able to see what kind of person Mo Ze Chen was. Mo Ze Chen was a good person by nature, but he was corrupted by the nature of this upper realm and was a bit selfish as well.


    However, none of thatpared to his passion for diving into ruins.


    For Lin Fan to convince Mo Ze Chen to follow him to this degree, there must be something special about him that could pull Mo Ze Chen away from his precious ruins.


    After thinking about it, Wang Jian paused for a second before saying, "Alright, I don''t mind working with you, but what do you n on doing?"


    Lin Fan looked around them at this and then said with a dangerous smile, "Since they all want to take care of us, how about we take care of them first?"


    Wang Jian also revealed a smile when he heard this and looked at the people around them, "So who goes first?"


    Lin Fan could see how much Wang Jian wanted to fight, so he made an inviting gesture and said, "How about you go first then?"


    Wang Jian nodded at this and raised his sword up above him as he moved past Lin Fan. Once he was past Lin Fan, he looked at one of therge groups and found the person he was looking for before charging right out at them.


    While these people had been listening to the conversation between Wang Jian and Lin Fan, they had been panicking because of what it meant.<sub> </sub>


    If Lin Fan and Wang Jian were to partner together, it would mean that they would be unstoppable.


    To put it simply, the two of them together were just too powerful and unless there was one person restraining the other, they wouldn''t have a way to deal with them. After all, while they were gathered in groups and they weren''t weak, these groups weren''t that closely knit since they were temporary alliances formed to deal with the two of them.


    If they had to actually fight them at full strength, there was no way that these groups would work since they would abandon the person that was being attacked by either of them if they did attack. Which was also what had happened at this moment.


    The moment that the people of this group found the person that Wang Jian was aiming for, they all moved away from that person to let him fend for himself.


    That person didn''t understand why Wang Jian was charging right at him, but that didn''t mean that he was willing to give up that easily. That person immediately raised their sword to block Wang Jian''s shing down at him while shouting, "Wang Jian, there is no grievance between us, why¡­!"


    But before he could even finish, Wang Jian''s sword had already fallen down on the sword that he had raised to block it.


    Like cutting through tofu, that sword didn''tst a single second as Wang Jian''s sword had snapped it in half, cutting right through it without any resistance.


    After cutting through that person''s sword, Wang Jian''s sword continued down to sh him right across his chest. However, Wang Jian was still aware of the rules and didn''t cut too deeply, but he made sure that the wound would hurt as much as possible.


    That person fell to the ground screaming in pain, clutching his chest as it bled and he shouted, "I''m dying, I''m dying, save me, save me!"


    But everyone who saw this moved even further away and not a single person dared to help that person who had been cut by Wang Jian.


    Seeing this, the person on the ground turned to the old woman and shouted, "Save me, do you know who I am? You even said in your rules that people can''t be killed, so you should save me!"


    The old woman just looked at him with a cold look, not doing a single thing.


    The person on the floor began panicking when he saw this and he tried to crawl away from Wang Jian, creating a trail of blood across the floor which made his condition seem much worse than it actually was.


    In fact, the wound that Wang Jian had inflicted was nothing more than a surface wound that didn''t cut that deep. The only reason it was so painful was because Wang Jian had used a special technique which incited the pain nerves found under the skin to make it much more painful than it really was.


    This pain was enough to make the mind of the person on the ground copse because he was that weak willed.


    While he was a cultivator that had his fair shares of battle, so he had his fair shares of injuries before, he was also a young master that had been pampered by his family, which made his mind weak.


    This kind of mind shattering pain was something that he had never felt before and as soon as he felt this pain, his first thought was that he was dying since this was something excruciating that went beyond anything that he had felt before.


    Seeing that no one was helping him, the person on the floor turned back to Wang Jian once again and said, "Please, spare me! I''ll follow you, I''ll do whatever you want, just spare me!"


    Wang Jian coldly narrowed his eyes and said, "Take out the sword that''s in your Storage Ring."


    The moment the person on the ground heard this, there was a chill that ran down his back.


    Once that chill ran down his back, it was like he forgot about the pain that wasing from his chest as he looked at Wang Jian and said, "I don''t know what you mean."


    Well, it wasn''t just him forgetting about the pain that wasing from his chest, rather it was also Wang Jian''s technique running out. The technique that Wang Jian used would onlyst for a certain period of time since it couldn''t keep forcing those pain nerves to fire forever.


    Wang Jian looked at him and then with a single flick of his hand, there was another cut that appeared on the chest of that person on the ground.


    Once again, the same excruciating pain came from his chest and he fell down once again, unable to get up as he was racked with pain.


    That person on the ground screamed out, "You b*stard, you''re shing me again for no reason!"


    Wang Jian ignored what he said and once again repeated, "Take out the sword in your Storage Ring."

 Chapter 501 Hide And Seek (4)

    That person had tried to y ignorant, but being forced into a corner by Wang Jian like this, he had no other choice.


    With a pained wave of his hand, there was a sword that suddenly ttered to the ground in front of him. This was a sword that he had pulled out of his Storage Ring.


    When Wang Jian saw this sword, he narrowed his eyes and after a moment''s pause, he came forward to pick it up.


    As he picked up the sword, his hand clenched around the handle of the sword and it clenched so hard that there was a line of blood that stained the handle. This blood fell drop by drop to the ground, creating a small puddle.


    After another moment''s pause, Wang Jian waved his hand and this sword disappeared into his Storage Ring.


    There was a sh of sadness that appeared in Wang Jian''s eyes before they suddenly turned as sharp as the sword in his hands. He looked down at the person who was lying on the ground gushing blood with those sharp eyes which made that person suddenly turn stiff.


    There was a moment of silence as he looked at this person on the ground, during which his eyes had looked over at the old woman standing there with a smile for a split second. Then after this moment of silence, Wang Jian said, "You''ll pay the price for this offense to the Myriad Sword Hall, even if it isn''t today. You will suffer at my hands, mark that down."


    After that, he just kicked that person right in the chin which knocked him out cold, sending him to the ground.


    In truth, Wang Jian did want to kill him, but he had to look at the circumstances. He wanted to pass this Hunters Exam for his own reasons, but that same time, he didn''t want to create a rift between the Myriad Sword Hall and the Hunters Organization just for this revenge.


    The Myriad Sword Hall would learn about thister and when they did, the full might of the Myriad Sword Hall would fall down on this person''s family.


    As for what that revenge was for, it was because of the sword that this person had been hiding in his Storage Ring.


    It was one of the artifacts that belonged to one of the Myriad Sword Hall juniors that had gone into the ruins. The person who had been knocked unconscious on the ground was one of the people who had hunted down these Myriad Sword Hall juniors since they had thought that Wang Jian was dead, but he never expected that not only would this be the downfall for himself, but also his entire family.


    Normally one wouldn''t be able to sense things like these that were hidden in Storage Rings, but since it was an artifact that came from someone who had the same cultivation technique as him, he was able to sense the familiar sensation that came from this person on the ground. From this sensation, he could tell that this person was hiding this artifact.


    After this person was dealt with, since Wang Jian wasn''t able to properly deal with him, there was an anger that filled his heart so he decided to vent it on the rest of the people that were standing around.


    These people had all moved away from Wang Jian, but that didn''t mean that they had left just yet. They had been standing around in hopes that there was still something that they could do, but it didn''t seem like there was anything for them.


    After all, even after everything that Wang Jian had done, Lin Fan had been standing there watching the rest of them the entire time. It was clear that the two of them were serious about working together.


    If that was true, then this was definitely the worst case scenario for them.


    One of the reasons was because they weren''t an organized group, so it was unlikely that they would fight to the end together. With such a high chance of betrayal, they were just grouping up together out of convenience.


    The second reason was the most important one.


    The second reason was that neither of them was someone that they could deal with unless they all worked together, or they needed one of them to deal with the other person. So now that they were working together, it meant that even if they all fought together, it was impossible for them to win.


    Just one of them was enough to take care of all of them, so that meant that if they fought in turns, it wouldn''t work to tire them out. As long as they rotated one person to take care of all of them, the other person could rest up and then swap out with the first person once they had rested enough.


    There was no way for these people to tire either one of them out, so that had cut out the only hope that they had of dealing with these monsters.


    Wang Jian rushing through them was like an adult ying with children, he cut them down again and again.


    However, even though he was cutting them down, he was only leaving minor injuries on them. The main thing that Wang Jian focused on cutting was their weapons because weapons were a major part of their power along with their pets.


    Rather, Wang Jian actually showed more mercy to the pets of these people than to the people themselves. He just ignored the pets that appeared in front of him, scaring them with his aura alone as he went right past them to cut down their masters.<sub> </sub>


    As soon as the masters were cut down, the pets would always run over to protect their master and leave Wang Jian alone.


    Wang Jian didn''t spare these pets because he was kind hearted, he spared them because he knew that to take care of the pawns, he had to take care of the kings first. The ones that summoned the pets would always care more about their own lives than the lives of others, so as long as they were cut down, they would always order their pets to guard them.


    If Wang Jian had to deal with all the pets that were in this ce, he would be fighting forever since each of these examinees all had several pets which greatly increased the number of opponents he would face if he had fought them all.


    It didn''t take Wang Jian long before he took care of all the examinees that had been staying in this room. That was because half of them had actually run out of this hall when Wang Jian had started his rampage.


    Of course, there were two people that Wang Jian didn''t let escape since they were special cases.


    These two people were the same as the first person that Wang Jian had attacked, they all had sword artifacts from the Myriad Sword Hall juniors that had been in the ruins.


    While Wang Jian had to leave them alive for now because of the rules of the Hunters Exam, that didn''t mean that he didn''t remember their faces and which family they came from to take revengeter.


    After taking care of the people that were in this room, Wang Jian had a dissatisfied look on his face because he hadn''t fought enough, but he still sheathed his sword and walked over to where Lin Fan was standing.


    <o>,m When he came over, Wang Jian said, "This brother, I''ve kept you waiting." Then as if he had thought of something, he suddenly said, "Right, I haven''t even asked your name yet."</o>


    Wang Jian revealed an awkward smile and cupped his hands to Lin Fan as he said, "Brother, I am Wang Jian. May I ask what this brother''s name is?"


    Lin Fan looked at him and calmly said with an indifferent look, "Lin Fan."


    Mo Ze Chen also came forward and said, "I''m Mo Ze Chen."


    Wang Jian nodded at Mo Ze Chen and said, "Brother Mo, you''re actually quite famous. I''ve long heard your name and it''s our first time meeting. Well, it''s not our first time meeting, but it''s our first time talking."


    Mo Ze Chen was confused as he asked, "We''ve met before?"


    Wang Jian nodded at Mo Ze Chen as he said, "A long time ago, but it isn''t important."


    Then he turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "Brother Lin, what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "We''ll find two more balls for me and Xiao Mo and then we''ll wait out the rest of the game in a hidden ce."


    Wang Jian knitted his brows as he said, "But brother Lin, how will we find the people who have the balls?"


    Lin Fan asked him, "Can you put your ball into your Storage Ring?"


    Wang Jian looked down at the ball in his hand and revealed a look like he just realized that he still had this thing. Then he tried putting it into his Storage Ring, but it didn''t seem like it would go in.


    After a few attempts, he found that there was something that was preventing it from going into the Storage Ring, so he said, "No, it doesn''t seem like I can."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and looked at the old woman before turning back to say, "Since that''s the case, it''ll be much easier."


    Wang Jian still asked, "But brother Lin, how will we be able to find who has the other balls?"

 Chapter 502 Hide And Seek (5)

    Lin Fan just smiled and didn''t say anything in response to this.


    Wang Jian was still confused, but then seeing the deeper meaning in Lin Fan''s smile, he suddenly asked, "Brother Lin, are you able to find them?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response.


    Wang Jian didn''t look happy to hear this, rather he knitted his brows and hesitated a bit before saying, "Brother Lin, if possible, can you help me find the person who has thest sword from our Myriad Sword Hall?"


    This time, Lin Fan didn''t respond in the same confident manner. Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I can only track the people who are on this airship, I can''t see what they have in their Storage Rings."


    Wang Jian revealed a trace of disappointment in his eyes, but he still said, "I see."


    While Wang Jian was disappointed, he still understood that it was already good enough for Lin Fan to be able to track all the people who had left this room. For Lin Fan to be able to track specific things that they had in their Storage Rings, which was a separate space created with spatialws, he would have to have some kind of amazing technique to do so.


    Lin Fan didn''t miss that trace of disappointment, so he said, "As long as we can get close, you can find them, can''t you?"


    Wang Jian thought about it and then he gave a nod.


    That was right, as long as they were close enough, he would be able to sense the faint aura that this sword had since it gave off the same aura as his own sword. There was still an hour and a half left before this game was over and the airship was only so big, so there would be time for him to check everyone.


    Since that was the case, there was no way that he wouldn''t be able to not find the sword that he was looking for.


    After thinking this through, Wang Jian became more excited and said, "Brother Lin, let''s go."


    Lin Fan looked at him and found his energy a bit overbearing, but he didn''t hate it.


    He just nodded with a smile and followed Wang Jian along with Mo Ze Chen, heading out of the room.


    Once they were gone, the old woman gave a snap of her finger and there were several ck figures that appeared.


    She didn''t bother looking at them as she continued looking in the direction that Lin Fan''s group had left in, but she said in a calm voice, "Take care of them."


    Then without even looking back, she walked out of the room.


    The ck figures all gave a bow in her direction before they moved to the unconscious bodies that were on the ground. These ck figures picked up these bodies one by one, throwing them onto the carts that had been ced on the side of this room, hidden under arge tarp.


    Once all these unconscious bodies had been piled onto this cart, they pushed the cart out of the room through a secret passage that opened up after they pulled at a candle stand on the wall.


    Moving through this secret passage, they came to the very back of the airship where there was a hangar.


    In this hangar, there was another group of people in ck clothes that were waiting for them. Once they saw this group pushing the carts, they came over to where they were and working together, they pushed these carts to one of the walls, which was different shapedpared to the others.


    This wall was more curved inpared to the other walls, with the top being closer inpared to the bottom of the wall.


    Once all the carts had been pushed in front of this wall, the wall suddenly started moving. It moved outward starting from the top of the wall, until itpletely opened up to reveal the outside. The moment that it opened, there were strong winds that filled the room that would have definitely knocked normal people over, but no one in this room was a normal person.


    When the door had fully opened, the people in ck started picking up the unconscious people in the carts and then one by one, they threw them out into the air without any hesitation.


    Only when the final person was thrown out did the hangar door close.


    It had to be known that the airship was flying at over twenty thousand meters in the air, which was even at a higher altitude than the normal jumbo jets of earth.


    Even if one was a powerful expert, to fall from this kind of altitude while unconscious was definitely fatal. Even if they were conscious, once they reached a certain point, they wouldn''t be able to stop the force of gravity and would still fall to their deaths since they wouldn''t be able to fly.<sub> </sub>


    Either way, it was certain death for them to be thrown out of the airship like this¡­


    When they had finished throwing people out, the people in ck split in half again. The ones that had pushed the cart to the hangar pushed the carts back out through the secret passages while the ones that had been in the hangar the entire time sat back down again.


    The ones pushing the cart went through these secret passages, but unlike when they had gone to the hangar, they split up after going through the passages for some time. There were many different corridors in these secret passages that led all over the airship and these figures in ck split up to head to different parts of the airship.


    When they arrived at their destination, there were more people on the ground who were unconscious.


    Without saying a word, they loaded them up and brought them to the same hangar as before.


    As for the old woman, she had gone to a room that was filled with monitors that showed everything that was happening on the airship. To the side, there were people who were talking into radios, giving instructions to the people on the other side. Most of these instructions were about where the location of these unconscious people were.


    The old woman was looking at the monitors in front of her with a faint smile on her face as she said, "It seems like it''s all going to n."


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan''s group had left the main hall, they started moving along the halls looking for other people.


    Once the game had been announced, while Lin Fan didn''t rush out along with the other people who had charged out of the room right away in search of the red balls, Lin Fan had done something else. He had already released ants that had stuck to everyone who was in the room because he had guessed that it was something that involved moving around the entire airship, so being able to track them was definitely a helpful thing.


    These ants told Lin Fan the location of all the people who were running around and hiding on this airship.


    At the same time, he had also released a few rats to go around the ship in search of the red balls, but it was too bad that none of them had found anything.


    But that didn''t mean that the ants didn''t find anything.


    With how many people the ants were attached to running through the ship and just how big the ship was, it wasn''t impossible for some people to find the red balls. Which was exactly what two of the people the ants had attached to had done.


    So there was nothing else that Lin Fan''s group needed to do other than take out these two with the red balls and take it from them.


    However, even knowing this information, Lin Fan didn''t act right away. Instead he was guiding Wang Jian to various people that were scattered around the ship, letting him beat them up in search of the sword he was looking for.


    Without knowing it, Wang Jian had already degraded himself down to being Lin Fan''s muscle for hire. It was always Wang Jian who beat up anyone they had encountered and he did it without even Lin Fan telling him to do so.


    Every single time, it only took a single sh of his sword to take down the people that they found, but there wasn''t a single time where he killed anyone. Other than slightly injuring them and knocking them out, Wang Jian didn''t do anything else.


    With a single sh, Wang Jian cut through the spear of the person who was in front of him.


    This person was only in the mid Fragmented Soul Realm, so there was no chance that he would be able to resist the attack of Wang Jian who was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    After knocking this person down, the lion that that person had released came over to his unconscious body andid over it. Wang Jian took a look at that lion before turning to walk back to where Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were waiting.


    As he came back, he shook his head and said, "It''s another dud, this person doesn''t have the sword or a single red ball."


    They had already encountered eight people who Wang Jian had cut down, but not a single one had what they were looking for, which was why Wang Jian was disappointed.


    Wang Jian gave a sigh before saying, "Brother Lin, do you know where the next one is?"


    But Lin Fan didn''t hear this as he had slightly knitted his brows.

 Chapter 503 Hide And Seek (6)

    Mo Ze Chen who now understood Lin Fan quite well could tell that something was off, so he asked, "Boss what is it?"


    Wang Jian was surprised when he heard this, but he also turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Brother Lin, is something wrong?"


    However, even with the two of them asking him questions, Lin Fan didn''t say a thing.


    Rather he was currently having a conversation with someone in his mind.


    "Master, they''re all gathering right now and it seems like there''s more of thempared to before."


    This voice came from Brainy who was working with the Desert Horror Ant Queen to keep track of everyone on the ship.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this and he asked, "What is their level of cultivation?"


    Brainy said, "Six in the high Embryo Soul Realm, fifty in the Embryo Soul Realm apart from them, and over two hundred in the Fragmented Soul Realm."


    Lin Fan''s brows rxed a bit when he heard this.


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried about the number of people gathering because with the power that he and Wang Jian had, they didn''t pose a threat to him. Rather, the thing that he was worried about was that the two people who had the red balls that he had been tracking had also gathered here.


    They hadn''t been exposed just yet, but if they were exposed, that would be bad for him since he had been nning on secretly taking the red balls from them. While it wouldn''t be possible to hide them in a Storage Ring, he had already tested it with the ball that Wang Jian had found and noticed that he could use his shadowws on them to hide the red ball.


    But now that the two of them were here, it was very likely that the red balls that they had would be exposed since there was just no good way to hide them.


    The method that both of them were using was to have a pet out with them and they made the pet swallow the red ball to hide it. While this was good in the short term, it didn''t work in the long term since people would be suspicious as to why they had their pets out the entire time.


    Eventually, the red balls would be found and revealed to everyone, ruining Lin Fan''s n.


    So Lin Fan thought about it and in the end, he decided that the best way to deal with this was to attack the people that had gathered together.


    After all, they were nning to attack them, so they would have to be dealt with eventually. Not to mention that since they were all gathered in the same ce, it would be much easier to deal with them than to chase them down one by one.


    As for whether they would be able to defeat them all or not, that was not something that Lin Fan was worried about since with him and Wang Jian working together, it meant that there was no one here that could face them.


    The only other few peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts that were left had already been defeated by Wang Jian. If this was before the ruins, he might not have been able to beat them all so easily, but now that he was only a single step from breaking through into the Child Soul Realm, it was easy for him to take care of all of them.


    Since that was the case, even if they all worked together, Wang Jian alone would have been enough to deal with them all. That is unless they had something special nned for him¡­


    But even then, there was Lin Fan to provide backup.


    Not to mention that as long as they took them all out, no one would be conscious to see Lin Fan take the red balls¡­


    So after thinking this through, Lin Fan said, "They''re trying to gather again to take us all out."


    Wang Jian''s eyes lit up when he heard this.


    For him, he was just feeling that it was going too slow since they had to chase down each person one by one. If they kept going at this rate, it would take them almost the entire time just to find that person. That was if there wasn''t an incident that stalled them.


    Since they were gathering up, Wang Jian wasn''t against beating them all.


    So Wang Jian said, "Then let''s go take care of them."


    Mo Ze Chen on the other hand was more cautious since he had his own worries.<sub> </sub>


    He looked over at Lin Fan and Lin Fan gave him a nod before he said with a sigh, "Alright, let''s take care of them."


    Since Lin Fan had already made up his mind, there was nothing else Mo Ze Chen could say to convince him otherwise. This was something that he already knew after going through the ruins with Lin Fan.


    So the three of them headed to the hall that all these groups had been gathering in.


    This hall was different from the hall that they had been in previously, this one was actually a practice arena that people could use to spar in. This airship was fully equipped with all kinds of facilities, such as bars, pools, and other different facilities, so it wasn''t strange for it to have a sparring arena as well.


    When they came to the door of the sparring arena, they didn''t go in right away, even if Wang Jian clearly looked like he wanted to.


    When Wang Jian was about to go forward to open the door, Lin Fan raised his hand to stop him.


    Wang Jian was confused as he turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Weren''t we going in to take care of them? Why are you stopping me?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before saying, "There''s no point in both of us charging right in at them, right?"


    Wang Jian was confused at first, but then he revealed a look of understanding as he said, "You have a n?"


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Give me five minutes to sneak in first. There''s two red balls that are currently inside. Let me get them first for me and Mo Ze Chen and then you can rampage as much as you want."


    Wang Jian didn''t even hesitate as he gave a nod and said, "Alright, we''ll follow your n."


    After all, Lin Fan was helping him find all these people and helping him find the person who took thest sword, so the least he could do was work with Lin Fan when Lin Fan had a n. Rather, it was better that Lin Fan had a n since he was the kind of person who usually charged right in.


    Anyway, the main point of this game was to find the red balls and if Lin Fan had found the red balls, Wang Jian naturally would give him a chance to get them.


    So Wang Jian stood by the door as Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen cracked it open to walk in.


    The people inside were currently listening to the few people in the center, so they didn''t notice that the door had suddenly opened. However, even if they had, they wouldn''t have been able to notice Lin Fan since he was using his shadowws to hide both him and Mo Ze Chen.


    In the center of the room, on the stage, there were six groups that were standing in a circle and each one of them was being led by someone in the high Embryo Soul Realm.


    As Lin Fan moved through the crowd towards his targets, he could hear what they were discussing.


    One person said, "So we''re in agreement that we''ll wait until there''s only half an hour left before we ambush the two of them?"


    The rest of the people all nodded before another person said, "But how will we be able to find them?"


    The first person said, "With how many people we have, do you really think that we can''t find them? We''ll spread out over the next hour and search the entire ship, I don''t believe that we won''t be able to find them."


    All the people who were standing around these six groups nodded.


    After all, they had over three hundred people here and each one of them had their own pets that they could summon, so it wouldn''t be hard for them to sweep through the entire ship. The only problem was that if they did encounter Lin Fan''s group, they might be taken out before they had a chance to do anything.


    Still, it wouldn''t be hard toe up with an answer to that situation with how many people were here.


    After this was dealt with, the only female of the six high Embryo Soul Realm Experts cut in by saying, "How will we divide the loot?"


    The first person turned to look at her and there was a lustful look that shed in his eyes that the female high Embryo Soul Realm Expert didn''t miss, but she chose to ignore it. That first person said, "Of course the six of us will all receive a red ball since we''re the most powerful, so we''ll be doing most of the work in this hunt. As for the rest¡­" His eyes turned cold as he looked around himself and said, "That''ll be decided by them."


    Everyone that heard this was a bit dissatisfied, but no one raised a singleint in response to this.

 Chapter 504 Hide And Seek (7)

    It wasn''t that they didn''t want to say anything, rather they didn''t have anything to refute this person with.


    After all, if they didn''t group up and take care of Lin Fan''s group first, there wouldn''t even be anything left for them to take since those two monsters were just too strong¡­If they didn''t find a way to deal with them, there would be nothing left for them.


    So even if the six high Embryo Soul Realm Experts were acting arrogantly, there was nothing that they could do. After all, these six were the only ones that could fight against Lin Fan''s group, the rest of them were just there to provide backup and make up the numbers just in case.


    However, there wasn''t a single person who forgot about this matter. They all kept this in the back of their minds for the future.


    The female high Embryo Soul Realm Expert gave acknowledgement of this answer, but then she didn''t say anything else.


    Seeing that no one else wanted to say anything, the first person gave a p before saying, "Now, since we''re all in agreement, let''s get into the n."


    But at this time, one of the mid Embryo Soul Realm Experts who was in the outer circle asked, "How will we even fight them?"


    The first person turned to the mid Embryo Soul Realm Expert who spoke with a look of disdain, but then he revealed a fake smile and said, "As I was saying, we''ll be talking about the n now."


    The mid Embryo Soul Realm Expert couldn''t help taking a step back from the way that person looked at him, but he still stabilized himself and firmly looked back at him. However, that didn''t mean that he had said anything in the end.


    While they discussed their n, Lin Fan heard everything that they had nned and he couldn''t help finding it a bit funny.


    The n that they had could only be described as messy if one put it in pleasant terms and it would be considered downright abysmal if one put it in unpleasant terms.


    Their n was just a mishmash of random ideas and there wasn''t one thing that worked with each other. However, the main reason for this was that they didn''t really want to work with each other, or rather no one was willing to take the lead in this operation since no one really wanted to face Lin Fan''s group. If it wasn''t for the fact that they had no other choice, they wouldn''t even be grouping up like this.


    Still, that didn''t matter for Lin Fan at all since he was already here and about to take them all down.


    Lin Fan silently moved through the crowd towards his target, the two people who were standing together with small pets on their shoulders. These small pets were the ones that had swallowed the red balls and since there was a restriction on the red balls that prevented them from entering another space, as demonstrated when Wang Jian tried to pull his red ball into his Spatial Ring, they had no choice but to keep them out on their shoulders.


    The people around them looked at the small pets that were on their shoulder from time to time and from the doubt that were in their eyes, it was clear that they had their suspicions.


    However, none of that mattered to Lin Fan as he moved through the crowd.


    As he moved along, not a single person was able to notice him since he was using his shadowws to hide himself and Mo Ze Chen.


    Eventually, they came up behind the two people who had the red balls that they wanted and waited.


    Based on the whispers between the two of them that Lin Fan could hear with his soundws, he could tell that they knew that each other had a red ball and decided to work together since that would give them a better chance to seed. After all, both of them were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm, so among these Embryo Soul Realm Experts, they weren''t considered anything.


    The n discussions in the center of the room continued as time passed and soon the five minutes that they had agreed on was already gone. However, once the five minutes had passed, Wang Jian still hadn''t charged into the room yet, which Lin Fan was surprised by.


    After waiting another minute and seeing that Wang Jian still wasn''ting, Lin Fan couldn''t help taking a look at what was happening.


    He sent an ant out of the room to check what was happening with Wang Jian and he saw that he wasn''t at the door leading into the room. Instead, Wang Jian was leaned against a column on the side with his eyes closed, making it very clear that he was asleep.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being speechless at this since he never expected Wang Jian to fall asleep like this, but he could understand it since they had been in the ruins for so long. Not to mention that he had heard about Wang Jian cutting his way to the giant glowing tree from the entrance, so Wang Jian must be even more tired than he was.<sub> </sub>


    But now wasn''t the time for sleeping, especially since there was another group that was hiding around the corner watching Wang Jian, unsure if this was a trap or not, so they didn''t dare move forward.


    The ant crawled up Wang Jian''s body and made it all the way up to his face without waking him up. Then without any hesitation, the ant bit right into Wang Jian''s face and woke him up.


    A normal ant wouldn''t be able to do anything to Wang Jian, but the speciality of this small Desert Horror Ant was the poison that it had in its fangs. With it, even if it couldn''t hurt Wang Jian, it could irritate him enough to wake him up.


    When Wang Jian woke up, he instinctively pped his face and killed the tiny ant, but Lin Fan didn''t care about that since he already knew that this would happen. Rather he had already gotten a little bit of revenge on Wang Jian for falling asleep.


    Wang Jian was in a daze when he realized that he pped himself, but then looking down at the little corpse of the ant in his hand, he knew what was going on. He also realized that he had fallen asleep and quickly wiped the drool off his face before lightly pping his face again to wake himself up.


    He looked down at his watch and realized that he waste, so he revealed an awkward smile and said, "Oops."


    But before he went in, he also noticed that there were a few people in the hall with him.


    Even if he used his foot to think, he would be able to guess why they were waiting in this hall with him, so there was no need for him to show any mercy. After all, they wouldn''t have shown any mercy to him, so there was no need for him to show mercy.


    However, Wang Jian didn''t want to make any noise and startle the people inside the hall, so instead of his normal charge forward with his sword, he utilized a different technique.


    Wang Jian waved his hand and there were several swords that appeared in the air around him. These swords werepletely different from the swords that he normally wielded, but based on the aura that came from them, there wasn''t a single one that was inferior to his sword.


    In addition to being a battle maniac, Wang Jian was also a sword otaku who collected many powerful swords in his free time. So no matter what the situation was, he would always have a sword present with him.


    These swords just seemed like they were floating in the air without anything holding them up, but that didn''tst long.


    When the people who thought that they were hidden while watching Wang Jian saw these swords, the leader of the group couldn''t help asking, "What''s he doing?"


    Another person in their group shook their head and said, "I don''t know."


    The third person stroked his chin while looking like he was in thought before saying, "Could it be that he''s nning on charging in with all those swords? That can be the only exnation, right?"


    The others two all gave nods in agreement to this since it never crossed their mind that they had been found. They had even used a special shadoww artifact to hide themselves, so they were confident that they wouldn''t be found.


    It was just too bad that Wang Jian''s spiritual sense far surpassed theirws, even surpassing thews that were in the shadoww item that they used, so he was able to easily find them.


    As they felt confident that they hadn''t been discovered, Wang Jian suddenly flicked a finger and the swords around him flew out.


    The three of them were surprised to see the swords fly away from Wang Jian, but they never thought that they would be aimed at them. That was until the swords were already right in front of their faces and they couldn''t react to them in time.


    Even after being cut down, they couldn''t believe that Wang Jian had found them.


    Wang Jian didn''t bother with them after cutting them down with his swords. He recalled the swords and let them float around him as he faced the door while saying, "Alright, let''s take care of this now."

 Chapter 505 Hide And Seek (8)

    With a single kick, the door to the hall flew open and everyone that was inside was stunned to see this.


    They all turned to look in the direction of the door and they were shocked to find Wang Jian standing there with swords floating around him. However, that wasn''t the only thing that surprised them as most of them were looking right at Wang Jian''s face, rather his right cheek to be precise.


    Wang Jian could tell that something was wrong since they weren''t reacting the way that he thought that they would. He could also hear that there were a few whispers among the people standing in front of him.


    "What''s that on his face?"


    "Could it be a mark that someone left while fighting him?"


    "Doesn''t he have anything to take care of it?"


    "He really does look dumb, doesn''t he?"


    ¡­


    Hearing all of this, Wang Jian immediately knitted his brows as he realized that something was off.


    He looked down at his hand where there was a mirror that was waiting for him that he had pulled out of his Storage Ring. Things like mirrors were considered daily necessities since experts like him usually camped out in the wilderness on hunts, so of course they would need these daily necessities at any time.


    Looking in the mirror, the expression on Wang Jian''s face turned stiff as he saw what was on his face.


    On his right cheek, there was a red hand mark that made it look like he had just been pped and in the center of that red hand mark was a red dot.


    Wang Jian''s face twitched a few times when he saw this and as his mind turned, he quickly figured out what it was.


    Naturally he knew that Lin Fan used ants because he had shown it to him, so when he saw that ant corpse in his hand after pping his face, he knew that it was sent by Lin Fan.


    So of course when he saw this mark on his face where the ant had bitten him, it was clear that Lin Fan also caused this.


    This was Lin Fan''s small revenge on Wang Jian for falling asleep.


    While the poison of the Desert Horror Ant wasn''t able to actually hurt Wang Jian since it was too weak, it was still able to affect him in another way. When the poison spread under Wang Jian''s skin, it caused the skin to easily bruise and caused that bruise tost a long time, which was why there was that red hand mark on his face from when he pped himself.


    Still, even though he knew what was wrong with his face, there was nothing that Wang Jian could do other than act like it was nothing. After all, if he were to address it, it would draw more attention to it and would make the situation worse.


    So without waiting any longer, Wang Jian charged forward and sent the swords flying in the air out towards the people in front of him.


    None of the people could react to the swords that suddenly flew out at them and without any hesitation, they were cut down. However, the swords hadn''t been aimed at the six high Embryo Soul Realm Experts who had been standing in the center.


    Wang Jian had only targeted the Embryo Soul Realm Experts who had been in the crowd, cutting down ten of them in total.


    But when he did, he lost the element of surprise because the people in the room had reacted from their daze.


    They had been waiting there to see what Wang Jian wanted to do because it wasn''t in their best interests to fight Wang Jian now. They wanted to see if Wang Jian would attack and if there was a chance for them to escape unscathed.


    However, now that Wang Jian had made a move, it didn''t seem that was likely.


    Even so, there wasn''t a single one of the high Embryo Soul Realm Experts that looked like they would make a move. It was almost as if they were all waiting for each other to make a move instead.


    But seeing that no one was making a move, the person who had called them all together and the person who had been leading the meeting came forward with a smile and said, "Brother Wang, there''s no need for this, right? We can talk about working together instead. After all, if the six of us work together with you, it''ll be easy for us to take all the red balls."<sub> </sub>


    Without any hesitation, this person had thrown away the rest of the people here which immediately created an uproar.


    The other people around him all cursed out him and the other five, but theypletely ignored everyone else that was also here. The only person that they were focused on was Wang Jian who was standing at the door with swords floating around him.


    Wang Jian looked at these six and gave a cold snort before flicking his hand again. The swords that had been around him flew out at the Embryo Soul Realm Experts other than the six of them, cutting them down one by one.


    The High Embryo Soul Realm Expert who spoke earlier asked, "Brother Wang, this is?"


    Wang Jian looked at him and said, "Didn''t you want to work together to take down all of these people? I''m doing that now, so what are you doing?"


    At this, the High Embryo Soul Realm Expert''s eyes lit up. He immediately drew his sword as well and shed out at the closest Embryo Soul Realm Expert to him.


    That person had a look of surprise as he looked at him and said, "You really are shameless!"


    Even though the High Embryo Soul Realm Expert was stronger, that didn''t mean that the mid Embryo Soul Realm Expert that he attacked would go down without a fight. He was able to put up quite a struggle, but he still went down in the end.


    During this time, Wang Jian had already cut down another twenty Embryo Soul Realm Experts. Also during this time, the other High Embryo Soul Realm Experts had also moved on the other Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    Some of them fought weaker ones and some fought stronger ones, but they also took out another ten Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    By the end of it, there were only five Embryo Soul Realm Experts left standing.


    As for the other five, they had been smart enough to see that the situation was bad, so they had tried to escape.


    This room had two different exits and one was being guarded by Wang Jian, so naturally they made their way through the crowd to the other exit while the other Embryo Soul Realm Experts were dying Wang Jian and the High Embryo Soul Realm Experts. The only problem was that there was also someone guarding this door, someone who had been in this room all along.


    As soon as he saw Wang Jian enter the room, Lin Fan took advantage of themotion he caused to knock out his two targets. The pet on their shoulders had tried to protect them, but Lin Fan also quickly sealed the life energy of these two pets before throwing them to Mo Ze Chen.


    There wasn''t any time for him to get the red balls out of these pets right now, he had to get to the other exit right away. Once he came to the other exit, this room was perfectly sealed and all the people inside were trapped like rats.


    As for the Fragmented Soul Realm Experts, there was no need to mention them at all. They tried to run away, but they were all easily dealt with by either Wang Jian or Lin Fan who were both guarding a door.


    Seeing that there were only five Embryo Soul Realm Experts left, the lead High Embryo Soul Realm Expert turned back to Wang Jian and said, "Brother Wang, should we start discussing how our cooperation will work?"


    They had already done their part to show their sincerity to Wang Jian, there was no need for them to keep attacking. Naturally, the most important thing for them to do now was to secure as many benefits as they could for themselves.


    But Wang Jian justpletely ignored him as he raised his flying swords again.


    The remaining five Embryo Soul Realm Experts raised their weapons to defend themselves with and their pets were standing in front of them as shields, but none of that mattered as Wang Jian''s flying swords skillfully weaved through the spaces between them to cut them down.


    Of course, he only cut down the masters and not the pets themselves. So once the masters were cut down, the pets immediately went to the masters'' side and didn''t bother Wang Jian anymore.


    Once he finished with the five of them, he turned back to the six High Embryo Soul Realm Experts standing there.


    When they saw him look over, they felt a chill run down their spines, but they still didn''t give up hope just yet. The lead High Embryo Soul Realm Expert revealed a smile and said, "Brother Wang, how about we discuss the terms of our cooperation? I''m sure you''ve seen our sincerity, so you should know that you can trust us."


    When he heard this, Wang Jian broke out inughter before saying, "Did you really think that I was listening to words from trash like you at all?"


    All six of them immediately knitted their brows and when the leader wanted to say something, Wang Jian said, "Brother Lin, can you take care of the other five? I only want this one."

 Chapter 506 Hide And Seek (9)

    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this from Wang Jian.


    He had assumed that Wang Jian would take care of all six of them by himself and he would only interfere if there was a need for him to do anything. However, he never expected that Wang Jian would just throw five of them at him and only take one.


    That didn''t fit the personality that Wang Jian had before, so he couldn''t help being a little surprised.


    However, since Wang Jian did this, he must have his reason and he could already guess what that reason was.


    So Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "Alright, I''ll take care of them."


    Only when he spoke did the High Embryo Soul Realm Experts realize that he had been there the entire time. When they turned around to see where he was standing, they immediately knitted their brows.


    They had been this calm the entire time because they knew that there was a second exit to this room and if the situation was bad, they could always escape from the second exit. However, now that the second exit was also being blocked, that meant that they were trapped in here like rats.


    They didn''t know exactly who Lin Fan was, but they definitely recognized him since he was someone they had seen fight Wang Jian back in the ruins. Back then, Lin Fan had been able to easily take care of Wang Jian, so it was clear that he definitely wasn''t weaker than him.


    He was also the other main reason they had gathered all these experts together, so it would be strange to say that they didn''t recognize him.


    As soon as they saw Lin Fan, they all turned back to Wang Jian and the lead High Embryo Soul Realm Expert said, "Brother Wang, what is the meaning of this? Didn''t you agree to work with us?"


    Wang Jian gave anotherugh before saying, "You really think that I would work with trash like you?"


    The lead High Embryo Soul Realm Expert revealed a fierce look on his face as he said, "You!"


    But before he could say anything else, both Lin Fan and Wang Jian had made their moves.


    Lin Fan had summoned out Rocky which he had left by the door, creating a wall made of rocks right in front of the door to prevent anyone from escaping. These rocks were made from the core parts of Rocky, so even if they wanted to break through, it would be hard for them since they had been strengthened to the point where they could even block attacks from peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    After leaving Rocky there, Lin Fan pulled out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact and transformed it into a small sword before charging out at the five High Embryo Soul Realm Experts in the center of the room.


    The five of them all looked at each other before moving away from the lead High Embryo Soul Realm Expert, grouping together to face Lin Fan.


    Wang Jian had made it clear that he only wanted him, so of course they wouldn''t risk their lives to help him.


    Instead of fighting Wang Jian who they already knew how powerful he was, it was better for them to take care of Lin Fan instead. Perhaps the power that he demonstrated previously was just because he had a power that suppressed Wang Jian, allowing him to do this.


    At the very least, they had a chance since they didn''t know what kind of power Lin Fan used.


    It was just too bad that they had lost this bet since Lin Fan was indeed more powerful than Wang Jian.


    With a single sweep of his sword covered in two different glows, he was able to p them all down to the ground. However, they were able to react in time and were able to block that attack, so they weren''t seriously injured by that sweep from Lin Fan.


    When they allnded on the ground, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan in shock.


    The strength behind this attack, it wasn''t something that should be in their realm, rather it was more like an attack from a Child Soul Realm Expert.


    <o>,m Naturally as young masters and a young miss who came from big families, they had seen fights between Child Soul Realm Experts and the strength that Lin Fan disyed was definitely at that level.</o>


    It seemed like they had drawn the short straw in the end¡­


    But they weren''t willing to give up just like this, so they looked at each other with tacit understanding and charged out together.


    Normally they would be trying to find a way to escape alone, but now that they were facing an enemy that far outssed them, they knew that their only way to escape was to work together. For the first time, they actually agreed on working together instead of forming a false alliance.<sub> </sub>


    It was just too bad that even the sum of all of their power wasn''t enough to match the amount of power that Lin Fan could release.


    Seeing that they were finally nning on working together, there was a third glow that suddenly appeared around Lin Fan''s weapon. With this third glow, his power once jumped up another level and none of them could evenst a single second.


    Lin Fan''s sword swept across all of their weapons and all of their weapons snapped instantly, knocking out the pets that had been infused in those weapons. Of course, Lin Fan had made sure to hold back so that the pets weren''t seriously injured, but it was clear that they could no longer fight.


    The shockwaves from his sh also traveled right through the bodies of these five and they all spat out a mouthful of blood before falling to the ground, losing consciousness. Of course, Lin Fan had also made sure to hold back, so they weren''t seriously injured, but if they wanted to keep fighting, that was definitely impossible.


    Seeing that Lin Fan had finished, Wang Jian finally started moving towards thest High Embryo Soul Realm Expert.


    When thatst High Embryo Soul Realm Expert saw Wang Jian move forward, he couldn''t help taking a step back as he asked in a trembling voice, "You¡­What do you want?"


    Wang Jian stopped when he said this and he said, "Take out the sword in your Storage Ring."


    When that High Embryo Soul Realm Expert heard this, he couldn''t help trembling. However, he knew that if he did acknowledge what Wang Jian was saying, it would be even worse for him.


    So in the end, he said, "Brother Wang, I have no idea what you''re talking about."


    Wang Jian didn''t hesitate at all as he flicked his finger and the sword flew out, cutting off the right ear of this person.


    At first that person didn''t understand what had happened, but then the pain from having his ear lopped off finally kicked in and he screamed out in pain. His hand immediately came to his ear and he pushed down to stop the bleeding, but his face became a bit pale from the amount of blood that he lost.


    After a while, he was finally able to adapt to the pain and he looked up at Wang Jian.


    But right before he could say anything, Wang Jian said, "I won''t ask a second time, bring out the sword now."


    When he heard this, a cold chill ran down his spine and he had no choice but to pull out the sword from his Storage Ring, otherwise who knew what this madman would do.


    A sword appeared in the air in front of this High Embryo Soul Realm Expert and dropped in front of Wang Jian.


    When he saw this sword, Wang Jian narrowed his eyes, but he wasn''t surprised since he had already felt this sword''s auraing from this person.


    When Lin Fan saw this sword, he confirmed the guess that he had.


    The only reason that Wang Jian would have to single someone out was if they had something that he wanted and right now, there was only one thing that he wanted. He wanted revenge for his juniors who had been killed in those ruins.


    The High Embryo Soul Realm Expert saw that Wang Jian wasn''t saying anything and he couldn''t help feeling ufortable.


    He still believed that with the power of his family behind him, Wang Jian wouldn''t go too far, so he was already preparing to leave, but it was too bad that Wang Jian didn''t n on letting him leave.


    With a single swing of his hand, Wang Jian''s fist hit that High Embryo Soul Realm Expert right in the face, knocking him to the ground again.


    But unlike before, without even giving him any chance to regain his bnce, Wang Jian once again punched that High Embryo Soul Realm Expert in the face. Again and again, the fist came down on his face without stopping like an endless torrential shower.


    After close to a hundred punches, Wang Jian finally left him unconscious on the ground.


    There were two strange things to note after this was done. One was Wang Jian''s right fist which waspletely red, but it wasn''t covered in blood at all.


    The other thing was that the High Embryo Soul Realm Expert''s face was swollen so much that no part of his face could be distinguished anymore. Other than his fat lips, there was no part of his face that even looked like features that a human should have.

 Chapter 507 End Of The Game

    As for why his face was like that, the simple answer was because of Wang Jian''s punches.


    But for an Embryo Soul Realm Expert, their body would heal most bruises quite easily so it wouldn''t leave a mark. It was strange how much the face of this High Embryo Soul Realm Expert had swollen.


    That was, if there wasn''t something else that had caused it.


    After Wang Jian had pped and killed the ant that bit his face, he didn''t throw it away. Rather he had been keeping that ant corpse in his pocket the entire time since he wanted to use it to confront Lin Fanter.


    However, after he had seen what the poison of the ant could do, he chose to use it for his revenge.


    The poison of the ant only needed to touch the skin of its target to affect it, so Wang Jian had crushed the corpse of the ant to extract the poison that was inside and spread it over a thinyer across his fist. With that fist, he had punched the face of the High Embryo Soul Realm Expert again and again, spreading that poison across his face.


    With the poison on his face, naturally his face would swell from each punch and with over a hundred punchesnding on his face, his face hadpletely swollen up like a pumpkin.


    However, since Wang Jian had coated the ant''s poison on his own fist as well, that meant that his fist had also turned red. It had turned red because of the swelling that came from beating this person''s face again and again.


    Still, it was worth it for Wang Jian to do this because he could vent the anger in his heart.


    After all, punching him until he lost consciousness didn''t threaten his life. While it looked quite ugly, this was considered holding back for Wang Jian since he didn''t actually cut him at all, which meant that he wouldn''t even die from blood loss.


    After he had taken care of this person, he picked up the sword and put it into his Storage Ring before walking past him to where Lin Fan was standing and waiting for him.


    Once he was in front of Lin Fan, Wang Jian asked, "Should we go and find the red balls for the two of you now?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "There''s no need for that."


    Wang Jian was confused when he heard this and he asked, "But don''t you still need red balls to win this game? Or are you giving up on the game?"


    Lin Fan pointed at Mo Ze Chen standing behind him without saying a word.


    When Wang Jian looked over, he was surprised to find Mo Ze Chen standing there with two red balls in his hand. Then looking down, he saw that there were two small beasts that were unconscious at his feet. The look on their faces almost looked the same as girls who had lost their innocence and thought that they couldn''t be a bride anymore¡­


    Wang Jian couldn''t help asking, "What did you do to them?"


    Mo Ze Chen just revealed a smile and didn''t say anything else, leaving it all up to the imagination.


    Wang Jian then turned to Lin Fan and asked, "How did you know that they had these red balls on them?"


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "Does it really matter how I knew?"


    Wang Jian thought about it before shaking his head with a bitter smile. He still couldn''t see through Lin Fan after everything that he had gone through with him and that was why he was still afraid of him.


    But since Lin Fan didn''t want to tell him anything, there wasn''t anything that he could say since he wanted to respect Lin Fan''s privacy.


    Then after another period of silence, Wang Jian asked, "What do we do now? Should we head back to where that old woman was and wait out the rest of this game?"


    Lin Fan looked at him like he had just heard something strange before saying, "Why would we do that?"


    Wang Jian was also confused as he asked, "Isn''t the point of this game to get the red balls to that old woman? So why would we stay here?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "If it was to get the red balls to her, she would have told us that. The only thing she said was that whoever held these red balls in the end would receive a prize. So there''s no point going back to where she was before since she most likely won''t be there anymore."


    Wang Jian thought about it and he realized that Lin Fan was right, the old woman had never said anything about getting the ball back to her. She had only said that it was their job to find and hold these red balls.


    Then Lin Fan continued, "But then again, we know that this is apetitive game where we''re trying to take red balls from each other. Since that''s the case, what do you think will happen if there were less people who had the red balls at the end of the game or if certain people had more red balls than necessary at the end. Do you think they would get a special reward?"<sub> </sub>


    After hearing this, Wang Jian was surprised as he fell into deep thought, but then he gave a nod.


    That''s right, this was apetitive game with ten different balls and they only currently had three of them. No one had ever said that they could only hold one red ball each, so what would happen if they had more than one red ball?


    Wang Jian suddenly asked, "Brother Lin, do you know where the other red balls are?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "Of course not. It was already lucky enough that I knew where these two red balls were, do you really think that I would know where the rest are?"


    Wang Jian then asked, "Then what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile at this and said, "Even if we don''t know where the red balls are, we at least know where the other people are. If we can''t find the balls, can''t we find them?"


    Wang Jian also revealed a smile when he heard this and he said, "Then shall we start?"


    With that, they left the room, leaving behind all the unconscious people lying on the ground.


    Right after they left, the people in ck came in with their carts. Thest person they picked up was that High Embryo Soul Realm Expert who had lost his ear, tossing both him and his ear into the cart before wheeling it off.


    ¡­


    A little over an hourter, there was an announcement that rang out through the airship announcing the end of this game of hide and seek.


    The announcement brought all the people who were still awake to the room that they had all started in.


    When the people who were still left and had red balls arrived, they saw that there was only the old woman waiting for them in that room.


    The old woman looked in the direction of the people who had juste in and said, "So, it''s just all of you who made it to the end?"


    The ones who had juste in was Lin Fan''s group.


    They didn''t look dusty at all, rather they looked like they had just gone for a walk even though they had hunted down everyst person who was on the ship, including a few that had escaped them earlier.


    In the room where they had fought all the people gathered together to take them down, there were a few Fragmented Soul Realm Experts who had been hiding among the unconscious people. The moment that Lin Fan''s group had left, they ran out the other door and went off on their own.


    It was just too bad that they never expected that it would all be part of Lin Fan''s n to let them leave so they could find red balls for him. After all, it would be too troublesome to find the red balls himself, so it was better to get some more people to do it for him.


    Then afterwards, he had tracked them down and knocked them all out.


    The old woman then asked, "Do you have your red balls?"


    Lin Fan and his group all came forward with their hands raised and in them were three balls each. With the help of the remaining people, Lin Fan''s group had been able to collect nine balls in the end.


    But no matter how they had tried looking for thest one, they weren''t able to find it in the end.


    The old woman saw this and gave a nod before saying, "Three balls each, not bad, not bad. It''s just too bad that they couldn''t take thest red ball from you, right?"


    Lin Fan''s group didn''t find anything strange with the first part of this old woman''s words, but the second part surprised them.


    It was clear that she wasn''t talking to them, but was there anyone else still left on the airship?


    Lin Fan had made sure to ce a tracking ant on everyone who had been in the first room, so he was sure that there wasn''t a single person that he missed. Since that was the case, they should have already taken care of everyone on the airship.


    But then, there was a soft voice that said, "It was definitely hard enough hiding from them."

 Chapter 508 End Of The Exam

    When this voice rang out, all three members of Lin Fan''s group were surprised.


    They turned in the direction of this voice and they found that there was a cloaked figure that was standing in the middle of the room, in between them and the old woman. This figure waspletely covered in their cloak, so they couldn''t see what this person looked like, but they were certain that they hadn''t sensed this person until the moment this person chose to reveal themselves.


    If this person had wanted to hurt them, they definitely wouldn''t have noticed them until it was toote.


    But as for whether this person could hurt Lin Fan and Wang Jian, that was apletely different story.


    Based on the aura that came from that person, it was clear that they were only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm. However, it was a fact that they had been unable to detect this person the entire time which meant that they must have some kind of special technique for hiding.


    Or they would have a deep understanding of thew that they were using to hide themselves with.


    Lin Fan asked Brainy, "Did you sense this person at all."


    Brainy was silent for a bit before saying, "I couldn''t sense them at all."


    There was a bit of aggrievement in its voice when it said this.


    In the end, Brainy was still too weak because it hadn''t broken through to the next realm just yet. If it had broken through, there would have been a quantitative leap in its spiritual sense and it most likely would have been able to sense that cloaked person.


    That cloaked person could feel Lin Fan''s group looking at them and they turned to look at Lin Fan''s group. Or rather that person was looking at Lin Fan quite intensely. It was almost as if this cloaked person recognized Lin Fan, but Lin Fan definitely didn''t know him.


    As Lin Fan was about to say something, the old woman cut in and said, "Very good, it seems like you''ve all passed."


    Wang Jian immediately asked, "What prize do we get for this game?"


    But Lin Fan also looked away from the cloaked person and asked, "What did you do with all the other people? Where did your people carry them off to?"


    At this, the three other examinees, including the cloaked person all looked at Lin Fan in a surprised manner.


    The old woman just stood there with a faint smile on her face without saying a thing.


    Wang Jian looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Brother Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    But Lin Fan didn''t bother exining as he just looked right at the old woman.


    The others might not have sensed it, but he had been able to detect what had happened after they had left anyone unconscious behind them.


    He had only left the ants on the unconscious people just in case they woke up again and started moving around, so he would be able to track them if they started ying in this game again. However, he, or rather Brainy, had found that they had all been taken away by people in ck clothes that appeared out of the wall, wheeling them away to an unknown ce since they had gone out of the range of Brainy''s detection.


    The one thing he knew was that they were no longer on this ship since Brainy''s spiritual sense should have been strong enough to cover the entire airship.


    Finally the old woman said, "You really have some pretty good detection skills, it really is strange how you didn''t detect this other kid."


    Then she said, "You don''t have to worry about them, shouldn''t you be worried about yourselves first?"


    When Lin Fan and the other examinees heard this, they immediately pulled out their weapons.


    But the old woman still had the same smile as she released a bit of her aura, forcing them all back a single step. Then after that, she startedughing as she said, "Why are you all so serious? I''ve already said that you''ve passed, so there''s no need to be this tense."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "But you''ve never told us what we''ve passed."


    The old woman then revealed a serious look and said, "The four of you are the only ones that have passed the Hunters Exam this year, congrattions."


    "Huh?"


    That was the one and only answer that they had in response to this.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "Isn''t this just a game before the third round? How can it be that we''ve passed the Hunters Exam already?"<sub> </sub>


    The old woman then said, "I never said that there would be a third round did I? I only said that this wasn''t the third round. After all, this is the final round, so how could it be the third round?"


    Lin Fan thought about it and he realized that the old woman was right. She had indeed only said that this wasn''t the third round, but she never said that there would be a third round after this.


    Lin Fan still couldn''t help asking, "What happened to the others though?"


    The old woman looked at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly turning around and saying, "Follow me."


    Lin Fan and the others were still cautious since they couldn''t confirm if what this old woman said was true or not, but they did follow her since the best way to find out was to see what she wanted to show them. Not to mention that based on the sliver of her aura that she released, they already knew that they wouldn''t be able to beat her in a fight anyway.


    The old woman came to the wall and pulled on one of the torch stands, opening up a secret passage.


    She led them through the secret passage and came to the hangar of the airship.


    When she arrived, the people in ck immediately stood up to salute her, but she just waved her hand to make them move to the side beforeing to the only curved wall here. She then gave a nod to the person by the handle and then that person pulled the handle to open the hangar doors.


    The moment the hangar doors opened, there was a strong wind that came in, but at their levels of cultivation, this wind wasn''t considered that strong. Lin Fan and the others carefully made their way to the edge, making sure to leave some distance between them and everyone else here just in case.


    When they looked out the edge, they found that there was another airship following them from a distance and on the deck, there were a few other examinees that had been in the test with them.


    Once she saw that they had seen the other airship, the old woman said, "We tossed all the ones that were eliminated down to that other ship where there''s a medical crew waiting to treat them. None of their lives were in danger, no matter how much you injured them."


    Hearing this, Wang Jian was the one to knit his brows this time.


    The old woman saw this and said with a smile, "There was one strange case where someone was poisoned. However, it was such a weak poison that the doctors decided that it was better if nothing was done for them and let the poison be naturally filtered out by their body."


    Then she shook her head and said, "It really is a strange case, his face was so swollen that we didn''t even know what happened to him."


    Wang Jian revealed a smile at this and looked at the old woman with a look of gratitude, but he didn''t say anything since he knew that it was better if he didn''t say anything.


    The old woman nodded before turning to Lin Fan and asking, "Do you believe it now?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a surprised look before giving a nod.


    He didn''t know why this old woman cared so much about what he thought, but he could tell that she ced quite the importance on what he thought.


    The old woman then said, "Old Qiao really has good eyes, he''s picked up a treasure this time."


    When he heard this, Lin Fan immediately understood what she meant.


    She was the Qiao Family ancestor''s acquaintance and adding in the position that she should have in the Hunters Organization based on how Shi Yan had reacted when he met her, she should be one of the top leaders of the Hunters Organization.


    So Lin Fan changed his attitude and gave a slight bow before saying, "I''m not worthy of such praise."


    The old woman gave a nod as she looked at Lin Fan with even more appreciation.


    It seemed like this kid wasn''t just headstrong, he knew how to act humble when it suited him. People who understood when to go forth and when to back down were people who could go far because they knew how to bnce the friends and enemies that they made.


    In a ce like the upper realm which had thew of the jungle, having both friends and enemies was good.


    Friends would help you when you were in trouble and enemies could be used to grind your de to make yourself stronger. It was important for an expert to find the right bnce between the two.


    The old woman looked at Lin Fan for a bit and made a decision.


    When she went back, she would tell Old Qiao to find a way to bring this kid into their Hunters Organization. He was definitely a talent that they could nurture to lead the Hunters Organization in the future.


    As for how¡­wasn''t Old Qiao''s granddaughter missing a fiance?

 Chapter 509 Triumphant Return (1)

    In the end, the airship brought them to the site where the third exam would have been held.


    This was a ce where there was a giant split in the earth, it was a canyon in the middle of the ground that they couldn''t see the bottom of, even with the increased eyesight that these people had as cultivators.


    Standing in front of the cliff of the canyon were three people, one of which was someone that Lin Fan recognized.


    It was the old man from the Qiao Family along with two other people who he didn''t recognize. One of them was a young girl who only reached old man Qiao''s chin in a kimono and the other was a tall woman with red hair who had a ck eyepatch over her right eye, also wearing a pure red duster and nothing else.


    ? When the two airshipsnded and the old woman came forward, the short young girl in the kimono came over to where the old woman was and said in an aggrieved voice, "Grandmother, you can''t just take my turn like this. I was looking forward to this since it was my first exam."


    The old woman revealed a smile and said, "Something came up, so we couldn''t let you do it anymore. Instead, how about I introduce you to an interesting young man instead?"


    The old woman had a sparkle in her eyes with a different kind of meaning when she looked at this young woman in the kimono.


    How could she forget? She also had a granddaughter that wasn''t dating anyone right now, wouldn''t she also work for baiting Lin Fan?


    Not to mention that Lin Fan seemed like a good kid, so he would be a good match for her granddaughter¡­


    This old woman had been worrying about too many thingstely and had actuallypletely forgotten about this, but seeing her granddaughter hadpletely reminded her of this matter.


    The Qiao Family''s ancestor on the side could see the look in the old woman''s eyes and gave a cough as a reminder for the old woman.


    The old woman looked at old man Qiao with a smile before turning to look at Lin Fan and saying, "Young friend Lin,e over here. I want to introduce you to someone."


    On the other side, the people who came out of the other airship looked like they clearly couldn''t ept the results that they had been told. After all, they were told that this was nothing more than a game, how could they have known that it was the final exam. If they knew, they definitely wouldn''t have given up so easily.


    So as soon as theynded, there were a few people that began arguing with the staff of the second airship, but the only response they received was to ept the results of the test.


    Without any other choice, there were a few people who came over to where the old woman was standing, clearly intent onining directly to her. They didn''t know who this old woman was, but based on how politely everyone else treated her, it was clear that she had a status that was above the rest.


    With how many of them there were, even if she was from the Hunters Organization, she would have to at least listen to them and give them a chance since there were many forces behind all of them.


    However, it wasn''t the old woman who acted, rather it was the young woman in the kimono who came forward first.


    This young woman in the kimono was called Mao Tao and she was also a hunter who was supposed to be the examiner for the third round, that was until the old woman who was her grandmother hijacked the exam and held the final realm. Her grandmother didn''t even tell her about this until halfway through the impromptu final exam that she had held¡­


    Still, Mao Tao loved her grandmother and seeing that these people had bad intentions, naturally she was the first one toe forward to stand up for her.


    On the side, the old woman surnamed Mao poked Lin Fan with her elbow and said, "You''re in for a treat. Just wait until you see Xiao Tao go."


    On the other side, old man Qiao said, "That little girl, she really is something, but she''s just a little too rough sometimes. Yi Fei is definitely better than a rough girl like her."


    The two old people red at each other and there were almost sparks that appeared in the air, but Lin Fan ignored it as he watched the young girl in the kimono walk over towards the people heading in this direction. He wanted to see just how powerful a hunter recognized by the organization was and if he really was at the same level.


    Mao Tao walked right in front of the peopleing over and stood there in front of them without saying a word.


    The people that came over were all men and when they saw the young girl in the kimono standing in front of them, they couldn''t help being surprised. However, when they took a closer look at her, they also couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    After all, Mao Tao was quite beautiful herself. She was actually considered one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City, so she wasn''t at a level that below Qiao Yi Fei.<sub> </sub>


    Rather she had her own charm because of how she was dressed and the way she looked. Instead of showing off her body, she was dressed in a rather conservative manner with the kimono covering anything and not entuating her curves, but that worked in her favour.


    Rather with her face that was perfectly sculpted along with that kimono, it was almost as if she was like a doll. A perfect doll that was beautiful from every angle one looked at her with her beautiful ck hair and perfect white skin.


    After being surprised, the young master personality in these people came out as one of them came up and said, "Hello beauty, do you mind moving out of the way. I want to have a word with the person behind you."


    But before that person could even react, Mao Tao had already pulled out a whip.


    With a single flick of her wrist, that whip wrapped around the young master who had tried to move her aside and tied him up in a shibari bind. The whip had gone over a branch of a tree that was nearby, so when she was finished tying him up, she also strung him up to hang.


    The young master had a look of pain on his face that quickly turned into a look of pleasure.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he saw this.


    Based on the standards of earth, the best way to describe this would be gap moe.


    This girl who looked like a perfect yamato nadeshiko was actually someone who was secretly a S&M queen¡­


    It really was hard to ept if you didn''t see it.


    Of course, Lin Fan also knew what old man Qiao and old woman Mao were nning to do, but he also knew what kind of response would be waiting for him if he actually went through with their ns. He was more scared of what was waiting for him at home than of disappointing the two of them.


    As soon as Mao Tao lifted up that one young master, the others all jumped back and pulled out their weapons.


    She revealed a sweet smile as she looked at them and asked, "You were saying?"


    They all trembled when they saw this sweet smile that she had, but they still had the power of numbers on their side and the forces behind them. Even if she wanted to fight them all, it would depend on if she was capable or not.


    This was evident by how the one that she had bound up came from the weakest power out of all of them.


    So they all turned to the young master who had the strongest backing and seeing them all look at him, he gave a sigh beforeing out and saying, "Young miss, we''re just trying to get an exnation on why we failed. Please don''t make this hard on us. We have our family''s expectations to think of."


    Mao Tao didn''t attack them this time, but rather she gave a cold snort and said, "You failed and you still don''t know why? You really are ipetent."


    When she said this, there was a dark look that appeared on the faces of the young master, but based on what she had done just now, not a single one of them said a thing to refute her.


    After saying this, she turned to the old woman and said, "Grandmother, is it alright if I do that?"


    The old woman revealed a smile as she gave a nod and said, "Xiao Tao, just do whatever you want to do. Grandmother will back you up!"


    Mao Tao gave a nod before turning back to the young masters and asking, "You want another chance?"


    At first the young masters couldn''t believe what they were hearing, but then seeing that Mao Tao had changed her tone and was given them a chance, they all nodded.


    Mao Tao saw this and then turned around, not forgetting to wave her hand at them while saying, "Follow me."


    She came right up to the edge of the cliff and then right in front of them, she jumped right in.

 Chapter 510 Triumphant Return (2)

    Everyone except for a few people were shocked when they suddenly saw this young woman in the kimono jump off the cliff. They couldn''t understand why she would do this and naturally wanted to find out what was going on, so many of them came to the side of the cliff.


    They watched as she fell down the seemingly bottomless abyss of the cliff.


    She just continued to fall like that, almost as if there was nothing that would stop her. As she continued to fall, she became smaller and smaller in their field of view.


    She continued to fall until she was about to be too small for them to see, but then they noticed that there was something on the walls of the canyon around her. Attached to the walls, there were strings, but these weren''t any normal strings.


    Looking closely at the strings, they found that they were part of a spider''s web that stretched out across the space in between the cliffs. Looking even more closely, they saw that there were actually spiders that were walking around on those webs.


    Mao Tao continued falling until she came in range of those webs and then reaching one hand out, she grabbed onto the web that was closest to her.


    The web stretched out under the weight of her falling, but it didn''t snap as itpletely stopped her from falling. However, once it did stop her, it also started moving backwards as if it was about to rebound her back up.


    However, that wasn''t the only problem that she was facing.


    The moment that she made contact with the web, the spider that had been on the webs suddenly turned in her direction before rushing along the webs towards her.


    These webs were used by the spiders to catch prey, so naturally they could sense if a prey had wandered into their webs. It didn''t take long before she waspletely surrounded by these spiders.


    As the people above watched the spiders approach her, one person suddenly said, "Ah, those are the Purple Demon Spiders! They''re one of the most dangerous poisonous spiders in this world and every single one that matures will almost always reach the Embryo Soul Realm!"


    Everyone was shocked to hear this, but they also kept watching as the spiders hadpletely surrounded Mao Tao.


    Even though she saw that she was surrounded by these spiders, Mao Tao didn''t panic at all.


    The reason why she had grabbed the spider web with only a single hand was because in her other hand, a kitchen knife had suddenly appeared. It was a small knife that was in a strange shape.


    There was the de of the knife that seemed normal, but at the very base of the knife, there was a slight curved bump that came out.


    For those that knew about cooking knives, they would know that this was a knife that was used for filleting fish. The flexible sharp part of the knife would be used to cut through the delicate flesh of the fish without damaging it while also having a sharp part at the base of the knife to cut through skin. Of course, the sharp part could also be used for other things just like with the boning knife.


    As Mao Tao started moving up, she shifted her body so that she would shoot up right at one of the spiders that was approaching her.


    The moment the web flung her back up, she twirled that knife in her hand so that the sharp part was pointed out and used it to cut right into the carapace at the neck of the spider. The pointed tip went right in and then in one smooth motion, she cut clean through the neck and severed the head.


    Since her other hand was free because she was no longer holding the web, she grabbed the corpse of the spider by one leg and shot right back up. Of course, it was impossible for her to keep all her momentum since some of it was taken by the, but she dide close to the top of the cliff.


    She grabbed the cliff right as she was slowing down and with one smooth pull, she threw herself up to the top of the cliff again,nding in front of everyone with the spider corpse.


    She tossed the spider corpse onto the ground in front of them all and then said, "As long as you can get one of these, you''ll pass the Hunters Exam. How about that?"


    Everyone was speechless when they heard this.


    First not mentioning if they could beat the Purple Demon Spiders if they were on normal ground since these were Embryo Soul Realm beasts, they wouldn''t even have the courage to do what she had just done.


    They had seen how far she had fallen and they could roughly calcte how strong the momentum was. With that kind of momentum, it would be close to impossible to negate with just their life energy, so they would have to be strong enough to move under that kind of momentum.


    It was hard to imagine what kind of power Mao Tao was hiding in that tiny body.


    Shepletely ignored the people who had been stunned by her disy and moved over to where the old woman was standing before saying, "Grandmother, wait a minute. I''ll prepare the dish now."


    The old woman gave a nod before turning to Lin Fan to say, "Watch this, my granddaughter is an amazing cook."<sub> </sub>


    Mao Tao first set up a makeshift cooking stationplete with a burner stove before throwing the spider corpse onto the cutting board. With one swift motion, she cut off the legs of the spider before dumping the rest of the spider''s corpse on the side.


    Then she didn''t prepare the spider legs at all, she just filled a pot with water and put in a few pinches of spices before bringing the pot of water up to a boil. The moment the water was boiling, she put the legs in and timed herself.


    At the exact two minute mark, she scooped out the spider legs and put them in a te along with a few smaller tes that had dipping sauce in them.


    She brought out another makeshift table for dining before putting the te in the middle of the table. Then she turned to the old woman and said, "It''s ready, grandmother."


    The old woman smiled as she patted Lin Fan''s shoulder and said, "Let''s go have a taste."


    She didn''t wait for Lin Fan''s response before pushing him over to the table. Following behind them was old man Qiao and the red haired woman.


    When they came over, Mao Tao naturally red at Lin Fan since he was the only one that didn''t belong there, but since it was her grandmother that brought him here, she couldn''t say anything.


    She put tes in front of each of them and put a leg on each te, as well as some smaller tes that were covered in dipping sauces.


    The spider itself was actually bigger than most of the people here, they were actually the size of a tiger, so each of the legs were more than a meter long. It was certain that there was plenty of meat in each of these legs.


    However, as Lin Fan looked at the spider leg in front of him, he couldn''t help hesitating.


    The old woman saw this and asked, "What''s wrong? You''re worried about our Xiao Tao''s cooking skills?"


    When Mao Tao heard this, she red at Lin Fan like he was a mortal enemy.


    Lin Fan naturally saw this, but all he did was give an awkward cough before saying, "Didn''t that person just now say that this spider is one of the most poisonous beasts in this world? Are you sure we should be eating them?"


    This time, it wasn''t the old woman who answered, but rather old man Qiao.


    Old man Qiao gave augh before saying, "That''s only if you don''t know how to process them. The legs themselves are fine as long as you make sure that you don''t break the poison nd inside the main body. If you do break the poison nd, then the poison will spread all over the spider and that makes it inedible."


    Old man Qiao then turned to Mao Tao with a look of praise, "Of course, Xiao Tao''s knife skills are first rate, so you don''t need to worry about that. You should know that these Purple Demon Spiders are considered a delicacy, it''s a very rare chance to eat them and only those that are acquainted with Food Hunters have that chance."


    Mao Tao turned to old man Qiao and gave a slight bow before saying, "Your praise is too much, master."


    Lin Fan looked at the leg in front of him and the only thing he could think of was a crab leg.


    It was certainly a delicacy on earth, but this was a spider that they were talking about.


    Still he remembered hearing that both spiders and crabs were from the arthropod family, so they should be simr to one another. Maybe this spider leg would taste just like crab¡­


    So after hesitating a bit, Lin Fan finally picked up the leg and cracked it open, revealing the pink meat that was inside.


    The first bite that he took was naturally without any dipping sauce since he wanted to taste the natural vour of this meat first.


    Taking a bite, the first thing that Lin Fan thought was crab because the taste was almost exactly the same, but this spider leg tasted better than any crab that he had ever eaten on earth.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help saying, "Delicious!"


    At this, Mao Tao''s face turned red because being praised by a handsome person naturally had this effect.

 Chapter 511 Triumphant Return (3)

    After blushing, Mao Tao immediately realized what was wrong and quickly calmed herself.


    She kept saying to herself, "It''s only because he praised your food, not because anything else. It isn''t because he''s handsome, or he''s handsome, or he''s handsome, or even because he''s handsome."


    On the other side, Lin Fan had started trying the dipping sauces that he had been given and after eating them, he looked at Mao Tao in apletely new light.


    It seemed like this girl really was a good cook, she would make a good wife one day.


    Seeing the way the two reacted, the old woman naturally had a happy smile on her face while old man Qiao had an ugly look on his.


    While they were enjoying their nice meal, the other people who had failed were standing at the edge of the cliff, looking down at the spiders waiting for them. There were many who were hesitating on whether to jump down or not.


    All of them looked at each other, waiting for another person to take charge here and go in first, but not a single person did a thing.


    Finally, there was someone who couldn''t take it anymore and came forward to the edge of the cliff. After a moment of hesitation, he finally jumped off and aimed right at the webs that were at the bottom.


    But before he could even reach the bottom, there was a sudden gust of wind that appeared out of nowhere. Before that person could even react, he was mmed right into the cliff wall and stopped falling as he was embedded into the wall.


    Still it was definitely better than falling all the way down because at least this way he could be rescued. If he had fallen all the way down, there was no way he would have survived because this person would have definitely been destroyed by the spiders.


    Seeing this, everyone suddenly turned to the people at the table having their meal.


    That person who spoke before was the one who came up and said, "Are you ying with us? You know that''s impossible for us and you''re asking us to do that? Give us something that we can actually do!"


    Mao Tao turned to look at this person with narrowed eyes that had a bit of annoyance in them since she was just about to speak to Lin Fan. After looking at him for a bit, she suddenly said, "You asked for a chance and you were given one. If you can''t do it, then give up."


    After saying this, she turned back to the table without even sparing that person a nce. Seeing that Lin Fan''s te was empty, she moved to put one of thest two spider legs onto his te.


    But of course, that person wouldn''t give up that easily as he immediately came right up in front of her and shouted, "You should know what kind of people are behind us! I advise you to think very carefully about this!"


    Mao Tao immediately revealed an annoyed look as she turned around to look at this person. She knew that withoutpletely destroying his ego, there was no way he would back down.


    She didn''t reply right away and turned to old woman Mao to say, "Grandmother, we''ve already given them their second chance, so I can take care of this how I want now, right?"


    The old woman looked at Mao Tao with a smile before giving a nod, "Do whatever you want, grandmother will take care of the rest!"


    Mao Tao revealed a sweet smile that waspletely different from the person that she had been before which caught most people who saw it off guard. Then she said in a sweet voice, "Love you grandma!"


    Then her face turned dark again as she turned to the person in front of her and she said with that cold expression, "You want another chance? Alright, you can have another chance."


    That person was surprised by the sudden response and what she had said, but then he immediately reacted by revealing a proud look and saying, "That''s more like it."


    Mao Tao didn''t bother answering this person when he said this, rather she had already pulled out her kitchen knife as she coldly looked at him and said, "As long as you can beat me, you''ll have passed the Hunters Exam."


    That person was surprised when he heard this and he was about to say, "Wh¡­" But he didn''t get a chance to finish as Mao Tao''s kitchen knife had already started moving.


    It had happened in an instant, there was only a single flick of her kitchen knife before it returned to its original position.


    However, that didn''t mean that there was only a single cut that she had made.


    Like a banana, the clothes that person had been wearing peeled into four parts from top to bottom before suddenly turning into countless tiny scraps. Just like that, that person waspletely stripped of all his clothes.


    Mao Tao looked down a bit before suddenly giving augh.


    That person didn''t know what happened at first, he just felt that it was a bit breezypared to before. Then when he looked down to see his bare body, he couldn''t help being shocked.<sub> </sub>


    It didn''t take him long to react from that shock as both his hands came down to cover up his private part. However, it was already toote since people had already seen it.


    Naturally he didn''t miss Mao Tao''sugh which really hurt his pride and filled his heart with rage that quickly came up to his head.


    He waved his right hand which had a ring on it over his body and another set of clothes had appeared over his body. Then he raised his right hand as a sword appeared and he roared out, "You b*tch!"


    But before he could do anything, Mao Tao''s kitchen knife once again flicked out.


    Once again, that person''s clothes peeled from his body like a banana and even his sword that was raised up to sh down wasn''t spared as it turned into countless pieces of scrap iron. However, this time that person didn''t immediately bring his hands to his private part to cover it.


    Instead, that person''s eyes rolled back into the back of his head and he fell forward, copsing onto the ground.


    Mao Tao didn''t spare that person a single nce as she turned to the others who had been standing there and said, "Is there anyone else?"


    p Everyone that she stared at couldn''t help taking a single step back. With a gulp, all of them shook their heads to show that they had no objections.</anda>


    After seeing this, Mao Tao turned back to the table and began serving thest two spider legs. One of them went to Lin Fan and the other one went to the old woman.


    Seeing this, old man Qiao muttered, "Once you find someone you like, you''ve already forgotten about your master."


    Mao Tao''s face immediately turned red and she pouted her lips as she turned to old man Qiao, "Master!"


    Old man Qiao just revealed a smile without saying anything.


    Lin Fan on the other hand pretended that he didn''t hear a thing. After all, if he was to follow the ns of these two elderly, he would definitely be in trouble back at home.


    After they finished the meal, the old woman brought all of them to a building that was a kilometer away from the cliff and inside of that building was a single gate with a terminal.


    This gate was the same as the one that had been at the Hunters Exam headquarters, it was a gate that was used to transport people.


    The old woman had the staff inside the room take care of the people who had failed while leading Lin Fan''s group of three and that cloaked person over to the side where a few people were waiting.


    These people all had different appearances, but not a single one of them looked normal. It was clear that the Hunters Organization was a ce where the entric gathered.


    When they saw the old woman leading them over, one person came forward to ask, "Are they the only ones that passed this year?"


    The old woman nodded and said, "Let''s wee these new friends into our group."


    The group of people all revealed smiles as they began congratting Lin Fan''s group who had awkward looks on their faces since they didn''t know a single name. Even with them introducing themselves, it was hard to understand because they kept talking all together.


    Finally after all the introductions and congrattions were over, the old woman said to the three of them, "You''re all now part of our Hunters Organization, but as for your licenses, we have to custom make them so we''ll be sending them to you in about a week."


    Lin Fan as the representative asked, "Then what do we do now?"


    The old woman just said, "You can do whatever you want now, the Hunters Exam is over."


    All of them didn''t know what to say to this, the only noise they could make was, "Eh?"


    But that didn''tst as the cloaked person said, "Can you send me back then?"


    The old woman nodded and said, "Of course, just head over to the gate and they''ll send you to wherever you want with a portal nearby."


    The cloaked figure gave a nod and a bow to the group from the Hunters Organization before leaving without saying another word.

 Chapter 512 Back In Harmony City

    As for Lin Fan''s group, they just stood there as if they were thinking things over.


    Finally Wang Jian was the one who broke the silence by turning to Lin Fan and saying, "Brother Lin, it seems like this is where we part. I have to return to our Myriad Sword Hall to report in. I will remember your kindness and hope that we can meet again in the future."


    Lin Fan nodded and said with a smile, "Same to you, brother Wang."


    Wang Jian gave a bow to Lin Fan before heading to the gate as well.


    Lin Fan turned to Mo Ze Chen and asked, "Where did you say that you were heading again?"


    Mo Ze Chen casually replied, "I was in Whiterun beforeing here, so I''ll probably head back there since I have some things to take care of. After that, I''lle to Harmony City to find you. It won''t take more than a month before I can head over."


    Lin Fan nodded since he needed some time to set up his store too, so he wouldn''t need Mo Ze Chen for anything just yet. Then he casually asked, "What were you doing in Whiterun anyway? That''s such a remote ce."


    Mo Ze Chen gave a shrug and said, "There was a Dragon Race ruin that was discovered there, so I was helping out with the excavation."


    Lin Fan just gave an "oh" sound since it didn''t really mean anything to him.


    Old man Qiao also came over and asked Lin Fan, "Kid, are you heading back to Harmony City?"


    Lin Fan turned to see who it was before saying in a respectful voice, "Yes, senior, I''m heading back now."


    Old man Qiao nodded and said, "Alright, I''ll call Yi Fei and have her wait for you."


    Lin Fan quickly waved his hands and said, "Senior, there''s no need for that."


    Old man Qiao revealed a smile and said, "Don''t worry about it, you''re one of us now."


    It was at this moment that old woman Qiao also cut in by saying, "That''s a coincidence, Xiao Tao was also heading back to Harmony City as well. How about you let her apany you as well?"


    When Mao Tao heard this, she gave a slight tremble and a slight blush came over her face, but she wasn''t against it.


    Lin Fan wanted to reject this, but seeing as how this would affect his rtionship with the higher level members of the Hunters Organization, Lin Fan could only give a nod in the end.


    The three of them headed off to the gate as the two elderly watched, but when they disappeared through the gate, the smiles on the face of the two elderly disappeared.


    They turned back to the group of other hunters who were waiting for them and the old woman asked the woman in the red duster, "What are the results?"


    The woman in the red duster shook her head and said, "It''s as we thought, there''s several of those snakes in our Hunters Organization and it seems that Shi Yan is the one leading them."


    The old woman asked, "Then how many have you found?"


    The woman in the red duster shook her head again and said, "Too few. They''re just too deeply hidden in the organization that we can''t dig them out. The only ones that we have identified were ones that were already linked to Shi Yan, so there''s no other clues for us to follow to find the rest. They have a secretmunicationwork that we don''t know about, so we haven''t been able to intercept anything." As she said this, there was a bitter smile that appeared on her face.


    When the old woman heard this, she stroked her chin as she said, "So it''s all rted to Shi Yan in the end?"


    Then she suddenly revealed a smile and said, "I saw something interesting while I was picking up the kids from the second round. It seems that Shi Yan is quite interested in the kid that Old Qiao brought in and it seems like it isn''t a normal level of interest."


    The woman in the red duster said in a hesitant voice, "Then you mean¡­"


    The old woman nodded and said with a smile, "That''s right, as long as we wait long enough, he''ll make his move. There''s no need for us to do anything except tighten up security around that kid."


    But when this was said, old man Qiao immediately knitted his brows and said, "Isn''t this too dangerous? Who knows what will happen? We''re just supposed to trust that we''ll be able to stop them?"


    The old woman turned to old man Qiao and said with the same smile, "What''s wrong, Old Qiao? You don''t trust my abilities?"


    Old man Qiao revealed a bitter smile and said, "It''s because it''s you that I''m not assured."<sub> </sub>


    The old woman gave a fierce look and said, "You, you, you, you''re getting much bolder now that you''re older? Your face is getting thicker as you age?"


    Old man Qiao spread his hands and said, "It can''t get thinner when I''m around you."


    The old woman didn''t get angry, rather she burst out inughter again before saying, "Alright, alright, I know you care about that kid since you''re the one who brought him in. Besides, it''s not me that''s taking care of it, it''ll be Xiao Hong. You can at least trust Xiao Hong, can''t you?"


    The woman in the red duster revealed a faint blush at being praised directly.


    Old man Qiao looked at the woman called Xiao Hong and said, "Of course, I trust Xiao Hong much more than I trust you."


    The old woman pretended to be angry as she pointed her finger in old man Qiao''s face and said, "You, you, you, if I give you an inch, you take a mile."


    She turned to everyone and said, "Who still remembers that time when Old Qiao set his own apron on fire?"


    Old man Qiao immediately came forward to say, "You said that you wouldn''t mention that anymore. Or do you want me to bring up the time that you kicked that person you gave the love letter to off a cliff just because he rejected you?"


    The old woman turned once again and pointed her finger in old man Qiao''s face as she said, "You, you, you!"


    Just like that, the two of them continued to bicker like two kids, but of course there was no real anger in their voices. This was just how these two friends interacted, they always liked to argue.


    Rather, it felt much weirder if they didn''t argue with each other at all.


    But even with them arguing, they had set up their n to use Lin Fan as bait. If Lin Fan were to know about this n, he definitely would have wanted to p them all in the face, but he didn''t know about it in the end.


    ¡­


    On the other side, after bidding farewell to Mo Ze Chen, Lin Fan went through the gate with Mao Tao.


    Neither of them said a thing during this entire time which made it even more awkward.


    Mao Tao had been walking alongside Lin Fan, with her head down and sneaking peeks at his face from time to time.


    As for Lin Fan, he tried to keep his expression as calm as possible because he knew that if he showed any signs, he would be deadter.


    After they came out of the portal, they arrived back in the Harmony City Hunters Organization branch, not the main Hunters Organization building that Qiao Yi Fei had brought Lin Fan to earlier.


    Speaking of Qiao Yi Fei, she was waiting for them the moment that they came out of the portal.


    Old man Qiao had said that he would send a message to Qiao Yi Fei and he had. Qiao Yi Fei had been waiting at the Hunters Organization branch the whole time since she didn''t know how long it would take, but that didn''t mean that it was an ufortable wait.


    As one of the elders of the Hunters Organization, naturally her grandfather had her own space in the Hunters Organization which was fully loaded out, so it was quite afortable stay for her. It was even better than being at home since there was full service here, service that was better than what they had at their own house since the Hunters Organization had much more resources than just the Qiao Family.


    But when she saw the two that came out, she immediately knitted her brows.


    Likewise, when Mao Tao came out of the portal, she had sensed the person in front of her and immediately looked up with knitted brows.


    When their gazes met, they both revealed snide looks.


    Qiao Yi Fei was the first one to speak as she said, "Oh, what is a little child doing here?"


    Mao Tao gave a cold snort and said, "Who built thisrge pole here? It really is blocking my view."


    Since Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei were both the grandchildren of high level members of the Hunters Organization, not to mention close friends like old man Qiao and old woman Mao were, they naturally knew each other since they were young. Then as they were both part of the Five Flowers of Harmony City, they naturally had more than enough of each other.


    In fact, they had been quite close when they were younger, but as they grew older, they started drifting apart¡­

 Chapter 513 Setting Up The Shop (1)

    It wasn''t that they suddenly drifted apart, but rather they slowly drifted apart because of various different factors.


    For one, it was because people had keptparing the two of them and as beautiful women, naturally they had their own pride.


    Both of them were beauties, but they were different kinds of beauties.


    Qiao Yi Fei was one of those mature beauties who had a perfect body along with her perfect looks.


    As for Mao Tao, she had a body that was more like a child''s, but she definitely didn''t lose in terms of beauty to Qiao Yi Fei since she was like a little doll.


    Then along with all kinds of other things, they slowly drifted apart even though deep down they wanted to get closer to each other again. After all, they had been quite close to each other when they were younger.


    After ring at each other and leaving a few snidements, Mao Tao came over to Lin Fan and said, "Little brother Lin, let''s go. There''s no need to care about this woman."


    This was the one time that she was willing to appear older since she was older than Lin Fan, even if she didn''t look like it. Being older naturally had its advantages and this was one of the cases where it yed in her favour, so she didn''t mind calling him "little brother".


    When Qiao Yi Fei heard this, she suddenly remembered that Lin Fan was standing on the side. She turned to Lin Fan with a cold look, but then she forced herself to reveal a smile and say, "Lin Fan, you''re back. Let me guide you back to the Seekers Union."


    For some reason, she was annoyed when she saw Lin Fan walking with Mao Tao even though she didn''t know why.


    Lin Fan had been trying to keep silent, but the moment that the two of them turned their attention to him, it made him reveal a bitter smile.


    All he wanted to do was silently leave this ce and prepare to find a space for his store, but now that dream had beenpletely dashed.


    So Lin Fan cupped his hands and gave a slight polite bow as he said, "Miss Mao, miss Qiao, I think there''s no need for that. I have some other business to take care of first, so I''ll be leaving now."


    With that, he started to head to the exit of this portal room, but before he could take more than two steps, Qiao Yi Fei stepped up right in front of him. She looked at him with cold eyes and said, "You''re trying to ditch the two beauties who are willing to take time out of their busy schedule to spend time with you? Do you know how many people would beat you up if they heard this?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he thought, "Then you should just call them here instead of me."


    But of course, he didn''t say it out loud.


    Instead, Lin Fan said, "Miss Qiao, I apologize, but I really am busy with something else right now. Perhaps we can talk another time?"


    Qiao Yi Fei''s pride didn''t let her back down. After all, she had even taken the initiative to approach Lin Fan this time, which was something that she had never done before. Not to mention that Lin Fan even had the nerve to reject Mao Tao who even she wanted to hug and squeeze!


    Mao Tao felt a bit of warmth in her heart when she had heard what Qiao Yi Fei said and she knew why Qiao Yi Fei said this, but what was between them couldn''t be fixed that easily.


    Instead, she came up and said in a gentle voice, "Little brother Lin, perhaps we can help you with what you''re busy with. After all, three heads are better than one."


    Qiao Yi Fei immediatelytched onto this and said, "That''s right, we can definitely help you. That is unless you''re looking down on us."


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile, but he still said, "How could I possibly waste your time with my small problem? Miss Tao, miss Qiao, it''s better if I just take care of this myself. Now, if you''ll excuse me."


    After saying this, Lin Fan once again cupped his hands to bid them farewell before moving to the door.


    But what he never expected was that they wouldn''t let him off at all as they began following behind him. Just like this, the two of them kept pace with him as he moved through the Hunters Organization branch.


    As they moved through the halls, naturally with how they were walking, people could see that there wasn''t a normal rtionship between them. Also as they were well known because of their beauty and their status in the Hunters Organization, there were plenty of people who recognized them.


    For both of these women to follow a single man like this, just who was he?


    When the gossipers saw Lin Fan''s face, they couldn''t help thinking that perhaps he was worthy of this, but the die hard fans of these two girls wanted to go all out with him. However, they couldn''t just fight him in front of these two girls and they didn''t know who he was, so they wouldn''t take the risk of challenging him to a fight that quickly.<sub> </sub>


    Still, even if they couldn''t fight him, that didn''t mean that they couldn''t take pictures and spread this news.


    It didn''t take long before the picture of Lin Fan and these two girls had spread across the forums of Harmony City.


    It even reached the watch of a certain person who had been waiting outside the Hunters Organization branch. She had appeared the moment that she had sensed Lin Fan''s aura back in the city and she had instantly appeared.


    However, the moment that she appeared, she had attracted the gazes of everyone around her. Thenter on, when she saw the news that came from her watch, everyone immediately felt a chill that froze them to the very core of their bones.


    Not a single person was able to approach her even though they wanted to.


    To her side, the person with white hair revealed a smile as he had also seen the posts on the forum.


    He knew that there was no truth behind them and this was all the imagination of the people watching, but he was also here to watch the show now since he found all of this funny.


    It didn''t take long before the doors of the Hunters Organization branch opened to reveal the person that she had been waiting for.


    The moment that Lin Fan had walked out, he immediately felt the chill around him and he knew what happened. After all, currently behind him were the two girls who were still following him.


    Even after he had walked out of the Hunters Organization branch, they still followed right behind him chirping along. But of course, they naturally felt the chill the moment that they came out as well. In fact, the chill that they felt was even colder because it was almost as if this chill was aimed at them.


    They immediately stopped talking and looked around them for the source of this chill that they were feeling. It didn''t take long before they noticed that girl in pure white that was standing there in front of them.


    p When they saw her, they were immediately stunned because as beautiful women themselves, they naturally had their pride, but that pride wasn''t worth anything in front of her. They had to admit that they couldn''tpare to this woman who was like an angel, one thatpletely surpassed them in every way possible.</anda>


    But that also confused them because they didn''t understand why this woman was ring daggers at the two of them.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he saw this, but he didn''t say a thing because he knew that saying anything would make it much worse.


    Ang looked at the two of them for a bit before turning her gaze to Lin Fan.


    She brought her hand up and made a hooking motion with her index finger for Lin Fan to follow her before turning to leave.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother saying anything to either Mao Tao or Qiao Yi Fei as he directly followed her.


    Just like that, the two of them disappeared.


    It was clear by the way that they acted who was the one in charge in that rtionship, so people couldn''t help feeling sorry for Lin Fan.


    Of course, that also dissuaded all of the rumours that had been posted on the city forums. There were many different posts that contained pictures of Lin Fan meekly following behind Ang that appeared in thements of the first posts which immediately dispelled those rumours.


    But the fact that they had been posted on the forums had also established Lin Fan''s fame as a whipped man.


    Momonga came forward to say to the two girls with a smile, "Don''t worry about him, he''ll be fine. But I''d watch your back for the next couple of days, just in case."


    Then without saying another word, Momonga had also disappeared.


    Qiao Yi Fei wanted to say "Diabolis", but she didn''t get a chance to say anything.


    The two of them just looked at each other and this time, they didn''t start fighting. Instead, they both looked at each other with bitter smiles before turning to go their separate ways.


    In their minds, they only thought one thing. They were praying for Lin Fan.

 Chapter 514 Setting Up The Shop (2)

    Aftering back to the residence that the Xu Family gave them, the first thing Lin Fan and Ang did was go into their room.


    In there, what happened wasn''t what everyone had thought would happen.


    It wasn''t a scene of hell for Lin Fan, but rather it was something that was quite funny.


    It was Ang who had pouted lipsying her head on Lin Fan''sp, turning her head to the side to not listen to him as he tried to exin what the situation was.


    In the end, it took an hour of giving her ap pillow and patting her head that Ang finally let go of her anger and decided to listen to Lin Fan.


    Of course, she was still jealous, but she knew that it wasn''t Lin Fan''s fault. It was the fault of those two foxes trying to snatch her family''s man, which was something that she definitely wouldn''t allow.


    When they were finally done making up, Lin Fan came out to the living room where Brainy and Momonga had been ying chess while waiting for them.


    Momonga saw that Ang didn''t follow him out and asked, "Did she fall asleep?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this.


    She had been worried over the past two days while Lin Fan had been away and when she saw hime out of the Hunters Organization with the two girls, naturally she was filled with rage.


    After dealing with that rage and then being pampered by Lin Fan, her exhaustion had finally caught up to her.


    In fact, she didn''t really need to sleep since experts at the level that she was at didn''t need to sleep. It was more mental exhaustion from how much she was worried about Lin Fan that had caused her to be this tired, which was why she needed some sleep.


    Still that at least showed how much she cared about Lin Fan, which made Lin Fan''s heart fill with warmth even though he had been treated the way that he had been treated.


    Momonga gave a nod to this as well and then asked, "So what are you nning to do now?"


    There was no need for him to ask Lin Fan about what happened in the Hunters Exam since he had been talking to Brainy as they yed their game of chess.


    Of course, there were a few things that Brainy didn''t know that Momonga was still curious about, but he could ask that another time. For now, what he wanted to know was what Lin Fan nned to do now.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before saying, "It''s finally time to open another store here."


    Momonga revealed a bit of excitement in his eyes when he heard this.


    During the time that there had been no store, they hadn''t been able to use the benefits that the store offered which they thought were given to them by Lin Fan''s master. In fact, they hadn''t even been able to feel the presence of Lin Fan''s master the entire time they were in this upper realm.


    Momonga had even started to doubt that Lin Fan''s master had abandoned him.


    But now that Lin Fan was saying that they were going to build another store, it gave him hope again.


    Of course, without feeling the presence of the master, he wouldn''t be able topletely calm himself, there was at least hope since Lin Fan wanted to build the store. As long as he could feel the master''s presence once the store was built, everything would be fine.


    Then there was another reason why he wanted to use the benefits that the store gave them as he had been away from the Lich''s Necropolis for too long.


    He had suppressed the other undead kings in the Lich''s Necropolis with his power alone, so now that they haven''t felt his power in the realm for some time, they would definitely be antsy. It was very likely that some of them might have already started nning to invade his territory already.


    While his subordinates might be able to fool them and hold them off for a bit, the moment they attacked, his subordinates would definitely crumble right away. After all, his most powerful allies were sealed away and the only ones left unsealed were some of the weaker ones that had escaped or had been in hiding. Whenpared to the undead kings that were powerful enough to fight Momonga, they certainly didn''t stand a chance.


    It wasn''t just the internal factors that Momonga was worried about, there were also external threats.


    For most of these upper worlds, the rulers themselves made up the majority of the deterring force. As long as the rulers of these worlds were there, it was very unlikely that another world would invade.


    However, if the ruler were to disappear for a long period of time¡­There would definitely be people who would start having ideas.<sub> </sub>


    It was the same for Ang and her World of Elements, but they could hold on better than the Lich''s Necropolis since there wasn''t as much internal strife. All the spirits in the World of Elements had already epted Ang as their queen, so they worked better together in repelling outside threats.


    Though it was the same case of if the ruler disappeared for too long, there would be a problem¡­


    Momonga paused before saying, "Where are you nning on opening the store?"


    When he heard this, Lin Fan knitted his brows.


    That was the one part of his n that he hadn''t thought through yet.


    While he had obtained the rights to open a store in the center of Harmony City after obtaining his Hunter License, that didn''t mean that he had the funds to open that store.


    There was the possibility of getting a store from the Xu Family since they had vowed to follow Lin Fan now, even though Lin Fan had them keep this quiet and act normal for now. However, the power of the Xu Family was limited in this capacity.


    While the Xu Family did have some power in Harmony City and they had more assets after taking the assets of the One Shadow Organization, that didn''t mean that they were a big yer in Harmony City. At best, they were nothing more than a local bully with a certain amount of power.


    If Lin Fan did ask the Xu Family for a store, they would do their best to fulfill his request, but the best they could give him was a store that was several kilometres away from the center of Harmony City.


    Lin Fan knew this because he had already consulted with the Xu Family Head about this. In fact, Lin Fan had been given a full list of the Xu Family assets right before the Hunters Exam since he wanted to understand the power of the Xu Family better. So he even knew exactly which store he could get if he wanted one from the Xu Family.


    Lin Fan kept that store in his back pocket as a spare just in case he couldn''t find any other spaces for his store.


    Lin Fan wanted his store to be in the most popr part of town because that would mean the most exposure and more customers, since after all, the store and the system were his only backing. Without the two of them, there was no way for him to match all the experts that he would have to face.


    It was just too bad that there was no way for him to get such a store.


    He had hoped that something would change during the time that he had been in the Hunters Exam, but it was clear that nothing did.


    Seeing that he had no other choice, Lin Fan opened his list of contacts and scrolled down to Qiao Yi Fei''s name before calling her.


    The Qiao Family was his only contact in the Hunters Organization, so there was no one else he could call on but them. He just hoped that they would be willing to help him.


    When Qiao Yi Fei picked up, she asked in a surprised voice, "What do you want?"


    Of course, there was a bit of rudeness in her voice because she was still angry about what happened earlier, but she was also genuinely curious why Lin Fan would call her this soon.


    Lin Fan calmly said, "I need to meet with your grandfather and I don''t have his contact information, so I could only call you."


    There was silence that came from the other side before Qiao Yi Fei said in a voice that was filled with a bit of surprise, "He says toe to the Seekers Union tomorrow, he''ll meet you there."


    Lin Fan could hear the surprise in her voice and he was also surprised when he heard this. He never thought that the Qiao Family''s ancestor would agree to meet him this quickly, especially since he had made his stance towards Qiao Yi Fei clear. He didn''t believe the Qiao Family ancestor didn''t know about this since it was spread all over Harmony City by now.


    So after agreeing to this, Lin Fan hung up.


    On the other side, Qiao Yi Fei looked at her grandfather who she had video called on another line and asked, "Grandfather, why did you agree to meet him that easily?"


    Old man Qiao revealed a faint smile and said, "Well, I also had some business with him, so why not?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was surprised by this once again and couldn''t help asking, "What business do you have with him?"


    Old man Qiao just revealed a smile and said, "It''s a secret."

 Chapter 515 Setting Up The Shop (3)

    After hanging up, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that something was off, but there was nothing he could do.


    So after rxing for a bit, he went off to bed where Ang was waiting for him.


    At the very least, they had made some progress as a couple. Even though she was angry, she no longer sent him to the couch like before and let him sleep in the bed with her.


    In fact, she had gotten used to sleeping with him, so it was more of her wanting to sleep with him than not punishing.


    But to a certain degree, this was a form of punishment for Lin Fan since he was so close, but so far at the same time. Even if he wanted to reach his hands out to touch the promisednd, he was unable to do so since he knew what would happen to him.


    After a nice night''s sleep, Lin Fan was much more recharged.


    He didn''t want to admit it, but he had been quite drained during this exam.


    It wasn''t the final round that drained him, it was the stress of the second round and the fact that he had almost died that drained him. Even now, he was still wondering who had saved him in the end¡­


    Still, that wasn''t something that he could figure out right now, so he turned his attention back to what was important.


    After having a simple breakfast, Lin Fan headed off to the Seekers Union with Momonga and Ang.


    This talk would involve something that was very important to them, the new shop that Lin Fan was building. Since that was the case, it was very natural for them to follow him into this meeting.


    When Lin Fan arrived in the main hall of the Seekers Union, everyone looked at him differently.


    Since the Seekers Union was under the Hunters Organization, they received the news faster than outsiders would. Almost everyone here knew that Lin Fan was one of the only four people who had passed this year''s Hunters Exam, so he was definitely worthy of their respect.


    There were even a few girls who looked at Lin Fan differently, but the moment they did, they felt a chill fall over them. They didn''t know where it came from, the only thing that they knew was that it only went away when they looked away from Lin Fan.


    The person who was at the receptionist desk today wasn''t Xiao Ling, rather it was someone that Lin Fan didn''t recognize at all. However, that didn''t mean that they were any less respectful. Rather, they were even more respectful towards Lin Fan because they weren''t as close to him as Xiao Ling was.


    The receptionist led Lin Fan to the second floor while also sneaking peeks, but she experienced the same problem as the other girls in the hall. There was a constant chill that hit her back whenever she tried to sneak peeks, so eventually she just gave up and did her job properly.


    Lin Fan''s group was brought to the second floor a third time and for the third time, they were brought to another new room that looked the same, but was painted a different colour.


    Sitting in that room waiting for them was the old man from the Qiao Family and Qiao Yi Fei standing on the side.


    When the old man saw Lin Fane in, he revealed a smile and stood up to receive him, but Lin Fan quickly said, "Elder, there''s no need for this. Please sit, please sit."


    It was a fact that this old man had treated Lin Fan well and he repaid this in kind by treating this old man well, taking him as an elder of his.


    Old man Qiao revealed a smile when he saw this and said, "Now, now, there''s no need to be polite. Come and sit."


    Lin Fan gave a nod, but he still waited for old man Qiao to sit down first before sitting down. Momonga and Ang both sat down after Lin Fan did.


    Old man Qiao looked at Lin Fan for a minute before finally asking, "So, what did you call me out for? Is it rted to your Hunter License or is it rted to something else?" After saying this, his eyes went over to Qiao Yi Fei who had been staring at Momonga the entire time.


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile before saying, "You can say that it is rted to the Hunter License, but also not at the same time."


    Then after a slight pause to reorganize his thoughts, Lin Fan said, "I want to open up a shop and I need to find some space for it. I was hoping that you would help me with that."<sub> </sub>


    Old man Qiao put his hand up to stroke his chin after he heard this. After thinking for a bit, he said, "That''s interesting, but you must need a space in a special ce if you''reing to me. So if I had to guess, it should be one of the busy parts of Harmony City?"


    Lin Fan had an awkward smile on his face as he hesitated a bit before saying, "If possible, I was hoping that you can help me find a store right in the center of Harmony City, right on Harmony Street."


    Qiao Yi Fei who had been in a daze staring at Momonga the entire time heard this and she couldn''t help cutting in as she said, "Are you kidding me? You''re not afraid of bing fat like this? You''re asking for such a big mouthful and you don''t feel any shame at all, I really have never met anyone with such a thick face before. You should know that Harmony Street is the most prosperous and busiest street in all of Harmony City, there''s not a single store there that has failed because of the natural street traffic that is generated there and you¡­"


    But before she could finish, old man Qiao had already raised his hand to stop her.


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at her grandfather and said, "Grandfather, what are you¡­"


    This time, old man Qiao looked at her with a slightly cold gaze and said, "That''s enough."


    When she saw this and heard the tone he spoke to her in, she immediately closed her mouth and stood straight. This was a tone that she had rarely ever heard from her grandfather since usually he was very carefree and to be honest, he pampered her to an extent that could be considered overkill. This was a rare tone that he used when he reprimanded her and it only happened when he was really disappointed in her.


    However, that also confused her because she didn''t feel like she had done anything wrong. Rather it was Lin Fan who had made the excessive demand no matter how you looked at it and she was just standing up for her grandfather.


    Old man Qiao turned back to Lin Fan and revealed a smile as he said, "Well, your request isn''t impossible, but let me hear what you want to do with the space first."


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this because even he felt that this was an excessive request and if it was him, he definitely would have rejected it without even thinking about it. However, the words that old man Qiao said almost seemed like he was willing to give Lin Fan the store.


    After Lin Fan came back from his shock, he said, "I''m nning on opening a pet training shop. I was just hoping that you would provide me with the space for it."


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t mention any conditions because in the end, most of the money that was earned through the shop would go right to the system and he wouldn''t be able to share any of the profits since he would still need that meager amount that he did get to fund other things. In fact, he was hoping to get the store for free, but he didn''t have the face to say this.


    Old man Qiao revealed a surprised look when he heard this before he asked, "You''re going to open a pet training shop? Do you even know anything about that?"


    Lin Fan waved his hand and called out all five of his pets.


    When they appeared, they appeared in their human forms so it was strange seeing all these children appear, but old man Qiao was able to easily recognize them.


    Old man Qiao narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan''s pets before saying, "Ho, you have this many pets at this level. It seems like you really do know a thing or two about training them."


    Then after saying this, he fell silent like he was thinking something over.


    It was at this time that the silent Momonga who hadn''t said a single thing the entire time suddenly chimed in with, "I can tell you that he''s quite good at it, especially with all the things that his master has taught him."


    It was at this that old man Qiao narrowed his eyes again.


    To be honest, Lin Fan was an outstanding person, but he was just so outstanding that it was strange.


    For him to appear out of nowhere like this, it really did raise questions.


    But if he were to have a master¡­


    After another pause, old man Qiao said, "Alright, I have an old restaurant there that I''m not using so I can give it to you to use."

 Chapter 516 Setting Up The Shop (4)

    When he said this, both Qiao Yi Fei and Lin Fan revealed shocked looks.


    Neither of them could believe that old man Qiao would actually agree to this request because no matter how one looked at it, it was quite the excessive request.


    Maybe if Lin Fan had offered some kind of condition, that would have been easier to ept. After all, Lin Fan had deliberately not offered any conditions because there were no conditions that he could offer. He wanted to see if it was possible to get it for free.


    After a moment of being surprised, Lin Fan then said, "I''m setting up a new shop, so I won''t just be borrowing the store."


    Old man Qiao gave augh before saying, "Of course, I''m giving you the store. What, you don''t want it now?"


    Lin Fan then awkwardly said, "I don''t really have any money to pay for it."


    Old man Qiao waved his hand and said, "Just take it. It''s not like I''m using it anyway, so you might as well take it and use it."


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say in response to this, but there was one thing that was certain, he was definitely moved by this. This was a store that would be worth quite a bit and was definitely not something that one could buy with just status.


    It could be seen how much kindness old man Qiao was showing Lin Fan just with this gesture.


    As Lin Fan thought of the reason for this, he slowly turned to look at Qiao Yi Fei who had a shocked look on her face. But then seeing Lin Fan look over, she immediately red at him with a cold look since she had alsoe to the same conclusion that he hade to.


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward look since he didn''t want to ept the store if it was under these conditions. Not to mention that there was a death re that poked him right in the back, putting so much pressure that it made it hard for him to breathe.


    But there was no other choice right now since there was no other way for him to get a store like this.


    So in the end, Lin Fan cupped his hands as he said with an awkward smile, "Senior, thank you for your kindness. I will take this store."


    Old man Qiao gave a nod before saying, "Very good. I''ll have someone send the deed to the store over to Xiao Fei Fei and you cane pick it up from her."


    His words made his intentions even more clear, but they also made it clear that this meeting was over.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since this created an awkward atmosphere, so he wanted to leave as well. Not to mention that old man Qiao was a hunter with Two Stars, one of the top hunters of the Hunters Organization, so he didn''t have as much free time as he made it seem right now.


    Lin Fan once again cupped his hand and gave a slight bow before leaving the room.


    When Lin Fan''s group left, there were only Qiao Yi Fei and old man Qiao who were left in the room.


    Neither one of them said anything as Qiao Yi Fei looked at her grandfather while old man Qiao was thinking about something while tapping his finger on the table. Thissted for another five minutes before finally Qiao Yi Fei couldn''t take it anymore and spoke.


    Qiao Yi Fei asked in an anxious voice, "Grandfather, do you have a fever or something?"


    p Old man Qiao heard this and revealed a smile as he turned to ask, "What''s wrong Xiao Fei Fei, do you think that I look sick?"</anda>


    Qiao Yi Fei shook her head, but then she also said, "Well you don''t seem sick, but you''re acting like it. Why would you just give him that shop for free? You know how much that shop is worth and what kind of meaning it has, but you just gave it to him to turn into a pet training shop. That just doesn''t make sense no matter how you think about it."


    Old man Qiao said with the same smile, "Maybe it''s because I''m looking out for you."


    Qiao Yi Fei''s face turned red before she revealed an aggrieved look and said, "Grandfather, I''ve already told you that I''m not interested in him. Rather, I''m more interested in the white haired one, my Diabolis. If you loved me, you would help me."


    Old man Qiao''s smile disappeared when he heard this. He was silent for a bit before saying, "That one''s no good."


    Qiao Yi Fei''s expression became even more aggrieved as she pouted her lips and said, "Why? Why is he no good?"<sub> </sub>


    Old man Qiao revealed a serious look and said, "It''s best if you forget about him. That person is nothing but trouble, both for you and our family."


    Qiao Yi Fei once again said with pouted lips, "You only care about the family, you don''t care about what I feel at all."


    Old man Qiao gave a sigh and said, "It''s not what you think, he''s much more dangerous than you know. However, that also isn''t the reason why I gave him the store. It''s somethingpletely different."


    Qiao Yi Fei had been nning on trying to guilt her grandfather even more, but then she heard the second half of what he said and swallowed her words back down. Seeing the look on her grandfather''s face, she didn''t know what to say at first. However, after thinking about it, she said, "Grandfather, is something wrong?"


    Old man Qiao shook his head and said, "Don''t worry about it. You just need to know that there''s another reason why I gave him the store and it isn''t rted to getting him to marry you at all."


    Qiao Yi Fei still couldn''t shake the feeling that something was off, so she kept asking, "But what is it then? Why can''t you tell me?"


    Once again, old man Qiao revealed a serious look and said, "This is something that''s decided by many important people, it isn''t something that you can get yourself involved in. This is much more dangerous than you think."


    Qiao Yi Fei was once again surprised by her grandfather. This was the same rare serious look that she almost never saw, but today she saw it twice. It seemed like it indeed involved something quite serious that her grandfather couldn''t tell her about.


    However, seeing as that was the case, she felt even more curious as to what it was.


    Old man Qiao giving Lin Fan the store really wasn''t rted to Qiao Yi Fei at all, rather this was something that was decided on by the Hunters Organization. The Hunters Organization would repay old man Qiao for the store, so he wasn''t suffering a loss at all.


    Before evening to this meeting today, old man Qiao had already decided to give Lin Fan this store. The only thing he was worried about was how to get Lin Fan to ept the store.


    However, he never thought that Lin Fan would be this direct and shameless about this store. He even asked him right to his face if he could have this store for free.


    Old man Qiao had already known that Lin Fan needed a store since he had already checked up on Lin Fan. Rather, he had known about the Xu Family looking for a store and knowing the rtionship between Lin Fan and the Xu Family, he knew that it was naturally rted to Lin Fan.


    Once this was known, the Hunters Organization''s higher ups immediately agreed to this n of giving this store to Lin Fan.


    There were two main reasons for this.


    One was that this would be consideredpensation to Lin Fan for using him as bait for Shi Yan.


    Even if he didn''t know what was happening, they should still provide some kind ofpensation to him since this would inconvenience him. That was the minimum that they should do since they were using him without his permission.


    The second reason was because they wanted to keep him in a ce where it would be easy to monitor him. After all, they needed to protect him while also being able to make a move on Shi Yan when he showed himself. If Lin Fan were to run all around like most hunters did after getting their license, it wouldn''t be good for them since they would have to devote manpower just to follow him around.


    It was better for them if he were to stay in one ce where they had a branch so they could just deploy people to watch that ce where he was staying instead of having to send people to follow him around.


    Now that Lin Fan had epted this store, it would make their jobs much easier.


    Of course, old man Qiao had been against this n in the first ce since he didn''t want to use Lin Fan as bait. He knew that the experts of the Hunters Organization were strong, but if an ident were to happen and something did happen to Lin Fan, it would already be toote to regret it.


    After all, he was still hoping that Lin Fan would be his grandson inw and lead their Qiao Family in the next generation.


    Still, there was nothing that could be done since he alone wasn''t able to oppose the entire Hunters Organization on this decision, not to mention Old Mao. Once that old woman set her mind to something, no one could make her change her mind¡­


    Since that was the case, he could only assign a few of his personal guards to watching over Lin Fan as well.

 Chapter 517 New Store (1)

    When Lin Fan had gotten home, he had to do many things to make it up to Ang, but he still convinced her that epting this store was the best choice.


    After all, there was no other way that Lin Fan could think of that would allow him to get a store in the most famous street of Harmony City.


    But in the end, Ang understood what Lin Fan was thinking and forgave him in the end. However, that wasn''t before making him run around buying her all kinds of sweets and decimating savings that he did have.


    Lin Fan didn''t even have to wait long for the deed to the shop to arrive, Qiao Yi Fei contacted him the next day to tell him that her grandfather had already sent the deed.


    Of course, when Lin Fan went to pick it up, he didn''t get to meet Qiao Yi Fei since she felt that it was too awkward.


    Both of them still thought that this was old man Qiao''s way of getting Lin Fan to marry Qiao Yi Fei, so it was too embarrassing for them to meet to hand over this deed.


    When Lin Fan came to the Seekers Union, the receptionist who was at the receptionist desk gave him the deed along with a message from old man Qiao that read, "The store''s a bit beat up, so I hope that you don''t mind cleaning up before using it."


    Lin Fan of course didn''t mind since he was getting this store for free and of course, he wasn''t going to be the one that would be cleaning it.


    While he was there, Lin Fan also asked the receptionist at the front, "Did Xiao Ling take a vacation?"


    The receptionist said, "Yes, she suddenly asked for a vacation and she hasn''t been in for the past few days."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows as he asked, "Did she give a reason for why she was taking this vacation?"


    The receptionist looked at Lin Fan with a doubtful look and was thinking that this man was one of Xiao Ling''s admirers, or rather her stalkers, so she was thinking about how to deal with him. However, at this time, another receptionist came over and answered for her. This receptionist was one of the receptionists that had been here when Lin Fan joined the Seekers Union and was one of the ones that were close to Xiao Ling.


    The second receptionist said, "She said that it was a family emergency, but she didn''t exin. However, based on how she said it, it should be quite bad."


    Lin Fan nodded and then turned without saying anything else.


    The second receptionist hesitated a bit before saying, "If you can, can you please check up on her?"


    Lin Fan stopped and turned around before giving a nod. Then without saying a thing, he walked out of the Seekers Union.


    The first receptionist looked at the second receptionist and asked, "Senior, should we have told that person about senior Xiao Ling? He looks like he''s one of her stalkers."


    The second receptionist tapped the first one on the head and said, "What nonsense are you saying? That person is one of the four people who passed the Hunters Exam this year and before that, he was one of Xiao Ling''s seekers. It''s normal for him to ask about her."


    The first receptionist''s eyes opened wide as she said, "He''s one of the only four that passed this year? Wow, he was so handsome too."


    The second receptionist saw the look in the first receptionist''s eyes, but she didn''t say a thing as she just shook her head with a helpless look. It was clear from her eyes that she was a shallow person, but still, she also had to admit that Lin Fan was just that handsome.


    ¡­


    After receiving the deed, the first thing Lin Fan did was head off to his new store.


    As for the deed itself, naturally the safest ce was to keep it with him since the only person he could trust here was himself.


    There were things like banks in this upper realm that kept people''s items, but they were all run by different organizations. There were also banks that were run by the twelve great factions, but Lin Fan still felt that the safest hands were his own.


    Taking a carriage to Harmony Street, when he arrived, Lin Fan really felt crowded since there were just too many people here. There were even more people than the crowded cities on earth.


    However, that wasn''t strange at all since this was a city that had a greater poption than any of the cities on earth. For there to be more people, it was just a natural thing as well.


    In fact, looking around, Lin Fan was excited since all the people here were potential customers and not a single one of them looked like they were poor. That was the big thing since the prices of his store had never been considered cheap and that was just in the lower realm. Lin Fan didn''t even want to think about how expensive the prices would be in this upper realm.<sub> </sub>


    Following the signs that were all around him, Lin Fan quickly made his way to where his new store was. It didn''t take him long to find it because it was the one store that waspletely different from the others.


    The other stores all looked bustling with plenty of customers inside shopping or waiting outside to get in, but the store that old man Qiao gave him was basically an abandoned building that was right in the middle of the other stores.


    However, the strange thing was that no one said anything about it.


    Neither the customers who were walking by or the guards that were standing all around even looked in that direction.


    Normally, the customers who saw such a ce would definitely point and whisper among themselves, trying to figure out why there was a ce like this on such a busy street.


    Normally, the guards would be trying to figure out what kind of owner would let their ce be like this since this was considered bad for the image of the neighbourhood, so they would try to get the owner to take responsibility and fix their shop.


    However, there wasn''t any of that here.


    Not a single person went forward to that abandoned store, it was almost as if it didn''t exist at all.


    But since everyone was treating this store like this, when Lin Fan made his way over to the store, naturally he drew plenty of attention.


    As soon as he went over, the guards immediately came forward to stop him while everyone else pointed at him and whispered amongst themselves.


    One of the guards came up to Lin Fan and said, "Stop, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan was confused why these guards had suddenly stopped him from going over to his new store, but since they were the guards, it wasn''t right for him to ignore them and just go to the store. After all, these guards were hired by the twelve great families since most of the stores here belonged to them.


    That meant that if he were to go against these guards, it would be equal to pping the face of the twelve great families which he definitely didn''t want to do right now.


    So Lin Fan calmly said, "I''m the new owner of this store. I''m here to clean and fix it up today and I''m nning on opening a new store soon."


    The guards immediately revealed looks of doubt since they knew what this abandoned store was and what it represented. There was no way that the person that owned the store would give it up that easily¡­


    So the lead guard that had spoken earlier said, "Alright, enough of your tricks. You cane with us peacefully or we will take you by force."


    As soon as he said this, the other guards all drew their weapons which they pointed at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see that they had escted the situation this quickly and he said in a confused voice, "What do you mean? Why would I be tricking you? I''m really the new owner."


    The lead guard said with a look of disdain, "Sure you are and I''m the leader of the Hunters Organization. You can tell us the whole story back at our barracks."


    Lin Fan of course didn''t want to be detained, so he pulled out the deed that he had in his Storage Ring for the guard as he said, "Look at this. This is the deed for thisnd, this shows that I own this store."


    The guard looked over with a look of disdain on his face, but the moment he saw the deed, his eyes immediately narrowed. He moved in closer to get a better look and the shock in his eyes became even deeper.


    This seal, could it be?


    If this seal was real, then that would mean something truly shocking.


    Another one of the guards saw that the lead guard wasn''t saying a thing, so he came forward to say to Lin Fan, "Enough of this. Come with us now and we''ll let you off with light charges, but if you insist on using this fake deed, we''ll have to charge you with forged docu¡­"


    But before he could finish, the lead guard suddenly turned around to p this guard in the face.


    The guard fell to the ground with a look of disbelief on his face as he looked at the lead guard, as if he couldn''t understand what had just happened.

 Chapter 518 New Store (2)

    The lead guard immediately roared out at the guard on the ground, "Stand down you fool!"


    The look of disbelief of the guard on the ground became even deeper as he waspletely confused by this turn of events. However, the lead guard did have some prestige among these guards since he was their captain, so the guard on the ground said, "Yes, captain!"


    Then after saying this, he quickly got up and moved back to where he had been standing before.


    The lead guard turned back to Lin Fan with a smile and said, "This young master, I apologize for the mix up. Please go ahead and enter your store, don''t mind us at all."


    Then with a wave of his hand, he led the guards away to patrol the street again.


    Everyone who had been watching couldn''t believe what had just happened and many of them were starting to question what kind of status Lin Fan had for the guard captain to act like this.


    After leading the guards away, the guard that the captain knocked down couldn''t help asking, "Captain, is there something special about that kid?"


    Their captain was normally quite well tempered and wouldn''t resort to violence that easily, so for him to have such a big reaction, it could be seen that this kid didn''t have a normal identity.


    The captain was still thinking about the seal that was on the deed.


    That seal was one that was very special since what it represented was something that they couldn''t ever go against.


    There was no need to doubt the authenticity of that seal since it was made with a special method. Only the ones that it represented had the way of creating that seal.


    Then again, if there was someone who was crazy enough to forge that seal, they would definitely be hunted down by the shadow guards of that organization it represented.


    But if that was the case, then that would mean that this young man definitely wasn''t normal.


    Seeing that their captain wasn''t saying a thing, the guard that had been knocked down asked again, "Captain, are you listening?"


    Hearing this, the captain finally reacted. He turned to look at the guard calling him and said in a serious voice, "Don''t bother asking, it isn''t something that we should get involved in. You''re just lucky that that young master was willing to let you go so easily. If you ever see him in the future, don''t push your luck with him, that''s the only advice I can give you."


    The guard was taken aback by how serious the captain was, but he still gave a salute and said, "Yes sir."


    These guards quickly made their way to their original post, but theypletely ignored Lin Fan and the gazes of the people around them.


    As for Lin Fan, while he was surprised by the reaction of the guards, he didn''t mind them and headed right into the store.


    When he opened the door, he saw what he had already expected. This store waspletely abandoned and the inside of the store was quite dirty, but it was a good thing that there wasn''t any rotting furniture or anything.


    Still, this was strange since this was a store that had belonged to old man Qiao, who was a Two Star Hunter. For it to be like this, something must have happened that must have made him give up this store.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that old man Qiao had given up this store just because he was bored of it and he had left it there. His disciples had cleaned it out of the valuable things, but that didn''t mean that they had time to clean it up which caused it to reach the abandoned state that it had currently been in.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind any of this since it wasn''t him who would be cleaning up the store, it was the system.


    As Lin Fan stood in the center of the store, he asked the system, "Does this qualify as a space that can be used for the store?"


    The system was silent for a bit before saying, "A suitable ce has been found. The system will now refurbish this location into the pet store. This process will take two hours. Host, please vacate the premises."


    Lin Fan was already used to this since this had happened with the stores back in the lower realm, so he just exited the store where he saw that there were quite a few people who had gathered.


    Ignoring them as he came out, he pulled out arge white sheet from his Storage Ring which he immediately threw over the store with his spiritual sense,pletely covering it up.<sub> </sub>


    When he did this, there were even more people who paid attention to this store that waspletely covered up in the white sheet.


    There were a few people in the crowd who knew what kind of store this was, so naturally they had other intentions as they watched this white sheete over this store.


    Finally, one of the people watching couldn''t hold back anymore and came up to Lin Fan to ask, "Hey, do you know what''s happening with this store?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see someoneing up to him, but since they weren''t hostile like the guards, there was no need for him to be hostile. Rather, by talking to this person, he would be able to generate some advertising for his store.


    Lin Fan turned to that person and said, "Yes, there''s a new store opening here tomorrow morning and I''m the new owner."


    The person who came up to ask had a surprised look when he heard this, but then he said with an excited look, "So that means that it''s finallying back!"


    Lin Fan was confused when he heard this, but before he could ask that person what he meant, that person had already run off.


    The people around them that knew what this store was before all had traces of excitement in their eyes as they pulled out their watches to start posting.


    Lin Fan looked around and seeing that no one else wasing over to talk to him, he had no choice but to give up the idea of advertising his store. Seeing that there was nothing else for him to do here, Lin Fan gave a sigh and then headed off back home.


    What Lin Fan wasn''t aware of was what kind of a stir he had just caused on the city forums.


    The reason for this was because of what this store was before Lin Fan had taken over and how popr it had once been. It was so popr that even after it had been abandoned by the owner like this, there were countless fans that still went once in a while to see if the owner would evere back.


    The main reason the store was so popr was because of who the owner was. The owner of this store previously had been the Ghost Chef, Qiao Yi Yin, the Two Star Hunter that everyone considered the best chef in the world.


    The only problem was that Qiao Yi Yin had a wandering spirit and wasn''t prone to stay in one ce. This meant that his store had actually been closed for most of the year and would only open on certain asions.


    However, just with those certain asions that it opened, it had generated fame that no one could ignore.


    There was a legend that once said that on the coldest day of the year, the Ghost Chef Qiao Yi Yin had served a special meal for an old friend, but the smell from that meal had spread all over Harmony Street. On that day, there wasn''t a single person in any of the other stores as they had all gathered around Qiao Yi Yin''s store, trying to get a single peek at where that delicious smell wasing from. Even the workers in the other stores had gone out to see where that smell wasing from.


    On that day, the entirety of Harmony Street had stopped.


    The economic damage to Harmony City was clear since their monthly revenue had dipped greatly that month, but no one could me anyone since even the officials of the city had been standing outside the store.


    Now there was someone that was taking over the store that the Ghost Chef once used, this was news that was definitely worth spreading.


    The Ghost Chef''s age wasn''t a secret and most people knew what he looked like since he was quite famous, so they knew that Lin Fan wasn''t the Ghost Chef. However, the fact that the guards had even allowed him to approach the store and he said that he was opening the store again, most people thought that Lin Fan was the Ghost Chef''s disciple.


    The disciples of the Ghost Chef were all famous in their own rights, so no one doubted their abilities, even if Lin Fan seemed a bit young.


    Just the chance to have a taste of the food cooked by the Ghost Chef''s disciple was something that one could brag about, so many people were excited for what was in store tomorrow.


    It was just too bad that all of this was pure spection and Lin Fan wasn''t nning to open a restaurant, but rather a pet training store.


    It seemed like tomorrow was destined to be a day that would be filled with disappointment and shock.


    But none of that was Lin Fan''s fault.

 Chapter 519 New Store (3)

    Lin Fan waspletely unaware of the storm that he had created on the city forums since he didn''t have time to check them.


    As soon as Lin Fan got home, he immediately went to check his cultivation realm farms since he would need materials for the store tomorrow.


    During the time that he had been on the upper realm, Lin Fan didn''t forget to maintain his cultivation realm farms and he had even made sure to take over several more cultivation realms. In total, Lin Fan had six different cultivation realm farms under him and he was already working on the seventh one, having already taken over half of that realm.


    He would have finished taking it over, but it seemed like the opponent that he was facing this time was quite tough and he hadn''t been able to take them down yet.


    Still, since each cultivation farm realm would be enough to support one store, that meant that other than the first four cultivation realm farms that he used to support the lower realm stores, he had two cultivation realm farms to support this upper realm store. Even if it was the upper realm, he would have plenty of stock for the store.


    While Lin Fan had been focused on these cultivation realm farms, he had also received a notice from the system that told him that the store''s refurbishing had been finished.


    Lin Fan was surprised since the system had told him two hours, but it had finished in an hour and a half, so he couldn''t help saying, "Wow, you finished quite fast didn''t you, system?"


    "Host, please do not doubt the abilities of the system. First warning."


    Now this was something nostalgic, it had been a long time since he had received a warning from the system like this that he almost forgot about it.


    Still, that didn''t mean that he had forgotten the possible punishments that he could receive from the system. With that in mind, Lin Fan chose to ignore it as he continued to prepare for tomorrow.


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried about the refurbishing of the store because he trusted the ability of the store. After all, they had been together for four different stores now, so there was no need to doubt the system''s abilities.


    Unbeknownst to him, the effects of his advertising were having their effect on the city forums.


    ¡­


    The next morning, Lin Fan headed out early with Momonga and Ang.


    He had been nning on going to the store alone since there was nothing for the two of them to do there, but for some reason, the two of them insisted on going to the store with him. Seeing how determined they were to go, Lin Fan had no other choice but to let them go with him.


    Lin Fan had timed it so that he would arrive five minutes before he opened the store, but when he arrived, he found that there was already a crowd of people who had gathered around his store.


    Lin Fan was surprised by the crowd that had appeared around his store, but when the people saw him, many people started to point at him.


    When Lin Fan left this store yesterday, there were people who had taken his picture and posted it on the city forums with the post about the store, so there were people that recognized him.


    "He really is as handsome as his picture."


    "Un, I hope that we get a good table so we can just look at him."


    "Is he really the Ghost Chef''s disciple?"


    "He''s taking over this store and the deed that he had shown yesterday had the mark of the Hunters Organization, so it should be real."


    "The Ghost Chef''s disciple, it really has been a long time since I had a good meal."


    "Right, I know exactly what you mean."


    Lin Fan heard all kinds of different whispers and many of them involved things that he couldn''t understand at all.


    Who was this Ghost Chef that they were mentioning?


    What did he have to do with the shop that he was going to open?


    He wasn''t opening a restaurant, he was opening a pet training shop!


    When he came up to the crowd that was in front of his store, they parted like the waves to create a path for him right to the store.


    Lin Fan walked through the path that had been created for him and when he did, he looked at the people around him. There were quite a few youngdies here and there were looks that could be considered dangerous on their faces.


    Even with Ang ring back at them, they weren''t affected since there were just too many of them andbined, they were able to cancel out the chilling from Ang.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, there were also a few gazes that made Lin Fan ufortable. They were gazes just like the ones that came from the girls, but they came from bulky men instead.


    Lin Fan looked to Ang for help, but all he heard was, "If that''s what you like¡­"


    Lin Fan didn''t know whether tough or cry, but he did his best to avoid those gazes after that.


    Once Lin Fan arrived in front of the store, he raised the white sheet a bit to reveal the door and then opened it without caring about anyone else.


    When the crowd saw Lin Fan opening the door, the ones that were in front started moving like they were about toe in.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he raised his hand and said, "Please wait, we''re not open yet."


    The crowd were surprised, but they were also anxious to get in because many of them had skipped breakfast toe here. One of them couldn''t help asking, "When are you opening?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see that people were this excited to go into his store without even knowing what his store was, but he still said, "We''ll be opening in another five minutes, right at nine."


    Hearing that it wouldn''t take much longer for the store to open, these people backed up and started urging Lin Fan to go in to prepare. He should take as much time as he needs to prepare.


    Lin Fan was once again surprised by just how understanding the people outside his store were. Even back in the lower realm when he was at the peak of his store''s poprity, he had never seen customers like this before.


    Still, since they were so understanding, there was no need for him to question it.


    He just assumed that this was the difference in quality of customers between the lower realm and the upper realm.


    It didn''t take long for Lin Fan to finish checking the store since the store''syout was almost exactly the same as the one in the lower realm. Even if the building itself wasn''t designed to fit this kind ofyout, the system had used spatialws to force the building into this kind ofyout.


    Since everything was the same, the only thing that Lin Fan had to do was pull out the materials from his cultivation realm farm and this store was ready to open for business.


    He finished right before it was time to open. While he was nervous about opening a new store, Lin Fan was also excited because this was the start of his new life in the upper realm. As well, this would allow him to build up the power that he would need to take revenge on the Liao Family.


    After taking a moment to calm himself, Lin Fan walked out of the store and in front of everyone, he pulled off the white sheet that had been over the store to officially open the store.


    However, the moment that everyone saw this store, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    After all, this store wasn''t a restaurant as they had expected it to be. Instead, this store seemed to be some kind of pet training store. Not to mention that the name of the store was quite arrogant.


    After a long time, Lin Fan''s store finally had a real name because he had unlocked that privilege after upgrading the system.


    So when he had the ability to choose the name of his store, Lin Fan had chosen to call it: Master Cultivation Pet Shop.


    It would have been fine to call it a cultivation pet shop, but to add the word master really was a bit too much. After all, Master Monster Trainers were rare even among Soul Realm Monster Trainers.


    For a store to call itself a master shop, there had to be a Master Monster Trainer that was working there.


    However, no matter how people looked at Lin Fan, they couldn''t see him as a Master Monster Trainer¡­After all, he was just too young!


    The person that had taken the lead earlier to ask Lin Fan a question came up and asked, "This young master, is there a mistake with the shop''s sign? Why is it a pet training shop and not a restaurant?"


    Lin Fan heard this and was equally confused.


    Why would he open a restaurant?


    He couldn''t understand why this man had suddenly asked him this question, so he asked back, "Why would I open a restaurant and not a pet training shop?"


    The man who heard this couldn''t help saying, "Eh? Aren''t you the Ghost Chef''s disciple? Isn''t that why you took over this store?"


    Lin Fan then asked, "Who''s the Ghost Chef?"


    When the crowd heard this, their only reaction to this was, "EH?"

 Chapter 520 New Store (4)

    After being surprised, there were all kinds of whispers that rang out once again.


    "What''s going on here? Didn''t you say that he was the Ghost Chef''s disciple?"


    "That was what was said on the forums. I didn''t personally check it either."


    "Didn''t you see that other post though? This was the person that was with Flower Qiao, so how could it be fake? Not only did he inherit the Ghost Chef''s store, he was also with Flower Qiao, so that could only be the exnation!"


    "Right, I saw that post too! I was very angry when I saw it, but if he''s also the Ghost Chef''s disciple¡­"


    Lin Fan could understand a few things from the whispers that he heard.


    It seemed like the Ghost Chef that they were all talking about was the ancestor of the Qiao Family and this used to be his store.


    Lin Fan had already heard that old man Qiao was a Gourmet Hunter, but he never knew that he was this famous though¡­


    This made him even more curious why old man Qiao had given him the store, but it wasn''t the time to think about that right now. After all, his store was currently surrounded by all these people who seemed like they were about to riot.


    So Lin Fan said, "Everyone, I am not the disciple of the Ghost Chef like you all think. I am simply his acquaintance because I myself am a hunter. When I talked to him about a space, he offered me this store which is why I''m currently running a pet training shop here."


    Everyone understood when they heard this, but then they looked at Lin Fan with another round of shocked looks.


    After all, if they hadn''t made a mistake, they had just heard Lin Fan admit that he was a hunter.


    Just how young was Lin Fan?


    He was now iming that not only was he Master Monster Trainer, he was also one of the people who owned the rare hunter license?


    It was just too unbelievable.


    However, before anyone could call Lin Fan out on this, there was a beast carriage that arrived.


    When the door of the beast carriage opened, it revealed Qiao Yi Fei.


    Qiao Yi Fei was surprised to see the crowd that was gathered in front of the store, but she still moved forward towards Lin Fan''s store.


    When the crowd saw her walking towards Lin Fan''s store, they immediately parted to create a path for her like they had done for Lin Fan.


    As one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City, naturally she was someone that everyone in the crowd recognized with a single look. Plus, there had been that rumour about her and Lin Fan that had been posted on the forums, so they were curious to see if it was true after all.


    But before she could even make her way over to the door, there was another beast carriage that appeared.


    When the door to this beast carriage opened, it revealed Mao Tao.


    Mao Tao was also one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City, so she was someone that had quite a bit of fame in Harmony City. The moment she stepped out, there were plenty of people that pointed at her as they started whispering.


    Of course, she saw that Qiao Yi Fei was also here, so she moved to the side, away from the path that had opened up for Qiao Yi Fei.


    <o>,m When she came up to the edge of the crowd, they also parted ways for her, creating another path for her.</o>


    It really was too bad for the people who were were in between the two paths since they had to squeeze together, but that also meant that they weren''t that far away from both of these beauties.


    It was just too bad that this didn''t end here since there was a third beast carriage that appeared.


    When this third beast carriage stopped, the door opened to reveal Fu Ling.


    As another one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City, Fu Ling was also immediately recognized by the crowd, however there was a different reactionpared to thest two.


    The other two had already been rumoured to have some kind of rtionship with Lin Fan already since there had been posts about them on the city forums, but there hadn''t been a single thing about Fu Ling.<sub> </sub>


    For three different Flowers of Harmony City to appear at the opening of Lin Fan''s store at the same time, naturally this was something that was very strange.


    Fu Ling ignored everyone and went in between the paths that had been created for Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao. Then looking at the people who were squeezed in there, she waited for a few seconds before they parted ways to create a path for her.


    They were definitely stretching themselves thin by making a third path for her, but they wouldn''t have had the chance toe this close to one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City normally. Not to mention that there were three of them right there in front of them. Even if it was a bit ufortable for them to do this, they were happy to do so since they could smell the fragrance that came from them.


    When the three girls made their way to the entrance, they all red at each other and didn''t say a thing.


    Even though their grandparents were all leaders in the Hunters Organization and they had grown up together, there was tension between them because they were all known as the Five Flowers of Harmony City. It was too bad since they had been quite good friends when they were younger.


    Of course, it was no coincidence that all three of them were here at the same time.


    There was no need to mention Qiao Yi Fei who had been sent here by her grandfather, as for the other two, their grandparents were high level members of the Hunters Organization, so they also knew about old man Qiao giving Lin Fan this store.


    As both of them wanted to take Lin Fan as a grandson inw, naturally they would send their granddaughters to the opening of Lin Fan''s store as well.


    After a moment of silence, it was surprisingly the shyest looking girl, Mao Tao who came up to Lin Fan first instead of Qiao Yi Fei who should have been closest to him.


    Mao Tao came right up to Lin Fan and said, "Young master Lin, it''s mean of you not to invite me to the opening of your store."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile as he felt needles stabbing him from inside the shop, but he still said, "Miss Mao, this isn''t anything special and you''re an important hunter, how could I invite you to something as small as this?"


    Fu Ling also came forward to say, "Then what about me? I''m not a hunter, so I''m more free. You just didn''t want to invite me?"


    Lin Fan thought that they weren''t close at all, so why would he invite her? But of course, he didn''t say it out loud.


    Instead, Lin Fan said, "Miss Fu, this is just a small event. How could I invite someone as important as you?"


    Qiao Yi Fei finally also came forward to say, "Then what about me? This was my grandfather''s store and you''re not even inviting me? Are you looking down on me and my grandfather?"


    Normally Qiao Yi Fei wouldn''t say anything since she wasn''t interested in Lin Fan like her grandfather wanted her to be, however with the other two here¡­her pride didn''t allow her to back down.


    The smile on Lin Fan''s face became even more awkward when Qiao Yi Fei joined in. He was expecting her to be the only person who didn''t join in, but she betrayed him in the end.


    The stabbing sensation in his back became even stronger, but there was nothing he could do since there were plenty of people who were watching.


    Mao Tao pouted her cheeks when she saw that the other two were also making her move, but she knew that what they were doing was making things awkward for Lin Fan, so she said, "Young master Lin, how about we go in and take a look at your store."


    When the other two heard this, they both gave nods because they also knew that they


    were making things awkward for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t want to let them into his store since he knew that this would make things worse, but he couldn''t deny their advertising effect.


    There were plenty of males in the crowd and many of them were staring at the three of them. Of course, every one of them had their own favourites, but that didn''t stop them from staring at the three of them since all three of them were beauties of different tastes.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan opened the door for them and said, "After you."


    The three beauties looked at each other before heading forward at the same time. Not a single one of them was willing to back down to the other two, so it was awkward since the door couldn''t fit all three of them at once.


    Still, they eventually got into the store and were surprised by how neat it was.


    Naturally they knew that the store had been abandoned previously, so to decorate the store in just a single night, Lin Fan must have really put in some effort.


    After looking around the store, they turned to the counter where instead of simply being surprised, they were shocked by what they saw.

 Chapter 521 New Store (5)

    The three of them turned back to Lin Fan at the same time and asked, "Owner Lin, are these really the prices of your store?"


    The prices that had been set by the system were anything but cheap, just like it had been on the Blue Star.


    For a Fragmented Soul Realm pet, the store charged one hundred spirit stones for training.


    Spirit stones were the currency of cultivators, so only those in the Soul Realm would have plenty of them to use, however, that didn''t mean that every cultivator had enough to use. Weaker cultivators that were in the Fragmented Soul Realm found it the hardest to earn spirit stones unless they had someone backing them.


    For most Fragmented Soul Realm Experts, it would be good enough if they even earned ten spirit stones a year. Now you''re telling people that to train their pet, they needed to pay what would take them ten years to earn?


    However, it wasn''t just the prices alone that were shocking, there was also something shocking underneath it.


    Other than Fragmented Soul Realm, Embryo Soul Realm, and even Child Soul Realm pets, this store imed that it could train Nascent Soul Realm and even True Soul Realm pets.


    To train True Soul Realm pets, it wasn''t something that any normal Master Monster Trainer could do. Those that could train True Soul Realm pets were well known across the realm and were people that could create waves with a single flip of their hand.


    No one believed that there would be someone of this level that would be at this store. Or at least no one believed that the owner who was this young would be at this level.


    There were many people who started looking at Lin Fan like he was a scam, but without knowing more about him, not a person dared to say anything. After all, he was someone that could inherit the Ghost Chef''s store and had three of the Five Flowers of Harmony City visit him, there was no doubt that his backing wasn''t small.


    Lin Fan was already used to this kind of reaction from his experience back on the Blue Star, but his store had nevercked business there, so he was confident in his store.


    Lin Fan looked at the three of them and gave a nod before simply replying, "That''s right."


    In this situation, a simple answer was definitely the best choice because too much exnation normally looked suspicious. A simple answer would make it seem that you were more confident that you really were.


    The girls still looked at Lin Fan with surprised looks, but then they decided to look around the store first. Perhaps there would be something here that would justify the confidence that Lin Fan demonstrated.


    The store''syout was the same as the lower realm, so other than the counter where he sold the training spots, there were also disys in the store that demonstrated the other products. There was a disy for pet food, there was a disy for special pet food, and there was a disy for training materials.


    Then to the very right hand side of the store, there was a new section that hadn''t been in the store before. This section was for the new items that Lin Fan had unlocked, the pet essories.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been able to properly make these essories back on the Blue Star since he didn''t have enough resources, but now he had plenty of resources to make proper essories since he devoted two cultivation realm farms just to this one store.


    The three girls all went to different disys since there were different things that caught their attention. Plus, they didn''t really want to be together since things were still tense between them.


    Qiao Yi Fei was attracted to the pet food disy since as the granddaughter of the Ghost Chef, her pets had always received special pet food made by her grandfather. Then as the granddaughter of the Ghost Chef, she naturally had some understanding of how pet food was made, so she was curious what skills Lin Fan had.


    When she came to the pet food section, she was once again shocked by the price because the cheapest bag of pet food that was being sold was a low grade bag that had a price of two hundred spirit stones. Even the pet food was more expensive than the training itself, just what kind of store was this?


    But when she came closer for a sniff, she suddenly realized that this pet food wasn''t as simple as it seemed.


    As for Mao Tao, since she was a Gourmet Hunter herself, she was more interested in the rare pet foods since most of them were just ingredients.


    When she came over to the disy and saw the items being disyed, she couldn''t help feeling that Lin Fan was a scam all over again.


    The items there didn''t look that special, but the effects that were being advertised just seemed too wild to believe.


    There was a fruit that was on disy that looked like several drawings of mes gathered together in the shape of a fruit with a green stem. Under this fruit, there was a sign that said, "me me Fruit, gives the pet who eats this fruit the ability toprehend mews."


    A fruit that could give a pet the ability toprehend mews, what kind of wild im was that?


    Werews that easily learned that just eating a single fruit would allow one to learn them?


    Even if it was an item that was used for a pet, this was just a im that was too ridiculous.<sub> </sub>


    Then there was the cost of this item, it was exactly ten thousand spirit stones!


    Ten thousand spirit stones were already enough to buy a Child Soul Realm Artifact, so instead of wasting it on training in this store or on this me me Fruit, it was better to buy something that would directly increase your own strength instead of the strength of your pet. No one who had that kind of money would spend it on a ce like this, not to mention one that seemed like a scam.


    But then when she was looking closely at the various high grade pet food that were on the shelves, she found that there were a few that contained energy that she couldn''t recognize. When she looked at them closely, she found that not only did they contain onew, but rather two differentws.


    This was something that she had never seen in an ingredient before.


    As for Fu Ling, she had gone to the pet essories section because she felt that they were quite cute, even if they were for pets.


    One that caught her eyes was this cor that was ced on disy.


    ording to the sign under the cor, it said that this cor had the ability to increase the agility of the pet that equipped it by 2. As for what kind of units that 2 used, it was unknown.


    However, what was most important was that there was no indication of the level of this item.


    All artifacts would be assigned a grade based on the level ofws that were contained within them, that way people could determine their value. However, these essories didn''t have any grading to them and as far as Fu Ling could tell, they didn''t seem to contain anyws either.


    But that was strange because she could sense some kind of strange energy that was inside of them.


    The worst part was that this cor alone had a price tag of five thousand spirit stones. That would already be enough to buy several Embryo Soul Realm artifacts.


    Still, in the end, when the three of them raised their separate issues to Lin Fan, they received the same answer.


    "You are free to buy it if you want. Our store doesn''t force any customers to buy our products."


    Huh?


    What was going on here?


    Normally stores would treat customers with respect because the customers were the ones that they were trying to convince to buy their products. There wasn''t a single store that would treat their customers like this¡­


    But that was exactly how Lin Fan treated his customers.


    There were a few people in the crowd who wanted toin, but when Lin Fan looked in their direction, they immediately closed their mouths.


    He had subdued them with pure force.


    Fu Ling naturally couldn''t take it since she was just being forced toe here by her grandfather, but it was different for Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao.


    Mao Tao was actually trying to chase Lin Fan down and it wouldn''t be good for her to not buy anything here, so she had to do something.


    As for Qiao Yi Fei, this store had been her grandfather''s and if it lost its fame just because of Lin Fan, that would be a p to her grandfather''s face. Naturally she wouldn''t be able to ept this.


    So after hesitating a bit, both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao called out a pet.


    Both of their pets were in the Embryo Soul Realm, which meant that training for them would cost a thousand spirit stones each. However, with the statuses that they had, this was nothing more than pocket change for them.


    Qiao Yi Fei was the president of the Seekers Union and Mao Tao was a hunter, not to mention that they had both the Qiao Family and the Mao Family behind them. A thousand spirit stones was just a wave of the hand.


    They sent the payment to Lin Fan''s watch and the moment they did, there was a notification from the system in Lin Fan''s mind.

 Chapter 522 Spinning The Wheel

    "Congrattions host. You have earned your first spirit stone and have unlocked the mid tier store."


    "Please wait, the mid tier store is now opening."


    "Congrattions host. The mid tier store has been unlocked."


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this since he had thought that what was in the store was already everything that would be avable. After all, there were some things in the store that were already far beyond his realm. They even reached the God Realm, so Lin Fan wasn''t sure that there could be anything else added to the store.


    But now the system was telling him that this store that he currently had was nothing more than a low tier store¡­


    It really was a p to his face and it really opened his eyes.


    He had thought that he would eventually reach the top of this world because of his system, but he now realized that perhaps his system didn''t have all the answers. Or at least not his current system, but he was at too low of a level to confirm this.


    ? He had to work hard to be stronger so that he wouldn''t be used and thrown away by the creator of the system like Huang Xiao Hou had been.


    After receiving the two pets from the two girls, Lin Fan brought them into the back beforeing out to the front again to say, "You cane pick up your pets tomorrow. Their training will be done then."


    The two girls were stunned when they heard this.


    Qiao Yi Fei had more resistance to Lin Fan since she had known him longer, so she asked, "You''re saying that you only need a single day to train my pet? Are you sure you aren''t making a mistake?"


    Mao Tao also followed up, "It normally takes a Monster Trainer several weeks or even several months to train a pet, you can''t just say things like this randomly."


    Lin Fan calmly looked at them and said, "Our store can guarantee that not only will the training be done in a day, your pets will either learn one or more skills and will have an increase in their cultivation level."


    Both of the girls revealed shocked looks when they heard this.


    Around them were the whispers of the crowd.


    "Did you catch that? Put it on the forum for everyone to see."


    "Right, right, we have to expose this scam store for what it is."


    "Serves him right for ying with the goddesses of my heart."


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao both looked around them and red at the people who had been whispering. When they did, the people who had been holding their watches up and taking pictures immediately stopped and turned away, whistling as if they hadn''t been involved at all.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao turned back to Lin Fan with concerned looks.


    They both had their own reasons to be worried.


    Qiao Yi Fei was worried because the store that Lin Fan had inherited was her grandfather''s and any rumours that arose would mean dirt being thrown on her grandfather''s face. Then again, if it was said that she wasn''t worried about Lin Fan, that would be a lie as well.


    Mao Tao was worried because she was worried about Lin Fan since he had already dazzled her with his handsome appearance.


    But when they saw the confident look that was on Lin Fan''s face, they couldn''t say anything.


    They just gave a sigh and said, "We''ll leave it to you, owner Lin."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this.


    Neither of them left, but since there was nothing else for them to do, they just sat there chatting with Lin Fan.


    As for the rest of the people that had been drawn into the store, most of them either came for Qiao Yi Fei, Mao Tao, or Fu Ling who had also stayed since she had been ordered to stay by her grandfather. There were also some that came for Lin Fan since his picture had also been spread on the forums and he was definitely much more handsome that most of the young masters in the city. There had even been a fanclub that had been started for him.


    However, when they arrived in the store and started ogling, there was a chill that suddenly ran down their backs that they couldn''t identify. Eventually, they couldn''t take it and they couldn''t find the source of it, so they had to leave the store.<sub> </sub>


    But some of the more determined girls didn''t give up as they put on coats even though it was the middle of spring and just stood there in the store fully bundled up.


    The people around looked at them with strange looks, but the girls themselves were satisfied as they stared at Lin Fan''s face.


    Behind Lin Fan, from time to time, there were clear clicks of the tongue that made Lin Fan flinch each time.


    He knew what he would have to deal with tonight, but he maintained the smile as he greeted the customers that came.


    However, even with all the customers that were in his store, there wasn''t a single other customer that purchased anything. Most of them had already heard about his store online and had already regarded it as a scam, it was clear by the way they looked around his store.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t let him bother him since he knew that this was just how it would develop. The same thing had happened on the Blue Star and he didn''t expect it to be any different here.


    At the very least, he had people that were willing to trust him and use his service. With the help of these two, he would be able to show off the power of his shop and easily establish his fame.


    The day passed by quickly and soon it was time for the store to close.


    There were still plenty of people at the end of the day since the three beauties had stayed the entire time.


    As the people saw the sun setting, they couldn''t help doubting this store even more since Lin Fan had been at the front desk the entire time. If he was there, then who would be the one training the pet?


    At this point, the information that Lin Fan had promised to train the pet in just a single day had already spread and most of the day had already passed.


    It seemed like this store really was a scam after all¡­


    But they weren''t disappointed since this was what they had already expected.


    As everyone began leaving the store, Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a worried look, but they still chose to leave without saying a thing since when they looked at him, they couldn''t see a single ripple in his eyes. Even with how many people were clearly against him, he wasn''t worried at all.


    This confidence infected them and they chose to believe in Lin Fan in the end.


    After sending off all the customers, Lin Fan went into the back room where Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao''s pets were waiting in cages.


    He let them out and took another look at them, feeling surprised by what kind of pets these two beauties had.


    Qiao Yi Fei, who had the style of a mature woman, actually had a little cat as her pet. It was almost so small that people would have mistaken it for a kitten, but it definitely didn''t act that way.


    Mao Tao, who had the style of a cute little girl, had a giant bear as a pet. This was a bear that when standing at its full height was over two meters tall. At the same time, it had paws that were covered in mes, making it look quite fierce. It was almost like the pet of a buff man instead of a little girl like her.


    However, both of them had these pets for their own reasons and it wasn''t up to Lin Fan to judge.


    This was a case of not judging a book by its cover.


    After Lin Fan had brought out these two pets, he looked into the air in front of him, but what he was actually looking at was the systems interface.


    He had received two rewards for opening this store, one was the unlock of the mid tier store when he earned his first spirit stone. The other had been given to him before he had even opened the store, it had been given to himst night when the system had finished renovating the store.


    Since this was his first store in the upper realm, the system had given him a special reward which was a roll of a wheel. However, it wasn''t just any wheel, it was a wheel that was filled with different cultivation realms that he could unlock.


    ording to the system, the level of the cultivation realms went from low to high, so everything would depend on his luck in the end.


    Moreover, when he opened the wheel now, he found that this wheel waspletely filled with symbols instead of actual words. It was unknown what kind of realms these symbols represented and there was clearly no way to tell what level of realms they were.


    It seemed like the only way that he would find out what kind of realm he would receive would be to actually spin the wheel.


    So with this thought, Lin Fan waved his hand to start the wheel.

 Chapter 523 Light Sanctuary (1)

    The wheel started out slow, but it quickly picked up speed as it began spinning faster and faster.


    Soon, Lin Fan couldn''t even make out the symbols that were on the wheel as it spun at a speed that was too fast for his eyes to keep up with. However, as he watched the wheel spin, he kept praying for a top grade cultivation realm.


    Until now, even though he had earned quite a bit of points from the shops on the Blue Star, he still hadn''t been able to earn enough to afford a top grade cultivation realm. The difference in points required between a high grade cultivation realm and a top grade cultivation realm was astronomical.


    The wheel continued to spin and eventually it started slowing down, allowing Lin Fan to see a few of the symbols that were on the wheel. He still didn''t understand what cultivation realms each of these symbols represented, but he could see that a few of them seemed different from the other symbols, so he could tell that the cultivation realms that they represented must have also been different.


    As the wheel slowed down more and more, Lin Fan saw that it was heading towards a group of normal tabs since they were repeating all over the wheel. The only tab that was special among that group was a tab that had the image of a sun on it.


    It seemed like that tab was the only hope that Lin Fan had of getting a top grade cultivation realm, so he began praying that it wouldnd on this one special tab.


    Based on how much it was slowing down, it seemed like it was about to reach that tab which gave Lin Fan hope. However, at the veryst second, it stopped on the tab that was just in front of the one with the sun on it. It was a very normal tab that had a raindrop that could be seen all over the wheel.


    Lin Fan''s expression immediately fell when he saw this and when he was about to give a sigh, there was a strange force that suddenly turned the wheel again, moving it forward by one more tab to the one that had the sun on it.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking around when this happened, but there was no one else in the store with him. Even if there were, they wouldn''t have been able to interfere because this system interface was something that only Lin Fan could see.


    Could it be that he was still being watched?


    Could it be that this was a gift from whoever made this system?


    As Lin Fan was pondering this, the system was already giving him his reward.


    "Congrattions host, you have opened the Light Sanctuary cultivation realm. This is a top grade cultivation realm."


    Lin Fan had already expected that this cultivation realm would be different from the rest, but when the system confirmed that it was indeed a top grade cultivation realm, he was filled with joy.


    Every top grade cultivation realm was special, they were ces that had people who were considered to be the top of this universe. For example, Ang and Momonga.


    If he were to find another person who was like the two of them, whether it was the strength or knowledge that they could provide, it would be of great help to Lin Fan.


    Since he had to train the two pets that the two beauties had left him, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate as he immediately chose to head to this new cultivation realm.


    There was the same sh of white light that appeared in front of him, but this time it didn''t seem like that light disappeared.


    Lin Fan forced himself to open his eyes and he found that he was in a new ce, but the reason why it didn''t seem like that white light disappeared was because he was surrounded by walls that were covered in intense white light.


    Looking around himself, it seemed like he was currently in some kind of castle.


    As he was looking around, he also found that there was some kind of balcony that led outside, so he immediately headed over to take a look at this new cultivation realm. However, the moment that he came onto the balcony, he was shocked by what he had seen.


    This "cultivation realm" wasn''t a realm at all, rather it was nothing more than a castle that was floating in space surrounded by some kind of bubble.


    Looking up at the bubble that was in the sky, Lin Fan could clearly see that this castle was somehow floating through space as he watched the stars pass by him. However, even though the bubble looked thin and would pop with just a single poke, it somehow was able to resist the ster winds generated by this castle floating through space.


    After being in a daze for a bit, Lin Fan asked the system, "System, what is going on here? Isn''t this supposed to be a cultivation realm? So why is it just a single castle that''s floating through space?"


    The system was silent for a bit before it responded.


    "Host, this is a cultivation realm. It meets all the requirements of a top grade cultivation realm, so it is ssified as such."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan immediately asked, "Then what are the requirements of a top grade cultivation realm?"


    "Host, your level isn''t high enough to ask these questions. Please work hard to increase your level before asking these questions."


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say since he knew that if he were to continue questioning the system, the only thing that he would receive in response would be a warning from the system.


    That wouldn''t help him, so there was no use in arguing with the system.


    Calming himself down and releasing his senses, he could tell that at the very least that this cultivation realm had the same concentration of life energy as the World of Elements or the Lich''s Necropolis. At the very least, he would be able to train the pets in this ce.


    So with a single thought to Brainy, he released several different scouts that headed off in different directions. The goal of these scouts was to find something for the bear and cat behind him to fight to force them to draw out their potential. After all, that was how Lin Fan trained all the other pets that came into his store.


    Of course, the cat and bear that were behind him didn''t notice this at all. Rather they were shocked by the sudden increase in concentration of life energy in the air and began drawing that life energy in to increase their own cultivations.


    It didn''t take long for Lin Fan to find something for the two of them to fight, or rather it didn''t take long for that something to find Lin Fan.


    While Lin Fan was still focused on scouting out the area, there was something that came floating down the hall.


    In the air, there was a ball of light that was slowly floating through the area, as if it was patrolling the halls.


    The moment this ball of light came to the balcony that Lin Fan was standing on, it immediately noticed Lin Fan and the pets that he had brought.


    As soon as the ball of light noticed Lin Fan, it suddenly red up and released a powerful and dazzling light before charging right at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan could feel the sudden aura that appeared to his side and he could tell that this thing was much stronger than him, but he didn''t panic. Instead, Lin Fan just jumped back to where the bear and cat were focused on drawing in life energy.


    Lin Fan jumped right behind them before picking up the cat to throw at the ball of light and pushing the bear at the ball of light.


    The cat and the bear were suddenly pulled out of their state of cultivation and before they could even react, they had their heads cut off by a beam of light that the ball of light suddenly released.


    Even when they died, they didn''t know what had happened to them.


    But that wasn''t the end of that since Lin Fan wouldn''t allow them to die just like that.


    So right after the bear and cat died, there was a warp in space before they were suddenly brought back to life.


    The bear and cat didn''t know what had happened, but the ball of light didn''t give them time to gather their thoughts as it attacked again.


    Luckily, the ball of light had been surprised by the sudden revival of the bear and cat, which caused it to hesitate slightly when it attacked. This gave the bear and cat the time to dodge the ball of light''s attack and make their own attacks at the ball of light.


    The bear''s ws that were covered in mes red up, causing the mes to burn even stronger as it shed them at the ball of light.


    As for the cat, it didn''t attack with its ws, but rather it suddenly opened its mouth. When it opened its mouth, there was a sudden chill that filled the air as it released an ice cold breath at the ball of light.


    However, even with these two pets attacking, the ball of light wasn''t fazed at all. The ball of light suddenly released a dazzling glow as it released another two beams of light at the two pets.


    There was no hesitation as the two beams of light cut down the two pets, causing two heads to roll to the ground.

 Chapter 524 Light Sanctuary (2)

    Even with the two heads rolling to the ground, that didn''t matter since with another distortion, the two pets were revived once again.


    Seeing that they were revived once again, the two pets were immediately filled with confidence as they attacked again.


    The ball of light hesitated again since it couldn''t understand what was happening. It had clearly killed these two beasts not once, but twice, however they were still standing in front of it.


    Just what was going on here?


    Still, the ball of light didn''t hesitate long since the bear and cat still attacked it. However, since it had hesitated because it couldn''t understand what was happening, it had been caught off guard and their attacks had hit it.


    It was just too bad that there was such arge disparity in cultivation realms that the attacks couldn''t break through the natural life energy shield that the ball of light had around it.


    Then without any hesitation, the ball of light shot out two more beams of light that cut down these two pets once again.


    But that still didn''t work in the end as the two pets once again stood up to fight it.


    Even if it couldn''tpletely kill the two pets, it was certainly annoying to kill them again and again. After all, each attack that it released used up a bit of its life energy, so it was slowly bing more and more exhausted.


    That didn''t mean that all the deaths didn''t have an effect on the two pets. As they died again and again, they were feeling more and more despair since they couldn''t defeat this ball of light at all.


    Just a single death would be enough to have an effect on any living being, but to die again and again in quick session would definitely fill one with despair.


    Lin Fan had been standing on the side watching the two pets fight the ball of light since he wanted to use this constant cycle of dying and reviving to make them stronger. However, when he saw that there was a look of despair in the eyes of the two pets and they even had the idea of running away, he no longer stood still on the side.


    Lin Fan personally jumped out after pulling out his sword since he was the only person here.


    Both Ang and Momonga had gone back to their own realm as soon as the store had closed. After all, they hadn''t been able to go back during the time where there wasn''t a store and that had caused some inconveniences back in their realms.


    Them waiting until the store closed was already showing consideration, so Lin Fan hadn''t stopped them from going back to their realms. He was just going to go into the cultivation realm to train the two pets, he really didn''t need them to follow him.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan wanted to train himself as well and that definitely wouldn''t have happened if they were there.


    Lin Fan charged forward with his sword raised and there were five different glows that immediately covered the sword as he shed down at the ball of light.


    The ball of light was surprised to see another enemy suddenly appearing, but it wasn''t afraid of Lin Fan at all since there was a giant disparity in cultivation realms. It released a sh of light that created an almost invisible wall in front of it that blocked it from Lin Fan''s attack.


    When Lin Fan''s sword was about to make contact with the wall of light, the ball of light was calm because it was certain that Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to cut through it, but the moment it made contact, the ball of light''s calm immediately disappeared.


    The sword cut right through that wall of light and fell down right at the ball of light.


    Seeing this, the ball of light suddenly twisted and created des of light that flew out at Lin Fan.


    Without any hesitation at all, the des of light cut right through Lin Fan''s sword and then went through Lin Fan himself, cutting him in half.


    However, with the same distortion in space, Lin Fan''s body that was cut in half became whole again in the air. Even the sword that he had been holding had be whole as he shed down with it. Unlike the pets that had been caught off guard when they had been revived, Lin Fan didn''t have this same weakness because he was already used to the sensation of being revived by the system.<sub> </sub>


    The ball of light didn''t know how to respond to this at first, but when it finally reacted, it was already toote.


    The sword in Lin Fan''s hand shed down on the ball of light, but it was only able to make a small cut in that ball to reveal what was hiding inside.


    Inside of the ball of light, there was what seemed to be a little child that was only around three inches tall with a pair of wings on its back. It had pure white skin and shining blonde hair, which gave it a very cute look, but there was no mistaking it for innocent since it was more than dangerous enough.


    The little boy in the ball of light was shocked to see that its ball of light had been cut, but then it immediately released several more des of light that immediately cut down Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t able to resist the first des of light which were weaker than these des, so there was no doubt that he wasn''t able to resist these stronger des of light.


    The little boy in the ball of light waved his hand around and the des moved around like they were under his control, making sure to cut Lin Fan into countless pieces.


    The little boy hadn''t been able to kill the pets before and he couldn''t kill Lin Fan now, so he started to think of different ways to take care of them. Since he couldn''t kill them by destroying vital organs, maybe it would work if he cut them to pieces that were too small to regenerate from.


    After cutting Lin Fan down to pieces that were too small for the eye to see, the little boy released the des of light that were floating in the air.


    He let his guard down since he thought that he had finally found a way to kill these unkible monsters, but then there was another distortion in the air from where the pets had been watching.


    After that distortion appeared, Lin Fan appeared once again,pletely whole even though he had just been cut into pieces.


    After he had finished forming, Lin Fan looked at the two pets that were staring at him in a daze and he kicked them at the ball of light as he said, "What are the two of you doing? Go out there and fight."


    The two pets had aggrieved looks on their faces, but they also knew that there was no other choice for them. If they didn''t fight, they would die, if they did fight, while they would die, they at least had a chance to survive if they won.


    They secretlyined about their owners for leaving them with this monster since they were intelligent enough to already figured out that it was Lin Fan who made it so that they were unable to die. After all, he was the one that had brought them to this realm in the first ce.


    While crying, the two pets charged out at the ball of light.


    At this point, the little boy in the ball of light had already used up quite a bit of its life energy, especially in that all out attack topletely chop Lin Fan to pieces. It released two more beams of light that flew out at the two pets, but the two pets were able to dodge this beam of light this time.


    There were two reasons for this. One was that the beam of light itself was weaker since the little boy in the ball of light was running out of energy. Two, it was because the two pets had slowly be stronger. Being forced to fight in this life and death situation again and again had pulled out theirtent potential in an attempt to survive, so they had be stronger.


    After dodging the attack, the two pets coordinated their attack by going to the two sides of the ball of light, attacking with their individual attacks from both sides to catch the ball of light off guard.


    The little boy in the ball of light raised his hand and created two walls of light on both sides of it to block these two attacks, which shattered them apart the moment that they touched the walls of light.


    Lin Fan took advantage of this gap created by the little boy in the ball of light to throw out his Iron Eater Bone Artifact that he had transformed into the shape of a dagger. The dagger flew through the air covered in five different glows and went right through the gap in the ball of light that Lin Fan had created previously, stabbing right into the chest of the little boy in the ball of light.


    Even in its final moments, it never could have imagined that it had been defeated by three enemies that were far inferior to it when it came to cultivation realms.


    The dagger carried the body of the little boy until it hit the wall, pinning him right up on that wall.

 Chapter 525 Light Sanctuary (3)

    When the two pets saw that the little boy had been killed and pinned to the wall, they let out a sigh of relief.


    They had thought that they were going to die again when they saw that their attacks had been stopped by the little boy, so they had resigned themselves to their fate. However, now that they didn''t need to die, naturally they were filled with joy.


    But then they immediately turned back to Lin Fan where was standing, lost in thought. They knew that it was this person who had brought them here, so they also knew that this person should be able to bring them back.


    Instead of staying in this terrifying realm where they were attacked again and again, they would rather go back and rx in that cozy,fortable cage. It was like being back in their mother''s womb, that was the kind of safety that they felt in there.


    So the two pets looked at Lin Fan with threatening looks and even posed themselves to attack him.


    Lin Fan had been lost in thought as he stared at the little boy pinned on the wall, but then he felt the aura that the two pets had been aiming at him and he turned his attention to them.


    It was easy for him to tell what these two pets were thinking because he had seen it many times before. When he had brought other pets to train in cultivation realms back on the Blue Star, the first thing he had to do was tame them. After all, he was asking them to die again and again to draw out their potential and whether it was a human or a beast, they weren''t willing to keep dying if they had a choice.


    So after the first battle and after the first experience of death, plenty of pets had tried to attack Lin Fan.


    It was just too bad for them that Lin Fan had his own method of dealing with them.


    With a wave of his hand, the dagger that had been pinning the little boy''s corpse to the wall suddenly came back to Lin Fan''s hand. In the distance, there was a "st" as the corpsended on the ground creating a gush of blood, but neither Lin Fan or the two pets cared about this.


    The two sides were staring at each other, until finally the two pets made their moves.


    They saw that Lin Fan wasn''t swayed by their threats at all, so they nodded to each other before moving in two different directions. They came from both sides of Lin Fan, swiping out with their ws at him.


    Lin Fan was able to easily see through their attacks and moved forward, moving through the gap in their attacks to arrive on the other side. Then with one quick motion, Lin Fan turned around while wielding a giant bat which had been transformed from the dagger that he had been holding previously.


    Lin Fan chose this bat instead of using a sharp weapon because he didn''t want to kill the two beasts, instead he used this bat to make sure that he hit the most painful parts to cause the two beasts the most pain.


    The two beasts also hadn''t used fatal attacks because they wanted to force Lin Fan to take them back and naturally he wouldn''t have been able to do so if he was dead. So their n was to hurt him enough until he listened to what they wanted him to do.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan hadpletely turned the tables on them. The two pets weren''t able to keep up with Lin Fan''s speed at all as he danced around him, hitting them with his bat again and again.


    Soon, the two pets werepletely covered in bruises while Lin Fan was just standing there, not looking like he had broken a sweat at all.


    However, the pride of the two pets didn''t let them back down at all. So with one tacit look between them, they suddenly burst out with life energy. Neither of these pets were holding back any longer and they were aiming for Lin Fan''s life.


    When Lin Fan saw this, there was a faint smile that appeared on his lips as he said, "Are you sure you want to do this?"


    While there was a smile on his lips, there wasn''t any friendliness behind it at all. When the two pets saw this smile, all they could feel was an endless chill hitting them that made them unable to stop shivering.


    Still, they had no other choice since they had already started this and their pride wouldn''t let them back down, so the two pets charged out at Lin Fan once again. However, this time, they were aiming to kill Lin Fan as they used their full power attacks.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he had already expected this. He had seen this many times before and he was sure that this wasn''t thest time he would see this.


    However, when Lin Fan moved forward this time, he no longer had the same bat that he had been holding the entire time. Instead, what Lin Fan was now holding was the same dagger that he had thrown out to kill the little boy in the ball of light with.


    Lin Fan easily dodged through the all out attacks of the two pets and with two quick shes, there were lines of blood that appeared at the necks of the two pets. Without even a gush of blood, the two pets slumped to the ground where they no longer moved.<sub> </sub>


    It was clear by theck of signs of life that they were dead.


    Of course, Lin Fan wouldn''t kill them if he didn''t have a way to bring them back to life. The revival power of the system didn''t just apply to if they were killed by natives of the realm, it also applied to when they had been killed by Lin Fan himself.


    After a few seconds, there were distortions in space around the corpses of these two pets before they were brought back to life again.


    The two pets were surprised that they hade back to life again, but aftering back to their senses, they immediately turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Seeing that he had the same smile on his face, they could still feel the chill that came from him. When this chill ran down their back and they couldn''t stop themselves from shivering, they put down their pride and bowed their heads to him.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he gave a satisfied nod before saying, "It''s good that you know your ce."


    As soon as his voice fell, he turned around and didn''t bother with them any longer.


    The two beasts let out a sigh of relief, but they knew that their ordeal was far from over yet.


    In their minds, they couldn''t help missing andining about their owners. They missed them because no matter how theypared them, their owners were better than this maniac that killed them again and again. Theyined about them because their owners had been the ones that had left them with this maniac in the first ce.


    All they wanted now was to see their owners again and in the future, they definitely wouldn''t take their owners for granted anymore.


    Lin Fan didn''t care as he moved over to where the corpse of the little boy from the ball of light was.


    As he looked at this little boy, the only thing that he could think of were the fairies of earth. This little boy would have fit the description of a fairy from earth perfectly with its features.


    But he quickly put aside these thoughts and started seriously studying the little boy''s corpse.


    As he was lost in thought, he couldn''t help muttering to himself, "Could it be that this is a spirit? Then could this realm be a realm of spirits like the World of Elements?"


    If it was, then he might be in trouble with Ang since the spirits were her people. If he were to kill spirits without even trying tomunicate with them, he would definitely feel her wrath as the queen of the spirits.


    Even when he had gone to the World of Elements, the only thing that he had been allowed to kill were the beasts that lived in the forest since they were considered prey for the spirits. If Lin Fan even thought about touching a spirit, he would be certain that Ang''s wrath would fall down on him.


    While Lin Fan was lost in thought, Brainy who had been standing by the side also came over to where he was.


    Brainy had been watching the battle and had been analyzing the little boy in the ball of light as well. Along with its intelligence that was greater than Lin Fan''s, it was able to recognize even more types of living creatures than him, so Brainy had been able to recognize what this little boy in the ball of light had been.


    Brainy jumped up onto Lin Fan''s arm which surprised Lin Fan and pulled him out of his thoughts.


    When Lin Fan looked down at Brainy, Brainy said, "It''s not a spirit, it''s a wisp."


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this as he repeated, "Not a spirit, it''s a wisp?"


    Brainy gave a nod in response to confirm this.


    Spirit and wisp, they were both beings that were made of energy, but there was also a major difference between the two.

 Chapter 526 Light Sanctuary (4)

    The main difference between spirits and wisps was the kind of energy that they were made of.


    Even though they were both beings made of pure energy, that didn''t mean that they were the same.


    The spirits were made of pure elemental energy that urred in nature. It could be said that the spirits were the children of the worlds themselves.


    However, it was different when it came to wisps because unlike the spirits, the wisps weren''t made of natural elemental energy found on worlds. Instead, the wisps were made of residualw energy.


    Wisps were creatures that came into being when residualw energy that was strong enough separated from the being that they came from and took form of their own. This form that they took were as wisps, so they were considered beings ofw instead of beings of elemental energy.


    Of course, since they were beings formed fromws, they weren''t considered living beings that were formed naturally like the spirits. Because of this, most of the wisps didn''t even have their own personalities. They only had intelligence, but they didn''t have individual thoughts, just living purely on instincts.


    There were some of the more powerful individuals among wisps that did have thought though, but they were more rarepared to the normal wisps without thoughts.


    Of course, the most important factor in deciding this was the level of cultivation that these fragmentedws came from. If the expert was stronger, the fragmentedws that they left behind were naturally stronger as well, which was what created the higher grade wisps.


    But that wasn''t the most important thing from this discovery. The most important thing was that for wisps to even appear, that would mean that there was a powerful expert that was present in this realm.


    As for whether that was good news or bad news, it was hard for Lin Fan to tell.


    If it was an aggressive expert that didn''t like people trespassing on their realm, then it would definitely be bad news.


    If it was a friendly expert who was willing to talk to him, at least Lin Fan wouldn''t have to fight him and would have a chance to gain another special employee. Since the shop had been upgraded, there was currently another free employee spot.


    Still, that would have to wait until Lin Fan met up with the expert that ruled over this realm.


    For now, he would explore this realm first and see what kind of treasures were hidden here.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan put away the corpse of the little boy. After all, this was the corpse of a wisp that was in the realm past the Soul Realm, so it was definitely something useful.


    Even ignoring everything else, for the corpses of wisps and spirits, since they were beings that were made of pure energy, that energy dissipated slowly when they died. Just the energy that was slowly released would be enough to power many things, which meant that this corpse could be considered an excellent battery pack.


    Then again, Lin Fan was sure that this wasn''t the only use for this corpse. When he got back, he would ask Momonga about this.


    After putting that corpse away, Lin Fan signaled for the two pets to follow him while he let Brainy lead the way.


    While they had been fighting the ball of light, the scouts that Brainy released had been checking out this castle the entire time. They had spread quite far and while they hadn''t explored the entirety of the castle, they had certainly explored quite arge part of it.


    Based on the part that they had explored, it wasn''t hard to figure out theyout of the castle. Brainy was currently leading Lin Fan to where it believed that the throne room of the castle should be.


    If it was a castle, then there should be a throne room since that would naturally be where the owner of the castle would be.


    As they made their way through the castle, they found balls of light that were wandering around the castle. There were some that wandered alone and there were some that moved around in groups.


    It was interesting to note that the ones that moved along in groups had weaker cultivations, only being in the Soul Realm instead of the realm beyond it like the first wisp. The ones that moved by themselves were much stronger, matching the first wisp in cultivation. There were even some that were stronger than the first wisp.


    It was just too bad for them that Lin Fan and the pets had the ability to revive endlessly.


    Well, it wasn''t endless for Lin Fan like it was for the pets since it cost him points to revive each time. However, with four different stores earning points for him, it wasn''t considered that much for him.<sub> </sub>


    Still, as the deaths racked up, Lin Fan had spent quite a bit of points.


    In total, he had died two hundred times and that had cost him twenty thousand points which would have been enough to enter this cultivation realm two hundred times.


    The system really could price things well, each revival cost the same as one entrance into this realm.


    As they made their way through the halls, they came closer and closer to where Brainy suspected the throne to be. When they came close enough to the room, Brainy was able to confirm it since it could see the throne in the room through one of its scouts.


    However, when its scouts looked around the room, they couldn''t find a single thing. There was also nothing that was triggered when those scouts entered the room. It almost seemed like the throne room was justpletely abandoned.


    When Lin Fan heard Brainy''s report, after a moment of thought, he still decided to head right for the throne room since he believed that as the center of this realm, it should hold some answers. Even if it was abandoned like it seemed to Brainy.


    He was very curious why this castle that seemed abandoned was floating through space, as well, why this abandoned castle could be considered a top grade cultivation realm.


    There were still a few more wisps that were in between them and the throne room, but they were easily dealt with by Lin Fan and the two pets.


    During this time, the two pets had both broken through to reach the mid Embryo Soul Realm. The moment that they had broken through, they had tried to attack Lin Fan again. The only thing that they had received was another lesson in fear that made sure that they wouldn''t dare to do the same thing ever again.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he had already aplished his goal by making them break through, though he wanted them to break through even more since the greater the training results, the better his reputation would be.


    As they came to the door to the throne room, Lin Fan could see that there were wisps that were standing near it and didn''t dare go in. It was almost as if there was an invisible circle that was keeping all the wisps out.


    Still, that worked in Lin Fan''s favour because he didn''t want the wisps to interfere when he met with the ruler of the realm.


    Lin Fan also didn''t bother fighting with the wisps as he rushed right past them, using the two pets as diversions to pull them away. After all, the pets would revive by his side when they revived, so they were perfect to pull the wisps away to clear a path.


    When he entered the range of the invisible circle that kept the wisps out, it was like he hadpletely disappeared from their line of sight as they suddenly stopped attacking him. They just went back to wandering around in the area outside of the invisible circle.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with them as he went right up to the doors to the throne room and pushed them open. As soon as the doors to the throne room opened, there was a bright sh of light, but that quickly faded.


    The throne room that appeared in front of Lin Fan was just as Brainy had described it and the moment he came in, there was no movement at all.


    Looking around the room, Lin Fan tried to see if there was anything that could give him a clue, but there was nothing that was here.


    If he had to describe it with one word, it would be "deste".


    It was almost as if this realm had been abandoned in a haste and everything of value had already been stripped of this room. There were no decorations on the walls and even the walls themselves seemed almost worn down from the passage of time.


    The only thing that seemed like it was worth anything in this room was the glowing throne that was sitting right in the center of the room.


    Lin Fan could tell with a single look that this was a throne that was fit for a ruler since the aura that it released was anything but normal.


    Since there was nothing else that he could find in this room, Lin Fan moved over to where the throne was and stood in front of it, looking it up and down.


    As he looked at it, there was a strange desire to sit down on it that came from deep down within him. He resisted this desire at first, but then he couldn''t stop himself as he slowly came towards it.


    When he was right in front of it and was about to turn to sit down, there was a voice that suddenly rang out that said, "Human, do you desire my throne?"

 Chapter 527 Light Sanctuary (5)

    Lin Fan had been caught off guard by this voice and he couldn''t help taking a step back as he looked around himself. However, as he looked around, he couldn''t find where this voice wasing from.


    While he was looking around, the voice asked again, "Human, do you desire my throne?"


    Lin Fan revealed a wary look and didn''t say anything, but his expression made his feelings clear.


    This time, the voice didn''t ask the same thing as it suddenly burst out inughter. Then afterughing for a bit, it said, "Of course you do, after all, it is this one''s throne."


    But then this voice suddenly turned serious as it asked, "But are you worthy of this one''s throne?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows before asking, "What do I need to do to be worthy of your throne?"


    The voice was silent for a bit before suddenly breaking out inughter again. Afterughing for a bit, that voice suddenly said, "Why are you so serious? You don''t need to prove anything to inherit my throne. In fact, there''s something that I want to ask of you."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more since he couldn''t keep up with this voice, but he still said, "What do you need from me?"


    The voice was silent, but then there was a ball of light that came out of the throne in front of Lin Fan. This ball of light floated for a bit before it suddenly changed form to take the shape of a man.


    This was a man that was like a grown up form of the wisps, but that did make sense since thew for the wisps came from this man. The only difference was that he had a pair of white wings that were on his back.


    This man floated in the air for a bit, looking over Lin Fan before saying with a smile, "I can''t see through you at all. No, it can''t be said that I can''t see through you since you''re too weak to even catch my attention normally, rather I can''t see through the person who''s behind you."


    Then after a pause, he said, "But that''s good enough for me. It means that you have enough backing to protect my offspring."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help muttering to himself, "Offspring?" Then he asked out loud, "What do you mean by that?"


    The man floating in the air for once didn''t have a smile on his face as he said with a bitter look, "It''s a long story, do you want to hear it?"


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit, but he still nodded in the end.


    The winged man gave a sigh before saying, "To put it simply, we just learned too much and we were punished, but that really doesn''t tell you anything, does it? You''re probably still wondering how this world became a castle floating out in space, right? Then let me start from the beginning¡­"


    The story that the winged man told Lin Fan was one that was missing plenty of details, but it was one that exined the general gist of the situation.


    It was like he said, this world had learned too much and they had been punished in the end. They didn''t even know how the punishment came, but their world had been destroyed when it was over and this winged man, he had been killed.


    He had left fragments of his will in this throne to pass down his request because he was worried about his descendants, so he had been waiting the entire time for someone to arrive.


    At the end of his story, Lin Fan asked with knitted brows, "But how do you know that your descendants are still alive?"


    The winged man revealed a smile as he pointed at the door and said, "You''ve seen it, haven''t you? There''s some kind of invisible barrier around this room?"


    Lin Fan thought about it and remembered the invisible circle that had kept the wisps out in front of the door to this room. It did seem like there was some kind of invisible barrier around this room, so he gave a nod.


    The winged man saw this nod and continued, "That was something that I ced myself, so you can be sure that it''s powerful. I ced many of those barriers around this castle to create safe zones for my descendants. It cost me the final bit of energy that I had, so I''m quite confident in them."


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before saying, "So you''re telling me that there''s still these areas active in the castle? Are you able to sense them?"


    The winged man nodded with a smile and said, "It''s good that you could pick this up fast. That''s right, I''m the one that made them, so naturally I''m able to find them as well. If you follow my directions, you''ll be able to find the safe zones."


    Lin Fan nodded, but then he knitted his brows again to ask, "What do you want me to do after I find them though?"<sub> </sub>


    The winged man revealed a confused look, "Since you were able to reach this realm, shouldn''t you be able to bring them away as well?"


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile as he said, "I used a special method toe here and I''m the only one that can use this method. I won''t be able to bring them away with me."


    The winged man didn''t seem to mind as he waved his hand to make a crystal appear between his fingers. Then he raised it in front of Lin Fan and said, "Perhaps this will solve the problem then."


    Lin Fan looked at the crystal and he could feel a familiarwing from it, but he still didn''t know what it was exactly, so he asked, "What is this?"


    The winged man tossed the crystal to Lin Fan without saying a word which Lin Fan easily caught. Then the winged man said, "It''s a teleportation crystal, you''ll be able to bring my descendants away with you as long as you have this. All you have to do is crush it and it''ll take them away from this realm with you."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows as he looked at the crystal and asked, "How are you sure that it will work?"


    The winged man revealed a smile and said, "Well, I made it with the final bit of my energy, so I''m confident that it will be able to bring them away with you no matter how far you''ll go. I wanted to make sure that they would have a way to escape, so I put quite a bit of power into it."


    Lin Fan then asked, "How does it work?"


    The winged man replied, "As long as you crush it, it''ll transfer everything within ten meters of the one who crushed it along with the one who crushed it. As for the destination, it will depend on the person who crushes it. As long as they are thinking of the location they want to go, it''ll bring them there."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head as he said with a smile, "You really thought of everything, didn''t you?"


    The winged man revealed a bitter smile this time as he said, "They are my descendants, it''s impossible for me to not care about them, don''t you think?"


    Lin Fan thought about his own family and after a pause, he gave a nod without saying anything else.


    The winged man wanted to say something, but then his figure suddenly flickered which caused him to knit his brows. After that flicker, it was clear that his figure was much more transparentpared to before.


    The winged man clicked his tongue before saying, "Che, it seems like time is up."


    Lin Fan noticed this too and quickly asked, "Where are your descendants? You still haven''t told me that yet."


    The winged man revealed a surprised look before suddenly pping his head and saying, "Right, Ipletely forgot!"


    He then lifted his finger and created a map that was made of pure light in the air. There was a dot for where they were standing and there were Xs that represented where the other shields were that held his descendants. The winged man also made sure to exin all the various routes because this map was only two dimensional, while the entire castle was three dimensional.


    After he finished exining, it was clear that his time was up since he had almost faded from existence.


    However, before he did fade away, he looked at Lin Fan with a serious look and said, "I hope that you will be able to keep your promise and I hope that one day, you will help my descendants rise up again."


    Before Lin Fan even had a chance to say anything, the winged man hadpletely disappeared and the room became much darker.


    Lin Fan turned to look at the throne in front of him again and when he looked at it now, there was a kind of connection that had formed between them.


    It seemed like the winged man had kept his word about giving him this throne and he had even shown his sincerity by letting it bind to Lin Fan. The only problem was that Lin Fan was just too weak to use it.


    He could tell that there was a will inside of this artifact and while it had bonded to him, it also disdained him. But the real reason why Lin Fan couldn''t use it was because he didn''t have enough life energy to let it use its abilities.


    For now, the only thing that he could do was put away this throne in his Spatial Ring until he was strong enough to use it.

 Chapter 528 Light Sanctuary (6)

    After Lin Fan put away the throne, he turned to look at Brainy who had been controlling his puppets the entire time.


    Brainy had used its puppets to go through the castle ording to the routes of the winged man and soon it was able to find the rooms that the winged man had described. However when its puppets arrived, they ryed back a scene that wasn''t what Lin Fan wanted to see.


    The first puppets had arrived at two different rooms, but the scene inside both of these rooms were the same.


    The door had been knocked down and it was a scene of a chaotic battle inside. There were also wisps that were wandering around, gathering around what seemed to be a pile of white bones in the center.


    Based on the white bones, it was clear that the descendants that the winged man had mentioned were already dead and it had been the wisps that had destroyed them.


    How ironic that was.


    The winged man had put up these barriers to protect his family, but in the end, it was the wisps that had been created from hisws that had destroyed them.


    Based on the decay on the bones, it was clear that this had happened quite a long time ago.


    ording to the story that the winged man had told Lin Fan, this realm had fallen over fifty thousand years ago, which also gave Lin Fan a clue into the cultivation realms of his descendants.


    <o>,m At the very least, it told him that his descendants at least weren''t in the Soul Realm.</o>


    Experts in the Soul Realm only had a lifespan of ten thousand years and that was only at the very peak of the Soul Realm. When experts just broke through to the Fragmented Soul Realm, their lifespan would only be increased to a thousand years.


    For the winged man to have hope that his descendants were alive, it meant that they had to be in the realm above the Soul Realm. However, since this was a top grade cultivation realm that was even ruled over by a ruler, it shouldn''t be surprising if they had this kind of cultivation.


    However, in the end, there had been too many wisps since they were naturally formed by the residualws that the ruler left in the realm. Eventually they had been overwhelmed and this was the scene that was left after they were finished.


    Based on the analysis that Brainy did through the puppet, it could tell that it would have taken at least more than ten thousand years for these bones to have reached this level of decay. It seemed like the winged man''s hopes had been dashed a long time ago.


    Still, that was only the first two of five different ces that Lin Fan had to check. There was still a chance that the other three locations were still safe.


    After waiting a bit, Brainy told Lin Fan that its puppets had reached two more locations, but there wasn''t good news this time either. When the puppets had arrived, they had found the same scene as the previous two rooms.


    The doors had been knocked down and there was a pile of bones that was in the center. The only difference here was with the decay of the bones. These bones seemed like they hadn''t been exposed to the elements as long as the other bones, which must have meant that they were able to hold out a bit longerpared to the rest.


    Still, they had fallen to the hordes of wisps that wandered the halls of this castle.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering how the winged man would have felt if he knew that the wisps that he created had caused the death of all his descendants.


    Well, not all his descendants because there was still one room left for Lin Fan to check, even though he didn''t have much hope left for it.


    This one was much further outpared to the other rooms, but Brainy''s puppet made it there in the end.


    Lin Fan was anxious as he waited for the result from Brainy.


    When Brainy connected its mind to the puppet, it gave a surprised "oh" sound.


    Lin Fan heard this and asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Brainy didn''t answer at first as it was concentrated on controlling the puppet, but after a minute, Brainy said, "The barrier is still up around this room, but it seems like there''s a secondary barrier around this room that''s blocking my puppet from entering. Perhaps there might really still be someone left alive in this realm."


    Lin Fan was also surprised since it had clearly been fifty thousand years since the destruction of this realm had happened. Anyone weak would have already died, but there was someone who had been able to hold on for this long. Unless they broke through to the same realm as the ruler, it was unlikely they would have survived this long.


    If there was someone who was in that realm here, Lin Fan really wanted to take him as an employee.<sub> </sub>


    But the first thing that he had to do was get to that person first.


    So without wasting another moment, Lin Fan left this throne room since there was nothing else of value here and went on his way to that room. Along the way, he also made sure to fight a few wisps to improve his own strength and the strength of the two pets that he had brought with him.


    The wisps actually became a bit easier to fight since the two pets had broken through, but the main reason why they became easier was because of thews that Lin Fan had absorbed.


    To his surprise, he had found that this lightw waspatible with him, so he had been absorbing the lightws that the wisps had been throwing at him. With how powerful these wisps were, he was able to easily condense a statue inside of his dantian which allowed him to use this lightw.


    With him grasping this lightw, it also increased his resistance to this lightw which allowed him to charge right at the weaker wisps.


    After several battles, Lin Fan finally made his way to the room with the barrier still around it.


    There were quite a few wisps that were gathered in this area, so that meant that the hallway waspletely filled up. There was no way for Lin Fan to run right through these wisp and enter the barrier.


    Since that was the case, the only thing that he could do was draw them away one by one and kill them all until he had cleared a decent path to the room.


    After having this idea, Lin Fan looked at the two pets who had been following him and then he picked them up before throwing them out while saying, "Make yourselves useful, draw a few of them away from the pack."


    The two pets had tearful looks on their faces, but they still obeyed Lin Fan.


    After being with him for this long, there was already an innate fear of Lin Fan that had been beaten into them.


    It took them around thirty minutes to finally clear out a path to the room and during this time, both of the two pets made another breakthrough.


    While they had been pulling away the wisps one by one, they had found that the wisps had the absolute advantagepared to them when it came to speed. Unless they could increase their own speed, their fate was to die again and again.


    So that was what they did in the end.


    The quickest way to do so was to break through, so with the pressure brought on by the wisps chasing them, the pets had been forced to break out of their shells and break through to the High Embryo Soul Realm.


    Still, that wasn''t enough for them to match the wisps in speed and they had been forced to work out several skills that increased their speed to work with this breakthrough. Eventually, they learned enough skills to match the wisps in speed and were able to lead them over without dying.


    But before they had been able to do that, they had died quite a few times already.


    Even after breaking through though, they didn''t dare to attack Lin Fan again because they had already learned their lessonst time. Not to mention that Lin Fan was the only one among them that could kill the wisps still, which meant that he was still clearly stronger than them.


    With the path cleared out, Lin Fan was able to easily make his way to the door. Once he stepped over the invisible boundary around the door, the wispspletely ignored him just like before.


    Lin Fan also ignored him as he started looking over the door.


    There wasn''t anything off about this door, but Lin Fan could sense a powerful auraing from it. It was clear that there was some kind of array that was ced on the door that kept people out.


    When Lin Fan looked down, he could see that there was dried blood that was at the sill of the door. Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    This blood, it probably meant that behind this door, there was a¡­


    After having this thought, Lin Fan felt a bit uneasy so he reached out for the handle.


    The moment that his hand touched the handle, there was a sh of light and then nothing else.


    Lin Fan was confused by this, but when he turned the handle, the door easily opened for him.

 Chapter 529 Shocking Training Results

    The door opened up and revealed the inside of the room to Lin Fan, which had shocked him the moment that he saw it.


    Just like with all the other rooms, this one was also inplete disarray, but the one difference was that there was blood all over this room.


    This blood wasn''t sttered in a way that indicated that the people inside were attacked, rather it was sttered in a way that suggested that these people had willingly shed their blood.


    Lin Fan turned around to look at the back of the door and as he had expected, there was an array that was drawn in blood on the back of the door.


    This array drawn in blood was different from a normal array. This was an array that utilized the life force of the people who drew this array, which made it much stronger than a normal array. To put it simply, they had used their very lives to draw this array and such a price naturally had a corresponding power.


    But that confused Lin Fan even more.


    ? Just what was inside this room that was worth the people here sacrificing their lives to protect?


    Looking around, he hadn''t been able to find anything special until he came to the very back of the room where there was a desk that had been untouched.


    Atop this desk, there was a piece of paper and a sealed box that was ced there.


    Lin Fan picked up the piece of paper first and he found that it was a final message from the people who had been in this room. The first part of the letter was just their farewell, but the second part of the letter was strange.


    Especially the one part that said, "For the glory of our lord, we will protect this box entrusted to us even in death."


    This made Lin Fan even more confused.


    It was clear that there was something that was very important in this box, but what was so important that they could not hesitate to sacrifice their lives for?


    It wasn''t as if there was the direct descendant of their lord in this box, not to mention that even if there was, this box was clearly too small for it to fit in.


    Still, Lin Fan put down the letter and turned his attention to the box.


    Based on the glowing surface of the box, it was clear that there was also some kind of array that was ced on this box protecting it. However, when Lin Fan''s hand touched the box, the array suddenly disappeared without a trace.


    The array on the box was simr to the one on the door, it was designated to dissipate when it recognized a certain life energy signature. That life energy signature naturally came from the lord they served, who was the ruler of this realm.


    Because of Lin Fan''s limited Spatial Ring that was only designated for use in lower realms, it couldn''t fully contain the aura of the throne that he had been given. In fact, if it wasn''t for the throne choosing to go into the Spatial Ring itself, it would have been impossible for the throne to enter Lin Fan''s Spatial Ring.


    The aura of the throne was the same aura as the ruler since this throne had followed the ruler through most of his life''s journey, it was the artifact the ruler used the most, so it had the same life energy signature.


    The arrays had felt the life energy signature of the throne leaking out which was why Lin Fan had been able to easily open both of these arrays.


    While he was confused as to why these arrays opened so easily, Lin Fan chose not to question it as he opened the box.


    When the box opened, it revealed a small round object inside that was like a smooth stone, but when Lin Fan looked at it closely, he found that it was an egg.


    He could feel the life force that wasing from the egg, which meant that it was still alive, but that was also surprising because that meant that this egg had been able tost for fifty thousand years.


    Still, the fact that there was this egg meant that he could at least keep his promise to the winged man. Not to mention that since it was only an egg, he was able to put it into his system storage and take it back with him without having to use the teleportation crystal.


    The teleportation crystal was a rare object and the fact that he didn''t have to use it was a good thing for him.


    Once the egg entered the system''s storage, it was registered by the system and gained a new name in his interface. The name that the system gave the egg was "Angel Egg".


    The first thought that came into Lin Fan''s mind was, "Could people have eggs? Angels could be considered close to humans, so why did they leave behind eggs?"


    But thinking about this wouldn''t help him now, so Lin Fan shook this thought out of his mind since there were still plenty of things that he had to do first.


    After all, he had already paid the price of admission to this realm and if he didn''t get his money''s worth, it would have been a shame.<sub> </sub>


    So Lin Fan turned to look at the two pets who had been resting by the door. The moment that his gaze fell onto them, both of them felt a chill run down their backs and they couldn''t help trembling.


    Lin Fan dragged the two of them out just like that and they continued training by fighting the wisps. When Lin Fan was finally satisfied with the level that the two pets reached, he brought them back to the pet shop.


    When the two pets saw the cages in the shop, they couldn''t be any happier as they immediately jumped in and reveled in that warm feeling that it gave them.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind them as he went upstairs to the break room.


    He could tell that both Ang and Momonga weren''t back yet because the system''s employee panel showed that they hadn''t used a teleport to return to this realm. Instead of going back home to be alone, he might as well stay in this shop and cultivate for the night, which was what he did.


    When the sun rose in the morning, Lin Fan stood up and stretched himself out before going around the shop preparing to open.


    After that, Lin Fan made a quick run to one of the stands that were operating outside for breakfast before just sitting there waiting for the opening of the store, feeling bored.


    Seeing that he had some time, Lin Fan finally went online to the forum to check out the hot posts and he found that quite a few of them were about him. As he read them, he finally understood why everyone cared so much about his store yesterday. It seemed like the old man from the Qiao Family really did have quite the reputation.


    While Lin Fan was silently scrolling along on his watch, the crowd began gathering outside.


    Throughout the night, the post about whether Lin Fan''s shop was a scam or not had been shared by millions of people and made it to the front page of the city forums. Many people who didn''t know about Lin Fan''s store yesterday had alle today after seeing the posts online and wanted to join in the fun. After all, this was also a chance to see at least two of the Five Flowers of Harmony City, which was a rare chance in itself.


    There were also quite a few girls that came because of how handsome Lin Fan was. As well as some men¡­


    As it came closer and closer to Lin Fan''s opening time, the street filled with more and more people who had alle to join in the fun. It was a good thing that Lin Fan had closed his shades or he would have seen all the people who were almost pressed up against his windows, trying to sneak a peek inside.


    Finally when it was just five minutes before nine, there were three carriages that had arrived at the same time.


    Everyone became excited because they recognized the carriages that had arrived and when they opened, many people stretched their necks out to get a better look.


    The three girls ignored all of them and through paths created for them, they came to the door at the front of the crowd and waited for Lin Fan''s store to open.


    The five minutes passed quickly and when Lin Fan opened the store door, he was surprised to see all the people that were standing outside. There was even a bigger crowdpared to yesterday.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t panic as he invited his customers in before opening the shades.


    Lin Fan''s store was big, but it definitely wasn''t big enough for this entire crowd to fit in, so after it reached capacity, the rest of the people all crowded the windows. There was even someone who was smart enough to bring broadcasting equipment which allowed them to broadcast to the crowd that couldn''t reach the window.


    After Lin Fan sat down behind the counter, the three girls came up in front of him and Qiao Yi Fei asked, "Owner Lin, are our pets ready for pickup?"


    Even though she asked this, she clearly didn''t believe that Lin Fan would have the pets ready for them.


    Lin Fan looked up at her and gave a nod before standing up to go into the back.


    After two minutes of waiting for Lin Fan to return, they finally heard his footstepsing back along with a pair of heavy footsteps which was clearly the bear that Mao Tao had left yesterday.


    After another minute, Lin Fan slowly walked out from the back with the two pets in tow..


    Both of the pets had unwilling looks as they looked into the back, as if there was something there that they missed. However, even with the unwilling looks on their faces, they didn''t dare drag their feet as Lin Fan pulled them out.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were surprised since they had never seen their pets behave like this with anyone but them.


    When Lin Fan finally reached the front counter and the two pets saw their owners, they immediately rushed forward to them as if they couldn''t be happier to see them.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about this and just released the leash he had been using to let them go.


    When Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao carefully looked over their pets, they were shocked by what they saw.

 Chapter 530 Established Fame

    These two were the pets that they had left here yesterday, but the aura that they gave off waspletely different.


    The biggest difference was that they had broken through three minor realms to reach the peak of the Embryo Soul Realm. Each major realm in the Soul Realm was definitely arge gap, but that didn''t mean that it was easy to break through minor realms either. Just the minor realms alone were gaps that were like the difference between heaven and earth.


    It would take years just for an expert in the Embryo Soul Realm to make a breakthrough to the next minor realm. Even for geniuses, it would take at least a few months to make a breakthrough if they didn''t encounter a fortuitous encounter.


    But now these pets had actually broken through three minor realms in just a single night.


    How was this even possible?


    While everyone else started to realize the change with the two pets, Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao both looked at Lin Fan with shocked looks.


    Finally after a moment of silence, Qiao Yi Fei asked Lin Fan with a strange look, "How did you do it? Are these even still our pets?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a strange look as well and asked, "Can''t you tell by the connection? How could I have faked that?"


    That was right, the two of them could feel the special connection that they had with the two pets in front of them. When an expert took a beast on as a pet, they created a contract which would establish a connection between both sides.


    As long as that contract wasn''t broken or if neither side was dead, they would be able to sense each other through this connection.


    This connection couldn''t be faked unless there was an expert who specialized in soul arts because this was a connection that was formed on the soul level.


    They didn''t believe that someone as young as Lin Fan would be able to do that.


    The two pets had been grasping their owners legs and had been hiding behind them, cautiously staring at Lin Fan the entire time. From time to time, they had been also looking at the door that led to the back with a longing look, as if there was something back there that they wanted.


    Lin Fan looked at the two pets and asked, "They also learned a few skills, do you want to test them?"


    Both of the girls were surprised when they heard this as they said together, "Skills, you also taught them skills?"


    Lin Fan nodded and then said, "We have a training room here that you can use, but there is a fee for using it each time."


    Qiao Yi Fei slightly knitted her brows as she asked, "How much?"


    Lin Fan casually said, "It''s not that expensive, it''s only ten spirit stones."


    The people around them couldn''t help cursing at Lin Fan for saying that it was "only" ten spirit stones.


    Did he not know just how much each spirit stone was worth?


    Even a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert would find themselves well off if they could earn ten spirit stones a year. Now he was charging this amount just to use a single training room?


    There were people who wanted to curse him out, but it wasn''t their right to do so.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao thought about it before giving a nod.


    They both took out ten spirit stones each and handed them over to Lin Fan who took them without any hesitation.


    The two of them came from big families in the Hunters Organization, so there was no need for them to ever worry about money.


    Just when it came to old man Qiao alone, if he was willing to cook a meal, there would be plenty of people who would be willing to pay himrge amounts of spirit stones for that meal.


    After Lin Fan received their spirit stones, he led them over to where an elevator had been hidden behind a shelf. Pushing a button on the wall, the shelf automatically moved out of the way and revealed the elevator that was waiting behind it.


    Lin Fan pressed a button by the elevator door and with a "ding", it opened to reveal a small elevator.


    Since it was a small elevator, there was enough space for Lin Fan, the girls, and several other people, but no one dared to go in the elevator with them when they saw Qiao Yi Fei''s cold stare. They had no choice but to wait for the next one.<sub> </sub>


    The elevator didn''t take long to get to the second floor and when they came out, there was a giant arena that appeared in front of them.


    The three girls were shocked because they didn''t understand how such arge arena was able to fit inside of this shop because this arena far exceeded the area that the shop upied. Logically, it shouldn''t have been able to fit inside of this shop.


    Lin Fan ignored them and came over to the control panel for the arena, opening up the door on the side that led in.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao looked at each other before going into the arena.


    At this time, there were people who had already arrived on the second floor as well, reacting the same way as the three girls had done earlier.


    Once the two of them were inside of the arena, Lin Fan closed the door and said through the speakers, "What kind of environment and what kind of enemies do you want?"


    Both of them were confused when they heard this and this time, Mao Tao was the one to ask, "Owner Lin, what do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan casually exined, "This is a state of the art arena with the special ability to simte different environments and opponents. You can just tell me what kind of environment you want to fight in and what level of opponents or what kind of opponents you want to face."


    Both of them were visibly confused and it was clear that neither of them believed what he said since they had never heard of this technology before, but Qiao Yi Fei impatiently said, "Just give us some enemies, you can choose whatever you want."


    Lin Fan just gave an "un" sound before pressing the randomize button.


    As soon as he pressed the button, the environment inside of the arena started to change.


    There were trees that suddenly appeared all around the two girls and the pets that they had summoned out again after putting them away since the elevator was too small. Before they even knew what happened, there was a forest that had suddenly appeared around them.


    As far as they could tell, this was just like a forest on the outside and didn''t seem like a simtion at all.


    As they were getting used to their environment, there was a sudden movement from the trees around them. Both of them released their spiritual senses and they quickly realized that they had been surrounded.


    From what they could sense, these enemies around them all seemed to be in the peak Embryo Soul Realm and there were over ten of them around them.


    For Mao Tao who was in the Child Soul Realm, this wasn''t hard, but this was definitely a hard fight for Qiao Yi Fei who was in the peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    As the enemies around them approached, the two girls pulled out their weapons to prepare to fight. However, before they could engage, Lin Fan''s voice suddenly cut in by saying, "What are the two of you doing?"


    The girls were surprised to hear Lin Fan''s voice because they couldn''t sense anything outside of this forest, so they had no idea what was out there. But Qiao Yi Fei still said, "We''re surrounded by enemies, so we''re getting ready to fight. Is there something wrong with that?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before saying, "Then why are you choosing to fight yourself? Isn''t this a test for your pets? What would be the meaning if you fought yourselves?"


    The two girls both said, "Eh?"


    Then Mao Tao said, "But Owner Lin, our pets are only in the peak Embryo Soul Realm as well and they just broke through to this realm, so they should be weaker than normal beasts in the same realm. Not to mention that they are outnumbered. How can they win like this?"


    Lin Fan gave a soft snort before saying, "Your pets are much stronger than you think. Just let them do the fighting, they''ll know what to do."


    Once again, both girls said, "Eh?" However, they chose to follow Lin Fan''s instructions in the end by sending out their pets to fight.


    The two pets were scared at first since they had been fighting wisps that were much stronger than them the entire time, but then when they sensed that their enemies were just at this level, both of them charged out without any fear. They had beenpletely surrounded, so they charged out in two different directions, one going forward and one going backwards.


    As soon as the enemies around them saw the two charging out, they also jumped down from the trees to attack these two pets. Once they were out of the trees, their true appearances were revealed to show that they were a bunch of apes.


    As these pets and beasts charged at each other, at the moment of collision, the pets suddenly sted right through these beasts with their attacks.


    In just a single move, Lin Fan had established the fame of his store because the abilities of these pets couldn''t be faked.

 Chapter 531 Passing Tribulation (1)

    When the two pets crashed through the apes that charged at each other, there was a shocked gasp from the crowd. This didn''t just include the crowd that was inside the arena, but also the crowd that was watching the screens outside because there was one person who had brought a camera to broadcast this.


    They had wanted to expose Lin Fan for the scammer that he was, but instead they had helped him establish his fame as a legitimate business.


    The two pets had both used new skills when they crushed through the apes, but they weren''t just using any normal skills.


    They were using skills that were considered advanced skills, far beyond the level of normal skills. These skills were ones that hadpletely doubled the power of their attacks.


    When it came to skills that pets used, it was different from human skills which were categorized by the level of cultivation that they were suited for. For beast skills, they were ranked by how much they increased the power of the beast''s attack.


    For basic skills, they only increased the power of the attack by 10% to 20% at most. Intermediate skills were able to increase the power of the attack by 50%. Then for advanced skills, they would be able to double the power of the attack.


    Beyond those normal skills, there were special bloodline skills that could increase the beast''s attack by several folds, but those could only be gained from having special bloodlines and not by training. For a pet to get a bloodline skill, it would mean purifying their blood and mutating.


    The skills that the two pets had used were both well known advanced skills, so it was very easy for the crowd to recognize them.


    The ze w Bear had gathered its ws together to gather the mes that surrounded its ws. Then after the mes had reached a certain extent, it suddenly pushed its ws out to release a wall of mes that engulfed the apes that were charging at it.


    This was an advanced skill known as the Inferno Wall and only the best fire attributed pets with the purest bloodline could use them.


    The ck Frost Civet had condensed all the moisture in the air around it to form giant icicles that suddenly flew out at the apes.


    This was an advanced skill known as the True Ice Shot and only the best ice attributed pets with the purest bloodline could use them.


    The apes were instantly decimated by the two pets and there was only silence in the air as everyone stared at the two pets in shock.


    Lin Fan let this fact sink in before opening the inte to say, "Is there anything else you want to fight? You still have this ce reserved for another half an hour."


    When Lin Fan''s voice rang, it brought Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao out of their shock. Immediately Qiao Yi Fei asked, "Owner Lin, did you really teach my ck Frost Civet an advanced skill overnight?"


    Lin Fan casually replied, "It doesn''t just know that, it learned quite a bit during the training. You can keep letting it show off what it learned if you want."


    When the two pets heard Lin Fan''s voice, they immediately heard the slight chill that was hidden in it directed at them. Both of these pets immediately dived to the feet of their owners and begged them to continue before standing up to flex, as if they were showing off their powers.


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were embarrassed by how their pets were acting, but they were also curious what other skills Lin Fan had taught them, so they let Lin Fan bring out some more enemies for them to face.


    One after another, the two pets continued to release different advanced skills that easily crushed their enemies. Even when outnumbered one to a hundred, they were able to easily overpower their enemies.


    When Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao finished counting, they realized that their pets had learned over five advanced skills each. Moreover, the skills that they learned weren''t just attack skills, but also movement skills and defense skills.


    If it was just attack skills, maybe they would be a bit stronger, but if they learned advanced skills for different situations, their battle strength would greatly increase.


    But they couldn''t believe that their pets had learned all of this in a single night. Not to mention that it had been done by someone as young as Lin Fan¡­


    If the twelve great factions knew about this, they definitely wouldn''t stay still. However, now that Lin Fan had made such a big ssh it was impossible for the twelve great factions not to know about this.<sub> </sub>


    The only positive was that this was the former store of the Ghost Chef, so people will know that this is the territory of the Hunters Organization. The eleven other factions wouldn''t be crazy enough to directly do anything to Lin Fan as long as he was in the territory of the Hunters Organization. The most that they would do was send scouts to investigate this store and that was something that Lin Fan could handle on his own.


    In the crowd, there were plenty of people who were already making posts on the forum, as well as some people who were sending private messages to the organizations that they came from.


    This store was sure to create waves in Harmony City and the sooner that they built rtions with the owner of this store, the better.


    After testing out their pets, both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao wanted to leave their pets to train here again. When the pets heard this, they revealed looks of betrayal as they looked at their masters, but both of them ignored their pets.


    However, when they asked, Lin Fan said, "The effect of the training won''t be as good as the first time, so their cultivation won''t improve as much and they won''t learn as many skills, you understand that, right?"


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao nodded to show they understood this because this was something that was very normal. After all, training could only bring their pets so far and without working on improving their bloodline and consolidating that training first, there was no way to further increase their power.


    After Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao paid for their training, Lin Fan brought the two pets into the back again. They had tearful looks on their faces as they were brought into the back, but when they saw the cages, there was a bit of constion that appeared in their eyes.


    When Lin Fan came back after putting those two pets in the cages, he found that there were a bunch of people who were standing in front of the counter waiting for him.


    They all came forward and wanted to leave their pet here for training, but Lin Fan quicklyid down the rules. They learned that there were only ten spots for training each day and they became even more frantic, but Lin Fan put them in ce. He quickly picked out the ones that would receive thest eight spots and then refused to give anyone else a spot.


    There were people who tried offering him more money and there were people who tried to threaten him, but they soon realized what kind of defenses this store had.


    Once that first person was sent out without even being able to touch Lin Fan, there was no one else who had tried to attack him again.


    In the end, not a single person was able to convince Lin Fan to give them another spot, but there were people with sharp eyes that started looking at the other products in the store.


    Since the trainer in this store was at this level, that meant that the products that they had wouldn''t be any worse, right?


    At the end of the day, other than filling the ten training spots, Lin Fan was also able to sell several bags of pet food. However, beyond that, no one had dared to believe his ims when it came to the special pet food and the pet essories.


    Once he had sent everyone off, Lin Fan went into the back to finish off his work.


    He had brought the two pets into the top grade cultivation realm before because they were the first pets that he had trained in this upper realm, so he wanted to give a big result to establish himself.


    Now that he had, there was no need for him to put in that much effort to train them.


    After beating them a bit with his suction force, Lin Fan tossed the pets that had been left here for training into the shadow cultivation room.


    For pets of this level, the shadow cultivation room was enough to train them.


    He had something else that he needed to take care of, something that he had put off for a long time because he had needed the abilities of this pet. However, now that he had some free time, it was time for that pet to finally break through.


    Brainy had reached the peak of the Primary Soul Realm for a long time now and while Lin Fan''s other pets had all reached the Fragmented Soul Realm, Brainy was the only one that hadn''t broken through.


    Lin Fan scrolled through the cultivation realms that he had unlocked and then picked out one from the list before disappearing with a sh of light.

 Chapter 532 Passing Tribulation (2)

    After that sh of light, Lin Fan appeared in a field that waspletely empty.


    It seemed like this ce waspletely abandoned and there wasn''t a single thing that was around them.


    This was a low grade cultivation realm that Lin Fan had chosen specially for Brainy to break through in. He chose this realm because it was a realm that only had weak beasts in it because he didn''t want anything to interfere with Brainy''s tribtion.


    It had been a long time for Brainy and it had really wanted to break through a long time ago, but Lin Fan had needed it for all the things that had happened recently, so it hadn''t been able to make its breakthrough.


    Now that things had calmed down and Brainy had a chance to break through, Lin Fan would naturally do what he could to help it since it was mainly his fault that Brainy had to dy its breakthrough for this long.


    After arriving in this realm, Lin Fan released his other five pets who all went off in different directions.


    The strongest beasts in this entire realm were in the Soul Realm, so just to make sure that nothing happened, Lin Fan sent out his pets to eliminate them or pacify them. As for which one they would do, that would depend on how the beasts of this realm reacted.


    In less than ten minutes, the five pets came back and there were two of them that had dragged back beast corpses.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind and put the beast corpses in his storage before sending the five pets off in five different directions. When they were all a set range from where Brainy was, they all stopped and released their life energy.


    As they released their life energy, there was a barrier that came out from all of them that went to two other pets each. These barriers continued outwards until they touched the other barriers released by the other pets, forming a perfect pentagonal barrier with Brainy at the center.


    This was an array that would keep out any intruders that would show up.


    When all of these countermeasures were finished, Lin Fan looked at Brainy and gave it a nod before moving to the side.


    Brainy gave a nod back to Lin Fan before just standing there right in the center of the array that the five pets had formed. It just stood there without doing a thing.


    After a while, the aura around Brainy began to change as it became stronger and stronger. As the aura around Brainy became stronger and stronger, the sky also became darker and darker.


    There were more and more clouds that gathered in the sky above Brainy.


    As these clouds gathered, the beasts that were around suddenly started running away from Brainy.


    These beasts had been inside the barrier, but they had been ignored because they weren''t in the Soul Realm. The strongest among these beasts was only in the Gold Realm, so naturally they would pose no threat to Brainy during its tribtion.


    Rather, it was Brainy''s tribtion that would pose the greatest threat to them since this was a tribtion of breaking into the Soul Realm.


    For a Gold Realm beast, the Soul Realm was a height that they could never imagine reaching. If they stayed here, they would definitely be killed by just the simple shockwaves released during the tribtion.


    The beasts ran away from Brainy and soon came to the barrier. They ran right into the barrier and the barrier didn''t stop them as they were allowed to freely escape the barrier.


    This was a barrier that was designed to keep intruders out and not keep living beings in, so they were able to easily get out. However, if they wanted toe back in, it definitely wouldn''t be that easy.


    Once they left the barrier though, there were a few beasts that had stopped and turned to watch Brainy in the distance.


    While they were certain that they would be killed by the shockwaves of the tribtion, it was also their chance to witness a tribtion firsthand. A tribtion of a beast breaking through into the Soul Realm was a rare thing to see, or at least it was for these beasts in this low cultivation realm.


    There were also beasts that came from the distance who stopped right outside the border. They came as close as they could to the barrier just so they could get the best view.


    These beasts that came were all in the peak tinum Realm, only a step away from breaking through to the Soul Realm. There was no doubt that being able to watch another beast make its breakthrough to the Soul Realm would be greatly beneficial to them.


    As for the five pets that were holding the barrier up around Brainy, they didn''t do a thing to these beasts that came to watch. As long as these beasts didn''t charge the barrier that they had created, there was no reason for them to leave their post to deal with them. After all, by leaving their post, they would be creating a temporary weak spot for anyone to attack from.<sub> </sub>


    This was also why Lin Fan had ordered them not to attack these beasts that showed up because he didn''t want anything going wrong.


    Of course, for these pets themselves, they didn''t want anything to go wrong either because this was the long awaited breakthrough of their older sibling.


    Brainy had lived in the wild for some time before being tamed by Lin Fan, so it was the oldest among all the pets that Lin Fan had.


    During the time that they had been together, Brainy had yed with the younger pets and taken care of them, so they had all taken Brainy as their older sibling.


    Since it was their older sibling that was breaking through, the pets would all give their all to make sure that it was a sessful breakthrough.


    In the center of the barrier, after gathering up its aura for some time, Brainy finally opened its eyes and looked up at the clouds above it. The clouds had gathered to a point where they had turned pitch ck and there were wisps of electricity running through them.


    It was about time for the tribtion thunder to fall and judging by the colour of the electricity in the cloud, it seemed like Brainy would be receiving a purple lightning tribtion. This was something that it couldn''t ept because this meant that it was below all of Lin Fan''s other pets.


    All of the other pets had all experienced red lightning tribtions and even Lin Fan himself had experienced the legendary ck lightning tribtion, known as the Tribtion of Death.


    Brainy had its own pride even though it was Lin Fan''s pet and especially because it was Lin Fan''s pet. It had seen the tribtions that all the other pets had received, so how could it be willing to fall behind the others.


    Brainy didn''t hesitate at all as it increased the power it released, as if it was trying to provoke the heavens into sending a more powerful lightning tribtion at it.


    As Brainy''s aura increased, the electricity in the clouds started to increase in density. There was more and more electricity that was gathering in the clouds like a pot that was boiling over and soon there were a few bolts of lightning that had started to change colours.


    It was gradual at first, but soon the colour of the lightning had gone from regal purple to a bloody red.


    Right after it had turned blood red, the lightning suddenly fell without any warning. However, Brainy wasn''t caught off guard since it had already expected this.


    As soon as the lightning fell down, Brainy immediately released two puppets in front of it. These two puppets immediately turned around and went into their shells, creating two shields in front of Brainy.


    The lightning shed with these two shields for a few seconds, but it dissipated in the end.


    However, that didn''t mean that there was no damage caused to the shields that Brainy had pulled out.


    The two shields both had burn marks on them that showed that they had been damaged quite a bit, but those burn marks also quickly started to heal up with thews of the puppets.


    These puppets were turtle puppets just like the two maid sisters from before, but the main difference was that these two puppets were puppets that were created from corpses. That was the only reason why Brainy was able to use them in this tribtion.


    If there was another living being that joined Brainy in the tribtion, it would increase the power of the tribtion in the end which would just harm Brainy.


    So the biggest difference was that dead puppets were considered tools, while living puppets were considered targets that could take the tribtion with Brainy.


    However, these turtle shield puppets were made from corpses that were in the low Fragmented Soul Realm and they had still been damaged by Brainy''s lightning tribtion. This just showed just how powerful this red lightning tribtion was, even normal Fragmented Soul Realm Experts couldn''t go against it.


    But that was just what Brainy wanted since it wanted to be as strong as Lin Fan''s other pets.


    After they had gone through their Tribtion of Era Defining, they had be so powerful that they could fight those that were several minor realms above them.


    After Brainy had destroyed the first bolt of red lightning, there was a slight pause before the second bolt fell down.


    As soon as the second bolt came down, Brainy released a horde of Desert Horrors at the bolt of lightning.

 Chapter 533 Passing Tribulation (3)

    The Desert Horror Ants that were released jumped up into the sky without any hesitation as they charged right at the red lighting bolt that was falling down on Brainy.


    As soon as they came close to the red bolt of lightning, they immediately blew up in the air.


    This was the special effect of the parasite seed that Brainy had ced inside of them. With just a single thought Brainy could blow them up, which would also blow up the puppet that it was in.


    If it was a living puppet, perhaps they might have been able to resist to a certain extent based on their cultivation, but Brainy wouldn''t do that to a living puppet unless they betrayed it. After all, living puppets were hard toe by and each living puppet lost was another one gone.


    The Desert Horror Ants that Brainy had thrown into the air at the red bolt of lightning were all dead puppets. These were all Desert Horror Ants that had willingly given up their lives to be turned into bombs.


    The Desert Horror Ants existed to protect the queen and since the queen was currently Brainy''s puppet, that meant that Brainy was above even their queen. So for them, to die for Brainy was to die for the queen, something that they were honoured to do.


    Inside of the hive that Brainy kept the Desert Horror Ants in, the queen was organizing a mass culling of her soldier ants. Once the soldier ant was killed, Brainy''s seed was ced inside of the dead soldier. However, the seed that was ced inside of the Desert Horror Ants wasn''t the normal parasite seeds, but rather the explosive seeds that Brainy could also use.


    With these explosive seeds inside them, when they blew up, the explosion was much stronger than just these Gold Realm Desert Horror Ants blowing themselves up. The explosion was strong enough to even injure those in the Primary Soul Realm because they were attacks formed from the life energy of a Primary Soul Realm beast like Brainy.


    But even with hundreds of these Desert Horror Ants blowing up near the bolt of lightning falling down, it didn''t cause it to waver at all. The force released by the bolt of lightning was just as strong as before.


    Still, Brainy didn''t give up because there were plenty of Desert Horror Ant corpses that he could use as bombs.


    Even though there were hundreds of Desert Horror Ants being used as bombs, that wasn''t even a fraction of what the queen ant could produce each day, so this wasn''t enough to make Brainy hurt just yet and there was no way he would run out of bombs.


    Eventually, after the five hundredth bomb hit the red bolt of lightning it finally began to waver.


    Brainy didn''t stop throwing bombs at it when it saw this, as it keptunching more and more Desert Horror Ant corpses right at the red bolt of lightning.


    Finally, the thousandth explosion was able to weaken it enough where Brainy''s two turtle guard puppets were able to block it without much trouble.


    Even though Brainy had been able to easily block this bolt of red lightning, that didn''t mean anything since this was only the second bolt of lightning in this tribtion. There were still seven more bolts of lightning that were about to fall and each one would be stronger in time.


    If Brainy were to rely on the Desert Horror Ant explosions the entire time, it would most certainly run out of Desert Horror Ant corpses since each bolt of lightning would take more and more explosions to block.


    While the specialty of the Insect Race was their ability to multiply their numbers, there was a limited amount of space in the hive and there was a limited number of eggs that the Desert Horror Queen couldy in a single day. There was no doubt that Brainy would run out in the end.


    However, Brainy didn''t panic even though that was the case.


    Watching the red lightning ferment in the clouds, Brainy suddenly released even more puppets with a single thought.


    This time, they weren''t the Desert Horrors or more turtle shields, rather there were beasts of all different shapes and sizes that had appeared. However, if one looked carefully at them, they would notice that every single one of these beasts were in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    It was hard to get an exact number, but there were easily over five hundred beasts that had appeared around Brainy.


    With just a single thought, Brainy had brought out an entire army.


    That was the advantage that Brainy had as a parasite beast, it was able to release an army even if it didn''t have any life energy or spiritual sense left. All it had to do was rely on the parasite seeds that it had already ced in its puppets beforehand to control them.


    These parasite seeds were created with spiritual sense and then stored in Brainy, so even without spiritual sense or life energy, Brainy could still control them. However, if Brainy wascking spiritual sense, it meant that it wouldn''t be able to finely control them like it was normally capable of.


    The other strange thing was that all the puppets that Brainy had just released had dull looks in their eyes andcked vital energy. All of these were just the dead puppets that Brainy had, Brainy also had quite a few live puppets that it had stored away in Lin Fan''s pet storage!


    After another few seconds, the third bolt of red lightning fell down, but this time, the results werepletely different.


    As soon as the red bolt of lightning fell down, the puppets began releasing their attacks to bombard that red bolt of lightning.


    Unlike before where the explosions of the Desert Horror corpses were unable to shake the bolt of red lightning, after just a single round of attacks, the red bolt of lightning hadpletely dissipated.


    That was the difference between the level of attacks just now.<sub> </sub>


    The Desert Horror Ant corpses only exploded with the might of the Primary Soul Realm, but these puppets that Brainy had brought out were all truly in the Fragmented Soul Realm. That meant that each of these attacks from the puppets was equal to an attack from a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert. The Primary Soul Realm and the Fragmented Soul Realm, they were twopletely different concepts.


    It was even overkill to release five hundred Fragmented Soul Realm attacks at the bolt of red lightning. It wasn''t even able to resist half of the Fragmented Soul Realm attacks before disappearing.


    Still, even with how easy it was to break this third bolt of red lightning, Brainy didn''t let its guard down.


    The fourth and fifth bolts of red lightning were all taken care of by the attacks of the Fragmented Soul Realm beasts, but things changed with the sixth bolt of lightning.


    The sixth bolt of lightning didn''t break with just a single round of attacks, it took several rounds of attacks before finally breaking apart. It hade quite close to hitting Brainy head on.


    Seeing this, Brainy knew that it had to change up its strategy, otherwise it wouldn''t be able to deal with the final three bolts of lightning.


    When the seventh bolt of lightning fell down, without any hesitation, Brainy released Desert Horror Ant corpses and started throwing them into the sky along with the Fragmented Soul Realm attacks.


    It was a full bombardment with all the attacks that Brainy could release and after throwing around two thousand Desert Horror Ant corpses, Brainy was finally able to destroy that seventh bolt of lightning.


    But then came the eighth bolt of lightning¡­


    Without even thinking about it, Brainy released even more puppets, but this time they were more turtle puppets. They formed ayer of shields right in front of Brainy.


    Even after throwing five thousand Desert Horror Ant corpses, Brainy wasn''t able to shatter the bolt of lightning in the end. Brainy was forced to resist it with its shield puppets.


    It was a good thing that Brainy had nned ahead and brought out even more shield puppets to create that wall of shields in front of it. The bolt of lightning directly pierced through five differentyers of shields before being stopped by the final fiveyers of shields.


    After blocking this eighth bolt of lightning, Brainy looked up at the cloud in the sky with a worried look.


    It had used all of its powers already and there was nothing else that it could pull out, unless it was willing to make a sacrifice¡­


    While Brainy was thinking, the ninth bolt of lightning fell down.


    As soon as it did, Brainy snapped back from its thoughts and after a slight second of hesitation, Brainy suddenly gave an order.


    Instead of releasing Desert Horror Ant corpses this time, Brainy had directly sent five of the Fragmented Soul Realm puppets around it into the sky. These five puppets flew right at the bolt of lightning and when they were right about to sh, the five puppets suddenly exploded.


    The might of the five puppets exploding was like five attacks in the peak Fragmented Soul Realm, it was even strong enough to threaten Lin Fan''s five other pets, so there was no need to mention this bolt of lightning.


    The reason why Brainy didn''t want to use this final trump card was because each Fragmented Soul Realm puppet that was destroyed was a puppet that was lost forever. Brainy didn''t want to lose these puppets unless it had no other choice because it was hard to rece them.


    But it was a good thing that Lin Fan''s pets had just brought back two more corpses for Brainy to turn into puppets.


    After the explosion of the five puppets, the bolt of red lightning had be much smaller, but it didn''t disappear in the end.


    Brainy looked at it and was about to send out another puppet to blow it up, but then it realized that this wouldn''t work.


    Brainy could feel the connection that tiny bolt of lightning had with it. Brainy could tell that this tiny bolt of lightning had heaven''s will in it and unless Brainy took it with its own body, the tribtion would never end.


    So with another thought, the puppets stopped bombarding the tiny bolt of lightning with their attacks. After all, even with the bombardment of attacks, it had done nothing to the tiny bolt of lightning, so there was no need to keep attacking it.


    The tiny bolt of lightning quickly fell down and touched Brainy, giving Brainy a tiny shock before disappearing.


    As soon as that tiny shock was over, Brainy could feel the floodgates of its cultivation breaking open and waves of life energy surged into Brainy.


    Brainy was finally about to break through.

 Chapter 534 Queen Of Knowledge

    As the waves of life energy surged into Brainy, the aura that it released became stronger and stronger.


    Lin Fan had been watching on the side the entire time, not feeling worried at all because he trusted Brainy. Rather he was quite curious how strong Brainy would be once it broke through. After all, Brainy was a twice mutated beast, so it was definitely stronger than most normal beasts.


    Brainy''s method of cultivation was also different from normal beasts, since it relied on cultivating its spiritual sense to use its parasite seeds. Lin Fan was looking forward to seeing what kind of new abilities Brainy would learn with this breakthrough.


    The breakthroughsted much longer than the tribtion which had ended in less than ten minutes. Each bolt of lightning hadsted no more than a minute, with thest one being a bit longer.


    Since Brainy had started breaking through, an hour had already passed.


    However, even with how long Brainy was taking, neither Lin Fan or his other pets dared to let their guard down. They maintained the barrier while Lin Fan stood guard by Brainy''s side the entire time.


    After a long wait, Brainy suddenly opened its eyes and there was a burst of smoke that came from it.


    Lin Fan was confused by the sudden burst of smoke, but since he could sense the increase in Brainy''s aura, he knew that Brainy was breaking through, so he didn''t do anything. He just increased his guard as he focused on protecting Brainy as it broke through.


    After another five minutes, the smoke finally cleared and Brainy''s aura had stabilized. It was clear at that point that Brainy had already finished with its breakthrough and Lin Fan could tell from its aura that it was in the low Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Since it was over, Lin Fan turned to see how Brainy was doing, but the moment he did, he was stunned by what he saw.


    Instead of seeing the normal little snake that was made of vines, there was a person that was standing there instead. If it wasn''t for the aura that they released, Lin Fan wouldn''t have known that it was Brainy.


    Unlike the other pets who had all taken the form of little boys, Brainy had taken a human form that was just as tall as Lin Fan. However, that wasn''t what the problem was.


    The problem was that she wasn''t wearing any clothes at all!


    Brainy had been looking at her hands as if she was sizing up her own body and then she looked down at her own body for a bit. After looking for a bit, her hands came to her chest and gave a squeeze.


    Lin Fan almost felt his blood surging to his head and blood almost spurted out of his nose.


    Brainy definitely wasn''t a child when it came to her body.


    She had a perfect figure and the most amazing thing about her was the vast valleys that were on her chest, which were even bigger than Ang''s. She was a beautiful young girl who looked to be in her teens with green hair that ran all the way down to her waist and piercing green emerald eyes.


    When she squeezed her peaches, they stood out even more and looked even more appetizing.


    After squeezing for a bit, Brainy put her hands down and walked over to where Lin Fan was standing before saying, "Master, I''ve broken through."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before suddenly realizing his mistake and turning his head.


    Seeing the slight blush on Lin Fan''s face, Brainy tilted her head in confusion before asking, "Master, what''s wrong? Are you sick?"


    Lin Fan had an awkward look on his face as he said, "Well¡­"


    Brainy kept her head tilted as if she was thinking about something and after a few seconds, she revealed a look of understanding as she said, "Oh, right, shame. Ipletely forgot about that."


    Brainy''s hands came up to cover her private parts and then she looked at Lin Fan with a deadpan look as she said in a monotone voice, "Pervert."


    Lin Fan had three dark lines that appeared on his forehead when he heard this.


    If she said it normally, it would be fine, but the way she said it really made Lin Fan unsure how to respond.


    Normally Brainy learned about whatever caught her interest and Lin Fan didn''t really interfere, other than giving her a few topics to learn about so that she could help him. Beyond that, he let her learn whatever she wanted to learn.<sub> </sub>


    The one thing that he had forgotten to teach her was the rtionship between men and women¡­


    He didn''t even know what gender Brainy had been previously, so he hadn''t been sure how to approach this, but now it seemed like he really had made a mistake by not teaching her any of this.


    Lin Fan turned his head even more, but his hand came up and with a wave, there was a green robe that appeared in his hand. After this robe appeared, Lin Fan said, "Put this on."


    Brainy looked at the robe in Lin Fan''s hand before saying "oh" and then taking it to put on.


    Lin Fan naturally didn''t carry around female clothing with him since that would just be weird, so he had specially bought this robe from the system''s store. It was a robe that was able to resist attacks at the Fragmented Soul Realm level, so it was definitely an expensive item. The one good thing was that this was an item that could only defend and couldn''t attack, so it was cheaper than a normal Fragmented Soul Realm Artifact, only costing Lin Fan a hundred thousand points, instead of the normal price tag of a million points.


    Lin Fan would normally rather die than buy something this expensive because these points were the only cushion that he had to keep himself safe with, but he was also someone that took care of his people. Since Brainy had broken through this time, Lin Fan felt that it was appropriate for him to buy her something to celebrate, which was why Lin Fan had been willing to buy this.


    The funny thing was that for the other pets that broke through, Lin Fan only gave them essories that came from the store. If they knew this difference in treatment, they definitely would have cried.


    After Brainy finished changing, she said, "I''m done."


    Lin Fan turned over and when he saw her, his breath couldn''t help stopping.


    Lin Fan thought back to Brainy''s information disyed in the system and he couldn''t help thinking of one special title that Brainy had. Brainy had the bloodline of Queen of Knowledge and seeing how she looked now, Lin Fan had to admit that she definitely would be considered a queen.


    After staring for a few seconds, he realized his mistake and shook his head before saying, "What new skills do you have?"


    Lin Fan could have just looked in the system interface to see what new skills Brainy had learned, but he wanted to see firsthand what kind of skills these were so he could learn how to best use them in the future.


    Brainy had learned several nt based skills that could be used to attack, bind, and speed herself up, but none of them were worth mentioning.


    The only three skills that were worth mentioning were the Vine Lash, the Ultra Intelligence, and the Seed Clone skills.


    The Vine Lash was a very special skill, it allowed Brainy to condense a vine that she could use as a whip. This was a very normal skill that most nt attributed pets had, but it had a special effect when Brainy used it.


    When Brainy used the Vine Lash on her own puppets, it would provide a buff that increased various stats. However, when Brainy used it with her new form, it did make her look like a queen, but it was the kind of queen that Lin Fan wanted to avoid her bing¡­


    The second skill, Ultra Intelligence was just an improvement of Brainy''s previous Super Intelligence skill, but the Ultra Intelligence was worth mentioning because it greatly improved Brainy''s brain processing capabilities and allowed her to more than double the amount of puppets that she could control.


    The third skill, Seed Clone, was actually the most important one.


    The Seed Clone skill allowed her to create clones with the parasite seeds. The puppets that received these special parasite seeds would be perfect copies of Brainy.


    However, the most important part of this was that with these Seed Clones, it meant that even if Brainy''s main body was destroyed, she could revive herself with these Seed Clones. The one downside to this was that the Seed Clone seeds required her to inject her own vital energy into them, so there was a limit to how many she could make.


    If she made too many of them, the main body would be negatively affected and would suffer from health issues.


    As Lin Fan watched these skills, he gave a satisfied nod.


    Brainy was bing more and more like a tactician like this.


    With her whip and her intelligence, she couldmand armies to take out all of Lin Fan''s enemies.


    After seeing Brainy demonstrate all of her skills, Lin Fan reached his hand out to pat her on the head as he said, "Good job."


    With his hand covering her, Lin Fan couldn''t see her face, but there was a blush that suddenly appeared on her face.

 Chapter 535 Type Of Hunter (1)

    This wasn''t the first time that Brainy had blushed today.


    When Lin Fan had turned away earlier, Brainy had been blushing while putting on the clothes.


    Brainy didn''t understand what this meant, but she did know that it felt good when Lin Fan looked at her body and it felt good now when Lin Fan patted her on the head.


    For now, she would have to look into what this meant when they got home.


    Lin Fan looked around the area and then called back the five pets that were still holding the barrier.


    This was a low cultivation realm where the strongest beasts present were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm. This was a ce that no longer had any value to Lin Fan other than being a ce for him to train lower tier pets.


    Since that was the case, there was no reason for him to stay here any longer.


    Once all his pets were put back into his pet storage, Lin Fan disappeared with a sh of white light. When he appeared again, he was in the back room of the shop.


    There wasn''t much left for him to do now that Brainy had broken through. The pets that he had received were already being trained in the shadow cultivation room, so all he had to do was wait for them to finish their training.


    The only thing he could do now was cultivate into the night since there was no one waiting for him at home to begin with.


    Even after two days, it seemed like Ang and Momonga still hadn''t solved their problems back home which made it clear to Lin Fan that it must be quite serious. However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried about them because he trusted them.


    Not to mention that even if he was worried about them, there was nothing that he could do if he went to their worlds. The only thing he could do for them was hope and pray that they were safe.


    So Lin Fan just sat cross legged in the break room in the store, drawing in life energy as he cycled his cultivation technique.


    The other thing that Lin Fan was thinking about was how to get people that could work in his store.


    While Lin Fan was able to stay in the store during the early periods, there was no way for him to stay in the storeter on when he had other things to do. There was still his revenge that he needed to take and if he were to be tied down by this store, that wouldn''t follow his ns.


    However, he couldn''t just randomly hire someone to take care of this store because of how important it was to him. All the people that he had hired before were people that he had formed a connection with and were willing to ept the strangeness of this store. If a normal person were to work here, they definitely wouldn''t be able to adapt.


    But so far, he hadn''t met anyone like that just yet.


    There was the Xu Family, but he wasn''t certain about them just yet. Or at the very least, he didn''t trust them enough to manage this store. Not to mention that he had something else nned for them since he had already sent Xu Lin to the True Spirit Sect.


    However, this was something that would take a long time to n, so there was no rushing this right now.


    For now, Lin Fan would keep an eye out for people who caught his interest. There was also quite a bit of time before he even had to leave this store, so there was still time for him to find a person to take over for him.


    After settling this, Lin Fan cleared his mind and focused on cultivating. He cultivated for the entire night, only taking a break to take the ragged pets out of the shadow cultivation room to put them back in their cages.


    Of course, that was only after he was satisfied with the results that they had gained from the shadow cultivation room. If the results of their training didn''t satisfy him, he wouldn''t have hesitated to throw them right back into the shadow cultivation room again.


    While Lin Fan was cultivating, Brainy who had been asked to be let out of the pet space was doing something else.


    For the first time, instead of reading books that contained knowledge on various useful topics, Brainy was reading romance novels instead. She hadn''t been able to find any scientific studies and the closest thing that she had found to a textbook were these "guidebooks to love" that had been rmended on the inte.


    Just like that, the two of them spent the night inplete silence. One of them was cultivating while the other one was "studying".


    When the sun rose, Lin Fan opened his eyes and after preparing breakfast, he came to the front of the store to open the shades to take a look outside. The moment he did, he saw another sea of people surrounding his store. Today, there were even more people than there were yesterday.


    That was because the stories on the forums had been too unbelievable.


    Just yesterday, everyone was calling this store a scam, but now they were iming that there really was a Master Monster Trainer that was in this store?<sub> </sub>


    There were plenty of people that didn''t believe it even if they had been beaten to death, so they hade today to find the truth.


    Lin Fan scanned the crowd and then closed the blind again since he didn''t care. He was confident in the ability of his store since he had something that no one else had, a cheat system!


    Stores were a ce that catered to their customers, so if there was any other store that saw this sea of people standing outside waiting to get in, they definitely would have opened early.


    When the crowd saw the shades open, this crowd that was mainly filled with people that hadn''t been here yesterday had thought that the store would open soon. No one could believe their eyes when they saw Lin Fan close the shades again. There was no sign of this store opening at all.


    They couldn''t understand what was wrong with this owner, did he not know how to do business?


    Even if it was a store that was run by the twelve great factions, they would have opened their doors early when they saw all these customers waiting outside.


    After all, this sea of customers wasn''t just potential business, but also a great opportunity to advertise. A sea of people were willing toe to your store early, that was without a doubt a scene that would draw plenty of attention and give you free advertising.


    However, if you just closed your doors and didn''t let them in, eventually there would be people that would leave which would hurt the reputation of your store.


    That was why even the stores of the twelve great factions would have opened early even though they had the twelve great factions backing them.


    When they saw Lin Fanpletely ignoring his customers, there were some people that wanted to leave, but thinking about the ims that had been ced on the forums, they couldn''t help stopping after taking a single step.


    They kept saying to themselves, "I''m just here to expose this scammer, then I''m leaving right away."


    With this mantra in their minds, the people who wanted to leave stayed in the end.


    But it wouldn''t have mattered if they had left because there were more and more people that came to join the crowd. Even if they had left, the crowd would have only grown in size and not shrunk.


    That was just how shocking the posts about Lin Fan''s store were.


    There were also quite a few scouts that came from the various families of Harmony City to confirm if the ims about this ce were true. After all, if they were, it would be their chance to increase the power of their family.


    A Master Trainer would be weed no matter where he went.


    Time passed and soon it was just five minutes before the opening of Lin Fan''s store.


    Just like before, there were carriages that arrived right before Lin Fan''s store opened and the three beauties appeared once again.


    The crowd made way for them and the three of them easily made their way to the front.


    However, this time, at the front of the crowd, there were people that they recognized.


    These were young masters from various families that had constantly bugged them by trying to chase them. When these young masters had heard word that these threedies had been gathering at this store, they had shown up first thing in the morning to wait for them.


    But of course, not a single one of thesedies were interested in any of the young masters waiting for them.


    As they rejected them, the opening time of Lin Fan''s store arrived and the door opened to let them in.


    Instead of Lin Fan opening the door this time, the door automatically opened when the opening time had arrived.


    The crowd immediately surged into the store, but there was only so much space inside of the store that most of them were kept outside by the window and by the disys that had been set up.


    Of course, the ones that had been let into the store were the ones that had tickets to pick up their pets because everyone wanted to see if the rumours about this store were true.

 Chapter 536 Type Of Hunter (2)

    The first thing that happened in Lin Fan''s store every morning was the pick up for the pets that had been left the previous day.


    It didn''t take long to finish this process because there were only ten people that had left their pets in the store for training yesterday.


    As soon as they received their pets, many of them wanted to test out the new abilities their pets gained to see if yesterday''s results were a fluke or not. However, most of them looked at Lin Fan with a wary look.


    There was only one young man who didn''t seem to mind Lin Fan looking at him as he said, "Alright buddy, let''s see what you can do now."


    His pet looked back at Lin Fan with a scared look, but who told it to have a contract with this young man?


    In the end, the pet had to listen to what the young man asked it to do and started gathering life energy around it.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he naturally put a stop to it immediately.


    Raising out his hand, he pressed down which caused an invisible force to fall down on the young man''s pet, squashing it into the ground.


    The young man was shocked when he saw this. It wasn''t just the young man, all of the people around were shocked because they couldn''t understand what kind of force this was. They couldn''t sense any life energying from the space around the pet, so just what kind of force was this?


    After squashing it for a few seconds, Lin Fan pulled back his hand and said, "Don''t make a mess in this store. If you do, I''ll kick you out and ban you."


    The young man wanted to say something, but his words were stuck in his throat.


    The pet on the ground had tears in its eyes as it thought, "It was the master''s fault, why are you taking it out on me?" However, it would never dare to say such a thing to Lin Fan''s face.


    After taking care of them, Lin Fan released the pressure on the pet before tapping the board beside him and saying, "If you want to test your skills, there''s the arena for you to test in."


    When they heard this, the people who had just received their pets realized something and they quickly paid the fee for the arena and Lin Fan brought them up.


    Instead of giving them the main arena that was in the center, he gave them the rooms that had been set up on the side. These rooms had the same ability as the main arena, only it wasn''t in the same prominent ce as the arena.


    Instead of being in the center of the second floor like the main arena was, what happened inside these rooms were broadcast by monitors instead which Lin Fan had turned on for the people who hade to watch.


    After taking care of that, Lin Fan went back down to prepare for the next group of people who would be training their pets.


    In total, there were fifty cages in this shop, which meant that Lin Fan actually had space to train fifty pets. The only reason that he had chosen to train ten yesterday was to give the illusion that each training spot in his store would be a rare opportunity.


    Today he was nning on increasing it to twenty, but even with twenty slots, there were too many people here that would pay for that.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan decided to use a lottery system. He would let everyone draw out a ball with a number on it from a bin and then he would roll a random number that corresponded with a ball. The person that had that ball would be the one that would receive the training spot.


    That was at least what Lin Fan had nned on doing first, but there were two interruptions that came before that.


    The first was Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Taoing up to the counter.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to see them since they had beening here for three days straight now, so he just calmly looked at them and waited for them to state their intentions.


    Qiao Yi Fei was the first one to act as she took out a small item that she ced in front of Lin Fan before saying, "Here, this is for you."


    Lin Fan looked at it before asking, "What is it?"


    Qiao Yi Fei pointed at the top of the small rectangr item and said, "Look carefully and you''ll see."


    Lin Fan picked up the small rectangr item and then he realized that this was his Hunter License.


    He had thought that it would take several more days before he would receive it, but it seemed like the Hunters Organization was much more efficient than he thought.<sub> </sub>


    What he didn''t know was that he was a special case.


    Old woman Mao and old man Qiao had specially rushed out his card since they wanted to make sure that he was marked as one of theirs, especially after they had heard about his shop. The other three who had passed with him, the paperwork for their license hadn''t even been started yet because they had focused on getting Lin Fan''s license made first.


    Lin Fan looked over the license, but since it didn''t look that special to him, he just put it away in his Storage Ring.


    Seeing that he didn''t appreciate the license at all, Qiao Yi Fei turned her head and gave a snort.


    Early this morning, old man Qiao and old woman Mao had gathered both her and Mao Tao together, telling them to work together to give this license to Lin Fan, which was why they hade over together.


    Mao Tao on the other hand didn''t mind and after seeing Lin Fan put his license away, she asked, "Owner Lin, what type of hunter do you n on bing?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a confused look and asked, "What do you mean by what type?"


    Mao Tao didn''t mind this and patiently exined, "Every hunter has something that they specialize in, which is why we say that there are different types of hunters. For example, Shi Yan who was your examiner, he''s a Ruins Hunter which means that he specializes in tracking down ruins and exploring them."


    Lin Fan gave a soft snort when heard Shi Yan''s name. After all, when he and Shi Yan had parted, they hadn''t parted on good terms. Lin Fan knew that Shi Yan would try to cause trouble for him, so he had a bad impression of him.


    Lin Fan then thought for a bit before asking, "What type of hunter are you?"


    Mao Tao was surprised to hear Lin Fan asking about her, but then she said in a proud voice, "I''m a Gourmet Hunter, just like my master. We hunt down different delicacies and give people the best meals of their lives."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before falling into thought once again. After another pause, he suddenly said, "Alright, I''ll be a Gourmet Hunter too."


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were caught off guard when Lin Fan said this.


    With the amazing training that his shop had demonstrated, they were both certain that Lin Fan would be a Beast Hunter or something simr to that. They never thought that he would take aplete 180 and be a Gourmet Hunter out of all things.


    Qiao Yi Fei was the first one toe back to her senses as she asked in a doubtful voice, "Can you even cook?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a faint smile and said, "Won''t you know in the future?"


    Both of them still had looks of doubt on their faces, but since this was Lin Fan''s decision, there really wasn''t anything that they could say to him.


    Lin Fan''s decision was actually based on what he needed in the future.


    When his subordinates came up from the lower realm and started his food business here, he would be able to use his status as a Gourmet Hunter to help promote that business. There was no need to use his status as a hunter to promote this pet store since the abilities of the system already set this store apart from the rest. That was already enough for his pet store to be famous.


    It was different for his food business because that business wasn''t something that was run by the system, which meant that it didn''t have a cheat that made it the best. Lin Fan had tasted Mao Tao''s cooking and he knew that it was better than the imitation that he made.


    The only thing special about his food business was that he had recipes that others didn''t. If it wasn''t for the fact that no one else knew how to make the food products that he sold, perhaps someone would have already swooped in and taken his business.


    As a Gourmet Hunter, he would have ess to the food knowledge stored in the Hunters Organization and he could use that to develop his own recipes.


    Now to mention that he had already seen how strong the advertising effect of being a Gourmet Hunter was on the first day he opened the store. He had seen just how influential the name Ghost Chef had been.


    It wouldn''t hurt to have the same kind of advertising for his food business.


    After deciding what type of hunter he was about to be, Lin Fan prepared to start drawing for training spots.


    However, before he could, there was someone who ran into the store who stopped him.

 Chapter 537 First Ban (1)

    This person was clearly a young master based on his appearance and it was also very clear that he was a very arrogant young master.


    He didn''t even bother looking at anyone else in the store when he came in, his eyes only fell onto Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao. After all, this was the only reason that he hade to this store today.


    He didn''t even bother investigating what kind of store this was, but when he had heard his subordinates mention that Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao had beening to this store for two days in a row, he had immediately ced his subordinates outside. When they arrived, those subordinates had sent him this information and he had rushed over, which was why he had only arrived now.


    But as soon as he did arrive, the people outside the store had immediately made way for him as well because he was someone who was famous in this city.


    This young master''s name was He Yong and he was the son of the Harmony City City Lord.


    As Harmony City was jointly established by the twelve great factions, naturally none of these factions could allow one faction to rule over the entire city. However, since the investment for this city was split twelve ways, it also meant that not a single faction had invested enough that they would send resources to help manage the city.


    The problem was that this was a city that they had jointly established, which meant that this was still a big issue of reputation. If this city wasn''t properly managed, it would be a p to their collective faces, so they couldn''t just leave it alone either.


    Since this city wasn''t worth managing personally and they couldn''t just ignore it, they chose a very simple solution of using a third party to manage this city.


    The third party that they chose was the person who was now the City Lord of Harmony City.


    This was a situation that was simr to Qing Ao''s Kunlun Mountains.


    The City Lord of Harmony City was someone who once was and still was considered a renowned expert, so the twelve great factions had jointly presented him with Harmony City as his territory.


    Of course, the City Lord of Harmony City wasn''t someone who was as strong as Qing Ao, so it was more of he was hired by the twelve great factions to manage Harmony City for them. But he had his pride, so it was announced as the twelve great factions presenting him this territory.


    Still no matter what the rtionship between the City Lord and the twelve great factions was, there was no doubt that he was a very influential person in Harmony City.


    So while in Harmony City, there was no one that dared to mess with his son which had created his arrogant personality.


    Once he came into the store, He Yong immediately came over to where Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were. He didn''t immediately say anything as he looked at them without holding back at all. There was a clear lewd look that was in his eyes as they roamed all over his body.


    Then after he was satisfied, he revealed a fake smile and said, "Fei Fei, Tao Tao, if you two wereing here, you should have told me. I had some free time, I could havee and apanied you."


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao had slight looks of disdain in their eyes, but they had been properly trained since they were young, so they were able to hold themselves back.


    Still, that didn''t mean that there was a reason for them to talk to him.


    He Yong didn''t mind this since he was already used to it. Of course, that was what he disyed on the surface. Deep down, he was really thinking, "Just keep acting tough. Once you''re mine, I''ll properly train the two of you."


    Since he wasn''t able to talk to the two of them directly, he went to find another method to show off.


    He Yong looked around and could figure out the general gist of what was happening based on the information that his subordinates had provided him with before.


    He Yong looked at Lin Fan for a bit and while thinking that he was handsome, he didn''t see him as a threat since Lin Fan was nothing more than an owner of a pet shop. Compared to him, who was the son of the City Lord, Lin Fan was nothing.


    With this thought in mind, He Yong gave a snap to Lin Fan before saying, "Owner, how many training spots does your store offer each day?"


    Lin Fan looked at He Yong for a bit before calmly saying, "There''s currently twenty spots being offered today."


    He Yong gave a nod before giving another snap and saying, "I''ll take all of them."<sub> </sub>


    Without even waiting for confirmation from Lin Fan, He Yong turned to the crowd and said, "I''ve just booked all the spots today, I think that no one minds, do they?"


    Once again, without waiting for anyone to say anything, He Yong turned to Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao to say, "Ladies, if there are any pets that you want to train, just leave it to me. I''ll give you all the spots that I have, so you can train whichever pets you¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan cut in with, "Our store only gives each customer one training spot and they will only receive that spot if they win the lottery draw."


    Everyone fell silent when they heard this, the tension in the air was almost palpable.


    The people that had been standing around the counter couldn''t help taking a step back.


    They had all allowed He Yong to do what he wanted because of his father. The City Lord was actually quite famous for being protective of his son, so no one wanted to offend He Yong over such a small matter.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t seem to understand this simple concept¡­


    No one wanted to be caught up in this mess, so they all tried to avoid making eye contact with He Yong or Lin Fan.


    He Yong turned around to look at Lin Fan with a smile on his face, but based on the look in his eyes and the vein that was pulsating on his forehead, it was clear what he was truly thinking.


    He looked at Lin Fan for a second and he realized why he didn''t like him from the moment he saw him. This person was different from everyone else who he met, he was one of those people who didn''t fear him, but rather looked down on him.


    He might have epted it if Lin Fan was like those other people, having backgrounds and abilities that far surpassed him, but he couldn''t ept this kind of gaze from what he considered to be a lowly pet store owner.


    Still, He Yong didn''t lose his temper right away as he calmly said, "I''m sorry, I don''t think I heard you correctly. Did you just say that you won''t give me all the training spots for your store?"


    Lin Fan''s expression didn''t even change as he calmly looked right into He Yong''s eyes and said, "Yes, you heard correctly. I said that our store only gives each customer one training spot and they are chosen through the lottery."


    The vein on He Yong''s forehead was throbbing even more when he heard this. There was something that he wanted to say, but the look on his face almost made it seem like he was choking on his words.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao couldn''t help slightly knitting their brows when they saw this.


    They could tell that Lin Fan wasn''t normal because of this store, but that didn''t mean that there was a reason for him to offend the City Lord through his son like this.


    Mao Tao leaned over the counter and said to Lin Fan in a low voice, "Owner Lin, you might not know who this is, but this is the son of the City Lord, He Yong. You should know who the City Lord is and what position he has in Harmony City. He is someone who is very protective of his son, so you don''t need to offend him over this small matter."


    Qiao Yi Fei then added, "Win the war and not the battle. A true man wouldn''t be petty over these small things."


    Seeing how close Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were acting with Lin Fan, He Yong''s rage reached another level.


    Without even caring about the two girls, he came up right to the counter and pointed his finger in Lin Fan''s face as he said, "You, do you know what kind of person you are offending? You''re nothing more than a lowly pet store owner and you want to embarrass me in front of everyone like this! Know your ce!"


    Lin Fan calmly swatted the finger out of his face and said, "Dear customer, if you don''t wish to follow the rules of our store, I will be forced to eject you from our store and you will be banned from ever entering this store."


    He Yong''s voice once again reached another level as he roared out, "You want to throw me out?!"


    Then he raised his right hand in the shape of a fist, bringing it back before sending it out at Lin Fan''s face while roaring, "Let''s see if you have that ability!"

 Chapter 538 First Ban (2)

    The fist was about to make contact with Lin Fan''s face, only being a few centimeters away, but Lin Fan still sat there with a calm look on his face.


    Qiao Yi Fei slightly knitted her brows when she saw this and was about to move forward to help, but Mao Tao suddenly reached her hand out to stop her.


    Mao Tao knew that He Yong wouldn''t be able to pose a threat to Lin Fan since He Yong was only barely in the Fragmented Soul Realm. Not to mention that his cultivation had beenpletely built on the foundation of pills that his father had gotten for him.


    With this kind of cultivation, he was actually weaker than most other cultivators that were at the same level.


    The only thing that Mao Tao had her doubts about was whether Lin Fan would do anything to He Yong.


    Denying his requests might be considered offending the City Lord, but it was only a minor offense. With Lin Fan''s status as a hunter, it would have been easy to settle this with the influence of the Hunters Organization.


    However, if Lin Fan were to make a move against He Yong, that would be directly offending the City Lord.


    Everyone knew that the City Lord wasn''t even willing toy a single finger on He Yong, so if even a single scratch appeared on him, it would bepletely offending the City Lord.


    Mao Tao just hoped that Lin Fan had moderation and wouldn''t hurt He Yong, but there was a part of her deep down that told her that this was impossible.


    Lin Fan just calmly watched the fist approaching his face and didn''t react at all.


    Finally, at the veryst second, right before the fist was about to make contact with Lin Fan''s face, there was an invisible force that suddenly stopped that fist.


    There was a pause of a few seconds that gave He Yong enough time to look at his own fist before there was a powerful force that suddenly sent him flying. This force was one that he couldn''t resist at all and it sent him flying right through the air,


    As he flew backwards, the door to the store that was closed suddenly opened and he was thrown onto the open space right in front of the door, sliding a few meters beforeing to a stop.


    Only then did Lin Fan stand up and walk over to stand in the doorway, looking down at He Yong who was lying there on the ground holding his arm.


    As for everyone else in the store, they all watched on in shock as Lin Fan walked over to the door.


    Not a single person could understand what had just happened, they didn''t even feel the fluctuation of life energy as that invisible force appeared in front of Lin Fan to block the blow from He Yong. At the same time, not a single person could believe what Lin Fan had just done.


    This was He Yong, the beloved son of the City Lord!


    Thest person who had even spoken fiercely with him had their entire family destroyed by the full might of the City Lord.


    How would the City Lord react now that his son had been beaten like this?


    Many of the people outside started to leave because they didn''t want to get caught up in this mess, but there were also those people who smelled an opportunity to stay. If they were to help He Yong at this time, it would be a good chance to hug the City Lord''s leg.


    It took a few seconds for He Yong to react, but the moment that he did, he became screaming.


    As a pampered young master, pain was a truly rare experience for him, so it was something that he couldn''t take at all.


    He Yong continued screaming for a bit, but then he looked down at his arm where the pain wasing from and he began screaming even more.


    He Yong roared out in a voice that was filled with panic, "What is this? What just happened? What did that peasant do to me!"


    Looking down at his arm, he could see that it was bent in several ces and there were even bits of the bone that were sticking out. If one wasn''t used to seeing the sight of blood, they definitely would have fainted from seeing this gruesome sight.


    The only reason that He Yong didn''t faint was because the pain kept him from fainting. In fact, he had fainted twice, but he was quickly woken up by the immense pain that came from his arm again.<sub> </sub>


    After He Yong was sent flying, there were two people that suddenly appeared out of the carriage that he hade in.


    It was clear by the aura that the two of them had revealed that they were experts, but the aura that they received also showed just how much the City Lord cared about his son. Both of these experts were experts in the Child Soul Realm.


    The City Lord himself was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, so those in the Child Soul Realm could be considered his most trusted subordinates. With that being the case, he had even assigned two of them to guard his son.


    One of the two experts, one who was dressed in a traditional Hanfu robe leaned down to look at He Yong''s arm with knitted brows before saying, "This¡­Young master, we have to bring you back immediately to be treated or else you won''t be able to use that arm anymore."


    After saying this, he leaned in to help He Yong up from the ground, but He Yong waved his good hand as he shouted, "No! I won''t go back unless I make this peasant pay first! Destroy his store and cripple him for me, only then can I vent this anger that I have!"


    The expert in the Hanfu robe knitted his brows even more, but he still stood up in the end and turned to look at the store before giving a look to the other expert.


    The other expert was a person who was wearing a pure white suit with a sword at his waist and seeing this look from the expert in the Hanfu robe, he gave a nod as he headed towards the store with his handing to the de at his waist.


    When the people in the store saw this, they wanted to leave, but they couldn''t since Lin Fan was blocking the way.


    As for Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao, they both knitted their brows.


    Their grandparents had told them that Lin Fan was important to the Hunters Organization this morning and now he had offended the City Lord. Would the Hunters Organization support Lin Fan in this?


    It would be best if Lin Fan could end this with as little conflict as possible¡­


    Mao Tao came forward and was about to say something to Lin Fan, but the two experts on the other side had already begun moving.


    They didn''t want to do this, but they knew how much their boss cared about his son, even so much that they might even be punished for not following his orders. Then there was the fact that He Yong had been seriously injured, if they didn''tpletely destroy the one who had done this to him, they would have to face the City Lord''s anger as well.


    Since that was the case, there was no reason for them to let this store exist anymore.


    They could tell from the aura Lin Fan had that he was only in the Embryo Soul Realm. Since that was the case, this would be an easy matter for the two of them.


    Both of them had released their pets that had turned intow energy that surrounded their weapons. The man in the suit drew his sword while the man in the Hanfu robe pulled out a spear.


    It only took an instant to appear right in front of the store and both of them attacked with their weapons at Lin Fan who was standing in the doorway.


    As a Child Soul Realm Expert herself, Mao Tao could see through the cultivations of these two experts and that was why she was conflicted. It wasn''t her ce to make a move to protect Lin Fan, but seeing that he wasn''t doing a thing, she couldn''t help feeling worried.


    Right when she was about to make a move, when the weapons of the two experts passed through the threshold of the door, there was an invisible force that had suddenly stopped the path of the two weapons. It was just like the invisible force that had stopped He Yong''s punch earlier.


    The two experts looked at their weapons that had seemingly stopped in the air with shocked looks.


    No matter how much force they used, they were unable to make their weapons go any further to touch Lin Fan.


    Then when they were about to make another move, there was a powerful force that suddenly came from in front of them. This force was so strong that they couldn''t resist at all as they were thrown straight into the air, flying several meters as well beforending right where He Yong hadnded.


    Falling to the ground around them were scrap pieces of their own weapons that had been destroyed by that powerful force.


    Those two men couldn''t help being stunned, but then the pain kicked in.


    They both roared out in pain as they looked down at their own arms that had been bent in several different ces, just like He Yong''s arm from before.

 Chapter 539 First Ban (3)

    But as experts, the two of them had a much higher tolerance for painpared to a spoiled young master like He Yong.


    It didn''t take them long to adapt to the pain and quickly apply some first aid as they forced their life energy into their arms to suppress the injuries. However, even with this first aid, they couldn''t use their arms at all since their arms had beenpletely shattered to pieces.


    The man in the Hanfu robe turned to the man in the white suit to ask, "Did you see what happened just now?"


    The man in the white suit shook his head without saying a thing because there was nothing for him to say about this situation.


    Just what had happened to them?


    They couldn''t believe that they would be defeated by someone in the Embryo Soul Realm, not to mention that they had been beaten in a way that they couldn''t understand.


    They hadn''t felt any life energying from Lin Fan when they attacked, so they had no idea what had stopped their attacks and had harmed them to this extent.


    Lin Fan looked at the three of them on the ground for a few seconds before he took a step out of the store.


    Lin Fan was very calm as he walked out of the store, but this calm appearance made the three people on the ground panic. They couldn''t help worrying about how calm Lin Fan was.


    Lin Fan was this calm because the three of them didn''t pose a threat to him at all.


    Even if there wasn''t the defense system of the store, Lin Fan still had his way of dealing with the two Child Soul Realm Experts. However, since there were the defenses of the store, why would he waste the time and effort to take care of the two of them?


    Lin Fan calmly walked over and the three of them couldn''t help scooching back a bit, but they couldn''t go far since they were all heavily injured.


    The two Child Soul Realm Experts saw that Lin Fan was moving towards He Yong, so they moved to the side, allowing him to reach He Yong. Even though they were bodyguards, they were still human and there was nothing more important to them than their own lives. After all, humans only had that one life and could only die once, or that was the case at their level of cultivation. No one was willing to die for another if they had the choice, especially someone like He Yong.


    He Yong saw this and he panicked even more. He Yong couldn''t help stuttering both from his panic and the pain of his arm as he said, "You! Don''t youe any closer!"


    Lin Fanpletely ignored him and continued heading towards He Yong at a steady pace.


    Seeing Lin Fan calmly approaching him, there was a pressure that He Yong felt that almost made him suffocate. He looked around himself and seeing that no one wasing to help him, it pushed him over the edge. Since there was nothing he could rely on, He Yong had no choice but to use his final card.


    He Yong raised his other hand, the hand that wasn''tpletely shattered and pointed it right at Lin Fan as he shouted, "You, you, you lowly peasant, do you know what you are doing? My father is the City Lord of Harmony City, the most powerful person in this city! Do you not understand what will happen to you if you do anything to me?"


    Then he calmed down a bit as he said, "If you''re smart, you will back down now and apologize. I won''t ask for much, as long as you break one of your arms, I''ll call it even. How about it?"


    As he said this, He Yong revealed more and more of an arrogant look as he remembered his ce as a young master. He was the son of the City Lord, he was someone that all these peasants should look up to!


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows the moment that he had heard this.


    He had been nning on letting him go in the first ce, but now that he had heard what He Yong had just said, he felt like he couldn''t just let him go like this¡­


    Lin Fan stopped right in front of He Yong and when He Yong saw this, he became even more confident. He had seen plenty of people act like this before, but when his father was brought out, they always backed down and apologized.


    Feeling more confident, He Yong was about to say something else, but Lin Fan made his move first.


    Before He Yong could even react, Lin Fan''s leg had already fallen down on his only uninjured arm. It didn''t break it like the force of the store had done, but it still cleanly split the bone in the arm in half.


    As soon as Lin Fan broke He Yong''s arm, He Yong once again roared out in pain.


    Lin Fan didn''t let him continue as with a single roundhouse kick, he knocked He Yong out.<sub> </sub>


    Then he turned to the two Child Soul Realm Experts who flinched the moment he looked at them and said, "When he wakes up, tell him that he is banned from this store. We will no longer provide him with any services after this."


    Without even letting them respond, Lin Fan turned to walk back into the store, not turning back once.


    The two Child Soul Realm Experts looked at each other before both of them gave a sigh of relief.


    They didn''t know why Lin Fan had just let them go like this, but they didn''t waste any time. With a whistle, there were two more people that jumped out of the carriage that they hade in.


    These two people were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm, so they wouldn''t have been able to do anything and had been hiding in the carriage the entire time. But now that it was all over, it was their job to help the two injured Child Soul Realm Experts and the young master get back into the carriage.


    The few people who had stayed quickly spread this news all over the forums and it didn''t take long for the people who had been here before toe back. They were all curious what would happen with Lin Fan''s store next.


    After all, the person that he had just beaten up was the beloved son of the City Lord.


    It wouldn''t be strange at all if the City Lord went berserk andpletely decimated this store.


    When Lin Fan came back into the store, it didn''t take long to fill all the training spots since there were only around twenty people who were left. These were the people who had enough backing to not worry about this matter or people who had been trapped in the store when Lin Fan stood at the entrance.


    Still, now that the disturbance was gone, that didn''t stop them from getting the training spots in Lin Fan''s store.


    After everyone else left, Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei came up to the counter with knitted brows. It was clear from their expression that they were worried about Lin Fan.


    After all, he had just offended one of the few people in Harmony City that shouldn''t be offended. It would be hard for him to avoid the consequences even if he had the Hunters Organization behind him.


    Mao Tao asked in a concerned voice, "Owner Lin, did you really have to go that far? You could have just given him a light warning and ended it there. With how heavy your blows were, this matter definitely won''t end with just this."


    Lin Fan looked calm on the surface, but he gave a bitterugh deep down.


    In fact, he didn''t want to do this either, but he had no choice since this had happened in the store. The automatic defenses of the store had kicked in and there was nothing else to say after that.


    But Lin Fan also wasn''t afraid of the City Lord since he could guess what kind of cultivation he had.


    For now, he was certain that the City Lord wouldn''t tear off all face and attack him, or at least he wouldn''t because of the support of the Hunters Organization. What gave him the greatest confidence in this was the fact that Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao hade to the store three days in a row.


    This was clearly done on purpose by their grandparents, which meant that they would at least stand on his side.


    So the strongest experts that the City Lord would send would only be in the Child Soul Realm and that was what he needed right now.


    Lin Fan had plenty of experience fighting beasts that were much stronger than him, but hecked experience fighting humans with higher levels of cultivation. After all, fighting humans and fighting beasts were twopletely different things.


    As long as he had this stimulus, he was certain that he would be able to break through, which was something he needed to urgently do.


    As for everything else, it was all calcted. After all, the reputation that woulde with going against the City Lord would definitely outweigh the cons of going against the City Lord.


    But the main thing was still the fact that he had no other choice.


    Still, if life gave you lemons, you would just have to make lemonade.

 Chapter 540 Everyone’s Own Plans (1)

    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t worried, the two girls knitted their brows even more before choosing to leave right away.


    After what had just happened, they would definitely have to report back to their respective families and see how they would handle this.


    They didn''t know why Lin Fan was so important to their grandparents, but he seemed important enough. Now that he was in trouble, they would definitely want to know about this and most likely help him.


    If it was said that the two of them didn''t want to help Lin Fan either, it would be considered a lie. They had only met Lin Fan for a bit, but they felt like they could be friends with him.


    Well, one of them did want to be more than friends, but the other one was still unclear.


    But as for Lin Fan himself, he didn''t care about any of this. For now, he could see that no one else would being into his store today, so there was no need for him to keep this store open for the rest of the day. After all, the videos of what had happened with He Yong would definitely be spreading all over the forums, that meant that almost no one would dare to shop at his store before the matter was settled out of fear of offending the City Lord. It wasn''t worth it just to keep his store open for those few people since there was something else that he needed to do.


    Since he had already offended the City Lord, it meant that he would have to make his own moves to ensure his safety.


    Of course, the top priority would be to obtain information and the only people that he could rely on right now was the Xu Family.


    So after closing the store, Lin Fan immediately headed off to the Xu Family.


    ¡­


    In another part of Harmony City, there was a beast carriage that had just pulled up to a manor when someone rushed out to meet it.


    That personpletely ignored all the people who had gathered around the carriage, he even ignored the two Child Soul Realm Experts who were sitting inside as he rushed to the side of He Yong.


    He knitted his brows the moment he saw He Yong''s injuries, but he didn''t lose his temper. Instead, he had a cold look on his face that seemed like it could freeze the entire world.


    Even the people around him couldn''t help taking a step back as a chill ran down their backs.


    This person was He Wuji, the City Lord of Harmony City and the father of He Yong.


    He was filled with rage that his beloved son was in this state, but he also knew that there was no point in getting angry now without getting the information he wanted.


    He looked at the two Child Soul Realm Experts and he could tell that these two had gone all out to protect his son based on their sorry state, but he was still enraged with them because he thought that instead of his son getting hurt, it would have been better for the two of them to die instead.


    Still, without knowing the entire situation, there was nothing to gain from getting angry, so He Wuji asked, "What happened?"


    p When the two Child Soul Realm Experts heard this, they felt a chill run down their back.</anda>


    They had followed He Wuji since his days as a wandering cultivator and it had been a long time since they had heard this chill in his voice. Of course, they had never heard it directed at them before¡­


    The two Child Soul Realm Experts quickly exined what happened and when they finished, they fell silent as they waited for He Wuji to speak.


    He Wuji knew that for these two to not even sense what had happened to his son, it meant that whoever was in that store had to be an expert that might even be at his level. Not to mention that strange force that the two Child Soul Realm Experts mentioned, it was something that he couldn''t understand at all.


    It was clear that there had to be some kind of expert who was behind this store or his son would have never would have ended in this state.


    But for such an expert to appear in his city and for him to not know about it, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of regret and a bit of fear.


    What if this wasn''t just a coincidence, but their goal was to target his family?


    Could it be that this was a move from one of the twelve great factions?


    After thinking about it, he waved his hand at the two Child Soul Realm Experts to let them treat their wounds. The two Child Soul Realm Experts acted like they had just been pardoned and immediately headed into the manor.<sub> </sub>


    The City Lord stood there in thought for a bit before he also headed into the manor.


    For now, it seemed like he would have to collect information first before he made his move since the information that he had on this store was just toocking. If he were to charge in like this, he would definitely suffer a loss.


    He went into the hall of the house that he had set aside for his son and called several subordinates over. After giving them their orders, he started pacing outside of the room that his son was being treated in. To the side, his wife was crying as she kept asking him if their son was going to be alright, but there was nothing that he could say to her.


    It wasn''t just his son that he spoiled, it was also his wife.


    As an orphan, he dreamed of having a family when growing up and that was the reason why he had spoiled his son to such an extent. However, he didn''t care since he was strong enough to protect his family, so he gave them whatever they wanted.


    He had been confident that he would be able to protect his family from everything with his strength, but now that confidence had been shattered.


    After around an hour, the doctor that was inside the room finally came out. As soon as he did, he gave a sigh before shaking his head.


    Seeing this, He Wuji knitted his brows while his wife began crying once again.


    As soon as he knitted his brows, the doctor immediately felt a chill that froze his back while a piercing gaze hit him right in the front. It was like being frozen on one side while being shed to a thousand pieces on the other side.


    The doctor quickly realized his mistake and came over to report to He Wuji and his wife. The doctor said, "Lord He, it''s much worse than it seems. While the left arm seems to be a clean break, the bones in the right arm have beenpletely shattered. There''s just no way to heal it properly now since the bones have already been pushed all around the arm. If we try to remove them, we might ruin his armple¡­"


    The doctor swallowed his words when he reached the end because he could see the cold gaze that was aimed right at him. If gazes could do anything, this gaze from He Wuji would have eaten him alive.


    He Wuji took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down before saying, "Is there any way to cure him?"


    The doctor hesitated a bit before saying, "There''s no way that we can solve him with normal medicine, but if we were to use some special herbs, maybe we could cure his arm. However¡­"


    The doctor once again trailed off, but the meaning of his words were clear.


    These special herbs that he mentioned were all herbs with special healing properties that could save lives. These kinds of precious herbs were all considered treasures and the ones that were qualified to keep them were peak experts who weren''t weaker than He Wuji.


    Even if He Wuji were to ask these experts for these herbs, it was very likely that they wouldn''t give him any face because these herbs were like another life for them, so how could they give it to He Wuji to use on his son?


    He Wuji was silent for a bit before asking, "Then before that, will it affect him in any way?"


    The doctor didn''t hesitate this time as he said, "His arm will be useless unless we can remove the bone fragments, but at the very least he''ll still have one arm that he can use."


    He Wuji''s eyes became incredibly sharp and his voice was like a cier as he said, "You''re saying that it''s a good thing that my son only has one arm left?"


    The doctor wanted to say something, but he immediately swallowed his words. He knew that he had made a mistake, but there was nothing he could do here. He could only hope that He Wuji would spare him.


    He Wuji silently red at the doctor for a bit before saying in a low voice, "Scram."


    The doctor didn''t need any more encouragement as he quickly bowed and said, "Yes, yes, I will scram now."


    With that, the doctor ran out of the manor.


    The only reason He Wuji had spared this doctor was because he was the best doctor in the city and he would need him to treat his son in the future, otherwise he might have already ripped him to pieces.


    However, there was still the problem of his son¡­


    What should he do to help him?

 Chapter 541 Everyone’s Own Plans (2)

    After a bit of thought, He Wuji suddenly turned to the butler that had been waiting on the side the entire time and said, "Get me information on the herbs, I don''t want to miss a single one."


    The butler gave a bow before walking out to follow this order.


    In his arms, his wife was still crying and seeing this, He Wuji''s expression rxed as he tried tofort her.


    However, while he wasforting her, there was someone else that suddenly came into this hallway. The moment that he heard this persone in, He Wuji immediately turned to re at them with his cold gaze as he said in a dangerous voice, "What is it?"


    That person who came in couldn''t help stopping and taking a step back, but then they lowered their head and put the report in their hand in front of them as they said, "Lord He, there''s amunication request for you from the Hunters Organization."


    He Wuji immediately knitted his brows when he heard this as he thought, "Hunters Organization? What do those people want now?"


    After thinking for a bit, he asked his wife to wait for him as he followed that subordinate out to the main hall.


    Once they were in the main hall, He Wuji immediately turned around with an ice cold look and said, "Report the situation to me."


    That subordinate fell to one knee and said, "The Hunters Organization suddenly called using the official line and stated that they wanted to talk to you, my lord."


    He Wuji''s brows knitted when he heard this.


    Official line, it seemed like it was even more serious than he had thought.


    Since he was someone that was being employed by all twelve great factions to manage Harmony City, all of the factions would want a way to directly contact him if anything had happened. That was where these official lines came in.


    These were specialmunication lines that linked the City Lord to each of the twelve great factions, allowing them to pass down their instructions when they needed to. However, as for whether the City Lord would follow those instructions or not¡­That was up to his discretion.


    However, even if this was an official line, it was rarely used because the moment it was used, the other factions would learn of it since they were all connected. This was one of the failsafes put in ce to make sure that there weren''t factions that went against the other factions.


    So for the Hunters Organization to use the official line this time, it could be seen that it was serious.


    He Wuji didn''t waste any more time since he knew that the Hunters Organization was still waiting for him on the other side of the official line. While he wasn''t scared of them, it wasn''t good for him to tear off all face.


    He Wuji quickly came to the room where all twelve lines were stored and picked up the one for the Hunters Organization before saying in a polite voice, "Hello, what is the problem for you to use the official line?"


    ¡­


    After twenty minutes of waiting and ten minutes in a call, old woman Mao put down the receiver and gave a sigh.


    Old man Qiao on the side noticed this and asked, "What is it? Is he not going to y along?"


    Old woman Mao gave a shrug and said, "He''ll y along, but you should hear the anger in his voice. It''s almost like he wanted to bite right through my throat."


    Old man Qiao gave augh and said, "That kid was never good at holding back, was he?"


    Old woman Mao didn''t reply to this and instead, she gave a sigh before saying, "That Xiao Lin, he really is something. My old heart really can''t take any more surprises from him."


    Old man Qiaoughed even harder as he said, "That Xiao Lin really gave us an interesting surprise this time. He''s even strong enough to defeat two Child Soul Realm Experts, it seems like my eyes were right about him, ha, ha, ha!"


    Old woman Mao red at old man Qiao before saying, "You, you, you, do you even think about all the work I have to do to take care of this?"


    Old man Qiao said with a smirk, "Well, that''s just the duty of the president. Good luck with that."


    Old woman Mao gave a snort and said, "Maybe I''ll retire then. I''m sure they''ll be happy to make you the next president."


    Old man Qiao stoppedughing and he raised his hand to stop her while saying, "If they do, I''ll retire as well."


    Old woman Mao saw the serious look he had and then she gave a sigh before saying, "Even if it is a joke, we can''t both retire just yet. If we did, the Hunters Organization wouldn''tst. The younger generation just aren''t ready to step up just yet."


    When old man Qiao heard this, he didn''t say anything in response. The only thing he did was give a sigh and reveal a look that made it clear that he agreed with her.


    The Hunters Organization wasn''t what it used to be, there was ack of new talent, so they were no longer as powerful as they once were. Otherwise, how could there be people foolish enough to have plots under the nose of the Hunters Organization.<sub> </sub>


    After a moment of silence, old woman Mao revealed a serious look and said, "But speaking of this, did you see the report?"


    Old man Qiao revealed a confused look as he said, "No, what did it say?"


    Old woman Mao said in a slow and deliberate voice, "They mentioned that He Wuji had been making contact with Shi Yantely¡­"


    Old man Qiao couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as he said, "I really don''t know if I can call Xiao Lin lucky or unlucky."


    ¡­


    On the other side, He Wuji was fuming after he had finished the call with the Hunters Organization, but there was still something more pressing to deal with.


    He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down before heading back to where his son was.


    His son was still unconscious and before he was certain that his son was safe, he didn''t have the heart to deal with any of this.


    As soon as he arrived in the room that his son was resting in, he immediately heard someone call out, "Papa!"


    The moment He Wuji heard this, his face lit up since this was a voice that he couldn''t be more familiar with.


    Pushing the maids that were by the bed aside, he leaned down beside the bed to look at his son who had woken up. Seeing him all wrapped up in bandage, there was a part of his heart that broke.


    He hadn''t even been willing to hit his son and now someone else had dared to beat him up?


    If he didn''t get revenge, he wouldn''t consider himself a man anymore.


    However, when he thought of the call that he had just had, he couldn''t help feeling frustrated.


    That was right, he couldn''t be considered a man since he couldn''t take revenge.


    Looking at his son, his eyes rxed as he asked, "Ah Yong, are you alright? How do you feel right now?"


    He Yong had a tearful look as he said, "Papa, it still hurts all over! Make the pain go away!"


    He Wuji''s wife came forward and hugged her son with tears in her eyes, but there was nothing she could say to him.


    He Wuji gave a sigh and said, "Papa is trying his best, but it''s not easy to cure this."


    He Yong then revealed a look of rage as he roared out, "That peasant, it''s all that peasant''s fault! Papa, you have to take revenge for me! Please drag him in front of me and let me take care of him myself!"


    He Wuji knitted his brows when he heard this and he didn''t say a thing, but his wife could tell that something was wrong.


    He Wuji''s wife said in a sharp, "What''s wrong? Are you going to tell me that you''re not even going to take revenge for our precious baby? What kind of a man are you if you can''t even take revenge for your son?"


    If it was anyone else, He Wuji wouldn''t have let them talk to him like this. If it was anyone else, they would already be dead, but this was his darling wife¡­


    He Wuji gave a sigh before saying, "It''s not that simple, there''s other forces getting involved and they''re protecting that fellow. Not to mention that there''s the unknown expert in his store who is protecting him. If I were to charge in without any information, it wouldn''t end well."


    He Wuji''s wife knitted her brows and asked, "Who is interfering? Aren''t you the City Lord of Harmony City? Is that just an empty title?"


    He Wuji looked at his wife for a bit before leaning in to say in a low voice, "It''s the Hunters Organization, they called with the direct line."


    He Wuji''s wife knitted her brows even more when she heard this before she said in a low voice as well, "They''re going this far to protect him? Just who is the owner of this store?"


    He Wuji shook his head and said, "I don''t know, I just know that it''s not someone who''s easy to deal with this time¡­"


    He Wuji''s wife then asked, "What do you n on doing then?"


    He Wuji fell into thought for a bit before suddenly asking, "Do you remember your cousin Shi Yan?"

 Chapter 542 Angel Egg

    He Wuji''s wife was surprised when she heard him ask this question, but then she asked back, "What about him?"


    He Wuji was silent for a bit before suddenly saying, "I''ve heard rumours that he''s up to something and it''s rted to the Hunters Organization. If we work with him, perhaps we can take care of two birds with one stone."


    He Wuji''s wife''s eyes lit up as she said, "Right, Xiao Yan mentioned that to mest time and he asked me to talk to you about it, but Ipletely forgot. If we work with Xiao Yan¡­"


    Seeing that the two of them were being all quiet, He Yong couldn''t take it anymore as he said, "Mama, papa, what are you two talking about? Are you going to help me take revenge or not?"


    When they heard the voice of their son, the two of them turned back and He Wuji said, "Ah Yong, papa will do what he can, but it''ll take longer than usual. Can you wait a few days?"


    He Yong revealed a dissatisfied look when he heard this and he pouted his lips as he said, "I can''t wait that long, I want to take my revenge now. Whenever I think of that b*stard, my arm itches. I can''t wait to tear him to pieces."


    He Wuji didn''t care at all how terrible his son''s personality was as he tried to persuade him like he was persuading a child, "Papa is doing his best, but it really is hard this time. Ah Yong, can you just give papa some time?"


    He Yong pouted his lips even more, but he still said, "Alright, I can give papa some time, but papa, can you give me a few more toys? I broke thest ones and I need a few recements. I don''t need that many, just ten of them will do."


    He Wuji''s face lit up when he heard this and he patted He Yong''s head as he said, "Ah Yong is so understanding. Of course you can have as many toys as you want."


    He Yong''s face also lit up when he heard this and he tried to sit up to give his dad a hug, but then he winced from the pain that came from his arm.


    Seeing this, both of his parents immediately came forward with concerned looks on their faces.


    He Wuji''s wife gently held He Yong and said, "Ah Yong, take care of yourself. There''s no need to worry, your papa will take care of everyone."


    He Wuji also said, "Ah Yong, just rest, papa will take care of everything."


    Then leaving his son to rest, he turned to the two maids on the side and said, "Bring up ten toys from the dungeon and make sure that they''re clean. If anything goes wrong, you know what will happen to you."


    The two maids suddenly shivered when they heard this.


    Both of them quickly gave bows and said, "Yes, master!"


    They were very clear on what kind of punishment they would receive because they''ve seen other maids receiving this punishment. They had seen those other maids being dragged down into the dungeons¡­


    He Wuji paid no mind to these maids as they quickly headed off as he came back to the side of He Yong''s bed. He patted his son on the head before saying, "Rest up first and then you can yter."


    He Yong''s eyes lit up when he heard this and he said in a happy voice, "Yay! Papa is the best!"


    After that though, there was a lewd look that appeared on his face as his mind ran wild.


    However, neither of his parents looked like they noticed a thing.


    Perhaps that was because in their eyes, their son could do no wrong¡­


    ¡­


    Back in the pet shop, Lin Fan had juste back from the Xu Family Manor.


    He had given many tasks to the Xu Family and now all he could do was wait for them to being back the information that he needed.


    Of course, now that Brainy had be much stronger, he also gave the Xu Family a few of Brainy''s seeds to use just in case they needed them. After all, there was nothing that was more effective at getting information than Brainy''s seeds.


    Now that he was back in the store, Lin Fan put the pets into the shadow cultivation rooms as per usual before heading up to the third floor.


    This was a floor that wasn''t open to the public because this was a ce that held a very special facility. This was the floor with the special incubation room.


    When Lin Fan had returned from the Light Sanctuary a few days ago, the first thing he had done was ce the angel egg that he had brought back with him into the incubation chamber. It had been several days now and it had taken several wisp corpses to feed the process, but now it was finally close to hatching.


    It had to be known that each of these wisp corpses were materials from the realm above the Soul Realm, but all of them hadn''t been able to provide enough energy for the angel egg.


    It was clear just how powerful the angel egg was.


    But it was to be expected from the descendant of a ruler.


    After waiting for a few minutes, the egg finally hatched and revealed the form of the baby angel to Lin Fan. However, the moment that he saw the true form of the baby angel, Lin Fan was stunned.<sub> </sub>


    No matter how he looked at it, he couldn''t help feeling that it seemed very familiar, like he had seen it many times before.


    Well, maybe he had seen it before¡­


    It was a little yellow round thing and the most defining features that it had were the two long ears on its head and the ''Z'' shaped tail on its back.


    However, when he looked closely, he couldn''t help feeling that it was quite different from the one that he remembered.


    The biggest difference was¡­that it was fatter. It was much rounder than the one that he remembered from earth¡­


    Lin Fan shook his head and threw this thought out of his mind as he opened up the system''s interface to check the status of this baby angel.


    Archangel (Young)


    Grade: Divine (God Kin)


    Cultivation: Fragmented Soul Realm


    Bloodline: Angel of Light


    Skills: Sealed (Not developed yet)


    Combat Strength: 1000


    System''s Comments: Strong rmendation to focus training, please don''t waste heavenly treasures


    As he read through the status of the baby angel, there were two things that stood out.


    The first one was the grade of the baby angel.


    The words God Kin stood out more than anything.


    If his understanding of the words God Kin were correct, wouldn''t that mean that this baby angel would be able to reach the God Realm when it grew up?


    That also meant that the ruler of the Light Sanctuary, who was the ancestor of this baby angel, wasn''t also in the God Realm?


    Just what had happened to their realm that even a god had fallen?


    Still the fact that this was a possible God Realm pet excited Lin Fan since he would need all the help that he could get in the future. He was almost certain that he would have to fight gods when the time came¡­


    Lin Fan patted the little baby angel on the head before feeding it a few more wisp corpses which it happily swallowed. Though watching it swallow the wisp corpses was definitely a strange sight.


    The little baby angel sucked in the wisp corpses and thenpletely disappeared into its mouth. It reminded Lin Fan of another little pink ball that could do the same thing¡­


    Once this was taken care of, Lin Fan put the sleeping baby angel into his pet space before starting his cultivation.


    It had been a few days now and both Momonga and Ang hadn''t been back yet, so Lin Fan was getting a bit worried. At the very least they should have contacted him to tell him that they were fine, but he had received no notice from them at all.


    Still, if there really was a problem, he would be able to see through the system interface and he could go to their worlds right away, so he just chose to believe in them.


    The most important thing was to break through and he could only do that by cultivating or doing missions for the system, but the system hadn''t released another mission yet.


    Lin Fan felt that this was very strange because every time that he had gotten a new store or something simr, the system would have issued a mission to him, but this time it was strangely quiet. It was almost as if it was biding its time to give him a big mission¡­


    The night passed and the next day came.


    The amount of customers had clearly decreasedpared to yesterday, but the quality of the customers had increased.


    All of these customers were rich people who weren''t here just to have fun, but actually looked carefully over Lin Fan''s products. There were even people who had brought alchemists to check Lin Fan''s pet food and they quickly discovered the specialty of the pet food.


    After discovering this though, they didn''t tell anyone and bought as much of it as they could for themselves, it was just too bad that there was a limit to how many one could buy in Lin Fan''s store each day.


    Just like this, the days passed in a peaceful manner, but then when it rained, it poured.

 Chapter 543 Sudden Developments (1)

    The first thing that came was a notice from the Xu Family.


    They reported to Lin Fan that there was another force that was harassing their businesses which had caused quite arge loss for them.


    When they did their investigations into this force, they found that it could be traced back to the City Lord.


    It seemed like the City Lord had already discovered the connection between him and Xu Family, so he was already making his move. However, Lin Fan was surprised that the City Lord only made a small move like this.


    The City Lord didn''t even send out any of the experts under him, instead they just used their influence to make things harder for the businesses of the Xu Family. From using his position as the City Lord to pass policies that suppressed their business to inciting thepetition to work together against them, he had used all these methods to attack the Xu Family.


    But in the end, this almost seemed petty for someone as important as him.


    This was also something that confused Lin Fan.


    For someone like the City Lord to act this way, it either meant that there was someone else pressuring him or this was all part of his n.


    But Lin Fan had no idea what it really was because of hisck of information.


    Still, that was only the least of his worries because there were other things that also came along at the same time.


    The store had been calm for the first few days it opened, but with the reputation that it had established, it had caught the attention of certain people.


    Each of the twelve great factions had their own people in Harmony City, so of course they quickly received information on Lin Fan''s store. However, no one had wanted to act rashly, so they had been investigating Lin Fan''s store over the past few days.


    The store that he was currently using had once belonged to the Ghost Chef, Qiao Yi Yin, so there were guesses that this store was somehow rted to the Hunters Organization. However, after they had investigated this store, they had found that it wasn''t rted to the Hunters Organization.


    Well, to say it wasn''t rted at all would be wrong since Lin Fan was a hunter, but there were plenty of hunters that didn''t belong to the inner circle of the Hunters Organization. The Hunter License was just a very convenient thing to have, so there were plenty of people who had gotten the Hunter License without any intention to join the Hunters Organization.


    Once they knew that Lin Fan was one of those people, they naturally all sent people to pull Lin Fan into their own organizations.


    By some strange coincidence, they all came on the exact same day.


    When they arrived and saw each other, they looked at each other with wary looks. But this wasn''t strange at all since they were herepeting against each other.


    It was clear why they hade, so they all had to make sure that they would be able to gain something that the others couldn''t today.


    When Lin Fan opened the door that morning, the first thing these young masters from branches of the twelve great factions came in and began looking around the store. They didn''t even bother with Lin Fan, instead it was almost as if there was someone particr that they were looking for.


    That was because they hade to the wrong conclusion after seeing the information on this store that their subordinates had brought them.


    They had seen how young and unknown Lin Fan was and had immediately written him off as the expert. They all believed that there was another expert that was behind this store and Lin Fan was nothing more than a front man for that expert.


    As long as they were able to find that expert and negotiate with them, it would be easy for them to take over this store.


    After all, they represented the twelve great factions. There were no greater organizations in this entire Gctic Humanity Alliance whenpared to them. As for outside of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, that was hard to say.


    However, this expert had chosen to stay in their realm, so they would at least give them face as the most powerful organizations in this realm.


    Lin Fan noticed these strange customers, but he ignored them. That was he tried to ignore them until they chose to seek their own deaths.


    As they were going around, they noticed out of the corner of their eyes that Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were at the counter chatting with Lin Fan.


    As residents of Harmony City, naturally they knew the fame of these two beauties. There were even some among them that had tried to be their suitors before, but they had been shot down before they could even step through the door. After all, the suitors that these two beauties had were on apletely different level.


    They were the young masters from the main branches of the twelve great factions.<sub> </sub>


    These two beauties were from the families that made up the leadership of the Hunters Organization, so it could be said that their backing wasn''tcking. They were indeed on the same level as the young masters from the main branches of the twelve great factions.


    However, even if they couldn''t be suitors, they still admired these two beauties.


    They had guessed that the Hunters Organization had sent these two to seduce Lin Fan and to build rtions with his master behind him, which they could respect as a smart n, but to use these two beauties¡­


    It was casting pearls before swine!


    How could someone as lowly as Lin Fan be worthy of these two?


    He was nothing more than someone who was lucky enough to be chosen by the expert as a pawn, he had no merit of his own that was worthy of this treatment!


    So there were a few young masters that were quite jealous of Lin Fan.


    Eventually, one of the young masters came over and cut into the conversation between Lin Fan and the two beauties.


    That young master came right up to the counter and stood in between Lin Fan and the two beauties, not even sparing a nce to Lin Fan as he said, "Miss Qiao, miss Mao, it is truly lovely to see you again. May I have the pleasure of inviting you to some tea."


    The way he acted was like he didn''t even notice that Lin Fan had existed. To him, Lin Fan was nothing more than air.


    However, Lin Fan found it funny when he saw this because he had seen plenty of these people back on earth. He knew that there wasn''t a good fate for him because he knew how terrifying these girls were.


    Lin Fan was right, there was no need for him to do anything as Mao Tao took the lead to punish this young master.


    Mao Tao narrowed her eyes and sized this young master up before suddenly giving a cold snort.


    When the young master heard this, there was a bit of anger that appeared in his heart since this snort had hurt his pride. Even if he wasn''t one of the young masters from the main branch, he was still someone from one of the twelve great factions.


    But he knew what the status of the girl in front of him was, so he held himself back.


    Instead, the young master did something that was the opposite of how he felt.


    He said in a concerned voice that made him sound like a gentleman, "Miss Mao, is there something wrong with your throat? Do you need me to help you look it over?"


    As he said this, he also started to move closer. It was clear by the way his hands were moving, he had impure thoughts. However, the other young masters that were around had a trace of admiration in their eyes.


    They had all hit on girls before and seeing the techniques of this young master, they couldn''t help praising him. He could be considered one of the best among them with how smooth he made it all seem.


    Mao Tao gave an even heavier snort before suddenly flicking her hand, bringing out a whip that suddenly wrapped around the head of the young master.


    The young master was surprised, but then he said in a gentle voice, "Miss Mao, is this what you''re into? I''m not saying that I''m against it, but to do this in public, it seems a bit wrong, don''t you think? How about we¡­"


    Before he could even finish, Mao Tao had already flicked her wrist and cracked the whip, sending the young master flying into the air.


    Mao Tao was in the Child Soul Realm while this young master was only in the Embryo Soul Realm, there was no doubt who would be the winner if the two of them fought.


    But the funny thing was that the young master had a shocked look in his eyes, as if he couldn''t believe what had just happened. He had beenpletely confident that he had made all the right moves, so why did she suddenly attack him?


    Mao Tao flicked her wrist again and sent the young master flying right into the ground, but before he could hit the ground, there was an invisible force that suddenly cushioned his fall.


    No one had been able to react at first, but then Mao Tao turned to look at Lin Fan who had his hand raised.


    Lin Fan looked right back at her and said, "Stop."

 Chapter 544 Sudden Developments (2)

    When Lin Fan spoke, Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei had looks of shock on their faces.


    Even the surrounding people had surprised looks on their faces.


    It was clear that Mao Tao wasn''t only taking care of this young master because he was bugging her, but rather because she was taking out the trash for Lin Fan. Lin Fan would definitely have scruples taking care of this person himself, but it was a different story for Mao Tao because of her status.


    As the granddaughter of the president of the Hunters Organization, she had a status that surpassed the status of this young master.


    When the young master saw this, he was surprised at first, but he quickly revealed a smile as he turned to Lin Fan to say, "You, not bad. It seems like you''re not as dumb as you look, you can understand how to curry favour. Good, as long as you give me this store, I can¡­"


    But before he could finish posturing, Lin Fan''s next words made him swallow the rest of what he wanted to say. In fact, Lin Fan''s words had made the expression on his face freeze beforepletely crumbling apart.


    Lin Fan didn''t even bother looking at the young master as he said to Mao Tao, "Don''t make a mess in here. If you''re going to do it, do it outside."


    Mao Tao once again revealed a shocked look, but then she looked like she slowly understood what Lin Fan was saying as she revealed a smile, "Sure Owner Lin, I''ll help you take out the trash."


    Then in front of the young master''s stunned expression, Mao Tao''s whip wrapped right around his neck, lifting him into the air as she walked out of the store with him behind her.


    There was no need to see what was happening outside to know what Mao Tao did with the young master, just the sounds that rang out were more than enough.


    Then when she came in with a bit of blood on her cheek, there were some people who even took a step back in fear.


    Lin Fan saw this and took a tissue from beside him which he handed her as he said, "There''s something on your cheek."


    Mao Tao took the tissue with a bit of a slight blush on her face as she said, "Thank you."


    Then she wiped her face in a manner that waspletely opposite to how she had acted just now.


    However, this was enough to show everyone the attitude the Hunters Organization had towards Lin Fan. They wanted him, so much so that they didn''t care about offending the other twelve great factions for him.


    That just made everyone even more interested in Lin Fan, or rather the expert who was really in charge of this store.


    Just who was this mysterious expert?


    Still, no one dared to look down on Lin Fan anymore since Mao Tao was still here. They might be young masters from the twelve great factions, but they were only from branch families, so the training that they received wasn''t as good as the core members. Most of them were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm, so of course they weren''t a match for Mao Tao.


    The ones that had been thinking about going forward to take care of Lin Fan now had a different idea after that one person took the initiative to be an example for them.


    The day passed just like that, with no one really making a move.


    A few of them dide over to talk to Lin Fan, but they just asked a few simple questions before leaving.


    When the end of the day came, that was when the third sudden development came.


    When the store was about to close, there were two unexpected customers that suddenly came through the door.


    Lin Fan was heading over to lock the door when they suddenly came in. Out of habit, Lin Fan said, "Sorry, we''re closed¡­"


    But when he saw who they were, he stopped moving towards the door as he revealed a surprised look.


    The two who had juste in were old man Qiao and old woman Mao.


    Old man Qiao looked at Lin Fan with a smile on his face as he said, "Are we not wee?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Of course not elder, you''re always wee. It''s just that the store is closing, so I won''t be able to provide you with any services."


    Both of them gave augh before old man Qiao said, "We''re just here to see the store. After all, this used to be my store, don''t you know?"


    Lin Fan nodded as he led the two of them around the store. Of course, he didn''t forget to lock the door behind them to make sure that no one else coulde in.<sub> </sub>


    As he led them around the store, the two of them had surprised looks.


    The store waspletely different from how it had looked when old man Qiao left it. He knew since it was his store, so he had sent people to check on it from time to time.


    However, with how much the store had changed, they were shocked by what they saw. Not to mention when they saw the second floor, they noticed that there were faint fluctuations of spatial energy warping the very space inside of the store.


    Even with their cultivation levels, they couldn''t tell what level thews were to warp the inside of the store like this.


    It seemed like they hadpletely underestimated Lin Fan, the backing that was behind him was possibly beyond this realm¡­Or he might be using some kind of special artifact for this store.


    Still, either way, it meant that there was something special about him and their decision wasn''t wrong.


    After touring the store, Lin Fan brought them back to the first floor where they took a seat at the table by the counter.


    While sitting there, Lin Fan brought out some tea that he had just prepared, but this was tea that waspletely different from anything that they had in this upper realm. It was something that Lin Fan had found by identst time in the Kunlun Mountains and it had taken him some time to prepare it, but now it was ready to be unveiled. However, before selling them, he wanted to test it with the two of them to see if it was any good.


    After taking a single sip, old man Qiao''s eyes lit up.


    As a Gourmet Hunter, he could easily tell that this tea was different from anything that he had before and he didn''t hold back with his praise.


    Old man Qiao said with a voice filled with praise, "Good tea!"


    He quickly finished off the rest of his cup and turned to Lin Fan to ask, "Little friend Lin, where did you get this tea?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile as he said, "It was just something that I found while exploring. I''m d to hear that you like it."


    Old man Qiao quickly said, "Like it? This tea has a taste that I''ve never tasted before. It has an earthy taste that also has a hint of sweetness to it, it''spletely different from the normal taste of tea. You have to tell me where you found it."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile and said, "This is just something that I found in the wild and I''m afraid I took thest of it. I can''t really tell you where to find more of this."


    Old man Qiao had a disappointed look as he said, "So it''s like this¡­"


    Of course, Lin Fan hadn''t beenpletely truthful because he did find the tree that produced these tea leaves and he had brought them back with him. While he couldn''t tell him where to find more of these tea leaves, he definitely could give him more tea leaves.


    So Lin Fan said, "I still have some of the tea leaves left, how about I give you some?"


    Old man Qiao''s eyes lit up once again as he said, "Is this true? Of course I''ll take them."


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "I''ll give them to you when you leave."


    It wasn''t hard to hear the meaning in his words, he was changing the conversation to the main topic, which was why they hade to visit him. It was clear that they weren''t just here to visit him and see the store.


    Since Lin Fan had taken the initiative, they didn''t shy away from it.


    This time it wasn''t old man Qiao who spoke, it was old woman Mao who said, "Little friend Lin, I''ve heard that a few friends of yours have met with some problems recently?"


    Hearing this, Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows.


    It wasn''t the fact that she knew this that surprised him, but rather it was the fact that she had chosen to mention this.


    For an organization as big as the Hunters Organization, there was no need for them to pay attention to a small family like the Xu Family, not to mention bringing it up in conversation like this.


    What was she nning to do by mentioning the Xu Family?


    After a period of silence, Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "Yes, they''ve met some problems recently, but it''s not something that they can''t handle."


    Old woman Mao gave a nod, but then she said, "Then can we ask you for a favour?"

 Chapter 545 Sudden Developments (3)

    Lin Fan knitted his brows the moment he heard this.


    He already had some guesses as to why they would mention the Xu Family, but he never thought that they would be this direct.


    Still, it wasn''t a bad thing to be direct sometimes because he was looking for a way to help the Xu Family. If the Hunters Organization was willing to make a move, it would definitely be enough to stop the City Lord''s harassment of the Xu Family''s businesses.


    That also depended on what kind of favour they were looking to ask him for, after all, he couldn''t just do whatever they wanted for this help.


    After thinking for a bit to weigh the pros and cons, Lin Fan finally asked, "What kind of favour are you asking for?"


    Old woman Mao revealed a faint smile as she said, "It''s not that big of a deal, we''re just looking to ask you to escort our granddaughters to a banquet."


    Lin Fan had thought of all the different things that they could have asked for, but this was the one scenario that he never would have thought of. After all, it was just too strange of a request that Lin Fan would have guessed that this would be their favour.


    Lin Fan sat there in a daze for a bit before asking, "Banquet? Are we talking about the same kind of banquet here?"


    ? Old woman Mao gave a nod and said, "An acquaintance of ours is holding a banquet for the younger generation and they invited our granddaughters. Of course, we don''t feel assured in letting them go alone, so we wanted to get an escort for them."


    Old man Qiao added, "You''re someone that we trust, so we want you to escort them to this banquet. You just have to bring them there and make sure that no one gets close, then bring them back. It''s very simple."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at them as if he was trying to find what was wrong with this situation, but there didn''t seem to be anything wrong.


    Even so, he couldn''t help shaking the strange feeling that he had that something was off. After all, this seemed just too good to be true.


    There had to be something that was special about this banquet or they were trying to use him as a scapegoat to help their granddaughters get rid of one of their suitors that they couldn''t get rid of with a normal method.


    Still feeling that this would be more of a pain than he expected, Lin Fan still agreed to it in the end.


    Lin Fan nodded as he said, "Alright, I can help them with that. When is it?"


    Old woman Mao gave a p before saying, "Good, little friend Lin''s response really is quite refreshing. There''s no hesitation in this reply at all!"


    Old man Qiao ignored her and said, "It''ll be in three days. We''ll send a carriage to pick you up after your store closes and you can head off with the two of them to the banquet. I''m sure you''ll have a good time."


    Lin Fan just nodded without saying anything since he felt like there was nothing else he could say.


    There was a small dirty feeling inside of him that almost seemed like he had sold something that he shouldn''t have, but there was nothing he could do about it.


    The three of them chatted for a bit longer before the two elders stood up and left the store.


    Lin Fan sat there for a bit before he also closed the store and headed off to the Xu Family.


    Since hecked information, the only thing he could do was get information. He didn''t know a thing about this banquet, so he would have the Xu Family find out what they could in the next three days. At the very least, it was better than sitting around here doing nothing.


    After all, knowledge was power and having this information would help him decide what to do at the banquet.


    ¡­


    On the other side, in the Qiao Family''s beast carriage, the two elders had been sitting there in silence.


    They continued to sit in silence until they arrived at the Hunters Organization branch in Harmony City.<sub> </sub>


    The two of them headed into the building and without even bothering to check in at the counter, they walked right through the lobby to the elevator. No one in this lobby tried to stop them because they recognized the badges that they had on their chests.


    This was a Two Star and a Three Star Hunter, there was no doubt that they were people with important statuses in the Hunters Organization. No one was willing to offend them just for something small like this.


    The elevator came up to the very top floor and the two of them walked down the hall to the door at the end. Pushing the door open, there was a conference room that was revealed where there were already people sitting there waiting for them.


    The two elders took their ces at the head of the table and then after settling, old woman Mao asked, "What is the situation?"


    The one to report was the red haired woman who had gone with them to the Hunters Examst time.


    She sat up in the chair that she had been leaning in and put a document on the table which she slid over before saying, "We''ve caught Shi Yan''s tail, he''ll definitely be going to the banquet in three days. As long as we know where he is, we''ll be able to capture him."


    Old woman Mao looked at the document that had been slid over to her before shaking her head, "No, we''re not making a move on Shi Yan yet. We still need to find out who he''s working for."


    The red haired woman knitted her brows when she heard this before saying in a frustrated voice, "President, we''ve already been chasing Shi Yan for this long, we can''t just keep letting him run free like this. You should know how many people we''ve lost over this, how can I make it up to them if we don''t get him!"


    Old woman Mao raised her hand and moved it in an up and down motion to signal for the red haired woman to calm down before saying, "I know how you are feeling, but it isn''t the right time just yet."


    Then she turned to the rest of the table and said, "We''ve gotten Xiao Lin to go to the banquet in three days. When Shi Yan sees him there, there will be no doubt that he will send his people after him. As long as we can capture them, we''ll be able to find who the person behind all of this is."


    As she said this, old man Qiao knitted his brows.


    He had known that this was their n all along since he had gone with old woman Qiao to see Lin Fan, but he still had his doubts about this n. No matter how he looked at it, this n was just too dangerous because it was directly exposing Lin Fan to danger.


    He was fine with using Lin Fan as bait for Shi Yan because it was just letting Shi Yane to Lin Fan and they hadpletely surrounded Lin Fan''s shop with guards. As long as Shi Yan came, he would be immediately taken down by the guards that had been waiting for him.


    However, this was sending Lin Fan into Shi Yan''s clutches instead of waiting for Shi Yan toe to them.


    Even if they would be assigning guards, this was much more risky than waiting for Shi Yan to fall into his trap.


    Old woman Mao could see the look on old man Qiao''s face and after giving a sigh, she said, "Old Qiao, you should know that this is the safest way. You should have seen Xiao Lin''s abilities, he was even able to take out two Child Soul Realm Experts that easily. I''m sure that he won''t be in any danger."


    Seeing that old man Qiao still had the same look on his face, old woman Mao said, "We''ll be sure topensate him properly after this matter is over, you don''t need to worry about this. You know how important this is to our Hunters Organization and you know that I would do this differently if there was a better way, but this is the only way that we have."


    Old man Qiao gave a sigh before saying, "There''s nopensation that can be given for a dead life, who would you give thatpensation to? Not to mention that there''s that expert behind him. If anything were to happen to Xiao Lin, you can be sure that we won''t hear the end of it that easily."


    Old woman Mao knitted her brows when hearing this and she began thinking of what she saw in Lin Fan''s store today.


    Then she also gave a sigh before saying, "This is what we have to do, there''s no other way around this. I''ll make sure that everything goes perfectly and that Lin Fan is safe, you don''t need to worry about anything."


    Old man Qiao looked at her and said, "I hope that you''re right about this. I have a bad feeling about this."


    Old woman Mao looked at him before turning back to talk to everyone else without responding to him.


    Everyone had pretended not to notice the conversation between the two of them because they knew that it wasn''t their ce to cut in.


    Soon, their n had been set and everyone had been dismissed.


    Old man Qiao took onest look at the n they had drawn up and said, "I hope that this bad feeling is just me being paranoid."

 Chapter 546 Banquet (1)

    Three days passed very quickly when nothing happened.


    Lin Fan ran the store as normal and as the days went by, he included more and more training spots until he reached his max of fifty.


    It was possible for him to increase that by buying more cages from the system, but he chose not to do so since he felt that it was just the right number.


    If he were to give more spots, it wouldn''t feel as special since it wasn''t limited. The more limited something was, the more people felt that it was special because it was considered rare.


    Not to mention that with more of these pets, it would mean having to run more than one load of training sessions. Currently the shadow cultivation room was only able to fit fifty different pets at once. If he were to take on more than fifty, it would mean having to rotate them out instead of leaving them inside overnight which would also decrease the quality of the training.


    While the quality of the training wouldn''t suffer that much, it would be visible to him.


    After running this shop for so long, he had developed the pride of a pet shop owner and he wouldn''t cut down on the quality of his service to increase his capacity.


    During these three days, there were more young masters that came to scout out the ce.


    Most of them just looked around before leaving, but there were some that came up to the counter to talk to Lin Fan. When they did though, the first thing that they asked him was about the master of the shop.


    Even though there was plenty of footage on the forums that showed Lin Fan beating up Child Soul Realm Experts, everyone still believed that there was a master who was behind this store that was training all the pets instead of Lin Fan.


    However, when they were met with rejection from Lin Fan, not a single person dared to raise their voice.


    They had seen how Lin Fan had thrown out the City Lord''s son and then taken care of his two Child Soul Realm bodyguards. For them who were only in the Fragmented and Embryo Soul Realms, to try to fight Lin Fan was crazy.


    When the night of the banquet came, the first thing that came was a package from the Hunters Organization.


    Lin Fan was confused when he saw the package, but then he understood when he saw what was inside.


    The package contained a full suit that felt very smooth to the touch. Looking carefully, Lin Fan could easily tell that this was a very well made suit that was made with very expensive materials.


    Seeing this, it made him lean more towards the idea that he was being used as a scapegoat to get rid of an annoying suitor.


    After the store closed, the beast carriage arrived on time and waited outside the store for Lin Fan.


    It took him five minutes to change into the suit that had been sent out for him and when he came out of the store, the driver of the beast carriage and everyone else who was walking around couldn''t help taking a cold breath.


    The phrase the clothes really made a man fit perfectly here.


    Lin Fan was already handsome even without the suit, but when he put the suit on, it was like changing a ten to an eleven.


    It really was a man in a suit that looked the best because it made him much more serious than normal. This seriousness waspletely different from Lin Fan''s normal seriousness, like going from an eastern feel to a western feel.


    All the people that had been in the surrounding shops that were open couldn''t helping out when they saw Lin Fan. The people that gathered around him weren''t just female, there were also males that were in the crowd.


    It seemed like people knew how to appreciate beautiful things.


    Lin Fan ignored all of them as he walked into the beast carriage. After sitting down, he noticed that they weren''t moving at all, so he poked his head out and said, "Are we not going?"


    The driver realized his mistake and revealed an awkward smile before saying, "Yes, sir Lin, we''ll be heading off right away."


    With a flick of his wrist, the reins made a cracking sound as they hit the beast and off they went.


    As they went, there were people that tried to keep up with them, but this was a special beast carriage that was sent by the Hunters Organization, so it wasn''t something that normal people could keep up with. Each of these beasts were in the Embryo Soul Realm, so they definitely didn''t move slowly and they soon lost everyone behind them.


    This beast carriage moved along for a few minutes beforeing to a location that was close to the banquet hall.


    At this location, there were three other beast carriages parked outside and they were no less luxurious than the one that Lin Fan came in. They also had the symbol of the Hunters Organization on them.


    Inside the location which was a private cafe were three beauties who were all dressed up, sitting there waiting for him.


    It was Qiao Yi Fei, Mao Tao and Fu Ling.


    The three of them were all sitting at one table, looking at each other without saying a word.<sub> </sub>


    When Lin Fan came in, the ice was broken between them as all three of them used him as an excuse to start talking. It seemed like the silence had been quite painful for them even if they hadn''t shown it.


    Lin Fan raised his hand to stop all three of them as he looked at Fu Ling and asked, "What are you doing here?"


    Fu Ling was surprised when she heard this, but then she pouted her lips as she revealed an annoyed look.


    Why was he only picking on her?


    Why was he only surprised that she was here?


    Why couldn''t she be here?


    Her grandfather had told her toe and if it wasn''t for him, she wouldn''t havee at all.


    Though while she was thinking this, she got a better look at Lin Fan and she couldn''t help swallowing all the angry words that she had been about to say.


    She admitted that Lin Fan looked handsome normally, but today waspletely something different. When she finally took a good look at him, she had almost forgotten to breathe.


    It was the same for the other two girls. They had been about to say something for Fu Ling, but then they also caught a look of Lin Fan and the words had beenpletely swallowed.


    Lin Fan looked at the three girls who were standing in front of him in a daze with a confused look before saying, "Well?"


    Fu Ling felt annoyed when she heard this, but it was quickly pushed down as she calmly said, "My grandfather told me toe as well."


    Lin Fan looked at the other two girls who had also snapped out of their dazes. Mao Tao said, "That''s right, my grandmother wanted to ask you if you could escort Fu Ling as well. She said that she''ll make it up to you for suddenly springing this onto you."


    Qiao Yi Fei nodded as she said, "My grandfather asked me to tell you the same. He''s also asking that you make sure that you bring the three of us back safely."


    Lin Fan looked at the three of them before giving a nod.


    Since he had already agreed to this favour, there was no difference if there was an extra one. Not to mention that Mao Tao had mentioned extrapensation, so he might as well ept this.


    He also had his own ns which was that with the extra girl, he would be able to draw even less fire to himself.


    The more girls that he showed up with, the weaker the grudge that would be created with the suitor he was driving off.


    While he would be gaining more jealousy from the people around, the suitors would find their rtionship less serious if he came with more girls, which meant that there was less of a reason to hate him.


    So while they would still hate him, at least it would be at a level that he could manage.


    So for once, he didn''t mind spreading dog food for all the lonely dogs to eat.


    After all, being with beauties was also pleasing to his eye and there was no doubt that Fu Ling was also a beauty.


    If she wasn''t, she wouldn''t have been included as one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City.


    So once that was settled, they rested here for a bit before heading off in the beast carriages.


    They wanted to head to the banquet, but since this was a banquet that invited plenty of famous people, that would mean the media would be all over this banquet. Theter that they showed up, the better since there would be more attention drawn by other people and it would be easier for them to sneak in.


    It was also why they hade to this arranged location beforehand, it was to make sure that no one noticed that the three of them, well it was now four of them, being together.


    Since they had all gathered, they all took one single carriage.


    The three girls were silent the entire time, partly because they didn''t want to talk to each other, but mainly because they were enjoying the view.


    Lin Fan on the other hand was looking out the window, looking in the direction they were heading in.


    As he sat there, he couldn''t help having a bad feeling about tonight¡­

 Chapter 547 Banquet (2)

    When they arrived at the banquet hall, most of the reporters that had gathered here had already chosen their targets and there were only a few reporters that were wandering around, hoping to find any story at all.


    They chose a very discreet position to park the beast carriage and they tried to hide as much as they could as they walked towards the banquet hall, but it was hard to hide something so dazzling.


    It was one reporter at first, but when the first one took a photo, the snap of the light immediately drew the attention of the other reporters.


    With how dazzling Lin Fan and these three girls were, it didn''t take long before all the other reporters were aiming their cameras in their directions. As soon as they did, there was a burst of camera shes that blinded Lin Fan and the three girls.


    They had tried to get in unnoticed, but it was impossible for them to do that.


    Just like with the reporters, they had also caught the attention of the young masters that the reporters had been interviewing previously.


    These young masters had been raised as the scion of their families, they were used to being the center of attention. When someone took away their spotlight, even if one used their foot to think, they would be able to understand that these young masters wouldn''t be happy.


    However, when they got a good look of who it was that had stolen their spotlight, they didn''t care at all about the spotlight being stolen. Rather their eyes werepletely focused on the three girls that were by Lin Fan''s side.


    Beauties could cause the downfall of nations and each one of these girls were beautiful enough to cause such an event.


    All of the young masters that were here had thoughts about one of these beauties before, but seeing all three of them with one guy had ignited their jealousy and anger.


    They looked at Lin Fan and were taken aback by him.


    Even if they didn''t look bad, they had no choice but to admit that Lin Fan looked better than them. They would never admit it in words, but deep down in their hearts, they had acknowledged it.


    Lin Fan was most likely the most handsome person that they had ever met, they had no choice but to admit that he was more handsome than them.


    Lin Fan could feel the piercing gazes from around him, but he had no other choice since this was the favour that he had epted. He knew that they woulde after him, but he could tell that there was no killing intent behind those gazes yet which was good.


    It took them much longer than normal to get into the banquet hall because there were too many reporters blocking their way, but eventually they made their way in.


    The reporters turned to go back to the other young masters, but they found that the other young masters had already gone in. There was nothing else for them here, so the reporters had no choice but to scatter.


    Inside the banquet hall, Lin Fan and the three girls stood around a table by themselves with drinks in hand.


    The three girls tried to talk to Lin Fan, but he just coldly responded to them each time, not engaging in conversation with them. Still even with how cold he was, that didn''t stop them from talking to him.


    They knew that as long as they were talking to him, no one else in this banquet hall woulde over to talk to them.


    Comparing Lin Fan''s cold treatment to the annoying treatment the other young masters gave them, it was clear that they would choose Lin Fan each time.


    A few minutes passed before someone finally came over, but it wasn''t a young master. Rather it was a young woman with fire red hair that was also wearing a fire red dress.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he saw her. It wasn''t because she wasing over, but rather because she seemed familiar for some reason. It was at the tip of his tongue, but he couldn''t remember who this was.


    That woman in the red dress came over and ignored Lin Fan as she said to the girls, "It seems like you were all dragged to this banquet as well."


    The three girls were surprised to hear this voice since they had been focused on Lin Fan, but the moment that they did, they all revealed happy expressions as they turned to the woman in the red dress.


    Mao Tao was the most direct as she reached out her arms to give this woman in the red dress a hug and said, "Big sister Murong, you''re here!"


    When Lin Fan saw Mao Tao hugging the woman named Murong, he suddenly remembered where he had seen her before. This was the red haired woman who had arrived with Mao Tao during the Hunters Exam!


    This meant that this red haired woman was also part of the Hunters Organization¡­


    It was clear that she didn''t want to be here, but there had to be a reason for her to be here.


    Perhaps the Hunters Organization wasn''t just using him as a scapegoat to take care of a few potential suitors, perhaps they had apletely different goal in mind¡­<sub> </sub>


    While the girls were talking to each other, Lin Fan started to look around the room to see if there was anything special about this ce.


    As he looked around, there didn''t seem to be anything special until he suddenly noticed someone that was also familiar.


    He wouldn''t have recognized him normally, but there was one part of this person that was very special that no one else would have.


    It was his moustache, the strange swirling moustache on his face made Lin Fan recognize him immediately.


    It was Shi Yan, his examiner for the second round, the person that had clearly threatened him.


    When Shi Yan had threatened him back during the exam, he had been interrupted by old woman Mao. Now that he was here at this banquet, there was also a member of the Hunters Organization that was also present.


    If he didn''t know any better, it was as if the Hunters Organization was keeping their eyes on him¡­


    Lin Fan''s mind began to turn as he started connecting things and soon he realized that what he had thought previously waspletely wrong.


    After they had talked for a bit, the girls finally remembered that Lin Fan was also here and they realized their mistake.


    As the one closest to her, Mao Tao turned to Lin Fan and gave an introduction, "Mister Lin, this is my friend Murong Yue. She''s also a hunter associated with the Hunters Organization, so she could be considered yourpatriot as well."


    Murong Yue gave a nod to Lin Fan and reached her hand out as she said, "Hello mister Lin, I''ve long heard of your fame and it''s a pleasure finally meeting you."


    Lin Fan shook her hand and then said, "We''ve met before."


    Murong Yue revealed a smile and said, "That couldn''t really be considered a meeting, we didn''t even get to talk at all."


    Mao Tao didn''t care about their conversation as she cut in, "Yue Yue, what are you doing here?"


    Murong Yue turned to Mao Tao and said, "My father forced me toe here since he heard that I was in Harmony City. You know who is holding this banquet, so it wouldn''t be good for my father if I didn''t show up at this banquet."


    Mao Tao revealed an understanding smile before saying, "So you''re nning on using us as a shield?"


    Murong Yue smiled without saying a thing.


    Then she turned to Lin Fan and said, "It seems like mister Lin isn''t happy that I''m here. Is mister Lin unhappy about having the chance to be with four beauties at once?"


    Murong Yue was indeed considered a beauty, she wasn''t inferior to the other girls at all.


    The only reason she wasn''t one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City was because she didn''t live in Harmony City most of the time.


    Her family was based in another city, so she would spend most of her time in that city instead where she was considered one of the top beauties there. The only reason she was in Harmony City this time was because of her mission.


    Lin Fan looked right into her eyes and after a bit, he revealed a faint smile as he said, "Well, sometimes I''m not too happy about being used as bait. I think you should know what I mean."


    The three girls revealed confused looks while Murong Yue revealed a surprised look. She took a serious look at Lin Fan before suddenly giving augh. It wasn''t the daintyugh of a woman, but the heartyugh of a man.


    Thisugh was quite loud and had attracted the attention of the people around, but Murong Yue didn''t care about them at all.


    Afterughing for a bit, she stopped and said with a smile, "It seems like mister Lin is much more perceptive than we thought. Our Hunters Organization is willing to give you some morepensation if you want, but I think we''ve given a fair amount."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows, but then he rxed them and said, "Well that depends on what happens tonight, don''t you think?"


    Murong Yue narrowed her eyes a bit as she looked at Lin Fan, but before she could say anything, there was someone else who spoke first.

 Chapter 548 Banquet (3)

    "Wee one and all to this banquet! It is a pleasure that you can all join me today!"


    This voice came from behind Murong Yue, so Lin Fan was able to clearly see where it came from.


    This voice came from someone who had suddenly appeared on the stage with a mic.


    The person who had spoken was a young man who was dressed in a pure white suit with windswept chestnut brown hair. His facial features seemed like they had been chiseled out of marble and there was also a pair of piercing golden eyes that perfectly finished his face.


    This youth stood there with a smile on his face as he looked over the crowd that was underneath him.


    After waiting for a bit, that youth continued by saying, "I hope that you''re all having a good time. Now that most of us have gathered, let''s start by announcing the reason for this banquet, but before that, let me tell you a few things about me."


    As the youth was introducing himself, which also counted as bragging about himself, Lin Fan whispered to Mao Tao, "Who is that?"


    Mao Tao was surprised to hear this from Lin Fan since that golden eyed youth on stage was considered a famous person. He was one of the Decagram Geniuses, the third ranked out of the ten of them, so most people knew who this youth was.


    Still, since Lin Fan didn''t know, Mao Tao exined, "He''s Lei Feng of the Lightning Sect, the third ranked member of the Decagram Geniuses and the eldest son of the Lightning Sect''s Sect Leader."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this Lei Feng''s introduction, it really seemed like he was an important person.


    Lin Fan didn''t recognize Lei Feng himself, but he definitely recognized the Lightning Sect because it was one of the twelve great factions.


    However, when he thought about it, he didn''t find this strange.


    Whether it was Mao Tao, Qiao Yi Fei, or Fu Ling, their grandparents all had important positions in the Hunters Organization. A banquet that could convince even one of them toe would mean that the ones holding it already had quite the status. For all three of them toe, it was certain that this banquet would need to be held by one of the other twelve great factions.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan turned his attention back to the stage. He had turned back just in time because Lei Feng had finished his introduction.


    Lei Feng took a deep breath after he finished before saying with a trace of excitement in his voice, "Now, let''s get to the main topic. I''m sure you''re all wondering why we invited all of you today, so let me tell you all. However, before I do that, I want to invite a dear friend of mine on stage to help me with this announcement."


    Lei Feng turned to the side of the stage where a spotlight had suddenly appeared, shining down on a person who had been waiting there the entire time.


    Even with a different outfit, Lin Fan recognized this person immediately because of his moustache.


    It was Shi Yan again!


    When he appeared, both Lin Fan and Murong Yue knitted their brows as they had confused looks in their eyes.


    What was Shi Yan doing here?


    After the spotlight appeared and Shi Yan was introduced, Lei Feng waved his hand to invite Shi Yan to the center of the stage with him.


    Shi Yan came to the center and the two of them fist bumped before Lei Feng turned to the crowd to say, "I''m sure many of you recognize my dear friend here, but for those of you that don''t, let me give you an introduction. My dear friend Shi Yan here is from the Shi Family of the True Spirit Sect and he''s also a well known hunter. He is here on behalf of the True Spirit Sect to announce this matter with our Thunder Sect."


    Everyone in the crowd looked at Shi Yan with surprised looks, but there were a few that knew more than the rest that narrowed their eyes to look at Shi Yan with a wary look.


    Lei Feng didn''t mind this as he continued, "The Thunder Sect is officially announcing that we have discovered an Ancient Era Ruin that we will be partnering with the True Spirit Sect to excavate."


    When this was said, everyone took a cold breath.


    They all had their different reasons for being surprised, but the biggest reason was the words "Ancient Era Ruin".


    The Ancient Era, it was something that they had all heard about in legends before.


    Long before this current era, there was an era where gods were all around the world. It was an era of cultivation glory, one where the level of cultivation far surpassed the current level of cultivation.


    However, because of an unknown incident, the era had ended and disappeared.<sub> </sub>


    Even though it was gone, there were still ruins that had been left from that era that people would find from time to time. The items that they found in these ruins had almost always been artifacts that could be considered the foundation of an organization.


    Now the Thunder Sect was announcing that they had found an Ancient Era Ruin and was sharing it with the True Spirit Sect?


    The other twelve great factions wouldn''t sit still, but that was also why Lei Feng had called this banquet.


    Of course, there were some that had sharper minds that began understanding the deeper implications of this.


    Shi Yan was indeed from the Shi Family of the True Spirit Sect, but the Shi Family wasn''t one of the two main families that ruled over the True Spirit Sect. There were more qualified people to represent the True Spirit Sect in the audience, but not a single one of them said a thing which meant that this was the will of the entire True Spirit Sect.


    As for why Shi Yan was chosen¡­


    Lei Feng could see that everyone was surprised and he gave them a bit of time to react before saying, "Now, now, I''m sure that you''re all excited, but it isn''t the right time to be excited yet. We will be going over the n for the excavation of this ruin now."


    With a snap of his finger, there were thirteen different people holding pillows in their hands that appeared. Atop each of the pillows were several tokens. There were also some pillows that had more tokens on thempared to the others.


    Lei Feng waited until they took their ce before turning to look at the audience to say, "These are the tokens that represent quotas in the ruin exploration team. As you can see, there is one for each of the twelve great factions and we''ve given out quotas already. Those that represent the twelve great factions, pleasee forward and receive your tokens."


    He didn''t even bother looking at the others who came up to the stage as he went to one of the pillows. Shi Yan was the same as he came to another one of the pillows.


    Both of these pillows clearly had more tokens on thempared to the rest, but this was also natural since the two factions that they represented were the ones leading this ruin exploration.


    If they wanted, they could have monopolized this ruin and not shared with the others¡­Well, they couldn''t havepletely monopolized this ruin since it was impossible to hide the news of an Ancient Era Ruin, but they definitely wouldn''t have had to give out so many spots.


    Them giving out all these spots was already them being generous enough.


    p Surprisingly, the representative of the Hunters Organization was Mao Tao.</anda>


    But when Lin Fan thought about it, he realized that this was the best choice since Mao Tao was the president''s granddaughter, so she was the one who best represented the Hunters Organization.


    The other representatives from the other twelve factions arrived on stage and went over to the pillows as directed. Once they were there, the first thing they did was find out how many tokens that they had been assigned.


    When it was over, there were people who had smiles on their faces and people who had displeased expressions.


    The first one to speak up was the representative from the Ice Goddess Pce, a beautiful young miss who had hair that was as white as ice. She turned to look at Lei Feng with narrowed eyes and said, "Young master Lei, what is the meaning of this?"


    Everyone''s attention had been drawn by her words and they all looked at the number of tokens that she had.


    It was clear thatpared to everyone else, the Ice Goddess Pce had received much fewer tokens.


    Lei Feng didn''t care at all as he looked right into her angry gaze and said, "Well, it should be obvious, shouldn''t it, miss Bing?"


    The young miss who had been called miss Bing knitted her brows, but she didn''t say a thing in response.


    Lin Fan knew the reason since it was one that was quite well known.


    For the longest time, the Thunder Sect and the Ice Goddess Pce had been at each other''s throats, so something like this was just natural.


    The thing worth noting was that the only other faction that received less tokens was the Myriad Sword Hall, but that also made sense since the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Myriad Sword Hall were all sects, so theypeted with each other when it came to disciples. There was no way for them to cooperate in harmony.


    The ones that received more tokens were the Assassins Association, the Tamers Guild, and the Alchemy King Hall.


    While everyone was focused on the twelve great factions, someone suddenly asked, "What about the thirteenth pillow?"

 Chapter 549 Banquet (4)

    When this was said, everyone realized that there was still a pillow with a batch of tokens that hadn''t been given out yet.


    It was normal for the other twelve great factions to receive their share, but what was this thirteenth batch of tokens for? Rather, who were they for?


    Was there someone else who deserved the tokens?


    Lei Feng revealed a smile when he heard this and he raised the mic to say, "Good question friend! Thisst batch of tokens is naturally for those that aren''t affiliated with one of the twelve great factions. We want to be fair to everyone, so we''ll be giving everyone a chance."


    When he said this, the eyes of many people who were sitting in the audience lit up.


    Most of the people that were here weren''t a part of the twelve great factions, so most of them had given up hope of being able to enter this Ancient Era Ruin, but now Lei Feng''s words gave them hope once again.


    It seemed like the Thunder Sect wasn''tpletely heartless, they still cared about everyone¡­


    Only a fool would have believed that.


    It was clear that the Thunder Sect not only wanted to bring more cannon fodder with them, they also wanted to fleece these cannon fodder for all they had. However, this was an Ancient Era Ruin, so no one was willing to miss out on this.


    Lei Feng could see the sparkle in their eyes, but he still didn''t say anything, as if he was waiting for something.


    Only after a few minutes of letting these people have their hopes pulled up did Lei Feng finally say, "As for how we''ll be deciding who gets these tokens, that will depend on how much each person is willing to pay. The Thunder Sect will be holding an auction next week to determine who will own these tokens, we encourage everyone to prepare for it."


    Then after a slight pause, Lei Feng didn''t forget to add, "Of course, we''re not against letting people contact us privately to give us their offers."


    Lei Feng''s words couldn''t have made it more clear what the intentions of the Thunder Sect was.


    The Thunder Sect truly was vicious, they didn''t hold back at all when gouging these other powers for their wealth.


    However, even if that was the case, the other powers still wanted tokens. All the representatives from powers that weren''t the twelve great factions looked at each other with wary looks.


    During this time, Lin Fan had been staring at Shi Yan on the stage.


    He wanted to see if he could find anything he could use since now Shi Yan was backed not only by his Shi Family in the True Spirit Sect, but also Lei Feng from the Thunder Sect.


    He didn''t believe that Shi Yan would let the grudge between them go, so he knew he had to be prepared.


    While he was looking at Shi Yan, Shi Yan also turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Shi Yan had noticed Lin Fan the moment he came in because Lin Fan really attracted quite a bit of attention with the way he was dressed. He didn''t forget the anger in his heart from being driven away that day and he didn''t forget his goal of finding out what happened in the ruins.


    Most importantly of all, his pride has been injured when this kid from out of nowhere had decided to stand up to him. Now that he had seeded in his ns, his pride had be even more stokedpared to before.


    There was only death for Lin Fan in his mind.


    When Shi Yan turned over to look at him, Lin Fan felt the intense killing intent that came from him.


    It was clear that Shi Yan hadn''t forgotten what had happened and he would definitely be making a move against him in the future. As for when¡­


    That killing intent also didn''tst long, it only appeared for a split second before it disappeared.


    The people around Lin Fan gave a shiver as if they had felt a chill, but when they looked around, they couldn''t figure out where this chill came from.


    Lin Fan didn''t panic when he felt this, instead he revealed a faint smile.


    Since he wouldn''t be able to do anything to change the situation, he would just have to adapt and make the best out of it.


    In this entire banquet hall, Murong Yue was the only one who didn''t miss this.


    Shi Yan was then pulled away by Lei Feng since he was introduced as a Ruins Hunter, so he was the one who was in charge of the excavation. He took the microphone away from Lei Feng and started exining his n as a presentation appeared behind him.


    Murong Yue took advantage of this time to lean in towards Lin Fan and she whispered, "Consider this as a form ofpensation. There are also rumours that Shi Yan has connections with the Assassin Association."


    Lin Fan knitted the brows the moment he heard this and he asked, "Then you''re saying that it''s not just an alliance between just those two?"<sub> </sub>


    Murong Yue gave a slight nod.


    Lin Fan thought for a bit before asking, "Then what about the Alchemy King Hall and the Tamers Guild?"


    Murong Yue shook her head this time and said, "It''s not the same with the two of them. Those two organizations have always been famous for how neutral they''ve been since there''s no reason for them to get involved. After all, there will always be a demand for pills and training for pets, so as long as their skills don''t decay, they will never truly be in danger."


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this as he fell into thought.


    However, Murong Yue didn''t give him time to think as she said, "You shouldn''t worry about that now, you should be worried about what wille after the banquet."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and he turned to look back at Shi Yan before saying, "You''re saying that he will¡­"


    Murong Yue gave a nod without saying a thing.


    Lin Fan looked into Murong Yue''s calm eyes and he had a slight premonition. After a pause, he said, "What kind ofpensation will I be getting for doing this?"


    Murong Yue revealed a smile as she said, "Mister Lin really is sharp, you can even pick up on this. It''s dangerous, so you can be sure that thepensation won''t be cheap."


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before saying, "Then what is your n?"


    Murong Yue''s smile became wider as she began describing the n that their Hunters Organization hade up with.


    As Lin Fan listened, he nodded along to Murong Yue''s n, not saying a thing as he listened. Once Murong Yue reached the end, she asked, "Any questions?"


    Lin Fan gave one more nod before saying, "It''s not so much as a question, but a suggestion."


    Murong Yue revealed a surprised look before saying, "What suggestion?"


    Lin Fan revealed a sly smile, "It''s very simple, I have a special ability that I can use¡­"


    The surprised look on Murong Yue''s face became deeper before she revealed a smile as well and said, "I''ll send a message to the team now and we''ll follow your n."


    Lin Fan nodded without saying a thing, also with a smile on his face.


    What he didn''t know was that someone had been watching them the entire time.


    Since he didn''t need to present anymore, he was free to do what he wanted and what he wanted to do was looking in Lin Fan and Murong Yue''s direction. The moment Murong Yue had leaned in close to Lin Fan, he immediately knitted his brows.


    Then when he saw the two of them talking andughing, he almost lost it.


    He forced himself to stay calm, but he moved over to where Shi Yan was standing and as soon as Shi Yan finished his current thought, he took the microphone out of his hand.


    Shi Yan was a bit surprised, but he didn''t get angry because he knew that he couldn''t afford to get angry with Lei Feng.


    Lei Feng cleared his throat before saying, "Now that we''ve gotten all of that out of the way, how about we begin this banquet?"


    With a p of his hands, the orchestra that had been on standby on the side suddenly started ying their instruments.


    With a smile, Lei Feng turned in the direction of Murong Yue and said with a slight bow with one hand put forward, "Miss Murong, may I have the pleasure of this dance?"


    Lin Fan and Murong Yue had still been talking when Lei Feng said this so it had caught them off guard.


    Murong Yue turned to look at Lei Feng and there was a clear look of disgust that had shed on her face before quickly disappearing. Of course, Lin Fan who had been sitting right beside her had been able to pick up on this.


    After a slight pause, Murong Yue suddenly turned to Lin Fan and leaned in to say with a smile, "Thank you."


    Lin Fan was confused at first when he heard this, but it didn''t take him long to understand what she had meant.


    Lei Feng''s face had darkened for a second, but then he quickly revealed a smile as he said, "This friend here, may I ask who you are?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he shook his head.

 Chapter 550 Banquet (5)

    Then without even caring about Lei Feng, Lin Fan turned to Murong Yue and mimicked Lei Feng as he asked, "Miss Murong, may I have this dance?"


    Murong Yue was taken aback by Lin Fan.


    She had used Lin Fan as a shield against Lei Feng, but all she expected was just him giving a perfunctory response and not doing something like this.


    With how handsome Lin Fan was, Murong Yue couldn''t help revealing a faint blush when she saw him acting like this. She couldn''t help turning aside while also sneaking a peek at Lin Fan''s face which actually made the blush on her face even darker.


    Naturally, none of this had escaped Lei Feng''s eyes and the rage burned deep inside of him, but he still forced himself to smile. That smile on his face couldn''t help twitching a few times as he forced his anger down.


    Seeing that he was being ignored, he didn''t force his way in because he knew that everyone was watching, but he didn''t forget Lin Fan''s face.


    Shi Yan revealed a smile from the side when he saw this, but that smile also quickly disappeared.


    Lin Fan had been peeking at Lei Feng from the corner of his eyes during this time and he had to admit that Lei Feng really was a good actor.


    It was clear that he was seething with rage at this moment, but he was able to force himself to keep it down. Then there was earlier where he had deliberately drawn out his words to create more tension in the crowd, making sure that he had their full attention and that he was able to raise their enthusiasm.


    If this Lei Feng was on earth, he would definitely be a talented host that could have won awards.


    Murong Yue looked at Lin Fan''s hand for a bit before suddenly raising a hand to take it.


    When Lin Fan felt her hand holding his, he looked up at her with a smile and then led her to the dance floor like a gentleman.


    The crowd that had been in front of them parted ways for them and they were the only two people who were on the dance floor.


    Murong Yue revealed an awkward smile as they were walking as she said, "I''m not really good at dancing."


    Lin Fan turned to her with a smile and said, "It''s fine, just follow me lead."


    Lin Fan had been the son of a rich family, so naturally he had been taught many things that he would need to socialize with people at his level. One of those things included ballroom dancing.


    Putting one hand on her waist and putting her hand on his waist, he took her other hand before leading her along to the rhythm of the music.


    Murong Yue could be considered to have two left feet since she wasn''t the kind of girl who practiced this kind of stuff before, but Lin Fan was able to easily lead her in the dance.


    <o>,m As they danced around on the dance floor, Murong Yue couldn''t help being swept up by the dance.</o>


    It was as if there were only the two of them in that entire banquet hall and all she could see was Lin Fan guiding her along in the dance.


    The people who were watching couldn''t help whispering among themselves when they saw this.


    "Those two¡­they really do seem like a perfect couple don''t they?


    "They do! They do!"


    "But have you ever heard of this Lin Fan before? Why haven''t I heard of him?"


    "I don''t know either, but if you look carefully, those are three of the Five Flowers of Harmony City that also came with him. For him to have all these women following him¡­"


    "Ai, it really all depends on the face, doesn''t it?"


    The whispers in the crowd were soft, but Lei Feng could hear them pounding on his ears, pounding on his heart.


    Murong Yue was his woman, she had been his woman since they had first met and now there was someone who dared to touch her? How could his male pride let that go?


    But even with all these whispers, Lei Feng forced himself to reveal a calm expression. However, under that calm expression, the twitching of his face became even more intense and there was a stuffed feeling in his heart. It was almost as if he was about to vomit blood out of anger.


    Shi Yan standing behind him had also noticed this and had heard the whispers around, so he came forward to whisper something in Lei Feng''s ear.<sub> </sub>


    Lei Feng looked annoyed at first, but then his eyes lit up when he heard the rest of what Shi Yan said.


    Once Shi Yan was finished, Lei Feng turned around so that no one could see his face and he revealed a cruel and twisted expression as he said, "Do it, I''ll support you. I want him to suffer, you understand?"


    Shi Yan''s heart trembled the moment he saw this expression. This was the expression that had made him decide to follow Lei Feng, this was the expression that made him realize that Lei Feng was destined to take over this realm one day, so it was best for him if he followed him earlier.


    Shi Yan would have given a bow if it wasn''t for everyone watching, so he just gave a nod and said, "Yes, young master Lei, I will pass down your instructions."


    Lei Feng gave a nod and then revealed a smile, but this time there was a cold chill in his eyes as he said, "Good."


    Without even caring about Shi Yan''s response, Lei Feng turned and revealed the same smile that he had before, the one that looked friendly and calm.


    Shi Yan took a few deep breaths to calm himself before also revealing a smile and secretlyughing deep down.


    He knew what Lei Feng''s n for Lin Fan was and he would have almost felt sorry for him if it wasn''t for his own hatred for Lin Fan. However, since he knew that Lei Feng was going to make a move now, he was certain that Lin Fan would die which made him much more confident.


    Shi Yan turned and walked off the stage, but no one cared about this since the only one that people cared about was Lei Feng. As long as Lei Feng was still on stage, Shi Yan was free to do whatever he wanted to do.


    Well, it wasn''t that no one had noticed Shi Yan walking off.


    Lin Fan had been dancing, but he was perfectlyfortable with leading since it was something that he had trained in before and his motor skills were better here because of his cultivation, so he was able to separate his attention to look around the room.


    He had seen the scene between Shi Yan and Lei Feng and knew that something was up, but there wasn''t anything that he could do now. He knew that their n woulde after the banquet.


    Still, this was all a part of his n.


    The reason why he had even chosen to go all out and dance with Murong Yue was because he knew that there would be no chance of reconciliation with Lei Feng, or more precisely, Shi Yan. He knew that since they had chosen their sides, they would have to fight to the end, so the best thing he could do now was infuriate Lei Feng as much as he could.


    If he filled Lei Feng with rage, he wouldn''t be able to think clearly and would make more mistakes, which would help him.


    What was the best way of filling him with rage?


    It was to hit him where it hurt the most.


    Which was to steal his girl¡­Or rather pretending to do so.


    He made sure to dance as dazzling as possible to sting his eyes even more.


    He also had to admit that Murong Yue really was good at ying along, she acted just like she was supposed to.


    What he didn''t know was that as they danced along, Murong Yue wasn''t just ying along, but she really felt like a princess.


    This was something that she had dreamed about since she was young, but she had been raised to be rough and tough by her family, so she never had the chance to experience this.


    However, even with that rough and tough exterior, there was still that soft girl that was beneath it.


    When they finished their dance, there was a round of apuse that sounded around them. Both Lin Fan and Murong Yue gave a bow to the crowd before returning to their seats.


    Lei Feng also took this time to raise the microphone again to say with a smile, "What an amazing disy. Let''s give it up again to these two for being the first ones to start the dance. I now invite everyone toe onto the dance floor to dance."


    After he said this, he gave the microphone to the servant waiting on the side and he walked off into the back of the stage.


    Before he left, he took onest look at Lin Fan and Murong Yue who were sitting there talking to each other. There was also a cold glint that appeared in his eyes.


    Lin Fan could sense the chill that came from that direction, but he chose to ignore it.


    Instead, he turned to the girls and said, "I think it''s about time we get going, don''t you all think so?"

 Chapter 551 Assassins In The Night (1)

    The girls all looked at each other before giving nods.


    The only reason they had toe was to give some face to the Thunder Sect and because their grandparents had told them toe. As long as they stayed for a certain amount of time, it was fine for them to leave early.


    As they stood to leave, there were people who turned to look in their direction, or rather they turned to look at the girls.


    Every person who turned clearly had one girl that they were specifically looking at and it was clear by the way they looked at them that they didn''t want them to go. However, with those girls together, they were just too dazzling that they were afraid of going over. Mainly because they were afraid of being rejected in front of everyone which would be bad for their reputation.


    There were also plenty of people who remembered Lin Fan''s face because they were nning on finding out who he was to be able to go with all these girls to this banquet.


    As they were walking out, Mao Tao and Murong Yue moved a bit slower than the rest, so they came to the back.


    While they were walking along, Mao Tao leaned close to Murong Yue and asked, "Did you have fun?"


    Murong Yue was taken aback by what she heard and there was a blush that quickly appeared on her face before she started denying it, "That was nothing, It was just a show that we were putting on, it didn''t mean a thing."


    The expression on Mao Tao''s face made it clear that she didn''t believe her, but she still said, "I saw him first, you and I were both there when it happened."


    Murong Yue quickly said, "Xiao Tao¡­"


    But Mao Tao didn''t give her any time to say anything else as she moved forward to catch up with Lin Fan.


    Murong Yue was left behind with a bitter smile on her face, but there was nothing she could say since there was a part of her that couldn''t deny what Mao Tao was implying. As well, there were also things that she couldn''t say since it was rted to her mission from the Hunters Organization.


    After they came out of the banquet hall, there were a few reporters that had stuck around that came forward to take pictures of Lin Fan''s group. After all, he hade with three girls, but now he was leaving with four beauties. There had to be a story there.


    However, when they came forward to take pictures of Lin Fan''s group, there were men in the ck that suddenly stopped them and pulled them away.


    These people made sure that Lin Fan''s group didn''t notice anything as they took these reporters away. They brought these reporters who had been trying toin, but they had covered their mouths as they dragged them into the alleys.


    After a few seconds, those people in ck clothes came out of the alleys without the reporters. The only difference was that they were wiping off blood from the daggers that they had in their hands.


    There had been carriages waiting outside for Lin Fan''s group. One was the carriage that Lin Fan and the three girls hade in and the other was Murong Yue''s courage.


    Lin Fan and Murong Yue exchanged a nod before Lin Fan said, "I''ll be going with Murong Yue, we have some things to discuss."


    Mao Tao immediately revealed an unhappy look when she heard this and she red at Murong Yue who did her best to look away.


    Lin Fan saw this and said, "We have some business to discuss, it''s not what you''re thinking."


    It was clear by the expression on the faces of the three girls that they clearly didn''t believe him, but then at the same time, they received calls from their grandparents. All of their grandparents told them toe home and not mind what Lin Fan was doing.


    This was all very strange, but since it was an order from their grandparents, they had no other choice. Even when they were riding away, Mao Tao was still looking out the window at Lin Fan and Murong Yue who were waving goodbye to them.


    When the beast carriage disappeared, Lin Fan went over to Murong Yue''s beast carriage and opened the door before giving a bow while saying, "Shall we?"


    Murong Yue''s heart couldn''t help skipping a beat, but she forced her expression to be calm as she got in the carriage.


    As the two of them drove off, the people in dark clothing who had been watching them suddenly made a call.


    When it connected, the leader of these people in dark clothing said, "The target has just gotten into a carriage with the boss'' woman. Should we engage?"


    There was a pause from the other side of the call before Shi Yan''s voice came out saying, "She should be dropping him off at the store. Wait until the target gets out and the boss'' woman leaves. We can''t afford to get her involved in this. Be sure to keep me posted on the situation at all times, the situation can change at any time and I need to be aware, understand?"<sub> </sub>


    The leader clearly didn''t care at all about what Shi Yan said, but he still said, "Got it, we''ll talkter."


    Then without even waiting for Shi Yan''s answer, he hung up.


    Shi Yan on the other side had an ugly look on his face, but he forced himself to calm down since he knew that there was nothing he could do.


    These people were people that he had hired from the Assassin Association to kill Lin Fan, but these weren''t just normal experts. All the people in the team that he had hired to kill Lin Fan were Child Soul Realm Experts, so they weren''t afraid of him at all, which was why they could act this brazen.


    Still, Shi Yan was confident that they would be able to kill Lin Fan since there were over ten of them and all of them were Child Soul Realm Experts. This was a team that could even kill him.


    Back during the exam, Shi Yan had been able to force Lin Fan into a bad situation and he was certain that he could have killed Lin Fan if it wasn''t for the president stepping in. Since he would have been able to kill Lin Fan, there was no chance that Lin Fan would be able to survive being surrounded by these Child Soul Realm Experts.


    He was truly happy that Lin Fan had dug his own coffin.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan showing off with Murong Yue in front of Lei Feng, he wouldn''t have been able to hire these Child Soul Realm Experts. The initial squad that he had nned for this assassination was a few Embryo Soul Realm Experts and two Child Soul Realm Experts from his Shi Family.


    However, since Lin Fan hadpletely offended Lei Feng with his actions at the banquet, Lei Feng had given him the support he needed to ensure that this assassination was a sess.


    With the funding that Lei Feng provided, Shi Yan had been able to hire all these Child Soul Realm Experts.


    The ugly look on Shi Yan''s face quickly disappeared as it was reced with a smile when he thought of Lin Fan''s death.


    Of course, it wasn''t all simple since Lin Fan had gone with Murong Yue.


    Since he was with Murong Yue and knowing how important of a position Murong Yue had in the heart of Lei Feng, he had to make sure that these assassins wouldn''t do a thing to her.


    In the beast carriage, Lin Fan and Murong Yue were sitting facing each other, but neither of them were looking at each other. Both of them were looking out the windows on opposite sides, as if they were looking for something.


    After a period of silence, Lin Fan was the first to break it by saying, "I''ve got six on my side, how many do you have?"


    Murong Yue turned back and said, "I got four on my side."


    Then she revealed a smile and said, "They aren''t even trying to hide themselves at all."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile as well to show his agreement to this.


    It was clear to both of them why they weren''t hiding themselves at all, but it was too bad that they didn''t know their own fatal mistake.


    When he spoke, Lin Fan didn''t respond to the previous issue, but rather he changed the topic by saying, "Are your people ready?"


    Murong Yue looked down at the watch on her wrist before giving a nod and saying, "They''re all in ce. They can move whenever you want."


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this and said, "Then let''s get this started."


    With a word from Murong Yue, the beast carriage turned into an alley before stopping.


    Both Lin Fan and Murong Yue came out of the beast carriage and stood there, as if they were looking for something.


    The figures in the dark clothing that had been following them were surprised by this and they raised their guard against them, that was until Lin Fan shouted out something that they couldn''t believe.


    Lin Fan looked around the alley before saying, "If you keep hiding like this, how can we have any fun? How about you guyse out and let''s get this party started?"

 Chapter 552 Assassins In The Night (2)

    While the figures in the dark cloaks had been caught off guard, they still didn''t do anything rash like taking Lin Fan''s challenge.


    After a slight pause to process what had happened, the leader called Shi Yan to report since this situation was just too strange.


    Once the situation was exined to Shi Yan, there was a slight pause from Shi Yan''s side before he said, "Take care of him. He''s giving you a chance, so make it quick and clean so that no one can track it to you. I''m sure you can handle that, right?"


    The leader could hear the slightly challenging tone in Shi Yan''s voice, but he didn''t mind it as he said, "It''ll cost extra."


    Shi Yan gritted his teeth as he said, "Fine. If you can get this done, you''ll get what you deserve."


    The leader revealed a faint smile when he heard this before saying, "Alright, consider it done."


    When he was about to hang up, Shi Yan''s voice quickly said, "Don''t forget that you can''t touch the girl. If even a single hair on her head is out of ce, none of us can afford the consequences, do you understand?"


    This time, the leader didn''t speak casually as he said in a serious tone, "I got it, you don''t need to worry about that."


    Without waiting for Shi Yan, he hung up decisively.


    With a wave of his hand and a few signals using his fingers, the people in dark clothing spread out on the rooftop around the alley, taking out long ranged weapons. In their line of work, guns were considered too messy and too loud, so what they used were bows instead.


    Arrows imbued with life energy were much stronger than bullets alone anyway.


    There were a few of them that also summoned pets that sat on their shoulders, releasing life energy that entered the bows.


    Once everyone was in ce, the leader of the group jumped off the roof tond at the entrance to the alley while another member of the group jumped to the other side to block off the other entrance.


    The other person stayed by the entrance blocking it off while the leader moved in towards the carriage.


    Lin Fan and Murong Yuepletely ignored the person who was standing at the other end of the alley as they turned to the one moving towards them. Seeing that he moved closer, both of them pulled out their weapons and looked like they were on alert.


    Seeing that he wasn''t stopping, Lin Fan asked, "Who are you? Why are you following us?"


    The leader just calmly looked at the two of them and based on his eyes, it was clear that there was a smile on his face, but he didn''t say a thing.


    Only when he was only a few steps away from them did he say, "I''m the person who will kill you now."


    Then without any warning, he suddenly charged forward, pulling out the sword that he had been hiding behind him the entire time. In one quick and smooth motion, the sword cut right through the air in an arc around him before shing right at Lin Fan''s throat.


    Lin Fan revealed a look of panic when he saw this and he quickly raised his weapon to block it, but seeing this, the leader felt even more confident. He didn''t bother holding back just in case and started using more life energy as his sword moved faster.


    It seemed like the sh of the leader''s sword was about to cut through Lin Fan''s dagger and then his neck, but then before it could, it was stopped by the dagger. There was the sound of metal shing before the dagger that Lin Fan was holding cut right through the sword.


    As soon as it happened, the leader''s eyes popped out and he tried his best to stop himself, but it was already toote.


    Lin Fan''s other hand had already formed a fist that was covered in three different glows thatnded right in the face of the leader. The leader didn''t even have time to react as he felt the pain that came from in front of him before being sent flying back.


    Lin Fan had aimed down with his punch, so instead of sending the leader flying right out of the alley, the leader went right into the ground and slid across it before stopping right at the entrance of this alley.


    Murong Yue had already expected this, but she still couldn''t help being surprised by how powerful Lin Fan was. Even if it was her, she wouldn''t have been able to take care of this person that easily.


    Lin Fan turned to look at her and asked, "Aren''t you going to give the signal?"


    Murong Yue looked at Lin Fan in a daze before suddenly saying, "Oh, right!"


    Then she turned to her wrist and said into her watch, "Do it now!"<sub> </sub>


    As soon as she gave themand, there were even more people that appeared on the roof. Unlike those people in ck, these people were dressedpletely in red.


    The people in ck had been surprised by how easily Lin Fan had taken care of their leader that they weren''t able to react in time, but then they realized that this was a trap that had been set for them and immediately ran off in different directions.


    There was no loyalty between these people, they were just assassins that had been gathered for a job, so this group was nothing more than a temporary one. No one felt obliged to help anyone else and they all scattered to give themselves the best chance of survival.


    It was just too bad that they were outnumbered by the people in red.


    There were two that turned after realizing that they were outnumbered, thinking that they could use their strength to force their way out. After all, all of the members of the assassin group were Child Soul Realm Experts.


    What they didn''t realize was that they hadn''t been able to sense these people in red at all, which clearly meant that they were much more powerful than them.


    As soon as these two assassins attacked the people in red, the people in red revealed their cultivation.


    These two assassins were only in the Low Child Soul Realm while the two people in red chasing them were both in the Mid Child Soul Realm.


    They shot their arrows which were easily dodge before they were knocked out with a single hit from the two people in red.


    The other assassins realized that they couldn''t win when they saw this and all tried to run, but it was too bad that every person in red was at least in the Mid Child Soul Realm, which surpassed their cultivations.


    The only other Mid Child Soul Realm assassin was the person who had blocked the other side of the alley, but he had been surrounded by three different Mid Child Soul Realm Experts.


    This person was one of the top Gold Ranked Assassins of the Assassins Association, so his battle power was greater than normal people in the same realm. The only problem was that not a single one of these Mid Child Soul Realm Experts were normal people.


    These people in red were the special Scarlet Strike Team of the Hunters Guild, which was all made up of hunters. These were people that had passed the Hunters Exam, an exam that only took the best of the best, so not a single one of them was a normal person. They were all far stronger than normal experts in the same realm.


    Just one of them would have been enough to take care of this Gold Ranked Assassin, but when there were three of them, it wasn''t even considered a fight.


    In a matter of a few minutes, all the assassins had been subdued by the people in red clothing and had been ced in a pile in front of the beast carriage.


    After they had all been gathered, two of the people in red picked up the Gold Ranked Assassin who had been ganged up on and brought them in front of Murong Yue.


    Murong Yue looked down at this person and tore off his mask to reveal an old man with a sharp face. She pped this old man to wake him up and when he did, he immediately started struggling, but the people in red easily subdued him.


    Murong Yue looked down at the old man for a few seconds before saying, "Who sent you?"


    The old man looked right at her without any fear, but he didn''t say a thing.


    Murong Yue pped him two more times before saying again in a stronger tone, "Who sent you?"


    The old man didn''t even flinch after being pped twice and he looked right into Murong Yue''s eyes as he said, "Is there a point in answering?"


    After he said this, he was about to spit right at her, but the two people in red forced his head down so that he would spit onto the ground.


    Then once he was done, they allowed him to look up again as Murong Yue said, "There''s no need to be like this, it doesn''t have to end the way you think it''ll end. As long as you work with me and answer a few of my questions, you can go free."


    The old man revealed a smile as he said, "You and I both know that won''t happen."


    Then he spat out again, but this time it was smoke that came out.


    After he spat out this smoke, he suddenly shouted, "Now!"

 Chapter 553 Assassins In The Night (3)

    The smoke obscured the vision of Murong Yue, Lin Fan, and the two people in red holding this Gold Ranked Assassin.


    While this was happening, there was an explosion from the pile of assassins that the other people in red had been guarding.


    The bodies in that pile suddenly flew out in all directions, catching the people in red off guard. At the same time, with that sudden explosion of bodies, there was smoke that came from the center of the pile that quickly filled the surrounding area, blocking off the line of sight of the people in red.


    As this smoke spread, there was a figure that quickly moved through the smoke before disappearing.


    When the smoke finally dissipated, there were the bodies of the assassins that were lying all over the ground with the people in red standing over them with their weapons drawn, prepared for anything that happened.


    As for the Gold Ranked Assassin, he was still being held by the two people in red with Murong Yue and Lin Fan standing in front of him, but now he had a smile on his face.


    Murong Yue and Lin Fan both quickly looked around and counted the assassins, but they found that there was one missing.


    Lin Fan stood there with a calm look, but Murong Yue immediately knitted her brows and shouted at the people in red, "Gather them up and quickly find the other one that escaped!"


    When the Gold Ranked Assassin heard this, he suddenly broke out inughter.


    Even though they heard this, Murong Yue and Lin Fan both ignored him as they walked around the area, looking for clues as to where the escaped assassin could have gone. While they were doing this, a few of the people in red put the assassins on the ground against the wall while the rest of them ran off to search for the assassin that had escaped.


    After around five minutes, these people in red came back and one of them reported to Murong Yue, "Boss, we weren''t able to find them at all."


    When the Gold Ranked Assassin heard this, hisugh became much more confident.


    He knew that they wouldn''t be able to kill him just yet since they clearly needed information from him. If all of them had been captured and no one knew that they were captured, then there was no way for them to survive.


    However, if one of them escaped, they would at least have a chance to survive.


    That was what both of the Mid Child Soul Realm assassins had agreed to.


    If there was a chance, one of them would help the other escape to bring word back to the Assassins Association and find a way to rescue the other.


    While he wasn''t certain whether the other person would uphold their end of the deal, he did know that this was his only way of surviving. If no one knew that they were being held captive, no one woulde and save them since they were disposable pawns to begin with.


    However, if that other Gold Ranked Assassin escaped and were to return to the Assassins Association, they would have to try to save them since it affected their reputation. Not to mention that they had taken the job from Shi Yan, so they would at least send someone else to finish the job because behind Shi Yan was Lei Feng.


    Lei Feng was not a customer that the Assassins Association could ignore, especially now that there was the new alliance between the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    It was the rare alliance between three of the twelve great factions, the Assassins Association wouldn''t let themselves seem weak in front of the other two factions by failing this mission.


    With all these reasons, the Gold Ranked Assassin was confident that everything would turn out his way.


    However, that joy that he felt was cut short by a singleugh from Murong Yue.


    When he heard thatugh, he immediately stoppedughing and looked at her with a shocked gaze.


    After giving thatugh, Murong Yue gave a nod and said, "All ording to n then."


    When he heard this, the Gold Ranked Assassin felt like the world was crumbling around him as he began searching his memories for what had gone wrong.


    That was right, it seemed off from the moment that they had been ambushed.


    Why had they incapcitated everyone instead of just killing most of them and leaving one or two people to get information from?


    They were being attacked, so the most logical thing to do was to take care of them so that it would be easier for them.


    However, the people in red had chosen to knock out all the assassins.<sub> </sub>


    Then the next thing they did was pile all the assassins in one big pile instead of lining them up against the wall and making sure that they wouldn''t be able to do anything. This wasn''t something that a normal person would do when they had a prisoner since it was much easier for them to make a move and talk to each other secretly when they were in that pile. After all, that was what the two Gold Ranked Assassins had done.


    Now they didn''t seem worried at all that the other Gold Ranked Assassin had escaped¡­Could it be that their n was to let one of them escape all along?


    But why would they do that?


    There was no benefit for them unless¡­


    Unless they had a way of tracking the person who had escaped!


    Murong Yue and Lin Fan ignored the changes in the expression on the face of the assassin in front of them as Murong Yue said, "Mister Lin, how is it going?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "It''s all good, I have his tracks right now."


    When the assassin heard this, it confirmed his guess and he had a very ugly expression on his face.


    Murong Yue gave a strongugh before saying, "I wasn''t sure about your n when you mentioned it, but if this really works, it''ll mean we''ll be able to catch them all in one fell swoop!"


    It wasn''t actually Lin Fan who was tracking the assassin who had escaped, but rather Brainy.


    If this was before Brainy had broken through, this might have been harder since Brainy wouldn''t have been able to infect the Child Soul Realm Expert with her parasite seed. Then again, if the assassin had been in perfect form, Brainy wouldn''t have been able to do it either.


    It was all because Lin Fan had seriously injured the Gold Ranked Assassin that Brainy was able to infect him with her parasite seed.


    Currently Lin Fan was tracking that assassin who escaped with the parasite seed and he was just waiting for the assassin to stop so they could find the location of their hideout.


    While Lin Fan was focused on tracking the assassin that escaped, Murong Yue turned her attention back to the Gold Ranked Assassin that her subordinates were holding in front of her. She looked down on his ugly expression and knew that she had dealt a strong blow to him.


    Now that she had used the stick, it was time for her to use the carrot.


    Murong Yue revealed a smile and said, "You should understand what is happening now, there is no escape for you. However, as long as you''re willing to cooperate, I can guarantee your safety. What do you think?"


    The Gold Ranked Assassin looked up at Murong Yue with a hesitant look on his face.


    He knew when he had been beaten and all he cared about now was his own life.


    Since he knew that the person who had escaped wouldn''t be able to help him, it was better for him to trade some information to see if he could keep his life.


    But of course, trading information was an art and he couldn''t rush it, so he had the same hesitant look for a bit before he said, "How do I know you''ll keep your word?"


    Murong Yue had the same smile on her face, but there was a slight chill that also appeared as she said, "You don''t. You just have to trust me." Then after a pause, she said with a shrug, "Of course, it''s not like you have much of a choice right now."


    The Gold Ranked Assassin gave a sigh before saying, "I can give you some information now and then depending on how I''m treated, I can give you more. What do you think?"


    Murong Yue stopped smiling as her face turned cold and she said, "That depends on what kind of information you have. I advise you to start talking now when I''m still in a good mood. If you keep wasting time, I can tell you that this mood will get worse and worse and that will not be good for you."


    The Gold Ranked Assassin gave a sigh and was about to speak, but Lin Fan suddenly cut in by saying, "He stopped."


    Murong Yue turned over to look at Lin Fan before turning back to the Gold Ranked Assassin to say, "Wait here for me, I''ll be right back."


    Then without even waiting for his answer, she came over to where Lin Fan was.


    Lin Fan had pulled out a 3D map of the city on his watch that Murong Yue had provided him and was currently focused on the location of the assassin as per Brainy''s instructions.


    This was a ce that wasn''t far from here, it was a small bar that no one would normally go to.

 Chapter 554 Assassins In The Night (4)

    Murong Yue paused for a second before saying to the people in red, "Team one, go and investigate. If you find anything, report back right away."


    Ten of the people in red gave a bow before quickly disappearing from the alley, flying off in the direction of the bar.


    Before they reported back, the only thing they could do was wait. Lin Fan would continue monitoring the situation through Brainy while Murong Yue would go back to interrogating the Gold Realm Assassin.


    However, before either of them could do a thing, Lin Fan suddenly heard Brainy''s voice say, "Master, something just killed that assassin."


    When Lin Fan knitted his brows, there were cries that came from the assassins that had been lined up against the wall, as well as from the Gold Ranked Assassin.


    Murong Yue immediately turned to look at the assassins lined up against the walls and shouted, "What''s happening?!"


    However, no one had time to answer since they were all checking the conditions of the assassins.


    Every single assassin had a trail of ck blood that came out of the corner of their mouth and their faces were very pale. It was clear that something had poisoned them and that they were dying.


    Murong Yue immediately roared out, "Don''t let them die! We still need to get information from them! We can''t let them die before getting that information!"


    All the people in red naturally knew this, but there wasn''t a thing that they could do. The poison that the assassins had been affected with acted too quickly for them to even react and when they tried to save them, the assassins were already dead.


    When they checked for signs of life, they knew that these assassins were truly dead and not just faking it since even their life energy was dissipating.


    Murong Yue turned to the Gold Ranked Assassin and hoped that he wouldst a bit longer since he had a higher cultivation, but there was no hope on that side either. The Gold Ranked Assassin had the same trail of ck blooding out of the corner of his mouth, as well as the same pale face and he was slumped back in the grips of the two people in red.


    When Murong Yue saw all of this, she couldn''t help cursing, "Damn, was it all for nothing?"


    She turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Mister Lin, what about the one that you were tracking?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "He''s dead too."


    Murong Yue knitted her brows and asked in a voice filled with doubt, "How are you sure that he''s dead?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I have a special method that allows me to know these things."


    Murong Yue''s eyes still had a bit of doubt in them, but she didn''t bother arguing with Lin Fan over this right now because there were more important things to do.


    At the very least she knew where the person behind them was hiding since Lin Fan had given her that location. All she could do now was wait and hope that they would be able to get some information for her.


    While waiting though, they also searched through the corpses of the assassins to see if they could find anything. However, these assassins were professionals, so other than having a few weapons each, they had nothing else on them that could identify them or provide Murong Yue with any information.


    The sad thing was that the assassins really were poor.


    Even though they were all Child Soul Realm Experts, all of the assassins were only using Embryo Soul Realm Artifacts as weapons. However, it made sense since they were only normal assassins.


    They might be able to make money with assassinations, but that didn''t mean that they would be able to get Child Soul Realm Artifacts that easily since those required prestige and not money to get.


    <o>,m The Assassins Association was different from the Hunters Organization, they took everyone that wanted to be an assassin in, unlike the Hunters Organization that only took in elites.</o>


    Since that was the case, there wouldn''t be enough resources to go around like in the Hunters Organization, so only the best of the best would receive the best resources.


    Otherwise if the Gold Ranked Assassin had a Child Soul Realm Artifact, that first sh would have ended much differently.


    Lin Fan wouldn''t have been able to cut through his sword that easily since it would have been an artifact on the same level as the Iron Eater Bone Artifact. Though part of the reason that Lin Fan could cut through the Embryo Soul Realm Artifact was because of his own absorption force and the Iron Eater Bone Artifact swallowing a bit of the metal in the Embryo Soul Realm Artifact.


    It didn''t take long for the people in red who had gone to check out the bar to report in.


    When they did, Murong Yue revealed another look of disappointment because their report gave no new information at all.<sub> </sub>


    When they had arrived at the bar, they had found that the bar waspletely abandoned and there was only the corpse of the assassin who had escaped that was left on the ground. It seemed like whoever did this was very thorough with eliminating the evidence.


    Murong Yue went back to look over corpses, but she couldn''t find any clues at all.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan said, "We know one thing about this at least."


    Murong Yue turned to look at Lin Fan with a confused look, "What do you mean? We didn''t learn anything tonight."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Look at their faces."


    Murong Yue knitted her brows as she turned to look at the faces of the assassins again. Looking at it carefully this time, she realized that something was off.


    There was an unwilling look on the faces of the assassins, like they hadn''t expected this to happen.


    When Murong Yue had seen that these assassins were poisoned, she had assumed that it was the Assassins Association silencing them since they didn''t want this matter to be spread or traced back to them. After all, it was clear that they were currently in an alliance with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, so they wouldn''t want this blunder to be known.


    However, based on the expression of these assassins, that didn''t seem to be the case.


    It would be fine if one or two had unwilling looks on their faces since that was just human nature, but for all of them to be surprised by this, it clearly meant that something was off. This shouldn''t be the poisoning of the Assassins Association that they should have expected, but poisoning from someone else¡­


    As for who that was, Murong Yue had a good guess.


    However, that also raised another issue.


    The fact that they had been willing to poison these assassins from the Assassins Association meant that there was a clear division of power in this alliance.


    It wouldn''t be the True Spirit Sect since they weren''t willing to go this far to solve Shi Yan''s personal grudge, so the only ones that could have instigated this assassins squad was Lei Feng from the Thunder Sect. After all, he had good reason to do so after how Lin Fan had provoked him at the banquet.


    But for him to poison these assassins this openly, it seemed like the Thunder Sect must have some kind of edge over the Assassins Association in this alliance.


    As for what it was, the only thing that was logical was that the Thunder Sect must be in control of the Ancient Era Ruin which was the cusp of their alliance. Otherwise, there would be no reason the Assassins Association would let their members be poisoned by the Thunder Sect like this¡­


    While they hadn''t gotten the information they wanted, at least they had gotten this information which was also quite valuable.


    With this, they would know which other factions to start contacting to create an alliance against the Thunder Sect.


    With these thoughts in mind, Murong Yue turned to Lin Fan and said, "Mister Lin, I think that it''s time for us to return. There are many things that I have to report, so I won''t waste anymore of your time."


    Lin Fan just gave a nod in response to this as he continued looking over the corpses of the assassins.


    Murong Yue saw this and didn''t mind it as she told the people in red, "Gather up the bodies, we''re heading back now."


    Then she turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Mister Lin, the Hunters Organization will take care of your friend''s problem with the City Lord. We will also offer separatepensation for what happened tonight. I hope that we can continue working together."


    Then without waiting for Lin Fan''s response, she turned to leave.


    However, before she could enter the beast carriage, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Can you leave me a few of these corpses?"


    Murong Yue was surprised when she heard this and she turned to look at Lin Fan with a confused look, but she didn''t question it. She just said, "I can''t give you that many of them since we still want to check them, but I can give you one of the weaker ones."


    Lin Fan knew that she was already making a concession here, so he gave a nod.


    Murong Yue turned to one of her subordinates and gave them a nod. That person in red gave the corpse of one of the Low Child Soul Realm assassins to Lin Fan who put it away in his Storage Ring.


    After that, Murong Yue and the rest of the people in red disappeared, leaving Lin Fan alone in this alley.

 Chapter 555 Unexpected Guests (1)

    Lin Fan of course didn''t stay in this alley any longer since there was no need for him to stay here.


    He headed back to the store where he put the corpse of the assassin on the third floor along with Brainy.


    The reason that he had wanted this corpse was to give it to Brainy to turn into a puppet since Brainy needed higher realm puppets, but it was hard to get corpses of higher realm experts. Since this was a corpse that hadnded at his door, he would be a fool to not use it.


    After leaving Brainy with the corpse, Lin Fan headed back down to start cultivating.


    The night passed and the morning came, it was time for Lin Fan to open the store again.


    Over the next two days, it was the normal routine of operating the store in the morning and cultivating at night. During this entire time, there hadn''t been any news on Ang and Momonga still.


    However, that didn''t mean that there wasn''t news that was spreading across this upper realm.


    The news that the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect had found an Ancient Era Ruin together and were about to lead an expedition into it was something that couldn''t be hidden.


    Normally, this matter wouldn''t be rted to these normal families and powers at all since this kind of event would only be something that the very top factions would be involved in. However this wasn''t the case because the Thunder Sect was offering spots for forces outside of the twelve great factions.


    When this news spread, there were countless families and organizations that went to look for the Thunder Sect to discuss this matter both in private and publicly.


    Since the spots haven''t been decided yet, there was no one that was willing to just give up on it.


    This was an Ancient Era Ruin, something that one couldn''t even dream of normally. If they had a chance to explore it, they definitely wouldn''t give it up that easily.


    But none of that involved Lin Fan since he didn''t care about the Ancient Era Ruin. What he cared about was his own ns on how to take out the True Spirit Sect.


    He had something that went far beyond the Ancient Era Ruin, he had something called the system which was something that was rted to the gods. With this cheat by his side, why would he risk his life exploring these ruins?


    However, during the work day, Lin Fan had heard all kinds of rumours in his shop.


    There were many rumours about various forces that were said to be falling under the influence of the Thunder Sect.


    Lin Fan knew that the Hunters Organization would be keeping track of this themselves, but he also made a mental list of all these rumoured forces just in case.


    Lin Fan spent the rest of the day like this, listening to his gossiping customers while waiting for the store to close.


    When the store closed and Lin Fan was about to lock the door, there was someone else that came in.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been paying attention since he had been looking for the keys, so he just said out of habit, "We''re closed. You cane back tomorrow if you need something."


    Then he heard a familiar voice say, "Boss, are you even closed for me?"


    Lin Fan turned to look at the person who came in and saw a familiar round face.


    It was Mo Ze Chen!


    He had finally arrived in Harmony City and there was a cloaked figure that hade with him.


    However, Lin Fan just said in a calm voice, "The store is still closed."


    Mo Ze Chen''s smile froze on his face and there was a giggle that came from the cloaked figure which also sounded familiar.


    After a while, Mo Ze Chen shook his head with a bitter smile on his face before he said, "The boss really is the boss after all."


    Lin Fan ignored him and looked at the cloaked figure for a bit before asking, "Who is this?"


    The cloaked figure looked at Mo Ze Chen and after seeing him give a nod, she took off her cloak to reveal that it was Lulu.


    Lin Fan was surprised as he said, "Why are you here so early? Didn''t you need some time to finish your training with your father?"


    Lulu pouted her lips and said, "Are you not happy to see me?"


    Lin Fan just looked at her without saying a thing.<sub> </sub>


    Seeing this, Lulu didn''t seem bothered as she just said, "Of course it''s because I finished the training that I''m here. Are you not happy to see me?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with her as he turned to Mo Ze Chen and asked, "What took you so long? Doesn''t it take just a few days toe from Whiterun?""


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an aggrieved look as he said, "It wasn''t easy getting out of that ce since I found something in the ruins. If it wasn''t for my Hunter Licenseing in time, I wouldn''t have been able to get out at all."


    Lin Fan raised a brow and asked, "What did you find?"


    Mo Ze Chen said with a proud look, "Well I went into the ruins since I had nothing to do and I found some dragon bones. However, there were people that wanted them, so they manipted the local families to keep me there in an attempt to get the bones from me." Then he revealed a bitter look as he said, "If the Hunter License didn''te, who knows what would have happened?"


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look when he heard this and he asked, "How long did it take you to get your Hunter License?"


    <o>,m Mo Ze Chen was also confused when he heard this question, but he honestly answered, "It took a few weeks for me to get it. How long did it take you?"</o>


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he fell into thought.


    What he didn''t know was that it would have taken Mo Ze Chen even longer to get his Hunter License if it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s indirect help. Because of the favours that Lin Fan had done for the Hunters Organization, they wanted to repay him by helping the people close to him since they weren''t able to directly repay him.


    They had done this with the Xu Family and they had done this by giving Mo Ze Chen his Hunter License sooner.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan changed the topic as he asked Mo Ze Chen, "What are you nning to do now?"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a shrug and said, "I''m here to help you boss. I''ll just do whatever you want me to do."


    Lin Fan turned to Lulu and asked, "What about you then?"


    Lulu looked at Mo Ze Chen and said, "I''ll just stay with Ze Chen."


    When he saw how close the two of them were, he couldn''t help thinking about Ang who still wasn''t back.


    It had been quite a long time and he couldn''t help getting worried about her.


    It was too bad that he had thrown Momonga into the back of his mind even though he had also been gone for a long time as well.


    Lin Fan was in thought for a bit beforeing back to his senses and saying, "Alright, you two can help me manage the store then. I still have something else that I need to do, so you came at the right time."


    Mo Ze Chen and Lulu looked around the store after hearing this.


    They had heard that this was Lin Fan''s store and they didn''t know what kind of store it was. Looking around now, they could see that it was indeed a pet store, but that surprised them even more because they just couldn''t match the cold Lin Fan to a pet shop.


    While they were looking around, there was a dragon scale that suddenly appeared out of Lin Fan''s Storage Ring and floated over to where Mo Ze Chen was.


    Mo Ze Chen had been looking around the store, so he didn''t see the dragon scale at first, but it was hard to miss it when it appeared right in front of his face.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help taking a step back when he saw the dragon scale in front of him and he asked, "Boss, what is this?"


    Before Lin Fan could say anything, there was a voice that came from the dragon scale that said, "Boy, you say that you''ve found some dragon bones?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to see Hong Long suddenlying out on his own. Normally the scale that contained Hong Long stayed in his Storage Ring since Hong Long had been staying in the scale to keep his soul from dissipating. If he came out too much, it would make his soul dissipate faster before he could find something permanent to ce his soul in.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan suddenly had a thought.


    Could it be that Hong Long wanted to use these dragon bones to create a new body?


    Mo Ze Chen looked over at Lin Fan and seeing that he didn''t say anything, he turned back to the scale and said with a nod, "Yes, I found some dragon bones."


    The scale got right into Mo Ze Chen''s face and said in an impatient voice, "Then take them out and let me see them."


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Lin Fan again for confirmation before taking them out.


    The scale floated over the dragon bones before it said, "Good, good, these will do."

 Chapter 556 Unexpected Guests (2)

    Lin Fan waited for a bit before asking, "Elder Hong, are you nning on using these dragon bones to rebuild your body?"


    The scale turned in the air to look at Lin Fan before it said, "These bones are too low grade for me to rebuild my body with, but they can be used for something else. After all, these bones do contain a trace of the True Dragon Bloodline."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he was confused by Hong Long''s response, but then he suddenly revealed a look of understanding as he said, "Then we can use it to help Xiao Feng purify his bloodline?"


    The scale rejected this idea by saying, "No, this concentration of bloodline in these bones won''t do anything to Xiao Feng. Rather, Xiao Feng''s bloodline is already as pure as it can be, he has the progenitor bloodline, so it can''t be anymore pure."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows in confusion again as he said, "Then what can these bones be used for?"


    The scale hesitated a bit this time before saying, "Well, they can be used to purify the bloodlines of other dragons¡­"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this and he asked, "What other dragons do we know?"


    There was a cough that came from the scale as an awkward silence appeared for a few seconds before Hong Long said, "There''s Qing Ao¡­Or rather there''s Qing Ao''s daughter Qing Bao Lan¡­"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at the scale.


    When Hong Long saw this, he couldn''t help moving back a bit as if he was trying to avoid Lin Fan''s gaze.


    After another period of awkward silence, Lin Fan said, "Why would we give the bones to her? Can''t brother Qing provide for his own daughter?"


    Hong Long gave another awkward cough before saying, "Well, you know the rtionship between her and Xiao Feng. If we help her purify her bloodline, it will be helping Xiao Feng in the future. After all, Xiao Feng will need allies in the dragon tribe when he takes over."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes even more and there was a dangerous glint that appeared as he asked, "And when did I agree to this?"


    Hong Long''s voice became even more awkward as he said, "Xiao Lin, you should know how special Xiao Feng''s bloodline is. His rightful ce is with the dragon tribe, so it''s only a matter of time before he goes back there. Not to mention that the dragon tribe has many treasures, so he won''tck his share of treasures to share with you."


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort and said, "Does it seem like I''mcking treasures?"


    Hong Long didn''t know what to say in response to this.


    He had been in this store for quite some time and he had seen the various things that Lin Fan had ess to, so there was nothing he could refute Lin Fan''s question with.


    However, he knew that he couldn''t just give up since he knew that Xiao Feng was the hope of his dragon tribe.


    After a pause, Hong Long gave a sigh and said, "Xiao Lin, the dragon tribe has suffered a loss since the invasion of the Outer Races and we all need to work together to resist the Outer Races. Xiao Feng is the hope of the dragon tribe and without him, the dragon tribe won''t be able to rise again and that will hurt our universe''s chance of defeating the Outer Races."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Outer Races?


    What was that?


    Seeing the change in expression on Lin Fan''s face, Hong Long thought that he had finally found an angle that he could work, so he continued by saying, "The next invasion of the Outer Race isn''t that far off, so we need to bring Xiao Feng back to the dragon tribe as soon as possible. Otherwise, it''ll be toote for the dragon tribe to revive."


    Lin Fan looked right at the scale and asked, "Outer Race? What is that?"


    Hearing this, Hong Long swallowed the next words he was about to say as he just silently floated there.


    After a long pause, Hong Long finally asked in a confused voice, "You don''t know about the Outer Races? Your master never told you about them?"


    Master?


    There was no master in this store, so how could he tell him?


    Lin Fan secretly thought this before saying with a calm look, "No, he never mentioned it before."


    Hong Long once again fell silent as he realized his mistake.<sub> </sub>


    Information on the Outer Races was considered top secret among the most powerful experts in this universe, there were only a few certain people that were allowed to know this secret.


    The dragon tribe used to be one of the greatest races in the universe and Hong Long was one of its important elders, so naturally he was allowed to know this secret. However, even among the dragon tribe, there were only a few people that did know this secret.


    Hong Long had assumed that Lin Fan''s master would have told him this secret, but now it seemed like he had made a mistake¡­


    After a long pause, Hong Long said, "Never mind that, pretend like I didn''t say anything. Anyway, Xiao Feng is very important to the Dragon Race, he has a very important duty as a member of the Dragon Race."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug as he said, "That doesn''t concern me at all. Not to mention, who knows if the Dragon Race will be hostile or not."


    Hong Long said in a serious voice, "I can guarantee that the Dragon Race will never be hostile towards you."


    Lin Fan gave another shrug as he said, "Your word doesn''t guarantee that the Dragon Race will never turn on us. Not to mention, how could they ept a member of their race with the progenitor bloodline following someone else?"


    Hong Long fell silent, but then he said, "As long as your master makes a move, I''m certain that everything will be solved easily."


    ? Lin Fan said with a serious look, "My master will never make a move, you can be sure of that."


    Hong Long was stunned by how certain Lin Fan''s tone was, but he gave a sigh in the end and said, "Then as long as I breathe, I will make sure that no one from the Dragon Race brings you trouble."


    Lin Fan gave a snort and said, "You and what body?"


    Hong Long didn''t know how to respond to that at all since he was too embarrassed to respond.


    Lin Fan was right, he wasn''t able to help at all right now because he was still trapped as a soul inside of this scale. If he didn''t find a way to recover his power, all he could do was sit and watch as the dragon tribe destroyed all chances of creating any rtions with Lin Fan.


    Seeing that there was a long silence and that there was finally a chance to say something, Mo Ze Chen came forward to ask, "Boss, what is going on here? Who is this¡­person?"


    Lin Fan looked at Mo Ze Chen and after thinking for a bit, he decided to tell the truth as he said, "This is Elder Hong Long of the Dragon Race, or rather a fragment of his soul."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised when he heard this as he muttered, "Dragon Race? But that''s¡­"


    Then Mo Ze Chen revealed an excited look as he said, "Boss, I always knew that there was something special about you, but I never thought that you were someone from the Dragon Race. The Dragon Race is one of the strongest races in this universe, they are far above just this tiny upper realm!"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''m not from the Dragon Race."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised by this, but then he looked at the scale and his brain quickly turned as he suddenly realized something. He quickly changed his tone as he said, "Oh, so you found this fragment of Elder Hong''s soul and he''s been teaching you this entire time, it''s no wonder you''re so strong."


    Hong Long had been proud when he heard the way Mo Ze Chen had praised the Dragon Race and he even thought that it would help his case, but then he heard thetter half of what Mo Ze Chen said and he wanted to dig himself into a hole.


    Him teaching Lin Fan?


    Was this kid even listening to the same conversation?


    Hong Long gave an awkward cough as he said, "Kid, you''re mistaken. I''m not the one teaching him, he has a master that''s far beyond me. What were you listening to the entire time?"


    Mo Ze Chen was once again surprised, but he became excited very quickly.


    This was a master that even Hong Long acknowledged as being beyond him, just what kind of master was that?


    Mo Ze Chen came up to Lin Fan and said with sparkling eyes, "Boss, the greatest decision in my life was choosing to follow you! I promise that I will follow you to the ends of the earth!"


    Lulu didn''t really understand what was going on, but she could tell that Lin Fan seemed very important right now, so she also came forward and said, "Savior, I knew that you were our savior from the moment I saw you! Please guide us to prosperity!"


    Lin Fan looked at the two of them and while he seemed calm on the surface, he was bitterlyughing deep down.


    When he was about to say something, there was a knock that came from the door.

 Chapter 557 Unexpected Guests (3)

    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and he turned to look at the door.


    There had been a closed sign ced on it and normally people understood that if there was a closed sign, it meant that the store was closed, so they didn''t bother knocking. But now there was someone who surprisingly didn''t understand what the universal closed sign meant.


    Still, there was no reason for him to answer since whoever was outside should understand that the store was closed if they didn''t receive an answer, but that wasn''t the case.


    After a slight pause, there was another knock on the door.


    Again and again, there were pauses and knocks on the door that continued for an entire minute.


    Finally, Lin Fan knew that this person wasn''t a normal person, so he said, "We''re closed. Come back tomorrow."


    After he said this, there was another pause before a voice said, "Hello there, I''m looking for Lin Fan. Can you please tell me if he''s here?"


    Lin Fan was about to open the door and chase this person away, but he then realized that this was a voice that sounded familiar. He was certain that he had heard this voice before, but where had he heard it before?


    While Lin Fan was thinking, Mo Ze Chen suddenly said, "Isn''t this brother Wang?"


    Lin Fan turned to look at him with a confused look and after a few seconds of thought, he realized who Mo Ze Chen was referring to.


    It was Wang Jian from the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Lin Fan then thought for a few more seconds before deciding to open the door for him.


    However, before he did, he made sure that Hong Long went back into his Storage Ring and that Lulu put her cloak back on.


    When the door opened, there was Wang Jian standing outside the door, but there were also other people with him. Based on their clothes, it seemed like they were also disciples of the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Wang Jian saw the door open and he said with a smile, "Brother Lin, can wee in?"


    Lin Fan looked at the two behind him before saying, "Only you, no one else."


    The two other disciples from the Myriad Sword Hall clearly looked offended, but Wang Jian raised his hand to stop them before saying, "Alright."


    Wang Jian turned to the other two and said, "You guys can just go look around at the other shops, I can handle it here."


    The other two disciples had clear unwilling looks on their faces, but they still listened to Wang Jian in the end.


    Once they were gone, Wang Jian came into the store. The first thing he did aftering in was to take a look at the store''s interior.


    After looking around, he looked back at Lin Fan and said in a surprised voice, "You were really running a pet shop?"


    Hearing this, Mo Ze Chen and Lulu both broke out inughter while Lin Fan just stood there with no emotions on his face.


    When he heard theughter, Wang Jian turned to see Mo Ze Chen and he said, "Yi, brother Mo, you''re also here?"


    The smile on Mo Ze Chen''s face froze and after a few seconds, he said, "I''ve been here the entire time."


    Wang Jian just said with a calm look on his face, "Is that so? I didn''t notice you."


    Mo Ze Chen suddenly pointed at him and said, "You!" But then his hand quickly came down and he shook his head with a bitter smile on his face.


    He knew that he wasn''t someone that stood out. He was just a little chubby who had an ordinary face, but he still wanted to be noticed at least.


    Lulu saw the look on Mo Ze Chen''s face and came forward to pat him on his shoulder.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw her, he took advantage of this chance and turned to pull her into a hug.


    Lulu was caught off guard by this, but she didn''t push him away. She just silently stood there, letting him hug her since she wanted to helpfort him, but there was a blush on her face.


    After all, she was someone who had been sheltered by her father her entire life, so she wasn''t used to being close to people of the other gender.


    Luckily for them, neither Lin Fan or Wang Jian paid them any attention since they were more focused on another matter.<sub> </sub>


    After a moment of silence, Wang Jian began the conversation by asking, "Did you hear about the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect working together to excavate that Ancient Era Ruin?"


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised when he heard this since he had already expected it.


    He had been at the banquet and he had taken note of how many tokens each representative had received.


    The people who had received the least number of tokens were the Ice Goddess Pce and the Myriad Sword Hall. Both of them were sects thatpeted with the Thunder Sect when it came to recruiting disciples, so of course they wouldn''t be allies.


    The only reason the True Spirit Sect was the Thunder Sect''s ally was because neither of them wanted to face these two other sects alone since the Ice Goddess Pce and the Myriad Sword Hall had always been close. They had been close ever since there had been a pair of lovers between them that had been tragically lost because of a mistake from both sects. Since then, they had built good rtions in order to honour the memory of these lovers.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before he gave a nod and said, "I''ve heard of it."


    Wang Jian had an awkward look on his face because he clearly expected Lin Fan to say more, but hearing that this was all he said, he still didn''t give up. Wang Jian continued the conversation by saying, "Then brother Lin, are you nning on going into the ruins?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "What reason do I have to go into the ruins?"


    Wang Jian revealed a look of disbelief as he said, "But it''s an Ancient Era Ruin, why wouldn''t you be interested in going? You should know what kind of meaning an Ancient Era Ruin has."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I''m not interested." Then after a pause, he added, "I don''t have a token to enter with anyway."


    Wang Jian was surprised when he heard this, "The Hunters Organization hasn''t given you a token?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused look, "Why would they give me a token in the first ce?"


    Wang Jian didn''t know what to say in response to this. The n that he hade here with was on the basis that Lin Fan was rted to the Hunters Organization.


    When Lin Fan had arrived at the second round of the Hunters Exam, he had been brought there by Qiao Yi Fei who was quite famous. He had also heard that Lin Fan had been hanging around with the equally famous Mao Tao and Fu Ling recently, so Wang Jian had just assumed that Lin Fan was someone that the Hunters Organization had chosen to nurture and he would be getting one of their tokens.


    Now that Lin Fan was telling him that he wasn''t rted to the Hunters Organization at all, Wang Jian didn''t know how to proceed.


    The main reason for himing here today wasn''t just to visit Lin Fan, but rather to find allies for the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Lin Fan could see the changing emotions on Wang Jian''s face and he could guess what he was thinking.


    Before Wang Jian could say anything, Lin Fan suddenly asked, "So what is your purpose in visiting me today?"


    Wang Jian trembled slightly at this, but then he said with a smile, "Can''t Ie and visit a friend?"


    Lin Fan gave a snort and said, "I believe that as much as you believe that. Why don''t you tell me the real reason?"


    Wang Jian revealed a bitter smile and said, "Am I really that untrustworthy?"


    Lin Fan gave a stronger snort this time and said, "Yes, you are."


    Wang Jian didn''t know how to respond to this as the bitter smile on his face became wider. Then he slowly said, "But I really do believe this."


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Maybe if it was some other time, but with everything that is happening now, only a fool would believe that you came here without any intentions. After all, with your status in the Myriad Sword Hall, shouldn''t you be getting ready to go into the ruins? Why would youe all the way here for no reason?"


    Wang Jian revealed a sly smile and said, "What if I said that I wasn''t going?"


    Lin Fan looked right at him and then asked, "What do you know?"


    Wang Jian gave an emotional sigh as he said, "It seems like I can''t hide anything from you at all."


    Then he went over to the door and peeked his head out to make sure that there was no one lurking outside beforeing back to the middle of the room to check the room.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by how cautious he was since this was definitely something rted to the Ancient Era Ruins, or rather the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect, so it would be something very important.


    After he had finished checking around the store, Wang Jian came back over to Lin Fan and leaned in to say, "There''s a third faction that''s working with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect."

 Chapter 558 Unexpected Guests (4)

    When Lin Fan heard this, he revealed a surprised look.


    He wasn''t surprised by the news itself, but rather the fact that Wang Jian had chosen to tell him this.


    This was without a doubt a very important piece of information, one that would require the lives of many people to find. After finding this information, the Myriad Sword Hall wouldn''t reveal it that easily since it would be an important chess piece for them.


    They would only reveal this to their closest allies since it would be something that would affect both sides, but they would also keep it away from their enemies or neutral parties since it would benefit them to see those parties suffer.


    Yet Wang Jian had told him this which meant that Wang Jian at least saw him as a close friend, one that he was willing to disregard the benefits of the Myriad Sword Hall to tell him this.


    This was something that warmed Lin Fan''s heart.


    Lin Fan was someone who treated others depending on how they treated him and when someone was this sincere with him, he had no reason to deny them the sincerity that they deserved.


    After a pause, Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I know."


    Wang Jian revealed a surprised look, but then he calmed down and asked, "Then is there a chance that we can work together?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Is there any meaning in you working with just me?"


    Wang Jian revealed a serious look and said, "You know what I mean."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I can''t represent the entire Hunters Organization, so I can''t give you an answer to this."


    Wang Jian knitted his brows and looked a bit worried, but Lin Fan then added, "I can however get you a meeting with the people that are in charge. As for what they decide to do, that is up to them."


    Wang Jian still had a worried look on his face, but it had rxed a bit when he heard what Lin Fan said.


    While it still didn''t guarantee that there would be a cooperation between the two sides, at least he had his foot in the door now instead of being kept outside the doorpletely.


    If the Myriad Sword Hall wasn''t able to find a third partner to cooperate with, they wouldn''t feel assured in going into the Ancient Era Ruins. As for who their other partner was, it was naturally the Ice Goddess Pce that they were close to.


    Before Wang Jian hade, the elders of the Myriad Sword Hall had already talked to the elders of the Ice Goddess Pce and they had agreed to bring the Hunters Organization into their alliance.


    Of course, this was all on the premise that the Hunters Organization agreed to this, which was why Wang Jian was here in the first ce.


    Wang Jian was silent for a bit before he said, "When can we meet the people from the Hunters Organization? The sooner we meet, the better since we''ll have more time toe up with a n for the Ancient Era Ruins."


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but then there was a knock that came from the door.


    Both Lin Fan and Wang Jian were surprised by this.


    Lin Fan was surprised because of all the guests that hade to see him today. After a few days of minding this pet shop alone, he had slowly gotten used to that lifestyle.


    Then there was today where everyone seemed to want to see him.


    Wang Jian was surprised because he had been releasing his spiritual sense the entire time to make sure that no one was eavesdropping on them, but he hadn''t been able to sense this person approaching at all.


    What he didn''t know was that it wasn''t the person who had escaped his spiritual sense, but rather the store had been trapping his spiritual sense in. The walls of the store were imbued with the power of the system, so it trapped the spiritual sense in and gave the sensation that everything was normal, so Wang Jian didn''t notice a thing.


    After a moment of thought, Lin Fan decided to open the door and see who it was since there was no harm in doing so.


    When the door opened, the person that was standing outside was revealed to be Qiao Yi Fei.


    Lin Fan had a surprised look the moment he saw her, but he didn''t say anything in the end.


    Qiao Yi Fei saw this and was a bit annoyed by this treatment, so she said in a snappy voice, "Are you not going to invite me in?"


    Lin Fan just said "oh" before moving out of the way for her by heading back into the store.


    Qiao Yi Fei had an aggrieved look on her face.


    She was still a beauty, when had she ever been treated like this?<sub> </sub>


    It was only when she was with Lin Fan that she was being treated like this¡­


    She was fine with it if it meant that she would be able to see her dear Diabolis, but she hadn''t seen him around in the past few days. She was even worried that something might have happened to him, but she couldn''t just ask Lin Fan about it because there was no reason for her to ask him about it. She wasn''t that close to her Diabolis, so it would seem strange if she were to ask about him.


    So in the end, Qiao Yi Fei pushed down her dissatisfaction at how she had been treated and went into the store. The first thing she did was look around to see if she could find her Diabolis, but after not being able to find him, she revealed a disappointed look.


    It was only then that she noticed Mo Ze Chen, Lulu, and Wang Jian in the store.


    She ignored Mo Ze Chen and Lulu as she focused on Wang Jian.


    She knew who he was and the faction that he represented. She also knew that Lin Fan had formed some kind of rtionship with him during the Hunters Exam.


    She wasn''t clear how close they were since there was no information on that in the report, but apparently it was close enough for Wang Jian to be visiting Lin Fan.


    She knew that her grandfather and Mao Tao''s grandmother both wanted to pull Lin Fan into the Hunters Organization, so she couldn''t help feeling a bit disappointed that Lin Fan was openly associating himself with someone from another faction like this. After all, their grandparents had invested quite a lot in Lin Fan and it felt like he wasn''t appreciating any of it. At the very least, she had to stand up for her grandfather.


    Not to mention that she had even been sent here with something even better for him.


    Qiao Yi Fei couldn''t help saying, "Owner Lin, it seems like you havepany over. Do you want to introduce us?"


    Lin Fan looked at Wang Jian and didn''t say anything as Wang Jian took the initiative toe forward first.


    Wang Jian came forth and gave a slight bow before saying, "How could I not know miss Qiao? You''re famous in Harmony City."


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at Wang Jian with narrowed eyes before saying, "It should be me who should be saying this. After all, young master Wang is one of the famed Decagram Geniuses."


    Wang Jian just revealed a smile and didn''t say anything else.


    Qiao Yi Fei didn''t bother with Wang Jian any longer either since she had already aplished her goal in forcing this introduction. There was no need for the introduction in reality because both of them were naturally aware of who the other person was.


    She only forced this introduction out to include Wang Jian in what would happen next.


    Lin Fan could tell that Qiao Yi Fei had something to do here, otherwise she wouldn''t be here, so he asked, "Is there something that miss Qiao needs from me?"


    Qiao Yi Fei gave a nod before saying, "My grandfather wanted me to bring something over for you."


    She flicked her hand and there was a token that appeared in it. This wasn''t any ordinary token, this was a token that both of them were very familiar with because this was what they had just been discussing.


    It was one of the tokens that represented a spot in exploring the Ancient Era Ruins.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he saw this and then he said, "Please take this back, I thank elder Qiao for his kind intentions, but I have no ns on exploring those ruins."


    Qiao Yi Fei couldn''t help being taken aback by this.


    Wang Jian just shook his head with a bitter smile on his face.


    This was an Ancient Era Ruin!


    This wasn''t something that one could get just with money or power, it was something that depended on your luck and was something that could definitely change your life.


    Now Lin Fan was saying that he wasn''t interested in going?


    Was there something wrong with him?


    Qiao Yi Fei took a few seconds to recover before she asked, "I''m sorry, I don''t think I heard you clearly. Can you please repeat what you just said?"


    Lin Fan looked right at her and calmly said, "I have no ns on exploring those ruins."


    Qiao Yi Fei just awkwardly stood there because she didn''t know what to say in response to this. She was certain that Lin Fan would ept when she had been sent here, but now this hadpletely gone against what she thought would happen.


    It was at this time that Wang Jian gave a cough from the side.

 Chapter 559 Unexpected Guests (5)

    Lin Fan was clear what this cough from Wang Jian meant, but there was no need for him to rush this.


    After all, this was a very delicate situation and rushing into it would make the situation worse.


    After a pause, Qiao Yi Fei said, "This is something that my grandfather has said to give you and it''s not in my nature to take back gifts after giving them. I will leave this here, whether you take it or not is up to you."


    Qiao Yi Fei put the token down on the table in front of her and moved back without even making any movements towards it.


    Lin Fan looked down at the token and he could sense the sincerity of the Hunters Organization behind it.


    After another pause on Lin Fan''s end, he looked at Qiao Yi Fei and asked, "What do you think are the Hunters Organization''s chances in this Ancient Era Ruin?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was taken aback by Lin Fan''s sudden change in topic.


    After what had happened the other night and with all the developments with the Thunder Sect over the past few days, she had finally been filled in on everything that had happened between the Hunters Organization and Shi Yan.


    Qiao Yi Fei was one of the most talented younger generations that had been raised by the Hunters Organization because of her grandfather, the only reason that she didn''t have a Hunter License yet was because she was needed to run the Seekers Union. At the same time, she didn''t want one yet because she still wanted her own freedom to explore, which was what the Seekers Union gave her.


    But if she did want one, she could easily pass the Hunters Exam, or even bypass it because of her connections.


    As one of the most talented youngsters of the Hunters Organization, there was no doubt that she would be one of the people that would receive a token for this Ancient Era Ruin.


    However, they also knew that there might be some foul y from the Thunder Sect in this matter since they were working with two other forces, one in public and one in the shadows. Not to mention that they should already know some parts of this Ancient Era Ruin since they had already explored it, so it would be easy for them to make a move.


    This made the Hunters Organization much less confident about their chances in this Ancient Era Ruin.


    Unless they were certain, they wouldn''t send in their most powerful younger generation, but before deciding anything, they would still send in their most powerful younger generation.


    It was also why they wanted to bring Lin Fan in since he was the most unpredictable factor.


    They had seen his performance in the Hunters Exam and they were still uncertain just what was the limit of his power. Perhaps he would give them a pleasant surprise.


    But they couldn''t rely on Lin Fan alone for this, so they had to find other measures as well.


    Of course, the most reliable measure was to find another one of the twelve great factions to ally with, giving them someone to work with on the inside of the Ancient Era Ruin.


    However, that was the problem with the Hunters Organization. With how the Hunters Organization was organized, they were considered a neutral organization like the Alchemy King Hall or the Tamers Guild.


    Normally they wouldn''t be involved in this kind of conflict between factions like this.


    If it wasn''t for the involvement of Shi Yan, they would be one of the neutral factions that would have been able to enter the Ancient Era Ruin without much worries.


    However, with the involvement of Shi Yan, it was clear that there would be conflict between them and the Thunder Sect, so they would have no choice but to get involved with this kind of conflict. But that also made it harder for them to ally themselves with any other factions because there was ack of rtions between them in the past.


    Qiao Yi Fei knew all of this and when she heard these words from Lin Fan, she didn''t immediately take these words as provocation.


    Qiao Yi Fei turned to look at Wang Jian and then back at Lin Fan before suddenly asking, "Are you suggesting what I think you''re suggesting."


    Wang Jian was about to say something, but Lin Fan raised his hand to stop him as he said, "As long as you''re interested, anything can be discussed."


    Qiao Yi Fei narrowed her eyes to look at the two of them again, but then she gave a shrug and said, "There''s no meaning in us discussing this since no one here can represent the organization behind them."


    Qiao Yi Fei then turned to look at Wang Jian with a doubtful look that had a trace of ridicule in it as she said, "Unless you''re saying that you can represent the organization behind you?"


    Wang Jian revealed an awkward smile and didn''t dare match Qiao Yi Fei''s gaze since she had hit the nail on the head.


    While Wang Jian was powerful, that was only among the younger generation.


    There was no doubt that he would be one of the leaders of the Myriad Sword Hall in the future, but that was in the future. Right now he was just one of the younger generation and while he had a bit more power than the rest of the younger generation, he was still just that.<sub> </sub>


    When it came to the entire sect, there were plenty of elders that were stronger than him and had more power than him.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "There''s no need to make it hard on brother Wang, all he''s asking for is a meeting."


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at the two of them again before she asked, "When do you want the meeting to be?"


    Lin Fan looked at Wang Jian before saying, "It''d be best if we could schedule it as soon as possible. How about tomorrow?"


    Qiao Yi Fei paused for a second before giving a nod and saying, "Tomorrow it is."


    Lin Fan was a bit surprised by the fact that Qiao Yi Fei epted this so easily, but he quickly figured out the reason behind this.


    It seemed like the Hunters Organization was also feeling the pressure that the Thunder Sect was cing on everyone. While they weren''t exactly certain when the exploration of the Ancient Era Ruin was, they knew that it was soon.


    They didn''t have much time left to find a solution to the problem that they were facing, so it was better for them to get anything that they wanted done as soon as possible.


    Lin Fan gave a nod and then asked, "So how will it be done?"


    When they heard this, both Qiao Yi Fei and Wang Jian looked at Lin Fan with looks that showed that they found what Lin Fan said to be funny.


    Lin Fan didn''t understand these looks as he asked in a confused voice, "What''s wrong?"


    Qiao Yi Fei said, "Owner Lin, you seem to know a lot of things, but it doesn''t seem like you know everything about the twelve great factions."


    Wang Jian gave a nod in agreement before saying, "Brother Lin, the twelve great factions naturally have a way of secretly contacting each other. Otherwise, how do you think the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were able to establish their alliance without anyone noticing?"


    Lin Fan realized that he was right.


    Both the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect wererge organizations, so there would naturally be a lot of attention ced on them.


    But at the banquet the other night, many people were clearly surprised when they heard that the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were working together to excavate this Ancient Era Ruin.


    If they didn''t have a method of secretly contacting each other, that wouldn''t exin their surprise. In fact, it was the only logical exnation there was.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother thinking any deeper than this because this was something that didn''t involve him beyond this. After giving a nod, Lin Fan said, "Alright, good luck with your meeting tomorrow."


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Wang Jian revealed confused looks when they heard this.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked in a confused voice, "What''s wrong?"


    Qiao Yi Fei said in a voice that seemed like it was natural to her, "Owner Lin, you''reing to the meeting too."


    Lin Fan was even more confused as he asked, "Why would I being? This is a matter between your two factions, how does it concern me?"


    Wang Jian said, "You''re the one that brought our two factions together, so naturally you would be involved. Not to mention that this involves you since you will be going to the Ancient Era Ruin as well."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and said, "I already said that I''m not going to the Ancient Era Ruin. So how will this involve me?"


    Qiao Yi Fei then rebutted with, "Then what about Shi Yan? Do you think that he will leave you alone just because you don''t go? In the end, you can''t avoid him and you will have to deal with him eventually."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    That was right, there was still the matter of Shi Yan.


    If it wasn''t for Shi Yan, he wouldn''t have been forced to deal with this mess in the first ce.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "Alright, when is it?"

 Chapter 560 Sudden Mission

    Qiao Yi Fei revealed a smile and said, "We''ll send someone to get you, it''ll be in the evening, after your store closes."


    This was quite the show of respect for Lin Fan, they were even scheduling their meeting to ount for Lin Fan''s store.


    Or it would have been if it wasn''t for them ounting for themselves as well.


    These important people naturally had things to do during the day and they couldn''t just go missing, so the best time for them to meet was in the evening because there would be people watching them at night as well.


    Ideally it was during a meal because that was when people let down their guards the most. Of course, the ones letting their guards down would be the people watching them instead of the ones being watched.


    Lin Fan just gave a defeated nod before sending off Qiao Yi Fei and Wang Jian.


    Of course, neither of them minded since they both had things to do back at their organizations to prepare for this meeting.


    After sending them off, there was only Mo Ze Chen and Lulu that were left in the store.


    Lin Fan looked at the two of them and asked, "Do you have a ce to stay tonight?"


    Mo Ze Chen shook his head and said, "We came here as soon as we arrived, so we haven''t had time to find one yet. But it''s not that hard to find a ce to stay, especially when you have a Hunter License."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Forget about that, you can just stay with me."


    Mo Ze Chen looked around the shop and asked, "Boss, there''s a ce to stay in this shop?"


    Lin Fan said, "There''s no space for you in the shop since it''s where I stay, but you can stay at the residence that I was staying at previously. There''s a few empty buildings there that you can live in."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a surprised look, "Buildings?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "It''s arge courtyard, so you can take some of the side buildings."


    After saying this, Lin Fan raised his wrist to make a call to the Xu Family.


    After talking for a few minutes, he brought his wrist down and turned back to Mo Ze Chen to say, "It''s all set up. You can just head over and show them your Hunter License, there will be someone waiting for you."


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t forget to write down the address for the two of them when he said this, otherwise they would have felt awkward standing there, not knowing where to go.


    Before leaving though, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help turning back to ask, "Boss, are you alright staying in this shop alone by yourself? Do you need us to stay here with you?"


    Lin Fan just said with a smile and a wave of his hand, "I have some business to take care of and you can''t help me, so you can just go ahead. You''ll be helping me tomorrow with the store, so I''ll take your offer then."


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod and seemed like he was going to ept this exnation, but he couldn''t help feeling that something was off still.


    But there was nothing he could do if Lin Fan wasn''t willing to talk about it and it was gettingte. He would try to talk to Lin Fan about it tomorrow.


    After they left, Lin Fan let out a deep sigh and went into the back to put the pets into the shadow cultivation room.


    There was a reason why Lin Fan didn''t want to go back to the residence with Mo Ze Chen, there was a reason why he had been staying in the store the entire time.


    That residence, after staying there for some time, had be a kind of home.


    Now that most of the residents of that ce were no longer there, Lin Fan would have felt lonely living there by himself, which was why he didn''t want to go back there by himself before they came back.


    As he was walking into the back, he couldn''t help muttering to himself, "Where are you right now?"


    As his voice fell, there was a sudden prompt from the system.


    "The first employee of the store "Ang" has been injured."


    "Now issuing a special mission."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this, but then he quickly asked, "What happened to her? Where is she now?"


    The systempletely ignored this outburst from Lin Fan as it continued giving out a mission in its mechanical voice.


    "Since the host is the owner of the store and the store is responsible for the wellbeing of its employees, the host must go and help the first employee "Ang" recover."<sub> </sub>


    "The first employee has been injured by an unknown power and can only be cured with the special "True Ice Grass" found on the World of Elements. The host must find the "True Ice Grass" and bring it to the first employee "Ang" within twenty four hours or the host will fail this mission."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and he asked, "What happens if I fail the mission."


    "If the host fails the mission, the store will fall back down to level 2 and the host will lose the rights to the essory room."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more as he asked, "What will happen to Ang."


    The system paused for a second before finally replying.


    "The first employee "Ang" will sumb to her injuries and die."


    Lin Fan''s face was cold, it was ice cold. It was so cold that if anyone stared at it, they would have felt like they had been plunged into ten thousand year old ice and they were unable to extract themselves from it.


    Lin Fan asked the system in a cold voice, "Why didn''t you tell me sooner that she was in danger?"


    The system remained silent for once.


    If this was before, the system would have definitely given Lin Fan a warning for talking to it like this, but the system felt like it was a good idea not to test Lin Fan right now.


    Hearing nothing from the system, Lin Fan became even more angry, but that anger turned into calm.


    His face was like a still pool without a single ripple as he took a deep breath and then he said word for word, "Teleport me there now."


    The system wisely didn''t choose to remain silent this time.


    "The host will now be transferred to the World of Elements. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, transferring."


    There was the same sh of white light before the scene in front of him changed. When the sh of light was gone, Lin Fan was no longer in the shop and he appeared in front of a castle.


    This was Ang''s castle, the castle of the ruler of spirits, but it was also a different castle from the one that Lin Fan had met Ang in the first time he was here.


    That castle was the old castle and Ang had gone there to think when Lin Fan had suddenly disturbed her.


    This castle was surrounded by guards who immediately pointed their weapons at him, but they also quickly put down their weapons after seeing who it was. Lin Fan had already been to this castle quite a few times because he had used the World of Elements as a training area before, so he hade with Ang to the castle before.


    The guards had all received orders that Lin Fan was allowed to be here, so they naturally didn''t do a thing to him.


    However, when Lin Fan came forward to enter the castle, the guards suddenly stopped him.


    Lin Fan looked at them with his cold gaze that made them shiver as he said, "What is it?"


    The guards had received orders that the castle was on lockdown and no one was allowed to enter because of their ruler''s injuries, it was an order that didn''t have an exception at all. Even if Lin Fan had received the ruler''s permission to enter the castle, that was from a different time¡­


    Lin Fan could see that neither of the guards were nning on letting him pass, so he drew out his weapon and was about to attack them.


    The only thing on his mind was seeing Ang and he wouldn''t let anyone stand in his way.


    The guards raised their weapons as well, but it was clear that they were hesitant to fight back. They had previously received orders from Ang that they should treat Lin Fan with respect, an order that they wanted to follow if it wasn''t for the circumstances.


    Right when Lin Fan was about to attack, there was a voice that rang out saying, "What is going on here?"


    All three of them turned to look in the direction of the voice and they saw a little girl dressed in only a green skirt withcy fairy wings on her back floating over.


    The guards immediately stood at attention when they saw this little girl.


    This little girl was Ang''s personal maid and even though she was only a maid, everyone knew that she was one of the closest people to Ang, so they all treated her with respect.


    The guards reported the situation to the little girl and when she saw Lin Fan, she gave him a nod before saying, "It''s fine, you can let him pass."


    The guards gave a salute before clearing the way for them.


    The little girl turned to Lin Fan and said, "Follow me."

 Chapter 561 Profound Ice Forest (1)

    Lin Fan ignored the guards and followed this little girl who started floating into the castle.


    He had met this little girl before as well, but every time, the only thing that he had been met with was a cold re. She made it very clear that she didn''t like him, but Lin Fan didn''t me her either since he had seen how close she was with Ang.


    If one were topare the two of them, Lin Fan really was the one who wascking¡­


    However, none of that mattered right now since Ang was in danger.


    As they quickly moved through the halls of the castle, Lin Fan suddenly asked, "How is her condition?"


    When the little girl in the green dress heard this, she visibly trembled, but she didn''t stop as she still quickly moved through the halls.


    After a pause, instead of answering the question, she asked, "Where were you the entire time?"


    This time, it was Lin Fan''s turn to tremble. He opened his mouth to say something, but there was nothing he could say.


    He had all the resources needed toe and see her during this entire time, but he hadn''t done so. It was partly because he trusted her, but it was also partly because he understood himself.


    He knew that even if he were toe, he wouldn''t have been able to do a thing for her or might have even been a burden to her. If he were to try to meddle in things that were above his realm, he would have been killed and that was something that Ang wouldn''t want to see, even if she knew that he could revive afterwards. Without a doubt, if Lin Fan hade, Ang would have most likely been more hurt or have gotten injured faster because she would have been too busy protecting him.


    Still, Lin Fan med himself for being too passive.


    He had epted this fact because he had epted his weakness, but if he had tried hard enough, perhaps there would have been something that he could have done for her. He had the system and the system''s store, there should have been something in the store that could have changed the situation.


    Perhaps even if he was a bother, he should havee here tofort her¡­


    The little girl in the green dress didn''t say anything else after this since she knew that she had been too harsh on him.


    She knew that what Lin Fan did was most likely the best choice for the situation, but she couldn''t help feeling sorry for her big sister Ang.


    Her big sister Ang had given so much to this human, so she wouldn''t feel right if she didn''t speak up for her at all.


    After walking in silence for a bit, they finally came to a door that was the full length of the wall to the floor and was over four meters wide.


    Lin Fan was about to go forward to open the door, but the little girl in the green dress suddenly raised her hand to stop him.


    After giving him a re, she went over to knock on the door before saying, "Young miss, young master Lin is here."


    Even though she addressed him in a formal manner, it was clear from her tone that she didn''t truly respect him.


    There was a sound that suddenly came from inside the room and when the little girl in the green dress heard this, she immediately ran into the room. However, even after going into the room, she made sure to close the door behind her which kept Lin Fan out.


    Lin Fan just awkwardly stood there, but he could hear the voices that came from inside.


    "Young miss, you have to lie down. Don''t force yourself to sit up just for someone like him."


    Even hearing this, Lin Fan didn''t go in because he had his respect as a man. If he were to barge into a woman''s room like this, even if she was injured, he wouldn''t be much of a man.


    After a minute or two, the little girl in the green dress finally came out and said, "The young miss will see you now." However, it was clear by her voice just how much she didn''t want Lin Fan there.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this as he gave a nod to the little girl in the green dress and walked in.


    The moment he came in, the first thing his eyes turned to was Ang in therge bed in the center of the room.


    The moment he saw her face, it was as if his heart had broken in half.


    Her skin had always been white, but now it was pale with a dark tone to it, clearly showing that she was seriously injured.


    Lin Fan came over to her bedside and took her hand. He just stood there for a minute in silence before saying, "I''m sorry."


    Ang looked at him and tried to smile, but the moment she did, she winced in pain.


    Lin Fan quickly leaned over to see if he could help her, but she raised her hand to wave him away before rxing in bed and saying, "I''m fine."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "How can you say then when you''re like this?"<sub> </sub>


    Ang didn''t say anything, but it was clear what she was thinking from the expression in her eyes.


    Lin Fan took a deep breath and asked, "Who did this to you?"


    Ang took a deep look at Lin Fan and said, "I won''t tell you. Even if you told me that you wouldn''t try to take revenge for this, I wouldn''t believe you."


    Lin Fan asked, "What about in the future then?"


    Ang gave a sigh and said, "Maybe in the future, but right now, you can''t do anything to them. These are people that are much stronger than you think, there''s no way you''ll be able to do anything to them."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he knew that there was no way for him to refute this.


    From the very first moment that he had met her, he knew that he and Ang were from two different worlds. But he still wanted to jump over that gap one day and stand by her side.


    Ang saw the look on Lin Fan''s face, so she didn''t say anything. Instead she turned to the little girl in the green dress and said, "Lu''er, make us some tea."


    Lu''er looked at Ang with a look that showed that she was clearly unwilling to leave, but she still gave a bow in the end and left to make the tea, leaving just Lin Fan and Ang in the room.


    After a while, Lin Fan asked, "What do you need to recover?"


    Ang looked at him and shook her head, "It''s fine, you don''t need to do anything. I have plenty of subjects and they will be able to find what I need."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and said in a stronger voice, "What do you need to recover?"


    Ang took a deep look at him before giving a sigh and saying, "You won''t be able to get it, so there''s no point in telling you."


    Lin Fan then said in a slow voice, "Is it the True Ice Grass?"


    This time it was Ang''s turn to be surprised when she heard Lin Fan''s words. She knitted her brows, but doing so made her wince in pain. After wincing in pain, she asked, "Did your master tell you this?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this.


    After all, in a sense, it was his "master" who told him.


    Instead, Lin Fan changed the topic by asking, "Where can I find it?"


    Ang revealed a serious look and said, "Lin Fan, this isn''t a ce for you to y around in."


    Lin Fan said once again, "Where can I find it?" But it was clear from his tone that he wasn''t asking this time.


    Ang looked at his serious look and there was a trace of warmth that appeared in her heart, but what filled most of her heart was still worry for Lin Fan. She knew that Lin Fan was someone who cared deeply for the people closest to him and he would do anything for them, which was why she was worried. It pained her to see him being hurt¡­


    After a while of staring at each other, Ang finally said, "It''s in the Profound Ice Forest to the north, but that forest is a dangerous ce. It''s ruled by a spirit that while recognizing me as the ruler of this realm, only listens to my orders in emergencies. In most cases, she just does whatever she wants in the forest. However, that doesn''t mean that she''s weak, she can be considered the second strongest in this entire realm after me."


    Lin Fan asked, "She wants to see you die so she can take over."


    After a pause, Ang gave a nod in response.


    Lin Fan always knew that Ang had her own troubles in her realm, but he never knew the details because she was never willing to share them with him.


    Lin Fan had known that this was to protect him, but it still bugged him deep down.


    Now it was different, now it was a matter of her life.


    Lin Fan nodded and then patted her head as he said, "I''ll get the True Ice Grass for you."


    Ang had a worried look as she said, "But¡­"


    That was all she got to say before Lin Fan cut her off by saying, "Trust me, I''m your man."


    When she heard this, there was a blush that came over Ang''s face.

 Chapter 562 Profound Ice Forest (2)

    As the mood seemed to be developing well, there was a voice that suddenly came from the door.


    It was Lu''er who had juste back with the tea that she made.


    Lu''er said in a sharp voice, "What are you doing to the young miss?"


    Lin Fan didn''t mind it, but it was clear that Ang did as she raised a hand to stop him while a blush appeared on her face.


    Lin Fan clicked his tongue deep down, but he still moved away in the end.


    Lu''er put the tray with the tea on a table beforeing over to push Lin Fan aside,ing over to Ang''s bedside. She leaned in and asked, "Young miss, did this beast do anything to you?"


    Ang looked at Lin Fan with a smile on her face before patting Lu''er''s head and saying, "It''s fine, he''s behaving for now."


    Lin Fan had a bitter smile on his face when he heard what she said, but he didn''t say anything in return. Instead he looked at the corner of his vision where the mission tracker was and he could see that time was slowly ticking away.


    After letting Lu''er enjoy it for a bit, he said, "Where is the Profound Ice Forest?"


    Lu''er was surprised to hear this from Lin Fan and it took her a while to finally react as she said, "What are you saying? That ce doesn''t concern you."


    Lin Fan looked at her and said, "I''m going there now. Get me something to bring me there."


    Lu''er''s look of surprise turned into shock before she stood up from the bed and said, "Hey, human, are you looking to die? Don''t overestimate yourself, that ce isn''t a ce that you can go that easily."


    Even though Lu''er''s actions had made it clear that she didn''t like Lin Fan, there was still a trace of concern in her voice when she said this.


    Sometimes, the best friends you made were the people who you could argue with.


    Ang raised her hand and patted the back of Lu''er''s hand that was holding her hand.


    When Lu''er felt the touch of her hand, she turned to look at Ang. She saw the calm look in her eyes and she couldn''t help feeling even more anxious.


    Lu''er suddenly said in a loud voice, "Your majesty¡­"


    But before she could say anything else, Ang''s aura had already fallen on her that made her swallow the rest of her words.


    In her haste, she had said the two words that Ang hated hearing the most. Or at least the two words that she hated hearing the most from her.


    Lu''er had a special position in this realm, while she wasn''t that powerful, she was the closest person to Ang for a reason. That reason was that she was the one who had been with her the longest.


    Lu''er had been with Ang since she had been born, even though Ang was a few months older than her. The two of them had been raised together since Lu''er''s purpose since she had been born was to serve Ang.


    However, that wasn''t how Ang viewed their rtionship.


    Since they were young, Ang had forbidden her from addressing her in a formal manner. However, it was in Lu''er''s nature to serve her, so in the end, the two of them agreed to let Lu''er call her young miss. Anything beyond that had been forbidden by Ang.


    Ang had never treated Lu''er as a servant and had always wanted to treat her as a friend, or even a sister, so she always got angry when Lu''er tried to lower herself.


    It was just too bad that it was in Lu''er''s nature to serve Ang since that was the reason she had been born, so when she was anxious, she would make this kind of verbal slip.


    Lu''er gave a gulp before changing her tone to say, "But young miss, that ce really is dangerous. Are you sure you want to send him there?"


    Lu''er actually viewed Ang as her big sister as well since that was just how long they had been with each other. So even if she hated Lin Fan for taking her big sister Ang away from her, she knew that Ang truly was happy with Lin Fan and that she should support her.


    Now that Lin Fan was about to send himself to his death, how could she let him do that?


    If he died, wouldn''t her big sister Ang be sad?


    Ang patted her hand again and said in a soft, but determined voice, "Trust him."


    Lu''er still had a worried look, but she trusted her big sister Ang.


    After giving a sigh, Lu''er stood up and headed to the door as she said to Lin Fan, "Follow me."


    Lin Fan took onest look at Ang before following Lu''er out of the room.<sub> </sub>


    As Ang watched the two of them leave, there was a trace of worry that shed in her eyes as she muttered, "Be safe."


    ¡­


    Lu''er closed the door behind her before leading Lin Fan through the halls of the castle again.


    When Lin Fan asked where they were going, shepletely ignored him and just continued forward without even turning back.


    Eventually they went from the top floor where Ang''s bedroom was located to the bottom floor where there was a stable. Inside of this stable, there were many different beasts in the various stalls that were all over the stable.


    Looking around, Lin Fan could see all kinds of mounts like deers, lions, and even flying mounts like griffins that were in the stalls.


    As a man, naturally he wanted to show off with a powerful mount, so he was looking forward to seeing which one he would be taking to the Profound Ice Forest.


    However, Lu''er moved past all of these mounts and went to the very back of the stable where the mounts were¡­a bit strange.


    Lin Fan could see that there were mounts like giant ostriches, giant dogs, and giant cats that were inside of the stalls. While he felt that it would be a bit awkward for a grown man to ride something like this, it was still in the range of what he could ept.


    It was just too bad that none of these mounts were the ones that he was going to use.


    They kept going through the stables until they reached the very back of the stables where there was only a single giant stall waiting there.


    This stall was much bigger than the rest of the stalls, so it was clear that whatever was stored here was giant. However, since the door was so big that itpletely covered up the stall, Lin Fan couldn''t tell what kind of mount was inside.


    Lu''er nodded to the groomers who worked in the stable and two of them came over to open the door to reveal what was inside.


    The inside of the stall was dark, so Lin Fan couldn''t see right away what was inside, but the light slowly came in and revealed the true appearance of the mount. When Lin Fan saw the mount that he would be taking, he was shocked.


    Inside of the stall was a giant round ball that seemed like a giant ball of liquid just standing there. On the giant ball, there were two vertical lines and a single long horizontal line underneath it that formed the generic face of a NPC in a video game.


    It only took a single look for Lin Fan to recognize what kind of creature this was.


    It was the first mob that was featured in every fantasy NPC, the weakest mob that anyone could defeat¡­It was a slime!


    While it was a giant slime, it was still a slime in the end¡­


    There were cases of slimes being fast in the games that he yed, but all of those were special slimes.


    This slime in front of him, no matter how he looked at it, it looked like nothing more than a normal slime one might find outside of the starting vige¡­


    Lin Fan raised a hand to point at the slime as he asked, "This is the mount that I''m taking?"


    Lu''er didn''t look back at Lin Fan as she came forward to pet the slime, but she still said, "The mount that ''we''re'' taking. I''ming with you as well."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this and he said, "You''re noting with me."


    Lu''er could tell from the tone of Lin Fan''s voice what he was thinking and she said, "What are you thinking? The mount can''t go inside the Profound Ice Forest, so you''ll need someone to watch it while you go in. Not to mention that Bu will only listen to me or the young miss, so you don''t have a choice."


    Lin Fan realized that she was right. The mount couldn''t just be left there and she wouldn''t be in danger if she waited with the mount. But then he realized his next problem.


    Lin Fan asked, "You''re saying that this slime belongs to Ang?"


    Lu''er looked at Lin Fan with a confused look and said, "What''s wrong? This is the young miss'' personal mount, you should be happy that we''re even letting you ride him."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows again as he looked at the slime.


    This was Ang''s personal mount?


    Was there a mistake?


    Why would someone who ruled over a realm of this level have a slime as their mount?


    Weren''t there plenty of other better mounts for her to use all around them?

 Chapter 563 Profound Ice Forest (3)

    However, as soon as they set off, it didn''t take long before Lin Fan realized why Ang had this slime as a mount.


    When they came up to the slime, there was a door that opened on the side that allowed them to enter.


    Aftering into the slime, Lin Fan was surprised by the interior.


    Inside of the slime was a fully functioning house¡­well to call it a house was putting it down. With the size of the rooms inside the slime, it was better to call it a vi instead of a house.


    The only thing that Lin Fan was caught off guard by was the decoration.


    There was much morece than he thought there would be, but it seemed like Ang was a girl in the end.


    Once they had settled, Lu''er gave instructions for the slime to set off.


    Lin Fan went over to one of the windows that was present in this room and he found that there was ayer of membrane that was over it, which was clearly the skin of the slime. However, the skin of the slime waspletely transparent, or at least it was for the part that covered the window, so Lin Fan was able to see outside.


    He could see that based on the scenery outside, the slime was moving out of the stable. However, the strange thing was that he couldn''t feel the vibrations of the slime moving at all, even though he could tell that they were moving based on how the scenery outside kept moving up and down.


    It really was strange, this interior of the slime really wasn''t what he expected at all.


    It took them five minutes toe to the entrance of the stable and Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling doubtful about the speed of this slime.


    Lin Fan went over to where Lu''er was controlling the slime from and asked, "Are you sure that we should be taking this slime?"


    Lu''er said without turning around, "The young miss has already given her permission, there''s nothing for you to worry about."


    Lin Fan said, "That''s not what I¡­"


    But before he could even say a thing, he suddenly felt a strong force pushing him backwards.


    Lin Fan had been looking out the window while he was talking to Lu''er and he had seen the scenery slowly get lower, which showed that the slime was tensing up to build strength to jump with.


    However, based on his previous knowledge of slimes, he didn''t have much hope that the slime would be able to move fast.


    It was too bad for him that the slime had proved him wrong.


    All the scenery outside of the window had turned into a blur and Lin Fan could feel the intense force that was pushing him back, which he hadn''t felt before when the slime was moving.


    All of this gave him an idea of just how fast the slime was moving right now.


    Previously when the slime had been bouncing along in the stable, it had been able to negate most of the force with its body, which had kept the room stable. However, this time the people inside of the room were able to feel it, which showed just how strong the force generated was.


    Lin Fan couldn''t believe it, but he had to believe it when it was in front of his eyes.


    This slime, it really was so god damn fast!


    The trees seemed to disappear past his eyes as he looked out the window¡­


    Lin Fan turned to Lu''er and asked, "How long will it take for us to arrive?"


    Lu''er just calmly replied, "It''ll take another ten minutes and we''ll be there."


    Lin Fan was shocked by this. He knew that even with the other mounts, it would have taken at least an hour for them to arrive, but it only took ten minutes with this slime?


    He believed it now, this slime really was worthy of being Ang''s personal mount.


    Lin Fan walked over to where the sofa was and sat down cross legged, as he began to cultivate and calm his mind.


    What he was about to do was very important and he would need a clear mind to do his best, so he would take this short time that it took to travel to calm himself as much as possible.


    The ten minutes quickly passed and soon they arrived.


    When they did, Lu''er came over to the sofa that Lin Fan was sitting on and she looked at him with knitted brows.<sub> </sub>


    Then after a slight moment of hesitation, she raised her hand which was covered in a green glow that sent a bit of energy into Lin Fan''s body that Lin Fan didn''t notice at all.


    This process didn''t take that long and not before long, it was as if nothing had happened.


    Once she was done, Lu''er adjusted her expression before saying, "We''re here."


    When Lin Fan heard Lu''er''s voice, he came out of his cultivation state and opened his eyes to see her standing in front of him. He turned to look out the window and the scenery that he saw outside surprised him.


    They were still surrounded by a forest, but halfway through that forest, the trees had suddenly changed appearances.


    Instead of normal trees that were covered in leaves like the rest of the trees in this realm, the trees past a certain line were trees that werepletely covered in ice. Or rather, it was more appropriate to call them trees that werepletely made of ice.


    These were trees that didn''t have a single trace of green on them, they seemed more like tree sculptures that were carved out from blocks of ice. However, if one looked closely, they would be able to see that there was indeed a trunk that was underneath the thickyer of ice.


    This ce wasn''t called the Profound Ice Forest for nothing.


    Lin Fan got up and was prepared to walk out of the slime when Lu''er suddenly called out to stop him.


    Lu''er said, "Wait, before you go, I have something for you."


    Lin Fan turned around with a confused look as he asked, "What is it?"


    Lu''er waved her hand and there was a piece of paper that appeared which she handed over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan took it and looked it over before revealing another confused look.


    He could tell that this was a map, but what was it a map of?


    Lu''er took a red pen out and marked a spot on the map before saying, "This is our current location." Then she took that same pen and drew a circle in the middle of the map before saying, "And this is the location of the True Ice Grass."


    She looked up at Lin Fan and said, "I don''t think I need to say anything else, right?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod since he was able to easily understand what she meant if she put it like this. This was clearly a map of the Profound Ice Forest in front of him and she had just given him the most direct route to it.


    Of course, Lin Fan would still have to take it slow because the most direct route for her didn''t mean the most direct route for him. After all, things that would be considered obstacles for him might not be considered obstacles for her.


    Still, Lin Fan appreciated this since it would make his job much easier now.


    Lin Fan gave her a nod of appreciation before walking out of the slime.


    Lu''er just watched him from the window of the slime as he disappeared into the forest of ice. Once he was gone, Lu''er said under her voice, "I''m sorry, young miss."


    ¡­


    The moment Lin Fan approached the trees of ice, he could already feel the chill that came from them. As he headed deeper and deeper into that forest, he felt the chill be stronger as it reached a point where it started piercing into his bones.


    At that point, Lin Fan had no choice but to call out Xiao Huo who perched on his shoulder, surrounding him in his mews. The mews didn''t burn intensely, but they did provide enough warmth for Lin Fan that he could move around normally without being affected by the chill.


    If one looked at Lin Fan carefully, they would almost be able to see ayer of light that surrounded him.


    Following the map that Lu''er gave him and apass that he brought with him, Lin Fan was able to easily follow the map to where he needed to go.


    He was certain that he was heading the right way because as he continued into the forest, the chill around him became colder and colder. Xiao Huo had no choice but to use more and more life energy to keep Lin Fan from freezing.


    There were also some beasts that Lin Fan came across along the way, but surprisingly, most of the beasts that he encountered were only in the Soul Realm and not a single one of them had surpassed the Embryo Soul Realm.


    That was very strange since in every other part of this World of Element, he had met beasts that were at a much higher level of cultivation. There were even beasts that were in the realm above the Soul Realm.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t have time to worry about that since he was racing against the clock.


    Finally, Lin Fan was able to make it out of the forest and into a clearing.

 Chapter 564 Profound Ice Forest (4)

    This clearing was just like the forest, beingpletely covered in ice and snow, but for some reason, it was warmer here than it was in the forest.


    Looking around, Lin Fan couldn''t find anything special about this ce. It was very open, so he could clearly see everything that was in this area, but there was only snow that covered the ground here.


    Of course, there was something special that was in the very center of this open field, but it was what Lin Fan expected to find.


    In the center of the field, there were des of grass that seemed to be made of ice, but they weren''t hard as ice at all. When a breeze blew past these des of grass, they swayed in the wind just like normal des of grass.


    This was the True Ice Grass that Lin Fan was looking for.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t in a hurry to pick these des of grass¡­Well, he was in a hurry since he wanted to get them to Ang as soon as possible, but he didn''t want to rush because something didn''t feel right.


    If he wasn''t mistaken, it was almost as if this was a trap that had beenid here for him. However, if that was the case, who was the oneying the trap?


    Moreover, what purpose would they have forying this kind of trap?


    Lin Fan waited for a few minutes, but he wasn''t able to find anything in the end.


    Seeing that nothing would change if he didn''t do anything, Lin Fan didn''t have a choice but to fall into this trap.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried because he had something that no one else in this realm had. He had the power of this system which would revive him if something did happen to him.


    After thinking this, Lin Fan came out of the trees and started walking towards the des of grass in the middle. While he was moving through this open space, he already had his weapon in his hand and was prepared for anything that woulde out at him.


    However, even with his guard up, there was nothing that came out of the surrounding area to attack him.


    He had made it all the way to the des of True Ice Grass and was even able to bend over to harvest them without anything happening.


    But at the veryst second, there was something that happened in the end.


    Lin Fan had just bent over when the snow around him suddenly started flying into the sky and surrounding him in a vortex of snow.


    Lin Fan stopped bending down and stood straight, raising his weapon which he had transformed into a sword.


    However, even if Lin Fan was ready to fight, there was nothing around for him to fight.


    He looked all around him, but he wasn''t able to sense a single living creature which unsettled him. Even if there weren''t any powerful creatures, there should be creatures that were around this area, but there just wasn''t a single one here.


    That meant that there was something that was keeping them all at bay¡­


    It wasn''t until a voice suddenly came from behind Lin Fan that he knew what it was.


    "Hmm, let''s get rid of this thing first."


    Then before Lin Fan could even react or turn around, there was a powerful force that had hit him in the back.


    This force sent him flying across this open area and he flew all the way to the edge, mming and shattering several trees made of ice beforeing to a stop by sliding across the ground for several dozen meters.


    When he finally came to a stop, Lin Fan couldn''t help spitting out a mouthful of blood onto the pure white snow.


    He was also able to see a few scattered pieces of green energy that was dissipating around him.


    ¡­


    Back in the slime house, Lu''er suddenly stood up when she noticed that her barrier had been shattered.


    When Lin Fan had been cultivating, she had ced an array on him that contained a barrier created with her full strength. Unless Lin Fan met the master of this Profound Ice Forest, there shouldn''t have been anything that could have broken through this barrier.


    Could it be that?...


    If it was, she really didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to make it out of this situation alive.


    After a moment of silence, she muttered under her breath, "I''m sorry young miss, I tried my best."<sub> </sub>


    Then without any hesitation, she had the slime mount start to move as she ordered it to head back to the castle.


    With her power, there was no way for her to retrieve Lin Fan''s corpse from the Profound Ice Forest and there was a more pressing matter for her to deal with right now, so she didn''t have any time to waste here. She had to get back and resolve the issue of the young miss, so she could only say sorry to Lin Fan, but she would be leaving his corpse here.


    In her mind, she was already certain that Lin Fan was dead since she didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to fight the master of the Profound Ice Forest.


    What she didn''t know was that even if Lin Fan had died, he wouldn''t die for real as long as he had his system with him.


    But she didn''t know that, so she didn''t feel like there was a reason to stay here any longer.


    With a quick spring, the slime immediately flew out in the direction of the castle, disappearing without a trace in just a few seconds.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan looked at these tiny wisps of green energy and he could tell that they were most likely from Lu''er. This should have been a barrier that she had put around him, which had touched him in the end, but there was no time for him to think about this as there were more pressing matters to handle.


    When Lin Fan finally stabilized himself, he immediately looked back in the direction that he had been sent flying from to see who had done it, but all he was able to see was the vortex of snow in the center of the open field.


    Since he wasn''t able to find the thing that had just attacked him, Lin Fan quickly stood and raised his weapon as he raised his guard, but that didn''t stop the voice from sounding out behind him.


    "What are you doing?"


    Lin Fan immediately turned the moment that he heard this voice, but he found that the source was already gone.


    Lin Fan released his spiritual sense to try and find it again, but there was nothing to be found at all.


    Still, at the very least, Lin Fan could tell that while whatever this was had attacked him, it didn''t want to kill him.


    With the first attack just now, based on how strong the life energy that it contained was, if whatever had attacked him wanted to kill him, he would already be dead.


    Even if something did block that first attack, it would have definitely been able to kill him with a second attack, but for some reason, whatever this thing was hadn''t attacked him and had just asked him a question.


    After taking a deep breath, Lin Fan asked, "Who are you?"


    There was a giggle that came from around him before a voice said, "You''re in my territory and you''re asking me who I am? Shouldn''t I be the one asking who you are?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Based on what it had just said and the intensity of the attack that he had just faced, Lin Fan''s guess was that whatever this was was the spirit that Ang had told him about before. This was the one spirit that she couldn''t control, the one spirit that was only second to her in this entire realm.


    Lin Fan had hoped that he wouldn''t run into this spirit on this trip, but the worst scenario had happened in the end and it had appeared before him in the end.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before saying, "I just want to take something and then I''ll be out of your hair."


    There was augh that rang out around him again before the voice said, "Normally when someone steals something, they try to hide it. You really are something else, openly admitting that you want to steal something from my territory."


    Then that voice turned sharp and fierce as it said, "What should I do with this little thief?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "Let him take his prize for being honest and let him go?"


    There was a pause from around him before the voice broke out inughter again, "You really don''t have any fear at all, do you?"


    Lin Fan said once again in a calm voice, "Is there a reason to be afraid?"


    The voice slowly said, "Well¡­I think so."


    Then before Lin Fan could even react, the snow and ice from under his feet suddenly came up into the air and formed icicles that were pointed right at his neck in a circle. They weren''t just sharp, they were also ice cold, so cold that Lin Fan''s skin was already turning blue even though they weren''t touching him at all.


    The voice said in a yful tone, "How about we y a game instead? I''ll give you one minute to tell me why I shouldn''t skewer you right now."

 Chapter 565 Profound Ice Forest (5)

    Lin Fan could hear the serious tone that was hiding under the yful tone.


    He knew that as long as he didn''t give an answer that satisfied the owner of this voice, they wouldn''t hesitate to stab him in the throat.


    But he still didn''t panic.


    Lin Fan was silent as he thought about what to say.


    Finally right before his minute was up, Lin Fan calmly said, "How about we make a deal instead?"


    There was a slight pause before the voice said, "Human, are you not afraid?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this and instead said, "What will you take for the True Ice Grass?"


    There was a soft snort that suddenly rang out that caused the temperature in the air to suddenly drop before the voice said, "You humans are known for being sly, do you really think that I would make a deal with you?"


    Before Lin Fan could say a thing, the vortex of snow that was in front of him slowly started to dissipate before finally disappearingpletely.


    When it did, Lin Fan revealed a surprised look.


    It wasn''t because of the vortex disappearing, but rather what had appeared in the center of the vortex.


    There was a girl standing there, right over the True Ice Grass in the middle looking right at Lin Fan with blue eyes that were as deep and cold as ten thousand year old ice. She was just dressed in a simple white sundress even though it was freezing and she had long white hair that flowed right down to her shoulders.


    This was a girl that was perfect and would have been the most beautiful girl that Lin Fan had seen if it wasn''t for the fact that he had seen Ang. Un, she was only second to Ang.


    Well, it wasn''t that she was perfect because from her neck down to her waist, it was a straight line¡­


    As Lin Fan was surprised by the sudden appearance of this girl, she slowly walked over to where Lin Fan was and looked him up and down.


    Then she stopped in front of Lin Fan and shook her head as she said, "I really don''t get what she sees in you."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    It wasn''t that he was insulted by what she had just said, but rather he was confused by what she just said. Or rather, he was confused by the hidden implication of her words.


    He had heard from Ang that this spirit was the one that didn''t listen to her and was antagonistic towards her, but based on what Lin Fan had just heard, that didn''t seem to be the case.


    It was almost as if¡­


    Lin Fan looked right at this girl and asked, "Are you worried about her?"


    The white haired girl revealed a confused look and said, "Huh? What are you talking about?"


    Lin Fan still calmly looked at her and said, "She doesn''t have that much time left."


    The white haired girl narrowed her eyes as she looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Do you have a screw loose?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything beyond that.


    However, when the white haired girl saw the way Lin Fan was looking at her, she couldn''t take it and couldn''t help saying, "Whatever you''re thinking, it''s not like that."


    But still Lin Fan didn''t say a thing.


    The white haired girl felt ufortable with the way Lin Fan looked at her, so she waved her hand and the icicles sent Lin Fan flying. They didn''t pierce him since she held back her power, but she still sent him flying with those icicles since she was shamed into anger.


    Once Lin Fannded, she walked over to where he was lying on the ground and said, "Don''t act like you know everything. You don''t know anything."


    Then she looked over Lin Fan and said, "There''s really nothing special about a human like you, so why did she go crazy over you? Tell me, did you do something to her?" When she said this, there was a hostile look that appeared in her eyes.


    It wasn''t a secret that Lin Fan and Ang were together since it was something that she had made clear herself. She had given orders that gave Lin Fan plenty of rights that normal people in this realm wouldn''t have, which made her stance towards Lin Fan very clear.


    There were even people who had started looking at Lin Fan like Ang''s boy toy.


    As the second strongest expert in this realm, naturally she had her own ways of getting information and finding out something that was this public wouldn''t be considered hard for her.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh before saying, "You can choose to believe me or not, but I really don''t have time for this right now."


    The white haired girl revealed a teasing smile as she asked, "Then what are you going to do about it?" Then after a pause, she said, "How about this? If you be my human pet instead, I''ll give her the True Ice Grass that she needs. What do you think about that? It''s a pretty good deal if I have to say so."


    Lin Fan shook his head again before saying, "Unfortunately that isn''t a good deal for me, so I''ll have to pass."


    The white haired girl still looked at him with the same smile as she said, "But it''s the only deal you have. What else can you do?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile and said, "It''s not my first choice, but it doesn''t seem like I have another choice."


    The white haired girl looked confused as she asked, "What are you¡­"


    But before she could even finish, Lin Fan moved forward towards the icicle that was ced right at his neck, allowing it to pierce right through his flesh.


    The white frost quickly spread across Lin Fan''s skin where the icicle had pierced him and soon he had been turned into a statue. Then once he hadpletely turned to ice, there was a crack that suddenly appeared before the statue had shattered to pieces.


    The white haired girl looked at the fragments of ice on the ground with a stunned look, not understanding what had just happened. She hadn''t even been able to react in time to stop Lin Fan from killing himself since she wasn''t able to process what happened.


    Why would this human choose to kill himself?


    There was no reason for him to do so, not to mention that there was something important that he had to do¡­


    Could it be that he felt that there was no hope for Ang, so he didn''t want to live in a world without her?


    But she was going to give her the True Ice Grass no matter what, he should have been able to see that or he wouldn''t have said those words¡­


    So what reason did he have to kill himself?


    As the white haired girl pondered this, still not understanding what had just happened, there was a wisp of energy that suddenly appeared.


    When it appeared, the white haired girl didn''t notice it since it was just a small wisp, but as the energy became stronger, she was suddenly dragged out of her thoughts and she turned around to look at where the wisps of True Ice Grass were.


    Looking at the swirl of energy that had appeared above the True Ice Grass, she immediately knitted her brows as she muttered in a voice filled with disbelief, "Timews?"


    The reason she was surprised wasn''t because it was just simple timews, but rather the energy that came from the swirl of timews was one that she had never felt before. She could tell that it was far beyond her own level, it was even beyond Ang''s level. The only way to describe the level it was at was "godly".


    Then her eyes popped out as she said, "God Realm timews? What''s going on here?"


    Even as she said this, she did nothing as she watched the timews swirl around. She didn''t make a move because she wasn''t clear on what was happening right now and she didn''t want to make a rash move.


    As the timews swirled around, they finally took form as they condensed into the form of Lin Fan.


    Once it was done condensing, Lin Fannded right on the True Ice Grass.


    The reason why it had taken Lin Fan so long to regenerate was because his body had beenpletely destroyed this time, so the system had to regenerate a whole new body for him.


    Without wasting a single second and taking advantage of the white haired girl''s shock, he bent down and picked several des of this True Ice Grass.


    When the initial feeling of surprise was over, the white haired girl suddenly realized what was happening and flew right at Lin Fan with her palm raised. Her life energy gathered at her palm before she pushed out, sending arge icicle right in Lin Fan''s direction.


    As she pushed her palm out, she shouted, "You!"


    Lin Fan saw this, but he didn''t make any motion to guard against it.


    The white haired girl was once again surprised by this, but she knew better to hold back again.


    The icicle flew through the air, quickly closing the gap between the two of them before stabbing Lin Fan right in the chest.


    The same thing happened asst time where the white frost spread from the point of contact beforepletely covering Lin Fan and then shattering the ice sculpture that was created.


    But before Lin Fan had beenpletely frozen, he looked at the white haired girl and said, "Goodbye."

 Chapter 566 Surprise Visitor (1)

    Once Lin Fan''s ice sculpture had shattered, the white haired girlnded where he had been standing and looked down at the pieces of ice at her feet.


    She looked around herself to see if there would be more timews appearing, but she couldn''t feel anything.


    It seemed like it was over, but she couldn''t help feeling that something was off¡­


    That human, he had let himself be hit with her attack too easily¡­It was almost as if he wanted to die¡­


    Then there was the fact that he had been able toe back to life and the strange God Realm timew that had appeared.


    Just who was he and why could he control God Realmws?


    As she had these thoughts, there was also an ufortable feeling that filled her heart.


    When she thought of his final words, she couldn''t help feeling a bit angry.


    She knew that all of this was nned by him, it was the only way to exin how he had been so calm the entire time. He knew that even if she did do something to him, he would have a way of escaping, so he didn''t panic at all.


    When it was put this way, it made it seem like she had been ying into his palms the entire time.


    As a powerful expert, she naturally had her own pride and she couldn''t stand being yed by someone like Lin Fan who she hadbelled as someone inferior to her. This was someone who wasn''t even close to matching her and yet he had been able to fool her like this.


    If this was known, she would definitely be aughingstock among her peers.


    Thinking this, the white haired girl decided that she couldn''t just let it end like this.


    Gathering all her power, she suddenly flew into the sky and then ripped space apart to create a void before heading right through it. Once she went through the crack in space, the crack in space disappeared and everything went back to normal, not leaving a single trace.


    ¡­


    Back at the castle, there was a vortex of timews that suddenly appeared.


    When it appeared, the guards in the surrounding area immediately raised their weapons to surround this vortex of timews. However, before they could swing their weapons at it, there was a change that happened with the vortex.


    The vortex condensed together and took the shape of a human, namely Lin Fan.


    When the guards saw Lin Fan, they all recognized him and immediately put down their weapons.


    When Ang had given the order that Lin Fan was free to move around the castle as he wished, she had given the order with the highest grade priority, so all the guards had made sure to remember Lin Fan''s face. They wanted to make sure that they didn''t do anything foolish like offending someone that was considered important to the queen.


    They were just simple guards, they couldn''t afford to offend someone as important as this.


    Lin Fan ignored the guards that had surrounded him and tried to head into the castle, but the guards then remembered the other order that they had received and after hesitating a bit, they still came forward to stop him.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about the guards that came forward and still pushed his way towards the castle, but seeing that Lin Fan wouldn''t listen to them, the guards had no other choice but to start using force by grabbing Lin Fan.


    The guards of this castle naturally had a higher cultivation than Lin Fan, so even if he struggled they were able to easily hold him back.


    Lin Fan shouted at the guards to let him go, but the guards just awkwardly asked him not to make it hard on them.


    Of course, there wasn''t a single guard that actually dared to use real force against Lin Fan. However, as they continued their struggle, the noise that they made had gathered quite a bit of attention.


    This included the attention of Lu''er who had juste back with the slime.


    She came over to see what themotion was, but when she saw the person who was causing themotion, she couldn''t help being stunned.


    She had clearly felt the shattering of her energy barrier, so she was certain that he was supposed to be dead.


    Just how had he been able toe back from that ce alive and well?


    Not to mention, how had he been able toe back before her?


    She had taken the fastest mount that they had and there was no faster way toe back, unless one was at the same cultivation level as the rulers. They had a special way of traveling that was faster than any of the mounts, so that was the only way to reach this ce before her.


    But was Lin Fan a ruler?<sub> </sub>


    They could all easily tell what Lin Fan''s cultivation was since he was much weaker than most of the intelligent creatures in this realm, so there was no way that was possible.


    But Lu''er didn''t have time to ponder this since she saw that Lin Fan was getting impatient and was about to pull out his weapon to attack the guards.


    She quickly came forward and said, "Enough, let him go."


    Everyone stopped when they heard this voice and when they saw that it was Lu''er, the guards immediately let Lin Fan go.


    Lu''er didn''t even bother with the guards as she waved her hand at Lin Fan and said, "Come with me."


    The guards all moved to the side to let her pass and Lin Fan followed behind her.


    When they finally entered the castle with no one else around, Lu''er asked, "Did you get it?"


    Lin Fan just said, "Un."


    When she heard this, she started moving faster because she knew that there was nothing for Lin Fan to gain by lying here. Since that was the case, they needed to get the True Ice Grass to Ang as soon as possible.


    Along the way, Lu''er also took out a leaf and said a few words into it before putting it away.


    It didn''t take long before there was a group of people in doctor''s uniforms that ran up beside Lu''er and asked, "Miss Lu''er, is it true that you got it?"


    Lu''er nodded before turning to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan gave a nod as well as he waved his hand and pulled out the True Ice Grass.


    When the doctors saw this, their eyes immediately lit up. This was the one ingredient that they needed to create the medicine that would help Ang recover and now that it was in front of them, how could they not be excited?


    The doctors quickly took the True Ice Grass without another word and headed off in a different direction to make the medicine.


    During this entire process, neither Lu''er or Lin Fan had stopped moving as they headed towards Ang''s room.


    Now that the True Ice Grass had finally been handed over, there was nothing else for them to worry about, so Lu''er took this chance to ask Lin Fan, "How did you get it? How did you get back here faster than me? And how did you not die?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile, but he just said, "It''s a secret."


    Lu''er knitted her brows, but she chose not to push him for the answer since he at least deserved this for what he had done.


    In fact, if it wasn''t for the fact that Lin Fan had leveled up the show, he wouldn''t have been able to do this at all.


    After he had leveled up the shopst time, his respawn abilities had improved, which allowed him to control the location of his revival.


    With the new abilities, he was able to revive within a hundred meters of where he died which was what he had used for the first revival. With this ability, he had tricked the white haired girl and was able to make it over to the True Ice Grass without her understanding how he had done it.


    The second new ability was that he now had the ability to set a respawn point, which he had set at the castle where he had appeared.


    This respawn point ability allowed him to choose one spot on the cultivation realm to revive to if he ever died. In addition to this, it also gave him a spot to appear from whenever he came to this realm.


    With these two abilities, he was able to pull off that heist with the True Ice Grass and appear back at the castle.


    Neither of them said a single thing as they headed right to Ang''s chambers. When they arrived, they opened the door, but then they felt an ice cold chilling out from inside.


    From the inside of the room, there was a voice that said, "You''re finally back? That took quite a while."


    Both Lin Fan and Lu''er knitted their brows when they heard this voice because both of them recognized it. It wasn''t Ang''s voice, but rather it was the voice of someone that they were both familiar with.


    Standing by Ang''s bed was a white haired girl.


    This was the same white haired girl that Lin Fan had met earlier and she was also the second strongest expert in this realm.


    Since Ang was weakened, she had taken advantage of the gap in defenses to appear in her room.


    But what reason did she have foring here?

 Chapter 567 Surprise Visitor (2)

    The white haired girl standing by the bed saw the way Lin Fan and Lu''er had their guard up, so she asked, "What''s wrong with the two of you?"


    Lin Fan and Lu''er really wanted to roll their eyes at her, but they held it back.


    Lu''er asked in a hesitant voice, "What are you doing here?"


    The white haired girl didn''t even look at Lu''er and she looked right at Lin Fan as she said, "What? I can''te here if something of mine was stolen?"


    It was clear by the underlying dangerous tone in her voice what she meant by that.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he shook his head, but he didn''t say anything.


    In fact, both of them wanted to roll their eyes and say, "If Ang was better, would you daree here?"


    But then the white haired girl knitted her brows as she looked down at Ang sleeping in the bed. After a while, she turned back to ask, "Her situation is much more serious than I thought. Have you already made the medicine?"


    Lu''er gave a nod before saying, "They''re making the medicine right now."


    The white haired girl''s brows rxed a bit before saying, "Good, if she dies, then there''s no one that will defend this realm. I don''t want to be the one fighting those annoying people."


    She turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "How do you n onpensating me for what you''ve done?"


    Lin Fan felt a chill run down his back when he heard this.


    It was clear that she wasn''t happy about being tricked, so now it seemed like she was here for revenge, but she should know that she couldn''t kill him after what had just happened earlier.


    Then, could it be that she was just¡­?


    Ang suddenly stirred after the white haired girl said this and she raised a hand to grab the sleeve of the white haired girl.


    The white haired girl was surprised when she felt someone pulling on her sleeve. When she turned to see that it was Ang, she knitted her brows and asked, "What are you doing?"


    Ang looked right into her eyes and said with a determined look, "You can''t touch him, he''s under my protection."


    The white haired girl knitted her brows once again as she asked, "Are you sure about that?"


    Ang just stared her right in the eyes without looking away.


    The white haired girl knitted her brows even more, but she didn''t say anything.


    The two of them continued their staredown until someone suddenly said something that broke the tension.


    That someone was Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan directly asked, "Why don''t you just ask how she''s feeling if you''re worried about her?"


    All three of the girls in the room revealed stunned looks when they heard this.


    No matter how one looked at it, this seemed like a situation where they could break out in a fight at any second. It didn''t seem like how someone would act if they were worried about someone else at all.


    However, the strange thing was that after a moment of silence, there was a blush that suddenly appeared on the face of the white haired girl.


    When she spoke, she even stuttered a bit as she said, "What, what kind of nonsense are you, you talking about? How could I, I be worried about her?"


    As she said this, she also made sure to re at Lin Fan with eyes that seemed like they could pierce right through him.


    But before Lin Fan could say a thing, Ang suddenly asked, "Were you worried about me?"


    The white haired girl heard this and the blush became even stronger on her face as she turned it away from Ang. Then she said in a low voice, "Humph, who would be worried about¡­"


    But before she could finish, Ang had already pulled her hand and she sat down on the bed, allowing Ang to hug her as she said, "Thank you for worrying about me."


    The white haired girl was taken aback by this, but then she lowered her head and said, "I just didn''t want to deal with what happened after you died, so I wanted to see if you would live through this."


    Lu''er had a shocked look on her face, but Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he saw this.


    He had a feeling that things would end like this.<sub> </sub>


    After all, when he had met the white haired girl, the encounter had been very strange.


    While the white haired girl had hurt him with the first attack, everything after that seemed different once she figured out who he was. While there was still hostility in her actions, it was a different kind of hostility, one that Lin Fan was actually familiar with.


    As a rich young master, naturally Lin Fan didn''t have ack of attempts at arranged marriages. He had gone to many of these meetings and had seen many girls from other rich families, but that wasn''t the point here.


    The point was the way the parents had looked at him, it was with that look of hostility that seemed like they didn''t think he was good enough for their daughters.


    Well of course, they had a point since he was an infamous young master, but that was how he had gotten familiar with this kind of gaze.


    The way that the white haired girl had looked at him was just like this, it was as if she didn''t feel that he was good enough for Ang.


    However, if they were really enemies like everyone had said they were, why would she look at Lin Fan like this?


    That was unless the way she really felt was¡­


    Then after getting over her shock and her shyness, the white haired girl suddenly looked at Ang with a confused look and asked, "Who are you? This isn''t the way you normally act."


    Ang just looked at her with a faint smile and said, "I''ve changed over the past few months. I''ve learned a few more things."


    The white haired girl still had a confused look, but based on the trace of happiness in her eyes, it was clear that she wasn''t against it.


    Then Ang said, "I''ve always wanted to be your friend, but you''ve always avoided me, so I didn''t know how to go about it. Now that I know that you care about me too, I can finally ask this. Do you want to be my friend too?"


    The white haired girl was once again taken aback, but then she gave a nod and said in a low voice, "Un."


    Ang revealed a happy smile and hugged her again.


    Lu''er had been standing on the side with a stunned look the entire time, but Lin Fan suddenly asked her, "Is the medicine not ready yet?"


    Lu''er snapped out of her daze and immediately said, "I''ll go check on them now." Then without any hesitation, she went right out of the room.


    Lin Fan turned back to look at Ang holding the white haired girl and he couldn''t help thinking of how she acted with the children (pets). It seemed like she really had learned quite a few things aboutpassion after being with them for a few months now.


    She waspletely different from the ice cold girl that he had first met when he came to this realm.


    Of course, just because she was acting differently now didn''t mean that she was a different person, rather it was more like the personality that had been hidden underneath her cold exterior. After all, she was someone who was expected by everyone in this realm to be their calm and wise ruler, so she couldn''t act the way she really wanted even though she was a kind girl deep down.


    It was also why Ang hadn''t been able to deal with the white haired girl the entire time.


    It wasn''t because she wasn''t able to beat her, rather she wasn''t willing to beat her.


    Lin Fan was clear that Ang at her full power was stronger than this white haired girl, so the only reason she hadn''t been able to deal with her was because she didn''t want to.


    Why didn''t she want to?


    It was clear by what she was doing that she wanted to befriend this white haired girl all along, but they just never had the chance to do so.


    Lin Fan looked at Ang and seeing the happy smile on her face, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile too.


    But then after a while, he pulled the white haired girl out of her embrace and pushed her back down as he said, "That''s enough, you still need to rest."


    Ang had a clear unwilling look in her eyes, but she stillid down like Lin Fan told her to.


    The white haired girl couldn''t believe what she had seen.


    This was the ice cold ruler of their realm, why was she acting like an obedient child in front of this weak human?


    Where was the ice cold queen who had been perfect? Where was the ruler of this realm that she had looked up to and even wanted to be one day?


    While she was happy that she was now friends with Ang, she still couldn''t feel a bit unwilling when she saw her change like this.


    The white haired girl bit her lip for a bit before suddenly asking, "What happened to you? How did you be like this? This isn''t the real you!"


    Then she looked at Lin Fan with a hostile look that even had a bit of killing intent and said, "Did he do something to you?"

 Chapter 568 Surprise Visitor (3)

    Ang revealed a faint smile when she saw this.


    It was clear by the way that she was looking at the white haired girl that she treated her like a mother would if her daughter stood up for her.


    She patted her on the head and said, "He didn''t do anything to me, it''s just that the world is wide. Without going out and seeing it, you won''t be able to truly know what''s out there."


    The white haired girl was slightly surprised by this and she couldn''t say anything, but at least she was no longer ring at Lin Fan.


    She could feel the deep meaning in Ang''s words and she also suddenly felt a desire to go see the world.


    It was then that Lu''er came into the room pushing a cart that had a bottle of medicine and some gauze on it. She came right to the side of Ang''s bed and pushed the white haired girl aside as picked up the bottle of medicine.


    The white haired girl red at Lu''er, but she didn''t say anything and moved to the side since she knew how important this medicine was.


    Lu''er was about to start applying the medicine when she suddenly remembered something.


    Her hands stopped moving as she turned to re at Lin Fan and said, "Get out."


    "Eh?" Lin Fan was confused when he heard this.


    Wasn''t it just giving her some medicine to drink? Why would he need to get out for that?


    But when Lu''er heard this, she red at him even more and said, "Do you want to get out now or do you want to be kicked out?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows slightly when he heard this and he said, "I want to see how effective the medicine is, why should I get out?"


    Lu''er gave a snort and said, "Aren''t you letting out your true intentions right now? I never knew that there was this kind of side to you."


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this and he couldn''t help asking, "Isn''t it just feeding her some medicine? What do you mean by true intentions?"


    Lu''er gave another snort before saying, "Who said that it''s feeding the young miss the medicine? The medicine is a salve that needs to be applied." After saying this, she pointed at the items on the cart that she had pushed in.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he immediately understood the mistake that he made.


    He had assumed that it was a medicine that should be drunk instead of applied¡­


    Lin Fan turned to look at the cart and he found that there were things that Lu''er needed to apply the medicine on it. However, that was strange since he didn''t remember those things being on there before.


    How could he have missed such a conspicuous thing?


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile before saying, "I''ll go out then."


    As he was heading out, he heard Lu''er say behind him, "A toad wanting to dine on swan meat."


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile at this.


    There were some words that he wanted to say deep down in his heart, but he kept them in because he knew that Lu''er needed to focus right now, so he didn''t say them in the end. However, since he had already shared a bed with Ang¡­


    After Lin Fan went out of the room, Lu''er revealed a triumphant smile as she came over to Ang''s side and said, "Young miss, let me help you apply the medicine."


    Ang sat there and patted her on the head before saying, "It''s best if you don''t mess with him too much."


    Lu''er suddenly revealed a blush when she heard this.


    Lin Fan hadn''t made a mistake earlier, there really hadn''t been any of the other items on the cart when Lu''er pushed it in. There was only the gauze and the bottle of medicine.


    It was a small trick that Lu''er yed on him, only when Lin Fan''s attention was drawn by something else did she put the other items on the cart. It was easy for her since her cultivation was also much higher than Lin Fan''s.


    Of course, the main basis of this n was that no one else ratted her out.


    She was sure that the white haired girl wouldn''t since she could tell that she didn''t like Lin Fan just like her, so she could be considered an ally. The only person that she had been worried about was Ang since she didn''t know what Ang would do.<sub> </sub>


    But in the end, Ang had supported her which she was very happy about.


    Still, now that Ang had called her out on it, she couldn''t help lowering her head in a shy manner before giving a slight now.


    Ang patted her head without saying a thing, but there was a smile on her face the entire time.


    On the side, the white haired girl watched all of this with a calm expression, but if one looked closely, they would be able to see a slight bit of envy in her eyes.


    After they finished applying the medicine on Ang''s wounds, she called Lin Fan back into the room and they started discussing what to do next.


    While he had been waiting outside, Lin Fan had received the notification that he hadpleted his mission from the system, which had given him quite a bit of relief. He was still worried that something would go wrong even though he had gotten the True Ice Grass and that something would happen to Ang, but seeing the system acknowledging that the mission wasplete, he knew that she would be fine. Or at the very least, she wouldn''t be in danger anymore since the mission had been given because she had been in danger.


    Lin Fan looked at Ang for a few seconds before asking, "What are you nning on doing now?"


    Ang tilted her head to think before saying, "I should be able to go back now, so how about we go back together?"


    Lu''er came forward to take Ang''s hand and said, "Young miss, you can''t. You''re still not fully recovered yet."


    Ang patted her hand and said, "It''s fine, I can just recover on that side."


    However, Lin Fan was the one to cut her off as he said, "No, you''ll stay here and recover. You and I both know that you''ll recover faster here instead of forcing yourself toe back with me."


    Ang looked at Lin Fan and seeing his determined look, she gave a sigh and said, "Alright, I''ll listen to you."


    But then she muttered under her voice, "But I really wanted to go back and get some human food."


    Lin Fan had heard this and he revealed a helpless smile, but he still took out something from his Storage Ring and said, "Here, this is for you." After saying this, he ced it right in front of her on the bed.


    Ang looked down at the box that had been ced in front of her and her eyes lit up because she could smell the sweet tasteing from it. She turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Is it strawberry voured?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "It''s your favourite."


    Ang didn''t bother with Lin Fan anymore as she happily lifted the lid off the box to reveal a strawberry cake underneath. She then turned to Lu''er and said, "Make some tea and cut this for me, I want to have it now."


    Lu''er looked at the cake with a suspicious gaze, making it clear that she didn''t trust the cake that Lin Fan brought out, but still she took it to the side where there were bottles of tea leaves stored.


    It didn''t take her long to make the tea and cut the cake into even pieces. She also put the slices onto exquisitely designed tes with forks on the side, bringing them over to serve.


    She had brought four tes in total, one for each of them since she had understood the underlying meaning of her young miss'' words. This was just one of those things that came from having served this young miss since she was young.


    Everyone epted their tes easily, that was except for the white haired girl.


    When she saw the te in front of her, she didn''t know what to do with it or even how to ept it. She just awkwardly looked at it until Ang said, "Go ahead, it tastes good."


    ''


    Seeing that she had just made up with Ang, she didn''t feel like she could refuse her. She picked up the fork and took a small piece of the cake that she slowly put into her mouth, but the moment she did, her eyes suddenly lit up.


    She didn''t waste any time as she began stuffing the cake into her mouth bite by bite, even barely chewing since she wanted to eat more of it.


    Finally when she finished, she tried to go for another bite just to realize that she had already finished the slice that she had been given.


    She turned to look at the rest of the cake, but she also forced herself to turn back and look calm as she sat there.


    Seeing this, Lu''er took the initiative to say, "I''ll get you another slice." She took the te from in front of the white haired girl and headed over to the rest of the cake. While doing this, she also brought along her own te that was also empty.


    The white haired girl tried to remain calm, but it was clear by the look in her eyes that she was happy about this.


    Then she turned to Ang and asked, "Just what was that? I''ve never had anything like that before!"

 Chapter 569 Return (1)

    Ang revealed a smile and said, "It''s called cake, it''s a delicacy from the human world."


    "The humans made such a delicious thing?" The white haired girl turned to look at the cake for a bit before turning to look at Lin Fan with a doubtful gaze.


    Lin Fan just revealed an awkward smile, but he didn''t say anything.


    Instead, Ang said, "It''s not just that, the humans have made many other delicious things as well. The delicacies that they''ve made aren''t things that we canpare to. The humans really have a special gift of creativity."


    The white haired girl revealed a look of longing before suddenly asking, "Then can I go to the human realm as well?"


    Ang didn''t answer right away and turned to Lin Fan as she asked, "Can she?"


    Lin Fan saw both of them looking at him with expectant looks and he didn''t know what to say right away.


    Technically, he did have another employee slot after he had upgraded the level of the shop, so he could bring her back if he did want to, but the problem was that he didn''t want to.


    First, he didn''t want to use this precious employee slot on another spirit because he already had Ang. He wanted to see if there was any other special species from the other top grade cultivation realms that he could find to bring back with him since the more employees he had, the more allies he had in the future.


    Second, it was because he didn''t want this white haired girl interfering with his and Ang''s private time.


    He could see what kind of rtionship the two of them had and he knew that with this rtionship, she would be a big light bulb for them. If he wanted any alone time with her, he would have to find a "babysitter" for this white haired girl first.


    But when he saw the way the two of them looked at him, especially with those eyes that were filled with hope, he couldn''t bear to turn them down.


    So he said with a sigh, "I still have another one of the contracts that you signed, so it''s not a problem if it''s another person."


    Ang revealed a smile and was about to say something, but then Lu''er suddenly cut her off.


    Lu''er came back and stood right in front of Ang, taking her hands as she said, "Young miss, I should be the one who goes to the human world with you."


    One of the white haired girl''s eyebrows twitched before she came forward to say, "Hey, what do you mean by that? Are you saying that I''m not worthy of going to the human world?"


    Even though she was facing the aura of an expert that was stronger than her, Lu''er didn''t back down as she said, "Sure you''re stronger than me, but can you honestly say that you know the young miss better than me? Are you able to take care of her better than me?"


    The white haired girl couldn''t help being taken aback when she heard this.


    That was right, she really couldn''t take care of Ang as well as Lu''er since she had never been as close to Ang as her. She had always been too shy to say her true feelings, so she had hidden under a tough exterior which caused them to be apart for so long. She didn''t even know what kind of things Ang liked, not to mention being able to take care of her.


    However, after being surprised, she struck back with a strong tone and said, "Even if I can''t take care of her, I can still protect her from anything that happens and that''s more important than anything. Besides, there will be humans in the human realm, we can just ask them to take care of her, but who can protect her other than me? What if they ambush her again, would you be able to stop them?"


    The two of them continued to argue for a few minutes, as their voices became louder and louder.


    Finally, Lin Fan couldn''t take it and said, "Stop arguing."


    However, the moment he said this, he made the situation much worse. The two of them turned to him and said with fierce looks, "Stay out of this."


    When Ang saw this, she knitted her brows as a bit of displeasure filled her heart. She was unhappy seeing them treat Lin Fan like this, so she said in a sharp voice, "Enough."


    The two of them were surprised to hear Ang speaking in such a voice, but Lu''er quickly bowed her head and said, "Young miss, I''m sorry. I was too agitated."


    The white haired girl didn''t bow like Lu''er, but she still turned her head and said in a low voice, "Sorry."


    Ang didn''t say anything and just looked at Lin Fan, waiting for him to say something.


    Lin Fan saw this and he gave a sigh before saying, "There''s no point in arguing about this right now anyway, it''s not like you''reing back with me right away."


    The two of them were surprised by this before the white haired girl asked, "Why not? I want to eat the human food now."


    Lin Fan looked at her and said, "Do you think that Ang is in any condition to move?"<sub> </sub>


    The white haired girl was taken aback, but then she realized that Lin Fan was right. It wasn''t like they would be going to the human realm just by themselves, they were mainly going because they wanted to be with Ang, so there was no point for them to go if she wasn''t going yet.


    Ang said, "I''m fine, I can go¡­"


    Lin Fan looked at her with sharp eyes and said, "Stop. Stay. Be good."


    Ang saw this and then leaned back down in the bed without saying anything. She pulled the nkets over her slightly to hide the blush that had appeared on her face.


    When Lin Fan got serious like this, she didn''t know why, but it always made her heart skip a beat.


    After settling down, Lin Fan turned to the white haired girl and asked, "I never had the chance to ask, but what is your name?"


    The white haired girl looked at him like he had asked a strange question before saying, "I don''t have one."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this answer and said, "You don''t have a name?"


    The white haired girl gave a shrug and said, "Names are for the weaker spirits, spirits like me and her are only addressed by our titles instead of names." As she said this, she pointed at Ang lying in the bed.


    Lin Fan paused for a bit before saying, "Then how about I give you a name?"


    The white haired girl looked at Lin Fan like he was crazy as she said, "Why would I want a name? Names are shameful things for lower grade spirits like her?" She pointed at Lu''er when she said this.


    Lu''er lowered her head when she heard this and didn''t dare refute it.


    Lin Fan was surprised by this.


    It seemed like that in this realm of spirits, names were considered a shameful thing¡­


    Then he looked at Ang and thought, "Then why did she let me give her a name?"


    Ang took this chance to say, "My name is Ang."


    She couldn''t stand seeing someone bully Lu''er, even if it was the white haired girl.


    The white haired girl was taken aback by this before saying, "What are you saying? You''re actually epting the name that this human gave you?"


    Ang knitted her brows when she heard this and she said, "His name is Lin Fan."


    The white haired girl became a bit angry when she heard this, "Does that matter? Names are only for those who aren''t strong enough to have titles, do we need names at our level?"


    Ang rxed her brows and she said in a calm voice, "While I''ve been traveling, I''ve learned many different things. Names aren''t as shameful as you think they are, they are a record of the individual that you are. Titles are nothing more than representation of power, but they are passed down through generations and mean nothing to you. Names are different, they are a representation of you alone and not the power that you pass down. That is why I epted this name, it''s because it represents me and me alone."


    The white haired girl fell into deep thought when she heard this. She could tell that there was profound meaning behind Ang''s words, otherwise it would have been impossible to convince her with just this. They were so strong that even she had a slight desire to have a name¡­


    The reason Ang was able to have such a strong conviction behind her words was because she had been listening to Momonga''s stories.


    She heard the stories of his past allies and the way he said their names, it was clear that the names represented much more than just a method of addressing someone, rather each of the names represented an individual that was to be remembered.


    She wanted to leave a memory of her, especially with Lin Fan instead of just bing a part of the title she held. A part that would be forgotten as soon as someone else inherited this title from her.


    On the side, Lu''er had looked up at Ang with sparkling eyes that were filled with admiration.


    What her big sister had said just now had struck a chord with her and it had left a deep impression on her.


    After thinking for a bit, the white haired girl turned to Lin Fan and said, "How about you give me a name too?"

 Chapter 570 Return (2)

    Lin Fan was surprised by how fast this white haired girl adapted.


    One minute she was saying that names were shameful and then the next she was asking him toe up with a name for her.


    But seeing the looks on Ang, the white haired girl, and even Lu''er''s faces, he knew that he had no choice but toply.


    So he began thinking about what kind of name would suit her.


    Of course, it would have to be a name that would be snow or ice based because of her abilities and her white hair.


    Lin Fan even considered naming her something that was simr to white witch, but then he decided that perhaps simple was better and he came up with a name that he liked.


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before saying, "How about Yuki then?"


    The white haired girl heard this and she muttered under her breath to herself, "Yuki¡­" Then she said in a louder voice, "Un, it''s not bad, I''ll use that as my name then."


    Without even caring to listen to Lin Fan''s response, she turned to Ang and said, "I''m Yuki from now on."


    Ang revealed a smile and reached out to pat her on the head without saying anything else.


    Lin Fan could see that everything seemed settled here and he had finished his mission, so there was no reason for him to stay here any longer.


    After making sure that Ang was alright, he said, "Alright, then I''ll be heading back then. Be good and rest up, contact me when you''re ready toe back, alright?"


    Ang gave a nod in response without saying anything else, but there was a clear trace of unwillingness in her eyes. It was clear that she didn''t want to see him leave just yet.


    But it was too bad that Lin Fan couldn''t stay in this ce forever, so he waved goodbye and then disappeared with a sh of white light.


    When the white light faded from his field of view, Lin Fan saw that he was back in his store.


    He was about to look at the time when he suddenly heard a voice say, "Oh, you''re back."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this voice and turned in the direction that it came from, but he was even more surprised when he saw who it came from.


    Sitting in a chair in front of him was a young man with silver hair and piercing purple eyes, it was another face that he hadn''t seen for a long time. It had been so long that he had actually forgotten about him when the Ang matter hade up.


    It was naturally the Lich King, Momonga.


    Lin Fan had been so busy with his matters and missing Ang that he had unknowingly forgotten all about Momonga. So when he saw him, he revealed an awkward smile and gave a nod before saying, "Yeah, I went to take care of some business, but I''m back now."


    Momonga narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan for a bit before asking, "How is she?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this at first, but then he quickly knitted his brows as he picked up on the hidden meaning in Momonga''s words. It seemed like whatever had happened was much bigger than he had thought.


    After a pause, he said, "She''s fine, but what about you?"


    Momonga gave a shrug and said, "Can they even do anything to me? I''m an undead, I can revive as many times as I want."


    Lin Fan didn''t feel like this was true and even felt that Momonga was putting on airs, but he didn''t expose him since he knew that this wasn''t something that was easy for him to talk about. Instead he asked, "Do you know who did it?"


    Momonga didn''t answer his question, but rather asked another question, "Do you know?"


    Lin Fan looked into those piercing purple eyes and after another pause, he said, "No, she wouldn''t tell me. She said that she was afraid that I wouldn''t be able to control myself."


    Momonga revealed a faint smile before saying, "Then do you want to know?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows once again as he took a serious look at Momonga. There was this feeling that he was plotting something that nagged him from the back of his mind, but there was also this feeling of curiosity that filled his heart.


    Finally, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Why would you tell me?"


    Momonga gave a sigh and said, "I know that you aren''t a rash person like she thinks you are." Then he looked at Lin Fan with a serious look as he continued, "I also know that you''re not someone simple, so eventually you''ll reach the level that all of this involves. Instead of not knowing anything, isn''t it better for you to know so that you cane up with your own ns?"<sub> </sub>


    Then as if it was an afterthought, Momonga added with a faint smile, "I''m also curious what your opinion on this matter is."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he looked right at Momonga. He wasn''t certain if he was telling the truth, but there was a part of him that told him to trust him.


    Finally, after a long moment of hesitation, he said, "Alright, tell me then."


    Momonga gave a nod, but instead of telling him what the situation was, he asked a question first, "What do you know about the general state of this universe?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback by this and he couldn''t help being stunned for a bit before asking, "What do you mean by that?"


    Momonga exined, "The situation between the Beast Race and the humans."


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this as he asked, "Aren''t the Beast Race and the humans at war? Is there anything else beyond that?"


    Momonga gave a chuckle before saying, "There''s always more underneath the surface, things that you can''t see. For example, aren''t there many different factions in your human society?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think before putting it together, "Then you''re saying that there are different factions among the Beast Race?"


    Momonga gave another chuckle before saying, "Beast Race, that really isn''t an urate way to describe it."


    Then he said in a more serious voice, "The Beast Race that you''re describing are the spirit beasts, but do you think that someone like me would be included in that?"


    Lin Fan didn''t understand what he meant by this at first, but then after thinking about it, he couldn''t help revealing a look of understanding, "Then are you saying that you''re not a part of the Beast Race?"


    Momonga shook his head before saying, "The Beast Race is a concept that you humans came up with in the first ce, it''s just a way for them to describe all living beings that are not a part of the human race."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows before asking, "Why?"


    Momonga gave a shrug, "Why else? It''s to create an enemy to unite against and to spread human supremacy propaganda. After all, isn''t it easier to achieve your goals if you have amon enemy to unite against?"


    Lin Fan fell into deep thought at this and in the end, he had no choice but to give a nod.


    Unlike the people that were born in this universe, Lin Fan who hade from earth had seen examples of this before which made it easier for him to ept.


    In the history of earth, the power of racism had demonstrated how strong it was again and again. There was no doubt thatmon hatred was one of the best ways to bring people together.


    Momonga then said with a smile, "Not to mention that the human word beast is such an ugly word, it''s probably why they used it to describe us all."


    Lin Fan nodded along to this because there had been clear examples of this on earth as well.


    Different groups had beenbelled with different slurs to make it easier for people to insult and gather against¡­Even in the modern era of earth that Lin Fan came from, this still hadn''t changed¡­


    Momonga continued by saying, "So the ones that the humans are really facing are the demon beasts who are only one of the races of the Myriad Races. The only advantage that they have is their ability to reproduce quickly, but those numbers have overwhelmed many other races before." After a pause, he continued by saying, "Of course, besides the demon beasts, there are many other races. Some are neutral towards the humans and some even work with the humans such as the Dragon Race or the Phoenix Race."


    Lin Fan slowly asked, "Then¡­which faction are you a part of?"


    Momonga revealed a smile and said, "Clearly I''m a part of the neutral faction."


    After a pause, he exined, "A big part of that is because no one wants to work with us undead. After all, all humans and beasts fear death and you have to admit that some of us really do look terrifying."


    Lin Fan nodded along to this.


    There was a reason why the undead were used for so many horror movies on earth, it was because they looked just too terrifying.


    Lin Fan then asked, "But if you''re a part of the neutral faction, then why did people attack you? Wouldn''t they be afraid of pushing you to the other side?"


    Momonga shook his head before saying, "It''s precisely because we''re a part of the neutral faction that they attacked us. The same applies for that little girl."

 Chapter 571 Return (3)

    Lin Fan knitted his brows before asking, "You''re saying that she''s part of the neutral faction as well?"


    Momonga gave a nod as he exined, "The spirits are pacifists by nature and unless you invade their territory, there''s no reason for them to fight."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this as he said, "That makes even less sense then. If they are attacked at a time like this, wouldn''t that just push them to the other side? Who would be foolish enough to do this?"


    Momonga didn''t answer those questions right away as he said instead, "The humans have been slowly bing stronger, so much so that they are starting to turn the tides against the demon beasts. If at this time they were to hear a rumour that the neutral factions wanted to make a move, what do you think they would do?"


    Lin Fan thought for a bit before suddenly saying in a voice of understanding, "You''re saying that the humans wanted to cut off future problems by nipping these problems in the bud? That''s why they attacked the neutral faction?"


    Momonga gave a shrug, "Take it as a guess, but who knows what they are actually thinking. Of course, there''s someone who used to work with those human rulers before¡­"


    At this, both Lin Fan and Momonga turned to look at Lin Fan''s Storage Ring.


    After a brief period of silence, there was a sigh that came from the Storage Ring before a dragon scale flew out.


    When it came out, it took the form of Hong Long and he floated there, looking at the two of them for a while before finally saying, "I haven''t been back to the Dragon Race for a long time, so it''s not like I know anything. Even if I were to return, what would you want me to say?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at him and asked, "Which side do you stand on?"


    Hong Long looked back at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly giving a sigh and saying, "I haven''t been back there in such a long time, I have no idea what the current Dragon Race is like. I can''t give you an opinion because I don''t even have one right now."


    Lin Fan looked at him for a bit before saying with a soft snort, "Then you still want to bring Xiao Feng back to that ce? I think you''re dreaming."


    When Hong Long heard this, he started to panic as he said, "You can''t do that, that would be the worst thing to do in this situation."


    Lin Fan gave another snort as he said, "As if what you say means anything at this point."


    Hong Long forced himself to calm down as he said in a serious voice, "If you really want to stop the Dragon Race from working with the humans to attack the neutral faction, it really would be the worst thing to do. After all, with Xiao Feng''s bloodline and talent, there is no doubt that he will be the leader of the Dragon Race in the future. When that timees, wouldn''t you be able to have him order the Dragon Race to stop attacking the neutral faction?"


    Lin Fan had been about to say something sarcastic, but when he heard what Hong Long said, he couldn''t help stopping himself. After all, what Hong Long said made sense.


    The best way to stop someone was to have someone higher ranked than them order them to stop, especially when it came to races that respected bloodlines. With Xiao Feng''s true dragon bloodline, it wasn''t possible that the other dragons wouldn''t submit to him to a certain extent. Then it was all about Xiao Feng''s strength, he would need strength to subdue the other dragon elders who were strong enough to resist the bloodline suppression.


    Lin Fan thought about it for a bit and when he was about to say something, someone cut him off again.


    This time it was Momonga who said, "It''s not a bad idea, but that will be much further in the future, so there''s no point thinking about it now."


    Momonga didn''t show his full support for the n since he knew that Lin Fan would be against it, but he had to at least leave that option open since it was a viable n. At the very least, it would be helpful in the future if Xiao Feng was able to takemand of the Dragon Race.


    Lin Fan nodded before saying in a worried voice, "That''s right, it''s far off in the future. Right now we have to think of another way to deal with the attacks. What if they attack again?"


    Lin Fan thought of how weak Ang had seemed when she had beenying in bed and he couldn''t stop a bit of pain from filling his heart. It was like someone had grabbed it and was currently twisting it.


    Momonga shook his head at this and said, "You don''t need to worry, it''s not like the neutral faction is weak. For now, we''ve made the humans that attacked us suffer quite a bit, so they won''t be trying anything like this for a while since they will need to recover from this attack."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "How long will thatst though?"


    Momonga gave a shrug before saying, "Who knows? I don''t know how fast those human experts will recover nor do I know how deep the human backing runs. It could be a few months, it could be a few years, but the important thing is that we have time right now."


    As soon as his voice fell, the room fell into silence.


    Everyone was lost in their own thoughts about what to do next, but there really wasn''t anything that they could think of since in the end, both Lin Fan and his pets were too weak to interfere in this matter.


    After a few minutes of silence, Hong Long couldn''t help giving a sigh as he said, "If it wasn''t for the fact that we had to fight the Outers, we wouldn''t have worked with the humans in the first ce¡­"<sub> </sub>


    As soon as his voice fell, there was another sigh that came from him.


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Outers¡­


    There was that word again¡­


    Hong Long had mentioned it before, but he had never exined it properly.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "You mentioned these "Outers" before, but what are they?"


    Hong Long trembled when he heard this and he covered his mouth like he had said something wrong since he had indeed made a mistake. He had made this same mistakest time, but this time was different since the first time was a genuine mistake and this time it was a slip of the tongue.


    Hong Long looked over at Momonga who looked right back at him with a bit of sharp glint in his eyes, as if he was ming him. Then Momonga shook his head without saying a thing, but Hong Long understood what he meant.


    Hong Long then said, "It''s not something you need to concern yourself with just yet."


    Momonga cut in before Lin Fan had a chance to reply by asking, "Did your master never mention the Outers to you before?"


    Lin Fan gave a bitterugh deep down, but he shook his head and said, "No, my master never mentioned this to me before."


    How could his master mention this to him?


    His master didn''t even exist!


    Of course, Lin Fan would never tell them that since the main reason why they were willing to work in this shop was because of this supposed master behind him. Who knew what would happen if they learned that there wasn''t a master?


    Momonga didn''t say anything in response to this at first. With the expression on his face, it was like he was considering something.


    After a while, Momonga suddenly asked, "Speaking of this, is your master nning on making a move? As long as the expert makes a move, I''m sure that he can solve everything as long as he makes a move."


    Make a move?


    How could someone that doesn''t exist make a move?


    But once again, Lin Fan kept that inside of himself as he said, "It''s not convenient for my master to do anything right now."


    Momonga fell into deep thought again.


    Was the expert still injured?


    If he was, why would he have allowed Lin Fan to bring the store up to this upper realm? Wouldn''t that just make it easier for others to discover him?


    But if the expert wasn''t injured, just what reason did he have to not make a move¡­


    Could it be that the expert had a big n that was going on that involved the entire universe? Was that why he didn''t make a move?


    As all these thoughts were going through Momonga''s mind trying to figure out what that "expert" was thinking, Lin Fan was sweating on the inside as he tried to figure out if he had been exposed or not.


    Finally after a long period of silence, Momonga broke it by saying, "For now, there''s nothing else you need to know since your cultivation isn''t high enough to do anything about it. The most important thing you have to do now is get stronger. Once you''re strong enough, naturally you''ll be able to involve yourself in this matter."


    Lin Fan had aplicated look for a bit before giving a nod.

 Chapter 572 Goddess Of Ice

    After learning the truth of the attack, Lin Fan made up his mind to start cultivating more seriously.


    He summoned out the first three pets that he received, the ones that received the ancient beast bloodlines. He brought them all into the shadow cultivation room and started beating them up.


    As he did, the three pets revealed satisfied looks like they were enjoying the beating.


    Lin Fan decided that it wasn''t enough for him to just increase his own cultivation because there was only so much that he could do alone, it would make sense to train his pets as well.


    After all, he had heard that there was also a Phoenix Race that was working with the humans¡­


    If Xiao Feng was able to suppress the Dragon Race with his bloodline, it didn''t make sense if Xiao Huo wasn''t able to do the same with the Phoenix Race with his bloodline. If he was able to do that, it would go a long way in helping the neutral faction¡­


    Without knowing it, Lin Fan had already started considering himself as part of the neutral faction.


    The night passed quickly and soon it was time for Lin Fan to open the store again.


    Even though he had stayed up all night training, that wasn''t a problem for him at his cultivation level. Even if he were to stay up for several nights, he would still be fine. However, he hadn''t reached the point where he was able to go without sleep or food just yet.


    There was the same crowd as usual outside the store as usual, but they also quickly dispersed once the few spots for training were sold.


    When the morning rush was over, there were only a few people who were still left in this store.


    These were all people sent by the various factions to keep an eye on this store. They hung around this store most days, so Lin Fan was already used to them.


    After around an hour passed, there was a girl who suddenly pushed through the doors of the shop.


    This was a girl who was a beautiful young girl with hair as white as ice.


    When she came in, the first thing she did was look around, but she didn''t bother with anything in the shop since the only thing that she seemed to care about was Lin Fan. The moment her eyes fell onto Lin Fan sitting at the counter, she walked over without any hesitation.


    Naturally Lin Fan had also noticed the girling in and the moment she did, he revealed a surprised look because he recognized her.


    This girl had been there the night of the banquet when the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect had announced that they would be working together to excavate the Ancient Era Ruin. She had been the one who hadined about the number of tokens that she had received.


    She was the one called miss Bing from the Ice Goddess Pce.


    But what was she doing here?


    The Ice Goddess Pce was naturally being included in the discussion between the Myriad Sword Hall and the Hunters Organizationter, so there was no reason for her toe to this store unless there was a special reason. After all, it would draw attention to them since Lin Fan was also participating in the meetingter.


    The girl came right up to the counter and looked over Lin Fan before revealing a look that seemed disappointed.


    It didn''t take a psychic to tell that this girl was disappointed with Lin Fan, but it was hard to tell why she was disappointed.


    After a moment of silence, she asked, "Are you the owner of this store?"


    Lin Fan looked right back at her without turning his gaze at all as he casually said, "That''s right, how can I help you?"


    She gave a snort before saying, "I don''t believe that you''re the one who really runs the store. Get the real owner out for me, I have something important to discuss with them."


    p Lin Fan looked at her like she was an idiot before giving a shrug and saying, "There''s nothing I can do for you, this really is my store. If you don''t believe me, then that''s too bad."</anda>


    Without caring about what she would do next, Lin Fan went back to the game that he had been ying.


    When the girl saw this, she immediately revealed a look of anger.


    There had never been anyone who had treated her like this or rather all those that did had been crippled by her.<sub> </sub>


    Naturally she wouldn''t take this from Lin Fan as well, so without anyone noticing, she condensed a small icicle in her hand. Then as acting naturally, she leaned in on the counter as if she was about to say something to Lin Fan.


    Then at the veryst second, she stabbed out at Lin Fan with the small icicle in her hand.


    Of course, she still wanted to meet the real owner of the store, so she chose to hold back in the end. She didn''t want to kill Lin Fan just yet, just hurt him enough that the real master of the store woulde out.


    That was the main reason for her visit today.


    Yesterday, the Myriad Sword Hall had suddenly contacted the Ice Goddess Pce about a meeting with the Hunters Organization.


    The Ice Goddess Pce was naturally aware of the situation with the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association working together since they were allied with the Myriad Sword Hall, so they also weed this. The Hunters Organization was normally considered a neutral faction, but that didn''t mean by any means that they were a weak faction. They were a faction that was known for having powerful experts, so they would be very good allies to have.


    But they also heard that there was another party that would be included in the discussion, which was Lin Fan''s shop.


    The Ice Goddess Pce could ept the Hunters Organization since they were also one of the twelve great factions, but they had never heard of Lin Fan''s shop before, so it was hard for them to ept that it was one of the parties that were invited to this meeting.


    Which was what had driven Bing Yu toe to this store herself to investigate the background of this store.


    The icicle approached Lin Fan and he could feel it, but he just sat there, not doing a thing.


    He had a good idea as to why this girl was here, but it was clear that he had to demonstrate his power first if he wanted to have a chance to say anything, so he allowed her to attack him.


    Right when the icicle was about to touch him, the defenses of the store kicked in and an invisible barrier appeared in front of Lin Fan.


    The icicle was stopped just a few centimeters away from Lin Fan and no matter how Bing Yu tried to push it forward, it wouldn''t go forward.


    Bing Yu knitted her brows, but before she even had a chance to say or do anything, there was a powerful force that came from in front of her. She had no way of resisting this force and this force carried her right out of the store.


    The door opened to let her fly right out and she skidded across the ground outside a few times beforeing to the stop.


    The people outside were surprised to suddenly see someone flying out of the store, but then when they took a closer look at who it was, they were shocked.


    Bing Yu was a well known person since she was one of the Decagram Geniuses. While she was ranked lower among them, she was still a talented person and the one that everyone thought would take over the Ice Goddess Pce one day.


    Now she had been sent flying out of Lin Fan''s store¡­Of course people couldn''t help being curious and shocked by this.


    Just a few days ago it was the City Lord''s son and now it was the Ice Goddess Pce''s goddess, just what kind of a store was this?


    Bing Yu didn''t care about the crowd around her and looked down at her hand which was still aching.


    The icicle that she had been holding hadpletely shattered and her hand was swollen. If the force that she had been hit with was a bit stronger, her whole hand might havepletely shattered.


    It was a good thing that she had chosen to hold back because if she hadn''t, the force that she would have encountered would have been much stronger and she would have been crippled just like He Yong.


    Looking back at the store, she couldn''t help feeling that it waspletely different from before.


    She had thought that it was a shoddy store, but now that she looked at it, she felt that it was a ce that she couldn''t see through.


    She was thinking about going back in to see if she could find anything else, but then after thinking about it, she decided against this idea.


    Taking onest look at the store, she then turned around without even looking back once and walked back to the beast carriage that she came in. Once she was in the beast carriage, she took onest look at the store before having the driver head off.


    Lin Fan had seen all of this through the window, but he just sat at the counter without doing a thing.


    After all, he would still see herter.

 Chapter 573 Three Way Meeting (1)

    This was only a small matter for Lin Fan since he knew that the bigger matter was what would happen after the store closed.


    However, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling worried about how risky it was for this girl from the Ice Goddess Pce to visit his shop.


    While it ended with her being thrown out which made it seem like there wasn''t a good rtionship between them, people would still be suspicious as to why she woulde to his store in the first ce.


    But there was nothing he could do about that, he could only hope that people would not look too deeply into this matter because they would believe the story on the surface.


    Time passed quickly since there were still no other customers in the store.


    While people understood that the items in Lin Fan''s store were high grade items, they still didn''t want to shop in Lin Fan''s store yet while he still had a feud with the City Lord.


    As for the bigger factions, they had only sent people to watch over Lin Fan''s store since they were more focused on the Ancient Era Ruins right now.


    When the time came, there was a beast carriage that arrived in front of Lin Fan''s store.


    To make it look more believable, Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao were the ones who came to pick it up since it was well known that they spent quite a lot of time with Lin Fantely.


    However, when Qiao Yi Fei entered the store, the first thing she did was go over to Momonga to make a fuss.


    It had been a long time since she had seen him, so naturally she was excited when she finally got to see him.


    Momonga had been on the side ying chess with Brainy as usual, but the one problem now was that Brainy had broken through which had allowed her to turn into human form.


    The moment Qiao Yi Fei found Momonga ying chess with Brainy and seeing that Brainy was a beautiful woman who didn''t lose to her, she couldn''t help ring at Brainy.


    Brainy didn''t understand what this was at first, but then she realized that this was the feeling of jealousy that she had read about in her bookst night. Ever since she had finished breaking through and since she had felt that different feeling towards Lin Fan, she had been reading many rtionship books.


    She still didn''t understand what the feeling she felt towards Lin Fan was, but she could tell how Qiao Yi Fei felt about Momonga, especially when she made it very obvious.


    When Qiao Yi Fei saw the two of them sitting there ying their game of chess, she immediately went over without even caring about Lin Fan,ing right up beside Momonga.


    After ring at Brainy, she mustered up the courage to move in close to Momonga and said with what she considered a bright smile, "Mister Diabolis, it''s been a long time."


    If it was anyone else, they would have been dazzled by this because she truly was beautiful, but Momonga was different from everyone else. As the Lich King who had lived for millions of years, there wasn''t ack of beauties that he had seen before. For him, Qiao Yi Fei was just a pretty little girl, nothing more, nothing less.


    Momonga just gave a nod to her before turning his attention back to the game.


    Lin Fan saw this and he couldn''t help finding it funny, but he didn''t say anything since he was also suffering from his own problems. Namely Mao Tao.


    When she saw Qiao Yi Fei mustering her courage to approach Momonga, she felt that she should do the same with Lin Fan, which was why she also came over to him and said, "Mister Lin, long time no see."


    As she said this, she did lean in closer to make her figure look better, but it was just too bad that she didn''t have a figure to show off¡­


    Lin Fan just revealed an awkward smile before thinking, "It hasn''t been that long, you were just here this morning¡­"


    But Lin Fan didn''t say this out loud because he knew what kind of trouble it would cause.


    Instead he just gave a nod before turning to Momonga to ask, "Do you want toe along?"


    Momonga didn''t look up from the game as he said, "No, you can go take care of your things, I''ll stay here."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying to Brainy, "Are you staying here as well?"


    Brainy looked up at Lin Fan and then after tilting her head to think, she gave a nod as well.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother to answer and turned to Qiao Yi Fei to say, "Let''s go."


    Qiao Yi Fei was still ring at Brainy, but since it was her job to bring Lin Fan back to the Hunters Organization, she had no choice but to leave.


    But before she did, she asked Momonga, "Mister Diabolis, will you still be here tomorrow?"


    Momonga didn''t look up from his game, but he still gave a nod.<sub> </sub>


    Qiao Yi Fei''s face was filled with joy which was quickly reced with an unwilling look as she left with Lin Fan and Mao Tao.


    Finally, when they were out of the store, Qiao Yi Fei turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Who was that in there with mister Diabolis?"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother answering as he turned to Mao Tao and asked, "How long will it take for us to get there?"


    Mao Tao also ignored Qiao Yi Fei as she walked over to the beast carriage and said, "It won''t take long, it''s just a short trip."


    Lin Fan nodded before getting in the beast carriage with her.


    During this entire time, Qiao Yi Fei had been bugging Lin Fan with questions about Brainy which he ignored.


    Even during the carriage ride, she still kept asking Lin Fan about Brainy until he finally gave up and told her that she was his pet.


    Qiao Yi Fei was surprised, but she also revealed a rxed look.


    After all, in human society, there was an established notion that humans wouldn''t be with pets. There were a few cases of this in history, but the likelihood of this was very low, which was why she wasn''t worried at all.


    It was too bad that her ideas were wrong since she was under the wrong impression that Momonga was human.


    At his level of cultivation, it wasn''t a problem for him to hide himself as a human in this lower realm which was why no one had been able to recognize him. As far as they knew, he was nothing more than a normal human.


    But he wasn''t that at all, he was the Lich King from the Lich''s Necropolis.


    What Qiao Yi Fei didn''t know was that this crush of hers was doomed from the very beginning.


    It didn''t take long for the beast carriage to arrive at its destination, but the destination that it arrived at waspletely different from what Lin Fan expected. The destination that this beast carriage arrived at was a tiny bar that was hidden inside of an alley in an obscure part of Harmony City.


    With the way the alley looked, it was clear that this wasn''t a good part of town. This was the ce where low lifes went to do shady things¡­


    Was the meeting between the three factions being held here?


    While it was a ce that would provide a certain amount of privacy, it definitely didn''t fit that they had as three of the twelve great factions.


    Not to mention that this definitely wasn''t a ce that beautiful girls like Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao should be going to. Lin Fan didn''t doubt that as soon as they stepped out, there would be people trying to cause trouble with them.


    So Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Are you sure that this is the right ce?"


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao looked at each other before revealing smiles.


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at Lin Fan with a teasing look and asked, "What, are you afraid of this ce?"


    Mao Tao on the other hand just gave a nod with a faint smile and said, "Yes, this is the ce."


    Lin Fan could see that they were rxed, which showed that they were serious, but all that did was make him feel even more doubt.


    Still, since the two of them were certain, Lin Fan followed them out into the street.


    As soon as they came out of the beast carriage, what Lin Fan feared would happen had happened right away.


    Beauties like Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei made it hard to not be the center of attention, especially when they made no effort to hide themselves.


    As soon as they came out, they became the center of attention and the thugs that were hanging around on the street all turned to look at them. As expected, they all had looks that had a bit of greed in them, making it clear what they were thinking.


    Before anyone else could make a move, there was a group of thugs that came from in front of the bar. They were heading right in the direction of Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei and it was clear from their expression what they wanted to do.


    Lin Fan saw this and without hesitation, he came in front of the two girls, standing between them and the thugs.


    In the end, he was still a man and this kind of situation was when he should stand out.

 Chapter 574 Three Way Meeting (2)

    When the two girls behind him saw this, they both revealed faint smiles that almost seemed like they knew something that Lin Fan didn''t.


    The thugs came right up to their group and stopped in front of Lin Fan.


    In fact, they didn''t even stop at first and were about to move past Lin Fan toe up beside the girls, but Lin Fan had pulled out his sword to cut a line in the ground.


    After this line appeared, he said in a low voice, "Pass this line if you dare."


    The thugs were taken aback when they heard this, as if they didn''t expect this at all. After being surprised, they turned to look at the two girls with looks that almost seemed like they were asking them for help.


    Lin Fan waspletely confused by this, but this wasn''t the time to think about this since the most important thing now was to protect the two girls.


    But then Mao Tao came forward to tap Lin Fan on the shoulder before saying, "It''s fine, let them through."


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this and he said, "But¡­"


    Qiao Yi Fei cut him off and said, "She said that it''s fine, so it''s fine."


    Lin Fan had a bitter look on his face and he turned to look at the thugs, but sensing that there was no killing intenting from them, not even any hostilitying from them, he moved aside in the end.


    The thug looked at Lin Fan with a weary look before passing since the pressure that he had ced on them earlier was real, but they came over to where Mao Tao was still.


    One of the thugs that seemed to be the leader of the group leaned in to whisper something in her ear before secretly handing her something. Others might have missed this, but with Lin Fan''s senses, it was hard to miss it.


    Then after handing the thing over, the thugs didn''t even look back as they went off in their own separate directions, joining the other groups of thugs that were also hanging out in this valley. Once they joined those groups, all those groups headed off in different directions before disappearing without a trace, leaving only the three of them in this alley.


    Lin Fan saw all of this and then turned to ask Mao Tao, "So they all work for you?"


    Mao Tao just nodded with a smile.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile, "Is it fun ying like this?"


    Mao Tao looked at him with a bright smile and said, "It''s good to know that you care."


    Then without even bothering to wait for Lin Fan''s response, she walked past him and headed towards the bar.


    Qiao Yi Fei took a look at Lin Fan before following Mao Tao into the bar.


    As Mao Tao headed towards the bar, she couldn''t help revealing a blush.


    When Lin Fan had suddenly appeared in front of her, her heart had skipped a beat before a warm feeling filled it.


    After all, he was just too dazzling and handsome when he acted like this.


    Even Qiao Yi Fei couldn''t stop her heart from skipping a beat when Lin Fan stood out in front of her which was why her brows were knitted as she followed Mao Tao. It was clear that the one for her was Diabolis, so why did her heart skip a beat for him?


    Not to mention that she knew that Mao Tao liked him¡­


    Lin Fan was left behind with a bitter smile on his face.


    Even an idiot could understand what was going on even if they used their foot to think. It was clear that this was all a cover up that the Hunters Organization had created to allow them to host this secret meeting.


    However, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling amazed by this. The reach of the Hunters Organization really was quite deep if they even had small ces like this prepared that they could use on such short notice.


    But this meant that they were worthy of being known as one of the twelve great factions.


    After a moment of being dazed, Lin Fan followed the two of them inside.


    The inside of the bar was surprisingly packed, but not a single person turned to look in their direction even though there were two nation copsing level beauties that hade in.<sub> </sub>


    Mao Tao went over to the bar and took out the thing that the thug gave her to show to the bartender behind the bar.


    When the bartender saw this token that she ced on the bar, he didn''t react at all as he continued wiping the cup that had been in his hand. All the bartender did was give a cough which caught the attention of the barmaid who had been about to go out to serve a drink.


    When the barmaid turned over and saw the token on the table, she gave a nod to Mao Tao before going out to serve the drink. Once she was done, she came back to lead Mao Tao into the back of the bar which led to a corridor that had several doors that were all ajar.


    As Lin Fan was being led past them, he was able to peek into them and he knew exactly what they were used for.


    These were rooms that had a couch in them and a slight pink tint to the light, almost as if it was setting a mood.


    These rooms should be one of the main earners normally for bars of this repute¡­


    After being led past several doors, they finally came to a door that was clearly bigger than the others.


    When this door that was bigger was opened, it revealed a room that was visibly much more luxurious than the others. There was even arge bed that was in the center of the room which Lin Fan immediately knew the function of with a single look.


    After leading them in, the barmaid gave them a bow and closed the door behind her as she said, "Please enjoy yourselves."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this, but he didn''t show it on his face since he knew that this was all part of the cover that the Hunters Organization had set for this ce.


    As expected, once they were here, Mao Tao moved right past the bed and headed to a bookshelf that had strangely been put in this kind of room. She moved to the side of the bookshelf and inserted the token that she received into a groove that was on the side of the bookshelf.


    Once the token was inserted, there was a click sound as the bookshelf started to move, turning in a way that revealed a passage with stairs leading down.


    Lin Fan reached his head out to look down, but all he saw was a winding staircase, so he couldn''t see that far down it.


    Since he couldn''t see, naturally his first reaction was to release his spiritual sense to check it out. However, his spiritual sense didn''t get far before being stopped by something that was at the bottom.


    It was the spiritual sense of another expert and based on how strong it was, it was clearly someone much stronger than him.


    Lin Fan pulled back his spiritual sense and started following the two girls down the staircase.


    As his spiritual sense told him, it didn''t take them long to reach the bottom of the winding staircase where there was another door that was waiting for them. This door was even bigger than the door that had led into the room that they had been in, making it clear that there was a big room behind this door.


    Mao Tao easily pushed open the door and revealed therge meeting room that was inside.


    This was a room with no decorations, only having a single giant table in the center of the room, but the table itself was more than enough to decorate the room with how luxurious it was.


    Lin Fan could feel the life energying from the table and he knew that this wasn''t a table that was made from simple material. It was definitely a table that was made from a very rare material.


    If it was left in a space long enough, it would be enough to fill a space with life energy that would be very beneficial to one''s training.


    Even when the door opened, Lin Fan could feel the stronger concentration of life energy that came from this room.


    Around the table were three different parties that had evenly divided the table into three parts.


    There was the Hunters Organization party which had both old man Qiao and president Mao, there was the Myriad Sword Hall party which had Wang Jian and a white haired old man that Lin Fan didn''t recognize, and finally there was the Ice Goddess Pce party which had Bing Yu and an older woman with blue hair that Lin Fan didn''t know.


    As he looked around the table, Lin Fan revealed an awkward look since he didn''t know where to sit.


    Seeing this, old man Qiao waved his hand at Lin Fan as if telling him toe over.


    Lin Fan quickly noticed this and was happy that he was given a way out, so he walked over to the Hunters Organization group with Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei.


    However, when Lin Fan passed by the Myriad Sword Hall group, the white haired old man suddenly opened his eyes to reveal a sharp gaze that he turned to look at Lin Fan with.

 Chapter 575 Three Way Meeting (3)

    Lin Fan naturally noticed this since as he walked by the Myriad Sword Hall group, he had also snuck a peek at them.


    When the old man''s sharp gaze turned to look at Lin Fan, he met Lin Fan''s gaze which had been looking at them and Lin Fan quickly turned his eyes away.


    He didn''t want to cause any trouble, so he thought that avoiding eye contact would be the end of it, but he didn''t know that he was wrong.


    The old man paused for a second with a thoughtful look on his face before suddenly standing up and blocking Lin Fan''s way.


    The moment he stood up, everyone turned to look at the old man.


    The Hunters Organization group had a worried look to them while the Ice Goddess Pce group looked like they were about to watch a good y.


    Lin Fan tried to move out of the way, but the old man moved over to block him from going past him. This made it very clear that this old man was doing it on purpose.


    Old man Qiao knitted his brows seeing this and he couldn''t help saying, "Hey, One Sword, what are you nning on doing? An old man like you is deliberately causing trouble for a junior? Won''t you be embarrassed if others heard about this?"


    The old man who had been called One Sword ignored this and continued to look over Lin Fan.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao on the side as juniors clearly couldn''t just cut in as they wanted, but they both had knitted brows as they watched this. Both of them had secretly put their hands on their weapons just in case something happened.


    It was the same for the Myriad Sword Hall group. Since their elder had made a move, naturally they were on guard just in case something happened.


    That was everyone except for Wang Jian who had a worried look on his face.


    After a long moment of silence, the elder from the Myriad Sword Hall who had been called One Sword suddenly spoke.


    He didn''t reply to old man Qiao, but rather he spoke directly to Lin Fan and what he said was so shocking that everyone in the room had been caught off guard.


    After looking at Lin Fan for a bit, One Sword finally said with a faint smile, "Not bad, not bad at all. Are you interested in following this old man and cultivating the sword?"


    "Huh?!"


    This was a collective exmation of surprise and confusion that came from everyone in the room.


    Not a single person had expected this to be the way that this situation developed based on the actions of this old man.


    Lin Fan was in a daze for a bit before asking, "Elder, are you sure that you haven''t made a mistake? I haven''t ever cultivated in the way of the sword, I''m not sure that I''m as suited for it as you think."


    One Sword gave augh and patted Lin Fan on the shoulder as he said, "Young man, you shouldn''t doubt this old man''s eyes. This old man has seen much more than you can even imagine."


    Lin Fan didn''t even have time to refute this as the two elders from the Hunters Organization finally reacted.


    Old man Qiao came up and said, "Hey, One Sword, are you really trying to steal our people from right in front of us?"


    President Mao added, "Even if we are old friends, you know you can''t do something as shameless as this, right?"


    One Sword once again ignored them as he looked right at Lin Fan, waiting for an answer.


    He wasn''t wrong about Lin Fan being suited for sword cultivation. The main reason why Lin Fan was suited for it wasn''t because of his physique or his talent for cultivating, it was mainly because of his personality and aura.


    One Sword could tell from Lin Fan''s aura that he was someone who had a strong confidence and will, which was the most important thing when it came to cultivating the sword.


    Sword cultivation was different from normal cultivation, it was all about having the will to persist the path of the sword, which would allow one to develop the Sword Will and subsequently, the Sword Heart.


    So the most important thing to sword cultivators wasn''t their physique or their cultivation talent, it was their personality.


    This was why One Sword wanted Lin Fan that badly.


    After a moment''s pause, Lin Fan finally said, "I''m sorry, I don''t think that I''m suited for sword cultivation still and I have no interest in cultivating the sword. Thank you for your offer, but I won''t be taking it."


    One Sword gave a sigh when he heard this and then he threw out a token for Lin Fan before turning back to sit down. As he sat down, he didn''t forget to add, "If you ever change your mind, take that token to the Myriad Sword Hall."


    Then it was as if hepletely lost interest in Lin Fan as he closed his eyes again.


    There was only silence that filled the room after that as everyone was stunned by his actions again.<sub> </sub>


    After a minute of standing there in a daze, Lin Fan gave a slight bow to One Sword before heading over to where the Hunters Organization group was sitting.


    The two elders from the Hunters Organization had been in a daze as well, but seeing Lin Fane over, they revealed wide smiles.


    It seemed like their investments hadn''t been in vain, Lin Fan at least knew how to repay them for their sincerity and that was more than enough for them to start building a rtionship.


    The two of them looked at each other before turning to look at their grandchildren with a spark in their eyes.


    As for how it would go in the future, that would all depend on their grandchildren¡­


    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao gave a sneeze at the same time.


    After the sneeze, the two of them looked at each other like something strange had happened before turning to follow Lin Fan over.


    Could it be that someone was talking smack about them behind their backs?


    p When Lin Fan came over and old man Qiao was about to wee him, there was a voice that came from the Ice Goddess Pce group.</anda>


    "Little friend, can I ask you for a favour?"


    Everyone turned to look in the direction of this voice and they found that it was the older blue haired woman who said this.


    Lin Fan raised a brow in surprise before asking, "Elder, please, what favour do you need?"


    The blue haired woman raised a hand to gesture to Bing Yu sitting beside her and asked, "I''m curious how talented you are if even One Sword is willing to take you as his disciple. I was wondering if you could spar with our Xiao Yu here?"


    Old man Qiao and president Mao immediately knitted their brows the moment they heard this.


    Not only the Myriad Sword Hall, even the Ice Goddess Pce was causing trouble.


    Were they both looking down on their Hunters Organization?


    This was supposed to be a discussion to see if there was any chance to cooperate against the Thunder Sect, but now it seemed like they were both here to target the Hunters Organization.


    One tried to poach Lin Fan and the other was now trying to fight him with hidden motives, they clearly were trying to p the Hunters Organization''s face.


    Old man Qiao was the one who spoke again as he asked with a slightly dark look on his face, "Bing Lan, what is the meaning of this?"


    The older blue haired woman who had been called Bing Lan looked at old man Qiao with a smile and said, "Old Qiao, I''m just curious as to how talented our little friend here is. Could it be that your Hunters Organization has so little confidence in our little friend?"


    There was a clear taunting tone in her voice even though it sounded very natural.


    Old man Qiao and president Mao both had dark looks on their faces.


    Old man Qiao was about to say something in response to this, but Lin Fan suddenly said, "Elder, it''s not a problem for us to spar, but I just wonder if miss Yu would be willing to do so?"


    He didn''t have a special tone to his voice, but the meaning behind his words were clear. Or at least they were clear for Bing Yu alone.


    He was clearly referring to how she had been thrown out of his store previously, a fact that Bing Yu had hidden in her report to Bing Lan and had suppressed on the city forums so that no one outside of those who had witnessed it knew about it.


    When she heard this, there was a clear trace of anger that appeared in her eyes, but she didn''t say anything in the end and just gave a snort.


    Bing Lan didn''t catch the underlying meaning in Lin Fan''s words, so she just said with a smile, "It''s just a friendly spar, what isn''t there to be willing about?"


    Bing Lan nodded at Bing Yu and said, "Xiao Yu, go ahead. This little friend is willing to spar with you, so there''s no need to hold back. After all, he is talented enough to even catch the eyes of One Sword."


    Bing Yu nodded before moving to the open space in the room beside the table. Once she was there, she turned back to look at Lin Fan with a provoking gaze.


    Lin Fan turned to look at old man Qiao and president Mao who clearly had worried looks, but when they saw his confident look, those looks faded a bit.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before heading over to where Bing Yu was standing.

 Chapter 576 Three Way Meeting (4)

    As Lin Fan walked over, Bing Yu narrowed her eyes to look at him.


    When she had been thrown out of the store earlier, she had thought that the power that had thrown her out was Lin Fan''s, but she realized that she had made a mistake after leaving the store.


    As she had been heading back in her beast carriage, she realized that there was no way for someone in the low Embryo Soul Realm like Lin Fan to release that much power.


    That meant that the only exnation was that the expert hidden inside the store must have interfered to protect Lin Fan. That was the only way such a powerful attack could have appeared¡­


    But now they were no longer in Lin Fan''s shop which filled Bing Yu with confidence.


    She was certain that as long as there wasn''t anyone to interfere this time, she would be able to beat Lin Fan. After all, she was already in the High Embryo Soul Realm, just being a single step from breaking through to the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    There were two full minor realms between them, that was a gap that was like heaven and earth.


    As well, she was a genius with incredible battle power. She was someone who was able to even cross levels to fight those normal experts in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    Of course, when she was beating Lin Fan, she wouldn''t forget to take a little revenge for the injustice she had suffered at Lin Fan''s store¡­


    It was just too bad that all her ns were for nothing in front of Lin Fan.


    That was because Lin Fan was a monster that she never would have imagined existed.


    After all, Lin Fan had even been able to beat up Wang Jian easily, so how could he not be able to beat up Bing Yu who was weaker than Wang Jian?


    He had even easily noticed her sneak attack in the store, but the reason why he had let the store''s defense system block the attack was to make a bigger impact.


    While he could also easily st her out of the store with his own power, he wouldn''t have been able to generate as much force as the defense system and that would havecked the impact that he wanted.


    He had wanted to use this impact to deter any ideas that Bing Yu might have towards him, it seemed like it hadn''t worked.


    He could guess the reason why the situation had developed like this, it was all because of his "master". After all, with this unseen and mysterious master, there were many things that could be pushed onto this master.


    Lin Fan could see it all in Bing Yu''s eyes, especially that slight desire for revenge¡­


    It seemed like unless he properly taught her a lesson, she wouldn''t leave him alone.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan wasn''t above teaching her a lesson.


    He had been held back by the righteous side of his soul previously, but after merging, he now had apletely different view. While he still believed that treating women right was the right thing to do, that didn''t mean that he was blind enough to believe that all women should be treated that way.


    If a woman deserved it, he would beat her just like he would beat a man.


    This was true gender equality!


    As they stood in front of each other, Bing Yu was the first to cup her hand and give a slight bow to Lin Fan as she said, "Young master Lin, please."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and cupped his hands as well, but he didn''t go as far as giving a bow. Even the smile on his face had a slight taunting tone to it as he said, "Miss Xiao Yu, no need to be this polite."


    Bing Yu knitted her brows when she heard this and she calmly said, "Young master Lin, this miss'' name is Bing Yu. I don''t think that we''re close enough for you to call me Xiao Yu just yet."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile without saying anything else in response to this.


    Bing Yu could clearly tell that Lin Fan was making fun of him and there was a trace of anger that filled her heart, but she forced herself to remain calm. She just cupped her hands to Lin Fan again and said, "Then I''ll be making my move, young master Lin."


    Lin Fan nodded and gave an inviting gesture.


    <o>,m The way he did it was almost like a senior who was sparring with a junior.</o>


    This once again filled Bing Yu''s heart with anger, but she was able to calm herself down with the thought of being able to wipe that look off his face soon. She still firmly believed that she would be able to beat him since he was nothing more than a Low Embryo Soul Realm kid.


    Bing Yu raised her right hand in front of her and condensed a sword that was madepletely of ice.<sub> </sub>


    Then in an instant, she disappeared from where she had been standing, appearing in front of Lin Fan in an instant.


    When she appeared, the sword that was in her hand was behind her and was being swung down over her head at Lin Fan. It was clear from this action that she wasn''t holding back a single thing.


    Lin Fan didn''t panic when he saw Bing Yu suddenly appear in front of him, he just calmly raised his hand to meet her de.


    Bing Yu and everyone else in the room revealed a shocked look when they saw this since no one believed that Lin Fan was able to take this attack head on. Well, everyone except for Wang Jian who had a bitter smile on his face.


    He had thought the same back in the ruins and he had suffered at Lin Fan''s hands. He knew that Lin Fan was even stronger nowpared to back when he had faced him, so he knew that Bing Yu would suffer this time.


    It was already toote for Bing Yu to stop the swing of the sword since she had used too much force in this swing.


    The sword of ice came right down on Lin Fan''s hand, but unlike what everyone expected, this sword was actually stopped by his flesh.


    The sword of ice even shattered to pieces and it almost felt like cutting a steel wall to Bing Yu as the tremors from the sword reached her hands. Her hands couldn''t help shaking as she looked down at them before looking up at Lin Fan in disbelief.


    Lin Fan hadn''t even usedws to guard against this sword of ice, he had used his bare palm to shatter it to pieces.


    Just how strong was his body that he was able to do this?


    Taking advantage of the slight dy in Bing Yu''s reaction, Lin Fan''s hand came down as shended and pped her right across the face.


    This time, Lin Fan had wrapped his hand with hisws which created a force that easily broke through Bing Yu''s defenses, sending her flying across the room.


    She slid across the floor for a few meters beforeing to a stop, lying down on her back, looking up at the roof with an aching feeling on her right cheek.


    She still couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    It wasn''t just her, no one in the room was able to believe what had just happened.


    Someone in the Low Embryo Soul Realm had been able to shatter the full force attack of someone in the High Embryo Soul Realm with just their body?


    If there was anyone that was told this, they would have called the person who told them this crazy.


    After all, there were two full minor realms between them!


    But in fact, Lin Fan hadn''t just used his body to resist it.


    While his physique was stronger than his current cultivation, reaching the Child Soul Realm, that alone wouldn''t have been enough to stop Bing Yu''s full power attack. Instead, Lin Fan had tried out the new power that he had received.


    The golden energy that he had gotten in the ruins, after learning to control it, he had found that he could strengthen his body with it.


    When Lin Fan had received that full force attack from Bing Yu, he had wrapped his hand alone with all the golden energy that he could draw out from the suns in his dantian. If they had been able to see the golden energy, they would have been blinded by how bright it was.


    Wang Jian had been the only one who had seen it and the moment it appeared, he had been forced to wince his eyes and turn slightly just to be able to see still.


    But of course, that alone also wouldn''t have been able to block it, so Lin Fan had also snuck in a bit of his absorption power.


    After what happened in the ruins, Lin Fan had found that the ck hole in his dantian had also be much bigger, which had increased the power of his absorption force.


    Just with the absorption power that he used, he had been able to weaken Bing Yu''s sword to half its power.


    Then with the golden energy, he was able to shatter it easily.


    Lin Fan looked down at his own hand and he gave a satisfied nod.


    It seemed that this power was quite strong, it could even be considered a trump card for him to use in the future.

 Chapter 577 Three Way Meeting (5)

    There was a silence thatsted in the room for a long time before Bing Yu broke it.


    She sat up from the ground and raised a hand to touch her cheek. When she felt the pain that came from touching it, she finally remembered what had just happened and there was a look of rage that appeared.


    She red at Lin Fan with eyes that seemed like she wanted to kill him as she roared, "You dare p me in the face!"


    But when she roared out at Lin Fan, looking like she was about to go all out against him, Bing Lan said, "Xiao Yu, enough!"


    Bing Yu immediately gave a tremble before turning to look at Bing Lan with an aggrieved look, "But master!"


    Bing Lan narrowed her eyes which caused Bing Yu to look down before she said, "Yes master!"


    With her head down, she went over to where Bing Lan was standing and came up behind her to stand there. However, as she walked away, she didn''t forget to re at Lin Fan onest time.


    Of course, there was also a trace of fear that was in her eyes because what she had experienced just now was real. She had no way of understanding how Lin Fan had just erupted with that kind of power just now.


    The only reason she was able to stay calm now was because of the specialty of the Ice Goddess Pce''s cultivation technique.


    This cultivation technique was one that suppressed emotions and at its peak, it would turn the one that cultivated it into an emotionless piece of ten thousand year old ice. But that was only at the peak of this cultivation technique and no one at the Ice Goddess Pce had reached the peak yet, not even their leader.


    Bing Lan also took a deep look at Lin Fan during this time.


    The only reason she had let Bing Yu go out was because she had believed that Lin Fan was only a normal Low Embryo Soul Realm Expert.


    She hadn''t heard about what had happened in the store, but even if she had, she still wouldn''t have had any reason to believe that Lin Fan was anything more than a genius that could skip a single minor realm.


    She never would have thought that he was such a monster that he was able to skip two minor realms¡­No, it would be three minor realms since Bing Yu''s battle power was at a level that even normal Peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts would find hard to resist.


    Then there was the fact that he had dealt with her full power attack so easily¡­


    With the power that he had demonstrated, she even suspected that he was capable of skipping a full major realm and fighting those in the Child Soul Realm.


    A Low Embryo Soul Realm Expert who was able to cross three minor realms and one major realm to fight those in the Child Soul Realm, she really had never heard of a monster like this.


    As this thought passed through her mind, she couldn''t help revealing a look of regret as she looked at the Hunters Organization group.


    If this kind of genius could have appeared in her Ice Goddess Pce, how great that would have been¡­


    It was too bad that she had also forgotten that her Ice Goddess Pce only took in female disciples. If Lin Fan were to appear in her Ice Goddess Pce, they wouldn''t have taken him in the first ce unless he¡­


    Since her n to demonstrate the power of the Ice Goddess Pce to take a more domineering position in this alliance had failed, she could only pull back now and present a more passive position.


    After staring at Lin Fan for a bit, she said with a sigh, "It seems like this little friend here really is talented."


    Then she said nothing else on this matter as she turned to the Hunters Organization group and said, "Since that is settled and everyone is here, how about we begin our negotiations?"


    Old man Qiao and president Mao had been in charge of the Hunters Organization for quite some time now and as the saying went, the old ginseng was the most spicy. It didn''t take long for them to figure out what Bing Lan had been nning with this sudden request for a spar, but they were d that everything had turned out for the better with Lin Fan.


    To be honest, even they never expected Lin Fan to be this powerful, but now he had given them quite the pleasant surprise.


    Both of them nodded at Bing Lan before turning to One Sword.


    While One Sword had his eyes closed, he was still able to hear everything that was happening around him and he also had his spiritual sense, so he had been able to see everything that had happened.


    When everyone turned to him, One Sword opened his eyes as well and he gave a nod.


    The negotiations didn''tst long since the order had already been established by the spar just now.<sub> </sub>


    One Sword already knew that Wang Jian had already lost to Lin Fan previously, so he didn''t try to put the Myriad Sword Hall in a dominant position either.


    Lin Fan spaced out during the negotiations because he felt that none of them applied to him, but at the end, old man Qiao said to him, "Then little friend Lin, are you fine with these terms?"


    Lin Fan suddenly snapped out of his stupor and turned to look at old man Qiao as he asked, "What terms?"


    Old man Qiao just calmly said, "You''ll be the leader of the team that we''re sending into the Ancient Era Ruin. Didn''t you hear what we just said?"


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look as he asked, "Ancient Era Ruin? But I''m not going."


    Old man Qiao then revealed a surprised look before turning to look at Qiao Yi Fei who had turned her head away.


    It wasn''t hard for him to figure out what was going on, so he slightly knitted his brows before turning back to Lin Fan to say, "Little friend Lin, the Ancient Era Ruin is a very special ce. It''s a ce that will be filled with opportunities, ones that you normally couldn''t even get even if you wished for them. I''m sure that you wouldn''t want to miss out on these opportunities, right?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug and said, "I don''t need them though."


    Old man Qiao was taken aback by this, but then he had to admit that perhaps Lin Fan didn''t need them.


    He had been able to sense thews in his store thest time he went there and he could tell that Lin Fan''s backing wasn''t normal. If Lin Fan was even rted to a higher realm, then he really wouldn''tck this single Ancient Era Ruin¡­


    Hearing what the two of them were talking about, Bing Lan''s eyes lit up.


    She could hear that there was a bit of dissidence between the Hunters Organization group and she could smell the scent of opportunity.


    Before old man Qiao could say anything, Bing Lan suddenly said, "Little friend Lin, if the Hunters Organization is treating you unfairly, how abouting to our Ice Goddess Pce? We have plenty of beauties just like Xiao Yu back in our pce."


    It seemed like Bing Lan had ced quite a high valuation on Lin Fan, even going as far as using a honey trap to pull him in and even going against the traditions of their sect to only ept women¡­


    But one had to admit that Bing Yu was beautiful and the Ice Goddess Pce was a sect that was filled with only women, so he would be the only man there¡­


    To put it in earth terms, it would be like being the only boy in an all girls school, full of girls who had never interacted with men other than their fathers before¡­That was a plot that many young men dreamed of!


    On the Myriad Sword Hall side, One Sword had been staring right at Lin Fan with an intense gaze, making his meaning very clear. He didn''t say a thing, but with his personality, he didn''t need to say a thing.


    Seeing both of them like this, old man Qiaq cursed at them in his mind, "Old vultures!"


    It seemed like they were intent on stealing Lin Fan away from their Hunters Organization, but how could old man Qiao let that happen?


    Old man Qiao suddenly stood up and without even caring about his appearance, he grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder and pulled him aside to have a private conversation.


    He had even released his life energy to form a barrier around them so that the other two forces couldn''t hear a thing that they were saying.


    Behind him, president Mao was tactfully doing the same, wrapping his barrier up with a barrier of her own just to ensure that these vultures wouldn''t be able to y any tricks.


    Old mao Qiao looked at Lin Fan and directly said, "Tell me, what do you want?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I just want peace and quiet. Is that really that hard to get?"


    Old man Qiao gave augh and said, "Even if you don''t go, do you think that Lei Feng and Shi Yan will let you off?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this since he already knew the answer to this.


    In fact, this was the only scruple that Lin Fan had which still dragged him back into any of this.

 Chapter 578 Three Way Meeting (6)

    Shi Yan and Lei Feng¡­


    If it wasn''t for Shi Yan, Lin Fan wouldn''t have gotten involved in any of this since he would have no reason to get involved.


    All he wanted to do was quietly build up his power before taking revenge on the True Spirit Sect, but there were all these twists and turns that didn''t let him.


    But what he didn''t know was that if it hadn''t been for Shi Yan, he never would have received the store that he was currently using. That store had been given to him by the Hunters Organization aspensation for using him as bait for Shi Yan.


    In the end, everything was connected and even if one thing was changed, the ending still might have been the same.


    Seeing that bitter smile on Lin Fan''s face, old man Qiao knew that his words had the effect that he wanted.


    With a smile, old man Qiao said, "So tell me, what kind ofpensation do you want?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer right away as he fell into a period of silence with a look of deep thought on his face.


    He was thinking about what was best to get aspensation since he would have to be involved in this matter anyway. Since he would get involved, he would gouge them for as much as he could.


    Old man Qiao could easily see through his thoughts, but he didn''t have a choice, so he just patiently waited.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally asked, "The store that I''m using, it used to be your restaurant, right?"


    Old man Qiao was confused why Lin Fan would suddenly ask this, but he still said with a nod, "That''s right, it used to be my restaurant. What about it?"


    Lin Fan then asked, "Since you ran a restaurant, were you involved in any other food businesses?"


    Old man Qiao was even more confused, but he still answered, "I also had a few other businesses under me, but what does that matter?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he heard this, "Then that must mean you have a distributionwork in ce, right?"


    Old man Qiao seemed to have understood something as he paused to think about something before asking, "You want to use my distributionwork? Wait, you can actually cook? You weren''t kidding about bing a Gourmet Hunter?"


    Lin Fan gave a slight nod before saying, "Well, I do know a few recipes."


    Old man Qiao slightly knitted his brows before asking, "Why not use the Hunters Organization''s distribution channels?"


    Lin Fan just said with the same smile, "It''s better to use a specialized distribution channel than just a general distribution channel, don''t you think?"


    Old man Qiao then knitted his brows even more.


    It seemed like this kid really was quite greedy, he even wanted to use his name to market his own products.


    Who was he?


    He was the famous Ghost Chef that had built his reputation up over the decades, he was one of the greatest figures in the culinary world!


    And this kid just wanted him to endorse his products that easily?


    Old man Qiao was silent for a bit before saying, "I have to see your product first and if I''m not satisfied with them, I can''t put them in my distribution channels. But I will find someone else to help you with distributing them based on what level of product I think it is. That is the best I can do for you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod without hesitation in agreement since this was to be expected.


    After all, the reputation that was built over time was something that was hard to regain once it was lost. He didn''t want to harm old man Qiao with his request since he did owe old man Qiao quite a bit, so he was fine with these terms.


    Of course there were still details that needed to be worked out, but they couldn''t just work them out here, so they just came to a simple verbal agreement right now.


    Once that was decided, both of them had smiles on their faces as they turned back around and came back to the table.


    Seeing the smile on their faces, it was clear that they had reached some kind of deal, so Bing Lan couldn''t help giving a sigh as One Sword closed his eyes again.


    It seemed like they wouldn''t have a chance to lure Lin Fan in this time.


    Once they sat back down, Lin Fan took the initiative to say with a smile, "Apologies everyone, that was my mistake, I misheard just now. It would be an honour to lead the team into the Ancient Era Ruin."


    No one said a thing in response to this since it was already something that had been decided and because they had all seen Lin Fan''s strength. He was more than qualified to lead them into the Ancient Era Ruins.


    After that was decided, there was nothing else for them to discuss since that was the only matter on the table, so everyone started heading off in their own direction.<sub> </sub>


    With everyone watching, Wang Jian stood up and walked over to where Bing Yu was sitting before asking, "Junior Sister Bing, are you alright?"


    When Bing Yu heard this, she immediately looked up at Wang Jian with a blush on her face before giving a slight nod.


    Wang Jian revealed a faint smile and said, "That''s good to hear."


    Bing Yu was taken aback by that smile before she also revealed a bright smile back that was like a blooming flower.


    This Bing Yu waspletely different from the one that had lost herself in her rage and wanted to kill Lin Fan.


    The reason for this was because Bing Yu and Wang Jian were not only childhood friends, but also childhood sweethearts.


    This was also rted to the rtionship between the two factions.


    After what happened all those years ago, they had be closer and that had caused many different couples to form between the two factions. However, there was no couple that was more important than this one.


    Bing Yu and Wang Jian were both the leaders of the younger generation and very likely to be the leaders of their organization in the future. If they were toe together, they would be like the couple that they had destroyed in the past. If they were toe together, it would truly bind the two factions together.


    That was why all the elders approved of the rtionship between the two of them and did what they could to push them together.


    After a moment of pause, Bing Yu suddenly said in a lower voice, "Senior Brother Wang, I feel that you should be the one to lead the team instead of that unknown kid. You''ve be much stronger since you came back from the Hunter Exam, I''m sure that you can easily take care of someone like him."


    Wang Jian revealed a bitter smile when he heard this.


    Take care of him?


    I can''t even touch him now¡­


    Wang Jian shook his head and said, "I can''t win against him either."


    Bing Yu revealed a shocked look when she heard this.


    The Senior Brother Wang that she had known was someone who never backed down from a challenge, even if that person was much stronger than him. His pride had never allowed him to admit that he was weaker than someone else.


    But what was going on now?


    Could it be that she was talking to a fake Senior Brother Wang?


    But what she didn''t know was that this was just how Wang Jian had matured after he had ovee his mental demon.


    After being beaten by Lin Fan, he had developed a mental demon that caused him to fear Lin Fan. Naturally this wasn''t something that he could allow himself to keep, so he had gone into closed door cultivation as soon as he came back from the Hunter Exam.


    Through his strong Sword Will, he was able to work through this mental demon and he came to a realization. There were still many strong people in this world, it was foolish for him to believe that he could beat them all.


    However, that wasn''t the realization that he came to.


    The realization that he had was that while he wasn''t able to beat them now, that didn''t mean that he wasn''t able to beat them in the future.


    With his talent, it wouldn''t be a problem for him to catch up to others in the future and when he did, naturally he would be able to win.


    So there was nothing for him to fear.


    The one problem that he neglected was that Lin Fan was younger than him and he was already more powerful, which meant that Lin Fan was clearly much more talented than him.


    So instead of it being considered a realization, it was more of a form of denial.


    Seeing the shocked look on Bing Yu''s face, Wang Jian didn''t forget to add, "But that doesn''t mean that I can''t win in the future."


    The shocked look on Bing Yu''s face immediately changed to one of admiration before she said in a gentle voice, "Of course you can, Senior Brother Wang."


    While the two of them were lost in their own world, Lin Fan and the others left this ce.


    Lin Fan didn''t head back with them, rather he headed off on his own back to the store since there were many things he had to think about¡­

 Chapter 579 Tamers Guild (1)

    The night passed and the day came again.


    ? As per usual, Lin Fan opened the store and the morning rush came.


    Most people just took a look at their pets and thanked Lin Fan before leaving. There were some that also stayed to try and get another spot, but those that were smart brought their pets home first to consolidate their realms first.


    It wasn''t a good thing to increase cultivation too fast sometimes because it meant that one wouldn''t be used to their own power.


    Of course, Lin Fan''s store reduced that possibility since most of the training Lin Fan did was actualbat training. If they didn''t learn how to use their new powers well, they would die and of course no one wanted to die for no reason.


    Still, there was the fluctuation of life energy, so it was best to get limated with this increase in life energy as well.


    After the morning rush, things differed from the norm as there was an old man who stayed after everyone else had left.


    This old man had the pet that he had put in Lin Fan''s shop for training out and he was going all around the pet, as if he wanted to see every detail of it.


    As he was going around the pet, he kept muttering to himself, "Interesting, interesting, interesting¡­"


    With the way he was looking at the pet, people even started feeling ufortable for the pet¡­


    It was just the look in his eyes¡­


    Lin Fan even considered asking him to leave, but he could tell that this old man wasn''t an ordinary old man based on the aura he released, so he didn''t do anything in the end other than watch him.


    Finally after circling around his pet several times, the old man finally stopped and petted it on the head beforeing up to the counter.


    The old man walked right up to the counter and looked over Lin Fan before asking, "Hello young man, can you please call out the owner?"


    Lin Fan looked up from the novel that he had been reading before saying, "I am the owner. Can I help you?"


    The old man revealed a surprised look before asking, "You''re saying that you''re the owner?"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod without saying anything else as if he was expecting something.


    However, to his surprise, the old man immediately revealed a happy smile and said, "Great, you''re even more than I had expected!"


    Lin Fan was taken aback when he heard this, but he still waited for the old man to exin himself.


    When the old man calmed down, he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Young man, you shoulde to our Tamers Guild. With your talent, you would surely be recognized as at least a Master Trainer, maybe even a Grandmaster Trainer!"


    Lin Fan was surprised, but he wasn''t surprised by what this old man had said. Rather he was surprised by the fact that this old man was actually from the Tamers Guild.


    The Tamers Guild, that was another one of the twelve great factions and it was the faction that backed the Monster Trainer Union on the Blue Star.


    As their name implied, they were an organization that specialized in training pets just like how the Alchemy King Hall specialized in alchemy. This was what gave them the ability to be known as one of the neutral factions among the twelve great factions.


    After all, everyone needed people who could train their pets just like they needed people who could provide them with pills.


    There were only these two main methods of increasing one''s strength in this universe, so there was nothing else they could do.


    Almost all the factions had dealings with the Tamers Guild, so they couldn''t do anything to them, which allowed the Tamers Guild to remain neutral. The other reason was that the Tamers Guild was aware of their own position and knew that siding with anyone would make them suffer, so they weren''t dumb enough to ruin their own long term benefits to gain some short term benefits.


    Before Lin Fan could say a thing, Qiao Yi Fei came over and pped the table before saying, "Uncle Huang, you can''t just steal people from our Hunters Organization like this!"<sub> </sub>


    Both the old man and Lin Fan were surprised the moment Qiao Yi Fei suddenly came over to shout at them.


    Qiao Yi Fei had been here this morning because she had been picking up the pet that she had left for training, but she had also left, so they were both surprised since they had seen her leave.


    What they didn''t know was that Qiao Yi Fei had noticed this old man she called uncle Huang, so she had taken the chance toe back into the store unnoticed when everyone else had left. She had been standing in a corner watching the old man the entire time, but she couldn''t help standing out at this time since the old man had crossed a line.


    After all, what he was doing now was tantly stealing someone from her Hunters Organization.


    The old man who was called uncle Huang revealed a smile after recovering from his daze and said, "Xiao Yi Fei, it''s not like he can''t take the Monster Trainer Exam for our Tamers Guild even if he is a Hunter. Not to mention that with his talent, the Tamers Guild is where he belongs. How can you hold him back like this?"


    Qiao Yi Fei didn''t have anything to refute this old man since she knew that he was right. After all, she had been using his shop since he had opened it and she had been shocked every time by how much her pet had grown.


    Her pet had already reached the Low Child Soul Realm and was close to breaking through to the Mid Child Soul Realm.


    The only reason it didn''t yet was because Lin Fan had made sure that it couldn''t since she would lose control once it did. If there was too much of a disparity in cultivation realms, she wouldn''t be able to control it since it would be much stronger than her.


    The contract that she had signed with her pet was a one sided contract, so it was a contract that was established on the basis of her being able to dominate her pet.


    But beyond that, the battle power of her pet was far beyond that of what a normal pet at this level of cultivation should have. Her pet was already capable of fighting those in the Mid Child Soul Realm and could even resist those in the High Child Soul Realm. This wasn''t just a normal pet anymore, this was at the level of a mutated beast.


    If Lin Fan was able to achieve this with just a few days of training, what could he achieve with a dedicated training n?


    Just with this, she knew that he was a genius Monster Trainer, one that the Tamers Guild would definitely be interested in.


    The old man saw that Qiao Yi Fei didn''t say anything in response, so he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Owner Lin, my name is Huang Gan and I invite you to our Tamers Guild to take the Monster Trainer Exam. With your talent, I''m sure that you will pass it with flying colours."


    Lin Fan looked at the old man before looking at Qiao Yi Fei. After this, he turned back to the old man and asked, "If I pass, what will be the restrictions on getting my certification?"


    The old man said with a smile, "There are no restrictions at all. Rather, you''ll be gaining ess to the mass amounts of information that we have in our library. I''m sure that this will be helpful in your own studies as a Monster Trainer."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile that had a bit of contempt as he said, "You and I both know that''s not true."


    The old man''s smile didn''t disappear as he said, "There is only a fee that you need to pay for your membership to the Tamers Guild and the guild will take amission for any jobs that they refer to you."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes before turning to Qiao Yi Fei with a questioning look.


    Qiao Yi Fei didn''t say a thing, but she gave a nod.


    The reason why she didn''t refute the old man was because he had been right, but the other reason was because she had felt guilty towards Lin Fan for pulling him into the Hunters Organization.


    She was the one who had brought him in in the first ce and then she felt guilty since it had caused him to be in the situation he was currently in where he had to face three different factions of the twelve great factions.


    She was certain that Lin Fan would pass this exam, so if he was able to get the protection of the Tamers Guild as well, it would be good for him.


    As for why she was certain that the Tamers Guild would protect him, she could see from her uncle Huang''s eyes that he clearly appreciated Lin Fan''s talent or he wouldn''t have gone all out to bring Lin Fan back to the Tamers Guild.


    But for Lin Fan, he couldn''t help feeling that this invitation was too sudden and that something was off.


    However, he also had to admit that the benefits the Tamers Guild offered did move him, so he didn''t want to give this up.


    After a few seconds of debating this, Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I''ll go, but only if shees along with us." As he said this, he raised his hand to point at Qiao Yi Fei.

 Chapter 580 Tamers Guild (2)

    Both Qiao Yi Fei and Huang Gan were surprised by Lin Fan''s decision, but Huang Gan didn''t dwell on it for too long.


    He was a shrewd old man and he didn''t have a problem with adapting to the situation.


    He had to admit that he had been too direct with his approach this time and it woulde off as suspicious, it made sense that Lin Fan would want to bring along someone that he could trust. Not to mention that with Qiao Yi Fei''s status, even the Tamers Guild would hesitate to move against her, which was anotheryer of protection.


    Huang Gan turned to Qiao Yi Fei and stroked his chin as he thought, "It seems like Old Qiao really is going all out this time. He''s even trying to set up Xiao Yi Fei with this kid. Everyone in our circle knows how much he cares about Xiao Yi Fei¡­"


    Qiao Yi Fei took a bit longer to react, but she still nodded in the end.


    With this settled, the three of them headed out from Lin Fan''s store after he closed up.


    Lin Fan didn''t have a problem closing up early since there was no one in his store other than the spies. The only reason he didn''t close early before was because he didn''t have anything better to do, but now that he did, there was no hesitation in closing the store early.


    Huang Gan hade in his own beast carriage, but so had Qiao Yi Fei, so Lin Fan and Qiao Yi Fei took her beast carriage while Huang Gan took his.


    Once they set off, Lin Fan suddenly asked Qiao Yi Fei, "Who is that old man?"


    Qiao Yi Fei hesitated a bit before saying, "He''s one of the two vice president of the Tamers Guild and a Grandmaster Trainer."


    Lin Fan then asked, "How do you know him?"


    Qiao Yi Fei answered without hesitation this time, "He''s an old friend of my grandfather."


    p Lin Fan finally revealed a serious look as he asked, "Can he be trusted?"</anda>


    Qiao Yi Fei nodded without any hesitation, "He''s one of the few friends that my grandfather has, he can be trusted."


    After this, the beast carriage fell into silence as neither of them said a thing.


    It didn''t take long for them to reach the Tamers Guild branch in Harmony City.


    Unlike the Hunters Organization which weeded out weaker people through the Seekers Union, the Tamers Guild only had a single organization and weed all Monster Trainers to join. The only requirement needed to join the Tamers Guild was a simple Monster Trainer Exam which graded Monster Trainers.


    So instead of calling it a faction, it was more of a trade skill union.


    As soon as they came through the doors, there were many people who saw Huang Gan and immediately came over.


    "Vice president Huang, the Zephyr Lingzhi you requested has arrived and I''ve put it in yourb for you."


    "Vice president Huang, can you help me take a look at my Wave Bear? I followed all the steps in the book, but it still won''t learn the Surging Tide Skill."


    "Vice president Huang, I saw that article about you! You really are something else!"


    "Vice president Huang, please take a picture with me!"


    The person who said thatst sentence wasn''t a young girl, but rather a grandma who seemed to be in herte seventies¡­


    "It seems like this Huang Gan is quite a popr person and he seems to treat everyone fairly." Lin Fan thought to himself as he watched Huang Gan answer each person who came up to him.


    After ten minutes, there were actually more people that gathered around Huang Gan than when they came in, but it wasn''t as if he could keep answering them.


    Huang Gan raised his hands and said, "Everyone, I have some other matters to take care of, so please excuse me. If you need me, pleasee to my office hours tomorrow."


    No one revealed a disappointed look since they knew that they were the ones that were taking up Huang Gan''s time. He was the vice president of the Tamers Guild, this was a position that meant that he was under only one in the entire Tamers Guild, so there must be plenty of things that he had to take care of as well.


    However, it showed what kind of good person Huang Gan was if he was willing to take time out of his busy schedule to talk to each of them.


    Naturally they didn''t expect to be able to take up more of his time.


    All of them immediately cleared a path for Huang Gan the moment he said this and they all did it with a smile.


    Seeing the path created, Huang Gan turned back to Lin Fan and Qiao Yi Fei to say with an inviting gesture, "Shall we?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan nodded before following him with Qiao Yi Fei silently following behind him.


    As they moved through the crowd, he could hear whispersing from around him. Most of them were asking about who he was, but there were a few that werementing on how handsome he was¡­


    "Wow, who is that man following the vice president? He''s so handsome!"


    "I wouldn''t mind warming his bed if he were to ask."


    "Keep dreaming, have you even looked at yourself in the mirror?"


    As for who whispered these, most of them were olddies in theirte seventies and eighties¡­


    Qiao Yi Fei saw all this and leaned in a bit to whisper, "How does it feel to be admired?"


    Lin Fan could clearly hear the slight teasing tone that was in Qiao Yi Fei''s voice, so his face turned a bit dark, but he didn''t say anything in response to this.


    The group of three made their way through the Tamers Guild until they came to this separate reception desk that was on the side of the main hall.


    This was a ce with only two receptionists unlike the main area which had a board filled with requests and many different receptionists waiting to serve all the Monster Trainers that were taking requests.


    This was the desk for those that wanted to take the Monster Trainer Exam and it was much less popted since these exams were only a one time thing, so there weren''t as many people to servepared to the mission board area.


    As they came up, there was another group that also arrived in this area. It was a group of two, an old man and a young man who also came up to the desk.


    The two sides met right before they came up to the reception desk.


    As they stood there staring at the other side, Lin Fan could clearly see a hostile look that shed on the faces of the two old men before they both revealed smiles.


    He also noted that the young man on the other side hadn''t looked at him once, he had been staring at Qiao Yi Fei the entire time.


    As for how to describe his expression, the best way to describe it would have been a lovesick puppy.


    The old man on the other side was the first one to speak as he said with a smile, "Old Huang, what a coincidence running into you here. Are you also bringing someone over to take the Monster Trainer Exam?"


    Huang Gan replied, "Old Bai, it really is a coincidence. That''s right, I''m bringing a talented young man to take the exam. What about you? Are you doing the same?"


    As both of them said this, they looked over the young man that the other brought before turning back to look at each other with smiles.


    As the two of them "chatted", the young man on the other side came over to where Lin Fan and Qiao Yi Fei were standing. Without even sparing a nce to Lin Fan, he walked right up to Qiao Yi Fei and said, "Fei Fei, why didn''t you tell me that you wereing today? We could havee together if you told me."


    Qiao Yi Fei looked at him before turning her head with a cold snort.


    The young man didn''t mind as he said, "Fei Fei, I found this great restaurant the other day. Once I pass this exam, how about we go and have lunch together?"


    Qiao Yi Fei coldly looked at him again before turning around with a cold snort and walking behind Lin Fan, cing Lin Fan between her and this young man.


    It was only then that the young man looked at Lin Fan and the way he looked at him definitely wasn''t kind. It was clear that he had bad intentions.


    After ring at Lin Fan for a bit, the young man asked, "Who are you? Why are you with Fei Fei?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile at this since it was very clear what was happening.


    He looked at Qiao Yi Fei with that bitter smile, but she turned her head away and wouldn''t look at him.


    After turning back to the young man, he gave a sigh and said, "I''m no one and I''m just passing by."


    The young man narrowed his eyes before saying in an aggressive voice, "Then scram for this young master right now."


    Lin Fan didn''t seem bothered by this as he revealed a smile, but his words painted a different story, "Thedy isn''t interested, I think even a boar like you can see that. How about you scram for me instead?"

 Chapter 581 Monster Trainer Exam (1)

    Lin Fan didn''t want to get involved in this matter at first since he knew that it was troublesome, but he felt that he should pay Qiao Yi Fei back, which was why he said these words.


    After all, there was no reason for her toe along with him to the Tamers Guild, but she still came anyway.


    Since she had done this kindness for him, then the least he could do was stand up for her.


    Not to mention, the tone of this young man had annoyed him slightly.


    The young man''s face turned redder than a beet as his face contorted with anger.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this, he never expected this young man''s ego to be this fragile¡­


    That young man was about to explode, but then he stopped himself when he noticed that the two old men had stopped talking to watch the two of them. He forced himself to stay calm before ring at Lin Fan and saying, "You better watch yourself. Don''t let this young master catch you alone or you''ll regret it."


    Then he walked back over to where the old man called Old Bai was standing.


    He really wanted to vent all his anger, but he couldn''t since he was in front of these two old men. After all, the two of them had very high positions in the Tamers Guild and he was looking to be recognized by the Tamers Guild as one of their talented Monster Trainers.


    It wouldn''t do if he were to offend either of them over this small matter right now.


    Seeing that the show they were waiting for wasn''t going to happen, the two old men finished their "conversation" before heading off to the reception desk to pick up a form and went off in different directions.


    As they were leaving the young man following Old Bai didn''t forget to turn back to re at Lin Fan.


    Once they were gone, Huang Gan came over to Lin Fan to hand him the form before saying, "Just fill that out and give it to the receptionists, they''ll give you a token and tell you when the exam is. It''ll be in the afternoon, so you''ll have some time to prepare."


    Lin Fan took the form, but he didn''t fill it out as he asked, "Who was that just now?"


    Huang Gan looked in the direction that the two people had just gone in before turning back to say, "That''s the other vice president of the Tamers Guild, Bai Chen. The one beside him is a talented young trainer that he brought back for the test, so you''ll be taking the test with him this afternoon. If I remember correctly, he''s from the Fei Family of Silver Vale City, but I can''t remember what his name was¡­"


    Qiao Yi Fei cut in at this time by saying, "It''s Fei Jun."


    Huang Gan suddenly revealed a look like he had remembered something as he said, "That''s right, it''s Fei Jun."


    Lin Fan however was already looking at Qiao Yi Fei.


    Seeing his gaze, she turned away at first, but then she turned back to say, "I went to Silver Vale City with grandfather for an errand one time and we met the Fei Family. Since then, he hasn''t stopped bothering me, so I try to avoid him as much as possible."


    Then after lowering her head for a few seconds, she said in a hesitant voice, "Thank you."


    As soon as she said this, she didn''t wait for Lin Fan to respond as she turned around, but that was more because she didn''t want him to see the blush that was on her face.


    When he had stood up for her earlier, there had been this same blush on her face.


    After all, it was hard not to feel moved when a handsome man stood up for you, especially when you weren''t expecting anything in the first ce.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile, but he didn''t say anything else.


    Huang Gan revealed a smile when he saw this and he couldn''t help thinking, "Ah, to be young again."


    But since he was the one leading them, he still took the lead to say, "How about we get some food first? The exam is in the afternoon, so there''s no need for us to stay here and wait."


    Lin Fan raised the form in his hand and said, "I haven''t handed in the form yet."<sub> </sub>


    Huang Gan revealed a surprised look before saying, "Oh, right. Then little friend Lin, you can fill that out first and then we''ll go have some lunch."


    Lin Fan nodded before heading over to a table where writing utensils had been put.


    The process of signing up didn''t take long since Huang Gan was with Lin Fan and as staff of the Tamers Guild, it would be strange if the receptionists didn''t recognize their vice president. Seeing that Lin Fan was with vice president Huang, they quickly processed his form and gave him a token along with instructions on how to get to the exam this afternoon.


    Once he finished signing up, Huang Gan brought the two of them out to have a meal, but he didn''t bring them to a fancy restaurant. Instead he brought them out to a noodle stand right by the entrance of the Tamers Guild.


    Qiao Yi Fei happily sat down at the noodle stand and quickly ordered some noodles for herself.


    Meanwhile Huang Gan could see the surprised look on Lin Fan''s face, so he said, "You should try this ce, the noodles really are quite good."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind eating at a ce like this, he was just surprised that someone like Huang Gan would want to eat here. But what surprised him even more was how quickly Qiao Yi Fei had epted eating at this ce.


    After all, her grandfather was the Ghost Chef, so he thought that she would disdain eating at a ce like this.


    He sat down beside her and put in his order before asking her, "Are you sure you should be eating at a ce like this?"


    Qiao Yi Fei had been busy eating her bowl of noodles that came, so she said while slurping away, "Why wouldn''t I eat here?"


    Lin Fan then asked, "Is the food at this ce up to your standard? Isn''t it bad for your grandfather''s reputation if you eat stuff like this?"


    Qiao Yi Fei gave a snort and said, "Why wouldn''t it be up to my standard? It''s not like I''m that special. Anyway, I''m with uncle Huang, so there''s nothing to worry about since I''m out for a meal with him. It''s not like I was the one that chose this ce, so why would it affect my grandfather''s reputation?"


    But then Qiao Yi Fei realized who she was talking to and turned to see him sitting right beside her.


    The noodle stand was already small enough and the seating was quite close together, which meant that Lin Fan''s face wasn''t that far away from hers.


    When she saw it this close, she was caught off guard and couldn''t help flinching back. After realizing what she did, she stood up with her bowl of noodles and moved to the other side of the table where Huang Gan was sitting.


    When this was over, there was a strange atmosphere in the air that wouldn''t go away.


    Huang Gan had a smile as he thought the same thing from earlier, but Lin Fan had a bitter smile on his face when he saw Qiao Yi Fei turning away from him.


    He could tell that something had changed between the two of them, but there was nothing he could do about it, so he just stopped thinking about it.


    When the meal was over, Lin Fan had to admit that Huang Gan had good tastes. The noodles that he had here were some of the best noodles that he had ever had in his life, it was even better than most of the five star meals that he had in his previous life. It was something that far surpassed the level of cuisine that should have been possible with the level of food culture in this upper realm.


    While there was a more reliable source of food in this upper realmpared to the lower realm, cooking techniques still hadn''t developed as much among the normal chefs. High ss cooking techniques were in the hands of experts like Qiao Yi Fei''s grandfather, the Ghost Chef and wasn''t spread among themoners which the owner of this noodle store was.


    The only reason the noodles tasted so good was because of the ingredients¡­


    All the ingredients were nts and meat that contained life energy which made them taste much more freshpared to normal ingredients.


    After they finished their meal, the three of them headed back to the hall designated for the Monster Trainer Exam, but this time the hall was much more packedpared to this morning.


    In the morning, people woulde at random times to sign up for the Monster Trainer Exam, so there wouldn''t be many people in this hall at the same time. However, when the time for the exam came, this hall would be filled with all those people who had signed up and that number wasn''t a small number.


    Looking around, Lin Fan could see that there were over a hundred people taking the exam today and this was an exam that was held almost every day, so it could be seen how popr the Monster Trainer upation was. On the other hand though, it could also mean that there was a high rate of failure for this exam¡­

 Chapter 582 Monster Trainer Exam (2)

    As he scanned the people who were in the room, Lin Fan''s eyes stopped on a spot that was by the counter where two people caught his attention.


    It was the two that he had met this morning, the other vice president Bai Chen and Fei Jun.


    But of course, he wasn''t surprised since he expected the two of them to be here. After all, Fei Jun was also taking this exam, so it would have been strange if he wasn''t here.


    When Lin Fan''s eyes swept over the two of them, Fei Jun coincidentally also looked over in his direction.


    When their eyes met, Fei Jun revealed a look that seemed like he wanted to kill Lin Fan, but that onlysted a second before he turned away.


    Lin Fan saw this and couldn''t help finding it funny becausepared to everyone else that wanted to kill him, this Fei Jun almost seemed like a joke. For now, there was no need for him to pay any attention to him.


    Lin Fan''s group had arrived just a few minutes before the exam was set to start, so as soon as he had signed in, they started opening the gates for the exam hall.


    Seeing this, Huang Gan and Qiao Yi Fei didn''t follow Lin Fan as they headed off in another direction. As they were leaving Huang Gan didn''t forget to say, "We''ll be heading off to the stands now. I would say good luck, but you probably won''t need it." After saying this, he revealed a smile.


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile without saying anything.


    But before they left, Huang Gan also came in close and whispered, "If you can, teach that kid a lesson. I hate seeing that smug look on Old Bai''s face."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help finding this funny.


    Huang Gan was already this old and he was still acting like a child.


    Still even though he had said these aggressive words, Lin Fan could tell that there was no real hostility behind them. It was nothing more thanpeting for power, but in the end, this Tamers Guild seemed more united than it did on the surface.


    Could it be that they were pretending to y weak to fool others?


    Even if they were, that wouldn''t mean anything to him right now.


    What he needed now was more people that could support him in his eventual fight against the True Spirit Sect and if the Tamers Guild was more powerful than it seemed, that would actually benefit him more.


    So the first thing he had to do was pass this exam and he had to pass it in such a dazzling manner that it caught the attention of the leaders of the Tamers Guild.


    When the door to the exam hall was opened, everyone started moving in a calm and orderly fashion because everyone knew that there was no point in rushing. At the same, they also started looking over each other to scope out theirpetition.


    While there was no technical limit to the number of people that could pass the exam, there was an unspoken rule that limited how many people could pass. After all, it wasn''t good for the reputation of the Tamers Guild if too many people were able to pass the exam.


    If something became a thing that many people owned, it wouldn''t be considered rare anymore.


    Though in all honesty, there wouldn''t really be muchpetition since it was unlikely that many of them would even reach the threshold to pass the exam in the first ce.


    After they went into the hall, they saw that there were many stations set aside for them to take the exam, but it seemed like there wasn''t enough for all of them to take the exam at once.


    In total, there were only around fifty stations, so it seemed like they would be split in half to take the exam.


    There was a drawing that was held to determine the order they would take the exam in and Lin Fan was ced in the second group. As for Fei Jun, he was ced in the first group.


    When the first group went up onto the stage, Fei Jun didn''t forget to re in Lin Fan''s direction before revealing a different expression. The look on his face was clearly one of arrogance, as if he was saying to Lin Fan, "See the level that you''ll never be able to reach in your entire life!"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile in response to this because the way Fei Jun acted reminded him of the arrogant young masters that were rivals of the main character from the novels he read, both from here and on earth. In the novels from both worlds, there was never a good ending for these young masters.


    Once the first fifty examinees were on the stage, there was an old man who appeared on the main stage in front of them. With a booming voice that didn''t match the old appearance that he had, he said, "Your first exam will be to tame the beast that you will be assigned. When you drew your tickets, there was a special mark that was on your ticket that corresponds with the beast that you will be assigned."


    When the examinees heard this, all of them took out their tickets to find that mark that the old man was talking about.


    Lin Fan also took out his ticket and at the bottom of it, there was indeed a mark, but he couldn''t make out what it stood for at all. It looked just like scribbles to him and whether he squinted his eyes or opened them wide, he couldn''t make heads or tails of it.


    Judging by the murmurs that came from around him, it seemed like he wasn''t the only one having trouble reading the mark.


    Of course, while they had time, the ones that were already taking the exam didn''t have time as the spirit beasts that they were to tame had already been brought over for them.


    There were cages of various sizes, but these cages wereplete metal boxes that didn''t have any gaps in them, so no one was able to see what kind of beast they had been assigned until they were let out.


    When the cages were in ce, they were all opened at the same time and beasts of different varieties came out. There were wolves, dogs, cats, tigers, and there was even arge lizard that almost seemed like a dragon.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling pity for the one person who had been assigned that lizard since that person was clearly at a loss as to what to do.


    Still, there was no worry about their safety because there were staff members from the Tamers Guild who were standing around the various stations. Based on the aura that came from them, not a single one of them was below the Child Soul Realm.


    Since all of the beasts that were being used for the exam were only in the Embryo Soul Realm, there was no worry that any of them would be able to do a thing to the examinee on stage.


    But as for how they would tame them¡­that was up to them.


    Once the beasts were released and ced in front of them, the ones that were more confident didn''t waste any time as they released their life energy.


    There were two ways to tame pets, one that could be done by anyone and one that required one to be a Monster Trainer to use.


    The method that anyone could use was to either bond with the beast and form the contract or to beat the beast into submission before forming the contract. This was considered a crude method and very hard to put into practice most of the time.


    The method that Monster Trainers used was to use a special taming technique that they learned to force a deeper bond with the beasts, allowing them to form mutual contracts rather than the one way contract that usually came from the first method.


    Of course, if a Monster Trainer didn''t have enough practice or their life energy wascking, they would be forced to make a one way contract in the end as well.


    As the Monster Trainers released their life energy to surround the beasts with, there were many beasts that directly broke through the life energy screen that had been created around them. The Monster Trainers that saw this started to panic and moved back as they released their pets to stop the beasts from approaching. At the same time, they started gathering life energy in their hands again to try and tame the beasts again.


    However, it was clear that most of these people would fail since they had their abilities shattered too quickly.


    There were some that had their life energy screens around the beasts still and were in the process of taming them. These ones were the ones that would most likely pass the exam since they seemed proficient with the taming technique.


    Among them was naturally Fei Jun who didn''t look like he was putting in any effort at all.


    After around ten minutes, instead of shattering like the others who had failed, Fei Jun''s life energy screen dissipated into wisps of energy as he took out a scroll which he crushed before throwing the energy that came out at the tiger in front of him.


    After another sh of light, the tiger came to Fei Jun''s side and started licking his face.

 Chapter 583 Monster Trainer Exam (3)

    The old man examiner who was at the front of the stage gave a nod when he saw this before saying, "Number 58 passes!"


    Fei Jun just revealed an arrogant look like this result was something that was natural before walking off the stage with his head held high.


    Of course, he didn''t let the tigere with him since this tiger wasn''t his even if he had created a contract with it. The contract that he created was just a temporary one that Monster Trainers used when taming pets to temporarily bind them before allowing them to form contracts with their permanent owners.


    The tiger was taken away by the Tamers Guild staff where it would be soldter to someone else since it was already tamed.


    As Fei Jun walked off the stage, he reveled in the whispers that rang out around him.


    "Ten minutes, he really only took ten minutes! Isn''t that a record for the Monster Trainer Exam?"


    "That''s right, the previous record was a full twenty six minutes and he cut that down by more than double!"


    "What a monster!"


    "He''ll definitely be a famous Monster Trainer in the future!"


    Ten minutes wasn''t considered fast for higher grade Monster Trainers, it was considered average, but this was an exam to test lower grade Monster Trainers, which was why it was considered very fast. After all, the lower grade Monster Trainers didn''t have the same experience as the higher grade Monster Trainers that allowed them to tame beasts faster, so being able to tame a beast at the average level of a higher grade Monster Trainer showed that he had the potential to be one in the future.


    That was why when everyone looked at Fei Jun, they all had the intention of ttering him and getting closer to him.


    They were all Monster Trainers and their goal was to get into the Tamers Guild. There was no doubt that Fei Jun would receive a high position in the Tamers Guild based on his performance, so they all wanted to hug his leg to climb up thedder.


    Once he was off the stage, Fei Jun looked at Lin Fan as if he was saying, "Do you see this?" Then he turned to the stands to see if he could find Qiao Yi Fei since that was the most important thing to him after all.


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and found all of this funny since he knew what was about to happen next.


    The first roundsted an hour and in the end, there were less than ten people that had passed. Thest person who had qualified was someone who had barely been able to pass, only taming the pet at the veryst minute.


    It was clear thatpared to Fei Jun, all of them werecking in talent.


    Up in the special seats, there were the two vice presidents and Qiao Yi Fei sitting on the side. Sitting in the middle of the two vice presidents was another old man who had a smile on his face as he watched the examinees leaving their stations.


    Once this first set of tests was finished, he turned over to Bai Chen and said, "Old Bai, it seems like you really found a good seed this time."


    Bai Chen cupped his hands with a smile and said, "President, it''s only a small disy, you haven''t even seen all of Xiao Fei''s talent yet. Please look forward to a good show."


    Huang Gan on the other side had a displeased look sh in his eyes, but of course he didn''t show it on his face. As an old man and vice president of the Tamers Guild, he had plenty of experience with controlling his emotions and he wouldn''t show them that easily.


    To the side, Qiao Yi Fei couldn''t help revealing a faint smile of disdain when she heard this.


    She knew that Lin Fan''s performance would definitely shock them since she had already experienced first hand his abilities as a Monster Trainer at his store. With how he had trained her pets, she was certain that his abilities as Monster Trainer went far beyond any of the Monster Trainers here.


    Bai Chen took this time to look over at Huang Gan and he said, "I heard that Old Huang also found a young talent that he wanted to bring in. I wonder, where is he now?"


    Huang Gan met his gaze without any fear and said, "Xiao Lin is in the next batch going up."


    Bai Chen revealed a faint smile as he said, "How about we make a bet, Old Huang?"


    Huang Gan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but he still asked, "What are we betting on?"


    Bai Chen said with the same smile, "How about we bet on whose young talent will have the better result? Let''s bet on how long it takes for your young talent to pass the first exam. If he does it faster than Xiao Fei, then it''ll be my loss."


    Huang Gan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    After all, even if he had faith in Lin Fan''s talent, he wasn''t certain that Lin Fan would be able to beat Fei Jun''s time. Fei Jun''s talent was even more monstrous than he thought, Fei Jun had been able to cut the record for fastest time by more than half!<sub> </sub>


    But as he became older, Huang Gan not only became wiser, he also became more stubborn.


    He couldn''t stand the smile on Bai Chen''s face and he wasn''t willing to back down that easily, so he said, "What are we betting on?"


    Bai Chen pretended to think for a bit before saying, "How about that red egg you disy in your study?"


    Huang Gan immediately revealed a dissatisfied look.


    It seemed like this Bai Chen had reallye to y.


    He had said it very casually, but there wasn''t a single person other than Qiao Yi Fei here who didn''t know what he was looking for.


    The red egg that Bai Chen was referring to was an egg that Huang Gan disyed in his office and it looked like a normal egg based on its appearance, but it was anything but normal. After all, this was an unknown egg that Huang Gan had once found in an Inheritance Realm before.


    It was the same Inheritance Realm where he had found his Monster Trainer technique that had allowed him to be one of the best Monster Trainers in the Tamers Guild.


    Over the years, Huang Gan had asked many master Monster Trainers to help him hatch the egg, but they had never been able to do a thing to it. They had tried many different methods, but the egg still stayed dormant the entire time.


    The only way that they knew that it was still alive was because of the faint vital energy they sensed from it and the amount of life energy that it had absorbed. The amount of life energy that they had spent on trying to hatch this egg was already enough to train five different Child Soul Realm Experts, but yet that egg still didn''t hatch!


    Still, that was enough to tell that this egg was definitely something special¡­


    It was famed as one of Huang Gan''s prized possessions and Bai Chen was immediately targeting it.


    That made Huang Gan feel a bit of worry.


    He couldn''t help turning to look at Qiao Yi Fei who just gave him a nod.


    After thinking about it, he gave a nod before saying, "Then I want that ice lotus that you have in yours."


    Bai Chen''s smile became a bit stiff, but then he nodded and said, "It''s a bet then."


    The ice lotus that Huang Gan wanted was also one of Bai Chen''s prized possessions which was why he had hesitated a bit, but then he agreed since he was certain of Fei Jun''s talent. That was just how monstrous Fei Jun''s talent was.


    However, Huang Gan also felt a bit of reassurance because he had seen the results of Lin Fan''s training with his own eyes. He knew that Lin Fan was talented when it came to training pets, but he just didn''t know how talented he was in taming pets.


    Still, with his talent in training pets, there was no way that his talent in taming pets wascking which was why he made this bet in the end.


    ? The president sitting between them revealed an interested look as he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan down below.


    This fellow was talented enough that Huang Gan was actually willing to make this bet, so he couldn''t help being curious about Lin Fan.


    To the side, Qiao Yi Fei once again revealed a faint smile of disdain since she already knew that this bet wasn''t even going to be a bet. This was going to be Huang Gan stealing Bai Chen''s items.


    Down below, after the first group had been led away, Lin Fan''s group were led onto the various stations.


    The same cages that had been brought to the stations before were once again brought to the stations, but they clearly had different things inside of them based on the sounds that wereing from them.


    Lin Fan looked down at his ticket again and this time he knew that the scribbles at the bottom was a picture of the beast that he would receive. He had already confirmed this with the other examinees that had just finished their exams.


    However, even if he knew what the scribbles stood for, he still couldn''t make heads or tails of it.


    Looking at it with a confused look for a bit, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile and shaking his head.

 Chapter 584 Monster Trainer Exam (4)

    Seeing that he wasn''t able to figure anything out from the ticket, Lin Fan put it back into his pocket.


    He tried releasing his spiritual sense to see what kind of beast was being held inside of this cage, but he found that the moment his spiritual sense touched the metal walls of the cage, they immediately dissipated. No matter how he tried prating that cage with his spiritual sense, it would always dissipate as soon as it touched the metal walls.


    There weren''t even any cracks in the cage, so there was nowhere for him to slip his spiritual sense through.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan just patiently waited until all of the cages were in ce.


    Seeing that everything had been set, the old man in charge of the exam on stage gave a nod before all the cages were suddenly opened.


    The beasts that had been trapped inside all came out slowly as if they were adjusting to the light like the first batch of beasts. During this slight dy, the examinees all released the life energy that they had gathered in their hands, creating life energy screens that surrounded the beasts that came out.


    There were some that shattered right away, which forced the examinees who failed to release their pets to stop the beasts.


    However, during this time, there was something shocking that happened.


    The bear that appeared in front of Lin Fan suddenly gave a roar before looking down at Lin Fan with red eyes.


    This bear in front of him was over three meters tall andpletely towered him, looking very menacing as it stood over him. However, even with the bear standing over him like this, Lin Fan didn''t show any fear at all.


    Then the bear suddenly brought the ws that had been held high up in the air and shed down at Lin Fan.


    The pressure that was created when it shed down was at a level that even made the staff members standing on the side panic. The amount of power contained inside of the ws had already reached the level of the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    This bear itself was known as the Berserk Bear and it was considered the bad luck draw for this exam since it was a beast that the examiners had been certain that no one could deal with. Even though it was only in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm, which was weaker than some of these examinees, the Berserk Bear had a special bloodline ability.


    When the Berserk Bear fought, just like its name implied, it would lose itself in a berserk rage which would increase their level of cultivation by a single minor realm. This would have already been enough to catch a normal examinee off guard since as Monster Trainers, they didn''t have as muchbat experience.


    Most Monster Trainers fought with pets, so if they were to fight the beast themselves, they would definitely suffer.


    But this Berserk Bear didn''t just go up a single minor realm, it went up two minor realms!


    There were shouts from the staff that went, "This Berserk Bear is in heat! Damn, why did no one check this!"


    The staff member that was closest to Lin Fan''s station tried to rush over to protect Lin Fan as he shouted, "Kid, run!"


    However, he didn''t make it in time.


    Rather, instead of saying that he didn''t make it in time, it was better to say that he didn''t get a chance at all.


    Lin Fan was very calm as he watched the w fall down above him,ing closer and closer.


    When it was about to hit him in the face, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand and threw out a punch.


    Like a kite that had been cut from its strings, the Berserk Bear wentpletely limp as it flew right through the air. It flew all the way back into the cage that it hade from before hitting the wall on the other side of the cage with a loud sound, creating an intent in the hard metal wall.


    There was only silence that came after that as everyone stared at Lin Fan with wide eyes filled with disbelief.


    This kid who was only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm had just punched a Berserk Bear in heat and had sent it flying?


    It had to be known that when a Berserk Bear was in heat, it didn''t just go up one minor realm, but rather two minor realms, which was why it had the strength of a Peak Embryo Soul Realm Expert!


    However, what they didn''t know was that for Lin Fan, a Peak Embryo Soul Realm Expert meant nothing¡­


    This Berserk Bear didn''t have a mutated bloodline, it was just a normal beast, so its battle power wasn''tparable to the battle power that a genius would have. It was nothing more than a normal Peak Embryo Soul Realm Expert, even if its body was a bit stronger because of its physique as a demon beast. Still, that wasn''t enough for it to match Lin Fan since Lin Fan''s physique was already in the Child Soul Realm.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan had some other special things such as the special golden energy and the absorption power¡­


    A minute passed since the Berserk Bear had been sent flying and it was only then when the Berserk Bear came out.


    When the Berserk Bear slowly came out of the cage, the staff member on the side finally reacted and jumped onto the tform, putting himself between Lin Fan and the Berserk Bear as he said, "Stand back, I''ll take care of this."<sub> </sub>


    But Lin Fan didn''t bother with him at all as he walked right past him, moving towards the Berserk Bear.


    The Berserk Bear saw Lin Fan and after a pause, it immediately ran towards him.


    The staff member thought that the Berserk Bear was about to attack Lin Fan again, so he cursed under his breath before saying, "Kid, get out of the way!"


    But Lin Fan once again ignored him.


    All Lin Fan did was raise his hand towards the iing Berserk Bear, but instead of forming a fist, he had his hand out as if he was about to pet the bear.


    Everyone thought that Lin Fan would be smashed by the Berserk Bear taking revenge on him, but no one expected what happened next.


    Instead of raising its ws, the Berserk Bear slid to a stop in front of Lin Fan and nuzzled up against his outstretched hand. Looking at it, it was almost like the Berserk Bear was acting like a cat¡­


    After petting it a few times, Lin Fan pulled out the temporary contract he had been given by the staff and after ripping it, there was a sh of light that appeared around the Berserk Bear before disappearing. Once it was over, the Berserk Bear acted the same way as before, cuddling up to Lin Fan like it was a big cat.


    Everyone gave a gulp and no one said a thing. There was even one examinee who had been watching Lin Fan that he had lost concentration, getting hit by the beast that was in front of him¡­


    Of course, the staff member stepped in before it got too serious, but that person still suffered minor injuries.


    After petting it a few more times, Lin Fan took his hand back and walked off the tform.


    The Berserk Bear tried to follow Lin Fan off, but he raised his hand and said, "Stay."


    Then without even looking back, Lin Fan walked off the tform.


    It was only then that everyone in the hall finally reacted to what had just happened.


    Lin Fan had just tamed the Berserk Bear and he had done it in such a strange method that no one could understand what had just happened.


    One punch!


    It only took a single punch from Lin Fan to make the Berserk Bear behave and allowed him to form the temporary contract!


    They had never heard of this kind of method before¡­


    It wasn''t the crude method of using force since the Berserk Bear wasn''t injured at all, it had only been sent flying, but Lin Fan had held back in his punch so that he wouldn''t hurt the Berserk Bear.


    That meant that there had to be something special with that one punch that had turned the Berserk Bear this tame¡­


    Just what had Lin Fan done?


    But that wasn''t the most shocking part¡­the most shocking part was that from beginning to end, less than two minutes had passed!


    Everyone already called Fei Jun a monster for passing the exam in just ten minutes, but what would they call Lin Fan who had passed in less than two minutes? What would be beyond a monster?


    A god? A demon? Or somethingpletely different?


    There were no words to describe the shock that they felt.


    What Lin Fan had done was the same thing he had done previously on the Blue Star. He had infused his fist with the absorption power which had allowed him to suck out the impurities in the bloodline of the Berserk Bear.


    The Berserk Bear was able to immediately sense what had just happened and this was something that it dreamed of. All beasts wanted to increase the purity of their bloodline to evolve even further, otherwise their cultivation would be limited by their bloodline.


    The Berserk Bear had been given this chance, so naturally it wanted to grab it which was why it had immediately tried to suck up to Lin Fan.


    It even wished that Lin Fan would punch it a few more times¡­

 Chapter 585 Monster Trainer Exam (5)

    After Lin Fan came off the tform, he looked at the old man who was in charge of the exam and asked, "Did I pass?"


    The old man heard this and snapped out of his daze.


    Looking at the Berserk Bear that was following behind Lin Fan like a dog, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as he thought, "If you don''t pass, then who else can pass?"


    After shaking his head with that bitter smile, he raised his voice to say, "Number 54 passes!"


    This time, it was Lin Fan''s turn to reveal a bitter smile.


    This number, it was one that he really didn''t like because of his superstitions from earth.


    After all, in the country that he had lived in, this number meant "I die"...It wasn''t an auspicious number, but he had no other choice since it was the one that had been assigned to him. There was no way for him to change it and since this was just a temporary assigned number, he would suck it up and ept it.


    Since he had passed, there was no reason for him to stay here any longer, so Lin Fan headed off in the same direction that the other examinees who passed had gone.


    As he went towards the exit, the Berserk Bear didn''t stop following him.


    Of course, the Berserk Bear wouldn''t be allowed to leave with Lin Fan since it still belonged to the Tamers Guild. They didn''t have any hope of it being tamed here at the exam and had scheduled a higher grade Monster Trainer toe take care of itter, but since it had already been tamed by Lin Fan, there was no reason why they couldn''t take it now.


    After all, they already had a buyer lined up for it, so this would be a nice amount of change for the Tamers Guild.


    However, the moment that they tried to take the Berserk Bear away from Lin Fan, the Berserk Bearpletely lost it. It was as if the Tamers Guild staff were the enemies that had killed its parents and it was getting revenge on them.


    It seemed like no matter what, it wouldn''t let itself be taken away from Lin Fan.


    The staff members couldn''t help revealing a helpless look since they couldn''t understand how this Berserk Bear was so attached to Lin Fan. All he had done was punched it before applying the temporary contract on it, so why was the Berserk Bear so loyal to him?


    This didn''t make any sense at all!


    After all, all of these staff members were Monster Trainers as well and the disy that Lin Fan had just demonstrated hadpletely gone against theirmon understanding as Monster Trainers.


    Lin Fan turned to look at the Berserk Bear who was looking at him with a pleading look before his face turned cold and he said, "Sit, stay."


    Then he didn''t bother saying anything else as he turned to walk off.


    The Berserk Bear suddenly fell down on its butt and just sat there as the staff members put the chains on it out of fear that it would rampage again. It didn''t make a single peep as it was led away by the staff members, but it had been staring at Lin Fan the entire time.


    Lin Fan exited the hall and was led by the staff member waiting there to the waiting room for the examinees who had passed.


    When he entered the room, all the examinees looked at Lin Fan in shock.


    In the center of this room, there was a screen that had a live broadcast of the situation inside the hall, so they had been able to see everything that Lin Fan had done. Naturally for such a shocking matter, the person who had been in charge of the broadcast had kept the camera on Lin Fan the entire time.


    None of them could even believe what they had just witnessed, especially Fei Jun who had a very ugly expression on his face.


    When Fei Jun saw Lin Fan, that expression on his face became even uglier, but he didn''t say a thing since there was nothing that he could say in this situation.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother with any of the other examinees and just walked into the room, picking a spot that he liked to head over to.


    As he walked through the room, he moved past Fei Jun who was just staring at him with a look of disbelief on his face. As he walked past him, he looked at him before giving a soft chuckle and walking off.


    This softugh reverberated through Fei Jun''s heart and attacked his mind, like a termite chewing on wood. His face quickly turned red and he red at Lin Fan, but he didn''t make a scene like he had done earlier.<sub> </sub>


    His pride wouldn''t let him. Even if Lin Fan had beaten his time, he still wanted to maintain his appearance as a genius Monster Trainer, so he couldn''t just point and shout at Lin Fan to intimidate him like he normally would have done.


    After a slight pause, Fei Jun turned to the staff member who was in the room and said in a calm voice, "I want to lodge aint."


    The staff member was surprised by this sudden remark from Fei Jun, but then he still respectfully said, "Young master Fei, what is yourint?"


    After all, he had seen Fei Jun''s talent and even if it couldn''tpare to Lin Fan''s, he was sure that Fei Jun would be a high ranking member of the Tamers Guild in the future. This was definitely not someone that he could not offend.


    This staff member was different from the ones that were out in the hall, this staff member was a young man who was actually just a disciple of one of the Monster Trainers and not a fully fledged Monster Trainer himself. If he was a fully fledged Monster Trainer, he wouldn''t have been sent to the waiting room to wait on the examinees who had passed.


    Fei Jun calmly said, "I suspect that examinee number 54 is cheating and I would like to ask the Tamers Guild to investigate this."


    Fei Jun might have been an impulsive and arrogant fellow, but he still had a brain and he could use that brain when it was necessary.


    Since he couldn''t directly attack Lin Fan or crush him with his performance, then his only option was to smear dirt on Lin Fan by using him of cheating. After all, there was no other exnation for how easily he had passed the exam just now.


    Just a single punch to tame a Berserk Bear, if someone was to say that wasn''t sketchy, he really wouldn''t believe it even if he was beaten to death.


    The staff member looked over at where Lin Fan was sitting with an awkward look on his face. He didn''t want to offend Fei Jun, but he also didn''t want to offend Lin Fan since Lin Fan''s talent for monster training was even more monstrous than Fei Jun''s¡­


    Still, in the end, with everyone watching, he had no choice but to report this to the upper management since he could also see the looks of doubt in everyone else''s eyes. In the end, this matter was just too fishy for them to ignore.


    The staff member gave a nod to Fei Jun as he said, "Please wait a moment, I will report this to upper management."


    Fei Jun revealed a faint smile when he heard this.


    He was confident that as long as there was some kind of investigation, Lin Fan would be immediately exposed for the fraud that he was.


    Once that happened, he would be able to lord over him again with his status as the examinee with the best time since Lin Fan would be disqualified. All he had to do now was bide his time.


    After a few minutes, that staff member came back into the room with another person, but this person was clearly much more important than the staff member from before. This person had a badge on his chest and it was the badge of a Monster Trainer that they were all trying to earn from this exam.


    However, it wasn''t just a badge, but rather this badge had three stars on it, which meant that this person was a Master Monster Trainer.


    Even the two vice presidents and the president were only Grandmaster Monster Trainers, so a Master Monster Trainer would be right below them in terms of status.


    Everyone was surprised to see that even a Master Monster Trainer had been alerted, but they couldn''t help feeling schadenfreude at the same time. It seemed like Lin Fan really had cheated and this Master Monster Trainer must be here to punish him!


    The Master Monster Trainer looked around the room until his eyes fell onto Lin Fan at which point he revealed a smile.


    He ignored everyone else in this room and came right up to Lin Fan before cupping his hands to say, "Young master Lin, if you have time, would youe with me to meet someone after the exam?"


    Everyone was shocked the moment they heard this and looks of disbelief appeared on their faces.


    What was going on?


    Shouldn''t this Master Monster Trainer be here to punish Lin Fan?


    Why was he talking to him in such a courteous manner?


    Fei Jun naturally couldn''t hold back as he said, "Sir, shouldn''t you be here to chase this person out for cheating?"

 Chapter 586 Monster Trainer Exam (6)

    The Master Monster Trainer narrowed his eyes to look at Fei Jun before saying in a voice that had a chill to it, "Who are you to ask me this?"


    Fei Jun was taken aback the moment he heard this since he had never been talked to like this before.


    However, this wasn''t the time for him to be making enemies in the Tamers Guild just yet, especially a Master Monster Trainer. Master Monster Trainers were ones that were only below the two vice presidents and the president, so they were still considered very high ranking members.


    Fei Jun took a deep breath before saying, "My name is Fei Jun, I was the one who raised theint."


    The Master Monster Trainer''s expression softened a bit when he heard this. He had checked the list of results earlier and he had seen that this Fei Jun was also a talented person as well, breaking the previous record.


    However, he could only me this monster Lin Fan for taking the exam at the same time as him.


    In this world, whoever was first was king and nothing else really mattered.


    Still, he wouldn''t openly be rude to Fei Jun since their Tamers Guild still needed to recruit more members and he was still talented, even if he was less talented than Lin Fan.


    The Master Monster Trainer revealed a faint smile and said, "So it''s little friend Fei."


    Then he turned to Lin Fan and said with the same smile, "In response to yourint, the Tamers Guild has already checked the footage and the beast tamed and we have found that there was nothing wrong with either of them. We can say for certain that young master Lin here didn''t cheat at all."


    Then when Fei Jun was about to say something, the Master Monster Trainer turned to look at him with narrowed eyes before saying, "This matter has already been confirmed by the president and the two vice presidents."


    Everyone took a cold breath the moment they heard this from the Master Monster Trainer.


    Even Fei Jun had no choice but to swallow the words that he had been about to say.


    This was a matter that had even drawn in the attention of the president and the two vice presidents.


    Fei Jun already knew that the two vice presidents would be paying attention to this matter since they were the ones that had brought him and Lin Fan to the exam in the first ce. However, the fact that this matter had even drawn the attention of the president went beyond his expectations.


    All three of them were considered to be the authorities on Monster Training in this Gctic Humanity Alliance and if they said that there was nothing funny involved, there was no one that could say anything or they would be challenging the authority of these three.


    But it was clear by Fei Jun''s aggrieved look that he couldn''t ept this decision.


    Still, there was nothing that he could do about it.


    After giving this piece of information, the Master Monster Trainer no longer cared about Fei Jun as he turned back to Lin Fan. He revealed a smile and said, "Young master Lin, if it''s possible, can we have a meeting after the exam? I have a friend that is interested in meeting you."


    Lin Fan looked at this Master Monster Trainer with an interested look for a bit before shaking his head and saying, "Unfortunately I have no time since I have to meet vice president Huang after this. Perhaps another time?"


    The Master Monster Trainer revealed a slightly surprised look when he heard this, but he quickly revealed a smile again as he said, "Of course, of course. When you have free time, we can set something up."


    Then after a few courteous words, the Master Monster Trainer left the waiting room.


    When he left, Lin Fan revealed a faint smile that had a trace of disdain in it.


    It was clear that this person wanted to draw him under him as soon as possible so he could get ahead of the others, but he never expected that vice president Huang was already behind this new talent. Since it was vice president Huang, this person had no choice but to give up.


    After all, they were only a Master Monster Trainer and vice president Huang was the vice president, as well as a Grandmaster Monster Trainer.


    But if it wasn''t for Lin Fan, this Master Monster Trainer wouldn''t havee personally. The only reason he hade was to try and recruit Lin Fan to his faction.


    Once the Master Monster Trainer was gone, the room fell into silence once again.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with strange looks in their eyes, with the strangest look belonging to Fei Jun. However, since even the upper management of the Tamers Guild had already confirmed that Lin Fan hadn''t cheated, there was nothing else they could do.


    But one thing that people could tell was that there was a clear grudge between the second ce Fei Jun and the first ce Lin Fan, so they started thinking about which side to take.<sub> </sub>


    Naturally people wanted to get closer to Lin Fan since his performance had been too monstrous, but Lin Fan just sat there without talking to anyone. Even when people came up to him, he just looked at them without saying a single thing in response.


    Since that was the case, there were a few people who had started heading towards Fei Jun''s side, but he also ignored them since he had already seen them approach Lin Fan. He couldn''t stand being treated as sloppy seconds, so naturally he didn''t ept those people at all.


    The sharp eyed people noticed this and they approached Fei Jun without even caring about Lin Fan. Those were the only people that Fei Jun epted.


    The ones that were denied had no choice but to continue trying with Lin Fan, but he ignored them still.


    Fei Jun had no choice but to ept his defeat in this round, but he didn''t give up since he knew that taming alone wasn''t enough to determine who was a better Monster Trainer. The second round would definitely involve actual training and that was what he really excelled in!


    ¡­


    Back in the VIP room, the president and the two vice presidents had been silent for a long time.


    It was only when the president suddenly burst out inughter that the silence was broken.


    Huang Gan revealed a smile and startedughing along with the president, but Bai Chen had an ugly look on his face.


    Once they were doneughing, Huang Gan turned to Bai Chen and cupped his hands as he said, "I have to thank brother Bai for letting me win."


    Even though his words were courteous, the meaning behind them were clear with the tone that he said this in.


    Chen Bai grinded his teeth in anger, but he didn''t let it show on his face. Instead, he just gave a snort and said, "It was just a lucky break." Then he changed his tone and said, "How about we make it more interesting by going double or nothing?"


    Huang Gan was surprised to hear this, but he was interested since he now believed in Lin Fan. After all, how could he not believe in Lin Fan after that monstrous disy that he just put on?


    So after a slight pause, Huang Gan asked, "What are you proposing?"


    Chen Bai said, "We''ll make a bet on the second round. If the kid you brought does better than the kid I brought, I''ll give you that scroll that I''ve been hoarding the entire time. However, if my kid does better, then you''ll have to give me that jewel you''ve been hoarding along with that red egg."


    Huang Gan knitted his brows when he heard this and he asked, "Why should I offer up the jewel as well? I''ve already gotten that ice lotus of yours, why should I offer another item up?"


    Chen Bai gritted his teeth when he heard this, but he didn''t have a way to refute it since the fact that he had lost was already a fact.


    Still, he wasn''t willing to give up on this easily, so after a pause, he gave a nod and said, "Alright, then it''ll just be the ice lotus and that red egg of yours."


    Huang Gan thought about it for a bit before giving a nod and saying, "Alright, it''s a bet."


    Chen Bai revealed an ugly expression, but deep down he was rejoicing since he knew that this was his chance. He knew that Fei Jun was better at training than he was at taming, which gave him confidence.


    During this time, the president had stood up and walked over to where Qiao Yi Fei was sitting and sat down beside her.


    Qiao Yi Fei was surprised to see the president sitting beside her, but she asked, "Uncle Ye, what can I do for you?"


    The president who she had called Uncle Ye revealed a smile and said, "Tell me about that kid."


    Qiao Yi Fei revealed a bitter smile as she heard this.


    As expected, it seemed like talent like Lin Fan''s couldn''t be hidden. Especially when he gave such arge disy.


    But still, there was no need to keep anything from the president since he was interested. She still had her own ns¡­


    So Qiao Yi Fei told the president everything that she knew about Lin Fan.


    During this time, the president just nodded along in an interested manner, not saying a thing as he listened.

 Chapter 587 Monster Trainer Exam (7)

    Another three fourths of an hour passed and the second half of the first exam was over.


    There were less people that passed in this second exam because a lot of them had been distracted by Lin Fan.


    It wasn''t that they were directly distracted by Lin Fan''s performance since it had onlysted less than two minutes, but their mentality had been struck a blow that had been hard toe back from.


    After all, the talent that Lin Fan had shown was just too much for them to ept.


    So there were many of them that had their egos crushed and weren''t able to perform as well as usual, which had caused them to fail.


    It was their own faults for not having a strong enough mentality, so they really couldn''t me anyone. Though there certainly were a few that med Lin Fan for what happened.


    In total, there were only five other people that had passed the second half along with Lin Fan.


    When the five of them came into the room, the first thing they did was look at Lin Fan with a terrified look before sitting down on their own to calm their minds.


    There was one who had tried to talk to Lin Fan, but he had received the same treatment as everyone else who had tried to talk to Lin Fan before him. In the end, he had no choice but to give up as well and sit down to calm his mind.


    It took another ten minutes before a staff member arrived to take them back into the hall for the second exam. As they went along, there was someone that asked the staff member what the second exam was on, but the staff memberpletely ignored him.


    Seeing this, no one else said a thing and just followed the staff member back into the same hall as before, but this time, the stations that had been there previously had already been removed. Instead they had been reced by eight stations that were muchrger than the previous stations.


    With their current numbers, it didn''t divide evenly into eight, but it still meant that they would be separated into two different rounds to take the exam in. But they still didn''t know what the exam would be about.


    That was until the old man who had been in charge of the first exam said, "For the second exam, you will be in charge of training a pet that has already been tamed assigned to you. As long as you reach the standard of an Expert Monster Trainer, it will be considered a pass."


    The standard for an Expert Monster Trainer, that wasn''t considered hard since it was only teaching a pet a new skill. It didn''t even need to be a high grade skill, it could just be a low grade skill and that would still count.


    However, that required years of working with pets before being able to do so and it wasn''t something that could be learned that easily.


    The ones that had passed the first exam revealed nervous looks because they had been under the assumption that they would only need to reach the level of a Junior Monster Trainer, but now they were asked to reach the level of an Expert Monster Trainer. This really was too quick of a change for some of them.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that everyone was worried. There were some people that were confident, for example, Lin Fan and Fei Jun.


    Both of them were certain that they would be able to reach the level of an Expert Monster, but for one of them, their goal was something else.


    Fei Jun red at Lin Fan while the rules of the exam were being exined. It was clear by the aggrieved and challenging look in his eyes that he wanted to take his revenge.


    He could already imagine the scene now.


    After the old man finished exining the rules of the exam, they drew tickets once again to determine the order that they would be going in.


    Just like with the first exam, Fei Jun was ced in the first round and Lin Fan was ced in the second round. As well, the tickets that they pulled out had the same scribbles on the bottom as the first round.


    This time they knew what the scribbles on the tickets meant, but it was still hard to figure out what kind of beast they would receive since they couldn''t make out what the scribbles were supposed to represent.


    Take the first round for example, Lin Fan''s best guess for the scribble on the ticket that he received was a cat, but it turned out to be the Berserk Bear.<sub> </sub>


    As for this time, the scribbles on his ticket seemed like they represented some kind of bird, but he wasn''t certain at all if that was the case.


    Still, it wasn''t his turn to go first, so Lin Fan was led to the side with the other six who would be going second where there was a viewing booth that had been prepared for them. This was also something that was different from the first round since in the first round, they were just left to stand wherever they wanted.


    This was just the difference in treatment between those that had passed the first round and those that had failed.


    p As Fei Jun moved up to his station, he had been ring at Lin Fan the entire time with a burning look in his eyes. Even when they brought out the cages that contained the beasts that they would be training, he was still ring at Lin Fan.</anda>


    Only when they gave them the imprints for the temporary contracts ced on the beasts contained in the cages did he finally look away.


    Since this was a test of their training abilities and not their taming abilities, the beasts that they were supplied with were ones that had already been tamed by the Tamers Guild. All they had to do was press the imprints on the back of their hands to apply the temporary contracts which would allow them to train the pets.


    Once everyone had finished applying their temporary contracts, the doors to the cages were lifted and the pets that they were assigned were revealed.


    Not a single person looked like they expected the pets that they had been assigned since not a single person had been able to make out what the scribbles on their ticket meant. Still, no one wasted any time in starting the training since there wasn''t much time assigned to them.


    Most Monster Trainers would take days just to train a single pet, but now they had to finish this training in just an hour which could be considered quite a rush.


    Fei Jun was even faster than most as his desire to beat Lin Fan burst forth.


    He immediately came up to the pet that he had been assigned, which was a two headed wolf. He gathered his life energy in his palm and ced it onto one of the heads of the two headed wolf.


    With a sh of light, there was a sudden change with the life energy of the two headed wolf as the life energy around Fei Jun''s hand had disappeared.


    He pulled his hand back and started moving it around in a pattern. As he moved his hands around, the life energy of the two headed wolf followed the movements of his hand as it moved around the two headed wolf.


    Since they had the temporary contract, Fei Jun was able to control the wolf to follow along as he moved its life energy.


    This was one of the mostmon methods of pet training, but also one of the most difficult because it requiredbining the Monster Trainer''s life energy with the pet''s life energy.


    Life energy for any individual was unique and tobine them together was simr to splicing genes together. It was very difficult, but it was also something that could be done.


    However, if it was done poorly, it would result in a life energy bacsh for both the Monster Trainer and the pet which would affect their cultivations. If it was serious, it might even take their lives.


    That was why most Monster Trainers wouldn''t rely on this method of training since it was too difficult, but there was no doubt that this was a very effective method of training because it was a very direct method.


    The method itself was very simple, which was to memorize the life energy movement patterns of certain skills and then using the Monster Trainer''s life energy to control the pet''s life energy to move in such a pattern. Then at the same time, the Monster Trainer would use the temporary contract to guide the pet into learning how to move along with the life energy pattern so they could use the skill.


    This was more effective than themunication teaching method or the physical training method, but the high difficulty and the high risk of this method was what kept most Monster Trainers from learning it, not to mention using.


    However, Fei Jun showed no hesitation as he immediately linked his life energy with the life energy of the two headed wolf.


    The rest of the examinees were all using either themunication teaching method or the physical training method.


    As time passed, the two headed wolf''s movements became more and more smooth until it was finally able to spit out mes from both of its mouths.

 Chapter 588 Monster Trainer Exam (8)

    The mesnded right in front of the two headed wolf and left arge burn mark on the floor of the station.


    Then after the first breath of mes, Fei Jun pulled back his life energy and released the link between the two of them. Once that link was broken, Fei Junmanded the two headed wolf to release this me breath skill alone.


    The two headed wolf was able to do it without any problems and Fei Jun revealed a smile before turning to look at Lin Fan with challenging eyes, ignoring everyone else that was in the hall. However, even if he ignored everyone else, that didn''t mean that everyone else would ignore him.


    There was a cold gasp from the crowd when they saw the two headed wolf release the me breath the second time.


    Then after a long silence, there were whispers that starteding from the crowd.


    "me Breath, it''s actually the mid grade me Breath!"


    "How could that be? He actually taught it the mid grade me Breath this easily?"


    "What a monster! It''s not just his taming, but also his training as well!"


    "But¡­"


    The one who said thest words turned to look at Lin Fan sitting in the waiting area.


    This was a monster who had tamed a Berserk Bear with a single punch, if his training abilities were as strong as his taming skills¡­


    The crowd couldn''t help looking forward to Lin Fan''s performance.


    The reason why they were so shocked with Fei Jun''s performance was not just because he had taught the two headed wolf a mid grade skill, but rather the amount of time he had taken to do it. From beginning to end, it had only taken him a total of five minutes!


    He had been spurred on by Lin Fan''s disy earlier and had drawn out all his power for this exam. He had entered a state of extreme focus the moment he started using his life energy to teach the two headed wolf.


    With this extreme state of focus, he had been able to break through his own personal best and had finished teaching the two headed wolf the mid grade skill in just five minutes.


    When he was finished, he handed back control of the temporary contract to the staff member that came over and headed off the stage to return to the waiting room.


    As he walked off, he didn''t forget to turn in Lin Fan''s direction to stare at him with a challenging gaze. He had done all of this just to break Lin Fan''s spirit, so how could he not enjoy the fruits of hisbour?


    However, the gaze that met him wasn''t what he had expected.


    Lin Fan just stared back at him with a calm and indifferent look on his face, as if he didn''t care at all about Fei Jun''s talent.


    Fei Jun was indeed a talented person and naturally talented people would be praised for their talent. But when talented people were praised for their talent, they would be conceited and too prideful, which was not a good thing.


    Fei Jun had this kind of pride and the way Lin Fan looked at him had hit him right in that pride. There was a me of anger that filled him, but he suppressed that me since he knew that it wasn''t the time to disy it now.


    He was certain that Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to do the same thing he did in the first exam in this second exam, so he was going to enjoy watching Lin Fan fail.


    After Fei Jun disappeared, the other examinees did their best, but the noise that wasing from the crowd didn''t help them concentrate.


    The ones that were let into the crowd to watch this Monster Trainer Exam were all members of the Tamers Guild. The only reason why they came to watch was to find if there were any good seedlings that they could pull into their factions since there were many different factions within the Tamers Guild. Most of these factions followed different Master Monster Trainers, but there were also factions that followed Grandmaster Monster Trainers, which there weren''t that many of.


    After they had heard about the two talents that had appeared in today''s exam, there were many people who had dropped everything just toe watch.


    The number of people in the crowd had more than doubled, more than tripled, quadrupling the amount of people that were currently watching.


    But of course that made the voices from the loud much louder as well.


    It was fine if they weren''t talking about much, but these people in the crowd kept talking about Fei Jun and Lin Fan which really was a big blow to the egos of the ones taking the exam as well.


    As far as they could tell, there wasn''t a single person in the crowd that cared whether they passed or not and of course this weighed heavily on their minds. It would have been fine if they didn''t talk about this, but the fact that they were just being disregarded like trash really hurt their egos.


    There was one examinee who tried to do something fancy with training his pet, but that just led to an ident where that person was carried away for medical attention.<sub> </sub>


    In the end, there wasn''t a single other person who had passed the exam and they were all dejected as they were led out.


    Seeing this, everyone who was in the viewing seat other than Lin Fan all became nervous. After all, it was their turn next, but they already knew that they would be treated as cannon fodder.


    They couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a bitter smile that he ignored.


    The pets and cages were quickly taken away and then Lin Fan''s group was led to their stations.


    There wasn''t much for the old man in charge of the exam to say since he could tell that everyone was excited to see what kind of miracle Lin Fan would create next. It would have been a lie to say that he wasn''t excited either, so he didn''t waste any time giving an introduction.


    It didn''t take them long to prepare the cages and they were promptly opened to reveal the pets that had been prepared.


    The other cages all revealed normal pets, but Lin Fan''s cage once again revealed something strange.


    However, this time, it wasn''t like Lin Fan received a giant, aggressive pet, rather he had received theplete opposite of this.


    When the cage opened, there was nothing that came out at first and after waiting for a few seconds, there still wasn''t anything that came out.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling curious, so he walked up to the cage and was shocked by what he saw.


    Instead of a normal lookingrge beast, all that was inside was a little bird that was lying on the floor of the cage taking a nap.


    When the little bird heard the sound of Lin Fan''s footsteps, it suddenly woke up and looked around in a daze. As it looked around, it revealed a scared look since it didn''t recognize its surroundings at all.


    It became even worse when it suddenly turned its small head to look at Lin Fan.


    Seeing this scary figure standing over it, there were tears that suddenly came out of the little bird''s eyes. If it was a human, it was the equivalent of the look that seemed like it wanted to pee its pants¡­


    Lin Fan''s mouth twitched when he saw this.


    He couldn''t understand why he couldn''t get a single normal beast to train or tame.


    It was the Berserk Bear in the first exam and now it was this tiny bird in the second exam.


    Based on the build of the tiny bird, it seemed to be a sparrow, but there was nothing special about it.


    Lin Fan reached his hand out to the sparrow and the sparrow flinched backwards for a second before suddenly turning its head to look at Lin Fan. It looked at Lin Fan with those cute small eyes for a bit before suddenly getting up and jumping into Lin Fan''s hand after sensing the bond that came from Lin Fan.


    The little sparrow had been too scared at first to think properly, but after it adjusted to its environment, it was able to sense the power of the temporary contract from Lin Fan.


    As the sparrow stood on Lin Fan''s hand, he brought it out of the cage and out into the open for everyone to see.


    However, when they did see it, they were all disappointed by it.


    "Ze, it''s the Zephyr Sparrow. I guess his luck really is bad if he draws this dud after the Berserk Bear he drew in the first exam."


    "Guess we won''t be able to see anything special. It''s really too bad, I had my hopes up for nothing."


    "He won''t be able to pass this round at all, that thing can''t be trained."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard the voices around him. He started going through his memories to see if he could find any information on this Zephyr Sparrow and it didn''t take long before he did. However, when he remembered the description of the Zephyr Sparrow he had read in his books, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    It seemed like he really had drawn a dud for this exam.


    It was no wonder no one believed that he would be able to pass.

 Chapter 589 Monster Trainer Exam (9)

    The Zephyr Sparrow, its name might have sounded imposing, but it was actually one of the weakest beasts out there.


    The only advantage that it actually had was its speed, which was the real origin of its name. It was able to fly as fast as the wind, greatly outpacing all other beasts that could fly.


    However, the fact that it was one of the weakest beasts out there.


    The simple reason for why it was considered the weakest was that it wasn''t able to learn any attack skills at all. The only thing that it had was its speed¡­


    Since it wasn''t able to learn a skill, the only way that one could pass with this Zephyr Sparrow was to increase its level of cultivation. However, that was something that was beyond the level of just an Expert Monster Trainer, that was already at the level of a Master Monster Trainer.


    But unfortunately, this Zephyr Sparrow was only barely in the Embryo Soul Realm, which meant that it was far from being able to make a breakthrough to the Mid Embryo Soul Realm.


    It would take a Master Monster Trainer several days or weeks of training before they could induce a breakthrough in a pet, so there was no need to mention how difficult it was to do it in just a single hour. This was not something that any normal Master Monster Trainer could do, not to mention a young Monster Trainer who was just taking the Monster Trainer Exam for the first time.


    If he could do it, it would mean that he was already at a level that far surpassed the level of people taking this Monster Trainer Exam. He would be at the same level as a Master Monster Trainer that had already been in the Tamers Guild for many years now.


    That was why everyone felt that it was a pity that Lin Fan had drawn this dud.


    They had seen his talent, but now it seemed like he would fail all because of his luck, or rather hisck of luck.


    In the waiting room, Fei Jun had a wide smile on his face as he watched Lin Fan through the monitor. If it wasn''t for the staff member that was with him in this room, he would have already burst out in wildughter filled with schadenfreude.


    This was exactly what he wanted for Lin Fan, but the only tiny bit of regret that he felt was that he wasn''t the one who had personally put the nail in his coffin.


    Still he considered himself a magnanimous person and put it all behind him, he was just happy that this matter was finally over.


    There was no one who believed that Lin Fan would be able to pass this exam, but it was too bad that they were all wrong about him.


    Well, it wasn''t that there was no one that believed in him.


    In the VIP seats, Qiao Yi Fei revealed a faint smile when she saw everything that happened as she thought, "These people are in for a treat."


    Then she gave a bitterugh as she remembered all the times that Lin Fan had shocked her.


    Back down in the hall, Lin Fan looked down at the little sparrow that was standing on his palm. This little sparrow seemed to have felt his gaze on it and tilted its head to look up at Lin Fan, looking at him with its cute little eyes.


    But after looking at Lin Fan for a bit, its instincts kicked in. The little sparrow felt that something was off as a chill filled its heart, but since there was the temporary contract between them, it didn''t run away from Lin Fan right away.


    Even though it should have done that.


    Lin Fan looked at this little sparrow who was acting cute in his palm for a few seconds before raising his fist without any hesitation.


    The little sparrow didn''t understand what was happening until the fist was erged in front of its face. It wanted to dodge, but it wasn''t able since it was already toote and Lin Fan punched the little sparrow right into the ground.


    Everyone in the crowd couldn''t help taking a cold breath when they saw this.


    They had all seen how cute the little sparrow was and almost none of them would have been able to do what Lin Fan did in a normal situation. Perhaps they would have done it if there was a special situation where they would be forced to do it, but they wouldn''t have done it without a good reason.


    There were many that even secretly called Lin Fan a brute under their breath.


    There were also people who thought that Lin Fan was frustrated since there was nothing he could do and he was taking his frustration out on the little sparrow.<sub> </sub>


    There were a few staff members that couldn''t watch this and were about toe forward to do something, but then they swallowed the words that they were about to say.


    After the little sparrow had been punched, it fell onto the ground in a daze and looked around as if it couldn''t understand what had just happened. But then after a few seconds, it suddenly looked like it understood something as it turned to look at Lin Fan''s fist.


    Without any hesitation, the little sparrow jumped off the ground and flew up to Lin Fan''s fist that was still hanging there. It rubbed up against Lin Fan''s fist as if it had never been punched and then it pointed at itself, as if it was asking to be punched again.


    Lin Fan had no reason to decline this request since that was what he wanted to do in the first ce.


    Drawing his hand back, he raised both his hands as he unleashed a barrage of punches onto the tiny body of the sparrow.


    It took every single punch that Lin Fan threw out at it and it revealed a look of ecstasy as it was being punched. It even flew out at Lin Fan''s fists just so that his punches would hit it faster.


    The crowd that was watching this didn''t know what to say in response to this, they didn''t even know how to feel about this.


    Naturally as Monster Trainers, they were people that had a certain amount of empathy and care towards pets. Seeing the Zephyr Sparrow being ruthlessly beaten down like this, they couldn''t help feeling strange emotions for it¡­


    They continued to watch this happen until one of the staff members finally couldn''t take it anymore.


    The staff member came over to Lin Fan''s station and raised his voice to say, "Hey, stop that. I know you''re frustrated, but there''s no need to do this to the poor little beast. How about we just stop and talk this over?"


    Lin Fan turned to look at this staff member with a confused look as if he couldn''t understand what he was saying.


    During this time, he had also stopped punching the little sparrow which caused the little sparrow to look up, turning that look of ecstasy into a look of disappointment. Then when it realized what had happened, the little sparrow turned to look at the staff member who spoke up with a look of aggrievement.


    The staff member didn''t know how to feel about this because of the way the little sparrow was looking at him as if it regarded him as an enemy even though he was the one speaking up for it. It wasn''t just a normal enemy, it was like they had a lifelong grudge that started with him killing its parents.


    The staff member didn''t understand why this little sparrow would show such an intense response to him speaking up for it¡­


    Lin Fan just looked at him for a bit before saying, "It''s alright, I''m almost done."


    The staff member didn''t know how to respond to this. However, he could tell that the little sparrow itself hadn''t suffered any injuries and with the way it looked like it was about to attack him, he really couldn''t say anything else.


    So in the end, he could only give a nod and said, "Alright."


    The other reason why the staff member backed off was because he remembered that Lin Fan was the one who had tamed a Berserk Bear with a single punch. With that fact, at least his punching could be justified since it might be a special technique that was used to tame and train pets.


    Of course, not just him, but everyone here had never heard of a technique where they punched pets to tame or train them¡­


    Then as he turned around to move back to his previous position, as if to prove him wrong, there were life energy fluctuations that hade from behind him.


    When he had been turning, Lin Fan had sent out onest punch, the veryst punch that was needed to finish off his training.


    When thatst punchnded on the Zephyr Sparrow, it could feel the shackles breaking through and it was finally able to break through to the next realm.


    But at the same time, it wasn''t just a breakthrough for the Zephyr Sparrow since the shackles that it had been feeling weren''t just the shackles of its cultivation, but rather it was the shackles of its bloodline.


    With each of Lin Fan''s punches, it felt that shackles of its bloodline loosening and with thest punch, the shackles broke free and it broke free of the restrictions of its bloodline.

 Chapter 590 Monster Trainer Exam (10)

    As the crowd felt the waves of life energy that was released from the breakthrough of the Zephyr Sparrow, they werepletely shocked.


    Just these fluctuations that came from it already meant that Lin Fan had passed the Monster Trainer Exam, but the fact that these fluctuations came from the Zephyr Sparrow meant that there was another implication. It was that Lin Fan was a Monster Trainer who was able to induce a breakthrough in the pets that he trained, which meant that he was at the level of a Master Monster Trainer!


    The youngest Master Monster Trainer ever had only reached that level when he was nearing a hundred and he was one of the most legendary Monster Trainers of the Tamers Guild. He was even someone who had caught the eyes of a Ster Kingdom and brought up to that higher realm.


    But how old was Lin Fan?


    They had tested his bone age when he signed up for the exam, so everyone knew that Lin Fan was only neen years old!


    This was a Master Monster Trainer that wasn''t even twenty years old yet!


    He hadpletely shattered the previous record!


    However, that wasn''t everything that had happened. There was still one important factor to consider, which was time.


    Just like the first time with taming the Berserk Bear, it had taken him less than two minutes to induce this breakthrough in the Zephyr Sparrow, even though the Zephyr Sparrow was nowhere near close enough to break through.


    This speed was already at the level of a peak Master Monster Trainer, even approaching the realm of a Grandmaster Monster Trainer.


    A Grandmaster Monster Trainer that was less than twenty years old?


    What kind of a concept was that?


    It had to be known that both the vice presidents and the president that were Grandmaster Monster Trainers were all people who had lived for thousands of years. If it wasn''t for their long lifespan and their long term dedication to polishing their skills, they would have never been able to be Grandmaster Monster Trainer.


    Yet this kid that appeared out of nowhere was already close to reaching the level of a Grandmaster Monster Trainer?


    While they all felt shock, not everyone in the crowd felt the same level of shock.


    There were also a few strange fluctuations that came from the Zephyr Sparrow as it broke through that most of the Monster Trainers in the crowd didn''t recognize. However, there were some more knowledgeable Monster Trainers that hade along because they had heard the rumours of the monstrous talents.


    However, the moment they felt these strange fluctuations, they couldn''t help standing up with stunned expressions.


    All the ones that did stand up were veteran Master Monster Trainers that had been in the Tamers Guild for a long time, so they had certain high positions in the Tamers Guild. The ones that hade with them were mainly their subordinates or their disciples.


    One of the disciples couldn''t help asking the Master Monster Trainer beside him, "Master, is something wrong?"


    That Master Monster Trainer suddenly had tears appear in his eyes as he muttered to himself, "This¡­It really is¡­"


    The disciples that hade with him couldn''t help feeling very worried when they saw him and the lead disciple came forward out of fear that something had happened to him. However, the moment that the lead disciple hade close to the Master Monster Trainer, he was immediately pushed aside as that Master Monster Trainer started moving towards the exam area.


    This same scene was happening all around the stands and these Master Monster Trainers pushed their way to the edge of the stands. However, there was a barrier that was set up to prevent the crowd from being implicated in any incidents that was blocking them from jumping down into the exam area itself.


    But even with this barrier blocking them, the Master Monster Trainers pressed right up against it as if they wanted to get as close as possible to the scene of the Zephyr Sparrow breaking through.


    The breakthrough of the Zephyr Sparrow didn''t take long. The continuous waves of life energy that were drawn in suddenly stopped after a minute and then there was a burst of life energy that suddenly came from the Zephyr Sparrow to show that it had broken through.


    However, the show wasn''t done just yet because the figure of the Zephyr Sparrow started to change once it broke through.


    The figure of the Zephyr Sparrow started to swell until it increased to twice its original size. At the same time, the aura that came from it waspletely different from the aura that hade from it when it was still a little sparrow.


    Once it had finished its transformation, it flew over to Lin Fan and started rubbing its cheek against his leg like a cat. Then it jumped back a bit and pointed at Lin Fan''s fist before pointing back at itself as if it was still asking to be hit.


    However, this time Lin Fan didn''t oblige.


    Instead, Lin Fan said, "Show me your new skills."


    The no longer little sparrow immediately gave a salute as soon as it heard thismand from Lin Fan. Then it flew up into the air in front of Lin Fan, just floating there for a second before it started pping its wings faster and faster.


    As the sparrow floated there in the air pping its wings, there were visible traces of wind that gathered around it until they formedplete des of wind. Then with a quick p of its wings, the des of wind suddenly flew out in front of the sparrow,nding on the ground of the stage.


    "Gale des!"<sub> </sub>


    "It''s actually the Gale des, that''s a mid grade skill! That means that he passes!"


    "Psh, please, he already passed when he induced the breakthrough for the Zephyr Sparrow! Is there even still any doubt that he would pass if he''s already at the level of a Master Monster Trainer?"


    "Wait, don''t you realize that something is off?" Someone in the crowd suddenly said, causing everyone to look at that person.


    When the person saw that everyone was looking at him, he was a bit surprised, but then he said, "It''s a Zephyr Sparrow, so how can it use an attack skill?"


    That was right!


    Zephyr Sparrows only had their speed and didn''t have the ability to attack at all, so how was this Zephyr Sparrow able to release the Gale des? Could it be that this was a rare variant? Or was there another reason?


    People started thinking about Lin Fan''s first performance and there was a possibility that suddenly came to their minds.


    Could it be that he had cheated and had reced the Zephyr Sparrow with another pet that was simr?


    But no matter how they thought about it, it didn''t seem possible since they had been watching Lin Fan''s performance the entire time.


    Many people were feeling confused until one of the Master Monster Trainers that had been pressed up against the barrier said, "Who told you that it''s still a Zephyr Sparrow?"


    When the people in the crowd heard this, they couldn''t help being taken aback. After being surprised, many people revealed confused looks since they couldn''t understand what this Master Monster Trainer meant by his words.


    If it wasn''t a Zephyr Sparrow, what else would it be?


    But seeing that this Master Monster Trainer had already spoken, he would definitely give the answer to this question afterwards, so they just waited for him to speak again.


    After a pause from him, that Master Monster Trainer then said, "It''s already mutated and has evolved into a Tempest Sparrow."


    It took a whole five seconds after hearing this that everyone finally reacted to what had just been said. As soon as they did react, there wasn''t a single closed mouth in the stands as every chin dropped to the floor.


    Mutation?


    Was he joking?


    How could a Monster Trainer who wasn''t even twenty years old possibly induce a mutation in a pet?


    That just wasn''t possible!


    However, not a single person refuted this Master Monster Trainer since he was the foremost expert on beast mutation in the Tamers Guild. If even someone as prestigious as this was saying this, they had no reason not to believe it¡­


    But how could that be possible?


    After all, being able to induce a mutation was something that not even the president and the two vice presidents could do and they were Grandmaster Monster Trainers!


    Inducing a mutation, that was something that only a Legendary Monster Trainer could do since it involved purifying the bloodline¡­


    After the sparrow had released the des of wind and they hit the ground, they didn''t disappear right away as they started spinning around on the ground in a circle, gathering more and more wind from their surroundings. As more and more wind gathered, the spinning des of wind became bigger and bigger as they grew upwards.


    Eventually they grew big enough that they had formed a tornado where the des of wind hadnded initially.


    This tornado didn''t grow anyrger, but it also didn''t disappear as it drew in the air from around it to maintain the same size.


    "Gale Prison!"


    "It''s not just the Gale des, it''s actually the Gale Prison! That''s a high grade skill!"


    Even though it was a high grade skill, the shock that they felt couldn''tpare to the shock that they had felt from learning that the Zephyr Sparrow had actually mutated.


    As they looked at Lin Fan who was just calmly standing there, everyone couldn''t help revealing a look of fear and shock, with just a hint of admiration under it.

 Chapter 591 Monster Trainer Exam (11)

    After a few seconds, the Tempest Sparrow stopped pping its wings as hard and the tornado slowly disappeared.


    Then it was about to release another skill when Lin Fan suddenly said, "That''s enough."


    The Tempest Sparrow immediately stopped pping its wings and flew over in front of Lin Fan, looking up at him with a look that almost seemed like it was looking for praise. Well, maybe there was a bit of something else in there as well¡­


    Lin Fan reached his hand out to pat it on the head, but then he did nothing else.


    Lin Fan turned to look at the old man in charge of the exam and said, "Is this considered passing?"


    The old man didn''t say a thing because he was still lost in shock. He was a veteran Master Monster Trainer himself, so he could recognize what Lin Fan had just done. But that was the reason why he couldn''t believe it.


    It was because he knew what it would imply about Lin Fan if this was true¡­


    Lin Fan saw that he wasn''t getting an answer, so he gave a cough and asked again, "Did I pass?"


    It was then that the old man said, "Wait a minute, I need to check something first."


    If his guesses were right, then this far surpassed his authority to judge. The only thing that he could do was call the president and the two vice presidents to advise on this matter.


    However, before he could, there was a call that came through on his wrist watch.


    The old man was surprised to see that he was getting a call, but he was even more surprised when he saw who the call was from.


    Without any hesitation, he immediately pressed the button to ept the call, but before he could even say a thing, a voice came out that said, "Pass him, don''t worry about anything else."


    Then before he could say anything in response to this, the call suddenly cut off.


    The old man didn''t know what had just happened, but there was nothing else he could do since he had already received his orders.


    Still it felt awkward for him since he had just told Lin Fan that he needed to report this up first.


    However, as an old man and one that had been wrapped up in the politics of the Tamers Guild, his face was quite thick. So the old man just gave a cough and said, "You passed. You can go and get ready for the next exam."


    Lin Fan raised a brow, but he could guess what the call the old man had just received was about. He gave a nod in the end and headed back into the waiting room.


    As he did, he also broke the temporary contract with the Tempest Sparrow, but that didn''t stop it from following him.


    When the temporary contract was handed back to the staff member, the Tempest Sparrow went against themand of that staff member as it tried following Lin Fan still. When the staff member tried tomand it again, it started pping its wings as if it was about to attack the staff member.


    Seeing this, the staff member couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a pleading look.


    In the end, Lin Fan had no choice but to turn around and say, "Stay."


    Finally the Tempest Sparrow calmed down, but the look in its eyes made it seemed like it had just been betrayed by the one that was closest to it. Even when it was being brought away by the staff member, it didn''t tear its gaze away from Lin Fan for a single second.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t pay it any attention as he had already turned to leave.


    When he was brought back to the waiting room, what awaited him wasn''t the peace that he wanted. The first thing that he saw the moment he came into the room was Fei Jun''s eyes ring at him as if he had just killed his parents.


    After just a single second pause, Fei Jun immediately came forward and pointed his finger at Lin Fan''s chest as he said, "What did you do? How did you cheat your way into passing this time?"


    Too bad it still wasn''t Lin Fan''s turn to speak yet.


    The staff member that had brought Lin Fan back immediately grabbed that finger and red right at Fei Jun as he said, "That''s enough of that. If you say anything else, it will be considered an insult to our Tamers Guild."


    Fei Jun was taken aback by the sudden harsh words of the staff member.


    When he had talked to these staff members earlier, they had only talked to him in polite voices, doing their best to leave a good impression on him. However, this staff member didn''t seem to care at all which really hurt his ego.<sub> </sub>


    But he could also tell that this person was stronger than him.


    ? When he looked closely at the staff member, he realized that this was a person that he hadn''t seen before. It wasn''t the same person that had been in this room with him earlier, rather this was someone that had unknowingly appeared out of nowhere.


    Of course, that wasn''t surprising since his eyes had been glued onto the screen the entire time and even after Lin Fan had left the exam hall, he had been lost in deep thought, pondering what he had just seen.


    He had been in no state to notice that the staff member that had been there slipped out after receiving a notification on his wrist watch.


    This new staff member that came was unfamiliar to him, but the one thing that made him wary was that he couldn''t see through this person''s cultivation.


    Fei Jun himself was in the mid Embryo Soul Realm, so his cultivation wasn''t considered that weak, but he could feel a dangerous auraing from this staff member.


    After letting his mouth hang open for a bit, he closed it and swallowed his words, sitting back down. However, as he went, he didn''t forget to re at Lin Fan.


    The staff member didn''t care about him as he turned to Lin Fan and said, "Young master Lin, if there''s anything you need, please feel free to tell me."


    Lin Fan was different from Fei Jun, his spiritual sense was much stronger and he had experience dealing with people with higher levels of cultivation. He was able to tell with a single nce that this person was in the Child Soul Realm and that he wasn''t weak, but that didn''te as a surprise to him since he already expected this.


    He had put on that disy for one reason and one reason only, it was to catch the attention of the Tamers Guild.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before sitting back down and waiting for the exam to finish.


    Seeing that he wasn''t needed, that staff member didn''t mind and stood guard near Lin Fan,pletely ignoring Fei Jun who was fuming.


    This staff member was a special guard that the Tamers Guild had sent out to protect Lin Fan just in case anything happened. This was a guard that had been specially trained by the Tamers Guild, so even though he didn''t have any Monster Training abilities, he was quite strong when it came tobat.


    Just based on this, it was clear that the Tamers Guild had ced quite the importance on Lin Fan.


    ¡­


    In the VIP seats, the three leaders of the Tamers Guild had serious looks on their faces as they silently watched the screen that was in front of them. They were no longer watching the exam that was being held below, instead they were watching a screen in front of them that had a recording of Lin Fan''s performance from earlier.


    As the leaders of the Tamers Guild and Grandmaster Monster Trainers, naturally they had been able to see what Lin Fan had done, which was why they were this serious.


    The two vice presidents had already forgotten about their bet and were seriously analyzing the footage in front of them with the president.


    As for Qiao Yi Fei, she was asked to leave since this was a private matter for the Tamers Guild.


    After a moment of silence, the president asked, "What do you two think we should do about this?"


    Both of the vice presidents looked at each other with bitter smiles, but not one of them said a thing.


    After all, this matter had just been too shocking for them¡­


    Seeing this, the president shook his head with a bitter smile as well before saying, "Old Huang, you really know how to pick them. You can even find this kind of monster."


    Huang Gan gave a bitterugh before saying, "How could I have known this? If I did, I wouldn''t have brought him to the exam at all."


    The three old men all shook their heads with bitter smiles before the president said, "Then we agree that we''ll report this up and see how they want to deal with it?"


    The two vice presidents nodded in agreement to this.


    Seeing this, the president then said, "For now, we''ll agree to watch over him to make sure that nothing happens to him. I''m quite interested in that strange technique that he uses as well."


    Both of the vice presidents nodded in response to this.


    After all, a technique where one tamed and trained pets just by beating them really was too strange¡­

 Chapter 592 Monster Trainer Exam (12)

    Back in the waiting room, the two examinees left were sitting on opposite sides of the room. One of them was looking at the screen on the wall while the other was ring at the other person.


    Standing beside Lin Fan was that guard that the Tamers Guild had sent who had also been staring at Lin Fan the entire time.


    However, unlike Fei Jun, the gaze of this guard was more curious than furious.


    After a while, the guard suddenly asked, "Young master Lin, can I ask you a question?"


    Lin Fan didn''t turn his head when he heard this and he wasn''t surprised at all, rather he even expected this from the guard. Lin Fan just gave a nod and gave an "un" sound.


    The guard didn''t mind when he saw this as he asked, "How did you manage to tame that Berserk Bear just by punching it in the first round? I''ve never seen anything like that before."


    Lin Fan wasn''t as cold as before since he still needed them, but he didn''t know what to say in response since it was something that he was certain that no one would have been able to reproduce.


    It was the same skill that he had used on the Blue Star, but this time it was also a bit different since he had obtained a few new skills. Namely, he was also using the golden energy he had received from those ruins.


    He had wrapped his hand with the absorption force as normal, but then around that was ayer of the golden energy.


    He knew that the golden energy was good for refining his body, so he had tested it with his own pets and the pets brought to his store to see if it could be used to refine their bodies as well. What he found was that it had the same effect as it did on him, but that was when he did it in moderation. Too much of the golden energy had actually hurt the beast that it was injected with.


    The golden energy was very strong and if it was too much for the beast to handle, it would run wild in their bodies, causing injuries to them.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had only increased the golden energy in moderation, otherwise it would have resulted in serious injuries for the beast. That wouldn''t have been good in a normal situation, but this would have been exceptionally bad since it was someone else''s pet that he was experimenting on.


    Still minor injuries were something that Lin Fan could easily heal with a pill or two, so there were no problems at all.


    The funny thing was that the golden energy had the same effect as the absorption power when used on beasts, which almost doubled the amount of pleasure they felt. It was one of the main reasons that made Lin Fan ufortable to use it.


    Still, he wanted to make a big ssh and there was no better way than to do this.


    As for how to exin it¡­


    After a slight pause, he said with a faint smile, "It''s a secret technique, so it''s not really something that I can tell others about."


    The guard just said "oh" and nothing else since this was an unspoken rule between experts.


    Everyone had their secrets and they were usually considered the bottom line of an expert. As long as there wasn''t a life or death grudge between two people, there was no reason for an expert to ask about another expert''s secret.


    Not to mention that the Tamers Guild was trying to befriend Lin Fan, so he had his orders to keep him safe.


    Which eliminated the other method of getting an expert''s secret, when one side was much stronger than the other and they could make the owner of the secret disappear without anyone noticing.


    By right, the Tamers Guid should have been able to do that to someone as unknown as Lin Fan, but the guard himself didn''t feel confident in taking down Lin Fan. Even now, he could feel a sense of dangering from him that he felt was ridiculous.


    After all, Lin Fan was only in the low Embryo Soul Realm while he was in the low Child Soul Realm.


    There was an entire major realm between them, how could he not take down Lin Fan?


    But he really wasn''t confident enough to say that he could.


    Time passed just like this in the waiting room until the second half of the second exam was over.<sub> </sub>


    The surprising thing was that unlike the first half, there was someone else who passed the second exam. This person was someone that no one recognized because he was dressed in a manner that encouraged people to not notice him.


    However, judging by his physique and voice, he seemed to be a little boy.


    This little boy had arge hat on his face that hid it, as well as arge cloak thatpletely covered his body. The way he was dressed and the way that he performed made it seem like he was very average.


    After all, he had only barely passed by teaching his pet a low grade skill at the veryst second.


    However, when Lin Fan watched him, he could feel that there was something off about this person. He had even felt this way when he had been in the exam hall earlier.


    He didn''t know what it was, but he could feel a strange sensation from the technique that this cloaked person had used when he had been in the arena. The sensation that came from this cloaked person was different from every other person in the room, even though he was using the same technique.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t have a reason to say anything just based on a feeling. Perhaps his technique was from an ancient inheritance, there wasn''t anything wrong with that.


    The cloaked figure didn''t interact with either of them and just sat in a corner by himself, but under the cloak, his eyes were looking at Lin Fan with different intentions. He had felt Lin Fan watching him earlier, but that wasn''t the reason he was looking at him now. It was all because the disy that Lin Fan had given was just too shocking.


    There was another ten minutes that passed before another staff member came in to bring them out again.


    It was the same asst time, the staff member didn''t say much as he brought them out, but this time they were lined up in front of the old man on stage.


    As well, instead of having multiple stations, there was only a single stage that was in the center of the hall.


    It seemed like whatever was happening involved all three of them at once.


    The old man saw the three of them lined up in front of him and he gave a nod before saying, "For the final exam, you will be fighting against each other with the pets that you trained in the second exam. A Monster Trainer''s real worth is the ability to bring out the power of their pet and the best way to measure this is in real battles. You will be facing each other in solo battles, but don''t think that winning the battle is the only way you can win. Even if you lose the battle, as long as you can fully demonstrate the power of your pet, it will be considered a pass."


    When he said this, Fei Jun''s eyes twitched.


    It was a blow to his ego when he heard these words because he thought that they were a dig at him.


    If Lin Fan''s exam results were true, he really was nothingpared to him, so this was just a way tofort him by saying that he could still pass even if he couldn''tpare.


    As someone who had been treated like a genius his entire life, how could he take being looked down on in the slightest manner?


    Of course, he was only filled with rage deep down as he forced himself to maintain a calm look.


    He had resolved himself. He would show them all, he would tear down Lin Fan''s image and show them that he was nothingpared to him!


    The old man didn''t notice any of this since it wasn''t his intention to look down on Fei Jun. He was just running the exam as normal since those were the orders that he had received. He continued by saying, "You''ll be drawing tickets to see who will be fighting who." Then after a pause, he added, "Of course, since there''s an odd number of you, that means that one of you won''t be fighting and will pass immediately."


    All three of them revealed a surprised look when they heard this.


    When the old man saw this, he revealed a sly smile and said, "Luck is also a part of one''s skills. You can''t do anything if you aren''t lucky enough. So if you''re lucky enough to draw the bye, it will be considered a pass."


    In the end, none of them said a thing because there was nothing that they could say. These were the rules that were set by the Tamers Guild, so they could only ept it.


    The old man called a staff member over before saying, "The one who will be drawing will decide everything, so it''s considered quite the privilege to be the one chosen to make the draw."


    After saying this, he deliberately left a long pause just to keep them in suspense.

 Chapter 593 Monster Trainer Exam (13)

    After that pause, the old man turned to the cloaked figure and said, "How about we give you that honour?"


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this.


    After all, this cloaked figure was the one that did the worst, so shouldn''t he be thest person to receive this honour?


    The one who clearly deserved it the most was Lin Fan who had given a monstrous performance. If it was given to anyone else, it would clearly be considered an injustice.


    Still, the old man didn''t care about the shocked looks that came from the crowd as he waited for the cloaked figure toe forward.


    That cloaked figure didn''t move at all, not because he was shocked, but rather because he was vignt.


    Could it be that he had been exposed?


    After looking at the old man for a bit, he couldn''t sense any ill intentions, so he figured that he hadn''t been exposed.


    Once that was determined, the cloaked figure looked over at Lin Fan and Fei Jun as his mind began to turn. It only took him a few seconds before he suddenly formed an idea of what the Tamers Guild wanted to do.


    Since that was the case, there was no reason for him not to y along.


    <o>,m The cloaked figure came forward to where the staff member holding the box for the drawing was standing. Taking one look at the old man, the cloaked figure reached a hand out to draw out one of the balls and lifted it for the old man to see.</o>


    The old man revealed a faint smile and gave a slight nod of appreciation when he saw this.


    In fact, he felt that this cloaked young man was quite good. Even if he was able to barely pass the exam, he had still passed it when everyone else had failed which meant that he was at least talented.


    But the thing that old man appreciated the most was the fact that this cloaked young man was quick witted. It was clear by the way he acted that he understood what they were trying to do and had worked with them.


    Just based on this, it seemed like he was a good seed to nurture.


    This old man even considered pulling him under him as a disciple after the exam was over.


    To be fair though, it wasn''t hard for the smart people in the crowd to figure out what was happening, but they were fine with this since they also wanted to see the show that was about to follow.


    After he gave his nod, the old man said, "This young friend truly is lucky. He has drawn the bye, so he automatically passes this exam and is the first person to pass the Monster Trainer Exam. Let us congratte this young friend." After saying this, the old man started pping which the crowd also echoed.


    There were a few hesitant ps from people who didn''t understand what was happening, but it seemed like most of the crowd had figured it out.


    Of course, Fei Jun was included among those that hadn''t figured it out yet.


    The moment that the cloaked figure had shown the ball that he had drawn, Fei Jun had a triumphant look on his face.


    He wanted to fight Lin Fan to shut him down, so the one thing that he was afraid of was that he wouldn''t have the chance to fight Lin Fan. However, it seemed like the gods were still on his side since they had allowed him to fight him.


    What he didn''t know, which most of the people in the hall already knew, was that this was a setup by the Tamers Guild.


    They clearly wanted to pit Lin Fan against Fei Jun since they wanted to see just how strong he was, which was also what everyone wanted to see.


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing when he heard this, but he was a bit surprised to hear it. After all, he thought that he had already shown enough to subdue the Tamers Guild, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case.


    Still, there was a small part of him that was confused by their decision to have him face Fei Jun.


    They should already know the difference between the two of them based on what they have already seen, why were they still sending him to face him?


    Didn''t they have any better choices in the Tamers Guild?<sub> </sub>


    But there was no time to think about that since they were about to fight right now.


    There were cages that were brought back out for them and the old man said, "We''ll be having you fight with the pets that you trained in the second round. Please form the temporary contracts and get ready to fight."


    The cages opened to reveal the two headed wolf and the sparrow once again.


    The reactions of these two pets werepletely different when they were released from their cages.


    The two headed wolf just took a look at what was happening outside beforeing out to stand in front of the cage alone. It didn''t even spare a nce for Fei Jun.


    As for the sparrow, the moment that it caught sight of Lin Fan, it rushed out of the cage and flew into Lin Fan''s arms. It didn''t even care that Lin Fan had an indifferent look on his face, it did all it could to bury itself in his arms, rubbing its head in his chest.


    Just based on the different reactions of the two pets, it made the difference in levels between them clear.


    But Fei Jun didn''t mind at all because he was still deluded in believing that everything up to this point was a trick that was yed by Lin Fan. He believed that as long as they were able to fight each other, he would be able to expose Lin Fan.


    Both of them took the temporary contract that the staff member offered them and pasted them on the back of their hands.


    When contracts were reformed, all the two headed wolf did was look at Fei Jun before moving over to where he was. As for the sparrow, it tried to dig even deeper in Lin Fan''s chest, as if trying to show all the affection that it had for him.


    Seeing that both of them had finished applying the temporary contract, the old man didn''t waste any time as he said, "Since both of you are ready, let''s start the match." Then he didn''t forget to add, "Remember that this is a friendly match, so don''t go too far."


    After that, he raised his hand and said, "Then let''s start this match!" On thest syble, his hand came down.


    Both sides immediately jumped back to opposite sides of the stage, with neither of them making a move while watching the other side.


    Both of them were aware that they didn''t know the full extent of the other side''s power, so they didn''t want to make a rash move.


    For Lin Fan, even if the Zephyr Swallow had mutated into the Tempest Swallow, he wasn''t certain how strong it really was since it wasn''t a pet that was registered with the system. He could tell that it had be stronger after mutating, but as for how strong it really was, he wasn''t certain.


    This was a pet that had been famous for its inability to attack, so even after mutating, Lin Fan didn''t think that it would be that strong.


    As for Fei Jun, while he didn''t believe that Lin Fan had yed some trick to pass, he still wasn''t certain if Lin Fan had any other tricks up his sleeve. If he were to rush in and get caught off guard, it wouldn''t end well for him.


    Just like this, the two of them stared at each other for a full minute, trying to see if the other side would do anything.


    The crowd naturally understood what both of them were thinking, butpared to the previous demonstration that they had put on, it was just too slow and boring. There were some people that couldn''t help feeling a bit disappointed by this disy from them.


    Fei Jun was the one who had a weaker mentality between the two of them since he didn''t have as muchbat experience as Lin Fan, he had focused on training his Monster Training abilities. So this long deadlock was much harder on his nerves than it was on Lin Fan''s nerves.


    Eventually he wasn''t able to take it anymore as he silently ordered the two headed wolf to attack.


    The two headed wolf raised its heads as mes gathered in its mouths before it suddenly let out a breath of mes. However, the direction that the breath of mes was heading in was strange.


    At first nce, it seemed like it was aimed at the little sparrow flying in front of it, but when one looked at it closely, they would find that this wasn''t the case. Instead of being aimed at the sparrow right in front of it, the me breath was actually aimed at Lin Fan who was standing behind the sparrow with just a slight deviation.


    The me breath would miss the sparrow by the slightest margin, but it would go past it to hit Lin Fan right in the face.


    It seemed like Fei Jun still held his grudge and he was actually quite the fierce fellow.


    He was using this match to directly attack Lin Fan, while making it seem like an ident.

 Chapter 594 Monster Trainer Exam (14)

    However, Lin Fan didn''t panic when he saw the mes approaching him.


    It wasn''t that he had faith in the Tempest Sparrow, but rather he knew that it was impossible for mes of this level to hurt him.


    As long as he used a little bit of his power, he would be able to extinguish these mes with rtive ease.


    So he was about to gather his life energy to create a barrier to block this attack, but he didn''t get a chance to do so since the Tempest Sparrow had acted before he could.


    With a single p of its wings, the Tempest Sparrow created a giant gust of wind that formed a wall in front of him, blocking him from the mes.


    One wouldn''t expect a wall of wind to be able to block mes, but the moment the mes touched the wall of wind, they were cut apart by the des of wind in that wall and dissipated.


    Then without any dy, the Tempest Sparrow gave another p of its wings, generating even more wind around it. Once the wind was strong enough, the Tempest Sparrow gave one big p, sending out des of wind at the two headed wolf.


    The two headed wolf was able to react and dodge, but it couldn''t dodge fast enough. The de of windnded right on the ground at the feet of the two headed wolf, creating a wide circle in the ground that still left it with some room to move.


    The two headed wolf could tell that this situation wasn''t good, so it tried jumping over the circle on the ground. The moment it did, the wind that was inside of the groove on the ground suddenly went a de of wind at it.


    Seeing this de of winde up at it, it could feel a sense of danger from it.


    The two headed wolf no longer continued forward andnded back in the circle, being able to barely dodge the de of wind. Well, it didn''t fully dodge the de of wind and was nicked on its leg, creating a bright line of red blood that streaked down.


    The two headed wolf no longer dared to make any rash moves after that, but that didn''t mean that the sparrow would be idle.


    As the two headed wolf stood there, the wind around it started to gather as the wind inside the circle in the ground grew stronger. The wind in the circle on the ground continued to grow in groove on the ground until it spun so fast that the wind started to lift off the ground.


    This wall of wind continued to grow in size until it was the same height as the two headed wolf, but it didn''t stop growing there. The wall of wind continued to grow until it was over two meters tall, towering over the two headed wolf, but it still didn''t stop there.


    That wall of wind grew and grew until it was over three meters tall. Once it had reached three meters, the growth of the wind wall finally slowed before stopping, standing at over three meters.


    Fei Jun had watched this happen, but he also didn''t know what to do since he had felt the power contained within the wind wall.


    This two headed wolf was only in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm, so there was still a limit to its power.


    When he saw that the attack of the Tempest Sparrow had blocked the attack of his two headed wolf, he knew that it would be impossible for the two headed wolf to break free unless it did something desperate.


    This was only a spar between pets, so there was no need for Fei Jun to be that desperate, but when he thought about Lin Fan winning over him, he just couldn''t ept it.


    In the end, his pride overcame his reason and he shouted out, "Do it!"


    As soon as Fei Jun shouted this, there were mes that appeared around the two headed wolf. The mes burned and burned as they became more and more intense. They continued to burn until they werepletely surrounding the two headed wolf.


    These mes started out as normal, but then once the two headed wolf waspletely surrounded by them, they suddenly changed colours. It went from the normal red mes to mes that were as ck as the darkest night.


    mes of this colour clearly were not normal mes. It wasn''t just the colour of these mes that demonstrated this, it was also the aura that came from these mes.


    The aura from the mes, it was no longer the power of the Mid Embryo Soul Realm, but rather from the High Embryo Soul Realm.


    When the people in the crowd sensed the auraing from the two headed wolf, they couldn''t help knitting their brows. Especially the president and the two vice presidents sitting in the special seat.


    The rules had stated that this was clearly just a friendly spar, but this was clearly ast resort used when one was on the edge of life and death. While it wasn''t strictly against the rules, it was frowned upon very severely.


    After all, while they werepeting at this moment, they would be colleagues in the future. To go this far against a colleague was detrimental to their organization.<sub> </sub>


    Not to mention that to use this move, the two headed wolf would have to burn its life essence which would affect its future development.


    This was the exact opposite of what Monster Trainers wanted to do.


    Still, it would be dangerous to interfere now, not to mention that it would affect their reputation if they stopped it now.


    So the only thing that they could do now was watch the end of this fight.


    However, the impression that Fei Jun left was the lowest of lows. Even Bai Chen, who was the one who brought him here, had already written him off in his heart.


    After the two headed wolf was surrounded in mes, it charged right at the wall of wind that was in front of it.


    However, to everyone''s surprise, the wall of wind didn''t crumple under the me Rush of the two headed wolf. Instead it bounced the two headed wolf right back and blew away all the mes that were around it.


    There were a few mes that still clung to the fur of the two headed wolf, but most of the mes had been blown away by the wall of wind.


    There were also various cuts on the body of the two headed wolf that were dyed red with blood.


    When it had crashed itself against the wall of wind, the wind des in that wall had made multiple cuts along its body. It was looking quite sorry after it had crashed into the wall and it was already clear who had won, but Fei Jun didn''t want to give up just yet.


    Still, he didn''t have a chance since he had noticed that something was off.


    The two headed wolf had only obeyed Fei Jun''s orders because it felt that it had been in danger and if it didn''t go all out, it might have lost its life.


    It was still in this dangerous situation where it had been surrounded by this wall of wind and if it didn''t find a way to break out, it would definitely be cut to pieces by the des of wind. So it once again tried to increase the amount of mes that was around itself, but then it realized that something was off.


    After a few seconds, the two headed wolf started to choke.


    When it looked up, it saw that there was another wall of wind that had capped the tornado that was surrounding it.


    This was what the Tempest Sparrow had been doing while the two headed wolf had been charging the wind wall with its me Rush. The wall of wind didn''t grow higher, instead it grew horizontally over the top of the tornado,pletely trapping the two headed wolf inside.


    Once this trap wasplete, the wall of wind started drawing all the air out of the space inside until there wasn''t any oxygen left at all, which was why the two headed wolf had started to choke.


    The two headed wolf didn''t give up right away as it tried charging the wall of wind again, but once it again it was repelled and sent flying back.


    In the end, the two headed wolf couldn''t do a single thing as it fainted fromck of oxygen.


    Once it fainted, the wings of the sparrow slowly came to a stop and the wall of wind around it disappeared, leaving the two headed wolf lying on the ground covered in wounds.


    There was no doubt about the result of this spar with this, but now it was all about who would pass.


    Most people assumed that Fei Jun wouldn''t pass because of his shameful behaviour just now.


    However, in the end, both of them were allowed to pass the final exam and receive their Monster Trainer License.


    As for the grade that they received, Fei Jun was only made an Expert Monster Trainer while Lin Fan wasn''t given a grade at all. Instead, Lin Fan was called up to the VIP viewing room that the president and two vice presidents were watching from.


    <o>,m Everyone had an idea of why Lin Fan was being called up, but they weren''t surprised at all with the performance that he had given.</o>


    As for Fei Jun, not a single person felt any pity for him since it was what he deserved.

 Chapter 595 Monster Trainer Exam (15)

    After the door closed behind him, not a single person in the room spoke.


    There were three old men sitting in front of Lin Fan, two that he recognized and one that he didn''t.


    It was the president and the two vice presidents of the Tamers Guild.


    They just sat there in silence looking over Lin Fan for a bit, but Lin Fan didn''t mind as he came in and took a seat in front of them.


    There was a long silence before the president suddenly asked, "Where did you get that technique?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with surprised eyes since he never expected him to be this direct, but that didn''t mean that he didn''t know how to answer.


    After a trace of surprise appeared in his eyes, Lin Fan casually said, "It''s a secret inheritance that I received." Once he said that, he just sat there calmly looking at the president.


    The president didn''t say anything else in response to this, but this was to be expected.


    After all, it wasmonly known that experts should respect each other''s secrets since it was rted to their trump cards which was considered their bottom lines. Trump cards were used to save oneself when one was in danger, so this wasn''t something that could be revealed easily.


    After another long moment of silence, the president looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and said seriously, "What are you nning?"


    The fact that Lin Fan was willing to show this kind of ability must mean that there was something that he wanted, so the president didn''t beat around the bush at all since that wasn''t the personality that he had.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a look of praise since this was the personality that he liked working with.


    He wasn''t someone that liked beating around the bush, trying to figure out the other side''s intention. It was much easier to be direct andy all your cards out on the table directly.


    After a slight pause, Lin Fan said with a faint smile, "Well, I was hoping that we could cooperate."


    The president slightly knitted his brows before he said, "The Hunters Organization?"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod.


    The president said in a voice that didn''t seem to care, "What benefit would that bring us? It''s not like you can offer us your special training technique, can you? In that case, it''s better for us to remain neutral instead of taking sides. Unless there''s something else you can offer us."


    He had already heard about Lin Fan from Qiao Yi Fei, so he knew how close Lin Fan was to the Hunters Organization. For Lin Fan to propose this was something that he had already expected, but he couldn''t think of what Lin Fan could possibly offer to make it worth his time.


    Lin Fan had also expected this, so he said, "If I have this technique, it must mean that I got it from somewhere. Or rather I got it from someone."


    The president knitted his brows the moment he heard this.


    He had also thought of this possibility, but even if it was true, it wouldn''t have affected anything since this was too vague of a promise for them to rely on. Even if there was someone or some organization behind Lin Fan, would they be willing to share the secret technique that easily?


    A promise like this was almost worth nothing.


    Seeing that the president didn''t say anything, Lin Fan then said, "The Thunder Sect''s ambitions aren''t as small as you''d think."


    The president immediately knitted his brows when he heard this. He looked at Lin Fan with a deep look as if he was trying to see through him, but he couldn''t see through Lin Fan''s stone face at all.


    Finally, the president asked, "Then tell me, how big are those ambitions?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "If they didn''t have some kind of unusual backing, do you really think that they would dare to make such a big move?"


    The president knitted his brows even deeper when he heard this.


    Lin Fan could see that he was seriously considering it, so he just waited. However, the knitted brows slowly rxed on the president''s face which was the opposite of what Lin Fan wanted to see.


    It was then that he yed his final card, "The Assassins Association is also involved."


    This time, the president and the two vice presidents both revealed shocked looks since this was information that they didn''t know about previously.


    If three different factions were banding together, this was not something that they could ignore.


    After a long moment of silence, the president finally asked, "What are you proposing then?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile before he started exining.


    ¡­


    In a dark alley outside of the Tamers Guild.


    There was a single figure that was standing here and the walls all around him were filled with holes.


    This figure was on the ground with his fists on the ground while he was panting. It was clear from the surrounding area that he had just gone on a form of rampage, which had caused all this destruction.


    There were also traces of blood that stained his fists.<sub> </sub>


    After taking a moment to catch his breath, this person looked up and the face that was revealed was Fei Jun''s. However, that face was twisted with rage and something even more terrifying.


    As for why he had this kind of expression, his reasoning was that it was all because of Lin Fan.


    After the Monster Trainer Exam was over, he had been given a license as an Expert Monster Trainer, but that was all.


    As soon as the exam was over, he had been shown the way out. Even Bai Chen who had brought him here hadpletely ignored him.


    It was clear from the attitude of the Tamers Guild that they hadpletely abandoned him, but that also confused him.


    Even if his disy during the exam was a bit shameful, that didn''t mean that they shouldpletely abandon him since he was still a talent no matter how one looked at it. Even if there were a few minor personality problems, he should have been weed into the higher rankings of the Tamers Guild.


    The reason why this didn''t happen was all because of Lin Fan.


    After all, the winner was king and everyone else was worthless.


    The talent that Lin Fan had disyed was far above his own, which was why the Tamers Guild was willing to drop Fei Jun like this.


    In Fei Jun''s heart, Lin Fan was the one that had taken everything from him.


    Thest straw was when he saw Qiao Yi Fei congratting Lin Fan on passing the exam with a smile on her face. The way that the two talked, itpletely crushed his heart.


    He wanted revenge, but he didn''t have a way to do so since his family wasn''t a part of the twelve great factions. He didn''t have the power or influence to deal with even Qiao Yi Fei, not to mention Lin Fan who would surely receive the full attention of the Tamers Guild.


    But that was what drove him mad.


    He was unwilling!


    He was unwilling to ept this!


    While Fei Jun was slowly going more and more insane in this alley, there was a figure that entered the alley. This figure walked up behind him and silently observed him for a bit until it finally said, "Do you want your revenge?"


    Fei Jun had beenpletely lost in his anger that he hadn''t noticed that someone hade up behind him, so he was surprised when he heard this voice. But after that surprise, he quickly turned around with a vignt look at this figure.


    When he turned around, he found that it was the cloaked figure from the exam, the one that had been lucky enough to get a bye in the final exam.


    Fei Jun revealed a look of disdain when he saw this person and he said with a snort, "What can you do for me? Get lost before I cripple you!"


    The cloaked figure didn''t make a single move when he heard this and he just gave augh before saying, "Good spirit, but you should be careful who you talk to like that. You might provoke someone that you shouldn''t provoke."


    The look of disdain on Fei Jun''s face became even heavier and he was about to say something, but his gaze met the eyes of the cloaked figure. The moment his gaze met those red eyes, he was filled with terror and he swallowed all the words he was about to say.


    The cloaked figure gave anotherugh when he saw this and then he said, "Good, you aren''t a fool either. Now, are you willing toe with me?"


    Fei Jun couldn''t help feeling a shiver run down his spine when he heard this. After a slight pause, he asked, "Who are you?"


    The cloaked figure didn''t answer this, instead he said, "I''ll give you your revenge if you follow me, that''s all you need to know."


    Fei Jun couldn''t help asking, "Are you the devil?"


    The cloaked figure gave augh before saying, "Maybe I am. Are you willing to make that deal with the devil?" Then after a deliberate pause, he added, "Then again, it''s not like you have much choice."


    Fei Jun was silent for a while before saying, "You''re right, I don''t have a choice, but that doesn''t mean that I have to take your deal. After all, it''s not like you''re saying you''ll give me anything after I take my revenge. Once my revenge is taken, if you can''t guarantee my safety, what meaning would that revenge be?"


    The cloaked figure gave a nod in response to this before asking, "Then what do you want?"


    Fei Jun said, "What can you offer me?"


    The cloaked figure revealed a smile under that hat that hid his face and said, "All that you want and all that you deserve will be yours. Will that be enough for you?"


    Fei Jun didn''t answer right away, instead he asked, "Is that a promise?"


    The cloaked figure said in a stronger voice, "It''s a guarantee. I think that should be enough for you, right?"


    Fei Jun could tell that the cloaked figure was slowly losing patience, so he didn''t push his luck as he said, "Alright, as long as you can guarantee it, I wouldn''t mind making a deal with the devil."


    The cloaked figure gave a nod before saying, "Good, I like working with smart people."


    Then without even waiting for a response from Fei Jun, he turned around and started walking as he said, "Follow me."


    This time, Fei Jun didn''t hesitate at all as he followed that cloaked figure out of the alley.

 Chapter 596 Auction (1)

    When Lin Fan walked out of the Tamers Guild, he had a smile on his face.


    After all, he had aplished what he had set out to do and even more than that, so there was nothing for him to be unhappy with.


    As he walked along, there were people that pointed and whispered at him.


    These were all people who had heard about his performance today or had personally witnessed his performance. However, not all the whispers that he could hear were about his performance.


    Rather the majority of them weren''t actually about his performance, but rather about how handsome he was.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t egotistical enough to let this affect him. He just felt a bit good about himself, but he still calmly headed back to his shop.


    Once he was back, he saw that there was no reason for him to open the shop again since it wouldn''t be open that long, so he decided to take the rest of the day off.


    The night passed just like that and it was a new day again.


    The usual morning rush came and then the store became empty.


    Another hour or so passed before anything happened.


    In the middle of the morning, close to noon, there was a beast carriage that arrived in front of Lin Fan''s store. This was a beast carriage that waspletely different from all the other ones that hade previously.


    This was a beast carriage that had a crest that no one recognized because it also had the crest of another city on it.


    It was clear that this wasn''t one of the important people from their Harmony City, but rather some important person from another city.


    People had a natural tendency to be curious about things that they didn''t know about and since the people here had a natural tendency to gossip, they all gathered around the beast carriage to see who was inside.


    However, the moment that the door opened, they were taken aback by the one who came out since it was a beauty that was on the same level as the Five Flowers of Harmony City.


    It was a beauty that was dressed in red with fiery red hair, it was no one else but Murong Yue.


    She ignored the crowd that gathered around her beast carriage and headed right into Lin Fan''s shop.


    Everyone around couldn''t help taking pictures of her as she walked past them and they quickly posted them on the city forums, trying to find an answer as to who she was. After all, this was a beauty that was on the same level as the Five Flowers of Harmony City, so naturally they would be curious who she really was.


    There were even some young masters who wanted to make their way down to Lin Fan''s shop just to see if they had a chance with her.


    When Murong Yue came into the shop, she didn''t bother with the few people who were pretending to look around and came right up to the counter where Lin Fan was sitting, looking at something on his watch.


    When Lin Fan heard the door open, he looked up and was surprised to see Murong Yue was there, but he still waited for her toe up to the counter first.


    When she came up to the counter, she said with a smile, "Owner Lin, can we have a private conversation?"


    The way she said it almost seemed like there was something special between them, but Lin Fan knew that this wasn''t the case. For her toe to his store, it must mean that it was something quite serious.


    Lin Fan looked at her for a few seconds before tapping his finger on the table.


    The moment that his finger touched the table, there was a ripple that came from it before forming an invisible bubble around them.


    The moment that this bubble appeared, itpletely isted them from the rest of the store. Or at least it isted the sound inside of the bubble from the sound that was outside of the bubble.


    This was an application of both the spacew and soundw that Lin Fan had, so the istion effect was much stronger than if just onew was used alone.


    Murong Yue was surprised when she suddenly noticed that all the sound around her had disappeared, but that didn''tst long since she could feel the life energy bubble that was around them. However, she still couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a look of admiration.


    It seemed that he had much more up his sleeve than she had expected, but that was a good thing since that meant that he was a reliable ally.<sub> </sub>


    Once this bubble was formed, Lin Fan raised his hand and gave an inviting gesture, as if he was waiting for her to speak.


    Murong Yue didn''t mind the way he acted and said, "The Thunder Sect will be holding the auction for the remaining tokens in a few days. They''ve already given away ten tokens in private deals and now they''re auctioning off the remaining twenty at the auction."


    Lin Fan looked at her with one raised brow and said, "And?"


    Murong Yue didn''t mind again as she continued, "They''ve invited the Hunters Organization and the president wants you to go."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.


    After all, without a proper reason, he would be one of thest people chosen to go. This was an auction where thest few tokens for the Ancient Era Ruin would be sold, it should be an auction that should be attended by the important people of the twelve great factions, not someone like him.


    And yet Murong Yue was here inviting him to go.


    That must mean that something should have happened, or at least the Thunder Sect had made some kind of move.


    Seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, Murong Yue exined without even being asked to do so, "The invitation was addressed to me and it stated that this would be hosted by the younger generation of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect. If we were to send any of the older generation, wouldn''t that seem like we''re afraid of them?"


    Lin Fan''s brows rxed when he heard this and he asked with a smile, "So it seems like Lei Feng hasn''t given up yet?"


    Murong Yue revealed a bitter smile when she heard this, but she didn''t say anything in response. However, there was no need for her to respond since the bitter smile on her face said more than enough.


    After a while, Lin Fan asked, "Since you already have your tokens, is there any meaning in going to this auction?"


    Murong Yue revealed a proper smile this time as she asked, "Do you really want me to answer that?"


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile, but he didn''t say anything in response.


    He had never expected an answer for this question since this was just a test question that he asked to probe Murong Yue, or rather to probe the stance of the Hunters Organization.


    Each of the twelve great factions had different factions and families under them that weren''t a part of the twelve great factions. These could be considered vassals that worked for the twelve great factions, so they were still considered part of the unaffiliated group.


    In other words, that meant that they were eligible to bid during this auction.


    The only reason the twelve great factions would be going themselves would be to make sure that things didn''t go wrong for these factions and families under them, as well as deciding when to pull out.


    The onest thing that Lin Fan was hesitating over was whether to anger the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect even further. Or rather, he was hesitating over angering Lei Feng even further.


    It was clear that Murong Yue wanted him along as a barrier against Lei Feng, but Lin Fan knew that while it was fine to anger him to force him to be irrational, if he were to push him over the line, there were no benefits for him.


    He wasn''t able to fully gauge where he was currently with Lei Feng, so doing this without proper information would be considered a gamble for him.


    Murong Yue could also see the hesitation in Lin Fan''s eyes and she started to worry since she knew that she was asking a lot from Lin Fan. There certainly weren''t enough benefits that were added to this deal that would make Lin Fan willing to do this for her, not to mention that they were only acquaintances, so they weren''t that close in the first ce.


    While the two of them just remained in silence, looking at each other, the door opened once again.


    It had been less than fifteen minutes since Murong Yue had arrived, but somehow Lei Feng had already made his way down to Lin Fan''s shop.


    Seeing the two of them at the counter, one standing and one sitting, looking at each other like that, there was an intense me of rage that consumed his heart. However, his expression was as calm as still water as he slowly walked towards the counter.


    When he got close, he could feel that there was some form of bubble that surrounded the two of them which filled him with even more rage.


    The two of them had formed this bubble to get their private time?


    Wasn''t this a p to his face?

 Chapter 597 Auction (2)

    Neither of them had heard anything since they were both focused on their conversation. Lin Fan hadn''t seen anything either even though he was facing that way because he had been lost in thought.


    Murong Yue was about to add something when she saw Lin Fan''s expression change, but then both of them felt a strong aurae from behind her.


    When they both turned to look, they saw Lei Feng standing there. Around him was a faint glow that if one didn''t look closely, they would have missed it.


    Seeing the two of them turn to look at him with surprised looks, Lei Feng felt like there was another dagger that was stabbed into his heart.


    He gave a soft snort and then the faint glow around him was released.


    It didn''t dissipate, but rather it went out in front of him like a ripple. This ripple continued until it made contact with the spacew and soundw bubble that Lin Fan had ced around them.


    The moment that this ripple touched that bubble, the bubble popped like¡­well, like a bubble.


    It didn''t matter that the bubble popped since the two of them had stopped talking the moment that they felt the auraing from Lei Feng, however Lin Fan still knitted his brows when the bubble did pop.


    The bubble that he had formed was something that he had made casually, but it was still something that was made with two differentws, so it wasn''t something that was weak. For Lei Feng to pop it with just a single wave of his life energy, it really showed how powerful he was.


    After releasing that wave of life energy, the expression on Lei Feng''s face immediately changed as he revealed a smile and came up to the counter as well.


    He walked up right beside Murong Yue and said to Lin Fan, "Owner Lin, it really is a coincidence meeting you here."


    Both Murong Yue and Lin Fan had the urge to roll their eyes when they heard this.


    Which one of them didn''t know why he was really here?


    But neither of them said a thing to contradict him.


    Lin Fan just gave a nod in response to this.


    Lei Feng didn''t mind this at all as he turned to say to Murong Yue, "Miss Murong, it''s also a pleasure seeing you here today. Will you being to our auction in three days?"


    Murong Yue did the same as Lin Fan and gave a nod in response.


    Lei Feng''s smile widened as he said, "I look forward to seeing Miss Murong there."


    Then he turned back to Lin Fan and the smile on his lips became a bit lighter as he said, "Owner Lin, this really is an interesting store you have here. I hope that your business will be better in the future."


    Without even waiting for a response from Lin Fan, Lei Feng walked right out of the store without even looking back once.


    In fact, it was taking all he could to restrain himself at this point.


    If only there weren''t people around, he would make Lin Fan disappear¡­


    After he left the store, Murong Yue turned back to Lin Fan as if she was waiting for his answer.


    Since Lei Feng had even taken the initiative to show up in Lin Fan''s store, there was no better example for her to use. All she had to do now was wait for Lin Fan to think things through and hope that he made the right decision.


    As for Lin Fan, once Lei Feng left the store, he fell into deep thought.


    The main reason why he hadn''t been able to make a decision previously was because he didn''t know enough about Lei Feng to make that decision. He was worried that if he pushed Lei Feng too far, he might disregard everything and go all out against him, which was thest thing that he wanted.


    However, based on the disy that Lei Feng had just shown him, he could tell that this wasn''t the case.


    It seemed like he had underestimated Lei Feng''s tolerance, it seemed like he could still push him a bit further.


    After a small period of silence, Lin Fan looked up at Murong Yue and gave a nod before saying, "I''ll go then."


    Murong Yue instantly revealed a smile before saying, "I''lle get you on that night, so you don''t need to do anything."


    Then without even giving Lin Fan a chance to reply, she turned and ran out of the store.


    For some reason, there was a bit of joy that she didn''t understand that had appeared at the bottom of her heart. However, she didn''t have time to worry about it now since there were still other things that she had to do first.


    Lin Fan was just left there alone in the store, but he didn''t mind it since he had already slowly gotten used to this. It had been the same with Qiao Yi Fei and Mao Tao, he figured that this was just how girls were.<sub> </sub>


    It was too bad that he didn''t know that this was just how girls were with him¡­


    As Murong Yue came out of the store, there were a pair of eyes that watched her enter her beast carriage and watched as that beast carriage drove off.


    This beast carriage had arrived after Murong Yue''s beast carriage arrived and had been parked here the entire time, watching her beast carriage.


    After seeing Murong Yue''s beast carriage leave, the person inside let out a sigh of relief before his eyes suddenly turned dark.


    Lei Feng tapped the armrest of his seat with his fingers a few times before he suddenly said, "Xiao Tie, investigate the owner of this store."


    The door didn''t open, but there was a person who was dressed in all ck that appeared in front of Lei Feng.


    That person in ck fell to one knee and cupped his hands as he said, "As you wish, young master."


    Then without making another sound, he disappeared from the beast carriage without a trace.


    Last time, Lei Feng had left this matter to Shi Yan. So even though the assassination had been a failure, he didn''t look too deeply into it since he thought that the warning sent should have been enough.


    However, it seemed like he was wrong and he needed to take action personally.


    After the person in ck clothing disappeared, Lei Feng muttered under his breath, "It seems like I need to personally take care of some flies."


    Then he said out loud, "Go."


    The driver outside heard this and immediately headed off without even asking for the destination since he already knew.


    ¡­


    Three days passed without anything really happening.


    It was a rare period of peace for Lin Fan''s shop where no one hade looking for him.


    Well, it wasn''t that no one hade looking for him.


    The Xu Family Head hade to ask him for his advice on some matter.


    The Hunters Organization had actually approached the Xu Family to see if they were willing toe under them, but the Xu Family Head didn''t agree right away. Instead he came to find Lin Fan for his opinion first.


    Lin Fan knew that the Hunters Organization would be helping the Xu Family after the incident with the City Lord, even though he didn''t know exactly what they would be doing. However, this didn''t seem to be a problem for him since he was already tied to the Hunters Organization boat, so having the Xu Family work under the protection of the Hunters Organization for now wasn''t a bad idea.


    He wanted to build his own force, but before he could, it wasn''t wrong for him to rely on existing forces to protect his own force.


    When they became strong enough to be equals, it wouldn''t be toote to separate from them. After all, once they became equals, it wasn''t like the Hunters Organization would be able to stop them from splitting off from them.


    So the Xu Family Head agreed to this and then the day after, the Xu Family Head came again to consult Lin Fan about another matter.


    The Xu Family had naturally received an invitation to the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect''s auction since they were a family with decent influence in Harmony City. However, that was also what the Hunters Organization had approached the Xu Family about.


    The Hunters Organization wanted the Xu Family to be one of the families that would bid on their behalf.


    This caught Lin Fan off guard since he never expected the Hunters Organization to trust the Xu Family this much. However, that didn''t mean that he would ept this.


    He felt that the Hunters Organization was going too far here, treating the Xu Family as a family that was actually under them instead of just using their influence temporarily. It seemed like someone really wanted to devour the Xu Family.


    This had made Lin Fan doubtful, but for now, he decided not to pursue this matter since he still needed to work with the Hunters Organization.


    But that didn''t mean that he would let the Hunters Organization use the Xu Family as they wanted.


    So in the end, even though the Xu Family Head was worried that they would offend the Hunters Organization by doing this, Lin Fan still had him reject the Hunters Organization''s request about the auction.


    Now on the day of the auction itself, Lin Fan was just waiting for Murong Yue to arrive to pick him up before heading to the auction.

 Chapter 598 Auction (3)

    Murong Yue''s carriage didn''t arrive thatte, but it also didn''te early.


    ? Lin Fan''s store closed at five, but that was clearly too early for the auction to begin.


    The auction itself started at eight, so there was still plenty of time after Lin Fan''s store closed before he had to leave.


    Lin Fan was able to put a batch of pets into the shadow cultivation room before Murong Yue had arrived at seven.


    When she arrived, she came into the store holding a bag that was even taller than her.


    The first thing she did was sweep her eyes over Lin Fan and when she saw what he was wearing, she couldn''t help revealing a dissatisfied look.


    Lin Fan saw this look and couldn''t help asking, "What''s wrong?"


    Murong Yue said, "Is that really what you''re wearing to the auction?"


    Lin Fan looked down over himself again before asking, "What''s wrong with it?"


    What Lin Fan was wearing was actually considered quite normal, it was just a normal hanfu robe.


    While it wasn''t considered fancy, it definitely wasn''t considered casual dress either since this was a set of clothes that had been custom made. If this was back on earth, this definitely would have been considered formal wear in China because this was something that was now rarely worn there.


    But this was another world where hanfu wasmon, so this couldn''t be considered formal wear at all.


    Murong Yue shook her head before saying, "Didn''t you dress up for the banquet?"


    Lin Fan scratched his head and said, "That was a banquet, so isn''t it normal to dress up for it? Why would I need to dress up for an auction?"


    Murong Yue shook her head again before saying, "This is a banquet that''s held by one of the twelve great factions and is attended by the rest. No matter how you look at it, wouldn''t this be considered an important event?"


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say in response to this since he knew that she was right.


    Murong Yue didn''t bother waiting for Lin Fan as she brought the bag that she was holding forward and said, "Here, take this."


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he said in a curious voice, "What is this?"


    Murong Yue just held the bag out and said, "Won''t you know if you open it?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with that curious look before taking the bag and opening the zipper on the side. When he opened it, he saw that there was a suit that was waiting inside for him.


    This suit didn''t look cheap at all, rather it looked like it was a custom designed suit which surely must have cost quite a bit.


    Lin Fan looked back at Murong Yue, but she didn''t give him a chance to say anything as she said, "This is rted to the reputation of the Hunters Organization, of course you can''t look too shabby."


    Then she started pushing him into the back as she said, "Go on and chance already, or else we''re going to bete."


    Lin Fan looked back at the suit before giving a nod to Murong Yue and heading into the back.


    Last time, it actually wasn''t his idea to wear the suit either. The suit was given to him by Mao Tao and Qiao Yi Fei when they had been heading there and he had changed along the way. Of course, there was a divider in their beast carriage that allowed him to do so.


    In fact, if it wasn''t for the fact that this was a high ss event and he had to wear a suit, he most likely wouldn''t have worn one since he had always hated wearing suits. Even back on earth, it was one of the things he hated to do.


    It didn''t take Lin Fan long to change into the suit and when he came down, Murong Yue was stunned by how he looked.


    If he was considered a ten before, he was now considered a twelve.


    The saying was true, clothes really did make the man. Especially when it was a man who was already as handsome as Lin Fan.


    After staring at him in a daze for a few seconds, Murong Yue couldn''t help turning away as a light blush came over her face.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Murong Yue didn''t turn back at all as she said, "Let''s go. We''ll bete if we stay any longer." As soon as her voice fell, she headed towards the door of the store.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan raised a brow, but he didn''t say anything in response as he followed her out of the store.


    They went over to Murong Yue''s beast carriage that had been parked near the store and were quickly heading off to the auction.


    The site of the auction was only fifteen minutes away and they still had around thirty minutes before it began, so there was plenty of time for them to get there. However, when they did arrive, they were consideredte already.


    Even though the auction began at eight, there were plenty of people who had arrived ahead of time and there were many reporters who were taking pictures of the people arriving.


    If Lin Fan had to describe it, the best way to describe it would be a red carpet event.


    Of course, neither Lin Fan or Murong Yue wanted to attract any attention, so Lin Fan wrapped them up in his shadow and spacews, creating a barrier around them.


    The two of them were able to easily slip past the reporters and the other people entering since they were experts. When they were at the door, they revealed themselves quickly to show the invitation that they had received before entering the auction hall.


    The person that they showed their invitation to led them through the hall and up some stairs.


    Since the invitation that they had was for the Hunters Organization, this staff member didn''t dare neglect them since they were from one of the twelve great factions. The staff member personally led them all the way up to their VIP room.


    Along the hall, they could see other VIP rooms that had different symbols on them. It wasn''t hard to recognize the symbols that these rooms had.


    After all, if they had been brought here since they were in the Hunters Organization, then the only other people that were qualified to be here would be people in the other twelve great factions.


    Looking at the number of rooms, they totaled exactly twelve.


    But that didn''t matter to them since every one of the twelve great factions had agreed to work separately. Or at least that was the case with the factions that the Hunters Organization worked with.


    When the door opened, the room that appeared in front of them could be considered luxurious. There were all kinds of amenities that were present and there were even maids that had been standing at the ready, waiting for them to arrive the entire time.


    However, what they wanted to do had to be done in private, so they dismissed everyone from this room right away.


    The staff member wanted to say something, but hearing the tone that they spoke in, they had no choice but to leave.


    However, neither of them said a thing after they all left.


    The first thing both of them did was immediately check the room for any listening devices. After all, they were currently in enemy territory, so it wasn''t a bad idea to check. Though both of them knew that the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect wouldn''t do this since there was nothing to gain from it.


    Both of these factions would already know about their ns to a certain extent since they were the same ns as all of the other factions.


    Moreover, if their listening devices were discovered, it would be a great loss of face if it was revealed.


    So after searching the room, they found nothing in the end as expected.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t take any chances as he created another bubble around them using his space and soundws.


    Once all of that was done, Lin Fan and Murong Yue both sat down across from each other, but they both also had a view of the auction hall below them.


    After a moment of silence, Lin Fan was the one who broke it by asking, "How many people do you have and what is your upper limit?"


    Murong Yue looked at Lin Fan and said in a calm voice, "We have ten different groups and each of them has been given ten million mid grade spirit stones. If necessary, we can redirect that amount to a single group, but that would create risk, so it would be considered ast resort."


    When she finished, she couldn''t help pouting her lips and saying, "Of course, it would have been eleven groups if a certain someone was to agree to work with us."


    Lin Fan naturally knew what she meant, but his expression didn''t change at all.


    Murong Yue saw this and didn''t continue with this topic.


    It was fine to tease him about it since they could be considered close enough to do so, but if she were to reallyin about it, it would create a rift between them. This was the time when they needed to work together, so this was thest thing she would want to do.


    Not to mention thatpared to using the Xu Family, it was more important that Lin Fan had agreed toe with her.

 Chapter 599 Auction (4)

    In a different room in the auction hall, there was a person sitting on a throne watching the auction hall under them.


    While this person was watching the auction hall, he had a smile of disdain on his face, as if he was looking down on ants.


    However, while this person was enjoying himself, there was someone that suddenly came into the room. This person quickly came up to the throne and fell to one knee as he said, "I have something to report."


    The person that had suddenlye into the room was the staff member that had led the way for Lin Fan and Murong Yue.


    As the person in the throne turned to look at the staff member, his face was revealed. It was no one else but Lei Feng who had organized this auction.


    He looked at the staff member before saying, "Go ahead."


    After receiving permission, that staff member stood up and came right up beside Lei Feng, whispering in his ear.


    As the staff member continued whispering, the expression on Lei Feng''s face turned darker and darker until there was a chill that seemed like it could freeze everyone that was released from him.


    That staff member couldn''t help swallowing the rest of his words and jumped back away from Lei Feng. His legs gave out under him and he started trembling as he looked on at Lei Feng with eyes filled with terror.


    He couldn''t help turning to the person who had been standing on the side the entire time.


    However, it was at this time that Lei Feng mmed his fist down on the armrest of his throne as he roared out, "I want someone sent in to watch them immediately! If you don''t tell me what''s happening in that room within the next minute, I will take your head!"


    The staff member immediately gave a tremble when he heard this and bowed his head to say something, but the other person in the room cut in.


    That person said, "Young master Lei, you can''t do this."


    When that person refuted him, Lei Feng immediately turned to look at that person with a dark look on his face as he asked, "Why not? This is the territory of my Thunder Sect isn''t it? Why can''t I do that?"


    That person gave a sigh before saying, "Young master Lei, you know why we can''t do this. There are no benefits to doing this."


    Lei Feng would have normally lost his temper with anyone else, but when facing this person, he fell into deep thought. Then after a while, he said, "Have someone watch over the entrance of their room and tell me if anything happens." Then he narrowed his eyes to look at the person who had been standing on the side and said, "Is that good enough for you."


    That person gave a nod before saying, "Thank you young master Lei."


    Lei Feng just gave a snort before turning back to look down on the hall, but it was clear from his expression that he was in a bad mood.


    That person rubbed his temple before waving his hand at the staff member, telling him to go take care of this matter.


    The staff member acted like he had just been pardoned as he gave a bow to that person before leaving the room.


    That person gave a sigh before sitting down in his own seat.


    That person was no one else other than Shi Yan.


    He really regretted not taking care of Lin Fan earlier, he never thought that this kid who he could have taken care of back in the Hunters Exam woulde to bite him in the butt after all this time.


    But that was just how it was.


    Sometimes the unexpected became a reality.


    ¡­


    Back in Lin Fan''s room, the two of them had been sitting there waiting for the auction to start.


    From time to time, Murong Yue''s eyes couldn''t help drifting to Lin Fan, sneaking a peek.


    As for Lin Fan, he was looking down at the people streaming into the hall.


    Since he had been in Harmony City for a while now, he had slowly been learning who was who, even if they were a small faction.


    Most of the people that came seemed to be from Harmony City, but there were also people that Lin Fan didn''t recognize, which meant that they were probably from other cities. As for which cities, that would depend on which one of the twelve great factions that they were under.


    Lin Fan also noticed that the Xu Family Head was here, but that was to be expected since Lin Fan was the one who told him toe after the Xu Family had received their invitation.


    After all, it would be too strange if the Xu Family didn''te and he didn''t want anyone knowing that they were working for him just yet. Well, anyone other than the Hunters Organization.<sub> </sub>


    As time passed, eventually the entire hall was filled and it was time to start the auction.


    When the auction started, the lights in the hall dimmed and there were stronger lights that appeared that illuminated the stage.


    From behind the curtain that was on the side of the stage, there was a beautiful girl with ice blue hair in an ice blue dress that came up onto the stage. She walked across the stage until she was in the center and then revealed a smile on that ice cold face of hers.


    It was like a flower that bloomed after a cold winter, weing the spring sun. It was so warm that it was even able to melt the coldest hearts.


    There were a few people under the stage that started to call out when they saw this.


    "Miss Shuang, I love you!"


    "Miss Shuang, please marry me!"


    Even Lin Fan couldn''t help staring at her in a daze for a bit when he saw her smile.


    That was until he felt a sudden pinch in his leg which caused him to turn to look at Murong Yue who had a hand outstretched. Seeing the slightly bitter look on her face, he was a bit confused, but then he asked, "Who is that?"


    Murong Yue gave a cough to calm herself before saying, "That''s Shuang Dong from the Golden Auction Hall. She''s the number one auctioneer in Harmony City, so hiring her isn''t cheap. It seems like the Thunder Sect has really gone all out with this auction."


    Lin Fan looked back down at her, but this time he looked at her with a different look in his eyes.


    For some reason, he felt that her smile was a bit lonely.


    After a small pause, Shuang Dong suddenly lifted the mic off the stand that was ced there and brought it to her lips. In a voice that was so sweet that it could even give people cavities, she said, "Wee one and all to the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect''s auction. I''m sure that you''ve been waiting a long time, so let''s get started."


    Then with a snap, there was a cart that was pushed out from the back to the center of the stage. Once it reached the center of the stage, the person who pushed it out lifted off the cloth covering it and revealed the contents.


    However, this wasn''t what everyone hade to buy, rather it was only a single herb that was ced on the cart.


    It was a single piece of normal looking ginseng, but in the center, there was a very realistic face that almost looked like it was screaming out in pain.


    Everyone was surprised at first, but they quickly understood what was happening.


    Lin Fan muttered under his breath, "So they''re building up tension first by bringing out smaller items¡­But this isn''t a bad item."


    Shuang Dong didn''t miss a beat as she said, "The first item that we have up for auction is a Human Faced Ginseng. This is a rare herb in the Child Soul Realm that has a strong nurturing effect¡­"


    She continued on to describe the effects of this herb before saying, "The starting price for this first item will be ten thousand low grade spirit stones. Please make your bid now!"


    There were people down below that immediately lifted their ques to make bids for this item.


    This was a Child Soul Realm Herb, for these lower grade families of Harmony City, this was not something that they could get that easily.


    Something like this was easy to get for the twelve great factions, but these weaker families only had experts that were barely in the Child Soul Realm at best. Most of these families didn''t even have a Child Soul Realm Expert, so how could they get a Child Soul Realm Herb?


    The price jumped up at irregr intervals because this was a free bid auction, but most of the increments were at least a hundred low grade spirit stones. Most of them were actually higher than a hundred low grade spirit stones.


    The price continued to climb until it reached around fifteen thousand low grade spirit stones, at which point the bids slowed down.


    After all, they were only lower grade families, which meant that they couldn''t spend too much on this side item. They all needed to save their wealth for the tokens that woulde outter.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan made his move.


    He tapped the button on the armrest of his chair and made his bid, "Eighteen thousand."


    Lin Fan directly increased the price by three thousand low grade spirit stones which was without a doubt arge blow for these lower families. Not to mention that they knew that these VIP seats were saved for people from the twelve great factions, so no one dared to go against them.


    But right after Lin Fan made a bid, there was another bid that rang out.


    "Eighteen thousand and one."

 Chapter 600 Auction (5)

    This bid came from another one of the VIP rooms.


    That meant that this bid came from another one of the twelve great factions.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t know which one since all of the VIP rooms had something blocking them.


    Not to mention that he hadn''t been able to recognize the different symbols that had been on the various doors. So he really didn''t know theyout the different factions had been ced in.


    After that bid had been made and seeing that no one else was making a bid, Shuang Dong knew that the situation was awkward, so she tried defusing the situation by saying, "It seems like VIP room 8 has made a bid for eighteen thousand and one low grade spirits stones. That''s the highest bid we''ve seen so far, so it''ll be eighteen thousand and one going once."


    Shuang Dong knew how insulting it was to increase the bid by only a single unit, but as a professional, she wasn''t going to let something like this trip her up.


    She quickly changed the topic back to the auction by pushing it forward with an auction chant and putting pressure on the first bidder to continue the bid.


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t make another bid, Shuang Dong pushed the bid to a second call.


    Lin Fan tapped his fingers on the armrest for a bit before finally pressing the button again, increasing his bid.


    "Eighteen thousand and five hundred."


    But before Shuang Dong could even acknowledge this bid, there was another bid that came in.


    "Eight thousand five hundred and one."


    Once again, it was an increment of only a single low grade spirit stone which made the scene very awkward.


    It was clear that someone up there was targeting the first person who bid, but no one dared toment since this was a matter that involved two of the twelve great factions.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but this time his hand came off the armrest.


    Since the other side was willing to go this far, he had no reason to keep going because it wasn''t necessary for him to win this item. The only reason that he had wanted it was to help Ang with her recovery once she came back, but there were plenty of other herbs that he could use for that.


    Seeing that there wasn''t another bid that came from the first bidder, Shuang Dong didn''t waste any time in locking down this first item.


    However, she could tell from the crowd that the mood wasn''t good because of what had just happened. But there was nothing she could do since she didn''t receive any instructions from the hosts.


    It seemed like they had just epted what had happened and were moving on from it without acknowledging it.


    Shuang Dong as a professional was naturally unhappy with this, but there was nothing she could do since this was the wish of the client. The only real thing she could do was continue to build up the mood of the crowd since that was also what the client wanted.


    It was also the reason why they were holding these auctions before the main items, they wanted to build up the tension of the crowd to make them bid higher for the main items.


    The next item was brought out as per Shuang Dong''s instructions and soon the atmosphere from the first auction item was forgotten. However, there wasn''t a single one of the VIP rooms that made a bid after that first auction item.


    In VIP room 8, Lei Feng sat on his throne with a smile on his face as he looked at VIP room 2 which was the room that Lin Fan and Murong Yue were sitting in.


    Unlike the rest of the people here, he as the organizer was naturally aware of who was sitting in which room. He knew immediately that it was Lin Fan who had bid for this since Murong Yue was from a family that didn''tck things like this.


    The mes of rage already burned inside him towards Lin Fan, so in his impulse, he had made that bid.


    Then when the second bid came from Lin Fan, he couldn''t just back down since he had already made that first bid. So without any hesitation he had made the second bid as well.


    Then when he didn''t see that third bid from Lin Fan, he couldn''t help feeling a bit disappointed since he wanted to keep stomping on Lin Fan with his bids. However, Lin Fan didn''t make a bid, so there was nothing he could do.


    After the auction for the first item was finished, Shi Yan said to him with knitted brows, "You shouldn''t have done that."


    Lei Feng gave a cold snort, but he didn''t say anything since he knew that Shi Yan was right.<sub> </sub>


    While it had felt good for him to do that, it had without a doubt damaged both the reputation of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect since they were the ones hosting this auction. For them to let this kind of behaviour slide, it really made others look down on them.


    Still, Lei Feng didn''t mind since there was nothing that they could do to them now, especially since their n was progressing as nned.


    Shi Yan had only said this to vent the slight bit of dissatisfaction that he felt, but he knew his ce and didn''t push his luck.


    Though it was clear that the rift had been created between the two of them.


    Shuang Dong didn''t miss a beat as she auctioned off several more items, while also stirring the crowd up slowly with the increasing rarity of the items. Of course, the effects weren''t as good with the incident of the first auction, but she was a professional without a doubt.


    During this time, there were five more items that were sold and surprisingly, the Xu Family had been able to buy one of them.


    The moment that the Xu Family made a bid, it was like there was an understanding between the other attendants of the auction and not a single person made a bid against them.


    As if she was working with them, Shuang Dong also quickly finished off the auction and sold the item to the Xu Family.


    Lin Fan knew that there must be something else at y, but for now, this was only secondary. This was something that he would have to deal with once the auction was over.


    The seventh item was something that Lin Fan was interested in again.


    "For the seventh item, it will be a rusted de that no one has been able to identify, but the de itself is stronger than any metal that has been found in this realm. Even a Nascent Soul Realm Expert wasn''t able to make a dent on this rusted de."


    As Shuang Dong said this, there were many skeptical looks in the crowd, but there were also some people who looked like they were interested.


    Shuang Dong knew that this wasn''t something that would sell for a lot, so she wanted to quickly sell this off and get to the next item which she considered a big seller.


    Shuang Dong quickly said, "The starting bid for this item will be one thousand low grade spirit stones."


    At first there was no one who made a bid, but then there were a few people who tentatively made bids.


    Of course, no one increased the price by more than ten spirit stones each time because to them, it was only worth that much. They had only bid just because they were curious about the de itself, it wasn''t as if they understood the value of the de.


    When the de reached eleven hundred, all bids stopped because no one else was willing to pay anymore. The person who had even made that bid for eleven hundred had only done it to make it more interesting. However, seeing that no one else was going to bid, that person couldn''t help feeling regret.


    Shuang Dong knew that this was the most that she could get for this, so she started counting it down, but then there was another bid that came in.


    "Twelve hundred."


    Everyone turned in the direction that the voice came from and saw that it was the Xu Family Head before revealing surprised looks.


    They never thought that the Xu Family Head would suddenly cut in here, but the person who had made the bid for eleven hundred let out a sigh of relief.


    No one said a single thing after the Xu Family Head made his bid and Shuang Dong also quickly finished off the sale by saying, "Twelve hundred going once, twelve hundred going twice, twelve hundred going thrice, and sold!"


    Then after closing the deal, Shuang Dong looked at the Xu Family Head with a bright smile.


    The Xu Family Head just responded with a nod in her direction and didn''t say anything else.


    Of course there was nothing else for him to say since it wasn''t him who had made the bid. He had nned on watching the fun when he suddenly received a message from Lin Fan.


    The message told him to win this rusty de and that Lin Fan would cover the cost required for it.


    The Xu Family Head had been confused why Lin Fan had suddenly sent him this message, but he didn''t think too much as he made his bid.


    Lin Fan had given him the right to choose how much to bid, but he didn''t want to bid too much since it wasn''t his money, so he chose the safest amount that would scare off everyone else and it had worked in the end.

 Chapter 601 Auction (6)

    However, it wasn''tpletely peaceful in the auction hall after the Xu Family Head made a bid.


    In VIP room 8, there was another struggle that happened between Lei Feng and Shi Yan.


    "Young master Lei, you can''t do that! If you keep doing this, it will ruin the auction!" Shi Yan said as he firmly held onto Lei Feng''s hand to prevent him from pressing the button to make a bid.


    Lei Feng didn''t even spare him a nce as he stared at VIP room 2 without blinking.


    It had only been a few days since Lei Feng had started investigating Lin Fan with all his forces and it didn''t take him long to figure out that the Xu Family was working for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had hidden many things about his involvement with the Xu Family, but there were still a few members of the One Shadow Organization that he missed. Through those people, Lei Feng had learned that the Xu Family was working with Lin Fan.


    As for the reason why he had contact with the One Shadow Organization, he had been watching them for some time because they had something that he wanted. After the Xu Family defeated the One Shadow Organization and took everything from them, the thing that he wanted was now in the hands of the Xu Family.


    Since the Xu Family had suddenly made a bid, he knew that it had to be Lin Fan making a bid through them because of what happenedst time.


    That was why he wanted to immediately make a bid to suppress them.


    However, Shi Yan wouldn''t let him do that for two different reasons.


    The first was naturally to preserve the auction.


    If they as the organizers allowed people to randomly bid and suppress people in the auction, naturally they would lose face. Not to mention that doing this would damper the mood of the auction, which would ruin the effect that they wanted to achieve.


    Second, it was because they had ns for the Xu Family already.


    That was why the Xu Family had won their bid so easily the first time.


    The unspoken rule was that after the auction, anything went. If you were able to return safely, then the matter was over, but if you couldn''t¡­There was nothing else to say in that situation.


    They had let the Xu Family win a bid just so they could take advantage of this unspoken rule.


    Seeing that Lei Feng wasn''t saying anything, Shi Yan quickly added, "We''ll take care of the Xu Family after the auction, so just hold in your anger for now. Not to mention, if he really is working with the Xu Family, he wouldn''t just watch as they¡­"


    Hearing this, Lei Feng''s expression rxed a bit.


    He knew that Shi Yan was right, if the Xu Family was working with Lin Fan, they would definitely ask him for help if they were in danger. After all, that was the basis of any cooperation.


    Shi Yan saw his expression rx and he quickly added, "I''ll personally take action this time so that nothing will go wrong. That should be enough for you, right, young master Lei?"


    Lei Feng''s expression rxed even more when he heard this.


    Even if he didn''t show it, he had to admit that Shi Yan was good at getting things done, even if sometimes some ns ended in failure.


    Thest assassination n had failed because the Hunters Organization had interfered, but when carrying out the n, Shi Yan had made sure that everything in ce. It was just bad luck that they had failed.


    Now that Shi Yan was saying that he was personally acting, Lei Feng felt a bit more reassured.


    After a pause, Lei Feng raised his hand away from the buttons to make a bid and said in a cold voice, "Make sure to bring me his head."


    Shi Yan let out a sigh of relief when he heard this before sitting back down and saying, "Rx, I''m going personally. It''ll be easy."


    Lei Feng didn''t say anything and just gave a nod in response to this.


    This had all happened earlier before Shuang Dong received an order in her earpiece to quickly sell off the de to the Xu Family.


    The Xu Family Head knew that something was off, but he sat there with a calm look on his face. His hands however were anything but calm as he quickly sent a message to Lin Fan.


    However, the message that he received back was one that made him knit his brows.


    "Act normal."<sub> </sub>


    Just two simple words.


    How could the Xu Family Head act normal when he knew that there was a plot at y?


    Still, since Lin Fan had said this, he had no other choice.


    He knew that Lin Fan had other ns, so the only thing he could do was y his part.


    ? The auction continued on and soon it had been an hour since the auction had started.


    During this time, there had been over twenty items that were sold, but not a single one was the item that everyone hade here for.


    After waiting for an hour, there were people that were starting to get impatient and began whispering to the people sitting beside them.


    Shuang Dong had a very sharp pair of ears as that was required for her to read the mood of the crowd. She could hear the whispers that were passing through the crowd and knew that the time was right.


    After selling the item that had been taken out, she gave a nod to the staff member that was bringing the item back into storage. The staff member immediately understood what she meant since this was coordinated between them and quickly headed off into the back.


    After that staff member was gone, Shuang Dong announced, "We will now be taking a short five minute break to prepare the next item, but I can tell everyone that it is the item that you have all been waiting for."


    Then without saying another word, Shuang Dong gave a bow to the crowd and headed into the back as the lights came back on in the hall.


    Intermissions like this could be considered normal since the auction had already been going for over an hour, but everyone knew what this intermission was really for. No one left their seats, but no one talked to each other either as they all started making calls.


    Everyone even red at each other with hostility, like they were enemies that were about to fight each other.


    Well, that wouldn''t be the wrong way to describe it because they were technically enemies that would be fighting over the next auction.


    Everyone could understand what Shuang Dong had meant by "the item that you have all been waiting for", since their goals were the same ining to this auction. It was clearly the Ancient Era Ruin token that wasing up for auction next.


    There were twenty in total, but everyone knew that this first one would be the one that would be the most contested, while also being the cheapest.


    Each token sold meant that there was one less token that was avable. As more and more tokens became unavable and the amount of tokens left diminished, it would make people more and more desperate.


    When people were desperate, it was hard to guess what they would do.


    Some people might even go all in and increase the price far beyond their limits.


    Not to mention that everyone knew that there were the twelve great factions backing people in the crowd. Once the twelve great factions made their move, it wouldn''t be their ce to stand on stage anymore. The price would reach a level that they wouldn''t even dare imagine.


    So everyone started making calls to check how much funds their family members had been able to procure and see if they could procure more funds during this time. After all, every single spirit stone would help.


    Five minutes passed much slower for these people who were tensepared to the people in the VIP rooms. They weren''t as worried as much since they had already prepared everything, they had taken the upper limit of what their factions could take out without anyone getting suspicious, so they wouldn''t be able to take out more money even if they wanted to.


    The only thing they could do now was hope that the other factions hadn''t taken out more money than them.


    Of course, the two factions that everyone was most worried about were the Alchemy King Hall and the Tamers Guild.


    It wasn''t an exaggeration to say that their businesses were the most lucrative out of the all of the twelve great factions, so they were the ones that had the most assets. That meant that they would be able to move more money outpared to the other factions.


    But their one downside was that they were neutral factions and didn''t have as many families under them as the other factions.


    So even if they had more money, they had less people to bid and that meant less tokens to win.


    No faction was willing to let one of the families under them win more than one token because that would seem too suspicious, so the less people they had, the less people they had that could make bids.


    Finally the five minutes passed and the lights dimmed again before Shuang Dong appeared on the stage.


    She looked over the crowd and seeing the tension that was there, she revealed a smile.

 Chapter 602 Auction (7)

    After a deliberate pause, Shuang Dong brought the microphone to her mouth to say, "Ladies and gentleman, it''s the moment that you have all been waiting for."


    Then with a wave of her hand, there was a staff member that came out with a pillow in their hands with a cloth over it.


    That staff member walked over to center stage where Shuang Dong was standing and with a single neat motion, she pulled off the cloth to reveal the token that was hidden underneath.


    As she removed it, she also said, "We will now be starting the auction of the Ancient Era Ruin tokens."


    After that moment of flourish, she dropped the cloth in the hand of the staff member before turning to the crowd to say, "Before we start, I will exin the rules of this auction to everyone."


    She gave another deliberate pause before saying, "The tokens will be sold individually and they will be sold in batches of five before other items will be auctioned in between them. The price for each token will be five hundred thousand low grade spirit stones and each bid increment must be at least ten thousand low grade spirit stones. There will only be ten seconds after a bid is made before the item is sold, so please be sure to bid as soon as you can."


    Everyone fell deep into thought when they heard this.


    Each one of these rules had a deeper meaning, but in the end, it was all done to make more money for the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    The first rule, the rule about the tokens being sold in batches of five, the main reason for that was to give people time in between the token auctions to prepare more funds. As more tokens were sold, the price would naturally increase and people would need more funds.


    This break would give the people participating enough time to gather more funds, but the key thing was that they didn''t state an approximate time for this break. Without knowing how long they had, some people might even get desperate when the amount of tokens decreased.


    Some might even sell off their businesses at a lower price than what it was worth just to get that extra infusion of cash.


    But this was also what some of the smaller families wanted to see.


    After all, for the smaller families, even if they got the token, they wouldn''t be able to do anything with them since their geniuses weren''t strong enough to use them. For these smaller families, the most they could do with the token was sell it to a stronger family for a higher price when the time to enter the Ancient Era Ruins came.


    For them, being able to buy these businesses at a low price was something that was very good for them.


    There was no doubt that the entire economy of Harmony City would change today¡­


    But that was all to help the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect fleece more spirit stones out of them.


    The second rule was to make sure that no one pulled the same trick as before, increasing the price by only a single spirit stone since that would be nothing more than a stall tactic, which was thest thing the organizers wanted to do as seen by the third rule.


    The most important thing about the second rule was that the minimum bid increase was ten thousand low grade spirits stones which wasn''t a small amount. Each increase would definitely push the price more and more out of the range of the normal bidders.


    But that didn''t matter to the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect since that meant they would make more spirit stones.


    Then there was the third rule which was that the bid would onlyst ten seconds before it was sold. This was very simply a time limit that would put pressure on the people that would bid, making them think irrationally and make them bid impulsively.


    All of these rules were just ways for the auctioneer to force the bidders to bid higher.


    Still, there was nothing they could do since they were the ones that wanted the token.


    Shuang Dong had paused again just to build tension and to let the rules sink in, but once she saw everyone''s expression change, she continued to say, "We''ll now be auctioning off the first token, so everyone please get ready and don''t regret anything."


    After she said that, she went on to start the auction.


    As soon as the auction for the first token began, the price began flying up.


    The base price was set at five hundred thousand, but it didn''t take long before it was already at a million and that was with increments of ten thousand each time. After all, no one wanted to increase it too much since they wanted to win it as cheaply as possible.


    Even after the price had reached a million, it still didn''t stop climbing.


    It climbed at the same rate until it reached two million. It was only then that the bids started slowing down, but that didn''t mean that all bids had stopped.


    There were a few families that were quite adamant about getting this first token and it had devolved into a bidding war between them. However, they were picked off one by one as they ran out of funds until there were only two people bidding.<sub> </sub>


    Just with the two of them, they were able to push the price all the way up to three million.


    Once it reached that three million price range, one of the two family heads started to hesitate and he was bidding at the veryst second each time.


    When it was raised by another two hundred thousand, the one that was hesitating finally couldn''t take it anymore and had no choice but to give up.


    It was just like that that the first token was sold for 3.2 million. Or it would have been if someone didn''t snipe it at the veryst second.


    "3.5 million."


    The family head who had thought that he had won was already bragging, but he stopped in the middle of his words the moment that he heard this. He quickly turned to look in the direction that the voice came from and he saw a cloaked figure that was sitting in the middle of the hall.


    That family head wanted to say something, but remembering that this was the territory of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, he swallowed his words.


    After a few seconds of gritting his teeth and hesitating on whether to bid or not, he finally made his decision as he said, "Three million five hundred and ten thou¡­"


    Before he could even finish, the cloaked figure cut right in and said, "Four million."


    The family head had a look of shock and hidden grievance on his face as he looked at the cloaked figure, but the cloaked figure didn''t pay him any attention at all. The cloaked figure was just staring at Shuang Dong who was also staring at him with a surprised look.


    She didn''t know where this cloaked figure came from, but someone who could throw down this kind of money was definitely suspicious. There were only two exnations for this.


    One was that he was someone hired by the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect to deliberately raise the price and two, he was someone who was here to cause trouble.


    It couldn''t be the first exnation since she hadn''t been told about this by the people who hired her, so that meant that it could only be the second option.


    However, there wasn''t anything being said in her earpiece, so she really didn''t know what to do.


    But then there was a voice that said, "It''s fine, continue with the auction."


    The moment that she heard this, Shuang Dong immediately said, "Four million going once!"


    Everyone had thought that Shuang Dong would have this cloaked figure escorted out or at least have someone investigate him, but they never expected her to continue with the auction right away.


    Many people even became suspicious that they were working together.


    The count onlysted ten seconds and no one else made a bid, so Shuang Dong dered that the cloaked figure was the winner. However, there wasn''t a willing face in the audience.


    Everyone doubted that the cloaked figure even had the ability to pay this amount and that they had all been scammed by the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    Shuang Dong as a professional could naturally see this, but she acted like nothing was wrong as she was about to start the second auction.


    However, before she could, the family head that had just lost the auction couldn''t take it as he shouted, "Wait, I want to raise aint!"


    Shuang Dong had just taken a breath and was about to speak, but hearing what this family head said, she swallowed those words and quickly changed them up by saying, "This sir, what do you want toin about?"


    The family head pointed at the cloaked figure without any politeness and said, "I want you to investigate if this person can even afford to pay this much! If not, then this auction is nothing more than a sham!"


    Shuang Dong''s face turned dark as she looked at the family head and said, "Are you doubting our credibility?"


    The family head immediately reined himself back as he realized how rude he had been and where he was, so he quickly said, "Miss Shuang, I''m just worried that this brat is someone sent here to cause trouble for you all."


    Shuang Dong gave a cold snort, but she didn''t bother arguing with him as she looked at the cloaked figure, silently agreeing with his argument.

 Chapter 603 Auction (8)

    The cloaked figure naturally understood what was being implied, but he didn''t panic at all as he calmly stood up.


    He looked at the family head who couldn''t help flinching back as he felt a chill run down his spine.


    Then after a moment of silence, the cloaked figure waved his hand to make something appear.


    This was something that he pulled out of his Storage Ring and it was something that immediately shocked everyone.


    It was a spirit stone that was the size of his hand,pletely covering it as he held it. It was so big that he almost couldn''t hold it with just a single hand.


    Without any hesitation, he threw it onto the ground before bringing out three more spirit stones that were exactly the same. All of them were thrown onto the ground before he just looked at the crowd in front of him without saying a word.


    The only thing that met his gaze were looks ofplete shock.


    It wasn''t hard for them to recognize what this was, it was a spirit stone, but the shocking thing was the grade of the spirit stone.


    Low grade spirit stones were small enough to fit in the palm of the hand and higher grade spirit stones would get bigger and bigger as the concentration of energy in them increased.


    This was a spirit stone that was almost too big to hold in the hand, so one could imagine just how much life energy was contained within it.


    A spirit stone of this size had another name, it was a peak grade spirit stone!


    As a spirit stone of a higher grade, the value of the spirit stone would also be much higher.


    There were four grades of spirit stone in total, going from low, to medium, to high, and finally to peak grade.


    Each increment had a set value for how many lower grade spirit stones they were equal to, which was one hundred. For example, one hundred low grade spirit stones equaled one medium spirit stone, or one hundred medium spirit stones equaling a high spirit stone.


    The exchange rate from a peak spirit stone to low grade spirits stones was one to one million.


    However, the key thing was that were peak spirit stones that easy to find?


    No, peak spirit stones were one of the rarest things to find and even the twelve great factions didn''t have many of them. So while the exchange rate was set at one million low grade spirit stones to one peak grade spirit stone, no one would really be able to get a peak spirit stone for just a million low grade spirit stones.


    Or rather, no one was dumb enough to trade a peak grade spirit stone for just a million low grade spirit stones.


    But then there was this cloaked figure that came out of nowhere who had thrown down four peak grade spirit stones out like they were nothing.


    Everyone couldn''t help bing suspicious, but no one doubted the legitimacy of the spirit stones since they could feel the auraing from them. This wasn''t something that could be faked.


    The cloaked figure throwing out four peak grade spirit stones like this was like a p across the face of not just the family head, but also the ones that hosted the auction since they were ones that had supported the family head in casting doubt on the cloaked figure.


    Shuang Dong was a master at controlling her emotions and she immediately red at the family head that had spoken since it was his fault that she was in this mess now. After a pause, she nodded at the staff member beside her to catch their attention before saying, "Send someone to escort this person out."


    The staff member was surprised, but then they gave a nod before speaking into their earpiece.


    Then without missing a beat, she turned to the cloaked figure and said, "We would like to apologize to this sir for doubting you. We acknowledge your bid and confirm that you are indeed the winner of the first auction."


    No one dared to say a thing at this time since anyone who was able to pull out peak grade spirit stones like this definitely wasn''t a normal person.


    They were already afraid that they had offended this person and if they were to say anything else, they would just be making it worse.


    However, there were many people who secretly sent messages to their people to watch this person when he left the auctionter. After all, even if they couldn''t be the one who would offend him, there would be people who would want to take his token.


    When the time came, it wouldn''t be toote for them to y the role of the oriole behind the mantis stalking the cicada.


    Security quickly came to escort the family head who had made a fuss out.


    He naturally tried his best to resist because he believed that as long as he was here, he still had a chance to win a token with the amount of funds that he had prepared. It was just too bad that Shuang Dong wouldn''t give him that chance after the fuss that he had made.<sub> </sub>


    It had even harmed her reputation as the number one auctioneer in Harmony City, so naturally she wouldn''t show mercy to this family head. Especially since there was the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect behind her.


    The family head even tried fighting back, but the guards in the auction house were people sent by the Thunder Sect, so they were guards in the Child Soul Realm. The family head was someone who was barely in the Embryo Soul Realm, so naturally he wasn''t able to resist at all as he was quickly incapacitated and carried out.


    Once he was escorted out, the peace came back to the auction hall.


    Shuang Dong had nned on bringing out the next token right away to make up for the disruption, but there was another disruption that suddenly came.


    The cloaked figure gave a cough and then said, "Then can I pay for that item now and leave?"


    Everyone turned to look at the cloaked figure with a shocked look since they never expected him to be this blunt about it.


    It wasmon sense to wait until the end of the auction to settle ounts before getting the item, but this person didn''t care about that at all. Instead he wanted to pay for the item directly and then leave.


    Wasn''t this just too arrogant?


    He was interrupting the auction just to say this.


    Did that mean that he valued his own time more than everyone else''s time?


    There were people from all twelve of the great factions here today, he was simply insulting them all right to their faces.


    Shuang Dong had a very awkward look on her face when she heard this, but this time she didn''t rush into it since she had messed up thest time, so she was starting to doubt her own judgement.


    The normal thing to do would be to reject this proposal and continue with the auction, but she really couldn''t help feeling that there was something off with this cloaked figure.


    When she was at a loss as to what to do, there was a voice that suddenly came from her earpiece that said, "Just send someone to bring him to the back to pay and continue the auction."


    It was like she had been pardoned as her face lit up.


    She turned to the staff member who hade out after bringing security over and the staff member also gave her a nod since they had received the same message.


    As the staff member moved over to where the cloaked figure was standing, Shuang Dong said, "Please follow this staff member into the back and pay for your item."


    Then without giving it any more attention, she gave a snap as the lights turned off again and there was another staff member that came out with a pillow in hand.


    Once that staff member came to the center of the stage, Shuang Dong lifted off the cloth on the pillow in one smooth motion to reveal the token sitting underneath. As soon as she did, she turned back to say, "Now, let''s begin the auction for the second token. We will be following the same rules as before, so everyone please get ready."


    One this happened, everyone turned their attention back to the auction.


    The staff member came over to where the cloaked figure was and after saying a few words, they led the cloaked figure out one of the exits and closed the door behind them.


    As they left, there were a few people who gave nods to the people sitting beside them and then those people also left.


    It seemed that there were still some people that had intentions towards the token that the cloaked figure had just won.


    As for the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect, naturally they wouldn''t miss out on this after everything that had happened.


    The staff member that was leading the cloaked figure to the exchange desk, they had also been given other instructions.


    But for the people left in the auction hall, that wasn''t their concern right now.


    They had assigned people to watch the cloaked figure and there were people who didn''t get involved, so all they could do now was focus on the token that was being auctioned.


    It didn''t take long before this token quickly climbed up in price as well.

 Chapter 604 Auction (9)

    Even if this token quickly increased in price, once it hit the three million mark, the same thing happened as before where there were only a few people bidding for it.


    This time, instead of two family heads, it was three different family heads.


    None of them seemed willing to give up, but it was clear by the difficult looks on their faces that none of them couldst much longer. For heads of small families like this, three million really was pushing their limits.


    In the end, it didn''t reach four million like the first auction, but it still reached 3.5 million after a family head decided to go all in and increase the price by three hundred thousand.


    That move had been enough to scare off the other two family heads and win the bid in the end, but the family head that won looked like he had lost more than he had won¡­


    All three of them looked like they wanted to cry.


    Just like this, the other three tokens were quickly sold, creating plenty of joy and sadness.


    Right after thest of the first batch of tokens were sold, there were more treasures that were brought out to be sold. These treasures didn''t lose in valuepared to the ones that had been brought out before the first batch of tokens, rather they were much more valuable.


    It seemed like the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect really were going all out with this auction.


    Thest item that was even sold before the next batch of tokens was actually a peak Embryo Soul Realm Artifact!


    Something at this level would normally be enough to drive an auction in Harmony City by itself, but today it was ying nothing more than a supporting role.


    Even if people felt that the auction was mismanaged because of the incidents that happened before, they still had to admire how rich the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were.


    The second batch of tokens was sold at a much higher pricepared to the first batch.


    Everyone was desperate since they knew that once these were gone, there would only be ten tokens left.


    But the main reason they were desperate was because they knew that the families under the twelve great factions hadn''t acted yet.


    Once this batch was over, those families would definitely join the fighting and once they did, with the financing the twelve great factions gave them, these normal families wouldn''t be able topete.


    As for why those families under the twelve great factions didn''t act, they were just following an unspoken rule. After all, they couldn''t be too greedy and ruin their reputation.


    They were powerful factions, but that didn''t mean they were strong enough to dominate the entire world themselves. They still needed others, so they had to at least share some benefits to keep them in line.


    For this batch of tokens, the highest priced token was thest one sold. The price had even broken five million and came close to reaching six million.


    It would have reached it if one of the two family heads didn''t finally crack under the pressure and couldn''t help giving up.


    For that family head, he had already gone past his limit a million low grade spirit stones ago and he was only going with pure adrenaline alone. However, adrenaline wasn''t enough to carry him to the finish line since there was the voice of reason inside of him.


    If he really went any further, he wouldn''t have been able to pay for it even if he sold the possessions of every member of his family.


    The only way he would be able to pay off the token would be to get a loan, but he was also certain that no one would give him that loan. After all, the moment that he won the token, not only would it be like putting a target on his back, it would be like putting a target on the back of every member of his family¡­


    With a heavy heart from all these thoughts, he had no choice but to give it up.


    When he did, it also caused a heavy feeling to fill the hearts of all the normal family heads and organization leaders that were here.


    They knew that once thisst token was sold, it was no longer their ce topete for the rest of the tokens.


    From this moment forth, it would be apetition between the twelve great factions, or rather it would be apetition between the families and organizations that were under them.


    With the small businesses that they had in hand, how could theypare to the finances of the twelve great factions that ruled over this upper realm?


    At the very least, there were other items that were brought up to auction.<sub> </sub>


    The Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect really didn''t hold back with this auction.


    They had already been surprised when they saw the Peak Embryo Soul Realm Artifact, but that wasn''t actually the end. In this round of items, there were actually two more Peak Embryo Soul Realm Artifacts and even a Low Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    The Low Child Soul Realm Artifact was something that hadn''t been sold in auction for over a thousand years now.


    Whenever one of these were found, they would be immediately taken by one of the twelve great factions and given to their juniors. These lower tier families would never have the chance to evene in contact with these things.


    But now there was one that had appeared in front of them, causing them to go wild.


    In the end, the price for the Low Child Soul Realm Artifact didn''t pale inparison to the token. In fact, the price that the Low Child Soul Realm Artifact sold for was even higher than the highest priced token.


    At the very end, there were four different organizations that werepeting and none of them seemed to back down. That was until one of them pushed the price up by an entire million to reach eight million low grade spirit stones.


    At that point, the other bidders all revealed bitter looks as they had no choice but to give up on this Low Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    However, the person who won didn''t have a bitter look on his face when he won this artifact like the ones who had won the tokens previously.


    This artifact was something that could directly increase their power instead of giving them a chance to find better items in the ruins, ruins that would require them to risk their lives. Compared to that chance, having this artifact in hand was definitely the better choice for these smaller families.


    However, the new price record set by this Low Child Soul Realm Artifact didn''tst long since it was time for the bidding of the next batch of tokens.


    Even the Hunters Organization had given each of the families under them ten million spirit stones each and they were one of the poorer organizations.


    Most of their money went to services for their members since that was the kind of organization that they were.


    It was hard to imagine what some of the richer factions like the Alchemy King Hall or the Tamers Guild would give their bidders.


    As soon as the auction for the first token of this third batch started, the price immediately jumped up over five million and showed no signs of slowing down.


    It was only when the price broke the ten million mark that there were less bids that came in.


    The reason for that was that what most factions had done was the same as the Hunters Organization, splitting their funds between the organizations under them. When they did this, most of them gave them around ten million since they had thought that would be enough for most of them to get a token or two. Then when it was necessary, they could shift money between the different organizations so that they couldpete.


    Of course, the main reason was because they didn''t fully trust the organizations under them, so they wouldn''t give them more than ten million spirit stones.


    Ten million spirit stones was an eptable loss for them since they wouldn''t have time to track down these organizations during the auction.


    So when it reached the ten million mark, most of the organizations made bids much slower because they were waiting for instructions from their contacts within the twelve great factions.


    At the same time, the contacts at the twelve great factions didn''t immediately give the orders to make the bids because they wanted to scope out the other people from the twelve great factions.


    Nevertheless, the price for the token still steadily climbed until it reached eleven million, twelve million, and finally thirteen million.


    It was at this point that there were only three people fighting over it and none of them were from the Hunters Organization.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head with a faint smile as he saw the frustrated look on Murong Yue''s face.


    At the end of the auction, the ten tokens were all sold for over ten million spirit stones, with thest one reaching twenty million spirit stones.


    But for the Hunters Organization, they hadn''t been able to get a single one of those tokens.


    Lin Fan had been watching the whole time and he knew that it was for one single reason, which was that Murong Yue wasn''t bold enough with her bids.

 Chapter 605 Night Hunting (1)

    Every bid, there was a certain amount that she would stop at since she wanted to save money for the next bid.


    Even at the end, when there was only thest token left, she wouldn''t go past eighteen million since she didn''t want to transfer the funds between the organizations under the Hunters Organization since it would be too ''suspicious''.


    Lin Fan understood where she came from since eight million spirits stones definitely wasn''t a small amount, but he still couldn''t help giving a sigh over how meek she was when it came to bidding.


    Compared to her usual confident self, it seemed like she was apletely different person.


    But that was her and the Hunters Organization''s problem.


    The only reason that he had been brought along was as a cover for Murong Yue and to annoy Lei Feng, there was no doubt that he had aplished this.


    While the person outside thought that he could hide himself, Lin Fan had noticed him the moment that he appeared.


    The fact that Lei Feng had assigned someone to watch their room meant that he had been properly angered, but the fact that he didn''t do more meant that he was still in the safe zone.


    After the auction was over, Murong Yue offered Lin Fan a ride home, but he decisively declined it since he still had other matters to take care of.


    Just like how everyone else had other ns after the auction, Lin Fan also had his own ns.


    He knew that the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect would be targeting the Xu Family. After all, the way that the Xu Family Head had won the items that he had bid for, there was no doubt that there was some interference from the back.


    But the Xu Family wasn''t close to the Thunder Sect or the True Spirit Sect, so why would they help the Xu Family for no reason?


    One reason was to get closer to the Xu Family through this kindness, but that wouldn''t make sense since the Xu Family, the Thunder Sect, and the True Spirit Sect weren''t even on the same level. The Xu Family was an ant on the ground and both the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sects were giants that could crush that ant at any time.


    There was no need for them to make the first move to approach the Xu Family.


    So the second reason was that they wanted to take advantage of the unspoken rule after the auction to make a move against the Xu Family.


    They would let the Xu Family take the item and then send people to attack them, taking the item from them. Or rather, the more important thing was to silence the Xu Family group forever.


    After all, des had no eyes in the darkness of the night.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan wouldn''t just let his subordinates be taken out that easily.


    Murong Yue naturally had her own matters to take care of and she could guess what Lin Fan was nning on doing, but she had already heard about his power, so she wasn''t that worried. When she looked carefully, she could even feel a sense of danger that came from him, which told her that he definitely wasn''t someone she could look down on.


    After separating from the auction hall, Lin Fan quickly made his way through the city to meet up with the Xu Family group.


    Along the way, he had quickly changed out of the suit and into dark clothes with a cloak to hide himself. The Xu Family group had done the same as they were all covered in a cloak.


    As soon as they met up, they didn''t waste any time with words before quickly making their way through the street back to the Xu Manor, but naturally things wouldn''t end that easily.


    Speaking of this, Lin Fan could even hear faint sounds all around them,ing from different parts of the city. It seemed like there were people engaging in this business all over the city¡­


    As for the Xu Family group, when they were several kilometers away from the auction house and getting close to the Xu Manor, they suddenly felt that something was off.


    For one thing, there was no one in the streets around them.


    To avoid falling into any traps, they had been going on the main roads and there had been plenty of people around. However, the moment that they turned the corner, they found that the road ahead had beenpletely abandoned. Even when they turned around, they found that the road that they had just been on which was filled with people had suddenly been emptied.


    There was no doubt that there was someone who wanted to make a move against them.


    However, to be able to clear out all the people on a main street this quickly, there was no doubt that the peopleing after them weren''t weak. In fact, probably only a faction at the level of the twelve great factions could do something like this.


    As for which one it was, it wasn''t hard for Lin Fan to guess.


    After all, there were two factions that were behind the auction where the trap had been set.<sub> </sub>


    Once they saw this strange phenomenon, the Xu Family Head immediately turned to Lin Fan who shook his head to show that he didn''t know what was going on either.


    Seeing this, the Xu Family Head immediately said to everyone else, "Gather around and form a circle formation. Keep your eyes out for anyone thates and prepare to fight at any moment."


    Hearing this, the Xu Family members immediately formed a circle with their backs to each other so that they had vision of everything around them.


    As for Lin Fan and the Xu Family Head, they stood in the center of the formation just waiting for the enemies to arrive.


    Well, waiting wasn''t the right way to describe it.


    Lin Fan had called Brainy from the store through the pet storage space. Since the store was managed by the system, Brainy was able to directly enter the pet storage space from the store and then appear when Lin Fan called her.


    Brainy was wrapped up on Lin Fan''s arm during this time and controlling the scouts that it had released to check the surrounding area.


    With Brainy''s improved abilities, she was able to control even more puppets by splitting her spiritual senses even more, allowing her to quickly find the enemies.


    There were ten of them in total that were dressed in ck and there was one that was dressed in pure red.


    They had thempletely surrounded and they were just watching the Xu Family group from the rooftops, as if they were looking at their prey. From the way they were standing, it didn''t seem like they would be making a move.


    Rather it almost seemed like they were looking for someone as the figure in red carefully looked over the Xu Family group.


    However, after a few minutes, the red figure shook his head as if he was disappointed in something before giving the order for the rest of the people in ck to attack.


    Once the figures in ck received this order, they immediately jumped off the roof and surrounded the Xu Family group.


    The moment that they appeared, the Xu Family group became tense because they could feel the auraing from the people around them.


    Even if they had be stronger from the resources that Lin Fan gave them, most of them were still in the Fragmented Soul Realm. As for the people that were currently surrounding them, all of them were in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    They had the advantage in numbers, but that didn''t mean a thing when it came to fighting experts that were much stronger than them.


    But after looking at Lin Fan and seeing that he was still calm, they no longer felt as tense as before.


    They had been with Lin Fan for some time and had gone through a few experiences with him. Every single time, Lin Fan had always been calm and every single time, he had single handedly taken care of every problem.


    Seeing that he was just as calm this time, it was clear that he had a solution as well and there was nothing that they needed to worry about.


    Once the ck figures appeared, Lin Fan gave a nod to the Xu Family Head who gave a nod back in return before asking, "Who are you all? What are you doing here?"


    The people in ck didn''t say anything as they just slowly moved forward until they had thempletely surrounded. They didn''t leave a single spot for the Xu Family members to escape from.


    Only then did the figure in red finally appear in front of the Xu Family Head.


    He took a look at Lin Fan''s cloaked figure before turning to the Xu Family Head and saying, "Hand over the items that you won at the auction and maybe we''ll spare you."


    The Xu Family Head gave a cold snort when he heard this before saying, "After you''ve done all this, do you really think that I would believe you?"


    The red figure gave augh before saying, "You''re free to believe what you want¡­" Then his voice turned cold as he released his aura, "But do you really think that you''ll be able to get away?"


    A chill ran down the backs of everyone from the Xu Family the moment that they felt this aura.


    This was an aura that far surpassed any aura that they felt before. It was even hard for those in the Fragmented Soul Realm to remain standing under this aura since it was an aura that crossed two major realms.


    Child Soul Realm!


    They were certain that this was an expert in the Child Soul Realm!

 Chapter 606 Night Hunting (2)

    However, this didn''t make any sense at all.


    Why would a Child Soul Realm Expert specificallye after them?


    Their family head was barely in the Embryo Soul Realm and the rest of them were in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Even if they had bought something valuable at the auction, it shouldn''t have been valuable enough to spur a Child Soul Realm Expert to act.


    As these thoughts passed through their minds, they couldn''t help thinking of the same thing.


    At the same time, all the members of the Xu Family turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan on the other hand found it funny the moment that he had felt this aura since it was an aura that he was familiar with.


    It seemed like the idiom was true, enemies really did meet on a narrow path.


    This was an aura that thest time he felt was being used to threaten him, or rather it would have been used to threaten him if someone hadn''t interrupted them.


    There was no doubt that this aura belonged to Shi Yan.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see Shi Yan leading this team because he never thought that Shi Yan would act personally. But since Shi Yan was personally acting, it seemed like they were putting quite the importance on this ambush.


    Was it because of the Xu Family?


    No, that wouldn''t make sense at all¡­


    It was because of him.


    It was because he had angered Lei Feng and Shi Yan had been sent to deal with this mess.


    They were targeting the Xu Family because of their rtion with him or maybe because of another reason, but they were targeting the Xu Family for sure. Since they knew that the Xu Family was rted to him, then that means that they were most likely expecting him to save the Xu Family¡­


    So Shi Yan personally took action to deal with him, to pay him back for the exam and to help Lei Feng take care of his "love rival".


    As for why they felt that this alone was enough, Lin Fan was still only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm and even if he was a genius, they didn''t believe that he would be strong enough to cross a major realm to fight someone in the Child Soul Realm. Not to mention that Shi Yan was a genius himself and he could also cross realms to fight experts with higher cultivation.


    Seeing the shocked looks on the faces of the Xu Family members, Shi Yan revealed a smile under his mask.


    After a period of being stunned, the Xu Family Head came back from his daze and looked at Shi Yan to say, "Why are you doing this?"


    Shi Yan just said in a cold voice, "me the side that you''ve chosen and the one you chose to work for."


    Then after a pause, he added, "But if you call the one you work for over now, I can consider sparing you."


    Lin Fan found this even funnier the moment he heard this.


    It seemed like Shi Yan hadn''t been able to see through his disguise at all.


    Lin Fan was wrapped up in the cloak and he had restrained his aura to the level of the Low Fragmented Soul Realm with his special physique. He could havepletely restrained his aura, but a person without an aura was more suspicious than someone who was only in the Low Fragmented Soul Realm.


    The Xu Family Head was surprised to hear this, but his brain reacted quickly as he stopped himself from looking at Lin Fan.


    Instead he asked, "What grudge do you have against him?"


    Shi Yan''s voice turned cold as he said, "That isn''t for you to worry about." Then after another pause, he asked, "Are you going to do it or not?"


    The Xu Family Head paused as if he was thinking before he said, "Can you guarantee that you''ll let us go if I do this?"


    Shi Yan just gave a chuckle before saying, "I''m giving you the chance to live¡­" Then his voice turned cold as he said, "It seems like you don''t want to take this chance."


    He didn''t bother saying anything else as he waved his hand.


    The moment that his hand fell, the ck figures all moved forward at the same time, charging at the surrounded Xu Family group with their weapons pulled out.


    The Xu Family Head had been trying to stall since he figured that Lin Fan was working out some kind of n. The least he could do was buy some time for him, but it seemed like that wasn''t an option for them.<sub> </sub>


    Since that was the case, he had to hope that Lin Fan would be able to do something since he clearly wasn''t a match for ten Embryo Soul Realm Experts himself. All of the Xu Family members had the same thought as they couldn''t help taking a step back.


    The ck figures quickly approached the Xu Family group and soon they were right in front of them, swinging down with their weapons.


    Seeing the des approaching them, the Xu Family members couldn''t help taking another step back, almost losing their nerve and turning to run. However, right before the des could fall down on them, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared in front of them.


    The ck figures had attacked in many different directions,pletely surrounding the Xu Family group, so this was a barrier that had topletely surround them. It was a barrier that wrapped the Xu Family group in a bubble, leaving no blind spot.


    The attacks of the ck figuresnded on the bubble and there was a slight pause before they were sent flying back by the force generated from the sh.


    All of the ck figures were pushed back a meter and when they stabilized themselves, they looked at the bubble in front of them with shocked looks that had a trace of wariness.


    They hadn''t even sensed the appearance of this bubble, but it had suddenly appeared and it was strong enough to block the full force attacks from all of them. It was clear that this bubble wasn''t as simple as it seemed.


    Even Shi Yan couldn''t help knitting his brows the moment he saw this bubble appear.


    After a few seconds of silence, Shi Yan asked, "Who is it? Why are you interfering with our business?"


    The only exnation that Shi Yan coulde up with was that someone else was interfering. There was no one in the Xu Family group that would be able to create a barrier of this level.


    He could feel the aura of this barrier and he wasn''t certain if he could even break it, not to mention his subordinates breaking it.


    However, the moment he said this, there was only silence that met his question.


    Seeing that the other side wasn''t willing to show themselves, Shi Yan gave an order, "Gather up around me and prepare to fight this unknown enemy."


    The ck figures immediately flew back to his side and prepared themselves to fight at any moment.


    This was what Lin Fan was waiting for.


    The five pets that had appeared among the Xu Family group suddenly charged out and gathered around Shi Yan''s group that was now standing together. They spread out evenly around them and then released their array, trapping Shi Yan''s group inside.


    Before Shi Yan''s group could even react, the barrier had formed around them and there was no way out for them.


    They recognized it as the bubble that had stopped their attacks, but that didn''t stop them from releasing their attacks again. However, when their attacks hit the barrier around them, they were all neutralized before they were hit by a shockwave released by the barrier.


    This time, the shockwave was much stronger than the one that they had been hit with before, causing minor internal injuries for them.


    As they fell to the ground, when they looked at the barrier around them this time, their eyes were filled with fear.


    They could tell that this wasn''t a barrier that they could easily break through.


    During this time, Shi Yan had been watching the situation. His eyes had been on the five pets that had suddenly appeared and he couldn''t help being shocked by the aura that he felting from them.


    All of these pets were only in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm!


    However, the barrier that they released was at a level that could even resist his attacks.


    Just what kind of array was this that allowed these five pets to skip two major realms and match him?


    Still, even though he was shocked, Shi Yan didn''t allow that shock to affect him long. He knew that they were currently in a bad situation and he quickly started trying to figure out a way to get out of it.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan stepped out from the Xu Family group and came forward to stand right in front of the barrier.


    Coming out in such a conspicuous manner, naturally they immediately noticed him. However, what they were shocked by was the fact that they could sense dangering from this cloaked figure.


    This person was only in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm as far as they could tell, so why did they feel a sense of danger from him?


    As Lin Fan stood in front of the barrier, he looked at Shi Yan and said with a coldugh, "You never would have thought that it would turn out like this, right?"


    Shi Yan knitted his brows when he heard this and he immediately asked, "Who are you?"

 Chapter 607 Night Hunting (3)

    Lin Fan gave a chuckle when he heard this and said, "You don''t even remember someone you tried to kill before?"


    Shi Yan knitted his brows even more when he heard this, but after a few seconds, everything clicked inside of his head.


    His expression changed into a look of shock as he said, "You? It''s you?"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod in response without saying anything.


    Shi Yan then shouted, "How can you be him? You''re nothing more than some brat in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm, you''re not him at all!"


    Lin Fan gave a snort and released his full aura.


    Shi Yan knitted his brows, but he still said in a voice filled with disbelief, "Even if you are in the Embryo Soul Realm, how can you put up a barrier strong enough to trap me? What kind of tricks are you ying?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before giving a snap.


    When he gave that snap, there was a hole that appeared in the barrier, just big enough for one person to pass through.


    After that hole appeared, he said, "Why don''t youe out and face me then?"


    Shi Yan didn''t move at all when he heard this, but when the other members of his group saw this hole in the barrier, they saw their chance. While they were loyal to Shi Yan, that was only on the basis that their lives weren''t in danger.


    When their lives were in danger, naturally the only person that mattered was themselves.


    They knew that they had no chance of breaking this barrier and now that there was a way out, they would be crazy not to take it. But there were some of them that hesitated because they thought that it was a trap.


    After all, he already had them trapped inside the barrier, so why would he open a hole like this?


    Still, there were people that were impatient and in the end, there was a ck figure that jumped out from Shi Yan''s group. Going as fast as he could, he rushed for the hole in the barrier in an attempt to escape.


    However, Lin Fan, or rather Brainy around his arm had already expected this.


    The moment that this ck figure flew out, there was a ball of light that appeared above the hole in the barrier. It grew brighter and brighter as the ck figure approached and when the ck figure was only a few steps away, it suddenly flew out at the ck figure.


    The ck figure was surprised by this and wanted to dodge, but he found that it was too fast for him to dodge.


    Seeing that he had no other choice, he pulled out his weapon and shed out at the ball of light with all his power.


    As the ball of light flew out, it suddenly changed forms. It shrank from the form of that ball of light and started to be thinner until it became a de of pure light, however that didn''t mean that it became weaker.


    As it became smaller and smaller, the ck figure felt a stronger and stronger sense of dangering from this de of light.


    However, it was already toote for the ck figure to do anything else. Even if he wanted to do anything else, with the speed that the de of light wasing at him, he wouldn''t have been able to make it in time.


    So the ck figure roared out and released even more life energy as he shed down at the de of light.


    The moment that his sword and the de of light came into contact, the de of light suddenly disappeared without a trace.


    The ck figure didn''t feel any resistance at all when he cut right through the de of light and he was filled with joy. He had felt a strong sense of danger from it, so he thought that it would be very hard for him to resist this attack, but there was no resistance at all in the end.


    Then when he was about to charge forward to dash out of the hole in the barrier, he suddenly realized that something was wrong.


    Before he could do anything, he looked down to see his sword split in half where the de of light had made contact with his sword. Then there was a sudden spurt of blood from his body as a line appeared on his chest, parallel to the line that was created in the sword.


    He didn''t even get a chance to say anything as his top half was separated from the bottom half per the line.


    Thest look on his face was a look of pure shock as his face fell onto the ground.


    Everyone from Shi Yan''s group had their mouths wide open, which was visible even though they had masks on.<sub> </sub>


    None of them could believe what had just happened.


    As soon as the ck figure''s sword had made contact with the de of light, they had felt the sensation from the de of light disappearing. They had all thought that the ck figure had destroyed the de of light, but they couldn''t understand why the ck figure had suddenly died.


    Of course, no one dared to go forward at this time since they knew that they wouldn''t be able to do anything to this de of light if this ck figure couldn''t do anything. The one that had gone forward was one of the strongest among them, being at the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    What they didn''t know was that the one that came out didn''t feel any resistance because he couldn''t offer any resistance.


    To feel resistance, one has to be able to resist the attack. When one couldn''t resist at all, then naturally they wouldn''t feel any resistance as the attack would cut right through you, like what had just happened with the ck figure.


    Of course, the reason why this attack had be much stronger was all because of Brainy''s breakthrough.


    Because Brainy broke through, her spiritual sense had reached a whole new level, which allowed her to have better control of the array Lin Fan''s five pets made. This allowed her to refine the attack to the point where it was so concentrated that it could even hurt those in the Child Soul Realm.


    So naturally the ck figure who was only in the Embryo Soul Realm couldn''t take a single hit from this de of light.


    After a moment of silence, Shi Yan finally stepped forward.


    He knew that there was no point in hesitating because if he didn''t do anything, he would be trapped inside this barrier. If he were to leave, at the very least he wouldn''t be trapped anymore and would have a chance to find a way out.


    Of course, he wasn''t feeling desperate yet since he still had a trump card up his sleeve. However, that trump card was something that he wouldn''t want to use unless he was forced to use it.


    Shi Yan calmly walked through the hole in the barrier before it closed behind him.


    Seeing this, one of the ck figures couldn''t help saying, "What about us? Are you going to let us go?"


    Lin Fan just ignored that person as he said to Brainy, "You can take care of the rest now."


    Brainy slithered out of Lin Fan''s sleeve andnded on the ground. She gave Lin Fan a nod before jumping back to the Xu Family group.


    Lin Fan and Shi Yan just stood there in the center of the street, staring at each other, even though neither could see the other person''s eyes.


    Shi Yan was the first to break under this pressure as he asked, "Do we really have to do this? As long as you''re willing, I can put in a good word with young master Lei and you can work with us."


    Of course, this was a in faced lie.


    He knew just how much Lei Feng hated Lin Fan, so there was no way that Lei Feng would ever ept working with him.


    However, at this point, it didn''t matter what he said as long as he was able to escape.


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile as he asked, "Then what should I do?"


    Shi Yan was pleasantly surprised when he heard this as he quickly replied, "As long as you tell me about the ruins from before and swear to serve young master Lei, I can promise that you''ll never have to worry about anything in the future. Naturally that means that you''ll also receive a spot in the Ancient Era Ruins exploration."


    Shi Yan didn''t forget to add a bit of sugar on top. After all, everyone in the upper realm was driven by benefits and without enough benefits, he wouldn''t be able to convince Lin Fan to switch sides.


    He firmly believed that the temptation of the Ancient Era Ruins was strong enough to move Lin Fan, which was why he had said all this in a confident voice.


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this before saying, "That''s not what I meant."


    Shi Yan knitted his brows before asking, "Is that not enough?" Then after a quick pause, he said, "I can talk to young master Lei about getting you some more¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan cut him off by saying, "I meant how should I take care of you."


    Shi Yan''s eyes immediately narrowed the moment he heard this, but when he reacted, there was already a white dagger that was in front of his eyes.

 Chapter 608 Night Hunting (4)

    Still Shi Yan was an expert and someone that could pass the Hunters Exam, which meant that he had some skills at least.


    His hands immediately came up and in them were a pair of daggers that he used to block the bone white dagger that was in front of his face.


    The moment his daggers shed with the white dagger, there was a faint moment of bnce between the two forces before he was actually pushed back a few steps. Still, in the end, he was able to deflect the dagger that had appeared in front of him, sending it flying into the air.


    Shi Yan didn''t hesitate at all after blocking that attack, flying out with his daggers brandished, but what met him was a giant white de that shed down at him.


    Shi Yan tried to lift his daggers up to parry it, but the de was just too heavy for him to parry. The momentum of the giant de fell down on him and he would have been crushed if he didn''t twist his body at thest second, dodging the mighty blow of the giant de.


    ? However, even if he had been able to avoid the blow of the de in the end, he wasn''t able to avoid the injuries caused by the shockwave of the blow. Still, he was able to keep those injuries light as he had avoided most of the blow.


    When the de fell onto the ground, there was a giant hole that was created there.


    The streets of Harmony City were specially paved in tiles that were made from special materials. It was done this way because Harmony City was a city of cultivators and fights between them weremon.


    If they had to repair the city every time someone fought, the costs would be enormous.


    So they specially made the streets out of a material that was hard to break, so that they wouldn''t need to repair it every single time.


    But now Lin Fan was able to crack the tiles on the floor with a single sh, which showed just how powerful his attack was.


    Shi Yan looked at the hole Lin Fan left in the ground before turning to look at the sword in Lin Fan''s hand with a surprised look.


    He could tell from the auraing from it that this was a Child Soul Realm Artifact, but he couldn''t understand where Lin Fan had gotten a Child Soul Realm Artifact from.


    Still this wasn''t the time for hesitation since his life was in danger.


    He knew that it would be a bad idea to face Lin Fan head on since in terms of power, he was inferior, so there was only one choice left for him.


    Without any hesitation, Shi Yan turned and ran.


    He wasn''t certain if he could get away, but at the very least, he would be drawing Lin Fan into his tempo by using this move. Lin Fan clearly wouldn''t let him escape, so the first thing he would do was chase after him.


    However, by chasing after him, he would leave openings for himself, openings that Shi Yan could take advantage of.


    So while he was running, Shi Yan also made sure to keep an eye on what was happening behind him.


    Lin Fan saw this and shook his head.


    The giant sword in his hand quickly turned into a pair of daggers that he immediately threw out at Shi Yan.


    Since Shi Yan had been watching, it was easy for him to dodge these daggers. He then waited for Lin Fan to make his next move, but as far as he could see, Lin Fan was just standing there without doing anything which confused him. However, none of that mattered to him.


    If Lin Fan wasn''t going to do anything, then he would seize this chance to escape.


    He was about to turn around and focus on escaping when he suddenly felt a sense of danger in front of him.


    Since he had been looking behind him to see what Lin Fan was nning on doing, he had released his spiritual sense in front of him just in case there was anything there. He hadn''t expected to sense anything, but now there was a strong sense of danger that was in front of him.


    The moment he turned, he saw that there was a pure white dagger covered in five different lights that was already right in front of him, aimed at his chest.


    With the speed that the dagger was moving at, it was almost impossible for him to dodge, so his only choice was¡­


    Shi Yan immediately twisted his body to the side as the dagger pierced into his flesh, but they didn''t fully go into his body. Still, with the momentum that the daggers had, they pushed him downwards, pushing him right to the ground below.<sub> </sub>


    What Shi Yan had done was twist his body at the veryst second so that the daggers didn''t stab him in a fatal area, but that didn''t mean that he had negated all the damage. The other thing that he had done was boost his life energy armour as much as he could to negate the damage, but that armour had been pierced right through by this dagger.


    He could tell that from the force of the blow, several of his ribs had cracked and even his organs had been knocked out of ce, but at least he was still alive.


    Still, that didn''t mean that Lin Fan''s assault was over.


    When Shi Yan fell to the ground, there was a white sword that was smaller than the previous giant white sword that fell down, aimed right at his neck.


    Shi Yan had the wind knocked out of him from the dagger stabbing him and he had been knocked to the ground, so he didn''t have proper footing. In this position, the only thing that he could do was bring his arms up to block the sword that fell down.


    He didn''t even have his daggers anymore since he had lost his grip the moment the dagger had stabbed him.


    This sword that was covered in the same five glows as the dagger just now fell without any impediment. It cut right through the arms that he had raised to block it and continued falling over his neck.


    However, right before it cut through his neck, the sword suddenly stopped. At the moment it stopped, the sword was only less than a centimeter away from his skin.


    There was a look of pure anguish that appeared on Shi Yan''s face, but his mental will was strong enough that he was able to stop himself from screaming. However, it was clear from the look on his face just how much pain he was feeling.


    After all, having both arms cut off wasn''t a light injury.


    That look of anguishsted five seconds on Shi Yan''s face before he looked up at the person holding the sword at his neck with a look of rage. There was also a trace of fear that appeared in those eyes at that moment.


    He had clearly sensed that the other side was only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm, but this person had been able to dominate him in a battle.


    He didn''t even know how that dagger had been able to appear in front of him.


    He knew that he had dodged both the daggers, so why was there a third dagger?


    But this wasn''t the moment to consider this. The most important thing to do now was to ensure that he would keep his life because if he lost his life, then it would all be over.


    So after having that look of rage for a few seconds, Shi Yan''s expression immediately became calm as he asked, "What do you want?"


    This was the bare minimum that he had confidence in. After all, that person could have clearly cut through his neck just like he had cut through his arms, but he had stopped at the veryst second. That must mean that he wanted something from him, which meant that there was room to negotiate.


    Lin Fan didn''t respond right away, leaving a small pause to build tension in Shi Yan before saying, "What are your ns?"


    Shi Yan slightly knitted his brows before asking back, "What ns do you mean?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "Ancient Era Ruins."


    This time, Shi Yan didn''t miss a beat as he said, "What other ns could we have? We found an Ancient Era Ruin and now we''re excavating it. Isn''t that what any normal person would do? After all, who doesn''t want to be stronger?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer any of this as he asked, "Then what about the Assassins Association? Are they also part of your group?"


    Shi Yan deeply knitted his brows this time.


    He knew that this question was a rhetoric, he wasn''t actually asking if the Assassins Association was working with them, rather he knew that they were.


    But that was what confused him since he and Lei Feng had made sure that the partnership that they had with the Assassins Association had remained a secret. There shouldn''t have been anyone that had known about this.


    The only time that the Assassins Association had been involved was when they had been moved to attack Lin Fan, but that could be considered normal too since hiring assassins was the normal way of getting rid of someone¡­


    So how did they know that the Assassins Association was working with them?

 Chapter 609 Night Hunting (5)

    Even though he was panicking on the inside, he knew that he couldn''t show that panic on the outside.


    The only thing that was keeping him alive was the intelligence that he had and the moment he showed his panic, revealing part of the intelligence that he had, he would be one step closer to death.


    Shi Yan didn''t say anything for a while, but then he said with a calm look, "I don''t know what you''re talking about. What does the Assassins Association have to do with any of this?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I see."


    Then Shi Yan started feeling pressure from the sword that was above his neck as it began falling, cutting into his skin.


    <o>,m The moment that he felt this pain from the sword, he immediately shouted out, "Stop, I''ll talk, I''ll talk!"</o>


    As soon as his voice rang out, the sword stopped falling. However, the damage had already been done as blood started dripping down the sides of Shi Yan''s neck, blood that wasn''t there before. It washed across the drops of blood that had fallen from his severed arms and washed away part of the blood that had started to dry.


    Shi Yan couldn''t help being shocked by what had just happened.


    This maniac, did he not know how to interrogate someone properly?


    Normally when interrogating someone, they would always resist at first and you would have to slowly coax them or break them until they gave you the information that you wanted. However, this maniac didn''t even care about any of that as he immediately shed down with his sword.


    He had felt the killing intent and he knew that if he hadn''t called out in time, his head would have already been separated from the rest of his body.


    As this thought passed through his mind, there was a chill that ran through his body.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had already moved the de of his sword back up, or else Shi Yan would have been cut if the sword was still in his neck.


    Still, the damage had been done since his voice had been a bit hoarse when he shouted out from his throat being cut.


    After moving the sword back over his neck, Lin Fan said, "Well? Talk."


    Shi Yan''s mind was racing at a hundred kilometers an hour, trying to figure out a way to stall, but Lin Fan didn''t give him that chance.


    Seeing that Shi Yan wasn''t saying anything, his sword started falling down again, cutting into Shi Yan''s neck again.


    Shi Yan felt the pain of the sword cutting him and he immediately said, "Wait, wait, I''ll tell you about the Assassins Association."


    Lin Fan''s de stopped, but he didn''t bring it up like he had donest time as he looked down at Shi Yan, waiting for him to talk.


    Shi Yan could see the dead look in Lin Fan''s eyes, so he said, "The Assassins Association found the Ancient Era Ruins with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect by ident, so we had no choice but to work with them as well."


    Lin Fan didn''t drop the de next time, but it was clear by the look in his eyes that he didn''t fully believe him.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t mind this and quickly asked, "Then what is your n? Is it just the Ancient Era Ruins, or¡­"


    Shi Yan paused for a second before saying, "What else would it be for if it isn''t for the Ancient Era Ruins? Who doesn''t want to be strong¡­"


    Before he could finish, he stopped making any sound.


    His mouth was still moving, but there weren''t any words that came out since his head had already been separated from the rest of his body. Even if his mouth moved, there were no vocal cords there to provide the sound.


    In thest few seconds of his life, his eyes revealed a look of shock as he stared right at Lin Fan.


    Even in his final moments, he couldn''t believe that Lin Fan had actually killed him like this.


    He was certain that Lin Fan would have kept the interrogation going a bit longer or would have chickened out in the end because of the influence of his Shi Family, but he never thought that he would be this decisive in cutting off his head.


    In those veryst moments, he felt a trace of regret.


    It wasn''t regret for choosing to make Lin Fan his enemy, but rather for not using his full power to crush him sooner.


    He firmly believed that if he took care of this sooner, he would have been able to kill Lin Fan before he was able to gain this kind of power.


    After all, he still didn''t believe that Lin Fan himself could have killed him. The only reason he was able to kill him was that strange Child Soul Realm Artifact with the different coloured glows.


    After killing Shi Yan, Lin Fan didn''t bother looking at his corpse at all.


    Rather he waved his hand and there was a white dagger that appeared.<sub> </sub>


    This was the other half of the Iron Eater Bone Artifact that he had thrown out, the dagger that had stabbed Shi Yan.


    He had split the Iron Eater Bone Artifact in half, which had reduced its power, but he had made up for it with his five mixedws.


    In fact, Lin Fan actually had more than fivews right now, but fivews was the stable amount that both his body and the Iron Eater Bone Artifact could hold without breaking down. If he had injected morews into the Iron Eater Bone Artifact, it would have started to break down from the strain of those mixingws.


    He brought the two des together and they reformed into a single de before disappearing.


    Lin Fan turned his attention back to Brainy who was controlling the array of his five pets that was trapping the other members of Shi Yan''s group.


    The ck figures all had very sorry appearances and there were even a few of them that were sprawled on the ground, not making a single movement. It was clear that they were already dead.


    The few remaining ck figures didn''t have time at all to see what was happening with Shi Yan as they were trying to keep their lives under Brainy''s assault.


    There were multiple balls of light that had formed all around them, trapping them in the center without giving them a way out. From time to time, there would be balls of light that would fly out, turning into des of light, aimed at the ck figures in the center.


    The ck figures would do all they could to dodge, but the des of light were arranged in such a way that it reduced the amount of space that they had to dodge until they had no choice but to take a hit. However, it only took a single hit to take a ck figure down, so that single hit was enough.


    This was what had happened to the ck figures on the ground.


    The ones that were still alive were the ones that had pushed their allies into the path of the des of light just to survive.


    Even now, they were all watching each other as well, trying to make sure that they were thest to survive since that was all that mattered to them. After all, there was only a chance to escape if they survived to the end.


    Lin Fan walked over to Brainy and asked, "How long will it take?"


    Brainy didn''t look at Lin Fan and said, "It''ll take longer if you don''t help."


    Lin Fan just responded with, "Un."


    Then without another word, he raised his hand to pull out a white dagger that he immediately threw out.


    One of the ck figures had just dodged a de of light, but then he felt another sensation of danger approaching him.


    When he turned in the direction of that sensation of danger, he found a white dagger covered in five different glows flying right at his chest. However, even though he saw it, he wasn''t able to dodge it at all as it pierced right through his chest, creating a hole there.


    With onest breath, the ck figure fell to the ground.


    The white dagger disappeared after stabbing that ck figure, reappearing in Lin Fan''s hand.


    Without any words, he threw it out once again and it pierced through another ck figure.


    Again and again the white dagger flew out until there were only two ck figures left. At which time, he lowered his hand and said, "The rest of them are yours."


    Brainy just gave a nod in response.


    It didn''t take long for Brainy to take care of the remaining two ck figures.


    During this time, Lin Fan had already gone back to the Xu Family group and led them out of this area.


    In no time, there were only the corpses of the ck figures and Shi Yan left in this ce.


    When the people who were assigned to clean up the mess arrived, they were shocked by what they had found and immediately reported it to Lei Feng.


    However, this wasn''t the only thing that was happening in this city.


    All over Harmony City, there were many groups that were fighting and killing each other for the items that they had won in the auction.


    This was just how auctions went.


    You might be able to win an item, but if you didn''t have the ability to keep it¡­


    No one could say anything.

 Chapter 610 After The Long Night (1)

    After Lin Fan brought the Xu Family group back to the Xu Manor, he didn''t waste any time to bring out the Storage Rings that he had received from Shi Yan and the other ck figures.


    The Storage Rings of the ck figures didn''t have much, so he just gave them to the Xu Family to reward them for acting as bait.


    As for Shi Yan''s Storage Ring, there were manymon items, but there was also an item that surprised Lin Fan.


    This was an item that all the families at the auction had fought over, it was the Ancient Era Ruins token!


    But he wasn''t surprised that Shi Yan had one, rather he was surprised that Shi Yan would keep it in his Storage Ring like this when he was going out on a mission. It seemed like he really didn''t think that he would be dying tonight.


    Still, even if he had this Ancient Era Ruins token, it didn''t mean that he would be able to do anything with it.


    After all, if he were to bring someone in with it, it would just be stating that he was the one who killed Shi Yan. While they would know that he was the one who killed Shi Yan since they already figured out that the Xu Family was working with him, they wouldn''t be able to make a fuss about it since Shi Yan had acted secretly.


    Unless Lin Fan made this knowledge public, the other side wouldn''t be able to make any public moves. Not to mention that their private moves had already failed, resulting in Shi Yan''s death, so they wouldn''t be making any private moves either.


    After thinking it through, Lin Fan decided to hand this token to the Hunters Organization and let them be his cover, but of course, he would also try to bring someone he was close to into the Ancient Era Ruins with him.


    Having another helping hand would always be good, not to mention that the person he wanted to bring in had experience exploring ruins.


    Once he finished going through the Storage Rings, Lin Fan headed back to the store.


    What he didn''t know was that there were many things that were happening as the sun rose.


    ¡­


    Murong Yue looked over the corpses that were on the ground before giving a sigh.


    After taking a moment to calm her nerves, she turned to the person kneeling on the ground beside her and asked, "What is the damage?"


    That person said in a curt voice, "We lost three members ourselves and the Tang Family lost twenty two members."


    Murong Yue revealed a pained look when she heard this.


    She had thought that this would be an easy mission, but it turned out that this was an ambush for them.


    Even if they had been able to break through and defeat the enemies, the losses were greater than the gain.


    She didn''t care for the Tang Family since they were only a subsidiary family under the Hunters Organization, but the three members that her squad lost really hurt.


    Each member of her squad was carefully trained by the Hunters Organization and the time that it would take to rece each member was very long. Each member lost also meant that this was arade who had survived countless battles with her being gone forever.


    This hurt her not only on a professional level, but also a personal level.


    Still, that didn''t mean that she would let her emotions get to her right now since that was how she had been trained.


    Their mission this time was to ambush the Shen Family, a subsidiary of the Thunder Sect that had obtained an Ancient Era Ruins token.


    They had thought that they would only meet slight resistance from guards sent by the Thunder Sect. With the elite squad that Murong Yue led, it would have been easy for them to take care of these small guards. The Tang Family that they brought along would have been the cover for them attacking the Shen Family.


    However, what they didn''t expect was that an ambush had beenid for them.


    They had been surrounded by multiple squads of guards from both the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, as well as assassins from the Assassins Association attacking them from the shadows.


    Murong Yue''s squad was clearly much stronger than these normal guards, so they had split up to handle the various groups of guards. However, it was those assassins that had caught them off guard, which caused three of them to be killed, along with the members of the Tang Family that were with them.


    At the very least, they had aplished their goal of stealing the token, but now there was the dilemma of how they would use it.<sub> </sub>


    After all, the person that they had been nning on giving the token to had died tonight. It was one of the three members of Murong Yue''s squad that had been caught in the ambush.


    After another long pause, Murong Yue said, "Gather up the corpses of our allies and clean up all traces that we were here. Leave their corpses to their own clean up squads, we''re leaving right away before they can send more reinforcements."


    The person who was kneeling gave a nod before standing up to carry out her orders.


    Looking around onest time, Murong Yue gave a sigh before jumping into the air and disappearing from this area.


    ¡­


    In the other parts of Harmony City, there were many corpses that were strewn all over the streets, but there were barely any normal people that were walking in those streets.


    That was mainly because of the influence of the twelve great factions and the City Lord Manor.


    The City Lord Manor had sent the city guards to evacuate many ces that they had heard would be locations of fights to ensure that the normal citizens wouldn''t be caught up in this.


    The main reason that the City Lord cooperated was because he had heard from his wife that Shi Yan was personally taking action. He wanted to make sure that everything went smoothly so that Lin Fan, the one who had crippled his son, would die.


    When the night was finally over, there were many people who received reports about the matters of the previous night.


    Just as there were people who were delighted by the reports that they received, there were many more who were enraged by the reports that they received.


    Among the reports, the one that most people had received was about the cloaked figure who had won the auction for the first token.


    Many factions had sent people to watch over this person because he was too much of a mystery. They had all tried to find out the identity of this person, but not a single faction had been able to find a single thing.


    They knew that the twelve great factions wouldn''t let such a mysterious person enter the Ancient Era Ruins since it was too much of a wildcard for them to handle in such an important event. If they couldn''t find anything about this cloaked figure, the best way to handle the situation for them was to kill this cloaked figure and take the token that he won.


    So most of the twelve great factions had sent kill squads to handle this cloaked figure. The only ones that didn''t were the ones that already had different ns, but they still sent obligatory scouts along.


    The various factions had been keeping track of the cloaked figure from the moment that he had left the auction hall during the auction, but the strange thing was that he didn''t rush off after leaving. Rather he leisurely walked through the streets of Harmony City, as if he was taunting them.


    After the auction, it didn''t take long for the kill squads of the twelve great factions to find this cloaked figure and they quickly surrounded him. With many Child Soul Realm Experts, even a few Peak Child Soul Realm Experts, everyone who was watching had thought that this cloaked figure was done for.


    However, that cloaked figure just raised his hand and with a single push of his palm, he knocked them all out.


    There was no suspense at all, it was just with a single push of his palm, every single person that had been surrounding him fell to the ground like they were kites that had their strings cut. Not a single person was spared, even the ones that were hiding in the dark behind him were all knocked out.


    The only people that weren''t knocked out were the ones watching from afar without any hostility, but they couldn''t believe what their eyes had seen.


    In the end, the cloaked figure walked off and disappeared without a single word, but the damage had already been done.


    The reputation that he had established was already enough to fill the twelve great factions with fear.


    After all, to be surrounded by all those Child Soul Realm Experts, as well as several Peak Child Soul Realm Experts, even a Nascent Soul Realm Expert wouldn''t have been able to do what he had done. Only a True Soul Realm Expert would have been able to give this kind of performance.


    However, what was a True Soul Realm Expert?


    These were the linchpins of the twelve great factions, the foundation that they were built on.


    Even if the twelve great factions were to lose most of their assets, as long as the True Soul Realm Experts were present, they would be able to continue existing.


    Each True Soul Realm Expert was someone who could cause storms in the Gctic Humanity Alliance with a flip of a palm.

 Chapter 611 After The Long Night (2)

    None of the scouts wasted any time to report this and soon the twelve great factions dropped this matter.


    It wasn''t that they weren''t able to face a True Soul Realm Expert since they had their own True Soul Realm Experts, but rather they didn''t want to send their True Soul Realm Experts out.


    After all, even if each True Soul Realm Expert was a peerless expert of their generation, if they were to fight, there was the chance that they would be injured or they might even die.


    A True Soul Realm Expert that was lost was one less True Soul Realm Expert that was avable to them.


    The strength of the twelve great factions were all decided by these True Soul Realm Experts, so they wouldn''t risk these True Soul Realm Experts unless there was danger of their faction being destroyed.


    Not to mention the fact that this cloaked figure didn''t seem hostile.


    If this cloaked figure was hostile, there was no reason for him to hold back and only knock out their experts.


    He could have killed them all and just left their corpses there, but the fact that he didn''t showed that he was at least willing to cooperate. For the twelve great factions, this was the best scenario.


    After all, another True Soul Realm Expert on their side would mean a powerful ally.


    There was of course the chance that he would betray them, but they were justforting themselves by saying that he was willing to cooperate with them since they didn''t want to think about the worst case scenario.


    However for some people, this wasn''t the biggest matter.


    When Lei Feng received the report that Shi Yan was dead, the rage that he felt towards the first report about the cloaked figure disappeared. Then after a moment of being stunned, he roared out at the person who gave him the report, "What is this report? Exin to me what you mean by Shi Yan being dead?"


    The person who had given the report was already kneeling down and didn''t dare look up since he wasn''t able to say a thing in response to this.


    After all, how could he exin why Shi Yan was dead?


    The only thing that he had found when he went to clean up were the corpses of the ten experts Shi Yan brought along and Shi Yan''s headless corpse, along with his head thrown to the ground on the side.


    He hadn''t been able to believe his eyes the moment that he saw Shi Yan''s corpse, but he had no choice but to report this back. He knew that he would die if he ran away, so at the very least there would be a chance to survive if he came back.


    Seeing that his subordinate had his head down without daring to say a thing, Lei Feng forced himself to calm down as he sat back in his chair, tapping his fingers on the armrest.


    He began going through all the possibilities of what could have caused Shi Yan''s death.


    A trap by the Hunters Organization?


    Or was it a trap by another faction?


    Maybe it was even a trap from a faction of a different upper realm.


    After all, Lin Fan''s appearance had been just too sudden and he couldn''t help thinking that maybe another upper realm was making a move. This also coincided with the cloaked figure that had suddenly appeared.


    Maybe this was all connected and they were all working together?


    Then what was their n?


    Was it all for the Ancient Era Ruins that they were nning to explore?


    As these thoughts passed through his mind, Lei Feng knitted his brows deeper and deeper as a strong headache came over him.


    It seemed more and more likely that his third idea was the one that was right as he began connecting all the various matters that had happened recently.


    If that was the case, it seemed like he would have to visit those people and make a report¡­


    Of course, it never crossed his mind that Lin Fan had taken care of Shi Yan himself since he never believed that Lin Fan would be able to take down Shi Yan.


    After all, Shi Yan was someone in the Child Soul Realm and Lin Fan was only in the Embryo Soul Realm. There was an entire major realm between the two of them, so how likely would it be that Lin Fan was able to cross that major realm to take down Shi Yan?


    It would be as difficult as ascending to the heavens!


    So he had thrown out that possibility from the beginning.


    After thinking this through, Lei Feng stood up which caused the person kneeling on the ground to tremble. However, Lei Feng waved his hand and said, "Leave."<sub> </sub>


    Like he was pardoned, the person on the ground immediately cupped his hands and gave another bow before running off.


    Lei Feng tapped on his wrist watch a few times before heading to the door, but before he could leave, there was a voice that rang out behind him.


    It was a female''s voice that was quite sweet and tender, but if one listened carefully, they would hear the poisonous tone underneath. To put it simply, it was like listening to a poison apple.


    That female voice said in a teasing tone, "Leaving so soon?"


    The moment Lei Feng heard this, he immediately knitted his brows.


    In one smooth motion, he turned around and a spear came out of his Storage Ring, appearing in his hand as he turned. The tip of the spear was ced at the neck of the girl behind him, but when he saw who it was, his hand trembled.


    The girl who stood in front of Lei Feng saw this spear and revealed a smile, not showing any fear at all even though she had a spear ced right at her neck. After a pause, she said, "Xiao Lei, why are you so cowardly now?"


    Lei Feng gave a snort in response to this, but he brought the spear down and asked, "Why are you here?"


    The smile on the face of the girl finally disappeared as she said with a cold look, "The life jade of my precious little brother broke, you really think I wouldn''te at this time?" Then her voice also dropped until it was cold enough to freeze the entire room as she said, "Xiao Lei, you better have a good exnation why my precious little brother is dead, or you might not leave this room alive today."


    Lei Feng wasn''t afraid of this girl, but he knew that it would be troublesome if he didn''t deal with her, so he gave her the report.


    The girl read through the report before saying in the same cold voice, "Who is this Lin Fan? You better give me all the details."


    Lei Feng gave a sigh before he started exining the situation.


    Ten minutester, the girl''s face rxed a bit, but it was still cold as she said, "So he''s the one who killed my precious little brother? I want to kill him, you won''t interfere, right?"


    Lei Feng also wanted to kill Lin Fan because of everything that had happened, but unlike Shi Yan, this girl was not someone that he could easily deal with even though she was a full head shorter than him.


    If one were topare them based on appearance, people would have thought that this little girl was Shi Yan''s little sister, but in fact, this little girl was actually Shi Yan''s big sister, Shi Yi.


    She was the greatest talent of thest generation for the Shi Family and someone that couldn''t be messed with easily.


    The one problem with her was that she had a brotherplex and she was very well known for being overprotective of her brother.


    So while she had been smiling earlier, that smile was actually one that was forced out by rage.


    After all, she couldn''t believe that someone would actually kill her little brother when she made it clear to the entire realm what she would do if someone killed her little brother. Yet someone had actually done it!


    Lei Feng was silent for a bit before saying, "It''s not that simple."


    Then he told her his theory and then said, "I have to report this up first before we do anything, otherwise we might really be in trouble."


    Shi Yi looked at him with cold eyes as she said, "My precious little brother is dead and that is all you want to do?"


    Lei Feng didn''t back down as he said, "Do you really think any of this matters in front of their n?"


    This time, Shi Yi had no choice but to back down when she heard those "people" being mentioned. After all, those people had the ability to wipe them out with a single wave of their hands, so she couldn''t take them lightly¡­


    After thinking for a bit, Shi Yi had no choice but to say, "Alright, go and make that report."


    Then after a pause, she added, "I''ll be the representative from the Shi Family from now on. I don''t think you''ll have an objection, will you?"


    Lei Feng looked at her and gave a nod, "No objections here. Rather it''s more assuring that you''re here."


    While Lei Feng was a bit unhappy with the way she had threatened him, he had to admit that it was indeed reassuring that Shi Yi was here since she was even more capable than Shi Yan. That was why before this, Shi Yi had been assigned to an even more important mission.


    But now that she was willing toe and help him, he would be a fool not to ept this.


    Shi Yi nodded before turning to leave without saying anything else.


    Lei Feng didn''t mind either as he headed out the door.

 Chapter 612 Break

    Meanwhile, back in Lin Fan''s shop.


    Since it was the morning, it meant that Lin Fan was open for business again.


    He took care of the morning rush as per usual, but he felt it was strange since there was no one that came looking for him.


    He was almost certain that there would be someone that woulde, or at least there would be people that would be assigned to watch his store, but there was no one new. There were just the same old scouts as usual.


    There was no one new that came, for example, people from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, or even the Assassins Association.


    Lin Fan was very surprised by this since he knew that Shi Yan should have been quite important to Lei Feng. After all, he had seen how close they were at the first banquet and Shi Yan had been trusted enough to lead the kill squad that came for the Xu Family.


    So why wasn''t there a single move being made?


    Still, there was nothing that Lin Fan could do right now. After all, it wasn''t like he could charge right at the Thunder Sect or the True Spirit Sect, could he?


    So after the morning rush, Lin Fan pulled Mo Ze Chen aside and gave him the token as he said, "Take this, we''ll be heading out soon, so get ready."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised when he saw this and he couldn''t help asking, "What is this?"


    Lin Fan asked, "Did you hear about the auctionst night?"


    How could Mo Ze Chen not hear about such a big event?


    Even if the city forums had deleted all mention of this, Mo Ze Chen had his own sources. Not to mention that he was a hunter now, so he also had ess to the Hunter Organizations informationwork.


    Anyone who was anyone would know about this, so how could Mo Ze Chen not know about it?


    After a pause, he looked down at the token and asked, "Then this is¡­"


    He didn''t finish his sentence, but the way he left his words hanging made it very clear what he was implying.


    Lin Fan nodded without saying anything, but that was already enough to answer Mo Ze Chen''s question.


    Mo Ze Chen held the Ancient Era Ruins token out again as he said, "Boss, I can''t take this. It''s too valuable."


    Lin Fan shook his head and didn''t take the token before saying, "I need someone on my side with me in there. It''s better than having someone unreliable in there, don''t you think?"


    Mo Ze Chen held the Ancient Era Ruins token for a bit before saying, "Alright."


    To be honest, he was actually quite tempted by this token, but he knew that this wasn''t the ce for him to be. After all, this was something that involved all twelve great factions and he was nothing more than a new Hunter.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan, he definitely wouldn''t even be qualified to be touching one of the tokens.


    After thinking for a bit, he couldn''t help asking, "Then boss, do you have another token for Lulu as well."


    After being with Lulu for a while, he had realized that he waspletely outssed by her.


    She was a true genius, one that had made several breakthroughs in just a few days, already reaching the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, just being a step away from reaching the Child Soul Realm. Meanwhile, he was still in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm and he had been there for a long time. He only felt the breakthrough nearing after receiving the rewards from the ruins from the Hunters Exam.


    She would definitely be much more useful to Lin Fan in these ruins.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "She can''t go into the ruins."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised as he asked, "Why?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows as he said, "First, there''s no token and second, we need someone to watch over the store."


    Lin Fan had a different reason for why he didn''t want to bring Lulu along, but he didn''t tell Mo Ze Chen yet because he didn''t know how to talk to him about this.


    Lin Fan was already treating the tribe in the ruins as part of his forces, so he didn''t want people to know about them just yet. Then again, it would be dangerous if they were ever found since they were apletely new faction that no one had ever met before. As well as being the original race of this, the race that had been here before the Gctic Humanity Alliance settled here.


    This would be a case of the new settlers meeting the aboriginals and Lin Fan knew perfectly well how that would go based on the examples from earth.


    The tribe wasn''t strong enough to face the twelve factions of the Gctic Humanity Alliance since their strongest member was the grand elder and even then, he was only in the Nascent Soul Realm. Or at least he would be when he recovered, but before he recovered, he was actually only in the Peak Child Soul Realm.


    There was no way that they would be able to im a piece ofnd for themselves with the power that they had.


    This was a dog eat dog world, so the most likely oue would be that they would bepletely eliminated or they would be chased off the so that they wouldn''t cause trouble in the future.


    So until the time was right, Lin Fan didn''t n on letting anyone know about them.


    Mo Ze Chen was about to continue arguing the case, but then there was a voice that called out from the front desk, "Owner Lin, are you here?"


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were both surprised to hear someone calling for Lin Fan, but Lin Fan recognized this voice since it was a familiar voice.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan came out to see Murong Yue standing at the counter with Lulu sitting behind it with a helpless look on her face.


    It was clear that she had tried to stop Murong Yue, but Murong Yue hadn''t cared about her.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to see her since he recognized her voice, but he was curious why she was here. The auction was already over and it was certain that the Hunters Organization would have their own matters to take care of, so he was curious why she would have time toe see him.


    Murong Yue waved at Lin Fan when he came out and then when he came over, she said, "Owner Lin, can we talk in private?"


    Lin Fan looked at her for a bit before giving a nod to Lulu.


    Lulu understood what he meant and she headed off into the store to stock a few shelves.


    Murong Yue turned to look at Mo Ze Chen and even though she didn''t say anything, the meaning in her gaze was clear.


    Lin Fan just calmly replied, "You can say anything you want to me to him."


    Murong Yue thought about it before giving a nod after remembering what she was here for.


    Lin Fan saw this and gave a snap, creating the same soundproof bubble as before.


    After the bubble was formed, Murong Yue said, "Owner Lin, do you have anyone that you can rmend for the Ancient Era Ruins trip?" As she said this, she turned her gaze to Mo Ze Chen.


    It was clear that Lin Fan trusted this person and while she didn''t know exactly who he was, she did remember that he was one of the four people who had passed thest Hunters Exam.


    Since that was the case, that meant that he fit both criteria for the person that they needed.


    Lin Fan raised a brow before asking, "Did you get another token?"


    Murong Yue just nodded in response.


    Lin Fan didn''t expect them to ask him to rmend someone to bring into the Ancient Era Ruins since he couldn''t be considered a core member of the Hunters Organization. They should have plenty of other Hunters that they could rely on, so why were they asking him?


    Still, Lin Fan said, "No, I don''t have anyone that I could rmend."


    Murong Yue was taken aback when she heard this.


    It was clear that Mo Ze Chen was the right candidate, but why was Lin Fan not rmending him?


    Mo Ze Chen could understand the meaning behind the conversation from the context, so he cleared his throat and said, "I already have a token, but¡­"


    Before he could say anything else, he suddenly felt a cold look from Lin Fan and immediately swallowed his words.


    Murong Yue was surprised to hear this as she looked at Lin Fan with a surprised look.


    Where had he gotten another Ancient Era Ruins token from?


    But then when she thought about it, she remembered the report from this morning.


    They had learned that Shi Yan had died, but they didn''t know who killed him.


    However, Murong Yue had a good idea who had killed him after learning that Lin Fan had gotten another token overnight.


    Still, this was a good thing since Shi Yan was one of the enemy leaders and they had taken one of the enemy''s tokens, so they would be down a person in the Ancient Era Ruins.


    As for who to give the token that they gotst night, the Hunters Organization had other candidates, but they had wanted to give it to Lin Fan''s choice since he was the leader and they wanted to build a team that could work better with him.


    After Murong Yue thought about it, she waved her hand and said, "Alright, that''s all I wanted to ask. See youter, Owner Lin."


    Without even giving him time to respond, she ran out of the store just as fast as she came.


    When it was just Mo Ze Chen and Lin Fan left at the counter, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Boss, wasn''t that another token that was just offered to you? Couldn''t you have given it to Lulu?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "It''s not time for her to show her abilities yet. The outside world isn''t ready for them just yet."


    Mo Ze Chen wanted to say something else, but then he swallowed his words since he knew that Lin Fan was right.


    This was what the grand elder had also told them in his letter, so he had to respect their choice.


    Seeing that there was no other way, Mo Ze Chen didn''t say anything else and headed off to help Lulu in the store.


    Lin Fan watched him walk away before shaking his head with a sigh and sitting down behind the counter.

 Chapter 613 Changes In Harmony City

    The rest of the day passed by without anything that exciting happening.


    The only other thing that happened was that the Thunder Sect announced that they would be leading the expedition into the Ancient Era Ruins in one month exactly. They hoped that everyone would be ready to explore the ruins when the time came.


    Now Lin Fan at least knew when the trip would be.


    But before that, there were still many things that he had to take care of.


    For example, he still felt that his cultivation was too low.


    While he might be able to fight someone in the High Child Soul Realm and would be able to escape from someone in the Peak Child Soul Realm, that wouldn''t be enough.


    He had to get stronger not just for the Ancient Era Ruins, but also for what he was nning in the future.


    After all, there were still members of his family that were being held captive¡­


    So over the next month, Lin Fan focused on his training, leaving the matters of the store to Mo Ze Chen and Lulu.


    ? He stayed in the back of the store most of the time or ran off to a cultivation realm to temper himself. The only times that he came out was when someone contacted him for something, like the Hunters Organization.


    However, his isted cultivation period wasn''t in vain as he was able to break through to the Mid Embryo Soul Realm during this time.


    It was a good thing that he had made that breakthrough in one of his cultivation realms instead of in the store, otherwise who knows what kind of amotion he would have caused.


    After all, the phenomenon that he caused when he broke through was on the same level as a Nascent Soul Realm Expert breaking through to the True Soul Realm.


    If this had happened at the shop, there was no doubt that his store would have beenpletely surrounded by experts of the twelve great factions.


    His breakthrough hade in the middle of the month, so he used the rest of the month to stabilize his cultivation.


    As for the outside world during this month, there really wasn''t much that happened since everyone else was also preparing to enter the Ancient Era Ruins.


    There were only a few matters that did happen during this month.


    The first was a report that Qiao Yi Fei had brought him from the Hunters Organization about a new member of the Shi Family that had been dispatched, Shi Yi.


    Lin Fan took note that Shi Yi was the big sister of Shi Yan, so he knew that she would be trouble. After all, the Shi Family dispatching someone like Shi Yi must mean that they wanted to find the person who killed Shi Yan and take revenge, so as that person, there was no doubt that he would be targeted by them.


    Not to mention that the report mentioned that Shi Yi was noted to be working with Lei Feng.


    Lei Feng hated Lin Fan''s guts, so there was no doubt that he would do what he could to convince Shi Yi that Lin Fan was the one who killed Shi Yan.


    So he had no doubt that he would have to face this Shi Yi in the Ancient Era Ruins in the end.


    The second thing that happened was that the City Lord Manor had actually stopped their attacks on the Xu Family.


    It wasn''t that they were no longer bothered by the City Lord Manor''s attacks because the Hunters Organization was helping them, but rather they hadpletely stopped their attacks.


    Both the Xu Family and the Hunters Organization had been confused by this and when it was reported to Lin Fan, even he was confused by why the City Lord had done this.


    After all, it wasn''t as if the grudge between them had suddenly disappeared. He had even heard that He Yong''s condition had gotten worse, though he didn''t know the cause of why it got worse.


    Since that was the case, wouldn''t the City Lord be even more angry at him and would double down on his harassment?


    Why did he suddenly stop harassing them like nothing was wrong?


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand what the City Lord was thinking, but he did advise both the Xu Family and the Hunters Organization to raise their vignce just in case.


    But even by the end of the month, nothing had happened at all.


    The third matter was the biggest matter, though it didn''t really concern Lin Fan that much.


    It had happened suddenly and it had happened when Lin Fan was in the cultivation realm breaking through.


    But even if it didn''t concern Lin Fan himself, it was something that had be the talk of the town for the rest of the month.<sub> </sub>


    No one knew what the reason was, but Lei Feng suddenly changed Wang Jian to a duel. If they had to guess, it was because of his title as the number one ranked member of the Decagram Geniuses.


    Since they were both part of the Decagram Geniuses, naturally Lei Feng wouldn''t be satisfied with being ranked underneath Wang Jian, so it was natural for him to challenge Wang Jian for the title of number one.


    It was just that it was too sudden.


    Everyone had already heard about Wang Jian''s sudden increase in power and how he was almost able to break through to the Child Soul Realm, but they hadn''t heard any special news from Lei Feng. No one understood where his confidence to challenge Wang Jian came from.


    Still, that didn''t dampen their excitement to watch the fun since this was a fight between two top geniuses of the twelve great factions. Since they were going to fight, naturally everyone was more than happy to watch.


    Not to mention that this would be helpful for them since it would give them precious information on Wang Jian and Lei Feng before the Ancient Era Ruins opened.


    No one had any doubt that they would have topete against each other in the Ancient Era Ruins, so before they did, any information that they could get on theirpetition would be very valuable.


    So among the crowd that had gathered to watch the duel between Lei Feng and Wang Jian, there were many geniuses from the twelve great factions.


    Wang Jian didn''t n on using his full power first since he was confident that he would be able to take care of Lei Feng without it, but that n quickly changed after he saw what gave Lei Feng the confidence to challenge him.


    After they met in the arena, Lei Feng was the first to speak as he said, "You''re going down today."


    Wang Jian just narrowed his eyes as he looked at Lei Feng before cupping his hands and giving a slight bow.


    Lei Feng didn''t give him the same greeting, rather he just waved his hand and pulled out a spear that he pointed at Wang Jian.


    The moment that this spear appeared, Wang Jian deeply knitted his brows as a bit of understanding appeared in his eyes.


    Based on the aura from the spear, he could tell that it wasn''t a normal weapon. Rather, based on this aura, he could tell that this was a Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    He himself was only using an Embryo Soul Realm Artifact and this was the best that he could get as a genius of the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Just where had Lei Feng gotten this Child Soul Realm Artifact from?


    But now wasn''t the time to think about this since Lei Feng was already charging at him with this Child Soul Realm Spear.


    Just as he had expected, the power of the spear really was overwhelming. It had almost reached the level of being as strong as a sword cultivator''s attacks which wasmonly regarded as being the strongest attacks.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that Wang Jian wasn''t able to match it since he was a sword cultivator.


    With a single sweep of his sword, the attacks of the two came together, shing for a minute before both of them were pushed back.


    Lei Feng was surprised to see Wang Jian being able to block his attack, but he didn''t give him any time to breathe. He knew that sword cultivators had to use quite a bit of life energy to use their powerful attacks, so he wanted to wear Wang Jian down using the Child Soul Realm Spear.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t know anything about Wang Jian.


    That attack just now wasn''t his full power attack, it wasn''t even a normal attack for him. It was one that he had released quickly because he had been caught off guard by how powerful Lei Feng''s spear attack was.


    Now that he had some time to focus, naturally the next attack would be countless times stronger.


    The life energy gathered around his sword before he swung out and with just a single sh, he sent Lei Feng flying and forced him to spit out a mouthful of blood. Lei Feng flew out several meters beforending on the ground. He didn''t look badly hurt, but it was clear that the fight was already over.


    This result was what everyone had expected, but what was unexpected was Lei Feng''s attitude after the fight.


    Everyone had assumed that Lei Feng would lose his temper after losing, but what they didn''t expect was that he just coldly walked off the stage and out of the arena without saying a thing.


    This wasn''t like the Lei Feng that the rumours had described.


    Still, since the fight was over, everyone quickly dispersed.


    Those were the only three matters that happened in the past month and the month had gone by in a blur.


    Now it was time for the Ancient Era Ruins exploration expedition.

 Chapter 614 Gathering (1)

    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were waiting outside the store at the crack of dawn, waiting for the people who they had arranged to meet toe pick them up.


    It was the day of the Ancient Era Ruins expedition that was announced a month ago.


    The details of the gathering had been released a week ago and now they were on their way.


    As for why they were going at dawn, that was the choice of the people who organized this expedition, so there was nothing they could say about it.


    The store would still run as normal since Lulu and Momonga were there to take care of it.


    The only thing that they had to think about was this Ancient Era Ruins expedition.


    It didn''t take long before a beast carriage arrived in front of Lin Fan''s store.


    When the door opened, it revealed faces that Lin Fan couldn''t be more familiar with. After all, whenever something happened, these were the people that always came to pick him up.


    Sitting inside the beast carriage were Qiao Yi Fei, Mao Tao, and Murong Yue.


    As for Fu Ling, she didn''te because she wasn''t part of the group heading into the Ancient Era Ruins. Instead, there was another mission that she had to take care of with her grandfather, so she wasn''t present.


    The five of them silently made their way to the gathering area. It was clear that they were trying to focus their minds before heading into the Ancient Era Ruins.


    But before they arrived, Murong Yue suddenly pulled something out that she spread in front of her.


    Lin Fan and Mo Ze Chen were surprised to see this, but when they saw what was on the piece of paper that Murong Yue pulled out, they knitted their brows even more.


    In front of them was a map that was iplete, but this was a map that they had never seen before.


    It wasn''t strange for Lin Fan to not have seen this map before since he was still considered new to the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but for someone like Mo Ze Chen who went all around this upper realm, it was strange when he didn''t recognize the map.


    That meant that this map was either of a ce that was hidden or it was of a ce that wasn''t on this. But that wouldn''t make sense since there was no reason to show a map of a ce that wasn''t on the.


    So the only exnation was that this was a map of a hidden ce.


    Moreover, with where they were going, it was most likely that this was a map of the Ancient Era Ruins, or at least what had been explored so far.


    As for how the Hunters Organization got this information, that was up to the imagination. After all, it wasn''t like there were that many people that had this information.


    This information definitely came from a high ranking spy that they had either ced in the Thunder Sect or the True Spirit Sect. Those two sects were the ones leading this expedition, so they must have explored a bit of it before which created the current map in front of them.


    After leaving the map for a few minutes, Murong Yue suddenly rolled it up and put it back in her Storage Ring without a single word. However, the meaning behind her actions were quite clear.


    It didn''t take them that long to reach the gathering spot and when they arrived, they saw that there were already quite a few people that were already here.


    Based on the groups that they gathered in, it was clear to see that these were the different alliances between the different factions.


    After they arrived, the other groups all looked at them and waited for them to head to one of the groups.


    After looking around to see what the groups were, Lin Fan led his group from the Hunters Organization to a location that was separate from the other groups, standing there as if they were waiting for something.


    Well, they were waiting for something.


    The Hunters Organization had more tokens than just the ones that were given to the five of them, so they had also found other people to go with them into the Ancient Era Ruins. However, those other people didn''t seem like they had arrived just yet.


    But that wasn''t strange since they had arrived early.


    After waiting for a bit, the rest of their group slowly showed up and finally they had all gathered.


    Once they were all gathered, Lin Fan led the group to join one of therger groups that were already waiting there.


    He didn''t lead the Hunters Organization group over to the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce group, instead he led the Hunters Organization group over to where the neutral factions like the Tamers Guild and the Alchemy King Hall were standing.


    The alliance between them and the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce was a secret, so naturally they couldn''t openly interact like the rest of the groups were doing.<sub> </sub>


    By nature, the Hunters Organization would be considered a neutral faction because of what kind of faction they are, but of course, the situation was different this time. However, before the time was right, they would hold themselves back and stay with the neutral faction.


    As more and more time passed and the time to open the Ancient Era Ruins approached, there were more and more people that arrived.


    Many of them were people that Lin Fan didn''t recognize, but there were a few that he did recognize.


    The leader of the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce were people he couldn''t be more familiar with. He was also familiar with the people from the Tamers Guild since they had met when he had been at the Tamers Guild for his Monster Trainer Exam.


    As for the other factions, there were a few people that were strangely familiar to him.


    For example, the group from the Dian Family and the Ying Family, for some reason, the leaders that led this group were familiar to him.


    After thinking about it, he realized that these people were familiar to him because they were simr to the two that he had met back on the Blue Star. The two of them must be their elder siblings¡­


    That meant that the two who he had met back on the Blue Star didn''t have low positions in the Dian Family and the Ying Family¡­


    This was not a good thing for him.


    As for the Alchemy King Hall, he didn''t find anyone that he recognized even though he thought that he should.


    With Song Shu''s backing and talent, she should have been one of the few people that received a token. Or at least that was what Lin Fan had thought, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case.


    However, when he saw this, he wasn''t disappointed at all.


    He knew that this Ancient Era Ruin would be a very dangerous ce and it would be best for her if she didn''t enter it.


    Then again, that elder treasured her like his own granddaughter, so it was reasonable that he wouldn''t let here to this dangerous ce.


    Finally, it was time for the Ancient Era Ruin to open.


    The ones that came out were Lei Feng from the Thunder Sect and Shi Yi from the True Spirit Sect.


    Lin Fan was familiar with Lei Feng because of all the times they had met, but when he saw Shi Yi, he couldn''t help being surprised by her.


    After all, even though he had read reports on what she looked like, when he was finally seeing her, he couldn''t help being surprised by her appearance.


    He had read that she was smallerpared to other people her age, but he never expected her to be something that he had only read about in mangas before.


    The best way to describe her was¡­legal loli.


    It wasn''t like the granny loli that he had seen before, this was a girl who was in the prime of her life, but her appearance¡­was like that of a little child.


    Lin Fan was sure that if she was on earth, there would be plenty of people who would be trying to make a move on her¡­


    However, the moment that she appeared, the first thing that she did was re in Lin Fan''s direction.


    It was clear that she knew something and she was holding a grudge against him, but he didn''t seem to mind it. After all, he knew that it was impossible for him to hide what he did, not to mention that even if it was hidden, Lei Feng would have pinned this matter on him regardless.


    This was something that he had already expected, so why would he be surprised by it?


    The two of them walked through the crowd and came right up to the stage that had been set up, which everyone had gathered around.


    Once they were on the stage, Lei Feng came up to the microphone that was prepared and said, "Is everyone ready?"


    There was no response to this question, but looking across the crowd, it was clear that everyone was more than ready.


    Lei Feng gave a nod before turning around to give a nod to the experts that had gathered around a tree that was ced behind the stage.


    Seeing this nod, the experts suddenly raised their life energy and injected it into the tree. Or rather, they injected it into certain spots around the tree.


    Once this life energy was released, there were rods that suddenly came out of the ground.

 Chapter 615 Gathering (2)

    After these rods came out of the ground, chains that were made of light were revealed.


    These chains were connected to the rods and in the center of the chains was a muchrger chain that hadpletely surrounded the tree.


    With a roar from the experts, they suddenly raised their life energy again.


    In response to this, the chains that had surrounded the rods in the ground suddenly started to dissipate beforepletely disappearing.


    From the rod, the chain that was connected to the tree dissipated until the chain around the tree waspletely gone.


    Once the chain around the tree disappeared, there was a glow that appeared in the center of the tree. This glow wasn''t that strong, but it slowly spread across the trunk of the tree until it formed a circle of light that had a fainter hue of light rippling in the center.


    No matter how one looked at it, this seemed to be a portal.


    As for what it was a portal to, it couldn''t be more clear to everyone since it was the reason why they had all gathered here today.


    After the portal appeared, Lei Feng said, "The Ancient Era Ruins are now open. All those that have a token, please step forward and enter the portal."


    Then without caring about anyone else, Lei Feng waved his hand and led his group from the Thunder Sect into the portal. Following right behind him was Shi Yi and the group from the True Spirit Sect.


    Once their two groups had gone in, there was only a brief moment of silence before the other groups charged forward to get into the ruins as soon as possible. But it wasn''t all the groups that charged forward, Lin Fan''s group from the Hunters Organization stood there waiting for the rest of the people to go through.


    One of the people who weren''t as close to Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Young master Lin, shouldn''t we be heading in as well? If we wait any longer, all the treasures will be taken by other people."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "There''s never anything good for the people who go in first."


    That person didn''t give up as they said, "That''s normally the case, but even the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect went in already. There shouldn''t be a problem with these ruins."


    Lin Fan shook his head again and said with a sigh, "You''re thinking is too shallow. Maybe that would work in another situation, but this is a situation where they control all the cards."


    When that person heard this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows as he asked, "What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan slowly exined, "They''ve had control over these ruins for so long, do you really think that they haven''t explored it before? Even if there are leaks and people have maps of parts of the ruins, does that mean that everything has been leaked? It''s not that hard for them to hide information if they really wanted to."


    The person suddenly realized something as they said, "You mean that it''s a trap?"


    Lin Fan didn''t directly answer the question as he said, "They should have had time to find a ce to hide, shouldn''t they?"


    That person couldn''t help being stunned when he heard this, but he no longer refuted Lin Fan''s words since he realized that what Lin Fan said waspletely reasonable. It was so reasonable that he even believed that this was what was happening on the other side¡­


    So their group just waited there until most of the other groups had gone.


    There were also another group that wasn''t in a rush to head in, which was the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce group.


    Wang Jian had the same feeling as Lin Fan, so he didn''t lead their group into the portal right away.


    However, as the crowd of people were going in, there was someone who had just touched the portal when there was s sudden re of energy that came from it.


    Before that person could even react, there was a sudden explosion of light from that portal before the powerful energy that was gathered suddenly shot out. That person couldn''t even react in time as that energy hit them head on, sending them flying before crashing right into the ground.


    It was clear by the way his limbs were pointing that this person didn''t get off lightly, but at the very least, this person was still alive.


    Everyone was shocked by this and turned to look at the people from the Thunder Sect who were standing on the side, overlooking this process.


    The person who was clearly the leader of the group from the Thunder Sect came forward, walking over to that person before shaking his head and saying, "It seems like these rats really don''t know their ce. We already told everyone that you need an Ancient Era Ruins token to enter and they think that could just sneak in? This is what you deserve."<sub> </sub>


    Without even bothering helping that person, the person from the Thunder Sect went back to their group.


    None of the other groups cared about this person because this person wasn''t someone from the twelve great factions. This person was nothing more than someone from a small family who thought that he could sneak in among the crowd, but he had been taught a painful lesson in the end.


    After this incident happened, there were quite a few people who had been in the crowd who silently walked out of the crowd.


    It was clear that many people had the same ideas, but they were now grateful that this person had taken the opportunity to set an example for them.


    It didn''t take long before the rest of the groups had entered the portal and there were only Lin Fan and Wang Jian''s groups left.


    Of course, neither of them could wait too long since it would seem too suspicious, so after a few minutes, Wang Jian''s group was the first to enter the portal.


    As for Lin Fan''s group, Lin Fan just kept looking at his watch as if he was calcting the time.


    On the side, the group from the Thunder Sect was ring at them.


    To them, it was clear that this group from the Hunters Organization was looking down on them, not giving them any face. After all, what they were doing right now was just tantly using them of having ulterior motives.


    Finally, after half an hour, Lin Fan finally made his move as he led his group into the portal.


    As the other groups watched them head in, there were some that were watching the Thunder Sect group to see if they would do anything to them.


    Of course, the Thunder Sect group didn''t do anything because they knew that it would hurt their reputation to make a move against Lin Fan''s group now. Not to mention that there was indeed a trap set up for them in the ruins, so they would just let the trap take care of them.


    Without any incident, Lin Fan''s group walked right through the portal.


    When they appeared on the other side, Lin Fan found that he had been sent to a corresponding portal on a pedestal on the other side, but to his surprise, he was all alone. Looking around, he couldn''t see a single trace of anyone else he came in with.


    When he was about to ponder his next move, he suddenly heard a sounde from the forest beside him.


    It was a human voice, but it was one that was filled with panic and pain as it shouted, "Help me! Someone help me!"


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows, but he didn''t panic since he had been expecting this. It was just that he had thought that he had spent enough time for all the traps to be triggered by the other people that came in first, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t knit his brows because he was worried about himself. Rather, he was more worried about the people who hade with him.


    He wasn''t worried for himself because he had something that the others didn''t.


    As Lin Fan was thinking about what to do, Brainy appeared in his sleeve.


    Then after Brainy appeared, there were many different smaller animals that appeared around Lin Fan. They only stayed near him for a few seconds like they were receiving orders before suddenly running off in different directions.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind any of that as he began looking around himself, trying to figure out where this was based on the partial map that he had seen back in the beast carriage, but it was hard to figure this out just based on the surrounding area alone. After all, unless he looked at it from above, he wouldn''t know what they of thend looked like.


    So after a minute of looking around, he gave up and jumped off the pedestal that he was on before heading into the forest.


    Of course, he moved in the exact opposite direction that the voice came from.


    This ce followed thew of the jungle and everyone only cared about themselves, so no one would have the time to rescue others.


    Not to mention that it wasn''t certain that he would be able to rescue that person since he didn''t know what that person was facing. So in the end, the only thing he did was send Brainy''s scouts over to see what the threat was so he knew how to avoid itter on.

 Chapter 616 Ancient Era Ruins (1)

    After jumping off the pedestal and entering the forest, Lin Fan only moved a certain distance before stopping.


    He jumped up into a tree and had Brainyy out puppets around him as a detection system before taking the time to sum up what he knew.


    Brainy had been controlling puppets to scout out the surrounding area during the time that he had been moving, so it was time for him to go over those reports before nning out his next move.


    ording to the reports that were sent back, it seemed like the cry for help that he heard earlier came from someone that was being attacked by arge tiger. Based on the aura that the tiger released, he knew that it had to be at least in the Child Soul Realm. There was no way that the Embryo Soul Realm Expert that it was chasing would have been able to fight against it.


    But also based on this report, it seemed like the main danger in this area were the beasts that lived in this area.


    From the other reports that he received, he had found that there were also many other Child Soul Realm beasts that were wandering the area. He had also found that in certain areas, there were auras that came from Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    It seemed like the trap that Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect had set up was quite devious.


    No one could me them since the teleportation was random, so they would also be subjected to the same treatment, but they surely had some way of keeping themselves safe.


    For example, they had control over these Ancient Era Ruins the entire time and it was known that they had time to explore parts of it, or Murong Yue wouldn''t have had that map.


    It was very likely that they had already found ces to hide from these Child Soul Realm beasts. As for what happened to the people that came with them, who knows if they were killed by the Child Soul Realm beasts attacking them or from a human attacking them.


    Everything that didn''te out would be forgotten in the Ancient Era Ruins.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had a premonition of this and had ced some of Brainy''s seeds on the members of the Hunters Organization group.


    Of course, those seeds weren''t embedded in them and wrapped around their nervous systems like Brainy''s puppets, but these seeds were still a part of Brainy. As long as they didn''t break, Brainy would be able to maintain a connection to them and track where the people with these seeds on them were.


    So far, not a single one of those seeds had broken yet, but a few of them were moving quickly which meant that the ones the seeds were on were most likely running from something.


    However, there was nothing Lin Fan could do for them since they were just too far away from him.


    So Lin Fan slowly created a map of the area around him with Brainy''s flying puppets and he was able to create a map that matched a part of the bigger map that Murong Yue had shown him. It didn''t take him long to recreate that map and find where he was, as well as mark down the location of the members of the Hunters Organization group.


    So far, it seemed like no one had been killed yet, though quite a few of them had been moving quickly to avoid attacks.


    In the end, it was all because Lin Fan had warned them about the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect''s ns that they had been on guard the entire time.


    At the very least, it seemed like they were concentrated in a single area and it wouldn''t take Lin Fan that long to gather them all up.


    After getting all this information, Lin Fan made a clear route to take that would allow him to gather up all the members as soon as possible before heading out.


    However, once he jumped off the tree that he was in, there were three people who suddenly surrounded him.


    Lin Fan didn''t recognize these people, but he certainly wasn''t caught off guard by them.


    After all, he had been surveying the entire area and it would have been shameful if he hadn''t been able to find these three. He had actually found them quite quickly and had been watching them the entire time, just waiting for them to make their move.


    Once he saw that they didn''t seem to have any intentions of letting him go, Lin Fan asked in a cold voice, "Can I help you?"


    The person who seemed to be the leader of these three people didn''t mind Lin Fan''s cold voice at all and said with a friendly smile, "This little brother, how about working with us? It''s already hard enough to survive in these ruins if we''re alone, so isn''t it a good idea for us to work together?"


    As he said this, he released his aura as a Mid Embryo Soul Realm Expert. Once he released his aura, the other two also released their auras as Mid Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    All three of them had confident looks on their faces, but to Lin Fan, they seemed like fools who were dancing and screaming in front of him.


    But they had justification in being this confident.


    The aura that Lin Fan was currently leaking as that of a Low Embryo Soul Realm Expert.<sub> </sub>


    A Low Embryo Soul Realm Expert was surrounded by three Mid Embryo Soul Realm Experts like this?


    Was there any doubt who would win?


    But that was only following normal logic and Lin Fan was anything but normal.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look over these three before saying in the same cold voice, "Unfortunately, I don''t need any help, so you''ll have to excuse me."


    There was a trace of anger that appeared in the eyes of the three since it was clear in Lin Fan''s voice that he was looking down on them. However, none of them backed down because they knew that they had the advantage in this situation.


    The leader of the three shook his head and said, "It''s a shame that this little brother can''t recognize a toast when he''s given one."


    Then he nodded at the other two and said, "Do it." After he said this, he pulled out his weapon and jumped at Lin Fan.


    Without any hesitation, the other two also jumped out at Lin Fan with their weapons brandished.


    Lin Fan saw this and didn''t panic like one would expect someone at his level to do. Instead he just gave a sigh and shook his head as he stood there.


    The three attackers were surprised by Lin Fan''s actions, it was almost as if he was treating himself as an adult and them as children, but they didn''t think deeper into that. They knew that they would be able to take care of him, so they continued charging at him without any hesitation.


    Right when they were about to hit Lin Fan, there was a sudden white energy that appeared around him.


    Then without any warning, Lin Fan suddenly disappeared from his original spot, causing all three of them to miss, striking the ground with their weapons.


    All three of them had bewildered looks as they looked around themselves, but then there was a roar that suddenly rang through the forest around them.


    When they looked up at the source of the roar, they suddenly noticed that there was a giant paw mming down at them.


    The speed of the paw was almost too fast for them to react to, but they were able to avoid it at the veryst second. However, that didn''t mean that they were able topletely avoid it since the paw had caught them off guard and they were hit by the shockwaves of the paw.


    Thoughpared to heavy injuries or even dying from being struck by the paw, it was better that they got off with light injuries alone.


    Afternding and stabilizing themselves, they looked at the owner of the paw that attacked them before immediately revealing looks of shock.


    It was a Child Soul Realm beast!


    Why was there a Child Soul Realm beast that had suddenly appeared and why hadn''t they noticed it at all?


    But they didn''t have time to think about this at all.


    The three of thempletely forgot about the arrogance that they had a few seconds ago and without caring about the other members of their group, they all ran off in different directions.


    These three attackers weren''t people from the twelve great factions, they were members of families that had won their tokens through the auction.


    Since they didn''t have other members of the same faction to work with, the three of them had decided to work together.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that they had any loyalty towards each other and they would abandon each other without any second thoughts.


    The tiger paused for a second as it was caught off guard by these three suddenly heading off in different directions, but it wasn''t stunned long as it suddenly made a decision to chase after one of these three people.


    The Child Soul Realm tiger was naturally much faster than this human who was in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm and since they were so close, it didn''t take long for the Child Soul Realm tiger to p this person to death.


    Even in death, that person couldn''t help thinking where it had all gone wrong.


    The only problem was that he never once considered Lin Fan as the source of his misfortunes.

 Chapter 617 Ancient Era Ruins (2)

    As for the other two, they didn''t even stop for a single second after that first person was pped into a meat patty by the Child Soul Realm tiger.


    The only thought on their minds was to escape.


    Well, not the only thought on their minds.


    The other thought was that they were praying that the tiger would go after the other person instead of them.


    After taking care of the first person, the tiger didn''t bother with the meat patty that it left on the ground as it turned to a second target.


    Without even a moment''s dy, the tiger shot out at the second person.


    The person who had been chosen as the tiger''s second prey naturally didn''t have a good look on their face, but they weren''t willing to give up. After all, they wanted to live, they wanted to live and find treasures to bring back to their family!


    But it was just too bad that the tiger was much faster than this person.


    It didn''t take any effort from this tiger to catch up to this person and as soon as it caught up, it mmed its paw down at this person.


    This person naturally tried to fight back, but with his level of cultivation, it was like throwing an egg at a wall. The egg cracked with a single touch and the person was turned into another meat patty.


    As for the third person, he didn''t get to run that far either, but it wasn''t the tiger that took care of him.


    After Lin Fan had suddenly used his spatialws to disappear, he had reappeared in a tree that wasn''t that far away from his original position.


    As he stood in the tree, he watched as the Child Soul Realm tiger that he led over with Brainy''s puppet ughter the first person and chase after the second person. Of course, he didn''t watch the tiger kill the second person since he turned his attention to the third person.


    He had already done all of this, there was no chance that he would be letting this third person live. Especially since he wanted to do something that he didn''t want anyone to see.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan jumped off the tree that he had been standing in and fell down right in front of thest person.


    p That person had been in a panic as he ran away from the Child Soul Realm tiger, so naturally he didn''t expect Lin Fan to appear in front of him like this.</anda>


    However, he didn''t panic when he saw Lin Fan appear since he still believed that he was stronger than Lin Fan. After all, his cultivation level was higher, so why wouldn''t he be stronger?


    So when he saw Lin Fan, he brandished his sword and shouted, "Move or die!"


    But Lin Fan just calmly looked at this person threatening him with his sword and shook his head with a faint smile.


    This person felt a trace of rage in his heart seeing Lin Fan like this, but he knew that he didn''t have time to vent this anger. His life was more important than just venting his anger.


    So he gathered all his power into a single strike that he swung out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t seem to mind at all as he just watched the sword in front of him get closer and closer until it was almost right in front of him. It was only then that Lin Fan raised his right hand, causing a white dagger to appear.


    In one swift motion, Lin Fan stabbed out with that dagger and the tip touched the de of the sword, instantly causing it to stop.


    That person revealed a shocked look as he looked at his sword.


    He tried to push it forward, but it was like he was pushing against a mountain, unable to move forward even a single inch.


    He looked up at Lin Fan standing in front of him with a look of terror this time as he asked in a trembling voice, "Who, who are you?"


    But he didn''t receive an answer at all.


    Well, to put it more urately, it wasn''t that he didn''t receive an answer at all. Instead of receiving a verbal answer, all he received was a direct answer in terms of action.


    Before he realized what had happened, his field of view suddenly flipped upside down.


    This person tried to move his hand to see what happened, but then he realized that he couldn''t feel his hand at all. Rather he couldn''t even feel his body at all.


    Thest thing he saw was his own decapitated body as he suddenly realized, "Ah, I''m dead."


    The head fell to the ground and rolled a few times before the light in those eyes went out.<sub> </sub>


    In his final moment, all that person had felt was regret towards provoking Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about what that person felt at all as he turned his attention to the Child Soul Realm tiger that had just finished taking care of the second person. Once it had finished ttening that second person into a meat patty, it had tried to find the third person only to find that Lin Fan had already taken care of him.


    However, that didn''t mean that it was nning on letting Lin Fan go either.


    The reason why it had chased Brainy''s puppet all the way here was because it had been trespassing on its territory and right now, they were still currently on the Child Soul Realm tiger''s territory. That meant that Lin Fan was an intruder that was currently trespassing on its territory.


    As the ruler of this area, how could it ept a human intruder stepping on itsnd?


    So without any hesitation, the tiger flew out once again, jumping in Lin Fan''s direction. As it was flying over Lin Fan, the tiger raised its paw and mmed it down on Lin Fan, nning on turning him into a meat patty like it had done with the other two.


    However, as soon as its paw fell down, there was a stronger force that suddenly sted its paw away.


    After flying away andnding, the Child Soul Realm tiger suddenly revealed a cautious look as it looked at Lin Fan.


    As for Lin Fan, he was just standing there with his right hand up and the index finger pointing out.


    The Child Soul Realm tiger no longer jumped out right away as it started stalking around Lin Fan, trying to find an opening to strike from. It no longer treated Lin Fan as prey, but rather it was treating Lin Fan as an equal predator.


    Lin Fan looked at the Child Soul Realm tiger with an amused look before suddenly running at it.


    The Child Soul Realm tiger was surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden action, but its pride wouldn''t let it back down from this challenge. Without any hesitation it jumped out and started running at Lin Fan at the same time.


    After a few seconds of running, the two of them shed.


    ¡­


    Five minutester, there was only Lin Fan left standing in that spot. The giant Child Soul Realm tiger hadpletely disappeared.


    Lin Fan quickly cleaned up the area and what that meant was that he cleaned out the Storage Rings of the three people that had tried to attack him. He didn''t bother doing anything with their corpses because there was no reason for him to help bring their corpses back.


    After that, Lin Fan started heading towards the closest seed that Brainy could sense.


    However, as he moved through the woods, there were many different Child Soul Realm beasts that he met.


    There wasn''t a single one that ignored him. As soon as he stepped into their territory, they would almost always attack him without any hesitation.


    Of course, every time that Lin Fan was attacked, the fight didn''t evenst as long as the first time he fought the Child Soul Realm tiger. In just less than two minutes, the Child Soul Realm beast would disappear and there would only be Lin Fan left standing there.


    In total, Lin Fan met ten different Child Soul Realm beasts before he finally reached the location of the first seed.


    With Brainy''s puppet scouts, it didn''t take long before he was able to find that person, but it was a person that he didn''t recognize.


    This person was one of the extras that the Hunters Organization had sent along, so Lin Fan wasn''t very familiar with them even though they had been introduced before entering these ruins.


    Still, this was an ally since it was someone from the Hunters Organization.


    But Lin Fan didn''t hurry to make contact with this person because Brainy''s puppets had also found someone else in this area.


    Lin Fan wrapped himself in his shadow and spatialws before moving over to that second person and he found that it was someone from the Thunder Sect group.


    Before entering the portal, Lin Fan had made sure to memorize all the people from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association before entering. Though for the people that came from the Assassins Association, all of them had been wearing cloaks and hiding their true appearances, so Lin Fan wasn''t certain what they looked like.


    But for the people from the Thunder Sect, they had nothing to hide, so Lin Fan had made sure to memorize their faces.


    Right now in front of him, this was without a doubt someone from the Thunder Sect group.


    As he had expected, it seemed like the Thunder Sect group was targeting the Hunters Organization.

 Chapter 618 Ancient Era Ruins (3)

    Lin Fan wasn''t in a hurry to make a move, rather he doubled down and strengthened thews that were surrounding himself to make sure that he was even more well hidden.


    The person from the Thunder Sect kept watching the person from the Hunters Organization without any awareness that Lin Fan was watching him.


    This was a ssic case of the mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind.


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t want to waste too much time waiting for this person from the Thunder Sect to make a move, so he had also sent out Brainy''s puppets to find the two other seeds that were nearby.


    Five minutester, Brainy received reports from those puppets about who the other two people were. Both of them were extra members that had been added to the Hunters Organization group that Lin Fan wasn''t familiar with, but that wasn''t the funniest thing.


    The funniest thing was that both of them had members of the Thunder Sect group watching them, as if they were waiting to make a move.


    However, it seemed like they were waiting for something since they didn''t make a move even though the members of the Hunters Organization group didn''t notice them at all.


    Lin Fan fell into thought after hearing this report.


    Could it be that they were nning on attacking all the members of the Hunters Organization group at once?


    Then could that mean that they had already found all the other members of the Hunters Organization group?


    No, if they had, they would have already attacked them¡­


    So the only one that they hadn''t been able to find had to be¡­


    As this thought came into his mind, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    At the same time, there was also a n that started to form in his mind.


    It was a good thing that he had spent his time picking up all those things before heading over.


    Once he had finished forming this n, he suddenly stood up and jumped out of the tree, but he did it in a way that the person from the Thunder Sect didn''t notice him at all.


    Once he was on the ground, Lin Fan released a puppet as well as something else from his pet space. After giving them their instructions, Lin Fan left the puppet to watch over this person from the Thunder Sect as he headed off to the next seed.


    When he arrived at the next seed, he didn''t bother looking for the person from his group at all as he directly arrived behind the person from the Thunder Sect.


    Just like with the first person, Lin Fan released a puppet and something else from his pet space before heading off for the third seed without a single moment of dy.


    Like this, Lin Fan tracked down each one of the seeds that he had ced and left puppets to watch each of them.


    When he finally reached thest person, he found it funny because thest person was Murong Yue. Unlike the rest of the group, she was the only person that didn''t have someone from the Thunder Sect or the True Spirit Sect watching her.


    There were a total of four from the Thunder Sect and five from the True Spirit Sect that were watching the other nine members of their group, which had one person extra because Lin Fan had brought Mo Ze Chen along.


    It seemed like his guess was right, they were waiting to strike and the reason they were waiting was because they hadn''t been able to find him.


    Once they did, they would surely attack the members of the Hunters Organization group.


    But it was also funny since Murong Yue was the only one who wasn''t being attacked. It seemed like Lei Feng was quite sincere about his feelings towards her.


    Once everything had been set up, Lin Fan gave Brainy the signal to start the operation.


    The four people from the Thunder Sect and the five people from the True Spirit Sect werepletely caught off guard by the sudden roar that came from behind them.


    <o>,m When they turned around, they saw that there was a Child Soul Realm beast that had suddenly appeared behind them and was currently charging right at them.</o>


    However, these were elite members of the younger generation from these two sects, so even if they were caught off guard, they quickly came back to their senses. As soon as they recovered from their shock, the first thing that they did was immediately turn to run.<sub> </sub>


    After all, these people from the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were only in the Embryo Soul Realm, so they weren''t a match for these Child Soul Realm beasts at all.


    As for the direction that they ran in¡­it was in the direction of the people from the Hunters Organization that they had been watching the entire time.


    Lin Fan had been watching everything happen through Brainy''s puppets, but he was surprised by the speed that the people from the two sects were running at.


    Even though the aura that they released was the normal aura of someone in the Embryo Soul Realm, the speed that they moved at definitely wasn''t.


    He understood that the people from the Thunder Sect would be faster since as their name implied, the people from the Thunder Sect cultivated with thunderws that would make them much faster than normal cultivators, but that didn''t exin why the people from the True Spirit Sect were faster than the Child Soul Realm beasts.


    However, when Brainy looked more closely with the puppets, she saw that there were wisps of green life energy around these people, which indicated that they were using some kind of windw.


    They must have some kind of artifact or some kind of talisman that stored windws, allowing them to move this quickly.


    However, this kind of boost was only temporary, so it wasn''t as if they could outrun the Child Soul Realm beasts forever.


    But they mustst long enough that these people were confident enough to continue with their n. After all, the reason why they were running at the people from the Hunters Organization was because they were nning on using them as bait for the Child Soul Realm beasts.


    When given an option between prey that was easy to catch and prey that was hard to catch, most predators would choose the prey that was easier to catch since it meant exerting less effort.


    These people from the two sects were confident that as long as they led the Child Soul Realm beasts to the people from the Hunters Organization, the beasts would definitely choose to attack the ones from the Hunters Organization instead of them.


    While this wasn''t how they were nning on getting rid of them, they had no other choice now.


    Just where had these Child Soul Realm beastse from?


    This was what they thought, but it was too bad that reality didn''t go the way that they had expected.


    The people from the Hunters Organization naturally heard the loud sounds that came from the people of the two sects being chased. The moment that they saw the Child Soul Realm beasts running towards them, they immediately turned around to run without even thinking about it.


    It was just too bad that they weren''t a match in terms of speed.


    It didn''t take long before the people from the two sects and the Child Soul Realm beasts were able to catch up to the people from the Hunters Organization.


    Lin Fan had been observing the situation the entire time through his puppets, but he wasn''t worried at all when they reported this. Rather, he revealed a faint smile when he heard that the Child Soul Realm beasts had caught up to the people from the Hunters Organization.


    As soon as the people from the two sects caught up to the people from the Hunters Organization, they jumped down beside them before running out in front of them, making sure that the people from the Hunters Organization were right in between them and the Child Soul Realm beasts.


    As they ran by, they didn''t forget to look at the people from the Hunters Organization with a smug smile.


    The Child Soul Realm beasts continued chasing right after the people from the two sects, so naturally they quickly caught up to the people from the Hunters Organization.


    When they were right behind the people from the Hunters Organization, they turned back to look at the Child Soul Realm beasts with looks of fear. They knew that once they were caught, they would be dead and now that it had happened, they had two choices.


    They could either ept their death or fight.


    Almost all of them chose to fight to the end since as experts, they had a strong pride and a strong desire to live. They didn''t want to die here before they had even aplished anything.


    The people from the Hunters Organization pulled out their weapons and turned to face the Child Soul Realm beasts, releasing their full aura as they prepared to fight them.


    However, when the Child Soul Realm beasts were right in front of them, theypletely ignored the people from the Hunters Organization.


    In front of shocked gazes, the Child Soul Realm beasts ran right past them and continued to chase down the people from the two sects. It was almost as if the Child Soul Realm beasts didn''t even see them at all.

 Chapter 619 Ancient Era Ruins (4)

    The people from the two sects were just as shocked by this, but they didn''t give up that easily.


    The artifacts that they had been given weren''t out of power yet, so they still had the speed advantagepared to the Child Soul Realm beasts.


    They first ran forward and once they saw that there was enough space, they went in a circle and turned back around, leading the Child Soul Realm beasts right back at the people from the Hunters Organization.


    The people from the Hunters Organization didn''t react at first, but then seeing the people from the two sects leading the Child Soul Realm beasts back, they immediately snapped out of their daze. Without any hesitation, they ran back in the opposite direction to avoid these Child Soul Realm beasts that were being led back, but it was no use at all.


    As long as the artifacts that the people from the two sects had were still in effect, they wouldn''t be able to outrun these people. Not to mention that Child Soul Realm beasts that had a much higher level of cultivationpared to them.


    So it didn''t take long before the Child Soul Realm beasts had appeared before the people of the Hunters Organization again.


    Both the people from the Hunters Organization and the two sects thought that a miracle wouldn''t happen a second time, so they were certain that they were dead this time, however the miracle did happen a second time.


    When the people from the Hunters Organization were prepared to fight the Child Soul Realm beasts, they found that the Child Soul Realm beasts ran right past them again.


    They were left in a daze as they watched the Child Soul Realm beast run right by them.


    As for the people from the two sects, what they felt couldn''t just be described as shock anymore. To them, it was like they had just witnessed the end of the world.


    Once might have been a coincidence, but for it to happen twice, they knew now that it was no longer a coincidence.


    The people from the Hunters Organization had some way of making the Child Soul Realm beasts ignore them, so there was no chance of their n working.


    That meant that the only thing they could do now was try to run away or else it would be their lives that would be lost.


    Without any hesitation, as soon as they came to this decision, the people from the two sects turned to run.


    But it was at that moment that there was an explosion that suddenly came from their bodies. For the different members of the two sects, there were explosions that appeared in different parts, but every single member suddenly felt an explosion hit them.


    This explosion wasn''t strong enough to break through their life energy barriers, so they weren''t injured by these explosions at all, but the explosions themselves had caught them off guard. It took them several seconds to recover from the shock of the explosions and by that time, the Child Soul Realm beasts had already caught up to them.


    The Child Soul Realm beasts hadn''t given them any chance to run as they attacked these people from the two sects without holding back.


    Most of the people from the two sects were able to dodge the attacks, suffering injuries of varying degrees from the shockwave of the attack. Only one person was unlucky enough to be directly ttened into a meat patty by the paw of the Child Soul Realm tiger over him.


    After this first attack, the Child Soul Realm beasts didn''t give the people from the two sects any chances as they immediately released a second attack, a third attack, a fourth attack. With this barrage of attacks, even if the people from the two sects were faster than the Child Soul Realm beasts because of their artifacts, they still suffered more and more injuries and became slower and slower.


    Eventually, the Child Soul Realm beasts were able to kill all nine people from the two sects.


    As they died, their eyes were filled with confusion and unwillingness.


    It wasn''t fair!


    Why were these Child Soul Realm beasts so intent on attacking them?


    And what was that explosion that had just happened?


    None of it made any sense!


    After the Child Soul Realm beasts took care of these nine people from the two sects, they turned back to their respective members from the Hunters Organization group.


    The people from the Hunters Organization group raised their guard, but they could tell that these Child Soul Realm beasts didn''t seem to have any hostile intent towards them.


    The Child Soul Realm beasts came up to them and stopped right in front of them. After they stopped, there was a rat that jumped off the backs of the Child Soul Realm beasts tond in front of the members of the Hunters Organization group.


    The rat took the piece of paper off its back and gave it to the members of the Hunters Organization group.


    After they finished reading the note, they looked at the Child Soul Realm beasts with strange gazes before getting on their backs and letting the Child Soul Realm beasts take them away.<sub> </sub>


    As for what the note was, it was a note from Lin Fan with instructions for them.


    Yes, everything had been nned by Lin Fan. Both the explosions and the Child Soul Realm beasts attacking were all done by Lin Fan.


    As for how it was done?


    It was simple.


    Take the first Child Soul Realm tiger that Lin Fan met.


    p After the first sh, the tiger had immediately acted like a giant kitten in front of Lin Fan when it felt the energy that Lin Fan had injected into it.</anda>


    It was just like with the Berserk Bear in the Tamers Guild, with a single punch, Lin Fan had tamed this Child Soul Realm tiger.


    After taming it, he had formed a temporary contract and ced the tiger into his system''s pet storage space to bring along with him.


    He knew that he would need some forcester on and these Child Soul Realm beasts that were in the forest were the best forces that he could get right now. After all, he had this simple way of taming them just by beating them.


    So that was why Lin Fan had stopped to fight all the Child Soul Realm beasts as he made his way along the forest. He had been taming them with one punch the entire time.


    As for the explosion, that was actually not Lin Fan''s merit or even Brainy''s merit, rather it was the Desert Horror Queen''s merit.


    The Desert Horror Queen had made a breakthrough, which had allowed her to breed even more kinds of ant soldiers.


    One special kind of ant soldier that she had been able to breed now was the explosive ant soldier. To put it inmon terms, it was a little mobile bomb.


    While the people from the two sects had been watching over the people from the Hunters Organization, Lin Fan had the Brainy control the explosive ant soldier through the puppet to hide on the bodies of the people from the two sects.


    Don''t look down on this tiny ant soldier, the explosion that it generated was several hundred times greater than the force that would normally be contained in the amount of mass in its body.


    That was even before Brainy tweaked it¡­


    If Brainy had added one her seeds into the ant soldiers, perhaps the explosion might have even been strong enough to break their life energy barriers.


    After taking care of this matter and making sure that the Child Soul Realm beasts wouldn''t have any problems bringing the members of the Hunters Organization group over, Lin Fan turned his attention to the problem in front of him.


    Murong Yue didn''t have the same attacker as the other members of the Hunters Organization group, but that didn''t mean that there wasn''t anyone watching her at all.


    There was someone from the Thunder Sect that was watching her and his cultivation wasn''t low, which was why even with her high cultivation, she wasn''t able to sense him.


    But of course, that person would have never expected that Lin Fan would have found him.


    Based on this person''s high cultivation, he clearly wasn''t a cannon fodder member of the Thunder Sect group. It was most likely that he was one of the subordinates that Lei Feng relied on, which also showed how much he cared about Murong Yue.


    Of course, none of that mattered to Lin Fan since this person was nothing more than an enemy for him.


    Lin Fan silently moved over to where that person was hiding and then before that person could notice, he came up right behind that person and threw a punch out.


    This was a fist covered in five different glows, which showed that Lin Fan didn''t hold back at all.


    When he attacked, the person from the Thunder Sect naturally sensed this attack because of the appearance of his life energy, but this attack was just too fast and he had been caught off guard. That person from the Thunder Sect didn''t even have time to turn around as the punchnded right in his ribcage, shattering his bones and his heart at the same time.


    When he turned around, thest thing he saw was Lin Fan looking at him with a cold look, not understanding what had just happened.


    He was aggrieved and unwilling!

 Chapter 620 Ancient Era Ruins (5)

    Murong Yue naturally noticed the sudden burst of life energy and turned in the direction that it appeared in, but she was in the middle of the forest, so it was all covered by the foliage.


    Without missing a single beat, she immediately pulled out her sword and cautiously made her way over to investigate.


    However, after taking a few steps, all she saw was Lin Faning out of the foliage.


    As she was about to say something, she suddenly saw Lin Fan throwing a person onto the ground in front of her.


    She was surprised to see someone being thrown in front of her, but when she looked more closely, she realized who this person was.


    Before they had entered these ruins, their group had made sure to memorize the faces of everyone from the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sects, so she immediately recognized that this person was someone from the Thunder Sect.


    Not to mention that she already knew who this person was beforeing into these ruins.


    This person was one of Lei Feng''s most trusted subordinates and he was someone who didn''t have a cultivation level that was weaker than hers. They had even shed several times before, so she knew just how strong he was.


    After realizing this, she couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan.


    Seeing how neat and clean his appearance was, it was clear that he hadn''t broken a single sweat killing this person¡­


    She couldn''t help feeling a chill run down her spine before being grateful that Lin Fan was her ally instead of her enemy.


    She hadn''t been able to sense the two of them at all, if either of them had made a move, she definitely would have been in trouble. But she definitely would have been in more trouble if it was Lin Fan since it seemed like he was already stronger than her.


    But how had he be this strong?


    It was like he was apletely different person from thest time she had seen him fight.


    Still, there was no time for her to question him on this, not to mention that even if she wanted to, she wouldn''t be able to. She still needed him to be on her side, so it wouldn''t be good for her to dig too deeply into what Lin Fan was hiding.


    So after gathering her thoughts, she asked Lin Fan, "What do we do now?"


    Lin Fan just casually waved his hand and said, "Let''s move away from this ce, we don''t want to be near this body. I''ve found everyone else, so we''ll just gather with them before exploring further into these ruins."


    Murong Yue was surprised when she heard thetter part of his words.


    He had already found everyone?


    How had he done it?


    She followed behind Lin Fan as he walked through the forest,ing up to a clearing before stopping. He turned back and indicated for her to wait as he sat down on a rock to the side.


    Murong Yue leaned against a tree, but she didn''t let her guard down for a second after what had happenedst time.


    After around ten minutes, there was a strong aura that suddenly started to approach them.


    When Murong Yue felt this aura, she immediately pulled out her sword and prepared for a fight because she could tell that this was a powerful beast that was approaching them.


    However, right when she was about to attack the beast that was about to appear through the foliage, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand to stop her.


    Murong Yue was confused, but she still listened to Lin Fan as she remained in her original position. However, her hand was on her weapon, as if she was prepared to fight at any moment.


    When the Child Soul Realm beast suddenly appeared from the foliage, Murong Yue was first surprised before revealing a look of disbelief.


    She was surprised at first because of the Child Soul Realm beast, but then she was shocked because she saw who was riding on the back.


    On the back of the Child Soul Realm beast was Qiao Yi Fei.


    After a moment toe back to her senses, Murong Yue immediately came over and asked, "Fei Fei, when did you tame a Child Soul Realm beast?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was still not fully recovered from the speed of the Child Soul Realm beast, so she didn''t reply right away, but once she did recover, she replied with a bitter smile, "It''s not my pet."<sub> </sub>


    Murong Yue revealed an even more confused look as she asked, "What do you mean by that? Then how are you able to ride it?"


    Qiao Yi Fei rolled her eyes and pointed at Lin Fan to say, "Why don''t you ask him?"


    Murong Yue turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "Young master Lin, you can tame Child Soul Realm beasts?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug like it wasn''t a big deal and turned his eyes to look back into the forest.


    Qiao Yi Fei and Murong Yue also followed his gaze as they had sensed the powerful aura that had appeared.


    Both of them drew their weapons, but once again, Lin Fan raised his hand to stop them.


    Both of them looked at each other before putting down their weapons, but they didn''t let down their guard.


    After a minute, there was another Child Soul Realm beast that appeared through the brush and on its back was one of the Hunters Organization members.


    As they saw this, the two of them looked at Lin Fan with strange looks.


    They could clearly tell that Lin Fan was only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm, but he was able to tame two Child Soul Realm beasts like this¡­It really was just too hard for them to believe. If the proof wasn''t in front of them, they really wouldn''t have believed it even if they were beaten to death.


    However, it was still too early for them to be shocked since the most shocking thing hadn''t even arrived yet.


    Over the next half an hour, there were seven more Child Soul Realm beasts that had appeared.


    With the appearance of each Child Soul Realm beast, the shock and disbelief on the faces of every member of the group kept growing until their chins were almost touching the ground.


    Well that was except for Mo Ze Chen who had followed Lin Fan long enough that he wasn''t shocked by this kind of thing anymore. He knew that Lin Fan was someone who could create miracles as easily as waving his hand, so he no longer questioned anything that Lin Fan did.


    But it wasn''t that same for the others from the Hunters Organization since they never had a full understanding of what Lin Fan could do.


    When the final Child Soul Realm beast arrived, they were filled with even more shock. After all, the final Child Soul Realm beast that had arrived wasn''t in the Low Child Soul Realm like the other beasts, but rather it was in the Mid Child Soul Realm!


    There was a full major realm and a minor realm between Lin Fan and this Mid Child Soul Realm beast, so how was he able to tame it?


    This went against allmon sense!


    However, when they saw the various Child Soul Realm beasts all acting cute in front of Lin Fan and trying to get his affection, they knew that this wasn''t fake. There were even a few people that had pinched the person beside them to see if it was a dream.


    Of course they wouldn''t pinch themselves since that would hurt!


    After gathering everyone, Lin Fan pulled out a sheet of paper that had something on it that they were familiar with, but there was also something that they weren''t familiar with on it.


    Lin Fan had clearly marked their location on this map and also he had drawn a route for them to follow which would bring them into the unknown area.


    Seeing this, Murong Yue couldn''t help asking, "Young master Lin, should we really be heading into the unknown part of the map this quickly? We don''t know what''s there yet, so wouldn''t it be better to let the other people explore it first?" Then her voice sank as she said in a solemn voice, "After all, it could be another trap from the Thunder Sect."


    As she said this, the rest of the group gave shivers as they remembered what they had just gone through.


    But as they thought about this, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan withplicated gazes. They still remembered how he had put those nine Child Soul Realm beasts into his pet space.


    Lin Fan looked up at her before saying, "I have an ability to scout out the area around me and this is the path that I''ve scouted out so far."


    He didn''t say anything else after that, but no one could refute him since he had been able to find them all. Not to mention that he had found those people from the two sects that had been plotting against them.


    So after a moment of silence from the group, everyone agreed with Lin Fan''s n since there was nothing else they could do. They didn''t have the same abilities as Lin Fan and it was dangerous to wildly wander around the area, so the best idea now was to follow the path that Lin Fan had created.


    With this n set, the Hunters Organization group set off with high spirits.


    But on the other side, the people from the two sects had ugly expressions on their faces.

 Chapter 621 Ancient Era Ruins (6)

    When Lei Feng heard what his subordinate had told him, his face had turned as cold as thousand year old ice. It was as if just a single nce from him could freeze a human whole and trap them in a block of ice.


    On the side, Shi Yi''s expression was just as ugly as Lei Feng''s, but the difference was that there was a clear me of rage that burned in her eyes.


    They hade up with this n, even risking their own members just to take care of the Hunters Organization, but in the end, they had obtained nothing. All of the Hunters Organization members had lived and the worst part of it all was that their subordinates had died!


    After a long period of silence, Lei Feng said in an ice cold voice, "Are you certain that there are no survivors at all? What about Lei Yuan? You''re telling me that even Lei Yuan is dead?"


    Lei Yuan was the Child Soul Realm subordinate that he had sent out to watch Murong Yue.


    Even if there were Child Soul Realm beasts running around this area, he didn''t believe that any of them could do anything to Lei Yuan. After all, Lei Yuan was his most trusted subordinate and also his strongest subordinate.


    If Lei Yuan was serious, it wouldn''t even be a problem for him to escape from someone in the High Child Soul Realm, not to mention Low Child Soul Realm beasts.


    The person from the Thunder Sect who had just given the report trembled when he heard this.


    He had found Lei Yuan''s corpse where he had reported Murong Yue was, but he had also seen how clean Lei Yuan had died.


    One hit, it only took a single hit to kill Lei Yuan!


    What kind of monster could have done that?


    Still, he had no choice but to report honestly to Lei Feng since he knew that there was nothing he could change about the situation.


    Lei Feng was so enraged that he was about to p this person to death, but then remembering where he was, he put down his hand again and tightly clenched his fists.


    He couldn''t kill his subordinates in this ce since it was just too dangerous. He still needed them forter, whether as helpers or as scapegoats.


    So in the end, he just gave a snort and turned without saying a thing.


    Seeing this, the subordinate who had made the report looked like he had received a pardon and immediately headed off to the side.


    Of course, that was only Lei Feng''s reaction. That didn''t mean that Shi Yi was about to let this matter go that easily.


    With a single wave of her hand, the subordinate who had started moving to the side was sent to the ground. As he was flying, there was a streak of blood that appeared in the air that came from his mouth.


    She had just sent him flying with a single p, someone in the High Embryo Soul Realm.


    Lei Feng narrowed his eyes to look at Shi Yi, but seeing that she wasn''t going to take this any further, he didn''t bother saying a thing. But he did give a snort to make sure that she knew her ce.


    Shi Yi heard this, butpletely ignored Lei Feng. However, she still turned around and didn''t make another move after that.


    On the ground, the subordinate who had just been on the ground had an aggrieved look, but he didn''t dare do anything since he had seen Lei Feng''s reaction.


    Of course, Shi Yi was also angry since she not only wanted to kill the Hunters Organization group, but she mainly wanted to kill Lin Fan for revenge. Now that she wasn''t able to take the revenge that she had wanted, it would be strange if she wasn''t angry.


    But she knew that she wasn''t able to do anything about this.


    What they were doing was already pushing the ns of those people and if she pushed it any further, she would harm the True Spirit Sect. This was not something that she could afford to do, either for herself or for the Shi Family.


    After a moment of silence in this group, they started heading off in a certain direction.


    With the way they moved, it was almost as if they had been here before and knew exactly where they were going.


    ¡­


    As for Lin Fan''s group, as they made their way through the forest, there wasn''t much that happened.


    They encountered a few Child Soul Realm beasts, but they were easily evaded with Lin Fan''s scouting abilities.


    Of course, Lin Fan could have also tamed them to use forter, but it wasn''t a good idea to show off too much in front of this group. While they had seen his nine Child Soul Realm pets, it wouldn''t be good to let them see how he tamed them, or rather how easily he tamed them.


    They continued along that path and everything was quiet until they were about halfway there.


    As they were heading through the woods, they suddenly heard shoutsing from the right side.<sub> </sub>


    At first, they couldn''t hear it clearly, but as they came a bit closer, they could tell that this wasn''t a cry of help, but rather the sounds of people arguing.


    It seemed like there were people fighting over something.


    As they came even closer, they were able to hear what the fighting was about.


    "You think we''d let you take it? We saw this herb first, so why should we let you have it?"


    "You''re saying that you saw it first? We''re clearly the ones that saw it first and now you''re saying you saw it first? Stop joking!"


    This was amon thing that happened in ruins like these since there was only a limited amount of resources avable and no one wanted to give something that they found to someone else.


    But this didn''t concern them since this was an argument between people from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family. Neither of these forces had any affiliations with the Hunters Organization, so there was no need for them to step in.


    However, that was until there was another faction that suddenly appeared.


    It was a bunch of people that were in full body cloaks that appeared.


    At first, no one noticed them, but then as they came closer, both the groups from the Dian Family and the Alchemy King Hall noticed them right away.


    Both of the groups stopped bickering as they turned their attention to the group of cloaked people that had appeared.


    This group of cloaked people was no one else but the Assassins Association.


    After a moment of silence, the leader of the Alchemy King Hall group asked, "These friends from the Assassins Association, is there anything we can help you with?"


    Right after that, the leader of the Dian Family group said, "If not, then please leave. This is a matter between our Dian Family and the Alchemy King Hall."


    There wasn''t any hiding the threatening tone in their voices. They didn''t hide it at all, they clearly did not want the Assassins Association group here at all.


    However, even after hearing these clear threats, the Assassins Association group didn''t leave at all.


    Instead, four members of the group turned to thest member of the group, the one who was standing all the way in the back with a different coloured cloak. It was clear that this person was their leader and they were just waiting for this person to make a decision.


    After another moment of silence, that person suddenly raised his hand and said, "Kill them all."


    The Alchemy King Hall group and the Dian Family group were caught off guard by this, but they didn''t panic.


    With a nod between the two leaders, the two groups suddenly came together to face the four people that had charged out from the Assassins Association group. It was almost as if they hadpletely forgotten about their argument from before.


    Of course, the groups from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family weren''t worried because they outnumbered the group from the Assassins Association.


    Both of their groups had four members each, so when added together, they far outnumbered the group of five from the Assassins Association.


    However, that was why they were also a bit confused.


    The Assassins Association group clearly didn''t have enough people to fight all of them, so why were they so confident?


    But that didn''t matter to them right now. The only thing that mattered was taking care of the people that were attacking them.


    Since they outnumbered them, the two groups split into four groups of two that fought the four from the Assassins Association two to one. At the same time, they made sure to keep an eye on the person in the back with the different coloured cloak who was just sitting there.


    But as far as they could tell, that person didn''t seem like he was going to make a move. He even sat down on a rock on the side like he was just watching a show.


    The groups from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family couldn''t help feeling a bit of anger at this.


    Weren''t they being looked down on too much?


    Taking this anger, all of them pulled out their weapons and summoned their pets as they prepared to fight the four that were charging at them.


    The people from the Assassins Association didn''t slow down at all when they saw that they were outnumbered, they just casually pulled out their weapons and summoned their pets as well.


    But as soon as their weapons and pets came out, the two groups from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family were shocked.

 Chapter 622 Ancient Era Ruins (7)

    Child Soul Realm!


    It wasn''t just their artifacts that were in the Child Soul Realm, even their pets were in the Child Soul Realm!


    What was going on here?


    When did the assassins from the Assassins Association suddenly be this strong?


    With these things, even if they were outnumbered, they wouldn''t necessarily be at a disadvantage. And facts proved that they weren''t.


    As soon as the two sides shed, the ones that were pushed back were the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups. With a single sh, the members of the Alchemy King Hall and Dian Family groups copsed at the first blow.


    The key thing was that they had split the groups evenly between the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family. That meant that each group had one person from the Alchemy King Hall and one person from the Dian Family.


    The reasoning behind this was that as alchemists, the people from the Alchemy King Hall weren''t as proficient at fightingpared to the Dian Family, but that didn''t mean that they were weaker. The power that the experts from the Alchemy King Hall had was the power of their mes, or rather the flexibility that they had with their me control skills.


    Working with those from the Dian Family, they would be able to cover their blind spots and overall demonstrate a power that was greater than if either was working alone.


    But that didn''t matter since the people from the Assassins Association had Child Soul Realm Artifacts and Child Soul Realm Pets.


    Even when they were working together, the difference in power was just too much that the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups were blown away.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups were giving up.


    Even if they weren''t able to face them in terms of power, that didn''t mean that they were helpless in front of that power. After all, if they weren''t able tond their attacks at all, they wouldn''t have any meaning at all.


    So the members of each group spread out to go to opposite sides of the people from the Assassins Association, forcing them to focus their attacks on one person first. But as long as they focused on one person, the other person would focus on attacking while the person being targeted would focus on dodging.


    This kind of going back and forth forced the person from the Assassins Association to divert their attention while attacking, giving the person being targeted room to dodge.


    Just like this, they used abination of attack and defense to kite the person from the Assassins Association around.


    Finally when it seemed like the first person from the Assassins Association was about to go down, they all suddenly pulled back.


    The people from the Alchemy King Hall and Dian Family groups weren''t surprised at all by this. Instead, they just gathered in front of the Assassins Association group with a smug look on their face, but there was no hiding the greed in their eyes.


    After all, this was four different Child Soul Realm Artifacts!


    This was something that would make any person from the younger generation excited, not to mention that it was in front of their face now.


    But of course, they didn''t let their guard down since there was still onest person who hadn''t made a move the entire time. He was clearly the leader because of his different coloured cloak, but why didn''t he make a move the entire time, even when his subordinates were being beaten?


    The most suspicious part was that they couldn''t sense any auraing from this person at all.


    That meant that they couldn''t see through his cultivation, which was a pretty bad sign.


    After gathering back in front of the person with a different coloured cloak, the people from the Assassins Association said, "Lord, we can''t take care of them. Please make a move."


    Hearing this, the person with a different coloured cloak gave a cold snort, but this cold snort was not a normal cold snort. The moment that he gave this cold snort, there was a chill that filled the entire area that made people feel like they had fallen into ice.


    That person''s eyes could be seen through the cloak and when those eyes were cast over the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups, they felt like they were standing in front of the reaper. It was like there was a scythe that had been ced at their necks and they would be killed at any second.


    Several people couldn''t help taking a step back and one person''s legs crumpled under them as they fell to the ground with a look of terror on their face.


    That person with the different coloured cloak didn''t say a thing as he suddenly raised his hand.<sub> </sub>


    There was a blue glow that appeared around his hand and it was clear that he was about to release an attack, but the aura that it released was one that the people from the Alchemy King Hall and Dian Family groups had never felt before.


    The people from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family knew that this was it. If this attack were to hit them, there was no chance for them to survive.


    So without any hesitation at all, the people from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family immediately turned to run off in different directions.


    However, when the person with the different coloured cloak saw this, he just gave another cold snort without worrying about a thing.


    Then the blue glow in his right hand suddenly became brighter as spikes of ice suddenly flew out at the people from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family.


    They knew that it was impossible for them to fight back, but none of them were willing to die without doing a thing, so they put up their defenses in the end.


    The people from the Alchemy King Hall released all their mes together to create a giant wall of mes while the people from the Dian Family released lightning to create a that covered the wall of mes.


    However, when the spikes of ice made contact with the wall of mes, the mes scattered in an instant like it wasn''t even there in the first ce. The spikes of ice weren''t affected at all by the mes, there wasn''t even a single drop of water on them from being melted by the heat.


    As the people from the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family, they could only watch as those spikes of ice became bigger in front of their eyes as they approached.


    But then before the spikes of ice could hit them, there was a white dagger surrounded by a colourful glow that suddenly flew out. This dagger was aimed right at the spikes of ice and when they made contact, the spikes of ice were suddenly smashed to pieces.


    Of course, the white dagger wasn''t able topletely negate the force of the spikes of ice and was sent flying back in the direction that it came from.


    The moment that the spikes of ice were shattered, the person in the different coloured cloak immediately knitted his brows as he turned in the direction that the white dagger came from.


    It had to be known that the attack that he had just released was already equivalent to an attack from a High Child Soul Realm Expert. It was something that he had considered invincible in these ruins, but now there was someone that had been able to shatter his attack.


    When he looked in that direction, the one he saw was no one else but Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had been watching the entire time, debating on whether to interfere or not.


    After all, if he didn''t need to, he didn''t want to show himself since there was no merit to it.


    The only reason that he had stayed in the first ce was because the Assassins Association group had suddenly shown up.


    The Assassins Association was working with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, so that meant that they would inevitably go against him and the Hunters Organization. Since that was the case, it would have been a good idea to take care of them before they could cause any trouble.


    Of course, if the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups could take care of them by themselves, that would be even better since it would be less trouble for Lin Fan.


    In fact, he wouldn''t have interfered if the person with the different coloured cloak hadn''t used his attack.


    He could tell how powerful it was, so he hadn''t hesitated at all to throw out his dagger.


    The Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups were more important than offending the Assassins Association. After all, he had already offended the Assassins Association with everything else he had done, so nothing he did now could make it worse.


    Instead, it was better to save the Alchemy King Hall and Dian Family group since they could be potential future allies.


    In fact, with the strength that the Assassins Association group had shown, they would most likely have to work together to deal with them in the future.


    When Lin Fan caught his dagger, he couldn''t help looking at it with a surprised look.


    The person with the different coloured cloak knitted his brows even deeper as he finally spoke. He said in a deep voice, "Who are you?"

 Chapter 623 Ancient Era Ruins (8)

    Lin Fan heard this and slightly knitted his brows, but he quickly rxed them as he said with a smile, "No one of consequence."


    The person with the different coloured cloak gave a coldugh before saying, "I must know."


    Lin Fan just calmly replied, "Get used to disappointment."


    The person with the different coloured cloak gave another coldugh before his voice turned even more chilly and he said, "Then what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "How about we leave matters here for now?"


    The person with the different coloured cloak took a deep look at Lin Fan and there was a tense silence that hung in the air for a long time. Finally, that person with the different coloured cloak gave a cold snort and turned around before saying with a wave of his hand, "Let''s go."


    Everyone had been caught off guard by this.


    Both groups had thought that with the way the person in the cloaked figure was looking at Lin Fan, he would go all out with him. No one expected him to suddenly back down like this and leave.


    Of course, this was the best result that everyone had wanted to see since they knew that it wouldn''t be the two of them that suffered if they fought, but rather it would be them who would be caught up in their fight.


    If they weren''t careful, there might even be the possibility that they would lose their lives.


    So naturally they would want to see this situation being resolved peacefully.


    Of course, nothing that they said mattered since they weren''t the ones that would make the decision.


    But now that they saw that the Assassins Association group was actually leaving, they were filled with joy, but they were surprised since there was no reason for them to leave. After all, it was clear that the person in the different coloured cloak was a match for this person who had just appeared to save them.


    So as the Assassins Association group left, not a single one of them let their guards down just in case that this was all a ruse.


    But they were shocked to find that the Assassins Association group actually left without a single fuss.


    When they were gone, the leaders of the Alchemy King Hall and the Dian Family groups came over to stand in front of Lin Fan.


    They didn''t know who he was, but the fact that he had saved them meant that he wouldn''t be a bad person. Otherwise, what would be the point in saving them if he had other intentions?


    Not to mention, they had seen how powerful the sh between him and that person with the different coloured cloak was. They knew that he had a power that they couldn''t match and it would be better to be his friend than to be his enemy.


    Both of the leaders cupped their hands as they said, "This young master, thank you for your help."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything, he just gave a nod in response to this.


    Neither of the leaders minded since they knew that experts like this had their own personalities.


    The leader of the Alchemy King Hall group spoke first, "This young master, may I ask what is your name? If you don''t mind, perhaps we could go together?"


    As soon as he said this, the leader of the Dian Family group said, "This young master, you could alsoe with our group. Our group is definitely stronger than their group."


    Both of them red at each other after saying this, but they quickly turned their gaze back to Lin Fan, waiting for his answer.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "There''s no need for that, I was just passing by. Perhaps if there is a chance, we will be able to cooperate in the future, but for now, let''s go our separate ways."


    Then without saying another word, Lin Fan headed off into the forest without even turning back once.


    The two leaders clearly seemed like they had more to say, but they weren''t able to say anything since they couldn''t say anything. After all, for people like this, saying more would actually make them annoyed with you instead of helping your case.


    So both of them just silently watched as Lin Fan disappeared into the forest.


    As for the matter of the herb that they had been fighting over, they decided to split it in half and go their separate ways since there were still other treasures waiting for them in this realm. If they spent too much time getting caught up with a single herb, they would be missing out on many different things.


    When Lin Fan came back to the Hunters Organization group, everyone except Mo Ze Chen looked at him with a strange look.


    They had been around the area and they had been close enough to see the battle and feel the aura that came from it.


    After this battle, there was no way for them to look at Lin Fan the same way. After all, the level of power that he released far exceeded their expectations.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about these gazes as he just said, "I''m going to the side for a bit. I''ll be back soon."<sub> </sub>


    No one said anything as they watched Lin Fan walk into the forest on the side, but it was clear by their expressions that they had their questions.


    Aftering into a clearing near the area where the Hunters Organization group was, Lin Fan suddenly bent over and spat out a small mouthful of blood.


    He had been holding this mouthful of blood in his mouth the entire time and after finally being able to spit it out, he looked much more relieved.


    As for why he had spat up this mouthful of blood, it was naturally because of his sh with the person with the different coloured cloak.


    He had been able to see just how powerful the ice spikes were, so he hadn''t held back at all as he released all eightws that he had at his disposal. This was an attack that had a very high strain on both his body and the Iron Eater Bone Artifact, but it was still at a level that he could contain since it was only a single attack. This wasn''t the reason why he had spat out that mouthful of blood.


    Rather the reason why was the bacsh that hade from the sh between the two.


    He had been shocked to find that the ice spikes were evenly matched for his attack, rather it was actually a bit stronger than his attack. If it wasn''t for the use of his absorption power, he might have really been in trouble.


    But the most shocking thing was that after absorbing part of thatw, there was already half of the ice statue that had formed in Lin Fan''s dantian.


    Just how strong did thosews have to be that even a small portion was enough to form half of the ice statue?


    This clearly wasn''t the level of cultivation that someone in the younger generation should have, but now there was someone who had been able to release this kind of attack.


    Was it someone that the Thunder Sect or the True Spirit Sect snuck in? Or was it someone from the Assassins Association?


    If it was someone from the Assassins Association, did that mean they weren''t working with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect?


    After all, if there was someone from the Assassins Association with this kind of power, why would they need to work with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect?


    But what about what Shi Yan had told him?


    He said that the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were indeed working with the Assassins Association, so it didn''t seem likely that the Assassins Association would betray them like this.


    So could it be that this person was the backing for all three of these factions?


    Was this person the reason why they had suddenly decided to work together?


    The more thought he gave this idea, the more Lin Fan felt that it was likely.


    After all, the sudden coboration between those three factions hadn''t made any sense at all. Unless there was a driving force for this coboration, they wouldn''t suddenly make an alliance like this.


    While it seemed like the Ancient Era Ruins might be that catalyst, it still didn''t make sense how close they were.


    But now with the appearance of this backer, it seemed to make much more sense.


    The only question now was where did this persone from?


    Lin Fan looked down at Brainy who had peeked her head out his sleeve and Brainy just shook her head in response to his gaze.


    She couldn''t figure this out either even with her super intelligence.


    There were just too many facts that were missing.


    Then there was the fact that this person might not be the only person that snuck in.


    After all, the Assassins Association group had all been cloaked because of their upation, so who knew how many others were like the person with the different coloured cloak?


    As Lin Fan thought about this, his head started to hurt more and more until he decided to stop thinking about it.


    There was just too little information to work with right now and if he kept thinking, all he would do is distort the facts until they didn''t make sense anymore.


    The only thing he could do now was continue forward on the path that he was given until he learned more.


    But he also couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as he shook his head while thinking to himself that this really was a lot of trouble.


    All he wanted to do was live a peaceful life and slowly build up his power for his and his father''s revenge, but now it seemed like he didn''t have that option.

 Chapter 624 Stairs (1)

    After thinking this through, Lin Fan took a deep breath and closed his eyes as he sat down cross legged.


    He started drawing in the life energy around him as the ck hole in his dantian turned.


    After a few minutes, the vortex of life energy around him suddenly stopped and he opened his eyes again. When his eyes opened, the aura that he released had returned to normal.


    For someone like him with the special ck hole and suns in his dantian, he was able to gather life energy easily and also recover quickly, so it didn''t take him long to recover from the wounds of the sh from earlier.


    Once he had finished recovering, Lin Fan headed back to the Hunters Organization group.


    It was still clear by their expressions that they wanted to ask him questions, but he ignored all those gazes as he led the way forward.


    Seeing that he didn''t want to answer their questions, the Hunters Organization group had no choice but to follow behind Lin Fan. After all, they were relying on him to safely guide them through the forest now and so far he had been able to avoid all Child Soul Realm beasts, so there was no reason for them to doubt him yet.


    But they did keep this matter in the back of their minds.


    It didn''t take them long before they reached a point where the forest around them started to get thinner until they finally reached the edge of the forest.


    Once they came out of the forests, they werepletely shocked by what they had seen.


    There was arge prairie that was stretched out in front of them covered in endless grasnds, but this wasn''t what shocked them. Rather it was what was on the grasnds that shocked them.


    In front of them were hundreds of different staircases with steps of different heights that led all the way into the clouds. As for how far up they went, they couldn''t see since the clouds were blocking their view.


    It almost seemed that as far as they could see, there were staircases that led up to the heavens.


    But after being surprised by them, Lin Fan started to look around the area while his group were still standing there in a daze.


    As he looked around, he saw that it wasn''t just his group that was here. There were many other groups that had made their way through the forest and were walking along the ins. Some groups that he was familiar with and some that he wasn''t familiar with.


    But as far as he could tell, there wasn''t a single group that looked as clean as his group.


    It seemed like they had all encountered their own hardships in the forest and most of them hadn''t been able to get off with light scratches.


    There was even a person who was missing an arm and a leg.


    It was hard to imagine what they had experienced for them to lose this much.


    As for the groups that he did recognize, there wasn''t a single one that seemed to have had all their members.


    It was clear that they either lost members or there were still members of their group that were still in the forest.


    For a group to bepletely together and not have lost a single member like them was rare, so naturally they attracted attention as soon as they came out. There were many people who were whispering to each other and were pointing in their direction.


    Of course, they wouldn''t do a thing since everyone was wary of each other, so all they did was whisper and point.


    Well, not all that they did. There was one group that did much more than that.


    From the group of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, there were two res that belonged to Lei Feng and Shi Yi respectively pointed in their direction. But those two res werepletely ignored since there was nothing that could be done about them.


    While looking around, Lin Fan found that it almost seemed like everyone was waiting around for something before turning his attention to the nearest staircase where there was a gate that was ced right at the entrance.


    When they had arrived, the first thing that they had looked at were the giant staircases leading up into the heavens, but they hadn''t actually looked at the bottom where the entrances were.


    Looking more closely at the other staircases, he found that there were gates that had blocked off the entrances of all the staircases.


    Then when he looked even more closely, he found that there was a timer above each of the staircases. Then looking around, he found that the timer for each gate was different and the shortest timer was the staircase that was closest to everyone.


    It seemed like these people weren''t waiting here because they wanted to, but rather because there was no way forward for them unless they waited.<sub> </sub>


    The only other thing of note was the pir that was right in the center of where everyone had gathered, standing right in front of the closest staircase that had the shortest countdown. However, there wasn''t anything that was on the pir, so there was nothing to pay attention to when it came to that pir.


    Lin Fan led his group to the area where all the other groups were waiting and they also found a spot away from the others to wait for the countdown to end.


    Based on how quickly the numbers on the countdown were changing, it seemed like the countdown was in seconds and it would take another ten minutes or so before the countdown would finish.


    So for now, there was nothing to do but wait.


    During this time, Wang Jian sent Lin Fan a secret message.


    As allies, naturally they had devised a way to send secret messages to each other just in case they needed to contact each other without anyone finding out.


    The message that Wang Jian sent was asking Lin Fan about the other members of the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce that were still in the forest.


    He hadn''t been with Lin Fan the entire way in the ruins during the Hunters Exam, so he didn''t know about Lin Fan''s abilities. However, seeing Lin Fan lead all of his members out safely, he could tell that Lin Fan must have some kind of tracking ability.


    If that was the case, he hoped that Lin Fan would be able to find the other members of their two groups.


    After all, they were working together, so this wasn''t considered too big of a request.


    Lin Fan had actually been looking out for these members during their travels, but the only ones that he had found were corpses.


    There were two from the Myriad Sword Hall and three from the Ice Goddess Pce, which matched the number of people that were missing from their group.


    After pausing for a moment, Lin Fan sent a message back telling Wang Jian about this matter.


    After Wang Jian read this message, his eyes clearly trembled before he leaned over to whisper something to Bing Yu.


    Her eyes turned wide when she heard this and then she turned to re at Lin Fan.


    Wang Jian saw this, but he didn''t stop her since he knew that this would be good for them.


    For people that didn''t know what was happening, they would think that Bing Yu ring at Lin Fan meant that there was some kind of grudge between them and the Hunters Organization. This was what they wanted to see happen since their cooperation was currently still a secret.


    Of course, he would make sure to calm Bing Yu down since if there was actual anger in her over this matter, it would ruin their cooperation as well.


    But it seemed like he didn''t have to worry.


    Bing Yu wasn''t actually affected by what Wang Jian had told her, she had done this on purpose after hearing what Wang Jian had said. She knew that they had fallen into the trap of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, so it couldn''t be med on Lin Fan.


    In fact, if it wasn''t for Lin Fan telling them to stay back, perhaps they might have suffered even more losses than just these five people.


    After waiting for some more time, there were more stragglers that slowly came out of the woods.


    All of them had groups that they could go to, even the ones that didn''t belong to any of the twelve great factions.


    They headed to different twelve great faction groups and blended in with them.


    It was clear that they had reached an agreement with these groups beforehand that they would work with them in these Ancient Era Ruins.


    There weren''t any that came over to the Hunters Organization group since they had used up all their tokens internally, so there wasn''t anyone from the families under them that came.


    When the countdown on the gate was about to finish, most of the people that hade into the Ancient Era Ruins had gathered.


    Most of the groups had lost three to four members, only the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect suffered the greatest, losing five members each. The only other group that didn''t suffer as much as the Assassins Association group who had only lost one member in the end.


    When the countdown on the gate finally finished, there was a sudden sh of light before a figure suddenly appeared in front of everyone.

 Chapter 625 Stairs (2)

    This was a woman in a blue dress with aquamarine hair that was the picture of beauty and with her perfect figure, she ignited the me of desire in any men that saw her. Especially those peaks on her chest¡­


    But when everyone saw her, no one dared to make a move.


    They could all feel that aura that came from her, it was one that ced extreme suppression on them.


    They could tell that if it wasn''t for her holding back, perhaps they might have already been crushed to pieces under this aura.


    After the woman in blue appeared, she took a moment to look over at the people gathered around her before revealing a smile and saying with a nod, "Un, un, not bad, not bad. It seems like quite a good group has gathered this time."


    When everyone heard this, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    They had all thought that this was a projection that had been left behind by the ones who left these ruins, but now that it was talking like this, it was almost as if this projection was able to see them¡­But that wouldn''t make sense since a projection didn''t have a free will of its own¡­


    Then could it be that it had been recorded like this?


    The woman in blue looked around again and as if she could see the looks on everyone''s faces, she suddenly said, "Now, now, don''t only believe what you''ve been taught to believe. Sometimes you have to ept the truth that''s ced in front of your eyes."


    This time, not a single person''s mouth could remain closed as their chins dropped down.


    They had beenpletely shocked by this clear showing of free will which a recording shouldn''t have.


    They hadn''t been able to sense the energy of a soul which was an indication of a soul fragment, so that ruled out the only possibility that they could think of. None of them could understand what kind of thing would allow a projection to have a free will like this¡­


    But they didn''t get hung up on that for too long.


    The one way that theyforted themselves was by telling themselves that this was the result of ancient technology. The ancient era must have some kind of way to create projections that could have a personality.


    After thinking this through, while everyone still had surprised looks on their faces, the look of surprise was much lighterpared to before and there was a bit of curiosity that appeared.


    Seeing this, the woman in blue gave a nod before saying, "You are all here to take our trials to ept our inheritances, that is admirable. However, before we start, I must ask if any of you wish to leave first."


    Hearing this, one of the people who had a shorter temper couldn''t help shouting, "Who do you think we are? Do you really think that we''re afraid of a little trial?"


    The others red at this person, but there were some people who looked at him with looks of agreement.


    They had all risked everything toe here and now to be asked if they wanted to leave like this, this was simply insulting them.


    Of course, none of them were as direct as this person since they knew that there were no benefits to acting out like this. Instead, they were more curious to see what kind of reaction the woman in blue would have.


    However, contrary to their expectations, the woman in blue didn''t get angry. Instead, she just looked at the person who had made that outburst and bowed her head before saying, "Please forgive me, I have no intentions of insulting you."


    Then when she looked up, her expression waspletely different from the rxed expression or the apologetic expression that she had earlier, instead it was an expression that was ice cold. Her eyes were so cold that it felt like being encased in thousand year old ice, never to see the light of day again.


    With these cold eyes and a cold voice, she said, "The trials that you are about to face are more terrifying than anything that you can imagine. I just wanted to ensure that you are all truly ready for them so you didn''t die a meaningless death."


    No one could say anything in response to this.


    After all, just the aura that this woman in blue was releasing was already enough to suppress them all. It wouldn''t be hard for them to imagine just how hard the trials that would follow would be.


    But still, not a single person backed down in the face of this challenge. Not even the person who had made the outburst just now who had also faced the strongest chill released by the woman in blue.


    Seeing the determined looks that everyone had, the woman in blue gave a satisfied nod before saying, "I see that my warnings are unnecessary."


    Then she turned around to walk to the gate at the bottom of the staircase that the countdown had just finished for.


    With a slight raise of her right hand, there was a staff that suddenly appeared. This was a staff that was made of some kind of wood that had been painted blue with arge blue gem that was right at the top of it.


    She lowered the tip of the staff a bit until the blue gem came into contact with the gate and then with a faint sh of blue light, the gates suddenly started to open.<sub> </sub>


    Once they were fully open, she turned around to look at everyone for a bit before saying, "You will find your trial on these stairs. As long as you can reach the top step, you will be able to receive the inheritance associated with these stairs."


    She then paused as she turned to the other stairs and said, "As time passes, the other staircases will unlock for different inheritances and you are free to take those trials." Then after another pause, she said in the same cold voice as before, "But each one will be harder than this first one, so please take them at your own caution."


    After saying this, she moved to the side to clear the way for everyone to enter the gate and step onto the stairs without saying another word.


    Everyone looked at each other before groups suddenly started rushing forward.


    The key thing with what she had said was that this was an inheritance, but she had never mentioned how many people could receive the inheritance. She had only said that they were free to take this trial.


    Then that could mean that even if they all took the trial, only the first person that finished the trial would receive the inheritance.


    If they were slow on the draw, someone else might take this inheritance before them.


    But of course, not everyone rushed forward at the same time.


    Specifically, the groups that stayed behind were the Hunters Organization and the Assassins Association.


    Both of their groups looked at each other with wary looks.


    Lin Fan found that aside from the one person with the different coloured cloak, all of them had the same styled cloaks.


    It seemed like there was only one person that was leading them¡­


    But could one person back all three factions like this?


    After most of the others had gone in, that person with a different coloured cloak waved his hand and led his group through the gate as well.


    Lin Fan watched him leave before waving his hand at his group as well and leading them forward.


    As they headed to the gate, what they didn''t notice was that the woman in blue had turned her eyes to Lin Fan. The moment that her eyesnded on him, they immediately narrowed for an instant before returning to normal.


    However, after catching sight of Lin Fan, the gaze of the woman in blue never left him.


    Until he finally disappeared through the gate did the expression of the woman change.


    She lowered her head to look at her fingers and she did some simple calctions before muttering, "It''s actually him¡­But the aura around him doesn''t seem right¡­Could it be that something happened?"


    Then she turned around and started walking towards the other staircases as she said to herself, "No, this isn''t right. I have to consult with the others."


    She fell silent after these words, but then she said one final thing, "If this doesn''t work out, our final hope is lost."


    ¡­


    Once they had stepped over the threshold of the gate, there was a sh of light that appeared in front of them.


    After that sh of light, Lin Fan saw that he was alone again.


    He hadn''t been surprised by that sh of light since everyone else had also disappeared as soon as they passed through the gate, stepping onto the stairs. He had figured that something must have transported them into the trail since he wasn''t able to see them anymore.


    The one surprise was that he had been separated from everyone else.


    Was it like when they first entered where everyone had been separated or was it something else?


    Lin Fan first checked with Brainy who confirmed that she couldn''t sense the seeds on the others at all.


    It seemed like it wasn''t like the beginning where they had been separated in the same space, but rather a new subspace had been created for each person who was taking the trial, so that they would be alone in their trials.

 Chapter 626 Stairs (3)

    After confirming this, Lin Fan looked around himself to see where he had been sent, or rather to see what kind of trial he was about to face.


    Looking around, he found that there was only a white space around him that he couldn''t see the ends of. Looking down, he found that he was standing on just empty space, he wasn''t even able to see what exactly he was standing on.


    The only thing of note in this entire space was the staircase that was in front of him.


    However, unlike the staircases that were outside, this staircase was much smaller.


    It was like this was a personal staircase for him.


    It didn''t take much to guess that the trial that faced him was climbing up the stairs, but he couldn''t help feeling surprised. After all, if it was just climbing up the stairs, didn''t that seem a bit too easy?


    For a trial that was set by someone with the aura of the woman in blue, it shouldn''t be something that was this easy.


    So it must mean that there was some kind of trick behind these stairs.


    Lin Fan looked at Brainy who came out of his sleeve and after exchanging a nod, he released a rat in front of him.


    Brainy controlled that rat to move up to the first step of the stairs, but as soon as it did, they were both shocked by what had happened.


    The moment that the rat stepped onto the first step, it was like a mountain had fallen onto it, instantly crushing it into the ground. The rat didn''t even have time to give a squeak before it was ttened into a meat patty.


    It didn''t take a genius to understand what kind of a trick this was.


    This was amon test that was used in trials like this. In fact, Lin Fan had even faced something like this back on the Blue Star Realm.


    In the Inheritance Realm that he had gone to, there was a tower where pressure fell upon those that entered and with each floor they passed, the pressure became stronger.


    This was the same concept, but instead of increasing the pressure on each floor, it seemed like the pressure increased with each step.


    Looking up at the stairs in front of him, Lin Fan could count at least a thousand steps before he couldn''t see the stairs anymore as they disappeared into the clouds.


    Based on what he had just seen, the pressure increase wasn''t just double. Topletely tten the rat like that, it would take at least ten times the normal amount of gravity.


    Now take that and multiply it by at least a thousand since that was the minimum amount of steps that Lin Fan could see¡­


    This trial was on apletely different scalepared to the one that Lin Fan had taken back on the Blue Star.


    However, even if the level of difficulty had been raised, that didn''t mean that Lin Fan was afraid since he knew that he had an ability that would easily allow him to pass this trial.


    His absorption force would help him absorb the pressure that fell onto him, making it his own power. This would allow him to constantly grow and adapt to the pressure that fell onto him, which would allow him to continually move forward.


    The only problem with this method was that it took time and time wasn''t something that Lin Fan necessarily had.


    ording to what the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect had told them about these Ancient Era Ruins, they would open for at most a month.


    With these thousand and more steps, Lin Fan wasn''t certain that he would be able to finish within that time.


    But since he was already trapped here, there was no choice but to take the first step onto the stairs.


    So after thinking all of this through, Lin Fan covered himself in his life energy as he took the first step onto the staircase. However, the moment that he stepped onto it, he found that nothing had changed for him.


    He had seen the rat being crushed under the pressure on the stairs, but for some reason, when he took his first step, he hadn''t felt a single thing.


    It was almost as if the pressure that the rat had felt didn''t exist for him.


    Lin Fan took another step and he found that nothing had changed for him still.


    As he continued taking steps forward, Lin Fan had found that there wasn''t anything different from climbing these stairs normally. He went from the first step to the tenth step without any pause and even when he was on the tenth step, he continued walking forward as if everything was normal.<sub> </sub>


    He continued up the staircase, not feeling any of the pressure that he should have felt.


    He reached the fiftieth step, the sixtieth step, the seventieth step¡­All the way up to the ny ninth step.


    Only when he reached the hundredth step did he finally start to feel the pressure that he was supposed to feel, but even then, it wasn''t as strong as he expected.


    It was only a tiny bit of pressure on him that almost felt like he was being rained on, but it didn''t impede his movements at all.


    He continued forward, going step by step as the amount of pressure on him continued to increase.


    He was able to continue normally for another twenty steps before the pressure started to impede his movements. When he reached the hundred and fiftieth step, he was finally moving at half his normal speed.


    Then when he reached the hundred and ny ninth step, he finally felt enough pressure that he wasn''t able to move forward anymore.


    It was at that time that Lin Fan finally started releasing his absorption force to help him negate some of the pressure that fell onto him.


    But the moment that he did, there was half a statue that formed almost instantly inside of his dantian.


    Lin Fan was immediately shocked by the speed of this statue formation, but his shock wasn''t just because of how fast the half statue formed. Even now, as he released his absorption force, he could tell that the statue was growing at a visible rate.


    It seemed like it wouldn''t take long before he would be able to use another new type ofw.


    Lin Fan was naturally excited at the prospect of anotherw, but at the same time, he also felt a bit disappointed. He was disappointed that he was only able to go up a fifth of the visible way.


    He had expected himself to be able to reach halfway when he had felt theck of pressure in the beginning, but now he had been stuck at the one hundred and ny ninth step. It really was toockingpared to what he had expected himself to be capable of doing.


    But he didn''t stop to think how amazing this was already since the pressure increased ten times with each step and with one hundred and ny nine steps, it had already been increased by one thousand nine hundred and ny times.


    Just ten times gravity was enough to crush a normal human and while cultivators were stronger than normal humans, that didn''t mean that they were invincible.


    The rat had been crushed on the first step because it was just a normal rat without any cultivation, but as for the other cultivators that had been sent into this trial with Lin Fan, the highest any of them had gone was the fiftieth step.


    It had to be known that there were Child Soul Realm experts here as well!


    Of course, even with their high cultivation, that didn''t mean that their bodies were as strong, so it was natural that they were stopped by this kind of trial. Even with their pets released to help them strengthen theirws into barriers, none of them had gone past the fiftieth step.


    For Lin Fan to reach the one hundred and ny ninth step in one go already meant that he was a monster.


    Especially since he hadn''t released his pets to set up the array to help him resist this pressure.


    Even Brainy had already been put back into his pet space since she was a beast that cultivated her spiritual sense, so her body was weaker than most beasts.


    After a few minutes of absorbing the pressure, Lin Fan was finally able to take another step forward, reaching the two hundredth step.


    The moment that he did and the pressure fell onto him, the statue inside his dantian was immediately finished.


    Lin Fan didn''t release thisw because he knew that it wouldn''t be of any help to him in climbing this staircase.


    The neww that he had received was thew of gravity.


    If he were to release thisw, it would actually hurt him instead of help him since it would just put more pressure on him if he used it on himself.


    As for using gravity tobat gravity¡­That would just make the pressure stronger, so that wasn''t a good idea either.


    But with his understanding of thew of gravity, he did feel the pressure relieve a bit as he started negating some of thew of gravity that was pressing down on him.


    This time, it didn''t take a few minutes for him to take a second step. All it took was one minute before he stepped onto the two hundred and first step.

 Chapter 627 Stairs (4)

    It took him even less time to reach the two hundred and second step, as he did it in just thirty seconds.


    Then after that, each step he took took even less time, with thest step taking only a few seconds.


    But of course, once he reached the two hundred and tenth step, he stopped again.


    It wasn''t the increase in the pressure that had stopped him, but rather it was the change in thew of gravity.


    It seemed like every ten steps meant that the quality of thew of gravity changed, making it harder for Lin Fan to negate with his own understanding of thew of gravity.


    But of course, Lin Fan wasn''t frustrated with this.


    Rather he was excited since as he absorbed this higher qualityw of gravity, thew of gravity that the statue in his dantian released also became of higher quality. With this new higher qualityw of gravity, it also increased Lin Fan''s level of understanding of thew of gravity, allowing him to negate the higher qualityw of gravity once again.


    It went on just like this, taking less and less time to make it up to the multiple of ten steps before suddenly stopping to adapt to this new higher qualityw of gravity. Once he adapted, he was able to make his way quickly up the steps to the next multiple of ten step.


    Just like this, Lin Fan quickly made his way up the steps, reaching the three hundredth step in less than two hours.


    The moment that he stepped onto the three hundredth step, he felt another change in the quality of thew of gravity, but this time the change was different from the multiple of ten step.


    The moment that he stepped onto the three hundredth step, it was like before when he reached the two hundredth step. It wasn''t just a change in the quality of thew of gravity, but rather thew of gravity reached a whole new level.


    The moment that his foot touched the step, the statue inside of his dantian suddenly grew in size. It reached a size that surpassed all the other statues that were inside of his dantian.


    Lin Fan immediately realized that this was bad since if it became too strong, it would be out of bnce with all the otherw statues that he had in his dantian. If it became too strong, he wouldn''t be able to use it properly since it would even overwhelm the strange absorption force.


    But as he tried to suppress it, he found that it was useless.


    Even when he dissipated thew of gravity that he absorbed as life energy to increase his own cultivation, the statue inside of his dantian continued to grow as part of thew of gravity was still being absorbed by the statue.


    He had to watch as that statue that represented thew of gravity continued to grow until it was more than twice as big as the other statues.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan could only give a helpless sigh in response because he knew that there was no other choice.


    Once he saw this, he gave up the idea of suppressing the growth of this statue.


    He knew that it was useless to do so, so instead of choosing to suppress it, he decided to see how strong it would be.


    He didn''t mind if it became stronger, he would just have to avoid using it temporarily since it would mean that his otherws would be unbnced with thisw of gravity. That would make him weaker instead of making him stronger, so until he was able to bnce the power of thew of gravity with the otherws, he wouldn''t use thew of gravity.


    As for when that was, it would be hard to tell since thew of gravity statue inside his dantian didn''t show any signs of slowing down its growth.


    But that didn''t slow him down as he continued moving up the staircase.


    After another six hours, he was about to reach the halfway point of five hundred steps.


    At this point, the statue in his dantian had already reached the point where it was five times bigger than any of the other statues that were already there. However, even though it was that big, it didn''t show any signs of slowing down its growth.


    Lin Fan really couldn''t help wondering just how big it would grow.


    But the one thing that never crossed his mind was just how fast he was rushing up this set of stairs.


    He had been able to reach the five hundredth step which was the visible halfway point in just eight hours, this was a speed that would have surely shocked everyone else. Especially since after eight hours, the best among them hadn''t even reached the hundredth step.


    The main difference between them and Lin Fan was the difference in recovery speeds.


    Naturally it took a lot of life energy to negate thew of gravity that fell whenever they took another step up the staircase, so they had to take the time to recover the life energy that they had spent.


    That wasn''t the situation with Lin Fan though.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had his absorption force that helped turn some of thew of gravity that fell onto him into life energy for him to use, as well as the suns inside of his dantian that kept generating life energy for him.


    So unlike everyone else, he was able to recover the life energy that he spent very quickly and that allowed him to push forward without having to spend that much time on recovering his power. He was even able to recover during the time that it took for him to adapt to the increase in pressure with each step.


    At this rate, it was only a matter of time before he finished this trial ahead of everyone else.


    And it turned out that way.


    It took him another twenty four hours, but he was able to reach the thousandth step in the end.


    When he did, the statue of thew of gravity in his dantian was already twenty times bigger than any other statue that was there.


    Standing on that thousandth step, his body was already almostpletely covered by the clouds and he really couldn''t see much, but when he looked down at his feet, he saw that there wasn''t another step for him to take.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised and confused by this.


    Could it be that the trial just ended there?


    But if it did, why was there no indication that the trial was over?


    Could it be that he had to take that next step into nothingness to see if this trial was over?


    It took him a few minutes to adjust, but he did adjust to the pressure that was on the thousandth step in the end. Once he finished adjusting, he started looking around himself to see if there was anything else, but there really wasn''t anything.


    It seemed like the only thing left for him to do was to take the next step into nothingness or to take a step back to head down the stairs¡­


    Seeing that there was nothing else he could do, Lin Fan had no choice but to raise his foot in the end and step off the stairs to the non-existent thousand and one step.


    But what happened next wasn''t what he had expected to happen.


    He had fully expected that the next part of this trial would be a leap of faith, but the moment that his foot fell down, the clouds around him suddenly started to change.


    The thick clouds that had obscured his vision suddenly started to dissipate and as it did, it gathered under his foot, forming the one thousand and first step.


    Along with that one thousand and first step, there was a tform made purely of clouds that appeared around Lin Fan, with a hole perfectly in the center. This hole was made to allow ess from the staircase which it was now attached to by the one thousand and first step.


    Lin Fan looked around at the white tform, but there was nothing atop this tform either.


    Still, he took that final step and walked up to the tform, standing atop that one thousand and first step.


    The one thing that he did know was that this should be the end of the trial since the moment that he took that one thousand and first step, the pressure that had been on him the entire time disappeared.


    After it had disappeared, it was like a giant weight was lifted off his shoulder and he felt like he could control his body better.


    When he looked down at his own hands, he realized that this wasn''t just a sensation, but rather it was the truth that reflected the change with his body.


    Through the tempering of thew of gravity, his body had slowly gotten stronger as his muscles were destroyed and repaired again by the golden power inside of him.


    After taking a moment to organize all the gains that he had gotten from walking up these stairs, Lin Fan finally started looking around again.


    Just like before, there wasn''t a single thing that was around him and even after waiting a few minutes, nothing happened.


    How was he supposed to get out of here if nothing was going to happen?


    As Lin Fan started to ponder how he would get out of here, the clouds suddenly started moving. They flowed to the middle where a vortex appeared before a statue suddenly came out of the ground.

 Chapter 628 Stairs (5)

    Lin Fan didn''t feel anything at first when the statue appeared, but once it had fully formed and he could see its appearance, he couldn''t stop his lips from twitching.


    Standing in front of him was the statue of a muscr man who was flexing his muscles. If he had topare it to something, he would havepared it to the ancient greek statues from earth.


    Not just because of the art style, but because this statue wasn''t wearing any clothes and only had a tiny cloth that was covering his private parts¡­


    When it was finally fully formed, there was a voice that suddenly rang out, "Oh, it seems like someone has passed the trial I set."


    Then after that voice fell, the statue started moving. It turned its head to look around itself before its eyes finally fell onto Lin Fan.


    It didn''t say anything at first as its eyes swept over Lin Fan, as if it was analyzing him. But then after a moment of silence, it suddenly came forward and lifted a hand to stroke Lin Fan''s face as it said, "Hmm, not bad, not bad. You really have a good face."


    As the hand touched his face, Lin Fan felt a chill run down his back.


    It wasn''t a chill that came from sensing danger, but rather it was an instinctive feeling of rejection towards the action of this statue.


    But he also didn''t do anything because he knew that this statue was strong even though it was just a statue.


    After all, when the statue had approached him, it had appeared in front of his face before he could even clearly see what had happened. This kind of speed definitely wasn''t something that a normal person¡­statue would have.


    Lin Fan maintained a calm look as he said, "So what happens now?"


    The statue stopped looking over Lin Fan''s body with shady eyes and took a good look at Lin Fan''s face before saying, "You really have a nice face."


    Lin Fan once again felt a chill run down his back, but he looked forward with a calm look on his face.


    The statue looked at Lin Fan for a bit longer before suddenly giving a sigh. Then it shook its head and said, "It''s too bad that I don''t have a body anymore, or I really would want to have some fun with you."


    Then it turned around and walked back to the pedestal it hade from.


    With a single tap of its finger, the pedestal started to change as it started growing taller and taller until it was even taller than the statue.


    As it grew taller, it also changed forms as more and more clouds from around it gathered together. In the end, the form that the pedestal took was a throne that was made of clouds.


    Turning around again, the statue sat down on the throne and put its face on one hand as it looked at Lin Fan with a smile before saying, "I''m sure you have your questions about this ce. Since you passed my trial, I''ll give you the right to ask three questions. Think carefully what you want to ask and be grateful for this opportunity."


    After hearing this, Lin Fan didn''t immediately respond when he heard this.


    At first he was naturally surprised when he heard that he would have a chance to ask questions, but then he fell into a state of thought as he tried to organize the various thoughts that were in his mind.


    After all, just having three questions wasn''t enough to answer all the doubts that he had in his mind. As well, the most important thing for him was his own safety inside this Ancient Era Ruin, so he needed information about this ce. Just three questions wouldn''t be enough for him to gain enough information to figure everything out.


    But after a few minutes of thinking, he threw away all the thoughts in his mind as he asked, "Who are you?"


    The statue had been sitting there admiring Lin Fan''s face with a silly look on its face, but the moment that it heard Lin Fan''s question, the silly look suddenly disappeared and was reced with a serious look.


    He looked at Lin Fan like this for a few seconds before suddenly knitting his brows, as if he had suddenly realized something.


    The statue was silent for a bit before giving a sigh.


    Lin Fan was confused why this statue had suddenly given a sigh, but he still patiently waited for the answer.


    The statue shook his head and muttered something to himself before finally turning back to look at Lin Fan to say, "I am a god, I think that''s what you wanted to know."


    Lin Fan waited for a few seconds, but seeing that this statue didn''t seem like it was going to say anything else, he just nodded in response before asking his second question, "What happened to this ce?"


    This time, the statue didn''t hesitate at all as it said, "I can''t answer that question since it would vite a rule among us in this ce." Then after a pause, he added, "Of course, that won''t count as one of your questions since it''s something that I can''t answer."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he had already expected this when he asked this.


    So instead, he rxed his brows and asked, "How dangerous are the other trials?"


    The statue didn''t give a vague answer like the first two times, instead it gave a concise answer as it said, "This trial is the simplest trial because it''s the starter trial to let people see what kind of trial they will face in the future. The rest of the trials are all trials of inheritances, so they won''t be as simple as this one." Then after another pause, he added, "But don''t misunderstand that as me being weak. This trial was only easy because it was meant as a starter trial and isn''t a reflection of how strong I really am."


    As he said this, the tone of his voice almost seemed like he was trying to prove something.


    Lin Fan ignored this as he started thinking about different things.


    After a period of thought, Lin Fan then asked, "Are there any ways to quit the trials without losing one''s life?"


    The statue looked right at him with a serious look and said, "If you''re not confident, then you shouldn''t take the trials in the first ce. But as for whether there is a way to quit the trials without losing your life¡­Some of them won''t take lives, but most of them will, so choose wisely and don''t be greedy. That''s the only advice that I can give you."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows after hearing this answer.


    He clearly still had more questions to ask, but before he even had a chance, the statue said, "That ends it there."


    Then the statue stood up and said, "Let''s give you the reward for clearing this trial."


    With a snap of his finger, the clouds underneath him suddenly floated up in front of him, taking the form of a key.


    Once the key had finished forming, the statue grabbed the key and tossed it to Lin Fan who reacted just in time to catch it.


    Lin Fan was confused as to why the statue had suddenly thrown this key at him, but the statue gave an exnation before he could ask anything.


    The statue calmly said, "As the one who performed the best in this trial, naturally you have the chance to challenge the best trial we have. That key will lead you to that trial and unlock it for you to challenge." Then his tone turned cold as he said, "But if you''re confident, I advise you not to attempt it because it is certain that you will lose your life if you fail."


    Lin Fan looked down at the key in his hand before giving a nod in response.


    The statue saw this and gave a wave of his hand as he said, "Alright, it''s time for you to leave."


    As he waved his hand, Lin Fan''s vision suddenly started getting brighter as a glow appeared around him. Before he could say anything, the light became so bright that he couldn''t see anything and then he disappeared on the spot.


    When he disappeared, the statue fell back down on the throne that it had created.


    As it sat there, the statue raised its hand to stroke its chin, as if it was thinking about something.


    Not long after, there was a sudden mist that appeared in the air. After the mist appeared, it slowly gathered together in a vortex before taking a human shape.


    Once the mist finished gathering, the figure was revealed to be the woman in blue who had appeared when the countdown to this trial had finished.


    The statue didn''t mind her appearance at all as it continued with its thoughts and the woman in blue didn''t say anything as it walked over to the throne.


    It was unknown how long passed, but the statue suddenly gave a sigh before saying, "He''s here, but what was with that appearance? He isn''t like what we imagined at all."


    The woman in blue didn''t respond right away as she had aplicated look in her eyes.


    After a long pause, she finally said, "I''m sure that he has his own reasons and we shouldn''t judge that quickly."


    The statue narrowed his eyes to look at her as he said, "Judge quickly? It''s already been this long, how can you call it quick? We even gave our lives for this and you''re telling me to stay calm? I can''t figure out what that man is thinking."


    The woman in blue turned to the side before giving a sigh and saying, "I''ve never been able to figure that out either¡­"


    As her voice drifted off, there was a silence that filled the air as neither of them said anything else.

 Chapter 629 Stairs (6)

    When the light in his vision cleared, Lin Fan found that he was back in front of the gate to the staircase.


    Looking around, he saw that there were the people that had entered the staircase with him.


    Most of them looked quite tired, but there wasn''t a single person that had serious injuries. There wasn''t even a person with minor injuries.


    Of course, that made sense since this was a trial that only tested with the pressure generated from thews of gravity.


    Each person here was an outstanding young expert, so even if they were weaker than Lin Fan, that didn''t mean that they were weaker than normal people. In fact, most of them were at a level that normal people could never reach in their lives.


    Their instincts were sharp and they had a strong sense of self preservation, once they knew that they wouldn''t be able to handle the next step, they would immediately back down. So in the end, this trial was quite simple for them if they had enough time, but¡­


    When they had all been sent back, everyone was confused at first as to why they had been sent out of the trial.


    After all, they had all been doing their best in the trial, but not a single person remembered clearing it just yet. The furthest that any of them had even gotten was the one hundredth step.


    Most of them used their own results as the benchmark for others and even the weaker people had estimated that no one had gotten past the two hundredth step yet, so there should have been plenty of time.


    But as they thought about this, they realized what the reason was for them being sent out.


    Someone had cleared it!


    In just a single day, someone had cleared the trial that most of them had thought would take at least ten days to clear!


    What kind of monster was hidden among them?


    They all looked at each other with wary eyes as they tried to figure out which one of them had cleared it.


    <o>,m They had felt how hard it was to pass this trial, so they figured that the reward for it should have been something very precious. If they knew who had received this reward, perhaps they could¡­</o>


    Of course, there wasn''t a single person who cast their gaze onto Lin Fan.


    Well, not that there wasn''t a single person, but most of them ignored Lin Fan since they didn''t believe that he was the one that had passed this trial. After all, the aura that he was currently releasing was that of a Low Embryo Soul Realm Expert, the only one from one of the twelve great factions that hade into this Ancient Era Ruins.


    Everyone else from the twelve great factions were at least in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm, with most people being in the High Embryo Soul Realm or the Peak Embryo Soul Realm. There were even Child Soul Realm experts that came, like Murong Yue and Mao Tao.


    The only person that was staring at Lin Fan was the person with the different coloured cloak from the Assassins Association, though with the cloak on, it didn''t seem like he was looking at him.


    Finally, there was a hot headed person that couldn''t help shouting, "Who was it? Who stole my inheritance?"


    Everyone looked at this person like he was an idiot, but no one said anything to refute what he had just said. In fact, everyone was focused on the expressions of everyone else.


    They didn''t mind this person taking the initiative to act this way because this person was asking what they wanted to know. If they could use this person to find the person who had cleared the trial, it wasn''t toote to take care of this person afterwards along with the person who cleared the trial.


    So they watched and waited, waiting for the person who cleared the trial to expose themselves.


    Of course, Lin Fan wasn''t a fool, so he didn''t rise to this person''s challenge.


    Instead, he gathered his group and just watched along with the rest of the people standing around. At the same time, he passed along some of the information that he gained to his group, along with his allies.


    Once he was done that, he started looking around himself at the various staircases that had slowly started to open their gates.


    They had already spent a day in this first trial, so there were more and more trials that had their countdowns finished, opening their gates for them to attempt.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t care about the staircases or the gates themselves, what he cared about was the aura that they released.


    Based on the aura, he was trying to pick out the ones that were safe for his group members to go to.


    When he had asked the question about leaving trials without losing one''s life, the answer that he received was not to be greedy. But that wasn''t the full answer, rather the answer that he wanted actually came from the aura that the statue had released.<sub> </sub>


    He hadn''t minded it back then, but now that he could sense the auras that wereing from the staircases, he could tell what the hidden meaning in the statue''s answer was.


    The statue had said, "Some of them won''t take lives, but most of them will, so choose wisely and don''t be greedy." As it has said this, it also released an aura based on which words he said.


    When he said "won''t take lives", he had released one aura and when he said "most of them will", he had released a different aura.


    The aura that he had released for these different words were the auras that Lin Fan was currently feeling from the staircases. That meant that the ones with the aura that won''t take lives were the ones that would be safe to enter. Or rather they would at least be safer than the ones where it was most likely one would lose their lives.


    Lin Fan made sure to note the position of the ones that would be safe before passing this information onto his group and the groups he was allied with.


    Naturally they had their doubts, but Lin Fan hadn''t guided them wrong so far, so they had no reason to not believe in him.


    Seeing that there was no one answering his challenge, the hot headed person cooled down a bit as he gave a snort and said, "A bunch of cowards." Then he didn''t waste any time as he headed off to another staircase that had been opened.


    Lin Fan watched him enter that staircase and shook his head with a faint smile.


    The staircase that this person had just chosen was one with the aura of death around it.


    This would most likely be thest time that Lin Fan saw him.


    Seeing that person was gone, everyone else started to head off on their own.


    One thing worthy of noting was that there were a few people who had followed this hot headed person into the gate that he had entered. Judging by the look in their eyes, they didn''t have any good intentions¡­


    But none of that mattered to Lin Fan.


    Since everyone else had scattered, this was his chance to send his group into the gates that were safe.


    Well, not everyone in his group and his allies'' groups wanted to go into the safe gates.


    After all, the rule with these trials was that the more dangerous it was, the greater the payout.


    This was a rule that held true with all things and this Ancient Era Ruin wasn''t an exception.


    Some of his allies didn''t want to go into safer trials, they wanted to head into the more dangerous trials for the greater benefits. Lin Fan was in no position to stop them, but he was in a position to offer them a choice.


    When it came to the auras that the staircases released, there were varying degrees of intensity. It was clear that not every single staircase was as dangerous as each other, there were varying degrees of fatality, so Lin Fan could at least let them choose between the super dangerous ones and the ones that were just normal dangerous.


    In the end, most of their groups chose the safer ones, only Murong Yue, Mao Tao, Qiao Yi Fei, Bing Yu, and Wang Jian chose the dangerous ones.


    For the people from the Hunters Organization and Bing Yu, they chose the ones that were just a normal level dangerous, but for Wang Jian, he chose the most dangerous one that Lin Fan could currently find. After all, the gates for every single staircase weren''t open yet and the ones that were still closed didn''t release an aura.


    So out of the ones that were open, this one had the strongest aura of danger to it.


    As for Lin Fan, the one that he chose was one of the safer ones that no one else had picked.


    He had his own reason for doing this, it wasn''t because he was afraid. Rather it was because he wanted to quickly clear this trial so he could move on to his real target.


    After all, he still had the key that he had received from the statue. The statue had said that this was the greatest trial with the greatest reward, so he was looking forward to seeing what kind of trial it was.


    As he walked through the gate, the figure with the different coloured cloak from the Assassins Association group turned to one of the members of his group and said, "Follow him."


    That person couldn''t help revealing a look of panic since he had heard about what Lin Fan had done.


    This was a person that could match their lord, how was he supposed to kill him?

 Chapter 630 Stairs (7)

    The person in the different coloured cloak could see the clear hesitation that this person was feeling, but he didn''t say anything about it.


    Instead, he released a tiny bit of his aura that he pressed down on this person before saying, "Are you thinking about disobeying my orders?"


    That person immediately felt like it was hard to breathe and almost fell down onto the ground. In fact, he would have fallen if there wasn''t a force that was holding him up against the pressure, not allowing him to fall.


    This would have been good, but with this force holding him in ce, it was like there were two different pressures fighting against each other, crushing his innards.


    If he was kept like this for any longer, it was clear that he would be ttened.


    At this thought, that person couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spine.


    That person quickly shook their head as they said, "No, no, my lord, I would never dare!"


    The person in the different coloured cloak clearly didn''t believe this, but he just gave a snort. Then he raised a hand and with a wave, there was a cube that suddenly appeared in his palm. With another wave of his hand, the cubended right in the hand of the person being suppressed.


    The person being suppressed saw this and was confused at first, but then when he felt that aura that came from it, he immediately understood what was happening.


    It was at this time that the pressure on him disappeared, so he fell to one knee and said, "I will not fail you, my lord."


    The person in the different coloured cloak didn''t even look at this person as he waved his hand to send him off.


    That person didn''t dare dy once the lord had given his order, so he immediately headed off in the direction of the gate that Lin Fan had entered. Of course, he did it in a stealthy manner that only people of the Assassins Association could have done, so no one saw him.


    After reaching the gate, he went inside without any hesitation.


    After all, he had the item from the lord, there was no chance that he would fail this mission.


    ¡­


    After entering the gate, the surroundings around Lin Fan changed immediately. The area around him was covered in light before it suddenly faded and he appeared inside of a forest.


    It was apletely different forest than the one that he had been in before, the trees here were all a strange purple colour instead of the normal green colour that trees should have been.


    In the air, Lin Fan could even feel a bit of a chill, almost as if this ce was haunted.


    There was nothing around him telling him what he should be doing, but there was a clear path that led through the forest in front of him.


    It made it quite clear what the person who designed this trial wanted him to do, but the way that the path looked from afar really seemed suspicious. It was almost as if the person who designed this wanted him to go into the haunted forest to be lost forever among those trees.


    Still, there was nothing else for Lin Fan to do since the trees all around him were densely sticking to each other, not giving him any space to move through at all.


    Unless he forcefully knocked down the trees, it was impossible for him to go through them.


    But he was also certain that if he were to do that, he would definitely be punished by whatever force was residing inside of this forest for going against the purpose of the trial. There was no need for him to do this since he knew that this was a safe trial and he would be able to leave even if he were to fail it.


    So without any other thoughts, Lin Fan started heading down the path that cut into the forest.


    As he walked down the path, he suddenly felt something from behind him.


    It wasn''t hard for him to tell that this was another person that hade into the trial and he wasn''t surprised by this. After all, this was one of the few trials that had been unlocked, so it was natural that there would be others that came in.


    But he had also left one of Brainy''s scouts behind just in case the people that entered after him had different ideas.


    It was also because of this scout that Lin Fan knew that the person who came in after him was from the Assassins Association, so it could be said that the purpose of leaving the scout had been aplished.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this as he continued forward along the path.


    The person from the Assassins Association naturally had his own method of tracking Lin Fan since this was one of the skills that was needed to be an assassin, the ability to track down your target.<sub> </sub>


    But then again, it wouldn''t be that hard for him to track Lin Fan down since there was only a single path in this ce.


    The person from the Assassins Association quickly covered himself in his ownws to stealth himself before quickly moving down the path.


    Lin Fan was leisurely making his way down, as if he didn''t have a care in the world, so the assassin who was rushing forward was able to quickly catch up to him. Seeing Lin Fan going at his own pace, the assassin couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    It seemed like this was going to be an easier job than he imagined, maybe he wouldn''t even need to use the item that his lord had given him.


    While Lin Fan was making his way down the path, the assassin actually passed by him and set up in front of him, preparing to ambush him.


    As Lin Fan came closer and closer, the assassin gripped his dagger and prepared to strike. Then when Lin Fan came right in his range, he suddenly felt something wrapping around him.


    Before the assassin could react, there was a vine that suddenly threw him right to the ground in front of Lin Fan.


    The force of the throw was so strong that it knocked the wind out of him and the stealth around him disappeared, revealing him to Lin Fan.


    The assassin looked around himself, but by this time, the vines that had wrapped around him were already gone. He couldn''t understand what had just happened, but his surprise didn''tst long.


    As a trained assassin, he naturally knew how to deal with unexpected situations like this.


    Without any hesitation at all, the assassin jumped to his feet while also moving back,nding several meters away from Lin Fan. As hended, he raised the dagger in his right hand while also pulling out the cube that the lord had given him in his left hand.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but then the cube suddenly flew out at him.


    Lin Fan did have fast reactions and immediately started moving out of the trajectory of the cube, but that didn''t matter at all as the cube suddenly expanded. It grew in size until it formed a giant thatpletely covered Lin Fan.


    This didn''t just cover him, but rather it also covered the space around him, not giving him any chance to escape being trapped by this.


    Using the trees around, the four corners of the wrapped around the trees to form a cage around Lin Fan, trapping him where he had been standing previously.


    When Lin Fan saw this cage appear around him, he just calmly came up to the cage to feel the material of the cage trapping him. However, the moment that his hand made contact with the cage, there was a sharp shock that suddenly ran down his hand.


    This show started out weak, but it got stronger and stronger until he had no choice but to let go or let his hand be burned by the shock.


    Seeing this, the assassin revealed a triumphant look as he started to approach the trapped Lin Fan, raising his dagger in a menacing manner.


    Lin Fan could see that there was no need to say anything since it was clear that this person wasn''t in the mood to talk, so he raised his hand and pulled out the white dagger. However, when he was about to use hisws, he found that he wasn''t able to release them at all.


    Rather, it was almost as if all the energy in the space around him had been frozen by some strange power, so he couldn''t draw on the natural life energy around him to form hisws.


    Even when he released his spiritual sense, as soon as it left his body, it seemed to freeze in the space around him just like the life energy.


    The assassin was naturally able to sense the slight changes in Lin Fan''s aura showing that he was trying to fight back, but seeing nothing happen at all, he couldn''t help finding this funny.


    After all, someone like this kid wanted to go against their lord?


    Come back in a thousand years!


    Still there was no need for him to show any mercy even though he was clearly at an advantage now.


    After all, his job was to kill Lin Fan and not just capture him.


    As he came closer, Lin Fan could clearly see what his intentions were, but he didn''t panic at all.


    Rather he revealed a smile when he saw him approaching.

 Chapter 631 Stairs (8)

    The assassin had been feeling confident as he approached Lin Fan, but seeing him suddenly reveal a smile, he couldn''t help it as a bad feeling filled his heart.


    For someone that was trapped, he seemed too calm.


    It was almost as if he¡­


    The assassin immediately looked around himself, but he couldn''t sense anything at all. He was certain that there wasn''t any trap waiting around him at all.


    Even if that was the case, the assassin couldn''t stop the worried feeling in his heart.


    He turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "What are you smiling at? Can''t you see that you''repletely trapped?"


    Lin Fan just had the same smile on his face as he didn''t say a thing.


    Seeing this, the bad feeling in the assassin''s heart became worse as he started to panic, but there was something that kept him from running.


    It wasn''t anything like loyalty since as an assassin, the concept of loyalty didn''t mean anything to him. Not to mention that this lord was someone that he had only met for a few days, so there was no way for loyalty to develop in this short period of time even if he was someone who could feel loyalty.


    The only reason he didn''t run away was because of fear.


    He had seen the lord''s power, the lord had demonstrated this to all the members of the Assassins Association group the day that he had met them. This was the reason why they had even followed him in the first ce.


    If he ran now, he knew that the lord wouldn''t spare him¡­


    So without any further hesitation, the assassin stabbed his dagger at Lin Fan, aiming for the holes in the.


    But before his dagger could even reach the, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared around Lin Fan. It blocked the force of the dagger and then with a sh of light, it suddenly blew the assassin away.


    The assassin flew back a few meters before quickly stabilizing himself and looking around, but when he looked around, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    But the barrier that appeared was still there in front of him, covering the, which proved that someone had interfered just now.


    After another pause, the assassin said, "Is there someone else here? If you are, there is no reason for you to interfere in this business! This is a private matter!" Then as if he had thought of something, the assassin had added, "If you leave this matter alone, I can promise that my lord will owe you a favour. You can see how strong my lord is based on the power of the, so it will be in your favour."


    Of course, he didn''t have the qualifications to actually promise something like this, but the other side didn''t know that.


    Lies were a very useful thing in certain situations.


    But his lies weren''t effective at all as the only response that he received was silence.


    The assassin knew that the situation wasn''t good for him, so his hand silently moved to his waist before suddenly throwing something to the ground.


    As soon as the item he threw hit the ground, there was a smokescreen that appeared and the assassin turned to run in the opposite direction.


    However, the moment that he turned, there was a ball of light that had suddenly appeared behind him. Before he could even react, the ball of light had turned into a beam of light that suddenly pierced right through his chest, right where his heart would have been.


    The assassin was thrown forward by the force of the beam of light andnded on his knees.


    Looking down at the hole in his chest, the assassin opened his blood soaked mouth to say a few words, but all he could say was "Who are¡­" Then before he could finish, he fell right onto the ground, creating a pool of blood.


    However, even after the assassin had died, the cage around Lin Fan didn''t disappear, but that didn''t matter to him.


    After the assassin had died, the ones that had killed him revealed themselves.


    Landing on the ground were five children and one teenager who had been hiding the trees around this area.


    Naturally they were Lin Fan''s pets.


    He had been keeping an eye on the assassin the entire time, even seeing him when he had been setting up his ambush. Or rather, Brainy had been keeping an eye on the assassin the entire time.


    Once he knew what the assassin was up to, Lin Fan had let out his pets and ced them around himself with Brainy leading them while he set himself up as the bait.


    Naturally what had blocked the attack of the assassin just now was the array that the five of them had set up.<sub> </sub>


    Even without Lin Fan giving them any instructions, the five of them could follow Brainy''s lead to create the array. Lin Fan didn''t expect to have them take action since he assumed that he would be able to take care of the assassin himself, he had only set up his pets in the area around him just in case anything happened.


    However, what he never expected was that he would need his pets to save him since he never expected that this assassin would have this cage.


    Even now, he still wasn''t able to use any of his powers as he stood there inside of the cage.


    Lin Fan saw them appear and said, "Try and hit this cage from the outside, maybe that will break it."


    The five kids were about to use their array to attack the cage when Brainy suddenly raised her hand.


    The five kids immediately stopped releasing their life energy as they looked at Brainy with confused looks.


    Brainy came forward and stood in front of the cage, looking at it for a bit before saying, "It seems like this cage is set up so that it freezes the life energy inside the cage, but it also allows things from outside to enter the cage. If we attack it now, the attack will just go right through and hurt master instead¡­"


    Then she reached out her hand towards the cage as she said, "But it doesn''t seem like there''s something set up outside of the cage to protect it or prevent others from using it. That means¡­"


    In one smooth move, she suddenly pulled the of the cage and pulled it off the trees that the four corners had been on, instantly freeing Lin Fan.


    As she held the in her hand, she gave nods as she muttered, "As expected, it''s only designed to guard against those on the inside and not against those on the outside. No one expected that the person trapped would have allies outside to free them, so it wasn''t designed that way. But then again, it also saves on costs if it''s designed like this¡­"


    Lin Fan didn''t bother her as he turned to the assassin who was dead on the ground.


    He walked over and took the dead Assassin''s Storage Ring beforeing back over to where Brainy was.


    When he came back, he saw that she was no longer holding anything and asked, "What happened to the?"


    He actually did care about the that she had recovered.


    After all, this was something that could restrict someone''s ability to use their life energy, so it was a very useful item. Not to mention that this matter wouldn''t be over yet since he knew that that person from the Assassins Association group wouldn''t let it end like this.


    If he were able to use this against them¡­That would be very helpful.


    The p to his face would be an extra bonus.


    Brainy pointed at the ashes on the ground and said, "It burnt up."


    Lin Fan looked at them and shook his head, but he didn''t say anything.


    He could guess that this was most likely a single use item and once it had fulfilled its purpose, it would destroy itself. Since it was gone, there was no use crying over spilt milk and he continued forward with this trial.


    Once this person was gone, Lin Fan pulled his pets back into his pet space other than Brainy since he still needed Brainy to maintain the puppets that were left at the entrance. After all, he didn''t know how far he would have to go in this forest and his spiritual sense wasn''t as strong as Brainy''s so he couldn''t cover that distance.


    Brainy changed back into the vine snake form and jumped into Lin Fan''s sleeve.


    Once everyone was put back into ce, Lin Fan started heading down this path.


    As he continued down the path, there was nothing that happened which confused Lin Fan.


    Shouldn''t there be a trial that he was supposed to be undertaking at this moment? So why was nothing happening?


    Lin Fan was confused, but that didn''t stop him from moving forward.


    Then after continuing on for another bit, he suddenly felt a chill from behind him, but this wasn''t just a normal kind of chill. It was almost as if there was someone''s cold breath that was falling onto the back of his neck.


    But when Lin Fan turned around, he saw that there was no one there.


    After continuing forward a bit longer, Lin Fan suddenly saw something out of the corner of his eyes. However, when he turned to look in that direction, all he saw were the trees that had been around him the entire time.


    What was going on here?

 Chapter 632 Stairs (9)

    If he didn''t know better, Lin Fan would have thought that he had suddenly entered some kind of horror game.


    After all, everything that was happening to him now was somewhat cliche of a horror game.


    Perhaps he might have been scared as a human, but now that he was a cultivator, his mental state was much better than before, so all he felt at this moment was confusion.


    Was this supposed to be the trial?


    Could it be that the trial was a test of courage?


    If it was, it really seemed dumb¡­


    After all, cultivators dealt with things like ghosts and zombies frequently, so it wasn''t as if they were scared of them like normal mortals were. Just this alone wouldn''t have been enough to scare a cultivator like Lin Fan.


    After making sure that there was nothing around him, Lin Fan continued forward again.


    Once he walked another few meters, he suddenly started hearing someone''s humminging from the trees.


    He naturally turned in the direction that the humming wasing from, but the moment he turned, the source of the humming also moved. Whenever he turned his head in the direction the humming wasing from, the humming would change to another spot.


    No matter how hard he tried or how fast he turned his head, he could never keep up with the source of the humming.


    Even when he tried using his spiritual sense, he wasn''t able to find the source of the humming at all.


    He had no choice but to ignore it for now and continue forward down the path.


    Just like with the humming, as he continued down the path, there were more and more cliche horror tropes that appeared around him. He was certain now that this was a test of courage¡­


    Finally after moving around a hundred meters away from where he started to hear the humming, when he went to take another step, there was something that suddenly grabbed his leg.


    Looking down, Lin Fan saw that it was a hand that was sticking out of the ground.


    A zombie, it was a zombie¡­


    He really didn''t know what to say about this anymore, it was just too cliche for him toment on.


    But he felt that this really wasn''t enough to be considered a trial if this was all that there was.


    Would a zombie scare a cultivator with powers?


    It was more likely that the cultivator would blow the zombie''s head off as soon as they saw it. After all, most cultivators hadbat experience and they would just treat the zombie like a normal enemy.


    However, that wasn''t what Lin Fan did.


    Instead, he watched as the zombie that grabbed his hand slowly came out of the ground, waiting for it to reveal its face.


    In situations like this, it would normally be the face reveal that was the real shock.


    After around a minute of waiting, the zombie finally pulled itself out enough to move around a bit. Once it was out, it turned its head to look at Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan saw the face of the zombie, he had a rxed look, but that rxed look didn''t stay on his face for long.


    The moment that he saw the zombie''s face, his expression froze before it slowly started to crumble.


    After all, the face that was revealed was one that Lin Fan was very familiar with. However, this shouldn''t be a face that existed in this world since this person was from earth.


    The zombie that was grabbing onto his leg was the zombie of his dead grandmother.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help panicking a bit as he shook the hand off his leg and took a step back.


    As he did, there were other hands that suddenly came out of the ground in front of him.


    Lin Fan realized his mistake and took a deep breath to calm down as he watched the other zombiese out of the ground.


    One by one, the zombies revealed themselves and as he expected, they were people that he knew from earth.


    It wasn''t just anyone that he knew from earth, they were all people who had some ce of importance in his heart when he had been back on earth.


    For example, his parents, the other rich young masters he hung out with, or¡­his victims.


    As they came out of the ground, they all started slowly moving towards him.


    They weren''t moving fast at all, rather it was a slow walk that was supposed to be menacing.


    As they came closer, they started to mutter something. At first it was too low for Lin Fan to understand what they were saying, but as they came closer, the voices became louder and louder until Lin Fan could hear them clearly.<sub> </sub>


    The zombies of his rtives and friends were talking about things that he had done in the past, while the zombies of his victims were cursing him for the wrongdoings he had done to them.


    In short, these were all things that no one in this other world should have known.


    So where did these zombiese from and how did they know all of this?


    If this was before where Lin Fan had his soul still split, perhaps he would have panicked since he was more emotional. However, now that he hadbined his soul together, his mental fortitude was actually greater than normal people''s. After all, he had two souls that came together as one, so his soul was naturally stronger than normal people''s.


    Lin Fan calmly thought this over, but when he didn''t have any exnations he turned to Brainy who had been in his sleeve.


    But when he looked at Brainy, he found that there was something strange about her.


    Brainy''s eyes were a bit listless and a bit zed over, like she couldn''t see clearly.


    But that wasn''t all that was strange with Brainy.


    From time to time, she muttered to herself, "Don''t leave me¡­"


    It was clear that she was seeing something that Lin Fan wasn''t and it had quite the effect on her.


    Lin Fan didn''t reach out to shake her since he knew that it would be bad to disrupt her when she was like this.


    But seeing what happened to Brainy along with the things that were around him, he started having an idea of what was happening around him.


    It really was the trial, but it wasn''t a test of courage like he had thought.


    This should be a trial on mental fortitude, which meant that everything he saw around him should have been¡­an illusion.


    This illusion array drew on his memories to create illusions, which was why it was able to show him things that only he should know. Or rather, it wasn''t the array that was showing him things, it was his brain that was showing him these things and the array was just tapping into his brain to do this.


    It was also why Brainy was seeing a different thing from him.


    What was shown to each person was most likely the thing that they feared the most.


    While he didn''t know what exactly Brainy was seeing, he had an idea of what her biggest fear was.


    Now that he had figured out what this trial was, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    This was a trial that would have been hard for normal people, but for him, it was easy.


    So after taking a deep breath, Lin Fan walked right towards those zombies.


    The zombies didn''t stop as they continued towards him, saying the same things as before, but this time, there was no contact made when he walked into them. Instead, he walked right through them as if they weren''t there.


    After he walked through them, the zombies all turned into smoke that dissipated right away.


    The reason this happened was very simple.


    These were illusions that had been created by Lin Fan''s mind, which meant that they didn''t exist in the first ce. The only reason that they had been able to touch Lin Fan before was because he had believed that it was real.


    If he believed that they were real, his body would react in such a way that would allow him to feel them if they were touching him.


    But if he knew that they weren''t actually there, it meant that the illusions wouldn''t have an effect on him.


    Lin Fan just continued forward down the path without stopping this time.


    There were many different illusions that appeared in front of him, but he didn''t slow down for a single second as he walked through them all.


    No matter what scene he was shown, he just walked right through the illusions that appeared to stop him and once he went through them, they all dissipated into smoke.


    Finally, after walking for around thirty minutes, Lin Fan was able to reach the end of the path which led to a clearing in the forest.


    The moment that Lin Fan walked into the clearing, the light in Brainy''s eyes suddenly came back and she peeked her head out of his sleeve to look around. Then she turned back to ask Lin Fan, "Master, what happened?"


    Lin Fan exined the illusion array that had been used by the trial and Brainy immediately understood.


    But for some reason, she seemed to be hanging more tightly around Lin Fan''s arm.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he turned forward, waiting for something to happen.


    When he did, there was a hole that suddenly opened in the ground.

 Chapter 633 Illusion Ring

    This hole wasn''t that big, but that was just the beginning.


    The hole slowly grew in size until it was three times as big as a normal person.


    When the hole reached this size, the ground started to shake. The tremors originated from the hole itself, so it was clear that something wasing from it.


    Before long, there was a statue that popped out.


    Rather than saying that it popped out, it was better to say that it slid out. As soon as the statue appeared, it got stuck in the hole that it created.


    It tried to push through, but that was a futile effort in the end.


    It was at that point that the statue went back down and widened the hole again before popping out once more.


    This time, it got half stuck in the hole as only its torso was able toe out.


    Lin Fan was only able to see half of it when it came out and since it was facing the other way, he wasn''t able to see its face at all. However, when he took a closer look at it, he couldn''t help feeling that the statue looked a bit familiar.


    Especially since it was covered in muscles¡­


    Since it was stuck, the statue went back down once again and opened the hole even further before finally popping out this time.


    It looked around and realized that it couldn''t see anything, so it turned around to see Lin Fan.


    The moment that Lin Fan saw this statue, there were three dark lines that appeared on his forehead.


    That feeling he had was right, he did recognize this statue, it was the same one from the other trial.


    But before he could say a thing, the statue had alreadye over to Lin Fan and was looking over him with a strange gaze.


    As this gaze swept over him, Lin Fan had the same feeling as before. It was a strong feeling of disgust mixed with rejection.


    After a few seconds of looking at him, the statue suddenly said, "My, don''t you look delicious." As it said this, it even licked its tongue while moving closer.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows the moment he heard this and he took a step back.


    But he didn''t back down since he could tell that something was wrong.


    Could it be that this was the final part of this exam?


    As Lin Fan stood there thinking, the statue came even closer with a dangerous look in his eyes.


    After a few seconds of thinking, Lin Fan suddenly turned around. However, when he did, there was a finger that was held to his right, right behind his face.


    The moment that he turned his head, it poked his cheek.


    Then there was augh that suddenly rang out from behind him.


    Lin Fan had a dark look on his face when this happened. He knew what had just happened, so he couldn''t help feeling a bit ashamed that he had fallen for such a childish trick.


    But before he could say anything else, there was a hand that patted his back and a voice said, "Did you have fun?"


    Lin Fan really wanted to scold this person, but he still took a deep breath and said, "Is the trial over now?"


    The voice was silent for a bit before it said in a pouty voice, "Bu, bu, you''re no fun at all."


    With a sh of light, the figure that the voice came from appeared.


    This was a handsome young man with a head of wild and scraggly hair. The way he was dressed almost made him seem like one of the Lost Boys, but there was no mistaking it, he was definitely an expert.


    The aura that he released it wasn''t simple at all.


    If he wanted he could most likely crush Lin Fan with a single pinky, but he didn''t have any ill intent at all.


    After pouting for a bit, the little fairy boy pointed at the statue and said, "He really is ugly, isn''t he?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this.


    The little fairy boy saw this and with a shake of his head, he waved his hand, making the statue disappear.


    Then after a pause, he said, "Well this is what I expected from someone who passed my trial." Then with a sigh, he walked in front of Lin Fan.


    As he stood there in front of Lin Fan, the aura around himpletely changed.<sub> </sub>


    The rxed and yful feeling he hadpletely disappeared and instead, he suddenly had the aura of a supreme expert.


    He looked at Lin Fan with a serious look and asked, "What are you hoping to get from my inheritance?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him and said without hesitation, "Can you give me information instead?"


    The little fairy boy looked at Lin Fan for a bit, with a clear trace of surprise in his eyes. After that pause, he suddenly asked, "Are you sure that''s all you want?"


    Lin Fan didn''t reply this time, he just gave a serious nod.


    Seeing this, the little fairy boy was clearly taken back, but then he suddenly burst into a strange fit ofughter.


    As heughed, he said, "Am I being underestimated? Is my inheritance not worth anything to him?"


    Lin Fan thought that he had offended this expert, so he was about to say something, but the little fairy boy cut him off by raising his hand.


    Afterughing for a bit longer, the little fairy boy then said, "Alright, you don''t need to say anything, I know what you mean. However, you shouldn''t look down on my inheritance. You can still use it even with your bit of cultivation, it just won''t be as strong as if you had a level of cultivation simr to mine."


    Lin Fan then asked, "Then my request¡­"


    The little fairy boy gave a nod before saying, "There are restrictions, but I can answer three of your questions."


    Lin Fan thought, "It''s three questions again. Is this the setting they were given or is it¡­"


    But he then asked, "If I had failed the trial, what would have happened?"


    The little fairy boy was a bit surprised by this question, clearly not expecting Lin Fan to ask something like this. However, even if he was surprised, he had the strong mentality of a god, so he recovered quickly.


    After recovering, he said, "If you failed, you would have fallen to the illusion and would have been sent out of this trial. You would have also had a mark ced on you, so you couldn''te back in again."


    Then his tone changed as he said, "So you know about the trick with our trials¡­You must have met that statue old man before this."


    Hearing this, Lin Fan immediately asked, "You could see the illusions that I was experiencing?"


    The little fairy boy was taken aback by how fierce and urgent Lin Fan had asked this question, but he still replied, "Not everything, I could see what happened here because I happened to be here. As for the illusions in the forest¡­well, those drew deep on your memories and I wasn''t peeking, so I didn''t see anything."


    Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief when he heard this.


    It wasn''t that he had to hide it, but he didn''t feel it was advantageous to him if others knew about his circumstances.


    Seeing this, the little fairy boy didn''t say anything else on this matter, but he did say, "That is your second question, so you should think carefully about your third question."


    Lin Fan thought about it and realized that he was right.


    Without thinking about it, he had wasted one of his precious questions because he was worried that his secret had been revealed, which really was a blunder on his part.


    But at the very least, it gave himfort knowing that it wasn''t revealed.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan asked, "What can you tell me about this?"


    As he said this, he raised his hand and revealed the cloud key that had been given to him.


    The little fairy boy looked at what was in Lin Fan''s hand and the moment that he saw that it was the key, he immediately narrowed his eyes. After a moment of silence, he asked, "Where did you get this from?"


    Lin Fan was confused why his question had been answered with a question, but he still said, "I got it from the beginner trial."


    The little fairy boy knitted his brows immediately when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything else on this matter. Instead he answered, "This key will be a blessing or a curse on you, that is all I can say."


    Then without giving Lin Fan a chance to say anything, he suddenly raised his hand where a ring appeared in his palm.


    He reached out towards Lin Fan with this ring and said, "Here, this is your reward."


    Lin Fan was surprised by the tone he suddenly spoke with.


    If he didn''t know any better, it was almost as if this little fairy boy was trying to drive him off as soon as possible.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What is it?"


    The little fairy boy suddenly seemed like he had realized something and he exined, "It''s called the Illusion Ring, this is your reward for my trial. You can slowly figure out what this is used for, but you won''t be able to use its full powers unless you reach the same level of cultivation as the past me."

 Chapter 634 Cloud Key

    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this, the little fairy boy didn''t waste any time as he threw the ring into Lin Fan''s hand, putting it onto his right hand''s middle finger.


    Then without a single dy, the little fairy boy waved his hand which caused a bright light to appear around Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan knew that this bright light meant that he was being sent out of this trial, but he was still confused why the little fairy boy was rushing this. Especially after he had heard about the cloud key.


    Could it be that it had some special meaning?


    But of course, the little fairy boy didn''t give him a chance to ask a single thing.


    As he left, thest thing that the little fairy boy said was, "Good luck."


    However, the way that he said it was very strange. It was almost as if he knew that Lin Fan wouldn''t survive and this was hisst farewell to him.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t get a chance to rify as he had been sent out already.


    Once Lin Fan was gone, the little fairy boy knitted his brows again as he muttered to himself, "For him to be given the cloud key, it must mean¡­"


    Then he turned around and with a snap of his finger, there was a portal that appeared in front of him. The little fairy boy revealed a determined look and said, "I have to get to the bottom of this."


    Then without any hesitation, he walked into the portal, disappearing from the spot.


    But what he didn''t notice was that behind him, there was another small portal that appeared which had an eye peeking out of it.


    This portal onlysted for a few seconds before disappearing.


    ¡­


    After the sh of light disappeared, Lin Fan found himself back among the stairs that were outside.


    Looking around, he didn''t see anyone else standing there.


    It seemed like everyone else had gone into a trial as well to test their luck, but it also seemed like no one had been able to clear a trial as fast as him.


    But that didn''t matter to Lin Fan since it was better for him that no one was around.


    He didn''t want anyone to know that he had cleared the first trial and if he were to use the cloud key in front of someone else, it was impossible for him to hide this information, which was the main reason why he had gone into the safe trial earlier.


    The other reason was that he wanted to see what kind of trials the safe trials were and if the information that he received from the statue was correct.


    Facts proved that the information that he received was correct, so he wasn''t worried about the people from the Hunters Organization.


    So now Lin Fan turned his focus to the cloud key.


    He pulled it out of his Storage Ring and held it in his hand, feeling the energy that came from it.


    There was a strange pull that came from the cloud key as he held it in his hand, as if it was telling him where to go.


    Lin Fan''s eyes followed the direction that pull came from and he saw that there were many staircases in that direction, so he had no choice but to follow the pull of the key itself until it led to the specific staircase.


    Walking along for several minutes, Lin Fan went past several staircases which he had thought that it would be and he reached a staircase that was very strange looking.


    It looked strange because this staircase wasn''t as tall as the other staircases, but rather this staircase only looked to be around two stories tall and Lin Fan could easily see the top of the staircase.


    There was also a gate in front of this staircase, but there wasn''t a countdown like the rest of the gates. Instead, there was only a single lock that was the same colour as the key in Lin Fan''s hand.


    Lin Fan could tell that the attraction that wasing from the key in his hand was pointed at this staircase, but he couldn''t help feeling a bit of doubt.


    After all, this staircase just lookedpletely out of cepared to the other ones.


    It didn''t even release an aura like the other staircases, so Lin Fan didn''t even know if it was safe or not. However, since the statue had said that it was the greatest trial, it should be safe to assume that it was also the most dangerous.


    Lin Fan had no reason to attempt this trial since he was just here to help the Hunters Organization, but now that the choice had been put in front of him, he couldn''t help wanting to take this trial.


    After all, this was an Ancient Era Ruin and the rewards that it should give shouldn''t be that bad.<sub> </sub>


    If this was the greatest trial with the greatest reward¡­Even he couldn''t help being tempted by it.


    Especially after he had figured out what the Illusion Ring that he had just received did.


    It wasn''t hard to figure out since its function was in its name.


    It could create illusions just like what Lin Fan had encountered in the trial he had just faced.


    While he couldn''t create illusions that were as powerful as the ones he had experienced in the trial since his life energy wasn''t strong enough, the illusions that he created were more than enough to bind anyone in the Embryo Soul Realm. They were even strong enough to temporarily stop people in the Child Soul Realm.


    As he became stronger, the illusions would be stronger since this was an artifact that was well beyond his realm. He didn''t even know the limits of the power that it could release, so this was something that he would be able to use for a long time.


    Just one of the safe trials gave him this kind of powerful artifact, he couldn''t even imagine what the greatest reward would be.


    So after a moment of hesitation, Lin Fan still raised the key in the end and popped it into the lock that was on the gate.


    The moment that the cloud key was inserted into the gate, there was a strong sh of light before the lock fell to the ground with a strong "thud" sound. After the lock fell off, the gate slowly began to open and it released an aura that immediately sent a chill down Lin Fan''s back.


    However, at the same time, this was an aura that was familiar to him.


    As his senses became sharper, he was able to recognize this kind of aura. This was the aura that the girl with the turquoise hair had and more recently, he realized that this was the same aura that his system had.


    He knew what this aura represented because Ang and Momonga had told him about it. This was the aura of the gods.


    It seemed like this Ancient Era Ruin really was something that was rted to the gods from a long time ago.


    He couldn''t help suddenly remembering what Huang Xiao Hou had once told him.


    Huang Xiao Hou had told him that it was the gods that had summoned both of them to this world.


    Perhaps he would be able to find an exnation for his reincarnation if he were to take this trial?


    As soon as this thought appeared in his mind, Lin Fan no longer hesitated and walked right towards the opened gate.


    As he passed through, there was a sh of light that appeared and then he lost his consciousness.


    This was different from the other times that he had been transported, this time he had beenpletely knocked out and didn''t have any awareness of what was happening.


    After Lin Fan walked through the gate, the gate suddenly mmed shut and the entire staircase disappeared from where it had once been standing. In an instant, it was as if there was nothing that had been there.


    Far above these ins, standing in the clouds was the buff statue and the woman in the blue dress.


    The two of them were standing right above where the staircase that Lin Fan had entered had been, intensely staring at where Lin Fan had disappeared from.


    For the longest time, neither of them said a single thing, but then the buff statue broke the silence by saying, "Is this the right thing to do?"


    The woman in the blue dress gave a sigh before saying, "He''s not doing his job, so we have no choice but to interfere."


    The buff statue had a hesitant look on his face and he was silent for a while before he finally said, "Perhaps he has his own reason? You don''t know what could have happened in the thousands of years that we''ve been dormant."


    The woman in the blue dress didn''t seem to acknowledge his words at first as she just silently stared down below, but then she shook her head and said, "No, I could feel his aura when that child walked past me. It didn''t seem right¡­"


    The buff statue revealed a confused look when he heard this as he asked, "Didn''t seem right? What do you mean?"


    The woman in the blue dress once again didn''t respond right away. Based on the look on her face, it was like she was thinking about how to answer.


    After another long silence, she finally said, "It''s almost as if he''s hesitating¡­but what would he have to hesitate about? Hasn''t our mission been the same ever since the Great War?"


    The buff statue knitted his brows, but he didn''t say anything.


    The two of them just stood in silence, looking down at the ins beneath them.

 Chapter 635 Ancient World (1)

    When Lin Fan opened his eyes again, the sh of white light waspletely gone.


    Instead, he found that he was lying down inside of a small building, looking up at the roof above him. There wasn''t even a bed that he was lying on, he was just lying on a straw mat on the ground.


    Lin Fan could feel his head pounding, but he ignored it as he sat up and looked around himself.


    He found that this was a simple and empty room that he wasn''t familiar with at all.


    The walls of the building were even clearly made of mud, which showed that this was clearly a poorly constructed building. Lin Fan didn''t remember anything like this in the Ancient Era Ruins at all.


    As his head slowly cleared, he suddenly realized something.


    He didn''t have any cultivation at all!


    He couldn''t feel his life energy, he didn''t have the absorption power or the golden energy, he didn''t even have a connection with his pets anymore.


    When he looked down, he found that the body that he was looking at was apletely different body.


    Lin Fan was about to stand and try to figure this out, but there was a voice that came from the door that said, "Ah!"


    Then when Lin Fan turned in the direction of the voice, he saw that there was a little girl who was standing in the doorway to this room, looking at him with a surprised look on her face. Of course, this was a little girl that Lin Fan didn''t recognize at all.


    The little girl was surprised for a bit before suddenly turning around to shout, "Mom, big brother is up!"


    Lin Fan was confused by this because he clearly didn''t remember having a little sister like this little girl. Not to mention that the little sister that he did have wasn''t even with him at this moment¡­


    But before he could say anything, the little girl had already run out of the room and headed to an unknown ce.


    Lin Fan was about to stand up to go after her, but then there was a sharp pain that filled his head.


    He couldn''t help reaching his hand up to hold his head as he winced from this pain.


    The pain didn''t go away at all, it just continued to grow stronger and stronger until he couldn''t help bending down, putting his head between his knees.


    After a few minutes, the pain slowly started to fade before it disappearedpletely.


    Lin Fan''s head returned to normal, but his body was still filled with pain. This was a pain that had been there before, but he hadn''t realized it because of the difort in his head.


    As the pain in his head disappeared, there was something else that appeared in his head.


    There were a bunch of memories that he never had before that had suddenly filled his head.


    Based on these memories, it seemed like the name of this body was Xia Yu, but everyone in this vige called him Xiao Yu.


    The reason for the pain that he was currently feeling?


    He had been trying to hunt a boar, but he had been pushed off a cliff by that boar in the end.


    Not to mention the pain that he was currently feeling, he was even lucky that he had been able to survive. After all, this Xiao Yu wasn''t a cultivator who could protect his body with life energy, he was just a normal human.


    If it hadn''t been for the branches that had cushioned him as he fell down, he certainly would have died.


    Even though he survived, he didn''t know how long he had been in aa for.


    Still, for Lin Fan, this seemed like apletely different scenario, but it was one that he was very familiar with. After all, this was something that he had experienced before and something that had happened quite recently.


    Could it be that he had been transmigrated again?


    ? But that didn''t make any sense at all.


    He didn''t die, so why would he suddenly be transmigrated?<sub> </sub>


    He remembered that he had just used the cloud key and entered the gate for that trial, so why did he suddenly be someone else?


    Did that mean that there was an ident during the transfer that had killed him? Or could it be that this was part of the trial?


    Lin Fan was in thought for a long time, but he didn''t have time to finish those thoughts because someone had suddenly burst into his room.


    It was the same little girl from before, but this time there was a beautiful blonde woman who hade in with her.


    Lin Fan was still confused as to what was happening, but when the beautiful woman saw him sitting up, there were tears that appeared in her eyes. Then without any hesitation, she rushed forward to take Lin Fan in her ample bosom, almost suffocating him as she hugged him.


    While hugging her, she kept saying in a tearful voice, "Xiao Yu, you''re finally awake! I really don''t know what I would have done if you didn''t wake up!"


    The little girl on the side also started to cry when she saw this. It didn''t take long before she fell to her knees and waspletely bawling her eyes out.


    Hearing thismotion, there was another person that came in through the door, but this person remained silent the entire time.


    Finally after what seemed like a long time, the beautiful woman''s tears slowly came to a stop as she finally let Lin Fan out of her grip. When she did, Lin Fan took a deep breath since he had been a bit smothered being held by her like this.


    With the memories that he received, he knew that this woman was the mother of the owner of this new body he received and the one standing silently at the door was the father.


    He didn''t know what was going on, but he knew that if he didn''t deal with this situation first, it would certainly get worse.


    Lin Fan raised his hands to take the mother by the shoulders and said, "Mom, calm down. I''m alright now, aren''t I?"


    The mother looked at Lin Fan with tearful eyes, but she still gave a nod in the end.


    It was then that the father came over and said, "Xiao Yu, it was all my fault."


    Lin Fan was confused by this at first, but then when he looked through his memories, he understood why the father said this.


    It was because during the hunt, it had been his father''s mistake that drove the boar to Xia Yu''s hiding spot, which had caused both him and the boar to fall off the cliff. The boar hadn''t been as lucky as Xia Yu since it had been thrown forward by its momentum, flying right past the branches that grew off the side of the cliff.


    Without anything to break its fall, the boar had fallen with the full force of gravity and shattered most of its bones, killing it on the spot.


    While the hunt had been a sess, the fact that it was his mistake that almost killed his son had filled the father with guilt. He hadn''t been able to sleep well over the few nights that Xia Yu had been in hisa, so even now, the panda eyes on his face were quite strong.


    Once Lin Fan understood, he shook his head and said, "It''s alright, it was an ident."


    The father shook his head and said, "No, it was all my fault. If it wasn''t for me¡­"


    Lin Fan knew that there was no point in arguing against him since it wouldn''t work, so instead, he said, "Alright, that''s enough of that. I''m alive now, aren''t I?"


    The father who had been holding back his tears the entire time finally couldn''t take it anymore as he broke out in tears as well. Seeing the father break out in tears, the mother and daughter both broke out in tears as well.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan revealed a helpless smile as he shook his head, but he didn''t say anything.


    Sometimes people just needed to let out the emotions that they had been holding in before they could get better, this was one of those times. It was better to let them cry until all their emotions were out and then they would be much easier to handle.


    As they were crying, there was a sudden thud that came from outside before the sounds of thumping footsteps rang out. Those footsteps came closer and closer until there was a twin tailed teenage girl that ran into the room as well.


    She first looked at the people that were crying in front of Lin Fan''s bed and revealed a worried look as a thought filled her mind, but then as she came closer, she saw Lin Fan sitting in the bed.


    When she saw him, she couldn''t help pinching her cheeks as if she thought that she was dreaming. However, when she felt the pain, she immediately ran forward and took Lin Fan in her arms, holding him tightly.


    For a young girl, there was no mistaking the fact that her breasts were quite ample as well. They could evenpare to the mother''s full peaks¡­


    Which was the first thought that Lin Fan had.


    The second thought was that he was afraid that after surviving it the first time, he might really be suffocated the second time¡­

 Chapter 636 Ancient World (2)

    Eventually, the teenage girl also let go of Lin Fan, allowing him to catch his breath.


    He had to admit that it was quite enjoyable being held like this, but he could do without the suffocating part.


    After some more searching of his memories, he remembered that this girl was called Qiao Qiao who was the childhood friend of Xia Yu. Rather, it was better to call them childhood sweethearts.


    Someone had been at the door of the Xia Family''s house when Lin Fan had woken up, so they had heard themotion from inside.


    In a small vige like theirs, it was hard to hide anything, so soon the news of Xia Yu waking up had been spread to every part of the vige.


    The moment that Qiao Qiao had received the news that Xia Yu had woken up, she had dropped everything she had been doing and rushed over to the Xia Family house.


    Then the moment that she came in and saw Lin Fan sitting there, she couldn''t control herself as she threw herself at him.


    It took a while before Lin Fan was finally able to break free, though it would be hard to say that he didn''t enjoy it.


    Once he did break free, the first thing he did was calm them down because he knew that if he didn''t calm them down first, he wouldn''t be able to do anything. It took quite a bit offorting before they finally calmed down and Lin Fan had a chance to ask his questions.


    Of course the first question Lin Fan asked was, "What happened?"


    Since Xia Yu had been in aa for an unknown period of time, Lin Fan wasn''t certain what happened during that missing gap in his memories since Xia Yu didn''t have any memories to pass down to him.


    When he asked this question, it caused some more tears toe out, but then the mother told him about everything that had happened.


    He had been in aa for two weeks now, with his vital signs fluctuating. They had almost been certain that he wouldn''t make it through, so that was why they had been so shocked to see Lin Fan wake up.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a secret bitter smile at this.


    If he was here now, the most likely thing that would happen was that Xia Yu hadn''t survived or he wouldn''t be here¡­


    But of course, he couldn''t just tell everyone this.


    After learning about what happened to him, Lin Fan started asking about the vige.


    When they heard these questions, everyone was surprised since they never expected these questions from Lin Fan, but they still answered it.


    The father was a high ranking hunter, so when it came to the hierarchy of this vige, he did have some power. That also meant that he knew much more than the average person about the workings of the vige.


    After hearing everything, Lin Fan fell silent as he started arranging his thoughts.


    After all, he was still unclear what had happened here, so before doing anything, gathering information was key.


    Had he been transmigrated again or was this still part of the trial?


    If he had been transmigrated, what should he do?


    If this was part of the trial, what was the goal?


    Of course, the worst part of all of this was that he didn''t have a single bit of his cultivation.


    Even though he never had something like cultivation back on earth, it was still hard for him to lose it after transmigrating to a cultivation world.


    Once he sorted out the information, Lin Fan realized that there was nothing in this vige that connected to the Ancient Era Ruin at all¡­


    Could it be that he really had been reincarnated again?


    Seeing how silent he was, the mother couldn''t help asking, "Xiao Yu, are you alright?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer at first since he had been deep in thought, but when this was asked a second time, he came out of his thoughts.


    He looked at the people in front of him and then shook his head as he said, "It''s nothing, I just had to gather my thoughts."<sub> </sub>


    Then when he was about to say something else, before the words coulde out of his mouth, there was a gurgle that came from his stomach.


    There was a silence that filled the room, but then everyone burst intoughter.


    Without any hesitation, the mother stood up and started heading out as she said, "I''ll get something for you. I already made something in case you woke up, so I just need to heat it up."


    Then after she went out, Qiao Qiao also stood up and followed her as she said, "Mother, I''ll help you with that."


    After they left, the father also left since he still had to go out for the hunt today, leaving Lin Fan with his new little sister.


    Since he never had a little sister before, he really didn''t know how to handle her. Especially since she was nothing like the little sister she had on the Blue Star.


    However, it was quite easy to handle her since she was still a little kid, so they ended up ying until the food was ready.


    Lin Fan spent the next week recovering in bed. At the same time, he tried to learn as much as he could about this new world.


    The bad thing was that this new world was an ancient world, which meant that information transfer technology wasn''t as good.


    Other than information on the vige, a few other viges nearby, and the city that they all surrounded, there wasn''t much other information for Lin Fan to learn.


    But Lin Fan also didn''t have time to learn more since he had other things to do.


    Since this was in ancient times, food technology wasn''t as developed, so this vige relied on both hunting and farming to feed its people. It wasn''t an exaggeration to say that they depended on good hunts to feed them since over half of their food came from hunting.


    Lin Fan was one of the best hunters since he had learned from his father, so in the few weeks without him, the food supply of the vige had suffered. So when he finally recovered enough to go back out with the hunting party, the people of the vige were filled with joy.


    Lin Fan wasn''t used to this body that didn''t have any life energy, but he was still able to use a bow properly because this was Xia Yu''s body and he had Xia Yu''s memories. Even though he had personally never shot a bow before, Xia Yu''s body remembered how to shoot it perfectly.


    On the first day back, Lin Fan had the greatest catch, scoring several birds and rabbits.


    However, that wasn''t all that he had found.


    As he had been scouting the forest, he had found a wolf corpse along with several smaller corpses that were clearly its cubs as well.


    It was clear by how it was rotting that it had already been dead for several days, so Lin Fan wasn''t interested in taking this corpse back with him since there was no way to salvage any meat from it. But when Lin Fan was about to leave, he suddenly heard a noiseing from not far away.


    Following that noise, he came up to a tree and looking down into a hole in the trunk, he found that there was a cub that was making these noises. Based on the sorry condition that the cub was in, it was clear that this cub hadn''t eaten for several days. It was already a miracle that it had been able to survive this long.


    Lin Fan knew that there was no merit in him taking this cub, but his conscience wouldn''t let him leave it out here alone, so he brought it back to the vige with him.


    The other hunters clearly didn''t approve of Lin Fan bringing this cub back with him, but since he was their best hunter, there was nothing that they could really say. Especially since Lin Fan had said that he would take care of this cub himself.


    Since Lin Fan had already made that decision, it meant that it wasn''t any of their business.


    Naturally his little sister was overjoyed about the cub and soon the two of them were running around everywhere together.


    In just a few months, the cub grew up and had be a full sized wolf. It was even so big that his little sister could ride on it and she definitely rode on it, going all around the vige on the back of the wolf.


    Of course, the wolf didn''t just keep his sisterpany, the wolf also came along with Lin Fan on his hunts after a bit of training.


    With the keen sense of smell that the wolf had, Lin Fan found it much easier to find prey and he was able to increase his daily catch even more.


    Just like this, he continued hunting for food during the warm seasons and stayed home during the cold seasons, only hunting from time to time when they wanted a certain kind of prey.


    He wasn''t sure why he was in this situation, but Lin Fan hadpletely adapted, taking on the identity of Xia Yu.


    In this manner, he lived this life for a year.


    But after that year, there was something that suddenly changed his new life as Xia Yu.

 Chapter 637 Ancient World (3)

    When Lin Fan had juste back from the hunt, he found that there was a crowd that had gathered in the center of the vige.


    He could hear a few things from the murmurs around him, but it was still better for him to find out the source of this anxiety from the center of the crowd.


    When Lin Fan headed over, the crowd that saw him started moving aside, parting to make way for him.


    That was the status that he enjoyed as one of the top hunters, he was someone that everyone in the vige respected.


    When he came to the center, he saw that everyone was gathered around a bulletin board that was at the center of the vige. However, he never remembered this bulletin board being here before, which meant that it must have been put up when he went out on his solo hunt.


    Seeing that he wasing over, the vige chief waved at him before saying, "Xiao Yu,e and take a look at this."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look, but he still came over to where the vige chief was before asking, "What''s going on?"


    The vige chief pointed at the bulletin board in front of him and said, "People from the City Lord Manor came by this morning to put this up. You should read it first¡­"


    Lin Fan could tell from his voice that this board wasn''t anything good, so he turned his attention to it and started to read.


    Even though this was an ancient world, education was at a surprisingly high level since everyone in the vige could read and write. This was an order that came from the City Lord Manor on behalf of the emperor, which stated that every household had to teach their children to read and write before they turned the age of ten or they would be fined arge fee.


    This was a wise move on the part of the government since this meant that there were more high ssbour that was avable to them, but since this was still an ancient feudal society, there weren''t that many jobs that were avable for this higher ssbour force. So in the end, most of the people were still stuck as farmers and hunters even though they could read and write.


    But based on the information that Lin Fan had learned in his year in this world, he knew that the central government was trying to push for more industrialization, so it showed how wise the emperor was. Without creating a capable workforce ahead of time, there would definitely be ack of capable workers when the time industrialization came.


    This was a very farsighted move on the part of the emperor.


    But of course, none of that mattered to a small vige hunter like Lin Fan.


    What he cared more about now was the bulletin board that had been ced in front of him.


    As he read the notice that was put on there, he couldn''t help slowly knitting his brows more and more.


    Once he was finished, he didn''t speak right away as he fell into thought.


    Seeing this, the vige chief waited for him to finish thinking.


    Since the incident with the cliff, the vige chief had found that Xia Yu hadpletely changed.


    He was no longer as rash as before, but rather he had be much more thoughtful and careful, but that also made him much more reliable. Even now, the vige chief found that he asked Xia Yu''s opinion when it came to most of the important matters of the vige.


    As for this matter, it was definitely one of the most important matters that had appeared in the vige since he had be chief.


    The notice was from the City Lord Manor and it was a notification that the northern barbarians had invaded the borders.


    As the city that was closest to the northern borders, it was naturally the job of the city guards to take care of the invading barbarians, however there was a problem.


    To put it simply, they didn''t have enough men.


    The northern city naturally trained arge garrison since it was the city that defended the northern borders, but the number of barbarians far exceeded anyone''s expectations. The army wouldn''t be able to match the number of barbarians, so they had no choice but to find other soldiers, even if those soldiers weren''t willing.


    So the notice wasn''t just a notification that the barbarians were invading, but also a notification of conscription.


    The notice even clearly stated that they would need fifty men from each vige to join the army to defend against the invading barbarians. However, it was that number that was a problem for Lin Fan''s vige.


    The total number of people in this vige added up to just around three hundred people, with an even division of men and women.


    The men were needed for the heavy work while the women were mainly in charge of things like taking care of the home and helping with their farms from time to time, but it was mainly the men who went hunting for their food. Among the men, there were only around seventy five able bodied adults since the rest were all elderly or children.


    If they were to take away fifty men like this, the vige would certainly copse from ack of food since they wouldn''t have enough men to do all the work¡­


    But it wasn''t as if they had a choice since this was a conscription notice.<sub> </sub>


    If they didn''t reply to this, before the barbarians even showed up to tear up their homes, the City Lord Manor would lead their troops to take care of them.


    Those were fully armed soldiers and they were just normal peasants, even if they were hunters, they didn''t have the training to fight actual soldiers.


    Then again, if they didn''t send anyone, it was likely that the barbarians woulde and rip up their homes. The barbarians were savage, they wouldn''t just kill them, they would torture them first.


    Thinking of that happening to one''s family naturally made them angry.


    After a long time, Lin Fan gave a sigh and asked, "How long ago has it been since this notice was put up?"


    The vige chief thought about it before saying, "It''s been there since noon, so a few hours."


    After a pause, Lin Fan asked, "How many have volunteered?"


    This time it was the vige chief''s turn to give a sigh as he said, "Just over ten and it doesn''t look like we''ll get more than twenty since more than half the vige has already seen this notice."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this before he muttered to himself, "If we teach a few of the kids and the women, I think we can have enough people hunting to feed the rest, but¡­"


    As he trailed off, the vige chief gave a nod before turning to look at Lin Fan with a serious look.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he already knew what the vige chief was going to ask him.


    The vige chief said in a slow and hesitant voice, "Are you going to go?"


    Lin Fan didn''t respond right away, but he could tell from the expectant look in the vige chief''s eyes what he wanted him to respond with.


    It wasn''t that the vige chief was scared that Lin Fan would be a threat to his position, rather he wanted Lin Fan to go for apletely different reason.


    He was more worried about the men that they would be sending as part of the conscription. This was also why he waited for Lin Fan toe back to discuss this with him.


    To put it simply, he didn''t want the men from their vige to be put on the front lines as cannon fodder. He knew that if that were to happen, they would certainly die.


    But why would they be used as cannon fodder?


    Between a soldier that had all kinds of investments stuffed in them like food, armour, weapons, and took months or years to train and a peasant that could be found anywhere, which one would be more valuable?


    It was without a doubt the trained soldier.


    Any propermander would choose to use the peasants as cannon fodder to stop the charge of the barbarians before sending out their trained soldiers. Of course in that situation, almost all of the peasants would die and the ones that didn''t would certainly be scarred for life.


    But the nobles and armymanders didn''t care about any peasants.


    That is unless the peasant had something that would catch the eyes of the nobles and armymanders.


    If there was a peasant that showedbat skills, especially the ability tomand, they would naturally catch the eyes of themanders. If that was the case, they would be allowed to be amander themselves and be given a squad.


    That squad would be excluded from the frontlines since they wouldn''t be useful as cannon fodder either, so that would allow them to keep their lives and avoid this suicidal charge.


    That was why the vige chief wanted Lin Fan to go.


    He wanted Lin Fan to go so that he could be a squadmander and bring the men from their vige into their squad, keeping them away from the suicidal frontlines.


    Of course, this wasn''t guaranteed since the other viges would have the same thought, but the vige chief would feel assured if it was Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was the most outstanding young man in their vige, so he was certain that he would catch the eyes of themanders.


    Lin Fan fell into deep thought for a bit before he suddenly gave a nod.

 Chapter 638 Ancient World (4)

    Other than the few men who volunteered, they were still missing several men before being able to meet their quota of fifty men.


    Of course, no one was willing to volunteer for something that they felt had a high chance of them dying. After all, all the men in the vige had their families to worry about, so none of them were willing to leave them.


    Out of fairness, the vige chief decided that they would do a drawing for the few spots that would be left out of their quota.


    Each family would be given one ballot and if their ballot was chosen, they would be required to send someone as part of the quota.


    Of course, families that didn''t have adult men or were already sending someone because they had volunteered were excluded from this drawing.


    In the end, the rest of the thirty were chosen, including Qiao Qiao''s big brother Qiao Man.


    On the day that they were heading off, everyone''s eyes were filled with tears, especially Qiao Qiao.


    She didn''t even bother looking at her big brother, rather she had thrown herself into Lin Fan''s arms as she begged him to be safe.


    On the side, Qiao Man had a bitter smile as he said, "Little sister, once you''ve found someone to love, you don''t care about your big brother anymore?"


    When Qiao Qiao heard this, she wiped her tears and finally came out of Lin Fan''s arms. She turned to Qiao Man with a scowl on her face and said, "It''s too much trouble worrying about an idiot like you."


    The men all around heard this and startedughing at Qiao Man who was just left there with a bitter smile on his face.


    While her mouth had been fierce, when she came closer to Lin Fan, she said in a low voice, "Xiao Yu, can you keep him safe for me?"


    Lin Fan looked down at her and gave a nod with a faint smile on his face.


    Qiao Qiao revealed a bright smile in return, but the tears quickly came back when she remembered that Lin Fan was heading off as well.


    But all things had toe to an end and Lin Fan led the group off to the city.


    When they arrived, they were immediately assigned to a mass barracks which were filled with various other peasants that had been conscripted.


    The living conditions were terrible and the food was even worse, but they had no choice since that was how things were. It was already good enough that they had received anything at all and weren''t expected to sleep outside or find their own food.


    After they arrived, the first thing that they were put through was a test to see the average level of these peasants. It was during this test that Lin Fan was able to stand out.


    With his abilities, he was able to catch the eye of themander who had rmended Lin Fan to the general.


    After seeing Lin Fan''s ability with the bow, the general had immediately made a decision to give Lin Fan a special position.


    Lin Fan was promoted to the position of a hundred manmander and he received fifty other peasants along with the people from his own vige to form a special unit. This special unit was a unit that waspletely made of archers, so other than the people from his own vige, the peasants assigned to him were all people who had experience as hunters.


    Lin Fan trained hard with this unit and before long, they became a legend on the battlefield.


    They didn''t be a legend because of their abilities in a head on fight, but rather they became legends as assassins.


    Lin Fan was even given the title of Lightning Bow because his shots flew out as fast as lightning as they pierced through the heads of barbarianmanders.


    As for his squad, their arrows always rained down where help was needed the most, alleviating the pressure on the frontlines.


    By the end of the war, it was unknown how many times they had saved the peasants that had been on the frontline from dying.


    The war itselfsted for half a year and in the end, the northern army was able to push back the barbarians.


    Lin Fan was offered a job to stay with the regr army for his performance, but he turned down that job since it wasn''t what he wanted. The war was anything but pleasant for him.


    He might have been a cultivator beforeing to this world, so he was not a stranger to fighting and killing, but war was just on apletely different scale. The number of deaths in this war far surpassed anything that Lin Fan had ever seen before.<sub> </sub>


    Not to mention that when it came to war, there were things that werepletely thrown out the window such as morals.


    He had seen the ruins of the viges that had been swept through by the barbarians and they weren''t things that were for the light-hearted.


    So in the end, he decided that it was best if he returned to his peaceful life in the vige.


    But with all the achievements that he had earned in this war, it was impossible for the government not to reward Lin Fan with something.


    So after the war was over, Lin Fan was given an official rank even though he was returning to the life of amoner. The exact details of his assignment from the government were to take care of a few viges that would be ced under him, namely the vige that he was from and a few nearby viges.


    This was their way of awarding Lin Fan and respecting his wishes, which was something that hismander had fought for.


    Finally when the war was over, Lin Fan brought the people from his vige back.


    It was a miracle, but they had all survived the war.


    Lin Fan hadn''t lost a single one of the vigers that had followed him into the war. In fact, he hadn''t lost a single man that had been on his squad.


    Of course there had been close calls since it was a war, but every time someone was close to losing their life, Lin Fan''s arrows would find their way into the heads of the enemies. Every time, Lin Fan''s arrows would save them at the brink of death.


    He was so popr that some of his other men even followed him back to his vige, bringing their families with them.


    The vige that he was from had also be bigger because during the time that they had been away, there were many young people who had gotten married out of fear that the barbarians would break their way through the lines of the northern army. So when Lin Fan had returned, there were more than ten babies that had been made.


    When the men returned, the first thing that the vige did was hold a banquet for the returning heroes.


    During that banquet, Lin Fan had been ced at the head of the table since everyone had heard about his aplishments during the war.


    While they were celebrating, Qiao Qiao suddenly seized the chance toe forward and stood right in front of Lin Fan.


    Then in front of many shocked gazes, she suddenly grabbed Lin Fan''s face and brought her own face closer,nding a big kiss on his lips.


    This was her first kiss, so she didn''t really know what to do. By the end of it, Lin Fan''s lips were covered in slobber when she moved away, but there was a big blush on both of their faces.


    All around them were sighs and clicks of the tongues from other girls.


    Lin Fan was a hero, so naturally he had be someone that they had all wanted. Qiao Qiao could see that, which was what had driven her to do such a bold thing like marching up to kiss Lin Fan.


    After a long moment of silence, while everyone watched with bated breath, Lin Fan said, "Let''s get married, alright?"


    He had spent an entire year and a half in this world and in the first year he had been here, he had spent quite a bit of time with Qiao Qiao. The feelings that the original Xia Yu had for Qiao Qiao had already been transferred to him.


    Qiao Qiao''s face turnedpletely red and after a long period of silence, she just gave a slight nod before running off.


    There was another moment of silence before everyone broke out inughter and cheers for the new couple.


    There weren''t any arguments from the families of the two because both sides had already been able to see the feelings that both of them had for each other. In fact, they had already assumed that they would be together in the end and that it was just a matter of time.


    Of course, they wouldn''t be married right away since neither Lin Fan or Qiao Qiao were of age just yet, but that didn''t mean that they couldn''t get engaged.


    The banquet continued onte into the night and by the end of it, most of the adults werepletely drunk. Most of them were sleeping on the ground, but a few of them had been pulled away by their wives.


    There were also people who had hooked up since anyone who came back from the war could be considered a hero and that was more than enough to attract some girls.


    As for Lin Fan, while he wanted to go to sleep, he was pulled away by Qiao Qiao in the end.

 Chapter 639 Ancient World (5)

    Just like that, another two years passed and both Lin Fan and Qiao Qiao came of age, so it was finally time for their wedding.


    But it wasn''t just their wedding, but also a celebration of the fact that they were bringing new life into this world.


    Since they had already been engaged and they were in love with each other, they had engaged in nightly activities from time to time.


    Just two months before their wedding, they found out that Qiao Qiao was pregnant which was a big surprise for them, but it was a happy surprise nheless.


    During these two years, Lin Fan had slowly adapted to his position as the official who oversaw this vige and the surrounding viges. At the same time, he had also started introducing new methods of farming based on his experiences from earth, which had greatly increased their grain yield.


    Because of this, the people from the surrounding viges were attracted to migrate over and the vige had already reached a level where it could be considered a town.


    Of course, Lin Fan wasn''t the mayor of this town since he didn''t want that position, so the mayor was the original vige chief of their vige.


    But none of that was on Lin Fan''s mind because it was finally time for his wedding.


    The day was a beautiful day without a single cloud in the sky.


    Everyone in their town had shown up to celebrate this wedding, which just went to show how popr Lin Fan was.


    Of course, even with how little Lin Fan talked, he was someone who showed his emotions through his actions instead of his words, so everyone understood what kind of person he was. There wasn''t a single person in the town that hadn''t been touched by his kindness.


    The families of the two sides were the most happy because they had been waiting for this day for a long time.


    When Lin Fan tried to go see Qiao Qiao before the wedding, he was stopped by his little sister.


    The wedding ceremony in this world was different from the one on earth, so there wasn''t the same rule about not seeing the bride before the wedding. But even then, his little sister was strangely aggressive about chasing him away.


    He really couldn''t understand what was happening.


    They always had a good rtionship, but since he and Qiao Qiao had announced the day of their wedding, she would act strangely aggressive towards him.


    Even today, she stood right in front of the changing room ring at him when he tried to enter.


    He tried coaxing her, but all he received were the words, "Get out of here, you''re in the way."


    Lin Fan had a bitter smile when he heard this.


    Qiao Man who was a part of his wedding party had alsoe along with him and when he saw this, he couldn''t help patting Lin Fan''s back with aforting smile on his face since he knew what he was feeling. After all, his little sister had treated him the same for the longest time.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say to this, but then the door to the dressing room opened and it was Qiao Qiao that came out.


    When Lin Fan saw her in her wedding dress, his breath couldn''t help stopping, almost as if it had been knocked out of him by this beautiful sight.


    He was about to say something, but Qiao Qiao waved her hand at him to stop him before taking his little sister in her arms. Then she turned and headed back in with his little sister.


    Before she went back in, she didn''t forget to turn back and say to Lin Fan, "You can go on ahead. We''ll have some girls time first."


    Lin Fan didn''t understand what was happening, but he could tell that she wouldn''t take no for an answer, so he just returned to his own dressing room.


    By the time that the wedding ceremony began, his little sister had returned to her happy smiling self from before. Not only that, it seemed like she was much closer with Qiao Qiao.


    During this time, it wasn''t just Lin Fan that she was strangely aggressive towards, but also towards Qiao Qiao. However, when it came to her aggression towards Qiao Qiao, she was much more restrained. She just treated her coldly whenever they were together and she didn''t shout at her like she did at Lin Fan.


    Seeing them being so close now, Lin Fan knew that Qiao Qiao must have said something to calm his little sister down.


    Looking at her standing beside him, he couldn''t help feeling lucky that he had someone like this to spend his life with.


    The wedding ceremony of this ancient world was different from the ones that Lin Fan was used to. This wedding ceremony was divided into three parts, the bows to the heavens, the vows, and the sealing kiss.


    p The first thing that they did as a couple was stand in front of the altar of the goddess where there had been mats ced. The two of them would be kneeling on those mats and kowtowing to the heavens for their blessing of their matrimony.</anda>


    However, when Lin Fan stood in front of the altar, he couldn''t help feeling a bit strange.


    After all, the statue of the goddess was someone that he was familiar with.


    It was the woman in the blue dress that he had met in the Ancient Era Ruins.<sub> </sub>


    He had been stunned the first time that he had seen this and he had asked around about this statue, but he hadn''t been able to find anything other than some basic information.


    This statue was a statue of the Goddess of Water, the giver of all life and the goddess that most of the people in this world believed in.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking whether this was just a coincidence or if this meant that he was still taking the trial, but he hadn''t been able to find anything else about this matter since seeing this statue.


    He had kept this matter in the back of his head the entire time, but he still hadn''t found anything.


    When the two of them were kneeling in front of the altar, the officiant of the wedding suddenly said, "Groom and bride, please bow to the heavens and receive their blessing for your matrimony."


    Lin Fan looked over at Qiao Qiao and reached his hand out to her. She looked back at him with a smile and then took his hand.


    Then together as one, they bowed their heads to the statue.


    The wedding tradition was to give three kowtows to the heavens to receive their blessings.


    After the first kowtow, the officiant said, "First bow."


    Then once again he counted the second kowtow, but it wasn''t as quiet as it was with the first kowtow.


    This ceremony was just ceremonial and didn''t have any real effects. It was just something that people had done as a testification of their marriage.


    However, when Lin Fan and Qiao Qiao gave their second bow, the sky had suddenly darkened.


    It wasn''t as if it had suddenly turned as dark as the night, but there were a few stray clouds that appeared.


    The people at the wedding were focused on the wedding, so they didn''t notice this. However, for the people that were further away, they couldn''t help looking up when they saw the sky darken.


    But when they saw that it was just a few stray clouds, everyone turned back to their own thing since just a few stray clouds weren''t that strange.


    Then when Lin Fan and Qiao Qiao gave their third kowtow, the skypletely changed.


    The sky suddenly filled with clouds as if it was about to rain.


    This time, the people at the wedding couldn''t ignore it since they all looked up in shock when everything suddenly turned dark.


    Lin Fan and Qiao Qiao both looked up as well, wondering what was happening.


    The moment that Lin Fan looked up, his eyes instantly narrowed.


    With the depth of his soul, his senses were much sharper than normal people''s. Even if it was far up in the air, Lin Fan could still instantly tell what he was looking at.


    The clouds above them weren''t clouds at all, but rather they were living beings floating in the air that hadpletely blocked out the sun.


    Based on the way they were moving, Lin Fan could tell that these were beasts¡­


    Was it an invasion of the Beast Race?


    But this was a world without any cultivation at all, so why would they invade this kind of world?


    Still, since the beasts were here and they were clearly aggressive, he didn''t have time to think about it that much.


    Lin Fan immediately stood up with Qiao Qiao and ignoring the wedding ceremony, he ran towards the crowd of guests that were present. All of them were high ranking people in the town, so he immediately gave them orders without any hesitation.


    Lin Fan shouted, "Gather everyone and make your way into the shelter! Don''t leave a single person in the town! Once you''re there, make sure to lock up the shelter doors and don''t open it under any circumstances!"


    After shouting this to the mayor, he turned to the buff men sitting in a group who were the guards of the town and he said, "Gather all your weapons and prepare for a fight! There''s no time to waste at all!"


    The people in the crowd were confused why Lin Fan had said this to them, so they hesitated a bit, but they still chose to follow Lin Fan''s words since they had trust in him.


    But it was that moment of hesitation that made it toote for them. No, even if there wasn''t that moment of hesitation, it still would have been toote.


    Because the moment that everyone started to move, there was a rain of mes that fell down on them.

 Chapter 640 Ancient World (6)

    There was only a bright light that suddenly lit up the sky above them before explosions rang out.


    The beasts in the sky that were fire based had started shooting fireballs down onto the ground without aiming, sting anything that they could see.


    Since there was a town here, naturally it was one of the targets that the beasts in the sky chose to fire at.


    There was a long barrage of fireballs that rained down and itsted a long time before thest explosion finally stopped.


    When the first fireball had fallen, Lin Fan had immediately grabbed Qiao Qiao and protected her with his body. However, he was only able to do this as the fireballs were just too strong for him to move.


    When the fireballs had finished falling, Lin Fan looked up to see that there were craters and burnt or half burnt corpses all around him. There was no blood at all since all their blood had been evaporated by the mes of the explosions.


    This was a grim scene for anyone and they would be disgusted by what they saw, but Lin Fan had his experiences from the war, so he was able to quickly move on from this.


    The first thing that Lin Fan did was look for his family, but as he looked around, he couldn''t see anyone that he recognized. Most of the corpses had beenpletely charred, so it was hard to recognize who they were before they had died.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t give up since he knew that his father had been with his family.


    Second to him, his father had be the best hunter in the town after learning a few tricks from him, so he wouldn''t be killed that easily.


    There were survivors around, so Lin Fan was certain that not everyone had died and that was the hope that he needed.


    Turning back, Lin Fan looked at Qiao Qiao who was trembling from seeing the scene of apocalypse in front of her.


    Lin Fan knew that it was a dangerous time for her mentally, so he held her by the shoulder and turned her to face him before saying, "Look into my eyes."


    When Qiao Qiao heard this voice, she suddenly snapped back into reality and her eyes focused as she looked into Lin Fan''s eyes.


    When Lin Fan saw her eyes clearing, he then said, "It''ll be alright, I''m here with you."


    Qiao Qiao stood there in a daze for a bit before suddenly giving a nod.


    When she hade back to her senses, the first thing she thought of was her family as she asked, "What about everyone else? Are they alright?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I don''t know, I haven''t found anything yet. However, we can''t stay here, it''s too dangerous. We have to get to the shelter at least."


    Qiao Qiao gave a nod to agree to this since she knew that Lin Fan was right.


    They would just be sitting ducks if they sat out here, they should find a safe ce to hole up in and slowly look for their family members. After all, if they died, it would all be meaningless.


    So without any hesitation, Lin Fan took her by the hand and they started moving through the crowd of corpses and people who were still dazed by the sudden attack. At the same time, they kept their eyes out for anyone who they recognized.


    As they headed along, there were a few of the soldiers who had recovered faster because they were more experienced who came over to Lin Fan. The first thing that these people did was ask about their family, but Lin Fan shook his head as he told them that he hadn''t seen anything.


    After confirming this, there were a few that chose to head to the shelter with them while the rest decided to go around the area looking for their families.


    Lin Fan wished those that left good luck and urged the ones that followed him to move quickly.


    When they arrived at the shelter, Lin Fan didn''t bother knocking on the door since he knew that it wouldn''t open for him even if he did knock.


    The shelter was designed in such a way that if there ever was a need to hide in it, the people inside would never open the door of their own volition unless it was absolutely necessary. The shelter door had a second method of being opened, one that only a few soldiers of the town knew how to operate, which was how they could keep them safe if anything happened.


    Lin Fan moved over to the tree where this mechanism was hidden and quickly opened the door.


    When the door opened, he saw that the shelter was already filled with people.


    When those people saw Lin Fan standing at the entrance, their faces immediately filled with joy since he was someone that everyone in the town trusted.


    The first person toe over wasn''t the mayor of the town, but rather one of the elders who was on the advisory board.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this elder and he asked, "Where''s the mayor?"


    The elder revealed a difficult look as he hesitantly said, "The mayor¡­"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan could guess what he was about to say, so he patted the elder on the shoulder and said in aforting voice, "Alright, let''s not talk about that now." Then just as quickly, his voice turned stern again as he asked, "What''s the situation?"


    The elder also changed tones and said in a clear voice, "We''ve already taken a count of everyone who made it into the shelter and it seems like more than half of the town is missing."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows again when he heard this, but this was about right based on the estimates that he had made.


    As he headed along the path to the shelter, he had counted the number of scorched corpses that he had seen.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, the elder asked, "Xiao Yu, what do we do now?"


    Lin Fan was pulled back from his thoughts when he heard this.


    He looked around the shelter and then looked out the entrance before making his decision, "We''ll lock the doors of the shelter for now and if anyonees, we''ll see if we can bring them in. But for now, we will hide in here and see if we can weather the storm."


    The elder didn''t say anything in response to this, he just gave a nod since he felt that this was the right decision.


    After bringing everyone in, Lin Fan let them go look for their families while he went off looking for his own.


    The people in the shelter were all separated into their own groups based on their families, so it was quite easy to search through them.


    At first, Lin Fan didn''t find anything and as he came to the end of the shelter, he started getting worried since he wasn''t able to find any traces of his family. However, when he reached the end of the shelter, he finally found something familiar.


    It was a ribbon, a bright ribbon.


    This was the bright ribbon that had been attached to the dress that his little sister had worn to the wedding and attached to it was the rest of the dress, along with his little sister.


    Along with his little sister, there was the rest of his family who were sitting there in the corner.


    The moment that he saw his family, Lin Fan felt the stone in his heart fall down.


    It was the same for his family since they had turned to look at him the moment that he came over.


    His little sister broke out in tears, but these weren''t tears of sadness, they were tears of joy since she was able to see him again.


    Without any hesitation, she ran forward and jumped into his arms.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this sudden move from her, but he still firmly caught her before walking over while holding her.


    His mother said, "Xiao Yu, you''re alright." As she said this, there were tears that were pouring down from her eyes.


    His father looked at him with a calm look, but from the tear in the corner of his eye, it was clear that he was also relieved.


    After spending a few minutes to catch up, Lin Fan left them to their own matters as he moved around the shelter looking for Qiao Qiao.


    It was apletely different scene on Qiao Qiao side since she was bawling her eyes out while her brother held her.


    Lin Fan immediately knew that something was wrong and when he looked around, he figured out what it was.


    Qiao Qiao''s brother was here, but her parents weren''t¡­


    Lin Fan looked at Qiao Man and he shook his head in response.


    He had hopes that perhaps they were still outside at first, but seeing that look from Qiao Man, it seemed like their fates had been sealed.


    Looking at the expression on Qiao Man''s face, he could tell that he must have seen it all happen.


    Qiao Man helped his little sister up and when she saw Lin Fan, she immediately threw herself into his arms.


    He didn''t say anything about what had happened nor did he try tofort her with his words. All he did was hold her in her arms as he patted her back and said, "I''m still here."


    Qiao Qiao cried even louder and held him even tighter, but Lin Fan just took it all.

 Chapter 641 Ancient World (7)

    After a few minutes, Qiao Qiao finally managed to calm herself down.


    She looked at Lin Fan as if she was asking him what she should do.


    Lin Fan looked right back at her and said, "My parents are here, you shouldn''t be alone right now. I''ll take you to them first."


    Qiao Qiao hesitated a bit before giving a nod in response.


    Lin Fan took her hand and led her over to the corner where his parents had been staying.


    When they saw him bring over Qiao Qiao and Qiao Man, they revealed happy looks at first. However, as soon as they saw that it was only Qiao Qiao and Qiao Man, their expressions turned dark again.


    The two families were quite close, which was why they had been very supportive of Qiao Qiao and Lin Fan getting married.


    However, now that they had received the news that their friends were dead, naturally they would feel sad.


    Lin Fan''s mother came over to Qiao Qiao and took her away from Lin Fan, bringing her to the corner with his little sister to have a talk and to help her calm down.


    The three men didn''t say anything and just watched the three women move to the corner.


    Once they were gone, Lin Fan''s father turned to ask him, "Xiao Yu, what are we going to do now?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think first before saying, "For now, we seal ourselves in here and see what the situation outside is. Once it bes more stable outside, we can send people out to see what the damage is."


    Qiao Man said, "But what if they¡­"


    Before he could finish, there was a loud sound that came from outside the shelter.


    As soon as they heard this noise, all three of them turned to look at the entrance before running up the stairs to the second floor.


    This shelter was built inside the mountain and consisted of three floors.


    The first floor was the floor that they had been on previously and it was the floor with spaces for them to live and sleep in.


    The floor underneath that floor was the underground floor which held most of their storage, such as food, water, and other necessities, as well as weapons just in case they needed to fight.


    The second floor was the smallest out of all three floors and it only contained a few simple rooms, but this floor was the floor that was used as a conference area as well as a surveince area. There were slits that had been carved into the side of the mountain, which they could look out of from the second floor.


    As soon as they arrived on the second floor, they found that there were already people who were looking out the slits.


    When these people saw that Lin Fan had arrived, they immediately made way for him to look out the slits to judge the situation outside.


    Lin Fan moved forward and looked out the slit right above the door.


    When he looked down, he found that there were beasts that were standing in front of the entrance.


    Even though the entrance looked exactly like a normal side of a mountain, the beasts had somehow figured out that it was the entrance to this shelter.


    Currently, there were tworge goris that were banging on the door with their fists, as well as several dozen other beasts waiting behind them.


    Based on the blood that was on their fur, Lin Fan could tell that they must have ughtered some people beforeing over here.


    Seeing the beasts that were gathered here, he knew that it was only a matter of time before the entrance for his ce was busted open.


    Since he was a cultivator before, he was sensitive to the aura these beasts released.


    Not a single one of these beasts were in the Soul Realm, the strongest among them was only in the Gold Realm.


    If he still had his cultivation, he would have been able to take care of these beasts with only a single wave of his hand. It was just too bad that his current body didn''t have a single bit of cultivation.


    He also knew that he couldn''t just leave these beasts outside since they would be able to break through eventually. He also couldn''t evacuate everyone because there were just too many people here and it would be impossible to save them all.


    After falling into deep thought for a bit, he turned to look at all the warriors standing around him, waiting for him to speak.


    After another long pause, Lin Fan asked, "Who''s ready to die with me today?"


    He didn''t sugarcoat it at all, it was very likely that they would die if they were to go out and fight the beasts.


    After all, even if they were well trained fighters, they were still humans that didn''t have a single bit of cultivation.


    When facing these demon beasts, it would be like fighting them naked because they wouldn''t have any life energy to protect themselves with.<sub> </sub>


    Just a single hit from any of these demon beasts would mean every bone on their body shattering. If they were unlucky enough to be hit by the Gold Realm beasts, they would certainly be stted into meat patties.


    The men gathered around Lin Fan all looked at each other and then without any hesitation, most of them agreed to dying with him.


    There were two who hesitated, but in the end, they chose not to fight.


    The others were about to say something, but Lin Fan stopped them and allowed the two of them to return to their families.


    These two were people who had immigrated over to the town in the past few months, so they didn''t have an attachment to the town like the rest of them.


    Lin Fan didn''t me them for feeling this way, but he also couldn''t rely on them since his n required no hesitation at all.


    If even a single person were to run, it would break his entire formation and kill them all, so he couldn''t take any chances at all.


    After making sure that everyone was prepared, Lin Fan shared his n with everyone.


    It was a very simple n, but it was also very hard to execute since the enemies were much stronger than them. It would take precise teamwork to pull off this n, but everyone had to admit that it was the best n they had right now.


    Once everyone understood the n and their part in the n, they all went to say farewell to their families.


    After all, it was very likely that they would die, so they would want the chance to leave a few words with their families.


    Lin Fan also went over to his family to say his goodbyes.


    When he came back, Qiao Qiao had already calmed down, but the moment she saw the look on his face, she started getting worried again.


    Lin Fan''s mother also saw this and turned to his father, but his father also pulled her aside to speak to her privately.


    Even though Qiao Qiao was worried, she could guess what Lin Fan was nning to do, so she couldn''t stop him.


    She just looked at him and said, "Can you promise that you''lle back?"


    Lin Fan looked back at her and said, "I can''t." Then after a pause, he said in a determined voice, "But I can promise that I will protect you."


    Qiao Qiao shook her head and threw herself in his arms as she said, "But I don''t want that, I just want you."


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "We both know that I can''t just walk away from this."


    Qiao Qiao gave a chuckle when she heard this before she put her head in his chest and said with a sob, "I know."


    There was a long silence that filled the air, but then Qiao Qiao suddenly came out of his embrace and raised her head. Before Lin Fan could even react, he felt a pair of soft lips fall onto his lips and a warm feeling filling him.


    This feelingsted for a few seconds before Qiao Qiao pulled away and said with a smile, "Now you owe me a kiss. I''ll wait here for you to return it."


    Lin Fan was stunned at first, but then he revealed a smile and said, "Alright."


    After they had all finished saying their goodbyes, all the warriors gathered at the side entrance.


    When designing this shelter, Lin Fan had naturally considered the possibility of the entrance being blocked, so he had made two side entrances just in case they needed to escape.


    Now they were using this side entrance to sneak up on the beasts and ambush them.


    Before heading out, Lin Fan turned to look at all the warriors gathered around him. Taking a deep breath, he said, "It is an honour to die with you all."


    The warriors all looked at Lin Fan and said, "It''s our honour to die with you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod to their determination before saying, "Then let''s go out there and die."


    Turning around, Lin Fan walked out of the side entrance without any hesitation.


    The other warriors followed a few steps behind because the n was to let Lin Fan scout out the area alone first since he had the best senses.


    When Lin Fan stepped outside the side entrance, he didn''t see anything at all, so he turned back to wave his hands at the others to follow him.


    However, before he could give the signal, there was a whistling sound that came from above him.


    Then before he could understand what was happening, there was a dazzling beam of white light that fell in front of him,pletely blinding him.

 Chapter 642 Ancient World (8)

    Lin Fan was unaware of what was happening since all he could see was the white of the blinding light that had fallen in front of him.


    However, after that light fell, there was a powerful force that suddenly threw him back, mming him against the tree that was behind him.


    The force was so strong that as soon as he hit the tree, his consciousness started to fade.


    Thest thing that he saw after the sh of white light was the crater that had been left where the mountain that held the shelter had been. There was smokeing from the crater, but there wasn''t a single thing left in that crater.


    Lin Fan tried reaching out with his hand with thest bit of strength that he had, but he couldn''t do it in the end and his hands slumped to the ground.


    It was at that moment that his vision faded and it all turned to ck.


    ¡­


    Up in the sky, there was an eagle beast that turned to the dragon beast that was in the center of their formation and asked, "My lord, there was no need for you to personally make a move was there?"


    The dragon didn''t even look at the eagle as it stared down at the crater where his pir of lightning had just fallen.


    After a long period of silence, the dragon suddenly said, "There was something strange about this area."


    The eagle immediately asked, "My lord, do you want us to search the area and see what we can find?"


    The dragon didn''t answer right away as it knitted its brows, but after a while, it said, "It''s fine, there''s no aura of life from this area anymore. Let''s not waste any more time and finish off this." Then it changed the topic and asked, "Did you find any traces of the traitor yet?"


    The eagle revealed a difficult expression as it said, "We''re currently searching for it with full force, but we haven''t been able to find anything so far¡­"


    The dragon gave a cold snort when it heard this, but it didn''t reprimand the eagle. Instead the dragon said, "Find it as soon as possible, I don''t want to stay on this lower longer than I have to. It''s disgusting seeing all these lower beings running around like bugs."


    Then after some thought, the dragon added, "Bring the traitor to me alive, I want to personally destroy his soul."


    The eagle immediately bowed its head before saying, "Yes, my lord."


    Then without any hesitation, it headed off to pass down the dragon''s orders.


    The dragon looked down at the hole that it had created in the ground one more time, then it turned its head and headed off in another direction without looking back.


    On the ground, there was a ck sphere near the crater that had been watching the beasts in the sky the entire time.


    When this ck sphere saw the beasts suddenly flying off, it let out a sigh of relief, but it didn''t let its guard down.


    Turning around, it looked at the human that was covered in a dark energy barrier on the ground and said, "You can''t die on me just yet. I have big ns and you''re the one who''s going to help me put those ns into action, so I can''t let you die just yet."


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan woke up again, the first thing he did was look around to see if there was anyone around, but he found that he was lying on the ground by the crater by himself.


    He couldn''t react right away to what was happening, but as his mind slowly cleared, he finally remembered what had happened.


    He had been about to lead the warriors to take care of the beasts when there was that sudden sh of light that had knocked him out.


    Lin Fan immediately stood up and headed to the side of the crater. Looking down into the crater, he found that he couldn''t even see the bottom of the crater.


    Lin Fan understood what this meant, but he wouldn''t let himself give up just yet.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan started moving around the outside of the crater, trying to see if there was anything that he could find. However, even after circling the entire crater, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    It wasn''t just humans that he couldn''t find, he also couldn''t find a single trace of the beasts that had invaded.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think and then after a while, he decided to head back to the town.


    When he came back to the town, the first thing that hit his nose was the strong scent of blood in the air. Then when he made his way through the town, he was able to find where that strong scent of blood came from.


    Strewed all over the town were ripped apart corpses of the people who had once lived here.<sub> </sub>


    Some of them had bites taken out of them, but it seemed that most of them were just ripped apart for the sake of entertainment.


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand what the beasts had wanted to achieve with this, but that didn''t stop him from feeling rage from these actions.


    After searching through the entire town, he found that he wasn''t able to find a single living being which confirmed the guess that he had had.


    As the reality of the situation hit him, even with how strong Lin Fan was mentally, he couldn''t stop his emotions from taking over.


    Just one minute he had been at his wedding, but then the next, everything that he had held dear had been taken away from him. It felt like the world was copsing around him and he felt like it was getting harder to breath as he fell to his knees.


    He almost felt like he was about to faint, but then there was a voice that suddenly rang out from above him that said, "Do you want revenge?"


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure what had happened, but then he realized that someone had indeed spoken.


    Gathering himself, he looked around, but he found that he couldn''t see a single thing.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking that he was hearing illusions from his distress, but then the voice rang out again to say, "You''re not hearing things. I''m asking you, do you want revenge?"


    After a moment of hesitation, Lin Fan asked, "Who are you?"


    The voice responded right away, "That''s not important right now. Just answer the question."


    Lin Fan knew that this conversation wouldn''t continue if he didn''t say a thing, so he responded, "Yes, I want revenge."


    The voice suddenly broke out inughter as it said, "Ha, ha, very good. Then tell me, if I said that I could give you the power to take that revenge, would you take it?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows the moment he heard this.


    He didn''t answer right away and after a bit of thought, he asked, "What do you want in return?"


    The voice had a bit of a pout to it as it suddenly said, "You''ve just lost your family and friends and now that someone is offering you the chance to take revenge, you won''t ept it? You really are a cold person."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this, but he said, "If you had good intentions, you would have answered the question. Since you didn''t answer the question, you clearly don''t have good intentions and there''s nothing for me to consider. If I''m alive, I can take revenge, but if I die, that would be the end, wouldn''t it?"


    The voice fell silent for a bit before suddenly bursting out withughter.


    After thisughter faded, there was a ck ball of light that suddenly appeared in front of Lin Fan.


    The ck ball of light circled around him a few times before stopping in front of him and saying, "It seems like I made the right choice saving you. You really are the one that I need for my revenge."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows once again when he heard this.


    Saved him?


    When did it save him?


    The ck ball of light saw the confused look on Lin Fan''s face and gave a snort before saying, "You really think you could have survived that pir of lightning by yourself? Even if it didn''t hit you directly, if it wasn''t for me, you would have been fried to a crisp by the shockwave that it released."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this and he asked, "Then couldn''t you have saved everyone else?"


    The ck ball of light gave a sigh before saying, "Do you really think that I''m all powerful? It took quite a bit of energy just to save you."


    Lin Fan had some knowledge about cultivation from his previous time, so he said, "If you can exist in soul form like this, your cultivation should have been quite strong when you were still alive. If that''s the case, why couldn''t you save everyone?"


    The ck ball of light fell silent this time. After a long silence, it said in a cold voice, "And why would I sacrifice myself to save a bunch of humans?"


    Lin Fan didn''t refute it when he heard this, instead he asked, "Then why did you save me?"


    The ck ball of light gave a chuckle and said, "I''ve already said it before, you are the one who will help me take my revenge. So how about it, will you work with me?"

 Chapter 643 Ancient World (9)

    Lin Fan didn''t know what this ck ball of light was, but he couldn''t feel any sincerity from its words at all.


    It was clear that this ck ball of light had only saved him for its own purposes, but that didn''t matter to Lin Fan right now.


    He didn''t know what the situation was and there was still the chance that the beasts were all around him even if there weren''t any in the town. He had already made up his mind to take his revenge after talking to this ck ball of light, but he also knew that as he was now, he wouldn''t be able to do anything.


    At the very least, he had to be able to cultivate before he could talk about revenge.


    That meant that working with this ck ball of light was probably his best choice since he wouldn''t be able to do anything else if he remained on this. After all, this was clearly just a of mortals or else beasts of that level wouldn''t have been able to destroy them that quickly.


    After these thoughts passed through his mind, Lin Fan asked the ck ball of light, "What can you give me if I work with you?"


    The ck ball of light didn''t answer right away and after a moment of silence, it gave a sigh before saying, "When you''re in a situation like this, wouldn''t normal humans ask about what kind of revenge I want or who I am? Why do you keep going against the norm with all these questions?"


    Lin Fan didn''t respond to this as he just waited for the ck ball of light to answer his question.


    The ck ball of light saw that it was no useining, so it said, "I''ll give you what you want, the ability to cultivate."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this and after some thought, he asked, "How?"


    The ck ball of light said, "If you let me into your body, I can give you a part of my cultivation and you''ll be able to cultivate with the cultivation technique that I give you."


    Lin Fan immediately shook his head and said, "No, that is not eptable."


    The one thing that Lin Fan had over this ck ball of light was his knowledge from earth. He knew all themon plots that had been used before and if he were to let this ck ball of light take over his body, he could guarantee that it would try to take him over.


    The ck ball of light didn''t seem surprised at all by Lin Fan''s answer.


    It was slowly getting used to the way Lin Fan treated it, so it could guess what Lin Fan was going to respond with.


    It didn''t let itself get caught up in Lin Fan''s pace as it said, "I figured, but that''s fine as well. I can give you a way of cultivating without having to enter your body. You should be fine with that, right?"


    Lin Fan looked at the ck ball of light with a look of doubt, but after a moment of hesitation, he still gave a nod in the end.


    When the ck ball of light saw this, it didn''t say a thing as it just floated there for a bit before a smaller ball of ck light came out from it.


    Once this smaller ball of ck light came out, it floated forward until it was floating right in front of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at this small ball of ck light, but he was confused because he couldn''t see anything special about it.


    After a moment, Lin Fan turned to the ck ball of light and asked, "What is this?"


    The ck ball of light gave a chuckle before saying, "Just wait, it''ll show its true appearance soon."


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this, but he turned his attention back to the small ball of ck light.


    After another few minutes, the small ball of ck light slowly expanded until it was bigger than the original ck ball of light. As it expanded, it started changing shape, slowly turning into something that was like a beast with four paws.


    Eventually, the change in the shape of the small ball of ck light stopped and at that time, it had taken the shape of a little rabbit.


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he saw the little rabbit that was lying on the ground in front of him.


    The ck ball of light just floated there and based on the way it was floating, Lin Fan almost felt as if it was proud of itself. But why would it be proud of itself for making this little rabbit appear?


    Lin Fan finally couldn''t take it anymore and asked the ck ball of light, "Well? What is this for?"


    The ck ball of light gave a sigh before saying, "You seem like quite the smart kid and you can''t see through this?"


    Lin Fan looked at the ck ball of light with a dark look, but he didn''t say anything.


    The ck ball of light saw this and didn''t keep teasing Lin Fan as it said, "It''s very simple, you''ll be taming this little rabbit and that will allow you to cultivate."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he asked, "What do you mean? How could taming this little rabbit allow me to cultivate? I don''t have any life energy at all nor is this body suitable for cultivation."<sub> </sub>


    The ck ball of light shook in ce like it was shaking its head as it said, "Che, che, that''s why you''re taming this little rabbit. By taming it, you''ll be able to receive a portion of its cultivation and that will allow you to cultivate."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    After all, this didn''t sound like the cultivation method that he was familiar with¡­


    The cultivation method that he was familiar with was using pets as support instead of sharing cultivation with the pets. The pets would help the owners fight, but they both had their separate cultivations which had to be increased separately.


    This method that the ck ball of light was proposing meant that both the owner and the pet would be able to cultivate together and grow stronger at the same time.


    If this was true, it would havepletely changed the cultivation method of the world Lin Fan had been from.


    That was also what made it hard for Lin Fan to ept.


    The ck ball of light saw doubt on Lin Fan''s face and it shook itself again before releasing another small ball of ck light.


    This small ball of ck light didn''t transform into another creature, but rather it was just a ball of ck light that had a small jade inside of it.


    Lin Fan looked closely and found that he recognized this jade.


    Well, he didn''t know exactly what this jade was, but he knew what kind of jade it was.


    This was a jade slip that could be used to pass down knowledge and in most cases, it would be used to pass down cultivation techniques.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all to take the jade slip from the small ball of ck light. Holding it in his hands, he looked it over before crushing it, releasing the information that was stored inside.


    There was a wisp of blue light that appeared the moment that the jade slip was crushed.


    This wisp of blue light swirled in the air for a bit before suddenly flying out to enter Lin Fan''s head.


    The moment that it did, Lin Fan could feel the new knowledge that was being crammed into his brain.


    As he went over this new cultivation technique that he had received, he realized that the ck ball of light wasn''t lying. This cultivation technique really was capable of allowing the pet tamer and the pet to share cultivations.


    Lin Fan looked down at the little rabbit that was still asleep on the ground and he reached out his hand.


    However, he realized that there was something missing.


    That''s right, he didn''t have any life energy right now!


    Even if he had this cultivation technique, without some life energy to form the bond with the little rabbit, he wouldn''t be able to cultivate it.


    Lin Fan turned back to look at the ck ball of light who he felt was just floating there in a smug manner.


    It wasn''t hard to guess what the ck ball of light was thinking as it floated there.


    It had already given Lin Fan everything that he wanted, but before Lin Fan could take it all, he had to show his sincerity to the ck ball of light first.


    After thinking this through, Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "Alright, I can see that you''re sincere, but I still want to ask you something."


    The ck ball of light didn''t seem to mind as it asked, "What do you want to ask?"


    Lin Fan looked at the ck ball of light for a bit and then asked, "Who do you want to take revenge on."


    The ck ball of light didn''t respond right away this time and it even turned a bit darker when Lin Fan asked this question. After a period of silence, the ck ball of light suddenly said in a deep voice, "The entire Beast Race."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Alright, then let''s work together."


    The ck ball of light just gave augh before saying a single word, "Good."

 Chapter 644 Ancient World (10)

    Aftering to an agreement, the ck ball of light released a faint sliver of blue light that floated over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan saw this and epted this sliver of blue light as it entered his body.


    As soon as it did, it was like being hit by lightning as all his senses had been stimted.


    He knew this feeling well and he didn''t waste any time since he knew that this would only be temporary.


    The ck ball of light had only given Lin Fan a bit of life energy and if he didn''t use it now, it would dissipate before he could.


    So Lin Fan guided that life energy that he received through his body, as per the cultivation technique. As he did so, he could feel himself absorbing the life energy around him.


    Once he had enough life energy, he reached his hand out towards the little rabbit and there was a faint sliver of blue light that came out of his hand.


    This sliver of blue light floated towards the little rabbit and when it was over it, it suddenly stopped as it floated in ce over the little rabbit.


    After a slight moment of pause, the sliver of blue light fell down and entered the head of the little rabbit.


    As soon as it did, the sliver of blue light disappeared, but then there was ayer of blue light that suddenly surrounded the little rabbit. It flickered a few times before finally disappearing.


    The flickering of the blue light was the will of the little rabbit contesting Lin Fan''s will, but since the soul that was currently inside Lin Fan''s body was Lin Fan''s original soul that was made of two different souls, it was much stronger than a normal soul. There was no need to mention his will that was much stronger than that of a normal person.


    Once the flickering blue light was gone, the little rabbit opened its eyes.


    After looking around for a bit, it finally turned its head to look at Lin Fan.


    Once it saw Lin Fan, the little rabbit hopped to its feet and jumped right into his arms, nuzzling its head against his chest.


    The ck ball of light saw this and floated up and down, almost as if it was giving a nod as it said, "It seems like it''s a sess." Then it looked up at Lin Fan and asked, "How are you feeling?"


    Lin Fan looked down at the little rabbit in his hand before moving it so that he could hold it in a single hand. Then he reached his hand out and looked down at his palm.


    After looking at his palm for a bit, he suddenly released a blue light from his palm that surrounded his hand.


    Letting that blue light linger for a few seconds, Lin Fan suddenly closed his hand and made the blue light disappear.


    Once that was over, Lin Fan looked back up at the ck ball of light as he said, "I''m fine."


    After a pause, Lin Fan then asked, "What now?"


    The ck ball of light spun around to look at their surroundings before asking, "Do you still have any attachments here? Is there anything else you need to do?"


    Lin Fan also looked around and after a few thoughts shed in his mind, he shook his head and said, "No, there''s nothing left here."


    The ck ball of light moved up and down again as if to give a nod before saying, "Alright, then let''s leave this ce."


    Lin Fan turned back to the ck ball of light and asked, "Where are we going?"


    The ck ball of light turned up to look at the sky and said, "There''s no need to stay on this anymore¡­" But then after a pause, he turned back to Lin Fan. He didn''t look right at Lin Fan, but rather he looked at the little rabbit in his hand and said, "I would like to say that, but you''re still too weak¡­So for now, we''ll focus on increasing your cultivation until you can leave this."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "How?"


    As far as he knew, this was nothing more than a mortal. It didn''t have any resources that were necessary for cultivation, so he wasn''t sure how he would be able to reach the Soul Realm needed to head off into space.


    The ck ball of light turned to Lin Fan and based on the way it was glowing, it looked like it was almost as if it was looking at a fool.


    After a slight moment of pause, the ck ball of light said, "Aren''t there the corpses of the beasts and humans?"


    Lin Fan was even more confused when he heard this.<sub> </sub>


    The ck ball of light saw this and said in a voice of sudden realization, "Do you not know what kind of pet you just tamed?"


    Lin Fan looked down at the little rabbit in his hand before shaking his head.


    The ck ball of light gave augh when it saw this. This kid seemed like he knew everything, but there were still things that he didn''t know.


    The ck ball of light turned to look down at the little rabbit in Lin Fan''s hand before saying, "The one that you tamed is called a Corpse Eater."


    "Corpse Eater?" Lin Fan repeated in a confused voice.


    The ck ball of light turned as if it was shaking its head before saying, "It really was hard enough finding one of those since they had gotten close to going extinct, so there''s no need to thank me."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and ignoring this, he asked, "What is a Corpse Eater?"


    The ck ball of light continued looking down at the little rabbit for a bit before it said, "The Corpse Eater is as its name implies, it can increase its cultivation as long as there are corpses for it to eat and digest."


    Then the ck ball of light turned to look at the horizon before saying, "There''s an entire filled with beast and human corpses, so this is the perfect ce for it to cultivate."


    Lin Fan followed the "gaze" of the ck ball of light and he looked at the horizon as well in silence for a bit. After a few minutes, he said, "So the entire¡­"


    He didn''t finish his sentence, but the meaning in his words had been made clear.


    The ck ball of light didn''t say anything, but it moved up and down to nod in agreement.


    Lin Fan didn''t feel as emotional hearing about the death of this entire as when he heard about the death of everyone in his town. After all, he didn''t have that close of a tie to the since this was a mortal.


    On ancient mortals like this,munication was very underdeveloped, so he didn''t really know anyone outside of his own town. There were a few people that he knew in the city, but he wasn''t really close to them either.


    After a moment of silence, the ck ball of light turned and started heading away from the town as it said, "Come on, let''s go find some food for this little rabbit."


    Lin Fan was still lost in thought, so he gave an absentminded nod before following the ck ball of light. However, as soon as he had taken two steps, he suddenly realized something and stopped moving.


    The ck ball of light saw this and turned around to look at Lin Fan as it asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first as his head had been down while he had been lost in thought, but then he suddenly looked up at the ck ball of light with a strange look.


    The ck ball of light saw this, but it didn''t back down as it looked right back at Lin Fan, waiting for him to speak.


    Lin Fan just stared at the ck ball of light for a bit longer in silence before suddenly asking, "Why did the Beast Race attack this?"


    It was just a few simple words, but it lingered in the air for a long time.


    There was a tense atmosphere that suddenly surrounded them as Lin Fan and the ck ball of light entered a stare off.


    The ck ball of light didn''t answer and just stared at Lin Fan, almost as if it was sizing him up.


    After a long period of silence, the ck ball of light suddenly said in a nonchnt tone, "How would I know what those beasts are thinking? Besides, isn''t it normal for them to attack human worlds like this?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response and continued staring at the ck ball of light for a few more seconds before suddenly jumping back. As soon as he jumped back, his hand came to the dagger that had been at his waist and he pulled it out in one smooth action.


    When hended, he raised the dagger that was covered in a blue light in one hand as he pointed the tip of that dagger at the ck ball of light.


    With the way he was standing, it was clear that he was wary of the ck ball of light.


    When the ck ball of light saw this, it didn''t say anything right away. It just floated there in front of Lin Fan, almost as if it was sizing him up again.


    But then after a period of silence, the ck ball of light suddenly asked in a deep and low voice, "What are you doing?"

 Chapter 645 Ancient World (11)

    This time, there was no hesitation in Lin Fan''s voice as he stared right back at the ck ball of light and said, "That depends on your next words."


    The ck ball of light once again fell silent as it just floated there, as if it was thinking about something.


    Then without any hesitation it said with a sigh, "Then do you want the truth?"


    Lin Fan was caught off guard since he never thought that the ck ball of light would be this direct with him. He was certain that the ck ball of light would make some excuse or even threaten him, he just never expected it to acknowledge it that easily.


    But after a moment of being stunned, he said, "How much are you willing to tell me?"


    The ck ball of light gave another sigh before replying with a question, "How much are you willing to trust me?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t answer this because he knew that he couldn''t trust the ck ball of light no matter what kind of answer that it gave him.


    The ck ball of light shook its head again before saying, "They dide looking for me, but that isn''t all of it."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and waited for the ck ball of light to exin.


    The ck ball of light took another pause before saying, "They might havee for me, but this was on the list ofs that was going to be invaded eventually, so it wouldn''t have mattered in the end."


    Lin Fan looked at the ck ball of light for a bit before finally giving a nod in response to this.


    He knew that this wasn''t the full story, but he also needed this ck ball of light right now, so there was no point in forcing it to show its hands.


    There was still plenty of time for him to slowly peel back all theyers of this onion, there was no rush for him.


    Seeing Lin Fan nodding in response to his answer, the ck ball of light didn''t show anything on the surface, but deep down it let out a sigh of relief.


    Even though it had seemed calm just now, it had been actually very worried after Lin Fan had started asking all those questions.


    The ck ball of light was actually at the end of its ropes and there wasn''t much option left for it. That was the reason why it had expended a part of its soul to create that barrier of deathw to protect Lin Fan with.


    Otherwise, with the current state that it was in, there was no way for it to release that kind of power.


    In fact, it couldn''t even force Lin Fan to listen to it even if it wanted to. It was very simply a problem ofcking the power to do so. That was just what kind of weak condition it was currently in.


    Since they had reached an understanding, the two of them walked out of the town and headed down the road towards the city.


    The city was the ce with the most dense poption, so it would make sense that there would be the most corpses there, perfect for letting the Corpse Eater eat its fill.


    Along the way though, the two of them never said a single word.


    It was several dozen kilometers, but Lin Fan had be much stronger now that he had regained his cultivation, so he was able to cross that distance in just a few hours.


    The scene that appeared in front of him was even worse than the scenes that he had seen back in the war with the barbarians.


    All around the city, there were corpses.


    Even before he reached the city walls, he saw the corpses that were lying on the sides of the road.


    There were beast corpses and human corpses that were mixed together, but most of the time, they were human corpses. There were even human corpses that were half sticking out of the mouth of the beast corpses.


    It was clear that these beasts had treated humans as nothing more than food and the humans had no choice but to fight back.


    Lin Fan didn''t judge what happened, he just let the little rabbit eat its fill of the corpses.


    As the corpses started disappearing into the stomach of the little rabbit, Lin Fan could feel his own cultivation be stronger.


    Just from a few simple corpses, he broke through the Iron 1 Realm and quickly reached the Iron 9 Realm, only being a single step away from breaking through to the Bronze Realm. And all of that was only from eating the human corpses.<sub> </sub>


    The little rabbit had wanted to eat the beast corpses as well, but these beast corpses were all from beasts that had some form of cultivation and were too hard for the little rabbit to eat.


    Until it broke through to the Bronze Realm, it wouldn''t be able to bite through these corpses.


    During this time, Lin Fan had gathered the human corpses from around the area to feed the little rabbit.


    As he moved the corpses, he didn''t reveal a single ripple of emotion on his face which surprised the ck ball of light.


    It had been silent as it floated by Lin Fan''s side during this time, but seeing how rxed Lin Fan was moving the human corpses, it couldn''t help feeling curious. After a while, it couldn''t take its curiosity anymore and asked, "How can you feel nothing from moving these corpses? They were living humans just like you a few hours ago."


    Lin Fan didn''t bother looking at the ck ball of light as he continued moving the corpses, but he answered, "They''re dead now, so what is there to feel? Life and death is like that, corpses are just corpses. Not to mention that these aren''t people that I knew, so why would I feel anything from their deaths?"


    The ck ball of light was surprised by Lin Fan''s answers.


    As far as it knew, humans were emotional beings that were easily affected by life and death. It had never seen a human who was this rxed towards life and death like Lin Fan was.


    Perhaps if it was either Lin Fan before the transmigration, they would have been affected by this, but after experiencing death once, the current Lin Fan was no longer as bothered by life and death. He just epted that death was something natural and that it woulde one day.


    After thinking for a bit, the ck ball of light suddenly said, "You really seem suited for thew of death. How about I teach it to you?"


    Lin Fan stopped moving when he heard this.


    He turned to look at the ck ball of light and after a moment of thought, he asked, "Why would you make this offer now?"


    The ck ball of light just casually said, "You seem suited for it, so why not?"


    Lin Fan answered, "How can you be sure that I''ll even be able to learn thew of death? Not to mention that even if I did, how could I make any progress if everything that I learned came from you?"


    The ck ball of light didn''t answer right away, but the way the light in it rippled made it seem like it was confused by Lin Fan''s answer. After a bit, it asked, "Why would you think that you can''t make progress if I teach you about thew of death? It''s still your ownprehension, so why can''t you make progress?"


    This time, it was Lin Fan''s turn to be confused.


    Teachingws was something that had existed in his previous life, but it was something that was rarely done because one''s understanding of thews was unique. If one were to teach someone else their understandings, they would be forcing them to follow their understandings instead of their own understandings.


    If they didn''t have their own understandings of aw, it meant that they didn''t have a grasp of thew itself, meaning that they would never be able to make any progress with thisw.


    Essentially, it was to make someone who was weak stronger, but it would also be crippling them since they would never be able to advance.


    Something like this was only done for weaker members of noble families to make them strong enough to be one of the members of this noble family. They would be used as soldiers in the future, but they could never be a true member of the noble family.


    This was Lin Fan''s understanding of teaching someonews, so the concept that the ck ball of light gave himpletely went against this.


    But that also made Lin Fan curious since he could tell that the ck ball of light truly believed what he had just said.


    So in the end, he said, "Alright, teach me thews then."


    The ck ball of light felt that something was off, but since Lin Fan had epted, it chose not to pursue this matter. It simply floated up and down to give a nod in response to this.


    Lin Fan kept feeding the little rabbit and soon it had broken through to the Bronze Realm.


    Once it broke through, it was able to start eating the beast corpses in the Bronze Realm, which increased its cultivation at an even faster rate.


    By the end of the day, the little rabbit had already reached the Silver Realm.


    At this rate, it seemed like it wouldn''t take long for it to break through to the Soul Realm.

 Chapter 646 Ancient World (12)

    But Lin Fan had been too naive in this matter since he realized that he had neglected something.


    The quality of the corpses.


    This was just a mortal realm, it was already good enough that they were able to kill Bronze Realm beasts and it was a miracle for them to kill Silver Realm beasts, but for them to kill Gold Realm or tinum Realm beasts was asking too much of them.


    Even after looking around the entire city, Lin Fan hadn''t been able to find a single Gold Realm beast corpse.


    He had already been lucky when it came to finding the two Silver Realm beast corpses that he had been able to find. Beyond that, there were no other higher grade corpses at all.


    It was quick for the Corpse Eater to reach the Silver Realm, but the cultivation speed slowed down much more after reaching the Silver Realm.


    After finishing off all the corpses in the city, the Corpse Eater still hadn''t broken through to the Gold Realm.


    This process wasn''t easy, it had taken Lin Fan an entire week to go through the city to bring all the corpses into one area for the Corpse Eater to finish off.


    It was just a good thing that Lin Fan''s cultivation had slowly increased as he did this, making it easier for him to move all the corpses over.


    Since there was nothing else left in this city, Lin Fan decided to continue his journey across this entire.


    The first step for him was the capital of the empire that this city belonged to.


    Since it was the capital, it would surely have a lot of people and surely have a lot of corpses for his Corpse Eater to dine on. Not to mention that since it was the capital, the experts of the empire should have been gathered there during the beast invasion.


    Even if they were humans, they were still experts and enough of them would be able to take down some of the stronger beasts.


    With this thought in mind, he hoped that he could find some higher quality beast corpses for his Corpse Eater to quickly increase his own cultivation.


    It was a good thing that he had found a map of the empire when he had been searching through the City Lord Manor, otherwise he really wouldn''t have known how to get there.


    But even with this map, he could tell that it was a long journey to reach the capital and there weren''t any forms of transportation right now.


    He had searched through the stables of the city and had found that in addition to the humans, the beasts had also eaten all the horses that would have been used for transportation. So he would have no choice but to walk all the way to the capital.


    The other problem that he encountered was the possibility of running out of food on his travels. Unlike the Corpse Eater, Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to fill himself with the various corpses that were thrown all along the road.


    When he checked the farm, he found that most of them had been destroyed by the rampage of the beasts. In addition to this, most of the livestock that had been on these farms had also been eaten by the beasts, so there wasn''t much meat left for him.


    After all, even if the beasts hadn''t picked the corpses of the livestock clean, the meat that was left was spoiled from being left on the ground for several days now and were showing signs of rotting.


    Lin Fan had been fine in the city since the city was filled with rations for the entire poption, so it wasn''t a problem to feed himself alone. However, if he were to head out of the city, it would be a problem since he didn''t know how long it would take and he didn''t know if he could carry enough food with him.


    But the ck ball of light gave him a solution in the end.


    The ck ball of light pulled out a Storage Ring from its depths and dropped it into Lin Fan''s hand.


    This Storage Ring waspletely empty, but the size of it wasn''t small at all. It was able to fit a year''s worth of supplies for Lin Fan alone in it.


    While there was no problem with the quantity, the quality of the food¡­


    It was just how it is, most of the rations that were made were made from drying foods to make it non perishable, so there wasn''t really a variety of delicacies that Lin Fan could choose from.


    After filling up his Storage Ring with food, Lin Fan headed off towards the capital.


    As he headed off, he couldn''t help looking at the ck ball of light with a doubtful look. After all, this ck ball of light kept pulling out things out of thin air that seemed to solve his problems¡­<sub> </sub>


    If he didn''t know any better, it was almost as if he was being guided somewhere¡­


    But in the end, he chose to not dig any deeper since there was no need.


    He had already decided to follow along with this ck ball of light and all he needed to do now was gain power. Only with power would he be able to do what he wanted to do and prevent any ns that targeted him in the future.


    But it was a long path for him in the end.


    He did make it to the capital after two weeks and he did see that the capital was filled with corpses, even having several Silver Realm beast corpses and one Gold Realm beast corpse, but that was still far from enough.


    It took him around a month to clear out the entire capital and even then, he was only able to push the Corpse Eater to the Gold Realm.


    Once the capital ran out of corpses, Lin Fan continued to travel through this world, heading to the various cities that had been marked on the map of the empire he found in the royal pce.


    This journey took him several months and even then, it wasn''t enough for him to reach the Soul Realm.


    Seeing that he had no choice, he headed into thends of the barbarians which were also filled with corpses.


    Just like this, Lin Fan took an entire year before he was finally able to push the Corpse Eater into the Soul Realm.


    An entire year of being alone on this dead, with no one to talk to at all. For a normal person, this would be considered torture and they would slowly lose their mind if they were subjected to this kind of torture.


    However, Lin Fan just silently headed forward to his next destination each time without showing any signs of breaking down.


    This was the difference in mental fortitude that he hadpared to normal people.


    Well, it couldn''t be said that he waspletely alone since there was the ck ball of light that kept himpany. However, the two of them never really seemed to see eye to eye, so most of the time, they were just arguing with each other.


    p But sometimes being friends was like that.</anda>


    Along the way, at around the six months point, the Corpse Eater had reached the tinum Realm and started learningws. To no surprise, thew that the Corpse Eater had learned was the deathw.


    At the same time, Lin Fan developed his ownw, but he was surprised to find that it was indeed the deathw as the ck ball of light had predicted.


    It was during this time that Lin Fan started to learn thew of death from the ck ball of light and he found that it was indeed as the ck ball of light had said. The ck ball of light didn''t teach him in a way that he had heard about before, instead he used a form of debating to pass down his knowledge, while also provoking him to gain his own understanding of the deathws.


    Instead of directly imparting one''s understanding, it passed down its understanding of thew of death in a way that worked with Lin Fan''s understanding of thew of death.


    It didn''t take long before Lin Fan''s grasp of thew of death soared and he was able to reach a level that was far beyond what he should have been able to grasp as his cultivation level. If he were to fight someone in the Soul Realm alone with hisws, he wouldn''t be at a disadvantage.


    But of course, it was still impossible for him to fight someone in the Soul Realm at his level because there was more than just the difference inws.


    There was still the difference in physiques and the difference in amount of life energy that had to be considered.


    Since Lin Fan was cultivating in a way that required him to share his life energy with his pet, his physique was actually weaker than if he had cultivated himself, so he definitely wouldn''t have been able to win.


    But the one advantage of the cultivation technique that the ck ball of light gave him was that he could tame multiple beasts as pets, sharing all of their cultivations with him, giving him more life energy than a normal cultivator.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering just who this ck ball of light was to have this kind of cultivation technique¡­


    But then again, he didn''t have that much time to consider it since he had finally reached the Soul Realm and it was time to leave this.

 Chapter 647 Ancient World (13)

    Before they left this though, they had to find a ce to go.


    This world wasn''t like the Blue Star which had already been linked up with an upper realm.


    This world was a mortal world, which meant that it had no contact with any upper realm since they didn''t even have a concept of cultivation. So there wasn''t a passage that Lin Fan could take that would guide him up to an upper world.


    Since that was the case, it meant that to reach an upper world, Lin Fan would have to rely on his own cultivation to break through the atmosphere of this and fly through space to reach another. Well, not just another, a that actually had life and other cultivators on it.


    So even if he were able to reach another after braving the ster winds found in space, he mightnd on another that didn''t have any living beings on it, which defeated the purpose of leaving this.


    After all, if he were tond on a that didn''t have any living beings on it, there would be the problem of food shortages.


    He could keep some food with him in the Storage Ring, but traveling through space took a long time and if he didn''t have a ce to restock his supplies of food, he would certainly starve to death.


    His cultivation had increased, but it still hadn''t reached a level where he could live without food and water yet.


    But along with this, there were still many different reasons why it was important that Lin Fan made sure that he found a with living beings to head to.


    That was why he was currently nning his route.


    Beforeing to this, the ck ball of light had floated through space, so it did have some idea of the geography of this quadrant in space. It had also found severals with life on them, but it had avoided them for different reasons beforending on this.


    With this knowledge, Lin Fan had made a simple map of the surrounding star space, but there was still a problem.


    It was deciding which they would head to.


    The main reason why the ck hall of light hadn''t gone to most of thes that he passed was because thoses were upied by the Beast Race.


    They weres that had already been destroyed and had been upied by the Beast Race experts.


    If Lin Fan as a human were to show up on thoses, there would be no doubt that he would be ripped to pieces by them.


    After all, even including the Corpse Eater, the two of them were only two Fragmented Soul Realm Experts. There would certainly be at least ten King Beasts that would be guarding each, so it would certainly be death.


    The only reason why this didn''t suffer the same fate was because it was nothing more than a mortal world. There weren''t enough resources here that was worth upying the, so all they did was raid the for the few resources that they had before leaving it for dead.


    So out of the fews that were in a range that Lin Fan could reach, there were really only two choices for him.


    One was a that was filled with cultivators, so it was a world filled with resources for cultivation. However, Lin Fan immediately rejected this option.


    Since it was a that was already filled with cultivators, that meant that it was a ce where there was already a hierarchy in ce. If Lin Fan wanted to gain even the slightest bit of resources in a ce like this, it would mean either following one of the established powers or trying to tear down the established powers and taking their resources.


    He didn''t want to be chained, nor was he crazy enough to challenge these old factions with his current strength, so he picked the second option.


    The second option was also a cultivation world, but it ran on apletely different system.


    To put it in simple words, this was like a rest stop.


    It was a ce for various experts from different races to stop and trade with each other.


    Of course, there were still plenty of resources on the itself, so there would always be work for the migrant poption. It was a ce where if one was willing to work or trade, they would certainly be able to get what they wanted.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan''s biggest priority was freedom, so this ce was perfect for him.


    After deciding where to go, Lin Fan looked up into the sky and gathered his life energy around him, forming a bubble which was quiterge.


    Once this bubble was formed, Lin Fan turned in the direction of his destination and flew up into the air. As he lifted up into the air, he started moving faster and faster until he escaped the binds of gravity and headed into outer space.


    The moment that he reached outer space, the bubble that he created around him instantly shrank until it was almost covering his skin.


    The reason why he had made the bubble so big in the first ce was to ount to the pressure of the spatial winds in the first ce. But even though he had made this calction, when he was feeling it now, it really felt like he was a can that was being squeezed.


    Lin Fan immediately released more life energy into the bubble around him and he was finally able to reach a bnce with the pressure around him, but it was definitely still tense. Theyer of life energy firmly wrapped around his skin and it was hard for him to take any action.


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure that he would even be able to reach the next like this before his life energy ran out, but the ck ball of light suddenly said in his mind, "What are you doing just fighting with life energy? Have you never been in the void before? You need to use yourws tobat the naturalws in the void, that''s how you travel to other worlds."


    Lin Fan indeed had never traveled in outer space before, so he wasn''t certain how to do it.


    But now that he had received a piece of advice from the ck ball of light, Lin Fan wrapped himself in his deathws even though he didn''t understand how the deathws would work in this situation.


    To his surprise though, the moment that the deathws were released, he felt the pressure around him be much weaker.


    He could see that the moment the ster winds touched the deathws around him, they immediately dissipated as if something had dissolved them. Of course, there were still traces of the ster winds that were left since the deathws couldn''t dissipate everything, but the pressure had been relieved quite a bit.


    As he continued along, it became harder and harder, but that was where the advantage of being a pet tamer came in.


    During the first leg of the journey, it had been Lin Fan using his life energy andws to cover them, so the Corpse Eater had been recovering the entire time.


    Once Lin Fan ran out of energy, all he had to do was change with the Corpse Eater and let it shield them with its life energy while he rested.


    By trading off shifts like this, both of them were able to stay quite rxed while traveling through space and soon they arrived at the they were heading to. Or rather, they arrived at where the ck ball of light had thought that the would be. However, they weren''t able to find the at all.


    The ck ball of light was confused since it clearly remembered that the was around this area, but now it was gone.


    As for Lin Fan, he wasn''t worried because he had already expected this kind of thing to happen.


    So all Lin Fan had to do was sense the greatest pull of gravity near him and follow the orbit that it set him on to find where the was.


    Once Lin Fan had reached the Soul Realm, he could already move faster than the orbit of a, so it didn''t take him long before he caught up to the in orbit.


    Even though it didn''t take him longparatively, it still took him around a week before he was able to find the. However, that was still better than the month long journey it took for him to even reach this area in space.


    When the came into sight, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling excited.


    It had been a long month in space, but even before that, it had been a long year on his former. He had gone over a year without talking to another person, so it was natural that he was feeling excited.


    But after not talking to anyone face to face for so long, he almost felt that he didn''t know how to talk to anyone anymore.


    However, he still had to go down to the and face people, so he took a deep breath and entered the atmosphere of the, slowlynding on the surface.

 Chapter 648 Ancient World (14)

    The ce that Lin Fan chose tond was a wide open field that didn''t seem to have anything around.


    Looking around, he couldn''t see any signs of humans around at all, making him start to doubt the ck ball of light''s description of this.


    The ck hall of light naturally could sense his doubts, so it came out and pointed to the side, "Don''t you see the road over there?"


    Lin Fan looked over and he found that there was indeed a road that cut right through this field. However, it had been blocked by the tall grass, so he hadn''t been able to see it.


    Following the road, it didn''t take long before he was able to make it to arge city.


    There was a long line outside the gate which should have been the line for entering the city. However, when Lin Fan saw this line, he felt nervous.


    After all, for this many people to be waiting outside in the middle of the day, it should mean that there was a strict check for entering the city. That was bad for him since as a mortal, he had never been registered with any databases before.


    If he had to reveal his identity, it would not have been good for him.


    In these kinds of situations, when people found out that he didn''t have a backing to rely on, they would mark him as easy prey.


    But luckily for him, it turned out that it wasn''t a strict check that was the reason for this line, but rather just a simple problem of volume of people.


    When it came to the actual check, all they did was take down his name to record his entry and check if he had any contraband.


    All of this took no more than five minutes, but with how it took five minutes to process one person, it made sense that there would be a crowd gathering outside. After all, even as Lin Fan left the gate, he could see that there were more people arriving than going through the gate.


    Once he was through, the ck ball of light''sughter filled his mind before it said, "Look at how nervous you were when you were in the line! You''d almost think that you''d have done something wrong! I''m surprised the guards even let you through!"


    Lin Fan revealed a displeased look, but he didn''t say anything.


    It would have been strange if he were to start talking to himself.


    The first stop that Lin Fan made was the Adventurer Guild.


    This was a ce filled with people who just needed jobs and it was a ce for people who didn''t ask too many questions. That made it perfect for someone like Lin Fan.


    Even when he was filling out the form, he found that most of the lines asking for information were listed as optional.


    The only required line was the name and nothing else.


    Of course, the more information you provide, the more chances you''ll get a higher rank. The higher your rank, the better jobs you could take.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother providing that much information and just gave his name and the level of his cultivation.


    However, when Lin Fan handed the application to the receptionist, she immediately asked in a confused voice, "I''m sorry sir, but what did you write here for the cultivation line? This isn''t a term that I''m familiar with."


    Lin Fan was also confused when he heard this, but he also didn''t know what to say in response to this.


    It was at this time that the ck ball of light''s voice rang out in his mind again, "Oh that''s right, the cultivation level you''re using isn''t the same one as the ones the humans use¡­"


    His voice drifted off, leaving Lin Fan in an awkward state where he had to pretend to think.


    Finally, the ck ball of light said, "If I remember correctly, the human equivalent of your current realm should be the Golden Core Realm."


    Lin Fan was surprised the moment he heard this.


    He was surprised by the name of the realm that the ck ball of light just told him about.


    This was a cultivation realm that he was much more familiar with since it was something that had beenmon in his first past life. This was a cultivation system that the Lin Fan from earth was much more familiar with.


    Seeing the surprised look on his face, the receptionist couldn''t help asking, "Sir, are you alright?"


    Her words pulled Lin Fan out of his daze and he quickly said, "Sorry, that''s a local term from my world. I should have written the Golden Core Realm there."<sub> </sub>


    The receptionist was a bit surprised, but she didn''t let it show on her face as she quickly made the revision to Lin Fan''s form.


    She wasn''t that surprised to hear that Lin Fan was in the Golden Core Realm since that was normal here.


    This was a world that gathered people from many different worlds and reaching the Golden Core Realm was the minimum requirement to travel here without taking a passage.


    Those that were below the Golden Core Realm realized the difference between them and those that were in this realm, so they mostly went back to their own realms to be stronger beforeing back.


    That meant that most of the people who applied to join this Adventurer Guild were people in the Golden Core Realm who came up from separate worlds.


    After quickly taking care of the registration, a temporary license was brought to Lin Fan.


    This temporary license was the license that was given to F Rank adventurers since most of them didn''tst long and the Adventurer Guild didn''t want to waste resources.


    It was a license that would expire in three months unless you made it to the next rank, so it was perfect for people who just joined the Adventurer Guild, especially if they didn''t give them any information like Lin Fan did. In these cases, these people were mostly just passing by and signing up to do some missions for money, which made the temporary license perfect.


    Once he received this, Lin Fan headed over to the mission board on the side.


    The missions that were avable to those in the F Rank didn''t pay that well, but he couldn''tin since they were still better than most of the handy jobs that were offered outside. Of course, that did mean that these jobs came with a certain amount of risk, but it wasn''t that bad for Lin Fan.


    After taking a job, he immediately left the Adventurer Guild.


    Once he was out of the Adventurer Guild, the ck ball of light immediately asked, "How do you know about the level of cultivations that was written in the cultivation technique I gave you?"


    The ck ball of light had always neglected this, but it finally realized that Lin Fan had epted the cultivation technique too easily.


    This was a cultivation technique that it had found in a ruin and the contents were not known to anyone. The current level of cultivation that humans used were not the same as the one that was listed in the cultivation technique, even the Beast Race didn''t use the same names to grade their cultivations.


    So why had Lin Fan been able to ept this system so easily?


    Lin Fan didn''t respond at all as he had fallen into his thoughts.


    After learning the term Golden Core Realm, Lin Fan finally couldn''t take his curiosity anymore.


    He still wasn''t sure what kind of ce he had been sent to, whether this was supposed to be his trial or if he had reincarnated again. However, there were many clues that were pointing in both directions.


    He was at a point where he didn''t know what to do anymore since he didn''t know which choice was correct.


    It took him a long time to gather all his thoughts and during this time, the ck ball of light had been looking at him with a strange look.


    When he finally gathered his thoughts, he was already outside the gates and was near the area of his target.


    The first mission that he took was to eliminate some Foundation Realm beasts and to take their core back.


    The energy contained within the cores were too wild to be used for cultivation, but there were other uses for them which was why people put up requests through the Adventurer Guild for them. It was one of the easier jobs since most people who became adventurers were in the Golden Core Realm.


    The ck ball of light was silent the entire time Lin Fan was killing the beasts, but then it couldn''t help asking something when it saw that Lin Fan was finished.


    The voice of the ck ball of light suddenly rang out, "Who are you?"


    This hadn''t been something that the ck ball of light had ever pondered because it had assumed that Lin Fan was nothing more than a mortal from a small mortal world. He was someone that couldn''t even imagine what it was like when it was at its peak, so there was no need to worry about Lin Fan.


    But after realizing all those things that it never realized about Lin Fan, it couldn''t help feeling that Lin Fan was much more mysterious than it had previously thought.


    It even started feeling a sense of danger from Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was silent at first when he heard the ck ball of light''s question, but then he suddenly answered, "Nothing more than a mortal."

 Chapter 649 Ancient World (15)

    Lin Fan''s answer to the ck ball of light''s question was also the answer to his own questions.


    The only way to discover the real answers to his questions was to move forward. Without moving forward, he wouldn''t be able to find any clues as to what this world was or what his goal in this world was.


    Since that was the case, he would follow the path that this world had ced in front of him. He would work with the ck ball of light until he was able to take revenge for the identity that he had been given.


    Of course, it would be a lie if it was said that there weren''t a bit of personal emotions that were involved in this revenge.


    After all, he had spent close to two years with those people, if it was said that he didn''t develop any feelings for them at all, that would have been a lie. Deep down, he did want a bit of personal revenge.


    The ck ball of light waspletely silent when it heard Lin Fan''s answer.


    Seeing that the ck ball of light wasn''t going to say anything else, Lin Fan started taking care of the Foundation Realm beast corpses.


    It was easy to handle the clean up for this job since it only required Lin Fan to dig out the cores in the head of the beasts. The corpses themselves were worth something, but it wasn''t worth enough that the Adventurer Guild would ask those that took this mission to bring them back.


    If the adventurer did bring them back, the Adventurer Guild would have to butcher them and sell the parts, which was a hassle for them. Since the beasts weren''t worth that much to begin with, they didn''t bother relegating resources into this department.


    The adventurers were free to do what they wanted with the corpses.


    In most cases, the adventurers would leave them since butchering the corpses out here would be dangerous as the smell of blood could draw in other beasts.


    But this wasn''t the case for Lin Fan.


    Well, he wasn''t going to bring them back to the city to sell, but he did have a use for the corpses.


    After digging the cores out of the heads of these corpses, Lin Fan called out the little rabbit and let it get to work.


    These corpses were corpses of tinum Realm beasts, Lin Fan was certain that they would be helpful to his cultivation. Or they would be much more helpful than the normal mortal corpses that he had been using so far.


    After the Corpse Eater finished off the tinum Realm beast corpses, Lin Fan could feel the effect that it had on his cultivation. It was rising at a much higher ratepared to using mortal corpses, but it was just too bad that it was still too slow for him.


    At this rate, it would take another year before he even broke through to the Embryo Soul Realm. Not to mention reaching the realm above the Soul Realm.


    If he wanted to increase his cultivation faster, he had no choice but to go after stronger beasts.


    But the problem was that he wasn''t as powerfulpared to his past life, so if he wanted to fight the beasts, it would definitely be hard for him. That was unless he¡­


    After picking up all the cores, Lin Fan headed back to the Adventurer Guild to turn in the mission.


    The moment that he had received the reward, Lin Fan immediately chose to ept another mission. This time, it was for a beast that was in the Fragmented Soul Realm just like him.


    There was still plenty of time left in the day, so Lin Fan decided to take care of this mission today.


    When he arrived at where the beast was found, the first thing he did wasn''t hunt down the beast for his mission, but rather set a trap for any random Fragmented Soul Realm beast.


    The first thing he did was find another Fragmented Soul Realm beast to tame.


    After waiting for a bit, there was a bear that fell into the trap that he had set, but because of how big the bear was, it wasn''t fully stuck in the trap.


    However, with the coordination between Lin Fan and the Corpse Eater, they were able to easily wear down the bear in the trap until Lin Fan was able to tame it.


    They had tried to avoid injuring the bear as much as possible since Lin Fan wanted it to be part of his power, so it had taken much longer than if they were just trying to kill it. But it worked in the end and the bear ended up joining them.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop there though.


    He had set up several traps around them and the bear was only the first one that had fallen in the trap.


    While they had been fighting the bear, there were other beasts that had fallen into the traps.


    Judging which one would escape first, Lin Fan started beating up all the beasts that had been caught in his trap and taming them one by one.<sub> </sub>


    By the end of this mass taming spree, Lin Fan had already tamed more than ten different Fragmented Soul Realm beasts.


    The ck ball of light became more and more shocked as it watched Lin Fan taming the beasts one by one.


    It had to be known that it was arge drain on a cultivator''s spiritual senses to tame just a single beast, not to mention taming multiple beasts. At best, the ck ball of light had thought that Lin Fan would be able to tame no more than three pets at his current level and that was already giving him a high evaluation.


    For normal people, they wouldn''t even be able to tame two pets.


    But Lin Fan was able to split his spiritual sense more than ten ways and tame all of these Fragmented Soul Realm beasts.


    The ck ball of light couldn''t help feeling a shiver pass through it as it started wondering what kind of monster it had unleashed upon the world. It even started doubting whether it would be able to aplish its ns¡­


    But the main reason why Lin Fan was able to tame all these pets was all because of his soul.


    His soul was much stronger than a normal soul because it was made up of two different souls, which made his spiritual senses much stronger than normal people''s.


    Not to mention that he had tamed a spiritual sense attributed pet like Brainy.


    From Brainy, he had learned the effective way to split his spiritual sense, which allowed him to form all these connections without using that much energy. In fact, he only used a tenth of the normal amount of spiritual sense that a normal person needed to tame one of these pets.


    After he had finished taming all the pets in his traps, Lin Fan stopped looking for more pets to tame.


    He actually wasn''t at his limit yet, but these pets were more than enough to serve his purpose right now.


    Rather, he didn''t want to limit himself with just these pets alone. He wanted to tame higher grade pets since it would be harder to raise the level of these pets other than the Corpse Eater.


    It was very likely that he would have to rece these pets eventually, so instead of wasting time taming more pets of this level, it was better for him to just tame higher level pets.


    However, the one thing that he did notice was the sharp increase in his own power.


    With each pet that he tamed, there was an increase in the amount of life energy that he had.


    Since he shared the life energy that each pet had, that meant that with each pet that he tamed, he would have more and more life energy at his disposal.


    Now that he had over ten different pets tamed, the amount of life energy that he had at his disposal was already ten times greater than a normal expert. Even without the help of his pets, he would be able to defeat everyone that was at the same level. He might even be able to fight those that were at a level higher than him.


    However, it wasn''t just this that made him powerful.


    The most powerful thing was that he could feel the seeds ofws that came from linking his cultivation to these pets.


    Every single one of the pets had a grasp of a differentw and when Lin Fan linked their cultivations, he could sense that there were seeds of theirws that appeared in his dantian.


    If he were to nurture these seeds, he would be able to grasp thesews as well!


    Life energy was one thing, but differentws¡­


    Lin Fan had already experienced the power ofbining differentws in his previous life, so he already knew how powerful it was.


    He really couldn''t understand where this ck ball of light had found this cultivation technique, but he was also d that the ck ball of light had. After all, with this kind of power, it would be easy for him to take revenge.


    All that he needed now was time.


    Once he had finished taming these pets, Lin Fan brought them over to where the target for his mission was.


    Lin Fan didn''t even need to act personally, he sent his pets alone to take care of the target.


    The time that it took to take down the target was less than five minutes.

 Chapter 650 Ancient World (16)

    The target didn''t stand a single chance as it was surrounded by five different beasts that were in the same realm as it.


    It made a struggle as it tried to run away, but it was all futile in the end as it was quickly killed by Lin Fan''s pets.


    Lin Fan pulled out the core and fed the corpse to the Corpse Eater.


    This time, he could feel his cultivation growing as the Corpse Eater finished off the Fragmented Soul Realm beast corpse. It was arge amount of growth as it had almost pushed him right into the Mid Fragmented Soul Realm.


    It seemed like as long as he fed the Corpse Eater with corpses of the same cultivation level, the effects were already very good. But if he were to feed the Corpse Eater with corpses of higher realms of cultivation¡­


    This was a world that was filled with beasts that were in the Soul Realm, even beasts that had reached the True Soul Realm. It seemed like this was a great ce for him to increase his cultivation.


    So without another thought, Lin Fan headed back to the Adventurer Guild to turn in this mission.


    He could have killed more Fragmented Soul Realm beasts, but that wasn''t his main goal right now.


    Well, his main goal was to be stronger, but it wasn''t just having a higher realm of cultivation that made him stronger.


    He would naturally be stronger as long as he continued feeding the Corpse Eater, so there was something else that he needed to work on during this time.


    After all, even if he had individual power, there was something that was stillcking.


    Money made the world go round.


    As long as you had money, there wasn''t much that you couldn''t buy in this world.


    Since he came from a mortal world, he didn''t have any of the currency that was used in this realm, which meant that he was nothing more than a poor beggar right now. If he didn''t have money, there were many things that he wouldn''t be able to aplish.


    But if he did have money, he wouldn''tck the resources that he needed to take his revenge.


    So while he could have killed more Fragmented Soul Realm beasts, Lin Fan chose not to do so.


    If he was going to kill, he would only do it when he would be able to earn money from it.


    After he turned in the mission, Lin Fan didn''t take another quest since it was already gettingte. If he went out now, it was very unlikely that he would be able to get back in since there was a curfew that was enforced on the gates.


    So after spending a night at a random inn that he found, he headed back to the Adventurer Guild.


    Of course, since he chose a cheap random inn, he was attacked in the middle of the night. However, his pets had been able to easily deal with the attackers, so Lin Fan didn''t lose any sleep over it.


    After he reached the Adventurer Guild, the first thing that Lin Fan did was find out how many missions he could ept at the same time.


    It would be a waste of time for him toe back and forth each time to turn in the missions, so it was better if he was able to get multiple missions at once. He would then be able to turn them all in once he finished them.


    After all, the biggest dy was having to go through the check at the gate each time, so doing everything in a single trip would save him quite a bit of time.


    The receptionist told him that he was able to take ten missions at once with his current rank, but she also advised him against this.


    All these missions were for different areas and it would be hard to find the beasts even in these areas. The missions that Lin Fan took yesterday were exceptions since the Adventurer Guild had already found the habitats of these beasts ahead of time.


    For the other missions, when the habitats weren''t located, the adventurer would have to spendrge amounts of time tracking down the beasts.


    All of the missions also had time limits, so if he had to waste all this time tracking down all the beasts, it was very likely that he would go over the time limit for these missions. Once the time limit was passed, it would be deemed a failure for these missions.


    While failing these missions didn''t seem like they had much consequences since there were no financial penalties, there was one important penalty that was fatal for adventurers.


    Adventurers didn''t just do missions for money, but also to increase their own rank if they wanted to remain as adventurers.


    They had toplete a certain amount of missions before they were able to rank up.


    Eachpleted mission would count as one point, but each failed mission would mean losing ten points.


    So if Lin Fan were to fail ten missions at once, it would be fatal for him.


    He would have to finish a hundred missions just to make up for this loss.


    The receptionist had warned Lin Fan out of the goodness of her heart since she could see that he was a good seed as an adventurer, but Lin Fan ignored her goodwill in the end. He still took ten missions and headed off that day.<sub> </sub>


    As the receptionist watched him walk out of the Adventurer Guild, she couldn''t help giving a sigh and saying, "Young people really are impatient." But after that, shepletely forgot about this matter since this kind of stuff wasmon.


    She just hoped that he would learn from the experience of this failure and learn his mistakes.


    But she was shocked when she saw Lin Faning back at the end of the day.


    She was about to ask Lin Fan why he was back so soon, but Lin Fan didn''t give her a chance to speak as he ced ten beast cores on the table and said, "Please turn these in for me."


    She was shocked at first, but then when she looked at the ten cores that he ced on the table, she was even more shocked.


    These ten cores were the cores needed for the ten missions that he had taken. There wasn''t a single one missing!


    How had he done it so fast?


    It hadn''t even taken him a single day to finish all ten of these missions!


    But seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t willing to say a thing, she had no choice but to register these missions for him. After all, the cores that had been ced in front of her were the best evidence that he hadpleted these missions, so there was nothing else for her to say.


    Once she finished, Lin Fan just took his reward and left the Adventurer Guild.


    The next day, Lin Fan took another ten more missions and finished them all by the evening.


    If it happened once, it was considered a miracle, but if it happened a second time, people would start feeling suspicious.


    Because of this, Lin Fan was put under probation by the Adventurer Guild.


    ? For the next mission that he did, he was followed by a senior member of the Adventurer Guild who would watch over him.


    Lin Fan didn''t have a problem with this since he had already expected this.


    After all, tall trees attracted the wind.


    People that stood out too much would find it hard to avoid attention.


    So Lin Fan brought the senior member along with him on his hunt.


    He had been allowed to take ten missions just like before and by that night, the senior member had reported to the Adventurer Guild that there was nothing wrong with Lin Fan. He had finished those missions with his own abilities and there was nothing suspicious with his behaviour.


    That was because Lin Fan had tamed a flying pet just for that reason.


    The missions that he chose were all around the same area, so the only problem was tracking down the beasts.


    That was where the flying pet came in.


    He allowed this hawk to fly around and find his targets.


    Once they were found, he used strength that was twice as strong as it should be in his realm to easily take care of the beasts.


    This hawk could hide its cultivation, so it appeared no different from a normal hawk to the senior member. Flying pets like this were often used by hunters, so the senior member naturally didn''t find a problem with this.


    The only thing that shocked him was Lin Fan''s strength, but it made sense with how he was able toplete ten missions in a single day.


    After that, Lin Fan was called a rising rookie and he continued that streak as he increased his rank and cultivation realm.


    Over time, Lin Fan reached the peak of the Adventurer Guild with his way ofpleting missions and was known as one of the top adventurers.


    Of course, along with this increase in rank, his cultivation realm also soared.


    The Embryo Soul Realm, the Child Soul Realm, the Nascent Soul Realm, and the True Soul Realm.


    All of this took him around ten years, but by the end of these ten years, he had reached the peak of the True Soul Realm.


    There was only a single step between him and breaking through to the next realm.


    He was just missing that one thing before being able to break through.

 Chapter 651 Ancient World (17)

    Lin Fan wasn''t certain what the thing was, but he still continued doing his missions as usual.


    However, now that he had already reached the peak of the True Soul Realm, there weren''t that many missions that could satisfy his cultivation needs.


    After all, the highest grade beast that was avable as a mission was in the Nascent Soul Realm, so it would take quite a few of those missions just for him to break through.


    But missions that had True Soul Realm beasts as targets were very rare. After all, it wasn''t easy for a beast to even reach the True Soul Realm in the first ce, not to mention finding one.


    This was a human dominated world and True Soul Realm beasts were all beasts with intelligence, they knew that to survive they would have to hide from the humans. It was very unlikely that they would ever reveal themselves to the humans of their own volition.


    The few True Soul Realm beasts that were found were kept secret by the forces that were local to this. After all, True Soul Realm beast corpses were rare items that even these families didn''t have that many of. There was a wide use for these corpses, so naturally they wouldn''t want others to have them.


    But without these corpses, Lin Fan didn''t have a way of breaking through to the next realm quickly.


    However, what happened next wasn''t just a chance for Lin Fan, but also a disaster for everyone else.


    The that Lin Fan was currently on was a trading, which meant that it was a that had many rare products gathered from many different worlds. Even if they would eventually go to different ces after they were sold, before they were sold, they were being held on this.


    The Beast Race had already had their eyes on this, but they never invaded because of the various forces that had invested in this.


    As soon as they attacked, there would be forces that came from many other worlds to defend this. It would be equal to trying to take over several different worlds at once.


    Instead of wasting forces on this, it was better for the Beast Race to focus their forces on taking out weakers.


    But it was hard to understand what the Beast Race was thinking since theymitted a full force to attack this. The force that theymitted was already enough to conquer ten differents of the same size.


    The forces that had enough investment on this that they would want to defend it only added up to a total of fives.


    It was clear what would happen if they were to send their forces to defend this, so in the end, they didn''tmit their forces. The losses that they would suffer from losing this was far less than their losses if they were to lose their forces, so they chose to give up on this in the end.


    No one knew what was so important to the Beast Race that they wouldmit this kind of force to invading this, but they had done so in the end, so there was not much else to say.


    Of course, for the people that were already on this, it wasn''t as if they could leave as they wanted since they were already surrounded by the Beast Race forces.


    For them, it had be a desperate struggle just to survive.


    That was, everyone except for Lin Fan.


    Seeing the hoards of beasts that came rushing at him, Lin Fan just revealed a smile.


    This was exactly what he wanted to see.


    Not only would it allow him to take revenge for what the Beast Race had done to him before, it would also provide what he needed to increase his cultivation. After all, he was about to go on a ughter.


    ? He released the different beasts that he had tamed and they charged the wave of beasts that came at them. However, the only difference was that Lin Fan''s pets were much more coordinated than these beasts that only knew how to charge forward.


    It was a one sided ughter in the end as Lin Fan''s petspletely out maneuvered the beast horde.


    They shed with the beast horde with their strongest attacks and then immediately drew back, provoking the beast horde to chase after them. However, as soon as the beast horde began chasing, they were immediately caught in the trap of Lin Fan''s pets.


    The pets with the strongest defenses were ced around the beast horde while the other pets rained their attacks down on the beasts.


    The beasts tried to break through, but the defenses of Lin Fan''s pets weren''t anything to look down on. They weren''t even able to make a single scratch on the hides of Lin Fan''s pets, not to mention being able to find a way out.


    There wasn''t a single casualty on Lin Fan''s side as they wiped out a beast horde with thousands of beasts in them.


    However, the most shocking thing was that Lin Fan''s pet horde didn''t lose in terms of numbers to the beast horde. Even if they had shed head on, Lin Fan''s pet horde wouldn''t have suffered that much.


    Still, the fact that Lin Fan was able to tame thousands of pets showed just how terrifying he was.<sub> </sub>


    In the end, the True Soul Realm leaders of the Beast Race forces were forced to make their move.


    That didn''t matter to Lin Fan since that was still what he wanted.


    When they came onto the battlefield, he used the traps that he hadid down ahead of time to trap them and slowly weaken them.


    But the difference between these True Soul Realm beasts and the other beasts was that Lin Fan didn''t kill all of them.


    He killed the ones that struggled the most and seemed the hardest to break, but the ones that had weaker wills, he showed mercy to them.


    After weakening them enough, he forcefully used his cultivation technique to tame them.


    Just like this, Lin Fan was able to add some True Soul Realm beasts with intelligence into his army. They easily fulfilled the role of beingmanders for his forces, which increased the battle power of his army even more.


    During this war, Lin Fan became the main reason why the human forces were able to hold out against the Beast Race forces for so long.


    Moving across the battlefield, even when he lost pets to the fight, he would always be able to grow his army of pets as he defeated the Beast Race. The ones that were defeated were tamed by him and then used against the Beast Race forces.


    It didn''t take long before he was recognized as a threat by the Beast Race army.


    Once he was recognized as a threat, there were higher level members of the Beast Race army that started attacking him.


    There was even a trap that was set by twenty different True Soul Realm beasts to kill him, but they had made a miscalction.


    Lin Fan had already tamed around twenty different True Soul Realm beasts over thest year of fighting, so he wasn''t afraid even when twenty True Soul Realm beasts surrounded him. He had more than enough pets to face all twenty of them and he was able to easily kill them with his own power since he had life energy andws that far surpassed the normal True Soul Realm.


    During his time on this, he had also learned a few of the human cultivation techniques. To be precise, he learned their body refinement techniques since his body was his one weakness.


    The cultivation technique from the ck ball of light didn''t help him strengthen his physique. That meant that his body was much weakerpared to his cultivation.


    If he were to use thebination ofws with this kind of body, it wouldn''t be able to handle the bacsh and he wouldn''t be able to use it.


    So he had built up his body as well during this time.


    With his greater amount of life energy andbination ofws, it only took him a single hit to kill a True Soul Realm beast.


    When the trap failed, the Beast Race army knew that Lin Fan wasn''t someone that they could underestimate and they sent one of their three generals to attack Lin Fan.


    These generals normally didn''t make a move since they had cultivation above the Soul Realm and they thought that it was beneath them to make a move personally.


    This just showed how much Lin Fan had pushed them into a corner.


    It was just too bad that this general wasn''t able to kill Lin Fan either.


    When the general was facing Lin Fan, he was shocked to find that Lin Fan had already broken through the Soul Realm to reach the next realm.


    With Lin Fan being in the same realm, it wasn''t a problem at all for him to take care of this general.


    Once he took care of this general, the Beast Race army really didn''t know what to do anymore. After all, the generals were experts that were already above the Soul Realm, they were experts that no one in this world should have been able to face. However, Lin Fan had done the impossible and killed the general sent to kill him.


    There were only three generals in this entire army and it was impossible for the other two to go all out to attack Lin Fan.


    So they tried to avoid Lin Fan by attacking the cities that he wasn''t in, but it was too bad that he chased down the Beast Race army.


    It seemed like this invasion was doomed to fail.

 Chapter 652 Ancient World (18)

    In the end, the Beast Race army withdrew from this world.


    It had been so sudden that people hadn''t been able to react to it in time, but all the beasts had suddenly disappeared one day.


    When they disappeared, it had been so quiet, almost as if there hadn''t been an invasion.


    That is if there weren''t the pile of corpses that littered the ground of the.


    Once the Beast Race army withdrew, Lin Fan started gathering the corpses for his own cultivation.


    No one had anyints about this since Lin Fan and his pets had been the main force in this fight, so it was natural that he would have im over the corpses that came out of the fighting. After all, most of these beasts had been killed by Lin Fan in the first ce.


    Well, it wasn''t that no one at all had anyints, it was just the people who had been stuck on the.


    A few days after the Beast Race army withdrew from this, the experts of the various forces that had invested here started showing up.


    They were shocked to find that this had been able to drive off the Beast Race army, especially with how many beasts the Beast Race had sent. However, they didn''t dwell on that too long since the only thing that they really cared about were their investments.


    With the invasion of the Beast Race, it was inevitable that there would be some losses to their business since plenty of property had been destroyed during the fighting. So these forces turned their eyes onto something else to recoup their losses.


    The only thing of value on this covered in destruction right now were the beast corpses that scattered thends.


    There hadn''t been any reconstruction done just yet, so they couldn''t resume their normal operations, so they wanted the beast corpses to recoup their losses.


    It was just too bad that the beast corpses had already been imed by Lin Fan.


    But these forces wouldn''t back down and started harassing Lin Fan for these beast corpses.


    They imed that since he was involved in the destruction of their property, he should give them some form ofpensation. They of course didn''t mention that he was the one who had saved their properties in the end since that didn''t benefit them at all.


    Lin Fan was toozy to care about these people and continued gathering the beast corpses for his own use.


    These forces had the pride thatrge forces had and when Lin Fan ignored them, they sent people to start harassing them.


    It was a pity that they had underestimated Lin Fan''s temper.


    Every expert that had been sent to "convince" Lin Fan had disappeared and there wasn''t a single clue as to where they had gone. But based on the context, they could surmise that it was very likely that they had met their demise at Lin Fan''s hands.


    If it was just this, they could have epted it, but they still would have sent more powerful people to harass Lin Fan since they couldn''t back down now. These forces had their reputations to consider and couldn''t back down just because of a single person.


    But they never expected Lin Fan to take things even further.


    After being harassed for a bit, Lin Fan decided that he had had enough of them and he sent his pets topletely destroy their investments on this.


    All of their properties were destroyed and the experts that they had sent had all been killed in a single night.


    Everyone on the had been shocked by this.


    They understood why Lin Fan would do this since they supported Lin Fan after he had saved this, but they never thought that he would be this decisive.


    Some people even began fearing Lin Fan after this.


    They had thought that he was a hero, but now it turned out that he was just a tyrant.


    When the forces received the news that their bases had been destroyed, they sent their own experts to hunt down Lin Fan for destroying their investments. But they didn''t know that Lin Fan had already left that.


    The forces tried looking for Lin Fan, but there were no traces of him at all¡­That was until he suddenly showed up on the of one of these forces.


    This force was surprised to see Lin Faning to their, but they thought that Lin Fan was done for since they never thought that Lin Fan was a threat to them.<sub> </sub>


    What they didn''t know was that Lin Fan was already much strongerpared to them and he sent his pets to destroy this while he personally killed the experts of the forces ruling the. None of them could stand a single blow from him and they all died with looks of shock in their eyes.


    After wiping out this force from this, Lin Fan left the without doing anything else.


    The people who lived on this were shocked by this, but the spies among them quickly sent news of this to the other forces that had been chasing after Lin Fan.


    There wasn''t a single force that hadn''t been terrified by Lin Fan''s actions and they called back their experts to their main base out of fear that Lin Fan would attack them. However, there wasn''t another move from Lin Fan during this entire time.


    Once they were certain that Lin Fan wasn''t going to attack them, they started sending out experts again, but this time they didn''t send them out to chase after Lin Fan.


    Instead, they sent out their experts to post a bounty on Lin Fan.


    The reason that they gave for this bounty was that Lin Fan was colluding with the Beast Race, which was why he was able to get those beasts to follow him.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this at all since he knew that once his ability to tame beasts was revealed, he would bebeled as a traitor to humanity. He would bebeled as someone who was colluding with the Beast Race.


    There was no concept of taming in this world at all and humans feared what they didn''t understand. Naturally the first thing their minds would jump to was the conclusion that Lin Fan had betrayed humanity since they already had a bad image of the Beast Race in their minds.


    They couldn''t ever imagine the Beast Race being willing to work with the humans.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this bounty at all, he was only surprised that it had taken this long for them to ce this bounty on them.


    This was also the reason why Lin Fan had done all those things that weren''t characteristic of him. The reason why he had destroyed the investments of those forces on that and why he hadpletely wiped out that force.


    He wanted to instill fear into them, that was the only way that he would find his peace.


    If they weren''t afraid, they would be tempted by the secrets that he had on him to attack him in an attempt to take those secrets. But if they were afraid, they wouldn''t dare to send their own experts after him out of fear of retaliation and would use more passive methods.


    Lin Fan had more than enough ways to deal with those passive methods, so they wouldn''t be a bother to him at all.


    After taking care of that force, Lin Fan started heading out into the world, going from to.


    He shed with the Beasts Race and the humans from time to time, but most times, he chose to avoid fighting since that wasn''t what he wanted.


    He still knew that he wasn''t at the end of his path of cultivation and before he was there, he couldn''t really hurt the Beast Race since their greatest backing were their absolute experts. He might have hurt them a bit by destroying the Beast Race army, but that wasn''t worth anything in the grand scale of things.


    As he traveled from to, he met all kinds of people.


    Somes were cultivations and somes were mortals.


    He had different adventures, learning different cultivation techniques and passing down his methods for beast taming to certain people.


    With how novel beast taming was, it didn''t take long before it had be a whole new sect of cultivation.


    Of course, with the implications of beast taming, their entire sect was called an evil sect who colluded with the Beast Race. They were unwee on most humans and they were also unwee on all Beast Races.


    But no one ever dared to attack these beast tamers since they would always be outnumbered. No one dared to look down on the strength that these beast tamers had.


    Lin Fan became known as the sect master of the beast taming sect, but the title that most people used for him was Demon Lord.


    He was feared by everyone for creating this new evil branch of cultivation, it had even reached the point where people told stories about him to scare their children.


    But none of this mattered to Lin Fan as he continued hunting down beasts to increase his own cultivation.


    It took a hundred years, but he was finally able to reach the realm of Rulers and reached the peak of cultivation for this world.


    It was during this time that he was suddenly contacted by someone who gave him a shocking piece of news.

 Chapter 653 Ancient World (19)

    Lin Fan had been resting up after he finished a hunt when there was a sudden sh of light that came from in front of him.


    His pets around him immediately raised their guard and stood in front of him to protect


    him, but Lin Fan waved his hand for them to back down.


    He couldn''t sense any hostility from this ball of light and he was curious how someone had been able to track him down this easily.


    The ball of light changed forms until it took the form of a little boy floating in the air.


    The little boy looked around himself when he appeared and when he saw Lin Fan, his eyes suddenly lit up.


    Ignoring all the beasts that were around it, the little boy floated over to Lin Fan who was still sitting.


    He floated there in front of Lin Fan as his gaze swept over him, as if he was sizing him up.


    After a long pause, the little boy finally said, "Not bad, not bad, I can see why the lords have chosen you."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this.


    He could tell from the aura of the little boy that he wasn''t a normal little boy and the fact that he had been able to find him this easily couldn''t be ignored either. There was most likely a very strong person who was behind this little boy.


    But that didn''t matter to Lin Fan since he couldn''t sense any hostility from the little boy.


    It didn''t seem like the little boy was here to do anything to him, so he could listen to what the little boy wanted to say.


    After muttering to himself for a bit, the little boy said, "Lin Fan, consider yourself lucky. You have been chosen by the lords as one of the main fighters for our universe. Make yourself useful to the lords and lead our universe to victory."


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows when he heard these words.


    It wasn''t that he couldn''t understand the words, but rather he couldn''t understand the meaning of the words.


    Of course, the disdainful tone that the little boy had didn''t help with his mood.


    Still, he was someone who could control his emotions, so he didn''t make a big deal out of this.


    After a moment of consideration, Lin Fan asked, "Who are you and who are the lords you represent?"


    The little boy had a trace of disdain sh in his eyes, but then as if he had suddenly remembered something, he immediately revealed a respectful look.


    He gave a bow to Lin Fan before introducing himself, "My name is Puck, I am the messenger of the gods. I havee here today to deliver their will to you."


    Lin Fan once again knitted his brows at these words.


    Gods.


    This was something that he hadn''t heard in a long time.


    In this world, the realm that was above the mortal cultivation realms was the Immortal Realm, which was equal to the God Realm from his previous world.


    He hadn''t heard anyone addressing these people as gods other than the mortals who treated the immortals as gods.


    But this made him even more curious about why this little boy had appeared in front of him.


    After another silence, Lin Fan asked, "Who do they want me to fight?"


    The little boy raised his head to look at Lin Fan and seeing the calm look in his eyes, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of admiration towards him. The little boy then said, "This universe is being invaded by Outers and we need your help in defeating them."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes before asking, "Why would the powerful gods need to ask for help from a lowly mortal like me?" As he said this, there was a trace of disdain in his voice.


    The little boy chose to ignore this as he said, "The Outer Gods will not join the fight as long as our gods do not join the fight, so we have to depend on powerful mortals like you."


    As Puck said this, there was a deep look in his eyes.


    As the messenger of the gods, he naturally had special abilities and his ability was a special pair of eyes that allowed him to see through the cultivation of people.


    With just a single look at Lin Fan, he was able to tell that Lin Fan already had a Divine Seed forming inside of him. As long as enough time passed, Lin Fan would naturally reach the God Realm and be one of the gods.


    However, before that, he was still considered a mortal and was allowed to join the fight with the Outers.<sub> </sub>


    Outers.


    That was a term that Lin Fan had heard a long time ago back in his previous life.


    Now that he was hearing it again, he started connecting the pieces of the puzzle together and he already reached a conclusion about where he was.


    But that confused him even more.


    What was the point of all of this?


    Still, even if he had heard this word before, he still didn''t actually know what the word Outers actually represented. After all, there wasn''t the concept of this word in this world, so he hadn''t been able to ask anyone what it meant.


    So Lin Fan asked, "What are the Outers?"


    The little boy wasn''t surprised by this question at all, so he exined, "The Outers is the term that we use to refer to beings from other universes. Theye to our universe to take our resources and that is why we fight them."


    Lin Fan could understand this since this was quite themon trope in cultivation novels, but he didn''t understand how this was rted to him. After all, his system was rted to the gods, so they must have called him for something rted to the Outers.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything, the little boy continued, "Other than you, we have gathered the other experts of this universe to counter the Outers together. As long as we all work together, we will be able to repel them."


    Lin Fan was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard this and he asked, "Other experts? What other experts?"


    The little boy had already expected Lin Fan to ask this.


    After all, this was a lot to take in and to be asked to fight the unknown Outers, it was natural for people to be worried.


    He had already guessed this and knew that to ease Lin Fan''s mind, he would need to mention the fact that he wouldn''t be fighting alone.


    The little boy exined, "Other than you, we have gathered the experts of the humans, the Beast Race, and the other races. This is a fight for survival for our universe, so of course everyone in the universe will have their responsibilities to the universe. That naturally also includes your part."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this and said under his breath, "The other races?"


    He didn''t know what the final ending of this scenario would be, but it seemed like it was approaching.


    Since that was the case, he would follow the role that he was given and y it through to the end.


    After muttering this, Lin Fan looked at the little boy and said with a nod, "Alright, I''ll fight with you. When is it?"


    The little boy was surprised to see Lin Fan agreeing this easily, but he didn''t find it strange at all. This was a fight that involved the fate of the entire universe, someone as smart as Lin Fan wouldn''t be unable to see this.


    There was no way for Lin Fan to avoid the invasion of the Outers and the destruction of the universe if they lost, so he would choose to fight with them to give himself the best chance of surviving.


    The little boy gave a nod of appreciation before saying, "The battle will be in a few days, but we have already started gathering the warriors for the battle. If you follow me, I''ll bring you to the gathering spot right now."


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate as he gave a nod in response to this.


    After that, he called his pets into his pet storage space before following the little boy into a portal that he created.


    There was a bright sh of light the moment that he walked into the portal, but then it quickly disappeared as he reappeared in a new ce.


    This new ce seemed like it was just an asteroid that was floating through space, but it was also a ce that seemed like it was frozen in space.


    All around the area where he appeared, there were experts of different races that were gathered around. However, all of them were standing with people of the same race as them. Not a single one of them approached an expert of a different race.


    But based on the aura that came from them, Lin Fan could tell that they were all peak experts that were just a bit weaker than he was.


    The people that were there saw Lin Fan appear, but no one was surprised to see him.


    After seeing that it was another human that appeared, someone from the human expert group came over to say, "Hey, brother,e with me."


    Lin Fan looked around at the various experts before following this person without a single word.


    When the human experts saw Lin Fan approach, they were surprised at first since they didn''t recognize who he was.


    But then there was one of them that revealed a look of shock as he said, "Demon Lord!"

 Chapter 654 Ancient World (20)

    The moment that the words "Demon Lord" was spoken, everyone revealed looks of shock.


    There wasn''t a single person who didn''t know the name Demon Lord since it was a name that was just too famous.


    The list of deeds that had been aplished by this Demon Lord could stretch out across an entire. That was just how famous he was!


    Or rather, that was just how infamous he was!


    Because of the bounty that had been ced on his head, there were still people that had tried to capture him even knowing how dangerous he was. However, even with the number of people that had gone after him, there hadn''t been a single one who hade back.


    In addition to being known as the Demon Lord, he was also known as a god of death. Not only because he killed everyone that came after him, but also because he specialized in using thew of death.


    There were many other things that he had done as well that were just too terrifying to describe.


    So even if he was a human, there were many people who didn''t treat him as a human.


    After his identity had been revealed, the human experts all took a step back.


    Even though they hadpletely outnumbered him, no one dared to act up against him at all.


    After all, the Demon Lord was famous for something else other than being cruel. The Demon Lord was known as someone who had an army of beasts under his control.


    Even if it seemed like he was outnumbered, he was capable of bringing out an army of beasts at any moment that wouldpletely turn the tides. Not to mention his seven supreme beasts, each one of which could be considered a peak expert in this universe.


    No one dared to look down on him even though he was standing there alone.


    After his identity had been revealed, the Beast Race and other race experts all looked at Lin Fan with traces of fear in their eyes.


    Lin Fan''s identity as the Demon Lord wasn''t just something that was spread among the human race, it was a title that was acknowledged by all the other races as well.


    The Beast Race had the deepest impression of Lin Fan since for some reason, Lin Fan always targeted them.


    Even though Lin Fan was someone that fought with beasts, he wasn''t working with the Beast Race as everyone thought. In fact, the Beast Race was absolutely terrified of Lin Fan since there was nothing that they had been able to do to stop him.


    If they sent beasts after him, the only fate that awaited those beasts were death or being forced into his army. There had never been a third option.


    Even when they sent their top experts, those top experts had been pulled into his army.


    Two of the seven supreme beasts actually came from top experts of the Beast Race.


    Then there were the Myriad Races.


    They feared Lin Fan for the same reason as the Beast Race.


    They didn''t have as much conflict with Lin Fan as the Beast Race or the human race, but it was impossible for them to avoiding into contact with someone as all epassing as Lin Fan. It was inevitable that there would be shes between them and Lin Fan''s army.


    As a result, two of Lin Fan''s seven supreme beasts also came from the Myriad Races.


    Respectively, they were from the Dragon Race and the Phoenix Race.


    In short, no one here had a good rtionship with Lin Fan.


    The moment that his identity was exposed, even the human race experts that had tried to pull him into their group at first immediately moved far away from him.


    Lin Fan was just left standing there in the middle of this area all by himself with everyone looking at him with wary gazes. It was as if he had suddenly be an attraction in the zoo.


    But Lin Fan himself didn''t mind this at all since he was already used to this kind of treatment.


    His eyes had been on the Beast Race experts the entire time, never leaving them from the moment that he arrived.


    However, different from when the other experts arrived, a bit after Lin Fan had arrived, there was a sudden sh of light that filled this ce.


    Then in front of everyone, there were several figures that appeared.


    Lin Fan had been calm during all of this, but it was hard for him to remain calm this time since he saw something that he never expected to see.


    Among the figures that had appeared, there was the muscr man who he had met a statue of and the woman in the blue dress that had appeared at the start of the trial. Even though it had been a long time since he had seen either of them, he immediately recognized them when they appeared.


    However, it was clear by the way that they looked at him that they didn''t recognize him.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but after a thought passed through his mind, he stopped himself and waited for the leader of the group to say something.


    The leader of this group wasn''t the muscr man or the woman in the blue dress, rather it was a man who had bright golden hair who was surrounded in a golden glow. The light around this man was almost so bright that it was hard to stare at him.<sub> </sub>


    Once this group appeared, the little boy who had disappeared after Lin Fan had arrived in this space came out once again.


    The little boy flew out and came to Lin Fan''s side before falling to one knee while bowing his head.


    As he did so, he said, "Messenger Puck reporting to the lords. I have brought Condition X here and he has agreed to fight with us."


    The group all looked at Lin Fan after hearing this and they had different expressions on their faces.


    Some of them had curious looks, some of them had looks of disdain, and some had looks of admiration.


    After a while, the golden man who was the leader gave a nod to the little boy before saying, "Good work."


    It was just two simple words, but the moment that the little boy heard this, his face lit up with joy. But of course, he didn''t dare say anything in response to this since he knew that this wasn''t his ce to speak.


    Once he had finished reporting, his role had been fulfilled and he no longer had a use here.


    The little boy gave another bow before disappearing once again.


    Once the little boy was gone, the golden man turned to Lin Fan and said, "So, this is the Demon Lord¡­Not bad, not bad, it seems like it won''t be long before you join us."


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this since he had already heard Puck mention that he had a Divine Seed, but the people that didn''t know were all shocked.


    The Demon Lord was about to be a god?


    It was clear to everyone present that the only people who could have the kind of aura that this group had were the gods, so this group had to be the gods that had gathered them together.


    However, they couldn''t understand why this group had suddenly appeared.


    But once they heard what this golden man said, they immediately understood.


    They were here for the Demon Lord.


    But if the Demon Lord were to be a god, wouldn''t that be the end of the world?


    Who would be able to stop him then?


    Still, it wasn''t their ce to talk, so they could only watch the interaction between the gods and Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he waited for the golden man to continue speaking.


    After a long pause, the golden man finally said, "We have high expectations of you and if you lead us to victory, we wouldn''t mind helping you be a god faster. It will all depend on your performance."


    "Si!" Everyone took a cold breath when they heard this.


    Even the gods had high expectations of the Demon Lord¡­


    Perhaps it was better to let go of all past grudges and try to tter the Demon Lord before he became a god¡­Otherwise, who knew what he would do after he became a god?


    As this terrifying thought passed through everyone''s minds, they couldn''t help feeling a shiver run down their spines.


    But Lin Fan had apletely different reactionpared to them.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and looked carefully at the golden man for a while before suddenly saying, "I''ll pass on that. Being a god sounds nice, but there are too many restrictions, aren''t there? Since that''s the case, there''s no need for you to help me be a god. There''s still other things that I have to take care of first."


    "Si!" Once again everyone took a cold breath.


    This Demon Lord, was he crazy?


    He should know that these gods were the strongest beings in the universe and he was antagonizing them just like this?


    Did he want to die?


    But what no one expected was that the golden man suddenly burst out intoughter.


    After he finishedughing, the golden man looked back at Lin Fan and said, "It seems like you already have a n in mind." But then his eyes suddenly turned sharp and a fierce aura filled the air.


    It was like being hit in the face with a bunch of knives that left scars all over their skins when this aura hit them.


    The golden man said in a sharp voice, "Whatever your ns are, I hope that you will keep moderation in your mind."

 Chapter 655 Ancient World (21)

    The many gods behind him all revealed different expressions after the golden man said this.


    There had actually been many gods that had opposed bringing Lin Fan into this matter since they had heard about his many deeds. The gods were all powerful and could naturally get all the information they wanted about Lin Fan, but the only thing that they couldn''t do was find Lin Fan''s true intentions.


    No matter how they tried reading into his actions, it all seemed random to them.


    It was like he wasn''t thinking anything, he just did whatever he thought about or considered was right for the time.


    Such a vtile person couldn''t be relied on to take care of the Outers.


    But in the end, the golden man had made the decision to bring Lin Fan into the group they were gathering to fight the Outers.


    As the leader, he had plenty of influence among the gods and his word had been the final say about Lin Fan.


    But now, when the gods finally met Lin Fan, they started having their doubts again.


    Even with their power, they actually weren''t able to see through Lin Fan''s soul at all. They couldn''t predict what he was nning¡­It was almost as if his entire existence was shrouded in mystery.


    After the golden man said this, he revealed a smile and said, "I hope that you will not disappoint me."


    Then with those words, he turned to leave without turning back once.


    All the other gods took another look at Lin Fan before following this golden man.


    When the gods left, everyone let out a long sigh of relief.


    The aura that the gods revealed, it really was too much for them¡­


    There were many people that had almost crumbled under the aura that these gods released.


    But once the gods were gone, there was a new problem to deal with.


    Everyone started looking at Lin Fan withplicated looks as they remembered what the gods had said.


    Lin Fan was someone who was close to bing a god¡­


    It was already hard enough to predict what this Demon Lord would do, so they could imagine what it would be like once he became a god.


    That was where the dilemma came in.


    Should they forget everything that had happened in the past and try to befriend him or should they find a way to take care of him before that happened?


    They hadn''t been able to deal with him individually, but if theybined all their powers together to take care of him¡­Perhaps that would work¡­


    But they also had to think about the invasion of the Outers first, so it was impossible for them to take care of Lin Fan right now. After all, as the gods had said, Lin Fan was their greatest weapon against the Outers.


    Facing these Outers with unknown powers, it was best to keep the strongest weapon at hand instead of trying to drive it away.


    Lin Fan could tell what they were thinking with just a single look, but he didn''t care about them. The only thing that he cared about was what that golden man had said just now.


    It was clear by the tone of his voice that he knew that Lin Fan hade here with ulterior motives, but all that mattered now was how much did he know?


    Lin Fan did have a n and it was a n that he was certain that no one had any ideas about, but now it seemed like that golden man did have some clues about his n.


    If that was the case, Lin Fan would have to think about abandoning that n¡­


    After thinking about it though, Lin Fan still decided to go through with his n.


    It was the best opportunity that he would get and even if he failed, he would still at least achieve a part of his goal and that was enough for him. At the very least, he would get to take his revenge for those people that he had almost forgotten about.


    It would all happen soon.


    ¡­


    Some time passed and still everyone chose to avoid Lin Fan.


    They didn''t want to make any rash moves and offend this Demon Lord, so instead of befriending him right now, most of the experts had chosen to observe him to wait for their chance.


    It was just too bad that their chance never came.


    After a long period of silence, there was a sudden roar that came from the group of Beast Race experts.


    There was one expert that stood up at first, but then there were several different experts that all stood up at the same time, letting out roars.


    After they finished roaring, all of them turned to Lin Fan with bloodshot eyes.


    The experts of the other races didn''t know what had happened, but they could guess that something had happened and it was something between the Demon Lord and the Beast Race.


    Lin Fan just casually watched them as they walked over towards him.<sub> </sub>


    The lead Beast Race expert pointed his finger at Lin Fan and roared out, "Demon Lord, you''ve gone too far this time! Our Beast Race can no longer co-exist with you!"


    Lin Fan just leaned back against the rock that he was sitting on and looked up at them with a calm look as he said, "Oh, is that so?"


    Seeing how rxed he was, all of the Beast Race experts were filled with even more rage.


    The leader of the Beast Race experts pointed his hand right at Lin Fan and roared out, "You!"


    As he roared out, all the Beast Race experts that followed him released their auras along with him.


    Seeing that a fight was about to break out, all the experts of the other races prepared themselves for a fight. However, not a single person made a move because they didn''t know who to support here.


    One would imagine that the human experts would back Lin Fan since he was a human and he was fighting their greatest enemy, the Beast Race, but not a single human expert came forward.


    In fact, they actually wanted Lin Fan to fight the Beast Race and take each other out since that would be killing two birds with one stone like that.


    But before the two sides could sh, there was another sh of light before several figures appeared.


    The same pressure that they felt before fell onto them again and the Beast Race experts couldn''t help taking a step back since the figures had appeared in front of them, so they were feeling the brunt of this aura.


    Well, it wasn''t that the figures appeared in front of them since the figures weren''t even facing them.


    All the gods had gathered right in front of Lin Fan and they were looking down at him as he sat there.


    The lead god, the golden man had a very serious look on his face as he stared down at Lin Fan who was very rxed looking up at them.


    After a long silence, the golden man suddenly asked, "Why did you do it?"


    Lin Fan looked up at the golden man and asked back in a rxed voice, "Do what?"


    The golden man knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything since he knew that it was useless talking to Lin Fan like this.


    Instead, he chose another approach to talk to Lin Fan as he said, "Do you know what you''ve done for our universe. Because of you, we''ve lost quite a few experts that could have helped us resist the Outers. Do you know what you''ve done to this universe?"


    Lin Fan looked right at him and said, "And what does that have to do with me?"


    The golden man''s brows knit even more when he heard this, but he didn''t make a move still.


    It was at this time that Lin Fan finally stood up and turned his gaze away from the golden man, turning his gaze to the Beast Race experts that had wanted to make a move against him previously.


    When the Beast Race experts saw Lin Fan stand up, they couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their backs, but they quickly calmed themselves down. After all, there were gods on their side.


    No matter how strong the Demon Lord was, it wasn''t as if he could beat the gods.


    But as Lin Fan came towards them step by step, the gods never made a move which filled their hearts with fear.


    The leader of the Beast Race experts raised his weapon and pointed it at Lin Fan as he said in a trembling voice, "What are you nning on doing?"


    The reason they had acted so arrogantly before was because they knew that the gods would be on their side.


    In a time like this where they were dealing with threats from the Outer, if someone were to hurt their own universe, the gods would never allow them to do so. So they had thought that the gods would take care of Lin Fan.


    But this situation now made it seem like the gods weren''t going to do a thing¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this question.


    Instead, it was the golden man who asked, "Have you really thought through your actions?"


    Lin Fan ignored him as well as he continued moving towards the Beast Race experts. As he came closer and closer, he waved his hand and summoned out his pets around him.


    As they came out, one of the pets that was one of his seven supreme pets, a jet ck crownded on his shoulder. When it saw the people that Lin Fan was heading towards, this crow suddenly revealed a smile as it asked Lin Fan, "Is it finally time?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before suddenly flying forward.


    Without a single word, he suddenly had a sword made purely of crow feathers appear in his hand.


    In one swift motion, he cut down the leader of the Beast Race experts, causing blood to spurt out everywhere.


    The leader of the Beast Race expert had tried to protect himself with his ownws, but it had been meaningless in front of the sword made purely of crow feathers.


    It was as if the sword had corroded hisws and made them disappear, as if they had never existed.


    The leader of the Beast Race expert couldn''t even say anything as he fell to the ground and his eyes dimmed, showing that he had lost all signs of life.


    Everyone held their breath as they looked at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just stared right at the Beast Race experts and said, "Anyst words?"

 Chapter 656 Ancient World (22)

    There was a silence that was so quiet that one could even hear the sound of a pin dropping to the ground.


    But that silence onlysted a second before all of the Beast Race experts turned to run.


    It was just too bad that they didn''t get that chance.


    While Lin Fan had been distracting everyone with his slow walk forward, he had already sent his pets around to the back topletely surround the Beast Race experts.


    The moment that they turned to run, they were met with Lin Fan''s pets that attacked them.


    While Lin Fan''s pets weren''t as strong as the Beast Race experts, their numbers more than made up for it. They got into the formations that Lin Fan taught them and they were able to easily stop the Beast Race experts from running away.


    Seeing that they were trapped, the Beast Race experts immediately turned to the gods that were just standing there watching.


    They understood that it didn''t seem like the gods were going to help them, but they didn''t want to give up either. After all, if they gave up now, it was clear that they would die since Lin Fan had worked hard to prepare this trap for them.


    None of them wanted to die!


    "Beast God, please save us. We are your loyal followers!"


    "Gods, we''re willing to fight for the universe, you can''t abandon us like this!"


    "Demon Lord, do you know what the consequences of doing this are? You won''t survive this if you really go through with this! We can end it here if you''re willing to back down now and apologize!"


    They screamed out whatever they thought would save them, but all of their words fell onto deaf ears.


    Lin Fan just watched them with an amused look before he started moving forward again.


    As he moved forward, he asked the crow on his shoulder, "Which ones do you want?"


    The crow looked over this group and pointed out a few of the experts while saying, "Give me those ones. They were the ones that forced me into hiding in the first ce."


    This crow was the ck ball of light that had fallen into the mortal world that Lin Fan was on.


    During the hundred years he had been cultivating, he had also fulfilled his promise to the ck ball of light by finding a suitable body for it to upy. The ck ball of light had been a crow beast to begin with, so it wasn''t hard for it to possess the crow body that Lin Fan had found for it.


    After that, it had formed a contract and became Lin Fan''s tamed pet because it had seen the potential that Lin Fan had. It knew that if it wanted to take its revenge against the Beast Race that had betrayed it and forced it into leaving behind only a sliver of its soul, its best chances were if it worked with Lin Fan.


    And now, it was reaping the benefits of that gamble.


    After picking out the ones that it wanted, the ck crow flew off Lin Fan''s shoulder and dived at them.


    Lin Fan had already helped it recover its cultivation, so the crow beast was one of the strongest pets that Lin Fan had. After all, before it had been betrayed by the Beast Race, the crow was already one of their top experts.


    Lin Fan let the crow have its fun as he turned to the rest.


    Lin Fan hadn''t targeted every member of the Beast Race since there were those that he wasn''t involved with. With his level of cultivation, he had to treat karma seriously, so he couldn''t just ughter at will.


    The ones that were currently trapped by him were the ones that had been involved with sending the army to the mortal that he had been from, or they were Beast Race experts that were involved inter incidents involving him.


    Since they were all trapped, Lin Fan saw no reason to dy this any longer, so he raised his sword. However, before he could sh down with that sword, there was a voice that stopped him.


    "If you do this, you will endanger the very existence of our universe. Do you understand what that means?" The golden man said in a low voice that froze the air around them.


    Lin Fan''s feet stopped moving and he narrowed his eyes to look at the golden man. After a moment of silence, he asked, "How is that rted to me?"


    The golden man knitted his brows the moment he heard this and he asked back, "Do you not consider yourself a part of this universe?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Is there anything for me in this universe?"


    The golden man didn''t say anything else in response to this, he just gave a sigh the moment that he heard Lin Fan say this.


    Lin Fan knew that the conversation was over, so he turned back to the Beast Race experts who revealed looks of panic again.<sub> </sub>


    They tried shouting out all kinds of things, but not a single person moved to help them.


    In the end, Lin Fan brought his sword of crow feathers down on every single one of them and there wasn''t a single Beast Race expert that was left standing.


    There was only silence that filled the air after Lin Fan finished off the Beast Race experts as they all stared at him in shock.


    None of them had expected Lin Fan to suddenly attack the Beast Race experts and none of them believed that he had actually finished them off. They were all certain that the gods would interfere before this because these Beast Race experts were needed to repel the Outers. It didn''t make sense that they would just let them die like this.


    But this was a calcted gamble on Lin Fan''s part.


    He had guessed that the gods wouldn''t be able to make a move since he had met them yesterday and it turned out that he was right.


    It wasn''t that the gods didn''t want to make a move, but rather they weren''t able to make a move.


    Once one became a god, it meant being limited by many restrictions.


    Bing a god meant bing the very embodiment of thew that one trained to the peak, so they would be limited by those veryws.


    The first and most important restriction was that they wouldn''t be able to do what they wanted against mortals.


    Mortals were what embodied thews, so by attacking the mortals, they would be attacking their ownws. So every time they made a move against the mortals, it would weaken their ownws, which was why they weren''t willing to make a move to stop Lin Fan.


    After the ughter was over, Lin Fan turned to the gods and watched them, waiting to see what they would do.


    They had tried all they could to convince Lin Fan not to do this, which meant that they at least cared that much, so they wouldn''t let this end like this. At the very least, they would try to get some kind of revenge on Lin Fan for doing all of this.


    That was what Lin Fan could tell from the look of suppressed rage on the face of the Beast God, the god that the beasts worshiped.


    After a long silence, the golden man gave another sigh before saying, "What''s done is done, we can''t change this. However, this is a serious blow to our defenses against the Outers¡­We can''t let things stay like this¡­"


    All the gods knitted their brows when they heard the golden man''s words.


    That was right, with Lin Fan killing all these Beast Race experts, their defenses had crumbled and it would be very hard for them to defeat the Outers. If the Outers did invade, even them as gods would suffer since the Outers would target thews they embodied as well.


    The golden man was silent as he looked at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly saying, "Since it is this human''s fault, he shall be the one to make up for it."


    Everyone was surprised by the golden man''s words, but they were also confused by what he meant.


    The golden man was silent for a bit longer before saying, "This human and his pets will be sent into the battlefield without a guard talisman. If he wins, he shall live, if he dies, then he will take out as many as he can with him."


    The gods were all once again surprised by this, but most of them could ept this since they felt that it was a suitable punishment.


    Of course, there were some gods that didn''t believe that this was the right decision and wanted a harsher punishment for Lin Fan. Such as the Beast God.


    But before he could even say anything, the golden man''s gaze fell onto him and he immediately swallowed his words.


    It was clear that the golden man had the final say here.


    After that, the golden man turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Are you ready?"


    Lin Fan just looked at him and asked, "What about my other pets?"


    The golden man was surprised by how calm Lin Fan looked, but he still said, "They will be brought onto the battlefield for you."


    Lin Fan nodded and then said, "Alright, then send me there."


    He already knew that this was a light punishment, but it was very likely that he wouldn''t survive this. But that didn''t matter to him since he also knew that he was already at the end.


    Since that was the case, he would go out with a bang.

 Chapter 657 Welcome Back

    The golden man waved his hand and with a sh of light, Lin Fan disappeared from in front of them.


    The golden man kept looking at where Lin Fan had been standing and after a while, he said with a sigh, "Good luck. This is all I can do for you."


    As for the other gods, there were varying expressions.


    It was clear that they didn''t think that this punishment alone was enough to punish Lin Fan for his crimes, but they couldn''t say anything since this was a punishment set by the golden man.


    But of course, there were those that wouldn''t let it end there.


    That naturally included the Beast God.


    The Beast God was the god that gained his power from the beasts that he represented. With so many beasts killed, his power would naturally be reduced and this was not something that he could ept.


    So there was no chance that he would let this matter pass.


    As for the rest of the gods, they would make their own ns since it wasn''t just the matter of Lin Fan that mattered. There were still the Outers that wereing.


    If they didn''t make ns now that Lin Fan had killed so many experts of their universe, they would surely be defeated in this war.


    So without wasting any time, the gods immediately disappeared.


    ¡­


    When the scene cleared for Lin Fan, he found that he had been transported to another ce that was simr to the space that he had been in before, but this ce waspletely devoid of all people.


    When he looked around, he found that there were many craters in the ground all around this area. It was clear that there was a serious battle that had happened in this area before he had arrived.


    However, when he released his spiritual sense, he wasn''t able to sense anyone.


    Where did the people that had been fighting go?


    He hadn''t even been able to find any corpses lying around the craters.


    At his cultivation level, Lin Fan''s spiritual sense had already reached a level where it could cover a veryrge area. But even then, he wasn''t able to sense anything other than the craters.


    However, before he even had a chance to do anything else, there were wormholes that suddenly appeared in front of him.


    Lin Fan could feel that auraing from the wormholes, but it was a kind of aura that he had never felt before.


    It was an aura that was simr to lightningws, but the feeling waspletely different.


    After a while, there were figures that suddenly rushed out of the wormholes.


    As soon as these figures came out, they immediately turned in Lin Fan''s direction and charged out at him. But instead of using weapons like a normal expert would do, they raised their hands that suddenly hadpartments appear.


    Once thosepartments appeared, they suddenly lit up with light.


    The light quickly grew in intensity before suddenly shooting out balls of light at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows the moment that he saw this and without any hesitation, he dodged the balls of light that were shot at him.


    The balls of light flew past him and hit the ground behind him, creating arge explosion before leaving a giant crater on the ground.


    Lin Fan immediately called out his pets after dodging these first few balls of light.


    The pets all charged at the figures except for the crow thatnded on Lin Fan''s shoulder. It looked at the figures with a confused look before asking, "What are those things? These are the Outers?"


    Lin Fan heard this, but he didn''t reply.


    It wasn''t that he didn''t know what to reply with, but rather he was surprised after being able to clearly see the figures.


    These figures were things that Lin Fan had seen previously, but that was why he had been shocked.


    Robots.


    These Outers were giant robots¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand why there were robots that were attacking this universe, but he also didn''t have time to think about this since the robots didn''t stop their attack.


    The robots split up in two different groups.


    A group of smaller robots jumped into the back and started firing missiles from their backs. The other group ofrger robots pulled out various energy swords from their backs and charged forward to meet Lin Fan''s pets.


    They blocked Lin Fan''s pets from charging forward as the missiles from the smaller robotsnded on them, creatingrge explosions among the rows of Lin Fan''s pets.


    However, after the mes of the explosions disappeared, the smoke cleared to reveal that there were barriers above the formation of Lin Fan''s pets. These barriers were formed by pets that were at the side of the formation and could cover the entire formation if necessary. The only downside was that this formation required a lot of energy to form, so that was why only smaller barriers were formed instead of onerge barrier to cover the entire formation.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan''s pets also started raining down various energy based attacks onto the robots.


    But before the energy attacks could hit the robots, the smaller robots in the back suddenly had somethinge out of their shoulders as they shot out an energy barrier into the air.


    The energy attacks hit this barrier and quickly dissipated into nothing.


    There wasn''t a single ripple that passed along the energy barrier which showed just how strong it was.


    Lin Fan could tell that this was going to be a hard fight, but then something else happened that made him knit his brows.<sub> </sub>


    There were more wormholes that suddenly appeared as more and more robots started flooding onto the battlefield.


    Lin Fan had been saving some of his pets to rotate out with the pets that were currently fighting, but it seemed like he wouldn''t get this chance. Seeing that he had no choice, Lin Fan sent out the rest of his pets to meet the new robots, but they were still outnumbered.


    This was a battlefield between universes, so it would take all the experts of a single universe and pit them against each other. Normally there would have been other experts that fought with Lin Fan, but this time he was fighting alone against an entire universe''s troops as his punishment, so it was natural that he would be outnumbered.


    Seeing this scene, Lin Fan knitted his brows before pulling out a sword and saying to the crow, "You got this?"


    The crow also had a dark look on its face, but it still nodded and said, "Go, I''ll take care of this."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before charging at the robot formation.


    The greatest role that Lin Fan could y wasn''t as the strategist, but the general that led the sh against the enemy.


    With his cultivation technique, he gathered all thews of his pets into his own body, which made him much stronger than a normal expert.


    However, instead of charging in with his own power and creating a hole or two in the enemy formation, normally it was better for him tomand his pets so they could fight better. But he had been training the crow for this reason and now the crow was qualified tomand, which freed him up to lead the charge.


    So Lin Fan reached the front of his pets'' formation and with a single swing, he created arge hole among the robots.


    He shattered the energy barrier that they had put up and there was arge hole in the line of the robots that his pets immediately charged into.


    Lin Fan didn''t charge into the formation of the robots with his pets, instead he went further down the line and created another hole for his pets to charge into.


    Just like this, Lin Fan attacked the robots again and again, creating holes in their formations. But the problem was that there were just too many robots.


    As he kept fighting, more and more wounds appeared on his body until he was covered in blood. As well, more and more of his pets fell, so they never had the numbers advantage when fighting the robots.


    Still, in the end, they were able to grind down the robots until there weren''t any more of them that came out of the wormholes.


    Right when it seemed like Lin Fan was about to win, there was a dagger that suddenly stabbed out at his heart.


    Lin Fan immediately raised his sword to block it, but that dagger broke right through his sword and stabbed his chest. He had twisted his body at thest second, so that the dagger didn''t stab his heart, but it still stabbed quite deeply into his body.


    Lin Fan looked up at the person who was holding the dagger and he narrowed his eyes.


    This person was the Beast God!


    The Beast God had a fierce smile on his face as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "You never expected this, did you?"


    The Beast God couldn''t attack Lin Fan back then because they were still in their universe, but this ce was a ce that was outside of the universe, so he was freely able to attack Lin Fan without any penalties.


    He had seized his chance when the other gods had let their guards down when it seemed like Lin Fan was about to win to attack him without any of them interfering.


    Lin Fan just looked back at the Beast God and revealed a smile.


    Seeing this smile, the Beast God felt a chill run down his back and immediately wanted to run, but he forced himself to stay calm. After that chill passed, there was a strong anger that filled his heart that came from shame. Shame over feeling fear because of a mortal.


    "You¡­" Before the Beast God could finish his words, he suddenly felt a wave of suppressione over him.


    Lin Fan was going all out to use his cultivation technique, even burning his life essence to use it.


    The Beast God felt true terror at this moment as he realized what was happening, but there was nothing he could say as the wave of suppression was too strong.


    Not long after, there was a seal that was formed on the Beast God''s forehead, a seal that showed that he had been tamed by Lin Fan. But this seal was something different from all the other contracts Lin Fan made with his pets.


    This was a Life and Death seal.


    It was used to tame beasts that were disobedient, forcing them to obey the master.


    If Lin Fan died, the Beast God would die as well.


    And at this moment, Lin Fan was dying.


    In addition to burning his life essence, he also couldn''t take the God Realmws that he received from the Beast God, which ravaged his body.


    The Beast God could feel that he was dying, so he roared out, "No, this can''t be!"


    But even with his disbelief, there was nothing that he could do.


    When Lin Fan fell, he didn''t look at the Beast God, but rather he turned to the crow who he gave a nod to. When the crow saw this, it gave a nod in response before giving the order to charge.


    It was just too bad that the moment that Lin Fan''s pets charged, there were more wormholes that appeared as more robots came out.


    Lying on the ground, Lin Fan''s final sight was his pets being ughtered by the robots.


    When he opened his eyes again, Lin Fan found that he was in a dark room, but that room didn''t remain dark for long. A few seconds after he opened his eyes, the lights of this room suddenly turned on to reveal a pure white room with nothing in it at all.


    There was only one figure that was standing in front of him, one that he was familiar with.


    It was the woman in the blue dress.


    The moment she saw him looking at her, she said with a smile, "Wee back."

 Chapter 658 Second Chance

    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to see her.


    He had already put together what had happened based on the clues that he had discovered and had already guessed that this was the case.


    That entire life that he experienced, it was the trial that he had been taking.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at her for a bit before asking, "How long has it been?"


    The woman in blue had the same smile as she said, "Thirty minutes."


    This time, Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised.


    He had spent over a hundred years in that other world, but only thirty minutes had passed in this world.


    How had they done it?


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan asked, "Was that an Illusion Realm?"


    The woman in the blue dress revealed a smile that was almost imperceptible, but she didn''t answer this question. Instead she said, "You have failed this trial, but you will be allowed a second attempt."


    Lin Fan once again wasn''t surprised by this since this was what he had already figured out.


    He had guessed that this first time was just to tell him the events that had unraveled, so it was best if he followed the path that he had been given to the end. Only then would he truly understand what had happened in this world and be able to give them the answer that they were looking for.


    Because he had followed the path, he already had an idea of what he needed to do.


    So Lin Fan just nodded before asking, "Was that the past? Or was it an alternate timeline?"


    The woman in the blue dress shook her head this time and said, "This is a story from a long time ago, that is all you need to know." Then after another sigh, she suddenly said, "I wonder if you''ll be able to show us an ending that we''ve never thought of before."


    Then after a moment of silence, she said, "Are you ready to take the trial again?"


    Lin Fan said, "Wait, before that, I want to ask some questions."


    The woman in the blue dress was surprised, but she gave a nod in the end and said, "You have earned the right to three questions. You may ask what you want to ask, but I also have the discretion to not answer if I am unable to answer."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows.


    Three questions.


    It was always three questions.


    Still he didn''t have a way to force her to answer his questions and being given three questions was already good enough. If she had wanted to, she didn''t have any obligations to answer any questions at all.


    Lin Fan fell into thought for a bit before asking, "What happened after Xia Yu died?"


    This was the question that had been on his mind the entire time.


    It was clear that Xia Yu''s beast taming method had been passed on which resulted in this world''s current system of taming pets. However, Xia Yu''s cultivation technique hadn''t been passed down in full and there were parts of it that were missing. Such as the part where one could share their cultivation with their pets.


    If the cultivations of this world had been able to do that, the Beast Race would never have been able to push the humans back to this extent. But then again, the Myriad Races wouldn''t have sided with the humans either since they would have also been targeted by humans as pets.


    So where did the deviation ur?


    Not to mention, Lin Fan had seen the waves of robots that had appeared. He had already fought with those robots and he knew how strong they were, so he was certain that the experts of this universe wouldn''t have been able to defeat them after what Xia Yu had done.


    Xia Yu had eliminated four of the eight main branches of the Beast Race, which meant that his pets had eliminated half or even more than half of the Beast Race poption!


    But even then¡­


    There were still many questions that were on his mind about this.


    The woman in the blue dress looked at Lin Fan for a bit before saying, "We won the war and the universe continued. That''s all you need to know."


    It was clear that she wasn''t willing to reveal more than this, but it also didn''t help Lin Fan since this was what he had already known.<sub> </sub>


    However, the one thing that he had gained from this was that he had learned Xia Yu''s cultivation technique. If he wanted to, he could share his cultivation andws with his pets, making him countless times stronger.


    Lin Fan fell into thought again before asking, "What happened to the other cultivation techniques that the humans were using? Why did they change to only using the beast taking technique?"


    The woman in the blue dress was surprised again, but this time her answer was different. Instead of answering the question, she just simply said, "Noment."


    Lin Fan had tried using a roundabout method to get an answer for his first question, but it seemed like it still wouldn''t work.


    It must mean that the information that he wanted was considered some kind of taboo, one that even the gods weren''t allowed to speak about that easily. But that also gave Lin Fan some clues.


    It could mean that there was someone even above the gods, or¡­it could be the orders of the golden man.


    The golden man had left a deep impression on Lin Fan, as he should since he was the leader of the gods.


    If it was the leader of the golden man, Lin Fan could understand why the gods would be so hesitant to talk about this. However, that would make him even more curious as to why he would give this order to the gods.


    But all that was ced to the back of his mind since there was something else he had to do right now.


    After taking a deep breath, he looked back up at the woman in the blue dress and asked, "Is there a way to save what Xia Yu cared about?"


    The reaction this time from the woman in the blue dress was the strongest out of all three questions. She had a deeply shocked look on her face and looked at Lin Fan like she was sizing him up.


    It took a while before the calm look returned to her face and she finally said, "No."


    It was a simple answer, a one word answer, but the meaning behind it was deep.


    It was an answer that was filled with emotions, but the emotion that Lin Fan felt the most from her words was doubt. It was as if just this single question had cast doubt on everything that she had believed in previously.


    Lin Fan just gave a nod before saying, "Alright, then send me back."


    The woman in the blue dress looked like she was about to say something else, but then it seemed like she swallowed those words as she said with a heavy sigh, "I wish you luck."


    She raised her hand and with a wave, there was a sh of light that covered Lin Fan''s vision.


    When that sh of light disappeared, Lin Fan''s body copsed once again.


    There was a mass of clouds that had suddenly appeared under Lin Fan to stop his body from hitting the floor. Then after Lin Fan fell onto the clouds, the clouds suddenly moved to the side where a hole opened up in the wall.


    The woman in the blue dress followed Lin Fan''s body out of this pure white room until they came to another room.


    Unlike the previous pure white room, this room waspletely decorated in luxurious items. It was apletely different scene from the previous room.


    Once they arrived in this room, the mass of clouds carried Lin Fan over to a chair and just floated there as if it was waiting for something.


    After a few seconds, there was a golden glow that surrounded Lin Fan before he suddenly opened his eyes again. However,pared to when he opened his eyesst time, this time his eyes had apletely different look to them.


    This golden glow didn''t dissipate, rather it grew even stronger.


    It continued to grow until Lin Fan''s pupils werepletely golden, the same colour as the golden glow around him.


    After a few more seconds, the golden glow around Lin Fan stabilized until it became ayer of light around him. At this point, Lin Fan suddenly sat up and jumped off the cloud,nding in the chair that was beside the clouds.


    Once he had sat down, Lin Fan looked over at the woman in the blue dress who had been watching him during this entire time.


    Seeing that he was looking over, the woman in the blue dress suddenly did something shocking.


    She fell to one knee and bowed her head to him.


    After that, she stood up again, but it was clear by the way that she was facing him that she was fearful and respectful of him. It waspletely different from how she had treated Lin Fan previously.


    ? Lin Fan looked at her for a bit before suddenly saying with a sigh, "Ask what you want to ask. Stop trying to guilt me like this."


    The woman in the blue dress trembled when she heard this, but then she shook her head with a bitter smile before asking, "Why are you hesitating?"

 Chapter 659 Answer (1)

    Lin Fan just sat there in the chair, but there was also a hint of a bitter look that appeared on his face as well.


    He didn''t say a thing as if he hadn''t heard what the woman in the blue dress had said, but the woman in the blue dress just waited for his answer.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally said, "What if I was wrong?"


    The moment that the woman in the blue dress heard this answer, her expression was filled with shock.


    The lord was admitting that he was wrong?


    This was something that she had never heard before.


    She couldn''t even help thinking that this was a fake lord¡­


    But when she looked carefully at the golden light around Lin Fan, she knew that there was nothing to doubt. Only the lord would have this kind of energy around him, there was no other that could imitate it.


    However, when she realized all of this, she couldn''t help feeling even more unsure and even a bit angry.


    Everything that they had now was built on the countless sacrifices of theirrades and now the lord was saying something like this?


    It would be strange if she didn''t feel angry at this moment.


    But she didn''t dare lose her temper with the lord, so she said in a voice that was a bit snappy, "My lord, you have to remember what this is all for. If you were to give up all of this now, how could we¡­"


    She didn''t finish her words, but the implied meaning of these words were clear.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help giving another sigh as more bitterness filled his face. But even then, he still didn''t say anything.


    He just looked at the woman in the blue dress, but it was clear by the distant look in his eyes that he wasn''t actually looking at her. Rather he was looking at something that was far off in the past.


    After a moment, Lin Fan gave a long sigh and said, "It''s not the time to discuss this right now."


    The woman in the blue dress quickly cut him off, "But my lord, if we don''t do this now, it''ll be too¡­"


    Lin Fan raised a hand to cut her off and said, "Enough, I understand your worries and I will handle them at my own discretion." Then his tone changed as he said in a serious voice, "What do you think are his chances of passing this trial?"


    The woman in the blue dress knitted her brows, but they rxed just as quickly as she remembered the final question that Lin Fan asked. After a while, she shook her head with a faint smile and said, "It seems like he already has his answer." Then her face filled with a trace of sadness as she said, "If we had been able to find that answer in the past, then¡­"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh as well before saying, "What''s past is past, there''s no changing it. We can only look to the future."


    The woman in the blue dress knitted her brows again as she said, "My lord¡­"


    Lin Fan raised his hand to cut her off since he knew what she was going to say. He just shook his head and said, "Enough."


    The woman in the blue dress fell to one knee again and gave another bow before leaving the room without saying another word.


    Lin Fan just looked at the screens on the side of the room.


    In these screens, there were images of various different people attempting trials.


    When one looked at these people carefully, they would see that they were the various members of the twelve great factions who hade into the Ancient Era Ruins with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just looked at these screens with a zed look as if he was thinking about something. However, as for what he was thinking, that was anyone''s guess.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan''s vision cleared again, he found that he was back to resting with his pets.


    He turned in one direction and as he had expected, there was a sh of light that appeared before a little fairy boy came out.


    As soon as the little fairy boy came out, he looked around until he saw Lin Fan. When his eyes fell onto Lin Fan, his eyes suddenly lit up.


    The little boy ignored all the beasts around it and floated over to Lin Fan, looking over him as if he was sizing him up.


    After a long pause, the little boy said, "Not bad, not bad. I can see why the lords have chosen you."


    Lin Fan felt a sense of deja vu when he heard this because he had heard these words before.<sub> </sub>


    It seemed like the woman in the blue dress wasn''t even giving him a chance to save the people that Xia Yu cared about, she had just thrown him right into the climax of the story.


    The reason that Lin Fan had asked his final question was that he had thought of a way to save them, but now it seemed like it wasn''t allowed at all. It seemed like those events had to happen to shape Xia Yu''s path or else everything would have turned out differently, which was not what they were testing for.


    So since he didn''t have a choice, Lin Fan would have to use his second method.


    He had wanted to use the first method to give Xia Yu a good ending, but now it seemed like he wouldn''t be able to do so.


    As Lin Fan fell into deep thought, the little boy had been talking the entire time and was just finishing up what he was saying. It was only then that the little boy realized that Lin Fan hadn''t been listening the entire time.


    When the little boy saw this, he was naturally annoyed since he was the distinguished messenger of the gods, but he suppressed his anger since the gods had given him strict orders.


    So instead of cursing him like he normally would have done, the little boy asked, "Lin Fan, are you listening to me?"


    Lin Fan hadn''t been listening at all, but when he heard the little boy call out to him, he came back to his senses and said, "Un, so the gods want me to fight for them."


    The little boy was surprised since he hadn''t even mentioned anything about this just yet. He had been exining how it was an honour for Lin Fan to be chosen by the gods for this mission, he hadn''t gotten to the part where there would be a fight.


    So before he had mentioned anything, Lin Fan had already brought it up himself.


    It seemed like he hadpletely underestimated this Lin Fan''s information system since he was even able to find out this information that the gods had hidden.


    At the same time, it also made him wary since this could also mean that Lin Fan was a spy for the other universe¡­


    But still, the little boy had his orders, so all he needed to do was bring Lin Fan to the battlefield. There really wasn''t a need for him to think about much else.


    If Lin Fan really was a spy, he wouldn''t be able to hide it from the gods.


    So the little boy then said, "Since you know all of this, there''s no need for me to exin it. Are you ready to go?"


    Lin Fan looked at him and asked, "What if I don''t want to fight?"


    The little boy''s body trembled the moment he heard this as he revealed a shocked look.


    What was this Lin Fan saying?


    Did he not know how important this fight was?


    That was the only way that he could say these kinds of words. After all, if they lost in this war, it would be the end of their universe.


    He couldn''t help saying, "Do you know what you are even saying?"


    Lin Fan looked right at him and said, "Does it matter to me if the Outers take over this universe?"


    The little boy narrowed his eyes the moment he heard this.


    The fact that Lin Fan had used the name Outers meant that he was clear on what was happening and he did know of the consequences, so how could he be that nonchnt about this?


    The little boy knew that this situation wasn''t good, so he had no choice but to release a bit of his aura as he said in a threatening voice, "Once again I ask you, do you even know what you are saying?"


    Lin Fan didn''t hold back either as he released his aura as well.


    The moment that the little boy felt Lin Fan''s aura, he felt a chill run down his back.


    He was certain that he had underestimated Lin Fan since he knew that he wasn''t a match for Lin Fan at all. Not to mention that there were the rumours about Lin Fan''s pets that were just as strong as him.


    He couldn''t even face a single Lin Fan, so how could he face Lin Fan fighting with his pets?


    But as the little boy was trying to figure out how to escape from this ce, Lin Fan suddenly pulled back his aura and said with augh, "Why are you so serious?"


    The little boy was shocked when he heard this.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother giving him a chance to speak as he just said, "Give me a week and then I''lle with you."


    After saying this, Lin Fan stood up and left this with his pets, leaving behind the little boy with a stunned look on his face.

 Chapter 660 Answer (2)

    A weekter, the little boy appeared in front of Lin Fan again.


    Just like before, Lin Fan was resting up after a long battle when there was a sh of light and the little boy appeared.


    This time, the little boy didn''t have the same respectful look, but rather a look of terror.


    He had been watching Lin Fan over the past week and after seeing Lin Fan''s true power, he could only feel fear towards him.


    The fear that he felt when Lin Fan released his aura wasn''t fake. It was something instinctive that was telling him that it was best if he never tried to fight Lin Fan. After all, if he were to fight him¡­It was very unlikely that he would survive.


    After a pause, the little boy asked Lin Fan, "Are you ready now?"


    Lin Fan acted like he didn''t hear him at first as he looked down at his hand. He was looking at his fingernails, but based on his eyes, he also wasn''t looking at them at all.


    As the messenger of the gods, the little boy was naturally someone who had his own pride, but he didn''t dare show off that pride in front of Lin Fan. So he suppressed the anger he felt and asked again, "Sir Lin, are you ready now?"


    When he spoke this time, there was a respectful tone that had never been there before.


    This time, Lin Fan was pulled out of his thoughts and he turned to look at the little boy.


    He had a slightly confused look at first, but then his eyes narrowed slightly as he said, "Oh."


    After that, he stood up and walked over to the little boy before saying, "Let''s go then."


    The little boy was caught off guard by how straightforward Lin Fan was, but he didn''t let it bother him for long as he opened the portal that would bring them to their destination.


    The same thing happened as before and when Lin Fan''s vision cleared, he found that he appeared on the same asteroid as before.


    The various experts were gathered here again and they were all split off into their various groups, but they looked much more raggedpared to before. There were even a few people that were herest time that were no longer here.


    <o>,m It seemed like there had been a battle during this week and it had been quite the intense one based on how injured they were.</o>


    The same thing happened asst time where a human expert came over to bring Lin Fan to the human group, but this time, Lin Fanpletely ignored this person. He just walked right past that person and found a rock to sit down by before closing his eyes to drift off to sleep.


    One of the reasons why he had been so out of it when the little boy had appeared was because he wascking sleep.


    He had been going around to variouss over the past week, preparing everything that he needed to do before putting his n in ce. It really had been quite hard on him, so he was quite tired now.


    Afterying back against the rock, ignoring everyone that was around him, he fell asleep.


    Of course, he wouldn''t leave himself defenseless in a ce like this, so there was a little rabbit that appeared in hisp before he fell asleep. The little rabbit justid there and if no one looked carefully at it, they would have thought that it was just a normal rabbit. But when they did look carefully at it, they would have found that this rabbit had an abnormally strong aura of death around it.


    It was almost as if you would be buried by the wails of countless people being killed just by approaching it.


    The human expert that had gone to wee Lin Fan was naturally angered that he had been ignored just like that.


    As an expert, he would have the pride of an expert and wouldn''t just ept being ignored this easily.


    However, when he was about to go to Lin Fan to vent his anger, there was someone from the group of human experts that said, "Demon Lord."


    This person had spoken in a soft voice, but his voice was carried out across the entire area as everyone clearly heard what he had just said. The moment after his voice rang out, there was even more silence that followed.


    The Demon Lord, that was a name that most people knew and feared.


    It was the same thing that happenedst time where everyone immediately started evading Lin Fan. Even the expert that had been wanting to cause trouble with him immediately backed off and didn''t even dare look at him any longer.


    After some time, there was a sh of light before the gods from before appeared again.


    The golden man led the gods over until they were standing in front of Lin Fan, but seeing that he wasn''t saying anything in response, they couldn''t help revealing dark looks. After looking closely and finding that he was actually sleeping, some of them even revealed indignant looks.


    One of the gods said, "This mortal dares to show this kind of disrespect in front of the lord?"


    Another one of the gods asked the golden man, "My lord, please permit me to teach this mortal a lesson!"


    But before he could evene forward, the golden man looked at him with a cold gaze that immediately froze him. That god didn''t know what to say as he just took a step back before falling to one knee.<sub> </sub>


    He could tell that the golden man was angry at him, but he didn''t know why¡­


    Still, there was nothing he could say since the golden man was the ruler of the gods¡­


    The golden man turned back to Lin Fan and after a chuckle, he walked over to Lin Fan and sat down as he began waiting.


    Once he sat down, all the gods and experts from the various races revealed looks of shock.


    Not a single one of them could believe what they were seeing.


    There was no need to mention the gods, but even the experts of the various races were shocked.


    They could clearly tell by the way that the gods treated this golden man that he was someone with a high status among the gods. However, someone at his level was actually sitting down and waiting for Lin Fan to wake up.


    It was hard for them not to be surprised by this.


    But none of this mattered to Lin Fan as heid there sleeping. At some point, he even started snoring quite loudly which slowly got on everyone''s nerves.


    It was clear by the expression that the gods had that they wanted to attack Lin Fan, tearing him piece to piece just to teach him a lesson, but they also couldn''t do that. After all, the golden man was currently sitting right beside Lin Fan and they didn''t dare do anything in his presence.


    As the golden man sat there, he turned over to Lin Fan and reached his hand out towards the little rabbit sitting in hisp.


    The little rabbit was surprised to see the golden man reaching his hand out to it, but after sniffing the golden man''s hand, it suddenly jumped out of Lin Fan''sp and into the hands of the golden man.


    After several hours of waiting, Lin Fan finally woke up.


    After waking up, the first thing that Lin Fan did was give a slow stretch before rubbing his eyes to wake himself up. It was only then did he look at the golden man who was sitting beside him.


    The golden man looked down at Lin Fan with a smile and asked, "Did you have a good rest?"


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to see the golden man at all. He just leaned back against the rock with his head behind his head and said, "It wasn''t my bad."


    The golden man gave a nod as he said with the same smile, "I see, I see."


    If one didn''t know better, they would have thought that the two of them were good friends who were just having a nice chat with each other.


    But seeing this, there were many people who were getting worried.


    It wasn''t the experts of the various races, but rather the gods that were worried.


    They were very familiar with the personality of this golden man and they knew that whenever he acted like this, it was actually when he was filled with rage. Thest time he had acted this way, he had started a ughter that hadsted seven days.


    When he finally came to an end, the ground was covered in rivers of blood from his work.


    If he were to lose his temper here and start a ughter¡­


    The worst part of it all was that they wouldn''t have been able to stop him.


    But then to their surprise, the golden man didn''t lose his temper and started attacking Lin Fan as they had expected. Rather, he asked in a calm voice, "Then what are you nning on doing now?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "What am I nning on doing?"


    As the gods heard this, they all gave a collective gulp.


    Was this mortal crazy?


    He was teasing the lord like this?


    It was all over!


    However, they were surprised once again when the golden man just calmly said, "Well, you''d have to tell me what you''re nning." But then the golden man''s voice turned cold, "If I don''t like it, I might not let you do it."

 Chapter 661 Answer (3)

    A chill ran down everyone''s back when they heard this golden man''s cold voice.


    Well that was everyone except for Lin Fan.


    Instead, he looked back at him with a rxed smile and said, "Why wouldn''t you let me do what I want? It''s your only option left after all."


    The golden man slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but then those brows quickly rxed as he said, "Is that so? Then why don''t you tell me what that option is?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "If I do, I have to start working right away. However, I don''t feel like doing anything right now."


    To everyone''s surprise, the golden man revealed a faint smile when he heard this as he said, "It''s true that working is annoying."


    Everyone felt anxious at this moment.


    They knew that the Outers wereing and it wasn''t time for them to stand here talking like this. The Outers could attack them at any time.


    But no one dared to say a thing since the golden man didn''t say anything about this.


    After another pause, Lin Fan reached his hand out to the golden man without saying a word.


    The golden man didn''t even look at his hand as he raised the little rabbit that he had been holding and handed it back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan took it and then after patting it a few times, he suddenly stood up.


    Everyone had their eyes on Lin Fan as they waited to see what kind of action he would take.


    Then before anyone could react, Lin Fan suddenly charged forward.


    He made his way through the crowd of gods and stopped in front of one god in particr. It was the Beast God that had attacked him in the first attempt.


    It wasn''t as if the gods couldn''t keep up with Lin Fan''s speed, but they were taken aback that Lin Fan would actually make a move against them. So none of them could react in time and make a move before Lin Fan made his move.


    As soon as he arrived in front of the Beast God, Lin Fan raised his hand in front of him and said, "I''ll start with you."


    Then after he said this, there was a sh of light that came from his hands that immediately surrounded the Beast God.


    The Beast God wanted to do something, but before he could, there was a strong pressure that suddenly fell onto him. It was a pressure that he couldn''t resist at all and he couldn''t even gather hisws to fight back with.


    This pressure became stronger and stronger until he couldn''t even stand up properly anymore.


    This was Lin Fan''s cultivation technique.


    He was using his cultivation technique to tame the Beast God.


    Last time he did this, he had been severely injured, so he had to burn his life essence just to even have a chance to tame him. And even after he had tamed him, the strongws that came from the Beast God had been too strong for his injured bodies to contain, which was what killed him in the end.


    But this time, he was in perfect shape, so that situation was different.


    Not to mention that he had the experience fromst time, so he was able to use the technique on the Beast God much more smoothly.


    It only took a single minute before Lin Fan was able to force the Life and Death Seal onto the Beast God again.


    However, when he finished, all the gods had already pulled out their weapons and were pointing them at him.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t scared at all.


    He just calmly looked at the gods around him before releasing his aura with a single snort.


    When the gods felt this aurae over them, they all revealed shocked looks.


    A god.


    This mortal had suddenly be a god.


    But if he had just be a god, they wouldn''t have been as shocked as they were now.


    They were shocked because the aura that he had released was much stronger than the aura that any one of them would have. It was an aura that was almost on the same level as the golden man.


    They knew that even if they were to attack Lin Fan now, it wasn''t very likely that they would be able to fight him.


    Seeing that there was no other option, they turned to the golden man who was still sitting there.


    The golden man hadn''t made a single move the entire time, as he had watched Lin Fan tame the Beast God with an amused look. It was clear that this was something that even he didn''t expect.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was finished, the golden man asked, "This is your answer?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan ignored all the other gods and turned to look at the golden man. After a slight pause, he gave a nod and said, "That''s right."


    The golden man tilted his head to look at Lin Fan, but he didn''t say anything. After a long pause, he suddenly asked, "Are those yourst words?"


    Before anyone could even react, the golden man had suddenly stood up and disappeared. When he reappeared again, he was already in front of Lin Fan with an arm raised that had a dagger in the hand pointing at Lin Fan.


    Of course, Lin Fan wouldn''t just let the golden man threaten him like this, so he had raised a crow feather to meet the tip of the dagger.


    The golden man looked down at the crow feather that had met his dagger and gave a nod as he said, "Not bad." Then he turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "What now?"


    Lin Fan looked right into his eyes and said, "Send me and my pets to the other universe."


    There was only silence that met these words.


    But that silence didn''tst long before the other gods roared out at Lin Fan.


    "This traitor, he wants to run after stealingws from our universe!"


    "My lord, please strike him down right away!"


    "You think that you can get away after betraying our universe!"


    These shouts came from around them, but both Lin Fan and the golden man ignored them.


    The golden man didn''t have a look of anger nor was he smiling, he was looking at Lin Fan with knitted brows.


    There were divisions between the gods. Gods that had more control overws would naturally be stronger than other gods.


    Lin Fan was much more powerful than the average god after he became a god, so he knew much more than the other gods. He knew that this golden man wasn''t just a normal god, rather he was the embodiment of this universe.


    All thews in this universe naturally flowed towards this golden man, so it could be said that he controlled the very universe itself.


    If this golden man were to send him to the other universe, it would mean that unless this golden man willed it, Lin Fan would be exiled from this universe.


    Even if Lin Fan left withws from their universe, since it wasn''t forcefully tamed, it would naturally flow back to its original universe. So even if the golden man sent Lin Fan to the other universe, thews would eventuallye back to their universe.


    That meant that the only reason Lin Fan wanted to be sent to the other universe was¡­


    To fight!


    He wanted to attack their universe before the Outers could attack their universe, forcing them to withdraw to defend and give up the idea of invading their universe.


    But to do this, that would mean that he would be sacrificing his life to save their universe.


    This was something that the golden man had considered before, but he had put this idea aside since he didn''t want to sacrifice anyone like this just to save their universe¡­But now Lin Fan was offering to be that sacrifice.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan had nned everything perfectly by taming the Beast God.


    It had to be a god that led the attack since only a god would create enough pressure to force the Outers to withdraw from their universe. At the same time, if it was a god, the rest of their universe could throw that god under the bus by saying that they had acted alone without the consent of the other gods.


    After all, gods were strong enough to do what they wanted and acting independently was a perfectly eptable exnation. The other universe would have had no choice but to ept this exnation.


    The golden man looked at Lin Fan with even deeper knitted brows as he asked, "Are you sure you want to do this?"


    Lin Fan looked back at him with a determined look before saying with a sigh, "It''s the only option."


    The golden man helplessly shook his head, but he didn''t deny Lin Fan''s opinion.


    Lin Fan could see that the golden man had already epted his ideas, so he turned away from him. He turned to look in the direction of the Beast Race experts who immediately felt a chill run down their spine.


    They were about to turn and run, but before they could even move a muscle, Lin Fan had already appeared in front of them.


    He raised his hand and immediately half of them had a light appear around them.


    It was the same light that had appeared around the Beast God.


    The rest of the gods saw Lin Fan ignoring them and they were filled with rage. There were some that wanted to go all out against Lin Fan, but before they could, the golden man had raised his hand to stop them.


    The gods were filled with confusion at this, but not a single one dared to go against the will of the golden man.


    After all the Beast Race experts were tamed, Lin Fan turned back to the golden man who was still staring at him.


    Seeing this, the golden man asked, "Are you ready?"

 Chapter 662 Answer (4)

    Lin Fan just looked back at him and gave a nod.


    The golden man didn''t say anything as he raised his hand and a golden light appeared around it.


    As this golden light appeared, there was the same golden light that appeared around


    Lin Fan, the Beast Race experts, and the Beast God.


    The Beast Race experts and the Beast Gods opened their mouths to say something, but there was no sound that came out. Lin Fan had restrained them with the contract, so they weren''t able to make a single sound of protest.


    The Beast God had thought that since he was a god, he would be saved still, but based on how the golden man was acting, that didn''t seem to be the case. It was almost as if the golden man had abandoned him.


    What he didn''t know was that the golden man had already known about all the things that he had done.


    The Beast God was not a good example for the other gods and he frequently used loopholes for his own gain. The only reason that the golden man had even allowed him to stay was because he was one of the stronger gods.


    Without a good recement, it wasn''t a good idea to get rid of this Beast God just yet.


    But now that an opportunity arose, the golden man threw away the Beast God without any hesitation.


    After the golden light reached its peak, it suddenly red with a burst of intense golden light.


    When the golden light disappeared, Lin Fan, the Beast Race experts, and the Beast God all disappeared along with it.


    Everyone just looked at the ce where they had been standing with looks of shock.


    The golden man also stared at it for a bit before giving a sigh and saying under his breath, "Good luck."


    Then with another sh of golden light, the golden man also disappeared.


    The other gods saw this and looked at each other in nk dismay, but they all disappeared in the end.


    After all, with this sudden change in the situation, there were many things that they had to n out or they would be in danger. They had a faint guess as to why the golden man had let Lin Fan take the Beast God away, so naturally they were afraid that they would be the next targets.


    After all the gods disappeared, the experts of the various races just stood there, not knowing what to do or how to respond to this.


    ¡­


    When the sh of golden light disappeared, Lin Fan found himself in apletely different ce.


    This wasn''t a ce in space, but rather the ce that they had appeared was a wide open field.


    As he stood there, he could feel the cool breeze blowing across his face which really felt satisfying. He could also feel the differentws that filled the air around him, making it a bit harder for him to use his ownws.


    However, he was confused by all of this.


    But it didn''t take him long to understand what was happening.


    This wasn''t a war, but rather this was a sneak attack, so of course Lin Fan wouldn''t be sent to the battlefield that was set up for this. Instead, he would be sent behind the enemy lines, onto one of theirs and he would start creating chaos from there.


    He would create chaos on this first and draw the experts of this universe to him.


    Once that happened, it would all depend on his strength to see how many he would be able to take out with him before he died.


    All around him were the Beast Race experts and the Beast God who looked at Lin Fan with looks of despair.


    It didn''t take them much to figure out what would happen next, so they were hoping that Lin Fan would spare them. After all, they had been forcefully tamed by Lin Fan and if he didn''t allow them to do so, they wouldn''t be able to escape this ce.


    But Lin Fanpletely ignored them.


    These Beast Race experts were the ones that he had killed in the previous attempt, the ones that he had taken revenge on. So there was no chance that he would allow them to escape. He had brought them here just so they would die with him.


    The Beast God was a new addition, it was more of a personal thing from thest attempt. Along with the fact that he needed a god to take the fall, so the Beast God was the perfect candidate.


    After taking a deep breath, Lin Fan raised a hand that all the Beast Race experts and the Beast God watched. Then without any hesitation, he brought it down.


    The moment that his hand fell, the Beast Race experts and the Beast God felt an uncontroble urge fill them.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had made full use of the contract between them to drive them into a frenzy and once they lost themselves in this frenzy, they weren''t able to control themselves as they charged towards the nearest aura of a living being.


    Lin Fan watched them form a beast wave and he called out more beasts to go with them.


    These were all beasts that were from the four bloodlines that the Beast Race experts were from.


    Over the past week, this was what Lin Fan had been doing.


    He had left his mark on these beasts and had prepared for the moment that he made his move. The moment that he did, the mark that he left would forcefully activate and tame these beasts.


    Since his cultivation was much stronger than these beasts, they weren''t able to resist at all as they were forcefully tamed.


    This was also the reason why Lin Fan had asked the golden man to teleport his pets as well since he had gained an entire army while stalling out after taming the Beast God.


    Lin Fan just casually followed the beast wave as they charged towards the nearest settlement which was a city.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the city, he couldn''t help being surprised by it.


    Walking through the streets, it was a very familiar scene because this was a city that he had been in before.


    This was the city that he, the Lin Fan from earth, had lived in before he had transmigrated¡­


    Did that mean that the ones that were invading them was the universe that Lin Fan hade from previously?


    After the beast wave had hit the city for a while, there were bright lights that suddenly came from the sky. All the beasts looked up to see beams of light falling down on them.


    The beams fell quickly and with how many beasts there were, it was hard for them to miss.


    As soon as the beamsnded, they immediately released giant explosions on the lines of beasts. However, after the mes of those explosions cleared, there were giant barriers that had been set up above these beasts.


    Lin Fan had scattered his own pets among the beast wave that could help them with setting up a barrier when needed, so there wasn''t a problem defending against the attacks of the enemies.


    Lin Fan did want these beasts to die for his revenge, but he also needed them to hold out as long as possible to deal as much damage as they could. Only by dealing enough damage and putting enough pressure on this universe would they be able to stop the invasion of the Outers.


    So Lin Fan couldn''t have these beasts dying too easily.


    After the explosions cleared, the ones who had fired the attacks showed themselves.


    It was the same as before, they were giant robots that floated down from the sky.


    Just like before, they split off into two groups with one being a melee group and one being a ranged group.


    The melee group charged down at the beast wave while the ranged group fired down at them from above.


    But of course, Lin Fan already knew about this and he had split his pets in a formation to deal with them.


    As soon as the melee groupnded on the ground, there was a group of flying beasts that suddenly went into the air to attack the ranged robots.


    These flying beasts were specially chosen for their speed and power, so they easily dealt with the enemy''s backline. Then without the support of the ranged group, the melee group was quickly surrounded and destroyed.


    But it wasn''t the end just yet as more and more robots descended from the sky.


    However, it wasn''t just robots that appeared this time.


    There was a loud boom of thunder and a bright sh of lightning before a figure descended from a hole in the clouds.


    It was clear by the aura from this person that this wasn''t a normal person.


    Well, it wasn''t a person at all since the aura that this figure gave off was that of a god.


    This person hadpletely ck skin that looked like metal and a bald head while being covered in muscles.


    After descending, that person floated over the beast wave and looked over it before his eyes finally fell onto the Beast God in the center of the beast wave. As soon as his eyes fell onto the Beast God, this person roared out in a loud voice, "This one is the God of Metal! God from another universe, how dare you invade our universe! Prepare to die!"


    Without even giving the Beast God a chance to say anything, this God of Metal charged right at the Beast God.

 Chapter 663 End Of The Trial

    The Beast God was still being restrained by Lin Fan, so he couldn''t exin his way out of this.


    Since that was the case, seeing this God of Metal charging at him, he had no choice but to release hisws around him.


    The Beast God''sws were mainly physicalws, so he was someone who was confident in fighting with his body.


    The God of Metal was a perfect match for him since the God of Metal was also someone who was confident in fighting with his body. After all, he had integrated his metalws into his body to make it as hard as steel, so it would be hard for him not to be confident to fight with this body.


    As the two of them shed, the robots and beast surrounding them moved further and further away to avoid the sh ofws that surrounded them. If they weren''t careful, they would be ripped to pieces by that sh ofws since it was at a level that they couldn''t reach.


    At the same time, Lin Fan watched the two of them shing with each other without making a move.


    His eyes were more focused on the God of Metal rather than the Beast God the entire time.


    After close to half an hour, Lin Fan finally made a move.


    The two gods that had been fighting were panting, but there weren''t that many scratches on their bodies. They were both gods that had trained their bodies and specialized in close rangebat, so it was hard for their bodies to be injured.


    That is unless someone were to hit them in their weak spot, which was what Lin Fan had been looking for this whole time.


    He raised his hand and a feather appeared which he immediately threw out in the direction of the God of Metal.


    There was this dark energy that was around the feather when it was thrown which made it seem to fade into the air, as if it was bing part of the background. It had faded so much into the background that even the God of Metal wasn''t able to notice it until it was toote.


    The feather hit the God of Metal right in the middle of his back, in between his shoulder des.


    This was the one part that wasn''t as strong as every other part since it was the part that was the hardest part for him to reach.


    As soon as the feather hit the God of Metal in the back, he immediately turned around and started searching for where it came from as he shouted, "There''s another one! You dare interfere with a sacred duel!"


    The Beast God took advantage of this momentarypse in his concentration to suddenly appear behind him.


    The God of Metal realized what the Beast God wanted to do, but it was already toote for him to do anything.


    He tried turning his body to avoid the blow while using his fist to attack the Beast God, but he couldn''t avoid the Beast God''s fist in time since it was too fast. The God of Metal tried roaring out, "You! Don''t you dare do this! It''ll be war between our universes if you-"


    Before he could finish though, the Beast God''s fist had alreadynded right on the feather that Lin Fan had thrown as he roared out, "Die!"


    As soon as the Beast God hit the feather, cracks started to form on the God of Metal''s skin. Those cracks quickly spread all over his body like a spider before he waspletely covered in these cracks.


    Once he waspletely covered in the cracks, his body suddenly shattered to pieces that fell to the ground.


    After shattering to pieces, there was a phenomenon that suddenly filled the skies.


    There were countless meteors that rained down creating a meteor shower while a rainbow aurora dyed the sky.


    This was the phenomenon that appeared whenever a god died, it was a natural response from the will of the world since gods were representation ofws of a universe. Once a god fell, thews that they represented would return to the universe until a new god took their ce, which created this phenomenon.


    But Lin Fan''s army of beasts didn''t have time to enjoy this as pressure fell onto them again.


    This time, there were two figures that came down through the clouds this time and both of them had the same level of pressure as the God of Metal from before.


    The two of them stared at the fragments that the God of Metal had been turned into before ring at the Beast God. One of them said in a cold voice, "Are you really trying to start a war between our universes?"


    The Beast God just revealed a bitter smile since he wasn''t able to reply at all. Lin Fan''s restrictions were still on him, so he could only fight and couldn''t exin himself.


    The two figures saw that he wasn''t saying anything at all, so they didn''t waste any more words as one of them suddenly charged out at the Beast God. The other one raised their hands to start gathering their energy.


    The one that charged at the Beast God raised their hands to condense a sword which they swung down at the Beast God.<sub> </sub>


    The Beast God didn''t hold back either as he gathered hisws in his fists and punched up at the sword falling down at him.


    When the two sides shed, there was a bnce between theirws and neither could push back the other.


    But it was at this time that the figure in the air had finished gathering the energy in their hands. Once they were done, they pointed at the Beast God and prepared to fire off that energy at them.


    However, before they could, there was another feather that flew through the skies that pierced through that energy, suddenly dispersing it.


    The figure in the air looked at their hands in shock before looking around, trying to find where the feather came from. However, after they weren''t able to do so, they immediately shouted to the figure on the ground, "There''s a second one! Be careful!"


    The figure in the ground heard this, but they didn''t have any time or attention to deal with it since they were busy fighting the Beast God. Rather, they were chasing down the Beast God.


    After their first sh, the Beast God had suddenly turned and started running away from this figure.


    This figure had chased after the Beast God since it knew that if there were two enemies, it had to deal with the Beast God as soon as possible. So this figure shouted to the one in the sky, "Don''t mind it! Help me deal with this one first!"


    But the figure in the sky muttered, "That''s easier said than done."


    It was just too bad that none of them noticed the little rabbit that snuck through the lines to arrive at the God of Metal''s corpse.


    After chasing the Beast God around for a bit, the Beast God suddenly turned and started attacking the figure that was chasing after it.


    The figure didn''t understand why the Beast God suddenly had this change of heart, but it didn''t care since it wanted to deal with the Beast God as soon as possible. It said to the figure in the sky in its mind, "Don''t worry about the one hiding, I''ll hold him and you finish him off."


    The one in the sky agreed to this.


    The figure holding the sword swung its sword down, creating countless swords of light in the sky that surrounded the Beast God.


    But before those swords could fall down, it was suddenly hit with a ck energy from behind.


    This ck energypletely corroded this figure''s back and it spat out arge mouthful of blood, but that wasn''t the end just yet. Before this figure could react, the Beast God had already hit it right in the chest with his fist.


    This figure crumpled like a kite that had its strings cut and flew back, bouncing several times before falling to the ground.


    After that, it justid there as another phenomenon appeared in the sky.


    The figure in the sky had been shocked by this, but it didn''t remain shocked for long as a feather flew through the air to pierce it right between the eyes. The figure in the sky didn''t have the chance to say anything else as it fell to the ground and the phenomenon in the sky became even stronger.


    The dark energy that had hit the first figure in the back naturally came from the Corpse Eater that had broken through after eating the God of Metal''s corpse.


    As for the feather, it came from Lin Fan who could have killed the figure in the air the entire time, but never did so as he was stalling for time.


    Naturally this wasn''t the end of the fight as more and more gods started descending from the clouds.


    Of course, there were only a certain number of gods that came each time since the fight between gods could destroy universes. They wanted to keep the damage as contained as possible, so there weren''t that many gods that joined the fight each time.


    But each time, Lin Fan was able to kill the gods that came to fight him and the Beast God, so the gods of this universe finally had no choice but to send more and more gods until they finally overwhelmed Lin Fan and his army.


    But by the end of it, Lin Fan had already killed more than a hundred gods.


    This was more than enough to wound the universe the Outers came from that they would give up any ideas of invading.


    As Lin Fan fell, he felt satisfied with what he had aplished as he closed his eyes.


    When he opened them again, he found that he was in the same dark room as before.

 Chapter 664 Greatest Rewards

    After a moment of silence, the room suddenly lit up to reveal the woman in the blue dress.


    But even after the room lit up, she just looked at Lin Fan with aplicated look without saying a thing.


    Lin Fan looked back at her and just waited for her to speak first.


    After all, even if he were to speak, there wouldn''t be much for him to say.


    After a long period of silence, the woman in the blue dress finally gave a sigh, but still she didn''t say anything. She just shook her head before giving another sigh, as if she was worrying about something.


    But then she suddenly realized something and turned back to Lin Fan to say, "So that was the answer that you came up with?"


    Lin Fan felt that there was something strange with her tone, but he still said, "Yes, that was my answer."


    The woman in the blue dress gave another pause before saying, "Why did you think that sacrificing yourself was the right choice?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He had felt that his choice had been correct, but based on the tone that the woman in the blue dress had, it seemed like she thought otherwise.


    Lin Fan didn''t answer right away and after a bit of thought, he said, "Sacrificing yourself for the good of the universe, isn''t that an honourable thing to do?"


    The woman in the blue dress didn''t respond, instead she asked, "But what about your revenge? Was that necessary¡­"


    But before she could finish, her body suddenly jolted. She looked around herself as if she had suddenly noticed something, but then she revealed a serious look before looking down to mutter something to herself.


    After all of that, she looked up and said, "Nothing, forget what I just said."


    Lin Fan was very confused by all of this, but he chose not to ask anything. After all, even if he were to ask anything, it was very unlikely that she would even answer his question.


    So he just stayed silent, waiting for her to say something.


    The woman in the blue dress took a moment to gather herself before saying, "You have passed this trial, so now it''s time for you to get your reward."


    With a wave of her hand, there was a golden light that suddenly appeared.


    This ball of light became stronger and stronger until there was a pen that had suddenly formed inside of it.


    This pen seemed like an outline at first, but as the light became stronger and stronger, the pen became more and more real. It kept bing more and more opaque until there was a golden pen that was floating inside the golden ball of light.


    Once this golden pen had formed, the woman in the blue dress suddenly flicked her hand and the golden pen flew out.


    It burst right through the golden ball of light and flew out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan''s eyes couldn''t keep up with it, but he raised his hands out of instinct. It was just that he wasn''t able to stop it.


    When his hand came up, it touched the pen that had stopped a single inch away from his chest. The tip of the pen was pointed right at his heart.


    Lin Fan looked down at it and knitted his brows, but he didn''t take a single step back.


    Lin Dan then looked back up at the woman in the blue dress to ask, "What-"


    But before he could finish his sentence, he suddenly felt a prick on his chest.


    When he looked down again, the pen''s tip had already entered his chest and was still moving forward.


    It was like nothing could stop it as it continued moving forward.


    Lin Fan''s brows knit even deeper as he suddenly roared, "What are you-"


    But once again, before he was able to finish his words, there was another change with the golden pen.


    After entering about a few centimeters into his chest, the golden pen suddenly began glowing again. The glowing grew in intensity until the golden pen suddenly exploded into balls of golden light.


    These balls of golden light floated there for a bit before suddenly entering his body.


    When those golden balls of light entered his body, there was a warm current that flowed through his chest.


    For some reason, he felt that it was a familiar feeling¡­Like he had experienced this somewhere before¡­


    Then it hit him, it was the golden energy that the golden man controlled!


    He had felt it when the golden man had sent him to the other universe. This was the golden energy that had surrounded him when he had been transported.


    But for some reason, that wasn''t the only reason why it felt familiar.


    It was only when the warm current reached his dantian that Lin Fan realized what the destination of the warm current was.<sub> </sub>


    It was the golden suns in his dantian.


    That was the other reason why it had felt so familiar.


    The energy that was currently flowing through him was the energy that the golden suns in his dantian released.


    But then again, it was also the golden energy that he received from the ruins that he had explored during the Hunters Exam¡­


    As all of these things came into his mind, the conclusion that Lin Fan drew became more and more confusing.


    Just how was this all rted?


    At the very least, he knew that the golden pen must be rted to the golden man from ancient times, the one that led the gods.


    Did that also mean that the golden man was the one that was behind the system that had brought him here?


    After the golden current reached the suns in his dantian, it flowed into the center of the suns before taking form as the pen that he had seen before.


    The pen just floated there inside of one of the suns in his dantian. It didn''t do anything, it was almost as if it wasying dormant inside of the sun.


    However, when Lin Fan tried using the golden energy from the sun, he found that it was much strongerpared to before.


    Lin Fan knew that this wasn''t the only function of the golden pen, it must have more functions to it, but he wasn''t able to use them since he wasn''t strong enough. After all, it was clear that this pen was powerful just based on the fact that it was able to pierce right through his skin without any resistance.


    Lin Fan''s body was stronger than his cultivation, but the pen had pushed right through his defenses like they were nothing.


    It must mean that there was a great power hidden inside of the pen.


    Without waiting for Lin Fan to finish gathering his thoughts, the woman in the blue dress suddenly raised her hand and said, "It''s time to send you off on your way now that you''ve received your reward."


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but before he could even say a thing, there was a white light that shed in front of his eyes.


    After that sh of white light, Lin Fan disappeared from where he had been standing.


    There was only silence left in this white room as the woman in the blue dress stared at where Lin Fan had been standing with aplicated look.


    After a long time, there were holes that suddenly opened up in the walls of this room. After the holes formed, there were cloaked figures that walked out and surrounded the woman in the blue dress.


    They all just stood there as if waiting for something.


    There were four more holes that suddenly opened in the four different walls and four more cloaked figures came out.


    The cloaked figures that surrounded the woman in the blue dress suddenly parted, creating a path for the four of them to reach her.


    All four of them walked through the other cloaked figures until they were standing around the woman in the blue dress.


    One of them suddenly asked, "What was the lord''s decision?"


    The woman in the blue dress shook her head and said, "He didn''t make one in the end, he just said that he knew what he was doing."


    One of the other cloaked figures couldn''t help saying, "But there''s not much time left! If this time doesn''t work, then¡­"


    Before they could finish, the other cloaked figures all red at the one who spoke.


    The cloaked figure that had spoken shrunk their head back and said, "It''s not like I''m wrong, you all know this."


    The other cloaked figures continued ring at this cloaked figure for a bit before they all gave sighs. Then they turned back to the woman in the blue dress and waited for her to speak.


    The woman in the blue dress however ignored all of this as she continued staring at where Lin Fan had been standing.


    Finally one of the four cloaked figures couldn''t take it anymore and asked, "Big sister, are we really not going to do anything? If we don''t, who knows what will happen."


    The woman in the blue dress suddenly came back to her senses after hearing this and she turned to re at the one who spoke as she asked, "Are you showing distrust in the lord?"


    The figure that received this re almost crumpled under her pressure as they quickly waved their hands and said, "No, no, I wouldn''t dare."


    It was at this time that there was a voice that came from behind the woman in the blue dress, "There''s no need to scare them like this."


    The woman in the blue dress didn''t turn around at all, she just raised her head and gave a soft snort as she closed her eyes.


    When she opened her eyes again, she turned around to look at the muscr man and said, "All we have to do is follow the lord''s will."


    The muscr man didn''t respond to this and looked up at the ceiling. After a long time, he said with a sigh, "The lord''s will¡­"

 Chapter 665 Surrounded

    When the white sh of light disappeared, Lin Fan found himself standing where he had been previously in the open field.


    The gate with the short staircase that had been in front of him hadpletely disappeared.


    If it wasn''t for the golden pen inside of the golden sun in his dantian, he wouldn''t have thought that the gate that he had just gone through even existed. But that golden pen was there inside of his dantian, which proved that everything that he had experienced was real.


    Well there were also the cultivation techniques that were in his mind as well.


    When he had been inside of that Illusion Realm, he had found quite a few different cultivation techniques from the different races, but the most important thing was Xia Yu''s cultivation technique. The cultivation technique that would allow him to share his cultivation with his pets was something that he looked forward to trying out.


    Still, that was forter when he was out of this Ancient Era Ruins.


    Taking onest look at the spot where the staircase had been, Lin Fan turned around to leave. However, as soon as he took two steps, he immediately stopped.


    He slowly looked around himself before knitting his brows and saying, "Are you going toe out or not?"


    There was only silence that met his call at first, but then there wasughter that filled the air before five figures suddenly surrounded him.


    All five of these figures were in cloaks, but Lin Fan knew who they were. They were the assassins from the Assassins Association.


    The only thing to note was that the one with the different coloured cloak wasn''t here.


    But Lin Fan was also confused why these assassins would suddenly show up like this.


    He had already taken care of one of them and they should know that he wasn''t someone to mess with, but the fact that they were surrounding him now clearly meant that they didn''t care about that.


    What gave them this courage?


    After theughter, the five cloaked figurespletely surrounded Lin Fan, standing at the exact same distance away from each other with Lin Fan in the center. It was clear that they were nning on using some kind of array on him, which of course Lin Fan wasn''t going to give them the chance to do.


    He immediately charged out at the assassin that was right in front of him, but before he could reach him, he suddenly hit a wall that bounced him back.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised by this wall because it was much harder than he thought it would be. It even caused minor injuries to him that made bloode up into his mouth.


    This clearly wasn''t the level of power that these five assassins should have, so it must be something else that the one with the different coloured cloak had given them. Just like the that the first assassin had used.


    It would be a lie if it was said that the assassins weren''t afraid at all.


    They could feel the aura that wasing from Lin Fan and the pressure that it gave them far surpassed anything they had felt before.


    But after they saw that the item that the lord had given them worked, they were filled with confidence. As long as they had this array, they would be able to take down Lin Fan and fulfil the lord''s orders.


    As for the rewards they would receive, there was no need to mention it.


    So being filled with excitement, the assassin that Lin Fan had just charged shouted out, "Start the attack, let''s take him down quickly before anything else can happen!"


    The other assassins all gave nods before raising their life energy.


    As soon as their life energy had been injected into the array, there were balls of lights that suddenly appeared in the air inside of this array.


    These balls of lights didn''t take long to gather energy before suddenly shooting out small swords of light at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all as he pulled out the Iron Eater Bone Artifact, turning it into a sword which he used to block these swords of light.


    When he shed through the swords of light, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    It wasn''t that he was surprised by how strong they were, but rather how weak they were. With how much power was behind each of these swords, they weren''t even enough to hurt someone in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    No matter how many of them there were, they didn''t pose a single threat to Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    However, even if that was the case, the assassins looked very confident that they would be able to take Lin Fan down. That was what surprised Lin Fan even more.


    So his natural conclusion was that there had to be something about this array that gave them this confidence. However, no matter how he used his spiritual sense to check, there didn''t seem like there was anything special about the array other than the barrier that was keeping him in.


    That was the only thing that was able to resist his spiritual sense, so he knew that it was much stronger than him.


    Lin Fan continued to guard against the swords of light that fell down on him as he tried to find a way out, but after a minute, he realized that something had changed. The power behind the swords of light was slowly getting stronger and stronger.


    It had been slow at first, but then the power behind the swords of light kept growing.


    It didn''t take them long before they had already reached the point where they could hurt normal Embryo Soul Realm Experts. Though, it still wasn''t a problem for Lin Fan to easily deal with them.


    However, the problem was that this increase in power didn''t show any signs of stopping.


    Lin Fan used his spiritual sense again and he could feel that the array was drawing in life energy from the surrounding area to make its attacks stronger.


    As for what the limits of the power of the array was, he wasn''t sure, but he knew that it wouldn''t be low. After all, the defenses of the array were so strong that he couldn''t break through them.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was getting more and more pushed down by their attacks, the assassins became even more excited and injected more life energy into the array.


    They had been saving some of their life energy just in case something happened, but seeing that Lin Fan was about to go down, they didn''t mind using their life energy to make it happen faster. After all, they were assassins and they knew that killing the target as quickly as possible was beneficial to them.


    The lead assassin even said, "Just a bit more and we''ll have him!"


    The other assassins all shouted out, "Yes!"


    The only problem with doing this was that when they focused their attention on increasing the power of the array, they let their guards down a bit.


    The moment before getting the kill, when they thought that they won, that was when most people let down their guards. It was also that moment that Lin Fan had chosen to strike.


    Even though he was slowly getting suppressed by the swords of light that fell down on him, Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all. He just calmly struck down all the swords of light that fell on him, even though it seemed like he was in a desperate situation.


    That was because he already had a n to get out of here.


    Even if he couldn''t break through the array from the inside, that didn''t mean that he couldn''t break the array from the outside.


    After focusing themselves on killing Lin Fan, the assassins didn''t notice that there were a few figures that were encroaching in on them.


    When they thought that they were about to kill Lin Fan and let down their guards the most, these figures took that opportunity to strike.


    There was arger array that suddenly appeared around the assassins that caught them off guard, but before any of them could react, there was a beam of light that attacked the lead assassin. The lead assassin tried to block against it, but it shattered his guard and sent him flying before he skidded to a stop in the ground a few meters away.


    The moment that the lead assassin had been blown away, there was a pause in the swords of light that fell down on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan took this chance to shatter all the swords of light that were falling on him and then gathered all his life energy to send a sh at one of the assassins.


    This array that the assassins used was one where each person had to take their set position for it to demonstrate its power, but now that one of them had been knocked away, there was no doubt that the array had weakened. But even then, the barrier of the array still existed and was able to block Lin Fan''s sh.


    However, the moment that the two sides shed, there were ripples that appeared in the barrier which showed that it was actually taking damage from Lin Fan''s attack.


    That wasn''t the main goal of Lin Fan''s attack though. He had only sent the sh out to distract the assassins that were still maintaining the array.


    There was another beam of light that appeared above the assassins that knocked another one of them down.


    With two of them getting knocked out of formation like this, the barrier was much weakerpared to before. It had reached the point where Lin Fan was able to shatter it with one more good sh.

 Chapter 666 New Mission

    After he had broken free of the array around him, Lin Fan immediately turned to the other three assassins.


    Based on how they were positioned, it was clear that they were nning to escape this ce, but how could Lin Fan let them escape that easily?


    He transformed his sword into three daggers that he threw out at the three of them.


    Even if splitting the Iron Eater Bone Artifact into three meant that he was cutting its power in three as well, Lin Fan made up for that by injecting his ownws and powers into it.


    But what caught Lin Fan off guard was when he tried using the golden energy of the golden suns in his dantian.


    The moment that he drew out that power, he felt overwhelmed by how intense it was. It had be countless times strongerpared to before, reaching a point where it was almost hard for him to control.


    Still, Lin Fan was able to control it in the end and injected it into the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    When he did, the otherws that he had also infused into the daggers started avoiding this golden energy. It was almost as if they were subservient to this golden energy and were making way for it.


    It was hard for Lin Fan not to notice this, but he chose to ignore it temporarily as he focused on the three assassins.


    The daggers urately flew at the assassins, however since they were all experts, they naturally sensed the daggersing at them.


    The assassins all turned and pulled out their weapons to block the dagger that wasing at them. The two sides shed and it seemed like they were going to block the daggers, but then there was a golden burst of light that appeared.


    The daggers covered in the golden energy cut right through their weapons and stabbed right into their bodies.


    With their instincts, the assassins twisted their bodies to avoid a fatal blow. Then adding in the fact that Lin Fan didn''t want to deal a fatal blow, so he avoided any fatal areas, the assassins were able to avoid being heavily injured by the daggers.


    But after the daggers had stabbed the assassins, there was a sudden burst of golden light that appeared.


    The assassins felt a powerful energy flow through them and this energy was clearly not friendly as it started raging in their bodies. They quickly released their own life energy inside of their own bodies just to block this energy that had invaded them.


    They were able to block the energy in the end, but that didn''t mean that they were able to escape unfazed.


    All three of the assassins had received heavy internal injuries from the sh of energy that had happened inside of their bodies, causing them to copse onto the ground unconscious.


    Even as they copsed, they still couldn''t understand what had just happened. After all, the golden energy that Lin Fan used was only visible to people who had it, so the three assassins had no idea what had happened other than the powerful energy rushing into their bodies.


    But it was different for Lin Fan who could see everything that happened.


    He watched as the golden energy rushed into the bodies of the assassins, showing a strength that he had never seen before.


    Though even without this, he could tell that something was off because of how hard it was for him to control the golden energy that came from the golden sun in his dantian. It was like opening a dam that suddenly caused a flood of this golden energy to spill out and of course, a flood was much harder to control than a steady stream.


    However, this wasn''t all bad news.


    There was no doubt that he was much strongerpared to before with this increase in the power of his golden energy. The only thing he had to do now was slowly find a way to control it.


    Once the assassins had been knocked out, therger array that had formed dissipated and the ones that released this array revealed themselves.


    Naturally the ones that had formed this array were on Lin Fan''s side since they had just saved him and it wasn''t a surprise that they were Lin Fan''s pets.


    As soon as he had noticed that he had been surrounded, Lin Fan had released his pets around him so that they could act at any moment.


    Perhaps they might not have been able to move unnoticed if it was before, but after taking this trial, Lin Fan''s understanding of hisws had be much better. This allowed him to easily cover his pets inws that allowed them to sneak around the assassins.


    The main thing was that while he had been in the trial''s Illusion Space, he had been given the opportunity to touch higher gradews.


    Even if he didn''t fully grasp it since they werews that were only lent to him through his pets, as well asws that were simted since it was just an Illusion Space, it still gave him plenty of experience with controlling thosews at a level that was far beyond his current level. This gave him plenty of experience to learn how to control his ownws now that he was back in his own body.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, that didn''t just apply to thews that he currently had¡­


    When he had been in that Illusion Realm as Xia Yu, he had tamed millions of different pets.


    While they weren''t all in the Ruler Realm like his strongest pets, many of them were still in the realm that was above the Soul Realm. The amount ofws that he had had at his disposal was innumerable.


    Now that he was back in his own body, his understanding ofws didn''t just apply to thews that he had already had, but rather he had understandings ofws that he didn''t currently possess.


    With the cultivation technique that he had obtained, as long as he found pets that had thews that hecked, with a mix of both the cultivation technique and absorption power, he could make anyw his.


    The one downside was that focusing on too manyws would make it hard for him to progress since eachw required more life energy for him to break through. So the morews that he grasped, the harder it would be for him to break through.


    But that didn''t matter since he had his new cultivation technique.


    Each pet that he tamed would help him increase his cultivation, so he would use numbers to help himself increase his cultivation.


    After his pets appeared, Lin Fan had them guard the surroundings while he started searching through bodies of the assassins.


    They were all unconscious now and Lin Fan would take this time to make sure that they wouldn''t have anything that they could use to escape. After all, he still had questions that he needed answers to, so he would still have to wake them up and question them.


    Once he finished stripping them, he tied them up andid them out on the ground before having Xiao Bai conjure some water that he threw in their faces.


    As soon as the water sshed on their faces, the five assassins all woke up.


    Their first instincts were naturally to reach for their weapons since they remembered what happened, but since Lin Fan had tied them up, they couldn''t move at all.


    Once they realized that they were being bound, they immediately started looking around themselves to determine what the situation was. Of course, being bound as they were, they couldn''t really see much other than what was in front of them.


    However, none of that mattered since the moment they saw Lin Fan, they immediately narrowed their eyes and focused on him.


    It didn''t take them much to figure out what was happening, so they focused their attention on Lin Fan, trying to find out what he wanted with them.


    Lin Fan had been waiting for this, so once he saw that they were all looking at him, he opened his mouth to speak. It was just too bad that before he was able to say a thing, all five of them suddenly spat out mouthfuls of blood.


    None of them even had a chance to react before all five of them had their eyes roll back in their sockets.


    Lin Fan knew that something was off, so he immediately leaned down to take their pulses, but he found that all five of them were dead.


    He immediately knitted his brows as he started looking over them to see what caused their deaths, but there was nothing unusual about their bodies. Even when he used his spiritual senses to search inside of their bodies, he wasn''t able to find anything at all.


    p Lin Fan knitted his brows even deeper as he fell into deep thought, but the surprises didn''t stop there.</anda>


    "Ding, a new mission has been released."


    "Protect the members of the Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and the Alchemist King Hall from the dangers of this Ancient Era Ruins. Each member that is lost will affect the final reward, so please strive to save as many people as possible."


    "Reward: ess to the Secret Shop (7 Days), hidden rewards based on how many people are saved."


    "Failure conditions: All members of the Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and the Alchemist King Hall other than the host dies."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being pulled out of his thoughts to fall into deeper shock.


    After all this time, the system was finally releasing another mission¡­

 Chapter 667 Surveillance

    It had been such a long time since another mission had been released that Lin Fan almost forgot that this function existed.


    But what he was truly shocked by wasn''t the fact that another mission was released, but rather the contents of the mission.


    Normally the missions would rte to the development of the store, but now it was telling him to save the members of the Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and the Alchemist King Hall.


    He could understand the Hunters Organization and the Myriad Sword Hall since they were working with each other, so there would be benefits to the store if they were saved. However, the Alchemist King Hall¡­There wasn''t any rtionship between them other than the fact that Song Shu was currently there, so why would the system want him to save those people?


    Wouldn''t it make more sense to save the people from the Ice Goddess Hall or even the Tamers Guild that he was cooperating with secretly?


    Why the Alchemist King Hall out of all the groups?


    But of course, even if Lin Fan had his questions, the system didn''t have to answer them.


    When he even thought about this, the system gave him a nostalgic response.


    p "Host, please do not doubt the missions the system gives, first warning."</anda>


    Lin Fan didn''t know why, but it feltforting hearing this warning from the system. Even though technically, the system was threatening him¡­


    He didn''t know why, but ever since he hade to this upper realm, it was almost as if the system had been silent. It was almost as if the system had abandoned him¡­


    He still was able to ess all the different functions that the system provided, but with the missions stopping, it was almost as if the system had stopped guiding him.


    He still had other things to do since he had his own goals ining to this upper realm, but there was a part of him deep down that was concerned. After all, his system was the greatest support that he was relying on after being reincarnated and if his system no longer wanted him, what would happen to him?


    What would he use to protect the people he wanted to protect?


    But as the system gave him another mission, his heart started to settle as he felt that the system was back to guiding him.


    Since that was the case, then the first thing he should do was finish this mission.


    With this thought in mind, Lin Fan gave the corpses of the assassins to Brainy to handle before putting them into his storage space. Once they were all stored, Lin Fan left this ce and started heading back to where most of the staircases were grouped together.


    ¡­


    Deep inside of Lin Fan''s soul, inside the golden pce.


    The version of Lin Fan covered in the golden glow watched the scene on the screen in front of him.


    The screen was broadcasting what was happening outside, showing Lin Fan as he moved towards the area where the staircases were concentrated.


    However, it was clear by the zed eyes of the golden Lin Fan that he wasn''t paying attention to the image on the screen. It was clear that he was looking at something that was much further off as he was lost in his thoughts.


    After a long time, the golden Lin Fan muttered to himself, "Running away? Am I running away from the past?"


    There was only silence that met this question.


    ¡­


    After Lin Fan reached the area where the staircases were grouped together, Lin Fan started releasing Brainy''s scouts.


    While he had ced seeds onto the members of the Hunters Organization group, he hadn''t ced seeds on the Myriad Sword Hall group members, let alone the members of the Alchemy King Hall members.


    His mission was to ensure that they didn''t die and while he couldn''t make sure that they didn''t die in the trials, he could make sure that they didn''t die outside of the trials. He could make sure that they didn''t die because of other people.


    But to do that, he had to make sure that he was able to find them.


    Even with the Hunters Organization members, Lin Fan had no idea how to track them right now.


    It seemed like the trial space was apletely different subspace created with spatialws. So even if Brainy had ced her seeds on them, she wasn''t currently able to sense where they were.


    So the only thing that Lin Fan could do now was release his scouts around the area and see if he could find them. Once he did, he would make sure that those scouts stuck to them to ensure that they were safe.


    Of course, he couldn''t stop them from going into the trials, so he would just try to save as many as he could.


    After all, the mission never said that he had to save everyone and he knew that it would be impossible for him to save everyone.<sub> </sub>


    There were already members of both the Myriad Sword Hall and the Alchemy King Hall that had already died along the way.


    As he released his scouts, he found that there were some people that were walking around the area, looking through the various staircases that were avable to them. There were also some people that were covered in injuries, clearly having juste out of a trial.


    However, none of the people that he found were the people that he was looking for.


    But one of the groups that he did find was the group from the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    They were all covered in wounds and were in a sorry state, showing that they clearly had a hard time with whatever trial they had chosen to undertake.


    They had already moved back into the forest and were currently hiding in a cave, trying to draw as little attention as possible while they tried to heal up as much as they could.


    It was clear by their actions that they had found some kind of treasure and were doing all they could to protect it. It was just too bad that Lin Fan had found them.


    Still, he wasn''t crazy enough to attack them all by himself.


    First, he wasn''t willing to reveal his full power since he still didn''t know where the group from the Assassins Association was yet.


    Second, he was more concerned about finding the targets for his mission instead of attacking their group right now.


    And third, the most dangerous anyone could be was when they were backed into a corner. They would fight with power that they normally didn''t have and Lin Fan wasn''t willing to face the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group like this.


    Well, it wasn''t that he wasn''t willing to face them like this, but rather there were others that could do the job for him.


    After all, there were plenty of other groups from the twelve great sects that could be lured in to do the work for him.


    Lin Fan just spent the rest of the day surveilling the entire area, waiting for the members of the groups that he had to save for his mission to show up.


    By the time that night fell, there were several members of the Alchemy King Hall and the Myriad Sword Hall that appeared, but none of them were people that Lin Fan recognized.


    Still that didn''t matter to him at all since he just needed to keep an eye on them.


    There were none of them that weren''t injured, so there was no one that headed into another trial right away. All of them went to find a ce to hide and rest before they were attacked by others.


    As other people from the same faction came out, they went to find the people from the same faction.


    So by the time night fell, most people that were out of their trials were resting up in groups.


    Lin Fan wasn''t in a rush since he knew that these trials took different amounts of time based on how hard they were. He had faith in the people that he knew were able to survive since he knew how strong they were.


    So instead of putting all his attention to this, he instead turned his attention to another operation that he was taking charge of.


    ¡­


    The Dian and Ying Family group were sitting in a clearing in the forest with two other groups which were the Zu and Chu Family groups.


    These four families were the four great families of the twelve great factions and since they were factions that were ruled by family members alone, they stuck together with each other against the rest of the factions. Though there were rivalries that formed between them, there were also marriages between the families that they could be considered allies with each other.


    But of course, everything changed depending on the benefits that they would receive.


    For now though, in these Ancient Era Ruins, the four great families chose to work together to get as many treasures as they could from here.


    They moved separately during the day, but at night, they would guard each other from any other factions that had bad intentions.


    It would make it much easier on them to decide guard shifts if they split them between the four groups.


    One of the people from the Dian Family group on guard duty suddenly gave a yawn before saying, "It really is boring out there."


    Another person from the Ying Family group red at him and said, "Focus on keeping watch. Who knows what will happen in this ce?"


    Someone from the Zu Family group said, "You''re being too uptight. With so many of us here, do you really think that someone would¡­"


    But before he could finish, there was a sudden roar that came from the forest behind him.

 Chapter 668 Fights In The Night (1)

    All the people on guard suddenly turned in the direction that the roar came from to see a giant tiger charging out of the forest at them.


    They were all experts from the four great families that had been specially chosen toe into this Ancient Era Ruins, so none of them were weak. They all immediately reacted by pulling out their weapons to face the tiger even though they could feel its aura.


    A Child Soul Realm beast!


    They didn''t know why this Child Soul Realm tiger would suddenly attack them, but that didn''t mean that they were just going to back down from it.


    However, they weren''t fools either, thinking that they could take this Child Soul Realm tiger on alone. So one of the guards suddenly turned around to run to the camp to get backup while the other three protected his escape.


    As this person ran off, the other three watched the tiger in front of them with strange looks since they couldn''t understand what this tiger was doing.


    This tiger was just pawing around them, as if it was being wary of them which didn''t make sense at all.


    After all, this tiger was in the Child Soul Realm while the three of them were all in the Embryo Soul Realm. They were only in the High Embryo Soul Realm, not even the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, so they wouldn''t have been able tost under the ws of this Child Soul Realm tiger for long.


    So the fact that it seemed wary made the three of them feel very strange.


    Of course, none of the three of them abandoned their posts as they cautiously watched the tiger walking around in circles.


    If they just withdrew and allowed the tiger to reach the camp, there was no doubt that they would receive strict punishments after returning to the family. At the very least, if the three of them worked together, they could stall long enough for reinforcements to arrive.


    However, in the end, the tiger never made a single move.


    Two minutes passed as the tiger just circled around and then the experts from the camp arrived.


    When the experts saw the Child Soul Realm tiger standing there, they didn''t feel any fear, rather they felt a bit of excitement.


    After all, there were more than four different Child Soul Realm Experts among the experts of the four great families. Even if a beast was stronger than a normal human expert, they far outnumbered the tiger.


    The materials from a Child Soul Realm beast weren''t cheap and now that there was one offering itself to them, how could they refuse?


    So getting into formation, the four Child Soul Realm Experts led the rest of the Embryo Soul Realm Experts to start surrounding the Child Soul Realm tiger. Of course, the Child Soul Realm tiger wouldn''t just let itself be surrounded by these people that easily.


    As soon as it saw that more humans had shown up, it started to turn and run away.


    The experts from the four great families had already had their greed ignited, so they wouldn''t let it get away that easily.


    The four Child Soul Realm Experts left the Embryo Soul Realm Experts behind as they charged forward to stop the Child Soul Realm tiger from running away.


    Since they knew that they outnumbered this Child Soul Realm tiger, they didn''t worry about holding back their life energy as they started moving faster and faster. All they cared about now was catching up to it before it could run away.


    But before they could catch up to the Child Soul Realm tiger, there was a roar that came from the forest in front of them.


    All of them were caught off guard by this roar and before they could react, there were several beasts that jumped out of the forest in front of them. Even the tiger suddenly turned around and attacked them.


    The experts of the four great families might have been caught off guard by the sudden appearance of these beasts, but they were still experts in the end. They immediately raised their guard, but it was just too bad that they were outnumbered.


    There were more than double their number in beasts and they were shocked to find that every single beast was in the Child Soul Realm.


    All four of these human experts were sent flying back into the Embryo Soul Realm Experts that had been running over, knocking the Embryo Soul Realm Experts to the ground.


    The few experts that were still standing looked at the beasts that had suddenly appeared with looks of pure shock.


    "What is going on here? Why are there so many beasts that suddenly appeared?"


    "Why are they all in the Child Soul Realm? Don''t these beasts not work with each other? Why are they suddenly fighting in a pack?"


    "Does any of that matter? Run!"


    After thest person spoke, all of the experts from the four great families jolted back to their senses and immediately turned to run. They all started turning in different directions since they knew that spreading out would give them the best chance of escaping, or rather it would give some of them the best chance of escaping.<sub> </sub>


    As for the ones that were targeted by the beasts, they could only offer their condolences for them.


    Unfortunately for them, the beasts didn''t give them that chance.


    While they had been in a daze from being ambushed by these beasts, the beasts hadn''t stopped moving as they spread out in a circle around the experts of the four great families.


    These human experts weren''t fools, they knew that they would be trapped as long as the beasts were able to fully circle around them, so they immediately started looking for any way of escape.


    To their surprise, they found that the area around them was still open and not guarded by a beast. However, that didn''t seem like it would be the case for long as the beasts to the sides were still moving to circle around them.


    These experts from the four great families immediately seized their chance when they saw this.


    The four Child Soul Realm Experts quickly recovered and they immediately turned as one of them shouted, "Run to the back! Run as fast as you can before we''repletely surrounded!"


    They didn''t understand how the situation had developed to this extent, but they understood that the most important thing for them to do now was to escape this predicament.


    Once they were safe, they would be able to figure out their next moves.


    All of the experts of the four great families ran together as one, forming a wedge formation as they charged at the one hole in the line of the beasts.


    They knew that the beasts wouldn''t let them escape this easily, so they had formed a wedge formation to concentrate all their power into a single point. That way, even if the beasts tried to stop them, they would still be able to break through.


    After all, the only beasts that could reach them to stop them would be the two beasts that were on the side at the very edge of the beasts'' formation.


    But strangely enough, the beasts didn''t rush forward to stop them. Instead, the beasts let them run straight forward.


    However, that didn''t mean that the beasts allowed them to escape.


    The beast formation started moving at the same pace as them, allowing them to continue forward, but they still weren''t able to lose the beasts around them. They continuously charged at the one open space in the line of beasts, but they were never able to break free.


    The experts of the four great families didn''t lose hope at seeing this since they knew that as long as they kept moving, they would be able to avoid being attacked by the beasts.


    The beasts were focused on moving at the same speed as them, so they weren''t able to do anything else. Even if they were to attack them, they would be able to easily dodge these attacks of the beasts and escape their formation.


    So this had suddenly turned into a battle of stamina.


    As they were running along, the four human Child Soul Realm Experts couldn''t help thinking about something.


    When they had chased down the Child Soul Realm tiger, they clearly hadn''t been able to sense anything around them.


    So just where had all these Child Soul Realm beasts appeared from?


    Even if they had been taken by their greed, they hadn''t lost all rationality while chasing the Child Soul Realm tiger. They had been releasing their spiritual senses the entire time to see if there was anything else hiding in the woods.


    But they hadn''t sensed anything at all.


    Then as they looked at the formation of the Child Soul Realm beasts, they almost couldn''t help feeling that it was almost like they were being led somewhere by these beasts.


    After all, the beasts should have seen that there was no use chasing them, but they still kept pace with them.


    Even if they were intelligent beasts because they had broken through to the Soul Realm, beasts still didn''t work that well together since most of them only cared about protecting their own territory.


    These beasts were different, instead of staying in their territory, they hade out to chase after them.


    Could it be that there was someone behind these beasts?


    After all, their behaviour was just too strange.


    As they were lost in their thoughts, someone from the group suddenly called out, "Look, there''s a cave in front of us!"

 Chapter 669 Fights In The Night (2)

    As soon as this voice rang out, everyone''s attention was drawn to the cave that was in front of them.


    They couldn''t see too deeply into the cave since it was too dark tonight, but the eyes of the four Child Soul Realm Experts lit up when they saw this.


    They knew that this cave would be their chance to escape.


    After looking at each other, they all gave nods to each other before one of them suddenly shouted, "Everyone into the cave! Don''t slow down or you''ll be left behind!"


    All the members of the four great families group were surprised to hear this, but they didn''t slow down for even a second as they charged towards the cave.


    The cave was actually slightly to the left, so they had to turn to the left a bit. However, to do so, they would have to defeat the beast that was at the end of the beast line to the left who was blocking their way.


    But the strange thing was that when they moved towards that beast, the beast actually retreated and the formation shifted so that the empty spot in the line of beasts led right to that cave. It was almost as if the beast were tactfully letting them enter that cave.


    No matter how they looked at it, it seemed like they were being led there by someone.


    As for what ns the person who was leading them there had, it was unclear. They just knew that whoever was leading them there definitely didn''t have good intentions.


    Still, that didn''t mean that they had a choice in this matter since they weren''t able to beat the beasts that were currently surrounding them.


    If they were to fight these Child Soul Realm beasts, they would suffer more than just following the n of the master of these beasts. So whether it was in the short term or in the long term, it was better for them to just y along for now.


    Once they entered the cave, the ones in front immediately threw rocks at the entrance of the cave to build a barricade.


    While they were doing that, the stronger experts pulled out their weapons and lined up along the barricade, watching the Child Soul Realm beasts. However, it was as if there was something keeping them away, but the Child Soul Realm beasts stopped moving once they saw that the group from the four great families were inside the cave.


    Seeing this made it clear that they had fallen for some kind of n, so the four great families group didn''t waste any time.


    After looking around the entrance of the cave, they weren''t able to find anything, so they could only decide to go deeper. After all, there must be something special about this cave if someone used these Child Soul Realm beasts to drive them here.


    If only it wasn''t for the Child Soul Realm beasts that were still at the entrance of the cave, they wouldn''t have to go along with this and go deeper. It was just too bad that even though most of them disappeared, there were still two Child Soul Realm beasts that were waiting at a distance to the cave.


    It was clear that if they didn''t do anything, these two Child Soul Realm beasts wouldn''t do anything to them. At the same time, they didn''t dare attack the two Child Soul Realm beasts since they were certain that the other Child Soul Realm beasts must be hiding around this area.


    Just like before, they weren''t able to discover them until it was toote¡­So they weren''t willing to take this risk.


    So after leaving a few experts at the entrance to watch the Child Soul Realm beasts, the rest of the experts from the four great families group headed deeper into the cave.


    What they didn''t notice were the ants and rats that were moving along with them.


    They proceeded cautiously deeper into the cave, but as they moved forward, they couldn''t help feeling anxious.


    This was something that even the master of ten Child Soul Realm beasts couldn''t deal with, so how was it possible that they would be able to deal with it?


    It was clear that this was a death trap that was waiting for them¡­


    As this thought passed through their minds, they also couldn''t help thinking about who the master of these Child Soul Realm beasts was.


    Was there someone that was strong enough to tame ten Child Soul Realm beasts?


    Their first thought had been the Tamers Guild group, but they quickly threw away that thought since they were familiar with the people from the Tamers Guild. It was impossible for them to tame ten Child Soul Realm beasts in this short period of time, even if they worked together.


    After all, there were only two people in the Tamers Guild group that had tamed Child Soul Realm beasts, but none of the beasts that chased them were the ones from the Tamers Guild.


    So these were all Child Soul Realm beasts that had been tamed inside of this Ancient Era Ruins.


    But even if they could tame Child Soul Realm beasts, how could they tame ten of them, or rather five of them each?


    They knew the abilities of the two from the Tamers Guild, so it was impossible for them to do this, no matter how much of their abilities they were hiding.


    So who was it in the end?<sub> </sub>


    While they were thinking this, there was a voice from in front of them that pulled them out of their thoughts.


    All the members of the four great families group fell silent and stopped moving as they listened closely to this voice.


    "Lei Feng, when are you nning on making your move?"


    There was no need for them to guess who the owner of this voice was. After all, there weren''t that many people who dared to address Lei Feng by his full name.


    There was no doubt that this was Shi Yi who led the True Spirit Sect''s group.


    There was no response to this question at first, but then Lei Feng''s voice slowly said, "It''s not time yet. If we move early, it''ll ruin the n."


    This time, it was Shi Yi''s turn to respond with silence.


    The experts of the four great families weren''t idle during this time.


    Making sure that they didn''t make a single sound, the experts of the four great families came closer and closer until they had a clear view of the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group sitting in the middle of the cave around a fire.


    With the fire, they were able to clearly see the figures of those people of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    When they saw them clearly, the eyes of the experts from the four great families lit up since they figured out what the master of the beasts wanted them to do.


    The master of the Child Soul Realm beasts was clearly someone from the twelve great factions since the people he wanted to deal with were the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect. However, this was something that also made them excited since it meant that this wasn''t as dangerous as they thought it would be.


    They had thought that they would be dealing with a beast that was in the Peak Child Soul Realm or even the Nascent Soul Realm, but now that didn''t seem to be the case.


    It was clear that whoever the master of the beasts were, they wanted to use the four great families to deal with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect. This just further confirmed the theory that the master of the beasts was someone from the twelve great factions.


    While it would be hard to deal with the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group, there was a factor that made it easy for them to make a decision.


    The Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group were covered in injuries.


    They were injured too, but they weren''t as injured as the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group. Not to mention that they had the numbers advantage here.


    As for why they were injured, it wasn''t hard to guess.


    They must have taken some trial and found some inheritance which was even more good news.


    After all, the master of the beasts was just using them to take care of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect. If they were to find some extra treasures that the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect had, wouldn''t that mean that they would be able to take them?


    The master of the beasts wanted to hide his identity and use someone else''s hand to take care of them, so naturally he wouldn''t fight them for the treasures of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect since they could be used to track him down.


    Thinking this, the members of the four great families group all revealed smiles.


    They had just been worried that they had been sent to their deaths, but now, it seemed like a pie had fallen out of the sky into theirps.


    Since that was the case, they weren''t against taking it.


    So they all pulled out masks from their Storage Rings before slowly moving through the cave, splitting into four different groups thatpletely surrounded the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect group.


    The Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group really hadn''t set up any defenses in this area since they thought that the cave was the best defense.


    After all, who would be able to find them in a cave in the middle of nowhere?


    It was just too bad that they had underestimated Lin Fan''s abilities.


    Once they were all in ce, the four great families group all looked at each other before charging out with a nod.

 Chapter 670 Fights In The Night (3)

    As soon as they ran out of their hiding spots, the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group immediately noticed them.


    They had been sitting in a circle around the fire, so they were able to see all around them.


    Of course, they were shocked to see that they were being ambushed.


    They had thought that they had found a perfect hiding spot, but now it seemed like they had made a mistake by not posting any guards.


    It didn''t take them long to see that they werepletely outnumbered and based on the aura of the enemies, it seemed like they were also outnumbered in terms of experts.


    The Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect groups only had a Child Soul Realm Expert each, so facing four Child Soul Realm Experts like this was naturally hard for them. Even if Lei Feng was strong enough to match a Child Soul Realm Expert even though he was only in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    As experts and geniuses of the twelve great sects, they naturally had strong wills and quickly recovered from their shock. All members of their group immediately formed a circle formation to meet the enemies rushing at them.


    As the enemies approached, Lei Feng roared out, "Who are you? My Thunder Sect doesn''t have any grievances with any of you!"


    Shi Yi also said, "The True Spirit Sect doesn''t want to fight you either! We can end this peacefully since I''m sure both our sides are injured!"


    However, their words fell onto deaf ears as the experts of the four great families continued charging forward at them.


    As they charged forward, they raised their auras and released their life energy, preparing for the sh between the two sides.


    One of the four Child Soul Realm Experts of the four great families said, "Just ept your deaths."


    Both Lei Feng and Shi Yi knitted their brows when they heard this, but neither of them panicked since they knew that this was the worst thing they could do.


    Arranging the experts from their group to match the lines of the enemies, they were able to stop their charge and fight evenly for a bit, but that didn''tst for long.


    The main factors were the fact that they were injured and they were outnumbered, so no matter how hard they tried to resist, they were going to be worn down eventually.


    The final straw was when one of the experts of the Thunder Sect fell under the de of an enemy.


    It didn''t take long before three more experts from their group fell and they were pushed back into an even tighter circle.


    There had been less than ten of them facing more than twenty enemies, so it was only a matter of time before this happened.


    But they weren''t destined to die tonight since there was someone else who came into the cave before the experts of the four great families could finish off the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    They had moved slowly so no one had heard them over the sounds of fighting, but even then, they didn''t release a single trace of aura that was felt as this person came over. It was almost as if this wasn''t a living person.


    But once this person came up behind the experts of the four great families, he suddenly gave a snort and said, "Useless."


    Everyone was shocked the moment that they heard this voice.


    This voice wasn''t loud, but it was clearly heard by everyone here.


    However, they hadn''t sensed this person approaching at all. So how did they suddenly appear behind them?


    When the two sides saw who it was, they showed very different reactions.


    The experts of the four great families revealed shocked looks since they weren''t able to sense the aura from this person at all. This meant that either this person didn''t have any cultivation or¡­


    As for the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect group, the moment that they saw this person, they all revealed looks of joy.


    Both Lei Feng and Shi Yi revealed excited looks as they muttered, "It''s the lord!"


    The person was no one other than the figure with the different coloured cloak that had been with the Assassins Association.


    The cloaked figure ignored them and looked at the experts of the four great families.


    The experts from the four great families looked at this person with a wary look, but it didn''t take them long to recognize who this person was. After all, there had only been a single group that had remained in cloaks the entire time.


    As well, among the Dian Family experts, there were the ones that had encountered this person before.


    They knew that this person definitely wasn''t easy to deal with, so they warned the Child Soul Realm Expert from the Dian Family.<sub> </sub>


    This Child Soul Realm Expert looked at that person to confirm these facts before turning to the cloaked person to say, "This friend from the Assassins Association, this is a matter between our groups. We aren''t looking for any trouble with you and consider it a favour if you leave now."


    The four great families didn''t know about the cooperation between the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association, so they thought that this person had passed by here by ident.


    Since they could tell that this person wasn''t easy to deal with, they decided to see if they could reason with him first.


    After all, why waste the energy fighting when things could be settled with words?


    It was just too bad that the cloaked figure clearly wasn''t in the mood to talk.


    The cloaked figure raised a hand and there were spikes of ice that suddenly formed in the air.


    When the person from the Dian Family saw this, they immediately remembered what had happened earlier in the day and shouted, "Dodge it!"


    Everyone was surprised by this shout from this person, but they all jumped back in several different directions.


    The ice spikes flew out where they had just been and while they were floating in the air, the ice spikes suddenly changed directions.


    These ice spikes started following the people flying through the air, as if it was being guided by something. It flew right at four experts from the four great families, aiming right at their chests.


    The experts were stuck in the air and it wasn''t easy for them to maneuver, so they had no choice but to raise their weapons to block these ice spikes.


    Since they couldn''t sense the aura of this person, they knew that this person must be stronger than them, so they didn''t hold back at all as they released all their life energy to defend with.


    All four of these experts were Peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts, so they weren''t weak by any sense. Even if they were to be hit by the attacks of a Child Soul Realm Expert, they would still be able to defend against it.


    However, the ice spikespletely ignored their life energy barriers and pierced right through their weapons before stabbing their bodies.


    When these four expertsnded on the ground, they had lost all signs of life.


    Everyone looked at the four corpses on the ground with shocked looks.


    Four Peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts were taken out just like this¡­It was clear that this person wasn''t normal.


    The Dian Family Child Soul Realm Expert turned back and shouted, "You, we clearly have no ill will towards you! How dare you be this ruthless! Do you really think that your Assassins Association can go against all four of our families?"


    When the cloaked figure heard this, he gave a snort and said, "You pieces of trash dare to talk to me like this?"


    Without another word, he raised his hand again and even more ice spikes appeared in the air.


    None of these ice spikes were weaker than the spikes from before, but there were much more ice spikespared to before. It was clear that this person had been holding back previously.


    Seeing the desperate situation that they were facing, the experts of the four great families looked at each other before the Child Soul Realm Experts shouted, "Gather together!"


    It was clear that they weren''t able to face these ice spikes alone, the four corpses on the ground had proven that.


    Unless they came together and gathered their life energy together to resist it, it was very likely that they would all die here. Of course, none of them were willing to just keel over that easily, so all of the experts of the four great families gathered together immediately to release all their life energy and form a barrier.


    But even with all of them forming the barrier, it was only barely able to stop all the ice spikes that flew out.


    They were getting slowly pushed back step by step as cracks began forming on the barrier in front of them. It was clear that it was only a matter of time before the barrier cracked and the ice spikes pierced them all.


    However, the cloaked figure couldn''t ept this.


    The cloaked figure saw that his attack had been stopped by these people and after giving a dissatisfied snort, he raised his hand. His hand stayed in the air a bit before he pushed forward.


    As he pushed forward, the power behind the ice spikes suddenly became stronger and even more cracks formed on the barrier.


    But that barrier onlysted an instant after he pushed as it shattered to pieces.


    As the experts of the four great families prepared to get stabbed by the icicles, there was another sh of light.


    Ten different coloured attacks suddenly flew out, shing against the ice spikes before actually shattering them to pieces.

 Chapter 671 Fights In The Night (4)

    When the ice spikes shattered in front of them, the experts of the four great families and the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect group were stunned.


    They all knew how powerful these ice spikes were, so they were shocked that they had been shattered that easily.


    As for the cloaked figure, he knitted his brows under his cloak before turning in the direction that the ten attacks hade from. As soon as he saw the source of these ten attacks, he knitted his brows even deeper.


    After all, he hadn''t been able to sense these ten Child Soul Realm beasts approaching at all.


    For someone like him to not be able to sense these Child Soul Realm beasts, it really was something that he didn''t expect. But at the same time, he could feel the me of rage burning in him as this thought hit him.


    Who was he?


    If someone could even hide from him, how could he not feel angry from embarrassment?


    The cloaked figure turned in the direction of the ten Child Soul Realm beasts and raised his hand before saying in an ice cold voice, "Die."


    It was so cold that it almost froze the rest of the people in this cave, but this wasn''t rted to them at all since most of the chill was directed at the ten Child Soul Realm beasts. However, the ten Child Soul Realm beasts acted as if they didn''t feel the chill at all as they continued facing the cloaked figure.


    After the cloaked figure raised his hand, there were even more ice spikes that started condensing in the air. The amount of ice spikes even surpassed the amount that this cloaked figure had condensed previously when he attacked the experts of the four great families.


    That was an attack that all the experts of the four great families working together couldn''t resist.


    The ten Child Soul Realm beasts didn''t panic at all as they suddenly released their life energy.


    It seemed like they were nning on shing with the cloaked figure directly.


    When the cloaked figure saw this, he knew that he was being looked down on and that filled him with even more rage.


    He looked at these ten Child Soul Realm beasts and said with another cold snort, "Overestimating yourselves."


    He raised his hand even further up and condensed even more ice spikes around him.


    The cloaked figure had been holding back since he knew that it wouldn''t have been a good idea for him to use that much power here. After all, if he used too much power, it would expose his identity and that was thest thing that he wanted.


    So he held back enough to just so that he didn''t surpass the Child Soul Realm, but this was enough power to even push back someone in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    He would wipe out these lowly beasts that dared to look down on him.


    Once he had finished condensing his ice spikes, the cloaked figure gave another cold snort before flicking his hand, sending the ice spikes out at the ten Child Soul Realm beasts.


    The ten Child Soul Realm beasts could feel the power contained within these ice spikes and they couldn''t help trembling when they felt this.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan controlling them, they would have run away already. But Lin Fan was controlling them through the contract, so they didn''t back down in the end.


    Instead, they released all their life energy and got into a certain formation, creating a barrier around them.


    The cloaked figure could tell that there was something strange about this barrier, but his pride wouldn''t allow him to back down at this time.


    Since he wasn''t able to use more life energy since it would break through the limit that he had set on his power, he chose to release more spiritual sense. As long as there was a single change, he would be able to detect it and react immediately with his spiritual sense.


    He wouldn''t let them y a single trick.


    The ice spikes just flew forward until it mmed into the barrier of the ten Child Soul Realm beasts, but the end result was still something that had shocked the cloaked figure.


    The result wasn''t the shattering of the barrier, an even sh between the two sides, or even the ice spikes being repelled.


    As soon as the ice spikes touched the barrier, they were immediately broken down and disappeared without a trace. The cloaked figure couldn''t even feel the life energy that he had released anymore.


    Even if the cloaked figure was someone with pride, he wasn''t able to hold back the shock that he felt at this moment.


    His mouth had unconsciously opened a bit wider as he muttered, "How¡­"<sub> </sub>


    But before he could finish saying what he wanted to say, there was another change with the barrier.


    The barrier started to get brighter and brighter until it was so dazzling that it was too hard to look at directly. However, it wasn''t just the brightness of the barrier that continued to increase, it was also the aura of the barrier that increased along with this brightness.


    The cloaked figure could tell that an attack wasing, but once again his pride didn''t let him retreat.


    So he raised his hand again and formed a barrier in front of him.


    This barrier didn''t use anything close to his full power, but he still didn''t believe that these lowly beasts would be able to break it.


    The barrier of the beasts finally reached a peak and then it released a single ball of white light.


    This ball of white light moved slowly at first, but then as it approached the cloaked figure, it started increasing in speed. It moved faster and faster until even the cloaked figure wasn''t able to follow it with his eyes.


    Still, he didn''t panic since he believed that his barrier would be strong enough to stop it.


    The white ball of light mmed into the barrier of the cloaked figure and at first, it was as he had expected. The white ball of light hit the barrier and couldn''t break through it. It was even being pushed back slightly by the barrier of the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure revealed a smug smile when he saw this and he was about to say something, but then something happened that made him swallow those words.


    As he opened his mouth to speak, the white ball of light suddenly erupted with a force thatpletely pushed him back.


    He stared at the white ball of light in shock as he tried to release more life energy to block it. However, the white ball of light''s power increased far faster than he could release life energy to strengthen his barrier and before he could stop it, the barrier shattered under the attack of the white ball of light.


    After shattering the barrier, the white ball of light hit the cloaked figure right in his chest and mmed him down into the ground. Even after mming him into the ground, the white ball of light didn''t dissipate as it pushed him back, sliding him across the ground.


    Finally, the cloak of the cloaked figure released a bright glow that shattered the white ball of light that had been at his chest.


    When the cloaked figure finally stopped sliding, he took a few seconds to gather his thoughts ande back to his senses before being filled with rage once again.


    He had actually been pushed back by the attack of these lowly beasts?


    Him?


    The cloaked figure immediately jumped up out of the hole in the ground and turned to look in the direction where the ten Child Soul Realm beasts had been standing previously, but all he saw was an empty space as they had disappeared.


    He immediately turned to look at where the experts of the four great families had been standing previously and as expected, all of them had disappeared along with the Child Soul Realm beasts. The only ones that were still standing here were the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect groups who were looking at the cloaked figure with shocked looks.


    The cloaked figure was filled with even more rage, but his rationality prevented him from chasing after the Child Soul Realm beasts.


    He knew that if he were to chase after them now, the gains wouldn''t outweigh the losses. So even if he was filled with rage over what had happened, he could only force himself to stay here.


    Lei Feng was the first one to snap out of his daze and he quickly came forward to kneel as he said, "My lord, I can send someone to chase¡­."


    But before he could finish, the cloaked figure pped him across the face, sending him to the ground before saying, "You piece of trash, you can''t even keep watch over some lowly beasts. What use are you?"


    Even if Lei Feng was a genius, even if he had his pride as the young master of the Thunder Sect, he didn''t dare say anything in response to this.


    He knew what kind of identity this cloaked figure had and even if he had a thousand lives, it wouldn''t have been enough for him to stand up to him.


    The cloaked figure saw that he was silent and didn''t bother with him anymore.


    In fact, that p just now was nothing more than venting the anger that had been in his heart. However, he wouldn''t go any further than this because he still needed the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    With a snort, the cloaked figure turned and walked further deeper into the cave.


    The people from the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect lowered their heads as they saw this. Only when he was gone did they let out a sigh of relief.

 Chapter 672 Calm Before The Storm

    Outside the cave, the experts of the four great families were sitting down to catch their breath.


    Around them were the ten Child Soul Realm beasts that had guided them to the cave in the first ce, but these were also the same beasts that had saved them from that cloaked figure just now.


    After catching their breath, the four Child Soul Realm Experts carefully came over to the one Child Soul Realm beast that had signaled for them to follow it earlier.


    They were still wary of the Child Soul Realm beasts, but they also couldn''t feel any hostilitying from them at this moment.


    So one of the four Child Soul Realm Experts said, "Thank you for saving us." But then after a pause, his voice filled with doubt as he asked, "But why did you save us? What are your intentions?"


    There was still that fact that it was these ten Child Soul Realm beasts that had driven them to this cave in the first ce. If it wasn''t for them, they wouldn''t have been caught up in this mess at all.


    The one Child Soul Realm beast lifted a paw and dropped a piece of paper in front of this Child Soul Realm Expert.


    <o>,m Then without even looking back at them, all the Child Soul Realm beasts suddenly disappeared into the trees. Even when they tried searching for them with their spiritual senses, they couldn''t find a single thing.</o>


    It was just like what had happened when these beasts had ambushed them.


    Seeing that they couldn''t follow them, aftering back to their senses, the Child Soul Realm Expert went over to the piece of paper that the beasts had left.


    He picked it up and when he saw what was written, his face was filled with even more shock.


    He turned and let the other Child Soul Realm Experts see what was written and they all revealed the same look of shock.


    After a long moment of silence, one of them finally asked, "If what''s written is true, what should we do about this?"


    There was a bitterugh from another one of them before they said, "Is there really anything to consider here?"


    The other three looked at this one thatughed and then the one thatughed said in a serious voice, "We''ve already offended one side, is there really anything left to consider?"


    These words hung heavy over them, but still not a single one of them said a thing because they knew that he was right.


    It was just¡­


    The cloaked figure was just too strong.


    It was clear that the cloaked figure hadn''t evene close to using his full power and yet he was able to dominate all of them. He was even able to face all the Child Soul Realm beasts by himself¡­


    While they didn''t know anything about the master of the Child Soul Realm beasts yet, they knew that he wouldn''t be normal since he was able to control all those Child Soul Realm beasts.


    Their only concern was if the master of these beasts could defeat the cloaked figure.


    If they were to back the wrong side¡­


    The most important thing was that this would determine whether they would be able to leave these Ancient Era Ruins or not.


    So this wasn''t a decision that they could make lightly.


    After all, with the power that these two sides had, it was clear that they wouldn''t just let them leave that easily.


    On the piece of paper that they were holding, there was only a single sentence written.


    "The Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect are working with the Assassins Association."


    ¡­


    Back where Lin Fan was, he was focused on Brainy who was giving him reports.


    After he hadmanded the ten Child Soul Realm beasts to escape with the experts of the four great families, he had been focused on watching the movements of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    Of course, that naturally included the cloaked figure from the Assassins Association.


    However, when the scouts that Brainy had left in the cave tried to follow the cloaked figure as he made his way deeper into the cave, they found that there was a barrier that kept them out.


    Brainy had many different kinds of scouts, so she had tried sending them through various different methods to prate the barrier. Of course that was prating the barrier through ways that couldn''t be detected.


    However, none of those different scouts could find a way to make it through the barrier that had been ced. Even when trying to dig under it or above it, they found that the barrier was actually ced inside of the walls of the cave as well.


    No matter how they tried digging around it, they weren''t able to do so. It was as if the barrier formed a perfect sphere around the area where the cloaked figure was.<sub> </sub>


    Seeing that was the case, Brainy had no choice but to give up in the end.


    After a bit of thought, Lin Fan said, "Forget it, there''s no point in trying to force our way in. It''ll be bad if he discovers what we''re doing."


    Brainy looked like she didn''t want to give up, but seeing that Lin Fan had already spoken, she had no choice but to pull her scouts away from the barrier in the cave. The only scouts that she left in the end were the ones that were watching the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect group.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything else at first, but then he asked, "Do you know where the groups of the other factions are?"


    Brainy nodded and drew up a simple map of the surrounding area that marked where each group was currently camping out.


    Of course, these groups were small for the amount of people that came in because not everyone hade out of their trials yet. Once more and more people came out, it was certain that the distribution would change as groups with more members would seize more and more territory.


    After all, it wasn''t just the trials alone that gave them benefits. There were plenty of herbs and beast materials that could be collected in the surrounding area as well.


    If they became too injured from the trials, they wouldn''t take the trials anymore and would focus on collecting the materials from the surrounding areas instead.


    Once that happened, it was certain that there would be a sh between factions over these materials.


    That also wasn''t counting the final sh that would happen between the other factions and the cloaked figure, which was clearly the cloaked figure''s n. The cloaked figure hadn''t hidden how domineering he had been the entire time, so it wasn''t hard to figure out.


    Before that, Lin Fan had to prepare since he wasn''t certain if he could beat him with pure power alone.


    In fact, Lin Fan wasn''t even certain what the upper limit of the cloaked figure''s power was because he had never seen him fighting at full strength. Whenever he had faced him, he had always felt that he was holding back for some reason.


    If there was ever a time where he stopped holding back¡­


    That would be a disaster for them.


    So after some thought, Lin Fan pointed at several points on the map and said to Brainy, "I need you to set up a few things at these locations. Just¡­"


    ¡­


    Five more days passed after the sh in the cave without much happening.


    During this time, there were more and more people that came out of the trials and there were even people that went into a second trial.


    As Lin Fan had expected, the people of the Hunters Organization had been able to clear the trial with just two of them being lost, but they were two that Lin Fan didn''t recognize.


    Still, that was an eptable loss since that was how these Ancient Era Ruins were designed. Of course, their own greed was also one of the reasons why they had lost their lives and they couldn''t me anyone but themselves.


    After they all came out of the trials, Lin Fan immediately gathered them in a group and filled them in on the situation.


    All of them immediately believed Lin Fan. He had been able to find them immediately right after they came out of the trials, which proved his surveince abilities. As well, they all knew that the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association were nning something.


    So they all started following Lin Fan''s instructions as they made preparations for the final sh.


    Lin Fan also contacted the Myriad Sword Hall, the Ice Goddess Pce, and the Tamers Guild and filled them in on the situation.


    The Myriad Sword Hall and Ice Goddess Pce were more inclined to listen to them, but the Tamers Guild weren''t as cooperative as they continued heading into the trials.


    Still, that didn''t matter to Lin Fan since he knew that the Tamers Guild wasn''t something that he could trust in the first ce.


    In the end, they wouldn''t be able to run from the ns of the Assassins Association, so he just let them do what they wanted.


    As for the Alchemy King Hall, he chose to ignore them for the most part.


    While they were part of his mission, it wasn''t imperative that he saved everyone for the mission and he chose to focus on saving the ones that he could. It would be very hard for him to work with the Alchemy King Hall since they didn''t have any previous connections, so he chose to let them fend for themselves.


    Of course, he sent a secret letter to them with the ten Child Soul Realm beasts that gave them the same information as the four great families.


    He believed that they wouldn''t be foolish enough to ignore this.


    With all these ns in ce, Lin Fan waited for the move of the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and Assassins Association group, but they didn''t do a thing during these five days.


    It was only on the sixth day that there was movement in the cave.

 Chapter 673 Final Clash (1)

    There was a group of three people from the Hunters Organization that were moving through the forest.


    They had been collecting various herbs and killing beasts for materials.


    Everything had been going smoothly since the morning, but Murong Yue couldn''t help feeling that something was off.


    Over the past few days, they had been preparing to fight the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association, but today, Lin Fan suddenly allowed her to lead a group to look for herbs and beast materials.


    It was clear that he was using them as bait for the enemies, but it almost felt like he was rushing things which made her a bit worried.


    After all, there really wasn''t a need for them to use bait since the enemies would eventually make their move. With the traps that they had set, it wouldn''t be a problem for them to wait for the enemies to make a move before attacking them.


    However, Lin Fan chose to send them out as bait for the enemies still.


    Actually, she was right that Lin Fan was trying to rush this, but it was for a different reason from what she thought it was.


    Lin Fan wasn''t rushing this because he was not confident in his own n, but rather because he wanted to save as many of the other people as possible.


    If the enemies were to make a move, they would naturally start from whoever was closest to them, which was actually the Alchemist King Hall group.


    Even if Lin Fan had chosen to abandon them, he couldn''t justpletely abandon them since they were still important for his quest. If he was able to save them, he would at least attempt to save them.


    Which was why he had sent Murong Yue out.


    As for the other two members of Murong Yue''s group, they were her loyal subordinates, so they didn''t question anything as they followed her.


    After half a day of collecting herbs and hunting beasts, they still didn''t encounter anyone at all.


    However, when Murong Yue and her two subordinates let their guard down the slightest bit, they realized that they had made a mistake.


    As soon as they took a moment to rx and take a break, there were several attacks that suddenly rained down on them.


    They weren''t able to make it in time to block these attacks and they were preparing to take it with their bodies, but the pain never came. In fact, they couldn''t even feel the life energy waves that should havee from the hits that they received.


    When they looked up, they found that there was a barrier that had formed in front of them.


    None of them understood why this barrier had formed, but they knew that if it hadn''t formed, it would have been bad for them. So they knew that whoever made this barrier was clearly on their side.


    Actually, it wasn''t that hard to guess who made this barrier if they thought about it carefully.


    However, there wasn''t time for any of that as there were several cloaked figures that had appeared in the trees around them. They stood above and looked down at them, waiting for the smoke from their attacks to clear.


    After the smoke cleared and they saw that Murong Yue''s group was unharmed, one of them who was clearly the leader said, "Finish them. Make sure that you don''t harm the one with the red hair, the rest you can kill."


    As soon as his voice fell, the other figures jumped out of the trees and pulled out their weapons, falling down towards Murong Yue''s group.


    Murong Yue''s group immediately pulled out their weapons to meet them, but before the two sides could sh, there were attacks that suddenly flew out from around them.


    Both sides were surprised by these attacks since they clearly didn''t expect them and definitely no one expected that the attacks would be aimed at the cloaked figures.


    The cloaked figures all raised their weapons to block these attacks out of instinct, but as soon as they did, they realized their mistakes. The moment that they turned their attention to these attacks, they realized that the power of these attacks far exceeded what they had expected.


    It was just too bad that they didn''t have any time to dodge it either as the attacks were just too fast for them to follow.


    So in the end, the attacks mmed right into them and knocked them out of the air. They were like kites that had their strings cut as they fell to the ground, creating several plumes of dust.


    Then as the plumes of dust settled, their sorry appearances were revealed.


    The cloaked figures were mainly in the Embryo Soul Realm, so when faced with these attacks that held the power of the Child Soul Realm, it was hard for them to resist. However, they were still able to block more than half of the power contained in these attacks because of their weapons.


    All of them had Child Soul Realm Artifacts, which was what gave them the confidence to ambush Murong Yue who was in the Child Soul Realm.<sub> </sub>


    Still, the attacks caused quite a bit of damage to these figures.


    p The leader who had still been in the tree watching over things suddenly turned in the direction that the attacks came from and released his spiritual senses. However, when he couldn''t find the attackers, he knitted his brows and asked, "Who is it? Do you hold some grudge against us?"</anda>


    He shouted this out in a threatening voice, but there was no answer that was given.


    Instead, there were more attacks that suddenly appeared in the air, flying out at this leader.


    The leader had his spiritual sense around him, so he had noticed these attacks as soon as he appeared, but he knitted his brows even deeper when he sensed these attacks. After all, these were ten different attacks in the Child Soul Realm.


    Not to mention that each of these attacks contained a differentw, which meant that they came from different experts since it was incredibly rare for someone to have more than a singlew.


    Ten different Child Soul Realm Experts, what kind of a concept was that?


    It had to be known that there were only around twenty Child Soul Realm Experts that entered in the first ce and that was spread out across the twelve great factions. For ten of them to attack at the same time, that would mean that there would be at least five different factions that were working together.


    Five different factions working together just to help the Hunters Organization?


    That would be crazy!


    Not to mention that it would be very detrimental to their n.


    While they had been nning on taking care of all the other factions and taking what they had gained in the trials, their n was to take care of them one by one while they still didn''t know what was happening.


    All of these thoughts passed through the leader''s mind as the attacks approached him.


    The final conclusion that he came to was that no matter what the situation was, the best thing he could do now was escape and report this matter to the lord.


    This leader was someone from the Assassins Association, so what he specialized in was not power, but rather speed.


    As the attacks approached him, this leader didn''t panic at all as he calmly analyzed the path of each attack. Once he finished determining the paths, he immediately jumped off the branch that he was standing in and turned in the air before jumping off some kind of invisible tform in space.


    This jump sent him at a trajectory that perfectly aligned him with a hole in the formation of attacks aimed at him.


    However, right as he was about to pass through that hole, there was something that suddenly stopped him. It was almost as if there was an invisible barrier that appeared that immediately sent him flying back into the midst of the attacks that had been aimed at him.


    The leader revealed a shocked look since he had recognized this barrier.


    This was the array that the lord had given the other members of the Assassins Association to take care of Lin Fan.


    While they had lost contact with the five of them, the lord had said that they wouldn''t be able to take the array from them. So why did it appear around him now?


    This thought however only appeared in the leader''s mind for a second since he didn''t have time to think that much about it. What was more important right now was finding a way out of the trap that he had found himself in.


    Even after being bounced back into the midst of the attacks aimed for him, the leader didn''t panic as he started bouncing around in the air using invisible tforms. This allowed him to keep moving and dodge the attacks that had been aimed at him, but he always dodged by the slightest margins and sometimes, he even had to let the attacks graze him.


    There was no doubt that he hadn''t escaped from those attacks unharmed, but hisbat abilities weren''t affected at least.


    That was unless he was trapped here and wasn''t able to escape to recover.


    Without even thinking, the leader charged out again because he didn''t believe that this barrier around him was the same barrier that the lord had given them before. He was certain that this was just a trick that the enemy was ying on him.


    However, once again, he hit the barrier and was sent flying back into the center of the array.


    Even when he attacked the array with his most powerful attack, there wasn''t even a single ripple that appeared.


    As he was sent back into the center again, there were faint balls of light that appeared around him.

 Chapter 674 Final Clash (2)

    p These balls of light continued to grow in intensity until they were quite bright.</anda>


    Once they reached this level of light, they suddenly started releasing des of light thatpletely surrounded the leader.


    The leader saw this and knew that this wasn''t good for him.


    With the way the des of light were arranged, there just wasn''t any space for him to dodge with. The only way that he could resist the des of light was to use his weapon to cut them down.


    So without any hesitation, the leader pulled out a pair of daggers that he started shing out with all around himself.


    The des of light weren''t that strong, so he was able to easily cut them down, but he knew that this array wouldn''t be this simple. And he was right as the des of light continued to grow in power.


    He knew that this was the same ability as the array that the lord had given the others and he knew that if he didn''t do anything now, he wouldn''t be able to resist the des of light that came afterwards.


    So the leader raised his life energy to the max and gathered all his strength into a single blow. He was so desperate that he even summoned out his pet to help him with this one strike, even though his pet didn''t increase his power, but rather his ability to sneak around.


    Still, even if his pet couldn''t help increase his power, it would work as a meat shield to take a few of the hits for him.


    But after gathering all his power, he noticed that something was off as the des of light that fell on him started decreasing in numbers. They were still increasing in terms of power, but there were clearly far fewer des of light that fell down.


    He didn''t let that bother him since that was a good thing for him. He just assumed that whoever was controlling the array had stopped the flow of life energy into the des of light to divert some of that power into maintaining the barrier.


    That meant that they were worried about his full power attack being able to destroy the barrier.


    If it was the array that the lord gave them, there was no need to worry about this at all since the lord had told them that the barrier could even block an attack in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    With this thought in mind, the leader was filled with confidence as he swung out his daggers at the de when his pet suddenly blocked the des of light for him.


    However, before his attack could even reach the barrier, there was a bright sh of light that appeared in front of him.


    He forced his eyes to remain open, but that didn''t matter as all it did was allow him to see the des of light concentrated into a single sh.


    This was something that he didn''t know was possible with the array that the lord gave them since he had never heard about this before.


    The single de of light that was thrown at him concentrated all the energy that had been in the scattered des of light. The scattered des of light only had power in the Embryo Soul Realm, but this concentrated de of light pushed that power all the way to the Child Soul Realm.


    The leader was also in the Child Soul Realm, so he didn''t panic at first and just continued shing out with all his power.


    He didn''t believe that this makeshift de of light would be able to stop him.


    But what he didn''t know was that there was something special concentrated inside of this de of light that even he could never expect.


    This array was indeed the one that the lord had given the Assassins Association members to attack Lin Fan with, but after Lin Fan had obtained it, he had been looking over it to see if there was anything else it could do other than what the assassins had used it for.


    In the hundred years that Lin Fan had spent in that trial''s Illusion Space, he hadn''t just spent all his time fighting the Beast Race and anyone else that came after him, he had also been picking up knowledge here and there.


    Just the amount of array techniques that Lin Fan currently had in his mind numbered over ten thousand, so an array like this was nothing for someone like him.


    He had easily been able to decode this array and find many surprising functions that he believed that even the lord from the Assassins Association didn''t know.


    Such as the ability to absorbws as well.


    Normally there were no concentratedws in the life energy that the array absorbed, it was all the naturalws that were so unconcentrated that they didn''t have any effect at all. However, if the people controlling the array were to release theirws and let theirws get closer to the array to let it absorb¡­


    Inside this de of light, there were ten differentws gathered together, creating a force that surpassed all parts of its sum.


    As soon as the leader''s daggers touched this de of light, they instantly crumbled under its might.<sub> </sub>


    The leader had forced his eyes open just so he could see, but that meant that thest sight he saw was the de of light falling down on him, cutting him in half right in the middle from head to toe.


    As he died, the only feeling that he felt was disbelief.


    He couldn''t believe that he had died to this imitation.


    Even in his final moment, he didn''t believe that this array around him was the real item.


    After the leader had been ughtered, he fell to the ground as the barrier around him disappeared.


    As for Murong Yue and her two subordinates who had been watching the entire time, they didn''t know what had happened, but it wasn''t hard for them to figure out that it was something that Lin Fan did.


    But that filled Murong Yue''s heart with shock.


    It had only been a few days in this Ancient Era Ruins, but the current Lin Fan was apletely different person from before.


    She knew that she wouldn''t have stood a chance against the barrier that had surrounded the leader. Not to mention that she hadn''t even felt it appearing, so there was no way that she would have been able to avoid it.


    But of course, the thought that weighed heaviest on her mind was that she was d that Lin Fan was her friend and not her enemy.


    As well as a bit of something else appearing in her heart.


    ¡­


    Back in the cave, the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association group were waiting for the group that they sent out to return.


    They had known that Murong Yue''s group had been bait, but they came to the same conclusion that Murong Yue had. They had thought that Lin Fan was uncertain of his own n, so he chose to send them out as bait to rush things.


    If that was the case, then with the Child Soul Realm Artifacts that the cloaked figure had given them, the group should have been easily able to take down Murong Yue''s group with their number and weapon advantage. After all, they had even pulled in their hidden members that they had bought over to their side out of the people outside of the twelve great factions, so it could be said that they hadmitted everything they had to this offense.


    However, to their surprise, the soul jade representing the group that they had sent suddenly shattered.


    They had used this soul jade just as a precaution, but they never thought that it would actually y a role here.


    Currently, there were only four people left out of their group. There was only Lei Feng, Shi Yi, and two cloaked figures from the Assassins Association left.


    The three people of the group all looked at the figure with the different coloured cloak as they anxiously waited for his response.


    The figure with the different coloured cloak had his cloak covering his face, but if it wasn''t there, they would have been able to see the ugly expression that he had. As well as the look of rage that was currently burning in his eyes.


    He had thought that this would be a simple matter, but every single one of his ns had backfired and he had lost quite a few artifacts that he had brought in with him. While those artifacts weren''t that important to him, it still hurt that he lost them. It wasn''t a financial loss, but rather it was a blow to his pride, suffering these setbacks again and again.


    After a long period of silence, this figure in the different coloured cloak gave a cold snort before sweeping his eyes over Lei Feng and Shi Yi. After releasing his chilling aura for a bit, he said, "Why are your subordinates all so useless?"


    Neither Lei Feng or Shi Yi dared to answer since they could hear the anger in the cloaked figure''s voice. They just lowered their heads and waited for the cloaked figure to say anything else.


    Seeing that they didn''t say anything, the figure in the different coloured cloak turned to the remaining cloaked figure and said, "Follow me."


    Then without saying anything else, he started walking out of the cave.


    He knew that there wasn''t much time left and if he didn''t make a move, it would be toote.


    Since that was the case, it seemed like he would have to personally make a move.

 Chapter 675 Final Clash (3)

    Aftering out of the cave, the figure in the different coloured cloak didn''t hesitate at all as he started heading out in a specific direction.


    All three of the other people in his group followed him without a word.


    As they continued along, they soon figured out where they were heading.


    They were heading in the direction of the Alchemy King Hall group, which was the closest group to them.


    Naturally they had also done their own scouting, so they had a good idea of where everyone else was. That was with the exception of Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and the Ice Goddess Hall groups.


    For some reason, no matter how they searched they hadn''t been able to find a trace of them.


    This wouldn''t have been strange if it was any other group, but they had the assassins of the Assassins Association, people that were experts in tracking. Still, even then, they hadn''t been able to find these three groups.


    That was also part of the reason why they had chosen to take this obvious bait.


    They had thought that it would be enough for them to capture these three from the Hunters Organization with the artifacts that the lord had given them. If they could capture them, they would be able to find where the rest of them were hiding.


    But since it didn''t work out for them, the only thing they could do now was rely on the power of the lord to take down these groups from the twelve great factions one by one.


    Now that their numbers had dwindled, it was not a good idea for them to face too many people at the same time. The more people that they faced, the greater the chance that there would be an unexpected variable that woulde into y.


    There had been too many surprises that had happened over the past few days that they had no choice but to be wary.


    Of course, with the power of the lord, even if they were to group together, it wouldn''t be a problem for him to take care of them all.


    The only one they had to worry about was the person who controlled those Child Soul Realm beasts.


    They hadn''t been able to find anything on that person, so even now, they didn''t know which faction that person belonged to. However, since it was the Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and the Ice Goddess Pce that they couldn''t find, that person should be from there.


    Which was also the other reason they chose to start with the Alchemist King Hall.


    As they made their way through the forest, they didn''t notice that there were actually small animals tailing them, watching their every move.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan was currently sitting in a tree all by himself with Brainy sitting in front of him in her vine form.


    Spread out in front of them was a board that had various pieces on them.


    From time to time, Brainy would move pieces on the board and tell Lin Fan certain things.


    ? At first the two of them had rxed looks as it seemed like everything was going ording to n, but then they suddenly knitted their brows as Brainy moved a piece.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before asking, "Are you certain about this?"


    Brainy gave a nod before saying, "They''re already on the move. If we don''t go now, it''ll be toote."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even deeper, but he gave a sigh after a moment of silence.


    It wasn''t that he hadn''t expected this, but this was one of his worst case scenarios.


    He had thought that the other side''s pride would be too high to get involved personally, but now that didn''t seem to be the case.


    Of course, it wasn''t that he never nned for this¡­It was just that he would have preferred to avoid this since he didn''t want to get certain people involved in this.


    But since they wanted to y, Lin Fan had no choice but to y along with them.


    So he waved his hand at Brainy who jumped up into his sleeve before jumping out of the tree.


    As he jumped out, there was a giant hawk that suddenly flew into the sky and came underneath him, letting himnd on it. Once hended, the hawk shot out at incredible speeds, tearing through the forest.


    It didn''t take long before this hawk arrived at its destination, which was another area that was covered in forest. However, different from before, there was a cliff that was at the edge of this area.<sub> </sub>


    As soon as the hawk arrived, Lin Fan jumped off the hawk and flew off in the direction of the cliff before waving his hand at the hawk, sending it away.


    When hended on the ground, he was standing right in front of the cliff and he looked up at the cliff itself.


    This cliff was covered in various holes, indicating that it was filled with caves, which made it a very good ce to hide.


    The Alchemist King Hall group weren''t fools, so they had chosen this ce as their hiding spot.


    Of course, with how good this ce was, Lin Fan had also made it the location of his ambush.


    In fact, it was actually Lin Fan that had made these holes in the cliff and sent the Alchemist King Hall group here. He had made sure that they would find this cliff so that they would use it as their hiding spot.


    This had all been for his own n.


    Not to mention that it wasn''t hard with all the Desert Horror Ants that Lin Fan controlled. With their help, he was able to make thiswork of tunnels in just a single night.


    Even now, his pets were waiting inside of the tunnels for the ambush.


    However, he wasn''t able to summon all of them since he had sent a few of them to different locations to n different ambushes based on how the enemies would act. Still, it wouldn''t take them that long to get here.


    Not to mention that the enemy was moving slowly since they were being cautious.


    After half an hour passed since Lin Fan arrived, the group of four from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association arrived.


    Once they came up on the cliff, they stopped for a second before the figure in the different coloured cloak chose a cave and started walking down it.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he revealed a faint smile as everything was going just as he nned.


    Not long after the enemy group entered the cave, the entrance of the cave that they walked into suddenly closed. However, the people in the cave didn''t notice this change at all.


    The enemy group just continued walking down the cave,ing to different forks in the path from time to time.


    Whenever they reached these forks, they would always stop to look at the figure in the different coloured cloak. That person would stand there for a few seconds as if they were thinking about something before heading down one of the paths.


    No matter how many forks they came to, the other three members of the group never said a single thing and just silently followed the figure with the different coloured cloak.


    It hadn''t been hard for Lin Fan to figure out what they were using to track their target, in fact, Lin Fan had even been using this to guide them into the trap that he had set for them.


    With how sensitive Brainy was to spiritual sense, she was able to easily deduce that they were using spiritual sense to track down the Alchemist King Hall group.


    Then with some special puppets that she had obtained, she was able to mimic the aura of the Alchemist King Hall group.


    As for the real Alchemist King Hall group, they were currently trapped inside of one of the caves. Even if they wanted to get out, they wouldn''t be able to unless they were able to dig their way out since Lin Fan had copsed the entrance to that cave.


    So even if the enemies wanted to find them, it wouldn''t have been possible to reach them.


    Of course, the Alchemist King Hall group didn''t feel like they were trapped. In fact, they thought that they were recuperating in this cave that they had been lucky to find after being chased by a Child Soul Realm beast.


    As for whether that Child Soul Realm beast was sent by Lin Fan or not, it was better not to ask¡­


    With these people from the Alchemist King Hall trapped, Lin Fan was able to mimic their auras even more realistically by actually tapping into their auras. Then he broadcasted them with the puppets that Brainy controlled.


    It was almost like using them as a battery.


    The Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and Assassins Association group continued along inside the cave until they finally came across something at the end of the tunnel. There was a bright light that came from the end of the tunnel which clearly showed that it was ending.


    It was at this point that the figure in the different coloured cloak raised his hand and said, "They''re just ahead."


    As soon as the other three heard this, they all pulled out their weapons and prepared for a fight.


    Seeing that they were all ready, the figure in the different coloured cloak led them all out of the end of this tunnel.

 Chapter 676 Final Clash (4)

    As soon as they came out of the end of the tunnel, they saw that they had appeared in a giant pit.


    They didn''t know where this pit hade from, but on the cliff walls around them were many different holes.


    None of them were fools and they knew that this should be some kind of trap, so they immediately turned to run back into the tunnel that they came from. However, before they could even turn around, the tunnel had closed behind them.


    Once again, not a single one of them hesitated at all as they immediately released attacks at the wall where the exit of the tunnel had been.


    Their attacks immediately hit the wall and created an explosion of dust before sending pebbles flying all over.


    When the dust settled, they saw that there wasn''t a tunnel in the wall of the cliff at all. It was as if the tunnel that they hade by had never existed.


    Lei Feng, Shi Yi, and the other cloaked figure didn''t give up as they attacked the wall again, but the figure with the different coloured cloak had already turned his attention to somewhere else.


    His eyes swept over the various holes in the wall around them, almost as if he was looking for something.


    Then as if he had noticed something, he immediately looked at the center of the pit where there was a vine sticking out of the ground. As soon as he saw this vine, he immediately knitted his brows.


    This vine was what he was sensing the aura of the Alchemist King Hall group from, but he could clearly tell that this wasn''t the real thing. It was nothing more than an outlet to release this aura to fool him.


    As soon as he realized this, he started looking at the various holes in the wall of the pit around him. He realized that none of them were close to the hole that they had juste from and it was faint, but he could sense the aura of beastsing from them.


    Once all these things were made clear, the figure with the different coloured cloak immediately turned around and said, "Forget about that hole! All of you separate and run for different tunnels!"


    Without even waiting for the other three to respond, the cloaked figure immediately jumped up and flew out at the closest hole to the right.


    However, before he could reach it, there were different coloured attacks that flew out at him.


    The cloaked figure took a look at these attacks and gave a snort as he raised a hand to create spikes of ice. The spikes of ice shed against these attacks and shattered them, not stopping him for a single second.


    However, before the cloaked figure could reach the tunnel, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared in front of him that sent him flying back into the middle of the pit.


    As for the other three that were still left in the pit, they were also instantly surrounded by attacks that came from every direction.


    They tried to block it, but they didn''t have the same power as the figure in the different coloured cloak. Even with the Child Soul Realm Artifacts that they had, they were knocked to the ground by the various attacks that fell onto them.


    All three of them spat out mouthfuls of blood after having these attacks rain down on them.


    The figure in the different coloured cloak didn''t pay any attention to the three of them as he studied the barrier that he had just mmed into.


    He could see the power behind this barrier and he was shocked by it. After all, this was a barrier that was at a higher level than even the ones that he possessed, so he couldn''t help being shocked.


    Could it be that there was another kingdom that was making a move here?


    No, that shouldn''t be possible.


    They had already sealed off all information about this ce, so it wasn''t possible that there was another kingdom making a move.


    So just what was happening here?


    However, he didn''t have time to think about this as more attacks rained down on him.


    When he raised his hand to condense ice spikes to block these attacks, he realized something and waved his hand instead. The ice spikes that would have condensed suddenly shattered into ice crystals that immediately formed a wall of ice around him, creating a barrier that stopped all these attacks.


    However, when the attacksnded on the wall of ice that he created, he could see the cracks that had started to form.


    He immediately knitted his brows and condensed more ice crystals that immediately reinforced the wall of ice and fixed these cracks, but his brows knitted even more as he defended against these attacks. After all, with more attacks that he took, he could feel that the power behind these attacks were getting stronger.


    The cloaked figure knew that if he continued holding back his power, he wouldn''t have a chance to do anything. Rather there was even a high chance that he might get seriously injured or even die if he kept holding back.


    As soon as this thought passed through his mind, there was a strong feeling of rage that filled him.<sub> </sub>


    He couldn''t believe that people of this lower realm were able to push him to this extent!


    It was a blow to his pride that he wouldn''t allow!


    So without another thought, the cloaked figure''s aura started to rise. It continued to rise until it broke free of the Child Soul Realm and reached the Nascent Soul Realm.


    As soon as it reached the Nascent Soul Realm, he raised his other hand and spikes of ice began appearing along the wall of ice that he had formed around himself. These spikes of ice were covered in ayer of ice crystals that blocked all the attacks falling on him as they condensed.


    Once all the spikes of ice were condensed, he flicked the hand that was controlling them and the ice spikes flew out in every direction.


    He didn''t know where the person controlling these attacks was, so he had no choice but to use a wide area attack to draw them out.


    However, as soon as those spikes of ice flew out, there was the same barrier that had knocked him down that appeared.


    The cloaked figure wasn''t worried about this barrier at all since he had thought that it wouldn''t be a match for him now that he had increased his power, but his thoughts turned out to be wrong in the end. As soon as the spikes of ice mmed into the barrier, they were immediately shattered into pieces.


    The only effect that they had on the barrier were a few ripples that ran through the barrier itself. However, those ripples disappeared almost immediately after they appeared. It was almost as if they had never happened.


    But the ripples that appeared did allow the cloaked figure to see the barrier around him.


    When he did, he couldn''t help being surprised by it since he couldn''t believe that this was an array that was being used in this lower realm. After all, even with his experience, he had never seen an array at this level before.


    Just who was the person that had set up the array?


    Why were they going against him like this?


    The cloaked figure inside the ice wall looked around himself, trying to find the ones attacking him as he shouted, "Who are you! Why are you doing this!"


    But all that met his questioning was another round of attacks thatnded on the ice wall around him.


    Just like before, the attacks were instantly repelled.


    It was like this that the two sides had reached a stalemate.


    Naturally Lin Fan had been watching this the entire time, so he could see what the situation was. With the current array that he was using with his pets, it would be very hard for him to break through this ice wall shield since this array was one that only gathered life energy.


    Even if he had plenty of pets, the life energy alone gathered together wouldn''t be a match for a shield in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    However, that didn''t mean that he couldn''t do anything about this.


    He had spent a hundred yearsmanding his beasts, he had plenty of arrays that he could choose from.


    Not to mention that he had Brainy on his side now, so even if these beasts hadn''t been trained, he could still get them in formation with Brainy helping him manage the array.


    So with a single thought, the attacks stopped raining down on the wall of ice.


    The cloaked figure was surprised to see this, but he didn''t let his guard down by releasing it. He just focused his mind as he released his spiritual sense around him, paying attention to anything that might happen.


    There was only silence for the first minute, but then out of the various holes around him came over a hundred different beasts.


    When the cloaked figure saw all these beasts surround him, this time he was filled with shock instead of just surprise.


    After all, these over a hundred beasts were all in the Child Soul Realm!


    The beasts didn''t give the cloaked figure any time to make a move as they all roared out and released their auras at the same time.


    As they did so, there was another barrier that formed around the cloaked figure in the pit.

 Chapter 677 Final Clash (5)

    As soon as the cloaked figure had seen these beasts appear around him, he had wanted to condense ice spikes to attack them with. However, before he could even do a thing, the barrier had already appeared around him.


    When the barrier did appear, his brows had knitted so deep that it almost seemed like his face was copsing in on itself.


    It was because he could see from the barrier that this array that had been put around him was something that he couldn''t understand at all. It was an array that shouldn''t have existed in this lower realm, yet here it was in front of him.


    He also knew that this array waspletely different from the one from before since he could feel that aura of dangering from it.


    This was an array that could hurt him even when he had pushed his cultivation to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    After these thoughts passed through his mind, he spoke once again, but his tone this time waspletely different from the tone that he had previously, "What do you want? Perhaps we can make a deal?"


    But once again, all that met his voice was silence.


    Well, it wasn''tplete silence as the life energy of the over a hundred Child Soul Realm beasts were released, being gathered into the array.


    Once the life energy was injected into the array, there were balls of light that appeared in the air. These balls of light were like the attacks from before, but this time, they weren''t just different colours.


    Each ball had a mix of different colours in them, as if they were some kind of amalgamation.


    However, the aura that each attack gave off was much stronger than before.


    On average, these balls of light had three different colours in them, but there were a few that had more colours to them mixed among the ones with three colours. Of course, the aura that these balls gave off werepletely different from the ones that only had three colours in them.


    After forming, the balls of light suddenly flew down at the wall of ice around the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure could sense the dangering from these balls of light, so he raised his hand again and increased the thickness of the wall of ice. Along with this, his aura started to swell as life energy poured out of him, flowing into the wall of ice.


    When the balls of light hit the wall of ice, they created a quick explosion before the smoke quickly dissipated.


    After the smoke disappeared, it revealed that the wall of ice was still there, but there were veryrge cracks that had formed on the wall of ice.


    The expression of the cloaked figure wasn''t that good, but that wasn''t revealed since the cloaked figure had his cloak over him. But based on the slow speed that the cracks in the wall of ice healed, it was clear that he wasn''t doing well.


    It was at this moment that a few more balls of light suddenly flew out at the wall of ice. However, these balls of light werepletely different from the previous balls of light.


    Not only were they fewer in number, the aura that they gave off made even the cloaked figure feel a sense of danger.


    He wanted to raise his hand and increase the power of his wall of ice again, but it was already toote.


    These few balls of light mmed into the wall of ice and this time, they didn''t explode. Instead, they shattered right through the wall of ice and even was about to hit the cloaked figure, but there was a barrier that suddenly appeared around the cloaked figure that stopped these balls of light.


    This barrier was almost invisible if it hadn''t been shing against the balls of light, which made it reveal itself.


    There was a bnce between the two sides thatsted a few seconds before the balls of light were repelled. They bounced back in the air before dissipating into nothingness.


    However, it was clear by the faint ripples that ran through the barrier that they had dealt damage to the barrier itself.


    The cloaked figure was stunned at first, but then his face waspletely filled with rage as he roared, "You lower being! You dare force me to use my life saving artifact! I''ll kill you!"


    His voice was different from all the other times that he had roared out in "rage" previously. This time, it was clear that his anger hadpletely swallowed his rationality and he wasn''t going to hold back any longer.


    After all, this cloak around him was his life saving artifact and he was truly enraged from the shame of having to use it here against someone of a lower realm.


    For him who was filled with pride, there was no describing this shame.


    After he roared out, there was a sudden burst of life energy that came from him.


    This time, he no longer cared about holding back at all as he released all the life energy that he could.


    With his experience in the Illusion Space, Lin Fan was able to easily recognize the change in his cultivation. It went beyond the Nascent Soul Realm and reached all the way into the True Soul Realm.<sub> </sub>


    Even after reaching the True Soul Realm, his cultivation didn''t stop rising.


    At this rate, it would break free of the Soul Realmpletely and reach the next realm¡­


    Even with over a hundred Child Soul Realm beasts under his control, this was not something that Lin Fan could face. After all, there was arge gap between these different realms of cultivation that went beyond major realms.


    If he didn''t do something now, it would be toote.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan immediately gave the order and even more balls of light condensed.


    There were far more balls of light that had more than three colours in them this time, many times more. There were even many balls of light that reached five colours or even six colours.


    In the center of it all, there was a ball of light that even reached seven colours.


    Each of these colours were as expected, differentws that had been condensed into this attack. With these differentws condensed together, the might of each of these balls of light far exceeded the might of the single coloured balls of light from the previous array.


    This was an array that could condense differentws into a single attack, which meant that it was an array that was at a much higher level than the one Lin Fan used previously.


    Of course, something like this was only possible because of all the Child Soul Realm beasts that Lin Fan had tamed, so it was only Lin Fan who could use this array. After all, without all these different beasts making up this array, sharing the pressure that came frombining thews together, this array would have copsed a long time ago.


    Which was why Lin Fan had spent the past few days taming all these Child Soul Realm beasts.


    They were his trump card in facing this lord from the Assassins Association.


    But that was all turned upside down when this lord revealed his true cultivation.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan threw all the balls of light at the lord. He threw the weaker ones first and then the ones with more colours in them behind it.


    As he had expected, as soon as the balls of light approached the cloaked figure, there was another barrier that had appeared.


    This barrier waspletely different from any that the cloaked figure had released before.


    Unlike that thick wall of ice, this one was much thinner and unlike that invisible barrier, this one was still visible.


    It was almost as if there was ayer of ss that had appeared right around the cloaked figure, but it was too strong to be just ss since it blocked every single attack that fell onto it initially. When one looked at it closely, they would see that instead of ss, this was actually a very thinyer of ice.


    But the strength that it demonstratedpletely overturned what one thought ice would be like.


    When the four coloured balls of light started hitting the thinyer of ice, they still weren''t able to break through, but they did shake the wall of ice.


    Then when the five coloured balls of light hit the thinyer of ice, the shaking became even stronger. It was clear that these were having an effect on the thinyer of ice.


    When the six coloured balls of light hit the thinyer of ice, there were small cracks that were starting to form on thatyer of ice.


    Lin Fan started feeling a bit of hope when he saw this.


    Perhaps the final ball of light would be able to do it.


    After the six coloured balls of light finishednding on the thinyer of ice, there were cracks that had formed all over it. However, these small cracks didn''tst long as they started to close at a rate that could be seen with the naked eye.


    Lin Fan ced all his expectations on the seven coloured ball of light.


    When the seven coloured ball of light hit the thinyer of ice, it didn''t instantly copse like the other balls of light. Rather, there was an even sh between the two sides thatsted a few seconds before giant cracks started forming on the thinyer of ice.


    It was like a piece of ss that had suddenly been hit with a stone as arge cobweb of cracks had formed.


    But that still wasn''t enough in the end as the seven coloured ball of light still dissipated and the thinyer of ice still surrounded the cloaked figure even if it waspletely cracked.

 Chapter 678 Final Clash (6)

    When the cloaked figure saw all this, he had a bit of surprise in his eyes, but then he broke out inughter.


    Thatughter didn''tst long before it suddenly cut off and he said, "Now, it''s my turn."


    He immediately raised his hands and created ice spikes around him.


    From the aura of these ice spikes, Lin Fan could tell just how powerful they were. If he let his guard down even a bit, he wouldn''t be able to block them.


    So instead of creating more balls of light, Lin Fan had the beasts increase their aura and focus all their life energy into the barrier.


    Just like the balls of light from before, this barrier was able tobinews together to amplify its power.


    This barrier was visible from the moment that it formed and its appearance showed that it clearly wasn''t a normal barrier.


    This was a barrier that had many different coloured currents of light flowing through it and when they were all counted up, there were ten different coloured of lights in total. That meant that there were a total of ten differentws that were flowing in this barrier, far surpassing the might of the balls of light from before.


    This was the limit of what Lin Fan could do with this array since if he forced it any higher, the beasts that made up this array wouldn''t have been able to withstand the pressure ofbining thesews.


    But that also showed just how powerful they were since even a hundred Child Soul Realm beasts weren''t able to withstand the pressure even though they were splitting it among themselves.


    Seeing this barrier appear, the cloaked figure gave a cold snort before waving his hand and shouting, "Die!"


    As soon as his hand fell, the ice spikes all around him flew out in all directions. They weren''t aimed at anything specific, but there was at least a single ice spike that was aimed at every Child Soul Realm beast around him.


    As the ice spikes flew out, they were growing in size as they started draining the air around them of moisture.


    As this happened, the air around the ice spikes almost seemed like it was warping.


    The ice spikes flew out and approached the barrier, but before they could sh, there was something else that appeared that stopped the ice spikes.


    There was a sudden boom in the sky before pirs of clouds suddenly fell down upon them.


    Both sides were shocked by these pirs of clouds since neither of them had created these pirs.


    Both sides looked at each other with wary looks, but they quickly realized that neither of them had created it. So then they tried to figure out the next most important question, which was who were these pirs of clouds targeting?


    It didn''t take long for that question to be answered as the pirs of clouds prated right through the barrier without harming it before shattering the ice spikes.


    There was no need to doubt it, these pirs of clouds were targeting the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure immediately raised his hands again as soon as he saw these pirs of clouds easily shatter his ice spikes.


    Since they were able to deal with his ice spikes that easily, the power contained in these pirs of clouds weren''t weak. He even felt that they might be a match for him when he was using his full power.


    Since that was the case, it meant that he didn''t have a chance to hold back at all. After all, no matter what the mission was, his life was the most important thing.


    So the cloaked figure released all his power to strengthen the thinyer of ice around him.


    However, as the pirs of clouds approached him, the cloaked figure started feeling that he might not even be a match for them even at full strength. Facts proved that he was right.


    The pirs of clouds didn''t care about the thinyer of ice around the cloaked figure at all as it shattered it right away. After that, the pirs of clouds surrounded the cloaked figure before he could make another move.


    After surrounding the cloaked figure, the pirs of clouds all pointed one end at him before falling down onto the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure wanted to do something, but he wasn''t able to react in time as the pirs of clouds had already trapped him by forming a cage around his body. They locked into formation all around him, forming a cage that stopped him from moving a single part of his body.


    He was just lifted up there in the air by the pirs of clouds, unable to do a thing.


    While just physically restraining him wouldn''t have been able to stop him from using his life energy since he could still control it even if he wasn''t moving a muscle, there was something special about these pirs of clouds. They had formed a special array that hadpletely sealed all the life energy of the cloaked figure, making him unable to do a single thing.


    Lin Fan saw all of this, but he didn''t reveal himself or make a move just yet.


    After all, the owner of the pirs of clouds still hadn''t revealed themselves yet.<sub> </sub>


    While the owner of the pirs of the clouds had restrained the cloaked figure, that didn''t mean that they would be friendly, so Lin Fan didn''t risk it bying out just yet.


    But it didn''t take long before the owner revealed themself.


    It was the woman in the blue dress again.


    She was the one who had controlled the pirs of clouds to restrain the cloaked figure.


    When the cloaked figure saw this woman in the blue dress appear, there was a chill that ran down his spine when he felt the aura that she released. This was an aura that was unlike any that he had felt before.


    Perhaps even the leader of his family wouldn''t be a match for this woman.


    He looked at this woman in the blue dress with a wary look as he said, "What do you want?"


    Of course he recognized this woman in the blue dress as the one who had introduced the trials to them, so he knew that this woman in the blue dress was one of the people who had left this Ancient Era Ruins.


    Since that was the case, he was confident that he wouldn''t die.


    After all, even if she was powerful, her power was still limited since she was nothing more than a fragment left by the real owners of these Ancient Era Ruins. Even if she wanted to do anything to him, he believed that he would be able to survive.


    After all, he still had his trump cards just in case anything went wrong.


    So that was why he had no fear when he questioned her.


    The woman in the blue dress looked at him and said, "You have surpassed the level of cultivation that we allow in these ruins. Since you have broken the rules, you are no longer wee in these ruins."


    The cloaked figure narrowed his eyes and said, "So what are you going to do about it? Are you going to kill me?"


    The woman in the blue dress just looked at him with a look that seemed like pity before shaking her head and saying, "No, but you will be sent out of these ruins now."


    The cloaked figure was confused by the look that she gave him, but it also angered him since he felt like she was looking down on him. However, when he heard what she said, he immediately said, "What do you¡­"


    Before he could even finish, the woman in the blue dress had waved her hand and there was a pir of blue light that appeared around the cloaked figure.


    He could feel the pir of blue light pulling him upwards and he said, "Stop it!"


    But it didn''t matter what he said, the pir of blue light continued pulling him up until he disappeared from where he had been floating.


    After the cloaked figure disappeared, the woman in the blue dress just shook her head again before disappearing as well.


    From beginning to end, she had never looked in the direction of the hidden Lin Fan, but he had been staring at her the entire time.


    He still had many questions that he had wanted to ask her, but he never got a chance to ask anything since she didn''t even stop for a single second.


    After all that was over, there was only silence that filled this area.


    That silencested an entire minute before Lin Fan finally turned his attention to the three that were still left in this pit.


    They had been knocked to the ground right away and suffered injuries, so they hadn''t been able to do anything the entire time. Rather, even if they wanted to do something, they wouldn''t have been able to do anything since this fight had reached a level that far surpassed their own level.


    If they had tried to interfere in this battle, they certainly would have been seriously injured or even worse, they might have died.


    So during this entire fight, Shi Yi had released her pet to heal them.


    She had a wood attributed pet that specializes in healing, so she had used it to heal their injuries just in case they would need to make a move.


    But it seemed like they wouldn''t get a chance.


    Lin Fan had turned his attention to the three of them.

 Chapter 679 Leaving The Ancient Era Ruins

    The three of them saw all the Child Soul Realm beasts turning to look at them and they all instantly trembled.


    They knew why these Child Soul Realm beasts were looking at them and they also knew that there was no way for them to escape.


    Now that their greatest backer, the cloaked figure had disappeared, if the other side wanted to kill them, it wouldn''t be hard for them.


    In this situation, the only thing that they could do was try to negotiate with the other side since force wasn''t an option. They had already seen how powerful the barrier around them was and even if theybined their powers together, they wouldn''t have been able to break through it.


    In this situation, talking was their best weapon.


    So seeing that all the Child Soul Realm beasts had turned to them, after a moment of being afraid, they all took a deep breath and faced these Child Soul Realm beasts.


    They were young leaders chosen by their families for a reason.


    Lei Feng came forward and said, "This friend, there''s no need for us to fight. I''m sure that there''s a way for us to¡­"


    But before he could even finish, there was a three coloured ball of light that hit him right in the chest.


    He hadn''t even been able to follow the path of this three coloured ball of light, so there was no chance that he would have been able to dodge it.


    As soon as it hit him, he was like a kite that had its strings cut as he immediately crumpled under the force behind the ball of light. As he flew back, there was a sweet taste that filled his mouth and he spat out arge mouthful of blood.


    Once he fell to the ground, he wasn''t able to move a single muscle as he almost lost consciousness. It was only his will that prevented him from losing consciousness.


    When they saw this, the other two people immediately knew that there was no chance of negotiating, so they started running off in different directions.


    The cloaked figure called out his pet which was a lizard that immediately released aw that made him blend into his surroundings. Shi Yi released her sapling pet again and had it start digging underground, looking for a way to escape.


    It was just too bad that before they could take more than two steps, there were two more balls of light that hit them in the chest as well.


    They had the same reaction as Lei Feng as they immediately crumpled onto the ground like kites that had their strings cut. Both of them spat out mouthfuls of blood before losing all the strength in their bodies.


    As the three of themid there thinking about where they had gone wrong, they knew that the end wasing for them.


    They were naturally afraid of death and unwilling to die because they always thought that they were destined for more, so they couldn''t help breaking out inughter at this.


    Then when they saw the balls of light forming above them, they remembered that the figure in the different coloured cloak had been sent out instead of being killed. Once this thought passed through their minds, they couldn''t helpughing even louder.


    Finally, Lei Feng roared out, "I don''t know who you are, but you can be sure that you won''t have a good life. You have no idea what the lord''s true ns are!"


    After his voice fell, the balls of light fell down on the three of them, crushing them into pools of blood.


    It was like this that the three young leaders from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association had died without even knowing who had killed them.


    Once they were all dead, Lin Fan finally showed himself.


    He had the beasts stay on standby as he jumped down to search the pools of blood.


    After finding three Storage Rings, he didn''t bother even looking through them as he left this ce. He had the Horror Ants copse this pit behind him, wiping out all traces of the battle that had urred here.


    Just like that, the final battle of these Ancient Era Ruins hade to an end.


    Over the next few days, there wasn''t much conflict between the few people left inside of the Ancient Era Ruins.


    Most of the remaining forces had already encountered the might of the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and Assassins Association group, so they didn''t want to make any moves while they were unaware of what their true ns would be.


    They didn''t know that Lin Fan had already wiped them all out.


    The few forces that didn''t know about their strength were the neutral factions, so it wasn''t as if they were going to do anything in the first ce.<sub> </sub>


    Instead, they started focusing on either doing the trials or collecting materials from the forest.


    There wasn''t anything else that they had found in these Ancient Era Ruins, so there wasn''t much else for them to do.


    During this time though, there were two from the Hunters Organization, two from the Myriad Sword Hall, and three from the Alchemy King Hall who fell to the trials.


    However, Lin Fan knew that there was no way for him to limit these people, so he just epted it as he saw these numbers shrink in his mission panel. The people that had survived were more than enough for him toplete this mission and the ones that did survive included the ones that he cared about.


    Lin Fan himself went into quite a few trials himself as he was looking for the woman in the blue dress.


    She clearly had answers that he wanted, but he didn''t know where to find her. The only clue that he had was that she was rted to the trials, so he kept going into the trials looking for her.


    However, the only people he met were experts that were much weaker than her and weren''t able to answer his questions.


    Even when he asked these experts about the woman in the blue dress, they would always evade his questions.


    He could see that this woman in the blue dress clearly had a very high status among the experts sealed in these Ancient Era Ruins. It was very unlikely that he would be able to find out anything about her or the answers to his questions.


    So after the days passed and it had been around a month since they came into these Ancient Era Ruins, there was a voice that suddenly filled the sky that said, "Trial takers, this realm has reached its limit and will now close. You will all be sent out of this realm."


    It wasn''t hard for everyone to recognize this voice since it was the voice of the woman in the blue dress that had appeared in the beginning.


    After this voice rang out, there were pirs of blue light that surrounded all of the people that hade into this Ancient Era Ruins, regardless of where they currently were. Even the people who were currently taking trials suddenly had pirs of blue light appear around them.


    There were some that tried to resist since they clearly hadn''t gotten enough benefits from these Ancient Era Ruins, but no matter how they tried to resist, they weren''t able to break free of the binds of these pirs at all.


    As for Lin Fan, he immediately looked to Brainy who was wrapped around his arm, but


    Brainy just shook her head in response.


    Over the past month, Brainy had maintained herwork of scouting puppets all over these ruins, so what Lin Fan had wanted Brainy to do was use thatwork to find the woman in the blue dress. However, Brainy couldn''t find a single trace of the owner of the voice at all.


    Seeing that this was the case, Lin Fan hesitated a bit before giving a sigh and saying, "Call them back."


    Brainy gave a nod before sending out the mental signal.


    At hermand, all the puppets that had been scattered through these ruins immediately started rushing back towards Lin Fan.


    These puppets couldn''t just be teleported back to Lin Fan, especially after he was sent out of the Ancient Era Ruins. So he had to call them back if he wanted to take them out of this ce with him.


    He didn''t know how many would make it before he was sent out of these ruins, but he would at least take as many as he could with him.


    After all, it wasn''t easy getting all these puppets and he didn''t want to spend more time getting more for Brainy.


    The pirs of blue lightsted for a few minutes, trapping all the people from the outside inside of them. Then they started pulling these people up, as if they were being sent into the sky.


    When they felt themselves being pulled up, they could see that it was getting brighter in front of them. This white light that appeared in their vision was familiar since they knew that this was the sign of spatialws being used to send them out.


    There were people that still struggled, but they couldn''t do anything at all.


    As they were being sent out, the woman in the blue dress in the clouds only had her eyes on a single person. She had been staring at Lin Fan since the beginning.


    The reason why they hadn''t been sent out of these Ancient Era Ruins right away was because she had been hesitating over something. But now that they were being sent out, she raised her hand and flicked it, sending out a small ball of blue light that entered Lin Fan''s body without him noticing.


    Then after that, all of the people from the Gctic Humanity Alliance were sent out of these Ancient Era Ruins.

 Chapter 680 Returning Home

    Once the white sh of light was gone, the people of the twelve great factions found themselves in a different location.


    They were familiar with this location as well since this was the entrance to the Ancient Era Ruins.


    After a moment to get their footings, everyone suddenly gathered around with their own group, warily staring at the other groups.


    They all knew that this was the most dangerous moment of this entire expedition. After all, they had just gotten plenty of loot from these Ancient Era Ruins and they were all tired from being in those ruins for close to a month.


    If someone were to make a move and attack them, it would be hard for them to fight back.


    But that didn''te into y as several figures jumped out from the trees around them,nding with each group. Of course, there were also several figures thatnded in open space that didn''t have any groups standing there.


    p These were all experts from the various factions that had sent groups into the Ancient Era Ruins. They had been waiting here for these groups toe out to protect them from any tricks that the other factions would y.</anda>


    Lin Fan took a close look at the figure that had jumped over to their group and he found that it was Qiao Yi Fei''s grandfather, Qiao Yi Yin.


    When Qiao Yi Yin saw Lin Fan looking at him, he gave him a nod with a faint smile before turning his attention back to the other experts. Namely, his focus was on three experts who stood there without a group.


    Lin Fan also followed his gaze, but he didn''t pay any attention to these three experts.


    Instead, he looked around the area that the three experts were standing in, looking for someone. However, no matter where he looked, he wasn''t able to find anyone in the end.


    It seemed like the figure with the different coloured cloak had long left this ce.


    But that did make sense since there was no reason for him to stay here any longer than necessary.


    As soon as they had been sent out of the Ancient Era Ruins, the tokens that they had that allowed them to ess it had disappeared. It was clear that once you were sent out, you didn''t have another chance to go back into the Ancient Era Ruins.


    So since he didn''t have a chance to aplish his goal, there was no need for him to stay in this area any longer.


    It seemed like the experts from the Assassins Association, the Thunder Sect, and the True Spirit Sect were already aware of this, otherwise they wouldn''t be as calm as they were.


    Still, even if he called them calm, they weren''t really that calm. After all, all the young experts from their factions had died in the Ancient Era Ruins, so there was no way that they would really be that calm.


    After a long period of silence, the expert from the Thunder Sect turned to old man Qiao and asked, "Old Qiao, it seems like the experts from our group have disappeared. Can you give me an exnation?"


    Old man Qiao didn''t back down as he said, "Why should I give you an exnation? It''s not as if we''re that close."


    The expert from the True Spirit Sect said, "Certainly we''re not that close, but isn''t that the reason why you''re the most suspicious?"


    The experts from the other factions were confused since they didn''t know the situation behind this, but none of them said a thing as they silently watched the discord between the two sides. There were even a few of them that wanted the two sides to start fighting and weaken each other.


    After all, if they did weaken each other, that would be a chance for them to strike.


    But before anyone else could say anything, Wang Jian''s master from the Myriad Sword Hall said in a sharp voice, "Isn''t it enough to leave this matter here?"


    The experts from the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were surprised to hear this since they didn''t know about the alliance between the two sides.


    The expert from the Assassins Association was about to say something, but the expert from the Ice Goddess Pce spoke first by saying, "Just let this matter end here."


    All three of the experts from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association looked at the expert from the Ice Goddess Pce with surprised looks.


    Then before they could recover from their shock, the expert from the Tamers Guild said, "There''s no need to drag out this matter, let''s just end it here."


    At this point, the three experts from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association had ugly looks on their faces.


    To put it simply, they were outnumbered at this point.<sub> </sub>


    They had never expected so many other factions to speak up for the Hunters Organization. With them being outnumbered like this, the situation was clearly not on their side.


    The moment that they fought and they showed any weakness, the other factions that remained neutral could change sides in an instant and it would make things worse for them.


    So after some thought, the experts from the three factions gave cold snorts before turning around to leave.


    Even if they had failed here, there were still other ns that their factions had been nning and the lord had explicitly told them that if they failed again, their factions would be med for ruining the n of the power behind the lord. When that happened, it was very likely that they would be wiped off the face of this to keep their secrets hidden¡­


    They had no choice but to back down in this situation to avoid drawing more attention to themselves.


    Seeing that the experts of these three factions back down, the experts of the other factions all stopped watching for fun. After all, even they could tell that the three factions suddenly speaking up for the Hunters Organization wasn''t normal.


    There was no need for them to involve themselves, all that mattered right now was for them to bring back their loot from these Ancient Era Ruins back to their factions.


    So after a moment of silence between everyone, they all split off into different groups heading in different directions without any words. Even the factions that were allies with each other traveled separately.


    After all, even if they were allies, things like allies among these factions were temporary. They didn''t want their "allies" to know what kind of treasures they had obtained just in case that alliance suddenly shattered one day.


    Once they were far enough from where they had been previously, old man Qiao took out a movement artifact and had everyone get on. Once they used this movement artifact, they started moving countless times fasterpared to before.


    Old man Qiao hadn''t taken this movement artifact out previously because it took most of his concentration to use this movement artifact if he wanted to go fast. The faster he wanted to go, the more concentration that he would need to use.


    Until he was far away enough from the other group to ensure that there wouldn''t be an ambush, he wasn''t confident in pulling out this movement artifact.


    But now that they were far away enough, he wanted to use this artifact to bring them back to a safe ce as quickly as possible.


    As they were moving quickly through the open fields, Lin Fan also waved his hand to release two differentws that covered them.


    Old man Qiao was surprised to see thesews, but he didn''t question them since he could understand what Lin Fan was trying to aplish with this. In fact, just the fact that Lin Fan had these twows under his control exined quite a few things.


    They didn''t return to Harmony City right away because there was another branch of the Hunters Organization that was closer to this area. So instead of taking more time to reach the Harmony City branch, they chose to head right to this other branch instead.


    All of the Hunters Organization branches had teleportation gates in the basement that connected to each other, so it didn''t matter if they headed to this branch first. They would be able to use the teleportation gate to immediately return to Harmony City. It would even be faster than if they ran all the way there.


    So after arriving at this branch, everyone let out a sigh of relief since they knew that they were now safe.


    After all, they were now on the territory of the Hunters Organization and the Hunters Organization would certainly defend their territory. Unless it was an attack by multiple factions of the twelve great factions, nothing would be able to stop them.


    Let alone the fact that there were transport gates in the basement that would allow them to escape.


    So everyone quickly separated and returned to their own cities.


    When he returned, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit emotional since it had been quite a long time since he had been here. In fact, this was probably the longest trip that he had taken since he hade up to the upper realm.


    Of course, he didn''t leave right away because there was something else important to do first.


    They had to distribute the loot that they had collected from the Ancient Era Ruins.


    While Lin Fan had a special agreement with the Hunters Organization that allowed him to keep whatever he found, he still didn''t feel right keeping everything since they had been the ones that had given him the tokens. So he took out some of the items that he found were useless to him that he had obtained from the trials.


    While these items were useless to him, that didn''t mean that they were useless to the Hunters Organization since they had people with many different abilities. They certainly had people who would be able to use these items.


    After that, Lin Fan headed back to his shop.

 Chapter 681 Mission Rewards

    Even if he had been away from his shop this entire month, Lin Fan had still been able to monitor the situation in the shop because of his system.


    During this time, he had seen his points rise at a steady rate, which showed that the store was still operating as usual and no one hade to disturb his business.


    Of course, nothing was better than overseeing his store personally, so the first thing that he did aftering back was head to the store.


    It was currently the middle of the day, so normally there wouldn''t be that many people at the store, but when Lin Fan arrived, he found that the store was surrounded by people.


    It wasn''t because they were just here to watch the fun, but rather they were all trying to get into the store.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see just how many people were gathering at his store, but he also found it strange since he didn''t have much to sell other than some pet food and other herbs for pets. However, most of the time, those didn''t sell because they were just too expensive.


    Not to mention that when he saw the people walking out of the store, he didn''t see any of them holding any merchandise.


    So what did theye to his store for?


    When he entered the store, he immediately understood why arge crowd had gathered around his store.


    To put it simply, they were just here for a fan meet and greet.


    Lulu was sitting there at the counter and lined up in front of her were many male customers.


    As soon as they reached the counter, they asked her some trivial question and then reached their hands out for a hand shake before leaving. As they were leaving, he even saw some people smelling their hands¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling some disdain when he saw them, but he could understand why they were doing this.


    Lulu was indeed quite the beauty, she was even at the same level as Qiao Yi Fei who was known as one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City.


    The most important thing was that Lulu was quite gullible since she had had a sheltered life. She trusted people quite easily and thought that all these people were just here to ask her for help, so she just went along with their requests.


    Of course, she had hermon sense and she used the defense system of the pet shop to kick out the ones that had excessive demands, but simple things like hand shakes were things that she could ept.


    But as soon as Mo Ze Chen came back, the first thing that he did was chase off the rest of the people who were lined up in front of the counter.


    They didn''t go easily, but Mo Ze Chen didn''t have any qualms about using force with them.


    The ones that had gathered here were all normal people, so it wasn''t hard for Mo Ze Chen to chase them off with his Embryo Soul Realm cultivation.


    After they had been chased off, Mo Ze Chen immediately started checking with Lulu to see if she was alright.


    She was confused why Mo Ze Chen was acting this way, but she was also happy to see that he was back.


    On the side, Lin Fan looked at Momonga and asked, "Why didn''t you stop them?"


    Momonga just said with a faint smile, "Well it was interesting so I didn''t want to stop them. Not to mention that it did get more people in the store."


    Lin Fan shook his head and asked, "How many of those people actually bought things?"


    Momonga just smiled without replying.


    Lin Fan shook his head again and chose not to say anything this time.


    After all, he had seen what kind of things Momonga was into. He had asked Momonga for help managing the store and he could see that inside the shop, there were two girls in maid dresses that were being stared at by quite a few men.


    Both of these girls were beauties, even if they weren''t at the same level as Lulu, so they still drew the attention of quite a few people.


    It was just too bad for them that whenever anyone tried to talk to these girls, they would be immediately knocked to the ground.


    Still, there were a few people that still went over¡­Then when they were knocked to the ground, they had a different kind of smile on their face¡­


    But Lin Fan decided to ignore all of this because none of that mattered to him.


    It seemed like nothing serious had happened during the time that he was away which was a surprise for him. After all, he had expected the City Lord to do something to his store while he was away which was why he had left Momonga. But now it seemed like his guesses were wrong.


    The City Lord was still a problem, but just what was he nning?


    Lin Fan put that to the back of his mind again as he headed into the back, ignoring all the noise in the front as countless men cursed out Mo Ze Chen.


    Once he was alone in the back, Lin Fan opened up the system interface and began browsing through the shop that appeared.<sub> </sub>


    This was the reward that he had received after he hade out of the Ancient Era Ruins.


    While it wasn''t a perfect clear for the mission, he still had been able to get a high percentage and the rewards weren''t bad. But the most important thing for him was this shop.


    After all, this was a secret limited shop from the system, so there should be some good things that he could buy from here.


    As he had expected, the things that were in the store were things that he couldn''t believe. They were all items that could be considered life saving items for him and they were all things that he wanted, but there was a problem¡­


    He couldn''t afford all of it.


    After around a month of saving, Lin Fan had already amassed quite a few points, but even then, it still wasn''t enough for him to buy more than one item in this shop.


    He had over ten million points and it was only enough for him to buy a single item from this shop.


    That was enough to show just how amazing the items in the shop were.


    But what he had to do now was choose which one of these items to buy¡­


    As he was going through the list, Lin Fan suddenly thought of something and revealed a shocked look that quickly turned to a look of joy.


    Lin Fan closed the shop and immediately pulled out a small bag from his system storage.


    He opened up the system interface again and looked at the description that the system gave this small bag.


    This was the other reward that he had received frompleting the mission. It was a loot bag that had many different items in it and what Lin Fan would receive would depend on his luck.


    Most of the things inside of this weren''t things that Lin Fan really cared about, but there was one item among the list of possible items that caught his attention.


    It was something that seemed like a very normal item, but it was the item that Lin Fan needed the most right now.


    It was a 20% discount coupon for the system''s store.


    While 20% alone wouldn''t have been much, the most special thing about this coupon was that it was something that could be stacked.


    He had received five of these small loot bags as a reward from the system and if he were to get 20% discount coupons from all of them¡­


    But there were over a hundred different items that were avable in the loot bag, so that meant that his chance of getting this 20% discount coupon was less than 1%.


    For him to get this, it would require some incredible luck.


    He didn''t have confidence in his luck since he knew that he only had a normal level of luck.


    But that didn''t mean that he was out of choices just yet.


    When he had been looking through the normal system shop, he had found something that had caught his eyes.


    He didn''t think that he would ever have a use for it before, but now¡­


    Lucky Pill: Greatly increases luck for the next five minutes.


    Cost: Five million points.


    He didn''t know exactly how much the greatly increased luck would be, but since this was an item from the system, it wouldn''t be that stingy.


    Since that was the case, it was all a gamble.


    If he was lucky enough, he would be able to get five 20% discount coupons. When those were stacked together, that would mean that he would have a 100% discount and would be able to get everything in this secret store.


    But if he wasn''t lucky and couldn''t even draw a single coupon, it would mean that he would have to give up on the items in the shop.


    After all, just the Lucky Pill alone would cost him five million points, half of his total points.


    Five million points definitely wasn''t something that he could earn back in a short period of time. Or at least it would be impossible for him to earn it back in the seven days before this secret shop closed.


    So what would he do?

 Chapter 682 Opening Loot Bags

    After thinking it over for a long time, Lin Fan still opened up the normal system shop in the end.


    After scrolling to a certain page, his finger hesitated over one of the items on this page for a while before falling down on it. He then took a while to drag it over to his cart before finally putting it in.


    Then on the final checkout screen, he just stared at the confirmation button as if he was still making up his mind.


    Still, in the end, he chose to press the confirm button.


    After he finished checking out of the store, Lin Fan opened up his system storage to look at the item that he had bought. Then he took it out and ced it on his hand, just silently looking at it for a bit.


    This was a tiny little sphere that justid there in his hand that didn''t look special at all, but this was a tiny little sphere that had cost him half of his points to buy.


    Now he just hoped that this was worth it.


    So without any more hesitation, Lin Fan brought the Lucky Pill up to his mouth and swallowed it.


    After he swallowed it, it didn''t seem to have any effect on him. However, it was hard to define what an effect would be when it came to a pill that increases luck. After all, luck wasn''t something that could just be felt.


    Still, Lin Fan trusted the items that the system gave him, so he turned his attention to the system storage. After taking the pill, Lin Fan immediately pulled out the five loot bags that he had received frompleting the quest.


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure how to open these loot bags at first, but then he just decided to pull the string that was holding the opening of the bag closed.


    As soon as he did, the bag suddenly released a light that started to grow brighter until it was almost too bright to look at. However, Lin Fan kept looking at the loot bags as they suddenly released an interface above them.


    It was a roulette wheel.


    It was one of the roulette wheels that were used for loot boxes in online games back on earth.


    The items that he had a chance to win were all lined up in a row and there was an arrow right in the center of the bar that indicated which item he won.


    Once the bars had finished forming, they paused for a second before they started spinning.


    The items started moving from right to left, going faster and faster until Lin Fan couldn''t clearly see which items there were anymore.


    It continued spinning like this for around thirty seconds before it slowly starteding to a stop. As it slowed down, Lin Fan was able to see the items that were passing by the arrow.


    However, all the items that passed by the arrow weren''t items that he wanted.


    As the wheel slowed down more and more, Lin Fan still wasn''t able to see the item that he wanted. All that passed by the arrow were junk items that he didn''t need at all.


    Of course, there was only space for ten items on this bar and there were over a hundred items in the loot bag, so there was still a chance that it woulde out in the end.


    But when the wheel seemed like it was about to stop, Lin Fan still didn''t see the 20% discount coupon which made him start to feel nervous.


    This wasn''t the case with just a single roulette, but it was the case with all five loot bags.


    Lin Fan didn''t know how long it would take for these loot bags to open and he only had five minutes, so he hadn''t wasted any time and had opened all five of them at once. However, it seemed like it had been a waste to do all of them at the same time¡­


    As the wheel was about to stop and when Lin Fan was about to lose all hope, he suddenly saw something that gave him hope again.


    The appearance of the 20% discount coupon!


    The items were moving at a pace that the naked eye could easily follow, but that was why Lin Fan immediately felt worried after seeing this 20% discount coupon appear.


    The 20% discount coupon had appeared in the same ce on every loot bag that he opened, but at the rate that it was going, it seemed like it wouldn''t reach the 20% discount coupon before stopping.


    But even if that was the case, Lin Fan couldn''t do anything other than watch as the bar slowly turned.


    Right as it was about to reach the 20% discount coupon, it stopped on the space right before it.


    When Lin Fan saw the item that it gave him, his expression couldn''t help looking even uglier¡­


    A packet of tissues¡­


    It was a constion prize no matter how he looked at it and he had won five of them¡­<sub> </sub>


    He had believed in the Lucky Pill that the system had sold him and it had given him this kind of result. He really wanted to find someone toin to, to tell them that these loot bags were rigged, but there was no one like that for him to find.


    It wasn''t as if he could justin to the system since he knew how that would turn out.


    The only real thing he could do was curse.


    But right before he could say anything, the wheel suddenly bumped and jumped forward a space,nding on the 20% discount coupon.


    It didn''t just happen with one of these loot bags, it happened with all of them.


    All five of them hadnded on the 20% discount coupon.


    In front of Lin Fan''s shocked gaze, the roulettes of the loot bags disappeared and there was a glow that came from inside the loot bag. After the glow appeared for a while, there was a ball of light that floated out of the loot bag, floating there in the air in front of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t need to see it to know what this was, it was definitely the prize that he had just won.


    There were five of these balls of light floating above the bags, which meant that he had won five of these 20% discount coupons. With the way they stacked, that meant that¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being filled with excitement at this moment.


    At the same time, he also apologized to the system in his heart for everything that he had said earlier.


    "As long as you know."


    Lin Fan was surprised when he saw this notification appear in front of his eyes.


    Was the system responding to him?


    No, no, that couldn''t be it. How could the cold system possibly respond to him?


    Lin Fan waited to see if there was another notification that appeared when he thought this, but there was nothing that appeared in the end.


    Seeing that this was the case, Lin Fan let go of the doubts in his mind and turned his attention back to the 20% discount coupons.


    As he reached his hand out to touch the balls of light, the 20% discount tokens dropped into his palm. When he had collected them all, he looked at these five 20% discount tokens with a hard to hide smile on his face.


    These were what he had been hoping for and now that he had gotten them, there was a strong sense of relief and joy that filled him that he couldn''t control.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time after that as he opened up the secret shop.


    When he did, he saw that there was a new button there for him to apply his discount coupons with.


    Once again, he didn''t waste any time as he pressed the button five times. Each time that he pressed the button, one of the discount coupons in his hand disappeared until they all disappeared.


    When it was over, Lin Fan turned to look at the items in the store, but he was surprised by what he saw.


    Instead of it all being free as he expected, the discount had stopped at 99% and wouldn''t go down any lower.


    It seemed like no matter how many discount coupons he applied, the store had a limit of a 99% discount and wouldn''t go any lower than that. That meant that every item in the store still cost around a hundred thousand points, but something like that was trivial for someone like Lin Fan with over five million points left.


    Well, it wasn''t that trivial since there were twenty items in the store still, so that meant that he had to spend around two million points to buy them all, butpared to before where he would have only been able to buy a single one, this situation was without a doubt much better.


    Looking at all the powerful items in his hands, Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling like a child at a candy store.


    It was like he had just picked up a hundred dors from the side of the road.


    After looking through all of his items, he put them all back into the system storage except for a single item.


    This item that he was holding in his hand was another pill.


    Of course, it wasn''t a simple pill since it was something that came from the system''s secret shop.


    This was a magical pill that would help Lin Fan breakthrough.

 Chapter 683 Child Soul Realm

    It had been a long time since Lin Fan had made a breakthrough.


    Or at least it had been a long time by Lin Fan''s standards.


    If it was by anyone else''s standards and they knew that Lin Fan was still calling his cultivation slow, they would have cursed him to death.


    Breaking through to the Embryo Soul Realm in less than a month and then reaching the Child Soul Realm in over two months, that was a speed that even the top geniuses of the twelve great factions couldn''t match.


    Yet Lin Fan was calling it slow.


    The pill that Lin Fan was about to take was called the Nine Revolutions Pill.


    It was a pill that would allow him to break through a major realm, but also would ensure that he wouldn''t suffer any side effects when he broke through. After all, people that relied on pills to break through would suffer when it came to future cultivation since without their own efforts, they wouldn''t fully understand thews that theyprehended when they broke through.


    Without thatprehension, it was harder to increase the power of thew wielded by a cultivator and it would be harder to break through since most breakthroughs were breakthroughs inwprehension.


    Only people that were desperate would rely on pills to break through or use pills that helped with one''s state ofprehension to break through with.


    But this pill was different.


    As the name implied, this was a pill that had its medicinal power revolved nine times to remove any traces of impurity and brought out the maximum amount of medicinal power of the ingredients. This was done bybining the medicinal power of the ingredients by revolving them together during refining, creating an even greater power just like how Lin Fan mixed hisws.


    In total, this created a pill that had no side effects and could help him break through to the next major realm.


    Of course, even with side effects, Lin Fan wouldn''t have had a problem using pills to break through.


    During his time in the trial space, he hade into contact withws simr to his own that were at a higher realm. With this period of contact with these upper realmws, he had better understanding of his ownws and could easily break through to the next realm if he wanted, but his problem right now was umtion of life energy.


    He didn''t umte enough life energy to break through and with how much life energy he could absorb, it would be hard for him to find enough life energy to break through.


    To put it simply, Lin Fan needed more than ten times the amount of life energy that a normal person needed just to break through a minor realm.


    As for a major realm, it could easily be up to a hundred times more¡­


    So this pill really was helpful since it would allow him to break through in a situation where it would have taken a very long time to break through.


    Lin Fan was rushing to break through because he knew that the situation with the Gctic Humanity Alliance wasn''t normal. There was clearly someone that was plotting something and they were doing it through the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    If he didn''t get stronger now, he might not be able to survive when the time came.


    After Lin Fan took the pill, he immediately felt the life energy around him starting to enter his body, filling his dantian.


    As the life energy started filling his dantian, the suns inside started to turn while the ck hole in the middle also started to swallow the mass amounts of life energy that came in.


    The suction of the ck hole was so strong that Lin Fan almost felt as if all of his energy was being sucked in by that ck hole. However, there was a constant flow of life energy that entered his dantian at the same time as the ck hole drained him of his life energy.


    Eventually, these two different flows of life energy bnced out.


    It was a feeling of being drained while also being filled with energy at the same time, a feeling that couldn''t be described since Lin Fan had never felt anything simr to this before.


    But at the very least, he would be fine as long as nothing broke that bnce.


    Too bad that life didn''t work out as he had wanted.


    As his cultivation came closer and closer to finally breaking through to the Child Soul Realm, the ck hole in his dantian became bigger and bigger and the suction force became stronger.


    This would have been a problem for him if the suns in his dantian didn''t also be bigger and provide him with more life energy. He even saw that the third sun was slowly developing.


    It was a strange feeling of one side getting stronger than the other before being bnced out by the other side.


    But in the end, Lin Fan was able to reach the point right before breaking through to the Child Soul Realm.<sub> </sub>


    Right, that entire process was just going from the Low Embryo Soul Realm to the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, but it already felt like he was about to die. It was hard to imagine what it would feel like to break through to the Child Soul Realm.


    But this was something that he had to do in the end, so he stabilized his breathing and focused himself on breaking through.


    During this process, Lin Fan didn''t know about the powerful fluctuations that he was sending out into the store.


    It wasn''t that noticeable at first because he hadn''t started his major realm breakthrough yet, but as soon as he did, the people in the store started to notice these signs.


    In fact, if he hadn''t chosen to break through in the store, the signs would have been much more noticeable.


    Lin Fan didn''t know this, but his foundation went far beyond the foundations that anyone else had. If he were to break through now, the phenomenon created by him would have been equal to someone breaking through in the True Soul Realm.


    It might have even reached the level of someone breaking through to the realm about the Soul Realm.


    But the signs that the people in the store felt made them shiver in fear since they had never felt pressure like this before.


    Some of the ones with sharper senses were able to tell that it wasing from the back of the store and they naturally wanted to find the source of this pressure. There were even some that felt that it was some kind of treasure and they started to feel greedy towards it.


    But it was at this time that Momonga stood up from the chair he was sitting in and said, "We''re closed now. Everyone, please leave."


    The people in the store were surprised when they heard this.


    There were people that had been here quite a few times during the month that Lin Fan had been away, so they naturally recognized this white haired person who sat in a corner of the store everyday.


    They never had any impression of this person because all he did was sit in the corner and y his games, so they dismissed him. Of course, the most important thing was that they didn''t sense any traces of danger from him. After all, this person was only in the Fragmented Soul Realm, so it wasn''t as if he could do anything to them.


    So one of the people in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm looked at Momonga and said, "Are you going to make us? Why don''t you open up the back door and let us see what''s there?"


    Momonga looked right at this person and his eyes released a bit of a red glow.


    When that happened, the vision of this personpletely changed from this store to a field of death. There were rivers of blood and mountains of corpses all around him, giving off the strong scent of death.


    The moment he saw this, he couldn''t help falling to his butt.


    Even if this person was a middle aged man in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, someone who clearly had his fair share of battles, he couldn''t take the aura of death in this ce at all.


    Then before he could do anything else, there was a giant skeleton that appeared out of the ground, wielding a giant bone club.


    As soon as the skeleton appeared above ground, it suddenly swung its bone club down at this person.


    This person tried to run, but his body wouldn''t listen to him as he felt that sensation of death approaching from above. All he could do was stare at the giant bone club that was falling down on him from above.


    But before the bone club could hit him, it suddenly started to fade before it disappeared in front of his eyes.


    The scenery changed along with the disappearance of this giant bone club until he was back in the store again.


    When he was back in the store, the Peak Embryo Soul Realm Expert turned to look at Momonga who was casually standing there before screaming out in terror. Without any hesitation, he immediately turned and ran out of the store. In less than a few seconds, he hadpletely disappeared without a trace.


    With the speed that he was running at, it was likely that he had already left Harmony City.


    Everyone took a cold breath when they saw this, but no one else said another word.


    They just looked at Momonga with shocked looks before tacitly leaving the store.


    Momonga didn''t pay any attention to them. He just stared at the door leading to the back for a bit before saying to Lulu, "Close up the shop and lock the door. You can go and have some fun with the little fatty."


    Then without saying another word, he sat back down in his chair in the corner.

 Chapter 684 Strange Black Hole

    Lulu was surprised to hear this from Momonga, but after working in this store for a bit, she knew that he wasn''t a normal person.


    She had heard a bit about him from the maids that he had summoned, but she never knew just how powerful he was, so she had always treated him with respect.


    She knew that something must be happening with Lin Fan in the back, so she closed the store before pulling Mo Ze Chen out with her.


    But before they left, Mo Ze Chen looked at Momonga with a worried look and said, "Is boss alright?"


    Momonga looked at him and gave a nod before waving his hand to chase them away.


    When they left, the shop fell into silence and Momonga turned his gaze back to the door leading to the back.


    ¡­


    In the back of the store, Lin Fan could feel that his cultivation was approaching the Child Soul Realm bit by bit.


    This was a familiar feeling for him because back in the trial''s Illusion Space, he had broken through to the Child Soul Realm as well.


    But there was also something that was unfamiliar to him because he was breaking through with a different cultivation technique.


    The cultivation technique that he had used back in the Illusion Space was the one that he received from the crow. It was a cultivation technique that relied on sharing one''s cultivation with the pets that they tamed, which allowed the pets to take part of the burden of the breakthrough, but also made it much harder for each pet that the cultivator tamed.


    But the cultivation technique that Lin Fan received from the system was the Nine True Sun Body Art which relied on the suns inside of Lin Fan''s dantian to break through with. So the process waspletely different.


    Of course, since the Nine True Sun Body Art was a cultivation technique at the God Realm, it was naturally harder to break throughpared to the technique the crow gave him.


    So this breakthrough that Lin Fan was experiencing was much harder than the one from before.


    During this process, the suns inside Lin Fan''s dantian released a heat that he never experienced before, but he knew exactly where it wasing from. It came from the golden pen that he had received.


    This golden pen released a power that he had never experienced before and it was so strong that it was almost too hard for him to control. Still, he was able to control it in the end.


    But now, this golden pen was recing all the weaker golden energy inside of the sun which created this burning sensation.


    Would he be able to control the power from these suns in the future?


    However, before he had time to consider that, there was something else that was changing inside of him.


    It wasn''t the golden sun, but rather it was the ck hole that was at the center of his dantian.


    The ck hole had been growing in size the entire time, had suddenly stopped growing and started to shake. After shaking for a bit, it suddenly started shrinking in on itself, almost as if it was copsing.


    Then after shaking for a bit, it actually did copse as it shrank until it was only a single speck.


    When it reached the point of being only a single speck, it suddenly split itself in half, creating two tiny specks inside of Lin Fan''s dantian.


    Only after it split in half did it start to grow in size again, but there was a clear difference in size between the two ck holes.


    There was one in the middle that should be considered the original that was clearly much bigger than the second ck hole.


    As for the second ck hole, it didn''t remain stationary like the original ck hole in the center of his dantian. Instead of just floating there in the middle, it started spinning around the original ck hole like it was orbiting it.


    In the end, to Lin Fan, the new form of the ck hole was almost like that of an atom. The original ck hole in the center was the nucleus with its protons and neutrons while the new ck hole circling around the original ck hole was the electron.


    However, even if the ck holes together were smaller than the ck hole from before, the absorption force that it generated was several times greater.


    It was so great that it was able to curb the powerful golden energy that the suns with the golden pen were generating.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan even thought that this was his body''s way of adjusting to the new power of the suns. However, what he didn''t know was that this guess was only half right.


    This was his body adjusting to the increase in power, but it was also the Nine Revolution Pill that had provoked this change in his dantian.


    The medicinal power inside of the Nine Revolution Pill also had aprehension boosting effect that had helped these two parts of his dantian evolve. Otherwise, his body would have most likely undergone a different transformation in response to this breakthrough.


    But with this new change in his body, Lin Fan could also feel his physique changing.<sub> </sub>


    The waves of golden energy swept over his body and started refining it while the absorption power helped draw out the excess energy so that it wouldn''t hurt him, while at the same time also providing him with life energy to sustain this release of golden energy.


    This process continued on for around half an hour before the release of energy slowed down and the absorption force weakened.


    But it wasn''t over yet since Lin Fan had reached the most critical point in his breakthrough, the actual breaking through to the Child Soul Realm.


    Lin Fan focused his mind and allowed the life energy to fill his dantian as he could feel something changing inside of him.


    It was as if there was something growing inside of him.


    This was the new soul that he had formed when he had broken through to the Soul Realm and now it went from the size of a small embryo to a full sized child.


    As this soul inside of him grew, he felt not only his cultivation growing stronger, but also his spiritual senses.


    Finally, when the soul had grown to the size of a child, there was one final burst of life energy that was pulled in as he broke through that threshold to reach the Child Soul Realm.


    After breaking through, there was silence for a few seconds before Lin Fan suddenly let out a breath of stagnant air.


    He had been holding this breath when he had been breaking through, but now that he had finished, he immediately released it because it was messing with the cirction of his cultivation technique.


    However, after breaking through, Lin Fan suddenly realized that something was off.


    The medicinal power of the Nine Revolution Pill still wasn''t gone yet.


    It still lingered inside of his body, as if it was looking for a ce to go.


    When Lin Fan was about to direct his life energy to move that medicinal power, he found that the medicinal power started flowing into his dantian without even being directed.


    As it flowed into his dantian, Lin Fan could feel his new cultivation stabilizing.


    He had thought that it would take him a bit longer after breaking through to stabilize this cultivation, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case.


    This Nine Revolution Pill really could be considered a godly pill, it even helped him stabilize his cultivation after he had broken through.


    This really made him want to refine this pill himself.


    This Nine Revolution Pill was actually the greatest product of the Nine Revolution Pill Refining Technique, the alchemy technique that Lin Fan had received from the system. It was just too bad that he wasn''t able to refine this since he hadn''t fully mastered that technique yet.


    Lin Fan honestly wasn''t even at the entrance of that technique since his cultivation was just too low. While he was able to make lower realm tiers, that didn''t mean that he could make the true god pills that came with the technique at all.


    It would still be some time before he was able to make the Nine Revolution Pill.


    But this experience really made him appreciate the effect that it had.


    After he had finished breaking through, Lin Fan started feeling out the changes with his body.


    The most obvious ones were the change in the power of the golden energy and the change in the ck hole, so he focused on those two.


    The change with the golden power was something he could manage since he had the new ck hole in his dantian, but the changes with the dantian were strange.


    Lin Fan raised his hand in front of him and gathered the absorption power in the palm of his hand.


    As the absorption power appeared, Lin Fan could actually see the warps in space that had been formed by it. However, as long as Lin Fan controlled it, he could stop it from forming those warps in space.


    Rather, instead of controlling it, he was just weakening it so that it didn''t tear the spacews around him keeping space normal.


    But then he started using more of that absorption power until it had formed a ck hole in the center of his hand.


    As he stared at this ck hole in his hand, Lin Fan suddenly had an idea.


    He raised his hand and pushed out with his palm.

 Chapter 685 Gathering

    As soon as he pushed out with his palm, the ck hole that had formed in his hand was pushed out as well.


    It went forward until it reached a box of supplies that he had left in the back.


    As soon as it hit the box of supplies, the wood of the box suddenly started to fade away.


    It was as if there was something that was sucking away the vitality of the wood itself, draining away its life force until there was nothing left.


    At the same time, the items that were inside the wooden box also shriveled up and turned into dust.


    Lin Fan could feel the life energy entering his body through this ck hole and knew that all of these items shriveling up was because of the ck hole that he had thrown. It was like the absorption force that he had used to surround his weapons with previously, but now it seemed like he was able to gather it together and use it remotely.


    Not to mention that the effects of the absorption force was much greaterpared to before.


    This must be the effect of the second ck hole that was revolving around the original ck hole.


    When he tried to make multiple ck holes that were like the one that he had thrown out, he found that he couldn''t make more than one. It seemed like he was only able to gather that absorption power to form a single ck hole.


    This was in line with the single extra ck hole that was inside of his dantian.


    Maybe he would be able to form more ck holes in his dantian in the future and form more external ck holes, but for now, it seemed like just forming one was his limit.


    As for where the life energy came from, it came from the second ck hole and not the first one at all. It was almost as if they were separate beings¡­


    Would he be able to let the second ck hole exist outside of him permanently in the future?


    If he were to develop his powers enough, would it be something that he could just control as a separate entity?


    There were plenty of uses for this ck hole if this was the case.


    Still, that wasn''t something for Lin Fan to consider now since he wasn''t able to do it. What was most important now was finding out the limits of this new ck hole that he could release.


    So after forming the ck hole again, he pulled out some items from his storage and a few of his pets.


    By the end of his experiments, all that was left was the dust of the items and the pets lying on the ground with exhausted looks. It almost seemed like they couldn''t be brides anymore¡­


    But Lin Fan had aplished his goal and found the limits of this new power.


    He had to admit, this really was a useful power. There were many ways that he could use this in the future.


    Once he was finished with all of this, Lin Fan headed back out to the front.


    When he came out the door and saw the empty shop, he looked around the store with a confused look before seeing Momonga sitting there.


    He walked over and asked, "Where did everyone go?"


    Momonga was focused on looking at Lin Fan as he said in a distracted voice, "I closed the store after I felt the fluctuations in the back."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but it wasn''t because he was surprised by the fact that Momonga had closed the store. Rather he was surprised because Momonga said that he had felt the fluctuations from the back.


    He had thought that the walls of the store would have been enough to block these fluctuations, but it seemed that he was wrong.


    The walls of the store could block these fluctuations in the past when he was in the Blue Star because thews involved in the breakthroughs under the Soul Realm were weak to begin with. However,ws in the Child Soul Realm were apletely different case, so the store couldn''t block all of the fluctuations. Though, the store did stop the phenomenon from appearing in the sky above the store.


    Lin Fan thought to himself, "It seems like I can''t have my breakthroughs in the store anymore. It''s best if I go to one of the cultivation realms."


    After a period of silence, Momonga suddenly asked, "Did the master of the store give you something? Or did he teach you something?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by Momonga''s sharp senses, but he honestly answered, "Master gave me a pill to help me break through."


    Momonga quickly asked, "Do you still have another one of these pills?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "No, there was only a single pill."<sub> </sub>


    Momonga gave a nod and didn''t say anything else in response to this.


    Lin Fan looked at him with a strange look, but he chose to ignore it in the end.


    Since the store had closed, Lin Fan decided to head out and take care of some business. He asked Momonga what he was going to do, but Momonga just said that he would stay in the store, so he just left him there.


    When Lin Fan left, Momonga was just left sitting there in the corner by himself, lost in his thoughts.


    He wasn''t surprised that Lin Fan''s master had this kind of pill since he already knew that Lin Fan''s master was at a level that far surpassed his understanding.


    The thing that had forced him into such deep thought was the residual medicinal power that he had felt around Lin Fan.


    This medicinal power was so strange that he didn''t know what it was at first, but he knew that it was what had helped Lin Fan make his breakthrough. But after he learned that this was medicinal power from a pill from Lin Fan, he was even more shocked.


    After all, with his strong spiritual senses, he could tell that there wasn''t a single side effect that had been caused by this pill inside of Lin Fan. This was a pill that shouldn''t exist in this world, after all, it was something that could overturn the veryws of cultivation.


    It was something that reached the realms of the gods.


    Such an item would even be effective on him, so that was why he had been so enthusiastic with his questions.


    But after he thought about it, he calmed himself down.


    It was natural that the master of the store would give this pill to Lin Fan since Lin Fan was his disciple. It was even more natural that the master of this store would only have a single one of this pill since this pill was clearly something that went against thews of cultivation.


    He shouldn''t ce his hopes on getting any of these pills from Lin Fan.


    But the fact that such a pill existed meant that there were hopes of getting another pill like this. After all, Lin Fan''s master still existed and as long as he was there in the store, there was always the chance that he would get more pills like this.


    So as long as Momonga worked well for the store, there was a chance that he would be able to get a pill as well.


    With the hope of breaking through the bottleneck that had stopped him for so long, Momonga was filled with enthusiasm towards working for the store. Of course, that also meant helping Lin Fan with what he needed.


    While he had gotten closer to Lin Fan during this time, he still was on the fence about using his powers in this lower realm.


    After all, this was a lower realm and if he did too much, there would be consequences.


    But now that he saw this hope, he didn''t care about those consequences at all.


    Those consequences were minorpared to the hope of breaking through to the next realm. After all, if he did break through to the next realm, that meant that the consequences wouldn''t even be considered consequences anymore since he would be strong enough to deal with the people that would annoy him.


    So with this, Momonga made up his mind.


    It seemed like he would have to get even closer to Lin Fan and this store.


    As he thought this, he opened up the interface that had been given to him when he had signed the contract with Lin Fan. As he looked at the points that he currently had, he began thinking of different ways to earn even more points.


    ¡­


    The next few days were quite silent as nothing happened in Harmony City.


    However, that was to be expected since all the twelve great factions had juste back from the Ancient Era Ruins. Not just the twelve great factions, even the powerful factions that had sent their sessors into the realm with the tokens that they bought.


    With all these powerful factionsying low, naturally there wasn''t anyone that dared to create any trouble.


    So it was a rare period of peace for the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Lin Fan opened his store as usual and did business as usual, while at the same time building up his strength and gathering more information for his future ns.


    But after around two weeks, there was a guest that shattered this peace.


    This guest was not someone that Lin Fan was unfamiliar with, but the request that they had this time really was surprising. It was a request that even Lin Fan was a bit helpless against.

 Chapter 686 Tournament

    It was a normal day for the store, but this time, the store wasn''t as empty as before.


    Even aftering back, Lin Fan didn''t take over the counter of the store, so it was still Lulu who sat at the front every day. As well as the two ghost maids that Momonga summoned that took care of business in the store.


    Because of this, there were still plenty of people who came to the store to stare at these three girls.


    Of course, now that Mo Ze Chen was back, he did chase off quite a few of them and got into quite a few arguments with those that didn''t leave. As for fighting him¡­as long as they were in Lin Fan''s store, they didn''t dare do that.


    <o>,m The first person that tried had been sent flying from Lin Fan''s store because of the store''s defense system.</o>


    Since Mo Ze Chen was helping out in the store, he was considered an employee and the store''s defense system would help him take care of anyone making trouble.


    So since then, no one had dared to use force against Mo Ze Chen even though he was weaker than them.


    But as the store was having a normal day, there was a customer that suddenly came in that changed all of that.


    This customer came up to the counter, ignoring the line of people that were there and asked Lulu, "Is Owner Lin in?"


    Lulu looked over at this customer and seeing who it was, she gave a nod and said, "I''ll go get him for you."


    The customer gave a nod and just stood at the counter waiting as Lulu ran into the back.


    As for the other customers, not a single one of them gave a singleint because they were happy to see this person. After all, this person was Qiao Yi Fei, one of the Five Flowers of Harmony City¡­No, it should be one of the Six Flowers of Harmony City.


    That''s right, ever since Lulu appeared, the title had changed.


    Everyone was now calling Lulu the sixth flower of Harmony City on the message boards¡­Even her fan club had reached a level that was just second to the previous five flowers. The only reason that it couldn''t reach the same level was because she was too new to Harmony City and there hadn''t been enough time for people to gather yet. However, in time, she would certainly reach the same level as the other five since she wasn''t any less beautiful than them.


    As for Lulu''s n to keep a low profile, that was already thrown out the window¡­


    So of course none of the customers had anyints about Qiao Yi Fei skipping the line anding right to the counter. Most of them were actually fans of Qiao Yi Fei as well and having this chance to see their goddess up close was more than they could ask for.


    There were even some that were working up the courage to walk up to talk to her, but after one person tried, they were immediately chased off with a cold look. After that, no one else dared to make a move.


    After a few minutes, Lulu came back with Lin Fan behind her.


    When Lin Fan saw who it was that was calling for him, he wasn''t surprised since there were only a few people that he could be considered acquainted with in Harmony City. Not to mention that Qiao Yi Fei was the one that contacted him the most when it came to matters with the Hunters Organization.


    The only thing that he was surprised about was how early she had shown up.


    He had thought that it would take at least another two weeks before any of the twelve great factions made a move.


    But still, she was here, so it meant that something was up.


    So Lin Fan gave a nod to Lulu and said, "Go and help the other two girls in the store, I''ll take over the counter."


    Lulu looked at Qiao Yi Fei before turning back to Lin Fan to give a nod.


    She took Mo Ze Chen by the hand and pulled him out to the store. But when she did so, there were quite a few people that looked at Mo Ze Chen with death res.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t mind all of this as he turned to look at them with a smug smile.


    However, even with Lulu gone, there were still a few people who remained at the counter because they were more interested in Qiao Yi Fei.


    That didn''tst long however since she immediately chased them off with her cold re.


    After sitting down at the counter, Lin Fan tapped the table and he released hisw bubble around them before asking, "What is it?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was a bit surprised to see Lin Fan being this direct, but she didn''t mind it. She just said, "There''s something new that''se up."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this and waited for her to exin.<sub> </sub>


    After a pause, Qiao Yi Fei said, "Aftering back from the Ancient Era Ruins, the ones that went in received the benefits and started to break through. Now that they''ve broken through, they can no longer be considered just part of the younger generation, so a transition is happening. To rank the new generation, the twelve great factions have decided to host a tournament for the new generation."


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this since he didn''t find anything strange with this.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything, Qiao Yi Fei continued, "The Hunters Organization wants you to be a representative in that tournament."


    Lin Fan gave another nod in response, but this time he finally answered. He spread his hands and said with a helpless sigh, "I would, but I can''t."


    Qiao Yi Fei was surprised when she heard this, but she quickly asked, "Why not?"


    Lin Fan looked right into her eyes and said, "Because I''ve also broken through."


    Qiao Yi Fei revealed a look of shock this time.


    After she came back to her senses, she focused her mind and released her spiritual sense to check Lin Fan''s cultivation, but she found that she couldn''t see through him at all. The only thing that she could feel was that he was in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    It seemed like he had a powerful technique for hiding his cultivation, but not only that, he was strong enough to hide his cultivation from her.


    But that shocked her even more.


    Thest time she had seen him, he was only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm, but just in two weeks, he had already broken through to the Child Soul Realm just like her.


    It had been hard enough for her to reach the Child Soul Realm, but Lin Fan skipped all the minor realms of the Embryo Soul Realm to reach the Child Soul Realm like it was nothing.


    People called her a genius for her cultivation speed, but Lin Fan was a monster whenpared to her.


    But since he had already broken through, she knew that there was nothing she could do.


    After a long pause to think, she gave a sigh and said, "Then what do we do?"


    Lin Fan could have just ignored this since this was a matter of the Hunters Organization and was unrted to him, but he did owe Qiao Yi Fei''s grandfather quite a bit. With all the help that old man Qiao had given him, it didn''t seem right for him to ignore this.


    Not to mention, that he would need the Hunters Organization help in the future.


    So Lin Fan raised his hand to point at someone and said, "Isn''t it fine just to send him?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was confused as she looked in the direction that Lin Fan was pointing in. When she saw the person that he was pointing at, she immediately narrowed her eyes and said, "Him?"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod in response to this as he said, "Yes."


    Qiao Yi Fei couldn''t help knitting her brows as she asked again, "Him?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said once again, "Yes."


    The person that Lin Fan had been pointing at was Mo Ze Chen who was currently arguing with one of the customers that had gotten too close to Lulu.


    Seeing the dark look on Qiao Yi Fei''s face, it wasn''t hard to guess what she was thinking when it came to Mo Ze Chen.


    While Mo Ze Chen had broken through to the High Embryo Soul Realm aftering back from the Ancient Era Ruins, he was still weakerpared to the geniuses of the other twelve great factions that would be entering the tournament. Most of the other geniuses were already in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, only a single step from breaking through to the Child Soul Realm. The only reason they didn''t break through was because they were still building up their foundation.


    The ones that weren''t in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm and were only in the High Embryo Soul Realm were those that had a special power which allowed them to match those in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    As for Mo Ze Chen, he was someone with none of that.


    Qiao Yi Fei had seen him fighting in the Ancient Era Ruins and knew that Mo Ze Chen was someone who wascking in terms of fighting experience, so he was actually weaker than most experts at the same level.


    So it was hard for her to imagine him performing well in this tournament.


    Lin Fan just casually said, "I have my trump card for him."

 Chapter 687 Recovery

    Qiao Yi Fei looked at Lin Fan with a look on her face that showed that she clearly doubted this, but she didn''t say anything in response.


    After all, the amount of times that Lin Fan had proved her wrong was already hard to count, so she had instinctively started developing a sense of trust towards him. She even trusted him when there was no evidence that showed that she should trust him.


    So after a moment of silence, Lin Fan called Mo Ze Chen over for Qiao Yi Fei.


    Mo Ze Chen was confused on why Lin Fan called him over, but after the situation was exined to him, he couldn''t help revealing a shocked look.


    After standing there in a daze for a few seconds, he couldn''t help giving a gulp and asking, "Boss, are you really telling me to go fight in this tournament? This is a gathering of all the top geniuses of the twelves great factions, shouldn''t you be the one that goes instead of me?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I''ve broken through, so I can''t go."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed the same surprised look as Qiao Yi Fei, but he didn''t try to check Lin Fan with his spiritual sense like Qiao Yi Fei had. He was much closer to Lin Fan, so his trust in Lin Fan had already reached the level of blind faith.


    If Lin Fan said something, he would believe it.


    But Mo Ze Chen still wouldn''t give up on this matter yet.


    After all, he was someone that didn''t specialize in fighting. If he were to go to this tournament, there was no doubt that he would be beaten up by whoever he faced and would be eliminated in the first round.


    So why would the boss send him to this meeting?


    Could it be that he had done something to anger the boss and he was being sent as a punishment?


    So Mo Ze Chen said, "Boss, isn''t it better if someone from the Hunters Organization goes instead? They have plenty of people, there''s no need for me to go, is there?"


    Lin Fan gave Mo Ze Chen the same answer that he had given Qiao Yi Fei, "I have my trump card for you."


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised to hear this, but he didn''t say anything else after that.


    If it was something that the boss was calling a trump card, it should be something that was quite amazing. Since that was the case, there was nothing to worry about.


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod and said, "Alright boss, I trust you."


    Lin Fan gave him a nod before turning back to Qiao Yi Fei and saying, "I think that settles it."


    Qiao Yi Fei still had a look of doubt on her face, but she didn''t say anything else.


    After giving a sigh, she also gave a nod and said, "Alright, I''ll pass your decision on to grandfather and he''ll make the final decision. That should be eptable, right?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before asking, "When is the tournament?"


    Qiao Yi Fei thought about it before saying, "There isn''t a set date right now, but based on the information that we''ve received, they''re nning on holding it in around two weeks."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin before saying, "That should be enough time for me to whip this fellow into shape."


    When Mo Ze Chen heard this, he felt a chill run down his back.


    He looked at the smile on Lin Fan''s face and felt that he had signed up for something that he would regret.


    But still, it was toote for him to back out since everything had been set, so he could only put on a brave look and face what wasing for him.


    After that had been settled, Mo Ze Chen immediately went back to where Lulu was standing with one of the ghost girls and started chasing off the men that were trying to get closer to her.


    Seeing Mo Ze Chen fighting off the crowd and then flirting with Lulu, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a trace of sadness that shed in his eyes.


    Qiao Yi Fei who still hadn''t left yet saw this and she couldn''t help feeling an ache in her heart. She didn''t know what it was exactly, but all she knew was that since they came back from the Ancient Era Ruins, she found it hard to look away from Lin Fan when she was with him.


    She didn''t know what it was, but he almost seemed like he was glowing from time to time.


    But when she was about to say something, the door to the back suddenly opened and someone came out that surprised both of the two at the counter.


    The figure that came out of the back saw Qiao Yi Fei standing there and then without any hesitation, she came up behind Lin Fan and wrapped her arms around his neck. She leaned in on his back before saying, "I''m back."


    Lin Fan was still in a daze when he heard this, but then he revealed a smile and said, "Wee back."


    The person who hade out of the back was Ang.


    He didn''t know why she was here, but that didn''t stop him from feeling happy that she was here.


    After all, it really felt like it had been a long time since he had seen her.<sub> </sub>


    Qiao Yi Fei saw the interaction between the two of them and she gave an awkward cough before saying, "Owner Lin, I''ll be leaving now."


    Lin Fan hadpletely forgotten that Qiao Yi Fei was still there when he saw Anging out and he only noticed her when she spoke up.


    He looked at her with a smile and said, "Alright miss Qiao, I''ll be waiting to hear from you. I won''t send you off."


    Qiao Yi Fei cupped her hands to Lin Fan before looking at Ang and then leaving. As she left, she couldn''t help feeling a bit of difort in her heart.


    What she didn''t even realize was that she had unknowingly stoppeding to Lin Fan''s store just to see Momonga. Even with him sitting in the corner the entire time, she didn''t say a single thing to him or even look in his direction¡­


    She didn''t know what she was feeling, but she did her best to ignore it.


    The most important thing was helping her grandfather with the matter of the tournament.


    With this thought in mind, she suppressed the emotions in her heart and left the store without a single look back.


    After Qiao Yi Fei was gone, Lin Fan turned his attention back to Ang.


    Looking at her, he could see that her face was much betterpared to before which soothed his heart. When he had seen herst, her face really had been pale which had filled his heart with pain.


    But seeing the way she looked now, he couldn''t help smiling as he looked at her.


    Ang also smiled as she looked at Lin Fan since it had been a long time since she had seen him as well and she had missed him quite a bit.


    After a moment of silence, Lin Fan raised his hand to hold her face as he said, "It really is good to see you again."


    Ang just smiled without saying a thing.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan started moving in towards her, but before he could do anything, there was a voice that sounded out from behind them along with a cough.


    "I''m here too, you know."


    Both of them were surprised by this voice, Lin Fan more than Ang since she remembered that she came with someone when this voice rang out.


    Lin Fan looked behind Ang to see Yuki standing there by the doorway.


    There was a sh of disappointment in his eyes, but that quickly disappeared as he said, "You''re here too?"


    Yuki could hear the disappointed tone in Lin Fan''s voice, but she ignored it as she said with a soft snort, "What? I can''t be here?"


    Lin Fan revealed a helpless smile as he said, "I never said that."


    Yuki ignored Lin Fan and came forward to take Ang by the arm before pulling her away from Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan clearly didn''t like this, but seeing the helpless smile on Ang''s face, he didn''t say anything and just gave a helpless smile himself.


    He knew that the rtionship between these two girls wasplicated, but in the end, Yuki''s feelings for Ang were sincere. Not to mention that Ang had always wanted to be friends with Yuki to begin with.


    So he just let her do what she wanted.


    Ang just ignored all of this and asked Lin Fan, "What''s been happening recently?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh when he heard this before saying, "It''s a long story."


    Ang just said with a smile, "We have time."


    Lin Fan caught Ang up on everything that she had missed during her time away and then he finally told her about how he was nning on entering Mo Ze Chen into the tournament.


    Ang turned to look at Mo Ze Chen before asking, "Do you want help training him?"


    Seeing the look in her eyes, even Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling sorry for Mo Ze Chen, so he said, "No, I can handle this myself."


    Ang looked at Lin Fan, but she gave a nod in the end.


    There was a moment of silence that appeared between the two of them before Lin Fan broke that silence by saying, "It really is good that you''re back."


    Ang just smiled and said, "I''m back."

 Chapter 688 Training

    There was a warm atmosphere that filled the space around them, but there was one person that was made ufortable by this.


    Yuki had held it in because she knew how Ang felt about Lin Fan, so she didn''t feel that it was right to cut into their conversation.


    However, if they were going to feed her dog food like this, she wasn''t going to hold back anymore.


    She walked forward and stood in between Lin Fan and Ang, blocking her view of him. Then she took Ang''s arm and said, "Ang, didn''t you say that you were going to show me the desserts of this realm?"


    Both Lin Fan and Ang had a blush on their face, but those quickly faded.


    Ang looked at Yuki standing in front of her with an expectant look on her and she revealed a faint smile. She reached her hand up and patted her on the head before saying, "Sure, let''s go get some now."


    Then she turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Do you still have my watch?"


    Lin Fan opened up one of the drawers beside him and took out the watch that he had gotten for Ang.


    After handing it over, Ang put it on and opened up a delivery service app and started going through the various famous dessert stores. All the things that she was adding to the cart were the most popr and the most expensive desserts from each store.


    But as they were going through the desserts, Lin Fan also saw Yuki drooling over each one that she saw on the screen.


    He knew a bit about spirits from the time that he spent in the World of Elements. While spirits did cook their food, they mostly enjoyed eating things raw since they felt that it was better to have things naturally.


    Of course, for spirits that mainly ate things raw, their food culture wasn''t as developed and even if they did cook their food, it was just mainly roasting it over a fire without any condiments and such.


    So there was no such thing as sugar and sweets in the World of Elements.


    This would be her first time having things like sweets and cakes, so it was natural that she would be excited.


    Of course, once Ang finished ordering everything, the expression on Lin Fan''s face didn''t look that good.


    The ount that Ang''s watch was linked to was of course Lin Fan''s ount, so whatever she spent on ordering food all came from Lin Fan''s ount.


    Once she was finished and he saw the bill that was charged to his ount, even if he was someone who had a good mentality, the corner of his lips couldn''t help twitching. But he just gave a sigh and closed the notification that had popped out of his watch.


    Who told him to love her?


    Seeing how excited the two of them looked, he also felt happy for them.


    He had a good idea of what kind of personality Yuki had based on the interaction between them when they first met. Now that he saw her happily talking to Ang like this, he knew that they had resolved themunication issue between them and they were much closer.


    He also knew that this was what Ang wanted since he had seen how she had reacted when Yuki had appeared in the castle.


    He was happy that it seemed like they had both gotten a new sister.


    But that didn''tst long.


    Once the delivery came, he saw how the two of them were eating whichpletely changed their view of them.


    Yuki didn''t have anything that resembled table manners at all as she stuffed the cakes into her mouth. It was very simr to how Ang had acted when she had first arrived on the Blue Star, but over time, she slowly developed table manners and ate properly. Though that didn''t change the amount of food that she ate¡­


    As for Ang, she just sat on the side eating her own piece of cake while taking breaks in between to help Yuki wipe the cream and crumbs off her face.


    If Lin Fan had to describe the rtionship between them in words¡­It would have been described as a rtionship between mother and child¡­


    He didn''t know how to react to this at first, but then he shook his head with a smile and walked out of the back to head back to the counter.


    After a while, the door behind him opened.


    When he turned around to see who it was, he found that it was Yuki and she had a te of cake in her hand.


    He looked at her with a surprised look as she came over and ced the te of cake in front of him. When she saw the confused look on his face, she gave an awkward cough before saying, "Ang said that you''re the one who paid for everything, so we should give you some as well. So here is your share."


    After saying this, she raised the te of cake that she held up to Lin Fan''s face.


    Lin Fan was about to reject this since he had seen how much she enjoyed the cake, but then he caught something out of the corner of his eyes. He saw Ang standing at the door entrance giving him a slight shake of the head.


    Lin Fan immediately understood what it meant, but he was confused why she would want him to do this. Still, since she was telling him to do it, he had no reason to refuse.<sub> </sub>


    So he took the cake from her and said, "Thanks."


    Yuki just gave a slight nod before turning around to run back to the table with the rest of the desserts.


    However, with Lin Fan''s sharp eyes, he could see the corners of her lips curling.


    When he saw this, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of warmth in his heart.


    Yuki went back over to Ang and when she was in front of her, Ang reached her hand out to pat her head. Yuki leaned in and rubbed her head against Ang''s hand while she patted her.


    Lin Fan really didn''t know what to think when he saw this.


    It was like he had gotten a little sister, a child, and a cat all at once.


    But at least it seemed like she would bring some fun to their lives.


    He turned his head back to the piece of cake and he realized that something was missing.


    The te didn''t have a fork with it!


    How was he supposed to eat this?


    But after thinking about it, he chose to pick up the piece of cake with his fingers since it was a small piece of cake to begin with and threw it all into his mouth.


    As he did this, he heard snickers from behind him, but he chose to ignore it.


    All in all, it felt good that Ang was back.


    ¡­


    Several dayster, after the store had closed.


    "Boss, can''t you go easy on me?" Mo Ze Chen said as he ran around the arena.


    Mo Ze Chen was currently being chased by severalrge beasts across the arena on the lower floor of Lin Fan''s shop. Beside him was a little tiger that was running along with him, throwing des of water behind him.


    Lin Fan was sitting in the audience seat, just watching as Mo Ze Chen was getting chased by the beasts.


    After hearing what he said, Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I''m not the one controlling them, so you''re asking the wrong person."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a bitter smile as he turned to the girl who was standing beside Lin Fan.


    He was going to say something, but after seeing the look on her face, he knew that it wouldn''t be of any use even if he had said anything. So all he could do was continue running as he was being chased by the beasts behind him.


    Lin Fan looked over at Brainy and he couldn''t help smiling when he saw the look on her face.


    It was all because of what had just happened earlier when Mo Ze Chen had met Brainy.


    Before this, while Mo Ze Chen knew about Lin Fan''s ability to scout ces, he didn''t know how he used this power. So naturally Mo Ze Chen didn''t know about the existence of Brainy.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan felt that it would be useful for Mo Ze Chen to know about Brainy since he could work with her in the future when he was unavable, so he told him about her.


    It was just too bad that Mo Ze Chen had made the worst first impression which was why he was currently being chased like this.


    As soon as he had met Brainy, the first thing that Mo Ze Chen had done was ask, "Why is your skin green?"


    Brainy had the mentality of a young girl and when she was asked a question like this, naturally she was unhappy.


    It wasn''t her fault that her skin was green, rather it was because she was a nt based beast to begin with. So even after she had turned into a human, there were times when her skin was green because of excess chlorophyll.


    It was also something that she was sensitive about, so when it was pointed out like this by Mo Ze Chen, he had immediately earned her wrath.


    It was too bad for him that she was the one that was in charge of his training¡­

 Chapter 689 Tournament (1)

    As Mo Ze Chen was being chased around the arena, Ang came out of the elevator with Yuki and walked over to where Lin Fan was sitting.


    She looked down at Mo Ze Chen running around in the arena, but her attention wasn''t on Mo Ze Chen, but rather the little white tiger that was running along with him.


    After a period of silence, she asked, "How is it going?"


    Lin Fan turned to look at her and after a while, he shook his head with a helpless smile. Then he spread his hand and said, "It''s going as well as it can go."


    Hearing this, Ang suddenly narrowed her eyes and turned back to Mo Ze Chen who was running around with the little white tiger. After a moment of silence, she suddenly gave a snort before turning to Brainy to say, "Throw some more beasts at him."


    Brainy was surprised to hear Ang suddenly speaking to her, but she turned and gave a nod before saying, "Got it, big sister."


    Ang naturally knew about Brainy the entire time, she had even tried to treat Brainy like the other pets of Lin Fan, trying to get them to call her "mom", but Brainy was the only one that refused. In fact, Brainy didn''t seem to like Ang at first, but slowly she came around to her and epted her.


    It was almost as if she was afraid of Ang¡­


    But even aftering around to her, she still refused to call her "mom" like all the other kids did and insisted on calling her "big sister".


    Ang had no choice but to ept this in the end since she was just happy that Brainy hade around to epting her.


    Yuki also came up behind Brainy and hugged her which caught Brainy off guard.


    But Brainy also epted this since over the past few days, she had gotten quite close to Yuki.


    It was mainly because both of them were rather childish.


    Yuki because it was her personality and Brainy because she was still technically a child, even if she was older than the older pets.


    With her age, Brainy was currently in the stage of being a teenager, so it was normal for her to act that way. As for Yuki¡­It seemed like even though she was as old as Ang, this was just her natural personality.


    Of course, the reason that they were here to watch Mo Ze Chen train wasn''t because they cared about his performance or even the fact that he was representing Lin Fan in this tournament, they only cared about the little white tiger that he was training with.


    Since Lin Fan had taken in the little white tiger, Ang had treated it like her son and she had always taken special care of it. Evenpared Lin Fan''s other pets who she treated like her children, it was clear that Xiao Bai was her favourite.


    Now that Xiao Bai was entering his first tournament, she had to go cheer him on as his mother!


    However, if Xiao Bai were to perform poorly because of Mo Ze Chen¡­


    It was hard to guarantee what would happen to Mo Ze Chen after the tournament¡­


    Seeing that Mo Ze Chen still wasn''t improving even after more beasts were sent, Ang started tapping her feet with impatience. Then when she saw Xiao Bai having to throw out some water des just to keep Mo Ze Chen safe, she couldn''t take it anymore.


    She turned to Brainy and said, "Call your beasts back."


    Brainy felt a chill run down her spine when she heard Ang say this, but she still listened to her.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw that the beasts were all backing down, he was very confused. He turned over to where Lin Fan was sitting and was about to ask what was happening, but before he could say a word, Ang had already jumped into the arena.


    Mo Ze Chen also felt a chill run down his spine when he saw her jumping into the arena and he quickly asked in a trembling voice, "Sis, sister inw, what, what are you doing, doing here?"


    Ang rolled up her sleeves and said one simple word, "Training."


    Mo Ze Chen''s expression sank as the bad feeling deep down inside him became even stronger.


    He had gotten to know Ang over the past few days and naturally he knew just how strong she was¡­


    If she were to do some "training", it would be hard to guarantee his survival¡­


    But Mo Ze Chen did know her one weakness.


    Without any hesitation, Mo Ze Chen turned to pick Xiao Bai up from the ground to use as a shield, but as soon as he turned, he found that Xiao Bai was already missing.


    When he turned back to look at Ang, he found Xiao Bai was already in her embrace, rubbing his head against her hand that was rubbing his head.


    Mo Ze Chen knew that he was doomed and he just said with the look of a dead fish, "Please be gentle."


    Ang just gave a cold snort before she raised her fist.


    As for what happened after, it was too graphic to describe. However, at the end of it, Mo Ze Chen justid there on the ground with his eyes rolled back, almost looking like he was dead.<sub> </sub>


    Lulu immediately ran into the arena and came to his side with a medical box.


    As she looked him over, she carefully looked at Ang and asked, "Sister inw, is he still alive?"


    Ang gave a snort before saying, "He''s alive."


    Lulu let out a sigh of relief before she started treating Mo Ze Chen''s wounds.


    Ang just ignored the two of them as she headed back upstairs with Xiao Bai in her arms and Yuki following behind her.


    As they passed by Lin Fan, he could see the two of them looking up different delivery menus online¡­


    The two of them were both big eaters and the two of them had worked their way through over a hundred restaurants in just a few days¡­


    The only thing that Lin Fan could think as they headed upstairs was that he needed to hold a funeral for his poor wallet.


    ¡­


    The trainingsted a few more days and finally they received the information on the tournament from Qiao Yi Fei.


    Like she had said, it was held two weeks after the time she hadst met them and it was being held in Harmony City.


    The reason why it was being held in Harmony City was because Harmony City was a symbolic ce.


    This was a city that had been built by all twelve of the great factions and it was considered a neutral ce between them.


    This tournament was to decide the rankings for the next generation and naturally they couldn''t let a single force be in charge of holding the tournament. So that was why they chose to hold it in Harmony City, under joint management.


    Of course the twelve great factions wouldn''t let another minor faction take over this tournament because of how important it was, so they decided to manage it together after long deliberation.


    Also because of how open it was, to show the spirit of fairness and to show off how benevolent they were, they allowed anyone to enter this tournament. They didn''t have to be from one of the twelve great factions to enter this tournament.


    Because of this, there were quite a number of participants that came from various minor forces.


    This was a tournament that would have the attention of the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance, so if one could stand out here, it would mean that they would have a bright future. If they could show off enough potential, there was even the chance of joining the twelve great factions.


    Which was the second and hidden reason why the twelve great factions had made this tournament public.


    No one was against gaining more geniuses.


    p However, this also meant that there would be many more rounds that they would have to go through to reach the final event.</anda>


    Another way of showing fairness that the twelve great factions came up with was to not give any seeded positions to their own geniuses. This meant that even the geniuses of the twelve great factions would have to fight in the preliminaries to get to the finals.


    But in reality, this was actually just a way for the twelve great factions to plot against each other.


    Since the twelve great factions were the ones organizing this tournament, it was very easy for them to manipte the drawings for the matches.


    They all knew who the famous geniuses of each of the twelve great factions were, so they could easily ce them with people with talent that weren''t as well known to hurt those geniuses. They could even ce them with assassins that could use the matches to kill them.


    After all, while killing was prohibited, swords didn''t have eyes.


    It was verymon for idents to happen in ces like this.


    But none of that mattered to Mo Ze Chen since he was not someone famous.


    Even if he was from the twelve great factions, he was someone that wasn''t known for his power since he really didn''t have much power to begin with.


    This was evident in where he had been assigned to fight his matches.


    Since there were many participants that had signed up, the preliminaries had been divided into different batches that would be held in many different locations.


    The location that Mo Ze Chen had been assigned was one of the lower tiered ones, which showed that no one really paid any attention to him.


    But of course, that was just fine since Mo Ze Chen was nning on staying low key for as long as possible.

 Chapter 690 Tournament (2)

    After they arrived, the first thing that happened was that Mo Ze Chen was pulled away by the staff member that helped him sign in.


    This staff member was from the Hunters Organization and was told to take care of Mo Ze Chen, so they had been waiting for quite some time for him to show up, even though Mo Ze Chen did arrive right on time.


    After Mo Ze Chen had been pulled away, the rest of the people that hade all went to find a ce to sit down in the stands.


    Even though these were only preliminaries, the stands were still filled with people.


    While they weren''tpletely packed because this was one of the lower tier locations, there weren''t that many empty seats either.


    There were plenty of people that were willing to see these fights and since they couldn''t get into the higher tier locations, they had no problems with settling with the lower tier locations. After all, even if this was a lower tier location, there were still members of the twelve great factions that were fighting here.


    This was a match that normal people like them never would have had a chance to see at all.


    Of course, the main reason for this was that the matches for the preliminaries didn''t have an entrance fee. Anyone coulde and watch the matches as long as they came to the arena.


    For the twelve great factions that were holding these matches, this was naturally a loss since they had to pay to hold these matches and then they wouldn''t be able to make any money off of them. After all, these matches were only the preliminary and it was very unlikely anyone would sponsor matches like these.


    So without sponsors and without charging entrance fees, but still having to pay the costs of the arenas and the staff, there was no doubt that they would be suffering losses.


    Logically, it would be normal for them to charge entrance fees, but the twelve great factions were adamant about not doing this.


    Of course, they had their own reasons.


    First, it was because most of the locations were owned by one of the twelve great factions and the workers were all people from the twelve great factions, their costs were minimal and could be basically ignored.


    Second, since their younger generation were participating in these preliminaries, this was a good chance to show off their might and establish their reputation. In the long term, reputation was worth more than anything that they could gain with the small amount of money that they had lost holding these preliminary matches.


    Of course, it wasn''t as if every single faction would be gaining reputation.


    There were certainly those that would lose out against those that were stronger and would lose reputation instead, but that was just the risk that they had to take.


    It didn''t take long for Mo Ze Chen to get his first match.


    The person that he was matched with was a genius from one of the minor factions and he was someone that was only in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm.


    However, if it was the past Mo Ze Chen, he might have struggled because he wasn''t someone that was specialized for fighting. This genius from the minor faction had also received artifacts that would help increase hisbat power.


    After all, for this genius, he knew that there wasn''t a chance for him to make it past the preliminaries and reach the finals. He was just a small genius from one of the minor factions, there wasn''t much that he could ask for.


    The only thing that he wanted was to defeat one opponent from the twelve great factions.


    As long as he defeated someone from the twelve great factions, he would be able to raise his own fame and would have a chance to move up in his own faction. Or if he was lucky enough, he might get recruited by one of the twelve great factions.


    However, all of that depended on how he did in this match.


    It was just too bad for him that Mo Ze Chen had suffered through two whole weeks of training.


    The current Mo Ze Chen waspletely different from the past.


    Even without calling Xiao Bai, he could easily deal with the person in front of him.


    As the two of them met on the stage, the genius from the minor faction cupped his hands to Mo Ze Chen first before saying, "Thank you for this match."


    Mo Ze Chen was confused when he saw how polite the other person was being, so he asked, "Isn''t this just a normal match?"


    The genius from the minor faction gave augh that had a clear tone of disdain in it as he said, "No, that was wrong. What I should have said is thank you for your sacrifice."


    It wasn''t hard for Mo Ze Chen to understand what this person meant by that, so he gave a coldugh and asked, "Aren''t you celebrating a bit too early?"


    The genius from the minor faction didn''t mind this at all since he was filled with confidence. The item that the elders of his faction had given him was something that had far surpassed his expectation, so he was certain that he would be able to win.


    The genius from the minor faction just looked at Mo Ze Chen with a smile of disdain and said, "Those that are at the top just have that much more room to fall."<sub> </sub>


    Neither of them spoke after that and took their positions on opposite sides of the arena.


    The official on the side saw that both of them were ready, so he gave the signal for the fight to start.


    As soon as the signal was given, Mo Ze Chen immediately shot out with a speed that didn''t match his fat body and he arrived in front of the genius from the minor faction in an instant. Before the genius from the minor faction could even react, Mo Ze Chen''s hand had alreadye out to p him on the face.


    It was a clean p that the genius of the minor faction could see at all and as it rang cleanly in his ears, he felt his body being lifted up before being mmed into the ground.


    By the time that he came back to his senses, all he could see was Mo Ze Chen''s shoes in front of his eyes along with the floor.


    It didn''t take much thinking to realize what had just happened and the genius from the minor faction had been filled with shame. As that shame filled him, the mes of rage were also fanned in his heart.


    He couldn''t believe that he had been caught off guard like this and had let this fatty do this to him!


    He was someone that was destined to be one of the top experts in the future had been humiliated by a fatty like this?


    The fact that this fatty had been relegated to this ce meant that he was clearly one of the weaker ones from the twelve great factions, he should have been easy picking for someone like him! Yet this fatty had pped him to the ground!


    He couldn''t ept this!


    The genius from the minor faction pped the ground under him and pushed himself up.


    As he stood up, he pulled something out of his storage ring that he immediately crushed in his hand.


    As soon as that ball was crushed, there was a bright blue energy that filled his cupped hand as the sound of electricity filled the air. Then when he finally stood up, he suddenly pushed the hand that was glowing in the direction of Mo Ze Chen while shouting out, "Die!"


    This was the trump card that he had been saving, the trump card that he had received from the elders of his faction.


    This was a crystal that had stored a full power attack from someone in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm. As long as the crystal was crushed, the one that had crushed it could release this attack at a target of their choosing.


    This genius from the minor faction didn''t hesitate at all to throw this bolt of lightning right at Mo Ze Chen.


    He had thought that he could take care of Mo Ze Chen with the High Embryo Soul Realm Weapon and the High Embryo Soul Realm pet that he had received, but now he didn''t hesitate to use this crystal as he lost his rationality to his anger.


    He just wanted this fatty to die!


    However, when Mo Ze Chen saw this, he didn''t panic at all.


    <o>,m Instead, he just jumped two steps back and suddenly raised his right hand to ce it right in the path of the bolt of lightning.</o>


    The genius from the minor faction saw this and broke out in a wild smile.


    This fatty was dead!


    But it didn''t go the way that he thought it would go.


    As soon as the bolt of lightning hit Mo Ze Chen''s hand, it didn''t burn him or electrocute him as he had thought, rather the bolt of lightning seemed to disappear as soon as it hit Mo Ze Chen''s hand. However, it wasn''t as if all traces of this bolt of lightning had disappeared.


    There was a blue glowing ripple that appeared in Mo Ze Chen''s right arm, rippling through hisyers of fat.


    This ripple continued up his right arm and reached his chest before heading to his left arm.


    Then once it reached his left arm, Mo Ze Chen suddenly turned to raise his left arm, pointing at the genius from the minor faction with two fingers.


    Out of the tip of those two fingers, the same bolt of lightning from before flew out and hit the genius from the minor faction.


    As he was thrown out of the ring, the genius from the minor faction could only look at Mo Ze Chen in disbelief.


    What had just happened?

 Chapter 691 Tournament (3)

    What had just happened to this genius from the minor realm were the results of Mo Ze Chen''s training.


    It had to be said, Ang really did know what she was doing.


    She had immediately figured out the specialty that Mo Ze Chen had and had trained it to this level in just two weeks.


    Most cultivators were able to maintain a proper body weight because they had refined their bodies to the point where impurities didn''t exist. The only reason a cultivator would be fat was if they had a special physique or if they had a cultivation technique that required them to be fat.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t have thetter, so he clearly belonged to the first category.


    However, Mo Ze Chen didn''t have any awareness of this, he had justined that no matter what he did, he was unable to lose weight.


    Ang had seen right through this and knew exactly what kind of physique Mo Ze Chen had.


    It was a very rare and special physique that people of this realm didn''t know about since it was a physique that was normally found in higher realms than these.


    Of course, this made her curious as to what kind of background Mo Ze Chen had, but Mo Ze Chen had a very normal background. He was actually a rogue cultivator that had lived his entire life in the Gctic Humanity Alliance. His parents were even farmers that lived in a vige not that far from Harmony City.


    But that made it all the more strange as to why he had this physique.


    The name of the physique was the Reflection Physique.


    This was a physique that was only second to the top physiques like the Void Physique.


    It was something that was considered very rare even in Ster Kingdoms.


    The main ability of this physique was to absorb life energy from attacks in the fat that lined the body of the owner of this physique. The fat would ripple from the life energy and then that ripple would allow the user to add his own life energy into the attack before sending it out again.


    Of course, that all depended on how developed this physique was.


    If it wasn''t developed, the owner of this physique would only be able to absorb attacks that were weaker than their own level. If it was developed, it wouldn''t be a problem for the owner of this physique to absorb attacks that were at the same level or even at a higher level.


    Mo Ze Chen had just absorbed an attack that was in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, which showed just how developed his physique was.


    Of course, it would have to develop to this extent to deal with Ang, or else Mo Ze Chen might have really died during the training.


    After the genius from the minor faction was thrown out, Mo Ze Chen turned to the referee who was looking on in shock and asked, "Can you call the match?"


    The referee looked at Mo Ze Chen with a shocked look of disbelief before giving a nod. Then he raised his hands and said, "The match is over! The winner is Mo Ze Chen!"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod before walking off the stage.


    At this moment, all he was thinking about was how cool he must have looked as he walked off.


    p When he passed by the genius from the minor faction, he didn''t forget to say, "I never got a chance to ask, what was your name again?"</anda>


    The genius from the minor faction looked up at Mo Ze Chen still with the same look of shock.


    He was seriously injured, but his injuries weren''t fatal because Mo Ze Chen had made sure to avoid hitting him in any fatal spots. After all, he still wanted to remain low key and it wasn''t a good idea to kill anyone since that would attract plenty of attention.


    The genius from the minor faction was about to say something, but then before he could speak, Mo Ze Chen cut him off by saying, "Forget it, there''s no need for you to tell me. You didn''t leave an impression at all, so I''m sure that I''ll just forget your name."


    Then without even turning back, he headed off to the waiting room.


    When the genius from the minor faction heard this, his face twisted and as he watched Mo Ze Chen walking off, he could taste something sweet.


    He tried to hold it back, but he couldn''t hold it back as he spat out a mouthful of blood. After spitting out that mouthful of blood, that genius from the minor faction copsed on the ground.


    This was all done intentionally by Mo Ze Chen.<sub> </sub>


    After all, if he couldn''t kill him, he could still scar him for life.


    This genius from the minor faction had clearly tried to kill him and even if Mo Ze Chen was a person that was rather forgiving, he clearly couldn''t just forgive an attempt on his life.


    But this was a ce where he couldn''t kill people, so he did the next best thing which was to create a heart demon in this genius from the minor faction.


    Even if Mo Ze Chen didn''t kill him, the fact that he now had a heart demon in him meant that his future as a cultivator had been sealed. It was very unlikely that he would ever be able to get over this heart demon and as long as this heart demon existed, he would no longer be able to break through.


    If he couldn''t break through, then he would have no future because everyone in the same generation would be at a higher level of cultivationpared to him. He would be the one left behind in time.


    Without knowing it, Mo Ze Chen''s personality and way of dealing with people like this had be closer to how Lin Fan acted. Without any hesitation, he dealt with people with cruel methods depending on how they treated him.


    Of course, this was to be expected as Mo Ze Chen spent more and more time with Lin Fan.


    The rest of the matches weren''t a problem for him because even if these geniuses from minor factions had trump cards, they couldn''t do a thing to him because of his special physique.


    Even when he faced the people from the other twelve great factions, he was able to easily take care of them since these were the second ss geniuses from the twelve great factions.


    Still, that didn''t attract too much attention to him since he was just the top of the second ss geniuses.


    The ones that everyone focused on were the ones fighting in the main arena and were considered the seeded contestants.


    At best, Mo Ze Chen would be considered someone lucky enough to be matched with weaker opponents which allowed him to pass these preliminaries and make his way to the finals. There was no chance that he would be considered a dark horse in this tournament with just this performance.


    But that was what Mo Ze Chen wanted.


    The more that they underestimated him, the better it would be for him in the long run.


    Not to mention that during this entire time, he hadn''t even brought out Xiao Bai yet.


    By the end of the day, Mo Ze Chen had won all his matches and had been dered the finalist from this preliminary group. He had done it without breaking a sweat since there was no one that was even a match for him after all that training.


    However, when he came back to Lin Fan and the others, the words that greeted him put a bitter smile on his face.


    Ang was the first toe forward when he came back.


    Mo Ze Chen had thought that she wasing forward to congratte him since he had started treating her as a master with all the training that they did, but it turned out that wasn''t that case.


    Ang pointed her finger in his face and said, "Why didn''t you let Xiao Bai fight?"


    Mo Ze Chen was caught off guard since this was clearly a question that he didn''t expect, but he still answered in a confused voice, "Wasn''t it the n to hide Xiao Bai as a trump card? So wasn''t it the n for me to fight by myself?"


    Ang didn''t ept his answer as she said, "You should have let me see Xiao Bai''s valiant figure during a fight. You should have called him out. I even brought a camera to capture it all, but now it''s all gone to waste."


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t know how to respond to this unreasonable answer at all.


    The only thing that he could do was turn to Lin Fan for help, but all he got from Lin Fan was a helpless look and spread hands.


    Mo Ze Chen had no choice but to say, "Sister inw, you can see Xiao Bai in action next time and it''ll be on a much bigger stage, so even more people will be able to see Xiao Bai''s valiant figure."


    Ang gave a nod in response to this which gave Mo Ze Chen a bit of hope, but then her next words crushed that hope.


    Ang calmly said, "It seems like you''re still a bit rusty. You probably need a bit more training tonight."


    Mo Ze Chen could only reveal a bitter smile when he heard this as he knew that his fate had already been sealed.

 Chapter 692 Tournament (4)

    After the day of the preliminary matches, there were two days given as rest days before the finals were held.


    While they were called the finals, these matches would be held over the span of a week.


    After all, even if they had held preliminaries to whittle the number of contestants down, there were still too many people who had signed up for this tournament in the end. So they had no choice but to hold the matches for the finals over several days.


    Mo Ze Chen actually wasn''t even scheduled to fight until the second day, so he was given three days to rest instead.


    After all, they reserved the matches that everyone wanted to see for the first day to build hype for the tournament and Mo Ze Chen was left for the second day, the day with the matches that fewer people wanted to see. The second day was really a day of rest for the audience after the hype of the first day.


    But Mo Ze Chen didn''t mind since he wanted to be underestimated.


    Though it had to be said, the way the tournament was scheduled really was something.


    Preliminaries that were held in a single day for hundreds of thousands of contestants and bringing them down to two hundred people in just a single day¡­That was a very harsh passing criteria.


    Mo Ze Chen should have been admired by many just for getting in the top two hundred, but he was overshadowed by the people that were much more popr than him.


    As for how the finals were arranged, they were divided into eight blocks of twenty four each. However, since two hundred didn''t divide equally by twenty four, there were byes that were added to each round.


    It was no surprise that the byes all went to contestants that were from the twelve great factions.


    The only unlucky thing for Mo Ze Chen was that he was put in a bracket where he would have to fight an extra match since he was matched with someone that received a bye. It was clear that they were trying to use him as cannon fodder to make the path easier for the person who received the bye.


    After all, his first opponent was also in the High Embryo Soul Realm and the one who received a bye was in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm.


    Mo Ze Chen himself didn''t mind it that much, but Ang clearly minded.


    When her Xiao Bai was looked down on like this, she was filled with anger.


    Of course, the way she vented that anger was by "training" Mo Ze Chen, so he showed up in a sorry state for his match that day.


    The ck eye and the bruises on his face made it look like he had been jumped on the way to the stadium.


    His opponent couldn''t help asking, "Are you alright?"


    Mo Ze Chen just said with an ugly smile, "I''m fine."


    His opponent didn''t say anything else after that since they were about to fight after this.


    For the first fight, Mo Ze Chen didn''t bring out Xiao Bai since there was no need for him to do so.


    The opponent was powerful, but Mo Ze Chen''s physique had developed even further with Ang''s training. The beating¡­The training over the past few days had paid off.


    But then it was time for him to face the contestant that received the bye.


    Ying Jun was one of the two from the younger generation that the Ying Family had the most hope for, which was why they did what they could to get him this bye. Of course the other reason was that there was no one else special in his bracket, so there was nopetition for this bye.


    When Ying Jun saw Mo Ze Chen, his first thought was that this would be an easy fight. While he was a bit surprised by the techniques that Mo Ze Chen used, he still didn''t worry about it because he was confident in his own power.


    After Mo Ze Chen finished his first match, he was given some time to rest, but it wasn''t much time at all.


    After all this was also part of the advantage of getting a bye.


    The person receiving the bye would be well rested and the person who didn''t receive the bye would be tired from having already fought a match. Even if he was given time to rest before the fight, it was only around an hour which wasn''t enough time for him to recover that much.


    So the person receiving the bye would be clearly at an advantage.


    It didn''t take long before it was time for Mo Ze Chen to fight again.


    When they came out of the rest room and entered the stage, it was clear who was the more favoured person just based on the audience''s reaction.


    This helped to fuel Ying Jun''s arrogance even more since he already believed that he would win.<sub> </sub>


    So to help show himself off more, he started thinking about things that he could do to show his magnanimity towards Mo Ze Chen.


    After they were both brought out onto the stage, Ying Jun looked at Mo Ze Chen and cupped his hands to say, "This friend, my name is Ying Jun. That is the name of the person who will defeat you."


    Mo Ze Chen slightly knitted his brows, but he didn''t lose his temper. Instead, he said in a humble voice, "Brother Ying, this one''s name is Mo Ze Chen. I hope that we will have a good match."


    Ying Jun revealed a smile and said, "Of course, of course, brother Mo."


    Then after a pause, Ying Jun continued with a smile while deliberately raising his voice, "Brother Mo, since there is a disparity between the two of us in terms of cultivation levels, how about I give you a handicap? I will stand here and take one of your attacks, what do you say?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a surprised look as he said, "Brother Ying, are you sure about that?"


    Ying Jun gave augh and waved his hand as he continued in that loud voice, "Of course, it''s not a problem at all. This is the least that I can do for you, brother Mo."


    Mo Ze Chen just revealed a smile and said with cupped hands, "Then I have to thank brother Ying for your generosity."


    The referee didn''t stop this conversation between the two of them, rather he even let the camera crew get a bit closer just so they could capture the conversation more clearly, broadcasting it to everyone in the stadium.


    With how people were looking at Ying Jun, it was clear that he had moved the crowd with his offer, which was his goal in the first ce.


    He had no fear in taking a single hit from Mo Ze Chen because he had seen what Mo Ze Chen''s specialty was. Mo Ze Chen''s attack wasn''t that special, the only special thing about him was his ability to reflect attacks. So even if he did give him this first attack, it wouldn''t pose any threat to him.


    Seeing that their conversation was over, the referee stepped up and had them both go to their corners before announcing the start of the fight.


    Neither side did anything at first as Mo Ze Chen just slowly walked to the very center of the arena.


    Everyone knew that Ying Jun was allowing Mo Ze Chen to attack him first, so their eyes were all on Mo Ze Chen while waiting for him to do anything. However, he didn''t do a thing as he just stood there in the center.


    Ying Jun narrowed his eyes as he looked at Mo Ze Chen, but he still asked, "Brother Mo, are you not going to make your move?"


    Mo Ze Chen just looked at him with a smile and said, "Brother Ying, please give me a minute, I''m just getting ready to make my move."


    Ying Jun had a visible look of doubt, but he didn''t say anything else. He chose to just wait and see what Mo Ze Chen would do.


    After arriving right at the center of the arena, Mo Ze Chen stood there for a few seconds before suddenly calling out Xiao Bai.


    Lin Fan had put Xiao Bai under Mo Ze Chen with a temporary contract, so Mo Ze Chen was able to put Xiao Bai in his pet storage space just like he would with a normal pet.


    However, the response to when Xiao Bai appeared was quite small after all, Xiao Bai was quite small himself.


    Even though he had broken through to the Embryo Soul Realm, he still had the same form of a small tiger like before since he still hadn''t grown up yet.


    There were many people in the crowd that were quite taken by Xiao Bai''s cute appearance and there were also quite a few girls that were defenseless against this cute little tiger.


    When Ying Jun saw this small tiger appear, the first thought that he had was disdain before he felt a bit of anger.


    After all that buildup, Mo Ze Chen had brought out this small tiger?


    Was he looking down on him?


    But before he could say anything, Xiao Bai had already made his move.


    Xiao Bai looked up and gathered a small ball of water above him.


    This small ball of water didn''t seem that powerful, but Ying Jun could feel the aura that it released. This definitely wasn''t just a normal ball of water.


    But once again, because he looked down on this little tiger, before he could react, the ball of water suddenly exploded.


    After the ball of water exploded, it released waves of water all around it that swept across the entire stage.

 Chapter 693 Tournament (5)

    The waves of water were unstoppable as they swept out over the entire stage, even swallowing Ying Jun before he could do a thing.


    When the waves of water finally stopped pouring out, there was only Mo Ze Chen who was left on the stage.


    The waves of water had washed everything off the arena, even including the referee who had been on the side watching over everything.


    But the most important thing was that the waves of water had carried Ying Jun off the stage.


    The rules of this match were that the match would continue until either contestant was incapicitated, whether knocked out or¡­Or the match would continue until either side was knocked off the stage.


    However, being knocked off the stage was very unlikely because of the size of the stage.


    The stage was muchrger than a normal stage to give the contestants all the space that they needed to use their abilities. At the same time, it wasrger to ensure that stage outs were unlikely.


    After all, this was a ce for the contestants to show off their abilities, so it was considered a let down if there was a stage out.


    In fact, some people even considered it cowardly to try to win with a stage out because that meant that the contestant wasn''t confident enough in their abilities to win in the first ce. The only way that they could win was to scheme and find a way to catch their opponent off guard to knock them off the stage.


    So winning by stage out left a very bad taste in everyone''s mouth.


    The crowd had been stunned by therge amount of water that had suddenly appeared, but they quickly reacted to what had happened.


    As soon as they did, there were many people that started to whisper to each other.


    However, the general gist of their whispers were about Mo Ze Chen and they were not kind whispers.


    "Did you see that? He took advantage of young master Ying''s kindness and then sneak attacked him! How shameless can this person be!"


    "Right? He knew that he couldn''t beat young master Ying, so he took advantage of young master Ying''s magnanimity."


    "Can there be a more shameless person?"


    These whispers rang out through the entire arena, but for a certain section, there was only silence.


    There were people who had started to whisper to each other, but before they could say a thing, they felt a chill suddenlye over them. It was as if if they said a single word, their lives would be taken at that moment.


    During all of this, there was one person who was holding the person that this chill came from back.


    Lin Fan held her hand to keep her in her seat as he said, "This is part of the n, there''s no need to be like this."


    Ang looked at him with an angry look, but she didn''t say anything in response to this.


    In the end, Lin Fan just said, "I''ll buy you some cake on the way home, alright?"


    She pouted her lips, but at least this time she gave a nod.


    Back in the arena, the referee still didn''t know how to handle this matter.


    Since he was someone that was refereeing this match, it meant that he was someone from the twelve great families. Then in order to ensure that Ying Jun had a better chance, the Ying Family had swapped the referee out for someone from their own family.


    But even if he wanted to stand on Ying Jun''s side, he couldn''t do it with how clear the results were. After all, even if he was from the Ying Family, this was a tournament that was held by all twelve great factions. Just the Ying Family alone wasn''t enough to go against the rules that all twelve of them had set.


    So this put him in a very awkward position.


    Mo Ze Chenpletely ignored all the insults that the crowd was throwing at him and he turned to the referee to ask, "Isn''t it about time to call the match?"


    The referee revealed a very ugly expression when he heard this.


    Perhaps he could dy it a bit if no one said a thing, but if Mo Ze Chen was directly questioning him, he had to say something.


    But before he could say anything, Ying Jun said in a voice filled with rage, "I don''t ept this!"


    Everyone''s eyes fell onto Ying Jun when he shouted this.


    The normal Ying Jun might have taken a pause to calm himself before speaking, but the current Ying Jun hadpletely lost himself in his rage.


    He couldn''t believe that he had been tricked like this and it had been arge blow to his pride. He was one of the greatest hopes of the Ying Family''s younger generation, this kind of position gave him a pride that others couldn''tpare to, which made his rage even greater.<sub> </sub>


    Ying Jun stood up and jumped back into the stage before pointing at Mo Ze Chen to shout, "I want a rematch! Fight me fair and square if you''re a man!"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an awkward look and scratched his head as he said, "Is there a need for this? I just won with the rules of the tournament, so this match is already over."


    Ying Jun flew into a rage when he heard this and said, "All you did was use your little tricks? You really think that you''re that great? Fight me fair and square if you''re a real man!"


    As soon as he said this, the crowd also started shouting out in support of Ying Jun.


    "That''s right, you should fight fair and square if you''re a real man!"


    "Real men wouldn''t use tricks like this!"


    "You didn''t win, all you did was y your tricks!"


    Leaving things like this would clearly leave a bad taste in everyone''s mouths, even the hosts of the tournament could see this.


    However, this was also a matter of face for them since they were the hosts of the tournament.


    If they allowed themselves to be swept up in sentiment of the crowd and forced the two to have a rematch, wouldn''t that mean prostrating themselves down in front of the crowd?


    That would be the exact opposite of what they wanted since this tournament was a demonstration of their power. It should be the crowd that should be prostrating themselves to their twelve great factions.


    But this disy was just too shameful and Mo Ze Chen was someone from the twelve great factions which hurt their reputation.


    It wouldn''t be good for them if they left things like this.


    There were many people who were cursing Mo Ze Chen at this moment, whether they were the organizers of this tournament or they were in the crowd. They all looked down on Mo Ze Chen''s disy just now.


    Not a single person felt that Mo Ze Chen had won based on his own power and had only won because he had taken advantage of Ying Jun''s magnanimity. However, that was what Mo Ze Chen wanted to see.


    As long as they thought this, it would mean that they would look down on him and would keep underestimating him.


    That way there wouldn''t be anyone that would make a move against him.


    Well, maybe the Ying Family, but they wouldn''t put that much attention on him since there were still bigger fishes to fry for them. They might make a few small moves, but they wouldn''t put their full attention on him since they had the other factions to deal with.


    The referee received a message from the organizers and turned to Mo Ze Chen to ask, "Contestant Mo, how about we redo this match? This match does seem a bit¡­"


    He left his words hanging, but it was clear what he meant by those words.


    But Mo Ze Chen just spread his hands and said, "Is there a need? I''ve already won the match, so there''s nothing else to say, right?" Then his eyes turned sharp as he looked at the referee and asked, "Or could it be that you feel that there''s a need for me to redo this match?"


    The referee waspletely stunned by Mo Ze Chen''s words.


    He had thought that since he was asking nicely, Mo Ze Chen would immediately agree to his request. After all, there were the twelve great factions behind him.


    Even an idiot would be able to recognize that this was the best choice in this situation, but Mo Ze Chen was this kind of idiot where he didn''t understand.


    Hepletely ignored the referee''s request and insisted on not doing the rematch.


    Hearing this, the referee revealed a very ugly look, but he didn''t refute Mo Ze Chen''s words.


    It wasn''t that he didn''t want to, but he couldn''t say anything.


    If he did, it would have gone against what the organizers wanted.


    They were hoping for Mo Ze Chen to agree to this rematch so that it would seem like it was something done willingly between the two contestants.


    After all, if they forced Mo Ze Chen to ept this rematch, that would mean that they were bowing down to the will of the people and that was thest thing they wanted.


    Before the referee could say anything else, Ying Jun roared out, "You really are shameless! Don''t you have any pride at all?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a smile and said, "Pride? Of course I do. I won by my own power and that''s why I''m moving on. Is there anything else to say?"


    Hearing this, Ying Jun''s facepletely twisted.

 Chapter 694 Tournament (6)

    Ying Jun didn''t hold back as he said, "Your own power? You take pride in this kind of shameful disy? What kind of a man are you?"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a shrug and said with a smile, "I really have to thank brother Ying for your generosity. If it wasn''t for your offer, I might not have been able to pull this off."


    Ying Jun''s face twisted even more as he tasted something sweet in his mouth, but he forced down that mouthful of blood. He pointed his finger at Mo Ze Chen and roared, "You! You! You! Just how shameless could you be!"


    Mo Ze Chen ignored this and cupped his hands towards Ying Jun as he said, "I have to thank brother Ying for letting me win."


    Ying Jun finally couldn''t take Mo Ze Chen''s shamelessness anymore as his eyes rolled back in his eyes and he spat out arge mouthful of blood before copsing on the crowd. He had been enraged to the point where he actually spat out blood.


    When the referee saw this, he wanted to say something, but he held his tongue.


    He knew that with how shameless Mo Ze Chen was, even if he did say something, he would most likely suffer just as much as Ying Jun had. However, he also knew that the Ying Family wouldn''t let matters end here, so he didn''t n on doing anything now.


    He would just leave it to the people above.


    Just like this, Mo Ze Chen walked off the stage to the booing of the crowd without a single care. However, when he walked off the stage and was alone in the corridor to the break room, his cool and collected expression broke as he suddenly gave a sigh with a worried look.


    "Is this really the right thing to do?" Mo Ze Chen muttered to himself.


    This wasn''t his idea in the first ce, this was all Lin Fan''s idea. Lin Fan had wanted him to act as shameless as possible just so he could hide his true powers for as long as he could.


    He didn''t want to do this, but Lin Fan was his boss and ordered him to do it, so Mo Ze Chen didn''t really have a choice.


    Who told him to choose to follow Lin Fan?


    After he came back to the resting room, all that he was met with were looks of contempt from the other people who were sitting inside of that resting room.


    Even his next opponent came up to him and said, "You''re done for in the next round. Don''t even think that you''ll get another chance to do something like that again."


    Mo Ze Chen just looked at him with a smile without saying a thing.


    As he saw this, his next opponent couldn''t help feeling a bit of pressureing from Mo Ze Chen. He didn''t know where he was feeling this pressure from, but there was even a small part of him that said that he wouldn''t be able to win against him.


    That person shook his head and red at Mo Ze Chen onest time before heading off.


    The matches continued after that and soon it was time for Mo Ze Chen''s next match.


    Facts proved that his opponent''s threats weren''t of any use at all.


    This person was also in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, but he still couldn''t do anything against Mo Ze Chen.


    This person didn''t hesitate at all as he attacked Mo Ze Chen as soon as the round started, but before he could even reach him, he was hit with the same wave of water that Ying Jun had been hit with.


    Even Ying Jun hadn''t been able to resist this wave of water, so there was no chance that this person, who was weaker than Ying Jun could resist it.


    Mo Ze Chen''s opponent was thrown right off the stage.


    By the time that he reacted to what had happened, he was already off the stage.


    He sat there on the wet ground in a daze for a few seconds before finally realizing what had happened. But there was a look of disbelief on his face as he realized something.


    Even when he had used all his power to resist the power of the wave of water, he hadn''t been able to fight back at all¡­


    This wave of water definitely wasn''t a normal wave of water¡­


    The referee was the same referee as Mo Ze Chen''s match with Ying Jun and he knew better than to question Mo Ze Chen, so he just epted the result and dered Mo Ze Chen the winner. However, he also couldn''t help feeling a bit of doubt over this.


    After all, he had seen Mo Ze Chen''s opponent charging at Mo Ze Chen with all his power, yet he had still been pushed off?


    Could it be that Mo Ze Chen was¡­?<sub> </sub>


    However, they couldn''t make a big deal over this tiny suspicion, so they continued the matches.


    But as the matches continued, it was clear that the enthusiasm in the stadium wasn''t as great as when Mo Ze Chen fought.


    He might have been shameless, but someone that everyone hated was still someone that everyone wanted to watch. Love and hate were both powerful tools in making someone famous.


    People loved to watch someone who was beloved by all just as much as they loved watching someone who was hated by all.


    Mo Ze Chen was on the path of bing the perfect viin for this block with his style of fighting.


    The next match that he had was in the round of six.


    He was matched with someone in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm and he won once again by sweeping that person off the stage with a wave of water.


    All of the Peak Embryo Soul Realm Experts that were in his block were all weaker than Ying Jun. This wave of water was something that had even swept Ying Jun off, so there was no chance that any of them could resist it.


    Then when it came to the round of three, Mo Ze Chen was actually given the bye to the final match.


    This bye was actually supposed to be given to Ying Jun who would have been in the position that the current Mo Ze Chen was in. This was something that the Ying Family had arranged to give Ying Jun the greatest chances of reaching the final round of the tournament.


    However, no one would have expected that Ying Jun would be defeated by some unknown person like Mo Ze Chen.


    Since they had no way of predicting this or even imagining that this was possible, the bye that they had prepared went to Mo Ze Chen in the end.


    He was able to rx in the waiting area and watch the fight between the two that had the chance to be his future opponent. However, he could also tell that there was nothing to fear from either of them since they were both normal experts.


    The only thing that Mo Ze Chen had to fear was someone with a speed basew that could reach him before he could release the waves of water. But even then the amount of power that these two demonstrated wouldn''t have been enough to hurt him.


    The only worry that he had in that scenario was that his true power would be revealed and people would no longer underestimate him.


    Still, that didn''t happen in the end as the person that ended up in the finals of this block with him was as he had expected.


    There was nothing unexpected that happened as that person charged right at Mo Ze Chen only to be met with a wave of water that sent him out of the arena.


    The referee looked like he was about to copse when he saw this since he never expected Mo Ze Chen to advance this far into the tournament just with this one trick alone. At the same time, the small doubt that filled his heart couldn''t help spreading as he made up his mind to report this matter back to the Ying Family.


    It seemed like they would have to take action now or it would be bad for them, especially when it came to Ying Ling, who was the number one genius that they were relying on.


    After he took care of thisst person, Mo Ze Chen walked off the stage without even looking back.


    However, this time, the jeering that came from the crowd wasn''t as loud as before.


    There were even some people that were looking at Mo Ze Chen with looks of admiration.


    Even with his High Embryo Soul Realm, he had made it into the final eight just with this trick. They were looking forward to seeing how far he could go just with this trick alone.


    If he were to somehow take this entire tournament just with this trick alone, then¡­


    As for the reason why none of his opponents revealed how strong he actually was, it was very simple. Even if they had revealed it, who would believe them?


    Once he finished with all his matches, Mo Ze Chen didn''t stay for any interviews with the reporters and such since he knew that none of them would have anything good to say.


    However, he also knew that there wouldn''t be anything good waiting for him after he went back.


    He could already see how Ang would respond to all this jeering that he received.


    After all, all the jeering that was directed at him was also indirectly aimed at Xiao Bai¡­

 Chapter 695 Interruption

    However, when Mo Ze Chen met up with Lin Fan and the rest, he didn''t die as he had expected.


    Instead, Ang justpletely ignored him as she had him summon Xiao Bai which she carried in her arms.


    As they headed home, they went to a cake shop as Lin Fan promised and when they came out, Lin Fan had a very dark look on his face. That was because as soon as they came out, the staff followed them to the door and put up the closed sign.


    After all, with no more products left to sell for the day, there was no need for them to stay open anymore.


    Even the smiles that they sent Lin Fan''s group off were so bright that it could have melted steel.


    But that was to be expected when Lin Fan had just bought all the products that had been left in the store.


    This didn''t happen with just a single store, but it happened with three different stores¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Ang and Yuki''s figures, wondering where they stored it all. However, as he stared for a bit, he couldn''t help getting lost in Ang''s figure.


    However, Yuki could feel the way that he was looking at her. When she turned back to look at him with a re, Lin Fan raised his hand in a helpless manner and revealed a bitter smile. Still, he turned away from looking at them in the end.


    As they continued on their way home, when they finally came to a less crowded area, Lin Fan, Ang, and Yuki suddenly knitted their brows.


    Mo Ze Chen and Lulu were still lost in their own world, but seeing that Lin Fan, Ang, and Yuki had slowed down, they realized that something was off. However, when they released their spiritual sense, they couldn''t find anything at all.


    Still, neither of them said a word since they trusted the spiritual sense of the three.


    Their group continued forward as if nothing had happened, but Lin Fan was secretly talking to Brainy in his mind.


    Lin Fan had made it a habit of having Brainy scout out his surroundings, so as soon as these strange figures had appeared around them, Brainy had immediately reported it to him.


    Ang and Yuki had also sensed it, so they signalled to Lin Fan with their eyes, but he signalled back, telling them not to worry and to leave it to him. Yuki had a trace of doubt in her eyes in response to this, but she still chose to believe after Ang patted her hand.


    There was still a trace of doubt in Yuki''s eyes, but she calmed down after this.


    It wasn''t that she believed in Lin Fan, but rather she believed in Ang.


    She believed that Ang''s eyes wouldn''t be wrong.


    Lin Fan was waiting for these dark figures to make a move, but they didn''t do anything in the end.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan knew that they must have some kind of n or instructions on how to take care of them. So before they were in the right position, these figures tailing them wouldn''t make a move.


    It would be easy for Lin Fan to take care of them now, but he also didn''t want to draw any attention, so he chose to y along with their n.


    He led their group on the path back to the pet shop, but instead of taking the normal path or the quickest path, he took a path that led to a rather deserted alley.


    As he had expected, once they reached a ce that was rather quiet, the figures following behind them started making their move.


    They didn''t reveal themselves right away, instead they took up positions thatpletely surrounded Lin Fan''s group, not revealing a single gap. Then after that, they started closing in on Lin Fan''s group, restricting their movement as much as possible.


    Only when they had made sure that everything was in ce, these figures finally jumped off the roof tond around Lin Fan''s group.


    With how coordinated they were, it was clear that they were professionals and they weren''t here to y.


    No one from Lin Fan''s group was surprised to see this, but they still acted surprised.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he looked at the person who was clearly the leader of this group and asked, "What do you want with us?"


    The leader looked at Lin Fan before turning his gaze to Mo Ze Chen and saying, "Give him to us and you can leave. You have my word that you will not be harmed if you leave him here."


    Before anyone could say anything, Lulu moved in front of Mo Ze Chen and said, "I won''t let you take him."<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen knitted his brows, but then he put Lulu behind him as he red at the leader while waiting for Lin Fan to make his move.


    Lin Fan looked right at the leader and after a moment, he said in a nervous voice, "How can I trust you?"


    There was a trace of disdain that appeared in the eyes of the leader when he saw this. This was something that he had seen countless times in his line of work.


    No matter how tough a person looked on the outside, they always cared about their own lives the most. Just like this person that was asking him if he could trust him, he didn''t hesitate to betray his allies just to escape with his own life.


    The leader wasn''t in a mood to y with this person since he knew that there was no chance that they would be able to escape.


    All of the people in Lin Fan''s group were all only in the Embryo Soul Realm and he was leading a team of over twenty Child Soul Realm Experts, this would be a simple matter for him.


    So the leader snapped his finger and there was a hole that was created in the line of his followers. He looked back at Lin Fan and said, "This is your only chance. Leave now if you want, or you can stay here and die."


    Lin Fan took onest look at Mo Ze Chen before waving at Ang and Yuki to follow him.


    The three of them walked towards the holes in the line, clearly having abandoned Mo Ze Chen to his fate.


    However, when they were about to cross the line, the leader suddenly gave a signal with his hand behind his back.


    When the two people beside him saw this, they immediately pulled out their daggers to stab at the back of Lin Fan''s head.


    Under his mask, the leader of the attackers revealed a faint smile.


    This was a trick that he used many times. He made his targets let their guards down by pretending to let them go and then killing them at the veryst second.


    This not only allowed him to aplish his goal, it also gave him a bit of personal joy taking out these people he looked down on. These people that only cared about their own life were the kind of people that he hated the most, so killing them like this was something that he quite enjoyed.


    He liked seeing the look on their faces when they realized that they had been lied to and that they were dead.


    It was just perfect in his eyes.


    However, before the daggers could stab Lin Fan, his hands suddenly came out to grab the hands holding the daggers.


    The two assassins immediately knitted their brows as they realized that they couldn''t move their daggers forward a single inch.


    Then before they could react, there was a blue glow that appeared around Lin Fan''s hand. After the appearance of this blue glow, they felt a cold feelinging from the hand grabbing their own.


    Then in an instant, there was ayer of ice that suddenly surrounded their arms,pletely freezing it. The chill from the ice was so strong that they couldn''t even feel them anymore.


    They immediately tried to pull their arms back, but seeing that their arms wouldn''t listen to them, they made a snap decision to cut off their arms. They could see that the ice was still spreading and if they didn''t act fast enough, it would be toote.


    It was just too bad that the ice had already slowed them down enough that they weren''t able to cut off their own arms in time.


    By the time that their other hand came up with another dagger to cut the hand that was frozen, the ice had already spread to their shoulder. Then before they could cut it, the ice immediately froze their other arm.


    Before the dagger could touch their arm, they had been turned into ice statues.


    After freezing the two of them, Lin Fan released their hands and turned around, but all that he met was a dagger stabbing out at his face.


    The leader of the attackers hadn''t been idle during this time. When he saw Lin Fan making his move, he had immediately pulled out his weapon and summoned his pet to join with his weapon before stabbing at Lin Fan.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t panic since he had already expected this.


    There was a vine that suddenly came out of his sleeve that pulled him out of the path of the dagger. At the same time, Lin Fan''s hand came up to grab the wrist of the hand holding the dagger while it was covered in the same blue glow.


    Before the leader of the attackers could react, he was already covered in ice.

 Chapter 696 Failed Ambush

    The ice spread all over him, but unlike the other two ice sculptures, the ice didn''t go all the way to his head.


    The ice went all the way up to his neck before suddenly stopping, leaving his head free.


    The leader of the attackers looked at Lin Fan with a shocked gaze as he felt the auraing from him. He said in a stunned voice, "You''re not in the Embryo Soul Realm, you''re in the Child Soul Realm! How did you hide your cultivation from me?"


    The leader of the attackers was actually in the Mid Embryo Soul Realm, much stronger than the rest of the attackers, but he was still dealt with easily by Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just ignored him and turned his attention to the rest of the cloaked attackers.


    When they saw that their leader had been frozen so easily, they knew that this mission was a failure and the only thought that they had left was to escape.


    But before they could even move a muscle, there were beasts that suddenly appeared out of thin air behind them. There was one beast behind each of them.


    They all tried to resist, but they found that these beasts weren''t weaker than them at all. In fact, each of these beasts were in the Child Soul Realm andmandedws at the same level as them, but they couldn''t resist at all.


    Without any hesitation, all twenty of the attackers had been caught just like this.


    Other than the three that were frozen, all the others had been knocked out.


    After taking care of these people, Lin Fan turned his attention back to the leader of this group who had been shouting at Lin Fan. However, when the leader saw all the members of his group being knocked out and Lin Fan turning to look at him, he immediately fell silent and revealed a cautious look.


    He still didn''t have any idea of what went wrong or what intentions Lin Fan had, so he knew that if he said anything recklessly, he would be the one that suffered. The best thing that he could do was wait until Lin Fan made his intentions clear and then yed along with him until he saw a chance to escape.


    After all, there wasn''t much that he could do while he was frozen like this.


    p So the leader of the attackers waited for Lin Fan to speak first.</anda>


    It was just too bad that there was a w in his n.


    Lin Fan just stood in front of the leader, looking at him without saying a thing.


    There was an awkward silence that filled the air as both sides just stood¡­waited there in silence.


    In the end, it was the leader that felt more pressure than Lin Fan and he couldn''t help starting to panic as he saw Lin Fan''s cold eyes looking at him.


    What was going on here?


    Could it be that he already knew who sent him and he was just waiting for something to happen?


    If that was the case, then there would be no chance of him being able to escape.


    As the silence dragged on, the leader finally couldn''t take it anymore as he said, "Is there any way that we can make a deal here? If you let me go, I can give you whatever you want."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at him before he shook his head and gave a sigh.


    The leader''s face turned red when he saw this, but he held back the rage that burned in his heart as he waited for Lin Fan to respond.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Do you work for the Ying Family?"


    The leader revealed a bitter smile and said, "Is that really something you need to ask?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said with a shrug, "That depends on if you want to live."


    When he heard these words, the leader felt a chill run down his back. He could tell that this young man in front of him wasn''t joking. This was a killing intent that even he who was a part of the assassin team didn''t have.


    He knew that if Lin Fan wanted, his life would be taken away in an instant.


    Knowing this made him much more honest as he gave a nod and said, "Yes."


    Lin Fan then asked, "Your target was our little fatty?"


    Mo Ze Chen''s face was filled with grievances when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything in the end.


    The leader looked at Mo Ze Chen before giving a nod and saying, "Yes."


    Lin Fan just gave a nod at this and then said, "Very good."


    But then he didn''t ask any further questions as he turned around to look at the other unconscious people on the ground.


    When the leader saw this, there was a bad premonition that appeared in his heart. He knew that unless he said something, something bad would happen to him.<sub> </sub>


    So he steeled his heart and said, "As long as you spare me, I''ll tell you everything you want about the Ying Family! I know many of the dirty things that they''ve done, it will be more than enough for you to go to the Hunters Organization with! The only thing I want is my safety guaran¡­"


    But before he could finish, he found that the ice that was at his neck was already creeping up towards his head.


    The leader immediately roared out, "You''re wasting a golden opportunity here if you kill¡­"


    But once again, he didn''t get to finish as the ice had already covered his head.


    Then under the ice, his eyes that had been filled with light gradually dimmed until theypletely turned dark. There wasn''t a single sign of life left with this man as he had been turned into a corpse by the ice.


    After taking care of the leader, Lin Fan looked at the other bodies on the ground.


    After a slight pause, Lin Fan had Brainy bring out several beasts and then he gave these beasts some orders.


    Once they had received their orders, the beasts picked up the unconscious people on the ground and the ice sculptures.


    Lin Fan released hisws to cover up these beasts so they would be able to hide and then he sent them off. Since they had already received their orders, the beasts didn''t hesitate as they flew off into the dark night.


    Once the beasts were gone, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Boss, was it alright to do that? Won''t this force the Ying Family''s hand?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "Where do you think that I''m sending those people off to? Did you forget about the other identity that you have?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a confused look as he asked, "Other identity? What other identity?"


    Lin Fan said with the same smile, "You are someone with a Hunter License from the Hunters Organization and someone who has reached the finals of the tournament, so you could be considered one of the top talents of the Hunters Organization. If the Ying Family were to target someone like you, wouldn''t that be considered making a move against the Hunters Organization?"


    Mo Ze Chen slowly revealed a look of understanding as he said, "Then you mean¡­"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I''ve sent all the evidence that they need to the people who will take care of this." After he gave a pause, he said with a sigh, "It really is much easier to handle things like this when you belong to arge organization."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed a bitter smile when he heard Lin Fan say this.


    In his heart, he couldn''t help feeling sorry for the "people who would take care of this".


    Since they had already taken care of matters here, there was no need for them to stay here any longer.


    So their group quickly made their way through the quiet streets of Harmony City before arriving back at the pet shop.


    Once they arrived, the first thing that Ang did was grab Mo Ze Chen by the back of his cor. With a bitter look on his face, Mo Ze Chen was dragged away to the arena for more "training".


    Lulu followed out of worry for Mo Ze Chen and Yuki followed to watch the fun.


    Lin Fan was about to check the stock of the store for tomorrow, but before he could go in the store, there was a call from his watch.


    He looked down and when he saw who it was from, he revealed a faint smile.


    He just let it ring for a bit before picking it up and asked, "How can I help you?"


    There was Qiao Yi Fei''s voice that came out of the watch as she shouted, "You! What did you do this time!"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I''m leaving the cleanup to you, isn''t that normal?"


    Qiao Yi Fei was about to say something, but when she heard what Lin Fan said, she immediately swallowed her words.


    This was technically part of the n that they came up with.


    She had been keeping tabs on Mo Ze Chen and she was surprised to see how well he was doing. However, the way he was winning the matches¡­


    Qiao Yi Fei then changed her tone and asked, "How certain are you that he''ll be able to win?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "You''ve already seen how strong he is, he still has the trump cards that I gave him."


    Qiao Yi Fei said in a surprised voice, "That isn''t his only trump card?"


    Lin Fan didn''t deem it necessary to give a response to this.


    Qiao Yi Fei was silent for a bit before saying, "Alright, we''ll deal with this. You just keep your promise."


    Lin Fan didn''t even get to say anything before Qiao Yi Fei had already hung up.

 Chapter 697 Tournament (7)

    Lin Fan shook his head with a faint smile after seeing that Qiao Yi Fei had already hung up.


    After standing there for a minute, he went into the store to make sure that Ang didn''t kill Mo Ze Chen.


    After all, they still needed him to win this tournament for them.


    ¡­


    A few more days passed and it was finally time for the finals.


    A day off had been given the day before the final matches to allow everyone to reach their peak state before the finals started.


    Of course, that meant that it was another day of getting beaten for Mo Ze Chen.


    When he showed up at the final round, Mo Ze Chen looked the same as he did when he went to the preliminaries. Mo Ze Chen''s face was covered in bruises and one of his eyes had turned ck.


    It almost seemed like he wasn''t in a state to fight if not for the energy that he had.


    The staff members that saw him even asked him out of concern if he was alright before letting him enter the arena.


    Mo Ze Chen just gave them a simple excuse before heading in.


    Seeing that he didn''t make a big deal over this, the staff members naturally couldn''t say anything else, so they just dropped this matter.


    Another hour passed before the drawing for the final stage was done.


    This entire hour was dedicated to a show from the twelve great families. After all, they were the hosts for this tournament and if they didn''t make a big show out of this to show off their might, there was no purpose in holding this tournament.


    Unlike before, the people that had been allowed to watch the finals were all people with standing. There weren''t anymoners here at all, these were all people that had some kind of influence in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    They were the people that the twelve great factions wanted to show off their power to.


    After all, there wasn''t a single person who wasn''t from the twelve great factions in these finals.


    Once the opening ceremonies were over, they brought several experts from the twelve great factions on stage to do the drawings. These were naturally all famous experts since the twelve great factions wanted to show off their power, but there were also people who had other intentions that participated in the drawing.


    As expected, the first opponent that Mo Ze Chen was matched up with was Ying Ling.


    She was the cousin of Ying Jun, the favourite from the block that Mo Ze Chen had been ced in. The one that Mo Ze Chen hadpletely humiliated to make it to these finals.


    The Ying Family clearly hadn''t forgotten about this matter, so they must have manipted these drawings to get these results.


    Of course, it wasn''t as if the other twelve great factions werepletely unrted to this.


    They could see the tension between the Ying Family and the Hunters Organization forming because of this, so they had turned a blind eye to the Ying Family''s maniption. This would only help fuel the conflict between these two factions and among them, one faction fighting with another faction was something they could benefit from.


    However, Mo Ze Chen wasn''t worried at all because of this.


    After the first match was over, it was Mo Ze Chen''s turn.


    When he came onto the stage, he was able to see Ying Ling for the first time.


    There was no doubt that she was beautiful, in fact, if she lived in Harmony City, she would have definitely been considered one of the Six Flowers¡­wait, it would be Seven Flowers with her.


    She had a perfect hourss figure with just the right curves that weren''t too big or small. She also had light purple hair that ran all the way down to her waist, along with a perfect face that seemed like it had been chiseled out of stone. But the most special thing about her were her eyes that glowed golden.


    Just one look from those eyes was enough to prate someone to their soul.


    Just a single look from those eyes would make one''s heart beat fast without control.


    But Mo Ze Chen wasn''t moved since he already knew someone that was just as beautiful as her. In fact, Lulu was even more beautiful than her in his mind.


    As well, he had also seen what Ang really looked like¡­


    Normally Ang would use her life energy to create a cover over herself that would hide her true appearance, but since Lin Fan trusted Mo Ze Chen, she had shown her true self to him.


    So when he looked at Ying Ling, it was almost like looking at a child¡­


    Ying Ling could see the strange way that Mo Ze Chen looked at her and she slightly knitted her brows.<sub> </sub>


    She felt a strange feeling that it was almost as if he was insulting her and there was an urge to hit him. However, that was the only feeling that she had.


    She didn''t care that Mo Ze Chen had knocked out Ying Jun and she didn''t care about the revenge that her family was asking her to take.


    After all, she didn''t think that what Mo Ze Chen did was cowardly at all.


    Her thoughts werepletely different from everyone else''s. Rather she was impressed by how effective his method was.


    Even if he had been caught off guard, this was a wave of water that had been able to knock him off the stagepletely. This must mean that the power in this wave of water wasn''t weak.


    Then based on how he had used this same wave of water to knock off all his otherpetitors, it was clear that this hadn''t been a fluke.


    The most likely scenario was that this Mo Ze Chen was hiding his true power for some reason.


    When she had this thought, she had even be excited.


    There were too many weak people around her and she never had any fun fighting people in the same generation as her, so she had always been looking for strong opponents. There was something about this Mo Ze Chen that gave her this feeling that he would be able to entertain her.


    After the two of them got onto the stage, they looked at each other as they waited for the referee to start the match.


    It was clear from the look in each other''s eyes that they were sizing each other up.


    As for the cheers from the crowd, it was clear who was the favourite. Almost the entire crowd was cheering for Ying Ling and there was a lot of jeering for Mo Ze Chen.


    After what had happened in the previous round, he had received a new nickname.


    Shameless King¡­


    That was that name that he had received for his shameless behaviour.


    There were also plenty of people who were cursing Mo Ze Chen because he had a chance to fight their goddess.


    They cursed him, saying that if he even dared to touch a single hair on the head of their goddess, they would bury him in the ground.


    Finally, after a minute of this silent showdown, the referee finally came forward to start the match. The only reason that they didn''t start it sooner was to build up tension for this match.


    As soon as the match started, neither of them made a move.


    Normally this would be when Mo Ze Chen used his signature wave of water to knock his opponent off the stage.


    But in these final matches, almost as if they wanted to prevent Mo Ze Chen from doing the same thing, the arena was much biggerpared to before.


    There were also a few people in the crowd who were looking forward to Mo Ze Chen using his wave of water.


    Even if he couldn''t knock Ying Ling off the arena, it would still be good enough just getting her wet. If she got wet, they would have a chance to see a few things¡­


    But neither Mo Ze Chen or Ying Ling acted as they had expected.


    Ying Ling was the first one to break the silence as she said, "Why are you hiding your power?"


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised by how direct she was with her words, but he remained calm as he asked, "What do you mean? Why would I hold back?"


    Ying Ling looked at him with an understanding smile and said, "So it''s not that you''re holding back¡­It''s just that they''re too weak."


    Naturally the crowd could hear what the two of them were saying, so when they heard Ying Ling''s words, there were jeers that suddenly rang out andints that came from the crowd.


    No one thought that Mo Ze Chen was more than he seemed, they all thought that he was just someone who had gotten to this final round through shameless methods. So of course, no one could ept what Ying Ling was saying.


    Ying Jun, who hade today to see Mo Ze Chen being beaten, couldn''t help revealing a bitter look when he heard Ying Ling''s words.


    "Cousin, can you not put it like that?"


    Ying Ling ignored the crowd as she looked right at Mo Ze Chen and said, "You should use your real power now."


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t answer as he asked with a smile, "What do you mean?"


    Ying Ling gave a shrug before saying, "If you don''t use your real power now, you won''t have a chance in the future."

 Chapter 698 Tournament (8)

    As soon as her voice fell, she gave a p before two figures appeared around her.


    These were her pets that she called out of her pet storage space.


    Afternding on the ground, their appearances were revealed to everyone.


    The two pets that she summoned were two pure white foxes that had traces of mes on them that almost seemed like will-o-wisps.


    The mes were wrapped around the two foxes at first, but then they slowly started moving from the two white foxes towards Ying Ling. After a while, the foxes themselves even disappeared as they seemingly fused with Ying Ling, wrapping around her like two fox fur scarves that were covered in mes.


    Ying Ling didn''t give Mo Ze Chen any time to think as she raised her hand and summoned mes all around her, sending them flying at him.


    But Mo Ze Chen didn''t panic as he called out Xiao Bai.


    With a single roar from Xiao Bai, there was the same wave of water that appeared out of thin air, sweeping out at Ying Ling.


    There were some people that were worried about Ying Ling when they saw this wave of water. They had seen many other experts being caught "off guard" and being sent off the stage by this wave of water, so they were worried that the same would happen to Ying Ling.


    When the wave of water shed with the balls of mes, the mes were immediately extinguished and the wave of water continued forward, charging at Ying Ling.


    Ying Ling saw this wave and revealed an excited look.


    This wave was even stronger than she had imagined.


    Those people back in her family were idiots. Even if Ying Jun hadn''t been caught off guard, he still would have been sent flying even if he had used his full strength to counter this.


    After all, this was a wave of water that was at the very peak of the Embryo Soul Realm, it even had a foot into the Child Soul Realm.


    For someone like Ying Jun who was only at the middle of the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, he wouldn''t have been able to resist this wave.


    But even if Ying Jun couldn''t resist, that didn''t mean that Ying Ling couldn''t.


    The two fox scarves on her neck suddenly came together and formed a me barrier in front of her.


    When the wave of water shed against this me barrier, there was the sound of water being evaporated, but in the end, the me barrier was able to hold on. It was able to burn a chunk out of the wave of water, allowing Ying Ling to stand there without taking a single step back.


    After the wave of water was gone, Ying Ling didn''t stop as she started running at Mo Ze Chen again.


    This time, she had transformed the two fox fur scarves on her neck into ming des that she swung at Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t panic as he had Xiao Bai put up a water barrier.


    When the des hit the water barrier, they were immediately repelled and Ying Ling was sent back a few steps.


    She looked at the water barrier with a surprised look as she clearly didn''t expect the barrier to be this strong. However, Ying Ling also recovered quickly as she took a step back after being sent backwards and swinging her des in front of her, creating even smaller des that flew out at Mo Ze Chen.


    Those smaller des of mes hit the water barrier and were immediately dissipated, not even creating a ripple on the surface of the water barrier.


    She didn''t make another move as she released his spiritual sense to investigate this water barrier.


    During this time, there was only silence in the crowd.


    They might be able to deny it if Mo Ze Chen only used the wave of water since that was something that he used every time to knock out his opponent. People had already considered it a dirty trick that he used without even thinking about the power contained within the wave.


    But this time, they weren''t able to lie to themselves anymore.


    After all, it was clear from the aura of Ying Ling''s attacks that she hadn''t held back, but Mo Ze Chen had been able to block them all with the water barrier.


    If they kept insisting that Mo Ze Chen was a coward and cheat, they wouldn''t be able to hold on anymore.


    After all, there was true power that was being demonstrated in front of them and there was no way of denying it.


    Mo Ze Chen had faced Ying Ling''s full power head on and he was able to stop it, which showed that he wasn''t just relying on tricks, but rather he had actual power.


    But they couldn''t be confused about why Mo Ze Chen had acted the way that he did.


    After all, if he was this powerful, why would he act in such a shameless manner that people even came up with the name "Shameless King" for him?


    Mo Ze Chen ignored the silence and focused on Ying Ling.


    He had to admit that he did admire her for her abilities.<sub> </sub>


    Not only was she able to match Xiao Bai''s abilities, she was even able to calmly analyze the fact that he was hiding his power.


    It seemed like if he continued holding back, this would be a hard fight for him.


    After this thought passed in his mind, Mo Ze Chen gave a nod to Xiao Bai who just rolled his eyes at Mo Ze Chen. At this, Mo Ze Chen revealed a bitter smile.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that Lin Fan had asked Xiao Bai to listen to Mo Ze Chen, Xiao Bai wouldn''t have been willing to work with this fatty. He much rather preferred the cute girl who hung around the fatty.


    But still, this was something that Lin Fan had asked Xiao Bai to do, so he had no choice.


    After receiving this nod from Mo Ze Chen, the aura around Xiao Bai had started to change.


    Once this change happened, Xiao Bai started to actpletely differently as he summoned out ws of water around his tiny paws.


    Then without any hesitation, Xiao Bai jumped out at Ying Ling, brandishing those ws.


    Ying Ling immediately flicked her hand holding the two fox scarves when she saw this, causing a me barrier to appear from the mes around the two foxes.


    This me barrier appeared right in front of Xiao Bai''s water ws, but Xiao Bai just gave it a snort of disdain as he shed down at this me barrier.


    The me barrier was immediately shed to pieces without burning away even a single drop of Xiao Bai''s water ws.


    The water ws continued falling down and when Ying Ling saw this, she released all her life energy to help the foxes release more mes. Those mes formed a protective barrier that was much stronger than the me barrier from before, but these mes also took up much more life energy.


    Even with how strong Ying Ling was, she wouldn''t have been able to keep this barrier going for long.


    But that didn''t matter as Xiao Bai''s water ws smashed through this barrier as well,nding on the twin foxes on her arms.


    The ws created tworge sh marks on the foxes before sending Ying Ling smashing into the ground. However, she was able to stand firm, so she just stood there in the crater that was created.


    However, she knew that this match was already over.


    There was no chance that she would be able to match Mo Ze Chen''s pet, not to mention that Mo Ze Chen himself hadn''t made a move yet. If Mo Ze Chen were to fight with his pet, who knows just how strong he would be¡­


    It was just too bad that she didn''t know that Xiao Bai was the true expert and Mo Ze Chen was just a vase. In fact, she was already facing Mo Ze Chen''s true power because he couldn''t produce an attack that was stronger than this.


    Even with his physique, he wouldn''t be able to reflect this kind of attack.


    The only reason Xiao Bai could release this kind of attack was because of his special bloodline.


    Seeing that Ying Ling wasn''t doing anything, the crowd couldn''t help feeling anxious.


    They had already created an image of Mo Ze Chen in their mind and it would be very hard for them to break that image now.


    If he were to defeat Ying Ling just like this, they would never be able to ept it.


    So the crowd suddenly broke out in cheers for Ying Ling.


    It wasn''t because they believed in her, but rather they just didn''t want her to give up.


    However, Ying Ling ignored all of this as she looked at Mo Ze Chen with a different kind of expression.


    When Mo Ze Chen saw this, he couldn''t help feeling a bit ufortable.


    He didn''t know why he felt ufortable seeing this, but the way she looked at him made him feel that sense of difort.


    After a long period of silence between them while the crowd cheered, Ying Ling suddenly turned to the referee and said, "I forfeit."


    When those two words spread across the stadium, it became so silent that even a pin dropping to the ground could be heard.


    Everyone looked at Ying Ling with looks of shock and disbelief as if they couldn''t believe their ears.


    What had she just said?


    It sounded like she was saying that she was forfeiting!


    But the shock that Ying Ling brought didn''t end there¡­

 Chapter 699 Tournament (9)

    After forfeiting the match, Ying Ling walked right in front of Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised and couldn''t help taking a step back when he saw this, but Ying Ling revealed a smile at this.


    She even leaned in as she said, "It''s not like I bite or anything."


    Mo Ze Chen''s heart couldn''t help skipping a beat when he saw her acting like this, but he also took another step back. After all, he was already someone with a girlfriend and it wasn''t a good thing for him if he were to get close to another cute girl like this.


    He wasn''t that petty to not admit that she was a beautiful girl, but that was all the more reason why he should stay away from her.


    However, when Ying Ling saw this, she took another step forward before asking while tilting her head, "Is there something you don''t like about me?"


    Mo Ze Chen''s mouth dropped open.


    Even if he was an idiot, he could pick up some clues about what was happening here. The only problem that he had with this was why was this happening to him?


    When Ying Ling saw his reaction, she revealed a smile as she said, "So you''re aware of me as a woman then. Then that''s good."


    After a pause to take a deep breath, she looked right at Mo Ze Chen and said, "Marry me."


    There was only silence that followed this, but then the crowd exploded.


    There wasn''t a single person that was able to keep up with how this matter developed¡­


    Mo Ze Chen just stood there in a daze, looking at Ying Ling with confusion and shock as he asked, "What did you say?"


    Ying Ling revealed a sweet smile and said again, "Marry me."


    Mo Ze Chen was once again stunned.


    He never expected Ying Ling to be this direct with her words and itpletely threw off the train of thought that had juste back on track.


    But before either of them could even say a thing, there were several figures that jumped onto the stage,nding in between Mo Ze Chen and Ying Ling.


    These figures that jumped onto the stagepletely ignored Mo Ze Chen as they surrounded Ying Ling, but based on the aura they released and the look on Ying Ling''s face, it was clear that they didn''t have any hostile intentions.


    These figures all surrounded Ying Ling and one of them, a rough looking man came up to take her shoulders as he said, "Xiao Ling, you can''t do this! You can''t just marry this fatty and leave your daddy!"


    The other figures all started trying to convince Xiao Ling against this decision as well and based on the words they said, it was clear that they were her family members.


    But Ying Ling ignored them all as she continued looking at Mo Ze Chen, as if she was waiting for his response.


    It took Mo Ze Chen longer than normal toe back to his senses which showed just how much he had been surprised by this matter, but when he did, he turned to look at Ying Ling with a serious look as he said, "I''m sorry, I can''t do that."


    Ying Ling tilted her head and asked, "Why not?"


    At the same time though, the rough looking man who was Ying Ling''s dad exploded with anger as he finally turned and acknowledged Mo Ze Chen. However, he didn''t have any kind words for Mo Ze Chen as he pointed his finger at him and said, "You dare turn down my cute little Xiao Ling? Who do you think you are?"


    Ying Ling gave a sigh and patted her dad''s shoulder as she said, "Dad, don''t act like that. Let''s hear what Ah Chen has to say first."


    She had actually changed the way she addressed Mo Ze Chen already, she was already calling him Ah Chen as if they were already dating.


    Ying Ling''s father revealed a pouty look when he turned back to his daughter and he said, "But Xiao Ling¡­"


    Ying Ling revealed a firm look and it was then that Ying Ling''s father stopped talking. Of course, that didn''t stop him from ring at Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen had a bitter smile on his face when he saw all of this, but he took a deep breath and said with a serious look, "I already have someone else, so I can''t marry you."


    This would have been a problem for anyone else because who would expect Mo Ze Chen to drop everything just to marry Ying Ling? However, it didn''t seem like it was a problem for Ying Ling.


    She just said, "Oh." Then after a pause, she said, "Is that all?"


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t know how to react to this as he just revealed a confused look.<sub> </sub>


    Ying Ling then said with a very rxed look, "All you have to do is leave them and then you can marry me. Is that really a problem?"


    Everyone revealed a shocked look when they heard this as they couldn''t believe what they were hearing.


    Ying Ling was this adamant about marrying Mo Ze Chen?


    Why?


    It had to be known that with how beautiful she was, Ying Ling had quite a few admirers and a lot of them were sitting in the crowd right now.


    The moment that they heard this, they all red at Mo Ze Chen with death res. If these res could kill, Mo Ze Chen would have died countless times already.


    Mo Ze Chen knitted his brows aftering back to his senses and ignoring the noise from Ying Ling''s family members, he looked at her and said, "I don''t have any reason to leave her, she is the one I want to be with, not you."


    Ying Ling couldn''t help finally revealing a different look from the calm appearance that she had the entire time.


    She hadn''t been rxed because she knew something that others didn''t, she had been rxed because she was confident in herself.


    After all, she was the sessor to one of the main branches of the Ying Family and she was the next top genius of the Ying Family''s younger generation. Not to mention that she believed that she was quite beautiful, so there wasn''t a single fault that could be found with her.


    But even with all of this, there was someone that was saying no to her?


    If it was anyone else, she would have gotten angry, but she didn''t get angry when Mo Ze Chen said this to her. Instead, she felt a bit sad, but also she became more interested in Mo Ze Chen.


    She had only proposed to begin with because of his strength, but now she found that there was something else that was attractive about Mo Ze Chen. It seemed like his personality was also quite interesting.


    She had thought that the only thing that she would want was someone who was stronger than her so that they could entertain her, but now she found that this wasn''t the only thing that she wanted.


    She just looked at Mo Ze Chen with upturned eyes and said, "Am I not good enough?"


    It wasn''t Mo Ze Chen who responded when she said this, but rather her father who hadpletely exploded.


    "You! You dare to bully my Xiao Ling? Who do you think you are! I''m going to¡­"


    But before he could keep going, Ying Ling had alreadye forward to cover his mouth. She didn''t bother looking at him as she looked at Mo Ze Chen, waiting for his answer.


    For the first time in her life, she was actually feeling nervous.


    Mo Ze Chen was silent for a full minute before shaking his head and saying, "It''s not that you''re not good enough. It''s just that my heart is with this other person."


    Hearing this, Ying Ling revealed a faint smile before saying, "Then that''s good."


    Ying Ling didn''t keep pestering Mo Ze Chen with this topic, but when she was leaving, she didn''t forget to turn and add with a wink, "Don''t forget that you''re mine. I don''t care who you''re with now, but you will be mine in the end."


    Without even waiting for Mo Ze Chen''s response, she just walked off the stage with a confident smile on her face.


    Thesest words left the arena in silence again, but that silence was quickly broken by Ying Ling''s father and other rtives who chased after her, trying to change her mind.


    Mo Ze Chen just stood there on stage in a daze as he watched Ying Ling walking off.


    As he thought about thest words that she said, he just couldn''t help feeling a bit confused. After all, when she had said those words, he had felt his heart skipping a beat.


    But that wasn''t right since he already had Lulu¡­


    So what was this feeling that he was feeling?


    The referee had been standing there on the side like a decoration the entire time, but seeing that Ying Ling was gone and Mo Ze Chen was just standing there, he knew that he had to do something. There were still other matches that had to be fought, so he couldn''t just let Mo Ze Chen stay on the stage like this.


    At first Mo Ze Chen didn''t hear what the referee was saying, but then he slowly heard his words and realized that he was just standing there in a daze, so he walked off the stage.

 Chapter 700 Tournament (10)

    The rest of the matches went as one would expect them to go.


    There wasn''t a surprise victory like Mo Ze Chen''s victory, so all the contestants that people expected to win had won their matches.


    When it was time for Mo Ze Chen''s next match, he still hadn''t recovered from the shock that he had just suffered. However, it wasn''t because he didn''t think it through, but because Ying Ling had been on the attack after he walked off the stage.


    He thought that he wouldn''t meet her again after that "confession", but as soon as he walked into the resting area, he found her waiting there for him.


    She came over with a smile and handed him a bottle of water and a towel as she said, "These are for you, darling."


    When she appeared in front of Mo Ze Chen like this, he didn''t know how to even react. The expression on his face was nk as he was still trying to process what was happening here.


    When he finally processed it, he found that she was alreadying closer with the towel, almost as if she was about to help him wipe his face.


    Seeing this, Mo Ze Chen immediately took a step back, avoiding her touch.


    A normal girl would have been hurt by this kind of action, but Ying Ling didn''t mind it. She just acted normal as she lifted the towel and said with a teasing smile, "Here, you can do it yourself if you''re shy."


    Mo Ze Chen still didn''t take it after that as he just stared at her with apletely confused look.


    Still, he didn''t get a chance to answer since there was a group that bursted into the resting area that chased her off. These people were the same group of rtives that had burst onto the stage when she had confessed earlier.


    They scolded Mo Ze Chen as they ran by before continuing to chase Ying Ling.


    After they were gone, there was only silence left in the resting area.


    Looking in the direction that they ran off in, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help revealing a faint smile. Even though he didn''t know what the feelings behind this smile were, he couldn''t deny that there was a bit of a good impression of Ying Ling inside of him.


    However, the silence in the resting area didn''t remain long as another one of the contestants suddenly came up to him.


    This was the person that Mo Ze Chen would be facing next.


    This person''s name was Dian Lun.


    There was no doubt that he was someone from the Dian Family with the name like that.


    However, there was something that was different about himpared to the rest of the otherpetitors.


    Simply put, he was in love with Ying Ling.


    It wasn''t a kind of love that was just because of how beautiful she was, but rather a love that was fostered over many years of being together.


    Since they were from the Ying and Dian Families respectively, they had spent quite a bit of time together in the past. Rather, it was better to just call them childhood friends since that was what they were.


    Dian Lun didn''t like Ying Ling when he first met her, but soon he was filled with admiration towards how free she was.


    She was someone who just did whatever she wanted whenever she wanted, she didn''t care about what anyone else thought of her.


    Over time, that admiration turned into a different feeling¡­love.


    He had thought that since they were from the Ying and Dian Family, it would be inevitable that they would get married since that was how it had been done between their families for generations. After all, both of them were the two strongest experts of their generation, so it was normal if the two families wanted them to be together.


    Let alone the fact that they had a very close rtionship, which made it even easier for them to get engaged.


    But now, there was this Mo Ze Chen who had suddenly appeared out of nowhere and stolen the heart of the one that he loved.


    How could he just ept this?


    It was too bad that he didn''t know that Ying Ling didn''t even think of him in that manner to begin with. Since they had spent so much time together as friends, she had even thought of him as a little brother since she was older than him.


    As well, she was stronger than him, which meant that she had even less of an interest in him.


    But of course, Dian Lun didn''t know any of that, which was why he was standing in front of Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t notice him at first, but seeing that he stood there the entire time, he had no choice but to acknowledge him.<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen looked at Dian Lun with a confused look as he asked, "Can I help you?"


    Dian Lun didn''t say anything at first as he continued to re at Mo Ze Chen, but then he shook his head and said, "I can''t understand why she thinks you''re special."


    Dian Lun didn''t give Mo Ze Chen a chance to respond as he said, "But since she''s taking an interest in you, I have to teach you a lesson. I''ll make sure she knows who''s the best person for her."


    Once again, he didn''t give Mo Ze Chen a chance to respond as he walked off to get ready for his match.


    Mo Ze Chen might have been a fool when it came to love, but when it was made this clear to him, even he wouldn''t still be an idiot. It was easy for him to tell that his next opponent had feelings for Ying Ling.


    Because of this, he even considered losing just to make her lose feelings for him¡­


    But of course, he knew that if he did this, he wouldn''t survive when he went back. Whether it was by Lin Fan''s hands or Ang''s hands¡­


    So he gave up that idea right away.


    The other two matches that followed his match ended quite quickly as well.


    Both of these matches ended with a clear winner and the ones that lost didn''t even have a chance to resist.


    In less than an hour, it was already Mo Ze Chen''s time to fight again.


    When he walked onto the stage, he saw Ying Ling standing in the crowd openly cheering for him. She had set up an entire section just to cheer for him and had created a banner with his face on it.


    He really couldn''t help feeling a bit of admiration for her that she was able to organize everything this quickly. Just the banner alone must have been hard because he could tell from the quality of it that it wasn''t something that could be made quickly. It was something that was clearly made with care.


    The one thing that did puzzle him was how she had made it this quickly.


    After all, it had only been an hour since their match had ended¡­


    Still, his eyes didn''t stay on her for that long as he started looking through the crowd for the one person that he wanted to see.


    He hadn''t been able to see her earlier since he had been rushed off the stage and he was worried about what she would think about all of this.


    Naturally, the person that he was looking for was Lulu.


    With someone confessing to him in such an open space and even in front of her, he had no doubt that she would be angry at him.


    What he had wanted to do the most over the past hour was to go and find her so that he could exin everything, but he couldn''t do that since the tournament rules didn''t allow him to leave.


    Those rules were in ce to ensure that the contestants didn''t get any outside help during the matches, but it yed apletely different role in this situation.


    Finally, after scanning through the entire crowd, Mo Ze Chen was able to find Lulu.


    She was sitting there with Lin Fan and the others and when he looked over at her, their gazes met. However, their gaze didn''t stay with each other for long as Lulu quickly turned away from him.


    When he saw this, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help feeling his heart sink.


    He knew that she would be angry with what happened today and now it seemed like that had been proven. It seemed like he would have a hard time tonight¡­


    But what he didn''t know was that Lulu wasn''t angry at all.


    To her, Mo Ze Chen was someone who was amazing and it was natural that other girls were interested in him. As long as he didn''t cheat on her with those other girls, she wouldn''t get angry if they confessed to him.


    Not to mention that when he had rejected Ying Ling, the words that he had said had made her heart start beating much faster.


    There was no helping it, he had been too handsome when he had said those words.


    So when she had turned her eyes away, it wasn''t because she was angry, but rather because she was embarrassed. She couldn''t look at Mo Ze Chen right now because she felt that he was too handsome.


    After getting onto the stage, Dian Lun immediately started taunting Mo Ze Chen by saying, "You should get off the stage already¡­"


    But before he could finish, Mo Ze Chen looked at him with a serious look and said, "Stop with the trash talk and let''s get started already."

 Chapter 701 Tournament (11)

    Dian Lun was taken aback by Mo Ze Chen''s reaction.


    This waspletely different from how Mo Ze Chen had acted in the resting area earlier. He even felt that Mo Ze Chen had turned into apletely different person.


    But he still wouldn''t back down since this match was important for him.


    It wasn''t just important because this would cement his position as one of the top geniuses of his generation, but also important for his future. If he couldn''t win this match, then he wouldn''t be qualified to stand by her side.


    So while Dian Lun was surprised by Mo Ze Chen''s words, he didn''t let them affect him for long as he said, "You can act tough all you want, but it''s already clear who will win in the end."


    Mo Ze Chen just gave a sigh. He didn''t reply as he just raised his hand and gave an inviting gesture, inviting Dian Lun to attack.


    Dian Lun was once again surprised to see how confident Mo Ze Chen was, but that also sparked his intent to fight.


    He wasn''t someone who judges people based on the values that everyone else judged them. He was actually quite the open minded person just like Ying Ling, which was why she liked hanging out with him as much as she did.


    He could see that Mo Ze Chen did have real power when he watched him fight Ying Ling earlier, but he still believed that he was stronger than Mo Ze Chen, which was why he was so confident.


    So seeing that Mo Ze Chen was inviting him, Dian Lun didn''t hold back.


    He pulled out a long spear from his Storage Ring before summoning out his pet.


    It was a hawk that had electricity flowing through the feathers on its body.


    The hawk didn''t waste any time as it suddenly flew onto Dian Lun''s spear before releasing a sh of light. After that sh of light, the spear was covered in a white lightning that ran along the shaft, gathering in the tip.


    With how intense this flowing lightning looked, there was no one who doubted the power contained in this lightning.


    But contrary to what everyone expected, Dian Lun didn''t stab out at Mo Ze Chen with this spear filled with lightning. Instead of stabbing out right at Mo Ze Chen, Dian Lun spun the spear in his hand before stabbing it right into the ground in front of him.


    As soon as the spear was inserted into the ground, as if there was nothing holding it back, the lightning inside the spear quickly started flowing through the ground. The lightning quickly spread out around him, but it didn''t spread out that far.


    Instead, the lightning forked off into two strips that surrounded the area where Mo Ze Chen was standing beforeing together behind Mo Ze Chen.


    A.


    The lightning had formed a around Mo Ze Chen to prevent him from escaping.


    After he created this of lightning, Dian Lun pulled the spear out of the ground which still had the same intense lightning around it and he suddenly jumped out at Mo Ze Chen.


    As he was flying out at Mo Ze Chen, Mo Ze Chen finally made his move.


    He did the same thing as before, using the wave of water to face the oing Dian Lun.


    As one would think, once the wave of water crossed the of lightning on the ground, it would pick up the lightning and then be even stronger. However, when the wave of water hit the edge of the lightning, vapour suddenly appeared.


    Unlike what everyone had imagined, instead of the wave of water picking up the lightning, the wave of water never made it past the of lightning on the ground. As soon as the wave of water hit the of lightning on the ground, it immediately started to evaporate the water.


    The wave of water was made from water that was condensed with waterws, so it was by no means normal water.


    But the same thing could be said about the of lightning on the ground that had evaporated this water, it wasn''t normal lightning. It had been able to stand up to therge waves of water and had actually been strong enough to directly evaporate the water.


    This was more than enough to demonstrate how powerful it was.


    But Mo Ze Chen didn''t panic when he saw this because his water wave attack was just the weakest move that he could use.


    To summon that much water, he would have to split apart the power contained in the waterws that Xiao Bai used. So that meant that while thews used to form the waves of water were strong, the actual power in the water was diluted since it was spread out to create all this water.


    Seeing that the waves disappeared, Mo Ze Chen had Xiao Bai attack.


    Xiao Bai used the same attack as before where he gathered water around his paws to form water ws before jumping out to meet Dian Lun charging at Mo Ze Chen.


    However, right before they were able to sh, Dian Lun''s figure suddenly flickered.<sub> </sub>


    By the time that Xiao Bai had reacted, Dian Lun was already past him and about to stab his spear out at Mo Ze Chen.


    Lightning was one of thosews that had two specialties. Not only was it powerful, it was also very fast.


    In terms of speed, Xiao Bai couldn''t keep up with Dian Lun at all.


    Dian Lun already knew just how strong the water ws that Xiao Bai used were, so he didn''t face them head on. He had already seen the damage that these water ws had done to Ying Ling''s foxes and he was certain that he wouldn''t be able to do the same.


    Since that was the case, it was best to ignore Xiao Bai and target Mo Ze Chen directly.


    After all, this was a match between him and Mo Ze Chen.


    As long as he took out Mo Ze Chen, the match would be over.


    Mo Ze Chen was surprised by Dian Lun''s speed and the fact that he targeted him, but he also didn''t panic as he just raised his hands.


    His left hand came in front of the spear while his right hand was pointed right at Dian Lun.


    Dian Lun couldn''t understand what was happening when he saw this, but since he was already here, he continued stabbing the spear forward.


    Right before the spear could hit Mo Ze Chen''s hand, there was a red glow that came from his right hand pointed at Dian Lun. Then the temperature around Mo Ze Chen suddenly increased as he started releasing mes from his right hand.


    Dian Lun was shocked to see the mes suddenly appear in front of his face and he twisted to avoid them. But this twisting caused his spear to go off target, not stabbing Mo Ze Chen in his left hand, but rather just grazing it.


    That graze was enough for Mo Ze Chen to steal some lightningws from his spear.


    Once he did, there was lightning that suddenly mixed in with the mes that Mo Ze Chen shot out.


    Dian Lun could see that this wasn''t good for him, so he immediately jumped back to avoid the mes. Once Mo Ze Chen saw Dian Lun jumping away to avoid his mes, he just stopped shooting them.


    What no one noticed was that the faint red flow in Mo Ze Chen''s left sleeve also stopped when he stopped shooting mes.


    Dian Lun knitted his brows, but he didn''t stay in ce for long as Xiao Bai had already turned around to sh at him with his ws.


    Dian Lun ran around Mo Ze Chen, trying to find a way to attack all while dodging Xiao Bai''s attacks. Xiao Bai continued swiping at Dian Lun with his water ws, but he couldn''t catch him at all.


    Finally Dian Lun resorted to sneaking up on Mo Ze Chen with his speed.


    He didn''t want to do this since he wanted to face Mo Ze Chen head on, but now it seemed that he didn''t have that option.


    This was a match that he couldn''t lose since it would decide his future with Ying Ling, so even if it was a bit underhanded, he decided to attack Mo Ze Chen from behind to catch him off guard with his speed.


    But before he could stab Mo Ze Chen with his spear, there was a wall of mes that appeared around Mo Ze Chen thatpletely stopped his spear. As soon as his spear hit the wall of mes, the lightning from his spear spread across the wall of mes before disappearing.


    The mews in these mes, they were stronger than his lightningws and had burnt away the lightning in his spear!


    For a second, Dian Lun''s speed dropped and that one second allowed Xiao Bai to catch up to him. However, Dian Lun didn''t keep his spear stabbed into the wall of mes.


    As soon as he pulled out his spear, he immediately regained his lightningws and his speed, so he easily dodged Xiao Bai''s attack.


    The look on his face though was very ugly as he stared at this me wall.


    He knew that he wouldn''t be able to break through this wall with his lightningws alone and even if he could, it would take up all his energy. At that point, he would just be a sitting duck for Xiao Bai.


    He really didn''t have a way to deal with Mo Ze Chen.


    But at the very least, Mo Ze Chen didn''t have a way to deal with him either since Mo Ze Chen couldn''t keep up with his speed.


    With this thought in mind, he prepared for a long battle since it seemed like this would be about who would run out of life energy first.


    Of course, Mo Ze Chen didn''t give him that chance.

 Chapter 702 Tournament (12)

    After seeing Dian Lun running around him, avoiding Xiao Bai''s attacks and hitting him with spear stabs to weaken his me barrier, Mo Ze Chen knew that this would take a while unless he did something.


    So he chose to do something.


    It wasn''t that he was afraid that he would lose a battle of attritions, but rather he could feel the chill that wasing from the crowd. Specifically, where Ang was sitting.


    Seeing Xiao Bai being led around like this by Dian Lun was naturally not something that Ang wanted to see. Seeing her little boy being yed around like this instead of showing off his power, it was only natural that Ang would be filled with anger.


    She even caused the temperature around her to drop by several degrees until the people around her were shivering even though they were cultivators.


    If she was filled with anger, the one that would suffer would definitely be Mo Ze Chen.


    So he couldn''t let her get even angrier or else who knew what would be waiting for him when he got back.


    His injuries started to ache again when he thought of this.


    So Mo Ze Chen didn''t waste any time as he pulled out two small daggers from his Storage Ring.


    When these two daggers were pulled out, Dian Lun could feel the strange aura that wasing from them. So without any hesitation, he immediately pulled back to the other side of the arena, creating some distance between him and Mo Ze Chen.


    He looked at the two daggers with a wary look as he asked, "What are those?"


    Mo Ze Chen just revealed a smile as he said, "Well, this is going on for a bit long, so I think that it''s about time to answer it."


    Dian Lun''s expression sank after he heard this and he said, "Do you really think that it''ll be as easy as that? I''ll just go down because you say I will?"


    But even though his mouth was saying this, deep down, he was actually feeling worried.


    He hadn''t been able to prate Mo Ze Chen''s defenses with his attacks and even if he was faster than him, he could also feel that his power was running out faster than Mo Ze Chen''s. If Mo Ze Chen just waited, there was no doubt that he would win.


    So that was also what confused Dian Lun.


    Why did it seem like Mo Ze Chen was in a hurry to end this?


    Could it be that there was something that he didn''t know about?


    After these thoughts came to his mind, Dian Lun decided to take a risk.


    He would wait for Mo Ze Chen to make his move and then he would focus all his lightningws to focus on speed.


    This was a technique that he couldn''t control properly since his reactions wouldn''t be able to keep up with the speed that his body went at, but as long as he was able to dodge Mo Ze Chen''s attack, he believed that this would work out. After all, there had to be a reason why Mo Ze Chen was trying to rush this.


    So Dian Lun stopped posing to attack and stood there with a defensive stance instead, waiting for Mo Ze Chen to make his move.


    Mo Ze Chen''s specialty was his artifacts since he wasn''t someone that specializes in fighting. Even after receiving training from Ang, that didn''t change the fact that he had many different artifacts which was something that he could use to his advantage.


    So during the free time that he had, he had gone through the artifacts that he owned to see if there was anything that would be suited for Xiao Bai.


    These two daggers were what he chose in the end.


    After he brought out those two daggers, he flicked them out and the two daggers flew in front of Xiao Bai.


    Xiao Bai didn''t hesitate at all to release the water ws on his paws and jumped onto the two daggers.


    With the size that Xiao Bai had right now, it wasn''t a problem for him to ride the two daggers like skis.


    Once Xiao Bai had mounted itself on the two daggers, Xiao Bai released a drop of water that quickly became ayer of water that wrapped over him.


    Once this was all done, the daggers started flying out again, moving at a speed that most people in the crowd couldn''t keep up with.


    Dian Lun was one of those people that couldn''t keep up with the speed of the dagger, but that didn''t matter since he also had a technique that would allow him to increase his speed to the max.


    Without any hesitation at all, Dian Lun started running in a circle with his lightningw focused purely on speed.


    As soon as he started moving, both he and Xiao Bai disappeared from sight since they were too fast to keep up with, but there were blurs that were formed all over the arena.<sub> </sub>


    One waspletely blue and one waspletely white, but they appeared at different parts of the arena.


    Based on the blurs that appeared, it seemed like they were evenly matched when it came to speed.


    However, as time passed, the distance between the blue blurs and the white blurs started getting shorter and shorter until they were almost atop each other.


    This finally continued until the blurs stoppedpletely and Dian Lun''s figure appeared, but it wasn''t just Dian Lun that appeared alone.


    Above Dian Lun, smashing into him was the figure of Xiao Bai on the pair of daggers.


    Dian Lun hadn''t even been able to guard himself since he had been focused purely on speed, so he had been moving at a speed that he couldn''t even react to. Naturally, he hadn''t been able to see Xiao Bai catching up to him, so he hadn''t been able to set up his defenses.


    As soon as Xiao Bai smashed into Dian Lun, he had the wind knocked out of him before he was mmed into the ground, creating arge hole in the arena.


    It only took a single look to realize that he had been knocked out since his eyes were rolled back in their sockets.


    Seeing this, the referee didn''t hesitate as he dered Mo Ze Chen the winner of the match.


    If people were doubtful before, even when Mo Ze Chen won against Ying Ling, there was nothing for them to doubt now.


    After all, he had shown his power in this fight and based on what they had seen, it didn''t seem like he had used all his power yet.


    This time, Mo Ze Chen didn''t walk right off the stage like all the other times. Instead, Mo Ze Chen came over to the crater that Dian Lun was lying in and he helped pull him out.


    After pulling him out, Mo Ze Chen put Dian Lun on the ground beside the crater before nodding at Xiao Bai. Receiving this nod, Xiao Bai created a ball of water above Dian Lun which he dropped onto his face.


    When this ball of water hit Dian Lun''s face, he immediately regained consciousness.


    Dian Lun was confused at first as he looked around himself, wondering what had happened, but it didn''t take him long to realize that he had lost.


    He looked up at Mo Ze Chen who was standing over him and there was a sad look on his face as he said, "It seems like I''ve lost¡­" Then after a pause, he said with a sigh, "You really are the one that suits her bet¡­"


    But before he could finish, Mo Ze Chen said, "Is that really all there is to your feelings? You''re giving up that easily?"


    Dian Lun was caught off guard when he heard this, but then he said with a self deprecating smile, "Even if I don''t give up, do I have a chance?"


    Mo Ze Chen said with a serious look, "That''s why I''m asking if that''s all there is to your feelings? If you truly love someone, would you give up that easily?"


    It was as if the words that he said had struck a chord with Dian Lun as his eyes suddenly lit up. Dian Lun looked up at Mo Ze Chen and said, "But can I really do it?"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod and said, "As long as you''re not willing to give up, there will be a day that you''ll be able to move her heart."


    Dian Lun was touched by how Mo Ze Chen went all out to help him, but he still said, "But she''s interested in you. I can''tpare to you, so how can I win her over?"


    Mo Ze Chen calmly said, "I already have someone else that I''m with."


    Dian Lun''s eyes lit up even more when he heard this as he said, "Really? Is that true?"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod.


    Dian Lun excitedly jumped up and grabbed Mo Ze Chen in a hug as he said, "Brother, you are my life''s greatest benefactor! I''ll be sure to name my first child after you!"


    Mo Ze Chen just patted him on the shoulder before saying, "Alright, alright, get off already!"


    Dian Lun didn''t let go at first, but eventually he did let go.


    Dian Lun took Mo Ze Chen by the shoulder and said, "Brother Mo, you are my sworn brother from this day forth!"


    Mo Ze Chen just revealed a bitter smile as he let himself be dragged off to the resting area by Dian Lun.


    In fact, the main reason he did this was so he could push Ying Ling who kept bothering him to someone else.


    But now it seemed like all he did was pick up another person who bothered him¡­

 Chapter 703 Toilets

    After being dragged to the resting area, Ying Ling showed her face again.


    She immediately came forward with another towel and a bottle of water, but this time she was kept off by Dian Lun.


    Ying Ling was surprised to see how close Dian Lun and Mo Ze Chen were, but it also made her happy to see them this close.


    After all, one was the person she saw as her little brother and the other was the person that she wanted to marry. Naturally it would be good if they could have a good rtionship with each other.


    But before she could say anything, Dian Lun came forward first.


    She looked at him with a curious look as he stood in front of her and said, "I like you, will you marry me?"


    Ying Ling waspletely caught off guard by this as she revealed a look ofplete shock.


    This was someone that she had treated like a little brother for the longest time and now that he was confessing to her, she wasn''t able to process the words that came out of his mouth. She looked at him like had suddenly transformed into an alien.


    But eventually, she came back to her senses.


    She looked at Dian Lun in silence for a bit before saying, "But you''re more like a little brother to me. I just can''t see you in that way."


    Dian Lun''s expression turned a bit sad, but Mo Ze Chen patted him on the back which raised his spirits again.


    He turned to look at Mo Ze Chen before turning back to Ying Ling to say, "I''ll do my best to change how you look at me. I just want you to know how I feel about you."


    Ying Ling couldn''t help taking a step back with how strong Dian Lun wasing on.


    It wasn''t that she was averse to it, she just really didn''t see him that way. However, she also didn''t want to hurt him, so she didn''t reject him then and there.


    Seeing that the two of them were just awkwardly standing there, Mo Ze Chen suddenly gave a cough.


    Dian Lun seemed to have realized something as he quickly said, "If you have time today, do you want to have dinner together?"


    A trace of panic appeared in Ying Ling''s eyes when she heard this.


    She never expected Dian Lun to be this direct.


    She just looked at him in silence before turning to Mo Ze Chen. She handed him the bottle of water and the towel before saying, "These are for you."


    Then before giving Dian Lun a chance to speak, she turned and walked off.


    Dian Lun was about to chase her, but Mo Ze Chen grabbed him by the shoulder, shaking his head when Dian Lun turned back.


    He knew that Ying Ling would certainly have some things that she needed to think through, so if Dian Lun were to follow her, he would just make it worse. It was best to leave her alone first and see how she would react to this.


    Whether it was good or bad, there would be ways to handle it.


    Not to mention that this wasn''t his specialty, so he would have to ask Lulu about this after he got back.


    He just hoped that she still wasn''t mad about this matter.


    Just like this, the first day of the finals came to an end.


    There was still another match after this, but that didn''t matter to Mo Ze Chen since he was confident that no one would be able to beat him with the trump cards that Lin Fan gave him.


    ¡­


    In the crowd, Lin Fan had been sitting with the rest of the members of the pet shop in the stand, but when he saw the way Ang was acting, he decided to head to the bathroom.


    He left Momonga who finally came with them today to take his ce, letting Ang brag about Xiao Bai.


    Xiao Bai had finally been able to show off in thisst match, so Ang didn''t hold back.


    When Lin Fan left Momonga as his sacrifice, he could feel Momonga''s look of betrayaling from behind him.


    Lin Fan leisurely made his way to the bathroom and he was able to find one where there was no one around.


    He just wasn''t good with public bathrooms and unless it was quiet, he wasn''t able to do his business.


    He went into one of the stalls because there was someone at the urinals and he started doing his business.


    During that time, the other person left and he was the only one left in the bathroom. That was until two people came into the bathroom after him.


    When he was about to leave, he suddenly heard voicesing from outside the stall.<sub> </sub>


    Normally he wouldn''t have cared, but when he heard the conversation between these voices, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    He didn''t push his way out of the stall as he listened to the conversation outside.


    "Are you sure that everything is prepared for tomorrow? It doesn''t seem like things are going as nned." A first voice said.


    A second voice said, "It''s fine, I''ve already made sure that everything and everyone is in ce. As soon as the finals start tomorrow, they will make their move. As long as they aren''t noticed before then, we won''t have a single problem."


    The first voice was silent for a bit before saying, "Where did that kid with the tigere from? I thought that you already investigated all the important participants, why wasn''t he on the list?"


    The second voice gave a sigh before saying, "I really don''t know. I was certain that I had information on everyone, but this kid really came out of nowhere." Then after a pause, he said, "But it''s fine. As long as we catch them by surprise, nothing will happen."


    The first voice replied, "Hmm, as long as you''re positive that nothing will go wrong. You know that both you and I can''t handle the consequences thate with failing this mission. The lord will have both of our heads."


    The second voice said in a firm tone, "I know, that''s why I''ve already triple checked everything before tomorrow. Just tell your man to be ready to move when the timees."


    The first voice calmly said, "He''ll be ready."


    There wasn''t much else that was said between the two of them as they just silently left the bathroom, heading off in different directions.


    Lin Fan had been quick witted and had Brainy release two ants to follow the two of them.


    It was clear from their conversation that they were nning on doing something during the finals tomorrow, but before taking care of them, he had to find out who they worked for. So Lin Fan wanted to use the ants to track them to their hideout so he could find who they worked with and who they worked for.


    Of course, Lin Fan also wouldn''t take care of this personally.


    This tournament was one that was organized by the twelve great factions and if there was an incident that happened during this tournament, it would be a great p to their faces.


    So if there was something that was going to happen, naturally it should be taken care of by the twelve great factions.


    If Lin Fan was the one that took care of it, it would also be a p to the twelve great factions since it would mean that they weren''t capable of stopping these incidents themselves. They had to rely on someone like Lin Fan to wipe their butts for them.


    Still, Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering who was able to plot under the noses of the twelve great factions like this without being caught.


    Perhaps there was someone powerful backing them?


    Or perhaps it was one of the twelve great factions?


    But then what would be their goal?


    Still, that was all forter when he found out who these people were and what their n was.


    The one thing that Lin Fan was certain of right now was that these people were either idiots or they were amateurs¡­


    Why would they choose to discuss their n in a public bathroom like this?


    Even if it seemed empty, why didn''t they check the stalls first?


    This all seemed sloppy and really drained on Lin Fan''s excitement and motivation to stop this.


    Still, he had to do it since he owed the Hunters Organization.


    He would just report this to them tonight and let them inform the other twelve great factions.


    When Lin Fan got back, he saw that Mo Ze Chen had already arrived and he was currently exining everything that had happened to Lulu.


    She had a calm look on her face, but Lin Fan could tell that she was enjoying watching him like this.


    Sometimes, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that Lulu really had a dark side to her. It was just a good thing that it only came up when she was with Mo Ze Chen.


    p Since Mo Ze Chen was already here, there was no need for them to stay any longer.</anda>


    After arriving back at the store, Lin Fan let everyone else do their own thing as he contacted old man Qiao.


    Once he had contacted him, Lin Fan set up a meeting with old man Qiao at night at a restaurant.


    The others also wanted toe, but Lin Fan made them stay as he headed off to the restaurant alone.


    The night went by like this and soon it was the day of the final match.

 Chapter 704 Tournament (13)

    The twelve great factions could have held the final match on the same day as the other matches of the final round, but they chose to hold the final match the day after.


    First, they wanted to build up tension and hype for this final match.


    And second, they wanted to let the contestants rest up so that they would be in peak condition for this match.


    After all, this was a match that would decide the top genius of the next generation, so this was without a doubt a match that everyone paid attention to.


    It was especially important for the Hunters Organization and the Chu Family where the two finalists were from.


    If their finalist won, it would mean that they would be the organization that would have the strongest momentum over the next generation. This was something that was very important among the twelve great factions.


    However, for Lin Fan''s group, the match was actually thest thing that was on their minds.


    In fact, most of Lin Fan''s group didn''t even show up in the stands to watch Mo Ze Chen.


    It was only Ang and Lin Fan who were sitting in the stands watching. As for the rest, they were all gone.


    Lulu was also here, but she was with Mo Ze Chen in the resting area instead of being with Lin Fan and Ang in the stand.


    At that moment, it was actually the first time that Ying Ling and Lulu met, so it was quite a tense moment in the resting area. Ying Ling had even dered that she would defeat Lulu and take Mo Ze Chen away from her.


    As for Momonga and Yuki, they had been sent off on a special mission by Lin Fan.


    It was easy with Momonga since he and Lin Fan already had a good rtionship, but it waspletely different with Yuki. She clearly didn''t want to follow Lin Fan''s order, but in the end, Lin Fan was able to convince her by having Ang speak up and also bribing her with special sweets.


    But when she left, there was a clear unwilling look on her face.


    Now the only thing that was left was for the other side to make their move.


    They said that they would be making their move during the final, so there was still some time before they would arrive.


    Before then, there was nothing for them to do other than wait and see what happened.


    Back in the resting area, Mo Ze Chen was still caught in between the two girls, but someone unexpected came to his rescue.


    It was his opponent from the Chu Family, Chu Huai.


    Chu Huai came forward with a smile and reached his hand forward towards Mo Ze Chen as he said, "I hope that we''ll have a good match."


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help raising a brow when he saw this. After all, he knew what kind of reputation that he had, so it was strange for Chu Huai to treat him like this.


    But still, he couldn''t see any liesing from Chu Huai''s eyes, only sincerity. He could tell that Chu Huai was serious, so there was no reason for him to treat him badly.


    Mo Ze Chen reached his hand out and shook Chu Huai''s hand as he said, "You too."


    Chu Huai just gave a nod before turning to go back to the person that came with him.


    Mo Ze Chen waspletely confused as to why Chu Huai would do this.


    Was it just because he was a good person or was it because of something else?


    Mo Ze Chen turned the hand that he just shook Chu Huai''s hand with and he couldn''t help looking it over. But no matter how closely he looked, he wasn''t able to find anything strange with it.


    Ying Ling on the side saw this and she knitted her brows. After a moment of hesitating, she said, "Darling, you should be careful during the match. I know what kind of personality that Chu Huai has, but it''s like he''s apletely different person today."


    Lulu normally would have called out Ying Ling for calling Mo Ze Chen "darling", but she was worried about him too, so she ignored it this one time.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t say anything for a while, but then he turned to them with a smile and said, "It''ll be fine, I still have my trump cards."


    The two girls were taken aback by this before they both revealed confident smiles.


    Mo Ze Chen had really been too handsome when he said this.


    It took another hour for their match to start because before this, the twelve great factions had held exhibition matches between people who had been eliminated earlier, as well as the third ce match between Dian Lun and the person Chu Huai defeated. That was also the reason why Ying Ling had been able to escape Dian Lun following her toe bother Mo Ze Chen.


    Once Dian Lun''s match was over, he immediately came over to find Ying Ling which caused her to run away.<sub> </sub>


    Even after an entire day, she still hadn''t processed how she would treat Dian Lun, so for now, she chose not to face him.


    This gave Mo Ze Chen and Lulu some time alone before his match started.


    Once it was time, Mo Ze Chen and Chu Huai were called onto the stage.


    The two of them walked shoulder to shoulder through the corridor until they reached the arena where they were hit with a burst of cheers.


    Well, there were cheers for one person and jeers for the other.


    It wasn''t hard to figure out who received what.


    However, both Mo Ze Chen and Chu Huai ignored this as they took their ces on stage.


    The referees that were presiding over this match weren''t like the other referees. The referees that had been brought in were an expert from the Hunters Organization and the Chu Family respectively.


    This had been done so that they could ensure the safety of the contestants, as well as making sure that the calls from the referees would be fair.


    But of course, the main thing was keeping the contestants safe.


    In a pinch, the referees would disregard the match to save the contestant from their faction. After all, if the contestant could reach the final round like this, there was no doubt that they were one of the top experts of the younger generation from their respective faction.


    So the faction would spare no expense in keeping them safe.


    There was only a moment of silence between the two of them before they both nodded at the referees to start the match. Seeing this, the referees didn''t keep anyone waiting as they suddenly raised their hands and called the start of the match.


    As soon as the match started, both Mo Ze Chen and Chu Huai suddenly jumped out at each other with their weapons, shing at each other.


    There was an intense sh between the two of them before both of them were pushed back to their starting positions. However, they didn''t remain still for long as they started running around, sending attacks out at each other.


    Everyone in the stand was shocked to see this, but they quickly started cheering when they saw this.


    This was what they had wanted to see in a final match, but they had been expecting something different since it was Mo Ze Chen who had made it into the final match. The way that he had fought before had given them matches that werepletely different from any that they had experienced before.


    It wasn''t to say that they were bad matches, it just didn''t give them the excitement that they wanted.


    But now that Mo Ze Chen was fighting the way that they wanted, naturally they were filled with excitement.


    ? Of course, for some people that had sharper eyes and knew what was happening, they were able to easily tell what was going on here.


    It was an illusion.


    The fight that they were currently being shown was an illusion.


    However, even though he knew that it was an illusion, Lin Fan wasn''t able to see through it. This illusion was much stronger than he had expected, so he couldn''t see what was happening to the real Mo Ze Chen.


    As for Ang, she would have been able to see it, but if she did, she would have to use a part of her real power and that would leak her real aura, revealing her to the people around her.


    The people here were some of the top figures in the twelve great factions, since they wanted to show how important this tournament was to their twelve great factions. It wouldn''t take much to reveal herself and revealing herself to these people would be disastrous.


    So she just sat there beside Lin Fan, but her brows were also knitted.


    After all, Xiao Bai was hidden by this illusion along with Mo Ze Chen.


    If she couldn''t see him, she didn''t know what was happening to Xiao Bai.


    What if he was in danger?


    If he was, it was certain that she wouldn''t let the person who put him in danger off.


    Inside of the illusion, Chu Huai and Mo Ze Chen weren''t fighting at all.


    Mo Ze Chen could see the two illusions of him and Chu Huai fighting around him, but that just made him focus his attention on Chu Huai.


    He narrowed his eyes to look at him as he asked, "Who are you?"

 Chapter 705 Tournament (14)

    Chu Huai just stood there with a smile on his face as he asked, "Who do you think I am?"


    Mo Ze Chen knitted his brows even more, but then he asked, "Alright. Then what is your goal? You must have some reason for trapping me in this illusion, right?"


    Chu Huai gave a shrug and said, "Who knows?"


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help feeling a bit annoyed when he saw this, but he held back. He took a deep breath and said, "Then what if I said that I don''t want to stay here any longer? What will you do about that?"


    This time, Chu Huai didn''t act as rxed as before. Instead, he gave a sigh and said, "If you insist, I suppose that I will have to get a bit rough with you. So I hope that you will insist."


    Mo Ze Chen thought that he had heard wrong, but then seeing the look in Chu Huai''s eyes, he could tell that he didn''t.


    Chu Huai had indeed said that he wanted him to resist since it was clear that he wanted to hurt him. But as for why he wanted to hurt him, that was the part that he was confused about.


    After all, they had never met each other before and there was no grievances between them, or as far as Mo Ze Chen could remember, so what reason did Chu Hugo have to hurt him?


    But in the end, seeing the look in his eyes, Mo Ze Chen assumed that this Chu Huai just wanted to hurt people simply for the reason of hurting people.


    Personally, he disliked this kind of people the most.


    So without any other choice, Mo Ze Chen could only call out Xiao Bai.


    The moment that Xiao Bai appeared, Chu Huai gave augh and said, "Ah that tiger of yours, I''ve been waiting for you to summon it."


    Without the slightest bit of hesitation, Chu Huai flicked his hand as a little ball appeared in it. Once the little ball appeared, he immediately threw it casually at Xiao Bai.


    With how slow it was, it was quite easy for Xiao Bai to react to it. However, dodging it was apletely different question.


    Xiao Bai moved to the side to get out of the way, but before he could move, he felt a strange force that kept him in ce. No matter how Xiao Bai struggled, he found that he wasn''t able to move no matter what he did.


    Xiao Bai had no choice but to let the little ball hit him.


    The moment that the little ball made contact with Xiao Bai, there was ayer of electricity that spread across him like a. It wrapped up around Xiao Bai and he wasn''t able to move at all. Rather, Xiao Bai even started shaking in pain from the lightning that shocked him.


    Mo Ze Chen immediately started to move when he saw that something was off, but Chu Huai didn''t give him that chance.


    Before Mo Ze Chen could take a single step, there was a spear of lightning that stabbed the ground in front of him. It released lightning into the ground around him, creating a web pattern in the ground.


    It was clear that as long as Mo Ze Chen took a single step, he would be shocked by the same lightning that was currently trapping Xiao Bai.


    Still Mo Ze Chen didn''t give up as he raised his hand towards the of lightning on the ground. After pointing his hand at it, he bent down slightly as he moved his hand towards it.


    However unlike before, when his hand made contact, he wasn''t able to absorb it like before. Instead there was a powerful shock that filled his body.


    This was the shock of the lightning.


    "Ah!" It was so painful that Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help letting out a scream of pain.


    He wasn''t able to absorb it and there was only one reason for that. It was stronger than what his body could handle, so it affected him normally instead of being absorbed.


    Just what was this lightning that he couldn''t absorb it?


    When Chu Huai saw this, he revealed a faint smile before saying, "Keep trying, maybe it''ll get weaker."


    Mo Ze Chen clearly knew that he was taunting him, but he didn''t give him the satisfaction by reacting.


    Instead, Mo Ze Chen secretly summoned out some things from his pet storage space.


    These things that he summoned were small enough to fit in his sleeve, but make no mistake about their power. These pets were small, but they packed more than enough punch.


    Right after they had been summoned, there was a barrier that appeared around Mo Ze Chen.


    When Chu Huai saw this, he still had a confident look on his face.<sub> </sub>


    To him, this was nothing more than a desperate struggle from Mo Ze Chen. As long as he crushed this barrier, it would all be over.


    However, when he looked closely, he found that the aura of this barrier was anything but normal. It was so strange that it even made him feel a sense of danger.


    Chu Huai knitted his brows and roared, "What is this?!"


    This time, Mo Ze Chen gave no answer. He just raised his hand and flicked it out.


    As soon as he flicked his hand out, there was a beam of light that flew out, hitting Xiao Bai. Or more urately, it hit the lightning around Xiao Bai.


    As soon as the two shed, it wasn''t the beam of light that was shattered as one would have expected, but rather the lightning around Xiao Bai.


    Once Xiao Bai was free, he immediately stood up and jumped over the of lightning on the ground tond on Mo Ze Chen''s shoulder.


    Once hended, he released a roar which suddenly made the barrier glow even brighter.


    After that, there were five different figures that suddenly went away from Mo Ze Chen, heading off in five different directions.


    As they moved out, the barrier spread along with them. Then when the barrier hit the lightning on the ground, the lightning waspletely shattered to pieces.


    Once they had gone far enough, the five figures stopped and formed an array.


    With this array, they gathered their energy together before shooting it out as a beam at Chu Huai.


    Chu Huai knew that this beam of light was dangerous, so he had no choice but to make his move. He raised his hand and formed a spear of lightning that he suddenly threw out at the beam of light.


    During flight, this spear of lightning suddenly separated into hundreds of spears of lightning that were all concentrated on this beam of light. However, even after they had split apart, it was clear that each one was as powerful as the original spear, so this attack was equal to attacking with one hundred times his original power.


    As the spears of lightning and the beam of light shed, there was only a single second where they bnced out before one side suddenly crashed.


    It was the spears of lightning that didn''t even stand a chance as they were shattered to pieces by the beam of light.


    After that, the beam of light hit Chu Huai right in the chest and sent him flying off the ground. Hended a few meters away and slid a few times before goingpletely silent.


    This was the power of the trump card that Lin Fan had left Mo Ze Chen, or rather the power of the five pets he had given to Mo Ze Chen on a temporary contract.


    They were the five pets that he used the most, the ones that had the most power out of all his pets because of their bloodline.


    Of course, now that they had broken through to the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, their power had reached apletely new level. Even facing a Child Soul Realm Expert, they would be able to easily overpower him.


    And that was what was strange about Chu Huai, he was actually in the Child Soul Realm. Well, that was until he had been knocked out by Mo Ze Chen.


    Once he had been knocked out, his cultivation suddenly returned to normal whichpletely confused him.


    At the same time, when Chu Huai had been knocked out, the illusion around them suddenly disappeared.


    Everyone who had been enjoying the fight provided by the illusion suddenly saw the illusion disappear and they werepletely confused by the scene that they saw.


    The scene that appeared after the illusion disappeared was Mo Ze Chen standing there with Xiao Bai in front of him and Chu Huai lying on the ground.


    No one could understand why the scene had just changed to this after they had been watching the two of them in a fierce fight, but there were some smart people who immediately realized what was wrong. Not to mention that there were people who already knew that something would be happening during the finals.


    They had been wondering when it had happened, but they never expected it to happen like this.


    The two referees immediately called for a stop to the match as they both went to the person from their faction.


    There was nothing to say about Mo Ze Chen, but after the Chu Family referee made sure that there was nothing wrong with Chu Huai, they turned to Mo Ze Chen to ask, "What happened here?"


    Mo Ze Chen looked right back at him and asked, "Shouldn''t I be asking you that? It was Chu Huai who did all this."

 Chapter 706 Tournament (15)

    The referee from the Chu Family knitted his brows, clearly looking like he didn''t believe this.


    However, there wasn''t anything that he could do since Mo Ze Chen was the only one awake, so he held the advantage here as the only person being able to recount what happened.


    At the same time, Mo Ze Chen had been watching the reaction of the referee from the Chu Family.


    Based on the expression that the referee from the Chu Family gave, it was clear that the Chu Family hadn''t been involved in this matter.


    Since that was the case, there was only one more person that he had to take care of.


    He ignored the look of the Chu Family referee and turned to one of the people who were standing at the sides of the arena.


    When that person saw Mo Ze Chen turning to look at him, he waspletely confused why Mo Ze Chen was looking at him like this, but there was also a slight bit of panic that filled his heart.


    After all, this person was the person that had been in the bathroom yesterday.


    Lin Fan had been tracking him the entire time and he had already warned Mo Ze Chen about this. He also wanted Mo Ze Chen to see if Chu Huai was rted to him.


    That was why Mo Ze Chen had been able to react rtively quickly and had used his trump card without holding back.


    Now, it was time to take care of this person.


    After looking at him for a bit, Mo Ze Chen ignored everything else as he started moving towards the person who was Chu Huai''s trainer. When the trainer saw this, he started taking a step back before realizing his mistake and firmly standing there.


    That was actually something that confused Lin Fan.


    Why would the Chu Family hire a trainer just for Chu Huai?


    The Chu Family was one of the twelve great factions and they had plenty of resources to help Chu Huai with his cultivation. So why was this trainer hired for Chu Huai?


    Unless they were also in on this as well.


    Mo Ze Chen eventually came off the stage and stood right in front of the trainer, looking him right in the eyes.


    The trainer waspletely unnerved at this point as he asked in a voice with a slight tremble, "What is it?"


    Mo Ze Chen without a single word raised his hand and punched the trainer in the stomach, sending him flying.


    The Chu Family referee immediately spoke up after seeing this. He roared out, "Contestant Mo, what are you doing?"


    He would have rushed right at Mo Ze Chen, but there was the Hunters Organization referee beside him not letting him make a move.


    However, he still had to speak up since even if he was an outsider, the trainer was someone that was hired by the Chu Family. So at the very least, if he was attacked and they allowed it to happen, it would hurt the Chu Family''s prestige.


    But when he saw the trainer who stabilized himself, he immediately knitted his brows.


    The appearance of the trainer shifted until itpletely changed.


    It didn''t take much for him to understand what happened, the trainer was clearly using some kind of illusion technique to hide his true appearance. That meant that the illusion that had broken just now was clearly made by this trainer.


    Putting these together, it was easy for the Chu Family referee to recognize that this trainer must be the one behind all of this.


    He no longer cared about the Chu Family reputation because this involved something even more important, the life of their Chu Family''s next generation''s most talented genius.


    If this trainer was using illusions during their fight, who knows what else he had nned?


    Seeing that the Chu Family referee was no longer focused on him, the Hunters Organization referee also turned to the trainer.


    In fact, all around them were experts from the twelve great factions.


    They had already known that something was going to happen, but now that someone had actually snuck in under illusion, this was a great shame for them.


    Since he had alreadye, there was no need for him to leave.


    Not to mention that they had to protect what really mattered, the contestants!


    When the trainer saw that he had beenpletely surrounded, he didn''t panic at all. Instead he revealed a smile as he looked at all the experts around him.


    "Well it seems like the jig is up. Then there''s no need for me to stay here any longer."


    After he said this, he pulled out a small ball just like the one that Chu Huai had pulled out earlier, but this one was a different colour. Instead of being yellow, this one waspletely white.


    As soon as he brought it out, there was no hesitation at all as he crushed it.<sub> </sub>


    There was a white glow that appeared, but then it quickly disappeared. After it was gone, the trainer was left there standing with a stunned look on his face.


    "What''s this? What''s happening? Why didn''t it work?!"


    The little ball that he had crushed was a ball that was filled with spacews.


    He had nned on using this to escape, but now it seemed like it had failed.


    Why?


    This was a ball that was filled with Nascent Soul Realmws, it wasn''t something that could be countered easily!


    The twelve great factions could counter this if they had been prepared, but they never expected anyone to use spatialws to try and escape, so there wasn''t any barrier that had been prepared to counter this.


    But that didn''t mean there was no barrier at all.


    Lin Fan had already known about their plot, so he had made his move earlier.


    He had Brainy control the Child Soul Realm beasts that he had tamed to form a barrier around this arena, one that would block any attempts at using spatialws to escape.


    With how many Child Soul Realm beasts that he had deployed, it was easy for them to block Nascent Soul Realmws, especially when it was just a small amount stored in a little ball.


    The experts of the twelve great factions quickly overcame their daze and immediately jumped into action. Without much effort, they easily caught the trainer who was still stunned over the fact that his escape n failed.


    They also quickly sealed off his life energy so he wouldn''t get another chance to escape.


    After that, they quickly took the trainer away and had the MCe onto the stage to calm the crowd, but those with sharp eyes could see that the important people from the twelve great factions had already left the stands.


    There was also someone who hade to pick up Lin Fan.


    He was given a cloak before he met up with old man Qiao and he was brought to a room where all the important people of the twelve great factions gathered.


    Once everyone was gathered, the trainer had been brought in.


    It was clear by the bruises on his face and body that he had already been interrogated to a certain extent, but it was also clear by the stumped looks that the ones bringing him in had that they hadn''t gotten any information from him.


    As soon as the trainer was brought in and he saw the people in the room, he broke out inughter.


    This strangeughter made all the people in the room knit their brows as they were confused why this man wasughing.


    After all he had been caught and there was clearly no way out for him. No matter how one looked at it, it was a desperate situation for him and he shouldn''t be acting this way.


    So why was heughing?


    Once the trainer finishedughing, he said a few words that answered everyone''s question.


    "You think you''ve won just because you''ve stopped me? The n goes much deeper than you can imagine." Once he finished speaking, the man burst out inughter again.


    All of the people in the room knitted their brows deeper.


    One of them came forward to grab the trainer by the cor to bring him up to his face before saying in a low roar, "What do you mean?"


    As he said this, he used his aura to pressure the trainer.


    The trainer shrunk back slightly under this pressure, but the smile never disappeared from his face.


    He looked right up at this person and asked with a smile, "Have you heard anything from the people you''ve sent yet?"


    The expressions of everyone in the room changed after hearing this.


    After this matter had been exposed, all of them had sent someone to check on the geniuses of their faction. After all, this was clearly a plot that was targeting the younger generation based on what had happened.


    When they thought about it, they found that it was strange that no one had responded after all this time.


    They immediately turned their attention away from the trainer and focused on their watches as they tried calling their people. However, no matter how they tried, they weren''t able to get in contact at all.


    The person who grabbed the trainer by the cor earlier grabbed his cor again as he roared even louder, "What did you do?!"


    The trainer broke out inughter again, but this time he didn''t say a thing. He didn''t need to say a thing to make it clear that he was taunting them.


    There was an unsettling silence that filled the room.

 Chapter 707 Tournament (16)

    That silence didn''tst long however as one of the watches suddenly started to ring.


    The person whose watch rang immediately turned to his watch and after a moment of shock, he immediately answered it.


    He roared out in an impatient voice, "What is going on over there? Why didn''t you answer?!"


    The other side immediately replied, "My apologies, but there were some strange fluctuations that came from around the manor when the call came. We were unable to pick up since we were investigating the strange fluctuations."


    The person then asked, "Is everything fine now?"


    The other side replied, "Yes my lord. There was nothing found and the young master is safely in his room."


    The person let out a sigh of relief before saying, "Keep your vignce and alert me immediately if anything happens."


    "Yes my lord."


    After that, the call hung up as everyone turned to look at the trainer.


    The trainer had a look of surprise on his face, but that look didn''t remain long. He revealed a wicked smile again and said, "You might have been able to stop one, but that doesn''t¡­"


    Before he could finish, there were two more watches that suddenly started to ring.


    Both of the people whose watches rang immediately picked up the call.


    As expected, it was the same report that the first person received. They hadn''t been able to pick up because of strange fluctuations and they had only just finished checking the area to find nothing, which was why they had called now.


    There was nothing for them to report since everyone there was still fine.


    After these reports finished, they turned back to look at the trainer.


    The trainer still had a smile on his face, but it was clear by the looks in his eyes that he was starting to panic. Still he forced out augh as he said, "You really think that it''s all over just because¡­"


    This time, he didn''t even get to make a threat as three more watches suddenly started to ring.


    It was the same as before, there were strange fluctuations that had been detected which was why they couldn''t answer. However, they all reported that nothing was wrong in the end.


    The trainer''s eyes were almost popping out at this point when he heard this.


    He had hope earlier since there were only those three reports, which meant that there were still three more targets left. However, with these three new reports, it meant that they hadpletely failed their mission.


    There were only six targets that weren''t at the arena.


    He was supposed to be the one that took care of the ones in the arena, but failing his mission meant that the total mission had half failed.


    Still, he had been confident since there was no way that they would be able to stop the rest of hispanions.


    But now it seemed like they hadpletely failed this mission.


    The trainer''s expression changed many times during this until he finally couldn''t help saying, "What is going on here?!"


    Hearing this, the others in the room felt much more relieved. After all, if the trainer still had some other n, he wouldn''t be acting this way.


    It was at this time that old man Qiao finally spoke.


    "It seems like you''re still very confused why you failed."


    Everyone turned to look at old man Qiao when he said this, especially the trainer who could tell that something was off.


    He looked at old man Qiao for a bit before asking, "What do you mean?"


    It wasn''t that he couldn''t understand the words that old man Qiao was saying, but he couldn''t understand why old man Qiao was saying these words.


    As far as they knew, there shouldn''t have been any indications of their ns, so why did it sound like that they already knew about their n?


    Did someone leak it?


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help feeling the urge to p his forehead¡­


    This man clearly didn''t remember what he did yesterday, even though it was such a dumb thing.


    This just made Lin Fan even more confused.


    Why did they think that they would get away with it if they were going to discuss their n in public? What made them so confident?


    Old man Qiao just shook his head and said, "You don''t even know this, it really is surprising that you were even able to get this far¡­"<sub> </sub>


    It was clear that old man Qiao was feeling the same thing.


    After all, Lin Fan had already told him everything, including how he had learned about their n¡­


    This made him feel even more ashamed since if it wasn''t for Lin Fan, perhaps this trainer''s n would have seeded since they didn''t know anything about it.


    It seemed like there really was a big problem with their surveinceworktely, he would have to double check this when he went back.


    Old man Qiao gave a sigh before turning his attention back to the trainer and saying, "Alright, just tell us who you are working for and we''ll make it easy for you. It''s clear that you''re not the one who nned this, so there''s no need for you to suffer. As long as you tell us who the mastermind is, it''ll be better for you."


    The trainer looked tempted for a second, but then as if he had suddenly remembered something, his expression filled with terror as he said, "You think that I would betray my master that easily? You must be a fool."


    Old man Qiao knitted his brows when he saw this.


    After all, the trainer''s reaction was just too strange to ignore.


    It was clear that the master behind him was a very powerful person that was targeting the twelve great factions. It was very likely that the master was someone who came from another upper realm, which was why they were targeting the twelve great factions.


    Not to mention that he had been able to use illusions to fool them earlier.


    Old man Qiao was in the True Soul Realm, one of the people at the peak of this entire upper realm, but he had been fooled by the illusions.


    This trainer was only someone in the Child Soul Realm, so it was impossible that he was able to use his ownws to fool them. There was no doubt that he had used some kind of artifact to fool them with his illusions.


    However, no matter how they had searched, they hadn''t been able to find it.


    That at least meant that the master of this trainer was someone at the same level as them¡­or at an even higher level.


    The other experts from the twelve great factions naturally recognized this as well, so they started backing old man Qiao up as they interrogated the trainer.


    However, no matter what tactics they used, the trainer never showed any signs of relenting. There was only that one moment of temptation in the beginning before hepletely ignored all the offers that they offered him.


    Seeing as they had no other choice, they decided that it was better to leave this trainer to the professionals to see if they could get any information out of him.


    After all, these experts weren''t professional interrogators (torturers) and they had people for jobs like this, so it was better to leave it to them.


    However, before the trainer could be taken away, something suddenly happened to him.


    Without any warning, the trainer''s eyes popped open and he suddenly started coughing out blood.


    Everyone was stunned to see this happen as there had been no changes in the life energy in the surrounding area. They had been on alert and they hadn''t been able to sense any attacks, so why was he suddenly coughing out blood?


    The trainer looked around himself as he shouted, "Master, I can still be useful, I can still be useful! Please spare me!"


    But as he was shouting, there was smoke that came from his chest.


    Everyone watched on in horror as the man started to melt from the inside as melted pieces of him started to drip onto the floor.


    It was clearly a very painful experience, but he never screamed in pain even once.


    Until the very moment that he died, he kept shouting out begging for his master to spare him, but in the end, he was stillpletely melted.


    There was only a pool of melted flesh and blood that was left on the ground.


    ¡­


    Inside of a dark room.


    A man with red hair had been lying on a couch when he suddenly looked up as if he had sensed something.


    After a moment of pause, the red haired man suddenly sat up on the couch and raised his hand up. When he did, there was a panel of light that appeared that had several strange symbols on it.


    The red haired man ignored all of this as he flicked his hand to the right in front of the pane several times.


    Each time that he flicked his hand, the image on the panel changed like it was flipping a page.


    Finally, he came to a page that had several red dots on it, but also a few dots that had faded out.


    He narrowed his eyes to look at the screen for a bit before muttering to himself, "Hmm, it seems like the puppet I was ying around with died."


    A man with blue hair sitting cross legged on the floor suddenly opened his eyes to look at the red haired man with a cold look as he said, "Did you take care of the remains?"

 Chapter 708 Burning

    The red haired man gave a yawn before saying, "There''s nothing to take care of. Once he gets captured, the thing that I put inside of the puppet will take care of it. It won''t leave a trace at all."


    The blue haired man narrowed his cold eyes as he looked at the red haired man and said, "If you do anything that jeopardizes the n, you know that I won''t let you off that easily."


    The red haired man gave a shrug and said, "I''m so scared of you." Then after a pause, he said with a teasing smile, "What''s got you in such a bad mood anyway?"


    The blue haired man red at the red haired man with a cold gaze, but the red haired man just met this gaze with a smile.


    After a short silence, the red haired man asked with a wider smile, "Did something happen to you in the Ancient Era Ruins?"


    When he heard the words "Ancient Era Ruins", the blue haired manpletely lost it.


    He gave a strong snort as the air around him dropped in temperature, even creating ice crystals in the air. It was so cold that anyone in that space might have been covered in ice in an instant.


    However, in the space around the red haired man, there wasn''t a single ice crystal.


    In the small space around the red haired man, the temperature was still the same as before, as if it wasn''t affected by the re of the blue haired man at all.


    The red haired man just said with the same smile, but there was a bit of provocation in the smile this time, "Did I touch a nerve?"


    The blue haired man gave a cold snort before saying, "Instead of ying around, you should focus on the mission."


    The red haired man gave a shrug and said, "I am. If this puppet had done its job, it would have weakened the twelve great factions which would have made it much easier in the future." Then he gave a sigh as he said, "It''s just too bad that this puppet was useless and couldn''t do anything."


    With another sigh, the red haired man said, "It really is hard finding useful puppets these days."


    The blue haired man narrowed his eyes again as he asked, "Puppets?"


    The red haired man gave another shrug and said, "Rx, they''re all the same. Their bodies have already melted away so it''s not like they''ll be able to track them to us."


    The blue haired man just red at the red haired man for a few seconds before saying with a cold snort, "You know how important this matter is. If you mess this up, you won''t be able to take the consequences."


    Without even waiting for the red haired man to reply, the blue haired man stood up and walked out of the room.


    The red haired man just ignored the blue haired man''s threat as he looked in the direction the blue haired man walked off in. After a while, he broke out inughter before saying, "Get in here!"


    There was a beautiful girl in a maid dress that suddenly came in, but the look on her face wasn''t natural.


    With how fast she moved, it was clear that she was terrified of this red haired man, not to mention that look of absolute terror on her face. However, when she came up to this red haired man, she bowed her head and said in a respectful voice, "Young master, what are your orders?"


    The red haired man didn''t say anything at first as he just stared at her, but then the expression on the maid''s face changed.


    Her facepletely twisted in pain as she immediately shouted out, "Young master, please spare me! Please spare me! I''ll do whatever you want!"


    But it was no use at all.


    As she screamed out in this pain filled voice, smoke started toe from her body.


    As the smoke appeared, her body started to melt just like the trainer''s body. And as her body melted, her maid uniform fell off her melting form to reveal the skin underneath.


    There had been no marks in the spots that could be seen, but underneath her clothes, her body waspletely covered in bruises and scars. It was clear that she had been beaten and based on how bad they looked, the beatings clearly hadn''t been light.


    The red haired man watched as the maid melted and as she begged him, his lips twitched.


    He raised his hand and pointed a finger out, creating a tiny me at the tip of his finger.


    When the maid saw this, her eyespletely filled with despair and she fell silent.


    The red haired man didn''t care about the maid''s reaction at all as he flicked his finger, sending the me out at the maid.


    The moment that the me touched the maid, she immediately burst into mes. The mes didn''tst long, but by the end of it, the maid had already turned into ashes.<sub> </sub>


    The red haired man didn''t react in the slightest to watching someone burn alive in front of him. It was almost as if the maid being burned alive didn''t have anything to do with him even though he had been the one who had burned the maid.


    After seeing the maid turn to ashes, the red haired man let out a breath before saying, "I feel much better now."


    Then he turned back in the direction that the blue haired man left in and muttered to himself, "That son of a b*tch, acting like he''s that great." Then after a pause, he stroked his chin and thought aloud, "It seems like something really happened to him in the ruins. If I were to find out what happened, then I could¡­"


    As his words drifted off, the red haired man revealed another smile that slowly grew wider.


    ¡­


    Back at the arena, everyone in the room stared at the pool of flesh and blood in front of them that had been the trainer.


    However, they didn''t keep staring at this pool for long as they all released their spiritual sense, trying to find the person that did this. But no matter how they searched, they couldn''t find a trace of any person. In fact, they couldn''t even find a trace of life energy around them.


    Seeing that this was the case, the guess that they came up with was that there must have been something inside of this trainer that did this¡­


    <o>,m It seemed like the master of this trainer had already prepared for the contingency that he would be caught.</o>


    They would have called this cruel, but this was something that they had encountered before, so it didn''t surprise them that much.


    After they came back from the surprise of the trainer being melted, everyone turned to old man Qiao with questioning gazes. After all, they had received news from old man Qiao before the finals that someone would be making a move, but they didn''t know what it would have been.


    Now it also seemed like old man Qiao had been hiding something else from them.


    For all six locations to have strange fluctuations, he must have done something to protect them.


    Still, since he had done them a favour by protecting the geniuses of their factions in secret, they wouldn''t make it hard for him by questioning him about this. However, that didn''t mean that they didn''t have a new impression of old man Qiao and the Hunters Organization.


    It seemed like the Hunters Organization''s informationwork was much bigger and extensive than they had expected.


    It was most likely not a good idea to get on their bad side right now.


    So with this, everyone just exchanged a few words of pleasantry with each other before heading off in different directions.


    Even if this matter was over, they wouldn''t let it end like this.


    This was a shameful matter for them since they had beenpletely caught off guard and if it wasn''t for the Hunters Organization saving them, the geniuses from their factions would have been killed right under their noses.


    What they would do now was search the area of this incident and see if they could find any clues as to who the perpetrator was. As well as who the one that had prevented this incident was.


    Any clues on the true power of the Hunters Organization would also be helpful.


    After old man Qiao and Lin Fan came to a private ce, old man Qiao looked at Lin Fan with aplicated look for a few seconds before asking, "Did you capture anyone?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer right away as he looked down at his watch. After going through two messages that he received, he looked back up and shook his head before saying, "It seems like the same thing that happened to the trainer happened to the people we captured."


    Old man Qiao knitted his brows when he heard this, but he also asked, "Did you get any information from them before they died?"


    Lin Fan once again shook his head as he said, "They wouldn''t say anything." Then after a pause, he looked at his watch again before saying, "It seems like other than the trainer, the rest of them were all acting like puppets. Even after they were caught, they only had a nk stare and didn''t say anything."


    Old man Qiao nodded in response to this before saying, "It''s the same with the Chu Family kid, but luckily he isn''t dead. It seemed like he had been ced under a strong illusion which was why he did everything that he did. He doesn''t even remember what happened over the past two weeks because of it¡­"


    Lin Fan just gave a nod, but he didn''t say anything.


    After a long silence, Lin Fan tactfully chose to leave because there was nothing else for him to say here.


    Old man Qiao didn''t mind this as he sat there in that room, tapping his right hand on the armrest of his chair while being lost in thought.

 Chapter 709 New Mission

    After leaving the room, Lin Fan headed back to the stands to watch the closing ceremonies.


    At the same time, it was also to make sure that nothing else happened during the rest of the tournament since he wasn''t sure if there was a backup n or not. While he had already captured all the people that he had marked with Brainy''s seeds, there still might be other people that would be working with them.


    However, that didn''t seem to be the case.


    The closing ceremonies could only be described with one word, awkward.


    After all, what had happened had been seen by everyone in the stands.


    Even if the twelve great factions had tried to cover it up, it was hard to cover up such a public event.


    Still, they held the closing ceremonies and gave the winners their prizes.


    Chu Huai was missing from this ceremony because his injuries were "too heavy" for him toe, but one of the members of the Chu Family epted his prize on his behalf.


    As for when Mo Ze Chen epted his prize, many people still had mixed feelings about him. At the very least though, they didn''t boo him, but they certainly didn''t cheer for him either.


    The closing ceremony ended quite quickly since all the twelve great factions had other things to do, so they chased everyone out of the arena quite quickly as well.


    Mo Ze Chen asked Lin Fan about what they would do next, but all Lin Fan said was, "We''re going to buy a cake."


    He still had to buy the cake that he had promised Yuki.


    As for the follow up to this matter, he left it to the twelve great factions.


    Mo Ze Chen had a bitter smile when he heard this answer, but he still followed Lin Fan to the cake shop.


    Later that night, when they were all back at the pet shop, Lin Fan had been resting at the counter while everyone else had gone off to do their own thing.


    Ang had dragged Mo Ze Chen back down into the arena.


    Even though the tournament was over, Ang had already made it a habit of beating¡­training Mo Ze Chen, so it seemed like she would continue beating¡­training him for a bit longer.


    The others all went to watch. Yuki watched because she found it fun and she wanted to cheer for Ang, Lulu went just in case anything happened to Mo Ze Chen. After the "training" of the past week, Lulu had gotten better at wrapping Mo Ze Chen up.


    As for Momonga, he was just sitting in a chair in the store''s disy space, reading a web novel on his watch.


    As Lin Fan sat there rxing, there was a sudden voice that rang in his ears that cut through his thoughts.


    "Ding, new mission has been issued."


    Lin Fan''s eyes popped out when he heard this.


    It hadn''t been that long since Lin Fan had just passed a mission, but now his system was giving him another mission.


    Other than in the beginning before he finished the tutorial, this had never happened.


    What was going on with his system?


    "Host, don''t be rude to the system. First warning."


    Well that was something that he hadn''t heard in a while.


    It seemed like the system was still the same system¡­


    "Host, don''t be rude to the system. Second warning."


    Lin Fan didn''t push his luck after that since he had already gotten his two strikes. After that was¡­


    The system ignored Lin Fan as it continued on with the mission.


    "A pet shop that doesn''t sell pets, how could that be allowed? Please prepare and sell some pets to your customers. Of course, only the top grade pets can be sold at the top grade store or it will affect the store''s reputation."


    "Child Soul Realm pets sold: 0/1000. Nascent Soul Realm pets sold: 0/100."


    "Reward: Upgrade of the shadow cultivation room."


    "Time to get selling, host!"


    Lin Fan looked at the pop up for the mission and he couldn''t help being surprised by it.


    He had a feeling that the tone of the system had changed recently and seeing this, it was no longer just a feeling. The way that the system was talking, it seemed much more fluent and not as mechanical as before¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help blurting out, "System are you alright? Do you have a fever¡­a virus?"<sub> </sub>


    "Host, don''t be rude to the system. Third warning."


    "Final warning given, random punishment will be chosen."


    "Temporary full body paralysis has been chosen."


    Before Lin Fan could even say anything, he felt his entire body turning numb. He had been sitting in the chair at the counter, but when his body went numb like this, he slid right out of the chair and fell to the ground.


    It was at this time that Mo Ze Chen came out of the door to the back.


    He hade up for a quick breather, but he never expected to see Lin Fan lying on the ground like this.


    Mo Ze Chen just stared at Lin Fan with wide eyes, unsure of how to react to this. But after a moment toe back to his senses, he asked in a concerned voice, "Boss, are you alright?"


    Lin Fan gave a bitterugh in his mind, but he said, "I''m justying around, don''t mind me."


    Mo Ze Chen revealed apletely confused look as he couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was thinking at all. But still, he already knew that his boss was quite strange, so he chose to ignore it as he headed outside for some fresh air.


    As he went out, he moved quite quickly as he heard the soundsing from behind him from the back of the store.


    The paralysis onlysted five minutes before Lin Fan was able to stand up again.


    Lin Fan ignored the system and turned his attention to his mission.


    He didn''t feel that much pressure from the content of the mission itself since it was something that he could easily do.


    Now that he had broken through to the Child Soul Realm, it wasn''t a problem for him to control Nascent Soul Realm beasts, let alone Child Soul Realm beasts.


    The only problems that he had with this was where he would get the eggs needed and who he would sell these pets to.


    After all, a Child Soul Realm pet wasn''t something that could be sold that easily.


    Child Soul Realm could be considered powerful experts of the twelve great factions, so there was no need to even mention Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    In total, each of the twelve great factions had no more than fifty Nascent Soul Realm Experts each. So if he were to sell a hundred Nascent Soul Realm pets to one single faction, it wouldpletely throw off the power bnce between the twelve great factions.


    Lin Fan wasn''t interested in starting a power war in this upper realm. While he knew it was impossible for him to keep a low profile after everything that had happened, at the very least, he didn''t want his fame to exceed the younger generation.


    If he were to attract the attention of the real experts of this upper realm, that would mean a lot of trouble for him.


    So after thinking about it, Lin Fan could onlye up with the solution that he had to slowly divide these pets among the twelve great factions.


    But before he did anything else, he would have to obtain the eggs needed to breed all these pets. It was a good thing that he had the incubation chamber, now the only thing that he needed were the eggs.


    However, that also wasn''t too much of a problem since Lin Fan was connected to the Tamers Guild, the biggest supplier of eggs.


    Lin Fan looked at the time and after thinking about it, he still raised his watch and dialed a number.


    The watch rang for a few times before it connected.


    "This is a rare thing, you''re actually calling me. So what is this rare asion?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "I need some eggs, high grade ones."


    There was a silence from the other side before the voice said, "How high grade?"


    Lin Fan once again calmly said, "One thousand Child Soul Realm eggs and one hundred Nascent Soul Realm eggs."


    The silence before the answer was even longer this time, but when the voice spoke, it spoke at a volume that was hard to control, "One thousand Child Soul Realm eggs and one hundred Nascent Soul Realm eggs?! Do you know how crazy that amount is?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug and said, "Isn''t that why I''m contacting you?"


    There was a snort before the other side said, "Impossible, I can''t give you that much on my own."


    Lin Fan gave a chuckle before saying, "What if I sell you fifty Child Soul Realm beasts and five Nascent Soul Realm beasts? Well, that is after I hatch them."


    The other side was silent for a bit before asking, "Are you serious? You''re saying that you can hatch the eggs? You should know how crazy of a im that is."


    That was right, even though they were known as Monster Tamers, they had a problem when it came to hatching beasts. It was a job that had a very low chance of sess, so most people chose to hunt for beasts instead of raising them.


    But now Lin Fan was saying that he could hatch these eggs and he had a high rate of sess?


    It had to be known that even 1% sess rate was already considered high when hatching beast eggs.

 Chapter 710 Hatching Eggs (1)

    Lin Fan just calmly replied, "That''s my offer, you can take it if you want."


    There was a very long silence this time, much longer than any of the other silences that came before this.


    After around five minutes, the other side finally said, "I can''t decide this on my own, I have to talk to old Huang and old Bai first before I get back to you."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind as he said, "Alright, but the sooner you get them to me, the better."


    The other side gave a bitterugh before saying, "If you wanted them sooner, why didn''t you tell me sooner?"


    Lin Fan didn''t choose to reply to this.


    After all, it wasn''t like he could just say that his system suddenly gave him a mission since he would have been treated as a crazy person.


    So instead Lin Fan just remained silent for the other side to draw their own conclusion.


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say anything, the other side gave a sigh and said, "Just give me some time and I''ll give you an answer."


    Lin Fan just agreed and then hung up after some pleasantries.


    The person that Lin Fan had called was the president of the Tamers Guild.


    After what happenedst time, the president had given him his personal line just in case he needed anything.


    Since he had this connection, it would be a waste not to use it.


    Half an hourter, Lin Fan received another call.


    When he picked up, it wasn''t just the president, but also the two vice presidents.


    The president did my waste any time as he directly said, "Be honest, what is the best that you can sell to us?"


    Lin Fan revealed a wry smile before saying, "What are you expecting?"


    There was a period of silence, but he could hear the sounds of whispersing from the other side. It was clear that this was an important matter for the Tamers Guild, so they were discussing it real time.


    After that silence, the president said, "One hundred Child Soul Realm beasts and ten Nascent Soul Realm beasts."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.


    The first offer that he made was a low one just so he would have space to negotiate with the Tamers Guild, but he never expected their appetite to be this big.


    It had to be known that most of the twelve great factions only had around ten to twenty Nascent Soul Realm Experts to begin with. All of these people were elders and were considered some of the most important people in this upper realm.


    Now that they wanted ten Nascent Soul Realm beasts, it meant that they wanted to almost double the amount of Nascent Soul Realm Experts under them.


    But taking it a bit deeper, the Tamers Guild really was being greedy.


    For tamers like them, they knew that the sess rate of hatching eggs was very low, being around 1%.


    After all, there were many different factors that could affect the sess rate, so that was why the sess rate was so low.


    Even if they knew that Lin Fan most likely had some kind of special techniques after his performance in the exam, they could only give him a conservative estimate of 20%.


    That meant that they believed that only 20% of the eggs that they gave Lin Fan would hatch, which was two hundred Child Soul Realm Beasts and twenty Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    For them to ask for one hundred Child Soul Realm beasts and ten Nascent Soul Realm beasts, they were basically asking for what they assumed would be half of what would hatch!


    By their standard, the first offer that Lin Fan gave was already very generous, but when it came to theserge factions, if they could be greedy, they would be greedy.


    They hadn''tsted all their time because of their kindness, but rather because their faces were thicker than city walls.


    But to Lin Fan, what they were asking for wasn''t considered that much since he knew that he was certain to hatch all of the eggs that he received with the help of the system.


    Still, he wasn''t willing to give this much to the Tamers Guild because of other reasons.


    To put it simply, he didn''t want to give this much to the Tamers Guild because he wanted to give more to factions that he was even closer to. For example, the Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and maybe the Alchemy King Hall.


    So after a moment of silence, Lin Fan said, "The best I can do is seventy Child Soul Realm beasts and seven Nascent Soul Realm beasts."


    The president didn''t reply right away as more whispers came from the other side. Then he suddenly said, "How about eighty and eight?"


    Lin Fan immediately countered with, "Five more Child Soul Realm beasts, that''s the most I can do."


    The president was silent once again, but this time it didn''tst long. After all, they had heard the determined tone in Lin Fan''s voice, so they knew that they wouldn''t be able to push any further.


    So with a sigh, the president said, "Alright, we''ll agree to those terms."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan gave a chuckle as he said, "It''s a pleasure doing business with you."


    Then he said in a serious voice, "How long will it take before you can deliver these eggs to me?"


    The president said in a bitter voice, "It''s not a small amount that you''re asking for, so it''ll take a while¡­" As he said this, he left his words hanging, as if he was waiting for a response from Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he had already expected this, so he just said, "I''ll add in five more Child Soul Realm beasts and a Nascent Soul Realm beast if you can get it here tomorrow."


    The president gave a bitterugh, but he still said, "Owner Lin, you really drive a hard bargain¡­"


    Lin Fan said, "Well, maybe I can go look for the Hunters Organization to help me get the eggs instead."


    The president no longer hesitated as he immediately said, "Tomorrow it is, we will get it to you tomorrow. Please don''t forget your words."


    Without even waiting for Lin Fan to say anything, the president immediately hung up as if he was afraid that Lin Fan would go back on his word.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile, but he didn''t say anything else about this.


    Now, what he needed to do next was find people to sell these pets to.


    After all, he needed to make sure that he could sell to all the people of the twelve great factions, but to do that, he had to make them aware of the fact that he was selling these pets.


    It was easier for some of the factions since he was close to them, but for the other factions¡­


    Especially the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    Well, perhaps he didn''t need to sell to those three factions since he wanted to see them disappear in the first ce¡­


    But for now, he would at least contact the Hunters Organization and the Myriad Sword Hall.


    So he raised his watch and dialed old man Qiao first.


    "You''re saying that you can sell the Hunters Organization Child Soul Realm beasts and Nascent Soul Realm beasts? Are you kidding?"


    That was old man Qiao''s first reaction to the offer that Lin Fan made.


    His second reaction was, "How many can you sell? We''ll take as many as you have."


    After all, the Hunters Organization didn''tck money.


    Lin Fan told him, "A hundred Child Soul Realm beasts and ten Nascent Soul Realm beasts."


    His starting offer was what the Tamers Guild''s maximum was. This was the difference between his rtionship with the Tamers Guild and the Hunters Organization.


    After a period of silence, old man Qiao suddenly asked, "Just this? Can''t you give us a bit more?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a faint smile before saying, "Alright, how much more do you want?"


    Old man Qiao thought for a bit before saying, "How about fifty more Child Soul Realm beasts and five more Nascent Soul Realm beasts?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "Alright, that''s not a problem. However, I can only give you the extra beastster than the first batch. Will that be a problem?"


    Old man Qiao immediately replied, "No problem at all. As long as you can get us these extra beasts, it''s not a problem at all."


    Then after a pause he asked, "Do you want something from us in return for these beasts?"


    That was the question that had been on his mind. After all, it was just too strange how Lin Fan suddenly offered to sell these beasts to the Hunters Organization.


    How could Lin Fan not know what he was thinking?


    Lin Fan just said, "It''s just something that I had a stock of and needed to sell, so you''re doing me a favour. However, you can just take this as me doing a favour for the Hunters Organization if you want."


    Old man Qiao gave a nod before saying, "Alright, the Hunters Organization will owe you one then."


    There was nothing else to say, so Lin Fan hung up after that.


    The next person that he called was Wang Jian.


    Wang Jian was also surprised by the offer that Lin Fan made, but he didn''t ept that quickly like old man Qiao. After all, he didn''t have the same authority as old man Qiao in the Hunters Organization in the Myriad Sword Hall.


    Something as important as this couldn''t be decided by him alone.


    So Wang Jian said that he would report this to his master and see what the elders thought before getting back to Lin Fan.


    As they were about to finish, Lin Fan suddenly realized something and he asked, "Do you sword cultivators even need these beasts?"

 Chapter 711 Hatching Eggs (2)

    Wang Jian gave a chuckle when he heard this and he answered, "While we can''t take these beasts as pets like normal cultivators, that doesn''t mean that we don''t have a use for them. After all, these are powerful beasts in the Child Soul Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm. Even if we can''t tame them as pets, we can still use them to guard our disciples or certain areas of the Myriad Sword Hall."


    Lin Fan gave a nod of understanding when he heard this.


    Then he also remembered something else, "I also have some for the Ice Goddess Hall, so can you help me contact them as well?"


    Wang Jian knitted his brows as he was confused about something.


    Where did Lin Fan get all these Child Soul Realm beasts and Nascent Soul Realm beasts?


    He knew that he wouldn''t just be giving these beasts to the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce, he would also be giving them to the Hunters Organization.


    If he gave them around the same amount¡­Then just where did he get so many beasts from?


    Still he chose not to ask in the end as he said, "I''ll talk to Bing Yu and she''ll pass this on to the elders. How many are you going to offer them?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "Fifty Child Soul Realm beasts and five Nascent Soul Realm beasts."


    Wang Jian immediately knitted his brows when he heard this. After all, Lin Fan had just offered a hundred Child Soul Realm beasts and ten Nascent Soul Realm beasts to the Myriad Sword Hall.


    But it wasn''t his ce to question this, all he had to do was pass this information to the elders of the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce.


    So Wang Jian didn''t keep asking Lin Fan anything else and they hung up quickly.


    As for the other factions, Lin Fan would leave it here for now.


    He had a way to contact the other factions, but it wasn''t appropriate for him to contact them thiste at night since he wasn''t that close to them. It would just have to wait until tomorrow.


    Lin Fan was looking forward to seeing what kind of beasts he would be able to hatch from all these eggs.


    ¡­


    The next morning passed by as usual with the morning rush of people looking to train their pets.


    Then once they were gone, it was the delivery from the Tamers Guild.


    To avoid attracting any attention, the president had told Lin Fan that he would be sending them in batches throughout the day, so this delivery was just the first batch. However, just the first batch already had a hundred Child Soul Realm beast eggs and ten Nascent Soul Realm beasts eggs which was more than enough for Lin Fan to use.


    So without wasting any time, he left the store to Mo Ze Chen and Lulu as he went to the incubation room.


    This was a room that he hadn''t been in yet with this new store since he never used this incubation room sinceing to the upper realm.


    It wasn''t that he didn''t want to, it was just that he never had an opportunity to use it.


    After all, there was no need for him to hatch eggs for beasts with lower cultivation. It was much easier for him to directly tame them in the wild since there were so many of them running around.


    Only beasts with higher levels of cultivation were worth him personally hatching since they would be beasts that were stronger than normal with the incubation chamber.


    The first thing that Lin Fan did was scan the eggs that he received with the system''s interface to see if there were any special eggs. However, he wasn''t able to find a single special one.


    The ones that had special bloodlines or talents would be put aside by him for his personal use.


    However, since there wasn''t any like that in the first batch, he decided to just hatch all of them.


    He put the eggs onto the tform on the pir and then put in the ingredients before leaving it to do its thing.


    Before long, there were sounds of eggs being scratched that rang out. Along with this, there were the sounds of eggs cracking.


    It didn''t take long before the eggs on the pedestal started to hatch and reveal the beasts inside.


    Soon there were a bunch of baby beasts that were sitting on the pedestal looking up at Lin Fan.


    With a single click on his system menu, Lin Fan formed the temporary contracts with all of them before leaving them to Brainy.


    She brought out her puppets that started taking care of them.


    At the same time, Lin Fan heard someone calling for him from outside.<sub> </sub>


    As he had expected, it was the next shipment of beast eggs.


    The rest of Lin Fan''s day went like that, receiving the eggs, hatching them, and then receiving the next batch.


    Of course, there wasn''t much for him to do during the hatching process since that was also automated by the store. The only thing that he really had to do was load the eggs in and then load in the ingredients to hatch them.


    So during this time, he went out to talk to Mo Ze Chen.


    "Huh, boss, you want me to do what?"


    That was Mo Ze Chen''s response to Lin Fan''s request.


    Lin Fan repeated himself, "Contact Ying Ling from yesterday and tell her that our store is selling Child Soul Realm beasts and Nascent Soul Realm beasts. That Dian Lun as well."


    Mo Ze Chen said with an awkward look, "Do I really have to contact her? Dian Lun isn''t a problem, but Ying Ling¡­If I were to contact her, you should know how Lulu would feel about that."


    Lin Fan didn''t care as he kicked Mo Ze Chen''s butt and said, "It''s just a simple call and you''re that scared. What kind of a man are you?"


    Mo Ze Chen held his butt with an aggrieved look and said, "Boss, it isn''t like that. You should already know what it means to Lulu if I contact her, you can''t just make me put her through this."


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this.


    He had been sitting beside Lulu and he had seen the look in her eyes, so he knew that Mo Ze Chen was worrying for nothing. The only reason he was even worrying was because Lulu liked to y around with him, otherwise, how could there be such a misunderstanding?


    Still, this was more important, so he didn''t have time to y around with the two of them.


    Lin Fan revealed a cold look as he looked at Mo Ze Chen and said, "Just do it."


    Mo Ze Chen swallowed the words that had been in his mouth as he just revealed a bitter smile.


    He couldn''t say anything when it came to Lin Fan. While he did act up a bit, that was just because of how close they were. When it really came down to it, he would still listen to Lin Fan''s orders in the end.


    So without a choice, Mo Ze Chen went into a hidden corner of the store and turned on his watch.


    He pulled up the number that had been forcefully added into his contact list and after hesitating a bit, he pushed the call button.


    There was no dy at all between him calling the number and the other side picking up.


    There was only that instance of the call initializing before the other side picked up as if they were already waiting for his call.


    As soon as the call connected, Ying Ling''s voice came from the watch saying, "Darling, you finally called me! I''ve been waiting such a long time for you to call!"


    In the background, one could hear angry voices, but they weren''t that clear so what they were saying couldn''t be heard clearly. But judging by the tone, it was clear that they were displeased with the way that Ying Ling was talking to Mo Ze Chen.


    Mo Ze Chen''s face turned dark when he heard this.


    Even though he had already turned down the volume, Ying Ling''s voice had rang out through the store and there were people looking in his direction, including Lulu.


    Mo Ze Chen quickly said in a clear and professional voice, "My boss wanted me to call you because we have some pets that are on sale at the store. He wanted to see if your family would be interested in them."


    Ying Ling immediately said in a teasing voice, "Are you sure that''s it?"


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t bother answering this.


    Ying Ling wasn''t discouraged by this at all as she asked in a yful voice, "What kind of pets are you selling? You should know that the Ying Family won''t just buy any kind of pet, right?"


    Mo Ze Chen wanted to scoff at this, but he held back as he said in the same clear and professional voice, "Child Soul Realm pets and Nascent Soul Realm pets."


    There was no yful teasing this time, instead there was a long silence before Ying Ling asked in a surprised voice, "Can you just repeat what you said?"


    "Child Soul Realm pets and Nascent Soul Realm pets." Mo Ze Chen calmly replied.


    After another long silence, Ying Ling shouted in a shocked voice, "Are you serious? Child Soul Realm pets and Nascent Soul Realm pets? This isn''t something that you can joke about."

 Chapter 712 Selling The Pets (1)

    Mo Ze Chen just calmly replied, "I''m just telling you what my boss wants me to tell you. Plus, I''ve already seen them, so I can guarantee that it''s the truth."


    Ying Ling could tell that Mo Ze Chen was serious, but this was even more shocking to her.


    If it was anyone else telling her this, she would have immediately hung up, but it was Mo Ze Chen.


    He was someone who had been hiding his power the entire tournament and now he was saying that he had a boss above him?


    She couldn''t even start to imagine what kind of person he worked for, but there was no doubting the capabilities of this person.


    If he said that he had Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts for sale, he most likely did.


    During this period of silence, Mo Ze Chen could hear the whispers that came from behind her. It was clear that whoever was there had heard everything and was discussing this with Ying Ling.


    After that long silence, Ying Ling finally said, "This isn''t something that I can decide myself. I need to talk with my family''s elders and get back to you on this. Is that alright?"


    Mo Ze Chen replied, "That''s fine, but I should tell you that my boss is also contacting the other twelve great factions, so you shouldn''t waste that much time deciding."


    Ying Ling didn''t say anything at first, but then she said, "Darling, you''ll hold some pets for me¡­"


    Before she could finish, Mo Ze Chen had already hung up on her.


    Lin Fan had already told Mo Ze Chen that there was a quota that had been prepared for the Ying Family, so this wasn''t a firste first serve situation.


    However, this was the little bit of revenge that Mo Ze Chen was taking on Ying Ling since she didn''t know that.


    He had to take some revenge after everything that happened.


    After hanging up on Ying Ling, Mo Ze Chen called Dian Lun.


    He told him the same thing, but he didn''t put the pressure on him like he did with Ying Ling.


    But he also asked Dian Lun to talk to the Chu and Zu Families for him as well, to tell them that they had pets for sale.


    Dian Lun was confused why Mo Ze Chen wanted him to contact the Chu and Zu Families as well, but he didn''t mind doing it. Of course, that was after he made sure that Mo Ze Chen promised that there would be more pets that would be sold to the Dian Family.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t have a problem promising this. In fact, he even had the idea of trying to get more for Dian Lun.


    It was surprising how they had be such close friends after knowing each other for such a short period of time, but they had be rather close.


    Of course, what they mainly talked about was how Dian Lun could win over Ying Ling so she would stop bothering him¡­


    Once that was done, Mo Ze Chen headed over to where Lulu was to apologize.


    Lulu wasn''t really angry since she could guess what Mo Ze Chen was doing based on his conversation with Lin Fan earlier. She had seen all the pets being hatched in the back, so it wasn''t hard to guess.


    However, she still acted in a spoiled manner when Mo Ze Chen acted like this. After all, she enjoyed seeing him panic like this.


    Lin Fan saw the two of them acting this way and shook his head with a bitter smile.


    However it wasn''t his ce to get in the middle of their rtionship and what they liked doing with each other.


    He continued hatching eggs until the afternoon when Ying Ling and Dian Lun came into the store with several old people behind them.


    They hade about the call Mo Ze Chen made this morning.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see theme this quickly, but he also admired how decisive these two families were.


    However, it turned out that it wasn''t just those two families, but also representatives from the Chu and Zu Families who insisted oning after Dian Lun contacted them on Mo Ze Chen''s behalf.


    As soon as she came into the store, Ying Ling''s eyes locked onto Mo Ze Chen who had been having a sweet moment with Lulu.


    Without caring at all, she ran over and hugged Mo Ze Chen from behind, catching him off guard. After all, he never expected to be tackled with a hug when he was in the store.


    When he saw who it was, his face immediately turned dark. However, before he could say a thing, Ying Ling spoke first, "Darling, I''m here to see you!"<sub> </sub>


    She was about to move in for a kiss, but Mo Ze Chen moved out of the way and her lips fell onto thin air.


    Dian Lun came over at this time and helped Mo Ze Chen by pulling Ying Ling off him. At the same time, there were several older people that came over to re at Mo Ze Chen.


    These were people that he was familiar with, these were Ying Ling''s family members that had red at him back during the tournament.


    But Mo Ze Chen ignored them as he turned his attention back to Lulu who had already walked away. All he could do was reveal a bitter smile as he imagined what he would have to do to get her forgiveness tonight.


    Still, he knew why these people were here, so he brought them over to Lin Fan who had been watching with an amused look the entire time.


    Everyone was surprised to hear Mo Ze Chen introduce Lin Fan as the boss of the store since they never expected the person that Mo Ze Chen followed to be so young. Still, that wasn''t what they cared about right now.


    The leaders of the group came forward to the counter where Lin Fan was sitting and Ying Ling''s father was the one who asked, "Are you the owner of this store? The one that says that you can sell Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts to us?"


    Lin Fan looked up at him and gave a snap.


    When he did, there was a bubble ofw that surrounded everyone who was standing at the counter.


    The people who felt thisw go over them were surprised since they could feel two differentws passing by them when this bubble was deployed.


    To be able to skillfully control twows like this, it seemed like he really wasn''t normal.


    After the bubble ofw had been formed, Lin Fan looked at Ying Ling''s father and asked, "Which one of you is qualified to negotiate? I will only talk to those people."


    The expression on Ying Ling''s father''s face changed, but he didn''t lose his temper. Instead he asked, "How can we be sure that you''re able to sell us what you say you can sell? Is there any meaning in negotiating when we haven''t even confirmed this."


    Lin Fan gave an understanding nod before saying, "Wait here for a second."


    Without waiting for an answer, Lin Fan stood up and made his way into the back of the store. When he came back, there were two pets that were in his hands that he ced on the counter.


    The two of them were still young, but there was no hiding the aura of their bloodline.


    When the experts from the Four Great Families felt the aura of the bloodline, they all revealed shocked looks.


    That was right, these two were beasts with Nascent Soul Realm bloodlines.


    While they weren''t Nascent Soul Realm beasts right now, as long as they grew up, they would naturally be Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    For this store owner to take out two beasts with these bloodlines this easily, it was clear that what he imed earlier wasn''t a lie.


    A great opportunity!


    There was a great opportunity in front of them!


    There were even some that had the idea of attacking the owner and taking this pet by force.


    Of course, that thought didn''tst long.


    A store that was able to take out pets with Nascent Soul Realm bloodlines this easily, the only possibility of that happening was that there was a True Soul Realm Expert that was in this store.


    While they had some Nascent Soul Realm Experts with them, that didn''t mean that they were arrogant enough to think that they could match a True Soul Realm Expert.


    True Soul Realm Experts were the true rulers of the Gctic Humanity Alliance and there wasn''t a single True Soul Realm Expert that was a pushover. So they weren''t crazy enough to pick a fight with an unknown one.


    However, next came the part that they weren''t looking forward to. They had to now negotiate with this pet shop after losing the advantage.


    After all, even if they were from the twelve great factions, they didn''t have the advantage here. Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm pets were things that any one of the twelve great factions wanted.


    After the disy that they had demonstrated, it was clear that the other side would feel less enthusiastic about dealing with them.


    Lin Fan could see this, but he didn''t make it hard for them since he wanted them to get some pets, which was the main reason he had even invited them in the first ce.


    Lin Fan just looked at them and asked, "So, do you want to buy them or not?"

 Chapter 713 Selling The Pets (2)

    Seeing this, the people from the Four Great Families let out internal sighs of relief.


    It seemed like he was still willing to sell to them and he was still willing to negotiate. Since that was the case, it meant that they still had a chance.


    However, they couldn''t show any signs of weakness or Lin Fan would take advantage of it.


    So after a pause, Ying Ling''s father said, "We do¡­But that depends on the price and how many you can offer."


    Lin Fan looked at the others and they all just stood there with silent agreement. It seemed like they would wait to hear the offer that Lin Fan made Ying Ling''s father before saying anything.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t nning on following their n.


    Lin Fan just said, "That depends on how much you''re willing to buy, but we can discuss that privately."


    The members of the Four Great Families knitted their brows when they heard this, but looking back at the two beasts that were justying there on the counter, they didn''t say anything.


    But they knew that if they didn''t have unity in this purchase, they would only be put in a worse position.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan wasn''t in a mood to listen.


    He met with each of the representatives of the Four Great Families alone and in the end, all of them epted the deal that Lin Fan offered them.


    They did give counteroffers, but Lin Fan was the one who held all the cards.


    The Chu and Zu Family were able to get fifty Child Soul Realm beasts and five Nascent Soul Realm beasts each. The Ying Family was able to get a bit more, earning sixty Child Soul Realm beasts and six Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    However, out of all four families, it was the Dian Family that had earned the most.


    Because of Dian Lun''s rtionship with Mo Ze Chen, Lin Fan gave them the most ck, letting them take seventy Child Soul Realm beasts and seven Nascent Soul Realm beasts in the end.


    Every single beast counted and in this situation, it was clear the Dian Family hade up on top.


    As for when they would pick up the beasts, that would depend on when Lin Fan had everything ready.


    He had just hatched them all today and he wanted to train them a bit before he sold them, so he told the four family representatives that he would contact them when the pets were ready.


    However, not all of them left after this.


    Ying Ling and Dian Lun both stayed in the store along with the people of the Ying Family.


    It was for no other reason than to chase Mo Ze Chen, or rather to stop Ying Ling from chasing Mo Ze Chen.


    Everyone was on the same page, except for Ying Ling who didn''t stop her aggressive attack on Mo Ze Chen.


    The interesting thing was that Dian Lun wasn''t able to break free of the stereotype of a childhood friend in the end. Other than surprising her when he confessed, Ying Ling didn''t treat him any differently in the end.


    So the dance between them continued.


    The rest of the day went on without incident and when the next day came, Lin Fan went to check on the pets, but he was surprised by what he found.


    All of them had grown up in just a single day!


    If it wasn''t for the special storage of the store, they would have already destroyed the store with how big they were.


    It seemed like he could already call the people of the twelve great factions to pick up their pets.


    But of course, the one thing that he couldn''t do was let them meet with each other because there wereplicated rtions within the twelve great factions.


    So he set up a schedule and nned on letting theme at different times to pick up these pets.


    It was a shame that all that nning went out the window since all of them came at the same time.


    When they saw each other, they were naturally wary, but it wasn''t hard for them to figure out what the other was doing here. But when they did, they couldn''t help feelingplicated feelings.


    After all, they all knew that Lin Fan was selling pets and if he was selling to the twelve great factions, it was most likely that they would receive the same amount. However, if any of the twelve great factions received all of the pets that Lin Fan sold them, it was clear that they would be at an advantage over the rest of the factions.


    So if they could take it all, that would be for the best¡­


    When they met Lin Fan, the first ones to try to talk to him were the Hunters Organization and the Myriad Sword Hall since they were the ones that were the closest to him.<sub> </sub>


    It was old man Qiao and Wang Jian who tried to talk to him, but Lin Fan stopped them before they could say anything.


    He just calmly said, "There''s a reason why I''m selling to all of you and you should know what it is."


    Of course they knew what he was thinking, but they still wanted to take their chance.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t give them that chance as he said, "If you''re not satisfied, you''re free to buy from someone else."


    Everyone revealed difficult smiles at this.


    If they were able to buy from someone else, would they have alle here?


    It had to be known that the people here represented eight of the twelve great factions, more than half of the twelve great factions!


    The power that they wielded was more than enough for them to do whatever they wanted in this Gctic Humanity Alliance, but all of that was meaningless in front of Lin Fan. After all, they didn''t know just how deep the backing of this store went.


    They weren''t fools to pick a fight with someone that they didn''t know the true power of, so they could just y along with him.


    However, the ones that were the most shocked were the Tamers Guild.


    They knew how many eggs had been sent to Lin Fan and for him to provide pets for all of the factions present, he must have hatched at least half of them. That was a sess rate of over 50%!


    This was unprecedented for them, the highest rate that they had ever seen was no more than 20% which was what they had based their estimates on!


    However, Lin Fan had shattered those estimates like it was nothing.


    Not to mention, they had the slight feeling that Lin Fan actually had more pets than he was letting on. Perhaps his sess rate didn''t just stop at 50%...


    When this thought passed through their mind, they felt a chill run down their spines. At the same time, they let out a sigh of relief about the fact that they had chosen to work with Lin Fan instead of going against him.


    They were naturally curious about his secrets, but it didn''t seem like it was worth antagonizing him to take.


    Lin Fan could tell that they had pretty much epted the deal that he had given them, so he didn''t waste any time. Of course, he didn''t want everyone to know how much they each got, so he brought everyone into the back one by one to give them their pets.


    Knowing that they were there to take pets, everyone had brought special storage tools, so it didn''t take long before everyone received their pets.


    However, after receiving their pets, they didn''t leave right away.


    Instead, they all hung around the counter while waiting for each other to say something.


    Lin Fan could tell what they were thinking, so he broke the ice by asking, "Does anyone here have a contact at the Alchemy King Hall, I want to sell them some pets too."


    Old man Qiao was the one who spoke up.


    Everyone could tell how close Lin Fan was with old man Qiao and they had done their research since yesterday, so everyone knew that Lin Fan was a Hunter registered with the Hunters Organization.


    Old man Qiao said, "I can contact the Alchemy King Hall for you." Then after a pause, he asked, "What about the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association?"


    When they heard this, everyone focused their attention on Lin Fan.


    Since they had done their research, they also knew about Lin Fan''s rtionship with the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    It was clear that Lin Fan wanted peace and while the twelve great factions agreed with this since they knew that an all out war between them would be devastating, they didn''t mind if they shrank down to the eleven great factions or even the ten great factions.


    After all, even if they shrank down, with Lin Fan providing them with simr amounts of pets, they would still be able to maintain a bnce.


    The only difference would be that they would have much greater resources with one less or two less factions to share resources with.


    Lin Fan''s eyes swept over everyone and then he calmly said, "I never had any intentions of selling pets to those three factions, so why would I contact them?"


    Everyone let out an internal sigh of relief when they heard this and then they exchanged looks with each other.


    It seemed like it had been as they had expected¡­


    They could only feel sorry for those three sects for angering Lin Fan.

 Chapter 714 Rumours From The Alchemy King Hall (1)

    Old man Qiao said with a smile, "Alright, since you aren''t interested in selling to them, then I won''t contact them. As for the Alchemy King Hall, I''ll help you contact them and I''ll get back to you after reaching them."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and he didn''t say anything else.


    After all, there was nothing else for him to say in this situation.


    They had already paid for the pets and they had received their pets from him, so there wasn''t anything else to be done in this situation.


    All Lin Fan had to do now was sit back and admire the amount of points that he had now.


    He had to admit that selling pets really was a lucrative business.


    The price that he had reached with the people who bought his pets was a million spirit stones for each Child Soul Realm pet and ten million for each Nascent Soul Realm pet.


    The price hadn''t been set by the shop, the shop had left setting this price to Lin Fan since he was the one who obtained the pet eggs in the first ce. Since he was the one who found the product, it was up to him to decide the price.


    So Lin Fan decided to set the price for each pet at a hundred times his price for training.


    After all, the price of training in his shop was already considered much more expensive than any other shop. If he were to multiply that by a hundred, it was surely arge price for each pet.


    But what he didn''t know was that this price was considered cheap for the twelve great factions.


    While a million low grade spirit stones was equal to a peak grade spirit stone, which was something that even the twelve great factions didn''t have many of, that didn''t mean that the twelve great factions didn''t have other kinds of spirit stones.


    The twelve great factions controlled the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so that included most of the spirit stone mines in this upper realm. The spirit stones that came from those mines weren''t low grade spirit stones or even mid grade spirit stones, they were high grade spirit stones.


    High grade spirit stones were mainly hoarded by the twelve great factions, so the price of high grade spirit stones was not an exact exchange. Most times, high grade spirit stones would be sold for much more than just ten thousand low grade spirit stones.


    The twelve great factions had been in control of the Gctic Humanity Alliance for thousands of years, so not just the low grade spirit stones, even the mid grade and high grade spirit stones that they had gathered were hard to count.


    To pay for these Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts, it was like a hair off of nine oxens for them. It didn''t even make a dent in their overall wealth.


    Of course, that was only the wealth of their organization. It would be hard for them to pay for these individually.


    After they received their pets, the representatives from the various factions all exchanged looks before leaving.


    It was clear that they would contact each other after this since they knew that it was their chance, so they wouldn''t waste it.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about that since he had already expected this.


    After what had happened in the Ancient Era Ruins, he already knew that there was no chance of reconciliation with the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association. Since that was the case, he would use the other factions to take care of them.


    And then there was his personal grudge with the True Spirit Sect¡­


    He had been keeping track of the True Spirit Sect through Xu Lin who had sessfully made it to the True Spirit Sect. Since he was the disciple of one of the Nascent Soul Realm elders, he had been able to get more information than normal disciples.


    Lin Fan had him keep an eye on his mother''s Yue Family to see if they would do anything, but after bringing his mother and sister back, it seemed like the Yue Family hadn''t made a single move.


    Lin Fan was confused why the Yue Family wouldn''t do anything after their disy on the Blue Star.


    Xu Lin had even reported that he had personally met Yue Qingrou and Lin Xue, which meant that they weren''t even being ced under house arrest.


    This was even more confusing for Lin Fan since he couldn''t figure out what the Yue Family was thinking in the end, but at least he knew that the two of them weren''t in any danger right now.


    He still wasn''t strong enough to go to the Yue Family, let alone bringing his father there.


    While he could rely on the factions that he was close with to do something, he didn''t want to do that.


    He wanted to use his own strength along with his father to bring his mother and sister back.<sub> </sub>


    Speaking of that, he remembered that he hadn''t checked on the Blue Star recently because of everything that had happened.


    He wondered, how strong was his father right now?


    Could he bring him up to the upper realm yet?


    Then there was Jiang Zhi Shu and his other followers¡­


    It seemed like he had to find some time to check in on the Blue Star.


    But first, what he needed to do was sell the rest of these pets.


    He still had a quota for his mission, so he still had to sell these pets. The only problem was that he didn''t know who to sell these pets to.


    After all, it wasn''t just anyone that could buy Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm pets.


    He would have to see how many he sold to the Alchemy King Hall before figuring out a way to sell the rest.


    For now, he would just leave the rest in his storage until the time came.


    It didn''t take long for old man Qiao to get back with Lin Fan about the Alchemy King Hall.


    He came early the next day, but not too early since he knew about the morning rush in Lin Fan''s store.


    After the morning rush, old man Qiao came to see Lin Fan at the counter of the store.


    Lin Fan was surprised since he knew how slow it was for most factions to decide on something. It was a different case with the Tamers Guild, the Hunters Organization, and the rest since they already had some degree of rtion with Lin Fan. This was what helped them make their decision faster.


    But the Alchemy King Hall was a faction that had no rtion to Lin Fan at all and shouldn''t have known anything about him that would have helped them make a decision faster, so it really was a surprise that they would respond this quickly.


    However, what Lin Fan didn''t expect was what their answer really was about.


    "They aren''t interested in buying any pets. In fact, they wouldn''t even listen when I tried to give them an exnation, they just hung up on me. It really was strange how quickly they decided that they weren''t interested." Old man Qiao said with slightly knitted brows.


    He had had contact with the Alchemy King Hall before, so he knew how they would act normally. When he contacted them this time, strange was the only word he could use to describe how they were acting.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as well and after a bit of thinking, he couldn''t help asking, "Do you have any ideas why they would be acting like this?"


    Old man Qiao didn''t say anything at first, but then he said with a sigh, "These are just rumours that have been spread, but I''ve heard that the Alchemy King Hall is undergoing some internal struggles."


    "Internal struggles?" Lin Fan repeated in a confused voice.


    Old man Qiao hesitated as if he wasn''t sure if he was supposed to say something, but in the end, he still said, "It''s a silly matter really¡­" He gave a sigh before continuing, "There was a new genius that was brought back from a lower realm by one of the elders and she quickly became one of the geniuses recognized by the Alchemy King Hall. It was said that even the Alchemy Master of the Alchemy King Hall recognized her as his future sessor and hisst disciple."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he asked, "Does that mean that there are elders that are against this and they are trying to take her down?"


    Old man Qiao shook his head and said, "Nothing like that at all. Most of the elders have already epted her talent and have already epted that it is likely that she will be the next Alchemy Master. But that''s where the problem lies."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more as he asked, "What problem?"


    Old man Qiao said, "Naturally all the elders want more power and the only way to seize that is the support of the Alchemy Master. Since they have already recognized her as the next Alchemy Master, they want to set up their disciples with her to ensure that they have a close rtionship with her." Old man Qiao shook his head as he said, "They''ve really taken it too far though, even openly fighting with one another over this matter."


    After another pause, old man Qiao said, "The Alchemy Master is currently away looking for some ingredients to help make a pill for his disciples and it is during this time that the elders are making their move. They''re all trying to get their disciples closer to her, so they don''t have any time for external affairs at all."


    Lin Fan had been in deep thought as he listened to this, but then he suddenly thought of something as he asked, "What''s the Alchemy Master''s disciple''s name?"


    Old man Qiao said, "Song Shu."

 Chapter 715 Rumours From The Alchemy King Hall (2)

    Lin Fan immediately revealed a slight angry look when he heard this.


    It wasn''t hard for him to understand the hidden implication behind old man Qiao''s words. It was clear that the elders were trying to force a marriage between Song Shu and their disciples since the Alchemy Master was away and couldn''t stop them.


    Once the engagement was set, it would be even hard for the Alchemy Master to cancel it since this was a matter of prestige.


    At that point, it would all be toote.


    That was exactly why Lin Fan was angry. It was because they were trying to force this fate on Song Shu.


    Song Shu, the little girl from the Blue Star who had gone with Elder Fu to the Alchemy King Hall. The little girl who had worked in Lin Fan''s store before. The little girl who was like a little sister to Lin Fan.


    They were trying to force her to marry someone?


    Even if she was willing, Lin Fan wouldn''t have agreed to it!


    After all, she was just too young!


    How could Lin Fan let these old meny their hands on his cute little sister?


    Old man Qiao could see the angry look on Lin Fan''s face and he was confused.


    Could it be that Lin Fan already knew the disciple of the Alchemy Master? Could it be that he already had a deeper rtionship with her? Was that why he was angry when he heard that people wanted toy their hands on her?


    Old man Qiao still wanted to set his granddaughter Qiao Yi Fei up with Lin Fan, so if this was true, this wouldn''t have been good news for him.


    But even if it was bad news, it wasn''t as if he could do anything since this was Lin Fan''s private matter.


    Still, he couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition so he couldn''t help asking, "Owner Lin, are you nning on doing something to the Alchemy King Hall?"


    Lin Fan restrained himself when he heard this. The look of anger faded from his eyes as he said, "Why would I do anything to the Alchemy King Hall? Not to mention, how could I do anything to the Alchemy King Hall? I''m just the simple owner of a pet store."


    Old man Qiao revealed a smile that showed that he clearly thought otherwise, but he didn''t say anything else.


    Since he had already passed on the information, there was no need for him to stay any longer since he still had other business to take care of.


    Actually, when old man Qiao came into the store, he looked quite tired. It was clear that he hadn''t gotten much restst night.


    But with all the facts that Lin Fan had dropped on them yesterday, it was inevitable.


    The various factions that had been in Lin Fan''s store yesterday held their secret meetings and were nning on having more meetings with each other today. Since old man Qiao was one of the leaders of the Hunters Organization, he had no choice but to go to those meetings.


    Let alone the fact that he was the one that could be considered the closest to Lin Fan.


    So Lin Fan didn''t keep him here any longer.


    But the other reason why Lin Fan didn''t keep him here was because he wanted to talk to Ang about something.


    Ang had been out with Yuki, but Lin Fan had called her right away since this was important. After Ang heard why he had called her, she immediately headed to the store.


    As soon as she came into the store, there was a chill that filled the store that made everyone shiver, but no one could look directly in her direction.


    Ang ignored all of this and found Lin Fan before dragging him into the back of the store.


    Lin Fan had a bitter smile on his face, but he gave a nod to Momonga to take care of things as he was being dragged away. Momonga naturally knew what he was asking for, so he had one of the ghost maid girls head over to the counter.


    After dragging Lin Fan to the back, Ang threw him onto a chair in the break room and said, "Speak! Tell me everything that happened!"


    Lin Fan still had the same bitter smile, but he slowly told Ang everything that he heard from old man Qiao.


    After she finished listening, she cracked her knuckles and turned to head out the room.


    Lin Fan could sense the danger that wasing from her, so he immediately grabbed her to stop her and asked, "What are you nning on doing?"


    Ang turned to look at him with a cold look and said, "What else do you think? If they want to do anything to her, I''ll just blow them all away. Wouldn''t that solve everything?"<sub> </sub>


    The bitter smile on Lin Fan''s face became heavier as he said, "Do you really think that''s the best way? Elder Fu and the Alchemy Master are also there and it seems like they treat her quite well. I''m sure that she would be sad if something happened to them."


    The expression on Ang''s face froze before she pouted her lips and looked at him, "Then what do we do? We can''t just wait and let something happen to her, right?"


    Lin Fan''s heart softened a bit when he saw this, but he quickly calmed his feelings before saying, "Of course we''re not going to let anything happen to her, but we can''t just rush into this. Solving our problems with violence isn''t a good idea."


    Ang knitted her brows and pouted her lips even more as she said, "Then what do we do?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he said, "We can''t do anything if we''re outsiders, but what if we''re not outsiders?"


    Ang looked at Lin Fan with a confused look as she asked, "What do you mean?"


    Lin Fan said, "Well, the Alchemy King Hall is an organization made of alchemists and almost all alchemists register with them. As long as we register with them as alchemists, wouldn''t we be able to go in and get the information we want? Then we can help Song Shu based on the situation."


    Ang revealed a look of understanding when she heard this, but then her expression became awkward.


    Lin Fan saw this and asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Ang hesitated for a bit before finally saying, "Well, my alchemy skills aren''t that good¡­"


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but before he could, Yuki, who had been in the room the entire time, spoke first. She said in an excited voice, "Big sister, I can take it and then you can follow me into the Alchemy King Hall as a follower! You know how good my alchemy skills are!"


    While Yuki didn''t know who this Song Shu was, seeing how strong her big sister''s reaction was, she knew that it must be someone important to her.


    Since this was a chance to show off her skills to her big sister and earn her praise, how could she let this go?


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but Yuki could already guess what he was about to say, so she red at him until he swallowed his words.


    She knew that he was about to suggest that they could both just follow him as his follower instead, but she wouldn''t let him take this opportunity away! After all, this was a chance for her to be alone with her big sister and receive her praise!


    Lin Fan just stayed silent as Ang thought about it.


    After a bit of silence, she looked at Yuki and said, "Alright, I''ll go with you then."


    How could she not know what Yuki was thinking?


    But seeing how excited she was, it wasn''t like she could burst her bubble. Not to mention, she also wanted to spend some time together with her.


    Yuki immediately revealed a happy smile and took Ang in her arms for a hug.


    While Ang''s back was turned, she made sure to look at Lin Fan with a smug smile to show off her victory.


    Lin Fan just shook his head with a bitter smile, but he felt happy for her as well.


    With this decided, the only thing that they had to do was figure out when they would be taking the alchemist exam.


    This information wasn''t that hard to find since the Alchemy King Hall was such a public organization. Their website gave clear indications of when the exams were and where they would be held.


    It didn''t take them long to find that the next exam would be held on Friday of this week and it was currently Wednesday. That meant that if they wanted to be a part of the next exam, they would have to sign up tomorrow before taking the exam on Friday.


    But that wasn''t the only problem.


    Unlike the Tamers Guild that held an exam at their branches almost every day, the Alchemy King Hall had a different policy.


    <o>,m They held their exams once a month and it would always be in a different location.</o>


    They did this to maintain their superiority, it was a way of them saying that alchemists were much rarer than Monster Trainers, so that was why they were the more noble profession.


    Of course, that just made it harder for people to attend their exams which did make them the rarer profession.


    Still, this wasn''t a problem for Lin Fan since there was also a Hunters Organization branch that was in the city where the exams were being held.


    All of the Hunters Organization branches were connected by transport gates, so all Lin Fan had to do was use the transport gate at the Harmony City branch to reach that ce.

 Chapter 716 Alchemist Exam (1)

    Early the next morning, Lin Fan headed off to the Hunters Organization with Ang and Yuki.


    He had already contacted old man Qiaost night, so everything was set up for them even if old man Qiao was doubtful about why they needed to use the transport gates.


    Still, all they had to do was go to the Hunters Organization branch and show them Lin Fan''s Hunter License. The people there had already been instructed on how to take care of them.


    As soon as they did arrive and Lin Fan showed his Hunter License, they were immediately led to the basement where the teleport gates were by the receptionist.


    They were led to a single gate which was also thergest gate here.


    This was a teleport gate to the Hunters Organization''s headquarters.


    Because there wasn''t a gate that would directly link the branch in Harmony City to the branch of the city where the exam was being held, they had to head to the headquarters first where there was a teleport gate to the city of the exam.


    As soon as they stepped through, there was someone who was waiting for them on the other side.


    After checking Lin Fan''s Hunter License, that person led them to another gate which was smaller this time. This was the gate that would lead to the city the exam was being held in.


    By the time that they arrived, only ten minutes had passed since everything had been taken care of for them. They were quickly led through each gate, so the only travel time was the amount of time that it took for them to move between gates.


    After they arrived in this city named Frost City, there was even a member of the Hunters Organization waiting for them.


    It was a young girl who was in her early teens who immediately bowed to Lin Fan when she met him.


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile when he saw this, but he also quickly said, "There''s no need for this at all."


    The girl jumped a bit when she heard this which caused two fluffy ears to appear out of her head.


    Lin Fan was surprised when he saw this, but then he couldn''t help revealing a smile as he saw the blush that appeared on the little girl''s face.


    Ang and Yuki both had looks on their faces like they were looking at something precious. The way their hands were raised made it seem like they wanted to hug and pat this girl, but Lin Fan shook his head at them to stop them.


    The little girl then raised her head and said, "I''m here to guide you on behalf of the branch president. If you need anything, please just tell me."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Then can you take us to the Alchemy King Hall?"


    The little girl gave a nod before saying, "Then if you will follow me." Then she immediately started leading the way.


    However, before she could even take two steps, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Wait, you haven''t told us your name yet."


    The little girl jolted when she heard this, but then she turned and said while bowing her head, "You can just call me whatever you want. Someone as lowly as me doesn''t deserve to be addressed by name."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but the more important thing was the way that Ang and Yuki were ring at him. It was clear that they were ming him for bullying this girl because that was what it looked like.


    Lin Fan looked at them with a bitter smile to show that he didn''t know what was happening either before turning back to the girl. He came forward and lifted her head up before saying while looking into her eyes, "I want to call you by your name, so will you tell me your name?"


    The little girl jolted once again, but then she said in a low and shy voice, "Xiao Tu."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Then Xiao Tu, my name is Lin Fan and those two beautiful big sisters are Ang and Yuki. You can just call us by our names or you can call us big brother and big sister. So can you lead the way for us, Xiao Tu?"


    Lin Fan even emphasized her name when he said this.


    There was a faint sparkle that appeared in Xiao Tu''s eyes when she heard this, but then she gave a quick nod and said, "Yes, young master Lin."


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but she had already run off and it was toote to stop her, so their only choice was to follow her.


    Xiao Tu ran at first, but then she realized her mistake and slowed down to look for Lin Fan. Seeing that they were following her at a normal pace, she let out a sigh of relief before slowly leading the way.


    However, she never had any intentions of turning back and talking to them it seemed.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this.


    Based on the fluffy ears that had popped out when she had been startled, it was clear that she was a demihuman, a product of a human mixed with a beast¡­


    Then based on the way that everyone looked at her as they went past, he could tell that there was the same discrimination against demihumans just like on the Blue Star.


    But that didn''t make sense.


    If there was this discrimination, why would they have sent Xiao Tu to guide them?


    Could it be that there was someone in this Hunters Organization branch that was plotting against them?<sub> </sub>


    No, that wouldn''t be possible since old man Qiao had made the arrangements. If they dared to go against old man Qiao''s orders like this, they wouldn''t have a future in the Hunters Organization.


    No one would be crazy enough to do something like this.


    So what was it?


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand this, but he didn''t let that bother him too much since there was still something else that he needed to do. For now, it seemed like nothing bad woulde from this, so he didn''t mind it since he could get this cute little bunny girl guiding him.


    Unlike the rest of the people of this world, he didn''t have any prejudice against demihumans because he was someone who came from earth.


    In fact, he even thought that kemonomimis were the best!


    If he had a chance, he would definitely try to get a chance to touch Xiao Tu''s ears. They really looked fluffy.


    He could see that it was the same with Ang and Yuki based on the way that they looked at Xiao Tu.


    It seemed like all girls liked cute things and Xiao Tu really was a cute little girl.


    Xiao Tu quickly led the way to the Alchemy King Hall.


    As they made their way along the streets of Frost City, they were met with many bad gazes.


    These gazes weren''t directed at them, but rather Xiao Tu who was walking in front of them with her head down. Even though her ears and tail were hidden, it was clear that everyone knew who she was with the way that they were ring at her.


    Lin Fan listened closely and he could even hear some of the whispers around him.


    "It''s that dirty demihuman girl. Why can''t she just leave already?"


    "I know! It''d be so much better if she would just die in a ditch already!"


    "Shh, keep your voice down. Those people behind her should most likely be Hunters based on the way she''s acting around them. It''s fine if we insult her, but if we ruin the mood of those hunters."


    "That''s right. You already know how the president of the Hunters Organization treats her. Keep your voice down."


    Lin Fan revealed an intrigued look when he heard this.


    It seemed like there was an interesting backstory behind this.


    As they walked along, there were several people that had wanted to do something to Xiao Tu, but they were immediately scared off by the cold gazes from Ang and Yuki.


    So their trip to the Alchemy King Hall was rather uneventful other than the whispers around them.


    When they arrived, Xiao Tu finally stopped and turned around to say, "This is the Alchemy King Hall." Then she gave a bow and was about to move to the side as she said, "I''ll wait for you outside."


    But before she could leave, Lin Fan had already grabbed her by the hand and pulled her over.


    Xiao Tu''s heart jumped to her throat as she quickly lowered her head and put her hands over them to protect herself.


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he saw this.


    It seemed like her life here wasn''t good¡­


    Lin Fan took a deep breath to calm his feelings before saying in a gentle voice, "Stop that, I don''t want to hurt you."


    Xiao Tu''s body trembled before she slowly lowered her hands and looked up at Lin Fan.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan continued, "I want you toe in with us as a guide. This is our first time here, so I want you to show us the way."


    Xiao Tu was surprised by this, but she quickly shook her head and said, "No, I¡­"


    Before she could finish, Lin Fan already lifted her up and brought her over to Ang before cing her in her hands.


    Ang looked at Lin Fan with a look that said "good job" while Yuki looked at her with an envious look.


    Lin Fan smiled as he said to Xiao Tu, "This should make it easier for you to lead the way."


    Then without giving her a chance to reject him, he turned and started walking into the Alchemy King Hall branch.

 Chapter 717 Alchemist Exam (2)

    After walking into the Alchemy King Hall branch, the first thing that hit them was a wave of noise before a wave of medicinal smells.


    The main hall of this branch was quite busy with many people walking back and forth between different counters inside of the hall.


    There were many counters that were set up for different services and many people moving between them with herbs in their hands.


    Lin Fan ignored all of this and asked Xiao Tu, "Which one of these counters is for the alchemist exam?"


    Xiao Tu was still flustered from being held in Ang''s hands like this. Ang on the other hand looked like she wanted to swallow Xiao Tu in one bite.


    But hearing Lin Fan''s question, Xiao Tu took a deep breath to calm down before looking around. After looking around for a bit, she pointed at one of the counters in the distance and said, "It''s that one over there."


    Lin Fan looked over and found that there was a counter with quite a few young people grouped there.


    However the strange thing was that they weren''t gathered there to sign up.


    Looking closely, he found that those young people were all surrounding one young man who seemed to be a young master.


    If he had to guess, it should be some young master who came to sign up and his entourage that came with him. However, that didn''t matter to Lin Fan.


    After confirming where he needed to go, Lin Fan turned back to give Xiao Tu a nod before leading Ang and Yuki over.


    They had nned on moving right past this group of young people, but that group didn''t give them that chance.


    As they went by, one of the young men noticed something and then leaned in to whisper in the young master''s ear. When the young master heard what he said, he turned to look at Lin Fan''s group with knitted brows.


    The person he was looking at was no one other than Xiao Tu.


    After confirming that it was indeed her, he revealed an arrogant smile and started walking towards Lin Fan''s group. As he was walking over, he raised his voice and said, "Aiyo, if it isn''t the dirty half breed? Who allowed you toe to a ce like this? This is a ce for humans, not a piece of trash like you."


    When Xiao Tu heard this voice, she immediately gave a jolt. Then she lowered her head and tried to get out of Ang''s embrace, but no matter what she did, she wasn''t able to get out.


    In the end, she could only sit there, but she put as much distance as possible between her and Ang.


    In her mind, she was ming herself for letting her guard down.


    These were the first people to treat her nicely other than her papa and uncles, so she had thought that she could enjoy this. However, the cruelty of reality had pulled her out of her illusions.


    That was right, she was just a dirty demihuman, she didn''t have a right to enjoy happiness like everyone else.


    She should have insisted on noting in with them, then they wouldn''t be in trouble like they were now.


    When Ang saw the way that Xiao Tu was acting, there was a trace of murderous intent that appeared in her eyes as she looked at the young master. The same thing happened with Yuki.


    When they looked over, the young master suddenly stopped in his steps as he felt a chill run down his spine.


    This was a feeling that he had never felt before. It was almost as if he was facing death itself¡­


    Lin Fan naturally noticed this and quickly came in between the young master and Ang. If he had left her to her own devices, it was very likely that she would have beaten him to death then and there.


    But that wouldn''t be good since they had just arrived in Frost City and it wasn''t good to stick out too much.


    So Lin Fan took the lead by asking with a cold look on his face, "And who are you?"


    When Lin Fan came in between the young master and Ang, the feeling of death that had wrapped around the young master became much weaker and he was able toe back to his senses.


    After taking a deep breath to calm himself, the young master said, "That should be my question. Who do you think you are to stop me from teaching this piece of trash demihuman a lesson? Don''t you know that it''s for the betterment of all of us if this piece of trash knows her ce?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Even he felt the urge to p this young master across the face when he heard this, but he kept that impulse down.


    Of course, it helped that there were waves of killing intenting from behind him, piercing him in the back that helped keep him keep his focus.


    Lin Fan just said in a cold voice, "Unfortunately, she''s our guide right now, so she doesn''t have time to y with you. Perhaps another time."


    Lin Fan was about to turn to leave, but that young master jumped forth and tried to grab Lin Fan''s cor only to fail. However, he was able to stabilize himself, so he pointed his finger in Lin Fan''s face as he roared out with a vein popping on his forehead, "Who do you think you are to talk to this young master like this? Do you think that you can even survive in this city if you do something like this?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile when he saw this.<sub> </sub>


    This young master¡­he really was too much of a cliche¡­


    Seeing this smile, the young master was even more offended, but he didn''t blow his top right away.


    Instead, he looked at Lin Fan and looked in the direction that he had been heading in before revealing a smile of his own. The young master said in a casual voice, "It seems like you want to register for the alchemist exam, but you should know that things won''t be that easy."


    After saying this, he looked at the receptionist who was at the desk who immediately gave a nod in response to this.


    Lin Fan just shook his head with a smile before saying, "Well we''ll have to see then."


    Then without waiting for the young master to respond, he walked over to the counter to register.


    Before Lin Fan could say a thing, the receptionist who had just nodded at the young master said, "This sir, unfortunately we cannot¡­"


    Before she could finish speaking, Lin Fan suddenly pped something on the table.


    The receptionist unconsciously looked at it as she was caught off guard by this sudden p, but then her eyes popped out as she swallowed the rest of her words.


    A Hunter License!


    It was a Hunter License!


    She just stood there with her mouth wide open for a minute before she said, "This young master, please wait a minute while I confirm this."


    She took out a scanner that she used on the Hunter License and once she confirmed that it was real, she immediately bowed to Lin Fan and said, "This young master, is there anything that I can do for you?"


    The young master from before was stunned when he heard this.


    What did he just do?


    Didn''t the receptionist already get his message, why would she still act this politely with him?


    The young master couldn''t helpe closer to take a better look and he was shocked when he saw the Hunter License on the table.


    This young man was actually a Hunter?


    It was no wonder the receptionist''s attitude had suddenly changed.


    This young master wasn''t even a member of the twelve great factions, he was just the young master of a lower tier family that was one of therge suppliers of this Alchemy King Hall branch. That was why he had been treated so kindly here that even the receptionists listened to him.


    But it was different with Lin Fan.


    Having a Hunter License meant that he was actually part of the twelve great factions, he was one of the Hunters from the Hunters Organization.


    The difference in status between the two was like heaven and earth.


    Lin Fan was someone who would be respected in any city with this Hunter License, so there was no need to mention Frost City.


    Lin Fan just ignored all of this and said to the receptionist with a nod, "Help me register for the alchemist exam."


    The receptionist immediately bowed and said, "Right away, young master."


    She turned around and pulled out some forms before cing them in front of Lin Fan, "Please just put down your information and I''ll submit your form right away."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and then remembered something. He pointed at Yuki and said, "Can you get a set of forms for her as well? She''s also registering for the alchemist exam."


    The receptionist gave another nod and quickly took out another set of forms.


    Yuki came over to take the forms, but then she found it too boring to fill out, so she just left it to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile, but he still filled it in for her in the end.


    After that, he submitted the two forms and the receptionist helped them file them before giving them information on the alchemist exam tomorrow.


    Once that was all done, Lin Fan didn''t bother staying here any longer as he turned around.


    When he walked past the young master who was still stunned, he didn''t forget to say, "Well, you can go about your business. We''ll be leaving now."

 Chapter 718 Alchemist Exam (3)

    The young master revealed a look of rage when he heard this and his eyes followed Lin Fan''s group as they walked out, but he didn''t do a thing to them.


    He knew that if he did anything, it would be bad for his family.


    But he also couldn''t just let this go so easily¡­


    So his brain began to turn as he figured out his n for revenge.


    While he couldn''t take revenge directly, that didn''t mean that he couldn''t take revenge indirectly.


    His followers were all silent as they waited for the young master to speak. Many of them had worried looks on their faces since they thought that the young master would vent the anger that he couldn''t vent on them.


    However, to their surprise, the young master didn''t lose his temper at all.


    Instead, he waved his hand at his number one follower toe over before having him lean in to whisper a few words in his ears.


    The number one follower''s eyes opened wide for a second, but then he said with a bow, "Yes young master, I''ll prepare everything right away." After saying that, the number one follower didn''t waste any time as he ran off.


    The young master kept looking in the direction that Lin Fan had left in, even though Lin Fan''s group was already gone. Then after a while, he suddenly gave a chuckle and said, "We''re leaving."


    ¡­


    Back to Lin Fan''s group.


    As soon as they came out of the Alchemy King Hall, Xiao Tu finally reacted to what had just happened.


    This time, she moved too fast for Ang to stop her and she was able to break free of Ang''s hold,nding on the ground in front of them.


    As soon as shended, she started bending over as if she was about to kneel down, but Lin Fan stopped her by holding her hands and keeping her up.


    She looked up at Lin Fan with tearful eyes and said, "Please don''t stop me. I have to apologize for everything that I''ve just done."


    However, Lin Fan didn''t let her go down any further. Instead, he used his life energy to force her to stand up straight before looking into her eyes and saying, "You don''t have to apologize for anything."


    Xiao Tu was stunned by the way Lin Fan said this, but then she quickly shook her head and said, "No, no, no, it''s all my fault! If it wasn''t for me, that wouldn''t have happened just now! It''s all my fault!"


    Lin Fan revealed a trace of sadness in his eyes when he saw this, but then he patted her head with a smile and said, "It''s not your fault. No one is ever at fault for existing."


    Xiao Tu was once again stunned, but this time, it was a different kind of feeling. As she looked into Lin Fan''s sincere gaze, her eyes couldn''t help filling up with tears.


    After a moment of silence, she asked in a tearful low voice, "Is that true?"


    Lin Fan patted her head again and said, "Of course it is."


    When Xiao Tu heard this, she couldn''t hold the dams back anymore as tears started bursting out. She moved forward to hug Lin Fan, but before she could, Ang had pushed Lin Fan out of the way and had taken Xiao Tu in her arms.


    p Xiao Tu was surprised, but she didn''t let that bother her for long as she put her head into Ang''s chest, crying her eyes out.</anda>


    Yuki immediately also came over and embraced Xiao Tu along with Ang.


    The three of them just stood there hugging each other as Xiao Tu cried her eyes out.


    With how loud they were, it naturally attracted the attention of the people around them.


    Everyone that looked this way all looked over with a look of disdain. It seemed like Xiao Tu was quite well known in this city¡­Or rather it could be said that she was quite hated in this city.


    However, these people didn''t stare for long as they were all scared off by Lin Fan''s gaze and aura.


    They could tell that Lin Fan wasn''t a normal person, so they immediately walked off, minding their own business. But even as they walked off, the trace of disdain in their eyes didn''t disappear.


    After a while, Xiao Tu''s emotions gradually stabilized.


    When she was calm again, her face was covered in a blush, but she didn''t leave the embrace of the two girls.


    But still, they had to separate eventually since they were standing out in the open, right in front of the Alchemist King Hall branch.


    Lin Fan was the one who broke it up by giving a cough and then saying, "Xiao Tu, how about you show us around Frost City? This is our first time here after all."


    Xiao Tu looked at Lin Fan and then at Ang and Yuki before giving a nod with a smile.<sub> </sub>


    Ang didn''t hold back after seeing this smile as she grabbed hold of Xiao Tu again.


    Because she had lost control of her emotions earlier, her ear and tail had popped out. So as soon as Ang grabbed hold of Xiao Tu, the first thing she did was start to rub her ears which really were soft.


    Yuki was jealous when she saw this and she immediately came over to rub Xiao Tu''s tail.


    Xiao Tu''s face turned red as they rubbed those parts of her and she couldn''t help saying, "No, not there. My ears are my weak spot¡­"


    Lin Fan let them do what they wanted at first, but seeing how it was turning out, he chose to give a cough to stop them.


    Ang and Yuki were unwilling, but they could see what it looked like and since they were in public, they chose to stop.


    Once they were done, Lin Fan turned back to Xiao Tu with a smile and asked, "Can you show us around the city now?"


    This time, Xiao Tu only hesitated a bit before giving a wide smile and a nod in response.


    She hesitated a bit before taking Ang and Yuki''s hands, leading them along, letting Lin Fan follow them on his own.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he thought that he had stopped them because it seemed wrong. It wasn''t because he was jealous about not being able to rub her ears at all¡­


    ¡­


    The four of them spent the day just touring around Frost City and when it was time for dinner, they were nning on finding a ce to eat. However, before they could do that, Xiao Tu received a message on her watch.


    She quickly opened it when she heard the ringtone that was different from the default ringtone.


    After reading the message, she awkwardly looked at Lin Fan and said in a hesitant voice, "Uh, big brother Lin¡­The president of our Hunter Organization branch wants to meet with you. Do you have time for that right now?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he saw how cute she was and then he gave a nod in response.


    In fact, he was curious about the president of this Hunters Organization branch in the first ce.


    After all, he was someone that would send a demihuman to pick them up even after receiving an order from old man Qiao to take care of them. For them to do that, it was clear that they had other intentions.


    So he was actually interested in meeting them.


    After all, he had some ideas as to what kind of intentions this person had based on the clues he had picked up, but before he met this person, he wouldn''t be certain.


    So he epted Xiao Tu''s request to bring them to meet the president of this branch.


    Xiao Tu quickly led them back to the Hunters Organization that they hade from this morning and instead of going to the basement like before, she brought them to an elevator that brought them to the top floor.


    Once they reached the top floor, they were brought to an office that was quite big. It was so big that it almost took up the entire top floor of the building, with only a little space left for a reception area.


    There wasn''t a receptionist at the reception area, so they had been allowed in right away.


    The strange thing was how familiar Xiao Tu was with this ce. She had opened the led and led them into the office without any hesitation, almost as if she had been here many times before.


    The office wasn''t that luxuriously decorated and it was more focused on utility rather than luxury.


    Sitting at the desk in the middle of the office was a middle aged man who was clearly the president of this branch.


    After they came in, Xiao Tu didn''t hesitate at all as she ran to the other side of the desk and to the side of the middle aged man. When she stood there beside him, she looked up with a smile and said, "Papa, I''m home."


    The middle aged man immediately revealed a smile as he looked at Xiao Tu and he said, "Did you have fun today?"


    Xiao Tu gave a strong nod and turned to look at Lin Fan''s group as she said with a wide smile, "I had a lot of fun with big brother and the big sisters today."


    When Lin Fan''s group saw this, their hearts melted.


    After all, she was just too cute with the way she smiled.


    The middle aged man was the same as he looked at her, but eventually he turned to look at Lin Fan''s group with a serious look and said, "Thank you for taking care of Xiao Tu today."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Well, that''s not a problem." Then after a pause, he said, "The problem is with how you were using us."

 Chapter 719 Alchemist Exam (4)

    The president knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything.


    All he did was move Xiao Tu behind him as he looked at Lin Fan with a wary look.


    But this was enough to admit his guilt.


    He had indeed had other ns when he set Xiao Tu to pick up Lin Fan''s group.


    Lin Fan saw this and found it funny, but he still maintained his serious look as he looked right at the president and said, "However, I don''t mind being used like this from time to time."


    The president looked right at Lin Fan as he revealed a confused look.


    Did he hear him right?


    He said that he didn''t mind being used like this?


    Did he really understand what he was saying?


    Lin Fan could see the confusion that was on the president''s face, so he turned to Xiao Tu and said, "I don''t mind being used when ites to someone as cute as this."


    The president was once again surprised by his words, but he quickly revealed a smile and said whileughing, "Is that so?"


    Lin Fan hadn''t been certain what the n of the president had been at first, but after seeing how Xiao Tu acted in front of him, he had put all the clues that he had gathered together.


    It was very simple, he had used them as people who would treat Xiao Tu properly. He wanted to give Xiao Tu the confidence that she should have had, so he used them for that purpose.


    When Lin Fan had looked carefully at Xiao Tu, he found that while her clothes were dirty, they weren''t in bad shape. It was clear that everything she was wearing was from a famous brand and they were brand new. The only reason they were dirty was most likely because of the bullying that she received outside.


    As well as the watch that she had, it was clearly the newest model, but there had been modifications made to make it look like an older model.


    For someone that took care of Xiao Tu that well, he clearly wouldn''t do anything bad to her, so it had to be something that would help her.


    With how cute Xiao Tu was, he didn''t mind at all.


    But there was still one thing that was on his mind.


    Lin Fan looked at the president and simply asked, "How were you this confident that it would work?"


    The president revealed a bitter smile as he replied, "It wasn''t confidence, but rather desperation. After all, there''s no one like you in Frost City. You should have already seen it today."


    Lin Fan paused for a moment before nodding in response to this.


    He had seen how the entire city treated Xiao Tu, it was true that no one would ever treat her properly in this city.


    The president then turned to Xiao Tu and said, "How about we go get some dinner now?"


    Xiao Tu nodded and then ran back to Lin Fan''s group. She took Ang and Yuki''s hands before leading them out while saying, "Big sisters, let''s go eat."


    Ang and Yuki followed her with wide smiles on their faces, while Lin Fan and the president were left there with bitter smiles on their faces as they had been abandoned.


    But they didn''t let that bother them as they couldn''t help revealing warm smiles when they saw how cute Xiao Tu was.


    The two of them looked at each other with these smiles and gave a tacit nod before following them to the elevator.


    The elevator brought them down to a lower floor where there had been a restaurant that had been booked by the president.


    While they were eating, Xiao Tu didn''t leave Ang and Yuki''s side at all, so Lin Fan and the president were left alone on the side to drink together.


    Lin Fan looked at Xiao Tu for a bit before asking, "Do you mind me asking what''s Xiao Tu''s story? After all, even if she does call you "papa", it''s not like you could be her actual father, right?"


    After all, Xiao Tu was a demihuman, which meant that her father was a beast who had vited her mother. Lin Fan could tell that this president was 100% a human and not a transformed beast.


    The president didn''t reply right away. Instead he looked up slightly at the ceiling with a sad look on his face before giving a sigh.


    It was only after a long period of silence that he looked back down and poured drinks for both of them before saying, "It''s a long story¡­" Then after a pause, he began telling Lin Fan Xiao Tu''s back story.<sub> </sub>


    Xiao Tu''s mother was a famous Hunter back in the day and the president''s senior, she was someone that everyone looked up to and admired. She was even considered the goddess of Frost City by almost all of the men who lived here.


    There were countless people who chased after her, including the president himself, but she never chose to settle down with any of them.


    But one day, tragedy struck as they were suddenly thrown into a minor world.


    This minor world had been created by the Beast Race as a way of invading the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but it had been discovered by the experts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance before it could be used.


    They had charged into the minor world to take care of the Beast Race Experts, but they found that the Beast Race was much more powerful than they had expected.


    In the end, Xiao Tu''s mother had sacrificed herself by closing the minor world at the expense of being trapped in the minor world with the Beast Race Experts.


    They had lost all hope of saving her, but they had been able to save her in the end a few monthster. It was just too bad that she had already been vited by the Beast Race Experts many times during that time¡­She had even be pregnant as a result.


    They asked her many times to abort this child, but she insisted on giving birth to it even though she knew how demihumans were looked down on. She said that this child was innocent no matter what the circumstances of its birth were.


    She was able to give birth to a healthy girl and she named her Xiao Tu, but it was too bad that she didn''t survive after the birth.


    The birth process of a demihuman was different from that of a human and she wasn''t able to adapt to it. As well, the doctors weren''t prepared since there were very few cases of demihuman births to begin with.


    So in the end, she bled to death from giving birth to Xiao Tu.


    Everyone naturally looked down on these demihumans, but the president and a small group of people who truly loved Xiao Tu''s mother vowed that they would raise Xiao Tu properly.


    That was how the president had be Xiao Tu''s "papa".


    As for the others, Lin Fan guessed that they had be the "uncles" that Xiao Tu had mentioned before.


    After he finished listening to the story, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Did you not resent Xiao Tu for causing her mother''s death?"


    He knew that this question was a bit too harsh, but he still couldn''t help asking it.


    The president revealed a sad look before saying, "It would be a lie to say that we didn''t at first, but can you me us if we did? However, you can see how cute Xiao Tu is, so all the resentment that we hadpletely disappeared as we watched her grow up. It is as Xiao Tu''s mother said, the child is innocent."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this as he could feel the love for Xiao Tu the president had in his words.


    Lin Fan looked over at Xiao Tu who was happily ordering desserts with Ang and Yuki and he couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    Perhaps one day, he would have a child that would be as cute as her.


    While he had been looking away, the president had taken arge swig of alcohol before looking right at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes.


    The president suddenly asked, "Xiao Tu really is cute, isn''t she?"


    Lin Fan just nodded along without thinking too much about it.


    Then the president suddenly took him by the shoulder and pulled him over before saying, "But don''t you have any ideas towards my little girl! I won''t be giving her to anyone!"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this, but he quickly said, "No, I don''t have any ideas towards her at all."


    The president grabbed him by the cor and pulled him close as he shouted, "You''re saying that my little girl doesn''t have any charm at all! I''ll beat you up!"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile when he heard this.


    He was damned if he admitted it or if he denied it¡­


    But he quickly figured out the reason why as he saw the president''s red face and the bottles of alcohol beside him.


    It seemed like he couldn''t hold his alcohol that well¡­


    Lin Fan just did his best to calm the president down, but no matter what he did, it was hard for him to usemon sense with a drunk person.


    Just like this, he was dragged into a discussion about how cute Xiao Tu was with the president threatening to beat him up from time to time for either agreeing that Xiao Tu was cute or disagreeing with him.

 Chapter 720 Alchemist Exam (5)

    The next morning, Lin Fan got out of bed early to prepare for the day that came.


    It was Friday, so it was time for them to take the alchemist exam.


    After dinnerst night, Lin Fan helped Xiao Tu carry the drunk president back to his room in the Hunters Organization building before Xiao Tu showed them to their rooms.


    Then before Xiao Tu could escape, Ang and Yuki caught her and brought her into their room to sleep with her.


    That left Lin Fan alone in the hall, forcing him to go sleep by himself in an empty room.


    After getting up, Lin Fan got up to prepare breakfast for the girls who hadn''t woken up yet.


    However, when he came out, he found the president who was standing outside in the hall near their rooms.


    The president wasn''t just standing there in the hall like a normal person, but rather he was hiding behind a potted nt, staring at the door to the room that Xiao Tu, Ang, and Yuki were in.


    Lin Fan shook his head when he saw this and he silently came up behind the president before saying, "So this is what the president does in his free time?"


    The president suddenly jolted when he heard this and quickly stood up as he said, "Well I just came to check up on you, but it seems that you''re already up."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "How about we go prepare some breakfast before they wake up?"


    The president gave a nod along with a cough before saying, "Yes, let''s go do that."


    The two of them quickly headed off to prepare breakfast and when they came back, they found that the girls had woken up.


    Since they were all awake, all five of them decided to have breakfast together.


    During this time, the president kept staring at Xiao Tu with a sad look.


    That was because other than greeting him, she spent all her time with Ang and Yuki. The way that she was smiling and enjoying herself was something that she had never shown with him, which made him feel like his little girl was leaving him.


    It was just a good thing that the president''s secretary came to take him away after breakfast or else he surely would have followed them to the Alchemist King Hall branch.


    Since they were done with breakfast, they also headed out to take their alchemist exam.


    It was still around nine and the exam started at ten, but Lin Fan had them head right to the Alchemist King Hall to prepare.


    The exam would be taken in groups, so it was better to see which group they were in before taking the exam. Especially with what happened yesterday.


    Lin Fan didn''t believe that the young master would let things end just like that.


    However, when he saw the groups for the exam, he was surprised.


    The young master hadn''t been ced in Lin Fan''s group, but rather he had been ced in the same group as Yuki.


    It seemed like this young master was using his brains.


    He knew that he wasn''t able to do anything to Lin Fan because he already knew that Lin Fan was a Hunter. Lin Fan had already found out the young master''s family background from the president, so he knew that the young master wouldn''t dare mess with him after finding out that he was a Hunter.


    So the only person that he could mess with was Yuki since he knew that Yuki wasn''t a Hunter.


    But it was just too bad that his guess was wrong.


    Yuki was the one that he couldn''t offend because when it came to alchemy skills, she far surpassed Lin Fan.


    After all, her cultivation was in a realm that was far beyond Lin Fan''s realm and her alchemy skills were the same. She was the one that was the harder one to defeat out of the two of them.


    After seeing these groups, Xiao Tu turned to look at Yuki with a worried look as she asked, "Big sister Yuki, are you going to be already? He''s almost certainly going to y some tricks to make it harder for you."


    Yuki''s heart melted when she saw Xiao Tu''s worried face and then she was filled with fighting will as she said, "Big sister will show you how to beat down a bully like that."


    Lin Fan had a bad premonition when he heard this and he quickly came in between the two, pulling Yuki aside to have a private conversation.


    While Yuki was unwilling, she wasn''t willing to act too strongly in front of Xiao Tu, so she followed Lin Fan to the side.


    Once they were alone, she red at him and asked, "What is it?"


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward look and asked, "You know that you can''t kill him right?"


    Seeing the surprised look on Yuki''s face, Lin Fan was d that he had chosen to intervene.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan then said with a sigh and a more firm tone, "You can''t kill him, even if you do it by ident." Seeing that she didn''t look convinced, he added, "If you do, you won''t be the only one who they will move against, they''ll also plot against Xiao Tu since they already know about her rtionship with us and the rtionship she has with that young master."


    <o>,m Yuki finally revealed a hesitant look.</o>


    She didn''t care if they plotted against her since she could easily take care of anyone that came after her, but it wasn''t as if she could stay with Xiao Tu forever to protect her. So if her actions caused harm to Xiao Tu, she wouldn''t be able to live with herself.


    After a moment of silence, Yuki pursed her lips and asked, "Then what do you want me to do?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod when he saw this and then he came closer to say in a lower voice, "You know that technique, right? Then when you''re taking the test, just¡­"


    ¡­


    When they came back, Yuki had a wide smile on her face and she looked at Xiao Tu to say, "Just watch your big sister take care of that jerk for you!"


    Xiao Tu didn''t understand what was happening, but she was so swept up in Yuki''s positivity that she just smiled along and said, "Un, big sister, you can do it!"


    Both Ang and Yuki couldn''t take it anymore and pulled Xiao Tu into their embrace again.


    Lin Fan just shook his head as he gave a sigh.


    Time passed and it was time for the alchemist exam.


    Since this was different from the Monster Tamer exam, the way that it was held was also different.


    Since this was a monthly event, they went all out in the venue.


    There was arge arena prepared and Lin Fan and Yuki were brought torge waiting rooms where there were already plenty of people gathered.


    It seemed like there were quite a few people who took these exams each month.


    They quickly found the young master from yesterday in the waiting room, but surprisingly, the young masterpletely ignored them. He just turned to his subordinate who hade in with him to say a few things before sitting down and closing his eyes, as if he was preparing for the exam.


    Lin Fan and Yuki both ignored this and waited for their turn to be called to the stage.


    Lin Fan was in the fifth round while Yuki was in the third round, so she was called to the stage before he was.


    Along with her went the young master from yesterday.


    He didn''t say anything to her, he didn''t even look at her as he walked into the corridor that led to the stage.


    Lin Fan made sure to ask one more time, "You''re sure you know what to do, right?"


    Yuki impatiently waved her hand at him and said, "I know, I know, stop being so annoying!"


    Then she headed out to the stage.


    There was a monitor that was set up in the waiting room, so Lin Fan could only watch with bated breath. He hoped that she wouldn''t go too far.


    ¡­


    After being brought out, Yuki''s group were sent to their own stations.


    When Yuki arrived at her station, she couldn''t help knitting her brows.


    While the station looked like it was the same as the other stations, it was clear that hers had been tampered with. However, she didn''t let any emotion show on her face as she took her ce.


    The judge came to the center of the stage and then said, "The rules of this first round are very simple. You have a recipe on the table in front of you and all the ingredients you need to make that pill. You will be given an hour and as long as the pill that you make can reach the normal standards, you will pass this first round."


    The rules were very simple and expected, so the judge didn''t waste that much time before starting the round.


    However, when the judge walked off the stage to watch from the side, Yuki didn''t miss the slight nod that the judge gave to the young master.


    It seemed like the corruption ran deep in the Alchemy King Hall.


    However, none of that mattered to her.


    Their interference was nothing more than adding a bit of impurities to her ingredients and tampering with her tools so that they weren''t as effective as the others. That was the limit of what they could do.


    But in front of her skills, none of that mattered.

 Chapter 721 Alchemist Exam (6)

    Yuki picked up the recipe and looked it over before looking at the others.


    It seemed like everyone had received a different pill recipe. She could see that everyone had also received different ingredients.


    This might have been a problem for someone else since the pill recipe that she was given was much harder than the others, but it wasn''t a problem for her since this recipe was just too basic for her.


    This would be as easy as taking candy from a baby.


    Without any hesitation, she created a blue me in her hand.


    This me wasn''t a normal me, it was a me that was made of ice. However, it wasn''t only cold like ice, it was also hotter than normal me in the center.


    She casually tossed this me in her pill cauldron, but she didn''t throw in any ingredients after tossing the pill in.


    Instead, the me burned inside the cauldron alone.


    What she was doing was refining the cauldron itself, fixing all the tampering that had been done with it so that she could use it normally. But of course, the people around her didn''t know this and there were some that even thought that she was messing up because of how nervous she was.


    "Look at that girl, she''s just standing there in a daze after putting the fire in the cauldron. Doesn''t she know that she has to add the ingredients too?"


    "Maybe her nerves are getting to her, you don''t know?"


    "Shh, does that matter? She''s a beauty, that''s all I need to know to cheer for her."


    Of course, thest words were the ones that filled the stadium since Yuki was indeed a beauty. She was a beauty that didn''t lose to Ang who was already the most perfect person that Lin Fan had ever seen.


    Even when she was hiding her true appearance, her beauty couldn''t be hidden.


    Of course, that was also because she had released some of her power hiding her true appearance.


    If she wanted to show off, it was better to show off with her beauty as well.


    It would make her feel better.


    After letting the me refine the cauldron, she took the ingredients and threw them in without any hesitation.


    As soon as the herbs touched the me ax there were sparks that appeared.


    This was a very bad sign since it shows that there were impurities in the medicinal liquid that Yuki was creating with her mes. The impurities inside of the medicinal liquid reacted with the mes to create these sparks.


    The more sparks there were, the more impurities there were in the mixture. The more impurities there were, the lower the grade of the pill.


    With how strong the sparks wereing from Yuki''s cauldron, no one believed that she would be able to create a high grade pill.


    Many people had already written her off and were certain that she would fail.


    "It really is a shame that such a beauty is failing."


    "Just because you''re beautiful, it doesn''t mean that you are skilled."


    "Maybe I can cheer her up after she fails the exam."


    When thisst sentence was said, many people realized that this person was right. They all turned to Yuki while some servants headed off to get information for these people.


    As for the young master, when he saw the sparks flying out of Yuki''s cauldron, he revealed a wide smile.


    He wasn''t able to do anything directly to Lin Fan, but it was impossible for him to let go of his revenge after how he had been shamed yesterday.


    Since he couldn''t take his revenge on Lin Fan, he would take it out on this girl who chose to go with him.


    But there was also a small part of him that felt it was a shame since she really was beautiful.


    He even started thinking that after the exam, he should go find this girl to steal her from Lin Fan.


    But of course, before that, he still had to pass this round first.


    So he stopped letting himself get distracted and started focusing on his own pill making.


    When he started focusing, there were different coloured glows that came from his cauldron.


    The audience wasn''t filled with people that were very knowledgeable about alchemy techniques, these were mainly people who hade to watch for fun and wanted to see if they could bring in any promising alchemists under them. So when they saw the different coloured glowsing from the young master''s cauldron, they didn''t really react.


    It was the referee who had given a nod to the young master before who reacted by showering the young master with praise for his techniques.


    This referee was an alchemist that was already acknowledged by the Alchemy King Hall, so his words did have weight. It made the people of the crowd pay even more attention than just having their eyes attracted by the different coloured glows to the young master.


    Even the superiors of this referee who had been monitoring him also started paying attention to the young master.<sub> </sub>


    Since the referee had already taken the young master''s bribe, naturally he would do his best to hype up the young master.


    The young master revealed a smile when he noticed that everyone''s eyes were on him and he became even more spirited as he put in more effort to his refining.


    Even if the referee had hyped him up, the young master''s technique was only considered unusual. It wasn''t rare enough for him to be considered a genius, but there was no one else that was showing enough talent to suppress him, so he was considered the genius of this batch.


    Of course, that all changed when Yuki made her move.


    She had been taking her time with her refining because she was waiting for the right moment.


    Now that the young master was finally focused on his refining, it was time for her to make her move.


    With a smile, she started controlling the fire in the cauldron to move in a different manner.


    As the mes followed her will, it separated the medicinal liquid in her cauldron in half.


    One was a drop of transparent liquid that was the pure medicinal essence of the herbs that she had just melted and the other was a pure ck drop.


    She separated the two to different sides of the cauldron, moving the transparent drop to the left and the ck drop to the right.


    Once the two were separated, she increased the power of the mes on the right side, increasing the temperature to a point that far surpassed any heat that she had produced before. As for the left side, she actually reduced the power of the me, making it just weak enough to keep the drop of medicinal essence in liquid form, but it wasn''t strong enough to refine it any longer.


    It was almost as if she had taken all the mes on the left side and had poured them to the right side to burn away the ck drop.


    As the heat on the right side increased, the ck drop started to tremble until smoke finally came out of it and it showed signs of evaporating.


    But once the smoke came out, there was a foul stench that filled the air.


    "What is this!"


    That was the crowd''s first reaction along with the urge to throw up.


    This was a scent that smelled like death, it was a scent that shouldn''t have existed in this world, but it currently filled the entire arena.


    Everyone immediately turned their attention to Yuki when this smell appeared and there were even people that had wanted to charge forward to stop her, which included the referee.


    He didn''t know what she was doing, but he knew that this was something that he had never seen before.


    Based on his experience, he knew that she had failed and he would stop her before she interfered with anyone else. Not to mention, that this gave him a direct chance to interfere with her.


    Since he had already taken the young master''s money, then there was no need for him to hold back.


    Not to mention, this girl''s body really was something else.


    As the referee prepared to make his move, there was a lewd look that appeared on his face.


    But before he could do a thing, there was a voice that stopped him.


    "This! This is the Concentration Purification Technique!"


    The referee immediately froze in ce when he heard this voice. This voice was his superior.


    While he was in charge of watching over this round, that didn''t mean that he was able to take care of everything. If something happened that he wasn''t able to take care of, there was someone else from the Alchemy King Hall who would take over.


    That was his superior, the head referee.


    He was only a Soul Realm Alchemy Expert, but the head referee was an Alchemy Master.


    There was noparing the gap in alchemy knowledge between the two.


    Since the head referee had spoken, naturally he as the subordinate couldn''t do a thing.


    But he couldn''t help asking, "Master, what is this Concentration Purification Technique?"


    The head referee didn''t reply right away as his eyes had been concentrated on Yuki''s cauldron, as if he was trying to see right into the cauldron to see what was happening inside.


    Then after a period of silence, the head referee said, "It''s a technique that separates all of the impurities in the ingredients and then burns them all away, leaving behind only the pure medicinal essence, but it''s very hard to perform because of the level of me control that is required."


    Then after a pause, he added, "Even I can''t use this technique."


    The referee looked at the head referee in shock.


    Even an Alchemy Master couldn''t use this technique?

 Chapter 722 Alchemist Exam (7)

    The referee looked back at Yuki in shock.


    Just who was this girl?!


    At the same time, there was a bitter smile that appeared on his face.


    It seemed like he had made a mistake¡­


    He had taken the young master''s money to mess with this girl because he had thought that it was a simple job. After all, he had never heard of this girl before and when he checked, there was no special information on her.


    He had assumed that she was just some randommoner, so it would be easy for him to mess with her.


    But now¡­


    However, he still couldn''t help asking, "But master, what about this smell?"


    The head referee revealed a bitter smile and said, "Well, that''s the one downside to this technique. It burns away the impurities that it separates from the ingredients and when those are burnt away, it creates a¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words, but it was clear what he was referring to.


    He was clearly referring to the stench that was currently assaulting their noses. Even if they tried their hardest, they still weren''t able to ignore it.


    The head referee shook his head with the same bitter smile and said, "It''s normally hard for people to ignore this smell and focus on their refining, but¡­" As he said this, he looked at Yuki with a look of admiration, "She''s able to keep her calm even with this stench and slowly burn away all the impurities. This is true talent."


    While he was saying this, many people in the crowd were getting close to vomiting. However, they were also very curious what kind of technique this was for the head referee to praise it this much.


    There were even many young masters whose eyes lit up.


    A beauty and an alchemy genius, if they could marry someone like that, they would be set for life.


    There were many young masters that started looking at her with even more fervourpared to before, as well as many more young masters that sent their servants to gather information on Yuki.


    But in this entire arena, the people who were suffering the most were the people taking the exam with Yuki.


    Refining pills was something that took great concentration and while they did have that, it was very hard for them to concentrate when their noses were being assaulted.


    They tried to hold on as much as possible, but it was clear by the fluctuations that came from their cauldrons they weren''t doing that well.


    Then after five minutes, the first cauldron exploded.


    This person wasn''t able to maintain a steady me with the stench that harassed his nose, so eventually he lost control of his me. With this me losing control, the pressure inside the cauldron built up until finally the cauldron itself exploded.


    Along with this explosion, the ingredients that he had been refining and the medicinal essence liquid that he had made were all burnt away.


    In the end, this person was left with a burnt face, a burnt cauldron, and nothing to show for it.


    The Alchemy King Hall had given two sets of ingredients since even the best alchemists failed. As long as he restarted his refining now, he would still be able to make it in time to pass this round.


    It was just too bad that there was still this powerful and foul stench in the air.


    Even if he wanted to try again with a second refinement, he knew that he would fail in the end. There was no way he could maintain his concentration with this kind of distraction.


    As he thought this, the person whose cauldron exploded looked at Yuki with a look of hatred and a bitter smile.


    If it wasn''t for this girl¡­


    <o>,m After the first cauldron exploded, there were several other cauldrons that also exploded.</o>


    This stench was just too powerful and no one was able to maintain their concentration with it in the air.


    Finally, the only ones that were still refining were the young master and Yuki.


    The young master had been focused on one particr thing, so he hadn''t been paying attention to the things around him. That fortunately also allowed him to ignore the powerful stench that had filled the air.


    However, once he finished with the part of his refinement he had been focused on, his mind rxed a bit as he prepared for the next step.


    As his mind rxed, his sense of smell came back to him and the foul stench hit him like a truck.<sub> </sub>


    The young master was trained, so he didn''t lose control of his me right away, but it really was hard for him to concentrate like this.


    The young master had been lost in his focus, so he didn''t know what was going on or where that stench came from.


    He quickly looked up around him and found that instead of looking at him, everyone was focused on Yuki. There was no one that was paying any attention to him.


    As he turned his gaze over to Yuki, he finally noticed where the stench wasing from.


    Without any hesitation, the young master turned to the referee andined, "I want to make a formalint against that contestant. She''s clearly using tricks to interfere with the other contestants! I advise that she immediately fail this exam and be escorted off the premises!"


    The referee red at the young master when he heard this as his heart almost jumped out of his chest.


    With the young master''s disy, it made it clear that there was some special rtionship between the two of them. If this was known by his superior, even his position in the Alchemy King Hall would be in danger.


    Didn''t this idiot hear what the head referee had just said?


    This was a special alchemy refining technique that even the head referee couldn''t use and he was calling it some tricks?


    What a joke!


    Even the crowd couldn''t help looking at the young master like he was a clown.


    He was nothing more than someone who was taking the alchemist exam and he was trying to dispute the words of a renowned Alchemy Master, this was just a little clown dancing his clown dance.


    The young master was surprised to see the referee ring at him, but he was still filled with confidence since he didn''t know anything. In fact, he had been so concentrated that he had ignored everything that had happened since he started focusing, which was why he didn''t hear what the head referee had said.


    So the young master said in a righteous voice, "This is clearly a mockery of the alchemist exam. She is just ying tricks to make others fail instead of taking this exam seriously. This could even be considered an insult to the Alchemy King¡­"


    Before he could finish, the head referee looked at him with a cold re and said in a low voice, "Shut your mouth."


    The young master immediately swallowed the words that he had been about to say.


    He could tell from the way that the referee looked at this old man that he wasn''t a normal old man. Before he knew who this old man was, it was better not to offend him since even the referee was scared of him.


    But the more important reason was that he didn''t have time to say anything since the next important part of his refining was beginning.


    This was a part that would take most of his concentration to do, so he didn''t have time to say anything in return.


    However, the problem was that he wasn''t able to enter a state of concentration.


    Whenever he tried to focus on refining his pill, he found that the stench in the air would assault his nose, making it impossible for him to enter a state of focus. Every time he tried, the stench would hit him right in the face and he was forced to close his eyes as tears filled them.


    This continued for several more minutes before he finally was unable to control the mes inside of his cauldron. The mes inside of his cauldron fluctuated several times as they became more and more unstable.


    The pressure continued to build from this temperature gradient until finally the cauldron couldn''t contain it anymore.


    With a resounding boom, mes burst out of the cauldron and hit the young master right in the face. The young master had been so shocked by the explosion that he wasn''t even able to raise his guard in time, letting the mes hit him right on for a few seconds before he raised his life energy barrier.


    When the mes disappeared and the young master''s face appeared again, his face had been scorched ck and even his eyebrows were gone.


    When the people in the crowd saw this, they couldn''t help bursting intoughter since his appearance really was just too funny.


    The young master had a stunned look on his face, but then he revealed a look of rage as he red at Yuki.


    Then without any hesitation, he triedining again to the referee as he said, "This is a clear attempt to sabotage this alchemist exam! I formally protest in the name of the Kong Family! I ask that this miscreant be dealt with immediately!"


    Since he had failed earlier, this young master knew that it would be useless to make anotherint unless he dragged his family into this matter. After all, his family did have some weight in this Alchemy King Hall branch.


    But the head referee just looked at him and said, "Focus on your own refining unless you''re done."


    The young master was shocked.


    He had even brought out his family, but he had been ignored like it meant nothing.


    Just what was going on here?

 Chapter 723 Alchemist Exam (8)

    The young master red at the referee once again, but this time, the referee didn''t even bother looking at him. He went out of his way just to look in the other direction, making sure that he didn''t see the young master.


    It was clear by his actions that he waspletely cutting off the young master.


    The young master was filled with rage when he saw this, but there was nothing he could do to vent this feeling at this moment. So without any other choice, he chose to focus on his refining.


    The most important thing for him was to pass this alchemist exam, so he didn''t have time to waste on this matter.


    But the problem was that the stench really made it hard for him to concentrate.


    So after thinking about it, the young master pulled something out of his Storage Ring that he ced in his nose and then focused on refining his pill.


    But even with these nose plugs in, he found that the stench was so strong that it prated through these nose plugs. In fact, with these nose plugs in, it was almost as if the stench had be stronger. It was as if the nose plugs had actually absorbed the stench which made it much worse.


    With this stench still assaulting him, he naturally still found it hard to concentrate.


    This time, it took him even less time than before for his cauldron to explode.


    He had been caught off guard once again, so the mes hit him right in the face and even swept across his clothes.


    When the mes disappeared, he stood therepletely covered in ck soot, painting a very sorry picture.


    The young master naturally couldn''t ept this arrangement and tried toin to the head referee again, but the head referee had already lost his patience with this idiot.


    Without any hesitation at all, the head referee called the guards on the young master who had already failed this exam.


    As he was being dragged out, the young master kept shouting out toin about Yuki and how she had sabotaged him. He even said that he would use the full power of the Kong Family to make the Alchemy King Hall pay for treating him like this.


    What he didn''t know was that his words had set about the destruction of the Kong Family in this Frost City.


    After he had been escorted out, the head referee called over one of the guards to whisper a few things in his ear before turning his attention back to Yuki.


    While Yuki had been refining, she had also been looking at the young master from the corner of her eyes. She had been waiting for him to make a move and when she finally saw him being kicked out, she revealed a faint smile before increasing the mes inside of the cauldron.


    That''s right, she had been deliberately slowing down the rate of the impurities being burnt away.


    With her skills and the mes that she controlled, she could have easily burnt the impurities that she had separated away a long time ago. The only reason that she had taken it slow was just to make the stenchst as long as possible.


    This was the n that Lin Fan had given her when they had talked alone.


    He had learned a bit about alchemy during his time in the trial illusion realm, so he had also picked up this technique there.


    With Yuki''s knowledge of alchemy, she was already aware of this technique and had learned it a long time ago.


    Since that was the case, it was perfect to use it here.


    The stench created by this technique really was unbearable for most people and only the greatest alchemist with the greatest levels of concentration would be able to ignore this.


    Lin Fan was certain that the young master wouldn''t be at this level, so he suggested this method to Yuki.


    It had gone as they had expected and in the end, he had even been thrown out by the Alchemy King Hall.


    It really made things easier when the other side was cliched and had shallow thoughts, it made it much easier for them to predict and deal with their ns.


    But now that the young master had been taken care of, there was no need for Yuki to continue stalling.


    With more mes appearing in the cauldron, the ck drop that had been slowly evaporating suddenly exploded with smoke as it started disappearing at a visible rate. In just a few seconds, the ck drop hadpletely disappeared from the cauldron.


    Once it disappeared, the stench that had filled the air was also gone and it was reced with a very fresh smell.


    This was a smell that was filled with the aura of life, which was the smell of pure medicinal essence.<sub> </sub>


    When the head referee smelled this, he knew that she had already seeded in eliminating all the impurities of the mixture. The only thing that was left for her to do was gather all of the medicinal essence together until it formed a pill, but that was the simplest thing for an alchemist to do.


    The real hard part of refining any pill was extracting and refining the medicinal energy found inside of herbs. Once that was done, shaping that medicinal energy into a pill was so simple that any alchemist could do it with their eyes closed.


    The fresh scent that came from the cauldron became stronger and stronger before suddenly disappearing. However, no one was surprised by the fact that the fresh scent had suddenly disappeared.


    Of course it would disappear once it waspressed into the form of a pill.


    The fact that not a single trace of that fresh scent remained was the more shocking thing since that meant that all of the medicinal energy of the herbs had been locked into the pill. Everyone was certain of one thing, this would be a pill of very high quality and purity.


    After the fresh scent disappeared, Yuki also stopped supplying mes to the cauldron and allowed the temperature of the cauldron to drop until it returned to normal. Once the temperature returned to normal, she reached in to pull out the pill that was in the center.


    As soon as she pulled it out, the head referee came to her side and started to look at the pill.


    Yuki was surprised to see this old man suddenlying to her side, but seeing how the referee acted around this man, she quickly figured out who this man was. She just moved to the side to give the head referee more room to check the pill.


    The head referee looked at Yuki with a grateful look before he continued looking over the pill.


    Everyone waited with bated breath as he continued looking over this pill, waiting for him to give his verdict.


    As the head referee looked over the pill, the expression on his face went from surprised to shocked to disbelief. He picked up the pill and brought it to his nose to take a sniff before he looked at Yuki with a shocked look.


    This pill¡­


    After taking a while to recover from his shock, he slowly said, "You pass this exam, you can go get ready for the next round."


    Yuki gave a nod in response and then turned to leave.


    After she left, the head referee just looked at the referee and said, "Clean up this mess and if you do anything like this again, I''ll personally take care of you."


    Without even waiting for the referee to say anything, the head referee headed off with the pill that Yuki had refined.


    The referee felt a chill run down his spine and he quickly gave a nod, but when he did, the head referee was already gone.


    The head referee ignored everything as he headed into upper levels of the Alchemy King Hall branch building.


    The exams were being held on the lower floors and the people that came for the exam were forbidden from going to the upper floors. That was because the upper floors were a restricted area that were only for the upper management of this Alchemy King Hall branch.


    Nothing stopped the head referee as he headed up to the top floors and as soon as he arrived, he smoothly headed to an office that was on the top floor.


    The person inside the office was surprised to see the head refereee in, but seeing the serious look on his face, he knew that the head referee didn''te in for nothing. He asked in a serious voice, "What happened?"


    The head referee didn''t say anything as he came right up to the desk and ced the pill that Yuki had refined in front of this person.


    The person in the office looked at the pill and after a few seconds, he revealed the same look of disbelief that the head referee had when he had inspected the pill after it had been refined.


    This person looked at the pill in a daze for a bit before turning to the head referee and asking, "Are you sure that this was made by an examinee?"


    The head referee nodded and said, "I watched them make it." Then after a pause, he added, "I even saw them using the Concentration Purification Technique¡­"


    The person revealed another shocked look as he said, "The Concentration Purification Technique? But that technique was lost a thousand years ago!"


    The head referee didn''t say anything in response to this.


    The person then revealed a thoughtful look before saying, "We have to report to headquarters, this isn''t something that we can handle alone."


    The head referee nodded in agreement to this.

 Chapter 724 Alchemist Exam (9)

    When Yuki came back to the waiting room, she looked at Lin Fan with a triumphant look.


    In return, Lin Fan gave a thumbs up and a wide smile.


    Their n had worked perfectly, so naturally they were happy.


    However, both of them also knew that it wouldn''t be the end with just this.


    After this exchange, Lin Fan came closer to whisper a few words besides Yuki''s ear.


    After hearing these words, Yuki revealed a smile and said, "You''re going to let me take care of them, right?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile and said, "Ang said that she wanted to take care of them herself."


    Yuki pouted her lips, but then she said with a smile, "Well, big sister should need some help with that."


    Before Lin Fan could say a thing, Yuki was already running off.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother stopping her since he knew that it would be useless. At the very least, he had already gotten watches for them, so they couldmunicate and meet up, so it wasn''t as if she was running off without any directions.


    Not to mention that she had already finished her exam for the day.


    The exam would be held over three days, with three different rounds, so Yuki was free today since she had already finished the first round. He was the only one that actually had to stay here.


    After the mess that she had caused, it seemed like it would take some time for them to prepare the arena for the next round of exams since there was still the smell from Yuki''s refinement in the arena. While there was the smell of the pill she refined that reced it, she had been burning the impurities for so long that the stench was much stronger andsted longer.


    It had been so bad that they had even evacuated the crowd since they couldn''t take it anymore.


    However, this was the Alchemy King Hall, one of the twelve great factions, so the time that it took them to remove the smell was much shorter than any other ce. After all, they were used to dealing with smells like this since they were an alchemist organization.


    Once the smell had been taken care of, it was Lin Fan''s turn to take the exam.


    Unlike Yuki, he passed the exam in a fairly normal manner, so he didn''t attract any attention. Other than being the first one to finish his refinement, no one noticed anything special about him.


    That was until the head referee came backter to check the pills that they had collected from the exam.


    The moment that he saw Lin Fan''s pill, his eyes immediately narrowed and he couldn''t help taking a cold breath. When he looked over Lin Fan''s pill, his face filled with shock and disbelief just like when he had looked over Yuki''s pill.


    After taking another deep breath, he immediately looked at the assistant beside him and asked in a serious voice, "Who was the one that made this pill?"


    The assistant was surprised to see how serious the head referee was, but they didn''t dare dy, so they quickly looked over the list of contestants before saying, "It was examinee 3042, Lin Fan."


    The head referee repeated to himself, "Lin Fan¡­" Then after a pause, he said, "Take care of the rest yourself, I''m taking this pill with me."


    Without even waiting for the assistant to respond, the head referee took the pill and headed off to the elevator.


    The assistant was just left there with a stunned look on his face, but he wasn''t able to say a thing since the head referee was already gone.


    The head referee took the elevator up to the top floor again and he went to the same office, but this time, there was another person that was in the office with the person from before.


    The new person was surprised to see the head referee running in, but then he asked, "What are you doing? Can''t you see that we''re in a meeting?"


    The head referee just took out the pill and ced it on the table with the pill that was already there without saying a thing. He made a gesture for the two of them to check the pill themselves.


    Both of the people who had been in office looked at the pill. They had calm looks on their faces at first, but then they couldn''t help revealing looks of shock as they moved in closer to examine the pill that the head referee had just brought in.


    The person who this office belonged to was the president of this branch and the new person who was having a meeting with the president was the vice president. Both of them were Alchemy Masters, so naturally they were qualified to examine this pill.


    The reason that they had been so shocked was that this pill was the same as the pill that Yuki had refined. Both of these pills had over 95% purity!<sub> </sub>


    This was something that neither of them could do, it was even something that was hard for the alchemists of the Alchemy King Hall headquarters to do.


    The vice president was the one who recovered first as he asked, "Where did you get this pill?"


    The head referee took out the list that he had and pointed out Lin Fan on the list before saying, "I didn''t see it because I was here talking to the president during that time, but it seems like there''s another monster that joined the exam this time as well."


    Both the vice president and the president stared at the two pills on the desk again and both of them had looks of deep thought on their faces. However, in their eyes, there were shes of excitement.


    While they were curious why there were two monsters that had shown up at the same time, they were excited since the Alchemy King Hall had seen ack of talent recently. Other than the disciple that the Alchemy Master had epted, there weren''t any other talented young alchemists.


    With thisck of talent, the future of the Alchemy King Hall had seemed dim, but now there were two monsters that had just appeared.


    Even if there was some hidden story behind why they had appeared at the same time, they were still alchemists and would have to go through the Alchemy King Hall for any future achievements. That meant that as long as they didn''t deliberately target the Alchemy King Hall, there was no way for them to have a negative rtionship with the Alchemy King Hall.


    As for targeting the Alchemy King Hall, they were the most neutral faction out of the twelve great factions, so that was even more impossible.


    The president finally said, "Find out as much information as you can about them. I want to know every single thing about them so we can avoid any mishaps. We have to pull them into our Alchemy King Hall."


    Then after a pause, he turned to the vice president and said, "Come with me to the headquarters right now. We have to report this to them and let the elders prepare themselves." Then he revealed a smile and said, "No matter which elder takes them in, we''re sure to receive the benefits as long as we inform them ahead of time."


    The vice president also revealed a smile and nodded in response to this.


    The head referee stood on the side with a smile as well.


    It seemed like they would be quite busy tonight.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan returned to the Hunters Organization, he found that Yuki and Ang were already back and they had gone out to y with Xiao Tu.


    Since he was the one who had registered their watches, he was also able to track them through their watches with the guardian feature that he had installed. That was right, he was treating the two of them like children¡­


    It didn''t take him long to find them, the three of them had been in an ice cream shop enjoying some fresh ice cream.


    Based on the number of bowls that were on their table and the number of waiters that were by their table with empty and full bowls, Lin Fan could guess that they''ve already had a lot. Then looking at the prices on the wall, his heart suddenly started to ache.


    Just like with the Blue Star, the food culture wasn''t as developed in this Gctic Humanity Alliance, so foods like ice cream were considered expensive luxuries. This store was a ce that only the rich were able to enjoy since foods like ice cream were in very short supply due to limited resources.


    Neither Ang or Yuki had any money for this upper realm since they didn''t work, so the ount that their watches were linked to was Lin Fan''s ount.


    That meant that he would be the one paying for everything.


    His heart hurt as much as the president''s heart had hurt this morning when he saw the bill for their mealst night¡­


    After all, these two girls might seem slim, but they were bottomless holes when it came to food¡­


    But still, there was nothing that Lin Fan could do, so he just epted it.


    When he came closer and he was able to hear their conversation, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    These two girls were talking about how they had beaten up the Kong Family earlier, but based on the words they were using, it seemed like they hadn''t held back¡­


    If they didn''t hold back and used their real power, wouldn''t they be discovered?


    Lin Fan quickly cut in and asked, "How much power did you use?"

 Chapter 725 Alchemist Exam (10)

    The two girls were surprised to see Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, but they were also unhappy with the way he doubted them.


    Yuki spoke first as she said with pouty lips, "We properly held back, why are you doubting us?"


    Lin Fan looked at her with a raised brow and said, "That doesn''t answer the question."


    Ang then said in a slightly cold voice, "Child Soul Realm."


    Lin Fan heard this and let out a sigh of relief before feeling a chill run down his spine.


    He had made a mistake.


    In his panic over worrying about whether the two of them could hold back, he had blurted out this question without caring about their feelings.


    Hearing the cold voice from Ang, he knew that he was in trouble, but he also knew that there was only one way to calm her down.


    With a bitter smile, he turned to the waiter and said, "Can you give me your biggest bowl and load it up with your top vours. Don''t worry about the cost, just give me the best that you have."


    Hearing this, both Ang and Yuki''s eyes lit up.


    Ang looked at Lin Fan with a cold look again before giving him a nod to show that she forgave him.


    Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief at that before turning to Xiao Tu.


    He saw that she looked much more confidentpared to when he first met her as she happily ate the ice cream with Ang and Yuki.


    But when she noticed that he was looking at her, she suddenly lowered her head.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile at this and said, "You don''t have to be afraid of me. Just treat me like you would treat your big sisters."


    Xiao Tu looked up slightly and gave a nod before saying, "Un, the big sisters really are amazing."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response and patted her on the head.


    When he did, Xiao Tu jolted before lowering her head again. He wasn''t able to see it, but there was a blush that had appeared on her cheeks along with a faint smile on her lips.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    It seemed like Xiao Tu hadn''t opened up to him as much as she had to the girls. But this wasn''t something that could be forced since he was different from the girls in the end.


    Girls had an easier time opening up to other girls and they had a harder time opening up to guys.


    This was just a rtionship that had to be built up over time.


    However, Ang suddenly gave a soft snort before taking Xiao Tu away from Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was confused when this happened since he didn''t understand why she was acting like this.


    Then when he tried to have a taste of the ice cream, he had his hand pped away with the spoon that Ang was holding.


    So Lin Fan could only sit there with an aggrieved look on his face as he watched them eating the ice cream, not knowing what he had done wrong.


    ¡­


    The next morning, their group headed back to the Alchemy King Hall branch for the second round of the exam.


    Lin Fan''s group had been in Frost City for a while now, so there was no need for Xiao Tu to guide them anymore, but they still had Xiao Tu guide them. Rather, it was more like Ang and Yuki wouldn''t let her escape¡­


    So she had no choice but to go with them to the Alchemy King Hall branch.


    It was even worse when Lin Fan and Yuki went off to take their exam. At that point, Xiao Tu was left to the grasps of Ang.


    She was forced to sit in Ang''sp while in the stand.


    There were plenty of people who red at her with looks of disdain, but they were all chased off by the chill from Ang''s re.


    In the waiting room, the reception that Lin Fan and Yuki received from the other examinees waspletely different.


    Lin Fan was treated normally without anyone taking any extra looks at him.


    But when it came to Yuki, they all looked at her with pensive looks filled with fear.


    They all knew about what she had done yesterday, but since the Alchemy King Hall hadn''t done anything, even going as far as praising her, it was clear that they couldn''t say anything about her.


    They just hoped that they weren''t in the same round as her because if she did the same thing as yesterday, they were certain that they wouldn''t be able to resist it.<sub> </sub>


    They were afraid that anyone who took the exam with her was certain to fail.


    So they were all praying that they weren''t in the same round as her.


    They had arrived early, so the listing hadn''t been made yet. When it came out, there were both sighs of relief and disappointed groans that rang out.


    The surprising thing for Lin Fan and Yuki was that they had been ced in very different groups.


    Lin Fan would be in the very first group while Yuki was ced in the veryst group.


    It was almost as if they were trying to keep the two of them apart¡­


    But no matter what the Alchemy King Hall had nned with this, it wasn''t something that mattered to Lin Fan or Yuki. They were certain that they would pass this exam since their level of alchemy far surpassed the level needed to pass.


    It was as easy as taking candy from a baby for them to pass.


    What they wanted to do waspletely different from what everyone else wanted.


    Since Lin Fan was in the first round, it didn''t take long before he was called to the stage.


    It was the same as the first round, he was brought to a station in the arena where there were ingredients and a recipe prepared for him.


    Everything was the same, but this time they were told that this was a pill of medium difficulty. Unlike the pill recipe that they received before, this would be much harder for them to refine.


    However, as soon as Lin Fan saw the recipe that he had been given, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    This pill recipe could be considered a medium difficulty pill for these examinees, but it was among one of the hardest medium difficulty pills there was. That was because this pill had many special things that one had to pay attention to to sessfully refine it.


    In terms of actual skills needed, it was no different from one of the hard difficulty pills.


    But this was something that Lin Fan was happy to see since he could tell that this was deliberately done.


    It wasn''t someone targeting him like the young master had done with Yuki, but rather, this was something that had been deliberately done by the Alchemy King Hall branch that ran the exam.


    It wasn''t that they were targeting Lin Fan, trying to make him fail this exam. Rather, it meant that they had their eyes on him and wanted to see his true abilities.


    This was what Lin Fan was trying to do with the pill that he had refined yesterday.


    He could even feel the head referee from yesterday sitting in a hidden corner staring at him, as if he was watching his every move.


    Since that was the case, he would give them a show.


    Lin Fan picked up the ingredients and casually threw them into his cauldron along with his me.


    This had been done so casually that many people even doubted him. They thought that he was someone who had been lucky to pass the first round and this was where he would be eliminated.


    But those that had sharp senses would be able to feel the strange feeling that wasing from the cauldron in front of Lin Fan.


    It wasn''t the bursting of energy that came from losing control of the cauldron and causing an explosion, but there was a strong energy that came from the cauldron that seemed like it would burst at any time. The strange part of it was that this strong energy seemed to be spinning.


    Again and again, it spun for a total of nine times before finally stopping.


    At that point, Lin Fan also pulled back his hand as he stopped supplying the cauldron with mes.


    Once the mes in the cauldron disappeared, the temperature inside the cauldron returned to normal before slowly opening to reveal the pill that was made.


    Once the pill was revealed, the head referee immediately came over to look at the pill.


    It was different from before where his face was filled with shock since he already had experience, but he still couldn''t hide the surprised look on his face.


    After a moment of silence, he looked at Lin Fan and said, "You pass."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and headed back to the waiting area.


    Because he didn''t use shy techniques, everyone thought that he had been lucky and received an easy recipe. Which was why when he headed off, there were even people who looked at him with looks of disdain.


    Then when it was Yuki''s turn, everyone became excited.


    After what happened yesterday, Yuki had already gained quite the reputation.


    Since she had already used the Concentration Purification Technique, she had no choice but to use it again today to the chagrin of her fellow examinees.


    In the end, she was the only who passed just like the first round.

 Chapter 726 Alchemist Exam (11)

    The rest of the day passed normally and then it was time for the third and final round of the exam.


    The number of examinees had already been narrowed down to the point where everyone could take the exam together, so they were all brought out at once. However, instead of being brought to a station that had ingredients and a recipe prepared for them, they were brought to different seats set up in the arena.


    When Lin Fan saw these seats, he couldn''t help revealing an awkward smile.


    That was because these seats looked like something from his past life¡­


    These seemed like seats that they would use for those trivia game shows. Even the buzzer that was ced in the center of the desk in front of the seat was just like the ones used in the game shows he used to watch¡­


    He couldn''t help wondering what this whole thing was about.


    After they had all been seated, the referee came forward to say, "Now that you''ve been tested on practical skills, the next test that you will be receiving will be a test of your theoretical knowledge."


    The referee came up to one of the desks and pointed at the various features as he exined them, "This deskes with a pen and paper for you to write your questions on and once you have finished them, they will be checked by the referee that we have assigned to each of you. They will then dere whether you have answered the question correctly or not with the board behind you."


    Behind each of the desks was a board that had a red and green light, which was pretty self exnatory.


    After he finished with his exnations, the referee didn''t wait at all as he said, "We''ll now be giving the first question."


    The referee moved to the side to allow another person toe forward to give the questions.


    The person who came forward was the head referee from before who had basically shadowed Lin Fan and Yuki.


    When he gave his question, his gaze was even on Lin Fan and Yuki who had been given seats right beside each other.


    The head referee said, "When the Sr Dragon Herb is mixed with the Lunar Phoenix Herb, the bnced effect of these two herbs should create a very strong healing effect. However, when mixed in a 1:1 ratio, the resulting mixture will always explode. Why is this?"


    This was a very simple question since it was a question about herbs that could be found everywhere in this upper realm. It was something that people had long experimented with and had found the reason for already.


    Of course, this was just the first question which was why it was so easy.


    However, even with how easy this first question was, there were some people that couldn''t answer it.


    But that wasn''t the case with Lin Fan and Yuki as they buzzed in seconds after the question had been asked.


    The referees behind them only took a single nce before dering that their answer was correct.


    Once the time was up, the head referee stopped them from answering and revealed the answer, "Because the yang energy contained within the Sr Dragon Herb is stronger than the yin energy of the Lunar Phoenix Herb, it requires a 2:1 ratio instead of a 1:1 ratio to bnce out."


    When he revealed the answer, there were some people who hadn''t been able to answer the question who became even more discouraged.


    But then they all focused their minds as they prepared for the second question.


    It was just too bad that when the second question came, everyone was stunned¡­Well, everyone except for Lin Fan and Yuki.


    The head referee said, "The second question. When you control your me to refine ingredients, why do you always have the me spin clockwise instead of counterclockwise?"


    This seemed like a very simple question, but in fact, it was a trick question.


    Even most Alchemy Masters had trouble exining this phenomenon.


    However, Lin Fan and Yuki weren''t stumped by this question at all as they immediately started writing. Almost at the same time, the two of them hit their buzzers to indicate that they had finished with their answers.


    The two referees behind them came to check, but unlikest time, they didn''t approve of the answers right away.


    The two referees stood there for a while with knitted brows, but they didn''t pass or fail their answers in the end. Instead, they called for the head referee toe over to verify the answer.


    The head referee was confused why the two referees would ask for him, but he soon found out the reason.


    That was because the answers that Lin Fan and Yuki gave werepletely different from the sample answer that they had prepared, but the thing was that their answers weren''t incorrect.<sub> </sub>


    The answers that both Lin Fan and Yuki gave were far beyond the level of the normal generic sample answer that they had prepared, so the two referees really weren''t able to verify if the information contained within these answers were correct.


    They had no choice but to call for the head referee.


    However, even the head referee wasn''t able to understand everything that was written in Lin Fan and Yuki''s answers.


    He tried his best to verify this answer, but as he continued reading over the answer, he found that these answers contained theories that even he had never heard about. But when he tested them in his mind, he found that they were feasible.


    After he finished reading the answers of the two, he had no other choice.


    The head referee nodded at the referees to leave this matter with him before saying into the microphone, "There''s been a small incident, so we''ll be taking a short break to deal with this before resuming the exam."


    Then without even waiting for anyone to say anything, the head referee quickly headed off.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan and Yuki with suspicious looks when they heard this. After all, the head referee had only run off after seeing their answers.


    After around ten minutes, the head referee came back with Lin Fan and Yuki''s answers to talk to the referees before the referees had epted their answers.


    Once this was done, the head referee took the microphone and specifically stated something, "The answers of these two examinees were judged to be a higher level than the answer expected, so they have both been given extra points in their total score."


    As he said this, his eyes swept over the crowd as if he was stressing this to everyone.


    The crowd didn''t say anything in response to this, there were even many people who turned from his gaze.


    After that, the head referee continued on with the exam like nothing had happened.


    However, with the two extreme variables known as Lin Fan and Yuki here, there was no way that the exam would continue as normal.


    Just like with the second question, every question that followed after that required the head referee to run off to check the answers that the two of them gave. Then every time that he came back, he announced that both Lin Fan and Yuki would be receiving extra points to their total.


    By the time that the exam was finished, both Lin Fan and Yuki had more than double the points that everyone else had. They even had double the maximum number of points that they could have earned from the exam.


    That was just how many extra points that they had been given.


    There were others who had passed the exam, but they were all ignored as all eyes were on Lin Fan and Yuki.


    After all, if it happened once or twice, it could still be considered a fluke.


    For the head referee to run and check the answer for every single question, it could no longer be considered a fluke. Not to mention that this was a public exam that was held by the Alchemy King Hall, they wouldn''t fake something like this since it would harm their reputation, so this had to be real.


    If that was the case, just what kind of monsters were Lin Fan and Yuki that even Alchemy Masters couldn''t match their knowledge?


    They would certainly be pirs in the Alchemy King Hall in the future, so everyone wanted to build a rtionship with them. It was just too bad that once the exam was over, the head referee immediately called Lin Fan and Yuki away.


    The two of them were led by the head referee through the Alchemy King Hall branch until they came to an elevator which they took to the top floor. When they came out of the elevator, they were brought into the office that took up the top floor.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he couldn''t help feeling that this ce was very simr to the president''s office at the Hunters Organization.


    When they came in, they saw that there were two men that were waiting for them.


    These were the same two men who had talked to the head referee two nights ago. They were the vice president and the president of this Alchemy King Hall branch.


    The two of them had serious looks as they looked at Lin Fan and Yuki, but the president gestured for the two of them to sit down which they obliged with.


    Once they were both seated, the president leaned forward and said, "You two really are something. Not just your pill refining skills, but also your theoretical knowledge is something else. You know many things that even we don''t know."


    Then his eyes became sharp as he asked, "So why have youe here?"

 Chapter 727 Alchemy King Hall (1)

    Lin Fan and Yuki could feel the hostility that came from the president.


    The president was excited about the possibility of two monsters showing up for this exam at first, but with all the things that Lin Fan and Yuki demonstrated, it was hard for him not to be suspicious.


    So he had no choice but to interrogate the two of them which was what he was doing now.


    However, Lin Fan and Yuki didn''t feel any pressure from this president at all since this president was only in the Child Soul Realm, so he wasn''t any threat to the two of them.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "We want to go to the Alchemy King Hall headquarters and we thought that the best way would be to stand out." Then after a pause, he said with a smile, "But it seems like we stood out too much."


    The president looked over at Yuki, but seeing that she wasn''t saying anything, he turned back to Lin Fan to say, "Then are you nning on taking any hostile actions against the Alchemy King Hall?"


    Lin Fan calmly faced his cold re and said, "We don''t have any hostility towards the Alchemy King Hall, but that will depend on the actions of the people from the Alchemy King Hall."


    The president kept looking at Lin Fan, but seeing his clear eyes, he could tell that he was being truthful.


    There was no fault with what he said since after all, arge organization like the Alchemy King Hall wasplicated. There were many rtionships between the higher ups and if there was a conflict of interest, that would mean that they would have a hostile rtionship.


    When one had to retaliate because of this situation, it wasn''t a strange thing or anything that required me.


    So the president just gave a nod in the end before saying, "Alright, we''ve already contacted the Alchemy King Hall and they''re already expecting you. You''ll be receiving certification as Master Alchemists today and you''ll be learning from the elders who are Grandmaster Alchemists." After a pause, the president added, "As for which elder you go under, that will be up to you, but I can rmend the second and sixth elders."


    The president didn''t forget to rmend the two elders that he was under.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but then there was someone else that came into the room.


    When he turned to look, he found that it was Xiao Tu and Ang.


    Ang had a clear wary look on her face since she could guess what was happening here, but she couldn''t stop Xiao Tu from pulling her into the room.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but before he could, the president suddenly said with a smile, "Tu Tu, what are you doing here?"


    Xiao Tu didn''t hesitate at all as she let go of Ang''s hand to run over to the president''s side. Then to everyone''s shock, she jumped into the president''s arms and hugged him as she said, "Uncle!"


    Well, it wasn''t everyone that was shocked, it was just Lin Fan''s group.


    But as he watched this, he quickly figured out what was happening.


    The uncles that Xiao Tu mentioned before, the president of this Alchemy King Hall branch, was one of them.


    It made sense since for a demihuman like Xiao Tu to openly walk through Frost City, just the influence of the Hunters Organization branch president wasn''t enough. It would require the influence of multiple powerful people to stop the citizens from just killing her.


    He couldn''t help wondering who the other uncles that Xiao Tu mentioned were¡­


    While he was pondering this, Xiao Tu suddenly came out of the president''s arms and crossed her arms at her hip as she said in an angry voice, "Are you bullying big brother and big sister?"


    The president revealed a warm smile when he saw this before shaking his hand and saying, "Of course not Tu Tu, uncle was just having a talk with them about their future. The Alchemy King Hall headquarters is interested in taking them in, so I was just discussing the details with them."


    Xiao Tu revealed a surprised look before also revealing a smile and said, "I knew that uncle was the best!" She went forward and hugged the president again who also revealed a happy smile.


    After a while, they finally let go of each other and the president turned back to Lin Fan''s group as he said, "I never imagined that you also knew Tu Tu. Since you can get Tu Tu to call you big brother and big sister, then you aren''t bad people and I''m more assured in sending you to the Alchemy King Hall headquarters."


    But then he also came forward to grab Lin Fan by the cor to pull him in as he said in a low threatening voice, "But if you think that I''ll ever hand Tu Tu over to you, you''re dreaming!"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he also said, "I promise I''m not interested in Xiao Tu."


    The president didn''t let go when he heard this and he lifted Lin Fan by the cor again as he said, "You don''t think that our Xiao Tu is cute enough? I''ll kill you!"


    Lin Fan had a speechless look on his face when he heard this.


    This president of the Alchemy King Hall branch was just the same as the president of the Hunters Organization branch¡­No, this one was worse.


    At the very least, the president of the Hunters Organization branch had been able to hold back until he was drunk, but the president of the Alchemy King Hall branch didn''t hold back at all.


    But in the end, it was Xiao Tu who came to save Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    Xiao Tu came in between Lin Fan and the president as she said, "Uncle, it''s not like that at all. Stop embarrassing me."


    But as she said this, there was a blush on her face that made it seem very unconvincing.


    The president looked like he was about to cry tears of blood, but he couldn''t just lose his temper with Xiao Tu in front of him like this. So in the end, he said through gritted teeth, "Well, let''s just leave this matter like this for now."


    He quickly changed his tone as he said, "How about you head off to the Alchemy King Hall headquarters right away? They''re already expecting you, so you can just take our transport gate."


    It was clear what kind of ulterior motives that he had, but that was fine for Lin Fan since he wanted to get to the Alchemy King Hall headquarters as soon as possible.


    He was worried about Song Shu and they had already wasted three days for this alchemist exam. He didn''t want to waste anymore time here.


    But before they could go, Xiao Tu suddenly asked in a sad voice, "Big brother, big sisters, you''re leaving already?"


    Seeing the way that she looked at them with her big sad eyes and her ears hanging low, they almost couldn''t say anything. However, they still had to leave in the end.


    So Lin Fan took the initiative to say, "Xiao Tu, we''re going to get another big sister for you to y with, but this time she''ll be around the same age as you. When we get back, you can y all you want with this new big sister."


    Xiao Tu''s eyes lit up when she heard this and she asked, "Really?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Un, so just wait a bit. We''ll be back soon."


    Xiao Tu gave a nod in response to this.


    Lin Fan turned to Ang to say, "Can you take Xiao Tu out for a bit? I have something I want to ask the president."


    Ang gave a nod and took Xiao Tu out.


    Once Xiao Tu was gone, Lin Fan turned back to the president and asked, "What do you know about the Alchemy Master''s disciple?"


    The president knitted his brows as he asked, "Why are you asking this?"


    Lin Fan said with a faint smile, "Well, I have a little bit of a connection with her."


    The president thought about what he had said before and then said with a smile, "So it''s like that¡­"


    But in the end, he still told Lin Fan everything he knew about the situation in the Alchemy King Hall headquarters.


    When he was done, he said to Lin Fan, "If you''re going to do something, the only thing that I can ask is that you don''t take it too far. It''s not the Alchemy Master''s fault, it''s just that¡­"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I''ll do what I can."


    Hearing this, the president gave a nod and said, "Thank you."


    After that, Lin Fan''s group was led down to the basement where the transport gates were.


    He quickly sent a message to old man Qiao telling him that he won''t being back through the Hunters Organization transport gate before heading to the Alchemy King Hall headquarters.


    When he was leaving, Xiao Tu hade to say goodbye.


    She reached her hand out with her pinky outstretched and said, "You''ll keep your promise, right?"


    Lin Fan did a pinky swear with her and said, "Absolutely."


    So with her waving with a smile, Lin Fan''s group went through the transport gate.


    When they came out the other side, there was already someone waiting for them.


    It was a youngdy who was in an alchemist''s robe.


    The youngdy bowed before saying, "Young master Lin, young miss Yuki, we''ve been expecting you. I''ve been sent by the seventh elder to wee and guide you."

 Chapter 728 Alchemy King Hall (2)

    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he saw this.


    It seemed like the old snakes moved quite quickly. But not only that, they were also quite decisive.


    They had only heard about Lin Fan and Yuki through reports, but they haven''t seen their real abilities just yet, so it was still a gamble to wee them this earlier. Still, they were willing to send people to wee them which showed their decisiveness.


    It was no wonder they were able to be elders of one of the twelve great factions.


    Not just that, this was one of the twelve great factions with the greatest internal struggle since this wasn''t a family inherited faction or a sect with traditions. This was a ce where anyone with talent was able to rise up, so that meant that there were many people struggling for the same position.


    The amount of internal struggle was much greater than any other faction.


    However, before Lin Fan could say anything to the youngdy who came to wee them on behalf of the seventh elder, there was another young man who came over. This young man was also wearing the robe of an alchemist.


    The young man gave a snort before saying, "It seems like your seventh elder faction really likes to sneak around."


    Then before giving the young woman a chance to say anything, this young man came forward with a smile and said to Lin Fan, "Young master Lin, young miss Yuki, I am here to wee you on behalf of the tenth elder. Pleasee with me, I have already prepared a banquet for your arrival."


    This young manpletely ignored the youngdy from before, standing right in between her and Lin Fan''s group.


    The youngdy was about to lose her temper, but there were two more people that came forward to wee Lin Fan.


    These two people were from the eleventh and fifth elder factions respectively.


    This was something that really caught Lin Fan off guard since he never expected this many people toe and wee him. In a sense, he had underestimated the Alchemy King Hall.


    However, even if that was the case, he had already decided what he would do before he even came here.


    Lin Fan looked at the people who had gathered here for him who were all ignoring each other and said with a polite smile, "I want to thank everyone for their kind invitations, but we have just arrived, so we would like to settle in first. Can someone please tell us where our assigned rooms are?"


    All of the people who came to invite Lin Fan narrowed their eyes when they heard this, but then all of them revealed smiles before offering to take them there.


    Lin Fan once again rejected all of their offers and just asked for them to point the way.


    All of them clearly had something else to say, but then there was a person who had the clothes of a staff member who came forward to say, "Young master Lin, young miss Yuki, I''ll show you to your rooms."


    Lin Fan could tell that this one wasn''t here with ulterior motives, rather they weren''t qualified to have ulterior motives since they were just a normal staff member. They were only here to do their job and show him to his room.


    He could tell all this because of the fear that this person showed towards the other four who came before.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan said, "Alright, take us there then."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind the other four who came and followed this staff member to their rooms.


    Along the way, once they were out of earshot of the other four, Lin Fan asked, "I heard that your Alchemy King Hall''s Alchemy Master has a disciple. Do you know where she is?"


    The staff member was surprised to have this question suddenly asked of him, but he quickly said, "That isn''t hard to find out since the Alchemy Master''s disciple is the center of attention these days. She lives in the center Alchemy Tower since she''s the Alchemy Master''s disciple." Then after a pause, he said, "But the Alchemy Master''s disciple hasn''t been outtely and has rejected anyone who has tried to meet with her. If you''re interested, I''m afraid¡­"


    Lin Fan gave augh before saying, "I was just curious about the rumours, nothing more, nothing less." Then he said with a sharp look, "After all, soon all the rumours will be about me."


    The staff member gave a gulp when he heard this, but he wisely chose not to say anything else since he knew that people who were arrogant like this would either fall quickly or have the ability to back it up.


    In either case, this wasn''t a person that he should get involved with since he was just a normal staff member. This person knew his ce and he knew that he would live longer as long as he didn''t overreach.


    Lin Fan saw this and didn''t say anything else since he didn''t care about this person.<sub> </sub>


    It was the same with how he had refused the offers of all the elder factions from earlier.


    Right now the thing that hecked the most was information and without information, he wouldn''t be able to make a move. So it was best not tomit to any side first before getting that information.


    The other goal that Lin Fan had right now was to connect with Elder Fu.


    Elder Fu was the one who had brought Song Shu to the Alchemy King Hall from the Blue Star, but more importantly, Lin Fan had met him before. He knew that Elder Fu was someone who cared about Song Shu, so he knew that he would be able to trust Elder Fu.


    Since Elder Fu was one of the elders of the Alchemy King Hall, he would be able to help Lin Fan with his n.


    But the problem with this n was that he couldn''t directly contact Elder Fu without offending the other elders. After all, if he were to contact Elder Fu, the other elders would think that he would be turning down their offers and was approaching Elder Fu''s faction.


    While Lin Fan didn''t know which faction Elder Fu was a part of, he was certain that he would be making some enemies by doing this.


    Before he had set up a n to help Song Shu, it was best to make as few enemies as possible since that would just make things harderter on.


    So after being shown to their rooms, Lin Fan immediately started thinking of ways to contact Elder Fu.


    One interesting thing to note was that they had been given separate courtyards.


    It was clear that they were trying to separate them to make it easier to pick them off one by one, but the courtyards that they were given were much bigger than normal because of their special status. In the end, it was no problem for all of them to live in a single courtyard.


    However, before they could even make a move, the others had made a move for them.


    They had arrived in the afternoon, so that very night, they had been invited to a banquet that was held to wee them.


    If it was being held by just a single elder, it would have been fine to reject them, but this was a banquet that was held by multiple elders and had several other elders from different factions on the guest list. Even if they didn''t want to go, they didn''t have a choice.


    The banquet was being held by four different elders, the third, the fifth, the eighth, and the eleventh elders, but the number of elders that came surpassed double digits.


    With all these elders here, there was a strong hostile atmosphere even though they were clearly acting like everything was fine.


    The elders all looked at Lin Fan and Yuki like they were delicious pieces of meat and they couldn''t wait to bite into them, but Lin Fan and Yuki just ignored all of this.


    After all, this banquet had turned out to be a blessing in disguise since Elder Fu had alsoe to the banquet.


    As it turned out, Elder Fu was actually the grand elder of the Alchemy King Hall, or at least he was the grand elder now.


    The previous grand elder had retired and the spot had opened, so Elder Fu had been promoted by the Alchemy Master since he had brought back Song Shu who had be the Alchemy Master''s final apprentice.


    However, because of what was happening in the Alchemy King Hall, Elder Fu was a person that attracted a lot of attention and he had been surrounded by many people as soon as he had arrived.


    But out of the corner of his eyes, he had been paying attention to Lin Fan as well.


    He hade because he heard that this was a banquet to wee Lin Fan, a name that was very familiar to him. He hade to check if this was the person that he was acquainted with and to his surprise, it really was.


    However, just like Lin Fan, he couldn''t contact him for the same reasons.


    He didn''t know what Lin Fan was nning on doing, but he had a good idea, so he didn''t want to ruin Lin Fan''s ns.


    What no one noticed was that during this banquet, there was a small rat that ran through the hall to where Elder Fu was.

 Chapter 729 Alchemy King Hall (3)

    The banquet continued on as normal and many different people approached Lin Fan, especially the elders, but he didn''t ept any of their invitations in the end.


    The elders were clearly unhappy about this, but they didn''t let it show on their faces since their rivals were also here.


    Still, even if they were unhappy, this didn''t affect how they treated Lin Fan. Until he chose a side, he was still someone that they wanted to win over. Especially after they had talked to him and found that his knowledge of alchemy might not be below their own.


    Yuki on the other hand acted more coldly, but still, she was treated the same because of the alchemy knowledge that she disyed.


    So after the banquet, Lin Fan and Yuki were given plenty of presents by the elders that they couldn''t refuse.


    However, none of that mattered since they had somewhere they had to get to.


    When they arrived in this empty building, Ang suddenly appeared in front of them.


    Lin Fan asked, "Is the area clear?"


    Ang gave a nod before going to sit down at the table on the side.


    Ang had been there with them at the banquet, but she had also snuck out early to secure this ce with Brainy''s puppets.


    That was because they were about to meet someone here, someone that would be the key part of their n.


    A few minutester, there was a person that came in through the door and asked, "Is it really you?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod to this person and said, "It''s me, I came up from the Blue Star."


    When the person heard the words "Blue Star", he came out to reveal his face. It turned out that the person that Lin Fan was meeting was actually Elder Fu.


    As for how he had gotten word to him about this meeting¡­He had used Brainy''s rat puppet to sneak a message to Elder Fu during the banquet.


    With his shadow and soundws developing further, he was able to easily sneak the rat through the banquet hall without anyone noticing. Even Elder Fu had been surprised to find the message that had suddenly appeared in his pocket.


    However, since the message had contained information about Song Shu before she had met him, he chose to follow this message and meet with the person this message was from.


    As he had expected, it was Lin Fan.


    After he came into the room, the first thing he did was give a sigh before bowing his head to Lin Fan and saying, "It''s my fault, I couldn''t keep my promise."


    Before he had left with Song Shu, he had promised that he would keep her safe.


    With the current situation of the Alchemy King Hall, it was clear that he had broken that promise.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first, but then he waved his hand and said, "It''s not your fault¡­It''s those greedy old fools'' fault."


    Elder Fu didn''t correct the way he had described the elders, instead he asked, "What is your n?"


    Lin Fan said, "I don''t know since I don''t have enough information right now. I need to ask you a few things before I cane up with a n."


    Elder Fu gave a nod before saying, "Alright, ask me whatever you need to ask."


    Over the next half an hour, Lin Fan asked Elder Fu many different questions. There were some that he wasn''t able to answer since they were specific questions about certain elders, but most of the questions he was able to answer.


    After he had received all his answers, Lin Fan fell into deep thought for a few minutes.


    There was a period of silence before Lin Fan said, "I have a n, but it might not be one that you like."


    Elder Fu knitted his brows as he asked, "Why? Is it going to put Xiao Song Shu in danger?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer right away, but eventually he gave a nod and exined his n.


    It took another few minutes before he finished exining his n, but by the end of it, Elder Fu suddenly pped the table that they had been sitting at and shouted, "No, there are too many unstable variables to your n! I won''t ept it!"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "What can''t you ept?"


    Elder Fu sat down again and said, "First, your n depends too much on how you predict the elders will act. They might be old fools, but they are still old fools that have held their positions for many decades, so they are quite shrewd. They won''t act the way that you think they will."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan shook his head and argued, "That might be true normally, but this time there''s another variable that cancels that out. As long as we use that variable, it''ll cancel out everything since this will be the best chance that they have."


    Elder Fu knitted his brows immediately and refuted, "But that variable is the one that will put Xiao Song Shu at risk. Do you really think I''ll allow that?"


    Then after calming down, he said, "I''ll only ept a n where there''s no chance that Xiao Song Shu will be at risk. If there isn''t one, then we''ll just wait for an opportunity to reverse the situation. At the very least, if the current situation persists, they won''t have a chance to do anything."


    Lin Fan once again shook his head as he said, "That''s not the case. Even if this situation persists, they will still try to find their chances."


    After saying this, Lin Fan took out two pieces of paper from his Storage Ring that he ced in front of Elder Fu.


    Elder Fu was confused at first, but then when he read the letters that had been ced in front of him, he deeply knitted his brows and asked Lin Fan in an anxious voice, "Where did you get these?"


    The letters that Lin Fan had just taken out were letters between elders who were nning on allying with each other to force Song Shu to get married. As long as they worked together, they would be able to gain enough influence that they could forcefully set this matter.


    By the time that the Alchemy Master came back, it would already be toote since this would have be a matter that was epted by everyone. If he wanted to go back on it, it would be a p to his face and would be very hard for him to ept.


    These letters had been found by Lin Fan before the banquet.


    With Brainy''s puppets, it was easy for him to find these things.


    Since he had no information after arriving in this ce, he hadn''t been idle. His greatest advantage was the information seeking abilities that Brainy had, so of course he would put them to full use.


    Specifically, these two letters had been found in the residences of the seventh elder and the eleventh elder who had sent people to wee him.


    He had Brainy''s puppets follow the people who had been sent to wee him and he had found these almost right away. It wasn''t even hidden, they were ced out in the middle of the elders'' residences.


    It seemed that these elders had gottencent after thinking that their ns were about to seed¡­


    But it wasn''t Lin Fan''s ce to judge them.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying a thing, Elder Fu fell into a state of deep thought.


    He naturally knew why Lin Fan had taken these things out and he knew that even if Lin Fan gave these things to him, he wouldn''t have been able to do anything with them.


    In fact, the Alchemy Master faction that he followed was the weakest since in this situation, everyone wanted to gain advantages while he was away, so even the people in the same faction as him were plotting against Song Shu.


    After all, it was almost certain that Song Shu would be the future Alchemy Master, so as long as they could get their disciples to marry her, their position would be secured in the future.


    So in this situation, even if Elder Fu had these letters, no one would trust them or back him up, even if he could prove that they were written in the handwriting of the elders.


    Lin Fan had brought these out to force Elder Fu since he was basically saying that Elder Fu had no choice but to ept his n. If he didn''t ept his n, it was only a matter of time before Song Shu''s wedding was forcefully decided.


    Elder Fu gritted his teeth for a long time, but in the end, he had no choice but to say, "I can ept this n, but you have to tell me what tricks you have up your sleeve that you''re so confident that this n will work."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile at this, but he still gave a nod and said, "Alright, that''s not a problem."


    Then he began exining a few more things to Elder Fu.


    ? By the end of it, the look of Elder Fu''s face had rxed a bit, but he still seemed like he was worried.


    But in the end, he said in a defeated voice, "We''ll follow your n, but I have to say that I''m still very against it."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "That''s fine. It''s not like you have any other choices."


    Elder Fu gave a sigh before saying, "Why does it seem like I''m making a deal with the devil?"


    Lin Fan just sat there with a smile on his face, but then he suddenly thought of something and said, "Right, don''t tell Song Shu that I''m here."


    Elder Fu was confused when he heard this as he asked, "Why not? I''m sure that she''ll be happy to know that you came for her."


    Lin Fan shook his head and as he simply said, "It''ll be more fun this way."


    Elder Fu was even more confused, but Lin Fan didn''t offer any more exnation beyond that.

 Chapter 730 Alchemy King Hall (4)

    The next morning, as soon as Lin Fan woke up, he went out of his courtyard and started walking around the Alchemy King Hall.


    There were still two days before their n was put into action, so he had two days to walk around the Alchemy King Hall and gather as much information as he could.


    Though it was like this, the ones that would be gathering the information would be Brainy''s puppets. He would just be walking around releasing those puppets and putting stealthws on them to keep them hidden.


    The Alchemy King Hall headquarters was surprisingly big.


    It wasn''t in a city like the Hunters Organization headquarters was, but rather it was built in a valley on its own.


    This entire area was just for the Alchemy King Hall. There were no civilians or people from other forces that lived in this ce.


    It was almost urate to describe this ce as an alchemy sect rather than an organization made for alchemists.


    There were many different Alchemy Towers that were found all over this valley, so there was a lot of ground that Lin Fan had to cover.


    Not to mention that each of these Alchemy Towers belonged to an elder and all the elders were Nascent Soul Realm Experts. So unless he personally came to apply the stealthws, it would be very unlikely that the puppets would be able to sneak in.


    However, with Lin Fan''s strongerws, it was easy for these puppets to sneak right in.


    Of course, there were still ces that couldn''t be essed by the puppets. These ces were important ces to each of the elders, such as their private rooms or their storage rooms that had important herbs stored.


    These were rooms that had special barriers around them that prevented anyone from going in.


    Still, even if he couldn''t go into these rooms, there were still plenty of other rooms for Lin Fan to search through.


    Such as the rooms of the elders'' disciples.


    There was quite a bit of information that could be gathered from these disciples since they were just as sloppy as their masters. Most of them put sensitive information out in the open in their rooms as if they didn''t care who saw it.


    Of course, that was only because they trusted the barriers that were around each of the Alchemy Towers.


    These were barriers that could even keep out Nascent Soul Realm Experts, so there was no need for them to worry if they kept their things out in the open.


    While he was moving through the Alchemy King Hall headquarters, he was also able to meet many different people.


    These people all knew about Lin Fan because of the banquetst night and because of their own factions. Everyone knew about his talent and they all wanted to pull him to their faction, so there were many people who approached Lin Fan to talk to him.


    Lin Fan naturally didn''t turn them away because he knew that the more people he talked to, the more information that he could obtain.


    So he started talking about some of the simple things, but then he slowly brought the topic to Song Shu, or rather who were the top candidates to marry her.


    The regr disciple that he was talking to had to think for a bit before saying, "The Alchemy Master''s disciple? Hmm, are you interested in her, brother Lin?"


    Lin Fan just casually said with a smile, "I''m not personally interested, but you should know how important her marriage is. Especially the person who marries her."


    The regr disciple gave a nod in response to this as he understood what Lin Fan was implying.


    That was right, even if Lin Fan wasn''t interested himself, he would still have to care about this matter. After all, the person that would be marrying Song Shu would be someone with a very high position in the Alchemy King Hall.


    He would be someone that even Lin Fan who was considered one of the top talents of the Alchemy King Hall wouldn''t be able to ignore, so naturally he would want to know who had the greatest chances of marrying Song Shu.


    That way, he could at least decide how to treat these people in the future.


    After thinking for a bit, the regr disciple started telling Lin Fan about the main candidates who had the greatest chance of bing Song Shu''s fiance.


    The regr disciple first looked around beforeing closer to Lin Fan to say, "The first person and the one with the greatest chance is the disciple of the first elder. Not only is he the strongest out of all the choices, but he also has the greatest attainments in alchemy. It''s said that he''s already an Alchemy Master even though he''s less than forty years old."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Less than forty? Just how old is he?"


    The regr disciple thought about it for a bit before saying, "If I recall correctly, he should be in his mid thirties¡­" Then after a pause he asked, "Is there something wrong?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I just couldn''t believe that he''s so young."


    The regr disciple gave a nod and said, "That''s right, he truly is talented." But then after realizing something, he quickly said, "But young master Lin, he''s not as talented as you."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just calmly waved his hand to stop the ttering and for him to continue.


    However, even if Lin Fan looked calm on the surface, he couldn''t help feeling angry deep down.


    A man in his mid thirties wanted to marry little Song Shu?


    It had to be known that Song Shu was only thirteen to fourteen years old and there was a man in his mid thirties that wanted to marry her?


    Lin Fan definitely wouldn''t allow it!


    In fact, he was looking forward to crushing this pedo bear¡­


    The regr disciple of course didn''t notice any of this since he had been hiding it under his calm look, so the regr disciple continued by saying, "Then there are the other two top candidates, the disciples of the second and sixth elders. There are also some other candidates that are disciples of the other elders, but those three are the main candidates that everyone has their eyes on."


    But then after thinking about it, the regr disciple suddenly added, "Well, there''s one dark horse that everyone has their eyes on as well¡­"


    But after he said this, he didn''t keep exining what he meant by this.


    So Lin Fan asked, "Dark horse? What do you mean by dark horse?"


    The regr disciple suddenly became very nervous when Lin Fan asked this and he looked around again beforeing closer to Lin Fan to say in a lower voice, "The youngest disciple of the sixteenth disciple, he''s the one that''s the closest to the Alchemy Master''s disciple ording to the rumours."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and asked, "What rumours?"


    The regr disciple slowly exined, "Well, the youngest disciple of the sixteenth elder is the one that''s the closest to age to the Alchemy Master''s disciple, so he''s the one who has spent the most time with her and is the one that''s the closest to her." Then after a pause, he added, "But that''s not the main reason why he''s the dark horse."


    Lin Fan was about to ask again what the reason for this was, but this time, the regr disciple didn''t keep him waiting in suspense.


    The regr disciples slowly said, "This is a story that goes back several years. It''s a story about when the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple arrived at the Alchemy King Hall."


    The story went as follows.


    In the year before the sixteenth elder came back with his youngest disciple, he had left the Alchemy King Hall headquarters to wander around.


    Then a year after he went wandering, he came back with a newborn child who was his youngest disciple.


    This wasn''t the strange part since things like this weremon.


    The strange part was who the child''s mother was.


    The sixteenth elder never told anyone, but there was an incident that revealed one thing about the child to everyone.


    When the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple was only five years old, he got into a fight with a city lord''s son while visiting another city with the sixteenth elder.


    Because he was injured during that fight, the city had been wiped out in a single night and no one knew who did it. However, it was clear that the cause of it was the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple''s injuries.


    That was made clear by the fact that the city lord and his entire family were strung up on poles to be made an example for everyone.


    The strangest thing was that the twelve great factions never pursued this matter and chose to drop this matter. They didn''t even bother hiding it, they just didn''t take any action at all.


    This made it clear that the backing that the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple''s mother came from wasn''t a small one, it was something that could even put pressure on the twelve great factions.


    The regr disciple then said, "The sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple has already made his feelings towards the Alchemy Master''s disciple clear, so if the force behind him were to take action¡­"


    He left his words there because it was clear what he meant by them.


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    As he was about to ask something else, there was a voice that suddenly cut him off.


    "Who do you think you are?!"

 Chapter 731 Alchemy King Hall (5)

    Both Lin Fan and the regr disciple were surprised by this voice.


    When they turned to look in the direction that the voice came from, they found that there was already a crowd that had gathered.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan and the regr disciple walked in the direction of the crowd to see what was happening.


    As soon as they came closer, they could hear the sounds of arguinging from the center of the circle. While it wasn''t as loud as before, they could hear how intense the arguing between the two sides was.


    "You think that you can juste here and take our herbs like this? Who do you think you are?" The one who said this was dressed in the uniform of a Junior Alchemist who was also the leader of a group of Junior Alchemists.


    The one who was facing him on the other side was wearing the uniform of an Expert Alchemist and was clearly someone of higher standing, but the group of Junior Alchemists didn''t back down in front of him.


    In fact, Junior Alchemists were treated as servants in the Alchemy King Hall. While they were technically alchemists who studied at the Alchemy King Hall, they were mainly used as servants because even if they were Junior Alchemists, they were still considered at the bottom of the rung.


    Those that were Expert Alchemists were the ones that were the disciples of higher ranking alchemists or even elders, so it was strange that the Junior Alchemists would stand up to this person.


    The Expert Alchemist said, "Just hand over the herbs already. The sixth elder was coincidentally missing these herbs for a pill that he was making." Then he revealed a threatening expression as he said in a sharp tone, "Are you saying that you''re trying to go against the sixth elder?"


    When the Junior Alchemists heard this, they immediately flinched.


    Going against an elder, that was something that these Junior Alchemists would never dare to do since that would mean that it would be the end of their time at the Alchemist King Hall.


    To be an elder, one had to be at least a Grandmaster Alchemist.


    Putting aside their alchemy skills, they were all also Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    Not a single one of the elders were simple and each one had the ability to crush their families.


    However, even when faced with the threat of the elder, the leader of the Junior Alchemists didn''t back down.


    That was because he had someone who was backing him.


    "Is this how the sixth elder goes about doing things? He just takes whatever he wants from other people like a brute?"


    When the Expert Alchemist heard this, he immediately knitted his brows and looked around for the source of this voice. When he finally saw the person who the crowd parted for, he immediately narrowed his eyes as a trace of worry appeared in them.


    It was clear by his reaction that he recognized this person.


    The person who spoke walked over to the Expert Alchemist and said, "If the sixth elder really needed these herbs, he could have just asked the logistics department for supplies. Is there a need toe and harass our herb gardens like this?" By the end of his words, his voice had turned ice cold.


    When the Expert Alchemist heard this, he flinched slightly. However, before he could say anything, there was someone else who suddenly walked through the crowd.


    "Brother Aotian, you can''t put it like that. You should know how tight supplies are in our Alchemy King Hall, so the sixth elder was just thinking about the logistics department."


    The boy who had been addressed as Brother Aotian looked at the person who walked through the crowd and narrowed his eyes. After staring at this person who just arrived for a bit, he said, "Brother Hu, you can''t say it like that. Our herb gardens are suffering from the same problem as the rest of the Alchemy King Hall, so our supplies are just as low."


    The man who had been called Brother Hu said with a smile, "But everyone knows that your herb gardens here are the most prosperous out of all the herb gardens in the Alchemy King Hall. Even now, I can see that there''s plenty of the herbs that my master wants."


    Brother Aotian shook his head and said with a sigh, "It''s a pity that our master also needs these herbs, so we can''t spare any for the sixth elder."


    Brother Hu''s smile became colder as he said, "Brother Aotian, it''s just a few herbs. Are you really saying that you can''t spare these herbs at all?"


    Brother Aotian looked right at him and said with the same cold smile, "Unfortunately, we can''t spare any of these herbs at all. Master is preparing to refine a new pill and he needs extras just in case."


    Brother Hu said with a hint of ridicule in his voice, "Oh, is the sixteenth elder not confident in the new pill that he is refining? If that''s the case, then I guess we''ll have no choice but to look elsewhere."


    Brother Aotian said with the same hint of ridicule, "Our master believes in being prepared at all times, so he likes keeping extra sets of herbs just in case anything happens¡­"


    As his voice drifted off, even though he didn''t say it, it was clear what he was implying.<sub> </sub>


    This was a jab at the sixth elder, saying that the sixth elder was sloppy and didn''t prepare anything in advance.


    The exchange of words continued between the two sides as they kept indirectly insulting each other.


    For Lin Fan who had been watching on the side, it wasn''t hard for him to guess what was happening. After all, when they stated it this clearly, it was hard for him to misunderstand the situation.


    The sixth elder had clearly sent these people here to harass the people of the sixteenth elder since this was the territory of the sixteenth elder. As for the two who had appeared afterwards, they were the disciples of the sixth and sixteenth elders respectively.


    But Lin Fan knew who they were because of a different reason.


    It was because he had just heard about these two from the regr disciple.


    The sixth elder''s disciple was one of the top candidates when it came to Song Shu''s engagement and the sixteenth elder''s disciple was the dark horse from an unknown faction.


    That was who these two were.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think for a bit before he suddenly started moving towards the two of them.


    The crowd had been focused on the exchange between the two sides at first, but then when the people saw Lin Fan walking through, they started making a path for him. Even if Lin Fan had only just arrived yesterday, he was already quite famous in the Alchemy King Hall because of the banquet that the elders had hosted for him yesterday.


    All of the normal alchemists in the Alchemy King Hall had already found a picture of him and memorized his face.


    After all, they knew that he was someone that they couldn''t offend, so it was better to remember what he looked like.


    However, they couldn''t help being surprised seeing Lin Fan walking towards the dispute between the sixth elder and the sixteenth elder.


    Normally speaking, he wouldn''t be getting himself involved in this since this was something that was unrted to him. That was, unless he had a reason to get involved¡­


    Could it be that Lin Fan was also interested in¡­?


    But that was just the spection that they had and before they received any concrete proof, no one dared to spread any rumours.


    Still, that didn''t mean that they couldn''t keep watching.


    After Lin Fan made his way through the crowd, he walked in between the two sides to the surprise of the two sides.


    The two disciples who had been quipping with each other were taken aback by Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, but once they saw who it was, they immediately revealed smiles and greeted him.


    Brother Hu was the first one to greet him by saying, "Brother Lin, it''s an honour to see you. Are you going around for a walk?"


    Brother Aotian quickly followed with, "Brother Lin, I''ve been looking forward to meeting you. Are you free right now? We can go have some tea if you have the time."


    Lin Fan just greeted the two of them before saying, "There''s something that I have to discuss in secret with the two of you. Do you two have some time right now?"


    The two of them were surprised by Lin Fan''s words, but they didn''t reject him.


    After all, this was someone whose talent wasn''t inferior to the Alchemy Master''s disciple. In fact, many of the elders who had tested him even thought that he was more skilled than the Alchemy Master''s disciple.


    If the Alchemy Master had been here, it would have been very likely that the Alchemy Master would have taken him as a disciple.


    With this kind of talent, it was clear that his position in the Alchemy King Hall wouldn''t be low.


    That meant that this was someone that they would want to pull to their side.


    So the two of them followed Lin Fan to a separate gazebo and after they had sat down, Lin Fan suddenly said a few things to the two of them.


    As soon as they heard what Lin Fan said to them, they revealed shocked looks.

 Chapter 732 Alchemy King Hall (6)

    Young master Aotian was the first toe back to his senses as he said, "Brother Lin, is what you just said true?"


    Young master Hu also quickly came back to his senses and asked, "Brother Lin, this isn''t a joke, right?"


    Lin Fan gave both of them a serious nod before saying, "This was something that Grand Elder Fu told me, so there''s nothing wrong with this."


    The expressions on both young master Aotian and young master Hu''s face changed after hearing this.


    The two of them looked at each other before suddenly standing up at the same time.


    "Brother Lin, thank you very much for this information. If there is a chance, I will certainly repay you in the future." Young master Aotian said with cupped hands before running off.


    "Brother Lin, I will not forget your kindness from today. I hope that we will meet again soon." Then after that, young master Hu also ran off.


    When the people who had been waiting on the side saw the two of them running off, they looked at the other side before following their young masters off.


    As for Lin Fan, he just sat in the gazebo taking a sip of his tea with a rxed look on his face.


    It almost seemed like the look of someone who had just caught arge fish in his.


    Well, it wasn''t just onerge fish, but rather tworge fishes.


    He didn''t think that he would run into the sixth elder''s disciple and the sixteenth elder''s disciple on his mission to collect information, but since he did, he didn''t waste that chance. After all, this was all in preparation for what would happen in two days.


    Thinking this, Lin Fan took another sip of his tea before suddenly standing up and heading off.


    There were still two more people that he had to meet before the end of the day.


    ¡­


    When night came, Lin Fan didn''t head back to his residence.


    Instead, Lin Fan headed to the deste and remote building where he had met Elder Fu the first time.


    After waiting for a bit, Elder Fu suddenly came through the door, but Lin Fan wasn''t surprised since he was already waiting for him.


    After Elder Fu sat down, Lin Fan asked, "How are things going with the preparations?"


    Elder Fu calmly said, "We''ve already prepared most of the things and we''re nning on announcing the event tomorrow." Then after a pause, he said, "I still have my doubts about this."


    Lin Fan ignored this and said, "I''ve told the first elder''s disciple, the second elder''s disciple, the sixth elder''s disciple, and the sixteenth elder''s disciple about this event today."


    Elder Fu was surprised when he heard this, but he quickly recovered. He even looked at Lin Fan with a look of admiration after he recovered before saying, "You really move fast."


    Lin Fan tapped his fingers on the table before saying with a sigh, "Well, it''s not like we have much time to work with."


    Elder Fu rolled his eyes and said, "Whose fault is that?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "There''s no other choice. If we dy this for too long, the other elders will have made their preparations and it''ll be toote. Also, if we wait too long, the other elders will start getting suspicious. It had to be done as soon as possible."


    Elder Fu was about to say something, but then he knitted his brows before swallowing his words. After thinking for a bit, he asked, "What do you mean by the other elders making their preparations?"


    Lin Fan raised his hand and swept it out over the table, taking out a few pieces of paper that he just left there.


    Elder Fu was surprised to see this, but he also quickly reached his hand out to take them and read over these pieces of paper.


    His face filled with more and more shock as he read over these pieces of paper and in the end, it was filled withplete disbelief.


    Elder Fu said to himself, "This¡­They¡­How could they do all this!" After pping down the piece of paper in his hand, he asked Lin Fan, "How did you get all of this?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I just did a bit of digging around."


    Elder Fu put his hand to his face before saying, "I never thought that it was this bad¡­"


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "I''ll leave this matter to you then." Then he said in a serious voice, "Of course, this has to be taken care of before the event."


    Elder Fu revealed a bitter smile as he said, "You''re just giving me more and more work, aren''t you?"


    Lin Fan gave another shrug before saying with a smile, "I would help, but I can''t do anything when ites to this. You know that."


    Elder Fu gave a nod before giving a sigh, "It''s not your fault either, it''s all those greedy fools. To think that they were making this many behind the door deals¡­"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this since there was nothing he could say here.


    After a period of silence, Elder Fu suddenly gave another sigh before changing the topic by asking, "Have you prepared the things that you need for the event? If you haven''t, I can help you get what you''re missing."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''ve already gotten everything, so you don''t need to worry about that."


    Elder Fu revealed a concerned look again as he said, "In two days¡­I still don''t like this n."


    Lin Fan gave another shrug and said, "There''s no other choice."


    Elder Fu just silently looked at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly standing up. He took the pieces of paper that were on the table and then walked out without another world.


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile when he saw this, but he didn''t say anything either.


    After standing there in silence for a few seconds, Lin Fan also suddenly disappeared from this ce.


    ¡­


    Two dayster, almost everyone at the Alchemy King Hall headquarters had gathered at the main square in the valley.


    This was because just a day ago, there had been a sudden announcement that had shocked everyone.


    It was an announcement that no one had expected during this period at the Alchemy King Hall, but it had happened.


    The announcement was about an event, but this was no ordinary event. This would be an event that would decide the engagement of the Alchemy Master''s disciple.


    It was also a very simple event, but it was verypetitive.


    The event would be an open alchemy contest where everyone could show their alchemy skills. The one that showed the greatest alchemy skills would be the one that would be the Alchemy Master''s disciple''s fiance.


    However, the gimmick of this event was that it wasn''t being held as a tournament.


    Rather, it was being held as a free for all fight and during the day that the event was being held, anyone coulde and refine a pill to be judged. The person that refined the greatest pill would sit atop the throne that had been ced in the center of the square.


    Every time that there was a pill that was judged to be superior to the one the person in the throne refined, the person in the throne would be reced.


    At the end of the day, the person who was left sitting on the throne would be the one who would be Song Shu''s fiance.


    As for the judges, they were a judge panelposed of different elders who had been invited by Elder Fu.


    That was the other thing that everyone had been surprised by.


    p This event was actually organized by Elder Fu who had been their biggest obstacle in trying to make their disciples Song Shu''s fiance.</anda>


    But it seemed that in the end, the old Elder Fu wasn''t able to hold them all off, so he had no choice but to organize this event.


    So naturally the elders were happy to join this event as judges.


    After all, if they were judges, they could give extra points to their own disciples, which would help them ce higher.


    So the first, the second, the sixth, and the sixteenth elders all made it onto the panel.


    As for the other five, they were random elders along with Elder Fu.


    The start of the event wasn''t that strong since none of the favourites showed up immediately. In the beginning, it was only the Expert Alchemist disciples of the Master Alchemists and the Junior Alchemists who made pills.


    Naturally, there was nothing special about this since their skills were at the bottom of the barrel that was the Alchemy King Hall.


    Eventually, one of the Expert Alchemists was firmly ced on the throne, sitting there for over an hour.


    Lin Fan had arrived early with the two girls to watch this event, but they hadn''t made a move the entire time.


    As time passed and noon came, people began wondering where the disciples of the elders were. But after noon passed, the disciples of the elders finally arrived.


    At first, it was just a single disciple of a single elder who easily took the throne from the person who was currently sitting on it, but he didn''tst long on the throne. Because as soon as the first elder disciple arrived, there were other elder disciples that quickly followed after them.


    But even with all these elder disciples, there wasn''t a single top candidate that appeared.

 Chapter 733 Alchemy King Hall (7)

    Finally when dusk came, the first of the four top candidates arrived.


    It was young master Hu, the sixth elder''s disciple that Lin Fan had talked to the other day.


    When he came into the square, the crowd that had gathered around the stage all parted like waves to create a path for him. As he casually walked through the crowd to the stage, he didn''t forget to wave his hand as if he was a celebrity who was surrounded by fans.


    Of course, with his status and his looks, there were fans of his that were in the crowd.


    As he waved his hand, there were cheers that came from the crowd for him.


    Once he reached the stage, the first thing that he did was take out his cauldron with flourish. As his cauldron appeared, there were mes that came out with it that pushed away everyone who was near him, even those who had been refining pills.


    While they red at him, there was nothing that they could do since there was a difference in status between them.


    However, for those in the crowd, they were shocked by the mes he released.


    "Those mes¡­could they be?"


    "It''s the Roaring Bellows mes!"


    "Aren''t those the mes that are considered the most intense mes in the world?! When did young master Hu get them?"


    Young master Hu revealed a faint smile as he heard all the chatter around him, but then he turned up the mes which were absorbed by the cauldron.


    After the cauldron was filled with mes, he waved his hand and took out several herbs. With one quick motion, he threw the herbs right into the cauldron which started releasing even more mes after these herbs were put in.


    The mes kept pouring out of the cauldron until they formed another cauldron of mes around the cauldron itself.


    "This is the Double Cauldron Technique! Isn''t that the legendary lost technique?"


    "Young master Hu, you are too amazing!"


    Young master Hu''s ego was stoked even more as he heard these cheers and he confidently continued his refinement, feeling like there was nothing in this world that could take him down.


    He even snuck a peek at Song Shu who had been sitting by the judges watching this entire time.


    As he looked at her, he couldn''t help revealing a bit of a lewd look.


    ? Song Shu waspletely different from how she looked a few months ago.


    After she started following Lin Fan, she was able to get proper nutrition, so she started growing properly. She was no longer as skinny as before and had even started filling out her curves, so now, she could be considered quite the beauty instead of a cute young girl.


    This was the other reason why most of the elders'' disciples were interested in marrying her.


    They were hot blooded young men, so naturally they desired beauty and who wouldn''t want the one who was proimed the number one beauty in the Alchemy King Hall?


    However, young master Hu''s show didn''tst long as another person made their way through the crowd.


    At first no one noticed this person because of young master Hu''s show, but after a few people noticed him, everyone noticed him. That was because this person was just as famous as young master Hu¡­No, it could even be said that he was more famous than young master Hu.


    That was because this was the disciple of the second elder, young master Ying.


    Once he came near the stage, young master Ying gave a simple jump before calmlynding on the stage.


    He ignored the heat released from young master Hu''s cauldron and raised his hand without a single word, bringing out his own cauldron.


    This wasn''t a normal cauldron, rather it was a cauldron that had two holes in it.


    Normal cauldrons only had a single hole for the alchemist to put herbs and mes in, but this one was a cauldron with two different holes on different sides of the cauldron. They were perfectly parallel to one another and created a symmetry on the cauldron.


    After his cauldron had been pulled out, young master Ying raised both his hands into the air. With a snap from both hands, different coloured mes appeared in both.


    While they were different coloured, the intensity of the mes didn''t lose to one another.


    He brought his hands up to the cauldron, putting them on different sides of the cauldron and started injecting the two coloured mes into the cauldron. The mes entered the cauldron at the same time and even flowed at the same rate until they stopped right in the center, creating a swirl that was made of two different coloured mes.


    This swirl continued to spin until the different coloured mes came together to form a single coloured me. This me was the colour of these two mes mixing together, but the me that it released was on apletely different levelpared to the two mes separately.


    The power of thisbined me was even stronger than that of the Roaring Bellows mes that young master Hu used.<sub> </sub>


    Young master Hu knitted his brows when he sensed the heating from beside him, but he didn''t lose heart as he focused his mind on his pill refinement. That is until he saw the herbs that the second elder''s disciple had taken out.


    "Those are! How did you get your hands on those?"


    Young master Ying revealed a faint smile when he heard this, but then his face returned to calmness as he too focused on his refinement.


    However, as they kept refining their pills, it was clear which one of them had the advantage.


    There was a strong fragranceing from young master Hu''s cauldron, but there wasn''t a single scent that came from young master Ying''s cauldron.


    All of his medicinal essence was caught inside of the swirling mes in the center of his cauldron, being refined again and again.


    However, if one went closer, they would still be able to smell the fragranceing from the cauldron.


    When they were finished, the pill that young master Ying made was the one that caught the attention of all the judges.


    They came forward to take sniffs of the pill and when they did, they all revealed shocked looks. This was a pill that even reached a level of purity that matched some of the pills that they made and they were elders!


    Finally, the head judge, Elder Fu said, "This is a pill of 95% purity and is a high grade pill. It is the highest grade pill that we have seen today, so young master Ying will take the throne."


    Everyone was shocked when they heard this.


    95% purity!


    That was something that even the elders had trouble with sometimes, but young master Ying had been able to achieve this with his pill!


    There were even people that thought that young master Ying had already won this thing.


    Young master Hu red at young master Ying and asked, "Where did you get that herb from?"


    The herb that he was referring to was the herb that young master Ying had pulled outst.


    This herb was known as the Cleansing Herb and while it had a simple name, it was anything but simple. This was a herb that had the effect of cleaning out impurities when refining a pill, but it also had the effect of decreasing the medicinal energy of the pill that was refined.


    To counter this, herbs with strong enough medicinal power were needed to create a powerful pill.


    Young master Ying had prepared all the ingredients just to make this pill, but the ingredients definitely weren''t things that could have been preparedst second, so he must have known about this event.


    But who told him about it?


    Young master Hu had only heard about this event from Lin Fan, which was why he was able to prepare his ingredients¡­


    After this thought passed through his mind, he realized something and revealed a bitter smile.


    It was Lin Fan. He had rushed off that day, so he didn''t know what else Lin Fan did, but he was certain that Lin Fan had gone to meet the second elder''s disciple after meeting him.


    Of course, he wasn''t angry with Lin Fan for telling the second elder''s disciple about this because he could understand why he did this.


    Lin Fan was new to the Alchemy King Hall and in this critical time, he had this crucial information. Naturally he would use this information to build connections with the disciples of the elders, especially those that had the chance to marry the Alchemy Master''s disciple.


    It wasn''t strange that he would share this information with the second elder''s disciple.


    At the very least, Lin Fan had still kept his promise of not entering this contest. He could see Lin Fan sitting in the crowd and he could see that he wasn''t intending on entering this contest at all.


    So in the end, Lin Fan couldn''t be med for his actions since these were things that he would have done as well.


    Young master Hu could only me himself for not preparing as much as the young master Ying.


    Young master Ying saw the change in expression on young master Hu''s face and he didn''t bother answering the question as he made his way to the throne.


    Along the way, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a grateful look.


    If it wasn''t for this Lin Fan telling him about this event, he certainly wouldn''t have been able to get all those ingredients on time.


    If anything, it was Lin Fan who helped him win this event.


    But it was still too early for him to think this.

 Chapter 734 Alchemy King Hall (8)

    As soon as young master Ying sat down on the throne, there was another stir that came from the crowd.


    The crowd quickly parted once again to form another path to the stage, but this time, the atmosphere of the crowd was different.


    When young master Hu and young master Ying came through the crowd, the crowd openly cheered for them. However, this time, there were no cheers that came from the crowd, there was only silence.


    There was a deathly silence that hung in the crowd as the person walking through made their way to the stage.


    This person was the first elder''s disciple, young master Jin.


    This was a man who waspletely different from the other elder disciples.


    This was a man who instead of being admired, was feared for his abilities.


    He was already a Master Alchemist even though he was under the age of fifty and he was someone that had even refined a Pill Line Pill before.


    Even if it was just once, people had already started looking at him like he was a Pill Line Alchemist.


    That along with his personality led to him being feared instead of admired. He was feared for his talent, but also because of his cold personality.


    Even when he was with people he was close with, he would always be calm and cool, giving off the feeling of a block of ice.


    But that just showed how much talent he had and how much respect hemanded.


    When he walked in, even young master Ying who was sitting on the throne couldn''t help feeling nervous.


    He recognized this young master Jin as his final opponent, so he was focused on what young master Jin would do.


    After young master Jin made his way onto the stage, everyone waited with bated breath to see what he would do.


    After all, young master Jin was the elder disciple with the greatest alchemy skills, so there was no doubt that he would do something shocking. The only question would be if it would be greater than the 95% purity pill that young master Ying had just made.


    Young master Jin went slowly as he pulled out his cauldron, cing it down on the ground in front of him.


    Then with a single breath, there were mes that appeared in a circle around him.


    It was a good thing that everyone on the stage had already backed down expecting this, so there was no one that was hurt by the sudden appearance of these mes.


    The mes covered almost the entire stage and burned brightly, but they didn''t leave a single mark on the stage itself.


    Slowly but surely, this circle of mes closed in on itself. It kept shrinking and shrinking, even moving past young master Jin himself until itpletely surrounded the cauldron. Then as the mes surrounded the cauldron, they formed another cauldron of mes just like what young master Hu had done.


    However, the difference was that there were severalyers of this cauldron of mes that were wrapped up around each other.


    This was the higher level of the technique that young master Hu had used.


    By using several me cauldrons wrapped up around each other, he was able to control the temperature even more precisely than young master Hu, which would allow him to better refine his ingredients. However, his demonstration didn''t stop there.


    After he had finished forming the several me cauldrons around his actual cauldron, he released another burst of mes around himself.


    This burst of me acted the same way as the first burst of mes he released.


    After forming a circle around him that covered the stage, the mes suddenly shrank until they wrapped around his cauldron. The mes came together to form several moreyers of me cauldrons thatpletely wrapped around the me cauldrons from before.


    Once those me cauldrons made of a different me formed, the entire cauldron started to spin along with the me cauldrons around it.


    They spun and spun until finally the me cauldrons of two different mes came together to form me cauldrons of a different coloured me.


    This was the technique that young master Ying had used!


    This was how young master Jin showed off his pride.


    He took the techniques that his rivals had used and used them to a higher level!


    As he released the mes, there were shocked gasps that hade from the judges'' table.<sub> </sub>


    The second elder couldn''t help turning to the first elder and saying, "You! You actually gave him those mes!"


    The first elder just revealed a knowing smile and didn''t say anything in response.


    However, even if he didn''t say anything, the other elders knew what had happened.


    The two mes that young master Jin had just used were the mes of East and West. They were famous mes that didn''t lose out to the Roaring Bellows mes, but they were much rarer than the Roaring Bellows mes.


    The only person who currently had these mes was the first elder and for young master Jin to get these mes, the first elder must have been the one to give it to him. However, what they were surprised by wasn''t the fact that the first elder gave it to him, but rather how early he had given it to him.


    Eventually the mes of East and West would be given to young master Jin since he was the first elder''s best disciple, but that was something that would only happen in the distant future. At the very least, he wouldn''t be receiving the mes of East and West this early.


    Unless something had suddenly changed¡­like this event.


    All the other elders had done the same for their disciples, which was how young master Hu got the Roaring Bellows mes and how young master Ying got the Cleansing Herb.


    Otherwise if they went to get ingredients by themselves, they definitely wouldn''t have been able to get these things.


    Of course, no one could say anything since at the end of the day, all this meant was that the first elder was the most prepared out of all of them.


    After he had finished forming thebined me, young master Jin revealed a faint smile as he started using his own refinement technique. The mes in the cauldron suddenly started to disappear, but it wasn''t that the mes were dying down.


    Rather the mes inside the cauldron were condensed to the point where there was only a tiny little me that was left inside the cauldron, but this me had the firepower of all the mes from before condensed into a single point. The amount of refining power that it now had couldn''t evenpare to what it was before.


    The ingredients were quicklypressed into a single drop of medicinal liquid that was then formed into a pill by young master Jin with a wave of his hand.


    Once that was done, he waved his hand again to release all the me cauldrons around his cauldron until there was only the tiny me inside left. After the tiny me inside also dissipated, the pill finally dropped out of the cauldron, but there wasn''t a single scent that was released by it.


    Young master Jin just picked up the pill and then tossed it onto the table in front of the judges.


    The judges all came forward to look over the pill before suddenly knitting their brows anding forward to sniff it. As they sniffed it, they couldn''t help revealing stunned looks.


    Finally, one of the elders said, "99% purity pill!"


    As soon as this was said, everyone in the crowd revealed gasps of shock.


    A 99% purity pill, that was already at the same level as the elders!


    Everyone knew that young master Jin''s alchemy skills were good, but they never expected that it would be at this level.


    Young master Ying had a bitter smile on his face as he stood up from the throne since he knew that this contest had already been decided.


    He thought that he had been able to best everyone with his Cleansing Herb trick, but it seemed that his greatest rival was even more prepared than him.


    However, before young master Jin could sit down on the throne, there was one more person that appeared.


    The crowd parted again to reveal another person walking through towards the stage.


    This was the dark horse that everyone had been waiting for, the disciple of the sixteenth elder, young master Aotian.


    He had never shown off his true power, so no one really knew just how strong he was, but based on what had happened in the past, they didn''t dare look down on him. They were excited to see what he would show them today.


    Young master Aotian made his way through the crowd to slowlye up to the side of the stage before jumping up,nding right in front of young master Jin.


    As he stared at him, he said, "Brother Jin, I think it''s a bit too early to be confident of your victory."


    Young master Jin narrowed his eyes to look at young master Aotian before saying, "What are you going to do about it?"


    Young master Aotian didn''t waste any words as he pulled out his cauldron and his ingredients.


    Unlike the other young masters who had released their mes in a shy manner, young master Aotian just raised his other hand and released a tiny ball of mes in his palm.


    He just said with a calm smile, "I''ll have to show you then."

 Chapter 735 Alchemy King Hall (9)

    As soon as his voice fell, he raised his cauldron to put the mes and the ingredients in with just a single flick of his hand.


    Once he put the mes in, he let the cauldron fall to the ground, almost as if he didn''t care about the cauldron. However, the sounds from the cauldron clearly showed that he was currently refining the ingredients that he had put in.


    Unlike the other three before him, his method of refining wasn''t shy at all. All that young master Aotian did was put the ingredients in and slowly use his mes to refine them.


    After a few minutes of just watching him slowly refine his ingredients, young master Aotian finally opened up the cauldron to reveal the pill that he had refined.


    ? This was a very normal looking pill, without any patterns on it at all. It was a pill that was just a smooth sphere of a single colour without having anything special about it.


    Young master Aotian just calmly picked up the pill and ced it on the table in front of the judges, just calmly waiting for them to deliver their verdict.


    The judges didn''t rush it and slowly looked over the pill, but as they continued looking over the pill, the looks on their faces changed from calm looks to looks of shock.


    They all came closer to it and gave strong sniffs, but they found that they weren''t able to smell a single thing from this pill. It was almost as if all the medicinal essence of the pill was sealed inside of the pill.


    But if that was the case, then that would mean¡­


    A 100% purity pill!


    This was a 100% purity pill!


    They all looked at young master Aotian in shock as they couldn''t figure out how he had done it.


    This kind of pill was something that even they couldn''t aplish unless it was a very special situation.


    Only the Alchemy Master could refine a 100% purity pill as simple as this!


    But this youngest disciple of the sixteenth elder had done this!


    However, as far as they knew, they never heard of the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple having this kind of ability. As elders, they naturally knew more than the normal disciples and they knew that the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple had only just reached the threshold of being a Master Alchemist.


    Something like this was definitely out of his reach.


    That was unless¡­


    However, even if they had their spections, even if they were unwilling, they had to admit that this 100% purity pill was the greatest pill that had been refined during this contest. They had no choice but to admit that the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple had produced the best result.


    Seeing the looks on the faces of his master and the other judges, young master Jin started to feel a bit nervous.


    After all, these weren''t expressions that showed that he had won. Rather, these were expressions that made it seem like he was about to lose¡­


    And as he expected, the head judge, Elder Fu came forward to say, "This is a 100% purity pill and is the best pill refined today, so the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple has the right to sit on the throne."


    When Elder Fu said this, even he was a bit nervous.


    Everything had been going ording to Lin Fan''s n, but now this 100% purity had thrown a wrench in the n. Even Lin Fan never would have expected that someone would produce a 100% purity pill.


    Elder Fu knew that Lin Fan could refine 100% purity pills because of his time on the Blue Star, so he hadn''t been worried when young master Jin had refined the 99% purity pill. But even if Lin Fan were to refine a 100% purity pill now, that would mean that he would tie with the sixteenth elder''s youngest disciple.


    Young master Aotian on the other hand had the look of a winner as he slowly walked over to the empty throne.


    Young master Jin had been watching young master Aotian the entire time, so he hadn''t taken his ce on the throne yet. However, before he could even sit down on the throne, he had already been knocked off the throne.


    There was nothing more humiliating than this¡­


    After young master Aotian sat down, he looked around and said, "I think that this should be the end of this event, right? Is there anyone else that wants to challenge me for this throne?"


    The reason why he said this was because he was confident that there were no more threats to his path to marrying Song Shu. He could already see the two of them at their wedding ceremony already.


    Of course, this young master Aotian didn''t just want to marry her because of the power he would have in the future. Rather, he wanted to marry her because he was truly in love with her.


    It had happened on the first day that he met her.


    When he saw her for the first time, his first thought had been, "How could there be someone this cute?"


    Ever since then, he had tried everything to get closer to her, but he had never been able to get her attention. It was always as if there was someone else who was already on her mind.<sub> </sub>


    But now, at least he would have the right to marry her.


    At least he had a way to start making his way into her heart.


    That was what he thought to himself, but he was wrong.


    He had thought that after he took care of those other elder disciples, there wouldn''t be any other threats because the only other possible threats would be Lin Fan and Yuki.


    Yuki was a woman, so it was very unlikely that she would be interested in this kind of event. As for Lin Fan, he had already made his promise that he wouldn''t be participating in this event.


    Of course, young master Aotian wouldn''t just believe any promises, but he believed Lin Fan''s promise because of the position that he was in.


    Lin Fan was someone that was unknown and he had just entered the Alchemy King Hall. He had promised all these elder disciples that he wouldn''t enter this contest and if he broke that promise, that would be offending all of them.


    With his current position, Lin Fan would be crazy to do something like that.


    So young master Aotian was confident in his victory.


    It was a pity that Lin Fan was indeed crazy.


    After young master Aotian sat down and when everyone thought that this was over, Lin Fan suddenly stood up from his seat in the crowd and made his way onto the stage.


    At first, no one noticed him since their attention had been on young master Aotian and he silently made his way to the stage. However, as he came closer and closer, there were people that finally noticed him and created a path for him.


    The crowd was like a wave, once someone moved, it was hard for the others to stop, so a path was quickly created for Lin Fan.


    Everyone was surprised to see him walking onto the stage, but none were more confused than the elder disciples that Lin Fan had made his promise to.


    What was he doing?


    Was he nning on participating in this event now?


    None of them believed that Lin Fan would do something as crazy as this, but they still had to consider all the worst possibilities.


    Of course, that didn''t matter for the defeated elder disciples. The only one that really had to worry was young master Aotian.


    For some reason, as he saw Lin Fan walking to the stage, he couldn''t help feeling nervous.


    He kept saying to himself that there was nothing that could beat a 100% purity pill at this point, but even then, he couldn''t calm himself down.


    So young master Aotian couldn''t help saying, "Brother Lin, are you nning on refining a pill as well?"


    Lin Fan had reached the stage at this point and he looked at young master Aotian with a smile as he said, "Brother Aotian, I just came onto the stage to test my own skills. Of course, I''m not interested in winning, but this is a good chance to show off my abilities, don''t you think?"


    Young master Aotian gave a cold snort deep down when he heard this as he thought, "Who would believe this?" However, he still said with a smile, "Brother Lin, I''m sure there are plenty of other ces where you can show off your skills. Can you please just leave this spotlight to me?"


    Lin Fan said with the same smile, "Young master Aotian, a good foil will always make you shine brighter. You have nothing to fear."


    Even if Lin Fan said this, young master Aotian still couldn''t settle down.


    But there was nothing that he could do.


    After all, this was a public contest that was backed by several elders. This wasn''t a ce where he could force Lin Fan to not participate in this contest.


    But still, he wasn''t willing to ept this as he said in a lower voice that only those on the stage and those with a certain level of skill could hear, "Brother Lin, are you breaking your promise of not participating in this contest?"


    Lin Fan just said in the same lowered voice, "Of course not. I''m not participating in the contest, I''m just testing my skills." After a pause, he added, "I would never dream of breaking my promise¡­" Then he said in a low voice that only he could hear, "Yet."


    Young master Aotian saw that he couldn''t persuade Lin Fan, so there was nothing else he could say as he just gave a gesture that invited Lin Fan to do what he wanted.


    Lin Fan gave a nod back before pulling out his cauldron and his ingredients.


    When the people in the crowd saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked.

 Chapter 736 Alchemy King Hall (10)

    Common ingredients!


    These were ingredients that were considered the most basic of all ingredients.


    As such, there really wasn''t anything special that could be refined from them¡­


    Lin Fan was nning on refining a pill from these ingredients?


    If he really was nning on refining a pill from these ingredients, then it really would be like he had said. After all, there was no chance that he would be able to refine a pill that would surpass young master Aotian''s 100% purity pill with these ingredients.


    Could it be that it really was as he had said, he was just here to show off his skills?


    Seeing this, young master Aotian felt a bit assured, but there was still that uneasiness that bit at him. Still, since he couldn''t stop Lin Fan, he decided to use his words to pressure him.


    Young master Aotian revealed a faint smile and said, "Brother Lin, it seems like you''re really nning on just showing off your skills. I wish you the best of luck with your pill refining."


    If hard didn''t work, he would use soft.


    He would use passive aggression to pressure Lin Fan into doing what he wanted.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t affected at all as he just looked at young master Aotian with a smile.


    Lin Fan moved his cauldron in front of him and ced it down before casually throwing his ingredients in.


    The way that he moved wasn''t like that of a master of alchemy, but rather he looked like someone who was just starting to learn alchemy. There were no special techniques or anything that was being used, he just casually threw his ingredients in before injecting in the fire to refine them.


    Everyone couldn''t help revealing disappointed looks since they had expected more out of Lin Fan, but they also understood why he was doing this. After all, with his current position, it wasn''t wise for him to offend these elder disciples.


    Based on what the elder disciples had said, he had clearly made some deal with them, which was why they were so friendly with him. If he were to create a mess now, it would certainly put him in a bad position.


    So while everyone waited for Lin Fan to finish his refinement, there wasn''t anyone that actually had any hopes of being surprised by the pill that he refined.


    However, what people didn''t notice was that as Lin Fan refined his pill, there were clouds that were gathering above them.


    As he continued refining, the clouds were getting thicker and thicker and there were rumbles of thunder that came from the clouds. However, even with all these clouds forming, no one associated it with the pill that Lin Fan was refining.


    Everyone just thought that it was a storm that was passing since it was impossible that these clouds and the thunder contained within them could have anything to do with the pill.


    After all, if it was rted to the pill, wouldn''t that mean that the pill that Lin Fan was refining was good enough to attract a thunder tribtion?


    If that was the case, that would mean that the pill was¡­


    A Pill Line Pill!


    They were more likely to believe that the world wasing to an end than to believe that Lin Fan was able to refine a Pill Line Pill with the ingredients that he had used. They were nothing more thanmon ingredients that could be found anywhere, how could something like that be turned into a Pill Line Pill.


    But no matter how they ignored it, the clouds and thunder in the sky became thicker and stronger.


    Lin Fan was just casually standing there refining his pill, with nothing special about his technique. But what they didn''t know was that inside the cauldron, something that they never would have expected was happening.


    Lin Fan''s alchemy technique was the Nine Revolution Pill Refining Technique that he received from the system.


    There was nothing special about it, it just controlled the mes to revolve the ingredients inside of the cauldron to purify them until there were no impurities left. But then after that, the revolving of the mes would concentrate the medicinal essence of the ingredients, making them more and more potent until they reached a level that far surpassed the medicinal essence that was contained in the ingredients in the first ce.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t go all the way with all nine revolutions.


    Instead, once he reached the third revolution, Lin Fan stopped refining the ingredients.


    It wasn''t that he couldn''t reach the fourth revolution, but rather because there was no need for him to continue with the fourth revolution. He had already refined the ingredients enough to aplish what he wanted to aplish, so refining them any further wouldn''t be good for him.


    Rather, if he made a pill that was too good, it would draw attention that he didn''t want.<sub> </sub>


    Since he had stopped his refining, the pill had taken form and that meant that it was time for it to be revealed.


    But before it could be revealed, the thunder in the sky suddenly became even stronger.


    Everyone looked at the clouds in the sky and they felt that this feeling was familiar. Most of these alchemists were experts that were in the Soul Realm, so they had experienced something simr to this in the past.


    These were tribtion clouds and the thunder that they contained were tribtion lightning.


    However, there wasn''t anyone undergoing a breakthrough here, so why were there tribtion clouds forming?


    The elders were worried about the safety of everyone, but mostly they were worried about the safety of their own disciples, so they all stood up as they prepared to head to the stage to block the tribtion lightning. Even Elder Fu stood up with them since he was worried about Lin Fan.


    However, it was Lin Fan that stopped them by raising a hand and saying, "There''s no need to panic, this is just a tribtion for the pill that I''ve refined. I''ll take care of this."


    The elders and everyone heard the words that Lin Fan was saying, but they couldn''t understand it since these words went against theirmon sense too much.


    Lin Fan was saying that the tribtion clouds were drawn by the pill that he had refined?


    But if that was the case, wouldn''t that mean¡­?


    Everyone revealed looks of shock as they looked at the pill that hade out of Lin Fan''s cauldron and after releasing their spiritual senses, they could tell that it was indeed that pill that was the target of the tribtion clouds.


    After they realized all of this, no one was able to move a single muscle as they waited to see what Lin Fan would do.


    The tribtion lightning built up in the sky for a few more seconds before the first bolt of lightning fell down at the pill.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he saw this, but he didn''t panic at all. He just casually raised his fist and sent a punch right at the bolt of lightning that was falling down on him.


    It didn''t even take his fist hitting the lightning to dissipate, just the force of his fist was already more than enough to scatter the energy contained within the bolt of lightning.


    Of course, that wasn''t the only bolt of lightning that came down, it was just the first bolt out of nine.


    The clouds rumbled again before releasing a bolt of lightning that was twice as big as the one that it had sent down before. However, that still wasn''t enough to pose a threat to Lin Fan.


    He just casually raised his fist again and with another punch, he scattered the bolt of lightning. However, this time, the bolt of lightning fell down much further than the previous bolt of lightning before scattering.


    Still, it had been shattered by the pure air pressure of Lin Fan''s fist alone.


    It was the same thing that happened with the third bolt of lightning. It was only when the fourth bolt of lightning fell down that the bolt of lightning was finally able to touch Lin Fan''s fist.


    Still, even if it had reached Lin Fan''s fist, he was still able to scatter it with a single punch.


    This continued once again until the seventh bolt of lightning.


    Lin Fan had been able to destroy the first six bolts of lightning with just his physical body and suction force alone, but now when he punched the seventh bolt of lightning, he had to use something to supplement his punch.


    There was a golden glow that no one else could see that appeared around his fist when he punched at the seventh bolt of lightning.


    With this golden glow that no one else could see, he was able to smash the rest of the lightning tribtion.


    After the lightning tribtion was finished, there was a glow that appeared on the pill that he had refined before a clear line appeared on the surface of the pill.


    Lin Fan casually picked it up from off the ground and then walked over to the judges'' table where the judges had been standing there in a daze.


    He just casually put the pill on the table and then said, "This is the pill that I refined."


    It took a long time before the judges were able toe back from their shock, but once they came back to their senses, they immediately came forward to check the pill.


    After another long period of silence, Elder Fu was the one to say, "It really is a Pill Line Pill."

 Chapter 737 Alchemy King Hall (11)

    There was only silence that met Elder Fu''s words.


    There was no one that could believe what Elder Fu had just said because it was just too ridiculous.


    A Pill Line Pill!


    Even if Lin Fan was talented, no one believed that he was able to refine a Pill Line Pill at his age!


    Not to mention that he had used the mostmon ingredients and the mostmon refining method!


    If he was able to make a Pill Line Pill in these conditions, that meant that his abilities might even surpass the elders¡­No, his abilities might even surpass the Alchemy Master!


    What kind of a monster would he be if that was the case!


    So everyone was waiting for the other elders to refute Elder Fu, but not a single one of the elders said a thing. They all just looked at the pill on the table before looking at Lin Fan with looks of shock.


    Based on this reaction from them, it was clear that this wasn''t a mistake, but it was true.


    There were no words to describe this situation as everyone was just filled with pure shock.


    That was just how much meaning the concept of a Pill Line Alchemist had.


    Not even all the elders of the Alchemy King Hall were Pill Line Alchemists and even if they were Pill Line Alchemists, their sess rate was incredibly low. The only one that had a consistent sess rate when it came to Pill Line Pills was the Alchemy Master.


    For Lin Fan to do something like this, it would mean that his skills were close to approaching the same level as the Alchemy Master!


    Lin Fan just gave a chuckle and said, "I was just lucky."


    Everyone was once again shocked by this, but they also immediately jumped onto it since this was the only way that they could ept something as shocking as this.


    "That''s right, he was just lucky!"


    "Right, how else could he have refined that Pill Line Pill?"


    "Do you think that he''s the Alchemy Master? How else could he have done it if it wasn''t luck?"


    These kinds of voices filled the crowd, not even bothering keeping their voices down so that Lin Fan wouldn''t hear it. It was almost as if they were trying to use saying it out loud to convince themselves. It was like the more that they said it, the more likely that it would be the truth.


    Even the elders started talking amongst themselves, saying that Lin Fan was just lucky enough to be able to refine a Pill Line Pill, but they were less certain because their alchemy knowledge was greater than the crowd. They knew that luck wasn''t enough to make a Pill Line Pill¡­


    But Elder Fu ignored all of that as he said whileughing, "Whether it was luck or not, that doesn''t change the fact that Lin Fan had refined the best pill, so he will be the one taking the throne now."


    Ugly expressions appeared on the faces of the judges and the other elders, but especially the faces of the elder disciples.


    After all, what Lin Fan was doing now was clearly going against the promise that he made to them. It wasn''t about whether he won or not, but rather the blow to their prestige if anyone ever learned that Lin Fan had fooled them like this.


    Young master Aotian however was angry for apletely different reason.


    After all, he wasn''t trying to get engaged to Song Shu just because he wanted power, but rather he truly loved her. Now that the woman that he loved had been taken away by someone else like this, how could he ept it as a man?


    Hepletely lost his temper and pulled out his sword as he jumped at Lin Fan, swinging the sword down at his head while shouting, "Lin Fan! You son of a b*tch, how dare you lie to me like this!"


    He didn''t even bother saying any polite words to Lin Fan, he didn''t even call Lin Fan "Brother Lin" anymore, he just called Lin Fan directly by name and cursed while swinging his weapon at him.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t have to do a thing as Elder Fu acted before he could.


    Elder Fu reached his hand and there was a hand made of mes that grabbed young master Aotian right out of the air, before throwing him onto the ground.


    The sixteenth elder on the side slightly knitted his brows when he saw this, but he didn''t say anything as he knew that Elder Fu was justified in doing this.


    After throwing young master Aotian to the ground, Elder Fu said, "What are you doing?!"


    Young master Aotian still red at Lin Fan with eyes filled with rage, but he still answered Elder Fu, "Grand elder, this is a personal grudge between me and Lin Fan, this has nothing to do with the contest. I ask that you do not interfere!"


    Elder Fu just gave a cold snort after hearing this before saying, "Is that so? That''s not what it seems like right now."<sub> </sub>


    The sixteenth elder spoke up at this time and said, "Aotian, not here. Just let it go for now."


    ? Young master Aotian still looked aggrieved, but he knew that this wasn''t a good situation for him. Instead of dragging this out in a public ce like this, it was better to settle this in private.


    But the thought of Song Shu being engaged to this man drove him crazy.


    However, it wasn''t just him alone who couldn''t ept these results.


    The other elders all had their own ns for who would marry Song Shu and now that someone had juste out of nowhere to wreck their ns, naturally they couldn''t ept it.


    So before Elder Fu could say anything else, one of the elders came forward to say, "Elder Fu, this contest was supposed to be a contest of refining skills and not luck. So we''re just saying that letting it end like this seems a bit¡­"


    This elder didn''t finish their sentence, but the meaning of his words were clear.


    They wanted to hold a do over or at least they wanted to give the others another chance since they didn''t believe that Lin Fan deserved this victory.


    At this point, they had already firmly brainwashed themselves to think that Lin Fan refining the Pill Line Pill was nothing more than a fluke.


    Elder Fu narrowed his eyes to look at this elder before saying, "So you''re saying that Lin Fan doesn''t deserve the victory?"


    The elder quickly waved his hand and said, "Of course not, of course not, young master Lin is truly lucky to refine a Pill Line Pill and providence is naturally the sign of a great talent, however this doesn''t seem to really demonstrate his skills¡­"


    The elder didn''t mince his words at all, he just changed Lin Fan''s feat of refining the Pill Line Pill to being just luck.


    However, before Elder Fu could say anything, the other elders came forward to try to convince him as well.


    After all, this was rted to their future influence in the Alchemy King Hall, they weren''t willing to give this up that easily.


    They finally found a period where the Alchemy Master was away and if they didn''t seize this chance to gain more power, it would be a waste to them.


    Elder Fu looked at these elders with a look of disgust that couldn''t be hidden, but then he pointed at them and said, "So you''re saying that all of your disciples relied on their own skills to refine their pills?"


    The elders looked at each other as if they didn''t understand what Elder Fu meant by this, but then they nodded in agreement to this.


    Elder Fu turned to the sixth elder and asked, "So where did little Hu''s Roaring Bellows mese from?"


    The sixth elder revealed an awkward look.


    Elder Fu didn''t care as he turned to the second elder and asked, "Where did little Ying''s Cleansing Herbe from?"


    Then he turned to the first elder and asked, "Where did little Jin''s East and West mese from?"


    Finally, he turned to the sixteenth elder and said, "Don''t think that I couldn''t tell. Where did little Aotian get the Sixteen Revolution Refining Technique from?"


    Once he had finished calling out all the elders, Elder Fu swept over them with disapproving eyes as he said, "So you''re saying that all of your disciples made their pills with their own skills?"


    All of the elders had awkward looks on their faces as they had never expected Elder Fu to call them all out like this.


    But their brains also started turning when they heard this.


    It seemed like this old man really was nning on backing Lin Fan all the way¡­If only this old geezer had waited a few more days, their n would have been ready and they could have forcefully manipted the results of this contest¡­


    But right now, the most important thing was to force Elder Fu to nullify the results of this contest and rehold it again.


    As long as the contest was held again, they were confident that their disciples would win against Lin Fan.


    So while they were silent, they sent messages to the elders in the other factions.


    As long as their various factions came together, they would have enough influence to even pressure Elder Fu.


    But before they could say anything, Lin Fan suddenly gave a cough and said, "I think that there''s someone else that you should speak to first."


    Everyone was surprised to hear Lin Fan speaking at this time, but what they were more surprised by was the person that suddenlynded.

 Chapter 738 Alchemy King Hall (12)

    As soon as this personnded, his eyes swept over the elders before he said with a snort, "It seems that while I was away, all of you have been ying your tricks."


    Everyone gave a shiver when they heard this.


    After all, the person who had justnded was the Alchemy Master.


    This person was Lin Fan''s final trump card, though to be fair, he hadn''t expected much out of this trump card.


    But now it seemed like it had an even better effect than he had expected.


    Before he had even left to take the exam, he had contacted the people from the twelve great factions that he was acquainted with. He had asked them to help him find the Alchemy Master and tell him what was happening in the Alchemy King Hall.


    While he had only done it as ast attempt, he never expected that it would be his most effective move.


    What he didn''t know was that the twelve great factions that he had contacted had attached great importance to this matter because of the transaction that he had made with them earlier.


    He had proven that he was someone that could breed Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts, so he was someone that they definitely had to build good rtions with.


    What they really wanted to do was actually lock him up and have him continuously breed pets for them, but they also knew that this wouldn''t be effective. Not to mention that they weren''t confident in capturing him since they knew nothing about him, including the people that were backing him.


    So they chose to help him find the Alchemy Master to build a good rtionship with him.


    After the Alchemy Master had been found, Lin Fan had immediately contacted him to tell him about the n, so the Alchemy Master had actually been watching the entire contest. He had just been waiting for the signal from Lin Fan toe out.


    Now that he was out, naturally he would release his full aura to suppress these people who had wanted to plot behind his back.


    The elders all knew that they were in a bad situation, so they immediately decided to put down their differences and work together.


    The first elder was the one that came out as their representative to say, "Alchemy Master, we''re not doing anything wrong here. We''re just worried about the future of the Alchemy King Hall and your disciple, which is why we organized this event."


    The second elder also backed him up by saying, "Alchemy Master, you know that we care the most about our little niece, which is why we were worried about her."


    The sixth elder said, "Alchemy Master, you should know that our disciples are the best of the best in the Alchemy King Hall, so we were just trying to help our little niece."


    The Alchemy Master looked over them again before saying with a snort, "Well, it seems to me that you were trying to seize power for yourselves. Is there anything else that you want to say?"


    The elders all lowered their heads, not daring to look at the Alchemy Master.


    They were acting this way because the Alchemy Master hadplete control over the Alchemy King Hall. That was because unlike them, he was a genuine Legendary Alchemist and a Two Pill Line Alchemist.


    With his skills, it could even be said that most orders that came to the Alchemy King Hall were for him.


    Which was why they were in a situation where they jumped when he said jump and ran when he said run.


    The Alchemy Master saw that no one was saying a thing, so he gave another snort before saying, "Since there''s nothing else that you all want to say? Good."


    He turned to the crowd and said, "I hereby dere that this contest is over."


    After this, he turned to Lin Fan and asked, "What do you think about this situation?"


    Lin Fan just said with a calm smile, "I think that there''s no need to take the results of this contest seriously and treat it as if it never happened."


    All the elders took a secret cold gasp when they heard this.


    He had already won and in such an overwhelming manner. With such a public result, even if the Alchemy Master cancelled the contest, it was still very likely that Lin Fan would be named Song Shu''s fiance.


    That was a position that would be able to influence the entire Alchemy King Hall in the future, but he was giving it up that easily?


    Even the Alchemy Master couldn''t help raising a brow as he asked, "Are you sure about this?"


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response.


    What he didn''t hear was that in the distance, there was a girl who gave a sigh of regret along with a sad look when she heard this.


    The Alchemy Master took a deep look at Lin Fan.


    Even now, he couldn''t see through Lin Fan at all.<sub> </sub>


    He had nned this entire contest and even brought him back, but for what?


    Still, since Lin Fan had already spoken, there was nothing else for him to say. After all, he treated his disciple like a daughter and if she didn''t want to marry, she wouldn''t have to marry.


    No one would be able to force her to marry!


    The Alchemy Master gave a nod to Lin Fan before turning to the crowd to announce, "This contest and its results will be nullified. Everyone can scatter now."


    After he said this, the entire crowd quickly left since they knew that they didn''t want to stay for what followed.


    As for the elders, they naturally didn''t dare leave now that the Alchemy Master was back.


    Once the crowd had dispersed, in front of everyone''s shocked gaze, there was a slender figure that ran out onto the stage and jumped at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan couldn''t react at first, but when he saw who it was, he opened his arms and took her in his embrace.


    The slender figure buried her head in his chest and stayed there for a full minute before lifting her head to look up at him. She asked in an excited voice, "Big brother, when did you get here? Why didn''t youe and see me if you were here?"


    It was naturally Song Shu, the Alchemy Master''s disciple that this entire affair was about.


    When Lin Fan was able to get a good look, he couldn''t help being surprised by what he saw. Gone was the little girl who used to follow him around, now there was a beautiful young girl who was in his embrace.


    But since he had watched her grow, he still treated her like a little sister.


    Lin Fan raised a hand to pat her on the head before saying, "Well, I heard about what was happening to you, so I came to help."


    Song Shu pouted her lips and said, "But that still didn''t exin why you didn''te and see me."


    She hadn''t known about Lin Fan being at the Alchemy King Hall since over the past few days, she had been in closed cultivation. She had done this to avoid the people who hade to pester her all day during this time.


    She had onlye out today since Elder Fu had picked her up for this event.


    She had also been unwilling toe to this event after hearing about what it was, but she hade in the end since Elder Fu had told her that there would be a surprise for her.


    Now she finally understood what he had meant by this surprise.


    After a long period of silence from the crowd, the first one to speak aftering back to their senses was actually young master Aotian, "Song Shu, who is this person to you?"


    Song Shu looked at young master Aotian with an angry look and said, "This person? Who do you think you''re talking to? This is my big brother!"


    Young master Aotian looked at Lin Fan with a confused look as he couldn''t understand what was happening.


    Lin Fan just shook his head before saying with a bitter smile, "She''s a handful, but if she''s willing, I''m not going to object. Best of luck to you."


    Young master Aotian was still very confused by all of this, but it didn''t take him long to figure out what Lin Fan meant by this.


    He looked at Lin Fan again and asked, "So you''re saying that you''re not involved romantically with Song Shu?"


    This was a very important question to him, so he ignored everything and asked it in a very direct manner.


    Lin Fan shook his head again and said, "I''ve already said what I''ve said, there''s no need for me to say anything else."


    All the elders suddenly revealed looks of understanding when they heard these words from Lin Fan.


    It turned out that Lin Fan was acquainted with the Alchemy Master''s disciple¡­Then this entire contest should have been a plot that he devised¡­


    They had allpletely underestimated him earlier, but now they couldn''t help looking at him withplicated looks.


    Perhaps that Pill Line Pill really wasn''t just luck¡­


    After all, he was someone that even the talented Alchemy Master''s disciple recognized as a big brother.


    As for young master Aotian, his face filled with joy as he immediately ran forward and grabbed Lin Fan''s foot as he said, "Big brother, please ept my proposal to Song Shu!"


    Lin Fan just shook his head with a bitter smile when he saw this.

 Chapter 739 Alchemy King Hall (13)

    As for what followed after this, the Alchemy Master just punished each of the elders by making them offer up part of the ingredients that they had hoarded for themselves.


    Normally the Alchemy Master would turn a blind eye to this since this could be considered a benefit for the elders, but this time he was forcing them to return the things that they took.


    Even so, that was still considered a very light punishment for what they had done.


    That was mainly because Lin Fan chose to forgive the elders for what they did.


    This was something that confused the Alchemy Master, but he soon understood why Lin Fan did that after the meeting he had with him.


    All the elders were confused as well, but they were also allowed in the meeting and they understood as well.


    The meeting was between Lin Fan''s side and the Alchemy King Hall, which sounded quite ridiculous when one thought about it.


    All that was on Lin Fan''s side was a single pet store and they were meeting with the Alchemy King Hall, which was one of the twelve great factions that controlled this Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But even then, the Alchemy Master chose to meet Lin Fan as an equal.


    That was because he had seen all the other factions helping Lin Fan look for him, which meant that Lin Fan was connected to all those factions.


    If it was just one or two factions, then it wouldn''t matter, but it was several factions at the same time.


    It seemed that something had changed during the time that he had gone off looking for herbs, so he didn''t want to rush into anything. It was better for him to listen to what Lin Fan was offering him before he gave a response.


    But when Lin Fan put his offer on the table, not just the Alchemy Master, even the elders were shocked by what he offered.


    The Alchemy Master said in a shaky voice, "Can you repeat what you just said?"


    As he asked this, all the elders focused on Lin Fan, as if they were afraid that they would miss a single word that he said.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I said that I can offer your Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts for a price. As for how many, that will depend on how many you can afford to buy or how much I have in stock."


    The Alchemy Master and all the elders had shocked looks on their faces as they couldn''t believe what Lin Fan had just told them.


    The first thing that he opened up with was that he was going to offer them Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts¡­


    This would be hard to believe no matter who it was¡­


    After a long time, the Alchemy Master asked, "How can you prove this?"


    Lin Fan just calmly waved his hand and brought out two young pets that appeared on the table.


    The Alchemy Master and the elders immediately came forward to look over these pets. As they scanned these pets with their spiritual senses, their expressions filled with more and more disbelief.


    They had asked Lin Fan to prove it and there was no better way to prove it than to take out the actual products.


    This was a beast with a Child Soul Realm bloodline and a Nascent Soul Realm bloodline respectively. While they weren''t in the Child Soul Realm and the Nascent Soul Realm right now, as long as they grew up, they would reach those realms eventually.


    So these two pets that were ced in front of them proved definitively that Lin Fan would be able to provide them with what he offered.


    Seeing that this was the case, the Alchemy Master immediately revealed a serious look as he fell into deep thought, but after a while, he said to Lin Fan, "Young master Lin, if it''s possible, can you give us some time to discuss this matter? I need to discuss this matter with the elders first before we cane to a decision."


    Lin Fan stood up and gave a nod before saying, "Of course, that''s not a problem at all. I''ll wait outside in the waiting room, please call me when you''re done."


    The Alchemy Master revealed a grateful look as he said, "Thank you, young master Lin."


    Then as if he had suddenly thought of something, he said, "Song Shu, why don''t you go and keep young master Linpany. I''m sure that you have plenty of things to catch up on."


    Song Shu who had been sitting with a bored look on her face perked up immediately when she heard this.


    She just ignored the Alchemy Master and grabbed Lin Fan by the arm to drag him out as she said, "Big brother, it''s been such a long time since we''ve seen each other!"


    Then she leaned in against him and nuzzled her head against his chest.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan just walked out with her with a smile on his face, but it was clear that other people didn''t like this.


    The other elder disciples all quickly followed after Lin Fan since there wasn''t a ce for them in this meeting at all.


    The Alchemy Master and the elders just had awkward smiles on their faces as they watched them leave.


    However, once they were gone, all of the elders revealed serious looks as they turned to the Alchemy Master. This was a very important meeting for them because this matter was something that would decide the future of their Alchemy King Hall.


    The Alchemy Master sat there for a minute with a serious look before saying, "So, let''s discuss this."


    ¡­


    Outside in the waiting room, after Song Shu pulled Lin Fan out, the first thing that she did was find a couch that was only big enough for the two of them before sitting down.


    After sitting down, she just held his arm andid her head against his chest, almost like how a girlfriend would act.


    After not seeing him for a long time, the suppressed emotions that she had burst forward and she showed them without holding back at all.


    On the side, young master Aotian looked at this scene with envy, but he also kept himself in check. He knew that Lin Fan only saw Song Shu as a little sister based on the way that he treated her, so there was no need for him to be envious.


    In fact, it was better for him to win over Lin Fan to get to Song Shu since it was clear just how much respect she had for him.


    This was something that the other elder disciples didn''t miss, so theypletely forgot about how Lin Fan had lied to them before and instead tried to get closer to him.


    It wasn''t just to get closer to Song Shu like they had originally nned. They had also seen how the elders had treated him in the meeting room, so they knew that not only would he have influence on the future Alchemy King Hall generation, he also had influence on the current Alchemy King Hall generation.


    Young master Aotian was the first one to go forward as he said, "Brother Lin, your alchemy skills truly are amazing. I can''t believe that you were even able to refine a Pill Line Pill. Can you tell me how you did it?"


    When the other elder disciples saw this, they all came forward to ask Lin Fan the same thing, but of course, their main goal was to tter Lin Fan.


    The one thing that they all ignored was Song Shu ring at them for interrupting her private time with Lin Fan.


    However, when she saw all of theming forward, she said, "Don''t you idiots know anything? It''s simple, it''s the ratio of ingredients that he used?"


    Everyone suddenly revealed a confused look as they asked, "Ratio, what do you mean by ratio? Weren''t they justmon ingredients?"


    Song Shu shook her head and said, "They aremon ingredients, but evenmon ingredients have special properties to them. While mixing the Sun Dew Herb with the Fire Tongue Herb will create a strong synergy, there are still differences in power between the two herbs. If you create a bnce between the power of these herbs, then an even stronger effect will appear, far beyond what normal synergy would be like."


    Everyone knitted their brows to fall into deep thought when they heard this since these two herbs were indeed among the ones that Lin Fan used.


    However, Lin Fan shook his head and said, "No, it''s not just that. You have to think about the ratio of the¡­"


    Song Shu immediately revealed an excited look when she heard this and she quickly countered, "But wouldn''t that¡­?"


    The two of them soon fell into a discussion between the two of them, bringing up many different topics, but it was all tooplicated for the elder disciples to listen to.


    Their heads started to spin as they tried to follow along with Lin Fan and Song Shu''s conversation, but they couldn''t make heads or tails of it in the end. It was almost as if the two of them were speaking in apletely differentnguage.


    However, through this conversation, they had confirmed that Lin Fan refining the Pill Line Pill wasn''t just a fluke.


    The two of them continued with their conversation until the door to the meeting room opened again.


    Elder Fu came out to bring Lin Fan back in, but this time, he kept all the disciples out of the room.


    Since they had been kept out, there was nothing that they could do but wait, but at least that also gave them time to talk to Song Shu.


    Young master Aotian couldn''t help asking Song Shu, "Just who is brother Lin?"


    Song Shu''s face filled with an excited look as she said, "You want to know about big brother?"

 Chapter 740 Alchemy King Hall (14)

    After Lin Fan was brought back into the room, he sat down in front of all the elders and the Alchemy Master.


    The Alchemy Master silently sat there looking at Lin Fan for a bit before asking, "How many can you offer us and what price can you give us?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "I can give you one hundred and fifty Child Soul Realm beasts and fifteen Nascent Soul Realm beasts." As for the price, he gave them the us


    When they heard this, the Alchemy Master and the elders couldn''t help taking a cold breath when they heard this.


    Putting aside the one hundred and fifty Child Soul Realm beasts, the fifteen Nascent Soul Realm beasts were what they cared about the most.


    When it came to Nascent Soul Realm Experts, since the Alchemy King Hall only had around twenty elders, fifteen Nascent Soul Realm beasts would mean almost doubling the number of Nascent Soul Realm Experts that they had.


    So this was a very significant matter for the Alchemy King Hall.


    Of course, they no longer doubted Lin Fan since he had already brought out the beasts as proof. Since that was the case, all that mattered now was actually signing the deal, but it was hard to contain their excitement and anxiety.


    It was only the Alchemy Master who was able to remain calm.


    He looked at Lin Fan for a bit as if he was in deep thought before suddenly asking, "Who else are you offering these beasts to?"


    The elders had been in an excited state, but when the Alchemy Master said this, it was like there was a bucket of cold water that suddenly fell onto them. However, one of them couldn''t help saying, "Alchemy Master, isn''t this question a bit too much¡­?"


    But it was clear by the way that his voice drifted off that he also wanted the answer to this question.


    After all, this was a very important matter.


    The reason they wanted these beasts was to gain power over the other twelve great factions, but if Lin Fan was also selling these beasts to the other twelve great factions, then that n wouldn''t mean anything.


    However, there was a deeper reason for why the Alchemy Master asked this.


    When Lin Fan had used his connections to find the Alchemy Master, he had already shown that he was connected to the various twelve great factions. However, the Alchemy Master had noticed that there were a few that were missing from the people that he had contacted.


    Since that was the case, he wanted to know what kind of rtions Lin Fan had to the other twelve great factions before making a decision.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first as he calmly looked at the Alchemy Master, but then he said, "If you want to know which ones I''m not selling to, I can tell you."


    The Alchemy Master trembled when he heard this.


    It was as he had suspected, there were a few rifts in the rtionship between Lin Fan and a few of the twelve great factions. If that were the case, that would mean that there would be ces for him to act.


    The Alchemy Master then revealed a faint smile as he said, "I think that while there are some ces that need negotiations, there is also the possibility of cooperation here."


    Lin Fan gave a nod as he also revealed a faint smile.


    Over the next hour, there were many things that were discussed, but in the end, they were able to reach a deal.


    However, no matter how the negotiations went, Lin Fan wouldn''t budge from his initial offer of one hundred fifty Child Soul Realm beasts and fifteen Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    The Alchemy King Hall naturally didn''t have a problem with money since they were the richest of the twelve great factions with their supply of pills. If they could, they would want to buy as many beasts as possible to increase their own power.


    However, Lin Fan wouldn''t budge from his initial offer because he didn''t want to break the bnce between the factions.


    He had started with his highest offer already because he didn''t want to waste time, but he didn''t expect these old men to be this shameless.


    Still, he had all the cards, so it wasn''t as if they were able to do anything.


    By the end of it, everyone who was involved looked exhausted.


    When Lin Fan came out of the meeting room, he was surprised to find all the elder disciples sprawled out over some form of seating, all with exhausted looks on their faces.


    The only person who was still sitting upright was Song Shu who seemed to be talking about something.<sub> </sub>


    However, when she saw Lin Fane out, she immediately stopped talking and came to his side, grabbing his arm as she said, "Big brother, you''re finally out! Are you done with your meeting?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and then before he could say anything, Song Shu said, "Since you''re free now, let''s go on a tour of the Alchemy King Hall! I can show you all of my favourite ces."


    Seeing how happy she looked, Lin Fan couldn''t say no to her, so he just let her pull him away.


    But as he was being pulled away, he couldn''t help looking back at the elder disciples who all had exhausted looks on their faces and thinking to himself, "What happened here?"


    What he never would have known was that these elder disciples had beenpletely knocked out by Song Shu''s enthusiastic speech about him.


    It was so intense that it almost could have been categorized as brainwashing.


    Even as they had been knocked out, all the things that Song Shu said kept ringing in their minds, as if it was slowly bing their own thoughts. Even their dreams were about Song Shu telling them all about the great things with Lin Fan.


    But it was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t know this.


    However, it wasn''t strange for Song Shu to act like this since this was just her true personality.


    When she had been back on the Blue Star, because of the way that she had been raised, she had always acted reserved since she learned from a young age that that was the best way to survive on the streets. But now that she was in a ce where she knew that she no longer had to hold back, her real personality came out like a tidal wave, sweeping away everyone that was in her way.


    ¡­


    Back in the meeting room, even if they were exhausted, the Alchemy Master and the elders hadn''t convened yet.


    Even though they had reached a deal with Lin Fan, there were still other things that they had to discuss first.


    Since they had been stuck in a period of infighting during the time that the Alchemy Master was away, they really hadn''t been able to get much information about the other twelve great factions and what was happening between them during this time.


    Even when they sent their people to the Ancient Era Ruins, they had just randomly picked a team to send, so they hadn''t really received much news from there.


    They only knew that there were a few casualties, but considering that it was the Ancient Era Ruins, this was a very normal thing. The elders hadpletely ignored this as they had other things to focus on and the Alchemy Master hadn''t been there.


    So right now, they were in a very ufortable situation.


    After meeting with Lin Fan, it was clear to the Alchemy Master and the elders that things were changing. If they didn''t have enough information to match this change, it was very likely that they would be caught off guard and would be left behind.


    They were just grateful that Lin Fan was connected to Song Shu and that he hade to pull them back before they went too far. If it hadn''t been for this, not only would they have missed out on the sale of these beasts, they also wouldn''t have known what was happening with the other twelve great factions.


    Even if they were a neutral faction, with all these factions moving, it was impossible for them to remain neutral.


    After a long period of silence, the Alchemy Master revealed a serious look before turning to Elder Fu to ask, "Who did we send to the Ancient Era Ruins this time?"


    Elder Fu replied, "None of the elders wanted to send their disciples, so we chose some random disciples of Master Alchemists."


    All the elders lowered their heads when they heard this since they knew that this was Elder Fu''s off handed jab at them, but then they all raised their heads and started volunteering to collect information.


    The Alchemy Master just waved his hand at them when he heard this and he turned his attention back to Elder Fu as he said, "I''m sure that they were ignored when they came back, so check with them again about what happened in the Ancient Era Ruins."


    Then he turned back to the elders and said, "I need you all to start contacting the various other factions, but make sure that you aren''t caught by the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association, understood?"


    The elders all gave nods with serious expressions.


    After seeing this, the Alchemy Master couldn''t help giving a sigh and saying, "The times really are changing¡­"


    But then he revealed a serious look and said to the elders, "We can''t let our Alchemy King Hall be swept away by this new era."


    All the elders once again agreed with serious expressions.

 Chapter 741 Small Movements

    Lin Fan only stayed another day in the Alchemy King Hall after the contest.


    After all, there was nothing else left for him to do there and he had already wasted enough time in the Alchemy King Hall.


    There were other things that he had to do, but he had taken time out of his schedule toe here because of Song Shu.


    Song Shu had wanted to go with Lin Fan, but knowing that this was a delicate time, the Alchemy Master didn''t allow this.


    In just a single day, he had already gathered more than enough information to get a general idea of the situation. He knew that the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association would certainly be watching Lin Fan''s store and if he were to allow Song Shu to go with Lin Fan, wouldn''t that be dering that their Alchemy King Hall was on Lin Fan''s side?


    Before everything had been settled, he wasn''t willing to let this happen, so he wouldn''t let Song Shu go.


    Song Shu threw a tantrum after hearing this, but Lin Fan was the one to calm her down.


    He didn''t want her toe with him either since he knew that this was a dangerous time for the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance. There was going to be a reshuffling with the top of the Gctic Humanity Alliance and he was going to be at the center of it.


    He had wanted to stay low key, but it seemed like the twelve great factions wouldn''t let him.


    It wasn''t hard for him to pick up the thoughts of the twelve great factions, but since these were the factions that already had grievances with him, he decided to let it go.


    After all, this would also help him with his real goal¡­


    But if Song Shu were toe with him at this time, it would mean that she would be caught up in attempts to attack him with her status. So it was better for her to stay at the Alchemy King Hall for now.


    When Lin Fan returned to the store, there was nothing that happened at first, but then there was a piece of news that created arge stir.


    The Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect had grouped together to announce that they had figured out a way to breed Child Soul Realm beasts and that they were now selling Child Soul Realm beasts.


    While this wasn''t much for the twelve great factions, it did mean a lot for the much smaller factions.


    After all, most of them didn''t even have Nascent Soul Realm Experts, so being able to buy Child Soul Realm beasts was a veryrge boost to their power.


    With this increase in power, they would be able to earn more resources and would have a chance to be a Nascent Soul Realm Expert in time.


    So this was a long term move on part of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect.


    After all, they were the ones providing the Child Soul Realm beasts to these smaller factions, so the smaller factions would have no choice but to get closer to them. Then over time, as the smaller factions became stronger, they would help the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect since there would be more and more Nascent Soul Realm Experts on their side.


    While the true power of each of the twelve great factions were its True Soul Realm Experts, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts still had their uses. After all, it wasn''t as if their True Soul Realm Experts could be everywhere and there were only so many True Soul Realm Experts.


    This was why the twelve great factions had been so excited about Lin Fan selling them Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    But of course, this also took the wind out of their sails since they were nning on taking care of the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    Of course, that was all depending on how quickly they could raise the new pets that they received from Lin Fan.


    But it would all be meaningless if the other side was able to raise Nascent Soul Realm Experts through these minor families.


    So the twelve great factions had gathered and finally through old man Qiao from the Hunters Association asked Lin Fan something.


    "Is it possible to sell Child Soul Realm beasts to factions other than the twelve great factions?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this, but after hearing about what the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect were doing, he immediately understood what they were thinking.


    They were trying to win over the small factions that the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect were appealing to. So they were going to use the same trick as the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect, they would win them over with Child Soul Realm beasts.


    However, the Tamers Guild wasn''t able to keep up with the supply of the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect alone, so they had no choice but to ask Lin Fan for help.


    Lin Fan just said, "It''s not a problem." Then he added, "Of course, that depends on how many Child Soul Realm beast eggs you can get me."<sub> </sub>


    Old man Qiao gave a confidentugh when he heard this and he said, "That''s not a problem at all. Even if we can''t hatch eggs like them, there''s no problem securing eggs. After all, we are from the twelve great factions just like them."


    Lin Fan nodded and just left this matter there.


    He didn''t mind this at all since he still had to sell Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    He had nned on slowly distributing them among the twelve great factions to bnce out the power between them, but now there was a chance to distribute these Child Soul Realm beasts elsewhere and at a rate much faster than he had nned. Lin Fan naturally wouldn''t miss out on this.


    As for the Nascent Soul Realm beasts, he would just give the twelve great factions that he was close to another batch when the time came.


    It seemed like it wouldn''t be a problem at all for him to finish this quest.


    The problem seemed to lie with the Thunder Sect and the True Spirit Sect¡­


    How were they suddenly able to breed Child Soul Realm beasts and at a level that even surpassed the Tamers Guild? They weren''t an organization that specialized in taming and breeding beasts in the first ce, so this was certainly a strange situation.


    This shouldn''t have happened unless¡­they were able to receive some kind of outside help.


    Lin Fan started thinking about the things that had happened in the Ancient Era Ruins when he thought of this.


    While the suspicious people had been a part of the Assassins Association group, they already knew about the rtionship between the Assassins Association and the two sects. It was clear that this sudden ability to breed Child Soul Realm beasts should be rted to these people that had suddenly shown up in the Assassins Association.


    But the key thing was, where did these peoplee from?


    Lin Fan could tell that these people certainly weren''t weak, so they were most likely experts from another upper realm, or¡­they could even be people that were sent by a Ster Kingdom.


    Of course, no matter where they were from, they should have their own goal, so that was what Lin Fan had to worry about.


    The key thing is if they would go against what Lin Fan wanted to do with the True Spirit Sect¡­


    But that was after he learned what their ns were in the first ce and that was too early. Without any of this information, Lin Fan''s guesses were useless.


    The only thing that he could do now was make the factions that he was close to stronger.


    As well, he would have to build up his own forces to help him aplish his goals. He couldn''t justpletely rely on others since there was always the chance that they would betray him, no matter how close they were now.


    So that was why Lin Fan had been making his preparations recently.


    After he took care of the selling Child Soul Realm beasts matter, Lin Fan changed the topic as he asked, "Are the people that I asked you to help me find here?"


    Old man Qiao gave a nod and said, "They just ascended and they were brought to us. I put them up in a nice residence, so they''re just waiting for you now."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Then let''s go now."


    Old man Qiao was surprised to hear this since it was still currently during the day and Lin Fan''s store was still open. Normally when he came at this time for something, Lin Fan would always ask him to wait until the store was closed, but this time¡­


    Still, old man Qiao didn''t say anything and just led the way to the residence that he had prepared.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile when he saw the people in the residence.


    These were people that he hadn''t seen in a long time, but he was nheless happy to see them.


    When they saw him, they were naturally also happy to see him since it was the same for them.


    These people were Jiang Zhi Shu and the other people who followed Lin Fan back on the Blue Star.


    He had used the Hunters Organization to bring them all up to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.

 Chapter 742 Future Plans

    Of course, it wasn''t just Jiang Zhi Shu''s group that was brought up. There was also one person that Lin Fan had brought up along with them that he wasn''t in charge of.


    When this person saw Lin Fan appear at the residence, he came over and asked, "Where are they?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "They''re currently being held under house arrest, but they are safe."


    This man was Lin Ao, Lin Fan''s father.


    The "they" that he referred to was his wife and daughter, who were also Lin Fan''s mother and little sister.


    Lin Ao knitted his brows before asking, "Where are they? I''ll go and break them out now."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Ao and he found that Lin Ao was in the Child Soul Realm just like him. However, he also knew that this was far from being enough to break into the Yue Family Manor in the True Spirit Sect.


    After all, that was one of the twelve great factions where there were True Spirit Realm Experts. Even if Lin Ao was already in the Child Soul Realm, he was still too weakpared to them.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "It''s not time yet."


    Lin Ao knitted his brows even more as he said, "Are you saying that we should wait until something happens before we act? We need to get them out as soon as we can."


    Lin Fan once again shook his head and said, "Even if we go now, there isn''t anything that we can do. I have someone watching over them, so there''s nothing to worry about for now."


    Lin Ao finally revealed a look of anger as he stepped up to Lin Fan and said, "So you''re saying that we should just trust this person you have watching them? How can we trust someone else like this? They are our family, we should protect them ourselves!"


    Lin Fan looked at how strongly his father wasing on and couldn''t help shaking his head as he gave a sigh.


    Lin Ao was taken aback when he saw this, but before he could say anything else, Lin Fan said, "Why do you think that mom went back with her family?"


    Lin Ao stood there in a daze as he looked at Lin Fan''s calm expression and then he suddenly said, "That''s because¡­"


    "Because we weren''t strong enough, right?" Lin Fan cut him off before he could continue. Then after a pause, he asked with a slightly sad look, "Do you think that we''re strong enough now?"


    Lin Ao looked like he wanted to say something, but then he suddenly gave a sigh as his shoulders sank and he stood there in silence.


    Lin Fan shook his head and then said, "They wouldn''t want us to throw our lives away for nothing. We have endured for this long, we can endure for a bit longer."


    Lin Ao looked up at Lin Fan and couldn''t help feeling emotional. He remembered when his son had been just born, how small and weak he had been. But now, his son was already taller than him and not any weakerpared to him.


    Rather, he even felt that if he were to fight against the current Lin Fan, it would be very likely that he would be the one who lost.


    So in the end, Lin Ao just gave a sigh and patted Lin Fan on the shoulder before saying, "I''ll listen to you." After saying this, he went back into the residence with a dejected sigh.


    But of course, that didn''tst long since he knew that Lin Fan was right.


    There was no time weeping over this, instead he should be using this time to get stronger.


    Back when he hade to this Gctic Humanity Alliance all that time ago, he never had the resources that Lin Fan had now. But even then, he had been able to reach the Child Soul Realm just with sheer hard work.


    Now that Lin Fan had prepared all these things to help him with his cultivation, if he wasn''t able to get stronger, not only would he be letting his son down, he would be letting his wife and daughter down.


    So with this renewed motivation, Lin Ao started his cultivation.


    As for Lin Fan, he had some small talk with the others before assigning them their tasks.


    Other than Jiang Zhi Shu and the people who could fight, Lin Fan had also brought up people who would help him manage his business.


    He didn''t just need people who would fight, he also needed people to help him earn money since only with money would he be able to make the people who could fight stronger. He himself wasn''t someone who was very good at this and he had already recruited people that were good at this back on the Blue Star, so it wasn''t a problem for him to bring them up with him.


    As for his business on the Blue Star, these people had trained their recements beforeing up.<sub> </sub>


    Unlike the Blue Star, there was plenty of food in this Gctic Humanity Alliance, so there wasn''t ack of food products. However, there was ack of innovation since most people wanted to be cultivators instead of cooks.


    After all, one couldn''t protect their family just by being cooks unless they were famous cultivator cooks like old man Qiao.


    So there was ack of variety when it came to foods.


    This was where Lin Fan came in.


    He still had plenty of recipes that he could use, so he would use them to promote food culture in this Gctic Humanity Alliance like he had done on the Blue Star.


    The only other thing that he needed were funds and locations to build hispany, which was what he had been slowly gathering during his time in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Not to mention that he had the Xu Family working for him now, so it was easy for him to get locations if he wanted. Worse case, he would be able to use the Hunters Organizationwork to help him gather more locations for his business.


    After assigning tasks to everyone, Lin Fan turned back to Jiang Zhi Shu''s group.


    He used his spiritual sense to check their cultivations, but he couldn''t help being disappointed in the end.


    The strongest among them was Jiang Zhi Shu who had barely reached the Fragmented Soul Realm and the rest were all still not in the Soul Realm yet. This was far from being strong enough to help him aplish his goals¡­


    After giving a sigh, Lin Fan waved his hands and brought out some pills before saying, "Work hard. You all need to get stronger before you can be helpful to me."


    When Jiang Zhi Shu and the rest saw the pills, they all revealed bright looks.


    They all quickly thanked Lin Fan before taking these pills and heading off to cultivate.


    Seeing that there was nothing left for him to do here, Lin Fan headed back to the store.


    When they left, old man Qiao couldn''t help asking, "Was that man your father? Is your family suffering from some kind of difficulties? If you are, you can ask our Hunters Organization for help."


    Old man Qiao had been eavesdropping on Lin Fan''s conversation with his father earlier. He and the entire Hunters Organization fully recognized how important Lin Fan was now, so they were doing all they could to bring him over to their side.


    Not to mention that these were troubles that people of the lower realm were suffering, so it wouldn''t be hard for the Hunters Organization, one of the twelve great factions to help them.


    Lin Fan looked at him for a bit before shaking his head and saying, "No, thank you, but this is a family matter."


    Old man Qiao wanted to say something else, but seeing the firm look on Lin Fan''s face, he swallowed his words in the end.


    Lin Fan had considered looking for the Hunters Organization''s help, but he recognized that this would make things much moreplicated than he wanted this matter to be.


    As long as it was only him and his father, this would only be a matter that involved the Yue Family and the Liao Family. Neither of these families could move the entire True Spirit Sect, so as long as the Hunters Organization or any of the other twelve great factions didn''t get involved, they wouldn''t be facing the entire True Spirit Sect.


    At most, the Yue and Liao Families had their Nascent Soul Realm elders to depend on, but if the entire True Spirit Sect was provoked, that would mean that even the True Soul Realm Experts would be moved.


    Even if Lin Fan was confident in himself, he knew that he wasn''t a match for True Soul Realm Experts just yet.


    So that was why Lin Fan chose to keep this matter small instead of making a mountain out of a molehill.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that he would be negligent.


    Since most of his forces were weak right now, he would supplement it with Child Soul Realm beasts that he had nurtured from thest batch. With these, it shouldn''t be a problem to keep them safe.


    As for the ones that he would sell to the smaller factions, he had already asked for more eggs from the twelve great factions, so he would just be able to hatch more.


    The only other thing that he would need to do was find a way to give more Nascent Soul Realm beasts to the factions from the twelve great factions that he was close to.


    If they worked together against the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association, it would be a good distraction that would help his own ns.

 Chapter 743 Rescue (1)

    The next day came as usual and everything seemed like it was going to be a normal day until a small dragon suddenly mmed into the window of Lin Fan''s store.


    It had created arge sound when it mmed into the window, so loud that even Lin Fan couldn''t ignore it and headed out to see what it was.


    The small dragon was built quite firmly, so even though it had mmed into Lin Fan''s store, it had been able to get away with only minor injuries. If it had been a human, they would have had their bones shattered and their flesh ripped apart likest time with the City Lord''s son.


    After the small dragon came back from its daze and it saw Lin Faning over, it immediately grabbed something from its neck and presented it to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this small dragon suddenly presenting him a letter, but he could recognize the aura that came from the letter.


    It was the aura of Qing Ao, the True Soul Realm dragon from Kunlun Mountains that he had met before. The one that had been rted to Hong Long.


    But he was surprised to see Qing Ao suddenly sending him a letter¡­


    Still, he could see that this small dragon was gathering a crowd, so without a single word, he picked it up and brought it into the store.


    The crowd only felt that it was strange and a few people took a few pictures of the small dragon, but beyond that, they quickly dispersed since it really wasn''t that strange. Things like this happen daily in a cultivation world like this.


    After bringing the small dragon in, Lin Fan left the store to Mo Ze Chen and Lulu before heading to the back with the small dragon.


    <o>,m At the same time, Ang and Momonga both noticed that something was off, so they came along with him.</o>


    When he was in the back, he put the small dragon down and took the letter from it to read. At the same time, Ang and Momonga both peeked at the letter from over his shoulder.


    The contents of the letter was very simple, but it was a very heavy letter.


    To put it simply, this letter was one asking Lin Fan for help.


    The gist of the letter was that some unknown people had attacked Qing Ao''s domain, but they were repelled by him. However, they had also sent a group to sneak into his domain and they had kidnapped Qing Bao Lan.


    He didn''t have any subordinates that had tracking abilities and he remembered that Lin Fan had a pet that could control other beings like puppets that could be used for tracking, so he wanted to ask for Lin Fan''s help in getting Qing Bao Lan back.


    After he finished reading the letter, Lin Fan thought about it before calling Xiao Feng and Hong Long out.


    Once Hong Long finished reading the letter, he immediately said, "We have to go and help him right away!"


    But Lin Fan wasn''t as enthusiastic.


    While he did treat Qing Ao as an ally, he was also cautious since Qing Ao had been attacked by an unknown enemy. Lin Fan didn''t want to rush into it and make another enemy at a critical time like this.


    But on the other hand, if he didn''t help Qing Ao at a time like this, it would mean losing his trust and him as a potential ally in the future.


    When weighing it in the long term, it was better for him to have a True Soul Realm Expert like Qing Ao on his side, even if it meant having another enemy¡­


    However, what really tipped the scale in the end was Xiao Feng.


    When Xiao Feng learned about what happened to Qing Bao Lan, he looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Is Xiao Bao Lan in trouble? Can we go help her?"


    Seeing the way Xiao Feng looked up at him with those big round eyes, Lin Fan couldn''t bring himself to say no to him. Let alone with the pair of cold eyes that were ring at him from the side.


    Ang loved Xiao Feng just as much as Xiao Bai, she had even taken all of Lin Fan''s pets as her adopted children.


    Even if she didn''t like Qing Bao Lan because of how she tried to seduce her little baby, seeing him stand out like this for the first time and wanting to rescue her, she was naturally on his side.


    In this situation, the only person that could possibly be on Lin Fan''s side was Momonga, but he wisely chose to stay out of this.


    Seeing that he was beset on from all sides, Lin Fan had no choice but to raise his hands and say, "Alright, alright, we''ll go and help."


    Everyone was clearly happy with his decision, but Lin Fan felt like he had escaped death, especially with the way Ang was smiling at him.<sub> </sub>


    But then Xiao Feng asked Lin Fan something that made him fall into deep thought again.


    Xiao Feng asked, "When are we going to see Xiao Bao Lan? I want to go right now."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, not because he was still on the fence about going to help, but rather because this did raise a thought provoking question.


    Back on earth, it was said that when it came to kidnapping cases, the first forty eight hours were always the crucial period when it came to finding clues.


    While this didn''t exactly hold true in this cultivation world, it was still a good idea to find clues while they were still fresh. Not to mention that if it was still close to when the kidnapping happened, that would mean that the kidnappers wouldn''t be far away from Qing Ao''s ce.


    So Lin Fan turned to the small dragon who had been silently waiting on the side and asked a few questions.


    After confirming that Qing Ao had sent this message as soon as he discovered that Qing Bao Lan was missing and that it hadn''t taken the small dragon long toe to his store, he decided that it was still the best timing for them, so they should head out as soon as possible.


    So after leaving some instructions to Mo Ze Chen and Lulu, Lin Fan immediately headed off with Ang and Yuki in tow. Momonga had been left behind to watch the store just in case anything happened.


    After all, if these enemies attacked Qing Ao, they might also know the rtionship between Qing Ao and Lin Fan, especially after Qing Ao sent that small dragon. Since that was the case, there was also the chance that they would attack Lin Fan''s store.


    While Lin Fan was certain that the defense system of the store could take care of anything that came, he still left Momonga there just in case.


    It didn''t take them long to get to the Kunlun Mountains since Lin Fan was now much faster now that he had broken through, not to mention that he was much better at controlling his spatialws after the trial realm.


    In less than an hour, they had already arrived at Qing Ao''s pce.


    Qing Ao had been anxiously pacing in the center of the hall when they were brought in and when he saw Lin Fan''s group, his eyes immediately lit up and he ran over to grab Lin Fan by the shoulder as he said, "Brother Lin, you''re finally here! Can you do it? Can you find my Xiao Lan Lan?"


    But as he said this, he kept shaking Lin Fan by the shoulder, not even giving him a chance to speak.


    Finally, Hong Long had to appear to grab Qing Ao to calm him down before Lin Fan had a chance to say anything.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time exchanging greetings since he knew that time was of the essence. So instead, he immediately asked, "Where did you see herst? Can you bring me there?"


    Qing Ao calmed down when he heard this and after thinking about it, he said, "She should have been in her room where she was¡­" His voice drifted off as he looked at Xiao Feng, but then he gave a cough and said, "Yes, she should have been in her room."


    Lin Fan ignored the strange tone that he had and said, "Can you take us to the room? I want to see if we can find any clues where the kidnappers went."


    Qing Ao had a difficult look at first, but he still gave a nod in response.


    He led them through the corridors of the pce, but as he came closer to Qing Bao Lan''s room, he couldn''t help slowing down. It was almost as if there was something there that he didn''t want them to see.


    However, Lin Fan said, "We need to hurry. The longer we stall, the further the kidnappers get."


    Qing Ao hesitated for a second before giving a nod and moving faster again.


    When they came to Qing Bao Lan''s room and they opened the door, they were shocked to see what was inside.


    The room was filled with pictures of Xiao Feng, both in dragon form and in human form. However, a lot of these pictures seemed to be of Xiao Feng after they hade back from the Kunlun Mountains¡­


    Could it be that Qing Bao Lan had been¡­


    Xiao Feng couldn''t help looking around and saying, "Wow, there''s a lot of me in here."


    Lin Fan gave a cough before calling out Brainy and her puppets as this wasn''t the time to discuss this.


    After a while, Brainy said, "I found a trail."

 Chapter 744 Rescue (2)

    Qing Ao immediately grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder again and said, "Where? Where are they?"


    Lin Fan pushed him off without any politeness this time since he knew that there was no time to spare. He then said, "No, I''m going alone on this one."


    Qing Ao knitted his brows immediately and shook his head as he said, "No, they took my precious Lan Lan, how could I just leave it to you? I have to get my little baby back myself!"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "It won''t work, they''ll immediately sense youing."


    Qing Ao wanted to say something, but he quickly figured out what Lin Fan was implying.


    After all, he was their target and they had been able to find him in this pce, so they must have some way of tracking him. As long as he left and chased after the kidnappers, it would immediately give away the fact that the kidnappers had been found.


    If that happened, who knows what would happen?


    Perhaps the enemy would send reinforcements to the kidnappers. They had experts that were strong enough to even keep Qing Ao busy even when they didn''t have a hostage, but now that they did have a hostage¡­


    Perhaps they might even take it a bit further and even kill Qing Bao Lan on the spot since their ns had failed¡­


    Either way, it wasn''t a good idea for Qing Ao to go since it would push the enemy into a corner and a cornered enemy was the strongest since they were at their most desperate.


    However, Qing Ao still couldn''t ept it¡­


    But instead of using words, Lin Fan chose to use actions.


    He used his variousws to immediately disappear on the spot before reappearing again in front of Qing Ao before asking, "Is this enough?"


    Qing Ao was surprised when he saw this since even with his cultivation realm, he hadn''t been able to find Lin Fan when he disappeared. Adding in Brainy''s tracking skills, this was more than enough for him to find Qing Bao Lan and safely rescue her.


    But he was still Qing Bao Lan''s father and she was the gem of his heart, so he couldn''t be assured in just leaving it to Lin Fan.


    Still, since there was no other choice, Qing Ao gave a nod and said, "Brother Lin, I''ll leave it to you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response and said, "I''ll get her back, I promise."


    Then without wasting any time, he headed off into the forest, following Brainy''s directions.


    Brainy''s puppets were still tracking down the kidnappers, so while she still hadn''t found the kidnappers yet, Lin Fan was following their trail. The moment that Brainy did find the kidnappers, Lin Fan would be close to where they were and would be able to catch up to them sooner.


    But even after half an hour of going through the woods, Brainy still wasn''t able to find the exact location of the kidnappers. Instead, she found that there were many fake trails that were made that led to many different locations in the forest.


    This would have proven effective against a normal tracker, but when it came to Brainy, it was less effective.


    While Brainy still had to search each one of these false trails since she couldn''t tell the fakes from the real trails, Brainy had many different puppets that could track, so she could use multiple groups to check multiple trails.


    Eventually, they were able to find the real trail and track down the real kidnappers.


    However, these kidnappers were a bit too arrogant.


    They were no longer running and had chosen to camp out in the Kunlun Mountains, Ao Qing''s territory, just because it had gotten dark. It was as if they werepletely looking down on Ao Qing, figuring that he would never be able to track them.


    But it wasn''t Lin Fan''s ce to judge as he quickly made his way to the camp of the kidnappers.


    However, after he arrived in the vicinity, he didn''t immediately attack the camp of the kidnappers. Instead, he sent Brainy''s smaller puppets in to start scouting out the camp.


    The most important thing was to find Qing Bao Lan since this was a kidnapping case. He had to ensure that she was safe and then figure out a way to safely get her away from the kidnappers before he attacked them.


    After all, he didn''t want her to be used as a hostage during the fight, or even worse, he didn''t want her to end up as an idental casualty.


    So Lin Fan patiently waited for Brainy''s puppets to do their thing, but of course it didn''t take long since Brainy was already used to doing things like this.


    After a few minutes, Brainy said, "It seems like Qing Bao Lan is being tied to a tree a bit away from their campfire and there''s a Child Soul Realm beast guarding her."


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this.<sub> </sub>


    No matter how he looked at it, this was clearly the work of amateurs since they didn''t even properly secure their hostages.


    As for the Child Soul Realm beast, that wasn''t a threat to Lin Fan at all.


    But that didn''t mean that there wasn''t any threat in the camp at all.


    Brainy then reported, "There''s two Child Soul Realm Experts and a Nascent Soul Realm Expert currently sitting at the camp. It seems like they haven''t set up any rms in the area and they are currently drinking wine."


    Lin Fan shook his head again, but he focused himself as he looked down at theyout of the camp that Brainy had drawn on the ground.


    In the center of the camp were the three kidnappers who were around the campfire and to the side, there was Qing Bao Lan who had been tied to a tree.


    Lin Fan had already expected that there would be a Nascent Soul Realm Expert among these kidnappers, otherwise it would be very hard for them to sneak into Qing Ao''s pce without being noticed.


    If this was before, this Nascent Soul Realm Expert would have been a problem for him, but now¡­


    So the only thing that he really needed to consider was how to get Qing Bao Lan free.


    What surprised him was that Xiao Feng had suddenly volunteered to rescue Qing Bao Lan.


    Xiao Feng jumped out in front of Lin Fan and said in a firm voice, "I want to save Xiao Bao Lan myself."


    Looking at this little child who was looking up at him with wide eyes filled with determination, Lin Fan really couldn''t say no.


    He had been nning on using the formation of his five pets to deal with the kidnappers, but since Xiao Feng was this determined to help Qing Bao Lan, it wasn''t as if he could say no to him. As for the Child Soul Realm beast that guarded Qing Bao Lan, he wasn''t worried about whether Xiao Feng could beat it or not.


    Xiao Feng was already in the Peak Child Soul Realm from his training over this period of time, so it would be simple for him to beat that Child Soul Realm beast.


    As Lin Fan looked at Xiao Feng standing there in front of him, he couldn''t help feeling a sense of pride. This was a sense of pride that came from watching one''s child grow up and Lin Fan was feeling it now.


    He had been affected by Ang treating the pets as children, so now, he even started looking at them like they were his kids.


    Since that was decided, Lin Fan decided that he would give Xiao Feng the best backup that he could and sent the rest of his pets along with Xiao Feng.


    It wasn''t as if he didn''t have other ways of dealing with the Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    So after the five kids had gathered, they were about to set off to rescue Qing Bao Lan, but before they went, Lin Fan suddenly had an idea.


    He stopped the kids and suddenly pulled out five different coloured pieces of cloth from his Storage Ring. After he pulled these pieces of cloth out, he bent down and tied a piece of cloth to the arm of each of his pets.


    He had given them a red, blue, green, yellow, and pink piece of cloth respectively.


    The kids excitedly looked at the cloth that had been tied to their arms and they even did a superhero pose after receiving them. Then with a final wave, the kids headed off into the forest to go and rescue Qing Bao Lan.


    As for Lin Fan, he just watched them disappear before remaining on the spot.


    He couldn''t help thinking of those hero shows that he had watched a long time ago.


    Of course, that wasn''t the only reason that he had remained there.


    He had also sent one of Brainy''s puppets to go with the kids to watch over them. At the same time, he was waiting for the kids to start their n before he started making his move as well.


    Once the kids made their move, they would certainly make enough noise that it would attract the attention of the kidnappers.


    Once the kidnappers were alerted, they would immediately go over to check on their hostage.


    That was when Lin Fan was nning on making his move.


    He was protecting the kids, but at the same time, he chose to make them bait so he could catch the kidnappers off guard.

 Chapter 745 Rescue (3)

    Xiao Feng led the rest of Lin Fan''s pets through the forest towards where Qing Bao Lan was, but since they were still small kids, it was very easy for them to get lost in these thick bushes.


    Thankfully, Lin Fan had organized one of Brainy''s puppets to follow them.


    After she saw through the puppet that they were getting lost along the way, with a sigh, she directed the puppet to guide them to their destination.


    The puppet led the five kids to where Qing Bao Lan was being held and then the five kids suddenly huddled together as they came up with a n.


    However, they were still kids mentally, so they weren''t that smart and any n that they came up with wouldn''t be that deep.


    In the end, the kids decided that they would surround the Child Soul Realm beast that was holding Qing Bao Lan hostage.


    They silently made their way to different positions around the Child Soul Realm beast. Once they made sure that everyone was in position, the five of them suddenly jumped out to surround the Child Soul Realm beast.


    When theynded, they alsonded with the same pose as if they had practiced this before.


    Then in front of the Child Soul Realm beast''s confused expression, Xiao Feng who had been designated the leader pointed at it and said, "Evildoer, you shall not get away with your evil deeds today!"


    After hearing this, the Child Soul Realm beast only had an even more confused look on its face. However, it was different for Qing Bao Lan, she had sparkling eyes as she stared at Xiao Feng.


    It was impossible for her not to recognize Xiao Feng since she had thousands of pictures of him on her wall.


    And now here he was rescuing her like a prince on a white horse. Her heart was about to explode!


    If it wasn''t for the fact that there was a gag around her mouth, she would have definitely called out to Xiao Feng in a delicate voice, asking him to rescue her like she had read about in those novels before.


    While the Child Soul Realm beast was confused, it knew what its mission was, so it didn''t stay in a daze for long.


    Aftering back to its senses, the Child Soul Realm beast suddenly raised its paw and mmed it down at Xiao Feng who was standing right in front of it.


    This was just a human brat, so it had expected its paw to immediately smash this human kid into a meat patty. However, what it never expected was that¡­


    Xiao Feng saw the paw falling down on him, but he didn''t panic at all. Instead he revealed a faint smile as he raised his hand towards the paw.


    Then with a single finger, Xiao Feng poked the paw that was falling down over his head.


    As soon as the paw was poked by the finger, it immediately stopped moving.


    The Child Soul Realm beast found that no matter how much strength it used, it wasn''t able to push down with its paw at all. It was as if there was an immovable wall that was underneath its paw and it wouldn''t shatter no matter what.


    The Child Soul Realm beast stared down at the little human child that it had looked down on previously and couldn''t help revealing a look of fear.


    Just what was this little child?


    Xiao Feng looked up at the Child Soul Realm beast above it with a smile and then he suddenly poked out with his finger, sending the Child Soul Realm beast flying up into the air.


    Once this Child Soul Realm beast was in the air, Xiao Feng also jumped up and kicked it in the abdomen, sending it flying into a nearby tree. The kick alone had already been enough to knock out the Child Soul Realm beast when it hit, so it just mmed into the tree unconscious.


    However, the other kids weren''t happy when they saw that the Child Soul Realm beast had already been knocked out with a single blow from Xiao Feng.


    They had all been excited about acting as heroes, so when it was cut short by Xiao Feng, they were naturally unhappy with him.


    So the other kids all crowded around Xiao Feng toin.


    Xiao Feng just revealed an awkward smile as he was surrounded by the others, holding up his hands while he apologized to them.


    He actually never thought that this Child Soul Realm beast would be knocked out that easily, especially since he had even held back when he kicked out.


    What he didn''t ount for was therge difference in cultivation between the two of them.


    Xiao Feng had already reached the Peak Child Soul Realm, whereas this beast was only in the Low Child Soul Realm.


    There were a total of three minor realms between them, so it clearly stood no chance even when faced with just a simple kick from Xiao Feng.


    It was already good enough that it didn''t die.


    As the kids argued, theypletely forgot about Qing Bao Lan who was still tied up there. However, that didn''t matter to Qing Bao Lan who had just witnessed Xiao Feng''s greatness.<sub> </sub>


    He had single-handedly taken out the Child Soul Realm beast assigned to keep her here like a hero would.


    If one listened carefully to the arguments of the kids, one would hear themining about how they weren''t able to be heroes.


    This was all because they had watched some hero shows that they wanted to be heroes. It was also why Lin Fan had given them those pieces of cloth around their arm, he already knew about this from the shows they watched.


    However, one thing that these kids were forgetting was that there was still another group of kidnappers sitting at a campfire not far away from here.


    In fact, when they heard the sounds of fighting that came from where Qing Bao Lan was, they had already stood up and prepared toe over.


    It was at that moment that Lin Fan made his move.


    There was a that suddenly flew out across the air towards these three.


    This was actually the that had been previously used on Lin Fan in the Ancient Era Ruins, however he had confiscated this after he had defeated the assassin that came after him.


    This was a that could even resist attacks in the Nascent Soul Realm, so it was very useful here.


    The three kidnappers immediately sensed somethinging at them and they tried to spread out to avoid it, but the grew bigger until itpletely surrounded them and trapped them.


    The three kidnappers didn''t give up and tried using their attacks to break through their, but the held firm under their attacks.


    At the same time, Lin Fan had already made his next move.


    There were five shadows that fell from the sky above these three figures,nding around them.


    These five figures were immediately revealed to be fiverge beasts, but it wasn''t their appearances that shocked the kidnappers. Rather it was the aura that came from them thatpletely shocked them.


    Nascent Soul Realm.


    All five of these beasts were in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    These five were beasts that Lin Fan had hatched from the original hundred eggs that he had nned to sell, but after changes in his n, he had decided to raise them to use himself.


    It was easy for him to raise them with the facilities of the store and he was able to control them now that he had broken through.


    With these five Nascent Soul Realm beasts and the, he was able to easily capture these kidnappers. That was why he didn''t mind letting Xiao Feng do what he wanted.


    Not to mention that he had used those kids as bait.


    He had given them the pieces of cloth knowing this. He knew about their obsession with hero shows, so he knew that they would lose control if they were to imitate it.


    That sound distraction was all that he needed to create a crack in the defenses of the kidnappers, allowing him to trap them in the.


    The Nascent Soul Realm kidnappers raised his head to look at the five Nascent Soul Realm beasts above him before looking around to say, "I don''t know who you are, but we clearly do not have any grudges. As long as you let us go, I promise that I will owe you a favour in the future."


    However all that he heard in response was, "Beat them, but remember to keep them alive. We still want information from them."


    So with ugly expressions on their faces, there were countless paws that fell down on these kidnappers, hitting them again and again.


    These attacks only stopped when the final Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper fainted.


    Lin Fan controlled the Nascent Soul Realm beasts to put seals on them before finallying out to tie them up.


    Once he was done, he looked in the direction that Qing Bao Lan had been held, but he was surprised to see that there wasn''t anyoneing over.


    It shouldn''t have taken those kids that long to take care of the Child Soul Realm beast, so what was happening over there?


    When he asked Brainy this question, she said in a helpless voice, "You should see for yourself."


    So Lin Fan was curious as he walked over, but when he arrived he found that Qing Bao Lan was still tied up and the kids were standing there arguing about something.


    When he listened closely, he found that they were arguing about who was which colour¡­


    At the very least, the Child Soul Realm beast was lying there unconscious.

 Chapter 746 Phoenixes (1)

    After giving a sigh, Lin Fan gave a cough that brought the kids back to reality.


    The kids looked at each other before realizing their mistake.


    They all had embarrassed looks, but Xiao Feng took the lead as he came over to the tied up Qing Bao Lan to help get rid of the ropes.


    These ropes were special ropes that were actually artifacts that could suppress the cultivation of the ones that they tied up, otherwise with Qing Bao Lan''s now Peak Embryo Soul Realm cultivation, there was no way that she would let herself be tied up like this by the kidnappers. If it had been normal rope, she would have already escaped.


    After all, she was the descendant of one of the dragons with a pure dragon bloodline, so it wasn''t a problem for her to deal with a Low Child Soul Realm beast.


    With a simple flick of his wrist, there was a wind de that cut right through the rope and freed Qing Bao Lan.


    As soon as she was freed, without even taking out the gag in her mouth, she stood up and jumped at Xiao Feng.


    Xiao Feng was caught off guard, but then he quickly reacted as he dodged out of the way of Qing Bao Lan''s tackle.


    Qing Bao Lan went right past Xiao Feng and after using her full force to tackle him, she couldn''t stop herself as shended face first on the ground.


    But even that didn''t damper her determination as she stood up again and turned around to look at Xiao Feng like a carnivore stalking her prey. This look sent a chill down Xiao Feng''s spine, but he did feel bad about dodging instinctively, so he let her grab his arm this time.


    Lin Fan saw this and couldn''t help shaking his head with a bitter smile.


    It seemed like Xiao Feng still didn''t understand the difference between girlfriend and friend who was a girl, but that wasn''t strange given how young he was. His mind might have grown quickly because of his quick cultivation increase, but he was still chronologically less than two years old.


    It wasn''t strange at all if he wasn''t as developed emotionally.


    But there was no time for any of this since they had already captured the kidnappers.


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure if the kidnappers had any other aplices that weren''t here or if they had been tracked, so there would be reinforcements sent after they had been defeated, but he wasn''t nning on staying here to find out.


    Now that he had already saved Qing Bao Lan, there was no need for them to stay here any longer.


    Since he couldn''t bring Qing Bao Lan into the pet storage space like the rest of his pets, Lin Fan summoned one of the Nascent Soul Realm beasts for her to sit on. At the same time, since she wouldn''t let go of Xiao Feng no matter what anyone said, Xiao Feng stayed out and rode on the Nascent Soul Realm beast with her.


    With the speed that they had, they returned back to the pce in less than a quarter of the time it took them to find the kidnappers.


    Of course, while they had been looking for the kidnappers, they had gone slowly because they had been following the kidnappers'' tracks.


    As soon as they returned and Qing Ao saw Qing Bao Lan, he immediately ran forward to take her in his embrace. However, Qing Bao Lanpletely ignored him as she kept holding onto Xiao Feng''s arm, rubbing up against him even though he had a clear ufortable look.


    After a sad look shed on his face, Qing Ao immediately started ring at Xiao Feng like he was his sworn enemy. However, that didn''tst long as he felt a chill run down his spine as Ang started ring at him for ring at Xiao Feng.


    ? Then after ring at Qing Ao, Ang turned her re to Qing Bao Lan who was still holding Xiao Feng. As soon as she did though, Qing Bao Lan turned in the direction of Ang and met her re straight on.


    It was just like this that the two fought like discordant inws.


    Lin Fan just awkwardly stood on the side for a bit before he gave a cough to break them up.


    They couldn''t just stay here for that long since there were people that were attacking this ce. Now that they had rescued Qing Bao Lan from the kidnappers, it was certain that there would be retaliation from the people behind these kidnappers.


    Lin Fan didn''t want to be here when that time came¡­


    Qing Ao came back to his senses after hearing Lin Fan''s cough and he gave a cough himself beforeing to Lin Fan to say, "Brother Lin, thank you for your help." Then after a pause, he said in an awkward voice, "However, I still have something else that I need your help with."


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but he still asked in a calm voice, "What is it?"


    Qing Ao didn''t reply right away and instead brought out a map that he spread out in front of Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    This was a map of the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    He raised his finger and made two marks on the map before saying, "I need your help in checking in with some of my allies."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear Qing Ao say that he had allies.


    Seeing the surprised and confused look that Lin Fan had, Qing Ao exined, "Well, they are allies, but they are also old family friends. They''re from races that have been allied with our Dragon Race since ancient times, so when we found ourselves on this world, we chose to stick together."


    He turned his head over to where Lin Fan''s pets were ying and said, "They have a bit of connection to you as well."


    Lin Fan followed his gaze and saw that his eyes were specifically pointing at Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei. However, he was confused when he saw this.


    How were they connected to Xiao Huo and Xiao Lei?


    Qing Ao didn''t exin this as he continued, "Since these unknown people have attacked me, it is very likely that they will be attacking my allies and it''s most likely they''ll have yed the same tricks on them. So I was hoping that you could check in on them and perhaps help them if they need it¡­" This time, his eyes drifted to Lin Fan''s sleeve where Brainy was hiding.


    Lin Fan could understand what he meant by this, but he also had a difficult look on his face.


    To be fair, he didn''t want to get caught up in this more than he had to since there were no benefits to making a new enemy at this time.


    He had helped Qing Ao get Qing Bao Lan back and he had done it without revealing his identity. So if he were to back out now, that would mean that he wouldn''t make any enemies even if he had helped Qing Ao.


    After all, the enemy would just assume that it was Qing Ao who got his daughter back.


    But if he were to continue getting himself involved in this matter, it was very likely that he would be caught up in this more and more until he couldn''t get himself out.


    At that point, it would be toote for him to regret this.


    Qing Ao could guess what Lin Fan was thinking from the expression on his face and knew that he was wavering, so he added, "My two allies are both True Soul Realm Experts and as long as you help them, I''m sure that they will be willing to be your allies as well."


    This time, Lin Fan revealed a different expression, it was a look of shock.


    True Soul Realm Experts, these were experts that were at the peak of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    When it came to the twelve great factions, each faction only had two or three True Soul Realm Experts each, but that was what allowed them to rule over the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    If he were able to get two more True Soul Realm Experts as allies, that would mean that he would be able to match one of the twelve great factions alone as long as they chose to fight with him.


    Of course, each faction also had many Nascent Soul Realm Experts, but that didn''t matter to Lin Fan as much since he had his Nascent Soul Realm beasts. In fact, when it came to the quantity of Nascent Soul Realm Experts, Lin Fan could far outnumber any single one of the twelve great factions if he wanted to.


    So he couldn''t help being tempted since this would be very helpful to his ns in the future.


    But what really made the decision for him was something else.


    Before Lin Fan could make his decision, the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper who had been on the side suddenly woke up.


    At first, he was confused where he was, but seeing that he had a rope around him and that he was inside his pce, he quickly guessed where he was.


    However, this Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper was well trained and didn''t panic.


    As soon as he figured out where he was, he immediately started looking around the area to find a way to escape, but all he was able to find was Lin Fan''s group and Qing Ao.


    But when his eyes fell onto Lin Fan and Qing Ao, they couldn''t help opening wide as he remembered what had happened earlier.

 Chapter 747 Phoenixes (2)

    "Where did you get that? Did the lord give it to you? If you work for the lord, why did you interrupt our mission?"


    He didn''t know who was the one that had captured him, but he assumed it was either Qing Ao who was their target or the person he was talking to who was clearly the leader of the other group.


    But that didn''t make sense.


    The that had been used on him, he clearly recognized the aura of the lord that had been on it, so he knew that this was something that the lord had given them.


    But if the lord was willing to give them something, then that would mean that they were also working for the lord. So why would the lord send them to kidnap Qing Ao''s daughter and attack him?


    None of this made sense.


    That confusion drove him to blurt out these questions in the end.


    Lin Fan and Qing Ao were both surprised to hear this voice, but then they saw that it was the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper who asked this.


    Both of them knitted their brows when they looked at him.


    Qing Ao had knitted his brows because he was thinking about how to take care of this person, but Lin Fan had knitted his brows because of what he had said.


    He had asked about the and said that it was something that the "lord" had given them.


    Thest time he had heard someone being called "lord" was back in the Ancient Era Ruins. It was that cloaked figure who had been forced out by the owners of the Ancient Era Ruins in the end¡­


    If he recognized this, then it was most likely that the person that they were working for were¡­


    Qing Ao was about to say something, but then Lin Fan came forward to raise the and asked, "Why do you think that the lord gave me this?"


    The Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper couldn''t help revealing a stunned look when he heard Lin Fan''s response, but then his mind quickly started to turn.


    He could tell that there was no fear or hesitation in Lin Fan''s words, so did that mean that it was his fault?


    But he was just following his orders¡­


    Then could it be that he had been set up by someone?


    There were countless thoughts that filled the mind of the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper, but he wasn''t able toe up with a single idea that he could believe in.


    All he could do was stare at Lin Fan with a confused look as his mind kept turning.


    Finally, Lin Fan helped him by saying, "Tell me what your orders were and who were the people that gave them to you. There might be a spy among our ranks."


    The Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper hesitated for a bit before he started giving Lin Fan the information that he wanted.


    As it turned out, this whole n was to take care of all uncontroble variables before they put their n into action, so that was why they were targeting Qing Ao. However, the kidnapper also expressed his doubt since if Lin Fan was close to Qing Ao, that would mean that Qing Ao had connections to the lord and there was no need for them to do all of this.


    After getting all the information that he needed and making sure that it was everything that the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper knew, Lin Fan revealed a smile and told him the truth.


    "I didn''t get this from your lord, I got it from someone who tried to kill me on behalf of your lord."


    The Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper''s eyes suddenly opened wide as he realized his mistake and he was about to struggle, but before he could move, Lin Fan''s other hand behind his back came out. It had a bone white dagger in it and it created a line across the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper''s neck.


    The Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper''s eyes opened up even wider as he realized what had just happened, but there was nothing that he could do about it.


    It started out slowly, but there was a line of blood that suddenly appeared across the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper''s neck. It continued to grow in size until blood gushed out and the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper choked on his own blood.


    Finally, the blood slowed down before finally clotting and stopping to drip.


    But that wasn''t because the wound had closed, rather it was because there was no more blood toe out of his body.


    With his eyes wide open, the corpse of the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper fell straight forward andnded on the ground, creating a ssh of blood.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan had created a barrier of life energy in front of him when he had slit the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper''s throat, so none of the blood had sshed on him.


    In fact, if it wasn''t for the fact that the Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper''s cultivation had been sealed, Lin Fan wouldn''t have been able to break through the defenses of this Nascent Soul Realm kidnapper that easily.


    Still, since he had taken care of this one, he couldn''t leave the rest alive.


    Lin Fan turned to the other two who were still asleep and he put them out of their misery.


    Qing Ao looked at Lin Fan with a slightly surprised look, but there was also admiration for his decisiveness in those eyes.


    Lin Fan turned back and said, "How many other allies do you have? Or rather, how many other True Soul Realm beasts do you know?"


    Qing Ao was surprised, but then he said, "Well, we True Soul Realm beasts have all made deals with humans, so they normally don''t attack us. To make sure that we''re safe, we do have a sort of coalition. In total, there''s around eight of us right now."


    Lin Fan asked, "Can you contact them?"


    Qing Ao thought about it before saying, "Even if I do contact them, it''s very unlikely that they will believe me."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "That doesn''t matter. All that matters is that they know about what''s happening so they won''t bepletely caught off guard. Once they get attacked, they''ll know what the truth is and they will have no choice but to cooperate with us."


    Qing Ao had a look that seemed like he didn''t really think the same, but he still gave a nod in the end.


    Lin Fan then said, "This is bigger than you think, it''s not just a plot against beasts, but rather a plot against everyone on this Gctic Humanity Alliance."


    Qing Ao revealed a confused look, but he chose not to ask anything since he knew that this wasn''t the time.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything else after that and then prepared to leave, but there was still something else that had to be taken care of before they left.


    Qing Bao Lan just wouldn''t let go of Xiao Feng when they were about to leave.


    Xiao Feng tried to convince her to let go, but she wouldn''t let go no matter what.


    In the end, Qing Ao said with a difficult look, "Perhaps it''s better if she goes with you."


    All the adults revealed surprised looks while Qing Bao Lan looked at her dad with sparkling eyes. They knew how much Qing Ao pampered Qing Bao Lan, so it was very surprising to see that he was willing to let her go. Especially with how dangerous it was for her right now.


    Qing Ao could see what they were thinking, so he exined, "It''s safer for her to go with you since it''s clear that they''re targeting me. If they could kidnap her from my pce the first time, they''ll definitely be able to do it again. So instead, it is better to send her to a ce that they don''t know about, namely your store."


    Lin Fan thought about this and thought that it did make sense, but there was also a problem with this n.


    Since Qing Bao Lan wasn''t one of his pets, she would have to stay out in the open.


    Since the other side knew about her, they would clearly know about her appearance and her aura. If she were to stay outside all the time, it would be very easy to track her down to Lin Fan''s store.


    This wasn''t a risk that Lin Fan was willing to take, both on his part and on Qing Ao''s part.


    But Qing Ao had the solution for this.


    "You humans have something that''s like a temporary contract, you can just form one with her." Qing Ao said in a surprisingly casual manner.


    Lin Fan had indeed thought about this before, but he hadn''t used this contract to help bring Qing Bao Lan back because he knew that forming this contract would be pushing the line with his rtionship with Qing Ao. But now, Qing Ao himself was suggesting that he form this contract with Qing Bao Lan.


    Qing Bao Lan didn''t really get what was happening, but she knew that this would mean that she could go out with Xiao Feng, so she was very excited about this.


    She came over to Lin Fan and asked, "How do we form this contract?"


    Lin Fan looked at both Qing Ao and Qing Bao Lan''s expectant looks and he couldn''t help feeling overwhelmed.


    But he knew that they were right, so he formed the temporary contract with Qing Bao Lan in the end.

 Chapter 748 Phoenixes (3)

    As they left Qing Ao''s pce, Ang had a very unhappy look on her face to Lin Fan''s dismay.


    He knew exactly why she was acting this way, it was because she didn''t want Qing Bao Laning with them.


    She had never liked Qing Bao Lan because of the way she showed her affection for Xiao Feng, so naturally she didn''t like that Qing Bao Lan would get much more time with Xiao Feng now.


    Even when she was put into the pet storage space, she kept bothering Lin Fan until he put her in the same room as Xiao Feng.


    He couldn''t take it anymore, so he had put all the kids into one room instead.


    At least that way, Xiao Feng wouldn''t have to deal with Qing Bao Lan alone and the other kids could help take some of her attention.


    But of course, this was also thest thing that was on Lin Fan''s mind right now. He was actually more focused on the "lord" that the kidnappers had mentioned.


    It was clear that this "lord" that they mentioned was the same "lord" that he met in the Ancient Era Ruins. As far as he knew, that "lord" was someone that wanted to take care of every other faction that stood in his way.


    Now that his men were making a move against the True Soul Realm beasts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, it was clear that he would be implementing his n soon.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan should also tell his allies what they were up to.


    He was certain that this was also rted to the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect''s movementstely.


    But it still confused him as to what the goal of this "lord" was.


    If he just wanted to get rid of the other factions or make them fall under him, there was no need for him to antagonize the True Soul Realm beasts. There was nothing to gain from doing something like this.


    The only reason that he would need to do this would be if he wanted topletely rewrite the structure of the Gctic Humanity Alliance. To wipe out everything and rebuild from scratch.


    But the amount of resources that would be needed and not to mention, the amount of people that would need to be eliminated¡­


    It was not something that a sane person would do.


    So just what was their n here?


    Lin Fan fell into deeper and deeper thought, but they had already arrived back in Harmony City, so he had to pull himself out of his thoughts.


    After arriving, the first thing that Lin Fan did was call old man Qiao.


    It wasn''t just to report to him what he had found, but also to set up another use of the Hunters Organization''s teleport gates.


    The two locations that Qing Ao had told him about were far away from Harmony City, so Lin Fan would need to use the Hunters Organization''s teleport gates to get to them.


    After old man Qiao heard about what happened, he couldn''t help asking, "How did you find out about all of this? The True Soul Realm dragon in the Kunlun Mountains is something that barely anyone knows about and it has always kept to itself."


    Lin Fan had already thought of an excuse, so he said, "I was out hunting for some things for my store, but I encountered the kidnappers who had captured the True Soul Realm dragon''s daughter. After returning it, he told me about what had happened before disappearing. It''s clear that he was trying to get me to send a warning."


    Old man Qiao thought about it before giving a nod in secret.


    This did make sense since it was very unlikely that Lin Fan had anything to do with the True Soul Realm dragon.


    That True Soul Realm dragon was something that even he had to be wary of. It was something that had caused the twelve great factions a headache a long time ago, but it was also famous for keeping to itself.


    After thinking this, old man Qiao went back to the main topic and asked, "What do you think their goal is? It''s clear that this isn''t the smart thing to do, especially since it just means that they would be antagonizing a bunch of True Soul Realm beasts for no reason."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I don''t know either, but we should start getting everyone to monitor the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassin Association."


    Old man Qiao was silent for a bit before saying, "We''re already doing that, but we''ll increase the surveince after this."


    He seemed like he was about to say something else, but then there was a knock on the door before he said, "I''ll contact you again when I have more information."


    Lin Fan knew that he was busy, so he didn''t keep him.


    But after he hung up, he just stood there lost in thought for a long time.


    ¡­<sub> </sub>


    The next morning, Lin Fan set out with the same group as before.


    Well, it wasn''t the exact same group since Qing Bao Lan was alsoing with them.


    Instead of leaving her in the store where she would cause a fuss and would be easily discovered, Lin Fan chose to bring her with them.


    It definitely wasn''t because she threw a tantrum about not wanting to leave Xiao Feng¡­


    They went to the Hunters Organization where they were quickly shown to the teleport gates just likest time and then they were sent to another city.


    This time, Lin Fan''s group wasn''t greeted by anyone when they arrived since they had no ns of staying in the city.


    Their target was the Sun Peak Mountain outside of the city, so they wouldn''t be wasting any time in this city.


    After they arrived, their group immediately left the city and started heading to Sun Peak Mountain.


    While it was called a mountain, it was better to describe this ce as a volcano instead. There was arge pool ofva that was right at the peak of the mountain that glowed with the burning fury of a sun, which was how this volcano received its name.


    ording to Qing Ao, that friend of his lived right in the center of the volcano, where thatke ofva was. So Lin Fan''s group had no choice but to hike all the way up the mountain and go into the crater at the peak, looking around theke ofva for Qing Ao''s ally.


    One thing that had to be acknowledged was that this ce really was hot.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan using differentws to form a barrier around them, they would have already burnt to a crisp already.


    Well, it wouldn''t have worked on Ang and Yuki since their physiques were different, but everyone else would have definitely burnt to a crisp.


    However, Lin Fan''sws weren''t able topletely negate all of the heat that was assaulting them, so they were still sweating like crazy.


    Xiao Feng, who had Qing Bao Lan attached to him the entire time, was sweating even more than everyone else.


    But he had to endure it since this was the only way for Qing Bao Lan to stay out and they needed Qing Bao Lan to stay out.


    Unless Qing Bao Lan was here, it was impossible for Qing Ao''s ally to recognize them as friends. If Qing Bao Lan wasn''t here, it was very likely that Qing Ao''s ally would have even attacked them for trespassing in their territory.


    In fact, when Lin Fan had passed by people along the way, they had all warned him about going to the peak of Sun Peak Mountain. Everyone who came here knew that the peak of this mountain was a forbidden area because there was a powerful beast that lived there and no one dared to approach it.


    After they came into the crater, they found that other than ake of bubblingva, there really wasn''t anything else here.


    Their group just stood there as they started wondering how they were going to find Qing Ao''s ally.


    But that problem solved itself in the end.


    After standing there for a bit, the heat around them suddenly started to rise as theva bubbled even more.


    Then ever so slowly, there were mes that appeared on the surface of theva. These mes burned the top of theva until they started gathering in the air.


    The mes came together above theva until they took the form of a bird that floated there above the crater.


    Once the bird had been formed, it suddenly said, "Who dares trespass in my territory!"


    When it spoke, there was a strong pressure that fell onto Lin Fan''s group.


    Lin Fan could tell that this pressure wasn''t inferior to Qing Ao''s, so it was clear that this was a True Spirit Realm bird. There was no doubt that this was the ally that Qing Ao wanted Lin Fan to find.


    But before Lin Fan could say anything, the bird suddenly turned its attention to Qing Bao Lan who was standing on the side.


    It revealed a surprised look as it asked, "Lan Lan, what are you doing here?" Then without giving anyone a chance to say a thing, it revealed an angry look and roared out, "You! You dare kidnap Brother Ao''s little Lan Lan and bring her here!"


    Then it said, "Don''t worry Lan Lan, I''ll save you now!"


    After saying this, it started rearing back its head, gathering its mes as if it was about to release a me breath.

 Chapter 749 Phoenixes (4)

    Qing Bao Lan naturally knew that this was a bad situation and she didn''t want anything to happen to her Xiao Feng, so she came out to say, "Auntie Feng, it''s not what you think! They didn''t kidnap me, daddy sent me with them to see you!"


    The bird in the air had almost finished gathering the mes for its me breath before it suddenly jolted and almost swallowed those mes.


    It quickly released the mes that had gathered in its mouth and gave two coughs before asking, "Lan Lan, what are you saying? Are they making you say these things?"


    The reason why the bird had stopped gathering mes was because it had seen that Qing Bao Lan hade forward to stand in front of Lin Fan''s group. If it really released its me breath, the first person that it would hit was Qing Bao Lan and naturally it wasn''t willing to do that.


    The bird looked at Qing Bao Lan with a confused look before looking at Lin Fan with a hostile look and saying, "If you did anything to Lan Lan, I will never forgive you!"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh while shaking his head.


    Why were these True Spirit Realm beasts all so impulsive?


    None of them took a moment to think and all went with their instincts¡­


    But then again, they were beasts, so this was something that was normal for them.


    Lin Fan came forward with Qing Bao Lan and took out a token that he raised before saying, "This was given to me by Brother Qing, I think that this should prove my identity."


    The bird looked closely at the token before revealing a shocked look.


    It could feel that aura that wasing from the token and it was certain that this was Qing Ao''s aura. This was an aura that it had felt countless times before, so there was no mistaking it.


    But then it couldn''t help looking at the human who was holding this token with a confused look.


    Why would Brother Ao give this human his token?


    p Not to mention, this human was even addressing Brother Ao as Brother Qing.</anda>


    It could tell that this human wasn''t that old, but he was actually calling Qing Ao brother?


    But there was no mistaking the aura of the token, so it decided to trust this human for now.


    So after a moment to think, the bird of mes suddenly started to shrink until it became the size of a human. It also started to move closer to them as it shrunk until itnded right in front of them, taking the shape of a beautiful woman with fiery red hair.


    As soon as shended, she ignored Lin Fan''s group beforeing forward to pick Qing Bao Lan up in her embrace.


    After she picked Qing Bao Lan up, she immediately moved back away from Lin Fan''s group. While she held Qing Bao Lan in one hand, she raised her other hand to form a sword of mes that she pointed at Lin Fan.


    Then she said in a cold voice, "Exin yourself."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but then he told this woman everything that happened.


    This woman calmly listened to Lin Fan, but never once during his story did she lower her sword.


    Even when Lin Fan was finished with his story, she still pointed the me sword right at him. Lin Fan almost thought that she wanted to cut him down still based on the look on her face.


    She looked down at Qing Bao Lan and after leaning in to whisper a few things, she finally brought the sword down and let the mes dissipate. Then she said, "Alright,e with me into my abode and we''ll talk further."


    Without a single word, she jumped into the pit ofva that was in front of them and sunk down.


    Lin Fan looked at where she had sunk in with a surprised look and then he didn''t know how to react to this.


    He could feel the heat that wasing from the pool ofva in front of him, this was not something that normal people could survive. It wasn''t even something that powerful cultivators could survive.


    While he didn''t doubt that the woman was fine since she was made of mes, he couldn''t help worrying about Qing Bao Lan who had been in that woman''s embrace. After all, Qing Bao Lan wasn''t fireproof just like that woman.


    When he turned to Ang and Yuki to ask what they should do, he found that the two of them had alreadye to the edge of the volcano. He had a bad feeling, but before he could say anything, the two of them had already jumped into theva.


    The two slender figures didn''t remain long before they disappeared under the surface of theva.<sub> </sub>


    There was only Lin Fan and Xiao Feng who were left standing there, not knowing what to do.


    The two of them looked at each other and just stood there in a daze.


    That was until there was a head that suddenly poked out of the surface of theva.


    Qing Bao Lan looked at the two of them with a confused look and asked, "What are you waiting for?"


    When the two of them heard this from Qing Bao Lan, they couldn''t help feeling awkward, but this also told them that there was nothing to fear. It was most likely that there was a passage where the woman had jumped in that would allow them in.


    So Lin Fan picked up Xiao Feng and jumped into the pool ofva where that woman had jumped in earlier.


    As expected, there was no heat when they touched the pool ofva. There wasn''t even contact with theva as they fell right through.


    There had been an illusion array set up where the entrance was, so it only made it seem like there wasva when in reality there was actually arge hole. But of course, all around therge hole was still theke ofva, so there was still heat that came from around them.


    It didn''t take long before Lin Fan and Xiao Fengnded and they found that they were right in the center of the volcano.


    In front of them was a giant pce that wasn''t inferior to Qing Ao''s pce and waiting for them were the girls.


    But the strange thing was that without knowing what happened, it seemed like the woman with the fiery red hair had suddenly be close to Ang and Yuki.


    She ignored Lin Fan as she led the two of them into the pce while holding Qing Bao Lan. All three of them ignored Lin Fan in the end, it was only Qing Bao Lan who turned back, but the only person that was in her eyes was Xiao Feng.


    Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile as he followed behind them,ing into the hall of the pce.


    The fiery red haired woman led their group to the main living room of the pce and had them sit down before saying with a sharp look, "Now, let''s talk." However, the look that she gave off shed very much with her appearance as she held Qing Bao Lan in her hands.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything about it, suppressing the awkward feeling that he had before saying, "Brother Qing asked us toe here to warn you about the attackers and to see if you needed any help."


    The fiery red haired woman narrowed her eyes before saying, "There''s no need for your help. There were attackers, but we''ve already repelled them."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows slightly as he asked, "Then do you have any children? The attackers will also target children."


    The fiery red haired woman said, "I''ve already checked on my daughter, there''s no way for them to get in here in the first ce. After all, no one is crazy enough to jump into that pool ofva."


    Thinking of what happened earlier, Lin Fan had to agree with her, but then he looked at Ang and Yuki and he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    Well, there were two people who were crazy enough¡­


    Sensing the tense atmosphere, Lin Fan knew that this woman still didn''t fully trust him, so he knew that it was hard to get any information from her.


    As he was thinking about what to say, there was a figure that suddenly appeared in the air.


    This red figure looked around before his eyes fell onto the fiery red haired woman and said, "Xiao Ling? Is that you, Xiao Ling?"


    The fiery red haired woman revealed a confused look at first since she didn''t know how this person knew her name, but then when she took a closer look at this person, she couldn''t help revealing a stunned look as she said, "Elder Hong? Is that really you, Elder Hong?"


    The one who had suddenly appeared was Hong Long.


    Hong Long took a close look at the fiery red haired woman and couldn''t help saying, "You''ve really grown into a beauty. I still remember back in the day when you were a snot nosed brat who used to follow Xiao Ao around."


    The fiery red haired woman''s cheeks were covered in a blush before she said, "Elder Hong!"


    Hong Long gave a chuckle before saying, "So you followed Xiao Ao to this world. What happened?"


    The fiery red haired woman gave a sigh before saying, "It''s a long story."

 Chapter 750 Phoenixes (5)

    Then she revealed a bitter smile as she said, "You could even say that it''s because of Brother Ao that I was cast out of the Phoenix Race."


    Hong Long looked at her with slightly knitted brows, but then he gave a sigh as well as he didn''t continue this topic.


    He already had a good idea of what had happened, so he didn''t need to ask since all that would do is drag up bad memories for her.


    Lin Fan on the other hand was curious, but he knew that this wasn''t the time to be asking about this.


    Hong Long gave a cough and then said, "What about the other brat that used to follow Xiao Ao, is she here as well?"


    The fiery red haired woman said with a sad smile, "Sister Ting is also here, she was cast out for the same reason."


    Hong Long couldn''t help revealing an embarrassed look. He had tried to change the topic, but it seemed that he had just stepped onto anotherndmine.


    The fiery red haired woman saved him by asking, "Elder Hong, what happened to you? Why are you like this?"


    She could tell that the Hong Long in front of her wasn''t the same Hong Long that she remembered. The Hong Long that appeared in front of her now was nothing more than a fragment of a soul.


    Hon Long gave another sigh as he said, "It''s a long story, but there''s no time to talk about that right now."


    The fiery red haired woman looked at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes and asked, "Is it because of him?"


    As she said this, there was a dangerous aura that came from her that fell onto Lin Fan.


    Hong Long gave a chuckle and said, "It''s not like that. It was something that happened a long time ago, before this kid was even born." Then after a pause, he said, "As for why I''m following him now¡­" As his voice drifted off, his gaze fell onto Xiao Feng who was on the side with Qing Bao Lan.


    The fiery red haired woman turned to look at Xiao Feng.


    When she had met Lin Fan''s group earlier, she didn''t have the time to properly look over them. Now that she had some time now, she turned to Xiao Feng and carefully scanned him with her spiritual sense.


    As soon as she did, she revealed a shocked look.


    It was the true dragon bloodline, the ancestral bloodline of all dragons!


    She never would have thought that the bloodline of this random dragon that was the pet of this person would be the true dragon bloodline!


    It was no wonder Qing Bao Lan was so stuck to this Xiao Feng!


    Then she couldn''t help turning to look at Lin Fan again, but this time there was aplicated look in her eyes.


    She didn''t know what to think of this person who was able to make this dragon with the true dragon bloodline his pet. Was it just luck or could it be that it was something else?


    No, it wouldn''t be just luck if he was also able to meet Elder Hong and Brother Ao, it had to be¡­


    Once again, there was a dangerous feeling that fell onto Lin Fan as this fiery red haired woman red at him. It was clear that she was wary of him once again because of what Elder Hong said.


    But this time, it was Qing Bao Lan who had suddenly remembered something.


    She finally let go of Xiao Feng, albeit she was very reluctant to do so and she came over to where the fiery red haired woman was. She pulled out something from her pocket and handed it to the woman as she said, "Auntie Feng, I forgot to give you this earlier. It''s a letter from daddy. He told me to give this to you since it would answer all the doubts that you had."


    The fiery red haired woman looked at Qing Bao Lan with an exasperated look that made it seem like she was thinking, "Why didn''t you give me this earlier?" But that expression quickly changed as she revealed a smile and patted her head as she said, "Thank you Lan Lan."


    Qing Bao Lan ignored the first look and just revealed a smile as she nodded before running back to Xiao Feng.


    The fiery red haired woman could sense Qing Ao''s auraing from it and since it came from Qing Bao Lan, it should indeed be a letter from Qing Ao. She opened it carefully and then slowly read through the contents.


    As she read this letter, there was more and more shock that appeared on her face. From time to time, she also looked up at Lin Fan as if she was trying to see through him.


    When she finished reading the letter, she just sat there in a daze, not knowing what to think.


    However, that state didn''tst long as she quickly stood up and grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulders, forcing him close to her as she said, "Do you have other pets?"<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan waspletely taken aback, but it wasn''t as if he could resist her since there was the difference in cultivation between them. Not to mention that she was a beast, so she was physically stronger than him.


    Seeing how intense her gaze was, Lin Fan knew that he had no choice but to listen to her, so he called out the rest of his pets.


    But the fiery red haired woman ignored all of them and came up to Xiao Huo.


    Xiao Huo was naturally scared by the woman who had suddenly picked him up, but after getting an order from Lin Fan to let her do this, he had no choice but toy there in her hands as she looked all over his body.


    While she was looking over him, she once again revealed a look of shock.


    When she was finally finished, she suddenly stopped turning Xiao Huo around and muttered in a shocked voice, "The true phoenix bloodline!"


    As a phoenix herself, Feng Ling was very sensitive to these kinds of things, so once she properly looked over Xiao Huo, she was able to immediately see this.


    Then she couldn''t help turning to the other pets that Lin Fan had.


    They all had some kind of strange bloodline that shocked her!


    She couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a look of absolute shock after this¡­


    There was a moment of silence before she put Xiao Huo down and came back to sit on the sofa.


    As soon as Xiao Huo had been released, he immediately ran back to the other kids. After reaching them, he even hid behind the others as he peeked out at Feng Ling with a wary look.


    While he was surprised by what she had done and he didn''t like being looked at like an object, he felt a strange sense of closeness with this fiery red haired woman.


    Feng Ling didn''t say anything at first, sitting there in silence, taking sips of her tea to calm her nerves.


    But then after a moment of silence, she suddenly stood up and flew out of the room, leaving Lin Fan''s group sitting there in silence.


    It was just a good thing that she didn''t leave for long as she came back with a little red bird that she held in her arms.


    The little red bird had been sleeping at first, but then after being shaken awake by Feng Ling, it said in a groggy voice, "Mommy, what is it? Why are you waking me up so early? It''s still not noon yet."


    Just based on its voice, it was clear that Feng Ling had spoiled this little bird just as much as Qing Ao had spoiled Qing Bao Lan. However, also based on how this little bird addressed Feng Ling, it was clear that this was her daughter.


    This meant that this little bird should be a small phoenix.


    Feng Ling didn''t get angry with the little phoenix''s words and said, "Yu Yu, it''s time to get up, we have guests here."


    The little phoenix had nuzzled up against her mother''s ample chest at first, but when she heard that there were guests, her eyes immediately popped out.


    She looked at the people staring at her in a daze before suddenly jumping out of Feng Ling''s hands and flying off through a door. It didn''t take long before a little girl who seemed to be around five years old in a fire red dress ran back.


    She gave a curtsy to everyone and said, "Hello, my name is Feng Yu and wee to our abode."


    Instead of thezy little phoenix from before, now she put on the appearance of a little princess.


    It was clear that this little girl cared very much about her appearance. She was theplete opposite of another little girl who was currently hugging onto Xiao Feng.


    Feng Yu came over to her mother again and gracefully sat down.


    After she sat down, she secretly poked her mother and said in a low voice, "Why didn''t you tell me that we had guests earlier."


    Feng Ling said with a faint smile, "Well, they suddenly dropped in, so it was a surprise to me as well."


    Feng Yu pouted her lips, but she quickly returned her expression to normal as she started looking over the various guests in the room.


    But then when her eyes fell onto Xiao Huo, she couldn''t stop them from sparkling.

 Chapter 751 Phoenixes (6)

    When Feng Ling saw this, she immediately revealed a bright smile.


    This was what she had wanted to see and was the reason why she had even brought Feng Yu over to meet everyone.


    Feng Yu stared at Xiao Huo in a daze while Xiao Huo also looked back at her, however, Xiao Huo had a confused look as he stared at this little girl who was staring at him.


    But one thing that he had to admit was that she really was a cute little girl and there was a familiar feelinging from her. It was just like the familiar feeling that he felt from the woman who picked him up earlier.


    Feng Ling just revealed a faint smile and patted Feng Yu on the back before saying, "Why don''t you go and introduce yourself to these new friends?"


    Feng Yu had still been in a daze, but when she felt her mother''s hand on her back, she slowly came back to her senses. She asked in a stuttering voice, "Mommy, is he really¡­"


    She didn''t finish her sentence, but it was clear to Feng Ling what she was asking.


    Feng Ling just gave a nod and said, "It''s what you think it is, there''s no mistake."


    Feng Yu''s eyes lit up when she heard this and then she got up elegantly before making her way over to where the kids were.


    The kids were surprised to see this cute girling over, but they didn''t make a move to introduce themselves since this girl was still a stranger to them.


    However, Feng Yu didn''t care at all as she walked past the other kids and made her way over to Xiao Huo.


    Xiao Huo was surprised to see this cute girl standing in front of him, but he didn''t greet her as he waited for her to speak.


    Feng Yu just raised her hand out in front of her and said, "Hello, my name is Feng Yu. Can we be friends?"


    It waspletely different from how Qing Bao Lan had acted when she met Xiao Feng. Instead of directly admitting that she wanted to mate with him, she took a slower approach by bing his friend first.


    Xiao Huo looked at the hand and then came out from behind Xiao Lei who he had been hiding behind to shake it before introducing himself.


    Feng Yu just smiled as she listened to Xiao Huo before directing him onto other topics of conversation.


    It became very clear who was the one dominating the conversation between the two of them.


    It seemed like in the future, it was Xiao Huo''s fate to be controlled by Feng Yu¡­


    Of course, that was only if this was allowed to happen.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first and he turned to look at Ang who had been sitting beside him.


    He was surprised to find that unlike Qing Bao Lan, she didn''t have the same re as she looked at Feng Yu. She even had a faint smile on her face as she watched the two of them together.


    What was going on here?


    Why did Ang not approve of Qing Bao Lan, but approve of Feng Yu?


    Well, the clear answer was the difference in personality between the two of them. One of them was calm and mature and the other was childish and spoiled.


    There was no contest between the two of them, it was clear which one would make a better wife.


    But Lin Fan couldn''t help worrying since he could tell that there was a clear disproportionate bnce in this rtionship. If this rtionship was allowed to happen, it would be clear that Xiao Huo would be a whipped husband¡­


    Lin Fan could ept that he was that, but he couldn''t let Xiao Huo be the same¡­


    So when Feng Ling suddenly said, "It seems like the kids are getting along quite well." Then after a pause, she asked, "Do any of them have any engagements yet?"


    After she asked this, Qing Bao Lan suddenly said, "Yes, yes, Xiao Feng and I are engaged!"


    Ang knitted her brows and red at Qing Bao Lan who red right back at her.


    But Lin Fan ignored this and said, "I''m letting the kids decide on their own in the future. As long as they aren''t willing to marry, then I won''t agree to it."


    He knew that he had to draw this line early or else he would get caught up in their ns.


    Feng Ling raised a brow when she heard this, but then she looked at Hong Long who gave a nod.


    Seeing this, she didn''t panic. Instead, she revealed a faint smile and said, "Well, it''s naturally good if they were able to find partners that they arefortable with."


    Then she changed the topic by saying, "Speaking of which, there''s still the matter of the attackers, isn''t there?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by this sudden change in topic, but this was the topic that he wanted to discuss as well. After all, this would be something rted to his future ns, so he wanted to see if he could convince Feng Yu to join their side.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "The attackers are people from the¡­"


    Feng Ling suddenly raised her hand to cut Lin Fan off before saying, "I''m not interested in the politics between you humans, you can just keep that to yourself. This is a discussion between you and me right now."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think for a bit before asking, "What do you want?"


    Feng Ling revealed a smile and said, "It''s always good to deal with someone smart." Then her expression turned serious, "As long as Brother Ao trusts you, that means that I can trust you. He is the leader of our group, so we will follow him." Then after a pause, she added, "Of course, I do have some things that I want you to do for me as well."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more as he asked, "What are you asking for?"


    Feng Ling looked over at the kids ying and then said with a smile, "It seems like our kids get along quite well¡­So I want you to help me take care of Xiao Yu. That is all I want."


    Lin Fan turned to look at the kids as well, as he immediately understood what she wanted.


    She wanted the same thing as Qing Ao and Hong Long, but her target was different¡­


    Instead of Xiao Feng, she wanted Xiao Huo who had the true phoenix bloodline.


    Also different from Qing Ao and Hong Long, the bait that she used was different.


    Unlike Qing Bao Lan who hadn''t made any progress with Xiao Feng, it was clear by the look in Xiao Huo''s eyes that he was slowly being won over by Feng Yu¡­


    It wouldn''t take much before he wouldpletely fall.


    But this was also important for Lin Fan since if he were to ept this, it would mean that he would have another True Soul Realm ally¡­


    Would he sell Xiao Huo just for this True Soul Realm ally?


    In the end, it wasn''t even Lin Fan who made the decision. Instead, it was Ang who said, "Alright, that''s not a problem."


    Lin Fan just looked at her with a bitter smile on his face, but he didn''t say anything.


    However, he was curious why Ang would agree to this when she had such strong feelings about Qing Bao Lan.


    Ang didn''t say anything to him and just exchanged smiles with Feng Ling before the two of them started talking about other things along with Yuki.


    With the way they were acting, it was almost as if they were already sisters.


    Lin Fan was just left there sitting all by himself.


    Hong Long patted him on the shoulder, but Lin Fan just gave him a nod with a bitter smile to show that he wanted to be left alone for now.


    Once that had been decided, all that was left was to form the temporary contract with Feng Yu like he had done with Qing Bao Lan.


    To his surprise, just like Qing Ao, Feng Ling had agreed to the contract without any hesitation.


    Feng Yu herself was even quite eager to form the contract with Lin Fan since she knew that as long as she formed the contract, she would be able to stay with Xiao Huo.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what these beasts were thinking, but he just went along with it.


    They stayed for the rest of the day since Ang insisted.


    Lin Fan had been treated as a servant as the three girls chatted with each other. At the same time, he was also treated as a babysitter who had to watch the kids while they were chatting.


    Lin Fan just shook his head and yed along, but he also made sure to have a proper talk with Xiao Huo during this time.


    He didn''t want Xiao Huo to be like him in the future, so he wanted to teach Xiao Huo how to stand up for himself.


    It was too bad that pets learned from their masters and Xiao Huo had already learned plenty from Lin Fan.


    Even with Lin Fan''s speech, it was already toote for him to change.


    Lin Fan just couldn''t help worrying about Xiao Huo in the future¡­


    After spending the night in the volcano pce, Lin Fan''s group with Feng Yu added along headed back to the Hunters Organization branch in the city.


    However, they didn''t go back to Harmony City right away.


    Instead, they headed off to another branch.

 Chapter 752 Qilin (1)

    The branch that they had arrived at was near a ce called the Sky Inds, which was where Lin Fan had to go next.


    This was where Qing Ao''s other ally lived.


    As for why they were called the Sky Inds, it was because they were literal inds in the sky.


    But they weren''t inds in the traditional sense, but rather they were inds that were formed of clouds that people could walk on.


    These cloud inds weren''t made up of normal clouds, but rather a very dense cloud called the Gigacumulonimbus. This was a special cloud that was countless times denser than normal cumulonimbus clouds, making it more like a block of ice than a cloud.


    There were beasts that settled and nt seeds that adapted, creating a proper environment on these Gigacumulonimbus clouds.


    There was even a human city that had been built on one of these Sky Inds, but it was a special ce that was ruled by one family that was free from the influence of the twelve great factions.


    So there wasn''t a direct transport gate to these inds, but as cultivators, they were able to fly up to these inds with tamed pets.


    Lin Fan bought some of the special pets used as transport to bring them up to the Sky Inds.


    Lin Fan could have had his pets bring him up there, but he didn''t want to expose himself, so he chose to use thesemercial pets instead.


    The pets were quite fast, but of course they couldn''t be as fast as Lin Fan''s pets.


    Still, it only took them around an hour to get to the Sky Inds that they needed to go.


    As soon as they arrived, they found a lush forest spread out in front of them, which was certainly surprising since it was growing atop a cloud. However, that wasn''t what attracted their attention since they had another destination.


    In the center of this forest, in the center of this cloud, there was a mountain that waspletely made of clouds.


    Unlike the white clouds that made up the ground of this Sky Ind, the clouds that made up this mountain werepletely ck. Not only that, there were traces of ck lightning that kept shing under the ck surface of this mountain.


    That was what gave this mountain the name Tempest Peak since there was a tempest brewing inside of this mountain almost constantly.


    Lin Fan''s group quickly made their way through the forest since no beast was willing to attack them with the aura they released.


    It didn''t take long before they reached the foot of Tempest Mountain.


    Now that they were at the foot, looking up at this pitch ck mountain, it seemed even more imposing.


    However, they didn''t have a choice since Qing Ao''s other ally lived at the peak of this mountain. So they could only brace themselves and make the slow trek up the mountain.


    They could have had the beasts that they bought fly up the mountain, but that would mean getting hit by the lightning that came out of the mountain from time to time. Instead of wasting their energy blocking all of these bolts of lightning, it was better to go slowly on the ground and only block the asional bolts of lightning that fell, instead of the lightning storm.


    But even if they went on the ground, they weren''t slow since they were high level cultivators.


    It took them around half an hour to climb up the mountain and reach the peak.


    But the peak was where things became even more intense.


    All of the thunder and storm clouds that made up the mountain gathered at the peak, so instead of rain, it was a never ending falling of bolts of lightning at the peak of this mountain.


    Tobat this, Lin Fan had no choice but to form a barrier with his life energy as he moved across the peak, looking for Qing Ao''s ally.


    ? Not only did he have to expend his life energy to form the barrier, he also had to strengthen it to protect the kids that were underneath it. After all, he needed Qing Bao Lan and Feng Yu to help him when he met Qing Ao''s ally, but it really did take quite a bit of energy protecting the two of them.


    Well, not just the two of them¡­


    They wouldn''te out unless Xiao Feng and Xiao Huo were brought out along with them¡­


    It was just a good thing that like before, it didn''t take long before Qing Bao''s ally appeared.


    There was a giant sh of purple lightning in front of them before there was a beast made of lightning that had appeared.


    This time, it was very easy to recognize what kind of beast this was because it had a very distinct form.<sub> </sub>


    It was a qilin.


    There were no other beasts that really had the same appearance as the qilin, so it was hard to mistake it for something else.


    But just likest time, as soon as the qilin appeared¡­


    "Human, who are you to trespass on mynd!"


    Then when the qilin saw Qing Bao Lan and Feng Yu¡­


    "Lan Lan, Yu Yu? Why are you here?" After a pause, the qilin of lightning red at Lin Fan and said, "Did you kidnap these two?"


    But before it could start shooting out lightning at Lin Fan, Feng Yu was the one who spoke up this time, "Auntie Lei, we''re here because our parents sent us here with this man. They have something that they want to talk to you about."


    Qing Bao Lan quickly followed up by saying, "Auntie Lei, it''s very important!"


    The qilin of lightning was taken aback by the daughters of her two best friends speaking up for this human, but she still chose to give the human a chance since she knew that with her power, it wasn''t hard for her to take care of him if the human did try to do something.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this. It seemed like this qilin''s temper wasn''t as bad as Feng Ling from before.


    Of course, he also didn''t panic because he had another trump card that he could use.


    He had seen Hong Long and Feng Ling discussing this qilin before, so he knew that Hong Long also knew this qilin.


    In fact, Hong Long had been watching and had been prepared toe out, but Lin Fan had stopped him since he didn''t want to overwhelm this qilin right away.


    After choosing to talk, the qilin of lightning suddenly shrank until she took human form. The form that appeared in front of Lin Fan was a beautiful woman with piercing purple hair and purple eyes.


    After introducing herself as Lei Ting, she led their group a bit further up the mountain until they came to a cave and then brought them in to lead them to a pce that was inside of the mountain.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he saw this.


    It seemed like all these beasts liked havingrge pces for some reason¡­


    However, before they could reach the living room this time, there was a small qilin that suddenly dropped down from the roof,nding in front of the four kids. She ignored the two girls and went over to the two boys, sniffing their bodies before slightly knitting her brows.


    As she stood there sniffing, she said, "No, this isn''t right. I can smell a faint scenting from the two of you, but you two aren''t the ones that I''m looking for."


    Everyone looked at this small qilin who had suddenly dropped with a shocked look, not understanding what was happening.


    Only Lei Ting, who had been just as surprised by this small qilin falling down, shook her head with a bitter smile on her face.


    She might have been a bit too free with her teachings as a parent¡­


    The small qilin finally finished sizing up the group and turned its gaze to Lin Fan as it said, "Human, do you have any other pets that you''re hiding? Bring them out now for me!"


    Lin Fan was taken aback by how this small qilin talked to him, but he could already guess what was happening since he had already seen it twice. In fact, he was quite surprised by how sharp this small qilin''s nose was.


    But since there was no stopping this, Lin Fan decided to call out Xiao Lei as well.


    As soon as Xiao Lei appeared, there was only a slight moment of dy before he was tackled by the small qilin.


    Xiao Lei waspletely caught off guard and justid there on the ground, not understanding what was happening as he looked up at the small qilin atop him.


    The small qilin seemed to have realized something and quickly took human form before picking Xiao Lei off the ground. The qilin who had transformed into a cute little girl with purple hair ran with Xiao Lei in her arms over to Lei Ting and said, "He''s mine! Mommy, I want him!"


    Lei Ting was about to say something, but when she looked at Xiao Lei, she suddenly narrowed her eyes.


    She swallowed her words and released her spiritual senses, scanning Xiao Lei with them. As she did, her eyes filled with more and more shock.


    In the end, she didn''t answer the small qilin''s request, but she looked at Lin Fan with a shocked gaze that also had a bit of inquiry in them.

 Chapter 753 Qilin (2)

    Lin Fan naturally knew what this gaze was about since he had already seen it twice from two different sacred beasts.


    But of course, there wasn''t a way for him to exin it since even he couldn''t really exin it. It wasn''t as if he could just tell them that he had received it from the system that was considered a cheat in this world.


    To begin with, they wouldn''t even understand what a system was.


    He also couldn''t just use his master as an exnation since unlike the humans, they hadn''t seen his store yet and would find it much harder to believe him.


    So in the end, there was nothing that he could exin it with.


    He just met that gaze without looking away.


    However, at this time, Hong Long also appeared above Lin Fan, surprising Lei Ting who saw him suddenly appear.


    After another moment of shock, Lei Ting said, "Elder Hong, is that really you?"


    It was the exact same reaction as Feng Ling and Hong Long gave her the same exnation.


    After that, Hong Long said, "Look at those two kids as well, there''s no need to doubt this person." As he said this, he pointed at Xiao Feng and Xiao Huo on the side.


    Lei Ting slowly turned her eyes to look at the two of them and as she checked them, she revealed the same slow shocked expression as before.


    Three true bloodlines from three different sacred beasts!


    She turned to look at Lin Fan with a look of shock that had a bit of fear in it.


    Just who was this man that he had three pets with these kinds of bloodlines?


    Hong Long shook his head when he saw this, but he didn''t say anything to exin it to Lei Ting. Instead, he turned to Feng Yu and Qing Bao Lan and said, "Give your auntie the letter that your parents wrote."


    Feng Yu and Qing Bao Lan had been too busy with Xiao Feng and Xiao Huo that they hadpletely forgotten about this, but after being reminded by Hong Long, they took out the letters for Lei Ting.


    Lei Ting slowly read the letters that she received and she looked at Lin Fan from time to time as she read through these letters.


    When she was done, she put the letters down and just sat there in silence, as if she was thinking about something.


    Then after a long period of silence, she turned to Lin Fan and said, "Since Brother Ao and Sister Ling both trust you, I think there shouldn''t be a problem working with you."


    She paused before adding, "There have been attacks on us here, but the lightning field has kept them away, so they haven''t been able to reach us. However, that doesn''t mean that it''ll keep them away forever¡­"


    <o>,m Lin Fan nodded in response to this.</o>


    The enemy had already shown that they had many items that had very strange effects, so it wouldn''t be strange if they had an item that could deal with the lightning. As long as they could deal with the lightning, it certainly wouldn''t be hard for them to sneak in and do what they wanted.


    Just like they had done at Qing Ao''s pce.


    Lei Ting then said, "But before we can work together, there''s something that I need from you before that." She revealed a smile and said, "I think that you should know what I''m talking about already, right?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he shook his head.


    These sacred beasts really were all simr, they all cared about bloodlines¡­


    But of course, that couldn''t be med on them since most of their cultivation relied on purifying their bloodline. So it was natural that they would worship pure bloodlines and try to bring those pure bloodlines into their own bloodlines for future prosperity.


    Lin Fan just said, "It all depends on how Xiao Lei feels. If he agrees, then I don''t have anything to say, but if he doesn''t, no one can force him to do anything that he doesn''t want to do."


    Lei Ting gave a nod in response to this as this was what she had expected.


    Perhaps she might have thought about forcing it if she had just found Xiao Lei with Lin Fan alone, but with the appearance of Hong Long and the other pets with sacred beast bloodlines, she knew that Lin Fan wasn''t simple.


    It was best if she didn''t offend him for no reason.


    Since Lin Fan had agreed, there really wasn''t anything else that they needed to discuss.


    The same contract was formed with the small qilin who was called Lei Huan and then they stayed the night just like before.


    He didn''t know why, but for some reason, Ang and Yuki were both able to be friends with Lei Ting just like with Feng Ling. Only, they treated Lei Huan differently from how they treated Feng Yu.<sub> </sub>


    After all, Lei Huan''s personality was more like Qing Bao Lan''s¡­No, in all fairness, it was more intense than Qing Bao Lan''s.


    The way she acted was even more wild than Qing Bao Lan and she didn''t stop to listen to anyone. That was until she tried to talk down to Lin Fan again.


    When she had done it the first time, Xiao Lei hadn''t been called out of the pet storage space, so he hadn''t seen it. The second time that she did it, he immediately reprimanded her.


    She was surprised to see him reprimanding her, but she also immediately bowed her head and apologized with pouted lips.


    It seemed like this rtionship was going to be different from the other rtionship.


    Xiao Lei was different from Lin Fan''s other pets, at least he knew how to talk strongly to girls when he needed to.


    Naturally, Lei Huan didn''t want Xiao Lei to hate her, so she folded under his strong words. But at the same time, she couldn''t help feeling a new feeling since this was the first time that anyone had treated her like this.


    It wasn''t a bad feeling, but rather she wanted him to speak to her harshly again¡­


    It seemed like Lei Huan was awakening to a new fetish¡­


    After they agreed to stay, Lin Fan was surprised to find that the three young girls didn''t insist on staying with the ones they were chasing, but rather chose to sleep together in one room, freeing the kids to finally spend a night with Lin Fan.


    But at the same time, Lin Fan was worried since he could tell that they weren''t up to any good based on the expression they had when they left for their rooms.


    Lin Fan himself was also left alone since Ang and Yuki were also having a sleepover with Lei Ting.


    But there was less action in that sleepover than at the sleepover with the three little girls.


    Qing Bao Lan was the first one to speak as she said, "Let''s start this nning session! We have to figure out a way to take care of that old hag so that I can be lovey lovey with Xiao Feng!"


    Lei Huan nodded along since Ang also didn''t like her, but Feng Yu said, "There''s no need for that, it''s not like she''s standing in our way."


    When she said this, the other two girls all red at her like she was the enemy. After all, she was basically bragging that she was the only one that Ang liked, which put her ahead of the other two.


    Lei Huan muttered, "Fake."


    Feng Yu heard this and she turned to Lei Huan with a smile to say, "It''s better than your strange tastes."


    Lei Huan didn''t really understand what Feng Yu meant by this since she wasn''t aware of her changing tastes just yet.


    Qing Bao Lan came in between them and said in a determined voice, "Stop, stop, we can''t turn against each other. We have to think of ways to help each other to get their attention. We definitely can''t fail!"


    The other two girls looked at each other before giving nods of agreement.


    Before anything else, they had to get their target to look at them as a girlfriend instead of as a friend who was a girl. These kids still didn''t have any awareness of love rtionships just yet, so they had to figure out ways to make these kids aware of this.


    Even when they were direct, such as telling them that they wanted to mate, the kids still didn''t understand since they were too young for that.


    So they had to think of other ways to get their attention.


    After thinking for a bit, Feng Yu said, "I''ve read in human novels that men like girls who are weak, it makes them want to protect them and that''s how they fall in love. So if we just act weak¡­"


    But when they heard this n, both Qing Bao Lan and Lei Huan had expressions that showed that they clearly didn''t agree.


    Both of them had strong personalities, so to tell them to act weak really was a bit¡­


    Feng Yu could see this, so she didn''t continue pitching this n and said, "Then how about we fight together with them? I heard that dangerous situations can also stir feelings."


    But even she didn''t agree with this n either since she could tell that the kids were stronger than them.


    All three of these girls were only in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm while the boys were already in the Peak Child Soul Realm.


    There really wasn''t an enemy that they could fight together.


    The three girls continued to wrack their brains all night, trying to think of a n to get the boys under their thumbs.

 Chapter 754 Meeting Of Subordinates

    Since they had finished going to each of Qing Ao''s allies, there was no need for them to go anywhere else now.


    Lin Fan decided the next morning that they would be returning to the store since they had already spent quite a bit of time away from the store.


    Not to mention, he had already aplished his goal of getting more True Soul Realm allies.


    Now he wanted to just be at the store if anything happened, so he could react as soon as possible.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the store since they had the Hunters Organization''s teleport gates, but there also wasn''t much that was happening at the store, or in Harmony City in general.


    After the various factions started announcing that they could sell Child Soul Realm beasts as well, there was a bnce that was struck between the two sides.


    Both sides tried to pull in different smaller families with their offer of Child Soul Realm beasts, but to Lin Fan''s surprise, the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect side were able to pull in more smaller families.


    It wasn''t because there was a disparity in amount of Child Soul Realm beasts that they could offer since it was easy for Lin Fan to breed more Child Soul Realm beast, but rather when their side tried to contact the small families, they found that they had already jumped to the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect side. They didn''t even give their side a chance to negotiate as they firmly stood on the other side.


    It truly was strange how fast the Thunder Sect and True Spirit Sect side moved, at the same time, it was even stranger how they had been able to foster this kind of loyalty with these families in such a short period of time.


    It was almost as if they had been threatened¡­


    But when their side checked into this, they found that there was no such thing.


    So that made things even stranger.


    The only thing that they could do was try to get as many of the remaining families as possible so there wouldn''t be a disparity.


    During the time that Lin Fan had been able, there wasn''t ack of supplies since Lin Fan had also taught Mo Ze Chen how to operate the incubator. He hadn''t told Mo Ze Chen how it worked, he just told him that it was a machine that could help breed pets.


    Mo Ze Chen was already fully on Lin Fan''s side, so he knew not to ask too many questions since it most likely had something to do with the master in the store.


    Aftering back, Lin Fan left the kids to Ang and Yuki as he went to the store to organize something.


    It was already past the morning rush when he arrived, but when he did arrive, there was a group who was waiting outside the store for him.


    They had arrived early in the morning and had attracted a lot of attention by standing there, but the guards just left them alone since Mo Ze Chen had even vouched for them. Since the workers of the store didn''t mind, there really wasn''t much that they could do.


    As for why Mo Ze Chen vouched for them, that was because they were Lin Fan''s people.


    It was Jiang Zhi Shu and the people that had been brought up from the Blue Star.


    When Lin Fan hade back the day before, he had called them and told them toe to the store in the morning.


    When they saw Lin Fan arriving, they all went to greet him, but Lin Fan waved his hand to stop them and then had them follow him into the store.


    He had Lulu take care of the store while he led Mo Ze Chen and Jiang Zhi Shu''s group into the back.


    Since Jiang Zhi Shu hade up from the Blue Star, that meant that he would be working for Lin Fan in the future. So he brought Jiang Zhi Shu''s group over to the pet store to get them familiarized with the store while also letting them meet Mo Ze Chen who they would be working with in the future.


    Both Mo Ze Chen and Jiang Zhi Shu had already made up their minds to follow Lin Fan, so there shouldn''t have been a problem for them to get along, but there was a small conflict between them when they first met.


    Both of them thought that they were the closest to Lin Fan, but that changed when they met each other.


    They could see that the other side had clearly gone through a lot with Lin Fan, so they were worried about losing their position.


    They both knew that the position right by Lin Fan, as his most trusted subordinate, would yield the most benefits, so neither of them were willing to give it to the other.


    But that was only a small tension underneath the surface. On the surface, they were actually quite cordial with each other.


    However, it wasn''t as if Lin Fan couldn''t see through the worries that they had.


    In fact, he had already thought of a way to handle this, which was why he had brought them to the back.<sub> </sub>


    He led them downstairs until they were in the arena and then put the two of them inside the arena together.


    Both Jiang Zhi Shu and Mo Ze Chen were confused when they saw this.


    Finally, Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what''s going on here?"


    Jiang Zhi Shu also asked, "Boss, why are we in this ce?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he just looked at them with a smile. Then he turned back to the panel that he had been fiddling with.


    The two of them just stood there in silence, but seeing that Lin Fan still didn''t say anything, they were about to say something again. But before they could say anything, they suddenly felt the space around them change.


    It was a very strange change, but by the end of it, they could tell that their cultivations had been suppressed.


    The most power that they could use was only in the Low Fragmented Soul Realm.


    Both of them looked around themselves with shocked looks, trying to figure out what had just happened to them.


    Lin Fan watched them acting like this with a smile on his face.


    This was a function of the arena built by the system, it used special suppressionws to limit all cultivation inside of the space to be at a certain level. It was just that Lin Fan had never used this function before because there was no need for him to use it.


    Most people who used this arena wanted to test the full power of their newly trained pets, so they never asked for cultivation limits.


    The reason he had done it now was because of his n.


    He thought that the best way for his two subordinates to get to know each other was with a spar. After all, men who exchanged blows would be closer to each other.


    So after giving them some time to get used to this suppressed space, Lin Fan said, "You two will spar now and see who''s stronger."


    Both Mo Ze Chen and Jiang Zhi Shu were surprised, but they didn''t stay that way for long. They figured that this was how Lin Fan would decide who would be the one that he depended more on, which was what they wanted in the first ce.


    So after hearing what Lin Fan said, both of them prepared to fight.


    What they didn''t know was that Lin Fan actually treated them both as his brother after everything they had been through together. So in his mind, they were actually on the same level and neither was higher than the other.


    The only reason he wanted them to spar was so they could get closer to each other.


    <o>,m The sparringsted for half an hour and by the end of it, both Mo Ze Chen and Jiang Zhi Shu were lying on the ground. Both of them had beenpletely exhausted by the other side and neither seemed like they were in any condition to keep fighting, but by the end of this, they had a greater admiration for the other person.</o>


    Seeing the look in their eyes, Lin Fan revealed a satisfied look.


    It seemed like his n had been a sess.


    Lin Fan was about to say something else, but he suddenly received a message on his watch.


    He looked down to find that it was a simple report from Old Man Qiao about the True Spirit Sect and he opened it without much care since he figured that it was some small news, but the moment that he read the first sentence, his eyes immediately popped out.


    Without any hesitation, he immediately called Old Man Qiao.


    Old Man Qiao picked up, but he asked in a surprised voice, "Is something wrong?"


    He clearly didn''t expect Lin Fan to suddenly call him out of the blue. He didn''t even associate it to the report that he had just sent since it was only a small piece of news from the True Spirit Sect.


    It was just the announcement of a wedding from the family of one of the sect''s elders. This was a very normal thing and shouldn''t have drawn any attention.


    But the one thing that he missed was that the bride had the same surname as Lin Fan.


    The bride was Lin Xue.

 Chapter 755 Sudden Wedding (1)

    Lin Fan''s first response was, "What is this wedding announcement that you sent me? Do you have more information on this?"


    Old man Qiao was surprised and confused when he heard this, but he still honestly answered, "We just received a notice that the wedding was being held by the Liao Family and the couple who was getting married was named Liao Ping and Lin Xue. This is just a normal notice from one of the elders of the True Spirit Sect, is it really worth noting?"


    Lin Fan gritted his teeth and asked, "When is the wedding?"


    Old man Qiao hesitantly said, "It''s being held in a month from now. Is something wrong?"


    Old man Qiao could clearly hear that there was something off about Lin Fan''s voice, but he couldn''t tell what exactly¡­


    But then when he thought about it for a bit, he suddenly realized something.


    The name of the bride was Lin Xue¡­The surname of Lin, could it be that she was someone rted to Lin Fan?


    If that was the case, that would exin everything. However, that would also throw a wrench in their ns since he knew that Lin Fan would certainly interfere with this wedding if this was the case.


    This was a very fragile time for their twelve great factions and Lin Fan was one of their important cooperators, so if he were to create a mess at this time¡­


    But it wasn''t as if he could order Lin Fan around. They were partners and not master and subordinate, so he didn''t have the right to order Lin Fan around. Even if Lin Fan was a hunter and he was an elder of the Hunters Association, he knew that the Hunter License was just something that Lin Fan had gotten out of convenience.


    If he no longer needed it, Lin Fan would give up the Hunter License, the object that countless people on this Gctic Humanity Alliance dreamed of without any hesitation.


    So old man Qiao started wracking his head for all kinds of solutions to this problem, but he wasn''t able toe up with anything useful in the end.


    Old man Qiao decided to cast this all away and said, "Xiao Fan, you shouldn''t act hasty. Let''s calm down and¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan cut him off by saying, "Thank you for your concern, but it''s fine. If you have any other information on the wedding, please send it to me as soon as possible."


    Without even giving old man Qiao a chance to say anything, he hung up.


    Old man Qiao just sat there looking at his watch with a stunned look on his face.


    He could tell from Lin Fan''s voice that he was drawing a clear line with their Hunters Organization. It seemed like he was going to take care of this alone, but how could he let that happen?


    Lin Fan was now a very important person not just to their Hunters Organization, but also the twelve great factions that they were allied with. Not only was he their precious supplier of Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts, the master behind him would be their ultimate trump card.


    Someone that could pull out Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts that easily and even im to be able to train True Soul Realm beasts, all of which were clearly beyond the capabilities of Lin Fan alone, was definitely someone that they couldn''t underestimate. This kind of person might even be some super expert from some Ster Kingdom that hade down for some unknown reason.


    However, the fact that he was willing to send his disciple Lin Fan to create rtions with their twelve great factions showed that he was willing to cooperate with them, which was all they could ask for.


    Especially when they were facing the unknown enemies that were backing the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    As their only link to this master, naturally Lin Fan''s importance was hard to measure.


    After thinking for a bit, old man Qiao pressed a few buttons on his watch and made a few more calls.


    It seemed like this would be a busy time for him.


    ¡­


    After hanging up on the call, Lin Fan just stood there with a dark look on his face.


    His subordinates who had noticed something happening all looked at him with wary looks. They had never seen Lin Fan like this, it was almost as if anyone who approached him would be instantly frozen by him.


    As for Lin Fan himself, all he could think to himself was, "That son of a b*tch!"


    That piece of trash from the Liao Family, he couldn''t win his mother from his father, so now he was targeting the younger generation?


    There was a gap between generations and he was touching his little sister?


    He was right about that person, he was nothing more than trash¡­but he was trash that had a powerful family behind him, so he could afford to remain the piece of trash that he was.


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t allow this to happen.


    This was the main reason that he hade up to the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so if he allowed this wedding to happen, it would mean that he failed.<sub> </sub>


    He had thought that he had some more time to prepare before he headed to the Liao Family, but since they were inviting him, there was no reason for him not to ept this invitation.


    After all, he was already basically prepared.


    With the lucky downfall of three True Soul Realm allies, it meant that he had the confidence to do this.


    If the True Spirit Sect really wanted to start something with him, it wasn''t as if he wouldn''t be able to fight back. He also didn''t worry that the Thunder Sect and the Assassins Association would interfere in this matter.


    After all, they were about to dere war on all the other twelve great factions and Lin Fan was just a single person that had now drawn a line with the other twelve great factions. They wouldn''t ruin their n just to help the True Spirit Sect.


    This was also why Lin Fan was confident that the True Spirit Sect wouldn''t go all out against him.


    A single elder family against their n that involved all the twelve great factions, it was clear which one would be sacrificed.


    But Lin Fan didn''t want to charge into this without any ns at all.


    He had already startedying down the foundations for his ns against the Liao Family, but that didn''t mean that he had any concrete ns yet. After all, he had thought that he had more time to prepare everything, so he had only startedying the foundations.


    It seemed like it would be a busy two weeks for him.


    Once these thoughts passed through his mind, Lin Fan let out a sigh and turned his


    attention to his subordinates.


    He narrowed his eyes as he began to think, nning out the role that they would y.


    The one problem with his subordinates was that they were all too weak. Even if they had been cultivating, it wasn''t as if they could break through that easily.


    So most of them wouldn''t be able to y a role in his n normally.


    But Lin Fan had something that others didn''t.


    He had been receiving Child Soul Realm eggs and Nascent Soul Realm eggs from the twelve great factions and he had been hatching them. The amount of Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts that Lin Fan currently had was much greater than any of the twelve great factions.


    So while his subordinates were weak, he could supplement them with these beasts.


    They couldn''t form contracts with them since they were much weaker than the beasts, but Lin Fan could have these beasts follow their orders since he had already formed contracts with them.


    They wouldn''t be as strong as normal Nascent Soul Realm and Child Soul Realm Experts since there was a disparity in cultivation, so the beasts themselves would be affected, but Lin Fan could make up for it with numbers.


    An elder family would have at most two Nascent Soul Realm Experts, so if Lin Fan just threw five Nascent Soul Realm beasts at them, that would already be enough to smother them. Not to mention that he had far more Nascent Soul Realm beasts than that.


    So using his subordinates wasn''t a problem at all. In fact, they had something that others didn''t have, their loyalty towards him.


    So that was actually the benefit of using his subordinates.


    Seeing the way Lin Fan looked at them, they couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spine, but they still just stood there waiting for him to say something.


    That was their loyalty on full disy.


    Lin Fan just let them do their own thing and train in this arena as he went back upstairs to make another call.


    When the call connected, Xu Lin immediately said, "I''m sorry, I don''t know anything about this either."


    It was clear that he had already heard about the wedding announcement from the Liao Family and he knew that he was at fault for this. Lin Fan had assigned him to watch over Lin Xue and Yue Qingruo, but he had allowed something like this to happen without even knowing how it happened.


    This was without a doubt a vition of his orders.


    It wouldn''t be a surprise if Lin Fan were to punish him.


    But he could only face it since he knew that it was his mistake.

 Chapter 756 Sudden Wedding (2)

    But to his surprise, Lin Fan didn''t me him at all for this matter.


    Lin Fan could tell from his voice that he was genuinely surprised by this news and he was sincere with his apology.


    This had alsoe as a surprise to him and he knew that there must have been something that had suddenly changed with the Liao Family for this to happen. This was not something anyone could have expected, so naturally it was an honest mistake on Xu Lin''s part.


    No, it couldn''t even be considered a mistake since there was nothing he could have done about this.


    Xu Lin was after all only the disciple of one of the elders in the True Spirit Sect, his status wasn''t high enough to do anything about this.


    So Lin Fan wouldn''t dwell on this matter, there were other things that required his attention for now.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "It''s fine, it''s not as if you could have predicted this. Tell me everything that has happened with the Yue Family and the Liao Family over the past few days. I want to see if anything has changed with their situation."


    Xu Lin was clearly surprised by Lin Fan''s words as he didn''t say anything right away. He knew how cold and merciless Lin Fan was after seeing what he had done for the Xu Family, so he thought that he would certainly be punished.


    But it seemed like he had been wrong about Lin Fan.


    This just made him more certain about his decision to follow Lin Fan.


    Xu Lin quickly described everything that he had seen over the past few weeks to Lin Fan, but all that did was make Lin Fan even more confused.


    Both his mother and little sister had been left alone in the Yue Manor and the Liao Family had never made any contact with the Yue Family, so why would they suddenly decide to hold this wedding?


    There were no signs that they had talked to each other to discuss terms. In fact, Liao Ping had even locked himself away during this time, not making an appearance when the wedding announcement was made.


    None of this seemed to make any sense¡­


    It was almost as if there was some hidden force behind the scenes that was manipting everything.


    But that exnation made even less sense.


    Since he couldn''t get anything useful from Xu Lin, he said, "Watch over the Yue and Liao Families for me. There should be something that has changed with those two families and I want to know what it is. As long as we can understand what has changed, it''ll be much easier to deal with whates in the future."


    Xu Lin hesitated a bit before saying, "Young master, what about¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan said, "I''ll send you all the funds you need, just get it done. "


    Xu Lin no longer hesitated as he said, "Yes young master."


    Since Lin Fan was offering his full support, there was nothing that Xu Lin needed to worry about.


    He knew that Lin Fan''s power was far greater than what it seemed on the surface based on the letters that he had been receiving from the Xu Family. Since he was going to give him everything he needed, all Xu Lin needed to do was follow his order.


    Before he hung up, Lin Fan also remembered something and added, "Help me keep an eye on the Shi Family as well."


    Xu Lin was confused why Lin Fan suddenly mentioned the Shi Family, but he agreed to this before hanging up.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking about one thing that Xu Lin had mentioned in his report.


    The Shi Family had met with the Yue Family before this wedding was announced¡­Could it be that this was rted?


    He wasn''t certain, but there was a faint bad premonition that he felt from this information.


    After all of this was taken care of, all Lin Fan had left to do was tell Lin Ao about this.


    This was the thing that he had been dreading the most since he knew how hard it would be to control Lin Ao once he heard this news. There was no doubt that he would rush right to the True Spirit Sect once he learned of this.


    But Lin Fan couldn''t have him do that since that would alert the Liao Family of their presence on the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Right now, the Liao Family didn''t know that he had alreadye up since there were countless people in this Gctic Humanity Alliance. Lin Fan had only done his business in Harmony City and the area around it, which wasn''t a ce that the Liao Family didn''t have any coverage in since they didn''t have any business in.


    Even if they heard the name Lin Fan, the group that had gone to the Blue Star had never even bothered learning his name, so they didn''t connect it to him.


    But if Lin Ao were to charge into the True Spirit Sect alone, it would without a doubt create arge incident. It would be impossible to hide it after something like this happened.<sub> </sub>


    Then they would lose the element of surprise which would be their greatest advantage.


    So Lin Fan had to make sure that Lin Ao didn''t go anywhere after he learned this.


    To even make sure that he could stop Lin Ao, Lin Fan even had Brainy release some puppets to form a barrier around the residence before he went in.


    Lin Ao had been cultivating when Lin Fan arrived. Lin Fan didn''t n on disturbing him since he wanted to dy talking to him about this, but Lin Ao stopped cultivating as soon as he sensed Lin Fan''s arrival.


    When he came out, he narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before saying, "Something happened, didn''t it?"


    He didn''t even wait for Lin Fan to respond as he immediately dashed at the door, but Lin Fan had already expected this as soon as he saw him narrow his eyes. He quickly moved in front of Lin Ao and raised his hand to form a barrier that pushed him back.


    p Seeing that Lin Fan wouldn''t let him leave, Lin Ao drew his sword and prepared to fight.</anda>


    Lin Fan saw this and gave a sigh as he also pulled out his sword, but he still said, "If you calm down, I''ll tell you everything first."


    Lin Ao red at Lin Fan and after a moment of hesitation, he did put his sword down in the end.


    If it had been anyone else who was standing in front of him, he would have already cut them down with his personality. However, the one in front of him was his son and someone who wasn''t weaker than he was, so he was unwilling to do this.


    Seeing that Lin Ao had calmed down, Lin Fan really was relieved.


    He was worried that he wouldn''t be able to convince Lin Ao and would have to fight him, but now it seemed like it would end peacefully. It wasn''t that he was afraid of fighting Lin Ao, but rather he wouldn''t be able to hold back if he did.


    If the two of them fought for real, it was certain that one or both of them would have been injured.


    After sitting down, Lin Fan told Lin Ao everything that had happened.


    Lin Ao had his brows knitted the entire time and even when he heard everything, he still sat there with knitted brows, not saying a thing.


    Lin Fan took this opportunity to say, "I''m already devising a n to take care of this matter, so all you have to do is get stronger and wait for the right moment. If you charge in by yourself right now, you won''t be able to do anything."


    Lin Ao didn''t deny Lin Fan''s words.


    He had already experienced how strong the Yue Family and the Liao Family were thest time that he had been here.


    If it wasn''t for the Lin Family Ancestor''s helpst time, he might not have been able to get away at all.


    But the fact that they were forcing his daughter to marry the man who ruined his lifest time ate away at him deep down.


    The onefort was that Lin Fan was here.


    If he didn''t have Lin Fan at his side, he would have disregarded everything to charge into the True Spirit Sect. If he couldn''t save them, he would want to at least die with them as a family.


    So after thinking about this, Lin Ao said in a low voice, "How much confidence do you have in your n?"


    Lin Fan said in a serious voice, "I''m 100% certain that we''ll be able to rescue them as long as we follow my n. This is something that I''ve been preparing for a long time now."


    Lin Ao looked at the serious look on his face and he couldn''t help feeling a bit of pride.


    When he had looked at his son before, while he still loved him, he had felt disappointed because Lin Fan had never shown any drive and determination. He had always lived his life in a half hearted manner, never taking anything seriously.


    But that also showed how kind of a person he was since the only time that he did take things seriously was when he did things for others.


    Still, since he was his son, he had let him live the way he wanted. He had even given him the store so he would be able to make a living.


    But now, the son standing in front of him waspletely different.


    He was a man who he could depend on, a son that he was truly proud of.


    Lin Ao gave a nod and said, "Alright, we''ll follow your n."

 Chapter 757 Sudden Wedding (3)

    Seeing that Lin Ao finally agreed to follow his ns, Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief.


    Now that he had finally ovee the highest hurdle, he felt that he would be able to aplish what he wanted to aplish.


    After making sure that Lin Ao had everything that he needed to cultivate, Lin Fan left the residence. Of course, before he left, he also made sure that Brainy set up a barrier around the house and a surveince system.


    While it seemed like Lin Ao had calmed down for now, Lin Fan didn''t feel assured leaving this matter like this.


    So he would watch over Lin Ao with this surveince system and if needed, he would use the barrier to keep Lin Ao here until he coulde and deal with him personally.


    Lin Fan had no intentions of leaving Harmony City over the next two weeks. There were many things that he had to prepare and nothing was more important to him than this matter right now.


    ¡­


    Far away from Lin Fan''s store, there was a meeting between some of the most powerful people in the Gctic Humanity Alliance. Of course, this wasn''t a physical meeting, but rather a virtual meeting.


    If they had a physical meeting, it would have been too hard for them to hide it and it would have created argemotion, so they could only choose to meet in secret like this.


    Of course, it wasn''t every single one of the twelve great factions that was invited to this meeting. It was only nine of the factions that hade.


    As for the three that had been excluded, naturally they were the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association. The ones that hade to this meeting were all the factions that had some form of connection to Lin Fan.


    In fact, the topic of their discussion was Lin Fan.


    "You''re telling me that the wedding the True Spirit Sect is holding is rted to him? How could that be possible?" One of the representatives asked.


    Old man Qiao gave a sigh before saying, "The bride of the wedding has the same surname as Lin Fan, so I think that we can all see what the connection is." Then after a pause, he added, "He had our Hunters Organization bring some people up from a minor world a few weeks ago and one of those people also had the surname Lin¡­"


    He didn''t add anything after that, but the implied meaning in his words were clear.


    The bride, the person brought up from the minor world, and Lin Fan, there was some kind of hidden connection between the three of them. It seemed like there was a story between them and the True Spirit Sect that they didn''t know about.


    They had all thought that Lin Fan had gone against the True Spirit Sect because of the matter with Shi Yan and Lei Feng, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case. It seemed like he had already been nning on targeting the True Spirit Sect before he even arrived in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    One of the representatives couldn''t help asking, "But if he''s from a minor world, how do you exin everything in his shop? Would a master from a minor world have that kind of stuff?"


    This was the thought that had been on everyone''s minds, but no one took the initiative to ask since they didn''t really know how to bring this up.


    But once someone did bring it up, they all paid attention to this since they all wanted to know the answer to this question.


    Everyone turned to look at old man Qiao who just silently sat there, waiting for him to answer.


    The Hunters Organization was the closest to Lin Fan, so it would make the most sense for them to know the answer to this question.


    But when old man Qiao saw everyone looking at him, he just gave a shrug and said, "How would I know? He''s never told me anything and I''ve never met the master of the shop." Then his tone became serious as he said, "Is there a need to know that answer to this question though?"


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this.


    Old man Qiao continued, "Right now, the master of the store is choosing to support us. Is there anything else that we need? If we dig too deeply and offend him, what will happen if we lose that support?"


    Everyone seemed to have realized something when they heard this.


    That was right, they had already gone too deep down this rabbit hole to be thinking about useless things like this. They all knew that there was an unknown backer behind the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association after everything that had happened. They also knew that this unknown backer definitely wasn''t weak based on everything they had been able to take out.


    Since that was the case, they really needed the backing of Lin Fan, or rather the master of the store.


    So there was no need for them to consider doing anything that would offend the master of the store. Even offending Lin Fan was a very dangerous thing to do.<sub> </sub>


    "Then what do we do about this wedding situation?" One of the representatives suddenly asked.


    That was the main topic that they had gathered here to discuss today.


    Old man Qiao had gathered them all here today because he had heard Lin Fan''s reaction to this wedding announcement. He knew that Lin Fan would try to do something at this wedding, so he had called all of them here to discuss whether they would help him or not.


    This would be a good chance for them to earn some points with Lin Fan, but at the same time, if they didn''t handle this properly, there was the possibility that this would devolve into an all out war between their factions and the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association. More urately speaking, it would devolve into a war between them and the backer behind these three factions.


    They still didn''t have enough information on the backer that they would be willing to risk this, but they also knew that it was impossible to stop Lin Fan from doing what he was nning on doing.


    So they had to find a bnce or decide not to involve themselves in this matter.


    "Don''t you all have invitations to the wedding? Send some of your experts there and we''ll monitor the situation on site. If something happens, we''ll be able to respond right away and decide what action to take." Old man Qiao said.


    Everyone nodded in agreement to this, but one of them couldn''t help asking, "How far are we willing to go though?"


    All of them fell silent when they heard this since this was a very good question.


    They weren''t willing to go all out and start the war with the True Spirit Sect since they weren''t ready yet. To put it simply, they didn''t have enough information to start a war yet, so before they could get that information, they didn''t want to start the war.


    But their bottom line was also that Lin Fan couldn''t be killed!


    Lin Fan was currently their only link to the master of the store and not to mention their supplier of Child Soul Realm beasts and Nascent Soul Realm beasts. They still needed those Child Soul Realm beasts to draw in the minor factions and the Nascent Soul Realm beasts to make themselves stronger.


    So no matter what, Lin Fan''s life had to be preserved.


    After thinking about it, old man Qiao said, "That kid should have his own ns since he dares to charge into the True Spirit Sect like that. Since that''s the case, we just need to watch and see how far he goes. If he''s in danger, then we''ll go and save him, but before that, we should just watch."


    Another one of the representatives couldn''t help asking, "But what if he doesn''t have a n?"


    Old man Qiao looked at that person like he was looking at an idiot and asked, "Do you really think that kid would charge in without a n? Haven''t you already suffered at his hands enough?"


    That person revealed a bitter smile when they heard this. In fact, all of the representatives revealed bitter smiles at this.


    Indeed, they had been yed by that kid and even now, they were in the palm of his hands.


    Why else would nine of the twelve great factions have to care about the safety of someone who was only in the Child Soul Realm?


    If this was known by the people of the Gctic Humanity Alliance, it definitely would have turned the world upside down.


    Finally, one of the representatives couldn''t help asking the question that they had all been avoiding, "What if this is all a plot by the people behind the True Spirit Sect? What do we do if they are just using this to bait us out?"


    No one had an answer for this since they had been avoiding this question for a reason.


    Even if they were from the twelve great factions, they weren''t confident in dealing with the backer behind the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    So if this was a trap¡­


    Old man Qiao gave a sigh in the end and said, "We''ll deal with that when ites up since we don''t know what they would do if this was a trap. We''ll just give them extra artifacts to make sure that they can return safely¡­"


    Even though he said this, his tone showed that he clearly wasn''t confident in this.


    But still, there was nothing else they could do about this.

 Chapter 758 Trump Card

    On the opposite side of this event, in the True Spirit Sect.


    The blue haired young man was sitting in the Liao Manor, looking down at the Liao Family Head who was currently kneeled down in front of him. He said in a cold voice, "Did you prepare everything?"


    The Lian Family Head trembled when he heard his voice before quickly saying, "Yes my lord, everything has already been prepared. There will be no idents on the day of the event."


    The blue haired young man narrowed his eyes as he looked at the Liao Family Head.


    As he just sat there silently, there was a mountain like pressure that fell onto the Liao Family Head. Even though he was in the Child Soul Realm, he still couldn''t just take the passive gaze of the blue haired young man.


    The blue haired young man then gave a snort and said, "I''ll spare you this time since if it wasn''t for you, I wouldn''t have met her. However, you should know what you have done to her family before and you should know to keep that piece of trash out of my sight for the rest of the time."


    The Liao Family Head felt another chill run down his spine before quickly said, "Yes, yes, my lord! I promise that I''ll keep that piece of trash out of your way!"


    The blue haired young man just gave another snort before waving his hand to dismiss the Liao Family Head.


    The Liao Family Head treated this like he had just been pardoned and was about to leave the room, but the door suddenly opened. After it opened, the red haired young man came in with a smile on his face.


    He grabbed the Liao Family Head who had been trying to escape and brought him back in front of the blue haired young man.


    The Liao Family head didn''t dare resist at all as he was dragged over by the red haired young man, but it was clear by the look on his face that he didn''t want any part of this.


    After all, these two were both jinxes that he didn''t want anything to do with.


    <o>,m When they had first met, he had thought that these two would be gods of fortune for his Liao Family, but now he knew just how wrong he had been. He couldn''t regret meeting these two any more than he was now, but his regret didn''t change anything.</o>


    The only thing he could do to preserve his life and the life of his entire Liao Family was to cater to whatever these two ancestors wanted.


    But of course, through his interactions with them, he could clearly tell that the two of them didn''t get along.


    He never wanted to be in the same room as the two of them because he knew that nothing good woulde of that.


    But here he was, being dragged into the room by the red haired young man.


    After he was dragged back in, the Liao Family Head tried to hide himself in the corner as much as possible, but the red haired young man didn''t allow it.


    The red haired young man said, "Yo, it''s almost time for the wedding. Are you excited? This is the wedding of your precious son after all."


    Though he had been asking the Liao Family Head this, it was clear who it was aimed at.


    The blue haired young man knitted his brows as soon as he heard this, but he didn''t say anything. There was no need for him to say anything as the chilling from him was enough to freeze anyone and the re that he had could kill if gazes could kill.


    The red haired young man ignored this as he looked at the Liao Family Head, waiting for his answer.


    The only thought that passed through the Liao Family Head''s mind was, "Please, young ancestors, please just spare me!"


    He knew that if he answered, not only him, it was very likely that his entire family would have been beaten as well.


    So he could only stand there in silence as the two young masters stared at him.


    Seeing that he wasn''t saying anything, the red haired young man was about to say something, but the blue haired young man spoke first, "Enough!"


    With a wave of his hand, he said to the Liao Family Head, "Scram!"


    The Liao Family Head quickly bowed his head and said, "Yes, yes, I''m scraming now!"


    He ran away before either of them could say anything else. Only when he was far away from the room did he let out a sigh of relief like he had just been pardoned by the emperor.


    The two that were left in the room just red at each other in silence for a while, letting their auras sh against each other. However, neither side seemed like they were being pushed back at all.


    Finally, the red haired young man broke out inughter as he said, "Who knows what your family will think after this."


    The blue haired young man gave a snort and said, "You just need to worry about yourself. There''s no need for you to care about my affairs."


    The red haired young man''s callous smile finally disappeared as he narrowed his eyes to look at the blue haired young man. After a long pause, he finally said in a cold voice, "If this disrupts the n¡­"<sub> </sub>


    Before he could finish, the blue haired young man said in a serious voice while narrowing his eyes to meet his gaze, "It won''t, I won''t let it."


    The red haired young man didn''t say anything as he just red at the blue haired young man.


    After another prolonged stare down between the two sides, the red haired young man gave a soft snort and turned to leave.


    But before he could leave the room, there was an ice blue dagger that flew past him and inserted itself into the wall by the door. It had flown right past his cheek, almost scratching it, but he didn''t react to it at all.


    The blue haired young man said, "Keep your hands off this matter, or you''ll face me."


    The red haired young man just gave a chuckle as he raised his hand, but he didn''t say anything else.


    His face had been turned, so the blue haired young man hadn''t been able to see the cold look in his eyes.


    ¡­


    Back in the shop, after Lin Fan had finished convincing Lin Ao to stay still, he didn''t talk to anyone else as he headed into the back by himself.


    Once he was in a room alone, Lin Fan pulled out the system and started going through the shop. He went through the various pages of the shop as he muttered to himself, "No, not this one¡­This one might¡­No, it''s not what I''m looking for and I wouldn''t be able to get the ingredients for it anyway."


    Lin Fan had a bad premonition in his heart the entire time.


    Even though he knew that he would be able to take care of the Liao Family and stop the wedding, he couldn''t help feeling that something would go wrong.


    So as soon as he came back to the store, he had started going through the system''s shop, looking for a trump card just in case.


    He had already saved up quite a few points after everything that he had sold.


    Even if the price of the Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts were set by him, the store still took a part of the price as points. So with all the beasts that he had sold so far, he had stocked up quite a few points.


    Right now, his point total had reached over a hundred million, so there were plenty of things that he could afford to buy in the store.


    But there were also many things that wouldn''t be able to help him.


    So that was why he continued going through the store, picking and choosing out things that he felt would be helpful.


    But in the end, there were only a few things that he bought.


    After he finished his shopping, he opened up another panel.


    Even if he had over ten worlds now as cultivation realm farms, there were still things that he didn''t get from them which he needed now. So he had no choice but to open up some new cultivation realms to farm resources.


    There were specific resources that he needed, so he also went through the list of cultivation realms that were offered by the system.


    Unlike before, with how much he was earning, he could freely choose between cultivation realms. It wasn''t even a problem for him to afford a top grade cultivation realm now.


    All of this was in preparation for the wedding in two weeks.


    Of course, before he headed off to these cultivation realms, he still had to tell Ang about everything that had happened.


    After hearing about everything that had happened, Ang didn''t try to stop Lin Fan. Instead, she looked at him with a worried look and asked, "Are you going to be alright?"


    Lin Fan looked right back at her and gave a sigh before saying, "I don''t know, but it feels like it could go wrong at any time."


    Ang was silent for a bit before saying, "Be careful."


    It was just two simple words, but they were the only words that she needed to say.


    She knew that he needed to do this, but she still wanted him to be safe.


    Lin Fan nodded with a smile and said, "I will."

 Chapter 759 Heading To The True Spirit Sect

    Another two weeks passed and it was finally the day of the wedding.


    As Lin Fan came out of his store early in the morning, he really did look terrible.


    He had been grinding out the preparations during the past two weeks, so it had been quite a bit of work for him. He had even sacrificed a lot of his rest time just for this.


    Even if he was in the Child Soul Realm, he had been focused on many things during this time that required him to put all his energy into, so with little time to restore that energy, naturally he had been worn down.


    When she saw him like this, Ang couldn''t help asking, "Are you sure you''re going to be alright?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "Un, there''s still time for me to rest up before we get there. So I''ll get a quick nap along the way and I''ll be ready."


    Even though he said this, Ang couldn''t help being worried.


    Instead of using the Hunters Organization''s portals, Lin Fan was nning on using a public transport portal. While this meant that it would take more time than usual to get there, there was still plenty of time before the wedding even began.


    He chose not to use the Hunters Organization''s portal this time because he wanted to make a clear cut between them.


    He didn''t want to drag the Hunters Organization into this personal issue and he knew that this was a very sensitive time for the Hunters Organization. Not just the Hunters Organization, it was a sensitive time for the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    With how the twelve great factions were moving, everyone knew that there was a changeing, so they were starting to pick sides.


    Then as the two sides developed, naturally tension between them would also rise.


    So Lin Fan didn''t want to drag the Hunters Organization into making any big moves at this time.


    He was going with the Xu Family to the True Spirit Sect instead.


    On his orders, Xu Lin had gotten close to the Liao Family. This was easily done because Xu Lin was the direct disciple of one of the True Spirit Sect''s elders, so naturally the Liao Family had to give face to him.


    Plus, Lin Fan had given plenty of money to Xu Lin to bribe the members of the Liao Family, so it would be impossible for him not to build a close rtionship with them.


    With this close rtionship, Xu Lin had received an invitation to the wedding which Lin Fan was going to use to get in.


    As for the rest of his men, he had already sent them to the True Spirit Sect during this time for Xu Lin to ce in critical positions. When the time came, they would y their parts.


    So right now, it was just Lin Fan and the Xu Family delegation that were going to the True Spirit Sect.


    When the Xu Family Head found out that Lin Fan was going to disguise himself as one of their servants, he was shocked. He quickly said, "Young master, you can just disguise yourself as one of our family members, there''s no need for you to disguise yourself as one of the servants."


    After all, Lin Fan was already in the Child Soul Realm.


    The Xu Family had alreadypletely fallen into their ce as part of Lin Fan''s faction, so now for Lin Fan to act as their servant, naturally it was very awkward for the Xu Family Head. Not to mention that he wouldn''t dare act along out of fear that Lin Fan might hold it against him one day.


    But Lin Fan shook his head and said, "No, it''s easier for me to move around as a servant, so I''ll be a servant. You don''t need to worry about me, I''ll just do what I need to do. You just need to bring me in and then I''ll handle things myself."


    While the Xu Family Head still felt awkward about this, he still gave a nod in response.


    He could see that Lin Fan already had a n in mind, so as one of Lin Fan''s followers, naturally he would do his part to y along with Lin Fan''s n.


    Since the Gctic Humanity Alliance was turbulent, there weren''t as many people travelling between ces, so they were able to get to the transport gate quite quickly. Then with the Xu Family''s influence in the city, they were quickly sent off without having to take care of the procedures.


    However, when they arrived at the True Spirit Sect, they found that there was a surprising amount of people that had arrived for the wedding.


    When Lin Fan looked closely, he found that there were quite a few people that he recognized.


    After working with nine of the twelve great factions for some time, naturally he became familiar with some of the key people in those organizations. Those people had shown up today to attend the wedding.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows under his mask when he saw this, but he didn''t react on the surface since he was in character right now.


    However, what he didn''t notice was that these people had all taken notice of the Xu Family carriage that had arrived.<sub> </sub>


    All the experts that hade from the nine factions that Lin Fan cooperated with naturally knew about the rtionship between Lin Fan and the Xu Family. Just like how he became familiar with the people of these factions, the people of these factions knew more about who Lin Fan''s people were so they could take care of them.


    They had already memorized most of the faces of the Xu Family, so when they saw a new servant showing up today, they immediately knew that it was Lin Fan.


    Once they confirmed this, they immediately had their secret guards watch out for Lin Fan.


    Their end goal today was no matter what happened, they couldn''t let anything happen to Lin Fan.


    So even if Lin Fan hadn''t wanted to involve them in this affair, just the fact that he was involved was enough for them to get involved.


    After they arrived, the people from the Liao Family led them to the reception.


    During this time, Lin Fan was free to sneak away to prepare the things that he needed to prepare.


    The first thing he did was meet up with Xu Lin since he needed his help to set up a few things. Since he was disguised as one of the Xu Family''s servants, naturally it was very easy for him to meet up with Xu Lin without raising any suspicions.


    Once they left the venue, Xu Lin led Lin Fan to various ces in the True Spirit Sect where Lin Fan nted certain things in the ground forter.


    As they were doing this, Xu Lin couldn''t help asking, "Young master, what are these things?"


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "You don''t need to know for now, but be ready to run when I tell you to."


    Xu Lin was confused when he heard this, but since Lin Fan wasn''t willing to tell him, there was nothing that he could say.


    When they came back to the venue, they found that the reception still hadn''t started yet.


    In fact, there wasn''t a single member of the main Liao Family or the Yue Family who were at the venue. It was almost as if this wasn''t even an event that was being held by them.


    There was no doubt that this raised quite a bit of dissatisfaction with the guests since they hade here on the Liao Family and the Yue Family''s invitations, but for the Liao and Yue Families to ignore them like this, it was very embarrassing for them. The Liao and Yue Families weren''t giving them any face.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that this was the True Spirit Sect, there certainly would have been people leaving already.


    But when most of the guests arrived, the Liao Family finally showed themselves.


    It wasn''t just one or two members of the Liao Family, it was the entire main Liao Family branch along with the Liao Family Head.


    The only one missing was the groom, Liao Ping.


    Seeing that the Liao Family had finally arrived, while there were some people that were unhappy with how they had been treated, they still came forward to greet them and offer their gifts.


    No matter what, they had been invited as guests, so naturally they would be using this chance to build rtions with the Liao Family.


    Only the members of the twelve great factions sat there, waiting for the Liao Family to make their rounds.


    Unlike the smaller families, their status wasn''t suited for them to directly greet the Liao Family. Instead, it was the Liao Family that shoulde and greet them since they hade to this wedding.


    But the fact that Liao Ping was missing was something that everyone noted, especially Lin Fan.


    This was Liao Ping''s wedding and it was something that had tortured him for so long, so with his personality, Lin Fan was certain that he would be showing off.


    So why didn''t he show himself?


    But that question was answered when the Yue Family arrived.


    When the Yue Family came, Lin Fan ignored the rest as his eyes were attracted by two people that he was very familiar with. It was Yue Qingrou and Lin Xue.


    However, the one that came with Lin Xue into the venue wasn''t Liao Ping, but rather a young man with blue hair.

 Chapter 760 Liao Family’s Wedding (1)

    Naturally it wasn''t just Lin Fan alone that took note of this.


    But the Liao Family didn''t react at all to how the blue haired man was leading Lin Xue into the venue. They didn''t even care that the blue haired man was holding Lin Xue''s hand.


    Lin Xue was supposed to be their future daughter inw, so why did they ept this blue haired man being so close to her?


    Wasn''t this a p to their face?


    But when everyone looked carefully, the Liao Family seemed to approve of this and were even happy about this.


    It was almost as if they were celebrating how close the two of them looked.


    Finally, one of the guests couldn''t take it anymore and asked the Liao Family Head, "Liao Family Head, this blue haired young man is being disrespectful to your future daughter inw. Are you not going to do anything about it?"


    The Liao Family Head jolted when he heard this, but he quickly recovered his cool as he said with a cough, "Ke, actually there have been some changes with the wedding n today."


    Everyone revealed shocked looks when they heard this.


    Changes?


    Why had they never heard about this?


    But no one said anything since they didn''t know what the situation was. Before they knew what was happening, it was better for them just to listen first.


    The Liao Family Head continued, "My son Liao Ping unfortunately has had an ident and is unable to attend this wedding. So in his ce, we will be having this young master marry miss Lin instead."


    Then after a pause, he added, "Luckily, there was no love between my son and miss Lin in the first ce, so it''s fortunate that this young master who does indeed love miss Lin showed up."


    Everyone couldn''t help revealing strange expressions when they heard this.


    They also couldn''t help turning to look at the blue haired young master.


    Who was this man that was able to threaten the Liao Family into giving up their future daughter inw and even make them host the wedding?


    Even if they didn''t have eyes, they could clearly see what kind of situation this was.


    The blue haired young man could feel the gazes falling onto him, so he looked at everyone with his cold gaze. As soon as his cold gaze fell onto them, all of them gave a shiver and immediately turned their eyes away.


    This blue haired young man had an aura that no one could approach¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help narrowing his eyes as he looked at this blue haired young man.


    While he didn''t recognize him, he felt that there was something familiar about him. It was something that he couldn''t put his finger on.


    Still, this was bad for him since this meant that his ns had beenpletely disrupted.


    His ns had been based on the fact that he was only dealing with the Liao and Yue Families. He didn''t know where this blue haired young man came from, but he knew that he certainly wasn''t from the Liao or Yue Families.


    It was unknown what kind of family or faction he was from, so Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling worried since he didn''t know how many experts this blue haired young man would have helping him¡­


    After the blue haired young man finished ring at the crowd, he turned to Lin Xue and reached his hand out with a smile.


    She had a clearly unwilling look on her face, but she still took his hand and allowed him to lead her forward to the table set for them.


    Lin Fan looked over at the Yue Family group and it was as he had expected, Yue Qingruo wasn''t with them.


    If they hadn''t done something to her, it was very unlikely that Lin Xue would have even agreed to this wedding.


    So the most pressing thing was to rescue his mother before saving his little sister.


    But he didn''t have to personally make a move, that was why he had brought his people along.


    He had sneaked his subordinates in before the wedding. With enough funds and connections on Xu Lin''s side, he had even been able to sneak Lin Ao into the True Spirit Sect.


    Of course, he had also stationed Mo Ze Chen with Lin Ao just in case he lost control, but so far he hadn''t.


    Lin Fan used their secretmunication method to pass an order down to Mo Ze Chen.


    ¡­<sub> </sub>


    Mo Ze Chen had been bored sitting in his hiding ce until he finally received the order from Lin Fan.


    However, when he saw the order, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    He turned to look at Lin Ao who had a cold look beside him and shook his head before saying, "Boss has some orders for us."


    Lin Ao stopped staring forward and turned to Mo Ze Chen, not saying a word.


    Mo Ze Chen didn''t mind this since he had gotten used to him after a day of being stuck in this hiding spot together. He naturally knew that Lin Ao was Lin Fan''s father, so he couldn''t be rude to him.


    Mo Ze Chen continued, "It seems like the Yue Family has shown up at the reception, so it''s our time to save target Y."


    Lin Ao''s eyes narrowed and revealed a sharp glow when he heard this.


    He had been waiting for this moment all this time and now that it was finally here, he felt like he couldn''t wait any longer.


    But before he could go out of the hiding spot, Mo Ze Chen came forward to stop him as he said, "Don''t forget the n. You can''t act on your own until everything is ready."


    Lin Ao narrowed his eyes to coldly look at Mo Ze Chen.


    The two of them just stared at each other for a bit before Lin Ao finally went back to where he had been sitting before.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help letting out a sigh when he saw this.


    "Boss, why did you give me such a hard job?" Mo Ze Chenined to himself.


    But after he finished this moment of indulgence, his eyes turned sharp as he took out a specialmunicator to send out a message.


    As soon as the message was sent, there were several plumes of smoke that suddenly appeared around Yue Family, but then everything seemed to disappear.


    The entire Yue Manor was covered in this smoke and the smoke quickly faded, returning everything to normal. But inside of the barrier that the smoke had created, the Yue Manor was in a panic since everything was covered in smoke.


    The few remaining guards at the Yue Manor all started to panic and didn''t dare move around with this smoke covering their line of sight.


    They tried contacting the main Yue Family members, but they found that theirmunication devices weren''t working at all. Even the backup emergency devices had all been cut.


    It was as if the entire Yue Manor had been isted from the world.


    The plumes of smoke that had appeared were items that Lin Fan had given to his subordinates. As soon as Mo Ze Chen sent that message, the subordinates in those locations used those items to create these plumes of smoke that created an array thatpletely hid the Yue Manor.


    Once he was sure that the smoke hadpletely surrounded the entire Yue Manor, he finally let Lin Ao, who had been patiently waiting on the side, head out.


    Lin Ao didn''t hesitate for a single second as he rushed out of their hiding spot and headed towards the Yue Family guards that were scattered around the manor.


    Since Lin Fan was the one that gave them this smokescreen, naturally he would also give them a way to see through the smokescreen.


    When Lin Ao charged out of the hiding ce, there was arge pair of sses on his eyes that sparkled under the smoke. With how quickly he moved, it was as if he could clearly see everything in front of him even though there was this thickyer of smoke all around him.


    That was the effect of the sses.


    Lin Ao quickly made his way through all the scattered guards and during this time, his sword never came out of his scabbard once. All he did was flick his fingers, sending out beams of sword energy at these guards.


    There wasn''t a single guard that was able to take more than a single beam of sword energy.


    The beams of sword energy were so sharp that they didn''t even leave a ssh of blood, it just cut right through the guard without even a single sound.


    The guards were shocked to find that theirrades were dropping to the ground like flies, without even making a single sound. It was as if a death god''s scythe had cut right through them and taken their lives.


    The guards started to panic and wanted to run, but none of them were able to escape from Lin Ao''s lightning fast beams of sword energy.


    By the end of it, all the guards that had been around the manor fell to the ground without leaking out a single drop of blood, but it was clear by theck of breathing and signs of life from their bodies that they were all dead.


    Mo Ze Chen came out after Lin Ao and couldn''t help looking around with an impressed look.


    As expected of the boss'' father, it was no wonder he was the way he was. The apple didn''t fall far from the tree.

 Chapter 761 Liao Family’s Wedding (2)

    After admiring Lin Ao''s work, Mo Ze Chen came over and said, "It seems like you''ve already tidied things up? Should we head in then?"


    Lin Ao raised a hand to stop him as he said, "Not yet. There''s still more of them hiding inside the manor."


    Mo Ze Chen turned his gaze to the manor and found that there were indeed some aurasing from the manor. Based on the intensity of these auras, the cultivation of the ones that these auras belonged to weren''t weaker than Lin Ao''s and they clearly outnumbered him.


    Mo Ze Chen couldn''t help knitting his brows, but before he could say anything, Lin Ao was already heading towards the Yue Manor.


    Mo Ze Chen shook his head with a bitter smile when he saw this, but he also sent another message to the others.


    After this message was sent, there was a sudden sh of light that appeared around the Yue Manor.


    It didn''t seem like anything had happened, but then there was a shattering sound that came from the Yue Manor. Just like ss cracking, the barrier that had been around the Yue Manor shattered to pieces and disappearedpletely.


    This was the Yue Manor''s protective array, one that had been built and improved on by the Yue Family over thousands of years. It was an array that could even take several blows from a Nascent Soul Realm Expert.


    But with a single sh of light, this protective array had shattered like ss.


    The experts of the Yue Family who were still in the manor couldn''t help staring on in shock.


    Just how did this happen?


    Naturally, the sh of light was also something that Lin Fan had given his subordinates. It was something that he had prepared just to deal with the Yue Manor''s protective array.


    As for how it was able to easily shatter that array, of course it was something that came from the system.


    The system''s items were on apletely different level, so it wasn''t hard for Lin Fan to find something to deal with this array.


    After the array had been shattered, Lin Ao started moving towards the Yue Manor in the smoke, unbeknownst to the people inside of the manor.


    Mo Ze Chen was still worried since he could tell that there were people that were just as strong as Lin Ao in the manor, but he also knew that he couldn''t stop Lin Ao. The only thing that he could do was follow him, throwing out the item in his hand just in case they needed to escape.


    This was another one of the items that Lin Fan had given him and it was supposed to be used as ast resort.


    It was a good thing that Mo Ze Chen didn''t need to use this in the end.


    Lin Ao moved right through the gates of the Yue Manor, ignoring all the guards that were spread out at the entrance. All he did was flick his fingers and send out beams of sword energy before they all copsed to the ground.


    But of course, these guards that had been ced at the entrance weren''t that powerful, they were nothing more than normal guards.


    As Lin Ao moved further into the Yue Manor, the experts that were scattered about there were much more powerful.


    Each one of these experts was in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm, just being a step away from the Child Soul Realm. But when faced with this sword cultivator in the Child Soul Realm, they were still cut down like wheat before a scythe.


    There was no stopping this god of death from making his way through the Yue Manor.


    Finally, Lin Ao reached the inner parts of the Yue Manor where the Child Soul Realm Experts were hiding.


    These were experts that were from the branches of the Yue Family, so they weren''t by any means weak. Even if they weren''t the greatest experts of the Yue Family, they still received the inheritance of the Yue Family, so they were far stronger than normal people.


    The one problem was that they were facing a sword cultivator.


    Sword cultivators were known for having the strongest attack out of all cultivators and since they were currently unaware of their surroundings because of the smoke, Lin Ao was able to catch them off guard.


    He sent out sword energy beams at these experts of the Yue Family, catching them off guard since they only felt the sword energy beamsing when he flicked his fingers.


    Since they weren''t able to raise their guards, they were hit head on by these powerful beams of sword energy.


    While they were able to survive because they were stronger than the others, they were still seriously injured.


    With this serious injury, there was no way for them to resist the follow up attacks from Lin Ao, even if they knew that he was here. Not to mention that with the smoke around them still, they weren''t able to see him at all, so they didn''t know where these attacks came from until it was toote.


    Just like this, Lin Ao swept through all the Child Soul Realm Experts of the Yue Family, only leaving two of them alive in the end.


    These two were the two Peak Child Soul Realm Experts who had been left in charge of the Yue Manor.<sub> </sub>


    After he took care of all the Child Soul Realm Experts, he dragged the two Peak Child Soul Realm Experts to a table that he sat them down at before flicking his hand to dissipate the smoke around him.


    When the two Peak Child Soul Realm Experts saw him, they couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    They weren''t shocked because there was an intruder, but rather they were shocked because they recognized Lin Ao.


    When Lin Ao charged into the Yue Manor in the past, he had caused quite amotion that had left a deep impression on all the Yue Family members. These two had been there when it happened, so they naturally recognized Lin Ao with a single look.


    One of them couldn''t help saying in a stuttering voice, "How can it be you?"


    But the other one had more of a stable mentality, so he said, "What do you think you''re doing? Do you really think that you''ll get away after you do something like this? You''re in the True Spirit Sect and you''ve attacked the family of one of the elders, this will not end well for you. It''s best that you surrender¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Ao mmed his hand down on the table, cutting it in half right in the center.


    Both of them shut their mouths when they saw this and couldn''t help shivering.


    This Lin Ao was much strongerpared to before¡­


    They almost felt the same amount of pressure from him as their ancestor, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert of the Yue Family.


    Lin Ao said in a cold voice, "Where is my wife?"


    The two of them looked at each other before revealing calm looks.


    That was right, they still had Yue Qingrou in their hands, so it wasn''t as if he could do anything to them. If he did, she would naturally suffer since it was unlikely that he would be able to escape the wrath of the Yue Family after what he did, so she would be left alone.


    It was impossible that he wouldn''t want to leave a way out for her.


    So they were filled with confidence once again, but it was too bad that this was all false confidence.


    How could Lin Ao miss the change in their expression.


    One of them was about to speak, but then Lin Ao suddenly raised his hand and sent two beams of sword energy right at their faces. It deviated at the veryst second, flying right past them on the right, cutting their cheeks.


    The one that was about to speak immediately swallowed his words after that and the two of them looked at each other with wide eyes.


    Lin Ao said in a cold voice, "If the next words out of your mouths isn''t the location of my wife, don''t think that the next beam will miss."


    Both of the Peak Child Soul Realm Experts couldn''t help giving a gulp when they heard this.


    They could hear how serious Lin Ao was and they werepletely surrounded by corpses, so they didn''t doubt this anymore.


    One of them finally said, "To the side, in the cab. There''s a hidden passage behind it."


    Lin Ao followed this person''s eyes to the cab on the side before turning back to them.


    The two of them started to beg for their lives, "We''ve already told you where she is, let us go! We promise that we won''t¡­"


    But before they could finish, Lin Ao had already shed their necks, cutting their heads off.


    Like father, like son, Lin Ao was just as cold and decisive as Lin Fan.


    ¡­No, that wasn''t right since the original Lin Fan''s wasn''t as decisive as this.


    After he came over to the cab, he released his spiritual sense to check it before flicking his hand to send out his sword energy.


    The back of the cab fell and revealed a hidden passage.


    Lin Ao quickly moved through this hidden passage until he reached a prison and it was there that he finally saw the person that he had been wanting to see the entire time.


    Without any hesitation, he flicked his hand and cut right through the bars of the prison, freeing Yue Qingrou.

 Chapter 762 Liao Family’s Wedding (3)

    Yue Qingrou had been resting in the cage when she suddenly heard the explosioning from behind her.


    She immediately sat up and turned around, holding up the stick that she had hidden as a weapon as she shouted, "Who is it? What do you want?"


    But before she could see what happened, she felt herself falling into a warm embrace.


    She wanted to struggle at first, but then she realized that this was a familiar embrace. She turned to look at this person and she was shocked to see who it was.


    "Brother Ao!"


    Lin Ao held her even tighter when he heard her say this and he said, "It''s alright, I''m here now."


    Yue Qingrou let her sink into Lin Ao''s embrace for a few seconds, but then she suddenly thought of something and quickly broke free to say, "Xiao Xue, she''s been taken away! They''re going to force her to marry someone!"


    Lin Ao knitted his brows, but he said, "It''s alright, Xiao Fan is here as well and he''s going to take care of her."


    Yue Qingrou revealed a stunned look before saying in a panic, "Xiao Fan is also here? Why did you bring him here? This ce is very dangerous, what will we do if both of them get hurt?"


    Lin Ao shook his head and said, "Xiao Fan isn''t the same as before, he''s even stronger than me. He''s the one who came up with this n."


    Yue Qingrou''s shocked expression became even more intense as she said in a daze, "He''s even stronger than you¡­?"


    Lin Ao gave a nod before turning back to look for something. But seeing that no one else was there, he took out themunication device that Lin Fan had given him and sent a message.


    In less than a minute, Mo Ze Chen came through the secret passage to arrive in the prison.


    Lin Ao didn''t waste any time as he brought Yue Qingrou over and said to Mo Ze Chen, "Take care of Qingrou for me, I''m going to go help rescue Xiao Xue."


    But before he could leave, Mo Ze Chen immediately grabbed him and said, "Boss'' father, please! You know that we need to follow the n, you can''t just rush over! The boss will have my hide if you run over without following the n!"


    Lin Ao knitted his brows when he saw this and when he was about to break free, Yue Qingrou asked, "Who is this? What does he mean by n?"


    Mo Ze Chen immediately turned to her and said with a smile, "Hello, boss'' mother, I am Mo Ze Chen, the boss'' number one follower. The n that I''m talking about is the one that the boss came up with to save you and his little sister. However¡­" As he left his words hanging, he turned to look at Lin Ao, clearly implying something.


    Lin Ao red at him and was about to say something, but the quick witted Yue Qingrou quickly said, "Brother Ao, is this really all Xiao Fan''s n."


    Lin Ao turned to look at her and after a moment''s hesitation, he gave a nod.


    Yue Qingrou had aplicated look after seeing this, but she still said, "Since it''s Xiao Fan''s n, then we shouldn''t do anything to risk it failing¡­"


    Lin Ao also had aplicated look when he heard this, but then he came back to her side with a sigh.


    In fact, the one who was the most relieved was Mo Ze Chen. After all, if Lin Ao had insisted on going to the wedding, he would have had to stop him since that was his job and he didn''t see it going well.


    But seeing that he had calmed down, Mo Ze Chen quickly said, "I''ll just leave the two of you to it." Then he immediately ran out of the room to send a few more messages.


    The two of them just stood there in silence for a while before Yue Qingrou finally broke the silence by saying, "Our son has really grown up."


    Lin Ao''s expression became even moreplicated before he gave a sigh and said with a nod, "Un."


    ¡­


    Back at the reception, after Lin Xue was brought over to the main table by the blue haired young man, they justpletely ignored the guests and went into their own world. The blue haired young man tried to entertain her, but all that he got in return was a cold re.


    Lin Xue was actually trying to force herself to be calm because as soon as she came into the venue, she had noticed something that had shocked her.


    No matter how he tried to disguise himself, for someone who was obsessed like her, she had been able to recognize him with a single nce. But she was also worried because she knew that these people were powerful and she didn''t want him to be hurt.<sub> </sub>


    While she was happy that he hade here to save her, she was also worried that he would be hurt if he tried to do anything, so she wanted him to leave as soon as possible.


    The guests were naturally unhappy about how the blue haired young man was acting, but when they remembered the chill that ran through them when he looked at them, they couldn''t help hesitating.


    They didn''t know a single thing about this person and since he was able to force the Liao Family to give up their daughter inw, he definitely wasn''t simple.


    The Liao Family Head could naturally see this, but he also couldn''t do anything when it came to the blue haired young master. The only thing that he could do was visit the guests and try to calm the situation as much as possible.


    After all, if the wedding were to fail, then it would be him and his family that would be in danger.


    In the distance, in a ce that no one could see, the red haired young man narrowed his eyes as he watched the reception.


    He had a look of disdain on his face as he watched how the blue haired man was acting, but his eyes didn''t stay on him for long. Instead, his eyes fell onto another person who was at the wedding reception.


    He could feel something strange from this person, but even when he tried to check this person, he couldn''t see through him. It was as if there was something that was stopping him from finding out this person''s real identity.


    But that wasn''t right¡­


    How could some piece of trash from this lower realm stop him?


    Unless he was also¡­


    The red haired young man knitted his brows, but then his expression quickly rxed.


    No matter who this person was, it didn''t seem like he was going to do anything. So at the very least, he wouldn''t force that person to act, he would just observe him for now.


    But once again, he couldn''t help looking at the blue haired young man with a look of disdain.


    As for Lin Fan, he had been silently watching the entire reception, waiting for his chance.


    He had already received the message from Mo Ze Chen that his mother had already been saved, so the only thing left for him to do was save Lin Xue. But he couldn''t help getting a familiar sensation from the blue haired young man, almost as if they had met before¡­


    That and the fact that the blue haired young man''s identity was a mystery caused him to hesitate.


    He had alreadye up with a n on how to take care of this, but now he didn''t know what to do.


    So he could only wait¡­


    But that didn''t mean that the rest of the guests would wait.


    All of the twelve great factions had sent people to attend this wedding, so naturally there were rules that had to be followed. The Liao Family was only an elder family of the True Spirit Sect, so they weren''t qualified to make the guests of the twelve great factionse and greet them since they had the same level of prestige.


    In fact, since the bride and groom were of a younger generation, it should be them that went with the Liao Family Head to greet the parties from the twelve great factions.


    However, since he came into this reception, the blue haired young man had just sat at his own table, trying to please Lin Xue. He didn''t make a single move as if he was about to go and greet the parties from the twelve great factions.


    The twelve great factions couldn''t make a fuss since this involved their reputation, but that didn''t mean that the minor factions couldn''t.


    There were many groups from minor families that were under the twelve great factions that were also invited, but not all of them were under the True Spirit Sect. There were many that were under the other twelve great factions.


    When these groups under the other twelve great factions saw that their backers were being disrespected, naturally they plotted to stand up for them to earn some favour from their backers. As for the groups from the twelve great factions, they turned a blind eye to this.


    That was because they wanted to find out the true identity of the blue haired young man, so they were nning on using these minor factions to provoke him.


    Finally, one of the young masters from the minor factions couldn''t take it anymore and marched right over to the blue haired young man''s table.

 Chapter 763 Liao Family’s Wedding (4)

    This was a buff and tall young man who had a naturally threatening look, he had been chosen for this job by his family just because of his looks.


    This buff young man came up to the table and mmed his fist down, catching everyone''s attention before saying, "Hey, who do you think you are?"


    The blue haired young man''s eyes immediately narrowed as he turned to look at this buff young man. The buff young man felt a chill run down his spine, but he resisted it as he said, "We''re guests invited by your Liao Family and you want to ignore us like this? Don''t you think that you''re going too far?"


    The blue haired young man kept looking at him in silence, not answering him at all. As he was being stared at, the buff young man felt more and more unsettled. However, since he hade with a goal and since he hade this far, it wasn''t as if he could just back down now.


    So he just stood there with a menacing look on his face, waiting for the blue haired young man''s response.


    The blue haired young man just casually stood there, staring back at him. With the look in his eyes, it was almost as if he was looking down on a piece of trash.


    But still, in the end, the blue haired young man still said, "It''s your honour to be invited in the first ce. Whether you stay or not is not my concern."


    The buff young man was shocked when he heard this. He had never thought that this blue haired young man would respond with such an arrogant answer, especially since there were members of all twelve great factions gathered here.


    Was the Liao Family not afraid that the True Spirit Sect would abandon them because of this?


    Was the Liao Family not afraid of being targeted by every single one of the twelve great factions?


    All of the members of the twelve great factions couldn''t help knitting their brows when they heard this.


    But the strange thing was that the Liao Family Head didn''t show a worried look at all. Even though it was clear that the members from the other twelve great factions weren''t happy with this, he didn''t seem to care.


    The look on his face almost made it seem like he found this natural¡­


    Just what were they nning?


    The buff young man pped the table again out of rage and said, "You¡­"


    Before he could finish though, the blue haired young man just casually waved his hand and there was a wave of ice that suddenly appeared.


    The buff young man couldn''t react at all as he was suddenly submersed in this ice, bing a giant ice block. It was even hard to tell if he was still alive or not while being frozen in this ice.


    All the guests suddenly revealed shocked looks.


    They never expected the blue haired young man to suddenly attack the buff young man.


    After all, he was the host and the buff young man was one of the guests that the Liao Family had invited. For him to just suddenly attack his guest like this¡­Did the Liao Family not care about their reputation anymore?


    The blue haired young man just acted like nothing happened as he turned his attention back to Lin Xue. He said with a smile, "Xue''er, is there anything else that you want? I''ll get it for you."


    But even when he acted like this, Lin Xue only just gave a cold snort and ignored him.


    Still, being treated like this wasn''t anything for him. It didn''t damper his mood and he continued trying to find different ways to please her.


    But everyone was still hung up on the fact that he had suddenly frozen the buff young man.


    No one had even felt him gathering his life energy to attack and before they could react, the buff young man was already frozen.


    It had to be known that the weakest member of the twelve great faction groups was in the Child Soul Realm. They had even brought along Nascent Soul Realm Experts because they had thought that they would need to protect Lin Fan.


    Even these Nascent Soul Realm Experts hadn''t been able to see through this blue haired young man.


    But the one that felt the most shock was Lin Fan, as he looked at the blue haired young man with aplicated look.


    He finally recognized who this person was¡­It was the ''lord'' who had gone with the Assassins Association group in the Ancient Era Ruins.


    Could it be that he had found out who he was and that was why he was marrying Lin Xue now?


    No, that shouldn''t be the case because he could tell that he was sincere about Lin Xue. Or at least he was sincere based on the way that he was treating her.


    So why did he suddenly want to marry her?


    Lin Fan''s brain kept turning and turning, but there wasn''t a single answer to this question that popped up. No matter how he thought about it, he just couldn''t connect the blue haired young man to his little sister.


    But that wasn''t the important thing.


    No matter how the connection had been made, it wasn''t as if he could allow this wedding to happen. It was clear that his little sister had been forced into this, so as the big brother, how could he not do something?<sub> </sub>


    So Lin Fan calmed his mind and waited for his opportunity to strike.


    After this opening reception, they would be moving to the wedding ceremony, which was what he was waiting for.


    He had already nted everything that he needed to make his move, so the only thing now was waiting for the right timing.


    There was no one else that tried to provoke the blue haired young master during this time, but it was clear that many people had be wary. No one really moved from their spots and didn''t interact with many people.


    That is except for the group from the Thunder Sect and the Assassins Association.


    They were the only ones that moved forward to greet the blue haired young master which drew questioning nces from the other twelve great factions, but they all ignored them.


    If Lin Fan hadn''t been able to recognize the blue haired young master, he also would have been confused as to why this was happening.


    Finally, once all the guests had arrived, the Liao Family Head took the lead by saying, "Once again, I want to thank everyone foring to this wedding today. It is an honour that you have alle to help us celebrate the union between young master Bing Jun and young miss Lin Xue. I hope that all of you will follow us to the wedding ceremony now."


    Everyone knitted their brows when they heard his words.


    This was the first time that the Liao Family Head had even mentioned the blue haired young master''s name.


    Many people couldn''t help turning to the Ice Goddess Hall group since the Bing Family was a famous family in the Ice Goddess Hall, but seeing the confused looks they had on their faces, it was clear that this young master Bing wasn''t from the Ice Goddess Hall.


    Was there another famous Bing Family?


    No, as far as they could remember, there wasn''t such a family in their Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    As soon as this thought passed through everyone''s mind, they couldn''t help knitting their brows even more.


    Then was this young master Bing from another world?


    Was the Liao Family trying to connect with a family from another world?


    But this also made people curious as to who Lin Xue was.


    They were told that Lin Xue was a junior from the Yue Family that had an engagement with Liao Ping, but now that Liao Ping was out of the picture, she was being married to this young master Bing.


    But as for who she was, no one had any idea.


    No one had ever heard of this Lin Xue from the Yue Family before.


    But a few of the people with keen intellect seemed to remember an incident from several years ago.


    ? Back then, the young miss of the Yue Family, Yue Qingrou had been engaged to marry Liao Ping, but before they could get married, she disappeared. If they remembered correctly, the man who she ran away with should have had the surname Lin¡­


    Then when they made this connection, those from the twelve great families suddenly remembered the reason why they were here.


    To protect Lin Fan.


    Lin¡­Fan.


    They had figured that Lin Xue was the sister of Lin Fan, so could it be that Lin Fan was also from the Yue Family?


    It seemed like everything was slowly revealing itself to them¡­


    But while everyone was lost in thought over this, Lin Fan started putting his n into action.


    He had the Xu Family members move to the side and blend into the crowd before escaping while he sent a message to his subordinates.


    After sending that message, he started moving closer so he could get a good position near Lin Xue.


    As the people in the reception hall walked out to the location of the wedding ceremony, there was a sudden explosion sound.


    Everyone here was an expert from some cultivation family, so they immediately raised their guards and tried to find the source of the explosion.


    However, the only thing that they could find was smoke that had suddenly filled the reception hall and the surrounding area.

 Chapter 764 Liao Family’s Wedding (5)

    As soon as the smoke appeared, Lin Fan didn''t waste a single second as he started moving towards Lin Xue.


    Of course, he moved slowly to give the smoke time to cover up the area so that he could sneak her out unnoticed, but as soon as the smoke was strong enough, he broke into a sprint.


    As he was running through the smoke, he also put on a pair of sses, just like the one that Lin Ao had worn before.


    With the vision that these sses gave him, he quickly made his way through the smoke and quickly arrived where the wedding party was. But he found that there was a problem when he approached.


    The blue haired young man was holding Lin Xue''s hand and keeping her close to him as he said, "Don''t worry Xue''er, I''ll keep you safe."


    At least the Liao Family Head and the other members of the Liao Family had already been sent off to check the situation, but with how close he was standing to Lin Xue, it was really hard for him to just grab her without attracting any attention.


    It was a good thing that Lin Xue hated this blue haired young man to begin with.


    After letting him pull her closer, she flicked her wrist and threw off his hand before saying, "Don''t touch me that easily."


    Bing Jun didn''t mind this as he said with a smile, "Xue''er, don''t be like that. It''s dangerous right now, so stay close and I''ll protect you."


    After saying this, he turned around to gauge the situation around him, but it was at that moment that Lin Fan made his move.


    As soon as Bing Jun turned around, Lin Fan grabbed Lin Xue''s hand and started running in the opposite direction.


    Lin Xue was surprised at first and wanted to resist, but then she saw who it was that was pulling her and she just froze in shock. But by freezing in shock, her body went limp enough that Lin Fan was able to drag her away.


    As for Bing Jun, he had still been casually looking around.


    He didn''t think that with him here, there would be anyone who would be able to sneak up on them. After all, he could sense everything that was around him even if there was smoke all around him.


    He was certain that this would be a small event in his wedding, but how wrong he was.


    When he finally turned back around, he couldn''t help revealing a shocked look on his ever calm face.


    After all, his bride to be, Lin Xue had disappeared!


    Bing Jun quickly looked around himself, but he couldn''t find her. However, the strange thing was that he could still sense her aura right beside him like before.


    When Bing Jun tried searching with his spiritual sense again, he found that her aura was still right beside him. But his eyes were telling him that she was gone.


    What was going on here!


    "Xue''er, are you here? Tell me if you''re in trouble, I''ll save you right away!" Bing Jun shouted out in a somewhat worried voice.


    He couldn''t help it, he had never felt this way before. She was the one weakness that he couldn''t resist at all.


    But hearing no response, Bing Jun immediately knitted his brows.


    He started looking around for her, hoping that this was just the smoke making it so he couldn''t see her, but that wasn''t the case. When he finally found the source of the aura, he was shocked.


    It was a glowing piece of paper on the ground, but he could feel Lin Xue''s auraing from this piece of paper.


    This was something else that Lin Fan had prepared, it was a special decoy that he had bought from the system''s store. He knew that even if there was smoke covering their escape, there would be people who could sense her aura with their spiritual senses. So they would notice right away if her aura were to disappear because of his stealthws.


    So he needed this decoy to buy him time to get away with her.


    When Bing Jun realized that Lin Xue was truly gone, hepletely lost his temper and raised his hand. With a swift motion, he brought it down onto the ground and generated a wave of ice that swept out around him.


    As this wave of ice travelled, there were people that were caught up and there were people that were able to avoid it, but it also swept away the smoke that was surrounding the area around him.


    When the wave of ice finally stopped, most of the smoke in this reception hall had already been cleared.


    But even then, Bing Jun wasn''t able to find Lin Xue.


    As for the members of the twelve great factions, they were able to easily avoid Bing Jun''s attack since he had kept it at the Child Soul Realm level. However, it was clear that they were very unhappy with how Bing Jun had attacked so easily.


    No matter what, they were guests that were invited by the Liao Family. To be treated like this, this was clearly them looking down on them.


    But that didn''t matter right now since everyone was still wary of the person who had released the smoke.


    But Bing Jun had already lost his anger.<sub> </sub>


    It was one thing to p him in the face by interrupting his wedding, but to steal his bride¡­


    That was the one thing that he definitely couldn''t allow!


    ? They would never know how important she was to him!


    So in a fit of rage, Bing Jun roared out, "Liao Ding, Yue Tu, get out here!"


    There were two figures that suddenly jumped out andnded in front of Bing Jun. Both of them kneeled down in front of them, as if they were his subordinates.


    But everyone who saw this was shocked.


    These two were the ancestors of the Liao and Yue Family respectively.


    That meant that they were the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of these two families and the elders from the True Spirit Sect.


    They were supposed to be figures thatmanded the respect of the entire world, but now they were acting as if they wereckeys for this young master Bing. Not to mention that this was happening while they were in the True Spirit Sect that these two were elders for.


    This waspletely looking down on the True Spirit Sect.


    But to everyone''s surprise, there was no reaction from the people of the True Spirit Sect.


    The people from the rest of the twelve great factions couldn''t help knitting their brows when they saw this.


    They had been trying to figure out who the backer of the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association was. It seemed like they had just received arge clue.


    All of them started making ns on investigating this young master Bing as soon as they went back.


    The two ancestors of the Liao and Yue Family immediately said, "Yes!" Then the two of them headed off in different directions, using their spiritual senses to sweep the entire area.


    However, no matter how they tried sweeping the area, they couldn''t find any traces of Lin Xue¡­


    When they returned in front of Bing Jun, the two of them kneeled down and started trembling with sweat covering their foreheads as they reported, "We can''t find them."


    It was clear that they were afraid of Bing Jun, but Bing Jun didn''t have time to waste with them. The more time that he took to find Lin Xue, the more danger she would be in.


    He didn''t want her to be in even the slightest danger, so he knew that he had no other choice.


    With a sigh, he said, "Huo Fei, I need your help."


    The red haired young master who had been watching from afar revealed a surprised look, but then the same frivolous smile that he usually had appeared on his face as he quickly appeared beside Bing Jun.


    He gave a chuckle before saying, "It seems like you''ve really got it bad."


    Bing Jun just red at him and asked, "What do you want?"


    Huo Fei pretended to think about it before saying, "Give me that Ice Jade that your family cultivates and I''ll help you this time."


    Bing Jun had a pained look when he heard this, but he agreed without hesitation, "Do it then."


    Huo Fei had a surprised look, but he still said with a smile, "Alright."


    With a flick of his hand, there was a mirror that suddenly appeared floating in his palm. Once this mirror appeared, he flew up into the air and let the mirror release its glow across the entire True Spirit Sect.


    Everyone was shocked to see this since they could feel the auraing from the mirror.


    This mirror was clearly not a weak artifact, but the True Spirit Sect was allowing this red haired young man to use it so tantly on their territory. Wasn''t the True Spirit Sect going to do anything about this?


    But even as Huo Fei used the mirror in his hand, there was no reaction from the people of the True Spirit Sect.


    After a few seconds, there was an image that appeared in Huo Fei''s mirror.


    It was Lin Fan and Lin Xue who were currently escaping through the True Spirit Sect, nning to go meet up with Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou.


    Huo Fei didn''t recognize Lin Fan, but since he had found them, he floated down and said, "Got them."

 Chapter 765 Liao Family’s Wedding (6)

    As soon as Bing Jun heard this, he immediately said, "Let''s go then."


    Without even waiting for Huo Fei to reply, he grabbed him by the back of his cor and floated into the air. Then he asked, "Which way?"


    Huo Fei was truly shocked to see this.


    His acquaintance with Bing Jun wasn''t for a short time, the two of them had known each other for a really long time. So he was quite familiar with Bing Jun''s personality.


    This was his first time seeing Bing Jun act like this.


    When anything happened before, Bing Jun would never show the slightest bit of worry. But now when it was something that involved Lin Xue, Bing Jun actually couldn''t hold back for a single second.


    Of course, Huo Fei didn''t provoke him since he knew that Bing Jun wasn''t someone easy to deal with. Otherwise, why would he go along with him like this?


    So Huo Fei just put this fact into the back of his mind before focusing his attention on helping Bing Jun find his kidnapped bride.


    The two of them flew off for a bit before Huo Fei suddenly said, "Stop!"


    Bing Jun immediately came to a halt and started searching the area with his spiritual sense. However, he wasn''t able to find a single thing, so he turned to Huo Fei and said, "Why are you telling me to stop here? There''s nothing here!"


    Huo Fei raised his hands and said, "Now, now, calm down. Just because you don''t see anything, that doesn''t mean that there''s nothing here."


    Huo Fei raised the mirror in his hand again and it suddenly released a bright light.


    That bright light shined down across the area before suddenly gathering together at a single point. When the light fell down onto that single point, there were two figures that were suddenly revealed.


    Lin Fan had stopped moving the moment that he sensed these two auras approaching. He could tell that one of these two auras belonged to Bing Jun and since he didn''t know what kind of special abilities or items that he had, he had chosen to stay still until they passed by.


    He had assumed that they were just heading through this area as they were searching for them, but he never expected them to suddenly stop above them.


    When he saw the unfamiliar red haired young man raise his mirror, he couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition. Then as he had expected, the mirror had somehow broken through his stealthws to reveal them.


    These were stealthws that could even fool those in the True Soul Realm, but this mirror had easily been able to see through them.


    Please, was this Ra''s Mirror?


    Why was it able to see through his stealthws that easily?!


    But of course, Lin Fan didn''t have time to care as Bing Jun immediately attacked as soon as he found Lin Fan and Lin Xue. The thing thatpletely made him lose control was when he saw Lin Fan holding Lin Xue''s hand!


    He wouldn''t allow anyone to touch his bride and all those that did only had one fate, death!


    So Bing Jun gathered ice all around him that formed icicles that he immediately rained down on Lin Fan.


    However, Lin Fan was already ready for this as he immediately released his pets to form an array around him.


    The icicles fell onto the array that Lin Fan''s pets created and they were all shattered to pieces. But that wasn''t the end since once the icicles were shattered, the ice lingered around the barrier created by the array, as if it was trying to break through the barrier.


    But this was a barrier that was made up of thews of Lin Fan''s pets, so naturally it also had the firew from Xiao Huo.


    The ice only lingered for a few seconds before it started being melted by the barrier itself.


    Bing Jun didn''t stop when he saw his first bombardment was a failure, he continued throwing down icicles at Lin Fan without a single care. Of course, it wasn''t that he didn''t have a single care since he didn''t want to hurt Lin Xue, but he had perfect control over the icicles and was certain that he wouldn''t identally hurt her.


    But no matter how many icicles that he threw down, he wasn''t able to hit the man that he wanted to kill. No matter how many icicles he threw, he wasn''t able to break through this annoying barrier.


    There were other things that he could do, but they would be a little too violent and he didn''t want to risk hurting Lin Xue¡­


    So Bing Jun raised his hand and stopped shooting icicles down at Lin Fan.


    Instead, he took a deep breath and flew closer before saying, "Who are you and why are you interfering with my wedding? If you give my bride back, I can give you a painless death."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort before saying, "Your bride? Do you think that you have the blessing of the family for that? Do you think she wants to marry you?"


    Bing Jun slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.


    But he still asked, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I am her big brother."


    Bing Jun knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    This was something that he had never heard about. As far as he knew, he was marrying Lin Xue with the blessing of her family, the Yue Family. He had never heard about an older brother or anything else.


    But he did feel that it was strange that he never met her parents¡­


    Not to mention that she clearly wasn''t willing to go through with the marriage. He had just thought that it was normalrge family politics and that she wasn''t willing to get married because she didn''t want an arranged marriage, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case.


    The biggest deciding factor was how Lin Xue was holding onto the hem of Lin Fan''s clothes right now.


    The only reason for her to do this was if they were family or if they were lovers¡­Naturally he wouldn''t ept thetter, so he chose to ept the former.


    It seemed like he would have to have a talk with the Yue Family after this, but for now, it was better to deal with this big brother first. After all, it seemed like he wasn''t a normal person¡­


    So Bing Jun revealed a smile and said, "Brother inw, it seems like this is all a misunderstanding."


    Lin Fan was surprised at how quickly Bing Jun could adapt to this situation , but he didn''t show this surprise on his face. He just calmly faced him and asked, "How so?"


    Bing Junnded on the ground in front of them and said, "Brother inw, I am sincere about Xue''er. If there is any misunderstanding between you and the Yue Family, I am willing to mediate between the two sides."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He could tell that this Bing Jun seemed sincere about Lin Xue, but since his little sister clearly didn''t want this wedding, he wasn''t going to let anyone force her to marry an unknown person.


    So Lin Fan said, "Unfortunately, this is not a marriage that our Xiao Xue seems to agree to. I''m afraid that it''s impossible for us to give a blessing in this situation. I''m sure you understand." Then after a pause, he added, "Of course, if you''re sincere, naturally you wouldn''t mind waiting and winning over our Xiao Xue instead of forcing her to marry you, right?"


    Bing Jun revealed an awkward look when he heard this, but he still said, "Brother inw, this is all a misunderstanding, but I do have an agreement with the Yue Family that you belong to. If I were to go back without my bride, you would understand how that makes me look, right?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and asked, "What does that matter to me? We''re not a part of the Yue Family to begin with."


    Bing Jun had a very unwilling look on his face.


    After all, he had thought that he would be marrying the girl that he loved today, but now it seemed like it wasn''t likely. For someone as obsessed and prideful as him, how could he ept something like this?


    But he naturally didn''t want to hurt Lin Xue''s family since they were important to her.


    While he was a prideful person, when it came to the people he loved, he would show them the hidden gentle side under the cold exterior.


    Huo Fei on the other hand was enjoying this very much.


    He had thought that this would end with Bing Jun getting married, but now he never expected this kind of plot to be hidden underneath.


    Now that there was this kind of tension, how could he let it go?


    Huo Fei asked, "This brother Lin, can I ask what you mean by you''re not a part of the Yue Family?"


    Lin Fan turned to this red haired young man with a wary look since he could tell that he wasn''t a part of this and was just here to cause trouble before saying, "It''s exactly what it means."


    Huo Fei gave a chuckle before asking, "Then let''s say we destroy the Yue Family for breaking the engagement with our young master Bing here. Would you have any objections to that?"

 Chapter 766 Liao Family’s Wedding (7)

    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this question, so he didn''t answer right away.


    He just narrowed his eyes to look at these two young men in front of him, trying to figure out what they were thinking.


    But in the end, he wasn''t able to read these young men, so he just said, "Do as you wish. It''ll save me the trouble of destroying them myself."


    Both Bing Jun and Huo Fei couldn''t help knitting their brows when they heard this.


    Naturally it had been a bluff when Huo Fei threatened to destroy the Yue Family. After all, the Yue Family, the Liao Family, and the entire True Spirit Sect were their subordinates. They would gain nothing from doing this.


    But they never would have thought that the grudge between Lin Fan and the Yue Family had already reached this level.


    Not to mention that this question had been a test to see what kind of character Lin Fan had.


    No matter what their expectations were, they never expected Lin Fan to be this decisive. It seemed like he wasn''t a simple person, let alone the fact that he said that "it would save him the trouble of destroying them himself".


    He had the confidence to destroy the Yue Family that was backed by the True Spirit Sect, it seems like the ones backing him weren''t weak¡­


    While Huo Fei didn''t really care about this since he was confident about his own backing, that didn''t mean it was the same with Bing Jun. Bing Jun could also remain aloof because of his backing, but he couldn''t remain aloof since this matter involved Lin Xue.


    So he had to figure out a way to convince Lin Fan to give back Lin Xue today.


    But as his mind turned, he wasn''t able to think of a single good method.


    No, that wasn''t true. It wasn''t as if he couldn''t think of a single method, but those methods involved getting a little rough¡­


    He wasn''t willing to get rough with Lin Fan since this was his future brother inw. He wanted to make Lin Xue happy and he could clearly see by the way she was holding his clothes, the gentleness that she treated him with that he had never felt before which made him jealous, they were quite close.


    If he were to hurt Lin Fan, it was clear that she would be sad.


    However, there were no other choices for him¡­


    So in the end, Bing Jun shouted, "Liao Ding, Yue Tu,e out!"


    The two ancestors immediately jumped out andnded in front of Bing Jun, falling to one knee as they said, "Yes, young master Bing."


    The two of them had followed the two young masters after they left the reception, but without orders from the young masters, they didn''t dare reveal themselves.


    Bing Jun narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before looking at Yue Tu. After a long pause, he said, "Capture the two of them, but make sure that you don''t hurt Xue''er. As for her brother¡­you can rough him up, but don''t hurt him."


    The two of them cupped their hands before saying, "Yes."


    Then after they stood up and turned around to face Lin Fan and Lin Xue, Yue Tu narrowed his eyes to look at the two of them.


    Lin Xue resembled Yue Qingrou, but Lin Fan¡­he resembled Lin Ao.


    When he looked at him, he couldn''t help being filled with rage.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Ao in the past, the Yue Family wouldn''t have suffered that much. And now that they were about to marry Lin Xue off to Bing Jun, this son came to ruin this matter for the Yue Family again.


    But this was also Yue Qingrou''s son, so he endured his rage.


    Yue Tu was Yue Qingrou''s grandfather, so he was also Lin Fan''s great grandson.


    So the first thing that he did was try to reason with him.


    Yue Tu said, "Great grandson, there''s no need to do this. I don''t know what your parents have told you, but you are still an offspring of the Yue Family. Give up on this meaningless struggle ande home with us."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "I''m not part of the Yue Family."


    Yue Tu revealed an angry look and said, "Are you not a child of Qingrou? You''re saying that you don''t have the blood of the Yue Family flowing in you? Child, stop being foolish ande home."


    Lin Fan calmly said, "The Yue Family isn''t worthy of me."


    Yue Tupletely lost his reasoning to anger when he heard this.<sub> </sub>


    It seemed like this child was just as arrogant as Lin Ao, so it seemed that there was no reasoning with him.


    Since that was the case¡­


    Yue Tu said in a deep voice, "It seems like your parents have led you astray. As your elder, it''s my duty to properly educate you."


    Lin Fan ignored him and looked at Liao Ding to say, "Do you want toe at me together? It''s easier than handling you one by one."


    Liao Ding had a dark look on his face after he heard this, but he just gave a cold snort and took a step back for Yue Tu to make his move.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan turned his attention back to Yue Tu.


    Without any hesitation, Yue Tu called out his pet, which was a giant rock that mmed into the ground. But then the rock started to move and revealed its true form as a turtle.


    This turtle exchanged a nce with Yue Tu before turning to Lin Fan. It raised its foot and stomped the ground, creating seismic waves that flowed through the ground, causing the ground to shake.


    While the ground shook, Yue Tu had already jumped out with weapon in hand, preparing to sh his sword down at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried as he gave an order to his pets with a single thought.


    The barrier formed by his pets immediately lit up before it also started releasing seismic waves as well. Those waves shed with the ones released by the turtle and canceled them out, stopping the shaking in the area that the barrier covered.


    Yue Tu was surprised to see this, but that didn''t stop him from swinging his sword down at Lin Fan.


    The sword that fell down shed with the barrier that was around him and after a few seconds of equilibrium, Yue Tu was suddenly sent flying backwards.


    After flipping once in the air, hended firmly on the ground. Once hended, he couldn''t help looking up at Lin Fan, or rather the barrier around him with a look of shock.


    After all, he was already in the Mid Nascent Soul Realm and he had been repelled by the barrier of someone in the Child Soul Realm. This was something that went againstmon sense!


    He had thought that it would be easy for him to teach Lin Fan a lesson, but now that didn''t seem to be the case.


    Of course, he had assumed that Bing Jun''s attack had failed because he only used power at the Child Soul Realm to hide his true powers. So he figured that Lin Fan wouldn''t be that strong¡­but now it seemed like he hadpletely misjudged Lin Fan.


    But still, that didn''t mean that he would give up that easily.


    No matter what, there was still a major realm between the two of them.


    So instead of having the turtle continue to use seismic waves in an attempt to disrupt them, Yue Tu had his turtle send those waves into his body which he immediately channeled into his de.


    As long as anyone was hit with this de, they would feel these powerful seismic waves filling them. It would be as if an earthquake was happening in their body,pletely destroying their internal organs.


    At the same time, he was certain that the seismic waves would help him shatter the barrier around Lin Fan.


    So being filled with confidence, Yue Tu jumped out again and mmed his sword down on Lin Fan''s barrier. But to his surprise, the barrier didn''t shatter, instead it canceled out his seismic waves.


    That was right, Lin Fan had been able to stop his seismic waves from shaking the ground, so there was no reason why he couldn''t use those same seismic waves to block this sword sh.


    No, that wasn''t correct either¡­


    The seismic waves that the turtle had used earlier were dispersed seismic waves that were used over arge area, so the power contained within them were naturally dispersed as well. It couldn''t match the power of the seismic waves that were currently contained within Yue Tu''s sword. The seismic waves inside his sword right now were concentrated seismic waves that hade straight for the source, so the power difference was like heaven and earth.


    For Lin Fan to block these seismic waves and even cancel them out¡­


    It must mean that he had been holding back his power earlier!


    This terrifying realization quickly passed through Yue Tu''s mind and he was about to separate himself from Lin Fan''s barrier, but before he could, there was a w that suddenly came out of the ground.


    This w stabbed up from the ground and was aimed right at Yue Tu''s back.


    It hade out so suddenly that Yue Tu was caught off guard, but he quickly broke free from the sh with Lin Fan''s barrier to turn and guard against the w with his sword.


    But even then, the w had been able to sh his arm and sent him flying.

 Chapter 767 Liao Family’s Wedding (8)

    When Yue Tunded, he couldn''t help looking at his arm in shock.


    Even if he had been caught off guard, he was still a Nascent Soul Realm. How could the attacks from someone in the Child Soul Realm possibly hurt him?


    He didn''t believe that someone like Lin Fan who was in the Child Soul Realm could tame beasts beyond the Child Soul Realm, so he immediately discredited that one possibility.


    It was just too bad that facts pped him in the face.


    Since he had alreadyunched his sneak attack, there was no need for his beast to hide itself anymore.


    The bear with rocks on its back came out of the ground and faced Yue Tu and Liao Ding.


    The moment that they saw this bear appear, they both revealed shocked expressions since they could feel the auraing from the bear. This was the aura of the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Lin Fan was actually able to control a Nascent Soul Realm beast, it was no wonder Yue Tu had been injured.


    After seeing this bear appear, Yue Tu couldn''t help feeling worried. Nothing that he had tried was working and unless he started using his trump cards, he was uncertain if he could even hurt Lin Fan. Not to mention that the orders were to capture Lin Fan and to avoid hurting him badly.


    So it wasn''t as if Yue Tu could go all out against Lin Fan.


    He started regretting not letting Liao Ding help earlier, but it was toote for that.


    After thinking for a bit, Yue Tu suddenly stabbed his sword into the ground. Once the sword stabbed into the ground, there were several stone pirs that came out of the ground all around Lin Fan.


    It was clear by how they were distributed that they had taken the form of an array, but as for the effect of the array¡­


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at the pirs that had suddenly surrounded him. He tried to figure out the effects of this array based on the life energy that was flowing through it, but he found that he couldn''t find a single array that was simr to this array in his memories.


    Even with all the arrays that he had learned in that trial space, there wasn''t one that was like this.


    But of course, that wasn''t strange since Lin Fan didn''t have time to learn every array in the world and this was just a Soul Realm array, so it was unlikely that Lin Fan would have studied many of these.


    However, even after this array appeared around him, Lin Fan didn''t panic at all. Instead, he revealed a faint smile.


    After the pirs of stone appeared around him, they started trembling, causing the ground around them to tremble. Then slowly, but surely, the rocks on the ground started rolling towards the pirs of stone.


    It was almost as if there was some kind of attraction force inside of the pirs that were pulling these rocks in.


    Once a decent number of rocks had gathered around each of the stone pirs, the stone pirs suddenly lit up as theyunched the rocks gathered into the air. As soon as they wereunched into the air, the rocks came together to form another barrier around Lin Fan.


    "Rock Tomb." Yue Tu said in a low voice.


    This was one of his special techniques, Rock Tomb. It was a two part technique, with the first part being forming a tomb of rocks to restrain the enemy.


    He just hoped that he wouldn''t be forced to use the second part because the second part was the part where he used those rocks to destroy the enemy. If he were to use it, it was unlikely that Lin Fan would survive under this full force attack, even if he did tame a Nascent Soul Realm beast.


    So he hoped that he could force Lin Fan to submit under the restraining array of the Rock Tomb.


    After this rock barrier was formed around Lin Fan, Yue Tu lowered his sword and said, "Child, give up now. You can''t break out of my¡­"


    But before he could finish speaking, there was a burst of energy that suddenly smashed through his rock wall.


    It hade from the barrier that Lin Fan''s pet had formed.


    While Yue Tu had been gathering rocks for his Rock Tomb attack, Lin Fan hadn''t been idle. He had his pets gather life energy from around and concentrated that life energy into a single attack.


    Once the rock wall had formed, the barrier had given off a single sh before releasing a beam of five coloured light. That beam of five coloured light was an attack that was formed from five differentws, so there wasn''t a single moment of dy as it smashed right through the rock wall that Yue Tu had set up.


    Yue Tu could only look on at the beam of light in shock, but he wasn''t in a daze for long since that beam of light was aimed right at him.<sub> </sub>


    Yue Tu immediately raised his sword and gathered his life energy together in it to form a defensive barrier. At the same time, the rock turtle behind him released seismic waves which mmed into the five coloured beam of light, slowing it down.


    When the five coloured beam of light hit Yue Tu''s sword, he couldn''t help knitting his brows as he stood there in bnce with it. But a few secondster, he was slowly being pushed back by that beam of light.


    However, in the end, Yue Tu was able to sh up with his sword and he sent that beam of light into the air where it exploded.


    Yue Tu couldn''t help turning back to Lin Fan with a look of shock.


    He could see the beasts that formed this array and he could tell from their auras that they were only in the Child Soul Realm. But the array that Lin Fan had them take was strong enough to injure a Nascent Soul Realm Expert like him¡­


    Yes, he had been injured when he had tried to block that beam of light just now. Even with his full force and his pet helping him, he had suffered light injuries to redirect that beam of light into the sky.


    It seemed like the backing behind Lin Fan wasn''t simple, but of course it wouldn''t be if he dared to mess with this wedding¡­


    Yue Tu could not maintain his pride any longer. He knew that if he was to force himself into fighting Lin Fan like this, he would eventually end up injured or he would be forced into fighting for real and would injure Lin Fan, going against Bing Jun''s orders.


    It was clear which option was worse for him.


    Since he had no other choice, Yue Tu said, "Old Liao, give me a hand. It seems like he''s much more troublesome to deal with than I thought."


    Liao Ding normally would have replied with disdain when he heard this kind of request from Yue Tu, but this time, he went against his normal character to say, "Alright."


    It was just a simple answer, there wasn''t anything else that was said.


    That was testament to the pressure that Liao Ding felt from Lin Fan.


    If he had been in Yue Tu''s position, he would have suffered from the same problems.


    It wasn''t that the two of them couldn''t kill Lin Fan if they were fighting for real, but they had their orders to capture Lin Fan which made it much harder.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he didn''t forget to add, "I already said that I didn''t mind if youe all at once, why did you wait until now?"


    There was a vein that popped out on Liao Ding''s forehead, but he took a deep breath and calmed himself.


    Right now he was in front of Bing Jun and he had received an important mission, it wasn''t time to let his emotions get the best of him.


    So he gave a nod to Liao Ding before jumping out with his weapon in hand.


    With a single sh of his sabre, there were countless des of wind that appeared around him that fell down onto the barrier around Lin Fan.


    Without anyone noticing, there had been a hawk that had appeared on his shoulder that was also pping its wings, sending out wind des along with his sh.


    These des of wind assaulted the barrier Lin Fan''s pets created, but they weren''t able to pierce through them. However, the flickering that the barrier created with each de of wind hitting it was getting weaker.


    It seemed like these des of wind would slowly wear down the barrier.


    However, even when he saw this, Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all as he turned his gaze to Yue Tu, waiting for him to act.


    Seeing that Liao Ding had already flown out, Yue Tu started doing the same thing as before. He stabbed his sword into the ground and created the stone pirs again that started drawing rocks to it.


    But instead of sending those rocks into the sky, he seemed like he was waiting.


    He was waiting for Liao Ding''s des of wind to wear down Lin Fan''s barrier so that he could trap him with the Rock Tomb again.


    Lin Fan naturally could see what they were nning, but he just revealed a smile as he murmured to himself, "It''s time."

 Chapter 768 Liao Family’s Wedding (9)

    After he said this, there were two ripples that formed in the air near Liao Ding and Yue Tu.


    Both of them had been focused on their attacks, so they noticed these ripples toote and couldn''t put up their guards in time.


    There were two ws that suddenly appeared out of nowhere, shing both Liao Ding and Yue Tu across the chest. Since they hadn''t been able to put up their guard, the ws that appeared out of nowhere cut right into their chests and left quite deep wound marks on them.


    They quickly moved away from the beasts that had hit them with their ws, but when they stabilized themselves, they were shocked by what they saw.


    The rock bear from before was still standing by Lin Fan, so these were two new beasts and they were both in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    Lin Fan actually had three Nascent Soul Realm beasts under him!


    How could someone who was only in the Child Soul Realm have three Nascent Soul Realm beasts under him?!


    With these three beasts and the barrier that his other pets formed, he was more than capable of fighting both of them at the same time.


    As they realized this, both Liao Ding and Yue Tu had ugly expressions on their faces.


    They had thought that it would be easy to deal with this Child Soul Realm junior if the two of them worked together, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case¡­However, it wasn''t as if they could just give up on this fight.


    They had received their orders from Bing Jun and if they were to disobey these orders¡­


    Both of them gave a gulp when they thought of this and then after exchanging a nce, the two of them steeled themselves as they turned back to face Lin Fan.


    Between having to fight Lin Fan and going against Bing Jun''s orders, it was clear which one they preferred.


    So without any further hesitation, both of them used their life energy to stop their wounds from bleeding before facing Lin Fan again.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this as he gathered the three Nascent Soul Realm beasts in front of him. He put two of them in front while thest one stood behind them.


    After they steeled themselves, Liao Ding and Yue Tu no longer fought separately, but rather came together to fight as one. They gathered their pets together before sending out a tornado.


    This wasn''t just a single tornado, but rather a tornado that was filled with rocks that kept throwing them at Lin Fan''s barrier. However, no matter how the rocks hit the barrier, they weren''t able to break through at all.


    But that wasn''t the point of the rocks. They were only throwing the rocks to slowly wear down the barrier while using the tornado as a protective barrier themselves.


    If Lin Fan''s pets were to approach the tornado at all, they would be immediately sucked in and bombarded with rocks. These were rocks that were formed with Yue Tu''s full power, so they definitely weren''t weak.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t mind at all since he knew that in a battle of attritions, he would certainly win. After all, he had more than just the pets that could be seen providing energy for the barrier. Not to mention that the barrier had a special ability to draw energy from the space around it to make it stronger.


    As this fight continued, Bing Jun couldn''t help knitting his brows as he stared at Lin Fan''s barrier.


    For some reason, this barrier seemed familiar to him, but he was unable to figure out how it was familiar. All he knew was that he had somehow seen this barrier before¡­


    After a long period of thought, Bing Jun suddenly thought of something as he said, "That''s right, it was from that time!"


    Huo Fei had been watching the fun, but when he heard Bing Jun shouting out, he looked at him and asked, "What time?"


    Bing Jun''s eyes turned cold as he looked at Lin Fan before he said, "He''s the one from the Ancient Era Ruins! This barrier is the same technique as the one that was used by the one who ambushed me!"


    Huo Fei narrowed his eyes to look more closely at Lin Fan after hearing this.


    Bing Jun felt the urge to attack, but then he remembered that Lin Fan was Lin Xue''s brother, so he suppressed that urge.


    While he was still angry about what had happened in the Ancient Era Ruins, the situation was different now. Compared to his previous grudge, what he cared about more was how to get Lin Xue back.


    So after taking a deep breath to calm himself down, Bing Jun said, "You two, get back here."


    Liao Ding and Yue Tu had been focused on fighting so they didn''t react to Bing Jun''s orders right away, but they quickly came to their senses when they realized who was talking to them. Both of them stopped their attacks and immediately came in front of Bing Jun before bowing down.<sub> </sub>


    Liao Ding said, "Young master Bing, please give us a bit more time. We promise that we''ll take care of this."


    Yue Tu added, "Yes, this is nothing more than a family dispute. We''ll settle this quickly."


    Bing Jun gave a cold snort before saying, "You won''t be able to take him and we''re wasting time like this. Stand back."


    Liao Ding and Yue Tu both had doomed expressions, but they still listened to Bing Jun.


    Bing Jun took a step forward and said, "It seems like we do have some kind of fate between us. Brother inw, what is your name?"


    He had never asked for Lin Fan''s name before this because he never thought that he would need to know until after his wedding was over, but now it was different. This was a person that he had a grudge with, a person that he remembered, so he wanted to know this person''s name.


    Lin Fan just looked at him and said, "There''s no need for you to know and you can stop calling me brother inw."


    Bing Jun narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before saying, "Brother inw, you don''t know what kind of power is behind me, it''s not something thates from this realm. You shouldn''t dismiss my offer that easily."


    Lin Fan just said in a cold voice, "If my little sister doesn''t want to marry, no one can make her."


    Bing Jun''s eyes turned cold when he heard this, but then seeing Lin Xue firmly standing with Lin Fan, his heart filled with a bit of pain. Still, he quickly suppressed all of this before shouting, "Ling Tian!"


    As soon as he shouted out this name, there was another person that appeared in front of Bing Jun. However, the aura that he released waspletely different from the aura that Yue Tu and Liao Ding had.


    This was an aura that Lin Fan had felt before, this was the aura of the True Soul Realm!


    This should be the sect master of the True Spirit Sect, but why was he listening to the orders of this young master Bing?!


    It wasn''t just Lin Fan who thought this. By this time, all the other people had already made their way over to watch the fight between Lin Fan and the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    With the life energy fluctuations that they released, it was almost impossible to miss them.


    All of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the twelve great factions were getting ready to interfere if the situation looked back for Lin Fan, but seeing how he had been able to take care of Liao Ding and Yue Tu, they had chosen not to make a move. After all, it still wasn''t time to tear off all face with the True Spirit Sect yet and they wanted to keep their rtionship with Lin Fan hidden for as long as possible.


    But now that Ling Tian had appeared, it was unlikely that they would be able to stay still.


    But then in front of everyone''s shocked gaze, Ling Tian fell to one knee in front of Bing Jun.


    This was the sect master of the True Spirit Sect, one of the few True Soul Realm Experts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance that could be counted on one''s hand. He was one of the top figures of this Gctic Humanity Alliance, a person with true pride, but he was bending that pride to kneel down in front of someone else?


    Everyone who saw this couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition¡­


    The worst case scenario that they had thought about before, it seemed like that it mighte true¡­


    After Ling Tian appeared, Bing Jun said, "Don''t hurt them, but capture them for me."


    Ling Tian gave a nod before saying, "Yes, young master Bing."


    After that, Ling Tian stood up and turned in Lin Fan''s direction, raising his hand as if he was about to make a move.


    Seeing this, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the twelve great factions that had connections to Lin Fan no longer stayed still.


    While it was already shocking enough that Lin Fan was able to deal with Nascent Soul Realm Experts, no one believed that he would be able to contend with a True Soul Realm Expert.


    So they knew that unless they stood up to defend him, it was impossible for him to escape today. And if he was captured, what would they do about their business with him?


    So they couldn''t let that happen.

 Chapter 769 Liao Family’s Wedding (10)

    So before Ling Tian could make a move, there were nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts that appeared in front of Ling Tian.


    Ling Tian had been about to make a move, but when he saw these nine people appear, he couldn''t help knitting his brows and stopping his hand.


    If it were anyone else, perhaps he might have blown them away along with Lin Fan, but the factions that these nine represented made him hesitate.


    After all, it would mean starting a war between the True Spirit Sect and the nine factions that they represented if he made a move now. That would be something that would go against the n that Bing Jun had formted, so he couldn''t do that no matter what happened.


    So Ling Tian lowered his hand and said in a firm voice, "These guests, can you please move out of the way? This is a matter of our True Spirit Sect, so this is something that our True Spirit Sect should deal with. It is not a ce for you to interfere in."


    Even if he had lowered his stance when facing Bing Jun earlier, when facing these people, he still had amanding tone. No matter what, they were only Nascent Soul Realm Experts and he was the sect master, the True Soul Realm Expert of the True Spirit Sect.


    He at least had this bit of pride when facing them.


    But even after he said this, not a single one of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts moved.


    Seeing this, Ling Tian knitted his brows even more and asked in a deep and threatening voice, "Are you all determined to interfere with the business of our True Spirit Sect?"


    This time, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Hunters Organization came out and said, "Unfortunately, the one that you have business with is a member of our Hunters Organization."


    Then the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Tamers Guild came forward to say, "He is also a Monster Trainer registered with our Tamers Guild."


    Finally, the Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Alchemy King Hall said, "He is also an alchemist registered with our Alchemy King Hall."


    Ling Tian''s expression became very ugly when he heard this.


    This was his first time hearing about something like this happening. It was very unlikely for someone to have all three of these identities since it would mean being able to excel in all three of these fields. This kind of talent was just unheard of.


    But the most shocking thing was that the three factions were willing to admit this at a time like this.


    They weren''t fools, they would know that standing out at this time would mean getting involved in this matter and would mean choosing Lin Fan over the True Spirit Sect.


    Ling Tian couldn''t understand what kind of value Lin Fan had that these three factions would choose to offend the True Spirit Sect to support him¡­


    But since they were going to support him, it wasn''t as if he could back down now. After all, he had Bing Jun''s orders to worry about. If he were to go against Bing Jun''s orders¡­


    Seeing that he was stuck between a rock and a hard ce, Ling Tian turned to the other six Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    It was unlikely for Lin Fan to be rted to these six factions since they were different from the neutral factions like the Hunters Organization, the Tamers Guild, and the Alchemy King Hall.


    For the Four Great Families, they werepletely made up of their rtives and close friends of rtives, so he doubted that Lin Fan would have any connection to them. After all, it was just too unlikely that Lin Fan would be rted to any of these families.


    As for the Myriad Sword Hall and the Ice Goddess Pce, the techniques that Lin Fan had used just now werepletely different from the core techniques of these two sects. So it was almost impossible for Lin Fan to be one of the disciples of these two sects.


    Since that was the case, Ling Tian would try to separate these six factions from this situation since fighting nine different factions at once would be crazy for his True Spirit Sect¡­Or at least it would be for now. If it were to happen right now, it would disrupt Bing Jun and Huo Fei''s n, which was a responsibility that he couldn''t afford to bear.


    So Ling Tian said, "I trust that he''s not rted to your six factions, right? So can you please let us handle this matter ourselves?"


    But to his shock, the six Nascent Soul Realm Experts didn''t move. They just faced his gaze head on and said, "We have our own connections to this young man and will be supporting him today."


    Ling Tian couldn''t understand what was happening.


    Nine of the twelve great factions were all supporting a single person to go against his True Spirit Sect?


    Was this really happening?<sub> </sub>


    His True Spirit Sect couldn''tpare to the value of a single person to these nine factions?


    When did the world be so upside down?


    But this wasn''t the time to think about all of that.


    In this situation, time was of the essence and as long as he acted fast enough, he would be able to avoid dealing with troublesome things¡­So it seemed like he would have no other choice than to¡­


    Since he couldn''t go against Bing Jun''s orders and since these nine were making it clear that they wouldn''t back down, he wouldn''t have any other choice than to¡­


    So with this thought in mind, Ling Tian started raising his hand and gathering his life energy.


    It was impossible for the nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts to miss this and they revealed a heavy look on their faces. They had thought that if all of them stood on Lin Fan''s side, then the True Spirit Sect would back down, but they never expected Ling Tian to go this far.


    There weren''t any True Soul Realm Experts that came with them today, so if Ling Tian really went all out, it would be hard for them. While it wasn''t impossible for them to block Ling Tian and escape with Lin Fan, it would mean that they would be heavily injured from the fight. It was even likely that half of them would die from this fight¡­


    But still, these were their orders and they didn''t have any other choices.


    So the Nascent Soul Realm Experts slowly gathered their life energy and prepared their weapons.


    Ling Tian also saw this, but he looked at them with disdain since he knew that it was impossible for them to truly fight them. The only thing that he really had to worry about was stopping them from escaping since Bing Jun''s orders were to capture Lin Fan and Lin Xue.


    However, before the two sides could sh, Lin Fan came forward and said, "Everyone, there''s no need for you to go this far."


    Everyone was shocked to hear this and they were confused as to what Lin Fan was doing.


    Ling Tian took advantage of this to ask, "Are you going to peacefullye with me? It would save everyone plenty of trouble if you were to do that."


    It would be troublesome for him to fight against these nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts after all, not because he would be in danger, but rather because of the damage to the True Spirit Sect''s reputation and the future repercussions of this matter. If possible, he wanted Lin Fan to surrender so they could end this peacefully.


    Since Lin Fan was taking the initiative to step out and mediate this matter, there was no reason for him not to y along.


    But to his surprise, Lin Fanpletely ignored him.


    Lin Fan looked at the nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts and said, "I''ve already decided that I would handle this matter alone today, so there''s no need for your nine factions to do this. Please leave this matter to me."


    The nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts all had difficult expressions on their faces after hearing this.


    The orders that they received were to not let Lin Fan suffer any injuries, but now Lin Fan was nning on fighting a True Soul Realm Expert alone?


    <o>,m How could they let that happen?</o>


    But still, they had to worry about their own reputations and other things since there were plenty of people who were watching this. If they insisted too strongly, there would be many rumours created from this.


    So the Nascent Soul Realm Experts looked at the one from the Hunters Organization for him to represent them in convincing Lin Fan. The Hunters Organization was the faction that was the closest to Lin Fan and had known him the longest, so they had the best chance of convincing him to not do this.


    The Nascent Soul Realm Expert from the Hunters Organization hesitated a bit before saying, "Young master Lin, this is a True Soul Realm Expert. Perhaps it''s best if you didn''t do this¡­ You don''t know just how terrifying a True Soul Realm Expert really is."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "There''s no need for you to worry, I have my own methods. Not to mention that my master has given me a few trump cards."


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experts clearly had their doubts, but when Lin Fan mentioned his "master", they couldn''t help hesitating.


    After all, this was an expert that even the True Soul Realm Experts of their factions couldn''t see through!

 Chapter 770 Liao Family’s Wedding (11)

    After a long period of silence, the Nascent Soul Realm Experts stood to the side and let Lin Fan do what he wanted.


    However, they didn''t dare let their guard down. They were prepared to jump out and save Lin Fan at any second the situation turned dangerous for him.


    Only then did Lin Fan turn his attention back to Ling Tian who was floating there in the sky.


    Ling Tian had felt a trace of anger appear when he had been ignored like this, but he suppressed it. He had his orders and he couldn''t hurt Lin Fan too badly, or else Bing Jun would be angry. So for now, he had to control his emotions to make sure that no idents happened.


    However, he was still surprised to see Lin Fan facing him like this, so he asked, "Are you sure you want to do this? Do you really think that a True Soul Realm Expert is that easy to deal with?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "Of course not, but I do have my ways."


    After saying this, he pulled out a dagger from his Storage Ring.


    This was not the Iron Eater Bone Artifact that he normally used, instead of his usual white dagger, this was a dagger that waspletely ck. It was also covered in a dark aura that seemed to leak off the de and looked like it was about to corrupt everything around it.


    The moment that this dagger appeared, all the experts around him couldn''t help feeling a sharp chill running through them.


    They didn''t know what this dagger was, but they all knew that it was dangerous.


    That included Ling Tian.


    The moment that he saw this dagger, even he could sense the danger that came from it. This was a dagger that could even harm a True Soul Realm Expert like him!


    But just where had Lin Fan gotten such a dangerous thing?


    Ling Tian didn''t know much about Lin Fan, but the things that had been revealed about him during this time had shocked him again and again.


    He had been able to tame Nascent Soul Realm beasts, he had nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts from nine of the twelve great factions protecting him, and now he was able to pull out this dagger artifact that even threatened him¡­


    Nothing about this young man was simple¡­


    So why did he have to be on the opposite side of his True Spirit Sect?!


    Still Ling Tian had the pride and confidence of a True Soul Realm Expert.


    Even if Lin Fan had a dagger that could threaten him, it didn''t mean anything if Lin Fan wasn''t able to hit him with a dagger. The difference in speed between someone in the Child Soul Realm and the True Soul Realm couldn''t even be measured by the distance between heaven and earth, it could only be considered universes apart.


    So he was certain that it wouldn''t be a problem for him to take care of Lin Fan.


    The only problem would be capturing him since that would give Lin Fan a chance to strike him¡­


    It seemed like the only way was to rough Lin Fan up a bit before capturing him. After all, he wouldn''t be able to put up a struggle if he was unconscious.


    So with his n of action decided, Ling Tian raised his hand to start making his move.


    But before he could do anything, there were several beasts that suddenly came out of the ground¡­


    No, it couldn''t just be considered several beasts anymore. It was over a hundred beasts that came out of the ground.


    The most shocking thing was that all of these beasts were in the Nascent Soul Realm!


    A hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts, what kind of a concept was this?


    It was equal to the experts from five of the twelve great factions, but here it was in front of them!


    Of course, no one believed that Lin Fan was the one who had summoned these hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts out. A Child Soul Realm junior controlling over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts?


    What kind of heaven defying thought was that?!


    Everyone just assumed that it was Lin Fan''s master who had shown up to protect him.


    That included Ling Tian who asked with knitted brows, "Who is it that hase to my True Spirit Sect?"


    But there was no answer to this question. There was only Lin Fan raising a hand tomand the Nascent Soul Realm pets to get into formation.<sub> </sub>


    Even after seeing Lin Fan give the Nascent Soul Realm pets amand, no one believed that it was Lin Fan who was controlling these pets. They all believed that Lin Fan''s master had given him control over these beasts as a trump card to keep him safe.


    However, a master that could give up control over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm pets, the equivalency of experts controlled by five of the twelve great factions, he definitely wasn''t simple.


    If he could feel assured in giving this many Nascent Soul Realm pets to Lin Fan, it would mean that he still had plenty of Nascent Soul Realm pets in his grasp.


    As this thought passed through their minds, the nine Nascent Soul Realm Experts couldn''t help thinking of all the eggs that they had been delivering to the store over the past while. Could it be that the store had been hatching all of those eggs and these Nascent Soul Realm pets were the results of that?


    If that were true, this would¡­


    A chill ran down their spines, but they also praised their own factions for choosing the right side to support.


    As for Ling Tian, since he didn''t receive an answer, he knew that there was nothing else that he could do¡­


    Since that was the case, he would go all out against this hidden enemy!


    So he released the power that separated True Soul Realm Experts from other experts in the Soul Realm, he released his domain.


    The domain was the special ability of True Soul Realm Experts and it came naturally as their soul developed in the Soul Realm. This was the precursor to the power that they would receive in the realm above the Soul Realm, so its power could not be looked down on.


    The domain allowed a True Soul Realm Expert to use the power of their soul and theirws to control a space around them. In this space, only their power existed, giving them absolute control over that space.


    As long as a domain was released, there was no other power that could enter that space.


    Well, it wasn''t as if there was no other power that could enter that space. As long as there was a power that was stronger than the owner of the domain, then the domain could be shattered.


    But in this ce where he was the only True Soul Realm Expert, it was unlikely that this would ever happen.


    So he would use his domain to restrain Lin Fan and all these Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    Ling Tian''s domain spread out around him and with his control, he spread his domain towards Lin Fan and the Nascent Soul Realm beasts. As long as his domain covered them, they wouldn''t be able to use theirws anymore.


    Once they were suppressed, it would be easy for him to capture them.


    As for why he hadn''t used this before, it was a matter of pride.


    For a proud True Soul Realm Expert to use his trump card, his domain to forcefully capture a Child Soul Realm junior, if this was known by the world, he would beughed at to death.


    But seeing that he had no other choice, he had to use his domain.


    However, before his domain could even reach Lin Fan and the Nascent Soul Realm pets, there was another barrier that appeared around Lin Fan.


    This barrier was formed by the Nascent Soul Realm pets that had appeared in a formation around Lin Fan.


    He had prepared this as his final trump card since there was always the possibility of having to deal with the True Spirit Sect''s True Soul Realm Expert. He had hoped that he wouldn''t need to use this, but he had also prepared for the worst case scenario.


    Ling Tian looked at this barrier in disdain as he felt that all of this was useless in front of his domain, but the moment that his domain came into contact with the barrier, the expression on his face couldn''t help changing. It went from that look of disdain to a look ofplete shock.


    He found that the barrier hadpletely blocked his domain and had stopped it from progressing even a single inch. No matter how he tried to push his domain forward, the barrier was able to sh with it and keep it at bay.


    Ling Tian looked at this barrier in front of him with a look of absolute shock as he shouted, "How is this even possible!?"


    Even if there were over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts here, as long as they were in the Nascent Soul Realm and not the True Soul Realm, it should have been impossible for them to resist his domain!


    So how was this barrier formed by these Nascent Soul Realm beasts able to block his domain!


    Thispletely went against allmon sense!


    Thispletely went against thews of the heavens!


    Even if he was looking at it with his own eyes, Ling Tian just couldn''t believe it.

 Chapter 771 Liao Family’s Wedding (12)

    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he saw this.


    Naturally he knew what Ling Tian was thinking, so he didn''t waste any time as he started charging at Ling Tian, taking advantage of the fact that he was caught off guard.


    When Lin Fan moved, the barrier around him moved along with him, smashing into Ling Tian''s domain.


    As the barrier and the domain shed, Ling Tian was shocked to find that he was getting slightly pushed back by the barrier.


    This pulled Ling Tian out of his shock and he increased his power, increasing the pressure of his domain and pushing the barrier back.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he immediately moved back again and brought the barrier away from Ling Tian''s domain. It seemed that even with this barrier, he didn''t have a proper way to deal with Ling Tian''s domain.


    As for what this barrier was, it was a pseudo domain that was formed from the variousws that the Nascent Soul Realm beasts injected into the array.


    Instead of using a single powerfulw to suppress the space, not allowing any otherws to exist in this space, the array followed a different principle. Instead of using the principle of suppression, the barrier created a chaotic space where no otherws could exist.


    It was very simple, by taking all the variousws and jamming it into a single space, it created a space that was filled with all these chaoticws smashing into each other. With all these differentws existing in this space, it was hard for a singlew to stand out above the rest, so it was impossible for any singlew to exist in this space, unless thatw was much stronger than the rest or was permitted by whoever set up the array.


    So while the end result was the same as a domain, it couldn''t be considered a domain since the foundation was different.


    That was why it was called a pseudo domain.


    But with all the differentws that were gathered in it, the suppression force that came as a sum of these chaoticws being pushed into the same space was equal to that of a domain¡­No, with all the power of these differentws gathered together, it might be considered even stronger since the suppression power was much greater than the sum of thews. It increased the power of thesews by exponentially instead of just adding them together.


    That was why Ling Tian had been forced back when his domain had shed with the barrier.


    But this was only temporary since this pseudo domain was very draining on the life energy supplies of the Nascent Soul Realm beasts. This was a barrier that used thews of over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts just to form a pseudo barrier and to cover all this space, arge amount ofws was necessary.


    So maintaining this barrier drained the life energy of the Nascent Soul Realm beasts much faster than maintaining the domain drained the life energy of Ling Tian.


    Lin Fan knew that he wouldn''t be able to fight in the long run, so he needed to do something to end this quickly or he wouldn''t be able tost.


    Ling Tian was also cautious at this time since he now knew that the barrier could even sh with his domain. This meant that his n to suppress Lin Fan with his domain would no longer work and he would have to find another way to restrain him.


    During this silence, Lin Fan decided to go all out.


    He had his Nascent Soul Realm beasts release their barrier before heading off in different directions.


    Ling Tian was surprised to see the barrier suddenly disappear, but after thinking about it, he realized that this seemed reasonable.


    After all, while the over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts working together could generate enough power to match his domain, it was surely something that was very draining when it came to life energy usage.


    It was no wonder the barrier had suddenly disappeared.


    Since he couldn''t use the barrier anymore, Ling Tian saw his chance and charged towards Lin Fan right away.


    However, even when Lin Fan saw Ling Tian charging at him, he just stood there with a calm look on his face.


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experts on the side were still stunned, but then they realized that Lin Fan was in trouble and was about to charge forth. However, before they could make a move, they felt a powerful aura falling onto them that stopped them in ce.


    Ling Tian naturally knew that these people would try to make a move, so he had spread his domain to cover them as well to make sure that they couldn''t do a thing.


    Seeing that everything was about to end, Ling Tian didn''t forget to say to Lin Fan, "Why don''t you just surrender now and save me the trouble. As long as you obedientlye with me, I promise that I won''t hurt you."<sub> </sub>


    However, Lin Fan just stood there with a calm smile on his face, looking right at Ling Tian. The way he stood there, it was almost as if he was provoking Ling Tian toe at him.


    How could Ling Tian possibly ept something like this?


    He was a respected True Soul Realm Expert and he was being taunted at by a Child Soul Realm junior like this?


    This was arge blow to his pride!


    He tried to suppress the anger that he felt, but this time it was hard to suppress all his anger. So with this bit of anger, he decided that he would show less mercy with his fists. He would still hold back enough not to kill Lin Fan, but he didn''t mind if he hurt Lin Fan a bit more than necessary.


    ? So he gave a cold snort before flying even faster at Lin Fan.


    As soon as he came close to Lin Fan, he spread his domain out again to cover the area, to cover Lin Fan to prevent him from doing anything.


    But it was also at this time that a barrier appeared around him.


    Ling Tian was caught off guard by the sudden appearance of this barrier, but he didn''t think much of it. He just thought that it was ast bit of resistance that Lin Fan was putting up and it wouldn''t be enough to stop him.


    But then he was shocked to find that this barrier didn''t just cover Lin Fan, it had also surrounded him as well.


    Not only did it surround him, the zone inside of the barrier was starting to put pressure on him. It was almost as if there was another domain that was smashing right into his domain.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he saw this since this was exactly what he had been nning.


    He had seen that his array had been able to push back Ling Tian''s domain, so he knew that his array was stronger when it came to suppression power. However, if Ling Tian was free to dodge out of the way, it would mean that he could slowly wear him down by shing against the barrier with his domain.


    So Lin Fan had chosen to release the barrierpletely to draw Ling Tian in.


    Then once Ling Tian was drawn in, he would have the Nascent Soul Realm beasts scattered around him release the array again to trap Ling Tian in. Even if Ling Tian wanted to escape, with him being stuck inside of this array, it would be impossible for him to break out.


    He would have to block the array with his domain and that would keep him from moving, which was exactly what Lin Fan wanted.


    He knew that there was a difference in speed between the two of them, so if he wanted to use the dagger in his hand, he would have to find some way to keep Ling Tian from moving. That was the second reason why he chose to use this method of baiting Ling Tian in.


    With the array suppressing Ling Tian and keeping him from moving, Lin Fan was free to use his dagger.


    So without any hesitation, Lin Fan jumped out at Ling Tian.


    Ling Tian realized that he was in a bad situation, but since he couldn''t move, the only thing that he could do was release all his life energy to increase the power of his domain.


    But it was already toote for him to do anything, even if he wanted to increase the power of his domain. He wouldn''t be able to break free of the suppression of the array in time.


    The only thing he could do now was strengthen his domain as much as he could to block Lin Fan''s attack.


    After all, the domain wasn''t just used to suppress the enemy. It would suppress all thews contained within attacks aimed at the True Soul Realm Expert, so it could be used as a shield as well.


    As Ling Tian released his domain to the max and prepared to use it to block Lin Fan''s dagger, there was a small badge that suddenly flew through the air. It prated right through the array set up by Lin Fan''s pets and flew in front of Ling Tian, stopping right in the path of Lin Fan''s dagger.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this, but it was already toote for him to change the directory of the dagger.


    The dagger stabbed right into the badge and then there was a sudden burst of light before Lin Fan was sent flying into the ground.

 Chapter 772 Liao Family’s Wedding (13)

    Ling Tian stood there in a daze, not knowing what happened at first, but he quickly realized what had just happened.


    Ling Tian looked down at Bing Jun standing on the ground and saw that he had a hand raised, looking like he had just flicked something out into the air. As for what he had just flicked, it was clearly the badge that had just blocked Lin Fan''s dagger for him.


    Ling Tian''s heart that had been in his throat fell down again and he let out a sigh of relief before saying, "Thank you, young master Bing."


    Bing Jun ignored him as he turned his gaze to Lin Fan who was lying in a hole on the ground. Huo Fei had also turned his gaze to Lin Fan and the two of them looked at Lin Fan with strange expressions.


    They could tell that the dagger that Lin Fan had wasn''t a normal thing. In fact, it seemed very simr to the items that they had brought with them when they came to this Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Could it be that Lin Fan was backed by an organization that was on the same level as their backer?


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei both deeply knitted their brows when this thought passed through their mind.


    If this was true, that would mean that he would be a great interference to their ns in the future¡­If this was true, it would be better for them to eliminate him today instead of letting him live¡­


    This became more of a dilemma for Bing Jun than Huo Fei since he still had to consider Lin Xue''s feelings¡­


    Lin Fan gave a cough and spat out a mouthful of blood before sitting up in the crater that he had formed.


    He raised the dagger in his hand and knitted his brows as he looked at the badge that was stuck to the end of the dagger.


    This was the badge that had been thrown out in front of his stab and had been the badge that had blocked the force of his dagger. It had suddenly released a shockwave that had stopped his attack and had sent that force back at him which had dealt internal injuries to him.


    Of course, with Lin Fan''s strengthened body and specialws, he was able to negate most of that damage. However, it was still enough to stop him and send him flying into the ground, creating this crater.


    It was clear that this wasn''t a normal item.


    Still, what Lin Fan cared about more was the person who owned the item than the item itself.


    Since that person was willing to throw out this item, it should mean that he''s willing to interfere in this battle, right?


    Up to this point, he had left the fighting to the people of the True Spirit Sect, but if he were to join in now¡­It really would be rough on Lin Fan. After all, Lin Fan just didn''t have enough information on Bing Jun and the red haired man.


    They had appeared out of nowhere and until recently, Lin Fan hadn''t even known Bing Jun''s name.


    So he didn''t know just how powerful they were.


    The one thing that he was certain of was that they were hiding their power for some reason. He didn''t know what that reason was, but the power that they were hiding wasn''t simple¡­


    After being saved by Bing Jun, Ling Tian immediately came back to his senses. After a chill ran down his spine, he quickly turned to Bing Jun and kneeled down before saying, "Young master Bing, thank you for saving me. It was my fault for letting my guard down, please give me another chance."


    Bing Jun just coldly looked at him and said, "Stand down."


    Ling Tian had a look like the world was copsing, but since Bing Jun had already given his order, the only thing that he could do was meekly move behind Bing Jun.


    However, deep inside his heart was a hatred for and anger towards Lin Fan.


    If it wasn''t for this junior, he wouldn''t have been humiliated in front of young master Bing like this. If it wasn''t for this brat, he wouldn''t be forced to ept punishment from young master Bing!


    But he couldn''t do anything right now, so he would keep this grudge in his heart.


    As for Bing Jun, he finally had no choice but to get involved. However, it wasn''t as if he had been idle during this time.


    He had gotten some information out of Yue Tu while Ling Tian had been keeping Lin Fan busy and he had sent the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the True Spirit Sect out to get something for him. It didn''t take them long, even if it did take a bit longer than usual since that thing wasn''t in the ce that they thought it would be.


    Still, they were able to find it in the end and secure it.


    Even if this wasn''t something that he wanted to do since he knew that Lin Xue would be angry with him for doing it, he had no other choice right now.<sub> </sub>


    So with a snap, there were three hostages that were brought over by four Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    The moment that Lin Fan and Lin Xue saw these hostages, they both revealed shocked looks before Lin Fan knitted his brows and Lin Xue revealed a worried look.


    The hostages that had been brought out were Lin Ao, Yue Qingrou, and Mo Ze Chen.


    When they had been brought out, Lin Fan couldn''t help saying, "Why didn''t you guys leave?"


    Mo Ze Chen revealed an awkward look and said, "I wanted to leave, but¡­" After saying this, he turned to look at Lin Ao.


    It wasn''t hard to understand what had happened from this.


    But before they could say anything else, Bing Jun interrupted them by saying, "Now, now, I don''t think that it''s the right time to talk about this. You should understand what it means for them to appear here, right?"


    Lin Xue looked at him with a look of disdain when he said this, which was a strong blow to his heart.


    Bing Jun revealed a difficult look and said, "Xiao Xue, I don''t want to do this, but I really don''t have another choice." Then he tried tofort her by saying, "At least this way, your family can be at the wedding with you. You would want that, wouldn''t you?"


    Lin Ao red at this young man when he heard this. It wasn''t hard for him to figure out through context that this young man was the one that was forcing his daughter to get married.


    He wanted to do something, but there were four Nascent Soul Realm Experts suppressing him. When they saw the hostility in his eyes, they immediately released their aura to suppress him, forcing him to the ground.


    Yue Qingrou immediately said, "Brother Ao!"


    Bing Jun knitted his brows when he saw this, but he didn''t say anything since he knew that this was necessary. However, after a few seconds, he still said, "There''s no need to be this forceful."


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experts were surprised to hear this, but they still retracted their aura a bit. It was still enough to keep Lin Ao from doing anything, but it no longer forced him to lie on the ground like before.


    Bing Jun gave a sigh before turning back to Lin Fan and Lin Xue to say, "As long as you give up now, we won''t do anything to them. But if you don''t¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words, but there wasn''t a need for him to finish his sentence to get his implied meaning across.


    Lin Fan and Lin Xue looked at each other, trying to figure out what to do, but they couldn''te to a solution.


    In the end, it was Lin Ao who gave them the solution that they wanted.


    Lin Ao was still being suppressed, but that didn''t stop him from speaking. He shouted out to Lin Fan and Lin Xue, "Don''t mind us! Take Xiao Xue and leave this ce! As long as you get out of here, you can take revenge for us in the future!"


    Yue Qingrou looked at Lin Ao with a surprised look before also turning to Lin Fan and Lin Xue with a determined look to say, "Ah Fan, Xiao Xue, get out of here! Don''t worry about us! We can take care of ourselves!"


    Even though she said this, it was clear that the two of them were nning on sacrificing themselves for Lin Fan and Lin Xue.


    Lin Xue had an unwilling look and she couldn''t help taking a step forward, but Lin Fan reached out his hand to stop her.


    Lin Xue turned that unwilling look to Lin Fan, but he just shook her head and pushed her behind him.


    Bing Jun could see that they were wavering, so he gave them another push, "You should surrender quickly or else¡­"


    As he said this, there were icicles that formed in the air around Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou.


    Lin Xue bit her lips when she saw this and was about to rush forward, but before she could, Lin Fan raised his hand to stop her.


    Lin Fan on the other hand took a deep breath before looking at them with a determined look.


    With a single thought from Lin Fan, there were spatialws that appeared around Lin Ao, Yue Qingrou, and Mo Ze Chen.


    Then before anyone could react, the three of them disappeared and what took their ce was Lin Fan and two of his Nascent Soul Realm pets.

 Chapter 773 Liao Family’s Wedding (14)

    This was another trump card that Lin Fan had prepared and it was ast resort, so he hadn''t wanted to use it.


    After all, by using this, it would mean that someone would be sacrificed in the end. Namely, he would be the one that would be sacrificed to get everyone out.


    He had wanted to escape with everyone, but now it seemed like he wouldn''t be able to do that.


    Still, being able to let them escape was already good enough.


    Bing Jun and the Nascent Soul Realm Experts were naturally caught off guard by this sudden change, but they all quickly reacted and were about to suppress Lin Fan. However, before they could do anything, they suddenly felt a suppressive force falling onto them.


    The same barrier as before appeared around Lin Fan again and this time, it covered all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts and Bing Jun.


    Ling Tian had been standing just out of the range of this barrier, so he wasn''t able to use his domain to help them.


    As soon as the barrier covered and suppressed them, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to pull out a dagger from his Spatial Ring. This was the same dagger as the one that he had pulled out before.


    When he had bought the dagger from before, he had made sure to buy a full set of three just in case he needed more than one dagger.


    No, he was certain that he needed more than one dagger since it was very unlikely that he would have been able to take down a True Soul Realm Expert with a single dagger. It was also very unlikely that the dagger would havested more than a few blows against a True Soul Realm Expert.


    So he had made sure that he would have spares.


    The first dagger that he had used was already broken because of the badge Bing Jun had thrown out, so he didn''t hesitate to pull out his second dagger.


    This was a dagger that could even pose a threat to a True Soul Realm Expert, so there was no doubt that these Nascent Soul Realm Experts wouldn''t be able to guard against it.


    They naturally tried to dodge out of the way, but with the suppression of the barrier, they weren''t able to move that far away. They were all still within the range of Lin Fan''s dagger.


    He swept out with the dagger in a single arc, cutting through the weapons of all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts who had tried to block his attack.


    All four of them were sent flying, but they also quickly fell down with the suppression of the pseudo domain¡­Well, it wasn''t as if they were smashed back down into the ground with the suppression.


    The suppression that was created was from a chaotic mix of differentws being forced into a certain space. As thesews were crammed into this space, they created many currents ofws in that space.


    So after they were sent flying, they were picked up by these currents and threw them in different directions. No matter how one looked at it, the way that they flew off wasn''t natural.


    After taking care of these four, Lin Fan immediately turned to Bing Jun who had also been caught up in his pseudo domain.


    The dagger in his hand hadn''t been destroyed yet, so he immediately threw it out at Bing Jun with a single flick of his wrist. After he had thrown it, he turned and shouted at Lin Ao, Lin Xue, Yue Qingrou, and Mo Ze Chen who were all together, "Run!"


    It was just a simple word, but it was enough in this situation.


    They had been standing there in a daze after being teleported by Lin Fan, but as soon as they heard what he said, they immediately turned to run after seeing that Lin Fan was doing the same.


    Of course, Lin Fan wasn''t actually going to run until they got away. He was just moving further away from Ling Tian so he would have more room to maneuver when it came to protecting his family.


    Bing Jun saw the dagger flying at him and he very calmly raised his hand, reaching out with a single finger. That finger came into the path of the dagger and he didn''t seem to n on pulling that finger back.


    However, Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows when he saw this.


    On the pad of his finger, there was another badge just like the one that had blocked his attack before.


    Just like before, as soon as the dagger made contact with the badge, there was a shockwave that was released. Then as if nothing happened, the dagger just froze there in the air, as if it had been stopped by Bing Jun''s finger. But if one looked closely, they could see that the dagger was once again stuck in the badge that had been on the pad of his finger.


    Bing Jun didn''t even look at this dagger as he just tossed the badge and dagger away with a single flick of his hand.<sub> </sub>


    He turned his gaze to Lin Xue who was running away and his eyes immediately turned cold, as well as holding a bit of worry.


    He quickly shouted, "Ling Tian, don''t worry about me! Go and get Xue''er back!"


    Ling Tian had been trying to break through Lin Fan''s barrier to attack him, but after receiving this order from Bing Jun, he immediately turned in Lin Xue''s direction and flew out to catch them.


    p Lin Fan of course wouldn''t let him go that easily, so he quickly released his barrier and used his spatialws again to change ces with one of his Nascent Soul Realm pets that was closer to his family. However, after he appeared, he had to stop for a second to catch his breath before he was able to turn to face Ling Tian.</anda>


    But before Ling Tian even reached Lin Fan, Bing Jun suddenly appeared in between Lin Fan and Ling Tian.


    Ling Tian saw this and immediately went to go around Lin Fan and Bing Jun, but Lin Fan immediately released his barrier after seeing this.


    But before his barrier could even spread, Bing Jun had suddenly stabbed a strange looking spike into the ground. Once that spike was inserted into the ground, there was a strange red lined array that appeared.


    When this array appeared, all of thews that had started filling the space around Lin Fan were pushed back. It was almost as if this spike created something simr to a domain thatpletely stopped thews of the Nascent Soul Realm pets from entering.


    But if that were true, then this spike was creating a domain that was even stronger than that of a True Soul Realm Expert like Ling Tian!


    Lin Fan couldn''t do anything else but pull out the third dagger and charge at Ling Tian himself.


    Ling Tian saw this and was about to deal with Lin Fan, but before he could, Bing Jun had jumped out to meet Lin Fan and knocked him to the ground. Since Bing Jun had already taken care of Lin Fan, Ling Tian couldn''t use this chance as an excuse to take a little bit of revenge.


    So he turned his attention back to Lin Xue and focused on capturing them.


    After being mmed into the ground by Bing Jun, Lin Fan was about to stand up when he noticed that he waspletely surrounded by icicles. They were just a few centimeters from his skin, but he had beenpletely surrounded.


    If he even made the tiniest movements, he would be pierced by these sharp icicles.


    Bing Jun let out a breath afternding before giving a sigh and saying, "Why can''t you just ept that this is something that you can''t stop? I don''t want to hurt you since that will hurt my Xue''er, but if you keep forcing my hand, I really won''t be able to hold back anymore." His eyes turned sharp after saying this and he continued, "You really don''t want to see me when I''m angry."


    He was actually getting quite angry right now.


    He had thought that today would be a simple wedding, but he never expected all these things to happen.


    These things that pissed him off, these things that dyed his wedding, these things that ruined the festive mood of his wedding!


    He really wanted to destroy everything that got in the way of his wedding, but he wasn''t able to do so. So that filled him with a rage that he couldn''t vent and he was feeling very ufortable.


    But he would endure all of this as long as he was able to get married to Lin Xue.


    As long as the wedding happened, it would all be worth it.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but before he could, he found that there were several icicles that were also ced at his mouth, preventing him from speaking.


    It was clear that Bing Jun was in no mood to talk to him anymore.


    Lin Fan turned back to his family and he could only watch as Ling Tian got closer and closer.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan was about to rush right out, even if it meant getting stabbed by these icicles, but something happened before he could make a move.


    Right as Ling Tian was about to reach his family, he was suddenly sent flying by some mysterious force. Ling Tian had blocked with all his might, but he still received internal injuries as a streak of blood came out of the corner of his mouth.

 Chapter 774 Liao Family’s Wedding (15)

    Even though Ling Tian had been sent flying, no one was able to see what had caused it.


    However, before anyone had time to say anything, there was a sword that suddenly fell from the sky in front of Lin Fan. As the swordnded on the ground in front of him, Bing Jun was sent flying back as all the icicles surrounding him shattered.


    Bing Jun retreated a few meters back beforending. As soon as hended, he narrowed his eyes to look at the sword that had fallen in front of him.


    This sword, the aura that wasing from it definitely wasn''t normal. It was an aura that seemed to exceed the upper limit of this world¡­


    If that were the case, then the owner of this sword should be¡­


    Before he could have more thoughts on this matter, there was a person thatnded on the sword that was inserted into the ground.


    This person was wearingpletely ck clothing and had covered his face with a hood, so no one could see what he really looked like, but the pressure that he released could not be underestimated. This was an aura that gave off a peerless feeling, this was an aura that made it seem like he could take on the entire world.


    At the very least, it wasn''t something that anyone here could deal with.


    But for Bing Jun and Huo Fei, his appearance had the greatest shock on them. That was because they could feel something familiar with this aura, it was something that they had felt before many times, but they didn''t want to believe it since it wasn''t something that should appear in this kind of lower realm.


    However, no matter how they wanted to deny it, it was impossible for them to deny what was standing in front of them.


    After a long period of silence, Bing Jun said in a cold and serious voice, "Who are you?"


    Without saying a thing, Huo Fei had already moved to Bing Jun''s side and looked like he was prepared to attack at any moment.


    This waspletely different from the personality that he showed before which also proved just how serious they were taking this. This also showed just how dangerous this person in front of them was¡­


    The ck cloaked person didn''t say anything, he just turned to look at Lin Fan.


    After staring at Lin Fan in silence for a bit, which made the situation even more tense, he gave a nod before turning back to face Bing Jun and Huo Fei.


    In a deep voice, he said, "How about we end this matter here today? I think neither you nor I want to take this matter any further."


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei both knitted their brows, looking like they had beenpletely caught off guard. They were almost certain that this person was here to protect Lin Fan and if he was, he would make sure that they wouldn''t be able to bother Lin Fan in the future.


    The only way to do that was to kill them all.


    That was what they had been certain would happen, but now it seemed like that wasn''t the case¡­


    Was he really just here to end this matter here?


    But even if that was the case, Bing Jun couldn''t ept it. After all, if he were to end matters here, that would still mean that his wedding would be cancelled.


    His bottom line was that as long as he could marry Lin Xue, he could ept anypromise. However, to end things here now was going against that bottom line.


    Huo Fei had rxed for a second before turning to look at Bing Jun since he knew that it was almost impossible for Bing Jun to ept thispromise. The key word there was "almost".


    That was because while they were given free reign of this mission, they still had a mission in the end. If he did anything that went against the mission, then he would be punished after they returned.


    The appearance of this unknown ck cloaked person clearly went against that mission.


    If they were to fight this ck cloaked man, their identities would be revealed and it wasn''t even certain if they could win¡­


    So it was better to ept thispromise and endure. They would endure and get what they wanted another day.


    The only thing that Huo Fei had a headache about was how he was going to convince Bing Jun to stand down. If it really came to a worst case scenario, then¡­he might even have to fight Bing Jun himself to subdue him¡­


    Bing Jun though just stood there with a dark look on his face for a few seconds before finally giving a sigh and saying, "Let''s end things here then."


    Huo Fei immediately turned to look at Bing Jun with a shocked look of disbelief. It was almost as if he couldn''t believe that the person in front of him was Bing Jun.


    But of course, he couldn''t be med since he knew Bing Jun''s personality and his obsession with Lin Xue. He really was a different person if he was epting apromise at this time.<sub> </sub>


    After another long pause, the ck cloaked figure gave a nod before saying, "Then it''ll end here."


    With a wave of his hand, there was an unknown force that lifted up Lin Fan and the others. Then before they could understand what happened, the scenery in front of them changed.


    In the blink of an eye, the ck cloaked figure and Lin Fan''s group disappeared from the True Spirit Sect.


    Once they were gone, there was only silence that was left behind.


    Huo Fei just stood there looking at Bing Jun with a shocked look, as if he still couldn''t believe what had happened.


    Bing Jun ignored him as he stared at the spot where Lin Xue had been. But he couldn''t just keep standing there forever, so after a few minutes, he turned to look at Huo Fei, "What are you looking at? Don''t you have other things to do first?"


    Huo Fei jolted when he heard this, but then he asked, "Who are you? Are you still Bing Jun?"


    Bing Jun gave a cold snort and said, "Who do you think I am if I''m not me?"


    Huo Fei was stunned again, but then he gave a chuckle and said, "Well, you seemed a bit too different for me to believe that it was you. Can you me me?"


    Bing Jun gave another cold snort before saying, "Take care of what you need to do. With that person''s appearance, it means that there''s another variable added to the n that we need to address." Then his eyes turned sharp as he said, "Find out who that person is and which Ster Kingdom hees from¡­"


    Huo Fei didn''t joke around this time as he responded with a serious nod and then disappeared.


    Bing Jun looked around at the people gathered before turning to Ling Tian and saying, "Take care of it. Nothing happened today, understand?"


    Without even waiting for a response for Ling Tian, he just turned and disappeared.


    Ling Tian and the other elders of the True Spirit Sect were left there with bitter helpless smiles on their faces. But no matter how they were feeling, the only thing that they could do was take care of this matter as per Bing Jun''s orders.


    So they turned to face the representatives of the other forces that had gathered.


    Still, no matter what they did today, there was no doubt that the True Spirit Sect would lose a lot of prestige today. As well, with four of their elders injured by Lin Fan, their overall power would greatly drop for a while.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that Bing Jun and Huo Fei were still here to back them, it could even be considered a disaster.


    But as forining, none of them even had a single thought of doing so.


    That was because they knew that the moment that theyined, the ones that would be destroyed first would be them. There was no fury greater than the fury of these two young masters when they were angered¡­


    With his bride stolen, there was no doubt that Bing Jun was in the worst of moods.


    Bing Jun was indeed fuming and depressed that his bride had been stolen, but he had been able to keep his reasoning even so. He wanted to marry Lin Xue, but he also wanted to make her happy.


    He knew that if he were to go against the ck cloaked figure that had appeared today, that wouldn''t have been possible.


    If he were to fight against the ck cloaked man, no matter how it turned out, that would be the end for him.


    Regardless of if their n seeded or not, he would be med for almost messing up the n.


    ? Once he was med for this, there was no doubt that his family would immediately throw him away. Without the backing of his family, even if he was an expert in his own right, there was no way for him to give Lin Xue the life that she deserved. Without his family, he really didn''t have anything.


    His status was one that was given to him by his family and it could be taken away at any time if he messed up.


    This was a cold hard fact that he was fully aware of.


    It seemed like he would have to start pushing his n forward to take over the family¡­


    But before that, he would need to finish their ns here.

 Chapter 775 Reunion

    After he recovered from being suddenly transported, Lin Fan found that they had been brought back to Harmony City.


    In fact, there was a crowd that had gathered around them since they had suddenly appeared out of thin air.


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to care about that.


    He quickly went over to his family and after making sure that they were alright, he let out a sigh of relief.


    He turned his attention to the ck cloaked figure that saved them who had been standing on the side the entire time. After narrowing his eyes to look at this person, he said, "Thank you for¡­"


    But before he could finish, the ck cloaked figure raised his hand and said, "That''s enough. There''s no need for that. I was just ordered by someone else to save you."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look when he heard this, but he also knew that he wouldn''t be able to get any information from this person, so he didn''t ask anything else.


    Then as he had expected, after the ck cloaked figure said this, he gave them a nod before suddenly disappearing.


    Lin Fan just stared at where the ck cloaked figure had been standing a moment ago in silence. After staring at that empty space for a while, he finally turned back to his family.


    He calmly said to them, "Come with me, let''s go to my store."


    Lin Fan believed that the safest ce to go now was his store since that was where the system''s defense system was. He didn''t believe that there was anything in this Gctic Humanity Alliance that could destroy the system''s defense system.


    After all, the system had been able to ess the peak realms of this world in the form of cultivation realms. It shouldn''t be limited to the power of just this small upper realm, so there was no chance that its defense would be destroyed.


    The crowd naturally dispersed once Lin Fan led his group away, but there were people with sharp eyes that went to report to their various factions. Naturally that included the people from the twelve great factions.


    But that wasn''t of any concern to Lin Fan.


    After leading his family to his store, Lin Fan let his mother and little sister settle down first beforeing over to talk to them.


    The two of them had been silent the entire time since they had arrived in Harmony City, but after settling down, it seemed like they were finally ready to talk.


    Naturally, the first thing that his mother did was take her two children in her arms. It had been a long time since she had seen either of them, so it was normal for her to be emotional.


    During her time at the Yue Family, Lin Xue had been separated from Yue Qingrou so that she could be brainwashed by the Yue Family to be loyal to them. However, it was already toote since there was already something else thatpletely filled her mind. Her thoughts of her brother.


    There was nothing that could eliminate that.


    Once Yue Qingrou had her fill of her children, she turned to Lin Ao who had been silently waiting on the side.


    She ran into his embrace and the two of them just stood there hugging each other and whispering to one another.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had closed the store, or it really would have been an awkward thing for the people in the store to witness this.


    As for Lin Fan and Lin Xue, they naturally didn''t want to watch their parents like this either, so they moved to the side and left the two of them alone.


    But as soon as Lin Fan came to the side, Ang and Yuki also came over.


    For some reason, Ang could feel a threat from Lin Xue, so she hade over when she saw that they were done with their family time.


    When she dide over, Lin Xue also looked at Ang with a look of hostility. It was just like how Ang could feel a threat from Lin Xue, Lin Xue could also feel a threat from Ang.


    But the two girls quickly revealed smiles and greeted each other.


    Lin Fan was none the wiser of the interaction between the two of them.


    Then there was a sudden knock on the door of the shop.


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this since he wasn''t expecting any visitors, but when he took a look, he let the people outside in. They were his friends from the Hunters Organization, the Myriad Sword Hall, and the other factions.<sub> </sub>


    Song Shu was the first to rush in as she immediately charged Lin Fan, grabbing him by the waist and burying her face in as she said in a worried voice while crying, "Big brother Lin, are you alright?"


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this, but as he looked around and saw the worried looks that everyone had, he figured out why they were here.


    They had most likely been sent by their factions to check up on Lin Fan. After all, the representatives of these nine factions had been at the True Spirit Sect, so they should have reported everything that had happened.


    Lin Fan had suddenly disappeared, so the first ce that they would check was naturally his store.


    Now that they had seen him, they all let out a sigh of relief before secretly sending reports back.


    Lin Fan patted Song Shu''s head and said, "I''m alright, I''m alright. Can''t you see that I''m perfectly fine?"


    Even though he said this, in truth Lin Fan was holding back his internal injuries. When he had been suppressed by Bing Jun, the injuries that he had suffered weren''t light. However, it was a good thing that his Nine True Sun Body Art allowed him to quickly recover. Even now, the suns in his body were releasing golden energy that was healing his injuries at an incredible rate.


    Song Shu brought her head out of Lin Fan''s chest and started moving around him, as if she was checking his body for injuries. Lin Fan just raised his hand and let her do what she wanted as she looked at the others.


    It was normal to see Wang Jian, Qiao Yi Fei, Mao Tao, Fu Ling since they were close friends of his, but he was surprised to see that Murong Yue and Bing Yu had also tagged along.


    Murong Yue was based in a city that was far away from here, so it was hard for her to have free time toe here. As for Bing Yu, it wasn''t as if he and Bing Yu were close. Rather, there was some contradiction between them because of what had happened before.


    Still, since they were here, it wasn''t as if he would turn them away.


    The other surprising person that came was the one from the Tamers Guild. It was a young Monster Trainer by the name of Chen Dong.


    After Lin Fan had obtained his Monster Trainer qualifications, this young man had started following him around, asking to be trained by him. Lin Fan had always rejected him and kept him at an arm''s length, but Chen Dong never gave up.


    The fact that he came now was surprising since Lin Fan never thought that he would have this kind of loyalty. He should know who Lin Fan was facing, so for him to stille regardless of this¡­


    It seemed like this Chen Dong could be raised¡­


    To the side, Ying Ling and Dian Lun had alsoe to see Mo Ze Chen after hearing that he had been at the True Spirit Sect as well.


    Mo Ze Chen had been silently letting Lulu treat his injuries until Ying Ling suddenly butted in and the two of them were now arguing over who would take care of him. As for Dian Lun, he just casually talked to Mo Ze Chen about what had happened.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan turned to Wang Jian and asked, "How are things with the Nascent Soul Realm Experts that you sent to True Spirit Sect?"


    That was the one concern that he had.


    After he escaped, he was afraid that the True Spirit Sect would take their anger out on the nine experts that hade to help him.


    But Wang Jian said with a smile, "What do you think? They all just came back like normal." Then with a snort, he said, "It''s not as if the True Spirit Sect would dare do anything to them since that would start a war. With what happened just now, I doubt they would want to start a war right now."


    The girls who had been ignored by Lin Fan were clearly unhappy to see that he was only talking to Wang Jian, so they came forward to say something. However, before they could, they were intercepted by Lin Xue.


    They were surprised to see Lin Xue standing between them and Lin Fan, but it didn''t take them long to realize who this Lin Xue was.


    Since Lin Xue was willing toe out and greet them, naturally they wouldn''t be against talking to her. After all, if they could befriend Lin Fan''s sister, it would let them have a better rtionship with Lin Fan.


    But as for Lin Xue, there was only hostility on her mind.


    How did her brother gather all these beauties in the short time that she was gone?


    She couldn''t allow them to get closer to her brother.


    After all, her brother belonged to her.

 Chapter 776 Meeting

    The rest of the day passed by like normal.


    The True Spirit Sect didn''t send anyone to Lin Fan''s store. In fact, the True Spirit Sect hadpletely shut themselves off from the rest of the world during this time.


    They had sent off all their guests and then pulled back all their disciples.


    They still left some people to manage the businesses that they had, but all non-essential members had been pulled back to the True Spirit Sect headquarters.


    It wasn''t just them though, it was also the Thunder Sect that had also closed their doors and called back all their members.


    It was clear that something was happening with these two factions, but as for what, that was anyone''s guess. After all, this was something that was only for the higher ups of these two factions to know, so it was hard even for spies to learn what was happening.


    Then when it came to people who had dealings with the Assassins Association, they had found that the assassins had cancelled most of their missions. The important ones for important allies were still being done, but most of the minor ones were being cancelled.


    As well, for the businesses that the Assassins Association owned, they were all being staffed by only the most minimal of staff. They were pulling back anyone that wasn''t essential to running the businesses.


    It was as if the Assassins Association was also closing their doors and locking themselves away.


    If it was just one of them, it would be understandable. Especially if it was the True Spirit Sect after what had just happened.


    Now that they''ve embarrassed themselves in front of everyone, it would make sense that they would want to close their doors and regroup. That way they wouldn''t give their enemies any openings to exploit.


    But for all three of these factions to close their doors at the same time, it was without a doubt suspicious.


    As part of the twelve great factions, the nine factions that had allied with Lin Fan didn''t miss this since they were already watching the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    As soon as they noticed this change with the three of them, they immediately called a meeting.


    Naturally Lin Fan was also invited to this meeting.


    They had seen what kind of power Lin Fan had after his sh with the True Spirit Sect and they knew that they couldn''t ignore it.


    Just the over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts was arge threat to them, but now there was also that mysterious cloaked figure to deal with?


    The Nascent Soul Realm Experts that the nine factions had sent all said that they couldn''t even sense the cloaked figure appearing. As for knowing what he did, they didn''t have a single clue.


    But what they did know was that the cloaked figure was linked to Lin Fan since that person did help Lin Fan and his family escape, as well as protecting them from the True Spirit Sect.


    So there was no doubt that the cloaked figure was one of Lin Fan''s allies.


    If they could secure the help of that cloaked figure in the uing war...


    However, that was only one of the topics that they wanted to discuss today. The other was naturally the appearance of Bing Jun and that other red haired young man.


    They had all seen the way Bing Jun had treated the leaders of the True Spirit Sect and they had seen how they had just epted the way Bing Jun treated them. There was no doubt that this was abnormal.


    The safest guess was that Bing Jun and the red haired young man were from the organization that had backed the three of them.


    But as for the identity of that organization, they didn''t have a single clue. So they were hoping that Lin Fan would have some clues for them.


    The meeting was held in a virtual space since it was impossible for them to gather all together. After what had happened at the True Spirit Sect, there was no longer a need to hide themselves since everyone already knew that the nine factions were working together after they came together to protect Lin Fan.


    However, they were all important people, so it was very unlikely that they would be able to gather together for a meeting, so that was why they were holding the meeting in virtual space instead.


    When Lin Fan opened his call, he found that most of the people invited were already present and just waiting. Of course, they weren''t idle as they were taking care of business while waiting for everyone else toe.


    But the moment that Lin Fan arrived, everyone stopped what they were doing to look at him.


    p Lin Fan just calmly sat there, waiting for everyone else to arrive even though he was being stared at like this.</anda>


    When the final person invited arrived on the call, old man Qiao took the lead to start the meeting by saying, "I want to thank everyone for gathering today for this meeting. I know that all of you are busy, but this is an important matter that we have to discuss."


    Everyone gave a nod in response to this.


    Old man Qiao continued, "Now, let''s not dy this any longer." He turned to look at Lin Fan as he said, "Little friend Lin, can you please tell us about what happened at the True Spirit Sect yesterday?"


    Lin Fan just calmly gave an ount of what happened and what his goal in going to the True Spirit Sect was.


    Everyone just calmly listened at first, but when they heard his description of Bing Jun, they couldn''t help knitting their brows. Especially after hearing that Lin Fan had already shed with Bing Jun in the Ancient Era Ruins.


    Most of them didn''t actually know about this.<sub> </sub>


    After Lin Fan finished telling his story, there was only silence that followed.


    This silencested for a few seconds before it was broken by someone who asked, "Then who was that cloaked figure that appeared at thest second?"


    Everyone turned to look at Lin Fan when this was asked since this was the question that everyone cared about the most.


    Lin Fan naturally knew this as well, but he just gave a shrug as he said, "I don''t know either. All he said was that he was ordered by someone to protect me."


    It was clear by the expression on their faces that no one really believed Lin Fan, but if he wasn''t willing to say anything, there really wasn''t anything that they could do.


    What would they even do? Try to force him to talk?


    Didn''t they already see the powerful cloaked figure that had saved himst time?


    If they even tried to do anything to Lin Fan, it was uncertain if they would be able toe back in one piece.


    Not to mention that there was his powerful master in the store that had given him over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts.


    Lin Fan had shown through his maniption of the beasts that he could even form an array that could counter their domains. That was the only thing that they had that they could rely on to suppress cultivators of lower realms.


    If they couldn''t even rely on domains, they definitely wouldn''t be able to beat Lin Fan without having to risk their lives.


    So since Lin Fan wasn''t going to say anything, they could only move on to the next topic.


    What they would do about the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    It was clear that they were nning something, but that something was the problem since they couldn''t find out what that something was. If they knew, they coulde up with some kind of countery, but since they didn''t know anything, there really wasn''t much that they could do.


    After another long period of silence after this was brought up, it was Lin Fan who spoke up this time.


    "I can offer an array to each of your factions to guard your headquarters so that the other factions will have enough time to react."


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with surprised looks when they heard this, but then they revealed doubtful looks.


    Even if Lin Fan had a powerful master, they didn''t believe that this master would get involved in this based on how he''s been acting. So they believed that this array came from Lin Fan himself.


    They were the twelve great factions that had ruled over this Gctic Humanity Alliance for thousands of years, the umted resources that they had couldn''t be looked down on.


    The array that came from a junior, they didn''t believe that it would even be able to enter their eyes.


    Still, they couldn''t just say that to Lin Fan''s face.


    So they didn''t say anything as they let old man Qiao take the lead for them, "Little friend Lin, let''s see this array of yours."


    Lin Fna didn''t say anything as he tapped a few buttons on his watch and his disy was reced with the array blueprint.


    The representatives all casually looked at this array with an aloof look, but one look was all it took to stun them. They immediately knitted their brows and then moved in as close as they could to take a closer look.


    They found that this array far surpassed their own knowledge and they would need to call their array specialists to take a closer look at this.


    When this silence appeared, Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile since he knew what was happening, but he didn''t say anything.


    After a long period of silence, old man Qiao broke it by saying with an awkward cough, "Little friend Lin, we have to take a closer look at this array, but I think that we will have a use for it."


    Lin Fan just replied with an "un" sound before sending the array blueprint to all the representatives. After he did that, he said, "Study it all you want, but remember that it''s a race against time. We don''t know how long they will take to prepare, but we do know that they will being. It''s best if you can prepare these arrays at your headquarters before this happens."


    Everyone was silent when they heard this, but they knew that Lin Fan was right.


    Old man Qiao once again took the lead for them as he said, "Yes, we''ll make our preparations."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Then that will be it from me."


    Without waiting for anyone to say anything, Lin Fan disconnected from the call.


    The representatives weren''t angry, rather that all had smiles on their faces. When dealing with someone this frank, it could be considered refreshing with all the double crosses they normally face.


    As for why Lin Fan left, he knew that these twelve great factions would have their own things to discuss, so it wasn''t suitable for him to stay.

 Chapter 777 Last Peaceful Days

    Over the next few days, nothing happened in this entire Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    After the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association locked themselves up, the other nine of the twelve great factions also settled down.


    They didn''t go as far as the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association bypletely locking up, but they started doing less business with the outside world.


    It was almost as if all of the twelve great factions were doing something.


    This Gctic Humanity Alliance ran around the twelve great factions and now that the twelve great factions wereying low, there was no way for anyone to do anything.


    The smaller factions could all smell the changes with the Gctic Humanity Alliance from the actions of the twelve great factions. If they were to take anyrge actions at this time, they would surely be caught up in something that they wouldn''t want to be caught up in.


    So no one dared to act rashly until they knew what the twelve great factions were up to.


    It was just like this that the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance fell into a period of peace. However, everyone knew that it was an unsettling period of peace.


    People didn''t even dare leave their houses if they didn''t have a reason just to avoid being caught up in something.


    Everyone knew that it was the calm before the storm.


    As for Lin Fan''s store, it was just as calm as the world outside.


    The number of customers that came to the store had dropped and for the first time in a long time, Lin Fan wasn''t able to sell all the training spots in the morning. Even as time passed and night came, he was still left with two training spots in the end.


    Even the foot traffic in the store had started to decrease as there were less people that came today.


    Lin Fan wasn''t close to the customers since he spent most of his time away from the store, but Lulu who spent most of her time managing the store was different. Plus, there was the fact that Lulu was a beauty, so people felt morefortable talking to her, much to the dismay of Mo Ze Chen.


    Lulu told Lin Fan that most of the regr customers had been called back to their families and were forbidden from leaving. They all sensed that something big was happening, so they were trying to hole up and avoid it beforeing out after it was over.


    The ones that still came to the store were people who hadn''t been called back yet, had snuck out toe to the store, or were people that weren''t affiliated to any factions.


    But even these people would stoping to the store as soon as they were either called back to their families or found a safe ce to weather out the oing storm.


    Lin Fan didn''t me them since he knew much more than normal people.


    This was a disaster that involved far more than just the twelve great factions, it wasn''t strange that these people were picking up on the signs. He didn''t look down on them for choosing to hide since that was most likely the best solution for people like them.


    Even though he wanted to hide, it was just too bad that he wasn''t allowed to do so.


    He was one of the people that were caught up in the middle of this.


    The other person should be Lin Xue.


    Lin Fan had seen how obsessed Bing Jun was about marrying her, so it was unlikely that someone as arrogant as him would give up that easily. The only reason that he had backed down before was the appearance of that ck cloaked figure.


    So Lin Fan was certain that Bing Jun would being to take Lin Xue back.


    That was why he had wanted to send Lin Xue back to the Blue Star to avoid all of this.


    Even in these turbulent times, the twelve great factions still had their foundation. It wasn''t a problem for them to send people down to the lower realms since it was just a simple transport array that they would use.


    Then when it came to guarding them, Lin Fan didn''t need any help since he could just send a few Nascent Soul Realm beasts with them. Sinceing back, he had hatched and raised even more Nascent Soul Realm beasts, so he was even strongerpared to before.


    But even with all this, he couldn''t convince his family to go back down to the Blue Star.


    Lin Ao refused to run from this and Lin Xue and Yue Qingrou didn''t want to leave them alone. But even with all their excuses, Lin Fan knew that the only reason they were staying was because he was staying.<sub> </sub>


    So he epted their feelings and he didn''t bring this matter up again since he knew that it was useless trying to convince them.


    The only thing that he could really do now was prepare for what wasing.


    As he came into the store today, he found that Ang was currently with Lin Xue and Song Shu.


    It wasn''t surprising to see Ang with Song Shu since this was something that had been happening since the Blue Star, but it was certainly surprising for him to see how quickly Lin Xue had taken to Ang.


    He had thought that it would take a while for Lin Xue to get used to Ang, but he never expected to see her spending this much time with her. In fact, whenever he tried to get some private time with Ang, Lin Xue would always cut in between them and take Ang away.


    When he had talked to Ang about it, she just looked at him before shaking her head with a sigh.


    It seemed like she was also getting tired of it...


    Still, he was happy to see the two of them getting along so well.


    After all, he had been worried about how to get his family closer to Ang, but it didn''t seem like it would be a problem.


    So he just left them alone as he went to take care of his matters.


    He had been busying himself with Brainy over the past few days, setting up surveinceworks and trying to send spies into the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    While Brainy could use her seeds to control people from the factions, her cultivation wasn''t that high, so she couldn''t control people that had higher positions in those three factions. So even with puppets in the headquarters of these three factions, she still wasn''t able to get any useful information.


    When Lin Fan came into the back room where Brainy was, he could see just how tired she was.


    She had been controlling several thousand puppets day and night for several days now, even if her cultivation had reached the Child Soul Realm, it was impossible for her to maintain this kind of spiritual sense consumption for this long. The only reason that she was able to keep going was Momonga who helped by using a secret technique to restore her spiritual senses.


    But even then, Lin Fan didn''t want her to keep up like this, so he came forward to say, "That''s enough, you can take a break."


    Brainy looked up with an unwilling look, but he shook his head and said, "It''s better than you falling down midway. We still need you forter."


    With Lin Fan''s firm words, Brainy reluctantly released her control of her puppets and put them all on autopilot as she went into the pet storage space to rest up.


    Momonga on the side didn''t say anything, but it was clear by his eyes that he agreed with Lin Fan. Second to Lin Fan, the one he cared about the most was Brainy who he had spent the most time with, so naturally he didn''t want to see her dropping down in the middle of this.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before turning to go over the reports that his subordinates sent him.


    His subordinates had also been sent out to gather information, but ording to the reports, it didn''t seem like they were getting anything important.


    The one person that he could depend on was Xu Lin, but the True Spirit Sect waspletely locked down, so he wasn''t able to send any information out. The only thing that he could send was a letter to his family that at least told them that he was still safe and not under suspicion over what happened before.


    After all, Lin Fan had been hiding as a servant of the Xu Family.


    But Lin Fan was certain that Xu Lin would be suspected once they investigated Lin Fan more and found the rtionship between him and the Xu Family, so he had advised Xu Lin to get out of the True Spirit Sect if he could.


    It was just that Xu Lin wasn''t able to right now.


    There were many things like this that Lin Fan had to worry about. While everyone was having their peaceful time, Lin Fan was incredibly stressed dealing with all these different matters.


    It was just that no one knew that the invisible hand of the enemy was also reaching out towards Harmony City.


    Early this morning, there was a batch of people that arrived in Harmony City through the public transport gate. Among these people was a person who was wearing a blue cloak thatpletely covered him.

 Chapter 778 City Lord’s Movements

    There was nothing special about this blue cloaked person, he seemed like any other traveler that had just arrived in Harmony City.


    But that was just because he was hiding himself.


    He made sure to suppress his aura so that no one would be able to recognize him, but if one could see his appearance, they would know that he wasn''t a normal person.


    After all, this was Bing Jun.


    He had investigated Lin Fan and found that he had a store here in Harmony City, which was why he was here.


    Of course, he couldn''t directly do anything to Lin Fan''s store, which was why he hade incognito.


    His target today was the City Lord of Harmony City, He Wuji.


    In his investigations, he had found that He Wuji had some kind of conflict with Lin Fan before because of his son He Yong.


    Since he wasn''t able to act in Harmony City, this He Wuji was the perfect representative for him to take action with. After all, there was already a cause for conflict between the two of them, so if He Wuji were to do something to Lin Fan, it wouldn''t raise any suspicions.


    The only problem was that this He Wuji was just too weak to do anything to Lin Fan.


    After all, He Wuji wasn''t even in the True Soul Realm.


    Even if he was at the peak of the Nascent Soul Realm, that didn''t mean anything when facing Lin Fan''s over a hundred Nascent Soul Realm pets.


    He had experienced their might personally and he knew that the strange array that they used could create a pseudo domain. The domains were the powers of True Soul Realm Experts, they were not things that any Nascent Soul Realm Experts could resist. Even if it was only a pseudo domain.


    But that was where Bing Jun came in.


    The items that he had would allow He Wuji to fight Lin Fan even if he had this pseudo domain.


    The one thing that he really cared about was getting Lin Xue back at this point. If Lin Fan were to get a bit or very injured, that was something that he was willing to ept.


    He was just that desperate.


    The only thing that he wouldn''t ept was if Lin Fan died, but he was here so he could stop He Wuji before he went too far.


    There was an unmarked carriage that was waiting to pick him up when he arrived.


    Bing Jun had already made contact with the City Lord, or rather his wife through the Shi Family.


    This unmarked carriage took Bing Jun around Harmony City in a loop just to make sure that no one was following them, but this was the most simple carriage that could have been sent, so there was no one that even noticed them as they left.


    When Bing Jun finally arrived at the City Lord Manor, he was shown in through the secret back way.


    However, once he arrived in the City Lord Manor, the low key treatmentpletely changed and he was shown into the living room like a proper VIP guest.


    In less than a minute of his arrival, the City Lord He Wuji came in with his wife and son.


    He Yong''s hands were still crippled after what had happened at Lin Fan shop that day, but the rest of him was looking much better. He Wuji had spared no expense in getting the best treatment for his son, but it seemed like it was only his hands that couldn''t be cured.


    He Wuji''s wife was the one that greeted Bing Jun first since she was part of the Shi Family, but she didn''t take up much of his time as she quickly introduced He Wuji and then moved to the side with He Yong.


    He Wuji wasn''t a fool and he could tell with a single look that this person wasn''t a normal person, so he immediately lowered his stance and greeted him humbly.


    For a proud person like him, this wasn''t something that he did normally. This was a treatment that only the leaders of the twelve great factions would receive.


    Bing Jun just waved his hand since he didn''t want to waste any time with pleasantries.


    He casually took out a dagger and some other items that he ced on the table and said, "These will let you get your revenge on him." Then after a pause, he said in a sharp voice, "But remember that I want you to capture him and the girl that I''ve told you about."


    He Wuji did have a hesitant look as he said, "My lord, are you sure that I can''t kill him? I promise that I will capture the girl that you want, but I really want to kill this person." As he said this, a look of rage suddenly filled his face and he gritted his teeth to say, "That person was the one who crippled my precious son! If I don''t take revenge, what kind of father would I be?"


    But Bing Jun just looked at him with a cold gaze and said, "No, you can''t kill him." But after a moment''s pause, he added, "But when ites to injuring him, I won''t say anything. As long as his life is kept, you can do whatever you want."


    While He Wuji wasn''tpletely satisfied with this, this was at least apromise.<sub> </sub>


    For the lord to give thispromise was already good enough and he knew better than to push his luck.


    It seemed like this girl really was important to this young master Bing¡­


    He Wuji took another look at the photo that Bing Jun had shown him just to make sure that he memorized how she looked. If he were to identally hurt her, he was sure that he would suffer at the hands of Bing Jun.


    Bing Jun seemed calm at first, but as time passed, he couldn''t help getting more and more irritable.


    He could even feel her aura in this city when he went around in the carriage earlier, but he wasn''t able to go see her which made him more and more tense.


    Seeing that He Wuji was just sitting here looking over the things that he brought out, he became even more and more irritated.


    He Wuji didn''t notice this at first, but he quickly noticed the look that Bing Jun gave him and realized what he wanted.


    But he still said in an awkward voice, "My lord, we can''t do anything today. I still need to gather my troops and prepare everything to surround the store, so the earliest will be¡­"


    He was about to say a week, but when he saw Bing Jun''s eyes getting colder, he couldn''t help swallowing those words.


    He hesitated a bit before saying, "Three¡­"


    But seeing Bing Jun''s eyes that could freeze the entire world, he swallowed those words again.


    With some quick thinking, He Wuji quickly bit the bullet and said, "Tomorrow! I promise that we''ll move tomorrow! I need at least a day to get all the troops ready, otherwise I can''t guarantee that they won''t secretly run off."


    Bing Jun still had the same cold look, but he gave a nod and a grunt of acknowledgement.


    This time, He Wuji gave him a reason that he could ept.


    If they were somehow able to escape because of gaps in their circlement, then he could only me himself for rushing He Wuji. He couldn''t let her run away no matter what, so he would have to give He Wuji this time to prepare.


    Since this matter had been set, Bing Jun stood up and said in a firm voice, "Tomorrow it is. I''m looking forward to your performance."


    Then without even waiting for an answer from He Wuji, he headed off to the room that had been prepared for him.


    After he left, there was only silence that was left in the living room.


    After a long period of silence, He Wuji let out a long sigh of relief.


    He Yong and his mother on the side had their legs turn soft as they fell to the ground.


    The pressure that Bing Jun had put on them really was just too much.


    But this made He Wuji even more certain that he was making the right choice. This man was definitely the one that would lead their He Family to a greater future.


    ¡­


    The next morning, everything seemed normal at first, but people with sharp eyes could notice different things happening.


    For one, the guards of Harmony City had all gathered in one spot in the city, the most popr business street.


    They didn''t do anything at first, but after Lin Fan''s group hade to open the store, the guards suddenly moved. They encircled the business street and prevented anyone from going in.


    At the same time, there were many groups of guards that were mobilized from all parts of Harmony City that entered this blockade.


    The people watching were naturally confused by this since the number of troops moved was enough to start a war.


    Could it be that there was a war that was happening?


    But why would it be happening in the most popr business street?


    The people all around were curious, but the guards stopped them from taking any pictures. The City Lord Manor had even restricted parts of the city''s forums just to make sure that nothing was leaked.


    All of these guards that were gathering and this information lockdown, just what was happening in Harmony City?

 Chapter 779 He Wuji’s Revenge (1)

    It was a fairly normal morning in Lin Fan''s store.


    The only problem was that there wasn''t the rush like there was every day. In fact, there wasn''t a single customer that was lined up outside of their store.


    When they opened their doors, they found that the entire street outside was abandoned.


    What was going on here?


    Could it be that something had happened in Harmony City today?


    They checked the city forums to see if there were any posts about them, but they found that there wasn''t a single thing. It seemed like no one knew if there was anything special going on in Harmony City today.


    However, after thinking about it, Lin Fan just decided that it must be because the customers had been called back to their families.


    What muste woulde eventually and it was already good enough that they hade this long.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan was already earning plenty from his Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beast trades with the twelve great factions, so he didn''t mind if the ie dipped a bit from the training quotas.


    All of this just showed how dangerous this Gctic Humanity Alliance was right now.


    As this thought passed through his mind, he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    But on the outside, the blockade started attracting more and more attention unbeknownst to Lin Fan and the people in the shop.


    It reached a peak when the City Lord himself came to this blockade.


    "Is that the real City Lord?"


    "It can''t be, right? Why would a Nascent Soul Realm Expert personally move with all these guards?"


    "No, I know that face anywhere¡­It really is the City Lord! Not only that, those are the elders of the City Lord Manor! Those are all Child Soul Realm Experts!"


    "But that can''t be right¡­Why would so many experts from the City Lord Manor be moved. Isn''t this just a business street? What would be here that would require all these experts?"


    The people around started gossiping anding up with different theories after seeing He Wuji appear here, but He Wuji just had the guards forming the encirclement chase them off before focusing on the army inside.


    He had gathered almost all the guards of Harmony City here today, he didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to escape.


    In fact, he had gathered so many guards that Harmony City''s walls were already running with a skeleton crew. If someone were to invade Harmony City now, it would immediately turn into a big incident.


    However, no one was foolish enough to invade this city that had been established by all twelve great factions.


    So He Wuji wasn''t worried about gathering all his troops here.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that everyone was as enthusiastic about this as he was. After all, he was moving the troops of Harmony City for personal revenge, this was something that many of the troops didn''t agree with.


    It was just too bad that they couldn''t stop him and could only follow the orders that they had been given.


    After He Wuji and the rest of the experts from the City Lord Manor arrived, they quickly took their ces among the troops, leading their own groups as they headed towards Lin Fan''s shop.


    All of them came right up to the shop andpletely surrounded it before He Wuji said, "Lin Fan, get out here now!"


    Lin Fan had been rxing inside the shop when he heard this noise.


    The first thing he did was naturally look out the window to see what themotion was, but after seeing that it was He Wuji, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    Perhaps if this was before, he would be worried about He Wuji, but now¡­A single Nascent Soul Realm Expert like him wouldn''t be able to do anything to Lin Fan. Even if he was in the Peak Nascent Soul Realm.


    With Lin Fan''s Nascent Soul Realm pets and the array they created, he was even able to fight against those in the True Soul Realm. Those in the Nascent Soul Realm weren''t able to threaten him at all anymore.


    But when Lin Fan was about to go out to deal with He Wuji and all the people he brought, he suddenly thought of something.


    The fight between him and Ling Tian was quite public and it should have already spread across the entire realm. Those with any kind of informationwork would be able to find out the fact that he was someone who could fight against a True Soul Realm Expert.


    It was impossible that He Wuji as the City Lord of Harmony City wouldn''t know this.<sub> </sub>


    So where did he find the courage to surround his shop?


    That didn''t make any sense at all¡­That was unless there was something that gave him that courage¡­


    As this thought passed through his mind, he couldn''t help turning to Brainy who immediately utilized the surveince system. However, a few secondster, Brainy said, "There''s no trace of a True Soul Realm Expert outside."


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    If it wasn''t a True Soul Realm Expert helping him, what would give He Wuji the courage to attack his store.


    There was no need to ask about his motivation since he had plenty of motivation after what Lin Fan had done to his son.


    After thinking for a bit, the only thing that Lin Fan could think of was vague possibilities and he couldn''t think of a single clear answer. Since that was the case, Lin Fan decided to use another method.


    Lin Fan walked up to the entrance and opened the door to the shop, but he didn''t walk outside. Instead, he stood right behind the threshold to the door, so that he was just inside of the shop, but the people outside could see him.


    When he appeared, He Wuji roared out through gritted teeth, "Lin Fan, you''re here! You will pay today for what you have done to my son!"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at him before saying, "How is your son by the way? Is he still crippled?"


    A vein popped out on He Wuji''s forehead when he heard this and he looked like he was about to start frothing at the mouth from his rage. However, he forced himself to stay calm as he said, "You will pay with your life for what you''ve done, mark my words. I will mince you into ten thousand pieces and then feed you to the dogs today!"


    Lin Fan just casually leaned in the doorway and said with a look that clearly thought differently, "Is that so? You and what army?"


    With this line, almost everyone in the city guards was angered. It was clear that Lin Fan was looking down on them.


    They were the city guards of Harmony City, elites that were chosen from countless experts and they were being looked down on by the owner of a simple pet store?


    As experts, they had their pride, but they also knew what had happened at this store before.


    He Wuji didn''tpletely lose himself to his rage, so he could tell that something was off. So after thinking about it, he said, "Ouyang, you attack first. I want to see what he''s hiding."


    The one with the surname Ouyang was the right hand man of He Wuji and one of the two Nascent Soul Realm Experts under him.


    After the past incident, He Wuji had taken out his treasures for his most trusted subordinates so that they could reach the Nascent Soul Realm. He wanted as much power as he could to kill Lin Fan, so he had spared no expense to make his subordinates stronger.


    This Ouyang was one of the two in the Peak Child Soul Realm that had broken through in the past two months.


    Ouyang raised his sword and gave a nod to He Wuji before saying, "Got it, I''ll take care of this, boss."


    Since reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, he hadn''t tested his power yet. This would be a good chance for him to test how strong he had be.


    Ouyang didn''t hesitate at all as he raised the winds around him, which immediately gathered in his sword in the form of a small tornado around the de.


    Like a gust of wind, Ouyangpletely disappeared from where he had been standing and when he reappeared, he was already standing in front of the store. With a single swing, he created countless wind des that shed out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t seem worried at all as he just stood there, watching the wind des approaching.


    Ouyang felt that something was off, but since he had already released his attack, it wasn''t as if he could stop it.


    The wind des came closer and closer to Lin Fan before stopping just a few centimeters in front of him. It was as if there was some kind of invisible barrier that was ced in front of him that had blocked this attack.


    The wind des just froze there in the air for a few seconds before suddenly flying back at Ouyang.


    Ouyang tried to dodge out of the way, but he found that the wind des were much faster than when he had released them. They were so fast that he wasn''t able to get out of the way in time.


    The only thing that he could do was use his own wind des to block them.


    But once again, to his surprise, he found that his wind des were no match for these rebounded wind des. They were scattered as soon as the two sides met and the rebounded wind des kept flying out at him without a single hindrance.


    Ouyang could only watch as the wind des cut right through his body, sshing blood everywhere. After he was cut by his own wind des, he was like a kite that had its strings cut as he fell to the ground.

 Chapter 780 He Wuji’s Revenge (2)

    Everyone from the city guards were silent since they couldn''t understand what had just happened.


    They had watched elder Ouyang attack with his wind des, but then they had also watched elder Ouyang being defeated by his own wind des that had been reflected by the enemy.


    Just how had Lin Fan done it?


    They hadn''t even seen him make a move or feel the slightest trace of life energy fluctuation.


    It was impossible that Lin Fan was able to do something without them noticing it. There was no way that they would ept that as a solution.


    But what Lin Fan had done was just use the defense system of the store.


    By standing right behind the threshold of the door, he was still technically considered inside of the store. Which meant that if there were any attacks aimed at him, he could activate the defense system of the store to reflect them at the attacker.


    That was what the invisible barrier that had stopped the des of wind was.


    Even after that Ouyang was heavily injured, Lin Fan remained standing behind the threshold of the door. He said with a teasing smile, "What? Is that all you have?"


    The city guards and the experts from the City Lord Manor were all filled with rage when they heard this, but that was what Lin Fan had wanted to see.


    After all, the defense system of the store could only be used in the store. So unless he was standing inside of the store, he wouldn''t be able to use this defense system to deal with these attackers.


    The most important thing about that was that it meant he was unable to move from his current spot. All he could do was wait for his enemies to attack him.


    If he couldn''t attack and could only wait, what would be better than provoking the enemies to attack than using his words?


    So he didn''t hesitate to throw out even more insults at the city guards and the experts from the City Lord Manor.


    "If this is all you can do, I really wonder how the peace in Harmony City was even kept."


    "Tsk, tsk, I guess a dog is a dog. No matter how big they act, there''s no way for them to bite the hands of their masters."


    With each insult, the faces of the city guards and the experts from the City Lord Manor turned more and more red. If it was possible, steam would have been shooting out of their ears at this moment, but too bad it wasn''t possible.


    Finally, the other Nascent Soul Realm Expert couldn''t take it anymore and he drew his weapon.


    He Wuji called out to stop him, but he was already charging at Lin Fan covered in mes.


    But this Nascent Soul Realm Expert had learned from the mistakes of Ouyang from before. He had seen that the energy based attacks that he had used werepletely useless against Lin Fan.


    He wasn''t that much stronger than Ouyang, so he didn''t believe that he would be able to break the barrier that Ouyang couldn''t.


    So instead of using energy based attacks, he used a physical attack.


    He charged right up to Lin Fan and shed his sword covered in mes at him.


    However, just like what happened before, the attack stopped just a few centimeters away from Lin Fan. It froze there in the air as if there was something holding it and then the sword was shattered to pieces as the Nascent Soul Realm Expert was thrown back in the air.


    He flew several meters before falling to the ground, skidding along before finallying to a stop in front of He Wuji.


    It was at this point that all of the city guards felt a chill run down their spine.


    If it only happened once, they could at least say that it was a fluke or some kind of trick, but for it to happen twice in a row, it meant that this was no trick. This was a real power that Lin Fan was using against them and none of them had any idea of how to break through it.


    If they couldn''t do anything to Lin Fan, what would be the point ofing here today?


    Even He Wuji had an ugly expression on his face.


    He had thought that as long as he had the support of young master Bing, he would be able to do whatever he wanted with Lin Fan. However, that didn''t seem like it was the case now.


    But now that he had called up all his troops and created such a big scene, for him to just leave without aplishing anything, he wasn''t willing to let it end just like this. If he let it end just like this, he would be the biggestughingstock in Harmony City tomorrow.


    Still, there was nothing that he could do against Lin Fan''s barrier¡­


    No, he still had the items that young master Bing had given him!<sub> </sub>


    As long as he had these, he would still be able to do something!


    So with this thought in mind, He Wuji pulled out a small ck dagger from his Spatial Ring. Looking down at the ck dagger and feeling the power that wasing from it, he was filled with confidence again.


    As long as he had this, the barrier that was around Lin Fan''s store wouldn''t be able to do anything to him.


    Revealing a smile, He Wuji slowly made his way towards Lin Fan.


    He walked right up to the store and stood just a meter away from Lin Fan, calmly facing him.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see how calm He Wuji was, but he wasn''t worried at all. That was because he hadplete faith in the defense system of the store.


    He didn''t believe that there was anything in this entire Gctic Humanity Alliance that could do anything to this defense system.


    He Wuji stood there in front of Lin Fan and asked, "Do you think that you''re safe by hiding in your store like a turtle?"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "You haven''t broken through the barrier around this store yet, so why are you feeling this confident?"


    He Wuji raised the little ck dagger in his hand and said, "You act so tough, but you''re just a kid who hasn''t even seen the world yet." His eyes turned sharp as he said, "Kids like you die young!"


    Then without any hesitation, he stabbed at Lin Fan with the little ck dagger.


    When he stabbed out, there was a dark energy that surrounded the dagger. This ck energy was like a cloak of death as it approached Lin Fan, but Lin Fan wasn''t scared by this dagger at all.


    Right before the dagger could hit Lin Fan, it once again froze in the air.


    But this time, He Wuji wasn''t worried.


    This dagger that he had taken out was a special dagger that had the ability to crush barriers. The dark energy that was currently surrounding it was just a fake.


    This dark energy was actually just some deathws that had been added to the de of the dagger, it was just supposed to be a cover for the actual power hidden in this dagger.


    In the hilt of this dagger, there was an array that was carved that had the power to crack barriers. This was an array that was designed by the special array masters of Bing Jun''s family, so it was strong enough to even shatter a True Soul Realm array.


    So even seeing the dagger being stopped in the air, He Wuji wasn''t worried at all as he saw the array on the hilt of the dagger lighting up. He knew that even though the dagger had been stopped, the array was still working, so all he had to do was wait for it to do its job.


    But in front of his smiling face, he found that the array on the hilt of the dagger suddenly dimmed before shattering to pieces.


    The smile on his face froze as he watched the dagger in his hand shatter to pieces as he muttered in a voice filled with disbelief, "How¡­"


    However, he didn''t have the time to say anything else as a powerful force suddenly mmed into him from in front of him.


    This was the rebound force from the defense system of the store in response to the deathw strike.


    The deathw wasn''t that powerful, but it was still in the Nascent Soul Realm. Once it was strengthened by the defense system of the store, it was enough to even hurt a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert like He Wuji.


    He did his best to block it with all his strength, but he could still taste the blood in his mouth as a small mouthful was forced out.


    This rebound force had actually caused internal injuries for He Wuji!


    He had been thrown back several meters, but unlike everyone else, he was able to stabilize himself and didn''t faint. He stood there holding his chest with a sliver of blooding out of his mouth.


    The city guards and the experts of the City Lord Manor all stood there with shocked looks of disbelief on their faces.


    The City Lord had personally attacked and even been repelled?


    Was there anything that they could do to Lin Fan?


    Thoughts of retreating and abandoning the City Lord even appeared in their minds.


    But before they could do anything, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared around them.

 Chapter 781 He Wuji’s Revenge (3)

    As soon as the barrier appeared, everyone''s expression changed.


    They lifted their hands and tried to invoke theirws, but they found that no matter what they did, they weren''t able to release their life energy or control the life energy around them. It was almost as if their powers had been sealed by something unseen¡­


    With the addition of this sudden suppression, the confidence of the city guards and experts of the City Lord Manor all fell as low as it could fall.


    They had looks of despair on their faces as they looked at He Wuji.


    They had been brought here today to siege a single store which they thought would be easy, but now it seemed like they were the ones that had been caught in a trap.


    But for some reason, He Wuji had a calm look on his face.


    It was almost as if he was still able to see a way out of this situation¡­


    However, Lin Fan wouldn''t give him that chance since he wanted to know where He Wuji gained the courage to attack his store like this. If he were to escape now, it would be unlikely that Lin Fan would be able to find him again and capture him to ask him questions.


    After all, no matter what, He Wuji still had the status of Harmony City''s City Lord.


    His position was one that concerned the reputation of all twelve great factions since Harmony City was one that they had created together.


    Lin Fan could capture him now and then negotiate with the twelve great factions, which would buy him enough time to get all the answers that he wanted from him. However, if He Wuji was allowed to escape, then Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to attack him without offending the twelve great factions.


    This was the difference between being attacked and attacking someone.


    Right now it was only self defense for him, so it was justified if he captured him. If he were to attack himter, he would be considered the aggressor and there would be consequences.


    So Lin Fan wasn''t willing to let him escape.


    Since he had already suppressed the city guards and all the experts from the City Lord Manor with his pseudo domain, Lin Fan had no fear as he stepped out of the store.


    But even after he stepped out, no one from the city guards dared to attack him.


    They weren''t even able to use theirws, what would they attack him with? Just their weapons?


    What difference would it be from attacking him with sticks.


    Not to mention that they could see the life energy swirling around him.


    If he was able to use life energy and they weren''t able to, it was no different from an adult punishing a group of children.


    So all of them couldn''t help taking a step back as they saw Lin Fan charging at them.


    In their minds, they were thinking, "Don''te over here, don''te over here, don''te over here!"


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about those small fries, his target was naturally the leader of this group, He Wuji.


    However, even when He Wuji saw him charging at him, he didn''t panic at all.


    There was no doubt that he couldn''t use his life energy or hisws or he would have released them already, so why was he still so confident and calm? Could it be that he still had something else up his sleeve?


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he thought this, but he still charged right at He Wuji with a white sword in hand.


    He Wuji just silently stood there as he waited for Lin Fan to approach.


    It was only when Lin Fan was only a few meters away from him that he suddenly pulled out another small dagger. This one was much smaller than thest one, but the aura that it gave off was also different.


    This was an aura that was actually a bit familiar to Lin Fan. It was as if he had seen this somewhere before¡­


    But where was it?


    The answer to that question was quickly given to him.


    He Wuji raised that dagger and stabbed it right into the ground. As soon as it was stabbed into the ground, there was a dome of light that appeared around him that quickly spread with the dagger as a center.


    It created a glowing space within the pseudo domain that spread around fifty meters around the dagger.


    It was inside of this space that all of the condensedws of the pseudo domain were pushed out.


    Once these condense chaoticws were all pushed out, the space inside of that glowing area returned to normal. That included the ability to use life energy again.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was just a few meters away from He Wuji, so he also felt the glowing energye over him. He could see the life energy gathering around He Wuji and immediately knew that this wouldn''t be as easy as he had thought it would be.


    Not to mention, he had made a mistake.


    He had thought that He Wuji was so calm because he had an ability to escape even with the pseudo domain in ce. He never would have guessed that He Wuji would have an ability that wouldpletely block out his pseudo domain.


    But that wasn''t the biggest surprise.


    The biggest surprise was that Lin Fan recognized this ability because it was something that had been used on him before.


    It had been back at the True Spirit Sect, when he had tried to use the same pseudo domain on Bing Jun.


    Back then, Bing Jun had also ignored the pseudo domain just like what was happening now. However, Lin Fan hadn''t seen this glowing area appear just like he was seeing right now.


    But he knew that this was still rted to Bing Jun because he could feel the same aura that he had felt from Bing Jun when he cancelled out the pseudo domain. Not to mention that giving items to his followers was something that Bing Jun did often, so this was filled with his stench.


    It seemed that Bing Jun didn''t give up, he was still determined to take Lin Xue back with him.


    However it seemed like he had calmed down and was using his brain more now.


    He had found out about the contradiction between He Wuji and Lin Fan, so he was using this to make a move instead of making a move himself.


    The only thing that Lin Fan was curious about was how did Bing Jun get to Harmony City without anyone noticing?


    After what had happened at the True Spirit Sect, everyone should have already known about Bing Jun and have put him on their watch list. If he ever took a single step out of the True Spirit Sect, he would have been immediately followed by the spies from the twelve great factions.


    There was no way that he would have been able to sneak all the way to Harmony City without anyone noticing¡­


    So how had he done it?


    But this wasn''t the time to think about that since He Wuji was already charging at him.


    With a single thing, Lin Fan was suddenly covered in several different coloured glows as he charged forward to meet He Wuji.


    He Wuji was surprised when he saw this since he thought that Lin Fan was crazy. After all, Lin Fan was only a Child Soul Realm Expert and he dared to fight him, a Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert head on?


    If this wasn''t seeking death, he didn''t know what was.


    But before they could sh, He Wuji suddenly knitted his brows as he realized something.


    The aura that Lin Fan was giving off, it wasn''t the aura of a Child Soul Realm Expert¡­No, this aura was the aura of a Nascent Soul Realm Expert!


    When did he break through?!


    Also, how long had it been since he had sent experts to attack Lin Fan?


    He didn''t believe that Lin Fan could break through this quickly!


    Even the greatest geniuses would take at least several years before they broke through to the Nascent Soul Realm!


    But this fact was ced in front of him and there was no denying it.


    Lin Fan had indeed broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm after what had happened at the True Spirit Sect. Before that, he had already reached the peak of the Child Soul Realm, so he was actually only just a tiny bit away from breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm.


    The intense fight with a True Soul Realm Expert and the Nascent Soul Realm Experts had provoked his hidden potential and he had broken through aftering back. Over the past few days, he had been stabilizing his cultivation and now he was ready to fight.


    As long as it was a fight with someone in the same major cultivation realm, Lin Fan didn''t have anything to fear.


    He had long been fighting while skipping realms to fight people, so something like this was normal for him. Let alone the fact that he now had many morews at his disposal with his new cultivation technique¡­


    When the two of them shed, He Wuji found that he wasn''t able to push Lin Fan back at all. Instead, it was him being pushed back by Lin Fan''s sword strike.


    When he looked at Lin Fan now, there was a very different look in his eyes.


    It was as if he was looking at a monster.

 Chapter 782 He Wuji’s Revenge (4)

    As the two sides shed, He Wuji found that he was being suppressed by Lin Fan.


    While he had his power and experience as a veteran Peak Nascent Soul Realm Expert, when the two of them shed with their weapons, it was always him that was pushed back a step.


    It seemed that no matter how much power he used, he wasn''t able to match the power contained within Lin Fan''s sword.


    As the fight continued, He Wuji was pushed back more and more until he came to the edge of the glowing area.


    He knew that he was about to lose, so he quickly shouted out, "Everyone, charge him with me!"


    But the city guards weren''t just standing there anymore.


    During the time that He Wuji and Lin Fan had been fighting, Lin Fan knew that there was a chance that he would have the city guards and the other experts from the City Lord Manor back him up.


    Lin Fan knew that this was a race against time.


    He wouldn''t be able to maintain the pseudo domain forever and he didn''t know how long the glowing area wouldst. In that situation, once the pseudo domain ran out while He Wuji was stalling him with the glowing area, he would be trapped in a sea of soldiers.


    Not to mention that the glowing area was big enough for some experts toe and help He Wuji fight him.


    He was already using everything he had to fight He Wuji, so if they were toe and help him, it would be very easy for them to overwhelm Lin Fan.


    In this situation, the best thing he could do was take care of the city guards while they couldn''t use their power.


    So he diverted some of the Nascent Soul Realm pets to taking them down.


    The city guards and the experts from the City Lord Manor didn''t even have a Nascent Soul Realm Expert left, but even if they did, it would be meaningless since there was the pseudo domain covering them. They wouldn''t be able to fight since they didn''t have theirws to use.


    They were no different from normal humans without thesews.


    Well, actually they were a bit stronger than normal humans because of their physiques developed through cultivation, but beasts had stronger physiques than humans to begin with and these beasts could usews.


    So it wasn''t a fight, it was a ughter.


    He Wuji had just finished shouting out for his troops to support him, but he found that not a single person came to help.


    He couldn''t help being shocked as he saw all his troops lying on the ground at the feet of the Nascent Soul Realm beasts that Lin Fan had sent to clear them out.


    He Wuji''s mind turned quickly and he knew that he had been beaten.


    It was unlikely that he would be able to win today¡­And even if he was able to beat Lin Fan, there were the Nascent Soul Realm beasts that were currently standing behind him.


    So he had to find a way to get himself out of this bad situation.


    There was only one thing that he could do.


    He Wuji stopped fighting and raised his voice to say, "Lin Fan, let''s end this here today."


    Lin Fan stopped swinging his sword when he heard this, but he didn''t respond.


    He Wuji felt like he had a chance when he saw this, so he kept pushing, "I am the Harmony City City Lord after all, this is a position that was granted to me by the twelve great factions. Unless you want to fight all twelve great factions, I suggest that we end it here." Then after a pause, he quickly added, "Of course, I will give youpensation for what happened today. I promise that you won''t be¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan had swung his sword down again.


    He Wuji was caught off guard by this since he thought that Lin Fan had been moved by his words. He couldn''t bring his sword up in time and he received a sh right across the chest.


    Still, he was able to release his defenses at thest second, so the wound wasn''t too deep, but the wound wasn''t light either.


    It would definitely be the decider in their fight.


    He Wuji panicked when he saw this and he quickly shouted, "Lin Fan, are you crazy? Do you think that the twelve great factions will let you off after this?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a faint smile before saying, "There is only one path for you today."


    He Wuji felt a chill run down his spine when he heard this, but he didn''t give up.


    He knew that there was no other choice, so he released all the life energy that he had. He was going to end this fight with an all out strike against Lin Fan, risking his life against his.


    But what he never expected was that Lin Fan would just make a casual swing to his right.<sub> </sub>


    On the ground to his right, was the dagger that He Wuji had stabbed into the ground. This was the dagger that was also creating the glowing area around them that allowed him to use his life energy.


    The moment that Lin Fan hit the dagger, it was knocked out of the ground and the glowing area disappeared.


    When the glowing area disappeared, He Wuji felt the pressure from before falling on him again as all of his life energy suddenly dissipated.


    He hadn''t been paying attention during the fight, but Lin Fan had been aware of the spacing. He had made sure to push He Wuji away from the dagger and putting himself closer to it.


    With that final strike just now, he had pushed He Wuji far enough that he wouldn''t be able to stop Lin Fan from knocking the dagger out of the ground.


    This dagger wasn''t like the item that Bing Jun had used back in the True Spirit Sect.


    The item that Bing Jun had used in the True Spirit Sect didn''t have such an obvious w as having to be stabbed into the ground to work. The space that he had created was able to move with him, so he could use it whenever he wanted.


    This dagger on the other hand had to be stabbed into the ground to create this zone. Moreover, this dagger didn''t have any protective features, so there was nothing stopping people from just knocking it off the ground to turn off the glowing area.


    Lin Fan had been paying attention to all of this unlike He Wuji who had been suppressed by Lin Fan from the start.


    That was how Lin Fan was able to easily win this fight.


    He Wuji had a bitter look on his face as he knew that he was in danger, but he forced himself to stay calm as he looked up at Lin Fan who had walked over.


    Lin Fan put his sword to He Wuji''s neck and said, "Tell me who gave you all these things and I''ll give you a peaceful death."


    He Wuji looked right up at him with firm eyes and said, "If you don''t let me go, wait to watch your store be destroyed by the twelve great factions. You won''t get away with this, I am the City Lord of¡­"


    Before he could finish though, Lin Fan flicked his hand.


    With one smooth movement, the sword in his hand cut off He Wuji''s arm that flew through the air, rotating a few times beforending on the ground beside him.


    He Wuji was in shock when it happened, but then the pain hit him. He grabbed his stump and roared out in pain as a trace of panic appeared in his eyes.


    He never thought that Lin Fan would be this decisive!


    Without any hesitation, he had cut off his arm and he had done it as easily as a hot knife through butter.


    But that did make sense since He Wuji wasn''t able to use his life energy right now.


    Without his life energy, he wasn''t able to form a barrier to protect his body.


    A sword that had life energy around it and a body that didn''t have anything, it was noparison.


    The difference between being able to use life energy and not being able to use life energy was massive.


    After cutting off the arm, Lin Fan''s expression didn''t change at all as he said, "Try again."


    When He Wuji looked back up at Lin Fan, his expression waspletely different. There was no longer the same confidence as before and there was even a trace of fear in his eyes now.


    But in his mind, he waspletely panicking.


    How did this kid who he could have crushed two months ago suddenly be this strong?


    He just couldn''t understand where he had gone wrong¡­


    But there was no time for that.


    The most important thing at this moment was getting out with his life since there was nothing more important than his life.


    So He Wuji raised his remaining arm which had his wrist watchmunicator and he tapped it a few times with his chin, calling a number. When the call connected, he immediately shouted, "Young master Bing, please save me! I promise that I''ll do whatever you want if you save me!"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    But to He Wuji''s dismay, the call had only connected for a few seconds before suddenly being cut off.


    It was clear that he had been abandoned.

 Chapter 783 Interrogation

    After being abandoned, He Wuji''s face looked like dying ashes, but there was nothing that he could do.


    Without any hesitation, he suddenly stood up and started running away from Lin Fan, trying to put as much distance between him and Lin Fan as possible.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan''s Nascent Soul Realm pets were waiting behind him.


    With a single flick of a tail, He Wuji was hit in the stomach and sent flying back in front of Lin Fan.


    To prevent the same thing from happening, Lin Fan cut off one of his legs this time.


    As He Wuji roared out in pain, some of the city guards and experts from the City Lord Manor woke up to see this scene.


    All of them had looks of horror on their faces as they couldn''t believe what they were seeing.


    The powerful City Lord, the one symbol of power for them, was currently lying on the ground screaming in pain, missing one of his legs and arms. This once powerful man was now lying on the ground looking this pitiful¡­


    They couldn''t believe their eyes, but the facts were in front of them.


    Lin Fan also noticed that they had awakened and turned his gaze onto them.


    As soon as his gaze fell onto them, they felt like they had been locked onto by the god of death.


    Without any hesitation, they immediately fell to the ground, kowtowing as they started begging for their lives.


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort when he saw this, but he didn''t do anything to them. Instead, he said, "Go back to the City Lord Manor and bring me He Wuji''s family. If you do this, I''ll spare your lives."


    He Wuji stopped screaming out in pain when he heard this and he quickly turned to re at his subordinates, but every single one of them ignored his gaze.


    To them, the most important thing was getting out of this alive. Their past loyalties didn''t mean a single thing right now.


    All of them quickly bowed their heads and promised Lin Fan that they would before quickly running off.


    As for whether they would really do it or not, Lin Fan didn''t care.


    Without He Wuji, it was impossible for his family to do anything to take revenge on him, so he didn''t care if those pieces of trash escaped.


    Lin Fan let them go before turning back to He Wuji who now looked at Lin Fan with apletely different gaze once again. There was no more confidence left in his eyes, there was only fear as he looked at this young man.


    He couldn''t understand where this young man hade from, but he did feel regret.


    If only his son hadn''t done something foolish back then, perhaps he wouldn''t have ended up like this.


    Lin Fan didn''t care how He Wuji felt, he just grabbed him by the hair and dragged him into the store.


    Outside of the street, when the guards blocking off the area saw the guards and experts that had gone into the street run out, they were all confused. But when they learned that the City Lord had been defeated and had been captured, their hearts filled with fear.


    Without even bothering thinking of a n to go rescue He Wuji, everyone just scattered and ran back to their barracks, hoping that they could escape out of this ce alive.


    When the crowd saw this, they naturally pulled out their cameras and started taking pictures that they shared on the forums.


    It didn''t take long before this entire matter spread all over Harmony City.


    Once it did, everyone began hiding in their homes.


    After all, something that had defeated the city guards and the experts of the City Lord Manor, it definitely wasn''t something that they could handle. All they could do was wait for the experts of the twelve great factions toe and save them.


    There were many different theories that had been posted about what had happened in the business street, but only those that knew inside information knew what had really happened.


    As soon as the twelve great factions learned of this, they immediately sent their representatives to Lin Fan''s shop.


    All of the twelve great factions except for the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association that had closed themselves up.


    They had wanted to send representatives as well, but Bing Jun had contacted them to stop them from doing so. As soon as he had received the call from He Wuji, he had already contacted the leaders of these three factions.


    Once he knew that He Wuji had failed, he had immediately left Harmony City and returned to the True Spirit Sect. As he went back, there was an unwilling look on his face, but it wasn''t as if he could do anything.<sub> </sub>


    Not to mention...their n was about to start¡­


    The goal that these representatives had was to make sure that Lin Fan was alright, but they were also hoping to rescue He Wuji if it was possible. After all, no matter what, He Wuji was the City Lord and if they couldn''t save him, it would hurt their reputation.


    It was just too bad that by the time that they arrived, it was already toote.


    It was a day after the fight between Lin Fan and He Wuji that these representatives arrived.


    When they did, all they found at Lin Fan''s store was the corpses of He Wuji and his family.


    The city guards and the experts of the City Lord Manor didn''t hesitate at all as they brought He Yong and He Wuji''s wife to Lin Fan''s store. It took them less than an hour to do so.


    When these two were brought to Lin Fan''s store, they had terrified looks on their faces, but they were still confident that nothing would happen to them. That was until they saw He Wuji lying there without a single limb.


    They had thought that He Wuji would save them like he had always done, but when they saw him lying there just as a torso and head, theirst bit of hope died.


    Looking at Lin Fan standing over He Wuji, they revealedplicated looks.


    He Yong had the mostplicated look since he never would have expected that this lowlymoner would be able to defeat his invincible father.


    ? As he stared at Lin Fan standing over He Wuji, he was filled with regret over his actions. If he hadn''t provoked Lin Fan in the past, perhaps none of this would have happened.


    Lin Fan didn''t care as he came over to He Yong and He Wuji''s wife. He put his sword at their necks and said to He Wuji, "Tell me everything that you know or they''ll die."


    He Wuji had a look of despair as he said, "I''ve already told you everything that I know, there''s nothing else I can tell you!"


    This was the truth, before Lin Fan had cut off his remaining arm and leg, he had already told Lin Fan everything that he had known. It was just that Lin Fan chose to keep interrogating him even when he swore that he knew nothing.


    Lin Fan could tell that he indeed didn''t know anything, but he was also taking his revenge, so he kept pushing it.


    Lin Fan brought He Yong out and said, "I''ll give you onest chance."


    He Wuji looked at his son and begged, "Please, just let my son go. I promise that I''ve already told you everything."


    Lin Fan ignored this and just slit He Yong''s throat right in front of He Wuji, letting the blood stter all over his face.


    He Wuji''s eyes died when he saw this. After a moment of being in a daze, he cursed with all his strength, "I will haunt you from the very pits of hell! I swear, I will never let you off."


    Lin Fan just looked at him with cold eyes and said, "You won''t have that chance."


    Then without even giving He Wuji a chance to say anything, he stabbed He Wuji right through the head, ending his life.


    He Wuji''s wife who had been silently watching from the side pissed herself at this moment as her fearpletely took over her. She knew that she was dead, but she didn''t want to die.


    So she used the only thing that she had left to her, her beauty.


    She lowered the straps at her shoulder to reveal more skin as she said in a seductive voice, "I''ll give you whatever you want as long as you let me go."


    She was indeed quite the beauty which was why He Wuji had married her in the first ce. It was just too bad for her that Lin Fan had already seen true beauty in Ang and the other girls, so a beauty of her level couldn''t move him.


    Lin Fan just gave a snort as he cut off her head.


    Back to the present, the representatives of the nine great factions looked at the three corpses in front of them withplicated expressions. The strongest emotion that they were feeling was actually fear since they never thought that Lin Fan would be this cruel.


    But since it was already done, there was nothing that they could do about this.


    After all, Lin Fan''s value far outweighed the value of this He Wuji.


    If He Wuji died, it would just hurt their reputation a bit, but they could still rece him.


    In these dangerous times, losing a bit of reputation wouldn''t hurt them too badly.


    But if Lin Fan was hurt, that was not a loss that they could afford.

 Chapter 784 Invitation

    After putting this matter aside, the representatives suddenly brought up another matter.


    Old man Qiao took the lead for them and came up to Lin Fan to show him a piece of paper.


    Lin Fan was confused by this piece of paper at first, but when he saw what was written on it, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    It was an invitation from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association to the Hunters Organization.


    For them to send something like this at this time, it was clear that they had finished making their preparations and were about to make their move.


    But to just send an invitation to the Hunters Organization?


    What was the meaning of that?


    That question however was quickly answered as the representatives all showed the invitations that they had received.


    It wasn''t just the Hunters Organization, every single one of the other twelve great factions had received the same invitation from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    This was a very simple invitation that just had a time and ce on it, inviting them to some kind of event. As for what the event was, there were no indications at all.


    No matter how one looked at it, this invitation was very sketchy, but this was an invitation from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassin Association, so it couldn''t be ignored.


    The main reason that they were showing this to Lin Fan was not because they wanted his help with this, but rather they wanted to see the stance of the master behind him.


    Since the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and Assassins Association were finally making a move, for them to counter that, they had to rely on Lin Fan''s master. After all, there was Bing Jun and the red haired young man of unknown origin behind these three factions.


    They didn''t know what these two were capable of or how strong the organization behind them was, so they needed some kind of backing of their own.


    This backing was the master of this store that they chose to cooperate with before.


    Lin Fan just knitted his brows as he stared at this invitation, trying to figure out just what the other side was nning. However, no matter how he looked at it, he couldn''t understand why they would do something like this.


    He had thought that their goal was to take over this Gctic Humanity Alliance, so they would eventually have to fight the other nine of the twelve great factions to make them submit under them. If they wanted to do that, they would try to at least have the element of surprise to make it easier for themselves.


    But now they''ve ruined that by inviting the other nine of the twelve great factions, which would just put them on alert.


    So why would they do this?


    Unless there was something that Lin Fan didn''t know about that was influencing their decision¡­


    But that wasn''t something that he could think about since if he didn''t know it, he didn''t know it.


    While everyone was pondering this, there was a knock that came from the door of the shop.


    Everyone turned to see a very normal person standing there, but this was a person that most of them were unfamiliar with.


    This person just ignored all of them and walked over to Lin Fan who he recognized with a single look. As soon as he was in front of Lin Fan, he took out a piece of paper that he handed to him.


    Without exining a thing, this person just said, "We hope to hear a favourable response from you."


    Then without a word, he walked out of the store without giving anyone a chance to say anything.


    Everyone was surprised by this person''s sudden appearance and sudden departure, so much so that they weren''t even able to react until he had been long gone.


    Everyone immediately turned their attention to the piece of paper that this person gave Lin Fan and they found that it was an invitation that was simr to the ones that they received as an organization, but this one was addressed to Lin Fan as an individual.


    It seemed like they were putting Lin Fan at the same level as their organizations after what had happened at the True Spirit Sectst time.


    But what Lin Fan really cared about was that beside his name, there was also Lin Xue''s name.


    This was clearly the work of Bing Jun. It seemed that he still wasn''t willing to give up on Lin Xue¡­


    However, at the same time, all of this just confused him even more since he didn''t understand what this meant.


    The fact that Bing Jun was willing to invite Lin Xue just meant that this event was safe enough that he was willing to let her go. But if this was a safe event, then it was clear that they weren''t nning on starting a fight.


    So just what was their end goal here?<sub> </sub>


    Or was he just confident that he would be able to protect her?


    Every single move that Bing Jun made confused Lin Fan more and more, but he decided to stop thinking about it. There was no need for him to waste his brain power on thinking about what Bing Jun was nning.


    After all, he didn''t n on letting Lin Xue go in the first ce.


    This was clearly a trap no matter how he looked at it, so he wasn''t nning on putting her in any danger.


    She would just wait in the store, the safest ce that one could be in this turbulent Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    As for himself, he had no choice but to go since he couldn''t avoid this.


    All these signs made it clear that no matter what happened, Bing Jun didn''t n on letting Lin Xue go. So unless he took care of Bing Jun, there was no chance that his family would ever find peace.


    Let alone the fact that it was unlikely the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and Assassins Association would ever make peace with him.


    He had fullymitted himself to one side and the only thing that he could do now was see things through to the end.


    So he gathered the attention of everyone around him and asked, "What are you all nning on doing?"


    The representatives looked at each other before old man Qiao said, "We were nning on going to this meeting that the three of them had set up, but we''re also nning on hiding our experts just in case anything happened. However¡­" As his voice trailed off, he looked at the door leading to the back of the store before looking back at Lin Fan.


    The way he left his words unfinished made it clear what his intentions were.


    Lin Fan looked at the other representatives and saw that they were all acting the same way.


    Since that was the case, then he would y along with them.


    With a cough, Lin Fan said, "My master won''t make a move directly, but he''ll provide help in different ways." Then after a pause, he added, "Let me go talk to him and see what ways he''ll be providing you support."


    The other representatives all looked at each other before revealing excited looks and giving gestures for Lin Fan to go.


    Lin Fan headed into the back and then just stood there as he started counting the minutes.


    After all, there was no master in this store.


    The master that they were looking for help from was nothing more than a lie from Lin Fan that had been made true with the help of the system. But since this was what they were willing to believe, Lin Fan didn''t mind making use of this.


    As long as they were willing to fight in the end, Lin Fan didn''t care what method he used.


    So he just stood there for around five minutes before heading back to the front. When he came in front of the representatives, he said, "My master said that he would be providing some items that will help protect you, but beyond that, he won''t be able to do anything else."


    The representatives revealed excited looks again.


    Just the fact that Lin Fan''s master was willing to provide any help at all was already a great boost to their morale.


    They already knew that there was no choice other than fighting for them, so they had already braced themselves for a hard fight. But if an expert that could give a hundred Nascent Soul Realm beasts to his disciple to control like it was nothing was willing to help, they wouldn''t turn it down.


    They were certain that while these items were small things for the expert, they would definitely be powerful items in their hands.


    As long as they had these items, they would be much more confident in the uing fight.


    Then Lin Fan added, "He''ll be giving you the items over the next few days, so you leave someone here to take them when they''re ready."


    The representatives looked at each other again before quickly saying, "No problem, no problem at all." After that, they started praising Lin Fan''s "master" and making all kinds of promises.


    But Lin Fan had another goal in having them leave someone.


    He didn''t want something like He Wuji''s attack to happen again, so he was getting these factions to leave someone here.


    Since it was an important mission, they would certainly leave someone in the Nascent Soul Realm, which would be a veryrge protective shield for the shop.


    Since they were on the same boat, he didn''t mind using them for his own benefits.

 Chapter 785 Proposition (1)

    The days passed quickly and soon it was time for the meeting set by the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    During this time, the representatives from nine of the twelve great factions had been in Lin Fan''s store a lot.


    They were waiting for the items that Lin Fan''s "master" promised them.


    To Lin Fan''s surprise, he found that they had not only sent Nascent Soul Realm Experts, they had also sent a True Soul Realm Expert in the form of old man Qiao.


    Old man Qiao had spent most of his time in the store during this period and every time he came, he always dragged Qiao Yi Fei with him.


    Whenever he saw that Lin Fan had free time, he always dragged Qiao Yi Fei over and tried to get the two of them together.


    It seemed like he still hadn''t given up on his n on getting the two married.


    However, whenever it happened, he would always feel a chill run down his spine. That chill came from Ang''s cold gaze that had pierced through him whenever he tried to push Qiao Yi Fei onto Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan who watched all this just had a bitter smile on his face.


    To his surprise though, Qiao Yi Fei just followed her grandfather. Instead of in the past when she kept running to Momonga, she just meekly followed her grandfather whenever he tried to get the two of them together.


    It wasn''t that Momonga wasn''t there, he had been sitting in the corner ying chess with Brainy as usual. It was just that it seemed like Qiao Yi Fei was ignoring Momonga now.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking, "Could it be that something happened between the two of them?"


    But he couldn''t just ask this, so he kept it deep in his mind.


    During the time that Qiao Yi Fei had been in the store, Mao Tao and Murong Yue also came over.


    Mao Tao''s reason foring was clear and she did her best toe in between Lin Fan and Qiao Yi Fei, but Murong Yueing to the store was a surprise to Lin Fan. He knew that she was certainly busy with her position in the Hunters Organization, so he was surprised that she even had time toe here.


    When he asked her about this, she said that she had been reassigned to the store to watch over him.


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but he could ept this since he already knew how important he was to the Mercenary Guild. However, there was still one thing that confused him.


    Wasn''t that the same reason that old man Qiao was here?


    If there was already a True Soul Realm Expert here, what use was it for Murong Yue toe here?


    Still, it wasn''t his ce to question what the Mercenary Guild was thinking, so he just epted this situation for what it was.


    But of course, Ang wasn''t happy about any of it.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that Murong Yue had told a half lie about this.


    She was indeed assigned here, but what she didn''t tell him was that this was after she had insisted on being assigned here. She had even brought her grandfather who was one of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the Hunters Organization to back her up.


    However, when it was time to go to the meeting, Lin Fan and old man Qiao wouldn''t bring any of the girls even if they insisted on going.


    Their cultivation had increased, with all of them reaching the Child Soul Realm, but it was still too dangerous for them.


    Even if they were much stronger, this was a meeting between the upper echelon of the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance. There would even be True Soul Realm Experts attending this meeting, so there was nothing that they could do in the Child Soul Realm.


    Of course, Lin Fan was an abnormality since he had that pseudo domain that his pets gave him, so he was able to attend without any worries.


    When they headed off, the girls all had sad looks on their faces.


    They still remembered when they first met Lin Fan and he was still only in the Fragmented Soul Realm. He had been much weaker than any of them, it would have only taken a single finger for them to take care of Lin Fan, but now he had shot ahead of them in terms of cultivation.


    Not to mention hisbat power, it was something that they couldn''tpare to at all.


    So they could only feel regret that they weren''t able to help him.<sub> </sub>


    It was almost as if he would be out of reach for them soon...


    Lin Fan headed off to the location set by the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association with an escort from the other nine great factions.


    It wasn''t an exaggeration to say that the lineup for this escort was quite stacked.


    After all, just in terms of True Soul Realm Experts, there were two of them apanying him.


    One of them was naturally old man Qiao who had been with him when he set off from the store. The other one was One Sword from the Myriad Sword Hall, who was also Wang Jian''s master.


    He came to Lin Fan''s store with Wang Jian early in the morning and they set off together when they headed out.


    Old man Qiao was surprised to see One Sword, but it didn''t take long before he understood why he came.


    It wasn''t for Lin Fan as one would think, but rather for Lin Ao.


    Lin Ao wasn''t that famous back then, but he did have fame among sword cultivators. He was regarded as one of the sword cultivators that had the greatest potential and One Sword had taken note.


    One Sword had wanted to take Lin Ao as a disciple and had favoured him very much, but it was just too bad that the True Spirit Sect got to him before he could.


    He regretted what had happened to Lin Ao, so when he heard that Lin Ao was back in the Gctic Humanity Alliance, he immediately tried to find out more about him. He was surprised to find that Lin Fan was his son, but he also acknowledged this since he had seen Lin Fan''s talent for sword cultivation.


    Only someone like Lin Ao could have a son that was as talented as this, there was no doubt about that.


    He hade to see Lin Ao and to see if he could take him as a disciple again, but he was disappointed to find that Lin Ao wasn''t at Lin Fan''s store.


    Lin Ao, Yue Qingrou, and Lin Xue had been ced in a safe ce by Lin Fan since he didn''t know what had happened. They weren''t willing to go at first, but after Lin Fan showed Lin Ao his new cultivation, Lin Ao epted Lin Fan''s arrangements. Once Lin Ao epted his arrangements, the women epted it as well.


    After all, without Lin Ao, they really couldn''t stop Lin Fan from forcefully putting them in a safe ce.


    After seeing his new cultivation, they all knew that this was far beyond the level of just going against the Yue and Liao Families. This was an event that involved the entirety of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    When One Sword arrived, Lin Fan was surprised to find that Wang Jian was also there.


    But he immediately understood why One Sword had brought Wang Jian.


    Wang Jian was the most talented member of the younger generation and he had received the benefits of the Ancient Era Ruins, so it wasn''t surprising for Lin Fan to find that he was already in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    Wang Jian on the other hand had a bitter look on his face when he saw Lin Fan.


    He had thought that he would surpass Lin Fan after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, but then he heard about everything that Lin Fan had been up to during this time.


    Not only had he been able to fight those in the True Soul Realm while in the Child Soul Realm, he was also in the Nascent Soul Realm now and had fought an established Nascent Soul Realm Expert like He Wuji.


    There was no doubt that if the two of them fought, he would be the one that lost.


    Ever since he had met Lin Fan, he had felt that he would never be able to beat him. Right when he gained a bit of confidence, Lin Fan took it away from him right away.


    Still, that didn''t discourage him as he knew that if he worked hard, he would have a chance to surpass Lin Fan one day. He still had that confidence after he had dealt with his heart demon.


    So just like this, their group headed off to the location that had been set.


    When they arrived, they found that it wasn''t just two True Soul Realm Experts that hade. Almost all of the True Soul Realm Experts of the twelve great factions were here.


    Along with the ones sent to escort Lin Fan, adding up all the Nascent Soul Realm Experts that were here, it almost ounted for most of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts in this Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    It seemed like the twelve great factions werepletely ready for war and they were expecting it to happen at this meeting.


    But to their surprise, they found that the situation wasn''t as they had expected.

 Chapter 786 Proposition (2)

    When they arrived, they found that the True Soul Realm Experts of the True Spirit Sect, Thunder Sect, and Assassins Association were all here.


    It seemed like their assumption was correct and they were nning on making a move against them.


    So it was a good thing that they had brought their own True Soul Realm Experts.


    It was 3 against 9, it was impossible that the other side would be able to do anything. But they should have expected this after they had sent their invitations, so what did they have up their sleeves?


    Were they expecting them to doubt each other and pick factions off to bring over to their own side?


    If they were, then it would be futile.


    Perhaps they would have doubted each other if they hadn''t talked to each other before, but these nine factions had something that connected them. They were all brought to the same side because of Lin Fan and it would be hard for them to convince them to betray this side.


    As they wondered what the True Spirit Sect, Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association were up to, they were surprised to find that it wasn''t them that had just been invited.


    There were also minor factions that had also been invited to this event.


    But the only minor factions that had been invited were those with Nascent Soul Realm Experts.


    There wasn''t a single faction that only had Child Soul Realm Experts invited.


    They had even somehow been able to invite two of the hidden True Soul Realm Experts to attend this meeting.


    As their name implied, they were people who didn''t care about wealth or fame, so they sealed themselves off without caring about the other world. But they were still True Soul Realm Experts that were on the same level as the leaders of the twelve great factions, so they couldn''t be looked down on.


    If they were to side with the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association, the situation would definitely be worse off for the other nine of the twelve great factions.


    After everyone had been gathered, the True Soul Realm Experts from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association didn''t take the lead to start this meeting. They just sat there on the side, sitting there with calm looks on their faces.


    They didn''t even take the time to talk to anyone else that came, they just sat there in silence.


    Everyone who saw this couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    How could they still be this calm even after everything that had happened?


    As they saw this, everyone couldn''t help feeling a bit unsettled by this as they couldn''t predict what was going to happen.


    Since they weren''t going to make a move, the other nine of the twelve great factions would.


    They approached the True Soul Realm Experts from the hidden factions to see if they could get any information from them. They found that these True Soul Realm Experts also had no idea what was happening.


    They had received an invitation from the three great factions and had been surprised by this.


    While they were able to find out what was happening outside with the informationwork that they had set up, they didn''t know about the rtionship between the twelve great factions. So they were surprised to find that three of the twelve great factions were inviting them at the same time, which was why they had evene in the first ce.


    Now they were even more shocked to see that the other True Soul Realm Experts of the remaining nine twelve great factions had alsoe to this meeting.


    Inwardly, they gave a sigh of relief that they had chosen toe.


    If they hadn''t, perhaps they wouldn''t have even known what had happened when they were destroyed by the turbulence that was clearly filling this Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But of course, the True Soul Realm Experts of the hidden faction didn''t respond to the requests of the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions.


    They didn''t know what the hosts of this event had nned, so before that, they naturally wouldn''tmit themselves to a single side.


    After all, they didn''t think that the True Soul Realm Experts of the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association were fools. No matter how they looked at it, unless they had outside help, it was impossible for them to face these nine True Soul Realm Experts.


    The tension continued to build even though no more people arrived at the venue.


    Looking around, they could tell that everyone who should be here was already here and there was no one else that should being.


    So why didn''t the hosts start whatever they were nning on starting?<sub> </sub>


    This question was then answered by the arrival of two people.


    It was a blue haired man and a red haired man.


    They walked right through the crowd without a care for anyone else, but those that recognized them immediately moved out of the way to let them get to the stage.


    Anyone with any kind of informationwork would know who these two people were. After all, they had already made a big ssh at the True Spirit Sect in front of plenty of people, it was impossible for them to not recognize them at this point.


    But the main reason they showed them this respect was that no matter how they investigated these two people, they weren''t able to find any information about them at all.


    So they didn''t know what background these two had and that made them even harder to deal with.


    After they arrived on the stage that had been prepared, Bing Jun and Huo Fei stood at the center overlooking everyone without saying a thing.


    Huo Fei was just looking over them casually, but Bing Jun seemed like he was searching for someone.


    When his eyes fell onto Lin Fan, they suddenly lit up, but then seeing that Lin Xue wasn''t here with him, they fell dim again.


    However, he didn''t let his emotions get the best of him.


    With a small breath, Bing Jun raised his voice and said, "I''m sure that all of you are probably wondering why we gathered you all here today."


    Everyone revealed a shocked look when they heard this.


    It wasn''t what he said, but rather the way that he said it.


    His tone was as if he hadmanded them all toe, rather than inviting them as equals. It was almost as if he was already treating them as his subordinates.


    When they heard this, quite a few people were unhappy about this because they could tell that Bing Jun was much younger than them. This young man was actually treating veteran experts like them like subordinates¡­


    Every single True Soul Realm Expert here was a genius among geniuses in their own generation, so they couldn''t let this young man look down on them.


    But Bing Jun ignored the dissatisfied looks that were directed at him and continued, "We have a very enticing proposition for all of you that I''m sure that none of you will reject."


    Huo Fei nodded before saying, "Of course, there will be great benefits for those of you that join sooner thanter."


    There was a hint of a threat in his voice which made everyone knit their brows even more¡­However, not a single person said anything as they waited for these two young men to exin themselves.


    Bing Jun took out a token with an icicle on it that he lifted and said, "This is a token representing the Bing Family from the Tai Ster Kingdom, one of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom."


    Huo Fei on the side also took out a token with a me on it which he also lifted as he said, "This is the token representing the Huo Family from the Tai Ster Kingdom, one of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom."


    The dissatisfied looks that everyone had were instantly reced with looks of shock. At the same time, the True Soul Realm Experts from the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association all revealed proud looks.


    They had suffered quite a few criticisms over the past few days over the fact that they had submitted to someone as young as Bing Jun, but now that Bing Jun and Huo Fei''s identity had been revealed, they were certain that everyone would praise them for their wise choices.


    After all, these two were from major factions of a Ster Kingdom!


    A Ster Kingdom, this was not something that an upper realm like them could resist. After all, Ster Kingdoms were made up of World Realm Experts, experts that were in the realm above the Soul Realm!


    Even the weakest experts of the Ster Kingdom could crush a lowly upper realm like theirs.


    But of course, it wasn''t as if experts of the Ster Kingdom would move against upper realms since that would just leave them open to attack from other Ster Kingdoms.


    Most Ster Kingdoms would use more subtle methods in subduing upper realms, just like what was happening now.


    As soon as Bing Jun and Huo Fei revealed their identities, everyone suddenly understood what was happening here.


    These young masters from the Tai Ster Kingdom were here on behalf of their factions to subdue this upper realm, to make them an upper realm that was attached to the Tai Ster Kingdom like a vassal.


    After that moment of shock, all of the experts present revealed ugly expressions.

 Chapter 787 Proposition (3)

    On paper, it would seem like a good idea to be the vassal of a Ster Kingdom since that would give them a backer in the future. At the same time, this would also provide them a path to further their own cultivations.


    With the resources that the Tai Ster Kingdom had, it wouldn''t be hard for them to help these True Soul Realm Experts break free of the shackles of the Soul Realm and reach the World Realm.


    But that was only in theory.


    The experts that were gathered here knew exactly what it meant to be a vassal of a Ster Kingdom.


    To put it simply, they would be taken in as ves by the Ster Kingdom.


    It would depend on the Ster Kingdom to decide how they were treated, but it was clear that they would be treated lower than the citizens of the Ster Kingdom since they were people that came from a lower realm. It was clear that their factions would be exploited by the Ster Kingdom, with their experts and resources carved between the factions of the Ster Kingdom.


    As for what remained in this upper realm, it would be turned into a farm for the Ster Kingdom.


    Vassal was just a nice way of calling them a farm.


    The Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association would clearly be in a different situation.


    Since they had chosen to submit earlier than the rest, there was no doubt that they would receive special treatment for their earlier subservience.


    They would most likely receive positions under the Bing Family or the Huo Family, as one of their subordinate organizations. That would allow the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association smoothly make their way into the Tai Ster Kingdom.


    This was a chance for them to move up in the world, so it was natural that they would seize it. If the other nine of the twelve great factions had been offered this, they might have also epted it.


    But it was toote to dwell on what ifs.


    They had already chosen which side they would be on, so they could only stick to it to the end.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei saw the effects that their words had, so they continued pushing.


    Bing Jun lowered his token and said, "I represent our two families to give you an offer."


    Everyone held their breath when they heard this. If there was still a chance to get out of this without having to fight, they would grasp it, so they eagerly waited to hear what Bing Jung was saying.


    Bing Jun continued, "We need your help taking back a that''s upied by the Beast Race. This will be a joint operation between four different Ster Kingdoms, so you can be sure that it will be safe as we will deploy plenty of experts." Then his tone changed as he said with a bit of righteousness, "Isn''t it our duty as experts to protect those weaker than us? Shouldn''t we work together to drive out the Beast Race from thend of us humans?"


    Although his words sounded righteous, everyone knew what his real goal was.


    The Ster Kingdom was still a society that was run by humans and the most important thing to the people up top was their own benefits.


    So they didn''t want to risk their own experts in this fight with the Beast Race.


    They went looking for an unrted upper realm to use their experts.


    So to put it simply, they wanted to use the Gctic Humanity Alliance as cannon fodder in this fight. They wanted to throw the experts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance against the Beast Race to thin their numbers before sending out their own experts.


    The experts of the Gctic Humanity Alliance knew that if they epted this offer, there would be only a path of death for them.


    After all, this was a that even four Ster Kingdoms had to work together to take back, so there was no doubt that the Beast Race Experts deployed there were powerful ones.


    It was definitely not something that they could face alone¡­


    Bing Jun saw the clear rejection on their faces of what he had just said and he wasn''t surprised.


    He already expected them to be able to figure out their intentions since it wasn''t that well hidden. He didn''t want to do this, but he knew that it was impossible to hide this matter, so he chose to reveal it as soon as possible to make it easier for them to ept and move on.


    After letting them revel in this for a bit, Bing Jun suddenly raised his voice to add, "As long as you''re willing to fight for our Human Race, I will guarantee that you will receive the glory that you deserve." Then after a pause, he deliberately added, "Of course, those of you that act sooner will receive more than the others before being decisive."


    He didn''t add anything else after that since the meaning in his words were clear.


    He just let these words sink in and let them have their effect on the people of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.<sub> </sub>


    To put it simply, he was trying to pressure them by using time against them. At the same time, he was using limited spots to force them to act against each other.


    He had basically said that as long as they acted quickly, there was a chance that these people would receive the same treatment as the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association. They would be taken in as subordinates of either the Bing Family or the Huo Family, so they would be spared the fate of being treated as cannon fodder in this war.


    He wanted them to copse from the inside to make it easier to bring this Gctic Humanity Alliance to his feet.


    At the same time, Bing Jun also looked at Lin Fan with a special look.


    It was almost as if he was trying to show off to Lin Fan so he could convince him to give Lin Xue to him.


    It seemed like he still hadn''t given up.


    The two True Soul Realm Experts from the hidden families started to panic after hearing this.


    They didn''t know what the situation was, but they knew that this was a Ster Kingdom. The Ster Kingdom was something that they yearned for since they wanted to break through to the next realm of cultivation, so even if it meant selling out the Gctic Humanity Alliance, they didn''t hesitate to stand on the other side.


    But it was different for the other nine of the twelve great factions.


    Perhaps they might have been tempted by this if this was before. Perhaps they might have even fought over who would be able to take this chance.


    But it was different now.


    They believed in the master hidden in Lin Fan''s store.


    After all, they didn''t believe that the master hidden in Lin Fan''s store wouldn''t have known that the other side was from a Ster Kingdom. Since he was still willing to fight with them even knowing it was a Ster Kingdom, that must mean that he had his abilities to take care of the experts from the Ster Kingdom.


    That must mean that the master in Lin Fan''s store came from a very powerful backing as well.


    It was likely that the master in Lin Fan''s store was even from another Ster Kingdom.


    Since he didn''t want to use them as cannon fodder and just let them do what they wanted, it was clear which side was better for them to choose.


    So, not a single one of those True Soul Realm Experts jumped at Bing Jun''s offer.


    Bing Jun had been silent at first since he thought that they were considering it, but when he saw that none of them said a thing and just silently stood there, he couldn''t help being a bit perturbed. It was almost as if they were nning on rejecting his proposition?


    Were these people crazy?


    It was clear that rejecting this offer was looking down on the Tai Ster Kingdom, so experts would be sent to destroy their factions and subdue their experts. Either way, they woulde under the Tai Ster Kingdom since there was no other choice. At the very least, they would have a chance to survive if they epted now, so what were they doing?


    Lin Fan had his brows knitted from the moment that Bing Jun and Huo Fei had announced their identities.


    He had already suspected that they came from a Ster Kingdom, but now that it had been confirmed, it was like a worst case scenario for him.


    To put it simply, he wasn''t ready to face the experts of a Ster Kingdom just yet.


    There was no master in the store, it was just him providing support to the nine great factions.


    If a Ster Kingdom really sent their experts, there wouldn''t be anything for him to do since his store didn''t have items that would allow him to deal with those experts. Rather, it did, but he didn''t make nearly enough points to buy them¡­


    So when facing the experts of the World Realm, it would be impossible for them to face them with their current power.


    But there was another problem which was that Bing Jun clearly wouldn''t give up on Lin Xue, he had made it very clear with the way he had looked at Lin Fan just now.


    If Lin Fan wanted to save his little sister, it was impossible for them to run and the only way was to fight them, taking care of Bing Jun here and now.


    As Lin Fan was conflicted by these thoughts, someone else took the lead to everyone''s surprise.

 Chapter 788 Proposition (4)

    Old man Qiao came in front of everyone and faced Bing Jun to say, "Young master Bing, we thank you for your kind intentions, but we will not ept the terms of the Tai Ster Kingdom."


    Everyone except the experts of the nine great factions had their chins drop to the ground. It was impossible for them to bring this chin back up as they looked at old man Qiao in shock.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei immediately knitted their brows as soon as they heard this and they silently looked at old man Qiao.


    As they stared at him, there was a silent pressure that fell onto old man Qiao, but he faced this silent pressure with a calm look on his face. It was almost as if he didn''t feel the pressureing from them at all.


    Of course, he was a True Soul Realm Expert, so he had the abilities of one. This silent pressure from this younger generation wasn''t able to faze him at all.


    After silently staring for a bit, Bing Jun finally raised his voice to say, "Qiao Yi Yin, are you certain about this decision?"


    There was a strong threatening tone in his voice and even more so, there was a disrespectful tone in his voice.


    Old man Qiao was in the generation above his own, but Bing Jun didn''t hesitate to say his full name. It was clear that Bing Jun didn''t respect old man Qiao as his senior.


    But old man Qiao ignored this and said, "We thank you for the opportunity, but unfortunately we are not blessed to enjoy this."


    Then without even caring, he turned to leave.


    A vein popped out on Bing Jun''s forehead when he heard this, but he also quickly turned to the other remaining leaders of the twelve great factions and asked in a low and deep voice, "Is there anyone else that feels the same as Qiao Yi Yin?"


    At that moment, the rest of the leaders of the nine great factions gave bows to Bing Jun and rejected his offer before leaving without giving him a chance to say anything else.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei were just left there with stunned looks on their faces as they couldn''t understand what had just happened.


    Were these people idiots?


    No, to be able to be the leader of these organizations, they clearly were not idiots.


    So how could they not understand the consequences of their actions?


    This was equal to cutting off all future paths for their organizations?


    Unless there was something that they didn''t know about?


    But how could that be possible?


    At that moment, they couldn''t help thinking of the cloaked man who had helped Lin Fan that day. The familiar feeling that they had felt, it was the same feeling that they had felt from the experts of their family.


    It was an aura that shouldn''t exist in this realm since it was the aura of the Star Realm! That meant that the cloaked figure was someone in the World Realm, an expert that should be found in a Ster Kingdom.


    For that kind of expert to lower themselves ande here to protect someone like Lin Fan¡­


    Could it be that Lin Fan had some connection to a Ster Kingdom?


    If that were true, they could finally understand why these factions were willing to go against them.


    As soon as this thought passed through their mind, they immediately turned to Lin Fan, lost in thought, who was still standing there among the crowd of people.


    They immediately narrowed their eyes and also fell into thought before Bing Jun gave a nod to Huo Fei. Huo Fei returned this nod before Bing Jun headed through the crowd.


    When these people saw Bing Juning over, they could immediately tell that they weren''t his target since his eyes had never been on them once while he was walking. His eyes were clearly looking at something that was behind them.


    Since that was the case, they didn''t hesitate at all to clear the path for Bing Jun.


    The path continued until the area around Lin Fan was cleared out.


    Lin Fan had been lost in thought, so he hadn''t noticed Bing Juning over. However, when the crowd around him dispersed and created the area around him, he had no choice but to acknowledge Bing Jun who was standing in front of him.


    Lin Fan carefully waited to see what Bing Jun was up to.


    However, to his surprise, Bing Jun didn''t have the same aggressive tone as he did with the representatives of the twelve great factions. Instead, he revealed a faint smile as he said in a gentle voice, "Brother inw, thank you foring."


    Everyone around them narrowed their eyes as they started looking at Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    This was someone that Bing Jun was treating nicely, there was no doubt that this was someone who was close to him. If he was someone close to Bing Jun, then he could be used to build a rtionship with Bing Jun.


    So in their minds, many people had already started remembering Lin Fan.


    After a pause, Bing Jun continued in a more serious voice, "Brother inw, it will be much more trying in the future, so you should bring Xue''er and the inws to the True Spirit Sect. I promise that I will do what I can to protect you all."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    But at the same time, this made his decision much easier.


    It seemed that no matter what Bing Jun wouldn''t give up on Lin Xue. Since that was the case, then¡­


    Lin Fan''s eyes turned cold as he said, "There''s no need for that young master Bing. Our family can take care of ourselves."


    Bing Jun knitted his brows when he heard this and he continued in a much darker voice, "It''ll be much more dangerous than you think. You alone won''t be able to protect your family. It''s better if you just bring everyone to my side and let me protect them. After all, I am the young master of the Bing Family, one of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom."


    The way that he threw his title around made it clear that he was trying to pressure Lin Fan with the power of his family, but Lin Fan didn''t crumble under this.


    He just looked right into Bing Jun''s eyes as he said, "I''m sure that young master Bing is capable of this, but our family does not need your grace."


    Then he immediately turned around to leave, but Bing Jun''s cold voice rang out from behind him, "Even if your family is attacked by others?"


    The meaning behind his words were clear and that touched Lin Fan''s bottom line.


    Lin Fan turned around with a cold gaze in his eyes and said in a low voice, "Why don''t you ask your dog He Wuji how that turned out?"


    This time, he hadpletely thrown out all courtesy and had directly called He Wuji a dog to Bing Jun''s face. At the same time, he revealed that he knew everything about the circumstances of He Wuji''s attack.


    While he did lose himself in his anger, he also kept a bit of sanity.


    He was using this verbal attack to probe Bing Jun to see what he knew and what he wanted to know.


    Bing Jun''s face turned dark when he heard this and he said, "Brother inw, these people won''t be as simple as you think." Then ignoring the whole He Wuji taunt, he added, "You won''t be able to protect them alone."


    Lin Fan just said, "Thank you for your concern, but this is our family''s business."


    Bing Jun then added, "If you think that the person who saved you previously can save you again, that is unlikely. It will be people that are stronger than that person."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows at this, but deep down, he was happy to hear this since he had finally gotten a piece of useful information.


    To put it simply, they were scared because they thought that he was connected to another Ster Kingdom, so they wanted information on that cloaked figure that had saved him before.


    Lin Fan had noted their expressions when they saw this cloaked figure and thought that this cloaked figure should be an expert from a Ster Kingdom. After all, he was able to easily deal with Ling Tian, the True Soul Realm Expert, which meant that he should be in the realm above the Soul Realm.


    So other than trying to get Lin Xue, Bing Jun was also here looking for information on this cloaked figure.


    But unfortunately for him, Lin Fan didn''t have any information on this cloaked figure. In fact, he didn''t know why an expert from a Ster Kingdom was protecting him.


    After all, he was nothing more than someone from a lower realm and had never made any connections to a Ster Kingdom¡­No, he had a connection with the Chu Ster Kingdom, but they were far away from this ce, so it was impossible for them to send anyone.


    Not to mention that Chu Ting didn''t seem like she had that much power, so it was unlikely that she could send an expert to help him.


    So where did this cloaked persone from?


    But this was not the time to think about this. Lin Fan just calmly looked at Bing Jun and said, "We''ll have to see then."


    Then without another word, he turned to leave.


    Bing Jun just stared at him for a bit before turning and leaving with a cold snort as well.


    It was like this, that this meeting was ended.

 Chapter 789 To Each Their Own Plans

    After Bing Jun left, Huo Fei shook his head and also left with him.


    The leaders of the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association were left to close this meeting with a bitter smile on their face, but they were happy to close it.


    After all, this was finally their chance to show off.


    They had been the center of all kinds of ridicule after what had happened at the True Spirit Sectst time. Even if the Thunder Sect and Assassins Association hadn''t been involved, everyone knew that the three factions were together because of how they had withdrawn at the same time.


    It wasn''t hard for them to find news that was as big as this, so everyone had started mocking all three of the factions in secret.


    Naturally the informationworks of these three factions had also picked this up.


    Normally they would deal with it by sending out their own rumours to counter these rumours, but they had been ordered to stay still by Bing Jun.


    Now that the situation was finally reversed, it was their chance to show off.


    So the leaders of the True Spirit Sect, Thunder Sect, and Assassins Association closed this meeting before starting to talk to the various Nascent Soul Realm Experts. Even the two True Soul Realm Experts from the hidden factions had stayed to talk to the leaders which made them quite proud.


    After all, these hidden factions wouldn''te out normally, even if they requested a meeting with them.


    Now that they were taking the initiative to get closer to them, of course they were happy.


    Just like this, they talked out in the open.


    But under the surface, there were people making ns.


    Such as Bing Jun and Huo Fei.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei were currently sitting in an enclosed and hidden room without saying a single thing.


    They both had knitted brows as they just sat there in silence, looking at one another.


    Finally Bing Jun broke the silence by saying, "We have to report to the family and get back up."


    Huo Fei looked like he wanted to say something, but before he could say it, he swallowed the words that came to his mouth. After another moment of silence, he nodded in agreement to Bing Jun''s suggestion.


    Their operation in this Gctic Humanity Alliance was a secret, which was why they had acted cautiously the entire time.


    Their speech hadn''t been entirely truthful.


    In fact, it wasn''t an exaggeration to call it a lie.


    The Tai Ster Royal Family had actually called on the Four Great Families to supply experts. They had to supply the experts of at least half an upper realm for their operation.


    The Bing and Huo Families naturally didn''t want to use their own experts, so they chose to invade the Gctic Humanity Alliance and use their experts instead.


    However, this was an invasion that didn''t have the permission of the Tai Ster Royal Family, so there would be consequences if they were discovered.


    It wasn''t that the Tai Ster Royal Family cared about lowly upper realms, but rather they cared about the fact that the Bing and Huo Families went behind their backs to invade this upper realm. This was aplete disregard of the authority of the royal family. It was like a p to their faces.


    If they let the Bing and Huo Families get away with this after they discovered this, their reputation would be greatly damaged.


    The key was the part, if they were discovered.


    That was why Bing Jun and Huo Fei were sent.


    They were just juniors of their families, so their disappearance could be easily exined with the excuse "they were out training".


    But if they were to call a World Realm Expert here, people would naturally notice since World Realm Experts were all important people.


    This would make it more likely that their actions would be discovered by the Tai Ster Royal Family.


    So Bing Jun and Huo Fei wouldn''t want to do this unless they didn''t have a choice.


    The problem was the cloaked figure who had appeared to save Lin Fan. He was clearly also a World Realm Expert¡­


    After their exchange, Bing Jun was almost certain that Lin Fan had some kind of connection to a Ster Kingdom. If the World Realm Expert protecting him were to interfere with their ns¡­


    With this unstable factor, Bing Jun and Huo Fei finally decided that it was time to summon help from their families.


    Bing Jun was silent for a bit before saying, "We''ll do it quickly and they''ll be able to go back right away. No one will even notice their disappearance."


    Huo Fei looked at Bing Jun with a look that clearly seemed like he thought otherwise, but he still said, "I hope so, or else you and I won''t have enough lives to cover this."<sub> </sub>


    Bing Jun fell silent after hearing this.


    Huo Fei was right¡­if they failed, it would mean their deaths.


    ? After all, if they failed, they would certainly be discovered. Once they were discovered, their families would immediately throw them away and deny all connections with them. They would say that this n to take over the Gctic Humanity Alliance was all Bing Jun and Huo Fei''s idea.


    They would be the scapegoats for this mess and would be killed by the Tai Ster Royal Family while their families remained safe.


    Neither Bing Jun or Huo Fei would allow that to happen¡­


    Bing Jun tapped a few things on a ball shaped thing before saying, "The higher ups are clearly unhappy that things have developed like this, but they understand that we can''t do anything about this. They''ve sent someone and they will be arriving in three days."


    Huo Fei just gave a silent nod of acknowledgement.


    The World Realm Expert would be arriving in three days, that meant that they would be striking in three days.


    This World Realm Expert would take care of the cloaked figure if they showed up, they would take care of the rest themselves.


    ¡­


    Back in Lin Fan''s store, as soon as he hade back, he sat down at the counter and was lost in thought.


    Everyone had wanted to ask him about how the meeting had gone, but Lin Fan didn''t say a thing.


    So it was up to Wang Jian who had alsoe to his store to exin.


    A Ster Kingdom¡­that was something that they never expected since it was just too unbelievable. However, they couldn''t deny it since it was there in front of them.


    It was only Ang, Momonga, and Yuki who weren''t worried at all. After all, a Ster Kingdom was still nothing special to them.z


    z


    They could take care of the experts from them with a single wave of their hands, but they didn''t want to expose themselves, so they waited to see how Lin Fan would react.


    Lin Fan was just silent as everyone discussed this, but then he suddenly thought of something.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan stood up and headed into the back of the store.


    Everyone who had been with him at the counter just stared at him in a daze, not understanding what he was doing. However, no one followed him since the back of the store was a private ce.


    Those that could follow him could see that he had a serious look on his face, so they chose not to follow him.


    When Lin Fan reached the back, he immediately headed into the break room.


    Inside of that room was Xiao Feng and Qing Bao Lan.


    As soon as Lin Fan came back, Qing Bao Lan had grabbed Xiao Feng and headed off into this room alone with him, calling it a "date". However, that date was just the two of them ying since Xiao Feng didn''t really understand what a date was and Qing Bao Lan didn''t want to push too much since it would put Xiao Feng off.


    Qing Bao Lan was naturally unhappy that Lin Fan had interrupted their "date", but Lin Fan just said, "Call out the messenger dragon."


    The messenger dragon that Lin Fan mentioned was the small dragon that Qing Ao had given Qing Bao Lan. It was to be used to allowmunication between Lin Fan and Qing Bao Lan.


    Qing Bao Lan was clearly unhappy, but she could see how serious Lin Fan was, so she called out the small dragon.


    Lin Fan quickly gave a message to the small dragon who headed off right away.


    It didn''t take long before that small dragon hade back with a reply.


    Seeing this reply, Lin Fan gave a nod and headed out of the room.


    The reply that he had received was a date and time, it was about a meeting that Lin Fan had set up with Qing Ao. Of course, it wasn''t just with Qing Ao, it was also with the True Soul Realm Beasts that lived in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    This was the final battle, so there was no need for Lin Fan to hide his alliance with the True Soul Realm Beasts anymore.


    Not to mention that the other side was from a Ster Kingdom, so they would certainly have their tricks.


    They would need all the help that they could get on their side and it was finally time to bring out these True Soul Realm Beasts.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t certain how this meeting would go, so he couldn''t help feeling a bit worried.


    He was still confident about having a way to escape in the end because of his shop, but without having toe to that, he didn''t want to use that method¡­

 Chapter 790 Meeting With The True Soul Realm Beasts (1)

    The next morning, Lin Fan left the store to Mo Ze Chen and Lulu before heading off with Ang, Yuki, and Momonga.


    He didn''t bring anyone else with him because he knew that it would be useless to bring anyone else with him.


    The ones that he was about to meet were True Soul Realm Beasts, it wasn''t something that normal people could meet. If he were to bring normal people, they wouldn''t even be able to face the pressure of these True Soul Realm Beasts, let alone meet them.


    So he chose to go with the ones that he knew would be able to face them.


    After all, Ang, Yuki, and Momonga were all from much higher realms than this Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    The meeting was set for Qing Ao''s manor in the Kunlun Mountains, so it didn''t take long for Lin Fan to arrive.


    As soon as he did, he was greeted by two dragonoid butlers.


    These dragonoids weren''t actually half humans and half dragons, but rather they were dragons that had transformed into human form. They just weren''t that used to transforming which caused this half human and half dragon form.


    From their auras, Lin Fan could tell that these dragonoids were both in the High Nascent Soul Realm, only being a bit away from the Peak Nascent Soul Realm.


    However, even with how powerful these two dragonoids were, they still showed Lin Fan respect.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by how powerful these two dragonoids were though. What he was surprised by was the fact that he had been greeted by the two of them instead of by Qing Ao like every other time that he had visited.


    However, it made sense when he thought about it.


    Qing Ao had his prestige as the master of this pce, it wasn''t as if he could go out and meet his guests in a serious situation like this. So it was normal that he would send his subordinates to greet the guests.


    As they headed in, Lin Fan saw two figures that he was familiar with.


    It was Feng Ling and Lei Ting that he had met before, the ones with the true Phoenix and Qilin Bloodlines.


    But once again, it wasn''t strange that they would be here since they were among the True Soul Realm Beasts that lived in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Both of them just gave Lin Fan a slight nod of acknowledgement before heading into the meeting hall.


    The others who had been invited saw this and couldn''t help looking more carefully at Lin Fan. None of them recognized Lin Fan, but they could figure that he wasn''t normal if he was invited to this meeting.


    After all, everyone that was here was one of the True Soul Realm Beasts that lived in this Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    The only strange thing was that they couldn''t sense a single trace of beast auraing from this person. It was almost as if this person was aplete human¡­


    But that shouldn''t be likely since this was a meeting of beasts and Qing Ao wouldn''t be crazy enough to invite a human here. The most likely exnation was that this person was just very good at hiding his energy, so they couldn''t sense his beast aura.


    What they didn''t expect was that it was the former and not thetter.


    Qing Ao was just crazy enough to invite a human here. Not only that, he had even put the human in the seat of honour, as if he wanted everyone to pay attention to this human.


    Of course, not everyone knew that Lin Fan was a human at first.


    At first, they were just curious about this young man that Qing Ao had invited to their meeting.


    Qing Ao was the one that started the meeting by saying, "I''m sure that many of you are curious about why I''ve called this meeting."


    The True Soul Realm Beasts in human form looked at each other before nodding in agreement.


    Qing Ao paused before saying, "I''m sure that you have all been attacked by humans during this time."


    Everyone''s eyes turned sharp when they heard this.


    This was also true, there had been many attacks by the humans during this time. Even their children had been targeted which was something that normally didn''t happen. It seemed like the humans wanted to go all out against them this time.


    Qing Ao also noticed this as he continued, "It seems that something has been happening among the humans during this time. It isn''t that all the humans are plotting against us, but a faction among the humans."


    Everyone exploded when they heard this.<sub> </sub>


    One beast in the form of a young man shouted, "Is that any different from usual? The humans all want to take care of us, so it isn''t anything different for them to attack us. We can''t trust the humans at all."


    Another beast in the form of an old man said, "That''s right, the humans have been our enemies since ancient times. It isn''t as if they will change their thoughts now."


    A beast in the form of a young woman said, "That''s not true. In the beginning, the humans have always tried to cooperate with our Myriad Races. It''s just that recently¡­"


    Qing Ao took over at this time and said, "That''s right, the humans have tried to cooperate with our Myriad Races before. However, during this time, that has all changed." He stopped there before turning to Lin Fan and saying, "I''ve brought someone that can help us with this."


    Everyone turned their attention to Lin Fan right away.


    They had already been curious about this young man who had been brought to this meeting. They hadn''t been able to see through him at all, so they were already wondering who he was.


    But then the ones with sharper minds among them realized that something was off.


    For Qing Ao to say all this and then introduce Lin Fan at this time, didn''t that mean¡­?


    The ones that had this thought immediately turned their eyes back to Qing Ao, but this time, there was a hostile look in their eyes.


    One of them said in a low voice, "Qing Ao, what is the meaning of this? Did you betray us to the humans?"


    Qing Ao just calmly looked at this person and said, "Wait and hear what this young man has to say first before making your conclusions."


    There were people who still didn''t understand the situation that were confused by these words, but they could tell that something was off. All of them had vignt looks in their eyes as they turned to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Ie here on behalf of the humans to talk to you all. This is a fight that doesn''t just involve us humans, but rather everyone who lives on the Gctic Humanity Alliance."


    Lin Fan said these words calmly, but all the True Soul Realm Beasts that heard them reacted the same. They didn''t bother listening to the rest of Lin Fan''s words as they all jumped out of their seats and transformed into their true form.


    All of them turned their eyes to Qing Ao as one of them said, "Qing Ao, did you really betray us? Do you think that you''ll get away with this?"


    There were a total of seven True Soul Realm Beasts that hade today.


    Five of them were new beasts and two of them were Feng Ling and Lei Ting.


    Seeing the others transform into their beast forms, Feng Ling and Lei Ting also got out of their chairs and came to Qing Ao''s side, preparing to fight against the rest of them.


    However, Qing Ao quickly raised his hands and said in a calm voice, "Everyone calm down, this is not the time to be fighting amongst ourselves. I urge you to finish listening to what this young man has to say before you make a decision."


    The other True Soul Realm Beasts hesitated when they saw this.


    Qing Ao was too calm even when facing all of them like this. If he really had betrayed them, wouldn''t he panic a little about the fact that he had already been exposed?


    For him to act this calmly, perhaps there was more than meets the eyes.


    Not to mention that they were wary of the three behind the young man. They could feel a strange auraing from the three of them, as if they wouldn''t be a match for them if they were to fight.


    All of this told them that it was better to calm down and observe the situation first before acting.


    Once they calmed down and returned to their seats, Lin Fan said, "I''m sure that all of you are unaware of the situation between us humans, so let me give you an exnation so you understand better."


    After giving a sigh, Lin Fan said, "It''s very simple actually, we''re being invaded by someone else. As for who that is, it''s a group from the Tai Ster Kingdom."


    When the True Soul Realm Beasts heard the words "Ster Kingdom", they all revealed shocked looks. Even if they were demon beasts, they still understood what the concept of a "Ster Kingdom" meant.


    In short, what the concept of a "Ster Kingdom" meant was more powerful experts than the ones that ruled over this realm.


    If they were invading this Gctic Humanity Alliance, they were sure that there weren''t any benefits for them as True Soul Realm Beasts.


    If the invaders were lenient, perhaps they would be left alone. But if the invaders weren''t, then they would be killed for their materials or even enved by the invaders.


    To put it simply, this was a disaster for them.

 Chapter 791 Meeting With The True Soul Realm Beasts (2)

    After a long period of silence, one of the True Soul Realm Beasts said, "We have to leave this upper realm right away."


    The other True Soul Realm Beasts were surprised by this suggestion, but after thinking about it, they all nodded in agreement to this suggestion.


    After all, it wasn''t as if they could fight the invading Ster Kingdom experts. Since they were nothing more than demon beasts that were living in this upper realm, there was no need for them to stay.


    But to say that they could just leave everything behind was a lie.


    They had already been in this Gctic Humanity Alliance for a while, so they had built their foundation here. Even if they had to leave one day, most of their subordinates and families were still here.


    If they left on their own, it would be easier for them since they could n out everything for their people. However, by being forced to leave, that would mean that they would have to sacrifice some of their people to leave behind since they couldn''t just move everyone that easily.


    So there was still a very hard choice in front of them since they still had to pick who to take and who to leave¡­


    As they fell into deep thought, Lin Fan cut in by saying, "There''s always another option that you haven''t considered yet."


    The True Soul Realm Beasts were pulled out of their thoughts and turned their attention back to Lin Fan.


    One of them couldn''t help knitting their brows as they asked, "And who are you that we should listen to what you have to say?"


    Lin Fan just calmly exined, "I''m someone that can help you contact the twelve great factions and work with them to resist the invaders from the Ster Kingdom."


    Another one of the True Soul Realm Beasts gave a snort as he said, "Work them them? Don''t you mean work for them?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''m here with sincerity, I hope that you can see that. We really do want to work with you since we can''t take care of the invaders by ourselves."


    The True Soul Realm Beasts still looked like they clearly didn''t believe Lin Fan, but that couldn''t be med on them. The reason why they were hiding in their respective territories was because they had been forced there by the humans in the first ce.


    Even if they had reached a non-aggression agreement with the twelve great factions, it was still a fact that humans and beasts had never gotten along well in the first ce. Even though they weren''t from the Beast Race per say and were from the Myriad Races.


    The difference between the Beast Race and the Myriad Race was that the Beast Race contained all demon beasts, but the Myriad Races were races of creatures that had established themselves as distinct ns. They were usually very powerful and had high intelligence, which allowed them to distinguish themselves from the normal demon beasts.


    Take the Dragon Race, the Phoenix Race, and the Qilin Race as an example.


    They didn''t belong to the Beast Race and had even fought with the humans against the Beast Race in the past.


    So that was why Lin Fan felt that it was possible to work with these True Soul Realm Beasts against the Tai Ster Kingdom.


    But there was still the fact that these True Soul Realm Beasts didn''t trust Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan understood this and took out a token that he ced on the table in front of him.


    As soon as the True Soul Realm Beasts saw this token, their expressions immediately changed.


    It wasn''t because of the token itself, but rather because of the aura that wasing from it. It was the aura of a True Soul Realm Expert, which meant that this token had belonged to a True Soul Realm Expert.


    When they looked at it closely, they immediately recognized where it was from.


    They had been in the Gctic Humanity Alliance for some time, so naturally they had an understanding of the power dynamic here. They also recognized the tokens of the influential factions, including the one that was ced in front of them now.


    This token was from the Hunters Organization and it was from one of the True Soul Realm Experts of the Hunters Organization!


    As they realized this, the True Soul Realm Beasts looked at Lin Fan with a different expression.


    It seemed that this kid''s background wasn''t as simple as they thought.


    With this, he was indeed worthy of talking to them, but it was just talking to them. As for proposing some kind of cooperation, this wasn''t enough.


    So the True Soul Realm Beasts calmed down a bit and one of them took the lead to say, "This isn''t enough to make us listen to you. But at the very least, we''ll hear what you have to say."


    It was just too bad that this wasn''t everything that Lin Fan had prepared.


    He didn''t say anything as he took out another token that he ced on the table.


    When they saw this token, the shocked looks once again reappeared on their faces.<sub> </sub>


    This was because this was another True Soul Realm Expert''s token, but this time it wasn''t from the Hunters Organization. This time, it was a True Soul Realm Expert''s token from the Alchemy King Hall.


    All of the True Soul Realm Beasts immediately knitted their brows after recovering from their shock and they turned their attention to Lin Fan.


    One token might have been enough to draw some attention, but two tokens was just abnormal.


    Just who was this person?


    The same True Soul Realm Beast from before forced himself to calm down and said, "While you may have these tokens, you can''t¡­"


    Before he could finish his words though, Lin Fan had already taken out another token to ce on the table.


    This time, the True Soul Realm Beastspletely copsed since they couldn''t take the shock of this third token.


    As expected, it was the token of another True Soul Realm Expert and as expected it came from a third faction. This time, the True Soul Realm Expert''s token came from the Tamers Guild.


    Since he had these three tokens, that meant that he had three of the twelve great factions backing him¡­What kind of a concept was this?


    There had never been three factions that had worked together before as far as they knew. But that was because they didn''t involve themselves in the matter of the Gctic Humanity Alliance and didn''t know about the collusion between the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    They relied purely on rumours to get their information since they isted themselves.


    But they knew that cooperation between three of the twelve great factions was more than enough to change the entire power dynamic of the entire Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    So they couldn''t help being moved by the appearance of these three tokens.


    It was just too bad for them that Lin Fan didn''t end it with just these three tokens.


    One by one, he took out six more tokens and each one of these tokens was the token of a True Soul Realm Expert from a different faction.


    The Myriad Sword Hall, the Ice Goddess Pce, the Dian Family, the Chu Family, the Ying Family, and the Zu Family. With these six factions added in, these were the tokens of nine of the twelve great factions.


    To put it in other words, that meant that nine of the twelve great factions were currently backing Lin Fan.


    The only ones missing were the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    Even Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting were shocked when they saw this. They never thought that Lin Fan would have so many factions standing behind him. Though at the same time, they were a bit excited.


    There was no escaping for them since they had already been escaping from something else in the first ce. The ce that they had escaped to was this Gctic Humanity Alliance, so they wouldn''t be able to leave it without alerting the people chasing them.


    That meant that they had no choice but to face the invaders from the Tai Ster Kingdom.


    They were naturally worried since these were the experts from a Ster Kingdom, not something that they could face. However, seeing that nine of the twelve great factions were behind Lin Fan, they felt much better.


    This at least meant that the humans of this realm hadn''t given up yet and were determined to fight the Ster Kingdom. This at least gave them some allies to fight the Ster Kingdom with.


    As for the remaining three factions, they knew better than to ask questions. After all, the answers that they would get most likely wouldn''t be the answers they wanted to hear¡­


    Seeing that these tokens had the effect that he had wanted them to have, Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod deep down.


    He had rushed to get these tokens yesterday beforeing to this meeting. He knew that he needed something big to get the True Soul Realm Beasts on their side since they weren''t like Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting, they wouldn''te to their side because they had no choice.


    So Lin Fan had the members of the twelve great factions that were on his side to prepare these tokens.


    The twelve great factions'' prestige was there, so it was perfect for him to use.


    Plus the leaders of these factions were happy to give him these tokens if it meant that they could get some True Soul Realm Beast allies. They needed all the help that they could get.


    But the most important thing was that they depended on Lin Fan, or rather his master.


    If there was anything he needed, they wouldn''t hesitate to help him.


    It had reached that level of dependence.

 Chapter 792 Meeting With The True Soul Realm Beasts (3)

    Seeing that the True Soul Realm Beasts were all shocked beyondparison, Lin Fan cleared his throat and continued by saying, "Am I qualified to negotiate with you now?"


    The True Soul Realm Beasts couldn''t recover at first, but then they all looked at Lin Fan and gave nods.


    This person had the token of nine different True Soul Realm Experts and not only that, these were tokens from nine different powerful factions. If he wasn''t qualified to negotiate with them after this, there was no one else in this Gctic Humanity Alliance qualified to negotiate with them.


    After seeing the appearance of these nine different tokens, the True Soul Realm Beasts became much meeker.


    Lin Fan gave a nod when he saw this and he continued, "The invaders are from the Tai Ster Kingdom like I''ve said before, but that doesn''t mean that there''s no hope at all. It isn''t the Tai Ster Royal Family that is invading us, but rather two of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom leading the charge." After a pause, Lin Fan added, "So far, they haven''t brought any powerful experts to attack just yet, so there''s a chance that they might not bring any powerful experts with them."


    The True Soul Realm Beasts were confused when they heard this and they couldn''t help asking, "What do you mean by that? Why wouldn''t they bring powerful experts?"


    Lin Fan exined, "Based on our observations of their actions so far, it''s fair to conclude that they are either unwilling to send their experts or they are doing this to test their younger generation since those are the only ones that have appeared."


    The True Soul Realm Beasts looked at each other before one of them quickly refuted, "So you want us to risk our lives just based on your guesses? Do you really have any sincerity at all?"


    Qing Ao red at this person, but Lin Fan raised his hand before turning to this True Soul Realm Beast and saying, "While it is a guess, this is something that has been greatly tested at our expense. I hope that you will not undermine that."


    Then after a breath, he added, "Not to mention, it''s very unlikely that they would send experts if you think about it. If they do, it weakens their own defenses and their enemies will be able to move into their territory. So unless it''s dire, they will not move their experts. They will rely on their prestige as a Ster Kingdom for as long as possible."


    This was the conclusion that Lin Fan and the faction leaders had reached after a long deliberation.


    This was the only possibility after everything that had happened.


    After all, if they really wanted to take care of them all, they could have done so without even revealing who they were. The fact that they did so and the fact that they hadn''t made any big moves must mean that there were some scruples that they had about doing this.


    Since that was the case, there was still the chance to fight.


    The True Soul Realm Beasts had been shocked by Lin Fan''s tone and gaze. It had even sent a chill down their spine even though they were True Soul Realm Beasts.


    It was almost as if even with their experience, they still didn''t have enough killing intent to match Lin Fan. In that moment, it was as if the god of death had put their scythe on their necks.


    They all internally made a decision that they wouldn''t provoke Lin Fan if there was no reason to do so from now on.


    But then there was still the decision that they had to make¡­


    Should they work with the humans or should they still run?


    Running was still the better option for them in their opinion because if they ran, then they would at least have a better chance to survive. To face this unknown enemy, it was unknown what kind of chances they would have to win.


    If they ran, at least they knew that there was the chance to survive.


    So no matter what, running seemed like the better option here.


    Seeing their hesitant looks, it wasn''t hard for Lin Fan to guess what these True Soul Realm Beasts were thinking. Of course, it couldn''t be med on them since their thoughts were correct.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan wouldn''t let them have these thoughts.


    So without a single word, Lin Fan stood up and walked over to where the True Soul Realm Beasts were sitting.


    They had been so lost in thought that they hadn''t noticed Lin Fan walking over at first, but then when he got closer, it was hard for them not to notice. That was because Lin Fan had walked right up to one of the True Soul Realm Beasts.


    This True Soul Realm Beast looked at Lin Fan with a surprised look as he asked, "What are you do¡­?


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan had already raised his fist and punched the True Soul Realm Beast right across the face. This punch lifted this True Soul Realm Beast out of the seat and sent him flying out several meters before hended on the ground.<sub> </sub>


    Silence, there was only silence left in this meeting hall.


    However, that onlysted a few seconds before the other True Soul Realm Beasts immediately jumped out of their chairs and took their beast forms once again. They all looked at Qing Ao and shouted, "Qing Ao, did you betray us after all!? Do you really think that you''ll get away with this!?"


    But the strange thing that they noticed was that Qing Ao was also shocked by Lin Fan''s actions.


    Qing Ao stood there in a daze longer than everyone else, but he still reacted. He immediately jumped out andnded in front of Lin Fan along with Feng Ling and Lei Ting, making his intentions to protect Lin Fan clear.


    Qing Ao was about to say something, but Lin Fan raised a hand to stop him as he looked at the True Soul Realm Beast that he had punched.


    Qing Ao just had a bitter smile on his face when he saw this as he thought, "Couldn''t you at least tell me what you were nning on doing before doing it?"


    But it was already toote toin since Lin Fan had already punched the True Soul Realm Beast.


    The other True Soul Realm Beasts looked like they were about to attack, but before they could, the True Soul Realm Beast that had been punched suddenly stood up. He stood there in a daze before turning his eyes back to Lin Fan.


    Everyone would have thought that he would have a hostile look in his eyes after being punched by Lin Fan, but instead, he looked at Lin Fan with glowing eyes.


    After staring at Lin Fan for a bit, he immediately ran over to Lin Fan. Qing Ao tried to stop him, but Lin Fan raised his hands to let him through. Not to mention that even if he had wanted to stop him, the True Soul Realm Beast wouldn''t let him.


    There was a strange look of frenzy in that True Soul Realm Beast''s eyes that made it seem like no one would be able to stop him.


    That True Soul Realm Beast grabbed Lin Fan by the shoulder and said, "What did you do? Tell me right now!"


    Lin Fan just raised his hand and punched the True Soul Realm Beast again. Though he did punch with much less strength this time.


    The other True Soul Realm Beasts were about to say something, but the True Soul Realm Beast that had been punched revealed a look of ecstasy before saying, "Yes, yes, that''s it, right there! The feeling that I had wasn''t wrong!"


    Everyone looked at this True Soul Realm Beast with looks of confusion, as well as a hint of disgust. After all, the face that he was making¡­it was just too much¡­


    The True Soul Realm Beast that was punched quickly said, "If you can keep doing that, I promise that I will work with the humans to resist the invading Ster Kingdom with you."


    Everyone revealed shocked looks this time.


    What was going on?


    He had been punched and instead of getting angry, he now wanted to help Lin Fan fight the invading Ster Kingdom?


    This just didn''t make any sense at all!


    The True Soul Realm Beasts warily looked at Lin Fan as one of them asked, "What did you do?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything and just looked at the True Soul Realm Beast who had been punched.


    That True Soul Realm Beast had an unwilling look in his eyes as if he wasn''t willing to share, but he knew that it was impossible to hide it in this situation. So he said in an unwilling voice, "When he punched me, I felt the shackles of my bloodline tremble."


    There was only silence that met these words and that was because the mouths of the True Soul Realm Beasts couldn''t close even if they wanted to. All of their chins had dropped to the ground, including Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting.


    As beasts, they all knew what it meant for the shackles of their bloodline to tremble. It meant that there was a chance that they would break through these shackles, it meant that their bloodline was being purified.


    That meant that a punch from Lin Fan was able to purify their bloodline!


    What kind of a concept was this!

 Chapter 793 Meeting With The True Soul Realm Beasts (4)

    Purifying the bloodline, what did that mean?


    For beasts, bloodline was the most important thing since it was what dictated what level of cultivation one would reach.


    While there have been cases where beasts have gone beyond their bloodline to reach higher levels of cultivation, those were all cases where mutations happened and they were able to purify their bloodline. By purifying the bloodline, they were able toe closer to the ancestral bloodline and change their own physique.


    So purifying the bloodline was something that was arge enticement to any beast.


    It meant that they would have the chance to be even stronger and not only that, it meant that they would have the chance to unlock new abilities from the bloodline dormant inside of them.


    There was no beast that would miss this chance.


    And now this human actually had the ability to help them purify their bloodline?


    Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting all looked at Lin Fan in shock.


    They had only thought highly of Lin Fan because he had been lucky enough to find these three pets with their ancestral bloodlines. They had thought that it was all because of a fortuitous encounter, but now they were realizing that might not be the case.


    They started to think that Lin Fan was hiding much more than they had thought and perhaps that they didn''t know him at all.


    It might not even be a fluke that he was able to find these pets with the ancestral bloodline.


    After all, he had just shown his ability to purify bloodlines with a single punch. They didn''t know to what extent this ability reached, but based on the examples that they had seen, they wanted to believe that he was able to purify bloodlines all the way to the ancestral bloodline.


    So if they were to follow him, wouldn''t that mean that they had a chance to purify their bloodlines to the ancestral state?


    Wouldn''t that mean that they would have a chance to get the true bloodline?


    If that were to happen, that would mean that they could resolve everything from the past¡­


    Qing Ao couldn''t helpining to himself, "Elder Hong, if you knew about this, why didn''t you tell me sooner? I could have done more to tter him and gotten even closer to him!"


    All of the True Soul Realm Beasts were silent after hearing this and just stared at Lin Fan in shock and disbelief.


    Lin Fan was the one to break this silence as he said, "Do you want to test it?"


    All of the True Soul Realm Beasts gave a tremble before quickly rushing in front of Lin Fan and saying, "I''ll volunteer! I''ll volunteer!"


    Seeing this, even Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting had wanted to rush over and volunteer, but they still restrained themselves. After all, they knew Lin Fan the longest and their daughters were currently with Lin Fan, so there were plenty of chances for them in the future.


    Their moods had brightened quite a bit as these thoughts passed through their minds. It seemed like their futures were quite bright even with the prospects of Ster Kingdom invaders.


    At the same time, they started thinking of backup ns.


    If things went wrong, the most important thing was getting Lin Fan out of this upper realm. As long as Lin Fan was safe, then nothing mattered, even leaving this upper realm and exposing themselves.


    As long as they had Lin Fan, they would be able to get their revenge¡­


    Lin Fan saw the giant beasts standing in front of him and said with a sigh, "You''re all so big, do you really want me to exhaust myself by reaching that far?"


    The True Soul Realm Beasts looked at each other before immediately turning back into human form.


    If it had been anyone else who had said this to them, they would have pped that person to a pulp with a single flick of the wrist. However, in front of Lin Fan, they were like obedient and meek puppies that obeyed his every order.


    After they shrank down, Lin Fan punched each one of them in turn, sending them flying.


    He hadn''t held back at all as he punched them, sending them flying away as they didn''t put up any guard against his punches.


    If it was said that he didn''t have any grudges about how they had acted earlier, that would be a lie. That was why the first punch that he had used had sent the True Soul


    Realm Beast flying while the second punch was a light punch.


    Just one punch each was enough of a punishment for them.


    But it still looked very strange, especially with the looks of ecstasy that True Soul Realm Beasts had on their faces. It was even more strange when Lin Fan had punched the only female True Soul Realm Beast because she was in the form of a beautiful young girl.<sub> </sub>


    If people were watching from the side, they definitely would have thought that it was some kind of strange fetish y¡­


    But the True Soul Realm Beasts didn''t mind it at all, rather they relished it.


    They could feel the feelings of their bloodline shackles trembling.


    They were certain that if Lin Fan were to punch them a few more times, they would have a chance to break through these shackles and take their bloodlines to another level.


    But Lin Fan stopped with the first punch. Even with them looking at him with hopeful looks, he just stood there with a stone face, as if he didn''t care at all.


    The True Soul Realm Beasts naturally knew what he wanted and without any hesitation, they immediately agreed to work with the humans to fight against the Ster Kingdom invaders.


    In front of the temptation of being able to purify their bloodline, nothing else mattered. They didn''t care as long as they had a chance to break through the shackles of their bloodline.


    Lin Fan gave a nod to ept all of their pledges and then gave them each another punch as a reward.


    Of course, this time, Lin Fan didn''t punch them as hard as the first time.


    They would be his allies in the future, so he wouldn''t mistreat them.


    All of them revealed looks that were happy and sad at the same time. They were happy to receive another punch, but they were sad that Lin Fan didn''t keep going. They were so close to breaking through, all it would take was a few more punches, but Lin Fan just wouldn''t give it to them¡­


    So they all looked at Lin Fan with looks like they were neglected lovers which made a chill run down Lin Fan''s spine.


    It was fine with the female True Soul Realm Beast, but for old men to be looking at him like this¡­


    Lin Fan just gave a cough before changing the topic of the meeting, "Let''s talk about how we will coordinate with you all."


    The True Soul Realm Beasts sat back down and watched Lin Fan pull out a vine snake from his sleeve.


    Lin Fan then said, "This is Brainy, she will be the onemunicating with all of you." Then after a pause, he said, "If you have any trusted subordinates, can you bring them in now?"


    The True Soul Realm Beasts were all confused by this request from Lin Fan, but they still called in their trusted subordinates who had been waiting outside.


    They had been filled with confusion when they first did this, but they were soon filled with shock after seeing what Brainy did. When they looked back at Lin Fan, they couldn''t help looking at him with eyes filled with a bit of fear.


    This person, he had hidden too many things that they couldn''t see through him at all.


    Lin Fan just ignored all these looks and started introducing himself to everyone.


    After all, they were going to be working together from now on, it wasn''t as if they could do that if they didn''t even know each other''s names or specialties.


    So the True Soul Realm Beasts also quickly introduced themselves and gave a brief description of their race and their abilities.


    Lin Fan had Brainy take all of this down to include in their ns.


    At the end of the meeting, when they were about to disperse, Ang suddenly came forward to say something.


    All of the True Soul Realm Beasts were surprised at first, but then they felt a chill run down their spines as her gaze swept over them. Especially the one female True Soul Realm Beast, it felt like she had been frozen in ten thousand year old ice.


    Ang calmly said in a cold voice, "He is mine, don''t any of you think about doing a single thing to him."


    She knew how big of an enticement bloodline purification was to beasts like this, so she naturally had to make sure that Lin Fan was safe. It definitely wasn''t because of the way they had looked at Lin Fan like they were scorned lovers¡­


    The True Soul Realm Beasts could feel the sense of dangering from Ang, so they all quickly nodded in agreement to this before escaping.


    Once they were all gone, Ang turned back to Lin Fan and grabbed him by the ear as she said, "You must have enjoyed the feeling of how they looked at you, right?"


    Lin Fan quickly shook his head and hands as he tried exining to her.


    Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting looked at Lin Fan with looks of pity.


    It seemed like no matter how powerful and mysterious he was, he still couldn''t stand up to his wife¡­

 Chapter 794 Man To Man Talk

    After the meeting with the True Soul Realm Beasts, Lin Fan didn''t have much free time either.


    First, he had a meeting with the leaders of the twelve great factions. He had to report that he was able to get the support of these True Soul Realm Beasts, while also giving them the new n.


    After the meeting called by the True Spirit Sect, these twelve great factions had already taken Lin Fan as sort of their leader.


    Behind him was the master of the shop, the only one that they could rely on. So they took Lin Fan''s words as the orders of the master since he was the only one that couldmunicate with that master.


    This was just how desperate they were.


    They didn''t have any confirmation from the master or if what Lin Fan said was true, but they didn''t have another choice at a time like this. The only thing that they could do was rely on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t let them down as he gave them many things that he had bought from the store.


    He knew that it was impossible for him to face Bing Jun and Huo Fei''s forces alone, so he needed the help of these twelve great factions. There was no time to hold back, he needed to do all he could to make them stronger so they could face the forces of the Tai Ster Kingdom.


    So he didn''t care about the bnce anymore and offered them even more Nascent Soul Realm Beast and Child Soul Realm Beasts. He was nning on stuffing these nine great factions full of Nascent Soul Realm Beasts and Child Soul Realm Beasts.


    But of course, there was still a limiting factor to this.


    It was the amount of Nascent Soul Realm and Child Soul Realm eggs that the nine factions could find.


    Lin Fan could only hatch these Nascent Soul Realm and Child Soul Realm beasts if he had the eggs to hatch, so he had to wait for supplies toe from these nine great factions. But now that Lin Fan didn''t hold back in supplying them with these Nascent Soul Realm and Child Soul Realm pets, they went all out in collecting the eggs that Lin Fan needed.


    Every day, there were more and more eggs that funneled into Lin Fan''s store and with each day, there were Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beastsing out. The nine great factions didn''t even have any more experts to form contracts with them, so they just used them to guard key areas now.


    However, it wasn''t just Nascent Soul Realm and Child Soul Realm beasts that Lin Fan provided to the nine great factions.


    In addition to these beasts, he also bought many different things from the shop and handed them over to the nine great factions.


    He had even used up half of his savings buying these things and things that he needed to prepare for himself.


    It was just a good thing that he had the business of the Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts supporting this or he definitely would have run out of points a long time ago.


    The points just came rolling in at the price that he sold these beasts for. It even made the finances of the nine great factions a bit short, but this wasn''t the time for them to worry about this since a war wasing.


    They also asked Lin Fan if he was able to breed True Soul Realm beasts since they had a few eggs that were considered treasures by them, but Lin Fan rejected this since he really wasn''t able to do so.


    He had thought that he would be able to since it was an option that was given by his system, but when he tried, he found that the incubation chamber just wouldn''t take it. Instead, there was a notification that appeared that said, "Insufficient privilege."


    He didn''t know what he needed to do to get this privilege or why the system would show him this notification, but he didn''t have the time to care about that. After all, there was still a waring.


    So for now, Lin Fan threw all of that to the back of his mind.


    The main topic that they were discussing at today''s meeting was the topic of whether they should attack the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, or the Assassins Association first.


    Lin Fan immediately vetoed this idea by saying, "There''s no knowing what kind of traps they have already set up for us since we have no idea what their ns are at all. We don''t even know what kind of forces they will be sending out at us. In this kind of situation, it''s better if we don''t make the first move and wait for them."


    After a pause he added, "At the very least, in that situation, we''ll be fighting on our home field instead of their home field."


    Everyone nodded in agreement to this.


    They had been sending spies to investigate the enemy during the past few days, but every spy that they had sent hadn''t been able to find a single thing.


    It was as if there was some kind of barrier that protected the Thunder Sect, the True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association. This was a barrier that they couldn''t break no matter what kind of items or powers they used.


    Naturally, they knew that this barrier came from Bing Jun and Huo Fei, which meant that it was a power that came from the Ster Kingdom. So they knew that it was futile hoping that they would break through.


    In this situation where they had no information, defense was the safest option since at least you would have the home field advantage. You would be the one with all the defenses prepared, making the fight much easier for you.


    So after discussing it a bit, they decided to continue with their passive stance for now.


    The main thing was getting theirmunicationwork set up because they needed to be able to respond right away if one of the factions was attacked. All of the other factions would need to send their experts to help support that one faction, as well as know what enemies to expect.


    That was whymunication was the most important thing.<sub> </sub>


    But that was a matter for the nine great factions since they had much more resources in this matter than Lin Fan, so he left it to them. He hung up on the call and went to deal with his next matter.


    Lin Fan left the store and headed to the residence that had been prepared for his family.


    Over the past few days, he had also been making arrangements for them.


    He knew that Bing Jun wouldn''t give up and he didn''t know how this war would turn out, so he had been preparing a back up n for his family. In fact, he wanted to send them down to the Blue Star, but even now, they still refused to go without him.


    So since that was the case, Lin Fan had no choice but to¡­


    When he arrived at the residence, he found Lin Xue and Yue Qingrou in the kitchen cooking something. When he saw them, he could easily tell from their bodynguage that they were clearly nervous and were just trying to distract themselves.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan didn''t disturb them.


    Of course, the main reason he didn''t disturb them was because he had someone else to see.


    He went to the training room in the basement. The moment that he came in, he saw the various sword marks that lined the walls and he couldn''t help shaking his head.


    It seemed like it would be hard to convince him to follow his n¡­


    Lin Fan walked to the center of the room where Lin Ao was standing.


    As soon as Lin Fan arrived in front of him, Lin Ao suddenly raised his sword to put at Lin Fan''s neck.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all to raise his own sword to block this and knock Lin Ao''s sword aside.


    As soon as Lin Ao''s sword was knocked away, he suddenly used the force to spin and sh out at Lin Fan. Lin Fan easily blocked this and then started using shes of his own.


    The father and son just fought like this for several minutes before finally calming down.


    Neither of them had any injuries on them, but it was clear by Lin Ao''s heavy breathing and the bitter look on his face that he was the one that had been pushed back by Lin Fan.


    However, there was still a trace of happiness in his heart when he saw this.


    His son had finally grown up and his son had even be stronger than him¡­


    He had once been called a monster, but it seemed that it was his son who was the true monster. It was hard to believe that less than a year ago, Lin Fan didn''t have any cultivation at all.


    He didn''t know what happened with Lin Fan, but he was naturally happy as a parent.


    He knew that this was a world that depended on strength and with the strength that Lin Fan had, it wasn''t hard for him to flourish in the world.


    The only problem was the one who had locked their eyes on his daughter¡­


    Lin Ao naturally knew what Lin Fan wanted to say, so before he could even say it, he shook his head and said, "No, I''m going to join the fight as well."


    Lin Fan however shook his head and said, "That''s not what I wanted to talk to you about."


    Lin Ao revealed a confused look as he waited for Lin Fan to continue.


    Lin Fan said, "I want you to protect them. I''ll move them to a safe location and you''ll be the one protecting them. Can I trust you to do that?"


    Lin Ao had aplicated look when he heard this, but he still gave a nod in the end.


    He knew that with his cultivation, he would just be a burden. Even if he had his pride, he also still had his intelligence.


    So he knew what Lin Fan''s true goal in proposing this was.


    Since this was what Lin Fan wanted, this was the least that he could do. After all, he was a father and he would support his son. Especially when his son had gone this far to help him maintain his pride.


    Seeing that Lin Ao agreed to his proposal, Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief before giving Lin Ao a nod and leaving the room.


    Once he was out of the room, Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "I hope that this is enough."

 Chapter 795 Start Of A War (1)

    When morning came, it was now the third day after the meeting called by the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    While everyone was still preparing, they were suddenly caught off guard by the moves of the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association.


    That was because these three factions didn''t attack the same target like they had expected, they attacked three different targets at once.


    The targets that they hit were the Myriad Sword Hall, the Ice Goddess Pce, and the Tamers Guild.


    No one knew why these three factions had been targeted, but as soon as they received word that they were being attacked, the other factions immediately jumped into action.


    Lin Fan was the same.


    The moment that he received this news, he knitted his brows and had a discussion with Brainy first. After that discussion, he immediately decided to head to the Myriad Sword Hall.


    As for why he chose the Myriad Sword Hall, it was half because of strategy and half because of emotions.


    For the strategy part, it was because the Myriad Sword Hall was the furthest away from any other of the twelve great factions, so they would receive reinforcements thetest. The other two factions would receive reinforcements right away from the factions that were closer, the Myriad Sword Hall wasn''t the same.


    It was also because the Myriad Sword Hall was filled with sword cultivators. Sword cultivators were considered the strongest among cultivators of the same level, this was alreadymon knowledge.


    Since that was the case, that would mean that the enemies would send their strongest forces to attack the Myriad Sword Hall.


    The other two forces would be able to hold on, so he would head to the ce with the strongest opponents.


    It was just too bad that this wasn''t the case.


    When he arrived, he found that the Myriad Sword Hall had already taken care of the enemies that attacked them.


    Lin Fan just stood there in a daze as he couldn''t help thinking where he had gone wrong in his ns.


    But then before he could do anything else, there was someone who brought some news that ruined those ns.


    "What did you just say?" Lin Fan said in a voice filled with disbelief.


    The messenger also had the same look of disbelief, but he still repeated, "The Tamers Guild is close to falling."


    Lin Fan took a deep breath before immediately knitting his brows and asking, "Tell me everything that happened."


    The messenger nodded before going into details about what had happened.


    No one knew how it happened, but the fight between the two sides had suddenly changed. At first, the Tamers Guild was able to push back the enemies with their waves of beasts, but then¡­


    All of sudden, there was a single beast in the beast wave of the Tamers Guild that suddenly turned.


    With one beast turning, the rest of the beast followed and all turned to face the Tamers Guild experts as well.


    No one knew what was happening at first, but¡­then before anyone could react, the pets of the Tamers Guild suddenly turned against their masters and started attacking the experts of the Tamers Guild.


    The experts of the Tamers Guild weren''t able to withstand this sudden change and they were forced to retreat to their defensive lines. However, with the added attack of the pets that had suddenly turned on them, they were forced back further and further.


    While the Tamers Guild hadn''t fallen yet, it was getting closer and closer with each passing moment.


    After hearing all of this, Lin Fan decided to not waste any time and head there right away.


    The experts of the Myriad Sword Hall had just finished their own fight, but they immediately followed Lin Fan to go and support the Tamers Guild. They still had plenty of experts that weren''t injured because the ones that had been sent to attack the Myriad Sword Hall were only weaklings to begin with.


    They couldn''t match the powerful sword cultivators of the Myriad Sword Hall at all.


    When Lin Fan''s group arrived at the Tamers Guild headquarters, they could see the destruction all around them. There were corpses of both humans and beasts lying all over the ground and the buildings were all demolished, showing signs of intense fighting.


    But the worst part was that they still couldn''t see any signs of fighting.<sub> </sub>


    Could it be that the Tamers Guild was already¡­


    No, Lin Fan shook his head to deny this possibility. There was still the chance that they had fallen back into the depths of the Tamers Guild.


    The Tamers Guild headquarters took up arge area, so there was still a deeper part of the headquarters that they could have retreated to.


    As soon as this thought passed through his mind, he immediately gathered everyone to head further in.


    They continued on deeper into the Tamers Guild headquarters, but all they could find were corpses and destroyed buildings. That was until they came to the center where they could still hear the sounds of fighting.


    It seemed like there was still a group from the Tamers Guild that had managed to hold on.


    Without wasting any time, Lin Fan sent the scouting team in to see what the situation was.


    The reports that came back told him that the barrier was still on outside of the main hall and there were enemies that were currently surrounding it, bombarding it with attacks. The enemies were made of plenty of beasts that they recognized as belonging to the Tamers Guild, including the Nascent Soul Realm Beasts that Lin Fan had sold them.


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows as he couldn''t figure out how they were able to steal the beasts of the Tamers Guild, but there was no time to worry about that. After all, the report had also said that the barrier outside of the Tamers Guild''s main hall was getting dimmer and dimmer.


    It was clear that they wouldn''t be able to hold on much longer, so Lin Fan''s group had to act now to save them.


    So after taking a moment to n things out, Lin Fan sent the sword cultivators to take the lead.


    It wasn''t that he was throwing them under the bus or using them to draw out the enemies, it was because they didn''t need to use pets. The enemies clearly had something that they could use to steal the pets that they used, so they couldn''t risk sending more pets out for the enemies to take over.


    So these sword cultivators that didn''t rely on pets were the best choice for this.


    As for the rest of them, they would wait here until the enemies were drawn out. They would watch over the enemies to see if they could find out how they were stealing their pets.


    As soon as the sword cultivators charged out, the enemies immediately turned around.


    As expected, they threw the beasts that they had stolen from the Tamers Guild in front since they nned on using them as meat shields against the sword cultivators.


    However, these beasts weren''t beasts that they had pet contracts with, so it was hard to give these beasts proper orders. Even if there were Nascent Soul Realm Beasts among them, they weren''t a match for the sword cultivators at all. They weren''t even a match for Child Soul Realm Sword Cultivators, so there was no need for the Nascent Soul Realm Sword Cultivators to do anything.


    Seeing that the beasts were being pushed back with ease, the enemies couldn''t help being pushed back a step. After all, there were more beasts than people among the enemies, so just the momentum of the beasts being pushed back pushed the rest of them back as well.


    But it was also at this time that there was someone who suddenly came forward.


    This was a cloaked figure, but based on the facial features that could be seen, it was clear that this was a young person.


    This cloaked figure raised the dark orb that it was holding in its hand and then with a dark glow that came from the orb, all of the beasts that had been stolen suddenly started moving in a strange pattern.


    This time, they didn''t act separately. They all moved together like a tide until they came into the form of an array.


    Once they came together in this array, the cloaked figure waved its hands a few times before a flow of energy came from the beasts. All the beasts released their life energy and that came together to form a giant barrier that surrounded them.


    This barrier pushed back all the sword cultivators that had been charging at them.


    As the sword cultivators were pushed back, the weaker ones couldn''t help spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    This was a barrier that was formed by over a thousand beasts and there were even Nascent Soul Realm Beasts in this barrier. This definitely wasn''t a weak array, so naturally those that had weaker cultivations suffered internal injuries.


    But for the most part, most of the sword cultivators were able to resist this barrier with their swords.


    After the barrier had been formed, the cloaked figure waved its hands a few more times and the flow of energy of the barrier suddenly changed. All of the energy gathered in a single point, creating a ball of light that was pointed right at the sword cultivators.


    There was no doubt that this was a powerful attack thatbined all the power of the beasts in the array.

 Chapter 796 Start Of A War (2)

    The sword cultivators didn''t panic when they saw this.


    Instead, under the directions of the elders, the sword cultivators also started moving in a certain pattern until they also formed an array. This was a sword array that gathered all their sword energy into a single sh.


    But before they could start the sword array, they suddenly received a message from Lin Fan telling them to stand down.


    While they were confused why Lin Fan would send this message, they still chose to follow it in the end.


    As they moved back, there were Nascent Soul Realm Beasts that suddenly appeared around them. These Nascent Soul Realm Beasts were spread out all over the area, with a certain amount of distance between each of them.


    Once over a hundred of them appeared, they suddenly released their energy, filling the space in between them with hundreds of differentws. Thesews shed against each other in this space, creating a chaotic area filled with variousws.


    When this chaotic area was formed, the barrier that the stolen beasts had formed suddenly cracked and shattered apart. The beasts weren''t even able to release their life energy anymore once this chaotic area formed.


    The weaker ones werepletely suppressed by all thews that filled this space and were pressed down into the ground. The stronger ones were still able to stand, but it was clear by the look on their faces that they were struggling.


    Even the cloaked figure couldn''t help trembling when this chaotic area formed, but then the cloak around him suddenly started glowing. As the cloak''s glow appeared, there was a small area that was formed around this cloaked figure that blocked out all thews that were around him.


    This was a phenomenon that Lin Fan had seen before, it was the same as the dagger that He Wuji had used.


    But of course, Lin Fan wasn''t surprised since the one that had given He Wuji that dagger was Bing Jun. It was also Bing Jun who was backing this army of enemies, so it was natural that they would have items like this.


    After the glowing area appeared around the cloaked figure, that cloaked figure suddenly burst out inughter. He continuedughing for a full minute before finally saying, "You''re finally here! I''ve been waiting a long time for you!"


    Then without any prompting, the cloaked figure pulled back the hood of his cloak and revealed his appearance.


    This was an appearance that most people were confused by since they didn''t recognize him. After all, this was clearly a person that no one was familiar with since he had never made himself well known in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    However, Lin Fan was able to recognize him after thinking for a bit, along with the two vice presidents who had been hiding in the main hall.


    Fei Jun!


    He was the young man that hadpeted against Lin Fan during the Monster Tamer, the one who had been rmended by vice president Bai.


    Everyone had forgotten about him because he had disappeared after the Monster Tamer Exam. He had passed the exam, but he chose not to follow vice president Bai in the end.


    Everyone had thought that he had gone back to his Fei Family because he had been discouraged by Lin Fan''s talent, but that didn''t seem to be the case...


    Fei Jun had his eyes on Lin Fan the entire time and those eyes were filled with an intense hatred. It was as if Lin Fan had killed his entire family.


    He said in a voice that was filled with hatred, "If it wasn''t for you! If it wasn''t for you! I would have be the star of the Tamers Guild, the holy child of the next generation! Everything was taken by you!"


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with a confused look, but Lin Fan just shook his head and gave a sigh.


    Lin Fan then looked at him with a look of pity and said, "Is that my fault? Vice president Bai even offered to take you under his wing still, but you''re the one who refused his offer."


    Fei Jun immediately roared out in rage when he heard this, "It''s all you! Do you think that they would even care about me if you still existed!? I would always be second fiddle to you and how could I, Fei Jun ever be inferior to anyone?!"


    Lin Fan shook his head again before saying, "Please don''t project your insecurities on me. It''s still not toote for you toe to the right side."<sub> </sub>


    Fei Jun flew into a rage again as he roared out, "Right side? Right side? Do you really think that you all have a chance against the lords? They are from a Ster Kingdom?! A Ster Kingdom! You''re a fool if you really believe that you can win."


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Is that better than betraying your family and the people you owe favour to?"


    Fei Jun gave a coldugh before saying, "Family? They were the ones that couldn''t recognize my talent and suppressed it. People I owe? All of those people abandoned me and felt pity for me! Do you think that they understand how great I am, do you think that they weren''t looking down on me? What do you think I owe them?"


    His eyes turnedpletely cold when he said this and he continued, "All that I have left is my hatred and I will burn this whole world down with it. Starting with you, you will all die!"


    Then he raised the orb that he had been holding in his hand and there was another dark glow that came from it.


    Even though they had been suppressed by the pseudo domain that Lin Fan had released, the controlled pets started standing up and forcing themselves to go against the domain. Even if it meant that they suffered internal injuries and started bleeding from various parts of their bodies, they didn''t stop as they pushed through the pain.


    There was a clear look of pain on their faces, but they didn''t stop even then.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this, but he didn''t hesitate to suddenly dash towards one of the beasts.


    When Fei Jun saw this, he immediately pushed the orb in his hand forward and shouted, "All of you grab him! Don''t you dare let him go!"


    As soon as his orders were given, the captured pets did all that they could to go against the pseudo domain and charge at Lin Fan. They dragged trails of blood behind them as they dragged their bodies forward.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he saw this and there was a trace of killing intent that appeared in his eyes.


    He looked at Fei Jun before turning back to the controlled pets.


    Since these pets were inside of the pseudo domain, they weren''t able to use theirws at all, but they still had their powerful bodies. The physiques of beasts were much better than the physiques of humans, so beasts were much stronger than humans at the same level.


    These beasts were able to make it all the way to Lin Fan and were about to grab him, but before they could, they were suddenly punched by Lin Fan.


    The moment that Lin Fan''s fist made contact with the first beast, it was sent flying. Then as his fist continued making contact with the other beasts, there were trails of blood that flew out as the beasts kept flying away from him.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop his rampage as he continued charging forward and punching each one of the beasts that tried to grab him. There were more and more beasts that were sent flying and there was more and more blood that covered the ground.


    There was even so much blood that it even formed a smallyer on the ground instead of being absorbed by the earth.


    But with each punch, there were less beasts that were charging at Lin Fan.


    At first, Fei Jun had a calm look on his face as he watched Lin Fan sending all the beasts flying. After all, even if Lin Fan was beating up each and every beast that charged at him, they were still under his control and he was slowly draining away at Lin Fan''s stamina.


    As long as he used enough beasts to gang up on Lin Fan, eventually he would be tired out and he would be overwhelmed by the waves of beasts, even if they couldn''t use their life energy. At the same time, he would be able to make the beasts that had been sent away charge at Lin Fan again even if their bodies wouldn''t obey. He had total control over these beasts, he could even kill them with just a single thought by ordering them to stop their hearts.


    ? But as more and more beasts were sent flying, Fei Jun''s brows knit more and more.


    That was because he could feel his connection with each of the beasts that had been sent flying disappearing. It was almost as if each punch from Lin Fan was severing the connection that he had with each beast, making him lose control of them.


    Fei Jun started to panic when he realized that he had lost control over half of the beasts that he had previously controlled.


    He looked at Lin Fan with a shocked look and asked in a voice filed with panic, "What did you do?"

 Chapter 797 Start Of A War (3)

    Lin Fan just ignored him and continued punching at each of the beasts that charged at him.


    However, Fei Jun already realized that Lin Fan was a threat, so he no longer sent the beasts he controlled at Lin Fan. Instead, he gave them the order to run from Lin Fan, to get as far away as possible from him.


    After all, if he were to lose control over all the beasts that he currently controlled, that meant that he would have nothing left.


    He himself wasn''t a powerful expert and he didn''t have any powerful beasts that he controlled. The only thing that was supporting him was this bead that he had been given by the lord and the beasts that he stole with the bead.


    If the beasts broke free of his control, he would have to enve them one by one again and that would be impossible without a long while since he had to inject each beast with the energy released by the orb. With his current cultivation, he wasn''t able to create that many strands of dark energy with the orb, so it would take him a long time to gather all these beasts again.


    He couldn''t let himself lose this or he would have nothing to defend himself with.


    However, there was still that pseudo domain that was restricting all the beasts that he was controlling.


    Even if he gave the order for them to retreat, it was still hard for them to move under the pressure of the pseudo domain. Even if they were retreating as fast as they could, they still couldn''t match Lin Fan''s speed.


    The reason they were able to approach Lin Fan before wasn''t because they were fast, but rather because he was moving towards them. With the two sides moving closer, naturally they would be able to reach Lin Fan.


    However, when they were running away, they were much slower than Lin Fan.


    It didn''t take much effort from Lin Fan to catch up to these beasts and send them flying with a single punch.


    Lin Fan was like a rampaging war god on a path of destruction. It seemed like nothing at all was able to stop him.


    Seeing him approaching, Fei Jun couldn''t help taking a step back out of fear. His legs even started shaking under him.


    He knew that if this continued, there was no chance that he would be able to win since all his power came from his control over the stolen beasts. He didn''t know how Lin Fan was breaking his control over them, but the fact that he was meant that he was slowly but surely losing the only card that he had.


    Fei Jun couldn''t allow this to happen, but he himself was only just in the Child Soul Realm. There wasn''t anything that he could do against Lin Fan who was already in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    So with a heavy heart, Fei Jun had no choice but to pull out a dagger from inside of his cloak.


    This was the final trump card that Huo Fei had given him.


    Yes, Huo Fei.


    It had been Huo Fei who had been the cloaked figure that had joined the


    Monster Trainer Exam with the two of them. He was the one that had passed the exam with them.


    He had also been the one that had taken the Hunter Exam with Lin Fan and the others, he had been the one cloaked figure that had passed.


    All of this was part of his mission to scout out the twelve great factions and to see if there were easier ways for him to take them down from the inside. However, he had never found anything that he could use, the closest thing to that was Fei Jun who he had brought back to use against the Tamers Guild now.


    The ck orb that Fei Jun had wasn''t something that anyone could use, it was only something that people with the special talent for it could use, which was why he had been interested in Fei Jun.


    So interested that he even gave him this dagger.


    This dagger wasn''t like the dagger that Bing Jun had given to He Wuji. After all, Fei Jun''s cloak performed the same function as the dagger that Bing Jun had given to He Wuji. There was no need to give him something else with the simr power.


    No, this dagger was a single use item that had a very terrifying ability.


    Instant death.


    This dagger was filled with deathws, but not just any kind of deathws. It was deathws at the World Realm.


    It was something that no one in this Gctic Humanity Alliance should have been able to resist since it was aw at a level of power that surpassed the level of power of this world.<sub> </sub>


    But the one thing that Huo Fei never told Fei Jun was that using power that surpassed the level of this world would result in a punishment from the will of the world¡­


    Fei Jun had been hesitant since this was an important trump card that would have protected his life, but now he had no choice but to use it on someone like Lin Fan. He had wanted to save it to use on someone at least in the True Soul Realm, but he had no other choice now.


    So after a long period of hesitation, Fei Jun finally threw the dagger out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had been getting quite close to Fei Jun, so he immediately felt the dagger being thrown out at him.


    Then without any hesitation, he also took out a small piece of paper.


    As soon as the dagger was right about to hit him, he threw out the piece of paper that started floating in front of him. As the piece of paper flew there in front of him, it suddenly started glowing before forming a barrier around Lin Fan.


    The moment that the dagger hit the barrier formed by the piece of paper, the ckws that had been surrounding it shattered to pieces. The tiny bits of ck energy scattered to the wind, dissipating away as if it never existed.


    When Fei Jun saw this, all he could do was stand there with a look of absolute disbelief on his face.


    This was an item that had been bestowed upon him by the lord from the Ster Kingdom, how could Lin Fan have possibly stopped it?


    This didn''t make any sense at all!


    But then he remembered something that the lord had told him¡­


    There was a chance that Lin Fan himself was also from a Ster Kingdom or had a Ster Kingdom backing him¡­


    Fei Jun''s final bit of resistance copsed as he looked up and asked, "Heavens, why do you do this to me? Why do you give this world a Lin Fan when there is already a Fei Jun!"


    After that, he couldn''t help spitting out a mouthful of blood from the bacsh that he received, as well as the pain in his heart.


    Lin Fan on the other hand gave a sigh of relief when he saw that the talisman that he threw out worked. He wasn''t certain if it would work since he could tell that that dagger had power surpassing the limits of this world and the talisman was something that was adjusted to the limits of this world.


    But the talisman was also something that he had bought from the store, so it wasn''t amon item, which was what he was betting on.


    That was right, it was because the talisman was something from the store that the barrier it formed had been able to block that dagger.


    The talisman was an item that could create a zone where allws would be eliminated. Of course, something with this kind of ability would cost an arm and a leg. It had cost Lin Fan a tenth of all the points that he had earned from selling the Nascent Soul Realm and Child Soul Realm pets.


    He too had wanted to save it for someone much more important than Fei Jun, but sensing the danger from the dagger, he had used it without any hesitation.


    That was the difference between him and Fei Jun, Lin Fan was decisive about using the things that he had since he knew that any moment of hesitation would put him in danger.


    As for why the talisman had been able to block it, it was also because the will of the world had weakened the deathws of the dagger. The will of the world restrained the deathws of the dagger to force it to fall down to the level of this upper realm, making it much weaker than it would have been normally.


    That allowed the talisman''s barrier to shatter it.


    After this, Lin Fan paused for a few seconds to see if Fei Jun would do anything else, but seeing him just stand there spitting out blood while looking into the sky, Lin Fan knew he was finished.


    So without any further hesitation, Lin Fan charged into the waves of beasts in front of him, sending them all flying with a single punch.


    It took him a bit longer to finish off all the beasts, but eventually he was able to make his way to Fei Jun who just stood there in a daze.


    Lin Fan looked at him and asked, "Are you ready to atone for your sins?"


    Fei Jun just looked at him with a smile, but before either of them could say anything else, there was a boom that came from the sky.

 Chapter 798 Start Of A War (4)

    Both of them looked up to be surprised by the dark clouds that had gathered above them.


    As for the booming sound, that came from the thunder and lightning that was currently


    running through these clouds.


    However, what confused them was that this was heavenly thunder, the kind that only fell when one broke through into the Soul Realm. There was no way that there was someone breaking through in this kind of ce, so why was there heavenly thunder gathering?


    The stranger thing was that the heavenly thunder was gathering right above Fei Jun.


    Fei Jun could sense the dangering from it, so ignoring Lin Fan, he immediately turned to run away.


    But before he could run, the first bolt of heavenly thunder fell down on him.


    Fei Jun released all of his life energy to resist, but he found that his life energy barrier copsed with a single touch of the heavenly thunder. This heavenly thunder gave him a pressure that he had never felt before, it was even greater than the pressure that the True Soul Realm Experts that he met felt¡­


    The thunder wasn''t stopped for even a second as it pierced right through his body, burning it into a crisp in an instant. By the time that Lin Fan could react, Fei Jun''s body had already turnedpletely ck.


    Then with a simple breeze, he was turned into ashes in the wind.


    No one could understand what had just happened, but they were certain that it happened since it happened right in front of their eyes.


    After the ashes scattered, there wasn''t a single thing left. The heavenly thunder had turned all the items that Fei Jun had on him into ashes, which included his Storage Ring.


    Lin Fan naturally didn''t covet the things that Fei Jun had, but he did want to check out that orb that he had used. That was not something that Fei Jun could have gotten himself, so he wanted to see just what kind of a thing it was.


    As well, he wanted to see if Fei Jun had anything else given to him by Bing Jun and Huo Fei.


    If possible, he wanted to use them against them just like the items that he had taken from them before.


    But it was too bad that the heavenly thunder had turned everything that Fei Jun had owned to ashes.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the sky with a strange look as the clouds that had gathered there were slowly dissipating. It didn''t take long before the clouds hadpletely disappeared.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan was certain that the heavenly thunder had gathered all because of Fei Jun. However, what he couldn''t understand was why something like that happened.


    After all, Fei Jun himself was just a normal person, so how could he attract something like heavenly thunder?


    Could it be rted to the items that he had used?


    This was actually the right thinking since it was because of the dagger that he had used in the end that had attracted the heavenly thunder.


    Fei Jun had used a dagger that was infused with deathws that surpassed the limits of the realm, this was a clear challenge to the will of the world that controlled the heavenly thunder.


    Since it had been challenged, naturally it couldn''t back down without doing a thing.


    So it had sent the heavenly thunder down at Fei Jun as a bacsh of usingws that surpassed the limits of this world.


    Seeing how Fei Jun had disappeared without a trace, it seemed like the will of the world had used all of its might to smite him¡­The will of the world of the Gctic Humanity Alliance really was prideful.


    Lin Fan had wanted to take some time to catch their breath and regroup the Tamers Guild after Fei Jun had been taken out, but they didn''t get a chance at all. Not long after Fei Jun had been killed, there was another messenger that came asking for help.


    This time, it was the Hunters Organization that had been attacked and it was much more serious than the attack here.


    While the Tamers Guild had suffered because of Fei Jun stealing their pets, it wasn''t as if they couldn''t hold on with the power of their True Soul Realm Experts. They were just unwilling to kill the pets that they had spent so much time training since that would decrease their battle power.


    In this period where the war was just beginning, if they cut down all of these pets, the Tamers Guild would have been effectively crippled and unable to continue in this war. So they had been retreating the entire time and trying to find a way to rescue the pets that had been captured from them.


    But they had been unable to think of a single method of doing so, which had caused them to lose all this ground and suffer all those casualties.


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had saved them from this dilemma.<sub> </sub>


    While Lin Fan''s punch had sent most of the pets that he hit flying, he had held back enough that it wouldn''t injure them. He just used his suction power to pull out all the dark energy that had invaded their bodies, which had also been controlling them, allowing them to break free of Fei Jun''s control.


    He had tried absorbing the power and he had found that it was unlike anyw that he had seen before. It didn''t form a statue inside of his dantian like all the otherws, instead, it just turned into energy that was absorbed by Lin Fan.


    So he had wanted to take a closer look at the orb that Fei Jun had used.


    It was just too bad that¡­


    But of course, there was no time to cry over spilt milk.


    Lin Fan immediately gathered everyone that was still capable of fighting and rushed to the Hunters Organization. He even pulled in the Tamers Guild experts that were still left capable of fighting.


    That was because the report had stated that there were over fifty True Soul Realm Beasts that had suddenly appeared to attack the Hunters Organization!


    Fifty True Soul Realm Beasts, that was more than the total number of True Soul Realm Experts that all of the twelve great factions had.


    While these True Soul Realm Beasts without any masters to coordinate with meant that they would be weaker than True Soul Realm Beasts that fought with their masters, but they were still True Soul Realm Beasts and they had the number advantage. With just the True Soul Realm Experts of the Hunters Organization, it would be like smashing an egg with a rock.


    There would be more than enough True Soul Realm Beasts topletely overwhelm the Hunters Organization.


    It was in this kind of situation that all of the nine great factions had toe together and fight together to resist the power of the True Soul Realm Beasts.


    But the one thing that Lin Fan was worried about was the fact that there were no traces of Bing Jun or Huo Fei in these reports. It was as if they had never taken a single step on the battlefield, which made Lin Fan worried.


    There was no doubt that the two of them would show themselves after the show that they had made. If they were to back down now, it would be a problem of pride for them.


    So the fact that they hadn''t shown up yet most likely meant that they had some kind of n that they were waiting to put into effect. This would most certainly be a problem if they were to all gather together to face the True Soul Realm Beasts¡­


    But even if it did feel like a trap, Lin Fan had no choice but to rush to the Hunters Organization''s aid. After all, if one of the nine factions were to be taken down that quickly, it would be arge blow to them.


    They needed everyone that they could get, so even if it was a trap, they would at least fall into the trap together.


    This was the exact same thought that all the other factions had, so they also rushed to the aid of the Hunters Organization even knowing that it was most likely a trap.


    But when they arrived, they were shocked by the scene that appeared in front of them.


    It wasn''t a scene of carnage as they had expected, but rather it was a scene of peace.


    The two lines were just standing there facing each other, but they could see the different beasts that were spread out among one of those lines. These were the True Soul Realm Beasts that the enemy had brought.


    But none of this made any sense.


    Why would they bring True Soul Realm Beasts and just reveal them like this?


    Why would they give up the element of surprise that they had by revealing them like this?


    Moreover, why didn''t they attack when they had first arrived and had allowed reinforcements for the Hunters Organization toe?


    No matter how one looked at it, it didn''t seem like the logical thing to do.


    It seemed careless, it seemed foolish, it even seemed...arrogant.


    Were they that confident that they would win? Was that why they had acted like this?


    But where did their confidencee from?


    Was it from these fifty True Soul Realm Beasts or was it from something else like they had expected?

 Chapter 799 The Main War Begins (1)

    But they didn''t have time to think about this.


    Before the enemy could spot them, Lin Fan immediately led his group charging towards the Hunters Organization.


    The Hunters Organization''s headquarters had beenpletely surrounded, so it would definitely be a bloody affair to rush through the waves of enemies to reach the Hunters Organization headquarters. They would have to steel themselves toe to the aid of the Hunters Organization.


    After all, it would be useless for them to hide out here.


    They would be nothing more than sitting ducks if they stayed out here. Without any arrays or defenses to help them, they would be easily swept through by the unknown capabilities of the enemies.


    So even if it was dangerous, they had no choice but to charge through the enemy lines to reach the camps of the Hunters Organization.


    But to their surprise, they found that the enemies didn''t do a single thing when they charged forward. When the enemies saw them charging at them, they even split up their lines to let Lin Fan''s group pass through.


    It was as if they weren''t afraid of Lin Fan''s group providing reinforcements to the Hunters Organization at all.


    As they charged through the gaps, Lin Fan could even see confident smirks on the faces of the enemy.


    Lin Fan had split his team into several smaller groups so that they could charge at the enemy lines from different directions to distract them. While this did make it easy for more of them to make it through the enemy lines, smaller groups meant more casualties since they didn''t have as much battle power as if they stuck together inrge groups.


    However, after making it through, Lin Fan was shocked to find that every single group that had charged at the enemy had made it through. The enemies hadn''t engaged even a single group even though it was clear that they had the advantage.


    They just opened their lines to create channels for the reinforcements to go through. They didn''t even attack the back of the reinforcement groups as they were passing by¡­


    None of this made any sense at all!


    Just what were the enemy nning!


    Not a single one of their actions made any sense!


    But the illogical behaviour didn''t just end there as after Lin Fan''s group arrived as reinforcements for the Hunters Organization. Even though they still outnumbered them and hadpletely surrounded them, the enemies didn''t make a single move to attack them.


    They just stood there outside of the Hunters Organization headquarters, as if they were waiting for something.


    A few minutester, the reinforcements from the other factions also arrived and the same thing as before happened.


    The enemy lines opened up as they let these reinforcements pass right on through to


    where the Hunters Organization was gathered¡­


    Every single move that the enemy made was illogical, but they had no choice but to think deeper into it.


    "Could it be that they want to gather us together to trap us?"


    Finally, one of the leaders of the nine factions gave this suggestion.


    Everyone had already been thinking this when they first arrived, but no one had been willing to say it out loud out of fear that it would be true. But now that someone had taken the courage to say it, everyone suddenly jumped onto this train.


    "It''s clear that they''re nning something¡­We should gather all of our power and abandon the Hunters Organization''s headquarters as soon as we can before they can do anything. With all of us here, I''m sure that we can break through." One leader said.


    "But even if we break through, where will we go?" Another leader asked.


    "This¡­"


    That was true, they wouldn''t have any other ce to go if they abandoned the Hunters Organization headquarters. That was because out of all their factions, the Hunters Organization headquarters had the best defenses.


    They were the closest to Lin Fan and his store, so they had received the most support from them. While the others were jealous seeing this, there was nothing that they could say.


    In their ns, the Hunters Organization headquarters should have been their final defense lines against the enemy. After all, the enemy should also know about the close rtionship between Lin Fan and the Hunters Organization.


    They would leave the Hunters Organization forst, instead of attacking them first like this.


    As they were discussing this, many of them took secret looks at Lin Fan.


    That was because they knew that it wasn''t actually the Hunters Organization headquarters that was the most secure, but rather Lin Fan''s store. His store had his master, the unknown expert from a Ster Kingdom there, so there would surely be all kinds of defenses that they could never imagine beingid down there.


    So in truth, Lin Fan''s store was most likely the most secure ce in this entire Gctic Humanity Alliance.<sub> </sub>


    But of course, not a single one of them dared to go to Lin Fan''s store to hide since they knew that it would incur the wrath of the expert hiding there. He was the only lifeline that they could rely on now, so they would never dare to anger him.


    Lin Fan naturally saw all these secret looks directed at him, but he ignored them all. The store was also his final card and if he didn''t need to, he wouldn''t bring it out that easily.


    After all, Bing Jun and Huo Fei hadn''t shown themselves yet.


    Not to mention that he had already spent quite a few points on strengthening these factions up. If they couldn''t even block the enemy here, then it would be too much of a waste.


    So the different factions could only think of a way of stopping the enemies here.


    Another half an hour passed just like this and once the final reinforcement group from the nine great factions arrived, the enemies finally started moving.


    It seemed like they had also sent spies to watch over the other factions to see if they would send reinforcements.


    After all, they moved right when the final group of reinforcements arrived.


    But the strange thing was that they still allowed that group of reinforcements through before surrounding the Hunters Organization.


    The True Soul Realm Beasts were evenly spread among their lines and instead of being used as trump cards, they were ced right in the front of the lines. It was almost as if they were nning on charging with these True Soul Realm Beasts¡­


    But before they made a move, there was a figure that made its way through the crowd to appear in front of Lin Fan and the other leaders. This was a person that they were all familiar with, it was Bing Jun.


    Bing Jun came right to the front and then stood there facing Lin Fan and the leaders to say, "Everyone, this is not the result that I wanted to see, but it''s still not toote for us to end this. As long as you''re willing to submit, we promise that we won''t mistreat you."


    There was no longer the tone of trying to broker a cooperation, but rather, he was now speaking as if he was the dominant side. He was clearly no longer hiding his natural pride and was speaking to them as if he was their master.


    Seeing this, they knew that they had reached the point of no return.


    After all, if they did surrender here, it was clear that they would be treated as ves¡­


    For their factions, for their families, for their pride, it was better to go down fighting than to give up at this point.


    Bing Jun could see that they clearly had no intentions of surrendering, but he had already expected this. He had already heard about what had happened at the Tamers Guild, so he knew that their spirits hadn''t been broken yet.


    The reason why he had evene out to say something was because¡­


    Bing Jun looked right at Lin Fan and asked, "Brother inw, where''s Xue''er? This realm is too dangerous for her to stay in. Please let me take her and the rest of my inws to a safer ce."


    Lin Xue, that was the only reason he had even bothereding out to talk to these fools.


    If Lin Xue were to get hurt in all of this, he would regret it and he would never stop regretting it. So he took this risk to expose himself just so he could take her away.


    But Lin Fan ignored him and instead threw a white dagger covered in many different coloured glows right at Bing Jun.


    Bing Jun gave a cold snort as ayer of ice appeared in front of him. Even though this dagger was enough to threaten someone in the Peak Nascent Soul Realm, it was easily blocked by theyer of ice in front of Bing Jun. There wasn''t even a single crack that had been formed in that perfectly smoothyer of ice.


    Bing Jun gave another cold snort before saying, "Brother inw, please don''t be like this. This is your final warning."


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say a thing, Bing Jun''s face turned ice cold as he said, "Then you can''t me me for the consequences."


    He said in a calm voice, "Do it."


    Then without even turning back, he walked away as the forces under him charged forth.


    He wasn''t worried because he had already swept the Hunters Organization headquarters with spiritual sense. He hadn''t been able to find a trace of Lin Xue which meant that she wasn''t here, which also made sense since he didn''t think that Lin Fan would bring her somewhere this dangerous.


    He also deployed a team to cover this entire Gctic Humanity Alliance with spiritual sense to make sure that she wouldn''t be able to escape. It could be said that everything was in the palm of his hands.


    The only problem was that he couldn''t find her even after doing all of this¡­


    But as long as he took care of Lin Fan, it would be natural that she would fall into his hands.


    Now it was just a matter of time.

 Chapter 800 The Main War Begins (2)

    As soon as they saw the enemy charging, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to give the order, "Activate the arrays and raise the barriers!"


    With the True Soul Realm Beasts leading the charge, there was no room to hold back at all.


    After all, these were True Soul Realm Beasts and they would be charging in with their domains. Normal experts wouldn''t be able to do anything against these domains, the only thing that could stand a chance was the barrier that he gave the Hunters Organization.


    It was a good thing that they had attached great importance to this and had gotten it set up in as little time as possible. This allowed them to have this array for this battle.


    But just the array alone wasn''t enough since these were still True Soul Realm Beasts.


    They were able to keep some of the True Soul Realm Beasts upied, but there would still be some that were free to create havoc on their lines.


    That was where the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions came in.


    Almost all of the True Soul Realm Experts had gathered at the Hunters Organization since they knew that this was the final battle. The few that had been left behind were the weak and young ones that had just reached the True Soul Realm within the past few decades.


    They were to escort the remnants of the nine great factions out just in case they lost, but they were also there to pass down their inheritances as they fled this world, so their factions would have the chance to rise once again.


    But there were only three of those True Soul Realm Experts that had been left behind.


    Right now, there were over twenty True Soul Realm Experts from the nine great factions that were gathered here.


    It was just too bad that the ones that they were facing were the fifty True Soul Realm Beasts.


    Even if these True Soul Realm Beasts were controlled by another method and didn''t have masters to fight with, they still far outnumbered the human True Soul Realm Experts.


    Even with the barrier upying a few of them, it was still impossible for all of them to be held back by the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions.


    So the Nascent Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions were the ones that stood out. They knew that this was basically a death sentence, but there was nothing else that they could do¡­


    That was until Lin Fan decided to take out one of his trump cards.


    With a single thought, there were eight beasts that suddenly appeared around him.


    If they were normal beasts, no one would be surprised, but these were clearly not normal beasts. When the aura of these beasts appeared, everyone around him had shocked looks on their faces.


    That was because all eight of these beasts were True Soul Realm Beasts!


    Where had Lin Fan found eight True Soul Realm Beasts to fight with him?


    The leaders of the nine great factions however weren''t as surprised since they already had some knowledge of this. Lin Fan had already reported to them that he had found some True Soul Realm Beasts as allies and they had approved of this.


    After all, the more help they could get, the better it was for them.


    What they were surprised by was somethingpletely different.


    The way that Lin Fan directed them, it was too natural. This was not something that could be aplished just by an agreement, it was only done if they were¡­


    The only exnation for this was that Lin Fan had formed a contract with these eight True Soul Realm Beast, turning them into his pets!


    But if that was the case, what kind of a monster was Lin Fan?


    He was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, but he had tamed eight True Soul Realm Beasts?


    How could they keep living if this was true!


    While it was true that Lin Fan had contracts with all of these eight True Soul Realm Beasts, what they didn''t know was that these were all only temporary contracts. But still, that was shocking enough!


    After all, these were proud True Soul Realm Beasts that didn''t even bend to the twelve great factions.


    The leaders of the nine great factions recognized these True Soul Realm Beasts since they were the ones that had reached an agreement with these True Soul Realm Beasts before. They were the ones that had been too troublesome to deal with, so they had given these True Soul Realm Beasts territory in exchange for not bothering them.


    How had Lin Fan subdued these proud and powerful True Soul Realm Beasts!<sub> </sub>


    After all, it had to be known that these True Soul Realm Beasts were strong enough to get territory from the twelve great factions! That was how much of a concession they had to make in front of these eight True Soul Realm Beasts!


    And now Lin Fan was able to tame them?


    Of course, the main reason why Lin Fan was able to tame them was because of his special ability. That ability to purify bloodlines with a single punch.


    Lin Fan was very important to these eight True Soul Realm Beasts since he represented their future, so they put aside their pride and allowed themselves to be restrained with a temporary contract just so they could follow Lin Fan for now. That was how they had been able to suddenly appear by Lin Fan''s side like this.


    To protect him, they didn''t care about anything.


    As soon as the eight True Soul Realm Beasts appeared, they immediately spread out to face the True Soul Realm Beasts charging at the lines of the nine great factions.


    These True Soul Realm Beasts were strong enough to even make the twelve great factions wary, so there was no need to mention their abilities to face these True Soul Realm Beasts without any masters.


    But the strange thing was that they had left one of the True Soul Realm Beasts alone.


    This sole True Soul Realm Beast was able to break through the lines and make its way into the midst of the nine faction experts.


    All of the Nascent Soul Realm Experts gave way for this True Soul Realm Beast, but they still surrounded it. None of them wanted to face this True Soul Realm Beast head on, but they knew that they couldn''t let this True Soul Realm Beast run free among theirrades.


    But to their surprise, the one that charged forward to face this True Soul Realm Beast wasn''t any of them, but rather a figure that suddenly came out of nowhere. When they saw clearly who it was, they were even more shocked.


    It was Lin Fan!


    He had charged out from among them and was charging right at the True Soul Realm Beast with his fists raised.


    He didn''t have any weapons, he didn''t have any pets, he didn''t have anyws, he was just charging at the True Soul Realm Beast with his fist.


    The moment that the True Soul Realm Beast saw this, it immediately released its domain to cover Lin Fan to stop him. But Lin Fan was already used to moving under a domain from his training over the past few days, so with his absorption power and sun releasing energy at full power, he was able to run without being impeded at all.


    The True Soul Realm Beast naturally didn''t just stop at this as it raised its w to swipe out at Lin Fan.


    The others watching this weren''t worried at first since they expected Lin Fan to use the same thing as before. However, when they looked closely, they found that there wasn''t a single Nascent Soul Realm Beast that had been deployed around Lin Fan.


    They also couldn''t feel the sensation of the pseudo domain that appeared.


    It seemed like Lin Fan really was charging forward without a single thing!


    No! They couldn''t allow that to happen!


    Lin Fan was the most important person here because he was the link between them and the expert hiding in the shop!


    If something were to happen to him¡­There might even be a chance that the expert would just give up on them!


    So they couldn''t let anything happen to him at all!


    But the strange thing was that the True Soul Realm Beasts that should have been the most worried were the calmest ones at this moment. It was almost as if they were watching a y.


    The True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions wanted to rush to Lin Fan''s aid, but they couldn''t get past the True Soul Realm Beasts that were blocking them. They could only watch as the w of the True Soul Realm Beast Lin Fan faced fell down atop of him.


    But then Lin Fan suddenly pulled out a dagger that he threw into the ground by the True Soul Realm Beast''s feet.


    This dagger suddenly released a glow that quickly formed a glowing area that surrounded Lin Fan and the True Soul Realm Beast.


    The True Soul Realm Beast was caught off guard by this glowing area that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. That was because it could feel that in this glowing area, its domain was being pushed out and it couldn''t use its domain at all.


    It was so caught off guard that its w stopped and it just stood there looking around itself in a daze.


    Lin Fan took advantage of this to charge right up to the True Soul Realm Beast and punch it right in the face!

 Chapter 801 The Main War Begins (3)

    Everyone who had been watching just fell silent at that moment as they couldn''t believe what had happened.


    Lin Fan didn''t use any weapons orws, he just directly punched the True Soul Realm Beast in the face¡­


    What was this!?


    Did he not want to live anymore?!


    Moreover, what did he think that he would aplish just with this simple punch?


    It was just a punch that was given by his body, it didn''t have anyws backing it up, so it couldn''t even break the defenses of the True Soul Realm Beast.


    The True Soul Realm Beast''s head didn''t even turn when it was punched as it stood there like a statue.


    Everyone was worried that Lin Fan would be pped down right away by the w that the True Soul Realm Beast had already raised, but to their surprise, that didn''t happen at all.


    The True Soul Realm Beast had a normal expression at first, but then its eyes filled with more and more shock. Eventually, itsrge beast face revealed an ugly look of disbelief as it looked right at Lin Fan.


    There was only silence that filled the surrounding area for a full minute before the beast suddenly lowered its w. However, this w wasn''t lowered onto Lin Fan as everyone expected and feared, rather it was firmly ced on the ground.


    After the w was put down, the True Soul Realm Beast got onto four limbs and bowed its head as if it was submitting to Lin Fan. In front of everyone''s shocked gaze, this lion True Soul Realm Beast then raised its head and rubbed up against Lin Fan like it was not a lion, but rather a kitten. It did all it could to get affection from Lin Fan¡­


    Thispletely shattered the world views of everyone watching as they couldn''t believe what had just happened.


    Just a single punch was all that it took to tame a True Soul Realm Beast! How could anyone else live after seeing this!


    At the same time, the leaders of the nine great factions let out a sigh of relief seeing that Lin Fan was fine. If something really had happened to Lin Fan, it was something that they couldn''t ept.


    Lin Fan let the True Soul Realm Beast rub up against him and he patted its head before turning his attention to the other True Soul Realm Beasts that were upied by Qing Ao and the others. He narrowed his eyes to study them before picking one to charge at.


    As soon as he charged out, the lion True Soul Realm Beast immediately followed him.


    The one that he had chosen was one that Qing Ao was currently holding down, it was a turtle True Soul Realm Beast that was able to rely on its defenses to block the attacks of Qing Ao. So even though it was alone, it was able to hold back Qing Ao by itself.


    Of course, the moment that Lin Fan and the lion True Soul Realm Beast joined in the fight, the turtle spirit beast had no choice but to use its ultimate move. It immediately shrank its head and all of its limbs into its shell and there was a greenyer of light that appeared around that shell.


    If that was just it, then it wouldn''t have been that hard to deal with, but it didn''t stop there.


    Once it tucked itself into its shell, it immediately started rolling. It rolled and rolled, going faster and faster until it generated an immense amount of force.


    It was so strong that even Qing Ao wasn''t able to stop it by himself.


    However, the one downside to this ability was that it consumed life energy at an immense rate. This powerful defense was created at the cost of using all of the turtle True Soul Realm Beast''s life energy, so it had no choice but to go all out.


    It didn''t hold back at all as it charged at Qing Ao and Qing Ao knew that this was bad. Unless he used his trump cards as well, it would be hard for him to guard against this ultimate move.


    After all, he could sense a trace of the ck Turtle''s bloodline in this turtle True Soul Realm Beast. That was also what made this green barrier around it even stronger.


    So unless he used his dragon bloodline, it was hard for him to block it.


    But luckily there was the support of the lion True Soul Realm Beast that Lin Fan had tamed.


    It came forward and with the two of them working together to kite the turtle True Soul Realm Beast around, they were able to eventually lead it into a ce where they stacked their domains on it and kept it in ce.


    Lin Fan jumped out at this time and without even using any life energy, he just simply punched the green glowing shell of the turtle.


    He didn''t care that there was a green barrier around the turtle True Soul Realm Beast, he just punched the turtle right in the shell. Of course, he wasn''t able to destroy the green glowing barrier and was pushed back, but that was already enough for Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    A few seconds after Lin Fan was sent flying, the green glow on the shell naturally dissipated by itself and the turtle poked its head out. It acted the same way as the lion True Soul Realm Beast, as it looked at Lin Fan for a few seconds in shock beforeing over to fawn over him.


    It didn''t matter that there had been that green glowing barrier around it, Lin Fan''s absorption power had still been able to go through it.


    Naturally, it wasn''t that the absorption power could go right through it, but rather Lin Fan had concentrated it into a single point. Then that needle thing point of the gathered absorption force was able to make its way through the green glowing barrier and reach the shell of the turtle.


    As long as Lin Fan was able to touch the shell with his absorption force, it wasn''t a problem for him to do what he wanted to do.


    Everyone once again revealed looks of shock and disbelief, but this time, the looks of disbelief on their faces were much stronger.


    After all, it could be considered a fluke if it just happened once, but if it happened twice¡­There was no way that they could keep lying to themselves like this.


    Lin Fan really was able to tame these True Soul Realm Beasts with just a single punch!


    Even though he was just a Nascent Soul Realm Expert, Lin Fan was able to control the situation on the battlefield¡­


    This naturally didn''t escape the eyes of Bing Jun or Huo Fei who were hiding away watching the battle.


    They knew that if it continued like this, then it would be impossible for them to aplish their n and they would be forced to use more "drastic" measures.


    The reason why they had done all these strange things, attacking in waves instead of focusing all of their power into crushing them, was because they didn''t want to crush them. Their goal in invading this Gctic Humanity Alliance was to collect experts to send out as cannon fodder as per the orders of the Tai Ster Royal Family. So if they were to crush them, that would go against their goals.


    They had wanted to use these waves of attacks to show these lowlymoners of this upper realm who they were dealing with and to show them the difference between them. They were certain that once thesemoners understood that difference, they would learn the errors of their ways and submit to them.


    That would allow them to collect as many uninjured experts from this Gctic Humanity Alliance as possible.


    But there was one thing that they didn''t count on, Lin Fan.


    They never expected that this unknown person who showed up out of nowhere would be able to achieve such miraculous things.


    Taming a True Soul Realm Beast with a single punch, it had been unheard of even in their own Tai Ster Kingdom¡­


    So this was a situation that no one could expect.


    It even made the two of them worried since their ns seemed like they were going off the rails.


    They didn''t worry because of the True Soul Realm Beasts, or rather losing these True Soul Realm Beasts since they were also considered cannon fodder for them. For families like theirs, it was as simple as waving their hand to gather fifty True Soul Realm Beasts like this.


    They were just worried about being forced to show their trump cards¡­


    But there was something that also confused them.


    These True Soul Realm Beasts had been specially modified by their families, so they should have beenpletely obedient to them. Even if Lin Fan were to tame them, it should be impossible for them to break free from their control.


    After all, there was a special energy that had been injected into these True Soul Realm Beasts.


    If they ever betrayed them, that energy should have detonated and killed Lin Fan, so why didn''t it happen yet?


    Why were these True Soul Realm Beasts perfectly fine and capable of going against them?


    None of this made any sense to them¡­


    Of course, they never would have imagined that Lin Fan would be able to suck out the special energy that they had injected into these True Soul Realm Beasts since they never encountered a power like Lin Fan''s before.


    For now, they had no idea how this war would end¡­

 Chapter 802 The Main War Begins (4)

    After taming this turtle True Soul Realm Beast, Lin Fan didn''t stop as he continued charging at different True Soul Realm Beasts.


    This time, he split up these three True Soul Realm Beasts and sent them to take care of two True Soul Realm Beasts at the same time.


    These three True Soul Realm Beasts split up and went to help Feng Ling and Lei Ting at the same time. With these five True Soul Realm Beasts working together at the same time, they were able to lead both of these True Soul Realm Beasts over to Lin Fan.


    Then all it took was a single punch for Lin Fan to bring these two True Soul Realm Beasts under his control¡­


    Seeing the True Soul Realm Beasts falling under Lin Fan''s fists one by one, the forces of the nine great factions were filled with morale. They cheered Lin Fan as they charged at the enemies without any fear.


    Naturally, the sesses of Lin Fan also hurt the morale of the enemies.


    Seeing their trump cards, the True Soul Realm Beasts being turned, the morale of the enemies tanked as they were overwhelmed by the forces of the nine great factions.


    With these seven True Soul Realm Beasts under his control now, Lin Fan made his boldest move. He sent all seven of them out and, working together with the other five True Soul Realm Beasts that were still fighting, lured all five of the enemy True Soul Realm Beasts over.


    Once again, all it took was a simple punch for each of these five True Soul Realm Beasts and they immediately changed sides¡­


    Seventeen True Soul Realm Beasts, that was how many True Soul Realm Beasts were currently under Lin Fan!


    This was almost the same number of True Soul Realm Experts that the nine great factions had in total!


    Of course, when it came to power, the nine great factions'' experts were stronger since their True Soul Realm Experts had deeper cultivations. They had been cultivating much longer than these True Soul Realm Beasts, so their techniques were much stronger.


    But seventeen True Soul Realm Beasts were more than enough to turn the tide of the battle itself.


    When the enemies saw this, their morale hit rock bottom and there were many who even thought about running away.


    It was at this time that Bing Jun and Huo Fei finally made their move.


    They had assumed that whatever strange technique that Lin Fan was using would definitely consume a lot of life energy. As long as they waited it out, he would use up all his life energy and he would no longer be able to disrupt the battlefield anymore.


    However, that n didn''t go as they had expected.


    After Lin Fan finished taming all nine of these True Soul Realm Beasts, he wasn''t even panting. It looked like using his powers to tame these nine True Soul Realm Beasts didn''t use any energy at all.


    Now he was even turning his sights to the True Soul Realm Beasts that were currently fighting the experts of the nine great factions.


    They couldn''t allow him to continue with this unimpeded. If he were allowed to continue doing what he had been doing this entire time, their defeat was certain.


    So they had no choice but to send out more forces.


    Bing Jun nodded at the eight people behind him and said, "It''s your turn."


    The eight of them had no fear as they looked at the battlefield and nodded in response before they said together, "We will not let you down, young master Bing."


    Then without another word, all eight of them disappeared.


    When they reappeared again, they had appeared on the battlefield, charging at the different True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions.


    There were people that tried to stop them, but they were taken down instantly when they shed with these eight people.


    Once the eight of them revealed their power, everyone revealed shocked looks.


    Eight True Soul Realm Experts!


    It seemed like Bing Jun and Huo Fei had still been hiding some cards¡­


    But of course, it didn''t take long before the forces from the nine great factions recognized these eight people.


    They were the True Soul Realm Experts from the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association. So it was natural that they would appear here since everyone already knew that these three factions had long submitted to Bing Jun.


    The eight of them charged at the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions, nning to take them out with the True Soul Realm Beasts.<sub> </sub>


    The True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions naturally recognized this and were positioning to fight the True Soul Realm Experts of the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association, but they were stopped by the True Soul Realm Beasts.


    Perhaps fighting one True Soul Realm Beast at this level would allow them some room to move, but two of them¡­All of the targeted True Soul Realm Experts from the nine great factions were under pressure fighting these two¡­


    However, before the enemy True Sou Realm Experts could reach their targets, Lin Fan made his move.


    He had been observing the battle while moving closer to the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions to see what he should do next. He didn''t immediately jump to their aid since he didn''t believe that Bing Jun and Huo Fei would let this battle end like this.


    As he had expected, the enemy had also sent out True Soul Realm Experts.


    So with a thought, Qing Ao''s group immediately headed off.


    They quickly came to the sides of the eight True Soul Realm Experts from the nine great factions that had been targeted.


    When the True Soul Realm Experts saw these beasts appearing beside them, they were immediately filled with excitement. They moved to work with these beasts to take down the enemy True Soul Realm Beasts, but Qing Ao''s group gave them a message that surprised them.


    "You take care of the enemy human True Soul Realm Expert, we''ll take care of these beasts."


    Then without even giving the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions time to respond, they charged at the two enemy True Soul Realm Beasts alone.


    The True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions were in a daze for a bit, but they quickly recovered as they realized that they were right.


    They were beasts, so it would be easier for them to fight these beasts. As for the enemy human True Soul Realm Experts, they were all people from the same generation and had fought each other before, so they knew what techniques their enemies would have. It was easier for humans to fight against humans and for beasts to fight against beasts.


    As for fighting together to take care of the beasts, they quickly realized that there was no time.


    The enemy human True Soul Realm Experts were moving much faster than they had imagined. It was clear that they were using some kind of artifact to make themselves move even faster.


    It seemed they were here to fight for real¡­


    Since that was the case, the eight True Soul Realm Experts from the nine great factions didn''t back then.


    They brandished their weapons and charged at the enemy True Soul Realm Experts. Not long after, the two sides shed with each other.


    But this sh didn''tst long as one side was quickly blown away by the other side.


    The ones that were blown away were the True Soul Realm Experts of the nine great factions.


    All of them were sent flying and had streaks of blooding out the side of their mouths. It was clear that they had been injured in that sh just now.


    As for the True Soul Realm Experts of the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association, all of them had strange looking weapons in their hands. However, even if they had strange appearances, the aura that came from them wasn''t strange. All of these strange looking weapons were all powerful artifacts.


    There was no need to guess where these artifacts came from, but the fact that they had these artifacts was enough to change the tide of the battle.


    One Sword looked up at Ling Tian above him and said, "You really sold your souls to those invaders, haven''t you?"


    Ling Tian just looked down at him and said with a wildugh, "So what if we have? Isn''t cultivation about chasing after power? So what''s wrong if we want more power?" Hisughter slowly stopped and he said with a serious look, "You should give up. The sooner you do, the better it will be for you."


    One Sword spat out a mouthful of blood before saying, "In your dreams! Unlike you, we still have our pride and won''t bow down to invaders!"


    Ling Tian shook his head like he was looking at an idiot, but he still said, "As you wish. Then let''s see if you be more obedient after getting beaten a bit more."


    But before either of them could make a move, there was a green glow that suddenly approached them.


    Both of them raised their guard since they didn''t know what this was and they could feel the True Soul Realm auraing from it, but then that green glow came to One Sword''s side. After it did, it stopped there and revealed itself to be the turtle True Soul Realm Beast that Lin Fan had tamed.


    It reached its head out and gave One Sword the jade slip that it had in its mouth.


    When One Sword saw this talisman, he suddenly revealed a wide smile and crushed it without hesitation.

 Chapter 803 The Main War Begins (5)

    As soon as One Sword crushed the jade slip, there were two balls of light that appeared, entering both him and the turtle.


    This jade slip contained a temporary contract with the turtle True Spirit Beast and once One Sword crushed it, he would be its master.


    One Sword was a sword cultivator and in normal situations, sword cultivators wouldn''t need pets because of their power. However, there were certain situations where sword cultivators would take pets.


    Sword cultivators were powerful because of their mighty attacks, but it was because of those mighty attacks that they also had a w.


    They werecking in defense!


    This was usually solved by sword arrays or using powerful attacks without care of defense, but those weren''t proper solutions. They were just a way of patching this deficiency and not solving it.


    The real way to solve it was by using a pet with a defensive ability, like this turtle.


    As long as they had a pet at the same level that defended while they attacked, they could be considered truly invincible on the battlefield.


    Not to mention, One Sword had already seen how powerful the defenses of the turtle was just now. This turtle would definitely be a perfect match for his One Kill Sword!


    So with a single thought, the turtle shrank and came up to his chest. Then with a bright sh of green light, the turtle suddenly disappeared and there was a turtle shell armour that appeared on One Sword''s chest.


    Looking down at this, he broke out in wildughter as he charged at Ling Tian again.


    Ling Tian had been warily watching all of this happen, but since he didn''t know what was going on, he hadn''t made a move. It was just too bad that he hadn''t, otherwise he could have stopped One Sword from getting stronger. If he knew this, he definitely would have kicked himself.


    Still, seeing One Sword charge at him, Ling Tian didn''t have any fear since he had received this artifact from young master Bing. This was an artifact that contained powers far surpassing his own, so he naturally was confident.


    But when the two sides shed, Ling Tian was the one that was knocked away.


    Ling Tian looked at One Sword in shock before looking down at the artifact in his hand.


    When the two of them had just shed, his artifact had been stopped by the green turtle shell that had been around One Sword and then he had been overwhelmed by the countless swords that One Sword three at him, sending him flying.


    Ling Tian was in a daze for a full minute before turning back to look at One Sword and shouting, "How?! How did you stop me?!"


    One Sword just gave a cold smile and said, "This is just the difference between the two of us."


    Then without another word, One Sword charged out at Ling Tian again.


    This situation didn''t just happen between One Sword and Ling Tian, the same situation was happening all over the battlefield.


    In the fight between the True Soul Realm Experts of the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association and the nine great factions, it was the experts of the nine great factions that wereing out on top.


    That was because all of them had received the same True Soul Realm Beast temporary contract as One Sword.


    The True Soul Realm Beast that Lin Fan sent to every one of them perfectly matched them, covering for their weakness, which brought their power to a whole other level. So even if the True Soul Realm Experts of the Thunder Sect, True Spirit Sect, and the Assassins Association had the artifacts that they received from Bing Jun, they still couldn''t match the experts of the nine great factions.


    Some of them even began wondering if they had made a mistake siding with young master Bing¡­


    Of course, during this time, Lin Fan didn''t remain idle.


    After sending the eight True Soul Realm Beasts to each of the experts from the nine great factions, he rushed off towards Qing Ao.


    The situation on the battlefield had already stabilized, so it was up to him to tip them in their favour since he had the ability to do so.


    Since Qing Ao was facing two different True Soul Realm Beasts this time and Lin Fan only had the lion True Soul Realm Beast helping him, he had no choice but to release his Nascent Soul Realm Beasts as well. They immediately scattered in different directions and formed the pseudo domain array, working with the lion True Soul Realm Beast to suppress one of the True Soul Realm Beasts.


    Qing Ao immediately caught onto this and suppressed the other one.


    It was easy this time because this True Soul Realm Beast didn''t have an ultimate move like the turtle True Soul Realm Beast had.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate at all tond a punch on that True Soul Realm Beast, immediately taming it and turning it to their side.


    The four of them then all turned onto the other True Soul Realm Beast, suppressing it in a matter of seconds.


    When the surrounding enemies saw that their True Soul Realm Beast allies were turning on them again, they could only reveal looks of despair. At the same time, the forces from the nine great factions were filled with spirit as they charged the enemy.


    In one single move, Lin Fan once again tipped the scales of the battle in their favour, but he wasn''t done with just this.


    After taking care of these two True Soul Realm Beast, he rushed over to where Feng Ling was with these four True Soul Realm Beasts and quickly tamed the two that she had been facing as well.


    Lin Fan spread across the battlefield like a disease that infected the True Soul Realm Beasts of the enemy, turning them to their side one by one.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei who had been watching this clenched their fists. With each True Soul Realm Beast that had been turned, they clenched their fists even more until they finally couldn''t take it anymore.


    Bing Jun mmed his fist into the table in front of him and said in a voice that was seething with rage, "It seems that we have no choice."


    Huo Fei beside him was also seething with rage as he said, "So you''re finally willing to call for reinforcements?"


    Bing Jun red at him and said, "This isn''t the time, do you not see what''s happening?"


    Huo Fei was silent for a bit before giving a silent nod.


    He had indeed been poking at Bing Jun to vent a bit of his anger, but Bing Jun was right. This wasn''t the time since if they kept going at it like this, it would mean that their n would fail and it would be over for them.


    The two of them turned to look at the final cloaked figure that was in this room and Bing Jun said, "Master You, it seems like we do need your assistance after all."


    This cloaked figure had been sitting there the entire time, but he hadn''t said a single word. He had his eyes closed too, so he hadn''t even seen what had happened on the battlefield.


    It was as if none of this had anything to do with him, or rather, he was above all of this.


    But hearing Bing Jun talking to him, he suddenly opened his eyes that were like pits into the abyss.


    This Master You looked at Bing Jun with narrowed eyes before turning to look at the battlefield. Seeing the situation that had been developing, he couldn''t help shaking his head and saying, "The masters of the Bing and Huo Families can''t even take care of a simple upper realm, this truly is disappointing."


    He didn''t even bother hiding the disdain in his voice, but even when Bing Jun and Huo Fei heard it, they couldn''t say anything.


    Right now, they were nothing more than juniors of the Bing and Huo Family and this Master You was one of the experts that their families had sent. He was a true World Realm Expert and he was worth far more to their families than they were.


    So even if he looked down on them, they had no choice but to show respect to him.


    Bing Jun bowed his head before saying, "We have to ask Master You to act in the end still."


    Master You ignored him and just looked at Lin Fan who was making his way through the battlefield with narrowed eyes. After a while, he said, "This kid really has strange techniques, even I''m not able to see through them. I''ll take this kid back and y around with him for a bit. He should make a good puppet."


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei both revealed a slight look of disgust when they heard this.


    They had long heard about this Master You''s hobbies before. The puppet he referred to were corpse puppets that he refined that he used to fight with, but that wasn''t all that he did with those corpse puppets¡­


    It was said that most of his corpse puppets were handsome men¡­


    After this, Master You turned to Bing Jun and Huo Fei and said, "I''ll leave the rest to you, I''ll only take care of that kid."


    Without even waiting for a response, he jumped out of the room and flew out at Lin Fan at an incredible speed.


    By the time that anyone could react, his hand was already pping down towards Lin Fan.

 Chapter 804 The Main War Begins (6)

    By the time that Lin Fan could react, he saw that palm that was getting bigger and bigger falling down on him.


    There was nowhere that he could run since the pressureing from it pinned him in ce. He could only watch as that palm came closer and closer to taking his life.


    But before anything else could happen, the palm was also suddenly knocked away.


    There was a cloaked figure that appeared out of nowhere that mmed into Master You, sending him flying.


    Master You was surprised at first, but after tilting his head to think for a bit, he suddenly remembered something. He narrowed his eyes to look at this cloaked figure and said, "So you''re the World Realm Expert that''s protecting this kid that I heard about. It seems like I''ll have to take care of you first then."


    The cloaked figure didn''t say a thing as he gestured up with his head. Then before anyone else could say anything, he suddenly flew into the sky.


    Master You gave a snort, but he still followed that cloaked figure into the sky.


    The cloaked figure had brought Master You away because this was a fight between World Realm Experts. If they were to fight here, it would certainly affect the people that were around them, including Lin Fan.


    As for why Master You agreed, that was because he knew that if he didn''t take care of this World Realm Expert first, he wouldn''t be able to get to Lin Fan.


    Since the other World Realm Expert was challenging him head on, then there was no need for him to shy away from it. Master You had this confidence to take care of another World Realm Expert, he had this confidence in his strength.


    The battlefield had stopped after the appearance of these two World Realm Experts since their pressure had forced everyone to stop. But after the two of them left, there was only another moment of silence before everyone started fighting again.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief after seeing the two figures disappear.


    He didn''t know who that person that attacked him was, but he knew for sure that this was most likely an expert that was sent by the Tai Ster Kingdom to kill him. This expert wasn''t just any expert, this was an expert that surpassed the limits of cultivation of this realm.


    He knew that if it wasn''t for the cloaked figure helping him, he definitely would have died at that moment even with all of his cheats¡­


    But Lin Fan didn''t let himself feel down since he had already expected this, which was why he had drawn all that attention to himself.


    So after a few seconds of pause to catch his breath, Lin Fan continued charging at the different True Soul Realm Beasts.


    Right now, he had already tamed ten of the True Soul Realm Beasts and there were only six left before his True Soul Realm Beast allies were freed, so he had to finish them off.


    So without any hesitation, he sent a mental message to the three remaining True Soul Realm Beasts to bring their enemies over for him to deal with.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei silently watched everything happen with Master You, but they were no longer as calm as before. They did know about the World Realm Expert that was protecting Lin Fan, but they never thought that this World Realm Expert would be able to bring Master You away.


    They had thought that Master You would beat that World Realm Expert right away and then take care of Lin Fan¡­


    But now that wasn''t the case, the two of them had no choice but to take to the battlefield themselves.


    So after picking up a few things that were scattered around the room, the two of them charged onto the battlefield. The direction that they were headed in was none other than where Lin Fan was currently standing.


    Lin Fan had just finished taking care of all the True Soul Realm Beast enemies, so he was taking stock of the battle''s situation. He was nning his next move when Bing Jun and Huo Fei suddenly showed up in front of him.


    But he didn''t panic when he saw the two of them appear since he was already expecting it.


    He felt that this should be around the time that the two of them appeared unless they had some kind of other trump card that they were hiding. After all, they had already brought out the World Realm Expert, so they shouldn''t have anything else left.


    And as he expected, here they were.


    However, they did have something that surprised him.


    The aura around the two of them, it was clear that they were at the Peak True Soul Realm, just a step away from breaking through to the World Realm.


    This was more than enough for them to be considered the strongest experts here, but at the same time, Lin Fan could feel strange aurasing from the weapons that they had¡­These were clearly powerful artifacts that they had received from their family.


    After appearing, Bing Jun was the first one to speak. He gave a sigh before saying, "Brother inw, did it really have toe to this? If you had just surrendered, you wouldn''t have forced our hands like this."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan gave a coldugh and said, "Then why don''t you back down? You''re free to leave and try again on another."


    Bing Jun shook his head and said, "You should know that''s not possible." Then his eyes turned cold and sharp as he said, "I''ll give you onest chance. As long as you surrender, I won''t make it hard for you on ount of Xue''er. But know that if you do resist, this won''t end well for you."


    Lin Fan looked right back at him with cold eyes and said, "Xue''er isn''t interested in you and I am not your brother inw."


    There was finally a trace of killing intent that appeared in Bing Jun''s eyes when he heard this. He looked at Lin Fan with those narrowed eyes and said, "It seems that you aren''t willing to ept Xue''er and I¡­Then there''s no need for you to live anymore."


    Without any warning at all, Bing Jun suddenly swept out with that sword in his hand.


    As the sword created an arc in the air, there was also an arc of blue light that was formed. The blue light gathered in the air until they formed icicles that suddenly flew out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t panic when he saw this, he just stood there waiting for the icicles to approach him.


    Right when the icicles were about to hit him, there was a barrier that appeared in front of him. The icicles hit the barrier right on and were shattered to pieces, scattering in the wind.


    Bing Jun just gave a cold snort and then suddenly disappeared. When he appeared again, he was already right beside Lin Fan with his sword raised.


    But then before he could sh down, he felt a pressure falling onto him.


    This pressure was even strong enough to stop him from moving, forcing him to move away from Lin Fan.


    After knitting his brows to think for a bit, Bing Jun suddenly took out a blue cloak. This was the cloak that he had worn before when facing Lin Fan''s pseudo domain and he was using it again now.


    However, when he tried to approach Lin Fan, he found that it still wasn''t working and he was being pressured by the pseudo domain around him. It didn''t even work when he used his own domain to counter it.


    He couldn''t understand what was happening, there shouldn''t be a domain that was strong enough to pressure him when he was wearing this cloak.


    After all, this cloak contained a wisp of a domain from a World Realm Expert!


    All the items that had been used to resist Lin Fan''s pseudo domain had a wisp of a World Realm Expert''s domain in it. Since it was stronger than the pseudo domain, it was easy for it to create a space where the pseudo domain was pushed out.


    However, since it was only a wisp of a World Realm Expert''s domain, it wasn''t strong enough to suppress thews of the enemies. It just created a space where domains couldn''t be used anymore.


    But even with this cloak, he wasn''t able to stop this pseudo domain?


    Why was that?


    It was actually because Lin Fan had now integrated the domains of the various True Soul Realm Beasts into his formation. He already had experience with this from the trial space, so he was able to easily coordinate with the True Soul Realm Beasts to aplish this.


    This was the domain of more than ten different True Soul Realm Beasts all forced into a single space, it was enough to even match the wisp of the World Realm Expert''s domain.


    That was why Bing Jun still felt pressure when entering this pseudo domain.


    After another moment of thought, Bing Jun abandoned the idea of charging in to attack Lin Fan. Instead, he pulled out a small blue orb that he held in his hand, gathering all the water in the space around him to form blocks of ice.


    When Lin Fan saw these blocks of ice, he couldn''t help knitting his brows since he could tell that these were much stronger than the icicles that he shot before.


    But still, he didn''t panic as he deployed the barrier around him.


    When the ice blocks hit the barrier, they were still shattered to pieces, but it was clear by the looks of the faces of the True Soul Realm Beasts around him that this had taken a toll on them.


    Lin Fan knew that in the long run, he would be the one who would run out of attrition first, so he had to be the one that made a move.


    But before he could, Huo Fei suddenly appeared behind him.

 Chapter 805 The Main War Begins (7)

    Huo Fei said with a smile, "It seems like you''ve forgotten about me."


    Then without another word, he stabbed down at Lin Fan with daggers that were covered in mes.


    Huo Fei was a special kind of genius, he was a genius with two differentws at birth.


    He had the mews that came with being a member of the Huo Family, but he wasn''t suited for head on attacks like the rest of his family. Instead, he was someone who was more suited for attacking from behind and attacking from the shadows.


    That was because his secondw was the shadoww.


    Then with the soundw that he learnedter on as a thirdw, he was able to move silently through the night. With the level that he reached, he was even able to move silently through the day.


    That was also the reason why he had been paired with Bing Jun.


    Bing Jun had the strongest attack power out of the Bing Family juniors, a trait that was rare for icew users like them since usually icews or rather waterws were more gentle. But Bing Jun went against the rest of his family and had developed an icew that had a powerful attack.


    With these two rare geniuses here, no one would have thought that they would be forced this far¡­


    It was just that no one had predicted the existence of a Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan saw this and he quickly turned, he brought out a ck dagger that he swept out to meet the ming daggers falling down on him.


    The two sides shed and the result was Lin Fan being pushed back by the ming daggers, but at the very least, he wasn''t injured by them. Though his ck dagger did shatter to pieces after shing with the ming daggers.


    However, this was something that Lin Fan expected since this ck dagger was a disposable item that he had bought from the system''s shop.


    It was the same as the daggers that he had usedst time, but this time, he had bought daggers that were stronger.


    With the points that he kept earning from selling Child Soul Realm and Nascent Soul Realm beasts to the nine great factions, he had plenty of points to work with. So he hadn''t held back and had bought the best items for himself.


    After all, there was nothing more important than his own life.


    Huo Fei knitted his brows when he saw this, but he didn''t hesitate as he charged forward to press the attack on Lin Fan. He wanted to kill Lin Fan before he had a chance to catch his footing.


    However, before he could reach Lin Fan, there was a ball of light that suddenly appeared in front of Lin Fan.


    Huo Fei was caught off guard by this ball of light, but then he didn''t hesitate at all to bring his daggers up in front of him in a X shape. He could feel the dangering from this ball of light, so he immediately put up his guard.


    As he had expected, the ball of light suddenly released a beam of light that was aimed right at him. The beam of light hit the daggers head on and then sent Huo Fei flying away.


    When hended, there was actually a sliver of blood that came out of the corner of his mouth.


    If he hadn''t put up his daggers to defend himself, perhaps he would have been even more seriously injured.


    It was only natural that he was injured by that beam of light since it was the culmination of many differentws from different True Soul Realm Beasts. Even if he was in the Peak True Soul Realm, when facing thebination ofws from many different True Soul Realm Beasts, it was impossible for him to get away uninjured.


    It was already good enough that he only suffered slight injuries.


    This was just the power of Lin Fan''s array.


    Not only was he able to form a pseudo domain with thews of the beasts involved, he was also able to gather theirws together to form barriers or to attack with. But to do so, he had to take some time to gather thews first, which was why he hadn''t been able to form a barrier to block Huo Fei''s first attack.


    After being knocked back, Huo Fei was beginning to feel the pressure from being inside of the pseudo domain for a long time, so he immediately jumped back and left the pseudo domain. Once he was out, he used his shadoww domain to fall into the shadows and disappear from everyone''s line of sight.


    This was the strategy that he and Bing Jun had already agreed on.


    Bing Jun would be the one drawing the attention of the enemy while he would be attacking from the shadows. So now that his attack had failed, all that was left for him was to hide in the shadows again and wait for another opportunity to attack.<sub> </sub>


    Bing Jun had also seen this, so he started gathering more ice to attack Lin Fan''s barrier with. He could see how powerful Lin Fan''s barrier was, but he knew that this wasn''t Lin Fan''s own power. This was clearly power borrowed from another source.


    With that fact in mind and the power that the barrier demonstrated, he was certain that this barrier wouldn''t be able tost long. As long as he kept bombarding the barrier, it would eventually copse, so he shouldn''t give Lin Fan any chance to catch his breath.


    So he started throwing waves of icicles at the barrier in front of Lin Fan. Even if the icicles were shattered to pieces each time, he didn''t stop throwing the waves of icicles at the barrier.


    Lin Fan knew what he was thinking, but he knew that this was the best choice.


    It was true, the array that Lin Fan was using consumed a lot of life energy, so he wouldn''t be able to hold on if Bing Jun was to keep hitting him with these waves of icicles. Lin Fan had to do something to end this fight quickly, but the problem was that Huo Fei was also here.


    If he were to go all out against Bing Jun, there was no doubt that Huo Fei would attack him from his blind spot.


    He wasn''t able to see through Huo Fei''s shadowws even with the help of Brainy, so he had no choice but to be wary of him.


    This put him in a difficult position since he had no choice but to defend when he wanted to attack.


    Lin Fan had to find a way to pin down where Huo Fei was if he wanted to get out of this situation. However, the problem was that Huo Fei had hidden himself perfectly.


    Even if Lin Fan wanted to use his soundws to find Huo Fei, he wasn''t able to since Huo Fei also had soundws. So all the soundws that he sent out were neutralized by Huo Fei without revealing his location.


    It seemed that for him to do this, there was only one chance¡­


    After a moment to catch his thoughts and n out his next move, Lin Fan suddenly pulled out several ck daggers that were like the ones that he had used to block Huo Fei''s attack. Right after he pulled them out, he threw them into the air and they floated there in the air around him.


    With these ck daggers floating in the air, Lin Fan charged forward at Bing Jun.


    Bing Jun was taken aback by Lin Fan''s sudden charge, but he didn''t back down at all.


    He summoned more icicles in the air and also charged at Lin Fan. With a wave of his hand, the icicles that he summoned went to different sides and surrounded the barrier around Lin Fan, giving him no space to run even if he wanted to.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about these icicles as he used his barrier to block it.


    It was as if he didn''t care at all about consuming the life energy of his pets as he used the barrier to block everything. However, with how reckless he was being, it was certain that it wouldn''t take long for his pets to run out of life energy.


    So why was Lin Fan doing this?


    Lin Fan ignored everything and just charged at Bing Jun with a white sword in his hand, as if he wanted to sh head on with him.


    Bing Jun was of course not a fool. He knew that as long as Lin Fan had that barrier up, then there was no chance that he would be able to face him head on.


    So Bing Jun didn''t take the bait that Lin Fan was dangling in front of him. Instead, Bing Jun dodged back and kept sending waves of icicles at Lin Fan, peppering him from a distance.


    Eventually, the barrier around Lin Fan started to slowly fade away.


    Seeing this, there was a sparkle that appeared in Bing Jun''s eyes.


    Then when Lin Fan''s barrier faded a bit more, Bing Jun finally charged forward with a sword of ice in his hand.


    By the time that Bing Jun reached Lin Fan, the barrier had almostpletely disappeared. So even though he was beside Lin Fan, he didn''t feel the same pressure as before.


    With this, Bing Jun revealed a confident smile and shed out at Lin Fan.


    At the same time, there was a hidden figure in the shadows that revealed a cold smile and also moved in to stab Lin Fan.


    But what they didn''t know was that this was what Lin Fan had wanted.

 Chapter 806 The Main War Begins (8)

    A person lets their guard down the most the moment that they think they''ve won.


    This was even more the case with Bing Jun and Huo Fei, these proud young masters who had never lost before. As soon as they were certain of their victory, theypletely let go of their carefullyid out ns from before.


    Both of them thought that Lin Fan''s barrier was running out of power and this was their chance to take care of him. So neither of them had the same caution as before and charged right at him to end this battle.


    It was just a pity that this was a trap that Lin Fan had set for them.


    Bing Jun was the closest to Lin Fan since he attacked Lin Fan head on, but right before his sh could hit Lin Fan, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared in front of him.


    This was the barrier that he thought had disappeared, the barrier that he had thought that he had weakened. However, that weakening of the barrier was just a trick that Lin Fan used.


    He had purposefully lowered the power of the barrier to make it seem like it was about to fade away.


    Of course, it wasn''t just as simple as that.


    He also had to make sure that the timing was right, otherwise it would seem strange that the barrier would suddenly be weaker. So he had been stalling this entire time to make sure that it seemed like a natural weakening of the barrier instead of a sudden weakening of the barrier.


    If he didn''t do this, it was impossible to bait Bing Jun in.


    Bing Jun''s attack was blocked by the barrier, but there was still Huo Fei who was attacking from the shadows.


    With Lin Fan''s barrier being upied by Bing Jun''s head on attack, Huo Fei still felt like he had a chance to attack Lin Fan from the shadows. So instead of drawing back like he normally would have after their n failed, he continued charging at Lin Fan.


    It was just too bad that he forgot about one thing.


    There were still those ck daggers that had been floating around Lin Fan.


    Both Bing Jun and Huo Fei had assumed that these ck daggers would be for Bing Jun since he was the one who was facing Lin Fan head on, but that wasn''t the case.


    As soon as Huo Fei appeared from the shadows, Lin Fan immediately turned his attention to him.


    Those ck daggers that had been floating in the air around him also disappeared in an instant. When they reappeared again, they were now floating around Huo Fei.


    Instead of passively floating around him like they had been doing with Lin Fan, the tip of these daggers were now all pointed at Huo Fei.


    Without a single pause, they suddenly stabbed at him from different angles,pletely covering every angle that he could escape in. Huo Fei had no other choice but to face these daggers head on.


    He didn''t have the spatialws like Lin Fan had which was what sent these ck daggers to surround him in the first ce.


    So with no other choices, Huo Fei raised his ming daggers to block the ck daggers that had surrounded him. It was just too bad that he had given up his guard to attack Lin Fan and he had been caught off guard by this sudden attack that he wasn''t able to block all of them.


    There were five ck daggers that had appeared around, just being able to block three of them was already good enough.


    But as for the two that he couldn''t block, they stabbed right into his back.


    These ck daggers were special items that Lin Fan had bought from the system, so they were by no means weak. They were even stronger than the True Soul Realm Daggers that he had bought previously.


    So Huo Fei who had been caught off guard by these ck daggers couldn''t block them at all as they drew blood. However, that wasn''t the only damage that Huo Fei suffered.


    Thews in the daggers were sent right into Huo Fei and they caused him to spit out a mouthful of blood. He had clearly suffered internal injuries from this blow and the injuries he suffered weren''t light.


    Seeing that Huo Fei had been injured, Bing Jun wasted no time gathering a wave of ice.


    He sent this wave of ice right at Lin Fan, but this wave of ice wasn''t for attacking Lin Fan. Instead, it was to obscure Lin Fan''s vision and create a wall between them while he went to rescue Huo Fei.


    Even if the two of them didn''t have a good rtionship, Huo Fei was currently his partner and he couldn''t just let him die for nothing. When it came down to it, Bing Jun would still save him.


    Even more so in this situation because Lin Fan''s strange techniques really were putting pressure on them. He didn''t feel confident in taking on Lin Fan alone, he still needed Huo Fei''s help.<sub> </sub>


    It was just too bad that he hadpletely underestimated the power of Lin Fan''s dagger.


    He had assumed that Huo Fei''s injuries weren''t that bad, but what was inside of Lin Fan''s daggers were deathws. They hadpletely wrecked havoc on Huo Fei''s internal organs and if he didn''t take some time to clear them to allow himself to heal, it was likely that he would die from this injury.


    Bing Jun had only based the situation on Huo Fei''s outer appearance, but after rescuing Huo Fei, he realized that this situation was bad for him.


    No matter how he looked at it, it was impossible for Huo Fei to fight anymore¡­


    Now he would have to face Lin Fan alone and he had seen how Lin Fan''s barrier was still working. It was clear that Lin Fan would be able to fight him still and he would even be able to pressure him with this strange barrier.


    But it wasn''t as if he could back down now¡­


    So after thinking about it, Bing Jun decided to use his words.


    Taking a deep breath, he turned to Lin Fan and said, "Do you really want to continue fighting? It won''t take long before Master You finishes off your guard and then what will you do?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows since he wasn''t certain about the ck cloaked man''s chances of fighting the World Realm Expert backing Bing Jun.


    He knew that they were both World Realm Experts, but he was reallycking information about the two of them, so he didn''t know who would win in a fight. Their fight could end at any second and once it did, it wouldpletely change the situation of the battlefield.


    Bing Jun naturally noticed the change in Lin Fan''s expression and continued pressing, "You should give up now. You''ve shown more than enough power and as long as you give up, I can guarantee that you won''t receive the same treatment as the rest of the cannon fodder. You will be given a proper position in our Bing Family and you''ll be considered one of the nobles of the Tai Ster Kingdom. This is something that not even those trash sects are getting."


    Then as if he thought of something, Bing Jun added, "As for my marriage to Xue''er, we can discuss this. I''m willing to take a step back and properly woo her. I''m certain that my sincerity will move me, you can believe in that, brother inw."


    Lin Fan looked right into his eyes when he said this.


    The way that Lin Fan''s eyes looked at him, it was as if he could see right through him, seeing right to the core of his soul. As this gaze was on him, Bing Jun couldn''t help trembling¡­


    But in the end, Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile and shook his head.


    Bing Jun could see that something was off, so he quickly said, "Brother inw, you shouldn''t reject this offer so quickly. All these terms are negotiable, so if there''s anything that you aren''t satisfied with or if there''s something that you want, you can just tell me. I promise that our Bing Family will give you terms that will satisfy you."


    This was unlike the normal Bing Jun who was cold and proud, but Lin Fan really had shown too much that he couldn''t deny him anymore. He couldn''t see through Lin Fan at all, so he knew that it was better if he could convince him to stop with words. But to do so, he would naturally need to put down his arrogance and treat him as an equal¡­


    But it was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t buy this at all.


    Once again, Lin Fan shook his head and said, "No, there''s no need for that at all."


    Bing Jun waspletely confused and angered when he heard this. He had even put down his pride and he was being rejected like this?


    When had a proud young master like him ever suffered this kind of humiliation?


    But he couldn''t help asking, "Why do you not consider it? Is it because I didn''t offer enough?"


    Lin Fan looked right at him and said, "It''s your eyes, it''s clear that you have no intentions of giving up on Xue''er."


    Bing Jun''s eyes turned cold when he heard this.


    That was right, he had indeed lied about that. He knew that once Lin Fan was brought up to the Tai Ster Kingdom, with the new status that he received afterpleting this mission, it would be easy to plot against him and make Lin Xue his.


    So everything that he had said was just a lie.


    Bing Jun said in a cold voice, "Since that''s the case, then there''s no need to talk anymore is there?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing, but his raising of his weapon made his intentions clear.


    But before either side could do anything, there was a ck figure that suddenly fell from the sky.

 Chapter 807 The Main War Begins (9)

    This ck figure came out of nowhere, but it dropped down near Lin Fan and Bing Jun.


    It fell all the way from the sky and when itnded, there was arge crater that was formed in the ground.


    After this ck figurended on the ground, there were streaks of red that also appeared in the sky. People couldn''t see what it was at first, but then as it fell, it created a storm that drenched the battlefield.


    Blood, it was all blood that was raining down!


    As this blood fell over the battlefield, everyone who had been fighting suddenly stopped fighting and turned to look at the crater that had been formed.


    Even if the auraing from it was faint, they could still tell that this was the aura of a World Realm Expert.


    The fight in the sky must havee to an end and they all wanted to see who won. After all, this would be what decided the battle.


    When the dust settled, the appearance of the ck figure was revealed.


    It wasn''t the ck cloaked figure or Master You, instead, it was an old man who was lying there in that crater. But when they looked closely at the old man, they found that he had scraps of ck cloth all over his body¡­


    This should have been scraps of the ck cloak that he had once worn!


    That must mean that this person was the ck cloaked figure that had defended Lin Fan.


    As if to confirm this, there was another figure that suddenly started falling from the sky. However, unlike the ck figure that had fallen quickly, so quickly that it had created a crater, this figure slowly floated down.


    As it slowly descended, everyone was able to clearly see who it was.


    Master You!


    It was Master You who had appeared out of nowhere to attack Lin Fan!


    The Master You who was clearly on the same side as Bing Jun and Huo Fei!


    When the people from the nine great factions saw this, their faces filled with despair. They knew that the ck cloaked figure was their only hope to deal with Master You since they were the only World Realm Experts here.


    Now that the ck cloaked figure had been taken out¡­There was no hope for them¡­


    But as they thought about it, they realized that they still hadn''t seen a move from Lin Fan''s master yet. That meant that there was still possible hope!


    As long as Lin Fan''s master made a move, then they would still have a chance of taking care of Master You!


    So with this faint hope, the people of the nine great factions didn''t give up.


    As for the enemies, they naturally were filled with spirit as they saw their World Realm Expert defeat the enemy World Realm Expert. Now they were certain that they would win this battle, so they no longer held back and began fighting with even more passion.


    After all, the more that they contributed in this battle, the more rewards they would receive.


    So the two sides started fighting again, but it was clear that the side of the nine great factions were suffering from ack of morale.


    As for Lin Fan, he had an ugly expression on his face.


    That was because he knew something that the people of the nine great factions didn''t¡­He knew that there was no master in his shop and that there would be no oneing to help deal with Master You¡­


    That was unless he wanted topletely expose the secrets that he was hiding¡­


    But the moment that he did, he would be used of coborating with the Beast Race and would no longer be able to operate in human territory.


    He needed to be able to operate in human territory to open stores to gain more points with the system. The system was the one thing that gave him confidence to be stronger and if he didn''t have the system, then¡­


    So right now, Lin Fan had to carefully consider what he would need to do.


    But after thinking about it, there seemed to be only one option.


    He never thought that he would have to use this reward so quickly. But maybe this was why the system had given him this thing as a reward, perhaps it had already seen this oue.<sub> </sub>


    That wouldn''t be strange since the system seemed to know much more than he thought and it had even given him plenty of missions that were rted to his current situation instead of being rted to the store. It was almost as if it was watching and grooming him.


    As for what purpose it was doing this for, he didn''t know, but he decided to follow the system since it was what brought him into this world in the first ce.


    When Master You came closer to the ground, people could see that he didn''t look the same as before. His clothes were covered in blood and they could see that he was holding one of his arms that was also covered in blood.


    Even though he had won the fight, he clearly hadn''t gotten out of it without injuries.


    Perhaps there really was a chance that they would be able to win¡­


    At this, everyone turned to look at Lin Fan with eyes filled with hope.


    Master Younded on the ground beside Bing Jun, but he ignored everyone else that was present. His eyes were looking right at the crater that had been created and after a few seconds, he suddenly spat out onto the ground.


    In a voice that was filled with anger and disdain, he said, "This piece of shit, even trash like him could hurt me. If it wasn''t for that special weapon that he used in the end, trash at his level wouldn''t even be fit to carry my shoes!"


    But even with the rage that he showed, he didn''t make a move to finish off the ck cloaked figure.


    Instead, when he looked back at Lin Fan, he couldn''t help revealing a wary look.


    That was because he had felt a familiar feeling from that ck cloaked figure during their fight earlier. This was a feeling that he had felt all those years ago, but he had never been able to forget since it had left that big of an impression on him.


    This feeling gave him an idea of which Ster Kingdom was backing Lin Fan, but if that were the case, then this would be very bad for their Tai Ster Kingdom.


    So before he was certain, he didn''t dare kill the ck cloaked figure.


    Each World Realm Expert was very important to a Ster Kingdom and if a World Realm Expert was killed by another World Realm Expert from another Ster Kingdom, then it would be a sign of aggression. While it wouldn''t start an all out war between Ster Kingdoms, it would certainly make life harder for the faction that caused this tension.


    Master You didn''t dare do this since it would mean consequences that he wasn''t able to handle.


    But it was different when it came to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was after all just a Nascent Soul Realm kid and even if he was protected by a World Realm Expert, no one would choose a dead Nascent Soul Realm kid to a World Realm Expert. As long as Lin Fan was dead, then this matter would be settled.


    So he turned back to face Lin Fan.


    While he had been injured, his injuries weren''t that serious that he couldn''t take care of Lin Fan quickly.


    Since they were in this lower realm, the two World Realm Experts had also been restrained to a certain extent. But their foundations were greater than normal experts of this realm, so they were far stronger than the True Soul Realm Experts.


    This was even more so for Master You than the ck cloaked person because Master You was in the Mid Realm while the ck cloaked person had only been in the Low Realm. If it wasn''t for the weapon he had brought out in the end, the fight would have ended even sooner.


    So without hesitation, Master You charged out at Lin Fan.


    But with his injuries, he was moving much slower than before. He had now fallen to a level that Lin Fan was able to keep up with.


    Lin Fan tried to slow him down with the barrier of his pet array, but Master You shattered it with a single blow. Then he tried slowing him down with the pseudo domain, but Master You''s domain was able topletely negate the pressure that came from the pseudo domain.


    With how Master You wasing at him, it seemed like it was impossible for him to stop Master You.


    That was until he suddenly pulled out a talisman.


    When this talisman came out, Master You felt a bit of danger since he could tell that this item contained the powers of the World Realm Expert, but it was only a talisman in the end. He didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to threaten a real World Realm Expert like him with just this talisman alone.


    But he also wasn''t negligent and raised his guard for when Lin Fan used this talisman.


    As far as he could tell, this talisman most likely contained the full power attack of a Realm Expert.


    Even injured, this was still something that he could easily dodge even if he couldn''t block it.


    But before he could take another step, there was a hole that appeared in his chest.

 Chapter 808 The End Of The War

    The first reaction that Master You had was the sweet taste of blood in his mouth.


    The second reaction he had was being thrown back and being sent flying away from Lin Fan.


    He was picked up by the force of the attack that he had been hit with and was sent flying several dozen meters away, spraying his blood all over the battlefield. The blood sshed across the battlefield and created another rain of blood just like when the ck cloaked person had fallen from the sky.


    Everyone once again stopped fighting to look at this rain of blood and to watch as Master You''s figure flew across the air.


    After Master You''s bodynded, he looked down at himself in disbelief before he couldn''t help feeling regret. If he hadn''t epted this request, then perhaps he wouldn''t have died like this.


    That was right, Master You had died!


    The attack had been so strong that Master You had been killed in a single blow!


    Perhaps if he hadn''t been injured, he might have been able to dodge this blow, but there was no chance with the injuries that he had suffered.


    The attack had been too fast for him to react to and it had hit him right in the chest, ripping arge hole out of him.


    In fact, if it wasn''t for the strips of flesh at the sides of the hole that were holding his body together, he would have been blown into four different pieces. A top part, two arms, and a bottom half.


    That was just how big the hole is and also just how powerful that attack was.


    No one could believe what had just happened, but everyone immediately raised their guards since they didn''t know where this attack hade from. There were even some that started running for cover or even directly running off the battlefield.


    This was an attack that could even take out a World Realm Expert like this, they would stand no chance if it was aimed at them. Not to mention that they wouldn''t even be able to see iting at them since they had no idea where the enemy that had released this attack was.


    It was the same for Bing Jun and Huo Fei.


    As soon as they saw this, both of them immediately pulled out an orb, one that was blue and the other was red.


    Holding these orbs, there was an intense wave of ice and fire that suddenly surrounded them.


    These were the final trump cards that their families had given them. In a worst case scenario, it could even block the final attack of a Peak Realm Expert.


    They never would have imagined that they would be forced to use it one day, especially in a ce like this, but they pulled it out without any hesitation after seeing Master You die.


    Then once this barrier was in ce, Bing Jun shouted out, "Which honourable expert is this? Is there a need for someone like you to hide like this?"


    However, there was no response to his questions.


    Seeing this, Bing Jun pulled out the Bing Family''s token and said, "I am the representative of the Tai Ster Kingdom''s Bing Family. Should I take this as a deration of war against the Tai Ster Kingdom?"


    But even then, there was still no response to his question.


    Well, it wasn''t as if there was no response¡­It just wasn''t the response that he was hoping for.


    After his voice fell, there was a sudden boom that came from the sky.


    Everyone looked up in shock to find that dark clouds had already gathered andpletely covered up the sky. As well, there were streaks of lightning that shed inside of those clouds.


    This was clearly the sign of the heavenly tribtion lightning, but they couldn''t understand where this hade from¡­


    Then before anyone could even react, the lightning suddenly fell down.


    To everyone''s surprise, it didn''t fall down on Bing Jun or Huo Fei who were clearly using power that surpassed this realm. It didn''t fall down on the ck cloaked figure who should have been the strongest person here. It didn''t fall down on any of the True Soul Realm Experts who were the strongest people in this realm.


    This bolt of heavenly lightning fell down on one of the people in the sea of people. This was just one of the random soldiers that had been a part of the invading army.


    It wasn''t even one of the leaders or a powerful expert, this person was nothing more than a simple Embryo Soul Realm grunt. But somehow, he had been able to attract the heavenly tribtion lightning.


    He hadn''t even been close to breaking through to the next realm.


    However, this was only a single urrence, so people wanted to move past it and consider it an outlier. It was just too bad for them that this wasn''t an outlier.


    After the first bolt of lightning fell, there was a sudden downpour of lightning bolts that fell above the sea of people.<sub> </sub>


    The strange thing about these bolts of lightning was that they seemed to only be targeting the army of invaders. None of the forces from the nine great factions were being targeted at all.


    Of course, the True Spirit Sect, the Thunder Sect, and the Assassins Association''s forces were included among the ones being bombarded in lightning bolts.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking up at the sky in shock as they couldn''t understand what was happening.


    The will of the world that controlled these lightning bolts should have been neutral. No matter what happened to this world, the will of the world should be neutral and wouldn''t get involved in any conflicts.


    Only when people tried to disrupt thews of this world would the will of the world get involved.


    For example, that strike that had hit Master You just now. That was clearly power that


    surpassed the limits of this world.


    If there was anyone that should have been punished with lightning tribtion, it was whoever had used that attack and not them.


    But what they didn''t know was that¡­the will of the world was scared of the one who had used that attack¡­


    That attack came from the talisman that Lin Fan used and it was his reward forpleting the pet selling mission. During the period before the war, Lin Fan had finished that mission by selling a bunch of pets to the nine great factions in preparation for the war.


    The reward that he had received was this talisman that contained the full power attack of a Peak Realm Expert.


    This wasn''t an attack that was held back to the limits of this world, but rather a full force attack of a Peak Realm Expert. This was without a doubt breaking the limits of the world and a case where the will of the world would punish the person who used this power.


    So logically speaking, it should be Lin Fan that was getting hit by the lightning bolts falling from the sky.


    But the will of the world didn''t dare throw any lightning bolts at Lin Fan. It didn''t even dare look in Lin Fan''s direction¡­


    That was because it could feel the aura that wasing from Lin Fan, or rather it could feel the aura that came from the attack that Lin Fan had released.


    This was an aura that it was familiar with¡­


    The will of the world had existed since the creation of the that Gctic Humanity Alliance was on, so it had been there much longer than any creature living there. In fact, it had been there at the beginning of the universe.


    The aura that it felt from the attack, it was the aura of its creator¡­


    That meant that this was an attack that was from a God Realm being or maybe even beyond that.


    The will of the world didn''t know why there was a God Realm being behind Lin Fan, but it was certain that it couldn''t provoke Lin Fan. So instead of punishing Lin Fan, it decided to destroy all of Lin Fan''s enemies.


    It hoped that by doing this, it could get in Lin Fan''s good books and earn some favour with him.


    After all, the will of the world still wanted to meet its creator and master¡­


    So the storm of lightning bolts fell down on the armies of the invaders, turning most of them to ashes. The few that were able to survive weren''t in a good condition either¡­


    Just like this, the situation of the battle had been settled in a strange manner that no one could understand.


    But Bing Jun and Huo Fei couldn''t just give up like this¡­


    Not only had they failed to conquer the Gctic Humanity Alliance, they had even lost Master You.


    The value of a World Realm Expert like Master You far surpassed their own and if they didn''t do anything to redeem themselves, there would be no way for them to stand up again.


    But there was knowing what was waiting for them here because the person who had killed Master You still hadn''t revealed themselves.


    So it wasn''t as if they could do anything.


    After eliminating most of the enemies, the will of the world turned its attention to Bing Jun and Huo Fei.


    It started sending down waves after waves of lightning bolts at the two of them, but the barrier that they had put up blocked all of the lightning bolts.


    Seeing that they had no choice, Bing Jun took out a re that he lit.

 Chapter 809 Becoming A Fugitive

    The re suddenly released a glow that flew into the air before suddenly exploding like a firework.


    The design of the re was very simple, it just created a glowing "Bing" character in the air.


    Not long after, there was a powerful fluctuation that came from the air.


    Where the re had exploded, there were ripples that appeared in space. These ripples started twisting until it formed a portal and out of that portal came a blue cloaked person.


    This blue cloaked person''s aura was there for everyone to see, this was clearly another World Realm Expert.


    This blue cloaked person looked over the battlefield and he had a calm look at first, but then when he saw Master You''s corpse on the ground, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    There was a trace of rage that appeared in this blue cloaked person''s eyes showing through the cloak as he turned to look at Bing Jun and Huo Fei on the ground.


    When the two of them felt this gaze falling on them, they couldn''t stop a shiver from running down their spine. However, they also had a helpless look on their face since there was nothing that they could do about all of this.


    After all, the enemy was someone that was strong enough to kill Master You with a single strike and they were strong enough to do it without attracting anyone''s attention. There was nothing that they could do against this kind of enemy.


    The blue cloaked person''s gaze only lingered on these two for a few seconds before it started looking around it.


    With the way the blue cloaked person was looking around, it was almost as if he was trying to find something on the battlefield...


    ? But before he could find what he was looking for, the rain of lightning fell down on the blue cloaked figure.


    The blue cloaked figure didn''t panic at all when he saw this. Instead, he gave a cold snort and just casually raised his hand into the air.


    With his hand raised there, there was a blue light that gathered in his hands. This blue light quickly condensed the water that was in the air and created an umbre that was madepletely of ice.


    When the umbre of ice appeared, it just casually took all the bolts of lightning that fell down on this blue cloaked figure.


    This blue cloaked figure just casually floated there in the air with his umbre in hand amidst that rain of thunder, it was almost as if he was just out on a casual stroll.


    This blue cloaked figure waspletely different from Master You, he was a direct descendant of the Bing Family. There was a reason why the Bing Family was known as one of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom.


    He was able to easily deal with the heavenly tribtion lightning that the will of the world sent.


    Of course, neither he nor the will of the world used their full power since unless there was a situation where only one of them could survive, neither of them would take the risk of revealing all their cards.


    But it was still shocking how he was able to deal with the tribtion lightning so easily.


    At the same time, it wasn''t that shocking since this person was far beyond Master You and the ck cloaked figure from before. This direct descendant of the Bing Family was someone who was already in the Peak Realm and already had a step into the Star Realm.


    The re that Bing Jun had used earlier was a special re given to the direct descendants of the Bing Family. It was only used when their lives were in danger.


    It would summon the closest direct descendant of the Bing Family in the World Realm toe and rescue the direct descendant who was in danger.


    That was what had summoned this blue cloaked figure.


    The blue cloaked figure didn''t understand the situation at first, but then after looking over the battlefield, he immediately knitted his brows as he turned to Lin Fan.


    He slowly floated down to the ground andnded in front of Bing Jun and Huo Fei.


    The ice and mes around them couldn''t stop this blue cloaked figure at all as he went right through their barrier.


    When hended, Bing Jun was about to say something, but he didn''t get a chance at all. The only thing that he received was a p right to the face that sent him to the ground.


    He looked up with an aggrieved look, but what he received was the stern voice of the blue cloaked figure. This was a voice that was like thousand year old ice, it could freeze someone just by listening to it.<sub> </sub>


    The blue cloaked figure said, "Xiao Bing, it seems like you''ve messed up quite spectacrly haven''t you?"


    It was a stern voice, but it was also calm. If it came from anyone else, it would seem like an adult that was reprimanding a child, but when it came from this blue cloaked figure, everyone could hear the disdain in his voice.


    It was clear that there was some kind ofpetition that was found in the Bing Family.


    Bing Jun had an unwilling look, but he still lowered his head and said, "Big brother, I have to ask you to help me take care of this matter."


    The blue cloaked figure gave a snort before saying, "You''ll be punished enough by the family when we get back, so I''m in no mood to y with you."


    Then he turned back without letting Bing Jun say another word.


    This blue cloaked figure turned in Lin Fan''s direction and his expression also changed.


    It went from the look of disdain to a look of interest, almost as if he had found a new toy to y with. But at the same time, there was a trace of killing intent in his eyes.


    The blue cloaked figure slowly walked over to Lin Fan while being bombarded by the bolts of lightning, but the ice umbre in his hands stopped all of these bolts of lightning. He leisurely made his way over to Lin Fan and stopped right in front of him, not saying a thing. The only thing that he did was look over Lin Fan as if he was analyzing him.


    Lin Fan could feel the pressure that wasing from in front of him, but he forced himself to stand firm even though his body wanted to unconsciously take a step back.


    After a long period of silence, the blue cloaked figure finally said, "So it came from you, huh?"


    This time, everyone couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan as they couldn''t understand what the blue cloaked figure was implying.


    The blue cloaked figure then continued, "But that''s strange, where did you get this Peak Realm Talisman from?"


    When they heard this, they finally realized what had happened.


    ording to the blue cloaked figure, it was Lin Fan who had released that attack that had hit Master You, it was Lin Fan who had killed Master You!


    Everyone''s eyes filled with shock as they looked at Lin Fan.


    Just what was the backing of this person? Just how many secrets was this person hiding?


    The blue cloaked figure didn''t seem like he was going to do anything at first, but then he suddenly released his aura and said, "Of course, that doesn''t matter. All that matters is that you''ve killed a World Realm Expert of the Bing Family and you have to pay for that."


    When this aura was released, everyone on the battlefield couldn''t stand straight anymore.


    This was the full aura of a Peak Realm Expert, this was not something that people like them could take that easily. Even the True Soul Realm Experts couldn''t help feeling like they were being pressed down on by a mountain.


    The only one that was able to face this unfazed was Lin Fan. He had already faced the aura of experts even stronger than this blue cloaked man, so he was able to resist the pressure that came with this aura.


    The blue cloaked man gave a nod of appreciation before saying, "Since you have killed a Realm Expert of the Bing Family, this is considered an act of aggression against the Bing Family. Naturally, the only punishment suited for a crime against thews of the Bing Family like this is death. So wash your neck and prepare to be killed."


    Without even giving Lin Fan any time to react, the blue cloaked man started walking towards him at a leisurely pace.


    When the will of the world saw what the blue cloaked man was nning to do to Lin Fan, it immediately stirred up even more clouds and generated more powerful bolts of lightning to throw down at the blue cloaked man.


    However, the blue cloaked man just summoned out a little blue sparrow. The little blue sparrow immediately flew into the sky and created a barrier of water above the head of the blue cloaked man, blocking all the bolts of lightning.


    All the bolts of lightning that hit the water barrier were absorbed by the water barrier and then released into the ground.


    Finally, the blue cloaked man made his way up to Lin Fan and raised his hand that was covered in a blue glow that took the shape of a blde. He looked right at Lin Fan and said, "Are you ready to die?"

 Chapter 810 An Old Friend

    Lin Fan stared right back at the blue cloaked man, looking right into his cold eyes.


    He could see that this blue cloaked man was serious, he was nning on killing him right here and now.


    But of course, it wasn''t as if Lin Fan could just bend over and let him do that. Lin Fan still had many things to do and he couldn''t ept dying just like this¡­


    So he started debating whether he should use his final trump cards¡­


    If they were used, there was no way for him to interact with humans as himself anymore, but at the very least, he would be able to keep his life. He would be a true fugitive and not just a fugitive that the Bing and Huo Families would be chasing down, but a fugitive against humanity.


    But none of that mattered if he couldn''t get out of this alive¡­


    So he was right about to call Ang to have her save him, but¡­


    Before the blue cloaked man could make his move, there was a slender hand that suddenly grabbed his raised hand.


    The blue cloaked man knitted his brows when this happened and he tried to move his hand away, but he found that he couldn''t move his hand a single inch. He turned around to look at the person who had grabbed his hand and he found that there was a slender purple figure standing there behind him.


    The blue cloaked figure narrowed his cold eyes and released a chill that prevented everyone from approaching him, as he said, "Who are you?"


    Even though there was this chill hitting this purple cloaked figure, they didn''t feel any pressure from it at all. They didn''t even feel the slightest bit cold as a female''s voice rang out, "I think that''s far enough. How about we leave matters here today?"


    The blue cloaked figure knitted his brows even more as he said, "Who are you to decide this?"


    The purple cloaked figure gave a chuckle and said, "No one important." Then in a cold voice, she said, "But someone that you can''t provoke."


    As she said this, there was a chill that ran down the spine of the blue cloaked figure.


    This voice, this chill, this aura, it really made him feel like she was someone that he couldn''t afford to offend. However, as someone from the Tai Ster Kingdom''s Bing Family, one of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom, he still had his pride.


    It wasn''t as if he could just back down like this with a single sentence from an unknown person.


    "Is that so?" The blue cloaked figure said before pulling his hand away.


    As he pulled his hand away, there was a blue light that gathered around it and it seemed like he was about to attack. But then before he could react, the purple figure was already pointing a finger that was covered in a purple glow right at his neck.


    It was as if if she wanted to, she could take his life right away.


    The purple cloaked figure asked, "Do you really want to push this further than it''s already gone. I don''t mind, but I don''t think the Bing Family will like losing two World Realm Experts like this, especially if one of them is a direct descendant. Don''t you think so?"


    There was a chill that ran down the blue cloaked figure''s spine the moment that he heard this.


    He knew that she was serious. If he really insisted on continuing, she wouldn''t hesitate to cut off his head right then and there.


    He had no choice but to relent at this point because he knew that there was an overwhelming difference in power between the two of them. When she had suddenly moved her hand to his neck, he hadn''t been able to see her movements at all.


    That meant that if she had wanted to, she could have taken his head and killed him there.


    Even if he was a fool, he wouldn''t fail to understand the reason why she did this¡­


    But of course, his pride wouldn''t allow him to back down without saying a few things first.


    The blue cloaked figure looked at the purple cloaked figure for a bit before turning back to Lin Fan to say, "Even if you help him today, you won''t be able to protect him forever. He has killed a World Realm Expert from the Bing Family and ruined the ns of both the Bing and Huo Families, they will not stop hunting him down for this."


    The purple cloaked figure gave a shrug and said, "That''s fine. As long as he survives today, what happens in the future will be up to him."


    Both Lin Fan and the blue cloaked figure were shocked when they heard this. That was because they could tell that the purple cloaked figure wasn''t kidding when she said this.


    It was almost as if she really didn''t care if Lin Fan lived or died in the future, she just wanted to save him today.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he heard this.<sub> </sub>


    He really wanted to criticize her, he really wanted to say something, but he couldn''t since she was here to save him. As for how she would save him or what she did after, that was up to her and he didn''t have any rights toin since he didn''t have the power toin.


    The blue cloaked figure just stood there in a daze for a few seconds before giving a cold snort and saying, "You won''t get off that easily either. You might be powerful, but do you really think that you can take on the entire Bing Family all by yourself? You''re way over your head!"


    He took several steps back to where Bing Jun was before saying, "You just wash your neck and wait, you won''t live a long life."


    The purple cloaked figure revealed a smile before taking out a token that she showed the blue cloaked figure.


    When the blue cloaked figure saw this token, he was confused at first. However, when he saw the character that was written on it, he couldn''t help revealing an absolutely shocked expression.


    He pointed at the token in the purple cloaked figure''s hand and stuttered, "You¡­That¡­How¡­How!"


    The purple cloaked figure raised one hand to her face and put a finger over her lips to signal for him to be quiet before saying, "Scram or you won''t get a chance to scram."


    The blue cloaked figure''s shoulders became dejected when he heard this, but he didn''t dare refute her anymore. After all, the organization that was represented by that token was¡­just too terrifying for him to say anything against.


    He couldn''t even help thinking that the Bing Family had really gotten itself in some trouble¡­


    As these thoughts passed through his mind, he couldn''t help turning to Bing Jun and Huo Fei who were looking at him, waiting for him to do something.


    A trace of anger filled his heart before he suddenly reached his hand out to p both Bing Jun and Huo Fei on the back of the heads.


    Bing Jun and Huo Fei looked at the blue cloaked figure with confused and aggrieved looks, but they didn''t dare say anything.


    The blue cloaked figure just gave a sigh in his heart.


    If it wasn''t for these two idiots not taking this job seriously and doing it properly, how could things have evolved this far. They wouldn''t have lost Master You and they wouldn''t have provoked this organization that they clearly couldn''t offend.


    But there was no medicine for regret, so he grabbed both of them and jumped into the air.


    As he floated there in the air, there was another portal that appeared in space that he entered. Once he entered it, the portal onlysted for a few more seconds before disappearing without a trace.


    The battlefield had been silent with the appearance of the blue cloaked figure and during the sh between the blue cloaked figure and the purple cloaked figure. However, seeing the blue cloaked figure leave, everyone let out a sigh of relief.


    It seemed like this battle was finally over and they had won.


    However, no one dared to cheer yet since they didn''t know what the purple cloaked figure was nning.


    They could tell that the purple cloaked figure was here to protect Lin Fan, but now what would she do?


    The purple cloaked figure had been watching the blue cloaked figure the entire time, but after he left, she turned her attention back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just stood there warily, waiting for her to say something. However, she didn''t say a thing as she turned her attention to the ck cloaked figure that was in the crater.


    She walked over to the crater and looked down at the person inside with a smile on her face. She then took out a small bottle that was filled with a green liquid and without any hesitation, she shattered it, spraying the green liquid all over the person in the crater.


    As soon as the green liquid touched the figure in the crater, the wounds all over his body began healing at a visible rate.


    It didn''t take long before all of his wounds were healed and he was able to stand up again.


    The purple cloaked figure didn''t say anything after he was healed and she finally turned back to Lin Fan to say, "Long time no see."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this as he tried to remember who this person was, but he couldn''t remember her at all, so he said, "Have we met before?"


    The purple cloaked figure took off her hood and revealed her face, revealing a face that Lin Fan did indeed know as she said, "You''ve already forgotten about me?"


    This was a person that could be considered an old friend.

 Chapter 811 Leaving The Galactic Humanity Alliance

    Lin Fan''s mouth dropped wide open in shock as he looked at this person in front of him in a daze.


    This was a face that he hadn''t seen in a long time, not since the Blue Star.


    Standing in front of him was Zi Ling who he had met a long time ago in the Inheritance Realm!


    But what was she doing here and what was with this strength that she had.


    After what seemed like a long time, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What are you doing here?"


    Zi Ling just said with a faint smile, "I''m here to rescue you. Why else would I be here?"


    Lin Fan''s lips twitched before he said, "That''s not what I meant. What I meant was¡­"


    Zi Ling cut him off before he could finish by raising her hand and then saying with a chuckle, "I know what you mean, but there isn''t much time for me to exin. So let''s get down to business first."


    Lin Fan revealed an even more confused look as he asked, "Business? What business?"


    Zi Ling pointed back at the corpse of Master You on the ground and said, "If you don''t call that business, what would you call it?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he said, "It''s not like I had much choice in that matter. If I didn''t do anything, he would have killed me, right?"


    Zi Ling gave a nod before saying, "That''s right, but it still did happen. So now we have to take care of the consequences of this decision."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows once again as he asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    Zi Ling finally revealed a serious look as she said, "Well, if you killed one of theirs, don''t you think that they will want to kill you? Since that''s the case, you can''t stay here any longer."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this as he said, "But I can''t just leave this ce like that. There''s still many other things that I have to take care of. There''s my family, my store¡­"


    Once again, Zi Ling raised her hand to cut Lin Fan off before saying, "I''ll help you take care of all of that. As long as I''m here, they won''t dare touch this ce." Then she revealed a smile as she said, "You''ve already seen how he reacted earlier, the Bing Family won''t dare touch this ce as long as I''m here."


    Then after a pause, she added, "Of course, that''s not enough to stop them from taking revenge on you, so it''s best if you don''t stay here. I''ll send you to another Ster Kingdom and you can build up your strength there beforeing back to take care of the Bing Family."


    Lin Fan waspletely stunned by Zi Ling''s words.


    There were many things that he still had to say and many things that he wanted to ask her about, but Zi Ling didn''t give Lin Fan a chance to ask anything.


    She waved her hand and there was a scroll that appeared in her hand.


    Lin Fan knew that something was off, so he quickly said, "Wait, don''t¡­"


    But before he could say anything else, Zi Ling had already crushed the scroll in her hand and sent thews that it contained in Lin Fan''s direction.


    Lin Fan couldn''t be more familiar with thew that Zi Ling had thrown at him since it was one of thews that he was most familiar with. It was the spacews that he normally used to teleport around with.


    However, the spacews that were contained in this scroll far surpassed the level of spacews that he controlled.


    Naturally with how powerful these spacews were, he wasn''t able to resist them even if he wanted to.


    So before he could do anything, there was a sh of light that appeared in front of him before the scenery changed.


    As for the people who were still watching, they just watched Lin Fan disappear.


    After Lin Fan disappeared, all of the people left on the battlefield all turned to look at Zi Ling as they waited for her to say something.


    After all, she was the strongest person here and if she wanted to do something to them, they wouldn''t be able to stop her. Especially since Lin Fan who had a rtionship with her was already sent away by her¡­


    But she ignored all of them and waited for the old man in the crater toe out.


    The old man stood up and came over to where Zi Ling was before bowing down to her. He then said, "Young miss, it was my fault, I wasn''t able to protect him properly."


    Zi Ling just waved her hand and said, "It''s fine, it''s fine, didn''t it all work out in the end? Not to mention¡­" She narrowed her eyes when she said this, "It seems like he has found some kind of special encounter."


    The old man looked at where Lin Fan was standing before asking, "Young miss, could it be that you were watching the entire time?"


    Zi Ling just revealed a knowing smile and said, "Grandpa, do you really want the answer to that?"


    The old man just revealed a bitter smile and shook his head without saying anything else.<sub> </sub>


    Then after thinking for a bit, he suddenly asked, "What should we do about the Tai Ster Kingdom? They''re certainly going to make a move after this. It''s not like they''ll let someone that kills one of their World Realm Experts off that easily."


    Zi Ling gave a shrug and said, "That depends on if they''re able to do anything."


    The old man knitted his brows before suddenly revealing a look of understanding, "Do you mean¡­?"


    Zi Ling gave a nod before saying, "They won''t interfere with this matter, but they will not let them cross the lines. So we will be using the influence of our Zi Ster Kingdom to make sure that they will only target Lin Fan."


    The old man knitted his brows again as he asked, "But why would they want people to chase down Lin Fan? Isn''t he supposed to be their hope?"


    Zi Ling gave a shrug and said, "Who knows what those people are thinking? You should know that they don''t tell us anything other than what we need to know." But after stroking her chin for a bit, she suddenly said, "But from what I can tell, it seems like they want to use this experience to train him and see if he can bring out his true power."


    Then after a pause, she added, "He''s starting to understand how to use his powers, but it''s still not at a level that they are satisfied with¡­Before he reaches that point, they won''t act."


    The old man shook his head and gave a sigh, but he didn''t ask anything else.


    Zi Ling was also silent as she was lost in thought, but then she suddenly turned to the people of the Gctic Humanity Alliance and said, "You can do what you want to do, the Tai Ster Kingdom won''t touch this upper realm anymore."


    Then without even caring about their response, she disappeared.


    When she appeared again, Zi Ling was already standing in front of Lin Fan''s shop.


    She opened the door, but the people inside weren''t happy to see hering in. After all, she was not the one that they were expecting.


    As soon as she saw her, Ang immediately came forward and brought her hand up to her neck as she asked, "Where is he?"


    <o>,m Zi Ling held her hand up and said, "I mean no harm, I''m just here to take care of some things for him."</o>


    Ang narrowed her eyes, but then she put her hand down as she waited for Zi Ling to speak.


    Zi Ling turned to Mo Ze Chen and said, "You''ll run his store for a bit, he''s not here anymore."


    Once these words fell, Ang''s hand was once again brought back to her neck as she asked, "Where is he?" But this time, her tone was much colder and more threatening.


    Zi Ling just calmly said, "He''s gone off training. I''m sure that he''ll build a new store soon and you''ll be able to see him again. Isn''t that how it works?"


    Ang just stared at her without saying a thing before suddenly saying, "Is he alright?"


    Zi Ling replied, "I saved him before it got too bad, so he''s fine."


    Ang kept staring at her for a bit before suddenly giving a snort and turning to head to the back of the store. Yuki gave Zi Ling a re as well before quickly following Ang into the back.


    Zi Ling watched as Ang left with a seemingly calm look on her face, but there were a bit of unknown emotions that were lingering in her eyes.


    Before she could say anything else, the door opened again and there were two old men who came in. One was the one she called "grandpa" and the other¡­was the Lin Family Ancestor.


    Lin Ao who had been in the store was shocked to see him, but he quickly came over to ask, "Grandfather, what are you doing here?"


    The Lin Family Ancestor gave a nod to Lin Ao before saying, "That''s not important now. For now,e with me and I''ll take you somece safe."


    Lin Ao knitted his brows as he said, "What about Xiao Fan? Where is he?"


    The Lin Family Ancestor gave a sigh before saying, "He''s off on a training trip that I arranged, but he''ll be back soon."


    Lin Ao still was a bit unsettled, but he still gave a nod in response to this and he started following the Lin Family Ancestor along with Yue Qingrou and Lin Xue.


    Zi Ling watched all of this and just allowed it to happen. But before they left, she couldn''t help asking, "Young master, are you sure that everything will be alright with Lin Fan?"


    The Lin Family Ancestor turned to look at Zi Ling before shaking his head and saying, "It''s all up to Xiao Fan¡­" Then after a pause, he added, "But I''ll talk to the family and see if they can make things easier for him."


    Zi Ling clearly didn''t seem like she believed him, but all she could do was give a nod in response to this.


    The Lin Family Ancestor shook his head and gave another sigh before waving his hand at Lin Ao to follow him.


    Once they were gone, Zi Ling couldn''t help looking out the window of the store and saying in a sad voice, "I hope you''ll be alright."

 Chapter 812 Wasteland

    When the white light disappeared and Lin Fan could see again, he found that he was currently standing in the middle of nowhere.


    This was a ce that he wasn''t familiar with, but he could tell that the concentration of life energy in the air was much greater than where he had been standing before.


    There wasn''t much around him, there was just dirt and rocks. While there were a few patches of grass that were scattered around, most of the grass was yellow in colour and close to dying.


    It was clear that whatever this ce was, it wasn''t a ce that was teeming with life. In fact, it almost looked like this ce was close to dying¡­


    The first thing that hit him was the stench that filled this ce.


    It wasn''t a pleasant smell, it was a smell that hit harder than an outhouse that hadn''t been cleaned.


    It was clear by the dark puddles of water that were also in the surrounding area that this wasn''t a clean ce either. However, this at least showed that there were signs of life in this area.


    After all, he could tell that these puddles and the dyingnd were all created by the man made objects that were around. He hadn''t seen them earlier since they were hidden by the rocks, but after looking behind the rocks, he was able to see all kinds of trash behind them.


    While Lin Fan was trying to understand where he had been sent, there was a sound that suddenly came from above him.


    As this sound rang out, Lin Fan felt that the area around him had also turned dark. It was almost as if there were clouds in the sky that were blocking the sun above him.


    Lin Fan looked up at the sky to see what it was, but all he saw wererge ck spots that were falling down. As they fell, they continued to growrger andrger as they came closer to him.


    It seemed like whatever these ck spots were, they were going to fall down right where he was standing.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what they were, but he definitely didn''t want to be crushed by them. So without any hesitation, he dodged to the side, running towards an area that didn''t have a shadow covering it.


    He was able to make it just in time as therge ck spots suddenly fell where he had been standing previously, creating arge storm of dust.


    It took a while for the dust to settle, but when it did, Lin Fan was able to see the true form of the ck spot that had just fallen on him.


    It was arge piece of rubble that seemed to havee from arge building, but based on the condition of it, the building should have been destroyed by something. However, it wasn''t just this rubble that fell down from above.


    It was also a bunch of other things that were all in ck trash bags that Lin Fan couldn''t see clearly.


    As he stood there with a confused look on his face, he suddenly noticed the presence of people around him.


    He immediately raised his guard, but then he saw what these people looked like.


    All of them were covered in dirt and most of them didn''t even have clothes to cover their bodies. They just had rags on them that covered up their important parts.


    When he turned to look at them, these people stopped moving forward and started cowering.


    Lin Fan could tell that none of these people were in the Soul Realm, so it was normal for them to cower like this.


    So he raised his hand and said, "I mean no harm, I was just thrown here by someone and I''m trying to figure out what''s happening."


    As soon as he said this, the people all looked at each other before rushing forward. They didn''t charge at him, but rather the garbage that was behind him.


    They jumped into the piles of garbage and started tearing into the ck bags, scavenging through them for anything useful.


    When they did, Lin Fan felt a wave of stench hitting him. This was a smell that was worse than anything that he had smelled before and he couldn''t help taking a few steps back away from the piles of garbage.


    However, the people currently diving through the garbage didn''t mind that stench at all. Instead, some revealed happy looks and some revealed sad looks as they found things that they were happy about and sad about in the trash.


    Lin Fan felt a bit of disgust seeing all of this, but he chose not to judge them.


    After all, he could see what the situation of the surrounding area was. To live in this ce, this was most likely the only source of sustenance for these people, even if it was disgusting¡­


    Plus, he needed information from them, the only people that he had met in this ce, so he had no choice but to wait until they were finished.


    But it really was disgusting seeing some of the things that they discovered.


    Even when they found a piece of meat that had maggots in it, they carefully cut out the parts that weren''t rotten and held onto them like treasures¡­It seemed that living in this ce really wasn''t easy¡­<sub> </sub>


    After most of the bags had been dug through, the people started to leave with their disgusting gains.


    Lin Fan had been watching them the entire time and had been looking for a person to talk to. After all, these people were clearly desperate and desperate people could be dangerous, so he had to be careful who he talked to.


    In the end, he chose an old man and a little girl.


    While the others had been fighting each other for things, these two had been secretly moving in between them and taking things without them noticing. He was able to tell that this old man wasn''t a normal old man, especially with the aura that he had.


    This old man was in the Soul Realm unlike the rest of the people here.


    He had relied on his cultivation to sneak in after everyone else came and had secretly stolen from them.


    However, he didn''t steal from anyone who looked like they really needed these items. He only stole from those that bullied others and used physical force to get what they wanted.


    So Lin Fan could tell that the moral character of this old man was quite good.


    When the old man saw Lin Fan approaching, his first instinct was to raise his hand to protect the little girl as he warily looked at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan knew what he was thinking, so he raised his hands and said, "I don''t want any trouble. I just want some information and you seem like the best person to get it from. After all, if I talked to those other people¡­"


    Lin Fan didn''t finish his sentence, but the meaning that he was implying was clear.


    The old man looked at the others before giving a nod and letting his guard down a bit, but he didn''t fully let down his guard. Instead of saying something, he raised his hands out towards Lin Fan as if he was requesting something.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and then with a wave of his hand, he pulled out a small spirit stone.


    The old man looked at the spirit stone in disdain before shaking his head.


    Lin Fan was surprised to see this, but after thinking about it, he found that it made sense.


    These people were fighting over garbage just to survive, they clearly didn''t have a need for spirits stones. Even if they had spirit stones, they wouldn''t be able to exchange it for anything.


    As for using spirit stones to increase their cultivation, this little spirit stone was far from being enough.


    What they preferred to get was¡­


    With this thought in mind, Lin Fan waved his hand and put the spirit stone away before taking out a shiny red apple.


    Lin Fan had been prepared for situations like this since he never knew what would happen. He had taken to preparing food just in case he had ever gotten stranded.


    Seeing the red apple, both the old man and the little girl licked their lips, but the old man stopped the little girl from going forward. He looked at Lin Fan and waved his hand, as if he was telling Lin Fan to throw it over.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to throw it to the old man.


    He knew that to gain trust, sometimes he had to take the first step. So he decided to trust his judgement of this old man''s moral character.


    After catching the red apple, the old man licked his lips before turning to the little girl.


    After hesitating a bit, he put the apple in the little girl''s hand and gestured for her to eat it.


    The little girl looked at the red apple with a longing look, but then she shook her head and pushed it back while saying, "Grandpa, you should eat it. You haven''t eaten in a long time because you keep giving me all your food."


    The old man shook his head with a smile and raised his arm to pose, as if he was saying that he was still plenty strong before putting the apple in the little girl''s hands and patting her head.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head with a smile when he saw this.


    It was almost as if he was the bad guy here, especially with how the little girl was looking at him with a pitiful look.


    So he took out another apple and said, "I have more if you want more."


    As he said this, the little girl''s face lit up and she said, "Thank you, big brother!"

 Chapter 813 Slum City

    After this simple exchange, Lin Fan was able to open up the hearts of this old man and the little girl and they exchanged introductions.


    Lin Fan learned that the old man''s name was Duanmu Hao Yu and the little girl''s name was simply Min''er, she didn''t have a surname at all.


    He also learned that the two of them were biological rtives at all, but rather Duanmu Hao Yu had picked up Min''er from this wastnd many years ago and had been taking care of her the entire time. Though with how he treated her and how the two acted with each other, those that didn''t know would think that they were a blood rted pair of grandfather and granddaughter.


    All of this was told to him by Min''er since he found that Duanmu Hao Yu couldn''t speak at all.


    The reason why he wasn''t speaking earlier wasn''t because he was wary of Lin Fan, but rather because he couldn''t speak at all.


    When Lin Fan looked more closely, he found that there was a rather prominent scar on the old man''s throat which looked quite bad. Judging by the way the scar looked, he should have lost his voice a long time ago¡­


    But this was a part of this old man''s past and Lin Fan had no right to dig into it, so he didn''t ask any further questions.


    Instead, he pulled out a tablet that he had stored and gave it to the old man.


    This was a tablet that he had picked up on the Gctic Humanity Alliance and it was something that ran on spirit stones, so he was able to use it even in a ce like this.


    He had picked it up to y around with, but he never thought that he would be using it like this.


    He let Duanmu Hua Yu use it because it had a function that would read out written text. Of course, even if it didn''t read the text, he could still write tomunicate with people.


    When Min''er saw this, her eyes immediately lit up as she said, "Grandpa, I can finally talk to you!"


    However, Duanmu Hua Yu wasn''t happy about getting something like this. He knew that he would be targeted if he had something like this, so he tried to give it back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh, but he said, "Give it back to me after you give me the information I want, how about that?"


    After thinking about it, Duanmu Hua Yu agreed to this.


    It turned out that Lin Fan had been sent to a Ster Kingdom, the Mu Ster Kingdom to be exact, but the location that he had been sent to was a bit tricky. That was because while this was the main of the Mu Ster Kingdom, the part that he had been sent to was a ce where the Mu Ster Kingdom''s people threw their trash.


    This was a ce where people who had nowhere else to go went. To put it simply, he had been sent to the slums and the wastnd where they threw their garbage.


    That was why all those things had suddenly fallen from the sky.


    The worst part was that once you came in here, it was very difficult to get out.


    The Mu Ster Kingdom naturally cared about their appearance, so they did all that they could to make sure that the people of the slums stayed in the slums. So even if you had money, it would take a ridiculous amount of money to buy your way out of the slums.


    But how could people in the slums even have money?


    They used their soldiers to suppress the people here and had built arge wall around the slums to make sure that they didn''t escape.


    So this had been a terrible ce that Lin Fan had been sent to.


    After learning this, Lin Fan fell into deep thought.


    He knew that Zi Ling had sent him away to keep him safe and that this was the best ce for him to hide out in, but he couldn''t help feeling worried. After all, he had left his friends and family behind, as well as the store.


    These were things that were important and he didn''t know if they were safe now¡­


    Well, he at least knew that the store was safe since he could see his points still increasing, which meant that Mo Ze Chen and Lulu should be watching the store for him.


    Not to mention that Ang and Momonga were both still back at the store if anything went wrong.


    But he still couldn''t help feeling worried since he wasn''t sure how Zi Ling would stop the Bing and Huo Families from taking revenge on the people he cared about.


    So after thinking this through, he still decided that the most important thing was for him to get out of here and make his way back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance. As long as he was careful, he should be able to pass by and make sure that his important people were safe before he continued on.


    But there was one thing that stopped him¡­


    It was another mission from the system.


    After he learned that he hadnded in the Mu Ster Kingdom, there was a mission that popped up telling him to create a store in this Mu Ster Kingdom.


    He was conflicted since he wanted to head back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance to check on the people he cared about, but this was a mission from the system. Thest mission had given him that full power strike from a Peak Realm Expert which was what had saved him in the end, he couldn''t help anticipating what the system would give him this time¡­<sub> </sub>


    Still, no matter what his thoughts were, he knew that there was nothing he could do in the middle of nowhere like this.


    So the first thing he had to do was find some human civilization.


    Luckily, there was a city in this slum and it was where Duanmu Hua Yu and Xin''er were from. So after talking for a bit, Lin Fan decided to head back to the city with the two of them.


    At the very least, they knew enough to be his guide.


    He also took out several more fruits for them to repay them for doing this.


    It didn''t take them long to get back to the city, but to call it a city was a bit of an exaggeration. It was just a bunch of tents and poorly constructed buildings that were put together.


    With how sloppy it looked, it was even hard to believe that people could live in a ce like this.


    But to his surprise, he saw quite a few people walking in the streets of this city. Then on the side, there were also plenty of people sitting there with items on the ground that they seemed to be selling.


    This ce didn''t even lose out in liveliness to the business street in Harmony City.


    In the end, a Ster Kingdom was a Ster Kingdom. Even a city in the slums like this was this lively, it was hard to imagine how lively the capital was.


    Of course, with so many people, naturally there were also people hiding in the crowd with bad intentions. There were people who watched the people walking by, looking for targets to strike.


    Since Lin Fan was new to this city, they immediately locked onto him as fresh blood.


    Lin Fan had suppressed his cultivation so as to not attract any attention, but this had bitten him in the butt as this caused these thieves to turn their attention to him.


    Since they couldn''t sense any cultivation from him, they thought that he was an easy mark. His clean and expensive looking clothes made these thieves even more greedy towards what he had.


    They had confidence in their skills and they were certain that they wouldn''t be discovered, so they made their way behind and in front of Lin Fan before approaching him.


    As Lin Fan was looking around in the street, these thieves chose to strike.


    They casually approached him as if they were just going to walk past him, but when they were right beside him, their sneaky hands suddenly went forward towards his pockets.


    But before they could take anything, Lin Fan''s hands had already grabbed their hands.


    With a single strong twist, the thieves that had tried to steal from Lin Fan were sent to the ground in front of him.


    Everyone turned to see what the cause of thismotion was, but seeing the people being thrown onto the ground, they just revealed sneers before they continued on with their own business. It was as if this was a verymon scene in a ce like this and they were already bored of seeing it.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he looked at the people on the ground.


    Normally he would have directly killed these people, but since he didn''t know what the rules of this ce were, he said, "Get lost."


    The people on the ground looked like they had been pardoned, so they quickly got off the ground and ran away without saying a single thing.


    After they were gone, Duanmu Hua Yu asked, "Why didn''t you kill them?"


    Lin Fan raised a brow before saying, "I don''t want to cause any trouble since I''m not familiar with this ce."


    Duanmu Hua Yu just said with a cold look, "Killing won''t cause any trouble, it''ll just save the guards the trouble. Not to mention, those people aren''t good people to begin with."


    Lin Fan gave a nod, but he didn''t say anything else.


    He had already suspected this and even felt that he had made a mistake since he was certain that they woulde for revenge in the future. But it was already toote for him to regret this, so he could only live with it for now.


    Of course, he gave himself a mental reminder to keep his guard up from now on.


    At the same time, he also gave the people who were still secretly watching around him a cold look as if he was taunting them toe at him. They just looked at him for a bit before turning away to mind their own matters.


    Seeing that there was this incident, Duanmu Hua Yu no longer walked slowly and started moving faster as he gestured to Lin Fan toe with him.


    They quickly moved through the streets until they came to a more quiet area, but that was only rtive to the main street. This ce was still filled with people and based on what they were doing, it seemed like this was a residential area.


    Duanmu Hua Yu brought Lin Fan over to one of the buildings and then brought him into the basement where he and Min''er lived.

 Chapter 814 Loan Shark (1)

    This house was old and dpidated, but it was still better than the tents that lined the streets.


    At the very least, this was a house that was properly built with wood and stone, so it was better at sheltering the owners from the elements than the tent.


    Of course, by Lin Fan''s standards, it was still a very poor ce to live.


    After they arrived, the first thing that Duanmu Hua Yu did was pull a piece of paper off the door.


    He quickly read it with knitted brows, but he also just as quickly put it away before inviting Lin Fan in.


    While it seemed very dirty outside, it was at least much cleaner on the inside. It seemed that Duanmu Hua Yu and Min''er took care of the ce they lived in.


    There were also a few toys that were scattered around that showed that Duanmu Hua Yu did take quite good care of Min''er.


    Once they were in, Duanmu Hua Yu sent Min''er off to y before inviting Lin Fan to sit down. He didn''t even have any water for Lin Fan, but when Lin Fan looked closely, he saw that there wasn''t anything like a faucet in this ce to begin with.


    It seemed that even water was a precious resource in this ce¡­


    So he pulled out a few bottles of water and some things to make some tea.


    Duanmu Hua Yu had an awkward look on his face when he saw this, but he didn''t stop Lin Fan. He knew that this was Lin Fan''s courtesy and it would be rude for him to reject this.


    It definitely wasn''t because he hadn''t had tea in a long time.


    Based on the scent of the tea leaves, Duanmu Hua Yu could tell that these tea leaves weren''t normal. These were high quality tea leaves that perhaps even he had never tasted before.


    That was indeed the case. These tea leaves were specially given to Lin Fan by old man Qiao who was known as the Ghost Chef. These were special leaves that even he felt pained to share with others, so it spoke to how great they were.


    They were grown over a thousand years in a special ce filled with life energy, only being watered with fresh spring water. These were tea leaves that were not only delicious, but also filled with life energy.


    As soon as water was poured on them, there was a burst of life energy that came out and filled the room.


    Sensing this, Duanmu Hua Yu couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look as he started wondering what kind of background he had. This kind of tea leaf was definitely not something that anyone could get, it was even hard to get in this Ster Kingdom unless one was from one of therge factions.


    But why would someone from arge factione to a ce like this?


    Still, since Lin Fan didn''t say anything, it wasn''t as if he could ask. So he just suppressed these thoughts and turned his attention to the tea.


    With such good tea in front of him, how could he not enjoy it?


    But before either of them could take a single sip of the tea, there was a loud knocking that came from the door. After that, there was a loud voice that shouted, "Duanmu, you old piece of trash, get out here!"


    Both Lin Fan and Duanmu Hua Yu knitted their brows and looked at the door when they heard this.


    As for Min''er who had been ying by herself, she immediately trembled and ran into the corner with a doll in hand.


    Duanmu Hua Yu turned to Lin Fan and was about to say something, but then the door suddenly flew in at them.


    In one swift motion, Lin Fan caught the door and ced it onto the ground beside him before looking at the people who were now standing at the empty doorway.


    Theserge men had tattoos and scars all over them, it was clear that they weren''t anyone good¡­As for why they were here, Lin Fan had a good guess based on the note that had been on the door.


    Duanmu Hua Yu had just stood up when one of the men suddenly came forward and knocked him to the ground in a single punch. Once he was on the ground, he began stomping on the old man as he shouted, "You dare run away! You think that you can run from your debt?"


    From his words, Lin Fan had confirmed that it was indeed what he had suspected.


    These men were clearly collectors for a debt that Duanmu Hua Yu had incurred and based on how they were treating him, it seemed like he hadn''t paid that debt for a long time.


    But of course, based on his living conditions, it should be hard for him to pay this debt even now.<sub> </sub>


    However, that also confused Lin Fan since Duanmu Hua Yu was clearly a Soul Realm Cultivator. If he really wanted to, it should be easy for him to earn money in a ce like this.


    So why did he have this kind of debt?


    But before anyone could do anything, Min''er couldn''t stand seeing her grandfather being trampled like this, so she ran forward to grab therge man''s leg as she said, "Stop it! Stop hurting my grandpa!"


    Therge men did stop, but when his eyes fell onto Min''er, they revealed a strange look.


    It wasn''t the look of disdain that most people would reveal in this kind of situation, but rather there was a bit of lust¡­


    It seemed that thisrge man had some strange tastes¡­


    Therge man licked his lips before saying, "Oh, I never thought that you would have a granddaughter like this. How old is she?"


    Duanmu Hua Yu naturally knew what this person was thinking and in one swift move, he came out from under the man''s feet and stood in front of Min''er. The look in his eyes made it clear that he wouldn''t let this many a single hand on her even if he lost his life.


    But at the same time, he gestured with his hands as if he was reprimanding Min''er foring forward.


    Min''er lowered her head, but she still revealed the same strong look as before as she held tightly to her grandfather''s sleeve.


    Therge man was surprised with the speed that Duanmu Hua Yu moved at, but then he was quickly filled with rage when he saw him getting in between him and this cute little girl. He raised his voice again as he shouted, "You really think that you can do anything here? You''re nothing but a piece of trash and you think that you can defy us!"


    He kicked out at Duanmu Hua Yu again to knock him out of the way, but the old man just wouldn''t move.


    Seeing this, therge man thought for a bit before saying with what he considered a friendly smile, but was actually quite terrifying, "Alright, let''s do this then. As long as you offer your granddaughter to us, we''ll consider your interest paid. How about it? Isn''t it generous?"


    There was a trace of killing intent that appeared in Duanmu Hua Yu''s eyes, but they also quickly disappeared. He picked up a pen and a piece of paper from the side before writing, "Just give me a few more days. I promise that I''ll pay, I just need a bit of time."


    Therge man''s face sank when he read this. He revealed a look of rage again as he roared out, "I''ve already given you plenty of patience! Do you really think that I want to do this? Wasting my time with a piece of trash like you?"


    He waved his hands at the otherrge men who moved to different parts of the house and started raising the weapons in their hands.


    Therge man looked at Duanmu Hua Yu and said, "Do you really think that I''m that easy to step over? What will you do if I destroy your house and break all your limbs today? If you don''t pay, that is what''s going to happen today!" Then after a pause, he added, "Of course, if you give us your granddaughter for a few rounds, we can reconsider."


    Lin Fan finally had enough at this point.


    He didn''t want to interfere since this clearly didn''t involve him and if he were to get involved, he would clearly be getting into plenty of trouble.


    But he just couldn''t keep watching anymore.


    The one thing that he was confused about was why Duanmu Hua Yu held back against these men. He could tell from their aura that these men weren''t even in the Soul Realm, so it would be easy for someone like Duanmu Hua Yu to take care of them.


    Was he holding back because they had a powerful backer, or was there another reason why he didn''t do anything to them?


    Either way, that didn''t matter to him.


    Right now, all he wanted to do was take care of these thugs and find out more about the person above them.


    After all, he wasn''t just doing this to save Duanmu Hua Yu and Min''er, he was also doing this to wipe out the organization behind them.


    If he wanted to make his way back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance, he would need to gather power first.


    In a ce like this, the easiest way to gather power was to take over the established powers that were here.


    So with a group to take over and a reason to take them over, why wouldn''t he ept it?


    Not to mention, he quite liked this grandfather and granddaughter pair.

 Chapter 815 Loan Shark (2)

    Seeing the defiant look on Duanmu Hua Yu''s face, therge man was about to raise his hand to punch him again. However, before he could punch him, there was a hand that suddenly grabbed him out of nowhere.


    During this entire time, Lin Fan had hidden himself with hisws and had been observing the situation, so theserge men didn''t even know that he was there.


    But now that he had suddenly grabbed thisrge man''s hand, naturally he revealed himself.


    Therge men were all caught off guard by Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, but they didn''t show any fear.


    Of course, that was mainly because they could sense the weak auraing from Lin Fan. Once they felt that they were stronger than him, they were filled with confidence once again.


    It was just a shame that this was a cover that Lin Fan had put on to make them let their guards down.


    Therge man whose hand was grabbed looked at Lin Fan with a fierce smile and asked, "Little friend, are you trying to y hero? Aren''t you afraid of getting hurt?"


    Even if therge man felt confident after sensing Lin Fan''s aura, he couldn''t help feeling a bit unsettled since there was something that he still couldn''t exin. Just how had Lin Fan snuck up on him without him being able to detect it?


    This kid had just appeared out of nowhere and not a single person had sensed his appearance¡­


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "I think it''s about time to end this, don''t you?"


    Therge man couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his spine when he heard this. However, since he was in front of his men, it wasn''t as if he could back down in front of a kid. So he said in a deep voice, "What do you mean by that?" Then he narrowed his eyes and asked, "Do you really want to do this?"


    Lin Fan just used more force in the hand that was holding the arm of therge man.


    Therge man felt the pressureing from his hand and he couldn''t help letting out a loud cry since it was just too much for him to take.


    When the otherrge men saw this, they all made their way forward to help him, but before they could react, Lin Fan already twisted the army that he was holding. Then in one swift move, he lifted therge man off the ground and swung him around a few times.


    He swung him in a deliberate manner so that all the other men grouped up together to avoid being hit by him. They were grouped up right in front of the open doorway.


    Then once they were all gathered there, Lin Fan released the arm he was holding.


    Therge man flew in the air in a perfect arc before hitting all the other men grouped there. Once he hit them, they were all caught up by the momentum and were sent flying.


    All of them were thrown right out of the door andnded in a pile in the hallway outside the apartment.


    Therge men all looked at each other in nk dismay as they couldn''t understand what had just happened.


    The man who had been grabbed was thergest one among them and the heaviest, but Lin Fan had lifted him like he weighed nothing and had even swung him around like a toy.


    Where in that tiny body was he hiding all that power?


    But Lin Fan wasn''t done with them just yet.


    He walked out from the apartment and stood in front of them, as if he was waiting for something.


    Seeing him just standing there¡­menacingly, therge men felt a shiver run down their backs. They all turned to their leader with looks asking for help.


    The leader was naturally also afraid of Lin Fan, but with how his subordinates were looking at him, he had to stand up for them as their leader. So he stood up in front of them and stared Lin Fan down as he said, "What do you want?"


    With a single flick of his hand, Lin Fan sent the leader to the ground again and this time, he pulled out a sword that he ced at his neck. In an ice cold voice, he said, "Take me to your leader."


    This voice was like the voice of death for these people.


    When faced with this, they had no choice but toply. However, that didn''t mean that they wouldply that easily.


    The leader put on a strong look as he said, "Do you really think that you can deal with our leader? If you really think so, then I''m happy to lead you to your death."


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug and said, "Say what you want. I don''t care as long as you lead the way." After saying this, he lowered his sword and gestured for them to lead the way to their hideout.


    As they were about to leave though, Duanmu Hua Yu couldn''t help following them. He gestured to Lin Fan that this was his own problem and he should deal with it himself, but Lin Fan wouldn''t listen to him.


    Of course, he wouldn''t let Duanmu Hua Yu take away his reason to destroy this group of loan sharks. But he did let theme along since he was confident that he would be able to protect them.


    Not to mention, he would feel assured just leaving them here alone.


    So the best choice was to bring them along as he charged into the enemyir.<sub> </sub>


    The loan shark thugs didn''t waste any time leading Lin Fan back to their base.


    They knew that they wouldn''t be able to defeat Lin Fan, but that didn''t mean that their boss wouldn''t be able to. So they were very confident as they brought him back to their base.


    During this time, Lin Fan learned the reason why Duanmu Hua Yu even had a debt with these people in the first ce.


    It was all because of Min''er.


    A year ago, Min''er suddenly became very sick and Duanmu Hua Yu wasn''t able to afford the medicine to cure her. The medicine that could cure her could be bought in the city, but it cost a very high price.


    It was a price that he definitely couldn''t afford with the amount of money that he was making, so he had no choice but to get a loan from the boss that these thugs worked for.


    Even if the interest was insanely high, he had no choice but to ept since it was Min''er''s life that was in danger.


    Over the past year, he had been slowly paying it off, but that had changed recently. He didn''t know why it had suddenly changed, but the interest payments had suddenly jumped up to more than ten times what they were before.


    Naturally, he wasn''t able to pay them and this was what led to the current situation.


    Still, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking why he didn''t just use his cultivation to solve this problem.


    After all, even if he couldn''t take care of the loan shark, he could at least get a job that was more suited for his level of cultivation. It would allow him to earn much morepared to before and it would be easy for him to pay off this debt.


    But when Duanmu Hua Yu heard this, he just revealed a bitter smile and pointed at his neck where the scar was. Then he pointed at Min''er and revealed a proper smile.


    Lin Fan could understand what he meant, but he still couldn''t agree to it.


    He still felt like there should be some other incident that happened in Duanmu Hua Yu''s past that caused him to act like this. But he wasn''t boorish enough to poke into someone else''s past like this, so he chose not to dig any further.


    Following the thugs through the streets, it didn''t take them long to reach their headquarters.


    Their headquarters was in a part of the city that was much cleaner than the neighbourhood that Duanmu Hua Yu lived in.


    Though there was still quite a bit of trash and dirt that was lying around. At the very least, there were some proper buildings instead of just a bunch of tents that were scattered around.


    These were high rise buildings that were clearly office buildings, so this area should be considered a business area of the city.


    The building that the thugs led them to wasn''t the tallest and it wasn''t in the best position, but it was at least good enough that Lin Fan could see some resemnce of a proper building when he walked in.


    In the lobby of this building, there was a proper receptionist desk and a receptionist sitting there.


    When she saw the thugs leading Lin Fan in, she just ignored them and let them through.


    The thugs also didn''t say anything to her, but Lin Fan didn''t miss the slight nod that they had given her. At the same time, he noticed that she had secretly pressed a button under the desk.


    This should be a signal that they had already agreed upon for when they brought back enemies.


    If his guesses weren''t wrong, what was waiting for him above was¡­


    As expected, when they stepped out of the elevator and into the office, there were many men that were already waiting there for them.


    Most of them had weapons in their hands, only a few of them just stood there punching one fist into the other palm.


    In the center of them was a slick looking man who was much smaller than all the other men, but it was clear that he was the boss here.


    As soon as Lin Fan''s group came out of the elevator, the slick looking man who had been sitting at the desk in the front of the room stood up and walked in front of the rest of these men.


    He looked over at Lin Fan without even looking at his own men who had brought Lin Fan here and just said, "It seems like I owe you for taking care of my boys. How do you think we should settle this?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile and said, "How about you give up? That''ll make things easier for you."


    The slick looking man looked at Lin Fan as if he was trying to decide if he was serious or not, but seeing that Lin Fan was indeed serious, he suddenly broke out inughter. He then said, "Do you really think¡­"


    Before he could finish his threat, there was something that flew past him.

 Chapter 816 Loan Shark (3)

    The slick looking man turned to look at what mmed into the walls.


    He found that it was one of his thugs that had led Lin Fan back to them.


    The slick looking man immediately knitted his brows and turned back to look at Lin Fan with a look filled with rage, but it was already toote. When he turned around, he found that all of his men had been sent flying.


    Some of them were on the ground and some of them were mmed into the walls, but not a single one of them was still left standing.


    Lin Fan just stood there like he hadn''t broken a sweat from all of this.


    When the slick looking man saw this, all of the anger that he had been feeling immediately disappeared as a chill ran down his spine. He couldn''t help stuttering as he said, "You¡­What are you nning¡­to do?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "From now on, you all work for me, understood?"


    The slick looking man had a stunned look on his face as if he couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was saying. After taking a long moment toe back to his senses, he asked in a voice filled with disbelief, "You¡­want to be our boss?"


    Lin Fan just said with a nod, "That''s right."


    The slick looking man still couldn''t understand anything that was happening, but at the very least, he knew that this young man in front of him was much stronger than him.


    This slick looking man didn''t seem that strong, but he was actually in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm. Duanmu Hua Yu was only in the Mid Fragmented Soul Realm, which was why he didn''t dare fight him.


    But in front of Lin Fan who was in the Nascent Soul Realm, it was like a child trying to fight an adult.


    The slick looking man just didn''t stand a chance at all.


    After thinking it through, he bowed down and said, "Greetings to the new boss!"


    All the other men who were lying on the ground or were stuck in the wall saw this and they didn''t hesitate at all as they got up and bowed to Lin Fan as well.


    These men weren''t just afraid for their lives, they had all carefully considered the risks and benefits here.


    Lin Fan was someone who had just sent them all flying without them noticing a single thing. Even their previous boss wasn''t able to react at all in front of Lin Fan.


    The slick looking man was considered a decently strong expert in this area, but that was it. He wasn''t strong enough to bring them any further into the city than this area which was only a third rate business street.


    But if they had Lin Fan''s power¡­


    Perhaps they might even be able to reach the center of the city and live like true kings!


    Lin Fan just gave a casual wave and said, "Alright, alright, that''s enough. Get up and let''s get to business."


    The slick looking man quickly gave a nod and then showed Lin Fan over to the desk that he had been sitting at. After Lin Fan sat down, he asked, "Boss, what do you want to do?"


    Lin Fan casually said, "Bring me all the records for all the loans that you''ve made, I want to see how many outstanding loans you have and what kind of people you''ve made loans to."


    The slick looking man quickly nodded and waved his hand at the others before saying, "Boss, just give us a few minutes and we''ll have everything prepared for you. In the meantime, do you want me to give you a massage?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help narrowing his eyes to look at this slick looking man when he heard this.


    This wasn''t a skill that could be gained overnight, it was clear that this slick looking man had some kind of experience with sucking up to people before.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan asked, "What''s your name? Where did you work before?"


    The slick looking man was surprised to hear this.


    He couldn''t help asking with a cautious look, "Boss, why do you want to know this?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a smile and said, "I can tell that you''re a smart person and I need someone like you to work for me. So tell me about yourself and I''ll see what I can find for you."


    The slick looking man carefully looked at Lin Fan for a bit, but when his intuition told him that Lin Fan indeed didn''t have any ulterior motives, he began telling him everything.


    The slick looking man''s name was Xia Liu and he was someone who used to work for one of the bigger gangs in this slum city. However, he was forced out of that gang because he had offended someone and was forced toe to this edge to create his own small gang, which led to this loan shark business.


    When Lin Fan asked him who he had offended and how he had offended them, Xia Liu couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as he said, "I offended the boss of the gang when I slept with his wife."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking a spit take as he looked at him with a gaze that seemed to be asking if he was serious or not.


    Seeing this, Xia Liu just gave a nod and said nothing else.


    Lin Fan took a moment to recover his calm before saying, "Alright, that''s fine since that''s all in the past. From now on, you''ll be working for me. As long as you work hard and don''t betray me, then I can guarantee that you''ll have a good life."


    Xia Liu revealed an excited look when he heard this.


    When he fought Lin Fan, the aura that Lin Fan had given off was even stronger than his old boss, so he didn''t doubt that Lin Fan had the ability to do this.<sub> </sub>


    But he couldn''t help asking, "Boss, what do you want me to do?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a sly smile and said, "I can see that you''re a very tricky person. You''re someone who will always prioritize his own life and to do so, you wille up with many different ns. I need someone like you since I need someone that cane up with dirty ns."


    Xia Liu also revealed a sly smile when he heard this and he nodded along with Lin Fan.


    It was at this moment that the thugs that had been sent out came back with a pile of papers. They brought them all over to the desk in front of Lin Fan and set them down in front of him.


    Lin Fan picked up the first sheet and started reading through it without any hesitation.


    It took him less than ten minutes to finish reading thatrge pile of papers that had been ced in front of him.


    Of course, he didn''t fully read through all of the papers, but rather he just skimmed through them to get a general gist of all the ounts that they had.


    After reading through them, he pulled out one of the pieces of paper and waved his hand at Duanmu Hua Yu and Min''er who had been silently standing in the corner all this time.


    Once they came over, he said, "Your debt is cleared now, you''re free to go."


    Duanmu Hua Yu revealed a shocked look while Min''er still didn''t really get what was going on, but hearing these words, she revealed a happy look since she thought that this matter was settled.


    But then Duanmu Hua Yu pushed Lin Fan''s hand back and wrote, "No, I can''t take this. I already owe you too much, I can''t owe you anymore."


    Lin Fan just casually said, "This isn''t something that you owe me, so it doesn''t matter if it''s negated."


    Duanmu Hua Yu wrote, "You''re the owner of this business and my debt is with this business, so my debt is with this business, so I owe you this money."


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile and said, "Alright, then do you want to work it off?"


    Duanmu Hua Yu was surprised, but he quickly wrote, "What kind of work are you talking about?"


    Lin Fan looked over at Xia Liu and said, "Arrange for him and his granddaughter to work in the restaurant you have on Third Street."


    Xia Liu quickly nodded and then waved his hand at two of the thugs to guide Duanmu Hua Yu over to the restaurant.


    Duanmu Hua Yu was shocked, but he still wrote, "Just this?"


    Lin Fan nodded, "Just this. I think that Min''er will be happy working there."


    Duanmu Hua Yu looked at him for a few seconds before writing, "Thank you. If there''s anything you need, you can just tell me."


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Just that gratitude is enough."


    With this Duanmu Hua Yu and Min''er followed the two thugs out.


    While they were leaving, Min''er couldn''t help turning back and saying, "Big brother, are you noting with us?"


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "I have some business to take care of first, I''ll see youter, Min''er."


    Min''er happily waved at Lin Fan and said, "It''s a promise!"


    Once they were gone, the happy mood disappeared and everyone became serious again.


    Lin Fan pulled out several more pieces of paper from the pile and put them on the table before saying, "We''ll be cancelling these debts as well."


    When Xia Liu saw this, he immediately said, "Boss, we can''t do that! If we do, the losses will be too much for us to recuperate and we''ll run out of money!"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Cancel them, it''ll be fine."


    Xia Liu still wouldn''t give up as he said, "Boss, this really isn''t something that we can do!"


    Lin Fan just waved his hand and made two low grade spirit stones appear on the table before saying, "Use this to pay off the losses."


    Xia Liu just looked at the spirit stones on the table with a look of shock before turning back to look at Lin Fan.


    After a while, he still said in a difficult voice, "Boss, why are you doing this? Is there a reason why we should negate these debts? Those people really do owe us a lot and it''s not as if there''s a reason why we should negate them."


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this.


    The reason why he was cancelling these contracts was simple.


    These contracts were for people who had no other choice but to borrow this money. They weren''t bad people, they had been forced into signing the contract by Xia Liu and his thugs.


    He was going to run this loan shark business, but he was also going to run it his way.

 Chapter 817 New Business Model

    Lin Fan just pped the table and said in a firm voice, "If I say to do it, you''ll do it. Understood?"


    Seeing him lose his temper, Xia Liu quickly changed his tone, "Alright boss, we''ll negate these debts, we''ll do it."


    As he said this, he also picked up the two spirit stones and handed them off to one of the thugs who ran off with them.


    Lin Fan wasn''t worried seeing this since he knew that this thug was going to exchange this spirit stone for iron coins, which was the currency that was used in this slum city.


    Spirit stones were useless for people like Duanmu Hua Yu who lived on scavenging day by day since they had no way of converting it and the life energy contained within was too little to help his cultivation. However, that wasn''t the same case when it came to Xia Liu.


    With a bit of power in this city, he had his channels to sell spirit stones and convert them into iron coins.


    But it also showed how rare spirit stones were in this city since just two low grade spirit stones were enough to pay off all these debts.


    However, Lin Fan''s changes didn''t stop there as he said, "From now on, we will no longer force people into taking these loans from us. We will only take loans with people who are willing to take loans."


    Once again, Xia Liu''s face fell as he said, "Boss, if we do that, we won''t be able to find any business at all¡­You should know what kind of business we run here and there''s no one that will be willing to take a loan with us unless they have no other choice¡­"


    Lin Fan nodded and then said, "But that doesn''t mean that there isn''t anyone willing to take this loan, right?"


    Xia Liu was about to say something, but then he fell into thought as he suddenly realized something.


    After a while, he suddenly asked, "Boss, do you mean?..."


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "I''m sure that you know some people already."


    Xia Liu nodded in response, but then he shook his head and said, "No, but those people won''t be willing to pay this money back. Unless we force them, we''ll never see that money again."


    Lin Fan then asked, "How strong are those people?"


    Xia Liu knitted his brows and said, "A lot of them are in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm like me. There''s even a few of them who have reached the Embryo Soul Realm."


    Lin Fan asked again with a smile, "Do you think that they''ll be able to beat me?"


    Xia Liu still had knitted brows for a few seconds before suddenly revealing a look of understanding as he realized what Lin Fan meant.


    That''s right, there was this new boss of his.


    With his strength, would it be possible for those people to avoid their debts?


    If they did try to void this debt, they would suffer the same fate that he had just suffered at the hands of Lin Fan.


    As this thought passed through his mind, Xia Liu couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    To be honest, there was a bit of bad blood between him and some of those people, so the thought of them suffering did make him happy.


    Lin Fan could see that Xia Liu understood what he meant, so he said, "I''ll leave it to you to get them to take loans with us, I''m sure you know what to do. Remember, the higher the loan, the better. Don''t forget to secretly raise the interest as much as you can, I''m sure that they won''t even bother reading the contracts."


    Xia Liu revealed a bright smile and said, "Boss, you can leave everything to me. I definitely know how to take care of this."


    Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod before standing up to leave.


    However, before he could, Xia Liu suddenly stopped him by standing in front of him.


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused look and asked, "What is it?"


    Xia Liu hesitated a bit before saying, "Boss¡­It''s just that we don''t have enough funds to charge them as much as we can, so¡­"


    Lin Fan nodded to show he understood and he pulled out five more low grade spirit stones to put on the table before saying, "Use that for now and if it''s still enough, you cane back to me for more. I''m sure that you won''t need more right now at least, right?"


    Xia Liu quickly took the five low grade spirit stones and said with a smile, "Of course, of course, I''ll take care of everything."<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan gave a nod before he walked out of the building.


    As he left, Xia Liu couldn''t help revealing an excited smile as he thought about Lin Fan''s n.


    Lin Fan''s n was very simple. Their business would no longer force normal people to takerge loans that had insanely high interest rates, like the one Duanmu Hua Yu had been burdened with. After all, those people didn''t have much money to begin with and even by selling off their organs or using other ways to get money back from these people, they didn''t really earn that much.


    Instead, they would be targeting the people in this part of the city that actually had money.


    There were other gangs in this part of the city apart from Xia Liu''s group and they were the ones that had the money.


    Before this, Xia Liu never did any business with them since he knew that he wouldn''t be able to afford doing business with them.


    It wasn''t that he was afraid since he was as strong as their bosses, so in a fight, they wouldn''t be at a disadvantage. However, that meant that they also wouldn''t be at an advantage in a fight with them.


    All in all, it wasn''t worth it to do business with these gangs before.


    But now Lin Fan''s n was to offer these gangs loans with high interest so he could collect arge amount of money from them.


    The gangs didn''t know about Lin Fan and they only knew that Xia Liu was the leader. So while they would be confused, there was no reason for them not to take this loan.


    After all, after they received the money from Xia Liu, it wasn''t as if they had any intentions of paying off the loan.


    There were no proper authorities to report this matter to, not to mention that this was pretty much an illegal loan shark contract to begin with. So that was why Xia Liu had never offered this kind of loan to the other gangs before.


    Even if he did offer it, he had no way of recuperating his money since he wouldn''t be able to get a single cent from these other gangs. That was unless he was willing to shed some blood to get it.


    But that was all different now that he had Lin Fan behind him.


    While he wasn''t able to beat up all the other gangs, that wasn''t the same for Lin Fan.


    Just like how Lin Fan hadpletely wiped out their gang in just a single move today, he was certain that Lin Fan would be able to do the same with the other gangs. As long as they had a justified reason to attack, it would be easy for them to wipe gangs out without drawing bacsh from the other gangs.


    So that was why they were going to start offering loans to other gangs.


    They would use the reasoning of these gangs not paying their debts to attack them openly and then subjugate them. They wouldpletely defeat them and take everything that they owned.


    At that time, what would the cost of the loan even matter to them. They would earn their money back countless times from the properties that these gangs owned.


    Of course, eventually, they would attract enough attention that multiple gangs would attack them, but Lin Fan had certainly already thought of that. While Xia Liu didn''t know exactly what Lin Fan''s n was, he knew that he didn''t need to know.


    He had seen Lin Fan''s power and that was already more than enough for him.


    So all he needed to do was set the trap for these gangs.


    The first thing that he needed to do was choose a few targets for them to attack.


    It wasn''t good for them to offer loans to all the different gangs at once since it would mean fighting a muchrger fight that they wouldn''t be prepared for yet. So for now, Xia Liu just needed to choose a few prime targets to attack first.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that he also couldn''t settle a few grudges while he was at it.


    Even if these gangs were to suspect something, they would still take the loans in the end since they had no scruples about taking free money. It was just too bad that this would be thest thing that they would do before they were destroyed.


    Xia Liu quickly went through a list of the different gangs that were in the area and after going through that list for a bit, he finally picked out a few names.


    He wrote a few letters before having his subordinates run off with the spirit stones and those letters.


    He had already spread the bait, now all he needed to do was wait for the fish to bite and then he would be able to harvest them.

 Chapter 818 Raids (1)

    A few days passed by after Xia Liu sent those letters.


    As expected, the gangs that he had contacted were suspicious of these letters, but after meeting with Xia Liu, they still took the money.


    While they didn''t understand why Xia Liu offered them these loans, they didn''t fear the clear trap that this was.


    That was because they were confident in using their hidden cards to deal with whatever Xia Liu had nned.


    At the same time, they also contacted each other to find that Xia Liu had offered the same deal to them.


    So they were certain that Xia Liu wouldn''t be able to seed with whatever n he was plotting. After all, they could juste to each other''s aid if there was something that happened.


    ? They didn''t believe that Xia Liu had enough power to take all of them on.


    It was just too bad that they werepletely wrong about this.


    A week after these contracts had been signed, Lin Fan made his move.


    He could have moved much earlier than this, but he had given them an extra two days so they would let their guards down.


    He didn''t take any of the thugs that Xia Liu offered him since he knew that all they would do was drag him down. After all, instead of having these thugs that weren''t even in the Soul Realm follow him, it was easier for him to rely on his pets.


    During this time, Lin Fan had also tested how summoning his pets would work.


    When he had been sent to this Mu Ster Kingdom, all of his pets were still outside since they had just been fighting in the war with the Tai Ster Kingdom. None of them should have been in his pet space that was sent here with him, so he shouldn''t have been able to summon them.


    But to his surprise, he found that he was still able topletely disregard time and space to summon out his pets.


    However, that wasn''t actually the case.


    When he had been sent away by Zi Ling''s scroll, these pets that had a contract with him had also been pulled away by the spatialw released by the scroll. They had been forcefully sent into the pet space and were dragged along with him.


    That included the pets that he only had temporary contracts with. That included the True Soul Realm Beasts that he had made temporary contracts with.


    When he had been sent here, Qing Ao''s group and the group of True Soul Realm Beasts that he had stolen from the Tai Ster Kingdom forces had all been sent into his pet space and had been sent off with him.


    He hadn''t opened the pet space when he first appeared in this ce, but when he opened the pet space after, he found that all of these pets with temporary contracts were waiting inside for him.


    Of course they were unhappy that they had been brought away from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but that unhappiness didn''t matter since they knew that they were with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had something that was even more enticing to them, so as long as he was here, it was all fine.


    So they decided to follow him.


    Of course, using True Soul Realm Beasts to attack these thugs was a bit overboard, so Lin Fan just called out a few of the weaker puppets that Brainy controlled.


    He didn''t want to put too big of a target on his head by bringing out pets that were too powerful since he was technically supposed to be in hiding, so he only brought out puppets that were in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    But that was still more than enough for him to deal with all the gangs that were in this area.


    Even if they were only in the Embryo Soul Realm, all of these puppets were in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm. They were not things that these gang bosses that were only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm could evene close to fighting.


    Not to mention that his first target was just someone in the High Fragmented Soul Realm, so there wasn''t even a need for many puppets. Just a single puppet was more than enough to destroy this whole gang.


    When he arrived at his target, he found that there weren''t any defenses set up at all.


    But that wasn''t strange at all since they wouldn''t even know that he wasing to destroy them.


    Lin Fan had never shown himself in public with Xia Liu and the others. Other than that first day when he attacked Xia Liu''s office, he had never associated with them directly, so people didn''t know that he was even connected to them.


    Whenever he contacted them, he would do so with the thug that Xia Liu had assigned as a messenger.


    This thug was just one of themon thugs in Xia Liu''s gang, so it was unlikely that anyone would monitor him. So it wasn''t strange at all that no one knew about Lin Fan''s existence.


    That was their first fatal mistake.


    Their second fatal mistake was thinking that they would be able to defend against any attacks that Xia Liu would send at them.


    After he arrived, the first thing that Lin Fan did was try to get a meeting with the boss, but he was kept at the gate by the receptionist.


    Finally, he lost his patience and did something drastic.<sub> </sub>


    The receptionist said again, "Sir, I''ve already told you that without an appointment, you can''t just meet our boss. Please stop causing a scene and leave right now."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "But I haven''t even started causing a scene yet."


    The receptionist knitted her brows, but she didn''t say anything. Instead, she turned to look at the thugs that had just arrived after receiving the silent rm from her.


    They looked at Lin Fan and looked at each other before giving a snort and then moving forward. It was clear that they were looking down on Lin Fan because of his age, but the main reason was of course because he was hiding his cultivation.


    Right now, he was only releasing the aura of someone in the Gold Realm.


    Both of these thugs were also in the Gold Realm, so they would be able to easily take care of this kid. Or at least that was what they thought...


    They came over and came in between Lin Fan and the receptionist. At the same time, they also came up close to Lin Fan to push him towards the door, but to their surprise, he didn''t take a single step back as he looked them right in the eye.


    Of course, these men weren''t intimidated at all by what they thought was just a kid, so one of them said, "Kid, how about you leave now before you get hurt?"


    Lin Fan had the same smile on his face as he said, "But I don''t think that I''ll be the one getting hurt."


    When the thugs heard this, they immediately revealed a slightly angry look.


    Even if they were a bit slow, how could they not hear that this kid was provoking them? How could they not tell that this kid was looking down on them!?


    They were a part of the mighty Axe Gang, how could they let just any kid off the street look down on them like this?


    The man who spoke before shook his head before pulling out the axe he had at his waist and saying, "You''re the one that asked for this."


    Without any warning, he swung the axe in his hand down at Lin Fan.


    However, before he could react, there was a powerful force that suddenly came from in front of him. This force was so strong that he couldn''t resist at all.


    The man was picked up off the ground by this powerful force and was sent flying. He flew past his partner, past the receptionist, and mmed into the wall right behind her.


    The wall wasn''t strong enough to stop him and he smashed right through it, hitting the wall of the building on the other side and creating a web of cracks on that wall.


    Judging by his rolled back eyes, there was no doubt that he was knocked out. However, judging by the blood thatpletely covered him, all of his bones should have also been shattered with that single hit.


    Lin Fan just stood there with his fist raised where that man had just been standing with a casual smile on his face.


    The other man turned to look at his partner before turning to look at Lin Fan.


    Without any hesitation, he turned to run!


    He just knew that his partner had been sent flying and the only one that could have done that was this young kid in front of him. He didn''t know how this kid had done it, but he didn''t intend to stay here long enough to find out.


    He knew that his only chance to survive was to run and find the boss.


    As long as the boss came, he would be able to take care of this kid.


    After all, the boss was a Soul Realm Expert. He was not someone that this kid could stand up against.


    But before he could take more than two steps, there was a powerful force that suddenly came from behind him that lifted him off his feet.


    Just like with the other thug, he was lifted off the ground and carried away by that force, being thrown up against the wall in front of him. Just like with that other thug, he smashed right through the wall andnded in the street in front of the building.


    There were people that had been walking past and they were shocked to see the thug suddenly fly out of the building. However, the people of this city knew better than to involve themselves in this kind of matter.


    So with only just a single look at the bloodied thug on the ground, everyone walked away from the building and minded their own business.


    There was only Lin Fan and the receptionist that were left standing in the lobby of the building.


    The receptionist who had looked down on Lin Fan before just stood there trembling with a look of absolute fear on her face. She said in a stuttering voice, "Please, please don''t, don''t hurt me."


    Lin Fan just asked with a smile, "Am I qualified to see your boss now?"


    But before the receptionist could answer, there was a ding that came from behind them.


    The elevator opened to reveal a thin man with arge axe on his back.

 Chapter 819 Raids (2)

    When the thin man with therge axe on his back came out, he was surprised to see the scene in this lobby.


    He couldn''t help looking at the two holes in the wall with a shocked look as he wondered what happened here.


    But of course, he didn''t panic at all.


    He justpletely ignored Lin Fan as he looked around and once he was done with looking around, he finally turned his attention to Lin Fan. Or rather, he turned his attention to the receptionist who was behind Lin Fan.


    He just asked in a casual voice, "Hey, what happened down here?"


    The receptionist cautiously looked at Lin Fan and seeing that he wasn''t doing anything, she said, "Third master, this person suddenly barged in here and attacked our members. Please uphold justice for us!"


    The one that she called third master was one of the executives of the Axe Gang. He was the third sworn brother of the boss and someone who was in the Peak tinum Realm, just a step away from the Soul Realm and one of the top fighters of the Axe Gang.


    The receptionist was scared of Lin Fan''s strength, but she didn''t believe that he was strong enough to defeat the third master.


    The one called third master looked at Lin Fan with a raised brow and said, "Ho? So you''re here to cause trouble with our Axe Gang? Who sent you?"


    Lin Fan just looked at him with a smile and took out a piece of paper before saying, "I''m here to collect a debt."


    The third master narrowed his eyes to look at the piece of paper that Lin Fan was holding and had to think for a bit before suddenly remembering something as he said, "Ah, so you''re one of Xia Liu''s people."


    He gave augh when he thought of this and then looking at Lin Fan like he was looking at a joke, he said, "Do you really think that we were going to pay back that debt in the first ce?"


    He shook his head and then said, "Kid, I rmend that you get out of here quickly or else you won''t be able to handle the consequences. You''re only in the Gold Realm and even if you are stronger than our thugs, you won''t be able to beat me."


    The third master sounded like he was offering him kind advice, but this was just the twisted personality that he had. He was only pretending to let Lin Fan go and once Lin Fan turned his back, he would make his move.


    He liked attacking people from behind and seeing their faces fill with shock when they were stabbed in the back.


    So he was letting Lin Fan go, while also preparing to send his axe flying right into Lin Fan''s back.


    But what he didn''t expect was that Lin Fan would suddenly raise his hand, looking like he was about to punch him.


    However, before Lin Fan did punch him, it was as if he suddenly thought of something. He stopped his hand from punching out and after thinking for a bit, he raised one finger instead.


    The third master had been watching since he was curious as to what Lin Fan was going to do, but he couldn''t help asking, "Hey kid, are you¡­"


    Before he could finish his words, Lin Fan flicked his finger.


    The scene in front of the third master suddenly changed as he saw the flooring closer and closer until everything turned dark. He wasn''t even able to do anything to resist as this force mmed him into the ground.


    After being mmed into the ground, he made a perfect indentation of his body in the ground.


    But of course, Lin Fan had held back and this third master was stronger than the others, so he wasn''t seriously injured.


    After sending him into the ground, Lin Fan grabbed the third master''s hair and pulled his head out of the ground before saying, "Where can I find your boss?"


    When the third master heard this voice, he was pulled out of his daze and he tried to grab the axe on his back, but he found that the axe had already disappeared.


    Lin Fan already knew that he would do this, so before he could grab the axe, he had already thrown it to the side. It had flown right past the receptionist and had mmed into the wall behind her. Of course, he had made sure to throw it at the other side of the receptionist since there was the hole that the thug had made on the first side.


    She had managed to stay awake through all of the fighting, but when the axe flew at her and she felt like she was about to die, she finally couldn''t take it anymore and fainted. But it was mainly because the third young master that she had faith in had been defeated so easily.


    This shattered thest bit of hope that she had and she fainted right away.


    Lin Fan then quickly broke the third master''s two hands before saying, "I just want to meet your boss, don''t make this hard on me."<sub> </sub>


    The third master screamed when his hands were broken, but he immediately fell quiet when he heard Lin Fan''s voice that followed. That was because this voice was like the voice of death¡­


    He knew that if he didn''t follow Lin Fan''s orders, then the consequences that he suffered would be¡­far worse than anything he had suffered so far¡­


    The only reason Lin Fan had held back in the first ce was because he needed information from this third master. Otherwise, this third master would have without a doubt ended up just like the thugs in the wall and lying on the street.


    The third master''s mind quickly turned before saying, "The elevator! If you take that elevator, then you can reach the boss! You''re lucky since we were having a meeting today to discuss something, so we were all here!"


    There were many different intentions in his words, but Lin Fan ignored them all since he knew that they couldn''t pose any threat to him.


    So he picked up the third master and walked right into the elevator.


    The third master wanted to send a message using the secretmunicator that he had on his body, but Lin Fan had shattered his hands, so he wasn''t able to do that. The only thing that he could do was hope that the boss wouldn''t be caught off guard by Lin Fan''s sudden attacks.


    When the elevator arrived on the floor that the third master told Lin Fan to go to, it opened up to reveal an office that had several people in it.


    These people looked very rxed and one of them turned to ask, "Old third, what took you so¡­" But he never finished his words as they suddenly faded away.


    That was because the people in the room were all staring at Lin Fan who was currently standing there holding the third master in his hand with looks of shock. They couldn''t believe what they were currently looking at.


    Lin Fan ignored all of them and just casually looked around the room at all the people inside. His eyes finally fell onto the man who was sitting behind the desk in the center of the room like he had found his prey.


    That was because this man was indeed his prey.


    This man was the boss of the Axe Gang and the only person here who gave off the aura of a Soul Realm Expert.


    As long as he took care of this person, he was certain that the Axe Gang would crumble and fall under him.


    After that initial moment of shock, the people in the room suddenly recovered and said in threatening voices, "Let go of old third right now or we''ll chop off that hand!"


    Lin Fan just ignored them as his eyes remained on the boss of the Axe Gang the entire time..


    The boss also never said a word since he had also been sizing up Lin Fan.


    This kid who had suddenly barged in only gave off the aura of a Gold Realm Expert, but for some reason, the boss felt a dangerous feelinging from him. It was almost as if this kid who wasn''t in the Soul Realm could pose a threat to him.


    The boss didn''t go forward himself as he turned to one of his subordinates and gestured with his eyes for him to go forward.


    That subordinate naturally understood this gesture and moved towards Lin Fan, raising his hand as he said, "Let go of old third now and we''ll consider letting¡­"


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan gave a snort and flicked his hand, releasing the third master that he had been holding. He threw the third master right at the person that had been moving towards him.


    That person wasn''t able to react at all as the third master suddenly flew at him.


    With the force that the third master had been thrown at, it caused both of them to fly forward until they mmed into the wall behind the boss.


    Everyone turned to look at the two men who had been mmed into the wall before looking back at Lin Fan with looks of shock and fear.


    That included the boss!


    Even the boss had been shocked by this because he hadn''t been able to see Lin Fan making a move at all!


    Even though he was in the Soul Realm, he wasn''t able to catch the movements of this kid!


    Just who was this kid!

 Chapter 820 Raids (3)

    After this deep feeling of shock and fear, the bosspletely re-evaluated Lin Fan.


    It seemed like he couldn''t judge Lin Fan just based on the aura that he was hiding¡­It seemed like this kid was hiding his real cultivation¡­


    This however made the boss feel uneasy since he wasn''t even sure if he could beat Lin Fan like this¡­


    Even if he could, he was sure that he would suffer quite a bit since he hadn''t been able to follow Lin Fan''s speed. If he were to suddenly attack him from different angles with that speed, the boss wasn''t certain that he would be able to block all of these attacks¡­


    Even if he would win in the end since he was confident in his durability, he would definitely suffer quite a few injuries.


    In that case¡­


    After this moment of thought, the boss turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "Who are you and what do you want?"


    If he could solve this problem with words, there was no reason for him not to do so.


    Lin Fan just raised the piece of paper that he had shown the third master before and said, "I''m here to collect your debt."


    The boss narrowed his eyes to look at the piece of paper that Lin Fan was holding up and after thinking for a bit, he suddenly realized what Lin Fan was talking about.


    The boss couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan for a bit longer before saying, "So this is the reason why Xia Liu suddenly became so bold¡­You''re the one who''s backing him?"


    Lin Fan just smiled without saying a thing.


    The boss just silently stared at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly waving his hand.


    The subordinates thought that he was about to make a move, but then the boss suddenly said, "Go and get the money. We''ll pay this debt off."


    Everyone looked at the boss with a surprised look, but since the boss had already spoken, there was nothing that they could do. So after nkly looking at each other, one of them suddenly ran off and came back with a pile of paper.


    While this slum city didn''t have a proper police system that protected the people, it did have a proper money system that was quite well protected. After all, the money system was run by the people from the Mu Ster Kingdom capital.


    As for why these people would want to run a bank in this kind of slum city, naturally it was for their own benefits.


    Running the money system didn''t cost them anything and they would be able to earn quite a bit from the people of the slum city. At the same time, they would also be able to control the people of the slum city if they ever got too troublesome.


    There had been cases where ounts had been raided by the border patrol, the guards at the wall that kept the people of the slum city in the city. They gave the reason that the owner of the ounts were plotting against the Mu Ster Kingdom and that all the assets were being confiscated during the investigation.


    Of course, there had never been a case where those assets had ever been returned. Even the people who those ounts were associated with were never seen or heard from again.


    As for where the funds in those ounts went¡­The people who managed the bank had no choice but to begrudgingly hold the funds after the owners of those ounts disappeared¡­


    With enough time, the fundspletely disappeared and no one knew where it went.


    Of course, everyone secretly understood that it went into the pockets of those from the Mu Ster Kingdom''s capital.


    But the money system that they created indeed made it easy for people to exchange currency.


    The iron coins were the currency that was introduced by these banks, but of course it was troublesome carryingrge amounts of iron coins. After all, each of these coins were quite heavy and carrying a bunch of them was troublesome.


    So after a certain point, paper currency was introduced forrge denominations, which was what the stack of paper this subordinate brought out was.


    Each one of these pieces of paper was a bill that was worth a hundred iron coins and there were easily five hundred pieces of paper in this stack, so this was a stack that was worth fifty thousand iron coins.


    Just a few iron coins was enough for people to survive each day, so this stack was quite arge amount.


    Even the Axe Gang felt pained giving up something like this, that is if it was their own money. Since this was just the money that they received from Xia Liu, it didn''t hurt as much.


    But after the subordinate ced this stack on a table in front of Lin Fan, Lin Fan didn''t make a move to take it.


    Everyone couldn''t help feeling tense when they saw this and the boss couldn''t help asking, "The money is all there. Are you afraid that we''ll cheat you?"


    Lin Fan didn''t even bother looking at the stack of paper on the table as he looked right at the boss and asked, "What about the interest?"<sub> </sub>


    The faces of the boss and the subordinates all sunk when they heard this¡­but after a while, the boss turned to the subordinate who had brought out this stack of paper and gave another nod.


    The subordinate clearly had an unwilling look on his face, but since his boss was telling him to go, he didn''t have a choice.


    It didn''t take long before he came back with a stack of papers that was just as big as the one that he had brought out thest time.


    The interest on the contract that they signed was exorbitant, but they never intended to pay it in the first ce, which was why they had signed the contract without any hesitation. Now it came back to bite them in the butt.


    However, if they were able to solve this with just money, the boss was willing to ept this.


    That was because he really was afraid of Lin Fan¡­


    After the stack of paper was ced, Lin Fan once again didn''t move to take the stacks that were ced in front of him. He just casually stood there with a smile on his face, as if he was waiting for something else.


    The boss had a bad feeling and asked, "There''s the interest. Is there anything else that you want?"


    Lin Fan just had the same smile as he slowly said, "What aboutpensation for everything that''s happened today?"


    Everyone''s faces sank once again when they heard this.


    Lin Fan was making it quite clear, he didn''t want to end things that easily today. It seemed like he already had a goaling here and at this point, he was just teasing them.


    So the boss finally couldn''t take it anymore.


    He could ept Lin Fan asking for the debt amount and even the interest since he acknowledged that he had been outsmarted by Xia Liu. He had never expected Xia Liu to have this kind of expert supporting him.


    But when Lin Fan asked forpensation, that was where he drew the line.


    It was clear that he was trying to push the issue by asking forpensation. After all, why should they be the one paying Lin Fanpensation when they were the ones that had injured people?


    Who was the one that had a ruined building and injured subordinates?


    If he agreed to Lin Fan''s request forpensation, there was no need for him to be the boss anymore. Especially since Lin Fan was asking forpensation right in front of his subordinates.


    He really wouldn''t have the face to be the boss anymore if he agreed to paypensation in front of his subordinates.


    So after a moment''s pause, the boss released his aura and said in a deep voice, "Don''t push your luck. Take this money and get out of here or you won''t be able to leave at all."


    Lin Fan ignored this threat and said with the same rxed smile, "Is that so?"


    With such clear provocation, there was no way that the boss could back down now.


    So he opened up a drawer beside him and pulled out a small handaxe.


    This was a very simple looking handaxe, but the aura that it gave off was anything but simple.


    It was very clear that this was an artifact and it wasn''t just any artifact, it was clear that this was a Soul Realm Artifact.


    The boss slowly stood up and pointed the handaxe at Lin Fan as he said, "Then give up on leaving today. Either you will die or I will die today!"


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I''m more willing to bet that you will die than I will die."


    There was a vein that popped out on the boss'' head as he said in a low roar, "You! It''ll be toote to regret it when you''re on the path to the Yellow Springs."


    As soon as his voice fell, he didn''t hesitate at all as he raised the small handaxe above his head and he jumped out at Lin Fan.


    With the aura that he released, everyone couldn''t help feeling a bit afraid, but also being filled with hope.


    This was the boss that they knew, this was the aura of the boss that they had submitted to.


    But before his handaxe could even touch Lin Fan, he was suddenly sent flying away.

 Chapter 821 Raids (4)

    As the Axe Gang''s boss flew by, those looks of hope turned into looks of shock and despair.


    The boss flew right past them and mmed into the wall, creating a hole in it as he was pushed halfway through. There was only his bottom half left inside of the building.


    But this was even more shocking since this room was built specially.


    This was the main office of the Axe Gang and they knew that there would be plenty of fights happening here. So when this was constructed, it was made of a special hard material that was very hard to break.


    Even when the boss had tested it, they had found that it was able to take half of his full power.


    That meant that this wall was even able to block an attack from a normal Fragmented Soul Realm Expert. Only a full force attack from a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert would be able to damage the wall.


    But the Axe Gang boss had been sent right through the wall like it was nothing?


    That meant that what the Axe Gang boss had just been hit in surpassed a full force blow from a Fragmented Soul Realm Expert¡­


    Could it be that this kid in front of them was an Embryo Soul Realm Expert?!


    If that was the case, then there really was nothing that they could do today¡­They only thing that was left for them was to pray that he didn''t want their lives, otherwise not a single one of them would be able to escape today.


    But lucky for them, that was indeed the case.


    Lin Fan never nned on taking the lives of these people, he just wanted their power and influence. He wanted to take them as his subordinates and have them bring all the resources that they had under him.


    So after taking care of the Axe Gang boss, he actually pulled the Axe Gang boss out of the hole in the wall.


    The Axe Gang boss had already lost consciousness from being punched right through the wall, but Lin Fan didn''t let him stay unconscious. He raised his hand and pped the Axe Gang boss a few times until the boss finally woke up.


    The boss looked up with his swollen face and seeing Lin Fan''s face right in front of his own, he couldn''t help jolting as he remembered what had just happened.


    He asked with a bitter smile, "Can''t you just spare me? I promise that I won''t mess with Xia Liu''s group anymore in the future. I''ll even be your greatest ally."


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "It''s not a problem to spare you¡­"


    He deliberately left his words there to give them a bit of hope.


    The Axe Gang boss naturally seized this opportunity and was about to say something, but Lin Fan suddenly cut him off, "As long as you be my subordinates."


    At this, all of the Axe Gang members revealed difficult expressions.


    They didn''t agree right away like Xia Liu''s group. Instead, they all had difficult looks as if this was something that was very hard for them to ept.


    That was because the Axe Gang was different from Xia Liu''s group.


    Xia Liu''s gang was just a gathering of people who wanted to gain power and resources, they didn''t have anything binding them together. That was why they were willing to submit to him without any hesitation.


    As long as it was someone stronger than them, they saw no reason not to submit since a stronger boss would mean a stronger backer for them.


    But it was different with the Axe Gang.


    The Axe Gang was made by the five brothers that took up the boss position and the four executive positions. This Axe Gang hadn''t just been made for resources and power, rather it had been formed to fulfil an ambition for the five brothers of the Axe Gang.


    Their dream was to gain enough power to one day leave this slum city and make it to the Mu Ster Kingdom capital.


    So if they were to submit to Lin Fan now, that would mean going against their dreams¡­


    But Lin Fan could also see this, so he gave them a little ''motivation''.


    Lin Fan raised his fist and asked, "Then since you''re not willing to work for me, there''s no reason for me to keep you alive anymore is there?"


    As soon as his voice fell, everyone felt a chill run down their spines.


    They could sense the killing intent that wasing from him¡­he was being serious¡­


    If they really insisted on not joining him, then he would kill them all here.


    So¡­


    "We''ll join, we''ll join!" The Axe Gang boss quickly said while everyone nodded in agreement to this.<sub> </sub>


    Even if they had dreams, the most important thing was naturally their life.


    If they didn''t have their life, they wouldn''t be able to have dreams. So before having dreams, they had to make sure that they could keep their lives.


    Not to mention, even if they were to submit under him, as long as they worked hard, there was still the chance that they would be able to escape this slum city one day. It wasn''t as if they werepletely giving up on their dreams by choosing to follow Lin Fan.


    Or at least that was how they tried tofort themselves.


    Lin Fan knew that this method of forcing people to be his subordinates wouldn''t create any sense of loyalty in them, but that was not what he cared about right now. He just needed their influence and resources, once he was done with them, he wouldn''t need to think about them again.


    After subjugating the Axe Gang, Lin Fan let the Axe Gang boss get healed up by the Axe Gang medic. However, he wouldn''t let the medic wrap any bandages around the boss or anything that made it clear that he had been treated.


    The Axe Gang boss was confused by this until¡­


    Lin Fan suddenly said, "Call the other three gangs that also have a debt with us. Tell them that you are being attacked and you''re struggling to fight back. Tell them that you need reinforcements."


    The Axe Gang boss'' eyes trembled when he heard this, but he forced himself to stay calm as he said, "Boss, I don''t have any contact with those other gangs. I don''t know what¡­"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes that turned cold and said, "Stop wasting words trying to lie to me. I know that your four gangs have already agreed to work together to avoid paying this debt."


    The Axe Gang boss felt a chill run down his spine when he heard this, but he didn''t give up as he continued, "Boss, I really don''t know what you''re talking about. I¡­"


    Before his next word coulde out, Lin Fan had summoned a white dagger with a flick of his hand and it was ced at the Axe Gang boss'' neck.


    The Axe Gang boss hadn''t been able to react to this at all, but he could feel the killing intent that Lin Fan was releasing¡­


    Lin Fan said in an ice cold voice, "Stop wasting my time and just do it."


    Finally the expression of the Axe Gang boss changed. He revealed a difficult look as he said, "Boss, you should know what happens if we betray those other three gangs. Nothing good wille from that."


    That was right, the main reason he didn''t want to contact them was because he wanted to keep himself safe.


    He didn''t know what backing Lin Fan had, but even if Lin Fan could keep himself safe, why would he help their Axe Gang?


    For him to call the other three gangs here for a trap, it was clear that Lin Fan was already nning on using the Axe Gang to take the me.


    Naturally the boss of the Axe Gang couldn''t let that happen.


    It wasn''t just about his own life, but also the lives of his brothers.


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t have any of it as he said, "I''m taking down these three gangs today, so you don''t need to worry about that." Then his voice turned cold again as he said, "Just call them already before I find someone else to do it."


    But the Axe Gang boss still wouldn''t back down as he said, "Boss, you are powerful, but one of these gangs is run by an Embryo Soul Realm boss. I''m afraid that¡­"


    He left his words hanging, but the meaning behind them were clear.


    Lin Fan just gave a soft snort before moving the white dagger slightly forward to pierce into the Axe Gang boss'' neck. Then he said, "I guess I''ll have to find someone else then."


    The Axe Gang boss felt tearse to his eyes when he heard this.


    With no other choice, he quickly said, "I''ll call them, I''ll call them!"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at him before giving another snort and saying, "Then do it already."


    After that, he pulled back his dagger and kicked the Axe Gang boss.


    The Axe Gang boss had an aggrieved look like a wife that was being mistreated, but he quickly looked away when faced with Lin Fan''s ice cold look.


    So in front of Lin Fan, he picked up something that seemed like an old version of a telephone that even had the spinning dial for dialing numbers.


    After he made the calls, they all quickly connected and the people on the other side all agreed toe as Lin Fan expected.


    This was a matter of their shared interests, so of course the other gangs wouldn''t hold back.


    But that was what Lin Fan counted on.


    After all, it was too troublesome to go looking for them. It was much easier for them toe to him.

 Chapter 822 Raids (5)

    It didn''t take long for the forces of the three other gangs to arrive at the Axe Gang''s headquarters.


    When they arrived and saw all the damage in the lobby, they couldn''t help feeling surprised. At the same time, there was an uneasy feeling that filled them as if something was off.


    But they just couldn''t tell what was off based on this alone.


    So they still headed up to the Axe Gang''s main office.


    The office was only essible by elevator, so they had no choice but to squeeze into the elevator. They only sent their strongest experts up first and everyone else would follow afterwards.


    When they arrived at the office, they were caught off guard by what they saw.


    That was because inside of the office, the executives of the Axe Gang were lying on the ground and the Axe Gang boss was currently fighting Lin Fan.


    They dashed across the room, exchanging blows, but it was clear that the Axe Gang boss was at a disadvantage. His face was swollen from all the blows that he had taken and he was still taking more blows as he exchanged blows with Lin Fan.


    When the elevator door opened, there was a ding that attracted their attention.


    Seeing the other bosses just standing there, the Axe Gang boss shouted, "What are you all just standing there for? Help me!"


    But as he said this, he diverted his attention for a split second.


    That split second was all the time that Lin Fan needed tond a punch on the face of the Axe Gang boss.


    The Axe Gang boss who had been caught off guard took the full force of this punch and he was thrown right into the ground. As his eyes rolled back in their sockets, he couldn''t help revealing an aggrieved look.


    He thought to himself, "Boss, didn''t you say that you would hold back?"


    But then he remembered what Lin Fan had said before these three gangs had shown up.


    He had said that he would be as gentle as possible, but he would need to be serious if there was a need.


    But even then, the Axe Gang boss couldn¨¨t helpining, "What happened to being gentle?"


    After the Axe Gang boss was knocked out, Lin Fan turned his attention to the three gang leaders that had just arrived.


    When Lin Fan turned his attention to the three of them and the subordinates that hade up with them, they immediately felt a chill from his cold gaze. However, they couldn''t just back down, so they had no choice but to face him head on.


    Of course, they wouldn''t choose to fight right away if they could, so the first thing they did was talk to Lin Fan.


    The leader of the Demon Wolf Gang, the only one of the gang leaders who was in the Embryo Soul Realm here, took the lead and said, "This friend, can we talk about this? We still don''t understand what the situation is, but I feel that it would be better if we can solve this with words than with action, right?"


    The other two gang leaders nodded in agreement to this.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t give them this chance to talk.


    In response to this, all he did was raise his hand and waved it towards himself, as if he was saying, "Come at me."


    All three of the gang leaders knitted their brows when they saw this and their expressions became ugly.


    Even though the Demon Wolf Gang leader was in the Embryo Soul Realm, he still didn''t feel like he had a chance of winning against Lin Fan. The aura that Lin Fan was releasing was¡­


    But before any of these gang leaders could make a move, the subordinates who had faith in them came out first.


    The vice gang leader of the Demon Wolf Gang came out and said, "Who do you think you are ignoring our gang leader like this? Do you really think that you can take all of us on?"


    Lin Fan didn''t even look at the vice gang leader as he shouted at him, he was just looking at the gang leaders, waiting for them to make a move.


    Being ignored like this hurt the vice gang leader''s pride, so without hesitation, he charged forward at Lin Fan.


    He wasn''t just charging because he was a fool, though that was a part of it. He foolishly believed that Lin Fan must have used up most of his life energy fighting the Axe Gang, so he was confident that Lin Fan was only acting strong.


    It was just too bad that he was an idiot.


    Lin Fan didn''t show any signs of exhaustion and it wasn''t just his appearance. Even his aura didn''t have any fluctuations that would show that it was weakening.


    But that was only something that the three gang leaders felt.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan was very skilled in controlling his aurapared to before, so he was able to make it so that none of the subordinates could tell how strong he was.


    Lin Fanpletely ignored this person that charged right at him, but before the sword of this person could hit Lin Fan, he suddenly went flying back in the direction of the three gang leaders.


    None of the gang leaders made any attempts to catch him. In fact, they even dodged out of the way of his body since they knew that they wouldn''t be able to stop him.


    That person mmed right into the wall in a burst of blood before crumpling to the ground like a sack of potatoes.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at him and then looking at Lin Fan with looks of shock and disbelief. No one had been able to see what had happened just now, including the three gang leaders.


    Even with their Soul Realm Cultivations, they hadn''t been able to follow Lin Fan''s moves at all.


    After seeing this vice gang leader being sent flying, they felt an even more sinking feeling like they had just kicked a steel te.


    Seeing this, the Demon Wolf Gang''s leader said, "Friend, this is all a misunderstanding. Let''s not escte this any more than it''s already been escted." Then after a pause, he said with a smile, "How about this, we''ll pay you the amount of the debt and the interest. As well, we''ll also give you some money topensate you for all this trouble. I think that''s very reasonable, don''t you think?"


    To their surprise, Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this.


    Seeing this, the eyes of everyone lit up.


    It didn''t matter if they had to pay a little bit extra since their lives were most important. If they could get out of here with as few casualties as possible, they didn''t mind if they had to pay a bit extra.


    What they lost, they could just take from the Axe Gang now that they had beenpletely destroyed.


    But then thatst me of hope was immediately crushed by Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "It''s a pity that I''m not a reasonable person."


    As soon as his voice fell, all of the gang leaders gave their orders.


    "Call out all the wolves and get in pack formation!"


    "Summon the water spirits and create a barrier around us!"


    "Summoning the lightning rats and create a spear of lightning!"


    Thest one actually caught Lin Fan off guard.


    It wasn''t because of the power of the lightning rats, but rather their appearances.


    He had seen other lightning based rodents before, but these ones were different. That was because these ones had an appearance that could be considered familiar to him¡­


    These were yellow rats with a lightning bolt tail and red circles on their cheeks¡­These lightning rats really had been famous in his previous world and he found it funny that he was able to see them here¡­


    But of course, that slight pause was temporary.


    With his much higher cultivation, they couldn''t take advantage of this at all since he moved much faster than them. However, it hadn''t been Lin Fan who had made a move earlier.


    As soon as their formation had beenplete, Lin Fan had to admit that it wasn''t that bad.


    Even though this was their first time cooperating with each other, the different gangs had more than enough information on each other to cooperate like this. They normally had to be wary of each other since they were inpetition with one another, so they knew all about their special formations and their methods of attacking.


    Still, even if this formation wasn''t bad, it still wasn''t a match for Lin Fan. Or rather the puppet that Lin Fan had in hiding.


    Once their formation was done, they immediately charged forward together, aiming their strongestbined attack right at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just stood there without any fear. It didn''t even seem like he was about to make a move which surprised the three gang leaders.


    But then before any of the gang members could react, there was a quick shadow that suddenly came out from behind Lin Fan and charged right at them. In one swift motion, the shadow punched out and shattered their array like it was nothing before disappearing.


    While they hadn''t been able to see the true form of the shadow, the bosses had been able to sense the aura that shadow released.


    The boss of the Demon Wolf Gang had the most shocked face because he knew what that aura meant¡­It was the aura of an expert in the Peak Embryo Soul Realm!

 Chapter 823 Assassins (1)

    After having their formation shattered, the gang members all suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood.


    Having their formation shattered like this naturally caused them to be hit with the rebound. However, it wasn''t that strong, so they were still able to fight if they wanted to.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t give them that chance.


    Before they could even react, there were daggers that were made of shadows that flew out of the ground and stabbed right into their bodies.


    With just one simple move, they had been turned into pincushions that were trapped against the wall.


    Not even the boss of the Demon Wolf Gang was an exception.


    Lin Fan came forward and said, "Submit or die."


    With no other choice, naturally they chose to submit.


    With all of this taken care of, Lin Fan let them all go before having them follow him back to Xia Lou''s gang headquarters. Before leaving though, he did p the Axe Gang boss to wake him up and had hime with them.


    Xia Liu was surprised to see all of theming with Lin Fan at once. He had thought that Lin Fan would only take care of the Axe Gang today. He didn''t expect him to take care of four different gangs at once.


    After all, these gangs were located in different parts of the city. It would take a long time just to go from each gang to the next, not to mention the time that it took to subjugate them.


    At most Xia Liu had only thought that Lin Fan could only subjugate two at most.


    He never expected Lin Fan to use this kind of lure the tiger off the mountain strategy to draw in these other three gangs.


    But since it was done, naturally Xia Liu was happy about it.


    However, now that they had already used this trick, it was impossible for them to keep using loans to trick others. Without the load though, they wouldn''t have justification to attack the other gangs.


    So they would have to think of a new method to attack the different gangs.


    Still with four different gangs falling under them, their influence had greatly increased. It would be easy for them to find justification to attack the other gangs.


    Lin Fan decided to leave this matter to Xia Liu since he was done for the day. There wasn''t anything that still needed his power to solve, so he decided to head home.


    He had gotten a house from Xia Lou''s gang as well and it was right beside the one that they had given Duanmu Hua Yu.


    So whenever he had free time, he would always go over and talk to him while also ying with Min''er.


    That little girl really was cute. He wished that his child would be as cute as her in the future.


    When he arrived home, he had a box of biscuits in his hands.


    Even though these were simple biscuits made of flour and sugar, they cost an arm and a leg. If it was someone else, they definitely wouldn''t have been able to afford it.


    It was just a good thing that he still has ess to all his spirit stones that he could turn into iron coins.


    Though he can''t be consideredcking money after his recent "expansions".


    When he arrived though, he immediately dropped the biscuits to the ground. He could tell that something was off.


    It wasn''t with his house since his house''s door was still closed, it was with Duanmu Hua Yi''s house.


    Without hesitation, Lin Fan ran right through the door that was left open, but he wasn''t able to find anything in the house. All he saw were the signs of a struggle based on the different destroyed objects scattered all over the house.


    It seemed like whoever came didn''t show any mercy at all¡­


    He couldn''t help feeling worried about Duanmu Hua Yu and Min''er¡­


    So Lin Fan quickly searched the house for any signs that would lead him to them, but he wasn''t able to find anything. That was until he looked at the back of the open door and found that there was a note stuck to the back.


    Taking the note down and looking he found that it read, "Min''er, if youe home,e and find grandfather at the quarry."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows since he could tell that this was indeed Duanmu Hua Yu''s handwriting. He was very familiar with it since Duanmu Hua Yu wrote to talk to him most of the time.


    However, he could tell that there were a few things off about this note.<sub> </sub>


    First, it was the way that he addressed himself. Instead of calling himself grandpa like he normally did, he used the more formal grandfather.


    Second, there was a strange symbol that was also written on the paper.


    From a first nce, one might think that this strange symbol was just a scribble that was identally made when Duanmu Hua Yu was writing the letter, but he knew that wasn''t the case because he was able to recognize this symbol.


    After getting closer to Duanmu Hua Yu over the past few days, he shared a few secrets with him.


    Of course, that included the meaning of this symbol.


    The meaning of this symbol was a specialmunication method between him and Min''er just in case anything happened.


    This symbol''s meaning was for Min''er to hide in a special safe spot that they had discussed and not toe out. He woulde and look for her when everything was alright.


    He had also noticed while searching that the special little pack that he had prepared for Min''er just in case of any idents was also gone. That must have meant that Min''er hade back before he did and had seen this note, so she took the special pack and had gone into hiding.


    As for where she was hiding, that was the one thing that Duanmu Hua Yu didn''t tell him.


    He had been close, but he still hadn''t trusted Lin Fan enough to give up thisst secret just yet.


    But as for why he told Lin Fan everything else¡­that was because he wanted to make sure that Lin Fan would be able to take care of Min''er if something happened to him. Like what was happening now.


    The only problem was that Lin Fan still didn''t know where Min''er was, so he couldn''t go and collect her even if he wanted to.


    So between Min''er and Duanmu Hua Yu, after considering it, Lin Fan decided to deal with the Duanmu Hua Yu problem first.


    The letter clearly stated that Duanmu Hua Yu wanted to meet Min''er in the quarry. If the kidnappers wanted to capture Min''er, naturally they would keep Duanmu Hua Yu alive to ensure that Min''er would willingly go with them.


    So in the short term, Duanmu Hua Yu could be considered safe.


    However, that was only in the short term.


    The longer it went without Min''er showing up at the quarry, the more suspicious the kidnappers would be. It would take them so long before they realized that they had been yed and Min''er wouldn''t being.


    Once they realized that Min''er wasn''ting, the first thing that they would do was kill Duanmu Hua Yu. Not just because he was no longer of any use to them, but also because they would be angry that he had tricked them.


    So the most important thing for Lin Fan to do right now was to save Duanmu Hua Yu before anything happened to him.


    He could already tell from the state of the broken items around the house that it had already been quite a while since he had been kidnapped. If he waited any longer, who knew if the kidnappers would run out of patience or not.


    But before he left, he couldn''t help muttering to himself, "Why would they want to kidnap old man Duanmu? Not to mention, what did they want with Min''er?"


    No matter how he thought about it, it seemed like there were things that he didn''t know about under the surface and this situation was much deeper than it seemed.


    Still, for now, the most important thing was to rescue Duanmu Hua Yu before it was toote.


    So Lin Fan headed right to the quarry.


    The quarry that was mentioned in the letter was the coal quarry that was just on the edge of town. It was the only ce in this slum city that would provide decent work, but it wasn''t a popr job since it was a job that took a toll on the worker''s life.


    This was a slum city and it wascking in resources, so most of the coal mining methods were a bit crude. The fumes that came from mining coal all day would umte inside of your lungs and would eventually kill you.


    So this ce was mostly abandoned because only people who were desperate would choose to work in a ce like this.


    But because it was a coal mine, it was also quiterge.


    The letter didn''t specify where to meet Duanmu Hua Yu, but that was also intentional.


    There was only one main entrance to this entire quarry and as Lin Fan expected, it was watched by someone. It wasn''t hard at all for him to find this person watching over the entrance with Brainy''s puppets at all.


    They were trying to catch Min''er off guard and catch her before she could do anything.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan was the one who came.

 Chapter 824 Assassins (2)

    After finding this person, Lin Fan didn''t make a move against him right away.


    Instead, he watched this person for a bit to see what kind of moves they would make and also searched the area around that person to see if he could find any of that person''s aplice.


    To his surprise, he found them standing not far away and they also had a bound up Duanmu Hua Yu beside them.


    The way they were standing, it was clear that they were amateurs¡­


    But if they were amateurs, how could they have thought of this n of waiting for Min''er by the entrance?


    It didn''t seem likely that they would be able to think of this n¡­So there must be a mastermind behind them that was hiding somewhere, watching everything¡­


    So Lin fan didn''t make a move even after finding Duanmu Hua Yu. He just left a puppet in hiding nearby to make sure that Duanmu Hua Yu was safe before sending out more puppets in a to search for the mastermind.


    It seemed like Duanmu Hua Yu had suffered quite a bit after being kidnapped. His face had beenpletely battered ck and blue and there were pieces of dry blood all over him.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what intentions these people had in capturing Duanmu Hua Yu, but it didn''t seem like it was a simple case of kidnapping someone for money.


    The more he thought about it, the moreplicated it all seemed¡­


    As Lin Fan had expected, it didn''t take him long before he was able to find the mastermind who was hiding away. This mastermind to his surprise actually chose to hide in the surveince room of the coal mine.


    The owner of the coal mine knew what his operation was doing to people, but he didn''t care about that. What he cared about was his own safety since he knew that every person that died had a family that would remember them, every person that died would have someone that would want to¡­take revenge for them.


    So he didn''t hesitate to buy a top grade security system for the mine and for his private home.


    Even though he could have invested money into buying better equipment that resulted in less death, he chose not to do so because it would cost more money to change his operations than to buy the things that kept him safe.


    The mastermind was making use of this surveince system.


    On the side of the room, there were two people who were dressed as security guards that were lying on the ground in pools of blood. It was clear that they were no longer breathing.


    The mastermind was a dark cloaked person who was currently sitting in a chair watching over the screens in front of them.


    Lin Fan had also noticed this security system when he had sent Brainy''s puppets in, so he had made sure to tell Brainy to avoid all of these cameras with his puppets.


    Since he had already found the mastermind and had secured the area, there was no need to hesitate anymore. He could tell from the auras of the kidnappers that they were only in the Fragmented Soul Realm and the mastermind was only in the Embryo Soul Realm, so there was no danger to him at all.


    So with these thoughts, Lin Fan walked right through the gates of the quarry.


    When he arrived, the person who had been keeping watch let him walk right through. That was until Lin Fan walked up right to this person.


    The person keeping watch was naturally caught off guard, but then he revealed a fierce look and said, "Keep moving and get lost, or don''t me me for being impolite."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "But I have business with you?"


    That person was caught off guard again, but then he said in a fierce voice again, "Business? I don''t even know¡­"


    Before he could finish, he suddenly felt a strong force hitting him in the stomach as Lin Fan''s figure in front of him suddenly disappeared. Right when he was about to faint, he finally saw Lin Fan again standing right in front of him.


    He struggled as he said, "What did you¡­"


    But he couldn''t finish his words as his breath escaped him and he fell to the ground.


    Not far away from this, the people who had been watching over him and Duanmu Hua Yu immediately reacted.


    One of them stayed back to make sure that nothing would happen with Duanmu Hua Yu while the others all started moving forward to attack Lin Fan.


    It was just too bad that before they could even react, there were vines that suddenly came out of the ground. The vines grabbed them by the legs and once they were on the ground, it started wrapping them up like a mummy.


    These kidnappers tried to resist by cutting the vines that were wrapping around them with their weapons or calling out their pets to attack the vines surrounding them, but it was no use at all.


    Whether it was the weapons or the pets, they couldn''t do a single thing to these vines. In fact, when the pets appeared, they were also wrapped up and trapped by these vines just like the kidnappers.<sub> </sub>


    In just a matter of seconds, all the kidnappers had been trapped by the vines that had suddenly appeared.


    It wasn''t just the kidnappers who were watching from afar.


    The moment that the mastermind who had been watching from the surveince room saw the strange happenings, he immediately nned on running. He knew that this wasn''t a good sign and if he stayed any longer, he would be implicated.


    The kidnappers were just random workers that he had gathered with money, so he didn''t care about them at all. The most important thing was naturally his own life and his mission.


    But it was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t have any intentions of letting him get away.


    Before the mastermind could react, there were vines that also came out of the floor under him.


    No matter how he tried attacking these vines, they wouldn''t be stopped at all as theypletely wrapped him up.


    The people that had been trapped by the vines found that they couldn''t use theirws at all.


    When they tried to gather life energy, they found that there wasn''t any life energy around them at all. Even when they tried using the life energy inside of them to do something, they found that the vines actually sucked away their life energypletely.


    It was as if they were nothing more than flies trapped in a venus fly trap.


    Lin Fan who had been standing at the entrance felt the squeeze from Brainy inside of his sleeve and he revealed a smile.


    Without any hesitation, he lifted the man he had just knocked out and jumped over to where Duanmu Hua Yu was.


    Duanmu Hua Yu had been watching in shock as his kidnappers were all trapped in vines, but when he recovered from his daze, he realized that this was his chance. Without any hesitation, he stood up and was about to run, but then he saw Lin Fan appearing in front of him.


    He was once again shocked before gesturing something with his face, as if he was asking, "You did all of this?"


    Lin Fan nodded and then freed Duanmu Hua Yu from his bindings before giving him the tablet.


    The first thing that Duanmu Hua Yu wrote was, "Where''s Min''er? Is she safe?"


    Lin Fan nodded before shaking his head and saying, "I don''t know where Min''er is, but she read your note and is hiding in the safe ce that you agreed on."


    Duanmu Hua Yu was nervous hearing the first part, but then he revealed a look of relief and patted his chest.


    But before Lin Fan or Duanmu Hua Yu could say anything else, Duanmu Hua Yu suddenly knitted his brows before spitting out a mouthful of ck blood and copsing to the ground.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this, but he quickly reacted and disappeared from the spot.


    When he appeared again, he was holding a figure wrapped up in vines that he tossed to the ground.


    The vines around that person shrank back enough so their face was revealed.


    The moment that the vines shrank back and light revealed itself again, the mastermind quickly looked around himself to see what the situation was. He was surprised to see that he was outside and he was even more surprised to see Lin Fan standing there, but seeing Duanmu Hua Yu on the ground, he revealed a smile.


    That was because he had seen a path of life.


    Without any hesitation, he immediately said, "He''s poisoned and I''m the only one that has the antidote to this poison. If you let me go, I''ll give it to you."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this. All he did was stare at the mastermind which made him very ufortable.


    That was because the gaze that Lin Fan was staring at him with was a pair of deep eyes that seemed like it could see through every part of him. It was as if there was nothing that he could hide in front of this gaze¡­


    It was as if this gaze was staring right into his soul¡­


    Feeling this feeling, the mastermind couldn''t help panicking as he quickly added, "If you don''t hurry¡­"


    But Lin Fan suddenly cut in, "You''re lying. There''s no antidote."


    The mastermind couldn''t help staring at Lin Fan in shock as he heard this resolute words.

 Chapter 825 True Identity (1)

    The mastermind only allowed himself to be shocked for a few seconds before saying, "How do you know if I''m lying or not? What if I''m not lying and there really is an antidote? Would you be able to live with yourself if you knew that there was one and you didn''t do anything to help?"


    There was a hint of panic in his voice when he said this, but he knew that this was the only way for him.


    The only thing that he could do was ask these misleading questions to try and create a bit of doubt in Lin Fan. As long as there was doubt, he would hesitate to kill him since there was still the possibility that he would have the antidote.


    But Lin Fan didn''t fall for this at all.


    He just calmly looked at him and said, "You have already shown your killing intent, there''s no need to hide it anymore."


    The mastermind wouldn''t give up as he was about to say something, but Lin Fan cut him off again by saying, "As for whether there is really an antidote or not, that is not up to you to say. I''ll talk to you once it''s done."


    The mastermind felt a chill run down his spine when he heard this and he immediately said, "What do you¡­Ah!"


    Before he could finish, he suddenly felt a stinging sensationing from his mind. Then after that, there was a mind rending pain that he had never felt before that suddenly ran right through him from head to toe.


    It was as if there was something that was digging right into his brain and was running along the nerves in his body, ripping it apart bit by bit and recing it. As this happened, the light that had once been in the mastermind''s eyes started to dim as if he was losing his free will.


    This was Brainy''s Parasite Seed that was taking over his body. However, the pain that he was feeling was deliberate.


    Normally it wouldn''t hurt at all for Brainy''s Parasite Seed to wrap around the nerve system of the target, but Lin Fan had ordered Brainy to make it as painful as possible. So right now, the thorns of the Parasite Seed''s vines were currently stabbing the mastermind''s nerves from every angle, causing him unimaginable pain.


    That was the little bit of revenge that he was taking.


    Of course, he didn''t forget himself in his revenge and had made sure to set up a soundw barrier to ensure that his screams weren''t heard by anyone.


    The screaming didn''tst long before the mastermindpletely sumbed to Brainy''s Parasite Seed. Once the Parasite Seed had taken over, the mastermind looked at Lin Fan with those dead eyes and waited for orders.


    The first order that Lin Fan gave was naturally for the mastermind to hand over the antidote.


    But as he had expected, there was no antidote.


    The mastermind told him the entire n, "The n was to use poison to kill both of them. First use the old man to attract the girl and then use the poison to kill them both since poison isn''t easily tracked. Of course, the mission was to kill them, so there''s no antidote to this poison at all."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even though he had expected this.


    He had already checked Duanmu Hua Yu''s body and even with his knowledge, he wasn''t able to recognize the poison or cure it. After all, there were many different nts on many differents, it was impossible for him to recognize everything.


    His cultivation and attainments with the Nine Revolution Pill Refining Technique wasn''t good enough for him to refine the All Cure Pill, the pill that could detoxify any kind of poison. So there really was nothing that he could do if this person didn''t have an antidote.


    While Lin Fan had his brows knit in thought, Duanmu Hua Yu suddenly stood up and walked over to him.


    Lin Fan was shocked to see this and quickly said, "You should lie down and prevent the poison from spreading. As long as you don''t move, you should be able tost long enough for me to find an antidote."


    But Duanmu Hua Yu just shook his head.


    He had already epted his death since he knew that these words from Lin Fan were nothing more than empty promises. He knew that it was impossible for Lin Fan to find an antidote for him before he sumbed to the poison, so he wanted to use the final bit of his life to do what he needed to do.


    He turned around and suddenly attacked the mastermind, but Lin Fan quickly reached out to stop him.


    Duanmu Hua Yu narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan, but Lin Fan exined, "He''s fully under my control. There''s no need to kill him, I can still use him for other things."


    Duanmu Hua Yu had a bit of doubt in his eyes, but since it was Lin Fan saying this, he had no reason to doubt him. Lin Fan had shown him many things that could be considered a miracle, so he didn''t need to doubt Lin Fan when he said this.


    So after a pause, Duanmu Hua Yu turned back to Lin Fan with something written on his board.


    "Will you listen to a story?"


    Lin Fan could tell from the heavy look on his face that it was something serious, so after a moment of hesitation, he gave a nod.


    Duanmu Hua Yu ignored the pain in his body as his shaking hand began writing his final words on the tablet.


    Over the next few minutes, Lin Fan learned all about the true identities of Duanmu Hua Yu and Min''er. As he had expected, it was anything from simple, but it also went far beyond what he could imagine.


    When he finished listening, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of regret choosing them that day in the wastnd¡­<sub> </sub>


    But it was already toote for regret.


    After he finished telling Lin Fan his story, Duanmu Hua Yu wrote, "Will you help keep Min''er safe? Even if she never reims what belongs to her and gets her revenge, all I want is for to be safe."


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit before giving a nod, making this promise to Duanmu Hua Yu.


    Duanmu Hua Yu''s lips slowly curled up before he wrote, "Thank you."


    Then with the final bit of strength that he had left, he raised his hand which had something in it towards Lin Fan. However, before he could give this thing to Lin Fan, he lost his final bit of strength and his hand started to fall downwards.


    Lin Fan reached out before his hand could fall to the ground and held tight as he took the item that he had been holding. As he held his hand, he looked at Duanmu Hua Yu and said, "I will protect Min''er for you."


    He felt like there was a squeeze in the hand that he was holding, but he wasn''t sure as Duanmu Hua Yu copsed onto the ground.


    Lin Fan took onest look at him before having Brainy take away Duanmu Hua Yu''s corpse.


    He then turned his attention to the people covered in vines lying on the side and his eyes turned cold. After a moment of silence, he said, "You can take care of them."


    If one looked at it from the side, they might think that Lin Fan was crazy for talking to himself. However, he was actually talking to Brainy that was in his sleeve.


    With a nod, Brainy jumped out from Lin Fan''s sleeve and disappeared into the ground along with the people covered in vines. She also took away the mastermind and Duanmu Hua Yu''s corpse.


    As for Lin Fan, he was just left standing there with a difficult look on his face.


    After an unknown amount of time, he suddenly shook his head and gave a sigh before walking out of the quarry.


    ¡­


    Lin Fan moved quickly and soon he arrived at a ce outside of the city.


    This was the ce that Duanmu Hua Yu had told Min''er to hide in after she received that symbol from him.


    He hadn''t known about this ce before, but Duanmu Hua Yu had told him where it was with hisst dying breath.


    Since it had been short, he hadn''t been able to clearly describe where the cave Min''er hiding in was. Lin Fan had also sent Brainy away, so he had to control the puppets himself to find this ce.


    Naturally Lin Fan wasn''t as skilled at controlling the puppets as Brainy, so it had taken him some time to find this cave.


    After he did, he slowly walked in to find an empty cave. However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried because he knew the trick of this cave.


    He walked over to one of the stctites on the roof and then with a turn of his hand, he turned the tip of the stctite to the side.


    As the tip of the stctite turned, there was a grinding sound that rang out before one of the walls opened up to reveal a secret room. Inside of that secret room was Min''er sitting there holding a stuffed rabbit.


    When the door opened, Min''er looked out with a look filled with hope, but that diminished a bit when she saw that it was Lin Fan there. She couldn''t help asking, "Big brother Lin, where''s grandpa?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and gave a sigh before saying, "Your grandpa is no longer in this world. I''ll be taking care of you from now on."


    Min''er''s eyes immediately filled with tears before she charged forward and started hitting Lin Fan with her little fists while shouting, "You''re lying! You''re lying!"


    Lin Fan gave another sigh before raising his hand and reaching out towards Min''er''s head before saying, "Unfortunately, you have to die as well."


    Min''er trembled when she heard this and she looked up in disbelief. But even this look couldn''t stop Lin Fan''s hand from approaching.


    Lin Fan''s hand came closer and closer until it covered up her vision and soon everything turned to ck for her.


    As her vision disappeared, her consciousness also faded. Her body turned soft before crumpling, falling backwards into Lin Fan''s other hand that was already waiting to catch her.


    Lin Fan just looked at her peaceful expression before saying in a sad voice, "This is the only way."


    After giving onest sigh, Lin Fan picked Min''er''s body off the ground and turned around to head out of the cave without turning back once. Once he was out of the cave, he flicked his hand and the entire mountain that the cave was a part of copsed to the ground, disappearing without a trace.

 Chapter 826 True Identity (2)

    In a dark room in the center of the slum city.


    There was a man who was sitting in the dark in a luxurious chair as if he was waiting for something.


    Then all of sudden, there was a cloaked figure that also appeared in the room.


    As soon as this cloaked figure appeared, they immediately kneeled down in front of the man sitting in the chair.


    The man in the chair didn''t open his eyes when the cloaked figure appeared, he didn''t even say a word as he sat there as if he was lost in his own world.


    After an unknown amount of time, the man finally opened his eyes and asked, "Is it done?"


    The cloaked figure gave a bow before saying, "Yes, young master, it''s done. They''re both dead."


    The man finally looked down at the cloaked figure and said, "Their bodies?"


    The cloaked figure pointed behind him and after a nod from the man, the cloaked figure went outside before bringing in two corpses. One was the corpse of an old man and the other was the corpse of a little girl.


    The man looked at these two corpses for a bit before saying, "Set them down in front of me and let me take a look."


    The cloaked figure followed these orders and put the two corpses down side by side in front of the man.


    The man looked down at the two corpses in silence for a bit before suddenly kicking out at the corpse of the old man. This corpse hit the old man''s corpse right in the head and caused the head to tilt in an unnatural manner.


    Seeing this, the man revealed a satisfied look before kicking the old man''s corpse a few more times.


    As he did this, he said, "You old fart, you dare disobey my orders and pledge your loyalty to this useless little girl? You think that you could get away from me? You thought that I wouldn''t find you and her?"


    It was almost as if he was venting some kind of past grievance.


    After a while, he gave a snort and said, "Look at you now! It seems like you chose the wrong master to follow."


    He looked like he was about to spit on the old man''s corpse, but before he did, he suddenly looked like he changed his mind and stopped himself.


    After a bit more kicking, he turned his attention to the corpse of the little girl.


    This time, his reaction was very different.


    After looking at the little girl for a bit, he suddenly revealed a smile and said, "Not bad, not bad, as expected of that woman''s daughter. If she was allowed to grow a few more years, she definitely would have be a good woman. It''s just too bad that she had to run away and was starved like this, or I might have even wanted to take her as my toy. It''s a pity that she was born into this family."


    Then without a care, he waved his hand for the cloaked figure toe over.


    The cloaked figure didn''t dare hesitate and quickly came up to the man sitting in the chair even though he didn''t know what he wanted.


    When the cloaked figure came over, the man reached out his hand towards him as if he was demanding something. The cloaked figure just looked at this outstretched hand with a confused look since he didn''t know what the man was asking for.


    Seeing that the cloaked figure wasn''t doing anything, the man suddenly knitted his brows to look at him and said, "Well? Where is it?"


    The cloaked figure''s confused expression filled with even more confusion as he asked, "Young master, where is what? I don''t know what you''re asking for."


    The man knitted his brows even more before giving an angry snort and saying, "The token! Where''s the token that was on him! I don''t believe that he wouldn''t have the token since that''s the only thing that would link this filthy girl with our family. It was the only thing that he could use to return this little girl to her rightful position." Then after a pause, he added, "It''s all meaningless without the token, so if you''re telling that you don''t have it¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words, but the meaning behind them was made clear.


    The cloaked figure panicked a bit when he heard this and his mind quickly turned before he suddenly looked like he had thought of something, "Ah, that token!"


    After saying this, he dug around in his chest for a bit before taking out a token for the man.


    This was a very simple token that didn''t have much decorations on it other than a single peach blossom engraved on it. But that wasn''t the important part, the most important part was that there was a veryrge "Mu" that was engraved on it.


    Seeing this token, the man''s eyes suddenly lit up and he snatched it out of the hands of the cloaked figure.


    He turned it around a few times to look it over before suddenly squeezing it. The token didn''t break under the pressure he put on it, but rather it released a peach blossom pink barrier around it that protected it against the force he used.


    However, this barrier wasn''t able tost long under his grip and it quickly shattered with one quick squeeze.


    But the man wasn''t bothered by this at all.


    Rather, he revealed a faint smile since this was the reaction that he had been looking for.<sub> </sub>


    This token was created for a special person and out of fear that this special person would be hurt, the one who had this token made had this special function added to it.


    Seeing it now meant that this token was indeed the real token.


    The man suddenly broke out inughter as he said, "Good, good, I never thought that I''d really be able to find this token like this. As long as I have this token, then the world is in my hands!"


    Afterughing for a bit, the man suddenly looked at the cloaked figure and said, "Speak. Did you n on hiding this token from me?"


    The cloaked figure was shocked when he heard this, but he quickly bowed his head and said, "I wouldn''t dare, young master! I just didn''t know that you wanted this!"


    The man didn''t say anything as he just looked at the cloaked figure for a bit.


    The silence thatsted during this time was oppressive, but then the man suddenly said, "Alright, I know that you wouldn''t betray me. Especially since you know that your family won''t live if you dare betray me."


    The cloaked figure trembled when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything in response.


    The man then suddenly changed the topic as he asked, "What about that person that I wanted you to investigate?"


    The cloaked figure immediately pulled out a folder for the man and said, "It is all here, young master."


    The man took the folder and opened it up. On the first page of that packet was an information sheet that also had a picture attached to it.


    That picture was a picture of Lin Fan.


    This entire folder was actually an investigation into Lin Fan''s background.


    The cloaked man then said, "As you can see, young master, this person is someone who suddenly appeared in the slum city a while ago and has slowly worked his way up."


    This packet didn''t include information on how Lin Fan had taken over the three gangs today since it had happened too recently for them to receive information on.


    The man looked at the sheet for a few minutes before throwing it to the side and saying, "This isn''t important. He''s just insignificant trash that isn''t involved in this at all, so there''s no need for us to take care of him. After all, it would be more trouble than it''s worth to take care of him."


    The information that he was reading on Lin Fan was actually the fake information that Lin Fan had Xia Liu prepare. He knew that it would be strange for him to suddenly show up in this city, so he had already taken precautions against this.


    The fake story that Xia Liu had made was that he was someone who had entered his gang a while back and had slowly been climbing the ranks.


    In the slum city, a story like this was easily faked as long as they had enough money and Lin Fan didn''tck money.


    The man didn''t really care if this story was true or false since he had already aplished his goal.


    Now there was only a single thing left for him to take care of.


    Putting the token away, the man finally stood up from the chair that he had been sitting in.


    The cloaked figure was surprised to see this man suddenly standing up, but he didn''t do anything as he just respectfully stayed there on one knee. After all, he knew that even if he wanted to do anything, he wouldn''t be able to do anything.


    That was because the man in front of him was a true World Realm Expert.


    The man looked down at the cloaked figure and said with a smile, "You''ve done very well. I''ll be sure to reward your family for everything that you''ve done."


    The cloaked figure was filled with joy hearing these words as he quickly said, "Thank you, young¡­"


    Before he could finish, he found that the world had suddenly started to spin. The world seemed to turn upside down right in front of him.


    The man then said, "However, your services will no longer be required. Please have a nice trip to the Yellow Springs."


    Without even bothering to look at his handiwork, the man turned around and walked out of the room without making a sound. He didn''t even bother sparing a single nce back to the two corpses on the ground.


    Just now, with a single flick of his hand, he had chopped off the head of the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure didn''t even know how he died as he died. There was only a wide eyed look of shock on his face as he realized that he had died.


    Not long after the man left, the house was suddenly filled with mes and it started to burn.


    However, it was also at that moment that the headless cloaked figure stood up and picked up its head to put back on its body. After putting the head back on, the cloaked figure said, "He truly is ruthless, he doesn''t even spare his subordinates."


    Then without another word, he picked up the two corpses on the ground and pulled out three more corpses from the side before leaving that ce.

 Chapter 827 True Identity (3)

    A week after the fire, Lin Fan walked into the office like nothing was wrong, but this time there was a little girl that followed him.


    When Xia Liu saw this little girl, he couldn''t help being surprised since he had never seen this little girl with him before.


    However, since that other little girl and that old man had disappeared, he had been quite worried about Lin Fan. Lin Fan had seemed quite close to those two and now that they''ve suddenly disappeared, he was sure that Lin Fan must be hurt.


    But he was also worried that Lin Fan was going down the wrong path since he showed up suddenly with this new little girl¡­


    He was worried that Lin Fan might be getting into weird tastes and that would be a bad sign for their business¡­


    But Lin Fan just ignored him as he brought this little girl with him wherever he went.


    He introduced this little girl to them as Xin''er, a girl that he had found and adopted.


    It was clear that many of his subordinates had things to say about this, but with how he looked at them, there wasn''t anything that they could say. So the only thing that they could do was ept it.


    After they settled down, Lin Fan had Xin''er y by herself on the side as he started the meeting.


    All of the subdued gangs had gathered today with most of their higher ups to meet their new boss. The only one that was missing was the Demon Wolf Gang''s vice leader, but who told him to charge at Lin Fan like that?


    Still, he wasn''t dead since Lin Fan had a use for him in the future and he was only lying in bed recovering.


    After they had gathered, Lin Fan went over his next ns.


    "Boss, are you serious?" Xia Liu couldn''t help asking when he finished listening to Lin Fanying out his ns.


    While the other people in the room didn''t say anything, it was clear by the looks on their faces that they were thinking the same thing.


    That was because the n that Lin Fan hade up with was just too crazy!


    Lin Fan didn''t respond to this question and instead, he answered with another question, "What? Do you doubt my abilities?"


    Xia Liu trembled when he heard this and he quickly waved his hands as he said, "No, no, boss, I would never doubt your abilities¡­It''s just that this seems a bit too dangerous. There are better ways to do this, so is there a need for you to take this kind of risk?"


    Lin Fan gave a chuckle before saying, "Risk? There''s no risk at all. They won''t be able to do a single thing to me."


    Everyone looked at each other with eyes filled with doubt, but not a single person dared to say a thing.


    That was because they could still remember how easily Lin Fan had taken care of all of them.


    It was clear that Lin Fan still hadn''t shown them his true power yet, but they were still worried since his n involved too many different parties that it was hard to ensure that nothing would go wrong¡­


    But Lin Fan was insistent on this, so they as subordinates didn''t have a choice but to follow.


    At the same time though, they couldn''t help feeling a bit of anticipation and expectation. After all, if Lin Fan''s n did work, this wouldpletely change their positions.


    This would be the gamble of the lifetime, so they couldn''t let anything go wrong.


    Seeing everyone being so filled with excitement and tension, Lin Fan shook his head before heading over to Xin''er and saying, "Xin''er, let''s go home."


    Xin''er nodded before taking Lin Fan''s hand and following her out.


    When everyone saw this, they couldn''t help shaking their heads while giving sighs, but they didn''t dwell too much on it.


    What they didn''t know was that this girl who lookedpletely different from before was actually Min''er.


    The corpses that the assassin had actually delivered to the master were fakes¡­Well, Duanmu Hua Yu''s corpse was actually real, but Min''er''s corpse was a fake.


    In a slum city like this where it was hard for one to even feed themself, it was quite easy for him to find a young girl''s corpse that looked simr to Min''er. Then all he had to do was add some final touches and it would be hard for the master to notice that it really wasn''t Min''er.


    Of course, those were only fake marks that had been made with a special technique from Lin Fan. Even he wasn''t cruel enough to defile a young girl''s corpse just for the sake of this deception.


    The assassin that had brought these two corpses to the young master was naturally the mastermind from that day, the one that had been controlled by Brainy''s Parasite Seed. So that was how even after his head had been chopped off, he was still able to stand up and bring the corpses back.


    The three corpses that were burnt in the house that day were nothing more than decoys that Lin Fan had made. They weren''t even corpses, but rather puppets that he had made with a special technique.<sub> </sub>


    So even if someone searched them, they wouldn''t be able to figure out that they were fakes.


    As for Duanmu Hua Yu and the little girl''s corpse, he had already buried them.


    Over the past few days, whenever they had free time, Min''er who now had apletely new appearance and had her name changed to Xin''er by Lin Fan would always want to visit her grandfather''s grave.


    Lin Fan just brought her there every day after he was done with his work.


    He left her alone, but whenever he went back to bring her home, he could see that her eyes were red¡­


    Still, he knew that a heart wouldn''t be healed overnight and the wounds of the heart needed time to heal. The only thing that he could do was apany her.


    After dropping her off in front of the grave, Lin Fan walked to the side and stood there by himself as he let her grieve.


    During this time, he pulled out a token from his Storage Ring. This was a token that had the cherry blossom design and the word "Mu" written on it.


    This token was the real token and the one that had been given to the young master was a fake that Lin Fan had made. To create that kind of simple barrier array was as simple as flipping his hand with his knowledge towards arrays.


    This token was something that he needed for Min''er''s future because this token was the only thing that could allow her to enter her real family again. This was the only proof of her identity and her im to their family''s session.


    But inversely, this was the main reason why they had attacked Min''er in the first ce and had killed Duanmu Hua Yu.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a sigh as he thought about all of this.


    He had only wanted to find a way back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but he never expected to be caught up in such arge plot as soon as he arrived on this Mu Ster Kingdom.


    In a sense, he really had to praise his own eyes since it seemed like they were quite good to recognize the specialty with Min''er.


    As for who Duanmu Hua Yu really was, he was the servant of Min''er''s mother and had been taking care of her since she was born. So naturally he was like a grandfather to Min''er since Min''er''s mother was like a daughter to him.


    As he looked at this token, particrly the "Mu" character, Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a sigh again.


    But then he quickly put away this token and vowed that he would never take it out again until the time was right.


    After an hour passed, Xin''er finally came out of the cave that Lin Fan had put the graves in and took Lin Fan''s hand without saying a word.


    Lin Fan could see that her eyes were red and it hurt his heart seeing this little girl being in pain like this.


    So he tried distracting her by asking, "Xin''er, what do you want for dinner tonight."


    Xin''er was silent for a bit before just murmuring, "I''ll have whatever, it doesn''t matter."


    Lin Fan wouldn''t give up though as he asked, "Xin''er, what about dessert? Is there anything special that you want? You better tell me before we get home or else I won''t go out and get it for you."


    Xin''er was still depressed, but she was still a child and very easily influenced by words. When she heard Lin Fan''s small threat, she immediately reacted.


    After thinking about it for a bit, she suddenly said in a low voice, "I want some cream puffs."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he heard this.


    Over the past few days, he had bought many different desserts for high prices just to cheer Xin''er up. It seemed like the cream puffs that he had bought yesterday had finally done the trick and cheered her up a bit.


    Personally, Lin Fan took this as a challenge since he knew that kids were hard to deal with. But he would have a kid one day as well, so he knew that he would have to face these challenges one day.


    While it had been strange circumstances that had brought them together, he had already decided that he would treat Xin''er like a daughter.


    Though he didn''t know how Ang would feel about this¡­but he was certain that she would love a cute little daughter like this as well!


    So with this smile on his face, Lin Fan walked hand in hand with Xin''er and said, "Then let''s go and get some cream puffs for you."


    Xin''er couldn''t help being influenced a bit by this as she also revealed a smile and gave a nod as she said, "Un!"

 Chapter 828 Conference (1)

    The next few days were like hell for Lin Fan''s subordinates.


    The n that he hade up with involved many different gangs, so they had to keep running around to contact these gangs. They couldn''t leave a single one of these gangs out because if they did, there was no way of guaranteeing that an incident wouldn''t happen.


    Right now they still had the element of surprise and while they were being looked down on, it was easiest to take them down.


    If they were alerted and contacted arger organization, it would be hard for them to take care of them all at once like they wanted to do.


    So having to contact everyone while keeping everything secret, naturally it was very difficult for Lin Fan''s subordinates.


    As for Lin Fan on the other hand, he was very rxed as he sipped tea in the office in preparation for the conference in the afternoon.


    He didn''t have any contacts with these gangs and he wasn''t as well known as the various gang leaders under him, so it wasn''t as if he could contact anyone to begin with. So he left all this work to his subordinates.


    When the time came, he left Xin''er at the office to be taken care of by the babysitters that he had hired and headed off.


    Naturally he couldn''t just leave Xin''er to his subordinates since they were all scarred men who didn''t look an inch like they could care for kids. He had no choice but to hire people to help him take care of Xin''er.


    With the price that he paid, they would have even given him an arm, let alone take care of Xin''er.


    Xin''er wasn''t happy to see him go, but she knew that he had business to take care of, so when he left, she waved her hand and said, "Come back soon."


    Lin Fan''s heart melted when he saw this and he said with a smile, "I''ll be back soon."


    If anyone didn''t know better, they really would have thought that the two of them were father and daughter.


    But after he left the building, his face immediately turned serious and his subordinates around him all felt the pressure that wasing from him. Still, even though they felt this pressure, this gave them even more assurance.


    The stronger that Lin Fan was, the better chances that they would have of everything going right today.


    Lin Fan was thest person to arrive at the conference, the other gang leaders had long arrived and were currently impatiently waiting in the conference room inside. But even so, Lin Fan didn''t go in right away.


    Instead, he waited for Brainy to check something. Only when Brainy gave him a nod to confirm that everything was ready, did he finally push the doors in front of him open and walk into the conference room.


    The people near the doors turned to look who it was, but seeing that it was someone they didn''t recognize, they ignored him and turned their heads back to the center. After all, right now, the center of the room was where the main show was happening.


    There were five different gang leaders that were gathered around the center of the room, gathered around one single person that they were all ring at.


    All five of these gang leaders were in the Embryo Soul Realm and were the leaders of the five strongest gangs left in these outer parts of the slum city. It would have been six since the Demon Wolf Gang was once considered a part of this group, but that was no longer the case after the Demon Wolf Gang chose to submit to Lin Fan.


    "What did you call us here for? You''re making us wait this long too! Do you really think that you''re better than us?!" The Inferno Ape Gang''s boss yelled as he pointed his finger in the Demon Wolf Gang''s boss'' face.


    The other four gang bosses just watched, but it was clear by the look on their faces that they also felt the same.


    The only reason that they had evene was to give the Demon Wolf Gang boss face since he was someone at the same level as them. However, after they arrived, the Demon Wolf Gang boss never started the conference and had them wait for this long.


    It was almost as if he was looking down on them.


    As the leaders of the strongest gangs, they naturally had their pride and their arrogance, so they couldn''t take being looked down on like this.


    But even after threatening the Demon Wolf Gang boss, he never started the meeting and just calmly told them that they would start once everyone had arrived.


    It was clear now that everyone had arrived since every gang boss they were familiar with was currently in the room. There was no one else that could possiblye and yet the Demon Wolf Gang boss still wasn''t starting the meeting.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that this was a meeting of all the gangs, they would have left this ce in rage already.


    They knew that the Demon Wolf Gang boss must have some kind of plot to call them all here, but they were also counting on this. They had the ambition and knew that this ce where all the gangs were gathered was the best ce for them to increase their own power.<sub> </sub>


    So they came here fully knowing that there was some kind of plot against them.


    In fact, they had already formed alliances amongst themselves.


    There was a group of two and a group of three who had allied with each other in preparation for this day. They were now just waiting for a chance to y their hand and take over the conference.


    But before anyone could say anything, Lin Fan had walked all the way up to the center.


    The five Embryo Soul Realm gang bosses were surprised to see this kid who came out of nowhere walking up to them, but that surprise quickly turned to annoyance.


    That was because this kid had walked right up to them, not giving them any face.


    No matter who he was, they were still the bosses of the strongest gangs in this conference and no one would treat them like this.


    The fact that this kid had walked right up to them like it was nothing made it clear that he didn''t have any respect for them at all. He walked up like he owned this ce, as if they were his subordinates.


    The Inferno Ape Gang boss was about to say something when the Demon Wolf Gang boss suddenly came forward and kneeled down in front of Lin Fan. Then as everyone revealed shocked looks, he said, "Boss, you''re finally here."


    Everyone looked at the Demon Wolf Gang boss in disbelief as they couldn''t understand what was happening.


    Why was one of theirpanions, one of the strongest gang bosses kneeling down in front of some random kid?


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "You can start it now."


    The Demon Wolf Gang boss nodded in response before standing up and turning to everyone else at this conference to say, "Everyone, we can start the conference now. The reason we called you here today is..."


    "Wait!"


    The Inferno Ape Gang boss suddenly shouted out to cut the Demon Wolf Gang boss off.


    The moment he shouted, everyone turned to look at him.


    The Inferno Ape Gang boss moved right in front of Lin Fan and pointed his finger in his face as he said, "You''re telling me that you''re listening to this kid now and he''s the one who called us all here?" Then he turned to the Demon Wolf Gang boss and roared, "Have you lost your mind?! Do you really think that any of us is going to listen to what this kid has to say?!"


    The Demon Wolf Gang boss just had a calm look on his face as he took what the Inferno Ape Gang boss was saying. He then just stood there without saying a thing.


    This further enraged the Inferno Ape Gang boss.


    As someone with a short temper, he was already angry enough being insulted like this. But now that he was being snubbed to his face, his ragepletely exploded.


    He pulled out his weapon and pointed it at Lin Fan as he said, "Kid, get out of here before I really lose my temper. You can''t me me for being impolite when that happens."


    Lin Fan just looked at the sword pointed at him before looking back up at the Inferno Ape Gang boss and saying, "With just you?"


    A vein popped out on the forehead of the Inferno Ape Gang boss and he roared, "Don''t me me for not warning you!"


    After saying this, he immediately raised his sword and was about to sh down at Lin Fan. But before he could move his sword down, he suddenly felt a powerful forceing from in front of him.


    This was a force that he couldn''t resist at all, it knocked the wind and the blood out of him, causing him to spit out a mouthful of blood before being mmed into the ground.


    As he was mmed into the ground, everyone jumped back and away from him as arge crater was formed around where he had been standing.


    After being mmed into the ground, he justid there turned sideways with his arms up and one leg above the other. This was a very iconic death scene in Lin Fan''s world, but in this case, he didn''t die since Lin Fan had held back.


    Lin Fan looked around at the others and said, "Is there anyone else that wants to try?"

 Chapter 829 Conference (2)

    All of the other Embryo Soul Realm gang bosses looked at each other, but not a single one of them took a step forward.


    They just all looked at Lin Fan with wary looks, as if they were afraid that he would make another move.


    But seeing him just standing there, one of the other bosses, the boss of the Purple Vixen Gang and the only female boss asked, "Who are you and what do you want?"


    Lin Fan just looked at her with a smile and said, "I''m the one who called you here, so naturally there''s something that I want. But let''s sit down and properly discuss this, alright?"


    No one let down their guard when they heard this and even when Lin Fan went over to grab a chair to sit down on, they still stood there looking at him with wary looks.


    Lin Fan saw all of this and just gave a sigh before saying, "Sit down and let''s talk."


    They suddenly felt a strong pressure falling onto them, one that they couldn''t resist at all. It was pushing them down, so they could either choose to sit down or they would be mmed into the ground, unable to move at all.


    In the end, all of the gang bosses chose to sit down since that was the less embarrassing option of the two.


    Lin Fan didn''t speak right away after they sat down, instead he turned his gaze to the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss that was lying on the ground.


    He had held back just now, so even though the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss had spat out blood, he wasn''t heavily injured and didn''t need to be treated right away. So Lin Fan turned to the Demon Wolf Gang''s boss and pointed his finger at the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss.


    The Demon Wolf Gang''s boss immediately understood what he wanted, so he picked the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss off the ground and put him in a chair along with the other bosses.


    Lin Fan then raised a finger and gathered some water in the air with some waterws.


    With a simple flick of his finger, the water that had been gathered was thrown right in the face of the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss.


    The Inferno Ape Gang''s boss that had been unconscious was immediately woken up by this ssh of ice cold water to the face. As soon as he woke up, he jumped out of his chair and shouted, "Who dares!"


    But before he could receive an answer, the answer that he received was a mountain like pressure that fell onto him, forcing him back into the chair.


    He couldn''t help revealing a shocked and terrified look as he looked around for the source of this pressure.


    When he saw Lin Fan standing there, he suddenly remembered everything that had just happened and the ce where Lin Fan had just hit him suddenly started aching again.


    The look of terror became even stronger as he just stared at Lin Fan in a daze.


    Lin Fan just looked at him with a smile, but this smile was like the call of a death god to the Inferno Ape Gang boss who immediately meekly shrank back in his chair. It was almost as if he was too afraid to make even a single sound.


    Lin Fan then turned to look at everyone else in the room with the same smile, but no one dared to look at him.


    After all, this was a person who had just knocked out the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss with a single hit. If it wasn''t for the fact that he had shown mercy just now, the Inferno Ape Gang''s boss would have most likely died on the spot.


    So naturally no one dared to offend someone like him.


    Seeing that no one was saying a thing, Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Alright, I think we''re all ready to talk."


    No one responded to this, but they all looked at him with fearful looks, as if they were afraid of his next words.


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile as he calmly said, "From this day forth, you will all be working for me. Your organizations will remain as they are, but now there will be one organization above all of your organizations that will control you."


    Not a single person was able to respond to this because they couldn''t react to it at all. They could understand the words that wereing out of Lin Fan''s mouth individually, but when they were put together, they just couldn''t understand them at all.


    He was someone that they had never seen before and he wanted to take over their organizations with just a few simple words?


    How could it be that easy!?


    But what could they do at this point?<sub> </sub>


    They knew that he wasn''t asking them, but rather threatening them. He had made this very clear based on how he had handled the Inferno Ape Gang boss earlier.


    Reject his proposal?


    If they did, they would be the next one sprawled on the floor and then they would be forced to ept it anyway.


    The only thing that they could do now was try to find a way to get out of agreeing with this temporarily and find a bigger backer.


    The amount of money that they made in the outer city wasn''t small, so there have been offers that had been made to them to fall under people from the middle of the city. However, they knew that these offers were nothing more than offers to take them under their wings as subordinates.


    So that was why the bosses of these strongest gangs had never epted these offers. However, it was different now.


    The offers before at least gave them a chance to move up and left them with some of their influence, but now Lin Fan wanted total submission. Compared to this kid who had shown up out of nowhere and demanded total submission, it was better for them to submit to the bosses that had already established themselves in the middle region of the city.


    The bosses all looked at each other and after looks of agreement, the Purple Vixen Gang''s boss took the lead for them and said, "We''re very honoured that you want us to work for you, but this is a big decision. It''s not something that we can decide that easily, so if you can give¡­"


    But before she could finish, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand to cut her off.


    She just looked at him in a daze as he said, "I''m sorry, I wasn''t asking. But then again, there''s not much to talk about with you. I meant that it''s about time to talk to the real people that I''ve gathered for the conference today."


    All of the gang bosses were confused when they heard this, but before any of them could even say a thing, the doors suddenly burst open. It wasn''t just a single set of doors that burst open, but rather several doors in different directions.


    With how big this conference hall was, it wasn''t strange that there would be several entrances to this ce.


    Behind each of the doors that had just opened were different groups of people.


    As the people inside looked carefully at these people, they realized that these were people that they recognized.


    The boss of the Yellow Sun Gang, the boss of the Flying Dagger Gang, the boss of Snow Feather Gang, and the boss of the Big Sabre Gang. These four were the four rulers of the middle city.


    All four of them were Peak Child Soul Realm Experts and with the bnce of power between them, they had divided the middle part of the city between them. It could even be said that as long as they didn''t step into the center of the city, they could do whatever they wanted in this slum city.


    When the four of them stepped in with their subordinates, they couldn''t help looking at each other with narrowed eyes.


    No one said a word, but there was no need for words. The hostility between them was made clear to everyone.


    After a long period of silence, the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss finally couldn''t take it as he shouted, "Hey, why are all of you here as well? Are you going to tell me that you''ve put things aside and havee here to attack me?"


    The Big Sabre Gang''s boss gave a snort and said, "Who would work together with them, idiot? I should be the one asking you all the same thing."


    The Yellow Sun Gang''s boss red at the Big Sabre Gang''s boss and said, "What did you call me? Do you really think that I won''t go all out with you?"


    The Big Sabre Gang''s boss pulled out his big sabre and pointed it at the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss, "You want to go? Then bring it!"


    At this, the Snow Feather Gang''s boss and the only female of the four rulers raised her fan to cover her face as she said with a chuckle, "It seems like men only know how to show off with force. How brutish."


    The Yellow Sun Gang''s boss and the Big Sabre Gang''s boss both turned to her and shouted, "What was that, you old hag?"


    A vein popped out on the head of the Snow Feather Gang''s boss'' beautiful face and she shouted, "Who are you calling an old hag?"


    During this time, the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss had been silently watching the situation. He hadn''t been looking at the other three rulers, but rather he had been looking down at where Lin Fan was standing.


    He didn''t know why, but he was getting a bad feeling from that kid that stood in the center.

 Chapter 830 Conference (3)

    The Flying Dagger Gang''s boss who had been silent suddenly spoke, cutting through the argument of the other three.


    Perhaps he wouldn''t have spoken if Lin Fan wasn''t there, but the bad feeling that Lin Fan gave him was just too strong for him to ignore and he had no choice but to address it.


    But his question wasn''t directed at Lin Fan.


    "Yu Xu, didn''t you say that this would be a meeting between me and you? Why is everyone else here?" The Flying Dagger Gang''s boss looked down at one of the people sitting in the chairs around Lin Fan as he asked this.


    The Yu Xu that he was addressing this question to was the leader of the Quiet Jade Gang, who was one of the six Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    Hearing this, the other three rulers stopped fighting and they also turned their attention to the center where everyone was sitting.


    The Yellow Sun Gang''s boss said, "That''s right! I almost forgot since I was arguing with that sabre fool and that old hag!" He then changed his tone and asked in a serious voice, "Hou Zi, why did you call me here? Didn''t you say that you wanted to meet alone?"


    Hou Zi was the boss of the Inferno Ape Gang.


    The Snow Feather Gang''s boss followed up by asking, "Hu Me, what is the meaning of this?"


    Hu Mei was the boss of the Purple Vixen Gang.


    The Big Sabre Gang''s boss also questioned one of the Embryo Soul Realm Experts.


    When they heard these voices questioning them, all of the Embryo Soul Realm Experts being questioned revealed confused looks.


    What were they talking about?


    When had they contacted these four rulers saying that they wanted to talk with them?


    Why couldn''t they remember this at all?


    As they were looking at each other with confused looks, they all suddenly had a bad premonition as they turned in the Demon Wolf Gang''s boss'' direction. All they saw was him standing there with a faint smile on his face as he looked at them.


    It was him!


    This person was the one who had imitated them and had made contact with the four rulers!


    But how had he done it?


    No, it didn''t matter how he had done it since it was already toote. Only now did they realize that they had been nothing more than bait for Lin Fan.


    He had said that he had called them here for a conference, but in reality, he had called them here as bait for these four rulers.


    They were nothing more than chess pieces that he had manipted from the start.


    They couldn''t help feeling depressed as this thought passed through their mind, but then there was another doubt that appeared as well.


    Even if Lin Fan had used them, these four were true Peak Child Soul Realm Experts. Even if he had been able to dominate them, that didn''t mean that the four of them would fall that easily.


    So everyone was looking forward to seeing what happened.


    Seeing that not a single person spoke, all three of the rulers other than the boss of the Flying Dagger Gang knitted their brows and revealed angry looks. Only the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss had a calm look as he analyzed the situation.


    After a while, he suddenly turned his head to look at Lin Fan and said, "So it''s you. You''re the one who gathered us here."


    When he said this all three of the other rulers all turned to look at Lin Fan for the first time.


    They had seen him earlier, but since he was just a kid, they had ignored him. But now that the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss had singled him out, they had no choice but to pay attention to him.


    As much as they didn''t want to admit it, the Flying Dagger Gang boss was indeed the strongest one among them. He could easily defeat them in a one on one fight and if it wasn''t for the fact that he didn''t seem to have any ambitions, he would have already been able to take them and forced them to submit. He could have already taken over the middle part of the slum city.


    But because of the fact that he didn''t have any ambitions, he normally didn''t care about stuff like this.


    So why was he the first one to say something today?


    Could it be that there was something special about this person?


    Lin Fan turned to look at the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss with a look of appreciation before saying, "That''s right, I was the one who gathered you all here today so we can have a talk."


    The Flying Dagger Gang''s boss knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything as he sized Lin Fan up.<sub> </sub>


    Instead, it was the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss that cut in by saying, "You''re saying that you called us here for a talk? What makes you think that you''re worthy of that? You''re just some snot nosed brat from who knows where and you''re saying that you''re on the same level as us?"


    Lin Fanpletely ignored the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss as he stared at the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss.


    It only took a single look from him to understand that this Flying Dagger Gang''s boss was the real leader of these people and as long as he could subdue him, the rest would follow.


    That was because he knew that out of the three of them, he was the only one that was actually in the Peak Child Soul Realm.


    The rest of them were only in the High Child Soul Realm, but no one knew the difference because there weren''t that many Child Soul Realm Experts in this slum city to begin with. So they were able to get away with saying that they were in Peak Child Soul Realm all this time.


    But it was different when it came to Lin Fan since he could tell the difference.


    When the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss saw that he was being ignored, the mes of rage ignited even more inside of him and hepletely lost his temper.


    Without any hesitation, he suddenly called out a golden crow and infused it into his body, turning into a ball of mes as he jumped into the air. While flying in the air, he roared out, "Kid, you''re about to see what happens when you mess with the adults!"


    Then without any hesitation, he dived at Lin Fan from the sky like a meteor.


    The heat of the mes caused everyone to move back slightly as they couldn''t stare right at the ball of mes falling down from the sky.


    Even the bosses of the Snow Feather and Big Sabre Gangs couldn''t help revealing surprised looks.


    This Yellow Sun Gang''s boss, he really¡­was something. He had even hidden himself this deeply.


    He was much stronger than thest time that he had faced them, so it was clear that he had done some kind of special training in secret¡­


    What they didn''t know was that this was a special move that the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss had prepared to fight the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss. He had worked hard to perfect it and this was his first time using it.


    He would have wanted to hide it, but Lin Fan really angered him and he had lost his self control.


    Right now, he just wanted to turn this kid into a pile of ashes.


    Lin Fan didn''t move at all when he saw this, rather he had a smile on his face like he wasn''t in any danger at all. He just casually said in a yful voice, "What a big candle, it really is bright."


    When the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss heard this, the mes of rage inside of his chest burned even more. At the same time, the golden mes that surrounded him also burned much more brightly as he said, "Kid, you will die today!"


    Lin Fan just shook his head with that same smile before saying, "I guess I should blow it out before it does any damage."


    Right before the giant ball of mes hit Lin Fan, he suddenly blew out.


    With just this single casual breath, all of the mes had been blown away from the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss'' body and he even came to a stop right in front of Lin Fan.


    Everyone''s eyes popped out when they saw this as looks of absolute disbelief appeared on their faces.


    The Yellow Sun Gang''s boss was just stuck in ce there, unable to move at all as if there were some invisible shackles holding him in ce. However, there really were invisible shackles that were holding him in ce.


    ? That breath that Lin Fan had released was infused with windws. These windws not only blew out the fire around the Yellow Sun Gang''s boss, but also created invisible wind shackles that locked him in ce in midair.


    The Yellow Sun Gang''s boss looked at Lin Fan with a proper look of fear this time and he asked, "What are you?"


    Lin Fan just answered with a smile and nothing else as he raised his fist.


    But before he could throw out a punch, there was a cold glowing dagger that suddenly flew out at him.


    No one had noticed it until it was just an inch away from his face, but when they noticed it, they were all shocked by its sudden appearance and how fast it was. That was, everyone except for Lin Fan who had already noticed it.


    At a speed that no one could catch, he raised his other hand up and caught it with two fingers before turning to look at the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss.


    The Flying Dagger Gang''s boss had been the one who had thrown this dagger. True to the name of his gang, he used flying daggers and shadowws to assassinate people, which was why no one had noticed the dagger until it was right in front of Lin Fan.


    Seeing that the dagger had been caught, the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss knew that this was a bad situation for him, so he cloaked himself with shadowws. The little roon that was on his back immediately turned into a cloak of shadowws that helped him hide himself.


    He disappeared in front of everyone, but even then, Lin Fan still had a casual smile on his face.


    That was because not long after, there was a sudden crash near where the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss had disappeared and he reappeared again as he was mmed into the wall.


    Standing beside him was a weasel that was covered in dark mes who had been responsible for mming him into the wall.

 Chapter 831 Deal (1)

    After being mmed into the wall, the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss spat out a mouthful of blood before being able to stabilize himself.


    Once his condition was stable, he looked at the weasel covered in dark mes in front of him and his eyes quickly filled with shock as he said in a voice of disbelief, "Nascent Soul Realm Beast?"


    "Si!"


    His voice hadn''t been loud, but everyone had heard it and the moment that they did, they all took in a cold breath before turning to look at the weasel cloaked in dark mes with looks of disbelief.


    There was not a single one of them that doubted the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss. If he said that this was a Nascent Soul Realm Beast, then this would definitely be a Nascent Soul Realm Beast.


    The Nascent Soul Realm, that was a wall that none of the four rulers had ever been able to break¡­And even the pet of this kid was at a level that was higher than them¡­


    Seeing this, the bosses of the Snow Feather and Big Sabre Gangs all prepared to leave. However, when they tried to leave, they found that there were already two beasts that were waiting beside them, both of which had the same aura as that Nascent Soul Realm Beast.


    These two were without a doubt Nascent Soul Realm Beasts as well!


    That meant that this kid controlled three different Nascent Soul Realm pets and it was unknown just how strong he was¡­


    Finally, the situation sank in and they realized how big of a mess they were in.


    After a long moment of silence, the two gang bosses couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with shocked looks that had a trace of terror in them as the Big Sabre Gang''s boss asked, "What do you want with us?"


    Lin Fan looked up at them with a smile before turning to the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss and saying, "I want your organizations to fall under me. You''ll still run your organizations, but you''ll fold under therger organization that I''m about to create. Does that sound good?"


    He might have had a smile on his face, but when he said these words, they felt chills run down their back.


    That was because while he had a smile on his face, the cold intent behind his voice was clear.


    He was the one that was holding their lives now and if they valued those lives, they would listen to his orders. It would take just a single flip of his hand for those Nascent Soul Realm Beasts to execute them.


    After all, it wasn''t like they could do anything¡­


    They were only in the Child Soul Realm and these were true Nascent Soul Realm Beasts. The gap between the two sides was like heaven and earth.


    Seeing that they had no choice, they could only give a nod in agreement.


    Lin Fan didn''t really care about them in the first ce, he only really cared about the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss. He could tell that there was something special about this person and he wanted to bring him under him.


    Even with the situation that he was in, the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss didn''t seem like he wanted to submit. It was clear that there was something that he was struggling over that prevented him from agreeing to Lin Fan''s conditions.


    But there was the situation that he was in right in front of him, so he really didn''t have a choice.


    After a moment of silence, he said, "I want to talk to you alone before making this decision. Can you at least grant me that?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss before giving a nod in agreement.


    He helped the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss up and then the two of them headed off to a private room that had been prepared ahead of time. Lin Fan had already expected that something like this might happen, but he had thought that there would be more people with backbone than just this Flying Dagger Gang''s boss.


    As for the others left in the room, not a single one of them dared to make a move. That was because there were still three different Nascent Soul Realm Beasts watching over them, ready to knock them down as soon as they made a move.


    It didn''t take long for Lin Fan toe back with the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss, but this time the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss followed behind him like a subordinate. When they came to the center of the conference room, the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss even fell to one knee and said, "Boss, I swear to follow you from now on."


    Lin Fan nodded with a smile and said, "Un, I''m looking forward to it."


    All the other gang bosses looked at each other, but in the end, they had no choice but to follow the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss and bow to Lin Fan as well.<sub> </sub>


    With this, the matter was settled.


    Lin Fan left the rest of this matter to the Demon Wolf Gang''s boss and Xia Liu who had been hiding in the shadows the entire time. He trusted that they would know what to do now that he had already subdued everyone there.


    But of course, to make sure that everything was safe, he also left behind the three Nascent Soul Realm Beasts.


    As long as those three were there, he was certain that no one would dare do anything.


    Not to mention that the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss hadpletelye to his side. After their talk just now, he had guaranteed the Flying Dagger Gang''s boss'' loyalty since he had promised to help him with his revenge.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time at all as he headed back to the office where Xin''er was waiting for him. However, when he arrived, he could tell that something was different.


    There was nothing different about the office itself or the people there, it was just that he could feel a strange auraing from within.


    When he arrived at the daycare that had been built for Xin''er, he found that she was still there, but she wasn''t alone. There was a sharp dressed man with sses who was currently ying with her.


    The problem was that Lin Fan didn''t recognize this man at all.


    If Xin''er hadn''t been there, he would have pulled out his sword in an instant and put it at that man''s neck right away. However, since Xin''er was here and with how close the man was to Xin''er, he couldn''t do anything to endanger her.


    The sharp dressed man noticed that Lin Fan was here and he tapped Xin''er on the shoulder before pointing to Lin Fan. Xin''er''s face lit up when she saw him and immediately ran over to hug him.


    Lin Fan happily greeted her as well, but he also made sure to keep an eye on the sharp dressed man who slowly came over.


    After letting her hug him for a bit, Lin Fan separated from Xin''er and asked, "Xin''er, didn''t we say that we couldn''t y with strangers?"


    Xin''er looked at Lin Fan with a confused look as she asked, "But this isn''t a stranger? This is uncle Jiang, he''s brother Lin''s friend, isn''t he?"


    The sharp dressed man who had been called uncle Jiang revealed a smile in response to Lin Fan''s sharp gaze before turning to Xin''er and saying, "Xin''er, how about you go over to the side and y for a bit? Uncle Jiang has something to talk about with your brother Lin."


    Xin''er''s eyes were a bit zed over as she gave a nod and said, "Un, I''ll y over on the side." Then she ran off to y with the toys that were scattered without even looking back once.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes even more as he looked at this sharp dressed man surnamed Jiang before saying, "Spiritualws? Mind controlling powers?"


    The sharp dressed man surnamed Jiang pped in response to this and said, "Very good, you got it in one guess." Then he revealed a polite smile as he said, "Let me introduce myself, my name is Jiang Gan and I work for some people that have taken an interest in you."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes even more as he said with a hint of hostility, "For you to evene for Xin''er, should I assume that you don''t have any good intentions?"


    Jiang Gan raised his hands to feign innocence as he said, "I''m not here with any intentions, I just wanted to have a talk."


    Lin Fan still looked at him with narrowed eyes as he asked, "What do you want?"


    Jiang Gan said with a smile that was like the smile of a sly fox, "Well, you''ve been making some big moves, gathering all the gangs in the outer and middle parts of the city. Did you really think that no one would notice what you were doing? What you''ve aplished is what you''ve been allowed to aplish because you''re following the n that they''ve set out for you."


    Then Jiang Gan''s face turned serious as he said, "Now that it''se to this, naturally there will be many people who will be approaching you with different offers since there are quite a few resources in this city that they want."


    Jiang Gan revealed a smile once again as he said, "Naturally that includes my superiors."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows after listening to all of this.


    This was what he had already expected, but he never thought that they would move so quickly¡­


    So what should his next move be?

 Chapter 832 Deal (2)

    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at Jiang Gan for a while before finally asking, "How far do your superiors go?"


    Jiang Gan said with a sly smile, "I can''t tell you exactly, but you''re free to let your imaginations run as wild as you want."


    Lin Fan gave a snort before saying, "Must not be that high then."


    Hearing this, Jiang Gan couldn''t help saying, "They still have more than enough power to give you what you want." His eyes turned cold as he said, "You shouldn''t underestimate the people who can crush you like the ant you are."


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "Is that so? Then I''m more than happy to wait for them toe and crush me."


    Jiang Gan knitted his brows for the first time since he had arrived.


    He knew that Lin Fan was going to be hard to deal with since this was a person that had done what had never been done before, but he never expected him to be this hard to deal with.


    But after knitting his brows for a bit, he suddenly broke out inughter before saying, "You''re even more interesting than I imagined." Afterughing for a bit longer, he stopped to say, "You''re free to act however tough you want, but I can tell you that the others won''t be as gentle as me and you might suffer a bit from them. I urge you to make your choice as soon as possible."


    Without waiting for Lin Fan to give an answer, Jiang Gan walked right past him and out the door. But as if he had suddenly remembered something, Jiang Gan suddenly turned around and came back in.


    Lin Fan had still been lost in thought, so he didn''t notice him at first.


    Jiang Gan didn''t care as he just said, "I almost forgot, but here''s a card for you to contact us with."


    He pulled a card out of his chest pocket and with a single flick of the hand, it was inserted into the wooden door frame, just hanging there.


    Without another word, he walked out and soon disappeared.


    Only when he was gone did Lin Fane back to his senses and walk over to the card to pull it out.


    There was only one thing that was written on it, "True Power Gang".


    There wasn''t even a name on it, it was just the name of the gang and a location to contact.


    But the name of this gang made Lin Fan knit his brows.


    He had already learned the names of the major gangs in this slum city and this True Power Gang was one of them. They were one of the ten most powerful gangs in the inner city and not only that, they were rumoured to be backed by a family from the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Of course, it wasn''t just the True Power Gang that was backed by a family from the Mu Ster Kingdom. All of the ten most powerful gangs were backed by different families from the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Even if they disdained this ce and wanted to keep it far away from them, the nobles of the Mu Ster Kingdom loved money above all. Even if there were few resources in this ce to begin with, there were still resources and they wouldn''t deprive themselves of them.


    So they had backed their own powers here in the city to siphon out resources for them.


    Of course, the strongest powers in the slum city were those that controlled the gate that kept people in the slum city and the bank that managed the money system, but those were all managed by royals.


    That''s right, even the royal family didn''t give up the meagre resources from this slum city. That was just how greedy the people of the Mu Ster Kingdom were.


    But this was all expected by Lin Fan and even all a part of his n.


    After all, his goal was to leave this slum city and reach the Mu Ster Kingdom capital. Unless he made contact with someone that had the ability to do so, then it would be impossible for him to leave this slum city.


    That was where these Mu Ster Kingdom nobles came in.


    With their power, it was as simple as waving their hand to bring him and Xin''er out of the slum city and help them resettle in the capital.


    The only problem now was choosing which one to work with.


    Until he got enough information on the various noble families behind the gangs, it would be hard for him toe to a decision.


    It wouldn''t have been a problem before when he was alone, but now that he had Xin''er, he had to carefully consider which ones to work with. After all, almost all of the nobles had connections to the royal family.


    The royal family was thest group that Lin Fan wanted to work with because he knew that they were the most dangerous ones to work with. Even if he had no other choice, he still wouldn''t work with them since he knew that it was only a matter of time before they woulde for his life.


    Not to mention that there was also Xin''er''s secret to ount for.<sub> </sub>


    So no matter what, the royal family was out.


    But how could he gather information if he was stuck inside this slum city?


    Perhaps it would have been a problem for others, but for him, it wasn''t a problem at all. That was because he had a little life hack called Brainy.


    Before Jiang Gan had left, Lin Fan had attached one of Brainy''s smaller puppets onto him. It was so small that Jiang Gan hadn''t noticed anything at all, but it would still transmit sound and image from around Jiang Gan to Brainy.


    It was an easy way to find out who Jiang Gan was working for and who those people were allied with.


    Of course, it wouldn''t work if he only bugged Jiang Gan, he also needed to find out about the other ten strongest gangs in the inner city.


    But he also had a n for that.


    Over the next few days, as he had expected, they made contact in various ways. However, no matter how they made contact with him, they always made sure to send someone to meet him.


    That was because they wanted to threaten him.


    All of the people that had been sent were in the Peak Nascent Soul Realm just like Jiang Gan, so they were of no threat to him at all.


    Perhaps they scared the normal residents since those in the Nascent Soul Realm like them were considered enemies that they could never defeat, but they weren''t worth anything in Lin Fan''s eyes.


    But since they can, Lin Fan wouldn''t let them leave for free.


    He would have them do some business for him, as he attached the same bug that he attached on Jiang Gan on everyone who came.


    All of them returned back to their gangs without knowing a thing and gave up all their information to Lin Fan.


    With this information, Lin Fan easily made his decision.


    It wasn''t the True Power Gang that Jiang Gan represented, it was the smallest gang out of all ten of the strongest gangs, the Swift Lightning Gang.


    That was because other than the Swift Lightning Gang, every other gang was associated in some form with the royal family.


    It wasn''t that they were controlled by the royal family, but rather the nobles behind them were associated with one of the princes that were trying to take the throne. This was verymon since if the prince that they supported was able to take the throne, naturally there wouldn''t be ack of benefits for them.


    The noble family behind the Swift Lightning Gang was from the neutral faction who were content with watching, so they didn''t have any connections with any of the princes.


    Of course, that wasn''t to say that this family was weak.


    There was a reason why they could form a neutral faction, which was that they were strong enough on their own that they didn''t need to suck up to any of the princes.


    The only reason that the Swift Lightning Gang was so weak was because they didn''t care that much about the slum city.


    But this was perfect for Lin Fan.


    So the Swift Lightning Gang was the one that he chose to cooperate with.


    To set this up, he sent someone to make contact with the location on the card that was left for him and when that person came back, he had the location for a meeting that the other side had set up.


    The only thing that worried Lin Fan''s subordinates when they learned of this meeting was that Lin Fan was to go to this meeting alone.


    Even now they still didn''t know the limits of Lin Fan''s power, but they knew that if Lin Fan went alone, it would be very likely that he would be heading into a trap.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he knew that this was something that woulde eventually. The other side had to see what kind of power he had before understanding how to deal with him, so he didn''t mind showing them a bit of his power.


    The only thing that he would have to worry about is if they sent a World Realm Expert, but that was very unlikely that they would send one to a ce like this.


    However, even if they did, he still had a way to deal with it.

 Chapter 833 Deal (3)

    The next day, Lin Fan headed alone to the inner city for the location of the meeting.


    This was his first time in the inner city and he was quite surprised when he stepped through the gates of the inner city.


    This ce waspletely different from the outer and middle parts of the city, the buildings here weren''t as run down as the outer and middle parts of the city. Though they couldn''t be considered luxurious, they could be considered livable.


    This wasn''t considered much for Lin Fan who had lived in a much more developed city, but for the people who lived in the slum all their lives, this was considered luxurious.


    Only the people who were able to reach this ce would never be people who had lived in the slums all their lives. The people who came here were all people who ended up in the slums for one reason or another and were the ones that actually had high cultivations.


    So for them, this ce wasn''t considered that luxurious either.


    Lin Fan continued heading deeper into the inner city until he finally came to a ce that finally looked quite impressive.


    This was the hotel that was right in the center of the city and was considered the most luxurious ce in the entire city. That was because this was the ce that had been built by the nobles for them to stay when they came down to inspect the slum city.


    So this hotel was very luxurious to suit their needs. Even the location of this hotel was in the best spot, right under the passage that led to the slum city from the capital city above.


    So the nobles wouldn''t have to travel far after arriving in this city.


    Normally one would need a special token proving their identity to even enter this hotel and luckily Lin Fan had one of these.


    It had been given to him by the person that he had contacted to broker this deal, so he was allowed right in and someone even led him right up to the room that had been booked.


    Naturally as a ce that catered to nobles, they understood what the nobles wanted. For nobles that came to a slum city like this, naturally they were doing things that they didn''t want people to know about.


    So with this in mind, all of the rooms had been soundproofed and guarded against eavesdropping.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t assured in just leaving this to others, so he also released some of Brainy''s puppets and had them secure the area.


    To his and Brainy''s surprise, they weren''t able to find a single thing wrong with this room. It seemed like whoever designed this ce had really put quite the effort into making this ce.


    But of course, this was to be expected since many different nobles came together to make this ce.


    After Lin Fan arrived, he actually waited in this room for quite a bit before the other side arrived.


    When they arrived, he couldn''t help being surprised by how they were dressed.


    That was because they had beenpletely covered up in cloaks and didn''t reveal a single trace of themselves. It was almost as if they were rogues instead of nobles¡­


    They didn''t say a word as they sat down right in front of them and there was an awkward silence that filled the air. However, even with this awkward silence, Lin Fan didn''t say a thing since he knew that saying something would actually mean that he would be giving up the initiative.


    In a situation like this where both sides were waiting for the other side to slip up and give them something to take advantage of, the person who spoke second would have the upper hand. After all, to get something, you had to give something, so the first person who spoke would actually be giving up information about themselves.


    But of course, if they let this silence remain for too long, they would never get anywhere.


    Luckily, the person who had contacted Lin Fan also came in not long after.


    This was a sloppily dressed young man named Zhong Jun and despite how he looked, he was actually in the Nascent Soul Realm and was the vice president of the Swift Lightning Gang.


    After he came in, he revealed an apologetic look and raised his hand to say, "Sorry I''mte. I had some business that kept me upied until now."


    Though he said this, not a single person in the room believed it.


    That was because he had indeed beente on purpose.


    He had been waiting outside on the orders of the noble family behind the Swift Lightning Gang and had onlye in because he received a secret order.


    The cloaked figures knew that keeping the silence wasn''t the right thing to do, but they couldn''t do it since they had their reputation to consider. So they chose to use Zhong Jun instead since this was a method that they could use to break the silence while also not exposing anything about themselves and keeping their prestige.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he knew that there was nothing he had lost from this.


    Zhong Jun saw that no one spoke, so he came forward to sit in between the two sides and said, "Should we get this started?"


    Though he said this to everyone, he looked at Lin Fan when he said this, making it clear that he was directing this to Lin Fan. In a way, he was using a passive aggressive manner to make Lin Fan speak first.


    Even though Lin Fan knew this, he still took the bait since he knew that staying too firm would mean that they would never go forward.


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Alright, let''s hear what kind of a deal you have?"


    The cloaked figures looked at him in silence for a few seconds before the smaller of the two cloaked figures said, "You really are interesting, aren''t you?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows when he heard this. The first words that came out of this person''s mouth wasn''t an offer, but rather this strange question.


    But what really surprised him was that even though this person had disguised their voice with soundws, with Lin Fan''s understanding of soundws, he was able to easily break through this. The voice that had just spoken was clearly the voice of a little girl¡­


    Before Lin Fan could answer, the taller of the two cloaked figures gave a cough and said, "You already know what we want, so give us your conditions."


    Lin Fan looked at the taller of the two and then turned to the shorter one, but seeing that she didn''t say anything, he said, "Alright, it''s very simple. I just want passage into the capital for me and another person."


    There was only silence that met this as all three of them looked at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan couldn''t see what expression the two cloaked figures had, but Zhong Jun had knitted brows on his face. Based on his guesses, he figured that the two cloaked figures most likely had the same expression as Zhong Jun.


    After a long period of silence, the taller of the two cloaked figures said in a deep voice, "It''s not as easy as you think to bring someone out of the slums and into the capital. Perhaps if you asked to be sent to a different world, then we can help you, but to ask to be sent to the capital¡­"


    Lin Fan remained firm as he said, "I want to go to the capital."


    There was another moment of silence before the taller of the two cloaked figures suddenly released his aura which pressed down on Lin Fan.


    To Lin Fan''s surprise, this aura wasn''t the aura of a True Soul Realm Expert that he was already used to, but rather¡­


    This was the aura of a World Realm Expert!


    This taller of the two cloaked figures was actually a World Realm Expert!


    Even if he had felt this kind of aura before, with his cultivation, it was still hard for him to endure and he couldn''t help shrinking a bit in the seat. But he stayed firm and looked at the cloaked figures right in the face.


    After a long moment of silence, the shorter of the two cloaked figures raised her hand.


    The taller of the two cloaked figures was surprised by this and quickly retracted his aura. However, even though Lin Fan couldn''t see his face, he could tell by the way that he was looking at him that the taller cloaked figure was ring at him.


    The smaller of the two cloaked figures then said, "Since he has given us these conditions, he must be confident that he has something worthy of this condition." She turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Speak, let us hear what gives you this confidence."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he heard this.


    He ignored the taller cloaked figure and focused on the smaller cloaked figure as he said, "I''ll give you all the business in the outer and middle parts of the city if you grant me this."


    Once again, there was only silence that met this, but this time the atmosphere was different.


    While the cloaked figures weren''t as shocked as the look on Zhong Jun''s face, it was clear that they were surprised by this offer.


    But after a moment of silence, the smaller cloaked figure said, "Do you think that the other factions will just let us take all of this business?"


    Lin Fan said with the same smile, "Who said that it would be you taking it all?"

 Chapter 834 Attacked (1)

    The cloaked figure fell silent and looked at him as if she was trying to figure him out.


    But then she gave up and said, "Exin yourself."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "As long as you don''t get too greedy, then there''s nothing the others can do to you since this is just fairpetition. It''s not as if we''llpletely give up our freedom to serve you and give you everything, we''ll just give you a share of what we earn and you won''t have to do a thing."


    The cloaked figure still looked at Lin Fan and said, "That still doesn''t answer my question."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Does your neutral faction only have you? Aren''t there others that have wanted a piece of this city for a long time?"


    The cloaked figure suddenly shook before falling into deep thought as if she had been provoked by his words. The taller cloaked figure though still looked confused as he asked, "So what? What does that have to do with this situation?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and shook his head.


    Seeing this, the taller cloaked man trembled, but this wasn''t out of understanding, but rather anger out of shame. He was about to stand up and point his finger at Lin Fan to say something to Lin Fan, but the shorter cloaked figure raised her hand to stop him.


    She looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and silently stared at him for a long time.


    After a long time passed, she finally said, "You really like to y big, don''t you?"


    Lin Fan said, "There are four rulers in the middle city and six powerful gangs in the outer city, you can decide how you want to arrange them."


    The smaller cloaked figure didn''t give an answer to this and instead asked, "What is your goal? It''s not as if you would do all this without any ns."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug and said, "I just want to peacefully open a pet store in the capital city. Would you believe me?"


    The smaller cloaked figure repeated, "Pet store?"


    She just silently stared at him for another while before saying, "No matter what your motives are, your conditions are indeed very favourable to us. However¡­" Her voice turned ice cold as she said, "If you ever think to harm our family, you should understand that the consequences are not what you can bear."


    This was a clear threat, but Lin Fan didn''t mind it since he already expected it.


    Lin Fan just nodded and said, "As long as you agree to my conditions, you won''t have to worry about anything."


    There was another long period of silence before the smaller cloaked figure said, "Alright, we''ll have to talk about it with the people in charge of the family, but I think that we cane to an agreement. Just give us two days and we''ll tell you of our decision."


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this at all. He had already waited a long time to get to this point, another two days wouldn''t matter.


    So he nodded and then stood up to leave.


    But before he could leave, the smaller cloaked figure suddenly said, "You should be careful during these next two days. You''re already drawing a lot of attention and that attention can turn into bad intentions."


    Lin Fan stopped moving when he heard this and he turned back to look at the smaller cloaked figure with slightly knitted brows.


    That onlysted for a split second before his brows rxed and he said with a nod, "I will."


    Then without even looking back, Lin Fan just walked out of the room and left the hotel.


    Back in the room, there was only silence.


    After a long time, the taller cloaked figure finally said, "Young miss, why did you agree to his conditions? There''s nothing for us to gain from this deal."<sub> </sub>


    The smaller cloaked figure that had been called young miss shook her head and said, "I''ve always said that you need to improve your brain or people will think you''re an idiot."


    The taller cloaked figure didn''t take offense at this and just asked, "Young miss, what do you mean?"


    The young miss said, "You said that we don''t have anything to gain from this, are you just blind? Can''t you see just how much he''s offering us on a silver tter?"


    The taller cloaked figure was even more confused as he asked, "Young miss, what do you mean by this?"


    The young miss shook her head and said, "Forget about the benefits that we can gain from this city because they don''t mean a single thing. Focus on what he said about the neutral faction and how many gangs with power there are in the middle and outer cities."


    The taller cloaked figure was still confused as he tilted his head to look at the young miss.


    The young miss gave a sigh before saying, "He said that we don''t need to take all of the gangs and their resources for ourselves, but they will still have to go to someone in the end. Who do you think that they will go to?"


    The taller cloaked figure was silent in thought for a long time before suddenly saying, "Oh, the other members of the neutral faction! He''s saying that we can give the resources of the other gangs to the other members of the neutral faction and build our influence like that."


    The young miss nodded before saying, "But it''s not only that. By giving the gangs to the other members of the neutral faction, we will be turning this matter into a matter of the neutral factions and the other nobles won''t be able to make a move easily. At the same time, by giving all these resources to the neutral faction, we will be increasing the overall power of the neutral faction. With our increased influence in the neutral faction from all the connections that we will be making, it''ll give us even more power in this stronger neutral faction."


    The young miss couldn''t help shaking her head and saying with a sigh, "This really is a perfect n of killing three birds with one stone¡­"


    The taller cloaked figure suddenly thought of something and said, "That''s right! Since he knows all of this, doesn''t this mean that he has a good understanding of the neutral faction and our family?" He suddenly couldn''t help having a trace of worry in his voice as he asked, "Could it be that this is all a trap?"


    The young miss was silent for a bit before shaking her head, "No, if it was a trap, there would be plenty of other signs. This person literally appeared out of nowhere and took over in an instant, his power and wisdom far surpasses anything that those other idiot nobles coulde up with."


    But then she said with a sigh, "Still, no matter how you look at it, this seems too suspicious."


    The taller cloaked figure asked, "Should we send someone to investigate where he came from?"


    The young miss shook her head and said, "No, there''s no point in doing this. Someone as smart as him would never leave a tail and if we were to offend him while investigating, there would be no benefits for us."


    The taller cloaked figure couldn''t help asking, "But young miss, didn''t the elders already give you full authority in this matter. You could have agreed to his proposal right away, so why did you give him two days? Also, why did you give him that warning at the end?"


    The young miss revealed a faint smile under her cloak, "Well, I wanted to test him to see if I could get a peek at what he''s hiding. Of course, we don''t want him to be injured since that would be shooting ourselves in the foot, so I gave him the warning. Now it''ll all depend on how he acts."


    Then after a pause, she couldn''t help saying, "But on that note, send someone to watch over him and make sure that nothing too tragic happens to him. If he''s hurt and we save him, he''ll have a better impression of us and that will make things easier for us."


    The taller cloaked figure gave a bow before saying, "Yes, young miss."


    Then he left to go outside to give instructions to Zhong Jun who had left as soon as Lin Fan had left. Zhong Jun knew his ce and knew that the two of them would want a secret conversation, so he left right away.


    He was smart like that even with the way he looked. That was why this young miss trusted him to act on her behalf in this city.


    After the taller cloaked figure was gone, the young miss couldn''t help taking out something from under her cloak that she clenched in her hand as she murmured, "Big sis, I know that you wanted to find your child, but it''s really hard¡­I''ll do my best still."


    It was a lie to say that this young miss only wanted to expand their family''s influence in the slum city just for benefits, there was another reason that she wanted to expand their influence and it was a personal reason.


    Of course, she would never let anyone know about this since this was a matter that was very taboo and if anyone were to learn about this, she would definitely be in danger.


    But what was sped in her hand right now was actually a handkerchief that had the same cherry blossom pattern as the token that Lin Fan had.

 Chapter 835 Attacked (2)

    After leaving the inner city, Lin Fan didn''t head back to their office right away.


    Instead, he started wandering around in the alleys, as if he didn''t really have a goal.


    He wandered around the alleys of the middle part of the city, going around in circles until he finally arrived in an open space that had no one else around. He just stood there in that open space as if he was waiting for something, but nothing appeared.


    Seeing this, he finally said, "Come out, I already know that you''re there."


    After his voice rang out, there was finally movement from around him as several cloaked figuresnded all around him.


    The aura that these cloaked figures gave off weren''t weak at all, every single one of them was in the Nascent Soul Realm.


    It was clear that they weren''t here with good intentions with the way that they surrounded him and covered themselves up with cloaks.


    Lin Fan looked at all of the cloaked figures around him with a calm look before saying in a cold voice, "Can I help you with something?"


    The cloaked figures didn''t say a thing, but it was clear what they wanted when they pulled out their weapons.


    Without giving Lin Fan any chance to react at all, they all attacked him at the same time. They didn''t attack from the same direction, but attacked him from every direction to try to catch him off guard. At the same time, there were half of them that jumped into the air to prevent him from escaping into the air.


    It was clear with how coordinated they were that this group already knew each other and were familiar with fighting together. The formation that they used didn''t give him a single inch of room to escape.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried.


    After all, he had chosen to stop in this ce, so he was naturally confident that he was able to deal with any attackers that came after him.


    As the attackers came closer and closer, Lin Fan just stood there as if he didn''t have a worry in the world. However, when the attackers were about to reach him, there was a sudden pressure that fell onto all of them.


    Not a single one of them was able to resist and they were mmed down into the ground.


    They tried releasing their life energy, but they found that they couldn''t release a single bit of it. They lost control of thews that they had been controlling and all of the life energy gathered before had been scattered.


    What had suddenly mmed into them and knocked them into the ground was a domain and this domain was centered around Lin Fan.


    All of them knew what this was after seeing that they lost control of their life energy and couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan in shock. Such a young kid was actually a True Soul Realm Expert?


    How could someone like this end up in a slum city?


    Shouldn''t someone like this be the young master of some noble family?


    But the truth was that the domain didn''t actuallye from Lin Fan.


    While he had improved because of the new pets that he tamed, he actually didn''t break through to the True Soul Realm just yet. He was still only in the Peak Nascent Soul Realm and couldn''t use a domain himself.


    But even if he couldn''t use a domain himself, that didn''t mean that he couldn''t use the domain of his pets.


    One of the True Soul Realm Beasts that Lin Fan had tamed was a giant snake, but it also had the ability to change its size at will. It was currently hiding inside of Lin Fan''s sleeve where Brainy would normally be and was releasing this domain around him which suppressed all of his attackers.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at the people who had tried to attack him and with one swift flick of his hand, threw them in front of him in a pile. Then with another swift flick of his hand, he destroyed all of the cloaks hiding their faces.


    When Lin Fan saw the true identity of his attackers, he couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    That was because among the people that attacked him, there was one that he noticed.


    It was a person that had contacted him before on behalf of one of the ten strongest gangs. It was Jiang Gan who had threatened Lin Fan with Xin''er before.


    Jiang Gan no longer seemed as confident as before, instead he had a bitter look on his face when he faced Lin Fan.


    He had thought that Lin Fan was someone that he could easily defeat, but he never thought that this normal looking kid was actually a True Soul Realm Expert. Even now, he could still feel the domain pressing down on him.


    But he didn''t lose his cool as he said in a different tonepared to before, "Young master Lin, what a coincidence meeting you here. I think that this is all a misunderstanding and we willugh about this in the future."


    He forced himself to stay calm, but there was a more respectful tone in his voicepared to before. He no longer talked down to Lin Fan like he had once done before.


    Now that he knew that Lin Fan was a True Soul Realm Expert, he treated him with the respect he would give to someone above him. That was because other than World Realm Experts sent down by the nobles, True Soul Realm Experts were the strongest people in the city.


    Only the leaders of the ten strongest gangs were True Soul Realm Experts.<sub> </sub>


    Lin Fan being a True Soul Realm Expert meant that he had the qualification to be as arrogant as he wanted because no one in the city would be able to stop him.


    But Jiang Gan had nobles backing him, so he didn''t fully submit to Lin Fan since he was also confident in his backers.


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "A misunderstanding you say? Are you sure you want to go with that?"


    Jiang Gan felt a chill running down his spine as he saw Lin Fan''s smile.


    All of his subordinates also knew that this situation was bad, so they looked at Jiang Gang before looking at Lin Fan, as if they were considering whether they should betray Jiang Gan and move to Lin Fan''s side.


    Jiang Gan hesitated for a while before finally saying, "Young master Lin, I think that you should know what kind of people are behind me. I don''t think that it would be in everyone''s best interests if we were to¡­"


    He left his words hanging, but the meaning behind them were clear.


    It was a threat.


    He was threatening Lin Fan with his backers to let him go.


    Lin Fan just revealed a taunting smile and said in a teasing voice, "Oh, what should I do?"


    Jiang Gan knew that he should take a step back, so he said, "As long as you let me go, there''s nothing for you to worry about. I promise that I''ll talk to them and¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan suddenly flicked his hand which now had a white dagger in it. In one swift move, one of Jiang Gan''s fingers was cut right off and flew through the air tond in front of him.


    Lin Fan then said with a smile, "I didn''t mean that. I meant how should I break you?"


    Jiang Gan felt a chill run down his spine when he saw this smile. He didn''t scream out in pain like a normal person since he was already used to this kind of pain.


    He was the vice leader of the True Power Gang, so he had been in his fair shares of fights. This kind of pain wasn''t enough for him to lose control just yet.


    But he also had seen his fair share of people and he knew that Lin Fan wasn''t joking. This young man in front of him really was nning on torturing him until he told him everything.


    So without hesitation, Jiang Gan pulled out something from his waist and was about to throw it onto the ground.


    But before he could, there was a vine that suddenly came out of the ground that grabbed his wrist. No matter how much strength he used, he wasn''t able to break free of the grasp of the vine at all.


    It was like he had been trapped by steel chains that held his arm in ce.


    But he didn''t give up as he raised his other hand to grab the item he was holding.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had already made his move and cut off his hand with one swift sh. The hand flew through the air beforending in Lin Fan''s hand where he opened it to see what the item he was holding was.


    The item was just a little ball, but Lin Fan didn''t underestimate it because he could feel thews that wereing from it. This ball was filled with powerful True Soul Realmws and with just a bit of force, it could be shattered to release an attack at the level of a True Soul Realm Expert.


    He knew that Jiang Gan was trying to shatter this ball to use this attack against him to buy time to escape, but he wasn''t worried at all. That was because during this time, Brainy in his other sleeve had locked her spiritual senses on these people.


    As long as they tried to make a single move, she would be ready with a vine to trap them and stop them from doing anything. Just like she had done just now with Jiang Gan.


    After seeing this, Lin Fan gave a mental order to Brainy and even more vines came out of the ground topletely wrap up Jiang Gan. The only part of him that wasn''t wrapped up anymore was his head.


    With these vines wrapped up around him, he wasn''t even able to move a single muscle as he justid there on the ground looking up at Lin Fan.


    Once he was trapped, Lin Fan shook his head and said with a smile, "That wasn''t very nice, you know? If you cooperated a bit, I could have given you a painless death."


    Jiang Gan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this and said, "So I die no matter what?"


    Lin Fan nodded, "That''s right, you die no matter what."


    Jiang Gan broke out inughter before saying, "Then I''ll curse you from hell."


    He was about to close his mouth to bite through his tongue and kill himself, but before he could, the vines reached out and blocked his mouth. He wasn''t even allowed to kill himself¡­


    Lin Fan shook his head and said with a smile, "How could it be that simple?"


    That smile was like a smile of death for Jiang Gan.

 Chapter 836 Moving (1)

    A few minutester, Lin Fan walked out of the alley that led to this empty area and he quickly left this ce.


    In the empty area that he had just been, there were several piles of flesh and blood that no longer looked human, but these were the remains of the people who had attacked him.


    He could have easily gotten the information that he wanted just by using Brainy''s Parasite Seed. He could have even easily gotten it with many other different methods that he had.


    However, he chose to take care of Jiang Gan with the most painful method that he could.


    That was because he still held a grudge over what happened with Xin''er.


    If Jiang Gan had more evil intentions that day, perhaps it would be toote for Lin Fan to feel regret.


    So he had taken precautions against it since that day, cing his pets near Xin''er to protect her just in case. However, he still held a grudge in his heart towards Jiang Gan over what had happened that day.


    Which was why Jiang Gan suffered the fate that he faced now.


    He didn''t even bother cleaning them up because things like this weremon in this slum city. There were corpses all over the ce and even if these looked a bit more brutal than the normal corpses, no one would pay it any mind.


    That was because the people of the slum city were just trying to survive and getting involved in these kinds of matters weren''t good for them.


    However, those corpses weren''t left there for long.


    Not long after Lin Fan left, there were cloaked figures that suddenly appeared in the open space where the fight had happened. They just calmly looked down at the meat piles on the ground and then with a wave of their hands, mes appeared to burn these meat piles to ashes.


    Once the ashes had scattered on the wind, these people also cleaned up the area so that there wasn''t a single trace of the battle left at all. When they were done, this empty area had returned to the way it was before.


    But in the distance, there had been people watching the entire time.


    All of them had noticed the terrifying might that Lin Fan had disyed and had sent reports back to their respective forces.


    That included the Swift Lightning Gang.


    When the young miss received the report about Lin Fan''s battle, she couldn''t help narrowing her eyes before saying, "Interesting, very interesting."


    The tall cloaked figure beside her said in a worried voice, "Young miss, it''s clear that this person is hiding something. We shouldn''t be dealing with a person like this."


    The young miss waved her hand and said, "Do you not trust my instincts?"


    The tall cloaked figure couldn''t help trembling when he heard this as he looked at the young miss with a shocked look.


    The young miss was saying that this was what her instincts were telling her?


    The young miss had obtained her current position with her intelligence and her instincts.


    With these two things, she had created many miracles that had brought countless benefits to the family that had more than doubled their power. This was what had made her the gem of their family, trusted by all the elders.


    That was also the reason why she had been given the full rights to make a decision when it came to Lin Fan. That was just how much the family head and the elders all trusted her.


    Now that she was saying that her instincts were telling her to work with Lin Fan, the tall cloaked figure had no choice but to ept what she said.


    However, he wasn''t assured in leaving things as they were, so he said, "Young miss, shouldn''t we assign someone to watch over this person?"


    The young miss shook her head and said, "No, this person is clearly a cautious and intelligent person. If we were to do this, he would immediately have doubts towards us and that would hurt our future cooperation. This person is someone that we can only face with full sincerity or it wille to bite us in the butt in the future."


    The tall cloaked figure clearly looked like he thought otherwise, but since the young miss had already spoken, it wasn''t as if he could say anything else.


    Since that was the case, he had no choice but to ept this situation.


    But he still couldn''t help feeling anxious.


    ¡­


    Two dayster, Zhong Jun made contact with Lin Fan again.<sub> </sub>


    This time, he brought with him special documents that would allow him and Xin''er pass through the tunnel that led to the capital.


    They had already discussed this through their subordinates previously, so now Zhong Jun was just bringing them the final products.


    As for his end of the bargain, that still hadn''t been fulfilled yet.


    That was because the noble families moved slowly when it came to matters like this.


    The noble family behind the Swift Lightning Gang needed time to gather members of the neutral faction that they wanted to take over the various gangs. So it would take a long time before they could set everything up.


    Lin Fan was actually surprised that the nobles behind the Swift Lightning Gang had moved this fast.


    Normally nobles wouldn''t act until they received the benefits that they were promised, so Lin Fan had expected this to take at least a month before he heard back from the nobles. He never thought that they would take care of this in just two days.


    While they said that it was for his protection since he had been attacked recently, but Lin Fan knew that this was just their sincerity.


    To his surprise, they had even prepared an extra surprise for him.


    Apparently they had remembered that he said that he wanted to open a pet shop, so they had actually bought him a pet shop as well.


    While the location of the shop wasn''t the best since it was only in a second grade business street, this was still considered quite good. After all, Lin Fan was sure that the businesses on the top business street were all businesses that were owned by nobles. Even the first grade business streets would most likely be owned by nobles.


    They respected that he wanted peace and quiet, but they also knew that he wanted business, so they got him a store on one of the second grade business streets.


    This was the best that they could do for someone like him who didn''t have any influence or status in the capital.


    Lin Fan understood all of this, which was why he was moved even more by it.


    After receiving these documents, Lin Fan immediately packed up everything and prepared to head to the capital the next day.


    As for what he did that day, naturally he stayed in the city to leave behind instructions for all his subordinates. At the same time, he also left behind one of the True Soul Realm Beasts and several Nascent Soul Realm Beasts.


    He knew that there was a chance that they would be attacked again, so he wanted to leave some guards just in case.


    All of these beasts had a Parasite Seed injected in them, so they would be able to contact Lin Fan at any time. Even if Lin Fan went far away from them by heading to the capital since Brainy had unlocked a new skill.


    Brainy only had a certain distance that she could control her puppets from, but with this new skill, that wasn''t a problem at all.


    That was because this new skill allowed her to create small clones of herself to head with her puppets that acted as antennas. So even if she was far away, she could connect to these clones and control any puppets that were in the range of the clone.


    Of course, there were also downsides to this new technique.


    Such as the clones having a much smaller range due to them having a weaker cultivation than her.


    Brainy was now in the Nascent Soul Realm, but the clones that she created were all only in the Embryo Soul Realm.


    But even with these downsides, these clones were still very useful.


    At the same time, Lin Fan would also be able to contact his subordinates through these pets. He had specially chosen beasts that were skilled in transforming into humans, so he would be able to contact his subordinates any time with Brainy and the clones.


    So there wasn''t a single thing that he was worried about in the slum city.


    All he needed to worry about was how to settle in the capital city and what to do with Xin''er.


    As they went to the capital city, there would be no doubt that there would be people that could recognize Xin''er¡­So Lin Fan had to be careful with Xin''er. He had already applied many arrays that would help hide her true appearance and her aura, but there were many experts in the capital with strange techniques, so he didn''t know what to expect.


    So with the remaining time that he had, he helped her refine many items that would help her at critical moments and items that would help her with her disguise, which he gave to her the morning they departed.


    Xin''er didn''t really understand what these things were for, but she happily epted them since they were gifts from her big brother Lin.


    With all this set, Lin Fan headed off to the capital with Xin''er.

 Chapter 837 Moving (2)

    When they arrived at the entrance of the tunnel, they were stopped by the guards that were there.


    However, when he showed them the documents that Zhong Jun had given him, they all revealed looks of reverence as they looked at him.


    They knew what these documents were for, so naturally they were filled with reverence. After all, of the people that could leave this slum city and head to the capital, not a single one of them was simple.


    So their tone immediately changed as soon as they saw these papers and they respectfully showed Lin Fan the way to the transport area.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    That was because this transport area was just like the one that he had used when he had gone from the Blue Star to the Gctic Humanity Alliance. Back then he had also taken a tunnel that had led from the Blue Star to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But this time was different since that was a tunnel between two differents and this was just a tunnel that led up to the sky.


    The capital of the Mu Ster Kingdom was built up in the clouds while the slum city was built on the ground below it, which was how they were able to dump all their trash down into the slum city.


    As for why it was built up in the clouds, that was because this had a strange atmosphere where spiritual energy rose and gathered in the sky. Since that was the ce where the most spiritual energy gathered, naturally it was also the ce that they had built their city.


    The tunnel trip didn''tst that long, since it was only a short transport tunnel that led from the slum city to the capital city.


    In fact, if they wanted, they could have installed teleportation portals instead since it was only a short distance. But that just showed how much they looked down on these people in the slum city.


    When they arrived in the capital, they were weed by guards as well. However, unlike the guards from before, they were treatedpletely differently.


    After confirming their documents, they were rudely pushed out of the transport room and were led out of the building. There were no exnations at all, they just directly forced them to leave as if they didn''t want anything to do with them.


    But that made sense since the guards on the two different sides were from different ces.


    The guards that were on this side were members of the royal army while the guards on the other side were guards that were recruited in the slums. Naturally no one from the capital was willing to head to the slums, so they could only recruit people from the slums to guard the gate on that side.


    To those guards from the slums, Lin Fan and Xin''er were like heroes. They had crawled their way out of the slums and had found a way to make it all the way to the capital city. They were examples of what they wanted to be one day.


    But for these guards from the royal army, they naturally had their pride as people from the capital city.


    So when they saw these people that came from the slums, even if they had permission toe out of the slums and arrive at the capital city, they still looked down on them as dirty people from the slums.


    Lin Fan could see all of this, but he didn''t care.


    This was only temporary and once he left this ce, he would never have to think about it again.


    The only worry that he had was that Xin''er would be affected by this, but she waspletely lost in the sights around her. Even if this building that they were in wasn''t the most luxurious building, it was still a building from the capital and was much more luxurious than anything that she had seen before.


    She had even acted this way when Lin Fan had brought her to the office for the first time.


    Of course, that wasn''t the first time since she had been there before as Min''er, but back then she had been threatened by Xia Liu''s gang and couldn''t properly look around.


    But before they were escorted out by the guards, there was someone that came over.


    The guards had confused looks so it was clear that they didn''t recognize this person. Lin Fan also revealed a confused look since he also didn''t recognize this person. As for Xin''er, it was natural that she wouldn''t recognize anyone from the capital city.


    However, this person came right up to Lin Fan and even waved his hand as he said, "Young master Lin, I''ve been waiting for you."


    The guards didn''t treat this person kindly since he was acting in a friendly manner with this person from the slums. This was a matter of pride for them since if even this person from the slums had a higher status for them, then what had their lives been for?


    So one of the guards came forward to stop this person.


    The guard raised his weapon and pointed it right at this person as he said, "Stand down. This isn''t a ce for you to act as you wish."


    The person narrowed his eyes to look at this guard and when he did, there was a trace of coldness that appeared in his eyes. This cold look sent a chill down the spine of the guard and he almost dropped the weapon in his hand as they started shaking.


    That person then said, "And it''s your ce to speak?"


    The guard''s face turned red from being shamed like this and he was about to be angry out of shame, but then his expression froze. However, it wasn''t just this one guard, but all of the other guards as well.


    All of them had looks of shock on their faces as they looked at the token that this person was holding up.


    That was because they knew what this token was and what it represented. The fact that this person had this token meant that this was a person that they couldn''t offend since this person was here on behalf of the family behind this token.


    After a temporary moment of shock, the guards immediately all ignored Lin Fan and bowed down in front of this person.


    The guard that had tried to stop this person even kowtowed on the ground while trembling as he said in a shaky voice, "It¡­it was¡­was my¡­my mistake. Please¡­don''t take¡­take offense¡­and spare me."


    That personpletely ignored this guard and turned his attention back to Lin Fan. He revealed a smile and said, "Young master Lin, I''ve been waiting a long time, but you''re finally here. I was sent by the family toe and pick you up and bring you to your new store."<sub> </sub>


    After hearing this, all of the guards looked at Lin Fan with a different expression.


    Gone were the looks of disdain and they had been reced with looks of shock and disbelief.


    After all, they couldn''t understand how someone like Lin Fan who came from the slums could be rted to this noble family¡­


    Plus, they could see that based on the way that the person with the token treated Lin Fan, it was clear that Lin Fan was in a higher position. This person with the token was just here to serve Lin Fan¡­


    When they realized this, they all felt a cold chill run down their backs¡­


    If he were to take revenge over what had happened just now¡­none of them would be able to survive at the end of the day.


    But it wasn''t as if they could beg for their lives at this point.


    So all they could do was wait and hope that Lin Fan would spare them.


    Lin Fan only now had the time to look at this person carefully since before this, he had been surrounded by the guards.


    This person was a young man who was dressed in a clean robe and had slicked back hair. It was clear that this person was very professional based on the way that he was dressed and Lin Fan had an even better impression of the noble family behind the Swift Lightning Gang.


    Lin Fan gave a nod to this neatly dressed person and said, "Yes, sorry to make you wait."


    The neatly dressed person quickly waved his hand and said, "No, no, you have nothing to apologize for. I''m sure that it was the fault of others that you were dyed."


    As the guards heard this, they couldn''t help crying silent tears.


    They had actually tried to get Lin Fan out as soon as possible since they didn''t want some dirty person from the slum city like him in their ce.


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "I just didn''t know that you were waiting or I would havee sooner."


    Then without caring about the guards, he started walking forward towards the neatly dressed man. The neatly dressed man saw this and raised his hand to guide Lin Fan along.


    When the guards saw this, they all let out a sigh of relief, but that didn''tst long.


    Before they left, the neatly dressed man suddenly asked, "Young master Lin, what should we do about these people?"


    Once again, they felt the sense of dangere over them and they lowered their heads once again.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about them.


    While he felt that this neatly dressed person was being a bit pushy with this matter, he knew that this was because of the orders that he received. He was most likely told to please Lin Fan in any way that he could and he had seen how the guards had treated him, so for him, this was an easy way to leave a good impression on Lin Fan.


    But that wasn''t what Lin Fan wanted since he wanted to keep a low profile.


    He knew that these guards were soldiers in the royal army and even if the noble family behind the Swift Lightning Gang could keep things under wraps, he didn''t want to do anything to these guards. After all, he would be creating bad rtions if he were to do anything to these guards and at the same time¡­


    The real goal of the neatly dressed man was to indirectly make Lin Fan more reliant on the family behind him.


    If the family behind him took care of this matter, the royal guards would know that Lin Fan was rted to that family. If Lin Fan''s cooperation with that family broke down and rtions between them were shattered, then the royal guards would be able to take revenge on Lin Fan.


    This was all a ploy to push Lin Fan closer to the family behind him.


    But Lin Fan just said, "I just want to get to the store as soon as possible, I don''t care about this ce at all."


    Since Lin Fan had spoken, the neatly dressed man could onlyply with him and he guided him out of this building.


    Behind them, all of the guards let out a sigh of relief and at the same time, they felt a bit of gratitude towards Lin Fan. After all, if it wasn''t for him, none of them would have survived today.


    However, after calming down, they couldn''t help wondering who that young man was.


    He was someone that even someone from that family had to be polite to, so why did hee from the slums?


    Could it be that something was happening that they didn''t know about?


    When they thought of this, they immediately stopped thinking about it further and returned to their jobs.


    There was nothing for them to gain from getting involved in this matter, so they chose to turn a blind eye and forget everything.


    But not all the guards were like this.


    Some of the guards were spies for some noble families and they had taken note of this matter.

 Chapter 838 Moving (3)

    After leaving the building, the neatly dressed man brought Lin Fan and Xin''er to a beast carriage that had been waiting outside.


    At first Xin''er was surprised to see therge tigers that were pulling this carriage, but she had the curiosity of a child and she quickly warmed up to the tigers. If it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s insistence, she might have even wanted to ride on the back of the tiger.


    They sat down in the carriage and headed off to their destination.


    While they were traveling in the carriage, the neatly dressed man finally had a chance to introduce himself.


    His name was Dongfang Ming and it turned out that he wasn''t just here to wee Lin Fan, but also to help him with anything that he needed with the new store.


    It seemed like the Dongfang Family, the noble family behind the Swift Lightning Gang, really did invest a lot into this. They were even willing to send one of their subordinates that they allowed to use the same surname as them to help Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan could tell that this Dongfang Ming wasn''t weak at all, he was someone who was in the Peak True Soul Realm. It could even be said that he was already a single step into the World Realm and only needed that one opportunity to break through.


    Seeing this kind of sincerity, naturally Lin Fan was loved and he had a much better impression of the Dongfang Family.


    It wouldn''t have taken them long to arrive at the store, but before they could, there was an incident that happened along the way.


    While they were driving through the streets of the capital, Xin''er had been staring out the window at the views. This was her first time seeing all of this, so it was normal for a child like her to be this curious.


    Even Lin Fan had never seen a city as prosperous as this, so he couldn''t help being curious. But he wasn''t a child like Xin''er, so he couldn''t stick his head out with Dongfang Ming here as well.


    So all he did was secretly nce out the window.


    While they were heading through the streets, Xin''er suddenly called out, "Look out!"


    Both Lin Fan and Dongfang Ming were surprised to hear this and immediately turned to look in Xin''er''s direction.


    After a few seconds of being surprised and seeing that Xin''er was about to jump out of the carriage, Lin Fan went over to stop her while Dongfang Ming went to tell the driver to stop.


    Lin Fan caught Xin''er right before she could jump out and asked, "Xin''er, what''s wrong?"


    Xin''er quickly turned around and said while pointing at an alley, "Big brother Lin, someone''s in danger over there! We need to go save them!"


    Lin Fan looked over at the alley with a confused look but seeing how anxious Xin''er looked, he still decided to get out of the carriage and head over to the alley to check it out.


    Dongfang Ming was about toe forward as he said, "Young master Lin, perhaps..."


    But before he could finish, Lin Fan raised a hand and said, "It''s fine, I''ll handle it."


    Dongfang Ming clearly had more that he wanted to say based on the look on his face, but since Lin Fan had already spoken, there wasn''t anything that he could say. The only thing that he could do was follow behind them to make sure that they were safe.


    However, while they were heading over, Lin Fan had Brainy secretly check the alley with her spiritual sense.


    Brainy''s spiritual senses were stronger than Lin Fan''s, so she was able to see right into the alley. She confirmed that there wasn''t anyone that he couldn''t face inside of there at all.


    In fact, there wasn''t even anyone in the Soul Realm that was inside of the alley.


    When they walked in, Xin''er anxiously pulled Lin Fan''s hand, but he stood there scouting out the situation in the alley first.


    To his surprise, it was nothing more than a few thugs who had dragged a young boy into the alley.


    This kind of thing wasmon even in his previous world, not to mention this kind of cultivation world. It really wasn''t something that he had ever cared about.


    However, it was clear that Xin''er cared about this very much since she kept pulling at his arm and pointing at the scene in the alley. It was clear that she wanted him to do something to help the boy.


    Lin Fan patted her on the head before giving a sigh.


    Even though she had been raised in that kind of environment, she was still able to keep this kind of kindness. It really could be considered a miracle and Lin Fan wasn''t willing to let her lose this.


    So with another sigh, Lin Fan stood out from where he had been and he walked over towards the thugs. While he was moving out, he made sure to give a hand signal to Dongfang Ming.


    Dongfang Ming gave a nod to show that he understood before moving beside Xin''er.


    He wasn''t worried that these thugs would be able to do anything to Lin Fan since he could already sense their cultivation. He had already read the report about what Lin Fan had done in the slum city, so he didn''t doubt Lin Fan''s strength.


    The thugs didn''t notice Lin Fan approaching at all, but the boy being beaten up did since he was facing Lin Fan.<sub> </sub>


    He couldn''t help being surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, but he also couldn''t do anything since he was still being beaten up by these thugs.


    Lin Fan came up behind these thugs without a sound and then he brought his arms around their neck. He leaned forward and said, "How about we leave things here?"


    All of the thugs suddenly turned in the direction of this voice that appeared out of nowhere and revealed looks of shock.


    Not a single one of them had sensed Lin Fan approaching just now. If he had wanted, he could have killed them all without making a single sound.


    The thugs all moved away from him, putting distance to allow themselves to react if he did anything. The two thugs that he held also tried to do the same thing, but they found that they couldn''t move at all as he held onto them.


    They tried pulling out their weapons to attack him while his arms were around them, but before they could even react, all they could see was darkness.


    That was because Lin Fan had knocked their heads together and had knocked them out.


    All the thugs immediately pulled out their weapons when they saw this and pointed them all at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before saying, "Like I said, I want to end things here. There''s no need to be like this."


    But it was clear that not a single one of these thugs believed his words since not a single one of them lowered their weapons.


    After a moment of silence, Lin Fan just gave a sigh and said, "Alright, since you won''t listen, then don''t me me for being impolite."


    The thugs felt a chill run down their spine at the end of these words, but Lin Fan didn''t give them a chance to react at all. He disappeared from where he had been standing and when he reappeared again, he was standing in front of the boy on the ground.


    All the thugs turned to look in his direction, but before they could fully turn, all of their visions turned dark and they fell to the ground.


    All of the thugs here were only in the tinum Realm, so there was no chance that they would be able to react to Lin Fan''s speed, let alone take a hit from him.


    After he had taken care of the thugs, Lin Fan reached his hand down to the boy and asked, "Are you alright?"


    The boy couldn''t respond since he still hadn''t been able to react to what had just happened.


    One moment these things had been beating him up and the next, these thugs were all unconscious on the ground.


    Just who was this man in front of him?


    The boy looked up at Lin Fan in a daze after this thought passed through his mind.


    Seeing that the boy wasn''t reacting at all, Lin Fan picked him up by the cor and helped him up.


    It was at this time that Xin''er ran over and started looking all over the boy as she asked, "Are you alright? Where does it hurt?"


    The boy was once again surprised by the sudden appearance of this girl and in his daze, he replied, "It''s fine, it''s nothing that I''m not used to."


    Xin''er still had a worried look on her face as she turned to look at Lin Fan with a pleading look.


    Lin Fan shook his head and gave another sigh, but he really couldn''t say no if Xin''er were to look at him like this.


    So he raised his hand and there was a pill that appeared in it.


    He tossed the pill over to the boy and said, "Eat this. It''ll heal you up."


    The boy was barely able to catch it and came close to dropping it, but he still caught it in the end. However, even after catching it, he didn''t eat it right away and instead looked at it with a doubtful look.


    Xin''er revealed a slightly angry look when she saw this, so she took the pill and stuffed it in the boy''s mouth as she said, "Eat it! Big brother Lin already said that it''s good for you!"


    The boy was stunned, but he also couldn''t stop himself from swallowing the pill.


    After swallowing the pill, he wanted to spit it out since he wasn''t sure if it was poison or not. But then he felt the pill going to work and starting to heal all his wounds.


    It didn''t take long before all his wounds had beenpletely healed.


    He then looked up at Lin Fan with a look of respect as he asked, "Who are you?"

 Chapter 839 No Good Deed Is Unpunished

    Lin Fan just waved his hand and said, "Who I am isn''t important. I was just passing by and saw that someone needed help, nothing more, nothing less."


    Lin Fan ignored the boy''s looks of awe and took Xin''er''s hand as he said, "Let''s go Xin''er, we still have other things to do."


    Seeing that they were about to leave, the boy suddenly came forward to grab Lin Fan by the leg and said, "Wait, please don''t go! If you go now, I won''t be able to save my little sister!"


    When Xin''er heard this, her eyes turned soft and she also looked at Lin Fan with big pleading eyes as she said, "Big brother Lin, how about we listen to what he has to say? We shouldn''t just leave him alone like this."


    Lin Fan looked at her and couldn''t help shaking his head again.


    But it wasn''t as if he could say no to her¡­


    So he turned to look in Dongfang Ming''s direction for help, but all he got was a helpless look as well. Dongfang Ming spread his hands and just shook his head as if saying that he couldn''t do anything either.


    Lin Fan cursed him under his breath since it was clear that he was having fun at his expense. However, since he was the one that had gone along with Xin''er''s whims, he couldn''t stop now.


    So with one more sigh, he said, "Alright, we''ll listen to what he has to say."


    The boy''s eyes lit up when he heard this and he looked at Xin''er with a grateful look. However, when his eyes turned to Xin''er, all he could do was look at her with a stunned look.


    That was because he had beenpletely smited by Xin''er''s beauty¡­


    He just stood there in a daze, even forgetting to breathe as he looked right at her with a blush on his face.


    Xin''er could see the strangeness with him, so she reached out a hand after seeing his red face and she said, "Are you alright? Do you have a fever?"


    But before she could reach out to touch his forehead, Lin Fan stepped in between the two of them.


    He could also see the look on the boy''s face and he wouldn''t let it happen.


    Xin''er was surprised to see Lin Fan suddenly standing in front of her, so she asked, "Big brother Lin, what''s wrong?"


    Lin Fan had been facing Xin''er, but he casually turned to the boy as he said, "Let me take a look at him instead, I''m better at this kind of stuff."


    Xin''er gave a nod when she heard this since she believed that Lin Fan could do anything.


    The boy heard this and was about to say something, but then he swallowed his words when Lin Fan''s cold gaze fell onto him.


    Lin Fan said with a smile that didn''t have any warmth in his eyes at all, "Now stand still and let me take a look."


    He then pretended to look over the boy, but what he was actually doing was poking the boy in ces where it ached.


    Even if the pill had cured most of his external injuries, there were still internal injuries below the surfaces that hadn''t been cured yet. After all, the pill that Lin Fan gave the boy wasn''t a top grade pill.


    He wasn''t going to waste a top grade pill on some random kid, so he just gave him a regr pill. Of course, a regr pill for someone like Lin Fan was considered a top grade pill for someone like the boy.


    That was just their difference in world views.


    The boy''s eyes teared up from being poked all over by Lin Fan, but as he sneaked peeks at Xin''er, he didn''t make a single sound to show that he was in pain.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a sigh when he saw this.


    It seemed like no good deed went unpunished¡­


    The hero saving a beauty was amon trope in his previous life, but it was amon trope for a reason.


    That was because it was effective!


    This was amon trope because it worked most of the time!


    Even now, this trope was bearing its ugly head.


    Well instead of calling it the hero saving the beauty, it was better to say that it was the beauty saving the¡­No, this kid really couldn''t be considered a hero with the way he looked.


    But it was clear by the way that he looked at Xin''er what he felt towards her.


    Luckily Lin Fan didn''t see the same look in Xin''er''s eyes or he would have taken care of this kid right then and there.


    He wanted to set his eyes on Xin''er,e back in a million years!


    He also heard Dongfang Ming secretlyughing at his misfortune on the side. He couldn''t help seeing this neatly dressed man in apletely different light.<sub> </sub>


    It seemed that under that neat out exterior, there was quite the trickster that liked ying jokes¡­but he did like this personality better than the stiff one from before.


    This was more the personality that he liked.


    So he also secretly red at Dongfang Ming and whispered, "Watch how I get you backter."


    Dongfang Ming revealed a bitter smile, but the smile in his eyes wasn''t bitter at all.


    He also had a new impression of Lin Fan and he quite liked this one better than the stiff one from before.


    Through this ident, they were slowly getting closer to one another.


    After pretending to check the boy for a few minutes, Lin Fan finally felt like he had vented his anger and said, "He''s fine, there''s nothing wrong with him."


    Xin''er let out a sigh of relief before saying to the boy, "Isn''t that good?"


    The boy nodded in a daze before suddenly remembering something and saying, "We can''t waste any time here, we have to go save my little sister."


    He grabbed Lin Fan by the arm and started pulling him, but Lin Fan wouldn''t budge at all.


    The boy turned back to look at Lin Fan with an anxious and pleading look, but Lin Fan wasn''t moved by this at all. Instead, it was Xin''er''s look that moved him.


    Still he didn''t move as he looked right back at her and said, "We don''t even know what happened yet, how can we rush into this?"


    Xin''er looked like she realized something before she nodded along in agreement. She looked over at the boy and said, "This big brother, how about we calm down first?"


    It waspletely different when Xin''er spoke. When the boy heard this, he no longer tried to rush along and obediently stood there.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help ring at the boy again, but this time the boy didn''t flinch as he stared right back at Lin Fan.


    So Lin Fan asked, "Tell me your story and what happened to your little sister."


    The boy had a slightly unwilling look since he didn''t want to do what Lin Fan told him to do, but he had no other choice, so he began telling his story.


    It was quite amon story in fact. This boy was an orphan and so was his "little sister", even though she wasn''t really his biological little sister and they only met by chance.


    The men who had beaten him up were from a loan shark that the boy had borrowed some money from and they were beating him up because he couldn''t pay his loan. At the same time, they had also taken away his little sister to sell since they couldn''t get their money from him.


    As for the reason why he borrowed money from them in the first ce, it was because he needed money to buy medicine for his little sister.


    Lin Fan had heard so many stories like this that he was almost tired of listening to them, but that wasn''t the case with Xin''er. For someone like her who had grown up sheltered by her grandfather, she didn''t know about this kind of stuff.


    In fact, since his situation was simr to her and her grandfather''s, it actually invoked even more sympathy in her.


    So Xin''er turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Big brother Lin, can we help him?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before saying, "Xin''er, if we help everyone we meet, do you think that we can help everyone in the world?"


    ''


    Xin''er lowered her head when she heard this and didn''t say anything.


    But Lin Fan then said, "However, we''ll help him this time since we''ve already helped him. Good people don''t stop helping just because things get hard, understand?" After saying this, he patted Xin''er on the head since he could see that she was sad over this matter.


    Xin''er''s face immediately lit up as she looked up at Lin Fan and said, "Un! I know that big brother Lin is the best!"


    The boy saw all this and couldn''t help feeling his heart sink. When he turned to look at Lin Fan, there was a challenging and aggressive look in his eyes.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care as he looked back at the boy with acent look.


    From an outsider''s point of view, it was almost as if there were two children fighting here.


    However, after ying with the boy for a bit, Lin Fan picked him up and said, "Alright, stop ying around and bring us to loan shark den."


    He walked over to the carriage and asked Dongfang Ming, "I''m sure that you don''t mind, do you?"


    Dongfang Ming just gave a sigh and spread his hands as he said, "Can I even say no at this point?"


    Lin Fan just answered with a smile.

 Chapter 840 Employees (1)

    The boy was shocked to see how luxurious the beast carriage was, but then he quickly gave the location of the loan shark den to the driver.


    This was a driver that worked for the Dongfang Family, so naturally he was skilled. As soon as he heard where it was, he had already found the best route and had already started moving the beast carriage.


    As they were heading along the way, they finally learned the name of the boy.


    This boy was called Xiao Tu and his little sister was called Fei''er.


    He didn''t introduce himself to Lin Fan or Dongfang Ming, he only introduced himself to Xin''er.


    Xin''er was very trusting since that was the personality that she had, so she didn''t sense any other intentions other than friendship from Xiao Tu. In a sense, it could even be said that she was turning him down since she saw him as nothing more than a friend.


    But Xiao Tu didn''t give up as he tried to get closer to Xin''er.


    He did things such as trying to sit closer to her, trying to hold her hand, or trying to bring up different conversations with her. If one didn''t know better, they would have thought that he wasn''t interested in saving his little sister at all.


    However, he didn''t get far since Lin Fan cut him off each time.


    No matter how he attempted to get closer to Xin''er, Lin Fan didn''t give him any breathing room at all. He would always take away Xin''er''s attention and then turn to Xiao Tu with a smug look.


    This smug look filled Xiao Tu with rage, but he couldn''t vent it since he knew that he still needed Lin Fan''s help to save his little sister.


    So the only thing that he could do was try other ways to get Xin''er''s attention.


    This created an endless cycle of Xiao Tu trying to approach Xin''er only to be blocked by Lin Fan.


    It was just a good thing that it didn''t take them long to arrive at the location that Xiao Tu gave them.


    When they arrived, they found that it didn''t look like a loan shark business at all. Rather, this ce seemed like a very proper office building.


    Even the lobby was very professional andpletely opposite of what a normal shark loan or gang office would look like.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help raising a brow as he asked Xiao Tu, "Are you sure that this is the ce?"


    Xiao Tu nodded before looking in with an anxious look on his face.


    Lin Fan turned to Dongfang Ming who after a moment''s pause said, "Alright, alright, let me take a look at this ce."


    After saying this, Dongfang Ming raised his hand to use his wristwatch and he opened up a few pages that Lin Fan couldn''t see clearly. After he flipped through a few of these pages, he finally said, "There''s indeed a ce of ill repute here, but it''s registered as a proper business that is renting the fifth floor."


    Lin Fan then asked, "Is there a way to get in there secretly?"


    Dongfang Ming gave a shrug and said, "Do you think that I really know everything about this ce? This is just a small part of the city that I normally wouldn''t evene to, so it''s not as if I know if there''s a secret entrance to this random building."


    Lin Fan nodded without any embarrassment since he already expected this, but it never hurt to ask.


    Xiao Tu anxiously said, "What do we do then? Should we just go in and meet them?"


    As he said this, he had already started moving towards the entrance of the building, but Lin Fan grabbed him before he could get too far away.


    He anxiously turned back to Lin Fan and asked, "What do you want? Can''t you see that this is an urgent situation?"


    Lin Fan flicked him on the forehead and said, "What urgent situation? They haven''t even moved from their office yet."


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with surprised looks when they heard this.


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug and didn''t exin how he knew this before he focused his attention on the Brainy''s puppets. While they had been talking just now, he had already sent Brainy''s puppets in to check the ce.


    Brainy''s puppets had already spread throughout the building and once he knew that they were on the fifth floor, he had the puppets there start monitoring the situation. It didn''t take them long to find the little girl that was being held captive, but strangely it wasn''t just one little girl.


    It was five little girls all being held captive in one room.


    After making sure that nothing dangerous was around them, Lin Fan turned back to Xiao Tu and narrowed his eyes to say, "Have you been telling us the truth?"


    Everyone was taken aback by this and they turned to look at Xiao Tu who just stood there in a daze. After a few seconds of shock, Xiao Tu asked in a dazed voice, "What, what do you mean?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this question and narrowed his eyes even more as he said, "If you''re lying to us, then I don''t think there''s a reason for us to help you anymore."


    Xiao Tu jolted when he heard this and he said, "Didn''t you say that a good person would help to the end? Are you afraid of doing that now?"


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort and released his aura to suppress Xiao Tu as he said, "A good person doesn''t let themselves fall into a trap for no good reason. If you''re not willing to tell us the truth, then I see no reason to help you."


    With this, he took Xin''er''s hand and turned to leave without any hesitation.


    Xin''er was about to say something, but seeing the way that Lin Fan looked at her, she just fell silent and followed behind him. But it was clear by the look on her face that she wasn''t willing.


    There was no need to mention Dongfang Ming since his only task was to follow Lin Fan and help him with what he needed. If Lin Fan wanted to save this kid''s little sister, he would follow him. If Lin Fan didn''t want to save this kid''s little sister, there would be no sweat off his back since he didn''t care about this in the first ce.


    Seeing that Lin Fan really was leaving just like this, Xiao Tu began to panic and he immediately ran forward to grab Lin Fan by the leg as he said, "I really didn''t lie about anything! I swear that all I want is your help to save my little sister!"


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort and ignored him, but Xin''er couldn''t ignore him any longer. She stopped moving and said, "Big brother Lin, what''s wrong?"


    It was only when Xin''er stopped that Lin Fan also stopped. Hepletely ignored Xiao Tu who was grabbing his leg and said to Xin''er, "Xin''er, we don''t need to help this kind of person that lies to get what they want."


    Xiao Tu couldn''t help shaking again when he heard this and then he quickly said, "What do you mean by that? When have I ever lied?"


    Lin Fan looked down at him with a cold gaze that made Xiao Tu suddenly shrink back when it fell onto him.


    Normally he wouldn''t even bother with this kind of person since he knew that there was nothing good that woulde from associating with them. If it wasn''t for the fact that Xiao Tu was also a kid, he would have personally taken care of this person for trying to trick him.


    But since Xin''er was also here, he decided that he would turn this into a learning opportunity for Xin''er.


    Lin Fan said in a cold voice, "He lied about it just being his little sister being trapped here. There were five girls that were being held captive in the office in total."


    After he said this, Xin''er turned to look at Xiao Tu again, but this time her eyes were filled with doubt and confusion.


    Xiao Tu heard this and revealed an awkward look.


    Lin Fan continued, "For all we know, he could be working with them. Everything from before could have been a trap to pull in innocent girls like you and then kidnap them like they did with the rest of the girls."


    Xiao Tu immediately denied this by saying, "I would never do that! I swear that I''m not with them!"


    Lin Fan just gave a cold snort in response to this.


    Xiao Tu had a very awkward look on his face for a long time, but in the end, he took a deep breath and said, "All five of them are my little sisters. I didn''t say anything because I thought that it would scare you away. After all, saving five people is very different from just saving one person."


    Lin Fan gave another cold snort in response to this. It was clear that he didn''t believe it.


    He was about to turn around again and leave, but Xin''er still wouldn''t follow him. So he had no choice but to turn to her to exin why they shouldn''t trust someone like Xiao Tu, but before he could say anything, she spoke first.


    Xin''er looked right into Lin Fan''s eyes and said, "Big brother Lin, no matter what, whether he is telling the truth or not, there are still five girls who are being held hostage inside of this building. Can we really just leave them like this?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback by Xin''er''s words, but he knew that he couldn''t deny them.

 Chapter 841 Employees (2)

    After a long pause, Lin Fan finally gave a sigh and said, "Alright, we''ll save them for you."


    Then he turned to Xiao Tu and said in a cold voice with a cold re, "As for you...We''ll see what the truth is after we save those girls and you''ll get what you deserve."


    Xiao Tu gave a gulp as he felt a chill run down his spine, but he still had a trace of relief in his eyes as he could tell that Lin Fan was still going to make his move and save the girls.


    Xiao Tu just gave a grateful nod and said, "As long as you save my little sisters, you can do whatever you want with me."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at Xiao Tu.


    For some reason, it seemed like Xiao Tu wasn''t lying to him which confused him slightly.


    But for now, none of that mattered.


    Xin''er was right, there were five little girls who needed their help right now and that was the most important thing. Whether Xiao Tu was telling the truth or not wasn''t important right now.


    That didn''t mean that he would trust Xiao Tu.


    So with a flick of his hand, there were vines that suddenly came out of the ground and wrapped around Xiao Tu.


    Xiao Tu was shocked to see this, but he wasn''t able to do a single thing since this was something that Lin Fan did. There was the disparity in cultivation, so he could only watch as the vines wrapped around him.


    But with thest bit of strength that he had, he said, "Please, please save them."


    Xin''er looked at Lin Fan with big wide eyes, but Lin Fan still had a cold look on his face as he didn''t trust Xiao Tu. In his eyes, this was nothing more than ast attempt to save himself by appealing to their heart.


    That didn''t mean that he wouldn''t save the girls since Xin''er was right. He could tell that they were indeed being held captive by the loan sharks and they were innocent, so he would do what he could to save them.


    It was easy for him to take care of them since he had already sent his puppets in.


    With Brainy''s new cultivation, she could easily send her vines through the entire building and with the puppets ying as eyes for her, she could easily find anyone that was hiding.


    So with this, Lin Fan let Brainy out and let her do her thing.


    Dongfang Ming couldn''t help being surprised by the appearance of Brainy, but he didn''t say a thing since he knew that this wasn''t something that he should ask about.


    Brainy released her spiritual sense that linked up with all the puppets in the building and soon she was able to see everything that was happening inside.


    The leader of the loan sharks was nothing more than someone in the Fragmented Soul Realm, so there was nothing to worry about in terms of strength. The only thing that he would have to worry about is if there was anyone behind these loan sharks.


    After all, to establish this kind of business in the capital, it was certain that there was someone behind these loan sharks.


    Lin Fan didn''t have the ability to investigate this since he didn''t have any foundations set up in the capital at all. However, that didn''t mean that he was helpless when it came to this.


    So he turned to Dongfang Ming with a meaningful look that Dongfang Ming immediately understood.


    After a moment to think about it, Dongfang Ming said, "Young master Lin, you should know that there''s an unspoken rule in the capital and your request is asking me to break that unspoken rule."


    Lin Fan didn''t want to beat around the bush with him, so he said, "Consider it as doing a favour for me."


    As expected, Dongfang Ming''s face lit up the moment that he heard this and he immediately said, "Very good! With young master Lin''s words, then I''m much more assured."


    He opened up his wrist watch again and with just a few simple flicks of his hand, he turned back to say, "It''s done. You can go as wild as you want now."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before turning back to Brainy.


    Brainy had been waiting for this confirmation from Lin Fan and now that she had received it, there was no reason for her to hold back anymore.


    With a single thought, the vines that had spread all over the building suddenly came out of the floor and walls of the fifth floor.


    The loan sharks that had been inside their offices were shocked to see vines suddenly popping out all around them, but they weren''t able to react at all as the vines wrapped them up. Even the boss of the loan sharks couldn''t do a thing as he was suddenly wrapped up and trapped by these vines.


    The five girls that were being held captive in a supply room also weren''t spared this fate, but that was more to protect them than to hurt them.


    The vines that Brainy controlled could be used to protect and to attack. These were vines that were created from Brainy''s life energy andws, so they were much stronger than normal vines.


    Just as how the people inside couldn''t break free, the people outside also couldn''t break them, which made them perfect for protecting people as well.


    Once the girls were trapped in vines, Brainy pulled them out of the building with the vine system that she had created and brought them in front of Lin Fan. At the same time, there was also a muchrger vine mummy that was carried out.


    When they were ced in front of Lin Fan, the vines around the five girls suddenly shrank back before disappearing.


    The girls that had been exposed to the sudden light after being trapped in the dark closet squinted their eyes and took a while to adjust. However, when they did and saw Lin Fan standing over them, they immediately started trembling and moving back.


    Xin''er was the one who acted first before Lin Fan could and came up to the girls to take their hands as she said, "It''s alright, you''re safe now."


    Perhaps they wouldn''t have believed it if it was Lin Fan who said it, but seeing this girl who was around the same age as themforting them, the effect was quite good.


    The girls stopped trembling and trying to run away, but they still looked at Lin Fan with a wary look.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he had already expected this. He just gave a flick of his hand and the vine covered mummy that was Xiao Tu was suddenly thrown in front of the girls.


    Seeing this bundle of vines being thrown at their feet, the girls suddenly jumped back and looked at it with a fearful look. But when it was opened to reveal Xiao Tu, they all revealed surprised and worried looks as they said, "Big brother!"


    All of them suddenly ran forward and anxiously looked over Xiao Tu''s body, looking for any injuries.


    Xiao Tu was currently unconscious because his body had finally run out of adrenaline. He had already been running on his fumes when he was being beaten by the thugs, the only thing that had kept him going was his desire to save his little sisters.


    But then when he was trapped in the vines with nothing to do, even if his mind was unwilling, he couldn''t stop his body from shutting down.


    Of course, he wasn''t dead or heavily injured since Lin Fan had already cured him with a pill. He was just currently in a deep sleep to recover the energy that hecked.


    After the girls made sure that there was nothing wrong with Xiao Tu, they came in front of him and red at Lin Fan as if they were trying to protect him from Lin Fan. One of them also asked, "What did you do to our big brother? If you did anything bad to him, we won''t forgive you!"


    Lin Fan didn''t care about this threat at all as he turned his attention to the other person wrapped up in the vines.


    With a wave of his hand, the vines receded and the person inside was revealed. This person was the boss of the loan sharks who looked every single bit of a stereotypical gangster.


    This boss was shocked to suddenly see the light and looked around him in a daze before finally noticing Lin Fan. He scooched back a bit on his butt and said in a cautious voice, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan ignored this and pointed at Xiao Tu as he said, "Do you know this person?"


    The boss waspletely confused as to what was happening, but hearing the pressure in Lin Fan''s voice, he didn''t dare act up at all. After all, he had seen his subordinates being wrapped up in the vines before they also wrapped him up, he knew that the person in front of him was an expert.


    So he turned to look at Xiao Tu and honestly said, "I don''t know this person at all, I have nothing to do with this person!"


    Seeing the look in his eyes, Lin Fan could tell that he wasn''t lying. It seemed like Xiao Tu really wasn''t working with the loan sharks and he had been telling the truth.


    So Lin Fan no longer had a need for these loan sharks.


    Before the loan shark boss could say anything else, Lin Fan waved his hand and the vines wrapped around him before pulling him away again.

 Chapter 842 Employees (3)

    Lin Fan could have easily killed him there on the spot, but he didn''t want to show Xin''er and the other girls this kind of violence.


    So he had Brainy pull the loan shark boss away to throw back into the pool of blood that was the office on the fifth floor.


    After the loan shark boss arrived, he was killed the same way as the rest of his subordinates.


    There were thorns that suddenly appeared on the vines that wrapped around him. After these thorns appeared, the vines started wrapping around the loan shark boss tighter and tighter until he had been pierced all over by the spikes and squeezed into a pile of flesh and blood.


    Even to the veryst second, the loan shark boss tried everything to escape, which caused all kinds of bloody marks to be left on the vines.


    After the vines had killed the loan shark boss, they released his corpse that dropped onto the floor with the rest of his subordinates, lying in that pool of flesh, blood, and vines together.


    The one who discovered all of thister couldn''t help emptying their stomach of their lunch because the scene in front of them was like a scene from hell. But that was a story for another time.


    Outside of the building, Lin Fan stood in front of Xiao Tu and the five girls who put him behind them, just looking them over as if he was trying to decide what to do with them.


    The girls would have tried to run away, but they were still weak from having been captured and held for so long by those loan sharks. The only thing that they could do was stand firm in front of Xiao Tu who was still lying on the ground.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan finally took a step forward.


    The girls were shocked by this sudden movement from him and tried their best to block him, but they were just too short for that.


    These girls were actually much shorter than normal because of theck of nutrition that they were getting, so Lin Fan was able to easily see over them even though they did their best to cover up Xiao Tu behind them.


    He casually raised his hand and with a single flick, there was a ball of water that was thrown onto Xiao Tu''s face.


    The girls were all shocked to see this, but then they angrily looked at Lin Fan like he was their enemy.


    But that didn''tst long since Xiao Tu woke up after being sshed in the face.


    Lin Fan had added a bit of lifews into that ball of water, so it gave Xiao Tu energy to allow him to wake up.


    He sat up with a stunned look on his face as he was confused why he had suddenly been sshed in the face with water. However, after seeing that he woke up, the girlspletely forgot about their anger towards Lin Fan and surrounded him with worried looks.


    Seeing the girls around him, Xiao Tu said in a shocked voice, "Fei''er, Yu''er, Ying''er, Xue''er, Ling''er, you''re all safe!"


    The girls dived into his embrace and hugged him as tightly as they could as the only thing that they could say was, "Un."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help sneaking a peek at Xin''er as this happened and as he had expected, there was a sad look on Xin''er''s face as she watched them hugging.


    Lin Fan knew what she was thinking, but he didn''t say anything.


    All he did was move beside her and pat her on the head.


    Xin''er looked up at Lin Fan and then after shaking her head, she revealed a smile to show that she was fine. However, Lin Fan could still see the trace of sadness that was in her eyes.


    It was clear that there were some scars on her heart that only time could erase.


    Still for now, all he could do was support her.


    After they hugged for a while, Xiao Tu finally released the girls and turned to Lin Fan. Even though there was a clear unwilling look on his face, he still bowed his head and said, "Thank you for keeping your promise and saving my little sisters. If there is anything that you need, please tell me."


    The girls could understand the situation based on the way that Xiao Tu was acting, so even if they still looked at Lin Fan with a somewhat hostile look, they also bowed their hands and thanked him.


    Lin Fan just gave a nod before saying, "Is there anything that a kid like you could even do for me?"


    Xiao Tu''s mouth twitched before he said, "Regardless, I have to show my gratitude in some way."


    The girls clearly looked like they thought otherwise, but it was a fact that Lin Fan had been the one that had saved them. So they could only look at Lin Fan as they waited for him to speak, but the looks on their faces were clear.


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "Alright, you''lle and work for me then."


    All of the kids revealed surprised and confused looks as they looked at Lin Fan, trying to understand what he had just said.


    Lin Fan said, "You''ll be an attendant at my store along with your little sisters, but be warned that it isn''t easy work. However, it''s a job that will include board and food, so you don''t need to worry about anything else."


    The kids all looked at each other with confused looks, but then it was Xin''er who jumped up and hugged Lin Fan by the neck as she said, "I knew that big brother Lin was the best."


    After finally snapping out of his shock, there was first a trace of anger in his eyes from seeing Xin''er hug Lin Fan before he asked in a hesitant voice, "Are you sure? We''re just a bunch of orphans, there''s nothing special about us."


    Lin Fan smacked Xiao Tu on the head and said, "It''s fine if I say it''s fine. What is a kid like you got to worry about? I should be the one who''s worried."


    Before Xiao Tu could respond, the five girls suddenly came forward and stood in between Lin Fan and Xiao Tu as they said, "You can''t bully big brother!"


    Lin Fan just gave a snort before turning to head back to the carriage. As he walked along, he waved his hand and said, "Come, let''s go." But then he realized something and with a wave of his hand, there were a few beasts that appeared beside the girls.


    These beasts helped these girls up and carried them over to the beast carriage.


    Seeing that Xiao Tu was just standing there in a daze, Xin''er turned back and waved her hand at him, "Let''s go!"


    Xiao Tu jolted awake when he heard this and after another moment of hesitation, he also ran after them with a faint smile on his face. Though he did his best to hide that smile and reveal a begrudging look.


    The only one who really had a bitter smile on his face was Dongfang Ming.


    After they had gotten in the beast carriage, the kids all ran over to the window to look out.


    It was the first time riding in a beast carriage like this for Xiao Tu and the girls, so naturally they were very excited about being here. They didn''t want to spend a single moment away from the window.


    Xin''er was also caught up in this excitement, along with her excitement of having new friends her age, so she stayed with them the whole time.


    There was only Dongfang Ming and Lin Fan who were sitting across from each other.


    Lin Fan could clearly see that Dongfang Ming was unhappy about something, so he asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Dongnfang Ming hesitated a bit as he looked at the kids before saying, "Was there a need to hire them for the store? If you needed employees, I could have helped you find some that were much morepetent."


    Of course, that wasn''t his main goal in helping Lin Fan hire employees.


    He wanted to imnt spies in Lin Fan''s shop through this matter and increase Lin Fan''s dependence on their Dongfang Family, so losing this chance was something that he was clearly unhappy about.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about this since he had never nned on asking Dongfang Ming for help with this in the first ce.


    However, after what happened just now and with Dongfang Ming''s help, it would be hard for him to say no.


    Lin Fan stuck with his decision to hire these kids though since he didn''t hire them just so they could help with the store. The main reason he hired them was because he could see that they didn''t have any evil intentions and they were kids around the same age as Xin''er, so he wanted them to be friends with her.


    The wounds in her heart were quite deep, so she would need time to heal them. Of course, having good friends by her side would also help her heal faster.


    Lin Fan said, "I still do need a few more employees, so I''ll have to ask you for your help."


    Dongfang Ming''s bitter look disappeared when he heard this and he said with sparkling eyes, "Oh, how many do you need?"


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "Just one or two, I still like my store being my store."


    Dongfang Ming revealed a slightly surprised look, but he gave a nod in response without saying anything else.

 Chapter 843 Wife

    When the beast carriage arrived at the store, even Lin Fan was surprised by the building, let alone the kids.


    If this building had been ced in Lin Fan''s previous world, it wouldn''t have just been considered a store. Rather this was already big enough to be considered a mall!


    It seemed like the Dongfang Family really had gone all out for him, which caused Lin Fan to knit his brows.


    When Dongfang Ming saw the look on Lin Fan''s face, he thought that he was dissatisfied with something, so he asked, "If this is still too small, we can buy the surrounding buildings and make it bigger."


    Lin Fan looked at Dongfang Ming with three ck lines on his forehead and he couldn''t respond right away.


    Buy the surrounding buildings and make it bigger?


    This really was the finances and influence of a noble family, they could do anything they wanted in a second grade business street like this.


    In the end, Lin Fan said, "No need, no need, this ce is more than big enough."


    Dongfang Ming was surprised when he heard this because as far as he knew, this ce was actually quite smallpared to the usual stores that they bought. This was already the biggest ce on this business street, so it wasn''t as if they could have bought anything bigger, but it was smallpared to their businesses.


    Still, since Lin fan said that it was enough, he wouldn''t question it.


    After Lin Fan entered the store, he was surprised to see theyout of the store itself. It had already been fully furnished and all he needed to do was find some people to man the counters and stock the shelves before being able to open the store.


    But when he saw this, he also couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    That was because he thought that it was such a waste of a perfectly decorated store like this.


    The pet store that Lin Fan opened were anything but normal stores, so this ce wouldn''t look like this for long.


    After he had stepped in, the system had already told him that it had found a suitable ce for the store and it was asking him if he wanted it to decorate the store.


    Of course, Lin Fan couldn''t do that with all these witnesses beside him, so he rejected this request from the system.


    But that didn''t mean that he wouldn''t let the system handle itter when everyone was gone.


    The store didn''t just have a single storefront, there was also an employee dorm and many different facilities that were located in the back. Lin Fan was quite impressed by how thoughtful the Dongfang Family was when they picked out this store for him.


    Since they had spent so long rescuing the girls from the loan sharks, by the time that they had finished going through the store, it was already lunch time.


    It was actually the growls of the stomach from the girls that had reminded them that they still hadn''t eaten yet.


    Lin Fan realized his mistake after hearing this.


    These girls had been held captive for who knows how long, it would be strange if they weren''t hungry.


    But since he didn''t know the area, he left the matter of finding a restaurant to Dongfang Ming.


    The next problem that came was when they entered the restaurant.


    Since this was a restaurant on the second grade business street, it was quite a high end ce. Orphans like Xiao Tu and his little sisters would never have a chance toe to a ce like this, so naturally they didn''t have clothes that were suited foring here.


    So as soon as they came in, the waiter looked at the kids with disdain before saying to Lin Fan, "Sir, please ask your servants to wait outside. This isn''t a ce for them to step foot in."


    Xiao Tu and the five girls all revealed red looks on their faces when they heard this.


    They naturally knew that they didn''t belong in this ce, but they had forgotten in their excitement of being brought to this ce by Lin Fan. It had been their first time riding in that horse carriage, going to this kind of ce, and seeing this kind of scenery, so they had forgotten about everything.


    But now they were reminded of their position by this one sentence from the waiter.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but before he could say anything, it was Dongfang Ming who came forward.


    The waiter was surprised and couldn''t help taking a step back when he saw Dongfang Ming step forward, but he stopped himself as he asked, "Sir, is there a problem?"


    Dongfang Ming narrowed his eyes and said, "I want to speak to your manager."


    The waiter narrowed his eyes as well, but before he could say anything, there was someone that came up behind him.


    It was a well dressed man who clearly looked like he wasn''t a normal person.


    When the waiter saw him, he immediately went to bow, but the well dressed man raised his hand to stop him. Then he looked at Dongfang Ming and said, "Sir, I am the manager here, is there a problem?"


    Dongfang Ming gave a cold snort and said, "Are you the one who came up with that discriminatory policy?"


    The manager narrowed his eyes to look at Dongfang Ming as he said, "Discriminatory? We run our restaurant to the highest standards and that is the standard that should also be expected of our customers. If they can''t even show the most basic¡­"


    The rest of his words were stuck in his throat as he saw the token that Dongfang Ming raised.


    This was a token that almost everyone recognized because it represented a family that no one could offend¡­


    After being stunned for a bit, the manager immediately bowed ny degrees and said, "My lord, I''m sorry for not recognizing you! I will immediately have a table set up for you and I''ll punish this idiot immediately!"


    Dongfang Ming gave another cold snort and said, "No need! Just know who you''ve offended today!"


    He turned and said to Lin Fan and the rest, "Come, let''s go to another ce."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help raising a brow as he looked at Dongfang Ming, but he still followed him while leading the kids out.


    The manager was just left there with a shocked and ugly look on his face before he turned to the waiter and started beating him.


    What Lin Fan didn''t know was that Dongfang Ming was someone who actually loved children. While he had been cold about saving them earlier, that was because he had to do that considering his position.


    But now that they had been saved and Lin Fan was taking care of them, there was no reason why he also couldn''t take care of them.


    It didn''t take them long before they found another restaurant and this time, they were shown a table right away.


    It seemed like the news about Dongfang Ming had traveled quickly and no one dared to offend this person.


    After they finished their meal, Lin Fan brought them back to the store where they were all stunned again.


    That was because during their meal, the inside of the store hadpletely changed.


    Right before they left, Lin Fan had the system start with the renovations, so naturally the store had changed when they returned.


    As the kids ran off to explore this new store, Dongfang Ming couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look. As far as he knew, Lin Fan shouldn''t have known anyone in the city that could do this kind of thing¡­So how had he renovated this store so quickly?


    But since Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything about it, he really couldn''t ask since he had to respect Lin Fan''s privacy.


    So the only thing that he could do was stare at Lin Fan with a strange look which made Lin Fan feel strange.


    Luckily Lin Fan was saved when the door of the store suddenly opened and a beautiful woman came in.


    Lin Fan was surprised by the appearance of this beautiful woman, but then he said, "I''m sorry, our store isn''t open yet. If youe back in a few days, we''ll be d to help you."


    But the beautiful woman didn''t leave after hearing this. Rather she walked up to Dongfang Ming and stood beside him.


    Lin Fan looked at Dongfang Ming with a strange look for a bit before Dongfang Ming exined, "This is my wife, I asked her toe here to help with the kids."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a shocked look as he said, "Wife? This is your wife? You''re married?"


    Dongfang Ming and his wife both revealed strange looks as they looked at Lin Fan. Then Dongfang Ming asked, "Is it that strange that I have a wife?"


    Lin Fan just said with an awkward look, "You''re married at such a young age, isn''t it awkward?"


    Dongfang Ming revealed a confused look at first before suddenly revealing a look of understanding and asking, "How old do you think I am?"


    Lin Fan answered, "Aren''t you in your early twenties?"


    Dongfang Mingughed and said, "I''m already close to two hundred years old, how could I still be that young?"


    "Eh?!" That was Lin Fan''s only response.


    Based on Dongfang Ming''s appearance, he had thought that he was at most twenty years old, but he never expected this¡­


    But after thinking about it, he realized that he had made a mistake.


    He had always been hanging out with young people and he always thought that they were the same as him if they looked to be around the same age. However, when one''s cultivation became higher, they would look younger even if they lived for much longer than a normal person would.


    There were many people who looked to be in their twenties even though they had lived for hundreds of years all because of their high cultivation.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Dongfang Ming''s wife and wondering how old she was. However, he was smart enough to not ask her this question since he could see the dangerous gleam in her eyes when she saw him looking at her.


    In his previous world, there was a saying about not asking a woman her weight or her age. It seemed like this was still the case in this world.


    After introductions were done, Dongfang Ming''s wife brought the five girls and Xin''er up to the employee dorms to wash up.


    As for Xiao Tu, he was just thrown into a bath all by himself since he was old enough to take care of himself.


    When they finally came back down after their baths, Lin Fan and Dongfang Ming both couldn''t help being surprised.

 Chapter 844 Reunion

    There were five angels that appeared in front of the two of them.


    After the five girls had been cleaned up, they hadpletely transformed into angels with their smooth white skin and perfect features along with their big, wide innocent eyes.


    Anyone who saw these girls couldn''t help but want to pamper them.


    Even Dongfang Ming''s wife couldn''t help staring at them with loving looks as she brought them down.


    Xiao Tu on the side waspletely ignored by everyone even though he was quite handsome after cleaning up.


    He seemed like apletely different person from the street urchin that they had saved from the thugs.


    However, Xiao Tu also revealed a look of pride when he saw the looks on their faces. He had always been a firm believer that his little sisters were the cutest and seeing this being acknowledged, he was naturally filled with pride.


    Once they were cleaned up, Lin Fan started showing them around the store and showing the different things that they needed to know to work in the store.


    Xiao Tu and the girls listened carefully to what he said. They had already epted working at his store, so they would do their best.


    While they were doing this, Dongfang Ming and his wife were secretly discussing something on the side.


    The afternoon passed by just like this and soon it was time for dinner.


    However, this time they didn''t go out because they knew that if they went out with these little angels, it was certain that someone would try to kidnap them. So instead, Dongfang Ming called some takeout to the store.


    While they were eating, Dongfang Ming and his wife suddenly brought something up that involved the girls.


    Dongfang Ming and his wife looked at the girls and said, "We thought about it and we want to adopt one of you if that''s alright with you girls."


    Dongfang Ming and his wife had been trying to have children over the past decade, but they hadn''t had any luck at all.


    It was partly because they were cultivators that they weren''t able to have a child. Cultivators with higher cultivations found it harder to create children because there was a higher threshold that was needed for them because of their cultivations. So even if they tried, it would take a long time for them to even conceive a child.


    The other part was because of their own bodies.


    For some reason, they just weren''t able to have children even after trying for over a decade and they had started to slightly give up hope. But they still wanted to have children, so they had considered adopting one instead.


    Now that these five angels had suddenly appeared, naturally they would want to adopt them.


    But unfortunately, these girls didn''t agree to their request.


    Not a single one of those girls wanted to separate from each other or Xiao Tu, so unless Dongfang Ming were to adopt all six of them, they wouldn''t go with him.


    Even if he was willing, there was a problem with adopting them since he was from the Dongfang Family. He could get away with adopting one with the contributions that he had made to the family, but six kids¡­


    So Dongfang Ming and his wife had no choice but to give up on this idea for now.


    They still wanted to take these angels as their kids, so they would see if they could find some way to adopt all six of them. It was just that for now, it would be impossible.


    Lin Fan didn''t interfere with this since he knew that this was a good thing.


    It wasn''t as if he would be able to stay here forever and since he had taken these kids under his wings, he would need to find a safe ce for them before he left. This was what he owed them as their boss.


    After all, it wasn''t as if he could take them with him when he left since that would be much more dangerous than being left here alone.


    Just taking Xin''er was already hard enough¡­


    He might not even be able to take Xin''er when he left this ce¡­


    Once dinner was over and the talk about adoption was put to the side, Dongfang Ming and his wife left as the kids were sent off to bed.


    They had all been given separate beds, but they all wanted to sleep together since it was their first night in a new ce.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he wanted these kids to be Xin''er''s friend, so he was happy to let them have a sleepover. However, that was only the case for the girls, not Xiao Tu.


    Xiao Tu was forced into a room all by himself and was forbidden from taking a single step out. Lin Fan even put an array around his room that would only let him out when the sun came up just to be safe.


    The five sisters weren''t happy about this at first, but since this was the only way that Lin Fan would let them have a sleepover with Xin''er, they quickly epted it.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help admiring the adaptability that these kids had¡­


    They had already learned to abandon their brother for a new friend that they met today¡­


    Lin Fan would almost feel sorry for Xiao Tu if it wasn''t for the fact that he hated him for trying to approach Xin''er.


    After the kids had been put to bed, Lin Fan went to one of the rooms in the back of the store and went over to the door that was there.


    This was the Anywhere Door, a door that connected him to all the other stores that he had.


    Back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance, he hadn''t been able to use this Anywhere Door to head back down to the Blue Star since it hadn''t been strong enough. The system wouldn''t allow him to do so.


    But after finishing the quest to find a store here in the Mu Ster Kingdom, the reward that he had received was an upgrade to the Anywhere Door that would allow him to teleport to any store regardless of which it was on.


    So he had been excited to use this since he had thought that it was his way back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    However, Lin Fan was disappointed to find that he wasn''t able to use the Anywhere Door still.


    "The host''s cultivation is too low to use the Anywhere Door to travel long distances betweens. Please work hard to increase your cultivation."


    Lin Fan was unwilling to ept this, but he had no choice but to ept this. However, that didn''t mean that the unlock waspletely useless because it gave him another function.


    Employees of the shop could also use the Anywhere Door and as long as their cultivation was high enough, they would be able to travel long distances¡­


    Naturally there was no one with higher cultivations than those three, so that meant¡­


    "The call has been sent to the employees, they will be arriving soon."


    Lin Fan anxiously waited to see the people that he wanted to see.


    Before long, there was a sh from the door before it suddenly opened to reveal three people who stepped out.


    The one who was in front was naturally the one who had wanted to see him the most.


    The two of them just stood there across from each other, looking into each other''s eyes in silence for a long time. After an unknown period of time, the woman who had stepped out of the door ran into his arms and hugged him tightly which Lin Fan responded by hugging her to by hugging her tightly as well.


    The other two who stood there watching had different expressions on their faces.


    The man who was covered in white just had a smile on his face as he watched the two of them like he was watching a y.


    The woman who was covered in white had an ugly expression on her face as she red at Lin Fan, but she didn''t break up the two of them since she knew how long she had been waiting for this moment.


    After a long time, the two of them finally separated, but that was just when it came to hugging. The woman still wouldn''t let go of Lin Fan''s arm.


    Lin Fan said in a soft voice, "I missed you."


    The woman nodded as she leaned her head against his chest and said, "Un, I missed you too."


    Finally, the man in white couldn''t help saying with a cough, "We missed you too, though not as much as her it seems."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "I missed you guys too."


    The three that hade out of the Anywhere Door were naturally Ang, Momonga, and Yuki, the three contracted employees of the store. With their cultivations, it wasn''t a problem for them to take this Anywhere Door.


    Momonga looked around the room and then said, "It seems like you''re doing quite well here."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "It''s alright."


    Of course, Momonga hadn''t just looked around the room with his eyes, but rather he had used his spiritual sense to check out the entire store.


    Since they were here, naturally Lin Fan had many things that he wanted to ask them.


    However, before he asked them anything, the first thing that he had to do was help them settle in this ce.


    That was because he would need their help in the future.

 Chapter 845 Mother (1)

    After showing them around the store, Lin Fan finally found a ce to settle down with them so he could ask them some questions.


    The most urgent question that he had was¡­


    "What happened after I was sent away?"


    Momonga exined, "After you were sent away, the Tai Ster Kingdom did send people to investigate, but since you were already gone, they couldn''t do anything. It seems like that little girl really kept her word and made sure that they med everything on you, so the Gctic Humanity Alliance ispletely off the hook."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows as he fell into deep thought.


    Just who was Zi Ling that she was able to do all of this?


    He had heard that she was from a Ster Kingdom as well, but to force the Tai Ster Kingdom into epting this kind ofpromise, it was clear that the Ster Kingdom that she was from was not a normal one¡­


    After hearing this, Lin Fan asked, "What about my family?"


    Momonga had a strange look sh on his face before he said, "They were picked up by that ancestor of your family and brought back to the Blue Star."


    Lin Fan naturally didn''t miss that strange look that Momonga revealed, so he couldn''t help asking, "Did something happen?"


    Momonga was silent for a bit before saying, "I just sensed a strange feeling from that ancestor of yours. I don''t know what it is, but it just feels off."


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before saying, "My father trusts the ancestor and it doesn''t seem like the ancestor has any ill will towards us, so it should be fine."


    But as he said this, there was also a hint of doubt in his voice.


    After all, he also felt that the ancestor of the Lin Family was a bit strange¡­


    Still, he couldn''t do anything about it with how far away he was.


    After putting this matter aside, Lin Fan went back to the topic at hand which was who would stay and who would go back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    He wasn''t assured in leaving the store at the Gctic Humanity Alliance alone since most of his subordinates were still there. He wouldn''t be able to watch over them, so he wanted one of them to help him watch over the store.


    Naturally it wouldn''t be Ang since he would miss her too much and Yuki wouldn''t stand being separated from Ang. Her only reason in following Lin Fan was to follow Ang, so she naturally couldn''t ept being separated from her.


    So the only choice left was Momonga.


    Momonga didn''t mind this since he was a fan of their ship, so he was more than alright being the one chosen.


    As he was leaving, he didn''t forget to tease, "Maybe I''ll be able to see your children when I see you again next time."


    When he mentioned this, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bit of an awkward look.


    All three of them naturally didn''t miss this and they all revealed different expressions.


    Momonga had a surprised look, Yuki had a look of anger and a hint of schadenfreude, and Ang¡­Naturally all she did was re at him with murderous intent.


    Lin Fan raised his hands and said, "It''s not what you think it is."


    Momonga gave a cough before asking with a teasing smile, "So you didn''t have a child with someone else while you were alone?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile as he looked at him and asked, "Why are you trying to make things worse? Not to mention, how could I have found someone like that so quickly?"


    Momonga gave a shrug and said, "Well, you could be considered quite handsome by human standards and you''re quite strong, I don''t think that it would be that hard."


    Lin Fan''s smile became even more bitter as he could feel the coldness that wasing from Ang. He couldn''t help saying, "What are you doing? Why are you trying to make this worse for me?"


    Momonga just stood there with a sly smile on his face.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before telling them about everything that had happened after he had arrived in this Mu Ster Kingdom.


    All three of them had calm looks on their faces as they listened to him, but Lin Fan knew that they were moved by this.


    By the end, Ang said, "Where are the kids now?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile and said, "It''s already thiste, they''re already in bed. It''s toote for you to meet them today."


    Ang gave a nod before not saying anything else.


    Momonga just gave a sigh and said, "It''s too bad that I can''t meet them today, but I''lle back in the future to see them."


    Then his eyes suddenly narrowed as he said with a serious look, "I don''t like this ce anyway, so it''s better that I''m not here."


    Lin Fan asked with a confused look, "What do you mean by that?"


    Momonga waved around him and said, "Don''t you feel that in the air? All that life attributed energy?"


    Lin Fan looked around himself, but he didn''t feel that there was anything different about this ce. However, he didn''t doubt Momonga since he was the Lich King and he was sensitive to this kind of stuff.


    Momonga exined, "This Mu Ster Kingdom has a special item that fills this ce with life attributed energy, so it''s not suited for an undead like me to stay here."


    Lin Fan nodded to show that he understood, but he really didn''t understand.


    After talking about a few more things with Momonga, he headed back through the door and returned to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    There was just Lin Fan, Ang, and Yuki that were left standing there.


    Since it waste, Lin Fan suggested that they get some rest which the girls agreed to. However, Lin Fan was kept out of the room that he had prepared for Ang¡­


    As she closed the door, she said, "We''ll see tomorrow if you''re innocent or not."


    Lin Fan was just left standing outside the door with a bitter smile on his face.


    But he didn''t head to another open room and instead, he slept on the couch that she had pushed out before closing the door. He knew that if he were to ignore her instructions and sleep in another room, he would suffer tomorrow.


    So it was better to take this small punishment for now than take the big punishment.


    When the sun rose and morning came, Xiao Tu was finally able toe out of his room.


    Lin Fan had ced an array outside of his room that wouldn''t let him out until morning came and Xiao Tu wasn''t a high grade cultivator, so his body still had needs such as eating and going to the washroom.


    After being trapped inside for an entire night, his dder was about to burst, so the first thing he did was run out of his room in search of a bathroom.


    As he looked for that bathroom, he ran past the room that Ang and Yuki were in. Naturally that also meant that he saw Lin Fan who was sleeping on the couch in the hallway.


    He had to stop ande back to make sure that there wasn''t anything wrong with his eyes, but when he was sure that it was Lin Fan, his jaws dropped to the ground. Hepletely forgot about the fact that his dder was about to burst and came up to Lin Fan just to double check again since he simply couldn''t believe it.


    Lin Fan had already woken up when he heard Xiao Tu running by, but he chose to ignore him.


    However, with Xiao Tu sticking his face in Lin Fan''s face, it wasn''t as if he could keep ignoring him.


    So he sat up and scared Xiao Tu who was about to get closer.


    Xiao Tu jumped back a few steps when he saw Lin Fan suddenly sitting up, but then he said with a wide smile, "What''s wrong? Did something happen?"


    Lin Fan just simply smacked him in the back of the head and said, "It''s none of your business." And then he started whistling.


    When Xiao Tu heard this whistle, he suddenly remembered the dder distress that he had been in and ran off to the bathroom without a care.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile, but he didn''t leave the couch.


    He knew that if he left before Ang came out, he would be in trouble.


    Half an hourter, Ang finally came out of her room.


    During the half hour that he had been waiting, Xiao Tu had gone off to find the six girls and had brought them all over. Currently, all of them were standing around Lin Fan, wondering what he was doing sitting on the couch in the hall.


    The five sisters were less concerned, but Xin''er couldn''t help but keep asking Lin Fan why he was doing this and why he wasn''t moving.


    Finally, Ang came out with Yuki and all the chins of the kids dropped down in shock.


    That was because¡­they had never seen anyone this beautiful before!


    Moreover, it wasn''t just one of them, but two of them at the same time since Yuki had followed Ang out.


    Ang was also surprised to see these kids here, but her eyes immediately ignored the rest and fell onto Xin''er.


    It didn''t take long before those ice cold eyes suddenly turned gentle.

 Chapter 846 Mother (2)

    After introductions had been made, everyone sat down in the employee dorm''s kitchen for breakfast.


    Lin Fan and Xiao Tu had been sent out to buy breakfast and when they came back, they came into a room that was filled with silence.


    The girls were still wary of Ang and Yuki, but there were also traces of admiration and awe as they snuck peeks at them from time to time.


    After all, as girls, these two were women that they aspired to be.


    Ang and Yuki however didn''t hide their looks, but rather stared right at the kids.


    When Lin Fan came back, he said with an awkward smile, "Come, let''s have something to eat."


    Even with him breaking the tension, the kids didn''t move until they saw Ang and Yuki start to eat. They even waited to see what they would eat before picking up the same thing and eating it with them.


    Kids were all like this, they were afraid of new things at first, but once they knew that it wasn''t dangerous, they would be filled with curiosity.


    Ang and Yuki just casually ate their food until they both suddenly picked up a napkin.


    Ang went over to where Xin''er was and in front of her surprised eyes, she brought the napkin down to help Xin''er wipe her mouth.


    As for Yuki, she helped the five sisters.


    It didn''t take long before the five sisters were happilyughing and talking with Yuki. But that wasn''t the case with Xin''er and Ang.


    After Ang helped Xin''er wipe the crumbs off her face, Xin''er just shyly looked up and said, "Thank you." Then she looked back down and continued to nibble at the bread in her hands.


    Ang just gave a slight nod before also continuing to eat her own food, but now she was sitting beside Xin''er.


    Xiao Tu who was also at the table felt that the atmosphere was strange, but there wasn''t anyone that he could talk to. Xin''er was with Ang and his five little sisters were with Yuki, so he was alone with Lin Fan.


    With no other choice, Xiao Tu turned to Lin Fan and asked, "What''s wrong with them? Why do they feel so strange?"


    Lin Fan who had been watching with a faint smile on his face was a bit caught off guard when he heard Xiao Tu asking him this, but he turned and hit Xiao Tu on the back of his head. He then said with a faint smile, "It''s fine like this. Just go and eat your breakfast."


    Xiao Tu rubbed the back of his head and looked up like he wanted to say something else, but seeing Lin Fan with his raised fist, he just lowered his head and started eating his food again.


    But like Lin Fan said, he felt that this was fine as well.


    That was because he was happy seeing how happy his little sisters were talking andughing with Yuki.


    Lin Fan however had a different feeling when he saw this.


    He almost felt like it was like a bunch of kids ying when he saw this¡­After all, he knew that Yuki had a young mentality, but he never knew just how young it was¡­


    Could it be that her thinking was the same as these kids? Was that why they got along so well?


    After they finished their food, the five sisters all pulled on Yuki''s hands and wanted to pull her in different directions, saying that they wanted to show off the store to her.


    However, Lin Fan told them that was only if they stayed in the store and they stayed near Yuki. They weren''t allowed to run off on their own.


    The girls pouted their lips, but Yuki patted them on the head and said with a nod, "I''ll take care of them." Then as she left, she didn''t forget to turn around and stick her tongue out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised when he saw this.


    He had to take back his statement from before about how Yuki was on the same mental level as these kids. It seemed like she was indeed also an adult and was capable of looking after them.


    He couldn''t help thinking that she would be an interesting mother if she ever became one¡­


    But the ones that he cared more about were Ang and Xin''er.


    They hadn''t moved after they had finished their breakfast, they were just sitting there at the table in silence.


    Ang sat there with a cup of tea in front of her while Xin''er was just shyly sitting beside her with her head down.


    Normally, Xin''er would have happily gone off with her friends, but this time, she was quietly sitting with Ang.


    Luckily for them, Xiao Tu had also been pulled away by the five girls, so there was no one bothering them right now. However, Lin Fan felt that if this silence continued for too long, it wouldn''t be a good thing since there would be nothing to break the ice for them.


    If this silencested too long, it would be too hard for them to break the ice eventually.


    But when Lin Fan was about to break the silence for them, Xin''er suddenly looked up at Ang.


    Ang wasn''t surprised by this at all and just looked at Xin''er with calm eyes.


    Xin''er hesitated for a while before finally asking, "Can you hug me?"


    She didn''t know why she said these words and she didn''t know what gave her the courage to say these words, but before she could stop herself, these words had alreadye out of her mouth.


    Ang didn''t show any surprise when she heard this. She just revealed a faint smile as she raised her arms towards Xin''er, waiting for her to take the final step.


    Xin''er''s eyes trembled when she saw this, but then without hesitation, she jumped into Ang''s embrace.


    She dug her head deep into Ang''s chest and justid there in her embrace.


    As she let herself be wrapped up in this warm embrace, she couldn''t help muttering, "Mom, where are you?"


    Lin Fan felt a hint of pain fill his heart when he heard this.


    That was right, he had never learned more about Xin''er''s parent''s from Duanmu Hua Yu¡­Well, he knew who Xin''er''s father was and that was impossible, but he didn''t know who Xin''er''s mother was.


    If her mother was still alive, should he try to find her and reunite them?


    After all, he at least knew that Xin''er''s mother was also a victim in this matter¡­


    Ang looked down at the little girl in her embrace and she couldn''t help feeling the urge to protect her.


    Lin Fan had already told her about everything that had happened to this little girl and she did empathize with her, but that didn''t mean that she would treat her like her daughter like she did with Xiao Bai.


    That was until the moment that this little girl asked her for a hug.


    At this moment, holding this little crying girl in her arms, she felt like she knew what being a mother really was and the urge to protect her surge inside of her.


    She patted Xin''er on the back and said, "It''s alright, mother is here."


    Xin''er trembled when she heard this, but then she looked up at Ang with tearful eyes and asked, "Is that alright?"


    Ang gave a nod and said, "Un."


    Xin''er''s tears poured out even more after this, but she also revealed a joyful smile as she obediently said, "Mother!"


    Ang just gave another nod and said, "Mother is here."


    Lin Fan didn''t do anything as he watched the two of them and after a few seconds, he went out of the kitchen, closing the door behind him. Even with the little bit of sensitivity that he had, he knew that he should give them some private time for now.


    But as he left, he also made sure to leave a guard at the door to make sure that no one would disturb the two of them.


    As for him, he went to the front of the store and started preparing everything that they needed to open the store tomorrow.


    When everyone gathered again, it was already time for lunch.


    Yuki and the five girls seemed like they were full of energy as they ran into the kitchen to eat, but Xiao Tu who was following behind him lookedpletely exhausted. It was almost as if he had been fighting for his life the entire morning.


    Ang and Xin''er who hadn''t left were much closer than before, with Xin''er now sitting on Ang''sp while she helped brush Xin''er''s hair.


    But when Xiao Tu saw Xin''er, he couldn''t help asking in a concerned voice, "What''s wrong? Why are your eyes red?"


    Xin''er''s eyes were indeed red because of all the crying that she had done earlier and when it was pointed out this tantly, her face couldn''t help turning red with embarrassment.


    When Xiao Tu saw her face turning red, he asked in an even more concerned voice, "Your face is all red. Do you have a fever?"


    He was about to reach his hand out to put on Xin''er''s head to check her temperature, but before he could reach her, he suddenly felt a chill run through his hand that forced him to pull it back. When he pulled it back, he saw that there was actually ayer of frost that had formed on his hand as well.


    He looked down at his hand in shock and he couldn''t understand where this came from.


    But then he also felt another chill run down his spine. He turned in the direction that the chill came from and found a pair of ice cold eyes staring at him.


    Ang could naturally see how Xiao Tu felt about Xin''er from his actions and now that she had taken Xin''er as her daughter in her heart, she would do all that she could to protect her from bugs like this. She had also heard about Xiao Tu from Lin Fan, so she knew what kind of background he had.


    Someone like this was naturally not worthy of her Xin''er!


    Xin''er felt that something was off, so she said, "It''s nothing, something just got in my eyes, that''s all."


    She then turned to Ang and said, "Mom, let''s eat."


    Hearing Xin''er calling her, Ang gave a nod.


    Everyone except for Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the two of them with shocked looks as they couldn''t understand how the two of them had suddenly gotten so close.


    Ang turned to Lin Fan who had a bitter smile on his face and he understood what she meant, so he started serving up the food that he bought earlier.


    After he was done, Xin''er turned to Lin Fan and said, "Thank you, big brother Lin."


    Lin Fan responded with, "Why is she "mom" and I''m "big brother Lin"? She is my wife, you know?"


    Everyone once again looked at Lin Fan with shock when they heard this.

 Chapter 847 Same Trend

    Ang''s face had a faint blush on it when she heard him say this.


    She then raised her hand to punch him in the shoulder, but she didn''t deny the things that he said, which made it clear that she silently epted this.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with even more shock as they couldn''t believe that he had such a beautiful wife. Well, that was everyone except for Yuki who just red at Lin Fan like something precious to her had been taken away.


    After the look of surprise, Xin''er revealed an awkward look as she said, "Then¡­can I call you¡­"


    She didn''t finish her words, but it was clear what she was referring to.


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "You can call me whatever you want."


    Xin''er still hesitated a bit longer before finally saying, "Then I''ll call you¡­dad."


    Lin Fan nodded with a smile.


    Actually, Xin''er had wanted to call Lin Fan this from a long time ago, but she could never bring herself to do it. That was because she felt like it wasn''t right.


    Lin Fan was the one who looked after her after her grandfather died, but that didn''t mean that he would be able to look after her forever. This was something that she already had a clear understanding of.


    Eventually, she would leave him and she felt that calling him "dad" would be too much. So she had settled with calling him big brother Lin since that still made it seem like she was close to him.


    But in her heart, she had already treated him like a dad.


    Now that he actually acknowledged it, she couldn''t stop the tears from flowing in her eyes again, but these were tears of happiness.


    It was just too bad that Xiao Tu was too young to recognize this.


    When he saw Xin''er crying again, he immediately turned to Lin Fan and said, "Why are you making her cry?"


    But before Lin Fan could even p him on the back of the head again, Xin''er said, "You can''t talk to dad like that. Apologize or I won''t forgive you."


    Xiao Tu was shocked to hear this, but the words were very effective. His feelings for Xin''er weren''t light, so this threat was very powerful.


    He lowered his head and with an unwilling look on his face, he said, "I''m sorry."


    Lin Fan didn''t p him on the head this time and just patted him on the head instead before saying, "You have to learn to understand girls in the future or you will suffer."


    As he said this, he remembered what happenedst night¡­when he had been sent to the couch in the hall.


    But Xiao Tu didn''t appreciate his good intentions and just turned away without saying a thing with the same stubborn look on his face.


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t care since he didn''t approve of this kid in the first ce.


    With that finished, they went to have their lunch.


    During lunchtime, Dongfang Ming arrived with his wife again and they were shocked to see Ang and Yuki. Especially Dongfang Ming because he was unable to see through the two of them at all.


    After looking at them for a bit, he couldn''t help turning to look at Lin Fan with a strange look as he said, "You, just what kind of secrets are you hiding?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "It''s not a secret, this is my wife and her friend."


    "Wife?"


    Both Dongfang Ming and his wife said this at the same time.


    After a moment of being stunned, Dongfang Ming quickly said, "Didn''t you think that it was weird that I was married? How can you act that way when it''s the same with you?"


    Lin Fan just gave a shrug and didn''t answer, though he didn''t have an answer even if he wanted to answer.


    Seeing that he didn''t answer, Dongfang Ming changed the topic by asking, "Since you have them and the kids, does that mean that you no longer need any other employees."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this and replied, "My wife is more suited to being a bossdy, so¡­"


    He left his words hanging, but the meaning behind them was clear.


    When Dongnfang Ming heard this, he also revealed a bitter smile. He looked at his wife before turning to Lin Fan and saying, "You too?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Dongfang Ming''s wife with a surprised look before turning back to give a nod with an understanding look.


    Dongfang Ming gave a sigh before saying, "Alright, I already have some people lined up for you to interview. I can bring them over now or I can bring them over tomorrow, which would you prefer?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before saying, "Let''s do it now, I want to open the store as soon as possible."


    Dongfang Ming just gave a nod before heading off to make a few calls.


    After lunch, the people that Dongfang Ming prepared arrived curtly and soon Lin Fan began his interviews.


    ¡­


    A few dayster.


    Over the past few days, Lin Fan had been working hard on preparing for the opening of the store.


    He had only hired two employees out of the dozens that Dongfang Ming had prepared, but that was enough for him. He also made sure that one of them was rted to the Dongfang Family like he had promised.


    After working hard for several days, the store finally opened early in the morning.


    However, unlike all the other stores, Lin Fan didn''t hold a big event for his store opening. All he did was pull off the curtains hanging in the window and hang up an "open" sign at the door.


    Dongfang Ming had objected to this and had wanted to help Lin Fan hold arge opening ceremony, but Lin Fan firmly rejected it. He didn''tpromise at all when Dongfang Ming did all he could to convince him otherwise.


    After all, without an opening ceremony, there would hardly be anyone that would notice that they had opened. This would be the worst thing for a business since it would mean that they would have to start from the beginning to get customers.


    But Lin Fan insisted on doing things his way.


    However, he did have his own reasons.


    The people that had been walking through the business street had seen that thergest store had suddenly closed up and was covered in curtains, so they would certainly be curious.


    After this curiosity built up over several days, it finally erupted in one single burst.


    When people noticed that Lin Fan''s store was open, they immediately started calling their friends to tell them about it.


    This was a mysterious store that had been locked down this entire time, it was hard for them not to be curious about it.


    It didn''t take long before Lin Fan''s store was filled with people. It was just too bad that those people didn''t stay long.


    It was the same trend that came with the opening of each store.


    The people flocked to the store and then when they saw the prices, they immediately left without even giving Lin Fan a chance.


    However, it wasn''t just the prices alone that drove people away from Lin Fan''s store. It was also the ims that it made.


    Lin Fan''s store still offered training as its main service, but the level of pets that it could train had increased as well.


    The prices for Soul Realm pets were the same as before, but now there was an added service along with this. Lin Fan''s store was now able to also train World Realm pets, but it was only pets in the first stages of the World Realm, the Star Realm.


    When people saw these ims, they immediately deemed this store as a fake because Monster Trainers that could train World Realm Beasts couldn''t be more rare. Because of this, all of them were associated with the nobles and not a single one of them would work withmoners like them.


    So they immediately casted doubts on Lin Fan.


    If he had this ability, why didn''t he work with the nobles?


    He clearly had the finances to do so judging by the fact that he was able to buy this store.


    That must mean that this was a scam!


    So everyone began waiting for the day that Lin Fan''s store would shut down.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about all of this at all since he had already expected it. He had gone through this situation several times already and was more than used to it.


    He knew that a good thing wouldn''t be hidden forever and eventually people would know the truth behind his store.


    But that didn''te on the first day since not a single person bought a single thing from his store on the first day.


    When the second day came, there were still people that came to his store, but most of them weren''t there for good reasons. Most of them hade to see just how this store would copse in the end with these prices and these ims.


    There were still a few new people that came to the store, but they were also scared off by the prices just like the people that came on the first day.


    By the end of the second day, it almost seemed like it would end the same way as the first day.


    That was until a young man suddenly walked into the store.

 Chapter 848 Shocking Method

    This young man was named Jun Xie, but unlike his name, he was the furthest thing away from an evil monarch.


    This was a young man with a very normal bowl haircut and arge pair of rimmed sses which made him look like someone that most people ignored.


    However, this young man was also a student of the Royal Academy, the number one academy in the capital.


    He was someone that was from a very rich merchant family that had bought their way into getting him admitted into the academy.


    The problem with that was that he didn''t have the talent to stay in the academy at all, so he was close to flunking out. If he didn''t pass the next exam, it would be certain that he would be kicked out.


    So he had tried looking for many different ways to increase his own strength to pass this exam. It was just too bad that even with money, he couldn''t buy talent. So he wasn''t able to make himself stronger and had no choice but to rely on pets.


    The one business that his family didn''t touch at all was the pet industry, so they didn''t know any high grade Monster Trainers at all. So even if he wanted to make his pet stronger, he wasn''t able to do so.


    With no other choice, Jun Xie turned to this store and itsrge boasts that had been trending on the web during this time.


    When he came into the store, no one paid any attention to him because of his normal appearance. However, when he came up to the counter to talk to Lin Fan, everyone had no choice but to pay attention to him.


    That was because he had be the guinea pig that was going to test Lin Fan''s services.


    Lin Fan didn''t pay any attention to Jun Xie when he walked up, but then he turned his head when he heard, "I heard that you can train pets here."


    Lin Fan looked at Jun Xie who was standing in front of him and calmly said, "The prices are on the board to the side. Summon the pet that you want to train and pay the price. You cane and pick up your pet tomorrow."


    Jun Xie didn''t move at first, but then he took out a few spirit stones that he put on the table and said, "I can pay extra, but I want to see if you''re really worth the price that you''ve set."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at him before saying with a sigh, "We''re not going to get anything done if you don''t summon out your pet first."


    Hearing this, Jun Xie couldn''t help revealing an awkward look.


    He had tried acting cool, but it had beenpletely ripped apart with just a single sentence from Lin Fan. All around him, he could hear the faint snickering of the people watching.


    But he sucked it up since he knew that Lin Fan was right.


    So with a wave of his hand, there was a pure white lynx that appeared in the shop.


    When this lynx appeared, everyone couldn''t help being shocked as whispers rang out.


    "It''s an Arctic Lynx!"


    "No, it''s not just an Arctic Lynx. Can''t you see how white the fur is? It''s definitely a pureblooded Arctic Lynx."


    "This kid looks so normal and he has a pet that has a Star Realm bloodline? Just who is he?"


    Jun Xie ignored all of the shocked whispers around him as he focused on Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan''s eyes were on the Arctic Lynx. He stroked his chin as he looked at it with an interested look, like he had found a fun toy.


    After stroking his chin for a bit, he said, "It might look powerful, but it''s nothing more than a runt."


    Everyone immediately started throwing insults at Lin Fan when they heard this, but Jun Xie couldn''t help revealing a strange look.


    Lin Fan just ignored them all and said, "This isn''t a pureblooded beast, or else it wouldn''t be this weak." He turned back to Jun Xie and asked, "Where did you pick this thing up?"


    Jun Xie didn''t answer this question and instead asked, "Can you train him?"


    Lin Fan looked around before saying, "I can, but you said that you wanted a little demonstration of what I can do?"


    Jun Xie felt that the way that Lin Fan said this sounded a bit strange, but he still said, "I want to see what you''re capable of first."


    Lin Fan nodded beforeing out from behind the counter. He walked over to the Arctic Lynx that stood beside Jun Xie and raised his hand.


    Both Jun Xie and the Arctic Lynx felt that there was something strange about the way that Lin Fan acted, but they didn''t know what, so it wasn''t as if they were able to react to it.


    Before either of them could react, Lin Fan suddenly sent a punch out at the Arctic Lynx that was beside Jun Xie. This punch picked the Arctic Lynx off the ground and sent it flying several meters until it slid to a stop on the ground.


    It was a good thing that the area in the store was so big, otherwise the Arctic Lynx would have been thrown right into a wall.


    There was only silence that filled the area after the Arctic Lynx had been sent flying as everyone looked at Lin Fan with eyes filled with disbelief.


    But then that silence was broken by the shouts of the crowd.


    "Did you see that? He couldn''t stand someone doubting him and resorted to violence!"


    "Report him and report this store! I won''t be able to stand it if this store doesn''t shut down by tomorrow!"


    "Did you get it on camera just now? We''ll use it as evidence against him!"


    Amidst these shouts, Jun Xie still hadn''t reacted yet. However, before he could even react and say anything to Lin Fan, the Arctic Lynx got off the ground.


    When everyone saw the Arctic Lynx stand up, they all fell silent as they waited for it to move. It was almost as if they were waiting to watch a y.


    After all, this Arctic Lynx had been sent flying by Lin Fan, so there was no way that it would remain still after recovering. Everyone was now just waiting to see how this store attendant would be punished for his violent actions.


    But to everyone''s shock, the Arctic Lynx didn''t attack Lin Fan at all. Instead, the Arctic Lynx walked up to Lin Fan slowly before suddenly jumping at him.


    Lin Fan didn''t dodge out of the way as the Arctic Lynx came at him and just stood there.


    The Arctic Lynx fell down in front of Lin Fan and raised its stomach to it like a dog, waiting for Lin Fan to pet it.


    Everyone''s chins almost dropped to the floor when they saw this.


    This Arctic Lynx that had been attacked by Lin Fan not only didn''t show any hostility, but rather was treating him with more friendliness than its owner.


    Jun Xie couldn''t help saying, "Xiao Han, what''s wrong? Why are you acting this way?"


    Lin Fan just petted it a few times before pointing at its owner.


    The Arctic Lynx had an unwilling look at first, but then it still came back to Jun Xie and raised its head as if it was showing off.


    Jun Xie was confused why it was acting this way, but then he noticed that the Arctic Lynx''s aura waspletely different from before. He came forward and looked over the Arctic Lynx before saying, "Xiao Han, you broke through?"


    His words were like stones that dropped into a clear pond, creating ripples that spread out among all the watchers.


    They couldn''t help turning to the Arctic Lynx as well and using their spiritual senses to check it.


    They found that Jun Xie was right, the Arctic Lynx had indeed broken through.


    Before Lin Fan had punched it, the Arctic Lynx was only in the Low Fragmented Soul Realm, but now it was in the High Fragmented Soul Realm.


    That was right, it wasn''t just a single breakthrough, but rather two breakthroughs in a row. The Arctic Lynx had skipped over the Mid Fragmented Soul Realm and had gone all the way to the High Fragmented Soul Realm!


    But that wasn''t all for the people with sharper spiritual senses.


    They could tell that the Arctic Lynx''s aura hadpletely changed and this wasn''t the change that was brought by just a breakthrough. It was almost as if the quality of the Arctic Lynx''s aura hadpletely changed.


    Almost as if its bloodline had been...


    Naturally Jun Xie was also aware of this as he was the one that knew this Arctic Lynx the best.


    He had this Arctic Lynx since he was young and he was the one who had picked it up even though it was a runt that didn''t have a pure bloodline. But he had always pretended that it was a pure bloodline both for his and the Arctic Lynx''s sake.


    But now he could feel that the Arctic Lynx''s bloodline hadpletely changed. It was nothing like it was before.


    He couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look as he asked in a stuttering voice, "Just, just who are you?"


    Lin Fan replied with a smile, "Just a normal pet store owner."


    Then he pointed at his prices and said, "Those are the prices for training, be sure to pay them and you cane back tomorrow to get your pet."


    Jun Xie could do nothing but give a nod in response.


    After all, the results were in front of him.

 Chapter 849 Bullying

    After Jun Xie paid Lin Fan and left his Arctic Lynx there, there wasn''t much for the crowd to do.


    After all, they wouldn''t know what would be the results of the Arctic Lynx''s training until tomorrow morning. So it wasn''t as if they could say anything about Lin Fan even though he had punched the Arctic Lynx.


    The cold hard facts were in front of their eyes, they could see how much the Arctic Lynx''s cultivation had increased after being punched by Lin Fan.


    There wasn''t a single person that could prove that this wasn''t some kind of special technique that Lin Fan used because not a single person was able to understand what had just happened.


    So in the end, they could only wait.


    But it was a good thing that Lin Fan had said that the training would be done tomorrow.


    Everyone was snickering at him on the inside when they heard this since not a single one of them had believed that he could get the training done in a single day.


    Most Monster Trainers took at least a month to get some kind of result, so no one believed that Lin Fan could break this standard.


    There were even many that thought that Jun Xie was working with the shop to fool them all. This was all a y that the shop had set up to trick them, so they were looking forward to seeing what would happen tomorrow morning.


    With all these different thoughts, the crowd that had been in the store dispersed, waiting for the y that woulde tomorrow morning.


    How could Lin Fan not notice these things?


    He just didn''t care since he knew what kind of things his store was capable of and he would show them all tomorrow morning.


    After the crowd was gone, Xin''er holding Ang''s hand couldn''t helping over and saying with a look of awe, "Daddy, you''re so amazing! How did you help mister lynx break through just by punching it?"


    Even if Xin''er didn''t really have a high cultivation because of ack of resources, that didn''t mean that she didn''t have any knowledge at all.


    After all, she had been raised by the Fragmented Soul Realm Duanmu Hua Yu, so she knew just as much as the next cultivator.


    Lin Fan just raised his hand and said with a smile, "It''s a little trick that I used, but it''s a trick that only I can use."


    After Jun Xie had left, the Arctic Lynx had been sticking to Lin Fan the entire time. However, when he saw the way that Xin''er looked at the Arctic Lynx, he tapped it on the head before pointing at Xin''er.


    As he tapped the Arctic Lynx, he made sure to use a bit of absorption force to draw out some more impurities for it.


    The Arctic Lynx had a look of joy for only a second before revealing a sad look like its wife had been stolen from it. But of course, it also understood what Lin Fan meant with his gestures, so it walked over to Xin''er and started rubbing up against her.


    Xin''er revealed a delighted smile and started rubbing the Arctic Lynx.


    As a child, naturally she didn''t know how to hold back with her ying, so the Arctic Lynx''s fur became all clumped up from her rubbing. Even then, it still forced itself to reveal a smile as it allowed Xin''er to do what she wanted.


    But this got even worse when Yuki came over with the five sisters.


    When the five sisters saw Xin''er ying with the Arctic Lynx, they immediately became envious and they all came over to y with it as well.


    However, the Arctic Lynx had its pride and wouldn''t let the five of them anywhere near it¡­that was until Lin Fan suddenly raised his fist at it. When it saw this, its attitude flipped 180 and it immediately started rubbing itself against the five girls.


    While Lin Fan didn''t like Xiao Tu, that didn''t mean that he felt the same about the five girls.


    After all, it was hard for him to hate cute little girls like this. Not to mention that Yuki waspletely attached to these five girls.


    Even if he and Yuki were normally at odds with each other, he was happy to see her being attached to them like this. He knew that Ang was also happy seeing Yuki like this and if she was happy, that was all he needed.


    After ying with the Arctic Lynx for a bit, Lin Fan still had to take it away from them since he needed to bring it away for its training.


    He had Xiao Tu take care of this, but before Xiao Tu took it away, Lin Fan also made sure to have a few private words with the Arctic Lynx.


    Xiao Tu tried to lead the Arctic Lynx away, but the moment that he took the reins that Lin Fan had put on it, the Arctic Lynx immediately started nipping at him. The more that he tried to lead it away, the more that the Arctic Lynx put up a fight.


    Lin Fan just watched all of this with a calm look on his face, as if he was already expecting this.


    His five sisters wanted to say something to help him, but they were soon led away by Yuki and went off with Ang and Xin''er to have some cake. Kids at their age really were easy to bribe and lead away.


    Xiao Tu was just left there with the Arctic Lynx that kept resisting whenever he tried to take it away.


    With no other choice, he looked to Lin Fan for help, but all Lin Fan did was just look at him with a smile before also walking off, leaving him there alone with the Arctic Lynx.


    Bullying, it was clear bullying!


    But there was nothing that Xiao Tu could do since Lin Fan was his boss. All he could do was try to get the Arctic Lynx to follow him into the back¡­


    That was still easier said than done.


    The order that Lin Fan had given the Arctic Lynx before heading off was to cause as much trouble for Xiao Tu as possible.


    He knew that Xiao Tu still hadn''t given up on his feelings towards Xin''er and that was what annoyed him. He wouldn''t ept Xiao Tu since there was nothing to ept about Xiao Tu, so he would do all that he could to keep them apart.


    Though with his standards, he felt that no one in this world was good enough for Xin''er.


    ¡­


    After dinner, Lin Fan headed to the area where the Arctic Lynx had been kept.


    The Arctic Lynx had been patiently waiting to be trained, but after such a long time, it couldn''t help being anxious.


    It had done its best to cause trouble for Xiao Tu, but of course it had also held back since there was the cultivation difference. Xiao Tu was only in the Gold Realm while the Arctic Lynx was already in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    If it was serious about making it hard for Xiao Tu, it was unlikely Xiao Tu would have gotten out without a scratch.


    Seeing Lin Fane over, the Arctic Lynx was immediately filled with excitement.


    Whenever it remembered the feeling of Lin Fan punching it, it couldn''t help being filled with excitement and joy. That was the feeling of having its bloodline purified and having its dreams fulfilled, it couldn''t be med for being excited.


    It was looking forward to being beaten up¡­no, it should be "trained" by Lin Fan. It was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t have such ns.


    He had already purified the Arctic Fox''s bloodline as much as he could for now. If he were to continue purifying the Arctic Fox''s bloodline, with the poor foundation that it had, it wouldn''t be able to handle this sudden increase in power.


    If he were to do this, eventually the Arctic Fox would be crushed under its own power and all his efforts would be wasted as it self-destructed.


    So before he could train it further, he needed to enhance its foundations and allow it to adapt to the new power that it was gaining.


    Naturally the best way for him to do that was¡­


    When the Arctic Lynx was brought out of thefy cage that it had been put in and was expecting to be beaten, it was led down a low hallway instead.


    It couldn''t help feeling that this hallway was eerie with how dark it was, but it tried to convince itself that this was just because it was nighttime and it was dark outside. It was


    just thinking too much and that was scaring itself.


    It was just too bad that it didn''t ept reality and face these instincts since Lin Fan was indeed bringing it to a bad ce.


    It was brought to a dome where it was ced in the center before Lin Fan left while telling it to stay. This was a very empty ce that didn''t have anything in it, but that all changed with a single push of the button from Lin Fan.


    With just a single blink, the Arctic Lynx found that it was now surrounded by frozen jungle and that it was standing in the middle of a blizzard.


    The Arctic Lynx couldn''t even begin to understand what had just happened. It had been standing inside of an empty dome one minute and the next, it had been transported to this world of ice and snow.


    While the Arctic Lynx was trying to get its footings and trying to understand what happened, something changed in this world of ice and snow.


    The shadow under the Arctic Lynx suddenly started to move before leaving the Arctic Lynx to take form in front of the Arctic Lynx. The shadow came out of the ground and transformed into a dark version of the Arctic Lynx that stood there in front of it.


    The Arctic Lynx didn''t react to this at first since it was still looking around itself trying to figure out what was happening, but then it felt the auraing from the shadow version of itself and it immediately turned its attention to the shadow version.


    It didn''t know where this shadow version came from, but it tried asking, "Who are¡­"


    Before it could finish its roar, the shadow version suddenly jumped out at it, swinging its dark ws down. As the ws swung down, dark ice formed around it like ws and shed at the Arctic Lynx.


    The Arctic Lynx was barely able to react in time, but it was able to release an ice wall that blocked this attack¡­or at least it thought it blocked the attack until the ice wall it formed had shattered and it was sent flying.


    The shadow version didn''t stop there as it continued beating up the Arctic Lynx again and again with the dark ice w.


    The Arctic Lynx tried fighting back, but it realized that it waspletely outssed and it was just getting wailed on by the shadow version.


    Just like how it had bullied Xiao Tu in the afternoon, it was now getting bullied by this shadow version of itself.

 Chapter 850 Shocking Results

    The Arctic Lynx eventually lost its ability to fight back and it could onlyy there on the groundpletely exhausted.


    It looked up at the shadow version of itself with a fearful look, wondering just where it had gotten this power from.


    But the shadow version didn''t let it justy there.


    With a single swing of its dark ice w, the shadow version cut right through the Arctic Lynx''s throat, causing it to bleed out to its death.


    Even in the final moments of its life, the Arctic Lynx never would have imagined that it would die like this. Its master had given it to this shop to be trained, but this shop had sent this creature to kill it¡­


    No matter how it thought about it, this didn''t seem right!


    It had been brought here to train, not to be killed like this!


    It was unwilling, it wasn''t willing to die just like this!


    As its consciousness was about to fade, it suddenly felt a strange warmthing from deep inside of it. This strange warmth spread all over the Arctic Lynx until it realized that this strange warmth had healed all of its injuries and had restored its strength.


    As the Arctic Lynx stood up, it couldn''t help looking down at its body in shock as it didn''t understand what had just happened.


    It was just too bad that the shadow lynx didn''t give the Arctic Lynx a chance to catch its breath as it started attacking again.


    Seeing this, the Arctic Lynx had no choice but to fight back. But this time, it found that its attacks had be strongerpared to before and that they were much easier to control.


    With this newfound power, the Arctic Lynx''s confidence swelled as it thought that it would be able to win against the shadow lynx.


    However, this false hope was immediately shattered with a single move from the shadow lynx.


    With just a single sh of the ice w, the Arctic Lynx''s ice shield shattered into pieces and it was cut down once again¡­


    Once again, it went through the process of dying and then being resurrected.


    The Arctic Lynx didn''t understand what was happening, but at this point, all it wanted was for this to stop. This process of dying and reviving again, it really was painful!


    Lin Fan watched the Arctic Lynx''s progress in the shadow cultivation room for the first few deaths before he lost interest.


    He knew that there was nothing that he needed to do now that the Arctic Lynx was inside of the shadow cultivation room. All he had to do was let the shadow cultivation room do its job and the Arctic Lynx would be stronger.


    As for how it felt about this kind of training, he didn''t care at all.


    ¡­


    The next morning, Jun Xie arrived nice and early,ing to the store as soon as the store opened.


    He hadn''t been able to get much sleep that night since he had been worried about leaving Xiao Han at the store. Even if he had seen Lin Fan''s ability in that short demonstration that he gave, he still couldn''t help feeling doubtful about the ability of the shop.


    After all, the training period that he gave was just too short!


    Everyone knew that even the best Monster Trainers needed at least half a month before they could train a pet!


    When he arrived, he found that it wasn''t just him that hade to the store. There were many other people who had been there yesterday that had alsoe back this morning to watch the show.


    The attention that he received from the crowd made him feel very ufortable. Jun Xie was a person that didn''t attract much attention in the first ce, so being the center of attention for him was a very strange and ufortable thing.


    But that didn''tst long since the store opened right on time and everyone''s attention went to Lin Fan who was sitting at the counter.


    They created a path for Jun Xie to head to the counter while also crowding around to see what the results would be.


    Lin Fan just took one look at Jun Xie before signaling to Xiao Tu on the side to go get the Arctic Lynx.


    Xiao Tu revealed a bitter look when he saw this, but he still went off to get the Arctic Lynx. When he came back, he waspletely covered in scratches, but he still led the Arctic Lynx over.


    The Arctic Lynx kept looking at the back with a look that made it clear that it was still unwilling to leave. However, when it reached the front and it saw Lin Fan, it immediately gave a chill and hid behind Xiao Tu.


    It waspletely different from how it had acted yesterday, when it did all it could to rub up against and tter Lin Fan. Today, it was treating Lin Fan like it was looking at a demon king.


    It didn''t take long for the Arctic Lynx to notice that Jun Xie was here.


    The moment that the Arctic Lynx saw Jun Xie, it was like it had seen its saviour and dashed forward to jump into Jun Xie''s embrace. However, before it could leave, Lin Fan grabbed its cor.


    The Arctic Lynx looked back with a fierce look, but seeing that it was Lin Fan, it immediately lowered its head and went to the ground with a look of absolute submission.


    Jun Xie couldn''t help revealing a very strange look when he saw all of this. After being in a daze for a few seconds, he asked Lin Fan, "Mister shop employee, what''s wrong with my Xiao Han?"<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Lin Fan looked at him and said, "First, I''m the shop owner and second, there''s nothing wrong with him."


    "Eh?" Jun Xie looked at him with an even stranger look.


    Shop owner? Someone who was this casual and careless was the owner of the shop?


    But thinking of the demonstration that Lin Fan gave yesterday, he had no choice but to ept this.


    However, that still didn''t answer the question of why his Xiao Han was acting this strange¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t bother continuing this conversation as he said, "As you have paid for, we have finished our training for your pet. As you can see, your pet has now reached the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm and has learned the skills¡­" Lin Fan listed off a bunch of high grade skills before saying, "Please confirm that you have received your pet."


    After saying this, he handed the leash to Jun Xie and then sat back down without a care.


    Everyone had been silently listening to him with expressions that filled with more and more shock. That was because each skill that Lin Fan listed had increased their disbelief even more.


    These were all high level skills that could be considered specialty skills, but he was


    saying that the Arctic Lynx had learned all of them?


    A normal Monster Trainer would never make such a bold im since it was hard enough for them to teach this Arctic Lynx even one of these skills! He was saying that he had taught the Arctic Lynx all of these skills!?


    Did he really think that he was a Grandmaster Monster Trainer or even a Legendary Monster Trainer?


    One person in the crowd couldn''t help saying, "You must be kidding right! How could you possibly teach the Arctic Lynx all of these skills in just a single night?!"


    Lin Fan turned to look at this person with narrowed eyes before turning to Jun Xie and asking, "May I?"


    Jun Xie didn''t understand what he meant by that, but he still unconsciously gave a nod when he met Lin Fan''s eyes. There was this strange persuasive power that Lin Fan had that made him want to agree with him.


    Lin Fan turned back to the Arctic Lynx who under his gaze, immediately revealed a fierce look.


    Everyone couldn''t believe that this was the same Arctic Lynx that had been lying on the ground just a few seconds earlier.


    The Arctic Lynx turned in the direction of the person that had spoken up just now.


    That person was surprised to see the Arctic Lynx looking at it like this and he couldn''t help saying in a stuttering voice, "What? What''s¡­wrong? What do you¡­want?"


    The Arctic Lynx suddenly opened its mouth and released a freezing wind that wrapped around this person. It didn''t take long before that freezing wind condensed a cage of ice in the air that trapped this person inside of it.


    Everyone was shocked by the sudden attack of the Arctic Lynx, but they were even more shocked by the cage that appeared.


    That was because this cage was actually one of the ultimate skills that Lin Fan had listed just now!


    Those that had doubted Lin Fan''s words couldn''t doubt him anymore now that there was this cold hard proof in front of their face.


    The person stuck in the cage quickly recovered and shouted, "What are you doing to me! You dare attack people in broad daylight to hide your shame! Let me out this instant!"


    Lin Fan gave a snort and gave another snap.


    The Arctic Lynx gathered up its life energy again and released one skill after another, demonstrating all of the ultimate skills that Lin Fan had just listed.


    If they could argue that one skill was a coincidence, with many different skills being used now, they couldn''t make that same argument anymore.


    In the end, that person that had made aint was turned into an ice popsicle and was frozen there in the shop with a look of regret and fear on his face.


    Lin Fan saw that his goal had been aplished, so he flicked his finger and sent out a small me that flew out to the block of ice in the center of the store.


    The moment that the me touched the block of ice, it immediately melted away and that person fell to the ground shivering.


    He looked up at Lin Fan with a look of fear before running out of the store.


    As for thoughts of revenge, he didn''t dare have any such thoughts because he had seen how terrifying Lin Fan was.


    He hadn''t been able to stop the Arctic Lynx''s attacks just now, but Lin Fan had melted the ice formed by those attacks with just a tiny little me. It was clear that Lin Fan wasn''t a pushover and was an expert in his own right.


    He would only be seeking his own death if he thought about taking revenge on Lin Fan.


    After his demonstration, Lin Fan just sat back down at the counter without a word.


    There was only silence that was left in the air after this demonstration.

 Chapter 851 Bullies (1)

    The crowd quickly dispersed after this incident.


    There were some that stayed to check out Lin Fan''s store, but many of them still left because they didn''t dare be rash. They didn''t know the full power behind Lin Fan''s store yet and they still had their doubts about trusting this service, so they wanted to see a few more examples before taking this bait.


    But of course, most of them were going back to report to their elders since it was clear that Lin Fan wasn''t a simple person.


    They would get the elders of their families toe and see this store first to see if they could figure out anything.


    Jun Xie also silently left with his Arctic Lynx, but the way that he looked at the Arctic Lynx hadpletely changed.


    Once the crowd was gone, Lin Fan didn''t bother staying at the counter and left tending to the customers to Xiao Tu. He had already aplished his goal today, so all that was left was to harvest the seeds that he had sown.


    Of course, it would take several days before that happened, so all he could do was wait.


    Xiao Tu on the other hand could only reveal a bitter smile because he had been left with all the work.


    ¡­


    In a quiet room, there was a neatly dressed man sitting there.


    When the subordinate that had juste into the room handed him a report and he read it over, he couldn''t help jumping out of his chair and saying in a serious voice, "Is this true?"


    The subordinate lowered his head and gave a strong nod.


    The neatly dressed man sat down again and stroked his chin for a while before saying, "I have to report this to the young miss¡­"


    That neatly dressed man was naturally Dongfang Ming.


    He couldn''t just keep going to Lin Fan''s store for no reason since that would be considered overstepping his bounds, so he had posted someone to watch over Lin Fan''s store for him, which was who this subordinate was.


    The report that the subordinate had just handed to him was a report on Jun Xie''s Arctic Lynx.


    He and the young miss had only thought that Lin Fan wanted to open this pet store to have a ce toy low and have some fun, but he never thought that the situation would be like this. He and the young miss hadpletely underestimated Lin Fan and he couldn''t help wondering what other surprises Lin Fan would give him¡­


    As well as that wife of his and her friend¡­He couldn''t help getting a strange feeling from them when he had met them before¡­


    But he also had to admire the young miss for her intuition and her intelligence. If it wasn''t for her, they wouldn''t have even been able to make this connection with Lin Fan in the first ce.


    He couldn''t help looking forward to seeing what other surprises Lin Fan would give him.


    ¡­


    Jun Xie headed off to school after going to the store since today was still a school day.


    Of course, since he went to the Royal Academy that was the best school in the capital, it was a ce that was different from normal schools. Instead of having sses, most of the time the students were allowed to engage in free studies since most of them came from special families. Most of them had their own special inherited techniques, so the only thing that they really needed from the school were resources.


    Well, it wasn''t just resources, but also fame.


    Since it was recognized as the best academy in the city, the students were also regarded as the best.


    As well, all the people here were sessors of big families, so it allowed the students to make many future connections.


    When Jun Xie arrived at the school, the first ce that he headed to was the practice field.


    He wanted to personally practice with Xiao Han to see how much stronger he had be. Not to mention, they would need to work on their coordination now that Xiao Han was stronger.


    But when he arrived, he found that there were people already there.


    If it was some other normal students, he would have been fine with them, but it was different for this group. That was because this group was a group of people that he recognized.


    While there weren''t any sses, students of the same year were still put in groups to help them interact with each other. This group was a group from his year group, but they were the furthest thing from friends.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    In fact, they were actually Jun Xie''s bullies.


    The leader of this group was the son of Count Chen, Chen Ru.


    As a noble, he had naturally been raised with the pride of a noble, but he was only a middle ss noble. After all, the count didn''t have a high position nor did he have a low position, he was just an average noble.


    That meant that he looked down on those that were beneath him, but since there were many things that he had to consider as a noble, he couldn''t bully anyone that was actually in his grade. That was until he encountered Jun Xie who was not a noble, but rather the son of a rich merchant''s family.


    This kind of person was the perfect target for him since there were very few consequences on picking on someone like this.


    His merchant family relied on nobles to do their business, so no matter what he did to him, he would have to take it since he couldn''t risk falling out with the nobles. So Chen Ru used him as an outlet to satisfy his vanity and make himself seem greater than he really was.


    When Jun Xie had nned on leaving the practice field after seeing them, Chen Ru noticed Jun Xie and stopped him from leaving.


    With a wave of his hand, Chen Ru and his group surrounded Jun Xie to stop him from leaving. After surrounding him, Chen Ru put a hand around Jun Xie''s shoulder and said, "Where are you going buddy? We haven''t seen you in a few days, we almost thought that you were running away from us."


    Jun Xie revealed an ufortable look, but he still sucked it up and said in a stuttering voice, "I, I had some family business to take care of. I would, would never try to avoid you."


    Chen Ru looked at him with a smile and said, "Is that so?"


    Jun Xie just gave an awkward nod.


    Then that smile disappeared from Chen Ru''s face as he said, "Then why did you try to leave just now?"


    Jun Xie revealed a look of panic when he heard this as he knew that something bad was going to happen. But he forced himself to remain calm as he said, "I just remembered some other business that I had to take care of, that''s all."


    Chen Ru nodded before asking with the same expressionless look, "Is that so? You just had some other business to take care of?"


    Jun Xie gave a gulp and was about to nod, but then Chen Ru suddenly pped the back of his head and said, "What could be more important than hanging out with your friends?" He looked around at his followers and asked, "Isn''t that right?"


    All of his followers were sons of minor nobles, so everything that they did was to make Chen Ru happy. But at the same time, these nobles had the same personality as Chen Ru, so they enjoyed bullying Jun Xie in the first ce.


    Not to mention that they often extorted money from Jun Xie since they were from small noble families that didn''t have much money in the first ce.


    So all of the followers nodded in agreement to Chen Ru''s words.


    Even though the people around them had ugly expressions from Chen Ru''s words, they didn''t do anything. It wasn''t as if they were afraid of Chen Ru, but rather there was no merit for them to help Jun Xie.


    These nobles were mainly here at school to build rtionships with other nobles and people that could help them in the future. A weakling like Jun Xie who allowed himself to be bullied by others like this naturally wasn''t someone that they wanted to associate with.


    Chen Ru turned back to Jun Xie and said, "Come, let''s go and have a practice match. After that, you can pay your fee for practicing with me."


    This was the normal routine between them.


    He would "graciously" offer to practice with Jun Xie and then afterwards, he would charge a "fee" for helping him practice.


    Of course, this was nothing more than a cover for beating up Jun Xie and then extorting money from him.


    But Jun Xie had already been conditioned to ept this after being beaten many times. So he just nodded and followed Chen Ru into the practice arena.


    Chen Ru stood in front of Jun Xie with a wide smile on his face as he said, "Xiao Jun, let''s do it like this. I''ll even stand still and give you a free hit, or else people will really think that I''m bullying you."


    Jun Xie just gave a nk nod since that was how it went normally.


    That was because while Chen Ru was an awful person, he was still a talented person as a middle ss noble. He was someone that had already reached the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm and had Peak Fragmented Soul Realm pets.


    With a wave of his hand, Jun Xie called out the Arctic Lynx before suddenly realizing that something was off.


    When the Arctic Lynx appeared, Chen Ru couldn''t help revealing a surprised look as he said, "Yi? You got a new pet?"

 Chapter 852 Bullies (2)

    After that surprised cry, Chen Ru suddenly narrowed his eyes a bit as he looked more closely at the Arctic Lynx.


    His eyes couldn''t help opening wide in shock as he suddenly said, "It''s actually a Peak Fragmented Soul Realm Beast!"


    When he said this, everyone that had been around couldn''t help turning to look in their direction, turning to look at the Arctic Lynx.


    Many of them also revealed shocked looks when they looked carefully at the Arctic Lynx. That was because they were all familiar with Jun Xie since they were all in the same grade, but they had never heard of him owning a pet like this before.


    The pets that he had before were all only in the Low Fragmented Soul Realm, how did he suddenly get a Peak Fragmented Soul Realm pet in a single day?


    But Chen Ru quickly revealed a look of greed.


    Jun Xie was someone that he bullied, so he had long thought of Jun Xie''s things as his own.


    Naturally, that included Jun Xie''s pet.


    How could he allow this Peak Fragmented Soul Realm pet to go to waste in the hands of Jun Xie?


    It would clearly be better off if it was in his hands.


    So with this thought, Chen Ru said, "Oh, this pet seems a bit too strong for you. How about if you lose, you give me this pet and I''ll give you a pet that you can control more easily?"


    Jun Xie jolted out of his daze when he heard this and for the first time, he stood up to Chen Ru by saying, "No, you can''t take Xiao Han away."


    Chen Ru knitted his brows when he heard this, but he acted like he didn''t hear Jun Xie at all as he said, "Good, so you agree. Then let''s get this show on the road."


    With a flip of his hand, he summoned out a ck fox thatnded in front of the Arctic Lynx.


    When this ck fox appeared, his followers all started praising it.


    "There it is, it''s young master Chen''s Shadow Fox!"


    "It''s a rare pet that even has a True Soul Realm Bloodline. As expected of the son of Count Chen, he really has things that others can''t get easily!"


    "That''s right, that''s right! Young master Chen will clearly be a World Realm Expert in the future!"


    Chen Ru''s ego was stroked by thesepliments and he revealed an arrogant smile as he said, "Like I said, I''ll give you one free blow, so make it count." After saying this, he gave the order for the Shadow Fox to remain still as he waited for Jun Xie to make a move.


    Of course, this was a lie.


    He was just waiting for Jun Xie toe closer before suddenly attacking him and injuring him.


    He was actually quite filled with rage after what had happened earlier with the duke''s daughter, so he wanted to vent that rage. It was a good thing that Jun Xie had appeared out of nowhere for him to beat up.


    But Jun Xie wasn''t willing to take it lying down this time.


    Perhaps he would have epted it if all they wanted was some money since he had plenty of it from his family. However, if they wanted to take away his precious partner, he certainly wouldn''t stand for it.


    He had personally picked out Xiao Han and had raised him, so they were more like brothers than master and pet. If someone wanted to take his brother away, naturally he wouldn''t let them do so.


    So Jun Xie revealed a determined look that he had never revealed before and said, "Xiao Han, let''s beat them up."


    The bullies had heard this, but instead of being offended, they just found it funny. They all revealed smiles of ridicule and started insulting Jun Xie, but hepletely ignored them.


    The Arctic Lynx was surprised since it had never seen Jun Xie like this, but since Jun Xie had made up his mind, it could only go along as his pet and his brother.


    The Arctic Lynx turned to look at the Shadow Fox with a hostile look, but before it could do anything, it suddenly revealed a shocked look. There was a trace of fear that flickered in its eyes before it waspletely reced with a look of rage.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    This Shadow Fox looked simr to the shadow lynx that it had foughtst night¡­


    When it remembered all the grievances that it sufferedst night, it couldn''t help exploding with rage!


    Chen Ru could sense that something was wrong with this situation and he couldn''t help asking in a stuttering voice, "What, what''s going¡­"


    Before he could finish, the Arctic Lynx had already summoned a giant storm of ice and snow around it. This storm of ice and snow was so strong that it immediately caused the temperature inside of this practice room to drop.


    This practice room was called the practice room, but it was by no means small. It was big enough to be used as an arena, so there was plenty of space inside of this practice room.


    This just went to show just how powerful the storm that the Arctic Lynx had summoned was as it was even able to cause the temperature to drop in such arge room.


    As the ones that were the closest, Chen Ru, his Shadow Fox, and his followers were the one that bore the brunt of this attack.


    Not to mention his followers, even Chen Ru wasn''t able to take this attack at all.


    All of them were picked up by this storm and mmed against the wall, but that was considered getting off easy.


    As for the Shadow Fox who had to bear the brunt of the Arctic Lynx''s rage, it was thrown around inside of the snow tornado that the Arctic Lynx had created. It was thrown back and forth inside of that snow tornado, being hit again and again with chunks of ice that had been condensed.


    It had tried its best to use its own shadowws to block these attacks and break free of the snow tornado, but no matter what it did, it wasn''t able to do a single thing. All of its defenses were shattered and the shadoww that it used to hide itself was useless since it was trapped inside of the snow tornado. Even if it were to hide itself with its shadoww, it wasn''t as if it would be able to break free of the snow tornado''s grasp.


    So it could only allow itself to be battered by the ice and snow of the snow tornado.


    But this was far from being enough to calm the Arctic Lynx''s rage, so without hesitation, it summoned even more ice that it shot into the snow tornado. With more ice being added in, the amount of ice that mmed into the Shadow Fox''s body increased until it was covered in bruises and it lost consciousness.


    Once it had lost consciousness, the Arctic Lynx knew that it couldn''t keep beating up the Shadow Fox, so it let it go. Of course, it wouldn''t let the Shadow Fox off that easily since it wouldn''t forgive itself if it did, so it threw the Shadow Fox across the room with the force of the snow tornado and mmed it into the wall. The Shadow Fox that had been thrown into the wall created its imprint in that wall, even though the walls had been made with a special alloy that was very resistant.


    Everyone was silent after the Arctic Lynx finished its disy, only looking at the Arctic Lynx with looks of disbelief. Naturally, that also included Jun Xie who never expected the Arctic Lynx to have this kind of power¡­


    It knew that the Arctic Lynx was stronger after being trained by Lin Fan, but he never expected it to be this strong!


    After all, the Arctic Lynx used to be weaker than other pets because of its impure bloodline, so it had been them that had been bullied by people.


    After a long period of silence, there were people that suddenly came into the practice room.


    After seeing the power of the Arctic Lynx and that the situation was bad for Chen Ru, some of the people in the practice room had run off to find certain people.


    While Chen Ru didn''t have many other friends in the same grade other than his followers, he did belong to a certain faction.


    Since this was a school, there would naturally be factions that exist in it.


    The faction that Chen Ru belonged to was the nobility faction.


    While it was called the nobility faction, it wasn''t a faction that was made up of all the nobles that attended. It was made up of nobles who believed that nobles should be treated with the utmost respect and receive the best treatment.


    After all, this academy wasn''t just made up of nobles. It was also made up of the juniors from minor powerful families and merchant families as well.


    The ones that came into the practice room were second year students, seniors to this group of first years students. They were also nobles that were part of the nobility faction.


    When they came in and saw the state that Chen Ru was in, they couldn''t help revealing ugly expressions.


    Especially since they knew that the one who had put him in this state was nothing more than a merchant family''s son.


    This was clear provocation towards their nobility faction!

 Chapter 853 Bet

    The leader of this group of seniors was called Ouyang Xun, the son of Count Ouyang.


    Unlike Count Chen who was only considered an average noble, Count Ouyang was actually a noble that had a bit of power since he had a position in the department of finance.


    He was someone that had some say in the country''s budget, so naturally respect was given to him.


    Especially since it was also said that he dabbled in tax collection.


    If they were to offend him, then¡­


    When Ouyang Xun saw the situation in the practice room, his expression immediately turned dark as he red at Jun Xie. However, it was above him to personally make a move against a first year, so he couldn''t beat him up even if he wanted to.


    After all, nobles had to care about their image and he couldn''t do anything that would publicly disgrace his family. There were just too many people that were around in the end.


    So with a snap and a gesture with his hand, one of his followers went forward to help Chen Ru and his followers.


    This follower came up to Chen Ru and helped him down from the wall before asking, "Junior Chen, what happened here?"


    Chen Ru hadn''t been knocked out from being mmed into the wall, but he had suffered some minor injuries so he spat out a mouthful of blood. It took him a while to recover, but his eyes lit up when he saw who it was that came to help.


    "Senior, we were just having a simple practice session with this ssmate, but we never thought that he would be so ruthless. We even gave him a free blow because normally he''s at the bottom of the rankings, but he took advantage of our kindness tounch a sneak attack on us! Senior, please take revenge for us!"


    The follower gave a nod before saying, "Junior Chen, don''t worry! I will settle ounts for you!"


    When the people who had been in the room before heard this, they couldn''t help revealing looks of disgust when they heard this. This was the most tant twisting of facts that they had ever seen, but they weren''t going to do anything about it.


    That was because Ouyang Xun was the one that led this group.


    Not a single one of them had enough power to match Count Ouyang, so they knew better than to stand up for Jun Xie. After all, they would just be causing trouble for their families if they were to stand up for him.


    It was better for them to watch from the side or leave this ce. In fact, there were a few people that left through the other entrance of this room when they saw that it was Ouyang Xun leading this group.


    Jun Xie would have also wanted to leave this ce, but there was no chance for him since he was the one that had started this.


    The senior came forward and stood across Jun Xie on the practice stage before saying, "I will take revenge for my junior now. However, I can''t have people think that I''m bullying you, so I''ll give you a free hit as well."


    This was very reasonable because this person was actually in the Embryo Soul Realm. Even if he was only in the Low Embryo Soul Realm, this was still a major realm that was between them.


    So he had to think about his image.


    He couldn''t challenge this weaker junior in the Fragmented Soul Realm with revenge alone as a reason, he had to give himself a handicap to make it sound better.


    But even then, Jun Xie still had an ugly expression on his face.


    Would a single blow be enough to cross the gap between this major realm? No, it was impossible!


    After the senior said this, he also summoned out his pet which was surprisingly another Shadow Fox.


    When the Arctic Lynx saw the Shadow Fox, its mes of rage couldn''t help being stoked again as it filled with killing intent towards the Shadow Fox.


    Jun Xie was shocked by this.


    For some reason, the Arctic Lynx wasn''t afraid to fight this Shadow Fox at all even though this Shadow Fox was in the Low Embryo Soul Realm. It should be clear that the Arctic Lynx wasn''t a match for it at all, but that didn''t seem like to be the case to the Arctic Lynx.


    Even the senior and the Shadow Fox were caught off guard by this because they felt a bit of dangering from this Arctic Lynx.


    But then they couldn''t help feeling angry from shame because they couldn''t believe that they had been afraid of this Arctic Lynx that was only in the Peak Fragmented Soul Realm.


    The senior even shouted in an angry voice, "Are youing or not?!"


    Jun Xie clearly didn''t want to get involved in this matter, but he didn''t have a choice, so he said, "Xiao Han, be careful."


    With this, the Arctic Lynx no longer held back, but this time it didn''t gather the same storm of ice and snow from before. Instead, it had a slow start as it only dropped the temperature around it.


    Everyone who had been watching couldn''t help being surprised since they had seen the strong attack from the Arctic Lynx before. Some of them even wondered if the Arctic Lynx had run out of life energy after thatrge attack¡­


    But before anyone could react, there was a sudden sh from the Arctic Lynx before both the Shadow Fox and the senior were encased in ice.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Neither of them had been able to react to this attack and after being encased, neither of them could do a single thing. They found that, let alone using their life energy, they weren''t even able to move a single finger.


    When they tried using their life energy, they found that it was being sucked away by the ice. It was as if anything that they tried to do was slowly being sucked away by the ice. They found that even their energy was slowly being sucked away by the ice and they were losing consciousness¡­


    But before they could lose consciousness, Ouyang Xun finally made his move.


    With a single flick of his hand, he shattered the ice that surrounded the two of them and they copsed to the ground without any strength. Then he turned back to Jun Xie and said, "I never thought that you would be so ruthless in a practice match. You even used a killing move like "Absolute Freeze" on them."


    The followers had been confused at first about what had happened, but when Ouyang Xun said the words "Absolute Freeze", they realized what had happened.


    "Absolute Freeze" was a very special skill since it was a skill that wasn''t easy to learn. It condensed the strongest icews and then used that to create a block of ice that had temperatures at absolute zero,pletely absorbing everything that it touched. That was why the senior and the Shadow Fox hadn''t been able to do a single thing since everything that they tried was drained away by the ice.


    If they had been left there long enough, it would be certain that their vital energy would have been drained as well and they would have died.


    So it wasn''t an exaggeration to call him ruthless at all.


    But at least now, Ouyang Xun finally had an excuse to act.


    Unlike the rest of the people here, he was a true forerunner in his grade, being considered one of the top experts.


    His cultivation had already reached the Peak Embryo Soul Realm and he was only a single step from breaking through to the Child Soul Realm.


    This time, the Arctic Lynx didn''t show the same confident look as before. Even if it was confident in crossing a major realm to fight, this was just too big of a gap that it can''t fight back at all.


    It even started to miss Lin Fan''s training since it knew that was what had allowed it to be so strong¡­


    But before Ouyang Xun could do anything, there was someone that suddenly came forward to stand between him and Jun Xie.


    When this person appeared, everyone was shocked.


    That was because this person was the daughter of Duke Yang, Yang Xi Ruo!


    Unlike these sons of counts, the daughter of a duke naturally had a higher status. Especially since it was Duke Yang who was one of the Five Great Generals of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    It was hard to find anyone with a higher status among all the people in the first year ss.


    Ouyang Xun was taken aback, but he was raised differently, so he quickly reacted by giving Yang Xi Ruo a bow and saying, "Your highness, what are you doing here?"


    "Your highness" was normally saved for royalty, but this was applicable in this situation since each of the dukes were regarded as kings. So in a sense, Yang Xi Ruo was a princess and could be addressed as such.


    Yang Xi Ruo gave a cold snort and said, "I couldn''t keep watching you bullying the weak anymore. Are you really not ashamed of doing this?"


    Ouyang Xun trembled when he heard this, but he was already in too deep to back down now even if the other side was the daughter of Duke Yang. The only thing that he could do now was try to use logic to convince her otherwise.


    So Ouyang Xun lowered his head again and said, "Your highness, how is this bullying the weak? We''re the ones that have been suffering at the hands of this brute. Can''t you see how my ssmate and his junior have all been injured by this violent man? Can you really tell me not to get revenge for them?"


    Yang Xi Ruo gave another cold snort before saying, "Do you really think that I don''t know what''s going on? It was clearly Chen Ru who provoked Jun Xie first and then your follower was the one that tried to sweep this matter under the rug by taking care of Jun Xie."


    This time, Ouyang Xun, his followers, Chen Ru, and all of Chen Ru''s followers all trembled when they heard this.


    They couldn''t believe that Yang Xi Ruo already knew about all of this¡­They didn''t see her in this practice room before, so how had she figured all of this out?


    But no matter what, it wasn''t as if they could admit to this now¡­


    So the only thing that they could do was continue the lie.


    Ouyang Xun red at Chen Ru for dragging him down before looking up at Yang Xi Ruo to say, "Your highness, how could it be like that? It really is my ssmate and his junior that was¡­"


    Yang Xi Ruo raised her hand to cut him off before saying, "Enough of these lies, I''m tired of them."


    Ouyang Xun had a very ugly look on his face and a trace of anger from being cut off like this, but he still bowed his head without saying a thing.


    Yang Xi Ruo then said, "Instead, let''s make a bet."


    Once again, everyone revealed a shocked look when they heard this.

 Chapter 854 Friend? (1)

    Ouyang Xun was once again the first one to react as he asked in a shaky voice, "Bet? Your highness, what do, do you mean by a bet?"


    Yang Xi Ruo just casually said, "It''s very simple, a bet is a bet. I''ll make a bet that Jun Xie will be able to beat any one of your followers at next week''s ranking exam."


    Ouyang Xun deeply knitted his brows when he heard this as his mind began racing, trying to figure out what Yang Xi Ruo''s goal in doing this was.


    But no matter how fast his mind turned, he wasn''t able to figure out a single thing¡­


    After all, this seemed just too willful and too nonsensical to actually have a goal.


    Jun Xie was someone who came from a merchant family. Even if his family did well for themselves, they didn''t have any status or influence like the nobles did. There was


    nothing about his family that made it worth standing up for him.


    As for Yang Xi Ruo, she was the only daughter of Duke Yang, the apple of his eye. He was famous for doting on his daughter, so he had made sure that his daughter had received the best that anyone could get.


    If one were to marry Yang Xi Ruo, it was certain that they would be set for life. They wouldn''t ever have to lift a single finger since they would be the future duke, ruling above all others.


    So there really wasn''t anything that Yang Xi Ruo would gain from doing something like this¡­


    But here she was standing in between him and Jun Xie¡­


    Could it be that there really was something special about this weakling?


    However, since he wasn''t able to think of anything, Ouyang Xun had no choice but to y along.


    After all, it was toote for him to back down now and if he were to publicly back down from a bet with Yang Xi Ruo over this merchant family brat, it would bring shame to him. They would say that he was so scared that he didn''t even dare face someone in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    His pride would never allow these kinds of rumours to spread, even if he was beaten to death.


    So after ring at Jun Xie for a bit, he turned back to Yang Xi Ruo and said, "What are we betting?"


    Yang Xi Ruo looked up as if she was thinking about something before saying, "How about that little de of yours?"


    When Ouyang Xun heard this, he deeply knitted his brows as he looked at Yang Xi Ruo with a trace of hostility, but that quickly faded as he asked, "Then what does he have that will be worth trading that de for?"


    It had to be known that the little de that Yang Xi Ruo was referring to was Ouyang Xun''s special artifact. This was a Child Soul Realm Artifact, something that wouldn''t have been easy to get if one wasn''t a noble. But for Ouyang Xun, it was his most precious item because this was the only Child Soul Realm Artifact he had been given.


    Even if they were nobles, it wasn''t as if he would be given artifacts that were far above his level for no reason.


    Of course, he had also never shown off this de before, so he couldn''t help being shocked by the fact that Yang Xi Ruo knew about this. He even suspected that she was plotting against him by requesting this.


    Yang Xi Ruo said with a smile, "He also has one too, so he''ll bet that with you."


    Everyone revealed shocked expressions when they heard this, especially Jun Xie.


    That was because Yang Xi Ruo was right, Jun Xie did indeed have a Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    Unlike the other children, he was actually someone who was pampered by his family, so they spared no expenses in protecting him. They even gave him this Child Soul Realm Artifact just so he could protect himself when he was in danger.


    But he had absolutely never told anyone about this, let alone taken out this Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    Just how did Yang Xi Ruo know about this?


    When this was exposed, Ouyang Xun couldn''t help taking this seriously.


    That was just how enticing the Child Soul Realm Artifact was.


    If he could win, he would be able to get another Child Soul Realm Artifact and he was certain that he would win easily.


    After all, even if that Arctic Lynx was powerful, it was still only in the Fragmented Soul Realm.


    As long as he sent one of his stronger subordinates, it was impossible for Jun Xie to achieve any good results on the exam.


    But he also had a vague bad feeling about this bet. After all, he had never heard of this Jun Xie before and he suddenly showed up with this powerful Arctic Lynx one day¡­Just where did this persone from?


    He even doubted that this was all an borate trap that had been set up by Yang Xi Ruo¡­


    However, the enticement was just too strong for him and he couldn''t help taking it in the end. So he said, "Alright, it''s a bet."


    Then without saying anything else, he waved his hand and led his subordinates away.


    His subordinates also picked up Chen Ru''s group and the subordinate that had lost to Jun Xie. It was clear that they wouldn''t have a good fate waiting for them, but it was what they deserved.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    After Ouyang Xun was gone, everyone headed off with their own thing and left Yang Xi Ruo alone with Jun Xie. After all, Yang Xi Ruo''s status was there and she wasn''t someone that could be easily offended.


    Since it was clear that she had some business with Jun Xie, it was better to leave them alone.


    Jun Xie just awkwardly stood there since he really didn''t know what to say.


    He also knew Yang Xi Ruo''s status and normally he wouldn''t be qualified to even talk to her. Now that she was standing here in front of him, it was hard for him not to feel awkward.


    Luckily for him, Yang Xi Ruo took the initiative to start the conversation. However, the words that she saidpletely shocked him.


    "Hello, my name is Yang Xi Ruo, can we be friends?"


    Jun Xie''s chin dropped to the ground and he couldn''t close it for a long time as he just stared at her.


    This beautiful and noble girl wanted to be his friend?


    Just how much luck did he have in his past life for this to happen?


    Now that everything had settled, he was able to get a better look at her. She was a beautiful girl with skin as fair as snow, features as delicate as a doll, and hair that was long and sleek like a waterfall. This was definitely a girl that could only be described as a nation copsing beauty and yet she wanted to be friends with him?


    Seeing that Jun Xie was just standing there in a daze, Yang Xi Ruo couldn''t help revealing a smile as she teased, "What? You can''t be friends with someone like me? That hurts¡­"


    Before she could finish the rest of her words, Jun Xie quickly waved his hand and said, "No, no, it''s nothing like that! It''s an honour that you would ask me to be your friend, but¡­" After a hesitant pause, he said, "I''m not really qualified, am I?"


    Yang Xi Ruo slightly knitted her brows when she heard this before saying, "Who says that you''re not?"


    Jun Xie awkwardly said, "Well, I''m not a noble and I''m not strong. Someone like me who is at the bottom of the ss, how could I match someone as beautiful and noble as you?"


    Yang Xi Ruo revealed a smile again as she said, "You think I''m beautiful?"


    Jun Xie was about to panic again, but after a moment, he just gave a nod.


    Yang Xi Ruo was a bit surprised by how direct Jun Xie was, so she couldn''t helpughing. Thisughter was like the beautiful singing of a nightingale, making one''s heart jump when it rang out.


    But then she revealed a serious look and said, "I''m the only one who can decide who is qualified to be my friend, no one else can ever decide this. If I want to be your friend, then you are qualified to be my friend."


    Jun Xie still had an awkward look as he said, "But¡­"


    Yang Xi Ruo raised a hand to cut him off before saying, "No buts. Unless you really don''t want to be my friend."


    Jun Xie once again panicked and said, "No, no, it would be my honour. But¡­"


    Yang Xi Ruo raised her hand again to cut him off, "I already said no buts." Then she said with a smile, "Since you''re honoured, then it''s already done. We''re friends now."


    Jun Xie couldn''t follow how direct and frank she was, but since she had already made a decree, there wasn''t anything that he could do. So this was the aura of a duke''s sessor and a princess, it really was something else¡­He really couldn''t say anything when facing it.


    After settling this matter, Yang Xi Ruo changed the topic by saying, "Since we''re friends now, I have something that I want to ask you."


    Jun Xie was surprised by this, but he quickly said, "Please ask anything you want. As long as it''s something that I know, I''ll be happy to answer."


    Yang Xi Ruo turned her eyes to the Arctic Lynx and asked, "Where did you find this pet?"


    Jun Xie was taken aback at first, but then he suddenly revealed a look of understanding.


    If she knew about his Child Soul Realm Artifact, she naturally knew about what level he was at before. So naturally she would be curious how Xiao Han had suddenly be so powerful.


    Naturally, she would also want the same thing for her own pets.


    Jun Xie just said, "I''ve always had Xiao Han."


    Yang Xi Ruo nodded before saying, "So did something good happen with Xiao Hantely?"


    Jun Xie hesitated a bit, but he figured that she would be able to find out about Lin Fan''s store in the end, he would just tell her. At least he would be able to earn some favorability with her by being direct.


    So Jun Xie told Yang Xi Ruo all about Lin Fan''s store, but he also made sure to tell her about how strange it was.


    Yang Xi Ruo nodded along as she listened to this before she suddenly said, "Alright, let''s go to the store together tomorrow?"


    "Eh?" That was the only thing that Jun Xie could respond with.

 Chapter 855 Friend? (2)

    Early next morning, Jun Xie was surprised to see a carriage waiting outside of his house.


    He had made ns to meet up with Yang Xi Ruo to head to the shop, but he had thought that they would meet up at the shop instead of hering to pick him up like this. After all, one couldn''t just expect someone with Yang Xi Ruo''s status to do something like this.


    When he came out, he found that there were guards that were at the gate of his house.


    When these guards saw him, they all looked at him with res which immediately made him shrink back. After all, all of these guards were in the Embryo Soul Realm and were much stronger than him.


    But Yang Xi Ruo came out of the carriage to save him from his predicament.


    Seeing him like this, she revealed a smile and took him by the hand as she pulled him into the carriage while saying, "Let''s go!"


    Jun Xie waspletely taken aback by this, but he also couldn''t help enjoying the feeling of holding Yang Xi Ruo''s hand. It really was soft and smooth, it was a feeling that was hard topare to.


    All of the guards narrowed their eyes to look at this which scared Jun Xie, but he couldn''t just break free from Yang Xi Ruo in front of everyone like this. It would be like pping her right in the face, so he had no choice but to endure.


    It wasn''t as if he was enjoying this feeling at all.


    After the two of them entered the carriage, all of the guards couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    "Have you ever seen the young miss like that before?"


    "No¡­I can''t even begin to imagine what the duke will do when he finds out about this¡­"


    All of the guards couldn''t help shivering when they heard this.


    The duke was famous among the people that knew him as a fanatic doting parent. If there were any bugs that tried to approach his beloved daughter, he would immediately wipe them all out¡­


    But this time, it seemed like it was his daughter that approached this bug first.


    If he were to wipe this bug out¡­his daughter would surely be unhappy.


    This feeling of being unable to do anything would definitely eat the duke apart and he would vent his anger out¡­on his subordinates.


    As this thought passed through their minds, all of the guards couldn''t help giving another shiver. They would certainly suffer when the timees, so they couldn''t help feeling hatred for Jun Xie.


    Even the ring that they did earlier was because of the orders of the duke who had immediately overreacted when he learned of this outing.


    The carriage headed off from Jun Xie''s house and soon reached the store.


    Even though it had only been a single day since he had been here, Jun Xie found that this store hadpletely changed. Unlike before where there were no customers at all, there were now people lining up to get their pets.


    After they had seen what happened with his pet, there were people that took a risk and left their pets with Lin Fan''s shop for training. They were here this morning to see the results of the training.


    When Lin Fan''s store opened, these people all rushed up to the counter where Lin Fan was sitting and asked for their pets back.


    Lin Fan just calmly faced them and asked for their tickets.


    Unlike yesterday where there was only a single person that had left their pet here, with more people, they had to give tickets to keep track of people.


    All of them took out their tickets and tried to thrust them in Lin Fan''s face, but he released a bit of his aura and suppressed them before making them get in line.


    When these people felt Lin Fan''s aura, they couldn''t help falling silent and slowly getting in line. But there was someone else that had a different expression when they felt Lin Fan''s aura.


    Yang Xi Ruo had narrowed her eyes to look at Lin Fan after feeling this aura from him because she could tell that this aura wasn''t normal.


    As the duke''s daughter, she had met many experts and she had felt their auras before. Lin Fan''s aura was simr to the auras of those experts that she had met before.


    It was clear that Lin Fan wasn''t a normal person, but he was someone who was willing toe here and run a pet store? Not to mention that there was that special increase in power for the Arctic Lynx¡­


    Just who was he?


    Lin Fan took the tickets one by one before having Xiao Tu bring out all the pets.


    When the owners saw their pets, they immediately went forward to check them.


    The power of these pets didn''t increase by the same amount as the Arctic Lynx, but they had all increased by quite a bit.


    The Arctic Lynx was special since it was the first pet that had been left at the store. Lin Fan had given it special training as a bit of an added service. But of course, this special training had left quite the impression on the Arctic Lynx.


    After seeing that their pets were all stronger, the owners didn''t waste any time at all as they headed off back to their homes to report to their elders.


    Such a good ce, naturally it would have to be hoarded¡­


    But that was none of Lin Fan''s concern as heid back in his chair and waited for the next customer.


    Jun Xie took this chance to bring Yang Xi Ruo forward.


    Standing in front of the counter, Jun Xie said, "Owner, I''m back for more training."


    Lin Fan who had been lying there with his eyes closed heard this familiar voice and opened an eye to look at him. Seeing that it was Jun Xie, he just waved his hand and said, "You know the process. Just bring out your pet and pay the fee."


    Then he was about to close his eye again, but then he noticed Yang Xi Ruo who was standing on the side.


    When he saw Yang Xi Ruo, he couldn''t help opening his other eye to look at her for a bit before asking Jun Xie, "Is this your friend?"


    Jun Xie was surprised to hear this, but seeing the way that Lin Fan looked at Yang Xi Ruo, he understood what Lin Fan was thinking. Lin Fan was a man and it was normal for him to be interested in a beautiful girl like Yang Xi Ruo.


    After hesitating for a bit, Jun Xie gave a nod and said, "Yes, she''s my friend."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at her for a bit before turning to Jun Xie to say, "Are you sure that she''s your friend?"<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Jun Xie waspletely confused by this.


    What did he mean by this?


    Was it because he seemed too in to be the friend of a beautiful girl like Yang Xi Ruo, or was there another reason why Lin Fan was asking this?


    In fact, what had caught Lin Fan''s attention wasn''t Yang Xi Ruo''s beauty, but rather the look in her eyes.


    He had already seen Ang, so this level of beauty wasn''t able to do anything to him. Even if he was moved, he wouldn''t have acted since he knew what would happen if Ang ever found out that he made a move on another girl.


    But he couldn''t help himself when he saw the way that Yang Xi Ruo looked at Jun Xie.


    It was a look that Lin Fan was familiar with, so he couldn''t help worrying for Jun Xie¡­


    After a long period of silence, Jun Xie said in a firm voice, "She is my friend."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he turned to look at Yang Xi Ruo, but he chose not to say anything after he noticed the look that Yang Xi Ruo had in her eyes. He knew that if he were to say anything else, she would certainly go all out against him.


    Lin Fan just turned to Xiao Tu and gave a nod to him.


    Xiao Tu came forward and asked for Jun Xie''s pet, which reminded Jun Xie why he hade in the first ce.


    The only reason that Xiao Han had be this strong was because it had been trained in Lin Fan''s store and now that he was in this predicament, naturally he would bring Xiao Han back for more training. That was the only way that he would be able to win this bet that had been set.


    So Jun Xie called out Xiao Han.


    When Xiao Han appeared, it looked around itself arrogantly. Its ego had been boosted after what had happened yesterday and now it acted arrogantly unlike before.


    However, the moment that it saw that this was Lin Fan''s store, that arrogant look on its facepletely copsed. It immediately hid behind Jun Xie and looked at Lin Fan with eyes filled with fear.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about it since he had seen plenty of pets in his store acting like this. He just had Xiao Tu take care of the Arctic Lynx, bringing it into the back for training.


    Xiao Tu dragged the Arctic Lynx away and the only thing that it could do was look back at Jun Xie like he was the one who had betrayed it.


    Jun Xie was very confused why the Arctic Lynx would look at him like this, but he still didn''t do anything.


    He had seen the results of the training in this store, so he was confident that nothing would go wrong.


    After the Arctic Lynx was taken away, Jun Xie turned back to ask Yang Xi Ruo, "Miss Yang, are you not going to leave your pet here for training as well?"


    He called her miss Yang only because that was the minimum that she would ept. He had tried calling her your highness or young miss like everyone else did, but she rejected all of this. She had wanted him to call her "Xi Ruo" like they were very close, but he couldn''t bring himself to do that.


    So in the end, they settled on miss Yang.


    Yang Xi Ruo shook her head and said, "I just wanted to take a look at this shop and now that I''ve seen it, it''s enough for me today."


    Jun Xie was surprised by this, but after thinking about it, he found that it seemed right.


    This was an unknown store and even if it had given him amazing results with Xiao Han, it was too hard for someone like Yang Xi Ruo to trust this store. After all, as the duke''s daughter, she had ess to many amazing resources and she didn''tck things like Monster Trainers for her pets.


    So after leaving Xiao Han here for training, they headed out of the store.


    As Lin Fan watched them leave, he couldn''t help giving a sigh as he felt regret for Jun Xie. It seemed like there would be no escape for him from that girl''s grasps¡­


    After they left the store, Jun Xie thought that they would part from each other, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    Jun Xie was pulled back into the carriage by Yang Xi Ruo and then they were heading off to another location.


    Jun Xie couldn''t help asking, "Miss Yang, where are we going?"


    Yang Xi Ruo didn''t answer this question and instead gave him a list.


    Jun Xie looked down and found that it was a list of ingredients that he had been handed. As he looked it over, he couldn''t help asking, "Miss Yang, what is this?"


    Yang Xi Ruo said with a smile, "Get your family to help you get this list of ingredients within a week, you''ll need it for your training."


    Jun Xie looked up with a shocked look and repeated, "Training? What training?"


    Yang Xi Ruo said with the same smile, "Even if your Arctic Lynx bes stronger, will you be able to control it with how strong you are now?"


    Jun Xie had a stunned look, but then he nodded in agreement.


    That''s right, if Xiao Han became stronger, it would reach the Embryo Soul Realm. With his current cultivation, he wouldn''t be able to control something like that¡­


    So there was no doubt that he would need to get stronger as well or he wouldn''t be able to win the bet in a week.


    But then he couldn''t help asking, "Miss Yang, why are you helping me with my training?"


    Yang Xi Ruo had already prepared an excuse for this as she said, "I''m the one that made the bet. If you lose by too much, don''t you think that this would hurt my reputation?"


    Jun Xie nodded in agreement to this.


    Yang Xi Ruo had been the one that stood up for him and if he performed too inadequately, it would actually hurt her reputation.


    So with this in mind, Jun Xie was filled with determination to do his best.


    What he didn''t notice was Yang Xi Ruo looking at him with a strange look in her eyes.

 Chapter 856 Strange Customer

    After Jun Xie left, there weren''t many other customers that came to train their pets.


    There were a few that were curious after seeing the results of the other people and decided to have their pet trained here, but the price was still what scared off most people since it was just too expensive.


    But at the same time, the excitement from the first few days died down because everyone''s curiosity had been fulfilled. So in the end, there were fewer customers that came to the store.


    The new customers that came because this was a lively business street were all scared off because of the prices.


    That was just the price of the training, so there was no need to mention the other things in the store. The prices of the pet food and the other elixirs in the store were even higher, so no one even gave them a second nce.


    Just like this, Lin Fan''s store settled into a lull where not many people wandered around.


    But of course, there were still people that were here because they had been sent by various forces to watch over Lin Fan.


    It didn''t take much for people to find out that this store was bought by the Dongfang Family and was given to Lin Fan. Since this matter involved the Dongfang Family, naturally there were many people who wanted to watch over this store.


    Everything went on as normal until the afternoon.


    When a customer who was wearing a cloak came in, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a strange feeling from this person.


    With the aura that they released, it was almost as if they were trying to catch his attention. That was because the aura that they released was one that he was familiar with.


    This aura was simr to the cloaked figure that hade to the meeting he had in the slum city.


    This meant that this was someone from the Dongfang Family.


    But if it was someone from the Dongfang Family, why would they be acting so secretive?


    He had already established a rtionship with the Dongfang Family and was in contact with Dongfang Ming. If they wanted to talk to him about something, they could just do so through Dongfang Ming.


    There was no need for them to sneak around like this.


    So who was this person and why were they here?


    Could it be that something had happened with the Dongfang Family and they had sent this person in secret to contact him?


    As this thought passed through his mind, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    After thinking for a bit, Lin Fan stood up and left the counter to one of the people he hired that Dongfang Ming rmended. He walked over to where that cloaked person was and then stood beside them as they looked over the items in front of them.


    The people in the store didn''t really pay attention to him other than looking in his direction. After all, Lin Fan was currently pretending to be stocking the shelves which was a very normal thing for him to do.


    However, what they didn''t notice was that with a single flick of his hand, there were illusion and soundws that formed a barrier around them.


    Thesews formed a barrier thatpletely obscured everyone''s view of them while also negating all the sounds that they made. To everyone else, all it looked like was the two of them minding their own business, with one of them looking at the goods and the other one stocking the shelves.


    After he did this, he asked in a calm voice, "Is there something wrong that you needed to do this toe to my store?"


    The cloaked person hadn''t noticed the barrier at first, but then when they saw that no one else turned in their direction, it wasn''t hard for them to figure out what had happened.


    They said in a calm voice as well, "It''s nothing like that. I was just curious about this store that everyone was talking about, so I snuck out to take a look."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being a bit surprised by this voice.


    It wasn''t because it was muffled with soundws because he could see right through these soundws and hear the real voice. It was because this was a voice that he recognized since he had heard it before at the meeting.


    This was the voice of the young miss that had been at the meeting.


    He never thought that he would meet her again this soon.


    After he hade to the capital city, he had been acquiring information on his own since he knew that he would be at a disadvantage if he didn''t know a single thing about the Dongfang Family.


    While it was hard for him to gather information since he didn''t have an informationwork set up here, he was still able to get some information. It wasn''t that hard for him to learn some gossip about the Dongfang Family.


    The most popr piece of gossip about the Dongfang Family was actually about one of the family''s juniors.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    That was because this junior was just too abnormal.


    She was the young miss of the Dongfang Family, but her status in the family wasn''t low. It was almost at the same level as the family head, which was why she was someone that everyone talked about.


    When it came to the Dongfang Family, there wasn''t a single person that didn''t know young miss Dongfang.


    So that was why Lin Fan was surprised to see her here.


    After all, young miss Dongfang was one of the most important people in the Dongfang Family, not someone who should be walking around without a single guard. For her to show up here without a single guard, something had to be wrong.


    After a long pause, Lin Fan finally said, "Is my store really that strange that even young miss Dongfang is interested in it?"


    The cloaked figure couldn''t help jolting when they heard this.


    They turned to look at Lin Fan before slowly pulling back the hood of the cloak to reveal their true appearance.


    Lin Fan was blown away when he saw this face.


    It was a face that was almost on the same level as Ang, a face that could be considered perfect no matter which angle one looked at it from. It was a face that hadrge wide bright eyes, a perfectly carved nose, and cherry pink lips that were both delicate and tender. All of this was perfectly framed by her long ck hair that flowed down to her shoulders.


    Young miss Dongfang looked at Lin Fan with a smile before asking, "How did you know that it was me?"


    Lin Fan was already used to beautiful faces like this, so after just being in a daze for a few seconds, he gave a cough before saying, "I have my ways."


    Young miss Dongfang looked at Lin Fan with a thoughtful look as she said, "Is that so?" Then she looked around the store before saying, "I have to say that you have quite the strange things in your store, but¡­" After a pause, she continued, "Not a single item in your store is weak though. I can sense the strong energying from them."


    She turned back to look at Lin Fan and asked, "Just who are you?"


    Lin Fan just looked back at her with a smile and didn''t say a thing.


    Seeing that he wasn''t willing to say anything, she gave a sigh and said, "Alright, since you''re not willing to speak, then I won''t ask anything else."


    She changed the topic by saying, "What are you interested in?"


    Lin Fan was taken aback by her sudden question, but then he said, "If I said that all I wanted to do was run this pet store in peace, would you believe me?"


    She looked at him with narrowed eyes as if she was scrutinizing him, but then she said, "It doesn''t matter what I believe, right? As long as you''re willing to work with the Dongfang Family, that''s all that matters."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes before asking, "Why do you trust me this much?"


    She gave a shrug and said, "I don''t know either. All I know is that my instincts are telling me that you can be used."


    Lin Fan''s mouth twitched when he heard this as he said, "I don''t know how I feel about being told that I can be used, but¡­" He turned to look at her before saying, "If you do trust me, that''s enough for me."


    This time, it was young miss Dongfang''s turn to be surprised.


    She had never looked at Lin Fan directly like this since she had only looked at him as a whole before. But when she saw his eyes staring right into her eyes, she couldn''t stop her heart from skipping a beat.


    She had never seen eyes that were as clear and bright as his were.


    Not to mention his face, it wasn''t just described with the word handsome.


    As he kept staring at her, she couldn''t help feeling a bit of heat in her face as a faint blush came over it.


    Lin Fan also saw this and couldn''t help asking in a concerned voice, "Are you alright? Your face is a bit flushed."


    Young miss Dongfang immediately held her face and turned away before saying, "I''m feeling a bit ill today, so I''ll be leaving first. But I look forward to working with you in the future."


    Lin Fan nodded in a daze and was about to say something, but before he could say anything, she had already put on her hood and ran out of the store.


    Right before she left his barrier, he made sure that the illusion being seen matched her running away.


    Once she was gone, he couldn''t help standing there in a daze wondering what had just happened.

 Chapter 857 Exam

    A week passed by just like that.


    There weren''t many customers that came to Lin Fan''s store, but there were still people that came to train their pets. However, he was never able to get any regrs that came to train their pet more than once.


    Well, actually there was one regr that came every day.


    Jun Xie was his first customer and also his first and only regr customer.


    Every morning, Jun Xie would be there to pay for another day''s training for his Arctic Lynx.


    Lin Fan''s store didn''t allow payment for multiple training sessions at the same time, so Jun Xie had toe to the store to pay each morning.


    The first morning he was still looking fine, but with each day that passed, Jun Xie''s appearance became worse and worse.


    There were only a few scratches on the second day, but then on the third day, his arm waspletely wrapped up in bandages. On the fourth day, he came with a cast and a crutch. On the fifth day, he came in a wheelchair. On the sixth day, he waspletely wrapped up in bandages like a mummy and had to be pushed in by someone¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help worrying about him with each passing day, but he could also tell from Jun Xie''s aura that he was slowly getting stronger.


    He was getting injured with each passing day, but that was all because he was undergoing some kind of intense training.


    Since this was his choice, there wasn''t anything that Lin Fan could say about it.


    Especially since Yang Xi Ruo came with him each time. Whenever she came, she would always re at him as if she had some grudge with him, so Lin Fan always kept his mouth shut.


    He wasn''t sure what kind of rtionship the two of them had, but it was best for him not to get involved in it.


    Finally, on the seventh day, Jun Xie camepletely healed.


    This change was so sudden that even Lin Fan doubted whether it was the real Jun Xie, but the door told him that it was indeed the real Jun Xie. While he might be wrong with his spiritual senses, the door that the store provided would never be wrong.


    However, he also couldn''t help being impressed by the aura that came from Jun Xie.


    In just a week, Jun Xie had somehow gone from the Low Fragmented Soul Realm to the Low Embryo Soul Realm.


    This kind of improvement would usuallye at the detriment of the person''s health or future cultivation potential, but Lin Fan could tell from the door that there wasn''t anything wrong with Jun Xie''s body. His sharp nose also caught the medicinal scent that wasing from him and with his understanding of alchemy, he was able to easily figure out which pills Jun Xie had taken.


    He looked at Yang Xi Ruo who had been standing behind Jun Xie the entire time and he couldn''t help revealing an impressed look.


    As expected of a duke''s daughter, she was even able to do something like this.


    But the one doubt on his mind was still why she would do something like this for someone like Jun Xie. Even if he had seen something different from her expression, it shouldn''t have been strong enough for her to do all of this¡­


    After receiving his pet, Jun Xie headed off to school with Yang Xi Ruo since today was the day of the bet.


    He had suffered a long week of training just for this moment. As he looked back on it now, he couldn''t stop the tears from welling in his eyes from all the pain that he suffered.


    But it would all be worth it when he won this bet.


    After all, he didn''t know what would happen to him if he were to lose this bet¡­


    Yang Xi Ruo''s reputation was at stake in this bet and she had put in so much effort in training him. If he were to lose to Ouyang Xun''s subordinate, it wouldn''t be impossible to say that he might disappear¡­


    But what he didn''t know was that Yang Xi Ruo didn''t have any intentions of doing that.


    Yang Xi Ruo actually had a very special taste¡­


    She liked weak men, the more useless the better.


    She had always been surrounded by capable people since she was young and she was already bored with them. She loved a man who waspletely useless, but her status didn''t allow her to be with a man like that.


    As the duke''s daughter, she had to think about her family, so she couldn''t let her desires run wild. But now that there was a man that would allow her desires to run wild also having enough potential to be trained, she wouldn''t let him go.


    She had already had her eyes on Jun Xie before because he was her perfect definition of a useless man.


    Now she had caught him, she wouldn''t let him go.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    This contest really didn''t matter for her because whether he won or lost, he would feel grateful to her for her help and that was the greatest gain for her.


    Jun Xie wasn''t feeling as confident because on every exam that he had taken before, he had always beenst ce.


    While he had be stronger, there was still the mental block of beingst ce all those times in ce. Not to mention that Ouyang Xun would also be sending a subordinate to participate in this exam.


    There was no doubt that he would also make the exam harder for Jun Xie to help him win the bet.


    With all these factors against him, it was normal for Jun Xie to be worried.


    Once they arrived, they found that there was already arge crowd gathered. Both Ouyang Xun and Yang Xi Ruo were famous among the academy, so it was natural that a bet between them would also attract a lot of attention.


    It was just too bad that the teacher had already been bought out by Ouyang Xun.


    The exam consisted of two parts, a theoretical and a practical portion. The theoretical portion was just a simple test which Jun Xie easily aced.


    During the week of training, his breaks had been to study the books for the test.


    He had been forced to memorize everything in the books and if he didn''t, he would be punished during the training. The punishment was much worse than just forcing himself to memorize all the material, so he forced himself to memorize everything.


    The teacher had even messed him up by giving him a version that was much harder than everyone else''s, but he still easily aced it.


    As for the practical portion, it was a simple demonstration of one''sbat abilities.


    Using the special dummies that the academy prepared, they would have their attack and defense skills tested.


    Before Jun Xie got onto the stage, the teacher had made some special tweaks to the dummy.


    The dummies that were used for this exam were used for both first years and second years. They had a special setting on them that would determine how much strength they would use depending on what year the examinee was in.


    The teacher set it to a second year''s exam for Jun Xie.


    That meant that the level the dummy would be at was the Embryo Soul Realm.


    For most first years who were in the Fragmented Soul Realm, this would be an impossible test, but¡­For Jun Xie and the Arctic Fox that had undergone intense training, that wasn''t the case.


    Jun Xie and the Arctic Fox came right up to the stage and faced the dummy.


    Normally they would face this dummy in one of the practice rooms with everyone else, but since there was the bet, even the academy gave his exam special privilege. It was now being held in an arena that was filled with people who hade to see how he would do.


    After everything was set up, the dummy was the one that attacked first.


    The teacher had also set it on aggressive mode since he had wanted to overwhelm Jun Xie who had ack of experience with fighting with aggressive attacks. If Jun Xie were to panic, it would make it easier for the dummy to defeat him.


    But to everyone''s surprise¡­


    The dummy ran right at Jun Xie without any regards for defending, gathering up life energy as it prepared to attack him. However, before it could even reach Jun Xie, there was ayer of ice that suddenly appeared around the dummy.


    Thisyer of ice was very thick, but it was also very clear, so the dummy inside of the ice could be seenpletely.


    It was just frozen there, unable to move a single inch.


    Eventually, the light in its eyes to show that it was powered dimmed until itpletely disappeared.


    With such a clear result, it was impossible for the teacher to say anything even if he had taken Ouyang Xun''s money. With this kind of result, he had no choice but to dere Jun Xie the winner and let the panel of teachers decide his grade.


    At the end of the exam, the top results were announced and without any suspense, Jun Xie took the top ce in the exam.


    After all, even the teachers had been shocked by what he had done.


    While others might not have seen it, the teachers with their higher level of cultivation were able to see everything that the Arctic Lynx had done. It had frozen the dummy with just a single flick of its w.


    This was not something that a normal student could do!

 Chapter 858 Duel

    After the top results had been announced, there was still another part of the exam that was left.


    This was a school that fostered and encouragedpetition among the students, so everything they did had that in mind. The top results were an example of this, but they also took things a bit farther than that.


    After the results had been announced, there was a free challenge period.


    This was when people that got lower ranks were able to challenge those that had higher ranks. As long as they defeated the people with higher ranks, they would take those ranks for themselves. The ones with higher ranks that lost would be demoted down to those lower ranks and wouldn''t have a chance to challenge anyone, so they would be stuck with these lower ranks.


    Naturally, Jun Xie who was in first ce was someone that had a big target on his back.


    However, no one dared to rush into this because they didn''t know just how strong Jun Xie was.


    They didn''t know if his freezing of the dummy was cheating or if it had been real.


    Even if there was the smallest chance that it was real, they didn''t want to be the first one to challenge him to test this.


    But there was a limited time to propose a challenge, so it wasn''t as if they could just keep waiting for someone to step up first forever.


    Everyone turned to look at Ouyang Xun''s subordinate who had been silently waiting as well.


    When this person noticed that everyone was looking at him, he tried to ignore it at first, but it was just too hard to ignore. After all, with the publicity that the bet between Ouyang Xun and Yang Xi Ruo, it was impossible for them not to know what was happening.


    If he didn''t do something now, he would be losing face to Ouyang Xun.


    In fact, Ouyang Xun in the audience was even ring at his subordinate at this moment as if telling him to step forward.


    Seeing all of this, the subordinate had no choice but to bite the bullet and be the first one to step forward.


    The subordinate came up to the stage and then pointed at Jun Xie to say, "I want to challenge first ce!''


    In response to this, he received a wave of apuse that really made him want to cry. However, since he had taken the lead, he had no choice but to stick with it to the end.


    So he pointed at Jun Xie and said, "I don''t believe that trash like you could ever take first ce, you must have bought the teachers off and cheated! But no matter, I will prove in front of everyone what a fake you are! Come and receive your punishment, viin!"


    The righteous ways that he said his words almost made it seem like he was the one that was in the right, even though technically Ouyang Xun was the one that had bought off the teachers.


    But after he said this, everyone couldn''t help whispering to each other.


    After all, it was true that Jun Xie''s change had been just too much. There were many people who had been wondering about this in the back of their head the entire time, but now that someone had said something, it was like the dam had broken.


    "That''s right! Jun Xie was the worst one on the exam before, how could he suddenly be this powerful?"


    "I would rather be beaten to death than to believe this lie!"


    "He, he, I heard that the Jun Family is quite rich. I guess we all know where that money went."


    When Jun Xie heard them, he turned to look at the subordinate on the stage before walking over with a dark look on his face.


    If they were just insulting him, he wouldn''t have cared because he was used to this kind of thing. However, insulting him now was also secretly insulting Yang Xi Ruo since she was the one who backed him.


    It was an understatement to say that everything he was now wasn''t because of her¡­Well, there was also Lin Fan''s store for helping him train Xiao Han, but she was the one who helped him train.


    Even if it had left a trauma on him that was hard for him to forget, she was still the one that had helped him be stronger.


    He wouldn''t let anyone insult her like this, even indirectly.


    The subordinate was about to say something, but seeing the cold look in Jun Xie''s eyes, he immediately swallowed his words down.


    He didn''t know why, but he was feeling a terrifying feelinging from Jun Xie¡­


    It was almost as if he was feeling a sense of threat from Jun Xie, but that didn''t make sense¡­


    Young master Ouyang had already told him that this Jun Xie was a weakling that wouldn''t even be able to fight him, but that didn''t seem to be the case now¡­


    The subordinate was a bit at a loss for words as to what to do.


    But after thinking about it, he knew what he had to do.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    He had alreadye this far and if he were to back down, there would be no future for him. The only thing that he could do now was destroy Jun Xie in a fight. It would be best if he didn''t hold back at all.


    While that would be looked down a bit by the crowd, it was still better than letting any idents happen and losing all face.


    So once they were on stage, the subordinate released his full aura.


    High Embryo Soul Realm, this subordinate was in the High Embryo Soul Realm.


    He was only second to Ouyang Xun in the second year and he was facing Jun Xie who should have been only in the Low Fragmented Soul Realm.


    But after he reached the stage, Jun Xie also revealed his aura.


    Low Embryo Soul Realm!


    Everyone was shocked when they saw this.


    It wasn''t because they thought that he would win, but rather because he was in the Low Embryo Soul Realm.


    It should be known that just a week ago, Jun Xie was only in the Low Fragmented Soul Realm. So that meant that he had gone up three minor realms and a full major realm in the span of a single week.


    This was a cultivation speed that even geniuses couldn''t keep up with.


    After a long period of silence, one of Ouyang Xun''s subordinates said, "He must be using some kind of special pill that boosts his cultivation or he must have used pills to increase his power. The power of money really is something else."


    When these words rang out, everyone couldn''t help nodding along with this.


    After all, this exnation was the easiest one for them to ept.


    They would never ept that Jun Xie had reached the Low Embryo Soul Realm in just a week from the Low Fragmented Soul Realm.


    epting this kind of truth would bring themselves down, let alone the fact that it was impossible.


    The teachers all looked at each other before one of the teachers came forward and said, "Before we start the match, we want to test each of the students to see if they have taken any enhancing items."


    There was actually indeed a rule against enhancing items in the exam rules, but it was an obscure rule that most people ignored since most people chose to use enhancements in the first ce. But for the teachers to bring it up now, it was clear that they were thinking that Ouyang Xun''s side would win, so they wanted to curry favour with him.


    But after the teacher searched Jun Xie, they couldn''t find a single trace of any enhancements.


    Unlike the other teacher who did a quick sweep over the subordinate, this teacher spent over ten minutes searching every bit of Jun Xie in hopes that he would find something. However, no matter how hard he tried, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    He wouldn''t have given up yet, but Yang Xi Ruo said, "Isn''t that enough?"


    This teacher was only a small teacher in this academy and naturally he couldn''t offend someone like Yang Xi Ruo, so he immediately backed down after this and announced the results.


    Everyone was once again shocked because the teacher confirmed that Jun Xie indeed didn''t use any enhancements.


    Since everything had been confirmed, it wasn''t as if they could do anything else to dy the match anymore. The teacher had no choice but to let Jun Xie and the subordinatee onto the stage before starting the fight.


    As soon as the fight started, the subordinate didn''t even have a chance to do anything as there was a chill that suddenly hit him.


    Before he realized what had happened, he waspletely frozen in a block of ice.


    No matter how hard he struggled, he wasn''t able to do a single thing and could only just stare at Jun Xie in shock.


    Seeing this subordinate being frozen, everyone couldn''t help shaking their heads with a bitter smile because this scene was very familiar. It was the same scene as when Ouyang Xun had confronted Jun Xie a week ago.


    His subordinate who had picked a fight with Jun Xie had been frozen just like this.


    Even though the teacher had been bought off, he couldn''t keep stalling when the results were this clear, so he had no choice but to dere Jun Xie the winner.


    Jun Xie didn''t even bother looking at them as he walked off the stage.


    But before he could leave, it was Yang Xi Ruo who jumped onto the stage and said, "Wait a minute."

 Chapter 859 New Customers (1)

    Everyone turned to look at Yang Xi Ruo with confused looks as they wondered what she was doing.


    She just ignored them all as she turned to look at Ouyang Xun and said, "Young master Ouyang, I think that it''s time for you to honour your bet, right?"


    Ouyang Xun had a very ugly look on his face when he heard this.


    That was right, he had been nning on not keeping his end of the bet!


    He had been nning on leaving the scene and then using rumours to discredit the bet so he wouldn''t have to give up his Child Soul Realm Artifact. But all of that had been ruined the moment that Yang Xi Ruo called out Ouyang Xun.


    Ouyang Xun forced his expression to calm as he said, "Your highness, there''s no need to rush this, right?" There was also a hint of entreaty and threat in his voice when he said this.


    It was clear that he was trying to force Yang Xi Ruo to back down.


    But Yang Xi Ruo didn''t back down at all as she said, "Is there anything to rush? All you have to do is hand over the item right now and it''s over."


    Ouyang Xun''s brows twitched as he gave a snort in secret while thinking, "Just hand over an item? Is it really as simple as handing over an item?" But his expression stayed the same as he stared right back at Yang Xi Ruo.


    After a pause, he finally said in a calm voice, "It''s such a precious item, you can''t expect me to carry it around with me, right your highness? I''ll send someone to fetch it and we''ll hand it over at another¡­"


    Yang Xi Ruo cut him right off and said, "We''ll wait until theye."


    Ouyang Xun''s eyes narrowed and finally he couldn''t hold it in anymore as he red right at her. He said in a deep and low voice, "Is that so, your highness?"


    Yang Xi Ruo looked right into his eyes and said, "That''s right."


    Ouyang Xun''s mes of rage were about to explode and his aura burst forth, but Yang Xi Ruo wasn''t scared of him at all as she met him with her own aura.


    Yang Xi Ruo was the daughter of a duke, so it wasn''t as if her aura was weaker than Ouyang Xun''s.


    After matching gazes for a few seconds, Ouyang Xun was the one who turned away first.


    After all, it wasn''t as if he could go all out against this duke''s daughter as the son of a count. There was a difference in status that he had to think about even if he was about to explode with rage.


    But that didn''t mean that there wasn''t someone that he could vent all his anger on.


    He turned his gaze away from Yang Xi Ruo and turned to look at Jun Xie while releasing all his aura to suppress him, but before he could do anything, Yang Xi Ruo was already standing in front of Jun Xie.


    Seeing this, Ouyang Xun couldn''t help revealing a surprised look.


    The bet was already over, so why was Yang Xi Ruo still protecting Jun Xie?


    Could it be that there was something happening that he didn''t know about?


    As he thought about it, he couldn''t help remembering something.


    The Yang Family backed the sixth prince and the Jun Family was a neutral family, but the wealth that they had was enough that even the eighth prince that the Chen Family backed was moved. There were many princes that had tried to find a way to bring the Jun Family under them, but not a single one of them had been able to do so¡­


    But this Jun Xie was the only heir to the Jun Family and Yang Xi Ruo was standing behind him now¡­Didn''t this basically mean that she had already aplished her goal?


    This honey trap really was something else.


    Seeing that he had no other choice, Ouyang Xun gave a cough and said something to his subordinate before turning back to say to Jun Xie, "Junior Jun, you were quite good out there. Your performance really surpassed what I thought was possible and I have to admit that you are a rare talent. You don''t have to answer me now, but have you considereding to work for me?"


    Everyone was once again shocked when they heard what Ouyang Xun said.


    One second he was using his aura to suppress Jun Xie and the next he was praising him like this¡­Not only that, he even offered him a chance to work with him¡­


    This didn''t make any sense!


    Not long after, while everyone was still stunned, the subordinate that Ouyang Xun had spoken to earlier came back with a sword in hand.


    Ouyang Xun took that sword and ced it in front of Jun Xie before saying, "Congrattions on winning the bet, this is yours."


    Everyone revealed shocked looks once again because they could tell from the aura of this sword that it really was a Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    Ouyang Xun was actually willing to hand this over that easily?


    Just what was going on?


    Even Yang Xi Ruo was a bit caught off guard by this as she never expected Ouyang Xun''s attitude to change this quickly.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Jun Xie looked at Ouyang Xun like he was meeting him for the first time and after a minute, he reached out his hand to take the sword as he wanted to test what Ouyang Xun''s intentions were.


    However, as he reached out, he also made sure that all his senses were active so he could guard against anything.


    But in the end, Ouyang Xun just handed over the Child Soul Realm Artifact like it was nothing.


    Jun Xie even checked the artifact to see if there was anything wrong with it, but he found that it was just a normal Child Soul Realm Artifact.


    All of this seemed like a dream as he couldn''t believe what was happening.


    After Jun Xie took the Child Soul Realm Artifact, Ouyang Xun then said, "Let''s meet again in the future."


    Without waiting for Jun Xie to respond, he turned and walked away, leaving everyone standing there stunned.


    After he had left the academy, Ouyang Xun waved his hand at one of his subordinates and said, "Go and investigate how his pet became stronger. It''s clear that Yang Xi Ruo trained him during this past week, but there must be something else happening with the pet since the Yang Family wouldn''t let their Monster Trainer work with an unaffiliated person."


    The subordinate gave a nod before running off.


    Later on in Ouyang Xun''s private study, the subordinate came back with aprehensive report about Jun Xie''s actions over the past week. Other than training with Yang Xi Ruo, the only thing that was off was how he always made sure to go to one store in the morning.


    This store was naturally Lin Fan''s store.


    After reading this report, Ouyang Xun knitted his brows and said, "It must be this store, but what''s so special about this store? How could they train his pet to that level?"


    Thinking this, Ouyang Xun knew that he would have to make a trip himself to see what was special about this store.


    At the same time, he could also bring someone else with him, someone very special¡­


    ¡­


    On the other side, Yang Xi Ruo was currently celebrating with Jun Xie.


    She hadpletely booked the restaurant so there were only the two of them here. However, Jun Xie didn''t seem to notice anything strange even though there was a candlelit dinner in front of him.


    After all, he never would have imagined that someone like Yang Xi Ruo would ever be interested in him.


    He had gotten stronger, but he still had the same weak mentality as before.


    But before they could settle in, Yang Xi Ruo suddenly received a call.


    When she saw who it was that was calling her, she revealed a look of disgust before excusing herself.


    After picking up, she said, "What do you want?"


    The other side spoke in a gentle voice despite her rude tone, "Ruo Ruo, there''s no need to be this fierce. I was just calling to check up on you because I heard some rumours from the academy today."


    Yang Xi Ruo knitted her brows as she said, "What does it matter to you? This is my own matter."


    The other side said, "Ruo Ruo, your business is my business, that''s just how it is."


    Yang Xi Ruo gave a snort before saying, "If you don''t need anything else, then I''m hanging up."


    The other side quickly said, "Wait, I do have something I want to talk to you about."


    Yang Xi Ruo didn''t hang up, but she didn''t say anything as she waited for the other side to speak.


    The other side said, "I heard some rumours about a pet store opening up and I wanted to check it out. I want you to take me there."


    Yang Xi Ruo knitted her brows even more when she heard this as she asked, "Why should I do that?"


    The other side said, "Well, I''ve heard that you''ve already been there before, so I wanted you to take me."


    Yang Xi Ruo was surprised to hear this, but then she quickly realized which store he was referring to which made her bite her lip.


    It wasn''t the store that she was worried about, but rather Jun Xie.


    After all, it was clear that he only wanted to go to the store to target Jun Xie.


    So after thinking about it, she said, "Alright, I''ll bring you there tomorrow."

 Chapter 860 New Customers (2)

    The next morning, Lin Fan''s store had business as usual.


    However, Lin Fan was surprised to find that Yang Xi Ruo didn''te with Jun Xie.


    He couldn''t help asking him about it, "What happened to the pretty girl that came with you each day?"


    Jun Xie was surprised to hear this because he didn''t normally talk to Lin Fan, but he was also excited since he worshiped Lin Fan.


    This mysterious store owner that had given him the chance to change himself, naturally he would feel admiration towards this owner.


    So he answered in a stuttering voice, "She''s¡­She''s not with me today. She said that she had something important to take care of."


    As he said this, there was a slight bit of worry in his voice.


    Over their week together, he had gotten quite close to Yang Xi Ruo, so it was impossible for there not to be any emotions that developed between them. However, it wasn''t at the point where it could be considered love yet, it was still at the level where he just admired Yang Xi Ruo.


    Lin Fan didn''t ask much after that because he was just a bit curious about this and he wasn''t too invested in this matter.


    After Jun Xie finished paying for his training, he waited around for a bit as if he was waiting for something before heading off.


    An hourter, Yang Xi Ruo did show up, but this time she was with someonepletely different. At the same time though, there was also someonepletely unexpected who arrived at the shop.


    It was Ouyang Xun who had bullied Jun Xie before.


    Like Yang Xi Ruo, he was also with someone else when he arrived at the shop.


    Both of them arrived one after another and they went to different parts of the shop, so they didn''t see each other right away.


    After Ouyang Xun arrived with this person, that person brought Ouyang Xun over to the shelves containing stat increasing elixirs.


    He picked up one of these elixirs off the shelf and started looking them over. After looking at it for a bit, he gave a snort and threw it back onto the shelf without any care as he said, "He sells these cheap fake items and you''re telling me that this store is special?"


    As he said this, there was a trace of a disdain that filled his voice.


    Ouyang Xun just calmly said, "After examining this matter from all different angles, this is the only possibility that came to mind. There is no doubt that there is something special about this store."


    The person brought by Ouyang Xun looked at him with one raised brow as he said, "Is that so? Someone like you rates this store that highly?"


    Ouyang Xun ignored this and said, "It''s a fact that the Jun Family''s heires to this store daily and that the Duke Yang''s daughter has been getting closer to him. At this rate, it''s very likely that the Yang Family will be able to pull in the Jun Family for the sixth prince."


    Hearing this, that person finally put away the disdain that filled his face and knitted his brows.


    After a long silence, he finally said, "Alright, tell me what n you have for taking care of this matter?"


    Ouyang Xun revealed a faint smile when he heard this before moving in closer to exin his n to this person.


    Once he finished hearing this n, he also couldn''t help revealing a smile as he said, "You really are a bad person."


    Ouyang Xun just smiled without denying it.


    On the other side, Yang Xi Ruo was being dragged around by the person that she brought who kept saying, "Ruo Ruo, if there''s anything that you like, just tell me and I''ll buy it for you. In fact, I could buy you this entire store if you like."


    Yang Xi Ruo had an expressionless look on her face the entire time as she said, "No, your highness, there''s no need for you to buy me anything."


    But this person wouldn''t give up asking her if there was anything that she wanted.


    Lin Fan naturally noticed these two groups because behind them were guards that he couldn''t avoid paying attention to. There were actually two World Realm Experts that were currently inside of his store, mingling among the crowd.


    No, if he counted the other one, it would be three World Realm Experts.


    He had no choice but to pay attention to them since if these three World Realm Experts made a move, he really would be backed into a corner and would have no choice but to use his trump card. But if he were to use his trump card, he wouldn''t be able to stay in this ce since there would be too many troublesome things to deal with.


    So for now, he hoped that they wouldn''t make a move.


    But that hope was ruined when the two groups bumped into each other.


    Both of these groups had been minding their own business until they bumped into each other in the center of the store by the counter.


    The moment that these two groups bumped into each other, they immediately knitted their brows and fell into deep thought. They all had their own thoughts as they just stood there in silence like this.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Everyone else around them minded their own business, but Lin Fan was worried because he could sense the World Realm Experts moving, as if they were about to fight.


    However, that didn''t happen in the end.


    The one to speak first was the person Ouyang Xun brought, "Sixth brother, it''s been a long time."


    The person with Yang Xi Ruo revealed a smile in return and said, "Eighth brother, I''m so happy to see you. But I wonder, for someone as busy as you, how did you find the time toe to a ce like this?"


    The person with Ouyang Xun replied with a smile, "Sixth brother, brother Ouyang invited me to see this new store, so of course I had to make some time for him." He then turned to Yang Xi Ruo and said, "Miss Yang, it''s a pleasure to see you."


    ? As he said this, he reached his hand out for her hand.


    Yang Xi Ruo naturally recognized who this person was and she had no choice but to give him her hand or else it would be an awkward situation for both of them.


    After receiving her hand, that person looked at the person who hade with Yang Xi Ruo with a provocative smile before cing a kiss on her hand. That person''s lips twitched after seeing this, but they didn''t say anything. All they did was silently re at them with eyes filled with a bit of killing intent.


    But the situation around them was slowly changing.


    People had been ignoring them since they had been quiet, but once they bumped into each other and started making noise, people turned their attention over.


    There were only a few whispers at first, but then there was one person that knocked everything over.


    "Isn''t that the sixth and eighth highness?"


    As soon as these words were said, the lid was blown off the pot and the pot exploded.


    Everyone was speaking in whispers, but it was clear that all of their attention was on these two men. After all, they were quite famous in the capital and it was impossible to not recognize them.


    The only reason no one said anything before was because they couldn''t believe that he would show up in a ce like this.


    Now that they had been recognized, it was impossible for them not to be the center of attention.


    With this, Lin Fan also understood who these two were.


    They were apanied by World Realm Experts, so that was the greatest attestation to who they were.


    But for them to show up here at the same time.


    Was it the contest of session?


    Lin Fan knew that there were many different princes for this Mu Ster Kingdom from his information gathering and the matter of session hadn''t been determined yet. Not a single crown prince had been crowned by the king.


    He just hoped that they wouldn''t take things too far in his store. He even thought about contacting the Dongfang Family just in case to make sure that they could settle this matter.


    At the same time, he also sent a secret message to Ang to keep Xin''er in the back.


    After this small exchange between the eighth prince and Yang Xi Ruo, their group exchanged pleasantries without a care about the people around them. Of course, every word that they said was filled with sharp barbs aimed at the other side.


    While they were doing this, there was a person that came into the store with a confused look.


    After looking around for a bit, this person noticed the group in the center.


    When this person saw Yang Xi Ruo, they couldn''t help revealing a strange conflicted look before saying, "Miss Yang, what are you doing here?"


    Everyone immediately fell silent and turned to look in the direction of this voice.


    Standing there was Jun Xie.


    When Yang Xi Ruo saw that it was Jun Xie, her brows immediately knitted and she asked in a worried voice, "Jun Xie, why are you here?"


    She had made sure toete just so she wouldn''t run into him in this store.


    So what was he doing here now?


    Hearing this, the sixth prince couldn''t help frowning as he looked at Jun Xie.


    So it was this person¡­

 Chapter 861 New Customers (3)

    Yang Xi Ruo immediately realized her mistake and corrected herself, "Young master Jun, it''s a surprise seeing you here."


    The way that she spoke now sounded formal and distant which waspletely different from how she had talked to him before.


    When Jun Xie heard this, he didn''t know why, but he felt a bit ufortable.


    Before he could even say anything, the sixth prince suddenly took a step forward. Taking advantage of the fact that Yang Xi Ruo was a bit caught off guard by this situation, he took her hand and asked, "Ruo Ruo, who is this friend of yours?"


    Seeing and hearing all of this, the ufortable feeling in Jun Xie''s heart grew stronger.


    Yang Xi Ruo had a trace of disgust sh in her eyes when she realized what had happened, but since they were in public, she couldn''t just throw away his hand like she wanted to. Instead, she politely took back her hand and said, "Your highness, this is my friend, young master Jun Xie. He''s from the Jun Family."


    As she said this, she made sure to stress the Jun Family so that the sixth prince would understand what backing Jun Xie was from.


    But the sixth prince wasn''t in the mood to care about this at all. His jealousy hadpletely swallowed his reasoning and there was only hostility in the way that he looked at Jun Xie.


    Jun Xie didn''t notice any of this as he focused on what she had just said.


    Your highness¡­


    It seemed like she was here with one of the princes¡­


    As he looked closely, he recognized that it was indeed the sixth prince that she was here with and on the side was the eighth prince along with Ouyang Xun.


    This was a gathering of these heirs of high ranking nobles and royals, it wasn''t a ce for someone like him. If it wasn''t for the fact that he knew Yang Xi Ruo and that this was Lin Fan''s store, he would have most likely been dragged out by the guards of the prince when he approached.


    When Ouyang Xun saw all of this, he couldn''t help revealing a smile that was very hard to see.


    After all, this had all been nned by him.


    He had sharp eyes and he hadn''t missed how Yang Xi Ruo had acted around Jun Xie. He had even made sure by sending out spies to watch them in secret to see what kind of rtionship they had.


    He also knew that the sixth prince was famous for having affections for Yang Xi Ruo.


    Once he saw how close the two of them were, it was hard to predict what he would do, which was what he had counted on.


    Seeing the results now, he really couldn''t say that he was disappointed. After all, it had gone much better than he had expected or could have expected.


    Ouyang Xun took advantage of the strange atmosphere at this moment toe forward to say, "Junior Jun, it really is a coincidence running into you here."


    Jun Xie was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard this voice.


    He turned to see Ouyang Xun and he couldn''t help narrowing his eyes, but then remembering that they were currently in front of the princes, he knew that he couldn''t act like this. So he calmed his expression and said, "Senior Ouyang, it really is a coincidence. I didn''t know that you knew about this store as well."


    Ouyang Xun gave a chuckle and said, "I heard about it from a friend, so I was interested." Then he turned to the eighth prince and said, "I remembered that the eighth highness was interested in this kind of stuff, so I brought him along as well."


    Acting as if he had suddenly thought of something, he said, "That''s right, I forgot that I haven''t given you an introduction yet." He gestured to the eighth prince and said, "Junior Jun, this is the eighth highness." Then gesturing back to Jun Xie, he turned to the eighth highness and said, "Your highness, this is Jun Xie, the young master of the Jun Family."


    The eighth prince had already heard the surname Jun, so he had a bit of interest in this person. However, when he heard that this Jun Xie was the young master of the Jun Family, his smile couldn''t help bing wider.


    He also felt a bit of admiration towards Ouyang Xun for setting all of this up.


    Ouyang Xun had already told him that he would help him create rtions with the Jun Family, but he had never told him how he would do it. All he had said was that they needed toe to this store, which he was already hesitant to do.


    But now that he had met the young master of the Jun Family and even had a chance to create rtions with, this trip was definitely worth it.


    ? The Jun Family''s wealth was big enough that it even moved his heart as a royal.


    The eighth prince immediately said with a wide smile, "Young master Jun, I''ve long heard of your fame. It really is a happy coincidence being able to meet you here today. I really have to thank brother Ouyang for bringing me to this ce."


    Jun Xie knew that he couldn''t be rude to the eighth prince, so he said with a bow, "Your highness, it is this little one''s honour to meet you."


    But before he could finish his bow, the eighth prince hade forward to stop him from bowing. Even the eighth prince couldn''t help feeling that his magnanimous gesture was moving, but that was only in his mind.


    Jun Xie could already guess what he was nning, but he also knew that this family was firmly set on remaining neutral.


    His father had always told him that remaining neutral was the best way to maintain their family status. If they were to ever meddle in the session battle, it was certain that they would lose everything before gaining a single thing.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    The sixth prince had calmed down a bit and he finally realized which family Jun Xie was from. As he realized this and he saw how the eighth prince was approaching Jun Xie, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of regret.


    But remembering how Jun Xie had talked to Yang Xi Ruo and how she had responded, he couldn''t help feeling angry again.


    No, even if this person was from the Jun Family, he wouldn''t allow him to touch his Ruo Ruo!


    With this thought, his hostility towards Jun Xie once again filled his heart.


    Yang Xi Ruo knew that something bad was going to happen seeing the look in his eyes, but she couldn''t react in time to stop him.


    The sixth prince came forward and said, "Is it really a coincidence?"


    The eighth prince, Ouyang Xun, and Jun Xie turned to look at the sixth prince with a confused look.


    The sixth prince continued with his confident expression, "You saw the way that he greeted Ruo Ruo, it''s clear that he is stalking her."


    Yang Xi Ruo immediately felt a wave of disgust fill her when the sixth prince said this.


    Stalking?


    If one had to mention stalking, it should be said that the sixth prince was the one that was stalking her.


    He had basically threatened her to take him to this store and now he was iming that someone else was stalking her?


    If it wasn''t for the fact that her status stopped her from saying anything, she would have angrily berated him right at that moment. Not to mention that she felt anger for Jun Xie being treated by the sixth prince like this.


    Jun Xie just had his eyes on Yang Xi Ruo the entire time and seeing that she wasn''t saying anything, he couldn''t help feeling more ufortable even though his brain told him that this was a very normal thing to do with her status.


    The eighth prince''s eyes lit up when he saw this because even he was able to recognize the opportunity this created.


    The eighth prince came forward and said, "sixth brother, I think that your words are a bit too harsh. I''m sure that this is nothing more than a coincidence and it''s not what you think at all."


    The sixth prince didn''t care as he gave a snap and pointed at Jun Xie before saying, "Guards, take this man away and beat him for me!"


    There were a few people that suddenly came out of the crowd and started moving towards Jun Xie.


    As a prince, naturally he would have guards that would follow him around secretly to ensure that he was safe. So it wasn''t strange at all that these people would suddenly appear out of nowhere.


    When the eighth prince saw this, he said, "Guards, stop them."


    There were several people that also came out of the crowd and stood in between the people that came out first and Jun Xie.


    Since the eighth prince was also a prince, he also had guards with him.


    After that, he turned to the sixth prince and said, "sixth brother, this is a clear abuse of power. I think that we should leave matters here today."


    But the sixth prince had already lost himself in his rage and jealousy again when he saw that Yang Xi Ruo had been about to interfere with his guards on Jun Xie''s behalf. The only reason that she hadn''t in the end was because he had grabbed her hand again.


    He turned to Jun Xie and said, "Guards, make this man disappear."


    The guards clearly looked ufortable doing this since they knew that this would be a big matter, but since the prince had already given his orders, they had no other choice.


    The guards of the eighth prince also looked back at him and seeing him give a nod, they once again faced the guard of the sixth prince, not intending to allow them to take a single step forward.


    Everyone could sense that something big was about to happen as the guards of the sixth and eighth prince were about to sh, so they all took a few steps back. Of course, not a single person left because they all wanted to see this matter first hand.


    Even the World Realm Guards of the eighth and sixth prince also moved as they prepared to join the fight if things got too intense.


    Lin Fan saw all of this and finally he chose to interfere.


    He had left them alone because he hadn''t wanted to get involved in matters with the royals, but since they were about to start a fight in his store, he had no choice but to get involved.


    But before he could, there was a person that walked up and stood between the two sides.


    After looking at both sides, he said in a deep voice, "That''s enough! Aren''t you afraid of embarrassing yourselves?"

 Chapter 862 New Customers (4)

    The eighth and the sixth prince had been ring at each other, so they didn''t see who this person was at first.


    When they heard this voice ringing out, both of them felt a hint of anger as they thought, "Who are you to talk to us like this?"


    They were royals after all, so they had the pride of royals.


    They were about to open their mouths and teach this rude person a lesson until they saw his face. As soon as they saw his face, their words were stuck in their throats and their expressions froze as they stood there in a daze.


    Seeing this, the person who stood out gave a snort before turning to the guards and saying, "Are you still holding up your weapons? Why are you not standing down yet?"


    When the guards heard this, they immediately stood down without waiting for permission from the sixth or eighth prince. After standing down, they all fell down and bowed to this man who had suddenly cut in.


    Both the sixth and eighth prince realized that they were staring too long and gave coughs to calm themselves before the eighth prince said, "Second brother, why are you here?"


    Second brother¡­that was right, this person was the second prince.


    He had been hiding in the crowd during this entire time, but seeing that the eighth and sixth prince were about to sh, he had no choice but toe out and stop them. After all, two princes shing was a very big deal, especially during these tense times.


    The sixth prince nodded before saying, "Second brother, didn''t you have some important business to take care of today?"


    When he had left the castle, he had bumped into this second brother of his and he had heard him say that he was busy with something. So why did his second brother suddenly appear here?


    But the second prince didn''t care about their questions and instead answered with a question of his own, "Do you realize what you''re doing? Do you know what status you have?"


    When the two of them heard this, they couldn''t help looking away awkwardly.


    After all, they had indeed gone a bit too far just now.


    If their guards really shed, it was unlikely that this store would have survived and there would have certainly been civilian casualties. This was not something that could be easily covered up, so they would certainly receive their punishment from their royal father.


    After a bit of awkward silence, the eighth prince said, "Second brother, it was all sixth brother''s fault. He was the one that started the fight."


    The sixth prince jolted when he heard this, but he then said, "Second brother, don''t listen to him. I was just punishing an evildoer, I wasn''t¡­"


    The second prince suddenly raised his hand to cut the sixth prince off and he said in a sharp tone, "Don''t bother lying to me, I''ve already seen everything."


    Then without waiting for either of them to say a thing, he turned to Jun Xie and slightly bowed his head as he said, "Young master Jun, I have to apologize for my younger brothers."


    There wasn''t a single person that said a thing as the entire area fell to the silence. There wasn''t even a single person who dared to breathe too loud out of fear that they would attract any attention.


    No one would have believed that the second prince would bow his head to Jun Xie, even if it was only slightly lowering his head.


    After all, the second prince was one of the people who everyone assumed had the greatest chances of bing the crown prince.


    His only otherpetitors were the first prince and the fourth prince.


    Jun Xie naturally didn''t know how to react to this, but with everyone''s attention on him after the second prince''s apology, he had no choice but to answer. So in the end, Jun Xie just stuttered, "Your highness, there''s no need to apologize to me. I should be the one thanking you for saving me."


    The second prince looked up and said, "No, it was my little brothers'' fault for involving you in this matter."


    He looked around before saying, "Uncle Long, uncle Ying, can youe out?"


    The two World Realm Experts who had been hiding in the crowd walked out when they heard this.


    The second prince then said, "Can I ask you to bring my little brothers back to the castle first. I''ll punish them ordinglyter."


    The faces of the sixth and eighth prince fell when they heard this, but they knew that it would be meaningless to argue. So they followed the two World Realm Experts out of the store.


    The second prince then turned to Ouyang Xun and Yang Xi Ruo and said, "Young master Ouyang and young miss Yang, I apologize for getting you involved in this matter."


    Both of them quickly bowed to the second prince and said, "No, your highness. It was no trouble at all."


    Though it was clear that one had suffered much more than the other. The second prince could also see this, so he said to Yang Xi Ruo, "Miss Yang, I think that you have some business with young master Jun, so you can leave for now."


    Yang Xi Ruo revealed a look of admiration when she heard this.


    She gave a nod to the second prince and simply said, "Thank you, your highness." Then without hesitation, she grabbed Jun Xie''s hand and pulled him out of the store.


    As she was leaving, she couldn''t help thinking that she should talk to her father about the sixth prince.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Their Yang Family had been supporting the sixth prince, but it wasn''t because they believed in his cause or his chances of seeding the throne. In fact, the only reason that the Yang Family even supported the sixth prince in the first ce was all because of a favour they owed to his mother.


    However, that favour had already been paid back by her father a long time ago, so there really was no reason why they should continue supporting the sixth prince.


    With the power that Duke Yang held, he wouldn''t have a problem switching from the sixth prince''s faction and entering the faction of one of the princes that actually had a chance to take the throne. The reason why they had never done this before was because they didn''t know which prince had the highest chance of winning and they didn''t know the personality of the princes.


    If they switched without learning anything, they would be the ones that suffered in the end.


    Yang Xi Ruo thought that she had a good judge of character and now that she had met the second prince, she was quite impressed by the character that he had shown.


    She didn''t know much about the first or fourth prince since she had never met them, but she had seen plenty of their subordinates at the academy. While one subordinate wouldn''t be enough to show the personality of the master, if almost all of the subordinates had the same personality, that should be enough.


    As for the subordinates of the first and fourth, most of them were selfish, arrogant, and narcissistic.


    So it was clear that the first and fourth prince weren''t good choices.


    The second prince didn''t have many subordinates, but he had something else that he could use topete with the first and fourth princes. The second prince was known as a cultivation genius, having a much higher cultivation than any of the other princes.


    So even without subordinates, he had more than enough power to deal with the other princes.


    After seeing the second prince in person and experiencing his manner of acting, she was convinced that the second prince was the right choice out of the princes. She would have to talk to her father about stopping their support of the sixth prince and moving to the second prince''s faction.


    After they left, the second prince turned his attention to Ouyang Xun and Ouyang Xun naturally understood what he meant. Since the eighth prince was gone, there was no longer a reason for Ouyang Xun to stay here any longer.


    Understanding this, Ouyang Xun bowed to the second prince before saying, "Your highness, I still have some other matters to attend to, so please excuse me."


    The second prince gave a nod before waving his hands as if to dismiss him.


    Ouyang Xun didn''t dare show any dissatisfaction with this and quickly left Lin Fan''s store.


    However, he had a smile on his face as he left because he had aplished what he had wanted to aplish. Even if there was a slightplication because of the second prince, it should still be more than enough.


    The young master of the Jun Family should have been moved by everything that they did.


    Thinking this, the smile on his face couldn''t help bing wider as he started imagining all of the benefits that he would receive from the eighth prince after this.


    But what he didn''t know was that all of his work had beenpletely negated by Yang Xi Ruo.


    He hadpletely underestimated the rtionship between the two of them.


    After everyone left, the second prince surprisingly didn''t leave with them.


    ? He just looked at everyone and said, "You can all go back to what you were doing."


    Once this was said, it was like a decree had been passed. Everyone immediately turned away from the second prince and went about their own business, but they also secretly watched him out of the corner of their eyes.


    The second prince didn''t care about anyone else and turned his eyes to Lin Fan who was sitting at the counter before he started walking over. He stopped in front of the counter and looked at Lin Fan for a bit before saying, "Are you the owner of this store?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by the fact that the second prince was still here, but he still calmly gave a nod in response.


    The second prince didn''t care that he didn''t say anything and just said, "I want to leave a pet here for training."


    This time, Lin Fan couldn''t help beingpletely stunned, especially after he saw the pet that the second prince took out.


    It was a World Realm Pet. To be specific, it was a Low Star Realm Pet.


    This was the first World Realm Pet that his shop was taking in for training, so of course he couldn''t help feeling a bit excited and a bit nervous.


    After taking a moment to calm himself, he said, "The prices are written, so you can just pay and leave your pet."


    The second prince nodded before waving his hand and taking out a hundred jades which he left on the table.


    Without another word, he turned and walked out of the store.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a nod of approval when he saw this.


    This was how a rich man should act.

 Chapter 863 Strange Request

    The advertising effect of the second prince really was good.


    It didn''t take long before the news that the second prince had left a pet to be trained by Lin Fan''s store was spread all over the capital and there were many people that came to check his store.


    While most backed down when they saw his prices, there were enough fans of the second prince that all of the training spots had been taken for the first time.


    For the first time since Lin Fan had opened this store, he had sold all the training spots in a single day.


    It was just too bad that not a single person bought any pet food or any of the stat increasing elixirs.


    The second prince had only left his pet to be trained by Lin Fan''s store and nothing else, so that only proved the effectiveness of Lin Fan''s training. The things on the shelf and the expensive pet food that they had never heard of, naturally no one would trust those things.


    So other than the rush to buy the training slots, there weren''t that many people that stayed in his store.


    Oh, no, that was wrong as well because there were some new "customers".


    They weren''t exactly customers since they never bought anything, they were just people that stayed around in Lin Fan''s store until closing time.


    This was a store that had even caught the attention of the second prince, so it naturally caught the radars of many people. All of them sent their own people to scout out the store to see what was special about it, so most of them just stayed there and watched over the store for the rest of the day.


    When the next day came, the second prince came on time to pick up his pet and he revealed a surprised look before giving a nod to Lin Fan and saying, "Thank you."


    Then without saying anything else, he left the store.


    Many people were shocked since they never thought that the second prince would leave just like this, but that made Lin Fan seem even more mysterious.


    After all, they could see that the second prince wasn''t dissatisfied with the training that he had received from Lin Fan''s store.


    Did that mean that Lin Fan''s store really had the ability to train World Realm Pets?


    Once again, all of the training spots sold out instantly and there were many more people that started hanging out in the store.


    After all, if there really was a store that could train World Realm Pets, this would be an important discovery.


    Any power at the World Realm was considered arge influence and if they were able to increase the strength of their World Realm Pets, that would mean having more influence in this Ster Kingdom.


    People that could train World Realm Pets were very rare and now that there was a store that opened here that seemed like it could train World Realm Pets, they naturally would do all they could to win Lin Fan over for their own benefits.


    But before that, they would want to get as much information as they can about him, which was why more and more people sent spies to watch over Lin Fan''s store.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about any of that because he didn''t n on making any deals with any other forces. He already had a deal with the Dongfang Family when it came to this store, so that was enough for him.


    However, even the Dongfang Family was moved in the end.


    They never would have expected that the person that they made a deal with would have this kind of ability and they couldn''t help worrying about the deal that they had made. They were worried that he would get them caught up in even more trouble.


    That was solved in the end by the young miss who said that she trusted him and believed in him.


    All of the elders trusted the young miss, so they left this matter at that.


    Still, Dongfang Ming made another appearance at the store.


    It had been a long time since he had been at the store since after helping Lin Fan settle in, he hadn''t been there in a long time.


    He had only been assigned to help Lin Fan settle and once Lin Fan had settled, there was no need for him to go back to Lin Fan''s store unless there was something special.


    This was one of those special asions.


    Lin Fan was naturally surprised to see Dongfang Ming, but he still weed him. He had actually gotten quite close to Dongfang Ming during the time that he had been here, especially since they both had wives that were¡­


    But Dongfang Ming didn''te for a normal visit, he was here with a purpose.


    Dongfang Ming took out a letter and said, "The young miss wants to invite you to a meeting."


    Lin Fan revealed a surprised look as he took the letter in front of him. He found that there was a slender and delicate writing on it, but it was an invitation for a meal.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    There was no purpose to this invitation, there was just a location and a time set for the meal.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that something was off when he saw this, but he didn''t ask anything. He knew that even if he were to ask Dongnfagn Ming about this, he wouldn''t get an answer.


    Before he could put it away though, Ang suddenly appeared behind him and looked over his shoulders at the letter in his hand. It only took a single look for her to recognize that it was from a girl, causing a chill to suddenly fall over Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just sat there with a bitter look on his face as he quickly exined who this letter was from.


    Ang looked at Dongfang Ming and he quickly also confirmed the same thing.


    After a while, she nodded before saying, "Come back soon."


    Even though it sounded like she was saying this out of worry for him, Lin Fan knew¡­that this was equal to a death sentence.


    But for now, he had something else that he needed to care about first.


    The meeting was set for after the store closed, so he had plenty of time to prepare.


    But since he didn''t know what the meeting was about, there wasn''t really much that he could prepare.


    He went alone to the location of the meeting and he found that it was a very fancy restaurant. Of course, he expected this since he had already checked the location of the meeting and it was in the first noble district that was open to normal people as well.


    This was a luxurious restaurant that was one of the top ranked restaurants in the city. It was even said that they only catered to nobles.


    In fact, when Lin Fan showed up at the restaurant, he was almost denied ess to the restaurant.


    He wasn''t a famous noble nor did he have anything that could prove that he was a noble, so the staff of the restaurant were about to send him packing. But before they could, there was a tall man that suddenly came forward to stop them.


    They were about to question this person, but then he raised the token of the Dongfang Family and they immediately fell silent.


    The Dongfang Family was more than qualified to bring guests to their establishment. If they actually offended the Dongfang Family over this matter, they would be the one that would suffer.


    So the manager quickly came over and was about to punish the staff members that had tried rejecting Lin Fan ess. However, before he could, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand and stopped him.


    The staff members looked at Lin Fan with grateful looks, but he didn''t care about them at all as he followed therge man in.


    As he looked carefully at this person, he realized that this person was the one that he met before in the slum city. He was the other cloaked figure that had been there when he had talked to the young miss.


    After this person led Lin Fan to the room, he gave Lin Fan a strange look before opening the door for him.


    Lin Fan noticed this, but he chose to ignore it as he walked in.


    There was arge table covered in dishes in this room, but there was only a single person sitting at this table.


    It was the same beautiful girl that he had seen at the store before. It was young miss Dongfang.


    She revealed a smile when she saw him and said, "Young master Lin, you''re here."


    Lin Fan nodded before sitting down across from her at the table, though it looked a bit strange since there were only the two of them at this table.


    Young miss Dongfang didn''t mind at all when she saw that Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything, just sitting there looking at her as if he was waiting for her to speak.


    She was the one that had called him here, so naturally it was normal for her to speak first.


    She just casually said, "I have a request for you."


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised since he had already expected this, so he asked, "What is it?"


    Young miss Dongfang took out a handkerchief that she ced on the revolving portion of the table that she turned over to him.


    Once it was in front of him, she said, "I want you to help me find someone."

 Chapter 864 Movements

    Lin Fan looked down at the handkerchief with a strange look since he couldn''t understand how this handkerchief was rted to finding someone.


    But when he looked closer, he found that there was a strange pattern on this handkerchief.


    There was a cherry blossom pattern on it that seemed very familiar to him. Almost as if he had seen it somewhere before¡­


    But he couldn''t remember where exactly¡­


    Young miss Dongfang had been watching him the entire time, as if she was waiting to see a reaction on his face. However, seeing that he just calmly looked at the handkerchief without revealing any reactions, she gave a sigh before continuing to speak.


    "I know you''re probably wondering what this handkerchief is."


    After a pause, she continued, "This is an item that is simr to the one that belongs to the person that I''m looking for. I want you to find that person with this item that has a simr pattern for me."


    Lin Fan looked at her with a confused look and asked, "I just run a pet shop in this city, how could I find someone like that for you?"


    Young miss Dongfang shook her head and said, "Who said that it would be in the capital city?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows before slowly saying, "The slum city?"


    Young miss Dongfang nodded and said, "That''s right."


    Lin Fan had a bit of understanding when he heard this.


    If it was in the capital city, there was no chance that young miss Dongfang would ask for his help with this. After all, when it came to the capital city, young miss Dongfang had countless times more influence than Lin Fan.


    But the slum city where the nobles didn''t have any influence at all, naturally it wasn''t a ce that young miss Dongfang or the Dongfang Family would be able to search at will.


    That wasn''t the case when it came to Lin Fan since he had taken over the gangs in the slum city. With all those different gangs spread out across the slum city, it was easy¡­no, it was easier for him to search for the person that she wanted to find.


    Of course, actually finding that person was still a big unknown.


    It was hard to find a single person in arge city after all. Especially if they were hiding, which Lin Fan was assuming was the case if young miss Dongfang wanted this person to be found.


    But he couldn''t help feeling a vague bad feeling.


    He took a closer look and for some reason, it really felt like this pattern on the handkerchief was very simr¡­Almost as if he had seen it somewhere before, but he couldn''t just ce his finger on it.


    Still, in the end, he decided to ept this request.


    After all,pared to not being involved, it made him feel more assured if he had some form of control in this matter.


    Young miss Dongfang gave a nod before saying with a grateful look, "Thank you for doing this. This is a very important matter."


    Seeing the way that she looked, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Is it important for the Dongfang Family or for you?"


    Young miss Dongfang was surprised to hear this from Lin Fan, but after taking a deep look at him, she said, "Both."


    Lin Fan could tell that there was a story behind this answer, but he could also tell that she wasn''t willing to talk about it. Moreover, it was most likely rted to something important for the Dongfang Family, so it would be strange if she was indeed willing to talk about it.


    Since that was the case, there was no need for him to stay here any longer.


    He knew that the longer he stayed, the more nails he put in the coffin that was waiting for him at home.


    So he stood up and excused himself before leaving without giving young miss Dongfang a chance to say anything.


    Young miss Dongfang had been lost in thought, so when she came back to her senses, she saw that Lin Fan was already gone. However, she didn''t mind this since she had already achieved her goal in asking him to meet her.


    The truth was that this was more of a personal matter for her than a family matter.


    She wanted to make up for the mistake that she had made in the past.


    "Big sis, I don''t know if I can find her, but I''ll do what I can."


    ¡­


    Even after he left the restaurant, Lin Fan couldn''t stop himself from thinking about what had happened back there.


    He walked in a daze on the way back from the restaurant.


    Of course, he could have taken a beast carriage and headed back sooner, but he had something that he wanted to think about.


    Only when he reached the store did he suddenly reveal a look of revtion as if he had suddenly thought of something.


    He had finally remembered where he had seen the pattern before.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    With a wave of his hand, there was a barrier ofws that appeared around him that obscured him from the view of everyone around.


    Once he made sure that no one was looking at him, he took out a token from his Storage Ring.


    This was the token that he had received from Duanmu Hua Yu when he had saved him and was one of thest things that he had been entrusted with.


    As for why he was taking it out, it was because he had to take a closer look at the pattern of the token.


    At the same time, he also pulled out the handkerchief that he had just received from young miss Dongfang and ced it beside the token.


    As he had expected, there was the same pattern on these two items¡­


    It seemed that the person that young miss Dongfang was looking for was Duanmu Hua Yu¡­No, it should be Xin''er¡­Min''er because Duanmu Hua Yu was the one that was assigned to take care of her. The token belonged to her originally.


    As Lin Fan realized all of this, he felt that this situation was getting worse and worse.


    What this token represented was the prestige of the Mu Ster Royal Family, so if the Dongfang Family was looking for Xin''er, then that meant that they had some kind of connection to the Mu Ster Royal Family.


    The reason that Lin Fan had chosen the Dongfang Family in the first ce was because they were a powerful neutral family. He didn''t want to get involved in the politics of this Mu Ster Kingdom both for his sake and for Xin''er''s sake.


    But the fact that the Dongfang Family was rted to the Mu Ster Royal Family and was looking for Xin''er meant that they were looking to enter politics¡­


    This was a very bad sign for him.


    So Lin Fan was certain that he didn''t want to help the Dongfang Family with this, but there was still one thing that he was concerned about.


    The original owner of this token and the handkerchief¡­


    These things most likely didn''t belong to Xin''er in the first ce¡­As for the people that they belonged to, it was most likely her parents.


    Well, since it was a cherry blossom pattern, these things most likely used to belong to Xin''er''s mother.


    A mother was an important thing for a child and he didn''t know if Xin''er''s mother was still alive or not. If she was alive, it was only right that Xin''er meet her once¡­


    So he still had to consider this¡­


    ¡­


    In another location in the noble district.


    Behind a set of closed doors.


    There were three people that were currently sitting in this room, two males and one female.


    One side was just one man by himself and the other side was one man and one female.


    Neither side said a thing as they just sat there in silence with both sides just staring at each other.


    Finally, the man sitting alone said, "Why do you want to switch sides now out of all time?"


    The woman said with a smile, "It should be clear based on the sixth prince''s performance what kind of person he is. You should understand why we no longer want to be associated with him, right?"


    The man narrowed his eyes to look at the woman before saying, "You say that, but you''ve been working under him for so long. Do you really think that you would be epted that easily?"


    The woman had the same smile as she said, "But we have something that we think will be able to prove our sincerity."


    The man narrowed his eyes before saying, "The Jun Family? You''re saying that you can give me the Jun Family?"


    The woman shook her head and said, "I can''t give you the Jun Family, but I can give you the information that you''ve been looking for."


    The man immediately released his aura in full and said in a deep voice, "Her? You''re telling me that you have information on her?"


    Both the man and the woman were shocked to see this kind of aura from this person, but they quickly calmed down. The man nodded to the woman and she took out a piece of paper that she ced on the table before saying, "Based on our investigations, there have been traces found in the slum city."


    The man knitted his brows as he took this piece of paper and he muttered to himself, "The slum city¡­"


    After another long period of silence, the man took the piece of paper and said, "I''ll investigate myself and if this turns out to be true, I''ll ept you to my side."


    Then without another word, he left the room.


    The ones that were left behind revealed wide smiles as they had aplished their goal.


    The one who had just left was the second prince and the ones left were Yang Xi Ruo and her father, Duke Yang.

 Chapter 865 Seeking Treasures (1)

    Since this was a matter that concerned Xin''er, Lin Fan couldn''t hide it from Ang.


    So the first thing that he did aftering back to the store was have a talk alone with Ang.


    No, the first thing that happened to him after he came into the store was that he was dragged away by Ang for his punishment.


    Luckily Xin''er didn''te alone since Ang didn''t want her to see what she was doing to Lin Fan, so Lin Fan was able to get to a room alone with Ang.


    He immediately told her everything that happened, not just out of concern for Xin''er, but also to save himself from his punishment.


    After Ang finished hearing everything, she had a dark look on her face as if she was nning on doing something drastic.


    Lin Fan had a bad feeling when he saw this look on her face, so he immediately stood in front of her and asked, "What are you nning on doing?"


    Ang just coldly looked at him and said, "I''m doing what needs to be done."


    Lin Fan knew immediately that she was nning on using force to solve this and he immediately grabbed her to stop her from going anywhere.


    Ang didn''t try to break free, but the way that she red at him was like being pierced by many different sharp des.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shrinking back under that gaze, but he still firmly held onto her, not loosening his grip on her arms at all. He knew that the moment that he let go even in the slightest, she would break away and solve this her way.


    With how much stronger she was, there was no way that he would be able to stop her.


    So he quickly decided to use reasoning to stop her, "You know that if you do this, we won''t be able to stay here anymore. Not just that, it will be unlikely that we''ll be able to escape this ce safely with Xin''er. You know that I can''t use the door and it''s impossible for Xin''er to use that door."


    Ang gave a cold snort when she heard this.


    She knew that if she was serious, it wasn''t a problem for her to destroy a Ster Kingdom or two.


    But she knew that Lin Fan also had a point. Not to mention that there was still the master of the store that was here.


    If she did this, she would not only ruin Lin Fan''s future, but would also ruin the n of the master of the store.


    This was not something that she could bring herself to do.


    So after taking a long breath, she finally said, "What do you suggest we do then?"


    Lin Fan first gave a sigh before also taking a long breath to say, "For now, we don''t do anything."


    She narrowed her eyes to look at him. Lin Fan could clearly see the doubt and annoyance that was in her eyes.


    Lin Fan exined, "The ones that are looking for Xin''er have entrusted the task of looking for Xin''er to me, so I will be able to control things and impede them as much as possible. Right now, if we rush this matter, it will expose information about us that we don''t want exposed. So the only thing that we can do is wait and see how the situation develops while gathering information as well. After all, we don''t even know why they are looking for Xin''er, right?"


    Ang knitted her brows when she heard this, but after a while, she nodded in agreement.


    Lin Fan felt a tinge of pain fill his heart when he saw her like this, but there was still something that he wanted to say. After a long period of hesitation, he finally said, "Not to mention¡­there is a chance that her birth mother is still alive."


    Ang looked right at Lin Fan with wide eyes when she heard this.


    She raised a hand and Lin Fan couldn''t help flinching since he thought that she was going to hit him again, but then she put both her hands in front of him. The way that she was standing, it almost seemed like she was asking for a hug.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan''s heart filled with even more pain as he understood the feelings that she was currently feeling.


    After all, an adopted mother could neverpare to a birth mother. Especially one that hadn''t been an adopted mother for long.


    If Xin''er''s birth mother were to appear now, she as the adopted mother would lose to the birth mother.


    But she also wanted Xin''er''s birth mother to be alive since she knew how hard it was not to have a birth mother¡­


    So she was feeling very conflicted after hearing this.


    Lin Fan took her in his arms and patted her on the head,forting her as much as he could, but he still felt that slightly cool and wet feelinging from his shirt.


    The two of them just stayed like this for a while before Ang finally calmed down.


    After calming down, she asked, "What do we do now?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and fell into deep thought for a bit before saying, "How about we go out together, just the three of us. We haven''t had an outing as a family yet, so we should seize this chance while we can."


    Ang couldn''t help looking at him with a surprised look before saying, "Are you sure that we can do that now? Isn''t it an important time for the store?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "It''s fine, the kids have been training, so they can handle the store by themselves for a day."


    Ang nodded in agreement to this since she had been watching the kids during the day. They had indeed slowly learned everything that they needed to learn to run this store during this time.


    It would actually be a good test for them to run the store by themselves for a day.


    She was about to say something else, but before she could, Lin Fan said, "We''ll leave Yuki here with them. You know how she feels about those five sisters, so we can just leave her to watch over them."


    Ang looked at him before agreeing with a nod, "Un, it would be good for her and them."


    After a long period of silence, Ang gave another nod and said, "Let''s do it then. We can head out tomorrow after the morning rush."


    Lin Fan nodded before taking her in his arms again.


    After a short period of silence, he said, "You know, it''s been a while since we''ve had some alone time. How about we¡­"


    Before he could finish, Xin''er''s voice rang out from outside the room, "Mom, are you done punishing dad?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he heard this.


    Ang just looked up at him with a faint charming smile and said, "Sorry, Xin''er is calling."


    Then without even giving him a chance to say anything, she left his embrace and walked out of the room.


    Lin Fan shook his head with the same bitter smile as he thought to himself, "It seemed like it was true. Once you had children, it was impossible to get any free time for yourself."


    But at the same time, he couldn''t help feeling a warm feeling in his heart.


    He could finally understand what his mother and father felt when they raised him.


    ¡­


    The next morning.


    After the morning rush, Xin''er excitedly pulled Lin Fan and Ang by the hand as they headed out of the store.


    Once she learned about their n to have a special outing with the three of them, she was so excited that she almost couldn''t sleep. In fact, she had only gotten half the normal amount of sleep that she normally got.


    However, even with this reduced sleep, she was still filled with energy as she pulled Lin Fan and Ang out.


    Kids really didn''t tire out unlike adults¡­


    Behind them, Xiao Tu couldn''t help revealing an envious look.


    He was forced to stay in the shop with Yuki to watch over it while the three of them headed off by themselves.


    Still, he felt happy for Xin''er after seeing the happy smile she had on her face.


    Xin''er dragged them out of the store, but then she revealed a confused look as she didn''t know where they were heading. Lin Fan and Ang had only told her that they were going out for an outing, but they never told her where they were going.


    So she slowed down and turned around to look at Lin Fan and Ang before asking, "Where are we going?"


    Seeing her cute appearance, Lin Fan and Ang couldn''t help revealing smiles.


    But then they took her hands and Lin Fan said, "Should we go?"


    Xin''er looked up at them and gave a nod with a happy smile.


    Lin Fan and Ang headed off with Xin''er in between them. No matter how anyone looked at them, they seemed like a very happy family that was enjoying a day together.


    But the only difference was that the three of them were all far more beautiful than normal people were.


    Lin Fan was a handsome young father, Ang was a beautiful young mother, and Xin''er was their pretty little daughter.


    Wherever they went, they attracted people''s attention.


    While most of them were just happy to watch them, there were those that had bad intentions towards them.


    They quickly made their move as well.

 Chapter 866 Seeking Treasures (2)

    Seeing this beautiful couple walking along with their beautiful daughter, the thugs that were hanging out in the corner couldn''t help revealing a disgusted look. Of course, there was also a trace of envy that were in their eyes.


    Normally they wouldn''t do anything to people walking around in the streets because there was nothing to gain from it, but seeing this couple, they couldn''t help having some evil thoughts.


    Not to mention that they couldn''t feel any powerful aura from Lin Fan.


    At most, he was only in the Gold Realm as far as they could tell.


    As for the girls, they didn''t sense any cultivation from them.


    Well, they should have sensed the Gold Realm aura from Xin''er since that was her current cultivation after training with Lin Fan and Ang, but this was deliberately hidden by both Lin Fan and Ang. Not to mention Lin Fan, there was no chance that these thugs would be able to see through Ang''s special methods.


    After all, the strongest of these thugs was only in the tinum Realm.


    Since they were confident in taking him down, naturally they didn''t hold back.


    They followed Lin Fan''s group for a bit until they saw that they were in a rather secluded ce.


    Lin Fan had naturally noticed these people following him, so he had deliberately chosen toe to this secluded alley.


    As they were walking through, the two entrances to the alley were blocked by these thugs. The leader of these thugs appeared in front of them and led a group of his followers forward to stop Lin Fan.


    With a smile on his face, the leader said, "Well, well, well, look at what we have here. Isn''t this such a lovely scene, walking around with a beautiful family like this?"


    The thugs behind him all nodded in agreement to this.


    But before he could say anything else, Xin''er said with a happy smile, "I love my family too."


    She had thought that the leader was sincerelyplimenting their family, so she was feeling quite happy hearing this.


    But the leader and the thugs didn''t feel the same.


    They all had awkward looks on their faces since they never expected this little girl to ruin their speech like this.


    It should have been very clear that they were being sarcastic and were actually threatening the three of them, but this little girl clearly didn''t get it.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan and Ang also revealed smiles as if they were making fun of these thugs.


    When the thugs noticed this, their faces turned red with anger from shame.


    The lead thug pulled out a knife and said, "Give us all your money or else!"


    With things reaching this point, the only thing that they could do was keep going and aplish the goal that they had wanted to in the first ce.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t moving at all, the leader thug suddenly revealed a lewd smile and said, "If you don''t have any money¡­How about you lend your wife and your daughter to us? We haven''t had any fun in some time and we''ll be sure to treat them right."


    As soon as he said this, he suddenly felt a chilling from in front of him. In fact, all of the thugs suddenly felt a chille over them.


    This was a chill that was like an executioner''s de being put at their throats.


    It was so strong that their legs turned into jelly.


    If it wasn''t for the bit of pride that they had that allowed them to stand up still, they would have copsed to the ground at that moment.


    Naturally this chill came from Lin Fan and Ang.


    When they had heard what the lead thug had said, they had already sentenced this group of thugs to death in their minds. They didn''t even care about the consequences as they just wanted them to die.


    Luckily for the thugs, Lin Fan, and Ang, Xin''er was the one who reacted first.


    Xin''er suddenly hit her hand with her fist and said, "Oh, you are bad people."


    The thugs didn''t know what to say in response to this, but the way that she did this really looked quite cute, so even their hearts melted for a second. Of course, that was only for a second as they quickly returned to their fierce looks.


    Xin''er tilted her head to think for a bit before saying, "Since you''re bad guys, then I should beat you up."


    When they heard this, the thugs couldn''t help being stunned at first. Then after a pause, they suddenly burst out inughter.


    The lead thug chuckled as he asked, "Little girl, how are you nning on beating us?"


    As he said this, he waved his hand and all the thugs around him released their aura.<novelnext></novelnext>


    They were only in the Gold Realm and the tinum Realm, so they weren''t a threat to Lin Fan or Ang at all. Even Xin''er who was in the Gold Realm wasn''t that scared of them¡­


    That was because being raised by Ang, she was already more than used to this kind of aura. She had even adapted to auras in the Soul Realm already, let alone this lower realm.


    So she just said with a smile, "Well, I''m pretty strong¡­And I have a helper."


    With a wave of her hand, there was another little girl that appeared beside her.


    When this little girl appeared, she suddenly fell to the ground which woke her up. She sleepily stood up and rubbed her eyes before saying, "Xin Xin, what''s happening?"


    The thugs were surprised to see this little girl suddenly appearing out of nowhere, but they weren''t scared of her because they couldn''t sense a single bit of auraing from her.


    But Lin Fan and Ang knew the tragedy that was about to befall these thugs.


    Xin''er pointed at the thugs in front of her and said, "These bad people are trying to bully dad, mom, and me!"


    The little girl narrowed her eyes to look at them before suddenly saying, "Then we need to punish them!"


    Xin''er nodded in agreement, "Let''s do this Bao Bao!"


    The thugs looked at each other while the two girls talked amongst themselves and they were about to break out inughter, but there was a pressure that fell on them that immediately made them swallow thisughter.


    Before they could realize what happened, there was an aura that hit them right in the face.


    This was the full power aura that Qing Bao Lan released.


    This was the full power aura of a Child Soul Realm Expert!


    They couldn''t understand what was happening before they were scattered like bowling pins by the cute little girl with a pair of dragon wings on her back.


    Those hands that had also transformed into dragon ws punched right through them, scattering them to the sides.


    At the same time, Xin''er took out a small cane that was shaped like a magical girl''s staff and she also charged out at the thugs.


    Lin Fan and Ang just stood there with smiles on their faces as they watched everything happen.


    It took less than five seconds for Qing Bao Lan and Xin''er to take care of the thugs. By the end of it, they were all scattered around and lying on the ground.


    As for the thugs that were at the entrances of the alley, they ran off the moment that they saw theirpanions being thrown around like toys. They knew that if they stayed, they would receive the same fate and they weren''t that dumb to stay.


    After they had taken care of all the thugs, they came back in front of Lin Fan and Ang.


    Xin''er looked up at them like a little kid who had just done something good and was waiting to be praised.


    As for Qing Bao Lan, she just stood there ring at Lin Fan, as if she was waiting for something.


    Lin Fan shook his head and patted Xin''er on her head before summoning out Xiao Feng.


    Qing Bao Lan''s eyes lit up when she saw Xiao Feng and immediately hugged him. Xiao Feng hugged her back since it had also been quite a while since he had seen her, so he did miss her.


    But that didn''tst long since Lin Fan couldn''t just let them run off or bring them along today, so he quickly called Xiao Feng away.


    Qing Bao Lan red at Lin Fan, but then she obediently returned to Xin''er''s pet storage space as well.


    As for how Qing Bao Lan ended up in Xin''er''s pet storage space, naturally that was because she had formed a contract with Xin''er. It wasn''t just Qing Bao Lan though, it was also Feng Yu and Lei Huan that had formed contracts with Xin''er.


    Of course, this was something that was done after the approval of their parents had been obtained.


    Xin''er was a girl who was around the same age mentally as the three girls, so it was good for them to be together. Of course, that was only mentally since in terms of body age, these three girls were much older than Xin''er.


    In fact, after the three girls were contracted to Xin''er, they had be much more mellow and didn''t stick to Lin Fan''s pets as much.


    This had a positive effect as Lin Fan''s pets slowly began missing these three girls, which made their rtionships better to Ang''s dismay. But she was happy to see Xin''er having friends her age as well.


    Though when it came to the contract, it was better to say that the three girls made contracts with Xin''er, rather than Xin''er making contracts with them. After all, with the difference in cultivation between them, it was impossible for Xin''er to make a contract with them in the first ce.


    After all the thugs had been taken care of, Lin Fan''s group continued heading off without a care.

 Chapter 867 Seeking Treasures (3)

    Putting these thugs behind them, Lin Fan brought the two girls to the best business street in the city.


    This was a ce that was designed for nobles that was open for the public, so it was the best ce to tour when it came to the capital city.


    After thest interference, Lin Fan and Ang had learned their lesson and decided to hide their appearances with theirws so that they wouldn''t attract as much attention. However, they found that even if they didn''t, they wouldn''t have stuck out as much since this ce was filled with beautiful people.


    It was only natural that there would be beautiful people here since these people were all rich people that cared about appearances if they could afford to shop here. So naturally there would be very few ugly people here.


    Still, it was better to be safe than sorry, so they didn''t release their barriers as they walked around.


    Xin''er hadn''t been affected at all by the sudden disturbance earlier. Rather, she became even more excited after getting some exercise, so she quickly pulled Lin Fan and Ang up and down across the street.


    In just fifteen minutes, she already had a stick of candied hawthorns in one hand, a stick of cotton candy in the other, and a toy mask on her face.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help smiling as he remembered something.


    She really looked like a kid who was enjoying a festival back on earth¡­


    But of course, this ce wasn''t earth. This was a cultivation based society that had many things that the society on earth didn''t have.


    For example, most of the stores here were actually based on cultivation.


    There were pill stores, pet shops, artifact houses, and many different ces that would help one improve their cultivation and increase their strength.


    However, those ces weren''t as exciting to Xin''er since she didn''t really care about cultivating.


    If it hadn''t been for Ang insisting, she wouldn''t have learned how to cultivate in the first ce.


    So they moved quite quickly down the street, moving past many of the stores that were there. The only times that they stopped was when a toy caught Xin''er''s attention or there was a new food ce for the two girls to try.


    There was no need to talk about Ang, but it turned out that Xin''er''s stomach was just as bottomless as Ang''s when she was excited like this. She was able to keep pace with everything that Ang ate and at times, she even ate more than Ang since Ang stopped to feed her.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head when he saw this as he thought, "Kids really do have a lot of energy sometimes, don''t they?"


    They continued going from shop to shop like this until they came to a certain shop.


    This shop was different from the other shops because this shop wasn''t a shop that was selling something. Instead, this shop was a ce for gambling.


    Of course, it wasn''t traditional gambling or else Lin Fan and Ang definitely wouldn''t have let Xin''ere here.


    Drugs and gambling, those were the two taboos that Lin Fan and Ang would never allow to approach Xin''er. Once she was addicted, it would be toote for them to do anything to help her.


    This ce was a rock cutting store.


    Rock cutting was buying raw ores and then cutting them to see what was inside. Sometimes there would be spirit jade, sometimes there would be special minerals, and sometimes there would be nothing. Everything depended on one''s luck, so it was a form of gambling, but it was also a form of entertainment and business since it was exciting and one could be rich if their eyes were good.


    If their eyes were good enough, naturally they would be able to see which ores contained the good stuff.


    Xin''er was only interested because there was someone that had cracked a good ore and the shine of the jade inside had caught her attention.


    As she looked at the different ores, she couldn''t help feeling excited since this was like a game for her.


    She immediately turned back to Lin Fan and pointed at the rock cutting store, "Can we try that store? It really seems interesting."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the store.


    He really didn''t have a good impression of these stores because he used to run a store like this back on earth, so he knew what kind of tricks this store used.


    Most of the time, the products that were ced in the front were those that had a very low chance of having anything inside. Even if they did, they were only small items that wouldn''t cost the store that much.


    The chances of getting lucky and hitting the jackpot in a store like this was close to zero.


    After all, they would keep the stones that had the highest chances of having rare ores to themselves since they would earn more money from cutting these stones themselves than selling them.


    So he really didn''t want to go to this kind of store if he didn''t have to.


    But seeing the sparkling eyes that Xin''er had, he couldn''t say no to her.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Not to mention, he could also see the sparkling eyes that Ang had to his side¡­


    It seemed like she was just as excited as Xin''er to try out this stone cutting¡­


    Lin Fan found it funny how aligned Ang and Xin''er''s interests were sometimes. Perhaps this was why they had clicked in the beginning and why Xin''er had embraced Ang as her mother so quickly.


    So in the end, Lin Fan gave a nod and the two of them ran off hand in hand while he slowly followed behind them.


    He looked around the store during this time and found the usual suspects for a ce like this.


    The people who were running the store were clearly people who were skilled at sweet talking customers and tricking them into buying the worst stones.


    While he wasn''t worried that Ang would be tricked, he was worried that Xin''er would be tricked since she was still too young and pure to go against these people. If Xin''er was tricked, Ang wouldn''t be able to say anything and would just go along with her.


    So it was his responsibility to keep them safe.


    When these store clerks saw these two girlsing into the store, their eyes immediately lit up.


    They could tell with their experience that these girls were clearly new to this and they were fresh prey for them. As long as they were able to talk to these girls, they knew that they would be able to trick them out of their money.


    So many of these clerks were excited abouting forward to talk to these two.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan stuck to them like a bodyguard. As soon as one of the clerks came over, he would immediately use his re to freeze them and scare them away.


    As a former young master on earth, he had plenty of experience dealing with people like this, so it was no trouble for him scaring them away.


    None of the clerks dared to approach after seeing Lin Fan''s gaze.


    It was as if they felt something instinctively repelling about him and they couldn''t approach no matter how they tried.


    This allowed Ang and Xin''er to browse in peace.


    After walking around for a bit, Ang and Xin''er still weren''t able to find a single piece of ore that they liked. It was as if there wasn''t anything in this store that could catch their eyes.


    As time passed, Xin''er couldn''t help feeling more and more sad as she couldn''t find the right ore for herself.


    So in the end, she was about to give up and to suggest that they leave this ce.


    However, before she could, Ang suddenly squeezed her hand.


    Xin''er looked up and saw that Ang was pointing at something. She turned her eyes in the direction that Ang was pointing in and her eyes fell onto that rock as well.


    As soon as she saw this, her eyes immediately lit up as she said, "That''s the one!"


    Lin Fan had been busy scaring off clerks, but he turned his head when he heard her say this.


    He looked at the rock that caught their attention and he couldn''t help being surprised.


    It wasn''t because the rock was very big or small, it wasn''t because there was any special shape or pattern to the rock. It was because this was a very normal rock that didn''t have any special defining features at all.


    It was a regr shape, size, and had a regr pattern. No matter how one looked at it, it was just a normal rock.


    Even the price for it was as normal as can be.


    But since this was the one that they had picked, Lin Fan chose to buy it.


    Finally, he let one of the clerks approach and had them bring the rock out for cutting.


    The clerk just revealed a bitter smile as he wasn''t allowed to sell them anything else and after receiving the money, he just wanted to cut it as fast as he could to get them out of the store.


    This man, he was clearly a jinx since once people saw him, they also left the store out of fear of provoking him.


    Business was down, so the sooner he left, the better.


    But when the rock was cut, the clerk was suddenly filled with even more regret.

 Chapter 868 Seeking Treasures (4)

    When the clerk first cut into the stone, he saw that there was nothing special about it at all and he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    He had seen how the two girls had acted and he was a bit doubtful, but now that he saw that this stone had nothing, he couldn''t help finding it funny.


    These two girls were nothing more than newbies that had beenpletely tricked by the stones they had put out. They acted like this rock was something special, but their eyes weren''t that good.


    He continued cutting deeper and deeper into the rock, but not seeing a single thing, the smile of disdain on his face became wider.


    That was until he reached the center of this rock.


    As soon as he cut into the center of the rock, the strange looking dust that came from the cutter made him knit his brows.


    He didn''t know exactly what this was, but he could tell that this dust was a sign that something not normal was inside of this ore. There was even a chance that there was a rare metal that was inside of this thing.


    As this thought passed through his mind, he couldn''t help being filled with regret over this.


    He knew that even if it was a small piece, it would still be worth at least a hundred times what they paid for this piece of ore.


    As he was cutting, his brain began turning before he said, "It doesn''t seem like there is much in here, but it does seem like there''s something there. In my professional opinion, this colour usually isn''t a good sign since it''s a sign of a normal chunk of metal."


    After a pause, he revealed a difficult look and said, "However, I''ve been in a pinch since I''ve been in trouble with my wife. This colour is her favourite colour, so I''m sure that she would love something like this as a present."


    He then turned to them with a kind smile and said, "How about I buy this off you for double what you paid?"


    The way he said all of this, it made it seem like he was doing them a favour.


    There wasn''t a single thing off with his acting and if this was earth, Lin Fan was sure that he could contend for an Oscar.


    But he wasn''t fooled by this at all.


    He knew that this was just a trick that the clerk was using to cheat them out of the ore. After all, he had noticed how the clerk had looked at the ore before he started talking.


    It was clear that he recognized something valuable here, so he wanted to try to get the ore back without paying too much.


    For most people, double the price was considered quite generous, but to Lin Fan, it meant that what was inside was very valuable if he didn''t hesitate to start with double the price.


    He didn''t really care about this bit of money since it was just a hundred spirit stones. This was something that he could easily earn with his store or anything else that he did.


    But he didn''t want to see Xin''er being cheated like this.


    It was the same for Ang who had put her hands over Xin''er as if she was protecting her.


    However, before either of them could say a thing, Xin''er shook her head and said, "No, I want to see what''s inside. It looks very interesting."


    If this was before, the shy Xin''er might have just given the ore to this clerk since he was being quite friendly. However, after being with Ang and Lin Fan, her personality had changed a bit.


    She had be smarter and she was able to say what she wanted.


    Hearing this, the clerk revealed an ugly look which he quickly suppressed. He then said with a kind smile, "Little miss, you''d really be doing me a favour here. How about this, I''ll give you three times as much."


    Xin''er still shook her head and said, "I want to see what''s inside."


    The clerk started losing his patience when he heard this.


    He had tried being kind to them since they were customers, but if they didn''t take the drink offered to them¡­


    The clerk looked at the counter and the person there gave a nod to show they understood. Then while the clerk kept Lin Fan''s group distracted, the person at the counter sent arge man from the back over.


    Thisrge man''s face and stature really made him look aggressive.


    But before he could evene over, he suddenly felt a cold chille over him.


    At that moment, it was as if a thousand des suddenly appeared in front of him. In an instant, there wasn''t a single part of him that wasn''t cut¡­<novelnext></novelnext>


    But then all of those cuts disappeared because it was nothing more than killing intent that had hit him head on.


    The eyes of thisrge man rolled back in his head and then his body fell backwards,nding on the ground with arge "thud" sound.


    There was only silence in the store as both the clerk and the person behind the counter stared at therge man on the ground in a daze.


    Neither of them understood what had just happened, but they knew that this was beyond what they could handle.


    So the clerk turned back to Xin''er and said with a smile, "Of course. This young miss, this belongs to you, naturally you can see what is inside."


    Xin''er however was staring at therge man on the ground and she asked, "Uh, is there something wrong with him? Should we get some help for him?"


    When she said this, all the clerk could hear was a threatening voice.


    He was certain that this was rted to her and now that she was asking him about it, her next target was most likely him.


    So he put even more friendliness in his voice as he said, "He''s just a little drunk and he fainted. We''ll help him in the back, you don''t have to worry about a thing."


    Xin''er looked at the man on the ground with a doubtful look, but seeing that the people of the store wereing out to help him, she didn''t ask anything else.


    She turned her attention back to the ore and revealed an excited look as she said, "Hurry up and open it! I want to see what is inside!"


    The clerk gave a quick nod and turned his attention to the ore that was being cut.


    After he made sure that the cut was finished, he slowly opened up the ore that had been cut.


    The moment that the two halves were separated, there was a strong burst of life energy that filled the store that caught everyone''s attention. They all turned to look in the direction of the source of this life energy, including someone that had juste into the store with a few followers.


    The clerk looked like he was about to cry, but had no tears when he saw this.


    He knew for sure that this reaction meant that this wasn''t a normal ore, but there was nothing that he could do about it now.


    He didn''t even know what had knocked out thatrge man, so he knew that there was no chance that he would be able to use force. As for using his words to trick this little girl, he had already seen how that turned out.


    But that didn''t mean that no one was going to do anything¡­


    Lin Fan and Ang were both surprised by this sudden burst of life energy, so they both narrowed their eyes to look at the ore. It had been cut into two halves and the insides had been revealed, showing a green piece of jade right in the center.


    After this jade had been revealed to the outside world, it started releasing waves of life energy. However, these waves were not as strong as the first wave that it had released when it had just been split open.


    Still, these waves of life energy created a space that was filled with dense live energy that would allow one to cultivate much faster than normal.


    So it was clear that this jade was a rare and precious item.


    After a moment of silence, both Lin Fan and Ang muttered, "Heaven Spring Jade¡­"


    Both of them looked at each other as if they were surprised that the other person knew the name of this jade, but then they both moved closer to Xin''er.


    They knew just how valuable this jade was, so they knew that there were people who would do anything to get this jade. In this kind of situation, the first person that they would target was Xin''er who was the one that technically owned this jade.


    But before anyone could say anything, there was a person that suddenly came forward with arge crowd.


    He came up to the jade and leaned over to inspect it while saying, "Interesting, interesting. To think that there would be a Heaven Spring Jade in a ce like this."


    The clerk was scared of Xin''er, so naturally he came forward to say something. But before he could say a thing, he suddenly recognized who this person was and immediately swallowed his words.


    This person was someone that he couldn''t offend even if he had a hundred lives, a thousand lives, ten thousand lives.


    This was the fourth prince of the Mu Ster Kingdom.

 Chapter 869 Seeking Treasures (5)

    The clerk immediately lowered his head and moved to the side, waiting for the storm to pass.


    After all, the fourth prince was someone that could crush their entire store with just a single wave of his hand. Naturally, the clerk wasn''t stupid enough to offend him over this little kid.


    The fourth prince continued inspecting the jade for some time before finally standing up and saying, "I like this thing. I''ll take it."


    Then without saying anything else, he turned to leave as if this matter had been settled.


    Xin''er pouted her lips a bit when she heard this, but before she could say a thing, Ang had covered her mouth and Lin Fan had stood in front of her to block her from sight.


    It seemed like this was about to end quickly, but then the fourth prince suddenly realized something and stopped his steps.


    He turned back and looked around the shop as if he was looking for something.


    When his eyes fell onto Lin Fan and Ang, they stopped and stared at them for a while.


    He then turned to the clerk who trembled as he was being stared at.


    The clerk had no choice but to look up to face the fourth prince. He could guess what he was asking with those eyes, so he gave a nod in response.


    The fourth prince revealed a smile and walked over to them before saying, "You''re the ones that bought this jade?"


    The fourth prince could have easily taken this jade without caring about anyone else, but it was different during this time.


    During this period of time, he had heard rumours that his father, the king of this Ster Kingdom was about to decide his sessor. During this period where the session race was about to start, he couldn''t allow a single blemish on his record.


    So even if he didn''t want to, he had no choice but to y by the rules.


    Lin Fan stepped forward and nodded in agreement.


    The fourth prince didn''t care about the defensive stance that he took since he knew all too well what kind of reputation he had. He was already used to seeing people act this way around him.


    In fact, it was almost a source of pride for him.


    After all, people feared those that had power and if they feared him this much that they were this wary, that meant that he had the power that he wanted.


    The fourth prince then said, "I want this thing, so name your price."


    Since it belonged to someone else, naturally the easiest way for him to get it is to use money to buy it from this person.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before cupping his hands and saying, "Your highness, it would be our honour to give you this jade as a gift."


    The fourth prince was a bit surprised when he heard this, but then he revealed a smile as he said, "You should know that this is a very precious thing and I don''t want to be used of taking advantage of others. So name your price."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes when he heard this, but that look quickly disappeared as he said, "Since it cost me a hundred spirit stones to buy this, I am willing to sell this jade to your highness for a hundred and one spirit stones."


    The fourth prince''s smile became wider when he heard this.


    This man was quite shrewd and knew exactly what his intentions were.


    Since that was the case, he wouldn''t say no.


    The fourth prince said, "Very good, I''ll buy it at that price." Then after a pause, he said with a bit of praise in his voice, "You are quite the smart person, I''m interested in you. If you want, you cane and work for me."


    Lin Fan lowered his head and said, "Your highness, you tter me too much."


    The fourth prince nodded in response. He knew that Lin Fan was giving him a soft rejection, but he really didn''t care because he only had interest in him on a whim. He didn''t really care if Lin Fan became his subordinate or not because there were plenty of other people just as talented that were willing.


    After his subordinate threw a pouch to Lin Fan, the fourth prince picked up the jade and walked away.


    As he walked away, his eyes couldn''t help seeing through the gap between Lin Fan and Ang, falling onto Xin''er.


    There was an obscure and strange look that appeared in his eyes for a second, but it quickly disappeared. However, this look wasn''t missed by the sharp eyes of Lin Fan and Ang.


    The moment that they saw these eyes, there was killing intent that filled their heart.


    They recognized this look, it was¡­lust.


    The fourth prince had a very strange taste when it came to women that most people didn''t know about. On the surface, he appreciated beauties like a normal person, but in secret¡­


    There were cases of little girls who disappeared in the capital, but every time, the cases would be suppressed by someone. There wasn''t a single case that had any clues or came close to being solved¡­


    As for who was suppressing these cases¡­


    It was the fourth prince.


    His taste in women was¡­the younger they were, the better they were.


    Especially when they were as beautiful as Xin''er¡­


    However, he knew that he was in public and it wasn''t good for him to do anything right now.


    Instead, he remembered Lin Fan and Ang''s face. Once the whole session matter was over with, he woulde for Xin''er¡­


    Once they were gone, both Lin Fan and Ang let out a sigh of relief.


    Normally, they wouldn''t fear people like this with their personality, but it was different because there was Xin''er.


    There was a reason why Xin''er couldn''t get involved with the Mu Ster Royal Family.


    Xin''er had been surprised by Lin Fan''s subservient tone, but then she heard the words "your highness". She immediately understood what Lin Fan was doing since she understood that this person must be one of the princes.


    She was someone that had grown up in this Mu Ster Kingdom, so she knew just how high status the princes had. Offending someone like that would be no different from seeking death for normal people like them.<novelnext></novelnext>


    She knew that Lin Fan was acting that way just to keep them safe.


    After the fourth prince left, everyone in the store let out a sigh of relief.


    After all, if the fourth prince lost his temper, no one in the store would be able to escape his wrath.


    There were many people that even quickly left the store out of fear that the fourth prince would suddenlye back and cause more trouble. They didn''t want to be here when that happened.


    The clerk turned to look at Lin Fan with a look of praise as he admired how Lin Fan had handled that situation.


    He had seen the smile on the prince''s face and he knew that the prince was satisfied with how Lin Fan acted.


    This in turn had saved their store, so he hadpletely forgotten about everything from before. In a sense, Lin Fan could even be considered his benefactor.


    Lin Fan turned back to Xin''er after the fourth prince left and said, "How about you pick another stone to cut out?"


    Xin''er gave a happy nod before running off with Ang.


    The clerk heard this and took the initiative toe forward to say, "This young miss, how about I show you some of the good stones in our store?"


    This was his way of repaying Lin Fan for what he had done earlier. He even felt a bit ashamed of how he had tried to scam them out of the ore that contained that special jade earlier.


    But to his surprise, Xin''er just said, "No need, I''ll go find one myself. Mister, you should really look for a stone yourself to apologize to your wife with."


    The clerk revealed a bitter smile when he heard this.


    He never thought that the lie that he told earlier woulde back to bite him in the butt like this.


    After all, truth be told, he didn''t actually have a wife.


    That was just a lie that he told Xin''er to try to trick the ore away from her.


    But since she didn''t want his help, there was nothing that he could do. So he could just awkwardly say, "This young miss is right. I won''t bother you then. Just tell me if you find something you like, I''ll give you a special discount."


    This time, Xin''er revealed a happy look as she turned and said, "Really? How much?"


    The clerk''s heart couldn''t help melting when he saw her smile.


    Even though Lin Fan and Ang had used theirws to hide her beauty, it still shined through when she smiled like this.


    The clerk couldn''t help gushing as he said, "I''ll give you 10% off."


    Xin''er happily pped her hands before turning around to look at the ores with a serious look.


    It didn''t take long before she found one that she liked, but unlike the first time, this rock was gigantic. It was over three times as tall as she was and twice as tall as Lin Fan, while also being three times as round as her.


    This was a giant stone and the price of it reflected how big it was.


    It was ten thousand spirit stones, a hundred times more expensive than the one from before.


    Seeing this, the clerk couldn''t help revealing an awkward smile.


    This little ancestor really knew how to pick stones¡­she chose one of the biggest and most expensive ones after hearing that he would give her a 10% discount¡­


    But the clerk kept his promise and sold the stone to them for nine thousand spirit stones.


    After that, he had severalrge men help him carry it over to the specialized cutter forrge stones like this.


    At first, he couldn''t help feeling a bit worried since there was nothing special about this stone. He was worried that this cute little girl would be sad if there was nothing about this stone that she chose.


    Without knowing it, he started caring about what Xin''er felt.


    But that was only in the beginning.


    It didn''t take long for his thoughts to change.


    That was because as the de cut deeper, it revealed something inside of the stone.


    A quarter of the way in, there was a powder that suddenly appeared on the cutting saw de. This powder was one that the clerk immediately recognized because it was something that he was very familiar with.


    It was one of the rarest things that could be found in their shop, but here it was in thisrge thing.


    It was Frozen Nether Iron!


    This was one of the rarest minerals that could be found in their Ster Kingdom and the dust had appeared so early¡­Did that mean that there was arge amount of this Frozen Nether Iron in this ore!


    If so, why didn''t their appraisers notice it beforehand and prevent them from selling this ore!


    By the time that the rock was cut open, the clerk was in tears as he saw how much Frozen Nether Iron was in this rock.


    It made up over 70% of this entire rock!


    Just a few kilograms of this would be worth tens of thousands of spirit jades!


    Yes, spirit jade, not spirit stone. This was a valuable mineral that even World Realm Experts wanted, so naturally the price would be measured in spirit jades.


    As for a chunk this big, it was impossible to measure its value in just spirit jades because there had never been a chunk this big that was found before.


    This could be considered the biggest jackpot of them all, even bigger than the Heaven Spring Jade!


    The clerk could only cry without being able to shed tears¡­

 Chapter 870 Sudden News

    The day after their trip to the stone cutting house, Xin''er was still admiring therge chunk of Frozen Nether Iron that she had found.


    The store offered to buy it from her at a reduced price since they did have to sell this to others to make a profit. But the price that they offered was much more money than she had ever seen in her life.


    Lin Fan decided not to interfere because he knew that this would be a chance to learn for Xin''er. At the same time, he wanted to see how far this store would take it if she said no so he could understand what he needed to do to take care of them.


    But to his and the store''s surprise, Xin''er offered them half of the Frozen Nether Iron on her own initiative.


    The store still paid for this Frozen Nether Iron and then gave her a premium membership so that she would keeping, but this didn''t mean a thing for Xin''er since she was already bored of this.


    She then offered a bit of it to Lin Fan and Ang. Ang declined since she didn''t really have a use for this, but Lin Fan hesitantly epted a bit in the end.


    This Frozen Nether Iron was a rare mineral and he needed these kinds of minerals for his Iron Eater Bone Artifact. So even if it was a bit embarrassing epting this from Xin''er, he still took it and fed it to the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    After that incident, everything had been calm and quiet as they opened the store like normal the next day.


    But something sudden also happened that day.


    In the afternoon, there was a sudden announcement that came from the Mu Ster Kingdom''s Royal Pce.


    It was a decree from the royal pce that stated that the session would be starting.


    All of the princes would be entered into an event that would decide who would be the crown prince and one day take over as king.


    As for what the event was, that was to be announced the next day.


    When this decree was released, naturally it created arge stir. Of course, that stir was only among the nobles and not themon people.


    For the nobles, this was the event that they had been waiting for the entire time. So without any hesitation, they called back all the important members of their family and locked themselves up in their manors to discuss what they would do.


    After all, many of the nobles backed one of the princes and if the prince that they backed were to take the throne, there wouldn''t be a shortage of benefits for them. So naturally they needed to do all they could to support the prince that they backed during the session race.


    At the same time, all of the princes finished up everything that they were doing and headed back to the capital city.


    All of them wanted to be there when the session rules were announced so no one would be able to get an advantage over the others. Especially those princes that had a lower chance of winning the session race.


    In short, there were many people that started making moves as soon as the session race was announced.


    But that also included the nobles that belonged to the neutral faction.


    They were able to remain the neutral faction because they had enough strength to maintain their neutrality. But that didn''t mean that they were fools that stayed out of the session racepletely.


    They knew that even if they were the neutral faction, they still had plenty of influence and they could exchange that influence for more power.


    Only with more power would they be able to maintain their neutrality when the new dynasty was formed.


    So they couldn''t sit still either.


    If this was Lin Fan from before, it wouldn''t matter to him what this session race was like, but now it mattered to him. That was because anything rted to the royal family was rted to Xin''er.


    As long as Xin''re was in his life, he would have to care about what happened to the royal family¡­


    So while he wasn''t willing, he contacted the Dongfang Family after the news was announced.


    To his surprise, the one who met with him was actually young miss Dongfang.


    After he arrived, she didn''t waste any time as she asked, "Didn''t you say that you weren''t interested in the session race? Why are you suddenly interested in this matter?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I said that I wanted to remain neutral, but you should have heard about what happened in my store recently. I just want to make sure that nothing bad will happen to me."


    Young miss Dongfang narrowed her eyes to look at Lin Fan for a few seconds before giving a nod.


    She had indeed heard about what had happened in his store with the princes. After all, it was a big matter that involved three princes, one of which was the powerful second prince. It was impossible for her to not know about this matter.


    Since that was the case, she could guess Lin Fan''s intentions and she didn''t have any doubts towards his words.


    So after asking what he wanted to know, she gave him a general overview of the situation.


    The favoured ones in the session race were the first prince, the second prince, and the fourth prince as Lin Fan already knew.


    However, what Lin Fan didn''t know was the personality of each of the princes.


    Well, he did know the personality of the fourth prince since he had met him at the stone cutting house before, but that was only a glimpse of the fourth prince''s personality. The personality that young miss Dongfang told him about was even worse than he thought.


    In short, the first prince and the fourth prince were not good people.


    The first prince relied on his session rights as the first born to draw in the conservative ministers, which created a powerful faction.


    However, the first prince was very spoiled and willful since he was the first prince. He was ttered by everyone and didn''t have a grasp of reality, often letting his subordinates control him.


    The fourth prince was the opposite of this.


    He was a very ruthless and cunning person.


    He was able to gather many of the remaining ministers under him through schemes and plots, often forcing these people toe under him.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It was even said that many of the underground forces in the capital were controlled by the fourth prince.


    Only the second prince was different.


    He wasn''t someone who was raised up because of his blood right session or because of plots, he was someone who pulled himself up with his own power.


    He was a genius of cultivation and a genius of studying, so he showed his power very early.


    He was the first prince to break through to the World Realm and was the prince that the king relied on the most when it came to policies.


    It was said among the people that if the second prince were to take the throne, a golden age woulde to the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    It was just too bad that if the second prince ever gained too much power, the first and fourth prince would immediately put aside their differences to suppress the second prince. The second prince didn''t care about that since all he cared about was the prosperity of the Ster Kingdom, so he let them do what they wanted.


    That created a delicate bnce in the session race.


    But now that the fuse had been lit by the Ster King, the other princes were also making moves.


    "From what information we''ve been able to gather so far, the other princes are starting to create alliances so they canpete with the three frontrunners. However, there isn''t a single alliance that can match even a single prince. It all depends on how many of them decide to work together in the end, but it seems very likely that one of the three princes will be able to take the throne."


    As she said this, young miss Dongfang couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    It was clear that she had some opinions about this, but she didn''t say them out loud.


    Lin Fan also had the same opinions since out of the princes that he had met, he felt that the second prince was the best choice.


    The second prince was someone that was clearly the best choice, but because of the circumstances that he faced, it was very hard for him to seed the throne.


    So many people were certainly feeling shaky about the future of the Ster Kingdom.


    But that didn''t matter to Lin Fan.


    The only person that he couldn''t allow to take the throne was the fourth prince because of what had happened at the stone cutting store. He knew that once the fourth prince took the throne, he would certainly be back for Xin''er¡­


    That was not something that Lin Fan could allow.


    But at the same time, there really wasn''t a way for him to do anything. After all, it was unknown what the method of deciding the session was and even if he did know, he didn''t have a close enough rtionship with any of the princes to do anything.


    So after hearing all of this, he could only give a sigh and end the meeting with young miss Dongfang.


    But before he could leave, young miss Dongfang suddenly asked, "Have you had any luck with the search?"


    Lin Fan was confused at first when he heard this, but then he thought of what she meant.


    The handkerchief that she had given him and the person that she asked him to look for.


    It seemed like she was quite anxious to find this person¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing¡­


    But he certainly couldn''t say that the person that she was looking for was Xin''er before knowing why she wanted to find Xin''er.


    So after hesitating a bit, he said, "We still haven''t found anything yet, but I''ve gotten everyone to keep an eye out for this person."


    Young miss Dongfang gave a nod before revealing a vacant look.


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit more before asking, "Can I ask why you''re looking for this person?"


    Young miss Dongfang''s eyes suddenly narrowed when she heard this and she looked at Lin Fan with a sharp look.


    After a long period of silence, she suddenly said, "The owner of this item is part of our Dongfang Family, so we want to find them and bring them back to our family."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling strange when he heard this.


    He knew that the item was a token with the Mu character carved on it which represented the Mu Ster Royal Family, but now young miss Dongfang was saying that Xin''er was from the Dongfang Family¡­


    Could it be that Xin''er''s mother was still alive in the Dongfang Family and was looking for her?


    Lin Fan once again felt a strange feeling as this thought passed through his mind, but he didn''t allow any of this to show on his face.


    Instead, he looked at young miss Dongfang with a strange look.


    After all, he never expected her to actually tell him any of this, so he was very surprised when he heard this from her.


    Young miss Dongfang could understand why he was looking at her like this, but she didn''t say a thing.


    Even though she didn''t know why she had suddenly answered this question, there was something deep down inside of her that told her that she should tell him this. It was as if she was hoping for something from him.


    But she was disappointed as Lin Fan just gave a nod and didn''t give her anything that she wanted.


    So like this, the two of them left the meeting with doubts towards the other side.

 Chapter 871 Contest Of Strength

    Aftering home from the meeting, Lin Fan immediately went to talk to Ang alone.


    She had been waiting for him the entire time because she knew that this would be an important matter about Xin''er, so she had been quite anxious the entire time.


    After they went into a private room, Lin Fan told her everything.


    Her expression didn''t change a bit when she heard everything about the session, but her expression couldn''t help changing when she heard Lin Fan telling her the possibility of Xin''er''s mother still being alive.


    There was a hint of sadness that appeared on her face when she heard this possibility.


    Lin Fan felt a hint of pain in his heart since he understood what she was feeling.


    But he also knew what the right thing to do was even if they didn''t want to do it.


    So for now, they would have to keep an eye on the Dongfang Family and see if they could find any information about them. They needed to first confirm if Xin''er''s mother was still alive or not.


    After holding her in his arms for a bit, she said, "How about we just destroy them all?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile before patting her on the head and saying, "You know we can''t do that."


    Ang pouted her lips in a cute manner and said, "I know, but¡­"


    Lin Fan patted her on the head again as he said, "All we can do is what''s best for Xin''er."


    After a long time, Ang gave a hesitant nod.


    ¡­


    The next morning, the city waspletely bustling.


    There were very few people that came to Lin Fan''s shop, but it wasn''t just Lin Fan''s shop. There were very few people that came to the business street in general even though it was a very popr street.


    That was because everyone was either in their homes or were gathered in front of the royal pce in the center of the city.


    There were even many people that had taken the day off just so they could watch this event. Many ces even treated the day as a holiday and allowed their employees to head off.


    Especially the ces that were owned by the noble families.


    This all went to show just how important this day was.


    After all, it was what would decide the future ruler of this Ster Kingdom, so this was something that would affect everyone.


    They all wanted to see how their future ruler was decided.


    The pce also went all out with the ceremony as a stage was set up right in front of the pce overnight. It really was surprising seeing this magnificent stage that had seemingly appeared in an instant.


    The people who lived near the pce hadn''t even heard anything as the stage had been built.


    It was most likely built using the power of World Realm Experts, which showed how important the pce treated this.


    Before the appearance of the king, each of the princes arrived at the event and walked out in front of everyone.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help remembering the red carpet events that were held before therge award shows back on earth¡­


    As each of the princes made their way in, they did what they thought was best to show off their specialties.


    There were princes that came with beautifulpanions, there were princes that came with powerful guards, and there was even a prince that came riding on the back of a fearsome tiger.


    All of this was to show off as much as possible to increase their chances of winning the session race.


    The first prince came with the daughter of one of the most powerful dukes in the Ster Kingdom. The fourth prince came with a group of his most powerful supporters following him.


    Only the second prince didn''te with anyone at all, he just walked down the red carpet alone without a care for the world.


    However, the aura that he released was more than enough to attract the attention of everyone.


    Even some of the reporters that had been around the first and fourth prince left their side to take pictures of the second prince.


    The first and fourth prince naturally noticed this and took notice of these reporters to take revenge on them in the future. But at the same time, they also looked over at the second prince.


    The second prince was their strongestpetitor even if they weren''t willing to admit it.


    So unless they did something to take care of him, there was no chance that they would be able to win this session race.


    They couldn''t help looking at each other as well, but they only looked at each other for a few seconds before turning their heads away.


    Unless they had no other choice, they preferred not working together.


    After all the princes arrived, the event still didn''t start as the various ministers and important nobles also arrived.


    This event was an event showcasing the very top strata of the Ster Kingdom, so there were many nobles that spent quite a bit of money and effort to get an invite to this event. Some of the lower noble families even spent most of their family fortune to get an invite.<novelnext></novelnext>


    They knew that if they were able toe to this event and build connections and reputation, all of that would be regained by them eventually when they moved up in the world. So they didn''t hesitate to throw all their wealth at this event.


    Just this alone took up most of the morning, but the people watching were excited since it was rare for this many important people to gather together in a public setting.


    Most of the time, nobles disdained interacting with themon people, so they rarely showed themselves in public settings.


    So themoners cheered happily for these nobles as this was their first time seeing most of them.


    But under the surface of this lively ceremony, there was a different mood.


    Even though the princes sat there with smiles on their faces, most of them were feeling worried about the announcement that wasing up.


    This was an event that would decide their lives, so it couldn''t be helped that they would be feeling nervous. Especially those that had very little chance of winning the session race in the first ce.


    The thing that they were more worried about was who would win.


    After all, once the crown prince was decided, whether they were allowed to live or not was also decided.


    Any prince that was left alive could be considered a threat to their future reign, so any prince that had a more vindictive mind would want to get rid of any threats in the future. That meant that any prince that was still left alive would be made to disappear. Or at least the ones that didn''t have much power.


    The ones that did would be put in minor positions and slowly phased out of politics until they lost their power, allowing the crown prince to kill them.


    So a vindictive prince taking the throne was the worst thing for them.


    Their only hope of living was if a benevolent prince took the throne¡­


    But the only one that fit that profile was the second prince and it was unlikely that he would take the throne with the first prince and fourth prince against him¡­


    So they were all worrying about what they should do.


    Should they curry favour with the first and fourth prince now to start creating paths of life or should they double down and do their best to win in the session race even if they only had a slim chance?


    Of course, no one thought about helping the second prince because they knew that this was a path of death.


    The ones that had tried working with the second prince had already been taken care of by the first and fourth prince in the past¡­


    With their examples in ce, no one dared to approach the second prince.


    This ceremony continued in this lively manner until noon when all of the guests had arrived.


    Once the guests were seated, the master of ceremonies came forward and said, "All rise for his majesty!"


    There was a group of trumpeters that yed as he came in and everyone stood up before bowing with respect to the man that came out of the pce gates.


    This was a powerful man in the prime of his life,pletely covered in green royal robes and with a golden crown on his head. The most shocking thing about him were those piercing green eyes that seemed to contain all life in this world.


    This was the Mu Ster King, the ruler of this Mu Ster Kingdom.


    The king continued along without caring about anyone until he came to his throne at the center of the stage.


    He was the only one that sat down, no one else dared to sit at all.


    Only when he waved his hand did they finally sit down and everyone let out a sigh of relief.


    The king looked at the master of ceremonies and gave him a nod before closing his eyes as if nothing about this mattered to him.


    However, even though he acted this way, no one dared to say a thing.


    That just went to show how much power this Mu Ster King held.


    The master of ceremonies had received his permission, so he continued, "Everyone, wee to the decree hearing that his majesty has set up. This decree hearing is about a matter that I''m sure that everyone is very interested in."


    Everyone revealed spirited looks when they heard this.


    Of course, there were also hints of worry that were hidden in all of their eyes. That was except for the second prince who calmly watched everything.


    The master of ceremonies didn''t stall out this event and instead directly said, "We''ll now have the royal decree reader read out the decree for everyone."


    Everyone was surprised, but they also quickly turned their attention to the sharply dressed person who hade out with arge piece of paper in hand.


    They all recognized this person because this was the special envoy of his majesty, the one that always delivered his decrees. They knew that this was real, so they made sure to pay extra close attention to his words.


    The decree reader cleared his throat before saying in a clear voice, "Everyone, take note! His majesty has decreed that the rights to session will be determined by a contest of strength!"


    Everyone revealed shocked looks when they heard this. After a full moment of silence, everyone couldn''t help looking at the second prince with worried looks.


    They all knew that the second prince was the strongest prince of them all when it came to cultivation. So if it really dide to a contest of strength between the princes, it was very likely that he would win¡­

 Chapter 872 Tournament Of Power

    However, the decree reader hadn''t finished reading the decree yet.


    When his words rang out again after the pause, everyone immediately turned their attention back to him.


    "Of course, this does not mean that it will be a contest of personal strength. That is not a proper measure of one''s ability to rule."


    Everyone let out a sigh of relief when they heard this.


    As long as it wasn''t a direct contest of strength, the princes had confidence in taking on the second prince.


    After all, all of them had influence, subordinates, and wealth. As long as they were allowed to use that, they would be able to close the gap between them and the second prince, though not by much since the second prince had his own influence, subordinates, and wealth.


    The decree reader continued, "The contest of strength will be a measure of all that makes a king worthy of ruling. The future crown prince will be tested based on his own strength, his influence, and his ability to use his subordinates."


    All of the princes revealed relieved looks when they heard this.


    "The session right will be determined through a tournament that will be known as the Tournament of Power!"


    Everyone revealed confused looks when they heard this. They had never heard of anything like this before.


    Even when the current Mu Ster King took the throne, he had never done anything like this.


    For his session test, all the princes had to do was find a special flower on a world dominated by the Beast Race. Naturally this wasn''t an easy task, but at least the instructions were clear.


    The decree reader saw this and continued his reading to relieve their doubts, "The Tournament of Power will be a tournament held for all of the princes. You will be ced into a bracket and pitted against each other in different contests of strength, intelligence, and luck. Of course, it will not be the princes themselves that will be taking part in this tournament because the safety of the princes is of the utmost importance. Instead, all of the princes will choose five champions to represent them in this tournament."


    Everyone couldn''t help giving a gasp and then looking at the second prince after hearing the rules.


    That was because they all felt that these rules were specifically made to target the second prince.


    Everyone knew that the second prince only had his own cultivation and intelligence to support him. His weakness was that he didn''t have that much influence and that many powerful subordinates.


    In a tournament like this where one was only allowed to use their subordinates to represent them, this was arge disadvantage to the second prince.


    When the first and fourth prince heard this, they couldn''t help revealing wide smiles.


    It seemed like even their royal father was trying to suppress the second prince. This would surely give them arge advantage when it came to this session race.


    As they thought this, they couldn''t help wondering why their royal father would suddenly do something like this.


    It could only be because of that "incident"¡­Ever since that "incident", the rtionship between their royal father and their second brother had never been the same.


    But no matter what, this was a great advantage for them.


    Even though these rules were clearly targeting him, the second prince still had a calm look on his face as if he wasn''t bothered by this at all. But in his eyes, there were a few sparkles as if he was thinking about something.


    The rest of the decree was filled with unimportant stuff like the dates for the contests and the format of the bracket. The only thing that wasn''t mentioned was what kind of contests would be given to the representatives of the princes.


    Once the decree reader finished reading the decree, he rolled it up and handed it back to the master of ceremonies.


    The master of ceremonies said, "Now that the announcement has been made, we will have a few words from his majesty for the princes."


    Everyone was once again shocked to hear this.


    They had thought that with the attitude that he had disyed, his majesty would be silent this entire time, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    No matter what his majesty said, it would certainly be important for the princes because it would show how he felt about this. It would even show which prince he favoured since he would most likely direct his words to the prince that he cared about the most.


    So all of the princes anxiously waited for the Mu Ster King to speak.


    The Mu Ster King opened his eyes for the first time since the ceremony started and stood up, which caused everyone else to stand up as well. After all, not a single person dared to sit while the Mu Ster King was standing.


    The Mu Ster King''s piercing green eyes swept over the crowd before finallynding on the second prince to everyone''s surprise.


    Staring right at the second prince, the Mu Ster King said, "I wish all my children luck in this tournament, but of course, I give my greatest wishes to my most promising son."


    Then without saying anything else, he turned and headed back into the castle without looking back even once.


    All that he left behind him was a stunned crowd.<novelnext></novelnext>


    No one could understand what his words meant just now. It wasn''t that they couldn''t understand his words, but rather they couldn''t understand why his words had been directed at the second prince.


    Based on the rules of the tournament, the second prince should be the least favoured prince¡­So why were these words of encouragement directed at the second prince?


    Could it be that there was something that they didn''t know about?


    As these thoughts passed through the minds of the princes, they all couldn''t help feeling anxious.


    If these thoughts were true and there was something that they didn''t know about, then it wasn''t the first or fourth prince that was their greatest rival, but rather the second prince¡­


    Even the first and fourth prince thought the same and they couldn''t help exchanging a look.


    If there really was something going on in the background, perhaps they might really need to work together to take down the second prince¡­


    Only the second prince knew the truth of this matter.


    It was a feint.


    The Mu Ster King was doing all he could to target the second prince and with just a few simple words, he had thrown arge target on the back of the second prince. This would make his chances even lower as his opponents would coordinate even more with each other to ensure that he didn''t win.


    "It seems like that old fool really is going all out to deal with me¡­" The second prince thought to himself. However, his smile became wider as he also thought, "It seems like he still doesn''t know about my ns yet."


    Underneath the surface, there were many plots that were currently forming that no one knew about just yet.


    ¡­


    Back in the store, Lin Fan''s group was also watching this being broadcast on the TV.


    This was arge event that would affect all of their lives, so all the staff members were interested in this. Not to mention that there wasn''t any business and all of the customers were also watching the same event with them.


    After Lin Fan saw what the Mu Ster King said to the second prince, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because he could see through the Mu Ster King''s intentions unlike the rest of the people watching.


    He could tell with a single nce that the Mu Ster King''s words were to put a target on the back of the second prince.


    That was because the Mu Ster King was simr to a person in his past life¡­


    His own father.


    His father was someone who only cared about his business and didn''t care about his son, so he did anything and everything he could to let his business grow. That even included selling out his own son, which he had done on several asions.


    Lin Fan could see that there was a strained rtionship between the Mu Ster King and the second prince, but he didn''t know what the origin of this strained rtionship was.


    After the ceremony was over, everyone headed off to do their own thing, but naturally no one was interested in getting their pets trained when such an important event was happening.


    So it was quite quiet in Lin Fan''s store¡­


    That was until an unexpected customer arrived.


    That person had covered himself up and used hisws to prevent others from recognizing him. That was until he came up to the counter and asked, "Are you still epting pets to be trained today?"


    Lin Fan had been looking at something on his watch when he heard this and he was about to casually respond until he suddenly realized something. This was a voice that he recognized.


    He looked up slowly to find that it was indeed a person that he recognized.


    It was a person that he had just seen on TV today and someone that should have been very busy, but for some reason, this person hade to his store to get a pet trained.


    It was the second prince!


    Lin Fan slightly narrowed his eyes to look at the second prince before saying with a smile and a joking tone, "You''re lucky today, there''s still a few slots left."


    The second prince also revealed a smile and said, "It really is my lucky day then."


    But even though they had smiles, the smiles didn''t really reach their eyes.

 Chapter 873 Strange Look

    After confirming that there were still spots open, the second prince called out his pet for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just had Xiao Tue over to take the pet away, but this time he made sure that the pet cooperated so Xiao Tu didn''t suspect anything.


    After all, the second prince hade in disguise, so it wasn''t his ce to reveal his disguise.


    Once the pet was taken away, the air around them fell into an awkward silence.


    Lin Fan could clearly tell that the second prince had something else to say and the second prince did have something to say, but he didn''t know how to say it.


    So they just remained there in silence for a minute before Xin''er suddenly came over.


    She had seen the awkwardness between the two of them, so she decided toe over and rescue Lin Fan.


    Aftering over, Xin''er smiled at the two of them and said, "Uncle, what''s wrong?"


    Hearing Xin''er call him uncle, the second prince was surprised.


    Lin Fan felt that something bad was going to happen, so he stood up and was about to pull Xin''er behind him. But before he could, the second prince came back from his daze and said with a smile, "Little sweetie, what''s your name?"


    Lin Fan was immediately shocked to see this.


    He never thought that the second prince would act this way with the personality that he had before¡­


    Even if the second prince didn''t get angry at being called uncle by a little girl, he would only give a stoic answer and not something as gentle and sweet as this.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering if this was even really the second prince¡­


    Xin''er was also surprised at being picked up, but she then happily said with a sweet smile, "Xin''er!"


    The second prince had a strange emotion flicker in his eyes when he heard this, but that quickly disappeared. His smile then became even wider as he said, "Xin''er, it''s nothing. Uncle just has something to ask your big brother here and was worried about how to ask him."


    To his surprise though, Xin''er corrected him by saying, "This isn''t my big brother, this is my dad."


    This time, there was a visible sh of unknown emotion in the second prince''s eyes that Lin Fan had caught. He didn''t know what it was, but he could tell for sure that it was directed at Xin''er.


    Almost as if he could recognize her¡­


    The second prince quickly recovered and said, "I''m sorry, he''s your dad, right? Then I have something to discuss with your dad. Thanks for your help, but I can take it from here now." After saying this, he put her down on the ground and then patted her head


    Xin''er tilted her head as if she was thinking before saying, "Alright, uncle!"


    Then without giving the second prince a chance to say anything, she ran back to where Ang had been waiting.


    The second prince watched her run off and just stared in her direction for a bit before turning back to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had been silent the whole time observing the second prince.


    The way that the second prince looked at Xin''er, it was almost as if he knew who she was¡­


    If that were the case, then this would be very bad for Lin Fan¡­


    But to his surprise, the second prince didn''t mention Xin''er again as he changed the topic.


    Coming right out of the gate, he asked Lin Fan, "Owner, I want to name you as one of my representatives for the tournament."


    Lin Fan thought that there was something wrong with his ears for a second as he couldn''t understand what the second prince was saying. But then he reacted and he still wasn''t able to process what the second prince was saying.


    This was a tournament that would decide who would be the crown prince, the future ruler of this Ster Kingdom.


    For an event that was this important, the second prince wanted someone like him to represent him.


    There were many problems with this.


    First, he had only ever had two interactions with the second prince. Once when he came to drop his pet off for training and the second time when he received his pet from the store.


    Both of those interactions had been very short and they didn''t talk much, so it wasn''t as if Lin Fan was close to the second prince.


    Second, the second prince didn''t know anything about him, so why did he want him as his representative?


    That seemed a bit too suspicious.


    And third, there was the fact that Lin Fan didn''t want anything to do with the Mu Ster Royal Family. It was not just for his sake, but also Xin''er''s sake. Not to mention what had happened just now between the second prince and Xin''er¡­


    So without hesitation, Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I''m sorry your highness, I have to refuse this offer."<novelnext></novelnext>


    The second prince gave a nod before saying, "Is that so?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help raising his guard as he tried to figure out what the second prince was nning to do.


    Even though the second prince acted casually, he was still a true World Realm Expert and if he were to release his power here, it would be hard for Lin Fan to resist.


    He wasn''t certain if the defenses of the store would be able to block an attack from a World Realm Expert¡­


    But to Lin Fan''s surprise, the second prince then said, "Then we''ll leave that matter there."


    There was no fuss or muss, the second prince ended that topic with just a single sentence as if he didn''t care about the oue at all.


    But if that was the case, why did he ask Lin Fan to be his representative in the first ce?


    Did the second prince know something about him?


    Or did the second prince know something about Xin''er¡­?


    He couldn''t rule out any possibility, so right now, he just wanted the second prince to leave as soon as possible.


    As if he could read his mind, the second prince actually left right after that. But before he left, he took onest look at Xin''er.


    Once the second prince was gone, Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows and stood there in deep thought for a few minutes.


    He called out to Xiao Tu to have him man the register with Xin''er while he went into the back with Ang. As he left, he didn''t forget to tell Yuki to keep a close look on Xin''er.


    In the back, Lin Fan had another talk with Ang about Xin''er, especially about the things he had noticed with the second prince.


    It seemed like they did need to n things out or trouble mighte to their doorstep.


    ¡­


    Deep in the second prince''s manor, in a hidden room that no one else knew about.


    The second prince slowly opened the door to reveal a brightly lit and finely decorated room.


    The design in this room wasn''t normal either. It was a room that was filled with cherry blossoms¡­


    This room only had a single person living inside and when she saw the second prince, she immediately ran into his arms and buried her head in his chest.


    The second prince also revealed a happy smile as he held her tightly in his arms and softly said, "Hua''er."


    After a long time just holding each other, the woman came out of the second prince''s arm and asked, "Ah Yong, why are you here? Did you finally find something?"


    The second prince said with a nod, "I finally found traces of Bao Bao, but¡­"


    The woman revealed a worried look when she heard this. She couldn''t help asking in a worried voice, "What is it? Did something happen to Bao Bao?"


    The second prince gave a sigh before saying, "No, nothing happened to Bao Bao, she''s very healthy right now."


    The woman''s expression was a bit relieved, but she still asked, "What happened then?"


    The second prince wanted to say something, but there were words that were stuck in his throat. What he had to say was just too cruel for his beloved and he couldn''t bear to say it to her.


    So in the end, he just gave another sigh and said, "Bao Bao is fine for now, there''s no need to worry."


    The woman''s expression was filled with even more worry when she heard this, but for the second prince''s sake, she suppressed this worry and leaned her head in his embrace tofort him.


    The second prince looked at her and couldn''t help revealing a faint smile as he stroked her hair. But then his brows knitted once again as he said, "Royal father has decided to hold a tournament to decide the session rights."


    The woman also knitted her brows when she heard this. After a moment of silence, she couldn''t help asking, "Then did he suppress you like you suspected?"


    The second prince gave a nod before saying with a smile, "But that just goes to show that he knows nothing of my true ns."


    The woman didn''t smile when she heard this, rather she revealed a worried look as she said, "Will it be alright though? Can you trust those people?"


    The second prince nodded and said, "Those people are my closest allies. There''s no one that I trust more than them."


    The woman was still worried, but she said with a nod, "Be careful. I can''t bear to lose you."


    The second prince patted the woman on the head and said, "Hua''er, I will never leave you."


    The woman just gave an "un" sound as she ced her head in his embrace.

 Chapter 874 Strange Mission

    After Lin Fan and Ang finished discussing their ns, Ang headed through the Any ce Door and disappeared from the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    As for where she was heading, only she and Lin Fan knew.


    Xin''er was naturally upset that Ang was gone for a few days, but Lin Fan promised that Ang would bring her back a souvenir from her trip, so she settled down a bit.


    She understood that Ang was on important business, so she knew that she shouldn''t pout. But this was her first time having a mother, so it was hard for her to not feel this way.


    Luckily there was still Yuki and the five sisters to help Xin''er tide this time over.


    Lin Fan on the other hand had something else that he had to deal with.


    He hadn''t noticed it earlier, but when the second prince hade, he had received a strange mission from the system.


    It wasn''t like any other mission that he had received before because there was nothing for him to do for this mission. The mission just gave him a simple prompt.


    "Watch the session race of the Mu Ster Kingdom."


    There weren''t any instructions on what to do for the session race, all it told him was to watch over it.


    What did that mean?


    Even the reward was a mystery.


    This really made him at a loss for what to do when it came to this mission.


    But after a while, he realized that thinking too much was no use. What woulde woulde and the system had a reason for giving him this mission.


    So all he had to do was wait and react when the time came.


    Over the next few days, the city was bustling with activity as the various families started making their moves.


    All of the various pill and artifact stores were emptied out as various families started stocking up on supplies.


    While it seemed like the session race would be peaceful because of the tournament, that was only on the surface. Everyone knew that people would be plotting under the surface to increase their chances.


    There was no telling who would be targeted by who, so everyone was preparing for the worst.


    In the end, it might even result in an insurrection by one of the leading princes if they didn''t win the session race.


    So it was better for them to prepare for a worst case scenario.


    It was even surprisingly busy in Lin Fan''s store.


    It wasn''t because he was getting plenty of new customers, but rather because an old customer was bringing people to his store.


    The day after the tournament was announced, Yang Xi Ruo brought many different people to Lin Fan''s store. These were all people that Lin Fan was unfamiliar with, but based on the way that they acted around Yang Xi Ruo, they should be the subordinates of the Yang Family.


    There was also Jun Xie who came with Yang Xi Ruo which Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by. What surprised him was how they were holding hands and walking quite close together.


    Thest time he saw them was when the incident involving the princes happened in his store. When they had left the store, it was clear that there had been a rift that had been created between them by the prince.


    How was it that just in a few days, they were this close?


    As he thought this, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling worried about Jun Xie because he knew what he had seen in Yang Xi Ruo''s eyes.


    It was good if they were in a rtionship where they mutually loved each other, but if they were in a rtionship where Jun Xie was forced to be with her¡­It wouldn''t end well for them.


    Lin Fan liked Jun Xie, not just because he was his first customer, but because he was a bright young man. If possible, he didn''t want to see Jun Xie end up like this.


    So while Xiao Tu was taking care of the pets for the Yang Family subordinates, Lin Fan pulled Jun Xie aside to have a little talk with him.


    Jun Xie was still happy to do so because Lin Fan was a sort of idol for him, but when Lin Fan started asking him questions about his rtionship with Yang Xi Ruo, his expression fell and he said, "I''m with Xi Ruo because I want to be with her."


    The firm way that he said it and the look in his eyes surprised Lin Fan, but at least he was able to tell that they were indeed together because they liked each other.


    He revealed a bitter smile and patted Jun Xie on the shoulder as he said, "Good luck."


    Jun Xie was confused when he heard this, but he still gave a happy nod and said, "Thank you."


    Based on Lin Fan''s experience, he knew that kind of person Yang Xi Ruo was because he was with someone simr to her. Jun Xie''s life in the future wouldn''t be easy, but at least he was happy, so that was fine.<novelnext></novelnext>


    But he really couldn''t help feeling sorry when he thought of Jun Xie''s future.


    Or could it be that he was actually feeling sad about his own future with¡­?


    He would never admit that even if he was beaten to death! Which most likely would happen if Ang were to find out that he was having these thoughts.


    When they came back, Yang Xi Ruo narrowed her eyes to look at Lin Fan. There was a clear hostility in her eyes as she looked at him, but then when she turned to look at Jun Xie, she said with a sweet smile, "What did you talk about with the owner?"


    Jun Xie patted her head and said with a smile, "It''s nothing, just some guy talk."


    As he patted her head, Yang Xi Ruo revealed a warm smile and wanted to nuzzle up against him.


    Lin Fan was once again surprised when he saw this and he couldn''t help looking at Jun Xie with a strange look.


    Could it be that Jun Xie was a secret chad and he had actually been able to tame Yang Xi Ruo?


    If that was the case, then he would have even surpassed what Lin Fan had done and tamed this wild mare¡­


    Lin Fan even thought about getting some tips about how to tame women from Jun Xie, but when he thought about the rtionship between him and Ang, he knew that it was unlikely that he would be able to tame her like this. After all, there was arge disparity between them and before he was able to close that disparity, it would be impossible for him to tame her.


    He should just be happy that he had her and not think about anything else.


    Once again, he couldn''t help heaving a sigh of relief since Ang wasn''t here.


    If she was in the store, she most certainly would have picked up on his thoughts. She was just strangely sharp about these kinds of things.


    But before he could let his guard downpletely, Xin''er suddenly came over and wrote something down.


    Normally Lin Fan wouldn''t care about these kinds of things, but he felt that there was something off about this, so he couldn''t help asking, "Xin''er, what are you writing?"


    Xin''er thought for a bit before showing him.


    To Lin Fan''s surprise, it was actually observations about him that he couldn''t make sense of. So once again, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Xin''er, what is this?"


    Xin''er said with a proud look, "Mom told me to record things for her about dad. She told me about all the things that I should look out for and I haven''t missed a single one."


    Lin Fan''s face couldn''t help turning ck when he heard this.


    He looked carefully at the book again and he found that there were many things that Ang didn''t like seeing in there. It seemed like he had let his guard down too easily since he thought that she was gone¡­


    She had actually trained Xin''er to watch over him for her!


    This¡­was¡­just¡­too¡­much!


    But of course, Lin Fan couldn''t do anything to Xin''er¡­So the only thing that he could do was try to bribe her to erase all of these things. But to his surprise, he found that his bribe didn''t work at all.


    Xin''er firmly shook her head and said, "I want to show mom what a good job I did!"


    Lin Fan could only reveal a bitter smile when he heard this, but there was nothing that he could do. It seemed like he couldn''t break the mother and daughter bond that these two had¡­


    But he was also a bit happy seeing this.


    He was worried that Xin''er would still have some misgivings in her heart about taking them as her new family, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    It seemed like she had sincerely treated them as their family.


    Thinking this, he couldn''t help thinking about things that he could do to make Xin''er even happier. After thinking for a bit, he asked, "Xin''er, do you want to go out for a meal with dad tonight?"


    Xin''er looked over at Yuki and the five sisters before turning back to ask, "Can aunt Yuki and the otherse with us?"


    Lin Fan looked at Xiao Tu when he heard this since he knew that this also included Xiao Tu who he didn''t want to let anywhere near Xin''er, but he also knew that Xin''er would be unhappy if he did this, so he nodded and said, "Of course."


    Xin''er happily ran off to Yuki to tell her this while Lin Fan watched her go with a smile.


    But there were also some worries deep inside.


    There were things that he needed to do to keep this happiness, so he shouldn''t have any hesitations¡­But he couldn''t help hesitating.

 Chapter 875 First Round Of The Tournament (1)

    The days passed by and soon it was time for the tournament.


    Lin Fan didn''t n on going, not to mention that he didn''t have a way to get in the venue even if he wanted to go.


    This was one of the most anticipated events in the entire Mu Ster Kingdom, so naturally the tickets had sold out the moment that they went on sale. They were also sold to the important nobles rather than themoners since they were able to use their influence to get these tickets.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he had nned on watching the event on TV in the first ce.


    As the days passed, Lin Fan was surprised to find that the progress bar for his mission was slowly filling up.


    There was nothing for him to observe when it came to the session race, but ording to the system, he was observing things.


    Could it be that just by being in the Mu Ster Kingdom and seeing what was happening in the session race was considered part of observing it?


    But that seemed strange no matter how he thought about it.


    What was special about this session race that he needed to observe?


    Still, he didn''t believe that the system would give him a mission for no reason.


    The only thing that he could think of was that it was rted to Xin''er in some way¡­


    The night before the first round of the tournament, there was a visitor that surprised Lin Fan.


    It was the second prince.


    The second prince appeared after the store was closed,pletely covered up in a ck cloak and knocked on the door.


    At first Lin Fan didn''t notice the second prince, but the system told him about someone suspicious that was outside the store. Just a single look at the cloak was enough for Lin Fan to recognize it as the second prince since it was the same cloak he always used.


    The second prince didn''te into the store when invited by Lin fan, instead he just said, "Take these."


    After saying this, he gave two tickets to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at the tickets in his hand and was surprised to find that they were tickets for tomorrow''s first round matches.


    When he looked up again, he found that the second prince was gone.


    Why had the second prince gone out of his way toe and give tickets to Lin Fan?


    Also, why were one of the tickets already registered to Xin''er''s name?


    These tickets weren''t just normal tickets, but rather VIP tickets. These VIP tickets were only for the most elite nobles, so they were registered by name instead of just allowing whoever held the ticket to enter the venue.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows as he wondered why the second prince wanted Xin''er toe¡­


    No matter how he looked at it, it seemed like the second prince was plotting to do something to Xin''er at the venue. Otherwise, why would he go out of his way to get this ticket?


    Could it be that he was nning on revealing Xin''er''s identity and having her take part in the session race?


    Did he n on pushing Xin''er under the bus to increase his own status?


    Or did he have some other ns?


    No, Lin Fan shook his head when he thought these thoughts because he could tell that the second prince wouldn''t do something as shameless and lowly as this. With his personality, it was basically impossible.


    So why did the second prince want to invite Xin''er?


    Lin Fan just stood there for half an hour thinking about all the possibilities.


    But in the end, he decided that it was better to take Xin''er to the tournament.


    To run away was impossible because Lin Fan didn''t have a way to safely leave this Mu Ster Kingdom with Xin''er. If he were to run, he would be in more danger than just staying here and facing what came.


    At the very least, if he went to the tournament, there was a chance that nothing would happen even if it was very small.


    Not to mention that he would be able to see everything that happened and react ordingly, allowing him to make the best judgement.


    With this settled, Lin Fan moved into the back of the store to contact a few people.


    In the worst case scenario, he needed a trump card¡­


    ¡­


    The tournament arena was naturally very lively as countless people came to watch.


    Those that didn''t have a ticket gathered in the square in front of the arena.


    In this square, there had been monitors set up for people to watch the tournament. So there were many people that set up stalls here to entertain and feed the people that came.


    Of course, these stalls had all been carefully chosen and only the best of the best had been allowed in.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Since this was an important event for the Mu Ster Kingdom, the government had even paid for everything and all the stalls were offering free merchandise for the people gathered.


    The only problem was that this created lines that went around the block and back again, so it took a long time for people to get anything that they wanted.


    The only people that were allowed to cut these lines were the nobles that had VIP tickets, but most of them just sent their servants to get what they wanted. The only ones that would actuallye to these stalls themselves were Lin Fan and Xin''er who had received VIP tickets from the second prince.


    When the people lining up saw the two of them, they couldn''t help being shocked and awed.


    Lin Fan was a very handsome man because of his cultivation and Xin''er was a cute little porcin doll.


    They all started wondering what kind of background the two of them had.


    "They must be from a ducal family at least!"


    "No, they should be a prince from another Ster Kingdom!"


    "Ah, that little girl is so cute!"


    Xin''er had never been treated like this, so naturally she felt very shy. However, holding Lin Fan''s hand, she was able to keep her calm and walked around with Lin Fan with a happy smile.


    After they had their fill at the stands, Lin Fan entered the arena and was respectfully shown the way to the VIP seats by the staff.


    There, he saw many people that he didn''t recognize, but there was someone that he did recognize.


    It was Yang Xi Ruo and Jun Xie along with a few older men that he didn''t know. However, looking at the way that they were sitting, it was clear that these were their parents.


    He didn''t disturb them and instead he followed the staff to his seats without them noticing.


    When he arrived, he was surprised to find that the second prince was waiting for him.


    This ce wasn''t just a VIP seat, but rather the second prince''s private viewing box.


    The second prince nodded at Lin Fan after seeing him arrive and gestured for him to sit. Then he looked at Xin''er and once again revealed a strange look in his eyes.


    Lin Fan raised his guard, but to his surprise, he found that there wasn''t any hostility towards him from the second prince at all.


    Xin''er was surprised to see the second prince again, but for some reason, she felt a close feeling towards him. She had felt this the first time that she had met him, but now when she saw him again, this feeling was even stronger.


    It was almost as if she should know who he was.


    The second prince said to Xin''er with a smile, "You can y around in this box. There''s plenty of sweets and toys prepared for you in the back. If you need anything, you can tell the big sisters in the back and they''ll prepare them for you."


    Xin''er for some reason didn''t feel any doubt when she heard this and she ran off after a happy nod.


    Lin Fan still stood there with a wary look, but he knew that if the second prince really wanted to do anything, it would be hard for him to resist.


    After all, the second prince was a real World Realm Expert.


    He had felt the power of World Realm Experts before and he knew that at his level, it was impossible for him to face them. If it hadn''t been the suppression of the Gctic Humanity Alliance''s world will back then, he might have been smashed with just a single p.


    The second prince once again gestured for Lin Fan to sit with a friendly smile on his face.


    Lin Fan hesitated a bit, but he sat down in front of the second prince still.


    After sitting down, the second prince was the one who released aw barrier this time to surround them. This barrier was simr to the one that Lin Fan had used before where it had hidden him and the second prince, along with blocking the sound of their voices, but this one was much stronger since it was formed withws in the World Realm.


    Once this barrier was formed, the second prince looked at Lin Fan with a serious look and said, "I mean you and Xin''er no harm. I just want you to be here to witness something and then afterwards, you will both be free to go. Can you ept that?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by the sincerity in the second prince''s voice.


    He couldn''t understand what was so serious that the second prince would act this way, but for the second prince to act like this, it was surely something very serious¡­


    So after a long period of silence, Lin Fan gave a nod.


    The second prince''s eyes revealed a slightly relieved look before he said in a soft voice, "Thank you for taking care of Xin''er."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the second prince with a strange look when he heard this.


    The way that the second prince said it, it was almost as if he was more than just a normal family member to Xin''er. It was almost as if¡­


    But there was a sudden sound that interrupted Lin Fan''s thoughts as the master of ceremonies came onto the stage and announced the start of the tournament. After this announcement, there were cheers from the crowd as they were all filled with excitement.


    When this happened, the second prince released thew barrier with a wave of his hand before standing up and saying, "If you''ll excuse me, there''s something that I have to take care of first."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before the second prince left.


    Once the second prince was gone, Lin Fan was just left there with his confused thoughts.


    But in the corner of his eyes, he could see the progress bar for the mission increasing.

 Chapter 876 First Round Of The Tournament (2)

    The reason the second prince left the viewing box was naturally because of the tournament ceremony.


    Since this was a session ceremony, the people that couldn''t be missing were naturally the princes.


    So all of the princes had been called onto the stage in the center of the arena to give a few words to the people.


    There were princes that gave long speeches, there were princes that gave arrogant talks, and there were princes that did all they could do to show off their power. But there was only a single prince who actually only gave a few words to the people.


    It was the man of few words, the second prince.


    "The ending has already been set."


    Those were the only words that the second prince said.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at the second prince with strange looks as they heard this. It was almost as if there was something that he knew that the others didn''t know and they didn''t like this feeling.


    But they weren''t able to find anything about this even after checking with their subordinates.


    At the same time, in a special private box, the Mu Ster King deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He had thought that the second prince would be acting tough since the odds were arranged against him, but he didn''t feel any tension in the second prince''s voice. It was as if he truly was confident about his chances¡­


    Could it be that there was still something up his sleeve?


    The Mu Ster King couldn''t help gritting his teeth when this thought had passed through his mind.


    This second child of his had once been his pride and joy, but after what happened with Hua''er, he couldn''t allow him to live. So he had done everything he could to indirectly kill this second child of his.


    He had sent him on dangerous missions that had no chances of survival, he had given him gifts that had hidden dangers to them, and he had even secretly strengthened the forces of his other children so they would take care of him for him.


    But no matter what he did, this second child of his had dealt with everything in that same calm manner and had survived.


    Not to mention that he had even taken Hua''er away from him!


    He didn''t know where this second child of his was hiding his Hua''er, but he would do whatever he could to take her back!


    As he thought of Hua''er, he couldn''t help thinking of the child that she had. Now that she had grown up, she would certainly be a ripe flower for him to pick¡­


    The fourth prince''s strange tastes hadn''t developed from nowhere, they had been passed down to him. It wasn''t just the fourth prince that had strange tastes, but also the Mu Ster King¡­


    After the princes finished with what they had to say, they were led off the stage and the master of ceremonies took over once again.


    But since this was arge event, naturally the main show wouldn''t start right away.


    There had been special demonstrations that had been prepared to hype up the event before it started.


    As the princes left the stage, there were some that gathered in groups. It was clear that these princes had decided to work with each other to improve their chances in this session race.


    However, the princes that everyone paid attention to the most were the first prince, the second prince, and the fourth prince.


    The three of them were actually standing by each other, as if they were about to confront each other.


    For the other princes, this was valuable information, so many of them remained silent and waited to see what these three princes would do.


    The first prince was the one that broke the silence first by saying, "Second brother, I took a look at your team earlier. It seems like you really had a hard time finding people since I didn''t recognize a single person that you chose for your team. Are you sure that you''ll be alright?"


    The tone that he used made it seem like he was worried about the second prince as an older brother, but it was clear to everyone that heard it that he was just taunting the second prince with these words.


    The fourth prince nodded and added fuel to the fire, "Second brother, if you really don''t have any capable subordinates, you could have asked me and I would have found some for you."


    The second prince ignored the taunting meaning behind these words and just calmly said, "Brothers, thank you for your concern, but I''ll be fine."


    Then without giving them a chance to say anything else, the second prince walked off.


    He had only stayed because he had noticed that the first prince and the fourth prince had wanted to say to him. He hadn''t expected much from them and he hadn''t been disappointed by what they had said.


    He had already expected them to be this close minded, so he didn''t care what would happen next since he already had his own ns.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Seeing that the second princepletely ignored them, the first and fourth prince couldn''t do anything.


    Right now they were in public view as session candidates, so they would never do anything that would harm their chances.


    So since the second prince was gone, their targets turned to each other.


    After all, after the second prince, their biggestpetition was each other.


    The second prince ignored all of this and headed back to his viewing box, but he was surprised to find that Lin Fan and Xin''er weren''t there. There was a trace of panic that filled his heart as he immediately turned to the maid that was standing on the side.


    But before he could say a thing, the door opened behind him and Lin Fan came in holding Xin''er''s hand.


    When he saw this, there was a tinge of a relieved feeling that filled his heart, but he had a calm look on his face as he turned to sit down.


    Lin Fan and Xin''er were naturally surprised to see the second prince here as well.


    Earlier Xin''er had felt a bit bored, so Lin Fan had taken her to walk around the arena since it was a very well built ce. They never thought that the second prince would be back so soon.


    As if she could sense something, Xin''er came forward and said with a smile, "Uncle, you''re back?"


    The second prince just gave a nod without saying anything.


    After this, the maids came forward to bring Xin''er over to the toys and sweets set up for her while Lin Fan sat down.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help thinking of a father who didn''t know how to interact with his daughter¡­But that wouldn''t be right since the second prince would be Xin''er''s brother if he had to ssify their rtionship.


    In short, it felt strange, as if he was missing a piece of the puzzle.


    ¡­


    In the center of the arena, on the stage, thest performance was finished and the performers were leaving.


    The host came up again to finally announce that the first match between princes was about to begin.


    This was a match between two princes that weren''t favoured to win, so people weren''t as excited, but this was still a match between princes and the real beginning of the tournament. So they couldn''t help getting excited in the end and started cheering regardless.


    Hearing this, the two princes who had their turn at the stage felt their egos swell even if they weren''t the main characters here.


    The group that the two princes chose were all filled with True Soul Realm Experts.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a sigh when he saw this.


    As expected of a Ster Kingdom, just the subordinates of a prince were all True Soul Realm Experts. If either of these groups were ced on the Gctic Humanity Alliance, they would surely have the strongest organization with just the five of them.


    This was the difference between a Ster Kingdom and an upper realm.


    Thepetition that these two groups were put to was a test of wisdom and cooperation.


    They would be ced inside abyrinth at different sides and they would have to solve puzzles to reach the center of thebyrinth. The first team that reached the middle would be dered the winner.


    This was a contest that wasn''t determined by cultivation, so it became very clear who the winner would be soon enough. After all, one prince had chosen a group filled with people that relied on brawns and the other prince had chosen a group filled with people that relied on brains.


    Before the team that relied on brawns could even solve the first puzzle, the team that relied on brains had already reached the center of thebyrinth.


    Just like this, one prince had been knocked out of the session race.


    That prince didn''t immediately leave, but rather stayed to watch the rest of the tournament since the result would be something that decided his fate.


    As for the prince that won, he didn''t have a rxed look on his face. He knew that this was just the beginning and the princes that he would have to face would only have much stronger teams.


    He had only gotten lucky with the round selection and without knowing what kind of rounds would being up next, it was impossible to guarantee that he would be able to win against his opponents.


    But with the first round done, many princes had a good idea of what would being and began discussing strategies with their teams.

 Chapter 877 Sudden Disturbance

    The first few rounds in the tournament were all between lower tier princes that didn''t have a chance to win the session race.


    So while the crowd was excited, it wasn''t a frenzy.


    The rounds continued with princes being eliminated one after the other.


    But none of them were major contenders.


    There were over a hundred princes in the Mu Ster Kingdom, so there were plenty of minor princes to hype up the crowd first.


    The first major contender that was brought to the stage was the first prince.


    As the eldest prince, he had priority when it came to his match, so he was the first one toe to stage.


    As soon as the first prince came onto the stage, the crowd erupted with cheers for him.


    This was the first prince, the eldest prince, the one that everyone felt was his birthright to take over the throne. If he hadn''t been too spoiled, perhaps he might have really been able to take over the position of crown prince without this tournament.


    But the cheers stoked his ego and he immediately revealed a wide smile as he came forward with his team.


    The members of his team were all experts sent by therge ministers, so every member of his team was in the World Realm. There was even one that released a stronger aura than the rest, which made it clear that he wasn''t just in the Star Realm¡­


    It was very likely that this person was in the peak of the Star Realm or might have even reached the Realm¡­


    As for the team of the fifty eighth prince, there wasn''t a single World Realm Expert¡­


    His only hope was that this would be a contest that didn''t rely on strength so he would stand a chance.


    But that hope was immediately crushed by the host who announced¡­


    "This contest will be a contest of strength. Each member of the team will face another member from the other team and we will continue until there are no members left on one team. Each contestant that goes up can remain on the stage after winning."


    The face of the fifty eighth prince fell when he heard this.


    In a contest of direct strength, he stood no chance¡­


    He even wanted to forfeit, but his team stopped him from doing so.


    They said that it was because of his reputation, but really they wanted to take advantage of this experience.


    It wasn''t often that they would have a chance to spar with a World Realm Expert.


    This tournament promoted harmony, so it had a rule in ce about killing. If any contestant killed in any of the contests, they would be immediately eliminated from the tournament and would be prosecuted under thews of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    In this situation, a chance to spar with a World Realm Expert was like a god given gift since it would provide them with insight to break through.


    The ones that supported the fifty eighth prince were all young talents from noble families, so of course they weren''t willing to let themselves be stuck at the Soul Realm.


    ? But the fifty eighth prince didn''t know any of this and was moved by their loyalty.


    He didn''t know that they already nned on abandoning him once he lost the session race.


    There was no dy at all as the result that everyone expected appeared.


    It took just a single one of the World Realm Experts to take care of all five of the members of the fifty eighth prince''s team. Every single time, it only took a single move from the World Realm Expert.


    However, when that World Realm Expert returned to the first prince''s team, he was teased for taking too long.


    It was very clear that even with how powerful this World Realm Expert was, he was the weakest member of the first prince''s team.


    The fifty eighth prince could only give a sigh, but he didn''t find this strange since he had already expected this result. So after taking a deep breath, he went over to where the first prince was.


    After all, he had to find a new backer once the tournament was over or he would disappear from this Ster Kingdom.


    With how strong the first prince''s team was, he was a very good choice for that new back. Not to mention that he already had a good rtionship with the first prince in the first ce because of all the bribes that he had given him.


    The first prince just epted him with a wide and magnanimous smile because something like this would allow him to show off while stroking his own ego.


    After all, if he epted even the losers, his reputation among themoners and the nobles would rise even higher.


    As expected, people started praising the first prince on the inte and in the broadcasts for being an open minded and magnanimous person.


    The next match after this was the fourth prince''s match.<novelnext></novelnext>


    However, unlike the first prince''s match, this match ended in a different manner.


    The eighty ninth prince that was supposed topete with the fourth prince forfeited his right to participate.


    That was because they were on the same side in the first ce, so there was no need for the fourth prince and the eighty ninth prince to fight.


    Instead, this was a better way for the fourth prince to show off his power.


    He was so powerful that his enemies forfeited just at his name, there was no better show of his prestige and might than this.


    Of course, the downside was that this would make him look like a tyrant, but that was what the fourth prince was already known as. So there was no downside for him doing this since it would establish his image even more.


    This would make his opponents think twice about facing him and would bring some of the princes to his side.


    The match after this was the second prince''s match.


    The second prince''s opponent was the tenth prince, a prince that actually had quite a bit of power since he was a higher rank prince than the ones that the first prince and fourth prince faced.


    This also showed how this tournament was rigged against the second prince since he had to face one of the stronger opponents in the first round.


    The second prince''s team wasposed of a group of people that werepletely covered in ck cloaks. They even hid their aura, not releasing a single bit of it so people couldn''t sense their cultivation at all.


    But many people were feeling doubtful about the second prince''s chances in the first ce.


    After all, the second prince was known for his own power and not the power of his subordinates. He didn''t have any famous subordinates under him, so no one believed that these subordinates would be able to do much.


    As for the tenth prince, two of his subordinates were in the World Realm. This wasn''t a weak team by any means since most of the princes didn''t even have a World Realm subordinate.


    The contest that they would bepeting in was actually a contest of strength, just like the one that the first prince had encountered.


    The tenth prince didn''t waste any time and immediately sent out one of his World Realm subordinates as probe for the second prince''s team.


    The second prince sent one of the medium sized cloaked figures out.


    The match onlysted a single second, or rather a single move. The cloaked figure waved their hand and the tenth prince''s World Realm subordinate fell to the ground unconscious.


    There was only silence that filled the arena. It was so quiet that even the sound of a pin dropping could be heard.


    Everyone rubbed their eyes and no one could believe what had just happened. After all, they hadn''t even sensed any life energy fluctuations when the second prince''s subordinate made a move.


    Could it be that the second prince''s subordinate had done all of that with just their physical body?


    Then what level of cultivation would they be at that they would be able to do this?


    They would have to be at least in the Realm to suppress a Star Realm Expert with their physique alone¡­


    This was just one of the second prince''s subordinates, so what about the rest?


    The first and fourth princes naturally weren''t fools and could recognize this as well.


    The moment that they saw this, they knew that they might be in danger at this rate, so they couldn''t help thinking about all kinds of different counters to the second prince''s team.


    At the same time, in the special private box, the Mu Ster King deeply knitted his brows as he looked at the second prince''s team.


    "When did the second son get these subordinates? Why didn''t I know about them?" The Mu Ster King couldn''t help muttering to himself.


    He had been keeping track of the second prince since he wanted to get rid of him and find his Hua''er, but he never knew about any of this.


    Could it be that the second prince had hidden more things than he had thought from him?


    Just how far did this go?


    But before he could think anymore, a man in full armour suddenly came in and said, "Your majesty!"


    ¡­


    Back on the field, the second prince narrowed his eyes as he watched his team approach. He released thew barrier around him to make sure that no one could hear what they were saying before saying, "Why did you do that? It''s almost time for the n to happen and you''re ying around like this?"


    The cloaked figure just gave a chuckle and said, "It''s fine, it''s not like anything can go wrong at this point, right?"


    The second prince knitted his brows, but then he rxed them and said, "I hope so."

 Chapter 878 This Is?! (1)

    After the second prince''s match, there was a sudden intermission that happened.


    It was supposed to be the match for the third prince that came after the second prince, but for some reason, the host suddenly called an intermission.


    Everyone was confused and some people even questioned this intermission.


    But when it was announced that this was a decree from the Mu Ster King, everyone suddenly fell silent. Not a single person dared to say anything else because if they did, that would mean going against the will of the Mu Ster King.


    They knew that there was no higher power than the Mu Ster King in this Mu Ster Kingdom, or at least that was the way it was for them. If they ever went against the Mu Ster King, there would be no ce left for them in this kingdom.


    So they could only patiently wait for the tournament to resume.


    But on the Mu Ster King''s side, the situation wasn''t as calm as the arena.


    The one that hade in earlier was a general of the Mu Ster Kingdom and he hade to report movements of troops of another Ster Kingdom on the borders of the Mu Ster Kingdom. This was a matter of national security, so of course it took precedence over the tournament.


    The Mu Ster King roared in a low voice, "Have you identified who the enemies are yet?"


    The general bowed and said, "We have just received a report from the frontlines that confirms the identity of the enemy forces. They are ships from the Ran Ster Kingdom."


    "Ran Ster Kingdom?" The Mu Ster King asked in a very confused voice.


    He wouldn''t have been this confused if it was just a normal Ster Kingdom, but it was different if it was the Ran Ster Kingdom. That was because the Ran Ster Kingdom was one of the Mu Ster Kingdom''s allies.


    Normally they had a very good rtionship, so they wouldn''t do something like this without warning.


    So why did they send ships to their border?


    Was there a special reason?


    The Mu Ster King knitted his brows to think for a bit before suddenly saying, "Could it be that this is all a misunderstanding? They could just be here to watch our session tournament, right?"


    The general knitted his brows, but he slowly shook his head as he said, "It doesn''t seem very likely."


    The Mu Ster King red at him and asked, "Why is that?"


    The general hesitated a bit before saying, "It seems like¡­they came in Thunder ss Battleships¡­"


    The Mu Ster King''s mouth opened wide when he heard this, but then he closed it and deeply knitted his brows.


    When it came to Ster Kingdoms, they all had different kinds of ships that they used to travel to different worlds since they ruled overrge domains. However, all these ships followed the same standard grades among Ster Kingdom to easily grade the various types of ships.


    Thunder ss Battleships were the strongest battleships that a Ster Kingdom could make¡­


    So if the Ran Ster Kingdom was bringing out their Thunder ss Battleships, the only thing that came to mind would be that they were¡­here for¡­war¡­


    The Mu Ster King was in deep thought for a while longer before saying, "What about our Thunder ss Battleships, have we not moved them yet?"


    The general revealed a difficult look as he said, "It''s already toote. The enemy''s Thunder ss Battleships are already in our domain and if they wanted, they could destroy any Thunder ss Battleships that we send out. The only thing that we can do now is keep the Thunder ss Battleship in the core of our kingdom to protect the capital and the surrounding area."


    The Mu Ster King gritted his teeth when he heard this, but he didn''t give up as he said, "The generals! What about all the generals that we''ve posted? Have they not been contacted yet? Why are they not moving their troops?"


    The general''s difficult look became even worse as he said, "We''ve tried making contact with them, but we haven''t been able to reach them at all. It''s almost as if there''s something blocking ourmunicationwork."


    The Mu Ster King mmed his fist down on the arm of the seat that he was sitting in as he red at the general and said, "Then shouldn''t you think of something! It''s your job as the supreme general to deal with these matters!"


    The general shrinked back when he heard this, but he still said, "We can only wait for now to see what intentions the Ran Ster Kingdom ships have. After all, if we make a rash move, then all we will be doing is falling into the enemy''s traps."


    This was advice given from his years of advice and it was solid advice, but this sounded like a coward''s talk in the ears of the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King ignored the general and fell into deep thought for a while before suddenly revealing a look like he had thought of something as he said, "The princes!"


    The general couldn''t help revealing a confused look when he heard this as he asked, "The princes? Your majesty, what about the princes?"


    The Mu Ster King once again ignored him as he said to himself, "Isn''t this a perfect way to get two birds with one stone?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    After saying this, the Mu Ster King broke out in wildughter as he said to one of the ministers standing on the side, "Send down the decree for all the princes to gather immediately!"


    The minister heard the Mu Ster King addressing him and after jolting to attention, he quickly ran off to send the decree.


    To his side, the general still had a confused look as he asked, "Your majesty, why are we gathering the princes?"


    The Mu Ster King revealed a sly smile as he answered this question with another question, "The princes have all gathered in the capital for the session tournament, correct?"


    The general was puzzled why the Mu Ster King would ask him this, but he still nodded and said, "Yes, all of the princes without fail have gathered in the capital."


    The Mu Ster King once again asked, "Since they''re all in the capital, then they should have brought all of their supporters with them, don''t you think?"


    The general still wasn''t able to understand what the Mu Ster King was nning.


    However, the Mu Ster King didn''t care as he said, "It''s fine to sacrifice a few princes like this."


    ¡­


    An hourter, all of the princes gathered on the stage of the arena.


    They were all confused why they had been suddenly summoned, even the princes that had already been eliminated from the tournament.


    However, this was a decree summoning them that came straight from the Mu Ster King, so they had no choice but to obey.


    All of the princes had confused and anxious looks on their faces as they wondered what had happened. The only one that was calmly standing there was the second prince.


    Once all the princes had been gathered, the Mu Ster King made his entrance into the arena.


    There had been a special spot set up for him on stage, so he made his way over and sat down on the makeshift throne brought in.


    No one said a word as he came over and they all waited for him to speak to see what this was about.


    After sitting down, the Mu Ster King said, "My children, it pains me to say that I will have to cancel this tournament."


    Everyone in the crowd and all of the princes took a cold breath.


    What was happening here? Why would the Mu Ster King suddenly canceled the tournament midway?


    But no one said a thing since they knew that there was more that the Mu Ster King had to say. They all waited for him to finish his words.


    The Mu Ster King gave a sigh before saying, "With a heavy heart, I have to report that one of our allies, the Ran Ster Kingdom has turned on us."


    Everyone once again took a cold breath of shock.


    The Ran Ster Kingdom was considered one of their closest allies and people wouldn''t believe that they would turn on them normally, but these were words that came from the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King definitely wouldn''t be someone that would joke about this, so they had no choice but to believe this.


    A war definitely took precedence over the session tournament, but why did the Mu Ster King gather all of the princes like this?


    It didn''t make sense if he just wanted to announce that the tournament was canceled, he could have done it with an official decree and sent everyone home. But instead, he gathered everyone like this, so he must have a reason.


    The Mu Ster King then changed his tone and said, "But this also provides us with an opportunity."


    He paused as his eyes swept over the princes before he continued, "As proud princes of this Ster Kingdom, it is your duty to protect the people. So when enemies invade ournd, naturally it is your time to step up."


    All of the princes looked at each other, but they could see in each other''s eyes that none of them bought this.


    The Mu Ster King definitely had some other intentions.


    The Mu Ster King didn''t mind this and continued, "So as princes of our Mu Ster Kingdom, naturally it is your duty to meet our enemies when they invade. As such, you will all be sent to the front line to fight the enemies of the Ran Ster Kingdom."

 Chapter 879 This Is?! (2)

    All of the princes immediately knitted their brows.


    As they had already guessed, they had been gathered to be sent out to face the enemy. Otherwise, why would the Mu Ster King even call back the princes that had lost and were preparing to leave?


    But none of the princes wanted to be the one to face the enemy.


    After all, this was an enemy from a Ster Kingdom that was at the same level as theirs. If they were to face the enemies, they would have to sacrifice their own subordinates and weaken themselves.


    That would not help them in the long run since it would mean they would have less of a chance of winning the session race.


    But the next words of the Mu Ster King changed their mindsets.


    The Mu Ster King could see the hesitation in the princes, so tapping his fingers on the armrest of his throne, he said, "Of course, this also presents us with another chance to see which prince is suited for the crown prince position. So instead of the tournament, we will turn this disaster into fortune by using it as a test of the crown prince position."


    All of the princes suddenly looked up at the Mu Ster King who was sitting there.


    Seeing that he had caught their attention, the Mu Ster King continued with a smile, "We will be counting your contribution based on the number of enemies that you defeat. The one that receives the most battle contributions will receive the title of crown prince."


    When the princes heard this, they immediately narrowed their eyes and looked at each other.


    Since the Mu Ster King had announced this in front of everyone like this, there was certainly no way of taking this back. So now it all depended on getting as much battle contribution as possible to win that title.


    All the princes that had been nning on holding back their power now were thinking about how to take down as many enemies as possible.


    That was except for the second prince who still calmly stood there staring at the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King revealed a smile when he saw the movements between the princes, but when he saw the second prince staring at him, that smile froze on his face. He could feel a bad premonition, as if something that wasn''t good for him was about to happen.


    But what could happen now?


    What could the second prince possibly do when they were facing enemies?


    As the princes started plotting out their ns, the second prince suddenly received a call.


    He didn''t open his wristwatch to receive this call, but rather he used a wireless headset to take the call. As he listened, he said, "Un, got it. Let''s start then."


    After hanging up on this call, he suddenly took a step forward.


    No one noticed him at first since they were too busy focusing on the new method of determining the crown prince, but after he took a few more steps they began paying attention to him.


    It was one person at first, but soon everyone was staring at the second prince as he slowly walked towards the Mu Ster King sitting on the throne.


    The Mu Ster King also noticed this and he just narrowed his eyes as he started at the second prince. However, as the second prince came closer and closer, he couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition.


    So when the second prince had moved halfway, he suddenly said in amanding voice, "Second prince, what are you doing?"


    But the second princepletely ignored him.


    Seeing this, the Mu Ster King waved his hand and several of his personal guards appeared between him and the second prince. They raised their weapons and pointed them at the second prince as the leader of these personal guards said, "Your highness, please stop. If you have something to say, please say it."


    The second prince ignored them and walked up right in front of him, making these guards very nervous.


    After all, they knew how strong the second prince was and if he were to fight seriously, it would not end well for them¡­


    But right before shing with them, the second prince suddenly stopped.


    He looked up at the Mu Ster King and said, "I have an objection."


    "Huh?"


    That was the only reaction that anyone could have in response to this.


    In this situation, what objection would the second prince have?


    After all, wasn''t this situation better for him? Not to mention, wasn''t it more important to deal with the approaching enemies instead?


    But the second prince was standing there in front of the Mu Ster King raising an objection.


    The Mu Ster King hesitated a bit before saying, "Second prince, what is your objection?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    The second prince looked right into the Mu Ster King''s eyes and said, "I object to you being the king. You are ipetent and rash, your reign has been a dark spot in the history of our Mu Ster Kingdom."


    The arena became so silent that even the sound of a pin dropping could be heard when the second prince said this.


    Everyone just stared at the second prince with wide eyes, even the other princes as no one could understand what was going on through the mind of the second prince.


    Even if his words were true, did he not know the consequences of saying these?


    The Mu Ster King was so stunned that he wasn''t even able to react to the second prince''s words. He just stared at the second prince in a daze as his mind turned and processed those words.


    Finally, his face scrunched up in a look of rage as he mmed his fist down on the arms of his throne, "Insolence! Traitor! Someone! Take the second prince away and lock him up in the deepest parts of the dungeons!"


    When the first and fourth prince heard this, they couldn''t help revealing faint sinister smiles.


    They had been contemting how to take care of the second prince who was their biggestpetition, but they never expected the second prince to take care of himself for them.


    Once the second prince was gone, there would be no one standing in their way to the throne.


    The personal guards revealed hesitant looks, but in the end, they still moved towards the second prince.


    The leader of the guards said, "Your highness, please don''t make this hard on us. Please juste with us willingly."


    But before they could make a move, the second prince''s subordinates suddenly jumped in front of the second prince. This group of cloaked figures stood between the second prince and the personal guards of the Mu Ster King.


    The personal guards knew that this meant that the second prince wouldn''te with them easily. So with heavy looks, they raised their weapons and prepared for a fight.


    However, one of the cloaked figures suddenly raised their hand and there was a domain that pressed down on them.


    No matter how the personal guards tried, they couldn''t go against the domain that fell onto them.


    As the personal guards of the king, naturally there wasn''t a single weak person among them.


    All of them were in the Star Realm and the leader of the guards was even in the Peak Star Realm. They would be considered experts no matter where they went, but now they were unable to do a thing against this cloaked figure.


    The only possibility of this was that this person was in the Realm.


    After stopping the guards, the short cloaked person said in a scrambled voice that had a teasing, "Your highness, it seems like you''re quite well liked.


    Even though this person had used their domain on the guards, there were many of them that weren''t struggling like the leader of the guards was.


    That was because they knew that between the current king and the second prince, the second prince was clearly the better choice. So instead of trying to force their way out of this bind to protect the king, it was better for them to wait and see how this turned out.


    If possible, they even wanted the second prince to take the throne.


    The Mu Ster King deeply knitted his brows when he saw this.


    He never would have expected that his son would have a Realm Expert following him. This was not a small matter since even the Mu Ster King didn''t have many Realm Experts under him.


    But that didn''t mean that he didn''t have any at all.


    Seeing that his personal guards had all been restrained, the Mu Ster King shouted, "General Wu!"


    The general that had been meeting with the king earlier suddenly jumped out and stood in front of the Mu Ster King, releasing his aura as he said, "All of you stand down now!"


    Then facing the cloaked figure, he said, "Release them or you die."


    It wasn''t just an arrogant statement, but rather a statement that he could back.


    After all, this General Wu was the supreme general of the Mu Ster Kingdom and one of the strongest experts that they had. He was someone who was in the Peak Realm, so he could easily stop this cloaked figure who was only in the Low Realm.


    But then before he could make a move, there was an aura that mmed right into his aura and negated it.


    Another one of the cloaked figures came forward and stood between General Wu and the rest of the cloaked figures while saying, "Hello general, shall wepare notes?"


    General Wu revealed a shocked look because the aura that this person was releasing wasn''t below his!


    This person was also in the Peak Realm!

 Chapter 880 This Is?! (3)

    The Mu Ster King wasn''t a fool or else he never would have taken this throne.


    As soon as he saw General Wu''s expression change, he knew that this situation was very bad for him.


    He knew that General Wu wouldn''t reveal this kind of expression unless he felt that this situation was dangerous, which meant that he felt that this cloaked figure that had stood out was someone that was his match.


    Even if the Mu Ster King''s cultivation wasn''t that high, he could still sense the pressureing from this cloaked figure.


    He could guess that this cloaked figure was most likely in the Peak Realm just like General Wu.


    But that made him even more confused.


    Where did his second son find a Peak Realm Expert to be his subordinate?!


    These experts were usually the top experts in any Ster Kingdom and would normally hold very high positions. They would also have very high pride since they were top experts in any Ster Kingdom, so they would only work for those that had the highest position in the Ster Kingdom.


    Why would this one work for a prince that didn''t even have session rights?


    But he didn''t have time to think about all of this¡­Right now he had to do something to fix this desperate situation.


    So the Mu Ster King cleared his throat as he forced himself to calm down before saying, "You in the cloak, why are you working for my foolish son? You should know that you have nothing to gain from this."


    The cloaked figure turned to face the Mu Ster King and just stood there in silence as if they were waiting for the Mu Ster King to speak.


    Seeing this, the Mu Ster King saw a glint of hope and continued, "As long as you''re willing to pledge your loyalty to me, I can grant you the title of duke in the Mu Ster Kingdom. I will even marry one of my daughters to you so you can join our Mu Ster Royal Family."


    This was a very generous offer, but it was worth it since this was a Peak Realm Expert.


    Even General Wu was surprised by this offer since he had never received something like this, but hemended the king for having this kind of determination at this time.


    If they were able to solve this matter with words and some benefits, then it would be the best scenario for them.


    After all, if they were able to bring another Peak Realm Expert to their side, that would mean having another card to use against the Ran Ster Kingdom. That would be gaining benefits from disasters.


    The cloaked figure just looked right at the Mu Ster King and didn''t say anything.


    After a long period of silence, the cloaked figure suddenly burst out inughter before turning to the second prince to say, "Your highness, you were right. This king really is a waste of space."


    The second prince gave a nod without saying anything else.


    The cloaked figure turned back to General Wu without even caring about the Mu Ster King and said, "Shall we?"


    The Mu Ster King''s expression fell when he heard this.


    Just what had the second prince promised this person that he would be willing to do all this for the second prince?


    Just what did he not give that this person wasn''t moved?


    After all, marrying one of the princesses meant that they had the right to be a duke that was part of the royal family. In the future, they could be considered part of the royal bloodline and their children would have the right topete for the throne in the future.


    This was an honour that anyone would be ttered by, but this cloaked figure just ignored it?


    General Wu didn''t have time to say anything as the cloaked figure suddenly attacked him.


    With this, it was clear that there was no way of talking this out.


    So the Mu Ster King turned his attention to his next trump card as he shouted at the nobles, "Anyone who takes down the second prince will receive a first grademendation and receive an increase in title."


    The nobles that were here watching were some of the most powerful nobles here and as long as he could convince them to stand with him, he wouldn''t have a problem. After all, since they were powerful nobles, they would be followed by powerful bodyguards.


    He just needed to stall for time so he could contact the various generals and have them send their experts to take down the second prince.


    But not a single one of these nobles made a move.


    The Mu Ster King looked around himself with a stunned look before shouting, "I''ll give you treasures as well, just take care of the second prince already!"


    He had already lost hisposure as the king since he knew that he was in trouble, but still none of the nobles made a move. There were even some that had startedughing at him, as if they didn''t care about the consequences.


    They¡­most likely thought that he would be reced by the second prince, so they wanted to tter the second prince while there was still time.


    Seeing that he had no choice at all, the Mu Ster King suddenly took out a token and crushed it.<novelnext></novelnext>


    With a sh of light, there were several figures that suddenly appeared in front of him.


    This was a special spatialw token that could only be used when the lifeline of the empire was in danger. To the Mu Ster King, that meant that if his life was in danger, he would use it.


    After all, he valued his life more than anything.


    The figures that had been summoned were the generals that had been posted around the various parts of the kingdom.


    Of course this could only be used in a crisis because by summoning all the generals, the defenses of the various parts of the kingdom would be weakened.


    The Mu Ster King didn''t care about any of that as he shouted, "Take care of the second prince, he''s rebelling!"


    But even then, none of the generals made a move.


    They just stood there staring at the Mu Ster King as if they couldn''t hear him at all.


    The Mu Ster King''s eyes popped out when he saw this and he shouted again, "Did you not hear me? The second prince is rebelling and trying to start a coup! Stop him!"


    But even then, none of the generals made a move.


    One of them said in a calm voice, "Your majesty, it''s time for your reign to end."


    The Mu Ster King''s chin dropped to the ground when he heard this.


    "This¡­This¡­This¡­" That was the only thing that he could stutter out when he heard this.


    The top generals and top experts of the kingdom were actually colluding with the second prince to seize control of the throne! Just when had the second prince done all of this!


    The Mu Ster King started backing away when he heard this and in his panic, he backed into the guards that were behind him. Seeing them, he pushed them at the generals and ran away from the arena.


    The Mu Ster King was going to run into the pce because hisst trump card was there.


    The foundation of the Mu Ster Kingdom wasn''t him, the Mu Ster King, but rather the ancestors of the Mu Ster Royal Family living deep inside of the pce. These were experts that were in the Sun Realm, the very peak of the World Realm.


    They were the ones that protected the kingdom and ensured that the kingdom existed.


    They were also the ones that appointed the king and ensured that he was safe. So they were the only ones that he could turn to now.


    As long as he had the help of those ancestors, then he would be able to take care of all of these traitors.


    So the Mu Ster King was nning on running to hide where the ancestors were.


    But to his surprise, the guards that he had pushed suddenly turned around and grabbed him by the hands, not letting him go anywhere.


    ? The Mu Ster King was shocked to see this, but then he roared out in an angry voice, "What do you think you''re doing?!"


    The guards turned the Mu Ster King to the generals who used their domains to suppress him.


    The Mu Ster King''s heart was filled with a chill as he realized that there were even traitors among his own guards. So with no other choice, he took out another token that he was about to crush.


    But before he could crush it, there was ayer of light that appeared around that token.


    This token was a token that could summon an ancestor to protect him when he was in danger and was the final trump card. If he wasn''t forced to use it, he wouldn''t have because this was the only one that he would ever get. The ancestors had made that very clear.


    But now that he had no choice, he had been nning on using it.


    A voice suddenly rang out that came from the token that said, "Huang''er, it''s over. It''s time for you to abdicate. Let Yong Li take the throne."


    Then there was only silence that followed this voice.


    That was because this was the voice of one of the two ancestors and it was telling the Mu Ster King to abdicate, as well as giving the throne to the second prince!


    Since the ancestor had spoken, there was nothing that anyone could do¡­


    The Mu Ster King could only just say, "This is?! This is!? This is!?"


    It was as if he was a broken record as he couldn''t understand what had happened.


    Even the ancestor had abandoned him?

 Chapter 881 Abdication

    The generals that surrounded the Mu Ster King weren''t surprised by this at all.


    It was almost as if they had already expected this.


    One of them sealed the Mu Ster King''s cultivation and then waved his hand to the guards before they all headed back to where the second prince was.


    General Wu and the cloaked figure had already stopped fighting as they had seen that it was already all over.


    General Wu''s attention waspletely on the Mu Ster King, so he no longer paid any attention to the cloaked figure. He pointed at the generals and roared, "You! All of you! Do you understand what you are doing? This is treason!"


    But the generals weren''t afraid of General Wu at all as they brought the Mu Ster King in front of the second prince.


    Then in front of everyone''s shocked gazes, they bowed and presented the Mu Ster King to the second prince. Then they said, "Your highness, please take the throne."


    The second prince nodded at them, but he didn''t sit down on the throne in the end. He turned to General Wu who was just cautiously standing there and said, "General, please put down your weapon. There''s no need to fight anymore, our Ster Kingdom still needs your power in the future."


    General Wu was surprised to hear this, but he still shook his head in the end.


    He had sworn his loyalty to the now previous Mu Ster King and he would never go against his oath. After all, he owed the now previous Mu Ster King too much to repay.


    So General Wu said, "Your highness, unfortunately there is no future for me with you."


    The second prince nodded before saying, "Someone lock General Wu away." Then after a pause, he gave a nod to General Wu and said, "If you ever change your mind, I am always willing to ept someone as outstanding as you."


    General Wu gave a bow to the second prince.


    He had long known the excellence of the second prince and he knew that as long as the second prince took the throne, their Mu Ster Kingdom would enter a golden age.


    After General Wu was taken away, the second prince turned to his father, the former Mu Ster King¡­Well, technically he was still the Mu Ster King since the abdication and coronation ceremonies hadn''t been held yet.


    The Mu Ster King looked up at his son who stood over him and was filled with rage as he roared, "Yong Li, how dare you do this to your own father! Did you forget about everything I did to raise you and this is how you repay me?! Do you have any filial piety?"


    The second prince shook his head and said, "Father, if you had any care about our rtionship, you would have never acted the way that you did. I gave you the chance to repent, but you never took it, so you forced my hand in the end." Then after a pause, he added, "There is still a chance for us to rebuild our rtionship if you willingly step down and pass down the throne."


    The Mu Ster King gave a cold snort and said, "I don''t know what trick you''ve used to convince the ancestors, but you should know that it won''tst! I am the one and only true king, that is a fact!"


    The second prince shook his head before nodding to the generals and saying, "Take my father away and put him under house arrest."


    The generals bowed before leading the Mu Ster King away.


    However, when the Mu Ster King was brought past the second prince, the second prince suddenly raised his hand.


    The second prince reached out and took the crown off the Mu Ster King''s head before saying, "Father, thank you for your many years of service. Your son will take it from here."


    The now uncrowned Mu Ster King''s face twisted and he was about to roar out, but the generals blocked his mouth with life energy and he wasn''t able to say a thing.


    The only thing that the could do was re at the second prince like a wild beast that wanted to tear him to pieces.


    The second prince¡­The new Mu Ster King gave a sigh before turning to the princes and saying, "As you can see, I am now the new king."


    All of the princes felt a chill run down their backs when they saw this.


    Even the first and fourth prince were helpless when it came to this matter.


    After all, while they had the support of the ministers, that didn''t mean that they had experts behind them.


    The ministers would never risk their family''s experts in what they considered a lost cause. It was very likely that the ministers would soon abandon the first and fourth prince to go to the second prince''s side.


    After all, there weren''t many subordinates by the second prince''s side to begin with, so there was a gap that they could fill.


    Not to mention that the second prince had the ancestors on his side, so there was nothing they could do in the face of this absolute power.


    The ancestors were the greatest power in the Mu Ster Royal Family and there was no going against them.


    So they were all fearful about what would happen to them now¡­


    After all, all of these potential sessors would only breed uncertainty in the new Mu Ster King''s rule. The nobles could use them as tools to fuel their own ambitions¡­


    So the best way to deal with these princes would be to¡­kill them all.


    So the princes all felt like they were waiting for a death sentence¡­but that death sentence never came.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The Mu Ster King said, "I won''t make it hard for you. As long as you give up your im to the throne, I will allow you to take up positions in the government and work for our Mu Ster Kingdom."


    All the princes revealed shocked looks when they heard this and they couldn''t help looking at each other with nk looks.


    The Mu Ster King was not only going to spare them, but also give them government positions?


    Wasn''t this preparing them to rebel against him?


    Would he really be that dumb?


    No, they knew how excellent the second prince had been, so he definitely wouldn''t miss this¡­The only reason he would do this was because he was confident enough that they wouldn''t be able to rebel against him¡­


    But since this was their only way out, there was nothing they could do in the first ce.


    After all, it was choosing to work for him or choose to die.


    So the princes all fell onto one knee, including the first and fourth princes, as they pledged their loyalty to the new Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King waved his hand and sent them off.


    The princes were guided away by one of the generals that had been standing on the side.


    The princes all had strange looks when they had been sent away, almost as if they werembs that were being led away to the ughter. After all, there was no reason to send them away like this, unless¡­


    But under the pressure of the general, it wasn''t as if they could do anything.


    The first prince and the fourth prince moved towards the back of the pack where the general was and were preparing to make their moves.


    But they didn''t know that the real reason that the Mu Ster King sent them away was because he had something else nned. He didn''t want them getting too deeply involved in the government, so he was just sending them away so they wouldn''t know what would happen next.


    That was his benevolence as their brother, he just wanted them to live simple lives.


    There was one thing that everyone neglected though¡­


    Why did the Mu Ster King choose to do this in front of everyone?


    After the former Mu Ster King was taken away, there was no need for the new Mu Ster King to do this while everyone was watching. He could have just taken his time and done a proper coronation ceremony before taking care of the princes.


    So why did he do this here?


    After the princes were taken away, the Mu Ster King faced the nobles and the cameras to say, "As you have heard, the Ran Ster Kingdom''s ships have been seen on our borders."


    Everyone suddenly jolted when they heard this.


    That was right!


    They hadpletely forgotten about this with everything that had happened!


    There was a war that was on the verge of happening, there was no time for them to concern themselves with trying to im power. After all, if they lost the war, they would lose everything that they had.


    Was it worth it to lose everything just to gain a bit of power temporarily?


    No!


    So everyone paid attention to the Mu Ster King as he brought this up.


    But then he said something that shocked everyone.


    "Those ships havee to attend our Mu Ster Kingdom''s coronation ceremony."


    Everyone''s chin dropped when they heard this.


    The Ran Ster Kingdom ships¡­they hade to attend the Mu Ster Kingdom''s coronation ceremony?


    What did that mean?


    It meant that they knew that there would be a coronation ceremony in the first ce and¡­they should have been working with the second prince all along.


    Just how far had the second prince nned everything and how long had he been allied with the Ran Ster Kingdom?

 Chapter 882 War

    The second prince turned to the cloaked figure that had fought General Wu and gave him a nod.


    That cloaked figure nodded back and then took off their cloak to reveal who they were.


    Everyone looked carefully at this person at first, but then they immediately realized who it was.


    It was the grand general of the Ran Ster Kingdom!


    With this, it was confirmed that the Ran Ster Kingdom had been working with the second prince all along!


    When this fact settled in, everyone couldn''t help feeling nervous.


    After all, the Ran Ster Kingdom now had a veryrge leash on the Mu Ster Kingdom as their new king owed a lot of his rule to the Ran Ster Kingdom. It was unknown how the Ran Ster Kingdom would use this card, but it was clear that they wouldn''t let it go that easily.


    Many of the nobles started worrying about the future of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    But then the words of the grand general changed all these thoughts.


    "The Ran Ster Kingdom sends their congrattions to the new Mu Ster King. I hope that our alliance will continue in this prosperity." As the grand general said this, he took out a box that he presented to the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King gave a nod and said, "Thank you, grand general. It is an honour to continue cooperating with the Ran Ster Kingdom."


    The nobles in the stands couldn''t help looking at the Ran Ster Kingdom''s grand general with confused looks.


    This was normally the time when the Ran Ster Kingdom''s representatives would make their demands or at least put some pressure on the new Mu Ster King, but this wasn''t happening at all.


    If they missed this chance while the Mu Ster King still hadn''t fully established his power, they would miss the chance to get the benefits that they wanted.


    So why would he just act this submissive and even offer a gift to the Mu Ster King?


    Could it be that the Ran Ster Kingdom didn''t n on receiving any benefits from the Mu Ster Kingdom?


    But why would they help the second prince take the throne if that was the case?


    That doubt didn''tst long as a special guest suddenly appeared in the arena.


    Once again, everyone was shocked to see who it was¡­


    The Ran Ster King, the newly crowned Ran Ster King!


    The old Ran Ster King had stepped down two years ago and the new Ran Ster King that took over had been the first prince.


    Unlike the Mu Ster Kingdom, there was no fierce session race because the Ran Ster King only had the first prince as his sessor.


    He had been known as a very dedicated person and had only ever taken his queen as his wife, so he only had three children. They were the first prince and the two princesses.


    After the new Ran Ster King took over, he immediately created a bunch of new policies and in just two years, the Ran Ster Kingdom''s economy had doubled.


    People even imed that this was the golden age of the Ran Ster Kingdom.


    The Ran Ster King walked right through the arena until he came right up to the Mu Ster King.


    Everyone was tense as the two of them just stared at each other, but then they did something that shocked everyone.


    The Mu Ster King and the Ran Ster King moved at the same time, reaching their hands out to grab each other''s hand before revealing smiles.


    It was clear that there was an unspoken bond between the two of them¡­


    ? But that made it clear why the Ran Ster Kingdom had helped the Mu Ster King take his throne.


    Going back in time a bit, when the second prince had been wandering the world in training, he had met the Ran Ster Kingdom''s first prince. The two of them had formed a team and traveled the world with their party before going back to their respective kingdoms to take over their duties.


    However, the bond that they had forged during their journey together was one that hadsted even to now.


    That was one of the reasons why the Ran Ster King had sent his ships to pressure the Mu Ster King and why he had sent his grand general to help the second prince.


    But of course, if it was with just this, it was impossible to send all of these things even with the prestige that the Ran Ster King had. There was another reason why the Ran Ster King had gone all out to help the second prince take the throne.


    This was what the Mu Ster King announced next.


    "Loyal subjects, while we will not be having a war with the Ran Ster Kingdom, there is a war that is approaching."


    All of the nobles in the stands and everyone watching were shocked when they heard this.


    They had thought that the threat of war was gone when the Ran Ster King arrived, but now that didn''t seem to be the case¡­<novelnext></novelnext>


    The Mu Ster King continued, "The Tai Ster Kingdom has colluded with the Bai Ster Kingdom to encroach on our Mu Ster Kingdom and Ran Ster Kingdom''snds."


    When everyone heard this, their chins dropped down.


    The Tai Ster Kingdom was one of the enemies of their Mu Ster Kingdom, this was something that they all knew. However, the Tai Ster Kingdom was weaker than either of their Mu Ster Kingdom or the Ran Ster Kingdom, so where had they gained the guts to attack them?


    Even if they had the help of the Bai Ster Kingdom, this shouldn''t be the case since the Bai Ster Kingdom was also weaker than either of their kingdoms.


    But since it was a war with weaker enemies and since they had the Ran Ster Kingdom on their side as shown by the Ran Ster King''s appearance, they were feeling confident.


    The nobles no longer looked worried as they revealed opportunistic glints in their eyes.


    After all, a war was a way to earn battle glory and battle glory meant increasing their rank. As long as it was an easy war, it would be easy battle glory, so they had no reason to oppose this war.


    Let alone the fact that this was about defending their country, which would raise their own reputations.


    This was clearly an easy win.


    No one thought more deeply into why the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom suddenly decided to attack them, but that didn''t mean that the Ran Ster King and the Mu Ster King didn''t think about it.


    They knew that there had to be a reason why the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom were suddenly encroaching on their borders¡­


    There had to be something that gave them this courage¡­


    This was the other reason why the Ran Ster King had decided to help the second prince take the throne.


    He knew that the previous Mu Ster King wasn''t a reliable ally, so he wanted someone that he could trust to take his ce. Who was better than his blood brother, the second prince?


    That was how he had convinced his ministers to send support for the second prince''s coup.


    Seeing that the ministers were all in agreement to the war, the Mu Ster King knew that everything had gone the way that he had wanted it to go.


    Now there was only one more thing for him to take care of.


    The Mu Ster King couldn''t help peeking at his private viewing box with a strange look in his eyes.


    ¡­


    In the viewing box, Lin Fan had calmly watched all of this happen.


    Even though he was calm on the surface, he couldn''t help being shocked deep down as he couldn''t understand how the system had known about all of this. He was certain that the system had already known that this would happen, or else it wouldn''t have given him that quest.


    But what shocked him even more was the name Tai Ster Kingdom.


    The Tai Ster Kingdom was where the Bing Family and Huo Family that were after him were from¡­


    If the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Ran Ster Kingdom were to fight the Tai Ster Kingdom, then wouldn''t this be a chance for him?


    He also couldn''t help wondering if the system even knew about all of this¡­


    If it did, then this must be the reason why it had wanted him to watch over the session race just so he could learn about all of this.


    If the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Ran Ster Kingdom were to fight the Tai Ster Kingdom, if they were to take down the Tai Ster Kingdom, wouldn''t that help him solve his problem?


    If he were to stop the Bing and Huo Families from chasing after him, wouldn''t he be able to return to his family?


    This was a chance!


    So Lin Fan fell into deep thought about how to process this whole thing.


    He needed to figure out a way to work with the Mu Ster Kingdom, but at the same time, he had to consider Xin''er''s situation¡­


    Or rather, should he say Mu Bao Bao¡­


    At the very least, he was close to the second prince, so he would be able to talk to him.


    But he still couldn''t figure out the strange way that the second prince looked at Xin''er.


    Could that be why he wanted them toe and see what happened today?


    Lin Fan looked at Xin''er with a strange look before giving a sigh.


    It seemed like the only way to solve this was to meet with the second prince¡­no, he should be the Mu Ster King now.

 Chapter 883 Xin’er’s Origins (1)

    After the dust had settled, the Mu Ster King returned to the viewing box where Lin Fan and Xin''er were waiting for them.


    Even if Xin''er had the limited understanding of a child, she still had a rough understanding of what had just happened, so she felt a bit nervous meeting the Mu Ster King again.


    After all, he was now the king and not just the uncle that she could talk casually to.


    But the Mu Ster King quickly dispelled her nervousness by saying with a smile, "Xin''er, why are you acting like that? You can still act the same way as before."


    Xin''er was surprised to see the Mu Ster King acting this way, but after seeing Lin Fan give a nod in response, she nodded to the Mu Ster King with a smile.


    The Mu Ster King also nodded back with a smile before turning to Lin Fan. He calmly looked at Lin Fan for a bit before suddenly bowing his head to Lin Fan''s surprise and saying, "Thank you for taking care of¡­Xin''er."


    When he said her voice, he couldn''t help hesitating a bit.


    It was almost as if he didn''t know what to call her by¡­


    But he still chose to say Xin''er in the end.


    Lin Fan could tell that this situation wasn''t normal, but he calmly gave a slight bow back before saying, "It''s not a problem."


    The Mu Ster King raised his head again and then suddenly said, "Can youe with me to a ce? I have something that I want to show you."


    Lin Fan was about to agree, but then he suddenly noticed something out of the corner of his eyes.


    So instead, he said, "Can we go back to my store first? I also have someone that I want to bring along to this."


    The Mu Ster King raised a brow as he looked at Lin Fan, but seeing the serious look on his face, he nodded in response.


    So the three of them left the arena without a single care about the people that were still there. There were many nobles that wanted to talk to the Mu Ster King as he left, but he scared them all off with a single look.


    The way that the Mu Ster King looked at them, it was as if he was prepared to kill anyone that disturbed him.


    Under this kind of gaze, naturally not a single person dared to disturb him and Lin Fan.


    When they reached the carriage, Xin''er still chose to sit beside Lin Fan in the end. However, that caused the Mu Ster King to reveal a bit of sadness in his eyes as he had been rejected by her.


    Once they arrived at the store, they found that Ang was waiting outside for them.


    That was the reason why Lin Fan had wanted toe to the store.


    He had noticed in the corner of his eyes from the system disy that Ang hade back. As the owner of the store, anything that Ang did with the resources of the store would be reported to him.


    So when she came back with the Any ce Door, he had immediately been notified.


    When Xin''er saw Ang standing there, she jumped out of the carriage and ran up to her, jumping into her arms.


    Ang revealed a faint smile as she held Xin''er in her arms, but she didn''t rx for long since she could see that the second prince was also here.


    Since she had been away, she didn''t know anything about what had happened in the Mu Ster Kingdom. She didn''t know that the second prince had already deposed the Mu Ster King and had taken the throne.


    So she was still wary of him.


    But Lin Fan waved his hand for her to calm down.


    Ang had a trace of confusion appearing in her eyes, but she still calmed down since she trusted Lin Fan.


    She moved Xin''er behind her as she watched the second prince and Lin Fane over.


    Lin Fan had been paying attention to the Mu Ster King''s expression when Xin''er ran out and he had seen that strange look that he had before again¡­


    Just what was this look?


    The Mu Ster King still revealed a smile after seeing Ang since he had already known about her as well.


    While he was confused why he didn''t see her recently, he had kept tabs on her and he knew about her rtionship with Lin Fan and¡­Xin''er.


    He didn''t mind at all that she had her guard up and said in a calm voice, "Can youe with me for a bit? I have something I want to show you all and a story I want to tell you."<novelnext></novelnext>


    Ang once again looked at Lin Fan and seeing him give a nod of confirmation, she picked Xin''er up and walked into the carriage.


    It took them another half an hour to reach the center of the city where the Mu Ster King''s second prince manor was.


    The servants came forward and they all wanted to serve the Mu Ster King after hearing about what had happened today. They all wanted to seize this chance to gain as many benefits as possible while he still didn''t have many subordinates yet.


    However, the Mu Ster King just red them all down and forced them away before heading into the manor with Lin Fan, Ang, and Xin''er.


    He led them deep into the manor,ing into the basement before pressing a button to reveal a secret passage. Going through this secret passage, they continued on for a few more minutes until they finally came to a hidden room.


    The door to this hidden room was made from a material that Lin Fan recognized.


    This was Flowing Light Mithril, it was the most resistant and hardest metal that one could find in a Ster Kingdom. This was something that should have been impossible to find, but there was a giant door that was made from this material.


    When he looked even closer, he saw that even the hinges and the walls that these doors were connected to were also made from the same material.


    It was very clear that whatever was in this room was very important to the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King took a locket from his neck and inside of that locket was a fine key that was also made from this Flowing Light Mithril.


    He put the key into the keyhole of this door and then turned it to unlock the door. The moment that the door was unlocked, there were various glows that also came from the door.


    Lin Fan and Ang both revealed frowns when they saw this because they recognized these glows.


    Each single different coloured glow was a different array that had been put on the door. Even the glows that had the same colours were different defensive arrays.


    This kind of precaution, even the panic rooms inside of the pce wouldn''t have this kind of defense¡­


    The door slowly opened and the light of the room was revealed.


    The person sitting inside was surprised to see the door suddenly opening, but seeing that it was the second prince, she revealed a relieved look. She naturally knew what today was and what would happen, but she never expected the second prince to be back so soon.


    Seeing the crown on his head, she asked him, "Is it all over?"


    The Mu Ster King gave a nod before turning his head to look at Xin''er.


    The woman also followed his gaze and turned to look in that direction. The moment that her eyes fell onto Xin''er, she couldn''t stop the tears from appearing in her eyes as she muttered, "Is it really?"


    The Mu Ster King gave a nod in response.


    The woman couldn''t hold back her emotions as she ran forward towards Xin''er and she cried out, "Bao Bao, it really is you!"


    But Xin''er was scared by this person suddenly running towards her, so she hid behind Ang who narrowed her eyes to look at the woman running towards them.


    The woman felt a chill hit her when Ang''s eyes fell onto her, but she didn''t mind it. It was Xin''er''s reaction that caused her to stop in the end.


    She looked at Xin''er and was heartbroken by the reaction that she had. She had thought that this would be their tearful reunion, but this¡­


    Xin''er couldn''t help peeking head out from behind Ang and then she asked Ang, "Mom, who is this person? Why do I feel that she looks familiar?"


    The woman looked at Ang with a stunned look that also had a trace of hatred, but she quickly suppressed this since she knew that this person was her benefactor. She was the one that had taken care of and protected Bao Bao when she had been out in the world alone, so she couldn''t fault her¡­


    It was just the fact that Bao Bao called her "mom" tore into her heart.


    The Mu Ster King gave a sigh when he saw this as his heart was also filled with pain for his Hua''er.


    He turned to look at Lin Fan and said, "I''m sure you''re wondering what this is about, aren''t you?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first, but then he shook his head and said, "I could already guess some of it." As he said this, he took out the token that he had received from Duanmu Hua Yu.


    The cherry blossoms that were on this token were the same as the cherry blossoms that were all over this room.


    It was clear that this woman was Xin''er''s real mother.

 Chapter 884 Xin’er’s Origins (2)

    The Mu Ster King naturally also saw this token, so he just gave a nod in response.


    Then he said, "But do you know who Bao Bao''s father is?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help raising a brow when he heard this.


    The Mu Ster King revealed a mischievous smile when he saw this and said, "It''s me."


    This time, Lin Fan couldn''t help holding back his shock.


    He had assumed the whole time that Xin''er had been the daughter of the previous Mu Ster King and this woman, but he never expected¡­It was no wonder the Mu Ster King had seemed so close to this woman just now¡­


    On the side, Xin''er couldn''t help looking up at Ang with a confused look as she asked, "Who''s Bao Bao?"


    Ang looked at her with a sad look before patting her head and saying, "You are."


    Xin''er''s eyes trembled when she heard this.


    She looked at the Mu Ster King who had just called himself her father and then looked at the woman who stood there with a heartbroken look in her eyes. After a long period of silence, she asked that woman, "Are you my mother?"


    The woman''s eyes filled with a glint of hope when she heard this and she nodded, "Bao Bao, that''s right, I am your mother. Come here, Bao Bao." As she said this, she stretched her arms out towards Xin''er.


    However, even after this confirmation, Xin''er didn''t know what to do.


    She had never thought that she would meet her real parents one day, she had even assumed that they had died, so she had sealed those feelings for them deep in her heart. She had found a new family, so she had decided to move on and live her life with them.


    So this sudden appearance of her birth mother hadpletely caught her off guard.


    But then she felt a hand falling onto her back.


    Ang pushed her out from behind her and said, "She is indeed your mother. You should at least go and say a few words to her." Though there was a strong unwilling tone to her voice.


    The woman looked at Ang with a look of gratitude before turning to look at Xin''er, waiting for her to react.


    Xin''er looked up at Ang before looking back at the woman.


    Then with hesitant steps, she walked over towards the woman until she was standing right in front of her, but she didn''t enter her embrace.


    Seeing this, the woman made a move to hug her. She stopped though when she saw Xin''er take a step back.


    The two of them just stood there awkwardly looking at each other.


    That silence was only broken when Xin''er finally asked, "Are you really my mother."


    The woman didn''t know what to say at first as she just opened and closed her mouth again and again. Then as if she came to a decision, she said, "Your name is Mu Bao Bao, your father is Mu Yong Li and your mother is Dongfang Tao Hua."


    Xin''er couldn''t help repeating after her, "Mu Bao Bao¡­"


    Then after a long moment of silence, she looked up at the woman and said, "I can''te to terms that you are my mother just yet, so can you wait for a bit?"


    The woman looked at her with sparkling eyes that were filled withplicated emotions, but she still gave a nod in the end.


    Xin''er looked at the woman with a smile and reached her hand out as she said, "Thank you."


    The woman looked at this little hand stretched out to her.


    She hesitantly stretched out her own hand until she held this little hand.


    As she held this little soft hand, she couldn''t help saying, "Bao Bao¡­"


    But before she could say anything else, Xin''er said, "This name¡­Mu Bao Bao, it doesn''t feel like it''s mine since I''ve never known it in my life. Can you please still call me Xin''er?"


    The woman''s eyes filled with moreplicated emotions, but she still gave a nod in the end as she said, "Xin''er."


    Xin''er looked up at her with a smile and nodded as she said, "Un."


    Then without holding back, she pulled the woman over to where Ang was waiting and introduced the two of them.


    Naturally, it was an awkward interaction because of their rtionship with Xin''er, but with Xin''er there as a social glue, it didn''t take long before the ice was broken. Still, it was a bit awkward for the two women¡­


    As for the Mu Ster King, he had a happy look in his eyes as he looked at Dongfang Tao Hua.


    He had failed her in the past and had watched her suffer because of his own mistakes. He had always felt that he had let her down in some way and had always wanted to do something to make things better.


    But he had never been able to do anything until today.


    Finally, he felt like had done a bit to make up for all the pain that he had caused her.<novelnext></novelnext>


    At the same time, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan and Ang with looks of gratitude.


    If it hadn''t been for these two who had cared for and protected Bao Bao, it would be hard to imagine what had happened to her.


    So he was grateful towards Lin Fan and Ang even if he didn''t know where they came from or who they really are.


    As far as he was concerned, they were the ones that had saved his child and that was enough.


    After standing there for a bit, the Mu Ster King went over to the side to put on a pot of tea.


    Since Dongfang Tao Hua spent most of her time in this hidden room, most of the things that she needed or wanted were in this room, including a working tea set.


    He normally didn''t do things like prepare tea, but seeing the mothers and daughter together, he couldn''t bear to break them up. So since there were no servants here, it was up to him to make the tea.


    Lin Fan came over and helped. When he saw the Mu Ster King''s surprised look, he just replied with a smile, "Well I''m used to doing things like this."


    This was a good thing for the Mu Ster King since he really didn''t know how to do something as simple as making tea. Instead, he went over to the pantry and prepared some snacks.


    Once the tea was finished and the snacks were brought out, they all sat down on a sofa set.


    On one sofa was Ang and Dongfang Tao Hua with Xin''er between them and on the other sofa was the Mu Ster King and Lin Fan.


    Once he finished pouring everyone''s tea, the Mu Ster King said, "I''m sure that you''re all curious about what happened to Xin''er and why she ended up in the slum city."


    Lin Fan and Ang both gave nods to this as Xin''er looked at the Mu Ster King with wide curious eyes.


    The Mu Ster King took a sip of his tea before saying, "It''s a long story¡­"


    The story between the Mu Ster King and Dongfang Tao Hua really wasplicated.


    They met when they were younger when Dongfang Tao Hua ran away from home. She had encountered the then second prince who had been on his journey and had forcefully added herself to his party.


    But over time, the two of them fell in love as they journeyed together and by the end of the second prince''s journey, they werepletely a couple that couldn''t be separated.


    So even if Dongfang Tao Hua wasn''t willing toe back, she still came back to the Mu Ster Kingdom with the second prince.


    He was nning on bringing her to meet his family and getting engaged to her.


    What he didn''t know was that this was the start of their disaster.


    Dongfang Tao Hua was known as the most beautiful woman in the capital, that was why she had run away in the first ce. The Dongfang Family had nned on using her in a political marriage and she didn''t want to be controlled by them.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help admitting that she was indeed beautiful.


    She was almost as beautiful as Ang and that was a veryrgepliment since Ang was the most beautiful woman that he had ever seen.


    The only reason that she had returned was because she was with the second prince.


    The second prince had told her that he would have the royal family engage them. As long as there was this engagement in ce, there wouldn''t be anyone that would be able to tear them apart.


    At the same time, the Dongfang Family would be happy since they would have a connection with the royal family and the second prince. There wasn''t a better connection for them to build at the time since the second prince was already very likely to be the crown prince at the time with how the former Mu Ster King relied on him.


    But no one expected that the Mu Ster King would fall in love with Dongfang Tao Hua.


    He had long heard about the most beautiful woman in the capital, but she had disappeared before he could find her. Since she was gone, he had forgotten about her and had moved on to other women.


    With how many princes and princesses there were, it was clear that the former Mu Ster King was a womanizer and he wasn''t a normal one. He took every beauty that he desired and no one dared to do anything since he was the king.


    When the second prince brought Dongfang Tao Hua into the pce to meet his father, the former Mu Ster King had fallen in love with her at first sight. He knew at that moment that he had to have her, even if she was the second prince''s woman.


    They did their best to resist, but the second prince couldn''t resist the former Mu Ster King at that time and Dongfang Tao Hua was taken from him.


    But then there was another variable.


    Dongfang Tao Hua had be pregnant.


    During the course of their journey, as their rtionship became closer and closer, naturally the second prince and Dongfang Tao Hua had already slept together. It was only when they came back that they discovered that Dongfang Tao Hua was pregnant.


    The Mu Ster King flew into a rage and ordered the child to be killed. He still wanted Dongfang Tao Hua even though she had been defiled, that was how much her beauty had affected him.


    It took everything that the second prince could do to get Dongfang Tao Hua out of the pce and into this hidden room. At the same time, he secretly helped her give birth and then had to send the child away to the slum city to hide her.


    That was how Duanmu Hua Yu and the child known as Min''er appeared in the slum city.

 Chapter 885 Xin’er’s Origins (3)

    After that incident, there had been a rift created between the second prince and the Mu Ster King, which was what led to the current situation of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Everyone had thought that the second prince would take the crown prince title, but then the rift happened and the first and fourth prince gained power.


    However, during all of this, the second prince had already started making his move.


    He knew that to allow Dongfang Tao Hua to return and to find his child again, he had to seize power from his father. So he plotted with his friends, slowly gaining power until he had enough to take down his father like he had done today.


    By the end of the story, he looked at Lin Fan and Ang with grateful looks as he said, "It''s all thanks to you that I was able to reunite with my daughter today. Thank you for keeping her safe."


    Dongfang Tao Hua also looked at them with grateful looks and repeated with a bow, "Thank you for keeping her safe."


    Xin''er was still a child, so she didn''t understand most of what had been said, but she could understand the hardships that her birth parents had gone through because of her. She lowered her head and asked, "Was I a burden?"


    Dongfang Tao Hua immediately shook her head and said, "No, you were a gift from god. You were the crystallization of our love and our treasure. There will never be a time when you will be a burden."


    The Mu Ster King gave a nod and said, "Xin''er, you are our treasure."


    Xin''er felt a bit of warmth fill her chest before she revealed a bright smile.


    After feeling warm together for a bit, Dongfang Tao Hua suddenly remembered something and asked, "Right¡­What happened to grandpa Duanmu? Wasn''t he supposed to be taking care of Xin''er?"


    The Mu Ster King slightly knitted his brows as he remembered this and he looked at Lin Fan with a questioning look.


    This time, it was Lin Fan''s turn to tell the story. With a sigh, he told them about everything that had happened in the slum city.


    As they listened to this story, Xin''er became more and more silent until she just sat there with a sad look on her face, not saying a single thing.


    But both the Mu Ster King and Dongfang Tao Hua also had simr looks.


    After all, old man Duanmu was someone that was important to them.


    Duanmu Hua Yu had once been a housekeeper in the Dongfang Family. Specifically, he had been assigned to take care of Dongfang Tao Hua and had been with her since she was a child.


    It could be said that he was the one that had raised her.


    So in her heart, Duanmu Hua Yu was like a grandfather.


    That was also the reason why the Mu Ster King had trusted Duanmu Hua Yu with the infant Mu Bao Bao.


    But learning that he was dead now¡­


    Dongfang Tao Hua couldn''t help muttering, "Grandpa Duanmu¡­" As she said this, there were tears that formed in her eyes.


    She still remembered being chased around by him whenever she was naughty as a child, those were memories that could never fade. But now it seemed like she would never have a chance to see the kind grandfather from those memories again.


    Xin''er had never had anyone to share her sadness over Duanmu Hua Yu''s death with since there was no one that could understand it. After all, she was the only one that was close to him when he died.


    Lin Fan had only known Duanmu Hua Yu for a period of time, so his feelings about him couldn''tpare to Xin''er.


    But now she found that there was indeed someone that could share her sadness.


    After all, before Duanmu Hua Yu had taken care of her, he had taken care of her mother, so they knew how each other felt.


    Xin''er turned to Dongfang Tao Hua and asked, "Can we visit grandpa''s grave together?"


    Dongfang Tao Hua looked at her daughter and seeing the look in her eyes, she gave a nod in response.


    Then to Dongfang Tao Hua''s surprise, Xin''er suddenly moved forward to hug her.


    Tears once again appeared in Dongfang Tao Hua''s eyes after she recovered from her surprise and she stretched her arms out to hug Xin''er as well.


    As for the Mu Ster King, he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    He was the one who had sent Duanmu Hua Yu to the slum city with Xin''er, so it could be said that it was his fault. If he hadn''t sent him or if he had prepared better, then perhaps he would have been able to prevent his death in the end¡­


    But at the same time, he also fell into deep thought.


    After all, ording to Lin Fan''s story, this was most likely the move of one of the former prince''s.


    One of the former prince''s had found out about Xin''er and had wanted to make a move against her¡­Now that he had be the Mu Ster King, it seemed like he needed to move up his n to announce Xin''er''s identity so he could provide more security for her¡­<novelnext></novelnext>


    Otherwise, it would be toote to regret it if something were to happen.


    With this thought in mind, the Mu Ster King revealed a firm determined look.


    After letting down his family once, he wouldn''t let it happen again.


    Once they finished discussing everything, there was nothing for them to do except let the mothers and daughter have their time together.


    But before they could get too into it, the door to this hidden room suddenly opened and a petite figure ran in. This petite figure looked around the room until her eyes fell onto Dongfang Tao Hua before immediately running over to her.


    Then without hesitation, she jumped off the ground and into Dongfang Tao Hua''s embrace.


    Dongfang Tao Hua didn''t dodge out of the way and caught this petite figure with a faint smile as she said, "Xiao Qian, it''s been a long time."


    The petite figure drilled her head into Dongfang Tao Hua''s chest and said, "Big sis, I''ve missed you so much!"


    This petite figure that had suddenly charged into the room was naturally the second young miss of the Dongfang Family, Dongfang Qian Hua. The one that Lin Fan had been in contact with before.


    As for why everyone regarded her as the Dongfang Family''s young miss instead of the second miss, that was because it was ordered by the former Mu Ster King to erase the matter of Dongfang Tao Hua. So the Dongfang Family had no choice but to pretend like Dongfang Tao Hua never existed.


    After taking a while to calm down, Dongfang Qian Hua gave a cough and wiped her tears off before leaving Dongfang Tao Hua''s embrace. She looked up and the first thing that she did was re at the Mu Ster King like there was a family grudge between the two of them.


    Well, there technically was a family grudge since it was the Mu Ster King and the former Mu Ster King''s fault that her big sister had to suffer through everything that she had suffered.


    The Mu Ster King just revealed an awkward smile since he never knew how to handle this little sister inw.


    Then after ring at the Mu Ster King, her re turned to Lin Fan as she said, "Why didn''t you tell me that you had already found Bao Bao?"


    With her intelligence, it didn''t take much for her to figure out what had happened. She knew that Xin''er was Mu Bao Bao, her niece.


    The reason why she had Lin Fan search for her in the first ce was because she wanted to keep her safe after hearing about the prince''s people moving in the slum city. But she never expected that the little girl who followed Lin Fan was actually her niece and she had been this close all along.


    Lin Fan just revealed an awkward smile and said, "I didn''t know who to trust, it wasn''t as if I could just tell you, right? I didn''t know if the Dongfang Family wanted to do anything to Xin''er."


    Dongfang Qian Hua red at him a bit more, but she gave a sigh in the end and shook her head since she understood where his logic wasing from. That was the curse of intelligence sometimes, she couldn''t get angry even if she wanted to because she could see through the logic easily.


    She ignored the two men and turned to Xin''er to say with a smile, "Bao Bao, it''s me, your aunt Qian Hua. Come and give me a hug."


    But her sudden enthusiasm scared Xin''er away. It caused her to run over to where Ang was and she hid behind Ang as she peeked out to look at Dongfang Qian Hua.


    Dongfang Qian Hua''s smile was immediately reced with a look of disappointment as she turned to Dongfang Tao Hua and said, "Big sis, why does Bao Bao hate me?"


    Dongfang Tao Hua revealed a smile that had a hint of bitterness to it as she said, "Xin''er doesn''t have any memories of us, so it could said that we''re strangers to her. It''s normal for her to be scared if youe on this strong. Also, she wants to be called Xin''er, not Bao Bao."


    Dongfang Qian Hua took a look at Lin Fan and Ang after hearing this before turning back to give a nod.


    Since she couldn''t get Xin''er toe to her like this, then she would have to think of another method.


    After tilting her head to think for a bit, she suddenly waved her hand and there were lollipops that appeared. She looked at Xin''er with a smile and said, "Xin''er, auntie Qian Qian has some treats for you. Come over here, alright?"


    Dongfang Tao Hua began shaking her head, but then her movement got stuck as she saw Xin''er slowlye out from behind Ang. Then her lips couldn''t help twitching as she saw Xin''er slowly move over to Dongfang Qian Hua before reaching her hand towards the lollipops and saying, "Auntie, can I really have these?"


    Dongfang Qian Hua looked at Dongfang Tao Hua with a smug look before turning to Xin''er with a smile, "Of course you can, Xin''er! Auntie has prepared a lot of these for you!"


    Xin''er took the lollipops with a happy smile before looking at Dongfang Qian Hua to say, "Thank you, auntie!"


    Dongfang Tao Hua pouted her lips before also picking up some cookies and saying, "Xin''er,e over here and let mommy feed you!"


    Xin''er looked at her and then obediently went over with her mouth open.


    Just like this, the two sisters started using sweets topete for Xin''er''s affection.


    Lin Fan''s face was covered in three dark lines when he saw this.


    It seemed like he would have to teach Xin''er about taking candy from strangers¡­


    Wait, that didn''t seem right either since technically they weren''t strangers¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help rubbing his head as he felt a headacheing on.

 Chapter 886 Future Plans (1)

    "The Mu Ster King''s daughter?!" Xiao Tu shouted out with a shocked look on his face.


    Xin''er just nodded with a smile.


    Xiao Tu and his five little sisters all looked at Xin''er with shocked looks when they heard this since they never thought that Xin''er would have this kind of origin.


    They knew that Xin''er wasn''t the strange shopkeeper''s real daughter, but they never expected this.


    Xiao Tu''s face couldn''t help filling with despair as he heard this because he knew the disparity in status between him and Xin''er had just jumped to the level of heaven and earth. He was nothing more than an orphan that had been picked up by the shopkeeper and Xin''er was now the one and only princess of the Mu Ster Kingdom¡­


    He thought that he had a chance when Xin''er didn''t know who her real parents were, but now¡­


    The five little sisters didn''t mind because they didn''t care about things like status. They were just happy for Xin''er that she had found her family and then they headed off to y.


    Even though Xin''er had found her family, she still stayed in Lin Fan''s store because she felt that it was awkward to leave them.


    The Mu Ster King had offered to build a brand new mansion for them, but Xin''er firmly rejected this.


    So in the end, both Xin''er and Dongfang Tao Hua lived in the store together.


    The Mu Ster King had also wanted to move here, but since he was the Mu Ster King, that was impossible. All he could do was visit as much as possible, but since he was the Mu Ster King, he couldn''t be more busy.


    However, he was here today because he knew that Xin''er was about to tell her friends her real identity. He wanted to be there tofort her in case something went wrong and to support her if it went well.


    Naturally it didn''t escape his sharp eyes the way that Xiao Tu looked at Xin''er.


    Even a fool would be able to notice the way that Xiao Tu felt about Xin''er, so his protective emotions were immediately ignited.


    But before he could do anything, Lin Fan stopped him.


    He felt the same way about Xiao Tu, but he knew that doing anything to Xiao Tu would just make Xin''er sad and he wanted to see that even less. Of course, that didn''t mean that he approved of Xiao Tu.


    In his mind, there was no one that could be worthy of Xin''er.


    The Mu Ster King looked at Lin Fan with a strange look, so he had no choice but to exin. At the end of his exnation, he didn''t forget to add, "He''s not a bad kid, just a bit rash and headstrong."


    Those were his honest feelings about Xiao Tu.


    After all, Xiao Tu had been in his store for some time, so it was a lie to say that he didn''t feel a small connection with the kid.


    The Mu Ster King knitted his brows, but he still epted what Lin Fan said. He recognized that this was a first time being a parent for him and he recognized that Lin Fan was more experienced in this, so he listened to him.


    But it still felt wrong letting this fly get so close to his cute daughter.


    Lin Fan recognized the look on his face and said with a sly smile, "Of course, that doesn''t mean that we''ll be letting him do what he wants."


    The Mu Ster King revealed an interested look when he heard this and asked, "What do you have in mind?"


    Lin Fan waved him over and then whispered a few of his evil ideas to him.


    The Mu Ster King was confused at first, but then his eyes lit up as he said with a smile, "That could work."


    The two of them both had evil smiles on their faces as they looked at Xiao Tu who was silently watching Xin''er.


    Xiao Tu had been focused on Xin''er, but when their gazes fell onto him, he couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his back. He looked around himself to see where the source of this chill wasing from, but of course, with their higher cultivation, they were able to easily hide it from him.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t know about the torture that he would be facing in the future.


    There were other people that came to the shop after the dust had settled and they were all surprised to find that Xin''er was the princess now. However, no one treated her any differently, or rather they didn''t dare treat her differently with Lin Fan and the Mu Ster King ring at them.


    The biggest surprise in the end wasn''t actually the reveal that Xin''er was the princess, but rather the engagement between Yang Xi Ruo and Jun Xie.


    After they became engaged, Lin Fan was shocked to find that Yang Xi Ruo had beenpletely tamed by Jun Xie. She no longer acted the same way as before and was like putty in his hands as she followed him wherever he went.


    He really couldn''t help feeling envy for just a second before quickly putting away those thoughts.


    If Ang were to ever find out that he had had these thoughts¡­


    The ending result would be too ugly to look at.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It seemed that everything was about to be settled and that the situation would be stable, but there was still one thing that was looming over their heads.


    The Mu Ster Kingdom and the Ran Ster Kingdom were about to go to war with the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom.


    This was a national affair that was impossible to ignore and every part of the Mu Ster Kingdom prepared for this.


    All the troops had gathered and they were getting ready to be deployed the moment that the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom made their move. That seemed like it would happen any day now since the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom had already moved their troops closer to the Mu Ster Kingdom and Ran Ster Kingdom borders.


    Everyone was looking forward to this war because they all believed that the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom were fools for trying to dere war on them. So they wanted to gain glory in battle and then raise their own prestige.


    This was a perfect opportunity for all the nobles now that the new Mu Ster King had taken over. It was also a perfect opportunity for the former princes since they no longer were able to be the Mu Ster King, so they needed to raise their own positions with battle glory.


    Everyone was looking forward to this war, but this war shouldn''t have had anything to do with Lin Fan.


    But it actually did have a connection to Lin Fan.


    Or rather, the Tai Ster Kingdom had a connection to Lin Fan.


    Technically, Lin Fan was still a fugitive that was wanted by the Tai Ster Kingdom for what had happened in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    After what he did, it was impossible for the Bing and Huo Families to let him off, so his only option was to take care of the Tai Ster Kingdom before they took care of him. However, the other side was an entire Ster Kingdom, so it was impossible for Lin Fan who was only in the True Soul Realm to take care of them by himself.


    Just a single World Realm Expert from either of the families would be able to take him out, so there was nothing that he could do.


    That all changed now that there was an imminent war between the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms and the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    If the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom were to win and take care of the Tai Ster Kingdom for him¡­then wouldn''t that take care of his problem?


    So as long as he supported the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms in the war, it would be like killing two birds with one stone.


    Of course, even without his previous connection with the Tai Ster Kingdom, he would still help the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Xin''er''s real father was the Mu Ster King and he was a good friend of Lin Fan''s, so it wasn''t as if Lin Fan would just abandon him.


    But before he could do anything, he had to talk to the Mu Ster King about this and there was no better time than this.


    So he tapped the Mu Ster King and pointed to the side to signal that he wanted to talk alone.


    The Mu Ster King was surprised by this, but he still followed Lin Fan since he was curious about what he wanted to say.


    He had known Lin Fan for some time now and it was rare for him to see Lin Fan acting this way. Normally, Lin Fan was much more silent and mysterious, so for Lin Fan to take the initiative to ask him to talk, something had to be up.


    "You want to provide training for our army?" The Mu Ster King said with a shocked look after hearing Lin Fan''s suggestion.


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response.


    He had already thought about how he could help the Mu Ster Kingdom''s army and he knew that this was the best way. After all, his special thing was his ability to train pets with his system, so the only thing that he could do for the Mu Ster Kingdom was training the pets of their troops.


    Of course, he had to ensure that he could do this with the store and after confirming, he had found a way.


    What he would do is set up a temporary shop in the military camp that would train pets for the military, but they would have to pay him ording to the prices set by the main shop. As for who would pay for it, it would naturally be the Mu Ster Kingdom since they couldn''t expect the soldiers to pay for this themselves.


    They would bankrupt themselves before they could pay Lin Fan''s price.


    So to put it simply, he would act as a contractor to the Mu Ster Kingdom army, training their pets for them.


    The Mu Ster King stroked his chin to think about it before giving a hesitant nod in agreement to this idea.


    One part of this decision was his personal feelings and Xin''er''s feelings towards Lin Fan, but the bigger part of his decision was that he had personally seen the effects of Lin Fan''s store''s training.


    His pet''s power had surged after receiving just a single training session from Lin Fan, so if the experts of their army could receive the same training¡­It would give them a greater chance of defeating the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    But there was still something he was worried about.


    The Mu Ster King hesitated a bit before asking, "But what are you going to tell Xin''er?"


    Lin Fan also slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.

 Chapter 887 Future Plans (2)

    Lin Fan was important to Xin''er, the Mu Ster King recognized this.


    He was even sometimes jealous that Xin''er was closer to Lin Fan than to him, her actual biological father, but he also couldn''t me her.


    Lin Fan had been the one who had taken her in when she was at the lowest point of her life and had been the one who provided love and care to her, it was inevitable that he would have a high position in her heart.


    That was why he hesitated now.


    This war wasn''t something that would end quickly, it was very likely that Xin''er would be separated from Lin Fan for months or even years.


    This wasn''t something that he wanted to force onto Xin''er when she was still so young.


    If the worst case scenario came and something were to happen to Lin Fan, then¡­it would be hard for her to ever recover.


    Lin Fan wasn''t heading off to go on a pic, he was heading off to a war. Even if he wouldn''t be fighting and would only take a support position in their military camp, he was still heading off to the frontlines.


    It was very easy for an ident to happen on the frontlines.


    While both of them were silent, Xin''er chose this time toe into the room that they were talking in.


    She had noticed that the two of them were gone, so she hade looking for them.


    When she came into the room, she saw the serious looks on their faces and couldn''t help feeling a bit worried. So she revealed a smile and asked, "Dad, what are you talking about?"


    She felt strange about using dad to address both of them, but they had said that they didn''t mind, so she continued using this way to address the two of them.


    Lin Fan and the Mu Ster King were both surprised by the appearance of Xin''er, but they still didn''t say anything.


    After all, this was something that they wanted to keep from her.


    But then the Mu Ster King suddenly had an idea. Even if this idea was a bit cruel, he felt that this would be the best way to protect Xin''er.


    So the Mu Ster King said, "Xin''er, you should know that there''s a waring up, right? Lin Fan wants to head off to the frontlines."


    Xin''er immediately revealed a shocked look before turning to look at Lin Fan who was looking at the Mu Ster King in shock. She asked in a shaky voice, "Dad, are you really heading off to the war?"


    Lin Fan could guess what the Mu Ster King was nning on doing and even if it was cruel, he knew that it was effective.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before turning back to Xin''er and saying, "I''m heading off to protect you, your mother, and everyone else that we love here in the Mu Ster Kingdom."


    Xin''er''s eyes trembled when she heard this, but she didn''t act selfish like the Mu Ster King had expected. Instead, she just stood there silently looking up at Lin Fan for a long time before saying, "Pleasee back safely."


    ? Lin Fan nodded and patted her on the head without saying anything.


    To the side, the Mu Ster King was shocked when he heard this.


    He had thought that Xin''er would pout and plead with Lin Fan not to go, but it seemed that he had beenpletely wrong.


    After thinking about it, he realized that he hadpletely underestimated Xin''er and that he didn''t really understand the girl that was his daughter.


    He had thought that she was just a kid, but he remembered everything that she went through. Everything that had been because of his own mistakes¡­


    She had no choice but to grow up quicker than other kids in that environment. The reason why she was acting the way that she was now was because she had never been able to act this way when she was younger. So she was making up for everything that she had missed out on.


    But that gave the Mu Ster King the wrong perception of his daughter.


    His daughter was much stronger and much more understanding than he thought¡­


    He gave a sigh before saying, "Lin Fan, I''ll arrange everything for you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response without saying anything else.


    He could see the look in the Mu Ster King''s eyes, so he chose not to make things worse with what he had been nning on doing.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This father and daughter had just reunited and he didn''t want to do anything that would cause a rift in their rtionship. After all, that would just hurt Xin''er and he didn''t want that to happen.


    But to their surprise, Xin''er actually came right up to the Mu Ster King and punched him in the leg before running off without looking at either of them.


    The Mu Ster King revealed a distraught look and turned to Lin Fan for help, but he exined that this was just her way of venting her anger at him and she would forgive him eventually. But of course, the Mu Ster King wasn''t convinced that easily, so Lin Fan had his work cut out for him.


    In the end, he was able to convince the Mu Ster King not to do anything, or else the entire Mu Ster Kingdom would have been affected¡­


    The Mu Ster King was even thinking about opening up the royal treasury just to find something that would make Xin''er happy again, but Lin Fan immediately shut that down.


    The treasury in the pce was the culmination of countless generations of the royal family and the Mu Ster King wanted to open it up just to make his daughter happy. If his ancestors knew about this, they would flip in their graves.


    Even the ancestors in the pce would flip if they were to hear this.


    Lin Fan had thought that he was a doting parent, but he learned the real definition of a doting parent from this man in front of him¡­


    After that matter was taken care of, there was nothing left for Lin Fan to do for the rest of the day, so he just left the store to Xiao Tu and headed into the back.


    He knew that if he were to go to the frontlines with his current cultivation, he would be putting himself in danger.


    Unless he was able to break through, it was actually foolish to head to the frontlines since there could always be an ident. The only way for him to truly protect himself was to break through to the World Realm.


    Only if he had this power would he be able to protect himself from the World Realm Experts of the enemies.


    If this was before, it would have taken him a long time to break through even if he had the experience of doing it before from the trial realm. However, after he finished the mission that the system assigned him, the reward was something that hadpletely shocked him.


    It was a Divine Grade Nine Revolution Pill, the ultimate pill that could be refined with his Nine Revolutions Pill Refining Technique.


    He thought that it would be a long time until he would be able to see one of these, but the system decided to give him one as a reward.


    It was almost as if it knew exactly what he needed at just the right time¡­


    As if the system was alive¡­


    Since his system had given him this pill, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to take it. After arranging everything, he went into one of the private rooms and locked the door before sitting down cross legged in the center.


    He held the pill in his palm and looked at it carefully, admiring the perfect set of ten pill lines on it.


    That was what defined it as a Divine Grade Pill, a perfect set of ten pill lines.


    Right now, he was only able to push a pill up to two or three pills if he really went all out, but those pills were still trash in front of this ten pill line pill. This was the peak of perfection when it came to alchemy and now Lin Fan was about to take this pill.


    He really was curious about how it would feel.


    The answer to that question was¡­pain.


    The moment that he took the pill, all he felt was the revolutions of the pill filling his body.


    As the name of the pill suggested, it wasn''t just refined with nine revolutions, but it also revolved every part of his body nine times to refine his body. But of course, this was a very painful process since it was like ripping his body apart and putting it back together a total of nine times.


    Lin Fan gritted his teeth and didn''t make a single sound, but the beads of sweat dripping down his forehead showed just how painful it was.


    But as his body was being refined again and again, he could feel the threshold of his breakthrough loosening. He became more and more in tune with thews of the world and the true soul inside of him scattered until it created an entire world.


    The reason why the World Realm was called the World Realm was because it took the soul formed during the Soul Realm and expanded it into an entire world inside of one''s dantian. That was where the "world" in World Realm came from.


    By the end of it, Lin Fan had a full world inside of his dantian and a floating there all by itself.


    To call it a was a bit too much since it was nothing more than a rock that had nothing on it, but this rock was the sign that he had broken through.


    Lin Fan had pushed through into the World Realm.

 Chapter 888 Setting Off

    Another few days passed before Lin Fan finally came out of the room.


    The moment that he did, he could feel the changes that had happened with his body.


    The room that he had been refining the pill in was a special room that had been made by the system that waspletely cut off from the world. So during the time he was in the room, he wasn''t able to sense anything outside of the room.


    That included the myriad ofws in the world outside of the room.


    Now that he had stepped out, thews rushed into his body and entered the world in his dantian, creating many different new things in that world of his.


    There was even a hint of green that appeared on the inside of that world.


    He could feel that there werews that were gathering inside of his dantian, almost as if it was creating a replication of the world. Of course, there were certainws that were stronger than the others.


    Such as the ck hole and the golden suns that were also there¡­


    When he came out from the back, everyone was surprised by Lin Fan''s appearance.


    They all felt that there was something different about him, almost as if he was apletely different person.


    The Mu Ster King was also here since he had heard that Lin Fan had been gone for a while from Xin''er. He had been worried about what effect this would have on her, so he had been checking in on her daily.


    But seeing Lin Fan now, he understood why he had disappeared.


    At the same time, he was also surprised by this since he never thought that Lin Fan would be this fast.


    When he had broken through into the World Realm, it had taken him a whole month to break through and that was already considered fast. Just that month-long breakthrough was enough to consider him a genius.


    Lin Fan had done it in only just three days.


    If he was considered a genius, then what was Lin Fan?


    A monster?


    An abnormality?


    Yes, that was the only way to describe him.


    The Mu Ster King was filled with more and more doubt about Lin Fan''s true identity. At the same time, he couldn''t help worrying about whether Lin Fan had any other intentions towards the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    But he shook those thoughts away.


    If Lin Fan really had these thoughts, he would have done something already.


    But then when he saw how everyone looked at Lin Fan, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    It wasn''t that he couldn''t understand why they looked at him like this, but rather there was this strange bitter feeling that filled him when he saw them like this.


    Well, it would be strange for him not to feel this way after seeing the looks of admiration on their faces as they looked at him. Even his wife and daughter had that same trace of admiration in their eyes.


    It wasn''t love, so there was nothing for him to worry about. It was just admiration for something that was beautiful.


    The Mu Ster King considered himself a handsome person, but he knew that he couldn''tpare to Lin Fan. Lin Fan was the true definition of a handsome person with his perfect features.


    He already thought that Lin Fan was handsome before he broke through, but after breaking through to the World Realm, he had no choice but to admit that he was inferior to Lin Fan when it came to appearances.


    Of course, this wasn''t all because Lin Fan broke through to the World Realm, but rather because of the Nine Revolution Pill.


    That pill not only helped him break through to the World Realm, it also refined his body through nine different revolutions. That allowed his body to not only be stronger, but also helped him remove the impurities inside, which made him even more handsome.


    It was a Divine Grade Pill, so if it didn''t have a divine grade effect, it wouldn''t suit that name.


    So now Lin Fan was on the same level of beauty as Ang, which was saying a lot since Ang without hiding it was the most beautiful thing that anyone had seen.


    Now that Lin Fan had broken through, there was nothing left holding him back from leaving.


    During the time that he had been in closed door cultivation, the war had actually started.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It was just a small skirmish on the border, but it was enough to escte to a full blown war. Of course, that was what the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had nned.


    In fact, even the cause of the skirmish was a set up from these two Ster Kingdoms.


    They were the ones that had blown up their own transport ships and then med it on the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms.


    The frontlines had already been determined and the different armies had been sent to build a frontline base. So if Lin Fan wanted to go, he would be able to go at any time.


    But before he went, he couldn''t help asking the Mu Ster King, "Have there been signs of the Bing or Huo Families from the Tai Ster Kingdom on the frontlines?"


    The Mu Ster King waspletely confused by this question and was curious why Lin Fan was so interested in these two families, but he still honestly answered, "Their troops have been seen there. Why are you interested in this?"


    Lin Fan thought about it before honestly saying, "I have some history with the two of them."


    The Mu Ster King revealed a look of understanding as he heard this.


    This was the final key to the puzzle that had been troubling him all this time.


    He had been thinking about why Lin Fan wanted to go to the war and why he was helping their Mu Ster Kingdom. He had thought that it was just for Xin''er, but now that didn''t seem to be the case.


    When he thought about it carefully, he remembered that when he mentioned the Tai and Ran Ster Kingdoms, he had seen a strange reaction from Lin Fan. He had thought that it was nothing, but that didn''t seem to be the case now.


    Lin Fan must have had some bad history with the Tai Ster Kingdom, particrly these two families that he had just mentioned. That was most likely the reason why he came to their Mu Ster Kingdom in the first ce.


    The enemy of an enemy was a friend, not to mention that Lin Fan was his friend in the first ce.


    Since that was the case, there was no need to doubt Lin Fan''s motives.


    But the Mu Ster King also couldn''t help worrying since the Bing and Huo Families were two of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom. Even if they were controlled by the Tai Ster Royal Family in the end, they still had considerable influence in the Tai Ster Kingdom.


    It was not an enemy that Lin Fan could face alone.


    He was worried that Lin Fan might do something rash on the battlefield.


    So after considering it, the Mu Ster King decided to post a few guards to Lin Fan.


    The excuse for this was to guard him as a special contractor, but of course, he wouldn''t just send anyone. He would send one of his most trusted guards to protect Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was a close friend now and the adopted father of his daughter Xin''er. For these two reasons, he would keep Lin Fan safe.


    Before leaving though, Lin Fan still had one more thing to do.


    Even if Ang didn''t show it, it was clear that she was angry that he was leaving the store and heading to the frontline alone.


    Even though she understood why he was doing this, she was still angry at him for putting himself in danger like this.


    Even though she knew that he had to do this to ensure the safety of his family, she was still going to punish him for being selfish.


    So Lin Fan spent the rest of his time before deployment appeasing Ang.


    It certainly wasn''t an easy matter, but he did all he could.


    He left the store to Xiao Tu and brought Ang out to the best dessert stores to let her eat whatever she wanted.


    But whenever they went out, she also brought along Xin''er, Dongfang Tao Hua, Dongfang Qian Hua who always hung around the store now, the five sisters, and Yuki.


    With all these people eating all that they wanted, it really was a strain on his wallet¡­


    It was a good thing that Lin Fan had quite a bit stored up from his business in the slum city or it definitely would have been bad for him¡­


    Speaking of the slum city, he had also brought some of the gang leaders up to the capital city like he had promised. He had given them some money to start a new business that was based on the memories of his past life, but at the same time, he also had them protect Xiao Tu and the other staff members just in case anything happened.


    The Mu Ster King would certainly protect his store while he was gone, but he was a busy person. So Lin Fan made sure that everything at the store was safe by bringing in his own people.


    With all of this in ce, he was finally assured in leaving the Mu Ster Kingdom''s capital and heading to the frontline camp.

 Chapter 889 Military Camp

    It took Lin Fan only a single day to arrive at the military camp which was quite a distance away.


    The Ster Kingdoms were kingdoms that didn''t rule over a single star system, but rather multiple star systems. Their influence spread across multiples that were very far away, so to keep that influence, they would naturally need a way to travel between thoses.


    Cultivators that broke through the Soul Realm were able to travel betweens, but that wasn''t reliable since it would take a lot of life energy to do so.


    So to facilitate travel betweens, they invented spaceships that could travel at the speed of light. After all, most Ster Kingdoms actually had territory that spread across several gxies.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being amazed on his first trip in this spaceship.


    This was a world of sci-fi fantasy that hadn''t been realized back on earth, so he was very excited to take this trip.


    But when they traveled at the speed of light, it was far too fast for him to see anything. All he could see was space warping around him as they flew through the emptiness of space, there weren''t any stars or ster bodies for him to see like he had expected.


    When they arrived at the camp, there wasn''t anyone there to greet them.


    Lin Fan was just led by the assistant that the Mu Ster King had assigned him to the location of his new store.


    This assistant that the Mu Ster King had sent, Lin Fan knew that this person wasn''t as simple as she seemed.


    Lin Fan wasn''t able to see through her cultivation, so he knew that she was much stronger than him.


    So he also knew that this assistant shouldn''t be just an assistant, but rather a bodyguard that he had ced on him to ensure his safety.


    Knowing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling touched.


    After all, the Mu Ster King was doing this much to ensure his safety, so he must care for him to a certain extent.


    The assistant''s name was simply Ying, or at least that was what she told him.


    She was actually the head of the Mu Ster King''s private guards and she had been following him since he had been the second prince. She was one of his closest confidants and one of the people that he trusted in the most.


    She also trusted him implicitly and was filled with admiration towards him.


    So even though she was confused why she had been assigned to protect this seeminglymon looking man, she still followed his orders and went along with Lin Fan.


    Though it would be a lie to say that she wasn''t a bit unwilling to do so.


    She admired the Mu Ster King and even had aspirations of one day catching his attention, so to be pulled away from him during this time¡­It was certainly not a good situation for her.


    So even if she didn''t mean to, she was a bit prickly when she talked to Lin Fan since she could only vent this unwilling feeling towards him.


    Lin Fan however didn''t mind at all as he could guess what she was thinking. He even felt that it was quite funny since he had already seen how deeply in love the Mu Ster King was with Dongfang Tao Hua.


    He didn''t believe that he would ever cheat, let alone take a concubine.


    So he couldn''t help feeling a bit sorry for her since he could already guess what would happen.


    When he arrived at the store, he was surprised to see how different it was from every other building around.


    Most of the other residences around this building were all tents. This building was one of the few buildings that had been ced in this camp.


    After all, this was a temporary camp, so it didn''t make sense to build solid buildings like this. The only other buildings that were here were all important military locations that would serve a long term use.


    When the soldiers in the camp saw Lin Fan arrive at the new store, they naturally couldn''t help looking at him with curiosity and a bit of hostility.


    They were curious why this person would receive this kind of special treatment.


    As for the hostility, they were naturally envious of the treatment this person received.


    But not a single one of them dared to do anything about it.


    They knew that to receive this kind of treatment, this person would have a special status. If they were to do anything to him, the ones that would suffer would be them in the end.


    After all, they were nothing more than rank and file soldiers, so they weren''t that strong to begin with.


    They could also sense that they couldn''t see through the depths of this person or the assistant beside him. So even if they did want to make a move against him, it was very unlikely that they would be able to do anything to him.


    They could only watch to see what made this person special.


    Lin Fan entered the building when he arrived and he was surprised by what he saw.


    He thought that this ce would either be decorated as a store or wouldn''t have any decorations at all, but this wasn''t the case. This building was filled with only equipment for training pets and a room for him to sleep in, there was nothing else here.<novelnext></novelnext>


    However, he knew that this fit what he currently needed since he was nothing more than a contractor hired to train pets.


    But this didn''t work for the system since it wouldn''t allow its host to live in a space that it didn''t control.


    So in the end, Lin Fan drew the curtains and closed the door behind him beforeing out with Ying.


    Ying was confused why he would do this and asked, "Mister Lin, what are you doing?"


    But Lin Fan didn''t give an answer. All he said was, "Wait and see."


    She clearly wanted to say something else, but seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, she knew that it would be useless. No matter what she asked him, it was clear that he wouldn''t give her an answer.


    So she had no choice but to wait and see.


    They stood outside the store for a full ten minutes before Lin Fan gave a nod and started moving towards the door.


    Ying was naturally surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden movement, but she still followed him since she was curious what he was doing.


    The moment that he opened the door and she saw the inside of the store, her chin couldn''t help dropping.


    The store lookedpletely different from before.


    It still had the same design andyout, but the furnishings werepletely different.


    To put it simply, it was as if everything in the store had been upgraded.


    But that didn''t make any sense since she hadn''t heard a single thing from the store. So how had he refurbished the store so quickly?


    Not to mention, there was no sound made at all.


    It was as if it had been changed with magic.


    Ying couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a different look. The trace of unwillingness in her heart also faded a bit as she realized that Lin Fan wasn''t what he seemed on the surface.


    The Mu Ster King must have had his reason to send her to guard over him if he had this kind of ability.


    Lin Fan on the other hand didn''t care at all as he entered the store and started looking around.


    He was surprised that the system had decorated the store like this since he had never seen it do that. He had actually been worried that the store would have changed into something like the other store back in the Mu Ster Kingdom capital.


    That would have been hard for him to exin.


    It was a good thing that the system had its considerations.


    Luckily the store wasn''t going to open today since he was going to take the day to settle and get used to the new store, however¡­the soldiers of the camp didn''t n on following that n.


    Well, it wasn''t the rank and file soldiers, but rather themanders.


    The ones at the very top had received information from Lin Fan and understood the intention of the Mu Ster King, but the low tier and mid tiermanders hadn''t received this same information.


    These low and mid tiermanders were mainly young masters from noble families looking to distinguish themselves on the battlefield.


    However, since they were young masters, they still had their pride and arrogance as young masters.


    They couldn''t stand seeing someone being treated better than them like Lin Fan was.


    Not to mention, he was even being apanied by a beauty like Ying!


    Ying normally hid her face since she worked in the dark, but that by no means meant that she was ugly. She was chosen not only for her cultivation talent, but also for her other aspects.


    When working in the dark, there were times beauty was required to seduce a target.


    Ying had that beauty and more.


    She was only a fraction lower than Dongfang Tao Hua, so it was clear what kind of beauty she was.


    Seeing that Lin Fan even had this beauty guiding him like he was on vacation, naturally the young masters were filled with envy and rage.


    So there were some that chose to teach Lin Fan a lesson.


    It was just too bad that they would be taught a lesson first.

 Chapter 890 Beating

    A group of young masters came together to Lin Fan''s new store.


    They weren''tplete fools.


    They knew that for Lin Fan to receive this kind of treatment, he must have a certain amount of background. So if they were to target him alone, they might be the ones that suffered.


    However, if they all came together and used theirbined influence to suppress him¡­


    Even if he had a strong backer, it was impossible for him to resist all of their families together.


    That was unless he was backed by the Ku Ster King himself.


    But of course, not a single one of these young masters thought that this was possible.


    They all remembered who was important to the Mu Ster King.


    This was a tense time for their Mu Ster Kingdom in terms of politics since the current Mu Ster King was famous for not having many close subordinates. If they were able to approach him during this time, they would certainly be able to benefit.


    So they memorized the few people that were close to him so they would not offend them.


    This person was clearly not one of those people.


    So they were filled with confidence to deal with Lin Fan.


    Still, they had their own reputations to worry about, so they couldn''t make their provocation too clear. They had to at least still use dirty tricks that would be hard to argue against.


    Which was why they gathered at his store while everyone was paying attention to it.


    As for their n, it was naturally to embarrass him by giving him requests that were far beyond his capacities to force him away.


    As long as he was here, he was apetitor for their battle glory and they wouldn''t allow that.


    Lin Fan had been in the middle of organizing the new store when the door suddenly burst open and these young masters came in.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to see who it was, but seeing that they were wearing the Mu Ster Kingdom''s uniforms and the badges signifying their ranks, he said with a smile, "I''m sorry, we''re not open yet. Pleasee back tomorrow if you want your pet trained."


    Hearing this, all of the young masters revealed faint smiles.


    The only thing that they could think when they saw this kind of Lin Fan was¡­pushover.


    Which was naturally a good thing for them since they were nning on putting him in his ce.


    It was just too bad that they were about to kick a steel board instead and they didn''t even know it.


    So one of the young masters that had the highest rank came forward and said, "Well, we wanted to take a look at the newbie that was sent out here all of a sudden."


    He came forward until he was in front of Lin Fan and then looking at him, he said with a smile, "But it seems like you aren''t that much."


    Lin Fan just said with the same smile, "Well, I''m not a soldier. I''m just here to provide support."


    The young master nodded before saying, "But are you really as good as they say you are?"


    Lin Fan''s smile became more mysterious as he said, "Well, you''ll just have to wait and see."


    The way that Lin Fan said this almost made the young master feel like he was being talked down to. Like Lin Fan was a senior even though he looked younger than this young master.


    How could the prideful young master possibly ept this?


    There was a fierce look that shed in his eyes, but it also quickly disappeared. He once again revealed a smile and said to Lin Fan, "This brother, how about giving us a demonstration of your abilities? I''m sure that we''ll feel much more at ease if you show what you''re capable of."


    After he said this, all the others around him gave nods and spoke up to support him.


    Lin Fan secretly shook his head and gave a sigh.


    How could he not know what these kids were here to do? He was able to see through their intentions with just a single look.


    But of course, it wasn''t as if he could just beat them all up. They were soldiers of the Mu Ster Kingdom army and he was just a private contractor.


    There was a disparity in status even if there was the Mu Ster King behind him.


    So he couldn''t just beat them up and throw them out.


    He had tried meditating with them, but since they wouldn''t ept the ss he raised, then he had no choice but to use methods that were a bit more forceful.


    Ying on the side watched all of this and couldn''t help feeling sorry for them.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Even though Lin Fan only released the aura of someone in the True Soul Realm, she knew that he was in the World Realm since the Mu Ster King had already told her about this.


    But even if he really was only in the True Soul Realm, that was still more than enough to take care of these young masters who were only in the Child Soul Realm.


    She couldn''t help being amazed by how dumb and arrogant these young masters were. At the same time, she also started feeling a bit worried about their chances to win if these were the kinds ofmanders that they had¡­


    It seemed like she would need to send back a report to the Mu Ster King.


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh and said, "Then how should I prove it?"


    The young master revealed a smile when he heard this.


    As they had expected, this person sent here really was a pushover.


    Since that was the case, as long as they were put in their ce, it wouldn''t be hard to turn them into ackey.


    They had to admit that this person''s backing was special if he was able to get a building like this. If they made this person theirckey, then that would help them raise their own position.


    All of these young masters had been sent here to earn battle glory for their family, so if there were more benefits for them to im, they had no reason not to im it. After all, to them, Lin Fan was a pushover that they could easily bring under their fold.


    The lead young master called out arge tiger before saying, "I heard that your ability is to train pets, so I was wondering if you could help me train this tiger of mine."


    Though he said this with a kind smile on his face, he had already sent a secret message through the connection with his tiger. The tiger also had a fierce look as it looked at Lin Fan, almost as if it was looking at prey.


    As for the order that the young master had given it¡­Naturally it was to mess with Lin Fan as much as possible.


    Lin Fan however wasn''t afraid at all. He even looked at the tiger with a bit of pity for choosing to follow this idiot, but he didn''t shy away from this challenge.


    He walked over to the young master and said, "So you want me to train this tiger now?"


    The young master gave a shrug and said, "If you''re saying that you can''t, then we don''t have a choice¡­"


    Lin Fan cut him off by saying with a smile, "That''s not a problem, but you should pay my fee first before I do that."


    The young master knitted his brows when he heard this. He looked at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes first, but seeing that he didn''t flinch at all, he asked, "Fee? What do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan patiently exined, "You''re asking for a service, so of course you''ll be charged a fee." He pointed at the prices on the counter and said, "As you can see, the prices are right there. Feel free to pay however you want to pay."


    The young master looked at it before saying in a shocked voice, "Ten thousand spirit stones?! Are you kidding me?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this and just waited for the young master''s reaction.


    The young master realized his mistake and gritted his teeth to say, "Don''t you think that this is too expensive?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "These are the prices that your Mu Ster Army agreed to, so there''s nothing that we can do there. Of course, since we''re all friends here, I can give you a slight discount." The young masters were about to reveal a smile and say something, but their expressions froze the moment that they heard what Lin Fan said next, "Let''s just say nine thousand nine hundred and ny nine spirit stones. I think that''s a fair price."


    This was bare provocation.


    He wasn''t even trying to hide it, he was clearly provoking them by giving them this price!


    The young masters couldn''t understand what was happening. They had all thought that Lin Fan was a pushover, but what was with this behaviour?


    The lead young master couldn''t back down now, so he had no choice but to double down. So he said with a fierce smile, "Is that so? Then I really have to thank you." He secretly patted his tiger and said, "But I have to say that my tiger really has a bit of a temper. He''s not easily controlled, let alone train¡­"


    Before he could finish his words, the tiger suddenly jumped out at Lin Fan with its ws raised and mouth open.


    The other young masters all revealed faint smiles when they saw this and just waited to watch Lin Fan suffer.


    The lead young master had given the order to the tiger to attack Lin Fan just now, so he also had the same smile in his eyes. However, he said with a worried look, "Brother, please be careful!"


    The tiger was confident as it jumped at Lin Fan since it couldn''t sense any threat from him. But midway through its flight, it suddenly felt a chill run down its spine.


    It trembled as it flew, but it was already toote for it to stop.


    This feeling though, it was as if it was about to die¡­


    Lin Fan just casually raised his fist as he looked at the tiger.


    He had already seen the secret movements of the young master, so he already expected this to happen.


    He looked at the tiger with narrowed eyes and just casually punched out.


    All of the smiles on the faces of the young masters froze at the same time. All of their faces couldn''t help twitching as they watched the tiger fly right past them before sliding to a stop on the ground.

 Chapter 891 General

    The young masters couldn''t understand what had just happened.


    As far as they could tell, Lin Fan had just sent out a casual punch. No matter how they looked at it, it shouldn''t have sent the tiger flying like this.


    The lead young master quickly recovered from his daze and ran over to his tiger''s side shouting, "Ah Hu, are you alright?"


    But even after he shouted this, the tiger justid there on the ground¡­


    It was almost as if it was dead¡­


    All of the young masters started to feel that something was off¡­Almost as if they had made some kind of mistake.


    The lead young master saw that his tiger wasn''t moving at all and immediately turned to point his finger at Lin Fan as he shouted, "What have you done to my Ah Hu? Don''t think that you''ll be able to get away with this."


    But that finger started trembling when he saw Lin Fan looking at him with his raised fist.


    The scene of his tiger being sent flying with a casual punch was still fresh on his mind, so he couldn''t help stumbling back as he said in a shaky voice, "You¡­What are you¡­nning on doing?"


    The other young masters also couldn''t help taking a step back at the same time. They also secretly let out a sigh of relief that they had chosen this person as their representative.


    If it was them facing Lin Fan now¡­


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "I find that the best way to pacify fierce pets like this is just to use a bit of force."


    All of the young masters couldn''t help trembling when they heard this.


    The lead young master quickly overcame his fear and said in a voice filled with rage, "A bit of force? You call that a bit¡­"


    Before he could finish the tiger suddenly stood up.


    All of the young masters turned to look at the tiger in shock.


    But the one that was the most affected was the lead young master. Seeing his tiger stand up, he said in an emotional and relieved voice, "Ah Hu, you''re¡­"


    It was too bad that the tiger didn''t even give him a chance to feel emotional as it charged right past him, charging at Lin Fan.


    The young masters thought that the tiger was going to take revenge for being caught off guard by Lin Fan. They were all watching with expectant eyes, waiting to see the tiger tear him to shreds.


    But they were all disappointed in the end.


    What none of them expected was that the tiger suddenly stopped right in front of Lin Fan and nuzzled up against him. It was almost as if the lead young master wasn''t its master, rather its master was Lin Fan!


    The lead young master''s mouth dropped to the ground in shock.


    This tiger was the gift that his father had given him when he was just a child. He had taken care of it and had grown up with it, but now it was acting as if it had nothing to do with him. Not only that, it was also nuzzling up against Lin Fan like this, acting so close to him.


    This feeling¡­


    It was like having one''s wife taken from them!


    The lead young master said in a shaky voice, "Ah Hu, what''s wrong? What did he do to you?"


    However, the tiger justpletely ignored the young master and did all that it could to tter Lin Fan.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t paying it any attention, it evenid down on its back and presented its belly to Lin Fan. It was even acting like a little kitten, acting cute to try to appeal to Lin Fan.


    For a proud tiger to do something like this, it was clear that it hadpletely submitted to Lin Fan.


    Seeing this was a heavy blow to the young master and he definitely couldn''t ept it.


    In his rage, he pulled out his sword and pointed it at Lin Fan as he roared, "You! What witchcraft have you used to trick my Ah Hu?! I will cut you down right now!"


    But before he could do a single thing, the tiger also jumped off the ground and finally turned to look at the young master.


    Unlike before, it bared its teeth as it looked at its master as if it was its enemy. It was actually protecting Lin Fan from its master!


    What was going on here?!


    This was another heavy blow to the young master and he really couldn''t bear to fight the tiger¡­So he tried to reason with it again.


    The young master lowered his voice and made it as gentle as he could as he said, "Ah Hu, remember me? I am your friend, your brother. Come back to me."<novelnext></novelnext>


    But the tiger still looked at the young master with hostility even though the young master was doing all he could to calm it down.


    Lin Fan knew how this would end, so he was about to raise his hand to finish it. However, before he could, there was a stern voice that rang out, "Enough!"


    All of the young masters trembled as they were shocked to hear this voice before quickly standing at attention.


    Lin Fan turned in the direction this voice came from and saw that it was a middle aged man with a handlebar moustache. There seemed to be nothing special about his appearance, but the uniform that he wore was more than enough to show what was special about him.


    Or rather, it was the badge that was a symbol of his rank.


    A general!


    This was a general in the Mu Ster Army!


    Anyone that could be a general was a World Realm Expert, which was why Lin Fan hadn''t noticed this middle aged man until he spoke up.


    The general ignored the young masters and came to the lead young master before saying, "I think that you''ve already had enough fun." Then he turned to Lin Fan and said, "I apologize for their rash behaviour, but I hope that you can forgive them."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the general.


    Although he had apologized, it was clear from the tone of his voice that this apology wasn''t sincere. There was even a trace of an order that was in his voice when he spoke to him.


    But Lin Fan knew that it was better than to cause trouble now, especially since there was a war happening. He chose to let these kids go since he had only been nning on teaching them a little lesson in the first ce.


    He gave a nod and said, "You can go back now."


    Of course, his words were for the tiger.


    The tiger looked up at him with a look like a wife that had been abandoned, but seeing the stern look on Lin Fan''s face, it had no choice but to leave. It came to the young master''s side and licked his hand before disappearing.


    Seeing this, the young master''s eyes lit up again as he knew that he had regained his advantage again. He thought that the general was on his side, but that hope was immediately dashed when the general''s cold gaze fell onto him.


    The general said in an ice cold voice, "You are embarrassments to our army."


    The young master''s mouth opened to say something, but before he could, the general said, "All of you will run fiftyps before the end of the day. If you don''t, then you will all be punished ording to martialw."


    The chins of all the young masters dropped when they heard this, but not a single one of them dared to argue back. They knew that if they did, all that would happen is they would receive a greater punishment.


    So they all just lowered their heads and headed off to the track.


    But before they went, they couldn''t help ring at Lin Fan.


    If it wasn''t for this person, they wouldn''t have been punished by the general like this. While they hadn''t been able to do anything to him now, they certainly wouldn''t forget about this.


    Lin Fan didn''t miss these gazes and shook his head before releasing a bit of his pressure to scare them.


    When this mountain like pressure fell onto them, the young masters finally realized their mistakes.


    They had thought that Lin Fan was someone that they could bully with their status, but they realized now that they were nothing more than frogs at the bottom of the well. It wasn''t that he was easy to bully, but rather because he felt that they weren''t worth his time at all¡­


    The general didn''t do a single thing as Lin Fan pressured these kids since he knew that if he stepped in, he would be the one that would offend Lin Fan.


    Unlike these kids who didn''t know anything, he actually knew that Lin Fan had been someone that the Mu Ster King had sent. While he was a general, the Mu Ster King was not someone that he could go against that easily, so naturally he wouldn''t do it for these kids alone.


    Though to say that he didn''t have his own negative feelings towards Lin Fan was a lie.


    After the kids had been sent packing, Lin Fan turned his attention to the general who was still standing there as if he was waiting for something.


    The general also saw Lin Fan looking at him, so he said with a nod, "I apologize for noting to greet you sooner. I am the general in charge of this area, so we''ll be seeing each other quite a bit in the future."


    Lin Fan nodded and casually said, "It''s a pleasure to meet you."


    Since Lin Fan wasn''t willing to keep the conversation going, the general just gave a nod in response before leaving.


    Lin Fan could naturally see the hidden feelings in his eyes, but he didn''t n on dealing with them. He was just here for his own purposes and as long as they didn''t get in his way, he had no reason to build a rtionship with them.


    He was just here to mess with the Tai Ster Kingdom.

 Chapter 892 Sudden Change In The Battlefield (1)

    After the general left Lin Fan''s store, he ignored everyone that greeted him and headed to a certain tent.


    The guards at this tent didn''t even attempt to stop him as they let him in right away.


    Once he was in the tent, he sat down at the empty spot that had been saved for him at the table.


    When he sat down, all the other people at the table turned to look at him and waited for him to speak.


    All of these people were wearing the same uniform as him, which meant that they all shared the same rank. All of the people at this table were all generals like him.


    But seeing that he didn''t say a single thing, one of them couldn''t help asking, "What''s wrong? Did something happen?"


    The general with the moustache shook his head and said, "It''s not that something happened, it''s just that¡­"


    Seeing him go quiet again, all of the generals looked at him with curious looks and waited for him to speak.


    The general with the moustache finally said, "He''s not what I thought he would be. He might actually be the real deal."


    All of the generals revealed different expressions when they heard this, but not a single one of them spoke as they kept staring at the general with the moustache.


    Finally the general who was at the head of the table said, "For now, keep an eye on him and see what he can do. There''s no need to provoke him since he has the Mu Ster King behind him." Then after a pause, he added in a cold voice, "But if he does anything to harm our Mu Ster Kingdom¡­"


    He didn''t finish these words and he didn''t need to.


    Hearing this, all of the generals looked at each other before nodding in agreement with the general at the head of the table.


    As for who that general was, he was General Li, the new supreme general appointed by the Mu Ster King. He was a general that had been guarding the border for almost his entire life and was considered a god of war in the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    The reason why he wasn''t the supreme general before this was because he was devoted to guarding the Mu Ster Kingdom''s borders that he never yed in politics.


    While his strength was enough for him to ignore all of this, when the former Mu Ster King called him back to the capital so he could fall under his fold like General Wu had, General Li had refused. Following this, he was demoted as much as possible, but the former Mu Ster King never court martialed him since he was afraid of his power and influence.


    General Li didn''t care about any of that since his only calling in life was protecting the Mu Ster Kingdom and the people who were important to him.


    This was something that the Mu Ster King recognized, so he promoted him to supreme general without a single second of hesitation.


    This General Li only had one thing on his mind and that was protecting the Mu Ster Kingdom. If Lin Fan ever had any hostile intentions towards the Mu Ster Kingdom, he would be the first one to strike him down.


    Of course, this General Li wasn''t weak¡­


    There were even rumours that he was in the Sun Realm like the ancestors of the royal family¡­


    ¡­


    Lin Fan spent the next week training the pets that were brought in.


    At first there were only Soul Realm pets that were brought in.


    It was clear that they didn''t trust Lin Fan''s abilities even though the contract that he had made was with the Mu Ster King. So they were just sending in these test subjects first to see what his training would be like.


    They were of course shocked to find that Lin Fan would only need a single day for the training and were filled with doubt towards him, but the results spoke for themselves. Lin Fan did the same training as usual, but this usual training was already heaven defying for normal people.


    All the pets that received training went up at least a minor realm and there were even a few that reached the peak of their current realm. At the same time, they all learned several advanced skills that would be impossible for them to learn since these pets weren''t high grade pets in the first ce.


    With all of these facts in front of them, the people from the army had no choice but to acknowledge Lin Fan''s skills.


    However, even if they did acknowledge it, that didn''t mean that they believed that Lin Fan would be able to train pets that were in the World Realm.<novelnext></novelnext>


    So for thetter half of the week, they still only sent pets that were in the Soul Realm for training. However, unlike before where the pets were only in the Embryo Soul Realm or the Child Soul Realm, this time they sent pets in the Nascent Soul Realm and the True Soul Realm.


    Once again, the same result came after Lin Fan trained these pets and all that questioned him were stunned. They couldn''t think of a single thing that they could question him with again¡­that is other than their doubt that he could train a World Realm pet.


    So at the start of this week, they decided to send a World Realm pet to his store.


    As for who the pet belonged to, it was the general with the moustache that came to Lin Fan''s store before.


    He was the one that had made contact with Lin Fan before, so it made the most sense for him to bring his pet to the store.


    There were of course many that still doubted Lin Fan''s abilities and wanted to keep monitoring him, but General Li thought differently which was why he ordered this moustached general to bring his pet in.


    General Li understood just what implications it would hold if Lin Fan''s abilities were true, so he wasn''t willing to give up on this opportunity.


    The moustached general had his doubts, but he still followed orders to bring the World Realm Pet for Lin Fan store for training. He was surprised to find that he was given the same timespan as the others, that he would be able to pick up his pet from the store tomorrow.


    The general was skeptical as he left, but he still left his pet with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan put the pet into the shadow cultivation room as per usual before heading out of the military camp.


    He had also prepared his own informants and it wasn''t right for him to meet them at the store, so he had already decided on a special meeting spot with them. This spot wasn''t that far from the camp itself, but Ying still insisted on following Lin Fan out.


    This was something that the Mu Ster King had already approved of since he knew that Lin Fan had his own ns. So even if Ying was there to protect Lin Fan, she still allowed him to leave the camp.


    When he arrived, he found that his informant was already there waiting for him.


    The informant waved at him before they headed into the small cabin that had been prepared for the meeting. Ying stopped once they reached the door and stood outside to wait for Lin Fan since it wasn''t appropriate for her to follow Lin Fan in.


    This was his private business, so she should respect that.


    When they had settled in the cabin and there was a pot of tea between them, Lin Fan took a sip of tea and asked, "What is the situation?"


    The informant took out several pieces of paper for Lin Fan before saying anything. All of these were maps of different ces that Lin Fan didn''t recognize.


    After spreading these maps out, the informant started pointing at different spots on the map and saying, "These were thest known location of the Bing and Huo Family forces, but no one understands what they are doing there."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the maps before asking, "Is there anything important near those ces?"


    The informant shook his head and said, "There''s not a single important facility there for either the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom side or the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom side. This ce is a neutral space between the Beast Race and the human race, so most people wouldn''t even go there normally."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition.


    The informants that he had hired were given one simple task, to monitor the forces of the Bing and Huo Families for him. He knew that they had a grudge towards him and they might seize this war as an opportunity to do something to his friends and family on the Gctic Humanity Alliance. So he wanted to keep an eye on them just in case.


    However, they weren''t even heading in the direction of the Gctic Humanity Alliance¡­


    Instead, they went to this random ce in the middle of nowhere, which didn''t have anything to do with the war¡­


    Could it be that they had some special n or they had found something special there¡­


    Or could it be¡­?


    There was an almost impossible thought that filled Lin Fan''s mind, but he quickly shook it away because he didn''t believe that these people would do something like this.


    After all, to do so would mean betraying the entire human race¡­

 Chapter 893 Sudden Change In The Battlefield (2)

    Lin Fan shook his head again before saying, "Help me find the forces of the Sen and Lei Families as well."


    He threw a piece of spirit jade on the table and said, "Take that as a deposit."


    When the informant saw the piece of spirit jade on the table, his eyes couldn''t help lighting up.


    Since it was investigating two of the Four Great Families of the Tai Ster Kingdom, it would cost quite a bit to do. However, it would only cost at most a single spirit jade.


    For Lin Fan to give them the entire spirit jade upfront, this just went to show how generous he was. At the same time, he was also telling them to spare no expenses by calling it a deposit, so he was willing to pay them even more if they could find any information he wanted.


    The informant was naturally happy to see this since he loved working with generous people like this.


    If he did his job well¡­then these kinds of people would be happy to tip extra and their tips were always wee.


    Thinking this, the informant couldn''t help giving a chuckle.


    Lin Fan saw that his payment had its intended purpose, so he didn''t waste any time and stood up to leave.


    The informant saw this and didn''t do anything at first, but then he suddenly remembered something and he took out a piece of paper from his Storage Ring. He presented it to Lin Fan and said, "This is a little extra, I''m sure you''ll be happy with this."


    Lin Fan stopped and turned to look at the piece of paper. He took it and looked it over, quickly knitting his brows before asking, "Are you sure that this is true?"


    The informant gave a nod and said, "This was found at the cost of the lives of several of our members, I guarantee that it''s urate."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more, but he still gave a nod and threw another high grade spirit stone to the informant.


    While this wasn''t as valuable as the spirit jade, the informant''s eyes lit up when he saw this.


    His guess had been correct and it had paid off, so it was natural that he was happy.


    There was nothing else for him here, so he also walked out along with Lin Fan before quickly disappearing.


    Ying saw Lin Fane out and she raised a brow, but she didn''t say anything.


    Since this was Lin Fan''s private matter, she couldn''t really inquire about it since she had her orders from the Mu Ster King. But if Lin Fan wanted to talk about it with her, then there was no reason why she wouldn''t listen.


    Lin Fan actually did talk to her, or rather he gave her something as soon as he came out.


    It was the piece of paper that the informant had given him at the end of the meeting.


    Ying was surprised to see this, but she quickly took it and read through it. As she read through it, her brows started knitting more and more as she couldn''t help muttering something to herself.


    After a while, when she finished reading, she looked up at Lin Fan and asked, "Is this true?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Help me send a report to the Mu Ster King about this."


    Ying hesitated a bit before giving a nod in response.


    As for what the paper read, it was a report about some Beast Race activity near the borders. However, it wasn''t just any Beast Race activity, but rather the activity of several Beast Emperors.


    These were the World Realm Experts of the Beast Race and every single one of them was dangerous because they were all generally mutated beasts. That was the only reason why they were able to reach the World Realm in the first ce.


    However, as mutated beasts, they were much stronger than normal beasts and had special abilities.


    It would take twice as many human World Realm Experts to deal with these Beast Emperors than it would to fight a human World Realm Expert.


    So if there were these Beast Emperors hanging around the border, it wasn''t a good thing.


    Especially since there was the war with the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    But no matter how one looked at it, it seemed like too much of a coincidence for these Beast Emperors to show up at the border at this time. It was almost as if¡­


    But if that were the case, did that mean that the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had¡­?


    No matter what, this was an important piece of information that even the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Ran Ster Kingdom hadn''t discovered yet, so it was imperative that this be reported back. They needed to take precautions right away just in case the Beast Race decided to do anything.


    At the same time, Ying couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    The informants that Lin Fan had hired had even found information that these two powerful Ster Kingdoms hadn''t found¡­Just who was this person and who were the informants that he had hired?


    From what Ying knew about Lin Fan, she knew that there was some kind of mysterious power behind him or he wouldn''t have been able to do all the strange things that he had done.


    She really couldn''t help wondering who Lin Fan was.


    Lin Fan could see what she was thinking through her expression, but he didn''t say anything.<novelnext></novelnext>


    That was because he couldn''t say anything.


    The informants that he had hired were actually someone that Momonga had introduced to him. These were informants that he had used before, so he guaranteed that they were quite good.


    Lin Fan wasn''t disappointed with them, but¡­


    They belonged to the Myriad Races, so working with them was considered a bit¡­


    Anyway, as long as people didn''t know about this, he would be fine. Once they found out though¡­


    As long as he was alive, he would never speak. He would take this secret to the grave.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything, Ying gave a sigh before saying, "I''ll send a report as soon as I get back."


    Even though this was important news, she was still on a mission to guard Lin Fan, so she couldn''t just abandon him to report back. She had to get him back to the military camp before she could report this matter.


    Of course, since it was an urgent matter, she didn''t waste any time.


    She picked up Lin Fan and ran off at a speed that was faster than his own speed.


    He was shocked by her sudden action and couldn''t react in time, so she was able to carry him for quite a while.


    It was a good thing that he was able to react before they reached the camp or she would have carried him.


    If the other people in the camp saw this, Lin Fan really wouldn''t know what to say. It would also be hard for him to show his face in the camp from now on if that were to happen.


    Right before they arrived at the camp, Ying stopped and put Lin Fan down.


    She seemed like she was unhappy that they were wasting time, but this was a very firm request from Lin Fan, so she had no choice but to agree.


    When they arrived back at the camp, she immediately excused herself and headed to the center of the camp where themand center was.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this and headed back to his store on his own.


    He didn''t know what kind of effect he had had on the entire camp and how they would react to this news.


    ¡­


    After arriving in the centralmand tent, Ying immediately gathered up all the generals.


    While most of the rank and file soldiers didn''t know who she was, it was impossible for the generals not to know who she was. She was an important aide to the Mu Ster King and they were high ranking military officials, so they all knew who she was.


    Not to mention that she had the token of the Mu Ster King as well, so they had no choice but to listen to her.


    It didn''t take long before all the generals were gathered and there was a conference call set up with the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King was a very busy person, but when he heard that this was rted to Lin Fan, he immediately dropped all his matters and attended this meeting. Without knowing it, the position that Lin Fan had in his heart was already quite high.


    After Ying finished showing everyone the report that Lin Fan had received from the informant, the Mu Ster King asked, "Is he certain that this is true?"


    Ying gave a silent nod in response.


    The Mu Ster King immediately turned to General Li and said, "General, I want you to send some men to check this out."


    General Li had deeply knitted brows when he heard this. He just remained in silence for some time before saying, "Your majesty, I don''t mean to disrespect you, but are we certain that we can trust this news?"


    The Mu Ster King narrowed his eyes to look at him, but seeing the way he looked back at him, he knew that he indeed didn''t mean any harm and this was just normal doubt.


    So the Mu Ster King gave a nod and said, "Brother Lin has already given me many pleasant surprises and it wouldn''t surprise me anymore if he gave me some more. I''m sure that there must be some validity to this report." Then after a pause, he added, "Not to mention, even if it''s not true, sending people to investigate won''t harm us since there''s the chance that the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms are nning something. We haven''t patrolled in that area for a long time, so it''s better to be safe than sorry."


    With all these reasons given, General Li had no choice but to ept hismand even if he didn''t feel like it was necessary.


    He felt that this would be a waste of resources, resources that could have been spent somewhere else.


    He didn''t fully trust Lin Fan yet, but it was clear that the Mu Ster King had implicit trust for this person from an unknown origin. He didn''t know why the Mu Ster King trusted this person so much, but he felt that this was very dangerous.


    A ruler that was easily swayed was a ruler that could be led down the wrong path.


    This would be bad for their Mu Ster Kingdom¡­


    However, this time, he would choose to follow themand and observe. He wanted to see what kind of skills Lin Fan really had that the Mu Ster King would trust him this much.


    So General Li gave a bow and said, "Your majesty, as you wish."

 Chapter 894 Sudden Change In The Battlefield (3)

    The Mu Ster King could see that unwilling look in his eyes, but he didn''t say anything else.


    He had faith in Lin Fan and he knew that what woulde would prove his abilities.


    However, before ending the meeting, he didn''t forget to add, "General, I want you to send some powerful experts on the scouting team. You can''t underestimate the enemy, do you understand?"


    General Li once again revealed a slightly confused and unwilling look, but he gave a nod in the end and said, "Yes, your majesty."


    With this the Mu Ster King ended the meeting and left the call.


    Since the Mu Ster King was gone, that meant that the meeting was over and all of the various generals headed back to their posts.


    But there was a group of generals that stayed and followed General Li back to his tent.


    Ying had noted all of this, but she didn''t do anything for now since she knew that it would be meaningless to do anything. For now, it was better to watch and ensure that they didn''t do anything to Lin Fan.


    As for whether they believed his abilities or not, what they would find would prove it.


    It was just a matter of time and making sure that no one did anything rash.


    So she headed back to Lin Fan''s shop right away to stand guard over him.


    When General Li and his group of generals entered his tent, they all sat down with heavy looks on their faces.


    There was a long period of silence before one of the generals suddenly said, "We can''t let this continue any longer! If that child of unknown origins is still capable of affecting our king''s judgement, our Mu Ster Kingdom will copse."


    This was what they were all thinking, but since no one said anything, it was hard for them to bring it up.


    But once one person spoke up, they all started speaking up and backing that person up.


    They talked about how Lin Fan was a cancer to their Mu Ster Kingdom and was slowly degrading the judgement of their king. They talked about how Lin Fan was so deeply entrenched that he was even affecting the judgement of the princess, preparing to influence the kingdom even after the king stepped down. There was even talk that Lin Fan was actually the true father of the princess which was why the Mu Ster King acted this way¡­


    But of course, it was all nonsense.


    It was just too bad that once they got started, they couldn''t stop themselves.


    At first it was just ming Lin Fan, but soon it got much darker.


    There were even plots to take care of Lin Fan or even kill him before it got toote. They acted like patriots who were removing a blight from their beloved Mu Ster Kingdom, but they were actually just a group of people who were plotting a murder without proper reason.


    It was a good thing that General Li was there to stop them.


    "Enough." General Li said in a strict voice.


    All of the generals suddenly fell silent and turned to look at General Li with surprised looks.


    They had thought that he would be the one most passionate about this since he was the one that cared about the Mu Ster Kingdom the most. They had all seen how he looked at the meeting, so it should have been clear that he was the one that was most dissatisfied with Lin Fan.


    However, now it seemed like he was sticking up for Lin Fan?


    Why was he doing that?


    General Li could see the doubt on their faces, so he said, "What will you aplish by killing him?"


    All the generals looked at each other before seriously considering this. They then revealed looks of understanding as they realized that they had been too rash about this.


    General Li saw this and continued, "That''s right, all you''ll be doing is throwing our Mu Ster Kingdom into chaos. Someone will have to pay for it and it will create a mass of internal strife for our kingdom. That is just how much weight that kid has in our king''s heart, so we can''t take this lightly."


    The generals all revealed helpless looks since they agreed with what General Li said, but they still couldn''t help feeling like there was something that they could do. One of them asked, "General Li, then do we just give up and do nothing?"


    General Li was silent for a bit before shaking his head, "Of course we can''t do nothing. We''ll just simply carry out the mission that his majesty wants us to do."


    All the generals once again revealed confused looks.


    General Li saw this and exined, "If we find anything, then we can just consider it luck. However, if we don''t find anything¡­"


    He left his words unfinished, but the generals were all smart people and they were able to quickly pick up on his words.


    "If we don''t find anything, then we can use this as a basis to raise a formalint to his majesty. With this, he will have no choice but to reprimand that Lin Fan since this is a matter of utmost importance!"<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Right, when that happens, that Lin Fan won''t be able to do anything with everyone''s eyes on him and the rift will be created between them. When that timees, it''ll be easy for us to make a move."


    General Li gave an approving nod when he heard this.


    This group of generals in front of him were some of his most loyal followers. They were people that only had the best intentions of the Mu Ster Kingdom in their heart, that was the kind of patriotism that they had.


    He had full and implicit trust in this group in front of him.


    With this decision, General Li said, "I want to leave this mission to a few of you. That way we can get the most urate information and give a properint to his majesty."


    The way that he spoke, it was as if he had already deemed that this information was false and Lin Fan was guilty.


    But none of the other generals minded this.


    In fact, there were many of them that were suddenly filled with excitement.


    They had been worried about what to do, but now that there was a path in front of them, it was hard for them not to be excited.


    General Li picked two of his most trusted generals to lead this scouting mission and they ended this meeting there.


    However, after the meeting ended, General Li couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition¡­


    ¡­


    A few dayster, that bad premonition proved to be true.


    General Li received the report that there were actually Beast Emperors lurking along their border and when the generals had gone to scout them, they had been discovered and seriously injured. They had been able to escape with their lives, but it would take at least a year for them to recover from these injuries.


    If he had taken this more seriously and sent more experts, then perhaps their injuries wouldn''t have been as serious.


    These generals were like brothers to him since they had followed him through many wars for their Mu Ster Kingdom. Now that they had been injured because of his negligence, he couldn''t help being wracked with guilt.


    However, when it rained, it poured.


    The reports didn''t just stop there.


    There were other reports of Beast Race Experts attackings that were at the Mu Ster Kingdom''s borders.


    When they received these reports, they had immediately deployed soldiers to save the people on thoses.


    However, things just kept getting worse.


    The armies of the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Ran Ster Kingdom were ambushed the moment that they arrived in space around the. However, it wasn''t just the Beast Race Experts that attacked them.


    To their surprise, they found that the troops of the Tai Ster Kingdom and the Bai Ster Kingdom were also waiting for them.


    The two sides only attacked the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms troops, never attacking each other. It was as if there was a tacit understanding between the two of them that they would only be attacking the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms.


    Being sandwiched like this, the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms had to retreat.


    During this retreat, they suffered heavy casualties and even the loss of two World Realm Experts which was a serious blow to their forces.


    This allowed the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms to move their forces in and upy severals on the Mu Ster Kingdom''s border, officially moving the frontline further into the Mu Ster Kingdom''s territory.


    Then after they defeated the forces of the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms, they turned onto the Beast Race.


    However, there was no fight at all as the Beast Race troops immediately ran away. The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces didn''t even chase after them, they just allowed them to escape.


    It was clear that there was something between the Beast Race and these two Ster Kingdoms.


    But before they could investigate, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms released a statement using the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms of colluding with the Beast Race. They also stated that their upation of the cities on the border of the Mu Ster Kingdom was to free them from the upation of the Beast Race.


    With them making the first move like this, there wasn''t much that the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms could do. If they were to make a statement now, it would just seem like they were trying to make excuses.


    The only thing that they could do was capture some Beast Race Experts to make them confess the truth, but they couldn''t even find the tail of the Beast Race.


    It was almost as if they were never there¡­

 Chapter 895 Sudden Change In The Battlefield (4)

    With just this single battle, the entire situation of the battlefield had changed.


    The Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms had been forced back and were now in a disadvantageous situation.


    With the momentum of this victory, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms could continue pushing forward and taking more territory while the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms regrouped.


    However, in the end, this didn''t change the overall trend of the battlefield.


    The Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms were stronger overall and had more resources, so they would eventually push back the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms if they were given enough time.


    It was just too bad that things didn''t go as nned.


    ¡­


    When Lin Fan received the report from Ying, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    He already had some doubts about this, but with the cold hard facts in front of his face, it really was hard to deny it.


    Thinking back, there were already signs of it when he was back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Bing Jun had said back then that they were recruiting people to fight the Beast Race¡­


    But now it seemed like they were actually recruiting people for this war and the fight against the Beast Race was the cover. It was a good thing that they had been able to resist or else the Gctic Humanity Alliance would have been caught up in this war.


    However, that still didn''t change the fact that the Beast Race was colluding with the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    Lin Fan had received another report from his informant over the past few days about the location of the Sen and Lei Family''s forces. It had actually been quite easy for them to find these forces because they were at the same ce as the Bing and Huo Family''s forces.


    After finding these forces, they found that they were heading towards the Mu Ster Kingdom''s borders with the Bing and Huo Families.


    It was clear that they had finished their deal with the Beast Race and wereing to participate in the war.


    Lin Fan had trained quite a few World Realm Pets over the past few days, which had helped relieve the pressure on the Mu Ster Kingdom. However, with more troops heading their way, it was clear that this was bad for them.


    They might even need to pack up this base and move further back.


    But that wasn''t as simple for Lin Fan since he had already set up his store here.


    It would be easier if it was a normal store, but a store that was set up by the system wasn''t closed that easily. If this store fell into the hands of the enemy, then it wouldn''t be good for Lin Fan.


    Of course, there was no worry that they would be able to use the facilities since they could only be used with Lin Fan''s permission.


    So Lin Fan wanted to find a way to push back the enemy forces if possible.


    It was just too bad that before he could think of anything¡­


    After reading the report, Lin Fan said, "Tell brother Yong to send a decree telling the generals to send in their Realm pets. If we can make them stronger, then it''s possible to fight back."


    Even though Lin Fan had been training World Realm Pets, all of these pets had only been in the Star Realm. The generals were busy using their Realm Pets, or rather, they still didn''t trust Lin Fan with them.


    However, if the Mu Ster King gave a decree telling these generals to send their pets to Lin Fan for training, they would have no other choice.


    Ying slowly gave a nod as she knew that this was indeed a problem.


    But to force the generals toply, it would be a bit harmful to the Mu Ster King.


    Still, it was better than losing more territory because they were too stubborn to use the resources that they had.


    Before she could head off to send the message though, there was a sudden explosion that came from outside the store.


    Both Lin Fan and Ying turned in the direction of the explosion, but they found that there were several more explosions that rang out following this explosion. These explosions came from all over the camp.


    At the same time, they could feel the aurasing from them.


    World Realm Experts and not just any World Realm Experts. These were clearly Beast Emperors, World Realm Experts of the Beast Race!


    How had they found a way to break into their camp?


    It had to be known that this camp had the strongest defenses since it was the main headquarters of the Mu Ster Kingdom army. It was where most of their generals and strongest soldiers were gathered, so it also had a very strong surveincework.


    Yet somehow the Beast Emperors had been able to sneak into the camp andunch an ambush like this¡­


    This wasn''t possible unless¡­there were traitors among them that let the Beast Emperors in!


    Regardless of how they got in, the most important thing was to take care of them before they suffered too many losses.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t abatant to begin with and Ying was supposed to be guarding Lin Fan. So it wasn''t their job to take care of this in the first ce.


    After the first explosion, there were many generals that had gone out to meet the Beast Emperors, but to their surprise, there were much more than they had expected.


    The generals that were here were off duty and many of the generals normally here had been stationed to different battlefields. It could be said that the camp was currently the weakest it had ever been.


    For the Beast Race to attack at this time, it was clear that someone had given them information about them.


    This made it seem even more likely that there was a traitor among them.


    Seeing the battle outside, Lin Fan could pick up a trace of anxiety from Ying''s eyes.


    It was clear that she wanted to go and help them fight, but she had her mission to guard Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan said, "It''s fine if you want to go. As long as I''m in this store, they won''t be able to do anything to me."


    Ying looked at Lin Fan with a surprised look, but she still shook her head in the end.


    However, Lin Fan insisted by saying, "Go and help them. I''ll be fine."


    Hearing the firm tone that he had, she finally gave a nod and then disappeared like a shadow.


    Her abilities were more for assassination than for fighting, so she would be a great help to the generals that were currently fighting. After all, with someone distracting their opponents, the generals would have a much easier time fighting them.


    When she left though, there were several pairs of sharp eyes that followed her as she left.


    Once they were sure that she was gone, one of them said into a token, "The guard has left, the target is alone now."


    This token was a token with a voice transmission array on it.


    After this person finished talking, a deep voice came from the token, "Make sure that you capture the target alive and don''t let anyone see you."


    The figure said, "Don''t worry, we''ll get the target right away and get out quickly."


    Then they put away the token and nodded at the other two beside them. Those two nodded along before spreading out to surround a building.


    As for the building that they were surrounding, it was Lin Fan''s store.


    These were Beast Emperor Experts that had been sent to infiltrate the Mu Ster Kingdom''s military camp, but their target was different from the others.


    Their target was Lin Fan.


    After spreading out around the store, they set up an array first to ensure that they weren''t disturbed.


    While arrays were mainly a human technique, the Beast Race had also learned from the humans, or rather stolen from the humans enough to develop their own array techniques.


    It was crudepared to the arrays of the human race, but it was an array formed by three World Realm Beasts, so it wasn''t weak. Itpletely cut Lin Fan''s store off from the rest of the camp without anyone noticing it.


    That was except for Lin Fan.


    The moment that the array had appeared, the store had immediately recognized that it was under attack and had notified Lin Fan about the attackers. However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all about these attackers.


    With the store''s defense system in ce, it wasn''t a problem for him to face these Beast Race Experts alone.


    In fact, it was what he wanted.


    If Ying was still here, it would be a bit hard for him to use the defenses of the store without showing too much. But now that she had gone off to help the others, he could go all out with the store''s defenses.


    It was a pity that these Beast Race Experts never understood that it was foolish for them to fight Lin Fan in the store.


    But that was just their luck.


    The Beast Race Experts tried breaking into the store from different angles, trying to go from the roof or sneaking in through the windows. However, they found that they couldn''t break through at all.


    Even when using all their strength, they found that they couldn''t do a single thing to the building.


    Just what was this building made of that they couldn''t do anything to it?


    With no other choice, they could only try the front door.

 Chapter 896 System Taking Out The Trash

    They were shocked to find that the front door wasn''t locked at all. It had been left open, almost as if the person inside was expecting them and waiting for them.


    This was surprising because they had thought that they had hidden themselves well enough with the array, but they never expected that the target had actually noticed them.


    At the same time, they were also surprised that the target was so confident that he would invite them in.


    It had to be known that while they were only Star Realm Beasts, two of them were in the Mid Star Realm and one of them was in the High Star Realm.


    Based on the information that they had received, the target should only be in the Low Star Realm. He wouldn''t even be a match for the Mid Star Realm Beasts, let alone the High Star Realm Beasts.


    So what gave him this courage to face them like this?


    Was he prepared or was he a fool?


    Or did he have some kind of hidden trump card?


    When they came in and saw him sitting there at the counter waiting for them, they didn''t have any more doubt.


    He was just a fool.


    There was no two ways about it, he was just a fool.


    If there were some kind of trap, they would at least feel a sense of danger. However, they didn''t feel a single thing with their refined senses.


    They didn''t believe that this Low Star Realm target would be able to hide a trap from them.


    When Lin Fan saw his guestse in, he greeted them with a smile, "I think you''vee to the wrong ce."


    The High Star Realm leader said with a smile, "I think that we came to the right ce."


    Lin Fan shook his head and gave a sigh, "Well, you''ll see what I mean soon enough."


    The World Realm Beasts couldn''t help knitting their brows when they heard this. However, they quickly put this out of their mind.


    The High Star Realm leader calmly said, "Do you want toe willingly, or do you want us to use force?"


    The firm tone in his voice made it clear that those were Lin Fan''s only two options.


    However, Lin Fan still said with a smile, "What if I don''t want to go?"


    The High Star Realm Beast shook his head and said, "Force it is I guess."


    He nodded at one of the Mid Star Realm Beasts who nodded back before moving towards Lin Fan. That Mid Star Realm Beast said with a smile, "Kid, just give yourself up or you''ll have to suffer."


    These beasts had transformed into human form, so he reached a hand out towards Lin Fan to grab him.


    Lin Fan just stood there with a smile on his face, as if he wasn''t bothered by this at all. He just watched as the Mid Star Realm Beast''s hand came closer and closer to him.


    However, that outstretched hand never made contact with Lin Fan.


    Just an inch away from him, right when it was about to grab him, the hand was stopped by something invisible. No matter how the Mid Star Realm Beast tried pushing forward, his hand was just frozen in the air as if there was something holding it back.


    However, this also didn''tst long.


    After a few seconds of silence and struggle, there was an incredible force that suddenly exploded against the Mid Star Realm Beast.


    This was a force that it couldn''t resist at all and before it knew what was happening, it was suddenly picked up and thrown away. It flew out at a speed that even the other two Beast Race Experts couldn''t react to.


    The door suddenly opened and the Mid Star Realm Beast was thrown out like a piece of trash.


    After bouncing off the ground a few times, it slid to a stop.


    This Mid Star Realm Beast cut a very sorry figure as itid there in a pool of its own blood. It couldn''t move at all from the force that had just hit it like a truck.


    It didn''t understand where this force came from, but it did feel something familiar to it.


    It was just like its attack¡­It was almost as if its attack had been reflected back at it!


    However, it was also several times stronger than its attack!


    After the Mid Star Realm Beast had been blown out of the shop, the remaining two beasts couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan who was just sitting there.


    Even a fool would be able to understand that the Mid Star Realm Beast had only been sent flying because Lin Fan had done something, but the important thing was¡­what did he do?


    They hadn''t even felt the fluctuations of anyws before the Mid Star Realm Beast had been sent flying¡­


    So they had no idea what had happened just now.<novelnext></novelnext>


    After a long period of silence, the High Star Realm Beast pped the remaining Mid Star Realm Beast on the back and said, "Go and get him."


    The remaining Mid Star Realm Beast revealed an unwilling look, but since it was an order, he had no choice but to listen to the High Star Realm Beast.


    This time, the Mid Star Realm Beast moved carefully towards Lin Fan. He was on guard the entire time as he approached, prepared for anything that woulde at him.


    It was just too bad that this was not something that he could guard against. In fact, if he didn''t do anything to Lin Fan, he wouldn''t have received any retaliation in the first ce.


    Unfortunately for him, he had his orders to capture Lin Fan.


    So he reached out to grab Lin Fan like the other Mid Star Realm Beast had done.


    But just like the first time, he wasn''t able to touch Lin Fan at all.


    Right before he could reach Lin Fan, the same thing happened where his hand was frozen in the air by something invisible. He tried using his strength to pull his hand back, but he wasn''t able to move a single inch.


    After a few seconds, the same incredible force asst time appeared and he was thrown out of the store just like the first Mid Star Realm Beast. When hended, he was also in a sorry state,ying in a pool of his own blood.


    The High Star Realm Beast just gulped when he saw this.


    He was certain that even with his higher level of cultivation, he wouldn''t fare any better than the two Mid Star Realm Beasts if he was hit with the same force.


    In the face of life and death, his mission didn''t mean anything.


    So without hesitation, he turned to run away.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had already seized the opportunity that came from his momentary daze and had already moved in between him and the door. Unless he moved Lin Fan out of the way, he wouldn''t be able to leave this ce.


    That is unless he broke the store itself.


    He had already seen what had happened after the two Mid Star Realm Beasts had tried to grab Lin Fan, so he knew that if he tried to do anything to him, he would suffer the same fate. But unless he physically moved Lin Fan, he wouldn''t be able to get past him and leave the store.


    So after hesitating for a second, he made his decision.


    He raised his ws and gathered his energy around them. Then after gathering all that energy, he shed out with his ws at¡­the window beside Lin Fan.


    There was arge window to this store that gave a clear view of the outside.


    With his strength as a High Star Realm Beast, he didn''t believe that he wouldn''t be able to break through this window.


    This was just a building built with normal materials. Even if it was made with special materials, he still believed that he could break through it with his strength.


    So he shed out with all his strength at the window since he couldn''t touch Lin Fan.


    The true form of this High Star Realm Beast was a Gehenna Lion that had control over the famous Gehenna mes, unquenchable mes that could even burn away souls.


    So when it shed out, there were des of ck mes that came from its ws, flying out at the window.


    The mes seemed like it had the power to burn down the entire world. These mes did not seem like something these flimsy windows could block.


    However, right before the mes could hit the window, they were suddenly stopped in midair.


    The High Star Realm Beast''s eyes popped out in shock when he saw this.


    This was his most powerful attack, but this attack still couldn''t break through the strange power that was in this shop.


    The mes didn''t burn for long before they were suddenly absorbed and disappeared into nothing. However, the High Star Realm Beast could still feel the power that lingered in the air.


    This was his power, so he was more sensitive to it.


    After a few seconds, there were several white des and a white ball that was rebounded back at the High Star Realm Beast.


    The High Star Realm Beast wasn''t even able to react at all as those attacks hit him, cutting off his limbs and sending him into the ground as the ball hit his chest.


    But this time, he was able to sense what it was that had stopped him.


    Spatialws.


    It was spatialws at a higher level that hadpletely rebounded all their attacks.


    There was a fatal w in their n¡­they had chosen to attack Lin Fan in his store.


    In this store, Lin Fan was invincible unless there was a Deity Realm Expert that came.

 Chapter 897 Interrogating The Beast

    This High Star Realm Beast wasn''t in as bad a shape as the two Mid Star Realm Beasts that had been thrown outside.


    The two Mid Star Realm Beastsying in the pools of their own blood couldn''t be more dead.


    At the very least, this High Star Realm Beast still had his life.


    But his cultivation had been crippled.


    That was the new setting that Lin Fan had unlocked when he broke through to the World Realm.


    As his cultivation increased, he found that he had more control over the parts of the store that he didn''t have control over before.


    For example, the defense system.


    Before this, he had only been able to control when the defense system was activated and nothing else about the system. So all of the people that were taken care of by the system were always taken care of in the same way.


    They would have their attacks rebounded at a certain ratio and then they either survived or died.


    However, now that Lin Fan had broken through, he was able to control what the defense system did and how much power was rebounded.


    So when the High Star Realm Beast''s attack was rebounded, he had put the settings to be weaker than what the Mid Star Realm Beasts experienced and had chosen to cripple him instead of killing him.


    The High Star Realm Beast naturally knew that Lin Fan had something that he wanted with him if he was going to spare him. The most likely thing that Lin Fan wanted was¡­information.


    Now that he had been crippled, the most important thing was to escape with his life.


    Unlike humans that were crippled, beasts that were crippled still had a chance to regain their cultivation.


    Human dantians couldn''t regenerate or be reced easily since human spiritual energy was more unique to individuals. It wasn''t the same when it came to the demon beasts.


    The cultivation of demon beasts came from their beast cores, but these beast cores weren''t unique. These beast cores were shared among beasts of the same race, so a Gehenna Lion could take the beast core of another Gehenna Lion to regenerate their cultivation.


    They could even take the beast core of a lower grade of lion demon beast to temporarily stabilize their cultivation if they needed to.


    But the key was that they had to be alive to do so.


    So what this High Star Realm Beast needed to do was find a way to escape this ce before recovering its cultivation.


    If there was anything that Lin Fan wanted to know, it wouldn''t hesitate to give him that information.


    Of course, that was indeed why Lin Fan kept this High Star Realm Beast alive.


    He didn''t understand why they would send all of these World Realm Beasts after him even if they were here to attack the Mu Ster Kingdom''s military camp. After all, there shouldn''t be anything that they would want from him¡­


    Unless¡­they knew something that he didn''t think they knew.


    Could it be that the Tai Ster Kingdom knew that he was here?


    If that was the case, then it would make sense that the Beast Race would send people to capture him.


    So he needed to see what the Beast Race knew.


    Lin Fan walked up to the former High Star Realm Beast and said, "I think that you should know what kind of situation you are in. As long as you tell me what I want to know, I can let you live."


    The Gehenna Lion nodded like a bobble head as he said, "I''ll tell you everything that you want to know."


    Lin Fan was a bit surprised by how easily this beast had agreed, but he let the beast tell him what he wanted to know.


    To his surprise, it wasn''t actually what he had thought it was.


    The Beast Race had captured a few of the World Realm Pets that he had trained for the Mu Ster Kingdom and had learned about him through them. They had told them about the special training methods that he had used on them and that had piqued their interests.


    For beasts, the most important thing was purifying their bloodlines and if there was a chance for them to achieve this, they would give up everything to look for it.<novelnext></novelnext>


    So when they had heard about Lin Fan''s abilities, they had decided toe and kidnap him when they attacked this ce.


    As for how they had broken into the camp, it turned out that it wasn''t the work of a traitor. Rather, it was the work of a few spies that they had sent into the Mu Ster Kingdom camp as pets.


    They had willingly be the pets of soldiers of the Mu Ster Kingdom army just for this day.


    It could be seen how long they had been preparing for this since sending in beast spies as pets wasn''t something that could have been done in a day or two. This n should have been in the making for at least several decades now.


    Lin Fan also asked about what other ns the Beast Race had with the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom, but the Gehenna Lion couldn''t tell him more.


    "I''m just a low rankedmander in the Beast Race, I really can''t tell you more than this since they don''t tell me more than this." The Gehenna Lion revealed a bitter look as he said this.


    Unlike the human race, the Beast Race was actually much more united.


    Instead of separating into groups like lower realms, upper realms, and Ster Kingdoms, the Beast Race separated themselves based on their tribes. The different races of beasts would group together regardless of cultivation.


    They had a hierarchy that was based on their strength, so they lived together regardless of cultivation instead of being separated into different realms.


    That was because instead of needing life energy to cultivate, beasts would naturally grow to certain levels based on their bloodlines and their natural abilities.


    So there was no need for them to care about different worlds filled with different amounts of life energy.


    After getting all this information from the Gehenna Lion, Lin Fan decided that it was time for him to let it go.


    The Gehenna Lion was surprised to hear this, but it didn''t waste any time as it ran out of the door and headed off to find a ce to hide. It currently didn''t have any cultivation and it was about to revert back to its beast form.


    Their Beast Race was currently raiding this Mu Ster Kingdom military camp and if he ran around in the form of a beast, he would naturally be attacked by the Mu Ster Kingdom army. He needed to make use of the short time that he had in his human form to find a safe ce before he turned back into his beast form.


    But a minute after it left, the Gehenna Lion suddenly came back.


    It had transformed back into its lion form, but its eyes werepletely zed over as if there was ayer of mist over it.


    He just walked over to Lin Fan''s store and went in, walking forward in a daze until he was standing in front of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to see this since he knew that this was going to happen.


    Before the Gehenna Lion left, he had also infected it with Brainy''s seed. The time that it took to leave was the time that it took for the seed to take over the Gehenna Lion.


    Lin Fan had said that he would let it go, but that didn''t mean that he was nning on letting it go free. It wasn''t going back on his words if he had Brainy take care of this Gehenna Lion.


    The key thing was that the Gehenna Lion had already seen what he looked like and he couldn''t let them take that information back.


    He still had a bounty out on his head in the Tai Ster Kingdom, so he had to be careful.


    It was one thing having Beast Race Expertsing after him, but also having the Tai Ster Kingdom Expertsing after him was just too much.


    After the Gehenna Lion came back, Lin Fan started asking him more questions and as he had expected, the Gehenna Lion had hidden some information from him. For example, he knew more than he let on about the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    Since the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms were officially working with the Beast Race, it was inevitable that some information about them would leak to the Beast Race.


    The Beast Race had a good understanding of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom''s n and in the end¡­they were nning on betraying them. They were only temporarily working with the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom while also slowly getting them to let their guards down.


    Just like how members of the Beast Race had already snuck into the forces of the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms as pets, there were also members of the Beast Race that had snuck into the forces of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms as pets.


    They had already found the key military positions of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms and as long as they wanted, they would be able to destroy the key supply lines of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    Of course that was only after they destroyed the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms first¡­


    It seemed like this was getting more and moreplicated¡­

 Chapter 898 Second Attack

    While Lin Fan was digesting all of the information that he had received from the Gehenna Lion, the fighting outside wasing to a stop.


    With Ying''s help from the dark, most of the generals were able to clean up the World Realm Beasts that had attacked them.


    While there were some that were still injured, this number was still much smaller than if Ying hadn''t helped them.


    So in all, this was considered a sess for the Mu Ster Kingdom army since they hadn''t suffered any major damage from this invasion of their headquarters. But it was still a veryrge blow to them because it wasn''t just the camp that would be in disarray after this attack.


    This would cause dys all over the battlefield in terms of orders being sent to the various frontlines.


    While there were generals on the frontlines to make decisions, they would have ack of information with the disruption in themunicationwork after the attack on the headquarters. This slight dy in judgement would result in many unexpected changes on the battlefield which was not a good thing for the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    At the same time, the headquarters was in charge of logistics.


    With the headquarters being thrown into chaos by this attack, it would mean that there would be dys in sending supplies to the various different battlegrounds.


    An army without supplies wouldn''t be able to fight. Even an army with reduced supplies would have reduced power, so there was no doubt that they would be pushed back this time.


    All of these were serious for the Mu Ster Kingdom army, so they had to regroup as quickly as possible.


    However, there was another disturbing piece of news that arrived during this time.


    The Ran Ster Kingdom army''s camp had also been attacked by the Beast Race.


    The only other option that they had in a time like this was to depend on the Ran Ster Kingdom''s camp for help. If the Ran Ster Kingdom army had been able to send troops and supplies, they would be able to make up for the gaps in the Mu Ster Kingdom army as a result of this attack on their headquarters.


    But now that the Beast Race had also attacked the Ran Ster Kingdom headquarters, there was no chance of this.


    That was because the Ran Ster Kingdom headquarters would be suffering the same fate that the Mu Ster Kingdom headquarters would be suffering. They wouldn''t have any extra troops or resources to send out to support them at all.


    They couldn''t understand how the Beast Race was able to send so many of their troops into both of their camps, but this was not the important thing. The most important thing was being able to recover from this attack.


    It was just too bad that this attack wasn''t over yet.


    When Ying came back to the shop, she was shocked to find the corpses of the two Mid Star Realm Beasts outside.


    Without hesitation, she pulled out her dagger and rushed into the store, but she found that there was nothing off with the store. Lin Fan was just still sitting there at the counter with a rxed look on his face, as if nothing had happened.


    When she saw this, she couldn''t help feeling a chill run down her back.


    He had taken care of two Mid Star Realm Beasts with such ease¡­Just who was this man?


    Lin Fan looked up at her and said, "Oh, you''re back. How did it go?"


    Ying just stood there in silence, not knowing how to respond at first. But then she gave a nod and said, "It''s all taken care of."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Then can you help me take care of the two in the front? They came while you were away."


    Ying couldn''t help trembling when she heard this.


    At first, it was just a suspicion that Lin Fan had killed those Mid Star Realm Beasts, but now that he had confirmed it, she couldn''t help back her shock. The only reason she had even suspected it in the first ce was because there was no other option, but she actually didn''t really want to believe it.


    But now that Lin Fan had confirmed it, she had no choice but to believe it.


    This man that his majesty had found, just how many secrets was he hiding?


    But still, she chose to follow his orders and went to take care of the corpses of the Mid Star Realm Beasts in the yard.


    However, before she could take care of them, there was another explosion that rang out.


    This time, it was different from the explosion that they heard before. This time, they felt the power ofws being scattered as the explosions rang out.


    This time, it wasn''t the Beast Race that was attacking¡­


    This time it was the enemy Ster Kingdom troops that were attacking.


    The explosions rang out all over the camp, but most of the explosions were concentrated at the center of the camp where the main tent was.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It was clear that they hade to attack them with a target in mind.


    They wanted to take down General Li, the supreme general of the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    If they took down this supreme general, it would be equal to crippling the Mu Ster Kingdom army''smand. It would take a long time for them to elect another supreme general, but that was disregarding the fact that there wasn''t anyone that could rece him in the first ce.


    There were no other generals that were on the same level as General Li.


    While there were generals that were on the same level as General Wu, the previous supreme general, that would mean that the Mu Ster Kingdom army would be falling back to the same level as before. This would make them much weaker and easier to deal with for the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    When Ying saw this, she immediately ignored the Mid Star Realm Beast corpses and pulled out her dagger.


    She was preparing to head to the main tent to help General Li, but before she could do anything, she found that she was surrounded by several World Realm Experts.


    There was one that was in the Low Realm like her and there were several Star Realm Experts of varying levels that were clearly here to back this Low Realm Expert up. With the way that they were scattered around her, it was clear that they didn''t have any intentions of letting her escape.


    That was because they knew that if they let this person escape, she would be dangerous.


    When the Beast Race had attacked the Mu Ster Kingdom camp, the forces of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had already been lying in wait. They had watched everything unfold and they had seen everything that Ying had done.


    So when they made their second attack, they made sure to send out a group just to take down Ying.


    Otherwise, with her grasp of the shadoww, she would be unstoppable as she made her way through the battlefield.


    When these experts had appeared, they wereid out in a formation that would prevent her from escaping even if she wanted to use her shadowws. So Ying knew that if she wanted to escape this ce and help General Li, she needed to break free of this blockade.


    But she recognized that this wasn''t easy to do because¡­these people had alle prepared.


    So she called out her little minx thatid on her shoulder. This little minx almost seemed to meld into her figure, as if it became a part of her andid there on her like cloak.


    However, the moment that the minx had appeared, it was as if her figure had suddenly faded. But when one looked closely, they would find that she was still there and it was just that the outline of her figure had be more faint.


    She was using the shadowws to hide herself in in sight, that was just the level of attainment that she had with these shadowws.


    The enemy Realm Expert knew that this would be dangerous if he allowed her to keep going. Even he recognized that his attainments with his ownws couldn''tpare to her attainments.


    If they were to fight head on, he would definitely be at a disadvantage.


    It was a good thing that he had the support of all these Star Realm Experts.


    The enemy Realm Expert said, "All of you, activate the formation and lock her up! We''ll slowly wear her down and take her out!"


    All of the Star Realm Experts looked at him with a strange look, but since he was stronger than them, they listened to his orders. All of them released their domains that seemed to ovep with each other and soon there was a barrier that appeared in front of them.


    This was an array that focused purely on trapping someone, so it was very ineffective unless used in certain situations. But this was one of those certain situations.


    Using this array meant that they would be defenseless since they would use all of their life energy to maintain the barrier that would put pressure on the targets inside. With all their life energy being used, they wouldn''t be able to defend themselves as long as this barrier was up. Even if the barrier was taken down, they would be exhausted from using this barrier in the first ce.


    So this was something that could only be used when they were certain that they would be safe.


    The Mu Ster Kingdom camp was in chaos right now because of the continuous attacks, not to mention that there were a bunch of experts attacking the main tent in the center of the camp. All of the Mu Ster Kingdom''s experts should be gathering there to protect General Li, who was the most important person.


    They wouldn''t send anyone to this store that was just to the side.


    But at the same time, they had also made sure to leave a few World Realm Experts around to keep people froming here.


    It could be said that this was a very heavy investment, but if they could take out Ying¡­it was all worth it.


    After the barrier was released, the World Realm Experts all released their pets to take care of Ying for them.


    With the suppression of the barrier around her, Ying recognized that this was a very dangerous situation for her. Even if she fought all of these pets, she would use up all her energy and would be too weak to fight back or help out afterwards.


    She couldn''t see a way out of this safely.

 Chapter 899 Saving The General (1)

    But for now, the only thing that she could do was fight.


    After all, the enemy wouldn''t go easy on her and give her any time to rest. Even now, their pets were slowly approaching her and had already surrounded her.


    The two Realm Pets led the way and the other Star Realm Pets followed behind them, charging at her from different angles. With the formation that they had, it would have been hard for the old her to fight back.


    Right, it would have been hard for the old her.


    Her Night Minx had also received training from Lin Fan during his free time, so it was now much stronger than before.


    Lin Fan had even given it special training since he knew that this Ying was someone that was a close subordinate to the Mu Ster King. At the same time, he knew that Ying was someone that had been assigned to protect him.


    So if his bodyguard became stronger because he helped her train her pet, wasn''t that a good thing for him?


    So he actually didn''t hold back with this training and the Night Minx was countless times stronger than before.


    That was how she had been able to do that much during the Beast Race attack earlier.


    With the help of the Night Minx, she was able to disappear right in front of the various pets. While they were looking around for her, she was able to sneak up behind one of the Realm Pets and sh it across the back.


    It was just a pity that the barrier was putting pressure on her and she couldn''t use her full power. So even if she didnd a blow on this Realm Pet, it wasn''t a serious injury and was only a gash on its back.


    The Realm Pet was still able to fight.


    As soon as it was hit, the Realm Pet turned around and tried to bite at her, but with her speed, she quickly moved out of the way. The other pets didn''t let her go and started shooting energy attacks at her as well, but she negated all of them with her shadowws.


    All of them just phased right through her and mmed into the barrier behind her.


    Without hesitation, Ying once again slipped into the shadows and the pets all raised their guards as they tried to find her.


    But the fight between them created a lot of noise and this noise reached Lin Fan who had been sitting in the store. He hadn''t been rxed since he knew that it was another attack, but hearing that it was so close to him, he couldn''t help looking out to see what it was.


    As he saw the situation outside, he actually revealed a smile.


    Perhaps he might have been worried if it was another Beast Race attack, but seeing that it was human experts that were attacking with pets, it was a different story.


    Not to mention that they were fighting right by his store.


    If he was in any danger, he could always run right back into the store and protect himself.


    But with pets¡­there was another way for him to handle this.


    So without fear, Lin Fan walked through the door and said, "Do you need some help?"


    Hearing this voice suddenly ring out, all of the experts on this battlefield couldn''t help being shocked as they turned to look at Lin Fan. Ying was also shocked the moment that she saw him, while also cursing under her breath.


    She had naturally also considered Lin Fan while fighting these experts, but since he had been hiding in the store, she thought that he would be safe since they wouldn''t care about him. It was clear that they were after her with how they had surrounded her as soon as she appeared.


    All of the experts narrowed their eyes after that since they had seen the way that Ying had looked at Lin Fan.


    They didn''t know what kind of rtionship Lin Fan had with Ying, but it was clear that he was important to her.


    Since that was the case¡­


    The Realm Expert immediately gave an order for the others to direct their pets at Lin Fan. At the same time, he had his own Realm Pets target Ying so she couldn''t break free and help him.


    Ying was indeed nning on doing that, but with the two Realm Pets going all out against her, she wasn''t able to break free temporarily. If she had time, she would be able to cloak herself with her shadoww and move to Lin Fan''s side.


    She could only watch as the Star Realm Beasts charged at Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all.


    When the first Star Realm Beast was about to reach him, he suddenly lifted a fist. Then in one swift motion, he punched out at the Star Realm Beast that was right in front of him.


    This was a simple punch, just a normal punch, but the Star Realm Beast felt like it couldn''t avoid it at all. There was even a feeling of wanting to be punched by this fist.


    When the fist made contact with the beast, there was no hesitation at all as it was suddenly sent flying away. It flew a few meters before skidding to a stop on the ground.


    As the beastid there on the ground, everyone even almost thought that it was dead with how it wasn''t moving at all.


    All of the other Star Realm Pets that had been charging at Lin Fan also suddenly stopped since they had felt the strange feeling from Lin Fan''s fist. It also made them want to be punched by this fist¡­<novelnext></novelnext>


    After a long period of silence, the Star Realm Pet that everyone had thought was dead suddenly got up. It looked around itself with a confused look before its eyes suddenly fell onto Lin Fan.


    With the way that it was looking at Lin Fan, everyone had assumed that it would have attacked him to retaliate for punching it earlier.


    However, to everyone''s shock, that wasn''t what happened.


    After taking a deep look at Lin Fan for a while, the beast suddenly ran over to his side. Then it didn''t attack him like they had all expected, but rather it fell to its knees and lifted its head up to him.


    This beast was over three meters tall, so even when it was on its knees, it was still taller than Lin Fan. However, the way that the beast was postured, it was a clear look of submission.


    But Lin Fan didn''t bother petting it on the head as he turned his attention to the other Star Realm Beasts around him.


    When his eyes fell onto them, they couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spine.


    While they didn''t know why the first beast had fallen to Lin Fan, they could see that it hadpletely submitted to him. This was a situation that clearly wasn''t normal and they were starting to fear Lin Fan''s fist, which he had raised as if he was about to punch them all.


    Lin Fan just casually said to Ying, "Hold off the Realm Pets for me for now, I''ll take care of the rest."


    Then without even waiting for an answer, he jumped forward with his fists raised.


    The Star Realm Pets were stunned by this sudden move and just stood there like frogs in front of a snake. It didn''t take long before there were giant bodies of Star Realm Pets that were flying through the air.


    But that still wasn''t the strangest part.


    The strangest part was that after they hadnded, they all started following behind Lin Fan as if they were trying to fawn on him.


    Even though he had sent them all flying with a single punch, they didn''t feel any hostility towards him and did their best to tter him. It was as if they hadpletely submitted just from being punched by him.


    Seeing all of this, the only thing that Ying could say was, "Alright."


    Then she turned to look at the Realm Pets in a daze, but she found that they were also just standing there without doing a thing.


    Not a single person or beast was able to understand what was happening as Lin Fan went on his rampage.


    After two minutes, Lin Fan had finished off all the Star Realm Pets that had been around him and all of them started fawning over him. There wasn''t a single beast that had been spared Lin Fan''s submission.


    As Ying watched this, she couldn''t help remembering what happened with the young master''s tiger.


    That was right! She had seen this trick before!


    Lin Fan had also subdued the tiger with just a single punch and it had acted the same way as these Star Realm Pets right now. At that time, it had even gone against its master to support Lin Fan¡­


    Just what trick did Lin Fan use to do something like this?


    But she shook that thought out of her head as she turned her attention to the two Realm Pets.


    These two were the most dangerous things right now and as long as they took care of them, they would be able to break out of this area.


    But would Lin Fan be able to subdue the Realm Pets like he had done with the Star Realm Pets.


    It was also at this time that the enemy experts also reacted.


    The enemy Realm Expert shouted, "What are you doing!? Focus the barrier''s suppression effect on that kid! I don''t even want to see him move!"


    As the enemy experts heard this, they quickly released their life energy to activate the barrier. The suppression effect did fall on Lin Fan and it was even stronger than what had been affecting Ying.


    However, even though it had fallen on him, it didn''t seem like it had any effect at all.


    That was because Lin Fan had his pets releasing a barrier that helped negate this and also he had his absorption power that blocked off the part that couldn''t be negated.


    So he walked under this array like he would normally, almost as if he wasn''t affected by it at all.


    When he was about to reach the Realm Pets, they finally reacted and turned in his direction to attack.


    Ying realized this and quickly went forward to help him, but she was only able to stop one of the Realm Pets.


    The other one was charging right at Lin Fan, about to p its ws right down on him.

 Chapter 900 Saving The General (2)

    Everyone thought that Lin Fan would be finished with this one attack, but that was not the case.


    Before the w could fall down on Lin Fan, his fist reached the Realm Beast first. However, this time, the Realm Beast didn''t go flying out like all the Star Realm Beasts had.


    Then the w suddenly stopped and the Realm Beast looked at Lin Fan in shock.


    It looked down at its body with a confused look as if there was something that it couldn''t understand. But then its eyes suddenly opened wide as it released a powerful aura that even shocked the Realm Expert that was its owner.


    Everyone was surprised to see this Realm Pet release this kind of aura because they could tell that this wasn''t just the aura of a Low Realm Pet. This was the aura of a Mid Realm Pet!


    The owner couldn''t understand how his pet had suddenly broken through, but this was a very good thing for them.


    Now that it had broken through, it would be able to easily suppress Ying who gave them the most trouble with her shadowws.


    So with a smile on his face, the Realm Expert said, "Now take care of her! As long as she''s taken care of, there''s nothing else to worry about!"


    All of the other Star Realm Experts making up the array looked at the Realm Expert with strange looks.


    They had thought that he was just a normal person, but now it seemed that they had to change how they treated him. It seemed like he had been hiding his abilities, especially his pet training abilities.


    Once this was over, they would see if they could build rtions with this Realm Expert before others found out about this.


    It was just too bad that the Realm Expert''s words fell onto deaf ears.


    After breaking through, the Mid Realm Pet''s eyes were only on Lin Fan.


    Then to everyone''s shock, it suddenly fell down and started acting cute in front of Lin Fan just like all the other Star Realm Pets had done.


    The Star Realm Pets were unhappy to see this since this Mid Realm Pet was much bigger than them, so they weren''t able to approach at all, but they couldn''t do anything. After all, the Mid Realm Pet had the bigger fist, so they couldn''t do anything to it.


    But this time, Lin Fan actually petted the Mid Realm Pet on the head before getting on its back.


    He turned his attention to the other Realm Pet that was still fighting Ying and then said in a calm voice, "Restrain it."


    Without hesitation, the Mid Realm Pet charged out at the other Realm Pet that was currently fighting Ying.


    None of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom Experts could even react to this since they never thought that this Mid Realm Pet would actually betray them. In the first ce, they thought that it would be easy for this Mid Realm Pet to take down Lin Fan.


    After all, there was a big disparity in cultivation between the pet and Lin Fan, so they didn''t think that Lin Fan would be able to do anything as he was squashed into a meat patty.


    So they didn''t even have time to apply the restriction of the barrier on this Mid Realm Pet before it reached the other Realm Pet.


    The other Realm Pet was shocked, but with the Mid Realm Pet and Ying working together, it couldn''t do a single thing as it was pinned down.


    Lin Fan walked over and without punching it this time, he just simply ced his hand on it before pulling it back.


    As soon as the Realm Pet felt the hand on it, it immediately stopped struggling. It had the same strange look that the other Realm Pet had before suddenly releasing its aura and giving a roar like the other one had done.


    It had broken through as well!


    Perhaps it was a coincidence if it only happened once, but for it to happen twice and in a row, there was no denying it anymore. It was impossible for them to call it a coincidence this time.


    But they didn''t have time to react since the two Mid Realm Pets¡­had now turned their attention to them¡­


    They immediately focused their minds and poured even more of their life energy into the barrier. The only way for them to get out of this situation was to restrain these two Mid Realm Pets with the barrier and wait for reinforcements toe.


    As long as their reinforcements came, it wouldn''t be a problem for them to take down these two Mid Realm Pets with the help of the barrier.


    So the Realm Expert had sent a request for help right away.


    However, before the Mid Realm Pets touched the barrier, they suddenly stopped in front of it.<novelnext></novelnext>


    All of the experts of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom were surprised by this, but they quickly revealed understanding smiles.


    They thought that this kid was quite smart since he knew that the situation wasn''t good for him. He was most likely trying to use these two Mid Realm Pets to threaten them and then negotiate a peaceful way out of this.


    That was why he ced them right in front of the barrier.


    The Realm Expert wouldn''t reject this since he knew that this would allow him to buy more time. After all, it would be hard on them if the two Mid Realm Pets were to attack the barrier again and again. That would slowly drain their life energy until they ran out.


    If he could stall for time by talking to the other side, then there was no reason for him not to do this.


    So the Realm Expert said with a nod, "You''re quite smart, you know that you can''t win, so you''re trying to negotiate." The tone that he had made it seem like he was the one that held all the cards here, but that was just to hide his nervousness.


    Though he did make it seem like he was in the mood to negotiate. Of course, there was no deal that he was prepared to cut since he knew that this person was dangerous. He was able to influence their pets this easily, he would certainly be a hindering block to them in the future.


    It was best if he died here and now.


    But to his surprise, Lin Fan didn''t say a thing as he just stood there with a calm look on his face.


    The Realm Expert couldn''t help feeling a bad feeling when he saw this, so he couldn''t help saying, "If you''re trying to intimidate me, that won''t work. I''ll tell you now that¡­"


    Before he could finish, there were screams that rang out around him before the barrier started to break apart.


    His chin dropped down in shock as he looked around himself to see what had happened.


    There were a few Star Realm Beasts that had suddenly appeared outside of the barrier and attacked the Star Realm Experts that made up the barrier. Once these Star Realm Experts were taken care of, the barrier that they were controlling was naturally destroyed as well.


    But where did these Star Realm Beastse from?


    When he looked closer, he found that these Star Realm Beasts actually looked quite familiar¡­


    They were the pets that Lin Fan had beaten up earlier!


    These pets had actually betrayed their masters and attacked them for Lin Fan!


    Just what kind of witchcraft was this!?


    But he didn''t have time to think too deeply about this since the barrier was dissipating. Without the support of the barrier, there was no way that he would be able to face the Mid Realm Beasts that had been his pet.


    So without hesitation, he turned to run away.


    It was just too bad that the Mid Realm Beasts were already at the edge of the barrier waiting for it to disappear. So when the barrier disappeared, they immediately pounced at this Mid Realm Expert.


    He couldn''t take more than two steps before he was hit with two different attacks from his pets.


    With the two pets breaking through, he wasn''t able to resist these attacks at all as he was mmed into the ground with heavy injuries.


    Looking up, the Realm Expert tried saying, "I am your master! You should be listening to¡­" But they didn''t let him finish as with another round of attacks, the Mid Realm Expert was knocked out.


    The Star Realm Experts saw this and all turned to run, but the Star Realm Beasts that had been freed from the barrier didn''t let them escape. They all immediately attacked their former masters.


    These Star Realm Experts werepletely exhausted from maintaining the barrier, so they weren''t able to fight back at all. As for the other Star Realm Experts that were supposed to be guarding them, they were all too far away toe.


    They had been posted further away to stop people froming in since no one had expected their n to fail.


    Of course, the Realm Expert was much better off than the Star Realm Experts since he had only been knocked out.


    Lin Fan showed no mercy with these Star Realm Experts and had their former pets¡­directly kill them!

 Chapter 901 Saving The General (3)

    Seeing these Star Realm Experts falling one by one, Ying couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a terrified look.


    She had never thought that Lin Fan would have such a terrifying ability, it was no wonder the Mu Ster King wanted her to watch over and guard him. But what she didn''t know was that the Mu Ster King didn''t know that Lin Fan had these powers.


    The only reason he wanted her to guard him was because of his personal feelings.


    After all of the Star Realm Experts had been taken care of, Lin Fan turned to Ying and said, "Let''s go."


    Then without waiting for her to respond, he started moving forward.


    Ying was in a daze for a few seconds, but then she quickly followed behind him and got on the giant Realm Beast with him.


    The other Realm Beast had its former master, the Realm Expert in its mouth.


    When she got a higher view of the area, she was able to see the general scene of the area and she was able to understand something. She had been confused about how the Star Realm Beast had escaped from the barrier in the first ce.


    She had been watching the entire time and she hadn''t noticed any holes that they could have escaped from, but seeing the ground from above now, she understood.


    They had dug their way out.


    One would normally assume that a barrier would also extend into the ground, but this barrier actually didn''t. It was focused purely on one thing, suppressing and keeping the enemy in, so that was why it would have even been able to keep the Mid Realm Pets in.


    So there were many things that itcked and could only be used in certain situations.


    For example, it didn''t extend all the way into the ground and one could easily dig out from under it.


    It used the misconception that all barriers extended all the way through to prevent people from digging their way out.


    Of course, that only worked on people that didn''t know arrays, which wasn''t the case with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had an extensive knowledge of not only arrays, but alchemy, forging, and many different subjects because of his experiences in the trial realm. So he had been able to recognize this array with just a single nce.


    He knew the ws of this array, so he had deployed his own pets skilled with earthws to dig a tunnel out of the barrier.


    The Realm Beasts charging at the barrier was nothing more than a distraction¡­Well, it was also to get them right up to the barrier so they wouldn''t be able to escape when they realized what happened.


    After realizing all of this, Ying looked at Lin Fan in apletely new light.


    She thought that the Mu Ster King had only admired Lin Fan''s talents in terms of beast training, but that didn''t seem to be the case. He was not only skilled in beast training, it seemed like he was also skilled in many other fields as well.


    It was almost as if he was the person that the Mu Ster King had brought in to help them win this war.


    As this thought passed through her mind, she couldn''t help also feeling that Lin Fan was quite handsome. There was a skip of her heart that followed this and a strange feeling that filled it.


    This was a feeling that she hadn''t felt since she met the Mu Ster King¡­


    Lin Fan led his group of beasts through the camp, heading towards the main tent in the center where General Li was.


    As he made his way through the camp, he helped the various generals that were currently caught in fights with the enemy''s World Realm Experts. At the same time, with each enemy that he defeated, he was able to collect more and more beasts into his army.


    The generals that he saved all recognized him because he was quite the famous person in the camp these days.


    Naturally they were shocked to see that he had arge army of beasts following him. However, they didn''t doubt him since he had saved most of them from the enemy that they were facing.


    Almost all of them were tired from fighting the Beast Race forces from earlier, so they were hardly a match for the fresh forces from the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom. If it wasn''t for Lin Faning to help them, they definitely wouldn''t havested long.


    After being saved by him, all of the generals followed Lin Fan''s beast army. They knew that he was going to the center to rescue General Li, which was also their top priority, so they all followed him.


    Soon, Lin Fan had already gathered half of the camp behind him.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The other half were clearing out the remnants that Lin Fan had left behind.


    They were only weak Soul Realm soldiers brought along by the World Realm Experts, so Lin Fan didn''t feel like there was a need for him to take care of them. He could just leave these to the soldiers of the Mu Ster Kingdom army instead.


    The more important thing to do right now was save General Li who waspletely surrounded.


    Since they had a moment of free time, Ying couldn''t help asking, "If you could do all this, why didn''t you act earlier when the Beast Race attacked? Could it be that you already knew that there would be a second attack?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile.


    He could have not answered this question since there wasn''t a need for him to answer this question.


    However, he still said, "Unlike these pets, the Beast Race are too wild for this trick to work. The pets have already been subdued, so it''s easy for me to turn them to my side with just a few tricks."


    Ying was still confused, but she gave a nod since that was all Lin Fan was willing to say to exin.


    In truth, it wasn''t exactly the truth, but it did have a hint of the truth.


    What Lin Fan had used on these pets was his absorption force. It gave them the hope of purifying their bloodlines and evolving, so they immediately fell under him.


    However, if he were to use this on the Beast Race, it wouldn''t have the same effect.


    That was because the Beast Race hadn''t had submission ced in them like the pets have. So if they were to encounter something like this and they were stronger than Lin Fan, what they would do is capture him instead of submitting under him.


    They would use their strength to take Lin Fan away and use him as a tool to purify their bloodlines, like how the three beasts had tried to kidnap him in the first ce. Against them, he would have no choice but to fight to defend himself since he didn''t want to be the Beast Race''s ve.


    Of course, this wasn''t the case with members of the Myriad Race like Qing Ao. They had more intelligence and were less aggressivepared to the Beast Race, so they were easier to negotiate with.


    As for the pets, they were already subdued by people before, so they were more willing to serve than to act aggressive. It was why they had immediately chosen to submit under Lin Fan as soon as they felt the absorption power.


    Instead of being trapped with their masters who couldn''t do the same thing that Lin Fan could, it was better to just swap over to Lin Fan''s side.


    So that was why he had used the store to defeat the Beast Race Experts and had used his powers to subdue these pets.


    When they arrived at the central tent, they found that it waspletely surrounded by enemy troops.


    The enemy troops had been focused on the main tent the whole time since they figured that no one would disturb them. After all, their troops should have been more than enough to take down the tired troops of this camp after the Beast Race attack.


    So they weren''t focused on the area around them at all.


    That was until Lin Fan''s beast army appeared and started attacking them.


    When they were attacked, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops turned around in shock to see the wave of beasts and Mu Ster Kingdom expertsing at them.


    They were dazed for a few seconds, but then the leader of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom group immediately gave the order for their troops to take formation.


    In this situation, they had been pincered in by the Mu Ster Kingdom troops and if they didn''t properly get in formation, they would be thrown into chaos and would be defeated. So before the people inside of the tent could react, they had to turn around and break free of the blockade of the beasts.


    But they found that these beasts wouldn''t go down that easily. In fact, it became harder and harder for them to fight as the fight continued.


    That was because as the fight went on, more and more of their pets¡­turned to the enemy side!


    There were only a few at first, so they didn''t notice it that much. However, it didn''t take long before many of the Star Realm Pets had abandoned their masters and were fighting for the enemy side.


    With these pets joining the enemy side, they soon became the ones that were outnumbered.


    The general of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces couldn''t help shouting, "What is going on here?!"

 Chapter 902 Saving The General (4)

    General Li and his men who had been stuck inside the entire time could see that the enemy formation outside was changing.


    They only saw small movements at first, which made them think that there were only a few troops in the back that were trying to rescue them.


    They were still far too outnumbered to do anything, so they could only hope that those troops could escape and didn''t go out to help them.


    But as they watched the situation develop outside, they saw that the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces were bing more and more disorderly. It was as if there was something outside that was disturbing them and throwing them into chaos.


    One of the generals couldn''t help asking General Li, "Supreme general, could it be that the situation is changing outside?"


    General Li looked outside with knitted brows, but he didn''t say anything.


    While he wasn''t certain what was happening, he was sure that the situation was indeed changing outside. He could see the lines of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces getting thinner and thinner as if there was something taking them out.


    However, there shouldn''t be any forces that would be able to defeat the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom trash. They should all be tired after the fight with the Beast Race, so this change was very strange.


    Seeing that General Li wasn''t saying a thing, one of the generals couldn''t help asking, "Supreme general, should we go out and assist them?"


    General Li slowly shook his head when he heard this.


    Even if there were people that were fighting out there, there were just too many enemies. He didn''t have any faith that they would be able to break through the blockade of the enemies, so if they were to go out now¡­


    The only ending would be that the reinforcements would be defeated and then they would be surrounded by the enemies.


    While it was cruel to abandon the people who came to save them, it was the right thing to do. As long as he as the supreme general didn''t fall, the enemies wouldn''t have a way to fullymit to attacking their camp.


    He would have to wait until the reinforcements from the surrounding area arrived and then break through the enemy lines with them.


    As long as there were enough reinforcements, he was certain that they would be able to break through.


    So he had no choice but to sit here and wait, watching as his men were ughtered outside.


    But as time passed, he was surprised to find that this wasn''t the case.


    They had expected the sounds of fighting to die down after some time since they didn''t believe the reinforcements outside would be able to win, but the sounds actually became louder and louder. It was almost as if the enemy forces were slowly being pushed back.


    In fact, they could see from the tent that the enemy lines were slowly thinning. They could see some familiar faces through the gaps in the enemy lines.


    It was almost as if¡­their reinforcements were slowly pushing through.


    Seeing this, some of the generals couldn''t help revealing anxious looks as they watched this.


    They knew that this was a chance and if they didn''t take this chance, there might not be another one as good as this to get out of this blockade. So many of them started looking to General Li as if they were about to advise him to charge out.


    But to their surprise, they found that General Li had already drawn his sword.


    It was as if he had already made up his mind and he was just looking for a target to bring his sword down on.


    Seeing this, all of them also drew their weapons and waited for General Li to make his move.


    As a long serving general with plenty of experience, how could General Li not see the gaps that these generals had seen?


    However, his eyes were on a much bigger prize.


    As more and more gaps formed in the enemy lines, they would reveal the prize that was hidden in the center.


    General Li wasn''t just the most important person here, but also the strongest expert here. He was the only High Realm Expert that was at the camp, so he could be considered their greatest weapon.


    If he were to charge out now, he would have to fight all the various enemy experts that would charge to take him down.


    With the trend that was happening outside, it was clear that if he waited long enough, he would be able to see a path to the target that he was looking for.


    Of course, this wasn''t guaranteed.


    So the other condition that he was waiting for was if the enemies gained their second wind and started pushing back their reinforcements.


    If he were to show himself at this time, then it would suppress this second wind and force the enemies back down.


    So he had already made up his mind to go out, all he was waiting for was the right opportunity.<novelnext></novelnext>


    That opportunity came not long after.


    In one big push, the reinforcements were able to break through the enemy lines and created a hole in them. From that hole, General Li was able to see a clear path to the center of the enemy formation.


    So without hesitation, General Li charged out of the tent.


    The other generals that had been with him were all prepared and had been waiting for him to act. So the moment that they saw him charge out, they all charged out along with him.


    The enemy lines were in chaos from being pushed through, so when they saw General Li''s forces charging at them, they immediately started to scatter.


    This was a group of experts that were fresh from recovering while watching them fight, so they were much stronger than those that had been fighting the entire time.


    If they were to face General Li and his troops now, their only ending would be death.


    Being forced into this situation hadpletely crushed their morale and they scattered without hesitation.


    There were a fewmanders that tried to rally the scattering troops, but because they were barking out orders, they were quickly cut down by the experts led by General Li. It didn''t take long before the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forcespletely lost all source ofmand and became a mob of headless chickens.


    General Li and his troops ignored the scattering troops and turned their attention to the center of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces.


    In that center of the formation, there was a group that was currently being surrounded by a bunch of beasts.


    General Li and his troops were surprised to see all of the beasts around the enemies, but they could tell that these beasts were fighting their enemies.


    As they said, the enemy of an enemy was a friend.


    So since these beasts didn''t show any hostility towards them, there was no need to mind them for now. In fact, they could even fight with these beasts since it was clear that these beasts were suppressing the enemies.


    It was just that the enemy High Realm Expert hadn''t made a move yet.


    They also couldn''t help wondering where all these beasts came from. At the same time, they were also curious why¡­it seemed like the enemy were a bit unwilling to fight these beasts.


    Still there was no time to think about that as they charged at the enemy.


    When General Li''s group charged forward, they were surprised to find that the beasts suddenly changed formation. They paused for a second to see what the beasts wanted to do, but then they found that the beasts had changed formation to support them.


    The beasts formed a wall in front of them that helped them block the enemy troops, while leaving a gap for them to break through into the center of the enemy formation.


    With the beasts covering them, they would be able to break through into the center in one fell swoop.


    General Li and his troops were naturally surprised to see the beasts coordinating with them like this, but they didn''t let this chance go. General Li immediately led his troops into the gap left behind by the beasts and started charging towards the center of the enemy''s formation.


    When they charged forward, the beasts around them also charged, helping them create walls that cut off the enemy experts that would surround them. This created a perfect path for them to the leader of the enemies.


    As they ran through this path, they heard the voices around them.


    "Xiao Lu, what are you doing? Please stop!"


    "Ah Ya, I raised you since you were a little cub! What are you doing?"


    There were simr voices pleading with the beasts, but they all fell onto deaf ears as the beasts continued to attack them and the enemies hesitantly fought back to stop them.


    Hearing all of this, General Li and his troops slowly put the clues together.


    Could it be that these beasts¡­were the pets of the enemies that had betrayed them?


    If that were the case, who was responsible for this?


    As far as they knew, they didn''t know anyone that had this kind of power¡­


    But in General Li''s mind, there was a young figure that appeared as he remembered the report that he had heard a while ago. It seemed like there was indeed someone in this camp that had this ability, someone that they had all ignored.


    But he also quickly shook these thoughts from his head and focused his mind as he looked at the enemymander.


    This was where the real battle began, he couldn''t let himself be distracted.


    As for the questions that were at the back of his mind, he would solve them after this battle was over.

 Chapter 903 Saving The General (5)

    As themanding general of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces saw General Li charging at him, he knitted his brows.


    Everything that had happened had far surpassed his imagination and he couldn''t understand why this was all happening.


    They had the perfect n and they had already surrounded General Li in his tent, all that was left for them to do was to slowly grind down theirst bit of resistance and finish them off. However, before they could do that, there was thisrge wave of beasts that had suddenly appeared.


    There were many beasts that they recognized because they were famous pets of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom generals!


    So why were they helping the enemy and attacking them?


    But since these beasts threw themselves at them, they had no choice but to fight back.


    They had thought that it would be easy to take down these beasts that didn''t have any masters, but that wasn''t the case¡­That was because when they summoned their pets to fight back¡­


    It had happened gradually, but more and more of their pets turned on them and joined the enemy lines.


    It was just Soul Realm Pets at first, but then Star Realm Pets, and then even Realm Pets went to the enemy side.


    No one could understand how it happened, all they could see was a sh before the pets suddenly fell into a daze. After their daze, the pets immediately turned around and started attacking their masters.


    Most of these Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom Experts weren''t willing to fight these beasts that had been their pets. After all, if they killed them, they would be much weaker without the support of these pets.


    So they mostly fought to subdue instead of kill.


    It was just too bad that the pets didn''t hold back at all and attacked them as if they were prepared to kill them.


    With this difference in ferocity between the two sides, it didn''t take long before the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces fell into a disadvantageous position.


    But the most important factor was that they had emotional attachment to these pets. These were pets that they had raised since they were young, so naturally they thought of them like family members.


    Even if they were now attacking them, they really couldn''t bring themselves to harm these pets.


    However, there were quite a few people that had lost their lives because of this.


    As they tried to appease their pets, they were surrounded by other beasts that had been controlled and quickly killed after being ganged up on by them. The worst part was that their pets didn''t feel any sadness towards their deaths and continued attacking the other Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom experts.


    It was as if they had never had a contract between them at all.


    As they were pushed back more and more, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces''mander began fearing for the worst. At this rate, it seemed like it wouldn''t take long before they were all¡­killed.


    He had been desperately looking for a way out of this, but it was at this time that General Li finally came out of his turtle shell.


    He didn''t see this as the final nail in the coffin, but rather he saw this as an opportunity.


    As long as he was able to kill the enemy''s supreme general, General Li, it would mean that the tides would turn in their favour. So he braced himself and turned to face General Li, knowing that this was his final chance.


    But of course, the enemymander didn''t call out their pet.


    That was because they didn''t know what was happening with their pets, so he didn''t dare call out his pet just in case even his pet was affected. If that were to happen, there would be no chance of winning.


    But General Li didn''t have this same concern.


    As soon as he charged forward, his sword was covered in mes released by the little bird on his shoulder.


    These mesbined the power of both himself and his pet, so it was not something that the enemymander was able to block with just his own power.


    He was able to hold on for a bit at first by going all out, but as the fight continued, he was slowly being pushed back by General Li.


    His subordinates wanted to help, but General Li''s troops stopped them froming forward. Even when they summoned their pets, there was a shadow that suddenly appeared before their pets turned on them.


    In fact, they were now being overwhelmed by General Li''s troops and their own pets.


    So with no other choice, the enemymander could only summon his pet as well.


    But the moment that he did, there was a shadow that suddenly appeared, charging at the pet.


    The enemymander was able to keep up with this shadow and immediately swung his sword at the shadow. But General Li was already able to see this and swung out to block the enemymander.


    The enemymander was already weakened from fighting General Li all this time, so without the support of his pet, he naturally wasn''t able to resist General Li''s attacks at all.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The pet had just been called out and hadn''t been able to get a proper view of its surroundings when it was attacked. It couldn''t react at all as the shadow reached it andnded a punch on it.


    However, this punch was very light, almost as if it didn''t do a thing to it as it firmly stood there.


    The High Realm Pet just stood there in a daze as if it couldn''t understand what had just happened. But then it suddenly turned its head to look at the shadow that was standing there.


    Everyone thought that this High Realm Pet would attack that shadow, but to their shock, that High Realm Pet didn''t do anything like that.


    After looking at the shadow for a bit, it suddenly kneeled down and started licking that shadow on the face.


    This time, the shadow didn''t disappear like it had done all those times before. Instead, this time, the shadows faded and its true appearance was revealed.


    It was a handsome young man.


    When General Li saw who it was, he couldn''t help revealing a smile as he muttered, "As expected."


    The rest of General Li''s troops were all surprised to see who it was since it was thest person that they had expected.


    And for the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops, they all had looks of confusion since they had no idea who this person was.


    It was no one other than Lin Fan.


    Of course, it was Lin Fan because other than Lin Fan, who else could control beasts like this?


    After revealing himself, Lin Fan petted the High Realm Pet before saying, "Go, take care of your former master."


    That pet didn''t hesitate at all to charge at the enemymander.


    Even though it had been its pet just a minute ago, now it attacked the enemymander with no hesitation.


    General Li also didn''t miss this opportunity as he immediately charged forward along with the pet.


    With the pet acting as a distraction, General Li was able tond a blow on the back of the enemymander.


    However, the enemymander wasn''t finished with just this.


    He was a smartmander and knew how to recognize opportunities in dangerous situations like this. So using the momentum of the attack from General Li, he charged at Lin Fan with all his speed.


    He waspletely ignoring defense and was using every bit of his power to attack Lin Fan.


    He could easily recognize that Lin Fan was the one that had the strange power to turn their pets against them. So he knew that unless he took out Lin Fan, it would be impossible for them to turn the tides.


    However, once Lin Fan was taken care of¡­The strange magic that had gripped their pets would be released and they would be able to fight back.


    To that extent, he didn''t mind if he died for it.


    It would all be worth it once Lin Fan died and they regained control of their pets.


    So without care for his own life, the enemymander charged at Lin Fan.


    But it was just too bad that Lin Fan had already prepared for this.


    It was no coincidence that the enemies weren''t able to follow Lin Fan earlier. That was because he had already found a pet that was very useful to him beforeing here.


    There were others that had noticed that he was the one that was turning their pets against them, so there had been others that had tried to take care of Lin Fan. One of them was an assassin that had a special pet that was dual light and dark attributed.


    However, just like the rest, he failed in his mission to take down Lin Fan and his pet had been taken by him.


    This assassin had been in the Mid Realm, so his pet was also in the Mid Realm.


    With this Mid Realm Beast and Ying''s Night Minx, Lin Fan was able tobine theirws to create a stealth effect that even a High Realm Expert couldn''t see through.


    So in front of the enemymander, Lin Fan seemed to disappear into thin air.


    No matter how he tried looking for him, he couldn''t find him at all¡­

 Chapter 904 Transport Gates

    Seeing Lin Fan disappear and not knowing where he went, the enemymander couldn''t help revealing a bitter look on his face.


    He knew that he had failed, but he couldn''t ept this!


    They had attacked with the perfect n and they even had the enemy supreme general pinned in, but somehow they were now the ones that had been suppressed.


    It just didn''t make any sense!


    But even if he couldn''t ept it, it wasn''t as if this changed reality.


    The reality of this situation was that they were now trapped and their power had been cut in half from their pets being turned against them. Even if they wanted to escape, it would be impossible being surrounded by all of these enemies.


    Perhaps they might have been able to do something if he had freed the pets by killing Lin Fan, but now¡­it seemed like it was impossible.


    So with no other choice, the enemymander raised his sword and roared out, "Take out as many of them with you as you can!"


    All of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops revealed bitter looks, but they knew that theirmander was right.


    The simple fact was they were trapped like flies and they had no choice but to fight.


    There were some that still held onto the hope of being able to run away, but they were quickly cut down when they ran into groups of Mu Ster Kingdom Experts.


    The remaining troops all gathered around the enemymander and took on a defensive formation.


    General Li knew that the strike he hadnded on the enemymander was fatal and as long as enough time passed, he would eventually die. Once the enemymander died, they would have nothing to rely on to resist their attacks.


    So he didn''t order his troops to attack.


    Instead, he had his troops form a blockade around the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces. They just held their ground without charging forward, not letting the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces escape.


    The enemymander revealed a bitter smile when he saw this, but he wasn''t surprised.


    This was the General Li, the Iron Wall of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    He had guarded their borders in many different situations, so of course he would recognize the situation of this battle.


    He would recognize that there was nothing more dangerous than a dying beast that was forced into a corner. These beasts had nothing to lose and would put up the greatest struggle before their death.


    In this situation, instead of sending his men forward and creating more casualties, the smart move was to wait for the best to die on its own and not provoke it. This was an effective way of killing the beast without sacrificing your own troops, so there was no reason not to use this strategy.


    But the enemymander couldn''t ept this.


    So with a wave of his hand, his troops all suddenly took a drill formation.


    Instead of waiting here for his death, this was the better option. With death in front and death behind, he chose the death that would give him the greatest hope, which was fighting with hisst breath to send his troops out of here.


    Seeing this, General Li was about to give amand to his troops as well, but he couldn''t even act before the beasts suddenly started moving.


    There was a barrier that suddenly appeared around the surrounded Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops. This was the same barrier that the experts had used on Lin Fan and Ying before.


    As for the worry of not being able to move¡­that didn''t matter since all around the beasts were the experts of the Mu a ster Kingdom.


    Both sides were surprised to see this array appear since they didn''t think that there was anyone else who could set up this kind of array.


    Lin Fan appeared beside General Li and said, "General, I''ll restrain them if you want to take them down."


    General Li was surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, but he quickly gave a nod and led his troops forward.


    At the same time, the remaining beasts that didn''t enter the array charged with them.


    Being suppressed and outnumbered like this, it didn''t take long before the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces were cut down.


    Before he fell, the enemymander couldn''t help taking onest look at Lin Fan as he muttered, "How¡­?"


    Lin Fan didn''t react at all when he saw this.


    As for how he knew how to use this array¡­Since he was able to find its weakness before, naturally he also knew how to set it up as well.


    So with enough pets, he was able to set up the array through them.


    The crux of that array was the High Realm Pet that he had taken from the enemymander. Without it, the array wouldn''t have been strong enough to suppress the enemymander.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Once all the enemies had been taken care of, the Mu Ster Kingdom troops gave a roaring cheer.


    They all looked to General Li to call out their victory, but he denied the honour. Instead, he turned to Lin Adam and offered the opportunity to him.


    But Lin Fan felt that it was inappropriate for an outsider like him to take this honour, so he denied this offer.


    General Li didn''t take offence to this since he understood Lin Fan''s reasoning. So he led the soldiers in a cheer while Lin Fan slowly gathered up all the pets.


    Once their cheer was over and they saw that they were surrounded by the pets, the soldiers couldn''t help feeling a bit anxious.


    After all, when it was all said and done, these were the enemy''s pets. Now that the enemy was dead and these pets had no masters, it was hard to predict what they could do.


    Arge group like this was more than enough to wipe out their entire tired camp.


    General Li turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Owner Lin, what are you nning on doing now?"


    He didn''t call him little brother Lin or Lin Fan like he had before.


    After thinking about it, he chose to call him Owner Lin since he felt that it was awkward to call him Brother Lin since they weren''t that close to begin with.


    However, he called him Owner Lin because of his respect for him.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s intervention, it would have been very likely that they would have been all wiped out here.


    He was finally starting to understand why the Mu Ster King trusted this unknown young man so much¡­Even he felt that he couldn''t see through this young man who was clearly at a lower level of cultivation, but felt like he could do anything.


    Lin Fan didn''t answer at first as he looked around himself.


    After a long period of silence, he asked, "Are the transport gates still functioning?"


    General Li was surprised by this sudden question, but he didn''t answer it himself. He turned to one of his subordinates who came forward to report, "Yes, the transport gates are still functioning, but¡­"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at this person.


    Even though this person was in the High Star Realm, he couldn''t help feeling pressured being looked at like this by Lin Fan who was in the Low Star Realm.


    After giving a gulp to calm himself, this subordinate said, "The transport gates are still functional and there''s contact with the other side, but the situation doesn''t look good. Also, the various other outposts are all being pressed by the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces, so they aren''t able to send any support at all."


    Then looking around, the subordinate said, "Even if the transport gates are functional¡­"


    He left his words unfinished, but it was clear what he was implying by the way he looked around himself.


    Lin Fan''s idea was clear to everyone.


    He wanted to use the transport gates outside of their camp to send aid to the Ran Ster Kingdom camp.


    This was one of the final lines of defense that had been prepared for both sides just in case they were ever pushed in this much. These were transport gates that were directly connected to the main camp of each of the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom main camps.


    If they were ever pushed that far, they would be able to use these teleport gates to instantly send support to the other side.


    But of course, no one had expected the enemies to directly attack their camps like this and to do so at the same time.


    It was a good thing that they had also nned ahead and made sure to build these transport gates outside of their main camps, so the enemies couldn''t use them. They would only teleport to an area that was nearby before sending help to their allies.


    But in this situation where they had just been attacked, it wasn''t as if they had troops that they could spare to help the Ran Ster Kingdom camp.


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "But what about the beasts around you?"


    Everyone was surprised when they heard this and after looking around, they realized that Lin Fan was right.


    There were still a bunch of beasts that they didn''t care about since they were the enemy''s pets. They could use these as fodder to take down the enemies and rescue the Ran Ster Kingdom camp.


    After thinking about it for a few seconds, General Li immediately nodded and agreed to Lin Fan''s n.


    As for the main reason he agreed, it was because Lin Fan stated that he was also going with them.


    With Lin Fan''s abilities and these beasts¡­they had a very high chance of seeding.


    And if they wanted to win this war, they had to save the Ran Ster Kingdom camp because it would be impossible for them to fight a Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom working with the Beast Race alone.

 Chapter 905 Saving Allies (1)

    As they watched the mes being lit all over their camp, the remaining troops of the Ran Ster Kingdom couldn''t help revealing deste looks.


    They didn''t understand how it had happened, but they had been suddenly ambushed by the Beast Race.


    These Beast Emperors had appeared out of nowhere and suddenly attacked their camp. However, working together, they were able to repel the Beast Race forces in the end.


    To those with sharp eyes, they could even see that the Beast Race forces hadn''t used their full power when they attacked their camp. It was almost as if they were holding back and hiding something¡­


    But right before they could get any time to rest, they were suddenly attacked by the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces.


    The situation in the Ran Ster Kingdom camp was just like the one in the Mu Ster Kingdom camp when they had been attacked. The remnant troops had been scattered and the ones that remained were fighting for their lives.


    The difference was that they didn''t have a beast wave like the one Lin Fan created to help.


    While they would still most likely survive since reinforcements woulde and this was deep in the Ran Ster Kingdom territory, so the enemy would be forced to retreat, they would sufferrge casualties because of this. This kind ofrge casualty might even cripple the entire Ran Ster Kingdom army if they lost enough generals and troops.


    The Mu Ster Kingdom forces would have been in the same situation if it wasn''t for Lin Fan saving all those people as he made his way through that camp.


    At the center of the Ran Ster Kingdom camp was the same situation.


    The supreme general of the Ran Ster Kingdom forces, General Fu was trapped inside of the central tent.


    Even though he could see his men being cut down outside, he couldn''t charge out like this. The only thing that he could do was wait and see if there was an opportunity or wait for reinforcements toe since he waspletely surrounded by the enemies.


    If he were to charge out, it would be certain that he would be cut down by the enemies surrounding them.


    So even if it was cruel, he could only sit in this tent and wait¡­


    But that didn''t mean that it didn''t eat away at him seeing his troops being ughtered like this.


    There were many times where he almost couldn''t control himself and ran out to save them, but he restrained himself in the end. As the supreme general of the Ran Ster Kingdom, this was his duty no matter how it hurt him.


    As they watched, the generals around them also knitted their brows more and more until finally one of them couldn''t take it anymore.


    That general came forward and said, "General, I am willing to lead a troop outside as a distraction. I will lure their attention and create an opportunity for the general to escape."


    Although it sounded brave, everyone knew that he was saying that he was prepared to go on a suicide charge. That was because no matter what kind of distraction he created, with how many enemies were surrounding them, it was impossible for them to break through.


    What he really wanted to do was create as much room as possible so that as many of the troops outside could gather. As long as they could gather, they would be able to push through the enemy lines and escape, reducing the number of casualties that they would take.


    But the problem with that was that it would reduce the overall number of troops they had to fight with¡­


    In this situation, the best idea was to let the brawl outside continue as long as possible.


    Simply put, the soldiers would be using their lives to buy them time for reinforcements toe.


    If the soldiers outside could escape, that meant that more and more enemies would join the siege around this tent. Once they reached enough people, they would be able to storm the tent with their numbers and take down General Fu.


    So in the end, the best idea was to leave them be¡­


    But General Fu also couldn''t watch his men die like this.


    These were men that had followed him and had fought on countless battlefields with him, to let them die like this really was a shame for them¡­


    Still, his duty as the supreme general came first and he stopped that general from charging out.


    But before either of them could do a thing, there was a sudden explosion that came from outside. After that explosion, there were several other explosions that suddenly rang out all over the camp.


    These were explosions that appeared in the center of the enemy formations.


    When they looked closely, they could see the enemies being scattered from the force of these explosions.


    All of the Ran Ster Kingdom troops inside of the tent couldn''t help looking out with wide eyes as they couldn''t understand what was happening. However, as they kept watching, they found that the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom lines were slowly getting thinned out.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It was clear that there was something happening outside, but they didn''t know just what it was.


    However, at the very least, they could tell that it was something good for them.


    Soon, the people in the tent were able to see that there was a different g that was being waved outside. When they looked closely at this g, they suddenly recognized it and couldn''t help being surprised.


    After all, this was the g of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    As far as they knew, the Mu Ster Kingdom troops should have been fighting the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops themselves, so how were they able to send troops to help them?


    But that didn''t matter right now.


    Since the Mu Ster Kingdom troops were here, that meant that this was the opportunity that General Fu was waiting for.


    As long as they worked with the Mu Ster Kingdom, they would be able to push back the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops.


    So without hesitation, General Fu led his men out.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troops were already suffering since there was something strange happening in their lines.


    Whenever they summoned out a pet to fight, there would be a strange shadow that would appear.


    No one was able to keep track of this shadow, but every time this shadow appeared, one of their pets would suddenly turn to the enemy side. The shadow just jumped forward and almost didn''t touch the pet, but then it would suddenly change sides as if it had realized something.


    Of course, it was hard for them to fight their own pets, so many of them still held out hope that they would be able to bring them back to their side.


    It was just too bad that they were soon overrun by the enemies.


    After all, it wasn''t just the Ran Ster Kingdom forces that were attacking them, but also the Mu Ster Kingdom forces.


    When the enemymander saw the gs of the Mu Ster Kingdom among the troops, he couldn''t help cursing under his breath.


    He knew that there was another attachment that had been sent to take care of the Mu Ster Kingdom camp, but here they were. So it was clear that the other attachment had already been taken care of by the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    Not to mention, they had been taken care of this quickly.


    If they had been able to hold out a bit longer, they would have been able to take out the Ran Ster Kingdom camp and then grouped up with them to take care of the Mu Ster Kingdom camp. Even if the Mu Ster Kingdom camp was hiding some kind of big secret, it would have been easy for theirbined group to take care of them.


    After all, it would be two High Realm Experts facing General Li alone. Even if General Li was recognized as a powerful expert, it wouldn''t have been possible for him to escape.


    But now that n had all been ruined by that fool of amander.


    Themander of the group sent to attack the Mu Ster Kingdom camp was a fool who only cared about his own benefits and own position. He was someone who was veryzy and didn''t properly check the conditions of the battlefield.


    However, because of his talent for cultivation, he was able to break through to the High Realm and be one of their top generals.


    Or at least that was his view of that person because he very much disliked thatmander.


    Still, there was no time to think about that now.


    What he needed to do was figure out a way to deal with this sudden change in the battlefield.


    So after thinking about it, themander said, "Bring all the pets to the back and have them attack from long range. Don''t let the enemy approach the pets."


    He didn''t know what it was that was turning their pets against them, but he could tell that it required contact. Otherwise, why would there be that shadow that moved through their lines from time to time, touching the pets?


    So he figured that as long as he kept their pets in the back and attacked from long range, he would be able to rely on their power and suppress the enemy with them.


    But it was also at this time that General Fu suddenly charged out with his troops.


    In this one move, they had beenpletely surrounded.

 Chapter 906 Saving Allies (2)

    Even though they were now surrounded, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forcesmander didn''t panic.


    He knew that these were experts that were tired from being attacked by the Beast Race and the other detachment, while his troops were all fresh troops.


    They might be in a disadvantageous position because of the strange happenings with their pets, but he was certain that they would be able to regroup as long as they didn''t panic any further. As long as they properly took a formation, they would be able to grind down the weak enemiesing at them.


    But it was too bad that Lin Fan had other ns.


    As the enemymander was about to give his orders, there was a sudden barrier that appeared around them.


    The enemymander''s jaw dropped since he recognized this barrier, but he never expected the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom troops to have this as well.


    After all, this was a special array that their Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces had prepared just for this war.


    This was the array that had been used on Lin Fan previously, the one that he had also used on the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces before. It was the one that trapped thempletely and suppressed them.


    The enemymander was about to shout something, but then there was a roar that came from in front of them.


    General Li led a group of his men forward, charging right into the lines of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces.


    With the full force charge of this High Realm Expert and the suppression that came from the barrier, there was no chance of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces being able to stop him. They were scattered like pins as they flew off to the sides, creating a path to the enemymander.


    As they were scattered, the same shadow dashed through the gaps in between them to reach the pets that were hiding in the back.


    The same situation happened where in just an instant, all of these pets turned to the enemy side.


    They turned around and started firing on people that had been their allies.


    With the support from these pets, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces scattered even more.


    Since they were already in formation, the panic caused by this one side spread all the way to the other side. So when General Fu charged in with his troops, he also easily scattered them since they were already in a panic and being suppressed.


    General Fu didn''t know what General Li''s n was, but seeing him charge through the enemy lines like this, he knew that he would certainly have a n.


    He could also see the barrier and could see the effect that it was having on the enemies, so he knew that this was the best time.


    He believed that as long as he and General Li worked together, they would be able to take down the enemymander.


    What he didn''t notice was that there was a shadow that had suddenly appeared to their side that was moving through the enemies that they had scattered. As this shadow moved through the enemy lines, there were enemy pets that also turned against them on this side.


    Soon, there was a beast wave that swept through the enemies around the Ran Ster Kingdom forces, blocking them from stopping their charge.


    General Fu narrowed his eyes for a second as he muttered, "This is¡­"


    But then he quickly focused his eyes back on the center of the enemy formation where the enemymander was.


    Without any hesitation, he led his men forward and charged at the center of the formation.


    Without any coordination, the two sides were able to reach the center of the formation at the same time.


    The enemymander was already prepared for this and sent out his honour guards in two halves at the two of them, while he personally turned to take one General Fu.


    General Fu¡­didn''t have the same prestige as General Li, so he figured that General Fu would be the easier target.


    But it was just too bad that he was wrong since that was the side that Lin Fan was currently on.


    There had been more than enough pets turned on that side, so he used his spatialws to move around the formation to reach the side that the Ran Ster Kingdom forces were on. With his shadow, light, and darkws working together, they weren''t able to see him at all.


    When the enemymander charged out, he naturally had his pet with him.


    Even though he had seen all those different pets being turned against them, he didn''t believe that it would happen to his pet. After all, this was a High Realm Pet, it wasn''t on the same level as the rest.


    Unfortunately for him, that wasn''t the case.


    The first sh was an even sh between the two sides.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Perhaps the enemymander would have been stronger since General Fu was tired from fighting the Beast Race, but the suppression effect from the barrier also had an effect on him.


    So it turned out to be an even sh in the end.


    That was when Lin Fan made his move.


    As the two of them stood there looking at each other, Lin Fan suddenly appeared behind him as a shadow and tapped his pet on the back.


    The moment that this happened, the pet suddenly stopped releasing life energy to support the enemymander and then the enemymander was pushed back by General Fu.


    The enemymander turned to look at his pet, but he found that the pet was just standing there in a daze. It was looking off into the distance and there was nothing in particr that it was focusing on.


    It was as if it was looking at something that he couldn''t see.


    The enemymander raised his hand to p his pet, but before he could do or say anything, the pet suddenly raised its w to attack the enemymander.


    The enemymander was caught off guard, but he quickly twisted out of the way to avoid the w shing upwards. But since he had been caught off guard, the w was still able to catch his side and drew some blood.


    It wasn''t a serious injury, but there was no doubt that he was injured.


    The enemymander looked at his pet in shock as he roared, "What are you doing? Do you need to be disciplined again?"


    Just like how there were those that cared for their pets, there were also those¡­that thought of them as nothing more than tools to be used. This enemymander was one of those people who disciplined his pets and never built a proper rtionship with it.


    After the pet had turned on the enemymander, Lin Fan noticed that something was off. It didn''t take long before he figured out the rtionship between them, so he said to the pet, "Do you want to take your revenge?"


    The pet was surprised to hear this voice out of nowhere, but it still gave a nod.


    Lin Fan gave a sound of acknowledgement before sending mental messages to both General Li and General Fu.


    General Li wasn''t surprised at all since he was already convinced by Lin Fan''s skills and immediately followed his orders.


    General Fu was slower to react, but he still did the same as General Li.


    While he wasn''t sure who it was that talked to him mentally, seeing General Li charge forward without hesitation, he knew that there was no time for him to have doubts. He needed to coordinate with General Li to take down the enemymander.


    The enemymander saw this and quickly backed up while throwing out some attacks at the two of them.


    These attacks were easily blocked by both General Li and General Fu, but it did create a gap in between them.


    While this was going on, not a single person paid any attention to the High Realm Pet that had been abandoned.


    Lin Fan came up to this High Realm Pet and ced his hand on it, releasing his shadow, dark, and lightws at the same time to cover it. As thesews surrounded the High Realm Pet, it disappeared from line of sight.


    It was just too bad that no one was paying attention to it since all of their attention had been drawn by the fight between the enemymander and the two generals.


    The enemymander kept maintaining his distance and throwing out more and more attacks at the two of them. He knew that even without his pet, he had more energy than the two of them since they had been fighting all the way while he had been conserving his energy.


    So if he wore them down enough¡­


    As he had expected, after five minutes of kiting them around like this, they finally showed signs of slowing down.


    But the enemymander was cautious and continued kiting them for another five minutes until their speed dropped considerably.


    It was only then that the enemymander turned around and charged at the two of them with his strongest attack.


    Working together, the two of them were able to block the attack, but it was clear that they were on the losing side.


    Seeing this, the enemymander couldn''t helpughing as he said, "It seems like you aren''t that great after¡­"


    But before he could finish, he suddenly felt a paining from his chest.


    He looked down to find that there was a w stabbing right through his chest.

 Chapter 907 Captured

    One let their guard down when they thought that victory was at hand.


    This was a principle that Lin Fan recognized and had utilized in this situation.


    The instructions that he had given to the generals was to lead the enemymander until he thought that he was winning.


    Even them struggling to block his final attack was all a ruse.


    The enemymander was just too confident in himself, a trait that both of the generals recognized immediately, which was why they had used this n.


    After all, Lin Fan had just asked them to fake losing and didn''t tell them how to do it.


    These two were experienced generals, so something like this was easy for them.


    The enemymander looked down at the w that was sticking out of his chest in disbelief.


    He wasn''t able to sense his former pet sneaking up on him at all, so he couldn''t understand just how it had happened.


    But the facts couldn''t be denied and there was indeed arge hole in his chest.


    After spitting out arge mouthful of blood, the enemymander suddenly gritted his teeth. He raised his sword and gathered every single bit of remaining energy that he could.


    But when he was prepared to swing at his former pet, he found that it was already fading away.


    When he swung out, all he was able to find was thin air with his sword.


    Then as he turned around, he found that the weapons of the two generals were already flying at him. With one final bitterugh, he faced his death.


    ? However, even at the moment of his death, he couldn''t understand where it had all gone wrong.


    Their Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms hade up with the perfect n and had even brought in the Beast Race, the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms shouldn''t have had a chance at all. However, in the end, they had been forced into this desperate situation where their pets even turned on them.


    Just what secret did the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom have?


    As expected, there was no suspense at all as the swords of the generals sliced right through the enemymander and his corpse copsed to the ground in pieces.


    The moment that the enemymander''s corpse fell to the ground, the enemy''s morale immediately copsed.


    This was no longer a fight, but rather a frantic panicked escape. The enemy didn''t even try to work together as they used each other as scapegoats for their own escape.


    The pets that had been taken were all abandoned and they scattered in every direction like rats.


    It was just too bad that neither the Mu or Ran Ster Kingdom forces were in the mood to let them escape. Not to mention that they had beenpletely surrounded in the first ce.


    With the suppression of the barrier that was still around them, it was impossible for them to face the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom forces head on.


    So most of them immediately chose to turn in the direction of General Li and General Fu.


    If they were able to capture these two¡­they would be able to use them as hostages to break through this siege.


    As for why they thought that they would be able to capture these two High Realm Experts, their logic was that they were weakened by theirmander. Not to mention that they were currently surrounded by enemies as well.


    The two generals had charged right into the center of the enemy formation to take down the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forcesmander, so they were currentlypletely surrounded by a sea of enemies.


    It was their group in the center, then the enemies around them, and then their troops standing outside surrounding everything.


    So they figured that with the weakened state that these two generals should be in and with how many of them there were here, they would be able to easily capture the two of them. It was just too bad that this was nothing more than optimistic thinking and they hadpletely overestimated their own abilities.


    With the support of the High Realm Beast that Lin Fan had taken from the enemymander, these remnants of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces werepletely scattered. Like an arrow, they flew right through the lines of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, scattering them all like pins.


    It took less than five minutes for the group of the two generals to break through back to their own lines.


    When the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces saw this, they knew that it was the end for them.


    They had be a trapped beast with nowhere to go.<novelnext></novelnext>


    But they knew that it was impossible to surrender since it was clear that the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdom forces weren''t in the mood to take prisoners.


    They had invaded their camps and had injured many of their allies, this was a debt that couldn''t be forgiven easily.


    Not to mention that all the troops that had been sent to attack the camp were elites, so it would certainly be arge blow to the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms if they were all destroyed.


    So with all these reasons, there was no need to take them as prisoners¡­other than a few of the high ranking officers.


    But those high ranking officers knew that they would be taken prisoner to be tortured for information, so it was better for them not to surrender or get captured.


    With the blockade in ce, General Li didn''t bother doing anything and just left everything to General Fu since this was the Ran Ster Kingdom camp. If he were to step in andmand the troops, it would be pushing the boundaries and would offend the Ran Ster Kingdom.


    General Fu also understood this and tookmand of the forces of the two Ster Kingdoms.


    In no time, they quickly took care of the rest of the enemies and they started cleaning up the camp.


    At that point, General Fu invited General Li and Lin Fan to the central camp.


    He had seen Lin Fan with the enemymander''s High Realm Pet, so he could guess that Lin Fan was the one that had turned the enemy''s pets on them. If that was the case, then Lin Fan was someone that was just as important as General Li since he was capable of overturning the situation of the entire war.


    Once they had settled, the first thing that happened was that General Li turned to Lin Fan to ask, "Why did you kill the enemymander?"


    This was a very important thing since they wanted information about the enemy and there was no one better to provide this information than the enemymander.


    If it hadn''t been for Lin Fanmanding the High Realm Beast to stab the enemymander in the back, the two of them wouldn''t have cut him down and could have taken him captive. But since he was already bleeding out from being stabbed in the back, the two generals had no choice but to cut him down before he did anything desperate.


    This had been their best chance to capture one of the enemymanders, but Lin Fan had ruined it for them, so of course he was displeased.


    Even if he was subdued by Lin Fan''s abilities, he was still the suprememander of the Mu Ster Kingdom forces and had to think about their overall benefits.


    As for why he couldn''t capture the enemymander back at the Mu Ster Kingdom camp, that was because it would have been too hard to do so with just him alone. Here he had the help of the High Realm Beast and General Fu, so it could have been easily done.


    General Fu also looked at Lin Fan with knitted brows since he was also annoyed about this.


    Lin Fan just calmly faced them and said, "He deserved to die, so he died. It''s just that simple."


    General Li and General Fu were filled with annoyance when they heard this and they mmed their fists onto the table.


    General Li stood up and pointed at Lin Fan as he said, "While I recognize the value that you have, that doesn''t mean that you''re allowed to do whatever you want."


    Lin Fan calmly faced him and said, "I came here as a contractor, so I''m not a part of your Mu Ster Kingdom army. I don''t abide by your orders."


    General Li was taken aback when he heard this, but he realized that Lin Fan was right. That was the agreement that the Mu Ster King had signed with Lin Fan and he was indeed free to do what he wanted¡­


    But this matter was just too important to them!


    So he couldn''t just back down on this.


    At the very least, he had to find a way to get Lin Fan to submit to their Mu Ster Kingdom army so he could properly deploy him.


    He recognized that Lin Fan''s ability was powerful and as long as he worked with them, they would be able to easily push back the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces.


    After all, this was a world where fighting with pets was absolutely necessary unless one was a sword cultivator. So if their pets betrayed them, then it would mean that their power would be cut in half, making them easy targets.


    So he needed Lin Fan in his forces.


    But before he could say anything else, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand and said, "Wait, before we continue, let''s go outside."


    Everyone in the room was confused when they heard this, but seeing that Lin Fan didn''t wait and already started heading out, they had no choice but to follow him.


    When they came out, they were shocked to see that¡­


    There were several beasts that were tied up waiting there for them.

 Chapter 908 Changing Situation

    General Li and General Fu just looked at the beasts lying there in a daze.


    They could tell from the aurasing from them that all of these beasts were actually Beast Emperors and there were even a few of them in the Realm.


    But where had theye from?


    General Li hesitantly turned to Lin Fan and asked, "This is?"


    Lin Fan casually said, "When we arrived through the transport gate, I noticed that there was a group of Beast Race forces nearby that was observing the situation. I sent a detachment of the beasts that I turned to capture them."


    General Li looked at Lin Fan in shock and disbelief as if he couldn''t believe what he had just heard.


    He had been with Lin Fan the entire time, so he never thought that Lin Fan had sent an entire detachment to take out these Beast Race scouts. At the same time, he was shocked that Lin Fan was able to find these Beast Race scouts in the first ce.


    Since they were heading into enemy territory, he had also made sure to send his scouts out to see if there were any enemies waiting for them.


    The result that they came back with was that there was no one around at all.


    This was an elite scout team that he had trained since he had started out as amander and had been trained into the most elite scout team in the entire army. This wasn''t just what he thought, but a fact that was recognized by almost all the generals.


    In special situations, many generals even asked to borrow this scouting squad from General Li.


    But now, Lin Fan had shown an ability that far surpassed his elite scouts¡­


    He couldn''t help feeling more and more amazed by Lin Fan since he kept showing things that shocked him more and more.


    Since they had captured all these Beast Emperors, there was no need for them to capture the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom troopmanders. However, the more that they had, the more information they would get.


    General Li didn''t hesitate at all to send a report back to the capital and immediately had several interrogators brought out to the frontlines.


    However, to his dismay, he found that the interrogators that he brought out were less effective than Lin Fan''s methods.


    He didn''t understand what Lin Fan''s methods were, but whenever he ced his hands on the captive Beast Emperors, they would immediately reveal shocked looks before begging him to stop.


    Then whatever questions he asked, there was no resistance at all as they obediently gave him the answers he wanted.


    It was all just too strange!


    What Lin Fan was doing was using his absorption power on them. However, it was different from when he used it to purify bloodlines.


    As his cultivation grew, his abilities also grew.


    The absorption power was much strongerpared to before, so naturally he wasn''t just limited to sucking out impurities in their blood. He could even directly suck out their bloodlines themselves.


    A beast without a bloodline wouldn''t be a demon beast anymore, they would be just a normal animal without any cultivation. So what Lin Fan was doing was effectively crippling them.


    Of course, they couldn''t take this since the moment that they lost their cultivations, they would also lose their intelligence.


    It was very much turning into a beast by crippling them like this.


    These Beast Emperors with their pride would never ept this!


    Even death was better than being crippled like this!


    However, the results were very good since they found out what kind of agreement the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had made with the Beast Race.


    It was as they had expected, they had betrayed the human race.


    They were working with the Beast Race to invade not just the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms, but also they were preparing to attack other Ster Kingdoms as well. They even had sleeper agents prepared in the Ster Kingdoms that they were preparing to attack.


    Once they finished off all these Ster Kingdoms, they would pretend to lose in an invasion by the Beast Race and give the territory through failing to defend against them.


    The next part was a part that the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms didn''t know.


    The Beast Race had also put many sleeper agents in the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms. They had sent many beasts into the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom as pets.


    As long as the signal was given, these beasts would work with the Beast Race to take down core parts of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    Then when the Beast Race invaded, they wouldn''t just stop at the agreed lines, but rather they would invade the entire Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It seemed like the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had invited a real wolf into their homes.


    But that wasn''t any of the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms'' problems.


    What they had now was evidence of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms betraying the human race and working with the Beast Race.


    The Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms didn''t hesitate to release this evidence to the surrounding Ster Kingdoms and it immediately raised an uproar.


    The surrounding Ster Kingdoms had been more partial to the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms when they announced that the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms had betrayed the human race. After all, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had spoken first and the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms hadn''t released a statement.


    But of course, there was no evidence from the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms and the situation with the war was strange, so many Ster Kingdoms had their doubts.


    They didn''t interfere with this situation and just waited to see how it would develop.


    But now that the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms had provided concrete proof, they had no reason not to believe them. Especially since they were already doubtful towards the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms in the first ce.


    As soon as this evidence was released, there were several Ster Kingdoms that dered war on the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms at the same time.


    All of sudden, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had found themselvespletely surrounded by enemies.


    They said that they were to subjugate the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms in the name of the human race. They were going to punish them for betraying the humans and working with the Beast Race.


    However, no Ster Kingdom would move without benefits.


    With this new evidence, it was certain that many Ster Kingdoms would move to subjugate the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms. As long as they moved as well, they would be able to take some of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom''s territory. Even if they couldn''t take the territory, they would still be able to get some treasures from the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    With the overwhelming forces against the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, they were certain to take them down.


    So no one was foolish enough to let this chance go.


    This was simr to the crusades back in Lin Fan''s previous world, but it would not fail they had failed.


    There were just too many enemies for the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    The final nail in the coffin came when thergest Ster Kingdom in the area, the Zi Ster Kingdom decided to join the war as well.


    They were thergest Ster Kingdom, so normally they stayed out of the conflicts of the smaller Ster Kingdoms.


    However, this time, they broke their norm and decided to intervene.


    That just went to show how serious this matter was.


    They condemned the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms for selling themselves out to the Beast Race and they would officially send a punitive force to these two Ster Kingdoms.


    A punitive force from the Zi Ster Kingdom waspletely different from an army from a normal Ster Kingdom. The punitive force from the Zi Ster Kingdom were all elites and they would work with the local forces.


    However, one shouldn''t look down on how small the punitive force was since as elites, they were all powerful experts.


    The weakest member of this punitive force would be at least in the High Realm and the leader of the punitive force would be in the Sun Realm.


    To put it into perspective, this was the same realm as the ancestors of the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms.


    This just went to show just how much stronger the Zi Ster Kingdom was if even the leaders of their punitive forces were in the Sun Realm. It wasn''t hard to imagine just how strong the ancestors guarding that kingdom was.


    But when Lin Fan heard that the Zi Ster Kingdom was getting involved, he couldn''t help thinking of something else¡­


    There was someone that he knew from the Zi Ster Kingdom, Zi Ling.


    Could it be that she was also involved in this matter?


    After all, she was the one that had sent him to the Mu Ster Kingdom in the first ce.


    Could it be that she had already anticipated all of this and had sent him here for a reason?


    But if that was the case, why didn''t she expose the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom ahead of time? Why did she allow them to do all of this to the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms and still not say a thing?


    There were just too many strange things about this that Lin Fan couldn''t figure out¡­

 Chapter 909 Kingdoms In Dead Ends

    Inside of a tent on a in the middle of nowhere.


    There were two parties that were sitting on opposite sides of the table.


    Neither one of these parties were normal and normally, it would be very hard for them to gather like this.


    However, they had no choice but to gather after what had happened.


    But neither side said a thing, almost as if they were waiting for someone.


    It didn''t take long before the tent p was opened and there were a few figures that walked in.


    These figures weren''t cloaked at all and they revealed their appearances without any fear.


    These were wild looking humans with scraps of clothes that were made of beast fur. These clothes only covered the most essential parts of their body and revealed everything else.


    However, these people didn''t care at all about this.


    The other half of the group was made up of people that were dressed in fine clothes, making them look like aristocrats. They were in a very direct sh with the wild group of people that they came in.


    Aftering into the tent, they sat down at opposite ends and looked at the people who had already been sitting there.


    After a long period of silence, the leader of the wild dressed people asked, "How did you mess this up?"


    The leader of the fine dressed people nodded and said, "We already gave you all that support and you still weren''t able to do anything with it. Don''t you think that it''s embarrassing." Then after a pause, they added, "Not to mention¡­you somehow exposed yourself and now you''re being surrounded by all these Ster Kingdoms. It seems like we made the wrong call working with you all."


    The leaders of the two groups really couldn''t say anything because there was nothing that they could say.


    They had followed the n set out by the Beast Race, but in the end, it was their troops that had messed up. The Beast Race were able to deal quite a bit of damage to the camps of their enemies, but then the troops that they sent to clean up the camps werepletely wiped out.


    Then they didn''t know how it had happened, but the enemy had found evidence of their betrayal of the human race and of their cooperation with the Beast Race.


    The ones that were currently at this meeting were naturally the kings of Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    The ones that had walked in were the transformed Beast Emperors of the Beast Race.


    The ones in the wild clothing were from the Sky Lion Race and their leader was the Sky Lion Lord.


    The ones in the noble clothing were from the Mist Pangolin Race and their leader was the Mist Pangolin Lord.


    These two were the ones that led the group that had arrived.


    These two were also the ones that had approached the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms in the first ce because they thought that they would be able to help them with their scheme. Of course, they also didn''t tell the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms about their n to take their territory.


    After all, it wasn''t as if this was something that they could admit so casually.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom had already been struggling since they had suffered several disasters in the past few decades. Their people had been suffering and they had asked for help from therger Ster Kingdoms, but all of them had given them vague responses.


    Even the Zi Ster Kingdom that was considered the keeper of this area had ignored them.


    All that they had offered was some minor support when it came to supplies, but they didn''t help them solve the root cause of their problems.


    With no other choice, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms knew that they would eventually be too weak to remain as Ster Kingdoms if this trend continued. The only thing that they could do was¡­invade other kingdoms, so they had started militarizing themselves.


    As for cooperating with the Beast Race, other than the royal families, the other powerful families didn''t know a thing.


    That was until the outbreak of the war with the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms when they finally learned the truth behind the repelling the "Beast Race invasion" n that the royal family had.


    As far as they knew, they were just supposed to repel the Beast Race and then im this territory as part of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, giving themnd to work with. However, when they arrived, they found that the Beast Race was there waiting for them, but not to fight them.


    Rather, the Beast Race was waiting there to join them.


    The powerful families of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms epted this in the end since they knew that this was the only way that they would be able to find newnd for themselves.


    After the disasters that they had suffered, much of theirnd was now unusable.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Namely, there were manys that they had developed outposts on that werepletely destroyed.


    So if they wanted morend, they had no choice but to take it. But it wasn''t as if it would be easy for them to takend since there were other Ster Kingdoms around them that were much stronger.


    That was why after the disasters hit them, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had focused on militarization.


    Still, that was far from enough.


    So the rulers of these two Ster Kingdoms decided to work with the Beast Race after being tempted by them which led to this current situation.


    Seeing that neither of the Ster Kings were saying a thing, the Sky Lion Lord mmed his fist on the table and said, "Since you''re all so useless, we''ve decided to stop supporting you."


    Both Ster Kings revealed stunned looks, but before they could say anything, the Mist Pangolin Lord said, "Of course, that is unless you can prove your worth."


    Both of them narrowed their eyes as they looked at the Mist Pangolin Lord.


    They knew that this routine from the two of them was deliberate, they clearly had a goal in mind when they came here. However, it wasn''t as if they had a choice in this matter since they were already forced against a wall.


    Every single Ster Kingdom had dered war on them at the same time and even the Zi Ster Kingdom was making a move. They had no chance in winning since the Zi Ster Kingdom alone was enough to wipe them out.


    So they had to have the support of the Beast Race, or their Ster Kingdoms would be destroyed.


    Seeing that they had their attention, the Sky Lion Lord sat back while letting the Mist Pangolin Lord do what they wanted.


    The Mist Pangolin Lord was actually a beautifuldy, so when she suddenly revealed a smile on that face that had been cold the whole time, it was like a flower blooming in the rising sun. However, neither of the Ster Kings or their followers felt any joy seeing this.


    Instead, all of them felt a chill run down their backs.


    The Mist Pangolin Lord wasn''t in a rush to speak as she casually sat there with a smile on her face.


    All this did was cause the Ster Kings and their followers to feel more and more tense, but they couldn''t say a single thing. The only thing that they could do was wait for the Mist Pangolin Lord to speak since she held all the cards here.


    After a long period of silence, the Mist Pangolin Lord said, "We want you to get someone special for us."


    She didn''t give them any information at all about who they wanted them to catch for them.


    But of course, that was done on purpose in order to test these two Ster Kings.


    After a moment of hesitation, one of them asked, "Who is it?"


    The other one didn''t say anything, but it was clear by the look in his eyes that he already supported him in this.


    Seeing this, the Mist Pangolin Lord gave a nod before saying, "It''s someone from the Mu Ster Kingdom. I''m sure that you''ve already heard about how your forces lost against the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms."


    This was a slight jab at the two Ster Kingdoms, but both of the kings had no choice but to give a nod in response.


    The Mist Pangolin Lord also gave a nod before saying, "As long as you bring back that person who caused the changes in the pets, we''ll continue backing you." Then after a pause, she added, "In fact, if you can bring him back, then we''ll guarantee that another four tribes will join your side in the fight."


    The eyes of the two Ster Kings lit up when they heard this.


    So far, they only had the support of three tribes from the Beast Race.


    It was the Sky Lion Tribe, the Mist Pangolin Tribe, and the Rainbow Peacock Tribe that weren''t here today.


    Just these three tribes had already brought many experts to their side, far more than they could have imagined.


    If another four tribes joined them, then they really were confident in facing the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    It was like a light at the end of the tunnel, they had suddenly found their hope to survive this predicament.


    So with firm nods, the two Ster Kings agreed to find this person for the Beast Race.

 Chapter 910 Seems Familiar

    Even though they had been the ones that had set up the meeting area, the ones to leave first were them.


    The Beast Race fully held the fate of the two Ster Kingdoms in their palms and they knew it.


    So when they asked to talk alone, the two Ster Kings revealed ugly expressions, but they still vacated the tent for the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord.


    As for leaving behind methods of eavesdropping, they didn''t do anything like that.


    After all, they fully knew that these two lords of the Beast Race were their only hope¡­


    Once the two Ster Kings and their followers had left, the two lords of the Beast Race suddenly burst out intoughter.


    Theyughed for a long time before finally settling down.


    The two of them looked at each other before the Sky Lion Lord broke the silence, "How are we going to share this once we get that kid?"


    The Mist Pangolin Lord revealed a charming smile and said, "Oh, I thought that we already came to an agreement? Aren''t we all going to take turns using that kid?"


    The Sky Lion Lord revealed a sly smile as he said, "You and I both know that isn''t effective since there''s so many people who already knew about this. Instead¡­wouldn''t it be better if we just controlled him and used him as we pleased? As long as we lend him from time to time to the others, they won''t be able to say a thing."


    The Mist Pangolin Lord slightly knitted her brows when she heard this, but she quickly went back to smiling as she asked, "How do you propose we¡­"


    Before she could finish, the Sky Lion Lord suddenly pped the table.


    The Mist Pangolin Lord''s subordinates were all about to draw their weapons in response to this clear act of aggression, but the Mist Pangolin Lord raised her hand to stop them. She then turned back and looked at the Sky Lion Lord with a calm look on her face.


    The Sky Lion Lord had been looking at her with narrowed eyes the entire time, but seeing that she didn''t even flinch in the face of his p, he suddenly broke out inughter as he said, "Good, very good, you''re just what I''m looking for."


    The Mist Pangolin Lord didn''t say a thing as she waited for him to borate.


    The Sky Lion Lord finally stoppedughing and looked at her with a serious look as he said, "I know about your little agreement with the Rainbow Peacock Lord."


    The Mist Pangolin Lord had a calm look on her face, but there was a trace of surprise that appeared in her eyes. At the same time, the subordinates beside her couldn''t help trembling before quickly forcing themselves to calm down.


    These subordinates were her most trusted subordinates, so they were very high ranking members of the Mist Pangolin Tribe.


    They knew exactly what the Sky Lion Lord was referring to.


    Seeing this, the Sky Lion Lord didn''t continue acting seriously as one would expect and instead revealed a smile as he said, "I can offer you something better."


    The Mist Pangolin Lord narrowed her eyes when she heard this, but she gestured with her hand to allow him to continue.


    The Sky Lion Lord didn''t mind this and said, "I have a connection with the Suanni Race."


    This time, the Mist Pangolin Lord couldn''t help revealing a visible look of shock.


    The Suanni Race¡­that was one of the most powerful races among the entire Beast Race.


    They were even strong enough to rival the Dragon and Phoenix Races at their peak and were separate from the Beast Race. However, because of a disaster that decreased the number of members that they had, they had no choice but to return to the Beast Race from being a separate member of the Myriad Race.


    But because of their innate powers, they were still ranked in the top of all the races of the Beast Race.


    The strongest members of their race were on par with the strongest Dragons and Phoenixes.


    After a long moment of silence, the Mist Pangolin Lord gave a slight nod.


    Compared to just getting this tool that could increase their power, being able to fall under the Suanni Race was the much better choice.


    The Sky Lion Lord broke out inughter again before saying, "Very good! You won''t regret this!"


    The Mist Pangolin Lord couldn''t help looking at the Sky Lion Lord with a strange look.


    She couldn''t figure out how this idiot lion had built a rtionship with one of the top tribes in their entire Beast Race.


    Well, since she had decided to work with them, it seemed like she would have to take control of this idiot lion before anything.


    So the Mist Pangolin Lord revealed a charming smile.


    ¡­


    After they had left the tent, the group from the two Ster Kingdoms came to a cave that they had prepared.


    The subordinates of the two lords had already given them a description of the person they wanted them to capture. However, even without this, they would still be able to recognize this person.<novelnext></novelnext>


    In the fight, while most of their troops had been wiped out, there were those that had survived. As well, there were those that they had sent to watch over the battle that had returned.


    It was from them that they had learned most of what they knew about the battle.


    The rest were from the deserters that they had captured:


    It should be noted that one group was still alive and one group was dead. They couldn''t be more dead as they were buried deep into the ground.


    After they settled, all of them had heavy looks on their faces as they sat there without saying a word.


    In this situation, there wasn''t anything that they could say.


    They had all read the reports and they knew how important their target would be to the Mu and Ran Ster Kingdoms. It would be almost impossible to get the target alone, let alone kidnap him while he was surrounded by guards.


    Not to mention that there were all those pets that he had taken from them.


    Unless they moved their ancestors, they felt that it was close to impossible to capture this target¡­


    As for moving the ancestors, that was even more impossible.


    As soon as the ancestors of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms moved, they would be surrounded and their capitals would be crushed.


    With all these Ster Kingdoms against them, it would mean that the moment that their ancestors left their capital, they would be surrounded and killed.


    The only reason that no one moved on the ancestors of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom now was because they knew that it would cost too much to take them down like this.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had their long history and had umted a lot of resources over the generations. Even if they had suffered a few setbacks during their current generation, it hadn''t touched the foundations of these royal families.


    The ancestors in the capital would have ess to these resources and would be stronger than normal with their set defenses. So that was why no one charged at them and just waited to slowly whittle down the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms with their forces.


    But if the ancestors were to ever leave the capital where their defenses were¡­


    If something were to ever happen to the ancestors of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom, they would no longer have the right to be known as a Ster Kingdom.


    The term Ster Kingdom came from the Star Realm. Only those that had a Star Realm Expert present would be able to call themselves a Ster Kingdom.


    Both the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms only had a single Star Realm Expert to begin with, who was their ancestors. If they were to lose these ancestors, they would lose all rights to be known as a Ster Kingdom and all theirnds would be taken.


    So losing their ancestors was thest thing that could happen.


    So that was why they were so depressed when offered thisst chance deal.


    After a long period of silence, the Tai Ster King finally mmed his hand on the table in front of him and roared, "Do none of you have any ideas at all? What are you even good for if you can''te up with a single good idea?"


    Both of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had four great families at the helm and all the family heads were currently present.


    It wasn''t just the heads of the Tai Ster Kingdom''s four great families that flinched, it was also the heads of the Bai Ster Kingdom''s four great families. They could see from the expression of the Bai Ster King that they weren''t going to receive any support from him, he even had a look on his face that seemed like he mirrored the Tai Ster King''s attitude.


    Seeing that all of these family heads shrank back, he gave another snort and said, "Useless."


    After another long period of silence, the head of the Huo Family suddenly thought of something. He turned to the head of the Bing Family who looked at him with a confused look and gestured with his eyes.


    The head of the Bing Family was still confused, but before he could do anything, the Tai Ster King noticed the interaction between them. He mmed his hand on the table and shouted, "What do you think you''re doing? Don''t you see that it''s a serious situation here and you''re just ying around? Do you think that I won''t cut you down myself?"


    The heads of the Huo and Bing Families quickly jolted before the Huo Family Head said, "Your majesty, it''s nothing like that. It was just that I thought of something and wanted to confirm it with the Bing Family Head."


    The Tai Ster King narrowed his eyes to look at him and seeing that he was being serious, he asked, "What is it? If you can tell the Bing Family Head, you can tell all of us."


    The Huo Family Head had a look like he was unwilling, but since the Tai Ster King had spoken, he couldn''t say anything else.


    With a sigh, the Huo Family Head asked, "Old Bing, do you remember what happened a few months ago? We sent a few youngsters from our family to take out an upper realm called the Gctic Humanity Alliance?"


    The Bing Family Head was confused about why the Huo Family Head had asked this, but he still gave a nod in response.


    The Huo Family Head continued, "Wasn''t there a report about someone with the same power as the target?"


    The Tai Ster King''s eyes turned sharp when he heard this and he leaned in to say, "Tell me more."


    The Huo Family Head gave a gulp, but he still told the story of their failure.

 Chapter 911 Return To The Shop

    When Lin Fan arrived in the capital city, he couldn''t help taking a deep breath.


    It had been a long time¡­well it hadn''t been that long, but it felt like it had been a long time since he had been back.


    However, seeing this city that he had slowly be attached to, he couldn''t help feeling like he was home.


    After all, there were Xin''er and Ang waiting back at the shop for him.


    As for why he was back, it was because there was nothing left for him to do at the frontlines anymore.


    Now that the misdeeds of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom had been exposed, there was no longer a need for him to personally be on the frontlines. While it would go faster and yield less casualties if he was there leading their assault with his special powers, he chose not to remain.


    The only reason he had helped in the first ce was because of the special circumstances.


    But in the end, he wasn''t a part of the Mu Ster Kingdom''s army and had no reason to stay and fight.


    General Li clearly protested this along with the help of General Fu.


    Both of them had seen how powerful Lin Fan was and they knew how important he would be to them if he fought with them. They wanted to keep Lin Fan on the frontlines to ensure a smooth victory and to ensure as few casualties as possible.


    However this protest fell onto deaf ears.


    In the first ce, Lin Fan wasn''t in the Mu Ster Kingdom army, he wasn''t even a citizen of the Mu Ster Kingdom to begin with, so there was no justification to forcing him to fight. Even if there was a special decree to conscript him, like General Li and General Fu wanted to do, they wouldn''t be able to act on it.


    In fact, if it had really happened, it would have most likely chased Lin Fan out of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    He wasn''t obligated to remain in the Mu Ster Kingdom and he no longer was forced to remain here.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms were already forced to the point where they wouldn''t be able to stand up again. There was almost no worry at all that they would be able to do anything to him if they were to ever find him.


    After all, they would bepletely focused on defending their kingdoms from all the people surrounding them.


    Let alone the fact that Lin Fan had picked up two powerful guards from the fight¡­


    The Mu Ster King was firmly on Lin Fan''s side and he wouldn''t do anything to jeopardize his rtionship with him. It was both out of his own personal feelings and his considerations as the Ster King.


    On the personal side, he didn''t want to drive Lin Fan away because of Xin''er.


    On the professional side, he knew what benefits their Mu Ster Kingdom would gain from having Lin Fan stay.


    His evaluation of Lin Fan even increased when he read the report from Ying about everything that had happened during the battle. He knew that if he did have Lin Fan head off to battle like General Li and General Fu wanted, they would be able to gain a lot of benefits from the war.


    However, he also knew Lin Fan''s personality better than the two of them.


    He was someone that enjoyed his freedom and unless he was the one that offered, it would be impossible to force him to do anything. They could suppress him with force, but if they did do that, they would offend him and create an enemy out of him.


    That would be the worst thing for them since he knew that Lin Fan''s backing wasn''t simple if he could do things like this.


    So the only way that he could handle Lin Fan was with a soft approach and never a hard approach.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the shop, he found that everyone was waiting for him.


    It was still a normal workday, so the shop was open for business like usual. However, when they saw hime in, there were two figures that rushed out to hug him.


    These were naturally Xin''er and Ang.


    After these two, the friends that he had made also came forward to greet him.


    To his surprise, he found that the Mu Ster King was here.


    The Mu Ster King should be the most busy person right now because of the war, but he took time off just toe and visit when he had heard that he was back.


    In fact, he was the only one that actually knew that Lin Fan was back. The rest didn''t know and were surprised to suddenly see him, but the Mu Ster King had received a report from Ying that Lin Fan would be back.


    To actually take the day off even when he was so busy just to receive him, it was clear how the Mu Ster King treated his friends.


    This was something that Lin Fan could respect and he felt that he had made the right choice back then.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This Mu Ster King, he was definitely someone who would back him up in the future and he needed people like that on his side.


    After slowly putting Xin''er down, he patted Ang on the head and came over to where everyone else was waiting.


    Business was still the same in the store, so there weren''t many people that were actually buying things even though the store was filled. Most people were here with ulterior motives since everyone knew how often the Mu Ster King visited this store.


    There had even been incidents, but any incident that happened within the store was always quickly dealt with by the defense system of the store.


    Soon, the store gained a reputation and no one dared to cause any trouble here.


    Once they had settled down, the Mu Ster King invited them all to a restaurant that he had booked for this asion.


    Hearing this, he immediately won points from the foodies Xin''er and Ang. To Lin Fan''s surprise, he found that Dongfang Tao Hua was just as excited as the two of them.


    Despite her appearance, he found that she was a foodie just like her and the three of them had really bonded over this.


    The other strange thing that he noticed was that Yuki wasn''t as attached to Ang anymore. Instead of going along with Ang and Xin''er, she went along with the five sisters who she had gotten close to.


    Looking at them, it was almost like looking at a mother with all her children¡­even though they didn''t look like each other at all.


    When they arrived at the restaurant, they found that this restaurant was the best restaurant in the entire city.


    When the Mu Ster King had booked it, he had booked the entire restaurant and not just a private room like one had thought. This was just a show of the power that he had as the Mu Ster King.


    It was just too bad that his wife and daughter didn''t appreciate this.


    When they saw that he had booked the entire restaurant, they immediately started mercilesslyying into him.


    "Look at your dad, Xin''er. He''s trying so hard to show off." Dongfang Tao Hua whispered in a not so quiet voice.


    Xin''er looked at the people walking away from the restaurant before saying, "Did we cause trouble for all those people?"


    The two of them going back and forth like this was like arrows being shot into the Mu Ster King''s heart again and again.


    Lin Fan really couldn''t bear to see this, so he patted the Mu Ster King and said, "I appreciate you going to all this trouble for me."


    With this faint ray of light shining down, the Mu Ster King grabbed what he could. He held onto Lin Fan and said with a few tears in his eyes, "Brother Lin, you really are the one that understands me best."


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile, but he patted him on the back as heforted him.


    Everyone had to admit that the title of the best restaurant in the capital was a well deserved one. The dishes that they served were all creative and delicious, but the most important thing was that they all went with one another.


    Unlike other restaurants that only served dishes in general themes, this restaurant''s menu waspletely based on a single theme and all the dishes of the feast led up to the next.


    This gave a perfect sense of harmony to the meal.


    When they were finished, they all sat around in the private room rxing.


    As the best restaurant in the capital, it wasn''t just their food that was the best. The service was at a level that matched this title of best restaurant.


    There were countless entertainment options that were avable for them to call on at any time and the kids didn''t hesitate to call on them.


    Seeing the kids ying, the adults weren''t in a rush to leave, so they just sat around talking to each other.


    The scene that it created could be considered a scene of harmony.


    However, that scene didn''tst long.


    One of the Mu Ster King''s subordinates suddenly burst in through the door, causing him to knit his brows.


    He had specifically instructed his people that he wasn''t to be disturbed, but here they were disturbing them.


    But when he received the message from that messenger, he couldn''t help being shocked.


    "An envoy from the Zi Ster Kingdom ising soon."

 Chapter 912 Sudden Reunion (1)

    The Zi Ster Kingdom, they were the strongest Ster Kingdom in this area.


    This wasn''t something that they dered themselves, but rather something that was recognized by all the Ster Kingdom in the area.


    That was because out of all the Ster Kingdoms here, they were the ones that had the strongest troops, strongest experts, most resources, greatest poption, and mostnd.


    In any way that a Ster Kingdom could be ranked, they were the top out of all the Ster Kingdoms in the area.


    So if an envoy from the Zi Ster Kingdom wasing to the Mu Ster Kingdom, it was a very big deal.


    The Mu Ster King immediately forgot his displeasure with this subordinate that had charged in and was about to ask something, but then he remembered where he saw. He quickly closed his mouth and signaled for the subordinate to wait for him outside before turning back to say, "I have some business to take care of, so I''ll be leaving first. You can stay and enjoy yourselves for as long as you want, the bill has already been taken care of."


    Then without hesitation, he turned around to leave.


    But he was suddenly stopped by Lin Fan who said, "Wait, I''ming with you."


    The Mu Ster King looked at Lin Fan with a surprised look as he asked, "Brother Lin, why?"


    Lin Fan just casually said, "I might have something to do with this."


    The Mu Ster King revealed a confused look, but he still gave a nod since he knew that Lin Fan had a mysterious background. It wouldn''t be strange if he was rted to the Zi Ster Kingdom in some way¡­


    If he remembered correctly, there was a powerful family in the Zi Ster Kingdom that had the surname Lin¡­


    If Lin Fan was from that family¡­then everything would make sense.


    But too bad that it wasn''t like that.


    However, the Zi Ster Kingdom was where Zi Ling was from.


    Lin Fan still had many questions for Zi Ling and while he knew that it wouldn''t be Zi Ling that would personallye to a ce like the Mu Ster Kingdom, at the very least he could make some contact with her through this group from the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    So he decided to tag along and meet them.


    As for what purpose they came here for, he was a bit invested since it was rted to the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    After spending the time that he had spent here, it was impossible to say that he didn''t form some kind of feelings for this ce. If he could help them with their problems with his rtions, he had no reason not to use them.


    So the two of them quickly rushed out of the room and boarded a carriage heading back to the royal pce.


    Along the way, the subordinate exined what had happened.


    They had suddenly received a message from the Zi Ster Kingdom that they would be sending an envoy that would be arriving tonight.


    The message didn''t exin any further on this, all it stated was that the envoy was already on its way. They didn''t tell them for what reason this envoy wasing and what kind of people the envoy contained.


    This kind of message, it was almost as if the Zi Ster Kingdom was looking down on them. It was almost as if they were treating them as people that were under them that they could order around at any time.


    But when it came to the power difference between the two Ster Kingdoms, the Mu Ster Kingdom really couldn''t do anything toin.


    All they could do was ept this and follow the message that had been sent.


    Even the Mu Ster King was helpless and could only meet the envoys with a smile on his face.


    After all, if they were to raise a protest, it was hard to tell what the Zi Ster Kingdom would do.


    They were depending on the Zi Ster Kingdom to take care of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms. If the Zi Ster Kingdom were to suddenly pull out¡­Well, they wouldn''t fully pull out, but they would pull out their experts¡­If that was to happen, the Mu Ster Kingdom would certainly suffer quite a few losses to deal with these two Ster Kingdoms.


    After all, it was their war, so they had no choice but to fight.


    Not to mention that it was unknown how many experts had been sent by the Beast Race to back the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    If it was just the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, they would have no problem since there were four Star Realm Experts on their sidepared to the two of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    But if the Beast Race also sent their Star Realm Beasts to aid the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms¡­


    It wasn''t just the Zi Ster Kingdom that would withdraw if they were offended, plenty of other Ster Kingdoms would withdraw as well.


    After all, without the Zi Ster Kingdom''s full support this time, many Ster Kingdoms would have moved.<novelnext></novelnext>


    ? They would have just let the other Ster Kingdoms deal with it while offering a show of support on the surface.


    So the whole situation of the war depended on the Zi Ster Kingdom''s support.


    Lin Fan who had been silent on the side the entire time couldn''t help asking, "Can I see the message that was sent?"


    The Mu Ster King''s subordinate who hade to pick him up had ignored Lin Fan the whole time since he didn''t recognize him. While he realized that Lin Fan was someone that was close to the Mu Ster King based on how they talked, he looked down on Lin Fan.


    This subordinate was one of the most important ministers in court right now, so it was no exaggeration to say that he was one of the most important people in the Mu Ster Kingdom right now.


    He had made his way up through his own talents and he took pride in that.


    So seeing Lin Fan who only got close to the Mu Ster King because of rtions instead of actual talent, he naturally looked down on him.


    Still, this wasn''t the time for him to express his disdain since the Mu Ster King was here.


    The Mu Ster King even gave him a nod to tell him to show Lin Fan the message, so this minister had no choice but to give it to Lin Fan.


    As Lin Fan read over the message, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows.


    The Mu Ster King didn''t miss this and asked, "Did you notice something?"


    After a moment of hesitation, Lin Fan shook his head without saying anything. However, his brows didn''t rx as if he was still thinking about something.


    The Mu Ster King could clearly see that Lin Fan recognized something, but since he wasn''t willing to talk, he wouldn''t force him to talk. He was looking forward to seeing what kind of miracles Lin Fan would bring him this time.


    As for the minister, he couldn''t help secretly giving a disdainful snort as he thought, "Look at this kid, acting all important. It''s clear that he doesn''t know anything and is just pretending to impress his majesty."


    As he thought this, the minister even thought about taking care of Lin Fan secretly¡­


    After all, if this kind of person kept hanging around his majesty¡­then it wouldn''t be good for the future of their Mu Ster Kingdom¡­


    Lin Fan though did see something simr with this message.


    It wasn''t the content of the message, but the writing that the message came in. This kind of message would normally be written by special scribes that were hired by the royal pce, but this writing seemed different.


    It was still elegant, there was no mistaking that, but it didn''t seem like professional writing. It almost seemed like this was written by someone else and it was personally handwritten.


    But if that was the case, wouldn''t that mean that this was a very important message?


    So who would being?


    Also, there was something that seemed familiar with this writing. It was almost as if he had seen it somewhere before, but he couldn''t remember where.


    It didn''t take long for this carriage to arrive back at the pce. This was a carriage that carried the symbol of the Mu Ster King, so wherever it went, everyone moved out of the way and allowed it to pass.


    There were even looks of reverence on their faces as they watched this carriage pass.


    This just went to show how much respect the new Mu Ster King received.


    Of course, it was all well deserved.


    After he had taken over from the previous Mu Ster King, the new Mu Ster King had enacted many edicts that improved the lives of the people. He also struck down many of the edicts that had been in ce previously that made the lives of themoners harder while benefiting the nobles.


    With the current Mu Ster King''s poprity with the army and his approval from the ancestors, there wasn''t anything that he needed to worry about. Even if the nobles wanted to do something, it was impossible for them to do anything to him.


    Not to mention that they were currently in the middle of a war, so everyone was focused on that.


    All of this raised his poprity among the citizens to a level that had never been heard of before.


    People were even calling this the golden age of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    When they arrived at the pce, someone quickly ran out to greet them.


    This was another minister just like the one that hade to pick them up and he had a message that was even more dire, "The Zi Ster Kingdom''s envoys have already reached our borders and are on their way."

 Chapter 913 Sudden Reunion (2)

    An hourter, the Mu Ster Kingdom''s royal pce waspletely locked down as everyone was on high alert.


    It wasn''t that there was an enemy attacking, but rather they were preparing to wee the Zi Ster Kingdom''s envoys.


    All of the important ministers and generals had been summoned without exception and they were all currently waiting in the hall for the arrival of the Zi Ster Kingdom envoys.


    The only one that seemed out of ce was Lin Fan.


    Even if he had changed into formal wear that was provided by the pce staff, he was the one person that people didn''t recognize.


    However, they all knew that this person must be important to the Mu Ster King based on the way that the Mu Ster King treated him, so no one dared to rashly offend him. The only ones that had a different look on their faces were the minister that had picked them up and a few of the generals.


    The minister had learned who Lin Fan was while preparing to receive the Zi Ster Kingdom''s envoys and when he received the report, he couldn''t help revealing another look of disdain.


    As for the generals, these were generals that hade back from the front line with Lin Fan. They had been injured and were sent back to the capital to recuperate, but they were the ones that had fought with Lin Fan when their camp had been invaded.


    They had seen Lin Fan''s power and many of them had even been saved by Lin Fan, so they looked at him with looks of admiration and gratitude.


    Even with all of these people gathered in this main hall, there was only silence in the air as no one dared to speak.


    Everyone understood how important the sudden arrival of this envoy from the Zi Ster Kingdom was, so everyone was trying to figure out what to do. At the same time, no one dared to speak rashly or they would be forced to step up and take charge.


    In fact, everyone tried to hide themselves as much as possible just so they wouldn''t be noticed at all.


    After a long period of silence, there was someone that came out from a side door and came to the Mu Ster King''s side.


    Without care about the ministers and generals that stood in the hall, this person whispered something in the Mu Ster King''s ear before disappearing. After hearing what this person said, the Mu Ster King couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    It didn''t take a genius to understand what had happened.


    In this situation, the only possibility for these actions was that the envoys from the Zi Ster Kingdom were here.


    The Mu Ster King hesitated for a few seconds before waving his hand for one of his ministers toe over.


    Everyone recognized who this was, this person was their best diplomat. He had been specially called into the pce earlier and had been waiting on standby near the Mu Ster King the entire time.


    The Mu Ster King whispered a few things to him before waving his hand to send him off.


    This diplomat didn''t dare dy at all as he ran off with the subordinate that had arrived earlier.


    Everyone took note of this and no one dared to make light of this.


    They knew that this situation meant that the Zi Ster Kingdom envoys would be arriving at any moment.


    All of them took deep breaths and calmed themselves. At the same time, they focused their minds as much as possible.


    After all, they would be meeting the people from the Zi Ster Kingdom soon. They couldn''t allow themselves to make even the slightest mistake in front of these people or the consequences would be unimaginable.


    So soon, a tense atmosphere quickly filled the hall as no one said a word, but they all had serious looks on their faces.


    They were all silently waiting for the arrival of the Zi Ster Kingdom envoys.


    As they waited in silence, they could feel the pressure of the silence. It was hard just remaining still like this knowing what was about toe up.


    Finally, this silence was broken by the sounds of people walking through the halls.


    Even though the doors were closed, it was quiet enough that they were able to hear a pin drop. Not to mention the sounds of the approaching footsteps outside the door. They almost rang out as clearly as thunder on a clear day.


    As the footsteps came closer and closer, these people couldn''t help feeling more and more nervous.


    Finally, the doors to the hall opened and the group outside came in.


    At the very front of the group was the diplomat who led them into the room. Behind the diplomat were the people that everyone in the hall actually cared about.


    There were five of them in total, three of which were in normal formal dress and two of them who were covered in cloaks.


    For them to wear cloaks in this kind of setting, it was clear that they weren''t giving the Mu Ster Kingdom any face. But even so, none of the ministers or generals could say a single thing and could only grit their teeth.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This group slowly made their way to the center of the hall and greeted the Mu Ster King.


    The one that spoke for this group was the man that walked up with the diplomat, addressing himself as Count Du of the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    He was just a simple count of the Zi Ster Kingdom, but he was talking to the Mu Ster King as if he was an equal. When he greeted him, he didn''t kneel or bow, he just gave a simple nod to the Mu Ster King.


    But once again, the Mu Ster Kingdom ministers and generals couldn''t do anything other than grit their teeth and endure.


    But they knew that based on this, the Zi Ster Kingdom envoys were most likely here to cause trouble.


    This created a sinking feeling in all of them because they knew that they would suffer this time. As for how much they would suffer, that would all depend on how far the Zi Ster Kingdom was willing to take it.


    After all, the Zi Ster Kingdom wouldn''t do this for no reason.


    So the only reason that they would do this is most likely to see how much of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom''s territory they could take from the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    They had sent troops on behalf of the human race and to punish the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom. If they were to steal territory with this punitive force, it would hurt their reputation, which would create more losses than gains from taking the territory.


    But if the Mu Ster Kingdom were to offer this territory to them¡­then this would be considered a gift of gratitude from the Mu Ster Kingdom and notnd that they had plundered from another Ster Kingdom. This would allow them to maintain their reputation and their ce among the other Ster Kingdoms.


    Of course, no one would say a thing because it was the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    Or rather, no one dared to say a thing because it was the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    So suddenly sending an envoy to the Mu Ster Kingdom¡­was most likely to discuss how much territory the Mu Ster Kingdom should offer to the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    As for the disrespectful attitude that they had, it was just to show them that the Zi Ster Kingdom was in a higher position so they would offer more territory. At the same time, if the Mu Ster Kingdom were to attack them because of the provocation, they would have a justified reason to use force to show them the difference between them.


    In the end, all of this was just an act to pressure the Mu Ster Kingdom to offer more territory to the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    That was how the officials and generals of the Mu Ster Kingdom saw it.


    It was just too bad that they werepletely wrong about this.


    This Count Du didn''t once bring up the topic of the war on the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom the entire time.


    Strangely, the only thing that he talked about was pet training.


    He talked about all different kinds of ways to train pets and how there were certain special ways to train pets out there.


    All of the officials and generals werepletely confused listening to this Count Du talk on and one. Even the Mu Ster King couldn''t help revealing a trace of confusion under that stern look.


    Only Lin Fan had slightly knitted brows.


    For some reason, he felt that these words that Count Du were saying were directed at him¡­


    Finally, Count Du wrapped up his monologue by asking the Mu Ster King, "Your majesty, have you ever encountered any strange pet training methods like this before?"


    Though he asked the Mu Ster King this, Lin Fan could tell that his gaze was more directed in his direction even though he was standing in a corner in the hall.


    The Mu Ster King also didn''t miss this and he couldn''t help being surprised.


    Could it be that the Zi Ster Kingdom''s target was Lin Fan?


    But they had covered up all information about Lin Fan''s special abilities, so no one outside of the Mu Ster Kingdom army should have known about this.


    So why did it seem like they were targeting Lin Fan?


    After a long period of silence, it was broken by a suddenughter that filled the room.


    Thisughter came from one of the cloaked figures behind Count Du.


    And for some reason, thisughter seemed very familiar to Lin Fan.

 Chapter 914 Sudden Reunion (3)

    Thisughter was like the singing of an oriole, it was very pleasant to listen to.


    Many of the officials and generals couldn''t help falling into a daze when they heard thisughter.


    Even the Mu Ster King couldn''t help being slightly stunned when he heard this.


    Afterughing for a while, that beautiful voice stoppedughing and said, "Count Du, I think that''s enough."


    As soon as this voice said this, Count Du immediately turned around and kneeled down to the cloaked figure that had spoken.


    Everyone was shocked when they saw this.


    Seeing the way that Count Du had acted, everyone had thought that he was the leader of this group of envoys. However, now it turned out that the real leader of this envoy was actually this cloaked figure with the beautiful voice.


    The cloaked figure ignored Count Du who was kneeling in front of them and turned to look at the Mu Ster King.


    The Mu Ster King couldn''t help feeling a pressureing from this cloaked figure, one that he hadn''t felt since he had met the ancestors.


    At this thought, he couldn''t help thinking¡­


    "Could it be that this person was a Star Realm Expert?"


    If the Zi Ster Kingdom had sent a Star Realm Expert, then it would be a very serious matter. After all, Star Realm Experts were rarely seen experts that almost never made a move.


    However, if they did make a move, that would mean that it was something very special that was happening.


    Were the Zi Ster Kingdom really going to make such a big deal over Lin Fan?


    At this, he couldn''t help peeking at Lin Fan out of the corner of his eyes.


    He had wanted to give him a secret signal to run away if he needed to, but he found that Lin Fan''s eyes had been on the cloaked figure the entire time. The look in his eyes was almost suggesting¡­that he recognized this cloaked figure.


    Could it be that Lin Fan really was rted to the Zi Ster Kingdom''s Lin Family?


    Was that why he recognized this person?


    The silence continued for another minute before that cloaked figure suddenly turned away from the Mu Ster King. That cloaked figure didn''t even greet the Mu Ster King as they turned to look right at Lin Fan.


    Then with a chuckle, the cloaked figure said, "Are you just going to keep staring at me like that?"


    Everyone was taken aback when they heard this.


    Instead of greeting the Mu Ster King who was the most important person here, the cloaked figure ignored him and turned their attention to Lin Fan, who everyone thought was the least important person here.


    They had all thought that he was just the friend of the Mu Ster King who had tagged along. Even the generals who knew his power had thought that he was just here to provide emotional support to the Ster King since they didn''t feel like his powers would help in this situation.


    But now it seemed like the situation had changed again.


    Was there something special about Lin Fan that made this envoy from the Zi Ster Kingdom pay him this much attention?


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this. Then he narrowed his eyes to look at the cloaked figure before asking, "Are you who I think you are?"


    The cloaked figure reached up and pulled back the hood to reveal their face.


    A beautiful head of purple hair and a pair of beautiful purple eyes were revealed.


    All who saw it couldn''t help revealing shocked and dazed looks, as if their very souls were taken from them. All they could do when they saw this was let their chins drop as they tried to see as much of this beauty as possible.


    This was a face that was a bit unfamiliar to Lin Fan, as well as being familiar.


    After all, this was a face that was much more beautiful than the one that he remembered¡­


    After a long period of silence, he asked, "Are you¡­Zi Ling?"


    The purple haired girl revealed a smile that was like a field of flowers blooming as she said, "It took you long enough to remember. That''s right, I''m Zi Ling."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a look of shock when he heard this.


    He had expected that he would be able to make contact with her through this Zi Ster Kingdom envoy, but he never expected her toe personally. Not to mention, she lookedpletely different from before.


    She was already beautiful before, but now¡­she was a beauty that was on the same level as Ang.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan said with great difficulty, "What, what are you doing here?"


    Zi Ling just smiled without saying a thing.


    However, before she could even say a thing, Count Du who had been kneeling in front of Zi Ling suddenly stood up.<novelnext></novelnext>


    He couldn''t understand why this kid from this lowly Ster Kingdom acted this way, but he definitely wouldn''t allow this to continue. He was already annoyed from the first moment that he didn''t know to show the courtesy to bow when he already felt her highness'' aura, now he was even being rude by talking to her without any respect.


    This was not something that he could ept.


    Count Du turned in the direction of Lin Fan and roared, "Who do you think you''re talking to? Do you really think that you can¡­"


    "Enough."


    It was just a single word, but the beautiful voice had turned ice cold.


    It was so cold that it was like being thrown into ice when one heard this voice ring out.


    Count Du''s words had been stuck in his throat when he heard this voice and he immediately turned to meet that ice cold gaze aimed at him. Without any hesitation, he immediately kneeled down and said, "Your highness, someone of his level was being this rude to you, I couldn''t¡­"


    "Enough."


    It was the same word as before, but this time, it was even more definite.


    It was as if Count Du said another word, she might have really struck him down then and there.


    Count Du''s mouth closed and he immediately bowed his head as if he was asking for forgiveness.


    Let alone Lin Fan, everyone in the room was shocked when they heard this voice.


    This voice was one that contained a majesty that even the Mu Ster King didn''t have. It was almost as if this was the voice of the empress of the word, unable to be resisted at all.


    There were even quite a few of them that had the urge to bow down to this beautiful purple haired girl.


    Lin Fan just stood there in a daze as he didn''t know what to say.


    So Zi Ling took the lead.


    Her ice cold face filled with a bright smile that was like the suning out in spring after a long winter. With that smile, she said, "It really has been a long time, hasn''t it?"


    Lin Fan was stunned by this sudden change in tone and he couldn''t help giving a stiff unconscious nod.


    Zi Ling couldn''t help giving a giggle when she saw this and then she said with a sigh, "It''s just too bad that we don''t really have the time to catch up like this."


    Lin Fan reacted immediately to this as he knitted his brows.


    For Zi Ling to personallye here, it must mean that whatever business she was here for, it was rted to him.


    If it was rted to him, it was most likely about¡­his family.


    Zi Ling didn''t borate any further and didn''t give Lin Fan a chance to ask anything. Instead, she turned to the Mu Ster King and said with a serious look, "Your majesty, it''s a pleasure to meet you. I am the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess Zi Ling. I havee here today on some private matters with young master Lin here, so can I ask you to provide a secret room for us."


    "Huh?"


    That was everyone''s first reaction when they heard this.


    They all suddenly fiddled with their ears as if they were doubting what they had just heard.


    The Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess¡­


    Then wasn''t she the future ruler of the Zi Ster Kingdom?!


    Such an important person hade to their Mu Ster Kingdom and for what?


    They all couldn''t help turning to look at Lin Fan in a daze, wondering just who this person was that it even drew an important person like her to their Ster Kingdom.


    At the same time, all of them suddenly realized that they had been wrong about Lin Fan.


    He wasn''t here just as the Mu Ster King''s acquaintance¡­he was the main reason that this meeting had been called in the first ce.


    The minister that had gone to pick up the Mu Ster King had a look like he wanted to die on his face. He knew that from this moment forth, if Lin Fan were to hold a grudge over what had happened¡­then his career was over.


    After all, this was someone that had a connection with the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess and based on their interaction, it seemed like they were quite close.


    She even reprimanded one of her subordinates on his behalf, so it could be seen that he didn''t have a low position in his heart.


    The Mu Ster King was also stunned for a bit, but then he gave a nod and arranged for a private room for them.


    He was relieved to know that this wasn''t rted to his Mu Ster Kingdom, but he also couldn''t help worrying about Lin Fan.


    After all, the other side was the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess!

 Chapter 915 Shocking Information

    It didn''t take long before they sat down in a private room.


    The Mu Ster King''s subordinates really worked fast, preparing this room in less than half an hour.


    This was a room that was hidden deep in the pce, a room that was normally only used by the most important people of the Mu Ster Kingdom. However, since it was a request from the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess, the Mu Ster King had no choice but to prepare this room for her.


    The ones that sat down in this room were Lin Fan, Zi Ling, the Mu Ster King, and the other cloaked figure from the Zi Ster Kingdom envoy.


    Well, everyone except for that cloaked figure sat down.


    That cloaked figure just stood by the door, as if they were standing on guard.


    When they had all been seated, Zi Ling was the one that spoke first as she said, "It really has been a long time since we''ve seen each other. It seems like you''ve grown a bit."


    Of course, she wasn''t referring to Lin Fan''s physical growth, but rather his cultivation growth.


    Even though he had hidden his cultivation, she had been able to detect it.


    Lin Fan was very surprised by this, but he wasn''t surprised that it was Zi Ling who had done it.


    This was a girl that he had never been able to see through. Since they had first met on the Blue Star, there was something about this girl that had always seemed mysterious to him.


    Then when they met again on the Gctic Humanity Alliance, she had sent him away with a method that he couldn''t understand at all.


    He knew that he couldn''t judge this girl with hismon sense, he had to treat her as something that he couldn''t understand.


    Lin Fan just nodded in response without saying anything.


    Zi Ling didn''t mind as she said, "Well, I won''t bother with pleasantries since time is short."


    She took out a piece of paper and showed it to Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan saw it, he couldn''t help being confused since it was a picture of several people that he didn''t recognize.


    He looked up at Zi Ling and asked, "What is this?"


    Zi Ling paused for a second before saying, "They are members of the Bing and Huo Families."


    Hearing this, Lin Fan immediately revealed a serious look and asked, "Where are they?"


    Zi Ling replied, "They were spotted near the Blue Star."


    Lin Fan stood up right away and was about to run out of the room, but the cloaked figure in front of the door stepped over to stop him. Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at this cloaked figure and raised his hand, as if he was about to attack.


    But before he could, Zi Ling said, "Calm down."


    Lin Fan turned around to look at Zi Ling and seeing the look in her eyes, he took a deep breath before sitting back down and looking at Zi Ling waiting for her to continue.


    She shook her head and said, "You won''t gain anything from running around in a panic, so let''s have a talk first."


    Lin Fan''s eyes were still on her as he gave a nod in response to this, but it was clear by the impatient look in his eyes that he wasn''t willing to wait forever.


    Zi Ling didn''t waste any time when she saw this and said, "They were just spotted near the Blue Star, that doesn''t mean that they have reached it yet. I''ve sent people to watch over them and they will report as soon as they arrive."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes again as he asked, "What is their objective?"


    Zi Ling gave a shrug and said, "What else could they want from the Blue Star?"


    Lin Fan mmed his fist on the table and said, "Didn''t you say that you would take care of them?"


    Zi Ling gave another shrug as she said, "Isn''t that what I''m doing now?"


    Lin Fan suddenly roared out, "If you were taking care of them, how could they have reached the Blue Star? How could they have known to target them?"


    The Mu Ster King who was confused was shocked when he saw how strongly Lin Fan reacted. As far as he knew, Lin Fan was someone who was always as cold as ice and never raised his voice like this.


    Zi Ling didn''t say anything in response to this as she just took a sip of her tea.


    Lin Fan took a deep breath after seeing this and asked, "What is your n?"


    Zi Ling revealed a smile when she heard this.


    She then said, "I need you toe with me to the Blue Star."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look when he heard this, but he didn''t question it as he just gave a nod in response.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Zi Ling gave a p of her hand seeing this decisive nod from Lin Fan and said, "I knew that I wasn''t wrong about you." She stood up after this and said, "Let''s go. My ship is already waiting for us."


    Lin Fan was about to follow, but then he said, "Wait."


    Zi Ling turned back with a confused look when she heard this.


    Lin Fan said, "I need to go to my shop first."


    Zi Ling looked at him for a few seconds before giving a nod. Then without waiting for another response, she started walking out the door.


    The Mu Ster King also stood up when everyone else had and he followed Lin Fan out, but there was the same concerned and confused look as before.


    Lin Fan turned to him and said while walking, "I need to go with her for a bit."


    The Mu Ster King was still confused by this entire situation, but he gave a nod in response and said, "Alright, I''ll watch over your store and Xin''er during this time."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response and said, "Thank you."


    Just these two words and nothing else.


    If he had to say what the most important thing he gained from this Mu Ster Kingdom was, after Xin''er, he would say that it was the friendship of this Mu Ster King.


    He was someone who trusted him implicitly and always followed what he said, he was a friend that would go to the ends of the world for him. This was something that was rarer than anything else that could be found in the world.


    When they arrived at the store, Ang, Xin''er, and the Dongfang sisters were there waiting for them.


    They were surprised to see Zi Ling, that is everyone except for Ang.


    She had already figured that Zi Ling would appear sooner orter, she just didn''t know when she would appear.


    Lin Fan took Ang aside and told her what was happening. Then he said, "I need to go to the Blue Star with her."


    Ang hesitated a bit before giving a nod and saying, "I''ming with you."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I need you to stay here and take care of Xin''er just in case they suddenly decide to do something to her."


    Ang had a worried look in her eyes when she heard this.


    She was also worried about Xin''er since she knew that the Bing and Huo Families were targeting the things that were precious to Lin Fan. While they wouldn''t be able to invade the Mu Ster Kingdom capital, for them to assassinate or kidnap someone as weak as Xin''er was easy.


    Even if the Mu Ster King was there to protect Xin''er, that didn''t mean that she was 100% safe.


    There was still the chance that they would be able to reach her even with his protection.


    But it was different with Ang there.


    As long as she wanted, there wouldn''t be a single person in the Tai or Bai Ster Kingdoms that could hurt Xin''er. The only way for them to even touch Xin''er would be to move the Rulers of the Beast Race and that was impossible.


    After all, each Ruler was heavily monitored and the human race experts would never let a Beast Race Ruler into their territory.


    That is, they wouldn''t if they could notice them...


    Finally, after a long moment of silence, Ang gave a nod.


    She was clearly unwilling, but she still epted Lin Fan''s n.


    Lin Fan gave her onest hug before heading back to everyone and exining that he was leaving for a while.


    Xin''er was clearly unwilling to see him go, but she still sent him off without a tear since she could see that this was an important matter for Lin Fan.


    When they left, the Mu Ster King didn''t follow them and they headed directly to Zi Ling''s spaceship.


    This was a ship that waspletely purple, but it was also designed in a way that clearly showed that it was built for speed.


    As soon as they got into it, it immediately set off.


    It took less than a few seconds before the capital of the Mu Ster Kingdom was thrown far behind them and they couldn''t see a trace of it.


    Lin Fan just stood there looking out the back window and it was only after a few minutes that he went to the cockpit where Zi Ling was waiting for him.


    When he arrived, he looked at Zi Ling and asked, "Now what do we do?"


    Zi Ling just revealed a smile without saying anything.

 Chapter 916 Setting A Trap

    It was the cloaked figure that had been following her that came forward.


    They stood in the middle of the room for a few seconds before taking out a piece of paper that they spread across the table.


    Lin Fan looked at them before turning to look at the piece of paper there.


    After unfurling the piece of paper, what was revealed was a map of the space around the Blue Star.


    The cloaked figure pointed at one of the areas near the Blue Star and said, "They will being in this direction. We have already ced several of our people there to stop them, but¡­"


    His voice trailed off as he looked at Zi Ling, almost as if he was confirming something with her.


    But before she said anything, Lin Fan said, "You want to use me as bait just in case the Beast Race is up to anything?"


    The cloaked figure looked at Zi Ling still and seeing that she gave a nod, he nodded in agreement to this.


    Lin Fan didn''t find this strange at all since he had already guessed that this was the case. In fact, he preferred it to be this way because that would mean that it was safer for his family.


    The cloaked figure then said with a sigh, "We know that this is dangerous, but there''s no other way. If they escape again, who knows what they will n next time. So we want to capture them all in one swift move."


    Lin Fan didn''t question this and instead asked, "How confident are you in doing that?"


    Zi Ling was the one that answered this time, "We''ve fully prepared for this." Then in a smaller voice, she said almost to herself, "After all, if something were to happen to you or the young master, our Zi Ster Kingdom wouldn''t be able to bear the consequences."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows as he asked, "What did you say?"


    Zi Ling revealed a bright smile and said, "Nothing at all."


    Lin Fan raised a brow in doubt, but he didn''t keep questioning her.


    Since she wasn''t willing to say it, he wouldn''t be able to get it out of her no matter how he tried. It was better to wait for her to say it herself since he knew that she would eventually tell him.


    Or rather, there woulde a time where she would be forced to tell him.


    He could tell that something had forced Zi Ling to move, that was why she was here in the first ce. After all, if she wasn''t forced to bring him along, there was no real need for her to put him in danger like this.


    He was sure that she was more than capable of creating a dummy of him that could fool the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, as well as the Beast Race Experts that would be with them. But she chose toe to the Mu Ster Kingdom and find him, so there must have been someone that told her to do so.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan would y along to see what this was all about.


    He had always felt that there was someone much bigger behind Zi Ling, so he was curious just who it was.


    Would they be friendly or did they have more sinister intentions for him?


    Zi Ling could also see that he had seen through everything. After hesitating a bit, she said, "You''ll understand everything soon." Then after a pause, she suddenly revealed a teasing smile and said, "When the timees, try not to be too surprised."


    After another pause, she suddenly said in a serious voice, "I''m only doing what is best for you."


    Lin Fan was taken aback by these sudden words. He couldn''t help looking at her with a strange andplicated look as he said, "You¡­"


    But before he could say anything else, Zi Ling suddenly stood up and said, "Don''t say anything else."


    Without giving him a chance, she walked away.


    Lin Fan just watched her leave with aplicated expression.


    He could guess a few things, but the way that she walked away tugged at his heartstrings.


    It was as if there were some feelings that he didn''t want to face that were forming in his heart.


    When she was gone, he gave a sigh and turned back to the cloaked figure that was still standing there. He had silently watched what happened between the two of them with aplicated look in his eyes.


    He knew what Zi Ling had to face, so he hadn''t said a thing¡­


    But it was hard for him not to feel sad because he had watched her grow up.


    There was a silence thatsted a long time before Lin Fan suddenly gave a sigh.


    Then he turned back to the cloaked figure.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The cloaked figure was surprised to see Lin Fan looking at him like this, but he didn''t say a thing as he waited for Lin Fan to speak. He could tell that Lin Fan had something that he wanted to say to him.


    Lin Fan didn''t do anything at first, but then he suddenly cupped his hands and bowed his head to the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure was taken aback when he saw this and he couldn''t help asking, "This is?"


    Lin Fan said, "Senior, thank you for helping me back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance."


    The cloaked figure was surprised to hear this since he never thought that Lin Fan would recognize him. He had made sure to hide his aura when he had been on the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so Lin Fan shouldn''t have known that it was him.


    He was even wearing apletely different outfit from before and he had never shown his face.


    So how did Lin Fan recognize him?


    What he didn''t know was that Lin Fan was able to recognize him because of hisws. Even if he was trying to hide his cultivation, Lin Fan was already at the same level as him and he had much stronger spiritual senses.


    It was easy for Lin Fan to see through him.


    Since he had been seen through, he didn''t deny it. He said with a wave of his hand, "It was nothing, the princess was the one who ordered it."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but then he figured that this was the case.


    After all, if it wasn''t for her orders, why would this cloaked figure protect him for no reason?


    It wasn''t as if there was some kind of rtionship between them that would justify this.


    It was just that it hadn''t been long since he found out that Zi Ling was the princess and he was still having a hard time processing this.


    He had already figured that she would have some kind of mysterious background, but this was a bit too much for him.


    The cloaked figure could see theplicated look on Lin Fan''s face and said, "I''ve watched the young miss grow up and I can tell you¡­she doesn''t do things without a reason. Whatever it is that your heart is telling you, I hope that you will face her with sincerity."


    Lin Fan trembled when he heard this and he looked up at the cloaked figure.


    Even though he couldn''t see his eyes, he could tell that there was a serious look about him.


    The cloaked figure saw the look on Lin Fan''s face and patted him on the shoulder before saying, "This is a matter between the two of you, it isn''t this old man''s ce to interject. All I can say is that I hope that neither of you leave any regrets in this matter."


    Then without waiting for Lin Fan to say a thing, he turned around to leave as well, leaving behind Lin Fan deep in thought.


    When the cloaked figure walked out of the cockpit, he found that Zi Ling had been standing there with pouted cheeks.


    He raised his hands with a helpless smile when he saw this and said, "I was just trying to help." Then his face turned serious as he said, "I don''t want to see you being hurt."


    Zi Ling''s lips were still pouting, but she gently hit him in the chest as she said, "Nosy."


    Then without saying anything else, she turned to leave.


    This cloaked figure had been following her since she was a child and there was a reason why she called him grandpa. He was the person that was closest to him after her own parents.


    This was the personal spaceship of the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess, so it was also one of the fastest and most powerful spaceships in the entire Zi Ster Kingdom.


    To go from the Mu Ster Kingdom to the area where the Blue Star was found, it only took them around three hours.


    When they arrived, everyone was gathered in the cockpit once again.


    Lin Fan and Zi Ling clearly looked a bit awkward when they saw each other again, but they quickly calmed down and sat down at the table.


    But before her subordinates said anything, Lin Fan said, "I''ll talk to you after this."


    Zi Ling''s eyes trembled when she heard this, but then she gave a nod.


    Along with this nod, there was aplicated look in her eyes.


    That was because she knew that once this was all over, perhaps she would be the one that wouldn''t be able to match him¡­


    After all, his real identity was¡­

 Chapter 917 Plots Hidden In Plots (1)

    "Are you sure that this information is correct?"


    The leader of this group asked one of the people in this group.


    That person that was questioned gave a nod and said, "We''ve double checked this information multiple times. This is the that the family of the target lives on."


    The leader of the group gave a nod before saying, "Alright, you all know what to do."


    This group was naturally the group from the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom that hade to take care of Lin Fan''s family.


    But what people would be surprised by is that¡­this group was made up of the family heads of the Four Great Families from both the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms. All of these family heads were Peak Realm Experts.


    This was a group that could even threaten a Ster King, but they had been sent to take care of the family of someone from a lower realm.


    If this was known, everyone would have died ofughter at them.


    But they treated this very seriously because they knew that this was their only chance of survival.


    If they weren''t able to capture Lin Fan''s family and threaten him with them, then they would be killed by all the Ster Kingdoms surrounding the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    Without the support of the Beast Race Experts, they wouldn''t be able to do a thing.


    That was why the Ster Kings that led this group kept asking them to make sure that they had the right ce.


    That was right, the Tai and Bai Ster Kings were personally leading this mission.


    That just went to show how important this was to their entire kingdom.


    Once they were near the Blue Star, they immediately started sending people out to scout out the surrounding area.


    Since they knew about the conflict between the Bing and Huo Families and Lin Fan, they knew that the Zi Ster Kingdom was also involved. After all, Zi Ling was a very famous person and it wasn''t hard for them to recognize her when she went to meet Lin Fan.


    So they knew that the Zi Ster Kingdom would certainly station people here to watch over Lin Fan''s family.


    But to their surprise, they found that there wasn''t a single person here assigned to protect the Blue Star.


    As they thought about this, the Tai Ster King couldn''t help asking, "Could it be that they''ve already moved them? Is that why there''s no one guarding this ce?"


    All of them revealed ugly looks when this was said out loud.


    If they weren''t able to grab Lin Fan''s family, they really didn''t know what to do¡­


    But one of the family heads shook their head and said, "The spy that we sent in has reported that they were still there not that long ago. It would be impossible for them to move them this quickly."


    ? Everyone had a difficult look on their face as they didn''t know what to do.


    Should they risk it and go for it, or should they pull back and look for a better method?


    After a long period of silence, the Bai Ster king finally said, "We''ve alreadye this far¡­If we go back empty handed now¡­It just feels wrong."


    Everyone looked at him before nodding in agreement.


    This was theirst chance, so if they didn''t take a risk and try for it, there wouldn''t be a chance for them in the future.


    So the Tai Ster King nodded in agreement and said with a determined look, "Let''s prepare ourselves. No matter what happens, we will survive this."


    Everyone nodded in agreement to this and then focused on the task at hand.


    But before any of them could make a move, there was someone that suddenly ran over.


    Everyone immediately turned to this person because this person was the one in charge of all of their scouts. So if this person was running in with a panicked look, it must mean that something out of their calctions had happened which was very dangerous for them.


    Both the Tai and Bai Ster Kings immediately said, "What is it?"


    The scout leader was surprised to hear this, but they were only stunned for an instant before falling to one knee and saying, "Reporting! We have just found that there''s a spacecraft from the Zi Ster Kingdom that has entered the surrounding star space."


    "What?!"


    Not just the Tai and Bai Ster Kings, all of the family heads looked like they wanted to grab this person and interrogate him, which caused him to tremble in fright. His legs even couldn''t help shifting back slightly as he prepared to run just in case.


    But then they calmed down and the Tai and Bai Ster Kings waved for him to continue.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The scout leader took a breath to calm himself before saying, "Not only is it a spacecraft from the Zi Ster Kingdom, it bears the mark of the crown princess."


    This time, they couldn''t hold back anymore as the Tai and Bai Ster Kings charged forward to lift this scout leader up. They brought him right up to their faces and shouted, "What did you say? The Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess? Why would shee to a ce like this?"


    The scout leader had a terrified look as he stammered, "I, I, I don''t know. We just found that the spacecraft was heading towards the Blue Star."


    Both the Tai and Bai Ster Kings immediately knitted their brows as they threw the scout leader down.


    The scout leader seized this opportunity to move back several steps, but he didn''t dare leave since he knew that he would be killed if he tried to run.


    After a long period of silence, the Tai Ster King said, "We know that it''s the Zi Ster Kingdom that''s backing this Lin Fan, so could it be that the crown princess ising to help his family? But if that''s the case, why would shee so openly?"


    The Bai Ster King answered, "Unless, it''s a¡­trap."


    Both of them fell silent as they mulled over this.


    But before they coulde to a conclusion, there was another person that suddenly ran in.


    This was one of the scouts under the scout leader and the scout leader was surprised to see him charge into this cockpit.


    This scout fell to one knee like the scout leader had done and said, "Report! We''ve just found signs that the target is with the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess!"


    "WHAT?!"


    Everyone shouted out once again.


    This scout was much weaker than the scout leader, so facing the auras of all these Realm Experts, he couldn''t handle it at all. With all of these auras falling on him without holding back, the scout''s eyes rolled back in his head and he fainted on the spot.


    Everyone had dark looks on their faces when they saw this.


    The Tai Ster King ordered the scout leader, "Wake him up right now! This piece of trash!"


    The scout leader didn''t hesitate as he condensed some water with his waterws and sshed it onto the scout''s face.


    The scout sputtered out the water and was shocked by being suddenly sshed with water, but seeing the dark looks all around him, he suddenly remembered where he was. He immediately stood up and fell to one knee again before saying, "We were able to see the target in the Zi Ster Kingdom''s spacecraft and were able to confirm it with the aura traces that we felt before. We are certain that the target is with the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess."


    All of them knitted their brows in thought when they heard this.


    None of these people were fools or they wouldn''t have been able to reach their current positions. They all knew immediately that this was a trap that had been set for them, but¡­they were considering whether they should fall into the trap or not.


    The Tai Ster King asked the scout, "What is the path of the Zi Ster Kingdom''s spacecraft?"


    The scout immediately replied, "It''s currently heading on a direct path for the Blue Star. It doesn''t seem like it''s noticed us at all."


    Everyone knitted their brows even more when they heard this.


    It was clear that this was nothing more than bait, but the problem was, how powerful of a guard had they prepared for this bait.


    The Beast Race had given them quite a few trump cards for this operation, so depending on how powerful the guards were, they could directly use these trump cards to deal with them.


    The enemies had set a trap for them, but if their trap wasn''t strong enough, they would be the ones that fell into the trap.


    Everyone turned to look at the Tai and Bai Ster Kings as they waited for their judgement. However, even though everyone looked at them, neither of the Ster Kings said a thing.


    They just knitted their brows in deep thought.


    After what seemed like a very long time, they finally looked at each other and gave each other nods.


    The Tai Ster King said to the scouts, "Go and continue monitoring their path. Tell us immediately if there are any deviations in the path at all."


    As for the Bai Ster King, he said to the family heads, "Gather up everyone and follow me. We''ll go and set up a trap for the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess. We''ll surround them and catch them in one fell swoop!"


    All of the family heads were surprised by this, but they all agreed to this n.


    For the Tai and Bai Ster Kings, they reckoned that as long as the enemies didn''t have a Peak Sun Realm Expert with them¡­they would be fine.


    After all, there were only so many Peak Sun Realm Experts and the Zi Ster Kingdom wouldn''t send one just to protect the crown princess.


    That would be impossible.

 Chapter 918 Plots Hidden In Plots (2)

    As they headed closer to the Blue Star, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling more and more tense.


    He knew that this was all a trap set by Zi Ling, but he couldn''t help feeling a bit of a bad premonition.


    It was as if he could already feel something going wrong¡­


    But he had alreadye this far, so it wasn''t as if he could turn back now. Not to mention, if he turned back, his family would most likely be in danger¡­


    So even if he had a bad premonition about all of this, he could only keep going forward.


    The only thing that he could really do was¡­make sure that he would be able to leave this ce alive.


    So during the time that he was free, he had been looking through the system''s store, looking for things that he could buy when it became dangerous.


    As for buying it ahead of time, he would never do that since it would just be a waste of points.


    After all, all of these items were single use situational items. If he were to buy them ahead of time and the situation wasn''t the right one to use them, it would be aplete waste of his points.


    These points represented his life, so he would never waste them like this.


    It was quiet as they approached the Blue Star, almost too quiet.


    It was clear that the enemies had already noticed them and were waiting to ambush them. After all, they were currently being watched by the Zi Ster Kingdom scouts that Zi Ling had sent.


    They had thought that they had entered this starspace quietly, but they had been noticed immediately.


    That was just the difference in level of scouts between the two Ster Kingdoms.


    It wasn''t until they were almost at the Blue Star that they were finally attacked.


    The sr system that the Blue Star was in was a sr system simr to the one earth was in before Lin Fan''s reincarnation.


    So there were eights here revolving around the sun and these eights were around the same size ratio as the ones in earth''s sr system. It was just that they were much bigger than the ones in earth''s sr system.


    As soon as they came out from behind what was considered the Jupiter of the Blue Star system, they were immediately surrounded by the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom forces that were waiting for them.


    They had chosen this spot because it was a blind spot.


    The Blue Star system equivalent of Jupiter was so big that itpletely covered up all sight of thes in front of it, closer to the equivalent of the sun. So they were able to hide behind the shadow of the equivalent of Jupiter until it was toote.


    By the time that they were noticed, they had already surrounded the Zi Ster Kingdom''s spaceship.


    Of course, all of them were hiding their faces to ensure that they weren''t recognized.


    They didn''t even use spaceships just in case those models were recognized and flew out to surround the spaceship before it could escape.


    They immediatelyid down a barrier before one of them came forward to say, "Come out of the vehicle and no one will get hurt."


    Of course even though they said this, no one had actually expected them toe out¡­


    But that was just what they did.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group were stunned to see this and didn''t know how to react at first. After all, they had already been prepared to attack the spaceship and force them out.


    But now that they came out on their own, they couldn''t do that.


    After all, they were nning on trapping them in the spaceship which would give them the advantage. As long as they were trapped inside, then they wouldn''t be able to fight effectively.


    But now that they were out, there was the chance that the target might create a gap to escape, so they couldn''t attack rashly.


    So after organizing their thoughts, the leader of the group came forward again to say, "We don''t want anything, just give us the one named Lin Fan and we''ll leave."


    Zi Ling was the one who came forward which surprised everyone since they all recognized her as the crown princess of the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    Everyone had recognized that it was her spaceship, but no one had thought that she would personallye. After all, she was one of the most important people in the Zi Ster Kingdom, normally she would be heavily guarded.


    No one would have thought that she would be out in the middle of nowhere like this without any guards.


    They couldn''t sense any powerful experts among the crew that came out and they couldn''t sense any powerful experts still in the spaceship.


    This just confused them even more as they didn''t understand why someone as important as the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess would be here.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Zi Ling said, "I think that you should all know who I am. As long as you''re willing to surrender, I won''t make it hard for you."


    She said this in such a confident voice that the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group really couldn''t help being stunned. After all, no matter how one looked at this situation, they were clearly the ones at an advantage, but she was speaking like she was the one in charge.


    It just didn''t make sense.


    The leader of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group said in a deep voice, "I don''t think you understand the situation here. You¡­"


    Before he could finish, Zi Ling suddenly said, "No, you''re the one that doesn''t understand the situation here."


    She suddenly gave a snap and there were many people that appeared around them, surrounding the people from the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms.


    When these people appeared, they were shocked since they hadn''t sensed them at all earlier and they had been here a long time. They had naturally made sure to check every corner of this ce just so their n wouldn''t go wrong.


    But now they were suddenly surrounded like this.


    What had gone wrong?


    They couldn''t understand any of this as they werepletely surrounded.


    Zi Ling said with a smile, "I think you should have a clear understanding now."


    If they still didn''t understand the situation developing like this, then they would truly be fools.


    But since they were trapped like this, it wasn''t as if they had another choice¡­


    They either had to fight their way out, or¡­they would have to let themselves be captured by the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    Either way, it was a death sentence, but at the very least, there was a higher chance if they fought their way out.


    So without another choice and without any hesitation, all of the cloaked figures of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms pulled out their weapons as if they were prepared to fight.


    But that was quickly shut down when one of the people from the Zi Ster Kingdom group released their aura.


    This aura immediately suppressed all of these people and they immediately knew that they were not a match for this person.


    That was because this person¡­was in the Sun Realm!


    If it was just people in the Realm, then they would at least have a chance to break through since they had plenty of people in the Peak Realm, but it was different if there was an enemy in the Sun Realm.


    Just one person in the Sun Realm was able to suppress all of them in the Peak Realm, that was the gap between these two realms.


    They knew that no matter how hard they tried, they wouldn''t be able to break through here¡­unless they¡­


    Looking at each other, they recognized that they were in a desperate situation and unless they did something desperate, they wouldn''t be able to escape this ce. The only option that they had left was to¡­use the trump cards that the Beast Race had prepared for them.


    Since they agreed on this, they took out the first of the three bags that the Beast Race had given them.


    After pulling it out, the Tai Ster King immediately pulled off the rope that was holding it closed and opened the bag.


    The moment that the bag was opened, there was a strange gust that appeared that swept out across this space. It quickly churned and churned until it created a whirlwind that released powerful des of wind all around the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdom group.


    It was clear that this was an attack that had been stored inside of this bag and it was released the moment that the bag was opened.


    As for how powerful these des of wind were¡­


    This was a full power attack from someone in the Sun Realm.


    When this was released, the Zi Ster Kingdom''s Sun Realm Expert immediately raised his hand and there was a domain that was released. This domain smashed down on the des of wind that were released and without hesitation, the des of wind were shattered to pieces.


    After all, this was a domain from a Sun Realm Expert versus just a full power attack from a Sun Realm Expert, there was no need topare the two at all. It was clear that the domain from a real Sun Realm Expert was much stronger.


    Seeing that this attack had been crushed, the Bai Ster King didn''t hesitate at all to open up the second bag that they had been given.


    When this bag was opened, there was a white sh of light before a portal suddenly appeared in front of them.


    The aura that came from this portal¡­was a dangerous one.

 Chapter 919 Plots Hidden In Plots (3)

    As soon as this portal was opened, the Zi Ster Kingdom''s Sun Realm Expert immediately released his domain to create a path through the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group.


    Without hesitation, he jumped through them andnded beside Zi Ling, standing there as if he was prepared to protect her with his life.


    But that wasn''t strange since she was the most important person here.


    When the sh of white light faded, there were several more figures that were now standing where the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group was standing.


    The Zi Ster Kingdom group didn''t recognize this group, but the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group naturally recognized them.


    It was the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord, as well as their followers!


    This was a very big deal because both the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord were Sun Realm Experts.


    The situation had once again changed and now the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group were the ones in charge.


    After all, even a fool would be able to recognize that two Sun Realm Experts were better than one.


    The Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord were surprised to have been summoned, but they quickly understood the situation after looking around. After all, this was what they had expected when they gave the package to the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group.


    Seeing that there was only a single Sun Realm Expert on the other side, the Sky Lion King came forward and said, "Watch me handle this."


    Even though he didn''t say anything special, it was clear that he was trying to show off to the Mist Pangolin Lord.


    She had taken this time to put her n of seducing him into y and it worked even better than she had thought. The Sky Lion Lord really was a fool and had easily yed into her palms, so she now had himpletely wrapped up in her fingers.


    It would take a single word from her to have him die for her.


    That was just how deeply the Sky Lion Lord had fallen.


    But of course, he still had his pride and he had to act like he was the man in this situation. However, when the two of them were alone¡­the Mist Pangolin Lord was the mistress.


    She didn''t say anything and just nodded with a charming smile.


    When he saw this, the Sky Lion Lord''s heart soared before he gave a roar aimed at the Zi Ster Kingdom group. He roared out, "All of you will fall under my ws."


    He didn''t even give them a chance to surrender, he was fullymitted to beating them all and showing off his power.


    Zi Ling slightly knitted her brows when she saw this, but she didn''t panic yet.


    She had alreadye up with many different scenarios and this one wasn''t one that she hadn''t nned for.


    She nodded at their Sun Realm Expert and said, "Uncle Nan, I think it''s time."


    The Sun Realm Expert called Uncle Nan gave a nod before shooting a beam of light into the air¡­or rather into the space above them.


    That beam of light soared up until it reached a certain height before suddenly exploding.


    All of the members of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group all raised their guards out of fear that this was an attack, but they found that there was no danger from this explosion. It was simply a visual trick and there was no real power that was hidden behind it.


    But as they slowly rxed their guards, they suddenly noticed that there were new life energy fluctuations that came from nearby.


    When they turned in that direction, they found that there was another group that had suddenly appeared.


    All of the people in this group were wrapped up in cloaks, but they didn''t hide their life energy fluctuations. It was almost as if they wanted to be found.


    The Mist Pangolin Lord was the one that spoke as she said, "These friends, who are you? I don''t think that you have anything to do with what''s happening¡­"


    Before she could finish, the Sun Realm Expert by Zi Ling suddenly charged out at the Sky Lion Lord.


    The Sky Lion Lord was caught off guard, but he was still able to react to this attack and shed out with his ws at the Sun Realm Expert. The Sun Realm Expert was able to easily dodge this and summoned out his pet to sh together at the Sky Lion Lord.


    If it wasn''t for the Sky Lion Lord''s thick mane, this attack would have definitely gravely injured him. Still, this was an attack from a Sun Realm Expert, so it wasn''t something that could be looked down on.


    The Sky Lion Lord''s mane still started to bleed when he was cut by this.


    As that Sun Realm Expert charged at the Sky Lion Lord, the leader of the cloaked figures made a move and they all started moving towards the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group.


    It was clear that they had hostile intentions towards them.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The Mist Pangolin Lord had an annoyed look on her face when she saw this.


    In her mind, she med the Sky Lion Lord for everything.


    If it hadn''t been for his rashness, they would have been able to gang up on the one that the Zi Ling had called Uncle Nan. With the two of them working together, that Uncle Nan would have easily fallen under them and they could focus on this group that had appeared.


    Shepletely forgot about how she had been thinking about using the Sky Lion Lord to deal with Uncle Nan while preserving her own power.


    She made everything the Sky Lion Lord''s fault instead.


    As the cloaked figured group came forward, they suddenly revealed their cultivations that caused the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group to reveal shocked looks.


    That was because there was also a Sun Realm Expert among the cloaked figures.


    All of them looked to the Mist Pangolin Lord for help.


    The Mist Pangolin Lord wasn''t looking at them as her eyes had been on this Sun Realm Expert.


    She knew that this person was the most dangerous person of that group, so she had to personally deal with them. So without any hesitation, she pulled out what seemed to be a staff and threw a stream of water in his direction.


    That cloaked Sun Realm Expert easily dodged this attack and then charged at the Mist Pangolin Lord with his sword drawn.


    As these four Sun Realm Experts fought, everyone moved backwards out of fear of being caught up in their fight. But of course, the Realm Experts of the Zi Ster Kingdom didn''t remain idle as they went forward to attack the members of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kings both gritted their teeth before the Tai Ster King shouted, "Everyone, fight back! As long as we stall for enough time, the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord will be able to defeat the enemy!"


    The Bai Ster King then shouted, "Take formation A and suppress them! Don''t let any of them have a chance to interfere in the fight!"


    At the same time, Zi Ling calmly said, "Everyone, you know what to do. Take formation C and trap them. We need to lure them away from Uncle Nan and Uncle Wang. They will take care of the two Sun Realm Beasts, we just need to take care of the rest."


    Just like this, the two sides shed with each other.


    There were explosions that rang out in space all over as Realm Experts shed with one another.


    Of course, not a single one of them dared to use their domain.


    That was because the Sun Realm Experts had released their domains.


    With how close they were to the fight of the Sun Realm Experts, the moment that they released their domains, they would be crushed.


    The domains of the Sun Realm Experts were on apletely different levelpared to Realm Experts, so no one dared to release it while they were close. They would need to get far away enough to release this or they would surely be influenced by the Sun Realm domains.


    As they shed with each other using their basic attacks, the two sides seemed like they were about even.


    As for Lin Fan, he just stood on the side and watched all of this since he knew that he wouldn''t be able to do anything. Or rather, he had a bad premonition that something was going to happen, so he adopted a wait and see attitude.


    Just like Lin Fan had expected, there was one of the Tai Ster Kingdom experts that was able to break through the blockade of the Zi Ster Kingdom experts.


    The way that he had broken through¡­it almost seemed like they had let him through on purpose.


    At the same time, the location that he came out of the blockade was very close to where Lin Fan was standing.


    When that expert came out, he looked around himself until his eyes fell onto Lin Fan.


    The moment that he saw Lin Fan, his eyes immediately narrowed because he recognized who Lin Fan was.


    Lin Fan also recognized this person because it was someone that he had been paying attention to.


    This person was the Bing Family''s family head.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan turned to run away.


    The Bing Family Head was caught off guard when he saw this, but then he started chasing Lin Fan.


    To the side, Zi Ling couldn''t help revealing a worried look as she watched Lin Fan run away, but she didn''t say a thing or do anything to help him.


    This was what she had been ordered to do after all¡­

 Chapter 920 Plots Hidden In Plots (4)

    Lin Fan knew that it was impossible for him to run away from the Bing Family Head.


    After all, the other side was in the Peak Realm while he was still only in the Mid Star Realm. There were a total of six minor realms between them, not to mention a major realm.


    The only reason Lin Fan was even able to run away was because he had pped a talisman on himself the moment that he ran.


    This was a talisman that he had bought from the system''s store that would increase his speed by a thousand times. That was just enough for him to maintain a distance between him and the Bing Family Head, but it wasn''t enough for him to get away.


    Not to mention, there was a time limit to this talisman.


    So Lin Fan''s goal in running away wasn''t to escape, but just to change locations.


    After all, if it was just someone in the Peak Realm, it wasn''t something that he was afraid of. Someone in the Peak Realm was still something that he could deal with.


    The only problem was being too close to Sun Realm Experts'' fight, that would mess with his ability to fight back.


    So running away was to find a better location for him to fight.


    The talismansted one minute and when the effects of it ran out, Lin Fan suddenly turned around.


    The Bing Family Head was surprised by this sudden turn, but he also revealed a smile since he understood what was happening.


    For him to stop here, it was most likely that he had been using some kind of secret technique or item that had boosted his speed. The effects had most likely run out which was why he had suddenly turned like this.


    Now the only thing he had to worry about was whether Lin Fan had another trump card like this.


    So instead of charging right at him, the Bing Family Head stopped in front of Lin Fan and waited for him to make his move.


    At the same time, he taunted, "Are you finally giving up? It''s a good thing that you''re smart enough to recognize that you can''t win."


    Of course, even though he said this, he didn''t let his guard down at all.


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and said, "I''m stopping to give you a chance. If you give up now, I can let you go without hurting you too badly."


    A vein popped out on the Bing Family Head''s forehead when he heard this.


    He had been the one provoking Lin Fan, but in the end, he had been the one that had been provoked.


    But it was a matter of pride for him, so he couldn''t back down.


    After all, he was the prestigious family head of the Bing Family, one of the four great families of the Tai Ster Kingdom. There were plenty of people who would do all that they could to tter him and approach him, but now he was being looked down on by this kid who came out of nowhere?


    How could he possibly ept something like this?


    So the Bing Family Head called out his pet and said, "It seems like you don''t appreciate the drink offered to you. Since that''s the case, then I''ll help you all you want."


    With a wave of his hand, his pet suddenly released a wave of life energy.


    The Bing Family Head used icews like the rest of the Bing Family, so his pet was naturally an ice attributed pet as well. The waves of ice life energy that was released suddenly caused the temperature around them to drop and if they weren''t in the vacuums of space, the air itself would have frozen.


    However, there were ice crystals that did form since these were created by the pet''s life energy itself.


    But before he could release his domain like he had nned, there was a sudden pressure that fell down on him and his pet that slowed them both down.


    When he tried to release his life energy, he found that there was something around him that seemed to be stopping him. It was as if the space around him was in chaos and the naturalws that were around him were being thrown into disorder.


    No matter how he tried to influence the natural energy around him with his life energy, it didn''t react at all. It was almost as if it was rejecting his life energy and fighting back against it.


    ? The Bing Family Head had never experienced anything like this before.


    While he wasn''t paying attention, there were two figures that appeared behind Lin Fan.


    These two were the main reason why the space around them had suddenly be very chaotic.


    At the same time, there were many other figures that had appeared around them.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The Bing Family Head only noticed all of this after a while. When he finally stopped trying to influence that area around him with his life energy, he noticed that he had beenpletely surrounded.


    When he looked closer, he saw that all of these figures around him were beasts.


    As he realized this, the Bing Family Head couldn''t help being shocked. He had never heard of anything like this before.


    There was the report that Lin Fan had somehow caused the pets of their troops to turn on them, but there was no report that Lin Fan was able to control all of these beasts...


    Not to mention, he could tell from the aura of these beasts that they were all in the Realm.


    He has a higher level of cultivation than Lin Fan, so he could tell that Lin Fan was only in the Star Realm.


    How was this kid in the Star Realm able to control Realm Pets like this. This justpletely destroyed his world views and went against hismon sense.


    But no matter how he tried to fight back, he found that he couldn''t use the natural energy around him to force out his domain.


    As the pressure kept falling onto him, the Bing Family Head found that he had no choice but to use the life energy stored inside of his body. He released that life energy and it quickly took the form of a small domain around him, creating a space that was separated from the array that Lin Fan had set up with the pets.


    The array that Lin Fan used was the same one that he used before, it was the array that allowed him to smash several domains together to create a chaotic space where no domains could exist.


    The domains were forced into a single area where they shed with each other in a fight for the natural energy in that space. That was why the Bing Family Head wasn''t able to use his domain.


    After all, there were just too many domains around him that even if he had a higher level of cultivation than the ones that created the array, he still couldn''t fight them for control of the natural energy around him.


    The only way that he could use his domain was to force his own life energy out to create that domain since this was life energy that belonged to him. No one would be able to manipte this life energy since it was something that belonged to him.


    But this technique was very draining since he couldn''t replenish his life energy from the surrounding area.


    Once that life energy was gone, he would be no different than a mortal with a strong body.


    So doing something like this was very dangerous and he wouldn''t have done it if he didn''t have any other choice.


    Still, the chaotic array was still pressing down on him that made it hard for him to move.


    He looked up at Lin Fan and started nning out how to deal with him quickly before his life energy ran out. However, as he looked around, he found that for some reason, his pet wasn''t as affected by the chaotic space around them as he was.


    While his pet wasn''t able to use its domain, it was still able to move around freely and use life energy to attack.


    Seeing this opportunity, the Bing Family Head didn''t hesitate at all to give the order, "Go. Wound him, but don''t kill him."


    His pet gave a nod before charging out towards Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to see this at all and the two figures behind him didn''t move at all.


    They just watched as the Bing Family Head came closer and closer until it was right in front of Lin Fan.


    The pet raised its ws and gathered ice around them, creating ws of ice that it swung out at Lin Fan.


    But right before it could swing down, there was a strange pressure that suddenly fell down on it. As this pressure fell down, it felt its movements bing stiff just like the Bing Family Head.


    It was still able to swing down with the ice w, but it was much slower than normal.


    Even someone with Lin Fan''s level of cultivation was able to dodge it.


    As the w of ice fell down on him, he easily moved to the side and swung his fist out.


    The fist didn''t hit the pet, but rather just grazed it as he moved past the beast.


    When the pet''s w fell onto thin air, it suddenly stopped.


    It didn''t stop because it had missed, but rather, it stopped because it had felt something.


    It couldn''t help turning back and looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.

 Chapter 921 Plots Hidden In Plots (5)

    After looking at Lin Fan with a strange look for a bit, the pet suddenly came forward¡­


    And then it suddenly bent down and licked Lin Fan on the face.


    This giant beast that was in the Peak Realm¡­it suddenly became as tame as a pet.


    The Bing Family Head couldn''t stop his chin from dropping in shock.


    He had already heard about Lin Fan''s special ability, but he never thought that even he would suffer at Lin Fan''s hands. After all, his pet was in the Peak Realm and Lin Fan was only in the Star Realm.


    Just what kind of magic had he used on his pet?


    But the Bing Family Head refused to believe that he wouldn''t be able to regain control over his pet. This was a pet that he had carefully raised and had taken care of like a son, so there was no way that it would ever betray him.


    So the Bing Family Head said, "Xiao Diao,e back here!"


    To his surprise though, his petpletely ignored him and just tried to rub its face against Lin Fan, but it was getting pushed back by Lin Fan.


    Even though it was being treated like this by Lin Fan, it still had a happy look on its face.


    It was nothing like the proud pet that the Bing Family Head had once owned that would allow no one but the Bing Family Head to touch it.


    The Bing Family Head''s jaw dropped as the undeniable facts were ced in front of him.


    After standing there in a daze for a bit, he suddenly woke up when he felt the pressure on him grow. He realized that he was slowly running out of life energy to maintain his domain and the array around him was affecting him more and more.


    If he kept standing here without doing a thing, then he would be crushed under the pressure of the array and would lose at the hands of this Star Realm kid.


    That was not something that his pride would allow to happen, not to mention how important it was that he captured Lin Fan.


    After all, the fate of the entire Bing Family and the entire Tai Ster Kingdom depended on if he could bring Lin Fan to the Beast Race.


    So he didn''t have any room to hold back.


    Realizing this, the Bing Family Head revealed a determined look.


    Even if it meant killing the pet that he had raised¡­he would have to use his trump cards to take down Lin Fan.


    So with a wave of his hand, there was a sword that waspletely made of ice that appeared.


    This was the special item that had been passed down through generations in the Bing Family, it was the greatest weapon that they had.


    This was the Sun Realm Artifact, the Magic Ice Sword.


    It was a sword that had been forged from Million Year Old Ice and was said to be able to freeze entires with a single swing. With this weapon, he would even be able tost several minutes facing off a Sun Realm Expert.


    Of course, he would still be overwhelmed in the end because of the difference in the quantity of life energy. He would eventually be worn down by the Sun Realm Expert since he wouldn''t be able to keep up the powerful attacks of the Magic Ice Sword.


    But that was more than enough to show how powerful this Magic Ice Sword was.


    As long as he had this, he was certain that he would be invincible in front of Lin Fan.


    As soon as the sword came out, there was ayer of ice that suddenly formed around the Bing Family Head.


    Thisyer of ice took the form of a barrier around the Bing Family Head, blocking off the pressure of the array, allowing him to move again. But of course, he didn''t use the full power of the Magic Ice Sword just on this, so he was still being suppressed by the array.


    Instead, there was a blue glow that appeared around the Magic Ice Sword that gave off a dangerous feeling.


    It was clear that the Bing Family Head was preparing an attack with the sword.


    After the glowsted for a few seconds, the Bing Family Head suddenly swung out of the Magic Ice Sword, creating a blue mist in front of him. That mist quickly condensed and there was a wave of icicles that suddenly appeared.


    Those icicles stayed in the air for a few seconds before suddenly flying out at Lin Fan.


    However, as these icicles flew out, they didn''t remain whole.


    As they flew out, they suddenly shattered to pieces, creating even smaller icicles.


    But even as they shattered into pieces and created smaller icicles, the aura that came from these smaller icicles made it clear that the power behind these icicles wasn''t weak¡­


    In fact, the aura that wasing from these smaller icicles was even stronger than the ones that came from therger icicles which didn''t make sense.


    After all, these smaller icicles hade from therger icicles, so they should contain the energy that was split up from therger icicle. It shouldn''t have contained a power that was greater than the thing that it came from.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This wentpletely against the fundamentalw of energy conservation.


    But this was what happened.


    Seeing the icicles flying at him, Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all.


    He slowly lifted his hand in the air as a talisman appeared.


    The Peak Realm Pet behind him was about toe forward to block this attack for him, but Lin Fan raised his free hand to stop it.


    Then looking at the icicles, he just simply flicked his hand as he threw the talisman at them.


    When the talisman flew out, it suddenly exploded into a burst of white light before disappearingpletely.


    After it had disappeared, there was a barrier of white light that appeared in front of Lin Fan. It was ced right in between him and the icicles that were currently flying towards him.


    The Bing Family Head was surprised to see this barrier suddenly appear, but there wasn''t a single trace of worry on his face.


    That was because he was confident in the power of his own attack. This was the heirloom that had been handed down in his family for generations, it had already be a symbol of belief for them.


    Even if the world lost belief in it, he would still believe in the power of his family''s heirloom.


    It was just too bad that his belief alone wasn''t enough.


    When the icicles shattered into the white light barrier, there was no hesitation at all as they shattered to pieces.


    After they were shattered to pieces, they were even absorbed into the white light barrier, disappearing into nothing.


    The Bing Family Head''s mouth almost dropped to the ground seeing this, but it was just too bad that his shock was just beginning.


    After the icicles had been shattered to pieces, the white light barrier suddenly started flickering. It was almost as if it was preparing to do something.


    The Bing Family Head noticed this and quickly prepared himself for whatever wasing.


    But to his surprise, there was only a faint beam of white light that suddenly shot out. This white beam of light flew forward until it made contact with the Magic Ice Sword in his hand before scattering into nothing.


    The Bing Family Head still had his guard up as if he was waiting for something¡­however, nothing happened at all.


    He couldn''t help looking down at the Magic Ice Sword in his hand and as he watched, the blue glow that had been around the Magic Ice Sword started to fade.


    It was slow at first, but it was soonpletely extinguished. In its ce, there was a white light that appeared around the Magic Ice Sword.


    When that white light appeared, the Bing Family Head''s expression couldn''t help turning strange.


    That was because he had lost connection to the Magic Ice Sword.


    Sun Realm Artifacts like this had their own spirituality, so they were able to establish links with people who could use them. If there wasn''t this link, then these Sun Realm Artifacts would be no different than normal items.


    The Magic Ice Sword had been linked to the Bing Family''s bloodline for generation and the leader would always undergo a ceremony that would connect them to the Magic Ice Sword.


    Since that ceremony, it was the Bing Family Head''s first time not feeling the connection of the Magic Ice Swore.


    ? It didn''t take a fool to realize that it was because of the white light barrier.


    The Bing Family Head looked up at Lin Fan and roared out, "What did you do?!"


    Lin Fan just stood there with a faint smile on his face, not saying a thing.


    The Bing Family Head gritted his teeth and started drawing out his life energy, as much as he could. He poured all of his life energy into the Magic Ice Sword, as if he was trying to establish the link between them again.


    Unfortunately, it was to no avail.


    All of his life energy waspletely blocked by the white light that was currently surrounding the Magic Ice Sword. It was almost as if that white light cover was a barrier thatpletely isted the Magic Ice Sword from the outside world.


    He had even tried attacking it with his life energy, but that white lightpletely reflected his attack. If he hadn''t held back, he might have even hurt himself from attacking the white light.


    He couldn''t help turning to look at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    He couldn''t understand how this kid who had appeared out of nowhere could pull out all these tricks.


    As he was about to say something, he suddenly heard a voice shouting, "Old Bing, I''m here to help!"

 Chapter 922 Plots Hidden In Plots (6)

    When the Bing Family Head turned in the direction of the voice, he saw that it was the Hua Family Head who was charging over.


    He was about to open his mouth to say something, but seeing him charge over, he closed it again and waited for him.


    The Huo Family Head charged over as he shouted, "Old Bing, let''s surround him together and take him¡­"


    Before he could finish his words, he had charged into the range of Lin Fan''s array.


    It was already toote to stop himself as he had charged forward as quickly as possible. So he could only try to stop himself when he felt the pressure fall on him.


    But the inertia was just too great for him to suddenly stop and he could only slide to a stop when he was near the Bing Family Head. At that point, it was already toote for him to do anything else as he had been suppressed by the array.


    The Huo Family Head looked around himself and said in a shocked voice, "What is this array? How is it even suppressing me?"


    After all, Lin Fan was only in the Star Realm;


    Something that a Star Realm Expert made was able to suppress someone in the Peak Realm like him?


    Everyone would beat the person who said this to death if this was said out in public.


    After all this went againstmon sense just too much.


    The Bing Family Head had a trace of anger in his eyes as he looked at the Huo Family Head. He never thought that he would have to deal with this kind of stupidity, but it was what had happened.


    Still, they were in a dangerous situation and it wasn''t time for him to dwell on this right now.


    Instead, the Bing Family Head said, "Summon out your pet. It seems like pets aren''t as affected by the array."


    The Huo Family Head looked at the Bing Family Head with a strange look since he had already seen his pet near Lin Fan. While he didn''t know what the situation was, he didn''t think that it was good.


    Still, the Bing Family Head had more experience facing Lin Fan than he had, so he had no choice but to trust the Bing Family Head.


    The Huo Family Head summoned out his pet which was arge lion with a burning mane.


    As soon as the lion was summoned out, it suddenly charged at Lin Fan with mes covering it. It was like a giant fireball that was hurtling at Lin Fan, as if it was preparing to burn away anything in its way.


    But Lin Fan didn''t panic at all when he saw this.


    He hadn''t used the array to suppress the lion at first just like with the Bing Family Head''s pet, allowing it toe all the way to him before using it. At the same time, the Bing Family Head''s pet suddenly turned to face the lion and created winds of snow to slow it down.


    Seeing this, the Bing Family Head said, "Pull out your heirloom and attack him now while he''s distracted."


    This had been his goal the entire time.


    He had been nning on using the Huo Family Head''s pet as a distraction so that they could catch Lin Fan off guard.


    The Huo Family Head however was also caught off guard by these sudden words and didn''t know how to react at first. Then he realized what the Bing Family Head had been nning the entire time and a trace of anger shed in his eyes.


    Still, he knew that this wasn''t the time to think about this now.


    So after a slight pause, he still pulled out the True Fire Mace that had been passed down through his family.


    When it appeared, it did the same thing as the Magic Ice Sword and created a barrier around the Huo Family Head to protect him from the array. However, it was different where it created a wall of mes instead of a wall of ice.


    Still, it did what it was supposed to do and freed the Huo Family Head from the influence of the array, if only temporarily.


    The Huo Family Head swung the True Fire Mace around once before throwing the head of it out at Lin Fan.


    This created a giant meteor in the middle of space, formed from firews that flew out at him while his back was turned from dealing with the lion.


    Lin Fan had grazed past the lion just like he had done with the Bing Family Head''s pet when the meteor suddenly came towards him.


    He naturally sensed it right away as it was arge mass of energy that was flying right at him. However, he didn''t panic when he saw this.


    All he did was calmly pull out another talisman.


    The Huo Family Head didn''t react to this, but the Bing Family Head reacted immediately when he saw this.


    That was because he recognized this talisman.


    It was the same talisman that Lin Fan had used before to stop his attack and seal his Magic Ice Sword.


    He didn''t know what kind of talisman this was or how it had been able to seal up his Magic Ice Sword that was a Sun Realm Artifact. Of course, he never would have expected Lin Fan to have a second one of these talismans.<novelnext></novelnext>


    The Bing Family Head started saying, "Old Huo, don''t let your attack hit¡­"


    But before he could, the meteor had already mmed into the white light barrier that had appeared. Just like before, the meteor dissipated the moment that it mmed into the white light barrier and turned into nothing as it was absorbed by the barrier.


    Then in front of the shocked eyes of the Huo Family Head and the Bing Family Head, the white light barrier released a beam of gentle white light that was shot at the True Fire Mace.


    The same thing as before happened where there was ayer of white light that appeared around the True Fire Mace.


    When that happened, the Huo Family Head looked down at the True Fire Mace in shock as he felt his connection with it being severed.


    After looking at it in a daze for a bit, he suddenly looked up at Lin Fan and roared, "What did you do?"


    Just like before, Lin Fan just looked at him with a smile without saying anything.


    Now that their cards had been used up, there was nothing left for the Huo Family Head and the Bing Family Head to do.


    ¡­


    "Hah, he really does have it."


    "Master of all beasts, king of all men, the Void Physique."


    "It seems like this wasn''t a wasted trip."


    Inside of a spaceship that was hiding in the darkness, there was a man and a woman who were looking out the window.


    As for what they were looking at, it was the scene of Lin Fan fighting with the Huo Family Head and the Bing Family Head.


    This spaceship has been here for a long time now. It had been there since the fight began between Lin Fan and the Bing Family Head.


    However, it never made a single move as it just stayed parked there, allowing this man and woman to watch over the fight.


    It was as if they didn''t care about the results at all.


    That was until they saw the sudden change in the attitude of the Bing Family Head''s pet.


    What they paid attention to the most was¡­the slight moment of contact between Lin Fan and the Bing Family Head''s pet. It was almost as if they could see something at the moment of contact between the two.


    "Mother, father, have you finished observing him? Are you sure that he has the legendary Void Physique?"


    A voice suddenly rang out from behind this man and woman.


    They turned around and the stern looks on their faces were reced with smiles.


    "Ah Jian, why are you talking so seriously? It''s been such a long time since we''ve seen each other and you''re acting like we''re strangers."


    The woman stepped forward to take the person who spoke in her arms, hugging him tightly.


    The person that had been hugged was the Lin Family''s ancestor.


    He gave a cough and said, "Mother, I''m already this old, please stop treating me like a child."


    The woman though didn''t mind it at all as she kept patting him on the head even though he looked like an old man. In fact, the woman looked like she was younger than the Lin Family ancestor.


    As this happened, there was another voice that rang out, "Great ancestor, shouldn''t we be helping Xiao Fan?"


    The man looked at the person who spoke and shook his head before saying, "There''s no need for us to do anything, he can do it himself."


    After the man said this, the one that had spoken didn''t say anything else. But they still had a worried look on their face.


    The one that had spoken was Lin Ao, Lin Fan''s father.


    Standing behind him were Yue Qingrou and Lin Yue who were looking out the window with worried looks.


    They had been surprised when this spaceship suddenly appeared on the Blue Star, but since the Lin Family Ancestor had gone with them, they really couldn''t say anything.


    After all, in the face of this man and woman, they couldn''t resist at all.


    Even in front of the guards that were behind them, they could only obediently follow their orders.


    Just who were these people?

 Chapter 923 Plots Hidden In Plots (7)

    Back at the main fight, the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord were slowly pushed back by the Zi Ster Kingdom''s Sun Realm Experts


    That was because these two had powerful Sun Realm Artifacts that they were able to use to push them back.


    While the Beast Race had their powerful physiques that would allow them to be stronger than human experts, the humans had their own specialties. Compared to the Beast Race, the humans were more creative and could create things that they could use to make themselves stronger, such as these artifacts.


    The Sun Realm Artifacts allowed them to release attacks that were greater than what their level of cultivation would allow them, so they were able to force back the Sky Lion Lord and Mist Pangolin Lord.


    As for the fight between the Realm Experts, even though the family heads of the four great families of both the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms had Sun Realm Artifact heirlooms, the Zi Ster Kingdom experts also had Sun Realm Artifacts.


    Moreover, the Zi Ster Kingdom experts actually had more Sun Realm Artifacts than them.


    Only the family heads and the two Ster Kings had them, but the Zi Ster Kingdom experts had more than twenty Sun Realm Artifacts.


    With their coordinated attacks, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group were pushed back more and more until they finally couldn''t take it anymore.


    With no other choice, they turned to the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord for help.


    The Sky Lion Lord was upied with his own battle, but seeing the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group asking for help, he couldn''t help looking at them with disdain.


    They had chosen to use this group of humans since they thought that they would be useful, but it turned out to be a big mistake. These humans werepletely useless and even dragged them down.


    But right now, the most important thing was getting Lin Fan¡­so there wasn''t time to waste with the Zi Ster Kingdom''s experts.


    The Sky Lion Lord turned to the Mist Pangolin Lord and shouted, "Use that!"


    The Mist Pangolin Lord revealed an unwilling look since this was a trump card that she was saving, but she knew that they had no other choice here. If they were to stay here any longer, they would slowly be worn down by the Zi Ster Kingdom''s experts.


    So she released a strong wave of life energy that pushed back the Sun Realm Expert that she had been facing.


    Once she had some breathing room, she suddenly took a deep breath, causing her chest to expand.


    It went from its normalrge size to almost triple the normal size, which made it look very deformed.


    But then the Mist Pangolin Lord suddenly breathed out and there was a mist that came out of her mouth.


    This was the special mist that was unique to the Mist Pangolin Tribe and the reason why they received this name. It was a mist that was carefully nurtured by the Mist Pangolins inside of their bodies, so it was a very precious thing.


    However, since it was carefully nurtured by them, it was also a very powerful thing.


    It was a mist that was so thick that itpletely obscured the vision and senses of their enemies, even if their enemies were at a higher level of cultivation than them.


    At the same time, it also had the ability to drain the life energy of the enemy, which allowed it to maintain its form even when separated from the Mist Pangolin''s body.


    The Mist Pangolins could use this mist to sneak attack their enemies without their enemies being able to resist at all. This allowed them to fight even enemies that were at a higher level of cultivation than them.


    That was what had allowed the Mist Pangolin Tribe to be one of therge Beast Race Tribes in the area.


    As the ruler of the Mist Pangolin Tribe and a Sun Realm Expert, the Mist Pangolin Lord''s mist was even greater than the mist of a normal Mist Pangolin.


    As soon as the mist appeared, the Sun Realm Expert in front of her couldn''t help jumping back to where Zi Ling was. He knew that there was something special about this mist, so he immediately worried about Zi Ling''s safety first.


    At the same time, when the mist appeared, the Sky Lion Lord also pushed his enemy back.


    He reared his head back and took a deep breath, causing his cheeks to swell several timesrger.


    Once he finished taking this breath, he suddenly let out a big breath that pushed the mist that the Mist Pangolin Lord released forward. This mist was carried by his breath until itpletely covered the Zi Ster Kingdom group.


    Both of the Sun Realm Experts of the Zi Ster Kingdom immediately went to Zi Ling''s side when this mist was blown at them.


    For them, the most important thing was naturally Zi Ling''s safety.


    After this mist was pushed onto the Zi Ster Kingdom group, the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord didn''t attack the Zi Ster Kingdom group in the mist as one would expect. Instead, they immediately turned around and started running off.


    As for the direction that they ran off in¡­it was the direction that Lin Fan and the Bing Family Head had gone.


    They had sent the Huo Family Head after them earlier, but even after all this time, neither of them came back with Lin Fan.


    The most important thing for the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group was Lin Fan''s capture, so they didn''t have the time to spare for the Zi Ster Kingdom group.


    So instead of fighting them, they decided to stall them and go capture Lin Fan instead.


    That was the only reason the Mist Pangolin Lord was willing to use her precious mist.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This one mist attack had used up almost all of the mist that the Mist Pangolin Lord had stored, so she wouldn''t be able to use this same attack again. In fact, this mist had taken her over a decade to carefully gather, so it was arge loss for her using it like this.


    Only if Lin Fan were captured would she be able to make up for this loss.


    They immediately ran off and didn''t look back for a second.


    They knew that the mist wouldn''t be able to hold back the Zi Ster Kingdom group for long. They were able to bring out all of those Sun Realm Artifacts, so it was unknown what other tricks that they would have.


    But they were certain that this mist wouldn''t be able to hold them.


    So they were going to capture Lin Fan as quickly as possible.


    After all, no one believed that a group of Realm Experts and two Sun Realm Beasts wouldn''t be able to capture Lin Fan who was only in the Star Realm.


    With their speed, it didn''t take them long to reach where Lin Fan was.


    But when they arrived, they couldn''t help suddenly stopping as they revealed shocked looks on their faces.


    That was because they saw the Bing Family Head and the Huo Family Head kneeling in front of Lin Fan. It was clear by the exhausted looks on their faces that they weren''t able to resist at all.


    Standing behind Lin Fan was the Ice w Marten and the me Devouring Lion. They knew that these two were the pets of the Bing Family Head and the Huo Family Head.


    They had already heard that Lin Fan was able to steal their pets, but they never would have imagined that Lin Fan was even able to steal pets in the Peak Realm¡­


    This was just too shocking!


    Many of them even started putting their pets behind them just in case Lin Fan did something.


    Even though they had the Sun Realm lords from the two Beast Race leading them, they didn''t dare move forward towards Lin Fan.


    After all, he did many things thatpletely went againstmon sense, so they didn''t dare let their guards down.


    Even if they were Sun Realm Beasts, there was a chance that he would be able to do something to them as well.


    The truth of the matter was that Lin Fan didn''t actually have much else.


    He had already spent quite a lot of points on dealing with the Bing Family Head and the Huo Family Head, so he might have enough to take care of a few more people, but he definitely didn''t have enough points to take care of this entire group.


    That slight moment of hesitation was actually all that Lin Fan needed because soon, there was another group that came over.


    It was Zi Ling''s group that had broken free of the mist and wereing over to help Lin Fan.


    Zi Ling knew the truth of Lin Fan''s identity and if there was even a single hair that was misced on Lin Fan''s head after he had passed the test, then it would be the entire Zi Ster Kingdom that would disappear.


    While she didn''t know if Lin Fan had passed the test yet, she didn''t want to risk it and had them use their trump card to break free.


    When they saw the Zi Ster Kingdom group run over, the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord revealed bitter smiles.


    They had wasted the opportunity that they had gained by hesitating and now they had been forced into a desperate situation¡­


    That is if they didn''t have¡­


    The Sky Lion Lord turned to the Tai Ster King and said, "Take out the third bag." Then seeing that he just stood there in a daze, he roared out, "Now!"


    The Tai Ster King was shocked by this loud voice and took out the third bag in a daze.


    The Sky Lion Lord snatched it out of his hand and without any hesitation, he tore off the ribbon closing it and opened it.


    The moment that it was opened, there was the same white sh of light before another portal appeared.


    But this time, the portal didn''t seem stable.


    The Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord went to the sides of the portal and raised their hands as they released life energy to stabilize it.


    At the same time, the Sky Lion Lord said to the Tai and Bai Ster Kings, "Hold them off for as long as you can or we will all die."


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kings, as well as all of their followers revealed shocked looks.


    However, seeing the serious look that the Sky Lion Lord had, they could only nod in agreement.

 Chapter 924 Plots Hidden In Plots (8)

    Luckily for them, the Zi Ster Kingdom group didn''t charge over to where they were at all.


    The moment that they saw the portal, they stopped a distance away from the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group.


    Thest time that they saw the portal, the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord along with their followers hade out.


    Now they had no idea what was happening, so they didn''t dare act rashly.


    However¡­


    Lin Fan was still isted from them¡­


    Lin Fan also recognized that this was a problem, so he slowly started to move towards them while avoiding the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group.


    At first, the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group looked like they wanted to intercept him, but they quickly gave up that idea. After all, one of the Sun Realm Experts from the Zi Ster Kingdom also moved over to where Lin Fan was.


    If he wanted to, he could instantly make a move on them if they were toe closer.


    It wouldn''t take much for a Sun Realm Expert like him to take their lives and no one wanted to lose their lives over this¡­


    So no one made a move in the end.


    If the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord weren''t focused on the portal, they would have immediately scolded these idiots. They were letting such a prime opportunity escape them just because they were afraid, they really couldn''t be more useless!


    Like this, Lin Fan was able to quickly make it over to the Sun Realm Expert and was escorted over to the Zi Ster Kingdom group.


    Then they just carefully watched over the Sky Lion Lord and Mist Pangolin Lord, waiting to see what they were nning to do.


    They could have charged over, but Zi Ling wasn''t willing to take that risk.


    If the portal suddenly opened and there was something powerful on the other side, it would be them who would be caught in a trap.


    She wasn''t willing to see this happen, especially with Lin Fan here.


    So she waited to see what would happen.


    After all, she still had more trump cards up her sleeve if anything did happen.


    The portal became brighter and brighter as it was clearly bing more stable. At the same time, the aura that wasing from it became more and more powerful.


    It was clear that whatever wasing through was powerful, more powerful than anyone that was currently in the Zi Ster Kingdom group.


    So the members of the Zi Ster Kingdom group couldn''t help revealing worried looks.


    But when they saw that Zi Ling still had a calm and collected look on her face, they immediately calmed down.


    That was the faith that they had in their crown princess, a faith that she rightfully deserved.


    She was the greatest sessor that the Zi Ster Kingdom had ever had. She was someone who was skilled in both cultivation and studying, so she was someone that could fulfill both the roles of a general and a minister.


    The current Zi Ster King asked for her advice in most matters and it was even said that she could take over as the Zi Ster Queen any time that she wanted to, it was just that she wasn''t willing to do so.


    That was just the kind of image that she had in the hearts of the Zi Ster Kingdom''s people.


    Finally, the portal became stable enough that the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord no longer had to inject their life energy into it to maintain it.


    Both of them moved away from the portal with relieved smiles on their faces before looking at the Zi Ster Kingdom group like they were looking at idiots. After all, these were the fools that didn''t take advantage of their moment of weakness to attack them and had allowed them to stabilize this portal.


    Now, it was their turn to be destroyed.


    With a bright sh of light, there was a stern looking person that suddenly came out of the portal.


    This person had sharp eyes that were like swords, seeming as if they could cut the world itself in half.


    These sharp eyes quickly swept over the surroundings before finally falling onto the Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord.


    When these eyes fell onto them, the two of them couldn''t help shuddering as they lowered their heads even more. That was because they knew that this gaze wasn''t one of approval, but rather disapproval.


    It was clear that this person was disappointed in them for having to summon them.


    But this was a desperate situation, so there was nothing that they could say in response.


    The stern looking man turned his gaze to the Zi Ster Kingdom group before suddenly giving a snort and releasing his aura.


    The moment that his aura was released, all of them suddenly couldn''t help trembling.


    Even some of the weaker Realm Experts couldn''t help crumbling under this pressure and falling to their knees.


    The moment that this pressure was released, the expressions of the Sun Realm Experts and Zi Ling immediately changed.<novelnext></novelnext>


    That was because they could tell¡­that this stern looking man was in the Peak Sun Realm!


    He was on apletely different level than them.


    The stern looking man didn''t bother looking at any of them, his eyes moved through their group until they fell onto Lin Fan. After looking at Lin Fan for a bit, he couldn''t stop a faint sparkle from appearing in his eyes.


    While he wasn''t able to see through Lin Fan, he could see that there was something special about him.


    He was the one that they were looking for.


    So after looking at him for a bit, the stern looking man said, "Hand him over and I''ll let you all live."


    It was a few simple words, but the tone was like he was giving them amand that brokered no argument. It was as if he was the king and they were his subjects, his orders were absolute.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group revealed looks of joy when they heard this.


    They didn''t know who this person was, but they could tell that he wasn''t a normal person. He was clearly one of the higher ups from the Beast Race.


    As long as this person was here, there was nothing for them to fear.


    However, on the Zi Ster Kingdom side, they couldn''t help showing worried looks.


    While they had faith in their crown princess, this was a powerful expert that far surpassed their expectations. Based on the looks on the faces of the crown princess and the Sun Realm Experts, they knew that this person had to be at least in the High Sun Realm.


    Even if they all worked together, they didn''t think that it was possible for them to even touch this person, let alone defeat him.


    So they couldn''t think of what the crown princess would use to stop this person from doing what he wanted.


    However, Zi Ling didn''t have a worried look.


    Rather, after a bit of surprise, she looked very calm standing there facing this Peak Sun Realm Expert.


    She just asked, "Who are you?"


    The stern looking man was surprised to hear this.


    He had thought that his aura alone would be enough to suppress them, but he never thought that this girl would be able to stand up to him.


    As he looked at her, instead of the angry look that one thought he would reveal, he instead revealed an interested look.


    This girl, her appearance wasn''t bad.


    She was suited to bing his fourteenth concubine.


    So the stern looking man said, "I am the young master of the Suanni Tribe. As long as you fall under me, I can guarantee that you''ll live a life without worry."


    Though he made it sound very nice, it was clear that he only wanted her for her body based on the tone of his voice.


    But at the same time, the words that he said revealed some important information.


    Young master of the Suanni Tribe¡­


    The Suanni Tribe was one of the bigger tribes among the Beast Race and had quite a few experts, including¡­Rulers.


    So this young master Suanni could be considered someone who was quite important among the Beast Race.


    After all, the tribes with Rulers behind them were equivalent to Astral Empires among the humans. So a Ster Kingdom like theirs clearly couldn''tpete with the backing of this young master Suanni.


    But to everyone''s surprise, Zi Ling was still very calm when she heard this.


    She stroked her chin as she looked at young master Suanni, as if she was deep in thought. After a while, she suddenly said, "A young master from the Suanni Tribe, that really is an enticing offer."


    Young master Suanni revealed his first smile when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything.


    Zi Ling then suddenly said, "Unfortunately, I have to reject this offer. You see, I''m not interested in being used by scum like you."


    Young master Suanni immediately knitted his brows and red at her after hearing this.


    The pressure that he released scared even the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group, the Sky Lion Lord, and the Mist Pangolin Lord beside him.


    She could have clearly just rejected him, but she had to reject him like this¡­


    It was an insult to his pride!


    But before he could say anything about tearing her to pieces, Zi Ling suddenly said with a smile, "Your majesty, I think that it''s your time to make a move."

 Chapter 925 Plots Hidden In Plots (9)

    Everyone was confused when they heard this at first, but then there was a pressure that suddenly fell onto them.


    Everyone in the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group was pressed down t and if it wasn''t for their own life energy holding them in space, they would have mmed down into the under them.


    Even Sky Lion Lord and the Mist Pangolin Lord couldn''t help revealing terrified looks when they felt this pressure.


    This was a pressure that was even greater than the one that they felt from young master Suanni.


    But thergest reaction out of the bunch came from young master Suanni.


    That was because unlike these people who had never felt this kind of pressure before, young master Suanni knew what this pressure represented.


    This was a pressure that he would never be able to release because¡­it was in apletely different realm.


    This was the pressure of a Ruler.


    Young master Suanni immediately tried pinpointing the source of this pressure, but since the other side didn''t want him to find out, it was impossible for him to find that Ruler.


    After all, Rulers were the true experts in this world, they were on apletely different level.


    Everyone that was under the level of a Ruler¡­was considered garbage in the face of Rulers.


    Young master Suanni however didn''t panic since it wasn''t as if this was his first time facing a Ruler. His own Suanni Tribe had their own Rulers, so it wasn''t as if he had nothing to face this Ruler with.


    He didn''t know why this Ruler had suddenly appeared, but it seemed like this Ruler was connected to Zi Ling.


    He still hadn''t done anything that would be considered going too far, so as long as he was able to talk to the Ruler, he should be able to escape with the prestige of his own Suanni Tribe''s Rulers.


    After thinking this through, young master Suanni took a deep breath and said, "This lord, I don''t think that there are any grudges that require this kind of action between us. I am the Suanni Tribe''s young master, the current patriarch of the Suanni Tribe is my father. As long as you let me go, I can guarantee that my father will give you a price that will satisfy you." Then after a pause, he added, "Of course, if you do take action, I''m sure that my father won''t forget this."


    The reason why he had added a threat at the end was because¡­his father had already given him something that would allow him to escape if he was ever faced with a low grade Ruler. This was the thing that gave him the greatest confidence right now.


    After all, he didn''t believe that some crown princess of some Ster Kingdom would be able to make contact with a powerful Ruler.


    But in response to this, all he received¡­was a cold snort.


    Then a cold voice said, "Are you really threatening me?"


    When young master Suanni heard this, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows.


    He couldn''t understand what was happening.


    After all, he had already brought up his position as the young master of the Suanni Tribe and that his father was the patriarch of the Suanni Tribe, a well known Ruler that was considered quite powerful.


    But even then, the other side didn''t back down and didn''t even show him any respect?


    Just who was this person?


    Young master Suanni didn''t get angry being spoken to like this and instead took a deep breath before asking, "Who are you?"


    The cold voice replied, "You aren''t worthy of knowing. The runt of the Suanni Tribe that was beaten until they couldn''t remain an independent race anymore, do you really think that the Suanni Tribe has the same power that they once had?"


    This was arge blow to young master Suanni''s pride and something that he couldn''t ept.


    So with a bit of rage, he said, "Do you really think that you''ll be able to get away with talking about the Suanni Tribe like this? If you don''t want to suffer, I suggest that you watch yournguage."


    But as he said this, he was also raising a little ball in his hand.


    This was the special item that his father had given him, it was a ball that contained spatialws from a Ruler. It was something that his father had spent a lot of money to get, but it was worth it knowing that it would keep him safe.


    However, before he could shatter it and release the spatialws inside, there was another cold snort before a snap rang out.


    Then there was this unfamiliar feeling that came from inside of young master Suanni.


    This was a very strange feeling that was hard to describe, but it was basically a swirling force that came from the very center of his body. It was almost as if it was trying to make its way out of his body and was doing it forcefully.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This strange feeling became stronger and stronger until young master Suanni knitted his brows in pain. The pain was so strong that he couldn''t even crush the little ball that he was currently holding.


    It became stronger and stronger until rips started forming in his body.


    There was a swirl of invisible energy that came out of his body that was only seen because it stirred up the blood and flesh of his body into a swirling pattern.


    In the end, he was ripped to pieces from the inside out from this invisible energy.


    After he was ripped to pieces, the swirling energy started to copse upon itself, swallowing the mass of flesh and blood that had once been young master Suanni. This swirling energy continued to copse upon itself until it finally reached a single point and disappeared from existence.


    The bestparison of what had just happened would be what happens when something falls into a ck hole, but even then, a ck hole would have remained.


    This invisible swirling energy that had appeared out of thin air had swallowed up young master Suanni and then disappeared into nothingness.


    All of this had only taken a single second to happen.


    If one hadn''t seen the invisible swirling energy, they would have never known about it and would have thought that young master Suanni had disappeared into thin air.


    The Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms group, the Sky Lion Lord, and the Mist Pangolin Lord just stared at where young master Suanni had been standing in shock. However, they didn''t remain in shock for long as they immediately turned and were about to scatter in every single direction.


    This was an unknown person that had taken care of young master Suanni, a Peak Sun Realm Expert in an instant. There was nothing that specks of dirt like them could do when facing this person, so their only thought was to run away.


    But before they could take more than a single step, there was the same strange feeling that filled them that had once filled young master Suanni. There was that strange swirling force that suddenly appeared inside of their bodies that they couldn''t resist.


    Just like with young master Suanni, in just a single second, their bodies were swallowed up by that swirling force and they disappeared without a trace.


    After the enemies had all been taken care of by this unknown expert, the members of the Zi Ster Kingdom group couldn''t help being shocked. At the same time, the Sun Realm Experts both raised their weapons and moved closer to Zi Ling, even though they knew that it was useless.


    After all, this was a person who had taken care of a Peak Sun Realm Expert in an instant, so what could they do?


    Even Lin Fan had his brows knitted as he looked at where the enemies had once stood.


    It wasn''t because he was shocked since he had already expected Zi Ling to have some kind of trick up her sleeve.


    Rather, it was because he felt something familiar from the swirling energy that had just ripped the enemies to pieces¡­


    It was like something that he had¡­


    It was like the absorption force that he had relied on to take care of so many of his enemies.


    After the enemies disappeared, Zi Ling asked, "Your majesty, I take it that he has passed the test."


    There wasn''t an answer at first, but then there was augh that rang out all around them.


    This was a voice thatpletely filled the space that they were in,ing from everywhere and nowhere all at once. It was almost as if this voice wasing from inside of their heads.


    Thisughter continued a bit longer before it suddenly stopped and the same voice as before spoke, but this time it was no longer as cold as before. Instead, it said in a friendly tone, "You were right after all, he did inherit it and he has awakened the Void Physique."


    Zi Ling had a calm smile on her face when she heard this, but deep down, she let out a sigh of relief.


    She had only recognized the power that Lin Fan had and had made an educated guess, but she never thought that she would hit such arge jackpot.


    After all, the Void Physique was¡­one of the supreme physiques.


    Then in front of everyone''s confused expressions, there was a spaceship that suddenly appeared out of thin air.


    Well, they knew that it didn''t appear out of thin air and it had been using some kind of power to hide itself before this, only revealing itself now.


    But it was still shocking enough to find that there was this spaceship lurking here the whole time.


    Just who did this belong to?

 Chapter 926 Ancestors

    When the spaceship appeared, the hatch suddenly opened and there were several figures that came out.


    When these figures came out, Lin Fan was shocked because he recognized a few of them immediately.


    It was his family and the Lin Family Ancestor.


    The only ones that he didn''t recognize were the man and woman who came out with them.


    Based on the look on Yue Qingrou and Lin Yue''s faces, it was clear that they wanted to rush over to where he was, but Lin Ao stopped them. He knew that they were only able to survive in this space because of the help of the ancestors and if they were to run out of the space of their protection, they wouldn''t be able to survive for long.


    Actually, he was able to survive since he had already reached the Soul Realm, but for Yue Qingrou and Lin Yue who were still not there yet, they wouldn''t be able to survive.


    So he held them back so they didn''t run outside of the zone of protection.


    The moment that this group came out, to the surprise of the Zi Ster Kingdom group, Zi Ling suddenly bowed down to the man and woman behind Lin Fan''s family.


    The Zi Ster Kingdom group were surprised to see this, but since their crown princess had already bowed down¡­how could they remain standing?


    Soon, there was only Lin Fan standing there in the middle of the Zi Ster Kingdom group.


    He quickly realized what he was doing and he was about to bow down to the man and woman, but as he was about to bend down, he felt an invisible force stop him. At the same time, he heard the man say, "There''s no need for that. We''re family after all."


    When everyone heard this, they couldn''t help being shocked, including Lin Fan¡­


    Well, the one exception was Zi Ling who already knew everything.


    Lin Fan had suspected that these were people in his family when he had felt the familiar feeling from the attack that had taken out the enemies just now, but he wasn''t certain.


    But since they had confirmed it, there was no need for him to doubt it anymore.


    So Lin Fan stood up and looked at the man and woman just standing there, as if he was waiting for them to exin.


    Seeing him act like this, the two of them weren''t offended at all. Rather, they couldn''t help revealing pleased looks as they saw how calm and collected he was even in the face of this situation that clearly should have caught him off guard.


    After giving a nod of approval, the man said, "I am the father of your great great grandfather here, so you can think of me as your great great great grandfather."


    Then after saying this, he looked at the woman, but she had a displeased look on her face when he looked at her.


    She then turned to Lin Fan and said, "You can just call me grandmother. If you add any greats to it, I''ll make sure you suffer."


    She said this with a smile on her face, but the smile didn''t reach her eyes¡­


    It was almost as if if he did say it, she really would do something to him.


    So Lin Fan didn''t risk it and said, "Yes, grandfather and grandmother."


    She gave a satisfied nod before saying, "Smart boy, it''s no wonder you were able to awaken the Void Physique."


    "Void Physique?" Lin Fan repeated.


    He had heard this before since he had seen the list of the supreme physiques before, but he didn''t know how this was rted to him. After all, he didn''t seem to have anything that could awaken this.


    The man took over and said, "I''m sure that you''ve already noticed that we were testing you earlier."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he still gave a nod in response.


    The man then raised his hand and said, "We found that you''ve inherited the Void Physique of our Lin Family, but not the iplete version. You''ve inherited the true Void Physique, one of the twelve supreme physiques."


    As he raised his hand, there was a swirl of energy that appeared that was just like the one that had killed all the enemies early.


    When this swirling energy appeared again, Lin Fan could once again feel¡­the simrity to the absorption power that he had.<novelnext></novelnext>


    He could also see through the intentions that this man had, so he raised his hand and copied the actions of the man with his absorption energy.


    Soon, there was a swirling energy that appeared in his hand just like the man''s, but there was also something different about its


    The man''s swirling energy was almost invisible, like it didn''t exist. However, Lin Fan''s swirl of energy took the form of a ck hole gathered in the center of the swirl.


    The man gave a satisfied nod when he saw this and said, "It truly is the Void Physique, this is the true voidw. It''s unlike the iplete versions that we have that can only swallow parts of what''s put in. This true voidw can even swallow the entire universe itself."


    Lin Fan looked down at the ck hole in his hand.


    He had never known where this power hade from even though it was the one thing that he relied on the most, along with the suns from the Nine True Suns Body Art.


    But now it seemed like this was the power that came from the original owner of this body¡­


    After confirming that he had this ability, the man suddenly said, "You wille back with us to the main family now. An ability like yours has the ability to be the next head of the family and the next emperor."


    "Emperor?" Lin Fan asked in a confused voice.


    The man was about to say something, but then he looked like he suddenly realized something.


    At the same time, the woman pped him on the arm and said, "Look at you, getting this excited that you even forgot to tell Fan''er who our family is and who we were."


    The man revealed an awkward smile before turning back to Lin Fan and saying, "Fan''er, the family that you are from is special, but I''m sure that you can tell that already. I won''t hide it from you any longer, I am the emperor of the Lin Astral Empire."


    The moment that the words "Astral Empire" were said, everyone couldn''t help revealing shocked looks, that was except for Lin Fan''s family and the Lin Family ancestor who already knew all of this.


    The Zi Ster Kingdom group couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with very shocked expressions as they never would have thought that this kid who their crown princess had ordered them to protect would have such a high status. It was no wonder the crown princess said that even if they all died, he couldn''t die.


    After all, now that he had been confirmed as the heir to the throne of the Lin Astral Empire, it could be said that he was above even the Zi Ster King.


    After all, the Zi Ster Kingdom was one of the many kingdoms that was under the Lin Astral Empire.


    Astral Empires controlled entire astral spaces which contained hundreds and thousands of gxies, it even contained several dozen superclusters of gxies. These were the highest forms of government in human society and the bastion of the human race, as they were the ces where Rulers resided.


    Rulers were the strongest experts in this world, which was why they were named Rulers in the first ce.


    So the Zi Ster Kingdom was worth nothing in the eyes of the Lin Astral Empire.


    The only one who didn''t have a shocked look and had aplicated look instead was Zi Ling.


    After all, she had known everything and she had cooperated with the Lin Astral Emperor to test Lin Fan.


    There had even been a small part of her that had hoped that Lin Fan would fail, but¡­she knew deep down that was impossible since she had already felt the power that came from him.


    Now that he had passed the test and had been epted by the Lin Astral Family, she was the one that was of lower status¡­


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear all of this, but he was about to shake his head to reject this¡­


    After all, bing involved in the Lin Astral Empire would just mean more trouble for him since it would mean interacting with some of the strongest people in the entire universe. Not to mention, he definitely wouldn''t be able to bring the people that he wanted to bring with him to the Lin Astral Empire since their disguises would be seen through right away.


    But before he could say anything, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "Don''t be in such a rush to reject this. You should know that in your situation, people will want to capture you since one of the twelve supreme physiques is just that rare. Not to mention that the Beast Race should already know even though I got rid of that runt from the Suanni Tribe."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help trembling.


    He had no way of refuting the Lin Astral Emperor''s words because he knew that he was right.


    It was already toote for him to hide this since he had been using it consistently with the pets. Since the Lin Astral Emperor had figured it out, there would be others that would find out and then they would want to kidnap him or they would directly kill him.


    So his best choice was indeed to go to the Lin Astral Empire for his own protection¡­

 Chapter 927 Heading To The Lin Astral Empire (1)

    But that would mean he would have to abandon Ang, Momonga, and Yuki since it would be impossible for them to hide themselves there.


    Even if they were Rulers, when they came across other Rulers, their disguises would surely be seen through.


    He couldn''t bear to leave them after everything that they had been through, especially Ang¡­


    So what should he do?


    Should he look for them to protect him and see if he could weather the storm that came?


    In the long run, that would be the worse choice of the two since there was no way that this would be sustainable.


    After all, there would be more and more people that woulde for him and eventually he would be revealed to be working with non-humans. They could only do so much without revealing themselves after all.


    As Lin Fan was debating what choice to make, there was a sudden notification from the system that pulled him out of his thoughts. But the moment that he saw this notification, he was suddenly shocked.


    That was because this notification was rted to his dilemma¡­


    No, it was better to say that this notification was giving him the answer to his dilemma.


    This was a notification asking Lin Fan to upgrade the store which he hadn''t done in a long time. He had actuallypletely forgotten about it since he didn''t feel like there was anything useful that he could gain from upgrading the store.


    But now, it was offering something that would solve his problems.


    If he upgraded the store, it would unlock an upgrade to the employee system that would allow them to hide their aura regardless of who the other side was. ording to the system, the only people who would be able to see through this camouge were those in the God Realm.


    Lin Fan might doubt many things, but the system was something that he would never doubt.


    This system was his greatest supporter in this world he had reincarnated and he never suspected its abilities. So as long as it said that it was capable of doing something, he would never doubt it.


    So with this, his doubts were solved and he was able to go with the Lin Astral Emperor to the Lin Astral Empire.


    But there was still a doubt that hadn''t been solved¡­


    Why did this sudden notification pop up?


    It wasn''t even a notification for a mission, it was just a sudden notification asking him if he wanted to upgrade the store which by no means seemed normal. Not to mention that it had provided him with the exact solution to the problem that he had been facing¡­


    It was almost as if the system was guiding him towards something.


    This was the doubt that he had since he had been on the Blue Star.


    After all, the missions that the system had been giving him almost seemed like they always had some kind of goal in mind. It was almost as if the system had been able to predict what would happen in each scenario, so it guided him along the best path.


    But if that was the case, didn''t that mean that there was someone who was controlling the system?


    This was a system that contained God Realm energy ording to Ang and Momonga, so the one that controlled it would definitely be a god¡­


    As far as he knew, gods should havepletely disappeared from this current world.


    If there was still one god that was left, then what did they want with him that they would bring him to this world and give him this system?


    In short, there seemed to be a big plot that was revolving around him¡­


    Still, since he wasn''t able to figure this out now, Lin Fan did the only thing that he could do.


    He agreed to the upgrade and in a matter of seconds, the system had finished upgrading.


    Now he was able to bring Ang, Momonga, and Yuki along with him to the Lin Astral Empire.


    There was no need for Momonga to stay at the old store in the Gctic Humanity Alliance since the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms'' days were numbered.


    They definitely wouldn''t be able to bounce back after losing the heads of the four great families and their Ster Kings, as well as so many Realm Experts.


    So Lin Fan nodded and said, "I''lle with you."


    The Lin Astral Emperor''s eyes lit up when he heard this and he gave a p as he said, "Great! It''s been so long since we''ve all gathered as a family, so I''m looking forward to it!"


    But before he could say anything else, Lin Fan suddenly said, "I have my own conditions though."


    Everyone suddenly froze and looked at Lin Fan.


    At first the Lin Astral Emperor narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan, releasing a bit of his aura to suppress him. However, he saw that Lin Fan didn''t back down at all in the face of his Ruler aura, even though it was just a portion of it.<novelnext></novelnext>


    This was something that he couldn''t help praising.


    It seemed like he had underestimated this descendant of his.


    With a satisfied smile, he said with a nod, "Alright, what conditions do you have?"


    Everyone couldn''t help being more shocked since they never thought that the Lin Astral Emperor would actually agree to this. This was the emperor of an Astral Empire, a real Ruler Expert, this was not someone that one could easily negotiate with.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked back and said, "I want to bring some people with me to the Lin Astral Empire."


    The Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help raising a brow as he asked, "Is that it?"


    Lin Fan was surprised since he had expected some kind of resistance, not this question. Still, he said with a nod, "That''s all I want." But then as if he thought of something, he added, "I also want a shop to open a pet shop with."


    He couldn''t forget about opening a pet shop for the system.


    He knew for sure that once he went to the Lin Astral Empire, the system would ask him to find another shop. So he might as well get one directly from the Lin Astral Emperor instead of wasting time finding one on his own.


    The Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help staring at Lin Fan again with the same raised brow for a while before suddenly saying, "For someone as bold as you, you really have some humble requests."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he looked the Lin Astral Emperor right in the eyes.


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod and said, "Alright, you can bring whoever you want and I''ll have someone prepare a shop for you. That should be enough, right?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Yes."


    The Lin Astral Emperor then said with a teasing smile, "Is that all you have to say? Is that really how you address a family member?"


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this since he never thought that someone as important as the Lin Astral Emperor would act this way.


    Still, since this was what he wanted, Lin Fan said, "Thank you, grandfather."


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a satisfied nod before turning to head back into the ship, while also waving his hand at everyone to get on as well.


    But before he took two steps, he suddenly turned around as if he had suddenly remembered something.


    He looked around himself before his eyes fell onto Zi Ling.


    When his eyes fell onto her, Zi Ling couldn''t help trembling.


    She knew that what she was waiting for had finallye, but at the same time, she couldn''t help feeling nervous since it was finally here.


    Lin Fan also couldn''t help looking at her at the same time as he remembered what he had promised¡­


    He had figured that Zi Ling was rted to the Lin Astral Emperor after seeing how she had asked for his help. He was even willing to guess that she was the one that had reported him to him and had been watching over him the entire time.


    That was why the cloaked figure that followed Zi Ling had rescued him back in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But that didn''t change the rtionship between them¡­


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked at her for a bit before suddenly revealing a smile and saying, "Xiao Ling, good job protecting Xiao Fan this whole time. We''ll be sure to send the reward to your Zi Ster Kingdomter."


    When the Zi Ster Kingdom group heard this, they couldn''t help being filled with excitement.


    Even if they were fools, they would be able to tell who this person was since he had already introduced himself to Lin Fan.


    The promise of the Lin Astral Emperor to send a reward to the Zi Ster Kingdom, this would surely raise their status among all the Ster Kingdoms that were under the Astral Empire.


    So they couldn''t help being excited.


    But for Zi Ling, these words immediately made the expression on her face sink.


    These were not the words that she wanted to hear and these words seemed like they were closing the door on what she wanted¡­


    But she wouldn''t let what she wanted escape her hands that easily.


    So she gave a gulp and took a deep breath before looking up to say, "Your majesty, I wish to follow young master Lin as his maid."


    Everyone took a cold breath when they heard this as they looked at her in disbelief.


    The Lin Astral Emperor just narrowed his eyes to look at her before saying, "Do you know what you''re saying?"

 Chapter 928 Heading To The Lin Astral Empire (2)

    Zi Ling felt the pressure of the Lin Astral Emperor''s gaze fall onto her and she couldn''t help lowering her head a bit. But she quickly looked back up at him and met his gaze.


    She naturally understood what she was asking for.


    Lin Fan had the Void Physique, which was the ultimate form of the Lin Family''s inherited True Void Technique.


    So it wouldn''t be an exaggeration to say that Lin Fan was already decided as the next family head and the next Astral Emperor.


    So the most important thing for the Lin Astral Family now was finding someone suitable to Lin Fan to ensure that he would be able to pass down this Void Physique to his descendants. This was something that involved the future prosperity of the Lin Astral Family, so it was not something that they would take lightly.


    In terms of status, Zi Ling really didn''t fit that role, but she was trying to follow Lin Fan as his maid.


    So of course, this was not something that the Lin Astral Family would easily ept.


    For this kind of bold action, it wouldn''t be an exaggeration to say that the Zi Ster Kingdom might be punished for this. What she was doing was basically throwing the Zi Ster Kingdom into the jaws of the lion.


    Naturally the people that followed her couldn''t help looking at her with terrified looks.


    But Zi Ling didn''t care about that at all, she just cared about this¡­or rather, she just cared about Lin Fan''s answer.


    After all, if Lin Fan spoke up, then¡­


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t say anything as he just looked at Zi Ling, but out of the corner of his eyes, he was watching for Lin Fan''s reaction.


    He had already seen how Lin Fan had acted around Zi Ling and he had seen Zi Ling''s reports about Lin Fan. How could someone as powerful and wise as him not be able to see through the feelings of these kids?


    So if Lin Fan said something, he didn''t really mind since he quite liked this Zi Ling in the first ce.


    She was smart and good at cultivating, so she would surely be someone that could support Lin Fan in the future.


    But for the sake of their Lin Astral Family, he still had to put on an act.


    So he was just waiting for Lin Fan now.


    And as he had expected, Lin Fan spoke up after hesitating a bit.


    "I want to bring her with me to the Lin Astral Empire."


    It was just a simple sentence, but there was conviction behind it.


    The Lin Astral Emperor revealed a faint smile, but that onlysted a second before he revealed a stern look. He turned to Lin Fan and said, "Xiao Fan, you should know what it means to take someone like her with you back to our Lin Astral Empire. This is not something that will be beneficial to you."


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before looking back at him and saying, "Still, I want to bring her back with me."


    After saying this, he turned to look at Zi Ling and slowly, he moved towards her. When he was in front of her, he stopped and took her hand as he said, "This is my answer."


    Zi Ling''s heart almost jumped out of chest at this moment as she looked up at Lin Fan. However, seeing the way that he looked at her, she couldn''t help lowering her head with a blush.


    But the warm feeling in her heart remained.


    This was all she wanted and now that she had gotten it, she was satisfied.


    In fact, everyone here had happy looks on their faces¡­except Lin Yue.


    She was the only one with a calm look that people couldn''t see through. However, if one looked closely into her eyes, they would be able to see the mes of anger that burned in her eyes.


    There were also some dark thoughts that appeared in her mind.


    As for Lin Fan, he was certain in his decision.


    From the first moment that he saw her in the Inheritance Realm back on the Blue Star, he had felt that there was something different about Zi Ling.


    She had always been in the back of his mind, even when they had been apart for so long.


    It was a lie to say that his heart hadn''t skipped a beat when they met again.


    But the one thing that had been holding him back was¡­the difference in statuses. He had felt that he didn''t match up to her yet, so he couldn''t make his feelings clear.


    But now that she had taken the first step, he wouldn''t be a man if he didn''t step up.


    So he did what he had to do.


    Seeing this, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod.


    This was how a man should act, if there was something he liked, he should take it for himself.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Since Lin Fan had done all this, the Lin Astral Emperor said with a nod, "Good, then she wille with us."


    With a wave of his hand, he said, "Let''s go pick up the people you want to pick up and then head back."


    He didn''t wait for anyone as he turned to head into the spaceship.


    Lin Fan held Zi Ling''s hand as they turned to leave, but then Zi Ling suddenly turned around to say, "I''ll have to trouble you to tell my father this."


    Naturally the people she was talking to were the group from the Zi Ster Kingdom.


    All of them just nodded in a daze.


    Not a single one of them dared to stop her because they knew that the one she was following was the next heir of the Lin Astral Empire, he was not someone that any of them could offend.


    Even if Zi Ling''s father, the Zi Ster King was here, he could only nod in agreement.


    But once they were gone, this group was filled with excitement.


    They knew what the implications of Zi Ling heading off with them was and it was absolutely beneficial to their Zi Ster Kingdom.


    While they might have lost an heir to the throne, what they would gain was worth much more. Not to mention that there were plenty of heirs to the throne that could rece Zi Ling, so there was no problem at all in terms of session.


    After they left the space around the Blue Star, Lin Fan had them head back to the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Since his family members had already bid farewell to everyone on the Blue Star already, there was no need for him to go. Not to mention that there was something there that he didn''t want to face.


    With the speed of this Astral Empire''s spaceship, it took them a quarter of the time it took with Zi Ling''s personal spaceship.


    During this time, Lin Fan had been catching up with his family and the Lin Family Ancestor.


    It turned out that the Lin Family Ancestor had already known everything and had been working with Zi Ling the entire time.


    Not to mention, there was something very special about the Lin Family Ancestor''s identity.


    He was the son of the Lin Astral Emperor.


    When asked about this, all he said was, "Something happened in the past and I wanted to find a ce to rest, so I went down to one of the lower worlds and met a woman. There I started a family and I stayed there until you came along."


    At this, he looked at Lin Fan with eyes filled with admiration and happiness, "Your talent is something that even I can''tpete with, but I''m happy that you''re one of my descendants."


    After that, he turned at Lin Ao and said, "I always thought that it would be Ao''er who would have the most talent in our entire Lin Family, but I never thought that it would be his son. But of course, the apple doesn''t fall far from the tree."


    Lin Ao also revealed a proud look when he heard this.


    He might not have been able to achieve greatness, but the fact that his son had gone far beyond what he could ever imagine was enough to fill him with pride.


    After what had happened with Yue Qingrou and Lin Yue back in the Gctic Humanity Alliance, he had already settled down like the Lin Family Ancestor had, so he didn''t mind that his son had surpassed him.


    He recognized that one day, the younger generation would surpass them.


    When they arrived at the Mu Ster Kingdom, there was a royal procession that weed them.


    Of course they would send notice to the Mu Ster Kingdom that they would being and the Mu Ster Kingdom didn''t dare neglect them.


    After all, this was the Lin Astral Empire!


    The Mu Ster Kingdom along with the Zi Ster Kingdom were both under the Lin Astral Empire.


    Even the Tai, Bai, and Ran Ster Kingdoms were all under the Lin Astral Empire.


    The Lin Astral Empire just gave them the freedom topete with each other because they didn''t care about these Ster Kingdoms. As long as they didn''t take things too far, the Lin Astral Empire didn''t care what they did.


    But a visit from the Lin Astral Empire was apletely different story.


    If anyone from these Ster Kingdoms offended the Lin Astral Empire, their Ster Kingdom would be destroyed overnight.


    No matter how many Sun Realm Experts they had, it was impossible for them to resist the Lin Astral Empire.


    So the Mu Ster Kingdom group was very nervous when meeting the Lin Astral Empire procession.


    But when they appeared, the Mu Ster Kingdom group couldn''t help being shocked.

 Chapter 929 Heading To The Lin Astral Empire (3)

    At the very head of the group was naturally the Lin Astral Emperor and his wife.


    As the emperor, no one would be allowed to go before him.


    But to the shock of the Mu Ster Kingdom group, following behind him was someone that they were actually familiar with.


    It was Lin Fan.


    They couldn''t understand why he was walking with them, almost as if he was part of their group.


    They had already suspected that Lin Fan was already from a different Ster Kingdom after seeing all the things that he had done, but no one would have dreamed that he would be from an Astral Empire. Even now, when they saw him walking with the Lin Astral Empire group, not a single one of them had the thought that he was really a part of the group.


    They just thought that he was traveling with them for some reason.


    Those that had sharp eyes also noticed that the Zi Ster Kingdom''s crown princess was with them, walking right behind Lin Fan. But no one found that strange because they already knew about the crown princess'' rtionship with Lin Fan.


    After the Lin Astral Empire group arrived, the Mu Ster Kingdom group immediately bowed down, including the Mu Ster King.


    In front of the Lin Astral Empire, of course no one dared to act arrogant.


    The Lin Astral Emperor just gave a nod before waving his hand and saying, "You''re free to do what you want. We''re just here to pick up a few people."


    When they heard this, everyone in the Mu Ster Kingdom group trembled.


    No matter how they thought about it, "picking up a few people" didn''t sound like a good thing.


    But no one dared to say anything in response to this or to stop them because it would be crazy for them to attempt this.


    The only thing that they could do was follow behind them just in case anything bad happened.


    At the same time, the ministers and generals all started thinking about anything that was wrong with their families. After all, if it was people from their families that the group from the Lin Astral Empire was after, they would surely be implicated in this matter.


    They wanted to think of a way to deal with it before being implicated just in case that this was the case.


    However, Lin Fan quickly exined the situation.


    The Mu Ster King''s chin dropped as he said, "Brother Lin, you''re from the Lin Astral Empire?"


    Lin Fan nodded with a bitter smile when he heard how loud the Mu Ster King''s voice was. With how loud it was, the moment that it rang out, all of the ministers and generals all turned to look at Lin Fan with shocked looks.


    Never in their dreams would they have thought that this person that they had looked down on previously would be rted to the Lin Astral Empire.


    But with all that was happening, it was impossible for them to deny.


    The Mu Ster King looked at Lin Fan in a daze for a bit, but then he suddenly started moving down, as if he was about to bow to him. At the same time, he started to say, "Your high..."


    Before he could finish though, Lin Fan suddenly stopped him and lifted him back up before saying, "Brother Mu, there''s no need for you to treat me any differently."


    Lin Fan didn''t have any intentions of letting the Mu Ster King act differently towards him.


    The Mu Ster King had treated him with sincerity and had treated him like a brother, which was something that he had quite enjoyed. After all, it was hard to meet people like this in one''s life, so Lin Fan didn''t want to lose the rtionship that they had.


    But for the ministers and generals seeing this, they all had excited and greedy looks in their eyes.


    They were excited since if their Mu Ster King had a close rtionship with someone from the Lin Ster Kingdom, that meant great things for their Mu Ster Kingdom in the future. It could even be said that their Mu Ster Kingdom would have a powerful safeguard in the future.


    But the greed that they had was because they wanted to use this as a stepping stone for something greater.


    They could see that Lin Fan was someone who was very young and many of them had single daughters. If they were able to attract Lin Fan''s attention with their daughters, they would be able to make a connection to the Lin Astral Empire.


    A young man like Lin Fan was an easy target for the beauties that were their daughters so they were very confident in that.


    It was just that it wouldn''t be easy to meet someone like Lin Fan normally.


    But with the connection that was the Mu Ster King, they would be able to connect Lin Fan with their daughters if they wanted.


    After all, these ministers and generals had some weight in the Mu Ster Kingdom and they could have some sway with the Mu Ster King.


    So it was as if they could already see their bright futures.


    They all wanted to follow the Lin Astral Empire group, but with a single re from the Lin Astral Emperor, they all immediately backed down.


    However, they didn''t despair because they knew that there was time and chances in the future.<novelnext></novelnext>


    But what they didn''t know was that Lin Fan was already taken.


    Zi Ling had also taken note of all the people who had looked at Lin Fan with greedy looks. She was preparing to give a list of these people to the Mu Ster King to take care of in the future since she was sure that they would try to make a move on Lin Fan.


    When they arrived at the pet store, the Lin Astral Emperor and his wife couldn''t help being surprised by it.


    Just like how Ang, Momonga, and Yuki had sensed something before, they couldn''t help feeling that there was something special about this store.


    But of course, since they were in avatars, their senses weren''t as strong as normal.


    That was right, the Lin Astral Emperor and his wife were currently in avatars.


    After all, the Lin Astral Emperor was a very important person and it wasn''t as if he could just run wherever he wanted.


    So the only way that he was able toe here was in an avatar.


    But even though it was an avatar, it was still in the Ruler Realm, so it showed just how powerful the real Lin Astral Emperor was.


    After they entered the store, everyone who was there was surprised to see that Lin Fan was back.


    They had thought that Lin Fan would take at least a week beforeing back, they never expected him to be back in just three days.


    The first one to run out to hug him was Ang, followed by Xin''er.


    When the Lin Astral Emperor saw Ang, he couldn''t help being surprised since he never thought that Lin Fan would already have someone. That was the main reason why he had arranged for Zi Ling to be with him in the first ce.


    But now it seemed that he had underestimated Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan''s family weren''t that surprised to see her since they already knew about Ang. Only they were surprised to see her here at the shop since they had thought that she had been sent somewhere safe, instead of being by Lin Fan''s side the entire time.


    At first, the Lin Astral Emperor didn''t feel anything from Ang, but then he couldn''t help feeling that it was strange.


    The only way that Ang was able to hide her abilities from him was if she was at a higher level of cultivation, or if she didn''t have any cultivation at all.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor narrowed his eyes to look at her.


    But then he rxed his brows and threw out the doubts that he had.


    As far as he could tell, this was a normal human girl and not some kind of expert hiding their cultivation.


    He was one of the strongest Rulers, so if he couldn''t see through her, there was no one that could see through her.


    He didn''t believe that someone like that would be with Lin Fan.


    So he treated her like a normal person.


    This had also been Lin Fan''s test.


    If it had failed, he wouldn''t be able to take Ang with him to the Lin Astral Empire.


    After all, while the system had said that it would hide her abilities and her identity, he didn''t know if the Lin Astral Emperor had any special techniques.


    But it seemed like he couldn''t see through her, so he didn''t need to worry.


    As long as she didn''t use any techniques too powerful, it shouldn''t expose her.


    So Lin Fan introduced his shop to the Lin Astral Emperor and the others.


    Not long after, Yuki came out of the back with Momonga.


    He had been distracting them so that Yuki could go to the store on the Gctic Humanity Alliance to bring Momonga over.


    His n had been to take Momonga, Yuki, and Ang with him to the Lin Astral Empire.


    He had been nning on leaving Xin''er and the rest all behind to take care of this store.


    After all, only the three of them would be able to take care of themselves in the Lin Astral Empire.


    It was too dangerous for him to take anyone else with him.

 Chapter 930 Heading To The Lin Astral Empire (4)

    When the others found out about his n, they were naturally very unhappy.


    Well, there were some that weren''t as unhappy as others.


    The one that was the most unhappy was naturally Xin''er since she felt like she was being abandoned by Lin Fan and Ang.


    While Ang was unhappy that they were leaving Xin''er behind, she knew that this was necessary since it would be dangerous where they were heading.


    She knew just how strong the experts in the Astral Empires of humans were, they were people that even she couldn''t look down on.


    She was even anxious about going to this Lin Astral Empire until Lin Fan exined that the store had hidden her real identity and her abilities.


    While she didn''t understand how it all worked, she never doubted the abilities of the store''s real owner since they had already shocked her many times with their ability and she knew better than to question them.


    After all, the real owner was in the God Realm, a realm that far surpassed their understanding.


    In the end, Xin''er could only be calmed down after they promised that they would be back for her when she became strong enough.


    On one hand, this was to calm Xin''er down.


    On the other hand, it was also to motivate Xin''er to cultivate more diligently because it was true that if she was stronger, they would be able to take her with them.


    She had the full inheritance of the Mu Ster Kingdom as the Mu Ster King''s daughter, so it shouldn''t be hard for her to reach a level where she could keep herself safe.


    So she was filled with determination after hearing this.


    While Lin Fan''s parents were surprised to hear that he had adopted a daughter while he had been out, they understood the circumstances after hearing his story.


    Not to mention, Xin''er was a very cute girl in the first ce, so she had instantly melted their hearts.


    It didn''t take long before Yue Qingrou and the Lin Astral Empress were spoiling her.


    Almost as if they were their real granddaughter.


    The rest of the time spent in the Mu Ster Kingdom went by quite harmoniously.


    Well, no, there was one incident that was quite disastrous.


    Lin Fan couldn''t just avoid it, so he did it as soon as he could. Just like tearing a bandaid off quickly so it wouldn''t hurt as much.


    He naturally had to tell Ang about the matter with Zi Ling.


    As expected, when Ang heard about this, she was silent for a moment before¡­


    She suddenly stood up and pped Lin Fan in the face.


    Lin Fan hadn''t resisted at all since he knew that he deserved this and was sent flying by the force of the p. He flew right through the air and mmed into the wall, creating a loud sound.


    If it hadn''t been for the fact that they had been talking in a back room in the store, perhaps the wall would have been shattered from the force of this p.


    The thudding of the wall had scared everyone outside, especially Zi Ling.


    She had been secretly listening and paying attention to the door, being ready to react the moment that it opened.


    From the first moment that she met Ang back on the Blue Star, she knew that she would be a formidable foe and one that she had no chance of beating.


    The only way for her to gain an advantage was to start from Lin Fan and submit under her¡­


    After a long period of time, the two of them came out with very different looks.


    Ang had her lips pouted in an angry manner and Lin Fan had a face that was covered in bruises.


    Though as a World Realm Expert, these kinds of bruises were easy for him to heal if he just used a bit of his life energy. He just didn''t dare use his life energy to cure these bruises out of fear of Ang.


    This was all a y between the two of them after all.


    When they came out, Zi Ling came in front of Ang and fell to her knees as she said, "I''m sorry, it''s all my fault. Please don''t me him."


    Ang narrowed her eyes to look down at Zi Ling.


    However, to Lin Fan''s surprise, she didn''t p her right across the face like he had thought she would.


    Instead, she just red at Zi Ling without saying a word.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking in fear when he saw this.


    This matter had already basically been over after Lin Fan had let her vent her anger on him, but now that Zi Ling wasing forward to stir the ho''s nest¡­this was just adding fuel to the mes and not helping anyone!


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t dare do a thing as he watched and waited for Ang to act.<novelnext></novelnext>


    That was because he couldn''t see through the look on her face.


    Normally, he would be able to see through her thoughts through the expressions on her faces. They had been together long enough that he was able to read through her now through her tiny expressions.


    But this time, he couldn''t understand what she was thinking at all.


    Instead of rashly trying to do something, it was better for him to wait for her to do something and then react. At the very least, that would minimize the damage that would be dealt.


    He wouldn''t add more oil to the mes like Zi Ling had done.


    But he waspletely caught off guard by what Ang did next.


    She leaned over and took Zi Ling by the hand before gently helping her up.


    Lin Fan''s chin dropped when he saw this.


    At the same time, Zi Ling couldn''t help revealing a panicked look because this had also been thest thing that she had expected.


    After all, no matter how one looked at it, she was the mistress and Ang was the wife.


    She was the one that had forced herself onto Lin Fan, so by all means, she should be the one that should be punished.


    But she could understand this since if she was also the one who had been with Lin Fan first, she wouldn''t be willing to share him with anyone. She would have acted the same way that Ang had acted.


    So what Ang was doing nowpletely surprised her and made her unsure how to act.


    Ang looked right into Zi Ling''s eyes and said, "I already knew that this would happen when I first saw you."


    Both Lin Fan and Zi Ling couldn''t help trembling when they heard this, but then they both revealed awkward smiles. After all, neither of them had even thought that this would happen when they first met, but Ang had.


    They hadn''t been aware of their own feelings, but she had been watching the entire time¡­


    Zi Ling didn''t know what to do for a while before suddenly bowing her head again and saying, "That doesn''t excuse¡­"


    Ang lifted her hand to cut her off before saying, "It''s not your fault."


    Then her voice turned sharp as she looked at Lin Fan with a cold look, "It''s this coward''s fault."


    Lin Fan''s smile became even more awkward before he quickly put it away and bowed his head to apologize, but it was already toote as Ang had already lifted Zi Ling up and walked away.


    As she was walking away, Ang added, "If you move, then I''ll double your punishment."


    Lin Fan could only kneel there on the ground with a bitter smile on his face.


    As for Ang and Zi Ling, Ang brought her over to another room and made some tea before saying, "Sit and let''s talk."


    Zi Ling was once again taken aback since her perception of Ang was different than this based on their previous interaction.


    Ang saw that she just stood there without saying a thing, so she released a bit of her aura and said again, "Sit."


    Zi Ling couldn''t help trembling when she felt this.


    This was the way that she had always felt in front of Ang, unable to resist at all.


    So she meekly sat down without saying a thing.


    After she sat down, Ang said, "There are some important things that you need to know if you want to be by his side."


    Zi Ling couldn''t help giving a gulp when she heard this and she looked at Ang with a trace of fear in her eyes.


    Out in the hall, when the Lin Astral Emperor passed by with the Lin Family Ancestor and Lin Ao and they saw Lin Fan just kneeling there, they couldn''t help shaking their heads with bitter smiles before patting him on the shoulder.


    Of course, they didn''t say anything because they knew that there was no need for them to say anything.


    After all, anything that they said would just hurt Lin Fan''s pride.


    ¡­


    A weekter, everything had been set and they all entered the Lin Astral Emperor''s spaceship to head off to the Lin Astral Empire.


    As they were heading off, Xin''er couldn''t help holding tightly to both Lin Fan and Ang, being unwilling to let go.


    It was the same with Yuki and the five sisters who had bonded during this time, but in the end, her bond with Ang was the strongest.


    They would only let go when they promised that they woulde back for them once they became strong enough to stand on their own.


    With that, they were off to the Lin Astral Empire.

 Chapter 931 The Truth

    The trip to the Lin Astral Empire was long because it was very far away from the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    The supercluster that the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Zi Ster Kingdom was in was actually at the very edge of the entire Lin Astral Empire''s domain.


    That was the main reason why the Lin Family Ancestor had settled here.


    So to get back to the main domain of the Lin Astral Empire, it would take them at least a week of traveling.


    That was with the super fast personal spaceship of the Lin Astral Emperor.


    But since it would take a long time, Lin Fan suggested that they take it slow and visit different parts of the Lin Astral Empire''s domain while traveling.


    While it would take them much longer, at least they would be able to enjoy the trip.


    For the Lin Astral Emperor who had just reunited with his son and his extended family, he was happy to ept this suggestion.


    After all, the biggest regret that he had in his life was when he had let his son leave.


    He knew that he didn''t have a choice in this matter since this was what was best for his son, but he had always felt that he could have done something else for him. He felt that all his power as the Lin Astral Emperor had been wasted when he couldn''t help his son recover his heart.


    So being able to spend time with his son and his descendants was naturally something that he wanted.


    Not to mention¡­it was something that he was doing for his wife.


    His wife had been the one that had taken their son''s sudden leave more seriously than he had and they had gotten into many arguments over it.


    So being able to reunite the two of them was something that he had always wanted to aplish.


    So this feeling was very good for them.


    It didn''t take long for them to plot out a course for their return journey.


    After all, this was the private spaceship of the Lin Astral Emperor and there was no impediments for this ship as long as they were in the territory of the Lin Astral Empire.


    Not to mention that there were verypetent ministers and guards that hade along with the Lin Astral Emperor. These were people that were very intelligent and had a good understanding of the Lin Astral Empire''s territory.


    It didn''t take them long toe up with various different suggestions for ces to go.


    There were ces with exquisite forging techniques, there were ces with masterful pill refining techniques, and there were ces with beautiful sceneries.


    All kinds of different ces were offered, but the Lin Astral Emperor and his wife left it all to the young people to decide.


    In this case, it was Lin Yue, Yue Qingrou, Ang, and Yuki.


    The men didn''t get a chance to say anything, nor were they willing to say anything because all the men here hadpletely submitted to the women. They didn''t dare say a thing and just let the women decide everything.


    The only woman that didn''t participate was Zi Ling who had strangely been in a daze since they had left the Mu Ster Kingdom. She just followed Ang around and to Lin Fan''s surprise, the two of them got along quite well.


    He had thought that Ang would keep Zi Ling at an arm''s length and he would have to slowly get the two of them together, but to his surprise, she had kept Zi Ling by her side at all times.


    It really didn''t make sense since she had just beaten him up over this matter not that long ago.


    But he didn''t dare provoke her or question it since it was good right now.


    He didn''t want to do anything that would ruin this good atmosphere.


    But in the end, all good things would need toe to an end.


    Right now, Lin Fan was sleeping in a separate room because Ang was angry at him. However, on the second day, Lin Fan was called into the room that Ang had been sharing with Zi Ling.


    In that room, Ang and Zi Ling were currently sitting on the bed talking about something, but they stopped the moment that Lin Fan came in.


    Aftering in, Lin Fan didn''t dare sit down after seeing the look on Ang''s face and only when she pointed at a chair that was prepared did he finally sit down. This chair had been ced so that it was facing Ang and Zi Ling who were sitting on the bed.


    With the two of them staring at him, he felt awkward, but he still didn''t say a thing.


    Or rather, there was nothing for him to say since he didn''t know what the situation was.


    After a long period of silence, Ang finally said, "Tell her about the store."


    Lin Fan didn''t react at first, but then he looked at her with wide eyes. That was because the store was the biggest secret that they had which they hadn''t even told the Lin Astral Emperor, the Lin Family Ancestor, or even his family about.


    This was a secret that would decide their face, but Ang was willing to share it with Zi Ling?<novelnext></novelnext>


    Just how much faith did she have in her?


    Or rather, when did she gain this kind of faith in her?


    Seeing the way that Lin Fan looked at her, it wasn''t hard for her to tell what he was thinking.


    She just calmly looked back at him and said, "It''s alright, her feelings are sincere."


    When she heard this, Zi Ling couldn''t help revealing a blush.


    In fact, she hadn''t understood what they had been doing over the past few days either.


    She had told her a few things about Lin Fan''s store, or rather hinting at it, but she had never told her anything concrete. Instead, she had been talking to her about many different things about Lin Fan.


    Such as his preferences, his habits, and other things about him.


    But Zi Ling hadn''t been around Lin Fan as much as Ang, so there were many things that she couldn''t answer asprehensively.


    Ang never seemed to mind and just kept asking her many different questions which confused Zi Ling even more.


    She had no idea what she had been doing until now.


    Ang had asked those questions with one thought in mind, she just wanted to see how sincere Zi Ling was.


    After all, even if she didn''t know much about Lin Fan, the fact that she did her best to answer and learn more about him showed just how sincere she was with her feelings. That was the most important thing for them because they weren''t afraid of the Lin Astral Empire with the God Realm Expert, as well as several Rulers in Ang, Momonga, and Yuki on their side.


    So they just needed to make sure that Zi Ling was sincere and loyal or else it would all crumble from within.


    In short, if she wasn''t sincere, she would be a danger to Lin Fan and Ang would never allow that to happen.


    But of course, what Ang didn''t know was that there¡­wasn''t actually a God Realm Expert in the store.


    After hearing this, Lin Fan looked at Zi Ling and just sat there in silence for a bit.


    After a long while, he finally said with a sigh, "Alright."


    Over the next hour, Lin Fan told Zi Ling everything that had happened over his long journey, albeit he left out a few details that only he knew. Such as his transmigration and the truth behind the store.


    The truth that there was no God Realm Expert like they had all thought.


    When she finished listening to it all, Zi Ling couldn''t help being stunned.


    After all, a God Realm Expert was a very big deal. But at the same time, the bigger deal was that Lin Fan was actually acquainted with Rulers of the Myriad Races.


    She had thought that Ang was just a powerful expert from some other Astral Empire, but she never expected that she would be from the Myriad Races.


    While the reputation of the Myriad Races wasn''t as bad as the Beast Race, they still weren''t on friendly terms with the human race. After all, there were many different races in the Myriad Races and they all had different attitudes towards the humans.


    Not to mention¡­Momonga''s real identity was the most concerning.


    The undead race was known as one of the most dangerous races among the Myriad Races and one that the humans tried to avoid the most. But here was the all powerful Lich King that was living among the humans¡­


    If people were to learn about this, there would be without a doubt serious repercussions.


    There was a long period of silence that followed after Lin Fan told her the truth, but her eyes weren''t asplicated as they thought it would be. There was only a moment of hesitation before a firm look appeared in her eyes, as if she had already made up her mind.


    Suddenly, Zi Ling looked up and said, "I''m on your side no matter what."


    Lin Fan revealed a moved look as he looked at her, but he still hesitated while standing there.


    Only after getting a nod of confirmation from Ang did he finally move forward to take Zi Ling in his arms.


    Being held like this, there was a warm feeling that filled her heart.


    Once they separated, Ang moved closer and said, "You''ll pay me back tonight."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a surprised look, but then he suddenly revealed a happy smile.


    After all, this meant that he had officially reconciled with Ang.


    Peace was truly the best.

 Chapter 932 Arriving In The Lin Astral Empire

    Over the next month, they headed off to many differents and explored many different ces.


    Ang was still the main wife, so she had the monopoly on most of Lin Fan''s time.


    But of course, since she had epted Zi Ling, she would give her Lin Fan from time to time.


    Such as when they arrived on the Green ins that was famous for a beautiful waterfall, she allowed Lin Fan to take Zi Ling instead of her. She went off with Yuki instead and the two of them had their fill of fun.


    Zi Ling''s heart would still flutter when she thought of the time she spent with Lin Fan there.


    The adults all had fun watching the kids slowly reconcile and get closer. After all, all of them were looking forward to seeing their grandchildren and great grandchildren.


    The fun thing to note was that Momonga had made his way into the adult group.


    Even though he looked young, he easily hit it off with the Lin Astral Emperor and the Lin Family Ancestor. After all, while he looked young, he was an old monster and an old man at heart.


    In terms of age, he was actually older than the Lin Astral Emperor as the undying Lich King.


    The only one who didn''t seem to have fun on this family trip was Lin Yue.


    She pouted andined the whole time, as if she wasn''t having fun at all. However, when Lin Fan tried to include her in the activities, she would also blow him off and run away with Yue Qingrou.


    Lin Fan couldn''t do anything when it came to her and could only do what he could to appease her.


    Still, this kind of happy and rxing vacation couldn''tst forever. Soon a month passed and they arrived at the Lin Astral Empire.


    When they arrived, there was arge ceremony that was held for them¡­or rather for the return of the Lin Astral Emperor.


    There were many that didn''t know that the Lin Astral Emperor was back, but the ones that did know were the important people in the Lin Astral Empire. They all wanted to use this chance to suck up to the Lin Astral Emperor by being the ones to wee him like this.


    But of course, what they didn''t know was that thispletely ruined the Lin Astral Emperor''s n.


    They didn''t know because they didn''t know why the Lin Astral Emperor had left in the first ce.


    The Lin Astral Emperor had wanted to return secretly to hide the existence of Lin Fan so he could slowly n the announcement of this new heir, but now¡­since the n had been ruined, he had no choice but to adapt to the situation.


    He also made a mental note to take care of the ones that made this messter.


    Still, he didn''t mind this at all since this would allow him to openly bring in Lin Fan who he had already deemed as his sessor.


    Lin Fan was the most talented member of their Lin Astral Family in many generations now, so he was someone that he was proud of. He wanted to openly announce Lin Fan to the world and make sure that everyone knew of his position in his heart.


    That would make sure that everyone who had any bad ideas towards Lin Fan would be kept at bay.


    Well, not everyone¡­


    This was the reason why the Lin Astral Emperor wanted to prepare first before announcing Lin Fan to the world.


    This was a member of their family that had appeared out of nowhere and he would be taking such a high position in the family, inevitably pushing down others that were already in that position. Being pushed out of the position by someone that had appeared out of nowhere, naturally they would be very unhappy.


    There would even be those in the family that would try to do things to Lin Fan in secret.


    Still, since this matter had already happened, there was nothing that the Lin Astral Emperor could do.


    In fact, it would make it worse if he didn''t announce Lin Fan at this point.


    Lin Fan was someone that wasing with them as they returned to the Lin Astral Empire, so everyone would take note of him. If they didn''t give him a proper status, then there would be people aiming for him in the dark.


    So they needed to give him a status to ensure that he was protected to a certain point.


    As for those jealous people in their family, he would leave that matter to Lin Fan as a test for him.


    Lin Fan would be the future head of their family and the future Lin Astral Emperor, so if he couldn''t handle the members of the family, then he wouldn''t be worthy of taking that position.


    Even though the Lin Astral Family was the royal family of this Lin Astral Empire, they were a family that got along to a certain extent. There was the normal familypetition for power, but no one took it too far since they knew that their greatest advantage was their unity as a family.


    Anyone that did take it too far would be heavily punished by not just the Lin Astral Emperor, but also the elders of the family.


    As for Lin Fan, he didn''t have any real feelings about this.


    He knew that this was something that he would have to deal with eventually when he chose to ept the Lin Astral Emperor''s offer. Compared to the alternative, it was much better than having to deal with all those Rulers on his own.


    Plus, this was his family.


    After spending time with the Lin Astral Emperor, the empress, and the Lin Family Ancestor, he felt much closer to them as family. They might have been only using each other before, but now they were indeed close like family.<novelnext></novelnext>


    No matter what, blood was thicker than water.


    So after waiting for a bit for the herald that they sent ahead to announce the news, Lin Fan and the rest came out of the port that the spaceshipnded in.


    The streets outside werepletely filled with people, but this was actually way more than the amount of people that had been in the streets previously.


    As soon as the news of the new heir to the throne was spread, everyone immediately dropped everything that they were doing and headed to the port where the parade was being held.


    Of course, for security reasons, there were only a certain number of people that would be allowed to participate. So once that number was met, the royal guards that had already been gathered immediately sealed off the area and prevented anyone else from entering.


    But they were also citizens of this Astral Empire and they knew how exciting this matter was, so they had allowed as many people as possible to enter before closing off the area.


    When everyone saw the new heir of the Lin Astral Empire, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because¡­he was just too handsome!


    Lin Fan had been handsome before he had started cultivating, but after he started cultivating, he became more and more handsome with each breakthrough.


    Even without doing anything and just walking along, he was able to pierce the hearts of many girls.


    The only thing that unnerved him was the re that wasing from behind him, piercing into his back. It wasn''t just a single pair of eyes, but two pairs of eyes that were currently piercing his back.


    Lin Fan gave a bitter smile deep down, but he maintained his calm expression as he moved forward.


    Naturally it was the Lin Astral Emperor that was moving at the very front of the procession that attracted the most attention, but Lin Fan didn''t receive ack of attention.


    In addition to themoners that were in the crowd, there were also nobles that were currently watching this procession with interested looks.


    After all, changes to the royal family also affected them, so they had to pay attention to this.


    There were many different gazes that fell onto Lin Fan.


    Some with good intentions and some with greedy intentions, but not a single person had ill intentions.


    That was because they knew who was behind Lin Fan.


    The Lin Astral Family!


    Even if all the forces in the Lin Astral Empire werebined, they wouldn''t be able to match the Lin Astral Family.


    Astral Empires weren''t like Ster Kingdoms where the power was divided.


    The Astral Royal Families were the ones that had built the Astral Empires with their power, the nobles of the Astral Empires were just those that had sworn their loyalty to the Astral Royal Families and were allowed to stay.


    There was no power struggle, there was only the Astral Royal Family.


    But of course, there were nobles that wanted to climb higher and the only way for that was to be a part of the Astral Royal Family.


    After all, it was impossible for the Astral Royal Family to create descendants on their own, they had to bring in new blood.


    There were Astral Royal Families that had tried to keep the family bloodline going on their own, but eventually their descendants degraded to the point where they could no longer be considered an Astral Royal Family. Without introducing new blood and new genes, the bad genes of their bloodline were multiplied until it couldn''t be lived with anymore.


    With these precedents, there were no more Astral Royal Families that tried to keep the bloodline in their family and epted new people into their families.


    This was what the nobles were aiming for.


    They didn''t know if Lin Fan already had someone he was engaged to, but there was always that chance of him taking concubines.


    They were using their own standards to measure Lin Fan with because most of the people from these noble families all had concubines. They had let power go to their head and had gone crazy with it.


    In fact, most of these families were no longer as great as the generation that had made them nobles.


    They were only living on the glory of their ancestors now.


    But if there was one thing that they were confident in, it was the beauty of their daughters.


    They had taken beautiful wives, so naturally their daughters had turned out beautiful as well.


    Many of them were certain that as long as their daughters could meet Lin Fan, they would be able to charm him.


    So what most of them were aiming for was Lin Fan''s debut ball where they would be able to introduce their daughters to him.


    It was just too bad that they were destined to fail with Ang and Zi Ling in the way.

 Chapter 933 Lin Astral Family

    When the parade was finally over, Lin Fan couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.


    Seeing this reaction from him, the Lin Astral Emperor patted him on the shoulder with a smile as he said, "You''ll get used to it eventually."


    The only thing that Lin Fan could respond to this with was a bitter smile.


    He wasn''t someone who liked crowded ces in the first ce, so he didn''t want to get used to something like this.


    Even back on earth, he was someone who was famous, but liked keeping to himself since people always annoyed him by asking him for things.


    So in a sense, he was already used to it. It was just that he disliked this kind of lifestyle very much.


    After they had entered the pce, the first thing that happened was that a group of ministers immediately came over to surround the Lin Astral Emperor.


    The reason that they gave was that they were here to greet him, but in truth, their goal was to scout out Lin Fan.


    There wasn''t a single one of them that dared to question the validity of Lin Fan since there was the Lin Astral Emperor being a guarantor for him. So the only reason they wanted to scout out Lin Fan was to see how to approach him in the future.


    After all, these ministers were all nobles that wanted to climb the socialdder.


    Not a single one of them was foolish enough to challenge the Lin Astral Family.


    But soon, there was a path that was cleared in the sea of ministers as a group came over.


    It was clear that whoever wasing over was an important person if everyone was clearing a path for them and Lin Fan already had a guess as to who they were.


    As he had expected, he could sense a familiar feelinging from them.


    The special technique of the Lin Astral Family allowed them to control the voidw, so what Lin Fan was feeling from them was the aura of the voidw. It was very simr to the absorption power that he controlled.


    He could even feel that the space around them was distorting a bit from this absorption power that came from them.


    It was a group of young people that were being led by one person that looked older, seeming to be middle aged.


    This person led this group of people through the crowd and they came up right in front of the Lin Astral Emperor. Then they all gave a slight bow, which was different from the deep bow and kneels that the ministers gave.


    It was clear that this was their privilege as the members of the Lin Astral Family.


    After this, the man leading them said to the Lin Astral Emperor, "Uncle, you''re back." Then he turned to the Lin Family Ancestor and said, "Cousin, it''s truly been a long time."


    Though he said this in a friendly tone, there was no hiding the hostile look that was in his eyes.


    It was clear that the rtionship between them wasn''t good, but one could imagine just by thinking about it.


    Based on the clothes that this middle aged man was wearing, he was clearly someone who thought highly of himself as he chose clothes that made himself stand out. He was someone that cared very much about his position and he must have had quite a high position while the Lin Family Ancestor was gone.


    But now that the son of the Lin Astral Emperor was back, there was no doubt that it would be a blow to the position that he currently had.


    There would be many people that would favour the Lin Astral Emperor''s son since that was his son and not his nephew. Not to mention, even back then, he had never been able topete with this Lin Jian who was the Lin Astral Emperor''s son.


    Even when they were younger, he had always beenpared to this Lin Jian and had always been considered the weaker of the two.


    So there were deep scars that had formed in his mind when it came to Lin Jian.


    The Lin Family Ancestor looked back at this middle aged man and said with a smile, "Cousin, it has been a long time."


    Though he had a smile on his face, that smile never reached his eyes.


    His eyes were as sharp as a sword as he looked at this middle aged man, cing pressure on him.


    The middle aged man felt like he was facing a storm of des that instantly cut him hundreds of times. It was even a bit hard for him just to stand there facing him head on, he felt the urge to take a step back when facing this pressure.


    But his pride wouldn''t allow him to back down.


    In the end, he gave a secret sigh when the Lin Family Ancestor finally took back his aura and he didn''t say anything else.


    He couldn''t beat the Lin Family Ancestor, so there was no need to embarrass himself by facing him. Instead, he turned his attention to Lin Fan and Lin Ao who were behind them.


    When his eyes fell onto Lin Ao, he only looked at him for a second before turning away. It was almost as if he had seen through him and disdained looking at him any further since there was nothing about him that could catch his attention.


    Instead, when his eyes fell onto Lin Fan, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Of course he had also heard the news of this young man who had been brought back to be the heir.


    That was why he had gathered all of these young members of the family and rushed over here to greet the Lin Astral Emperor.


    As for his impression of Lin Fan, it was just as bad as his impression of Lin Jian.


    Just like how Lin Jian would inevitably take away his position and influence, Lin Fan would also take away the position and influence of his descendants of his branch and the descendants of his brothers'' branches.


    Lin Jian had never left any descendants in the Lin Astral Empire, so until now, most of the positions that should have been taken by Lin Jian''s descendants had gone to descendants of these side branches. But now that Lin Jian was back with his descendants, there was no doubt that these positions would switch back to Lin Jian''s descendants.


    After all, they were the direct descendants of the current Lin Astral Emperor and these positions should have been theirs in the first ce.


    So the reason why he had brought all these youngsters here was to suppress Lin Fan and Lin Ao.


    Of course, there were never any thoughts of harming them because they were still a part of the Lin Astral Family. They knew that if they even thought of harming anyone, they would be immediately kicked out of the Lin Astral Family no matter what they did.


    The strongest thing about the Lin Astral Family was their unity, so no matter what, they would never think of harming each other.


    Which was why even though Lin Jian very much disliked this Lin Tian, going all the way back to when they were kids, he had never thought of harming him. All he did was suppress him with his talent and aura since he knew that in a pinch, they would both fight for the Lin Astral Family to the end.


    After staring at Lin Fan for a bit, the middle aged man Lin Tian revealed a smile as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "So this is my great great nephew."


    When he said this, he made sure to stress the "great great" part, as if he was putting Lin Fan in his ce. He was making sure that Lin Fan knew that he was from a senior generation and that he had a higher position than Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan was someone who was born with pride in his bones.


    Even if he didn''t act that way in front of Ang, he wouldn''t allow others to look down on him like this.


    So he gave a snort and released his aura as he faced Lin Tian.


    Then he slowly revealed a smile as he said, "Great great uncle, nice to meet you."


    Just like Lin Jian, the smile was only on his mouth, but it never reached his eyes.


    His eyes were just as sharp as Lin Jian''s as he looked at Lin Tian.


    Even though there was a disparity in cultivation levels, with Lin Fan being in the Star Realm and Lin Tian being in the Sun Realm, Lin Tian couldn''t help being surprised by and pushed back slightly by Lin Fan''s aura.


    It was almost as if he was facing a younger version of Lin Jian.


    But at the same time, there was this strange feeling that he had never felt before.


    It was a feeling of suppression that came from deep inside of him, as ifing from the voidws that he controlled. It was like his voidws felt inferior to the feeling that came from Lin Fan and inherently bowed down to them.


    As a prominent member of the Lin Astral Family, he had naturally already heard the news about Lin Fan''s Void Physique.


    He had thought that this was just an exaggeration used by the Lin Astral Emperor to make Lin Fan seem stronger than he really was, but now that he had felt this feeling from Lin Fan, he was certain that this wasn''t an exaggeration.


    It seemed very likely that Lin Fan had indeed developed the Void Physique.


    The Void Physique.


    This was the ultimate form of the Lin Astral Family''s cultivation technique and the hope of the family.


    They had hoped that one day, one of their descendants would be able to break through to the peak of this cultivation technique and reach the Void Physique, bringing prosperity to the Lin Astral Family again.


    Of course, Lin Tian was happy to see that the Void Physique had returned, but the fact that it wasn''t something that had been born to his branch was something that was worrying to him.


    He knew that with Lin Fan as their headliner, Lin Jian and the Lin Astral Emperor''s branch would stabilize their hold over the Lin Astral Family even more.


    It would be impossible for his branch to stand up and they would forever be known as the branch family.


    This was not something that he could allow!


    He had to find a way to deal with Lin Fan before this happened!


    Or else it would be very bad...

 Chapter 934 Cousins

    With this renewed conviction, Lin Tian turned to the youngsters behind him and waved at one of them.


    This was a handsome young man who had a bright smile on his face, but there was also a dark look in his eyes as he stared at Lin Fan.


    He was just like Lin Tian as he scrutinized Lin Fan.


    Lin Tian introduced this young man with a smile, "Great great nephew, this is your cousin Lin Hong. Since he''s around the same age as you, I thought that he could show you around our Lin Astral Empire."


    Lin Hong cupped his hands to Lin Fan and said, "Cousin, I''ve long heard your name and only now had the chance to meet you. It truly is an honour meeting you for the first time."


    His words and actions were polite, but there was no hiding the hungry look in his eyes.


    It was clear that he had ambition and he wanted the position that Lin Fan currently held, so there was no doubt that there was hostility towards Lin Fan in his heart.


    Lin Fan was no fool and could easily see through this, but he still acted polite since the other side had acted polite. He also cupped his hands and said, "Cousin, your words are too much. It''s my honour to meet you."


    The two of them had smiles as they looked at each other, but neither of their smiles reached their eyes.


    It was clear that there was a silent war that was currently happening between them.


    In the end, it was the Lin Astral Emperor that interrupted by saying, "Xiao Fan, go on and get to know your cousins. You''ll be seeing them a lot from now on."


    While the Lin Astral Emperor knew exactly what they were here for, he still let Lin Fan go with them.


    In a sense, this was a little test for Lin Fan.


    After all, in the future, Lin Fan would be the Lin Astral Emperor and the head of the Lin Astral Family. At the same time, these people would be important people in the family since they were the most talented members of the Lin Astral Family''s younger generation.


    It would be inevitable that they would have to work together in the future since they were one family.


    Lin Fan nodded and then followed Lin Hong as this group of young people led him out of the hall.


    All the ministers looked at them with unwilling looks, but they were from the Lin Astral Family and they had the orders of the Lin Astral Emperor, so they had no choice but to let them go.


    But before they did leave, the Lin Astral Emperor suddenly remembered something and said, "Wait, I forgot to give you something."


    Everyone turned and watched as the Lin Astral Emperor waved his hand to create a token that he threw to Lin Fan.


    When they saw this token, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because this was a token that had the character "Lin" on it.


    It was a token that could represent the entire Lin Astral Family and a token that only the most important people in the family could own. Even someone like Lin Tian didn''t have one of these tokens even though he was one of the important branch family heads.


    Everyone assumed that Lin Fan would receive one eventually because of his status, but they had thought that he would only receive it after his debut banquet.


    After all, his official status hadn''t been set yet, so it was a bit inappropriate for him to receive this token.


    But since it was the Lin Astral Emperor who gave it to him, no one could say anything.


    At the same time though, they could see just how important of a position Lin Fan had in the Lin Astral Emperor''s heart.


    It seemed like they had to think over their ns again.


    Lin Fan looked at the token and gave a nod of thanks before leaving with Lin Hong.


    The Lin Astral Emperor revealed a faint smile before turning back to the ministers.


    Since Lin Fan was already gone, there wasn''t much else that they wanted, so they all went back to ttering the Lin Astral Emperor. However, before they could do that, Lin Tian still had something else he wanted.


    He finally turned to Lin Ao who he had ignored before and said, "Great nephew, you''re also new to our Lin Astral Empire, so how about we have some of your cousins show you around as well?"


    With a wave of his hand, a few people that were older than the group before came over as well. They were older, but they were still young enough to be considered part of the younger generation just like Lin Ao.


    Lin Tian had been nning on ignoring Lin Ao at first since he looked down on him.


    However, after experiencing the power and aura that Lin Fan had, he realized that he needed to do more than just try and suppress Lin Fan. He had to start with Lin Fan''s weakness, which was this father of his.


    The reason why Lin Tian looked down on Lin Ao was because he felt that this father of Lin Fan''s truly was worthless.


    After all, he was someone who had been brought back based on the merits of his son and his cultivation was very weak.


    His son was already in the World Realm, but this father of his was still in the Soul Realm.<novelnext></novelnext>


    All those in the same generation as Lin Ao had already reached the World Realm, so he was considered the weakest one among them.


    Lin Tian was nning on suppressing this father of Lin Fan''s and then using him to suppress Lin Fan.


    The Lin Astral Emperor could clearly see through his ns, so he slightly knitted his brows when he heard this. After all, he also felt that Lin Ao was disappointing whenpared to Lin Fan.


    While Lin Ao was talented with the sword like Lin Jian had been, his cultivation was¡­


    So he didn''t think that Lin Ao would be able topare to his cousins like Lin Fan could.


    But before he could say anything, Lin Jian said, "Ao, go on and have fun at the sword trial with your cousins."


    Lin Ao just gave a nod and then headed off with these cousins of his.


    Since Lin Jian had already told them to go to the sword trial with Lin Ao, they could only take him to the sword trial.


    These cousins had also looked at Lin Tian before heading off and only after seeing him give a secret nod did they head off with Lin Ao.


    Lin Tian was surprised that Lin Jian had given them permission to take Lin Ao away, but while he didn''t know what Lin Jian was nning, he was still confident in these youngsters from his branch.


    They were the most talented people from Lin Ao''s generation, so he was certain that they wouldn''t lose even if Lin Jian forced them to do something that Lin Ao excelled in.


    With the difference in cultivation levels, it should be easy for them to suppress Lin Ao.


    With the younger generation all gone, Lin Tian blended into the crowd of ministers that all surrounded the Lin Astral Emperor.


    During this time, the Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help secretly asking Lin Jian, "Xiao Jian, is it really alright to let Xiao Ao go with them?"


    Lin Jian gave a secret nod before saying, "Ao might seem weakpared to Xiao Fan, but he''s still the most talented person toe from my family. He''s the one that I''m the most proud of after Xiao Fan."


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked at Lin Jian and seeing the confident look in his eyes, he gave a nod in response before putting this matter aside.


    As for Lin Jian, he was full of confidence in Lin Ao.


    If it was anything else, he might not have felt as confident, but when it came to swords¡­


    Lin Ao had fully inherited his talent and had even surpassed it.


    The saying was true, the younger generation would rece the older generation eventually.


    ¡­


    After they left the pce, Lin Hong brought Lin Fan to thergest business street in the capital.


    Of course, since they were part of the Lin Astral Family, they had put on disguises to avoid being recognized.


    These disguises really were something.


    Lin Fan could feel Sun Realmwsing from these disguises, so they had to be made by a Sun Realm Expert.


    Something like this would be considered a national treasure in any Ster Kingdom.


    He could tell from the look on Zi Ling''s face that she waspletely shocked by this.


    But here, they were used as toys for these younger members of the Lin Astral Family.


    It really was a difference in perception.


    After walking around for a bit, they brought Lin Fan to arge building that was in the center of the business street.


    Lin Hong exined, "This is the Forest Auction House, which is owned by our Lin Astral Family. There happens to be an auction happening today, so we wanted to bring cousin Fan here to participate."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response, but he could tell that they clearly had some kind of plot based on the look in their eyes.


    Still, he was willing to y along because he had his own trump card for this situation.


    Lin Hong gave an inviting gesture and asked, "Cousin, shall we?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before following him in.

 Chapter 935 Auction (1)

    While they were in disguise, it wasn''t as if the prideful younger generation of the Lin Astral Family would ept sitting in inferior seats.


    So after they entered the shop, they immediately called a staff member to call the manager.


    The staff member was going to call the guards on these people at first since the cloaks hid their identity, but then Lin Hong showed the staff member a token that shocked them.


    This token was designed in the same way as the token that the Lin Astral Emperor gave Lin Fan, but it didn''t have the same "Lin" word on it. Instead, it had a "Hong" on it which stood for Lin Hong.


    After the staff member recovered from their daze, they immediately ran off to get the manager.


    They had been trained on recognizing these kinds of tokens since their first day on the job. They knew right away that this token was the token of a branch member of the Lin Astral Family.


    Since this was the auction house opened by the Lin Astral Family, it wasn''t rare to see membersing here and they had to make sure that they didn''t offend these members at all.


    It didn''t take long for the staff member toe back with the manager.


    As soon as the manager saw the token, he personally led their group up to the top floor of the auction house where the VVIP rooms were.


    These were rooms that were only reserved for royals and the top nobles, so it was rare that they would be used.


    From time to time, there would be some rich noble that would pay arge amount of money to use it to show off, but they were mainly unused.


    Even though these rooms had been unused for a long time, they were all well maintained.


    These rooms had been decorated with the greatest luxuries and there wasn''t a single expense spared.


    Even the food here was the best of the best.


    The weakest ingredient here was still in the Realm and there were even some Peak Sun Realm ingredients used.


    It was clear that this was the treatment reserved for royals.


    This also went to show how much power the Lin Astral Family had.


    As they came in, Lin Hong and the other cousins watched Lin Fan for his reaction. It was as if if he gave a single reaction, they would immediately jump on it and say something.


    But in the end, they were disappointed since Lin Fan just silently sat down after looking around.


    It was only Ang, Zi Ling, and Yuki who went over to the buffet set out for them and started stuffing their faces¡­Well more Ang and Yuki as Zi Ling was more there just to join in.


    She wasn''t a super glutton with a bottomless stomach like the two of them.


    Her cultivation wasn''t as high, so there was only so much life energy that she could absorb from these dishes before she felt stuffed.


    As for Momonga who had alsoe along, he was looking down the balcony and at the people sitting down in the auction house as if he was observing them.


    For this Lich King who had lived countless years, this was his first time in an Astral Empire, so he was actually quite interested in this ce. After all, as a Lich King, it would be impossible for him toe here normally and even if he dide here, it would be a one way trip¡­


    It wasn''t as if he could get away from an Astral Empire by himself.


    Even with an army of undead, it would be hard because Astral Empires were the reason why the human race were able to carve out a ce for themselves in this vast universe.


    But of course, this Lich King didn''t have any intentions of doing something like that in the first ce.


    He was just interested in the Astral Empires, even if it was a simple part of their lives like going to the auction house.


    It didn''t take long before the auction began.


    Even though it was announced to startter, they bumped up the start time because the manager of the auction house knew that the members of the Lin Astral Family were here. They didn''t dare dy this any further even if it meant offending some of the nobles that would miss out because they started early.


    So soon the first item was taken out.


    The auctioneer was a beautiful young miss who received tons of cheers the moment that she stepped onto the stage.


    She was very skilled in creating hype among the crowd and soon one could even feel the tension seething from it.


    When Lin Fan looked over, he found that even a few of his cousins were attracted to this beautiful woman.


    The way that they were acting¡­really looked shameful, but they didn''t care at all since they let the fact that they were the Lin Astral Family go to their head. Even if someone wanted to say something, would they dare?


    So they just did whatever they wanted without care for the world.


    They even forgot about their reason for bringing Lin Fan here.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help secretly shaking his head and giving a sigh.


    When they had been heading to the Lin Astral Empire, the Lin Astral Emperor had told Lin Fan a bit about his family.


    To put it simply¡­disappointing.


    That was the word that he used to summarize the current younger generation of the Lin Astral Family.<novelnext></novelnext>


    They had let their pride go to their heads and they were more concerned about their own position instead of their duty as part of the Lin Astral Family.


    It was just that they didn''t cross the line by betraying the family and working on their own, so the Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t clean them all up. Not to mention that he didn''t want to since they were still a part of his family.


    The main cause of this was because of the gap that had been left by Lin Jian when he left the Lin Astral Empire.


    The roles that should have been fulfilled by Lin Jian and his descendants had gone to these branch family members. They had gained power all of a sudden and that had gone to their head, making them arrogant.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor had hoped that introducing Lin Fan would be a reminder for them to act modest again.


    Which was why he had sent Lin Fan off with Lin Hong and the others earlier.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he would be depending on the Lin Astral Family from now on.


    From what he had heard, there was the chance that this situation would be worse, so it was best if he did something about it. After all, this was a problem with the safety of himself and his family, so he had to do something.


    After hyping up the crowd, the beautiful auctioneer finally brought out the first item.


    It was a very simple weapon, a Peak Sun Realm Artifact.


    This was something that was considered rare for both nobles andmoners, but it wasn''t too rare that they wouldn''t be able to obtain it if they really wanted to. So it was the perfect item to start off the auction.


    As soon as this item was brought out, Lin Hong said to Lin Fan, "Cousin, I''m sure that you''ve never seen something like this before. How about I buy it for you as a weing gift?"


    He was making his move.


    Lin Fan had thought that he would hold back and wait for a few items, but it seemed like he really couldn''t wait. It seemed like their mentality wasn''t good and they really couldn''t stay calm.


    But this was what Lin Fan was already expecting to happen.


    There were many reasons why they couldn''t suppress him with force, but they still wanted to suppress him, so they would use different methods. Such as suppressing him with wealth and influence.


    They wanted to make a show of how much of a hick he was and show him the true power of people from the city.


    It was just too bad that they didn''t know that Lin Fan already had a card to deal with that.


    These were not the favoured children of the Lin Astral Emperor, so they had never been spoiled by him like Lin Fan was. They didn''t know just what kind of treatment the Lin Astral Emperor was willing to give if he wanted to.


    Seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say a thing, Lin Hong revealed a faint smile as if he could see through Lin Fan already.


    This hick, he clearly wants it, but he''s still trying to keep his pride.


    Then in that case¡­


    Lin Hong pressed the button on his seat before saying, "Ten thousand low grade spirit jades."


    There was a gasp that suddenly came from the crowd as they all looked up at the VVIP room that it came from.


    Everyone knew what kind of room this was, but they never thought that there would be a biding from it for the first bid. Not to mention such arge bid.


    After all, the bid had only been at ten thousand top grade spirit stones.


    To suddenly increase it to ten thousand low grade spirit jades¡­that was an increase of more than a million times.


    The bidding hade to a stop at this, but no one revealed dissatisfied looks because they knew who was capable of sitting up there. There wasn''t a single person in the crowd that was willing to provoke someone like that.


    Not to mention that no one could outbid someone like this in the first ce.


    The people that could sit up there were people that controlled the true wealth in this Lin Astral Empire.


    All of the wealth of the people in the crowd added up together wouldn''t even be a drop of what the people in the VVIP box had.


    As for the auction house side, they naturally wouldn''t say anything about it.


    In fact, they couldn''t help being filled with joy when hearing this.


    After all, this was much more than they had expected to sell this item for, so they would surely earn a muchrgermission from selling this item.


    This was a business after all, so more money was always wee.


    The auctioneer even had a beaming smile on her face when she heard this.


    As for Lin Hong, he had a smug smile on his face when he saw the reaction of the crowd.


    This was the reaction that he wanted to see.


    This was his way of proving his superiority!

 Chapter 936 Auction (2)

    After enjoying his fill of the audience''s reaction, Lin Hong turned his gaze to Lin Fan.


    However, seeing Lin Fan''s reaction, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because he didn''t get the reaction that he wanted from him, but rather he just saw Lin Fan sitting there with a calm look on his face as if he didn''t care about any of this.


    Lin Fan might have had a calm look on his face, but deep down¡­


    He was filled with disappointment.


    This was just too cliche, too boring!


    He had wanted Lin Hong to do something interesting, but it seemed like he hadpletely underestimated the intelligence of this young master Lin Hong.


    Someone of his capacity was only capable of something of this level, he wasn''t able to do more¡­


    But that was fine since this was easy for Lin Fan to deal with.


    So Lin Fan just casually reached his hand out and pressed the button on the armrest of his chair before saying, "One dragon vein."


    The crowd had been filled with whispers as the auctioneer had been making a show out of the bid, but it immediately fell silent once Lin Fan''s voice rang out.


    They could easily tell that this was a different voice because it waspletely different from the voice from before.


    The voice that had bid ten thousand low grade spirit jade was frivolous like that of a young master, but this voice¡­it was calm and cold, just like a de that was waiting to be sheathed.


    No one dared to question this voice and many people even began wondering just who would have a voice like this.


    But the beautiful auctioneer was a professional, so she quickly took this bid and started the count.


    In the room, Lin Hong looked at Lin Fan with shock before quickly saying, "Cousin, you can''t just make a bid like that. Do you know how precious dragon veins are? Even I don''t have something like that."


    Then he quickly added, "If it''s found out that we made a bid without having enough to pay, that will hurt the reputation of the Lin Astral Family and we will be punished when we get back."


    He said this in a very concerned voice as if he was worried about Lin Fan, but in truth¡­he was just worried about himself.


    After all, if they were punished over this, he would surely be implicated since he was the one who had brought Lin Fan to this ce. So in the end, all he cared about was himself and how to avoid being implicated by this matter.


    Seeing that calm look on Lin Fan''s face when he asked this, Lin Hong couldn''t help feeling a little annoyed.


    It was almost as if Lin Fan didn''t care about this matter at all.


    Lin Hong cursed the one that taught Lin Fan about dragon veins since it was clear that he didn''t also teach him the value of these dragon veins.


    So Lin Hong said, "Cousin, you might not know this, but¡­"


    Lin Fan cut him off by looking at him and saying, "Who said that I was expecting you to pay? If there''s something I like, then I''ll buy it myself."


    Lin Hong''s chin dropped when he heard this, but then he quickly revealed a look of disdain.


    Buy it himself?


    Was he joking?


    Did he really expect that they would be fooled into thinking that someone from the boonies like him would have something like dragon veins?


    Dragon veins were the main currency forrge deals in Astral Kingdoms because they were the ultimate form of life energy. After all, dragon veins were representations of life energy ofs.


    The term dragon veins came from veins of life energy that made up the reserves of a''s life energy supplies. So all of the life energy that was on a would normallye from this dragon vein.


    This meant that as long as one had these dragon veins, they would be able to bring life to destes and create new worlds.


    But these dragon veins were used like spirit stones for powerful cultivators when it came to these Astral Empires.


    As for how these dragon veins came about, there were plenty ofs that were destroyed for a variety of reasons. However, even after thes were destroyed, it wasn''t as if the dragon veins would disappear.


    These dragon veins were the concentration of a''s life energy, so even if the was gone, it would take a long time for these dragon veins to scatter.


    Once thes were gone, it wasn''t as if people were going to just leave these dragon veins floating in space, so they developed ways of harvesting them. Then the Astral Empires of the human race found a way to store these dragon veins in crystal form, making them easier to carry and to use, either for cultivating or restoring destes.


    As for the value of these dragon veins¡­they were equal to ten thousand peak tier spirit jades and that was only a low grade dragon vein.


    That was because as long as the dragon vein was used, there was the chance of earning more than that back by developing a and harvesting spirit jades from it.


    As long as they could nurture a high grade, they would be able to earn their investment back countless times.


    So dragon veins were considered the most precious currency in these Astral Empires.<novelnext></novelnext>


    They were even highly valued by the Lin Astral Emperor and were considered a military expense, so they weren''t easily circted.


    So of course no one would believe that Lin Fan would have any.


    Lin Hong quickly put away his look of disdain before saying, "Cousin, I don''t know how you think you will pay for it, but this is not important. The important thing is that we won''t be able to provide the dragon vein now and we will get in trouble if we can''t pay."


    Lin Hong then tried to offer him a way out by saying, "How about I go talk to the manager and smooth this matter over. I''m sure that it was just a mistake and as long as we talk to the manager, we''ll be able to negate¡­"


    Before he could finish, he suddenly closed his mouth and swallowed his words as his eyes popped out.


    That was because he had seen the crystal that Lin Fan was currently holding in his hand.


    This crystal had appeared out of nowhere, but he had been shocked the moment that his eyes fell onto it.


    That was because whether it was in terms of appearance or aura, this was something that he immediately recognized. Others might now have seen this item before, but as members of the Lin Astral Family, he naturally recognized it.


    This was a true dragon vein crystal.


    It hadn''t been a lie when Lin Fan had said that he would be able to pay for it because he actually could pay for it with this dragon vein crystal.


    But where had a hick from the boonies gotten a dragon vein crystal?


    It was like showing up at a meeting with the newest edition item just to find that someone else already had an even newer edition of that item that hadn''t been released yet.


    It was a feeling of being one upped that they couldn''t ept!


    It was like being pped to the face without any preparation!


    This was a feeling that these young master and young misses from the Lin Astral Family didn''t like. In fact, they hated it very much since it was a veryrge blow to the pride that they had built over the years.


    Lin Hong pointed at the dragon vein crystal in Lin Fan''s hand and said in a stammering voice, "Cousin, where, where did you get, get that?"


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "Does it matter where I got this? Or are you doubting how I got this?"


    Lin Hong and the other juniors from the Lin Astral Family couldn''t help being taken aback when they heard this. Then when they felt the aura that wasing from Lin Fan, even though they were at a higher level of cultivation than him, they couldn''t help taking a step back.


    These eyes, these cold and uncaring eyes, it was as if they were being cut by a thousand des being stared at by these eyes.


    Even if they were geniuses from the Lin Astral Family, they really couldn''t handle this.


    After all, these were young masters and young misses who had never experienced real danger before. Even when they went out for experience, they had always been escorted by experts of the Lin Astral Empire and had never been in any real danger.


    So when they faced this killing intent that was honed in the real world, they really couldn''t stand firm with their weak wills.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan''s killing intent was something that was refined after being trained by the system. It was something that far surpassed the killing intent of normal people, so the shock that they felt was much stronger than normal.


    It was a good thing that the weaker ones had been sitting or they definitely would have copsed from the shock.


    Lin Hong quickly raised his hands and said, "Cousin, it''s not like that at all. We''re just surprised that you had a dragon vein crystal."


    Lin Fan looked at him with those narrowed eyes and said in a cold voice, "Is that so?"


    Lin Hong quickly nodded and said, "Of course, of course."


    Lin Fan just silently watched them for a while. During this time, they felt the pressure on them grow even stronger as Lin Fan''s cold gaze was on them.


    They really wanted to turn their eyes away, but Lin Hong didn''t have a choice since he was the one that Lin Fan was talking to.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan finally said, "Alright, if you say so."


    When the Lin Astral Family juniors heard this, their faces couldn''t help turning red.


    After all, the way that Lin Fan said it made it clear that he didn''t believe them and he was even looking down on them.


    As prideful members of the Lin Astral Family, how could they ept this?


    Being shamed by someone that they had taken as their junior and their inferior?


    But right now, it wasn''t time to rip off all face with Lin Fan just yet.


    After all, Lin Fan had a higher position than them and before they suppressed him, it was impossible for them toe out on top.


    So they had no choice but to endure it all.

 Chapter 937 Auction (3)

    The bid was quickly finalized by the auctioneer and the item was considered sold, but no one found anything strange about that.


    After all, this was a dragon vein¡­


    There was no one in this crowd that could beat a bid like that.


    As for questioning whether they would be able to pay something like that, the auction house would never doubt them since they were from the Lin Astral Family.


    Even if they didn''t have the dragon vein crystal on them, they would still be able to get it from the Lin Astral Family.


    After all, the Lin Astral Family was the best guarantor one could find in this Lin Astral Empire.


    So no one from the auction house even bothered to ask for the payment as they immediately brought the item over.


    It was the manager himself that personally came in and brought the item over to where Lin Hong was sitting. However, when Lin Hong saw this, his face couldn''t help turning red.


    Lin Fan just casually said, "I was the one who bought it."


    The manager was surprised to hear this, but seeing the nod from Lin Hong, he bought the item over to Lin Fan.


    However, as he prepared to leave, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand to stop him.


    The manager was surprised by this and couldn''t help asking, "This young master, is there anything else I can do for you?"


    Lin Fan just casually tossed a crystal to him.


    The manager was caught off guard by his crystal that was suddenly thrown at him and he couldn''t catch it in time. But when he reached down to pick it up off the floor, his chin immediately dropped to the ground.


    As the manager of the Forest Auction House, he naturally recognized this crystal.


    Even if others wouldn''t recognize this crystal, there was no way that he wouldn''t recognize it.


    It was a dragon vein crystal.


    There was no doubt in his mind that this was the payment for the bid and he quickly picked it up from the ground. After all, if there was any damage to it, he was certain that he would be responsible for it since he was the one that dropped it on the ground.


    After quickly making sure that there was nothing wrong with the dragon vein crystal, he quickly bowed to Lin Fan and asked, "Is there anything else that you need?"


    Lin Fan just casually waved his hand at the manager.


    It was only then that the manager had turned to Lin Hong and asked, "Young master Lin, is there anything that I can do for you?"


    Lin Hong had been reduced to the secondary main member of this group.


    Before this, he had been treated as the leader of this group because of the token that he had shown before, but now¡­


    The manager naturally understood that a person who could throw out a dragon vein crystal as casually as this definitely didn''t have a normal identity. So there was no way that he would dare to neglect Lin Fan.


    In his mind, he had already put Lin Fan above Lin Hong.


    But Lin Hong really couldn''t say anything or else he would offend Lin Fan.


    So with an annoyed and impatient look in his eyes, he waved the manager away.


    The manager bowed before leaving the room. As soon as he left the room, he couldn''t help revealing a wide smile as he looked down at the dragon vein crystal in his hand.


    Even if this was the money that was used to buy the Peak Sun Realm Artifact, their auction house would receive argemission and arge part of that¡­would go into his own pockets.


    So it was hard for this manager not to be happy.


    After the excitement of the first auction started dying down, the beautiful auctioneer quickly led into the second auction.


    This time, the item couldn''tpare to the first item, but it was still considered expensive for the people down in the main hall.


    Before the bidding for this second item started, everyone looked up at the VVIP room first to see if there was any movement. If the people there wanted the item, there was no chance that they would be able to get it.


    So they were waiting for the reaction from the people in the VVIP room before making their bids.


    Seeing that there was no sounding from the VVIP room, the people down in the hall all let out a sigh of relief before starting to make their bids.<novelnext></novelnext>


    While this item wasn''t that rare, it was still a rare enough item to make it to this auction, so people didn''t hold back in this bid. It didn''t take long before there was a bidding war between three different parties pushing the price up.


    But none of that mattered to Lin Fan''s group up in the VVIP room.


    Since this item wasn''t as good as the item that Lin Fan had bought, naturally Lin Hong couldn''t buy it at a high price to flex on Lin Fan. So the only thing that he could do was wait for the next rare item to buy at a high price.


    He didn''t believe that Lin Fan would have a second dragon vein crystal to suppress him with.


    It was just luck that he had one, it was impossible for him to have a second one.


    That was how Lin Hong and the other cousins calmed themselves.


    But sitting there in silence was awkward for them, so Lin Hong tried making some small talk by saying, "Cousin, it seems like you quite like that artifact, don''t you?"


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at him and said, "It''s not bad, but it''s not that good either."


    Lin Hong just revealed a knowing smile since he knew that Lin Fan was holding back his excitement.


    This bumpkin, it was clear that he was getting excited over just this Peak Sun Realm Artifact. He didn''t believe that Lin Fan had ever seen anything this powerful before, but for these cousins, they didn''t feel it was that powerful.


    After all, they had seen Ruler Artifacts before.


    Even if they had never held one before, they had seen them and knew that they existed.


    Rulers were the peak of this world and they were proud members of the Lin Astral Family, a family filled with Rulers.


    Each Ruler Artifact was priceless, but their Lin Astral Family had several of these Ruler Artifacts.


    At this point, they were desperate to find anything that they could use to maintain a sense of superiority over Lin Fan that they were already digging deep into anything that they could use. Even though the Ruler Artifacts were items of the Lin Astral Family, the main branch of it and had nothing to do with them, they still used it as a basis for remaining superior to Lin Fan.


    They had really be desperate.


    The next few items didn''t catch their attention at all since these were just normal items that were used to pad the auction and stall for time. These items were considered normal even for the people in the hall below, so of course it wouldn''t attract the attention of these youths from the Lin Astral Family.


    During this time, Lin Hong kept chatting with Lin Fan even though it was clear that Lin Fan didn''t want to talk to him.


    But Lin Hong didn''t give up and got the information that he wanted in the end.


    After beating around the bush for a while, he finally brought the topic to where he wanted it.


    "Cousin, how did you get that dragon vein crystal of yours?" Lin Hong asked in a very casual voice, but it was clear by his expression that he cared about this very much.


    Lin Fan just casually replied, "It was great grandfather who gave it to me."


    There was no need for them to ask who great grandfather that Lin Fan referred to was since they immediately knew that there was only one person that he could be referring to.


    The Lin Astral Emperor, that was the only person that he could refer to that had this kind of power.


    All of the cousins couldn''t help revealing shocked looks after hearing this since they couldn''t believe that the Lin Astral Emperor would actually give something like this to Lin Fan.


    After all, they had never received something like this from the Lin Astral Emperor before.


    But it never urred to them that the Lin Astral Emperor never favoured them because to them, they were entitled people who deserved the best. They were the younger generation of the Lin Astral Family, so of course it was natural for them to receive the best.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor giving this dragon vein crystal to Lin Fan was something that absolutely puzzled them.


    That was until they forced out an exnation.


    Lin Fan was new to the Lin Astral Empire and he was the Lin Astral Emperor''s direct descendant, so it was natural that he would be given something special.


    They didn''t believe that he had more than a single one of these dragon vein crystals, so that was how theyforted themselves.


    It didn''t take long before another bid caught their attention.


    This was a bid that was used to raise everyone''s energy in the middle of the auction so that they would be able to keep going until the end.


    The beautiful auctioneer brought out the item and said, "Now, we have something that will excite everyone. Please pay attention to this item since it is one of a kind and not something that can be bought anywhere else."

 Chapter 938 Auction (4)

    With this, the beautiful auctioneer waved her hand to the staff standing behind her and they took the curtain off the item being auctioned.


    This curtain was a special item that would suppress the aura of the item, so people couldn''t use that to tell what it was.


    The moment that the curtain was pulled off, the aura of this item spread across the entire room and everyone suddenly revealed a shocked look.


    That was because they could feel the powerful aura that wasing from it.


    This was definitely not a normal item.


    The beautiful auctioneer could see the shocked looks that everyone had and secretly revealed a smile. This was the reaction that she was waiting for, this was what she wanted the crowd to feel before she gave her introduction.


    Now it was time to put the nail in the coffin.


    What had been revealed was arge chunk of wood, but it clearly wasn''t a normal piece of wood.


    The beautiful auctioneer said in a slow and deliberate voice, "This piece of Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood was found on a in the Frost Sector. It is a piece of wood that has absorbed arge amount of naturalws and is filled with natural energies."


    She didn''t say what the use of this piece of wood was, but everyone already knew since they could feel the powerfulws that it contained.


    This feeling was even greater than the feeling that they had gotten from that Peak Sun Realm Artifact.


    The only thing that could reach this level was Ruler levelws.


    That meant that this piece of wood was actually a piece of material that could be used to create a Ruler Artifact.


    While it wasn''t guaranteed that they would be able to craft a Ruler Artifact, just the opportunity to create one was more than enough for one to take a risk with this item. After all, it was impossible to get a chance to craft a Ruler Artifact normally since they were strictly controlled by the Lin Astral Family.


    This Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood being sold in this Forest Auction House was definitely a first, but no one doubted its authenticity.


    Everyone knew that the Lin Astral Family was behind the Forest Auction House, so they knew that this was being sold with their permission.


    As for why the Lin Astral Family would allow this to be sold, they didn''t have any clues?


    But that didn''t matter to them as the most important thing was securing this item.


    Even the young masters and young misses of the Lin Astral Family couldn''t help being shocked when they saw this.


    They had never expected something like this to be auctioned off, but they were all filled with greed to obtain it. After all, this was a potential Ruler Artifact and if they were to bring it back, they had a very high chance of creating one.


    They were from the Lin Astral Family and even if they were from a branch family, their families still had more than enough knowledge and skills to create a Ruler Artifact.


    If they could bring this Ruler Artifact Embryo back to their family, then they would certainly be rewarded by them.


    They knew that it was better to be rewarded than to have hopes of getting the Ruler Artifact for themselves. Even if they were to get the Ruler Artifact, they wouldn''t be able to use it in the end, so it was better to get a reward from the family.


    But that was all on the basis of them being able to obtain it.


    So all of them started looking at each other with hostility.


    Even if they were all cousins, that didn''t mean that they were from the same branch family.


    They had cooperated earlier since they had amon enemy in Lin Fan, but now that there was something that they all wanted ced between them, that alliance was destroyed in an instant.


    It was just that kind of feeble alliance in the first ce.


    All of them started to secretly check just how much funds they had ess to.


    Once the beautiful auctioneer finished introducing this item, she started the bid without any hesitation. She knew that the preciousness of this item was more than enough for everyone to understand how great this item was and there wouldn''t be a problem raising the price.


    As expected, as soon as the bidding started, there was a flurry of bids.


    This was an item that excited the crowd and theypletely lost themselves.


    In the past bids, they had all turned to the VVIP room to check if there was an action from that room, but now¡­


    They were so excited that they didn''t care about that at all and immediately started making their bids.


    Even if they didn''t let their excitement carry them away, they still would have made a bid for it.


    After all, this item was just too important to let slip away.


    Even if it meant offending the people in the VVIP room, they would still have to get this item.


    Ruler Artifact, this was a sign of absolute power in this Lin Astral Empire.


    If they were able to get a Ruler Artifact, they would immediately be one of the most powerful forces in the entire Lin Astral Empire. That was how the main noble families under the Lin Astral Family received their position.


    So this was a matter of the utmost importance for these lower tier nobles and merchants.


    But before the price could get any higher, there was a voice that suddenly came from the VVIP room that said, "One thousand high grade spirit jades."


    When this bid was made, everyone in the auction hall fell silent.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Before this, the highest bid had only reached ten high grade spirit jades, but it was made in a bid of a thousand medium grade spirit jades.


    For the price to suddenly jump up by a hundred times, there was no one in this auction hall that was able to keep up.


    Even if they wanted to, it would mean selling everything that they had just to buy this Ruler Artifact Embryo and that wasn''t worth it to them. In addition to offending the person in the VVIP room, they would have to sell everything that they had to buy it.


    If it failed to create a Ruler Artifact¡­then they would have nothing.


    No one was willing to take this risk, especially since they didn''t have a way of guaranteeing that a Ruler Artifact could be made.


    The only ones that could guarantee the formation of a Ruler Artifact was the Lin Astral Family since they were the only ones that had the technique and knowledge to do so. So no one else would be willing to take this risk.


    After this high bid was made, everyone in the auction hall fell silent as they all couldn''t help cursing the person in the VVIP room under their breath.


    Though all of them were angry, not a single one of them dared to show it on their faces.


    There was nothing to gain from offending the people in the VVIP room after all.


    Inside of the VVIP room, the atmosphere hadpletely changed.


    Gone was the rxed atmosphere from before, now there was a tense atmosphere between the young masters and young misses of the Lin Astral Family.


    However, what everyone was doing now was staring at Lin Hong who had made that bid. Based on the expressions on their faces, it was as if they couldn''t believe that he had made this bid.


    After all, none of them could understand how he had been able to get this much money.


    As younger members of the Lin Astral Family, there was only a certain amount of money that they would have ess to. However, in addition to this, they would also be allowed to start businesses and earn money that way as well.


    But none of them had ever been able to earn this much money.


    The base amount that they had ess to was around a hundred high grade spirit jades, but those that were skilled in business were able to gather around two hundred high grade spirit jades.


    No one had ever been able to gather an amount like this before.


    So many of them were shocked that Lin Hong had been able to bid with this kind of amount.


    After all, they knew that he wouldn''t joke around at this point, so he must have this amount if he was making the bid.


    What they didn''t know was that Lin Hong had already secretly contacted Lin Tian before the bidding started.


    Lin Hong was the one that Lin Tian cared about the most, so he had given him a special method of contacting him when there was something important. So as soon as Lin Hong contacted him, Lin Tian had already made the decision to fund him.


    While it was impossible for Lin Tian to get a lot of money on a short notice, something like a thousand high grade spirit jades was easy for him since it coulde out of his own personal ount.


    So he wasn''t worried that Lin Hong would be able to win this Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood since it was impossible for anyone to match him.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t know about what Lin Fan had done before, or he would have been worried.


    The old pepper is the spiciest, this wasn''t a phrase that was used lightly.


    Since Lin Fan had a single dragon vein crystal and he used it so easily, that would mean that he would have another, or maybe even more than that.


    But Lin Fan didn''t make his bid right away.


    Instead, he waited for the beautiful auctioneer to slowly count it out.


    The beautiful auctioneer knew that this was arge amount for this item, but her experience and instincts told her that this wouldn''t be the end.


    When someone usually confidently made a bid like this, the winds of change would usuallye and someone would make a bigger bid.


    It was almost a cliche at this point.


    So she stalled out this bid for as long as possible to give this next bidder time to make a bid.


    ? But Lin Hong didn''t know any of this.


    While he didn''t know why the beautiful auctioneer was drawing it out, he didn''t mind since this allowed him to show off his superiority. While his cousins all had ugly expressions on their faces, he had a winning smile on his face.


    As for who he was looking at, it was naturally Lin Fan.


    He felt that he had made up for the blunder at the beginning of the auction and had now suppressed him.


    So what if you had a dragon vein crystal before?


    You''ve wasted it and now you can''t bid for this item, so aren''t you the fool?


    But as he was thinking this, Lin Fan slowly raised his hand towards his armrest.


    Seeing this, Lin Hong suddenly felt a trace of fear in his heart.


    Then in front of his stiff smile, Lin Fan said, "One low grade dragon vein crystal."

 Chapter 939 Auction (5)

    When this voice rang out, the auction hall once again fell into silence.


    Everyone remembered this voice since it had left arge impression on them before.


    After all, there was no one that could bid the same amount as this voice. Even now, it was still bidding at a level that no one else could keep up with.


    Earlier, everyone had doubted whether that person who had made this bid could pay the dragon vein crystal like they had bidded. However, since there had been no stir from the Forest Auction House side, they were certain that it had already been paid.


    So no one dared to look down on the owner of this voice.


    After all, someone that could afford to pay a dragon vein crystal definitely wasn''t a normal person.


    No one wanted to offend that person.


    And now, that person was making a move again, so everyone couldn''t help waiting with bated breath for what happened next.


    They recognized that the person who made this bid was different from the person who had just made the bid for a "thousand high grade spirit jades". This person had also made a bid right after the person that bid a "thousand high grade spirit jades"st time.


    Even a fool would be able to tell that there was tension between these two people.


    So they were all waiting to see what would happen next.


    Inside the VVIP room, Lin Hong''s expression turned very ugly as he looked at Lin Fan, but he didn''t say anything as he just red at Lin Fan. It was almost as if he was waiting for Lin Fan to give an exnation.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t even bother looking at Lin Hong as he looked directly at the stage, looking right at the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood. It was as if Lin Hong was like the air to him.


    Lin Hong''s face couldn''t help turning darker and darker when he saw this, but he held his silence.


    Eventually, the beautiful auctioneer finished her three count and the item went to Lin Fan.


    As soon as this item was sold, the audience broke out in apuse.


    Even if they couldn''t win the item themselves, they would do all they could to tter the person that had won it. After all, that person was clearly not a normal person, so if they could catch their attention, it would naturally be good for them.


    Inside of the VVIP room, all of the cousins looked at Lin Fan with strange looks.


    There was only silence in this room until the manager came in.


    This time, he didn''t even bother going to Lin Hong since he knew exactly who had made that bid. There was only one person that could make a bid like this, the person that had given him the dragon vein crystal from before.


    So the manager quickly brought the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood over and ced it in front of Lin Fan. Then he kneeled there, peeking up at Lin Fan as if he was waiting for something.


    But Lin Fan just sat there without moving a single finger as if he didn''t even see the manager.


    Even so, the manager didn''t dare say a thing as he waited.


    During all of this, Lin Hong''s expression kept fluctuating. It was as if he wanted to say something, but then he swallowed his words and just sat there in silence.


    However, it was clear by the look on his face that he didn''t feel good about all of this.


    Lin Fan didn''t care and just sat there for a long time in silence, letting Lin Hong stew in his rage.


    Yes, that was what he was doing.


    He knew that by acting this way, he would hurt Lin Hong more than he could by saying something.


    Sometimes, silence really was the best weapon.


    Finally, after a long time, Lin Fan finally waved his hand and pulled out another crystal that was just like the one that he had pulled out before. He casually tossed it at the manager who eagerly caught it with a bright smile and then quickly left the room without even bother talking to the other young masters and young misses.


    They were clearly unhappy about this, but if they were to say anything, it would be their reputation ruined instead of Lin Fan''s. So they had no choice but to sit there and take it even if they were fuming on the inside.


    Once the manager left, all of them just sat there in silence until Lin Hong waved his hand to send off the maids that were taking care of them.


    Seeing this, the maids all tactfully left the room since they were already used to this.


    They knew that important people like this would use these rooms to talk about business sometimes, so they had already learned to recognize this. Not to mention, Lin Hong made it very clear with his hand signal.


    Once they were gone and there were only members of the Lin Astral Family left, Lin Hong said with a smile, "Cousin, it truly is kind of you to buy this item for me. I''ll take it now if you''ll hand it over."


    With the way that he said it, he made it sound so natural as if this was how things should be.


    However, all of the others who heard this couldn''t help knitting their brows and narrowing their eyes to look at Lin Hong.<novelnext></novelnext>


    They clearly knew what he was trying to do, but they also didn''t say anything as they wanted to see how Lin Fan would react.


    After all, if Lin Fan acquiesced to this request, that would mean that there was still room for them to do something.


    As long as they could get this Ruler Artifact Embryo, they didn''t care what they did at this point.


    So they were all just waiting for Lin Fan''s reaction.


    Lin Fan just acted like he didn''t hear him at all when Lin Hong said this and continued watching the auction hall below him.


    Seeing this, there was a vein that popped out on Lin Hong''s forehead when he saw this, but he continued saying in a friendly voice, "Cousin, stop ying around and hand it over."


    Though his voice was friendly, there was a threatening tone that couldn''t be missed that was underneath it.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at him and asked, "Why would I do that? This is something that I bought for myself, so I''ll keep it. If you want it, you can buy it next time."


    Lin Hong suddenly mmed his fist on the table and said in a fierce voice, "Will you really not ept the drink offered to you or are you just stupid?"


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at him for a second before suddenly narrowing his eyes and releasing the same pressure that he released when they first met. As soon as this pressure was released, Lin Hong and all of the juniors of the Lin Astral Family couldn''t help taking a step back.


    Then Lin Fan just said, "Why should I? What is there to gain for me to be friends with a bunch of useless pieces of trash like you?"


    Lin Hong and all of the juniors of the Lin Astral Family couldn''t understand what Lin Fan said at first, but the moment that they processed his words, they were immediately filled with rage.


    They had already known that Lin Fan was arrogant, but they never thought that he would be so arrogant that he would act this way!


    No matter what, they were still Lin Fan''s seniors, so he couldn''t just treat them like this!


    At this point, Lin Xue couldn''t help revealing a worried expression since she knew that these people all had a higher level of cultivation than Lin Fan. But then Ang patted her on her hand and shook her head to show that it was fine.


    She couldn''t help rxing a bit when this happened, but then she also quickly pulled back her hand and pushed Ang''s hand away.


    When Ang saw this, she couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    Lin Hong then pointed at Lin Fan and said, "Since you won''t ept the toast offered, then prepare to suffer the consequences. I challenge you to a duel."


    He pointed at the piece of Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood and said, "If I win, this is mine."


    Lin Fan just calmly looked back at him and asked, "What do I get if I win?"


    The way that he said it, it was almost as if he thought that he was already going to win.


    This arrogance once again enraged Lin Hong and the other juniors of the Lin Astral Family.


    But Lin Hong couldn''t just ignore it because he was right.


    If he wanted to take the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood, he had to offer something of equivalent value or there was no reason for Lin Fan to ept this duel.


    Just challenging Lin Fan to this duel was already embarrassing for him since he was someone with a higher level of cultivation challenging someone with a lower level of cultivation. This would already bring shame to him when it was spread, but if he wanted to duel him for this Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood for nothing, he wouldn''t be able to live it down.


    But in the end, he didn''t have anything that would have the same value as this piece of Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood, so he didn''t know what to say.


    Seeing this look on his face, Lin Fan said, "Alright, if I win, you be my ve."


    Lin Hong''s forehead was popping with veins when he heard this.


    He waspletely enraged when he heard this.


    He never thought that Lin Fan would be so arrogant that he would demand that he became his ve!


    This was arrogance that reached the heavens!


    His anger reached the point where he wished that he could grab Lin Fan and rip him to pieces, but he couldn''t do that. Even if they were going to duel, it would be a duel within limits because they were still members of the Lin Astral Family.


    If he was to kill another member of the Lin Astral Family, not to mention someone with a high position in the Lin Astral Emperor''s heart like Lin Fan, there was no need to talk about his future in the family even if he won the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood.


    But his rage and pride forced him to a point of no return, so Lin Hong said in a booming voice, "Alright! I ept these terms!"


    It was just a good thing that the walls in this room were thick, or else he would have died of shame if someone else heard this.

 Chapter 940 Auction (6)

    After the duel had been set, the two of them sat down again.


    After all, if they left now, they would surely create a scene and attract unwanted attention.


    So they nned on staying to the end of the auction before heading back to the pce to duel each other.


    Lin Fan was actually quite interested in the end of the auction.


    If something like the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood was used as the item for the middle of the auction, just what would they use for the end of the auction?


    It would definitely be something that wasn''t inferior to the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood since it was the finale.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling excited when he thought of this.


    Even though he had a calm look on the surface, he had actually been quite excited when he won the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood.


    He also knew what the concept of a Ruler Artifact was and unlike these other juniors, he was someone that was actually able to use it.


    This was something that he had found a long time ago in the system''s store, but he never had a chance to use it. After all, it was a very special use item and it was very rare to find a chance to use it.


    But now that he was in this Lin Astral Empire, he actually did have the chance to use it.


    As long as he brought this piece of Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood back to the Lin Astral Family and had the Lin Astral Emperor turn it into a Ruler Artifact for him, he would be able to use it.


    While there were conditions to him being able to use it, it was a fact that he would be able to use it.


    The item from the system''s store would allow him to form a spiritual connection with the Ruler Artifact, just like his connection with the Iron Eater Bone Artifact. As long as there was this connection, even if his cultivation was too weak to use the full power of the Ruier Artifact, he would still be able to draw on bits of the Ruler Artifact''s power.


    There was no doubt that this would make him much stronger since even a trace of the Ruler Artifact''s power could be looked down on. Just the trace would be enough to make him stronger than everyone in the same minor realm of cultivation as him.


    He was currently in the Mid Star Realm, so that meant that just with his powers alone and the powers of the Ruler Artifact, he would be able to fight those in the Peak Star Realm¡­Though with Lin Fan''s unique physique and power, it was better topare him to someone in the Low Realm.


    So with this Ruler Artifact, he would be able to face anyone in the Peak Realm.


    Of course he would be excited about something like that.


    Time passed and the different items were brought out one by one for the auction, but there wasn''t a single item that caught Lin Fan''s eyes.


    There were a few that caught the eyes of the Lin Astral Family juniors and they easily won their bids.


    Without Lin Fan blocking them, they had more than enough money and influence to suppress all the people down below.


    If there was an item that they wanted, it was easy for them to get.


    Finally, it was time for the final item to be brought out.


    The beautiful auctioneer had been quite filled with energy when introducing the other items, but when it came to this item, she suddenly became very quiet and mysterious.


    She didn''t give them any hints as to what this item was and wouldn''t bring it out right away.


    She said that the item was still being prepared, so they needed to wait a while before it could be brought out.


    So during this time, she performed a song and dance for everyone apanied by zither music.


    This beautiful auctioneer was well trained, so naturally she was able to sing, dance, and y the zither if she wanted. With her beautiful dancing and singing, all of the dissatisfied feelings in the crowd immediately disappeared.


    When faced with this beautiful singing and dancing, along with the beauty of the auctioneer, it was impossible for them to remain angry.


    After the performance, the beautiful auctioneer announced that they would be taking an intermission before bringing out the final item.


    It seemed like the auction house was really stalling for time, but that also made people more excited.


    After all, the longer that they stalled, the more precious the item was. They were clearly trying to give people as much time as possible to gather as much money as they could.


    Which is what a lot of people did during this intermission.


    Including the people inside the VVIP room.


    When the beautiful auctioneer finally appeared again, she had regained her energy from before and excitedly introduced the item.


    When everyone heard what the item was, they couldn''t help being shocked.<novelnext></novelnext>


    In terms of value, this couldn''t be considered as something that was more valuable than the Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood, but for certain people, it definitely had more practical value.


    The item that was brought out was an egg and nothing else.


    However, this wasn''t a normal egg.


    This was the egg of a qilin and it had already been confirmed that this qilin had a very purified bloodline.


    That meant that as long as the qilin was hatched and trained properly, there was a chance that one would be able to obtain a Ruler Realm Pet.


    But this was a very risky investment since it was hard to guarantee that the hatched qilin would be a Ruler Realm Pet.


    This was a living being and there were many idents that could happen when it came to living beings. So there would never be a guarantee that one would be able to hatch a Ruler Realm Pet.


    But the attraction of a Ruler Realm Pet was still very strong for many people.


    That naturally included the Lin Astral Family juniors in the VVIP room.


    As members of the Lin Astral Family, they also had experience with Ruler Realm Pets. So they were the people with the highest chance of developing a Ruler Realm Pet with the support of their family.


    So many of them wanted this egg.


    But the problem was¡­


    They all turned to look at Lin Fan.


    If it was once, it was an ident, but a second time couldn''t be considered an ident.


    Lin Fan had been able to bring out two dragon vein crystals, so there was no guarantee that he wouldn''t have another one.


    He was also from the Lin Astral Family like them, so he would also be able to nurture this egg into a Ruler Realm Pet. If he wanted this egg, they really wouldn''t be able to stop him.


    So they could only pray that he didn''t want it.


    It was just too bad that they couldn''t read through that calm look on his face.


    He was like a tiki head statue with that expression on his face.


    After giving a long introduction to the egg, the beautiful auctioneer finally started the bidding.


    There were plenty of people that wanted the egg in the audience, so it didn''t take long before bids came in.


    But in the VVIP room, all of the Lin Astral Family juniors just sat there in silence, waiting for Lin Fan to make a move.


    Before Lin Fan showed his card, they weren''t willing to make a move.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t show a single thing and the time was against them. Soon, there were only a few people that were making bids and it seemed like the auction was about to end.


    They weren''t willing to let this egg slip out of their hands, so they were bing more and more tense until one of them finally couldn''t take it and made a bid.


    Once that string of tension was cut, there was nothing holding them back anymore.


    All of a sudden, there were a bunch of bids that came from the VVIP room that shocked everyone below.


    There were a few people down there that weren''t willing to give up and made bids along with the VVIP room, but they were quickly suppressed by the bids of the VVIP room.


    The Lin Astral Family juniors had more than enough money each to suppress the people down there, so there was no need to mention them being able topete.


    It didn''t take long before there were only bids that came from the VVIP room.


    These bids also didn''tst long since they all had a good idea of how much money each of them had. After all, while they were from the same family, they were from different branches and inpetition with each other. They naturally kept eyes on each other to ensure that they woulde out on top, so they had plenty of information on each other.


    The one that came out on top would be the one that could gather the most money in the short time that they had before the auction.


    In the end, the one that had the highest bid was Lin Rong, one of the more talented juniors of the Lin Astral Family who was in a different branch than Lin Hong.


    She had been able to contact one of the elders and received more money than the rest, so she was able to make the highest bid.


    That was until the two count came and Lin Fan pressed the button on his armrest, "One dragon vein crystal."

 Chapter 941 Duel (1)

    Everyone was less surprised this time since they had already expected that Lin Fan would have another dragon vein crystal.


    It wasn''t even that shocking anymore that he would have one.


    They were more surprised that he would wait for the veryst second before making a bid.


    It was almost as if¡­he had a grudge against Lin Rong and was doing it on purpose.


    But that didn''t make sense at all since they didn''t even know about Lin Fan before today. They shouldn''t have had a history with him, so there would be no reason for him to have a grudge against them.


    So why was he doing this?


    Lin Rong knitted her brows at first, but then she revealed a bright smile as she moved over to where Lin Fan was sitting.


    There was no denying Lin Rong''s beauty, but in front of Lin Fan¡­it paled inparison to other girls he knew.


    Lin Rong then leaned forward while holding her hands at her chest to entuate the curves there before saying, "Cousin, this egg is really important to me, can you¡­"


    Before she could finish her words, she suddenly felt a chill stabbing her in the back.


    As soon as this chill stabbed her, she felt like she had been sent into a valley of ice and she was frozen on the spot. This feeling was so strong that even her lips turned a bit blue and her body began to shiver.


    It didn''t take long before her legs almost gave out and she copsed to the ground.


    It was at this point that Lin Fan "saved" her.


    Yes, Lin Fan "saved" her.


    After all, if he left her in the face of Ang''s killing intent like this, it wouldn''t be long before she fainted and that would bring more trouble than it was worth.


    So Lin Fan said in a cold voice, "Scram."


    Lin Rong and all the other juniors trembled when they heard this.


    Even though they clearly had a higher level of cultivation than Lin Fan, the moment that they heard this word from him, there was an innate sense of submission that filled them.


    Most importantly, Lin Rong was shocked that her beauty didn''t work.


    She had used this beauty to move countless men before and even if they were from the same family, she didn''t mind using her beauty to bend him to her whims.


    But¡­it was like Lin Fan was made of stone as he wasn''t affected by her charms at all.


    Lin Rong wanted to say something, but seeing the look from Lin Fan''s eyes, she couldn''t help backing down. There was a feeling inside of her that told her that she wouldn''t win if she fought against him.


    So in the end, Lin Rong moved away and stopped fussing over the matter.


    During this time, she also looked over at Lin Hong who was just calmly sitting there with a serious look on his face.


    She could only hope that he would teach Lin Fan a lesson in their duelter.


    After Lin Rong backed down, there was no one else that said anything and just sat there watching Lin Fan.


    Before long, the same manager came back with the egg and he brought it over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t make him wait this time and took out the dragon vein crystal right away before suddenly standing up.


    The manager was afraid that he had offended Lin Fan in any way and quickly bowed as he said, "This young master, is there anything that we''ve done wrong? Please tell us and our auction house will immediately fix it."


    Lin Fan just casually waved his hand and said, "It''s fine, I just have some other business to take care of."


    As he said this, he didn''t look at the manager at all. Instead, his eyes had been aimed at Lin Hong the entire time.


    Lin Hong was surprised to see Lin Fan acting this way.


    He thought that even if Lin Fan didn''t try to stall, he wouldn''t rush back like this. After all, it was clear who should win if they were to fight¡­


    Even if Lin Fan had some kind of secret weapon, it shouldn''t have been enough for him to be this confident¡­


    Lin Hong couldn''t help feeling a bit of fear when he saw this.


    The manager gave an inner sigh of relief when he heard this and then he quickly bowed his head before waving at the staff on the side. The staff quickly came over with an item on a pillow that the manager took and presented to Lin Fan.


    The manager said, "Young master, this is the VIP token of our Forest Auction House. It''s only given to our most prestigious customers, but considering how much you''ve spent today, I think that it''s only right that you qualify for this token."


    As he said this, his voice was filled with utmost respect, his head was bowed down, and he was raising the token high up so that it was right in front of Lin Fan.


    The only fear that he felt now was that Lin Fan would reject this token.<novelnext></novelnext>


    After all, if Lin Fan didn''t want it, there wasn''t anything that he could do to force Lin Fan to take this token.


    There was a moment of silence before Lin Fan reached out to take the token. Then Lin Fan said, "Un, I''ll be back in the future."


    He sincerely meant this.


    The things that he bought today were very useful to him and the ce that could give him such gains was naturally a ce that he would visit again. He woulde again to see if he would be able to get something else next time.


    When the manager heard this, his heart soared.


    This was a customer that was willing to pay dragon vein crystals like it was nothing, a customer like this was always wee.


    So the manager quickly started fawning over Lin Fan, but he was also immediately cut off by a wave of Lin Fan''s hand.


    This person was able to be the manager of the Forest Auction House for a reason, so he very tactfully waved his hand at the staff member before leaving with a bow.


    Once they were gone, Lin Fan looked back at Lin Hong before giving a snort and heading to the door.


    All of the Lin Astral Family juniors just stood there in a daze, not knowing what to say.


    The way that Lin Fan acted reallypletely overwhelmed them and they didn''t know how to deal with him.


    They couldn''t use force because they knew the consequences that came with it and they couldn''t beat his sharp tongue, so the only thing that they could do was sit there in a daze.


    After a while, everyone couldn''t help looking at Lin Hong.


    He was the only hope that they had left since he was the one that had bit the bullet and challenged Lin Fan to a duel. He was the only one that could use force since it was an official duel over an item.


    He had put his reputation on the line, so no one would be able to say anything.


    None of them thought that Lin Hong would lose since Lin Hong was in the High Realm and Lin Fan was only in the Star Realm. No matter how one thought about it, this should have been a very simple match¡­


    But that wasn''t what Lin Hong thought.


    He actually was a bit worried because when he was in front of Lin Fan, he would always feel this kind of suppression from him. It was as if he innately felt that he wasn''t able topete with Lin Fan¡­


    It was as if he felt that Lin Fan would be able to beat him.


    He didn''t know why he felt this way, but he did and it irritated him.


    So after a while, he red at his cousins and said in a sharp voice, "Let''s go!"


    They all looked at each other before following Lin Hong out.


    Since they had reached this point, Lin Fan didn''t go in the same carriage as Lin Hong and the others.


    Once the drivers learned of this, another carriage was immediately brought over for Lin Fan himself.


    As they were sitting in their carriage, Lin Xue couldn''t help asking in a worried voice, "Are you really going to fight him?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile and said, "Yes, I''ll go y with him for a bit."


    Lin Xue couldn''t help revealing a confused look when she heard this as she asked, "y? What do you mean by y?"


    Lin Fan just had the same smile on his face without saying a thing.


    Ang patted Lin Xue on the back of her hand and shook her head before bringing her over to where Yuki was sitting so they could talk.


    But even as she left, Lin Xue still had a worried look.


    Lin Fan though¡­didn''t have a trace of worry.


    He knew that it was impossible for him to lose to Lin Hong even if he was powerful. After all, Lin Fan still had some trump cards up his sleeve that he hadn''t used yet.


    When they arrived back at the pce, there were people that immediately led them to a practice arena.


    This was used by the juniors of the Lin Astral Family in their training, so it was the best ce for them to duel.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he saw that Lin Hong was already standing in the arena waiting for him.


    Seeing this, he couldn''t help saying with a taunting smile, "It seems like you didn''t run away."


    The veins popped out on Lin Hong''s forehead when he heard this, but he forced himself to stay calm as he said, "Let''s see if your skills are as sharp as your tongue."

 Chapter 942 Duel (2)

    In this ce, other than these juniors, there was no one else.


    When they hade back to the pce, everyone had heard about the conflict between Lin Hong and Lin Fan right away and wanted toe watch. But this was a matter that concerned the prestige of these Lin Astral Family juniors, so their guards had immediately locked down the area and prevented anyone froming in.


    There was plenty of sound that came from outside as disappointed servants were sent away by the guards.


    But none of that affected Lin Fan and Lin Hong who were standing in the arena.


    The two of them were looking at each other, but they clearly had different expressions on their faces.


    Lin Fan stood there with a rxed look while Lin Hong had a slightly tense look as he stared at Lin Fan.


    He didn''t know what it was, but by just standing there, he was feeling pressure from Lin Fan.


    But that shouldn''t be right!


    He was clearly the one that was stronger here!


    So why was he feeling pressure from this person who was younger than him and had a lower level of cultivation?


    It didn''t make sense at all!


    There was no way that he should be afraid of this person!


    But yet¡­there was that feeling deep down that he couldn''t deny¡­


    After a long period of silence, Lin Hong suddenly made the first move.


    With a single thought, there were threerge pets that appeared behind him. It was a rhino, an elephant, and a hippo.


    All three of them released powerful auras and it was clear that they were just as strong as Lin Hong.


    All three of them were in the High Realm just like him.


    The Lin Astral Family juniors were surprised to see this.


    They hadn''t expected Lin Hong to go this far just for a duel against someone younger and weaker than him. After all, Lin Hong was recognized as the strongest in the younger generation for a reason.


    There was no one that could fight against even one of these pets, let alone all three at the same time.


    When he fought with all three, he was strong enough to even match Sun Realm Experts.


    Still, seeing all of Lin Hong''s petse out at the same time assured them.


    If Lin Hong was taking the fight this seriously, there was no chance that Lin Fan would be able to win.


    But when Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help revealing a rxed smile.


    It was as if he wasn''t worried about this fight at all.


    All of them couldn''t help being confused when they saw this and at the same time, they couldn''t help feeling a bit worried.


    Could it be that Lin Fan had a trump card up his sleeve?


    No, that was impossible.


    Even if he had dragon vein crystals, it was impossible for him to surpass the gap of an entire major realm. After all, it wasn''t as if there was anything that could be given that could make his powers suddenly explode.


    Even that Peak Sun Realm Artifact that he bought earlier was impossible.


    If he were to use that Peak Sun Realm Artifact, he wouldn''t be able to draw out all of its power with his current cultivation, so it was impossible for him to defeat Lin Hong with it.


    Seeing this smile actually made Lin Hong nervous and he couldn''t help bing anxious.


    With this affecting him, he decided to not care about his pride and made the first move!


    "Charge!"


    With a single order from him, his three pets suddenly lined up and created a wall in front of him before charging out at Lin Fan.


    As the three of them charged, they were suddenly surrounded by a sort of invisible representation of force.


    This was the forcews of these three pets that had beenbined into a single attack that was targeting Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he didn''t dodge out of the way at all. He just stood there staring at the three of them charging at him with a disinterested look as if this didn''t bother him at all.


    When everyone saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    As the three pets came closer and closer to Lin Fan, they couldn''t help feeling worried.


    That was because Lin Fan didn''t put up any guard at all.


    If he were to get hit by these three pets charging at him at the same time without guarding, it would be an understatement to say that he would be seriously injured. The more likely oue would be that he would be killed by thebined force of these three pets.


    That was what made them worry.


    This was supposed to be a duel, but it was a duel with limits.


    Members of the Lin Astral Family weren''t allowed to seriously hurt each other, let alone kill each other. It was the taboo of the family and anyone that broke the taboo would suffer serious punishments.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Could it be that this was Lin Fan''s n all along?


    Was he really that crazy that he would y with his life like this?


    As Lin Hong thought about all of the things that he had done before, he couldn''t help feeling more and more scared.


    That was right!


    Lin Fan was just this crazy!


    Lin Hong knew that he had to do something or else this would end badly for him!


    So Lin Hong shouted, "Stop!"


    But it was already toote for that. Even if his pets wanted to stop, it would be impossible for them to stop before they hit Lin Fan.


    Everyone could only watch as the three pets came closer and closer to Lin Fan, until the moment that they were about to hit him¡­


    That was when Lin Fan suddenly disappeared from where he was standing.


    When he reappeared again, he was standing behind the three pets that had been charging at him.


    The three pets that had lost their target couldn''t stop themselves in time and the only thing that they could do was keep charging forward. So theynded on the ground where Lin Fan had been standing previously, but they couldn''t shatter the arena ground at all.


    This arena was specially made by the Lin Astral Family, so it was made of a very strong material that even Sun Realm Experts would find hard to destroy, so there was no need to mention these juniors being able to break this arena.


    After the attack missed, everyone was in a daze since they couldn''t understand what had just happened.


    Not a single one of them had been able to keep up with Lin Fan''s movement, so they had no idea how he had dodged Lin Hong''s attack just now.


    But as juniors of the Lin Astral Family, they weren''t that useless either.


    After they recovered from their shock, they used their spiritual senses to check the area.


    It didn''t take them long to recognize what Lin Fan had done.


    "Spatialws¡­"


    Lin Hong muttered as he recognized the faint traces of spatialw energy that was left in the air.


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile without saying anything.


    But after saying this, Lin Hong was even more confused.


    After all, he had his understanding of spatialws as a member of the Lin Astral Family. He knew that it was impossible for spatialws to be used that quickly at Lin Fan''s level of cultivation.


    Lin Fan was using spatialws at the same level as Sun Realm Experts.


    Did he have a special item that he used or¡­?


    No, that was impossible.


    Lin Hong shook the other possibility out of his mind since he refused to believe that this was true.


    So he deemed it was Lin Fan using a special item to avoid his attack.


    Yes, it had to be a special item.


    He had even been given a dragon vein crystal, so it wasn''t impossible for Lin Fan to be given a special spatialw item that he could use.


    But an item was an item in the end and it was impossible for Lin Fan to keep using it.


    So all he had to do was keep pressing the attack and using his endless stream of attacks to suppress Lin Fan. As long as he consumed all the energy in Lin Fan''s artifact, then there would be no way for Lin Fan to dodge his attacks.


    Once Lin Fan''s artifact ran out of life energy, it would be over.


    That was what Lin Hong firmly believed because if he didn''t believe it, it would be the end.


    It was just too bad that he was wrong¡­


    After thinking this through, Lin Hong shouted, "Split and charge!"


    His three pets immediately split off in different directions and started charging at Lin Fan from different directions.


    Lin Fan used the same spatialws to disappear, causing the three pets to m into each other, but that didn''t matter to them. Even after mming into each other, they didn''t seem to feel a thing.


    That just went to show how well trained these three pets were.


    Lin Hong didn''t mind that he missed and shouted, "Keep charging!"


    The three pets followed his orders and immediately split up to keep charging, but this time they charged one by one.


    Lin Hong was holding back his power just in case to avoid hurting Lin Fan because he knew that if an ident happened, he wouldn''t be able to avoid the consequences.


    But Lin Fan easily dodged all of these attacks.


    After dodging for a while, Lin Fan suddenly revealed a smile and said, "It''s time to end this game."

 Chapter 943 Duel (3)

    A vein popped out on Lin Hong''s forehead again when he heard this.


    He could clearly hear the disdain that was in Lin Fan''s voice and he was filled with rage after hearing it.


    This cousin who was younger than him and had a lower level of cultivation, just what would he depend on to look down on him like this?


    Naturally he couldn''t take it as the person who was older and had a higher level of cultivation.


    He had backed down previously because he felt an uneasy feeling in front of Lin Fan, but now that he had been pushed to this point, he couldn''t back down anymore. After all, if he continued backing down in front of the other cousins, where would his face go?


    He wouldn''t be able to stand tall anymore in front of them.


    So he threw caution to the wind and decided to go all out.


    Lin Fan had shown that he would be able to survive, so he didn''t need to worry about killing him. He decided that he would use his full power topletely suppress Lin Fan.


    With this decision made, Lin Hong suddenly called his pets back to him before jumping onto the back of the elephant.


    All three of them came together to form a giant wall as Lin Hong also released his life energy. This time, the life energy of all four of them came together and the pressure that came from them was different from what it was before.


    This was Lin Hong''s full power.


    While the three pets working together were powerful, it couldn''tpare to when Lin Hong was directing them.


    Lin Hong was the conduit that allowed the three of them to perfectlybine theirws perfectly, creating a force that was much greater than the sum of the power.


    This was what had allowed Lin Hong to even fight against those in the Sun Realm even with his Realm cultivation.


    When the Lin Astral Family juniors saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    They never thought that Lin Hong would fight seriously like this.


    However, at the same time, they couldn''t help revealing excited looks.


    They had seen Lin Fan dodging Lin Hong''s attacks, so they couldn''t help feeling a bit worried. But if Lin Hong was going to take it this seriously, then there was no way that he would lose.


    It wouldn''t take him long to suppress Lin Fan now.


    Their eyes started to sparkle as if they could already see the scene of Lin Fan being suppressed by Lin Hong.


    After he had finished synchronizing with his pets, Lin Hong suddenly gave a beast like roar before the pets under him charged at where Lin Fan was.


    This time, they charged at more than five times the speed that they had when the pets were charging alone. This was so fast that many of the cousins weren''t even able to follow along with their eyes.


    They just saw a sh before Lin Hong suddenly appeared in a different ce.


    They all had confident smiles on their faces as they looked at where Lin Hong had stopped, waiting to see Lin Fan''s crushed body.


    But to their surprise, they found that Lin Hong was the one that had an ugly look on his face.


    As for Lin Fan, he was nowhere to be seen.


    When Lin Hong had gone to attack Lin Fan just now, the veryst second before he hit him, Lin Fan had looked up at him with a smile. Then in front of him, he disappeared without a trace.


    It was clear that Lin Fan could have dodged much earlier, but he had chosen not to do so just to taunt Lin Hong.


    It was clear that he was trying to stomp on Lin Hong''s pride.


    Which was why Lin Hong had such an ugly look on his face.


    He couldn''t stand being yed around by someone that was younger who he considered weaker than him!


    This was like being yed around with by a child!


    So Lin Hong immediately gave another roar and summoned all his power as he prepared for another attack, but then he suddenly knitted his brows. He looked down at his three pets under him with a strange look.


    That was because instead of responding to his summons, the three pets were currently just standing there in a daze.


    He looked down at them and said, "What are you doing? Charge!"


    But no matter how he shouted at them, his three pets all just stood there in a daze as if they couldn''t hear what he was saying. It was as if there was something that had enchanted them.


    Seeing this, he raised his hand and pointed them at the two beside him while his feet were firmly nted on the elephant.


    He suddenly started releasing an energy that Lin Fan was very familiar with.


    This was the special technique of the Lin Astral Family, so it wasn''t strange that Lin Hong would have this. He was just surprised that Lin Hong was using it the same way that he had been using it for.<novelnext></novelnext>


    It was just too bad¡­


    After sensing the absorption power that was being used on it, the elephant suddenly bucked Lin Hong off. At the same time, the rhino and hippo dodged out of the way of Lin Hong''s absorption force.


    It was as if they didn''t want to let it touch them no matter what.


    Lin Hong was caught off guard by this sudden bucking of his elephant and was thrown off. But he was still a Realm Expert, so he was able to easily flip through the air andnd behind the elephant.


    When hended, he couldn''t help looking at his three pets with a shocked look as he didn''t understand what was happening.


    After all, this was the special ability of the Lin Astral Family that allowed them topletely subdue their pets. He had never seen this kind of rebellious behaviour from his pets before.


    As he stared at them, he couldn''t help saying, "What are you doing? It''s me, your master."


    But his pets justpletely ignored him as they turned their attention to Lin Fan.


    Then while Lin Hong was still talking to them, the three of them suddenly charged at Lin Fan.


    Seeing this, Lin Hong couldn''t help revealing a smile.


    It seemed that even if they were acting a bit strange, they were still focused on the fight. Since that was the case¡­


    Lin Hong also released his forcews and was about to charge at Lin Fan, but then his chin couldn''t help dropping and his eyes couldn''t help opening wide.


    That was because his pets didn''t attack Lin Fan like he had thought¡­


    But rather, they suddenly stopped in front of him and looked down at him. It was as if they were examining him for something.


    "What are you¡­" Lin Hong tried saying, but¡­


    Before he could finish, the three pets suddenly shrank down to a size that matched Lin Fan and started sucking up to him.


    It was almost as if they were Lin Fan''s pets instead of Lin Hong''s pets.


    Lin Hong just stood there in a daze for a while before suddenly shouting, "What is going on here?!"


    He wasn''t the only one that thought this, all of the others watching were also shocked by this.


    Lin Fan just ignored the three pets as he looked at Lin Hong and asked, "What''s wrong?"


    Lin Hong''s face twisted with rage once again as he asked through gritted teeth, "What did you do?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a knowing smile without saying anything.


    Lin Hong hated this feeling that he felt from Lin Fan right now.


    It was a feeling of inferiority, like he couldn''tpare to him and that was the one thing that he couldn''t ept.


    So even without his pets, he pulled out a Peak Realm Sword and released his full power as he shouted, "It''s not over yet!"


    Lin Fan just shook his head with a smile before waving his hand at Lin Hong''s three pets.


    As soon as he waved his hand, the three pets that had been trying to rub up against Lin Fan suddenly turned around and looked at Lin Hong.


    When Lin Hong saw the three of them looking at him like this, he couldn''t help feeling a bad feeling. It was almost as if¡­


    Then as he expected, the three of them suddenly charged at him.


    But to his shock, they were charging at him with their forcews fully disyed.


    He thought that they might use a bit of their forcews, but he never expected them to attack him like this¡­


    It was almost as if they were treating him as an enemy that had killed their entire family.


    Lin Hong had no choice but to raise his sword to block them, but he didn''t use his full power against them.


    Even if he was strict with them when giving orders, they still held a soft spot in his heart. After all, he had received these pets from his grandfather all those years ago.


    They had grown up with him, so they were like siblings instead of pets.


    But even if he held back, that didn''t mean that they would hold back.


    They mmed right into Lin Hong and sent him flying out of the arena. He kept flying until he mmed right into the wall bashing him, spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    Everyone held their breath when they saw this because no one had expected the situation to develop like this.

 Chapter 944 Duel (4)

    Lin Hong weakly fell to the ground from the wall.


    As hended, he looked up from his ce on the ground at the three pets standing over him before turning to Lin Fan with a look filled with disbelief as he said, "What did you do?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he waved his hand again.


    With the wave of his hand, the three pets moved forward again.


    This time, they didn''t charge at Lin Hong, but ratherpletely surrounded him.


    When the three pets had surrounded him, Lin Hong couldn''t help feeling a bad feeling as he said, "What are you nning on¡­"


    Before he could finish his words, with a snap of the fingers from Lin Fan, the three pets raised their front limbs and¡­


    They started trampling on Lin Hong.


    They didn''t use their forcews and used their paws alone to trample on Lin Hong, but Lin Hong was already injured from being charged at by the three of them. He had also been caught off guard by the sudden attacks of these three pets, so he wasn''t able to raise his life energy barrier in time.


    As the three of them were trampling him in turn, there was no space given to Lin Hong to react. As the paws stomped down on him, he had no choice but to take it while lying there.


    All of the chins of the people watching dropped when they saw this.


    They had thought that the duel would end with Lin Hong being sted out of the arena, but they never thought that Lin Fan would be this cruel.


    Finally, some of the cousins closer to Lin Hong couldn''t help saying, "Lin Fan, don''t take it too far."


    They had stopped calling him "cousin" and called him by his name directly to threaten him. It was just too bad that this didn''t work at all.


    Lin Fan just coldly looked at them and said, "Take it too far? What do you mean? We''re just having a duel here."


    Hearing the indifferent way that he said this, they all couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spines. It was at that moment that they realized that they had made a mistake.


    Their perception of him waspletely wrong.


    They had thought that he was a pushover that they could easily suppress, but now they realized that they had been too naive¡­


    Lin Fan was the furthest thing away from a pushover.


    But hearing these words, Lin Hong who had been lying on the ground being stomped realized something.


    That was right!


    This was a duel!


    Since it was a duel, as long as he gave up, then Lin Fan would have to stop!


    As for the implications of losing, he didn''t have time to think about that now as he was being trampled on like this. If he continued lying down and being beaten one sidedly like this, he would lose all his reputation.


    As for the other things, they could be discussedter on.


    After all, Lin Hong didn''t believe that Lin Fan had aplished this all on his own. As long as heined about Lin Fan relying on outside help to defeat him, then he would at least have a way out.


    It was better than his current situation.


    So Lin Hong opened his mouth and said, "I surren¡­Bmhp!"


    Once again, before he could say anything, there was a paw that fell down on him.


    Before this, those paws had only been trampling his body and avoided his face. However, this time, the pawnded right on his face and stopped him from talking.


    The elephant''s pawnded right on his face, blocking itpletely, which naturally included his mouth. All he could do was muffle out a pained grunt which sounded like nonsense.


    But once the elephant''s paw came up, Lin Hong endured the pain and tried to say, "I surren¡­"


    Once again, before he could finish these words, there was another paw thatnded on his face.


    This time, it was the rhino paw that smashed into his face and stopped him from talking.


    These paws were all big enough that his face waspletely squished and he wasn''t able to make a single sound. The only sounds that he could make were the muffled sounds of his pain.


    The rhino''s paw came off Lin Hong''s face and he was about to say something, but this time it was the hippo''s paw that smashed his face.


    If it was once or twice, he might be able to give an excuse, but it was impossible to deem this as a coincidence now. Not to mention that all of these stomps were timed to fall right as he was about to speak¡­


    It was clear that these stomps were deliberate.


    Even the Lin Astral Family juniors on the side could tell that Lin Fan was doing this on purpose.


    Indeed, Lin Fan was doing this on purpose.<novelnext></novelnext>


    He had received a task from the Lin Astral Emperor to teach these juniors a lesson, so he was doing that right now.


    He had been a scion back on earth and he knew what these Lin Astral Family juniors were thinking.


    In the Lin Astral Empire where no one went against them and they could dominate over anyone they met, naturally a sense of pride had been developed. The problem was that the sense of pride that they had developed was too strong and it made them willful.


    They didn''t have the humility that came with knowing defeat, so they didn''t know how to treat others properly.


    In cases like this, Lin Fan knew that the best way to deal with them was to crush this pride.


    As long as their pride was crushed, they would know how to be humble again.


    This was what had happened to him when he came to this world and his soul hadbined with the other Lin Fan''s.


    So he was doing the same with these Lin Astral Family juniors.


    As for how he was nning on doing it¡­Naturally he was going to beat it out of them.


    With how he was beating up Lin Hong with that smile on his face, no one among the juniors dared to say a thing.


    Finally, it was Lin Tian who came out and said, "Stop it now!"


    He used his full prestige as a Peak Sun Realm Expert when he said this and it scared all three of Lin Hong''s pets into stopping their actions. It was during this pause that Lin Tian suddenly charged forward and pulled Lin Hong out from under the feet of the three pets.


    Once he brought Lin Hong out, the other juniors came over to help him.


    He was covered in blood and it looked very serious, but when they looked carefully, they realized that it was nothing more than superficial injuries and his foundation wasn''t damaged.


    The only real damage that he suffered was mental damage.


    Lin Tian knitted his brows when he saw this before he turned to Lin Fan and said in a dark voice, "What is going on here?"


    He was surprised to find that Lin Fan didn''t back down in the face of his pressure at all and just calmly said, "We were having a duel as proposed by Lin Hong, is there a problem?"


    Lin Tian knitted his brows even more as he asked, "A duel?"


    He pointed at Lin Hong who was lying there on the ground and asked, "You call this a duel? It''s clear that you have lost yourself after living away from our Lin Astral Family for so long. As your elder, it''s my duty to teach you a lesson!"


    As he said this, he had already raised his hand as if he was about to make a move.


    But before he couldn''t he suddenly felt a pressure fall onto him as another voice rang out, "Teach him a lesson? And what lesson is that?"


    The moment that he heard this voice, he couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his spine because he recognized this voice. This was a voice that he would recognize no matter where he heard it because it was a voice that had been deeply imprinted on his mind.


    He turned around to see Lin Jian standing there behind him.


    The moment that he saw him, he couldn''t help being shocked since he hadn''t sensed him at all.


    In the past, he could at least feel that he was a match for Lin Jian, but now¡­


    He couldn''t even understand how Lin Jian had be this strong in exile all these years.


    But he couldn''t back down now¡­


    So Lin Tian said, "Yes, I said that I would teach him a lesson. Is this any way for them to act as cousins?"


    Lin Jian gave a cold snort and said, "Then why aren''t you teaching your grandson a lesson for proposing the duel in the first ce?"


    When Lin Tian heard this, he couldn''t help trembling.


    Since the servants of the pce had learned about this matter, naturally they would know about it as well. That was the reason why Lin Tian had shown up when Lin Hong had been beaten by Lin Fan to save him.


    He had been watching the entire time, waiting to see how the situation developed.


    Lin Tian opened his mouth and closed it again and again, not being able to say anything in the end.


    After all, there was nothing that he could refute him with¡­


    He was right, it was Lin Hong who had proposed the duel in the first ce and it was already embarrassing enough.


    Since that was the case, he turned to the other juniors and said, "We''re leaving."


    Without even looking back, he started leaving with Lin Hong and the others.


    But then, a voice rang out behind him, "What about the terms of the duel?"

 Chapter 945 Reward

    The moment that this was said, Lin Tian couldn''t help stopping.


    Since he knew about the duel, he naturally also knew about the bet that they had set.


    But how could he allow that to happen?


    Since he was forced into a corner by Lin Fan and he couldn''t suppress him with Lin Jian here, he had no other choice¡­


    Lin Tian turned around with a smile and said, "Great nephew, this is just a squabble between kids, is there a need to be that serious?"


    His only choice now was to downy it and try to use familial pressure to get Lin Fan to drop this matter.


    Since he couldn''t use force, he could only use a soft method to handle this matter. However, no matter how one looked at it, it was a very low handed method.


    Even some of the Lin Astral Family juniors couldn''t help revealing looks of disdain when they saw this.


    But they couldn''t say anything in this matter.


    Lin Jian immediately knitted his brows when he heard this, but before he could say anything, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Alright, let''s dy these matters by a few days since cousin Hong is injured. However, I wille and settle this matter in a few days."


    While it wasn''t the result that he wanted to see, it was still better than nothing. At the very least, he had bought himself a few days toe up with countermeasures for this matter.


    So Lin Arian said with a smile, "Of course, great nephew."


    But then when he turned around to leave, his face turned cold again.


    Once they were all gone, Lin Jian asked Lin Fan, "Xiao Fan, is it really alright to let them leave like this?"


    Lin Fan looked at Lin Jian with a smile and said, "Grandfather, I have my own considerations."


    Seeing the confident look on his face, Lin Jian revealed an appreciative smile.


    It seemed like Lin Fan already had his own considerations and he was just being nosy.


    So he decided not to pursue this matter and leave this up to Lin Fan.


    Instead, he changed the topic by saying, "Come with me, father wants to see you."


    Lin Fan nodded and the two of them headed off.


    ¡­


    In a private room.


    Lin Fan entered with Lin Jian to see that the Lin Astral Emperor, the empress, and his parents were already there waiting for him.


    When he saw Lin Ao, he couldn''t help being a bit surprised.


    That was because Lin Ao waspletely covered in cuts.


    But Yue Qingrou was already helping him wrap up his wounds and he could see the proud look on his face, so he knew that these were his scars of victory.


    He knew better than to interrupt the lovey dovey time between his parents, that would never end well¡­


    Perhaps if this kept going, it would be likely that he would get another sibling soon¡­


    After sitting down, the Lin Astral Emperor asked, "How did it go?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile and said, "It''s going slowly, but the n is progressing."


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod before saying, "Good." Then after thinking about it, he said, "I should give you some kind of reward for this."


    Lin Fan''s smile became wider as he said, "Great grandfather, haven''t you already done that?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor was surprised to hear this, but then he revealed a wide smile as well before asking, "When did you notice?"


    Lin Fan gave a chuckle and said, "Well, it was all too suspicious, so I had some people investigate."


    As they had beening back to the castle, Lin Fan had sent the people that the Lin Astral Emperor had assigned to him back to the auction house to check some things. The information that he had received had been what he had expected.


    For the auction house to suddenly put the items that it had auctioned off today on auction, there had to be someone acting from behind the scene.


    After all, these were all rare items that would normally never be auctioned off since the Lin Astral Family would strictly control them.


    So the only way that these things could be sold is because¡­there was someone meddling.


    As for who¡­<novelnext></novelnext>


    Who else would it be other than the Lin Astral Emperor who hadplete control over the Lin Astral Family. If his permission wasn''t given, would anyone dare to allow the auction house auction these things off?


    So the only exnation was that the Lin Astral Emperor had given these items to the auction house.


    But why would he do that?


    It was for this reason that he had been given a hundred dragon vein crystals in the first ce.


    The Lin Astral Emperor wanted these items to end up in his hands.


    It could be said that this was a reward that the Lin Astral Emperor had set up just for Lin Fan.


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave another nod when he heard Lin Fan''s response before saying, "Still, I should give you another reward for your hard work¡­What should I give you?"


    Lin Fan''s lips couldn''t help twitching when he heard this.


    The current Lin Astral Emperor waspletely different from the Lin Astral Emperor that he had met when they first saw each other.


    The current Lin Astral Emperor no longer had the serious tone that he had in the beginning, instead he now looked like a friendly old grandpa who looked a bit too young for his age.


    As he fell into thought, the empress on the side suddenly said, "Dear, you can''t keep doing this."


    Lin Fan let out a secret sigh of relief when he heard this as he thought that the empress would restrain the Lin Astral Emperor, but her next words shocked that thought out of his mind.


    The Lin Astral Empress said, "You have to remember to give something to Xue''er as well."


    The Lin Astral Emperor was surprised when he heard this, but then he gave a serious nod of agreement.


    These two had always been regretful about letting their son leave, so they had suppressed their pampering side. Not to mention that there had never been anyone in the Lin Astral Family that had caught their eyes since they were just prideful young scions that brought shame to their family.


    So they had been suppressing their urge to pamper their grandchildren for the longest time.


    But now that they had found Lin Fan, they could finally let that urge to pampere out.


    Lin Fan was the great grandson of their only son, so in a sense, he was also like their own grandson. Not to mention that he was talented and had a personality that matched their tastes, so they were more than happy to pamper him.


    At the same time, during the month long trip that they took, the two of them had also spent quite a bit of time with Lin Xue and they had fallen in love with her as well.


    She was a smart and beautiful girl, as well as being their granddaughter, so it was hard for them not to love her.


    Now that they finally had grandchildren to spoil, they didn''t hold back at all in spoiling them.


    As for Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou, they didn''t receive the same level of pampering since they could see the firm look in Lin Ao''s eyes.


    If they were to try and pamper him, it would just be a waste since he wouldn''t ept anything. Yue Qingrou was deeply in love with Lin Ao, so she followed him and wouldn''t ept anything from them.


    So now Lin Fan and Lin Xue were stuck with the problem of being pampered by the two of them¡­


    It would be fine if it was normal pampering, but the things that these two who stood at the peak of the Lin Astral Family gave¡­were anything but normal.


    In the auction just now, Lin Fan had received a Ruler Artifact Embryo and a qilin egg that could be a Ruler Pet. Either of these things were more than enough to create a stir in the entire Lin Astral Empire, but both of them had ended up on him.


    And that was just the beginning of being pampered by this royal couple.


    Lin Fan already couldn''t imagine what they would give him next and he felt a headacheing on.


    But still, this was their way of showing love to their grandchildren, so he never stopped them and just politely epted.


    He could see the regret that they had and this was their way of making up for it. It wasn''t anything bad and they were family, so he did want to help them.


    But as he listened to their discussion about what to give them, he had no choice but to cut in since none of the others were saying anything.


    Lin Jian, Lin Ao, and Yue Qingrou were just listening with smiles on their faces as if they had already epted what the royal couple were nning to give.


    But the words ", "secret realm", and "Ruler" were being thrown around like it was nothing, that it was just too scary to let them continue.


    So Lin Fan gave a cough and said, "Grandfather, about the request that I made."


    The Lin Astral Emperor and his wife were pulled back from their discussion when they heard this. He then said, "Oh, right, I''ve already gotten people to set it up and it''ll be ready in a few days."


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this.


    As for what it was that he had asked for¡­


    It was naturally the pet shop!

 Chapter 946 New Shop

    Over the next few days, there wasn''t much that happened.


    The Lin Astral Family had all gained a new fear of Lin Fan after the incident with Lin Hong, so they all did the best that they could to avoid him.


    As for Lin Hong and Lin Tian, that entire branch almost disappeared from the pce overnight.


    They had been able to defer Lin Hong''s bet, but they knew that it was impossible for them to negate it. It had been made in front of all the Lin Astral Family juniors and had been spread all over the pce.


    Overnight, it had even spread out to the nobles and to themoners.


    That was because any gossip that involved the Lin Astral Family would naturally spread.


    Not to mention that it was gossip that was rted to Lin Fan, the new heir that had appeared out of nowhere.


    People were naturally curious about this person that had suddenly been dered as the heir to the Lin Astral Emperor.


    It was impossible for them to stop the curiosity of the people.


    Even if they punished the people who spread this gossip, it would be impossible for them to punish everyone since there were just too many people spreading this gossip in the first ce.


    So they did the best that they could to avoid the public eye.


    Lin Fan didn''t do much either during this time because he knew that the best way to hurt them was to let this gossip spread. After all, it was impossible for them to avoid these rumours and words hurt more than people would think.


    Even if they acted like they didn''t care, the words could dig under their skin and pierce their hearts.


    Lin Fan on the other hand just spent his time in leisure.


    He acted like he was on vacation, hanging out around the pce without a care in the world.


    Normally people would criticize someone like this, but after the terrifying disy that he had shown, no one dared to say a thing.


    After all, he defeated Lin Hong who was in the High Realm as a Star Realm Expert. It was even said that Lin Fan hadn''t personally made a move and had just used Lin Hong''s pets against him.


    No one had figured out how Lin Fan had done it, but they knew that he wasn''t simple.


    Finally, after the days had passed, it was time for Lin Fan''s new store.


    The Lin Astral Emperor had used up all his free days and he was now busy with the affairs of the empire, it was the same with the empress. The two of them really wanted to personally bring Lin Fan to the store, but they had to leave it to their subordinates in the end.


    The subordinates all treated Lin Fan with respect when they met him. It was clear that they had heard the rumours about him and had a bit of fear towards him.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind this at all.


    He was just excited to see his new store.


    With the Peak Sun Realm cloaks that he had received, they were able to make their way to the store without any trouble.


    It was just a good thing that they had these cloaks since the ce that the store was in was quite the crowded ce.


    The Lin Astral Emperor hadn''t held back at all when it came to fulfilling Lin Fan''s request. He had gotten him the very best ce that one could get, it was the center spot of the best business street in the entire capital.


    There had been arge store there previously, but it had disappeared in a matter of days.


    This was a business for the Lin Astral Family that had been very profitable, but since it was a decree from the Lin Astral Emperor, they had no choice but to shut it all down.


    There were many people that questioned this decision and after learning that it was for Lin Fan, there were even more people that questioned it.


    They used Lin Fan of being a wastrel for the way that he was acting.


    However, no one dared to use him in public since they had heard the rumours about him.


    When Lin Fan arrived at the store, he was surprised to see how big it was.


    This was basically a giant shopping mall in his old world, but here it was being used as a single store.


    Still, he was happy to use this ce since it would give him plenty of space for what he needed.


    Once they arrived, the subordinates asked Lin Fan if there was anything that he needed.


    Lin Fan just simply dismissed them before heading in to check on the store itself.


    When he came in, he saw that this ce had already been fully furnished as a pet store. The items that were there were so good that even he couldn''t help taking a few of them with him¡­


    After all, it would all be gone once the system had its way with the store.


    After making his way through the store to close all the blinds, Lin Fan walked out and stood in front of the store.


    All of the people that the Lin Astral Emperor sent were confused when they saw this.


    Their leader couldn''t helping forward to ask in a worried voice, "Young master, are you not satisfied with the store?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    If there was something that Lin Fan wasn''t satisfied with, the ones that would be punished would be them. They had decorated the store before Lin Fan received it, so of course it would be their responsibility if he didn''t like it.


    So all of them couldn''t help being nervous when they saw him acting this way.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "It''s not that I''m not satisfied with the store. It''s something else."


    Lin Fan turned back to the door and after confirming with the system, he said, "Well, just wait and see."


    They couldn''t understand what Lin Fan meant by this, so they became even more worried after hearing this.


    Still, since Lin Fan had already spoken, it wasn''t as if there was anything that they could do.


    So all they could do was wait like he had said.


    After about fifteen minutes, Lin Fan suddenly started to move.


    Seeing this, the subordinates quickly moved along with him.


    They had just watched him stand there silently for fifteen minutes. He had been so still that the people around had even started noticing him even with the obscuring power of the cloaks, people couldn''t help noticing them with how strange they were acting.


    Once Lin Fan opened the door, the subordinates couldn''t help being shocked by what they saw.


    That was because the store hadpletely changed from how it had looked previously.


    In fact, they could even tell that there were spatialws that had been applied to the store which made it much bigger than it had been before.


    Just what had happened in the fifteen minutes that they had been waiting outside?


    They hadn''t noticed anyone at all entering the store, let alone someone changing the inside of the store.


    For this kind ofrge scale renovation, it was impossible not to make any sounds or life energy fluctuations.


    So what happened here?


    Lin Fan just acted like everything was normal as he went in and set up the store as usual.


    Ang, Momonga, and Yuki all helped him set up the store since they were already used to this.


    Lin Xue was among the group that was shocked by this since she had never seen him renovating a store before.


    She couldn''t helping over and tugging Lin Fan''s sleeve as she asked, "What happened here? How did the store suddenly change?"


    Lin Fan saw the cute way that she asked this and just said with a teasing smile, "Magic."


    Lin Xue could naturally tell that he was teasing her, so she pouted her lips and headed over to where Ang and Yuki were.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind as he started setting up the things that he needed.


    At the same time, he did something that he should have done a long time ago.


    He leveled up the system again.


    He hadn''t seen the need to level it up before, but with the different stores all earning money for him, he had too many points to not do it anymore. Not to mention, he wanted to see what kind of new features he would unlock.


    But he was disappointed since there weren''t any new features that were unlocked.


    It was just an overall upgrade to the current features of the store.


    Now, he was able to train Ruler Pets.


    He might have been surprised by this before, but now he just figured that it was natural.


    After all, this was a store that even shocked Rulers with its features and was something that came from a god, so it should only be natural that it would be able to train Ruler Pets.


    But what he didn''t expect was therge stir that this would create when the store opened.


    Still, that was still a few days away.


    Before that, he needed to collect on a few debts.


    It was finally time for him to bring Lin Hong in and make him pay up.


    But before that, he had to find Lin Hong.


    For that, there was no one better than the Lin Astral Emperor¡­but he was busy, so he settled for his ancestor, Lin Jian.


    So the first thing to do was head back to the pce.

 Chapter 947 Collecting Bets (1)

    After arriving back at the pce, Lin Fan found Lin Jian, but he was surprised to see that Lin Ao was also with him.


    It turned out that the other people in his generation had been scared off just like Lin Fan had scared off Lin Hong and the rest.


    His performance at the sword trial had just been too shocking that they couldn''t do anything to him.


    So they did all they could to avoid him.


    Even though he hadn''t reached the World Realm, they regarded him as a monster just like Lin Fan.


    After Lin Jian heard what Lin Fan wanted, he couldn''t help revealing a smile and standing up right away as he said, "Let''s go then."


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile before following him.


    As for Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou, they decided to stay.


    Lin Ao had been training with his sword when Lin Fan arrived and he would stay here to keep training his sword.


    Even if the people in the same generation regarded him as a monster, he knew that he wasckingpared to his son who was the true monster.


    As a parent, he was proud that his son was growing, but he didn''t want to fall too far behind. He wanted to stand tall as the father of this monster, so he couldn''t let himself fall behind too much.


    So he had put his everything into his sword training.


    Yue Qingrou could see what he was feeling, so she silently supported him from the side.


    But she was proud of both her son and her husband.


    Lin Jian led Lin Fan out of the pce to his surprise.


    He had thought that Lin Tian''s branch would stay in the pce since it was the safest ce, but it seemed that they didn''t think the same.


    After all, it was the ce where the Lin Astral Emperor and consequently Lin Jian held the most influence. If they remained in that ce, they would be at a disadvantage if Lin Fan came to collect on the bet.


    So they had evacuated to the residence of their branch thinking that if they were in their territory, they would at least control what happened.


    But that was the wrong idea.


    If they had remained in the pce, it would have actually restrained the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian more.


    This matter was something that would make others believe that the Lin Astral Family wasn''t as united as they seemed. That was thest thing that the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian wanted to see happen since that would hurt the prestige of the Lin Astral Family.


    There were too many outsider eyes in the pce and if they did do something to Lin Tian''s branch, it would be found immediately.


    So they would actually be restrained by this.


    But outside of the pce, even if there were people watching them, it was easy for them to avoid these watching eyes. They didn''t have the same worries as they did inside of the pce.


    When they arrived, the first thing that Lin Jian did was knock on the door. It was just too bad that this wasn''t a normal knock.


    This was a knock that used hisws, so the doors were blown off their handles and flew out into the courtyard of this residence.


    Lin Jian wasn''t worried about this being seen since he had already sent his people to take care of the people watching this residence.


    The moment that the door flew off their handles andnded in the yard, the people who were there practicing their techniques were shocked. They turned to look at Lin Jian who was standing there with shocked looks, but not a single one of them asked who he was.


    Even if they were blind, they would still recognize him.


    He was the son of the Lin Astral Emperor, someone who had been famous in the Lin Astral Empire since long ago.


    Not to mention, many of the ones currently practicing were those that were in the same generation or the generation above him, so they had a deeper impression of him than most.


    With the loud sound, the people inside were also drawn out.


    Lin Tian came out with Lin Hong following behind him.


    The moment that the two of them saw Lin Jian and Lin Fan respectively, they couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    The shocked look on Lin Tian''s face quickly disappeared as he came forward and said in a stern voice, "Cousin, what are you doing?"


    Lin Jian didn''t say anything as he looked at Lin Fan, as if waiting for him to speak.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this, he just cleared his throat and said, "We''re here to collect on a debt."


    Lin Tian knitted his brows when he heard this, but he said in a confused voice, "Debt? What debt?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Great uncle, did you forget about the bet that cousin Hong and I made?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    Lin Tian of course knew that this was the reason that they were here, but he had been ying dumb to avoid confronting them. He had hoped that if he denied it, they wouldn''t make a big deal of this matter, but it was clear that this wasn''t the case.


    Since that was the case, he would act dumb until the end.


    Lin Tian said with a serious look, "I don''t remember any bets that were left unpaid. Great nephew, are you sure that you are remembering this correctly?"


    Lin Fan just said with the same smile, "Of course, it was something that everyone witnessed, so how could I remember incorrectly? I think that cousin Hong still has to pay his wager."


    Lin Tian knitted his brows and said, "Great nephew, didn''t we agree that we should drop this matter? After all, we are family and we shouldn''t be doing things like this."


    Lin Fan''s expression suddenly changed as he said with a serious look, "Is great uncle joking? This was a duel that was set with our honour on the line, so if great uncle is asking me to forget this, this is an insult to my pride."


    All of the members of Lin Tian''s branch revealed ugly expressions when they heard this.


    Lin Tian''s expression rxed a bit when he heard this since he didn''t want a direct confrontation with Lin Fan. He quickly raised his hand and said, "Great nephew, I didn''t mean that. It''s just that we''re all family..."


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan suddenly came forward and said, "Great uncle, if you truly believe this, it will be an insult to my honour. In that case, I will challenge you to a duel."


    When Lin Tian heard this, his chin couldn''t help dropping.


    What was this great nephew of his saying?


    He would challenge him to a duel?


    Challenge who?


    Lin Tian just didn''t know how to react when he heard this, but he had definitely been ced in a very difficult situation.


    Now he had to decide whether to fight Lin Fan or to hand over Lin Hong.


    If he chose to fight Lin Fan, there was nothing for him to gain since he was from the older generation and Lin Fan was from the younger generation.


    If Lin Fan challenged him, he could either ept or decline.


    If he epted and won, he would gain nothing and would be looked down on for bullying a junior. If he declined, he would be recognized as someone who was afraid of a junior, so he didn''t dare duel him.


    There was no upside to this.


    But if he handed Lin Hong, that would be equal to throwing away his face as the leader of this branch.


    So it was now deciding which one was the less embarrassing option for him.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Tian finally said, "Xiao Fan, this is just a small matter, you shouldn''t take it this seriously. Let''s just sit down and talk this over as a family, I''m sure that we can find a solution to this."


    He had finally rxed his tone and spoken in a gentle voice for the first time. Even though he didn''t mean it, he wanted to put Lin Fan at ease by invoking the feelings of family.


    Lin Fan had the same stern look as he said, "If you don''t want to solve this matter, then I''ll have to go to grandfather about it."


    After saying this, he turned to leave.


    As he turned to leave, all of the people around revealed shocked looks.


    They never thought that Lin Fan would bring the Lin Astral Emperor into this matter.


    Once the Lin Astral Emperor was brought in, this would go from a small matter to a big matter.


    Lin Tian naturally could not allow that to happen.


    So after a moment of hesitation, he said through gritted teeth, "Great nephew, you can take your cousin Hong with you."


    Lin Hong''s face became very ugly at that moment.


    In the end, he was being sacrificed.


    Of course, he couldn''t me them.


    Compared to the fate of the entire branch, it was much easier to just sacrifice him to Lin Fan.


    Even if he went to be Lin Fan''s ve, they were still family, so Lin Fan wouldn''t go too far.


    Lin Fan suddenly stopped when he heard this and he turned around to look at Lin Tian.


    Lin Tian couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his spine as Lin Fan looked at him.


    Lin Fan looked right at Lin Tian and said, "Since you have offended my honour, I challenge you to a duel."

 Chapter 948 Collecting Bets (2)

    Everyone''s mouths dropped in shock when they heard this.


    There were many people even checking their ears to see if they had heard this correctly.


    Lin Fan was actually challenging Lin Tian to a duel?


    Lin Fan might be a monster, but he was still someone from the youngest generation.


    Lin Tian was someone who was three generations higher and was someone that was on the same level as Lin Jian.


    Not to mention the cultivation level difference.


    Lin Fan was only in the Star Realm while Lin Jian was in the Peak Sun Realm!


    This was a gap that was impossible to climb no matter how much of a monster Lin Fan was.


    That was two major realms!


    So everyone couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was doing, except¡­Lin Jian.


    He wasn''t surprised at all by Lin Fan''s challenge towards Lin Tian since he knew something that the rest of them didn''t know. In his eyes, one could see enough confidence in Lin Fan, as if he could already see Lin Fan''s victory.


    If anyone had actually seen it, they would have thought that he was crazy since it would be impossible for Lin Fan to win.


    There was only silence that filled the air for a long time as people didn''t know how to react at all.


    It was only after a long time that Lin Tian finally said with great difficulty, "You want to challenge me to a duel? Are you sure?"


    He couldn''t help asking this since he couldn''t believe his ears.


    After all, no one would think that someone in the Star Realm would challenge someone like him who was in the Peak Sun Realm.


    That was equal to suicide.


    But he also couldn''t help feeling a bit of rage since this challenge would without a doubt hurt his prestige. Even if he didn''t ept it, even if he chose to ignore Lin Fan, his prestige would still be hurt as someone who was challenged by a junior.


    This was a mark that would never be washed off.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at Lin Tian and answered, "I challenge you to a duel because you have insulted my honour."


    Everyone couldn''t help revealing even more shocked looks when Lin Fan said this the second time.


    If he just backed down here, then nothing would have happened and they could have treated it as a joke.


    But the fact that he said it again meant that there was no backing down now.


    Lin Tian''s face turned dark as he said, "Then are you prepared for the consequences?"


    Since Lin Fan was this crazy, he would oblige him.


    Since Lin Fan would go this far to piss him off, then he would take this chance to vent his anger.


    Since Lin Fan wouldn''t back down, then neither would he.


    Lin Fan just said with a calm smile, "Isn''t it just beating an old dog? What consequences will there be?"


    Everyone was suddenly filled with rage at Lin Fan''s words of provocation.


    This time, his arrogance had reached the sky¡­It had even torn a hole in the sky with how arrogant he was.


    Old dog?


    This was Lin Tian, one of the pirs of the Lin Astral Family and he dared to call him old dog?


    This kid clearly didn''t have any adults in his eyes.


    But Lin Tian was surprisingly calm as he said, "Good, very good. Since you''re this confident, then I''ll y with you."


    Then he turned his eyes to look at Lin Jian standing beside Lin Fan as he said, "Cousin, you heard your grandson. He''s the one that provoked me first, so my hands are tied. The only question now is¡­will you be interfering?"


    The reason why he didn''t lose his temper right away was because he knew that Lin Jian was still here.


    Lin Jian was the one person that he would always fear no matter what.


    This was a fear that was deeply imprinted in his heart.


    If Lin Jian made a move here, this situation wouldn''t be good for him.


    So he had to see what Lin Jian''s intentions were before he made his move.


    Lin Jian just looked at Lin Tian and said, "It''s his matters, why would I interfere?"


    Everyone was once again shocked when they heard this, it was even enough for them to forget their rage.


    After all, they didn''t expect Lin Jian to act this careless in this matter.


    Lin Jian was someone that could match Lin Tian, so he would be the only one that could stop him if things went too far. But now he was saying that he wouldn''t interfere¡­so would he still not interfere when Lin Fan was in danger?<novelnext></novelnext>


    After all, if he did interfere now that he had said this, this would be a blow to his prestige.


    Lin Tian just gave a nod before revealing a wide smile.


    This was a smile that didn''t reach his eyes at all though as his eyes still had the faint mes of rage in them.


    He looked at Lin Fan and said, "Great nephew, follow me."


    Then without even looking back, he headed into the residence.


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Jian followed him without a single care.


    Lin Tian led them into the residence, into arge building where there was arge arena waiting.


    This was the training area of Lin Tian''s branch.


    Lin Tian jumped onto the stage before turning to Lin Fan and saying, "I''m waiting."


    Lin Fan just revealed a smile and also jumped into the arena.


    Lin Tian then asked, "Shall we have a referee for this match?"


    Even if he had lost himself in his rage, he still kept a bit of his reasoning. His proposal for a judge was to make sure that when things got too heated, someone would be able to stop them.


    After all, he knew how much the Lin Astral Emperor valued Lin Fan, so it wasn''t in his best interests to hurt him.


    But to his surprise, Lin Fan said, "There''s no need."


    Lin Tian knitted his brows as he looked at him for a few seconds, but then he gave a nod in agreement.


    With the difference in cultivation levels, he should be able to hold himself back if things came to worse. Things should end much earlier than that since he would be able to suppress Lin Fan right away with his cultivation base.


    He had only asked just in case.


    Since they were both ready, there was no waiting. Lin Tian just had someone dere the start of the match and they would fight.


    Before the match began, the two of them just stared at each other.


    Lin Tian couldn''t help being unnerved as he looked at Lin Fan.


    The calm way that Lin Fan was just standing there, it was almost as if he could already see his victory. But by allmon reasoning, he shouldn''t be this confident since every single factor was in Lin Tian''s favour.


    There was no world where Lin Fan would be able to defeat Lin Tian.


    So why was he this confident?


    Lin Tian could see that this confidence wasn''t fake¡­he could see the look in Lin Fan''s eyes.


    It was as if he could already see himself defeating Lin Tian.


    The more Lin Tian saw this look, the more it unnerved him because it was just like Lin Jian''s eyes whenever he faced him in the past.


    Lin Jian had also looked at him like this whenever they had fought.


    It was like he didn''t put him in his eyes at all.


    This look triggered Lin Tian''s mental trauma and he couldn''t hold himself back anymore.


    He suddenly summoned out his pet.


    It was a giant deer that had antlers that seemed to be made of crystals, but when one looked at it more closely, they would see that it was made out of ice.


    This was the Frozen Antler Deer, a Peak Sun Realm Pet.


    As soon as the Frozen Antler Deer was summoned, it raised itself onto its two back legs and the ice antlers started to glow. It didn''t take long before there was a blizzard that started forming around the Frozen Antler Deer that quickly spread all around it.


    The only safe space was the space around the Frozen Antler Deer where Lin Tian was standing.


    The pressure from this blizzard made almost all of the spectators tremble since this was an all out attack from a Peak Sun Realm Pet.


    Most of the spectators were only in the Star Realm, there were only a few that were in the Realm. So this kind of pressure was very strong for them and they found it hard to withstand.


    If it wasn''t for the barrier around the arena, they might have copsed right away from being exposed to this pressure.


    But Lin Fan just calmly stood there in the arena, watching the wall of snow and winding at him.


    He didn''t flinch at all when he saw this and just looked like he didn''t even see it at all.


    Lin Tian felt another tinge of unease fill his heart, so he secretly gave an order to the Frozen Antler Deer.


    The ice antlers lit up with even more light as the blizzard became even stronger.


    Everyone believed that as long as Lin Fan was hit by this blizzard, he would be frozen in an instant. There was no chance that Lin Fan would be able to resist or dodge this attack, so they were just waiting to see him being frozen.


    But right before the attack could hit him¡­Lin Fan disappeared.

 Chapter 949 Collecting Bets (3)

    No one could believe that Lin Fan was able to dodge it, but Lin Tian''s reaction confirmed it.


    The moment that Lin Fan disappeared, Lin Tian immediately knitted his brows and started looking around for Lin Fan.


    However, no matter how he looked, he wasn''t able to find Lin Fan in the end.


    It was as if Lin Fan hadpletely disappeared.


    With no other choice, Lin Tian said, "Great nephew, are you running away now? Does that mean that you are forfeiting this duel?"


    While he didn''t believe that someone with Lin Fan''s pride would give up that easily, he knew that it would be impossible for him to do anything if Lin Fan didn''t show himself. So he chose to taunt Lin Fan to see if he could get him to expose himself.


    But all that answered him was silence.


    Lin Tian deeply knitted his brows when he saw this and he continued searching around himself.


    But no matter how he searched, he wasn''t able to find a trace of Lin Fan.


    Until¡­


    He suddenly felt a presence from behind him.


    When Lin Tian reacted, there was a domain that suddenly fell onto him that restricted all of his movements.


    He had been caught off guard by this sudden domain falling onto him so he wasn''t able to release his domain in time when he was suppressed. Then when he was suppressed by this domain, he found that he wasn''t able to release his domain at all.


    He found that this domain was very strange since it had suppressed the flow of life energy around him.


    When this domain appeared, it was as if it had driven out all of the life energy around him and had created a void of life energy. So even if he wanted to use his powers, he wasn''t able to draw on the life energy around him.


    With no other choice, Lin Tian could only use the life energy inside of his body to create his domain, but that was only able to stop the suppression temporarily. It was still strong enough that he wasn''t able to move at all.


    Lin Tian turned around and saw that Lin Fan was standing there, right in the zone where there wasn''t a blizzard.


    He didn''t understand how Lin Fan had gotten in this space at all, but right now, Lin Fan was just casually standing there staring at him.


    Lin Fan only looked at Lin Tian for a second before moving over to the Frozen Antler Deer that was standing on the side.


    The Frozen Antler Deer had also been suppressed by this domain, so it wasn''t able to do anything. All it could do was watch as Lin Fan raised his hand that was in the form of a fist, as if he was about to punch him.


    Lin Tian wanted to say something, but before he could, Lin Fan suddenly punched the Frozen Antler Deer.


    Well, punch was too strong of a word to describe what he did.


    What he really did was simply tap the Frozen Antler Deer on the side with his fist.


    Lin Tian waspletely confused as to why Lin Fan did this until he saw the look on the Frozen Antler Deer''s face.


    It was a look ofplete shock as if it had suddenly felt something.


    But then it suddenly started moving as if it wasn''t affected by the domain around it.


    When Lin Tian saw this, his eyes suddenly lit up.


    If his pet could move, then that meant that it could take down Lin Fan.


    After all, Lin Tian didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to fight his Frozen Antler Deer.


    It was a pet in the Peak Sun Realm after all.


    But then in front of his shocked eyes, he saw the Frozen Antler Deer lean down to lick Lin Fan on the face.


    After it licked Lin Fan on the face, it suddenly released the blizzard that was around them, allowing everyone to see the scene inside. At the same time, it revealed the true appearance of the domain that suppressed Lin Tian.


    When everyone saw the scene on stage, their chins couldn''t help dropping in shock.


    That was because around Lin Tian and Lin Fan in the center of the stage, there were ten pets that were standing at the edges in a formation.


    But the most shocking thing was the cultivation of these pets.


    Everyone could tell from the aura that came from them that these pets¡­were all Sun Realm Pets!


    Not only that, they were all in the Peak Sun Realm!


    No one knew where these pets had suddenlye from, but they couldn''t deny what they were seeing.


    When Lin Tian saw all of this, he didn''t know what to say.


    All he could do was let his chin drop down in shock.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Lin Fan petted the Frozen Antler Deer on the head beforeing over to where Lin Tian was.


    When Lin Tian saw himing over, he couldn''t help stumbling back a step, but he could also feel that he wasn''t able to go any further than this with the domain on him. Even with his own domain around him, the more he moved, the more chaotic the space around him was.


    He didn''t understand what was happening, but he knew that it was rted to the ten pets around him.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t have the ability to do anything to them.


    As he watched Lin Fan getting closer, he couldn''t help saying, "Great nephew, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan just came closer and closer with each calm step.


    Finally, Lin Tian couldn''t take it anymore and said, "The duel is over, I admit de¡­"


    Before he could finish his words, he suddenly felt a pain across his cheek.


    Before anyone could react, Lin Tian was suddenly sent flying through the arena.


    When it looked like he was about to be sent out of the arena, the barrier suddenly activated and stopped him from flying any further. However, this barrier didn''t dissipate the force that he had been flying with, so he mmed right into it before sliding down onto the ground.


    A pain that Lin Tian had never felt before filled his body and he couldn''t help shaking from this pain.


    This was a pain that he hadn''t felt in a long time, not since he became a Soul Realm Expert in his teens.


    After all, the Lin Astral Family was spoiled and it didn''t just start with Lin Fan''s generation. The Lin Astral Family had been spoiled since a long time ago and Lin Tian wasn''t an exception.


    But it was also because he was inside of this strange domain that he felt this pain in the first ce.


    If it wasn''t for this strange domain suppressing his ability to use life energy, he would have been able to block this blow with his life energy. Without the life energy shield, he was taking an enhanced blow from Lin Fan with just his body.


    Even if Lin Fan was only in the Star Realm, it was impossible for him to be alright from this blow.


    But he quickly suppressed the pain and stood up to say, "I admit¡­"


    Once again, before he could finish his words, Lin Fan suddenly came up in front of him and gave him a p. The p forced the words back down his throat and he wasn''t able to say a thing as he was sent flying again.


    With the same amount of force, he hit the barrier on the other side.


    Everyone had been watching with looks of shock the entire time, but seeing Lin Tian being sent flying again, they couldn''t take it anymore.


    One of Lin Tian''s sons came forward and said, "Lin Fan, that''s enough! The duel is over!"


    He had directly called Lin Fan by his name in an attempt to show that he had power over him as a senior, but that just blew up in his face.


    Lin Fan looked at him with a look of disdain as he said, "Great uncle hasn''t admitted his defeat yet, so how is the duel over?"


    Lin Tian''s son''s face turned dark when he heard this as he shouted, "You''re not letting him admit defeat! Are you even a man?"


    Lin Fan gave a cold snort as he said, "Do you have such little belief in great uncle''s abilities? Is he really that weak that he can''t defeat someone like me from the younger generation?"


    The son''s expression suddenly twisted when he heard this, but he didn''t say a thing.


    How could he say anything?


    No matter what he said, it would sound bad for his father, so there was nothing that he could say.


    So instead of trying to reason with Lin Fan, he decided to use force.


    Even if Lin Fan had ten Peak Sun Realm Pets, they shouldn''t be looked down on. They were still a branch family of the Lin Astral Family and if they became serious, they would be able to take these pets down.


    So with a nod at the others, they all started moving forward towards the arena.


    But before they could do anything, Lin Jian suddenly pulled out his sword and said in a cold voice, "Where are you going? The duel isn''t over yet."


    When this voice rang out, everyone felt a chill run down their spine as they froze in ce.


    Lin Jian waspletely different from Lin Fan.


    He was a name that was well known among their Lin Astral Family and even their patriarch Lin Tian was afraid of him.


    So naturally these juniors were also afraid of him.


    Lin Fan ignored all of this since he knew that with Lin Jian here, they wouldn''t dare do anything.


    Lin Fan walked up to Lin Tian and helped him up before saying, "Great uncle, are you saying that you want to give up?"

 Chapter 950 Collecting Bets (4)

    When Lin Tian heard this, his face couldn''t help twisting in rage.


    Shaming him!


    He was openly shaming him!


    There was no good intentions here at all, he was clearly lifting him up in front of his family just to shame him!


    But Lin Tian could only swallow this shame since he couldn''t do a thing to Lin Fan.


    Even if he wanted to, he couldn''t even gather his life energy, so he couldn''t use his powers.


    The only thing that he could do was let himself be beaten up.


    But he couldn''t take this lying down, so he decided to use the rest of his life energy in ast ditch attempt to break through this domain.


    But before he could, he found that there was a beast that was standing over him.


    Lin Fan hadn''t moved at all this time and had sent a single beast forward.


    It was the Frozen Antler Deer.


    Seeing his pet standing in front of him, Lin Tian couldn''t help being shocked. But then he quickly revealed a wide smile as he reached his hand out towards the Frozen Antler Deer.


    When his hand came close, he said, "Xiao Lu, did you finally break¡­"


    But before he could finish, he felt a hoof stomp him in the face.


    The Frozen Antler Deer had just raised a hoof and stomped it right on Lin Tian''s face before he could even react.


    When he realized what had happened, his face had already been pushed into the ground by the Frozen Antler Deer''s hoof.


    Once again, everyone revealed shocked expressions as they couldn''t believe what just happened.


    They knew that this Frozen Antler Deer was a pet that Lin Tian had gotten when he was just a young boy and was the beast that had apanied him his entire life, so they were even more shocked that it would betray him so easily.


    Just what kind of magic had Lin Fan used to make his Xiao Lu act this way?


    As Lin Tian was trampled to the ground, the only thing that he felt was shock.


    But he quickly suppressed his shock and started thinking about everything that had happened up to this point.


    He knew that there had to be some kind of trick to Lin Fan''s abilities, so he wanted to find it. If he could, then he would be able to break his Xiao Lu out of this trick and make aeback.


    But no matter how he thought about it, he couldn''t figure out what Lin Fan had done.


    That was until he suddenly remembered something that he had heard.


    This was news that had only been passed down among the upper ranks of the Lin Astral Family, but since he was the head of a branch family, he had received this news.


    It was said that Lin Fan had the Void Physique, the true culmination of their Lin Astral Family''s cultivation technique.


    No one had been able to confirm this since Lin Fan had just arrived in the Lin Astral Empire, but this was what the Lin Astral Emperor had told them, so they had no reason to doubt¡­But many of them still doubted it because they didn''t believe that someone as young as Lin Fan would be able to aplish something like this.


    However, when Lin Tian thought about it, he remembered something special about the Void Physique.


    Master of all beasts¡­


    That was what had been described in the ancient texts.


    He had thought that it was all nonsense, but seeing the way that his Xiao Lu acted, he could tell that this wasn''t nonsense.


    Otherwise, how could this situation be exined?


    Master of all beasts, as it implies, one would be the ruler of all beasts.


    The Lin Astral Family''s specialty was the voidw, so they had control over beasts that were usually much stronger than them.


    As for how they did it, it was the same thing that Lin Fan did.


    They used their voidws to drain out impurities from the bloodlines of beasts to subdue them. At the same time, this allowed them to train beasts that were much stronger than other beasts.


    So in truth, the pets of Lin Tian and Lin Hong were all stronger than them even if they were in the same cultivation realm.


    So even if they had fought them, they would have lost in the end.


    Lin Tian knew that there was no way for him to win this¡­so he decided to suck it up and admit his defeat.


    He knew that there was no way that he would be able to do anything like this.<novelnext></novelnext>


    So he looked up at Lin Fan and opened his mouth to speak¡­


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t give him that chance.


    With a single nod from Lin Fan, the Frozen Antler Deer¡­started stomping on his face just like Lin Hong''s pets had done for him.


    Seeing his great grandfather being stomped on like this, Lin Hong couldn''t help feeling strange feelings.


    He was of course worried about his great grandfather, but there was a part of him that felt like he deserved this. After all, Lin Hong had been sacrificed by his great grandfather when he saw that Lin Fan wouldn''t back down on this matter.


    It would be a lie if he said that this matter didn''t bother him at all.


    But he knew that it was for the best for their branch, so he had suppressed all of this in his heart.


    After beating him until his face waspletely swollen, the Frozen Antler Deer finally let Lin Tian go.


    Lin Tian justid there unable to move at all as every single part of his body was filled with pain and numbness.


    This was a feeling that he had never felt before.


    He still looked up at Lin Fan and said, "I give up."


    Lin Fan didn''t stop him this time and just let him give up.


    After he gave up, he waved his hand and the strange domain around them suddenly disappeared.


    The Peak Soul Realm Pets who had been around the arena also moved over to where Lin Fan was before suddenly disappearing.


    Seeing this, Lin Tian suddenly raised his hand and sent out thest bit of life energy that he had in the form of a palm blow. This was hisst ditch attempt at trying to regain some kind of vengeance for himself.


    He had already lost all his face after being beaten up by Lin Fan like this, so he didn''t care at all and used this underhanded method to attack Lin Fan.


    Lin Jian naturally saw this as well and was about to do something before suddenly taking his hand off his sword.


    He had felt the life energy fluctuationsing from Lin Fan, so he knew that Lin Fan was already prepared for this.


    As he had expected, Lin Fan suddenly disappeared from the spot where he had been standing and when he reappeared, he was standing over Lin Tian.


    The palm force that he had sent out went right past where Lin Fan had been standing and kept flying out past the boundaries of the arena.


    When Lin Tian had given up, his descendants had released the barrier to go and help him.


    However, this had backfired on them as this hadn''t prevented the palm force from flying out.


    This palm force went flying right into the descendants who had just entered the arena.


    This was a palm force from Lin Tian who was in the Peak Sun Realm. Even if it was weakened because he had been injured by Lin Fan, this was still an attack from someone in the Sun Realm.


    So when they were hit by this, they were immediately sent flying and all of them suffered injuries to different extent. The ones with weaker levels of cultivation suffered heavy injuries, while the ones that had stronger levels of cultivation suffered minor injuries.


    There wasn''t a single person that wasn''t injured by this.


    As for Lin Fan, he stood over Lin Tian with a cold smile as he said, "It seems like you can''t even deal with a junior and need to use tricks like this. Is this really the power of a branch family head like you?"


    Lin Tian''s rage surged through him and he felt like he couldn''t breathe after hearing these words.


    It didn''t take long before this surging feeling filled his chest and he suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood before fainting in his rage.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care at all about this.


    He had already turned around and was walking out of the arena towards Lin Jian.


    Lin Jian gave him a nod of appreciation before walking along with him out of this ce.


    But they suddenly stopped when they were walking out.


    Lin Fan turned to Lin Hong who was just standing there in a daze and said, "What are you still standing around for? Let''s go."


    Lin Hong was shaken back to his senses when he heard this.


    He looked at Lin Fan in a bit of a daze before giving a nod and following him.


    Lin Fan was even able to beat up his great grandfather who was in the Peak Sun Realm, there was no way that Lin Hong would be able to resist him.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan had Lin Jian here who everyone feared in the first ce.


    So with a bit of a stunned expression, Lin Hong followed Lin Fan and Lin Jian out of this ce.

 Chapter 951 Store Opening

    Once Lin Fan and Lin Jian came back to the pce, Lin Fan called for some servants to take care of Lin Hong who had followed them in a daze.


    Sinceing to the pce, Lin Fan had been given a private wing in the pce. This was a wing that waspletely emptied other than the servants assigned to take care of Lin Fan.


    So far, only Lin Fan and his family lived there, but now Lin Hong was also going to live there.


    When he arrived, he couldn''t help being shocked by the luxurious room that he had been assigned.


    It was even better than his room in the pce before, it was even better than the room he had at the branch residence.


    It made it very clear just what the difference in treatment between him and Lin Fan was.


    With this made clear, Lin Hong became even more subdued.


    But what he didn''t realize was that there was a terrible fate waiting for him.


    ¡­


    A few dayster, it was time for Lin Fan''s store to open.


    Over the past few days, Lin Hong had been drilled over working at the store, but¡­


    He was someone that had been pampered his entire life, so the concept of work was foreign to him.


    He had suffered quite a bit as the ghost girls that Momonga summoned.


    Normally Lin Fan would recruit people to work in the store and it was easy for him to do so with the influence of the Lin Astral Family, but this time he decided against it.


    Right now the Lin Astral Family had too many uncertain aspects about it since it was such arge family that was not fully united. They would unite in times of danger, but it was impossible for them to unite during times of peace like this.


    That was also why the Lin Astral Emperor wanted his help in disciplining the juniors of the Lin Astral Family in the first ce.


    There were too many things that he needed to keep secret in the store, so he couldn''t risk it.


    The only reason that he took Lin Hong in the first ce was because he was certain that he would be able to control him. After all, Lin Hong had a personality that he could easily see through since he had that kind of personality back on earth. He knew that with just a bit of work, he would be able to mold Lin Hong into someone he could control.


    Now after a few days of training, they would finally be opening.


    Since it was a store that was in the center of the most busy business street and a store that was once owned by the Lin Astral Family, it was a store that attracted a lot of attention.


    There were also rumours about Lin Fan taking over the store which everyone paid attention to.


    With the current rumours spreading about Lin Fan, this brought even more attention to the store.


    Especially after the rumour that Lin Fan had defeated Lin Tian, someone who was in the same generation as Lin Jian.


    No one knew where this rumour came from, but it quickly spread all over the capital city.


    Lin Tian''s branch had tried to suppress this, but it was to no avail.


    That was because the one that had spread it was¡­Lin Fan himself.


    He had two reasons for doing this.


    One was to raise his own fame since he knew that defeating someone at Lin Tian''s level was something that was very impressive. He knew that it would be good for him to raise his own fame for the future.


    Second, it was to suppress Lin Tian''s branch even further.


    He wanted to make an example of them so that they wouldn''t act up in the future and would be more humble like the Lin Astral Emperor wanted. At the same time, he wanted to give all the other branches an example of what happened if they acted up.


    In fact, in the days that the rumours had spread, the juniors and seniors of the Lin Astral Family had started restraining themselves. So it seemed like it had been quite effective in the end.


    When Lin Fan opened the store, he found that it was already surrounded by arge crowd.


    There were so many people that it could even be considered a sea of people gathered around the store.


    Lin Fan couldn''t even see the other side of the street with all the people that surrounded the store, though this street was very wide because of therge poption of the capital city to begin with.


    Lin Fan could also hear the buzzing of the crowding from the outside.


    Many of them were whispering among themselves about his store.


    There were words like "Lin Astral Family", "handsome young master", and "powerful pets" being thrown around.


    It was clear that many of them were talking about Lin Fan.


    After all, Lin Fan was the main reason that most of them were here.


    Lin Fan hadn''t hidden that this was his store, so many of them were here just for the chance to see him.


    He chose to ignore the cold stare that was stabbing into his back.<novelnext></novelnext>


    He knew that he was in trouble tonight because of all the whispers outside, but he chose to ignore it for his own safety right now.


    Once opening time came, the doors were opened and the wave of people flooded into the store.


    The people outside had thought that they wouldn''t be able to all fit into the store. Even though the store was as big as a shopping mall in Lin Fan''s old life, there were just too many people out there.


    But to their surprise, they found that the space inside of the store was much bigger than what it seemed from the outside.


    When they looked closely, they realized that there were spatialws that were used inside of this store that made it much bigger.


    It wasn''t a problem for the sea of people outside to fit in the store.


    The first thing that everyone did after entering the store was head to the counter where Lin Fan was sitting. The moment that they entered, all of their eyes had fallen onto Lin Fan.


    When they saw his appearance, they couldn''t help admitting¡­


    The rumours were all true!


    "He really is handsome¡­"


    "That''s the young master of the Lin Astral Family¡­if I could¡­"


    "Psh, a fat cow like you? He''s clearly more interested in me!"


    Thetterments made Lin Fan''s mouth twitch, but he didn''t break his professional smile.


    The person that received the second most attention was¡­surprisingly Lin Hong.


    He was a well known member of the Lin Astral Family and it was rare for the public to meet him.


    Even if he wasn''t as influential as Lin Fan, he was still someone that they wanted to marry.


    After all, he was still more influential than most people as a member of the Lin Astral Family and putting aside his personality ws, he was a handsome person.


    So there were many girls that surrounded him¡­Among them were also a few men dressed as girls.


    After having their fill, the people''s attention started to turn to the items in the shop.


    "What are these prices?"


    "Are they for real?"


    "It''s so much more expensive than other ces¡­"


    Lin Fan heard these words around him and he shook his head.


    It seemed that no matter where he went, it would always end the same way. Even if he did provide superior service, no one would buy his products right away since there was no credibility.


    Or at least that was what he thought based on these words at first.


    But then to his surprise¡­


    The counter he was at was suddenly surrounded by people asking to leave their pets for training.


    He couldn''t help being overwhelmed by all of the people who wanted to leave their pets here for training as there were just too many of them. Plus, they all werepeting with each other since they had seen that there was a limit to how many training spots there were each day.


    They didn''t want to miss out on this opportunity.


    Luckily, Lin Fan had already thought of a way to deal with this way back when he opened his first store.


    He had been so optimistic that he would be able to use this system one day when his store became popr enough back then. The sad truth was that it had never be popr enough for him to use it.


    Or at least, he didn''t know that it was being used at the stores on the Blue Star since he hadn''t been back there in a while.


    It was a drawing system where everyone who wanted to leave their pet at the store for training would draw from. If they could draw the winning ticket, they would be able to receive a training spot.


    With this, it didn''t take long for the training spots to be taken.


    The people that didn''t receive training spots couldn''tin since the training spots had been given out in a fair manner.


    So the only thing that they could do was turn their attention to the other products of the store.


    It wasn''t just the training that was popr, all of the items in the store were popr to Lin Fan''s surprise.


    The pet food, the special elixirs, the essories, not a single thing wasn''t popr.


    By the end of the day, they hadpletely sold out of everything.


    Lin Fan just couldn''t understand what had happened.

 Chapter 952 Shocking Results

    It would make sense that people would leave their pets here for training, but to buy out everything as well¡­


    Those items in the store released strong energy, but they didn''t show their effects unless they were used, so there was no way of confirming whether they were real or not.


    This was an unknown store and even if it was backed by the Lin Astral Family, people shouldn''t have trusted it so easily.


    So why did they buy out all the items?


    What Lin Fan had done waspletely underestimate the prestige the Lin Astral Family had in the Lin Astral Empire and the economy of the Lin Astral Empire.


    The ones that hade to his store today were all rich people who had plenty of money to spare, so even if the items in Lin Fan''s store were expensive formon people, it wasn''t much for them.


    They just bought the items without care since they wanted to curry favour with the Lin Astral Family.


    Buying items on the opening day, it was without a doubt a good way to tter the Lin Astral Family that supported this store.


    But these customers had also made a mistake.


    What they didn''t know was that this store wasn''t rted to the Lin Astral Family at all. It was a store that had beenpletely given to Lin Fan, so their ttery didn''t work at all.


    Still, Lin Fan was happy that everything was sold.


    Since he had moved up to this higher realm, the items that he had brought out to sell were also on a higher level.


    Since the items were at a higher level, the price of these items was also higher.


    He happily stared at all the points that he had received from selling all of these items.


    With the rate that he was earning these points, it wouldn''t be a dream to buy some of the expensive items in the store.


    But what Lin Fan had to deal with first was¡­


    His punishment.


    With the things that had been said in the store during the day by all those girls, it was impossible for him to escape this punishment. Especially since there were plenty of girls who hade to just see him.


    Ang had been holding it in all day, but once managing the store was over, he was dragged away by the ear.


    Following closely behind them was Zi Ling.


    When he came out of the room the next morning, he looked very ragged and very tired.


    But his parents who saw him like this couldn''t help revealing smiles.


    Yue Qingrou even said something to Ang and Zi Ling that made both of them blush.


    Lin Fan didn''t hear exactly what she said, but he had heard the word "baby".


    Without knowing it, this put quite a bit of pressure on him¡­


    When they arrived at the store, they found that it was surrounded by even more people than yesterday.


    When these people saw Lin Fan''s group, they immediately created a path to the store for them. The only problem was that it was a bit small¡­almost as if it was done intentionally¡­


    As they went through, there were a few hands that tried to reach out to touch them, but they had already put up barriers expecting this.


    So the crowd had disappointed looks once they made their way through.


    They hade early, so the crowd had to wait a while before being able toe in, but that didn''t diminish their enthusiasm at all.


    Many of the people in the crowd had onlye for fun in the first ce.


    They were all here to watch the pets being given back after the training.


    They wanted to see what the results of the training was.


    Everyone had been surprised yesterday when they had heard that this training would only take a day, but they weren''t that surprised since Lin Fan was rted to the Lin Astral Family.


    The Lin Astral Family''s specialty was their voidws, so people knew that they were good with beasts in the first ce.


    The news had spread quickly and many people came to see just what the results of the training was.


    When the ones that left their pets here received them, they were shocked by the training results.


    One minor realm and several advanced skills, that was what every single one of the pets had gained.


    There were even some pets that had advanced one major realm and had learned some ultimate skills.


    Everyone couldn''t help being shocked by this since they never expected something like this even if it was rted to the Lin Astral Family.


    When the Lin Astral Emperor received the report of this, he also couldn''t help being shocked.<novelnext></novelnext>


    That was because he knew that even if Lin Fan had the Void Physique, this was not something that he could have done at his current level.


    He remembered that there was another report from the people he had assigned to help Lin Fan with the shop. He had disregarded it at first since he felt that it was too impossible, but now¡­


    It seemed like there was something special about this shop.


    That feeling that he had when he entered Lin Fan''s shop back in the Mu Ster Kingdom, it wasn''t false.


    It seemed like there was someone who was hiding inside of that shop.


    While he didn''t know how that person was able toe to their Lin Astral Empire without being detected or how he was able to do all the things that he had done, he knew that this person didn''t seem to have any bad intentions.


    So for now, there was no need for him to do anything.


    He could see that this person clearly was caring for Lin Fan and Lin Fan was willing to cover for him, so the rtionship between them shouldn''t be bad.


    If he had to guess, it was most likely that this person was Lin Fan''s master.


    He even had to guess that Lin Fan''s Void Physique came from this master of his.


    But that was his own good fortune, so of course he wasn''t jealous of Lin Fan.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was a man who had experience, so he knew that every person had their own destiny. Not to mention that Lin Fan was his beloved grandson, so he wouldn''t do anything to him in the first ce.


    After these people received their pets, they didn''t hold back at all as they rented the arena in the store to test out the skills of their new pets.


    Since they did it in front of an audience, it was quickly recorded and spread on the web.


    It didn''t take long before the entire capital knew about Lin Fan''s abilities.


    It might have spread even further, but the guards of the Lin Astral Family stopped it before it could spread even more. After all, they knew that these rumours would be bad for Lin Fan, so they stopped them right away.


    So they region locked the videos so that only people in the capital could see them.


    While it would be good for his business, it would also draw people who would want to cause him harm, so they couldn''t allow that.


    If it was before, it would have spread right away and Lin Fan wouldn''t have been able to stop it.


    But it waspletely different that now he was in the Lin Astral Family.


    The guards of the Lin Astral Family didn''t just physically guard him, they also guarded him on the inte and stopped all kinds of bad rumours about him.


    They were an all purpose group that had powerful experts and a powerful support team, whether it was tech or intelligence.


    There was a reason why the Lin Astral Family had been able to remain firm in their ce over all these years.


    After the videos of Lin Fan''s shop went online, there were many other posts that followed about the efficacy of the items from his store.


    It wasn''t just the training that was amazing, all of the items from the store were also just as amazing.


    So once again, they were keptpletely busy all day as all of the items in Lin Fan''s store sold out again.


    Once there were people that had tested it and were willing to testify for it, there was no hesitation anymore.


    Everyone even fought to buy out all the items in Lin Fan''s store.


    Lin Fan just watched all of this with a smile on his face as if he could already see the points rolling in.


    And when he revealed a smile, the customers also revealed smiles since they were happy to see his handsome face.


    It was just too bad for Lin Fan that Ang and Zi Ling had seen all of this¡­


    By the end of the day, Lin Fan couldn''t help breaking out inughter after sending off the customers.


    What he had earned in just two days hadpletely overtaken what he had made from the Blue Star shops in all the time that they had been open. The economies of these two realms were justpletely on different scales.


    But as Lin Fan was being filled with joy, there was something that suddenly appeared that brought him out of this joy.


    "Special mission notification!"


    Lin Fan was shocked when he heard this notification from the system.


    A special mission?


    It had been a long time since he had heard something like this¡­


    He couldn''t help wondering what kind of special mission it would be.

 Chapter 953 Surprise Mission

    When he saw the mission prompt that appeared in front of him, Lin Fan couldn''t help being shocked again.


    This was the one kind of mission that he never expected from the system at this point.


    "Special quest: Go to the special cultivation realm and obtain the special item before the time limit."


    It wasn''t something that was rted to him or the store.


    For once, it was an actual mission to retrieve something and there was even a time limit attached to it.


    What was so special about this ce and this item that the system would create a mission for it?


    There was a bit of unease that filled Lin Fan as this thought filled his mind.


    It was clear that this mission was anything but simple¡­


    But the worst part was that he could already see the timer counting down.


    It seemed that whether he went or not, he would be timed. So if he didn''t seize all the time that he had, he might not be able to finish the mission on time.


    So there was no time to waste¡­


    With this thought, Lin Fan said, "Cousin, I''ll leave you to close the store. I have something else important to do."


    Without even giving Lin Hong a chance to reply, Lin Fan waved at Ang, Yuki, and Momonga to follow him.


    Zi Ling who had been standing nearby was surprised and a little hurt that Lin Fan didn''t call her along, but Ang still pulled her into the back with them.


    Once they were there, Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first as he stood there with a stern look. Only after a while did he finally say, "I''ve received a mission from master, so I need you guys toe with me."


    The three of them had thought that they would be prepared for anything that Lin Fan said, but this really caught them off guard.


    In their time in this store, they had never received a mission from the master of the store before.


    They had gotten used to not having any contact with the master of the store even though the reason why they were able to stay with Lin Fan was because of this master.


    So now that the master actually had a mission for them, they were of course shocked.


    But as if to answer their doubts, there was a popup that appeared in front of them with the mission content.


    This hadn''t been here before, but the moment that Lin Fan had talked to them about the mission, this prompt had suddenly been generated.


    However,pared to Lin Fan''s mission, the content of their mission was a bit different.


    Nheless, it was a mission that came from the master.


    This was a mission from a God Realm Expert, so of course they were excited about it.


    Zi Ling was the only one who had a disappointed look since she knew that this didn''t involve her.


    She might know about the master of the store, but she had never had any contact with them. She could also see from the faces of everyone here that something had happened between them that she wasn''t aware of.


    So she had no choice but to ept that this had nothing to do with her.


    Seeing the looks on their faces, Lin Fan said, "Let''s go now, we don''t have any time to waste."


    All three of them gave nods in response to this.


    Zi Ling was a bit hurt when she saw this, but Lin Fan turned to her and stroked her face before saying, "We''ll be back soon."


    No matter how she was feeling, she knew that the only thing she could do now was¡­


    "Un." She said with a smile on her face before saying, "Come back soon."


    Then in front of her, the four of them disappeared.


    Once they were gone, she couldn''t stop a single tear froming out of her eye.


    ¡­


    When the scene cleared in front of Lin Fan, he was shocked by the world that he saw.


    This was a world that waspletely dested, without a single trace of life.


    There were bones scattered all around them, making it look even more terrifying.


    But at the same time, it was also a bit familiar¡­


    This ce¡­it looked very much like the cultivation realm that Lin Fan had found Momonga in.


    So he couldn''t help turning to look at Momonga.


    When Momonga saw this, he shook his head with a bitter smile and said, "It''s different."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Lin Fan raised a brow as he looked at him without saying a thing.


    Momonga thought for a bit before saying, "It''s different from my ce¡­thews here are different."


    Lin Fan looked around, but he couldn''t feel anything strange.


    Momonga then added, "I don''t know what it is, but there''s something about this ce that I don''t like. We should leave as soon as possible."


    Lin Fan nodded in response.


    He didn''t doubt Momonga''s senses and since he felt that there was something off with this ce, he was sure that there was.


    Not to mention that he felt uneasy about this ce in the first ce.


    So he quickly opened up the system interface and found that there was a map that was provided.


    Though this seemed natural since it was a mission to find something, he couldn''t help feeling that there was something off about this map.


    The route that it gave him seemed very specific, as if the system was guiding him somewhere.


    With how eerie this ce was and how sudden this mission was, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling more and more uneasy.


    The three others with him just looked at him with strange looks, but none of them said a thing.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan said, "Let''s go."


    The three nodded before following him along.


    None of them made a move to take the lead. It was as if they were here as observers rather than participants.


    While Lin Fan didn''t want to follow the route that the system gave him, it was still the safest way. After all, if he were to wander around in this ce that he was unfamiliar with, it was unknown what kind of danger he would run into.


    And the worst part of it all was¡­he didn''t have any extra lives.


    Normally when he went to cultivation realms like this, he would always be given the ability to revive himself and his pets. But this time, after he arrived in this realm, he had received a notification from the system that told him that this function had been sealed.


    So for now, he believed that his system wouldn''t have any ill intentions towards him and would guide him on a rtively safe path.


    Though judging by the way that this ce looked, it didn''t seem like there would be a safe ce here.


    They went through the empty ins covered in bones for a few minutes before finally seeing something in the distance. Looking from afar, it seemed like it was a group of buildings.


    When Lin Fan checked on the map, he found that this group of buildings was on the route that the system hadid out for him and that he would need to pass through it.


    However, no matter how he looked at it, it seemed like it was a trap¡­


    In the end, after hesitating for a while, Lin Fan still decided to head towards these buildings.


    When they came closer, they found that it wasn''t just a few buildings, but rather a bunch of buildings. With all of them together, it almost seemed like this was a city.


    The only thing that was missing was the city wall that protected this ce.


    Then when they came closer, they found the reason why there wasn''t a city wall.


    On the edge of the city, there was rubble lying all over the ground in a perimeter around the city.


    It was clear that this was the remains of the city wall that had once protected the city.


    At the same time, when they came closer, they could see that the buildings werepletely dpidated and surrounded by rubble. It was as if there had been a natural disaster that had blown through this ce.


    But looking even more closely, they could see signs of fighting in the form of cut marks and remains of arrows. Only the arrowheads remained, the wooden shafts of the arrows had long been decayed by the power of time.


    The more they saw this, the more uneasy they felt.


    It was clear that there had been something bad that happened here¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking the three of them, "Do any of you know what realm this is? Have you heard of a ce like this?"


    All three of them shook their heads.


    While Lin Fan asked all three of them, his question was really aimed at Momonga, the immortal Lich King. So he was disappointed when he saw that he shook his head as well.


    Momonga saw this and said, "I don''t know what this ce is based on the surroundings, but I should be able to find some clues in the city and then I can tell you what this ce is."


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up, but it also quickly dimmed.


    He had nned on moving past the city quickly since this ce gave him a bad feeling, but Momonga was right. They should try to get some information about this ce so they would at least know what they were dealing with.


    So with a nod from Lin Fan, they entered the city.

 Chapter 954 Strange City

    Once they entered the city, they felt that there was something strange in the air.


    Lin Fan looked at Momonga, but he shook his head to show that he didn''t know what this was either.


    All four of them quickly raised their guard just in case anything happened, but as they slowly made their way forward, there was nothing that appeared.


    Eventually, they were able to reach one of the buildings in front of them that was near the edge of this city.


    Lin Fan was about to take the lead to open the door, but to his surprise, Momonga stopped him. Before he could open the door, Momonga reached his hand out and pushed Lin Fan back before moving in front of the door.


    Then he gathered a bit of dark energy in his hand before pointing that hand at the door.


    As he pointed his hand at the door, the wisps of dark energy came out of his hand and entered through the cracks of the door.


    Other than that, there was nothing else that happened.


    After a few minutes, Momonga finally said, "It''s clear." Then he pushed the door open and went in.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan and the two girls followed him in.


    The inside of the house wasn''t that impressive either.


    Most of the furniture had already turned into dust over time, so there wasn''t much in this house.


    There were just a few pieces of rubble that were scattered around and what seemed to be a bookshelf in the corner.


    It was actually quite amazing that the bookshelf hadsted this long.


    When Momonga went over, he was surprised by what he found.


    Lin Fan also came over to see that he had found a bunch of jade slips.


    These jade slips seemed to have something written on them, but it was in anguage that Lin Fan couldn''t recognize at all.


    So he could only wait as Momonga read through them.


    After what seemed to be a long time, Momonga finally said, "This ce used to be a human kingdom, but it seemed like it was destroyed because of some reason. The jade slips for thetter volumes of this history book seem to be missing from this ce."


    After saying this, Momonga started looking around the room trying to find more jade slips, but this ce waspletely empty.


    The only other thing here was a set of stairs that led up to the second floor, so without hesitation, he headed in that direction.


    Lin Fan followed him, but he couldn''t help asking, "Human kingdom? What human kingdom?"


    Momonga shook his head and said, "It doesn''t say what human kingdom, it just called itself the kingdom in the books. Most of what was written was just some trivial history about this kingdom."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he didn''t keep asking questions since he knew that there was no use asking them.


    Instead, he turned to look at the stairs heading up with Momonga.


    Perhaps there would be more information upstairs.


    It was just too bad that they were disappointed by what they found.


    There was almost nothing upstairs.


    The only thing that they were able to find was a bed that seemed to be made of jade as well, but there was nothing special about it. The only thing that was strange about this bed was that there was a cool feeling that came from it.


    It was clear that this bed was made from some kind of special material, but no matter how they tried moving it, it just wouldn''t budge.


    Since there was nothing else here, they decided to spread out and start searching around the city.


    There were too many buildings for them to search one by one and they shouldn''t waste too much time in this ce since there was a time limit to their mission. However, Lin Fan also didn''t want to give up this chance to find information about this ce.


    Information would be important since it would make his mission easier, so he decided to use a bit of the time that they had to search for some.


    Spreading out did make it much easier for them to search, but even then they weren''t able to find much.


    There were a few jade slips scattered around the buildings here and there, but there was never any substantial information in these jade slips.


    Eventually, Lin Fan called out Brainy and had her puppets search the buildings instead of going one by one. This brought arge amount of jade slips over, so Momonga, as the only person who could read them, sat down and read them all.


    By the end, he had no more information than he had in the beginning.


    There just wasn''t any useful information in the jade slips that he read. The only thing that was written in these jade slips was the trivial history of this kingdom and the people that lived here.


    Perhaps if he could cross reference with his own collection, he might be able to find out which civilization this was, but it was impossible with the information that he had on hand.


    He might have been the immortal Lich King, but there was only so much that he could remember.


    The only other thing of note was that there was the same ice cold jade bed in each and every one of the houses.


    Every single one of them was like the first one that they found, they couldn''t move them no matter how they tried. It was almost as if they were just bolted in ce.


    Since they weren''t able to do anything to these jade beds, they just left them there in the end.


    Well, it wasn''t that they weren''t able to do anything¡­It was that Lin Fan stopped them from doing anything to the jade beds.


    He didn''t know what would happen if they broke the jade beds, or what kind of monster Ang and Yuki using their powers would attract.


    He still had a mission, so he didn''t want to bother with these things.


    The only thing left for them to do in this city was check therge buildings that were scattered throughout the city.


    So far, they had only checked the small buildings that were like the first building that they had checked. These were the buildings that had been scattered throughout the city and seemed to be residences.


    However, there were alsorge buildings that were scattered around the city.


    These buildings were clearly public facilities or important locations to this city, so they would most likely have more information than these small buildings.


    But neither Momonga or Lin Fan were willing to risk checking these buildings out.


    After all, these were most likely important ces, but they would also hold danger in them.


    So without a need, they didn''t want to take this unnecessary risk.


    But as they found that there was no information for them at all in these small buildings, they couldn''t help bing more and more curious about theserger buildings.


    The two of them were certain that there would be important information in these ces, but the danger that they held¡­


    Eventually, their curiosity got the better of them and they couldn''t help picking out one of these buildings to check out.


    The building that they chose was much smaller than the rest of therge buildings, but it was still muchrger than the regr small buildings. So they were certain that there would be something important hidden in here.


    Their group had gathered at the entrance of this building and had been prepared to head in, but they didn''t get the chance to go in in the end.


    That was because they suddenly heard a sounding from the distance.


    When they turned to look in the direction of that sound, they didn''t seem to see anything other than a cloud of dust.


    But when they looked more closely, they found that this cloud of dust was gettingrger and closer to them.


    With their vision, they were able to see quite far, so they were able to see right through the cloud of dust as well to see what was causing this cloud of dust.


    It was a bunch of skeletons that were running towards the city.


    Momonga immediately knitted his brows when he saw this, but he also raised his hand and gathered his ck energy in his palm. After gathering a ball of this ck energy, he suddenly released it into wisps of ck energy that flew out into the air without any targets.


    These wisps of ck energy seemed to dissipate into nothingness, but Momonga just had a calm look on his face when seeing this.


    But after a few minutes, he couldn''t help knitting his brows again.


    Lin Fan could tell that something was wrong, so he asked, "What is it?"


    Momonga didn''t answer at first as he narrowed his eyes to look at the swarm of skeletons charging at the city.


    Then after a while, he said, "I can''t¡­control them."


    Lin Fan didn''t really understand what was wrong at first, but then he realized something.


    Momonga was the immortal Lich King, the peak of all undead.


    Normal skeletons like this should have been easy for someone like him to control, but now he was saying that he wasn''t able to gain control of these skeletons.


    Did that mean that there was something special about these skeletons, or¡­was there someone with stronger undeadws than him here that was already controlling the skeletons?


    Lin Fan couldn''t help also looking at these skeletons with a strange look.

 Chapter 955 Undead Swarm

    He shook those thoughts out of his head in the end since it wasn''t the time for that now.


    It was clear that these skeletons were heading towards the city and towards them.


    While they didn''t know what kind of goal these skeletons had, it was hard to imagine that they would just leave them alone. So they had to figure out a way to deal with these skeletons if Momonga couldn''t control them.


    To the side both Ang and Yuki looked like they were getting ready for a fight, but Lin Fan quickly stopped them.


    It would be a waste of energy to fight them and that would be considered thest option to them. After all, if they were to fight here, it would just dy them from their mission.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help turning to Momonga to ask, "Do you know why you can''t control them?"


    Momonga shook his head at first, but then he gave a nod before saying, "It''s strange¡­It''s just like when we first came to this world, there was a strange energy that filled this air. That strange energy is also in those skeletons controlling them. It''spletely different from the normal deathws that I use to control the undead."


    After a pause, he added, "Thews that are controlling these skeletons are like the darknessws that I control, but¡­there''s something strange mixed into it. It''s almost like a form of a grudge against the living."


    "Grudge against the living?" Lin Fan couldn''t help repeating.


    Just what had happened in this world that such a thing existed?


    He couldn''t help feeling more and more uneasy about this ce that the system had sent him.


    So without hesitation, he decided to abandon searching the city and continue down the path that the system had set for him.


    It was just a good thing that the skeleton horde wasing from the side that they had entered from. As long as they left by the opposite side, they would be able to continue on that path.


    But when they arrived on the other side of the city, they found¡­


    There was another skeleton horde charging at the city from that side as well.


    Without hesitation, Lin Fan''s group started moving around the edges of the city looking for a way out, but they found that there were two more skeleton hordesing from the left and right as well.


    It seemed like they werepletely surrounded.


    There were holes in between the four skeleton hordes and there wasn''t aplete blockade around them, but if they tried to break out through these gaps, they would definitely be noticed by the skeletons. At that time, they wouldn''t be just attacked by a single horde, but two different hordes at the same time.


    So their best option now was to break through one of the hordes or find a ce to hide in the city.


    Ang and Yuki looked like they were ready to fight since these skeletons were their natural enemies to begin with, but Lin Fan stopped them in the end.


    He didn''t want to waste time fighting his way through hordes of skeletons, not to mention that it would be a waste of energy. It was unknown what other enemies would be hiding in this world, so they didn''t have the energy to waste on these skeletons.


    At the same time, they couldn''t see through the cultivation levels of these skeletons.


    It was a strange feeling, but it was like there was something obscuring them from scanning these skeletons with their spiritual senses.


    Even the aura of the skeletons were subdued, so they couldn''t get an urate read of them.


    So after thinking for a bit, Lin Fan decided to hide inside one of the houses and see what the skeletons were up to.


    With him and Momonga working together, it should be easy for them to hide themselves.


    So they bunkered down in the first house that they explored since this was the house that they had made their base in while exploring the city.


    It didn''t take long for the skeletons to make their way into the city.


    To their surprise, the skeletons didn''t just wander around the city like they had thought, but rather they all went certain routes as if they already knew where they were going.


    All of them started heading towards the houses that were spread out across the city.


    There were also quite a few that headed towards therge buildings that were scattered around the city. It was almost as if there was something in these buildings that attracted all of these skeletons.


    But they didn''t let their guard down since there was one that also went into the building that they were currently in.


    Lin Fan''s group was currently hiding out on the second floor since they wanted a ce where they could ess the roof whenever they wanted. After all, it was safer to escape using the roof than running around on the ground covered in skeletons.


    But the skeleton headed right up to the second floor without hesitation.


    When they saw this, they immediately went into a corner to hide themselves.


    They watched as the skeleton came up to the second floor and didn''t even look around as its eyes fell onto the jade bed right away. It walked over to the jade bed and thenid down on it before bing inactive.


    They just watched the skeletony there for a few minutes.


    It didn''t move at all as if it had been deactivated by something.


    Momonga wasn''t even able to sense any of the strangews that he felt before in the air.


    Seeing that it wasn''t doing anything and that they couldn''t stay here, they started moving again.


    It was just a few centimeters at first, but seeing that the skeleton didn''t react at all, they slowly came closer and closer to look at it more closely.


    The skeleton just continued lying there as if it didn''t notice a thing.


    Finally, they had crossed halfway across the room and could see the skeleton more clearly.


    This skeleton looked like the normal skeleton of a human, but there was something different about it as well.


    On the skull, on the forehead, there was another hole that was just like the two eye holes below it. It was as if when this skeleton was still alive, it had a third eye right on its forehead.


    Lin Fan looked at Momonga after seeing this who responded with a shake of his head.


    He had done plenty of research into the different creatures of this universe, but he had never heard of a human with three eyes before¡­


    He was tempted toe even closer and take a closer look at this skeleton, but before he could move closer, the skeleton suddenly sat up in the ice jade bed.


    When they saw this, Lin Fan''s group immediately froze.


    However, none of them panicked since they had Momonga''s darkws and Lin Fan''s shadowws around them.


    They didn''t believe that this skeleton would be able to see through them.


    The skeleton looked around for a minute before suddenly turning in their direction, looking right at them.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan''s group couldn''t help jolting since the scene of a skeleton suddenly looking at them like this was quite terrifying.


    Still, they didn''t panic since they had faith in the powers of thews hiding them.


    After all, Momonga was a true Ruler.


    He wasn''t holding his powers back since they were now in a cultivation realm far away from any human civilizations.


    The power of a veteran Ruler like Momonga was not something that could be looked down on.


    However¡­the skeleton suddenly raised its bony hand and pointed at them with a single finger.


    Then before any of them could react, the skeleton suddenly started screaming.


    This scream was like the scream of a banshee, eerie and shrill. It cut right into their eardrums and it felt like they were about to get knocked out from this scream alone.


    However, they were able to hold on in the end.


    There was no doubt about it, the skeleton was somehow able to see through their camouge and see them!


    Lin Fan quickly looked out the window and he found that there were other skeletonsing out of the other buildings. The direction that they were heading in was the building that they were currently in.


    If they wasted more time here, they would surely be surrounded.


    So he quickly went over with Momonga to the exit to the roof to secure it while Ang and Yuki sent their fists flying at the skeleton.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop them this time since they had already been discovered.


    Since they had been discovered, it was better to destroy this one that was telling the other skeletons their current location.


    Ang and Yuki didn''t punch the skeleton with their fists, but rather used the force from their fist to destroy the skeleton.


    There was no resistance at all from the skeleton as the force hit it and it was scattered into pieces of bone.


    Ang and Yuki couldn''t help being surprised by this since they felt that the skeleton wasn''t that weak, but since it was destroyed, there was no need to think too much about it.


    They quickly turned to head up to the roof with Lin Fan and Momonga.


    However, before they could get up there, there was a skeletal hand that grabbed their leg that caught them off guard.


    Turning around, they saw that it was the same skeleton that they had destroyed, but it had somehow reformed itself.

 Chapter 956 Strange Power

    Aftering back to their senses, both Ang and Yuki kicked at the skeleton at the same time.


    This used even more force than their punch from before, so the skeleton wasn''t able to hold on at all as it was shattered to pieces once again.


    However, the hands were still firmly holding onto their legs¡­


    But they didn''t notice since they were more focused on getting out of that building before it was surrounded by all the skeletons below.


    After escaping the building, they didn''t waste any time at all as they jumped to the roof of the building next door.


    Just like this, they jumped from building to building, moving away from the skeletons that had surrounded the building that they had been in before.


    Only after moving a distance away did they stop to gather themselves.


    Seeing that there was no movement from below, they finally noticed that the skeleton''s hands were still on their legs.


    Both of them knitted their brows when they saw this since as spirits, they hated anything to do with the undead. So both of them gathered their life energy into their fists and mmed their fists down on these two hands.


    But to their surprise, they found that they weren''t able to destroy the hands.


    Unlike the skeleton that copsed with a single blow, these bones were too strong to destroy.


    That was very strange since even if they didn''t use their full power, this was still a blow from a Ruler. It wasn''t something that could be blocked so casually, especially by one of these casual skeletons in the undead horde.


    If even a casual skeleton in the horde could block this, wouldn''t that mean that this was a horde of Ruler Realm monsters?


    So what would be hidden further into this cultivation realm?


    What was waiting for them at the end of the map?


    All of these thoughts passed through Lin Fan''s mind and he couldn''t help feeling worried again.


    This time, it wasn''t just Lin Fan who was worried.


    The other three all felt worried when they saw how the skeleton''s hands resisted these attacks.


    As expected of the master of the shop¡­


    Any mission from him definitely wasn''t something simple. It was something that could even pose a threat to their lives.


    Both Ang and Yuki started gathering life energy in their hands again as they were prepared to make another attack, but before they could¡­They suddenly heard the sounds of cking bonesing from beneath them.


    They all quickly looked down to find that there were skeletons gathering around the building that they were currently standing atop of.


    With the way that they moved without hesitation, it was clear that they knew that they were there.


    How they knew that they were there was a mystery, but they didn''t n on finding out just yet since it would be toote for them once they were surrounded.


    So without hesitation, they jumped off the roof to another roof.


    They created some more distance with the horde of skeletons below before turning their attention back to the hands grabbing at their legs.


    This time, Ang and Yuki didn''t hold back at all and used all of their power concentrated in one point on the skeleton hand. But in the end, all it could do was create a crack on the bony hand and nothing else.


    Everyone was once again shocked.


    If it wasn''t for the skeleton breaking apart from just a single hit from them, with how strong their bodies were, it would be a hard fight even for these Rulers¡­


    Just what was this ce?


    After the moment of shock, they gathered their power again to attack the hands once more, but they were interrupted again by the cking sound of bones.


    Looking down, they found that the skeletons were once againing for them.


    However, when they looked at it carefully, they found that there seemed to be¡­more of them this time.


    Lin Fan carefully looked at the buildings around them and he found that there were skeletonsing out of them.


    It seemed that it wasn''t just the skeletons that had appeared in the beginning that were following them, but rather there were skeletonsing out of the houses around them that were alsoing at them.


    It seemed that if they kept moving through this city, there would be more and more skeletons drawn out from the buildings.


    Eventually, they might even call out the entire horde if they kept running like this.


    Once that happened, they would bepletely surrounded and¡­


    It was a coincidence if it happened once, but a second time meant that it clearly wasn''t a coincidence.


    There was something telling the skeletons where they were, that was how they were chasing them.


    At the same time, this thing seemed to also be alerting all of the skeletons in the buildings that they ran by, causing them toe out and chase them as well.


    Unless they figured out what this was, it was impossible for them to escape.


    But of course, the first thing that they had to do was find another temporary safe spot before they were surrounded.


    So without hesitation, they jumped off this roof and created some more distance with the skeleton horde chasing them. It was just a good thing that all of these skeletons moved so slowly, or else they might have caught up to them already.


    Once they were on the next roof, Ang and Yuki were about to start chipping away at the hands on their legs again, but Lin Fan stopped them.


    He went over and looked carefully at the hands before suddenly saying, "It should be these things that are drawing them to us."


    Momonga was surprised since he hadn''t thought of this, but when he came over to look at the hands, he nodded in agreement as he said, "It seems like there''s a draw from these hands to the skeleton from before. There''s an invisible power that''s linking the two together."


    Then after raising his hand and waving it a few times, letting out a few dark wisps of energy that dissipated around him.


    Once they were gone, he said, "It also seems like there''s a resonance between the hands and the skeletons around, which is causing them to wake up and chase us as well."


    After saying all of this, Momonga couldn''t help knitting his brows as he muttered, "How did I not notice any of this before?"


    Lin Fan patted him on the shoulder tofort him before turning to look at the skeleton hands on their feet again.


    The two of them had wanted to attack it again, but Lin Fan stopped them once more.


    He then raised his hand towards the two hands and started drawing on that absorption power.


    He had a n, but he didn''t know if it would work¡­


    Still, he wanted to give it a try.


    As the absorption power came close to the hands, there was a sudden visible distortion that appeared in the air.


    The power that was inside of the hands wasn''t visible to the eye, but when it came in contact with the absorption power, it started distorting the space around it.


    They could see the visible flow of energy that went into Lin Fan''s hand.


    The moment that the energy entered his hand, his face couldn''t help twisting in pain.


    This was a feeling that he had never felt before when he had used his voidws before.


    It was a very strange feeling, as if there was something foreign entering his body that his body couldn''t process.


    Normally, the moment that something was absorbed by his voidws, it would be turned into fundamental energy and would be absorbed by him. But this strange power seemed to refuse to be broken down by his voidws and seemed to be fighting against it, causing him pain.


    Seeing this, Ang was about toe forward to help him, but Momonga raised a hand to stop her.


    Ang red at him, but he just shook his head in response.


    After a while, she backed down in the end since she knew that he was more knowledgeable about this matter.


    But what she didn''t know was that Momonga was actually quite worried deep down.


    This was his first time seeing this situation as well.


    He also knew about the voidw''s ability to absorb everything in this world, but he could see that the strange energy wasn''t letting itself be absorbed.


    The only thing that he could do was wait and see how it would turn out.


    As Lin Fan tried to absorb this strange power with this voidws, he could feel that it was slowly affecting him.


    It was attacking his body, attacking his mind, attacking his soul.


    It was as if this strange power wouldn''t go down without a fight.


    He used his voidws as much as he could, but he found that the strange energy was slowly affecting him.


    It was subtle at first, but it was slowly corroding his reason and made him want to ughter. It was a powerful grudge that seemed to want to destroy the world itself.


    He didn''t know where this feeling came from, but it was getting harder and harder to resist.


    As this feeling filled him, the expression on Lin Fan''s face also couldn''t help changing.


    It became more wild and more violent, as if he was about to attack at any moment.


    At the same time, he turned to look in the direction of the other three.

 Chapter 957 Fragmented Memories

    When the three of them saw Lin Fan looking at them this way, they couldn''t help feeling a bad feeling.


    Especially Ang who felt like her heart was ripping apart from seeing Lin Fan act this way.


    All three of them raised their hands and gathered their life energy in preparation of what was toe. But at the same time, they all revealed encouraging looks as if they were cheering Lin Fan on.


    Inside of Lin Fan, he was still struggling against this strange power.


    As this strange power invaded him, resisting the voidws that he used to absorb it, he started seeing some strange things.


    These were fragments of what seemed to be¡­memories¡­


    These were very strange memories since Lin Fan could only see a bit of them and couldn''t understand what the context was.


    However, almost all of the memories involved¡­some form of ughter.


    It was like having the memory of being killed again and again, but the strange thing about it was that the one getting killed was a different person each time. Every memory that he saw was from the perspective of a different person who was being killed.


    As for who was killing them¡­it was always a skeleton.


    Lin Fan just couldn''t understand how he was getting the memories of all these different people being killed by the same thing, especially since these memory fragments seemed toe from the skeleton that killed them.


    However, these were the memory fragments that filled his mind and he couldn''t deny it.


    As these memory fragments filled his mind, his body started to move.


    His hands came up as if he was about to attack someone and he slowly made his way forward as he looked at Ang, Yuki, and Momonga.


    They all knew that this was a bad situation and it seemed like it was going to get worse, but Ang really couldn''t raise her hand to hurt Lin Fan in this situation.


    Even if she did normally hit Lin Fan, that was only because she was ying around with him.


    To hit him for real¡­was something that she couldn''t bear to do.


    But luckily for her, Momonga and Yuki stepped up.


    Yuki came in front of her and led her back while Momonga raised his hand to release his dark energy.


    These wisps of dark energy created chains that quickly tied themselves to Lin Fan''s limbs, stopping him from moving.


    However, when it seemed like he had stopped Lin Fan, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because¡­there were cracks that started forming in the dark energy chains around Lin Fan. The cracks that appeared were also slowly getting bigger and bigger, showing signs of the chain breaking at any moment.


    Momonga couldn''t help knitting his brows even deeper when he felt this.


    He had been holding back since he didn''t want to hurt Lin Fan and with the disparity in cultivation, it should have been easy for him to hold back Lin Fan.


    But the chain breaking was a fact.


    It was as if there was a strange energy that wasing from Lin Fan that was cracking the chains. Not to mention, this was a very familiar energy.


    It was the same energy that he had felt from the skeletons before.


    At this rate, it seemed like Lin Fan wouldn''t be able to absorb the strange energy with his voidws. It even seemed like Lin Fan would be the one absorbed by the strange energy.


    If this continued, they might even need to think about putting Lin Fan down¡­


    But if they did, they would lose their connection with the master of the store¡­


    This seemed like a very bad situation for them¡­


    If it hadn''t been for the instructions that they had been given, it wouldn''t have ended like this.


    The instructions that they had received from the master of the store was to observe Lin Fan as he made his way through this cultivation realm. That was why they hadn''t stopped him earlier when he went to absorb the energy from the skeleton hands.


    Momonga couldn''t help raising his other hand, condensing another ball of dark energy. However, this dark energy was different from the one that he had used to condense the chains.


    This dark energy gave off a much more sinister feeling, like the feeling of death.


    It was as if wherever this ball of dark energy went, it would bring death with it.


    That was because instead of being condensed from darknessws, this ball was condensed with deathws.


    Just one touch of this would definitely kill Lin Fan.


    He had condensed it for a worst case scenario, but the hand that was holding the ball of death energy couldn''t help shaking.


    He was hesitating.


    It was a lie to say that he didn''t form a connection with Lin Fan during the time that he had spent in the store. So unless he was forced to, he wouldn''t want to hurt Lin Fan who he considered a close friend.


    At the same time, Ang saw what Momonga was nning and couldn''t help revealing an anxious look.


    She could have easily broken through Yuki holding her, but she knew that this wouldn''t help them.


    So she turned to Lin Fan and said in a clear voice, "Don''t let it control you."


    The moment that she said this, Lin Fan who had been struggling against the chains suddenly trembled before going still.


    Seeing this, Ang said in a voice filled with trust, "You can do it."


    This time, Lin Fan trembled again, but it wasn''t to break through the chains.


    It was as if there was some kind of internal struggle going on inside of him.


    That was actually what was happening inside of Lin Fan.


    Inside Lin Fan''s mind, he had been bombarded by the fragmented memories that filled his mind.


    As those fragmented memories filled his mind, he felt his sense of self fading and his consciousness disappearing. With all those fragmented memories filling him, he felt like he was losing control of himself.


    It came very close to himpletely losing control, but¡­


    There was a clear voice that suddenly rang out through his mind.


    Naturally it was Ang''s voice.


    The moment that Lin Fan heard this, his consciousness immediately came back and his will gathered, forcing back the fragmented memories that filled his mind.


    However, those fragmented memories didn''t stop assaulting his mind.


    They kept trying to flood him with the various scenes that they contained, trying to do what they could to submerge him.


    But with renewed willpower, Lin Fan wouldn''t let himself be submerged by these memories.


    Then there was a second call that filled his mind that renewed his willpower.


    With this renewed willpower, he was able to push down all of the memories that filled his mind.


    No matter how they tried assaulting him, they were isted by his mind and couldn''t affect him at all.


    Instead, it became Lin Fan who was slowly going through the memories one by one.


    It didn''t take him long to sort through these memories since he didn''t go through all of them.


    Most of them were basically the same, so there wasn''t much for him to go through.


    The only one that caught his attention was a strange memory that was a bit different from the rest.


    Once he finished sorting out all of these memories, he forcefully suppressed the strange energy that he had swallowed. Without these memories helping it, the strange power couldn''t resist at all as Lin Fan''s voidws swallowed it and made it his own.


    The statue that appeared in his dantian was a very strange one.


    It was a deformed statue that he couldn''t really tell what it was, but when he activated it like with the rest of the statues, he could feel the strange power that came out of it.


    The only difference was that he didn''t know how to use this strange power that came out of this deformed statue.


    It even seemed a bit out of his control, but he was able to restrain it when he wanted to.


    Since the strange power had been suppressed, he pulled himself out of his sea of consciousness and back into the outside world.


    When he came out, he saw the three of them looking at him with wary looks.


    He raised his hands and said, "It''s me, I''m fine now."


    They had doubtful looks at first, but seeing that he wasn''t going to do anything, they decided to rx their poses.


    The main thing was that Momonga could no longer sense the strange energy that had beening from him.


    After confirming that it was him that was in control, Ang ran over to support him before checking his body.


    Once she had confirmed that there was nothing wrong with him, she raised her fist and mmed it into his head for worrying her.


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile and apologized for what he did.


    Once she was done, it was Yuki''s turn to beat Lin Fan for worrying them.


    During this time, Momonga went over to the two shattered skeleton hands on the ground and started observing them.


    He looked at them for a while before turning to Lin Fan to ask, "Can you use that strange energy that they have?"


    Lin Fan nodded and raised his hand, gathering a ball of that strange energy.


    It was an invisible energy, but they could tell that it was there from the energy fluctuations that came from it.


    Momonga couldn''t help looking closer at the strange energy, but he wasn''t able to find anything from it.

 Chapter 958 Herding

    After a while, they suddenly heard the cking of the bones again.


    They looked down to find that the skeletons were gathering around them once more.


    So without hesitation, they ran away from the wave of skeletons.


    But this time, they didn''t go as fast as they did before.


    Instead, they deliberately went slower just to see how the skeletons would react.


    This time, instead of turning right away, the skeletons continued to surround the building that they had been on.


    It seemed like their guess had been correct.


    The skeletons had been drawn by the skeletal hands that grabbed Ang and Yuki''s feet. Now that those skeletal hands were gone, they would be able to sneak around without being surrounded by the skeletons.


    With this, they would be able to sneak out of the city.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t seem to want to go just yet.


    He couldn''t help staring at the skeletons that were gathering around the building that they had been in previously.


    As he stared at them, there was a strange look that appeared in his eyes.


    As they were familiar with him, they could tell that he was thinking something crazy¡­So the three of them couldn''t help feeling a bit worried.


    When he had this look in his eyes, it was never a good sign.


    And as they had expected, it wasn''t a good sign.


    "You want to do what?" Momonga said in a voice filled with disbelief.


    Both Ang and Yuki also looked at Lin Fan with eyes filled with disbelief without saying anything.


    Lin Fan just nodded and repeated, "I want to catch another one of the skeletons and absorb that strange power again."


    Ang didn''t waste any time toe forward to hit Lin Fan, but Lin Fan dodged out of the way instead of letting her hit him.


    Even if she did hit him, she would always hold back, so he was able to dodge. But he didn''t dodge when she hit him because he knew that it would be much worse to dodge than to let her hit him.


    Still, he dodged this time because it was important for him.


    Ang couldn''t help revealing a shocked look as she looked at where he had been standing.


    Lin Fan said with a serious look, "I can sense something when I absorb that strange power and it gives me clues as to why we''re here. I need to absorb a bit more of that strange power and then I''ll be able to figure it out."


    Seeing how serious he looked, all three of them didn''t argue with him.


    Instead, Momonga asked, "How do you n on isting them to do this? Not to mention, you lost control of yourself just from absorbing that little bit of power from those hands. Do you really think that you can keep your consciousness if you absorb even more of it?"


    Lin Fan didn''t speak right away when Momonga said this since he knew that he was right.


    Last time, it had been hard for him and it was only the strange power inside of the skeleton''s hands. If he were to absorb all of the strange power inside an entire skeleton, it would be very likely that he would be taken over.


    And there was the problem of isting it to capture it.


    The skeletons that were awake were all part of the horde right now. As for the ones that weren''t awake¡­


    While they could try to capture the ones that were still sleeping inside of the buildings, it would be hard for them.


    They couldn''t sneak up on them since there was something that allowed the skeletons to see through their camouge.


    So there really wasn''t a good way for them to capture a skeleton for Lin Fan to drain the power of.


    Not to mention that they would have to restrain Lin Fan while he was absorbing the strange power.


    No matter how they looked at it, it was just too dangerous.


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t back down as he said, "Let me test something first."


    All of them were confused when they heard this, but they waited for Lin Fan to do what he wanted to do.


    Lin Fan jumped onto another one of the other buildings and suddenly raised his hand.


    They couldn''t see exactly what he was doing, but they were able to sense it.


    He was gathering a ball of that strange energy in his hand.


    Nothing happened at first when he did this, but then¡­


    The skeleton horde that they had been watching suddenly started to slow. It didn''t take long before the skeleton horde suddenly came to a stop and turned in the direction that Lin Fan was in.


    After a slight pause, they suddenly started moving towards the building that Lin Fan had been on.


    Lin Fan dropped the ball of the strange energy that he had gathered and jumped back to where the other three were.


    The skeletons didn''t seem to notice him at all as they continued to head in the direction of the building that Lin Fan had dropped the ball of strange energy on.


    At the same time, they noticed that the skeletons in the surrounding buildings also starteding out.


    They followed the skeletons in the horde and went towards the building with the ball of strange energy on it.


    When the three of them saw this, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    They had already guessed that the strange energy was most likely what had attracted the skeletons to them, but they never expected Lin Fan to be able to use the strange energy like this.


    When Lin Fan returned, he asked, "How about it? Do you think that we can do it now?"


    Momonga stroked his chin before nodding in agreement.


    If there was a safe way to do this, then he was in agreement of doing it.


    Well, "safe" was a rtive word.


    There was still the danger of Lin Fan being taken over by the strange energy likest time.


    But there was nothing gained if they weren''t willing to take a risk.


    Lin Fan knew that Momonga would be on board the moment that he saw this, so the only one that he had to convince now was Ang.


    The one that surprised him was actually Yuki who firmly rejected it.


    Even Ang only mildly rejected it and seemed like she could be convinced.


    When asked why she rejected this proposition, Yuki said, "I don''t want to see you hurt."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being touched and confused when he heard this, but Yuki immediately shut him down by saying, "It''s not you that I''m worried about, it''s big sister."


    Earlier when she had seen how worried Ang had been about Lin Fan, it felt like her own heart was being torn out.


    She didn''t want to see that happen again, so she was firmly against this n.


    Lin Fan looked at Ang with a hint of guilt in his eyes, but his determination came through in the end as he said, "This is the only way for us to get the information that we need, so we have to do this."


    Yuki raised her hand and there was a ball of snow that was gathered around it as she said, "I''ll stop you, even if I have to use force."


    All three of them were shocked when they saw this from Yuki.


    She had always been the most indifferent part of their group when it came to things like this, so they never would have expected her to take such a strong stance on this matter.


    Ang quickly came over and said, "Yuki, don''t do this."


    Yuki revealed an aggrieved look and said, "Big sis, I can''t stand this fellow hurting you like this. If he does it again, I''ll hurt him before he can hurt you."


    Lin Fan could see the serious look in her eyes and couldn''t help taking a step back.


    But Ang stopped her before she could do anything and said, "Yuki, you can''t do this. It''s hard enough for him already, you can''t make it harder for him."


    Yuki just revealed an aggrieved look, but she still dropped her hand since she knew that Ang was right.


    Ang patted her on the back before looking at Lin Fan and saying, "Be safe."


    She had been hesitating, but after thinking about how serious Lin Fan was about this, she decided to trust him.


    Unless he had a reason, he wouldn''t do something like this.


    So the fact that he wanted to do this meant that he must have a very good reason for this.


    Lin Fan revealed a touched look before reaching his hand out and saying, "Come with me."


    Ang was caught off guard by this, but she took his hand only after a slight second of surprise.


    She didn''t know what he was nning, but since he had offered, she would go with him to the end.


    This was actually Lin Fan''s n against the strange energy.


    What had awakened him in the end was Ang''s voice.


    He didn''t know how it had awakened him, but he knew that it had done it.


    Since her voice could awaken him, then that should mean that if she was with him¡­he should be able to break free of the assault of the strange energy.


    So this time, they would go together.


    If they broke through the strange energy, it would be together.


    If he was taken over by the strange energy, then Ang could kill him before he did something that he shouldn''t do.

 Chapter 959 More Memories

    The n that they came up with in the end was to lure the skeletons all to one ce before using the strange energy to wake up the skeletons in an area.


    Then from the skeletons that came wandering out of the buildings, they would pick one to nab for Lin Fan to drain.


    At least that was the n at first.


    That was until Lin Fan noticed a certain skeleton among the horde of skeletons


    It was a certain skeleton that was missing its hands.


    The moment that he saw this skeleton, he couldn''t help thinking of the memories that had entered his mind before.


    They were all rted to that skeleton.


    If he were to use the voidws on another skeleton, the memories that he would see would most likely be different.


    So the moment that he saw the skeleton, he couldn''t help falling into a state of deep thought.


    When the other three saw the look on his face again, they knew that something bad was about to happen.


    As they guessed, Lin Fan said, "I want to catch that skeleton."


    When she heard this, Yuki raised her fist again as if she was about to hit Lin Fan, but before she could, Ang stopped her again.


    Lin Fan could see the questioning look on Momonga''s face, so he exined everything about the memories.


    After hearing this, Momonga gave a nod, but then still shook his head as he said, "Even if you want to get that skeleton, it''s not easy. There''s all those other skeletons in the way, so we won''t be able to snatch it." Then after a pause, he added, "Unless you have some kind of n."


    Lin Fan shook his head before giving a nod before shaking his head again.


    It was as if he did have a n, but at the same time, he hadn''t thought it out properly.


    After a long period of thought, he finally gave another nod and said, "Un, I have half a n."


    "Half a n?" Momonga repeated, but he still gave a nod and said, "Alright, let''s hear it."


    After that, Lin Fan jumped onto the other buildings and dropped a few balls of the strange energy before jumping back onto the building the others were on.


    These balls of strange energy did what he had thought it would.


    There seemed to be a certain range to the attraction of the strange energy balls, so there were only a certain number of skeletons that were attracted to each of the strange energy balls.


    Just like that, the horde was cut up into different pieces.


    There were groups of skeletons wandering all over the city now, being guided by the different strange energy balls.


    As for what determined the attraction range, after testing it out several times, Lin Fan found that it was the concentration of power that determined it. The more of the strange energy concentrated into the ball, therger the attraction range.


    So with this, he was able to easily split up the skeleton horde into tiny wandering groups of skeletons.


    These small groups of skeletons could have been split into further groups, but Lin Fan was slowly running out of area to herd them in. At the same time, he didn''t know what would happen if he created too many balls of this strange energy, so he decided to not risk it.


    It was already good enough for them to capture the skeleton with missing hands.


    This skeleton was currently wandering around the building Lin Fan and the others were on, being pulled back and forth between two different balls of strange energy that Lin Fan was controlling.


    He was activating them at intervals so that they would draw in the skeletons in turn.


    That was what he had learned while ying around with the strange energy earlier.


    The balls of strange energy would still remain there even if he didn''t use them, so he could turn them on and off at will.


    It really was a strange thing, it wasn''t like anything that he had ever encountered before.


    While they were being led back and forth, Momonga and the others went into position. Though in reality, it was only Momonga who was going to capture this skeleton.


    It couldn''t be helped, he was the only one with spatialws.


    Momonga was the immortal Lich King, so the number ofws that he could use was countless. Of course, they were weaker than thews that he specialized in, but they were still very useful.


    With the spatialws, he created a portal around the skeleton with the missing hands and brought it onto the roof that they were on.


    As soon as the skeleton appeared, its eyes locked onto them.


    However, the skeleton wasn''t able to do a thing as Yuki had already mmed it into pieces.


    As soon as it appeared, the skeleton was punched from behind by Yuki.


    She hadn''t held back at all when she remembered the grievances from earlier, so the pieces of the skeleton had gone flying as soon as it appeared.


    It was just a good thing that Momonga had already predicted this and had created a barrier to catch all of the pieces.


    The pieces were scattered, but they were ced in front of Lin Fan.


    They could feel the strange energying from these pieces and they could see the parts of the skeleton moving closer together.


    It wouldn''t take long for this skeleton to reform.


    The strangest thing was that during this time, the skeleton''s head had turned to look right at them.


    It seemed that the skull was the core and it was still functional even when the rest of the body wasn''t connected.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time other than being surprised by this.


    He reached his hand out and released his voidws as he began sucking up the strange energy of the pieces of the skeleton.


    As for his other hand, it was still firmly holding Ang''s hand.


    They had been like this the entire time.


    As the strange energy filled him, Lin Fan began feeling like he was being submerged in the memories from before.


    These were the same memories as the ones that he had seenst time, they were reying themselves again, but for some reason, he could see it clearer than before. It seemed that the more of the strange energy he absorbed, the more clearly he saw these memories.


    But at the same time, since the memories were clearer, they were also more powerful and began drowning him.


    He fell faster than before as the wave of memories flooded into his mind.


    There were even more memoriespared to before, which quickly flooded his mind and submerged him.


    But before they could drown himpletely, there was a warm feeling that filled him.


    This was a warm feeling that came from his very core that warmed him uppletely, driving away the memories that kept assaulting him. This warm feeling pushed back all the memories trying to crush him and allowed him to regain his consciousness.


    Once his mind cleared, Lin Fan focused on the sea of memories in front of him and started going through them.


    Most of the memories were just like the ones that he had seen before. They were all memories of different people being killed by a skeleton.


    Now that he had seen it more clearly, he could tell that the skeleton in the memory was the skeleton that he was currently absorbing this strange energy from.


    But now that the image had cleared, he was able to see the surroundings as well.


    The skeleton killed people either in this city or in the areas surrounding the city.


    It seemed like they weren''t the first person to set foot in this ce after it was destroyed.


    Lin Fan just went through a few of these memories before putting them aside and digging even deeper into the memories that flooded his mind.


    No matter how deep he dived, there was that same warm feeling that came from deep inside of him that allowed him to maintain his consciousness.


    Finally, he reached the very bottom of the sea of memories and found the one memory that he had been looking for.


    This was a memory that he had only caught a glimpse of previously which had made him want to find this skeleton.


    As he sank into this memory, he couldn''t help being shocked by what he saw.


    As for what this memory was¡­it was the memory of the skeleton being killed.


    Well, not the skeleton, but rather the human that the skeleton had been before it had been killed and turned into this walking skeleton.


    The one that killed it¡­Lin Fan couldn''t see that person clearly.


    The human that the skeleton had been waspletely trapped by that thing and was slowly eroded by the power released by that thing until it became a walking skeleton.


    As for what that power was, Lin Fan recognized it immediately.


    It was the strange power that he was currently absorbing.


    He didn''t know what this strange power was, but he was certain that this strange power came from this thing.


    As he was looking through this memory, he suddenly felt a wave of pressure fall onto him.


    The thing inside of the memory turned to look at him¡­not the skeleton, but rather Lin Fan who was watching the memory from the skeleton.


    Then after looking at him for a bit, it said, "Interesting, there''s actually someone that cane into this ce."

 Chapter 960 Canyon

    Lin Fan wanted to say something, but he found that he couldn''t open his mouth no matter how hard he tried.


    It was as if there was this strange thing that was forcing him to keep his mouth shut.


    It was just too strong for him to break free.


    After a long silence, the figure said, "It''s time for you to leave."


    Then with a single flick of what seemed to be a finger, Lin Fan''s consciousness was forced out of the memory.


    Once he had been forced out, he found that he had regained his ability to move once again.


    However, no matter how he tried to get back into that memory, he found that he wasn''t able to do so at all. It was like there was some kind of strange power that was blocking his entry into this memory.


    It was very simr to the strange power that had forced him to keep his mouth shut earlier.


    Lin Fan tried many times to break into the memory, but he found that it was just impossible for him to break through this strange power.


    So in the end, he had no choice but to give up on this.


    Since this was thest memory he wanted to check anyway, there was nothing left for him to do. So with a single thought, he pulled his consciousness out of the sea of memories and returned to the outside world.


    Once his consciousness came out, the rest of the strange power was subdued by his voidw and was swallowed by it.


    Seeing him suddenly open his eyes, Yuki and Momonga both raised their guard just in case he attacked.


    When he had been absorbing the strange power earlier, he had been strangely subdued which caught them off guard. He wasn''t like how he was the first time, where he had tried to attack them.


    So they thought that he had eitherpletely subdued the strange power like they had nned, or¡­he had beenpletely taken over by the strange power right away and now it was no longer the Lin Fan that they knew who was controlling this body.


    But Lin Fan quickly proved that it was still him with the key phrase that had been decided.


    Only Momonga knew the key phrase, so when Lin Fan said it¡­


    "Ang has put on a few poundstely."


    Ang immediately pulled him in with the hand that she was holding and proceeded to beat him.


    Lin Fan just sat there letting himself be beaten.


    Momonga gave a satisfied nod when he saw this since this was a bit of revenge that he was getting on Lin Fan for everything that he put them through.


    Yuki just watched with a look of schadenfreude.


    When she was finished, Lin Fan''s face waspletely swollen.


    He could have dodged, but the test was to see if he would let himself be hit.


    It was a double test of seeing if they would say it and if they would let themselves be hit. After all, even if whatever was in the strange energy took over Lin Fan, they wouldn''t know the rtionship between them since it wouldn''t be able to read through Lin Fan''s memories that quickly.


    So whatever was in the strange energy would most likely dodge if Ang attacked them.


    After letting himself be hit, Lin Fan quickly apologized to Ang and exined that it was just a test.


    However, Ang had been a bit self conscioustely because of her weight.


    It was all the fault of those sweets and how delicious they were.


    Before she came to the human world, she never knew about these delicious treats. But now that she had been exposed to them, she couldn''t resist them at all.


    Especially the new treats that she found in the Lin Astral Empire.


    Unlike the Blue Star that struggled to fight against the Beast Race and had food problems, the Lin Astral Empire had abundant food because of their experts guarding their territory.


    The level of cooking in the Lin Astral Empire was far above that of the Blue Star, so there were treats that even Lin Fan had never heard of before. However, there wasn''t a single dessert that didn''t taste good since Lin Fan was a part of the Lin Astral Family.


    The cooks of the Lin Astral Family were specially gathered from all the cooks in the Lin Astral Empire, so they were the best of the best. The things that they cooked were naturally delicious.


    As well, they used the best ingredients offered in the Lin Astral Empire.


    That was just the power of the Lin Astral Family.


    It was inevitable that Ang would gain a few pounds from eating all these desserts.


    But it wasn''t a problem since at her level of cultivation, she could easily burn through the fat that gathered and restore her figure.


    However, as a woman, she couldn''t help feeling a bit insecure about it.


    When it was pointed out by Lin Fan, she didn''t hesitate to¡­beat him.


    After this little incident, they didn''t waste any time to head out of town.


    With Lin Fan absorbing the rest of the strange energy, he had been able to fully form the statue inside of his dantian. With that fully formed statue, his control over the strange energy was much greater than before.


    With this control, he was able to easily move all of the skeletons out of his way with coordinated balls of strange energy around them.


    This created a straight path out of the city for them.


    With this distraction, they were able to make their way out of the city without any incidents at all and were able to follow the system''s map again.


    They found that once all of the skeletons entered the city, there were no more skeletons left in the surrounding area.


    After following the path set by the system''s map, they quickly arrived at what seemed to be arge canyon.


    When they looked down, they found that they couldn''t see the bottom at all.


    It was like this ce was a bottomless pit.


    But the worst part was that it was just too wide for them to jump over it.


    As for flying over it¡­it was much too dangerous since they couldn''t see what was underneath them.


    There could be all kinds of hidden danger underneath them in the canyon, so they didn''t dare risk it.


    But the map was pointing them across this canyon, so they didn''t really have a choice. They had to find some kind of way across or else they wouldn''t be able to finish this mission.


    Not to mention, time was against them.


    They had spent quite a bit of time in the city dealing with the skeletons and that had used up quite a bit of their time.


    If they continued at this pace, they definitely wouldn''t be able to reach the goal in time.


    So they had to speed up a bit.


    Without a choice, they did the only thing that they could do. They started looking around the area, trying to find a ce to cross this canyon.


    Luckily for them, they were able to find a bridge quite quickly.


    Unluckily for them, this bridge was just a simple rock bridge that cut across the canyon. It was nothing more than a strip of rock that led from one side to what they assumed would be the other side.


    After all, there should be something holding this strip of rock up.


    It was just a problem that this was a very simple and small rock bridge, so they wouldn''t have anywhere to run or to defend themselves if there was something that attacked them from below.


    Still, after going through their options, they still decided that this was the best way.


    After all, it was better than flying. At the very least, they would have some ground to stand on and move around on to fight instead of being trapped in the air.


    So going in a row, they made their way across the bridge.


    It was Yuki right in front, Ang and Lin Fan in the middle, and Momonga in the back.


    This was the formation that they decided was the best for them.


    Yuki with her snowws would be able to instantly cover them and deal with anything that came at them. Momonga in the back was already surrounded by many different ghosts that he had summoned earlier.


    He was the one that could use his summons to support Yuki and block their back if necessary.


    As for Lin Fan and Ang in the middle, Lin Fan was there since it was the safest ce and Ang was there to protect him if anything went wrong.


    It was Lin Fan who was on the task for the master of the store, so it was important that he make it to the end.


    Lin Fan was against this, but he was also the weakest person, so his arguments were rejected.


    Just like this, they started making their way across the bridge.


    It seemed quite peaceful at first, like nothing was going to happen¡­


    Until something happened.


    It was subtle at first, but then they started hearing the bone cking sounds around them.


    Out of the darkness of the canyon, they saw something white flying up towards them.


    These things were clearly skeletons, but they were different from the skeletons before.


    These things looked like fish instead of humans and they were flying through the air with what seemed to be wings where their fins should have been.


    And of course, the one thing that they all had was the same strange energy as the skeletons.

 Chapter 961 Skeleton Fish

    These skeleton fish came up from the canyon all around them.


    It only took a few seconds for them to bepletely surrounded by these skeleton fish.


    The only reason that they didn''t start fighting these skeleton fish was because these skeleton fish didn''t seem to notice them yet.


    So Momonga and Lin Fan had immediately cast their dark and shadowws respectively to hide them. Once it had been cast, they immediately started moving slowly but steadily forward.


    They didn''t know when these skeleton fish would attack, or if they would even attack.


    However, they weren''t nning on staying here to find out.


    It would be best if they could sneak past these skeleton fishes before they even noticed them.


    After all, they still couldn''t see the end of the stone bridge and the other side of the canyon yet. They didn''t know how long they had to go and any fighting now could mean damaging the stone bridge.


    While they could still fly in a worst case scenario, that would just mean that they would be surrounded by these skeleton fish.


    They were able to make it a fair bit before the skeleton fish suddenly turned in their direction.


    It was just one skeleton fish at first, but it didn''t take long before several of them turned in their direction. After a while, all of the skeleton fish were looking at them.


    Even though they had the camouge around them, the skeleton fishes'' eyes were all aimed at them.


    It was clear that they were able to see through this camouge just like how the skeletons had seen through it back at the city.


    However, since these skeleton fish had the same strange energy as the skeletons there, they figured that they came from the same source. Since they came from the same source, it wouldn''t be strange if they had the same power such as being able to see through their camouge.


    Now it was all about what they would do next.


    As expected, with the movement of one skeleton fish, the rest followed and started diving in their direction.


    With their mouths wide open, it was clear what they were nning to do.


    So with no other choice, they could only decide to fight.


    As soon as she saw them diving, Yuki released her snowws to create a barrier around them. While it was only a barrier of snow and wind, the power contained within instantly froze anything that approached.


    Then with a few quickly shot icicles, those skeleton fish shattered to pieces.


    Though not a single one of them had their bones crack.


    They were scattered to pieces based on the joints and the various bones covered in ice fell down into the canyon.


    With Yuki''s snow barrier, there wasn''t a single skeleton fish that was able to reach them. They were all kept at the distance of the snow barrier, with not a single one of them being able to break through without being shattered to pieces instantly.


    During this time, no one else made a move and just observed the situation.


    Just Yuki alone was already enough to deal with these skeleton fish, so there was no need for them to make a move.


    It was better for them to save their power for if anything else happened.


    But the problem was that no matter how many of the skeleton fish she took care of, there would always be more that took their ce.


    It was as if she wasn''t reducing their numbers at all.


    When Lin Fan and Momonga looked around the area carefully, they noticed that there were bones that were flying up out of the canyon. These bones floated there by themselves in midair for a few seconds before flying towards other bones that had floated up into the air.


    Once these bones came together, they startedbining with each other until they formed another skeleton fish.


    When they looked closely, they found that there were traces of ice on the bones as well.


    It was clear that these were the skeleton fish that Yuki had shattered to pieces before and were now reforming.


    It seemed that these skeleton fish could reform just like the skeletons, so shattering them to pieces wasn''t a solution to dealing with them. Only if they could destroy the bones of the skeleton fish would they be able to destroy itpletely.


    Or if they found a way to drain the strange energy controlling these skeleton fish would they stop moving.


    However, thest time that they did it, it took all of Lin Fan''s power and he had almost lost himself to that strange energy.


    In this situation, it definitely wasn''t time to try this.


    So what should they do?<novelsnext>please visit </novelsnext>


    Run?


    It was possible to run with Yuki''s snow barrier around them and try to make it to the other side, but there were problems with that too.


    First, it consumed too much of Yuki''s life energy to maintain this barrier around them. If she had to keep this up while they were running, she would eventually run out of life energy.


    Second, they couldn''t see the end of the bridge at all.


    Just running aimlessly like this would definitely mean being caught and then swarmed by the skeleton fish.


    So they had to think of a solution before Yuki''s snow barrier ran out.


    But there wasn''t anything that they could do to these skeleton fish with their strong bones.


    The only thing that they could do in the end was use all kinds of differentws to see if any would have an effect on the skeleton fish.


    Momonga had gathered manyws in his many years of being alive. While they weren''t on the same level as his main darknessw, they were still powerful enough to hurt most people.


    So they should also affect the skeleton fish if they were effective.


    Lin Fan had hisws from the many different pets that he had contracted with his new cultivation technique, so he could also use many differentws that were just as powerful as his mainws.


    But no matter whatws the two of them used, they found that they couldn''t do anything to the skeleton fishes flying around them at all.


    Every time theirws hit the skeleton fish, it was as if there was some kind of special barrier around the bones of the skeleton fish that blocked their attacks.


    So it was all useless in the end.


    Unless they could find a way to prate the barrier around the bones, it would be impossible for them to defeat the skeleton fish.


    In the end, all of them could only reveal ugly expressions as they watched the skeleton fish flying around them.


    The skeleton fish still charged at the snow barrier around them which still couldn''t affect them, but their bombardment with their bodies slowly made the snow barrier around them get smaller.


    With the look on Yuki''s face, it was clear that it was getting harder and harder for her to maintain the barrier. It wouldn''t take long before this snow barrier disappeared and these skeleton fish would surround them.


    Momonga raised his hand and the ghosts that had been around him started to fly out. But before they could go far, Yuki raised her hand and shook her head before releasing even more life energy.


    It was as if she was saying that she could keep going.


    Seeing this, Momonga gave a nod before waving his hand to summon the ghosts back.


    However, he narrowed his eyes at the same time and started observing the skeleton fish around them even more closely.


    As for Lin Fan, he couldn''t help raising his hand and gathering a ball of that strange energy.


    That strange energy had been used to herd the skeletons back in the town and these skeleton fish had the same strange energy as those skeletons¡­So did it mean that he could also use it here?


    The moment that the ball of strange energy was gathered in Lin Fan''s hand, there was a reaction from the skeleton fish.


    They all turned to look in the direction of that ball of strange energy and then¡­they all suddenly started flying even faster at Lin Fan.


    They were all stopped in the end by Yuki''s snow barrier, but it was clear that they had been incited by the ball of strange energy.


    Lin Fan''s sharp eyes didn''t miss this, so he quickly gathered more balls of this strange energy. Then without any hesitation, he scattered those balls of strange energy around them.


    The moment that these balls of strange energy appeared, the skeleton fish couldn''t help turning in the direction of these balls of strange energy. After a moment of hesitation where they didn''t know what to do, they started charging at the balls of strange energy.


    There wasn''t a single skeleton fish left that charged into Yuki''s snow barrier.


    They all couldn''t help being surprised seeing this, but they also knew that they couldn''t stay here for long. Now that the skeleton fish had been distracted, it was time for them to run.


    So Yuki immediately released the snow barrier and they all started running forward on the bridge.


    While running, they kept their eyes on the skeleton fish.


    For the first time, they saw what happened after the skeleton fish reached the ball of strange energy.


    The one that reached the ball of strange energy first opened its mouth and in one big gulp, they swallowed that ball of strange energy.

 Chapter 962 End Of The Road

    Once the skeleton fish swallowed the ball of strange energy, they could feel the strange energying from the skeleton fish be stronger.


    It seemed that these skeleton fish and the skeletons from before were chasing the strange energy because it made them stronger.


    So when the skeletal hands were grabbing Ang and Yuki, they assumed that these were the remains of one of the fallen that they could absorb the strange energy from.


    It was also why they chased the strange energy balls that Lin Fan released.


    This was their path to bing stronger.


    After that skeleton fish swallowed the ball of strange energy, it immediately turned its attention back to Lin Fan''s group.


    The same thing was happening with the other groups of skeleton fish that had gone to chase the other balls of strange energy.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan quickly gathered more balls of strange energy that he threw out around them.


    Once the bait was thrown out, all of the skeleton fish turned away from Lin Fan''s group and turned their attention back to the balls of strange energy floating there.


    It became another mad scramble to see who could get to it first.


    Just like this, they were able to quickly make their way across the stone bridge and get closer to the end. However, it still took them quite a bit of time before they were able to reach the end.


    Calcting the distance, it was several hundred kilometers that they had to travel across this small stone bridge.


    They were high level cultivators, so they were able to move at incredible speeds. But even then, they had to spend quite a bit of time before they were able to reach the end.


    Not to mention, they had to slow down from time to time as more and more skeleton fish appeared around them.


    Every time that they appeared, Lin Fan had to throw out even more balls of strange energy around them to distract these skeleton fish.


    In the end, they had more than double the amount of skeleton fish gathered around them.


    If Lin Fan ran out of life energy, it really would be hard for them to escape from these skeleton fish.


    Even if they left this bridge, they didn''t know what would happen. The skeleton fish were still surrounding them and they didn''t think that they would just leave them alone once they got off the bridge.


    So they still had to think of a way to deal with them once they got off the bridge.


    However, when they reached the end of the bridge, they were surprised by what happened.


    Instead of following them, the skeleton fish all suddenly stopped chasing after them and returned to the bottom of the canyon. In the blink of an eye, they had all disappeared without a trace.


    If they hadn''t seen the skeleton fish, they might have even doubted that they had existed.


    But since they weren''t chasing them, they couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.


    That was because Lin Fan was already running out of life energy at this time.


    He had managed to keep going with his voidws and the suns in his dantian providing life energy for him, but it was hard to keep it up with the extra skeleton fishes that had appeared at the end.


    So he was getting low on life energy near the end.


    He was tempted to go back and see if he could catch one of the skeleton fish to drain of its strange power, but he thought better of it in the end.


    That was because he could see the time ticking down on him.


    There wasn''t much time left for the mission and if he were to waste more time on this ce, then it would be toote for him to finish it.


    So with a heavy heart, he had no choice but to give up this idea and continue on the journey.


    The rest of the journey was actually surprisingly short since the bridge had actually been a shortcut. It was supposed to be a long wrap around across the canyon based on what Lin Fan could see, so the fact that they had cut right across the canyon had actually saved time.


    As for what that wrap around was, Lin Fan was certain that there must have been another way through the canyon that was much harder.


    After all, if it wasn''t for the strange energy that Lin Fan had absorbed, he definitely wouldn''t have been able to distract the skeleton fish.


    So that was the only reason they had been able to take this shortcut.


    There was nothing that happened during the journey to the final destination, but when they arrived, they couldn''t help being shocked by what they saw.


    Even the three Rulers couldn''t help being shocked by this since this was something that they had never seen.


    It was a mountain as one might expect of a final destination, but¡­


    This mountain just looked like aplete stereotype of what a final battle location would look like.<novelsnext>please visit </novelsnext>


    This mountain had thunder raining down on its peak and there was smoke soaring into the sky like it was a volcano.


    It was every bit like what one would expect from a final battle location¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as he muttered to himself, "Could it be that we''ll have to fight the sealed god of the mountain too?"


    After all, that was the cliche ending to most of these final battles¡­


    But still, this was where the map was pointing them, so that was where they had to go.


    At the very least though, when they approached the mountain, Lin Fan found that the map had zoomed in and he was able to more urately see the location of the item that they were supposed to find.


    As expected, it was at the very top of the mountain.


    So first they had to make their way up.


    They would fly up, but with the thunder raining down, it made it really hard for them to fly.


    After all, the moment that they flew up above everything else, the thunder would all immediately concentrate on them. Unless they wanted to be burnt to a crisp, it was best not to fly into the sky.


    So the only thing that they could do was walk up the mountain.


    While there were bolts of thunder that would fall down on them from time to time, these were much easier to block. With all the cover that was found on the mountain, they could even easily make their way to the peak without being struck.


    As for what this cover was, it was the nts that had grown in this environment.


    To grow in a ce that was constantly being struck by thunder, the nts had adapted and gained powerful resistance to electricity. Most of the nts were able to easily channel the electric energy into the ground without any harm to their own body.


    So with these things providing cover for them, they were able to easily make their way up the side of the mountain.


    It was only when they were halfway that they found that there was a problem.


    There was a river ofva that was in their way.


    The smoke plume that came from the top of the mountain really seemed to be an indicator of a volcano. This was backed even more by the appearance of this river ofva in their way.


    Though they guessed that it was a river, it was better to say that this was aplete sea ofva that they couldn''t see the other side of at all.


    They could fly across it just like with the canyon, but there was also the risk that there was something hiding inside of theva.


    So the only thing that they could do again was try to find a bridge across this river ofva.


    It didn''t take long to find the bridge, but it was just like the one from before.


    No, this one was actually much more flimsypared to the one from before.


    There were only a few rocks that were floating in theva that formed a bridge. But these were very flimsy and looked like they could tip over at any moment, so it was much worse than that simple stone bridge.


    But they still had no choice.


    At the very least, Momonga was able to use some gravityws to maintain the stability of the floating rocks so that they wouldn''t tip when they walked over them. At the same time, they just knocked away any of the lightning that fell on them.


    To their surprise, the number of thunderbolts that fell down in this ce was much less than the other ces on this mountain. It was easy for them to ignore it and just swat away the asional one that fell.


    As they took their first steps on these floating rocks, they really expected to be attacked by things hiding under theva. However, there wasn''t a single thing that popped out of the surface of theva to attack them.


    It was as if there was nothing that was living under theva at all.


    Though that wouldn''t be surprising.


    That was because they could feel the heating from theva.


    It was even at a level where the three Rulers felt ufortable with.


    If it wasn''t for Yuki putting a snow barrier around them that kept them cool, they would have already been sweating.


    For Rulers to think that the heating from theva was hot, it wasn''t hard to imagine just how hot the actualva was.


    This ce was definitely anything but ordinary.


    But that was to be expected of a cultivation realm that the system had sent them to.

 Chapter 963 Strange Corpse

    It didn''t take them long to make it to the other side of theva river.


    When they reached the other side, they were able to see the top of the mountain.


    They could see that there were many bolts of lightning that were raining down on the top of this mountain, almost as if there was something there that offended the gods themselves and they were trying to smite it.


    It waspletely different from the thunder that rained down all over the mountain, it was a constant barrage of thunder focused on a single point.


    Unfortunately, that was also where the item that they were supposed to find was.


    So with no other choice, they started heading up towards the top of the mountain.


    When they came closer, they were able to make out what was attracting the bolts of thunder that fell from the sky.


    At the very tip of the mountain, there was an altar that was getting bombarded by the bolts of thunder, but it didn''t seem affected at all. The thunder that hit it was all channeled through the altar and sent to the ground where it was dispersed without any harm.


    It was just like a perfect lightning rod.


    However, when Lin Fan''s group saw this altar, they couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    Once again, they felt something that they were familiar withing from this altar.


    It was the same strange energy that they had felt from all the undead that they had found scattered around in this cultivation realm. But, the strange energy that wasing from this ce was much stronger than the strange energy that they had felt anywhere else.


    It was clear that whoever was here was very powerful¡­


    It was very likely that whatever this strange energy came from was most likely the original source of this strange energy. That meant that whoever was in this ce was most likely the master of all the undead and the master of this world.


    The undead had attacked them without restraint when they had been found, so it was very likely that the person here wasn''t friendly. If they were found, they would most likely be attacked as well.


    But the marker for the quest was pointing to this ce, so they had no choice but to go into the altar.


    Before heading in though, they made sure to rest up so that they were in peak condition.


    They had rushed up the mountain and saved quite a bit of time, so they could afford this time to rest.


    Not to mention, this was the perfect ce to rest since there was no lightning raining down on them. With the altar there attracting all the lightning, this ce had be a shelter from the constant lightning raining down on them.


    So they didn''t have to defend themselves and could focus on healing.


    Though of course, they didn''t let their guards down while resting just in case lightning did fall on them.


    Once they finished recovering, Lin Fan exchanged a look with the others.


    Receiving a nod of acknowledgement from them, he turned and led the way into the altar.


    However, when they entered the altar, they couldn''t help being surprised by what was inside.


    Instead of the borate maze that they had been expecting, they found that the altar had a very simple design. It was just a simple exterior that waspletely empty except for a singlerge thing that was right in the center of the room.


    However, this thing really was big. It was so big that it almost took up half the room just by being in the center.


    It was almost like a mountainpared to the four that had just walked in.


    But that wasn''t the most surprising thing for them.


    The most surprising thing was that it was the source of the strange energy that they felt.


    The moment that theyid their eyes on it, they could feel the powerful strange energy that came from this thing and they immediately raised their guard. Whenever they encountered some kind of corpse with this kind of energy, it would normally stand up and attack them.


    They didn''t believe that this giant corpse would be any different.


    However, the giant corpse justid there in the center of the room without moving. Even after they got a bit closer, it just seemed toy there as if it didn''t even notice their presence.


    Still, there was the powerful strange energy that wasing from it that seemed to even threaten Rulers like them, so they didn''t dare get too close.


    Only Lin Fan was able to ignore this powerful strange energy and move closer in the end.


    That was because this giant corpse was the goal of his mission. This giant corpse was the item that the system wanted him to retrieve.


    So he went towards it without any hesitation.


    When he came closer, he saw the notification from the system pop up.


    "Please obtain the corpse containing a trace of the Outer God''s power and absorb it."<novelsnext>please visit </novelsnext>


    Lin Fan''s eyes popped out when he saw this notification.


    He had already guessed that the strange power that he had absorbed was not something from their universe since it was not something that he had ever experienced before. But now, the system had confirmed that it was indeed power from an Outer.


    As for the Outer¡­those were the creatures that came from outside of their universe that invaded their universe.


    He had already heard this from Momonga before and he had seen it in the memories of the trial of the past.


    The Outers had been the reason why that person had fallen in the first ce and why the gods had sealed themselves off¡­


    Right now in front of him¡­there was the corpse that had a trace of an Outer God''s power¡­


    Lin Fan really didn''t know how to react.


    The other three immediately noticed the strange expression Lin Fan had and couldn''t help feeling worried.


    But before any of them could say a thing, they received a notification from the system as well.


    It was a severe warning telling them not to interfere.


    They had never seen anything like this before.


    Lin Fan looked closely at the giant corpse in front of him with aplicated gaze before turning back to look at Momonga. However, when he turned around to look at Momonga, he saw him turning away from him.


    When he turned to Ang and Yuki, they did the same thing.


    It wasn''t hard to guess what was happening.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling doubt towards the system. He had always thought that the system was guiding him towards something and now that suspicion became stronger.


    It was clear that it was interfering with the three of them and it was basically forcing him to absorb the power of this giant corpse.


    As for why, he didn''t have any ideas¡­


    But he was also curious why there would be a corpse with the power of an Outer God in a ce like this. In fact, he was still very confused about what this ce was in the first ce.


    With all of these doubts, Lin Fan walked forward towards the giant corpse and raised his hand.


    As his hand came up, the voidws gathered.


    When it came all the way up, he took one final step forward and ced his hand on the giant corpse.


    The moment that his hand and the voidws in his hand made contact with the giant corpse, there was arge surge of energy that filled him.


    This feeling was different from the strange energy that he had absorbed from the skeleton before.


    Topare the two, the energy that he absorbed from the skeleton was like a wave and this energy that he was absorbing from the corpse was like the entire sea. Itpletely drowned him in an instant and he was at its mercy right away.


    However, this strange energy from the corpse didn''t force its way in and take him over like the other strange energy had done. Instead, it just remained still as if it waspletely in charge of the situation and was just watching over it.


    Lin Fan could have taken this time to fight back, but he didn''t have the ability to do so.


    He had been able to break through the strange energy before with the power of his bond with Ang, but now¡­


    The system had forcefully separated him and her, so he couldn''t rely on her.


    He had to break through this power with his power alone.


    But it just wasn''t strong enough.


    The strange energy remained still for a while before finally pressing down on Lin Fan as if it was finally turning its attention to Lin Fan.


    It just pressed down on him for a few minutes before a voice suddenly said, "It''s you again. Little boy, are you really trying to absorb my power?"


    Lin Fan trembled when he heard this since he immediately recognized this voice.


    It was the owner of this strange power that he had seen in the memory of the skeleton.


    Lin Fan gritted his teeth and wanted to say something, but he found that he couldn''t say a single thing with this strange power pressing down on him. It was just like before when he was in the memory, when there was this invisible power that stopped him from doing anything.


    Seeing that he didn''t say anything, the voice said, "Well, it doesn''t matter. I will gratefully ept your body."

 Chapter 964 Outer God Fragment

    As soon as this voice rang out in Lin Fan''s mind, he felt a strong power pressing down on him.


    The moment that this power pressed down on him, he felt his consciousness fading away.


    He did all that he could do to resist, but this was the power of a god, so it wasn''t as if he was a match at all.


    In his final moments, he couldn''t help wondering why the system had rushed him into absorbing this fragment of the Outer God''s power.


    It was clear that he wasn''t ready for it, but the system had forced him to absorb it.


    He had thought that the system would have some method of protecting him, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    For the first time, the system was actually harming him¡­


    That was thest thing that Lin Fan thought before he fell unconscious.


    The strange voice rang out again, but this time it was muttering as it spoke, "How did this childe here? He shouldn''t have been able to make it all the way through all of my servants with his level of power. So how did he make it to my altar?"


    There was a spiritual sense that suddenly swept out and entered Lin Fan''s mind and body, searching through it.


    After a period of silence, there was a trace of hostility that filled the voice as it said, "It''s the voidws! It''s the damn voidws!"


    Slowly, there was anger that filled the voice as it said, "It''s thews of that man! It''s thews of that sted man!"


    There was a wave of energy that swept over Lin Fan again as the rage of this voice reached a peak and it shouted, "If it wasn''t for that damn man, then we never would have been defeated! If only I could rip that man to pieces!"


    The entire mind space started to shake when exposed to the anger of this voice, but that quickly calmed down.


    That voice calmed down again as it said, "If this child has the voidws, then that means that this child is one of the descendants or the sessor of that man."


    The voice turned cold at this point as it said, "Since that''s the case, then I can''t let this child live. Not only that, I will make sure that this child suffers the worst death possible. I want anything rted to that man to suffer!"


    There was a surge in the strange power before it suddenly fell down on Lin Fan, but it didn''t crush him like before. Instead, it started slowly seeping into Lin Fan, as if it was going to refine him.


    The strange energy kept pouring into Lin Fan''s body, integrating into him, bing a part of him.


    As this strange energy entered Lin Fan''s body, his body started turning darker and darker until it was almost as ck as the night.


    However, Lin Fan''s eyes that had suddenly opened were not as dark as the rest of his body. Instead, his eyes were a strange yellow colour just like that of a cat''s, piercing right through the night of his skin.


    This was a process of refining Lin Fan''s body into the perfect vessel for it, so it took quite a long time.


    During this process, Lin Fan''s mind that was still unconscious was tortured with countless nightmares.


    So while Lin Fan was sleeping, he was currently facing nightmares that slowly destroyed his soul.


    Seeing that it was going so well, the voice suddenly rang out again with a chuckle.


    But midway through that chuckle, there was a sudden golden glow that came from Lin Fan.


    Before the voice could even react, there was a golden barrier that suddenly appeared around him. This golden barrierpletely took up the space around Lin Fan, so that he couldn''t be seen at all.


    At the same time, there were wisps of that strange energy that were forced out of the golden barrier.


    The voice couldn''t understand what was happening and didn''t do anything at first, but then it said, "You want to fight back now? Child, you have already been condemned to a fate of bing my vessel, there is no way out for you."


    After the voice said this, the same pressure as before fell down on Lin Fan.


    However, this time, the golden barrier around Lin Fan didn''t crumble like Lin Fan''s mind had before. It firmly stood under the pressure of the strange energy that fell onto it and even pushed the strange energy back a bit.


    When the Outer God fragment saw this, it couldn''t help being shocked as it said, "What is this?"


    But then it suddenly noticed something and said in an even more shocked voice, "This power¡­this power¡­it''s that! It''s that god!"


    The Outer God fragment was about to pull back its power, but before it could, there was a sudden burst of golden light. The golden barrier suddenly pulsed and released a golden shockwave around it, blowing away all the strange energy that had been pressing down on it.


    By the end of the shockwave, there was just the Outer God fragment who had been revealed.


    It had been cloaking itself in the strange energy so that it couldn''t be noticed, but when Lin Fan had started absorbing the strange energy from the corpse, it had snuck into his body and into this mind space. It had been floating just above Lin Fan.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This Outer God fragment looked very strange.


    It was like a swirling mass of ck energy, but at the same time looked like it was covered in a cloak.


    As for the face, it wasn''t just a single face.


    There were many faces that were showing and all of them were grotesque. They all were screaming, as if they were asking for help, but not a single one of them made a sound.


    This was a creature that was truly grotesque and shouldn''t have existed.


    It was almost as if it was an amalgamation of grudges that had been forced together.


    After the true appearance of the Outer God fragment was revealed, the voice said in a panic, "What are you doing here? You were sealed away after thest war! You shouldn''t have the power to do anything right now!"


    From the golden barrier, there was a golden figure that appeared.


    This golden figure was too bright to look at at first, but then as the golden light dimmed, it revealed its appearance.


    It looked just like Lin Fan, but it was made of golden energy.


    This golden Lin Fan looked at the Outer God fragment and said, "Just like how you''ve hidden yourself away, I''ve also hidden a fragment of myself away. I''ve just regained the power to break through into your hiding spot and today, you will die."


    The Outer God fragment was about to panic again, but then it suddenly calmed down as it realized something.


    The faces of the Outer God fragment turned to look at golden Lin Fan and with a chuckle, it said, "Ha, you might have scared me earlier with your sudden appearance, but you can''t fool me. You said that you''re just a fragment of yourself, so that means that you don''t have the same power as before."


    The faces of the Outer God fragment turned fierce as he said, "Since you''re just a fragment, then you won''t be able to resist my full power."


    With this, it suddenly released a new wave of that strange energy.


    The strange energy that it had used before was only a fraction of its power.


    It had only used a fraction since it could tell that Lin Fan was weak. Just a fraction was already enough for it to refine Lin Fan and turn him into its vessel.


    But now that it was facing this golden Lin Fan, it didn''t have the option to hold back.


    This god¡­it was one of the reasons that they had lost back then. Along with that man, they had defeated and sealed all of the Outer Gods.


    If it wasn''t for the two of them, they wouldn''t have been defeated like that.


    So now that it was facing this god again, it didn''t dare look down on him.


    That was just how much fear this god had left on him.


    But even with this new wave of strange energy, it wasn''t able to suppress the golden barrier of this golden Lin Fan at all. As soon as this wave of strange energy fell down on the golden Lin Fan, it was immediately pushed back by another golden barrier that appeared.


    Then with a golden shockwave, the strange energy was sted to pieces.


    At the same time, the Outer God fragment was sent flying away. But before it could fly far, it was suddenly mmed down by a golden fist that had appeared out of nowhere.


    The golden Lin Fan jumped forward andnded on the Outer God fragment, mming his foot down on it and pinning it to the ground.


    No matter how the Outer God fragment tried struggling, it wasn''t able to break free at all.


    The faces of the Outer God fragment could only look up at the golden Lin Fan in shock and fear as it said, "How do you have so much power? You werepletely destroyed back in the war!"


    The golden Lin Fan gave a snort, but didn''t answer the question. Instead, he said, "You will submit now and hand over your essence now or you will be destroyed."


    The Outer God fragment couldn''t help trembling when it heard this, but it still had a look of defiance.


    Seeing this, the golden Lin Fan didn''t give it a chance.


    Before the Outer God fragment could even say anything, the golden Lin Fan''s foot stepped down on it and crushed it.


    All that was left was a ck ball of energy lying there.

 Chapter 965 Memories Of A God

    "Humph." The golden Lin Fan gave a snort before looking down at the ck ball of energy lying there.


    Without even picking it up, he turned back to Lin Fan lying in that golden barrier and then he disappeared into Lin Fan.


    He hadn''t wanted to crush the Outer God fragment just now because it meant that the essence left behind would be weaker. A part of the Outer God fragment''s power would be scattered by the power that he suppressed him with.


    But that Outer God fragment gave him no choice.


    He could see in his eyes that he refused to submit.


    ¡­


    "Ah!"


    When Lin Fan woke up, that was the first thing that he said.


    He sat up and looked around himself, but he found that everything was calm.


    He was in his mind space and there was nothing around him.


    He couldn''t help looking down at his own body and found that there was nothing wrong. It was as if everything that he thought had happened didn''t happen at all.


    But it all felt so real¡­


    He could even sense the strange energy at this moment.


    Wait¡­


    He could sense the strange energy.


    Lin Fan started looking around himself until his eyes fell onto the ck ball of energy lying near him.


    This was where the strange energy wasing from.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking around again to see if there was anything else here, but he found that other than him and the ck ball of energy, there was nothing else here.


    Just with a little thought, it wasn''t hard for him to figure out what had happened.


    When he had been pressured by the fragment of the Outer God''s power, there had been someone or something that had appeared to save him.


    This ck ball of energy had to be what remained of the Outer God fragment.


    "Who was it?" Lin Fan muttered to himself.


    He just remained there looking around himself, trying to find the one that had saved him.


    But there was just nothing around him.


    So in the end, Lin Fan could only ept that he had been saved by someone and not knowing who it was.


    The suspicion that he had was that it was rted to the system somehow, but the system wasn''t replying to anything that he asked it. It was as if the system waspletely ying dead.


    Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t do anything to the system, so he turned his attention to the ck ball of energy on the ground.


    This was what he was supposed to absorb in the first ce. This was the item that the system wanted him to obtain.


    So after picking it up, Lin Fan started absorbing it.


    Unlike the strange energy that he absorbed before, this energy just obediently entered him and allowed itself to be swallowed and refined by the voidws.


    As he absorbed this ck ball of energy, the statue inside of his dantian became more and more refined.


    Finally, when the ck ball of energy was gone, the statue was fully formed.


    This statue was different from the vague statue that he saw before.


    Instead, this statue had a form that sent shivers down Lin Fan''s spine.


    It was a statue that waspletely made of people and each one had a face that was twisted in agony. This was a statue that waspletely made to represent the agony that these people suffered.


    However, Lin Fan could feel the strong powering from it.


    At the very least, he knew that there wasn''t aw like this in this world.


    After absorbing the ck ball of energy, there was something else that he gained as well.


    Just like with the strange energy that he had absorbed from the skeleton, there were memories that came with the strange energy that he absorbed from this ck ball of energy.


    The memories were the memories of the owner of this strange energy, the Outer God fragment.


    The first memory that Lin Fan received was the formation of the undead of this.


    They had all been refined with the same strange energy that the Outer God fragment had used to refine Lin Fan, though they were not refined the same way. The way that Lin Fan was refined was as a vessel while the undead were refined as puppets.


    The main use of these puppets was to gather power for the revival of the Outer God fragment.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    That was why Lin Fan had received the memories of those people dying.


    The people who died in those memories were all those that had trespassed on this and had been in by the undead. The agony that they left behind at the moment of their death was collected by the undead and given to the Outer God fragment to strengthen it.


    It used the agony, which contained fragments of the souls of those that died to empower itself.


    This allowed the Outer God fragment to slowly regain its power and reach the level that it had been at before.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s meddling, it would have taken less than a hundred years for the Outer God fragment to regain its power. Then it would have left this realm and gone back to the Outer, or tried to find a way to establish itself in this universe.


    All of that depended on the situation of the surrounding area, but that was a problem for the future when the Outer God fragment regained its power.


    The other memories that Lin Fan obtained from the Outer God fragment were about the past.


    These were memories that dated all the way back to the war between the gods and the Outer invaders.


    Lin Fan had already seen a bit of this because of the trial that he had undergone, but this time, he saw it from the point of view of the invader.


    He was able to see fragments of the Outer, the world where this Outer God fragment hade from.


    It was a world that waspletely destroyed, but it was still filled with creatures like the Outer God fragment. These were grotesque creatures that fed on the suffering of others to strengthen themselves.


    But these creatures worshiped the Outer God who was the progenitor of them all.


    They were running out of materials to refine, which was why they had invaded this world along with the other Outers.


    Once they came to this world, they were caught up in a fight with the residents and the gods of this world.


    They had onlye here in the first ce to absorb some agony, but since the residents and the gods of this world stood in their way, they had no choice but to fight.


    The story went as Lin Fan had known.


    The Outer Gods and Outers fought against that man and his army of beasts, being overwhelmed by him in the end and being defeated.


    Once they had been defeated, most of them had been destroyed.


    It was only this Outer God and a few other Outer Gods that had been able to survive.


    They left behind fragments on worlds that they had conquered, allowing them to survive all this time.


    The skeletons with three eye holes were an ancient race that had been wiped out because of the war with the Outers. That was why even Momonga didn''t know about this race.


    As for the fish skeletons, they were something that this Outer God had stolen from another one of the Outer Gods and kept here as puppets.


    There were many other things that couldn''t be found in this universe at all that were hidden on this as well. They had all been gathered by this Outer God fragment in preparation for the future.


    After he finished sorting out these memories, Lin Fan had an idea of what the system wanted.


    The system was without a doubt connected to the gods that had sealed themselves up.


    So for them to bring him to a ce like this with an Outer God fragment, it could only mean one thing.


    They were training him and teaching him about the Outers.


    Could it be that there would be another war with the Outers in the future?


    Lin Fan remembered that he had talked to Momonga about the Outers in the past, but he had just changed the topic.


    Did that mean that the Rulers of this universe already knew about the Outers and knew that there was an invasioning?


    Was that what they were worried about?


    There were many different possibilities that filled Lin Fan''s mind as he thought about this.


    But there was one thing that was clear on his mind as he thought this through.


    He didn''t know when these Outers woulde, but he knew that with his current level of cultivation, he was just too weak to face them.


    Even the peak Rulers of the past had been destroyed by the invading Outers. Even the gods had been killed by Outer Gods.


    The enemies were definitely not weak and he wasn''t even a Ruler yet.


    If they invaded while he was at this level, there was no doubt that he would be nothing more than cannon fodder.


    If he couldn''t be stronger, he wouldn''t be able to protect his family.


    While there was the Lin Astral Empire behind him now, that was far from being enough.


    So Lin Fan started feeling the urgency after learning all of this.


    He would need to make some changes to his ns after heading back.

 Chapter 966 Return Journey

    Once he finished organizing the memories of the Outer God fragment, there was nothing left for him to do in this mind space.


    So Lin Fan exited the mind space and appeared outside again.


    When the three others saw him, they immediately raised their guard.


    They had felt the fluctuationsing from Lin Fan, so they knew that whatever he had absorbed wasn''t simple or weak. It was even at a level that they were threatened by, which meant that it was most likely¡­rted to a god.


    They knew that the master of the store was someone in the God Realm, so it wasn''t strange that whatever Lin Fan had been sent here to get was rted to a god.


    But they didn''t think that Lin Fan would be able to refine the energy of a god¡­


    So they were worried that Lin Fan had been taken over.


    Lin Fan immediately raised his hands when he saw this and said, "It''s still me."


    None of them rxed their guards, but Ang took a step forward and asked a few questions in a small voice, making sure that the other two wouldn''t hear.


    Once Lin Fan answered the questions, she put her hands down and went forward to hug him.


    As for the questions that she had asked, they were intimate questions that only the two of them should know which was why she had spoken in such a small voice.


    Seeing this, Yuki and Momonga rxed a bit, but they still maintained their guard just in case it was a trick.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this and just exined what this ce was to them.


    After they finished listening to the story, they couldn''t help turning to look at the giant corpse with shocked looks.


    Momonga was the one that went over to it and started looking it over with an interested look.


    This was a corpse that had once held a fragment of an Outer God, it was without a doubt precious.


    If it wasn''t for the notification that suddenly popped up when he approached it, he would have wanted to take it away with them. However, it seemed like the master of the store wouldn''t allow them to take it.


    The master of the store most likely had his own ns for this thing, so Momonga could only give up.


    But that didn''t mean that he would give up looking it over while he was still here.


    Now that they had finished the mission, there wasn''t a time limit anymore, so he could spend as long as he wanted looking at this thing.


    Of course, they didn''t want to spend too much time on this ce since it was still filled with undead creatures.


    Now that Lin Fan had absorbed the Outer God fragment that controlled these undead, it was unknown how they would act. The most likely oue was that these undead would go crazy and start attacking whatever came near them, instead of just lying there waiting for prey toe.


    So it was best if they left this ce as soon as possible.


    As for why they had to leave, it was because the system was giving them the task of heading back to where they started.


    They had to follow the same path as before and reach the location where they first arrived on this cultivation realm before being sent back by the system.


    That would mean that they would have to go through all the ces filled with undead that they had to go through before. They could avoid it, but they didn''t know what dangers hid on this world outside of this path, so the safest way was to take this path back.


    After spending around half an hour letting Momonga investigate the statue, they pulled him away with an unwilling look on his face out of this altar.


    As they left, Momonga couldn''t help saying, "Just give me another few minutes, I almost have something."


    But that was what he had been saying the entire time and they had finally gotten tired of hearing it. So they dragged him away even if he didn''t want to leave.


    When they came out, they were surprised to find¡­


    The rain of thunder bolts that fell down was gone.


    The sky hadpletely cleared and there wasn''t a single trace of the lightning clouds from before. There was now a bright sun that was high up in the sky above them.


    But this made sense since what most likely attracted the thunderbolts in the first ce was the Outer God fragment that had been here.


    Now that Lin Fan had absorbed this fragment, it made sense that the thunderbolts stopped.


    However, they could also see some bird like creatures flying through the air because of this.


    This meant that all the creatures that had been hiding out from the thunderbolts were now out and about. It was unknown if these creatures were friendly or hostile, but this added a new degree of danger to their return trip.


    If they had gone earlier, then perhaps there would be less danger.


    But now that they had spent all that time in the altar studying the giant corpse, they had given the animals time toe out.


    So it was unknown how many animals were out and about, but it did mean that there was now hidden danger all around them.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The three of them couldn''t help looking at Momonga with looks of me.


    Momonga just faced those looks and showed a look that didn''t have any regret.


    He would never regret using this chance to find out more about the Outer Gods, even if he didn''t find anything from the corpse.


    It was toote for regret, so the only thing that they could do was move through the forest like normal.


    To their surprise though, they found that not a single animal approached them.


    It wasn''t that there weren''t any animals in this forest, but rather they all went out of their way to avoid them. They could sense the animals all around them, watching them as they made their way down the mountain.


    Many of these animals were in the World Realm and there were some that were even Rulers.


    If they really wanted to attack them, they would be quite troublesome.


    But in the end, not a single one of them attacked.


    Lin Fan''s group was surprised by this, but they didn''t dwell too deeply on this. After all, they were now trying to escape this cultivation realm, so they didn''t have time to care about this.


    When they reached the bottom of the mountain, they quickly went the same way that they went before.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the canyon.


    In front of them was the same stone bridge without anything around, but they knew that there were those skeleton fish hiding inside of the canyon.


    Now there was a choice that was ced in front of them.


    They could either follow the pathid out by the system and test the unknown waters to see if it was safer, or they could use the same path that they used before and use this stone bridge.


    But if they used the stone bridge, that would mean getting attacked by the skeleton fish.


    No, in the first ce, they didn''t know if the skeleton fish were still here.


    After all, they had been controlled by the Outer God fragment before and now that the Outer God fragment had been absorbed by Lin Fan, it was unknown if they even stayed here.


    They could have already left this ce before they came here.


    That would be good for Lin Fan''s group since that would allow them to travel across this stone bridge without any danger.


    But it was all a gamble in the end since the skeleton fish could still be here.


    After debating it for a long time, they still decided to take this stone bridge since it was unknown what kind of danger was on the other path.


    In a worst case scenario, they would be able to rush forward with Yuki''s snow barrier. Now that they knew how long it was, they were certain that she would have enough life energy to get them across.


    As for what would happen after they crossed, that was for them to worry about afterwards.


    So they took the first step onto the bridge.


    As if on cue, there were cking sounds all around them.


    As soon as they heard this, they immediately knew what this meant and didn''t hesitate at all to charge forward.


    The skeleton fish soon quickly caught up to them and surrounded them.


    When Yuki had raised her hands and was about to use her snow barrier, Lin Fan stopped her.


    He raised his own hand and gathered the strange energy from before.


    While he didn''t know if it would still work, he decided to use this to see if they could distract the skeleton fish.


    The strange energy orbs were quickly released all around him, but the reactions from the skeleton fish were strange.


    Instead of being distracted by the balls of strange energy likest time, they just froze there in the air and stared at them.


    It was as if they had noticed something strange about these balls of strange energy.


    Lin Fan also felt a strange feeling when these skeleton fish did this.


    It was as if there was some kind of resonance with the skeleton fish when he released these balls of strange energy.


    After a daze, the skeleton fish started moving towards the balls of strange energy and then they¡­

 Chapter 967 Big Buildings

    When the skeleton fish reached the balls of strange energy, they didn''t open their mouths to bite at them likest time.


    Instead, they suddenly tapped their heads against the balls of strange energy.


    Lin Fan could feel the strange energy flowing out of them and into the balls of strange energy.


    After this strange energy flowed into the balls of strange energy, he felt the connection between him and the strange balls of energy. The strange energy that went into the strange balls of energy¡­flowed into him.


    It was as if they were gathering energy for him.


    At the same time, after each skeleton fish touched the balls of strange energy, Lin Fan could feel¡­a new connection with each of the skeleton fish.


    It was as if he could control them with his mind.


    So he focused on one of the skeleton fish and gave it an order.


    As soon as that skeleton fish received the order, it immediately flew towards Lin Fan.


    Seeing this, the other three immediately raised their guard and prepared to fight, but they were stopped by Lin Fan who raised a hand.


    They revealed a confused look, but they still watched the skeleton fishe closer.


    The skeleton fish had charged at full speed towards Lin Fan until it was close to him. Then it suddenly slowed down until it stopped in front of Lin Fan, floating there as if it was waiting for something.


    Lin Fan slowly reached out his hand and touched the skeleton fish on the head, but there was no reaction from the skeleton fish.


    Lin Fan turned his eyes to the other skeleton fish floating there and with another thought, they all started heading in his direction. Then they did the same thing as the first skeleton fish and stopped in front of him.


    They all came forward and lined up in a row in front of him, as if they were waiting for orders.


    Seeing this, the other three couldn''t help being shocked.


    It didn''t take them long though to understand what was happening.


    They had already heard from Lin Fan that the one who controlled the skeleton fish was the Outer God fragment.


    Now that Lin Fan had absorbed this Outer God fragment, it wasn''t hard to imagine that the control of these skeleton fish was transferred over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan started giving the skeleton fish more orders to test the limits of what he could do with them. As he became more and more familiar with the skeleton fish, he was able tomand them to take many different formations and put on a show with them.


    But of course, the other three weren''t impressed since they knew that he was just ying around.


    So with a p on the back of the head from Ang, Lin Fan let the skeleton fish stop their performance and had them take positions around them.


    He would use the skeleton fish to guide them across the stone bridge.


    It was much more rxed this time since they had these skeleton fish guards.


    Even when more skeleton fish appeared out of the canyon, all Lin Fan had to do was release his balls of strange energy and they would start following them as guards.


    Just like this, Lin Fan was able to collect a bunch of skeleton fish that followed his group along the way.


    When they arrived at the other side, Lin Fan dismissed these skeleton fish and they all returned back into the canyon.


    All of them except for one that Momonga insisted on bringing along to study.


    Since it was big enough, Lin Fan decided that they would ride it instead of walking.


    So all of them got onto the back of the skeleton fish. Though when Ang and Yuki got on the back, they couldn''t help revealing strange looks.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling worried when he saw this, so he asked, "What''s wrong? Do you feel ufortable somewhere?"


    Ang shook her head at first, but then she also gave a nod whichpletely confused Lin Fan.


    After being silent for a bit, she exined, "It''s this skeleton fish, it feels strange sitting on it. I didn''t feel anything earlier when we were being attacked by it, but it feels strange riding on it." After a pause, she added, "It''s almost like a natural repulsion, like we aren''t supposed to mix."


    Lin Fan gave a nod when he heard this.


    Undead and spirits were natural enemies, so it was normal for her to feel this way.


    Ang then said, "It''s fine if we sit on it for a bit, but if we have to sit on it for a long time¡­"


    She looked over at Yuki who nodded in agreement.


    Lin Fan understood what they meant, so he said, "It''s just a little while. It won''t be much longer."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Both of them nodded and sat down on the back of the skeleton fish.


    During their trip, the one that was the most excited was Momonga who kept moving around the skeleton fish, looking at every inch of it.


    Like he had said, this was a kind of undead that he had never encountered before and it was created with aw that he didn''t recognize. So he would certainly benefit from researching this thing.


    It was just that in his fervor, even Lin Fan found him annoying.


    He had never seen Momonga like this before, but then again, this was the first time that he had seen something that Momonga didn''t recognize. It turned out that this was how he acted when he met something new like this¡­


    Still, Lin Fan couldn''t take how annoying he was anymore, so he made Momonga sit down.


    But then he realized his mistake as he had to suffer through a lecture from him about this skeleton fish.


    It was just a good thing that the ride wasn''t that long and they were able to reach the city very quickly. Otherwise, Lin Fan might not have been able to contain the urge to throw him off the skeleton fish.


    When they arrived in the city, they could have gone right past it, but there was something that Lin Fan wanted to try first.


    So they went to the first building that they could find and carefully made their way up to the second floor with the jade bed.


    Once they were there, they found that there was still a skeleton lying there.


    Just like before, once they came close enough, the skeleton immediately turned its head and looked at them with those empty eye holes. Then it stood up and started making its way towards them.


    Lin Fan saw this and released a ball of strange energy in front of the skeleton.


    When the skeleton noticed this, it immediately stopped before moving towards that ball of strange energy.


    Just like with the skeleton fish, this skeleton didn''t bite into it like it had done before. Instead, it just ced a hand on the ball of strange energy before its strange energy started flowing into it.


    Lin Fan felt the same connection as with the skeleton fish form with this skeleton.


    Then with a single thought, he found that he was able to control it.


    As expected, he was able to control the undead of this cultivation realm now that he had absorbed the Outer God fragment.


    They would be able to explore wherever they wanted in this cultivation realm with this ability¡­


    Well, not everywhere since there would be natural disasters and beasts that Lin Fan couldn''t control here as well, but they would be able to explore most ces. Especially if Lin Fan used the undead as guards or scouts.


    So this was a very good thing.


    It was just that now wasn''t the time for them to explore this.


    They could alwayse back to this cultivation realm and take care of these matters.


    There was only one ce that Lin Fan and Momonga wanted to explore right now.


    It was also the reason why they hade back into the city in the first ce.


    They wanted to check out therge buildings that they hadn''t been able to check out before because they were in a rush.


    They could tell that theserge buildings had important things, so they were very curious about what was inside.


    However, they didn''t rush to head into therge buildings.


    Instead, they went around the smaller buildings around therge buildings and started gathering a bunch of skeletons.


    Lin Fan just released his balls of strange energy and attracted the skeletons from the buildings. Once they were attracted, he formed the connection with them with these balls of strange energy.


    He was able to gather arge horde of these skeletons, even bigger than the ones that had chased them through the city previously with these balls of strange energy.


    Only then did their group head to therge buildings.


    They chose the one that was closest to the area that they were in and they sent the skeletons in to check it out first.


    They stood at the entrance, watching the skeletons as they made their way in.


    Nothing happened to these skeletons at first, but then¡­there was a sudden explosion as something giant dropped down on the skeletons. As soon as theynded, all of them were shattered to pieces and they were scattered across the room.


    This was a giant creature that was made of different kinds of bones that had dropped down where the group of skeletons had been.

 Chapter 968 Strange Reward

    These were huge lumbering skeletons that were far bigger than the normal skeletons.


    However, the one thing that they had inmon with the smaller skeletons was that they also had three sockets in their heads to symbolize three eyes in life.


    Other than that, the bones that they had were a mix ofpletely different creatures.


    Lin Fan was stunned by the appearance of these giant skeletons at first, but then he quickly sent out the balls of strange energy in an attempt to control them.


    Luckily, these balls of strange energy were still effective against these giant skeletons.


    When they made contact with the giant skeletons, there was a connection that was formed with them just like with the rest of the undead.


    However, this connection wasn''t made as smoothly as the other undead.


    When it made contact, Lin Fan could feel a bit of resistance from the giant skeletons, as if they were resisting his control.


    He didn''t know if this would happen with the Outer God fragment, but he guessed that it was because he was weaker than the Outer God fragment that they thought that they could break free of his control. However, Lin Fan wasn''t weak when it came to spiritual sense because of his contract with Brainy.


    So he was able to overwhelm the wills of the giant skeletons and subdue them.


    Though, it was a challenge subduing them since their wills were quite strong.


    In the end, he was able to control these giant skeletons.


    As for the smaller skeletons that he had sent forward, he found that they had beenpletely drained of all of their strange energy and were lying there as bones.


    It seemed that these giant skeletons had the ability to absorb the strange energy just by touch, which was why they had been able to destroy the skeletons that they had scattered.


    After realizing this ability, Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering¡­


    What would happen if they were to touch normal people that didn''t have this strange energy?


    What would they drain from them?


    There was already a vague answer that formed in the back of his mind, but for the sake of his own mental state, he decided to ignore it.


    But there was one thing that was certain, it was dangerous to bring these giant skeletons anywhere other than this ce.


    Still, there was no denying that he had obtained a very powerful card to use against others.


    These giant skeletons could be treated as his secret weapon.


    Especially since¡­even Momonga, Ang, and Yuki felt a sense of dangering from them.


    That meant that these giant skeletons would be more than enough to pose a threat towards normal Rulers if they even threatened these peak Rulers.


    After gaining these giant skeletons, Lin Fan still didn''t go into therge building as he sent those giant skeletons further into the building to search the ce. As he had expected, there were more giant skeletons guarding the deeper parts of thisrge building.


    He had given each of the giant skeletons a ball of strange energy and they used that on any of the giant skeletons that they found.


    It didn''t take long before the entire building had fallen under Lin Fan''s control.


    It was only then that they entered the building and started searching it.


    There didn''t seem to be anything at first as most of the things in the rooms on the lower floors were simr to the things in the smaller buildings. It was only when they reached the higher floors that they found different things.


    There were traces of technology and books that were left behind by whoever lived here before.


    The level of technology wasn''t at the same level as the human race was at currently, but there were pieces of technology that werepletely different that Lin Fan didn''t know the functions of.


    For now though, he just put them away in his system''s storage so he could check them outter.


    As for the books that were left behind, they were immediately taken by Momonga since he was the only one who could read them in the first ce.


    It didn''t take him long to trante them and figure out what was written on them, but the content was just too much even for him.


    This¡­it wasn''t a that belonged to their universe.


    It was a that came from the Outer and had been brought over by the Outer Gods as part of their invasion n.


    That was where the three eyed people came from.


    As Momonga had said, there had never been a race of three eyed people who lived in this world. That was because they had only existed in the Outer and had been brought over by the Outer Gods.


    But when they were defeated, they didn''t have a way to bring their back and they were eventually destroyed since they were invaders.


    The had been abandoned since it was filled with Outerws that the people of this universe couldn''t control.


    Once he learned this, Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the skeletons that were around him and feeling sorry for them.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    While they were invaders of their universe, he couldn''t help feeling sorry for those that were caught up in this mess.


    After all, there were a few smaller skeletons among the horde that were clearly the skeleton of children.


    Their entire was brought over, so it was inevitable that those that wanted to leave would be caught up in this mess. They had no fault in this matter, they were just innocent victims of the ns of those with more power than them¡­


    But still, this was a matter that had happened a long time ago, so Lin Fan didn''t dwell too much on it.


    The only other thing that was special about thisrge building was arge crystal in the middle of the very top floor.


    This was a crystal that was filled with the same strange energy that Lin Fan controlled.


    However, it was stronger than anything that Lin Fan had felt before.


    If he had to guess, it was most likely that this was the umtion of all the energy that the skeletons in the city had gathered. Of course, it wasn''t just this single crystal, but there would be crystals scattered all around the city in therge buildings.


    This would help Lin Fan in developing the strange energy inside of him, but he didn''t approach the crystal.


    He could feel the immense energy that was contained within the crystal.


    It was just too daunting for him to absorb like this.


    He was certain that it would overwhelm him and that wouldn''t benefit anyone.


    After all, he had plenty of time now that he had finished the mission and coulde back to this cultivation realm. So he would be able to absorb the energy in the crystal another time, when he had more control over the strange energy.


    So just like this, they left everything else behind and headed back to the spot where they first arrived in this realm.


    Once they arrived, the system promptly sent them back to the Lin Astral Empire.


    With the abilities of the system, the time dtion meant that they were only gone for about fifteen minutes even though they had spent close to a day on that cultivation realm.


    Zi Ling had still been standing where they had disappeared and she was shocked to see theme back so quickly.


    She quickly went over to hug Lin Fan when she saw that they were back, but then she calmed down and looked at Ang with an awkward look.


    Ang just gave a nod and patted her on the shoulder.


    Momonga on the other hand didn''t waste a single second as he immediately headed off to his private room in the store to conduct his research.


    He had brought back all the books that he had found in therge building and he couldn''t wait to start going through them.


    After settling down, Ang, Zi Ling, and Yuki headed off to have a midnight snack¡­though it would only be Ang and Yuki who would be eating.


    As for Lin Fan, he hung back from the others to check something.


    Once they were all gone, he opened up the system and looked at the notification he received.


    It was confirmation that he had finished the mission given and also a notification of the rewards that he had received.


    There was the ess to this cultivation realm that he expected, so he wasn''t surprised by that. What he was surprised by was the other reward that he received from the system.


    Unknown Key: It''s an unknown key.


    That was the only description that the system gave him for this item.


    When he took it out of the system storage and looked at it, he couldn''t help being more shocked.


    That was because it was just a simple key with nothing special about it.


    No, there was something special about it¡­


    It waspletely covered in rust.


    This was a rust covered key that didn''t have any special marks on it, so Lin Fan really


    didn''t know what it was good for.


    He couldn''t even feel an auraing from this key.


    No matter how he looked at it, it just looked like a normal key¡­


    But Lin Fan didn''t dare look down on this key since he knew that nothing that came from


    the system would be normal.


    In the end, he just put the key away and waited to see what was so special about it.

 Chapter 969 Debut

    Lin Fan just checked out a few more things with the system before leaving the store.


    Momonga wasn''t nning on leaving, so Lin Fan just left the store to him while heading back to the pce.


    Ang, Yuki, and Zi Ling had gone out to eat, so for once, it was just him alone.


    However, there was no danger to him at all since he had guards from the Lin Astral Family with him.


    The captain of his guard team was someone in the Peak Realm with a Ruler Artifact. Unless there was an actual Ruler Expert that invaded the Lin Astral Empire, it was impossible for anyone to hurt Lin Fan.


    If there actually was a Ruler Expert that invaded, they would be immediately stopped by the Lin Astral Emperor and the other Ruler Experts in the pce. It wasn''t as if Lin Fan was that far away from the pce in the first ce.


    However, since this was his first time being alone, many people thought that this was their opportunity to approach him.


    There were many nobles that wanted to use the pretext of bumping into him to start a conversation, but his guards kept them all away.


    Since these were private guards of the Lin Astral Family, the nobles didn''t dare go against them.


    After all, private guards of the Lin Astral Family were all experts among experts that were drafted into this special unit. The status that they had in this Lin Astral Empire wasn''t below that of these nobles.


    So even if the nobles wanted to flex their influence and power, it wouldn''t work on these guards.


    They had no choice but to let Lin Fan pass them and reach the pce without being able to approach him.


    Once Lin Fan was in the pce, he was surprised that he had received a sudden summon from the Lin Astral Emperor.


    It was an invitation to a family dinner.


    Since he hade here, other than the first few days where they met for family dinners, this had never happened.


    After all, the Lin Astral Emperor and the empress were all busy people. They had only been able to get a few days off by pushing everything to their ministers.


    However, there were things that could only be done by them that the ministers wouldn''t be able to handle. In the end, they would still be forced to return to work and they would be much busier than before.


    So that was when the family dinners ended.


    But that also didn''t matter since Lin Fan and the others were all finding things to do.


    As members of the Lin Astral Family, there wasn''t ack of things for them to do, so they all kept busy.


    Lin Fan had his store of course, so that was what kept him busy the most.


    So for there to be a sudden family dinner, it must mean that something important hade up.


    Without wasting any time, Lin Fan followed the maid to the dining room that the dinner was being held in.


    When he arrived, he found that everyone was already here and seated. He was the only one that they were waiting for.


    Seeing that he was here, the Lin Astral Emperor gestured for him to sit down.


    Since he was the one that they were all waiting for, it was already clear that he was the reason why they had been gathered today.


    After Lin Fan sat down, there wasn''t a person that said a single thing as they all turned to look at the Lin Astral Emperor.


    Seeing all of them look at him like this, the Lin Astral Emperor revealed an amused smile as he asked, "Is there something on my face?"


    Not a single person answered this and it was clear by the unamused looks on their faces that they weren''t interested in the joke.


    Seeing this, the smile on the Lin Astral Emperor''s face became bitter, but his eyes were still amused.


    After all, this was his family that he could joke with, so he couldn''t be mad.


    He was no longer the ice cold and cruel Lin Astral Emperor that everyone else knew, but rather the loving father and grandfather that this family knew.


    So he didn''t waste any time with this and said, "It''s time for Xiao Fan''s debut banquet."


    "Debut banquet?"


    Everyone except Lin Jian and the empress repeated before looking at Lin Fan with confused looks.


    Lin Fan shook his head to show that he didn''t know what was happening either.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Seeing these looks, the Lin Astral Emperor exined, "It''s been long enough that Xiao Fan has been here that we need to hold a banquet to introduce him to all of the Ster Kingdoms and the other Astral Empires. He needs to be introduced to our allies, so that his status can spread and everyone will know not to do anything to him."


    Everyone nodded in agreement when they heard this since they knew that the Lin Astral Emperor was right.


    As long as Lin Fan''s status as the heir of the Lin Astral Emperor''s throne was known, there wouldn''t be anyone in the surrounding area that would dare to do anything to him.


    As for the ones that would do harm to him, the enemies of the Lin Astral Empire, precautions had already been taken. Unless they were willing to go to all out war with the Lin Astra Empire, no one would be able to do anything to Lin Fan.


    So the best move now was to hold this banquet for Lin Fan to debut.


    This was something that the Lin Astral Emperor had been nning since he had met Lin Fan, but it had taken a long time because of the various things that had happened in between. Such as the challenge of Lin Hong and Lin Fan defeating Lin Tian.


    These were things that the Lin Astral Emperor had never nned for, so he had to change his ns to fit around these things.


    But in fact, his original ns would have taken even longer to prepare this banquet. He would have had much more time since Lin Fan would have been hidden from the Lin Astral Empire and they could slowly prepare everything.


    That had all been ruined when that parade had been held to wee Lin Fan.


    Since then, it had been impossible for him to continue on his original path.


    So he had to adapt to everything.


    After all, it was impossible for the Lin Astral Empire to keep the news of Lin Fan within the confines of the Lin Astral Empire forever. There were already cracks that had begun to show in the frameworks, so they had to move fast.


    Still, it was all about bncing the amount of preparation to how long they would be able to maintain this secret.


    This was the timing that the Lin Astral Emperor had determined to be the best time.


    Seeing that no one said a thing, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "The debut banquet will be held in two weeks and we will be inviting the royal family of all the Ster Kingdoms under the Lin Astral Empire. At the same time, we will be inviting guests from the Wang Astral Empire and the Lu Astral Empire that we are currently allied with."


    Everyone suddenly revealed a serious look when they heard this.


    With such concrete ns, it made it clear that this was serious and that everything had already been nned.


    So the only thing that they could do now was¡­prepare for the banquet that wasing.


    But Lin Fan couldn''t help picking up on one certain thing.


    He looked at the Lin Astral Emperor and asked, "The Ster Kingdoms under the Lin Astral Empire¡­does that include the Zi Ster Kingdom?"


    Hearing this, the Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help revealing a smile. In fact, everyone in the room couldn''t help revealing a smile¡­that was except for Lin Xue who had a dark look on her face.


    The Lin Astral Emperor waved his hand and gently tossed something in front of Lin Fan before saying, "That is their eptance letter right there."


    Lin Fan looked down at it and he recognized the mark of the Zi Ster Kingdom. This was a mark that he had seen from Zi Ling many times, so it was hard for him to mistake it.


    Not to mention, there was an aura that was simr to Zi Ling that wasing from the eptance letter.


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile when he heard this, but he didn''t raise this matter any longer.


    When he turned back to the Lin Astral Emperor, he had a serious look on his face again, as if he was waiting for something.


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod of appreciation when he saw this.


    He always admired how calm and intelligent this talent great grandson of his was.


    No matter what he implied or what ns he had, this great grandson would usually be able to see through his thoughts right away.


    After this nod, he said, "I''ve already arranged tutors for all of you to teach you the things that you need for this banquet."


    Lin Ao, Yue Qingrou, and Lin Xue were surprised to hear that they were included in this, but they quickly realized why.


    They were Lin Fan''s immediate family, so of course they couldn''t be missing from this banquet.


    However, this banquet was a solemn affair, so they had to learn the etiquette involved in this matter. That was what the tutors that had been prepared were for.


    It was going to be a hard two weeks for them.

 Chapter 970 Tutors

    With this matter settled, it seemed like it would be the end of the family dinner.


    But before it ended, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Are there also tutors prepared for¡­"


    He didn''t finish his sentence, but it was clear what he was implying.


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked at him with an amused smile before saying, "Aren''t you going to take lessons together with the two of them? Do you need me to hire separate tutors?"


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this and said, "Thank you, great grandfather."


    The Lin Astral Emperor nodded with the same amused smile without saying a thing, but the look in his eyes¡­were a bit strange.


    It was as if he could already see himself holding Lin Fan''s child, whether that was a child with Ang or Zi Ling.


    Lin Fan felt a strange feeling when he saw this gaze, but he had an idea what this gaze was.


    He had encountered this same gaze in his past life, but it was in a different context.


    He was the only son of the Lin Family and had never settled down with anyone. They had been anxious to see him leave an heir for them, but he never seriously dated anyone or married anyone, so that never happened.


    So they had given him the same gaze as the Lin Astral Emperor, but there wasn''t as much familial love as the Lin Astral Emperor.


    They just wanted him to have a child so that the future of the Lin Family would be secured.


    This feeling unsettled Lin Fan a bit as it reminded him of a past that he didn''t want to remember, but he quickly calmed his heart. This was his past life and now in his current life, he no longer had that same family.


    The family that he had now waspletely different from his cold family from before. This was what a real family should be like.


    What Lin Fan didn''t notice was the way that Lin Xue was looking at him.


    It was a way that a sister shouldn''t be looking at her brother¡­


    ¡­


    The next day.


    "You want us to take lessons with you?" Ang asked in a surprised voice.


    Lin Fan nodded before exining the situation behind this.


    When he reached the part of the Zi Ster Kingdom, he could see an excited look appearing in Zi Ling''s eyes that caused him to reveal a faint smile.


    When he finished exining the situation to them, Ang was nodding in a daze while Zi Ling had an excited look on her face.


    To the side, Yuki and Momonga just sat there with different expressions as well.


    Lin Fan left the two of them to their thing and turned to Momonga and Yuki to ask, "Are you guys alright without the lessons?"


    Momonga was the first one to answer as he just gave a nod in response before saying, "Do you want me to help teach her as well?"


    Lin Fan nodded with a smile without saying anything else.


    Yuki couldn''t help revealing a confused look when she heard this, but she didn''t get a chance to ask anything as Momonga said with a nod and a smile, "Alright, I''ll drill what''s necessary into her head."


    Then without waiting, he took Yuki by the shoulder and pulled her away.


    Yuki had a clear unwilling look on her face and wanted to follow Ang, but Ang just shook her head before giving her a wave of the hand. Seeing this, Yuki had no choice but to let herself be dragged away by Momonga.


    Once they were gone, Lin Fan turned to the two girls and gave a bow before saying, "Shall we?"


    The two of them looked at each other before looking back to Lin Fan with smiles and giving a nod.


    Over the next week, they went through many difficult sses with the tutors that had been prepared.


    The first lesson that they learned was¡­etiquette.


    Even if Ang was the queen of the spirits and Zi Ling was the princess of the Zi Ster Kingdom, there were still many things that they had to learn.


    It was easier for Zi Ling since she had been the princess of the Zi Ster Kingdom. However, there were still unique etiquette rules to the Lin Astral Empire, so she had to learn those.


    As for Ang¡­


    While she was the queen of the spirits, her etiquette¡­was severelycking. It was only slightly better than the average person and that was only because of the grace and nobility that she had as the queen of the spirits.


    So there was no doubt that there were many things that had to be improved on.


    For example, her eating habits.


    The way that she ate shocked the tutors and they couldn''t help teaching her from the fundamentals.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    While this annoyed Ang very much since she didn''t like all these strict rules about eating, she still followed along the lesson since this was what Lin Fan wanted.


    In fact, she actually listened more than usual because she didn''t want to embarrass Lin Fan.


    She knew that since they were in human society, she would have to follow along with the rules of human society.


    So she did her best to learn what they were teaching, but it still took a long time in the end.


    The final tutors that they received at the end of their training was a dance tutor.


    Since it was a debut banquet, it was held as a debut ball. Naturally, as the star of the show, Lin Fan would be expected to dance and it would be expected that Ang and Zi Ling would be his partners.


    Since that was the case, they would also have to learn to dance.


    It was much easier in Zi Ling''s case since she had already been taught how to dance as a young child since she was the Zi Ster Kingdom''s princess. This was something that had been mandatory in her training.


    Though since she hadn''t done anything like that in a while, it was good for her to take a refresher course.


    But Lin Fan also hadn''t learned anything like this either since he had just been a normal person.


    Well, the Lin Fan from this world.


    The Lin Fan from earth had learned how to ball dance before as the young scion of the Lin Family, but the dance from earth waspletely different from the dance in this ce.


    So he still had to learn from scratch.


    But the experience from earth definitely made it easier for him.


    The one that struggled the most was Ang who had never learned anything like this before.


    The spirits didn''t have the same customs as humans after all.


    But there was one good thing that came out of this.


    Since this was a lesson that required both a male and female partner, Ang was able to monopolize Lin Fan during the entire lesson.


    Zi Ling got the choreography down very quickly since she was already used to this kind of dancing. After learning with the tutor for a bit, she was allowed to practice on her own.


    As for Lin Fan and Ang, both of whom were consideredplete beginners, they had to work with each other to learn this.


    So they held hands and danced around whenever they were at the lesson, much to the envy of Zi Ling.


    She knew that she shouldn''t be envious, but she just couldn''t help it seeing them like this.


    Ang, on the other hand, had a wide smile on her face.


    There might have even been a few times where she "tripped" a few times by ident just to fall into Lin Fan''s arms.


    But Lin Fan didn''t dare assume this with what kind of personality he thought she had.


    He just did what he should and caught her each time.


    Just like this, the tutoring time passed by quickly and soon two weeks had passed.


    It was only the day before the debut ball that Lin Fan and the two girls were given a passing grade by the tutors.


    They had wanted to keep Lin Fan and the two girls in training for as long as possible since there were still things to improve on, but they knew that was impossible, so they did everything that they could to help them cram this information in their mind.


    As for the rest of the day, they were taken away to prepare for the debut ball.


    They had to pick out their clothes, get ready for the ball, pick out their defenses, and all kinds of other things.


    So they were kept busy right up to the debut ball.


    It was only when there was an hour before the ball that Lin Fan and the others met again. This time, Momonga and Yuki had also been brought into the pce to participate in the ball.


    The Lin Astral Emperor knew that these two were important enough to Lin Fan that he brought them with him to the Lin Astral Empire, so he wasn''t going to treat them poorly.


    He would allow them to be in the debut ball as supporters for Lin Fan and the two girls.


    When they met again, Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Yuki with a strange look.


    That was because she lookedpletely exhausted.


    It was as if something hadpletely drained her will to live with the nk look in her eyes.


    Lin Fan looked at Momonga for an exnation, but he just revealed a smile without saying anything.

 Chapter 971 Ball (1)

    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that something was wrong when he saw this, but before he could ask anything, there were people that suddenly came into the room that they were in.


    These were the drivers that were responsible for taking them to the hall where the ball was being held.


    The ball wasn''t being held in the pce, but rather in a different hall that was specially built for this ball.


    It had been built the week before the ball was held and was specially named after Lin Fan since it was built for him.


    It was named the Peaceful Normal Hall.


    Since it was time, Lin Fan and the others in his group followed the driver to the carriage prepared for them.


    Lin Fan wasn''t going with the Lin Astral Emperor or the empress since they had already gone to the hall before them.


    The reason why Lin Fan was goingte was because it was expected of them to gote. They were the guests of honour, so of course they would show up after everyone else showed up.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was the host, so he was the one that would be in charge of meeting and greeting everyone.


    To help him, Lin Fan''s parents and Lin Jian had gone with them.


    So it was just Lin Fan, Ang, Zi Ling, Momonga, Yuki, Lin Yue, and Lin Hong who were here.


    Lin Hong clearly didn''t want to be here, but he had no choice.


    He would have to attend with Lin Fan as his cousin.


    Lin Fan couldn''t be allowed to go alone, or else people would think that there were cracks in the rtionship of the Lin Astral Family. So there had to be someone from the Lin Astral Family''s younger generation that went with him.


    But the problem was¡­they were all afraid of him and were unwilling to go with him.


    If they were forced to go with Lin Fan, it would have the opposite effect.


    That was why Lin Hong was the best choice in this matter.


    Lin Hong had spent a decent amount of time with Lin Fan as his ve, so he had gotten used to him. Even if he was still afraid of Lin Fan because of all the things that had happened, he was at least able to act normally around him unlike all the other cousins.


    So that was why Lin Hong was the perfect person to go with Lin Fan.


    When they arrived at the banquet hall, they found that there were still many people gathered outside. However, not a single one of them were actually invited to this banquet.


    Most of them were people that were rted to newspapers in some way that were all here to get the scoop of the century.


    After all, it was impossible for the reason for this ball to be kept a secret, so everyone had learned the reason.


    This was a ball that would be the introduction of the new heir of the Lin Astral Family.


    This was news that would shake the entire human society, so no one wanted to miss this.


    There were even spies for the other races among the people here.


    But of course, Lin Fan''s protection was at the highest level, so not a single person was able to reach Lin Fan. There had already been a route prepared for when this happened, so Lin Fan didn''t go in through the main entrance.


    There was a special side entrance that no one knew about where he entered the hall from.


    At the front, everyone was still waiting for his arrival.


    But in the back, he had already entered.


    When he arrived, he and his group were immediately taken to a room that had been prepared for them.


    This was a special dressing room that had many different outfits and people for makeup, styling his hair, and different roles that were waiting.


    They had been on stand by the entire time, waiting for him to arrive.


    When they saw him, they didn''t waste a single moment to grab him and bring him to the styling chair to prepare.


    The others with him were also taken into their own private dressing rooms.


    Half an hourter, Lin Fan, Lin Hong, and Momonga had all gathered in a single waiting room.


    Thest half hour had been quite intense for them as the different people brought here to help style them had run them ragged.


    They were all leaning in the chairs that had been prepared for them.


    As for the girls, they still weren''t ready yet.


    They could hear the sounds that wereing from the distance and it seemed like it would be a long time before they were ready.


    However, they weren''t given time to rest at all.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Or at least, Lin Fan wasn''t given time.


    Not long after he had finished with everything, there was someone that came for him.


    It was one of the private servants of the Lin Astral Emperor that Lin Fan was familiar with.


    As soon as he arrived, he asked Lin Fan to follow him.


    Lin Fan didn''t need to ask to know what was happening, but he couldn''t help saying, "The girls aren''t ready yet."


    The servant shook his head and said, "They cane to the hallter. It is your entrance and your introduction right now."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this, but he nodded in response to this.


    He was the guest of honour after all, so it was normal for him to enter all by himself when he was introduced.


    He had wanted to go with Ang and Zi Ling, but thinking about it, it was better this way.


    That way, the attention would be on him and they wouldn''t attract any danger.


    So he was prepared to go with this servant, but before they could go, Momonga said, "He''s not going anywhere¡­or at least he isn''t with you."


    Lin Fan, Lin Hong, and the servant were all surprised by this.


    But Lin Fan trusted Momonga, so he quickly moved away from the servant and pulled out a white sword.


    When the servant saw this, he revealed a fierce look and pulled out a dark dagger that had a faint green glow to it.


    Before he could do anything though, Lin Hong had already charged forward at the servant.


    While he disliked Lin Fan, he knew how important this day was for their Lin Astral Family. He wouldn''t allow this day to be ruined for any reason and out of all the people here, he was the most disposable.


    The servant quickly raised his dagger to stab in Lin Hong''s direction.


    Taking advantage of the gap created by Lin Hong, Momonga waved his hand and there was a wisp of dark energy that came out. This dark energy went behind Lin Hong and using him as cover, itnded right in the eyes of the servant.


    When itnded in the servant''s eyes, the servant''s vision suddenly turned dark and he couldn''t see what was in front of him.


    Lin Hong noticed that there was something off with this servant, so he quickly moved to the side to dodge the sudden stab that came out before pushing out his palm at the servant. The three pets behind him all released their forcews at the same time, making his attack even stronger.


    The servant wasn''t able to endure this direct hit to his side and was sent flying by the force of this palm. He mmed right into the wall and then his eyes rolled back as he lost consciousness. His hand also released and the green glowing dagger dropped to the ground.


    Lin Hong couldn''t help looking at his palm after this and he revealed a confused look.


    After all, he knew that he wasn''t that strong. Even with his pets, he wasn''t that strong.


    The pets that he had now were the three pets that he had before, but they had been returned to him by Lin Fan.


    Even if these three pets had be stronger because of Lin Fan, they shouldn''t have been strong enough to do this.


    After themotion, the guards outside suddenly came in and they were surprised to see the servant lying there, as well as Lin Hong standing there with his three pets out.


    Lin Fan took control of the situation and exined the situation.


    The guards were surprised to hear this, but they quickly pulled out their weapons and surrounded the servant. However, seeing that this servant was knocked out, they quickly put the restraints on him and took him away.


    The captain of the guard came over to Lin Fan and said with a serious look, "Young master Fan, should we report this to¡­"


    He didn''t finish his sentence, but it was clear who he was referring to.


    He knew that this was the right thing to do, but if he did¡­it was clear that he and his team would be med for what had happened.


    This wasn''t a small matter either.


    This was an assassin that had somehow been able to reach Lin Fan, the heir to the Lin Astral Family.


    If something had happened to Lin Fan, they definitely wouldn''t be able to keep their lives.


    Lin Fan shook his head in response to this and said, "I''ll bring this matter up with grandfatherter. You shouldn''t worry about this now and secure the perimeter."


    The guard captain looked like he had been pardoned and he quickly left the room with his guards, but he didn''t risk it and left two with Lin Fan.


    Lin Hong looked at Lin Fan with a stern look and was about to say something, but Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Not now."


    Lin Hong was taken aback by this, but seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, he nodded in the end.

 Chapter 972 Ball (2)

    Lin Fan knew that if this was known by the Lin Astral Emperor, he would surely cancel this ball.


    But this was not the best move for them, even if it was the safest move.


    If they did cancel this, it would mean that everything that they had nned during this time would go to waste and it would be a blow to their prestige.


    So thest thing that they could do was cancel this ball.


    But it wasn''t as if they could just let down their guard either.


    The enemy had been able to infiltrate to this point, so it wasn''t as if they couldn''t sneak more people in.


    Lin Fan was nning on showing up at the ball and then informing the Lin Astral Emperor what had happened.


    Once that happened, he wouldn''t be able to cancel it even if he wanted to.


    It didn''t take long before another person came back to bring Lin Fan into the main hall.


    It was the guard captain from before who had taken over for the servant.


    As they headed to the main hall, the guard captain told Lin Fan, "The emperor''s servant has been found. He was knocked out and hidden in one of the empty rooms in the hall. Other than being a bit injured, there''s nothing wrong with him."


    Lin Fan nodded in acknowledgement of this.


    It wasn''t just that it was a good thing that the servant had survived, but also because this now confirmed how the assassin had snuck in.


    It was clear that the enemy had some kind of powerful disguise technique that allowed them to take the appearances of people. At the same time, they also had a powerful technique that allowed them to mimic the aura of the people that they disguised as.


    That was how they hadn''t recognized the servant in disguise just now.


    It was only because of Momonga''s superior spiritual sense that they were able to see through the disguise in the first ce.


    Momonga was a Ruler, so it was hard to hide from him unless they were a Ruler as well.


    When they reached the banquet hall, Lin Fan was introduced in front of everyone and was escorted in by the guards.


    The guests weren''t surprised since Lin Fan was the important heir to the Lin Astral Family, but the Lin Astral Emperor was confused by this. He had sent his personal servant to go pick up Lin Fan, so he was surprised to see that his servant was gone.


    Still, he didn''t show it on his face at all.


    Since Lin Fan was here, he came to Lin Fan''s side with a smile and walked down into the hall with Lin Fan before introducing him.


    It didn''t take long before the two of them were surrounded, but during this time, they had a secret conversation with the soundws that they both had gained through their voidws.


    "Where is Lin Ming?"


    That was the name of the servant.


    "An assassin knocked him out and disguised themselves as him." Lin Fan replied.


    The Lin Astral Emperor immediately asked, "What? Why didn''t you report to me?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer, but this silence was more than enough of an answer.


    The Lin Astral Emperor then said with a sigh, "I assume that you have some kind of n?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer right away, but then he honestly said, "I have no n at all. I was just going to observe the situation and react ordingly."


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave another sigh before saying, "You should know what kind of position you have, so you should also know what the risks are. I hope that you will remember this when you act."


    Then without saying anything else, the Lin Astral Emperor moved away to talk to other guests.


    However, Lin Fan knew that he was going to confirm the situation with the guard captain and arrange countermeasures.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile, but he also didn''t let that stay on his face for long because he was currently being surrounded by guests.


    Most of these people were groups from Ster Kingdoms that had alle forward to greet him. These were all members of the royal family from these Ster Kingdoms that had alle to tter this new heir to the Lin Astral Family.


    After all, this was someone that would one day rule over them, so the closer they could get to him, the more benefits that they would receive.


    So of course they would try to get in his good books while they had this chance.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t interested in this at all.


    To him, these Ster Kingdom royals were not trustworthy at all.


    He knew that they were only approaching him because of his position, so there was nothing that he would gain from them.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    If there was someone with a higher position than him or if he lost his position one day, they would abandon him immediately.


    So he just casually talked to each of them before moving on to the next.


    It was only when it was the Zi Ster Kingdom''s group that he stopped and talked to them properly.


    That was because¡­this group was Zi Ling''s family.


    However, Lin Fan found that this group was just like the rest.


    They weren''t like his family at all, they only cared about currying favour with him.


    So after giving a few words of promise that he would visit the Zi Ster Kingdom in the future to give them a show of support, Lin Fan moved onto the next group. However, there was a disappointed feeling in his heart when he moved away.


    He had heard from Zi Ling that her father was a caring person, but he hadn''t asked a single thing about her during his talk with Lin Fan.


    It seemed that he was only caring when he benefited from it.


    He was only caring when Zi Ling had been the prodigy princess of their Zi Ster Kingdom.


    But now that she had been sold to Lin Fan as a fiancee, he didn''t care about her as much¡­


    It was the same with the rest of her family who she had described as caring.


    So he made a decision not to let them meet in the future, or at least as little as possible so it wouldn''t shatter the image that Zi Ling had in her mind.


    He knew that if it was shattered, she would surely be crushed.


    This wave of royals continued for a long time until a certain group came forward.


    As soon as this group came forward, the Ster Kingdom royals immediately scattered and created a path for them.


    This group just walked right through everyone as if it was a natural thing and they came up in front of Lin Fan.


    Once they were there, the leader of this group looked over Lin Fan before suddenly revealing a smile and saying, "Brother Lin, it''s an honour to meet you."


    Lin Fan didn''t know who this person was until the guard beside him whispered, "This is the crown prince of the Wang Astral Empire, Wang Yin."


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised by this since he could already tell that this young man wasn''t a normal person. So he just said with a smile, "Brother Wang, it is my honour to meet you. I''ve long heard your name, but have never had a chance to meet you."


    Wang Yin just said with a smile, "I can''t say that it''s been the same for me since it''s only been not long since I''ve heard of you." Then his smile became a bit pointed as he said, "But I''ve heard plenty about your aplishments already."


    As he said this, he looked over at Lin Tian in the distance.


    It was clear what he was referring to.


    Lin Tian also felt this gaze on him and he turned to see the two of them looking at him. When he saw this, he couldn''t help revealing an ugly expression before turning away.


    Of course Lin Tian was also here.


    As one of the elders of the Lin Astral Family, even if showing his face here was thest thing he wanted to do, he had no choice but to show his face.


    After all, he had to show everyone else that the Lin Astral Family still had its unity, still had its power.


    But he could already guess why these two youngsters were looking at him, which made him feel very awkward and embarrassed.


    This wasn''t the ce for him to say or do anything about it, so he did the only thing that he could do. He made an excuse and left the banquet hall so that he could avoid attention for a while.


    He would still sneak backter.


    But as he left, he bumped into Lin Hong who had also been here.


    The two of them exchanged an awkward look before going on their own way.


    After all, they still hadn''t forgotten what had happened when Lin Fan raided Lin Tian''s branch.


    After Lin Tian left, Wang Yin turned back and said, "Brother Lin, I have to ask you for a spar one day."


    Lin Fan just nodded with a polite smile, "Of course, I''m curious on how strong brother Wang is as well."


    While they were talking, there was another group that came over that created a gap in the sea of Ster Kingdom royals.


    This group came right up to Lin Fan and in a beautiful voice, a person said, "Lu Fei Yu, pleasure to meet you."

 Chapter 973 Ball (3)

    Lin Fan looked at that person and found that it was a beautiful girl with green eyes and green hair, but he didn''t dare underestimate her as he felt the auraing from her.


    Since she had received the same treatment as this Wang Yin, it wasn''t hard to guess who she was.


    She was most likely the one from the Lu Astral Empire.


    As if on cue, the guard beside him whispered in his ear, "Young master, this is the crown princess of the Lu Astral Empire, Lu Fei Yu."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile after hearing this and said, "Miss Lu, it''s my pleasure to meet you."


    Lu Fei Yu''s expression didn''t change at all, but she reached her hand forward.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised, but he still took it and kissed the back of her palm.


    What he didn''t notice was that there was a strange sh in Wang Yin''s eyes when he saw this. However, this didn''tst long and Wang Yin quickly said with a teasing smile, "Brother Lin, it seems like you''ve caught miss Lu''s attention. I''ve never seen her give her hand to anyone this easily."


    Lu Fei Yu immediately red at Wang Yin when she heard this before turning away with a soft snort.


    Lin Fan just revealed a polite smile as he said, "Brother Wang, I''m sure that miss Lu is just being polite."


    Wang Yin just had the same teasing smile without saying anything.


    Lin Fan seemed calm on the surface, but he couldn''t help being confused deep down.


    That was because¡­he just couldn''t see through the two of them at all.


    But a reason for this was that he didn''t know them well enough to begin with. He had only heard about them today since he had been too busy with preparing for this banquet before this.


    Still, he could tell at the very least that neither of them were simple based on first impressions.


    Once the greetings were done, both of their groups headed off and were immediately surrounded by groups of Ster Kingdom royals.


    While Lin Fan was the main guest at this banquet, these two were still heirs of their respective Astral Empires. If they were able to create rtions with them, there were no downsides for their Ster Kingdom at all.


    Lin Fan could even see the Zi Ster Kingdom group following the crowd, making him feel even more disappointed.


    It seemed like he really needed to take care of this group in the future or else it would hurt Zi Ling¡­


    But he had to be careful how he did it since they were her parents and family in the end.


    After they left, he was once again surrounded by the Ster Kingdom groups, but he was saved by a surprising group.


    It was a group of cousins from the Lin Astral Family.


    Normally, these cousins avoided Lin Fan as much as they could because of how terrified they were of him. However, they wereing closer to him today.


    When these cousins started talking amongst themselves, it was impossible for the Ster Kingdom groups to cut in. After all, there wasn''t a single person that was close enough to them that they could join in their conversation.


    Not to mention, if they unwittingly offended anyone from the Lin Astral Family, it wouldn''t be hard to imagine what the fate of their Ster Kingdom would be like.


    So not a single person came forward.


    But everyone watched this group with sharp eyes out of the corner of their eyes. The moment that one person strayed from the pack, they would immediately follow them to talk to them.


    This was the only ce that they could do this without consequences, so no one was willing to miss this chance.


    It was almost like hunters watching their prey.


    Even though the cousins had surrounded him, they didn''t say a thing to him while talking amongst themselves.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile when he saw this, but he didn''t stop them.


    He knew that they were all there to use each other, so he was fine with it since he was also using them.


    He was getting tired of talking with the people from the Ster Kingdoms, so he wanted a break as well. At the same time, it would give him time to check with Brainy.


    After what had happened in the waiting room, Lin Fan had Brainy release his puppets all over the hall.


    He hadn''t done this before because he didn''t know if doing this would interfere with the surveince the guards had set up, but he couldn''t care about that now. After all, the had already failed, so he needed to take action.


    Brainy had already released enough puppets to cover every inch of this hall and she had eyes on every part, but she hadn''t been able to find a single thing.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he knew that the other side had amazing disguise abilities.


    It would have been strange if she had actually found something.


    But what Brainy did find was that there were several guards who had been knocked out.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    As soon as she found these, Lin Fan immediately reported them to the guard beside him who ryed this information to the other guards.


    The guard was surprised, but he also quickly radioed this in and the guards that had been knocked out were found. Their appearances were quickly photographed and sent off to all the other guards to look out for.


    They knew that the enemies had the ability to disguise themselves as the people that they knocked out, so every single guard that had been knocked out was a potential disguise.


    At the same time, they started checking with each guard at every minute to make sure that no one else was missing¡­but there were already more guards that were missing.


    It was clear that the enemies had already been plotting for a long time.


    Just how did they get here so quickly and sneak in so far?


    It didn''t make sense at all.


    Not long after, there was another group that arrived that caught Lin Fan''s attention.


    It was the girls who had finished changing.


    When he saw them, his chin couldn''t help dropping.


    He had beenpletely blown away by their beauty.


    It wasn''t just him who was blown away, almost all of the other men in the hall were blown away, regardless of age or if they were married. But right after that, there were quite a few men who received ps to the face, the arm, and such.


    However, even women weren''t immune to their beauty as quite a few women also were stunned by their beauty.


    It was a beauty that made them feel inferior, but they didn''t feel bitter. It was a beauty that made them ept that there was always someone who was above them.


    It was a beauty that even made a few of these girls¡­blush.


    Even though they weren''t into women, they couldn''t help having indecent thoughts when seeing these two.


    But everyone also quickly looked away.


    It was just a single whisper at first, but soon everyone knew just who these two women were.


    They knew that these two were Lin Fan''s women and they didn''t dare look at them anymore. After all, they all knew who Lin Fan was and if they were to somehow offend the Lin Astral Empire because of this, it would be the end of them.


    As for the other two beautiful women along with these two, they also didn''t dare look at them.


    One was Lin Fan''s little sister and the other was a close female friend¡­which most people assumed meant that she would be a concubine in the future.


    In short, they were rted to Lin Fan, so they weren''t for them to stare at.


    When they came over, the two of them just stood there in front of Lin Fan as he stared at them in a daze.


    Only after a while did he give a gulp and say, "You''re both beautiful."


    Both of them revealed a blush when they heard this, but Lin Xue had other ns. She came forward and she poked Lin Fan right in the rib.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile, but he didn''t do anything about it.


    After another while, he finally remembered something and he gave a bow as he reached his hand out towards Ang as he said, "May I have this dance?"


    Ang reached her hand out towards his and ced her hand in his before giving a nod.


    To the side, Zi Ling didn''t mind this since she knew that this was how it was. No matter what, she couldn''t take Ang''s ce in Lin Fan''s heart. She was just happy that he had made a ce for her in his life.


    The two of them walked out to the middle of the dance floor while everyone watched them.


    To this point, not a single person had gone onto the dance floor because¡­Lin Fan hadn''t gone yet.


    As the guest of honour, it was Lin Fan''s duty to have the first dance.


    So before Lin Fan went, not a single person dared to go.


    And now that he was going, everyone naturally paid attention so that they could tter him at any time.


    But for Lin Fan and Ang, the two of them were in their own world.


    They ignored everyone and just made their way to the center of the dance floor.


    Once they were in ce, the music began.

 Chapter 974 Ball (4)

    As soon as the music began, the light in the hall also dimmed as a spotlight appeared above the two of them.


    It was a slow dance at first, but as the music picked up, the two of them moved faster and faster.


    This was a dance for cultivators like them, not a normal ballroom dance for normal people.


    So this involved manyplicated movements that couldn''t be done with a mortal body. It was only something that could be done for powerful cultivators like them.


    However, since it was a noble dance, it was also veryplicated and hard for normal cultivators. Nobles and royals were expected to be the strongest cultivators of their country, so the dance that they performed reflected that level.


    It was aplicated dance that only powerful cultivators could do.


    But the two of them made it seem easy.


    They moved in sync with one another and moved with precision, giving a perfect performance of the dance. It was at a level where there wasn''t a single person who could praise it just to tter them, it was at a level where it only drew sincere praise.


    By the time that they were finished, there was only silence that filled this hall.


    Not a single person was able to react to the dance that they had just witnessed.


    After that moment of silence though, there was sincere pping that rang out through the hall as everyone started cheering and apuding for them.


    Even the two from the allied Astral Empires were pping along with the crowd.


    However, they had a different look in their eyes.


    Just like how Lin Fan was sizing them up earlier, they had also been sizing up Lin Fan.


    The alliances between Astral Empires all depended on the rtive power between Astral Empires. So they had been sent not only to show respect to the Lin Astral Empire, but also to size up Lin Fan who was the future of the Lin Astral Empire.


    If they could find any weakness in Lin Fan, then it meant that in the future, they would start working against the Lin Astral Empire.


    In the future, when Lin Fan took over for the Lin Astral Emperor, they would do what they could to destroy the Lin Astral Empire and split their territory amongst themselves.


    However, if Lin Fan didn''t show any weakness, then they would maintain their current alliance.


    Which was what was happening now.


    The perfect dancing showed just how powerful Lin Fan was.


    That was the real reason behind the cultivator''s noble dance.


    It was a hard dance that could only be done by powerful cultivators, which meant that those that could perform it perfectly were very powerful.


    So it was a show of might of the future generation against their possible allies and enemies.


    This dance also made the same impression on the various Ster Kingdom royals.


    Their other goal ining today was to judge the power of Lin Fan, the heir of the Lin Astral Family.


    They were associated with the Lin Astral Empire and were controlled by them, so they were considered part of the Lin Astral Empire''s territory. But if the Lin Astral Empire ever showed any weakness, they would immediately look for another Astral Empire to fall under.


    If the Lin Astral Empire couldn''t protect them, they wouldn''t waste their time showing subservience to them and would find another Astral Empire''s leg to grab.


    This was also the main reason why Lin Fan didn''t want to cancel this ball.


    If they did, it would mean a period of internal trouble for the Lin Astral Empire.


    Once they were finished, Lin Fan went over to where Zi Ling was and gave her his hand just like he had done with Ang.


    She epted it with a smile and the two of them once again made their way to the center.


    The royals that had been prepared to go onto the dance floor suddenly stopped themselves. Then they all returned to their original positions and waited for Lin Fan and Zi Ling to finish their dance.


    At the same time, quite a few people looked in the direction of the Zi Ster Kingdom group. The way that they were looking at the Zi Ster Kingdom group, it was easy to figure out what they were thinking.


    The Zi Ster King''s eyes lit up when he saw this since he had thought that Zi Ling was just a concubine, but it seemed like Zi Ling''s position in Lin Fan''s heart was much greater than he thought.


    That would also mean that¡­they would receive much more benefits than he thought.


    So all of the Zi Ster Kingdom group started thinking about how to get closer to Zi Ling, or rather closer to Lin Fan.


    When they reached the center, the two of them danced the same dance as before and were able to do it perfectly just like Ang and Lin Fan had done before.


    Doing it once perhaps meant that there was a bit of luck, but a second time¡­


    Not to mention that he did it with two different partners that had different builds. That meant that he had to make fine adjustments each time he did this dance.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This meant that Lin Fan was at an even higher level than they thought he was at.


    So the silence that came after this dancested longer thanst time.


    But there was still the same resounding apuse that came after the dance.


    Once they were done, the two from the allied Astral Empires came forward to talk to Lin Fan.


    They had seen how powerful Lin Fan was, so they came forward to get closer to him.


    As for the rest of the Ster Kingdom royals, they took this chance to step onto the dance floor.


    This was a gathering of Ster Kingdoms, so it was also a way for them topete with each other. They would do it with their dances just like Lin Fan had shown off with his.


    The ones that came were all the promising youths of the various Ster Kingdoms.


    They were here to show off their power not just in front of the Lin Astral Empire, but also the other Ster Kingdoms.


    After all, if Ster Kingdoms went to war, it was not something that the Lin Astral Empire cared about unless they took it too far. So this was the best way to make sure that no one started a war with them by showing off their power.


    At the same time, it would allow them to see which Ster Kingdoms had weak younger generations so they could attack them in the future.


    This was all a war of information for these Ster Kingdoms.


    After he finished talking to the two from the Astral Empires, Lin Fan went into the back room as well.


    This was where the Lin Astral Emperor had been the entire time.


    Since Lin Fan was the guest of honour, he would just be taking away from Lin Fan by being there. So he tactfully removed himself from the party.


    But at the same time, he removed himself so he could deal with the situation with the enemy.


    This was an enemy that could disguise themselves to sneak into the banquet hall, this was one of the worst enemies to deal with.


    It was also hard to imagine what kind of technique they were using that even the guards of the Lin Astral Family weren''t able to see through them. These were some of the strongest experts that could be found in the Lin Astral Empire and they weren''t able to see through this disguise.


    If they weren''t able to figure out what this was, the Lin Astral Empire would be in danger in the future if this was used on the battlefield.


    So this wasn''t just about saving this banquet, it was also about preventing a future danger.


    But they just couldn''t find a single thing.


    When Lin Fan walked into the room, he could see the dark look on the Lin Astral Emperor''s face. He didn''t need to ask to know what was happening since he had been kept up to date with everything by his guard.


    So he knew that they hadn''t been able to find a single thing.


    But the situation was getting less and less dire with each passing moment since with each passing moment, they came closer to the end of the debut ball.


    Once it was over, it would be toote for the enemies to do anything even if they wanted to do something.


    However, they knew that the enemy wouldn''t let it end here.


    So they were just waiting for the enemy to make their final move.


    The more time passed, the more anxious they became.


    Now that Lin Fan had left the hall, it was even harder to predict what they were going to do, but this meant that Lin Fan was safer.


    After all, there was no safer ce than by the side of the Lin Astral Emperor.


    Everything was quiet until suddenly¡­


    There was a report that came in.


    "There''s an enemy attacking on the west side of the hall. We are requesting back up, they have a Ruler Artifact."


    "West side?" Both Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor said in confused voices.


    However, the Lin Astral Emperor stood up in the end and said, "I''lle personally and deal with them."


    Then he turned to Lin Fan to say, "Stay in here and don''t move. This is the safest ce in the entire hall."


    Without waiting for a response, he headed off.

 Chapter 975 Ball (5)

    Lin Fan just sat there with slightly knitted brows.


    He knew why the Lin Astral Emperor was in such a rush.


    It was because he was the only one here that could take care of this mess without creating a fuss.


    It was possible to give a Ruler Artifact to one of the guard captains and they would be able to take care of the enemy, but that would create argemotion.


    After all, they would be even in terms of power to a certain extent. Even if the enemy would be overwhelmed by the number of guards eventually, it would still be an extended fight that would draw the attention of many people.


    In a ce like this, that was thest thing that they could allow to happen.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor was personally going to take care of the enemy as the only Ruler present.


    A Ruler against a Ruler Artifact, this was not a contest.


    It would only take a flip of the hand for the Ruler to take care of the person with the Ruler Artifact unless they were able to draw out the full power of the Ruler Artifact. Someone that was being dyed by the guards in the World Realm clearly wasn''t able to do that.


    So he wanted to end this as quickly as possible.


    This did seem like the best move in this situation, but Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that something was off.


    It almost seemed too sloppy for what the enemy had done until now.


    Was it that they were running out of options, or was it that they¡­had another n?


    Still, even if they had another n, Lin Fan was in this ce that would counteract it.


    This room that the Lin Astral Emperor had been in was a special bunker that had been designed when this banquet hall had been created. They had already expected something like this to happen, so they had made sure to create this special room to protect Lin Fan when the time came.


    This was a room that was built with many materials that could have be Ruler Artifacts, so it was a room that could even take attacks from Rulers without problems. It would be impossible for it tost forever against a Ruler, but it could stall Rulers easily.


    So as long as Lin Fan was here, it would be impossible for anything to happen to him.


    But Lin Fan still felt an uneasy feeling.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan said to the guards around him, "You can all leave now. Guard this ce from the outside."


    Since the enemies could disguise themselves, he took this extrayer of precaution.


    If by the off chance that they had already disguised themselves as one of the guards and had been hiding here the whole time, then all of this would be for nothing.


    The guards were caught off guard when they heard this, but most of them obeyed this order and started moving towards the exit. However, there were two that didn''t follow the orders and just remained there.


    When the guards saw this, they all raised their weapons and pointed them at these two.


    But these two suddenly pulled out something that was like an orb that released a wave of energy.


    All of the guards that had been in the room were sent flying, mming into the walls of this room.


    Not a single one of them made a dent, but that was just because the walls of the room were very hard in the first ce. That wasn''t a good show of how hard they had been hit by the wave of energy.


    All of them were instantly knocked out after slumping to the ground.


    When they had all been taken care of, the two guards that were still standing turned their attention back to Lin Fan''s group.


    The two of them didn''t show any emotions on their faces as they spread out around Lin Fan.


    The orb that they had pulled out before was dropped to the ground as they both pulled out a pair of daggers. This pair of daggers was then stabbed into the ground under them and there was a glowing barrier that appeared.


    This barrier didn''t appear around them, but rather they appeared around Lin Fan''s group.


    It wasn''t a barrier to protect, but rather a barrier to restrain.


    As soon as this barrier appeared, there was a pressure that fell down on Lin Fan''s group.


    This was a pressure that was simr to the one that a domain released, but it was at apletely different level. It was as if the onew that was used to create this domain was the only thing that could exist in this space.


    As if it was the absolutew.


    This was not something that could be done in the World Realm.


    This was only something that a Ruler could aplish.


    So it was clear these daggers were Ruler Artifacts.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Only when these daggers were ced and the barrier was established that these two guards finally rxed. They were rxed as if they thought that they had already taken care of Lin Fan, standing there looking at him like he was a fish in a barrel.


    Lin Fan could guess what they were nning on doing next, but he raised his hand to stop Momonga, Ang, and Yuki behind him.


    It wouldn''t be a problem if these three used their powers since this was just a Ruler Artifact. It wasn''t something that they would struggle against.


    However, it would create an even biggermotion if the three of them were to use their powers. It would even be a biggermotion if one of them used their powers.


    After all, a Ruler appearing out of nowhere would definitely be scrutinized by everyone.


    At the same time, it was unknown if they would be able to keep their identity hidden if they were to use their powers.


    So unless it was an absolute emergency, a life or death situation, Lin Fan wouldn''t let them use their powers.


    Instead, he pulled out something from his chest.


    It was apass that was carved out of wood.


    With thispass in his hand, he had a calm look on his face.


    That was because he knew that with thispass, there wouldn''t be a problem.


    But the enemies didn''t miss this either.


    They could tell that thispass wasn''t a normal thing, so when it was pulled out, they pulled out another pair of daggers.


    These daggers didn''t have the same aura as the ones that they stabbed in the ground, but Lin Fan could still sense the powering from it. While they were suppressed by this domain created by the Ruler Artifacts, it wasn''t possible for them to resist it.


    So he injected his life energy into thepass in his hand.


    When it received this life energy, thepass suddenly released a colourless glow. This colourless glow continued to grow stronger until it created a barrier that was released around them.


    Wherever this barrier went, it pushed away the barrier created by the two daggers.


    At the same time, the glow of the barrier created by the two daggers became weaker and weaker. It was as if something was draining the energy out of that barrier.


    When one looked closer, they could see the space bending at where the two barriers shed. They could see that the barrier created by thepass was¡­swallowing the energy of the barrier of the daggers.


    As it swallowed the energy, the barrier of thepass was getting stronger as well.


    The enemies couldn''t help being stunned when they saw this and they stopped charging.


    They didn''t know what this thing was, but they could sense the danger from it.


    Unless they did something now, it would be very unlikely that they would be able to take down Lin Fan.


    As for what thispass was¡­it was a specialpass that had been carved from acacia wood. It was just that this acacia wood used wasn''t any normal acacia wood.


    It was a piece of Ten Thousand Year Old Acacia Wood.


    Once the barrier of thepasspletely swallowed the barrier of the daggers, it turned to the dagger itself. The daggers stabbed into the ground weren''t spared the fate of being devoured as the barrier of thepass swept over them.


    It was gradual at first, but soon this barrier started nibbling away at the edges of the dagger until there was nothing left of them.


    This was a Ruler Artifact that was made to work with Lin Fan''s voidws, so it would swallow anything that was considered an enemy inside of the voidw barrier. It didn''t matter if it was energy or material matter, it would all be swallowed by the voidws.


    This was considered an absolute defense, which was the one thing that Lin Fancked.


    He had plenty of attack power with hisbinedws attacks, he just needed something that could defend himself against anything.


    However, thispass hadn''t even shown its true power yet.


    As for the enemies, they didn''t give up when they saw their daggers being devoured.


    Instead of wasting time stopping Lin Fan from using thepass to devour the barrier around him, they started doing something else.


    Both of them had pulled out orbs and were drawing an array on it with their blood.


    When Lin Fan had finished taking care of the daggers, they had also finished drawing the arrays on the orbs.


    Without hesitation, they brought the two orbs together that suddenly released a powerful glow.

 Chapter 976 Ball (6)

    The moment that the powerful light bloomed from the orbs, there was also a powerful aura that appeared.


    It was different from the aura that the two assassins had before. It was even different from the aura of the Ruler Artifact.


    This feeling was like¡­the descent of an actual Ruler.


    As the powerful light became brighter and brighter, it built up to an explosion of light.


    However, this light wasn''t just normal light, it was a light that waspletely ck.


    It was even cker than the dark of the night, so dark that it seemed to draw everything in.


    At the very center of it was a figure that looked like a human figure, but on the back of this figure was a pair of wings and on its head were a pair of horns.


    After this figure appeared, the first thing that it did was turn back to look at the two assassins that were standing there. Both of the assassins looked like they werepletely drained of all energy as they stood there.


    They just nkly looked at the figure, as if they already knew what was going to happen, so they epted it.


    The figure raised its hands and then¡­it suddenly stabbed them into the chests of the two assassins.


    The two assassins didn''t show any emotions when they died, they just epted it for what it was.


    As the figure had its hands through the chests of the assassins, the blood that dripped out swirled around the figure''s hands and entered the figure''s body. This continued until there wasn''t a single drop of blood left in the bodies of the assassins.


    Once they had beenpletely drained, the figure threw the assassins onto the ground like it was nothing.


    The withered bodies of the assassins lookedpletely different from when they were alive. It was like every bit of moisture had been drained from their bodies before they had died.


    Once it was done with draining the blood of these two assassins, the figure turned to look at Lin Fan''s group.


    When it looked over, Lin Fan was able to see it clearly.


    The only thing that Lin Fan could think was¡­demon.


    That was what this thing was.


    It was part of the Demon Race, one of the Myriad Races.


    These demons were like humans in every aspect, but they had these wings and horns on their bodies. As well, the demons had a natural affinity for darknessws, so they were able to wield great power.


    Most of them were able to reach the World Realm just by reaching maturity.


    But this power came with a price.


    This strong affinity for darknessws meant that they were too powerful to reproduce quickly, so they always had a small poption.


    At the same time¡­their physique required them to hunt for the blood of other creatures to sustain them. They could make do with beasts and such, but the best food for them was human blood.


    They didn''t know what it was about human blood that did it, but a single drop of human blood was considered greater than all the blood in a powerful demon beast. So they preyed on humans and were regarded as a natural enemy by humans.


    This demon that had been summoned by these two assassins, the blood that it had drained was clearly the price of summoning it.


    This summoning was clearly ast resort kamikaze trump card.


    It was to summon this demon and let it destroy their enemies without care of who suffered.


    Now that the demon had been summoned, there was only destruction that followed.


    The demon was also checking out Lin Fan''s group while Lin Fan checked it out.


    After staring at them for a bit, it suddenly revealed a smile and said, "It''s been a while since I''ve seen such prime prey." It narrowed its eyes to look at Lin Fan before saying, "You¡­There''s such a delicious tasteing from you."


    Lin Fan and the rest were all surprised to hear this from the demon, but they didn''t let their guard down.


    Lin Fan immediately summoned out his pets and spread them all around him, but he wasn''t certain that he would be able to stop this demon like this.


    That was until Momonga told him, "This demon isn''t a Ruler. It''s very close, so I don''t me you for being mistaken, but it''s still in the World Realm. It''s just a sliver away from finishing its world and entering the Dao Realm."


    Lin Fan looked carefully at the demon and found that it was indeed like this.


    This gave him the confidence to fight this demon.


    After all, he had a Ruler Artifact and several Peak Sun Realm Pets, so he should be able to stop it even if he wasn''t able to win.


    As for letting those three take care of it, that was out of the question.


    People should have felt the tremors from the demon being summoned, so there should be people heading here soon.


    He would just need to stall it until they came.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The demon waved his hand and there were thorns of dark energy that appeared in the air.


    Lin Fan immediately raised thepass and there was an evenrger barrier that appeared around them.


    The demon narrowed his eyes when he saw this, but he still waved his hand to send out the thorns of dark energy. As expected though, the thorns of dark energy were immediately whittled away when they touched the barrier.


    The demon didn''t mind this since he had already expected it. He pped his wings and immediately appeared behind Lin Fan, sending out even more thorns of dark energy at the barrier.


    But at the same time, he dropped to the ground and pped his hand on the ground.


    Nothing happened in the end.


    The demon looked at the ground under Lin Fan and could see the traces of dark energy there. He instantly understood what happened.


    He thought that he could sneak the dark energy under Lin Fan since most barriers didn''t block from beneath, but it seemed like it wouldn''t work.


    Still, the demon wasn''t discouraged since he knew that there were plenty of other things that could be done.


    This was a barrier that had been created with an artifact instead of one''s own power, so it wouldn''tst forever. As long as he kept bombarding the barrier with his attacks, it would eventually crumble as the artifact would run out of energy, or the user ran out of energy to maintain it.


    The only thing that was concerning was what happened to the thorns of dark energy as they hit the barrier.


    They just seemed to disappear into nothing.


    It was as if something was swallowing them.


    As far as he knew, there shouldn''t be aw that could do something like this¡­


    But then again, this demon didn''t know that much since he was just a young one. That was the only reason why the humans were able to make a contract with it since it had been caught by the humans.


    However, if it could absorb the blood of this delicious prey¡­it was certain that it would be able to evolve and be a true demon.


    Then it would no longer be restrained by the humans.


    So without hesitation, the demon gathered up even more thorns of dark energy and started shooting them at the barrier.


    But every single time, the barrier just absorbed all of the energy.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile when he saw this.


    The special thing about thispass was that as a Ruler Artifact made with voidws, it was able to use the specialty of voidws. Which was that it was able to absorb anything that hit it.


    This gave thepass the ability to assimte anyws that it absorbed, just like with Lin Fan''s voidws.


    It would only be at its weakest when it was first made, but as it absorbed more and morews¡­it would only be stronger and stronger.


    And right now, thepass was having a buffet of darknessws from this demon.


    At the same time, thepass would never run out of energy as long as more and more of these thorns of dark energy hit it, it would just keep gaining more and more energy to form the barrier.


    So the n that the demon had wouldn''t work at all.


    After a few minutes of bombarding the barrier and seeing that it wasn''t going down, the demon started feeling a bit worried.


    This wasn''t going the way that he had thought at all¡­


    He knew that if he stalled for too long, it would be bad for him.


    After all, he could tell that this was somewhere in the human society and he was surrounded by humans.


    The summon for him was to take care of these people in front of him and unless he did, he wouldn''t be able to leave.


    If he couldn''t leave, then he would be surrounded by humans and killed.


    So he had to crack the barrier somehow and take care of them.


    Finally, the demon stopped throwing these thorns of dark energy at the barrier and put his hands together to gather a ball of dark energy.


    Lin Fan and the rest could all tell that this ball of dark energy wasn''t normal.


    This was the demon''s final attack.


    He was going to use its strongest attack on the barrier and see if he could break through it.


    He didn''t use it before because this would drain him of all of his energy, but he didn''t have a choice now.


    So once this ball of dark energy was gathered, he pointed his hand out as if he was about to shoot it.

 Chapter 977 Review

    Right before that ball of dark energy could be released, there was arge sound that rang out.


    The demon was caught off guard and didn''t shoot the ball of dark energy. Instead, he turned in the direction of the sound and saw that there was something strangeing towards him.


    It looked¡­like the bottom of a shoe.


    Before the demon could react, the bottom of the shoe hit him right in the face and he was knocked down to the ground.


    At the same time, the demon lost consciousness without a single clue what had just happened.


    Lin Fan''s group was also surprised by this sudden attack on the demon. But the attack had been so strong that it had actually shattered the ground and there was dust that was raised up, so they couldn''t see who it was.


    Once the dust settled, they weren''t surprised to see that it was the Lin Astral Emperor standing there.


    With this kind of power behind the attack, only the Lin Astral Emperor could do something like this.


    However, he had made sure to hold back enough not to kill the demon.


    Once that demon was taken care of, the guards that hade with him picked it up and suppressed it before taking it away. The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t pay any attention to it as he turned to look at the two withered corpses on the ground.


    After seeing the state that they were in, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    He still waved his hand and there were two guards that came forward to take these two corpses away.


    As for the rest of the guards, they started searching the area to see if there was anything else left.


    Once that was taken care of, he turned back to Lin Fan to ask, "Are you alright?"


    Lin Fan nodded but he didn''t take down his barrier right away.


    Even though it seemed like he was safe, the enemy had an ability that was just too strange that he didn''t dare let his guard down.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t mind this and just left Lin Fan alone as he went to supervise the clean up of this room.


    Only when they werepletely alone did Lin Fan finally release thepass'' barrier.


    After releasing the barrier, the first thing that Lin Fan did was¡­clean himself up and then leave the room.


    There was no doubt that the appearance of the demon would have caused somemotion, so he was going to deal with that. Otherwise, if both the host of the Lin Astral Emperor and the guest of honour of Lin Fan were gone from the hall, it would spark rumours.


    So he didn''t have any time to waste.


    He had to get there before people started talking.


    There was only so much that the prestige of the Lin Astral Empire could do to stop people from talking.


    Once he arrived, he was naturally surrounded by people once again.


    The cousins were also kept in the dark about this matter, so they all couldn''t help looking at him with strange looks, but Lin Fan didn''t have time to tell them anything.


    For the rest of the ball, he had to calm the guests one by one.


    Of course, the fake news that he had was spread instantly by the first few people that he talked to.


    The fake news that the Lin Astral Empire hade up with was that it was an explosion caused by a pet going wild. The pet had already been captured and everything was taken care of.


    There were people who clearly didn''t believe this, such as the two from the Astral Empires, but no one said anything to expose this lie.


    This was the Lin Astral Empire''s territory, so respect had to be given to them.


    With this, the ball ended without a hitch and everyone was sent off safely.


    At the end, the Zi Ster Kingdom group had tried to make an appointment to meet Lin Fan, using the excuse of meeting Zi Ling, but Lin Fan turned this request down. He gave them the excuse that he was busy with handling the affairs after the ball, but in truth, he just didn''t want to meet them or let them meet Zi Ling.


    Zi Ling didn''t know any of this since Lin Fan had Ang distract her.


    After all of this was done, Lin Fan went back to the pce and immediately met with the Lin Astral Emperor.


    When he arrived in the room, he found that the Lin Astral Emperor was waiting for him alone.


    At the same time, the moment that he entered the room, he could feel the array around him.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This was a very powerful array, but he didn''t resist at all as he let it work its effects on him.


    After raising an orb that had been beside him and seeing something in it, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a satisfied nod. He raised his other hand and gestured for Lin Fan to sit down.


    Lin Fan just sat down without a word and then he looked at the Lin Astral Emperor with a questioning look.


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a sigh and said, "It''s a Soul Searching Array. We created a soul jade for you when you first came if you remember and we used this array to search your soul for a match with the soul jade."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response before asking, "What are the results?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor was silent for a bit before shaking his head. With another sigh, he said, "We weren''t able to find a single thing."


    He pulled out a folder that he ced on the table and slid over to where Lin Fan was sitting.


    Lin Fan picked up the folder and knitted his brows as he read it.


    ording to the reports, the autopsy showed that¡­they had the exact same DNA and everything as the people they disguised as. It was as if they were identical twins.


    This was a technique that had never been seen before, so they really didn''t know what to make of it.


    The only thing that they could find was different were traces of different souls. These were different from the souls that existed in the bodies of the ones that were copied by these assassins.


    Luckily, they had only knocked out the ones that they had copied.


    If they had to guess what it was, it was most likely that they had to keep whoever they were copying alive to keep copying them.


    Of course, they couldn''t test this by killing the ones that had been copied since they were guards of the Lin Astral Family.


    So in the end, they couldn''t figure out what this technique was.


    The only real thing that they had learned in the end was that this technique couldn''t affect the soul. That was why the Lin Astral Emperor had installed this Soul Searching Array in the first ce.


    But this was ineffective since it cost a lot just to make these Soul Searching Arrays and they only had the materials for so many of them.


    So this was only a temporary solution.


    After seeing that there was nothing else that they could do about it, Lin Fan changed the topic, "Do you have any idea who it was that sent them?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor knitted his brows again, but this time he gave a nod in response to this before saying, "We interrogated the demon that was caught, but he didn''t know anything about them either. All he told us was that he was captured by some humans, but he didn''t know who those humans were."


    Lin Fan stroked his chin before saying, "There wasn''t anything else that you found? Was this it?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything.


    The silence was more than enough as an answer.


    Lin Fan also fell silent and the two of them just sat there in silence for a long time until he finally asked, "What do we do then?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t answer right away. He just remained in thought for a while before saying, "For now, we can''t have you leaving the empire''s territory. I wanted to have you head off to the Ster Kingdoms and then our allied Astral Empires to exchange notes with the younger generation and raise your prestige, but now that there''s this wrench thrown into the mix¡­"


    Lin Fan nodded in agreement with this.


    In the first ce, he wouldn''t have wanted to do this.


    After all, the best way for him to be stronger was to stay at the store and earn as much as possible. Only by earning more would he be able to buy things from the store that made him stronger.


    Not to mention¡­the store really was the safest ce.


    Even the Lin Astral Empire''s pce wasn''t as safe as the store.


    But if his great grandfather really wanted him to go, he would have gone in the end.


    After all, it wouldn''t be bad for him to get familiar with the Ster Kingdoms and the Astral Empires for the future.


    So either way, it wasn''t bad for him.


    But now that there was this hidden danger, it was better for him to stay.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t have anything else to discuss with Lin Fan, so he didn''t stay here any longer. He had something else to do, something that the Lin Astral Emperor had just assigned him.

 Chapter 978 Training

    After Lin Fan left the room, he went to the training field of the pce.


    When he arrived, he saw that there were people there that were waiting for him.


    These were people that he recognized.


    These were his cousins from the Lin Astral Family.


    They had been gathered by the Lin Astral Emperor, so they had no choice but toe here.


    But of course, not a single one of them knew why they were here.


    They had just been summoned on behalf of the Lin Astral Emperor by the servants that had been sent. These were all servants that had high positions in the pce, so they knew that this was the truth.


    They had been surprised when they saw that it was the other cousins who had been gathered.


    Finally, when Lin Fan arrived, they couldn''t help feeling an uneasy feeling.


    There was still that feeling of fear that they felt towards Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he nodded at the servants and all of them left, which made them feel even more uneasy. After all, this made it seem like¡­he was the one that was in charge here.


    There were a few of them that moved towards the door as if they were trying to escape, but they found that there were already guards standing there. These guards were firmly standing there without leaving a single gap, making it clear that they wouldn''t let anyone pass by.


    So they could only stand there and watch.


    Lin Fan came to the center of the arena and was the center of attention.


    He looked at them before saying, "I''ll be training all of you today. I''ll be whipping all of you into shape for the future."


    All of them revealed shocked looks before those expressions turned into looks of indignation.


    This was someone that they regarded as the youngest one of them, so they were against treating him as someone that was above them. That would hurt their pride as someone who was older than him.


    But they were also scared of him, so not a single person made a move.


    Instead of facing him directly, they chose to leave this training room.


    However, they were stopped by the guards that were at the door.


    They tried ordering the guards to move, but not a single guard listened to them. This was something that they had never experienced before.


    Still, they couldn''t do a thing since it wasn''t as if they could defeat the guards.


    The guards were the guards of the Lin Astral Family, so these were elite experts of the Lin Astral Empire. Even the weakest among them was in the Realm, just like them, but the ones here were all those in the Sun Realm.


    It would take just one of them to take care of all of them.


    They could only turn to face Lin Fan who was standing there with a confident look on his face.


    When being trapped between a rock and a hard ce, they chose to face Lin Fan since they felt that they had a better chance with him. After all, they had reasoning on their side, so they felt that they would be able to do something against Lin Fan.


    They chose the oldest one among them toe forward and talk to Lin Fan.


    However, before he could say anything, Lin Fan suddenly pped him across the face.


    That person who was pped could only stand there in a daze as he didn''t understand what happened.


    As for the rest of them, they also looked at Lin Fan in daze since they never expected him to do something like this.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t done after doing this.


    He looked at them with a smile of disdain on his face and he said, "Is that all you have?"


    Their pride was pped when they heard this and this was worse than any p to the face.


    Since Lin Fan was provoking them, they decided that they wouldn''t hold back anymore. But before they attacked, one of them said, "Do you dare fight us with your own power?"


    As they said this, all of the cousins remembered what had happenedst time with Lin Hong.


    They knew that if they were to fight Lin Fan now, they would just be beaten up by his pets.


    So they immediately started supporting the cousin that had proposed this.


    Lin Fan''s disdainful smile grew wider as he said, "Why wouldn''t I? In fact, I won''t even move from this spot and you still won''t be able to do anything to me."


    All of them were angered by this again, but they also let out a sigh of relief when they heard this. After all, if Lin Fan really didn''t use his pets, they didn''t think that they would lose to him.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Not to mention that he even said that he wouldn''t move.


    But Lin Hong who had also been dragged here by the guards couldn''t help feeling an uneasy feeling.


    He knew that Lin Fan wouldn''t say something like this unless he was confident in doing it.


    So he moved to the back of the crowd¡­


    He knew what was about toe.


    Seeing that Lin Fan just stood there without doing a thing, the cousins all started feeling confident. They pulled out their weapons and started moving towards him.


    Lin Fan just stood there without doing a thing, but there was something that appeared in his hand inside of his sleeve.


    Seeing him just standing there, they gathered their life energy and used their most powerful attack.


    They had thought that this pressure would be enough to force him away, but it didn''t do a single thing as he just stood there with the same smile on his face. It was clear that he was still looking down on them.


    So they didn''t hold back like they were nning on doing and used their strongest attacks on him.


    But before they could hit them with their attacks, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared around him.


    This was a barrier that they were all familiar with since they were all members of the Lin Astral Family.


    This was a barrier created from voidws.


    The moment that their attacks hit the barrier, they were all stopped. Then in a phenomenon that they were familiar with, all of the life energy that hit the barrier was drained away.


    All of their attacks had been negated and sucked into the barrier.


    It was all that they could do just to pull themselves away from the barrier without being sucked dry by it.


    In the end, they could only look at Lin Fan like he was a monster.


    They had never encountered such strong voidws before, or at least they had never encountered anything like this before against a member of their own generation. Even against people in the upper generation, they had never felt voidws like this.


    The only time that they had encountered voidws this strong was¡­when they had sparred with the Lin Astral Emperor that one time when he taught them.


    They couldn''t understand how he was able to release this kind of powerful voidw barrier, but there was nothing that they could do about it. After all, it had just absorbed all of their strongest attacks, so they knew that it was impossible for them to break through it.


    They had been so confident in taking him down, but now¡­


    After looking at each other, they all understood what they should do.


    They decided to split up so that Lin Fan couldn''t attack them all at once and they also created distance with Lin Fan. Lin Fan had said that he wouldn''t move from his spot, so they wanted to create distance to make it harder for him to attack.


    Then they started attacking with different attacks from different directions.


    It was clear that they were trying to find the weakness in the barrier around Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just stood there and allowed all of these attacks to hit his barrier, but not a single one of them was able to break through it.


    When they saw this, they knew that this wasn''t the method to take him down, so they started moving away and observing Lin Fan''s barrier.


    It was just that Lin Fan wouldn''t give them that chance.


    As they were standing there observing his barrier, there were balls of life energy that gathered all around him.


    The cousins were all surprised and confused by these balls of life energy, but before they could react, all of them shot out at them. They weren''t even able to keep up with these balls of life energy with their eyes as they shot out.


    When they reacted, the balls of life energy had already mmed into them and had sent them flying into the walls behind them.


    These balls of life energy were of the exact samew that they had used to attack Lin Fan with, but they were much stronger than their attacks.


    The only ones that had been sent flying were the ones that had made an attack. The rest of them were just standing there with shocked looks on their faces.


    The only one that had a different expression was Lin Hong who had a bitter smile.


    He had already expected this, which was why he had moved to the back and watched everything.


    There was also a trace of schadenfreude in his eyes as he finally was able to see someone suffer the same way that he had suffered before.


    Lin Fan just looked at them with the same disdainful smile as he asked, "Is that it?"

 Chapter 979 Movement

    By the end of the training session, all of the cousins were exhausted and lying on the ground.


    Even Lin Hong hadn''t been spared that fate.


    They all had looks of unwillingness in their eyes, but they couldn''t even move a single muscle right now.


    During the training session just now, they hadn''t been able to resist at all as Lin Fan thrashed them around.


    Even without summoning his pets, they hadn''t even been able to do a thing to him.


    But their biggest mistake in the end was losing control and summoning out their pets. The moment that their pets were summoned, their loss had been secured.


    Lin Fan didn''t move, but the voidw barrier was also able to do the same thing as him using his voidws. The moment that they made contact with the voidw barriers, they were immediately converted to Lin Fan''s side and pledged their loyalty to him.


    As for the ones that weren''t physical attackers¡­they were quickly overwhelmed by the pets that had been converted and dragged over to the barrier. The look on the faces of the converted pets made it seem like they were doing these pets a favour.


    It was almost like they were bringing someone into a cult.


    So just like this, all of the cousins were beaten to a pulp.


    But of course, during this time, Lin Fan had given each of them guidance as he beat them up. So it couldn''t be said that they didn''t gain anything out of this.


    His guidance was really urate, touching on the weak points of their techniques urately.


    If they followed his guidance, there was no doubt that they would be stronger.


    The only thing restraining them in this aspect was¡­their pride.


    It all depended on if their pride would allow them to ept this guidance.


    It was very unlikely that it would, but Lin Fan also had a solution for that in the future.


    He would slowly beat that pride out of them.


    Since they had been crushed today, he would leave it at this. This was his mercy for the first day of training.


    Tomorrow¡­would be much worse.


    Many of them thought that this would be a one time thing, but many of the cousins would be disappointed.


    After he was done, Lin Fan was nning on heading to the store, but he found that there was a messenger who was waiting for him.


    He was surprised by this messenger because¡­it was the trusted subordinate of the Lin Astral Emperor who had been knocked out by the enemy and disguised as. He was surprised to find that it was this subordinate who had been sent here to present a message.


    So he raised his guard and prepared to attack this subordinate to the surprise of the surrounding guards.


    The guards that had been assigned here were ones that hadn''t been on guard at the ball, so they didn''t know what had happened. After all, it was very important, so the Lin Astral Emperor had given a gag order in the first ce.


    The subordinate was caught off guard by this, but then he quickly raised his hands and said, "Your highness, it''s actually me."


    The guards were confused to hear this, but they forced themselves to have calm looks on their faces as they watched this.


    Lin Fan waited to see what the messenger would do, but seeing that he didn''t try to struggle at all, Lin Fan decided to see what he wanted. After all, he couldn''t doubt every single person that he met just because of what had happened, that would be counterproductive.


    So he said, "What do you want?"


    The messenger gave a sigh of relief when he heard this before saying, "His majesty wants to meet you in the usual meeting room."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this and even doubted that this was a plot, but he knew that it wouldn''t be.


    That was all because of the location of the meeting that the messenger was inviting him to.


    That usual room, it was the room that currently had the Soul Searching Arrayid out in it. If he went to that room, there was no doubt that he would be able to immediately find out whether whoever was waiting for him was the real person or not.


    That was because the Lin Astral Emperor had given him ess to the Soul Searching Array.


    The Soul Searching Array was linked to the soul jades stored in the pce, so if Lin Fan wanted to, he could even verify the identity of the Lin Astral Emperor who had a soul jade inside of the pce. So that would be the worst ce to lure Lin Fan into a trap.


    Which was why Lin Fan wasn''t afraid of it being a trap.


    So in the end, Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this and waved his hand at the guards to follow him.


    The subordinate couldn''t help revealing a touched look before bowing to Lin Fan, but he didn''t follow since he knew that it would be inappropriate.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Lin Fan waved his hand at the subordinate as he left.


    When he arrived at the room, the guards all took their ce outside while Lin Fan went in.


    When he went in, he found that it wasn''t just the Lin Astral Emperor, but also Lin Jian and Lin Ao who were there.


    With a thought, he quickly verified their identity with the Soul Searching Array.


    They felt the effect of the array and didn''t resist it.


    Once he had confirmed that it was indeed them, he sat down and waited for the Lin Astral Emperor to start.


    When Lin Astral Emperor saw him sit down, he took out three packets that he threw out in front of them and just waited for them to read it first.


    The three of them had confused looks as they looked at these packets, but they still opened them and read them.


    As they read through these, they couldn''t help knitting their brows more and more. Finally, they all put down the folders and looked at the Lin Astral Emperor with knitted brows, but not a single one of them spoke.


    The Lin Astral Emperor could guess what they wanted to ask, but he also didn''t say a thing.


    Finally, Lin Fan was the one that broke the silence by asking, "Has this been confirmed?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod before saying, "It''s been confirmed by the scouts in the area, so there''s no mistake."


    After hearing this, the three of them couldn''t help knitting their brows even more.


    After all, if this had been confirmed, then this really was bad.


    What the folder had contained were reports of Beast Race movement in the territory of the Lin Astral Empire.


    With how the Beast Race seemed to be moving, it seemed like they were nning on taking action against the Lin Astral Empire.


    For the past few centuries, the Lin Astral Empire had enjoyed peace as they had a truce with the Beast Race. Or rather, the Beast Race had turned their attention to other Astral Empires, so they left the Lin Astral Empire alone.


    As far as they knew, the Beast Race were currently targeting some of the Astral Empires to the north. That included the Yu Astral Empire, which was a mortal enemy of the Lin Astral Empire.


    But it seemed like nothingsted forever and the Beast Race wanted to take action against the Lin Astral Empire.


    The only problem was the reason why they wanted to do this¡­


    If one thought about it carefully, there had only been a single big thing that had happened in the Lin Astral Empiretely.


    That was the arrival of Lin Fan.


    After his debut, everyone knew that he was the heir to the Lin Astral Empire and anyone who had even the slightest bit of an intelligencework would know some things about him¡­such as the fact that he had the Void Physique.


    The Lin Astral Emperor even looked the other way when those rumours spread because he wanted to establish Lin Fan''s prestige.


    He never thought that it woulde to bite them in the butt like this.


    The Beast Race movement and the incident with the assassins, it was clear that everyone was trying to take care of Lin Fan before he could develop.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor, Lin Jian, and Lin Ao all looked at Lin Fan with concerned looks.


    Lin Fan on the other hand was very calm about this.


    He had already expected this, so of course he was calm.


    In the first ce, he wasn''t nning on leaving the Lin Astral Empire and was just nning on staying in his store. So even if the Beast Race was moving, it didn''t concern him.


    The Lin Astral Empire might suffer, but this was just a part of the fate of being an Astral Empire.


    The Beast Race would have attacked them eventually for one reason or another because they were the pinnacle of the human race. If they attacked because of him, that was just what it was.


    The Lin Astral Emperor had been most worried that Lin Fan would take this news personally, but seeing how calm he was, he couldn''t help revealing a look of praise.


    It seemed like he had been right about this great grandson of his.


    He really would bring them into a new age.


    But for now, it was still his time as the elder to take care of Lin Fan.

 Chapter 980 Further Signs

    There was no way that the Lin Astral Emperor would have let Lin Fan leave the Lin Astral Empire after what had happened with the ball.


    So now that there were signs of movement from the Beast Race, it was even less likely that he would allow them to leave.


    The reason why he had called him here in the first ce was just to ask his opinion on what they should do.


    In a way, it was a sort of test for Lin Fan, as well as giving him guidance. At the same time, he wanted to teach Lin Fan about the matters of the Lin Astral Empire in preparation of him taking over one day.


    There was nothing really for Lin Fan to do other than to give his opinion on the matter.


    But to everyone''s surprise, Lin Ao made a request that shocked them.


    "I want to be put in the investigation team."


    When they heard this, the other three all looked at him with shocked looks.


    They knew that Lin Ao wasn''t a fool and he knew how dangerous this matter was, so why would he make this request?


    It was Lin Jian who spoke first, "Ao''er, you shouldn''t y around at a time like this. You know how dangerous this is."


    Lin Jian was the one that cared about Lin Ao the most, even more than he cared about Lin Fan. That was because Lin Ao had been the apple of his eye for a long time, so his feelings for Lin Ao were much deeper than his feelings for Lin Fan.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that he didn''t care for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan nodded in agreement to this and said, "Father, there''s no need for you to go personally. The Lin Astral Empire has plenty of experts to take care of this matter."


    The Lin Astral Emperor just backed them up with a simple nod.


    He also cared for Lin Ao as one of his great grandchildren, but he also cared for Lin Ao''s talent after seeing his performance at the sword trial.


    He knew that while Lin Ao wasn''t as talented as his son, Lin Fan, he was still talented in his own way. Or at least he was much more talented than the other members of the Lin Astral Family.


    So Lin Ao was also someone that he wanted to help develop, which is why he wanted him to stay in the Lin Astral Empire''s capital.


    Facing the questioning and shocked gazes of all three of them, Lin Ao exined, "I want to go and gain some practical experience by fighting against the Beast Race."


    All three of them knitted their brows again when they heard this.


    The Lin Astral Emperor said, "If you want some fighting experience, I can arrange that. There''s no need for you to go out and take this risk."


    Lin Fan and Lin Jian nodded in agreement to this.


    Lin Ao didn''t back down though as he said, "Yes, but it won''t be as helpful as actual battle experience against the Beast Race."


    All three of them knitted their brows even more when they heard this.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was about to say something else, but Lin Ao said, "I want to make my family proud as well. I''m sure that you can understand that."


    When he said this, both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian revealed understanding looks. They knew what he was talking about as men with family, so they could rte to him.


    Only Lin Fan still had a slightly concerned look.


    Well, it wasn''t that Lin Fan wasn''t able to understand where he wasing from, but Lin Fan had never been a father before. It was hard for him to understand exactly why Lin Ao was doing this.


    But both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian had felt what Lin Ao felt before, so they knew where he wasing from.


    So after considering it, the Lin Astral Emperor still gave permission to Lin Ao to head out with the investigation team.


    However, to ensure that he was safe, he gave him a Ruler Artifact and a few Peak Sun Realm Experts as guards.


    It might be considered excessive, but these were all his personal items and personal guards, so there was nothing that anyone could say about it.


    Lin Ao was touched that the Lin Astral Emperor gave him all of this and thanked him graciously, but the Lin Astral Emperor just said, "Come back safely."


    The next day, Lin Ao left the Lin Astral Empire''s capital with Yue Qingrou.


    At first, Lin Ao had insisted that she stay in the capital, but she had insisted on going. She had even gone as far as threatening to kill herself if she wasn''t brought along.


    Lin Ao knew her better than anyone and he could see the crazy look in her eyes, so he had no choice but to bring her along.


    For Lin Fan and Lin Xue though, it was very awkward seeing their parents acting this way.


    Less so for Lin Fan since he had Ang and Zi Ling tofort him, but it was a strong blow to Lin Xue who was still single.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    She was at the age where she was interested in that kind of stuff¡­no, she was interested in that kind of stuff a long time ago. It was just too bad that the person that she was interested in was¡­


    After they left, Lin Fan went back to the store and managed it like normal.


    With the advertising effect that came from the ball, there were even more people that came to his store.


    It waspletely packed and everything sold almost instantly. The only time it didn''t sell instantly was when people startedpeting for the items in the store.


    These were all idiots who didn''t know the rules of the store and tried to use their influence to gain advantages. Not a single one of them was able to get a single thing from the store.


    They were all found out by Lin Fan and then kicked out of the store, being banned for a day.


    Not a single one of them dared to raise aint since it was Lin Fan who kicked them out.


    Comining to the heir of the Lin Astral Empire, the one who was basically confirmed as the crown prince. That was just asking to die.


    As for why he wasn''t the crown prince¡­that was just because the Lin Astral Family hadn''t announced it yet.


    But in everyone''s heart, he was already the crown prince based on how the Lin Astral Emperor treated him.


    So no one dared to offend him.


    But there would always be idiots who didn''t know the rules that Lin Fan would have to take care of.


    A week passed just like this before Lin Fan was summoned back to the same meeting room as before.


    This time, he had been summoned because the first reports from Lin Ao had been sent back.


    Gathered in the room was the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian when he arrived.


    When the two of them saw him, they gave him the report from Lin Ao.


    Lin Fan didn''t read it right away as he looked at the expression on their faces. It didn''t seem like everything was going well based on the expressions that they had.


    However, he didn''t ask them anything and he read the report.


    After he finished reading it, he couldn''t help knitting his brows as well.


    The report didn''t have anything bad about Lin Ao, he and Yue Qingrou were both safe as they went with the investigation squad. However, there was something strange about the report that they sent back.


    There were reports of a strange energy that they didn''t recognize.


    After a long silence, Lin Fan asked, "Has there been any progress made in identifying the strange energy?"


    Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian shook their heads when they heard this.


    They had sent people to check the strange energy after receiving the early reports that they hadn''t shown Lin Fan, but they hadn''t been able to find anything.


    The reports they received was that this strange energy was a type of energy that didn''t seem to exist in this world.


    They didn''t know exactly what that meant, but as the Lin Astral Emperor and his son, they had some ideas¡­


    The Lin Astral Empire had been around long enough to inherit some details of the past, so they knew a few things that others didn''t. That included what could be the source of this strange energy.


    But both of them were also surprised by Lin Fan''s question.


    After all, they could hear a trace of recognition in Lin Fan''s voice.


    How did Lin Fan know about this strange energy?


    He had never seen the records of their Lin Astral Family yet¡­


    Lin Fan knitted his brows to think for a bit after seeing this before suddenly saying, "I want to go and investigate that ce myself."


    Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian were caught off guard when Lin Fan said this.


    Both of them had the impression that Lin Fan was a calm and collected person who wouldn''t act impulsively¡­so they were both caught off guard when Lin Fan suddenly said that he wanted to go.


    But after recovering from their shock, the Lin Astral Emperor immediately shook his head and said, "No, it''s too dangerous."


    Lin Fan had already expected this, so he said, "I''m the only one that can examine that energy and determine what it is."

 Chapter 981 Signs Of Outers

    The Lin Astral Emperor immediately knitted his brows and asked, "What makes you so sure that you can tell what this strange energy is?"


    Lin Fan thought about it a bit before saying, "I''m sure that you know about my master in the store, right?"


    When the two of them heard this, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    After all, they never expected Lin Fan to be so forward about this.


    However, they nodded in agreement to this.


    Both of them had already guessed that there was something special about the store, which was why Lin Fan had been able to be so powerful. As they had expected, it was indeed an expert who had been teaching Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan then said, "My master knows what kind of energy this is. It''s from the Outers that once invaded our universe."


    Once he said this, the two of them revealed shocked looks once again.


    After all, they knew what the Outers were as well. They just never expected Lin Fan to know what they were.


    Outers were a well kept secret among the Astral Empires since they didn''t want the general public to know about this. If this was spread, there was no doubt that it would cause a panic.


    There was a prophecy that the Outers would invade their universe again after all.


    If the public were to learn of these powerful Outers'' imminent invasion, there would be all kinds of disasters.


    The normal members of the Lin Astral Family didn''t even know about the Outers. Only the top of the top, such as the Lin Astral Emperor, Lin Jian, high ranking elders like Lin Tian, and the ancestors knew about this. The younger generation shouldn''t have had a single clue about the Outers.


    So for Lin Fan to mention the Outers now¡­it seemed like they hadpletely underestimated that expert hiding in the store.


    They were strong enough to know about the existence of Outers.


    Lin Fan saw the look on their faces and he raised his hand to gather some life energy.


    However, the life energy turned into a strange energy that neither the Lin Astral Emperor or Lin Jian recognized.


    As they stared at the energy in his hand, they couldn''t stop their expressions from fluctuating.


    After all, they never thought that Lin Fan would be able to control the energy of the Outers.


    How did they know that it was from the Outers?


    It was simr to the energy sample that had been sent back by the investigation team. This was one thing that had been left out of the report by the two of them deliberately so that Lin Fan wouldn''t be too affected.


    But it seemed like they had been worrying too much.


    Whoever the master of the store was, it seemed like they were also worried about the Outers and had been getting help from Lin Fan regarding this matter.


    The master of the store even understood the voidw better than them, or else they wouldn''t have been able to help Lin Fan absorb the energy of the Outers like this.


    So it seemed like there was nothing for them to worry about¡­


    After all, the strange energy had appeared inside of the territory of the Lin Astral Empire. This was still the territory that they controlled, even though there were signs of the enemy, they would still be able to keep Lin Fan safe.


    The main thing was that the master of the store was clearly having Lin Fan investigate the Outers, or he wouldn''t have given Lin Fan this strange energy.


    That was why his expression had suddenly changed after hearing about this strange energy.


    So even if they wanted to stop him, it was unlikely that they would seed.


    He would most likely find some way to reach there with the help of his master who they couldn''t gauge at all.


    Instead of letting him be in danger like this, it was better to send him there themselves.


    So in the end, both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian just epted with sighs.


    But they had conditions.


    Lin Fan had to be apanied by a group of Peak Sun Realm Experts from the Lin Astral Family guards, who would also have several Ruler Artifacts. At the same time, he would also be apanied by one of the four special Ruler Realm guards of the Lin Astral Family guards.


    There were only four guards that were in the Ruler Realm who had been carefully raised by the Lin Astral Family.


    These were guards that had sworn absolute fealty to the Lin Astral Family, even giving their souls to them. So if they ever tried to betray the Lin Astral Family, they would be killed with the soul jade that they had left.


    Normally, these guards would only be deployed when protecting the Lin Astral Emperor, but now the Lin Astral Emperor was sending one as Lin Fan''s dao protector.


    This was the treatment that only the crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire would receive.


    But that was what Lin Fan was, even if it wasn''t official yet.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he knew that they were just being cautious. He was more focused on the strange energy that had been mentioned in the report.


    That was because when he read this report, there was a notification that came from the system.


    It was a notification of a new mission being generated.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    He was being asked to go and investigate this strange energy by the system.


    So even if he didn''t want to go, he had no choice but to go.


    But he also couldn''t help finding it very strange.


    First the system sent him to that cultivation realm which was where the fragment of the Outer God had been. Now, the system wanted him to investigate this strange energy that had been found in the Lin Astral Empire, which should be rted to the Outers.


    He couldn''t help feeling that the system was paying quite a bit of attention to anything that was rted to the Outers¡­


    Almost as if it knew something.


    Of course, this was just a suspicion.


    Even if he wanted to do something about it, it wasn''t as if he could interrogate the system. The system only answered when it wanted to answer, so he couldn''t forcefully get any answers from it.


    But this was something that he cared about as well.


    If the signs of the Outers were appearing, then that would mean that the imminent invasion wasing¡­


    That would mean danger for the Lin Astral Empire and his family.


    He had epted his family here, so he would do what he could to protect it.


    For that, he would need information.


    So he was going to see what this strange energy was.


    But before he could leave, there were many things that had to be prepared.


    The meeting was set here and Lin Fan went off to prepare his things.


    At the same time, the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian held their own meeting without Lin Fan to prepare for his trip. They would need to prepare things like his guards, his transportation, securing the area, and many other things before he set off.


    These all needed to be gathered and prepared before he left.


    As for Lin Fan, he went to the store to prepare it for his absence.


    While the store could run on its own, there were still things that he needed to take care of personally. So he would have to take care of them before he left.


    When he arrived at the store, he found Ang, Yuki, and Momonga waiting for him.


    The three of them called him into the back room before Momonga asked, "Why is the master so interested in the Outers?"


    Lin Fan was surprised by this question, but then he realized what it was.


    Just like before, they must have received a mission from the system just like he had.


    So they knew about the strange energy as well.


    With the experience of the cultivation realm from before, they would know that this strange energy was rted to the Outers. So it wouldn''t be hard to figure out that this mission was rted to investigating the Outers.


    Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "I don''t know."


    This was the truth.


    He really didn''t know why the system was so obsessed with investigating the traces of the Outers.


    All three of them had known Lin Fan long enough to know that he wasn''t lying to them.


    However, for the master of the store not to tell Lin Fan anything when Lin Fan had been trusted to run the store for him¡­this meant that this was a very big deal.


    Lin Fan saw their knitted brows and asked, "Are youing with me?"


    All three of them nodded instantly when they heard this.


    They knew that even if they didn''t want to be involved, they had no choice.


    The threat of the Outers was just too great for them to ignore this.


    In fact, they were even grateful to the master of the store that he gave them this chance to be involved.


    After all, they also knew that the invasion of the Outers was something that would happen soon, so if they could get more information about this, then it would be very useful to them.


    After all, they all had people that followed them.


    Ang was the Spirit Queen and Momonga was the Lich King, so they had to take care of their people.


    The more information that they got, the safer they would be.

 Chapter 982 Radiation

    A weekter, Lin Fan gathered with his group in a secret space port.


    This was a special space port that had been built in secret by the Lin Astral Family.


    This port waspletely separated from the normal ports of the Lin Astral Empire''s capital and was only used by the Lin Astral Family.


    It was used for when they left the city on secret missions, which was what Lin Fan was on.


    There was a decoy that had been left in the pce while Lin Fan snuck out.


    When they arrived at the port, Lin Fan was surprised to see the spaceship parked there.


    This was a ship that wasparable to the Lin Astral Emperor''s ship, but it waspletely brand new.


    This was the ship that had been custom made for Lin Fan.


    It was a ship that had been specially ordered by the Lin Astral Emperor and had all of the state of the art technology installed in it. Construction of it had started when Lin Fan first came to the Lin Astral Empire and they had been slowly building it over time.


    It had just been finished recently and now it was being used by Lin Fan.


    But of course, when he decided to leave a few days ago, the Lin Astral Emperor suddenly gave another request to the builders.


    He had them install many different weapons and barriers into this ship just in case anything happened.


    This ship was now at the same level as the top tier battleships of the Lin Astral Empire while also being built for luxury.


    It should be said that it was even more expensive than the Lin Astral Emperor''s own ship.


    That was just how much he pampered and cared for his great grandchildren.


    The day that Lin Fan left, there was no one there to send him off.


    Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian were people who were watched, so they couldn''t just sneak out to send him off. They had privately held a sending off partyst night at the pce, so it didn''t matter that they weren''t here today.


    The only other two who would send them off were the empress, who was also at the party, and Lin Xue.


    Lin Xue had been at the party as well, but she had left early with a scowl on her face when she had been told that she couldn''te along.


    She had been left behind when Lin Ao went out and she was being left behind now that Lin Fan was heading out.


    She didn''t care as much when Lin Ao left since she knew what her father and mother felt, so she left them alone to give them the alone time they needed. But it was different with Lin Fan.


    Since the Blue Star, she had felt him getting further and further away from her. He was reaching a level that she felt that she would never reach and he would leave her grasp.


    That was especially true since she wasn''t as talented as Lin Fan and had never received the Lin Astral Family''s resources since she was young like her cousins. So right now, she was the weakest member of the Lin Astral Family, other than the ones still stuck on the Blue Star and the infants that had just been born.


    She was only in the Soul Realm, while all of the cousins were in the World Realm.


    This was not something that she could ept.


    At the same time, now that she was reunited with Lin Fan, she went on the offensive after Zi Ling appeared in his life.


    She knew that if she remained passive, nothing would ever change.


    But Lin Fan, the Lin Astral Emperor, and Lin Jian all wouldn''t budge on this matter.


    It was just too dangerous.


    So she was left behind in the pce.


    She had locked herself up in her room, but after Lin Fan left, she went to go train.


    She knew that unless she reached a certain level of cultivation, there was nothing that she could do.


    So she would make the most of her time here.


    After Lin Fan''s group set off, the first thing that they did was go in the opposite direction.


    It was impossible for them to hide themselvespletely even if they did leave from a secret port, so they would be taking a roundabout route that would take much longer, but it was safer for them like this.


    It would have taken them a single day to arrive with the direct route, but with the roundabout route, it took them three days.


    When they arrived, the team that had been dispatched was already waiting for them.


    This was a that had a colony under the Lin Astral Empire on it, which was why there had been reports of this strange energy.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    As soon as the strange energy was reported, the Lin Astral Empire''s army sent a team of scouts here to investigate. But after what had happened, they had sent a full army here as well to guard the ce.


    But of course, that army wasn''t on this itself.


    It was on a different nearby that had no inhabitants and was covered in beasts.


    The excuse for that was that this army was here on a training session, so they were camped there to fight against the demon beasts and to fight against each other for training.


    In reality though, the experts of that army had moved to this.


    So the ones greeting them were the general and the experts of that army.


    When they saw the ship, they immediately kneeled down in front of it and waited for Lin Fan to walk down.


    Only when Lin Fan was standing in front of them did the general and experts give their greeting.


    Lin Fan just gave a simple acknowledgement of this before saying, "Bring me to the site of the strange energy."


    The general and the experts were taken aback when they heard this since they never thought that Lin Fan would act this quickly. However, they also didn''t dare dy as they quickly led the way over.


    As they walked along, they couldn''t help looking back at Lin Fan with looks of admiration.


    They had naturally already heard rumours of this heir of the Lin Astral Family, but they never thought that they would have a chance to meet him so soon.


    This personality, this aura, and this overall feel that he had, he was worthy of all the rumours that they had heard.


    This was definitely something that they would be able to brag about to their families and friends in the future.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the location of the strange energy. Even before reaching it, Lin Fan and the other three could feel the strange energying from there.


    Only when they got close enough did the Lin Astral Family guards step forward.


    Their job was to guard Lin Fan, so of course they couldn''t let him explore this dangerous ce by himself.


    Before they could let him go, they would have to secure the area.


    The Ruler Realm guard stood right by Lin Fan and created a barrier around him while the others headed forward to scout the area that the strange energy wasing from.


    It didn''t take long before they came back because there wasn''t much to scout out.


    It had been written in the report that there was just this strange energy that they could feel in this small area, but they weren''t able to find a single thing. Even though the area waspletely abandoned.


    The strange thing about this area was that it was in the middle of a forest, but the surrounding nts had all died.


    There was just a circle of death where this strange energy wasing from.


    So it didn''t take them long to secure the area.


    While he had been waiting for the guards to finish their search, Lin Fan had checked the surrounding area.


    He could see that there was a gradual change from the clearednd and the forestednd. There was ayer of dying nts that was around the area that waspletely empty.


    When he took his first step into the cleared area, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    The feeling of this strange energy, it was¡­somewhat familiar¡­


    It was as if he had felt this strange energy somewhere before, but he couldn''t tell where.


    So he just stopped moving and knitted his brows to think.


    After a while, he suddenly remembered where he felt this energy before.


    It was from earth!


    Back when he was still that young master, he had tried many different things. That included ying around with some dangerous things.


    So he had robbed his family''sb and stolen some precious materials, but that had resulted in him getting radiation poisoning since he didn''t know that they were radioactive materials. It was a good thing that he only took a single vial, or he might have died from radiation poisoning.


    The feeling that he was feeling now from this strange energy¡­was just like the feeling of radiation. However, the difference was that he had his life energy around him that formed a barrier, protecting him from the harm of the radioactive energy.


    But why would there be radioactive energy in this ce?


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking around before looking at the very center of the circle. He looked right down at the ground as if he was looking for something.

 Chapter 983 Mechanical Arms

    After staring at that spot for a bit, Lin Fan started moving forward.


    The guards around him were taken aback when they saw this, but they also moved forward with him to protect him. However, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand to stop them.


    The guards revealed a conflicted look, but they didn''t follow him in the end.


    They had already secured the area, so there shouldn''t be anything that could cause Lin Fan harm.


    Lin Fan was the heir of the Lin Astral Family in the end, so his position wasn''t something that could be ignored. They had to obey his orders in the end.


    So Lin Fan was allowed to move to the center of the cleared area by himself.


    As he moved closer and closer, he could feel the strange energy getting stronger.


    This strange energy kept assaulting him, almost as if it was trying to make its way into his body. However, Lin Fan strengthened the life energy barrier around himself to prevent it from entering his body.


    As he came closer though, he had to use more and more life energy to keep it out.


    When he was standing in the center of the circle, he could feel the intense strange energying out of the ground and assaulting him. He knew this feeling very well and he knew that this was dangerous for the people in the area, so he raised his hand and said, "Everyone move away from the circle, now!"


    All of the people around him were confused when they heard this, but they quickly followed his orders and moved further away from the circle.


    Then Lin Fan looked down at the ground under him before raising his hand to gather some life energy.


    This was a brown coloured life energy that he had gathered this time.


    This was earthws that he was using.


    With these earthws, he easily moved the ground under him and uncovered what was hidden within.


    As he moved the dirt under him, he could feel the radiation energy bing stronger.


    It seemed like the dirt that had been there had been blocking the radiation energy and now that he was moving it, it was just getting stronger.


    But it was still within a range that Lin Fan could ept.


    As he moved it more and more, he was also getting deeper and deeper into the ground. It didn''t take long before he had created a hole that was over three meters deep, but even then, he wasn''t able to find what he was looking for.


    Still, he could feel the radiation energy getting stronger, so he knew that he was getting close.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop using the earthws to dig, but before he could dig any further, there was movement from the ground under him.


    The ground only trembled a bit at first, but then the shaking became stronger and stronger until cracks started forming in the ground.


    Lin Fan who noticed this immediately moved back and raised his guard.


    The guards around him also pulled out their weapons as they prepared for a fight. Even the Ruler Realm guard had pulled out a weapon.


    Before anyone could react though, there were these limbs that came out of the ground.


    These were dark limbs that had a sharp tip at the ends of them that stabbed out of the ground.


    At first, they just stayed there in the air without a target. Then as if they had found a target, they suddenly turned to point the sharp tips at Lin Fan. There were also a few of them that pointed at the guards around the area.


    When they saw this, everyone knew that these limbs were prepared to attack.


    But Lin Fan also had a different reaction.


    That was because these limbs¡­seemed almost familiar.


    They seemed like the limbs of an octopus, but they were made of metal.


    They had links in between them that locked all of the metal segments that made up these metallic octopus arms. With this system, it was actually much more flexible since it was like having multiple joints all over the arm itself.


    As for where Lin Fan had seen them¡­they were like the arms of a certain superviin that fought against a spider themed superhero.


    These arms wildly stabbed and swung at Lin Fan, but they moved at a speed that was very easy for him to dodge.


    The only problem was that he had misjudged the reach of these metallic arms.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    He had thought that since they were stuck in the ground, what he could see was the range that they had, but that wasn''t the case. Rather, each of the segments in the metallic arms could stretch, giving it a max reach of over double what it seemed like it had.


    So there were a few times where it was almost able to get him.


    But Lin Fan could dodge all of the attacks that came swinging and stabbing at him with his overwhelming reflex. So in the end, the metallic limbs weren''t able to hit him at all.


    As for the guards, they also had no trouble dodging this, but they were at a level that was below Lin Fan''s. There were a few of them that were hit by these metallic arms in the end.


    It wasn''t a problem that they were hit by these arms since there was no life energy infused in them.


    There was only the strength that came with having metallic limbs that sent them flying and gave them a few bruises, but there were no serious injuries.


    Lin Fan had been overwhelmed by the number of metallic arms that came out at first, but then he had no problem tracking them and easily dodging out of the way. He moved around the arms until he was only in the range of a few of the arms.


    At that point, he pulled out his Iron Eater Bone Sword and started swinging at the metallic limbs.


    To his surprise though, he found that these metallic limbs were very hard and the Iron Eater Bone Artifact couldn''t even make a single dent.


    But at the same time, he received a message from the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    Lin Fan looked at the metallic limbs with narrowed eyes after hearing this, but then he went along with the Iron Eater Bone Artifact''s n.


    He dodged and weaved past the metallic limbs, making swings at them as he passed.


    He wasn''t able to make a single scratch on these metallic limbs, but if one looked closely, they would be able to see something glimmering in the air. It was almost like there was some kind of sparkling dust that was left behind Lin Fan as a trail.


    He didn''t push further into the center of the circle, just dancing his way around the metallic limbs that were swinging and stabbing at him. Every time he passed by one, he would always make sure to sh at it.


    This continued for some time until the metallic arms started getting slower.


    It wasn''t that they were getting weaker, but rather they chose to slow down on their own after seeing one of the arms suddenly breaking apart on its own. This arm had just swung at Lin Fan when a few of the outer segments suddenly fell off from the rest of the arm.


    It was as if whatever had been connecting it had suddenly been severed.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he confirmed something.


    It seemed like there was something controlling these arms that was learning as it attacked. If he had to guess what it was, it was most likely an advanced AI that could analyze the situation and learn, adjusting to the changes in the situation.


    This kind of thing didn''t exist in this world, but for a world that could make these kinds of futuristic metallic arms, it shouldn''t be a problem.


    After adjusting, the arms started working together to try and trap Lin Fan, but it still didn''t work.


    No matter what patterns these arms took, they just weren''t able to touch the hem of Lin Fan''s clothes.


    However, the situation got worse and worse for the metallic limbs as time passed on. One by one, they started breaking apart, losing more and more segments of themselves until they were just nubs.


    At that point, Lin Fan stabbed right into the exposed machinery and silenced those metallic limbs forever.


    If one looked carefully at the segments that had fallen off, they would have seen that the metal that these segments were made of had¡­lost their sheen. At the same time, it was as if the segments themselves had grown much smaller.


    It was as if something had been carved off and stolen from them.


    It was Lin Fan''s Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    He had used the special ability of this Iron Eater Bone Artifact to slowly whittle away the essence of the metal used to create these metallic limbs. This made them weaker and weaker until they just fell apart on their own since they couldn''t handle the force being used anymore.


    At the same time, if one looked carefully at Lin Fan''s sword, they would see that it was starting to sparkle more and more.


    This Iron Eater Bone Artifact was just getting stronger and stronger from absorbing the essence of the metallic limbs'' metal.


    At the same time, it started releasing an aura that didn''t seem to exist in this world.


    After all, the metallic limbs were created from metals that didn''t exist in this world.


    Once he had taken care of the metallic limbs around him, Lin Fan was about to head deeper in to take care of more metallic limbs.


    But before that could happen, all of the metallic limbs suddenly drew back.

 Chapter 984 Strange Ship

    They had pulled away as if they had recognized the danger that Lin Fan brought.


    Lin Fan stopped for a second as he thought about whether to chase or not, but he still decided to chase after these metallic limbs in the end.


    However, before he could take a step forward, the ground under him started shaking again.


    The cracks that had formed in the ground became evenrger, especially the one in the hole at the center of this area. It became wider and wider until it made the holepletely copse in on itself.


    The shaking didn''t stop until a burst of dirt came from the hole.


    There was arge thing that suddenly burst out from the hole, standing straight up where the hole had been before.


    Once the dust settled, they saw that¡­it was another metallic arm just like the other ones.


    The only difference was that this one was giganticpared to the other ones.


    This should be the main arm from whatever was attacking them.


    However, when they looked closer, they found that this arm wasn''t just a simple arm. It was a collection of multiple different armsing together to create a giant metallic arm.


    This giant metallic arm just stayed there without moving, but this time, it was Lin Fan''s Ruler Realm guard''s turn to fight.


    When Lin Fan had been fighting the metallic arms earlier, this Ruler Realm guard had seen that he wasn''t in any danger at all.


    He had been taught absolute loyalty to the Lin Astral Family and he was smart enough to recognize that Lin Fan had something nned, so he hadn''t interfered just now. After all, if Lin Fan wasn''t in danger, his orders were to be obeyed since he was the heir of the Lin Astral Family.


    But now that this giant arm had appeared, the guard couldn''t let Lin Fan do what he wanted anymore.


    He could sense dangering from this giant arm, so he knew that it would be too dangerous for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t a fool, he could also sense the danger.


    He knew that there was no point in putting himself in danger, so he had moved back outside of the cleared circle.


    No one made a move as they watched the giant arm, but the giant arm also didn''t make a move. It just stayed standing there, as if it was waiting for something.


    Then all of a sudden, before anyone could react, the ground split apart again.


    There were several holes that appeared in the ground and out of those holes, there were beams of light that flew out.


    These beams of light flew straight up into the air before flying off in different directions. Then as they flew through the air, they suddenly started to curve and fly out in another direction.


    The one thing that these beams of light shared inmon was that¡­they all had the same target.


    They were all aimed at the Ruler Realm guard.


    Whoever controlled these beams of light could clearly tell that the Ruler Realm guard was the most powerful person, so they were aiming to take out the Ruler Realm guard first.


    But that wasn''t strange since the Ruler Realm guard had released his aura to draw the enemy''s attention.


    The Ruler Realm guard immediately released his domain and blocked those beams of light, but the beams of light were only meant to be a distraction. There was no real power behind those beams of light, they were just attacks that moved much faster than the attacks of the metallic arms.


    With the domain being used to block the beams of light, the metallic arm went for the weak spot of the domain.


    The power of the domain had been gathered to block the beams of light since the Ruler Realm guard didn''t recognize the attacks that had been thrown at him. He couldn''t even judge it with his spiritual sense, so he didn''t dare rx at all.


    So he had gathered all of the power to one side to block the beams of light.


    This naturally meant that there was one side that was weaker.


    That was what the giant metallic arm aimed for.


    But what the enemy didn''t know was that the domain of a Ruler Realm Expert waspletely different from the domain of a World Realm Expert.


    The domain of a World Realm Expert was just them controlling thews inside of the domain with their power, so that they would be the one controlling a specificw in a space. They would be imposing their will on that space.


    The domain of a Ruler Realm Expert waspletely different.


    They were still imposing their will on the space, but with the increased power that they had, it was as if their will was that space.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    They could control everything in that space and do things instantly that World Realm Experts couldn''t do.


    Such as instantly controlling the flow of life energy.


    So in an instant, the domain''s concentration of power changed direction.


    It went from blocking the side with the beams of light to the side with the metallic arm in an instant.


    But to the surprise of the Ruler Realm Expert, he found that the metallic arm was able to keep even with his domain for a few seconds. It was only after a few seconds that the metallic arm was pped back.


    As the metallic arm was pped back, the various arms that it was made of split up from it and stabbed out at the domain.


    The Ruler Realm Expert was about to repel them, but then he suddenly pulled his hand back and jumped out of the way. That was because he had seen a strange energy around the metallic arms that had been about to stab at him.


    This was a strange energy simr to the one that they had felting from this area before, but he could tell that it was strong enough to threaten him.


    He didn''t know what would happen if this strange energy made contact with his domain, so he didn''t risk it by confronting it head on.


    Seeing this, the Ruler Realm guard knew that it was impossible to take care of this metallic arm without putting in a bit of effort, so he summoned out his pet.


    This was a bird that was covered in mes, but it wasn''t a phoenix or a vermilion bird as one would expect. This was a crow that waspletely golden in colour.


    This crow released its mes and it surrounded the Ruler Realm guard, turning into a set of golden me armour. Along with this armour, there was a golden me halberd that was also formed.


    The Ruler Realm guard immediately used his speed to go around the metallic arms in circles and from time to time, he swung out with ming shes. These ming shes cut right through the metallic arm, cutting off segments of the metallic arm.


    The metallic arm tried to resist by breaking up and attacking from different angles, but it couldn''t ovee the difference in speed.


    It wasn''t able to keep up with the Ruler Realm guard at all as the Ruler Realm guard went around it in circles.


    Finally, after peeling away theyers of metallic arms around the center, the Ruler Realm guard was finally able to reach the very center of thisrge metallic arm.


    At the very center was arge ck mass.


    When one looked at it closely, they would see that it was some kind of wire that had been covered with a stic coating.


    When this was revealed, the Ruler Realm guard found a target to attack.


    He focused his life energy into a single swing that cut right through the mass of wires without any resistance. The sh had also been heated by the golden mes, so the parts that were cut were melted and fused together.


    Once the mass of wires had been cut apart, all of the metallic arms in the surrounding area froze before drooping to the ground. They justid there as if there was no life left in them at all.


    It was as if they had lost whatever signal had been controlling them.


    It seemed like this mass of wires was what had been connecting everything in these metallic arms.


    After the metallic arms stopped, everyone watched and waited to see if anything else happened.


    After nothing happened for five minutes, they finally came up to the remaining stub in the ground along with Lin Fan¡­Well, Lin Fan came over and they didn''t want to leave Lin Fan unguarded, so they came up with him.


    Looking at the stub, Lin Fan paused for a second before reaching down to grab it.


    But before he could, all of the guards stood in his way to stop him.


    Lin Fan saw this and then shook his head before saying with a sigh, "You can pull it out now."


    The guards received this order and pulled at the stub in the ground.


    Now that there was something to grab onto, it was easier to pull it out than to dig into the ground looking for it.


    With these guards working together, it didn''t take long before they were able to pull out the object that these metallic arms had been attached to.


    As they pulled it out, the ground under them cracked apart and they had to fly into the air to avoid falling down.


    When they pulled it out, they saw that they had pulled out a strange ship.

 Chapter 985 Machine Artifacts

    It was a strange ship because it wasn''t in the shape of any ship that they had seen before.


    But for Lin Fan, when he saw it, he couldn''t help revealing a strange expression¡­


    Wasn''t this a UFO?


    It was a round saucer that had holes in it where the metallic arms wereing out from. At the same time, there were also glowing holes that were clearly the power source for the UFO and where the beams of light hade from.


    But why was there a UFO here?


    No, the UFO here should be something from the Outers¡­so could it be that the aliens that people had seen on earth were Outers?


    The more he thought about this, the more it hurt his head¡­


    So Lin Fan threw away these thoughts since he knew that it was impossible for him to understand everything. Instead, he started going over the UFO and trying to find a way


    in.


    But as far as he could see, the UFO waspletely sealed off and there wasn''t a way in.


    Well, there were holes all over it, but that was where the self defense weapons came from, so that was most likely not a safe ce to enter from.


    There should be a part of the ship that opened up that would allow him to enter the ship, but he wasn''t able to find it. That was until they finally found a tiny sliver using their life energy.


    Lin Fan gave up in the end and had the guards use their life energy to search every part of the ship.


    This was different from a spiritual sense search, which was scanning it with their spiritual sense.


    That was because the body of this thing strangely blocked spiritual sense from entering.


    This life energy search consumed a lot of life energy because it was using life energy to check every single inch of the surface. It was like covering this thing in water and then seeing if there was a gap for the water to soak into.


    However, life energy was much more flexible than water since it was a form of energy.


    It was even able to detect gaps that could be measured in microns.


    So they were able to find the gap in this airtight seal of the strange ship.


    Then after finding that gap, they brute forced it open with their life energy.


    With the hole in the ship opened, they could see that the ship waspletely dark.


    There were things that looked like lights that were on the ceilings of this corridor, but it was clear that there was no power running through them since it was so dark.


    Lin Fan took a closer look at these lights, but he couldn''t see anything that seemed like it was providing power to this light. It was almost as if there was some kind of wireless power source connected to this.


    But this was definitely not something that he could understand since this technology was just too advanced for him.


    So in the end, they just created a few lights with their life energy and headed deeper in.


    With the atmosphere of this ship, it was almost like they were in a horror movie.


    Lin Fan was expecting some alien creature to jump out and attack them at any moment, but nothing like that happened.


    They made their way through the dark corridors of the ship until they finally came to what seemed like the bridge of the ship.


    However, the moment that they walked into this room, they immediately raised their guard.


    That was because there was a dark figure that was sitting at the seat behind the wheel.


    Whoever this was, it was most likely the owner of the ship.


    Since they owned this ship and this ship belonged to the Outers, this was most likely an Outer.


    The guards immediately came up in front of Lin Fan and pulled out their weapons.


    They took a formation with the normal guards forming a wall in front of him. To his side, the Ruler Realm guard was standing at the ready, prepared to make a move if anything happened.


    Lin Fan also pulled out his weapon just in case, but he also raised his hands to stop the three who were standing in the back.


    After a long period of silence, the guards that were in front slowly moved forward.


    One of the team leaders took the foremost position and with his sword pointed at the dark figure, he said, "Who are you?"


    There was only silence that followed this.


    With this silence, they looked at each other before slowly moving towards the figure just sitting there.


    Once they were close enough, they slowly used their weapons to poke at that figure, but that figure just didn''t react at all.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Finally, they brought the lights closer and they were surprised by what they saw.


    Pulling off the cloak on that figure, they found¡­a skeleton sitting there.


    This skeleton didn''t have a single bit of flesh left, so it was clear that it had been here a long time.


    As they stared at it, Lin Fan came forward to take a closer look at it.


    The guards were about to stop him, but he just waved them down. Seeing this wave from Lin Fan, the guards had no choice but to back down since they knew that it would be too much to try and stop him.


    Lin Fan came right up to this skeleton and took a close look at it.


    He found that this skeleton was just a normal human skeleton without any extra things on it.


    He couldn''t help thinking of the skeletons that he had seen before when he had been teleported to the cultivation realm by the system.


    It seemed that most creatures that came from the Outer had the same shape as humans, but why was that?


    Why were there so many creatures that were just like humans in the Outer?


    Was there a reason why they all had the same form as humans?


    This was something that Lin Fan couldn''t help being really curious about, but he also shook this thought from his mind after thinking for a bit.


    After all, it wasn''t the time to think about this right now.


    He turned his attention back to the bridge that the skeleton had been sitting at, but this bridge didn''t have any sign of power at all. It was clear that whatever had been powering this ship had been damaged in the fight, so they weren''t able to use this ship at all.


    Since that was the case, there was no reason to spend time trying to fix it.


    They didn''t understand the technology at all, so it would have just been a waste of time.


    So Lin Fan led his group search through the entire bridge first to see if there was anything that seemed like it would give them information.


    But after searching through the bridge, they found that there wasn''t a single thing here.


    So they decided to search the rest of the ship.


    There were other paths that they had seen when they made their way through the ship, but they had ignored them for now since they had wanted to find the control room of the ship.


    But since the bridge was a bust, it was time for them to explore all of those rooms.


    They made their way to the room that was closest to the bridge and when they went in, they found that this ce was just as dark as the rest of the ship.


    With the light that they brought, they found that this ce was filled with machines of different shapes.


    These were machines that they had never seen before and they all had weird shapes to them.


    These were shapes that they never would have thought would exist for these machines.


    One of the guards who was better at handling machines than the others went to take a closer look at them, but even after opening them up, he wasn''t able to determine what they were used for.


    There wasn''t even any wire inside of these machines that they could use to guess what these things were for.


    So they had no choice but to forget about the machines.


    There were also some smaller things that they could take with them that were in the room, but they still couldn''t figure out what these things were. They couldn''t even power them on since it seemed like they were out of power.


    As for what kind of power that would even need, that puzzled them even more.


    So in the end, Lin Fan said, "Bring them along."


    The guards nodded before gathering up all the machines that they could take with them. There were a few that were attached to the floor, so they couldn''t pick these ones up and take them with them.


    The ones that they did take were the smaller ones that were scattered around the floor.


    Their job after all was to scout out this ce for the source of the strange energy.


    So they would take these things back and check them out properly to see what they were.


    Once they were all gathered, they headed off further into the ship to see what else they could find.


    The next room that they entered had a strange feeling to it.


    It was the strange energy that they had felt before when they had been above the ground, but this time it was much stronger.


    It was as if they had found the source of this strange energy.

 Chapter 986 Samples

    This room was actually quite spacious and emptypared to the other two rooms that they had been in.


    There was only a single thing that was in this room and it was arge tube that was in the center of the room.


    But thisrge tube had a crack in the ss walls, so it was clear that something had happened to this tube.


    But that wasn''t the important thing.


    The important thing was the strange energy that wasing from this tube.


    Lin Fan recognized this strange energy as radiation, so he could guess what this tube was for.


    Whatever this tube had contained was most likely the energy source of this ship, which is why the ship waspletely dark since the tube had been destroyed along with whatever energy source it had.


    If he had to guess, he would guess that this ship most likely used some kind of nuclear energy system, which was why that radiation energy was being released. It was natural decay after the energy system was destroyed.


    However, the others didn''t think the same.


    As soon as the guards had felt the strange energying from the tube, they had immediately surrounded Lin Fan to protect him.


    The Ruler Realm guard had even set up a barrier just to protect Lin Fan from what he thought this tube was.


    Lin Fan could feel the influence of the radiation energy getting weaker with this barrier.


    It seemed that life energy barriers worked the same as radiation suits.


    But of course, he still wanted to observe it, so he exined that it was most likely the energy source of this ship.


    When they heard this, the guards couldn''t help being shocked and confused. Even the guards who were more mechanically gifted were confused by Lin Fan''s exnation.


    That was because there was no such thing as nuclear energy in this world.


    This was one of the differences to Lin Fan''s old world.


    That was all because of the existence of life energy and pets.


    With life energy and pets, it was easy for them to generate the electricity that they needed to power their machines. So this world had never developed anything like power generation technology before.


    There was no hydro, sun, coal, fossil fuels, and naturally no nuclear energy.


    So when Lin Fan exined nuclear energy to them, they couldn''t understand what he was saying at all.


    In the end, he just said, "In short, it''s Outer technology, so you don''t need to worry about it. It''s something that isn''t dangerous since it''s already been disabled, so it won''t cause us any harm."


    The guards clearly had looks that seemed like they thought differently, but with how firm Lin Fan''s voice was, they had no choice but to listen to him.


    They slowly made their way over and started observing the tube, but they weren''t able to understand a single thing about it.


    After all, it was just a tube with nothing but a few rocks inside of it.


    However, Lin Fan knew what these rocks were.


    These were most likely radioactive isotopes that were used by the nuclear generator to create power. So this was where the energy was created and then harnessed to power the ship.


    While it seemed broken, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking of something.


    He didn''t know if it was just the generator that was broken, or if the entire thing was broken. If it was just the generator, then as long as a new source of power was connected¡­


    But if it was the entire thing, then it would be useless.


    Still, he wouldn''t know unless he gave it a try since he couldn''t understand the technology ced in front of him in the first ce.


    So without any hesitation, Lin Fan summoned out a thunder attributed pet.


    This pet was one of the Peak Sun Realm Pets that he had caught during the trip to the Lin Astral Empire.


    But the moment that this pet came out, the guards immediately surrounded him again which made Lin Fan exasperated.


    It seemed that these guards really were inflexible, they surrounded him for every little thing¡­


    But in the mind of the guards, they thought that Lin Fan had summoned this pet out to fight. They thought that Lin Fan had detected some kind of threat that they hadn''t detected, so they didn''t dare neglect his protection.


    After Lin Fan waved the guards away, he had the pet go over to the tube.


    The pet gathered its electricity before shooting it at the tube.


    When the electricity hit the tube, it suddenly disappeared.


    Lin Fan had the pet only shoot a single bolt of electricity at the tube to test it at first, but there was no reaction at all.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he saw this, but he still had the pet continue sending electricity into the tube. After all, the bolt that he had sent had disappeared somewhere, so he could tell that whatever he was doing was having an effect.


    After a few minutes, there was finally a reaction from the tube as it started to glow.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    As soon as it started to glow, the guards once again surrounded Lin Fan to protect him which made him give a sigh.


    He just watched as the tube started glowing more and more.


    As the tube lit up, there were clicks and whirling sounds that came from all around them that just made the guards even more cautious as theypletely surrounded him once again.


    Lin Fan ignored all of this as he kept watching the tube and the pet supplying the energy.


    After a while, he called out a second thunder attributed pet.


    This one was weaker than the first one he called out, but he had it send electricity into the tube as well since the first one was slowly getting drained.


    After another while, the lights above them suddenly came on.


    The guards were all shocked by this, but they finally understood what Lin Fan had been doing.


    He had been supplying power to this ship to turn it on.


    But of course, this just made them cautious once again.


    A group of the guards surrounded Lin Fan while another group quickly spread out to secure the area.


    Now that the ship had suddenly turned on, they didn''t know what would happen.


    So they didn''t dare let their guard down for a single second.


    However, even after the ship was powered on again, nothing happened.


    There were just the lights that lit up above them that allowed them to see the ship''s interior better, but that was it.


    After waiting for a bit, Lin Fan turned and headed out of the room.


    The guards all quickly followed him, but he didn''t let them stop him from going back to the bridge.


    When he walked in, he found that the panels had all lit up and it seemed like they could operate the ship. However, Lin Fan didn''t touch any of the buttons since he didn''t know what they did.


    He didn''t dare risk this while they were still exploring the ship.


    So he turned back and headed for another one of the rooms on the ship.


    Now that they could see, they were able to see that there were markings for each of the rooms that they had passed. It was just that the markings were in anguage that he nor the others recognized. Even Momonga with his vast knowledge wasn''t able to recognize these markings.


    So Lin Fan just chose one of the rooms to enter.


    This room was also different from the rest of the rooms that they had seen, but there was something familiaring from inside of this room.


    The room was also well lit now that the power had been restored to the ship, so they were able to see what was inside the room without a problem.


    There were severalrge tubes that seemed like they would be able to hold people without any problems.


    These tubes looked like the human experimentation tubes that Lin Fan had seen in movies before. The ones that were used modify humans into human weapons¡­


    However, these tubes that were in front of him were all empty.


    No, it wasn''tpletely empty.


    That was what the familiar feelinging from these tubes was.


    There was energy contained inside of each of these tubes, energy that was attuned to differentws.


    There was one that was filled with mews, one filled with powerws, one filled with darkws, and many other differentws.


    The most surprising thing was that there were even tubes filled with space and timews.


    Space and timews were some of the most powerfulws to exist, so being able to capture thesews in a tube really was hard to do. The fact that they were able to do it clearly meant that their technology was very advanced.


    But the question was¡­why did they do this?


    Why were they collecting thesews in tubes like that?


    They wouldn''t do this for no reason, so what was the reason for this?


    This was a ship from the Outer, so thesews were unknown to the Outers that hade.


    But for them to collect them like this¡­


    Was it just out of curiosity, or was there a different reason for this?


    No matter how Lin Fan thought about it, he couldn''t help feeling that there was a deeper reason for all of this.


    It was almost as if they were here to stealws from their world.

 Chapter 987 Androids

    In the end, Lin Fan left these samples alone.


    He knew that it was better to leave these alone than to meddle with them and cause an ident.


    After all, he didn''t have any idea how any of this worked, so there was no reason to randomly touch things.


    Onest thing that caught his attention was that there was a tube that waspletely covered in some kind of ck substance. It was as if this ck substance was covering this tube, preventing it from showing anything.


    It was almost as if there was something that was being suppressed inside of this tube.


    It wasn''t just the fact that the tube was ck tinted that his attention was attracted, but because he felt something familiaring from this tube.


    It was as if it was attracting him towards it.


    It didn''t take Lin Fan long to recognize what this feeling was.


    He raised his hand and gathered some life energy in it, creating a little ck hole.


    The ck hole looked normal at first, but then there was a kind of attraction towards the ck tinted tube.


    This ck hole was something that he created with his voidws, so it was supposed to absorb. However, it was being attracted by whatever was inside of the tinted tube¡­


    This meant that there was something that was inside of the tube that could absorb things just like his voidws. That meant that it was most likely voidws that were stronger than his own that were stored inside.


    But where had they gotten this voidw from?


    As far as he knew, the Lin Astral Family were the only ones that had the voidws.


    Did that mean that they stole it from the Lin Astral Family?


    If that was the case, where did they steal it from?


    This was a major issue for the Lin Astral Family, if they really did steal from the Lin Astral Family. It would mean that there was an issue with the Lin Astral Family''s security.


    It seemed like Lin Fan had to have a talk about this with the Lin Astral Emperor once he got back.


    For now, he would just leave everything here.


    After taking care of that, Lin Fan went out into the corridor again.


    There weren''t many rooms left in this ship for him to explore, there were only three doors left that hadn''t been opened yet.


    The first one that they opened revealed a room that seemed to be a kitchen and food storage area.


    They looked around the ce and found some things that seemed to be utensils and tes, but they were in strange shapes that they had never seen before.


    There were also things that seemed to be stored food, but some of it had been destroyed and the "food" inside seemed to be rotten. Perhaps that was just the kind of food that they ate and it wasn''t rotten, but from their perspective, it seemed rotten.


    At least there were a few containers that seemed like they still had things in them, so they could take them back and research them.


    While it seemed pointless to research what kind of things these Outers ate, any information about them would be helpful. It was unknown what woulde in handy one day¡­


    Such as the need to poison the Outers¡­


    The next room that they went into seemed to be some kind of resting room.


    It wasn''t like a normal bedroom, but rather it was a room that had a single giant vat inside of it filled with water that seemed like it could hold a human.


    They would have thought that it was another experimentation room, but they could see that there were personal objects in this ce as well¡­or at least what seemed like personal objects.


    They all had strange shapes, so it was hard to recognize what they were.


    But at the very least, the way that they were ced around the room made it seem like they were personal objects.


    So that was why they thought that it was a resting room.


    That and what seemed to be a clock on the wall.


    That clock was ticking at the same rate as the one in their watches, so they could tell that it was a clock. However, it had all kinds of strange symbols that they couldn''t understand, so they didn''t know what time system they used.


    It had fourteen segments instead of the twelve that they were used to.


    Still, there was nothing of interest in this room.


    No, the vat that seemed to be the resting vat was interesting.


    Momonga came up to it and took a sniff of the liquid inside, which made Lin Fan scrunch his face as he thought of something strange. But it didn''t turn out the way that he thought it would.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Instead, Momonga listed off a bunch of herbs that he thought could possibly be in this liquid.


    Lin Fan however looked at the liquid with a strange look.


    Chemistry was another thing that wasn''t as developed since alchemy had taken its ce.


    Lin Fan knew with his basic understanding of chemistry that this was most likely some kind of nutrition chemical that would nourish the people who slept inside of this vat. He didn''t know what kind of form it used, but it would be useful to analyze it¡­


    It was just too bad that there were no chemists in the Lin Astral Empire and it would be too hard to teach them with just his basic understanding of chemistry.


    He hoped that the alchemists would be able to find something.


    Finally, it was thest room left for them to explore.


    This room was also different from the rest of the rooms as there was only one thing that was inside of this room.


    It was a pod, a cryosleep pod.


    It wasn''t just a single pod, but rows of pods ced all along the room.


    The guards naturally didn''t know what these things were, so they were immediately put on guard and surrounded Lin Fan again. But Lin Fan quickly had them scatter since there wasn''t any movement from the pods.


    When he went over, he found that there was ayer of mist on the window looking into the pod, so he wiped his hand across it to clear the mist. When he saw what was inside, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    It was a face that was looking back at him, but this face wasn''t the face of a person.


    It was apletely gray skinned face that seemed more like a machine than human.


    This was a face that had only gray skin that didn''t have any hair at all, which made it clear that it was some kind of machine.


    The face itself was designed in the same way as a human, so that was something that Lin Fan recognized, but it was clear that these things were not human.


    The eyes of this face were closed along with the mouth, making it seem like they were sleeping.


    The guards all gathered around the one pod that Lin Fan was looking into and they all stared down at the lifeless gray skinned face in front of them.


    One of them couldn''t help asking, "Is this a corpse puppet?"


    Corpse puppets, that was one of the obscure cultivation methods of this world.


    Instead of using pets, it involved refining corpses into puppets that one would use to fight with.


    But it was phased out since it was one of those dark arts that involved corpses.


    There were too many cases of violence and corpse stealing for this cultivation technique to be popr. So while there might be people that still practice this cultivation technique to this day, it was a dying breed.


    But the corpse puppets that they cultivated looked exactly like the thing inside of this pod, so it was understandable why the guard thought of a corpse puppet the moment that they saw this.


    Lin Fan knew different though.


    He was someone who hade from earth, with all of its sci fi fantasy, so he knew what this thing was as soon as he saw it.


    It was an android.


    This wasn''t a corpse that had been refined into a weapon, but rather a machine that had been created to imitate humans. Of course, as a machine, it had been refined to the point where it was much stronger than a normal human, but it was still something that mimicked humans.


    If there was an android inside one of these pods, then¡­


    Lin Fan turned to look at the rows of pods that were in this room and he couldn''t help looking through the window of another one of these pods.


    As expected, there was also an android in this pod.


    Then that should mean that there were androids in all of these pods.


    There were more pods than there were guards, so they would definitely be outnumbered if the androids were suddenly activated¡­


    In the end, Lin Fan decided against activating the androids to see if he could get more information and decided to just take the entire ship back with him.


    But before that, he waited for a bit for the ship to turn off.


    As expected, he had only given the ship just enough power to turn on, so it powered off not long after.


    This inactive ship didn''t have anything lifting it up, but they had more than enough manpower to lift it.


    The guards had to lift it at first, but then they were able to get some soldiers from the army to follow them back, lifting it for them.

 Chapter 988 More Strange Rewards

    Aftering back from the investigation, Lin Fan was immediately pulled into a meeting with the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian as he had expected.


    They had already read the reports that the guards had sent back, so there were plenty of questions that they had for Lin Fan.


    Once they sat down, the Lin Astral Emperor immediately asked, "How did you recognize the objects on that ship?"


    That was the main thing that had puzzled them.


    Lin Fan acted like he was already familiar with the things that were on the ship, which should be things that he shouldn''t have seen before. He had even figured out how to power and turn on the ship like it was nothing.


    This was not something that could be done just by observing things for the first time. This was a kind of recognition that came from having known these items before, a recognition that Lin Fan shouldn''t have had.


    So they couldn''t help being suspicious.


    Especially after the incident with the assassins disguising themselves.


    This made them even more wary.


    Though the Soul Searching Array did confirm that this was indeed Lin Fan. However, they didn''t know if the enemy''s techniques would be more refined and would be capable of fooling even the Soul Searching Array.


    So they didn''t dare assume anything.


    Lin Fan had already expected this since he had been too focused on the Outer ship that he hadpletely forgotten to hold himself back. He had let his excitement and curiosity in seeing all of these things carry him away and he had revealed too much about himself.


    So it wasn''t strange that he was being questioned for it right now.


    But it didn''t take him long toe up with an excuse.


    It was the age-old excuse that he used and that he kept using even now.


    After all, it was an excuse that just worked every time since no one could see through the store or the "master" that was in it.


    So he said, "It was what my master told me. He wanted me to research it, so that was why I knew everything."


    "The master?" Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian repeated after Lin Fan before knitting their brows.


    When it came to the store and Lin Fan''s "master", they really didn''t know what to say.


    Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian had secretly gone to Lin Fan''s store to scope out this "master" of his, but they hadn''t been able to find a single thing. They couldn''t even figure out how the spatialws inside of the store worked.


    It was as if thosews were on apletely different level from them.


    So they really didn''t know what to say about this "master" of Lin Fan''s.


    Once Lin Fan brought it up, the questioning stopped and none of them knew where to go from there.


    Luckily, there was someone who knocked on the door at this time.


    After thinking about it, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "Come in."


    That person came forward and stood there in front of the table, waiting for something. After feeling the effects of the array on himself and then seeing the Lin Astral Emperor give a nod, he came forward to present the thing that he had been holding in his hand.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was the one that took it before putting it on the table''s holographic scanner to let the others see it.


    This was a report on the ship that Lin Fan had brought back.


    During the time that they had been in this meeting, the engineers of the Lin Astral Empire had already started working on it.


    However, the report just gave the conclusion that they weren''t able to find anything at all.


    As Lin Fan had expected, the technology was just too advanced for them and they would need to study it for a long time to get some results. But at the same time, the engineers had been filled with excitement seeing this.


    In the report, they had reported all kinds of new inspirations that they had after seeing this ship.


    It seemed like the ship engineering department was going to advance by leaps and bounds from researching this Outer ship.


    But of course, the Lin Astral Emperor didn''t just care about that.


    This Outer ship had appeared in the territory of their Lin Astral Empire, so that was arge security issue. Then there was the matter of the voidw samples that had been taken by the Outers.


    He wanted them to find out what the story was behind this, so the fact that there were no results was something that he couldn''t ept.


    He didn''t take his anger out on the messenger, but he did say in a cold voice, "Get them to find out what the sample room situation is or none of them are getting their bonuses this year."


    The messenger revealed a bitter smile when he heard this since he knew that this included him.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Working for the Lin Astral Family was one of the best jobs because of the benefits that it came with. The bonus was one of those benefits that attracted people the most since it was very generous.


    If they lost their bonus, it could be said that they were losing more than half of their ie for the year.


    So this was indeed quite the heavy punishment.


    The messenger didn''t dare waste any time as he headed off to convey the message to the research team. But of course, his words wouldn''t be as kind as the Lin Astral Emperor''s since his bonus was on the line as well.


    Seeing how fast the messenger left, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a satisfied nod before saying, "For now, I''ll check our family to see if there have been any incidents of voidws being stolen."


    Lin Fan nodded in agreement to this.


    The fact that voidw samples had been found on the ship was a big matter since it meant that even the Lin Astral Family had beenpromised by the Outers. If even the greatest power, the Lin Astral Family waspromised, then it would mean danger for the Lin Astral Empire.


    But of course, they couldn''t assume anything.


    There could be a chance that it was some other source that they had received this voidw from. So they couldn''t just assume that it was from their family and would need to check first.


    If it was from a different ce, that presented a different danger.


    Their Lin Astral Family had relied on this voidw to remain unchallenged for so long and if there was another group that had voidws, they would pose a threat to the Lin Astral Family.


    So they had to find the source of this voidw sample as soon as possible.


    After discussing this, Lin Fan was allowed to leave the meeting room and the pce.


    He went to the shop as per usual, but he didn''t go and talk to the staff who were still working. He headed right to the back of the store and locked himself up in one of the back rooms.


    Once he was there, he called out the system and received the reward for the mission.


    Once he found that Outer ship, the system had marked the mission that it had issued cleared, so now he was receiving the reward from that.


    What appeared in front of him was a strange lookingntern.


    He took out the strange key that he had received from the system before and put it with the strangentern.


    There was nothing special about either of these¡­other than the fact that they werepletely covered in rust.


    Lin Fan had tried to get the rust off the key before, but he had found that it was useless.


    When he tried to get the rust off thentern, he found that it was just as futile as when he tried to get the rust off the key.


    Looking at these two things that the system had given him, he couldn''t understand what use they had at all.


    If the system had given him another key, then he would have at least thought that these keys would be for some kind of secret and that he would only be able to open them when he had all of them. But the fact that it had given him thisnternpletely confused him.


    There was clearly a reason why the system was giving him these things, but¡­


    He couldn''t figure it out at all.


    After thinking for a bit, he decided to inject some life energy into thentern.


    At the very least, thisntern should have a function unlike the rusted key, so he tried activating it.


    As he had expected, when it received the life energy, thentern suddenly released a green glow. However, that green glow didn''t seem to do anything other than give a green hue to the things that it lit up.


    The colour of the light¡­was almost eerie the way that it lit things up.


    It was almost as if it was something that could see ghosts¡­


    But then again, ghosts did exist in this world of cultivation.


    There were even people who used ghosts as pets.


    So it wasn''t really that strange seeing ghosts.


    But Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit weird about the light of thisntern, so he put it away.


    Since he couldn''t figure out what it did, he wouldn''t think too much about it.


    He was certain that it would be useful one day.

 Chapter 989 More Beasts

    Over the next few weeks, there was only peace.


    There were no new reports about the Beast Race or the Outers that came in, so Lin Fan was free to work on his pet shop.


    With the ie that came in and the surprising amount of support that they had, Lin Fan was able to open up a second pet shop in the second most popted business street.


    He hadn''t nned on it at first, but to his surprise, the nobles actually gave a proposal to the Lin Astral Emperor for this.


    The nobles had all seen how effective Lin Fan''s training was, so they had all swarmed to Lin Fan''s store. However, there was the problem of there being a certain number of training spots in the first ce.


    If it was anywhere else, they would have used their influence to force the owner to give them the spots. However, since it was a store that was owned by Lin Fan who belonged to the Lin Astral Family, they couldn''t do that.


    If they dared cause trouble in a store owned by the Lin Astral Family, then it would be over for them in this Lin Astral Empire.


    So of course they didn''t dare do this.


    But they were nobles and they did have some influence.


    If there was something that they wanted, they would have a way of getting it.


    So they all came together and made a proposal to the Lin Astral Emperor. They all requested that Lin Fan open a second store.


    After all, if he opened a second store, then there would be more spots for them to bring their pets in for training. This was the way for them to get what they wanted without offending anyone.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been nning on opening a second store at first, but the Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t do anything about it either.


    It wasn''t as if they were asking for much, so he should give the nobles what they wanted in these situations. Plus, it was a good way to establish Lin Fan''s prestige among the nobles.


    By increasing his fame as a monster trainer, there would be more and more people asking him for favours in training their pets. That would lead to less and less people wanting to offend him, as well as more and more people wanting to curry favour with him.


    With more people wanting to get on his good side, there would be more people trying to protect him.


    So this was a good thing for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t want to open the second store since there was no need for him, but since the Lin Astral Emperor asked him, he couldn''t do anything.


    So the second store was decided on and it didn''t take long for Lin Fan to get it ready to open.


    The only problem was finding people to work in it.


    That was quickly solved when the Lin Astral Emperor gave him an idea.


    His cousins.


    He had been training his cousins during this time as well as per the request of the Lin Astral Emperor.


    When he was troubled over finding staff for his new store, the Lin Astral Emperor gave him a suggestion.


    He suggested that Lin Fan use the cousins as his staff members.


    Lin Fan was surprised to receive this suggestion from the Lin Astral Emperor, but he wasn''t against it. He had already seen how Lin Hong had be a great employee with a bit of training, so he knew that the other cousins could be the same.


    The only problem was that they were members of the Lin Astral Family, so it was hard for them to work a job like this.


    After all, these were young masters and young misses who had never worked a day in their life at a menial job like this. So how could they ept working at this store?


    That was of course easily solved by a single decree from the Lin Astral Emperor.


    Even if they were young masters and young misses, the Lin Astral Emperor was the head of the Lin Astral Family. His words were thew of the Lin Astral Family, so they had no choice but to follow his orders in the end.


    The excuse that he had given on the decree was that it was to give these cousins some real life work experience. This would help them in the future as it would give them the experience they needed.


    The older members of the Lin Astral Family didn''t agree with this, but they didn''t say anything since the Lin Astral Emperor had spoken.


    He still had this power in the Lin Astral Family.


    At first, the cousins tried to resist Lin Fan''s teachings, but they quickly learned their lesson.


    It was the same as with their training. If they tried to resist, they would be beaten into submission.


    But this time, Lin Fan was actually using his pets, so it hurt them even more when they were beaten by him.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    It didn''t take long before they all fell under him and started listening to his instructions.


    On the first day that the store opened, the customers were shocked to see the staff members.


    They weren''t shocked because it was members of the Lin Astral Family serving them, but rather because of their faces. Every single one of them had faces that were beaten ck and blue.


    The customers tried asking them what had happened, but they all just dodged the questions.


    That was because they could feel Lin Fan''s gaze on them.


    Not a single one of them dared to say anything. Not to mention that their pride wouldn''t have allowed them to say it in the first ce.


    So they just worked in silence.


    They were nning on gathering their strength and growing stronger to beat Lin Fan, even if it was a feeble hope.


    Lin Fan red at them, but he was actually satisfied with their work.


    As expected of elites of the Lin Astral Family, they picked up the job quickly and worked efficiently. He wouldn''t have a problem leaving the store to them if something came up.


    And almost as if expected, there was something that happened.


    On the day that Lin Fan opened his second store, there was a messenger that came from the pce.


    He had a message from the Lin Astral Emperor for Lin Fan and it was urgent, so Lin Fan immediately headed off to the pce. Since he had these talented employees, it wasn''t a problem for him to leave the store to them.


    When he arrived in the pce, he was once again brought to the same meeting room as before and inside, it was the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian waiting for him as usual.


    Both of them had ugly expressions on their faces, so it was clear that something had happened again.


    When Lin Fan came in, after the usual scanning from the array, he received a report.


    When Lin Fan read through the report, he couldn''t help knitting his brows as well and revealing an ugly look.


    That was because this was a report from the frontlines.


    It was a report that the Beast Race were officially invading their Lin Astral Empire.


    It was unknown why the Beast Race had suddenly decided to invade the Lin Astral Empire, but they didn''t exactly have time to consider this with the enemies already invading them.


    But for the three of them, there was a more serious implication.


    The location that the Beast Race had chosen to invade from, it was where Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou had been investigating the signs of the Beast Race.


    Now that that ce had turned into a battlefield, it was unknown if the two of them were still safe.


    The Lin Astral Emperor could see the look on Lin Fan''s face, so he said, "I''ve already sent a group out to find them and see if they are safe, but they haven''t responded yet. It takes time for them to get there, especially since it''s a battlefield now."


    Lin Fan just knitted his brows without saying anything.


    After a long silence, he took a deep breath and asked, "What do we do now?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian both gave sighs before the Lin Astral Emperor said, "I''ve already gathered the fourth and eighth armies. They will be heading out as soon as they''ve finished gathering supplies. They will be the ones in charge of rescuing the third army there and pushing back the Beast Race."


    Lin Fan nodded since he knew a bit about the organization of the Lin Astral Empire''s military.


    The fourth army was the strike unit and the eighth army was the rescue unit, so they were the best armies for this job.


    Lin Jian then suddenly said, "I''ll personally go and lead the armies."


    The Lin Astral Emperor immediately knitted his brows when he heard this before saying, "Jian''er, you can''t act irrationally. I''m worried about Xiao Ao as well, but we can''t just act on our impulses."


    Lin Jian shook his head to refute this as he said, "The general of the fourth army is my old friend. You know that I work well with him and if I go, the morale of the army will be higher since they know that a member of the Lin Astral Family is with them. That would be the best move in this situation."


    The Lin Astral Emperor knitted his brows when he heard this since he couldn''t refute it, but he still couldn''t ept it.


    But before he could say anything, Lin Fan said, "I''m going as well."

 Chapter 990 Beast Race Attacks (1)

    "Huh?"


    That was the only response that the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian had to this sudden outburst from Lin Fan.


    But then aftering back to their senses, they immediately said, "No! That is not even an option!"


    Lin Fan just waited for the two of them to calm down.


    Seeing how Lin Fan was just sitting there, not looking bothered by theirints at all, the two of them did calm down in the end.


    The Lin Astral Emperor then said in a serious voice, "You should understand what position you are in right now. If you were to go to the frontlines, it''s very likely that you''ll be targeted by people moving in the shadows."


    Maybe it would be possible if he was to go in secret to gain some experience, but it was impossible for Lin Fan to go while leading an army.


    This would immediately let anyone with intentions know that Lin Fan was leaving the Lin Astral Empire''s capital. At the same time, the fact that he was heading to the battlefield meant that he was going to a ce where idents could happen at any time.


    It was not a ce that Lin Fan should go anywhere near.


    But Lin Fan just said, "I still need to go."


    Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian knitted their brows when they heard this.


    Normally, Lin Fan would be able to give them a clear response that was both logical and convincing, but this time¡­he was just using brute force to insist that he needed to go. It was as if he couldn''t think of anything, so he was just throwing a tantrum as a child now.


    This wasn''t the way that Lin Fan would act normally.


    So the fact that he was acting this way must mean that there was a reason for him to act this way.


    The Lin Astral Emperor asked, "Why do you need to go?"


    Lin Fan didn''t respond at first and just remained silent as if he was thinking about what to say. Then he suddenly said, "It''s a task from my master."


    "Huh?"


    That was the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian''s response again.


    This answerpletely caught them off guard since they never thought that Lin Fan would answer like this.


    Both of them narrowed their eyes to look at Lin Fan, but he just sat there with a calm look on his face.


    After a long time, the Lin Astral Emperor finally said, "Does your master have a way to ensure that you will be safe in doing what you need to do?"


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this.


    Finally with a sigh, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "Go and get ready."


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this. He then gave a nod and left the room.


    Once he was gone, Lin Jian couldn''t help asking, "Father, why did you let him go? You know how dangerous it will be for Xiao Fan if you let him go there."


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a sigh before saying with a smile, "Do you really think that I could stop him? If I didn''t give him permission, he would have run off on his own in the end now that he has a ship. It''s safer this way since he''ll at least have you and the army protecting him just in case."


    Lin Jian wanted to say something, but he closed his mouth in the end since he knew that the Lin Astral Emperor was right.


    Even though he had mellowed out with age, he was someone that had the same personality as Lin Fan and Lin Ao back then. He was someone who was easily influenced by their impulses and would make rash decisions like this.


    So he knew that if they had tried to stop Lin Fan, he would have just snuck off in the end which would just make things worse.


    It was better to just let Lin Fane along.


    In the end, Lin Jian also revealed a bitter smile and shook his head with a sigh.


    Lin Fan went back to the store and immediately arranged for the cousins to handle it while he was away.


    However, there were a few of the cousins that volunteered toe with him.


    They didn''t know exactly what it was that Lin Fan was heading off to, but they had received messages from the elders of their branches that something big was happening with the Lin Astral Family. These elders were the elder generation of the Lin Astral Family, so they were able to get some information that others didn''t.


    For Lin Fan to leave at this time, it must mean that he was entrusted with something special by the Lin Astral Emperor.


    If they could go with him and share in the glory, it would mean that they would also receive great gains from the Lin Astral Emperor.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    But Lin Fan rejected all of them since he knew that they wouldn''t be able to keep up with him on the battlefield. They might have gone out for experience, but they had never experienced anything like a real war.


    The cousins were indeed very relieved when theyter found out that Lin Fan had gone to fight the Beast Race.


    Lin Fan quickly took care of everything and now he was just waiting for the fourth and eighth army to finish gathering supplies.


    But during this time, he didn''t want to remain still, so he went to check his own ship.


    During the weeks of peace, the engineers hadn''t stopped working on the Outers ship. They had gone through every single part of it bit by bit, but they still weren''t able to figure out a single thing about the Outer technology.


    But, studying this ship did give them inspiration.


    This inspiration gave them ideas for new technology and that increased the overall level of ships in the Lin Astral Empire.


    However, before those inspirations could be utilized, they had to be tested first.


    Lin Fan had arranged so that the tests would be done to his ship.


    So over the past few weeks, there had been many modifications made to his ship. It lookedpletely different from how it did a few weeks ago.


    Still, it had also changed greatly when it came to specs.


    The engineering department had increased the overall speed of the ship by ten times and they had added all kinds of beam based weapons on the ship that used different kinds ofws. They had made the ship so strong that it was even superior to the Lin Astral Emperor''s private ship.


    Of course, this ship still couldn''t defeat a Ruler Realm Expert.


    They had even tested it with one of the four Ruler Realm Experts of the Lin Astral Family guard.


    It was able to suppress the Ruler Realm Expert at first, but once the Ruler Realm Expert started using his domain, itpletely blocked off all the attacks of the ship. So while it wasn''t able to defeat Ruler Realm Expert, it was still more than enough to fight off Peak Sun Realm Experts.


    Lin Fan went over to the ship that still had engineers working on it.


    When the engineers saw hime over, they were all surprised, but they stopped their work since they all recognized him.


    The leader of this team of engineers said, "Your highness, is there anything we can do for you?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "Prepare the ship, I need it now."


    The leader of the team revealed an excited look as he said, "Is it really time for a field test?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I need it for something else."


    The leader of the team could hear from the tone of his voice that whatever it was being used for was a secret, so he didn''t ask any further. However, he did say in an excited voice, "Then can I send two engineers with you to see how it performs?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but he still said, "It''ll be dangerous if theye along. I''ll be going to a ce that will be a battlefield."


    The leader of the team just said with a rxed smile, "That doesn''t matter. As long as we can see our beautiful ship in action, we don''t care if we lose our lives."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being taken aback by these words.


    He looked at the firm look in the eyes of the leader and he knew that it wouldn''t be possible to talk him out of it. So he said with a sigh, "Do as you wish."


    The leader gave a strong nod before the engineers started a rock paper scissors tournament among themselves.


    It seemed like there were quite a few of them that wanted to go even though Lin Fan had already told them that it would be dangerous.


    The looks in the eyes of the engineers were the same as the one that the leader had when he asked Lin Fan if they coulde.


    It was as if they were all prepared to die just to see the ship that they had created in action.


    That was also what moved Lin Fan to let theme.


    Craftsmen who were willing to risk their lives for their craft.


    Devoting everything that they had just to ensure that they had the very best skills.


    This kind of determination was something that could move anyone, including Lin Fan.


    So he couldn''t say no to them.

 Chapter 991 Beast Race Attacks (2)

    When they finally set out, a day had already passed.


    It took the fourth and eighth army an entire day to get all their supplies ready, which Lin Fan was let down about. However, he didn''t me them since this was already them moving fast.


    If possible, they would have wanted to prepare for at least three days before heading out to ensure that all of their supplies were intact.


    But at Lin Fan''s insistence, they shortened it to a single day to get everything. The other supplies would be brought to them from supply depots around the battlefield, which would still give them the same level of supplies.


    It was just that there was the chance that those supplies would be dyed or attacked for various reasons that made it much riskier.


    Still, this was Lin Fan''s insistence, so they had no choice.


    Lin Fan knew what kind of position he was putting them in by making this decision since he knew that this was something that involved their very lives. Without those supplies, lives could be lost, so it was better to be as prepared as possible.


    But he couldn''t wait much longer.


    The reason he was going to the battlefield in the first ce was because he had received a mission from the system.


    This mission was a time sensitive one and it was to save his father, Lin Ao and his mother, Yue Qingrou.


    He didn''t need to guess to know what the consequences of failing this mission was.


    To give him the greatest support, there was even a map that had been provided. However, as time passed, there were parts of the map that were changing.


    Just like the mission, this map was clearly a time sensitive thing.


    So the more time that he wasted, the worse the situation would be.


    He wanted to go as soon as possible.


    The one problem was that he couldn''t tell anyone about this map since it was something from the system. He could say it was his master, but the map was integrated into the system and he couldn''t show it unless he showed the system interface.


    That was not something that he was willing to do.


    He had no choice but to wait.


    After setting off, the first order that he gave was for the fourth and eighth armies to follow him.


    Lin Jian had been confused by this, but he still trusted Lin Fan.


    Once he gave the order for the fourth and eighth armies to follow Lin Fan, they had no choice but to follow. Lin Jian had received the decree appointing him as the leader of this expedition.


    With the decree there, they had to follow this order.


    But as they went on the path that Lin Fan set out for them, the fourth and eighth armies couldn''t help feeling more and more confused as to why they were going this way.


    Their task was to repel the invading Beast Race and to rescue the people caught up in this invasion. This was a task that should be top priority and should be finished as quickly as possible.


    The path that Lin Fan guided them on was the most twisted path that they had seen.


    One moment they would be going straight and then the next, they would be going down a turn that was almost the exact opposite direction. They were almost going backwards, but they were moving a bit to the left or to the right, so they were going towards the target.


    But this was clearly a waste of time moving like this.


    So they all had their misgivings about Lin Fan''s path.


    That is until the scouts came back with reports on the areas that they had evaded.


    When the generals that were with the fourth and eighth armies read these reports, they couldn''t help being shocked by what they saw.


    These scouts had been sent out by the generals in the first ce so they would have evidence against Lin Fan when they protested to the Lin Astral Emperor. After all, the things that Lin Fan did were interfering with their mission, so it could be considered treason.


    This was a mission to rescue their fellow countrymen who were being attacked by the Beast Race, they couldn''t waste any time at all running around like this.


    However, ording to the reports that they received from the scouts, they learned that there were¡­ambushes from the Beast Race that were waiting for them in the ces that they avoided.


    These were Beast Race troops that had somehow infiltrated all the way to these ces that were already waiting to attack them.


    By following the route that Lin Fan made them take, they were able to avoid these ambushes.


    If they had taken the most direct route, there was no doubt that they would have had to fight their way just to reach the front lines.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Not to mention all the time that it would have wasted, many of them would have been injured or even killed in these battles.


    So being able to avoid all of these ambushes was without a doubt the best method.


    The generals couldn''t help being amazed by Lin Fan''s superior awareness that allowed him to avoid all of these ambushes. If it was them, they definitely wouldn''t have known about them until it was toote.


    For generals like them, this was a failure of their duty to both the country and their men, so it was hard for them to ept.


    But this also made them feel feelings of worship towards Lin Fan.


    Lin Jian had also received the same reports since he had checked out the areas that Lin Fan had avoided.


    He hadn''t done it to harm Lin Fan like the generals nned to do, he wanted to check the areas just in case the generals wanted to do something. But when he learned the same things as the generals, he ripped up all the reports with a smile.


    It seemed like Lin Fan really did have a reason foring on this expedition.


    So the route that they took was much longer than normal, but they were able to reach the frontlines without encountering a single enemy.


    As for the ambushes that were waiting, the generals of the fourth and eighth army had already sent word to the local armies about this and they were sending troops to take care of these Beast Race troops waiting in ambush.


    They couldn''t just leave these Beast Race infiltrators there.


    When they arrived, they could see how devastated the area was already.


    There were twos that had been destroyed and debris was scattered all over in space.


    There were still signs of fighting in the distance, but it was clear that one side was getting weaker and weaker based on the life energy fluctuations that came from over there.


    Now that they were on the battlefield, Lin Fan leftmand of the fourth and eighth army to Lin Jian.


    Lin Jian was surprised at first, but he also quickly understood why Lin Fan did this.


    Lin Fan might have been a smart and talented person, but he did have his ws as well. One of those ws was that he wasn''t able tomand an army since this was not something that he had done before.


    He couldmand an army of pets, but that was different since he had the voidws.


    When it came to an army of actual people, he had no experience in this.


    So he handed this over to Lin Jian who did have experience.


    Lin Jian immediately gathered up the generals of the fourth army while leaving the generals of the eighth army to their own devices.


    The fourth army was the strike unit, so they would be charging in to take care of the enemies. These were the troops that Lin Jian would be leading into battle, so he had to coordinate with them.


    The eighth army was the rescue unit and they would be going around looking for survivors to save.


    They had their own chain ofmand, so there was no need for Lin Jian to order them around. Their generals would take care of everything on their own, so he left them to their own devices.


    Once he had finished coordinating with the generals of the fourth army, Lin Jian came to find Lin Fan.


    He and the Lin Astral Emperor had allowed him toe, but they definitely wouldn''t let him go anywhere near the fighting. So Lin Jian said, "Just stay here and observe. When it''s over, I can bring you to where you need to go."


    Lin Fan nodded in agreement to this before saying, "Alright."


    Lin Jian narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan when he heard this.


    Then he turned to the Ruler Realm guard that hade along and said, "Keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn''t run off on his own."


    The Ruler Realm guard nodded in agreement to this.


    There were two Ruler Realm guards that had been brought along this time.


    The Lin Astral Emperor had sent the two of them to guards Lin Fan and Lin Jian respectively.


    So one would be going with Lin Jian into battle, while the other one would be staying here to watch over Lin Fan.


    The one watching over Lin Fan was disappointed that he didn''t get to go into battle against the Beast Race for the sake of the Lin Astral Empire, but he had received his orders and he would follow them.


    It was just too bad that none of them noticed the sly look in Lin Fan''s eyes.

 Chapter 992 Beast Race Attacks (3)

    After the fourth army left, the eighth army also started on their task.


    The generals had created many rescue teams that were now spreading out among the remains of thes that had been destroyed, looking for any survivors.


    Lin Fan''s ship was kept back where they had made their base to make sure that it was safe.


    And to make sure that Lin Fan didn''t run off, he was "guarded" by a group of guards and a Ruler Realm guard.


    But of course, they had the right to stop Lin Fan even with force if they had to since that was the order that Lin Jian had given them.


    Lin Fan didn''t run off at first, pretending to be interested in the work of the eighth army. He went around the base that they had created and helped the eighth army with all kinds of work.


    But then, he suddenly disappeared from the base along with the three friends that he had brought.


    Those three friends were Ang, Yuki, and Momonga.


    While Lin Jian didn''t understand why he wanted to bring them, Lin Jian could figure out that those three were rted to the "master" of the store. After all, they spent as much time in the store as Lin Fan.


    So he figured that they were the students of the master just like Lin Fan.


    The Ruler Realm guard immediately went searching for the four of them along with the rest of the guards, but it was as if they had disappeared without a trace.


    That was because even if there was a Ruler Realm Expert, it was impossible for that Ruler Realm Expert to see through the darknessws that Momonga had used to sneak them out. Momonga was a Ruler Realm Expert that was also much stronger than the guard.


    So they were able to make their way out of the camp and followed the path that the system had set for them.


    This path brought them closer and closer to the battlefield, but it didn''t bring them right to the center of it where Lin Jian was fighting the Beast Race with the fourth army.


    The ce that the system had brought them was a that wasn''t inhabited by anyone that was caught up in the battlefield.


    This was a ce that would have eventually be one of thes under the Lin Astral Empire if it was given enough time to develop, but now¡­


    When they arrived on this, they could see the devastation that had been caused by the fighting here.


    Even if the itself hadn''t been destroyed like the other twos, it had caused plenty of damage.


    There were scattered trees that had been torn apart and there were all kinds of corpses scattered around, whether they were human corpses or beast corpses. They justid there on the ground, lookingpletely broken.


    With this trail of destruction, it was hard to imagine that there were people still alive on this.


    But this was the ce that the system''s map was guiding them.


    This was where the system was saying that Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou are.


    After they arrived, the first thing that they did was look around for clues as to where Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou were.


    This was thest ce that the system had guided them to. From now on, they had to depend on themselves to find Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou.


    However, no matter how they looked, they weren''t able to find any clues. There were only signs of destruction and carnage that were scattered around them.


    It seemed very unlikely that they would be able to find them.


    As they were looking around for clues, Ang couldn''t help saying in a worried voice, "Are you sure that they are here?"


    It wasn''t that she wanted to cast doubt on them, but she really was worried about Lin Ao and Yue Qingrou. After all, they were Lin Fan''s parents and she knew how important they were to him.


    She had also gotten quite close to them during the trip to the Lin Astral Empire.


    So she was worried that something might have happened to them, especially after seeing this scene.


    Lin Fan also had a trace of doubt in him, but since the system hadn''t told him that he had failed his mission yet, he still held onto that bit of hope. So he said, "They will be here."


    Ang could see the bit of worry in his eyes, but she didn''t say anything else and just nodded in response to this.


    Finally, after searching for a long time, they were able to find a trail from something. There was blood that was scattered along this trail and it looked like something had been dragged a long distance, but this was a trail for them to follow in the end.


    They didn''t know what they would find at the end of this trail, but they had no other clues right now.


    So they didn''t waste any time in following this trail.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    After following for a bit, they found that there were signs of fighting nearby.


    There were life energy fluctuations that wereing from in front of them. However, they could tell that one set of life energy fluctuations wasing from a human expert.


    The rest were alling from beasts.


    Wasting no time at all, Lin Fan charged forward with an army of beasts.


    When the human saw the wave of beastsing at him, he thought that he was done for. He thought that this was the reinforcements from the Beast Race that were here to help the beasts that he was fighting.


    However, both him and the Beast Race experts were surprised to find that these beasts didn''t attack the humans, but rather the Beast Race experts.


    The Beast Race troops were made up of normal beasts, but there were beasts that had intelligence and were in charge ofmanding the others. These Beast Racemanders were all mutated beasts with stronger bloodlines than the others, which allowed them to suppress the other beasts.


    When they saw these new beasts attacking them, they immediately tried using bloodline pressure to stop them.


    "What are you fools doing? Attack the humans!"


    The Beast Racemanders shouted.


    However, they weren''t able to convince the beasts that attacked them to stop. In fact, they were easily taken care of by the beasts that attacked them since they werepletely outmatched.


    The Beast Race troops that were fighting the human were only in the Soul Realm, so when faced with these World Realm Pets, they were easily taken out.


    The ones without intelligence were all killed and themanders were captured.


    When Lin Fan came over, everything was already finished.


    When the human expert saw Lin Fane over, he couldn''t help being shocked since he never expected to see another human. But he quickly overcame his shock and asked, "Are you here to rescue us?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this before asking, "Is there anyone else? How many of you are there?"


    The human expert nodded and said, "There''s a whole group of us, but I separated from them to draw these Beast Race troops away."


    Lin Fan then asked, "Where are they now?"


    The human expert shook his head and said, "I don''t know exactly where they are, but I do know where they are heading. We set up a rendezvous point, but¡­" He couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile, "It was very unlikely that I would even be able to reach it, so I don''t know if they would even be waiting for me."


    Lin Fan looked at this human expert and nodded.


    This human expert was only in the Nascent Soul Realm, so it was amazing that he was able to fight against these Beast Race troops thatpletely outnumbered them. It was only possible because of the World Realm Artifact that he was holding.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother asking anything else as he turned to deal with the Beast Racemanders.


    The reason why he had captured them instead of killing them like the rest was because he wanted information from them.


    Right now, they didn''t know why the Beast Race had suddenly decided to invade the Lin Astral Empire, so they needed information.


    The Beast Racemanders had looks on their faces that seemed like they would rather die than give up any information, but that was normal. After all, they were invaders and Lin Fan was the one that had just defeated them.


    But those expressions changed when Lin Fan pped each and every one of them on the face.


    They revealed shocked looks before looking at Lin Fan in a daze, as if they had realized something.


    Then they quickly revealed eager looks as they looked at Lin Fan.


    It was a good thing that there was a cultivation level difference between them, or else Lin Fan wouldn''t have been able to do this. Since there was a cultivation level difference, Lin Fan was able to easily subdue these Beast Racemanders.


    However, based on their cultivation levels, they shouldn''t be high ranking Beast Racemanders.


    So Lin Fan wasn''t expecting to get that much information from them in the first ce.


    Still, any information that they could get was information that they needed.


    Lin Fan quickly formed the temporary contracts with them before throwing them into his pet storage space.


    After that, he turned to the human expert and said, "Lead the way."

 Chapter 993 Beast Race Attacks (4)

    The human expert stared at Lin Fan in shock after everything that had happened.


    But after taking some time toe back to his senses, he gave a nod and turned to lead the way.


    He could tell that even if he wanted to run, he wouldn''t be able to run.


    At the very least, he would be safe if he was with this powerful human expert.


    So he led the way forward.


    He led them back the way that they hade, but they were going slightly to the rightpared to before. It seemed that if they had just gone right to begin with, they would have arrived at where the rendezvous point had been set.


    As they came closer and closer, Lin Fan felt more and more nervous.


    He knew that his parents should be on this since the system had guided him here, but he didn''t know what kind of shape they were in. If they were seriously injured¡­then he didn''t know what he would do.


    When they arrived at the point, they found that there was¡­no one there.


    The human expert looked around the area and found that there were traces of blood leading away from the scene.


    When they saw this, they knew that something must have happened that the people they were supposed to meet had left this ce.


    So Lin Fan asked the human expert, "Is there anything else that you know?"


    The human expert revealed an awkward look and said, "I don''t know. I didn''t exactly have time since I was being chased."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he didn''t say anything.


    As they stood there not knowing what to do, there was a sound that came from behind them.


    All of them pulled out a weapon in response to this, but they quickly put it down when they saw what it was.


    There was a hole that appeared in the ground and out of that hole, there was a human head that peeked out. When this person saw the human expert with Lin Fan''s group, they immediately revealed a look of joy and said, "You survived!"


    But then that person saw Lin Fan''s group and immediately revealed a wary look as he said, "Who are they?"


    The human expert with Lin Fan''s group revealed an awkward smile before saying, "They saved me when I was surrounded by the Beast Race, but I never got a chance to ask who they were."


    Lin Fan just said in a calm voice, "We''re the rescue team from the Lin Astral Empire."


    Both the human expert with them and the human who was in the ground couldn''t help revealing shocked looks before their eyes suddenly filled with excitement.


    But then again, both of them revealed wary looks and the one in the ground asked, "Do you have anything that can prove that?"


    Lin Fan pulled out a token that he showed this person.


    This token was one that he had received from the eighth army. It was proof that the owner of this token was someone that belonged to the eighth army.


    When these two saw this, they immediately revealed excited looks again.


    They both took out two tokens and presented them before identifying themselves as members of the third army.


    The third army had been the ones who had bore the full brunt of the Beast Race invasion and they had been scattered by the Beast Race troops. So they had been sent to all different ces and they had been trying to survive while waiting for reinforcements.


    Since they were with the third army, they naturally knew that the eighth army''s specialty was rescue. Since the eighth army had been deployed, that meant that they had also deployed a strong army to push back the Beast Race troops.


    At the same time, they knew that they would be alright since the eighth army troops were here.


    So they didn''t waste any time in letting Lin Fan in.


    When Lin Fan went into the tunnel, he found that there was no one else with this person.


    That person exined, "The rest are in a different location. My specialty is earthws, so I was able to construct a tunnel and hole for everyone to hide in. I came here to help our friend escape after he lured away the Beast Race troops."


    Lin Fan nodded before asking, "How many of you survived in the end?"


    When the third army soldier heard this, he gave a sigh and said, "The Beast Race invasion came too suddenly and we weren''t able to hold them back at all with how many there were. So there were many of us that fell in that first attack."


    Then with a bit of hope in his voice he said, "But then his highness inspired us and we were able to push them back while slowly backing away. If it wasn''t for his highness, we might not have been able to escape."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He picked up on one special thing that he said¡­


    "His highness."


    The only people that would be called that by the people of the third army would be¡­members of the Lin Astral Family.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    There should have only been one person from the Lin Astral Family in this area.


    So he asked, "This highness that you mentioned, where are they now?"


    The third army soldiers looked at each other with confused looks when they heard this, but then the one that spoke before said, "His highness rallied all the troops of the third army and retreated with us. Then he led the group that covered the retreat of the injured."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this and he said, "Yes, where is he now?"


    The two third army soldiers stopped moving after hearing this.


    Both of them looked at Lin Fan with wary looks that had a bit of hostility in them.


    The one that spoke before asked, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before taking out his personal token for them.


    When the two third army soldiers saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    They would never fail to identify this token that they had been shown. It was the mark of the Lin Astral Family.


    That meant that this person in front of them was from the Lin Astral Family.


    He was most likely rted to the highness that had rescued them all, so it was natural that he would be worried about them.


    After seeing this token, the two third army soldiers were about to bow to Lin Fan, but he raised his hand to stop them before saying, "Tell me what happened to the highness that you mentioned before."


    The two third army soldiers revealed awkward looks before saying, "His highness¡­"


    It was clear that there was something that they didn''t want to talk about.


    Lin Fan just waited for them to muster up the courage to speak.


    Finally, the one that spoke before said, "It was because of his highness that so many of us were able to escape, but¡­his highness had to make a sacrifice for us."


    The two of them fell to their knees as if they were trying to apologize for something before saying, "It''s all our fault that his highness was injured. We don''t deserve to live."


    Lin Fan''s heart tensed when he heard this, but he quickly pulled the two of them up and said, "How seriously injured is he?"


    The two of them looked at each other before hesitantly saying, "He isn''t seriously injured, but¡­"


    They shut up as if they didn''t dare say anything else.


    Lin Fan could tell that there was something wrong, but they weren''t willing to talk about it.


    In the end, he said, "Just bring me to him. You can do that, right?"


    The two of them hesitantly looked at each other before nodding in response to this.


    They started going down the tunnel again, but this time, they were moving much fasterpared to before. The two third army soldiers didn''t dare look back as if there was something that they were afraid of behind them.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling worried when he saw this, but he forced himself to stay calm.


    Before seeing what happened, he wouldn''t let his mind wander.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the end of the tunnel.


    There were only two forks that they had to cross, so they didn''t waste that much time getting there.


    When they arrived, they found that there was a cave that had been built under the ground here. This ce was rough and rugged, but it was well lit with the torches on the wall.


    They could see the group of people sitting in the middle and they seemed to be gathered around something.


    When they came into the cave, the people inside all turned to look at them and some of them even raised their weapons as if they were prepared to attack. However, when they saw the two third army soldiers, they let down their guard.


    Then when they saw Lin Fan''s group, they raised their guard again.


    But the two third army soldiers stopped them.


    Lin Fan ignored them all and went to the center of this circle.


    When he got through them, he saw that there was a person lying in the center.


    This person was lying there covered in bandages, but that was the least of their concerns.


    The most shocking thing was that¡­one of their arms was missing.

 Chapter 994 Beast Race Attacks (5)

    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he saw the stub of that missing arm.


    The stub that was left was also covered in a ck energy that seemed to damage the flesh that was left. It was as if it was slowly festering the rest of the flesh and would make it rot if left unchecked.


    The person that was missing an arm was naturally Lin Ao, his father.


    Beside him was Yue Qingrou who looked very roughed up, but she didn''t have any serious injuries.


    When the two of them saw Lin Fan, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    Lin Ao tried to get up, but Lin Fan quickly came forward to stop him. He pressed Lin Ao down and then started looking more closely at the stub.


    Yue Qingrou was about to say something, but seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, she stopped herself. She could tell that he was focusing on the stub, as if he had noticed something.


    Ang came forward and took hold of Yue Qingrou, moving her away.


    She didn''t know what Lin Fan was about to do, but she knew that he needed to focus and he couldn''t be distracted by her.


    She also had a worried look as she looked at Lin Ao on the ground.


    As for the rest of the third army remnants, they were moved back by Yuki and Momonga.


    They were about to argue at first, but Lin Fan just threw his token on the ground without even looking at them. The moment that they saw this token, they immediately closed their mouths and followed his directions.


    After all, they recognized that this token was from the Lin Astral Family.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand towards Lin Ao''s arm stub and said, "Do you trust me?"


    Lin Ao nodded without any hesitation when he heard this. He closed his eyes and just let Lin Fan do what he wanted.


    Lin Fan brought his hand forward, but when he came close, he couldn''t help knitting his brows even more.


    As his hand came closer, there seemed to be something that came from Lin Ao''s arm stub. This was a kind of dark energy that wanted to bite at Lin Fan''s hand that wasing closer.


    But this was an energy that Lin Fan had never felt before.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    It did remind him of one thing though¡­


    It was very much like the strange energy that he had obtained from the Outer God fragment.


    Could it be that this was another type of energy from the Outer?


    But if it was, then what was it doing with the Beast Race?


    There were many thoughts that ran through Lin Fan''s mind when he saw this reaction from the energy surrounding the stub, but he forced those thoughts down. He summoned his life energy and gathered his voidws in his hand.


    When the strange energy tried to bite him, all they found were the voidws that had appeared in his hand.


    The strange energy wasn''t able to resist at all as the voidws sucked them in and absorbed them.


    If it was before, he might have had problems with this strange energy. But the situation had changed after he had encountered the strange energy from the Outer God fragment.


    Absorbing that energy had fundamentally changed his voidws.


    His voidws had adapted to the strange energy of the Outer and was now able to absorb those strange energies even though they didn''t exist in this world.


    But of course, there was a limit to how much he could absorb and what kind of energy he could absorb even if his voidws had be stronger.


    He would only be able to absorb energy that was weaker than his own energy without problems, or he would have to forcefully subdue it with his will.


    He also couldn''t absorb too much of it since absorbing this strange energy didn''t restore his life energy like other energy would. It would drain his life energy to subdue this strange energy, so he would slowly be drained of his life energy trying to absorb it.


    Once he was out, he wouldn''t be able to use his voidws anymore.


    But it wasn''t a problem to absorb the ck energy that clung to the stub of Lin Ao''s arm.


    Once it was gone, the flesh underneath was revealed.


    It clearly looked infected and was close to rotting, but it started looking better once the ck energy was removed.

 Chapter 995 Beast Race Attacks (6)

    ?


    The ship was something that Lin Fan could control remotely with the automated driving that had been installed. That was how they were able to escape with just the four of them and not a crew to drive the ship.


    Lin Fan controlled the ship so that it was in space above where they currently were.


    Once the ship was positioned, Lin Fan summoned out a bunch of pets.


    There were many injured people, so it was very unlikely that they would be able to move on their own. The only thing that he could do was rely on his pets to carry them into the ship.


    But before they could do that, Lin Adam sent out Brainy''s puppets to scout out the surrounding area. Working with the soldier who had the earthws, he created holes that would allow the puppets to reach the surface.


    Once they were on the surface, they quickly spread out all over the to look for traces of the Beast Race.


    Since Brainy had broken through, she was now able to cover a muchrger area with her spiritual sense. It wasn''t even a problem for her to cover an entire like this with her spiritual sense.


    So she was able to check the entire to see if there were enemies around.


    But to their surprise, they found that there wasn''t a single Beast Race troop left. There were only corpses of Beast Race troops that were left behind and nothing else.


    It was as if they were the only ones left on this.


    Where did all the Beast Race troops that had been here looking for the remnants of the third army go?


    Did they withdraw because they couldn''t find anything or was there a different reason for why they were gone?


    Whether it was, it was very unsettling¡­


    But Lin Fan didn''t have time to waste right now.


    It was already bad that he had spent all this time scouting out the, but if they wasted any more time, there would be people dying. So he had to bring them away as soon as possible.


    So without thinking too deeply into why the Beast Race was gone, Lin Fan started bringing people out of the cave underground and onto the ship.


    They couldn''t bring everyone just in case there was an ambush that Lin Fan had missed, so they brought people out in groups instead of bringing them all out at once. While they were being brought out, Lin Fan''s pets surrounded the area, making sure that it was clear.


    During this time, not a single thing happened.


    There wasn''t even a single sound that was made around them. Almost as if there wasn''t even a breeze around them.


    No matter how he looked at it¡­it seemed like it was too quiet.


    It was almost like this was the calm before the storm¡­


    Still, they were able to load everyone onto the ship without any problems.


    The ship was equipped with all kinds of different facilities, which included a medical bay. So they were able to put some of the heavily injured people in there and stabilize them.


    But of course, that didn''t save them.


    They would still need medical attention or they wouldn''t be able tost much longer. Though it did prolong the time that they did have.


    So Lin Fan started the ship and flew out into space without hesitation.


    He knew that they were already on their way, so he took the direct route to the eighth army camp.


    While this route might be dangerous since there would be all kinds of different Beast Race Experts waiting for them, it was the fastest. With the speed of the ship, he was confident in outrunning the Beast Race Experts until they made contact with the reinforcements that wereing.


    But what they didn''t expect was that as soon as they left the, they would be surrounded.


    The Beast Race also used ships, but the ships that they used were much more primitive than the ships that humans had. In fact, the "ships" that they had were nothing more than saddles that had been ced on beasts that could travel through space.


    However, these ships carried quite a few Beast Race Experts.


    Once they were surrounded by the Beast Race, the beasts came out of the ships and started attacking Lin Fan''s ship.


    They didn''t even send anyone to negotiate, they just sent out their experts to destroy Lin Fan''s ship.


    Unfortunately, they were only expecting Lin Ao and the third army remnants. They had no idea that Lin Fan had already met up with Lin Ao''s group.


    There wasn''t a single person in Lin Ao''s group that was in the World Realm other than him, so they had only sent a few World Realm Beasts. Moreover, these were beasts that were only in the Star Realm, so they were no match for the ship''s defenses.


    These were beam weapons that had been made to hurt even those in the Sun Realm, so these Star Realm Beasts were unable to fight back against these beam weapons at all.


    As soon as the beam weapons hit them, they disintegrated right away.


    When the other Soul Realm Beasts saw this, they didn''t hesitate to run away.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Unlike human armies, the Beast Race forces didn''t have the same unity. They followed the leaders of their various tribes and when those leaders were taken out, they would run away.


    As for who the leaders were¡­they were the Star Realm Beasts that had been blown to pieces by the beam weapons.


    So in no time at all, the Beast Race forces that had surrounded them were scattered away.


    When the third army soldiers saw this, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan in shock. They never thought that this ship of his would be this powerful¡­


    Wasn''t this at the same level as the battleships that their army owned?


    These were top of the line battleships that each army only received ten of.


    Each army had hundreds of thousands of soldiers and they only received ten of these battleships.


    Lin Fan had one all for himself.


    That was just the difference between normal soldiers like them and royals from the Lin Astral Family.


    Once the path had been cleared, Lin Fan wasted no time in taking the shortest path back to the eighth army''s camp.


    As he had expected, there were many Beast Race Experts that they ran into along the way. However, not a single one of these Beast Race Experts were able to stop the ship.


    They were all taken down with a single st of the ship''s beam.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling sorry for the engineers that hade with him.


    They had followed him to see the power of this ship, but he had to leave them at the camp when he snuck off. So now that the power of the ship was being disyed, they couldn''t see it at all.


    It seemed like they wouldn''t be able to see their baby in action for some time.


    After all, once Lin Fan returned¡­it was very likely that he would be grounded by Lin Jian. So there was no chance that this ship would be able to leave the camp again.


    But that was fine for Lin Fan since his only goal ining was to rescue Lin Ao.


    As long as he could get Lin Ao back to the camp, he didn''t need to go fight the Beast Race.


    So all he could do was give a silent apology to the engineers.


    As they came closer and closer to the eighth army''s camp, there were less and less Beast Race Experts that attacked them.


    That wasn''t strange though since this was near the eighth army''s camp.


    The eighth army might be an army that specialized in rescue missions, but they were still an army in the end and were capable of fighting still. They would have cleared out the area around their rescue camp to ensure that the people they rescued were safe.


    Still, they weren''t out of the woods yet until they reached the eighth army''s camp.


    As they came closer and closer, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that something was off.


    They were already more than halfway there, but they hadn''t run into the reinforcement team yet¡­


    It was almost as if they weren''ting, but that wasn''t possible. So the only exnation was that something had happened either to the team or at the eighth army''s camp.


    Perhaps even now, they were just getting closer and closer to a trap.


    Lin Fan thought about many different scenarios, but in the end, he still decided to head back to the camp.


    Without knowing what happened to the camp, he wouldn''t be able to n their next move.


    In the end, they weren''t able to reach the eighth army''s camp before they were surrounded again.


    This time, the ones that surrounded them weren''t the grunt soldiers of the Beast Race, but rather actual experts.


    But Lin Fan could see that these Beast Race Experts were injured to a certain extent.


    It seemed like his guess was right¡­something must have happened at the camp that dyed these reinforcements.


    Without hesitation, he fired the beam weapons at the Beast Race Experts around them. However, this time, the beam weapons didn''t have the same effect as with the others.


    These were actual experts who were able to resist the power of the beam weapons.


    These were actual Beast Race Experts in the Sun Realm.

 Chapter 996 Beast Race Attacks (7)

    ?


    Once the beams had been destroyed, the other beasts started moving forward to surround the ship.


    Since they knew that the beams wouldn''t be able to pose a threat to them with the protection of these Sun Realm Beasts, they didn''t have any fear in moving closer.


    After all, they knew what this ship contained.


    A bunch of human Soul Realm Experts, that was easy prey for them.


    One of the main reasons the Beast Race attacked humans was because the Beast Race needed to eat the meat of powerful creatures to grow stronger.


    So a bunch of human Soul Realm Experts was a perfect meal for them.


    They didn''t want anyone else stealing from them, so they all came as close as they dared to so they would be able to fight over the prey when the time came.


    Through the screens of the ship, Lin Fan looked at the Sun Realm Beasts that stood there. As he stared at them, he didn''t reveal any expressions until he suddenly revealed a smile.


    He pressed the button to shoot the beam weapons again.


    When the beams came out, the Sun Realm Beasts were surprised, but they still blocked all of the beams that were shot out.


    It was just too bad for them that Lin Fan didn''t let them rx as he pressed the button to shoot the beams again and again. With each press of the button, more and more beams were shot out at the Sun Realm Beasts.


    The Sun Realm Beasts did their best to block these attacks, but each one was equal to a full force attack from a Sun Realm Expert. So even if they were Sun Realm Beasts, they were slowly being worn down by these beams.


    They could feel that their powers were draining and soon they wouldn''t be able to block these beams anymore.


    Finally, one of the Sun Realm Beasts stopped blocking it and dodged out of the way.


    As soon as this Sun Realm Beast dodged out of the way, the beam hit the beasts that were hiding behind the Sun Realm Beast, wiping them all out. The beam created a single line of empty space in the waves of beasts that surrounded the ship.


    It wasn''t just this single Sun Realm Beast that dodged out of the way.


    The other Sun Realm Beasts also couldn''t keep blocking the attacks anymore, so they also dodged out of the way.


    There wererge areas that were soon cleared out in the lines of beasts that surrounded the ship as they were mowed down by the beams that were shot.


    The Sun Realm Beasts had ugly expressions on their faces, but there wasn''t anything that they could do.


    So they used the weaker beasts around them as meat shields as they started charging at the ship.


    These Sun Realm Beasts did have intelligence and they could tell that as long as they took out the ship, they wouldn''t have to deal with these beams anymore. So they didn''t bother blocking those beams anymore and focused on the source of the beams.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had already expected this as well.


    Instead of shooting the beams at all of the Sun Realm Beasts now, he focused the beams on the ones that came the closest to the ship.


    Since they had been weakened by blocking the beams, they were much slower than normal.


    With this reduced speed, Lin Fan could focus on the ones that were the closest to the ship without worry that the other ones would be able to reach the ship.


    Once they were hit with the focused attacks of the beams, the Sun Realm Beasts weren''t able to resist at all as they were also blown to smithereens.


    This was an attack system that had been designed to be strong enough to repel even Ruler Realm Experts, so of course these Sun Realm Beasts couldn''t resist when facing the full brunt of these beam attacks.


    When the Sun Realm Beasts that were further away saw the Sun Realm Beasts in front being destroyed like this, they couldn''t help stopping in their tracks as they started to hesitate. But then they charged at the ship once again in an attempt to destroy it.


    They didn''t believe that they wouldn''t be able to destroy this ship with all the beasts that they had gathered.


    But in the end, the Sun Realm Beasts were proven wrong.


    They couldn''t approach the ship at all under the waves of beams shot at them and they were forced all the way back to where they had even started when their numbers had been thinned out.


    They just didn''t have enough Sun Realm Beasts to distract the beam weapons.


    These Beast Race troops just couldn''t understand how this ship was able to shoot all these powerful beams again and again.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    No matter how they looked at it, a normal ship would have already run out of energy. That was the case with every other ship from the Lin Astral Empire that they had encountered.


    This ship was different because it was using a new energy source developed by the ship engineering department based on the energy source of the Outer ship.


    The energy source on the Outer ship was a nuclear fusion engine, but since the engineers of the Lin Astral Empire didn''t understand nuclear fusion, they used something else that they did understand. Instead of a nuclear fusion engine, it was aw fusion engine.


    Just like how Lin Fan fusedws together to create a force stronger than the sum of thews, this engine smashedws together to create a stronger force that it used to power the ship.


    So as long as differentws were injected into the ship, this ship would almost never run out of energy since it only took a small amount ofws to power this ship. Thew fusion would create mass amounts of energy that far surpassed the sum of what was added.


    With Lin Fan''s control of multiplews through his cultivation technique and his voidws, he could power this ship alone with almost no effort.


    So this ship would never run out of energy for the beam weapons.


    The Sun Realm Beasts seemed like they were about to run away, but then they suddenly turned around to look at something. It was as if they had suddenly sensed something approaching.


    It wasn''t just the Sun Realm Beasts, but all of the beasts that surrounded the ship.


    They had seemed like they were about to retreat, but they all stopped when they felt somethinging from behind them.


    Lin Fan also was able to see something on the sensors of the shiping at them. The energy reaction that came from the sensors showed that this thing was much more powerful than anything that was currently near the ship.


    It was clear that this was¡­a Ruler Realm Beast.


    It was a bright thing that was flying through space, so bright that it drowned out all of the stars that were around them. It was as if this thing was shining as bright as the sun itself.


    When it finally came close and revealed itself, everyone was able to see that it was a golden crow.


    However, it wasn''t a real golden crow since it didn''t have three legs. It only had two legs like a normal crow, meaning that it was most likely a mutated crow beast that had powers simr to the Golden Crow Tribe, which had separated from the Beast Race to be one of the Myriad Races.


    The power that it released was real though.


    When the golden crow appeared, it couldn''t help narrowing its eyes as it looked at the ship.


    Then it looked at the Sun Realm Beasts with those narrowed eyes, causing them to back down.


    However, it didn''t waste any time with the Sun Realm Beasts as it turned back to the ship and started attacking it.


    Using the golden mes around itself, it shot out a giant ball of golden mes at the ship.


    When the people on the ship saw this ball of golden mes, they couldn''t help panicking. After all, they could sense the power that came from the golden crow, so they knew that this was a Ruler Realm Beast.


    With their current power, it was impossible for them to block this attack.


    The only people that weren''t nervous were Lin Fan and his group.


    Lin Fan just calmly took out apass that he raised.


    When thispass was raised, it suddenly released a barrier that surrounded the entire ship.


    When this barrier appeared, the golden crow couldn''t help knitting its brows. It could feel the power of the barrier and this power¡­didn''t seem to be below its own.


    When the ball of golden mes mmed into the barrier, there was a second of pause before it was swallowed up by the barrier.


    At the same time, Lin Fan pressed the button and shot the beams out from the ship.


    The golden crow had been so focused on its attack that it was caught off guard by the beams that were shot at it. However, it was still a Ruler Realm Beast in the end, so it was able to block it with a barrier of golden mes.


    However, the golden crow was surprised to find that the beam weapons were actually pushing it back.


    That wasn''t strange since these beam weapons had been designed to be able to hold back a Ruler Realm Beast, but the golden crow didn''t know this.

 Chapter 997 Beast Race Attacks (8)

    ?


    In the end though, the golden crow was a real Ruler Realm Beast and couldn''t be defeated by the beams alone.


    It was able to gather enough mes to burn away the beams that had been shot at it,pletely scattering them to nothing.


    Once it was finished with the beam, it turned its attention to the barrier around the ship.


    This was a barrier that had been able to stop one of its attacks, so it clearly wasn''t a normal barrier. But that attack just now had only been a quick attack that didn''t contain its full power, it didn''t even contain a tenth of its power.


    It had assumed that with its strength as a Ruler Realm Beast, it would be able to smash through this ship easily.


    But now it seemed like it would need to focus on the ship a bit more than it had expected.


    So the golden crow didn''t waste time as it started gathering golden mes around itself again. This time though, the golden mes were much hotter and much more densepared to before.


    There was so much heating from the golden mes that the beasts around the golden crow had no choice but to move back or be burned by the mes.


    So they moved out of the way and allowed the golden crow to do its thing.


    As the golden crow gathered the golden mes, the people on the ship couldn''t help feeling more and more worried. They could feel the oppressive feelinging from the golden crow, showing just how much power it was gathering.


    They didn''t feel that Lin Fan had a chance against this golden crow even in this ship that had stopped the attack.


    They could tell that the golden crow was about to get serious, so it would be the end for them.


    But Lin Fan still had a calm look on his face as he looked at the golden crow through the monitor.


    He was even so calm that he brought down the hand that had thepass in it, as if he wasn''t nning on using it to block the attack.


    That was because¡­


    When the golden crow had finished gathering its golden mes, it paused for a second to look at the ship in front of it. It had been focused on gathering the golden mes, so it hadn''t noticed that the barrier around the ship had disappeared.


    What was going on here?


    This strange disappearance of the barrier caused the golden crow to hesitate in a moment of confusion as if didn''t understand what was happening.


    Had this ship given up or was there a different reason for why they had put down the barrier?


    The golden crow felt an uneasy feeling, but in the end, it threw these thoughts out of its mind.


    It was a Ruler Realm Beast after all, it wasn''t as if they would be able to do anything.


    It hadn''t been able to sense any Ruler Realm Experts in the surrounding area, so of course it didn''t think that it would be in any danger or that this ship would be able to resist its attack.


    After all, Rulers were the representation of absolute power in this universe.


    Only other Rulers would ever be able to stop Rulers.


    That was the established rule of this universe.


    So without any further hesitation, the golden crow used the golden mes that it had gathered to create another ball of golden mes. This time, this ball of golden mes contained immense power as it floated there,pletely oppressing everyone around it.


    It was as if it contained the power topletely burn down everything in this world.


    This was clearly an attack that would end everything.


    However, before the golden crow could fire it out¡­


    Before the golden crow could even react, there was a dark spear that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. This dark spear flew through the air and before the golden crow could react, it had already stabbed right through its chest.


    The ball of golden mes that it had gathered scattered the moment that it was stabbed through the chest. At the same time, the golden crow spat out a mouthful of blood after being stabbed like this.


    The golden crow immediately turned around in the direction that the dark spear hade from, but it wasn''t able to find a single thing. It was as if the dark spear had just appeared out of nowhere.


    But the golden crow knew that this wasn''t the case.


    However, the golden crow wasn''t able to find a single thing no matter how hard it tried searching for the enemy.


    In the end, the golden crow had no choice but to shout, "Who is it?! If you dare, show yourself, you coward!"


    Of course, that cheap provocation didn''t work.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The golden crow was about to say something else when it suddenly noticed something approaching at an incredible speed.


    This was the aura of a Ruler Realm Expert and it clearly wasn''t the aura of a beast.


    This was the aura of a human Ruler Realm Expert.


    The golden crow knew that it was in a bad situation and if it were to stay here, it would have no chance of winning. It wouldn''t even be able to escape with how injured it was.


    So without even thinking about it, the golden crow turned around to run.


    But before it could run, there was another dark spear that appeared out of nowhere that flew at the golden crow. Though this time, the golden crow wasn''t as focused as before and could sense it before it came too close, so it was able to dodge at thest moment.


    However, this dodge wasn''t clean enough and it still was injured by the dark spear, which had stabbed into its arm.


    The golden crow looked at where the dark spear had appeared in the air and once again, it wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    It was as if the dark spear had once again appeared out of thin air.


    But the golden crow knew that it wasn''t possible.


    Still, the golden crow wasted no time in trying to run away again even if it wasn''t able to find the enemy. It knew that the longer that it waited, the worse the situation would be for it.


    Once again, there was another dark spear that appeared out of thin air that was shot at the golden crow.


    The golden crow was used to it this time and was able to dodge it without taking any damage. But in the first ce, this spear had be weakerpared to the spears that had been fired before.


    It was clear that the first one was the strongest and with each passing spear, the enemy was getting weaker and weaker since they didn''t have time to gather their power.


    The golden crow didn''t slow down at all as it kept trying to run away.


    But the spears also kept flying out at it.


    It was no longer a single spear that appeared out of thin air, but rather multiple spears that were flying at it now.


    Since the enemy knew that it wouldn''t be able to overpower the golden crow, they had decided to use numbers to make up for theck of power.


    It was enough to contain the golden crow even if it didn''t hurt the golden crow.


    When the other beasts saw this, they all started moving in different directions, as if they were about to run away.


    They could tell that the situation was getting worse and worse and without the protection of the golden crow, there was no chance that they would be able to survive. So many of them had thoughts about abandoning right away.


    But before any of them could run, there were beams that were shot at them.


    It took all that they had to dodge, but some of the weaker ones couldn''t dodge them at all and were shot down by the beams.


    Lin Fan had noticed that the beasts were running, so he left the golden crow to whoever was helping them and started firing beams at the other beasts.


    They were currently at war with the Beast Race after being invaded by them, so this was no time to show mercy to the beasts that had surrounded him.


    The beasts did their best to run, but they couldn''t under the constant barrage of beams being shot at them. At the same time, the golden crow tried to run, but it was being stalled by the rain of spears that fell onto it.


    None of the beasts were able to escape from these attacks, but as time passed, there was a new presence that made itself known.


    There was an aura that was quickly approaching that was just as strong as the golden crow.


    It was clear that this was a Ruler Realm Expert that had appeared.


    The beasts all had sinking looks on their faces when they realized this.


    They had sensed this aurater than the golden crow, but they knew exactly what it meant for someone like this to appear here.


    They would all be killed.


    But there was nothing that they could do under the barrage of the beams.


    Finally, that aura approached and in one swift move, they coordinated with the spears raining down to take care of the golden crow.


    As for the rest of the people that came with this Ruler Realm Expert, they took care of the remaining beasts that Lin Fan hadn''t shot down yet.

 Chapter 998 Beast Race Attacks (9)

    ?


    Once the other beasts had been cleaned out, there was only the golden crow who was left.


    The golden crow had tried struggling against the Ruler Realm Expert that had appeared, but it wasn''t able to fight back when it was injured like this. At the same time, from time to time, there were dark spears that flew out at it, catching it off guard and injuring it even more.


    As the fight progressed, it became weaker and weaker and couldn''t fight the Ruler Realm Expert head on anymore.


    It had no choice but to use its trump card to escape.


    At this point, all of the beasts around it had already been cleaned out, so it couldn''t use them as shields.


    The golden crow suddenly spat out a golden crystal that released a powerful aura.


    This was the special item that it had been given by the powerful Rulers of the Beast Race. This golden crystal containedws that far surpassed the level of this golden crow.


    But before it could crack it open, there was a powerful dark spear that flew out at it.


    At the same time, the Ruler Realm Expert also used a powerful attack to pinch it in so that it didn''t have anywhere to run.


    So before the golden crow could use it, it was mmed in between the two attacks and ripped apart to pieces. The golden crystal was just left there floating in the middle of space.


    Even though the body of the golden crow had been destroyed, the Ruler Realm Expert wasn''t idle at all as he released his domain in the area that the golden crow had been in.


    At the same time, there was another Ruler Realm Expert that revealed themselves and used their domain in the same location.


    It didn''t take long before an almost invisible figure appeared.


    This figure had the same shape as the golden crow from before.


    When it was revealed, the golden crow revealed a look of panic and started to run. However, it couldn''t move at all as it was being restrained by the domains that had been released around it.


    The two Ruler Realm Experts focused their domains on the almost invisible figure of the golden crow and it started deforming.


    As the domains crashed down onto it, the golden crow shouted, "No, not like this! I can''t die like this!"


    This almost invisible figure of the golden crow was the soul of the golden crow.


    Once one reached the Soul Realm, as long as their soul survived, they would be able to reform their body.


    This was taken a step further when one reached the World Realm since one''s soul would be much stronger, so they would be able to recover much sooner than those in the Soul Realm.


    As for those in the Dao Realm, as long as even a fragment of their soul existed, they would be able to reform themselves one day. That was what happened when they started integrating thews of the world into themselves, making themselves a part of thews of the world.


    What the two Ruler Realm Experts were doing now was using their domains topletely destroy the soul of the golden crow.


    Once this soul waspletely destroyed, the golden crow would be dead.


    The death of a Ruler was not something taken lightly since it was hard to kill Rulers in the first ce.


    The death of this golden crow would surely be arge blow to the Beast Race.


    But there would be no me ced with the death of this golden crow.


    Normally, the death of a Ruler was something that would have irreparable consequences since this was something that concerned the fate of a race as a whole. So if there was a Ruler of a race that died, they would take immediate action against the ones that killed that Ruler.


    But it was the Beast Race who had invaded the Lin Astral Empire this time.


    They were the ones who had already instigated a war, so there was nothing wrong with the Lin Astral Empire killing a Ruler.


    What could they do? Start another war?


    Even if they wanted to take revenge, if they moved too many of their experts to the Lin Astral Empire, the other races in different ces would take advantage of this and attack them.


    So there were no consequences in killing this golden crow this time.


    This was the result of war.


    With a final cry, the soul of the golden crow was shattered to pieces and it finally died.


    With that final cry, the Beast Race troops that had surrounded Lin Fan''s ship were all taken out.


    Seeing this from inside the ship, the remnants of the third army broke out in cheers.


    That was because they recognized the people who were outside.


    They could recognize the banners and gs of the fourth and eighth army.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    These were the reinforcements that had been sent to save them.


    This was also why Lin Fan hadn''t been worried when the golden crow wanted to attack his ship with its full power.


    The sensors of the ship were much more developed than the senses of a normal expert, so it was able to sense things much further than normal experts. That included the golden crow that wasn''t able to sense the approaching Ruler Realm Expert.


    However, Lin Fan was able to sense the Ruler Realm Expert approaching as soon as the golden crow appeared, which was why he wasn''t worried the entire time.


    Once the beasts had been taken care of, there was a ship that came over and stopped in front of Lin Fan''s ship. This ship docked with Lin Fan''s ship before a group came over to Lin Fan''s ship.


    When the airlock opened and the group came out, Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile.


    That was because the leader of this group, as he had expected, was Lin Jian.


    Lin Jian didn''t have a good look on his face, but that wasn''t strange since Lin Fan had snuck off to save Lin Ao in the first ce.


    But he didn''t scold Lin Fan right away and instead went to check on Lin Ao.


    After seeing that Lin Ao was missing an arm, he deeply knitted his brows. He immediately turned to the medical squad behind him and said, "Heal him."


    This group immediately nodded and came over to help Lin Ao.


    This medical squad was the best medical squad in the eighth army and each member of this squad was someone with lifews, so there was no problem with taking care of Lin Ao. It might even be considered overkill for this entire squad to take care of Lin Ao alone.


    Lin Ao also knew this, so he said, "You don''t all need to help me. Go and help the others in the medical bay, they need it more than I do."


    The medical squad hesitantly looked at Lin Jian with a slight look of entreaty in their eyes.


    After all, even if they were from different armies, they knew that the medical bay had the remnants of the eighth army. They were all people from the Lin Astral Empire, so they wanted to help these people too.


    Lin Jian nodded in response to this as he revealed a look of praise for Lin Ao before turning back to Lin Fan.


    When he turned back to look at Lin Fan, his eyes became stern again.


    Lin Fan just stood there with a bitter smile on his face.


    After a long silence, Lin Jian said, "Exin yourself."


    Lin Fan said with the same bitter smile, "Well, it''s a long story¡­"


    Lin Jian didn''t say anything as he kept looking at Lin Fan with the same stern look.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before telling him what had happened.


    Lin Jian had the same stern look the entire time as he listened to Lin Fan''s story.


    Once Lin Fan was done, he finally changed his expression by giving a sigh and saying, "You really are too reckless, I really don''t know where you get it from." But then after looking at Lin Ao, he said with a sigh, "No, I do know where you get it from."


    Lin Fan just revealed another bitter smile when he heard this.


    Afterining to himself for a bit, Lin Jian said, "Alright, that''s the end of that." He looked at Lin Fan with a serious look and said, "You can go back now, right?"


    Lin Fan was caught off guard when he heard this, but he gave a nod in response to this.


    Lin Jian nodded too before saying, "Since you''re done here, take Ao''er and Yue''er back to the capital with you. We''ll say that you were evacuating the injured soldiers from the eighth army, that should be a good enough excuse."


    Lin Fan nodded again in agreement to this.


    He had already finished his mission by saving Lin Ao, he could see that in the system panel.


    Since he had finished the mission, there was no need for him to stay on the battlefield anymore.


    He was lucky this time, but he could be unlucky next time and lose his life.


    There was no reason for him to risk his life like this when all he needed to do to get stronger was stay in the shop.


    So he had no reason to stay here any longer.


    After this was settled, Lin Jian turned to leave.


    There were still the Beast Race forces that were waiting for him out there, so he was nning on heading out with the fourth army again that hade to rescue Lin Fan.


    However, before he went, Lin Fan suddenly remembered something.

 Chapter 999 Strange Rewards

    ?


    As Lin Jian was about to leave, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Wait, there''s something else."


    Lin Jian suddenly stopped and turned around to look at Lin Fan with a confused look. At the same time, there was a bit of worry in his eyes.


    He was worried that Lin Fan would want to do something else¡­


    However, he was surprised by what Lin Fan said next.


    Lin Fan told Lin Jian about the strange ck energy that had corroded Lin Ao''s arm stub. Then he said, "This strange energy, it was simr to the energy that I founding from the ship."


    Even though he didn''t clearly say what he was thinking, Lin Jian immediately understood from this context.


    Lin Jian then asked, "Were there any other traces that you found?"


    Lin Fan shook his head as he said, "That was the only one."


    Lin Jian knitted his brows before turning to look at Lin Ao. However, after looking at Lin Ao for a bit, he hesitated and turned to the remnants of the third army.


    There were those that were injured, but there were also those that were still fine.


    He waved his hand at one of the soldiers of the third army that was fine to call them over.


    This soldier was confused, but they still came over to where Lin Jian was.


    When the soldier came over, Lin Jian asked them to tell him everything that happened up to this point.


    The soldier was once again confused to hear this, but they still nodded and recounted everything that happened to the third army. They told Lin Jian about the sudden invasion of the Beast Race and how Lin Ao had rallied everyone to push them back.


    As they told their story, Lin Jian suddenly stopped them in the middle of their story.


    Lin Jian asked, "When Ao''er went to fight the Beast Race, what happened between them? Which beast came out to fight Ao''er?"


    The soldier revealed an awkward look before saying, "We were too busy running away, so we weren''t able to see anything."


    Lin Jian knitted his brows when he heard this and he turned to Lin Ao who was still being treated.


    The reason why he had asked this soldier instead of Lin Ao himself was to let Lin Ao have time to rest up and recover, but it seemed like he had to ask Lin Ao about this after all.


    The soldier just stood there with an awkward look on their face as if they didn''t know what to do. Only when Lin Jian waved his hand was this soldier relieved of this awkwardness and allowed to leave.


    Lin Jian walked over to what Lin Ao was being treated.


    When Lin Ao saw him walking over, he revealed a knowing smile and said, "I don''t know what that ck energy is either. It was a wound that I suffered from one of the des of the Beast Race."


    "de?" Lin Jian repeated.


    Lin Ao nodded before saying, "It was a strange beast that fought in human form instead of its beast form."


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Jian knitted their brows when they heard this.


    The Beast Race normally fought in their beast form since that was their natural form and the form that they held the most power in. There would only be the rare beast that had a special power that would be stronger in human form.


    So Lin Jian asked, "Was it one of those special beasts?"


    Lin Ao shook his head and said, "No, it was a normal beast that shouldn''t have transformed¡­but it did and then it pulled out this strange de."


    After a pause, he said with a sigh, "This was the strangest de that I had ever seen. It was as ck as the darkest night and there was this strange feeling that came from it, as if it didn''t belong to this world. The strangest thing was that it almost felt like the de itself had a presence, like it was alive."


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Ao knitted their brows once again after hearing this.


    They had never heard of a weapon like this before, but they could tell that Lin Ao wasn''t lying.


    Lin Fan was most affected by this since he knew more than most people did.


    He had already encountered two different races of the Outer through his experience, so he was more open minded to these kinds of things. He wouldn''t be surprised if there really was something like a sentient weapon race¡­


    But for now, he couldn''t say anything since he didn''t see it personally.


    Lin Jian knitted his brows to think about this for a bit before finally saying, "You can tell father about this when you get back. He should know more about this."


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Ao nodded in agreement to this.


    No matter what happened, this information had to be brought to the Lin Astral Emperor.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The Lin Astral Emperor was the head of the Lin Astral Family and the Lin Astral Empire, so this information that could pose a threat to both had to be brought to him. Not to mention, he had lived much longer than them and had ess to more information, so he should know more about this.


    Once that was decided, there was no need for Lin Jian to stay any longer.


    He left one of the Ruler Realm guards with them before setting off with the other one.


    The one that he left was the one that had gone with Lin Fan to the Outer shipst time. The one that he took with him was the one with the shadowws that had hidden in the shadows to throw those dark spears that golden crow.


    The Ruler Realm guard was naturally displeased about what Lin Fan had done, running away without even telling him. Of course, if he had told him, the Ruler Realm guard wouldn''t have let Lin Fan run off in the first ce since it was his job keeping Lin Fan there.


    There was no doubt that he would be punished for losing track of Lin Fan this time.


    But he also couldn''t help being confused as to how Lin Fan had thrown him off.


    So the Ruler Realm guard closely followed Lin Fan, trying to figure out how Lin Fan had escaped.


    He went everywhere with Lin Fan. Going with him to eat, going to the bathroom with him, he even wanted to sleep in the same room as Lin Fan. However, that was immediately shut down by Ang.


    The Ruler Realm guard didn''t understand why, but he couldn''t help feeling pressure from Ang. Even though he was in the Ruler Realm, when facing Ang, there was this kind of pressure that came from her that made him cave in the end.


    It was only because of Ang that Lin Fan was able to finally get some time to himself.


    He locked himself up in a room and then opened up the system panel.


    He hade to the borders this time not just because he was here to save Lin Ao, but also because of the system''s mission.


    Since he had finished the mission, it was time to see what kind of reward he would receive.


    The system had been giving him quite a few missions recently and they had all given strange rewards. So he was curious what reward he would receive this time.


    When the system gave him the reward for this mission, Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised by what he received.


    This time, the system had given him a map.


    He didn''t know what it was at first since it was a rolled up piece of paper that seemed very old. However, when he opened it and looked closely, he found that there was a map on the piece of paper.


    At the same time, there was a X that was marked on the map as if it was signifying some kind of treasure.


    But this map was for a ce that he had never seen before.


    So naturally, Lin Fan had no idea how to use this map.


    After he received this item, the system remained quiet as if it had nothing to say to him. Even after he called it out for giving him this thing and he tried to question it on what the map was, he never received an answer.


    So Lin Fan had no choice but to put this map away.


    He was about to give up until he saw something appear out of the corner of his eyes.


    It was another notification from the system.


    "Special cultivation realm has been discovered and activated."


    It was a simple notification, but Lin Fan couldn''t help being shocked when he saw this.


    He immediately opened the page with the cultivation realms listed and he found that there was a new tab that had been opened up.


    It was a tab that said "special cultivation realms".


    He immediately opened it and found that there was only a single cultivation realm that was avable under this tab.


    It was a cultivation realm known as "unknown".


    There was no name, there was no description, there was only the single word "unknown" for it.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows when he saw this.


    He could guess that it was rted to all of the missions that he had done, but he couldn''t help feeling a bad feeling from this special cultivation realm¡­


    So in the end, Lin Fan chose not to open this cultivation realm just yet.

 Chapter 1000 Myriad Race Visitors

    ?


    When they arrived back in the Lin Astral Empire, the first thing that happened was¡­


    Lin Fan and Lin Ao were immediately summoned to the pce.


    The ce that they gathered in was the same meeting room as before and waiting for them was the Lin Astral Emperor.


    When he saw them, he didn''t wave for them to sit down like he normally did. Instead, he stood up and came over to them before taking them in his arms.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t seem like the powerful emperor of the Lin Astral Empire at this moment, but rather he seemed like a very normal grandfather who had been worried about his grandchildren.


    After hugging them for a bit, he finally calmed down. He gave a cough before saying, "Sit down and let''s talk."


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Ao had warm smiles on their faces after hearing this, but they didn''t say anything to embarrass the Lin Astral Emperor with. They knew better than to say anything at this time.


    After they sat down, before they could even discuss anything, the Lin Astral Empress came in.


    When she saw the two of them, she did the same thing as the Lin Astral Emperor. She immediately came forward to take the two of them in her arms and pulled them into a big hug.


    Once she was done, they could see that her eyes were red.


    It was clear that she had been crying before they hade back.


    They were both touched when they saw this, Lin Fan more than Lin Ao.


    Lin Fan had his preconceptions from earth that these royal families would be cold to each other, so that was why he was more touchedpared to Lin Ao.


    Finally, when they had all settled down, the Lin Astral Emperor asked, "What happened?"


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Ao were clear what he meant by this, so Lin Ao was the one that exined.


    He told the same story as before about the strange de that the Beast Race had. However, this time, he added in the fact that Lin Fan had been the one that had helped him take care of the ck energy that had been on his arm.


    After the Lin Astral Emperor heard this, he turned to look at Lin Fan with an expectant look.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before raising his hand and¡­releasing the ck energy that had been on Lin Ao''s arm stub.


    Lin Ao was surprised when he saw this since he wasn''t used to the voidws. Even though he was a member of the Lin Astral Family, his specialty was still his sword, so he wasn''t familiar with the powers of the voidws.


    After he had absorbed the ck energy, Lin Fan had found that there was a new statue that had formed in his dantian. This was of course the usual and he was able to draw on the power of the new energy he had absorbed.


    But the surprising thing was that the statue in his dantian was very simple.


    Unlike the other statues that had formed when he absorbed the Outer energy, this time it was just a simple statue of a skeleton.


    He didn''t know what it represented, but it was a very eerie statue.


    After the Lin Astral Emperor saw the ck energy, he couldn''t help knitting his brows. He moved closer to get a better look and he couldn''t help knitting his brows even more when he got a close look at this.


    But in the end, he shook his head and said with a sigh, "I don''t recognize this kind of energy at all."


    As expected, it wasn''t as if the Lin Astral Emperor would know everything, especially something about the Outer.


    Then the Lin Astral Emperor asked, "Can you give me a sample of this?"


    Lin Fan was surprised when he heard this, but he still nodded in agreement to this.


    With skilled control of the energy, he separated a bit of it so that it was left on table for the Lin Astral Emperor.


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked at this ck energy again before taking out a crystal. The crystal was brought over to the energy that was left on the table and when it came close, it started absorbing the energy.


    The crystal had been clear at first, but after absorbing the ck energy, it turned as ck as the energy.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t pick up the crystal with his hand and instead took out a special cloth that he used to pick it up instead. This special clothpletely blocked any vision of it and it even blocked off all spiritual sense, creating a perfect seal around the ck crystal.


    Then he pressed a button on the table and someone came in through a secret door.


    He whispered a few words to this person before that person carefully took the crystal and went back out the secret door.


    Once they were done with this, Lin Fan and Lin Ao stood up as they prepared to leave. However, before they could go out, there was someone that knocked on the main door.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Everyone in the room knitted their brows since they knew that everyone in the pce knew how important this meeting room was. Unless it was an emergency, they normally would never bother them in this room.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t waste any time as he waved his hand and the door opened.


    The person outside the door was surprised by the door suddenly opening, but they quickly came in and kneeled down in front of the table.


    Both Lin Fan and Lin Ao had already sat down during this time since they wanted to hear what this person had to say.


    This person was one of the ministers that worked in the foreign rtions department, so they were very confused why they would see this person here.


    After all, most of the time, the foreign rtions department was a very quiet department.


    With the prestige of the Lin Astral Empire, there were few organizations that would be required for the foreign rtions department to deal with. So they mostly watched over the other nations or forces to ensure that no other nation or force threatened them


    So for the foreign rtions department to report an emergency¡­it most likely meant that some other nation or power was¡­


    For this to happen at the same time as the Beast Race invasion¡­


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked at the minister and said, "What is it?"


    The minister had still been bowing his head and seemed like he was afraid of speaking, but when the Lin Astral Emperor addressed him, he had no choice but to say something.


    So this minister looked up and said, "It''s an envoy from the Dragon Race."


    The Lin Astral Emperor immediately revealed a confused look as he asked, "Dragon Race? Why is the Dragon Race sending an envoy to our Lin Astral Empire at a time like this?"


    The minister shook his head and said, "I don''t know, but they are very urgently requesting a meeting with your majesty."


    The Lin Astral Emperor deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    No matter how he looked at it, it didn''t seem like this was a good thing.


    The Dragon Race appearing right when the Beast Race was starting a war, it was clear that they were just here to cause more trouble. But the Dragon Race was one of the more prominent races among the Myriad Races, so he couldn''t just turn them down.


    The Dragon Race was one of the first races to cooperate with the humans, which paved the way for more and more of the Myriad Races to cooperate with humans.


    So it went to show just how much influence the Dragon Race had.


    If they were to stop cooperating with the humans because of the Lin Astral Empire, the Lin Astral Empire would be sanctioned by many of the other Astral Empires. They might even be caused by the entire human race because of this.


    They had to give the Dragon Race face even if they were very confused as to why the Dragon Race came at a time like this.


    In the end, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "Show them to the guest rooms and we''ll prepare a banquet to wee them with."


    The minister nodded and then headed off to pass down the Lin Astral Emperor''s orders.


    The Lin Astral Emperor then looked at the rest of them and said, "I''ll go wee them. We don''t want to offend them in any way."


    Everyone else nodded in agreement to this, but Lin Fan''s nod came a bitte.


    The Lin Astral Emperor however was too lost in thought to notice this.


    When Lin Fan had heard that it was an envoy from the Dragon Race, he couldn''t help deeply knitting his brows as he fell into thought.


    The Dragon Race was a race that he had ties to, so he couldn''t help wondering if they were here because¡­of him?


    After all, he had something that the Dragon Race wanted very much.


    Xiao Feng''s bloodline was something that could make the entire Dragon Race go crazy.


    Not to mention, there was someone that had wanted to take Xiao Feng back to the Dragon Race in the first ce.


    He was also someone very important to the Dragon Race.


    So he didn''t know if the Dragon Race was here for him¡­


    He shouldn''t have revealed anything about his connection to the Dragon Race.

 Chapter 1001 Dragon Race’s Request (1)

    ?


    Since it was an official envoy from the Dragon Race, this meant that Lin Fan didn''t have to attend the banquet.


    Even if he was the heir to the Lin Astral Family, the head of the Lin Astral Family was still the Lin Astral Emperor.


    Since the Lin Astral Emperor was personally going to greet them, that meant that Lin Fan was excused from going. At the same time, this applied to all of the Lin Astral Family members, so none of them were allowed to go to this banquet.


    There were someints from the Lin Astral Family''s branch heads, but the Lin Astral Emperorpletely quelled thoseints.


    Before they knew what the Dragon Race wanted, the Lin Astral Emperor wanted to restrain their ess to the Lin Astral Family so that they couldn''t pull any tricks.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was still the head of the family, so his word wasw.


    Lin Fan had just returned to the pce from the store when he was summoned back to the meeting room again.


    This time, it was just the Lin Astral Emperor and empress and they had a dark look on their faces.


    They had just finished the banquet with the Dragon Race envoys, so it was clear that the Dragon Race wanted something that they couldn''t ept.


    When Lin Fan came in, they both looked at him with strange looks that caught Lin Fan off guard.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What happened?"


    Neither of them said a thing as they gestured for him to sit down. Even after he sat down, they just stared at him as if they were waiting for him to say something, but Lin Fan didn''t say anything in the end since he didn''t know what was happening.


    After a long time, the Lin Astral Emperor finally asked, "Do you have some kind of connection to the Dragon Race?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows when he heard this.


    If it was anyone else, he would have hidden this and kept his face calm, but this was his family.


    So instead of answering the question, Lin Fan asked, "What did they ask for?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a sigh and said, "They didn''t ask for anything. They just requested a meeting with you, as if they already knew about you."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    After a bit of silence, he asked, "Did they say what they wanted from me?"


    The Lin Astral Emperor shook his head before saying, "They just said that they wanted to meet you to talk about something. No matter what I asked them, they wouldn''t tell me a single thing. It''s almost as if they didn''t care about me, or as if it was rted¡­to the secrets of the race."


    Both Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor fell silent when they heard this.


    The Lin Astral Emperor asked again, "Do you really not have any connections to the Dragon Race?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and said, "I do have some connection to the Dragon Race, but it shouldn''t be at this point where they would send an official envoy to talk to me."


    That was what he said, but it wasn''t the truth.


    This was just what he thought had been revealed since he didn''t believe that the matter of Xiao Feng''s bloodline had been revealed. It was impossible for one to recognize Xiao Feng''s bloodline unless they were a true member of the Dragon Race and came close enough to Xiao Feng to sense the pressure from his bloodline.


    So he assumed that it was most likely rted to Hong Long or Qing Ao¡­


    The Lin Astral Emperor narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before asking, "Do you need help with anything?"


    Lin Fan shook his head at first, but then he said with a nod, "Do you have a picture of the envoys from the Dragon Race? I want to confirm something."


    The Lin Astral Emperor responded with a nod, "I''ll have someone send them to youter. Also, I can only stall this for a few days, so I''ll need an answer from you before then."


    Lin Fan nodded before thanking the Lin Astral Emperor.


    Then without any hesitation, he ran off to his wing and sent off all the servants there.


    Once the servant came with the picture of the Dragon Race envoys, he locked down the area and called out Qing Ao and Hong Long. But as he called out Qing Ao, Feng Ling and Lei Ting also came out since they were curious why Lin Fan had called Qing Ao out.


    After they were all gathered, Lin Fan ced the picture of the Dragon Race envoys on the table and waited for Qing Ao''s response.


    Qing Ao was confused at first, but when he saw the picture of the envoys, he couldn''t help deeply knitting his brows. He looked at the picture a few more times as if he was confirming something before asking, "Where did you get this picture from?"<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Lin Fan calmly exined, "This was the envoy sent from the Dragon Race that arrived today."


    Qing Ao knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    That was because he recognized these people in the picture.


    They were subordinates of his brother.


    Qing Ao looked at the picture for a bit longer before asking, "What did theye here for?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "They are here requesting an audience with me, but they haven''t told me what they wanted yet."


    Qing Ao fell silent for a bit before saying, "If they''re here looking for you, then¡­"


    He trailed off before saying, "The fact that they can officially represent the Dragon Race must mean that something has changed back home¡­If even these people can represent the Dragon Race, then that means father¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words again, but it was clear what he was implying.


    Hong Long had been silent the entire time, but when Qing Ao''s father was mentioned, he couldn''t help saying, "Qing Fei Yu wouldn''t be weak enough that he would be defeated by his own son."


    Qing Ao looked at Hong Long with a strange look before saying, "Father has been getting weaker and weaker because of an illness, so there''s no saying definitely what happened."


    Hong Long knitted his brows when he heard this before turning to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan shook his head as he understood what he was implying.


    Perhaps if it was before, he might take a chance with this, but now¡­he had his official position as the heir of the Lin Astral Emperor to think about. He couldn''t just move on his own like he could before.


    Hong Long gave a sigh before moving back into the corner with a look of deep thought on his face.


    Qing Ao looked back at Lin Fan and asked with a calm look, "What do you n on doing? Do you want me to meet them?" There was a trace of eptance in his voice as he said this.


    He knew that Lin Fan had his position to think about, so¡­the easiest method to solve this matter was to¡­


    Both Feng Ling and Lei Ting moved closer to Qing Ao after he said this, as if they were going to protect him. But Qing Ao shook his head and had them move back to their original position.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile before asking, "Do you really think so little of me?" Then he added with a serious look on his face, "Not to mention, it wouldn''t solve the problem if I did that."


    He was silent for a bit before saying, "The question is, how did they get this information in the first ce? There must be a reason they know about this and came here."


    Qing Ao nodded in agreement, but there was also a touched look in his eyes.


    Lin Fan was silent for a while before saying with a sigh, "Regardless, I should go and meet with them to see what they want. If I know that, I can at least have an understanding of what they know and we can n forward from there." He revealed a smile and said, "For now, they won''t do anything to me since I am the heir of the Lin Astral Family, so you don''t need to worry about me."


    Qing Ao nodded again before saying, "Should we n out an escape just in case?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a serious look, "I won''t abandon you."


    Qing Ao was taken aback by how firm Lin Fan''s voice was when he said this.


    He opened his mouth to say something, but he could only open and close them a few times before finally saying, "Thank you."


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod before turning to Hong Long and saying, "I need you to tell me a bit more about the Dragon Race."


    Hong Long was pulled out of his thoughts with a surprised look, but he gave a slow nod in the end.


    Before this, Hong Long had avoided many of Lin Fan''s questions about the Dragon Race. Even if he wanted Lin Fan to bring Xiao Feng to the Dragon Race, he had avoided giving Lin Fan vital information about the Dragon Race.


    After all, he was still a part of the Dragon Race and he couldn''t betray them like this.


    But the situation had changed, so he had no choice but to tell them.


    This was Hong Long, one of the elders of the Dragon Race.


    The amount of secret information that he knew about the Dragon Race wasn''t small.

 Chapter 1002 Dragon Race’s Request (2)

    ?


    Two dayster, the meeting had been set with the Dragon Race envoys.


    The Lin Astral Emperor had been stalling them with lies that Lin Fan was busy recently because of the Beast Race invasion matters.


    The invasion of the Beast Race was something that had already spread not just across their Lin Astral Empire, but across many different Astral Empires, so it wasn''t as if the Dragon Race envoys didn''t know about this.


    In fact, even the Dragon Race had been bothered by this since it wasn''t just the Lin Astral Empire that had been invaded.


    No one knew what happened to the Beast Race, but they suddenly invaded several different tribes of the Myriad Race and several Astral Empires. And to everyone''s surprise, the Beast Race had been able to push back several of the groups that they invaded.


    One of the tribes of the Myriad Race that had been invaded was an ally of the Dragon Race, so they had no choice but to send reinforcements to them.


    So they knew just how bad the situation was and they knew that they couldn''t force the Lin Astral Empire to let them meet Lin Fan. So they patiently waited for Lin Fan to be free to meet them.


    If it was a normal envoy, the Lin Astral Emperor would have been able to stall much longer, but this wasn''t a normal envoy.


    These were subordinates of Qing Ao''s brother, so they were rather young dragons. They were much younger than the normal dragons that would have been sent as envoys.


    With their youth came impulsiveness¡­these young subordinates of Qing Ao''s brother didn''t have the same patience that the older envoys would have had.


    So by the second day, they were already getting very impatient and urgently requesting to meet Lin Fan.


    eaglesnov?1,§ão§® Lin Fan had nned on stalling for a few more days so he could get more information and make a better decision, but it seemed like the Dragon Race envoys couldn''t hold it in anymore.


    Since he didn''t want to cause any problems for the Lin Astral Empire, he decided to meet with them.


    The Dragon Race envoys were brought to this special meeting room that had been set and found that Lin Fan was sitting there.


    Lin Fan was the famous heir to the Lin Astral Empire, so people knew what he looked like from the pictures that had spread. So as soon as the Dragon Race envoys saw him, they knew who he was.


    So they sat down in front of him without making much of a fuss, but they sat there in silence. It was as if they were waiting for Lin Fan to make the first move.


    But Lin Fan also sat there in silence, casually sipping the tea in front of him as if he didn''t notice the envoysing in at all.


    It soon became a staring contest where one''s patience was tested.


    The patience of the envoys ran out first since they were impulsive youths in the first ce and they were the ones that had insisted on this meeting.


    One of the envoys who had blue hair cupped their hands and said, "Your highness, I am Qing Lan from the Azure Dragon Tribe."


    Lin Fan gave a simple nod when he heard this, still not intending to speak.


    There was a trace of annoyance that shed in this Qing Lan''s eyes when he heard this.


    It was almost as if Lin Fan wasn''t nning on giving him any face at all¡­but Qing Lan also couldn''t do anything to Lin Fan since he was the heir of the Lin Astral Family.


    Qing Lan might be the envoy from the Dragon Race, but the status between the two sides waspletely different. After all, he was an envoy of the Dragon Race and couldn''t represent the Dragon Race, let alone the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    On the other hand, Lin Fan was the prince of the Lin Astral Empire, with the trust of the Lin Astral Emperor, so he had actual power in the Lin Astral Empire.


    If Qing Lan were to offend Lin Fan in some way, he would be the one that suffered.


    So he endured his annoyance and anger and said, "Your highness, we''ve asked to meet with you today because we wanted to discuss an issue with you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod, still not saying a single thing.


    This time, it wasn''t just Qing Lan who was annoyed by this, but also the rest of the envoys from the Dragon Race. However, Qing Lan raised a hand to signal to them to calm down.


    While he was still as impulsive as the rest, he was also able to figure out what Lin Fan was doing.


    He wouldn''t let the rest of them fall into Lin Fan''s pace.


    So Qing Lan took out a picture and ced it on the table before saying, "Your highness, do you recognize the person in this picture?"


    Lin Fan looked down at it and as he had expected it was a picture of Qing Ao in his human form. However, his face was calm the entire time as he looked at the picture.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Seeing that there was no reaction from Lin Fan, Qing Lan couldn''t help being a bit surprised.


    However, he didn''t stop there as he said, "Your highness, the one in the picture is called Qing Ao as you already know and I hope that you will hand this traitor to our tribe over."


    He didn''t dare say this in amanding tone since it was Lin Fan, but there was a firm tone to his voice as well.


    Lin Fan didn''t show any emotions again, but he couldn''t help being a bit taken aback deep down.


    As he had already somewhat expected, this matter was rted to Qing Ao.


    However, he never thought that the envoys would be so direct about it.


    For them to be this direct, they either had to be idiots or they had some kind of other n.


    Lin Fan looked at the envoys in front of him and thought¡­it was the former.


    They didn''t seem smart enough to have any other ns judging by what Lin Fan could read from them, so they must not have any other ns in the first ce. They were just trying to ce pressure on him or trying to catch him off guard by mentioning this name.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan''s mind and emotions were much deeper than theirs, so he didn''t react at all to this.


    He just calmly looked at the envoys without a single reaction to the demand that Qing Lan had just made.


    Even though it was the Dragon Race envoys that had made a demand of Lin Fan, they were the ones that were being pressured by Lin Fan who was just silently sitting there.


    The pressure that they felt from Lin Fan was so much that the envoys who had been standing up couldn''t help taking a step back.


    Finally, Qing Lan said, "Your highness, you should know that doing something like this will not bring any benefits to your Lin Astral Empire or your human race. We are just here asking for a simple¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan suddenly pped the table and said, "Are you threatening me?"


    The Dragon Race envoys werepletely caught off guard by this since they never expected such a strong reaction from Lin Fan.


    Qing Lan''s mouth was just stuck open as he didn''t know how to respond to this.


    Lin Fan had gone from the quiet and calm type to this explosive and angry type. It was just too much of a difference that they couldn''t even process it.


    But then Qing Lan said in a slightly panicked voice, "Your highness, of course we wouldn''t dare do that. We were just saying that it would be beneficial for your Lin Astral Empire to be owed a favour from our Dragon Race."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at Qing Lan and this put even more pressure on him.


    Qing Lan couldn''t help shrinking back into the couch that he sat on when he was hit with this pressure. However, he was also the leader of this group, so he couldn''t keep acting like this.


    So Qing Lan forced himself to sit up again.


    When he did, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Can you say that you can represent the Dragon Race?"


    Qing Lan opened his mouth as if he was going to respond, but then it seemed like his words got stuck in his mouth.


    He had been about to say "of course", but then he realized what Lin Fan was doing. If he really did say that, then that would be it for him.


    While they hade as the Dragon Race envoy, in truth, they were just here as the Azure Dragon Tribe''s envoys and it wasn''t even with the full power of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    They had onlye here with a few tricks that had been yed by the eldest son of the Azure Dragon Tribe''s leader, so they weren''t actually here officially.


    So if Qing Lan were to say this to the Lin Astral Empire and if this was spread, it would be over for him. The Dragon Race would cut all ties with him and he would even be hunted down for impersonating a real envoy of the Dragon Race.


    So no matter what he did, he couldn''t actually admit that he could represent the entire Dragon Race.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help giving a coldugh deep down.


    He was slowly forcing these envoys into the trap he had set for them.

 Chapter 1003 Dragon Race’s Request (3)

    ?


    Qing Lan was starting to sweat from the pressure that Lin Fan put on him.


    He just sat there with his mouth wide open, not knowing what to say.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan decided to put more pressure on him and stood up as he said, "I think we''re done here."


    When the Dragon Race envoys saw him standing up, they immediately came forward to stop him, but Qing Lan raised his hands to stop them. Instead, he said in a calm voice, "What do you want?"


    Lin Fan stopped moving when he heard this and he couldn''t help feeling a bit surprised.


    He had thought that there wouldn''t be any deep thoughts from these Dragon Race envoys, but it seemed like he had been wrong.


    It seemed that at the very least, Qing Lan was capable of some form of thought.


    Lin Fan turned around to look at Qing Lan with narrowed eyes after hearing this and Qing Lan couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his spine. It was almost as if he was prey that was being scoped out by a predator.


    He almost felt the urge to run, but he held that back and just sat there looking right back into Lin Fan''s eyes.


    Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod before saying, "I don''t know anything about a traitor, but why do you think that we have this "traitor" of yours here?"


    Hearing the slightly more gentle tone that seemed like he was more willing to cooperate. Qing Lan felt a bit of hope. So Qing Lan said, "Your highness, my tone was a bit too harsh earlier. I was just too agitated because of the pressure that my superiors have ced on me. I hope that you will forgive me."


    Then with a hesitant and cautious look, he continued, "Your highness, before I answer that question, can you please promise me one thing?"


    Lin Fan calmly looked at him without giving a response, but this was more than enough for Qing Lan.


    Qing Lan asked, "Can we ensure that the contents of this meeting will never be spread? This is a matter of utmost importance for our Dragon Race, so I hope that you will understand that."


    Lin Fan didn''t show any expressions, but he gave a coldugh deep down.


    This brat, he was trying to cover up for his mistakes from earlier.


    After all, even if he didn''t say that he could represent the entire Dragon Race, the things that he said already was more than enough for him to be executed several times over. So he wanted to make sure that no one would ever know about this, so he could wipe his own butt.


    But of course, Lin Fan had no reason to oblige to this¡­


    Qing Lan also knew this, so while he asked this question, he smoothly took out a crystal that he ced on the table.


    This was a dragon vein crystal.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he was surprised that this Qing Lan would be this generous.


    e¦Áglesn?¦Íel After all, dragons were well known for their love of treasures and their natural tendency to hoard things. It was said that dragons were willing to go all out instead of paying with treasures.


    So anything that could get a dragon to give up part of their treasure was considered very valuable.


    And of course, there was nothing more valuable than one''s life.


    But Lin Fan didn''t react again.


    When Qing Lan saw this, he couldn''t help revealing an ugly look, but he also knew what Lin Fan was implying.


    So with a pained look on his face, his hand moved across the table and soon there was another crystal just like the one from before beside the one already on the table.


    Lin Fan once again didn''t react at all when he saw this.


    Qing Lan''s expression turned even more ugly after seeing this, but this time¡­he went all out and brought three more crystals out.


    Lin Fan finally reacted after seeing this.


    He could tell that based on the look on Qing Lan''s face, this was his bottom line. Even if he pushed him any further, he wouldn''t have anything else to take out.


    So Lin Fan came back and sat down with a smile on his face as he said, "Of course, this is an important matter to the Dragon Race. We can''t just let anyone know about this."


    As he said this, he waved his hand to the attendant beside him and the attendant quickly erased the footage of everything recorded in this room in front of them.


    While this happened, he waved his hand across the table and the five crystals lying there disappeared.


    With how smoothly they disappeared, it was as if they had never been there in the first ce.


    Seeing this, Qing Lan couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Now that his ass had been covered, it was time for him to finish what he started.


    Qing Lan turned back to Lin Fan with a serious look and said, "Your highness, we have suspicions that the traitor is here because of what happened on the Gctic Humanity Alliance."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a sigh deep down when he heard this.


    As he had expected, it really was because of what happened there.


    That was the only time that Qing Ao had made a public appearance and he had thought that it would be fine since it was just a lower realm, but it seemed like Qing Ao''s brother really didn''t hold back.


    Even a small rumour on a minor realm was something that he would follow up on like this.


    Lin Fan then said, "And what about this Gctic Humanity Alliance?"


    Qing Lan was once again taken aback when he heard this.


    He thought that by revealing this trump card of his, he would be able to evoke some kind of reaction from Lin Fan. He never thought that Lin Fan would ask him this question with such a deadpan expression.


    Still, he didn''t hold back as he said, "Your highness, Qing Ao''s appearance on the Gctic Humanity Alliance was as your¡­"


    He didn''t finish his sentence, but it was clear what he was saying.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at Qing Lan which caused a chill to run down the spines of the Dragon Race envoys again. Then he said in a clearly impatient voice, "That was a temporary contract created with a dragon that I found in the wild. I have no idea where that dragon went after that."


    Qing Lan and the other envoys all knitted their brows when they heard this.


    With the way that Lin Fan said this, it seemed very likely that it was the truth.


    But their job was to find where Qing Ao was and this was the only lead that they had right now. They couldn''t just give up this lead that easily, even if the other side was the heir of the Lin Astral Family.


    Qing Lan softened his voice and asked in a voice filled with entreaty, "Your highness, do you know where you left that dragon? Any clues that you have will be helpful."


    Lin Fan gave a shrug that made it seem like he really didn''t care about this as he said, "I said before that it was just a temporary contract. You should know that I was sent away to an unknown ce after that incident. When I was in the middle of nowhere, the temporary contracts were released and they wandered off on their own."


    Qing Lan and the envoys knitted their brows even more when they heard this.


    Qing Lan wanted to say something, but he didn''t know what to say in response to this.


    Finally he said, "Can you at least tell us around which area younded so we can search the area for traces of the traitor?" Then in a serious voice, he said, "This will be something that will be remembered forever by the Azure Dragon Tribe."


    Once again, Lin Fan was surprised by these words.


    "Azure Dragon Tribe", that was the tribe that Qing Ao was from.


    Instead of saying that this will be a favour to the Dragon Race, this Qing Lan was saying that it was a favour to the Azure Dragon Tribe. It seemed like hepletely threw aside the idea of hiding it from Lin Fan and was putting all his cards down on the table.


    He knew that it was impossible for him to outsmart Lin Fan, so there was no need for him to try.


    He was going to use pure honesty to move Lin Fan.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan wasn''t moved at all by this.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Qing Lan with narrowed eyes as his brain kept thinking about all the possibilities.


    In the end, he narrowed it down to two¡­this Qing Lan was either a schemer or an idiot.


    No, he was an idiot.


    That was what he had established before and he didn''t change his mind on this now.


    Since he was an idiot, then Lin Fan would treat him like an idiot.


    Lin Fan randomly picked out a ce that was far away from the Lin Astral Empire and gave it to Qing Lan.


    When Qing Lan received this, he was surprised that Lin Fan would actually give him this information without making a demand first.


    Lin Fan just said with a smile, "I''m looking forward to what you will repay me with."


    Qing Lan gave a strong nod before saying, "Your highness, we will not disappoint."

 Chapter 1004 More Visitors From The Myriad Race

    ?


    After the Dragon Race envoy left, Lin Fan thought that it would be over.


    However, a few days after the Dragon Race envoys left in search of the fake trail Lin Fan gave them, there were more visitors that arrived.


    They were still from the Myriad Races, but this time, they were from the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race.


    Just like the Dragon Race, they requested an audience with Lin Fan.


    Unlike the Dragon Race, they didn''t push for the audience and waited for Lin Fan to be free.


    It was clear that they hade with different intentionspared to the Dragon Race.


    But to confirm, Lin Fan still checked with Feng Ling and Lei Ting.


    Neither of them had any ideas as to why the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race would send envoys here, but¡­Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that their answers were suspicious.


    While he was talking to them, it almost seemed like they were hiding something.


    But since they weren''t willing to tell him, it wasn''t as if he could force them to say anything.


    So he didn''t waste any time and met with the envoys. Of course, he did it separately so that he wouldn''t be rude and could stop them from ganging up on him.


    The first group that he met was the Phoenix Race group. It was for no reason other than the fact that they had arrived first.


    When he was in the room with the Phoenix Race envoys, he was surprised to find that they were all female. They were all beautiful red haired women in flowing red dresses.


    This was very strange since Lin Fan knew that there were many kinds of phoenixes that were a part of the Phoenix Race. So for all of the envoys that came to be fire phoenixes¡­there had to be a reason.


    Not to mention, Feng Ling was also a fire phoenix.


    When they sat down, Lin Fan was surprised by their request.


    e¦Áglesn?¦Íel "Your highness, do you know the whereabouts of Qing Ao?" The leader of the group Feng Yue asked.


    Lin Fan was surprised since he never thought that they would ask him about Qing Ao. He had been certain that they had been here for Feng Ling, but now that didn''t seem to be the case.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t know what rtion this Phoenix Race group had with the Dragon Race group that came before, so he just shook his head and said, "I have no idea who that is."


    Feng Yue knitted her brows when she heard this before waving her hand at one of her subordinates. That subordinate came over and ced a piece of paper in her hand which she ced on the table in front of her.


    Lin Fan looked down at it and found that it was a picture of him and Qing Ao together when they were fighting back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Feng Yue didn''t say a thing after cing this picture on the table and just waited for Lin Fan''s reaction.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes as he looked at the picture before looking up at Feng Yue.


    He had mistakenly used the same attitude when dealing with the Dragon Race group to deal with this Phoenix Race group. However, it was clear from this single move that they were onpletely different levels.


    It was clear that this Phoenix Race group wasn''t as dumb as the Dragon Race group.


    He had thought that there wouldn''t be any physical evidence like this since the Dragon Race group had never brought out anything, but now that didn''t seem to be the case.


    So Lin Fan asked, "What are you asking this for?"


    Feng Yue calmly said, "We have a matter that we need to settle with Qing Ao, nothing more, nothing less."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help finding the way that she said this strange.


    It seemed calm on the surface, but for some reason, he could hear a bit of anger in her voice. It was almost as if she was repressing some kind of hidden anger towards Qing Ao.


    But why would she be angry towards Qing Ao?


    There were many things that Lin Fan couldn''t understand about this, but he still had to handle this matter.


    So he chose to give the same excuse that he gave the Dragon Race, even if he wasn''t sure if they would buy it.


    "I established a temporary contract with this dragon back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance because of the circumstances. However, after it was broken, it wandered off and I have no idea where it went." Lin Fan said in a calm voice.


    Feng Yue narrowed her eyes to look at him, as if she didn''t believe his words.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked back at her without showing any emotions at all.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Finally, Feng Yue said, "Is that so?"


    Lin Fan once again looked back at her with the same calm look on his face.


    After a long period of silence, Feng Yue finally raised her hand out towards her subordinate again. The subordinate took out another two pieces of paper that they ced in her hand which Feng Yue then ced on the table.


    Lin Fan looked down at the two pieces of paper and found that these were also pictures.


    This time, they were pictures of him with Feng Ling and Lei Ting.


    Feng Yue then asked, "What about these two? Do you know where these two have gone?"


    This time, Lin Fan wasn''t surprised since he had expected this already.


    Well, he didn''t expect the Phoenix Race group to be interested in Lei Ting, but he knew that they would be interested in Feng Ling.


    However, the strange thing was that there was no hostility in Feng Yue''s voice when she asked this. It was as if she only had hostility towards Qing Ao and she was genuinely concerned about Feng Ling and Lei Ting.


    Still, Lin Fan wouldn''t be convinced that easily.


    So he said the same thing, "I don''t know anything about these two either. The only rtionship between us is that I formed a temporary contract when I was on the Gctic Humanity Alliance. I think that since you were able to find out that I had a temporary contract with them, you should know the circumstances that led up to it."


    Lin Fan left it there, not willing to give them any extra information.


    The Phoenix Race group just looked at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes as if they were trying to see through him.


    But they couldn''t see a single thing wrong with what he said.


    Indeed, they had already investigated this matter and they knew what the story behind it was. They had talked to all the people that Lin Fan had gotten close to during his stay in the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so they knew that Lin Fan had only formed these contracts during the war.


    There was nothing that they had found that suggested Lin Fan had formed these contracts before the war.


    This was a race that was powerful enough that even Astral Empires would be careful of them, so their intelligenceworks were not things to look down on.


    So in the end, they had no choice but to stop their questioning of Lin Fan.


    They chose to use the soft method just like the Dragon Race group had done and asked Lin Fan where was thest ce that he had seen these three.


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan decided to not give the same ce that he had given the Dragon Race since that ce was actually a trap that he had set for them. It was a ce that was very dangerous, but he knew that the Dragon Race would still send people to check.


    He just wanted them to suffer a bit since there was a bad rtionship between Qing Ao and the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    But it was different for this Phoenix Tribe.


    As far as he could tell, there wasn''t a hostile rtionship between Feng Ling and the Phoenix Tribe, so he had no reason to punish them with this trap.


    So he told them a random ce that was far enough that it would take a while for them to check. After all, it wasn''t as if he was going to remain idle after the Phoenix Race had already made their move.


    By the time that they finished checking, it would already be toote.


    With this, they ended the meeting and Lin Fan sent them off.


    But before the Phoenix Race group left, Feng Yue suddenly turned around to face Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being caught off guard when he saw her doing this and he was about to ask what she wanted, but she spoke first.


    "Please, if you have any information about my sister Feng Ling, I ask that you pass it to me." As she said this, Feng Yue even went as far as bowing her head.


    Luckily there was no one around to see this or they certainly would have misunderstood the situation.


    Even the rest of the red haired girls from the Phoenix Race couldn''t help being shocked by this.


    Before Lin Fan could ask anything else, Feng Yue had already stood up and started walking away.


    As she left, Lin Fan couldn''t help noticing a few sparkles in the air that instantly turned into vapor.


    He wasn''t a fool¡­he could tell that she had been crying when she said those words.


    This just made him even more and more confused.

 Chapter 1005 Situation Of The Qilin And Phoenix Races

    ?


    After the meeting with the Phoenix Race, Lin Fan also met with the Qilin Race.


    The representative of that group was a young man called Lei Feng.


    The strange thing was that¡­this person looked very simr to Lei Ting.


    The request that they had for him was very simr to the one that the Phoenix Race made.


    They took out the same picture of Qing Ao that the Phoenix Race had done, as well as the two pictures of Feng Ling and Lei Ting, but the difference was that they cared more about Lei Ting.


    When it was over, Lei Feng had asked the same thing as Feng Yue, but of course it was about Lei Ting.


    He asked Lin Fan to give him any information that he had on his big sister, Lei Ting.


    After meeting with these two groups, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling more and more confused.


    It was clear that there was a backstory here that he didn''t know.


    eaglesnov?1,§ão§® So without hesitation, Lin Fan went to find the three who had caused all of this.


    When Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting heard about all of this, they couldn''t help revealing awkward looks. They just sat there looking down, as if they were afraid to speak.


    But Lin Fan wouldn''t allow them to get away with this.


    So he said in a clear and frank voice, "Exin."


    Qing Ao looked up first as he gave a cough and then said with a sigh, "It''s a long story¡­"


    Lin Fan just looked at him with a calm look and said, "We have time."


    Qing Ao revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he had no choice but to exin.


    The matter with the Dragon Race was clear since he had already exined it to Lin Fan.


    It was a matter of session where Qing Ao''s father didn''t want his elder son to seed the Azure Dragon Tribe since his elder son was in the pro war faction, while he was in the against war faction.


    But the elder son didn''t remain idle and was making moves to take over the tribe, even with his father working against him.


    Which was why he had sent these envoys to find Qing Ao since he knew that Qing Ao was working on something secret for their father.


    As for the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race¡­


    After thinking about it, the only exnation that they had was that they were here for Feng Ling and Lei Ting.


    Lin Fan was confused when he heard this.


    He asked, "Didn''t they follow you on their own free will? Why would their ns care about them being out on their own and want to find them?"


    Qing Ao said with an awkward smile, "It''s moreplicated than that."


    Lin Fan just waited for him to exin.


    The story was¡­


    Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting were three talented youngsters of their respective ns a long time ago. Because of the rtionships between their races, they were introduced to each other and became friends.


    Or rather, Feng Ling and Lei Ting both fell in love with Qing Ao and wouldn''t leave him no matter what anyone said.


    But that wasn''t in the best interest of the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race.


    So they had been separated in the end by their parents and they were locked up in their tribes.


    Butter, Qing Ao had been sent out because of his big brother''s ambitions of taking over the tribe, so he was allowed to go free.


    To follow him, Feng Ling and Lei Ting both made deals with their tribes so that they would be allowed to go free as well. They had mated with mates chosen by the tribe and had provided heirs to take their position before being allowed to go free.


    They both had two children and their elder sons had remained in the tribe, being looked after by the elders of the tribe and raised to be the future heirs.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Qing Ao when he heard this.


    Qing Ao nodded and said with a bitter smile, "It was the same for me, Bao Lan is my younger child and my eldest son is still under the care of my father."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help shaking his head when he heard this.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    He really didn''t understand what the elders of these tribes were thinking, but there was nothing that he could do to change their minds in the first ce, so he just threw those thoughts out.


    Lin Fan then asked, "Since you''ve already made a deal with your tribes, why are they looking for you now?"


    Both Feng Ling and Lei Ting knitted their brows when they heard this and after thinking for a bit, they both shook their heads.


    This was also the thing that confused them.


    By all right, their races shouldn''t be looking for them since they already had someone to take their ce. So why did they send these envoys after them for just a small trail that almost had no hopes of finding them?


    It was almost as if they were desperate to find them.


    After thinking for a while longer, they finally came to the conclusion, "Something must have happened with the Phoenix and Qilin Races."


    But the problem was that they had no way of finding out what it was.


    They had already left their tribes, so they no longer had ess to the resources that they once had. They couldn''t use the intelligenceworks of the Phoenix or Qilin Races.


    However, they had forgotten one thing.


    Lin Fan was the heir of the Lin Astral Family and he was able to use the resources of the Lin Astral Family.


    The Lin Astral Empire was a power that even the Phoenix and Qilin Races were cautious of, so of course their intelligenceworks wouldn''t be weak.


    Lin Fan just had to make a simple request to the intelligence agency to get the information that he wanted. There was no dy at all since everyone already knew his power in the Lin Astral Empire.


    But there wasn''t as much information as he had hoped.


    Still, that wasn''t strange since this was information about the secrets of the Phoenix and Qilin Races, it wasn''t something that was that easy to get. All that was included in the report was superficial information about the Phoenix and Qilin Races.


    Just with this though, Feng Ling and Lei Ting were able to pick up some clues that helped them figure out the situation.


    Both the Red Phoenix Tribe and the Purple Thunder Qilin Tribe had their leaders reced some time ago.


    The leaders of those two tribes had been Feng Ling and Lei Ting''s mothers. So the ones that reced them were most likely the children that they had left behind, both of their elder sons.


    Now that these two tribes were looking for the two of them, it was clear that it had something to do with this.


    As for what their sons were nning, that was something that they couldn''t tell.


    Even though they had given birth to these two, they didn''t have any interaction with these two children. They had left them to be raised by the elders of the tribe, so they didn''t know what kind of personalities they had.


    These two could be looking for them for revenge or they could be looking for them because they wanted to be a family again. They just couldn''t tell unless they knew more information.


    But if they had to guess what it was, it was most likely for revenge.


    After all, these two had been used by Feng Ling and Lei Ting as a tool for them to escape their ns to follow Qing Ao.


    So they should be filled with hatred towards Feng Ling and Lei Ting.


    That should also be why they were chasing after Qing Ao, since he was the root cause of all of this. If they hadn''t met Qing Ao, perhaps they would have happily followed the ns of their tribes and lived happy lives with their children back in the n.


    Perhaps they would have be the leaders of these two tribes since they were the most talented youths in their generation.


    However, they abandoned their child and their tribe to chase after Qing Ao¡­


    After Qing Ao learned this, he couldn''t help feeling guilty.


    It wasn''t as if he didn''t feel anything towards the two, but¡­the circumstances had made it hard for him to ept them. Not to mention that he had also gotten another wife and had children with her.


    So when he learned of all the trouble that he had caused, he couldn''t help feeling guilty.


    He wanted to say something, but the two of them immediately made him shut his mouth by telling him that it was their choice.


    Still, Qing Ao had a guilty look for the rest of the time.


    After learning all of this, Lin Fan decided to have the Lin Astral Empire''s intelligencework look deeper into this situation. They needed more information about these two tribes before they could make a move.


    He just hoped that it was thetter rather than the former since he didn''t want to have to deal with the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race while dealing with the Dragon Race.


    Each one of these races could put pressure on the Lin Astral Empire alone, so all three of theming at once would be considered a disaster.

 Chapter 1006 New Cultivation Realm

    ?


    Once that had been settled, Lin Fan went back to the shop to see how it was going.


    It had been a long time since he had been in the shop since there were just so many things for him to do, so he hadn''t been able to find the time to head on down.


    He had left the shop in the hands of his cousins from the Lin Astral Family, along with a few of Momonga''s ghost maids to watch over them.


    When he walked in, he couldn''t help being surprised by how busy it was.


    Even though the items on the shelves had clearly been sold out already, there were still people gathering in the store.


    To his surprise, he found that there was a screen that they were all watching.


    On that screen, there was a live feed of the arena downstairs where there were people fighting in what seemed to be a cage match. As he looked carefully, he recognized a few of these people.


    These were the sons and daughters of the nobles who kept bothering him.


    They were now fighting each other with their pets inside of the arena.


    Lin Fan was very confused as to what was happening, but when he looked around to find his cousins sitting there with smiles on their faces and crystals in their hands, it wasn''t hard to guess what had happened.


    He was actually amazed that they had this kind of courage to do something like this in his store.


    Still, he actually wasn''t against it.


    When he walked over, the cousins were surprised to see him and they quickly scrambled to put away the crystals in their hands. But before they could, Lin Fan reached his hand out and said, "Where''s my cut?"


    The cousins all revealed shocked looks when they heard this.


    They never thought that this was the first thing that Lin Fan would ask them.


    They all thought that he would immediately chew them out for doing something like this in his store without permission, but now it seemed like he wasn''t made at all.


    Lin Hong, who was the one that led them, looked at Lin Fan with narrowed eyes before asking, "How much do you want?"


    Lin Fan immediately, "90-10, in and simple."


    They couldn''t help revealing ugly looks when they heard this.


    They had thought that Lin Fan would have some kind of restraint, but he didn''t hold back from gouging thempletely. At the very least, wasn''t it courtesy to ask for half and then slowly negotiate from there?


    After all, they were the ones that did all the work setting this up!


    But seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, they knew better than to argue with him.


    Lin Fan was the only person that could tame the scions of the Lin Astral Family like this because he was the top of these scions. He was the one that had received the acknowledgement of the Lin Astral Emperor and was deemed as the heir to the family.


    Not to mention, there wasn''t a single one of them who could beat Lin Fan in a fight in the first ce. They couldn''t win even after ganging up on him.


    Even if Lin Fan hadn''te to the store to check on them, he had been holding the training sessions just like before. If they didn''te, he would send the Lin Astral Family guards to drag them to the training area.


    So they had no choice but to get beaten up by Lin Fan.


    They did get stronger with the training sessions, but they found that they still couldn''t do anything to Lin Fan.


    So in their hearts, they started acknowledging his position as their leader.


    In the end, they just handed over the crystals with bitter smiles on their faces.


    Lin Fan pocketed those crystals without a single moment of hesitation before heading into the back.


    As he left, the cousins all cursed him under their breath for being heartless and cruel.


    But before he went into the back, one of them couldn''t help asking, "Cousin Fan, what is the situation of the frontline?"


    As members of the Lin Astral Family, they naturally knew about the Beast Race invasion. No, even if they weren''t members of the Lin Astral Family, they would still know since news of this level would be hard to hide.


    There were plenty of newspapers that had already dug this out, so they were all preparing the articles for when the Lin Astral Family allowed them to announce this. As for announcing it before receiving the go ahead from the Lin Astral Family, they weren''t crazy.


    They knew that if they did anything to mess with the Lin Astral Family like this, they would have no future in this Lin Astral Empire.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    So of course not a single newspaper dared release an article.


    But there were plenty of ways for this information to slip and it didn''t take long before the rumour had filled the entire Lin Astral Empire.


    Lin Fan looked at this cousin for a bit before saying, "Grandfather is leading the charge, so there shouldn''t be any problems."


    After hearing this, the cousins couldn''t help looking more relieved.


    They knew what this Beast Race invasion meant for their Lin Astral Empire and they were afraid of what woulde. They were members of the Lin Astral Family after all and it was their duty.


    However, there were a few of them that looked much more relieved than the others.


    After all, this was something that affected the entire Lin Astral Empire, so if the war efforts went poorly, then they would be called upon to defend the Lin Astral Empire. It was their duty as the Lin Astral Family, so they couldn''t run from the fight even if they wanted to.


    The ones that looked much more relieved were the ones that were afraid of the war, afraid of fighting.


    It wasn''t that they wereplete cowards, but they didn''t have any experience with this at all.


    They had experience fighting beasts, but that was in a protected environment with their escorts. They knew that if they were to fight in the war, it would bepletely different.


    So they were afraid of being sent to the frontlines.


    Just like how there were a few that were relieved, there were also a few that looked disappointed.


    These were the ones that had been looking forward to being deployed to the battlefield.


    While they were happy to see that their Lin Astral Empire''s armies were pushing back the invading Beast Race, they had wanted to fight on the battlefield to build up their reputation.


    Since the Beast Race was being pushed back, that meant that they wouldn''t have a chance to go to the battlefield, so they couldn''t help feeling a bit disappointed.


    But that was it, just a bit of disappointment at how weak the Beast Race was.


    All of them were still proud of the strength of their Lin Astral Empire.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan just gave a nod before heading into the back.


    He knew that there were different kinds of people in the family, so he wouldn''t judge those that had the courage and those thatcked it.


    As for the side business that they were running, he had even less of a reason to care about that since it was actually good for his business.


    All of his products were being sold out, so there was nothing for them to do for the rest of the day. However, they had found a way to drive customers into the store even if there were no products on the shelves.


    The arena was the one thing that could be freely used in Lin Fan''s store, as long as one paid a fee.


    Of course they didn''t dare skimp on this fee, so they paid the fees for the ones that fought in the arena. Naturally, they earned all of that back from the admission fee that they charged to watch the fight in the arena and all of the betting earnings that they made.


    That was right, the people watching were all betting on the people fighting in the arena.


    As for the ones fighting, they were getting a cut of the betting earnings as prize money for the fight and at the same time, they were establishing their reputation.


    This was a store run by the Lin Astral Family as far as they were concerned, so those that fought and won here would receive recognition from all because of the fame of the Lin Astral Family. That was why the sons and daughters of the nobles all fought here.


    It didn''t take long before the fighting arena here was known as the proving grounds of the future generation of the Lin Astral Empire.


    They even thought that this was the reason why it had been set up.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop them because not only did it drive people to the store, it also increased his earnings since normally people rarely used the arena. Even if it had good facilities, there were plenty of ces like this that were much cheaper to use.


    But with the crowd that it drew, he was certain that plenty of people would keeping to use this arena. Not to mention that he could see his points increasing.


    So he was actually proud of the one that thought of this idea.


    As he headed to the back, he suddenly heard a notification from the system.


    "New special cultivation realm has been released."

 Chapter 1007 Dragon Stone

    ?


    "Another new special cultivation realm?" Lin Fan couldn''t help saying to himself.


    He quickly opened up the panel and he was shocked when he saw what the newly released special cultivation realm was.


    He couldn''t help staring at the panel in front of him with a very confused look before that confused look turned into a look of doubt.


    After staring for a bit, he couldn''t help asking, "System, are you sentient?"


    Because that was the only thing that he could think of when he saw what this special cultivation realm was.


    The system answered, "The system only has the artificial intelligence given by the gods to run the system. The system does not have the "sentience" that you are referring to."


    It was a mechanical voice, but Lin Fan was filled with doubt when he heard this.


    After all, the new special cultivation realm was called "Dragon Race Cultivation Realm".


    The system was clearly trying to send Lin Fan to the Dragon Race''s homeworld after what had happened with the Dragon Race''s envoys.


    The more Lin Fan thought about it, the more certain that he was of his doubts.


    Every time something seemed to happen to him, the system would give him some kind of mission to help him. It was as if the system was purposefully guiding him to a single target.


    No, rather it seemed like it was getting rid of his worries so that he could focus on achieving what the system wanted him to achieve.


    It almost seemed like he was ying into the palms of the system.


    If that was the case, could it be that the system wasn''t a blessing, but rather a trap?


    The more that Lin Fan thought about this, the more he thought that this was the truth.


    That was until the system suddenly said, "This system was designed to guide you in your new life, this system does not have any malicious intent towards the host. The system is just taking steps to help relieve you of any troubles you face."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being taken aback when he heard this.


    As he had expected, the system really was sentient to a certain extent and he had even confirmed that it was able to read his mind.


    But when he heard what the system said, he couldn''t help wanting to believe it a bit.


    If it had wanted to hurt him, it could have left him to die in many different situations.


    Like back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance¡­


    If it had just left him, he would have already died at the hands of that Huang Xiao Hou.


    He didn''t know what had saved him at first, but he had figured out that it was the system in the end.


    There were also many other times where he had been saved by the system.


    Just recently, the Outer God fragment¡­


    There were many times where he would have died without the system, so if it wanted to hurt him, it wouldn''t have bothered saving him all those times.


    As for the system''s mysterious goal¡­he had no ideas at all.


    So for now, he decided to trust the system.


    After this thought passed through his mind, he turned his attention back to this special cultivation realm.


    ¡­


    Deep inside of Lin Fan, inside of the golden pce.


    The golden version of Lin Fan had been watching everything through the screen in front of him. There was also a voice that sounded like Lin Fan''s voice that was narrating all of his thoughts.


    After hearing Lin Fan make up his mind about trusting the system, the golden version of Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief.


    If Lin Fan wasn''t willing to follow the n that they had set, then all of this would be meaningless. This n was pivoted on the fact that Lin Fan would be willing to help them, so if he wasn''t¡­


    That was also why he had released all of those missions helping Lin Fan.


    He had wanted to help him take care of all his worries so that Lin Fan could focus on the main mission that he had for him.


    But he now realized that was a mistake since it just made him seem even more suspicious.


    If he had been a bit patient, everything would have worked out in the end.


    However, with the increasing signs of Outers that he was seeing through Lin Fan''s eyes, he knew that the time that they had was limited.


    It seemed that the Outers were getting more impatient as well since they weren''t keeping the covenant that they had made.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    So it didn''t seem like he had time to wait for Lin Fan to follow the n.


    ¡­


    Since he had made up his mind about going to this special cultivation realm, the first thing that he had to do was discuss this with Qing Ao and the others.


    He wanted to find information about the Dragon Race''s homeworld while at the same time, he wanted to discuss with them what he should do if he went there.


    After all, if he went there now, he wouldn''t have any kind of goal in the first ce.


    But to his surprise, when he met with Qing Ao and the others, Qing Ao actually told him¡­


    "There''s no reason for you to go."


    Lin Fan revealed a confused look when he heard this and he waited for Qing Ao to exin.


    Qing Ao gave a sigh and said, "What are you nning on doing there? Are you going to kill my brother and all of his men?"


    Lin Fan suddenly revealed a look of understanding as he realized that Qing Ao was right. Even if he were to go there, it wasn''t as if there was anything that he could do since this was a political matter.


    Only if he had some way of helping Qing Ao''s father take down Qing Ao''s brother in a righteous manner would he have a reason to go there. Otherwise, he would just be trespassing on thends of the Dragon Race for no reason.


    In fact, it would even make the Dragon Race more cautious if he were to go there unannounced and it was found out.


    Lin Fan had just assumed that since it was something that the system had given him, there would be a solution from the system for this matter. But he realized that he hadpletely underestimated the situation.


    He couldn''t helpining about the system in the back of his mind.


    But when he did, there was a sudden notification from the system again.


    It was another mission being released.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard by this sudden mission, but when he looked at it to see what it was, he couldn''t help being even more shocked.


    Qing Ao and the others were also caught off guard when they saw the sudden change in Lin Fan''s expression.


    Qing Ao looked at Lin Fan with a concerned look and asked, "Are you good? Is there something wrong?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer at first as he read the mission details and then he said, "What is the Dragon Stone?"


    Qing Ao was shocked to hear this, clearly never expecting Lin Fan to suddenly ask this question.


    After a moment of silence, Qing Ao suddenly asked, "How do you know about the Dragon Stone?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer as he waited for Qing Ao to answer his question.


    Qing Ao narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan as if he was starting to doubt him, but after a while, he said with a sigh, "You really should give an exnation. The Dragon Stone is a secret that few people in the Dragon Race know about."


    But he also didn''t wait for Lin Fan to respond as he said, "The Dragon Stone is a treasure passed down in the Dragon Race that had the ability to purify bloodlines. However, it was lost a few generations back when it was in the hands of our Azure Dragon Tribe. Because of this, our Azure Dragon Tribe lost our standing in the Dragon Race for a few generations until my father''s generation. With my father''s power, he was able to bring our Azure Dragon Tribe back into the ranks of the top tribes, but if we could get the Dragon Stone back¡­"


    His voice trailed off when he said this.


    Then he continued, "So that was why I was sent to the Gctic Humanity Alliance since we heard rumours that the Dragon Stone was found near that area."


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "What if I told you that the Dragon Stone is still on the Dragon Race homeworld?"


    Qing Ao revealed a shocked look before revealing a look of doubt as he asked, "How do you know this?"


    Lin Fan just said with a secretive smile, "I have my ways."


    Qing Ao deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    From what he knew about Lin Fan, he knew that Lin Fan wasn''t someone to joke about things like this.


    Since he was saying this, it was very likely that the Dragon Stone was on the Dragon Race homeworld and he knew where it was.


    Hong Long narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before asking, "Is it the master of the store?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this, but it was clear by the look on his face what the answer was.


    After seeing this, Hong Long looked at Qing Ao and said, "I''ll leave this decision to you."


    He did want to go back to the Dragon Race homeworld since he wanted to bring Xiao Feng back, but he also knew how dangerous it was right now. So he would leave everything to Qing Ao who knew the best.


    After hesitating a bit, Qing Ao gave a nod and said, "Let''s go."

 Chapter 1008 Restoring Body

    ?


    Lin Fan nodded in agreement to this before turning to look at Hong Long.


    Hong Long was surprised by Lin Fan''s gaze falling on him and seeing that he wasn''t saying anything, he couldn''t help asking, "What is it?"


    Lin Fan looked at him in silence for a bit before saying, "We should reconstruct your body before we go there."


    Hong Long was taken aback when he heard this, but then he said, "You can do that?"


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this and pulled out a puppet that was shaped like a dragon.


    Hong Long had a skeptical look on his face when he saw this, but when he looked more closely at the puppet, he couldn''t help revealing a shocked look. That was because he could tell that this puppet wasn''t a normal thing.


    This puppet was made of something that he had never seen before, but he could tell that it was a special material that could ept soul fragments, helping them recover. He could even feel his power returning just by being near this puppet.


    He didn''t know where Lin Fan got this thing, but he had a guess who was the one that made it.


    It was very likely the expert of the store, who was also Lin Fan''s master.


    He was confused why the expert would suddenly make this thing for him, but he chose not to question it. After all, it wasn''t his ce to question the intentions of the expert. All he could do was be a good pawn in the expert''s n.


    Since the expert was willing to help him rebuild his body now, there was no reason for him to reject it.


    So without hesitation, Hong Long allowed the soul fragment inside the dragon scale to be absorbed by the puppet.


    As soon as the soul fragment was absorbed, the dragon shaped puppet started to change.


    There had been no colour to this dragon shaped puppet before and it was apletely ck white canvas. But the moment that Hong Long''s soul fragment was absorbed by the dragon shaped puppet, it started changing colours.


    It was a faint pink at first, but it became darker and darker until it became a red colour that was as red as mes.


    At the same time, the small dragon shaped puppet grew in size until it was arge dragon that took up arge part of the room.


    But the most shocking thing about this dragon puppet was the aura that was leaking out from it.


    This aura wasn''t at the level of a Ruler yet, but it was very close.


    If Lin Fan hadn''t thought to put up a barrier to block this aura before meeting with them, it would have caused a veryrge scene. After all, this was a foreign aura that appeared in the Lin Astral Empire, it would have been taken as an enemy attack.


    Finally, the dragon puppet stopped growing and instead shrank.


    It continued to shrink until it was the size of a human. It even transformed into the shape of a human, but it couldn''t be seen clearly because there was ayer of red light around the figure.


    When the red light vanished, Hong Long in his human form was standing there.


    This was a figure that they were all familiar with since they had already seen him many times, but it wasn''t transparent like it was normally when he was in soul form.


    Afterbining his soul fragment with the puppet, he had an actual body now.


    The only problem was that his cultivation was still weak.


    Based on the aura, it was clear that Hong Long hadn''t recovered his full power and was only in the World Realm. To be precise, Hong Long was currently in the Peak Sun Realm, only a step away from the Ruler Realm.


    Hong Long just stood there looking at his hands, clenching them as if he was testing this new body of his. After standing there in silence for a bit, he said, "It''ll take some time, but I can feel my powers recovering."


    That was right, even they could feel it.


    With each second that passed, the aura that came from Hong Long became stronger and stronger, as if it was slowly growing.


    Lin Fan could tell at this rate that it wouldn''t take him long before reaching the Ruler Realm.


    So Lin Fan immediately pulled out a contract for Hong Long to sign.


    Hong Long was surprised to see this contract, but when he read it, he couldn''t help being surprised by what it was.


    It wasn''t a pet contract, but rather an employment contract for the store.


    Since Lin Fan had upgraded the store, he had gained new employee slots that he still hadn''t used yet. Or rather, he hadn''t found anyone that he thought was worthy of using these employee slots on.


    But Hong Long was definitely worthy of this.


    He was a Ruler that was on the same level as Ang or Momonga at their peak.


    With the puppet from the system, he was sure that he would recover to his peak as long as he had enough time.


    Hong Long didn''t hesitate to sign the contract presented to him.


    He knew what kind of things the real owner of the store was capable of, so being under him only had benefits.


    With the contract signed, Lin Fan could see Hong Long being added to the employees under the employees tab in the system menu.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    With this, he had gained another powerful guard just in case anything happened.


    At the same time, with the contract signed, there was no need to worry about Hong Long being exposed. Since he was now an employee, the system would hide his aura just like it did with the other three.


    Since he had finished restoring his body, Lin Fan turned the topic back to the Dragon Race homeworld.


    As soon as he saw that it was the Dragon Race homeworld that was the special cultivation realm, his first thought was to buy the puppet for Hong Long so he could restore his body.


    That was because there was no better guide than Hong Long for this.


    That was why even though he could have bought this puppet for him before, he had saved up his points to avoid buying it. It was only now that he bought it because he needed Hong Long in a restored body as a guide.


    But of course, he would never actually tell Hong Long that.


    Since Hong Long''s body had been restored, that meant that he was able to go to the Dragon Race homeworld with Lin Fan. If he had only been in his soul form, it would be impossible for Lin Fan to release him since he would have been found by the Dragon Race experts right away.


    With the protection of the system and this new body, he could easily hide his presence from being detected, so he could go with Lin Fan.


    It was different for Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting.


    Not to mention Feng Ling and Lei Ting, even Qing Ao would stick out like a sore thumb the moment that he appeared on the Dragon Race homeworld.


    So there was no way for him to go, even though he was filled with determination to go.


    In the end, they agreed that Qing Ao would go if he stayed in the pet storage space the entire time.


    In the pet storage space, no one would find him and he would be able to see everything that was happening outside as long as Lin Fan allowed it. That was the minimum that he was willing to ept.


    Of course, they didn''t set off right away since Lin Fan had to handle the matters with the Lin Astral Family first.


    He didn''t know how long it would take him to find this Dragon Stone, so he couldn''t just disappear for an undisclosed period of time. He had toe up with an excuse that would allow him to disappear for some time without people worrying.


    As for the excuse that he used¡­he used his "master" once again.


    "Your master wants you to go into closed door cultivation?" The Lin Astral Emperor asked.


    Lin Fan nodded in response to this before saying, "I''ll go into closed doors cultivation at the shop. I don''t know how long it will take, but I ask that no one disturb me."


    The Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Ao looked at each other after hearing this with doubt in their eyes, but in the end, they turned back to Lin Fan and nodded in agreement to this.


    Even now, they still weren''t able to get a grasp of Lin Fan''s master in the store.


    But they knew that he was much more powerful than they thought.


    He had helped guide Lin Fan through the Beast Race invading forces right to where Lin Ao had been to help him rescue him, this was something that even the Lin Astral Emperor hadn''t been able to do.


    So they knew that Lin Fan''s master definitely wasn''t normal.


    Since that master wanted to bring Lin Fan into closed door cultivation, that was a good thing because of the current situation of the Lin Astral Empire. It would keep Lin Fan safe from all the dangers that could being after him because of the Beast Race invasion.


    Even if Lin Fan was in the capital, he wasn''t 100% safe.


    The only way for him to be 100% safe is to be protected by an expert of the Lin Astral Emperor''s level all the time. Of course, the Lin Astral Emperor wasn''t able to do that since he was busy with running the Lin Astral Empire.


    So this suggestion from the master came at just the right time.


    The Lin Astral Emperor even considered this master of Lin Fan''s to be at the same level as him.


    In the end, they agreed to Lin Fan heading into closed door cultivation, but they warned him that he had to be careful.


    Lin Fan promised that he would, though he did feel a bit bad since he was technically lying to them.


    After handling this matter, he prepared to go to the Dragon Race homeworld.


    As for who he was bringing with him, it was the usual trio plus Hong Long.


    He had been nning on leaving them there, but they insisted on going in the end.


    Or rather, it was Ang who insisted on going and the other two were just dragged along by her.


    Still, they were excited since the Dragon Race homeworld was also a ce that they had never gone to before. After all, it wasn''t as if the undead race or the spirit race were close to the Dragon Race.


    It would be their first time visiting.


    Once everything had been arranged, Lin Fan activated the teleport to the special cultivation realm.

 Chapter 1009 Entering The Special Cultivation Realm

    ?


    When they arrived in the special cultivation realm, they looked around themselves to see where they were.


    Even though the system had sent them here, the location that they had been sent was random.


    After looking around, Hong Long admitted that he didn''t even recognize where they were even though he knew the entire Dragon Race homeworld like the back of his hand.


    This was a ce that waspletely foreign to him.


    Of course, this ce wasn''t that strange that it would be weird if he did recognize it.


    This ce was a clearing in the middle of a forest and there were the sounds of creatures all around them, so it wasn''t as if this was a strange forest that didn''t have a single sound in it.


    No matter how they looked at it, it didn''t seem like there was anything off about this ce.


    That is until they looked up.


    They had ignored what was above them since there was lighting from above, so they assumed that there was the sky and a sun above them. But when they looked up, they found that this wasn''t the case.


    Instead of the sky that they had expected to see, there was a ceiling that was above them.


    This ceiling waspletely brown with a single spot on it that was releasing light that filled this entire space.


    They didn''t know how big this space was since they couldn''t see the walls, but this spot on the ceiling really was bright since it was able to light up this entire ce.


    Seeing this, they immediately realized that they were underground.


    Hong Long couldn''t help looking around himself again before saying to himself, "I never knew that there was this kind of space under our world¡­"


    Lin Fan also looked around, trying to see just how wide this ce was. However, he wasn''t able to see the walls of this ce.


    He didn''t know if it was just because it was too big or if there was some kind of illusion blocking him from seeing the ends of this ce.


    After looking around for a bit, Lin Fan turned his attention to the panel in front of him.


    Since this was a special cultivation realm that came with a mission, naturally there would be assistance from the system. Just like before, there was a map that was loaded up in front of him, guiding him on the path to the Dragon Stone.


    With this map, he should be able to avoid the dangers of this ce, but he didn''t dare rx either.


    He had also released Brainy''s puppets as soon as they arrived and they had just finished checking out the surrounding area.


    To Lin Fan''s surprise, the strongest creature here wasn''t even in the Soul Realm.


    This was the Dragon Race homeworld and even if it was a hidden ce on that homeworld, the creatures living in this ce shouldn''t be that weak. Could it be that this was just how this ce was supposed to be, or was there a different reason why they were so weak?


    It also made him start thinking about what awaited him at the end of this road¡­


    But he shook those thoughts out since there was no need to think about them right now.


    He would have to deal with it eventually since he couldn''t leave without finding the Dragon Stone, so it was better not to think too much about it.


    With the surrounding area scoped out and Brainy''s puppets searching along the path they were supposed to take, Lin Fan didn''t waste any time in setting off.


    The three who were used to this just followed Lin Fan without a word, it was only Hong Long who was confused as to why Lin Fan was heading out so confidently.


    The way that Lin Fan moved almost seemed like he knew the way.


    But as they were heading along, he saw the map that Lin Fan had and understood why.


    Since Hong Long had signed the contract with Lin Fan, he was able to see the panels from the system. When he saw the map that Lin Fan put in front of him, he couldn''t help being shocked by how urate it was.


    This was a map that perfectly showed them the surroundingndscape and drew a clear path for them to follow even though this was a ce that they had never been before.


    Hong Long couldn''t help feeling even more admiration for the master of the store.


    He knew about this ce that the Dragon Race didn''t even know about on their own homeworld and he was able to provide this kind of detailed map.


    Just who was the master?


    As they went through the forest, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling more and more unsettled.


    It wasn''t because they didn''t encounter anything since that was normal. He was following the map of the system, so it should be leading him on the safest path.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    At the same time, there were still plenty of living creatures around them, so it wasn''t as if he was unnerved by this.


    The reason he was feeling unsettled was because of the cultivation level of the creatures around them.


    Every single living being here didn''t even reach the Soul Realm.


    How was this possible?


    He could feel the concentration of life energy in the air. It was as dense as the Lin Astral Empire''s capital, so it should be impossible for these creatures to not reach the Soul Realm.


    So what was keeping them from breaking through?


    As they walked through the forest, they were getting closer and closer to their destination, but the surrounding area didn''t change at all. There were just trees as far as the eye could see.


    That was until all of that suddenly changed when they came in range of the target.


    All of the trees suddenly disappeared and there was a clearing that appeared in front of them.


    There wasn''t a single thing in this clearing as far as they could see, but there was still some distance before they reached their target.


    But of course, Lin Fan didn''t trust this clearing that appeared out of nowhere and he had Brainy''s puppets scan it first. As expected, he wasn''t able to find a single thing here¡­but then he realized that this was strange.


    There wasn''t a single living thing that was living in this clearing, whether it was under the ground or above in the air.


    It was as if there was something in this area thatpletely stopped the creatures that lived in this ce from approaching.


    He even used Brainy''s puppets to chase a few of the creatures towards the clearing.


    The moment that the creatures saw that they were about to enter the clearing, they suddenly turned around and looked like they would fight for their lives. So Lin Fan just had Brainy''s puppets let them go and they immediately ran off without any hesitation.


    It seemed that there was indeed something here that was driving the creatures away.


    After experimenting and scouting for a bit, Lin Fan decided to head forward.


    They continued along the ins in front of them until they finally reached the location that was marked on the map. However, when they arrived, they weren''t able to find a single thing here other than that the grass was taller than before.


    As they hade closer to this area, they had found that the grass was slowly growing taller and taller until it reached their waists.


    Of course, with their cultivation levels, that wasn''t a problem at all.


    They just used their life energy barriers to push aside the grass so that it didn''t affect them at all.


    But the problem now was that there was nothing here in this spot that the map led them to.


    The three who had followed Lin Fan earlier didn''t say anything, but this was Hong Long''s first time on a mission like this. Seeing this scene in front of him, he couldn''t help asking, "Is there something that we''re missing here? Could it be that the map led us to the wrong ce?"


    He didn''t want to doubt the master of the store, but since there was nothing in front of them, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of doubt.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything as he looked in front of him, as if he was thinking about something.


    He was actually focused on Brainy''s puppets that were currently exploring the area, looking for anything out of ce. But even with all of Brainy''s puppetsbing the area, they weren''t able to find a single thing¡­


    So Lin Fan also couldn''t help feeling a bit of doubt.


    That was until he suddenly came to the very center of the tall grass and he identally kicked something.


    When he kicked this thing, there was a clicking sound that suddenly rang out.


    He looked down and he wasn''t able to find a single thing by his feet, but he was certain that he had kicked something just now¡­


    Then in front of their surprised eyes, the grass seemed to part as something raised out of the ground.


    When it was fully raised, they saw that it was a podium carved out of stone that appeared in front of them.


    They all looked at each other with confused looks beforeing forward to look at the podium.


    "Those that wish to find the Dragon Stone, bring the purest dragon bloodline you can find."


    "Purest dragon bloodline?" All five of them couldn''t help repeating to themselves.

 Chapter 1010 Pure Bloodline

    ?


    After a pause, Hong Long was the one that came forward to step in front of the podium with a smug look on his face.


    He was the only dragon among them, so if one was to talk about pure dragon bloodline, he would be the only one.


    The others looked at him with doubt, but they didn''t say anything as they waited to see what would happen.


    Hong Long walked up in front of the podium and then waited for something to happen. However, when he saw that nothing was happening, he raised his hand and ced it on the podium as if he was trying to activate something.


    Seeing that nothing was happening still, he gathered his life energy in his hand and started injecting the podium with life energy.


    The podium did absorb the life energy that Hong Long injected, but nothing happened in the end.


    Hong Long''s expression became more and more ugly when he saw this.


    Finally, he couldn''t help saying in a frustrated voice, "This thing must be broken!"


    The other four watching him couldn''t help revealing faint smiles when they heard this, but then Lin Fan suggested, "It''s asking for the purest bloodline, so wouldn''t it require blood to test that?"


    Hong Long was surprised to hear this, but he nodded in agreement to this.


    So he reached a finger out and a drop of blood fell from the tip of his finger.


    When itnded on the podium, it was immediately absorbed by the stone.


    Nothing happened at first, but then there was a faint red glow that appeared around the podium. This faint red glow onlysted for a few seconds before disappearing without a trace.


    Then there was nothing that followed it.


    Hong Long just stared at the podium, as if he was expecting something to happen.


    However, there was nothing that happened no matter how long he waited¡­


    Finally, Lin Fan said, "I think that it didn''t work."


    Hong Long revealed an ugly expression again before saying with an annoyed voice, "I told you already, this thing is broken! I''m one of the elders of the Dragon Race and it still says that I don''t have a pure enough bloodline!"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything.


    He knew that this was just Hong Long''s way of making himself feel better.


    But there was still the fact that they needed to find a dragon with pure enough bloodline to open this ce.


    So after thinking about it, Lin Fan called out some more people.


    When they appeared, they couldn''t help being surprised by the fact that they had been called.


    It was Qing Ao, Feng Ling, Lei Ting, their kids, and Xiao Feng that were called out.


    Feng Ling, Lei Ting, and the four kids were naturally the most confused since they had no idea why Lin Fan called them.


    Feng Ling and Lei Ting were after all a phoenix and a qilin, so they yed no part here.


    As for the three girls, they had been busy with attracting their respective partners, so they didn''t care about anything that happened outside. Xiao Feng was currently in the clutches of Qing Bao Lan, so of course he knew nothing.


    Only Qing Ao understood why he was called, but he couldn''t help asking in a worried voice, "Is it alright to summon us like this here?"


    Lin Fan said with a nod, "This is a hidden ce, they won''t sense you."


    Qing Ao had a skeptical look, but seeing the nod from Hong Long, he didn''t say anything else.


    Instead, he turned to the podium and walked over until he was in front of it. Then he reached out his hand and lifted a finger over the podium before a drop of blood fell onto it like Hong Long had done before.


    When the drop of blood fell onto the podium, there was a faint azure glow that appeared around the podium.


    However, just like with Hong Long, this faint azure glow didn''tst long before disappearing without a trace. At the same time, there was nothing that happened around them.


    It was clear that Qing Ao''s bloodline concentration wasn''t enough either.


    Qing Ao revealed a depressed look, but he didn''t say anything about this. Instead, he turned to look at Qing Bao Lan and Xiao Feng who were still standing there holding each other.


    The two of them werepletely in their own little world, so they didn''t have any idea of what was happening.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    But when Qing Bao Lan saw her dad looking at her, she couldn''t help being pulled out of this world. She looked back at Qing Ao and asked, "Dad, what is it?"


    Qing Ao waved his hand at the two of them and said, "Come over here for a moment."


    Qing Bao Lan obediently came over, but she didn''t let go of Xiao Feng, so he was dragged over as well.


    Qing Ao then picked up Qing Bao Lan, but since she was still holding Xiao Feng, he had to pick him up as well. He carried Qing Bao Lan over to the podium and had her reach a hand out over it.


    With his life energy, he took a drop of blood from her hand, but when he did, Qing Bao Lan couldn''t help saying, "Ouch, that hurts daddy."


    Qing Ao appeased her, but his eyes were on the podium, waiting for a reaction from it.


    After the podium absorbed the drop of blood, there was a silence before a stronger azure glow came from it.


    It was much brighterpared to the glow that Qing Ao had created when it absorbed his blood, but it still faded away after a few seconds. After it faded, nothing happened just like before.


    Seeing this, both Qing Ao and Hong Long revealed bitter smiles.


    Qing Ao knew that the purity of his daughter''s bloodline was much greater than his own since he had seen all the training that Lin Fan had given her along with Xiao Feng. With that kind of training, it was hard for her not to have a pure bloodline.


    But it seemed that it wasn''t enough for the podium to consider it the purest bloodline.


    It wasn''t as if they didn''t have another way, but this was what they had wanted to avoid the entire time.


    Xiao Feng had the primordial bloodline, the ancestor bloodline of their Dragon Race. There couldn''t be any dragon that had a more pure bloodlinepared to Xiao Feng right now.


    So if Xiao Feng''s blood didn''t work, then there wouldn''t be any dragon that had blood that would open whatever this podium was supposed to open.


    But they didn''t want to use Xiao Feng''s blood for this.


    Every drop of Xiao Feng''s blood was precious since it contained the bloodline of the ancestor, so every drop lost was a drop that was gone forever.


    This would certainly have an effect on Xiao Feng in the future, so they had wanted to keep this from happening.


    It seemed like they had no choice though.


    None of their bloodlines were considered pure enough to open whatever this ce was, so they had to use a drop of blood from Xiao Feng to open it.


    Of course, Qing Ao didn''t take a drop of blood from Xiao Feng himself.


    Instead, he made Qing Bao Lan let go of Xiao Feng and then put Xiao Feng down in front of the podium before walking away. As he walked to the side, appeasing Qing Bao Lan as he went, he turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before walking over to where Xiao Feng was.


    Lin Fan asked Xiao Feng in a gentle voice, "Can I get a drop of your blood?"


    Xiao Feng just gave a strong nod before reaching his hand out for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan picked up Xiao Feng like Qing Ao had done earlier with Qing Bao Lan. The way that the two of them looked, it was almost as if they were parent and child.


    Though that wouldn''t be wrong since Lin Fan had raised Xiao Feng since he was a child, so it could be said that he was something like a parent.


    Lin Fan took Xiao Feng''s hand and brought it over the podium before picking his index finger out. Then with a thought, a drop of blood came from Xiao Feng''s finger that fell onto the podium.


    The moment that it fell onto the podium, the same thing happened where there was no reaction at all. Then all of a sudden, there was a burst of strong azure light that came from the podium.


    This burst of azure light was much stronger than any of the light that the podium had given off before. Even if all of the past glows werebined, this current burst would be considered much stronger.


    But this burst of azure light didn''t stay the same for long.


    It didn''t disappear, but the light suddenly started changing colours.


    It didn''t just remain azure, but rather it changed to the different colours of the rainbow, as if it was representing many different attributes.


    Finally, after changing colours several times, the light stopped changing colours and changed back to the same azure glow as before.


    This light also became concentrated on the top part of the podium where the instructions were. The instructions disappeared and soon there were glowing words that were written on the podium.


    "The sessor hase¡­The vault will now open."

 Chapter 1011 God Realm?

    ?


    After the voice fell, the ground started to tremble.


    The podium sank back into the ground again and everything returned to as it was before the podium appeared.


    It was as if nothing else was going to happen.


    That was until an even stronger trembling came.


    It was so strong that any normal person would have fallen to the ground and would have been unable to walk. But as they were all powerful cultivators, they could use their life energy to keep them standing.


    Still, the vibrations were very powerful and it took them quite a bit of life energy to remain standing.


    It took a long time to shaking before it finally started to weaken.


    In front of them, there was a part of the ground that opened up and revealed a set of stairs that led down.


    Judging by the dust built up at the corners of the stairs, it was clear that the shaking was the stairsing up from under the ground.


    Finally the shaking stopped when the opening in the groundpletely opened up.


    Lin Fan was the closest to the hole since he had been standing where the podium had been.


    When he looked down, he found that he couldn''t see the bottom of these stairs at all.


    It led down at an angle, so he could only see a few flights down before it was all blocked off by the ground in front of him.


    But when he stood there looking down, he could also feel a strong energying from beneath him. It was clear that there was something powerful that was down there releasing this presence.


    When he looked down in his hands, he found that Xiao Feng wasn''t surprised by this aura at all. There was even a curious look on Xiao Feng''s face, as if he wanted to find the source of this aura.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking of something.


    This aura seemed very familiar and he had finally figured out why it seemed familiar.


    It was very simr to Xiao Feng''s aura.


    So did that mean that the one down there has the same bloodline as Xiao Feng?


    If that was the case, then why did Hong Long get so excited about Xiao Feng if there was already a dragon that had the ancient beast bloodline in the Dragon Race?


    No, Hong Long had revealed a surprised look when he saw this ce, so the Dragon Race shouldn''t have known about this ce if even an elder didn''t know about it.


    Just what was the dragon that was down there nning?


    He remembered that this dragon had called Xiao Feng its "sessor", so did that mean that it wanted to pass something down to Xiao Feng?


    But when it came to things like this in novels, it would usually be a trap for the person who was sealed to steal the body of the one that they were passing things down to.


    There was a possibility that this was all a trap to steal Xiao Feng''s body¡­


    Still, they had no choice but to go down since the item that they needed was down there. They needed the Dragon Stone to take care of the Azure Dragon Tribe''s matters, so they couldn''t just leave it there.


    In the end, they had no choice but to go down.


    However, they wouldn''t let Lin Fan and Xiao Feng go first.


    That was the bottom line for Hong Long, so he took the lead with Qing Ao behind him just in case anything happened.


    At the very back was Momonga who was walking alone.


    Then in the middle was Lin Fan who was holding Xiao Feng and Qing Bao Lan, Ang who held onto Lin Fan, and Yuki who walked behind them.


    The stairs weren''t that long, so it didn''t take them long to reach the bottom.


    When they arrived at the bottom of the stairs, what waited in front of them were arge set of doors.


    These were doors that were clearly the size of a dragon, even though the stairs that had led down to these doors were the size of a human.


    This seemed like it was very out of ce no matter how one looked at it, even though this was the site of a dragon heritage.


    On the doors, there were two dragons soaring into the sky that had been carved. Each of the dragons showed only a single eye and there seemed to be something missing from those eye sockets.


    Based on the way that these dragons were designed, it seemed very likely that they would have to find some kind of gem to fit into those eye sockets before the door could open.


    But that wasn''t the case this time.


    After they arrived in the room, there was a glow that suddenly came from the eye sockets.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This glow became stronger and stronger until it was a concentrated glow that filled these eye sockets. Then once they became this concentrated, they started pulsating inside of those eye sockets.


    After pulsing for a while, there was a wave of light that was released throughout the room, almost like it was scanning the room.


    As the wave of light swept through the room, it almost felt like there was some kind of spiritual sense that was sweeping over them. They tried to resist a bit, but they found that it was hard for them to resist.


    This was a powerful spiritual sense that they had never sensed before, but it was simr to¡­the powers of the master of the store. It was simr to what was the God Realm Expert.


    Even Lin Fan who knew that there wasn''t actually a master to the store felt that this was simr to the power of the system.


    The system wielded God Realmws, so that meant that to be simr, this had to be God Realm spiritual sense¡­


    But if that was the case, what was a God Realm Expert doing here?


    Why did the Dragon Race not know that they had a God Realm Expert?


    After the wave of light swept through the room, the light concentrated in the eye sockets suddenly released two beams thatnded in the space in front of them. These two beams came together to create what seemed to be a spotlight.


    Afterwards, there was a deep voice that said, "Let the sessore forward."


    Everyone knitted their brows when they saw this and heard this voice.


    Hong Long took the lead by asking, "Who are you?"


    The voice didn''t answer this and the spotlight just shined there in front of them without changing.


    It was as if they didn''t hear what Hong Long said at all.


    Hong Long revealed an ugly look when he saw this, but he didn''t say anything else since he didn''t know who the other side was.


    But to let Xiao Feng go forward on his own like the voice wanted¡­that was not something that they would ept.


    So Hong Long was the one that came forward to step into the spotlight and said, "I am the sessor."


    There was a silence that followed after he said this before the beams of light suddenly became much stronger. There was a sudden sh before Hong Long was thrown out of the spotlight and mmed into the wall.


    He had a shocked look as he wasn''t even able to react to this sudden force that blew him away. It was as if it had appeared out of nowhere and it had sted him with a force that he couldn''t resist at all.


    Then the voice said in a firm tone, "Only the sessor can enter."


    It was clear who he was referring to.


    So now they were faced with a dilemma of letting Xiao Feng go alone or¡­they would have to fight whoever was behind this door who wielded the God Realm powers.


    There was no good choice here¡­


    In the end, Lin Fan decided that¡­he would go in with Xiao Feng.


    The others looked like they wanted to stop him, but once Lin Fan made up his mind, it wouldn''t be changed.


    So in the end, they could only watch nervously as he moved towards the spotlight.


    Lin Fan holding Xiao Feng in his arms walked forward towards the spotlight until he was right in front of it. Then he looked up at the door and said, "I want to go in with the sessor."


    There was no response to this, just like what happened with Hong Long.


    So since there was no answer to his question, he didn''t hesitate as he stepped forward towards the spotlight. Then in one swift step, he stepped into the spotlight with Xiao Feng in his hands.


    There was no reaction at first just like with what happened with Hong Long, but then the voice suddenly said, "You, there''s something strange about you."


    There was a sh of light before the beams of light started flickering, as if they were scanning Lin Fan.


    After a while, the voice said, "This feeling, it''s a familiar feeling¡­"


    There was another pause before it slowly said, "This is the feeling of voidws, but¡­"


    After another while, the voice finally said, "Your request is epted, you are allowed in with the sessor."


    At this, the door in front of them suddenly opened, but they weren''t able to see what was inside. It was as if there was something that was blocking them from seeing into the room in front of them.


    So Lin Fan turned back and said, "We''ll be heading off."


    Without waiting for a response, he headed into the room.

 Chapter 1012 Dragon Heritage (1)

    ?


    After stepping through the door, it was as if they had suddenly gone through a barrier.


    After stepping through, the scenery in front of them cleared while they became unable to see what was behind them.


    The nervous faces disappeared and it was reced with¡­a garden.


    There was a garden that appeared in front of them.


    This was a garden that was filled with green scenery and lush nts, that waspletely different from the room or even the forest that they had been in. The nts were growing so much that they could even be considered overgrown, almost bing dangerous.


    But these were calm nts that didn''t do anything to Lin Fan and Xiao Feng when they came into the room.


    There was a clear path that had beenid out in front of them for Lin Fan and Xiao Feng, making it very obvious that they should follow it.


    But Lin Fan didn''t take this path right away.


    Instead, he turned his attention to the nts around them.


    Normal people wouldn''t be able to recognize them, but he wasn''t a normal person. With his knowledge that he gained during his time in the trial back then, he had memorized information about countless nts, so he was able to recognize everything around him.


    Every single nt here was¡­a rare herb that would be very hard to find normally.


    All of these herbs also had great medicinal power, so they could be used in many different things.


    If he were to gather these herbs, there was no doubt that he would be able to refine some powerful pills.


    So instead of following the path that had beenid out, he pulled out some tools and moved towards the nts on the side.


    These nts as high grade herbs naturally had spirituality and had their intelligence, so they could see what Lin Fan was nning to do. It was clear that they were unwilling to go along with this, but¡­


    In the end, they didn''t move away as Lin Fan came closer to them.


    Even when he brought the de towards them, they just allowed him to cut them away and put them in his storage space.


    With the way that they were acting, it was almost as if they had received some kind of order not to go against Lin Fan.


    Of course, they had indeed received an order not to resist Lin Fan and let him do what he wanted, so they could only let him harvest them.


    However, harvest didn''t mean that he was cutting them from their roots and killing them. After all, these were herbs that had experienced spirituality and had intelligence, so they could grow even stronger.


    Instead of cutting them from the roots, he made sure to extract their essence from their nt bodies and kept them in his storage space.


    If he nted them in his store, he would be able to raise these herbs in his store and get an unlimited supply of herbs.


    He wouldn''t kill the golden goose thatid him golden eggs, he wasn''t a fool like that.


    As time passed, more and more of the nts were cut down and ced into Lin Fan''s storage, but he couldn''t make a dent in the garden at all. There were just too many nts for Lin Fan to harvest and he couldn''t get them all.


    But if there was anything that Lin Fan had right now, that was time.


    There was no reason for him to follow the path that had beenid out for him, so he could slowly take his time and collect the herbs that were in front of him.


    That didn''t mean that whoeverid out the path for him would allow him to do so.


    Lin Fan was able to collect the herbs with Xiao Feng for a while before there was a voice that suddenly rang out, "What are you doing?"


    Lin Fan just ignored this voice and continued gathering the herbs that were scattered in front of him.


    Xiao Feng had turned in the direction that this voice came from since he could feel something familiaring from it. However, seeing that Lin Fan didn''t react to that voice at all, Xiao Feng turned back to help him gather the herbs again.


    There was a short silence that followed as the owner of the voice couldn''t believe that it was being ignored like this. But when it came back to its senses, the voice boomed out again, "You''re ignoring me? Do you know what you are doing?"


    Once again, Lin Fan ignored this voice and continued harvesting the herbs.


    However, the herbs around him started to tremble after hearing this voice.


    They could hear the anger that was in the voice and they knew that if the owner of the voice was angry, the ones that would suffer the most would be them.


    So as soon as they recovered from their fear, they immediately started speaking up to urge Lin Fan to listen to the voice.


    "Hey, listen, you don''t want to annoy that person."


    "Hey, listen, you should just go down the path and meet that person."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "Hey, listen¡­"


    These voices came from all around Lin Fan, but hepletely ignored them.


    Even when they tried using their life energy to make their voices stronger, it didn''t matter to Lin Fan since he simply put a soundw barrier around himself. With this soundw barrier, he didn''t hear a single thing that they said.


    Seeing that Lin Fan had no intentions of listening, there was a bolt of lightning that suddenly cut through the sky andnded on the ground beside him.


    The unlucky herb who had been hit by this bolt of lightning had beenpletely turned to ashes.


    Lin Fan had no choice but to pay attention to the temper tantrum now.


    When he looked up, he was surprised to find that what he thought was the sky was actually just an illusion of a sky. The only thing that was actually providing light was just the crystal that had been installed in the roof.


    Right now, the sky had turned cloudy because of the bolt of lightning that had been sent down.


    Seeing that he finally reacted, the voice said, "Now, take the path ande to where I am. I need to meet the sessor to give him the inheritance."


    Lin Fan tilted his head as if he didn''t hear him and was curious why the sky had turned dark.


    Seeing this, there was more lightning that appeared in the sky.


    Still, Lin Fan wasn''t fazed at all by this.


    After watching the lightning sh in the sky, he turned back to the herbs and started collecting them again.


    The herbs werepletely terrified of everything that happened, so they just stood there without moving at all. With them shocked like this, it made it even easier for Lin Fan to collect them.


    After all, they were still resisting a bit before being stunned.


    It wasn''t enough to stop Lin Fan, but it was enough to make it harder for him to harvest them.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was still ignoring it, the owner of the voice really didn''t know what to do and was stunned.


    This was the first time that it had ever been treated like this, so of course it didn''t know how to deal with Lin Fan.


    Finally, the voice couldn''t help asking, "What do you want? If you bring the sessor over, I''ll grant you one favour."


    Lin Fan once again ignored this as he continued to harvest the herbs.


    There was a trace of desperation that appeared in the voice as it said, "Anything, I can grant you any favour."


    But once again, Lin Fan ignored the voice and continued doing what he was doing.


    Seeing this, the voice had no choice but to give an order to the herbs.


    It knew that Lin Fan was using his harvesting to ignore it, but at the same time, it knew the benefits that Lin Fan would gain from harvesting these herbs. It had lived for a long time, so it knew what kind of things these herbs could be used for.


    So it gave the order for¡­


    When the herbs received this order, they immediately revealed relieved looks.


    Then without any hesitation, they started running away from Lin Fan.


    They hadn''t resisted earlier because of the order of the voice, but now that the voice gave them an order to avoid Lin Fan, they went all out executing that order.


    After all, Lin Fan was like the grim reaper who had been collecting the lives of theirpanions¡­No, he wasn''t collecting their lives, but they didn''t know where Lin Fan was taking them, so they were as good as dead to them.


    They had been praying that Lin Fan didn''t pick them next to be harvested.


    So once they received the orders, they immediately started running away from him.


    Lin Fan could have easily caught them if he used his life energy, but he didn''t since he didn''t know what this space was. He didn''t know how the owner of the voice would react if he were to suddenly use his life energy to catch the herbs.


    Not to mention, he didn''t want to harm the herbs in the first ce since they would lose their medicinal efficacy.


    So he had no choice but to recognize that he had been outyed.


    With a voice that recognized that he had been defeated, Lin Fan said, "Alright, let''s discuss conditions.

 Chapter 1013 Dragon Heritage (2)

    ?


    When the owner of the voice heard this, there was a sigh that rang out.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile when he heard this, but he quickly made that smile disappear from his face.


    After a pause, the voice said, "What conditions do you have?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said back, "What can you offer?"


    There was another long pause that followed this, as if to show the exasperation of the owner of this voice.


    After this long pause, the voice said, "I''ll give you the herbs in this garden, how about that?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this as if he was satisfied with this, but then he suddenly said, "And?"


    Once again, there was a long pause that followed after Lin Fan said this. Then in an exasperated tone, the voice asked, "What else do you want?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he heard this and he asked, "What are you nning on doing to Xiao Feng."


    There was a short pause this time as the owner of the voice was caught off guard before it asked, "Is that all you''re asking?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but he still gave a nod in response to this.


    There was a boomingughter that filled the air after he gave this response.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard when he heard this, but he could tell that this wasn''t a bad sign. There was genuine amusement in theugh as it boomed out, so it didn''t seem like the owner of the voice had any bad intentions.


    Theughter continued for a long while before it slowly came to a stop. Then the same voice as before said in an amused tone, "I think that you have some kind of misunderstanding of my intentions."


    Lin Fan once again slightly knitted his brows after hearing this, but he didn''t say anything in response.


    The amused tone disappeared from that voice as it suddenly said in a more serious tone, "I wouldn''t hurt this child, especially since it has my blood running through its veins."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a confused look when he heard this as he repeated, "Your blood?"


    The voice didn''t answer this question and just said, "Follow the path to where I am and I''ll answer all your questions."


    After the voice faded, the herbs that had been avoiding Lin Fan came back to surround him even though they clearly looked like they didn''t want to. They formed the same scenery around him and created the same path as before.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows as he looked at this path, but in the end, he still picked up Xiao Feng and walked down it.


    As he walked down this path, he reached his hand out towards the herbs around him.


    Even though they trembled, they didn''t avoid his hand in the end.


    It was clear that they had received the order to not avoid him like they had received before.


    As he walked down this path, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking about what the voice had said.


    It said that Xiao Feng had its blood running through his veins, but what blood did that refer to? Did it mean that Xiao Feng was the child of the owner of the voice, or did it mean the bloodline that the system had given Xiao Feng?


    If it meant the bloodline that the system gave Xiao Feng, then¡­how did the system get that bloodline in the first ce?


    As he thought about all of this, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking that this might be his chance to find out more about the system. Or at the very least, he would be able to find out more about the gods that had created the system.


    At the same time, there was no longer the doubt that he had towards the owner of the voice.


    He had been able to hear it in the voice, the owner of the voice had no bad intentions towards him. It seemed that the owner of the voice did genuinely just want to meet Xiao Feng.


    It didn''t take him long to reach the end of the path and when he arrived, he was surprised by what was waiting for him.


    There was nothing there other than a single statue that was carved from stone. When he looked closely at it, he found that the stone used to carve the statue wasn''t anything special and seemed to be a normal kind of stone.


    However, he was getting a strange feeling from the statue.


    This was the same feeling that he got when the system used any of its features.


    This was the feeling that the others had described as the feeling of the God Realm.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    It seemed like his guess had been correct and whatever this was, it was in the God Realm.


    When Lin Fan arrived with Xiao Feng, there was nothing that happened at first. But then the statue that was there started to glow.


    This glow became stronger and stronger until it took actual form.


    The statue had been carved in the shape of a dragon, so the form that this light figure took was also a dragon.


    This was a dragon that waspletely made of azure light.


    After it appeared, it turned to look at Lin Fan who was just standing there staring at it and then its eyes turned to Xiao Feng who was in Lin Fan''s arms. When its eyes fell onto Xiao Feng, it suddenly revealed a wide smile as it said in a familiar voice, "My sessor!"


    Lin Fan had already guessed that this dragon of light was the owner of the voice that had been speaking the entire time, but he couldn''t understand what it was.


    This dragon of light clearly wasn''t a soul fragment like Hong Long had been since he couldn''t feel the same thing he had felt from Hong Long before.


    Was it something left by whoever owned this ce, or could it be that this was a living dragon of light?


    The dragon of light came forward with its hands raised, as if it wanted to take Xiao Feng from Lin Fan, but Lin Fan stopped him by taking a step back and raising one hand. When the dragon of light saw Lin Fan with one hand raised out at it, it couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    With a sh of light, the dragon of light suddenly turned into the shape of a human.


    It took the form of a handsome young man with azure coloured hair and piercing azure eyes.


    But even after it changed into the form of a human, Lin Fan still stared at it with narrowed eyes.


    The handsome young man had the same bitter smile on his face as he said, "Young sessor of the Void God, there''s no need to look at me with such suspicion. I am nothing more than a fragmented will left behind by the Dragon God to pass on its inheritance to those that possess its bloodline."


    "Dragon God?" Lin Fan asked.


    The handsome young man gave a nod before saying, "The Dragon God has already ascended to the world of gods, so he can''t personallye down to help the sessor. So he left this fragmented will before ascending to be a god."


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows after hearing this.


    He had already expected that whatever was here was rted to the gods based on the feeling that he felt before, but he never expected a fragment from a god to be here.


    The Dragon God fragment saw the look on Lin Fan''s face and misunderstood what he was thinking. So the Dragon God fragment said, "Young sessor of the Void God, I guarantee that I mean no harm to the one who shares my bloodline. I just wish to pass some of my knowledge and power to it."


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the Dragon God fragment.


    He wasn''t a fool, he could already tell that if this Dragon God fragment wanted to, it would be able to easily take care of him. So if it was lying to it, there was no need at all since it could have easily taken him down and taken Xiao Feng.


    So there had to be some truth in what it said.


    But that wasn''t important to Lin Fan right now.


    What he cared about more was the world of gods that this Dragon God fragment had mentioned.


    ording to what he had heard from Momonga, the gods had disappeared from this worldpletely. There were no traces of the gods left behind when they suddenly disappeared, but there had been evidence of the world of gods back then.


    The Dragon God fragment had said that the Dragon God had ascended to the world of gods.


    Did this have something to do with the disappearance of the world of gods back then?


    At the same time, he knew that the gods were connected to his system.


    So he really wanted to ask this Dragon God fragment about this, but he didn''t know if the Dragon God fragment would answer.


    The Dragon God fragment couldn''t help feeling anxious seeing the way that Lin Fan was looking at him.


    So the Dragon God fragment finally couldn''t help asking, "Is something wrong?"


    Lin Fan suddenly said, "Can you answer a few of my questions?"


    The Dragon God fragment was caught off guard by this, but he nodded and said, "If I know the answer, I''ll answer your questions."

 Chapter 1014 Clues About The System

    ?


    Lin Fan was surprised that the Dragon God fragment would agree to his suggestion this easily, but he didn''t think too much about it.


    Since he had agreed, then there was no need to hesitate.


    "What is this world of gods that you mentioned?" Lin Fan asked.


    The Dragon God fragment revealed a confused look before saying, "It''s the world that gods reside in, what else could it mean?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this response, but then he rified, "I mean what kind of a ce is the world of gods. Is it a separate world from our world or is it a ce that we can reach?"


    The Dragon God fragment still had that confused look as he said, "It''s a part of this world, but how can mortals reach that ce? It''s only when someone bes a god that they will be able to reach that ce."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling his head ache when he heard this.


    Based on the answer that he received, it seemed that this Dragon God fragment didn''t have all of the memories of the Dragon God. It was only a fragment of its will, so there should only be a few memories that were left with it.


    Even if he kept asking this question, he knew that the Dragon God fragment wouldn''t be able to answer it with his limited knowledge.


    So instead, he changed his question.


    "Ok, let''s forget that. What is the God Realm?" Lin Fan asked in a serious voice.


    The God Realm, that was the one thing that had always eluded him.


    He had heard people mentioning it many times, but no one had ever been able to give him any information about what it really was. Everyone just said that it was when one reached the peak of cultivation, but no one told him how it was possible.


    So he wanted to ask someone who had the experience of bing a god what the God Realm was.


    The Dragon God fragment gave a nod when it heard this and it looked like it had expected this.


    After all, the God Realm was something that everyone in this world wanted to reach. This was something that would never change no matter how much time had passed.


    So the Dragon God fragment revealed a look like it was an elder passing down knowledge as it said, "The God Realm is very simple, it''s when one reaches the peak of cultivation and the peak of understanding for a singlew. When one reaches the God Realm, they be the very embodiment of thatw and they be the god of thatw."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but he also wasn''t that surprised since he had figured that it was something like that.


    But that still didn''t exin why no one had been able to reach the God Realm in so long. So he asked this question to the Dragon God fragment.


    "There hasn''t been a God Realm Expert in a long time and all the God Realm Experts have disappeared?" The Dragon God fragment repeated in a confused voice.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being confused by this question, so he just simply gave a nod in response.


    The Dragon God fragment knitted his brows after seeing this as he muttered, "That shouldn''t be right¡­Gods can''t leave the world of gods easily, but they can be summoned by their ancestors in times of need still. There should still be sightings of gods in this world¡­"


    Lin Fan just silently listened to the mutters of the Dragon God fragment, gaining quite a bit of knowledge from it.


    After mumbling for a bit, the Dragon God fragment then said, "I''ve been here for a long time, so I don''t know what changes have happened outside. The only thing that I can say is that there should still be gods in this world since I haven''t felt the copse of anyws yet."


    "Copse ofws?" Lin Fan repeated in a confused tone.


    The Dragon God fragment nodded as he said, "If a God Realm Expert ever dies, thew that they represent will copse and enter a period of instability. It will be weaker than aw that has a god representing it until a new god appears. So since I haven''t felt any weakenedws, there shouldn''t be any gods that disappeared."


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    The Dragon God fragment had just confirmed that there were indeed still gods that existed, but if that was the case, where were these gods?


    Could it be that they were all hiding in the world of gods that the Dragon God fragment had mentioned.


    If that was the case, would they remain hiding when the Outer Gods appeared?


    If they did remain hidden, how would they take care of the Outer Gods?


    There were many things that Lin Fan couldn''t help worrying about.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Now that he had decided to settle in this world, there were things that he cared about and he needed to think about how to protect them.


    If the gods weren''t willing to help them take care of the Outer Gods, he had to think of a different way to deal with them.


    All of these different things made his brain hurt even more, but he also threw them away since he would think about themter.


    For now, what he wanted to ask was¡­


    "Have you ever heard the word ''system''." Lin Fan suddenly asked.


    The Dragon God fragment immediately revealed a confused look when he heard this before asking, "What is that?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before saying, "Have you heard any of the other gods mentioning this before? It should be something that they give to mortals."


    The Dragon God fragment had the same confused look as he thought about this before saying, "I''ve never heard that term before, but I did hear that there were some gods working on something secret. It was something that was supposed to help deal with the Outers and it was something that would involve the mortals."


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows when he heard this.


    As he had expected, the system was something that had been made by the gods. While he didn''t know which gods had been the ones to make this, he at least knew that gods had been involved in its creation.


    But ording to the Dragon God fragment, it was something that had been created to deal with the Outers¡­


    Could it be that the gods had some kind of overarching n on how to deal with the Outers and it involved the system?


    If that was the case, it made sense how the system had sent him to a realm where there had been a fragment of an Outer God¡­As well, it exined all the different things that it was pushing him to do.


    It was as if it was preparing him to fight the Outers¡­


    Lin Fan couldn''t help having a bad feeling about the other special cultivation realm that the system had wanted him to go to. It was very likely that this special cultivation realm was also rted to the Outers in some way.


    It was even likely that this special cultivation realm was the world of the gods¡­


    So he felt like it would be something that would bepletely out of his depths, so he didn''t want to ept this mission unless he knew more.


    As he was about to ask another question, the Dragon God fragment suddenly knitted his brows as if he had noticed something. The Dragon God fragment couldn''t help looking around, but in the end, he wasn''t able to find what he was looking for.


    As he was about to open his mouth to say something, there seemed to be something that caused him to close his mouth again.


    He deeply knitted his brows after this.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help wanting to ask something, but the Dragon God fragment suddenly raised his hand to stop him before saying, "There are some things that you shouldn''t ask too much about. It''s not time for you to learn about these things yet."


    Lin Fan revealed a look of absolute confusion when he heard this, but he could only nod in agreement when he saw the look on the Dragon God fragment''s face. It was as if he could even see a trace of fear in those eyes.


    But what would a fragment of a god be afraid of?


    The Dragon God fragment let out a sigh of relief when he saw Lin Fan agreeing to this.


    If Lin Fan kept asking questions, he was afraid that something bad would happen to him.


    That sensation and that voice just now, it invoked a very strong memory deep inside of him.


    Even if he was only a fragment of the Dragon God''s will and not the Dragon God himself, this was a feeling that had been deeply embedded into him and could not be forgotten.


    This aura and this voice¡­it belonged to a person that no one dared to mess with in the world of gods. Even the Dragon God would have been instantly destroyed when facing that person, not to mention a fragment of the Dragon God''s will.


    So of course, the Dragon God fragment didn''t dare talk about this any further.


    Since Lin Fan had agreed, the Dragon God fragment pushed on to say, "Can I give the sessor of my bloodline the inheritance now?"

 Chapter 1015 Growth

    ?


    Lin Fan hadpletely forgotten about this when he had started asking about the God Realm.


    But now that the Dragon God fragment had mentioned it again, he suddenly remembered the reason why they were here.


    So he agreed as long as he could see what the inheritance the Dragon God fragment wanted to pass down was beforehand.


    The Dragon God fragment didn''t mind this since he knew that this was the care that Lin Fan had for Xiao Feng. If he was in the same position, he would also want to check.


    Lin Fan looked at the thing that the Dragon God fragment and while he couldn''t understand what it was, he didn''t feel that it was anything bad. That was because it was just a single drop of blood was sealed inside some kind of barrier.


    The feelinging from this drop of blood was simr to the feeling that he felt from Xiao Feng.


    It was the feeling of the ancient dragon bloodline.


    He didn''t know what effects this drop of blood would have on Xiao Feng, but he was sure that it would be helpful to him.


    He could even see the excited look that Xiao Feng had when he saw this drop of blood. He even looked back at Lin Fan as if he was begging him to give him this drop of blood.


    So Lin Fan put Xiao Feng down and gave a nod to the Dragon God fragment.


    The Dragon God fragment brought the drop of blood in front of Xiao Feng before releasing the barrier around it. Then Xiao Feng poked out his tongue towards the drop of blood and licked it up.


    After licking up the drop of blood, Xiao Feng started glowing with a powerful azure glow.


    At the same time, he released a powerful aura that Lin Fan had only felt once when the system had bestowed the ancient beast bloodline on Xiao Feng.


    Once this azure glow appeared, Xiao Feng''s eyes also closed and he curled up beforeying down on the spot.


    Lin Fan looked at him for a second before turning his attention to the herbs around him.


    He left the Dragon God fragment to watch over Xiao Feng while he went to harvest the herbs.


    The Dragon God fragment would have more knowledge about this than him, so he just left it to him since it was easier for him to deal with it if anything went wrong. He went to take care of the herbs that the Dragon God fragment promised.


    Since the Dragon God fragment had promised him all of the herbs here, he wasn''t nning on leaving a single one here.


    The herbs could only shed bitter tears since they had received the order from the Dragon God fragment not to avoid Lin Fan. They had no choice but to let him harvest them.


    After a long harvest, Lin Fan came back to see that Xiao Feng was starting to wake up.


    After what he had done here, this ce lookedpletely different from before.


    There was no sign of green left other than the grass that grew here.


    All of the herbs that gave this ce a vibrant feeling before had disappeared into Lin Fan''s storage.


    After Xiao Feng woke up, the first thing that he did was run over to Lin Fan. When he came over, he tried to jump into Lin Fan''s arm, but Lin Fan dodged out of the way before he could.


    So instead ofnding in Lin Fan''s arms like he had nned to do, Xiao Fengnded on the ground.


    After lying there for a few seconds in a daze, Xiao Feng couldn''t help looking back at Lin Fan. There was a clear look of betrayal in his eyes after what had happened.


    When Lin Fan saw how Xiao Feng looked at him, he couldn''t help revealing an amused look.


    There was a reason why he had dodged out of the way just now.


    Xiao Feng was currently in his dragon form, but he was no longer the small dragon that he was before.


    Lin Fan didn''t know how Xiao Feng had grown this big, but Xiao Feng was the size of a full grown dragon now. He wasn''t at the same level as Hong Long or Qing Ao, but he was definitely the size of a normal adolescent dragon.


    That meant that his current form was actually bigger than Lin Fan.


    So if Lin Fan were to catch him, he would have been crushed under the current Xiao Feng.


    Lin Fan just said straight to him, "You''re too big for me to carry."


    Xiao Feng looked down at Lin Fan with a confused look before looking at his own body. It was only then that he realized that his body was differentpared to before.


    Xiao Feng looked all over his body and then looked at Lin Fan with an excited look as he started posing. It was almost as if he was saying, "Look at how cool I am!"


    Even the way that he looked at Lin Fan made it clear that he wantedpliments from him.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Seeing this, Lin Fan revealed a smile and patted Xiao Feng on his head.


    Then Xiao Feng realized something and suddenly changed into human form.


    Therge dragon form quickly became smaller and shrank down to the size of a human, but¡­it was no longer as small as it was before.


    Xiao Feng''s human form was now in the form of a teenager instead of a child.


    After shrinking down, Xiao Feng tried to jump into Lin Fan''s arms again, but Lin Fan still dodged out of the way.


    It wasn''t that Xiao Feng was too big for him, but for someone that looked as old as Xiao Feng to hug him¡­it was a bit awkward.


    When he fell onto the ground again, Xiao Feng looked at Lin Fan with an aggrieved look. Lin Fan just revealed an awkward smile and patted Xiao Feng on the head.


    Since what they hade here to do was done, Lin Fan took Xiao Feng by the hand and was about to leave this ce. But before they left, Lin Fan suddenly remembered something and turned to look at the Dragon God fragment.


    The Dragon God fragment was already starting to fade since it had finished what it was supposed to do.


    When it saw Lin Fan looking at it, it couldn''t help being surprised before asking, "What? Is there something else you need?"


    Lin Fan nodded before saying, "Do you know where the Dragon Stone is?"


    "Dragon Stone?" The Dragon God fragment repeated in a confused voice before suddenly revealing an understanding look.


    With a flick of his hand, there was a stone that came out of the statue.


    This looked like a normal stone, but Lin Fan could feel something familiaring from that stone.


    This was a feeling that he couldn''t mistaken because there was no one who was more familiar with this feeling than him.


    It was the feeling of voidws.


    It seemed that this Dragon Stone did have something to do with his voidws like he had suspected. However, he couldn''t tell who made this or what they had made it for, but he felt like there was something that was drawing him in about this stone.


    Almost as if there was something telling him to absorb this Dragon Stone.


    He reached his hand out towards it as if he was about to absorb it, but then he caught himself with his other hand and stopped himself.


    This Dragon Stone still had a use, so he couldn''t absorb it.


    He had to bring it back to Qing Ao and bring it to the Azure Dragon Tribe first.


    So suppressing that urge to absorb it, Lin Fan took it and put it away.


    Seeing the way that he looked, the Dragon God fragment said, "Young void sessor, I know how you feel, but you should resist the urge for now. This Dragon Stone still has a use to y in our Dragon Race. However, if you gather all five stones from our five races, then you''ll be able to unlock something greater than just absorbing it alone."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being dazed for a second before asking, "You''re saying that there''s something simr to the Dragon Stone in four other races?"


    The Dragon God fragment nodded before saying, "That was the agreement that we made with your ancestor in the past."


    "My ancestor?" Lin Fan repeated.


    Hearing this, he couldn''t help feeling more and more confused.


    But in the end, he nodded and epted what the Dragon God fragment said.


    Before leaving though, he couldn''t help asking one more thing, "Why was the Dragon Stone here? How did it get here?"


    The Dragon God fragment revealed a bitter smile and said, "The Dragon Stone also has a will, so it came to me on its own."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing an even more confused voice when he heard this before asking, "It came to you on its own? Why would it do that?"


    The Dragon God fragment said with a sigh, "The Dragon Stone judged that our race wasn''t worthy of possessing it during those times, so it came to me as per the ancient agreement."


    "Wasn''t worthy?" Lin Fan had the same confused look on his face.


    He didn''t understand what the Dragon God fragment was saying, but that didn''t matter since he had obtained what he hade here to get.


    As for whether the Dragon Stone would stay with the Azure Dragon Tribe or not¡­that wasn''t up to him.

 Chapter 1016 Heading To The Azure Dragon Tribe

    ?


    After receiving the Dragon Stone, there was no need for him to stay here anymore.


    He led Xiao Feng by the hand and headed off to the exit.


    But as he was leaving, he heard the Dragon God fragment''s voice ring out behind him, "Please take care of my Dragon Race."


    When he turned around again, he found that the Dragon God fragment had disappeared.


    Lin Fan looked at the statue that was there and gave a slight bow to it.


    It was undeniable that he had some kind of rtion to the Dragon Race, so even without the Dragon God fragment telling him this, he would have to care about the future of the Dragon Race.


    But of course, to repay the Dragon God fragment for everything that it had told him, he would do even more for the Dragon Race.


    After they passed through the door, the scenery changed once again and they weren''t able to see behind them anymore. At the same time, the door mmed shut behind them, shutting them out.


    Lin Fan''spanions had all been anxiously waiting for the two of them to return.


    With the leisurely pace that Lin Fan took, it had already been three hours. They were quite worried and even thought that something had happened to the two of them.


    When they came out, the one who charged forward first was Ang.


    The one she charged at was¡­Lin Fan and what she did was¡­punch him in the stomach.


    One would have thought that the hug was the way to go here, but Ang chose to punch him in the stomach.


    Lin Fan could only reveal a bitter smile when this happened, but he knew why she did it.


    She punched him to hide her own embarrassment and to vent her anger for worrying her.


    The second one to charge forward was Qing Bao Lan.


    The one that she charged at was Xiao Feng¡­or at least what she thought was Xiao Feng.


    However, when she saw the unfamiliar person standing there, she couldn''t help stopping. She looked around as if she was looking for Xiao Feng before saying out loud, "Xiao Feng, where are you?"


    Xiao Feng was naturally surprised to hear Qing Bao Lan calling out for him. He came forward and said, "It''s me."


    But for Qing Bao Lan who didn''t recognize him at all, she couldn''t help being scared when approached by a stranger like this. Especially with how close he came towards her.


    Xiao Feng was used to this because of how close Qing Bao Lan always came towards him, but Qing Bao Lan didn''t recognize him, so it was like she was being approached by a strange man.


    Seeing this, Qing Bao Lan couldn''t help taking a few steps back before screaming, "Don''t, don''te near me. I want to keep my body pure for my Xiao Feng!"


    When Qing Ao heard this, he immediately rushed forward to protect Qing Bao Lan.


    He also didn''t recognize Xiao Feng at first with the changes that had happened to Xiao Feng.


    When Xiao Feng saw this, he couldn''t help panicking as he didn''t know what to do.


    It would be a lie to say that he hadn''t developed feelings for Qing Bao Lan after all the time that they spent together, so he definitely didn''t want to do anything to hurt her.


    At the same time, even though he had gained the body of a teenager, he still had the mind of a child. So when it came to situations like this¡­


    In the end, Xiao Feng turned to look at Lin Fan for help.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he saw this and he said, "Alright, that''s enough."


    Both Qing Ao and Qing Bao Lan were surprised to hear this from Lin Fan and couldn''t help looking at him with a strange look. After all, they could both tell that he was clearly saying this to them.


    Lin Fan walked over to Xiao Feng and patted him on the shoulder as he said, "This is Xiao Feng."


    Both of them revealed shocked looks when they heard this before carefully looking at Xiao Feng.


    While they couldn''t recognize him because of the change in his appearance, they were still able to tell that it was him because of the aura that he gave off. Even if his appearancepletely changed, there was no changing the aura that he gave off.


    Especially since they were dragons, the aura that he gave off affected them more than it would others.


    Both of them just stared at Xiao Feng in a daze, but it wasn''t just them who were surprised. Everyone else couldn''t help looking at Xiao Feng with stunned looks as they couldn''t believe that their cute little boy had turned into this handsome young man.


    Xiao Feng still had the mentality of a kid, so being stared at by everyone like this was a bit too much for him.


    He couldn''t take it and turned around to hide his head in Lin Fan''s chest.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Lin Fan didn''t stop him this time since he knew just how hurt he was from all of this. If he were to avoid Xiao Feng again like he had done all those times, it really would be too much for him.


    The second one to react was Ang.


    She also hadn''t been able to recognize Xiao Feng at first, so she couldn''t help feeling a bit guilty. She came over and hugged him along with Lin Fan, patting him on the back andforting him.


    If Lin Fan was the father, then Ang was the mother.


    Xiao Feng immediately hugged her back and cried in her chest like he done for Lin Fan, but it did look less awkward than when he was crying in Lin Fan''s chest.


    Then when they reacted, Qing Bao Lan immediately tried toe over to where Xiao Feng was while Qing Ao raised a hand to stop Qing Bao Lan.


    Even if he knew that this stranger was Xiao Feng, it didn''t seem right to let his young daughter approach a handsome young man like this. It felt like the wrong thing to do for him as a father.


    But in the end, Qing Bao Lan broke free by¡­biting Qing Ao''s hand.


    Qing Ao had a bewildered look on his face when it happened, but Qing Bao Lan didn''t care at all as she broke free of his grasp.


    She ran over to Xiao Feng and took his hand.


    Xiao Feng was surprised to feel his hand suddenly being grasped, but when he saw that it was Qing Bao Lan, he couldn''t help revealing an even more surprised look. He still remembered how Qing Bao Lan had acted just now.


    Qing Bao Lan saw this and couldn''t help revealing a guilty look since she knew that she had acted too impulsively.


    She patted his hand and said, "Xiao Feng, I''m sorry."


    As she said this, her eyes couldn''t help misting over.


    Xiao Feng might still have the mentality of a kid, but he was still a man.


    When he saw a girl that he cared about crying like this, of course he would want to stop her.


    So Xiao Feng pulled himself out of Ang''s embrace and turned to face Qing Bao Lan. He then said in a strong voice, or at least what seemed to be a strong voice for him when in reality it was a soft voice, "It''s ok."


    It was just two simple words, but it was enough to calm Qing Bao Lan down.


    Then in front of Qing Ao''s shocked eyes, Xiao Feng pulled Qing Bao Lan in by her hand and held her in his embrace.


    Qing Bao Lan was taken aback when this happened, but then sheid there in his embrace with a happy smile on her face.


    But for everyone else¡­it looked very strange.


    That was because this was a teenager who was hugging a little girl¡­


    If it was Lin Fan''s previous world¡­perhaps the police would havee to take Xiao Feng away. No, even in this world, this would have been reported and the police would havee to take Xiao Feng away.


    Still, they knew better since they knew Xiao Feng''s real mental age.


    There was only Qing Ao who was standing there with a bitter look on his face.


    After this matter was settled, Lin Fan pulled out the Dragon Stone for everyone to see.


    When the Dragon Stone came out, all of the dragons other than Xiao Feng immediately focused their attention on it. That was because they could feel a special feelinging from it.


    This was a feeling that came from the very depths of their heart, a feeling that came from their bloodline.


    It was as if it was telling them that if they had this thing, it would be able to purify their bloodline.


    But they were able to suppress it in the end.


    This feeling to their surprise was actually weaker than the feeling that Lin Fan gave them when he used his voidws.


    Still, it was enough for them to confirm that this was indeed the Dragon Stone that they were looking for.


    Since Lin Fan had found the Dragon Stone, the only thing left for them to do was to head to the Azure Dragon Tribe to finish this.


    The only problem was¡­how were they supposed to get there?


    They had been sent to this ce by the system, so if they were to leave this ce, wouldn''t it just send them back to the store?

 Chapter 1017 Azure Dragon Tribe (1)

    ?


    As they were wondering what they should do now, Lin Fan saw a notification from the system.


    "Special transport activated."


    Lin Fan was very confused when he saw this, but he was shocked when he saw what the system meant by it.


    It was a special one time teleportation for him and hispanions to¡­a ce that was near the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    While it wouldn''t bring them into the Azure Dragon Tribe, it would put them where they wanted to go.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the system prompt with a very strange look.


    This seemed like too much of a coincidence¡­


    But after he thought about it, he figured that it was actually quite normal¡­


    This was the kind of thing that the system had been doing recently and since it was giving him this opportunity, there was no reason for him not to take it.


    So he told everyone about the special transport.


    The four that had contracts with the store couldn''t help looking at their own panels and they found that they had received something simr.


    As for the others, they went back into Lin Fan''s pet storage space.


    There was nothing to gain from them being outside when they teleported over to the Azure Dragon Tribe, so they wouldn''t stay outside anymore.


    But when they left, Qing Ao could only stare at Qing Bao Lan and Xiao Feng with a bitter look on his face.


    Once everything was ready, Lin Fan activated the transportation and they were sent off by the system with a sh of white light.


    When the white light cleared and they were able to see again, they found that they had been sent into a forest by a mountain.


    Lin Fan turned to look at Hong Long who gave a nod in response, confirming that they were by the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    This mountain was where the Azure Dragon Tribe made their home, so they would just have to climb up the mountain to arrive at where the Azure Dragon Tribe was. However, it wasn''t as simple as going in through the front door.


    They were here without notifying anyone and if they just went in the front door like that, it would cause argemotion.


    So they had to find a secret way into the Azure Dragon Tribe and find Qing Ao''s father, who was the current head of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Luckily, they had Hong Long with them.


    Hong Long was close to Qing Ao''s father and knew things about the Azure Dragon Tribe that other dragons wouldn''t. That included secret entrances to the Azure Dragon Tribe''s main residence.


    He normally wouldn''t use them since they were told to him in confidence, but this was different.


    So he brought Lin Fan and the others to the other side of the mountain.


    On the opposite side of the mountain, there was a cave there.


    Inside of this cave, there wasn''t much other than a dead end.


    However, when they were at the end of this dead end, Hong Long suddenly pressed something on the wall. When he pressed this thing, there was arge sound that rang out before the wall started sliding out of the way.


    After a while, the wall hadpletely slid to the side and a tunnel was revealed.


    There were torches that were lining the walls of this tunnel, lighting it up for them to see.


    However, there wasn''t much to see since it was nothing more than a simple tunnel.


    Hong Long led the way down the tunnel while the rest followed him.


    As for why he led the way¡­it was because after walking for a bit, the tunnel split in two in front of them.


    Without any hesitation, Hong Long took one of the paths that was in front of them. With the way that he went, it was clear that he knew which path was the right path.


    As they went along, Hong Long exined that there were fake paths that had been added to this secret escape tunnel just in case there were intruders that found it. There were fake paths on both the way in and way out.


    As they went through, they were able toe out of a few forks and see the fake paths for the people heading out of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    This tunnel was quite long and had many twists to it, so it took them quite a bit of time to make it through.


    When they finally made it to the end, there was a luxurious looking door waiting there for them. This door was madepletely of gold and was decorated with many jewels, making it very grand.


    However, Hong Long ignored this door.


    He went over to the side of the tunnel and pressed something on the wall, causing a secret tunnel to appear.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The door that was ced at the end of this tunnel was a trap just like the different forks. If one took this door, they would be brought to a room which had beenced with many different traps that would end their lives.


    This was the final trap for intruders who made it all the way to the end of this tunnel.


    After taking the secret tunnel, they arrived in a hidden room in the manor of the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head.


    This was a secret room that was in the depths of this manor that only the head would be able to ess, but that didn''t mean anything since they came in from the other side.


    The only problem now was finding a way to contact the head, Qing Ao''s father.


    Since they had snuck into the manor and wanted to keep their presence hidden, it wasn''t as if they could walk through the manor looking for him. They would be caught in no time with all the different experts who were wandering around this ce.


    So they had to find a way to call Qing Ao''s father without alerting anyone.


    In the end, it was Hong Long who gave the answer again.


    He called out a Spatial Ring out of nowhere and then took out a token with the word "Qing" on it.


    When Lin Fan saw the Spatial Ring that he called out, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    At the same time, Hong Long also saw this smile and revealed an awkward look before exining, "Well, there were a few secrets that you didn''t know about me."


    Lin Fan just gave a nod in response, but he didn''t have a trace of me in his expression.


    He knew the reason why Hong Long had hidden this from him.


    Hong Long had hidden this inside of his soul fragment the entire time, so no one had been able to take it from him.


    As for why he hid it¡­it wasn''t that he didn''t trust Lin Fan. It was that he wanted to be prepared no matter what happened in the future.


    It was impossible for him to guarantee that nothing would happen to Lin Fan.


    So on the off chance that something did happen to Lin Fan, he would be prepared to run away.


    After all, he couldn''t die since he had the fate of the Dragon Race in his hands¡­or at least that''s what he thought.


    The token that he took out was one that Qing Ao''s father had given him personally since they were old friends. As long as he injected it with life energy, he would be able to contact Qing Ao''s father.


    The token didn''t respond right away, but when it did, a shocked voice suddenly said, "Old Hong, is that really you?"


    Hong Long couldn''t help revealing a smile when he heard this voice since it was a voice that he hadn''t heard in a long time.


    After a moment''s pause, he said, "Old Qing, it really is me."


    The shocked voice quickly turned serious and asked, "Where are you right now?"


    Hong Long revealed an awkward smile and after a pause, he said, "Would you believe me if I said that I''m in the secret room in your manor?"


    There was only silence that greeted this answer before the other side said, "Are you being serious."


    Hong Long just gave an awkwardugh before saying, "Un, it''s true."


    There was more silence that followed this before the other side said, "Wait, I''ming now."


    Hong Long didn''t forget to ask, "Come alone."


    The other side said in an annoyed voice, "Do I need you to tell me that?"


    Hong Long just gave a chuckle when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything.


    Even if he wanted to say anything, the token had already gone still and seemed like it had lost all power. It was clear that the other side had stopped using the token and wasing to where they were.


    In less than five minutes, the door to the secret room suddenly opened and there was a person who was standing there.


    That person looked in and the first thing he did was run up to Hong Long to take him in an embrace after seeing him.


    As he hugged him, that person said, "Old Hong, it really is you! I never thought that I would see you again after thatst war!"


    Hong Long also had an emotional look on his face as he was being hugged by this person. He patted him on the back and said, "Old Qing, it really is me."


    After taking a while toe back to his senses, that person separated from Hong Long and finally realized that there were others here.


    Looking at Lin Fan and the others, that person asked, "Old Hong, who are these people?"

 Chapter 1018 Azure Dragon Tribe (2)

    ?


    As he said this, there was a hostile tone in his voice.


    However, that couldn''t be med on him since there were these strangers that were in his Azure Dragon Tribe''s hidden room.


    Hong Long came in between us and him, raising his hand as he said, "They''re not bad people. Calm down and let me exin."


    That person narrowed his eyes to look at Hong Long before shutting the door and sitting down in one of the chairs here. Then he said in a calm voice that still had a bit of pressure in it, "Exin then."


    Hong Long nodded before sitting down with him and starting to exin what happened.


    He told this person about how he had met Lin Fan on the Blue Star and about everything that had happened up to this point. Of course, he had made sure to leave out a few things since he felt that it would be too shocking to tell him these things now.


    But when he told him about the Dragon Stone¡­


    "Dragon Stone? You''re saying that you have the Dragon Stone?" That person jumped out of his chair and turned to stare at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking a step back at how intense his gaze was.


    Hong Long grabbed that person by the shoulder and made him sit back down before saying, "We do have the Dragon Stone right now, but¡­"


    He left his voice trailing off, but it was clear what he was implying.


    That person nodded in response to this before sitting down to think.


    After all, it wasn''t as if he could just evacuate the entire manor right away without any exnation. If he were to do something like this, there was no doubt that people would be suspicious.


    Right now, the situation in the Azure Dragon Tribe was already tense enough without him making it even more tense.


    As they sat there in silence, Hong Long acted like he suddenly remembered something and he said, "Xiao Ao is here too."


    When that person heard this, he immediately jumped up again. This time, he revealed a vignt look and looked all around himself before saying, "You''re saying Xiao Ao is here? Where is he? This ce isn''t safe."


    Hong Long raised his hands to calm him down before saying, "Xiao Ao is in a safe ce right now and we can bring him here at any time, but¡­"


    Once again, he left his sentence iplete, but it was clear what he was implying.


    This time, this person didn''t waste any time at all.


    He pulled out something that seemed to be in the shape of a rock and then with a burst of light from that thing, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared around this room.


    When Lin Fan and the others tried to test this barrier, they found that they weren''t able to break through it with any casual probes. Only if they focused themselves would they be able to make a dent in the barrier, but of course that wasn''t what they wanted to do.


    They could tell that this barrier had beenid down to protect them from being spied on.


    In fact, this barrier was one of the supreme treasures of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    It was something that had been left behind by the ancestors of the Azure Dragon Tribe, giving them the power to create a barrier that contained the power of the ancestors. This was a power that was close to reaching the peak of the Ruler Realm, so normal people wouldn''t be able to do a thing against this barrier.


    But since it was one of the supreme treasures of the Azure Dragon Tribe, it was something that was very precious.


    At the same time, there was only a limited number of times that this thing could be used.


    The fact that this person had used it without any hesitation really showed how impulsive he was.


    But at the same time, it also showed just how much he cared about his son since this person was Qing Ao''s father and the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Once the barrier had beenid down, Qing Ao''s father immediately said to Hong Long, "Where''s Xiao Ao?"


    This was a voice that brokered no argument and he wouldn''t let Hong Long get a word in edgewise.


    Seeing this, Hong Long gave a sigh and turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before calling out Qing Ao and Qing Bao Lan. As for the rest, he decided that it was better not to call them out for now.


    When the two of them appeared, they had very different reactions.


    Qing Ao immediately went over to Qing Bao Lan''s side as if he was going to protect her while Qing Bao Lan started looking around, as if she was looking for something.


    Once they reacted to what had happened and they saw where they were, Qing Ao let his guard down a bit while Qing Bao Lan started searching even harder. She walked around the room and looked all over for what she was looking for.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    As for what she was looking for, it was naturally Xiao Feng.


    She had just been in the pet storage space with Xiao Feng, so being suddenly called out alone was something that she wasn''t happy about.


    When she couldn''t find Xiao Feng, the person she red at was naturally Lin Fan.


    But on the other side, when Qing Ao and his father saw each other, they stared at each other in silence for a few seconds before suddenlying forward to hug each other.


    "Father!"


    "Xiao Ao!"


    The two of them just stayed there like this for a minute before finally separating from each other.


    During this time, Qing Bao Lan had gone over to Lin Fan and was using her small hands to hit his leg, as if she wasining to him. Of course, she didn''t use any actual strength or life energy when she hit him.


    In short, it was just a kid''s tantrum.


    Lin Fan just ignored her as he watched Qing Ao and his father reuniting.


    After they finished hugging, Qing Ao''s father asked, "Xiao Ao, what are you doing back here? Where did youe from?"


    Qing Ao raised his hand to stop his father before saying, "Let''s sit, I''ll exin everything."


    Qing Ao''s father looked at him again with a deep look before nodding and sitting down.


    Over the next fifteen minutes, he told him about everything that had happened. There were many things that ovepped with what Hong Long had told him, but Qing Ao also added in a few things that Hong Long hadn''t mentioned.


    When he heard these things, Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help ring at Hong Long who had left them out.


    Hong Long just looked back at him with an awkward smile.


    Even if he had left these details out, he had done it for a good reason. As Qing Ao told him everything, Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    It was just a good thing that it was his son who told him this or he might have found it hard to believe because of his shock.


    When he finished telling the story, Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    If it was anyone else who had told him this, he might have found all of this hard to believe.


    However, since it was his son and one of his oldest friends that told him this, he had no choice but to believe that it was true.


    But at the same time, there was a trace of hostility that appeared in the eyes of Qing Ao''s father. This person had forced his son and his granddaughter into a contract, so there was bound to be a bit of hostility between them.


    Even though Qing Ao clearly told him that they had formed the contract willingly, Qing Ao''s father still felt hostile towards Lin Fan. He didn''t ept that his son and granddaughter would willingly ept a contract with a human, so he was certain that Lin Fan must have done something to trick them.


    Lin Fan just revealed a slightly bitter smile when he saw this, but he didn''t do anything.


    After ring at Lin Fan for a bit, Qing Ao''s father turned his attention to Qing Bao Lan.


    When these eyes fell onto Qing Bao Lan, all of the seriousness in them disappeared without a trace and what was reced was a doting look.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help thinking of¡­the doting look that Qing Ao had whenever he looked at Qing Bao Lan as well.


    It seemed that this tradition of doting on their children and grandchildren ran in the family¡­


    But Qing Bao Lanpletely ignored this grandfather of hers and was still focused on punching Lin Fan''s leg. Her cheeks were also pouted and there was a displeased look in her eyes to show that she was throwing a tantrum.


    Qing Ao''s father had been focused on Qing Ao just now, so he had forgotten about Qing Bao Lan for a second. But now that he was fully focused on her, he started ring at Lin Fan even more than before.


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh before saying, "I can''t let Xiao Feng out right now."


    Qing Bao Lan pouted her cheeks even more when she heard this.


    But Qing Ao''s father had apletely different reaction.


    In a voice that seemed calm, but had dark undertones, he said, "Xiao Feng? Who is Xiao Feng?"

 Chapter 1019 Azure Dragon Tribe (3)

    ?


    When Qing Ao heard this, he remembered that he had forgotten to mention this earlier.


    If he had mentioned it earlier, then perhaps it would have been easier to exin to his father. However, it was toote now.


    As for Qing Ao''s father, he wasn''t a fool.


    The moment that he heard this name and saw the way that Qing Bao Lan reacted, he had already guessed what the rtionship between his beloved granddaughter and this Xiao Feng was.


    As soon as he realized this, there was killing intent that had appeared in his eyes.


    Lin Fan saw all of this and for the first time in a while, he didn''t know how to act.


    After a long period of silence, he gave a sigh and still called out Xiao Feng in the end.


    After all, it was impossible to hide the matter of Xiao Feng now that they had already revealed it.


    When Xiao Feng came out, Qing Bao Lan didn''t hesitate to run over to Xiao Feng and jumped into his arms.


    Xiao Feng was much taller now, so he was able to pick Qing Bao Lan up and hold her in his arms in a princess carry. Not to mention, she had jumped into his arms, so it wasn''t as if he could just drop her.


    Since Xiao Feng''s growth, this was Qing Bao Lan''s favourite thing to do.


    After shended in his arms, Qing Bao Lan justid there with her eyes closed, a blush on her face, and a happy smile on her lips.


    But for everyone else, they just couldn''t feel the same happiness as her.


    After all, this was a teenager who was holding onto a small child. Even if he had the mentality of a child, it created a very strange picture.


    When Qing Ao''s father saw this, he immediately lost control of himself and was about to explode. However, before he could explode, Qing Ao and Hong Long quickly came forward to stop him.


    But even after stopping him, they couldn''t stop him ring at Xiao Feng with eyes filled with killing intent.


    If it wasn''t for the barrier that he had deployed earlier, perhaps every single dragon in the Azure Dragon Tribe would have been called over from that outburst of rage just now. At the same time, if it wasn''t for the barrier, perhaps this room would have been crushed by the pressure that he had released just now.


    After calming down, Qing Ao''s father started ring at Qing Ao as he said in an angry voice, "Qing Ao! How could you let something like this happen? Weren''t you supposed to be looking out for Bao Bao?"


    Qing Ao revealed a bitter smile when he heard this.


    If it was before, then perhaps it would be easier to exin, but now that Xiao Feng had grown this much¡­it really was hard for him to exin.


    So the first thing he said was, "Father, please take a closer look at him first."


    Qing Ao''s father narrowed his eyes to look at Qing Ao when he heard this, but he still followed Qing Ao''s instructions to look carefully at Xiao Feng.


    He had a doubtful look on his face at first, but then it was as if he noticed something. He knitted his brows and took a closer look at Xiao Feng.


    After that, his expression changed again and again until it was a look of shock.


    He looked at Xiao Feng in a daze for a bit before turning to Qing Ao to say, "Is this real?"


    Qing Ao just gave a simple nod in response to this.


    Qing Ao''s father turned to Hong Long and asked, "Is this real?"


    Hong Long also gave a simple nod in response to this.


    Then he turned back to look at Xiao Feng again with an unstable expression.


    But in the end, he still turned back to Qing Ao with an angry look and said, "You sold out Bao Bao just for this? What kind of a father are you?"


    As he was about to raise his hand to hit Qing Ao, Qing Ao quickly said, "Father, please take a closer look. It isn''t what you think it is."


    Qing Ao''s father stopped his hand from moving forward before asking, "What do you mean?"


    Qing Ao revealed a bitter smile and said, "Although he looks like that, he''s actually younger than Bao Bao."


    "Huh?" Qing Ao''s father had an absolutely confused look on his face when he heard this.


    He then revealed a doubtful look as he looked at Qing Ao before saying, "If I find that you''re lying to me, you know what will happen¡­"


    He left his words hanging, but Qing Ao''s expression was more than enough to show that he understood exactly what he was being threatened with. But in the end, he still revealed a calm look and waited for his father to take a look at Xiao Feng.


    Seeing this, Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help being a bit surprised.


    So he released his spiritual senses in Xiao Feng''s direction.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Xiao Feng felt this spiritual sense right away and tried to resist it, but this was spiritual sense from a Ruler Realm Expert, so it was very hard for him. In the end, he was able to resist it because of the pressure from his bloodline.


    He had the ancient dragon bloodline, the progenitor bloodline of the Dragon Race. This bloodline gave him the ability to suppress all other members of the Dragon Race naturally.


    It was not something that a member of the Dragon Race could resist since this was a pressure that came from their very essence.


    So even a Ruler Realm Expert like Qing Ao''s father, the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe couldn''t resist it.


    Xiao Feng looked at Lin Fan for help, but all he saw was a look from Lin Fan to let it happen.


    Xiao Feng was very confused when he saw this, but since it was Lin Fan who gave him this look¡­Xiao Feng stopped resisting in the end and allowed Qing Ao''s father''s spiritual senses to sweep over him.


    Of course, it felt very ufortable since it was letting someone else''s spiritual sense sweep through him. It felt like he was being looked at from every angle by someone.


    This was definitely not a good feeling.


    Qing Ao''s father had a confused look at first, but as he swept across Xiao Feng with his spiritual sense, he couldn''t help revealing a surprised look. As he continued looking at Xiao Feng, he eventually revealed a shocked look.


    That was because¡­


    "He really is younger than Bao Bao?" Qing Ao''s father muttered.


    As he muttered this, he couldn''t help looking at Xiao Feng with a strange look.


    What he had done just now was check the age of Xiao Feng''s bones.


    There were many ways for a cultivator to hide their age, but the hardest way to do it was to hide the age of their bones. After all, that would require them to change every single bit of bone in their body and there were many cases of bodies rejecting the bones that they received.


    So as long as a person was sane, they wouldn''t do something as crazy as this.


    That was why Qing Ao''s father didn''t doubt the result that he had just gotten.


    But for this young man who clearly looked like he was older than Qing Bao Lan to be younger than her¡­not to mention having the pure bloodline that he had, it really seemed a bit too unbelievable for him.


    Still, with the proof ced right in front of him, he had no choice but to believe it.


    But still¡­he couldn''t stand seeing the two of them like this!


    This was his precious granddaughter, his only granddaughter!


    He wouldn''t hand this precious granddaughter to someone that he didn''t know yet!


    While he understood why Qing Ao didn''t stop them and he knew that it would be good for their Azure Dragon Tribe to pull Xiao Feng in, he still couldn''t just hand over his precious granddaughter like that!


    So he walked over to Xiao Feng and stood there in front of him.


    Xiao Feng couldn''t help being a bit scared by this old man who suddenly came in front of him.


    Then Qing Ao''s father reached out and took Qing Bao Lan from Xiao Feng''s arms.


    Qing Bao Lan who had been fully enjoying being in Xiao Feng''s embrace was pulled out of her joy by these arms that suddenly wrapped around her.


    With the anger from having her happiness interrupted, she startedshing out at the arms that had wrapped around her.


    It was just too bad for her that she couldn''t match her grandfather who was in the Ruler Realm.


    She tried hitting him with all her face, but with her Soul Realm cultivation, it was far from being enough to hurt him.


    In fact, all it did was tickle her grandfather.


    Seeing her act like this, Qing Ao''s father didn''t act discouraged at all. Instead, he revealed a happy smile and said, "Bao Bao, did you miss grandfather that much?"


    To him, he thought that Qing Bao Lan was just ying.


    Qing Bao Lan red at her grandfather before attacking him even more, but it didn''t have any effect on him at all.


    In fact, it was her hands that were getting hurt from hitting her grandfather.


    So in the end, she had no choice but to settle down and let herself be held by him.


    But it was clear by the look in her eyes that she wasn''t enjoying it.


    To the side, everyone couldn''t help shaking their heads with bitter smiles as they thought, "What a helpless grandfather¡­"

 Chapter 1020 Azure Dragon Tribe (4)

    ?


    Qing Ao''s father doted on Qing Bao Lan for a bit like this until he finally came back to his senses.


    However, even aftering back to his senses, he still didn''t let go of Qing Bao Lan.


    Even if he was a foolish doting grandfather, he wasn''t a fool when it came to other things.


    He knew that the moment that he let go of Qing Bao Lan, she would run off to Xiao Feng again.


    That was thest thing that he would allow!


    Xiao Feng couldn''t help shrinking a bit under this Ruler Realm Dragon''s gaze and he even went over to hide behind Lin Fan, so that even Lin Fan was suffering from the pressure of this Ruler Realm Dragon.


    But in the end, Qing Ao''s father released his pressure and returned to the main topic.


    "So you said that you found the Dragon Stone." He suddenly brought this up.


    He had been distracted by his son and his granddaughter, but in the end, he was still the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe. The Dragon Stone was a very important item to them, so it wasn''t as if he could just toss that aside.


    When they heard this, everyone suddenly turned to look at Lin Fan since he was the one that was currently holding it.


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this before reaching his hand out.


    As he held his hand there, there was a stone that suddenly appeared out of nowhere in his hand.


    When the stone appeared, Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help looking at it with a strange look. However, after looking at it for a bit, his expression quickly changed to one of surprise.


    Then he moved closer to the stone as if he wanted to get a better look at it.


    As he continued looking over this stone, his expression kept changing until he finally had a look of shock.


    Qing Ao''s father reached his hand out towards the stone and asked, "Can I hold it?"


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response before holding it out.


    He didn''t mind since this thing belonged to the Azure Dragon Tribe in the first ce.


    Qing Ao''s father took the stone in his hand and as he held it, he couldn''t help muttering to himself, "This feeling, it''s this feeling¡­This is just like the ancestors described it¡­"


    After he looked and groped the stone for a bit, Qing Ao''s father immediately turned to look at Lin Fan with a strange look. It was clear by the look on his face that he was filled with doubt towards Lin Fan.


    After a long moment of silence, he asked, "Where did you get this from?"


    Lin Fan just looked at him with a calm look without saying a thing, making it clear that he wasn''t going to say a thing.


    Since he couldn''t get the answer from Lin Fan, he turned to look at Qing Ao and Hong Long in session.


    Both of them looked away, as if they weren''t willing to say a thing.


    They knew that the only reason that they had found this Dragon Stone was because of the help of the master of the store. So if they were to tell him what he was looking for, then they would be betraying the master of the store.


    Neither of them were foolish enough to do that.


    So the only thing that they could do was stay silent.


    Seeing that neither of them were willing to say a thing, Qing Ao''s father turned back to look at Lin Fan.


    He didn''t do anything as he just stared at Lin Fan since he wasn''t able to see through Lin Fan at all.


    He could easily see through Lin Fan''s cultivation, but it was his mind that waspletely guarded. He couldn''t see through Lin Fan''s intentions at all, which was why he was worried.


    There was still the chance that his old friend and son were controlled by Lin Fan since this was all too suspicious.


    It wasn''t that this head of the Azure Dragon Tribe was cautious of humans by nature since he was part of the peace faction, but the circumstances of all of this had been so suspicious that he couldn''t help being doubtful.


    So after thinking about it, he decided to release his pressure.


    This time, his pressure was used on Lin Fan.


    But before he could use his pressure to threaten Lin Fan, Hong Long suddenly came up in front of him.


    He used his own pressure to force Qing Ao''s father''s pressure down before putting a hand on his shoulder. He looked right into his eyes before suddenly shaking his head.


    Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help being taken aback when he saw this.


    He never expected Hong Long to have such a strong opinion on this matter¡­<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    But since Hong Long had taken this stance, it wasn''t as if he could do anything to Lin Fan and the others. At the same time, he could see out of the corner of his eyes that Qing Ao was also looking at him with the same intentions.


    Even if he didn''t trust Lin Fan, it wasn''t as if he could let this matter turn him against his closest friends and family members.


    So in the end, he pulled back his pressure and waited for Lin Fan to speak.


    But Lin Fan didn''t say a single word as he stared at Qing Ao''s father.


    With this impasse, Qing Ao''s father had no choice but to drop this matter since there were more important matters to take care of.


    For example, now that they had the Dragon Stone, they had to figure out how to stop Qing Ao''s brother.


    The n that he had was to have Qing Aoe back with the Dragon Stone and then have him present the Dragon Stone to the entire Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Everyone in the Azure Dragon Tribe knew how important the Dragon Stone was, so if Qing Ao had the aplishment of bringing it back to their tribe, there was no doubt that he would be able to im the position as the next head. That had been Qing Ao''s father''s n the entire time.


    But now¡­there were many different variables that had been added into this n and it was impossible for them to use this simple n anymore.


    So he had to think about all the different things that he had just learned and he woulde up with a new n.


    However, as he was thinking, he couldn''t help suddenly remembering something.


    Lin Fan, that was the name of this young man in front of him.


    For some reason, he couldn''t help thinking that it seemed a bit familiar¡­until he suddenly remembered where he had heard it.


    In the reports that he had received, he had heard that the Lin Astral Empire''s royal family had found a new heir and that new heir''s name was¡­Lin Fan.


    Qing Ao''s father looked at Lin Fan and said, "How are you rted to the Lin Astral Empire?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile, but he didn''t answer.


    Still, that smile was more than enough of an answer for Qing Ao''s father¡­


    It seemed like this really was the new heir of the Lin Astral Family.


    This just made things even moreplicated¡­


    After all, if it was the Dragon Race as a whole, they wouldn''t need to care about a single Astral Empire. The Dragon Race as a whole was stronger than a single human Astral Empire.


    But that wasn''t the case for the Azure Dragon Tribe alone.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe alone wasn''t strong enough to face an entire Astral Empire, so now they also had to consider the Lin Astral Empire if Lin Fan was involved.


    Seeing the look on his father''s face, Qing Ao also told him about the envoys that his brother had sent to the Lin Astral Empire.


    When he heard this, Qing Ao''s father couldn''t help revealing an ugly expression.


    It would have been fine if he had just gone in the name of the Azure Dragon Tribe, but to fake an envoy from the entire Dragon Race was not something that simple. Once this was discovered by the other tribes, there was no doubt that the entire Azure Dragon Tribe would suffer.


    As for how the Dragon Race would find out¡­that all depended on the Lin Astral Empire.


    This son of his had really thrown the Azure Dragon Tribe in a pit.


    So even if he didn''t trust this young man in front of him, Qing Ao''s father had no choice but to trust him at this moment.


    He took a deep breath before looking at Lin Fan and saying, "What n do you have?"


    Since he had confidentlye to the Azure Dragon Tribe, that must mean that he had some kind of n, right?


    That was what Qing Ao''s father believed.


    But to his shock, Lin Fan just gave a shrug and said, "I don''t have a n at all."


    Qing Ao''s father looked at Lin Fan with a look of disbelief, as if he couldn''t understand the words that Lin Fan was saying.


    But seeing that his expression didn''t change at all, Qing Ao''s father had no choice but to believe this.


    Lin Fan then said, "I''ll leave it to you. As long as it doesn''t hurt the Lin Astral Empire, I can go along with your n."


    Qing Ao''s father looked at Lin Fan in disbelief once again.


    But seeing the calm and determined look that he had, he said with a sigh, "Alright, we''ll do it your way."

 Chapter 1021 Azure Dragon Tribe (5)

    ?


    The Azure Dragon Tribe was abuzz today as everyone gathered in the meeting square.


    Everyone was confused why there had been a sudden meeting called, but they still all came since it was a meeting called by the head.


    Even his eldest son who the head had been avoiding the entire time was called.


    When everyone heard this, they knew that something big was happening.


    So now they were currently waiting for the head to arrive.


    Qing Ao''s older brother, Qing Qiang had arrived early and was currently scouting out the crowd. It was as if he was searching for someone, but he wasn''t able to find what he was looking for.


    He knew that since his father had summoned him, there had to be a reason.


    The problem was that he didn''t know¡­why!


    So he couldn''t help feeling nervous as he stood there.


    He had no idea what his father knew, but there were many things that he had done in secret that would have been considered traitorous to their Azure Dragon Tribe. If any of them were exposed, it was certain that he would be in trouble.


    He needed to figure out what it was before it was revealed so he could think of a way to counter it.


    But there were just no clues here.


    In the back of his mind, he had thought that this was rted to his younger brother who had mysteriously disappeared from their tribe.


    His father had said that his little brother had been ambushed by an enemy and had gone missing, but he didn''t believe it. He knew that it was some kind of trick that his father had set up with his little brother so that his little brother could escape his grasps.


    He knew that as long as his little brother was taken out of the picture, there would be nothing stopping him from taking over as the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Once that happened, it would only be a matter of time before their Dragon Race reimed their ce as the supreme race. They would no longer have to care about those disgusting humans and take their ce as rulers.


    All those old fogies at the top were afraid of nothing and holding back the Dragon Race.


    Peace between the races was nothing more than an insult to their pride as dragons, but he couldn''t do anything if he didn''t take over the Azure Dragon Tribe first.


    So he had done everything that he had done for the glory of the Dragon Race.


    That included sending the fake envoys to the Lin Astral Empire.


    As soon as he had found a trace of his little brother, he had sent his people to track him down. Even though that meant going against the rules of their Dragon Race.


    The excuse that he gave himself was that he was doing it for the glory of the Dragon Race.


    But if it was found out he did this, there was no doubt that he would be persecuted.


    The funny thing was that he didn''t think for a single second that it was because of this that this meeting had been called. He was certain that he had hidden every aspect of his involvement in this, so there was no way that they would be able to prove that it was him.


    It was strange but no matter how long they waited, no one came to start the meeting.


    As time passed Qing Qiang couldn''t help feeling more and more anxious since he didn''t have any ideas what was going to happen. It was a feeling of not being in control, which was something that he found hard to ept as someone who would normally be in charge.


    But still there was nothing that he could do.


    What he didn''t know was that there were people that were watching over him as he sat there anxiously.


    Finally, after close to an hour, there was someone that finally arrived.


    But it wasn''t the person that everyone was waiting for.


    Instead, it was a person that everyone was shocked to see since they never expected someone like this to appear.


    It was a representative from the Red Dragon Tribe.


    Out of the eight tribes, they were the tribe that was closest to the Azure Dragon Tribe, so it wasn''t strange to see members of the Red Dragon Tribe here.


    But this representative was the current heir of the Red Dragon Tribe, the one that would be the future head.


    For someone like him to appear here, it was naturally a big matter.


    Qing Qiang was caught off guard when he saw this person, but then he quickly stood up and made his way over to greet him. With the way that he walked over, one would think that he was the one that had called this meeting instead of being called to attend.


    When he came over, he said, "Brother Hong, it''s been a long time."


    When Hong Jun heard this, he looked over with narrowed eyes. As soon as he heard who it was, he couldn''t help revealing a slightly disgusted look, but he also quickly hid that expression.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The Red Dragon Tribe was one of the tribes that was in the peace faction and this Hong Jun was also a firm believer of peace, so he didn''t like this Qing Qiang who was a firm advocate of war. However, since they were from the Azure Dragon Tribe and the Red Dragon Tribe respectively, Hong Jun had no choice but to be respectful to Qing Qiang out of respect for the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head.


    Personally, he preferred Qing Ao who had mysteriously disappeared a while back.


    But there was no time to think about that.


    Qing Qiang was about to say something else, but before he could, there was a group that came forward to greet Hong Jun.


    This was a group of subordinates who were under the current head of the Azure Dragon Tribe, Qing Qiang''s father.


    But Qing Qiang immediately said, "There''s no ce for you servants, I''ll take it from here."


    As he said this, he released his full prestige as the young master of the Azure Dragon Tribe. Even though he hadn''t been named the heir, he still acted that way around the others which actually hurt his reputation.


    The subordinates didn''t back down as they said, "Young master Qiang, we have orders from your father to take care of young master Hong. Please step aside."


    Qing Qiang was taken aback when he heard this.


    Usually, these servants didn''t say anything to him when he threw his weight like this because he did have some powerful backers among the Azure Dragon Tribe. But today, it was unknown where they had found the courage to speak back to him.


    As he heard this, his pride had actually been hurt, so he was about to argue back.


    Before he could though, the subordinates pulled out a token that they ced in front of him.


    Seeing this token, Qing Qiang had no choice but to swallow his words.


    This token was his father''s token, the one that represented the greatest power within the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    In front of this token, there wasn''t anything that Qing Qiang would say or it would be deemed that he was going against the authority of the head.


    Once this token appeared, Qing Qiang had no choice but to back down.


    But the look on his face made it very clear that he wasn''t doing it willingly.


    After Qing Qiang backed down, the subordinates went over to greet Hong Jun before leading him away from Qing Qiang.


    Hong Jun acted differently from how he acted with Qing Qiang. Since these were subordinates of his Uncle Qing, he wouldn''t be rude to them.


    He politely epted their greetings before following them away.


    As he walked off, he couldn''t help ring at Qing Qiang as he passed by him.


    Qing Qiang however was too busy fuming over this matter to notice this.


    He couldn''t help himself since he was the young master of the Azure Dragon Tribe who had been respected by all since he was young. Now that someone had actually dared to go against him like this, it naturally hurt his pride.


    Still, he didn''t let it bother him for too long.


    He quickly swallowed this anger and fell into a state of deep thought.


    Even the Red Dragon Tribe had been called to this meeting¡­this was clearly not something normal.


    It seemed like it was even bigger than he thought¡­


    Qing Qiang couldn''t help bing more and more anxious as these things passed through his mind.


    And of course, the worst part was that he had no idea what was even happening¡­


    Since he couldn''t do anything, Qing Qiang decided to go and talk to the others that were here. He didn''t know if he could get anything out of them, but just sitting here without doing a thing was not something that he wanted to do.


    However, before he could talk to anyone, he heard some more sounding from the side.


    When he turned to look in that direction, he was once again shocked by what he saw.


    That was because standing there were people that he recognized once again.


    These were not members of the Azure Dragon Tribe, but rather they were people from the Yellow Dragon and ck Dragon Tribes.


    Before he knew what was even happening, representatives from three out of the seven remaining tribes had shown up at this meeting.


    It was clear that something big was about to happen¡­

 Chapter 1022 Azure Dragon Tribe (6)

    ?


    Qing Qiang didn''t waste any time as he went over to greet the representatives from these two tribes.


    However, this time, he wasn''t able to reach them in time before his father''s subordinates went over to greet them.


    Then when he tried to take over for them, they once again showed the same token as before to shut him down.


    He never thought that his father would go all out against him like this¡­


    But there was nothing that he could do.


    But the ck Dragon Tribe representative rejected being shown around by his father''s subordinates in favour of being shown around by Qing Qiang.


    Since it was a personal request from the ck Dragon Tribe representative, there wasn''t anything that the subordinates could do. So they headed off with the Yellow Dragon Tribe representative alone, leaving the ck Dragon Tribe representative with Qing Qiang.


    Qing Qiang wasn''t happy that they would only listen to the ck Dragon Tribe representative and not him here in the Azure Dragon Tribe, but he wouldn''t let that displeasure impede him.


    He turned to the ck Dragon Tribe representative and said, "Brother Hei, it really has been a long time."


    The one he called brother Hei, whose name was Hei Tie nodded back at him and said, "Brother Qing, it really has been a long time."


    Unlike the Red Dragon Tribe and the Yellow Dragon Tribe representative, this ck Dragon Tribe representative didn''t look at Qing Qiang with disdain.


    That was because the ck Dragon Tribe was one of the tribes that were in the war faction. They wanted to end this false peace that the elders had created and wage war on the humans and the other races, showing that the Dragon Race was the superior race.


    It wasn''t a secret that Qing Qiang was someone who wanted war, so of course he got along well with this Hei Tie.


    The two of them exchanged greetings for the sake of appearances before they headed off to a private corner.


    Once they were there, Hei Tie asked Qing Qiang in a hushed voice, "Brother Qing, what is this meeting about?" As he asked this, Hei Tie had a very confused look on his face.


    Qing Qiang couldn''t help revealing an awkward smile when he heard this before shaking his head, "I don''t know."


    Hei Tie couldn''t help being surprised when he saw this before asking, "Isn''t this a meeting called by your Azure Dragon Tribe, why don''t you know what it''s about?"


    Qing Qiang''s smile became even more awkward as he said, "This was called by my father, I had nothing to do with it. I''m sure that you saw how those servants of hispletely ignored me just now."


    Hearing this, Hei Tie knitted his brows deeply.


    Hei Tie was the young heir of the ck Dragon Tribe, so he was someone with power. He naturally knew about the conflict between Qing Qiang and his father, so he understood what he meant by this.


    If this was true, it would be bad for their war faction.


    They had been waiting for Qing Qiang to take over the Azure Dragon Tribe so that they would be able to have more influence in the entire Dragon Race. However, if Qing Qiang''s father were to stop him from inheriting the position as the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe, that would ruin their ns.


    So the three tribes of the war faction had been secretly supporting Qing Qiang''s bid as the next head.


    Hei Tie was silent for a bit before asking in a serious voice, "What do you know?"


    Qing Qiang just shook his head to show that he knew nothing at all.


    Hei Tie''s expression became even more ugly when he saw this, but he took a deep breath and said, "Let''s see what happens next and then we''ll n our next move."


    For now, they were on the disadvantageous side since they didn''t know anything about the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s next move. In this situation, if they were to make rash moves, it would hurt them rather than help them.


    So it was better for them to wait and see what the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head had nned.


    Since there were three different tribes that were supporting Qing Qiang, they had quite a bit of power. They had been able to maintain surveince over the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head during this time.


    If it was a big move, they would have already seen clues of this.


    So whatever this was, it wasn''t big enough that it would bring an end to this power struggle.


    It was better for them to wait and see what would happen next.


    Qing Qiang thought about it before nodding along to Hei Tie''s suggestion.


    He had been quite anxious because he thought that his father had found some kind of ultimate card to use against him, but now that Hei Tie was telling him to wait, he knew that this wasn''t the case. After all, if he had found something, the ck Dragon Tribe and the other two war faction tribes would have warned him.


    Since this wasn''t the case, it seemed like there was nothing for him to worry about.


    Or at least that was what he told himself.


    But no matter what he did, he couldn''t help feeling an uneasy feeling deep down.


    That only got worse when¡­the representatives from more dragon tribes arrived.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This time, two more representatives came. One was from the Green Dragon Tribe and one was from the Gold Dragon Tribe.


    The representative from the Green Dragon Tribe went with the head''s subordinates while the representative from the Gold Dragon Tribe went with Qing Qiang''s group.


    The Gold Dragon Tribe was another one of the war faction tribes.


    After arriving, the Gold Dragon Tribe''s representative Jin Yu immediately asked them what the situation was. However, just like before, they told him that they didn''t know a single thing.


    But they also couldn''t help asking Jin Yu why he was here.


    Jin Yu shook his head and said, "We received an invitation from the Azure Dragon Tribe headtest night asking for a representative from our tribe at this meeting today. We didn''t know that the other dragon tribes had also been invited."


    After saying this, he turned to look at the groups from the Red Dragon Tribe, the Yellow Dragon Tribe, and the Green Dragon Tribe.


    With this new group of representatives that arrived, six out of the eight dragon tribes had been gathered here.


    The importance of this meeting had gone up another level.


    The only way that it could be more serious was if representatives from the remaining two dragon tribes came as well¡­


    And in the end, that was what happened.


    A representative from the Purple Dragon Tribe and a representative from the White Dragon Tribe also arrived at this meeting.


    The representative from the Purple Dragon Tribe went over to Qing Qiang''s group while the White Dragon Tribe''s representative headed off to meet Qing Qiang''s father.


    Once the representatives from all eight dragon tribes had arrived, everyone started feeling anxious.


    They finally realized that they hadpletely underestimated this meeting.


    Whatever was about to happen now¡­it could possibly shape the entire future of the Dragon Race.


    As they realized this, Qing Qiang was also feeling more and more uneasy. But it wasn''t just Qing Qiang who was feeling this way. It was also the other three representatives from the war faction that were feeling the same way.


    They looked at each other and exchanged secret eye signals, but in the end, all three of them shook their heads.


    Not a single one of their tribes had noticed anything off with Qing Qiang''s father during this time.


    But even after the representatives from all seven other tribes arrived, the meeting still didn''t begin.


    They were made to wait another hour before the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head, Qing Qiang''s father finally showed himself.


    The war faction representatives were all uneasy over this and seeing this, the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head couldn''t help revealing a faint smile. This was the effect that he wanted to see, which was why he had dyed for another hour even though everyone had arrived.


    After he stepped up onto the stage, everyone fell silent and waited for him to speak.


    But the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head just stood there without saying a thing.


    During this time, his eyes fell onto Qing Qiang.


    When Qing Qiang saw his father staring at him, he couldn''t help feeling a chill run down his spine. However, it wasn''t because he was staring at him¡­it was because of the look in his eyes.


    The way that he looked at him, those eyes that were filled with sympathy, it was as if he could already see the end of their power struggle and he was about to end it today.


    This feeling made Qing Qiang very uneasy since he still had no idea what was happening today.


    The war faction representatives with Qing Qiang had also noticed this and they all gave him secret signals to calm down. But deep in their hearts, they also felt uneasy over this.


    They could see how serious the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s eyes were¡­


    Could it be that they had really missed something?


    After looking at him for a bit, the Azure Dragon Tribe head turned back to the crowd and said, "I want to wee a special guest today."


    "Special guests?" Confused whispers spread through the crowd.


    As this happened, there was a cloaked person that suddenly appeared on stage.


    There were a few guards that raised their weapons, but they quickly put it down after seeing the Azure Dragon Tribe head wave his hand for them to put it down.


    Everyone couldn''t help wondering just who this person was.

 Chapter 1023 Azure Dragon Tribe (7)

    ?


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head saw this and said with a smile, "I''m sure that you''re all curious who this guest is."


    He didn''t get to the main point and beat around the bush like this, making them feel more and more anxious.


    But this was all done on purpose.


    After talking nonsense for a while, the Azure Dragon Tribe head finally said, "This is a friend who hase all the way here from the Lin Astral Empire."


    As soon as the words "Lin Astral Empire" were said, there was a chill that ran down Qing Qiang''s spine. As for everyone else though, they all revealed confused looks since they didn''t remember their Azure Dragon Tribe being associated with the Lin Astral Empire.


    So why would someone from the Lin Astral Empire suddenly show up here?


    That is unless they figured out that the envoy that was sent came from him¡­


    So Qing Qiang couldn''t help bing more and more nervous as he stared at this envoy cloaked figure.


    Finally, he couldn''t take it anymore and stood up to say, "Father, how are we certain that this is a real envoy from the Lin Astral Empire? They have no connections to us at all, so why would they suddenly send an envoy?"


    Doing this was naturally very rude, but Qing Qiang had been forced into a corner and he had no other choice. If he didn''t take the initiative now, when he was forced even further back into the corner, he wouldn''t be able to do a thing.


    So even if it was rude, he had to speak up now.


    As soon as he spoke up, the three representatives from the ck Dragon Tribe, the Gold Dragon Tribe, and the Purple Dragon Tribe all backed him up.


    While they didn''t know what he was doing, they were certain that this "envoy" was definitely someone called by the Azure Dragon Tribe head. They couldn''t let this envoy speak or it would be bad for them.


    But the Azure Dragon Tribe head didn''t panic when he saw this.


    He just looked at the four of them with a smile on his face, just like he was watching a bunch of kids.


    When the four of them saw this, they couldn''t help feeling nervous.


    They knew that the Azure Dragon Tribe head wouldn''t look this way unless¡­he already had some kind of countermeasure to their arguments.


    So they couldn''t help feeling uneasy.


    After their voices fell, the Azure Dragon Tribe head looked at Qing Qiang and said, "Are you done? Have you finished embarrassing our Azure Dragon Tribe yet?"


    Qing Qiang''s face turned red when he heard this.


    Even if there was a power struggle, his father had never talked to him like this before. Even if there was a power struggle, his father had always treated him with respect, which was one of the things that he respected about his father even though they were on opposing sides.


    Now that his father was suddenly speaking to him in this tone, he couldn''t help feeling very strange.


    But he couldn''t back down now.


    So Qing Qiang said, "Embarrassing our Azure Dragon Tribe? I''m protecting our Azure Dragon Tribe from those sneaky humans. How could that be considered embarrassing?"


    Since he didn''t know what the situation was, the only thing that he could do was stick to his guns. He always presented himself as someone who thought about the prosperity of their tribe, so he would use this to defend himself.


    But it wasn''t the Azure Dragon Tribe head who answered.


    Instead, it was the cloaked figure who spoke.


    "This young master of the Azure Dragon Tribe really is disappointing. Without even waiting to judge the situation, he charges in rashly without even thinking. If he were to take over as the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe, it really will be the end of the Azure Dragon Tribe." The cloaked figure said in a voice filled with disdain.


    When he heard this, Qing Qiang''s face turnedpletely red from anger out of shame.


    But before he could respond to this cloaked figure, the Azure Dragon Tribe head said, "I apologize for this fool. I didn''t raise him well."


    Qing Qiang''s face twisted when he heard this.


    It was one thing if a random stranger insulted him, but when his own father said this about him, it really was hard for him to ept.


    He puffed and huffed, looking like he was about to explode from his rage, but before he could¡­


    The cloaked figure suddenly took out a token that had the word "Lin" on it and presented it to everyone.


    When the crowd saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because there was no mistaking the aura that came from this token.


    This was the aura of the Ruler Realm and this token was a representation of the Lin Astral Family.


    That meant that this envoy was legitimate and was even sent by the Lin Astral Family.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This was not a small matter.


    Qing Qiang''s mouth froze and he immediately swallowed the words that he was about to say.


    Even if he was a fool, he wouldn''t go as far as insulting the representative of the Lin Astral Family to his face once he proved his identity. He could still get away with it if he yed the previous things that he said as concern for the Azure Dragon Tribe, but¡­he knew that it wasn''t as simple as that.


    But there wasn''t anything that he could really say in this situation.


    After all, if he were to say anything, he would be revealing what he had done before¡­


    So Qing Qiang could really feel the pressure that was being ced on him.


    As for the three representatives from the war faction, they could tell that this situation wasn''t good. They didn''t know exactly what it was, but they could tell from Qing Qiang''s expression that there was something that he knew that he wasn''t telling them.


    The three of them started exchanging nces and secret words, preparing for the worst case scenario.


    After Qing Qiang settled, the Azure Dragon Tribe head continued as if nothing had happened, "This friend from the Lin Astral Empire is here for a simple matter that we''ll be addressing today. This is also why I''ve invited the friends from the seven other tribes here."


    As they heard this, the war faction representatives all knitted their brows.


    But on the other side, the four from the peace faction also couldn''t help revealing surprised looks.


    They had also been keeping an eye on the situation and helping the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head as much as possible. However, they had never heard of anything like this before.


    Seeing the looks on everyone''s face, the Azure Dragon Tribe head looked like he had already expected this and he was even satisfied with this reaction. So he continued by saying, "I will now hand this over to the friend from the Lin Astral Empire."


    The cloaked figure gave a nod to the Azure Dragon Tribe head before walking forward to take the stage.


    Once he stood on the stage, he didn''t say a word as he looked down in front of him. His eyes swept over the crowd in front of him before finallynding on Qing Qiang who was still standing there.


    Of course, he couldn''t see those eyes looking at him because of the cloak, but he could feel the gaze on him.


    With this gaze on him, he felt even more unsettled as if his guess had been confirmed. It was almost as if this person was specifically targeting him¡­


    After a long silence, the cloaked figure finally started speaking again, "Hello everyone, I''m here on behalf of the Lin Astral Empire to solve a problem that we''re currently facing."


    When they heard him use the word "problem", they couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    If the Lin Astral Empire was facing a problem, how was that rted to their Dragon Race, or rather, how was it rted to the Azure Dragon Tribe?


    The cloaked figure didn''t say anything even after seeing all these confused looks.


    Instead, he just deliberately waited while looking in a certain direction.


    This direction was in the direction of Qing Qiang.


    Qing Qiang even almost felt like this person was waiting and giving him a chance to confess.


    But Qing Qiang would never do anything like that.


    Even if he was beaten to death, he would take this secret to his grave.


    So he just firmly stared back at this cloaked figure.


    Seeing that Qing Qiang didn''t show any sign of remorse or repentance, the cloaked figure no longer waited and said, "Just a few weeks ago, there was an envoy sent by the Dragon Race that came to our Lin Astral Empire."


    As soon as he said this, everyone couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    That was because they had no idea what he was talking about!


    They had never heard of their Dragon Race sending an envoy to the Lin Astral Empire before.


    In fact, most of these tribes had never had any dealings with the Lin Astral Empire.


    The only thing that they could remember was sending their congrattions to the Lin Astral Empire over their new heir.


    But for something like this to happen during the period where the new heir had appeared¡­


    It was almost as if someone was targeting their Dragon Race¡­or it might be someone from their Dragon Race that was having thoughts about the Lin Astral Empire.


    The representatives from the seven tribes couldn''t help looking at each other as this thought passed through their minds.

 Chapter 1024 Azure Dragon Tribe (8)

    ?


    The cloaked figure didn''t say anything else after saying this.


    They just watched over the crowd again, specifically, they were looking at Qing Qiang who was standing there frozen.


    He forced himself to have a calm look on his face, but there was no hiding the beads of cold sweat that was dripping down his back. It was so strong that the back of his shirt was even starting to get soaked.


    After taking another long pause, the cloaked figure said, "As for which tribe the envoys came from¡­it was the Azure Dragon Tribe."


    After he said this, everyone turned to look at the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    The representatives of the other races had serious looks while the members of the Azure Dragon Tribe all had concerned and worried looks.


    This was a very serious usation for their Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Impersonating an envoy from the entire Dragon Race was something that meant going against the entire Dragon Race. It was a crime that could result in all seven other tribes ganging up to destroy the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    So all of the members of the Azure Dragon Tribe were afraid that this was it for them. After all, there were representatives from all seven tribes here.


    It was impossible for them to hide this from the rest of the Dragon Race like this.


    They also couldn''t helpining about their head. He was the one who knew who this cloaked figure was and he still invited the representatives from the seven tribes.


    It was as if he wanted to ruin their Azure Dragon Tribe!


    But to everyone''s surprise, the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head had a very calm look on his face. It was as if he wasn''t bothered by this disastrous revtion at all.


    Could it be that he already knew something else?


    Qing Qiang took a deep breath before saying, "We''re just supposed to believe you? Even if you represent the Lin Astral Empire, why should we believe you when you say that our Azure Dragon Tribe sent an envoy representing the entire Dragon Race? Unless you show us proof, this is all a lie and you''re just trying to harm my Azure Dragon Tribe!"


    Qing Qiang waspletely pushed into the corner, so he couldn''t let himself be taken out without putting up a fight.


    The only way that he would be able to put up a fight was if he used the other side first.


    After all, in most cases, the one who acted first was usually the side that everyone sided with. Not to mention that this was the Azure Dragon Tribe, so his side was the side that most people would want to take.


    If they took the side of the Lin Astral Empire''s envoy, it would mean the end of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    No member of the Azure Dragon Tribe was foolish.


    So after Qing Qiang spoke up, the other members of the Azure Dragon Tribe who supported Qing Qiang all started speaking up to criticize the cloaked figure. Even some people who were on the fence started speaking up against the cloaked figure.


    It was only those that werepletely loyal to the current Azure Dragon Tribe head that didn''t say a thing. But judging by the look on their faces, it was clear that they didn''t support what the Azure Dragon Tribe head did.


    Facing this wave of criticism, the cloaked figure didn''t react at all as they kept looking at Qing Qiang.


    Qing Qiang was still spewing out as much righteous BS that he could, but he could feel the gaze on him. With this gaze on him, he felt a chill running down his spine.


    Still, he didn''t stop talking as he kept saying more and more righteous words.


    If someone didn''t stop him, he might even reach the point where he would have started a war between the Azure Dragon Tribe and the Lin Astral Empire over this. But before he could reach that point, the cloaked figure spoke again.


    "Evidence? Who said that there was no evidence?"


    As soon as he said this, everyone couldn''t help falling silent and staring at this cloaked figure with looks of disbelief.


    Not a single one of them believed that he could back this up since they had deluded themselves into thinking that he was just here to cause trouble.


    But in their hearts, they also didn''t want him to have any evidence since it would be bad for their Azure Dragon Tribe.


    In the end though, the cloaked figure took out a crystal that he held up in front of everyone to let them see what it was. When they saw this, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    The Dragon Race wasn''t as technologically advanced as the humans, but they still imported some things from the humans. This crystal was one of those things.


    This crystal was a cultivator''s method of storing media.


    So there was video that was stored onto this crystal like DVDs in Lin Fan''s past world.


    As soon as this was brought out, everyone couldn''t help giving a gulp.


    Lin Fan held this crystal up for a bit before raising the arm with the watch on it for everyone to see. With just a few taps on the watch, there was a screen that appeared in front of him.


    All he needed to do now was ce the crystal on the watch so that it would disy what was stored inside.


    However, he didn''t do that right away as he held it there.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    During this time, he looked at Qing Qiang as if he was waiting for something.


    Qing Qiang was certain now that this cloaked figure was targeting him.


    Every time he did something, he deliberately waited to bring out his next card and he kept staring at him. It was almost as if he was trying to pressure the truth out of him¡­


    But if that was the case, didn''t that mean that he already knew the truth behind the identity of the envoys?


    At the same time, it would mean something terrifying¡­


    His father was cooperating with this cloaked figure, so that meant that his father also knew about this matter. Since his father knew, there was a high chance that they had some kind of conclusive evidence which was why they were doing this.


    Qing Qiang''s back waspletely soaked at this point and if it wasn''t for his long hair, he would have beenpletely exposed. But he still couldn''t back down since there was no path of salvation for him if he did.


    The only thing that he could do was act strong until he was past the point of no return.


    Seeing that Qing Qiang wouldn''t give himself up, the cloaked figure put the crystal onto the watch on his wrist.


    As soon as the crystal touched the watch, the scene of Qing Lan and his group of envoys appeared on the screen.


    This was a perfect shot of Qing Lan''s group and it perfectly captured the fake Dragon Race envoy token that they brought with them.


    Qing Lan was a decently well known person in the Azure Dragon Tribe, so as soon as they saw him, everyone knew that this wasn''t fake. That was because almost everyone knew that Qing Lan wasn''t here and was on a mission for Qing Qiang right now.


    As they looked more closely, they recognized that all of the members of this group were¡­people who followed Qing Qiang.


    It made it very clear who was the one behind this fiasco¡­


    Qing Qiang''s expression was very ugly when he saw this, but he didn''t allow himself to be distracted for long. Instead of epting the evidence that had been ced in front of him, he rejected it with all of his might.


    "This is fake! This is clearly doctored evidence! We all know what kind of tricks the human race are capable of!" Qing Qiang shouted with all of his might.


    When he shouted this out, his supporters immediately started backing him by calling out this evidence as fake.


    But the others all had strange looks as they looked at Qing Qiang.


    They weren''t fools and they were able to see through the truth of this video.


    Even if they weren''t as technologically advanced, they were able to see what was true and what was false.


    Even the representatives from the war faction could see this and were staying out of this. They just silently observed Qing Qiang, as if they were waiting to see if he would be able to think of a way to get out of this.


    The cloaked figure just stood there on stage, as if he wasn''t bothered at all by this.


    In the end, it was the Azure Dragon Tribe head who came forward and cupped his hands to the cloaked figure as he said, "Sir envoy, I would like to apologize on behalf of the Azure Dragon Tribe for this matter."


    When the Azure Dragon Tribe members heard this, they all revealed ugly expressions.


    Now that their head had admitted to this, they had no choice but to ept the dishonour of this.


    Once this spread through the representatives of the other tribes that were here, their Azure Dragon Tribe would certainly face the punishment of the Dragon Race elders.


    Qing Qiang was also caught off guard by his father suddenly apologizing, but he quickly said, "Father, you can''t fall for the tricks of these humans!"


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head narrowed his eyes and looked at Qing Qiang with cold eyes as he said, "What tricks? You dare insult the Lin Astral Empire''s envoy like this? You disgrace of a son!"


    Qing Qiang''s face twisted again before saying, "You have to be a fake! My real father would not be tricked by human tricks like this! Everyone, help me take down this fake!"


    Qing Qiang tried to rally the others to take down the Azure Dragon Tribe head, but not a single person rose up with him. Even his subordinates stayed back and didn''t follow him.


    After all, the Azure Dragon Tribe head was a Ruler Realm Expert, so if they were to fight him, there was no doubt that they would be the ones trampled by him.


    Seeing this, the Azure Dragon Tribe head gave a snort before suddenly releasing his aura.


    Once he released the aura of a Ruler Realm Expert, there was no denying it.


    It forced Qing Qiang back along with the rest of his supporters.


    Then the Azure Dragon Tribe head said, "Who said that these are tricks? The envoy even has evidence of this matter!"


    Qing Qiang''s face twisted and he wanted to say something else, but the Azure Dragon Tribe head continued, "Not to mention, we have already investigated this matter and have found the culprit responsible for this act of treason."


    Once this was said, Qing Qiang''s expression froze.

 Chapter 1025 Azure Dragon Tribe (9)

    ?


    After the Azure Dragon Tribe head said this, everyone couldn''t help taking a cold breath.


    They all looked around at each other as if they were suspecting each other, but they quickly turned back to look at the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    They noticed that the Azure Dragon Tribe head wasn''t looking at any of them. Rather his eyes had been on Qing Qiang the entire time.


    As they saw this, everyone remembered something.


    That was right, all of the people who had been in the video were members of Qing Qiang''s faction.


    So it only made sense that he was involved in this matter, right?


    So everyone also couldn''t help turning to look at Qing Qiang.


    They saw the stunned look on his face and they believed even more that this was the case.


    Qing Qiang realized his mistake and quickly forced himself to calm down before saying, "If you have evidence of who the culprit is, why don''t you take it out for everyone to see then?"


    In the end, he stuck to his guns and would reject everything that was thrown at him.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head gave a sigh when he heard this before putting his hand on his head and shaking it.


    Seeing this, it was as if there was something sharp piercing into Qing Qiang''s heart.


    Finally, the Azure Dragon Tribe head took out a few pieces of paper and said, "This is the proof of who the culprit is, but I don''t think that you would want me to spread this."


    As soon as he said this, everyone once again looked at Qing Qiang.


    Qing Qiang however couldn''t hold himself back since he immediately recognized these pieces of paper as soon as they were brought out. That was because these were things that he had hidden deep inside of his manor, in a ce that he never thought that anyone would be able to find.


    But more importantly, he recognized this since this was proof of his involvement with this matter. It was undeniable proof that he was the one who had obtained the token that Qing Lan''s group had used to show that they were envoys from the Dragon Race.


    No matter how he thought about it, he couldn''t understand how his father had obtained this thing.


    At the same time, he felt regret over keeping it.


    What was written on the pieces of paper weremunications that he sent to the people that had arranged for him to receive this envoy token.


    The only reason that he had kept this was so he could use it as ckmail against them if they ever did anything to harm him.


    He had kept it safe in a hidden part of his manor, a ce that no one could have ever known about. That was why he had felt safe enough to keep this thing instead of disposing of it.


    But he never would have imagined that someone would be able to find it and steal it without him noticing.


    These thoughts passed through his mind in a matter of seconds before he suddenly flicked his fingers.


    Then before anyone could react, there were two figures that suddenly appeared out of nowhere.


    The appearance of these two figures had caught everyone off guard and no one was able to stop them as they rushed at the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    As they were moving through the air, there was something that was pulled out by them.


    This was a ball that was thrown through the air the moment that they pulled it out.


    As this ball flew through the air, it suddenly exploded in a burst of light.


    This burst of light onlysted for a single second before fading, but that wasn''t the important thing. The important thing was that after this burst of light, the ball had transformed into a that suddenly surrounded the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    This didn''t wrap up around him, but rather flew around in the space around him.


    It was as if it was putting pressure on him just by being there.


    But the most shocking thing about this was that the aura that came from it¡­was equal to the aura that the Azure Dragon Tribe head released. It was the aura of the Ruler Realm.


    So it was clear that this was a Ruler Realm Artifact that was designed for capturing.


    As soon as the was released, the two figures didn''t hesitate at all to draw their heads back as they gathered mes in their mouths.


    This was the special Dragon Breath attack that almost all of the Dragon Race could use with just a few exceptions. It was one of their most destructive and wide range attacks.


    When the two of them released their mes, it wasn''t arge range Dragon Breath, but rather a pir of mes that was aimed right at the pieces of paper in the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s hands.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This was a special Dragon Breath that was much harder to use since it was concentrated mes instead of normal mes. Since it was concentrated, the mes themselves were much stronger than normal¡­so strong that it was to the point where it would burn the user''s mouth before they shot it.


    That was why it was much harder to use and much rarer than the normal Dragon Breath.


    Unless one trained extensively to use it, it would just result in their mouth being burned if they tried to use this technique.


    So most dragons would avoid doing this since it was embarrassing burning themselves with their own mes. Not to mention that at the heat that these mes reached, it would be very easy to put their own lives at risk.


    So these two figures that had attacked were clearly highly trained individuals.


    As the mes approached the pieces of paper in the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s hand, Qing Qiang couldn''t help revealing a look of hope in his eyes.


    As long as these pieces of paper were burnt away, then there would be no evidence of his wrongdoings.


    That was why he was willing to sacrifice these two death guards that he had spent so many resources to train.


    He was even willing to use that Ruler Realm Artifact that had cost him the lives of several of his subordinates to obtain secretly.


    All of this was to protect his secret and his life.


    But it was all useless in the end.


    With a snort, the suddenly snapped to pieces. Then the Azure Dragon Tribe head suddenly shot out mes at the two pirs of mes that were approaching him.


    The mes shed head on, but there was no hesitation at all as his mes shattered those two me pirs.


    Qing Qiang couldn''t help being shocked when he saw this.


    The reason why he had trained these two death guards in the first ce¡­was to use them to assassinate his father when the time was right. He had thought that with their Peak Sun Realm cultivations and the Ruler Realm Artifact, they would be able to take him down if they ambushed him.


    But they werepletely outssed¡­


    They couldn''t hurt him at all, not to mention that their target was only to stall him for a bit so that they could destroy the pieces of paper in his hand.


    Qing Qiang realized that he hadpletely underestimated his father.


    After shattering the me pirs, the Azure Dragon Tribe head didn''t hesitate at all as he drew his head back again.


    This time, he gathered the mes inside of his mouth a bit before shooting them out at the two figures flying through the air.


    When he shot this Dragon Breath out, it waspletely different from the one that he had casually shot out just now. This one had a heat that made everyone take a step back and they couldn''t look at it directly with how bright it was.


    The two death guards tried all that they could to dodge it, but they quickly realized that it was impossible for them to dodge it with their speed. So they had no choice but to take it head on.


    Both of them worked together andbined their domains to create a barrier in front of them, but that didn''t work at all.


    The moment that the Dragon Breath hit the domains, they shattered to pieces and the two of them were left with no protection.


    Being hit by the mes head on like this¡­it didn''t leave a pretty picture.


    The two of them fell down from the sky like puppets that had their strings cut andnded right in front of the Azure Dragon Tribe head. However, it was clear by the light in their eyes that they were still alive.


    Both of them knew that it was impossible for them to escape, so they didn''t hesitate to bite down on the capsules in their mouths.


    The reason they were known as death guards was because they would give their lives for their master. They would die for Qing Qiang without hesitation since that was what they had been trained to do.


    It was just too bad that they weren''t even allowed to do that.


    Before they could break the capsules in their teeth, a pressure fell on them and they were stopped from moving a single muscle.


    No matter how they tried, they couldn''t do a single thing.


    So they had no choice but toy there in pain with skin covered in burns.


    Qing Qiang looked at his father with aplicated look as he finally realized¡­


    He had only gotten as far as he had because it was his father that he was facing¡­


    If his father hadn''t shown mercy because of their familial bond¡­then this power struggle would have ended much sooner.

 Chapter 1026 Azure Dragon Tribe (10)

    ?


    After the two assants had been subdued, there was only silence that followed.


    Everyone looked at the Azure Dragon Tribe head with a new look.


    It had been a long time since he had shown his power since he had always tried to settle things peacefully, but now they remembered why he had be their leader in the first ce. The power that came with this title of leader wasn''t something that could be underestimated.


    As for the Azure Dragon Tribe head, he raised his hand and gave a sign.


    After he gave this sign, there were two figures that appeared beside him as well.


    Just like how Qing Qiang had trained death guards, the Azure Dragon Tribe head also had simr guards.


    He just didn''t summon them since he felt that he needed to show a demonstration of his power for everyone.


    But now that he had shown his power, he would leave the things that needed to be handled to the guards since it was their job in the first ce.


    The two assants were brought onto the stage in front of the Azure Dragon Tribe head before being restrained. While they were being restrained, they were also searched for anything that could be used to take their own lives.


    Once they were restrained, the Azure Dragon Tribe head came forward to p them across the face.


    He could have chosen a much gentler method of waking these two up, but he didn''t do that. Instead, he just pped them across the face to wake them up.


    In a way, it was him venting his anger towards his son on these subordinates of his.


    If it wasn''t for Qing Qiang causing all that trouble, they wouldn''t be in the mess that they were currently in.


    Still, there was no choice since this was what Qing Qiang had already chosen.


    He had to fulfil his duty as the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe and as a father.


    After these two woke up, the Azure Dragon Tribe head said in a cold voice, "Who sent you?"


    The way that he said this made it clear that he brokered no argument and he was only expecting the answer from them.


    However, these two death guards had been properly trained and no matter how they were tortured, they wouldn''t say a single thing. So both of them just stood there staring at the Azure Dragon Tribe head with nk looks, as if they didn''t even register that he had spoken to them.


    Of course, the Azure Dragon Tribe head had already expected this from these two when he had first captured them.


    They didn''t even fear death, so there was no chance of getting any information from them.


    Instead, he just gave a sigh and turned his attention away from the two of them.


    Everyone was surprised, but then they remembered what had been happening before this.


    All of them immediately turned their attention back to the Azure Dragon Tribe head and waited for him to finish telling them what he had been about to tell them. Especially Qing Qiang who had a look like he was about to face death on his face.


    He had used all his trump cards and in the end, he hadn''t been able to do anything¡­


    This feeling of helplessness was crushing for him.


    So after thinking it through, he decided¡­that he would rather submit than die.


    Even if he had to submit to his father, which was thest thing that he wanted to do, it was still better than dying.


    So before the Azure Dragon Tribe head could say anything, Qing Qiang sent a secret spiritual sense message to him.


    But he was shocked to find that the Azure Dragon Tribe head acted like he didn''t hear him.


    Qing Qiang wasn''t a fool, he knew exactly what this meant.


    It meant that his father had condemned him to his death and would sacrifice him to the Dragon Race for the sake of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    When he realized this, there was a piercing feeling inside of his heart like he was being stabbed by a dagger, but he didn''t have time to dwell on it.


    So instead of waiting for him to speak, he suddenly pointed at his father and said, "The true culprit is our head! He was the one that sent the envoy to Lin Astral Empire to look for my younger brother Qing Ao in the first ce! The pieces of paper in his hands are just fakes to frame innocent people with!"


    In times like this, he would strike first to bend the truth.


    As long as he struck first, the public would be on his side and they would believe what he said.


    So he chose to throw it all back at his father, spinning it so that it was all his fault.


    Everyone couldn''t help turning to look at Qing Qiang before turning back to look at the Azure Dragon Tribe head.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The name Qing Ao was considered a taboo in the Azure Dragon Tribe, so now that it was brought out, of course it attracted a lot of attention.


    Qing Ao was the one that people had wanted to take over instead of Qing Qiang, but since he had disappeared, everyone had stopped talking about him out of fear of offending Qing Qiang. But now that his name had been brought back out again, everyone couldn''t help feeling that this was strange.


    Thest person to see Qing Ao was the Azure Dragon Tribe head, his father.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head gave a sigh when he heard this and he shook his head.


    The way that he looked now, it was as if he was filled with disappointment towards his son.


    Qing Qiang''s face couldn''t help twisting a bit when he heard this, but he quickly continued ndering his father.


    He believed that with all the nder that he had thrown at his father, he would be able toe out on top.


    But he didn''t realize one critical mistake.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head released his aura again and the pressure from it made everyone fall silent. They all turned to look at him, waiting to see what he would say this time.


    "Who said anything about Qing Ao?" Those were the words that the Azure Dragon Tribe head calmly said.


    As soon as he said this, everyone couldn''t help looking at each other with a confused look since they never expected him to say these words.


    Even Qing Qiang couldn''t help being confused at first.


    But then when they had a moment to process this, they realized that¡­he was right.


    From beginning to end, no one had mentioned anything about Qing Ao.


    So why did Qing Qiang suddenly bring it up?


    Everyone turned back to look at Qing Qiang who had a very ugly look on his face.


    He never would have thought that he would self-destruct like this¡­


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head didn''t give him any time to say anything else as he raised the pieces of paper in his hand and said, "As you''ve all expected, it was my son Qing Qiang who forged the token and sent the envoy to the Lin Astral Empire."


    He calmly said these words that had such deep meaning, almost as if he didn''t feel anything.


    Everyone couldn''t help feeling strange when they heard this since they knew the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    He was someone who cared deeply about his family, even his rebellious son. Or else it would have been impossible for the power struggle to havested this long.


    After a moment of silence, the Azure Dragon Tribe head looked at the two guards he had summoned and gave them a nod. As soon as they received this nod, they started moving towards Qing Qiang.


    Qing Qiang immediately snapped out of his daze when he saw this and he quickly raised his hand which had transformed into a w as he said, "What are you doing?"


    One of the guards said, "Please don''t resist and let yourself be detained. Otherwise, we have no choice but to be rough."


    Qing Qiang''s expression twisted even more when he heard this.


    He knew that there was no path forward for him if he were to allow these two to detain him. What would be awaiting him was the punishment of the Dragon Race elders and for a crime of this extent, it would mean that he would be killed.


    So unless he fought back now, there was no chance that he would survive.


    As long as he was alive, there was a chance for him to make aeback.


    After all, he was still the son of the Azure Dragon Tribe''s head. He was someone that had a right to session even if he wasbelled as a traitor to the Dragon Race. This was his blood right and there wasn''t anyone that could take this from him.


    As long as he was able to escape, he was certain that the war faction would be willing to shelter him until the time was right for him toe back.


    He even looked over at the war faction representatives for confirmation of this.


    They didn''t give any visible signs, but the look in their eyes made it clear what they were saying.


    They agreed to shelter him if he was able to escape, but they wouldn''t do anything to help him escape.


    That was their bottom line.


    With this promise, Qing Qiang didn''t lose hope and looked to beat the guards approaching before looking for a way to escape.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t get this opportunity.

 Chapter 1027 Azure Dragon Tribe (11)

    ?


    Before anyone could even react, the Azure Dragon Tribe head had already raised his hand up.


    Then in one smooth move, he pushed out towards Qing Qiang.


    There was an air pressure palm that flew out at Qing Qiang and crushed him into the ground before he could react as well.


    He had beenpletely focused on the guardsing at him, so he didn''t notice his father making a move.


    After being crushed into the ground, Qing Qiang''s eyes rolled back in his head and he didn''t get up again.


    There was only silence that followed after Qing Qiang had been knocked out.


    Everyone first stared at Qing Qiang lying on the ground in shock before turning to look at the Azure Dragon Tribe head. In their eyes, there was a look of disbelief, as if they couldn''t believe that he would actually make a move to take down Qing Qiang like this.


    But the facts were there in front of him and he wasn''t able to deny it.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head nodded to the two guards who immediately went over to tie up Qing Qiang.


    Then he turned to the representatives of the seven tribes and said, "I hope that you will bring news of this to the other tribe heads for me."


    The seven of them found it hard to react after hearing this, but then they all nodded in agreement to this.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head nodded back before with a wave of his hand, there were several pieces of paper that appeared in front of them. As those pieces of paper floated there, he said, "This is the proof of this traitor''s actions, I hope that you will bring it to the tribe heads."


    The seven of them couldn''t help revealing confused looks when they heard this.


    But after taking those pieces of paper and reading them, they couldn''t help understanding what the Azure Dragon Tribe head meant.


    After all, there were members of their tribes that were implicated in this matter.


    They would need to take care of this and hand them over to the elders of the Dragon Race, or else their tribes would also suffer.


    The peace faction representatives looked at the Azure Dragon Tribe head with grateful looks, but this wasn''t the case for the war faction representatives. That was because most of the ones that were implicated were rted to the war faction tribes.


    It was clear that he was giving them these not to help them¡­but rather to threaten them.


    He knew that they were secretly helping Qing Qiang, which was something that hurt the Azure Dragon Tribe as a whole. So he was forcing them to back off or they would have to face the elders of the Dragon Race.


    The elders were the real rulers of the Dragon Race, even though it seemed like the ones in charge were the leaders of the tribes.


    They remained neutral in general when it came to the affairs of the Dragon Race, they only came out when it came to matters that would affect the survival of the entire Dragon Race.


    So they didn''t step in when it came to struggles of the war and peace factions. Both of these paths were paths that could be explored without endangering the Dragon Race, so they didn''t step in.


    But when it came to matters that involved betraying the Dragon Race, the elders of the Dragon Race frowned upon this seriously and would always involve themselves.


    So this case would certainly catch the attention of the elders.


    After this matter was settled, the representatives from the seven tribes were about to stand up and leave.


    They all assumed that this was the only thing that the Azure Dragon Tribe head had wanted them to see, so they were all nning on returning to their tribes to report to the leaders.


    Now that Qing Qiang had been taken care of and the future of the Azure Dragon Tribe was uncertain, the leaders had to be informed so they could n ordingly.


    But before they could leave, the Azure Dragon Tribe head said, "Now that that has been taken care of, we can move on to the main event."


    As soon as they heard this, everyone couldn''t help looking at him in shock.


    This was a matter that could even alert the elders of the Dragon Race and the Azure Dragon Tribe head was actually just calling this a prologue.


    If that was the case, then just how shocking was this "main event" that he spoke of.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at each other with strange looks before settling down again. This included the representatives of the seven tribes.


    They were all curious what this "main event" would be.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head actually waited for everyone to settle down before he started talking again.


    When he spoke though, everyone was caught off guard by what he said.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "I''m sure that many of you have been anxious about the future of our Azure Dragon Tribe. But today, I want to announce my sessor."


    When they heard this, everyone suddenly revealed confused looks.


    Sessor?


    The two candidates for the position of the next head of the Azure Dragon Tribe were all gone now, so how could there be a sessor?


    Qing Ao who everyone had wanted to take over had disappeared and Qing Qiang who had the highest chances had been deposed of by the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    Just who was left to be the sessor?


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head could see the confusion on everyone''s faces and knew exactly what they were thinking of. However, he didn''t seem to care as he continued with his announcement.


    "This has been a matter that has gued our tribe for a long time, but I want you all to be assured that I have chosen the best person for this job."


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head turned to some of his people who had been waiting on the side the entire time.


    When they saw him waving at them, they turned to the person that they had been watching over the entire time and brought that person up to the stage.


    When the person arrived, she was brought over to where the Azure Dragon Tribe head was standing and then picked up by him. He held her with a smile on his face as he said, "I want to present my sessor, my granddaughter, Qing Bao Lan."


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at the little girl in his hands with a strange look.


    That was because not a single person knew about this granddaughter that he mentioned.


    They had indeed heard about this granddaughter being born when Qing Ao was still in the tribe, but she had disappeared along with Qing Ao back then.


    Everyone had assumed that it was Qing Qiang who took care of her, but now it seemed¡­that this wasn''t the case.


    However, since no one knew about her, not a single person knew what kind of views she had.


    Especially those representatives from the seven tribes.


    They wanted to know which faction she stood on, whether it was the war or peace faction.


    One might assume that it was the peace faction since the Azure Dragon Tribe head supported her this much, but one could never know how she might develop. They could all see just how young she was, so they knew that there was still time before her real opinions developed.


    Many people were confused why the Azure Dragon Tribe head would pick someone as young as this as his sessor.


    However, since he had done it and he had announced it in front of everyone like this, they knew that it was impossible for him to go back on his word now.


    They were all nning on how to influence Qing Bao Lan to achieve their goals.


    But the next words that the Azure Dragon Tribe head saidpletely caught them off guard.


    "In addition to this, I want to announce something else very important to our Azure Dragon Tribe." This time, he said this in such a serious voice that people couldn''t help looking at the Azure Dragon Tribe head with serious looks.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head waved his hand and then¡­there was a stone that appeared in his palm.


    The moment that this stone appeared in his palm, everyone couldn''t help turning their eyes to look at it.


    That was because there was something special about this stone that drew all of them to it right away. This was a feeling that came from the very essence of their bodies, the very essence of their bloodlines.


    It was as if something was telling them that they needed to have this stone.


    But of course, no one dared to fight the Azure Dragon Tribe head for it.


    Seeing these expressions on their faces, the Azure Dragon Tribe head revealed a satisfied look in his eyes.


    He knew that he had obtained the reaction that he wanted, so he continued by saying, "I''m sure that all of you know that a few generations back, our tribe had a special artifact that could help purify bloodlines."


    As soon as they heard this, everyone couldn''t help revealing shocked expressions.


    They could already guess what he was going to say next based on this and the feeling that they got from this stone, but they still waited for him to finish his words. They still waited for him to confirm it.


    Then as if to confirm their guesses, the Azure Dragon Tribe head lifted up the stone and said, "This is the Dragon Stone that our Azure Dragon Tribe lost all those years ago."

 Chapter 1028 Azure Dragon Tribe (12)

    ?


    Once this was confirmed, there were looks of greed that appeared on the faces of the representatives from the seven tribes.


    However, they also quickly restrained themselves and revealed calm looks again.


    They knew that there was no chance that they would be able to steal the Dragon Stone from the Azure Dragon Tribe with their powers alone. If they really wanted the Dragon Stone, they had to go back and report back to their leaders before doing anything.


    Without the support of the experts of their tribes, it would be impossible for them to do anything.


    So after this thought passed through their minds, they quickly revealed fake smiles and congratted the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head and all of the Azure Dragon Tribe knew that these were fake smiles, but they didn''t say anything about this.


    In fact, many of the Azure Dragon Tribe supported their head in revealing the existence of the Dragon Stone to the other tribes. They knew that it would be impossible for them to hide the existence of the Dragon Stone now that it was back, so it was better to announce it early to gain the upper hand.


    After all, if the elders knew that the Dragon Stone was back, they would certainly take action to protect it again.


    At the same time, the Azure Dragon Tribe could erase the shame of losing the Dragon Stone in the past and rise up to their previous position.


    But many people also couldn''t help wondering¡­just how had the Azure Dragon Tribe head found the Dragon Stone?


    This was something that had been lost for generations, so for it to suddenly appear, it really was hard to believe.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head saw that he had already obtained the reaction that he wanted, so with a wave of his hand, the Dragon Stone disappeared. Then he lifted Qing Bao Lan up again as he said, "The one who found this Dragon Stone for our tribe is my granddaughter, Qing Bao Lan."


    He stated this as a simple fact, but everyone couldn''t help being surprised by the contents of his words.


    This new sessor was the one that had found the Dragon Stone¡­it was no wonder she had been chosen as a sessor by the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    However, everyone couldn''t help wondering about a new thing¡­


    Just how had this little girl found the Dragon Stone?


    The people that had been nning on influencing Qing Bao Lan started thinking differently.


    They had thought that it would be simple for them to influence a little girl like Qing Bao Lan. With their positions, they would be able to approach her and with how young she was, it would be easy for them to manipte her with words.


    But someone who had found the Dragon Stone definitely wasn''t simple.


    It seemed like they couldn''t underestimate Qing Bao Lan.


    So many people starteding up with different ns on how to approach Qing Bao Lan.


    It was just too bad that the Azure Dragon Tribe head wasn''t done shocking them yet.


    Once he put away the Dragon Stone and after a short pause, he said, "I also have something else to announce."


    When he said this, everyone couldn''t help immediately turning their attention to him.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head had something else to announce on top of all these shocking things¡­


    Everyone couldn''t help turning to look at him with strange looks.


    Just what was happening with the Azure Dragon Tribe that all of these things were happening at once.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head looked over at his subordinates and waved his hand at them again. This time, they brought someone else onto the stage, someone that no one was able to recognize.


    However, they could clearly tell that this person was a part of the Dragon Race based on the aura that they released.


    The strange thing was that they weren''t able to tell what kind of dragon he was based on his aura.


    The aura that this person released wasn''t like the aura of any of the dragon tribes. However, they could feel a powering from this person that they had never felt before.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at this person with curious and confused looks as they all wondered just who this person was.


    As this person walked onto the stage, some of the female dragons couldn''t help revealing¡­infatuated looks.


    That was because this person was just too handsome, or at least he was when it came to dragon standards.


    This person was not only tall and handsome, they had scales that shined bright like the sun in the sky while also having the same luster of the darkest night. This was a coat of scales that was of the highest caliber, signifying that this person had a pure bloodline.


    As for what that bloodline was¡­it was hard to tell.


    Even a few of the representatives of the other tribes couldn''t help being attracted to this person.


    During this time, Qing Bao Lan could see everyone who was looking at this person this way and revealed a displeased expression. Even if she was a child, she could clearly understand what all of these people meant by these looks.


    So she noted down all of these faces for the future.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    She wouldn''t spare anyone that looked at her man this way!


    When this person was brought up onto the stage, he stood there in front of the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    But what people found strange was that the look on his face seemed a bit¡­childish.


    Or at least it didpared to how his body looked.


    As he stood there, the Azure Dragon Tribe head didn''t say a word. The people that looked closely found that the Azure Dragon Tribe head even had a strange look on his face as he looked at this person.


    It was almost as if he wasn''t willing to say what he was about to say¡­


    But in the end, the Azure Dragon Tribe head gave a sigh and said, "I want to introduce my granddaughter''s fiance, Xiao Feng."


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at this handsome young man before looking at the little girl who was in the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s arms.


    Then they couldn''t help revealing even stranger looks.


    With the clear age difference, it was strange to hear that they were actually engaged.


    But Qing Bao Lan didn''t care about any of that.


    After hearing the Azure Dragon Tribe head announce that Xiao Feng was her fiance, she couldn''t help revealing a happy smile while a blush covered her face.


    This was what she had dreamed of since she had met Xiao Feng and now that it was actually happening, it was like a dreame true.


    As for Xiao Feng, he just stood there with a calm look on his face.


    But it wasn''t as if he didn''t understand what was happening. The look in his eyes made it clear that he understood what being Qing Bao Lan''s fiance meant.


    After a moment of shock, everyone couldn''t help looking at Xiao Feng with inquisitive eyes as they tried to figure out just who this person was.


    After all, not a single person was able to recognize Xiao Feng.


    For this dragon that came out of nowhere to be suddenly engaged to the future leader of the Azure Dragon Tribe, it was not something that people could ept that easily. The difference in status was just too much for them to ept, especially those that had ns for Qing Bao Lan.


    But it wasn''t as if they could say anything at a ceremony like this.


    So they wanted to figure out what was special about Xiao Feng and then make their movester.


    But before the meeting could end, there was another shocking thing that happened.


    After Xiao Feng had been introduced, there was a suddenmotion from the back.


    Everyone turned to look in the direction of themotion and they were shocked to find seven people that they recognized.


    These were the current heads of the seven tribes!


    Why did they suddenly show up here?


    However, the heads of these seven tribes ignored all of them and made their way through the crowd. They came all the way up to the stage and then looked around for a bit as if they were looking for something.


    They kept looking around until their eyes fell onto Xiao Feng who was on stage.


    Then they each pulled out a different item that they ced on their palms.


    All of these items started moving towards Xiao Feng as if they were attracted to him.


    When they saw this, all seven of the tribe heads immediately revealed stunned looks before looking at the Azure Dragon Tribe head with narrowed eyes.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head acted as if he had already expected this reaction from them and just faced those gazes head on.


    After a long period of silence, all of them turned to look at Xiao Feng and were about to say something.


    But before any of them could say anything, there was a pressure that suddenly fell over all of them that made them stagger.


    After recovering their steps, all of them turned to look in the direction that this aura came from.


    There were three cloaked figures that were currently moving through the crowd, approaching the stage. As they moved through the crowd, the crowd parted for them, creating a path to the stage.


    Everyone recognized these three immediately because of their cloaks.


    These were the elders of the Dragon Race!

 Chapter 1029 Azure Dragon Tribe (13)

    ?


    As soon as the elders appeared, all eight of the tribe heads went over to greet them.


    However, the leader of this group of elders raised his hand to stop them before moving past them.


    The three cloaked figures made their way over to where Xiao Feng was before they surrounded himpletely. All three of them started looking all over Xiao Feng''s body, looking at different ces.


    It was as if they were looking for something specific and they weren''t able to find it.


    That was until they finally found what they were looking for.


    All three of them suddenly kneeled down and said, "Greetings to the ancestor."


    All of the dragons who had been in the crowd couldn''t help being shocked when they saw this. However, since the elders had already bowed down, there was nothing that the rest of them could do.


    They immediately all bowed down in front of Xiao Feng, all of them except for Qing Bao Lan who jumped out of her grandfather''s arms to stand by Xiao Feng''s side.


    As they all bowed to Xiao Feng, Xiao Feng couldn''t help revealing a look of slight panic on his face.


    Xiao Feng''s mentality was still like that of a child, so when all of these adults bowed down to him, it was hard for him to ept. But before he could do anything, there was a voice that said, "My child, let me take care of this."


    Then Xiao Feng felt like his consciousness was disappearing and he waspletely exhausted, causing his eyelids to start to droop. It didn''t take long before his eyes werepletely closed.


    Then there was ayer of light that suddenly appeared around Xiao Feng.


    Thisyer of light became stronger and stronger until it took the form of a figurepletely made of light.


    This figure of light floated into the air above Xiao Feng and looked down over the dragons in front of him. However, even though this figure of light was floating there in front of them, not a single one of them dared to look up at this figure of light.


    The reverent expression on their faces made it clear what they were thinking.


    They all thought that this figure of light was the ancestor of their Dragon Race, the one that had the ancestral bloodline.


    After the figure of light floated there for a bit, he suddenly said, "This one is not the ancestor that you are looking for, but rather my descendant."


    Everyone couldn''t help revealing a surprised look at first, but then they quickly understood what the situation was.


    That was right, their ancestor, the Dragon God was still alive. They were just in the realm of gods, so it wasn''t as if they coulde here freely.


    The elders had even been able to maintain contact with the Dragon God through the shrine that had been left, so this shouldn''t be the Dragon God.


    When they heard that it was the Dragon God''s descendant, they couldn''t help revealing a trace of jealousy.


    All of them were technically the Dragon God''s descendants, but since their bloodline wasn''t as strong, they couldn''t be considered true descendants like Xiao Feng. So they were of course jealous of Xiao Feng for the bloodline that he possessed.


    But not a single one of them dared to do a thing to Xiao Feng.


    Xiao Feng had received the acknowledgement of the Dragon God, so he was someone that would be protected by the entire Dragon Race until he reached the God Realm as well.


    After a pause, the figure of light continued, "I ask that you look after this child until he is grown up for he will be the future of the Dragon Race." Then after another pause, the figure of light said, "Also, do not conflict with the master of this child¡­He too ys an important role in the future."


    After this was said, the figure of light started to dissipate until it waspletely gone.


    When the figure of light disappeared, everyone couldn''t help looking at Xiao Feng again with a strange look.


    Their ancestor, the Dragon God had just said¡­that this descendant of his had a master?


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at the Azure Dragon Tribe head right away.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head already knew this, but if he were to say anything in this situation¡­it wouldn''t be good for him. So he just shook his head to show that he didn''t know anything.


    However, it was clear by the looks on their faces that no one believed him.


    In short, not a single person knew what to do in this situation since there were too many unknown variables for them to do anything.


    So the three elders after a period of silence said, "The true descendant will live in the Azure Dragon Tribe for now. When we know more, we will decide what to do with the true descendant."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Then without waiting for anyone to say a thing, the three elders left this ce.


    But before leaving, they did grab Qing Qiang from the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    What Qing Qiang had done had already been reported to them, so they were going to take care of Qing Qiang now.


    As Qing Qiang was brought away, the Azure Dragon Tribe head couldn''t help looking at him with onest sad look. However, that sad look quickly disappeared since he knew that this was the only way.


    But at the very least, he knew that now that Qing Qiang was gone, that paved the path for Qing Ao toe back.


    At the very least, he would have one of his sons back along with a granddaughter.


    The one thorn in his side was this Xiao Feng, but it was impossible for him to do anything to Xiao Feng now that his status had been established.


    What everyone had forgotten was that there was still a representative from the Lin Astral Family standing on the side there who had been observing everything.


    After seeing what happened, that person didn''t waste any time in leaving the area before anyone could react.


    The leaders of the other seven tribes all looked at the Azure Dragon Tribe head withplicated looks, but they still paid their greetings before leaving. Now that the true descendant had appeared, there was nothing for them to fight over when it came to the peace and war factions.


    As long as the true descendant willed it, even the elders of the Dragon Race would move for him.


    So their peace and war faction struggles were trivial in the face of the true descendant.


    That was why everyone also looked at the Azure Dragon Tribe head with those res.


    They were all jealous that he had been the one who had found this true descendant and had brought him back to the Azure Dragon Tribe. At the same time, he had even been able to engage his granddaughter to this true descendant before anyone could do a thing.


    There was no doubt that the Azure Dragon Tribe''s position in the Dragon Race would rise up from now on.


    Still, in the end, they all had no choice but to congratte the Azure Dragon Tribe head on Qing Bao Lan''s engagement.


    When the Azure Dragon Tribe head heard these congrattions, it felt like he was being pped in the face since these were things that he didn''t want in the first ce. But for the sake of face, he had to ept these.


    Once that was all done, all of the seven tribe leaders quickly left the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    They were all heading back to their own tribes to n out how they would handle this matter.


    The appearance of the true descendant was not something that they could ignore, so they had to figure out what to do before anything else went wrong.


    When it was just the Azure Dragon Tribe left, there were many that quickly came forward to surround the Azure Dragon Tribe head and more importantly, they surrounded Xiao Feng.


    Before they knew Xiao Feng''s true identity, there were many of them that even felt that Xiao Feng wasn''t worthy of marrying Qing Bao Lan.


    But now that they had learned Xiao Feng''s true identity, they felt that Qing Bao Lan didn''t suit Xiao Feng.


    They all wanted to introduce their own daughters to Xiao Feng, not for their own personal gains, but for the prosperity of the Dragon Race.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head gave a secret cold snort when he saw all of this, but he still vaguely promised them meeting with Xiao Feng in the future.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe was in a fragile position right now, so he as the leader couldn''t do anything else that would createrge waves. When he got rid of Qing Qiang, that had already createdrge ripples in the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    If he did anything else, there was no doubt that the Azure Dragon Tribe would be ripped apart from the inside.


    After giving all of these vague promises, the Azure Dragon Tribe head brought Xiao Feng and Qing Bao Lan back to his manor. They went through many secret tunnels until they finally came back to that secret room.


    Inside of that secret room was everyone else, but Lin Fan was now wearing a cloak.


    This was the cloak that the Lin Astral Empire envoy had worn.


    That was right, Lin Fan had been that envoy.


    So he had been there to see everything that had happened.

 Chapter 1030 Azure Dragon Tribe (14)

    ?


    After they all sat down, they all had different expressions on their faces.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head had the ugliest expression on his face since he knew that the Azure Dragon Tribe would be the ones that suffered the most from this incident.


    In just one single move, the Azure Dragon Tribe had received the attention and ire of all seven other tribes. It didn''t matter if they were allied or not before because now that the Azure Dragon Tribe had been given custody of Xiao Feng, they would be targeted by everyone who wanted Xiao Feng for themselves.


    So in short, the Azure Dragon Tribe had been thrown into the pot by Lin Fan''s n.


    But no one would have expected it to turn out like this.


    The n originally was to show a bit of Xiao Feng''s origins and then slowly attract the attention of the Dragon Race. That would have paved the way for Hong Long and Qing Ao toe back in time.


    However, not a single one of them had expected the elders of the Dragon Race to act.


    Once the elders made a move, everything became much moreplicated.


    They had expected conflict from the seven tribes as they tried to slowly figure out who Xiao Feng was. If it was a slow reveal, the Azure Dragon Tribe head would have been able to take his time to solidify his rtionship with some allies, so that it wouldn''t have mattered if people found out about Xiao Feng''s identityter.


    But once the elders were involved, everyone immediately knew Xiao Feng''s true identity and that ruined any ns that they hade up with.


    So the Azure Dragon Tribe''s current position could be described in one word.


    Screwed.


    As for Lin Fan, the reason that he had agreed to this was because of his meeting with the Dragon God fragment.


    If it was before, he would have only cared about the Azure Dragon Tribe and not the Dragon Race as a whole. Perhaps he would have cared about the Red Dragon Tribe as well since he also had Hong Long by his side, but that would have been it.


    But since he had received information from the Dragon God fragment and was told about the importance of the Dragon Race to what he wanted to know, he decided to repay the Dragon God fragment by helping the entire Dragon Race.


    The best way to do that was to let Xiao Feng return to the Dragon Race and guide them as the one who had received the Dragon God''s inheritance.


    However, now that the n had beenpletely derailed, it seemed like it would be much harder to aplish what the Dragon God fragment wanted him to do.


    It might be better for him just to pack up and leave with Xiao Feng, instead of getting involved in the affairs of the Dragon Race.


    As long as he packed Xiao Feng inside of his system''s storage, it would be impossible for them to find him. After all, the system was something that came from the gods themselves, so it wasn''t as if these dragons would be able to find him.


    Even if there were a bunch of Rulers, they were nothingpared to gods.


    But that would be like running away and Lin Fan couldn''t ept that as easily.


    So in the end, Lin Fan decided to keep going with this and see how it turned out since he was able to escape as he wanted. All he needed to do was teleport back to his store using the system and he would be gone from this ce.


    After all, this was still considered being in a cultivation realm and they enjoyed the benefits of it being a cultivation realm.


    Namely, the pets would be able to revive at any time and Lin Fan would also be able to revive for a certain amount of points. With the current amount of total points that he had, it was basically negligible for him.


    After making up his mind, he turned to look at the Azure Dragon Tribe head and asked, "So what''s the n now?"


    When the Azure Dragon Tribe head heard this, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look. It was a look of half rage and half confusion since most of his problems came from Lin Fan in the first ce.


    The n that they had enacted had alsoe from Lin Fan.


    However, now he was passing this responsibility over to him¡­


    It was as if he was trying to throw all of the problems to him to take care of.


    But even if he was angry at Lin Fan, he knew that if it wasn''t for Lin Fan, their Azure Dragon Tribe would have self-destructed from the inside because of Qing Qiang. In the end, Lin Fan had brought back his son and his granddaughter, while also saving their Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Though it meant sacrificing one of his sons, he knew that this was already the best ending.


    Since he had given this to them, at the very least, the Azure Dragon Tribe head could work with him to solve this.


    Not to mention, he too cared very much about Xiao Feng.


    He knew that Lin Fan would take Xiao Feng away if things went wrong and that was thest thing that he wanted. He knew how important Xiao Feng was to the Dragon Race and he had seen the figure of the ancestor, the Dragon God earlier.


    So after thinking about it¡­the Azure Dragon Tribe head came up with the idea to¡­wait and see.


    There was nothing that they could really do right now since they had no idea what the elders were thinking.


    The elders held all of the power here and if they didn''t know what ns the elders had, it wasn''t as if they could do anything.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Rather, it would be more harmful than helpful to act rashly when the elders were involved.


    Lin Fan agreed with this n in the end since he knew that he was right. Not to mention, he wanted to learn a bit more about the Dragon Race as a whole before he did anything.


    So they decided to just stay idle for a few days to see what happened.


    ¡­


    Inside of a dark hall, there were several cloaked figures sitting there.


    These cloaked figures all had the same cloak and the design of this cloak was¡­the cloak that the elders who had gone to the Azure Dragon Tribe had worn.


    All of these cloaked figures sitting here were the elders of the Dragon Race.


    Not to mention that based on the number of seats that were left empty, there were more than double their numbers that were just not here at this meeting.


    It was no wonder they weren''t afraid of the human Astral Empires.


    The further up they were seated, the older the elder.


    Then in the very center, on one end of the room, there was a dragon shaped statue.


    This was a statue that Lin Fan would be familiar with because he had seen a statue just like this before. It was the statue of the Dragon God.


    The two elders who were sitting closest to the statue were the oldest elders and were called the Great Elders of the Dragon Race.


    The left Great Elder was the first to speak.


    "Are you sure you weren''t able to find anything?"


    The one that he was speaking to was the leader of the elders who had gone to the Azure Dragon Tribe today.


    This elder said with a nod, "Great Elder, we have already scanned the entire Azure Dragon Tribe and we weren''t able to find a single clue about the true descendant''s origins."


    After they had left the Azure Dragon Tribe, the three elders had actually stayed nearby and observed the Azure Dragon Tribe for the rest of the day. They had even mobilized all of their spies to check every inch of the Azure Dragon Tribe, but they weren''t able to find anything.


    It seemed like that true descendant Xiao Feng had just appeared out of thin air.


    Both of the Great Elders knitted their brows when they heard this before the right Great Elder asked, "What about Qing Di? Has he not said anything yet?"


    Qing Di was the name of the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    The three elders had also sent a secret message to Qing Di asking him about Xiao Feng. In that message, they had put many threats and bribes that they hadn''t used in the morning at the ceremony.


    After all, they had their pride as elders to consider and couldn''t do it in public.


    But in private¡­they held no qualms.


    But the answer that Qing Di had sent them was the same as what he had told them in public.


    He made it clear that he didn''t know anything about Xiao Feng and had only met him the first time when his granddaughter had brought him back with the Dragon Stone.


    He was able to make it so convincing since this was actually the truth. He just chose to omit certain facts.


    The elder shook his head to answer this question.


    Both of the Great Elders knitted their brows even more when they saw this.


    Finally the left Great Elder said, "It seems like we have no other choice."


    The right Great Elder seemed more hesitant as he asked, "Are you sure we should do this?"


    The left Great Elder gave a firm nod before saying, "It''s the only way."


    After a long silence, the right Great Elder said with a nod, "Alright."


    Then without even giving an order, a few of the elders suddenly left the room to take care of something.


    However, there was a tense and dark feeling that filled this room after they left.


    This feeling was¡­regret and worry.

 Chapter 1031 Azure Dragon Tribe (15)

    ?


    Qing Qiang sat there in silence, looking into the distance.


    He was trying to figure out just what had gone wrong with his n that he was in this current situation.


    One moment, he was the young master of the Azure Dragon Tribe and the next, he had be the traitor of the Dragon Race.


    Not for a single second did he think that anything that he did was his own mistake.


    In his mind, everything that had happened to him was the plot of his enemies. Or rather, now¡­he even considered his father an enemy, so he considered this the plot of his father.


    He knew that he had underestimated his father, but he had never thought that it would result in something like this¡­


    Now he felt that the entire world was against him.


    But at the same time, his eyes were still filled with traces of life.


    Qing Qiangpletely believed that he was the saviour of the Dragon Race, so he didn''t believe for a single second that he would be stuck here for long. He believed that there was something that would bust him out of this ce and then he would be able to plot his return.


    In short, he waspletely deluded in thinking that he was the main character and that everyone would go his way.


    That was just how it had gone since he was young, so that was the only way that he thought things could go¡­


    In some way, it was also the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s fault that he turned out this way¡­


    But it was mainly because of his own personality that he acted like this.


    As Qing Qiang sat there, he plotted his future ns.


    If it wasn''t for this cursed array that was around him, he would have been able to break free of this ce.


    This arraypletely suppressed his cultivation and even drained his life energy from him over time. If enough time passed, his cultivation would be weaker and weaker until it waspletely gone, so he knew that he couldn''t stay here for long.


    But the facts were that his cultivation was sealed and he couldn''t do anything to break out.


    That was until he suddenly felt a strange sensation.


    It was as if his body was suddenly filled with power.


    Qing Qiang gripped his fist and he found¡­that he was able to gather his life energy again.


    He looked around himself and he realized that he wasn''t able to feel the pressure from the array anymore. It was as if the array had suddenly been turned off or it had suddenly disappeared.


    He didn''t know what it was exactly that had stopped this array, but he didn''t n on wasting any time to figure it out. He just assumed that this was the chance that the universe was giving him as the main character.


    So Qing Qiang didn''t think about why the array was gone and focused on the bars in front of him.


    This was the second hurdle that he had to face before winning his freedom.


    These were special bars made of a special material that could absorb life energy, which made it the bane of any cultivator.


    Of course, it wasn''t strong enough to take the attack from a Ruler Realm Expert, but it was more than enough to deal with those who were below the Ruler Realm.


    So Qing Qiang definitely wouldn''t be able to break through these bars with his level of cultivation.


    Qing Qiang was considering what he should do when he suddenly thought of something¡­


    "Since I''m the main character, that should mean that everything should go my way¡­Since that''s the case, I should just try opening it."


    This was the most idiotic thought that one could have normally, but when it came to Qing Qiang¡­it was actually the right choice.


    The bars were still working since it was impossible for the materials used to make the bars to suddenly lose their properties. But when Qing Qiang pushed on the door to his cell, he found that it wasn''t locked at all.


    One single push was all it took to open the door and he was free from the cell.


    He didn''t know why it was unlocked, but he also didn''t care.


    He was fully convinced now that he was the main character of this world and the only person loved by the heavens.


    When he had been exposed as a traitor of the Dragon Race and thrown into this jail, it was only a trial for him. Now he was using the full power of his identity as the main character to break out of this jail.


    And once he was out, he would go back and reim everything that was his.


    His first target had already been decided¡­<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Even though he had been thrown in jail, he had heard some of the rumours that the guards had been gossiping about.


    This was something that was spreading all over the Dragon Race, so naturally the guards couldn''t avoid gossiping about it as they did their rounds.


    It was the news of Xiao Feng.


    Qing Qiang had learned the existence of Xiao Feng and why he was so important, which had filled him with envy. He couldn''t stand that Xiao Feng was the one that possessed the ancestral bloodline and not him.


    After all, he considered himself the main character of this world.


    So his target now was Xiao Feng.


    As long as he was able to kill Xiao Feng and take that bloodline for himself, then the Dragon Race would have no choice but to follow him. He would lead the Dragon Race in a crusade against the other races and create a world for the Dragon Race.


    With these thoughts in mind, Qing Qiang excitedly started moving through the dungeon.


    He followed the path that he had taken when he was first brought to this ce.


    As he made his way along, he also made sure to move carefully since there were guards that patrolled these dungeons.


    However, he didn''t find a single guard as he made his way through.


    A normal person would have be suspicious of this, but Qing Qiang once again chalked that up to his identity as the main character. Since he was the main character, it wasn''t strange that he encountered this kind of luck.


    He was able to make it all the way to the entrance of these dungeons without encountering a single guard.


    However, that didn''t mean that he was free just yet.


    The hardest part to break through was actually right in front of him.


    This entrance was where the guard barracks and the warden office were, so this was where all of the strongest guards in the prison were gathered.


    If he tried to leave through this entrance, it would be very likely that he would be surrounded and caught by all of these powerful guards. So Qing Qiang had to find a way to sneak past all of these guards that were here.


    But when he arrived, he found¡­


    That there wasn''t a single guard.


    When he looked carefully, he found that all of the guards were gone from this ce.


    It was as if there had never been a guard to this prison with how every guard was missing.


    He had even taken a chance by peeking around in the guard barracks and the warden office. This was a stupid idea that most people would have never done, but Qing Qiang thought that it was a good idea and decided to check both these ces out.


    That didn''t mean that Qing Qiang was naturally stupid.


    He was the son of the Azure Dragon Tribe head and had been raised properly, so he was actually quite the smart person when it came to doing things. It was just that his ego had been raised by all of the luck that he had encountered and he was on a victory high where he didn''t think that anything could go wrong for him.


    Luckily for him, there was indeed no one in these two ces, so he didn''t get caught in the end.


    Since there were no guards to stop him, Qing Qiang didn''t hesitate at all to walk out the front door.


    Once he was out, he immediately ran off into the forest around the prison and he made his way to freedom.


    Even in the forest, which was actually the final line of defense for this prison and was filled with dangerous beasts, he didn''t encounter a single thing.


    Most people would have been very suspicious of all of this, but Qing Qiang¡­just thought that it was his god given right as the main character. He was so devoted to this idea that he had basically given up on thinking¡­


    What he never noticed was that in the distance, there was a cloaked figure that had been watching over him the entire time.


    This person was wearing the cloak of¡­a Dragon Race elder.


    As this cloaked figure watched over Qing Qiang, they never made a single move to stop him.


    In fact, it was almost as if they were escorting him along his escape from this prison¡­


    That wouldn''t make sense since they were the ones that had locked him up here in the first ce, but that was what was happening now.


    When Qing Qiang finally escaped the forest, the cloaked figure revealed a smile under his cloak and said, "The trap has been set¡­now we just wait and see what we''ll catch."

 Chapter 1032 Azure Dragon Tribe (16)

    ?


    Over the next few days, nothing happened in the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Lin Fan and the rest remained in the secret room inside of the head''s manor since they couldn''t freely walk around the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    After all, they weren''t supposed to be there in the first ce.


    So they had to spend the time entertaining themselves.


    It was a good thing that they were cultivators, so they could just focus on cultivating instead of being bored.


    Xiao Feng on the other hand didn''t get a single moment''s rest.


    Since Xiao Feng was the new hottest topic in the Dragon Race, he was someone that everyone wanted to meet. Not to mention, since he was now the true descendant of the Dragon Race, he was someone that had plenty of responsibilities.


    In short, he was to the Dragon Race like Lin Fan was to the Lin Astral Empire.


    Lin Fan left Xiao Feng to the Azure Dragon Tribe head to take care of during this time, but he also made sure to give Xiao Feng a few things that would protect him if he was ever in danger.


    But of course, nothing of that sort happened.


    Everyone knew just how important Xiao Feng was to the Dragon Race, so not a single person would dare do anything in public. The moment that they did, they would be chased down by the entire Dragon Race and there would be no future for them.


    So anyone that wanted to do anything did what they could to try and find where Xiao Feng went at night.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head had already thought of this, so he brought Xiao Feng back to this secret room every night.


    This was a room that only he and certain members of the Azure Dragon Tribe knew about, so it was impossible for people toe here and disturb them.


    Or at least that was what everyone thought.


    ¡­


    After he had escaped, Qing Qiang had somehow made his way back to the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Wherever he went, for some reason, people would always disappear.


    He didn''t know why he didn''t encounter a single person, including guards in ces that should have guards. However, once again he chalked that up to him being the main character and the universe looking out for him.


    He was able to make it all the way to the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s manor.


    This was a ce that he couldn''t be more familiar with since he had been here countless times. So he was able to easily find a path in and a ce to hide in the manor.


    From there, he went on with his n to find Xiao Feng.


    He hid in the cracks of the manor and listened to the conversation between the servants of the manor. However, he wasn''t able to hear a single thing about Xiao Feng''s location from them.


    It was clear that not a single one of them knew where Xiao Feng was¡­but that was also a clue for him.


    After all, if no one knew where Xiao Feng went, there was only one ce that he could have gone.


    Back when he was younger, his father had shown him and his brother a secret passage in his manor. This was a secret passage that was used to secure the safety of both him as the head and his family, which included Qing Qiang and Qing Ao.


    So he knew where this secret room and passage was.


    If one wanted to hide something, this secret room was naturally the best choice.


    So Qing Qiang made his way through the ceiling of the building and made his way to the secret room.


    He also knew about a secret passage into the space above the secret room, which was something that only he and his brother knew. This was a space that they had created in secret as a hiding spot for when they wanted to hide from their father.


    So no one else knew about this at all.


    From that hidden space, he could easily see what was inside of the hidden room.


    To his surprise, he found that it wasn''t just Xiao Feng and Qing Bao Lan who were alone in this room. There were also several other people who were currently in the room with the two of them.


    However, hepletely ignored those other people.


    The only one that he cared about at this moment was Xiao Feng.


    Qing Qiang secretly gathered his life energy and prepared to attack.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    He didn''t believe that with his cultivation, he wouldn''t be able to take care of Xiao Feng in a single attack.


    As long as he could take care of Xiao Feng and take the corpse away, then he would be able to find a safe ce to absorb the ancestral bloodline. Once he had this bloodline, they would have no choice but to side with him since Xiao Feng would already be dead.


    If they didn''t, then that would mean losing the ancestral bloodline which was thest thing that the Dragon Race wanted.


    As long as he was able to sessfully steal the ancestral bloodline, Qing Qiang would be able to get everything that belonged to him.


    He even revealed a look of joy as if he could already see what he would obtain once his n seeded.


    It was as if he could already see himself stepping over his father and brother who had stood in his way his entire life.


    But Qing Qiang only allowed himself to fantasize about this for a bit before focusing his mind. He knew that he still hadn''t achieved his goal yet and he was only on the threshold of it, so he needed to focus.


    Once he finished gathering his life energy, he didn''t waste any time to aim his attack at Xiao Feng.


    Luckily for him, Xiao Feng was currently being held by Qing Bao Lan.


    He knew that if he used Qing Bao Lan as bait, he would be able to get Xiao Feng to block the attack.


    Not for a single second did he feel any guilt about using his niece as bait¡­he didn''t even care if Qing Bao Lan died. That was just how he felt about his own family¡­


    So Qing Qiang turned his w in Qing Bao Lan''s direction before¡­suddenly bursting out of the ceiling.


    His sudden attack had caught everyone in the room off guard since no one had thought that they would be attacked in a ce like this.


    By the time that they reacted, it was already toote for them to do anything since Qing Qiang''s w was right over Qing Bao Lan.


    Xiao Feng saw this and as Qing Qiang expected, he turned around to grab Qing Bao Lan and used his own body to block the attack.


    As soon as he saw this, Qing Qiang immediately revealed a smile and gathered even more of his life energy in his attack. He wanted to make sure that this one attack would kill Xiao Feng before anyone else was able to react.


    As the w was about to reach Xiao Feng and Qing Qiang had an excited look, there was a barrier that suddenly appeared in front of this w.


    When the w collided with the barrier, there was a second of equilibrium before¡­Qing Qiang''s w was blown away.


    Qing Qiang immediately revealed a shocked look, but he didn''t allow himself to be idle.


    The force that the barrier sent him back with wasn''t that strong, so he was still able to act. So he didn''t hesitate at all to attack Qing Bao Lan and Xiao Feng again with his other w.


    While this one wasn''t as strong as the other since this was a quick attack, he still believed that it would be strong enough to take down these two juniors.


    It was just too bad that the barrier that had blocked him was still there.


    When the w shed against the barrier, there wasn''t a moment of bnce that happened this time. Instead, Qing Qiang''s attack waspletely shattered and he was sent flying into the wall.


    When Qing Qiang looked closely at the barrier to find what had happened, he found that¡­there were traces of his life energy that were still there. He could see that the barrier was slowly absorbing his life energy.


    After being blown away, Qing Qiang knew that he wouldn''t have a chance to ambush them.


    So instead of using his human form to attack, Qing Qiang started to transform into his dragon form. But before he could expand into hisrge dragon form, there was a pressure that suddenly fell down onto him.


    This pressurepletely made him unable to move and his transformation stopped, shrinking him back into his human form.


    Qing Qiang tried to fight back against this pressure, but he found that he couldn''t break free at all.


    As for where this pressure came from¡­it wasn''t anyone in the room.


    It was a cloaked figure that was in the ceiling, where he had been before.


    He immediately recognized this cloak as the cloak of the Dragon Race elders, but he didn''t know how an elder had gotten there in the first ce.


    But that was also thest thing that Qing Qiang saw as the pressure knocked him out.


    Once Qing Qiang had been knocked out, the elder jumped down from the ceiling and turned to look at Lin Fan.


    He looked at him for a bit before saying, "The Void God sessor¡­the prophecy was true¡­"

 Chapter 1033 Azure Dragon Tribe (17)

    ?


    After the elder said this, he suddenly bowed to Lin Fan before saying, "Void God''s sessor, I apologize for what has happened. I will personally ensure that everything is settled and nothing will bother you again."


    Before giving Lin Fan a chance to speak, the elder suddenly picked up Qing Qiang and was about to leave with him.


    But then as if he suddenly thought of something, the elder turned around to say, "Void God''s sessor, pleasee and see the Great Elders when they send a summon. There''s much that we need to discuss."


    Then this time, without giving Lin Fan a chance to say anything, he disappeared from the spot.


    Everyone in the room was just left there with a confused look on their face.


    After a long moment of silence, the Azure Dragon Tribe head asked out loud, "What happened just now?"


    There wasn''t a single person that was able to answer this question for him.


    But this did draw out a reaction from the people in the room¡­or rather it drew out a reaction from Qing Bao Lan.


    She finally realized that she had almost died just now, so she burst out into tears.


    When she burst out into tears, Xiao Feng, Qing Ao, and the Azure Dragon Tribe head were all stirred into action.


    Xiao Feng who was still holding her started patting her on the back while Qing Ao and the Azure Dragon Tribe head came over to calm her down.


    Of course, the one that had the most effect was Xiao Feng which left a bitter smile on the faces of Qing Ao and the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    After a long silence, Lin Fan finally gave a sigh and said, "There''s nothing to gain from thinking about it too much. We should wait to be summoned by the elders and see what they have to say."


    The others all hesitated a bit before agreeing with what Lin Fan said.


    There was no ming them for this since this matter was just too unpredictable and confusing for them.


    The only clue that Lin Fan had was¡­that the Dragon God fragment had also called him the Void God''s sessor. Perhaps that meant that the Dragon God left some kind of message for the Dragon Race before ascending.


    Perhaps that was the reason why the elder had reacted so strongly¡­


    But these were all guesses that didn''t mean a thing unless they were confirmed, so there was no need to think too deeply about it. Instead, it was better to spend some time on thinking about a backup n.


    If the Dragon Race elders were to n on doing something¡­it would be easy for them to disappear from this ce since they had the system.


    If they were nning on doing something, Lin Fan would immediately teleport back to the Lin Astral Empire.


    However, before that, he would make sure that he would be able to get some benefits first.


    ¡­


    A few dayster, the invite from the elders came just like that elder had said.


    It was sent secretly to the Azure Dragon Tribe head instead of being sent openly to the Azure Dragon Tribe and the invite asked for the Void God''s sessor and Xiao Feng.


    They clearly had some intentions in inviting the two of them alone, but Lin Fan didn''t mind ying along if it meant that he could get the information that he wanted. After all, he had a way of escaping even in front of all these elders that they couldn''t stop.


    Even if they tried to stop him, it wouldn''t work even if they killed him.


    The system would just revive him since this was a cultivation realm and he would be able to revive in a different ce because of the system. Once he was revived, he would immediately be able to escape using the system''s transport.


    So there was nothing that they could do to trap him.


    In short, he was the one that held all the cards in this situation.


    The others weren''t as happy about this arrangement and wanted to go with him.


    They understood the power of the system, which they thought was the master of the store, but they still couldn''t help worrying about Lin Fan.


    But in the end, Lin Fan convinced them not to follow and just told them to be ready to leave at any moment.


    After that, he followed the Azure Dragon Tribe head to the elder hall.


    This was a special ce on the Dragon Race homeworld that was located right where the core of the was. It was a ce where the most intense life energy on this gathered, so it was the most suited ce to cultivate.


    These elders of the Dragon Race were the strongest experts of the Dragon Race,ing from all the different tribes. They were thest guardians of the Dragon Race if something happened, so of course they needed the best cultivation space.


    This was considered one of the most secret ces of the Dragon Race, it was definitely a ce that outsiders wouldn''t be able to enter. Even members of the Dragon Race would find it hard to get approved for a visit to the elders hall.


    But Lin Fan and Xiao Feng were led there without any hindrance.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Since this was a secret meeting, the Azure Dragon Tribe head brought them to meet two cloaked elders that would lead them the rest of the way.


    The path had already beenpletely cleared for them.


    Normally, there would be many guards since this was one of the most secret ces for the Dragon Race, but all of those guards had been dismissed.


    It was just an empty path that they traveled on.


    When they arrived at the entrance to the elders hall, the Azure Dragon Tribe head was surprised to find that he was being led to another area.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head narrowed his eyes to look at the two elders and said, "What is the meaning of this? I was supposed to be their guide, so I should be guiding them all the way. You''re telling me to leave all of a sudden and I should just listen to you?"


    The two elders didn''t say anything out loud in response to this.


    Instead, one of the elders came over to whisper something into the Azure Dragon Tribe head''s ear.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head had a skeptical look at first, but when he heard what the elder whispered, his brows immediately knitted together. He narrowed his eyes to re at this elder before saying, "Is what you said true?"


    The elder gave a simple nod before turning back to head over to where Lin Fan was.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t move as he kept watching the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    Finally, the Azure Dragon Tribe head said, "I''ll go with you then."


    The elder gave a nod and with a snap, there was a cloaked figure that appeared.


    This cloaked figure wasn''t wearing the elder cloak, but rather the cloak of one of the elite guards of the Dragon Race.


    These elite guards were those that couldn''t be elders, but were the most powerful soldiers of the Dragon Race. They had power that was at the same level as the tribe leaders and were just under the elders.


    This elite guard gestured for the Azure Dragon Tribe head to follow him.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head revealed a guilty look before saying to Lin Fan, "I need to go with them."


    Lin Fan could see from his expression that this was something that was important to him, so he said with a nod, "You don''t need to worry about me. Just go and do what you need to do."


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head gave a nod and said, "Thank you."


    Then the two of them headed off in apletely different direction.


    Lin Fan could already guess what the elders had used to bait the Azure Dragon Tribe head and he couldn''t me him for it.


    There was only one thing that could incite him like that¡­


    It was Qing Qiang.


    The elder had taken Qing Qiang away to deal with him, but it seemed like Qing Qiang was still being kept alive by these elders.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind since he knew how the Azure Dragon Tribe head felt about Qing Qiang.


    He hoped that he would be able toe up with a good solution for Qing Qiang.


    After the Azure Dragon Tribe head left, the elder gestured for Lin Fan to follow them as one of them said, "This way, please."


    Lin Fan nodded before following them without a word.


    The two of them led the way up to a gate where there were actual guards standing outside this time.


    When the guards saw the elders leading Lin Fan and Xiao Feng, they just revealed a strange look. They didn''t make any moves to stop them and they were allowed to pass quickly.


    It was clear that they had already been informed about the arrival of Lin Fan and Xiao Feng.


    After stepping through the gate, Lin Fan and Xiao Feng couldn''t help being taken aback by the concentration of life energy in the air in this ce.


    It was much greater than anything that they had experienced before. It was even greater than any training room in the Lin Astral Empire or even the store.


    But this was a training ce for Rulers, so it wasn''t strange that the concentration of life energy in the air was this strong.


    The elders led them right up to the only building in this ce and then gestured for them to follow them in.

 Chapter 1034 Dragon Race Prophecy (1)

    ?


    There were guards that were standing outside this building, but seeing Lin Fan and Xiao Feng, they revealed the same strange look as the guards at the gate.


    They didn''t even try to search them and just let them pass by, but they were staring at Lin Fan and Xiao Feng the entire time.


    It was clear that they had also been informed of what was happening.


    Once they made their way into the building, they found that there wasn''t anything here other than two rooms. There was a main room that weed those that came to this building and then there was an inner room.


    Judging by the auras that came from that inner room, that was where the elders of the Dragon Race were waiting.


    But to Lin Fan''s surprise, the two elders that led them didn''t bring them in right away.


    Instead, they brought them to the side of the hall and up to a mural that was hanging there. Well, it wasn''t a mural, but rather arge stone tablet that was hanging on the wall that had a few words engraved in it.


    After they came up to it, the elders didn''t say anything as they gestured for Lin Fan to have a look at it.


    Lin Fan looked at them with a confused look, but he still went up to read it.


    "The Void King will soar through the sky with the sacred beasts, uniting all in thend under him. Only then will thisnd be free of its shackles and enter new worlds. Only then will the Dragon Race be able to obtain true prosperity."


    Lin Fan was even more confused after reading this, but it was clear by the way that the two were looking at him that they were expecting something.


    But in the end, Lin Fan didn''t have anything to give them.


    He didn''t understand what was written on this thing in the first ce, so there wasn''t anything that he could give them.


    As for Xiao Feng¡­he waspletely bored of this and was just standing to the side with a nk look on his face.


    It was clear that this tablet, this prophecy meant nothing to him.


    Seeing that they weren''t able to get a reaction out of either Lin Fan or Xiao Feng, the elders waved for the two of them to follow. It was hard to hide their disappointment as they walked in front of them.


    They brought Lin Fan and Xiao Feng over to the doors to the main hall and then gave them a second to gather themselves before opening the door.


    As soon as the door opened, the pressure that came from within became much stronger than before.


    Lin Fan and Xiao Feng looked in to see that there were a bunch of cloaked figures that were currently sitting there inside of this hall.


    As for the pressure that they gave off¡­it was the pressure of the Ruler Realm that Lin Fan was familiar with. This was a pressure that Lin Fan had experience with, so he knew immediately that it was pressure from the Ruler Realm.


    But he couldn''t help being surprised just how deep the roots of the Dragon Race ran.


    After all, there were just too many cloaked figures that were sitting in here.


    Not to mention, there were also the elite guards that were in the Ruler Realm.


    Lin Fan had felt this from the elite guard that had guided the Azure Dragon Tribe head away.


    While Lin Fan didn''t know just how many Ruler Realm Experts the Lin Astral Empire had, he was certain that it wasn''t as many as the Dragon Race. It was no wonder the Dragon Race was strong enough to be considered a part of the Myriad Races.


    As soon as the door opened, countless pairs of eyes fell onto Lin Fan and Xiao Feng.


    That included the eyes of the two Great Elders who were sitting at the end of the hall, right in front of the statue.


    After being caught off guard by the number of elders there were, Lin Fan turned his attention to the two Great Elders and the statue.


    As soon as he saw the statue, he couldn''t help being surprised.


    That was because he recognized this statue as being the same as the one he had met before. It was another statue of the Dragon God.


    So could that mean that there was another fragment of the Dragon God that had been left to take care of the Dragon Race. If that was the case, he wouldn''t be surprised since this would seem right.


    But when he looked carefully, he found that there was something different about this statue.


    Rather, he felt that there was something different about the feeling that this Dragon God statue gave him.


    The one that he met before gave him a strange feeling, almost as if it didn''t belong to this world. This one in front of him didn''t give him that same feeling. In fact, this statue in front of him didn''t give him any strange feelings at all.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Once Lin Fan and Xiao Feng were led to stand in the center of the hall, standing right in front of all the elders, one of the Great Elders said, "Sessor of the Void God, I''m sure that you''re very curious why we summoned you here."


    The other Great Elder said, "You should have seen the tablet outside, so you should know about the prophecy. However, that wasn''t the only thing that the great Dragon God left us."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He had already expected this since they wouldn''t do this just because of a vague prophecy like that.


    It was very likely that the Dragon God had left some kind of instruction for them before ascending.


    But what was important was knowing what kind of instructions had been left for them by the Dragon God.


    Seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, the two Great Elders both fell silent.


    After a long period of silence, the left Great Elder said, "You don''t need to look at us with that hostility. I can tell you that we have no intention of opposing you. In fact, we want to help you with your mission."


    The right Great Elder nodded as he said, "You should know that this doesn''t just involve our Dragon Race, but also the four other sacred beast races."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being caught off guard when he heard this.


    He had assumed that this was all the work of the Dragon God alone, but it seemed that it was even bigger than he thought.


    If it involved multiple races, then it should involve multiple gods¡­


    Then did that mean that it had something to do with his system as well.


    As this thought passed through his mind, he couldn''t help thinking of what the Dragon God fragment had said.


    It said that it didn''t know anything about the system, but¡­it was only a fragment of the Dragon God, so it wasn''t as if it knew everything. It was possible that there was something that the real Dragon God knew that it didn''t know¡­


    After thinking about this for a bit, Lin Fan sat down where a seat had been left for him and Xiao Feng. After sitting down, he looked at the two Great Elders with a look like he was waiting for them to exin.


    Xiao Feng also sat down after seeing Lin Fan sit down, but the look on his face made it clear that he wasn''t interested in any of this.


    Even if Xiao Feng looked older, he still had the personality of a child after all.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was willing to cooperate, the Great Elders felt a bit of relief fill their hearts.


    Then the left Great Elder said, "You should know that the prophecy states that the sacred beasts will follow the Void God''s sessor. This refers to the true descendants of our sacred beast races following you."


    The right Great Elder said, "We can see that our true descendant is already following you, which is perfect for us. We hope that you will take care of our race''s true descendants."


    After saying this, all of the elders, including the Great Elders, gave a slight bow to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan could help being taken aback when he saw this.


    He never expected the Dragon Race elders to ept Xiao Feng being his pet that easily.


    He hadpletely expected them to request that he break the contract that he had with Xiao Feng and allow Xiao Feng to return to the Dragon Race.


    After a moment of silence, Lin Fan said, "I won''t change how I take care of Xiao Feng after this. Nothing will change how I take care of Xiao Feng."


    Hearing this, all of the elders gave another bow before both the Great Elders said at the same time, "Thank you."


    Then after taking a moment to calm down, the Great Elders continued to move this forward.


    The left Great Elder said, "Other than that, we have some other things to discuss with you."


    The right Great Elder said, "There are a few things that we need to entrust to you before you leave."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help raising a brow when he heard this as he looked at the two Great Elders.


    The left Great Elder waved his hand and there was a cloaked figure that appeared.


    This cloaked figure was one of the elite guards and in their hands was a tray with something on it.

 Chapter 1035 Dragon Race Prophecy (2)

    ?


    Lin Fan looked carefully at the tray and when he saw what was on it, he couldn''t help being taken aback.


    That was because the moment that he felt the auraing from it, he already knew what it was.


    However, this item should be with the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    It was the Dragon Stone that he had returned to the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    If it was here now, that should mean that something had happened to the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    Lin Fan immediately narrowed his eyes to look at the two Great Elders.


    The two Great Elders just sat there with calm looks on their faces even when faced with the look of scrutiny from Lin Fan.


    After a while, the right Great Elder said, "It''s not what you think it is."


    The left Great Elder said with a nod, "We didn''t take this thing with force, it was given to us freely."


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He knew just how important the Dragon Stone was to the Azure Dragon Tribe, he had been hearing about this for several days now from the Azure Dragon Tribe head and Qing Ao. So he knew that unless they had no other choice, they would never give up the Dragon Stone, even if it was to the elders of the Dragon Race.


    The Great Elders could see the doubtful look on Lin Fan''s face, so they exined.


    The left Great Elder said, "He made a deal that he couldn''t turn down, which is why he gave this to us."


    The right Great Elder followed up with, "You should be d that he took this deal since it helped him settle one of his unresolved issues."


    A trace of confusion appeared in Lin Fan''s eyes.


    He could tell from their voices that it didn''t seem like they were lying, but he couldn''t figure out what they had given him that would convince him to give up this treasure of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    Until he suddenly remembered how they had convinced the Azure Dragon Tribe head to let him and Xiao Fenge meet the elders alone.


    It was most likely rted to Qing Qiang¡­


    After this thought passed through his mind, he decided not to think too deeply about this.


    He had ns on taking the Dragon Stone in the first ce and if it wasn''t with the Azure Dragon Tribe, then he wouldn''t feel as much guilt about taking it back. This would make it easier for him and it would make it easier for the Azure Dragon Tribe head.


    This was the least he could do for him for taking care of him during this time.


    Now he still needed to think of a way to get the Dragon Stone.


    But to his surprise, what happened next was actually rted to this.


    The left Great Elder gave a wave of his hand and the elite guard came forward, stopping in front of Lin Fan. Then the elite guard lifted the tray in his hand so that it was right in front of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan looked at him with a confused look, not understanding what he was doing.


    The right Great Elder said, "Please ept this Dragon Stone on behalf of the Dragon Race."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the two Great Elders sitting there with a shocked look.


    He never would have thought that these two who sat at the top of the Dragon Race would give him the Dragon Stone, treasure of the Dragon Race this easily.


    After looking at them for a bit, he couldn''t help looking at the other elders who were sitting there.


    Not a single one of these elders reacted to the Great Elders presenting the Dragon Stone to him. It was as if this Dragon Stone wasn''t the treasure of their Dragon Race and was just a random stone they had found on the ground.


    But that wasn''t right¡­


    Lin Fan was sensitive to things like voidws and this Dragon Stone was something that was made with voidws. So he could immediately tell that this Dragon Stone that was ced in front of him was the real thing.


    In fact¡­it felt like the voidw fluctuationsing from the Dragon Stone were stronger than before.


    If that was the case, why would they give it to him?


    This was something that they could use to purify the bloodlines of the Dragon Race and the purer their bloodlines, the stronger they would be. This would create a generation of powerful experts that could support the Dragon Race in the future.


    Why would they give this up to give this Dragon Stone to him?


    It just didn''t make any sense at all.


    Seeing that Lin Fan was hesitating and not taking the Dragon Stone, the left Great Elder said, "Our ancestor left instructions on what to do with the Dragon Stone once the Void God''s sessor appeared."


    The right Great Elder said, "You don''t need to be doubtful, these are the words that our ancestor has left behind, so we will follow them."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the Great Elders with a strange look. Then he turned to look at all of the elders around him with the same strange look.


    The look that they had in their eyes when they talked about the Dragon God¡­it was almost scary. It was almost as if they werepletely obsessed with the Dragon God¡­


    But he was the ancestor of their race, so it shouldn''t be that strange¡­


    In the end, Lin Fan decided to take the Dragon Stone.


    This was something that the Dragon God had already told him would be his and there didn''t seem to be a better chance to take it back. Of course, he was still doubtful of the Dragon Race''s purpose in giving this to him.


    But at the very least, it would be hard for them to take it back from him if he took it now.


    After all, he could put it in the system''s storage so that no one could reach it.


    Seeing that Lin Fan took the Dragon Stone, the elders all seemed to let out a sigh of relief.


    Lin Fan saw this and he couldn''t help being even more confused. But in the end, he chose not to question it since he knew that it would open up a different can of wormspletely.


    After taking the Dragon Stone, Lin Fan just remained silent and waited for the elders to do something¡­to do anything.


    They were the ones that summoned him, so he was the one that was here to react.


    However, he found that they didn''t say a thing as they all stared at him and Xiao Feng.


    The way that they stared at him and Xiao Feng was very unsettling. It was as if they were expecting something from him, but he had no idea what they were expecting.


    The only ones that didn''t look at him this way were the two elders that had brought him in.


    However, those two elders didn''t say a thing since they didn''t want to disappoint the rest of them.


    Finally, the Great Elders couldn''t take it anymore.


    The left Great Elder asked, "Young Void God''s sessor, did you have time to see the mural outside?"


    The right Great Elder nodded along before saying, "That''s right, did you get to see the prophecy written on it?"


    The way that they were looking at him made it clear that they were expecting something from him. However, Lin Fan didn''t have anything for them.


    Even if they asked if he felt anything from reading that prophecy, he really didn''t have any ideas at all. It was his first time hearing anything about this, so of course there was nothing that he could say about this.


    But Lin Fan could also tell that this wasn''t the answer that they were looking for.


    Still, since he didn''t know the answer, then he wouldn''t lie to them.


    He would tell them straight just like he had done to the two elders from before.


    The two elders from before could see this and revealed bitter smiles, but they didn''t stop him.


    After hearing Lin Fan say that he didn''t know anything about the prophecy, the smiles on the faces of the two Great Elders turned crooked.


    They kept looking at Lin Fan as if they were waiting for him to tell them that this was all a joke, but in the end, Lin Fan didn''t say that. In the end, they had no choice but to ept that Lin Fan was being serious.


    So the smiles on their faces turned bitter.


    Still, they didn''t say anything about this and just expressed their disappointment before moving forward.


    Lin Fan could also see that the rest of the elders were just as disappointed as the two Great Elders.


    Just what had they been expecting from him?


    After taking a deep breath to calm down, the left Great Elder said, "I''m sure that you still need to return to the ce that you need to go."


    The right Great Elder continued, "We hope that you will continue taking our Dragon Race''s true descendant with you."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being caught off guard when he heard this.


    Normally in situations like this, Xiao Feng would be restricted and not allowed to leave the tribe.


    But the two Great Elders were giving Xiao Feng permission to follow him¡­


    It was almost as if they didn''t care about Xiao Feng at all.


    Of course, Lin Fan knew that this wasn''t the case.


    Just what had the Dragon God told these elders that would make them act like this?

 Chapter 1036 Next Location

    ?


    Once they had finished discussing all of this, it seemed like everything was done until the two Great Elders had remembered something.


    The left Great Elder asked, "That''s right, Void God''s sessor, have you made contact with any of the other sacred beast tribes?"


    The right Great Elder said with a nod, "That''s right, you still need to contact the other sacred beast tribes to obtain the stones from their tribes as well."


    Lin Fan was surprised by this question, but he quickly took interest in this.


    After all, he had thought that the other races would have something like this since the Dragon Race had the Dragon Stone. So he had thought about going to the other tribes to see if they had something simr.


    The prophecy had mentioned that the Void God''s sessor would soar through thend with the sacred beasts, so there had to be some connection there.


    Not to mention, he had his own reason for going to the Phoenix and Qilin Tribes in the first ce.


    Lin Fan thought about it for a bit before deciding to shake his head.


    He remembered that the Phoenix Race and Qilin Race had sent envoys to the Lin Astral Empire asking about Feng Ling and Lei Ting, so he figured that it wouldn''t be a good idea to mention his connection to them, even if this was the Dragon Race.


    He didn''t know what kind of rtionship the Dragon Race had with these two races, but it shouldn''t be bad since they had a shared prophecy. So for now, it was better not to let them know that Lei Ting and Feng Ling were with him.


    Seeing him shake his head, the eyes of the Great Elders lit up.


    The left Great Elder suggested, "Should we help you connect with the other four sacred beast races?"


    The right Great Elder said with a nod, "If you''re willing, we can set up a meeting with representatives from the other four sacred beast races. Even if they haven''t found their true descendants yet, they will be happy to meet with you, the Void God''s sessor."


    Of course this time, it wasn''t just to fulfil the prophecy that involved all five of their sacred beast races.


    This time, the two Great Elders had ulterior motives in setting up this meeting.


    If they were the ones that set up the meeting, they could show just how close they were with Lin Fan. At the same time, they could also unt their race''s true descendant being discovered and raise their reputation among the five sacred beast races.


    This would without a doubt raise the Dragon Race''s prestige and their future position among the five sacred beasts.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything and just thought about it at first, but in the end, he agreed to this.


    After all, he would have to meet the other sacred beast races eventually and it would be easier for him if he had the introduction of the Dragon Race.


    At least, that way, it would make it easier for him to meet the representatives of these races.


    Seeing him agree to this, the two Great Elders were filled with joy.


    The left Great Elder said, "We promise that we will do all we can to help set up this meeting for you."


    The right Great Elder then cracked a joke by saying, "That''s right, as long as you don''t have a conflict with one of the sacred beast tribes, it''ll all go fine."


    The two Great Elders and all of the other eldersughed at this joke, but Lin Fan just had a secret bitter smile on his face.


    Conflict with the sacred beast tribes¡­that was hard to say.


    He didn''t know what the situation with the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race was, so it was hard to tell if he had conflict with them. However, he also thought of something else that he needed to address¡­


    Xiao Bai.


    He hadn''t thought about Xiao Bai''s connection with the White Tiger Race since the Blue Star because it had all seemed so far away, but now that wasn''t the case.


    Now that he had made a connection to the Dragon Race and they were about to help him connect himself to the White Tiger Race, it didn''t seem that far away. It seemed like he would have to confront the problem with Xiao Bai soon¡­


    As for how he would handle it, he didn''t have any ideas right now.


    Still, it wasn''t the time to think about that right now, so he pushed it to the back of his mind.


    He turned his attention back to the elders that were in front of him and just decided to handle it when it came up.


    The two Great Elders only needed to confirm with Lin Fan when he would be heading to the other sacred beast tribes and when he would be going, but Lin Fan stalled on that for now. He had to talk to the others first before deciding that, so he couldn''t answer this right now.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    At the very least, he had to talk to Feng Ling and Lei Ting before heading to either the Phoenix Race or the Qilin Race.


    They would be the crux of his visit there, so he would need their cooperation.


    Seeing that Lin Fan hadn''t decided, the two Great Elders didn''t push and just said that they would help him as soon as he had decided. Then they showed excited looks when they heard that he would be staying in the Dragon Race for a bit longer.


    They asked Lin Fan if it was possible for Xiao Feng to stay with them for a bit since they had some things that they wanted to give to Xiao Feng.


    Lin Fan looked at Xiao Feng and seeing the bored expression Xiao Feng had, he couldn''t help feeling that he had indeed spoiled Xiao Feng quite a bit¡­


    Though in reality, he had thrown Xiao Feng to death many times before¡­


    Still, since they had things for Xiao Feng, it wasn''t like him to reject this.


    Anything that they gave Xiao Feng would definitely be a good thing and would make Xiao Feng stronger, so he chose to let them take Xiao Feng for a few days.


    The main reason he did this was that this was still a cultivation realm and if anything did happen to Xiao Feng, he could just die and return to Lin Fan''s side. So even if they had bad intentions, they wouldn''t be able to do anything to Xiao Feng.


    After this, Lin Fan was led out of the elder hall and went back the same way that he came.


    When he came out of the elder hall, he found that the Azure Dragon Tribe head was there waiting for him.


    On the face of the Azure Dragon Tribe head, there was a guilty look.


    It only took one nce for Lin Fan to understand what the Azure Dragon Tribe head was guilty about, but he didn''t address it any further. Even when the Azure Dragon Tribe head wanted to talk about this, Lin Fan raised a hand to stop him.


    He just simply said, "That is your matter, you don''t need to feel any guilt. Not to mention, this can be considered repaying you for everything that you have done for us."


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head was still feeling guilty, but he could recognize Lin Fan''s sincerity. So in the end, he just gave a nod of appreciation to Lin Fan before saying, "Thank you."


    The two of them traveled in silence back to the Azure Dragon Tribe and they went back to the secret room where the rest were waiting for him.


    When he arrived, they immediately questioned him on what happened.


    Lin Fan slowly told them everything and by the end of it, he was being attacked by Qing Bao Lan. Of course, as a little girl, it was hard for her to actually hurt Lin Fan, so it was more of a tantrum than attacking him.


    As for Qing Ao, he was looking at his father with an usatory gaze.


    Lin Fan had told them about the Dragon Stone, so they knew that the Azure Dragon Tribe head had traded it with the elders for something.


    After Lin Fan was finished with his story, Qing Ao asked his father, "Was it for him?"


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head looked away when he was questioned like this and he couldn''t look at Qing Ao. However, that gesture was more than enough of an answer for Qing Ao.


    He revealed a disappointed look as he looked at his father before turning away with a sigh.


    It was as if he didn''t have anything that he could say to his father.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head also remained silent with the same guilty look on his face.


    Lin Fan didn''t address this and instead turned to look at Feng Ling and Lei Ting who he had also summoned out.


    He hadn''t nned on revealing them to the Azure Dragon Tribe head, but since this decision involved them, he had no choice. But the Azure Dragon Tribe head was too busy with his own family matters to even pay attention to this.


    Lin Fan asked them, "Which one should we go to first?"


    This question was naturally about whether to go to the Phoenix Race or the Qilin Race first.


    The two of them looked at each other and it seemed like they couldn''t make a decision.


    So in the end, there was only one way to decide this.

 Chapter 1037 New Cultivation Realm (1)

    ?


    The result of the rock paper scissor game was that they would be going to the Phoenix Race first.


    But knowing that they would eventually be going to all five sacred beast races in the end, Lei Ting wasn''t that sad about it. In fact, there was even a bit of a relieved look on her face.


    Rather, it was Feng Ling who had a sad look on her face.


    In this situation, she would be the one that would have to face her problems first.


    Instead of having some time to prepare herself, she would have to face the problems that she had left behind.


    This was of course very unnerving and anyone would be freaked out over this.


    She even thought about trying to dy this for as long as possible, but she stopped herself in the end. It would be unfair to her family back in the Phoenix Race if she were to dy this any further.


    There was clearly something that had happened in the Phoenix Race and Qilin Race, so they had to go back to settle it.


    If not, the family that raised them might even disappear.


    So that was how that was decided.


    Lin Fan didn''t head out right away since it waste, but he said that he would talk to the Great Elders of the Dragon Race first thing in the morning about connecting with the Phoenix Race first.


    Both Feng Ling and Lei Ting epted this since they knew that this wasn''t something that could be rushed.


    At the same time, it would give them some time to calm their hearts.


    However, there was still another problem that Lin Fan was facing¡­


    They hade to this Dragon Race homeworld through the system as a special cultivation realm.


    Normally, the way to leave this ce would be to teleport back with the system, but¡­they were nning on visiting the Phoenix Race homeworld now.


    So Lin Fan was curious¡­was it possible for him to leave the Dragon Race homeworld like this?


    Was it even possible for him to go with the Dragon Race elders to the Phoenix Race homeworld?


    He was very curious what would happen if he were to leave the Dragon Race homeworld in a normal manner instead of through the system. He wondered if it was even possible or if he would be sent back to the Lin Astral Empire by the system.


    If that was the case, then he would have to go through the Lin Astral Emperor and get permission to visit the Phoenix Race.


    After all, it wasn''t as if he could just run off on his own.


    The only reason he was able toe here in the first ce without causing any trouble for the Lin Astral Family was because of the system. If he didn''t have the help of the system this time, then it might be hard for him to go to the Phoenix Race.


    So Lin Fan had to see if the system would help him or not¡­


    That night, Lin Fan tried tomunicate with the system, but it just ignored him all night.


    No matter what Lin Fan said, the system didn''t respond at all. It was as if the system hadn''t heard anything that he said.


    The system still functioned normally and talked to him when he did things, but it didn''t say anything when he asked it about the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    So when he woke up in the morning, Lin Fan had no choice but to see if it was possible for him to do anything about this.


    As a World Realm Expert, he was able to fly out into space all on his own.


    So that was what he did.


    He wanted to see if it was possible for him to leave the Dragon Race homeworld like this.


    But as he had expected, once he left the atmosphere of the Dragon Race homeworld, there was a notification that came from the system.


    "You are leaving the confines of the cultivation realm. Please return or you will be forcefully returned."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he saw this, but he didn''t go back down.


    Instead, he wanted to see how the system would forcefully return him.


    When the countdown from the system ended, there was a sh of white that appeared in front of him. This was just like when the system teleported him to any cultivation realm.


    When the sh of white faded, he found that¡­he was back on the Dragon Race homeworld.


    Not to mention, it wasn''t just any ce. It was where he had first appeared when the system had teleported him up from underground. This was the ce near the Azure Dragon Tribe that they had been sent by the system.


    Lin Fan just looked around himself with a bitter smile before taking the path that he took before.


    It took him quite a while since he had to remember how to get through the Azure Dragon Tribe''s hidden tunnels.


    When he emerged from the secret passage, everyone in the hidden room couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    Ang looked at him with a strange look and asked, "What are you doing there?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile on his face, but he didn''t say anything in the end.


    That was because he was alreadyte for his meeting with the elders.


    He had nned this meeting to discuss the matter of heading to the Phoenix Race homeworld with them.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The elder who hade to pick him up was already waiting outside, but they didn''t say anything when they were made to wait. They just waited silently outside the secret room for Lin Fan toe out.


    Lin Fan went off on his own and was led by that elder to the same hall as yesterday.


    When he arrived, the first thing that happened was Xiao Feng running over to hug him.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Xiao Feng with a strange look when he saw him run over, but he didn''t avoid him like he had done before. Xiao Feng immediately hugged him and hid his head inside of his arms, as if he had been bullied.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at the elders when he saw Xiao Feng like this, as if he was asking what was happening.


    Both of the Great Elders revealed bitter smiles when they heard this.


    The left Great Elder said, "We didn''t do anything that bad, we just had the true descendant meditate in front of the Dragon God''s statue for a few hours."


    The right Great Elder''s smile became even more bitter as he said, "Who would have thought that the true descendant wouldin about this just after a few minutes¡­"


    Both of them shook their heads with bitter smiles as they shook their heads.


    Lin Fan also couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as he shook his head along with them.


    Even if he had trained Xiao Feng to have a strong will, this waspletely different.


    After all, Xiao Feng''s mentality was still that of a child and to make him sit down and meditate, that was not something that was going to go well. Xiao Feng would without a doubt be bored of this very quickly since his mentality wasn''t mature enough to endure something like this.


    That was why Xiao Feng was acting like they were bullying him for forcing him to undertake this training.


    Lin Fan looked at Xiao Feng and pushed him away after hearing the exnation of the two Great Elders.


    Seeing Lin Fan push him away like this, Xiao Feng couldn''t help acting like he had been betrayed. But Lin Fanpletely ignored this look as he turned to the two Great Elders to move onto the next matter.


    "I want to go to the Phoenix Race." Lin Fan calmly said.


    The two Great Elders were caught off guard by this sudden statement from Lin Fan, but then their eyes lit up as they said, "Void God''s sessor, you have already decided to head to the other sacred beast tribes?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod of acknowledgment when he heard this.


    The left Great Elder said with a nod, "Alright, then we''ll start making preparations immediately."


    The right Great Elder continued, "It should take about a week for us to arrange everything."


    Lin Fan shook his head when he heard this and he said, "I want to set out tomorrow."


    "Huh?" The two Great Elders said at the same time.


    They revealed awkward looks before saying, "Void God''s sessor, that will be very hard for us to arrange. It''ll take time to contact the Phoenix Race and to arrange safe transport to their homeworld. We need at least a week to get everything prepared."


    Lin Fan shook his head again and said, "I need to get to the Phoenix Race as soon as possible."


    The two Great Elders revealed very difficult looks, but they didn''t question Lin Fan.


    Since he said that he had to reach the Phoenix Race as soon as possible, he must have his reason. It was even possible that the Dragon God had sent some kind of message to Lin Fan on this matter.


    Since Lin Fan had already said this, the two Great Elders had no other choice.


    The left Great Elder said in a very awkward tone, "Two days, that''s the minimal time that we need to prepare everything."


    The right Great Elder nodded in agreement before saying, "We need those two days to ensure that it will be safe for you and the true descendant."


    Lin Fan saw the firm look in their eyes and knew that this was their bottom line. Even if he tried to pressure them more, he knew that it was impossible for them to lower this bottom line.


    Not to mention, he knew that time was necessary for them to contact the Phoenix Race in the first ce.


    So Lin Fan didn''t keep insisting.


    Two days was something that he could ept in the first ce.


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this and said, "Alright, two days is fine."


    The two Great Elders let out sighs of relief when they heard this.


    After all, if Lin Fan had kept on insisting, it wasn''t as if they could do anything.


    Since this matter was settled, Lin Fan didn''t n on staying any longer.


    Xiao Feng stood up as if he was about to leave with Lin Fan, but Lin Fan stopped him before saying, "You can stay here and keep training until it''s time to leave."


    The eyes of the two Great Elders lit up when they heard this.


    This was something that they had wanted to mention, but they never thought that Lin Fan would bring it up on his own.


    Lin Fan knew that this was one of Xiao Feng''s weak points, so he knew that this training was good for him. Since it was training that would help him in the future, Lin Fan was very firm in this.


    Xiao Feng was just left there with a betrayed look on his face.

 Chapter 1038 New Cultivation Realm (2)

    ?


    Once Lin Fan stepped out, he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    He had expected something to happen when he was in the meeting with the elders, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    The system had stayed silent the entire time.


    So he couldn''t help being disappointed when he came out.


    It seemed like he really did have to consider going to the Lin Astral Family about this matter. While it would cause arge problem and take a long time, he couldn''t just cause trouble for his family by running off again.


    But before he coulde to that decision, the system notification suddenly appeared.


    "You have unlocked a new special cultivation realm."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    Before even opening the panel, he could already guess what kind of cultivation realm the system offered him. Then when he actually opened it and saw what it was, there was a look that showed that he wasn''t surprised by what he saw.


    As expected, it was the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    As he had expected, the system had been watching and listening to everything.


    But it was only when he had no other choice that the system would act.


    It was almost as if the system was alive and deciding everything for him.


    Lin Fan just silently stood there for a bit which surprised the elders that were guiding


    him.


    They turned to ask him if something was wrong, but Lin Fan just told them that it was nothing before walking in silence. The look in his eyes made it clear that he was lost in thought.


    When they arrived back at the Azure Dragon Tribe, Lin Fan didn''t go into the secret room right away.


    Instead, he found a private ce to have a conversation.


    As for who he was having a conversation with¡­it was the system.


    If someone had passed by and seen what had happened, they would have thought that Lin Fan was crazy. That was because to an outsider that didn''t know what was happening, it would have seemed like Lin Fan was just talking to himself.


    At first, Lin Fan just stood there without saying a thing before he suddenly said, "You''re there, aren''t you?"


    There was no answer that followed this, but Lin Fan didn''t expect one in the first ce.


    Of the many times that he had tried to talk to the system, there wasn''t a single time where he had seeded.


    Every time that he had tried to engage the system, he had always been met with silence.


    This time wasn''t an exception as all that met his question was more silence.


    Lin Fan waited a bit longer before not minding the silence and asking, "Just what do you want?"


    Just like before, there was silence that met this question.


    But Lin Fan didn''t give up as quickly asst time and just stood there in silence.


    While it seemed like he wasn''t thinking anything, there were actually many things that were passing through his mind. Many of these things were things that had happened in the past and had involved the system.


    As he thought through these things, the thoughts that he had began changing.


    It was as if he was beginning to lose more and more faith in the system and even had thoughts about finding ways to get rid of the system.


    But that couldn''t be med on him when he had a system that kept guiding him around with things like missions and didn''t tell him a single thing. It was clear that there was some kind of plot involving him that was dragging him further and further in.


    Once he got too deep, he wouldn''t be able to run away even if he feared for his life.


    As these thoughts filled his mind, there was a certain person in a golden pce that became more and more worried.


    Finally, Lin Fan asked the final question that he had, "Do you n on hurting me?"


    This question wasn''t actually a question that he had nned on asking, but since this system had been with him for so long and it had "helped" him in many situations, he did feel close to it.


    Not to mention, it was the only thing that reminded him that he was a transmigrator.


    So he couldn''t help wanting to take it as his partner.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Not receiving an answer from the system, Lin Fan wasn''t surprised. He just gave a sigh and was about to leave when¡­


    "The system was made specifically for the host and has no intentions of hurting the host. Is that answer satisfactory?"


    Lin Fan''s foot that had been raised couldn''t help freezing in the air when he heard this.


    He was silent for a bit longer before asking the system, "What do you want?"


    Once again, the system fell silent and didn''t say a single thing. It was as if the system was deliberating, but at the same time, it was as if this was something that the system couldn''t talk about.


    Lin Fan once again started having certain thoughts¡­


    But then the system said, "Keep following the path that is ahead of you, even if it is to meet the five sacred beast races. At the very least, you''ll learn a bit about the God Realm and what it means to be a god. Once you know more, see if you want to walk on the path that I have set for you."


    This time, Lin Fan couldn''t help being taken aback.


    That was because he had clearly heard the system use the word "I".


    It was as if the system was talking about itself, but Lin Fan knew that it wasn''t the system that was saying this. Rather, it was the one who had designed the system, the one who had given it to him.


    It should be one of the Gods from the world of gods.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows slightly when he heard this and he asked, "Why can''t you just give me a simple answer?"


    After a bit of silence, the system said, "If you receive the answers now, you won''t reach the conclusion that you''re meant to reach. Only when you put in the effort to reach the end, will you have your opinion and your own ideas. Only when you reach the end on your own will you be able to properly decide what you want."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows even more when he heard this.


    There was a long period of silence that followed as many different thoughts passed through Lin Fan''s mind, but this time, the context was very different.


    Based on the experiences that he had, he had already figured out that something must have happened in the world of gods.


    For them to create this system and even rely on a transmigrator, it was clear that they were getting desperate.


    Since that was the case¡­then Lin Fan had no choice but to ept the words that the system had said and see things through to the end.


    He also felt that this was what he owed to himself after everything that he had gone through.


    When these thoughts passed through Lin Fan''s mind, that person inside of the golden pce let out a sigh of relief.


    He had been able to buy time, but just how much time would he be able to buy?


    Eventually, Lin Fan needed to know the truth¡­


    After making up his mind, Lin Fan confidently walked off without asking the system another thing. He knew that the system or whatever was behind the system would be able to read his thoughts to a certain extent, or else they wouldn''t have said anything just now.


    So Lin Fan went back to the secret room where the others were anxiously waiting for him.


    When they saw hime in, they immediately asked about what the elders said.


    Once they heard that the elders had approved of the n to head to the Phoenix Race, the one that let out the biggest sigh of relief in the end was Feng Ling.


    If the elders didn''t allow them to go, then they wouldn''t be able to reach deep enough into the Phoenix Race to find out what was happening.


    While Lin Fan might be able to go there, they wouldn''t have anyone to talk to and figure out the problems of the Phoenix Race.


    So it was good that they were able to get help from the Dragon Race.


    Though Feng Ling did feel a bit of guilt about dragging the Dragon Race into this private matter.


    As for the two days wait, she knew that this was something that was expected. It took time to set these things up, so she knew that it couldn''t be rushed¡­or at least it couldn''t be rushed too much.


    Lin Fan had already done quite a bit by shortening it down to two days.


    She would have thanked Lin Fan for this, but he was busy being attacked by Qing Bao Lan right now.


    Qing Bao Lan had thought that Lin Fan woulde back with Xiao Feng and she had gotten herself worked up about it. So when she saw that Lin Fan was back by himself, she was crushed and she took out all those bad feelings on Lin Fan.


    Qing Ao would have been there tofort Qing Bao Lan, but this time, he was looking at Feng Ling.


    So in the end, Lin Fan was left to suffer Qing Bao Lan''s "wrath".


    Though the one that suffered was Qing Bao Lan whose little fists hurt from hitting Lin Fan.

 Chapter 1039 Where Are We? (1)

    ?


    The next two days were spent in peace as they prepared to head off to the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    The elders made sure to send someone to keep Lin Fan up to date on what the preparations were, so they never had to ask about it.


    When the two days were over, Lin Fan put everyone into the Pet Storage Space and brought the rest of them with him as he went to meet the elders again.


    The elders already knew about the people that had been in the secret room with Lin Fan, but since they werepanions of the Void God''s sessor, they didn''t choose to question it.


    Even though they felt some familiar auras from those people¡­


    The one that felt the most familiar to them was of course Hong Long.


    Hong Long had been struggling the entire time he had been on the Dragon Race homeworld. He didn''t know if he should reveal himself or keep himself hidden for Lin Fan''s sake, but in the end, it was Lin Fan who told him that it was fine to reveal himself.


    So on the final day, before they left, Hong Long made the decision to reveal his true identity.


    When they walked into the elder hall, the one that came forward was Hong Long who had a cloak over himself.


    The elders just silently watched Hong Long stand in front of them and waited to see what he had to say. After all, they could all feel the familiar aura that wasing from him.


    When Hong Long revealed himself, the elders in front of him weren''t shocked at all. Rather, most of them revealed knowing looks since most of them had already guessed who he was based on his aura.


    But when he revealed himself, some of them couldn''t help feeling happy.


    Hong Long was the past generation''s Red Dragon Tribe head, so he was someone that many people in the Dragon Race knew.


    The current Red Dragon Tribe head was actually Hong Long''s nephew, his younger brother''s son. He had inherited the position when Hong Long had disappeared after his fight with the Outers.


    So by right, Hong Long should be one of the elders right now if he had survived.


    Once he lost the position as the Red Dragon Tribe head, he would have joined the elders of the Dragon Race. That was how there were so many different elders in the Dragon Race.


    The Azure Dragon Tribe head would also join the elders once he passed on his position as the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    The ones that were happy were those that came from the same generation as Hong Long and Qing Di, they had be elders before the two of them even though they were around the same age as them.


    As those who had grown up with Hong Long, naturally they were very happy to see that he was still alive.


    The two Great Elders looked at Hong Long with narrowed eyes.


    It was as if they were seeing Hong Long for the first time.


    But that wasn''t strange since there was a strange feeling that wasing from Hong Long¡­


    That was because of his contract with the system.


    After he signed the contract, part of the system''s power entered him, transforming Hong Long. Part of it was being used to maintain his ess to the store''s system and the other half was used to hide his cultivation.


    So even now, the two Great Elders couldn''t see how strong Hong Long was.


    After a long silence, the left Great Elder asked, "Elder Hong, how did you survive?"


    The right Great Elder said with a nod, "Last we saw of you, you sacrificed yourself to take down one of the Outer Rulers."


    The elders all focused on Hong Long when they heard this, with many of them nodding in agreement to this.


    Hong Long shook his head and gave a sigh when he heard this.


    It wasn''t that he didn''t want to answer it, it was that he didn''t know how to answer it. Rather, he didn''t know how much he was able to say without revealing Lin Fan''s secrets.


    Even if he was loyal to the Dragon Race, there were things that couldn''t be said now that he had signed a contract with Lin Fan''s master.


    So after another long silence, Hong Long said, "It''s a long andplicated story. I''ll tell you what I can say." After saying this, he turned to look at Lin Fan with a meaningful look.


    This look wasn''t for Lin Fan, but rather for the elders of the Dragon Race.


    It was so that they would understand that there were certain things that he couldn''t say because it was rted to Lin Fan. Or rather, it was rted to the secret behind Lin Fan.


    The elders all knew that there had to be some kind of secret behind Lin Fan''s abilities, but they didn''t pry since he was the Void God''s sessor.


    Now that Hong Long showed the same difficulty, they understood what he was in.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    The two Great Elders nodded in agreement to what Hong Long said.


    So Hong Long started telling them everything about what happened to him after he sacrificed himself.


    He told them about how he hadnded on the Blue Star and what happened before his meeting with Lin Fan.


    Then after that, he started telling the story of his journey with Lin Fan, but now he started leaving out many things. The one thing that he didn''t leave out was that he knew about Xiao Feng''s bloodline as soon as he met him.


    There were a few elders who couldn''t help criticizing in a low voice after they heard this.


    "If he knew about the true descendant, he should have contacted us much sooner."


    That was the number oneint that these elders had.


    As soon as Hong Long heard this, he stopped his story midway to look at these elders.


    These elders couldn''t help being taken aback when they heard this and they just looked at Hong Long with a strange look.


    Hong Long met those gazes for a bit before turning to look at Lin Fan with aplicated look.


    This action made it clear what he was suggesting and all of the elders understood why he hadn''t tried to contact them.


    After that, Hong Long stared at these elders a bit longer before continuing his story.


    Just like how he had friends among the elders, he also had people that he couldn''t get along with. The elders that hadined about Hong Long just now were some of those people.


    They hadn''t gotten along when they were younger and even now, they still couldn''t get along.


    These elders had celebrated when they heard that Hong Long was dead and they were disappointed when he showed up alive again.


    After he finished his story, the two Great Elders gave nods before the left Great Elder said, "Elder Hong, it has been hard on you."


    The right Great Elder said, "I''m sure that you have some things to take care of first, but our Dragon Race will wee you back with open arms."


    Hong Long shook his head when he heard this before saying, "I have no intentions ofing back to the Dragon Race. I''ve already found a ce to work at, so I will be staying there."


    The two Great Elders looked at each other in surprise before nodding in response.


    Hong Long had told them about Lin Fan''s store, but not about where it was. But even if Hong Long was working at Lin Fan''s store, they figured that he could split his time between the Dragon Race and the store.


    In fact, they had even nned on sending Hong Long as their informant on Lin Fan by having him spy on Lin Fan for them.


    But they never expected him to cut off all rtions to the Dragon Race like this¡­


    Still, they didn''t me him since they figured that he had his reasons for this.


    From what they had heard about Lin Fan''s store, they knew that it definitely wasn''t a normal store.


    After hearing this, there were a few different reactions from the elders. Some were happy about this and some were sad about this.


    Once this was settled, the two Great Elders gave an order to one of the elite guards and the elite guard disappeared.


    It didn''t take long before that elite guard came back with the current head of the Red Dragon Tribe.


    This current head was called Hong Gui and was Hong Long''s nephew.


    When this head of the Red Dragon Tribe was called in, the first thing that he did was kneel down in front of the elders to show them respect. The look on his face made it clear that he already had the worst case scenario on his mind, so he didn''t hesitate to tter them ahead of time just to save himself and the Red Dragon Tribe.


    All of the elders couldn''t help revealing bitter smiles when they saw this.


    Even Hong Long revealed a bitter smile when he saw this.


    He knew what kind of personality this nephew of his had, so he knew exactly why he was acting this way.


    Hong Gui couldn''t help feeling awkward when he saw that no one was saying a thing to him.


    So Hong Gui couldn''t help peeking up at who was in this room.


    His expression was normal at first until he saw¡­Hong Long standing there.

 Chapter 1040 Where Are We? (2)

    ?


    There was a slight moment of dy in thought before Hong Gui said, "Uncle? Is that really you?"


    Hong Long gave a nod in response to this, but he didn''t say anything else.


    Hong Gui''s expression twisted when he saw this and it changed several times before he forced himself to calm down. Then Hong Gui asked, "Uncle, how are you still alive? Didn''t you sacrifice yourself in the battle with the Outers?"


    Hong Long shook his head and said, "It''s not the time to exin now."


    Then Hong Long started asking Hong Gui a few questions about the Red Dragon Tribe.


    Hong Gui was confused when he heard this, but seeing all of the elders looking at him, which included the two Great Elders, he had no choice but to respond truthfully. As he responded, he couldn''t stop a bad feeling from filling his heart.


    It was almost as if he was slowly walking towards his own doom.


    But in the end, nothing happened.


    Hong Long just gave a nod in response to everything that he heard from Hong Gui before turning to walk over to where Lin Fan and the rest were standing.


    Hong Gui couldn''t help feeling very strange when he saw this and he had many questions about this, but he couldn''t ask this since he was in the elders hall.


    The elders all noticed this, including the two Great Elders.


    As soon as they saw this, they knew that something had to be done or else¡­there might be the risk of their secret spilling.


    So the two Great Elders both gave signals to the elite guards near them to take care of this matter.


    Once that was settled, Hong Gui was led out of the elders hall. Though the look on his face made it clear that he wanted to stay here.


    Since he had alreadye here, he wanted to take advantage of this chance and build some rapport with the elders.


    Even if the elders remained neutral, it wasn''t as if they were made of stone.


    There were elders that helped certain people with matters that weren''t considered that big, so it would never be bad for Hong Gui to make these connections.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t get this chance to do so.


    He was immediately led out by the elite guards and based on the look on their faces, it was clear that they weren''t in any mood to talk to him.


    Once Hong Gui was led out, everyone immediately forgot about this and went back to the main topic.


    The left Great Elder said, "Your transport has already been prepared and we have already gathered the guards."


    The right Great Elder said, "If you''ll follow us, we''ll bring you there right away."


    The two of them stood up, but before they could take a single step, Lin Fan raised his hand.


    The two Great Elders and all of the other elders who had been prepared to move were caught off guard by this. They just looked at Lin Fan with confused looks as they waited for him to say something.


    Lin Fan looked at the two Great Elders and calmly said, "Thank you for your concern, but we will meet you there when you arrive."


    "Huh?"


    That was the only thing that the elders could say when they heard what Lin Fan said.


    The two Great Elders immediately said, "Void God''s sessor, what do you mean by this? It is too dangerous for you to travel alone with the true descendant."


    Lin Fan didn''t listen as he said, "We have some other business to take care of first, so we''lle after taking care of that business."


    The two Great Elders nkly looked at each other before turning to look at Hong Long for help.


    However, Hong Long just shook his head with a bitter smile.


    That was because he had also received the notification from the system just now about the transport to the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    He didn''t know why there was this sudden notification, but he could guess that it was most likely rted to Lin Fan.


    He didn''t understand the rtionship between Lin Fan and the owner of the shop, but there was no denying that they had a close rtionship. It was almost as if whenever Lin Fan needed something, the master of the shop would be there to help¡­


    It was almost as if the master of the store was taking orders from Lin Fan¡­but Hong Long knew that this was impossible.


    So he just assumed that it was the master of the store spoiling Lin Fan who was his only disciple.


    Seeing that Hong Long wasn''t able to help them, the two Great Elders were about to say something else to try and convince Lin Fan otherwise. However, Lin Fan didn''t give them that chance since he knew that once the Great Elders started speaking, they would never let him go.


    It was the oldest ginseng that was the spiciest, so these Great Elders of the Dragon Race would without a doubt be very shrewd and very good at talking.


    Lin Fan raised his hand again and said, "Unfortunately, we don''t have any time to spare, so we''ll have to leave now."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "Huh?"


    The elders said again as they didn''t understand what Lin Fan was saying.


    But then with a sh of white light, Lin Fan and hispanions all disappeared from the spot.


    None of the elders were able to do a single thing as Lin Fan and hispanions disappeared. They didn''t even know where they had gone.


    All they could feel was that there were traces of spatial energy that were in the air.


    However, not a single elder was able to understand how this was even possible.


    After all, this was the most secret and protected ce of the Dragon Race. Only those that were at the very peak of the Dragon Race were even allowed in this ce.


    So naturally this was a ce that was covered in arrays that would stop people froming in with spatialws. Unless they had a certain item that allowed them to do so, they couldn''t use spatialws here¡­


    No, there was another way for one to use spatialws here.


    They would have to overpower the array that was ced here¡­that meant that they had to control spatialws that were at the level of the God Realm¡­


    As they realized this, the elders all couldn''t help revealingplicated looks.


    They had thought that they had a good idea of what Lin Fan was capable of, but this was like a wrench that had been thrown into their ns. They now realized that they didn''t know as much as they thought about this Void God''s sessor.


    Even if they wanted to find out more about them, it was already toote since the Void God''s sessor was already gone.


    The two Great Elders were lost in thought for a bit before suddenly reacting.


    The only clue that they had about the Void God''s sessor and their true descendant was the Phoenix Race homeworld. If they arrived before they arrived, then there was a chance that there would be conflict between them.


    If either the Void God''s sessor or the true descendant was hurt, they wouldn''t be able to live with themselves.


    So the two Great Elders quickly looked at the elite guards and said, "Go! Go to the Phoenix Race homeworld and find the two of them!"


    The elite guards and the elders who had been chosen to head to the Phoenix Race homeworld reacted when they heard this and they quickly headed off without any dy.


    The two Great Elders had even wanted to go themselves, but they knew that it was impossible.


    They were the Great Elders of the Dragon Race, they were people that couldn''t move easily.


    If they were to suddenly head to the Phoenix Race homeworld, it would send the wrong message to them. Instead of helping the Void God''s sessor, they would just be hurting them by making thingsplicated.


    So even if they were agitated, they had no choice but to stay here.


    They could only pray that the Void God''s sessor and their true descendant were safe.


    ¡­


    When the sh of white light cleared, Lin Fan and the rest looked around themselves.


    But after thinking about it, Lin Fan called out Feng Ling and Feng Yu.


    They were from the Phoenix Race and this was the Phoenix Race homeworld, so he wanted to see if they knew where they were.


    However, neither Feng Ling or Feng Yu recognized this ce.


    As she looked around, Feng Ling couldn''t help bing more and more confused since she had never seen this ce and she reckoned that she was an expert of the Phoenix Race homeworld. After all, she had explored almost every inch of it when she was younger and more wild.


    "Just where are we?" Feng Ling couldn''t help asking as she looked around.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say since everything had been taken care of by the system.


    The system had named this ce the Phoenix Race homeworld and had taken care of the teleportation, so there was nothing that he could say about it.


    Lin Fan thought about asking the system about this until he looked up at the sky.


    When he looked up, he couldn''t help being taken aback by what he saw.


    After all, this was a scene that he was familiar with.


    When they first arrived on the Dragon Race homeworld, they had seen something simr to it.


    It was the same rock ceiling that they had seen before.

 Chapter 1041 Phoenix God Fragment (1)

    ?


    As soon as Lin Fan saw this, he immediately figured out where they were.


    But at the same time, he couldn''t help being confused as to why there was this kind of ce under the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    It was just like the one that they had encountered under the Dragon Race homeworld, so there should also be a Phoenix God fragment here¡­


    After this thought passed through his mind, Lin Fan called out Xiao Huo.


    When Xiao Huo came out, Feng Yu made her move.


    She didn''t jump Xiao Huo like Qing Bao Lan jumped Xiao Feng, but she moved to his side and stood there as if she was the only one that could be by his side.


    Xiao Huo looked around with a confused look after being summoned, but then he went over to where Xiao Feng was and couldn''t help looking at him with a strange look. During this past period of time, Xiao Feng hadn''t been in the pet storage space for a while, so Xiao Huo hadn''t seen Xiao Feng''s transformation.


    He couldn''t help being surprised by just how big Xiao Feng was now.


    While the two of them caught up, Feng Yu couldn''t help looking at Qing Bao Lan with a strange look.


    She had thought the same as everyone else when she had first seen Xiao Feng, but then seeing how handsome he was and how smug Qing Bao Lan looked, she couldn''t help¡­feeling a bit inferior.


    She had to admit that this new Xiao Feng was a handsome young man, even if he did look mismatched with Qing Bao Lan.


    But for young girls like this that had someone that they had their hearts set on, when they saw their friends bragging about having someone better, they couldn''t help feeling inferior.


    She couldn''t help revealing a slightly bitter smile as she looked at Xiao Feng.


    Lin Fan let them catch up before picking up Xiao Huo and heading deeper into this ce.


    Xiao Huo was happy to be carried by Lin Fan and Xiao Feng came over to be carried too¡­it was just too bad that Xiao Feng was just too big for him to carry with one hand like Xiao Huo.


    So Xiao Feng had no choice but to walk while Xiao Huo sat in Lin Fan''s arms.


    Their group followed Lin Fan until they came to the center of this ce.


    Just like before, there was something hidden in the center of the tall grass and when Lin Fan triggered it, there was a podium that appeared.


    Instead of mentioning the Dragon Stone, there was just a line that said, "Those that wish to continue forward, bring the purest phoenix bloodline."


    It was simr to the one that they had met in that ce under the Dragon Race homeworld, but this time it was asking for pure phoenix bloodline.


    That was the reason why Lin Fan had been holding Xiao Huo.


    But before he could do that, Feng Yu ran in front of them to stop Lin Fan.


    She turned to look at her mother who revealed a bitter smile.


    Feng Ling never thought that her daughter would sacrifice her own mother for the one that she loved. She had always been a good and obedient daughter who loved her mother, but now she was throwing her under the bus like this.


    It seemed that once her daughter had someone special, she didn''t care about her mother anymore¡­


    Still, Feng Ling nodded and walked forward towards the podium.


    When Lin Fan and the others saw this, they couldn''t help revealing knowing smiles. After all, something like this had happened before and they knew what the result was.


    But still, since she was willing to try, then there was no need to stop her.


    Xiao Huo''s blood was precious and if they could stop him from using it, then they weren''t against trying other people''s blood.


    But as expected, the blood that fell onto the podium didn''t do anything.


    Well, it did create a glow around the podium just like Qing Ao''s blood had done, but that was it.


    Then¡­it was Feng Yu''s turn.


    She didn''t want Xiao Huo to have to put a drop of blood onto this podium, so she took the initiative to put her blood onto it.


    A stronger glow than the one that Feng Ling created appeared, but still there was nothing that happened.


    Lin Fan just had a look on his face like he had already expected this to happen before taking one of Xiao Huo''s hands and bringing it up to the podium. Then he pricked Xiao Huo''s hand and a drop of Xiao Huo''s blood fell onto the podium.


    As soon as the drop of blood fell onto it, there was a moment of silence¡­then there was a burst of red light that appeared around the podium.


    This was just like the burst of azure light that Xiao Feng created before.


    It was too bright for them to look at directly at first, but then the light slowly became weaker and weaker until they could look right at it.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    This light eventually faded and there were words that appeared on the podium.


    "The sessor hase¡­The vault will now open."


    Once that happened, the same thing as before happened where the podium started sinking into the ground. It didn''t take long before a shaking also happened and then an opening in the ground appeared.


    There was a set of stairs that appeared in front of them.


    Just like before, Lin Fan could feel a feeling that was familiaring from it. It was like the feeling that Xiao Huo gave with his bloodline.


    They walked down the stairs and they found arge set of doors that was very simr to the one that they saw before. The only difference was that instead of dragons on the door, there were two phoenixes rising into the sky.


    As we stood there in front of the door, there was silence that followed.


    That is until there was a light that swept out from the eyes of the phoenixes on the door and swept over the people in the room. After sweeping over everyone, they focused into a beam of light that fell onto Xiao Huo standing there.


    "Let the sessore forward."


    This time, Lin Fan and the rest weren''t as tense as they were before because they had already experienced this once. The only ones that were still tense were Feng Ling and Feng Yu who hadn''t seen what had happened with Xiao Feng before.


    After hearing this, Lin Fan came forward and said, "I want to go in with him."


    The spotlight went over to where Lin Fan was standing and fell onto him. There was a moment where it was about to be stronger, but then it reverted back to its original form.


    Lin Fan knew what was happening, so he said, "I am the Void God''s sessor."


    There was a silence that came from the door, but the spotlight was still cast on Lin Fan as if it was checking him out.


    Finally, the same voice said, "You maye in with the sessor."


    As soon as the voice fell, the spotlight disappeared and there was a click as the door opened.


    Just like before, they weren''t able to see through theyer of something that was over the door. It was as if this thing was blocking them from seeing into the room.


    Lin Fan picked Xiao Huo up and without any hesitation, he walked through this door and into the room.


    Once they were in, everything behind them disappeared.


    Feng Ling and Feng Yu had worried looks, but the rest calmed them down. At the same time, they shook their heads to stop the two of them from following Lin Fan and Xiao Huo in.


    As soon as they walked through, there was the same scenery that appeared around Lin Fan and Xiao Huo.


    They werepletely surrounded by nts and all of these nts were rare herbs.


    But this time, Lin Fan didn''t start harvesting these herbs like he had done before.


    Instead, he waited for the nts to move aside to form a path for him.


    Seeing this path form, he walked down it like it was nothing and arrived at a clearing where there was a statue that was waiting for him.


    This statue was in the shape of a phoenix.


    When he and Xiao Huo approached the statue, there was a redyer of light that appeared around it. It took no time for the redyer of light to form a red figure made of light that appeared in front of them.


    However, instead of being a handsome young man this time, it was a beautiful red haired woman.


    When she appeared, she looked at Lin Fan and couldn''t help revealing a strange look as she asked, "Why aren''t you surprised?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile as he said, "Well, it isn''t my first time seeing something like this."


    Hearing this, the woman asked in a shocked voice, "It isn''t?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before taking out the Dragon Stone.


    The moment that woman saw the Dragon Stone, she couldn''t help revealing a look of further shock.


    She couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    There was an awkward silence that filled the air for a bit before she suddenly revealed a bitter smile and said, "Since you have that, you should have already met the Dragon God fragment."


    She then gave a nod and said, "As you expected, I am a fragment left by the Phoenix God."

 Chapter 1042 Phoenix God Fragment (2)

    ?


    Lin Fan just gave a nod of acknowledgement when he heard this since this was what he had already expected when he was sent to this ce.


    So far, everything went the same way as when he met the Dragon God fragment.


    So he could even expect what would happen next.


    Before the Phoenix God fragment could say it, Lin Fan said, "You want to give your inheritance to Xiao Huo?"


    The Phoenix God fragment was caught off guard when asked this by Lin Fan, but in the end, she gave a nod in response. Then she couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a curious look, as if she was trying to figure out how he already knew this.


    Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile when he saw this since it was hard for him to exin this.


    Instead, he said, "I have some conditions before that happens."


    The Phoenix God fragment couldn''t help knitting her brows when she heard this, but she gave another nod of acknowledgement.


    After all, she knew that there was nothing in this world that was free.


    While she was trying to give something that would without a doubt benefit Xiao Huo, she knew that it was impossible to erase the doubt that Lin Fan had towards her. After all, they didn''t have an existing rtionship, so it wasn''t as if there was a reason for him to trust her.


    At the same time, they hadn''t interacted with each other long enough to build that kind of trust.


    But it wasn''t as if the Phoenix God fragment had that much time in the first ce.


    There was only so much power that was left in this ce and there was only so long that she could maintain her form. So if she stalled for too long, she might miss her chance to pass down the inheritance.


    So she chose to go along with Lin Fan''s request.


    If there was something for both sides to gain, then it would make it easier toe to an agreement.


    She didn''t believe that this Void God''s sessor would have too high of a requirement for her that she wouldn''t be able to pass down the inheritance. So it was very likely that she would ept any request that Lin Fan had.


    After seeing her nod in agreement, Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "I want the herbs that are in this ce."


    The Phoenix God fragment couldn''t help being surprised when she heard this.


    She couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a doubtful look, as if she didn''t believe what he had just said. But seeing that he had a serious look on his face and it didn''t seem like he was kidding, she nodded in agreement.


    She had no need for the herbs that were here in the first ce. These herbs had grown because of the life energy that the Phoenix God fragment naturally released when she was in hibernation.


    So it wasn''t as if she had any sentimental attachments to them, even if they had formed spirituality.


    When the herbs around her saw this, they couldn''t help revealing bitter looks.


    This ce was a paradise for them, but now they have been sold off by the owner of this ce. It was hard for them not to feel some kind of bitter feelings towards this.


    Of course, it wasn''t as if they could say anything about this since they knew their ce.


    Since the owner had agreed to let Lin Fan take them, that meant that their only path forward was to go with Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised that the Phoenix God fragment agreed to this so easily. It had been the same with the Dragon God fragment, so he had expected this answer from the Phoenix God fragment.


    But he didn''t move after receiving confirmation from the Phoenix God fragment.


    The Phoenix God fragment looked at him for a bit before saying, "Is there something else?"


    Lin Fan nodded and said, "I still have another condition."


    The Phoenix God fragment knitted her brows when she heard this, but she said with a nod, "Alright, tell me what you want."


    Lin Fan looked right into her eyes and said, "I want to ask you a few questions. If you answer honestly, then I''ll allow Xiao Huo to ept your inheritance."


    The Phoenix God fragment couldn''t help revealing a surprised look again when she heard this, but then she knitted her brows once more. She looked at Lin Fan with a serious look for a bit before saying, "I can answer your questions, but what if there is a question that I can''t answer? Will you go back on your word if there''s a question like that?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "If there''s a question that you can''t answer for any reason, you don''t have to answer it. I hope that you will tell me the reason, but I know that there are certain things that you can''t say."


    The Phoenix God fragment couldn''t help looking even more confused when she heard this.


    She just couldn''t figure out what Lin Fan''s goal was¡­


    No matter how she looked at this, this didn''t seem like he would be gaining anything from this. No matter how she looked at this, it almost seemed like he was ying with her.


    But she could see the seriousness in his eyes and knew that he was serious about this answer.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    So she couldn''t help feeling even more confused.


    In the end though, she agreed to Lin Fan''s terms.


    She was curious what questions he would ask her.


    The first question that Lin Fan asked was, "Have you ever heard of the word ''system''?"


    When the Phoenix God fragment heard this question, she couldn''t help revealing a confused look.


    She thought about it before shaking her head and saying, "I''ve never heard of this thing before. What is it?"


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before saying, "I''m sure that you should have heard some kind of rumour about this before. Can you think of anything?"


    The Phoenix God fragment was even more confused when she heard this, but she tried thinking about it like Lin Fan wanted. After thinking for a while, she finally said, "I heard some people in the world of gods talking about it before¡­"


    The answer that she gave in the end was just the same answer that Lin Fan had received before. It was that there were some gods that had been experimenting with something like this.


    Lin Fan would have asked more about it, but he figured that she would give him the same answer as the Dragon God fragment. Since she wouldn''t be able to give him any more information, then there was no need for him to ask anything.


    Instead, he asked, "Do you have something simr to the Dragon Stone?"


    When the Phoenix God fragment heard this, she immediately revealed a serious look as she turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Seeing the look on her face, Lin Fan couldn''t help being taken aback.


    The Phoenix God fragment then said, "Since you''re saying this, does that mean that you have already collected the Dragon Stone?"


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response before waiting to see what she would say.


    Seeing this, the Phoenix God fragment just said, "This was an agreement that we made with the Void God all those years ago¡­" Then her voice just drifted off as she didn''t say anything else.


    Lin Fan just calmly waited for a while, but it didn''t seem like she would say anything else.


    So he suddenly gave a cough as if he wanted to draw her attention.


    But in the end, the Phoenix God fragment just said, "This isn''t something that you should know now. You still have to find the true descendants of the five sacred beast races and get the five stones. Only then will you learn about the true past between us and the Void God."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    While this wasn''t the information that he wanted, there was some new information that he obtained from this answer.


    He at least confirmed that there was indeed one stone for each of the sacred beast races and that there would be a ce that was simr to this for the three remaining sacred beast races.


    That meant that he would have to go to those ces as well to obtain them.


    He had already nned on this, but there was still a wrench in that n¡­


    He didn''t have the ck Tortoise bloodline.


    He only had pets with four of the five bloodlines, he had never obtained thest one.


    So what would he use to meet the ck Tortoise God fragment?


    Still, he threw this thought out of his mind and turned back to the present.


    Since she wasn''t willing to give him any more information, there wasn''t anything else that Lin Fan wanted from her.


    So he just turned around to look at the herbs around him before taking out a pair of scissors.


    Seeing this, all of the herbs felt a chill run down their spines as they knew what Lin Fan was nning on doing.


    At the same time, Xiao Huo ran up beside Lin Fan and looked like he was nning on helping him.


    But Lin Fan turned Xiao Huo back to face the Phoenix God fragment and said, "You go with her for now and ept her inheritance."


    Xiao Huo revealed a sad look, but he still gave a nod when he heard this.


    The Phoenix God fragment let out a sigh of relief before looking at Lin Fan with a grateful look.


    At the very least, he kept his promise.

 Chapter 1043 Meeting The Phoenix Race

    ?


    It didn''t take Lin Fan long to collect all of the herbs that were in this ce.


    The herbs would have resisted, but they had already heard the Phoenix God fragment selling them to Lin Fan. So they had no choice but to go with Lin Fan, hoping that he would treat them kindly.


    In hopes of currying favour with him, the herbs that could move on their own pulled themselves out of the ground and went over to Lin Fan on their own. They were hoping that by showing that they could act on their own and by showing a disy of submission, they would be able to get closer to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was certainly surprised since this didn''t happen when he met the Dragon God fragment, but he wasn''t opposed to this.


    After all, his n wasn''t to kill these herbs in the first ce.


    If he could get a continuous supply of alchemy ingredients from these herbs, then there was no need for him to do anything to them. He understood that it was better to take care of the goose thatid golden eggs than to kill it.


    So he put them all away and nned on nting them once he returned to the store, just like with the herbs he obtained from the Dragon God fragment.


    When the herbs that he collected met with the herbs that he collected before, they found that their stories were the same and they became closer to each other.


    Once he had finished collecting all of the herbs, Lin Fan went back to where the statue was.


    He found that the Phoenix God fragment was standing over Xiao Huo who was sitting there on the ground. However, he also found that Xiao Huo, who had taken his beast form, was¡­much bigger than before.


    This was just like what had happened with Xiao Feng when he epted the Dragon God''s inheritance.


    It was already near the end of the inheritance eptance when Lin Fan came back, so he didn''t have to wait long before Xiao Huo opened his eyes.


    The moment that Xiao Huo opened his eyes, the first thing that he did was look around for Lin Fan.


    Once he found Lin Fan, he immediately charged over to hug him, but Lin Fan dodged out of the way just like he had done with Xiao Feng.


    Xiao Huo revealed a hurt look, but Lin Fan wasn''t affected by it.


    That was because he knew that if he hadn''t moved out of the way, he would have been crushed by Xiao Huo. After all, Xiao Huo was now more than three times the size that he was before, standing even taller than Lin Fan in his beast form.


    If Lin Fan had tried to hold him, there was no doubt that he would have been crushed.


    Lin Fan reached up to pat Xiao Huo''s head as a constion and when he did, Xiao Huo realized what had changed. Xiao Huo quickly looked over his own body in an excited manner.


    After he finished, he stood there in front of Lin Fan and gave an imposing pose.


    Lin Fan nodded at him with a smile and gave him a few words of praise before turning to the Phoenix God fragment.


    The Phoenix God fragment was already starting to turn transparent.


    But there was still something that Lin Fan wanted from this Phoenix God fragment.


    "Before you go, can you give me the Phoenix Stone?" Lin Fan suddenly asked.


    The Phoenix God fragment looked like it had suddenly realized something, but it shook its head in the end before saying, "I don''t have it."


    "Huh?" Lin Fan said in a confused voice.


    The Phoenix God fragment revealed a smile as she said, "I left it with my descendants. If you want the Phoenix Stone, just go to my descendants with this one here and they''ll give it to you. I''ve already left instructions to them on what to do if they meet the Void God''s sessor."


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response to this.


    He had already guessed that it was something like this, but getting the confirmation was better than nothing.


    As she faded away, the Phoenix God fragment said the same thing as the Dragon God fragment.


    "Please take care of my Phoenix Race."


    Lin Fan once again gave a simple nod in response to this.


    Once she was gone, Lin Fan gave a slight bow to the statue in front of him before turning to leave.


    Xiao Huo saw this and shrank down to his human form, but he was the same as Xiao Feng in this sense. He looked like a handsome young man, but he still had the mentality of a child.


    So Lin Fan felt strange about holding him, once again dodging out of the way.


    Xiao Huo once again revealed a hurt look.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    When they walked through the door, the same thing happened where the rest of them didn''t recognize Xiao Huo right away.


    The ones that had already experienced what had happened before with Xiao Feng were able to react a bit faster, but they were still caught off guard by Xiao Huo''s new appearance.


    As for Feng Ling and Feng Yu, they reacted just like Qing Ao and Qing Bao Lan had reacted.


    When they were done, Feng Yu was acting the same way as Qing Bao Lan from before and wasforting Xiao Huo.


    But at the same time, she was looking at Qing Bao Lan with a look that only the two of them could understand. It was a look that seemed like she was bragging about how Xiao Huo was just as handsome as Xiao Feng now.


    It was hard to understand the feelings of these young girls¡­


    Since Lin Fan had met the Phoenix God fragment and Xiao Huo had received the inheritance from her, that meant that their task here underground was done.


    Since it was done, Lin Fan was now just waiting for¡­


    As if on cue, there was a notification from the system telling him that it would be teleporting them to the Phoenix Race''s homeworld.


    As an added bonus, the notification also said that they would be teleported to where the Dragon Race envoy was.


    Lin Fan was surprised that the Dragon Race envoy was already here. After all, it had only been a few hours since they hade to the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    However, it did make sense since these two races were both races from the five sacred beasts. They had a close rtionship with one another, or else a situation like Qing Ao, Feng Ling, and Lei Ting''s wouldn''t have happened.


    So there must be a secret passage that the five sacred beast races had amongst themselves for getting to each other''s homeworlds quickly.


    The rest of them all received the same notification, so Lin Fan quickly put Feng Ling, Feng Yu, and Xiao Huo into the pet storage space.


    These three couldn''t be revealed to the Phoenix Race yet until Lin Fan figured out what the situation with the Phoenix Race was.


    There was a sh of white light that appeared in front of them before they appeared inside of a building. Behind them, there was something that seemed to be a portal that was powered on.


    All around them were different people that were standing there, but there were two different auras that clearly came through.


    It was the aura of the Phoenix Race and the aura of the Dragon Race.


    After the white light cleared up, they found that they werepletely surrounded by those from both the Phoenix Race and the Dragon Race.


    The guards from both of these races immediately came forward to surround their group, but once they saw who the intruders were, there were two different reactions that appeared.


    For those from the Phoenix Race, they raised their guard and prepared to strike at any moment.


    They didn''t know who these intruders were, but the fact that they were able to teleport into this ce¡­a ce that was considered a secret facility for the Phoenix Race that was also heavily guarded¡­They definitely weren''t normal people.


    The Phoenix Race was already thinking about how to dispose of these intruders now that they had seen these secret facilities.


    But for those from the Dragon Race¡­


    They immediately recognized Lin Fan.


    The guards that hade were all the elite guards of the Dragon Race, the ones that had been prepared to guard Lin Fan and Xiao Feng in the first ce. So naturally all of them recognized Lin Fan as he was the one that they were supposed to guard.


    The elders of the Dragon Race also recognized Lin Fan immediately, but they couldn''t understand how he had suddenly appeared in this ce.


    After a moment of silence, the elders of the Phoenix Race gave a signal to their guards.


    As soon as these guards received this signal, they started moving towards Lin Fan''s group with their weapons raised.


    Since they were guards in this ce, these were guards that were on par with the elite guards of the Dragon Race. These were guards that were in the Ruler Realm.


    The pressure that they released as they came closer towards Lin Fan wasn''t weak.


    The leader of the Phoenix Race''s elite guards said, "Identify yourselves or you will be shown no mercy!"


    But before they could approach Lin Fan, the elders of the Dragon Race quickly came forward to stand between Lin Fan and the guards.


    The leader of the Dragon Race envoy quickly raised his hand and said, "Wait! Wait! This is all a misunderstanding!"

 Chapter 1044 Red Phoenix Tribe (1)

    ?


    The Phoenix Race elders and elite guards were surprised by the sudden actions of the Dragon Race elders.


    They couldn''t help looking at the Dragon Race elders with very strange looks, but in the end, they let down their weapons and waited for them to exin.


    Seeing this, the Dragon Race elders couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.


    But at the same time, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a bitter look.


    They had heard from the two Great Elders that Lin Fan would be making his way to the Phoenix Race homeworld on his own. It was even their jobs to find Lin Fan after he made his way here.


    However, not a single one of them expected Lin Fan to suddenly appear out of nowhere like this.


    In fact, not a single one of them could expect this.


    Though they should have since Lin Fan had disappeared in the same way.


    If it wasn''t for the two Great Elders driving them away so quickly, they would have known about this and would have been able to react properly.


    Seeing that the Phoenix Race elders and elite guards rxed their guards a bit, the Dragon Race elder that led the envoy let out a secret sigh of relief before slowly giving an exnation.


    During this time, he looked at Lin Fan and gave him a secret signal with his eyes.


    Lin Fan understood this and called out Xiao Feng as well.


    When Xiao Feng appeared, the elite guards couldn''t help moving a bit closer to him, as if they were prepared to protect him from anything that happened. Even though this was the Phoenix Race''s territory, they couldn''t help being careful.


    If anyone were to happen the true descendant, it would be their asses on the line.


    So they didn''t dare let their guard down until they were absolutely certain that they were in a safe ce.


    Lin Fan was able to appear in this ce without any warning, so it wasn''t as if others couldn''t. Though it was very unlikely, that was just how much they had been shaken up by Lin Fan appearing out of thin air.


    It was just a good thing that the Phoenix Race was focused on the elder''s story, or else they might have taken offense to this.


    Once they finished listening to the elder''s story, they turned to look at Lin Fan and Xiao Feng.


    Xiao Feng''s case was easier since they could just look at him and sense the ancestral bloodline that wasing from him. As sacred beasts, they were sensitive to things like this and could easily sense something like the ancestral bloodline.


    But it was more difficult when it came to Lin Fan since the Void God''s power was something that could only be sensed when it was used.


    Lin Fan knew what they were waiting for, so he raised his hand and gathered his voidws for them.


    When they saw this, the Phoenix Race elders and elite guards all looked much more rxed.


    It wasn''t that just any kind of voidws would trigger this kind of reaction from them. There was something special about Lin Fan''s voidws that gave them a special feeling, allowing them to sense that he was the Void God''s sessor.


    Namely¡­the Void Physique.


    So once this had been confirmed, they immediately brought Lin Fan and Xiao Feng further into the Phoenix Race homeworld.


    Just like with the Dragon Race homeworld, the core of the had been converted to a meeting hall for the elders.


    That was where Lin Fan''s group and the Dragon Race envoy were brought to meet the rest of the Phoenix Race elders. That included the three Great Elders of the Phoenix Race.


    Even though the Phoenix Race had three Great Elders as opposed to the Dragon Race''s two Great Elders, that didn''t mean that the Phoenix Race was stronger than the Dragon Race.


    After all, the greatest strength of these two sacred beast races was the gods of these races, their ancestors. Even if those ancestors had ascended to the world of gods, that didn''t mean that they didn''t leave something for their descendants.


    These powerful God Realm Artifacts were the greatest things that supported these two sacred beast races.


    When Lin Fan met the three Great Elders, the first thing that they did was sweep him and Xiao Feng with their spiritual senses.


    Lin Fan didn''t resist and just let them do what they wanted since he knew that this was the easiest way to earn their trust.


    After they had finished, all three of the Great Elders revealed wide and weing smiles.


    Seeing this, all of the elders also became much friendlier towards Lin Fan and the Dragon Race delegates.


    The three Great Elders stood up and brought Lin Fan out to the hall in front of the elder hall. They brought him over to a mural that was the same as the one that he had been shown back at the Dragon Race elder hall.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    When the Dragon Race elders saw this, they all revealed bitter smiles, but they didn''t say a thing as they let the Phoenix Race Great Elders do what they wanted to do.


    However, it ended in disappointment for them just like the Dragon Race elders.


    After they showed Lin Fan the mural, they found that he didn''t know a single thing about it. But they didn''t lose hope right away and silently waited to see if Lin Fan would have a reaction to this mural.


    Of course, they were disappointed in the end since he didn''t know a thing.


    So with this disappointment, they went back into the elders hall.


    After sitting down, the middle Great Elder asked, "Void God''s sessor, did you juste to greet us or is there something else that you wanted to say today?"


    The other two Great Elders nodded in agreement to this and waited to see what Lin Fan would respond with.


    After all, they hadn''t found their true descendant yet.


    Until they did and it made a bond with Lin Fan, it wasn''t as if they could just follow through with the ancestor''s instructions. The ancestor had left clear instructions that only the Void God''s sessor with the true descendant should be given the things left behind by the ancestor.


    So there really was nothing else that they could do for Lin Fan even though he was here now.


    But of course, they also didn''t want to offend Lin Fan since he was the prophesized Void God''s sessor.


    In the end, the Great Elders and all of the elders were anxious since they didn''t want to offend Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just gave a natural nod in response to this and said, "Actually, I wanted to meet the leaders of the Red Phoenix Tribe."


    As soon as he said this, the Great Elders and the elders couldn''t help revealing confused looks.


    They would understand if he was looking for a specific elder, but why would he be looking for someone random from the Red Phoenix Tribe. The Red Phoenix Tribe was just one of the five tribes of the Phoenix Race and they weren''t even the strongest.


    So why would this Void God''s sessor want to meet the leaders of the Red Phoenix Tribe?


    This wouldn''t make sense unless¡­there was some kind of grudge between them already.


    But if that was the case, this would be bad for them.


    Seeing that the Great Elders and the elders didn''t say anything, Lin Fan pulled out a token that he showed them. He didn''t mind using this token since the Dragon Race elders had already seen it before.


    This was the token of the Lin Astral Family.


    When the Phoenix Race Great Elders and elders saw this, they couldn''t help being surprised before waiting for Lin Fan to exin why he took this out.


    Lin Fan calmly said, "The Phoenix Race recently sent an envoy to the Lin Astral Empire asking about a few things. I just wanted to have a talk with the Red Phoenix Tribe who sent the envoy.''


    When they heard this, the Great Elders and the elders couldn''t help revealing ugly looks on their faces.


    What they had hoped wasn''t true had actuallye true. There did seem to be some kind of past connection between Lin Fan and the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    Moreover, it seemed like it was something that would create some kind of grudge between them.


    The Great Elders and elders naturally knew about this envoy unlike the Dragon Race and Qing Qiang''s envoy. This envoy was one that they had approved of after hearing the Red Phoenix Tribe''s reasoning.


    They thought that it would be a good way to get the Red Phoenix Tribe to owe them, but they never thought that it would blow up to this level.


    Now they couldn''t help feeling regret over agreeing to let the Red Phoenix Tribe send that envoy.


    But it was toote for regret.


    As for the Dragon Race envoys, they finally understood why Lin Fan wanted toe to the Phoenix Tribe first.


    It turned out that there was this history between the Phoenix Race and Lin Fan.


    At the same time though, they also couldn''t help feeling anxious because they could tell that this wasn''t a good thing.


    The prophecy required Lin Fan to be in harmony with all five sacred beast races¡­so if there was some kind of grudge that was started between him and the Phoenix Race because of this matter¡­it would be bad for them.


    So everyone was left with an anxious look on their face after hearing this from Lin Fan.

 Chapter 1045 Red Phoenix Tribe (2)

    ?


    Finally, the center Great Elder said, "Young master Lin, I''m sure that whatever misunderstandings there are between you and the Red Phoenix Tribe, they can be settled peacefully."


    The two other Great Elders nodded in agreement to this before trying to mediate between Lin Fan and the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    However, Lin Fan clearly wasn''t listening.


    He just stood there with a calm smile on his face, almost as if he couldn''t hear what these Great Elders were saying.


    Seeing this, the expressions on the Great Elders'' faces turned more and more bitter.


    Finally, Lin Fan said, "I''m not here for any misunderstandings. I just want to ask the leaders of the Red Phoenix Tribe a few questions. Nothing more, nothing less."


    The Great Elders and the elders all revealed ugly expressions, but in the end, they had no choice but to agree to Lin Fan''s request.


    When it came down to it, between the Red Phoenix Tribe and Lin Fan¡­Lin Fan was more important. Even though the Red Phoenix Tribe was a part of their Phoenix Race, the prophecy was something that their ancestor had left behind and was something that they had followed for countless generations.


    It was something that went beyond a faith, it was almost a cult level belief in the prophecy.


    This was the case for the Dragon Race as well¡­


    So when it came to the Void God''s sessor, they might even give up part of their own flesh to satisfy him.


    But of course, Lin Fan didn''t know any of this.


    He didn''t know just how deep their faith in the prophecy was.


    Since they had agreed, they didn''t waste any time in bringing Lin Fan to the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    Normally, they would have had to send a messenger first and prepare everything on the Red Phoenix Tribe side, but Lin Fan was being very insistent on meeting them as soon as possible. So they had no choice but to send one of the Great Elders to bring Lin Fan there to make up for this.


    With the Great Elder there, everything would be exined and they would be able to keep everything secret.


    At the same time, sending the Great Elder would justify sending the elite guards to clear the path and make sure that no one interfered.


    While this might cause some confusion and panic, it was still better than the alternative.


    When they arrived at the Red Phoenix Tribe, there wasn''t a single person around.


    The entire Red Phoenix Tribe had been cleared out by the Phoenix Race elite guards.


    The only ones that were still left here were all in the manor of the head and were the ones that Lin Fan wanted to meet. So they couldn''t go anywhere even if they wanted to run away.


    After all, all they had heard was that one of the Great Elders wasing.


    They didn''t know what the reason was, but one of the Great Elders moving was not a small thing. If it was serious, it was very likely that the entire hierarchy of the Red Phoenix Tribe would change today.


    So naturally the ones that were waiting were very nervous.


    When they arrived in the room, they found that there were two people waiting for them.


    One of them was in the Ruler Realm while the other was just a young boy who wasn''t even in the World Realm yet. However, this young boy was allowed to sit right beside the man in the Ruler Realm, which meant that he was someone who held a powerful position in the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    But it was strange since he was just a young boy who had a weak cultivation.


    After the Great Elder entered the room, both the man and the young boy stood up to greet that Great Elder. Both of them bowed to this Great Elder and remained standing, waiting for the Great Elder to sit first.


    However, the Great Elder didn''t sit down, so everyone had to remain standing in the end.


    The Great Elder ignored the two of them and turned to look at Lin Fan who had put on his cloak. While the Great Elder didn''t know why Lin Fan put this cloak on, he chose not to question it.


    After they entered the room, the Great Elder invited Lin Fan to sit down which shocked both the man and the young boy.


    They couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with confused and curious looks as they wondered just who this person was.


    Lin Fan epted the Great Elder''s invitation and sat down before the Great Elder also sat down.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Seeing that the Great Elder sat down, the man and the young boy also finally sat down.


    There was a silence that filled the room after they were all seated as no one said a single word. For the man and the young boy, they didn''t dare start the conversation and for the Great Elder, he was waiting for Lin Fan to speak first.


    But seeing that Lin Fan didn''t say anything in the end, the Great Elder finally said to the man and young boy, "Why don''t you introduce yourselves to our guest here?"


    The man and the young boy were both taken aback when they heard this.


    They could hear the polite tone in the Great Elder''s voice as he said this.


    Just who was this cloaked figure that he could even get the Great Elder to speak in such a polite tone?


    Still, they didn''t dare ask these questions out loud and they introduced themselves.


    The man was Feng Huang and the young boy was Feng Tian. Feng Huang was the head of the Red Phoenix Tribe, so he was Feng Ling''s father and Feng Tian was the young master of the Red Phoenix Tribe¡­so he should be Feng Ling''s son.


    This was the son that she had left behind so that she could gain her freedom.


    The fact that he was here meant that he had obtained quite a bit of power in the Red Phoenix Tribe¡­and at the same time, he should have hated Feng Ling because she left him here in the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    If Lin Fan had to guess who was responsible for sending the envoy, his first guess would have been Feng Huang. But now that he had met Feng Ling and learned that Feng Ling was in a position of power like this, his first guess changed to Feng Ling.


    After they introduced themselves, the Great Elder turned to Lin Fan and waited for him to say something.


    He had even taken the lead to open this up which was him taking a step back with his position. If he were to go any further¡­then it would seem like he was putting himself down and he couldn''t allow that to happen as the Great Elder of the Phoenix Race.


    Of course, Lin Fan didn''t want to put the Great Elder in that position in the first ce.


    The Great Elders and the other elders had been quite helpful so far, so he didn''t want to cause trouble for the Great Elder and the Phoenix Race.


    Lin Fan took out a token that he ced on the table before saying, "I am from the Lin Astral Empire and I want to discuss a few things with you."


    Feng Huang and Feng Tian looked at the token on the table and recognized that this thing was indeed the token of the Lin Astral Family.


    But when they recognized this token, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with strange looks. They never would have thought that this cloaked figure that even the Great Elder was showing respect to was someone from the Lin Astral Empire.


    After all, the Lin Astral Empire was just a normal Astral Empire of the human race. It shouldn''t have enough influence that the Great Elder would act this respectful to an envoy from them.


    So they couldn''t help feeling very confused about this situation.


    As for why the Lin Astral Empire would send someone here, they weren''t confused at all since they immediately knew what he was here for.


    It was the envoy that they had sent not that long ago.


    This was an envoy that had been sent with the permission of both Feng Huang and Feng Tian, so of course they would know about this. It was also one that had been sent after they had gotten permission from the elders, so they didn''t think that there would be anything wrong with it.


    But now¡­


    With how the Great Elder was treating Lin Fan, it wasn''t as if they could put on a strong stance or else they would risk offending the Great Elder.


    So the only thing that they could do was¡­


    Feng Huang revealed a smile and asked, "This friend, please tell us what you want to discuss."


    They could only try to act friendly with Lin Fan and hope that it wasn''t anything serious.


    Lin Fan had a calm tone to his voice before, but then that voice became serious as he asked, "May I ask just what the Red Phoenix Tribe meant by sending that envoy and making those demands of our Lin Astral Empire."


    As soon as he said this, both Feng Huang and Feng Tian knew that this situation was bad for them.


    Just based on the way that he worded his sentence and the tone that he took when he said it, it was clear that he wasn''t here just for a simple exnation¡­


    He was most likely here to cause trouble for them.

 Chapter 1046 Red Phoenix Tribe (3)

    ?


    Neither Feng Huang or Feng Tian were able to say a single thing as they just stared at Lin Fan.


    Both of them were trying to figure out what intentions he had asking this, but they couldn''t see a thing because he was wearing his cloak.


    The Great Elder had a bitter smile on his face as he realized why Lin Fan wore this cloak.


    It was so that they couldn''t see through his expressions at all, so they didn''t know what he was nning.


    But the Great Elder didn''t know if Lin Fan had good or bad intentions towards the Red Phoenix Tribe, so he didn''t say a thing. Though if one just listened to the tone of Lin Fan''s voice, it would seem like he had bad intentions towards them.


    After all, the way that he phrased his words, it didn''t seem like he was being friendly.


    After a long pause, Feng Tian was the one that spoke by saying, "This honoured guest from the Lin Astral Empire, we didn''t have any ill intentions when we sent that envoy. I''m sure that the envoy has already told you what we were looking for and this is an internal issue, so I don''t think that you want to get involved in this matter. If we have offended you in some way, please let me be the first one to apologize since this wasn''t our intention at all."


    The way that he said this was very polite and eloquent, it was a kind of tone that really didn''t match his age.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help narrowing his eyes to look at Feng Tian as he said this.


    Then he turned to look at Feng Huang on the side and he could see that he had a look of support for Feng Tian on his face.


    It was clear that this Feng Tian could represent the entire Red Phoenix Tribe even though he was this young.


    But Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering why Feng Tian was able to represent the entire Red Phoenix Tribe.


    After a long period of silence that made both Feng Tian and Feng Huang ufortable, Lin Fan said, "What if I said that we want to get involved in this matter?"


    Both Feng Tian and Feng Huang couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan like he was crazy.


    That was because he didn''t say this on a personal level, but rather on a level that involved the entire Lin Astral Empire.


    Did he understand what he was saying?


    He wanted to get the entire Lin Astral Empire involved in the Red Phoenix Tribe''s internal affairs?


    No matter how one looked at it, there didn''t seem to be any benefits to be gained from this. Especially since the Lin Astral Empire didn''t have any connections to the Red Phoenix Tribe in the first ce.


    If they were to get involved in this matter, it would mean getting caught up in the affairs of the Myriad Races, far away from their territory. This would mean only trouble and it might even mean the end of the Lin Astral Empire.


    After all, if they got too deeply involved, it would mean the destruction of the Lin Astral Empire.


    Neither Feng Huang or Feng Tian believed that the Phoenix Race would choose the Lin Astral Empire over their Red Phoenix Tribe. The Phoenix Race as a whole was stronger than a single Astral Empire, so they wouldn''t need to fear the Lin Astral Empire.


    Both of them also doubted that this was a real envoy since there would be no envoy that would do something as crazy as this.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that the Phoenix Race Great Elder was with him and showing him respect, they would have thought that this person was a fake.


    In the end, Feng Tian narrowed his eyes and said, "Are you sure that you want this? This isn''t something that you should be able to decide on your own, right?"


    Lin Fan didn''t back down as he said, "Are you certain of that?"


    Both Feng Tian and Feng Huang couldn''t help being more and more confused as they talked with Lin Fan. No matter how they thought about it, they couldn''t think of a single way that their Red Phoenix Tribe had offended the Lin Astral Empire that they would send someone like this to deal with them.


    Other than sending the envoy this one time, they had almost never had any contact with the Lin Astral Empire other than sending obligatory messages.


    Why was this person so insistent on this matter?


    Feng Tian was silent for a while until he finally said, "What do you want?"


    Since he couldn''t think it through, he decided that there was no need to continue this charade.


    The Great Elder was here and that should put enough pressure on the other side that they wouldn''t want to beat around the bush either. So the best thing to do now was to be as direct as possible so that they could settle this as quickly and as simply as possible.


    Lin Fan didn''t answer right away as he just started at Feng Tian.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    He couldn''t help feeling a bit of appreciation for this young boy since he never thought that he would be this bold.


    He could sense an intelligence and maturity that didn''t match his ageing from him and he was starting to understand why this young boy had obtained the position that he had.


    But he still hadn''t gotten the information that he wanted yet, so he couldn''t just give up the hard appearance that he had going.


    So after that moment of silence, he said, "I just want to know the real reason the envoy was sent."


    Both Feng Huang and Feng Tian couldn''t help knitting their brows when they heard this.


    They had a few guesses when they heard this, but they still couldn''t form a conclusion about what this all meant just yet.


    So Feng Tian took a deep breath and calmly said, "We''re just trying to find a missing member of our tribe. She''s an important person in our tribe, so we want to bring her back." Then after a pause, he added, "Not to mention, she is an important part of our family and we miss her."


    Hearing him say this, Feng Huang gave a nod of support for Feng Tian.


    Lin Fan though couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he heard this.


    The look on his face made it clear that he didn''t believe a single thing that Feng Tian was saying, but it was a good thing that they couldn''t see his expression because of the cloak.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan gave a soft snort and said, "An important part of the family and an important person in your tribe? If that was the case, why did you drive her away in the first ce?"


    Both Feng Tian and Feng Huang couldn''t help being taken aback when they heard this.


    Now they were almost certain that this person knew more than he was letting on.


    It was even likely that he knew¡­where the person that they were looking for was.


    But before either of them could ask Lin Fan anything, they felt a cold re falling onto them. They knew that this cold re came from the Great Elder who had been sitting on the side.


    Sensing this pressure from the Great Elder, they just couldn''t ask Lin Fan what they wanted to ask. After all, it was obvious that the Great Elder was supporting Lin Fan more than he was supporting them.


    Though deep down, the Great Elder couldn''t help revealing a secret bitter smile.


    He wasn''t a fool and he could also understand what Lin Fan was implying with his words. However, he never would have imagined that Lin Fan had this kind of connection with his Phoenix Race, with the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    So in the end, Feng Tian just affirmed, "She is an important part of our family and an important person in our tribe."


    Lin Fan once again gave another soft snort when he heard this before saying, "Why don''t you just tell me what the real reason is. I''m sure that everyone''s tired of having their time wasted like this."


    Both Feng Huang and Feng Tian were both taken aback when they heard this.


    Feng Tian was about to say something, but Lin Fan suddenly started putting pressure on him as well.


    Feng Huang wanted to help Feng Tian relieve this pressure, but he felt the Great Elder pressuring him, forcing him to stay there and not do a thing.


    Feng Huang just couldn''t understand why the Great Elder was supporting Lin Fan this much. Could it be that this wasn''t the real Great Elder and this was a fake?


    No, he could feel the auraing from the Great Elder and he could feel the bloodline synergy, so he knew that this was indeed the real Great Elder.


    So just what was happening?


    Feng Tian opened and closed his mouth a few times as he tried speaking under Lin Fan''s pressure, but he couldn''t say anything in the end.


    Even though everyone thought that he was mature for his age, they forgot that he was just a child in the end.


    So when he was faced with this kind of pressure without any help from anyone, he couldn''t take it anymore.


    After facing this pressure for a while, there were tears that suddenly swelled in his eyes before he said while crying, "I just want to see my mom!"

 Chapter 1047 Red Phoenix Tribe (4)

    ?


    When everyone saw Feng Tian suddenly break out in tears, they couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    That included Feng Huang and the Great Elder.


    But of course, they were shocked for different reasons.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what to say after seeing Feng Tian suddenly break out in tears.


    He had wanted to get the truth out of him, but that didn''t mean that he wanted to see a little boy cry like this.


    As he watched Feng Tian crying, he couldn''t help feeling a bit bad about what he had done. But he could also tell that Feng Tian wasn''t fake crying and was crying for real.


    This was a child that truly missed his mother.


    Deep inside of him, there was someone who had been watching the whole thing who was asking toe out. In fact, seeing Feng Tian cry like this, they were even demanding toe out.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s firm rejection, they would have even broken the contract that they had with Lin Fan toe out now.


    It was just a good thing that Lin Fan was much stronger than before and they couldn''t forcefully break the contract between them.


    So they had no choice but to watch from inside the pet storage space.


    Lin Fan just silently watched Feng Tian crying for a bit, but he didn''t lose his mind even though he did feel sorry for him.


    After a while, when Feng Tian calmed down, Lin Fan looked at him and asked in a gentle voice, "Can you tell me if you think that your mom did anything wrong?"


    Feng Tian looked at Lin Fan and for some reason, he couldn''t help feeling a bit closer to him even though he was the one who had made him cry.


    Feng Tian shook his head and said, "My mommy didn''t do anything wrong. She just did what she had to to get her freedom." Then after a pause, he turned to look at Feng Huang and said, "It was all grandpa''s fault that this even happened. If it wasn''t for him forcing mommy, she wouldn''t have left our tribe."


    Feng Huang couldn''t help revealing a bitter look when he heard this.


    His grandson had basically thrown him under the bus with this sentence.


    Even though he doted on him and did everything that he could to make him happy, his grandson still threw him under the bus like this. But it wasn''t as if he couldn''t understand where he wasing from.


    It was indeed his fault that Feng Ling was driven away from the Red Phoenix Tribe and that she had to leave Feng Tian here to act as the sessor.


    So it could be said that it was all his fault that Feng Tian didn''t have a mother to dote on him.


    But being thrown under the bus like this still hurt, especially with how much he loved his grandson.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at Feng Tian and he could tell that this young boy was telling the truth.


    So in the end, he asked, "Were you the one who came up with the idea of sending the envoy?"


    Both the Great Elder and Feng Huang couldn''t help knitting their brows when they heard this. The tone that his voice had, it was almost as if¡­he was nning on ming everything on Feng Tian.


    But even then, the Great Elder still suppressed Feng Huang. Though he did feel a bit disappointed with this Void God''s sessor.


    Feng Tian looked up at Lin Fan and even though he couldn''t see his face, he could feel something as well. It wasn''t the same thing that Feng Huang and the Great Elder felt, it was somethingpletely different.


    It was almost as if he was testing him.


    But Feng Tian didn''t have anything to hide at this point since he had already spilled his guts.


    So Feng Tian said, "Yes, I sent it to find my mom."


    Lin Fan just looked at him in silence for a bit longer before finally giving a bitterugh.


    Both the Great Elder and Feng Huang couldn''t understand why Lin Fan would give this bitterugh, but they were both very tense since they could see that he was nning on doing something.


    Lin Fan then raised his hand and brought it closer and closer to Feng Tian.


    When Feng Huang saw this, he did all that he could to break free of the pressure the Great Elder put on him. However, there was arge difference in cultivation between them, so he couldn''t do anything in the end.


    But to their surprise, Lin Fan just put his hand on Feng Tian''s head and patted him. Then Lin Fan asked, "Do you still want to meet your mother?"<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    All three of them revealed confused looks as they looked at Lin Fan, not understanding why he asked this question.


    But Feng Tian was the one that reacted first.


    He didn''t understand why Lin Fan was asking this question, but he could feel that there was something strange about the way that he said it. It was as if it was giving him a bit of hope that he would soon be able to get what he had been wishing for.


    So he just gave a nod in a daze.


    Lin Fan gave a nod back before finally opening up the pet storage space for that one person who had been trying toe out the entire time.


    As soon as the portal to the pet storage space was opened, there was a figure that rushed out. This figure didn''t care about anyone else in the room as they ran right past


    Lin Fan and picked Feng Tian up in their arms.


    Feng Huang had wanted to do something to stop them, but the Great Elder was still suppressing him, so he couldn''t do anything. But then he realized who this figure was andpletely stopped struggling.


    That was because this figure was a person that he couldn''t be more familiar with¡­


    Feng Tian was in a daze as he was being held.


    He didn''t know what was happening at first, but he didn''t feel like struggling.


    It was a familiar feeling as he was being held in these arms. It was as if he recognized the feeling of being hugged by this person, as if he had experienced something like this before.


    But he just couldn''t tell what this feeling was exactly because he was too lost in this feeling. He let himself bepletely lost in the feeling of this hug as his body turned soft and he just rxedpletely.


    As the two of them stood there, it was as if they were lost in their own world and no one could disturb them. Though, everyone was too dazed to disturb them in the first ce.


    But eventually, they came back to their senses.


    Feng Huang found that he was no longer being suppressed by the pressure of the Great Elder and was about to take a step forward. However, before he could, Lin Fan looked at the Great Elder who was pulled back to his senses.


    When Lin Fan pulled him back from his daze and he saw the look from Lin Fan, Feng Huang once again felt the pressure of the Great Elder falling on him.


    He couldn''t help ring at Lin Fan for stopping him like this, but Lin Fan didn''t care at all.


    Instead, he looked at Feng Huang with a look that seemed to be saying, "Don''t interrupt."


    Feng Huang couldn''t help revealing a bitter look on his face when he saw this, but he had no choice but to obey since he was being suppressed by the Great Elder.


    Finally, after a long time, the two of them came apart from their hug.


    Feng Tian had recognized what the feeling of this hug was and from that, he was able to recognize who the person hugging him was. As he looked up in disbelief, his eyes couldn''t help growing wider and wider.


    Then as he stared at this person with a look of absolute disbelief, he asked in a dazed voice, "Is it really you?"


    The woman who had run out to hug him gave a nod as tears appeared in her eyes.


    She had thought that this child would resent him for what she had done to him before, but she never thought that he would miss her so much that he would even go as far as sending an envoy to find her.


    Of course the one that had been released from the pet storage system was Feng Ling.


    After seeing this nod, Feng Tian ignored everything to dive into her arms again as he hugged her tightly. With the way that he was hugging her, it was as if he thought that if he let go for a single second, she would disappear.


    Lin Fan watched this with a happy smile on his face, but that smile didn''tst since he could feel that Feng Huang wanted to say something.


    This was something that couldn''t be stopped, so he eventually gave a cough to bring Feng Ling and Feng Tian out of their own little world.


    After they reacted, Feng Ling turned to look at Feng Huang, her father.


    There was a look of resentment in her eyes as she looked at him.


    Feng Huang felt the pressure on him relieving a bit, but he still wasn''t able to move. At the very least though, he could speak.


    So he said, "Why are you here?"

 Chapter 1048 Red Phoenix Tribe (5)

    ?


    After he said this, he couldn''t help feeling regret.


    This wasn''t what he meant to say and the way that he had said it hade out wrong.


    It was much more aggressive than he had wanted it to sound.


    But Feng Ling could only hear the aggressioning from his voice, so she narrowed her eyes as she looked at Feng Huang.


    She patted Feng Tian on the head before putting him down and walking back over to Lin Fan''s side.


    The way that she stood there, it was as if she was telling him that she was leaving everything to him. When he saw this, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    Still, he said, "I think that this should make things clear how I am rted to the Red Phoenix Tribe now."


    Feng Huang looked at him with narrowed eyes before saying, "The envoys said that the new crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire said that they hadn''t seen Feng Ling before. How did you get that crown prince to lie to cover you?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Noment."


    Feng Huang knitted his brows and was about to ask something else, but Lin Fan suddenly said, "I think that you''ve mistaken something."


    Feng Huang couldn''t help being taken aback when he heard this. He narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before asking, "What have I mistaken?"


    Lin Fan looked right at him before saying in a calm voice, "You''ve mistaken that you hold any power here. You have no rights to ask any question and are just here to respond to what is asked of you. If you understand this, then there won''t be a problem, but if you don''t¡­"


    He left his words hanging, making his intentions very clear.


    When Feng Huang heard this, a vein couldn''t help popping out on his forehead.


    He didn''t know how old this cloaked envoy from the Lin Astral Empire was, but he felt like this envoy shouldn''t be that old. Or at least he wouldn''t be old enough topare to him.


    So being spoken down on by what he perceived to be a junior didn''t sit well with him.


    At the same time, this junior was trying to take power from him in the Red Phoenix Tribe, in the Phoenix Race while the Great Elder was here. He couldn''t understand if he was just stupid or insane.


    "You¡­"


    Before Feng Huang could say anymore, he felt a pressure falling on him again that made him swallow his words.


    He couldn''t help turning to look at the Great Elder who had once again pressured him with a confused look.


    No matter how he looked at it, the Great Elder should be supporting him over this envoy from the Lin Astral Empire. He was one of the heads of the five tribes of the Phoenix Race and this was an outsider.


    But it seemed like the Great Elder was insistent on protecting this envoy.


    Lin Fan also saw this and shook his head at the Great Elder.


    It was only then that the Great Elder released the pressure that he put on Feng Huang.


    When Feng Huang heard this, he couldn''t help feeling even more shocked.


    Why did it seem like the Great Elder was taking orders from this outsider?


    That would make even less sense!


    As the pressure relieved, Feng Huang couldn''t help asking another question, "Just who are you?"


    But the only answer that he received was silence.


    Lin Fan just silently stood there looking at Feng Huang before saying, "What are your ns for Feng Ling?"


    Feng Huang couldn''t help being taken aback when he heard this. He never thought that some random person would question him on how he would treat his daughter.


    As he came back to his senses, he couldn''t help feeling a hint of annoyance.


    It was almost as if his parenting skills were being questioned.


    He narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before looking over at Feng Ling. Then he said, "I don''t think it''s any of your business how I treat my own daughter, is it?"


    After he said this to Lin Fan, he said to Feng Ling, "Come back to the tribe and we''ll talk this over."


    He tried to be as gentle as possible as he spoke to Feng Ling, but the annoyance towards Lin Fan in his voice hadn''t faded yet. It carried over to what he said right now.


    Feng Ling couldn''t help knitting her brows when she heard this.


    But for Lin Fan, he couldn''t help giving a sigh and revealing a bitter smile.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    As he interacted with Feng Huang and saw how he spoke to Feng Ling, he could already guess something.


    Lin Fan didn''t suppress Feng Huang with the Great Elder this time. Instead, he turned to Feng Ling and said, "If you don''t want to stay, you don''t need to stay."


    Feng Ling was surprised to hear this, but she gave a nod in response.


    When Feng Huang heard this though, another vein popped out. After all, the words that he said were a clear challenge to what he had said earlier.


    He was directly contradicting his request for Feng Ling toe back. That meant that he was directly going against him.


    A junior was going against him like this in his own Red Phoenix Tribe?


    The problem was that he didn''t know what would happen if he lost his temper again.


    Everything that had happened so far made it clear that he wouldn''t receive any support from the Great Elder. If he really did something to this envoy, then he might be the one that suffered.


    Seeing the difficult look that appeared on his face, Lin Fan decided to push him.


    So he turned to look at the Great Elder and asked, "Could the head of the Red Phoenix Tribe be reced?"


    The Great Elder, Feng Huang, Feng Tian, and Feng Ling were all taken aback by Lin Fan''s bold question.


    The Great Elder was about to say something, but then he saw the slight shake of the head that Lin Fan gave. After thinking about it, he decided to go all in on this and see where it led.


    So the Great Elder said, "It''s possible."


    These were two simple words, but they had a very strong effect on everyone here.


    The Great Elder was giving approval for the change of the Red Phoenix Tribe head.


    While it was only verbal approval heard by the people in this room, this still meant something. After all, since one of the Great Elders said this, there was no doubt that it would be enforced if it was ever brought up.


    Feng Huang''s mind started copsing as he couldn''t understand what kind of situation he was in right now.


    Was he really going to lose his position as the head of the Red Phoenix Tribe just because of the words of some outsider?


    That was not something that he could ept after all the years that he had spent serving the Red Phoenix Tribe and the Phoenix Race!


    But he knew that he couldn''t do anything in this situation¡­


    Unless he contacted the other two Great Elders and found out what was happening, then it was impossible for him to make aeback.


    So the only thing that Feng Huang could do here was¡­look to his daughter for help.


    He had wronged her, he recognized this and he had tried to make up for it with his earlier attempts. It was just that he wasn''t good at doing things like this and it hade out as aggression instead of reconciliation.


    But now that he had been pushed to a wall, he had no choice but to ask his daughter for help.


    He had seen how close his daughter was with this envoy, so he wanted to use that to reconcile.


    It was just too bad that she wasn''t interested in doing this at all.


    When Feng Ling saw Feng Huang looking at her with eyes asking for help, she gave a soft snort and turned her head away.


    She looked like she wasn''t willing to listen to him at all.


    Feng Huang''s expression couldn''t help twisting a bit when he saw this, but at the same time, there was a bit of disappointment that appeared in his eyes.


    It wasn''t disappointment towards Feng Ling, but disappointment over the fact that their rtionship wouldn''t be the same as before. He knew that once this was over, there was no way for them to return to the way that they were before.


    It was like losing a part of him¡­


    But he couldn''t dwell on that right now¡­


    So instead of being sad over his daughter rejecting him, he focused on solving the predicament that he was facing. He couldn''t do anything to Lin Fan with the Great Elder here, so all he could do was appeal to the Great Elder.


    Feng Huang turned to the Great Elder and said, "Great Elder, you should know about my various contributions to the Red Phoenix Tribe and the Phoenix Race. You should know how much I''ve given for the prosperity of our Phoenix Race. Can you really listen to an outsider like this and do something like this to me?"


    The Great Elder just casually looked at Feng Huang before saying, "Do you even know who he is?"


    Feng Huang couldn''t help revealing a confused look when he heard this.


    The Great Elder just ignored this and said, "He is the Void God''s sessor."

 Chapter 1049 Red Phoenix Tribe (6)

    ?


    When he heard this, Feng Huang couldn''t help revealing a confused look at first.


    It was as if he couldn''t understand what the term "Void God''s sessor" meant at first.


    But then he revealed a look of understanding as if he suddenly remembered something¡­


    Void God''s sessor.


    This was a term that he had heard before, but he couldn''t tell where at first. That is until he remembered exactly where he had heard this and what kind of meaning it had.


    As one of the heads of the five Phoenix Race tribes, he did have information that others didn''t.


    That included information on the prophecy left by the ancestor.


    When he remembered everything, he finally understood why the Great Elder stood on the side of this envoy instead of backing him. He also understood that when it came to value, this Void God''s sessor had much more value than he did.


    So that was why the Great Elder didn''t hesitate to say that recing him would be easy.


    At the same time, he realized that even if it was the other two Great Elders, they would have acted the same way.


    The intentions of this Great Elder were the intentions of the entire Phoenix Race¡­


    There was no way for him to reverse this if this Void God''s sessor wanted to remove him from his position¡­


    The only thing that he could do now was hope that this Void God''s sessor wouldn''t want to do anything like that.


    It was just too bad for him that the next words out of his mouth were.


    "Then can we change it so that Feng Tian is the new head of the Red Phoenix Tribe?"


    The Great Elder slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but in the end, he still gave a nod of affirmation.


    While this would weaken the Red Phoenix Tribe a bit, it wasn''t a problem if the elders were willing to interfere a bit. For the Void God''s sessor, he was certain that the elders wouldn''t mind interfering.


    Not to mention, he could already see the tension the current Red Phoenix Tribe head had with his descendants. He could tell that if things were left as they currently were, it would eventually end up causing a problem with the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    Especially seeing the new chasm that was developing between the new and old Red Phoenix Tribe heads.


    When Feng Huang heard this, it felt like the ground was copsing under him.


    He did have intentions of giving the position as the Red Phoenix Tribe head to Feng Tian eventually, but that was after he had consolidated his own power so that he would be able to act as an advisor in the future. At the same time, he wanted to make sure that everything had been cleared out of the way for Feng Tian.


    After all, there were people in the tribe that thought about taking over the position as the head from Feng Tian and they had to be taken care of before Feng Tian took over.


    But they wouldn''t be a problem since the Great Elder had said that it was possible to rece Feng Tian with him. The elders agreed to let Feng Tian be the head, so of course they would take care of everything that needed to be taken care of.


    The elders wouldn''t do a sloppy job of leaving behind a mess for Feng Tian to clean up on his own.


    So the only problem that Feng Huang had was that his position was being forcefully taken away from him.


    If that happened, there would no longer be a position for him in the Red Phoenix Tribe. At the same time, since it was the elders who were stripping him of his position, then he wouldn''t be able to be an elder either.


    What would happen is that he would be an outcast of the Phoenix Race, without a ce to go.


    No one would drive him away since he was a Ruler Realm Expert, but with the elders suppressing him, he also wouldn''t be able to do anything. He might even be locked up by the elders since his cultivation could be considered a threat to the Phoenix Race.


    If that happened, it would be the end of him.


    So before that could happen, he had to figure out a way to preserve his position.


    But while he was lost in thought, everything had already been decided.


    The Great Elder sent one of the elite guards who were hiding in the vicinity off to take care of this with the other two Great Elders. So all that was left for them to do was take care of Feng Huang.


    Either they locked him up, or they figured out another way to keep him contained.


    The Great Elder looked at Lin Fan as if he was waiting for him to do something.


    And indeed, Lin Fan already had a n for Feng Huang.


    He looked at Feng Huang and said, "Red Phoenix Tribe head¡­Ah, no, it''s ex Red Phoenix Tribe head now."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    When he said this, Feng Huang immediately snapped back from his thoughts and red at him. But he didn''t say anything as he waited to see what Lin Fan had to say.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind the re that was pointed at him and calmly said, "Is there anything that you want to say to Feng Ling?"


    When Feng Huang heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a confused and shocked look. He never expected that Lin Fan would suddenly ask him this question.


    He narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan, but this time he didn''t re at him as much as he did before. After a moment''s pause, he asked, "What do you mean by that?"


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at him and said, "Now that you no longer need to worry about the Red Phoenix Tribe, isn''t there anything that you want to say to Feng Ling? Your daughter?"


    He didn''t need to add thest part of that, but Lin Fan specifically emphasized thatst part as if he was trying to imply something.


    Feng Huang was still confused at first, but then he suddenly realized something.


    He couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look as he realized this.


    Then he turned to look at Feng Ling, as if he was looking at her for the first time¡­


    Feng Huang opened and closed his mouth a few times, but he didn''t say anything in the end. It was as if he couldn''t think of exactly what to say and he was struggling with forming words.


    When Feng Ling saw Feng Huang acting like this, she also felt a strange feeling like she was meeting her father for the first time. It was a side of him that she had never seen before.


    When Lin Fan saw the two of them acting like this, he couldn''t help shaking his head with a bitter smile on his face.


    It seemed like both of them were really bad at expressing themselves, it wasn''t just Feng Huang alone¡­


    The moment that he had heard what Feng Huang had to say to Feng Ling, he already knew what the problem was.


    There was ack of propermunication between father and daughter. There were many different reasons for this, but in the end, they didn''t talk to each other properly.


    Because they put up these walls between them, they had never been able to reach an understanding with each other.


    As for the main wall between them, it was their responsibility to the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    So that was why Lin Fan decided that it was time for Feng Huang to retire.


    If they no longer needed to care about the Red Phoenix Tribe, perhaps they could be more honest with their feelings. But that didn''t seem to be the case now.


    They had be used to acting this way over the years and now that they had this chance, they didn''t know how to take it.


    So Lin Fan said again with a sigh, "Just tell her how you really feel. That''s all that matters."


    Feng Ling couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a look that seemed like she thought that he was being too nosy, but then Feng Huang suddenly took a step forward, pulling her attention back.


    She couldn''t help taking a step back when she saw Feng Huang suddenly moving forward like this.


    But before she could say anything, Feng Huang suddenly asked, "Ling Ling, will youe back to the tribe? Your mother misses you."


    Feng Ling was about to say something, but then she couldn''t help being taken aback as she realized something. What her father had called her just now¡­Ling Ling, that was something that she hadn''t heard in a long time.


    It was his pet name for her when she was a young girl and when she grew up, he had stopped using it.


    For him to use it now, she couldn''t help feeling very strange. At the same time though, she also couldn''t help feeling emotional.


    Still in the end, she said, "I can''t."


    Feng Huang couldn''t help revealing a sad look when he heard this.


    But then before he could say anything, Feng Ling suddenly said, "I don''t me you for what you did back then. You only did what you had to do. It was just fate that we would take different paths."


    Feng Huang couldn''t help looking up at Feng Ling suddenly as he asked, "Really?"


    Feng Ling looked right into his eyes and after staring for a bit, she gave a sincere nod.


    Feng Huang''s eyes trembled when he saw this.


    For the first time, this father and daughter pair were actually making real progress.

 Chapter 1050 Red Phoenix Tribe (7)

    ?


    Lin Fan watched as the barriers were broken down between this father and daughter pair.


    Eventually, it was no longer as tense as it was before.


    Though they didn''t get any closer, at least they were no longer against talking to each other like before.


    For Lin Fan, that was already considered a step forward.


    So he said to the Great Elder, "I think that it should be fine for the ex Red Phoenix Tribe head to stay on as an advisor right?"


    The Great Elder gave a nod in response to this since this was indeed for the best. After all, if they didn''t find a ce for Feng Huang, that would mean that they would have to lock him up.


    They couldn''t just let a Ruler Realm Expert run around on his own.


    If he did anything bad, then it would be a reflection on the Phoenix Race. At the same time, the loss of a Ruler Realm Expert was not something that the Phoenix Race wanted to happen.


    Each Ruler Realm Expert made up the power of the Phoenix Race and each one they lost would mean the Phoenix Race was bing weaker.


    So this solution was really for the best.


    But it was Feng Huang who seemed unwilling to do this.


    If it was him who had consolidated this position for himself, then he would be happy to take it. But if he was to take this offer now, it would mean that he was submitting himself to the elders, but mostly to Lin Fan since it was his suggestion.


    He was fine if it was the order of the elders since the elders were the ones that took care of the Phoenix Tribe. Both him and the Red Phoenix Tribe owed the elders a lot, so it wasn''t demeaning for him to submit to the elders.


    But Lin Fan was apletely different story.


    Even if he knew that Lin Fan was the Void God''s sessor and he was grateful since he knew that Lin Fan was the one that restored his rtionship with his daughter, he still didn''t like him.


    From the first moment that he interacted with him, he didn''t like Lin Fan.


    So if he were to take this position that Lin Fan had created for him, it would seem like he was submitting to Lin Fan.


    Normally there wouldn''t be a problem with this and it would even be an honour since Lin Fan was the Void God''s sessor, but Feng Huang just didn''t feel right about it.


    It waspletely because of his own emotions.


    Lin Fan could see this as well, so he yed his next card.


    With a wave of his hand, there was another small figure that came out of the pet storage space.


    When she appeared, she looked around herself since she hadn''t been paying attention to the outside. She had beenpletely focused on being with Xiao Huo.


    So she hadn''t seen anything that had happened between her mother and her grandfather.


    When Feng Yu suddenly appeared, she couldn''t help being surprised by all these unfamiliar faces.


    Out of the ones that she did recognize, she didn''t want to getfort from Lin Fan¡­so she ran over to Feng Ling. In the end, it was her mother that she cared about the most out of all these people.


    Feng Ling picked up her daughter with a smile on her face, but then she remembered where she was.


    She couldn''t help peeking at Feng Huang and Feng Tian out of the corner of her eyes, trying to gauge their reaction.


    Both of them were stunned when they saw Feng Yu appear, but they also immediately recognized Feng Yu as soon as they saw her.


    This was the familial bond that they had between them.


    Feng Huang was the one that was affected the most since this was his granddaughter that he hadn''t seen since she was born.


    The way that he treated his granddaughter waspletely different from the way that he treated his grandson. Instead of being strict with his granddaughter, his eyes werepletely filled with a doting look as if he wanted to spoil her.


    As for Feng Tian, he couldn''t help revealing a strange look at first when he saw Feng Yu.


    He knew that he had a little sister, but he had never met her since she had left when he was still a baby.


    But after a while, the strange look in his eyes was quickly reced with a different look. It was a look that made it clear that he wanted to protect Feng Yu, he wanted to protect this cute little sister of his.


    Seeing these looks, Feng Ling couldn''t help letting out a secret sigh of relief.


    But at the same time, Feng Ling couldn''t help revealing a confused look as she turned back to look at Lin Fan.


    She did want to introduce Feng Yu to her tribe, but this clearly wasn''t the right time. So why did Lin Fan call her out now?


    Lin Fan just stood there with a faint smile on his face as he waited for the reaction that he wanted.


    And finally, it came.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    After Feng Yu adapted to this new environment that she was in, she turned to Lin Fan and asked, "Where''s Xiao Huo?"


    Everyone couldn''t help being confused when they heard this as they had no idea who this Xiao Huo she mentioned was.


    Feng Ling on the other hand couldn''t help feeling anxious as she didn''t expect her daughter to suddenly reveal this secret. The existence of Xiao Huo was something she knew had to be kept secret or else it would have a great effect on the Phoenix Race.


    As soon as Xiao Huo''s bloodline was known, he would immediately be snatched up by the Phoenix Race.


    While the Dragon Race was understanding when it came to Xiao Feng, she didn''t know if the Phoenix Race would act the same way.


    So she was scared when her daughter casually mentioned Xiao Huo like this.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t worried at all about this.


    He even had a smile when he heard this since this was what he was expecting from Feng Yu.


    A child was easy to predict sometimes and in this case, his prediction waspletely correct.


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "I''ll call him out now."


    As soon as he said this, Feng Ling couldn''t help revealing an even more anxious and shocked look. She never thought that Lin Fan would call out Xiao Huo this easily, especially with one of the Great Elders beside him.


    But before she could even stop him, Lin Fan had already called him out.


    When Xiao Huo appeared, everyone immediately knitted their brows.


    That was because they could feel the aura that wasing from him.


    The Great Elder was the first to react by releasing his spiritual sense to sweep Xiao Huo. As his spiritual sense sweeped over Xiao Huo, his expression couldn''t help changing until he had a look of absolute shock on his face.


    He slowly turned his head to look at Lin Fan with disbelief as he couldn''t understand why Xiao Huo was with Lin Fan.


    But the one that actually moved first was Feng Yu.


    She jumped out of Feng Ling''s hands and ran over to Xiao Huo before jumping into his hands.


    Xiao Huo was already used to this, so he just caught her and held her in his hands.


    The two of them standing there together really painted a strange image.


    Even Feng Ling, who had slowly gotten used to it, couldn''t stop her lips from twitching.


    When Feng Huang and Feng Tian saw this, they immediately snapped back to their senses. They ran over to where Xiao Huo was and grabbed Feng Yu out of his hands before putting her behind them.


    The two of them formed a protective wall in between Feng Yu and Xiao Huo.


    After all, the scene that the two of them had created made one¡­want to call the police.


    Xiao Huo was taken aback by the actions of these two and he didn''t know how to react to having Feng Yu suddenly taken out of his hands.


    But after thinking about it, he felt that he should try to protect her.


    It was just too bad that there was Feng Huang on the other side who was a Ruler Realm Expert. With the pressure that Feng Huang released, Xiao Huo couldn''t fight back against him at all.


    While watching them, the Great Elder also came back to his senses.


    He turned to look at Lin Fan with a strange look and asked, "Was he with you the entire time?"


    Lin Fan just gave a casual nod in response.


    The Great Elder couldn''t help revealing a strange bitter look when he saw this, but he didn''t say anything else.


    After all, this was a happy thing that had happened.


    Their Phoenix Race had just been visited by the Void God''s sessor and now their true descendant had also appeared. That meant that their Phoenix Race would be able to fulfil the prophecy that their ancestor had left behind.


    So it shouldn''t matter that the Void God''s sessor had hidden that he had already found their true descendant¡­


    But there was a part of him that couldn''t help feeling bitter that the Void God''s sessor didn''t trust the Phoenix Race to this extent.


    Lin Fan could guess what he was thinking, but he didn''t exin his actions.


    After all, there was something else that he could do to make it up to them.

 Chapter 1051 Red Phoenix Tribe (8)

    ?


    Lin Fan waited for Feng Huang and Feng Tian to calm down a bit before he spoke again.


    He said, "Don''t be too hard on Xiao Huo. He is Feng Yu''s fiance after all."


    Hearing this affirmation, Feng Ling couldn''t help revealing a surprised look.


    This was something that she had tried to get out of Lin Fan before, but she had never been able to get it. All that he had said before was, "Let them decide on their own. If Xiao Huo agrees, I won''t say anything."


    But now, he was giving the affirmation that he was willing to engage Xiao Huo to Feng Yu.


    This was not a small matter.


    After all, Xiao Huo was the true descendant of the Phoenix Race.


    This was not an identity that could be taken lightly.


    As for the two that this directly involved, Xiao Huo had a confused look on his face while Feng Yu couldn''t help blushing.


    Xiao Huo didn''t really understand the meaning of getting engaged since he was still a child, but since it was something that Lin Fan had set for him, it wasn''t as if he would go against it.


    Feng Yu waspletely for this since she had fallen for Xiao Huo the moment that she saw him. She had tried to get Xiao Huo to agree to this before, but he had never given her this affirmation.


    But now that Lin Fan had, this was as good as done.


    On the other hand, both Feng Huang and Feng Tian revealed ugly expressions when they recovered from the shock of hearing this announcement. The two of them boiled for a bit and seemed like they were about to explode, but before they could¡­


    The Great Elder suddenly gave a p and a happyugh before saying, "Good, good, good!"


    The Great Elder had even said good three times, which showed just how much he approved of this and just how excited he was about this prospect.


    He had been worried about how to tie their true descendant to their Phoenix Race.


    Since the true descendant was already following Lin Fan, the Void God''s sessor, there was no way for them to bind them to the Phoenix Race. After all, it stated in the prophecy that the true descendant would follow the Void God''s sessor.


    So they would have no way of restricting Xiao Huo''s freedoms and keeping him here to bind his heart to the Phoenix Race.


    But this was the perfect solution.


    If Xiao Huo were to marry a member of the Phoenix Race, namely Feng Yu who was the sister of the new Red Phoenix Tribe head, there was no doubt that this would create a strong bond between Xiao Huo and the Phoenix Race.


    Once that happened, they wouldn''t need to worry about Xiao Huo''s rtionship with the Phoenix Race.


    The only thing that they needed to ensure that Feng Tian remained in the position of the Red Phoenix Tribe''s head.


    But that was easy for the elders who controlled the Phoenix Race.


    With this, all of their problems would be solved.


    That is except for Feng Huang and Feng Tian.


    They had just regained Feng Yu in their lives and they were willing to do anything to protect her. They definitely wouldn''t let her get engaged that easily, especially not to someone that they didn''t know at all.


    At the same time though, they hadpletely forgotten that they didn''t know Feng Yu that well in the first ce.


    Feng Yu had gone with her mother, Feng Ling into exile, so it wasn''t as if she grew up with them.


    The worst part of it all was¡­the clear age difference that was between them.


    With the difference in physiques, it just looked like a crime no matter how they looked at it.


    So even if it meant offending the elders, Feng Huang and Feng Tian decided that they wouldn''t allow this engagement to happen.


    When the grandfather and grandson looked at each other, there was a determined look of understanding and cooperation that appeared in their eyes.


    Both of them stood firmly in between Feng Yu and Xiao Huo, not allowing either of them to have any vision of the other.


    Feng Huang then said in a firm voice, "No! Xiao Yu is too young to be engaged! Not to mention that the other side is clearly too old!"


    Feng Tian red at Xiao Huo and said, "Who do you think you are? Did you really think that you could take my little sister away?"


    Both of them showed an aggression that really didn''t befit the image that they had shown off before.


    But Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile when he heard all of this.


    He then said, "Xiao Huo is younger than Feng Yu."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    When they heard this, both of them couldn''t help revealing shocked looks. Then they both looked at Xiao Huo with strange looks.


    Feng Huang didn''t hesitate to release his spiritual sense to sweep Xiao Huo.


    As he did, his expression couldn''t help filling with more and more shock until he said, "It''s true, he really is younger."


    Feng Tian revealed an even stranger look before saying in a hesitant voice, "Are you sure?"


    Feng Huang gave a nod to confirm this.


    When he used his spiritual sense, he had checked Xiao Huo''s bone age.


    He had confirmed that Xiao Huo was indeed younger than Feng Yu and it was by arge amount. Even though he looked like this, Feng Yu was actually the one that was much older¡­


    Feng Huang just couldn''t believe this.


    If he looked like this at such a young age, just what would he look like when he got even older?


    He couldn''t help feeling scared for Feng Yu as this thought passed through his mind.


    The same thought passed through Feng Tian''s mind and he revealed a look that was even more determined to separate the two of them.


    But in the end, it was Feng Yu who settled this matter.


    She raised her hand and pped the two of them on the back of their heads.


    Both Feng Huang and Feng Tian didn''t dare resist at all and just let Feng Yu abuse them however she wanted. But she just pped them a few times before moving past them towards Xiao Huo.


    When she came closer to Xiao Huo, both of them suddenly wanted to go forward to block them again. However, when they got close, Feng Yu raised her hands again as if she was about to p them again.


    Both of them immediately flinched when they saw her do this.


    Just like this, the three of them yed a game of cat and mouse until Feng Yu was back beside Xiao Huo.


    As she stood there, she raised her arms for Xiao Huo to pick her up.


    However, this time Xiao Huo didn''t do the same thing he normally did.


    He could tell that there was some kind of rtionship between Feng Yu and the two behind her because of the simr auras that they had. With the way that the two of them were ring at him, he really felt awkward about doing something like this.


    But then Feng Yu turned around and threatened to p the two of them again, making them finally turn around and stop ring at Xiao Huo. Then she turned back to Xiao Huo and raised her hand in the same threatening manner towards Xiao Huo.


    Xiao Huo felt like there was an invisible pressure that wasing from Feng Yu, so in the end, he bent down to pick her up.


    Once he had picked her up, the pressure that had been on him was released and she looked at him with a bright smile. But then she turned back towards Feng Huang and Feng Tian who had been ring daggers at Xiao Huo.


    She raised her hand once again to look like she was about to p them and red at them until they finally stopped.


    When Lin Fan saw all of this, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    It seemed like his "son" had learned from him and had be a man who couldn''t stand up to his wife.


    As for where they had learned it, it was naturally from observing him with Ang.


    Whenever he was with Ang, as long as she put any kind of pressure on him, he would immediately crumble and follow her demands. He had beenpletely broken by her and waspletely under her thumb¡­this was something that his sons had picked up from watching him.


    While he wanted to teach his son not to act this way, he knew that it was impossible for him since he would never be able to change himself.


    As long as he didn''t change himself, then there was no way that they would be able to learn anything from him.


    So he hoped that Feng Yu would be kind to Xiao Huo.


    He wished that all of the girls who had been set up with his "sons" would be kind to them.


    After watching the four of them go on like this for a bit, Lin Fan turned back to the Great Elder and asked, "Shall we head back then?"


    The Great Elder gave a strong nod with arge smile on his face.


    He had no idea what to expect when he came to the Red Phoenix Tribe today, but he was very happy with how things turned out.


    In his mind, things couldn''t have turned out better.

 Chapter 1052 Red Phoenix Tribe (9)

    ?


    Since they were taking both Feng Yu and Xiao Huo with them, Feng Huang and Feng Tian followed their group back to the elder hall.


    The Great Elder had tried to get them away since he knew that they were against the engagement in the first ce, but he couldn''t help being surprised by how insistent the two of them were.


    He could see in their eyes that they were even willing to fight to the death if they weren''t allowed toe.


    So the Great Elder had no choice but to allow them toe with them.


    When they arrived, they were promptly shown to the elder hall since the Great Elder had already sent one of the elite guards back to report on what happened at the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    When they came in, they found that all of the elders were there with excited and expectant looks on their faces.


    Once they came in, all of the elders quickly released their spiritual senses to sweep the group.


    However, it was very clear who they were looking for.


    After their spiritual senses swept over them, all of them focused on a single member of this group.


    Xiao Huo.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that Feng Huang, Feng Tian, Feng Ling, and Feng Yu were here, they wouldn''t have cared about their prestige and would have run over to grab Xiao Huo. They wanted to check every part of this body since this was their precious true descendant.


    Lin Fan had already seen this when he had brought Xiao Feng to meet the Dragon Race elders, but the ones from the Red Phoenix Tribe couldn''t help being taken aback by all of this.


    Finally, after they had satisfied their curiosity, the elders calmed down.


    The two Great Elders that had remained were the ones that had been the most excited about this.


    The Great Elder that came with them went back to his seat and sat down beside the other two. The three of them discussed a few things before turning back to look at Lin Fan.


    The two Great Elders who remained looked at Lin Fan with bitter smiles as one of them said, "Void God''s sessor, you really can''t stop giving us big surprises one after another, can you?"


    The other Great Elder said, "Of course, this is a happy asion, but can you at least tell us ahead of time so that we can prepare ourselves?"


    Lin Fan just looked back at them with a faint smile on his face.


    When they saw this smile on his face, they knew what he was trying to say.


    They looked over at Feng Ling on the side and they couldn''t help letting out sighs.


    They knew that Lin Fan had done this because of Feng Ling''s rtionship with the Red Phoenix Tribe. Feng Ling was someone that followed Lin Fan and before he knew what kind of rtionship the Red Phoenix Tribe had with her, he couldn''t reveal anything.


    Otherwise, if things went wrong, he wouldn''t have a trump card.


    It was all about nning for the worst case scenario.


    The Great Elders understood this, but they still couldn''t help feeling wronged. But they didn''t me this matter on Lin Fan¡­they med this matter on Feng Huang and Feng Tian since they were the ones that had instigated everything.


    If it wasn''t for the envoy that they had sent to the Lin Astral Empire, none of this would have happened.


    However, one thing that they had neglected was that if it wasn''t for this envoy in the first ce, Lin Fan wouldn''t havee to the Phoenix Race.


    So everything was still rted in terms of cause and effect.


    But they didn''t have any intentions of punishing the Red Phoenix Tribe since there was something that they had done right.


    Feng Yu.


    With the engagement of Feng Yu and Xiao Huo, that would mean tying the true descendant to their Phoenix Race.


    This also meant that there would be prosperity for the Red Phoenix Tribe since the Great Elders wouldn''t let Feng Yu''s tribe fall while she was married to the true descendant. They would make sure that itsted long and was prosperous to tie the true descendant even closer to their Phoenix Race.


    So if there was someone that stood in the way of this engagement, they would be the first ones to stop them.


    It was a pity that the ones that wanted to stop this engagement the most were the ones that would have benefitted from it the most. The ones that wanted to stop this engagement were Feng Tian, the new head of the Red Phoenix Tribe, and Feng Huang, the ex head of the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    The two of them were just standing there in awe since it was a rare opportunity for them to be in the presence of the elders, but both of them were ring at Xiao Huo out of the corner of their eyes.


    It was just too bad for them that the elders had no intentions of slowing down.


    The Great Elder that had gone with Lin Fan to the Red Phoenix Tribe suddenly asked, "When are you nning on having them tie the knot?"<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    When this was said, the two other Great Elders and all of the other elders all revealed looks of support and started giving different suggestions.


    As Feng Huang and Feng Tian heard this, their faces couldn''t help looking like dying ashes.


    But on the other side, Feng Yu''s face was covered in a blush. However, there was an expectant look in her eyes as if she could already see her own wedding.


    Finally, the elders settled down and the Great Elders said, "This wedding will be an important affair to the entire Phoenix Race, so you can be certain that you will have the support of the entire Phoenix Race. We will make sure that it is an extravagant event."


    All of the elders nodded in agreement to this with happy smiles on their faces.


    That was when Feng Huang and Feng Tian finally couldn''t take it anymore.


    Their patience and respect for the elders finally snapped under the pressure of this impending engagement.


    Feng Huang and Feng Tian both shouted at the same time, "I don''t agree to this engagement!"


    In the middle of this festive atmosphere, when these two suddenly shouted out, it created a big scene where everyone suddenly turned to look at them.


    After making sure that they had heard what they had heard, the elders and Great Elders all suddenly knitted their brows as they looked at the two of them. It was as if they were looking at idiots who couldn''t understand when something was good for them.


    There were many elders who were even nning on beating up these two so that they would understand, but they didn''t get that chance in the end. The one who beat these two first¡­was Feng Yu.


    She had been happily dreaming about her wedding when she suddenly heard this outburst. When she did, she immediately turned to look at the two of them with looks of fury and she raised her hand without hesitation to p the two of them.


    They could only let themselves suffer under the ps of this small hand.


    Lin Fan watched with a bitter smile for a bit before turning to the Great Elders to ask, "Can I discuss something with you?"


    The Great Elders had also been watching this with bitter smiles on their faces, but they immediately turned to Lin Fan when they heard his words.


    Without hesitation, they agreed to discuss whatever he wanted to discuss with them.


    Lin Fan asked, "Do you know where the Phoenix Stone is?"


    When the three Great Elders heard this, they couldn''t help being taken aback.


    They looked at Lin Fan with a strange look, almost as if they were wondering just how he knew about this thing. But they also quickly recovered in the end and nodded to show that they did know what this thing was.


    The Great Elder in the center said, "The Phoenix Stone has been passed down for generations through our Phoenix Race and it is one of the greatest treasures left behind by our ancestor."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    That was because what they had just said made it hard for him to say his next words.


    But in the end, he still had to say it.


    "Can I have that Phoenix Stone?" Lin Fan asked in a calm voice.


    The Great Elders were once again taken aback by this forward question, but they nodded in agreement after calming down.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised by just how quickly they had agreed to this.


    Seeing the confused look on his face, the Great Elders exined, "The ancestor had already passed down instructions that the Phoenix Stone would be taken by the Void God''s sessor one day, so we would have to give it to them when they came."


    Lin Fan gave a sigh of relief when he heard this.


    If he had to steal a treasure of the Phoenix Race¡­that wouldn''t be something that he would want to do.


    The Great Elders saw the look on his face and couldn''t help smiling.


    Then one of them asked, "To know of the Phoenix Stone, did you receive some instructions from the ancestor?"


    Lin Fan just looked at him with a difficult look, but he didn''t say anything in the end.


    He might have told them if it wasn''t the system that had led him to the statue, but since it was the system, he couldn''t just talk about it.


    Seeing this look on his face, the Great Elders all revealed understanding looks and didn''t ask anything else about this.

 Chapter 1053 Blue Phoenix Tribe (1)

    ?


    The Great Elder in the center gave a nod before saying, "I''ll have someone bring the Phoenix Stone over. During this time, let''s talk about a few things."


    Lin Fan gave a nod in response to this since this was what he wanted too.


    He still had things to discuss with the Phoenix Race elders, such as the matter with the Qilin Race which was his next destination.


    If he obtained the support of the Phoenix Race along with the support of the Dragon Race when meeting with the Qilin Race, there was no doubt that it would make it easier for him.


    After all, this was two of the five sacred beast races against a single race. Even if they had some misgivings, they wouldn''t attack them right away with the elders of the two races vouching for Lin Fan.


    So they started discussing heading to the Qilin Race after Lin Fan received the Phoenix Stone.


    The Great Elders didn''t mind showing support during Lin Fan''s visit to the Qilin Race, but the one thing that they wanted to change was Lin Fan''s schedule. There were still other things that they wanted to do with Xiao Huo, their race''s true descendant who they had just found.


    They didn''t want to let Xiao Huo go just yet.


    However, that didn''t matter to Lin Fan since he had his own matters to take care of.


    So it became a discussion of how long Lin Fan could push back his trip since the Great Elders knew that they couldn''t stop Lin Fan.


    Force wasn''t even an option since they couldn''t just hurt Lin Fan or Xiao Huo. Both of them were the most important parts of the prophecy that their ancestor had left behind, so they had to protect them both for the prosperity of the Phoenix Race.


    The only thing that they could hope for was that they would be able to convince Lin Fan to dy this by a few days, months, or even years. The longer that they had to keep Lin Fan and Xiao Huo here at their Phoenix Race, the better it would be for them.


    To the side, the Dragon Race elders who watched this all revealed bitter smiles since they knew how this was going to go.


    They had been through the same thing when Lin Fan was at the Dragon Race.


    Lin Fan naturally shut all of this down and was determined to go to the Qilin Race as soon as possible.


    Now it was just a matter of how long they could keep Lin Fan here.


    There were certain things that they at least had to pass on to Xiao Huo before he left since these were things that their ancestor had left behind for Xiao Huo.


    But before they could finish discussing this, the elite guard who had been sent to get the Phoenix Stone came back. The problem was that this elite guard didn''te back with the Phoenix Stone, but rather a bitter look on his face.


    When the Great Elders saw this, they couldn''t help questioning this elite guard as to why he came back empty handed.


    The elite guard exined, "It''s the Blue Phoenix Tribe, they are refusing to give up the Phoenix Stone."


    "What?" The three Great Elders couldn''t help revealing confused looks that had a trace of annoyance in them.


    This was a direct order not just from the three of them, but from the entire elder hall of the Phoenix Race. That should hold great importance in the Phoenix Race, but now the Blue Phoenix Tribe that was holding the Phoenix Stone actually refused to hand it over, this was a clear sign of going against the elders.


    Normally, this would cause the elders to fly into a rage and send someone to take care of the Blue Phoenix Tribe, but they couldn''t do that in front of Lin Fan.


    If they were to show that there was discord in the Phoenix Race, that would be a sign of weakness that they were showing Lin Fan.


    So they couldn''t just settle matters with force like they normally would have done.


    Instead, they had to figure out a way to settle this secretly.


    But when Feng Ling heard that it was the Blue Phoenix Tribe who had ignored the orders of the elders, she couldn''t help knitting her brows.


    While the Great Elders were still silently deciding what to do about the Blue Phoenix Tribe, Feng Ling suddenly asked, "Who''s the current head of the Blue Phoenix Tribe?"


    Everyone was surprised that Feng Ling had spoken suddenly.


    She had been silent the entire time and since she wasn''t the main character here, everyone had almost forgotten that she was here.


    But when she suddenly spoke up, they had no choice but to pay attention to her.


    After all, she was the mother of Feng Yu who would be marrying Xiao Huo. This status was enough to give her some say in this council.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    At the same time, it also seemed like she was close with Lin Fan, the Void God''s sessor. It wasn''t that kind of rtionship, it was one where they seemed likerades who had fought together.


    That was technically true since they had fought against the same enemy back in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    The elders were confused why Feng Ling had asked this question, but Feng Huang and Feng Tian had an understanding look on their faces. At the same time, they also looked like they were afraid of something.


    One of the Great Elders said in the end, "It''s still the same person that was in charge of the Blue Phoenix Tribe as when you left the Red Phoenix Tribe."


    During the time that they had been here, the Great Elders had already had the elite guards search up the situation between Feng Ling and the Red Phoenix Tribe. After all, they wanted all the information that they could get that was rted to this situation so that they could make the best judgement.


    But they couldn''t understand what the connection was between Feng Ling and the Blue Phoenix Tribe that she would ask this.


    Feng Ling knitted her brows even more when she heard this, but then she asked, "Is there a new young master of the Blue Phoenix Tribe?"


    The Great Elders were still confused when they heard this, but then one of the elders on the side said, "That''s right. A few years ago, the Blue Phoenix Tribe had announced that they had found a new sessor to the head. If I remember correctly, it was someone named Bing Fu."


    When Feng Ling heard this name, she couldn''t help knitting her brows even more.


    Even a fool would be able to tell that Feng Ling recognized this name and had some kind of history with this person. And based on the way that she had reacted, it shouldn''t be a good history.


    Lin Fan just silently waited for Feng Ling to exin herself.


    Feng Ling saw this and with a sigh, she directly said, "Bing Fu is Xiao Yu''s father."


    As soon as this was said, everyone understood what the situation was.


    But if the Blue Phoenix Tribe had denied the request to give back the Phoenix Stone because they knew something¡­then that meant that there was a mole in the elder hall that was providing the Blue Phoenix Tribe with information¡­


    When this thought passed through their minds, all of the elders and the Great Elders couldn''t help looking at each other with suspicious looks.


    They just looked at each other as if they were suspecting each other before one of the Great Elders suddenly pped their hands and everyone came back to their senses.


    They all stopped looking at each other, but there was still doubt in the hearts of all the elders and Great Elders. They just knew that they couldn''t suspect each other right now in front of the Void God''s sessor.


    But before they could decide anything, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Let''s go to the Blue Phoenix Tribe."


    "Huh?" All of the elders and Great Elders revealed confused and stunned looks when they heard this.


    By all right, this should be thest ce that they went right now.


    After all, they didn''t know just what the Blue Phoenix Tribe was nning.


    The Blue Phoenix Tribe should know about the true descendant, so they would want to control him as well since that would increase their position in the Phoenix Race. It was unknown what kind of things they would do to achieve this goal, so the Blue Phoenix Tribe was the most dangerous ce for the two of them right now.


    But Lin Fan wanted to go to the Blue Phoenix Tribe?


    The elders and Great Elders all tried to convince him otherwise, but Lin Fan was firmly set on heading there.


    During this time, Feng Tian and Feng Huang had both moved over to where Feng Ling was.


    They wanted to talk to her about Bing Fu, but she didn''t want to hear any of it.


    She just waited until all of the elders gave up on trying to convince Lin Fan toe over to him. She looked right at him and said, "Thank you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod and then said, "Go and end this. Leave your regret behind."


    Feng Ling looked back at Feng Huang and Feng Tian before turning to look at Feng Yu with Xiao Huo.


    An even more determined look appeared in her eyes as she said, "I will."

 Chapter 1054 Blue Phoenix Tribe (2)

    ?


    Since the Great Elders and elders weren''t able to convince Lin Fan of this matter in the end, they had no choice but to head to the Blue Phoenix Tribe in the end.


    But they wouldn''t just let Lin Fan and Xiao Huo go alone.


    Once again, one of the Great Elders came and this time, there were several elders that followed them.


    But if one looked carefully, they would have noticed that there wasn''t a single Blue Phoenix among them.


    They were heading to the Blue Phoenix Tribe, so it should make sense to bring one or two elders who hade from the Blue Phoenix Tribe to guide them or help mediate. But there wasn''t a single Blue Phoenix elder that came along.


    That was because they didn''t trust them.


    Someone had leaked information about Xiao Huo to the Blue Phoenix Tribe and the elders didn''t know who it was.


    Before figuring this out, the most likely candidate would be one of the elders that came from the Blue Phoenix Tribe in the first ce. So they wouldn''t bring one of the elders from the Blue Phoenix Tribe where all of this was happening.


    They would put these elders under house arrest until they figured out where the leak came from.


    If possible, they would have liked to lock down the entire elder hall¡­but that wasn''t possible with Lin Fan''s request to go to the Blue Phoenix Tribe.


    Since it was a visit from the elders, the path had been cleared just like when they went to the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    From how there weren''t any people that blocked their way, it didn''t seem like the Blue Phoenix Tribe was rebelling against the elders. It almost seemed like they werepletely subservient to the elders.


    But that wasn''t the case under the covers.


    If one looked closely, one could feel many eyes that were peeking on them from afar.


    They didn''te close, but they were trying to find something.


    It was just too bad that the elders formed a barrier that they couldn''t peer through.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the manor of the Blue Phoenix Tribe head.


    When they arrived, they found that there were only a few servants waiting for them. They led them to an empty room where they were made to wait.


    This waspletely unlike the Red Phoenix Tribe where Feng Huang and Feng Tian had been waiting for them. Instead of showing their humble side, they decided to show their arrogant side by being the one that was waited for instead of waiting.


    This showed that they thought themselves as more important than the elders.


    Seeing this, the elders and Great Elder all knitted their brows.


    In their years of helming the Phoenix Race, they had never seen this kind of disrespect before.


    But they didn''t do a thing because Lin Fan just walked forward and sat down without a word. It was as if he didn''t care about the disrespect that the Blue Phoenix Tribe had shown them.


    Since Lin Fan had acted calmly, it wasn''t as if the elders and the Great Elder could lose their temper as the seniors. So they copied Lin Fan and sat down to enjoy the tea that had been brought for them.


    The ones that were watching secretly couldn''t help being surprised by this reaction from the elders.


    They knew what kind of temper the elders had, so for the elders to just calmly sit down like this¡­


    They could see that it was all because of Lin Fan.


    Because he calmly sat down first, the elders followed him.


    So the eyes that were watching secretly took note of Lin Fan.


    The information that they had received was that there was someone special who had arrived in the Red Phoenix Tribe, but they didn''t know who it was. Now that they saw Lin Fan, they knew that this was most likely the special person that had arrived.


    But there was also one other person that they cared about more than this special person and they weren''t seeing her now.


    Since the elders had gathered and they couldn''t get any more information, they decided to head in.


    The ones that came in were the head of the Blue Phoenix Tribe, Bing Mu Chen and the young master of the Blue Phoenix Tribe, Bing Fu.


    When the two of them arrived, the servants all stood up to greet them.


    This was a stark contrast to when Lin Fan and the elders came into the room where the servants didn''t show them any signs of respect.


    But to the surprise of the two who came in, not a single person from the elder group was dissatisfied with this. They just calmly sat there while sipping their tea, as if they didn''t even notice theming in.


    The two of them couldn''t help turning their attention to Lin Fan who sat in the middle with the Great Elder.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    They had been curious as to who this person was, but they hadn''t been able to figure anything out. They just knew that he had a special status that even the elders respected¡­


    Aftering in, Bing Mu Chen sat down in front of them without even being acknowledged and he poured himself a cup of tea. He did the same thing as the elders and calmly sat there sipping his tea without acknowledging them.


    The difference between the two sides was that Bing Mu Chen was secretly paying attention to the elders while sipping his tea, waiting for them to make a move.


    The elders just didn''t move at all as they waited for Lin Fan to make a move.


    And Lin Fan¡­was waiting for Bing Mu Chen to make a move.


    It had be a deadlock of who would break first.


    And in the end, it was Bing Mu Chen who broke first by saying, "Elders, it is an honour to have you at our Blue Phoenix Tribe today. May I ask what business you have with us?"


    The elders and Great Elder looked at Lin Fan and waited for him to speak.


    When Bing Mu Chen and Bing Fu saw this, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    They didn''t think that there would be anyone important enough that they would make the elders and Great Elder defer to them, so they couldn''t help being even more curious about Lin Fan''s identity.


    Lin Fan just calmly looked at Bing Mu Chen without saying a word.


    So the room fell into an awkward silence.


    Both Bing Mu Chen and Bing Fu felt the pressure that came from this silence and they were feeling more and more ufortable.


    During this entire time, Lin Fan had been watching the two of them.


    He didn''t know why they had refused to hand over the Phoenix Stone, but he didn''t think that it was for the same reason that the elders thought it was for. After all, he didn''t think that there would be an elder that would betray the Phoenix Race after everything that he saw.


    So he thought that they had received some other kind of information.


    Namely, they had received information about a certain someone.


    That was confirmed by him when he saw the way that Bing Fu looked around the room, as if he was searching for something.


    That was why he had decided toe to the Blue Phoenix Tribe himself.


    He knew that there wouldn''t be danger to himself or Xiao Huo since their target was someone else in the first ce. Not to mention that the target wanted to end their rtionship with the Blue Phoenix Tribe in the first ce.


    So Lin Fan came to set the stage.


    Finally, it was Bing Fu who couldn''t take this silence anymore and broke it by saying, "Where is she?"


    Everyone was confused at first when they heard this, except for Lin Fan. He had already expected this and was even waiting for him to say this.


    He had been silently watching Bing Fu and he had already figured out what kind of personality he had.


    In this situation, he wouldn''t be able to hold back his rage and he would try to find the one that he was looking for.


    The one he was looking for was Feng Ling, his ex-wife.


    Bing Mu Chen slightly knitted his brows when he heard this, but then he rxed them.


    He adopted a stance of wait and see.


    He knew that hecked too much information to make a proper judgement, so he wanted to see what woulde out of Bing Fu''s outburst. In a worst case scenario, he could just offer the Phoenix Stone to the elders to reconcile since that was the one thing that they wanted.


    Or else they wouldn''t have sent all these elders and even the Great Elder.


    Lin Fan just picked up his cup and took another sip of his tea before saying, "Who are you talking about?"


    Bing Fu narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before saying, "Who are you? Do you think that a kid like you has the right to speak in this ce?"


    The elders and the Great Elder knitted their brows when they heard this, but Lin Fan just raised a hand for them to calm down before saying, "I have more right than you."


    Bing Fu couldn''t help being taken aback by the aura that Lin Fan released.


    He didn''t know who this kid was, but he could tell that he definitely wasn''t a normal person.


    So in the end, he said, "Just tell me where she is and we''ll give you the Phoenix Stone."

 Chapter 1055 Blue Phoenix Tribe (3)

    ?


    The direct way that he said this caught everyone off guard, including Lin Fan.


    He never thought that he would directly offer the Phoenix Stone for this, but that didn''t mean that he would take this bait.


    Once again, Lin Fan looked at him and asked, "Who are you talking about?"


    It was at this that Bing Fu lost his temper and was about to p the table. But before his hand could hit the table, it was as if there was some kind of force that stopped his hand from falling down any further.


    He didn''t know exactly what it was, but he could guess what it was.


    Bing Fu looked over at the elders and Great Elder that were sitting there.


    But none of them revealed any expressions as they sat there with calm looks on their faces.


    Bing Fu looked like he was about to say something, but Lin Fan spoke first by saying, "Let''s assume that I do know what you''re talking about¡­" He just let his voice drift off when he said this.


    Bing Fu narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan when he heard this and he waited for him to finish.


    Lin Fan saw this and then continued, "What do you n on doing?"


    Bing Fu was surprised to hear this question, but then he said in a firm voice, "That is none of your business."


    "Is that so?" Lin Fan asked in an almost whimsical tone.


    Bing Fu narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan before saying, "That''s right, it''s none of your business. I will do what I want with that woman."


    Lin Fan didn''t feel any pressure from Bing Fu even though he was putting everything that he could into suppressing Lin Fan. It was almost as if he didn''t even notice that Bing Fu existed.


    But the calm way that he sat there just served to annoy Bing Fu even more.


    Then as if he didn''t care about Bing Fu at all, Lin Fan just suddenly stood up and turned around.


    He gave a nod to the elders and Great Elder sitting there before saying, "We''re leaving. There''s nothing for us to do here."


    No one was able to react to this at first, but then they couldn''t help revealing surprised looks.


    They hade all the way here because they were prepared for Lin Fan to do something drastic, but they never expected him to want to leave this easily. It was as if he hadpletely forgotten about the reason he hade here in the first ce.


    But in the end, the elders and Great Elder stood up to follow Lin Fan out.


    They didn''t know what Lin Fan was nning, but the reason that they hade was to keep him and Xiao Huo safe. Now that he wanted to leave, this was what they wanted in the first ce.


    The elders were convinced that the Blue Phoenix Tribe had betrayed them, nning to do something to Xiao Huo so that they could increase their standing in the Phoenix Race.


    So they wanted to take Xiao Huo away to keep him safe.


    However, before they could leave, Bing Fu stopped them.


    When he finally came back to his senses, Bing Fu suddenly pped the table. This time, there was no force that had stopped his hand froming down, so there was a loud sound that rang out in this room.


    Then after that, Bing Fu shouted, "Where do you think you''re going? Do you really think that this is over just because you say that it is over?"


    Lin Fan didn''t stop because of this outburst and continued walking out.


    There had been a few guards from the Blue Phoenix Tribe who had been standing on the side, watching over the whole thing.


    Since Bing Fu had moved, they were naturally also expected to move.


    But the other side was the elders of the Phoenix Race, each one being in the Ruler Realm. Even if they had a hundred times the courage that they currently had, not a single one of them dared to do anything to the elders.


    So instead, they moved to stop Lin Fan who was currently walking alone.


    Before they could even reach Lin Fan, they felt a pressuree over them that stopped them in their tracks. Not a single one of them was able to move as this pressure came down on them.


    As for Bing Fu who had also charged forward, he didn''t feel this pressure.


    That was because Lin Fan had given a secret signal to them to not interfere with Bing Fu.


    They didn''t understand what Lin Fan meant by this, but they couldn''t help being worried.


    That was because Lin Fan was only in the Realm, while Bing Fu was in the Sun Realm.


    But since Lin Fan wanted to do this himself, they just watched as Bing Fu came closer to Lin Fan.


    When Bing Fu was about to hit Lin Fan, Lin Fan suddenly moved out of the way at a speed that Bing Fu couldn''t keep up with. Lin Fan was able to easily move out of the way and Bing Fu''s fist hit the ground, leaving a patch of ice there.


    As a Blue Phoenix, naturally Bing Fu''s fist was infused with icews.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Bing Fu narrowed his eyes to look at Lin Fan, but he didn''t give up as he punched out at Lin Fan again.


    However, this time, Lin Fan didn''t dodge out of the way.


    Instead, there was a barrier that appeared in front of him that absorbed the attack of Bing Fu.


    Bing Fu tried to push through at first, but he soon found¡­that this barrier was actually draining him of his energy. The more that he tried to push against this barrier, the more energy that was being drained out of him.


    If he didn''t pull back, he might bepletely drained by this barrier.


    So Bing Fu had no choice but to back away.


    But even that was hard for him.


    He found that even using all of his strength, it was hard for him to pull back from the suction force of this strange barrier. It was as if the more that he resisted, the more that he would be pulled in.


    Finally, when he was about to run out of energy, he was released from the barrier.


    As hended on the ground away from Lin Fan, he couldn''t help panting as he red at him. There was also a trace of wariness in his eyes as he wondered just what had happened just now.


    He had clearly been the one that was stronger, but he was drained because he had tried to attack Lin Fan.


    It didn''t make sense at all.


    As he red at Lin Fan, he couldn''t help asking, "Just who are you?"


    Lin Fan revealed a smile without saying anything.


    But the elders couldn''t help being confused.


    After all, ording to them, the reason that they hade to the Blue Phoenix Tribe was because the Blue Phoenix Tribe knew Lin Fan and Xiao Huo''s identities. But that didn''t seem to be the case with how Bing Fu was asking this question.


    So just what was all of this about?


    After a long silence, Lin Fan suddenly asked, "Are you sure that you want to see her?"


    Bing Fu couldn''t help being taken aback when he heard this.


    He just couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was nning with all of this.


    One moment, he was denying that he knew her, even going as far as leaving to stick to this story.


    But now he was asking him if he wanted to meet her.


    Just what was his goal here?


    This time, Bing Fu didn''t act as arrogantly as before and warily looked at Lin Fan. Seeing that he didn''t do anything, Bing Fu finally gave a nod of affirmation.


    Lin Fan gave a nod back to him before suddenly waving his hand to summon Feng Ling.


    The moment that Feng Ling appeared, Bing Fu couldn''t help being taken aback.


    He looked at her for a bit before turning to look at Lin Fan with an even more confused look.


    He actually called Feng Ling out like this¡­the only way that this was possible was if he had made a contract with Feng Ling¡­


    But the proud Feng Ling making a contract with a human?


    Just exactly what was going on here?


    After staring at Lin Fan for a bit, he still turned back to Feng Ling.


    Right now, it was imperative that he took care of his problems one by one and Feng Ling took precedent.


    As he looked at her, his eyes couldn''t help revealing a trace of gentleness and love. She was still as beautiful as the first day that he had met her and he still couldn''t forget about her after all that happened between them.


    Though he was angry with her for leaving him, he still wanted to see her because¡­he wanted her back.


    It wasn''t for what everyone thought would happen, where he would take revenge on her, but rather because he wanted to ask her toe back to him.


    Bing Fu took a step forward, but seeing Feng Ling take a step back when he did this, his face couldn''t help twisting. He looked at her and said, "You tramp, you''re finally back?"


    He didn''t mean to say this, but his anger had taken over him and he hadn''t been able to hold himself back.

 Chapter 1056 Blue Phoenix Tribe (4)

    ?


    Feng Ling was also surprised that Lin Fan had suddenly called her out since he had never said that he would be doing something like this.


    The only thing that he had told her was that he would give her an opportunity to end this, but she never thought that it would be like this.


    Still, when she heard what Bing Fu called her, she didn''t hold back at all as she said, "I''m back, so what? You piece of trash, it''s time to end this."


    When Bing Fu heard this, his face couldn''t help twisting more than it had already twisted.


    Even though he didn''t mean to say what he had said, when he heard her insulting him like this, it was like his heart was being pierced. When she insulted him like this, he remembered everything that had happened in the past.


    Bing Fu¡­had fallen in love with Feng Ling the moment that he hadid eyes on her.


    So he had done all that he could to be the one that married her.


    With Feng Ling''s beauty and her status, there were plenty of people that wanted to marry her. He had beat all of them toe out as the top suitor, the one that was most likely to marry her.


    But in the end, she had rejected him because she was in love with someone else.


    Though she never said who it was, it was clear to everyone who that person was.


    Qing Ao from the Dragon Tribe.


    This was something that would never happen since Dragons and Phoenixes could never be together¡­So Bing Fu had thought that there was nothing to worry about at first.


    That is until Feng Ling ran away with Qing Ao.


    Sheter came back, but during this time, it was as if something had been ripped out of his heart. It was as if there was a wound that had appeared that would never heal inside of his heart.


    When she came back, he didn''t know how to feel at first.


    After all, he knew that she had run off with Qing Ao, so he knew that she would have been tainted by him.


    This was the woman that he loved and she had been tainted by another man¡­there was no man that would be able to ept this that easily.


    That is until the Red Phoenix Tribe head proposed a marriage to the Blue Phoenix Tribe head. As for who was being married, it was him and Feng Ling.


    When he learned of this, he didn''t care at all that she had run off with Qing Ao before. He didn''t care at all that there was the possibility that she had been tainted by Qing Ao as long as he would be able to have her in the end.


    As long as he was the final winner, nothing in the past mattered.


    With this, the marriage between them was settled and they got married.


    This marriagested for several years and they had even given birth to two children.


    Bing Fu had thought that he would be happy for the rest of his life with her. He thought that he would eventually be able to change her mind and make her fall in love with her, especially since they were even able to have children together.


    But she proved him wrong by running off again.


    She took their daughter and ran off without a single word.


    His world had been shattered that day.


    He was now remembering all the indignities and humiliation that he suffered while they were married when he heard her cursing at him.


    That was how she had talked to him during the time that they had been married. She had never used any soft words and would always be insulting him.


    She hadn''t even allowed him to touch her body other than once a month when they did it just so they could have children.


    She hadpletely blocked him out and that had bred many dark feelings inside of him.


    All of that churned inside of him now when he was being insulted by her again.


    Eventually, Bing Fupletely lost his temper andunched an attack at Feng Ling.


    But before that attack could reach, the barrier appeared once more around Feng Ling.


    Bing Fu saw this barrier and wanted to stop himself, but it was already toote for him to stop himself. So his attack hit the barrier once again and he felt himself being drained of his life energy once more.


    It took a lot of effort once again to pull himself away from this barrier.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Once he pulled away, Bing Fu red at Lin Fan before saying, "This is a matter between husband and wife. I don''t think you''re that boorish that you would interfere in something like that, right?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer this question and instead said, "A good man wouldn''t resort to violence with a woman."


    Bing Fu''s face twisted not just because of the disdain in his voice, but also the look of disdain that Lin Fan showed him.


    He could tell that Lin Fan waspletely looking down on him, but he didn''t make a move since he knew that he couldn''t beat him. He didn''t know what that barrier was, but he knew that he wouldn''t be able to break it no matter what he did.


    As for his father, he had to sit there and watch since the elders were still here.


    As soon as his father acted, the elders would also act¡­they made that very clear with how closely they were watching him.


    Once the elders acted, they would stand no chance at all.


    So Bing Fu took a deep breath before turning to ask Feng Ling, "Where''s Xiao Yu?"


    That was the other thing that he wanted to know.


    Feng Yu was his daughter and she had been taken away from him, so of course he wanted her back. She was the apple of his eye and he had never been able to see her, so of course he wanted to have her back.


    The only clue that he had to where she was was Feng Ling standing in front of him.


    Feng Ling didn''t say anything as she looked at Lin Fan, as if she was waiting for him to make a move.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he saw this and with a wave of his hand, Feng Yu was also called out.


    The moment that Bing Fu saw her, he immediately recognized her. Even if it had been a long time since he had seen her and thest time he saw her, she had only been a child, he still recognized her with a single nce.


    But before he could say a single thing, Feng Yu already moved to the side. Shepletely ignored both of her parents and went over to where Xiao Huo was sitting.


    She got on the couch that Xiao Huo was sitting on and then she moved into hisp so that he was holding her.


    When Bing Fu saw this, his face immediately twisted. He pointed his finger at Xiao Huo and shouted, "Who do you think you are to touch my Xiao Yu?"


    He would have charged at Xiao Huo and attacked him, but he was wary of Lin Fan.


    He knew that Xiao Huo was a member of the elders'' group, so if he did attack him, he was sure that Lin Fan would interfere. He didn''t know how to break this barrier yet, so he couldn''t just attack.


    The only thing that he could do was use his voice and his pressure.


    But Xiao Huo wasn''t affected at all.


    Xiao Huo was just confused by Bing Fu suddenly shouting at him, especially since he didn''t recognize Bing Fu at all.


    It wasn''t Xiao Huo that spoke in the end, it was Feng Yu.


    She red at Bing Fu and said, "Who do you think you are? When did I be your Xiao Yu?"


    Bing Fu was taken aback and it looked like he had been hit when he heard this. He forced himself to speak in a gentle voice as he said, "Xiao Yu, you might not recognize me, but I''m your father."


    Feng Yu gave a snort and said, "Of course I recognize you, but that still doesn''t mean that I''m your Xiao Yu. Also, you shouldn''t think of yourself as my father. As far as I''m concerned, I don''t have a father."


    Bing Fu looked like he was crushed when he heard this before turning to re at Feng Ling and saying through gritted teeth, "What kind of poison have you been feeding Xiao Yu? She doesn''t acknowledge me as her father? If it wasn''t your doing, then I really don''t know who else it could be! Tell me, what did you do to her?"


    Feng Ling gave a shrug and said, "She doesn''t want to recognize her father, that is her choice. You have no right to say anything."


    Bing Fu''s face twisted even more when he heard this, but before he had a chance to say anything.


    "p."


    There was a p that rang out through the room and everyone''s attention was pulled to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "I''m sure that you have your grudges to settle, but let''s settle them in a proper manner."


    He looked at Bing Fu and said, "Since you''re raring to go, let''s settle this the way you want. Let''s settle this with violence."


    Everyone couldn''t help being surprised when they heard this.

 Chapter 1057 Blue Phoenix Tribe (5)

    ?


    Bing Fu looked at me with a strange look before suddenly saying, "Alright, I agree to this."


    He didn''t know what was happening, but it seemed like it was going in his favour.


    After all, he could tell that Feng Ling''s level of cultivation wasn''t as high as his. She was only in the Star Realm while he had already reached the Peak Sun Realm. If they were to fight, there was no doubt that he would crush her.


    While he was confused why Lin Fan would allow such a thing to happen, he didn''t care as long as he was able to achieve his goal.


    But before they fought, he had to set his terms.


    "If I win, I want Feng Ling and Feng Yu toe back to our Blue Phoenix Tribe." Bing Fu said before anyone else could say anything.


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response to this as if he had already expected this before saying, "If you lose, you will no longer be allowed to contact either Feng Ling or Feng Yu."


    Bing Fu slightly knitted his brows when he heard this.


    He didn''t think that he would lose if he fought Feng Ling, but there was something in Lin Fan''s voice that made it seem like he was already certain of his victory. It was as if all of this was already a foregone conclusion, like it was just a formality.


    He didn''t understand why Lin Fan had this kind of confidence, but it made him wary.


    Still, he knew that this was the only way that this would be settled, so he agreed to these terms with a nod.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan gave a nod as well before turning to Xiao Huo and saying, "Xiao Huo,e and y with him for a bit."


    When Bing Fu heard this, he said, "This isn''t what we agreed on."


    Lin Fan looked at him and said, "When did I say that you would be fighting Feng Ling? Aren''t you ashamed of even thinking of something like this when you can clearly sense the difference in cultivation levels? Is this the kind of man that you are?"


    There was a vein that popped out on Bing Fu''s forehead when he heard this, but he forced his anger down by gritting his teeth.


    After taking a deep breath to calm down, he said through those same gritted teeth, "This is a matter between me and Feng Ling, ex husband and wife. This is not a matter that others can easily interfere in."


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile as he said, "That''s fine because Xiao Huo isn''t an outsider in the first ce."


    Bing Fu knitted his brows a bit when he heard this before he said, "How isn''t he an outsider?" With a snort, Bing Fu said, "Are you going to tell me that he''s my ex wife''s lover?"


    When Feng Ling heard this, she couldn''t help revealing a disgusted look as she looked at Bing Fu.


    She had always hated his anger issues and the way that he lost control with his words.


    But he was the one that her father had set her up with in the end, so even if she was disgusted by him, she did what she had to do. She had endured sleeping with him even though the very thought of him touching her filled her with waves of disgust.


    The only good thing that came out of that rtionship in the end in her mind were her two children.


    Lin Fan''s lips also twitched for a second and his eyes filled with a bit of disdain as he looked at Bing Fu, but then he said, "He''s not Feng Ling''s lover, but he''s Feng Yu''s fiance. So if you look at it from that perspective, he is rted to this matter."


    When his voice fell, Bing Fu immediately revealed a shocked look as he said, "What did you say?"


    He turned to look at Feng Yu who was hugging Xiao Huo and his eyes filled with even more rage and hatred as he red at Xiao Huo.


    Even if he hadn''t been around for most of her life, he still thought of himself as Feng Yu''s father. So when he heard that his precious daughter was engaged and it was to someone like Xiao Huo¡­he couldn''t help exploding with rage.


    Especially when he saw the difference in stature between the two of them.


    The way that they looked¡­it was like looking at a crime.


    So as someone who thought of himself as a father, how could he allow something like this to happen?


    Bing Fu''s rage filled him and he couldn''t help giving twoughs before saying, "Good, good, good! Very good! Alright, I ept your terms!"


    His rage hadpletely filled him and he couldn''t take it anymore.


    If he didn''t take this chance to beat the one that was being called Feng Yu''s fiance, where would his face as a father go?


    So it was decided that Bing Fu would fight Xiao Huo.


    Xiao Huo wasn''t as excited to fight as Bing Fu was, but that changed after Lin Fan whispered a few things to Xiao Huo.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Xiao Huo might have been a child, but there were still things that he could understand. After hearing certain things from Lin Fan, the way that Xiao Huo looked at Bing Fu changed.


    There was what seemed to be a trace of anger in his eyes.


    As he looked at him like this, Bing Fu couldn''t help feeling a bit of pressure falling onto him.


    He didn''t understand why he was feeling pressure from what he considered his junior.


    The elders had been silent the whole time, but it was clear by the look on their face that they didn''t approve of this. They didn''t want to see Xiao Huo get injured, let alone fight.


    But since it was something that Lin Fan had decided, it wasn''t as if they could say anything about it.


    So they just watched with all of their focus, getting ready to interfere if anything happened.


    Of course, this wasn''t the ce for them to fight since it was too small for a fight here. So they all stood up and followed Bing Fu to another ce.


    This was a room that was very spacious and there was an arena right in the center.


    It was clear that this was the training room of the Blue Phoenix Tribe which made it perfect for the fight that was about to happen.


    All of the spectators moved to the spectator seats while Bing Fu and Xiao Huo made their way to the stage. But before the fight happened, Feng Yu came forward and in a daring disy, she stood up on her toes to nt a good luck kiss on Xiao Huo''s cheek.


    Both Xiao Huo and Bing Fu who were in the arena were caught off guard by this sudden action by Feng Yu.


    After nting the kiss on Xiao Huo''s cheek, Feng Yu ran off with a shy look on her face. However, there was no denying the wide smile that was also on her face.


    She was clearly happy with herself for having the courage to do this.


    When the shock passed and everyone came back to their senses, they reacted in different ways.


    Bing Fupletely exploded and he looked like he wanted to rip Xiao Huo to pieces.


    Xiao Huo¡­had a surprising blush on his face.


    Even though he still had the mentality of a child, he understood what the concept of a kiss meant.


    So he just stood there with a dazed look on his face.


    Bing Fu couldn''t wait any longer, so he said, "Let''s begin."


    Then without even giving Xiao Huo a chance to react, Bing Fu suddenly charged forward. There were blue mes that appeared around his hand as he jumped forward at Xiao Huo.


    These blue mes didn''t give off heat, but rather drew in all the heat around it.


    These were the special blue mes of the Blue Phoenix Tribe that were based on icews.


    So anything that these blue mes covered, they would freeze instead of burn.


    But Xiao Huo was still in a daze from being kissed by Feng Yu, so he didn''t react right away.


    It was only when Bing Fu was too close that he couldn''t dodge anymore that he finally reacted.


    Seeing the blue mes that were closing in on him, Xiao Huo didn''t hesitate at all as he was suddenly surrounded in red mes.


    When the blue and red mes shed, there was a wave of life energy that was released from the collision. This was a powerful wave of life energy that would have pushed those at the same cultivation level as the two of them back, but the two of them were able to maintain this equilibrium between them.


    That is until there was a strained look that appeared on Bing Fu''s face and he was forced to take a step back.


    Then all of a sudden, the bnce between the two of them crumbled and Bing Fu was sent flying back. He was able to stop himself before he was thrown out of the arena, but the way that he held his chest made it clear that his injuries weren''t light.


    His eyes were filled with disbelief and shock as he looked at Xiao Huo, trying to understand what had just happened.


    But Xiao Huo didn''t give Bing Fu that time to think.


    Xiao Huo was already charging at Bing Fu covered in red mes.

 Chapter 1058 Blue Phoenix Tribe (6)

    ?


    Bing Fu looked up at those red mes that were approaching and he couldn''t help feeling a bit of fear.


    But then his heart also filled with shame as he couldn''t believe that he would feel fear from the attack of a junior like this. His rage quickly stomped out the fear that he had felt and he gathered his blue mes around himself.


    These blue mes quickly covered Bing Fu and in no time, he charged forward just like Xiao Huo had done.


    The two of them wrapped up in mes mmed into each other, but this time¡­


    There was no bnce that was formed between the two sides. Instead, Bing Fu''s mes were scattered almost immediately by the red mes around Xiao Huo and he was blown away.


    Before he could react to what had happened, he was already being sent flying out of the ring at an incredible speed that he couldn''t resist. He had no choice but to let himself be mmed into the wall on the side of the arena.


    After mming into the wall, there was the outprint of his body that was formed in the wall.


    Everyone was caught off guard by how quickly the situation had changed.


    After all, no one had expected Xiao Huo to dominate Bing Fu this easily.


    They could tell that the two of them were at the same level of cultivation, so it should be a close fight. But people favoured Bing Fu since he was older and had much more experience.


    Lin Fan who knew everything just had a faint smile on his lips when he saw how this fight ended.


    It had gone exactly how he had expected it to go.


    People might think that Bing Fu had more experience, but that really wasn''t the case since¡­Xiao Huo was someone who had lived on the edge of death countless times. He might even have more experience than any one of the elders.


    It was all because of Lin Fan and the special training system of the store.


    Xiao Huo had been in countless life and death battles, so he had learned many different ways to use his abilities.


    It was not something that someone as protected as Bing Fu could everpare to.


    But one thing that Lin Fan took note of was when he saw the sh between the red and blue mes. At the center of the sh, there was a strange phenomenon that only those that looked carefully would notice.


    The red mes¡­had been swallowing the blue mes.


    It had happened both times that there had been a sh between the two sides.


    The first time, the red mes had only swallowed a bit of the blue mes before the equilibrium broke. The second time, the red mes had swallowed the blue mes like crazy, so the equilibrium couldn''t even form before Bing Fu was sted away.


    After a long moment of silence, Bing Fu dropped down out of the wall andnded on his knees.


    He waspletely covered in blood from being mmed into the wall from the force of Xiao Huo''s attack and he was panting hard to catch his breath. However, the look in his eyes made it clear that he wasn''t nning on giving up yet.


    Xiao Huo on the other hand was just standing there in a daze, looking at his hands. It was as if he was trying to figure something out with the way that he looked at his hands.


    In the end, Xiao Huo didn''t have the time to figure out what he wanted to figure out as he was interrupted by a roar from Bing Fu.


    Bing Fu''s racepletely exploded as he roared out, "Who do you think you are! Do you really think that an insect like you can take down a chosen one like me!"


    Then his body started to expand and expand until he took his true form as a phoenix.


    This was a phoenix that was coveredpletely in blue mes and stood tall at five meters in height.


    As he stood there, he towered over Xiao Huo who was just still standing there.


    At the same time, there was an invisible pressure that appeared in the air around Bing Fu. He was no longer holding back and had released his domain.


    In the area around him, there were streaks of blue mes and bits of frost that formed in the air. This was a full release of his power without holding back at all, he was nning on burning everything he had on this one attack.


    Xiao Huo was already caught since he was in a daze, but Xiao Huo didn''t panic at all.


    That was because in the small area around him, Bing Fu''s domain had beenpletely eliminated.


    It was as if in that area, Bing Fu''s domain just couldn''t enter no matter what happened.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    But Bing Fu didn''t seem to notice as the only thing that was on his mind was how he would destroy Xiao Huo. Xiao Huo had provoked his pride and ego too much, so he wouldn''t be holding back anymore.


    Xiao Huo just calmly turned to face Bing Fu before taking a deep breath and¡­releasing his own domain.


    The moment that Xiao Huo''s domain, there was a phoenix cry that rang out.


    This was a cry that cut through the air, almost freezing everything around Xiao Huo for an instant. It was a cry that created a resonance with all of the members of the Phoenix Race present, including Bing Fu who had been in the middle of his attack.


    When this phoenix cry rang out, Bing Fu couldn''t help freezing as he looked at Xiao Huo with a look of confusion.


    Then as if in response to this phoenix cry, he felt his own domain copsing.


    Bing Fu desperately tried to maintain his domain, but it seemed that he couldn''t do a thing as it copsed around him. In the end, there was only Xiao Huo''s domain that was left in this space.


    It was absolute suppression how Xiao Huo''s domainpletely crushed Bing Fu''s domain.


    In the end, Bing Fu was mmed into the ground by Xiao Huo''s domain.


    Xiao Huo stood there covered by this faint red glow that took the shape of a phoenix. When one looked at Xiao Huo like this, it made it very clear that he had obtained the inheritance of the Phoenix God.


    In fact, this was the first time that one of Lin Fan''s pets who obtained the inheritance of a god has fought. Before this, things like the red glowing phoenix around Xiao Huo didn''t exist. It seemed that the inheritance really had its own use.


    Xiao Huo just stood there looking down at his hands, as if he was still trying to figure something out. He didn''t care about Bing Fu who was lying there on the ground, being crushed by his domain.


    Finally, Xiao Huo''s expression changed into one that looked like he had figured something out as red and blue mes appeared around his hands. He brought his hands together and the mes in both of them merged together to form a new dual coloured me.


    With this dual coloured me, Xiao Huo revealed a happy look as he looked around for a target to use it on.


    His eyes finally settled on Bing Fu who waspletely suppressed there.


    When Bing Fu felt Xiao Huo''s eyesnd on him, he felt a chill run down his spine.


    He had been struggling and trying to break free from the suppression of Xiao Huo''s domain, but he hadn''t been able to do a single thing. He hadn''t even been able to move a single muscle of his finger as heid there on the ground.


    If Xiao Huo was to throw the me in his hands at him while he was being suppressed andpletely unguarded like this¡­there was no doubt that Bing Fu wouldn''t survive.


    So even if Bing Fu''s pride wouldn''t allow him to admit that he was inferior to this junior, he had no choice but to admit it or else he would lose his life.


    The only problem was that he waspletely suppressed and he wasn''t able to move, let alone say anything.


    Even if he wanted to give up, he couldn''t say anything.


    Bing Mu Chen was about to make a move when he saw the predicament that Bing Fu was in, but the elders quickly stopped him.


    The elders should be protecting Bing Fu as well, but seeing the way that Xiao Huo''s powers were developing, they wanted to see what would happen if he used his full power.


    But before Xiao Huo could throw the mes in his hands out, Lin Fan said, "That''s enough."


    When Xiao Huo heard this, he stopped the motion of his hands and held the mes there. He turned to look at Lin Fan with what seemed to be a pleading look, but Lin Fan denied it with a shake of his head.


    Xiao Huo had a disappointed look on his face, but in the end, he released the mes in his hands and was about to pull back his domain.


    Before he could, Feng Ling suddenly jumped into the arena.


    Xiao Huo didn''t think that it was safe for Feng Ling if he released his domain, so he quickly strengthened it again to keep Bing Fu suppressed.


    Feng Ling walked right up to Bing Fu and looked down at him.


    Bing Fu looked right back up at her, wondering what she was doing here.


    Then before anyone could react, Feng Ling had raised her foot.

 Chapter 1059 Blue Phoenix Tribe (7)

    ?


    Before Bing Fu could understand what was happening, Feng Ling''s foot came down to stomp on his face.


    She wasn''t that strong, but he didn''t have any guard up, so his nose started to bleed from being stomped in the face like this.


    Then without waiting for him to recover, she stomped on his face again.


    Again and again, she stomped on his face without giving him a chance to catch his breath to speak. It was as if she was trying to vent all the anger that had been suppressed in her heart.


    When she finished stomping on Bing Fu''s face, he hadpletely lost consciousness and his face was covered in blood.


    But even then, she didn''t show him any mercy as she pped him awake.


    Bing Fu''s eyes immediately opened when he was pped across the face and he looked up at Feng Ling with eyes that were filled with rage. He was about to say something, but he found that he still couldn''t because Xiao Huo''s domain was suppressing him.


    Feng Ling looked down at him and said, "From now on, nevere near me, Xiao Yu, or Xiao Tian. If you evere near me again, I will make your life a living nightmare."


    She didn''t even bother letting him respond, though he wouldn''t have been able to, before throwing his head down on the ground.


    She turned and walked away, giving Xiao Huo an appreciative look before heading over to where Feng Yu was waiting.


    Xiao Huo might have been a child, but he was still able to understand what this was all about. So he also went over to where Bing Fu was lying and suppressed him even further with his domain.


    Then standing over him, he brought his hands in front of his eyes as a pair of scissors before pointing them at Bing Fu. It was as if he was saying, "I have my eyes on you."


    Then once he was done, he released the domain and let Bing Fu free.


    But Bing Fu waspletely out of energy at this point from being suppressed by Xiao Huo''s domain and being beaten up by Feng Ling, so all he could do wasy there.


    Lin Fan and the elders turned their attention to Bing Mu Chen who was sitting there with aplicated look on his face. He noticed that they were looking at him, so he forced himself to show a calm look as he waited for them to speak.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "I think that there''s a stone that you need to hand over."


    Bing Mu Chen looked at the elders who were behind Lin Fan and he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    It was clear that they would be willing to use force if he wasn''t willing to cooperate with them.


    He definitely wouldn''t be able to fight the elders since he was only a single Ruler Realm Expert against all of them. Not to mention, every single one of them was stronger than him in the first ce, that was why they were elders and he was just the head of one tribe.


    So he reached into his chest pocket and pulled out a red stone that he presented to the elders.


    When they saw this, they turned to look at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had already seen a stone that was simr to this and gave off the same feeling, so he was sure that this stone was the Phoenix Stone.


    Bing Mu Chen was surprised that Lin Fan was the one that took this stone, but he still gave it to him regardless.


    After he received the Phoenix Stone, there was no reason for them to stay here any longer.


    As they were leaving, Bing Mu Chen couldn''t help staring at Lin Fan and Xiao Huo. His instincts told him that these two were definitely not normal people and the fact that they had offended them¡­would be a bad thing.


    But it wasn''t as if they could take this back¡­


    So he wanted to figure out just who they were so he could think of a countermeasure.


    It was just too bad that he didn''t get a chance.


    As they were leaving, Lin Fan said to the Great Elder, "I think that it''s time for a change in leaders for the Blue Phoenix Tribe."


    The Great Elder was surprised that Lin Fan would suggest this, but he gave a nod in response since he also thought the same. Since the Blue Phoenix Tribe had done everything that they could to avoid handing over the Phoenix Stone, it was clear that there would be problems in the future.


    Not to mention, there wereplications between the current head of the Blue Phoenix Tribe and Feng Yu''s mother. Between the two of them, Feng Yu''s mother was more important since Feng Yu was the important piece that would tie their true descendant to the Phoenix Race.


    Between a true descendant and a measly head of one of the tribes, there was no choice.


    So they would secretly do their thing and remove both him and Bing Fu from the Phoenix Race.


    While it was a shame to lose a Ruler Realm Expert because of this, the overall payoff would be much better. Though they would have hoped that some kind ofpromise could have been made.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    But, everything that happened today showed them that this wasn''t possible.


    So they had no choice but to take care of the Blue Phoenix Tribe.


    Once they left the territory of the Blue Phoenix Tribe, Lin Fan pulled out the Phoenix Stone again. This time, he also pulled out the Dragon Stone that he had received.


    When the Phoenix Race elders saw this, they couldn''t help being surprised. But it didn''t take them long to remember that Lin Fan hade with the Dragon Race elders in the first ce.


    So it wasn''t strange that he would have the Dragon Stone with him.


    Lin Fan lifted the two of them in his hands and carefully looked at them.


    As he looked at them, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows.


    That was because he could feel some kind of attraction between the two stones.


    He didn''t know where this sense of attraction wasing from, but it was like there was something inside the stones that wanted to bring the two of them together.


    It wasn''t strong enough that Lin Fan couldn''t resist it, but he was also curious what would happen if they were brought together.


    This feeling of attraction wasn''t like that of the voidw, so he was certain that it was something that had been left in the stones by the one who had made it. It was something that no one other than him would ever experience since no one other than him would have brought these stones together.


    So after checking both the stones and not finding a thing about the attractive force between them, he decided to bring them together.


    He brought them together slowly, but the closer that they came together, the stronger the attractive force became. Finally, he couldn''t resist the force at all as they came right up to each other and he lost his grip on them.


    The stones didn''t fall to the ground, instead they flew through the air, pulled by that attraction force. The two stones mmed into each other, but there wasn''t the sound that one would expect from two stones mming into each other that rang out.


    Instead, the stones suddenly merged with each other.


    It was an ovep at first, but then they became a single stone that dropped to the ground in front of Lin Fan.


    There was only silence that followed after this happened as everyone couldn''t help revealing confused and surprised looks.


    Not a single person had expected the two stones to suddenly act in this manner.


    Lin Fan went down and looked carefully at this new stone that had formed.


    This stone was the same as either the Phoenix Stone or the Dragon Stone when it came to shape and size, the only difference was that there were two colours on the stone now instead of just one.


    Instead of just being either red or azure, it was now a mix of the two.


    It wasn''t a mix in that the two colours had mixed together to form a colour that was in between the two. It was a mix in that now there were stripes of red and azure that were running along the stone.


    The one other thing that was different was the feeling that came from the stone.


    The Phoenix Race elders could still feel the attraction that came from the stone, but there was also a strange feeling that came from it. At the same time, they could tell that the attraction from the stone was much stronger than before, as if the stone''s powers had be greater.


    Later when Lin Fan asked the Dragon Race elders, they told him the same thing as the Phoenix Race elders.


    But for now, Lin Fan looked closely at the new stone that had been formed.


    As he was staring at it, he couldn''t help thinking of what the two god fragments that he had met had told him.


    They wanted him to gather all five stones¡­


    If these two stones could fuse, then didn''t that mean that the other three would also¡­


    Just what would be created when all five stones had fused together?


    It was clearly some kind ofrge secret that they wanted to show him, that was why they wanted him to do all of this.


    So Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling excited.

 Chapter 1060 White Tiger Race

    ?


    A few dayster, Lin Fan''s group was now on the White Tiger Race''s.


    After they had settled matters at the Blue Phoenix Tribe, they hadn''t wasted any time in moving on to the next ce, the Qilin Race.


    Just like before, Lin Fan received another special cultivation realm and had found another statue representing another god fragment. There, he met the Qilin God Fragment.


    The Qilin God fragment gave its inheritance to Xiao Lei, but it didn''t give anything to Lin Fan.


    That was because the information that this Qilin God fragment had was the same as the information that the other two god fragments had. But Lin Fan couldn''t me them since they were only fragments left behind by gods.


    It wasn''t as if they would know everything about the world of gods.


    Then after that, Lin Fan and his group teleported to the Qilin Race''s special reception area where the Phoenix Race and Dragon Race envoys were waiting for them.


    It was the Phoenix Race elders'' first time experiencing this, but the Dragon Race elders just revealed bitter smiles when Lin Fan suddenly appeared.


    Just like before, they were able to exin to the Qilin Race elders what this was about and proved the identity of Lin Fan.


    Just like before, they met the elders and then they headed off to the Purple Qilin Tribe that Lei Ting belonged to.


    This was almost the exact same situation as the Phoenix Race where they had sent the envoy to the Lin Astral Empire because¡­Lei Ting''s son had missed her. So he had wanted to find her and bring her back, just like Feng Tian had done.


    Lin Fan had already suspected that this was the case before evening to the Qilin Race and after leaving the Phoenix Race.


    When he confirmed that this was true, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile before going through the same thing again.


    He revealed Xiao Lei and Lei Huan and announced their engagement.


    Lei Huan¡­was less elegant than Feng Yu in taking this announcement.


    She just ran around holding Xiao Lei''s hand and proiming that she was already his wife because their parents had agreed. But they were still happy seeing how excited she was.


    There was only Lin Fan who felt a bit bitter because he knew that Xiao Lei¡­would be under the thumb of Lei Huan in the future just like how he was under Ang''s thumb.


    It seemed that this was the only thing that he had passed down to his "sons".


    There was also a jealous ex that they had to deal with, but he was easier to deal with than Bing Fu. He wasn''t as extreme and explosive as Bing Fu, so they were able to reach an amicable agreement where he was allowed to see Lei Huan again.


    It was just too bad that Lei Huan wasn''t interested in this father of hers since she now had a lover.


    It really was true that daughters would forget their parents as soon as they found someone to love.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering one day what would happen if Xin''er were to evere home with a boyfriend. But then he immediately threw that thought out of his mind and even made the decision to stomp on that thought if it ever came back.


    He just wasn''t ready to think about such things yet¡­


    In a sense, he was still a coward.


    He wanted her to remain the little girl that she was for a bit longer¡­


    So after everything, they arrived at the White Tiger Race''s homeworld.


    Before teleporting here, Lin Fan had also found the White Tiger God Fragment and Xiao Bai had received his inheritance.


    But now that they were here, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling worried.


    This was the one race that he wasn''t as confident about meeting because there was a history between them.


    Or rather, there was a history between Xiao Bai and the White Tiger Race.


    When Lin Fan had found Xiao Bai back on the Blue Star, he had found him when his mother was dying and had been entrusted with Xiao Bai.


    Before receiving the bloodline from the system, Xiao Bai already had a powerful bloodline. It was almost impossible for a white tiger with this kind of bloodline to appear in the wild.


    So the more likely guess was that Xiao Bai''s mother had some conflict with the White Tiger Race and had been driven down to that lower world. Xiao Bai was very likely the offspring of one of the main tribes, so Xiao Bai''s rtives were most likely still in the White Tiger Race.


    Lin Fan wasn''t sure what Xiao Bai would think since he was still too young, but if he understood that his mother was driven out of the White Tiger Race¡­<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    He would want revenge.


    This was veryplicated since they had their current statuses and there were still many things to consider.


    So Lin Fan just felt a headachee on when he thought about this.


    The one thing that he was most worried about was Xiao Bai''s real father.


    He knew that he would have to deal with this matter one day, but he had avoided it because he didn''t want to think about Xiao Bai''s father.


    After all, it was very likely that Xiao Bai''s father had abandoned his mother, or else she wouldn''t have been alone in the Blue Star. At the same time, Xiao Bai''s mother had been a normal demon beast, so the bloodline that he inherited most likely came from his father.


    This father was very likely one of the scions of one of the tribes and a high ranking one based on the bloodline that Xiao Bai inherited.


    When the scenario like this, Lin Fan thought of five different backgrounds that could have suited this.


    But every time, it ended up with him thinking that Xiao Bai''s father was some scumbag who had yed around with his mother and then ditched her, leaving her to raise Xiao Bai alone.


    He had read this kind of scenario many times in novels back on earth, so that was his first conclusion here.


    Now it was all about finding the information that he needed.


    After he appeared, the elders of the Qilin Race, the Phoenix Race, the Dragon Race quickly exined who he was to the White Tiger Race elders group.


    The White Tiger Race elders didn''t trust it at first until Lin Fan released his voidws.


    When they felt the strange sensation that came from his voidws, the wariness in their eyes reduced. That was because they were all elders with experience and had encountered the voidws before.


    The voidws that Lin Fan released werepletely different from any voidws that they had encountered before.


    So they were certain that Lin Fan was different.


    Since that was the case, they would bring him to see the Great Elders and see what they thought. At the same time, they would bring him to the prophecy and see what his reaction was.


    But they were once again disappointed since Lin Fan didn''t know a thing about the prophecy.


    He might have seen a simr prophecy three times before, but he had never been able to react in the way that they had wanted him to react. That was because not a single one of the god fragments that he had met had told him a single thing about this prophecy.


    So they brought him into the hall where he met the elders waiting there.


    When he came in, the first thing that he did was release his voidws again.


    When the elders and Great Elders in the room felt this, they all revealed relieved looks and treated him in a much more friendly manner.


    The Great Elders took control of this by asking Lin Fan, "Void God''s sessor, what business do you have with our race? We still haven''t found our race''s true descendant, so there''s not much that we can do for you right now."


    Unlike the other three races, the Great Elders of the White Tiger Race were much more direct and asked Lin Fan directly what he was doing.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Well, I''m going around meeting all of the five sacred beast races."


    The Great Elders looked at the three groups from the other sacred beast races and they nodded in agreement to this.


    They could understand this and they even gave grateful looks to the envoys of the other three sacred beast races.


    They had misunderstood this to be the three other sacred beast races convincing Lin Fan toe and visit them so that they could meet the Void God''s sessor. But in reality, none of these three sacred beast races had wanted Lin Fan to leave their homeworlds.


    After all, the arrival of Lin Fan had also brought the true descendants of their races and they still hadn''t passed on the inheritances that they should have passed on to them. Because Lin Fan was in a rush to go to all of the different sacred beast races, they had no choice but to follow him around even if they were unwilling.


    Lin Fan then said, "If possible, can I get a tour of your White Tiger Race''s tribes? I want to see if I can find something interesting."


    The Great Elders and elders of the White Tiger Race were confused by this request, but they had no reason to deny it.


    So it was decided that Lin Fan would be touring the different tribes of the White Tiger Race.

 Chapter 1061 Various tribes

    ?


    Since they had agreed, they didn''t waste any time in heading out.


    The group that apanied Lin Fan''s group was one Great Elder from the White Tiger Race along with several elders. Then there were the elders from the Qilin Race, the Phoenix Race, and the Dragon Race.


    The White Tiger Race elders wanted to show hospitality to these envoys from the three races, but they insisted on going with Lin Fan in the end.


    However, the White Tiger Race didn''t me them since they knew how important Lin Fan, the Void God''s sessor, was to all five sacred beast races. So they just epted this and allowed them toe along.


    It didn''t take long before they arrived at the first tribe.


    This was the ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    The White Tigers weren''t separated based on colour since all of them were white tigers. Instead, they were separated based on the colour of the stripes on their body since that changed the differentws that they controlled.


    They all had onew inmon, but their secondaryw was determined by their stripes.


    As for why they had a secondaryw, that was all because of the crossbreeding that happened with other races. This was also the reason why the other tribes had members of different colours.


    The ancestors were the only ones that had their respective bloodlines, so it wasn''t as if there were others back then for them to mate with. So they had no choice but to mate with other demon beasts, which created the various bloodlines that were passed down through the five sacred beast races.


    That was why there were secondaryws that they could use.


    The ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe was a race that had gravityws. The peak of which was the ability to condense gravity to the point where it copsed and created a ck hole that was as dark as the stripes on their bodies.


    When they arrived at the ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe, the situation was the same as when Lin Fan visited any tribes of the other three races.


    The tribe had beenpletely cleared out and there was only a group waiting for them.


    When they arrived at the manor of the tribe head, there was the tribe head and a younger member of the tribe waiting for them.


    Naturally, these two were confused why the elders hade to their tribe since they couldn''t think of anything that they had done wrong. But they didn''t dare rx as they weed the elders.


    The one thing that they were the most confused by was the presence of Lin Fan.


    The elders didn''t exin who Lin Fan was, but by the way that he acted, it was clear that he had an important position that even the elders couldn''t ignore.


    So in the end, who was Lin Fan?


    They didn''t get a chance to ask this as Lin Fan suddenly asked, "Do you know if there''s been any juniors of your tribe that have gone missing recently?"


    When the ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe head heard this, he couldn''t help revealing an even more confused look. He had no idea why Lin Fan was asking this question, but the moment that he did, the elders suddenly started paying more attention.


    The elders also didn''t know why he was asking this question, but it felt like Lin Fan knew more than he was putting on¡­


    If he was asking about a youth that was missing, could it be that he already had a clue as to where their tribe''s true descendant was?


    Was that also one of the reasons why he had asked to see the various tribes.


    As this thought passed through their minds, they couldn''t help turning back to the ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe head. They all looked at him with serious looks that werepelling him to answer.


    The ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe head couldn''t help shrinking back when facing the pressure from all of these elders.


    He didn''t understand what was happening at all, so he just truthfully answered, "There have been a few that have been in idents, but there aren''t any youths that are missing like you''re asking for."


    Lin Fan immediately understood what he meant by this.


    The youths of any race would go out to prove themselves and this was with its risks.


    Those that went out to train would face the risk of death and there were a few that fell to the risks outside.


    These were the ones that had been in idents that the tribe head mentioned.


    But these were not the ones that Lin Fan was looking for.


    So in the end, he just gave a nod and said, "Thank you."


    Then without waiting for anything, he stood up and turned to leave.


    Everyone else who was in the room was caught off guard when they saw him do this.


    However, the elders quickly reacted and stood up to follow him.


    All that was left behind was a stunned ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe head and his son.


    They looked at each other with confused looks as if they were trying to figure out just what had happened, but neither of them were able to say a thing. In the end, they were just left therepletely confused.


    Once Lin Fan left the ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe, he asked the elders to bring him to the next tribe.


    The elders had an idea of what Lin Fan was nning to do, so they wasted no time in contacting the next tribe and arranging the meeting.


    But the next three tribes that they went to were all busts.


    They were just like the ck Stripe White Tiger Tribe, they didn''t know a single thing about anyone disappearing. All that they had were kids that were injured or killed because of their excursions outside.


    So losing hope, Lin Fan headed to thest tribe, the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    This was the weakest out of all five of the White Tiger Race''s tribes, which was why it was thest ce that they had gone to.


    The elders were certain that the true descendant of their race would appear in the powerful tribes and not the weak tribes, so that''s why they had gone in this order. But it turned out that this wasn''t the case and they had just wasted their time.


    No one had any hope when they came to the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    But there was a surprise that no one expected.


    When Lin Fan and the elders arrived, they were greeted by the tribe head and a younger person just like the rest of the tribes.


    The tribe head was the one that asked, "Is there something that we can do for you today?"


    The elders all turned to look at Lin Fan.


    He had been slightly in a daze since he had also thought the same thing as the elders. The tribe that Xiao Bai came from must have been one of the stronger tribes, so he didn''t think that this final tribe would be it.


    But he still asked out of obligation because he had already asked everyone else this question, he couldn''t just not ask them.


    So he asked, "Have there been youths of your tribe that have gone missing recently?"


    The tribe head revealed a confused look when he heard this, but out of the corner of his eyes, Lin Fan could see a tremble from the young man beside the tribe head. It was as if he had some kind of reaction to this question from Lin Fan.


    When he saw this, Lin Fan couldn''t help narrowing his eyes to look at this young man.


    He hadn''t been paying attention to this young man before, but now that he was looking at him properly, he could tell that there was something off about him. He clearly looked like there was something that he wanted to ask, but he didn''t because the tribe head didn''t want him to.


    The tribe head finally gave him the same answer as the other tribe heads, but Lin Fan stopped him by asking, "What does he want to say?"


    The ''he'' that he was referring to was the young man beside the tribe head.


    The Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe head was surprised to hear this, but since Lin Fan had asked this and the elders were all ring at him, he had no other choice.


    So with a sigh, he said, "Go and tell this honoured guest what you want to say."


    The young man was surprised to hear this, but in the end he said, "My wife has gone missing. There was an ident and she was injured before going missing. If you have any news of her, can you please tell me?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, while the elders lost interest when they heard that it was his wife that was missing instead of a child.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a focused look as he stared at the young man, as if he was trying to see him through.


    The young man was confused when he saw this, but he didn''t back down as he looked right at Lin Fan with a calm look. He didn''t flinch at all since he knew that he didn''t do anything wrong, he just wanted to find his wife.


    After looking at him for a bit, Lin Fan realized that¡­


    He might have made a mistake when it came to Xiao Bai''s rtionship with the White Tiger Race.

 Chapter 1062 Different Circumstances (1)

    ?


    Lin Fan suddenly asked, "Can you tell me more about this?"


    The young man was caught off guard when he heard this, but he could hear a sincere tone in Lin Fan''s voice. It was as if he really was curious about what had happened.


    At the same time, he didn''t know why he felt, but he felt like there was a sense of hopeing from Lin Fan. It was as if he told Lin Fan what happened, there was a chance that he would be able to help him solve this problem.


    So in the end, the young man told him the story.


    It was a story of a young pair of lovers who ended in tragedy.


    This young man''s name was Tu Hong, he was the young master of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe and the son of the current head, Tu Lei.


    When he was younger, he fell in love with a female tiger who wasn''t a part of the White Tiger Tribe. This was a demon beast that he had met when he had been out training.


    He had wanted to marry her and bring her to the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe, but his father and all of the elders of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe had opposed this.


    When this was said, the tribe head beside him revealed a look of disappointment and resentment. It was clear that the tribe head was still holding this matter to heart and hadn''t resolved it with his son.


    So, Tu Hong and that female tiger had gone against the wishes of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe and had run off on their own. The two of them had eloped without a single care.


    When this was said, the elders couldn''t help remembering something from a long time ago.


    Since they were the elders of the White Tiger Race, this matter had also been reported to them. At that time, they had sent members of the White Tiger Race after the couple because Tu Hong was an important junior to them.


    Not only did he know secrets of the White Tiger Race as the young master of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe, he was also a seed that they could have trained for the future. So there was no way that they would allow him to escape on his own like this.


    They had worked with the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe to bring him back.


    As this thought passed through the minds of the elders, they couldn''t help feeling more and more anxious.


    After all, there had to be a reason why Lin Fan had asked about Tu Hong''s story¡­


    If their true descendant was rted to Tu Hong''s story and they were one of the causes for his tragedy¡­wouldn''t that mean that they had shot themselves in the foot by doing what they had done in the past?


    There was no pill for regret, but they without a doubt regret what they had done.


    The story continued where the two of them were able to get away from the White Tiger Race''s homeworld.


    Once they were away, they found a small to hide on and were content living a peaceful life with the two of them alone.


    Since this was a small that was on the same level of the Blue Star, they were able to reign at the top of the food chain with Tu Hong''s cultivation level. All of the inhabitants of this small left them alone since they knew that it was impossible for them to beat them.


    But there were those with ambition on that.


    It was impossible for them to defeat Tu Hong, but that didn''t mean that others couldn''t.


    The inhabitants of this minor realm contacted those of a higher realm, asking for help in defeating Tu Hong.


    They were able to find some helpers in the end, but Tu Hong was just too strong for them.


    The problem was that they recognized Tu Hong as a member of the White Tiger Race. The moment that information about a member of the White Tiger Race was spread, the attention of countless people was attracted.


    They didn''t know why there was a member of the White Tiger Race here, but not a single person was willing to let them go.


    Whether it was a member of the White Tiger Race in training or whether it was an exiled member of the White Tiger Race, people''s greed was provoked. Someone of the White Tiger Race was very valuable whether they were alive or dead.


    If he was alive, then he could be sold as a pet to one of the human realms. They would pay top dor for a living member of the White Tiger Race like this.


    If he was dead, then his body was a trove of treasures. Every single part of the corpse of a White Tiger could be used for different things.


    So everyone was determined to catch Tu Hong.


    Tu Hong also recognized the danger of this and nned on escaping, but it was too bad that there was an ambush that had beenid out for him.


    He did his best, but there were just too many people that were participating in this fight. So in the end, Tu Hong was overwhelmed and had no choice but to run.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    During this, Tu Hong was split up from his wife and he waspletely lost.


    He was only able to survive by falling into a tear in space and being transported to somewhere random.


    When Tu Hong came to, he found that he was lying in a pool of his own blood and was covered in injuries.


    It took him several months before he was able to recover, but the first thing that he did after recovering was make his way back to the minor realm that he had hid on with his wife.


    It also took him a month to get there since he had been thrown quite far away by the tear in space.


    When he arrived, he disguised himself and tried to find his wife.


    He took revenge on a few people who had called those from the upper realm, but he wasn''t able to find his wife in the end.


    So he came to the painful decision toe back to the White Tiger Race.


    He knew that it was only with the White Tiger Race''s resources that he would be able to find his wife one day. However, it was harder than it seemed to get ess to these resources.


    After all, everyone in the White Tiger Race had looked down on his wife.


    It was only when he became the young master of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe that he was able to start searching for his wife. But even now, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    There were a few things in his story that he shouldn''t have said out loud, but for some reason, he felt a bit of hopeing from Lin Fan that made him say more than he was supposed to in the end.


    After he was done, he looked at Tu Lei who looked back at him.


    After a moment of silence, Tu Lei said in a low voice, "I never thought that you would still be hung up over here. It seems like I really do need to teach you a lesson still."


    When the elders heard this, they immediately felt a chill run down their spine.


    They didn''t know if this story was really rted to the true descendant or not, but the fact that Lin Fan was interested in it was more than enough for them. Even now, they could see that he was lost in deep thought after hearing this story.


    It seemed like it had invoked some kind of idea inside of him.


    So for the sake of the true descendant, there was no need for them to hesitate.


    As soon as Tu Lei''s voice fell, before Tu Hong could even say anything, the Great Elder raised a hand. After he raised this hand, there was a powerful pressure that fell onto Tu Lei, pushing his face into the table.


    When they felt this, both Tu Hong and Tu Lei couldn''t help revealing shocked and confused looks as they couldn''t understand why the Great Elder did this. After all, back then, the elders had all supported Tu Lei in separating Tu Hong and his wife.


    Why would they suddenly do something like this?


    What hit the nail on the head was that the Great Elder then said in a threatening voice, "Shut your mouth, or I''ll shut it for you."


    As soon as Tu Lei heard this, he felt a strong chill run down his spine.


    He could tell that the Great Elder was serious and he knew that this was a dangerous situation for him.


    But Tu Lei just couldn''t back down since he felt like he had to say something. So he opened his mouth and said, "I¡­"


    Before he could say anything else, it felt like something had grabbed his mouth and had shut it.


    He could only mumble a few times, but he wasn''t able to say a single thing.


    Tu Hong looked at the Great Elder with a confused and surprised look again and what met him was the smiling face of the Great Elder and the elders. When he saw this, he couldn''t help bing even more confused.


    Just what was this situation where the Great Elders and elders were standing up for him?


    No, he knew that it had something to do with Lin Fan who was sitting there lost in thought¡­


    Could it be that¡­?

 Chapter 1063 Different Circumstances (2)

    ?


    After a long period of silence, Tu Hong suddenly asked, "Do you know what happened to my Yu''er?"


    As he asked this, his heart couldn''t help tensing as he prepared himself for the worse.


    Lin Fan had been lost in thought, but he was pulled out when he heard Tu Hong asking him this. With a bitter smile he said, "Well, it''s a long story."


    Tu Hong''s heart sank when he heard this as he knew that nothing that began like this would be a good thing.


    On the other hand, Tu Lei''s expression became better.


    If something had happened to that woman, then this would be even better for him. After all, once she was gone, there was nothing that anyone would be able to do.


    So with a deep sigh, he said, "Can you at least tell me if she''s still alive or not?"


    Lin Fan looked right at Tu Hong for a bit before slowly shaking his head.


    The moment that Tu Hong saw this, there were tears that welled in his eyes. He did his best to keep them in, but¡­there was a streak that fell down from his right eye.


    There was only silence that filled the room as no one was able to understand what the situation was. If she was dead, then could it be that this wasn''t rted to the true descendant after all?


    Could it be that this was simply a message that had been entrusted to Lin Fan instead of something important?


    Tu Hong took a while to gather himself, but then he asked, "Did she leave something behind for me?"


    Lin Fan gave a simple nod this time.


    Tu Hong took a deep breath to calm himself down before saying, "Then can you please give it to me?"


    Lin Fan didn''t act right away this time as he stared at Tu Hong.


    He could see the hurt look in his eyes, it was a feeling that he understood very well now that he too had a family of his own. If anything had happened to a member of his family, he would be in the same state as Tu Hong.


    So reaching out to pat Tu Hong on the shoulder, he called out Xiao Bai.


    When Xiao Bai appeared, he was lying on the ground wrapped up in a bundle.


    Xiao Bai had been different from the others when he received the White Tiger God Fragment''s inheritance. Instead of bing bigger like the other three had, Xiao Bai remained the same small size as before.


    Lin Fan had been confused as to why that was the case, but he figured that it was most likely because Xiao Bai was much younger than the other three. At the same time, Xiao Bai''s ancestral bloodline wasn''t fully awakened just like the rest of them.


    Because of his age, it was there, but he couldn''t use its full power yet.


    When he was called out, Xiao Bai''s head peeked out.


    Xiao Bai had been sleeping in the pet storage space before being called out by Lin Fan, so he was still half asleep when he looked up.


    Seeing all of these unfamiliar faces that were looking at him, Xiao Bai panicked a bit before he saw Lin Fan sitting there. He got up quickly and moved over to Lin Fan, sitting down on hisp before lowering his head again.


    Everyone was confused at first why Lin Fan would call out this small white tiger until Tu Hong suddenly realized something.


    Tu Hong''s face filled with shock and disbelief as he said in a stuttering voice, "Could it be¡­Could it be that he is her and my¡­child?"


    When they heard this, they all turned back to look at Xiao Bai lying there.


    As they stared at him, the expression of the elders started to change and they all quickly released their spiritual senses.


    When Xiao Bai felt these spiritual senses falling onto him, he couldn''t help shrinking into Lin Fan''s arms and trying to avoid them.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile before patting Xiao Bai''s back.


    When Xiao Bai felt this patting on his back, he rxed a bit and allowed those spiritual senses to sweep over him.


    As they swept over Xiao Bai with their spiritual senses, the expression of the elders changed even more. There wereplicated looks that also had a trace of understanding in them.


    They finally understood why Lin Fan had done everything that he had done before¡­


    Tu Hong had stood up and had slowly made his way over to Lin Fan, moving slowly since he didn''t want to scare Xiao Bai. During this entire time, his eyes had been on Xiao Bai in Lin Fan''sp.


    When he finally came close, Xiao Bai raised his head again to look at Tu Hong.


    The moment that Tu Hong saw Xiao Bai''s face, he immediately knew that this was his son.


    That face was his, but those eyes¡­they belonged to the mother, they belonged to his Yu''er.


    He was about to charge forward to take Xiao Bai in his arms, but Xiao Bai couldn''t help flinching back when he saw Tu Hong suddenly moving faster. He was scared that Tu Hong would do something to him, so he shrinked back into Lin Fan''s arms again.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    When Tu Hong saw this, it felt like his heart was being ripped apart.


    This was his child, but his child was scared of him like this¡­


    Of course, he couldn''t me Xiao Bai for any of this. It was all his fault since he wasn''t able to protect his Yu''er and his child¡­


    To the side, Tu Lei had been staring at Xiao Bai as well.


    His expression wasplicated at first since he never expected Lin Fan to bring out a grandchild out of nowhere. But when he thought about who the mother of this child was, his eyes couldn''t help slowly turning hostile.


    No matter how he looked at it, this was a smear on the face of his Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    If there wasn''t a child, then he still had a chance to marry off his son who received many engagement requests. It was that Tu Hong had rejected all of them and had been adamant on not getting married. With his position in the tribe, Tu Lei hadn''t been able to force his son to get married, but he thought that it was only a matter of time.


    So he hadn''t been rushing.


    But now that there was a grandchild that appeared out of nowhere, it would be even harder for him to aplish his goals.


    There wasn''t a single moment where he thought about epting Xiao Bai into the tribe since he still had bad feelings towards the mother. His feelings for the mother had been transferred to Xiao Bai, which made him hate this grandchild that he had met for the first time.


    There was even a part of him that thought about¡­killing Xiao Bai and hiding all of this.


    But of course, that part of him didn''t act now since there were elders here.


    But the elders weren''t fools and they could see through his thoughts based on the expressions on his face.


    So they immediately knew what he was thinking.


    They would never allow that to happen.


    There was an immense pressure that fell onto Tu Lei and he was mmed through the table, pressed down onto the ground. There wasn''t a single part of him that was able to move because he waspletely suppressed by this pressure.


    It almost felt as if this pressure was about to crush him into a pancake with how strong it was¡­


    Tu Lei felt true fear at that moment as he couldn''t understand what was happening.


    Why were the elders acting this way?


    Lin Fan saw this, but he ignored it since he could also guess what Tu Lei was thinking. He already had thoughts about taking of that Tu Leiter since he knew that he would be a threat to Xiao Bai.


    He also thought that he should take care of Tu Lei before¡­Ang found out about this.


    Xiao Bai was the one that Ang spoiled the most, so Tu Lei wouldn''tst a single second if Ang knew about this.


    But for now¡­


    Lin Fan looked down at Xiao Bai who was cowering in his arms and he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    This was one of the side effects of being pampered by Ang too much.


    Because of how protective she was, he hadn''t been able to train him just like the other pets. He hadn''t been able to take him to the cultivation realms and let him die over and over again fighting different demon beasts.


    So Xiao Bai''s mentality was a bit weakerpared to the others.


    Xiao Bai was more of a cowardpared to others.


    He was easily scared by things that the others would be able to easily face with confidence.


    Lin Fan patted Xiao Bai on the back and in response, Xiao Bai slowly peeked his head out.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan said, "Xiao Bai,e and meet your father."


    Xiao Bai tilted his head in a confused manner before saying, "Dad, aren''t you my dad?"


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile before saying, "I''m your dad, but I''m talking about your birth father."


    Xiao Bai revealed a distressed look when he heard this as he asked, "Dad, do you not want me anymore?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before saying in aforting voice, "It''s not that at all. I just want you to meet your birth father since it''s your right, but I''ll always be your dad."


    Xiao Bai couldn''t help revealing a happy smile when he heard this before turning to look at Tu Hong who stood there with aplicated look.

 Chapter 1064 Different Circumstances (3)

    ?


    When Tu Hong saw Xiao Bai looking at him like this, he wanted to say something.


    But he found that even though he opened his mouth, the words just wouldn''te out.


    When he saw how Xiao Bai and Lin Fan had acted, he felt that they were more like father and son than he was with Xiao Bai. He felt disappointment and a bit of jealousy towards Lin Fan when he saw this.


    However, in the end, there was no resentment at all and there was even a bit of silent eptance when he saw this.


    After all, he couldn''t me anyone that the situation was like this.


    It was his own fault for not being able to protect his wife and his unborn child back then.


    He was the one that had caused this entire problem by being useless.


    There was no excuse for his behaviour and the only thing that he could do was ask for forgiveness for his uselessness, but to ask his child something like this¡­It wasn''t hard because he was thinking of his pride, rather he didn''t want to put this on Xiao Bai.


    Instead of thinking for himself, he was thinking what kind of effect this would have on Xiao Bai.


    Even though he had just learned that he had a child, he was already thinking on his behalf as a parent.


    To a certain extent, this kind of thinking was admirable.


    It was just too bad that his cowardicepletely outssed that, so there wasn''t any sympathy or admiration that was earned from this.


    When Lin Fan saw how afraid and how much he was hesitating, he couldn''t help giving a sigh and shaking his head. He was filled with a bit of disappointment towards Tu Hong since he never thought that he would be this much of a coward.


    Since Tu Hong wouldn''t take the first step, the only other choice was to have Xiao Bai take the first step.


    Lin Fan looked down at Xiao Bai and said, "Why don''t you introduce yourself?"


    Xiao Bai revealed a bit of fear in his eyes when he heard this, but seeing the encouraging way that Lin Fan looked at him, he gave a nod in the end.


    Xiao Bai came out of Lin Fan''s arms and jumped down onto the ground.


    When hended, there was a puff of smoke before Xiao Bai suddenly changed into human form. There wasn''t a puff of smoke whenever the other pets took human form, but there was one when Xiao Bai changed into a human.


    That was because of the transforming scenes in the shows that Momonga had been showing him.


    In a way, Momonga had also been a bad influence on him¡­


    When this cute little boy appeared, everyone''s hearts couldn''t help melting from his tiny stature, his big wide eyes, and his fair skin. The only part that didn''t seem like the features of a little boy was the white hair that was on his head.


    This was white hair that had brown stripes in them, the only part of him that gave a resemnce to the fierce White Tiger Race. The rest of Xiao Bai just looked like a little cute boy.


    When Tu Hong saw him though, his eyes couldn''t help trembling.


    That was because all he could see in Xiao Bai was¡­his Yu''er.


    Seeing him like this, all kinds of memories appeared in his mind and he couldn''t help staring off into space.


    Xiao Bai walked over to Tu Hong while he was like this and said in a clear, but shaky voice, "My name is Xiao Bai, what''s your name?"


    Ang who was watching on the side couldn''t help shaking when she saw this.


    With the look that she had on her face, it looked like she wanted to run out and hug Xiao Bai. It looked like she wanted to shower him with praise, but she held herself back in the end.


    Since she knew that this was an important moment for Xiao Bai and it was not her ce to interfere.


    When Xiao Bai spoke to him, Tu Hong was pulled out of his daze and he looked down at the little figure in front of him. He could see a bit of a trembleing from that small figure which tugged on his heartstrings.


    But he calmed himself down and said with a faint smile, "My name is Tu Hong, but you can call me¡­"


    He couldn''t bring himself to say the final word because¡­he didn''t feel like he deserved to say it.


    Xiao Bai couldn''t help tilting his head and looking at Tu Hong with a confused look when he heard this. He felt like there was something off about Tu Hong, but he couldn''t tell what it was.


    In the end, Xiao Bai reached his hand out and patted Tu Hong''s leg as he said, "Uncle, don''t be sad."<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    Tu Hong was taken aback when he heard this and his heart felt like it was being ripped apart.


    Being called ''uncle'' by his son like this really was a powerful blow to his heart¡­


    But at the same time, he couldn''t help being proud of his son for being a kind and caring person. It seemed like the person who had been taking care of him the entire time had taught him properly and took good care of him.


    He looked over at Lin Fan and revealed a grateful look.


    Lin Fan just revealed a faint smile before looking over at Ang.


    Seeing this, Tu Hong also looked over at Ang and gave her a grateful look.


    However, he found that Ang was currently ring at him and it was clear that she had hostility in her eyes.


    He didn''t understand why she was looking at him like this, but there was nothing he could do if she did this.


    So he turned back to Xiao Bai and said, "Un, thank you."


    Xiao Bai revealed a wide smile before running back to Lin Fan. He looked up at him as if he was looking for praise from him.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a bitterugh deep down, but he revealed a faint smile and patted Xiao Bai on the head before lifting him up again.


    There was a moment of silence that followed before Tu Hong looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Can you please tell me what my Yu''er''s final moments were like?"


    Lin Fan was surprised that Tu Hong would ask something like this, but he gave a nod and told him the story of how he had met Xiao Bai.


    By the end of the story, Tu Hong''s face was as cold as stone, but his eyes revealed everything. The pain, the me, the hatred, all of the different emotions in his eyes made it very clear what he was thinking.


    He took a long time to calm down before saying, "Thank you for taking care of Xiao Bai and for taking revenge on my Yu''er and our other children."


    Lin Fan gave a nod of affirmation when he heard this.


    After this, there wasn''t much else that needed to be discussed since he had already told Tu Hong everything that he knew. As for what had happened to Xiao Bai''s mother before the Inheritance Realm, that wasn''t something that he knew.


    So he finally turned his attention to the elders who had been patiently waiting.


    Seeing that it was finally their turn, they immediately went over and tried to appeal to Xiao Bai in their own way.


    The moment that their spiritual senses had swept over Xiao Bai, they had already figured out that he was the true descendant. Even if the bloodline was a bit weak right now, they knew that he possessed the ancestral bloodline and it would awaken in time.


    So they wanted to find a way to tie him to the White Tiger Race while they still could.


    After all, they knew that Xiao Bai would keep traveling with Lin Fan.


    That was what had been written in the prophecy left behind by their ancestor and they didn''t n on going against that.


    But there was still plenty that they had to give Xiao Bai before he left.


    When the elders of the other three sacred beast races saw this, they couldn''t help revealing bitter smiles since they had gone through the same thing. But they knew that it was impossible for Lin Fan to stay here, so they would be disappointed in the end, just like they had been.


    In the end, all they did was scare Xiao Bai back into Lin Fan''s arms when they surrounded him like this.


    They did their best to try to cheer Xiao Bai up and get him to trust them, but a bunch of old men naturally found it hard to entertain a kid like this.


    So the elders had no choice but to move back with disappointed looks on their faces.


    Tu Hong, who had been silently watching all of this happen, suddenly stood up.


    Everyone in the room couldn''t help looking at him with a strange and confused look, as they wondered what he was nning on doing.


    Tu Hong looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Can I ask you to take care of Xiao Bai for me?"


    Lin Fan was surprised, but he said with a nod, "Xiao Bai is like my child, I''ll take care of him no matter what."


    Tu Hong gave a satisfied nod before saying, "I''ll be leaving the White Tiger Race for a bit. There is something that I need to take care of."

 Chapter 1065 Different Circumstances (4)

    ?


    When he heard this, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    Tu Hong didn''t react to this and just calmly looked at Lin Fan with the same determined look.


    It was clear that he had already made up his mind that he would be leaving the Tiger Race forever and it didn''t seem like anything that he thought Lin Fan might say would change his mind.


    But Lin Fan didn''t agree with his idea.


    That was because he knew¡­that he was being a coward.


    Lin Fan didn''t ept this kind of school of thought from Tu Hong, so he wouldn''t let him go through with it.


    So Lin Fan shook his head and simply said, "No."


    Tu Hong couldn''t help revealing a shocked look when he heard this before he stammered, "No? What, what do you, you mean by that? You''re saying that you won''t take care of Xiao Bai?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before saying, "That''s not what I''m saying. I''m saying that I don''t ept you leaving the White Tiger Race."


    Tu Hong couldn''t help being even more taken aback when he heard this.


    He never would have thought that this was the reason why Lin Fan would deny his request.


    At the same time, he couldn''t understand why Lin Fan would say something like this.


    Since he had been the one that had saved Xiao Bai, he should have also felt some kind of hostility towards the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe, if not the entire White Tiger Race. He should have been the only one that would have supported him in this decision since he knew how he felt.


    So why had he said no?


    Tu Hong was about to say something to try to convince Lin Fan, but Lin Fan spoke first.


    "You are a coward."


    When Tu Hong said this, his mouth couldn''t help dropping in shock as he looked at Lin Fan in disbelief. There wasn''t a single trace of understanding in his eyes as he had no idea what Lin Fan was saying.


    Coward?


    How was he a coward?


    Tu Hong just kept looking at Lin Fan with the sameplicated and confused look, trying to figure out exactly what Lin Fan meant. But in the end, he wasn''t able to understand at all.


    So he said, "How am I a coward?"


    Lin Fan calmly looked at him and said, "You aren''t taking responsibility and instead are running away from it. If you don''t call that being a coward, what would you call it?"


    "Running from my responsibilities?" Tu Hong repeated in a slow voice before shouting, "Who''s running from their responsibilities? I am going to find my wife and repent, if anything, that is taking responsibility for my past mistakes!"


    Lin Fan didn''t mind his sudden outburst and just calmly looked at him as he said, "Then what about your current responsibilities? What about Xiao Bai?"


    The moment that he said this, Tu Hong''s expression copsed.


    The rage and anger that he felt because of Lin Fan''s wordspletely disappeared and he calmed down. He looked over at Xiao Bai who had hidden behind Lin Fan after his sudden outburst and he was filled with shame.


    That was because he knew¡­Lin Fan was right.


    He was saying that he was taking responsibility, but in truth, he was just trying to run from his responsibilities as a father.


    He had failed as a husband and he was afraid of failing as a father, not to mention that there was already someone else who would be able to take his ce as Xiao Bai''s father. So he wanted to run and avoid taking responsibility for his child, leaving it to someone else to take care of.


    So Lin Fan was right to call him a coward because that was what he was.


    But he really didn''t know what to do when it came to Xiao Bai.


    The guilt that he felt towards Yu''er and his other children that had already died, that was not something that could be erased.


    So whenever he approached Xiao Bai, he would always be restrained by that guilt.


    Whenever he saw Xiao Bai, all he could think of was how he had let down his wife and his other children.


    It was that that filled him with fear¡­


    There was an awkward silence that filled the room after they heard this.


    All of the elders watched this withplicated looks because they all had been in this situation before. Even if they were elders, that didn''t mean that they didn''t have families.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    They had all been in the same position as Tu Hong at one time.


    They had been in his shoes as a new father, so they knew what kind of fear he was facing.


    But at the same time, they couldn''t help looking down on him for the way that he had been acting.


    All of them had ovee their fears in the end and had acted as proper fathers to their children. If any of them had done less than that, they would have looked down on themselves as men.


    Even Tu Lei sympathized with Tu Hong at this moment because he had been in his shoes when he was faced with¡­Tu Hong.


    He was a father just like him and he had wanted to do the best for Tu Hong, even if that meant things had turned out a bit wrong.


    After that long silence, Tu Hong still said, "I¡­I can''t. I bear too many sins to be a good father."


    There were traces of disdain that appeared in the eyes of all the elders that were in this room, but not a single one of them said a thing as they turned to look at Lin Fan. They hadn''t been curious about it before, but they were wondering just how mature this young man was now¡­


    He had hit the crux of this matter before any of them and had spoken in a manner that made it clear that he understood the struggles of being a father.


    But there was still just how young he was.


    They wanted to know just what kind of experience he had before.


    Lin Fan looked right at Tu Hong and said, "There''s no such thing as being a good father."


    When everyone heard this, they couldn''t help being taken aback again.


    Even the elders who had been parents before couldn''t understand where Lin Fan was going with this.


    Lin Fan ignored all of this as he continued, "One is a father whether they want to be one or not. It all depends on whether you want to be that father or if you''re too scared to be one."


    When the elders heard this, they couldn''t help giving a nod of approval.


    They were confused about what Lin Fan said at first, but then they understood that he was thinking much deeper than just being a good parent.


    After all, sometimes one couldn''t choose to be a parent and it just happened. At that time, it depended on if one was able to step up or not, it wasn''t about if they were good at it or not.


    Tu Hong suddenly broke out inughter when he heard this before saying, "That''s right, I''m not man enough to be a father." As hisugh continued, there was a bitter tone that filled thatughter, making it seem like he wasughing at himself.


    Lin Fan once again shook his head and said, "It''s not about whether you''re a man or not, you just haven''t given yourself the right to be one."


    "Right?" Tu Hong asked in a confused voice.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "You have to remember that a child isn''t a toy or a possession, it''s an actual living being. So you have to ask yourself if you have the right to love them as another person, because that is what they are." After a pause, Lin Fan added, "And you haven''t given yourself that right yet."


    Tu Hong''s body trembled the moment that he heard this.


    The right to love another person¡­


    That was right, at the very crux of it all, that was what being a parent was.


    He hadn''t given himself that right because he didn''t feel like he deserved that right¡­


    But had he ever thought about how Xiao Bai felt?


    Tu Hong couldn''t help looking down at Xiao Bai who had been peeking out from behind Lin Fan''s leg to look at him.


    Xiao Bai might be a child, but when they made it this clear with what they had said, he could understand that this person in front of him was his father. While he didn''t know anything about this birth father of his, he was still curious about him since he was his father.


    When Tu Hong looked at Xiao Bai like this, he realized that he had been nothing but selfish.


    This just made him hate himself even more.


    He really wanted to smash his head into a wall and end it all when he saw the way that Xiao Bai looked at him, but he took a deep breath before revealing a calm look.


    He slowly walked over to where Lin Fan was before bending down.


    When Xiao Bai saw this, he couldn''t help taking a wary step back at first, but then he took another step forward to cancel that out.


    Tu Hong came down until he was at eye level with Xiao Bai before reaching out his hand and saying, "Xiao Bai, I am a terrible father, but can you at least give me the right to love you?"

 Chapter 1066 Changes

    ?


    Xiao Bai peeked his head out to look at Tu Hong.


    He didn''t really understand what Tu Hong was saying, but seeing the look on his face, he couldn''t help feeling sad.


    He didn''t know why he felt sad, but he just didn''t want Tu Hong to look this way.


    So Xiao Bai slowly came out from behind Lin Fan''s leg and walked over to Tu Hong in front of him. He slowly reached his hand out before patting Tu Hong''s arm and saying, "Don''t feel sad, Xiao Bai will make it better."


    Tu Hong looked at Xiao Bai and said again, "Xiao Bai, can you give me the right to love you?"


    Xiao Bai looked back at Tu Hong, not knowing what to say. But there was something inside of him that was telling him to do something¡­


    So Xiao Bai gave a nod in the end.


    When Tu Hong saw this, his heart suddenly filled with joy and he couldn''t control himself as he charged forward to take Xiao Bai in his arms.


    Xiao Bai wasn''t able to react since he had been caught off guard, but then when he entered Tu Hong''s embrace¡­he felt that there was something strange about it. There was a feeling that filled him that made him not want to break out of this embrace.


    So Xiao Bai reached his hands out to hug Tu Hong back and then nuzzled his head in his chest.


    The father and son had finally reunited in their first hug.


    Everyone just watched on in silence as the two of them hugged each other like that.


    Finally after a long while, the two of them separated from each other and Tu Hong looked down at Xiao Bai to say, "I won''t leave you again."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this because he knew that Tu Hong would have to leave him again when he went to the ck Tortoise Race. Still, he felt that it was better not to say anything at this moment.


    Xiao Bai patted Tu Hong on the shoulder, "I''m d you''re feeling better, uncle."


    Then without even waiting for Tu Hong to say anything, he turned back to walk in front of Lin Fan. He raised his arms out as if he was asking to be picked up and Lin Fan picked him up in the end.


    Tu Hong revealed a bitter smile, but he knew that this didn''t matter.


    While he said that he would never leave him, he knew that it was impossible for him to have a proper father and son rtionship with him. He knew that Xiao Bai was someone who was destined to go with Lin Fan and fulfill the prophecy of their White Tiger Race.


    So he never nned on keeping Xiao Bai by his side in the first ce.


    When he said that he would never leave him, he meant that as more figurative as he would never stop loving him.


    Tu Hong also went over to Lin Fan''s side and watched over Xiao Bai without saying a word.


    Lin Fan felt awkward having a handsome young man like Tu Hong by his side, staring at him¡­well, Xiao Bai in his arms like this, so he didn''t waste any more time here and decided to head back to the elders hall.


    After all, there was still something that he wanted from the elders.


    When he turned to leave, the elderspletely ignored Tu Lei who had been forgotten and just left the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    Tu Hong took a step forward as if he was about to follow them, but he stopped himself in the end since he knew that there was still something else for him to do here. He knew that his father would want to do things to Xiao Bai, so he had to take care of matters in the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe first.


    Only then would he be able to protect his son.


    A reunion between a father and son sparked another fight between another pair of father and son.


    But this fight wouldn''tst as long as one would expect.


    That was because as they were heading back to the elder hall, Lin Fan casually said to the Great Elder, "I think that it''s time for the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe head to pass on his title. Don''t you think the same?"


    The Great Elder was surprised that Lin Fan would give this suggestion, but he quickly gave a nod in response.


    When they had been with Tu Lei earlier, they hadn''t missed the look in his eyes as he stared at Xiao Bai.


    They could already guess what Tu Lei was nning to do and they wouldn''t let anyone touch a single hair on Xiao Bai''s head while they were around.


    So they already hade up with ns to take care of Tu Lei.


    The only problem was that Tu Lei was technically Xiao Bai''s grandfather even if they didn''t have a harmonious rtionship. If they were to take care of Tu Lei on their own without telling Lin Fan or Xiao Bai anything, there was the risk of hurting their rtionship in the end.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    So they had been hesitating on whether to take care of Tu Lei or not.


    But since Lin Fan had brought up this issue first, there was nothing left for them to worry about.


    After all, this was tacit agreement from Lin Fan to take care of Tu Lei.


    As for who the next tribe head would be, naturally the best choice was Tu Hong who was the son of Tu Lei, the young master of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe, and the father of Xiao Bai.


    Tu Hong who was already nning on taking care of his father didn''t even know that there was a powerful ally that had been prepared for him.


    Seeing this nod, Lin Fan just calmly said, "I''ll leave it to you."


    The Great Elder gave another nod in response.


    When they arrived back at the elder hall, the first thing that happened was that a wave of spiritual senses hit Lin Fan. Though the target that they were aiming at was Xiao Bai in Lin Fan''s arms and not Lin Fan himself.


    Xiao Bai once again panicked when he felt all these spiritual senses falling onto him, but Lin Fan patted his back to calm him down again. Only after patting him a few times did Xiao Bai settle and let the spiritual senses sweep over him.


    The expressions of the elders who had remained in the hall quickly changed as their spiritual senses swept over Xiao Bai.


    This was the same sequence of expressions that the elders who had gone to the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe had when they first saw Xiao Bai as well.


    Once they were done, all of the elders and the other Great Elder looked at Lin Fan with bitter smiles. There was a hint of me in these smiles, but that was just it, just a hint of me.


    They could understand why Lin Fan had done what he had done, especially since they knew what happened at the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    The moment that everything had been revealed, the Great Elder had already sent one of the elite guards back so that they could tell the rest of the elders. So the elders all knew about Xiao Bai''s past¡­


    Because of this, there were a few elders who had apprehensive looks.


    That was because they were the ones who had gone along with the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe in tracking down Tu Hong in the past.


    It could be said that they were the ones that were responsible for most of what happened to Xiao Bai''s family.


    After all, if it wasn''t for the intervention of the elders, Tu Lei never would have been able to push Tu Hong that far with just the power of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe.


    It was only when the full might of the White Tiger Race was brought in that the situation had developed this way.


    So they were afraid that it would be impossible for them to reconcile with the true descendant.


    But to all of their surprise, Lin Fan didn''t bring up this matter at all.


    Instead, he asked, "Do you know where the White Tiger Stone is?"


    All of them had been expecting Lin Fan or at least Xiao Bai to question them about the matters of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe, but he didn''t seem interested in it at all.


    Still, the elders couldn''t just let it go.


    They were afraid that if they left it and let it sit, it woulde back to bite them in the butt.


    So the Great Elder asked, "About the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand to cut him off before saying, "I''ve already discussed this matter with the other Great Elder. There''s no need to mention this matter anymore."


    The Great Elder turned to look at the Great Elder who had gone with Lin Fan and he gave a nod in response to confirm what Lin Fan said.


    So while the Great Elder didn''t know what arrangement they had reached, he still felt a bit of relief from this.


    Since that was what Lin Fan wanted, they wouldn''t mention this matter anymore.


    They would get the information that they wanted from the Great Elderter.


    With this settled, the Great Elders quickly arranged for someone to bring the White Tiger Stone over.

 Chapter 1067 New Stone

    ?


    The White Tiger Stone didn''t take long to arrive.


    Unlike at the Phoenix Race and the Qilin Race, the tribe that kept the White Tiger Stone quickly sent it over when the elders sent someone to retrieve it.


    There wasn''t a jealous ex or some other problem that hadplicated this process.


    When it came, it was brought over to Lin Fan to see what he would do with it.


    Lin Fan picked up the White Tiger Stone and felt the same feeling from it as the other stones that he had received.


    He held this White Tiger Stone in his hand for a bit before taking out another stone.


    This was a stone that looked simr in shape and size to the White Tiger Stone, but the difference was that it had a different colour. It was actually a mix of three different colours on this stone.


    The azure from the Dragon Stone, the red from the Phoenix Stone, and the purple from the Qilin Stone.


    This was the stone that had been formed when those three hadbined.


    It still gave off the same feeling as the three separate stones even though it was abination of all three.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what would happen when all five stones came together as one, but he didn''t feel like the god fragments would mislead him. There must be something that had been left behind for him by the one that had created these stones.


    So he brought the White Tiger Stone over to the mixed stone.


    Just like before, there was the same reaction where there was an attractive force between the two stones. It didn''t take long before they suddenly came together and fused as one.


    But the moment that the White Tiger Stone fused with the mixed stone, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because the feeling that came from the mixed stone hadpletely changed.


    It was no longer the same feeling that it gave off when it was still the individual stones, but rather a much stronger feeling. However, Lin Fan could still feel the traces of the voidwing from the stone.


    This stone had transformed into something that waspletely different. It was now a stronger version of what the stones had been on their own and the voidws that it released was much clearer that Lin Fan could feel a resonance with them.


    But at the same time, he could tell that these voidws were much stronger than his own.


    If he had to guess what this was, this came from a more developed version of the Void Physique, so it should be the more advanced version of his own voidws that would have developed over time.


    Sensing this, he started analyzing them as he tried to figure out how to develop his own voidws, but he found that he wasn''t able to synchronize with the voidws in the stone at all. It was at just too high of a level for him to decipher.


    But as he tried deciphering it, there were parts of it that he drew inspiration from and was able to improve his own voidws.


    During all of this, the various elders of the five sacred beast races were all looking carefully at the stone.


    The moment that the stone had changed, all of them had noticed the change with the stone.


    This was a feeling that triggered them to their core as they wanted to use this stone, but they held back in the end since they had already felt this feeling from the stone before. It was just that this time, it was much stronger than anything that they had felt before.


    They didn''t know what had happened, but they had a guess¡­


    Since their ancestors had told them to leave this stone to the Void God''s sessor, they would do that regardless of how they felt.


    But before they dropped this, they had to remind Lin Fan of something.


    So one of the Great Elders said, "Void God''s sessor, even if we are able to restrain ourselves in front of this stone, there will be those that won''t be able to restrain themselves. Those that have weaker cultivations and weaker wills will not be able to stop themselves from trying to take this stone from you by any means."


    Lin Fan had been focused on the stone when he heard this, but he still turned back to give a nod in response to this.


    But then, he waved his hand at the Great Elder as if he was asking him toe over.


    The Great Elder was surprised to see this, but he still went over as Lin Fan requested.


    When the Great Elder was standing there in front of him with a confused look, Lin Fan suddenly brought the stone in his hand closer.


    The Great Elder was caught off guard by this, but he didn''t resist.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    When the stone was brought to the Great Elder''s arm and ced on it, the Great Elder found¡­that there wasn''t the feeling that he had expected toe from it. Instead, there was no feeling at all as if the voidws weren''t interacting with him at all.


    But he could feel that there were indeed voidws that were inside of this stone¡­


    So what was going on?


    Could it be that something was broken with this new stone?


    The Great Elder took the stone from Lin Fan''s hand and grasped it tight in his hand, as if he was trying to activate it. Seeing that nothing happened, the Great Elder tried all kinds of different things with the stone.


    He tried injecting his life energy in, he tried putting it on different spots of his body, he tried all kinds of strange things as he tried to get this stone to activate.


    But no matter what he did, he didn''t feel a single thing from the stone.


    It was as if it had beenpletely broken.


    Seeing the way that he acted, the other elders couldn''t help looking closer and using their spiritual senses to sweep the stone itself. But the moment that their spiritual senses even came close to the stone, they were sucked in by the voidws.


    At the very least, they were certain that there were still voidws that were inside of this stone¡­


    But it no longer did what it had done before¡­


    Finally, the Great Elder couldn''t help giving up and turning back to look at Lin Fan, hoping that he would have some exnation for this.


    Lin Fan said, "It''s been transformed. There might still be voidws inside of this stone, but the voidws have be a different kind from the ones used to drain impurities from bloodlines."


    After he said this, all of them turned to look at the stone again.


    None of them doubted the words that he said since they could all feel the voidws that wereing from this stone. But in that case, why would the ancestors leave such a thing for them?


    They knew that all five sacred beast races had been instructed to give their race''s stone to the Void God''s sessor. Now that they knew that these stones wouldbine when brought together like this, they knew that this was what the ancestors had nned all along.


    But why would they do that?


    The stones had been the treasures of their races and had been the things that they had relied on to purify their bloodlines for each generation. So why would the ancestors leave them something that would go against that when they werebined?


    Were they giving up on them or¡­was there a different reason?


    Lin Fan had actually already thought of the reason and hadn''t said it out loud since he knew that it would bring trouble to him.


    The very simple reason was that there was no need for these stones once they had found the Void God''s sessor.


    The Void God''s sessor would be able to do everything that the stones had been able to do and would be able to do it at a better level than the stones. So that was most likely the reason why the stones lost this power once they werebined.


    Lin Fan even had a theory in his mind.


    The stones had actually been something that the Void God had left behind for their sessor, but they altered the stones when they were passed down to the five sacred beast races. It was most likely at the request of the five sacred beast races'' gods.


    They wanted these things to help purify the bloodline of their descendants so that a true descendant would appear sooner.


    Since the Void God knew that their sessor would need the help of these true descendants, they decided to go along with the n of the five sacred beast races'' gods.


    Then when the Void God''s sessor was found, they wouldbine the stone and it would lose that power, turning into the real item left by the Void God for their sessor.


    But Lin Fan didn''t tell them this theory since¡­the moment that he did, he was certain that he would be bombarded by requests to help purify the bloodlines of descendants of the five sacred beast races.


    This would mean having to train and beat up all those different juniors, it would take up a lot of his time that he didn''t have.


    And with the help that he had received from the five sacred beast races, it would be hard for him to reject.


    So he decided to keep this to himself.


    At the same time though, Lin Fan couldn''t help looking forward to what the stone would transform into once he got the final ck Tortoise Stone.

 Chapter 1068 Black Tortoise Race

    ?


    Since that matter had been settled, it was now time to deal with the final problem that Lin Fan had had doubts about the entire time.


    The ck Tortoise Race¡­


    This was the only race that he hadn''t made a contract with a pet that had the ancestral bloodline.


    So he didn''t know what would happen if he went to the ck Tortoise Race now.


    But it was also thest ce that he had to go, so he didn''t want to leave it forter.


    He wanted to figure out the mystery of thebined stone.


    Though the other problem that he had was that he knew that the ck Tortoise Race wouldn''t give him the stone since he didn''t have a pet with the ancestral bloodline.


    After being with the elders of the Dragon Race, the Phoenix Race, and the Qilin Race for a bit, he had learned something from them. They had told him that if it wasn''t for him bringing the true descendant back to their races, they wouldn''t have given him the Dragon Stone, the Phoenix Stone, and the Qilin Stone.


    While he hadn''t asked the elders of the White Tiger Race about this yet, he was sure that it would be the same.


    But just to make sure.


    Lin Fan suddenly asked the White Tiger Race''s Great Elders, "If I didn''te with Xiao Bai, would you still have given me this White Tiger Stone?"


    When the Great Elders heard this, they couldn''t help revealing an awkward look.


    It was the same for all of the elders around them who had heard this.


    After a long period of silence, the two Great Elders gave honest nods in response to this question.


    Lin Fan had already guessed that this was the case, but having this confirmed did make it worse¡­


    So he guessed that if he went to the ck Tortoise Race now, all he would do wase back empty handed¡­Unless he was able to find a pet with the ck Tortoise ancestral bloodline.


    However, that was something that was close to impossible.


    After all, this was a bloodline that hadn''t appeared in billions of years since the ancestors of the five sacred beast races.


    If it hadn''t been for the system, Lin Fan wouldn''t have even been able to get the four that he already had. So it was impossible for him to find one out in the wild.


    Lin Fan did already have temporary contracts with members of the ck Tortoise Race, but to train them up now¡­was not an easy thing. There was no way that he would have the time for that.


    So in the end, there really was no other option for him¡­


    The only thing that he could do now was go to the ck Tortoise Race and hope that they would give him what he wanted.


    As for his optimism towards that¡­it was in the pit.


    He knew that the chances were basically zero, but he still had to take this chance.


    As for his best chance of sess, that would all depend on the support of the four other tribes.


    Since he had already made the connection with the four other races, he would use this connection to help him with the ck Tortoise Race.


    Once all of the elders had finished checking the stone, Lin Fan changed the subject by saying, "I''m going to the ck Tortoise Race, can you prepare a transport for me?"


    When the elders of the White Tiger Race heard this, they all revealed bitter and shocked looks.


    After all, their true descendant had just returned to the tribe and there were still things that they needed to pass down to them. At the same time, they had wanted to introduce the true descendant to a few people.


    Unlike the case with the Dragon Race, the Phoenix Race, and the Qilin Race, there wasn''t someone that was engaged to Xiao Bai who could bind him to the White Tiger Race.


    So the elders had wanted to find someone for Xiao Bai.


    They wanted to lock him down before he could leave the White Tiger Race so that he would be bound to them regardless of where he was.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t giving them that chance.


    When the elders from the three other races saw this, they all revealed bitter smiles since they were familiar with this.


    This was something that they had also experienced when Lin Fan had been at their races. It was just that they had a better situation since Lin Fan had also shown them that Xiao Huo, Xiao Feng, and Xiao Lei were all engaged to members of their respective races.


    So now the elders had to find a way to keep them here¡­


    None of the elders replied when Lin Fan asked this question as they all looked at each other with bitter looks.


    But while they were like this, their brains were turning to see if they could find some kind of solution for this problem.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    Lin Fan could see what they were thinking, so he said, "If possible, I would like to leave as soon as possible. There''s only the ck Tortoise Race left to visit, so I want to see if there will be anything that changes when I arrive."


    This was a subtle way of bringing back the prophecy that their ancestors had left behind to put pressure on them.


    After all, they didn''t know how to fulfill it, but they knew that the Void God''s sessor had to meet all of the five sacred beast races.


    The sooner that he met them, the sooner that this prophecy mighte true.


    So they had even less reason to deny him.


    Finally, one of the Great Elders suddenly said, "What about Xiao Bai''s mother? I''m sure that she had a tribe, shouldn''t we let Xiao Bai meet them first?"


    As soon as he said this, all of the elders started agreeing to this.


    They knew that this was one of the few straws that they could grasp at to get Xiao Bai and Lin Fan to stay at their White Tiger Race, so they didn''t hesitate to grab at it.


    It was just too bad¡­that their information wascking.


    "Xiao Bai''s mother was born in the wild and didn''t have a tribe. Her parents were killed in a territory battle, so she wandered around until she met Xiao Bai''s father." Lin Fan said in a deadpan voice.


    The moment that they heard this, all of them couldn''t help revealing awkward expressions.


    They also turned to peek at Xiao Bai who was sitting there, but it seemed like Xiao Bai didn''t understand what they were talking about. Instead, Xiao Bai had his eyes closed and was nuzzling up against Ang''s chest, almost as if he was asleep.


    Seeing this, they couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.


    If they had identally hurt Xiao Bai because of this, it would just make their position worse.


    After all, they didn''t know a single thing about Xiao Bai other than his connection to Tu Hong.


    They had sent people to investigate, but these were details about someone that they had never heard of before in the White Tiger Race. They had to send people out further to investigate the background of Xiao Bai''s parents.


    It was just too bad that they never expected something this tragic to happen.


    At the same time, they all couldn''t help ming Tu Lei for all of this. If it hadn''t been for Tu Lei spurring all of them on in the past, they wouldn''t have lost this true descendant in the first ce.


    He would have been safely cared for in the White Tiger Race, waiting for Lin Fan''s arrival.


    But now¡­they had to deal with this troublesome situation.


    The elders all came to a decision.


    When they removed Tu Lei from his position as the head of the Brown Stripe White Tiger Tribe in the future, they would be more ruthless¡­


    So with no other straws to grasp at, the Great Elder had no choice but to say in a defeated voice, "Just give us a week, we need that much time to prepare the ships."


    Lin Fan shook his head and said in a firm voice, "Three days."


    All of the elders revealed ugly expressions when they heard this.


    They could tell from Lin Fan''s voice that he wouldn''t change his mind on this, but¡­three days was just too short.


    So the Great Elders put down their face and asked, "Three days is just too short of a time, we need a bit more¡­"


    Lin Fan looked at them before saying, "Four days and no more."


    When the elders heard this, they all revealed bitter smiles. However, a single day was still a day more and it could be considered a win.


    As for the elders of the other races, they couldn''t help revealing looks of shock.


    They had asked the same thing, but Lin Fan had denied it and firmly insisted on three days.


    So why had he changed his mind now?


    That was because the situation was different this time.


    Before, the ones that were connected to the three races had already been there before and had left on their own ord.


    Since that was the case, there was no need for Lin Fan to be considerate.


    But in Xiao Bai''s case, this was his first time at the White Tiger Race and his first time meeting his father, so Lin Fan felt that he should give him an extra day.


    That was the least he could do.

 Chapter 1069 Black Tortoise God Fragment (1)

    ?


    Over the next few days, it was quite chaotic.


    During this time, the elders of the White Tiger Race arranged many meetings between Xiao Bai and members of the White Tiger Race.


    As for who Xiao Bai met¡­they were all little girls that were around the same age as him.


    All of them were dressed up as prettily as they could and they did their best to coax Xiao Bai out, but¡­Xiao Bai just refused to leave Ang''s embrace when meeting them. He hid himself in her arms and didn''t even meet with these girls who did their best to talk to him.


    At the same time, Ang did what she could to keep off these girls.


    She kept asking these girls questions that they found hard to answer, just like a fierce mother inw.


    Or at least that was what Lin Fan thought.


    He would naturally not dare to say this out loud since he didn''t have a death wish.


    Eventually, all of the girls were driven away to the dismay of the White Tiger Race elders.


    They would have gathered even more, but there was no time. They also had other things that they wanted to pass down to Xiao Bai and they had limited time.


    So they could only give up and pass down the inheritance left behind by the ancestor for Xiao Bai.


    This took two days and by the end of it, the aura around Xiao Bai waspletely different.


    As for his personality¡­


    It was still the same as before.


    Even if his power and aura changed, Xiao Bai was still the same scaredy cat as before.


    In fact, after receiving the inheritance, he seemed like he was even worse.


    The moment that he saw Ang and Lin Fan, he immediately ran over and jumped into their arms.


    When the elders tried to approach, he just looked at them with an aggrieved look like he had been wronged by them. This caused Ang to re at the elders and scare them off.


    The elders weren''t actually scared of Ang''s power, but the look that she gave them¡­It scared them.


    They knew that there was nothing scarier than a mother protecting their child and Ang had shown more than enough to show that she considered herself Xiao Bai''s mother.


    So they didn''t dare provoke her.


    It was the day that they were going to head to the ck Tortoise Race and there were many that came to send them off.


    But most of them were just there to escort their daughters.


    After all, this was the final chance to make an impression on Xiao Bai, so they all wanted this chance. But not a single one of them was able to even approach Xiao Bai with the barrier that was Ang.


    Xiao Bai in the first ce wasn''t interested in them, so they didn''t have a chance, but it was made even worse with Ang there.


    To try and prevent Ang from doing anything, the White Tiger Race elders had even summoned more girls than before.


    They no longer focused on just the prominent daughters from the various tribes and even calledmon girls of the White Tiger Race. They were desperate, not caring which girl did it, as long as there was a girl that was able to bind Xiao Bai to the White Tiger Race.


    It was just too bad that not a single girl was able to seed in the end.


    So the White Tiger Race elders could only watch on with looks of dismay and disappointment as every girl was sent packing.


    They just couldn''t understand what Xiao Bai wanted¡­


    They had picked beautiful girls,mon girls, and any kind of girl that one could think of, but Xiao Bai wasn''t interested in any of them.


    It seemed that they had forgotten that¡­Xiao Bai was still a child.


    He just simply wasn''t interested in stuff like this and they were trying to force it onto him.


    So of course they would fail in the end.


    Lin Fan once again shocked the elders when he said that he would be heading to the ck Tortoise Race''s homeworld alone.


    The elders wanted to say something, but he disappeared in front of their faces.


    Even the elders of the Dragon Race, Phoenix Race, and Qilin Race all revealed bitter smiles when they saw this. Even if they had already seen this before, it was still something that they weren''t used to.


    When they reappeared, Lin Fan''s group found themselves in a familiar ce.


    This was a ce that they had appeared in four times already, so they didn''t question it and kept moving forward.


    But all of them had a doubt that was in the back of their head.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    When they arrived at the pedestal, they knew that this doubt was the truth and everyone turned to look at Lin Fan.


    If there was anyone that coulde up with a solution for this, it would be him.


    It was just too bad that this time, Lin Fan didn''t have a solution.


    He had a solution for every other pedestal that appeared because there was someone with the bloodline for each one. But this time, he didn''t have anyone with the ck Tortoise ancestral bloodline.


    So there was nothing that he could do.


    As they stood there staring at the pedestal, Lin Fan finally gave a sigh and called out a few pets.


    These were Xiao Huo, Xiao Feng, Xiao Lei, and Xiao Bai.


    He called them out hoping that there would be some resonance between them and the ck Tortoise God Fragment, so that he would at least be able to meet with them. But there was no reaction when these four appeared.


    Then to Lin Fan''s surprise, there was another pet that came out.


    It was Rocky, the other pet that Lin Fan used the most.


    But it had been a long time since Lin Fan had called him out.


    That was because Lin Fan had been focused on the pets that had the bloodlines of the five sacred beasts, so he had left Rocky out on purpose.


    When Rocky appeared, he looked at Lin Fan with a sad look like a child that had been neglected by their parents.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he saw this, but he still went over to pick Rocky up. That was because he did know that it was his fault that he had been ignoring Rocky during this time.


    It was the same for Ang who quickly came over to hug Rocky as well.


    She had also been too focused on the other four with what had been happening and she had also forgotten about Rocky during this time.


    So the three of them just stood there hugging each other.


    As they hugged, Rocky''s rocks rubbed up against each other and dust was formed.


    This wasn''t a strange thing since Rocky''s body waspletely made of rocks in the first ce. He was able to gather more rocks to form his body when he needed them, so there were a lot of byproducts that came from Rocky''s body.


    As the dust formed, it floated away from Rocky''s body andnded on the pedestal in front of them.


    When the dust settled on the pedestal, there was a strange reaction that came from it.


    It was very subtle at first, but then there was a faint glow that appeared around the pedestal.


    It was so faint that most people didn''t notice it at first, but as more and more dust came from Rocky''s body tond on the pedestal, it became hard not to notice. The light was bing stronger and stronger until it wrapped around the pedestal.


    Once they noticed this, they couldn''t help looking at the pedestal with a strange look.


    After all, even if the dust had fallen on the pedestal, it was just too small for people to notice.


    After looking at the pedestal for a bit, Lin Fan went closer to inspect it. But as he looked at it, he wasn''t able to figure out just what it was that was creating this light.


    That was until he stroked his finger across the surface of the tablet.


    When he did this, he noticed that there was something there.


    He raised his finger up in front of his face and rubbed his two fingers together to see that¡­it was dust.


    He looked closely at the dust and soon figured out just who it came from.


    When he noticed this, Lin Fan quickly turned back to look at Rocky.


    When Rocky saw the way that Lin Fan looked at him, he couldn''t help feeling a bit scared. Seeing that Rocky was scared by this, Ang immediately red at Lin Fan and scared him off.


    Lin Fan revealed an awkward smile and quickly apologized before calming Rocky down.


    Once Rocky was calmed down, Lin Fan asked, "Can I have one of your rocks?"


    Rocky was surprised to hear this from Lin Fan, but he also quickly took one of the rocks from his body and handed it to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan took this rock and patted Rocky on the head before moving back over to the pedestal.


    Once he was in front of the pedestal, he dropped the rock on his hand onto it.


    The moment that the rock made contact, the pedestal immediately absorbed it just like it would absorb the blood that it had been offered before.


    The moment that the rock was absorbed, the light became stronger and the ground started to shake.

 Chapter 1070 Black Tortoise God Fragment (2)

    ?


    The shaking didn''tst long before the same set of stairs appeared.


    When it appeared, everyone couldn''t help turning to look at Rocky. Lin Fan especially, but what he was looking at wasn''t Rocky, but rather the system window in front of him that appeared with Rocky''s information.


    No matter how he went through this information, he wasn''t able to find what he was looking for.


    After all, there was no sign that Rocky had the ck Tortoise bloodline.


    So why did a rock from Rocky unlock this set of stairs?


    Could it be that there was more to meet the eye with Rocky, or was it that there was something else about Rocky?


    Lin Fan just kept staring at the screen for a bit before giving a sigh and turning to look at Rocky.


    Rocky was fine at first, but with everyone staring at him like this, he couldn''t help feeling self conscious. So eventually, he started moving back in Ang''s arms and looking a bit scared.


    Seeing this, Ang realized her mistake and quickly red at everyone to make them stop.


    There wasn''t a single person here who didn''t fear her, so they all quickly looked away from Rocky.


    Though that didn''t cause the doubt in their hearts to subside. They were all still curious why that rock from Rocky had opened up this passage.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t remain dazed for long as he took Rocky from Ang and went down the passage.


    At the end of these stairs, there were the same doors as before.


    But this time, the voice had a strange tone to it.


    "My sessor isn''t with you, but I sense something familiaring from this group. Just what is this feeling?"


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help looking around at each other as if they were trying to figure out what this voice was talking about.


    But no one had any idea since they didn''t sense anything strangeing from them.


    After a long period, there was a light that came from the door that fell onto Rocky before the same voice said, "This one, I can feel something familiaring from this one."


    Everyone once again looked at Rocky with strange looks.


    It seemed like it wasn''t a coincidence that he had been able to create a resonance with the pedestal and open up the passage. However, no one could understand just what was special about Rocky that this happened.


    Finally, the door opened and the voice, "You,e forward and meet me. I want to see you personally."


    But Rocky just hid further in Lin Fan''s arms.


    Rocky didn''t know what was happening, but he was scared of this voice that came out of nowhere.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan said, "Can Ie in with him?"


    When he asked this, he also released the voidws that were inside of him.


    "You?" The voice started saying before it suddenly fell silent as if it realized something. There was a silence that lingered in the air before the voice said again, "The Void God''s sessor?"


    It asked this as if it wasn''t asking anyone in particr.


    After another silence, the voice said, "Alright, you cane in. I also need to see you."


    With that, the door opened for the two of them.


    Like with the other god fragments, they weren''t able to see what was beyond this ce.


    Lin Fan turned around and gave a nod to the rest of them before heading through the door just like always. Though as he was going through, Rocky looked like he was scared of what was in front of them.


    Rocky actedpletely different from Xiao Huo and the rest when they were brought to see the god fragments.


    It was most likely because there wasn''t the bloodline resonance that the others had felt. So for Rocky, this was just a terrifying ce that Lin Fan was bringing him to.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that Lin Fan was holding him and not letting him go, then he wouldn''t have gone in the first ce. At the same time, as they were heading in, Rocky looked back and asked Ang for help with his eyes.


    This tugged at her heartstring, but she stopped herself in the end.


    This was the trust that she had in Lin Fan.


    If he was going forward and ying along with this, then she would trust him.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    But if anything happened to Rocky¡­Lin Fan would be in for it when he returned.


    After they went through, they appeared in a ce that was very simr to the rest of the god fragment resting ces.


    The herbs quickly created a path for them and Lin Fan didn''t waste any time to head to the statue that he knew was there.


    When he arrived, he found that there was a figure that was already there waiting for him.


    Unlike the rest of the figures that he had seen when he met with the other god fragments, this one was that of an old man. The rest were all young men and women and this was the first elderly figure that he had seen.


    He couldn''t help finding this strange, but he didn''t have time to ask anything as the elderly figure immediately moved forward to stand in front of him.


    Lin Fan was about to say something, but he found that the elderly figurepletely ignored him and leaned in to look at Rocky. The look in his eyes showed that he was very confused as he looked at Rocky.


    Seeing this old face suddenly appear in front of him, Rocky was caught off guard before shrinking into Lin Fan''s arms.


    He wasn''t scared of new people normally, but this¡­this old face and the look that it had in its eyes, even Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit scared. It was as if this old man wanted to see every single part of your soul with the look that he had.


    There was a long silence that filled the air as the old man just kept staring at Rocky.


    Lin Fan tried coughing a few times to catch his attention, but all that happened was that he waspletely ignored. It was as if the old man didn''t have any interest in him and only cared about Rocky.


    Rocky kept moving around and trying to avoid him, but the old man''s gaze couldn''t be avoided.


    So in the end, all they could do was wait for the old man to finish and say something.


    After a long period of silence, the old man finally brought his hands up and mmed one fist in the other palm as he said, "I got it!"


    Without even caring about the two of them, he ran back over to the statue and jumped in, disappearing without a trace. After he was gone, it was just Lin Fan and Rocky who were left there standing awkwardly, not knowing what to do.


    They couldn''t understand what the old man was doing at all, so all they could do was wait patiently.


    Well, all Lin Fan could do was wait patiently.


    Rocky kept pulling at Lin Fan''s sleeves and wanted him to leave this ce.


    But Lin Fan knew that they couldn''t do that.


    After what seemed like hours, the old man finally appeared again, but this time he wasn''t alone. There seemed to be an egg in his hand that he was holding very carefully as he approached them.


    The old man walked up in front of them and then ced the egg in front of them.


    Without saying a word, the old man looked at them with an expectant look, as if he expected them to already know what to do. But Lin Fan and Rocky were both confused why this old man had suddenly ced this egg in front of them.


    At the same time though, there was a bit of reaction from Rocky''s eyes.


    It was as if he could feel something that was familiar from this egg.


    As they stood there in silence, the old man just looked at them with the same expectant look. But neither of them did a thing, so the old man finally couldn''t help saying, "Well? Aren''t you going to get in?"


    When Lin Fan and Rocky heard this, they were even more confused.


    Lin Fan looked at the old man and asked, "Sir, are you the ck Tortoise God''s fragment?"


    The old man gave a nod in response and said, "That''s right. It seems like you''ve already met the other god fragments." Then after a pause, he added, "I can sense the stones on you."


    When Lin Fan heard this, his expression couldn''t help changing. He looked like he wanted to ask the old man something, but he held himself back in the end since there was something else that he had to deal with first.


    He looked at the egg and asked, "Sir, what do you mean by getting in the egg?"


    The old man shook his head and said, "I don''t mean you. I mean the little one."


    Lin Fan looked down at Rocky who was in his hands.


    During this time, Rocky had been staring at the egg almost in a daze, as if he recognized something about this egg.


    Lin Fan finally looked back up and asked, "Why would he get in the egg?"


    The old man looked at Lin Fan with a confused look like he was looking at someone dumb. But then he said, "Of course, it''s because it''s his in the first ce."

 Chapter 1071 Black Tortoise God Fragment (3)

    ?


    The moment that Lin Fan heard this, he once again revealed a confused look.


    After a while, he asked, "Just what do you mean by that?"


    That was the crux of it.


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment just looked at the two of them without saying a thing.


    Finally, he said, "If you let the little one enter the egg, then you''ll find out."


    The moment that he said this, Lin Fan held Rocky closer to himself and moved away from the ck Tortoise God Fragment and the egg.


    Seeing this, the ck Tortoise God Fragment couldn''t help asking, "What are you doing? Why are you moving away?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he heard this.


    After all, no matter how one listened to this, it seemed very shady.


    The way that the ck Tortoise God Fragment had said this, it just sounded like it was a trap.


    Of course, Lin Fan could guess that it wasn''t what it sounded like and this was indeed something that was rted to Rocky. But before he knew the full story, it wasn''t as if he could let Rocky do something as dangerous as this.


    So he took another step back when he heard this.


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment started panicking when he saw this. He then said, "Is something wrong? Do you want something before doing this? I can give you all the herbs in this ce if you want."


    Lin Fan''s bitter smile became wider when he heard this.


    It seemed that the ck Tortoise God Fragment really was like what his figure looked like, a senile old man.


    He was trying to exin what was happening, but he wasn''t good at exining it. He was just directly trying to tell them what would happen if they did what he told them to do, that he forgot the context.


    In short, all he did was make himself seem more suspicious than he actually was.


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "Exin what the egg is and then we''ll decide."


    This time, it was the ck Tortoise God Fragment''s turn to reveal a bitter smile.


    He didn''t know what this Void God''s sessor was thinking, but he could tell that he was serious about what he said. Unless he told him what this egg was, he wasn''t nning on letting Rocky touch it.


    Though, judging by the look on Rocky''s face, he did want to touch this egg.


    So the ck Tortoise God Fragment had no choice but to suppress his excitement and slowly exin what the situation was.


    "The egg is the remainder of my child and it belongs to that little one over there." The ck Tortoise God Fragment said in a heavy voice.


    But all this did was confuse Lin Fan even more.


    If it was a child that belonged to the ck Tortoise God, then how was it rted to Rocky?


    After all, Rocky wasn''t rted to the ck Tortoise Race at all.


    Rocky was hatched by Lin Fan with the system''s incubation room and was a rock attributed pet that had the Divine Giant bloodline. There wasn''t a single bit of this that could be rted to the ck Tortoise Race.


    Seeing the confused look on Lin Fan''s face, the ck Tortoise God Fragment continued, "My child was an unfortunate one. He inherited the full bloodline from me, but he was cut down in his prime before he could bloom, that is why there was this egg that was left behind. Once he died, his body turned into this egg."


    Once again, Lin Fan revealed the same confused look as he asked, "How is that rted to Rocky still?"


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment didn''t mind this question and slowly continued at his own pace, "Our ck Tortoise Race has a special ability that activates when we die. We can save our soul in the fragments of our shell to give us the chance to regenerate ourselves in time."


    When he heard this, Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows.


    After a while, he said, "So you''re saying that Rocky isn''t made of rocks, but rather the scales of the ck Tortoise Race?"


    Hearing this, the ck Tortoise God Fragment gave a strong nod as a relieved look appeared on his face.


    It seemed that the Void God''s sessor was finally understanding what the situation was.


    Lin Fan however looked at the ck Tortoise God Fragment with a doubtful look.


    The system had clearly stated that Rocky was supposed to be an Aegean Giant that had the Divine Giant bloodline. No matter how he looked at this, it didn''t seem like this was rted at all to the ck Tortoise Race.


    So he couldn''t help asking, "As far as I know, Rocky should have the Divine Giant bloodline. How can he also have the ck Tortoise bloodline?"<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    When he heard this, the ck Tortoise God Fragment revealed a faint smile and said, "That''s another name for our bloodline in the first ce. Do you know just how big a ck Tortoise is at full size?"


    Lin Fan still couldn''t help revealing a skeptical look when he heard this, but he also turned to look down at Rocky. He had seen that Rocky had been looking at the egg on the ground the entire time, so he knew that Rocky must feel some kind of connection to it.


    In the end, even if it seemed strange and confusing, Lin Fan would let Rocky decide what to do.


    After staring at the egg for a bit, Rocky did try to get out of Lin Fan''s hands.


    So Lin Fan ced Rocky on the ground and watched what happened.


    If it seemed like he was in danger, Lin Fan would immediately take action to bring Rocky away.


    He might not have been confident if it was anywhere else, but in this ce, he would have the system''s help. After all, this was still considered a cultivation realm from the system, so he could pull out with just a single thought.


    At the same time though, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking about how the system was rted to this.


    The system had not only given him the four bloodlines of the sacred beasts in the first ce, it had also been the one that had allowed him to incubate Rocky¡­So he couldn''t help thinking that this had all been set up by the system.


    But as these doubts filled his mind, the system remained silent and didn''t say a single thing.


    Rocky made his way over to the egg and then he just stood there in front of it, looking over the egg. It was as if he was trying to figure out what he would do with the egg¡­


    That is until he finally decided.


    Without any warning at all, Rocky''s body suddenly copsed into pieces.


    It turned into countless rocks that were still moving on the ground.


    As they moved, they surrounded the eggpletely and then¡­Rocky''s rocks suddenly crawled up the egg. These rocks from Rocky created ayer of rocks around the egg itself before they started glowing.


    It was as if there was some kind of power that was being infused, either into the egg or into the rocks.


    Thissted for a while before the rocks suddenly crumbled away and they fell off to reveal the egg in the center that was still glowing.


    However, the moment that Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because he couldn''t feel Rocky''s aura from these eggs anymore.


    But the only way that was possible was if¡­Rocky died.


    However, Lin Fan also knew that this was impossible since they were in a cultivation realm. If Rocky did die, then there would have been a system notification before he was revived.


    So something had happened to Rocky, but he didn''t know what had happened.


    The only other thing that he could sense was that Rocky''s aura was nowing from¡­the egg itself.


    It was as if Rocky was inside the egg.


    Lin Fan turned to look at the ck Tortoise God Fragment and asked, "What''s happening?"


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment had been staring at the egg and Rocky covering it the whole time in a daze, so he didn''t hear what Lin Fan had said. But when Lin Fan said it a few more times in a louder voice, he came back to his senses and said, "My child is being reborn. The soul has returned to the body."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this, but he also had an idea of what he was saying.


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment had said earlier that the special ability would contain the soul in the fragments of the shell.


    So now that the souls in the fragments of the shell had been absorbed by the egg, that probably meant that¡­


    Since Lin Fan wasn''t able to get the information that he wanted from the ck Tortoise God Fragment, he decided to look at the system.


    Rocky was still a pet that was registered to him under the system, so he was able to check Rocky''s status there.


    As he opened up Rocky''s status screen in front of him, there wasn''t anything that changed on it¡­


    No, there was one thing that was currently flickering which was the race name.


    The words ''Aegean Giant'' were flickering, as if they were about to change.


    Then all of a sudden, there was a burst of light that came from the glowing egg as a crack formed on the surface.

 Chapter 1072 Black Tortoise God Fragment (4)

    ?


    Since it wasn''t that bright, through this burst of light, one was able to see that there were more and more cracks that were currently forming on the surface of this egg.


    It didn''t take long before there was almost a web-like pattern that had formed on it.


    However, even with this pattern on the surface of the egg, it still didn''t crack open.


    It was as if there was some kind of mysterious force that was holding all of the cracked pieces in ce, keeping it in the shape of an egg. But there was a force that was building up behind it that caused the egg itself to shake.


    The more the egg shook, the more powerful the force they could sense became.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking a step back as if he was afraid that the egg would explode and shoot out the pieces of its shell.


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment just stood there in the same ce, but the look on his face kept changing. It was filled with more and more excitement as he sensed the power inside of the egg building up.


    Finally, the shell of the egg didn''t seem like it could take it anymore as even more cracks formed on the surface.


    These continued to grow until all of a sudden, the egg shell cracked to pieces and exploded.


    They didn''t shoot out like one would expect of them, but instead they just crumpled away to pieces and disappeared without a trace. These egg shell fragments turned into sparkles that quickly dissipated in the air.


    When they disappeared, all that was revealed was another ball of light.


    This ball of light was clearly holding something inside of it, but it was too bright to see what this thing inside of it was.


    So they had to wait again for this ball of light to dissipate.


    This ball of light had flown up into the sky after it appeared and it just kept floating there, as if it was building up to something.


    But then all of sudden, this ball of lightnded on the ground and shattered to pieces like it was made of ss.


    When the ball of light disappeared, there was a creature that was left in its ce on the ground. It justid there for a few seconds before looking up and looking around itself, as if it was looking for something.


    This creature kept looking around until it saw Lin Fan.


    When it noticed Lin Fan, it stood up on its four legs and began moving towards him.


    As it came closer, Lin Fan was able to clearly see the appearance of this creature.


    It looked like a very strange reptile, but when Lin Fan looked at it closely, he realized that this thing was a turtle. And the even stranger thing about this turtle was¡­it didn''t have a shell.


    This turtle made its way over to Lin Fan and stood up on two legs, reaching its front legs up towards Lin Fan as if it was asking to be picked up.


    Lin Fan didn''t do anything at first since he didn''t understand what was happening.


    But then he put two and two together and realized what the situation was.


    Lin Fan looked down at the naked turtle in front of him and asked, "Rocky, is that you?"


    The turtle tilted its head as if it was confused by this question before giving a nod still to answer it.


    Lin Fan''s chin couldn''t help dropping down when he saw this.


    Even though he had already guessed that this was the result, seeing it in front of him was still very shocking.


    To confirm that this was true, Lin Fan pulled up the system''s screen and found that under the panel for Rocky, it now showed that he had the ck Tortoise Bloodline. At the same time, it was registering that it was indeed Rocky that was this turtle that was standing in front of him.


    Seeing that Lin Fan wasn''t picking him up, Rocky couldn''t help pouting out his cheeks like he was having a tantrum.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he revealed a bitter smile and picked up Rocky in the end, holding him in his arms.


    But as he held him, he couldn''t help feeling that it was very strange.


    During this time, the ck Tortoise God Fragment had been staring at Rocky the entire time with a strange look in his eyes.


    Finally, seeing that Lin Fan was holding him, the ck Tortoise God Fragment snapped out of this and came over to where Lin Fan was. He reached his hands out as if he was about to take Rocky from him, but Rocky quickly moved out of the way to avoid his hands.


    In the end, Rocky peeked out from behind Lin Fan with a wary look that caused the ck Tortoise God Fragment to have a bitter smile on his face.


    With that bitter smile, the ck Tortoise God Fragment said, "Hei''er, it''s me. It''s your father."


    But no matter what he said, Rocky just looked like he didn''t trust him at all.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he heard what the ck Tortoise God Fragment said.


    The other god fragments hadn''t acted this strongly, but this ck Tortoise God Fragment¡­it seemed like he had a story. Still, Lin Fan wasn''t interested in hearing it right now since there were other things that he wanted to do.


    But before any of them could do anything, Rocky looked at his own body as if he realized that he was missing something. Then he jumped out of Lin Fan''s hands and made his way over to the rocks that had been abandoned on the ground.


    With a stomp of his two front feet, the rocks that were on the ground suddenly floated up into the air before flying out at Rocky. But right before they seemed like they would hit him, they started slowing down.


    In the end, they came slowly enough to gently fall onto Rocky''s back and they started piecing themselves together.


    By the end of it, the rocks had turned into a shell on Rocky''s back.


    Once the shell had properly formed, Rocky took a good look at it.


    After seeing that it was to his standards and it was satisfactory, Rocky gave a nod beforeing back over to Lin Fan.


    He reached his hands up once again to be hugged by Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a smile, but he still picked up Rocky in the end.


    Seeing the two of them like this, the ck Tortoise God Fragment had a bitter look on his face. But in the end, he said, "Come over and I''ll give you the inheritance."


    Before he could though, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Can I take all the herbs with me?"


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment looked at Lin Fan with a bitter smile before giving a nod. After all, it wasn''t as if he had a use for this in the first ce, so he didn''t care if the Void God''s sessor took it.


    With this, Lin Fan put Rocky on the ground and pushed him towards the ck Tortoise God Fragment.


    Seeing this, the ck Tortoise God Fragment revealed a grateful look while Rocky revealed a look like he had been betrayed. It was just too bad that Lin Fan didn''t care about any of this and headed off to collect the herbs.


    Just like this, a few hours passed.


    When Lin Fan came back, he saw the two of them still standing apart.


    The ck Tortoise God Fragment had a bitter smile on his face, but it seemed like he was slowly fading.


    Lin Fan had only seen this happen when the god fragments finished passing down their inheritances. So he knew that the ck Tortoise God Fragment had done his duty and Rocky had received the inheritance.


    The only difference was that Rocky didn''t grow in size¡­


    No, Xiao Bai also hadn''t grown in size and that was because he was too young.


    Whether it was this turtle Rocky or the previous rock Rocky, they were both younger than Xiao Bai.


    So it seemed that Rocky would stay the same size just like Xiao Bai had done until he could fully use the ck Tortoise Bloodline.


    As the ck Tortoise God Fragment was disappearing, his eyes had been on Rocky the whole time.


    Right when he was about to disappear, he said, "Hei''er, live a good life."


    With that, the ck Tortoise God Fragmentpletely disappeared.


    Rocky couldn''t help looking at where the ck Tortoise God Fragment had disappeared and then he raised his hand to give a wave.


    He didn''t know why he did this, but it felt like the right thing to do at this moment.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at Rocky as he did this.


    He didn''t know if this meant that Rocky hadtent memories from the past or if this was just a fragment that was left, but it seemed like he had to keep his eyes on Rocky. If Rocky suddenly changed personalities one day or broke free from his control, that would be bad.


    After they had finished everything here, Lin Fan picked up Rocky and they headed back the way that they came.


    As they were heading back, Lin Fan was lost deep in thought.


    After all, he had to think of a way to exin what happened to Rocky.


    Rocky had turned from a pile of rocks into a turtle, this really was something that was hard to exin¡­

 Chapter 1073 Black Tortoise Race (1)

    ?


    When he came out with Rocky the turtle in his hand, everyone looked at him and looked around for Rocky, the pile of rocks.


    Lin Fan said with a bitter smile, "This is Rocky."


    They all looked at Rocky the turtle in his hand which caused Rocky to shrink back in his arms.


    They then looked up at Lin Fan like he was crazy, but all he could do was stand there with the same bitter smile on his face.


    After all, there wasn''t anything else he really could say until they epted this fact.


    If he said anything now, they might just think that he was crazy.


    In the end, it was Ang who recognized Rocky first.


    Even if Rocky had gone from a pile of rocks into a turtle, his aura didn''t change. This aura was recognized by her and she realized that Lin Fan was indeed telling the truth.


    So she came forward and took Rocky in her arms.


    Rocky had been sad about not being recognized by anyone, so Ang had tofort him in the end to make up for not recognizing him.


    While she was doing this, the rest of them all scanned Rocky with their spiritual senses and confirmed that this was indeed Rocky''s aura.


    Even if his body had changed, it was usually impossible to change one''s aura like this. One''s aura was something that was unique to them and unless it was something very impactful that happened, this normally wouldn''t change.


    So if this turtle had Rocky''s aura, then it was Rocky.


    With this, all of them looked at Lin Fan with a look of doubt as they wanted to know what happened in that ce.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh before going to exin everything.


    By the end of it, they all looked at Rocky with a strange look.


    The story seemed very unusual and unbelievable, but because it was Lin Fan, they chose to believe it.


    After all, they had seen even more unbelievable things from him and the master of the store.


    Since this was something that involved the ancestor of the ck Tortoise Race, they just epted that it was something rted to the God Realm. The God Realm was the realm that they couldn''t reach and they couldn''t understand. There were many different things that only those in the God Realm could do that they couldn''t understand no matter how they thought about it.


    So it wasn''t worth thinking about it.


    Since they had finished getting what they had wanted, there was no need for them to stay here any longer.


    Lin Fan could also see that the teleport was ready to send them to the surface, so he activated this.


    Of course before this, Lin Fan sent Rocky back into the pet storage space.


    Rocky was in the middle of being pampered by Ang, so he had an unwilling look on his face. But Lin Fan stayed firm and sent Rocky back into the pet storage space in the end.


    When the sh of light disappeared, they found themselves in the same situation as before.


    This time, in front of them were the elders from the four different sacred beast races.


    They all had experience with Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, so they all quickly moved in front of him to show that he was with them.


    The elders of the ck Tortoise Race and the guards all raised their weapons in a wary manner, but seeing that the elders from the other four sacred beast races had moved forward to protect him, they hesitated. They knew that these elders wouldn''t protect this stranger who had suddenly appeared for no reason.


    So there had to be something special about this person.


    The elders of the Dragon Race, the Phoenix Race, the Qilin Race, and the White Tiger Race all quickly started to exin the situation. Then with Lin Fan releasing his voidws for the elders of the ck Tortoise Race to see, everything was cleared up and they were led to the elder hall.


    When they headed there, they stopped in front of the elder hall itself to look at the same mural that had been shown to Lin Fan four times now¡­Well, it wasn''tpletely the same since this time it was about the ck Tortoise Race, but the contents were basically the same.


    So the elders of the ck Tortoise Race were disappointed to see that Lin Fan didn''t have any reaction to this.


    The elders of the other four sacred beast races already expected this, so they didn''t say a thing.


    With a heavy heart, the elders of the ck Tortoise Race led Lin Fan into the elder hall.


    When he stepped in, Lin Fan lookedpletely at ease, as if he wasn''t bothered by all of these Ruler Realm Experts that were currently in front of him.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    But that wasn''t strange since he had already encountered this same situation many times before, so he was already used to it.


    He was even used to the spiritual senses that suddenly came forward to sweep over him.


    The elders in the room had only just heard who he was when they already sent their spiritual senses at him to make sure that he was indeed who he said he was.


    Once they had confirmed this and had satisfied looks on their faces, the Great Elders of the ck Tortoise Race took over.


    One Great Elder said, "Void God''s sessor, you are finally here. We have been waiting a long time for you, though it seems that we have been waiting the longest."


    As he said this, his eyes couldn''t help looking over at the elders from the other four sacred beast races to the side. There was a hint of me in them as he looked at them.


    After all, they could have sent a messenger to them that the Void God''s sessor had appeared instead of leaving them in the dark like this. It turned out that they had been the final ones to find out that the Void God''s sessor had already appeared.


    Still, they didn''t hold it against them too much.


    The bond between the five sacred beast races was much deeper than this, so it wouldn''t be broken over this small thing.


    After this tinyint, another Great Elder said, "Void God''s sessor, is there anything that we can do for you?"


    Lin Fan nodded when he heard this and said, "I need the ck Tortoise Stone."


    The moment that they heard this, the elders of the ck Tortoise Race couldn''t help revealing difficult looks.


    It wasn''t that they didn''t want to give it to Lin Fan, it was just¡­that before they found their race''s true descendant, they still needed it.


    While it was possible that a mutation could happen in the wild that would allow one to obtain the ck Tortoise Bloodline, the most likely thing to happen was that one of the descendants would eventually have a pure enough bloodline to return to the ancestral bloodline.


    So the best method was for them to use the ck Tortoise Stone.


    This was an item that would allow them to purify their bloodline to bring it closer to the ancestral bloodline. They needed this in the tribe so that they could keep using it on the juniors to get them closer to bing the true descendant.


    So before that, they couldn''t give it to Lin Fan just yet.


    They even thought about asking Lin Fan to use his voidws to help them purify the bloodlines of their juniors.


    After all, Lin Fan was the Void God''s sessor, so of course he would be able to do this for them.


    It was just hard for them to ask this all of a sudden.


    So there was an awkward silence that filled the room.


    Lin Fan could tell from the looks on their faces that they didn''t want to give him the ck Tortoise Stone which was a problem.


    So he said, "Is there a problem?"


    Hearing him ask this, the elders had no choice but to admit it.


    The Great Elder said, "We still haven''t found our true descendant just yet, so we still need the ck Tortoise Stone to help purify the bloodlines of our juniors."


    The other Great Elder said, "I''m sure that you can understand the importance of this matter, so we have to ask for some time. Once we find our true descendant, we will follow the instructions of the ancestor and hand you the ck Tortoise stone."


    After this, the two Great Elders looked at each other before the first one turned back and said, "If possible, can you please help us with purifying the bloodlines of the juniors?"


    The second Great Elder said, "As the Void God''s sessor, you can surely control voidws which can be used to help purify bloodlines. With your help, we will be able to find our true descendant even faster and you''ll be able to receive the ck Tortoise Stone sooner."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a faint smile which confused the elders.


    Beforeing here, he too had been worried about the same thing as these elders.


    However, after meeting the ck Tortoise God Fragment¡­he had already solved this problem.


    If it was before, he might not have done this¡­but he really wanted to know what happened after hebined the five stones together and it didn''t seem like they would give him the stone before this¡­


    So Lin Fan decided to call out Rocky in front of everyone.

 Chapter 1074 Black Tortoise Race (2)

    ?


    The elders were surprised when they saw this turtle suddenly appear in front of them.


    As they looked at Rocky, they didn''t understand why Lin Fan would suddenly call this turtle out in front of them.


    That is until they noticed that there was something off about Rocky.


    The moment that they noticed this, all of them suddenly knitted their brows and looked carefully at Rocky. At the same time, they also released their spiritual senses to sweep over Rocky.


    Rocky had been in a daze about being suddenly summoned, but when he felt the wave of spiritual senses falling onto him, he was also scared by this. So he quickly went over to where Lin Fan was and hid behind him.


    It was only when Lin Fan patted him to calm him down and assured that these were good people that Rocky finally rxed. Once he rxed, he allowed the various spiritual senses to fall onto him.


    As they used their spiritual senses to check Rocky, the expressions on the faces of the elders all changed.


    They filled with more and more shock, just like the elders from the various sacred beast races before.


    However, the ones that were the most shocked were the elders from the four other sacred beast races.


    After all, they knew more than the elders of the ck Tortoise Race.


    They knew that Lin Fan didn''t just have Rocky, but also the true descendants of all of their races.


    Then that meant¡­that the true descendants of all five sacred beast races had already gathered with the Void God''s sessor¡­


    Didn''t that mean that the prophecy that had been left behind by their ancestor was close to being fulfilled?


    This was definitely much more important than just the ck Tortoise Race''s true descendant being discovered.


    So these elders couldn''t help getting excited.


    Lin Fan knew that this would be the case if he brought out Rocky, but he didn''t mind since there was something else that was more important right now.


    After giving them some time to react, Lin Fan gave a cough and said, "Can you bring out the ck Tortoise Stone now?"


    When he said this, all of the elders were pulled out of their daze and they quickly focused on him. They all looked at him carefully, as if they were trying to figure out just who Lin Fan was, that he was able to bring out their true descendant so easily.


    But Lin Fan ignored all of this as he looked at the two Great Elders, waiting for their response.


    He also ignored the gazes from the elders of the four sacred beast races on the side, trying to get his attention so that they could talk to him privately.


    Finally, the Great Elders nodded in agreement to this.


    One of them waved his hand and some elite guards appeared. He gave the order to the elite guards to go get the stone as Lin Fan had requested and the elite guards disappeared.


    Then he continued to stare at Lin Fan with the other Great Elder, both of them having questioning gazes still.


    But Lin Fan ignored all of this as he waited for the elite guard toe back.


    Finally, one of the elders couldn''t take it anymore as he came forward to talk to Rocky. As soon as he moved forward, all of the other elders did the same and they immediately surrounded Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was surprised that it had taken them this long, but he still didn''t do a thing.


    Seeing this, even the Great Elders couldn''t hold back anymore and they went forward to talk to Rocky as well.


    It was just too bad that this had a negative effect and all they did was scared Rocky off.


    With how all of these old men were surrounding Rocky, it really did seem like a dangerous scene. After all, they were also offering him treats and special items in an attempt to get closer.


    One might think to call the cops after seeing this since it just screamed "strange danger".


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind since he knew how important Rocky was to the ck Tortoise Race. He knew that not a single one of these elders would actually do anything to Rocky.


    In the end, the elders weren''t able to get through to Rocky at all, so they had no choice but to ask Lin Fan for help.


    Once again, Lin Fan ignored them as he waited for the ck Tortoise Stone to arrive.


    After what seemed like an eternity, the ck Tortoise Stone finally came.


    The elite guards first went to the two Great Elders with this stone, but the Great Elders just gestured for them to bring it over to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was surprised by the generosity that they showed, but he quickly realized why they did this when he saw the look that they were giving him.


    They were trading this ck Tortoise Stone for help with Rocky.


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile seeing this, but he didn''t remain silent and still like before. After all, it wasn''t as if he wanted to create a bad impression with the ck Tortoise Race since it was very likely they would need to work together in the future.


    So he stood up and went over to the group of elders.


    He opened up the wall and went into the center to pick up Rocky before saying, "Rocky, it''s rude to not say anything like this."


    Rocky had been scared by the old men surrounding him, but he was less scared when Lin Fan picked him up. Moreover, he was raised properly by Lin Fan and Ang, so when Lin Fan scolded him like this, he knew that he had made a mistake.


    So Rocky turned to the elders and introduced himself in a small voice.


    Seeing this, the eyes of all the elders lit up.


    They had tried talking to him for so long just now, but they hadn''t been able to get him to say a single word. But now that Lin Fan had said something, he opened up to them right away.


    It really was arge difference in treatment.


    But they didn''t dwell on that since they wanted to build a good rtionship with this true descendant.


    So once again, they surrounded him with all kinds of presents and treats for him, trying to win his affection.


    Lin Fan immediately raised his hand and stopped all of them froming forward. He turned to the Great Elders and reached his hand out with Rocky still in them.


    Rocky was surprised to see this and wanted to struggle a bit, but he calmed down when he felt Lin Fan patting him on the back.


    The two Great Elders carefully reached their hands out, but the problem was that there was only a single Rocky. So they had to decide who would hold him first.


    It was a fierce rock paper scissors match, but the one on the left won and was the first to hold Rocky.


    Rocky looked ufortable, but since Lin Fan had given him an order, he had no choice. So he allowed this Great Elder to hold him and pamper him while looking ungrateful.


    Still, the elders didn''t mind as they all wanted a chance to hold Rocky.


    Lin Fan just shook his head when he saw this before turning his attention to the ck Tortoise Stone.


    Behind him, Rocky looked at him with a look that made it seem like he had been betrayed by Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan carefully checked the stone, but he wasn''t able to find anything strange about it.


    This stone was the same as the other stones that he had received, but it was different in colour.


    Just like how the other stones had been colours that represented the race that they came from, this stone waspletely ck in colour. It even looked like a piece of obsidian with how dark it was.


    At the same time, he also felt the same voidwsing from this stone.


    After making sure that there was nothing special about this stone, Lin Fan pulled out thebined stone.


    The moment that this appeared, everyone''s focus turned to this stone.


    Even the ck Tortoise Race elders who had been focused on Rocky couldn''t help turning to look at this stone.


    That was because they could feel the strange sensation that came from this stone.


    They also couldn''t help looking at the elders from the other sacred beast races for an exnation, but they found that all of them were focused on the stone and what was about to happen next. They didn''t have any time to ask them any questions.


    So in the end, they also turned their attention back to the stone and Lin Fan who was holding it.


    After taking a pause, Lin Fan brought the two stones together.


    Just like before, there was an attraction that appeared in between these stones.


    The only difference was that this time, the attraction force was much stronger than anything Lin Fan had experienced before. It was so strong that the ck stone was ripped out of his hand and flew towards the multi coloured stone.


    The moment that it made contact, they didn''t sh with each other as one might expect, but the ck stonepletely disappeared. It was absorbed in an instant by the multi coloured stone and disappeared without a trace.


    Once that happened, there was a glow that suddenly appeared around the multi coloured stone.

 Chapter 1075 Void God’s Inheritance

    ?


    This was a multi coloured glow that matched the colours of the stone itself.


    These were the five colours that represented the five different sacred beast races.


    It kept flickering with this five coloured glow until it finally stopped and there was a crack that formed on the stone.


    The moment that this stone cracked, the reaction was instant. There was a spider web crack that formed all over the stone before it suddenly shattered apart to reveal a single thing.


    Lin Fan just looked down at this thing with a strange look.


    All of the elders couldn''t helping in closer to see what this thing was too.


    Instead of the stone that had been in his hand, there was now a key.


    This was a key that was as ck as night and didn''t have a single trace of colour unlike the stone from before. It was so dark that it was almost as if it drained all the colour from the surrounding area.


    Lin Fan could feel the voidws that were contained within this key, but he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows when he felt this.


    That was because¡­it was as if there was something missing from this key.


    The voidws were much stronger than before and they were much moreplex than any voidws that he had seen before. These voidws were even stronger than the ones that the Lin Astral Emperor had shown him before.


    But it was as if these voidws were missing that one final ingredient that would make themplete.


    It was just that Lin Fan didn''t know what that was.


    That is until he noticed that there was something strange about this key.


    When he looked clearly, he saw that there were four different cracks that were on the key.


    They were evenly split apart and with these four cracks, the key was split into five different parts. These five parts weren''t exactly even since the different parts of the key were of different sizes, but they were divided evenly in terms of length.


    That wasn''t the strange thing about this key though.


    The strange thing about this key was that there was a familiar aura that came from each part of the key. This was an aura that Lin Fan had sensed before when he made his way to the worlds of each of the five sacred beast races.


    This was the aura that he had sensed when he met each of the five sacred beast god fragments.


    At the same time though, it also felt like there was something missing from the aura of these five sacred beast god fragments. Just like the voidw, it was like there was a key ingredient that was missing.


    That is until Lin Fan suddenly remembered something.


    Could it be that there was another reason that they couldn''t give the stones over unless the true descendant was found?


    Could it be that there was a deeper meaning to how it was all designed?


    Since that was the case, the five true descendants should also y a role in unlocking the true power of this key.


    So without any hesitation, Lin Fan called out the rest of them.


    The moment that the other four appeared, all of the elders in the room regardless of which race they came from revealed shocked looks. That was because all of them could sense the aura that wasing from each one of these pets that Lin Fan had called out.


    The elders of the Dragon Race, the Phoenix Race, the Qilin Race, and the White Tiger Race had more subdued reactions since they had already thought of this, but the elders of ck Tortoise Race couldn''t help revealing absolutely shocked looks.


    That was because they didn''t know that the true descendants of the other races had been found.


    But when they calmed down and thought about it, they realized that this wasn''t that strange since Lin Fan had brought out that multi coloured stone. That multi coloured stone was already proof that they had been found since the other races would never hand over their stones if their true descendants hadn''t been found.


    The elders of the other races would never hand over their stones unless their true descendant was found after all.


    The elders of the ck Tortoise Race couldn''t help revealing bitter looks as they looked at the elders from the other four sacred beast races.


    During this time, Lin Fan had been calming down his pets after summoning them.


    After they had been called out, they had all been attracted by the aura that came from the key and had been intensely looking at it.


    Lin Fan was able to draw their attention away from the key and asked, "Can you give me a drop of each of your blood?"


    The five of them were surprised and confused to hear Lin Fan ask this, but they didn''t hesitate to draw out a drop of blood from their fingers.


    These five drops of blood floated in the air with the life energy of these five. Lin Fan then wrapped his own life energy around these five drops of blood and brought them over in front of him.


    Holding the key in his hand, he looked at five drops of blood that were in front of him.


    Then slowly, he controlled the drop of blood from Xiao Feng until it was right over the key.


    He controlled it so that it was brought to the very end of the key where the loop of the key was. This was the part of the key that released the aura of the Dragon God Fragment.


    The moment that this drop of blood came close to the key, there was a feeling of attraction between it and the key. This was simr to the sense of attraction that Lin Fan had felt before when he brought stones of different races together.


    So without hesitation, Lin Fan released his control of the blood and let it fall.


    The moment that it did, it was pulled by some invisible force into the key and then disappeared without a trace.


    Then the part of the key that corresponded with this drop of blood was suddenly surrounded in an azure glow. The glow went no further than the crack that had formed in the key and only surrounded that one part of the key.


    The rest of the key just remained still after this drop of blood was absorbed.


    Lin Fan waited a bit to gauge the reaction of the key, but seeing that nothing was happening¡­he brought the second drop of blood over and let it be absorbed as well.


    The second drop of blood was Xiao Huo''s blood and it was absorbed by the part under the ring part of the key. It still contained a bit of the ring, but mainly it was part of the shaft of the key.


    The moment that this second drop of blood was absorbed, the same thing as before happened where there was a red glow that appeared around this part of the key.


    Once the glow appeared, there was nothing else that happened.


    It was clear that unless all the parts of the key were lit up, nothing was going to happen.


    So this time, Lin Fan brought two drops of blood down at the same time.


    Both of them were absorbed and the glows representing the Qilin Race and White Tiger Race appeared around the key. There was only a single portion of the key that wasn''t lit up after this.


    Since there were already four different coloured glows around this key, it was clear what this final part of the key was.


    It was the ck Tortoise Race portion of the key.


    But before putting it in, Lin Fan tried to use his spiritual sense to scan the key to see if anything had changed. He found that there wasn''t a single thing that had changed about the key, which included the part that was already glowing.


    Even though it was glowing, the key itself was still the same as before.


    So Lin Fan brought the final drop of blood forward and let it fall onto the key.


    The moment that this final drop of blood was absorbed, there was a burst of light.


    The glows that were already around the key suddenly exploded and became super bright. At the same time, there was a deep ck glow that appeared around the final segment of the key that seemed to swallow all light that came towards it.


    These five different coloured glows shed one final time before disappearing without a trace, but that didn''t matter. That was because the feeling of the key hadpletely changed.


    It now had a voidw that was even more powerful than the one that it contained before and it seemed like it could be used for different things.


    But before Lin Fan could do anything with the key, a voice suddenly said, "My sessor, this is my inheritance. I hope that you will be able to aplish what I couldn''t in the past."


    Before anyone could react, the key floated into the air and then suddenly entered Lin Fan''s body.


    By the time that they knew what happened, the key had disappeared without a trace.


    They all looked at Lin Fan, looking at where the key had entered his body, but they couldn''t find a thing.


    It was as if nothing had happened just now with how the key had disappearedpletely.

 Chapter 1076 Return

    ?


    There was only silence that filled the room after the key disappeared.


    Everyone just stared at Lin Fan, waiting for him to react.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t have a reaction at all since he couldn''t find anything different about himself.


    Well, the one thing that was different was that there was now a ck key that was inside of his dantian. It floated right in the center of the ck hole that was there and it seemed like it was slowly being absorbed by it.


    But there wasn''t anything that really changed with the ck hole.


    At the same time, Lin Fan really couldn''t feel anything different about his voidws.


    He had thought that he would master some kind of new ability or it would be stronger than before, but in reality, it was only just a tiny bit stronger and that was because it had absorbed the voidws from the key. Other than that, there was no real change with his voidws.


    He didn''t know how long it would take the ck hole in his dantian to absorb this key, but at the rate that it was currently going, it didn''t seem like that would be for a while.


    So he had no choice but to give up on having the key grant him some kind of magical power.


    But he couldn''t help feeling confused and a bit disappointed.


    The voice had said that this was the Void God''s inheritance, but there really wasn''t much to inherit¡­


    Could it be that he still had to do something special to unlock the powers of the key before he could use it?


    Or was there something that he was missing?


    Lin Fan really couldn''t think of what he was missing, so he just gave a sigh and put all of this in the back of his mind.


    Seeing that Lin Fan finally reacted, the ck Tortoise Race Great Elders took the lead.


    One of them asked, "Void God''s sessor, are you alright?"


    The other asked, "Void God''s sessor, is there anything that you need?"


    Lin Fan looked at them and shook his head as he said, "I''m fine."


    Hearing this, everyone around them let out a sigh of relief.


    They had all been scared that something had happened to the precious Void God''s sessor that they had been waiting so long for. If that did happen, they really didn''t know what they would do.


    Especially since it was because of the stones that they gave him that this happened.


    If anything did happen, they could only me themselves and they wouldn''t know how to fix it.


    But nothing happened, so it was all good.


    Seeing that he was fine, the ck Tortoise Race elders decided to forget about all of this and focus on something else.


    So the Great Elders spoke again.


    One of them said, "Then shall we prepare your quarters for you?"


    The other one said, "You''vee a long way, so we''ll prepare a ce for you to rest."


    Their goal was to get Lin Fan to stay at the ck Tortoise Race for as long as possible since they wanted to keep Rocky here for as long as they could. There were many things that they had to arrange now that Rocky was here, so they wanted him to stay for as long as possible.


    So they would try to show the utmost hospitality so that they wouldn''t want to leave.


    On the side, the elders of the four other sacred beast races revealed smiles of schadenfreude when they heard this.


    That was because they already knew that the ck Tortoise Race elders would be disappointed by how Lin Fan reacted.


    That was until they realized that there was something different this time.


    There was no other sacred beast race for Lin Fan to visit anymore.


    The excuse that Lin Fan had given for rushing to leave all of their races'' homeworlds was because he needed to visit all five of the sacred beast races as quickly as possible. But now that he had already visited all of them, was there any excuse that he could give?


    So could it be that he would stay on the ck Tortoise Race homeworld for once?


    But Lin Fan didn''t disappoint them as he said, "We won''t be staying long."


    The moment that he said this, the ck Tortoise Race elders all revealed distraught looks.


    At the same time, the elders of the other four sacred beast races couldn''t help knitting their brows. They should have had looks of schadenfreude on their faces when they heard this, but they couldn''t help feeling confused.


    After all, if Lin Fan wasn''t going to stay on the ck Tortoise Race homeworld, where would he be going?


    After thinking for a bit, they couldn''t help feeling a bit of hope.


    After all, there was the chance that he was heading back to the homeworlds of the other sacred beast races. There were still things that weren''t done because he had rushed to leave, so perhaps he was going back to take care of them.


    Lin Fan and his pets all had bonds in some shape or form with the other four sacred beast races. It was only the ck Tortoise Race that didn''t have any bond since this Rocky hade out of nowhere.


    He wasn''t rted to the ck Tortoise Race at all, or at least that was as far as the elders could remember.


    So it didn''t seem likely there would be anything that would keep Lin Fan here.


    The elders of the ck Tortoise Race tried to talk Lin Fan out of leaving this quickly, but Lin Fan wouldn''t listen to them as he insisted on leaving.


    He said that he would leave this ce in three days and he wouldn''t change his mind.


    But the elders of the other sacred beast races couldn''t help finding this strange.


    He gave the ck Tortoise Race the same amount of time as he did the other four races¡­well, he did give the White Tiger Race an extra day, but they couldn''t understand what he was thinking.


    So where was he nning on going?


    Finally, one of the Dragon Race elders couldn''t take it anymore and asked, "Void God''s sessor, where are you nning on going now? There''s no more sacred beast races to visit, so you will being back to our Dragon Race, right?"


    Seeing him take this initiative, all of the elders of the other races red at the Dragon Race elder.


    However, they didn''t waste more time ring at him since they knew that they couldn''t fall behind.


    So they all quickly started asking Lin Fan if he woulde back to their races.


    They held onto this hope and started listing all the different things that could possibly attract Lin Fan back.


    For the Dragon Race, it was the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    For the Phoenix Race, it was the Red Phoenix Tribe.


    For the Qilin Race, it was Purple Qilin Tribe.


    For the White Tiger Race, it was the Brown Stripe White Tiger Race.


    When the elders of the ck Tortoise Race heard this, all of the revealed shocked and betrayed looks.


    They had guessed that the other four sacred beast races had already made connections with the Void God''s sessor, but they never thought that it would be this deep.


    They had already arranged engagements or had family members of the true descendant in their race.


    Their ck Tortoise Race was the only ones who didn''t have anything at all¡­


    But none of these requests had even the slightest effect with Lin Fan.


    That was because he didn''t care about those things.


    Perhaps it would have worked if there was a deeper bond between him and those ces, or if they had appealed to the people rted to them directly, but for Lin Fan¡­it didn''t matter at all.


    So he didn''t n on staying longer than he needed to.


    Lin Fan just turned to the ck Tortoise Race elders and asked, "Where are our quarters? I want to rest after a long journey."


    Hearing this, the elders of the other sacred beast races couldn''t help feeling anxious.


    So they tried even harder to convince Lin Fan¡­but all that did was annoy him until he finally said, "We''re not going anywhere. I''m going home to take care of other business."


    When they heard this, all of them couldn''t help revealing ugly expressions.


    It seemed that not a single one of them would be able to bring Lin Fan and the true descendant back to their race''s homeworld. At the same time, it would mean that they would lose contact with them since Lin Fan was heading back to his own world.


    Who knew how far away that was¡­


    No, the Dragon Race did have an idea of where that was since¡­they had a clue as to who Lin Fan was from the act he had done at the Azure Dragon Tribe.


    As for the other races, they all wanted to look for the people rted to their races to find out where Lin Fan was from.


    But Lin Fan knew that it was impossible to hide this in the first ce.


    So he was nning on using this to help the Lin Astral Empire once he returned.


    After all, the Lin Astral Empire was still being invaded by the Beast Race.


    If he could use the five sacred beast races to put pressure on the Beast Race, that would be for the best.


    So while they were making ns, he was also making ns on how to use them.

 Chapter 1077 Another Special Realm

    ?


    During the three days, the elders of the ck Tortoise Race did all kinds of things to try and get them to stay.


    At the same time, the elders of the other four sacred beast races tried to get Lin Fan toe back to their own homeworlds.


    However, it didn''t have any effect.


    The elders of the ck Tortoise Race had gone all out in inviting all kinds of different girls for Rocky like the White Tiger Race had done for Xiao Bai, but they took it even further. They didn''t limit themselves at all and just called every single willing girl toe.


    All that did though was backfire on them since it just scared Rocky with how aggressive they were.


    The girls didn''t hold back at all.


    They could feel the power of the bloodline that came from Rocky, so they knew exactly who they were trying to seduce. They all wanted to be the sparrow that ascended to be a phoenix, so they didn''t hold back as they tried to get closer to Rocky.


    There were many girls who even sabotaged each other in an attempt to get closer to Rocky.


    But all that led to was Rocky being surrounded by all of these girls.


    Due to Lin Fan mostly hiding Rocky away, Rocky had never really interacted with many people before. So when all of these girls suddenly wanted to talk to him and get closer to him, he couldn''t help being overwhelmed.


    It was the same situation with Xiao Bai where he ran into Ang''s arms forfort.


    Then, the girls had topete with Ang for Rocky''s affection.


    Ang had a mean re that scared off most of the girls, but there were still plenty that didn''t get scared off. They tried all kinds of different things just to get the chance to talk to Rocky.


    But in the eyes of normal people¡­these actions would be considered crazy.


    Such as sneaking into their room, hiding in the ceiling, and all kinds of other things that only stalkers did.


    It was much worse than at the White Tiger Tribe since the ck Tortoise Race elders didn''t regte them at all.


    Even when Lin Fanined about it, the ck Tortoise Race elders just gave a vague reply.


    Still, it was only for three days, so Lin Fan sucked it up.


    When the ck Tortoise Race elders saw that their n wasn''t working, they couldn''t help getting more and more desperate. But there wasn''t much else they could do other than kidnapping Lin Fan and Rocky to force them to stay.


    So they could only give Rocky the inheritance and leave it at that.


    When the three days were over, everyone in Lin Fan''s group couldn''t help letting out sighs of relief. The past three days for them had been quite hectic, but it had been hardest on Ang who had been keeping Rocky safe.


    The other option would have been to keep Rocky in the pet storage space during all of this¡­but Lin Fan knew that it would create a panic if Rocky suddenly disappeared.


    So they had no choice but to suffer through this.


    As they were preparing to leave, the elders from all five of the sacred beast races were trying to convince them not to leave. However, it was all to no avail since Lin Fan had already made up his mind.


    So in front of all of them, with a wave of his hand and a sh of bright light, he and the rest of his group all disappeared.


    When the sh of light disappeared, all of the elders were left there standing with bitter smiles on their faces.


    But the looks in their eyes made it clear that they weren''t nning on giving up just yet.


    After exchanging a few words, the elders of the other sacred beast races quickly headed back to their homeworld.


    Since they weren''t able to convince Lin Fan to stay and they weren''t able to bring him back to their homeworlds, they could only do one thing.


    Instead of bringing him back with them, they would go to him.


    They had clues on how to find him, so now they would follow them.


    They wouldn''t let their true descendants and the Void God''s sessor get away from them since this was the path to prosperity for their races.


    ¡­


    After that sh of light, Lin Fan''s group found that they were back at the store.


    They were in the back rooms of the store, the ones that had been locked after Lin Fan had gone into closed door cultivation.


    However, not a single one of them left this ce yet because Lin Fan wouldn''t let them leave this ce.


    That was because there was somewhere else he needed to go first.


    Lin Fan opened up the system panel and went to the list of special cultivation realms that were avable to him.


    This list had grown quite a bit after the adventure to the homeworlds of the five sacred beast races, but there was one that Lin Fan paid close attention to. This was one that had been on there before he had even gone to the Dragon Race''s homeworld.


    It was the very special cultivation realm that said¡­"unknown".


    That was the only thing that was listed.


    There wasn''t any description of this realm, there wasn''t even a name for it.


    Lin Fan had left this special cultivation realm alone because of this since he knew that it would be dangerous with the way that it had been described, but Lin Fan also knew that there had to be a reason for the system giving him this special cultivation realm.


    So while he had time now¡­he wanted to see what this special cultivation realm was about.


    After staring for a bit, Lin Fan asked in his mind, "System, what is this cultivation realm?"


    But to his surprise, he found that there was an answer that came from the system.


    "The host will find out what this special cultivation realm is after traveling there. It is rmended that the host takes the time to visit this special cultivation realm since there is a special treasure hidden there."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows when he heard this.


    The system hadn''t given him any special information, but there was one thing that caught his attention.


    The system was saying that there was a ''special treasure'' there.


    Something that the system considered ''special'' would definitely be worthy of this adjective.


    But that would mean that it was dangerous¡­


    After all, the system would never just give out this kind of special treasure without some kind of price being paid.


    So Lin Fan had to think about whether to take this chance or not¡­


    But in the end, he decided that he needed to go since he needed more power to achieve what he wanted to do.


    With this decision, Lin Fan turned to look at the others and said, "I''ll be gone for a bit."


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help being surprised.


    Normally, when Lin Fan went anywhere, he would at least bring them with him.


    But this, he was choosing to leave them behind.


    Ang was the one that was the most affected by this.


    However, before any of them could say anything, there was a notification that appeared in front of them.


    When they saw this, they couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    That was because this was a notification from the system stopping them from doing anything to follow Lin Fan. In fact, they werepletely helpless since there were severe consequences that were ced in front of them.


    If they dared to go against it, it would be unlikely that they would even be allowed to stay in this store anymore.


    So they had no choice but to ept Lin Fan going alone.


    Before he left, Ang made him promise to be safe.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he saw the way that she was acting, so he said with a smile, "I promise, I''ll be safe."


    She just gave a simple nod before taking him in her embrace.


    The two of them stood there like this for a while before she was finally willing to let him go.


    Then Lin Fan disappeared from in front of them with a sh of light.


    When it cleared, they saw that he was gone.


    Not a single one of them knew where he was going, but they couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition.


    It was like it would be a long time before they would see him again.


    After the light cleared from in front of Lin Fan''s eyes, he found that he was in a familiar ce. However, this ce waspletely burnt down and it didn''t seem like there were any signs of people living here.


    As for what was familiar about this ce¡­it was that it looked like the world that he had seen in the trial before.


    This was the world of that person with the bow who had their world destroyed, the one that Lin Fan had taken over during the trial.


    But why would the system bring him to a ce like this?


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being confused as he looked around himself, trying to find any clues that would help him figure out why he had been sent here.


    But no matter how he looked around himself, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    So he just stood there with a confused look on his face.

 Chapter 1078 Abandoned World (1)

    ?


    Not knowing what to do, Lin Fan turned to the system.


    He hoped that there would be a map provided by the system that would lead him to a certain ce, like it had done with all the other special cultivation realms.


    However, there wasn''t a single thing from the system.


    It seemed like he waspletely on his own in this matter.


    So he was faced with a choice right now.


    He could just stay here and search around the area for clues, though that was something that he had already done to no avail. Or he could go and move away from this ce, looking for clues.


    The first option was safe since he had already secured the area, but there wouldn''t be much information for him here.


    The second option was dangerous, but it would definitely be more productive than sitting here twiddling his thumbs.


    So he had to decide which one he would go with.


    In the end, Lin Fan decided to search the area.


    That was because he had one thing that normal people didn''t.


    With Brainy''s puppets, it should be easy for him to avoid anything dangerous in the area.


    The only problem was that Brainy''s puppets had limited knowledge, so they wouldn''t be able to find what he was looking for. He would have to tap his mind into herwork and search for these things himself.


    This was something was able to do now that she had broken through to the World Realm.


    She could share what she saw from her puppets with people, but unless they had strong enough spiritual senses, they wouldn''t be able to withstand the sudden influx of information.


    Lin Fan could only ess a small part even with his powerful spiritual senses. So he really couldn''t help admiring Brainy''s abilities once again.


    Not just for how useful it was, but also for how strong Brainy''s spiritual sense was to be able to process all this information.


    After searching for a bit, Lin Fan found¡­nothing still.


    There wasn''t a single thing in this ce, there was only destruction. Or rather, the remaining signs of destruction.


    There had been buildings on this world in the past, but they had all eroded away and returned to thend. But because of how much destruction had been wrought in this ce, thend itself had also died and there was nothing growing here anymore.


    So this was a deste wastnd that didn''t seem to have a single resource.


    The more that Lin Fan explored this ce, the more confused he was about why the system had sent him here.


    After all, there had to be a reason that the system had sent him here, but what could he do in this ce where there was only deadnd?


    What kind of special treasure could be in this ce?


    Lin Fan paused to think about where to go next¡­that is until he suddenly remembered something else.


    There were special items that he had been given before he had unlocked this special cultivation world. It was only because he had those items that this special cultivation realm had been made avable to him in the first ce.


    So without hesitation, Lin Fan pulled out the three items that he had received and spread them out in front of him.


    They were the key, thentern, and the map.


    With these three things in front of him, Lin Fan paused to think for a second before reaching out towards the map.


    After all, when he didn''t know where to go, this map should be the most likely thing that would lead the way forward for him.


    When he opened it, he looked down at what was written.


    There was the same map that had the X on it, but¡­he found that he didn''t know what to use this for at all.


    After all, there was no marking that he could use to tell what his position was on the map. Even if he tried to look around for andmark¡­with the destend that didn''t have anything around him, there was nondmark for him to make out at all.


    So he would never be able to figure out just where he was on the map¡­


    Since it was worthless, then he turned his attention to the other items that were here. Though he didn''t really have any hope that they would be useful.


    The key he chose to ignorepletely since this key would only have one purpose and it wouldn''t be rted to what he was doing now.


    Thentern¡­was a long stretch, but he still decided to inject life energy into it.


    When he did, it released the same green glow as before.


    After lighting up thentern, Lin Fan turned around while holding it in his hand. He let the light of thentern fall onto the various things around him as he tried to find anything with its glow.


    But the only thing that thisntern''s glow did was give everything an eerie feel to it.


    No matter what he shined thentern''s glow on, there wasn''t anything that changed.


    So Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling even more confused about what the role of thisntern was. That is until he saw something out of the corner of his eyes.


    He didn''t really understand what it was at first, but then he looked carefully at it.


    It was a mark that had appeared on the map.


    It was a green mark that seemed to be in the shape of antern, just like the one that was currently in Lin Fan''s hand.


    After seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help stopping the flow of life energy being supplied to thentern.


    When this happened, he found that as he had expected, the green mark on the map also disappeared.


    After testing it a few times, he found that this green mark was indeed linked to thentern and more importantly, it marked their ce on the map. When he moved around with thentern in his hand, the mark would also move on the map and show where he was going.


    With this, he would be able to figure out his way to the X that was on the map.


    But the one thing that confused him was how the green mark had appeared on the map in the first ce.


    No matter how he tried checking out the two things, he couldn''t find a single thing linking them. There was no life energy link, no spiritual energy link, and now linking them.


    He had made sure of this by using his voidws topletely surround the area around thentern. It wrapped around it perfectly so that not a single particle would be able to escape this area.


    But even then, thentern was still able to appear on the map.


    It was as if there was some kind of strange force that was causing this that he didn''t know about at all.


    So Lin Fan had no choice but to give up.


    After all, this was something from the system, so it was something that was made by a God Realm Expert. The God Realm was still something that Lin Fan had no idea about, so he didn''t know if there was some kind of magical power that allowed for this to happen or not.


    Since he couldn''t figure it out, there was no need for him to keep thinking about it.


    After all, he was still in this dangerous ce alone. He should quickly follow this map and find what was at the X.


    Though he was also certain that it would be a dangerous journey to get to this X.


    Anything that the system gave him was usually filled with all kinds of danger.


    Taking a deep breath, Lin Fan focused his mind and started heading on the path that the map hadid out for him.


    Well, it wasn''t so much a path as a general direction for him to head in. That was because other than the two marks on the map, there really wasn''t anything there.


    So he just had to follow in the general direction of the X and get closer.


    Though he didn''t know what was waiting for him, if it was anything like the Outer God Fragment realm that he had been sent to¡­there should be plenty of things getting in his way.


    But to his surprise, he found that there wasn''t a single thing.


    No matter how careful he was, he couldn''t find a single thing here.


    It was as if this entire world was empty and he was the only person that was here.


    So it was a very uneventful journey to the X.


    In fact, the only thing that got in his way was his own slow action. If he hadn''t moved so slowly and deliberately, he would have reached this ce a long time ago.


    It was all because he took it slow that it took him this long to arrive.


    When he arrived, he found that there wasn''t a single thing waiting for him, just like the rest of this special cultivation realm.


    Even though on the map, thentern mark was right over the X, there was nothing here around him. He couldn''t find a single thing in this ce that would be worthy of there being a X on the map.


    But there was no mistaking it since this was where thentern mark met with the X.


    So why did the system bring him to this ce?

 Chapter 1079 Abandoned World (2)

    ?


    Lin Fan sent out Brainy''s puppets to scour the area.


    Instead of the general sweep that he had done before, he had Brainy''s puppets full search every single part of this ce. If there was even a single rock that was out of ce, he wanted to find out.


    But in the end, they couldn''t find anything that was strange about this ce.


    So Lin Fan was once again confused about what to do.


    Without any indications on what to do here, he could only turn to the only thing that he had which was the map.


    He held up thentern in one hand and the map in the other as he started walking around the area.


    As he walked around, one might think that he was crazy with the way that he was walking back and forth. He was clearly just moving around in a circle, but he was still focused on the map and continued walking forward.


    It was almost as if he had gone crazy¡­but there was no one around to say anything.


    However, Lin Fan did have a goal in doing this.


    It wasn''t as if he was just walking around for no reason.


    He was trying to pinpoint exactly where the X on the map was in this ce.


    As he moved with thentern in hand, the mark on the map would move so slightly. However, it still did move in the end which allowed him to track just where he was.


    He was using this mark and moving back and forth to align himself with the X.


    Once he was certain where the X was, he would be able to search even more in depth.


    So with this method, he finally stopped in one area.


    This was the area that was considered right on the X ording to the map.


    However, this area was just as barren as the rest of the area. There wasn''t a single thing here that he could see that could show him what he was supposed to find.


    So Lin Fan was about to put thentern away so he could focus on searching.


    But before he could, he noticed something¡­something that he didn''t see before.


    Lin Fan slowly brought hisntern forward and towards the ground. As the light of thentern came closer and closer to the ground, he found that there was something changing in front of him.


    Once he was almost right up against the ground, he saw what it was¡­


    It was a X that was made of stones.


    He didn''t know how he didn''t see this before, but now there it was right in front of him. Even if he wanted to miss it, it was impossible for him to miss it.


    But how had he missed it before?


    Lin Fan stood up again and he realized just how he had missed it before.


    When he stood up, the X made of stones slowly started to fade away.


    That was because the light of thentern was slowly being moved away from it.


    It turned out that thentern wasn''t just used to mark him on the map, but also to show these things that were hidden by the person who made this ce. However, the light of thentern was very faint, which was why it had a short range.


    So that was why he hadn''t been able to see anything when he used thentern earlier¡­


    Lin Fan really had some choice words for the people who designed this¡­


    But that was forter.


    For now, he wanted to see what was so special about this X that it needed to be hidden with this much security.


    The only problem that Lin Fan had now was that he had to hold thentern in one hand as he inspected this X.


    It was quite cumbersome holding it in his hand like this, but he was able to do it in the end by shifting his grip on thentern''s handle.


    He brought it close up to the center of the X and he found that there was one stone that was different from the rest. This one stone had a higher level of elevationpared to the rest.


    With how it jutted out like this, it was almost as if it was being asked to be pushed.


    But at the same time, it also looked like the perfect trap.


    This X in the middle of nowhere that could only be revealed by thisntern¡­this all seemed like some kind of convoluted and borate trap¡­


    So Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling conflicted over this.


    After agonizing over it for a bit, Lin Fan finally decided to take a risk and press that center stone.


    After all, there was nothing else for him to do here.


    He could take the safe way and search the entire special cultivation realm¡­but there was no guarantee that he would even find anything if he did this.


    So even if this was risky¡­it was the better choice.


    After taking a deep breath and calling back Brainy and the puppets, Lin Fan pressed the center stone.


    There was nothing that happened at first, but then there was a sudden clicking sound.


    While Lin Fan was still looking around, searching for the source of that clicking, he felt the ground disappear from under him. When he looked down, he found that there was arge pit that was now under him and he was currently in a freefall.


    Lin Fan looked to the sides of this pit to find something to grab onto, but he found that there wasn''t a single thing. The sides of the pit seemed like they had been deliberately smoothed out so that there wouldn''t be a single thing to grab.


    So without any hesitation, he called out the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    He changed it into the shape of a grappling hook and shot it at the wall on the side.


    When the grappling hook hit the wall, there was a loud metal nging sound that rang out. Then when he looked at the grappling hook more closely, he found that there were even cracks that had formed on it.


    That meant that whatever the wall was made of, it was much harder than the grappling hook made from the Iron Eater Bone Artifact.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he heard this, but he wasn''t worried when he put the Iron Eater Bone Artifact away. That was because it would be able to heal itself in no time, but he wouldn''t be able to use it before it healed itself.


    Seeing that he had no way of stopping this, Lin Fan just resigned himself to his fate.


    After all, there was something here that was suppressing his ability to fly as well.


    So there really was nothing that he could do.


    As he fell, Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised by just how far he was falling.


    By his estimate, he should have already been falling for around half an hour and yet he still hadn''t reached the bottom of this pit yet. The Iron Eater Bone Artifact had even regenerated during this time.


    Yet he didn''t even see a sign of the bottom.


    That is until he suddenly felt something below him.


    Even though it was dark, he could still see that there was some kind of floor that was approaching him.


    Lin Fan didn''t know how fast he was falling, but he knew that it would certainly hurt if he mmed into that ground below him.


    So he immediately focused his mind and gathered his life energy.


    Weaving it in his hands together, hebined several differentws together. Then all of sudden, he pushed forward with his hands and released that ball of differentws that he had gathered.


    There was arge explosive force that came from in front of him that cancelled most of the speed that he was falling with. However, it wasn''t enough to cancel out everything, so he had a roughnding in the end.


    But at least this was better than the alternative of smacking onto the ground like a meat patty and dying.


    Though the injuries that he got couldn''t be considered light either.


    The worst part of it all came after he got up and he looked around himself.


    He found that the part of the floor that hended on was a different colour from the floor around him. The floor around him was all green and the floor that he was currently on was gray¡­


    Lin Fan went over to the green part of the floor and reached his hand down to pat it.


    When his hand made contact with that part of the floor, he found that it sunk right into the floor.


    This part of the floor was very soft and very absorbent¡­It seemed like it would negate all impact that came its way.


    For example, a very long drop down this long hole.


    But at the edge of where this green part stopped and it revealed the gray part, he found that this part of the floor was scorched¡­as if the green part that had been over the gray part had been burnt away.


    As for what burnt it away, it wasn''t hard for him to guess.


    After all, there was only one explosion that happened just now.


    If he hadn''t done anything, he would have been perfectly fine since the impact of his fall would have been absorbed by the green part of the floor¡­


    So in the end, he had only made the situation worse.

 Chapter 1080 Abandoned World (3)

    ?


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking the system, "Is this harassment or is this some kind of prank?"


    The system didn''t respond when he asked this.


    However, that was all the answer that Lin Fan needed.


    Since he was already here, he would see what he needed to do.


    So he raised his hand as if he was about to create some fire in his hand to generate light. But then he suddenly stopped himself as he remembered something.


    He put his hand back down and then pulled out thentern from before.


    With a bit of life energy, he lit up thentern and used it to see the area around himself better.


    He could see a bit without light, but it was much more clear when he had light.


    He immediately saw that the green stuff on the floor was some kind of moss. This was a very soft looking moss that was able to withstand all kinds of impact, which was something that Lin Fan had no knowledge of, even with his intensive knowledge of herbs and such.


    This really was an herb that he had never seen before.


    He really wanted to take a sample of it as well, but there was no time for that since he could see that there was a door to the side of this¡­room? At the side, there was arge pair of doors that seemed to lead into the dark unknown.


    Seeing these doors, he walked over slowly and carefully, making sure that there were no traps. However, the only thing that he really felt was the soft feeling of the moss as he walked across it.


    When he made it over to the door, Lin Fan found¡­that he couldn''t open it.


    No matter how he pushed at the door, he found that he couldn''t open it and it seemed like it waspletely bolted.


    So he started looking over the door, trying to figure a way through it.


    But he found that there was nothing special about this door at all. There were no designs that could give him a clue as to how to open it and there were no extra grooves or indents for things like keys.


    He had thought that he would be able to use the key here since¡­there was still the key that he had received from the system that he hadn''t used yet.


    Since he wasn''t able to find anything with this door, Lin Fan turned his attention to the area around the door.


    He started searching the walls and even the ground itself for anything that could open this door. As he searched and found nothing, he started expanding his area of search until he finally called out Brainy once more.


    He sent Brainy''s puppets all around the room, which fortunately wasn''t that big.


    However, no matter how hard they searched, they weren''t able to find a single thing.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling frustrated again until he suddenly thought of something.


    This had been used when he had needed to find the X and now that he wasn''t able to find what he needed to find¡­would it work again?


    Lin Fan looked down at thentern in his hand again.


    He first moved over to the door and shined the light of thentern against it, but there was nothing that appeared.


    He already expected this since this had already been done when he had examined the door earlier.


    So instead, he started walking around the room. He moved along the wall of the room, going slowly to make sure that he could shine the light of thentern on the wall.


    However, as he slowly moved around the room, he still wasn''t able to find anything.


    When he came halfway across the room, at the exact opposite side of the door, he was starting to feel that this was all hopeless. That is until he found that there was something there.


    It was very small, so he didn''t notice it at first, but then he saw it.


    It was a keyhole in the wall.


    As for the shape of the key itself¡­it was very simr.


    At this point, Lin Fan called out the key that he had received from the system.


    Looking at the key and looking at the keyhole, he could tell that it was a perfect fit.


    So he was about to put the key in the keyhole.


    That is until Lin Fan suddenly realized something else.


    "The shape of this key and this keyhole, why does it seem familiar?"


    After he muttered this to himself, he couldn''t help falling into deep thought.


    After all, it felt like he had seen the same shaped key that would fit the indentation of this keyhole just like the key in his hand.


    It took him a while before suddenly remembering where he had seen this key before. The moment that he figured it out, he immediately looked inside of himself, he looked into his dantian.


    There floating in the ck hole that was at the center of his dantian was the key that he had received frombining the five stones together. This was the key that he had received as the Void God''s inheritance.


    But the thing that Lin Fan cared about the most was the shape of this key.


    That was because as he looked at it carefully, he found¡­that it was the same shape as the key that was currently in his hand. Though the key in his dantian could be considered a bit bigger than the one in his hand.


    When he realized this, Lin Fan couldn''t help freezing.


    After all, everything that had happened had all been rted to the system.


    If it wasn''t for the system, he wouldn''t have even gone to meet the various god fragments of the sacred beast race gods. If it wasn''t for the system, he wouldn''t have been able to go to all those different homeworlds without being detected. If it wasn''t for the system, he wouldn''t have evene here and been given the key to open this door.


    So just what was the goal of the system here?


    Lin Fan was almost waiting for the system toe out and exin itself, but it remained silent just as usual.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling more and more suspicious about this, but was there anything that he could do in this situation?


    He had alreadye to this ce and to even go back, he would need the help of the system.


    He was sure that if he tried to escape this ce now, the system wouldn''t allow it¡­


    So he really did have no choice but to continue forward¡­


    As for the keyhole, it was just waiting for a key.


    Which key should he use for it?


    No, there was no choice as to which key he should use.


    One key was out in his hand while the other was in his dantian and he didn''t know how to get it out. Not to mention, the second key was too big to fit in the keyhole anyway.


    So Lin Fan brought the key that was in his hand up to the keyhole and inserted it.


    There was no reaction after he inserted it, so he started turning the key.


    He found that the key wouldn''t turn at first, as if it was stuck. But when he started using a bit more force, he found that he was able to turn it.


    It went slowly at first, but eventually he was able to turn it all the way around so that it was facing the opposite direction of the way that it had been inserted.


    Once it had beenpletely turned, there was a clicking sound that rang out which was soon followed by a loud rumbling sound.


    With the faint light from thentern, Lin Fan turned around and was able to see that the door was opening up. It was scraping along the floor, stirring up dust as it moved, clearly showing that it hadn''t been moved in a long time.


    Behind it was just darkness that Lin Fan couldn''t see through at all.


    So Lin Fan slowly approached this darkness with thentern raised up in front of him.


    The light of thentern was faint and it couldn''t cut through the darkness behind the door at all, so he wasn''t able to see much. With this light of thentern, he was only able to see a few feet in front of him, but that was enough for him.


    So without hesitation, Lin Fan walked through the door.


    As he walked through, he said in his mind, "I''m trusting you."


    It was as if he was saying this to the system, but the system didn''t say anything in response.


    As soon as he made his way through, there was a sudden loud sound that came from behind him as he found that the door had suddenly mmed shut.


    It seemed that he wouldn''t be able to go back the way that he hade from even if he wanted to.


    So Lin Fan faced forward and looked at the room that he had entered.


    But the moment that he saw what the room looked like, he couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because this was just a tiny cave that didn''t have a single thing in it.


    This looked like a ce that people would use to trap people in¡­


    So was this all an borate trap from the system?


    But if it was, why did it want to trap him here?

 Chapter 1081 Abandoned World (4)

    ?


    Lin Fan took the time to look around the small room with the light of thentern.


    He found that this really was just a small cave that didn''t have a single thing in it. There weren''t even any stctites or stgmites that were hanging or jutting out from the surfaces of this cave.


    The ground was also strangelypletely barren, almost as if it had been smoothed out so that there wouldn''t be a single thing here.


    No matter how one looked at it, this ce was man made.


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh and didn''t know what to do.


    But of course, he didn''t panic at all since he could always escape from this ce with the help of the system.


    He had checked earlier and as long as he wanted, he could always use the system to leave. But before doing that, he wanted to think about where he had gone wrong on his way here.


    As he stood there, he could feel something changing around him.


    The concentration of life energy in the air was slowly getting stronger and stronger.


    It didn''t affect him much at first, but then it became much too strong for him to just stand there in.


    The stronger that the concentration of life energy got, the more suffocating it was for him.


    While one might think that this was a good thing for any cultivator since a higher concentration of life energy in the air would allow them to cultivate more efficiently, this wasn''t the case when the concentration of life energy became too high.


    Anything that was too concentrated was never a good thing.


    That was because as the concentration of life energy increased in this ce, as more and more life energy was forced into this finite area, it started pushing away everything else.


    But the most important thing was that it was also pushing away Lin Fan.


    So when the life energy concentration increased, Lin Fan felt like he was being squeezed by something. The space inside of this tiny room was beingpressed by the concentrated life energy that was here.


    If he didn''t do anything¡­it wouldn''t take long before he was also squished into a meat cube.


    Lin Fan started suspecting more and more that this ce was a trap, but he didn''t have time to think about that. The more important thing to do right now was figure out a way to get out of this ce.


    There was the system''s emergency escape¡­but it wasn''t time to do that yet.


    Even if he escaped with the system''s help, he would have toe back to this ce. So it was better to see if he could figure out this trap itself first and only use the emergency escape as ast resort.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any more time standing in the center of this small room and started searching around himself for where the life energy wasing from. There was only so much space in this room and there had to be something that was pumping this life energy in.


    He tried releasing his spiritual sense to find the source of this life energy, but he found that it was already toote. The life energy in this room was already too concentrated for his spiritual senses to prate through, so he couldn''t move them more than a few centimeters away from him.


    Once they got too far away, they immediately copsed under the pressure of the concentrated life energy.


    Even in the area around himself, he wasn''t able to find the flow of the life energy with howpressed it was. It was just too slow moving for him to track it.


    Since he couldn''t find the source of it, he knew that he wouldn''t be able to stop this room from filling up with more life energy.


    Since there was no way of stopping more life energy from flowing in, then there was only one thing that Lin Fan could do.


    He would have to use up the life energy that was gathered inside of this room.


    If he could burn away that life energy, he would be able to slowly decrease the concentration of life energy in here.


    But the problem was that he had to burn life energy faster than the amount of life energy that was filling this room and he wasn''t certain that he would be able to do that. After all, he had no idea just how much life energy was being pumped in.


    However, it wasn''t as if the situation was giving him time to think about it.


    So without any more thinking, Lin Fan sat down cross legged in this room and started sucking in the life energy gathered in this area for his cultivation.


    The one upside was that with all of this concentrated life energy, his cultivation base started to soar. With all of the life energy that was gathered, the world inside of his dantian started to grow at an immense rate.


    Even then¡­it still wasn''t enough.


    As he drew in the life energy around him, Lin Fan still felt the pressure on him getting stronger. Even if he was pulling life energy out of the space, there was too much of it being pumped back in than he could take out.


    At this rate, he would be crushed by all of the life energy around him.


    So while he sucked in life energy for cultivating, Lin Fan started using his voidws as well.


    His voidws created ayer of ck energy around him that started draining all of the life energy that was still left. With this void of life energy created, all of the life energy around him spilled in to take that space, which created arge flow of life energy towards around Lin Fan.


    This allowed the voidws to suck in as much life energy as it could¡­but there was a problem.


    The voidws sucked the life energy in and then converted it into life energy for Lin Fan, but there was only so much life energy that Lin Fan could store inside of his body. So there would be a limit to how long he would be able to use this voidw.


    To counter that, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to create a ball of energy in the air.


    This ball of energy was quickly engulfed in mes and turned into a ball of fire that just floated there. However, it didn''t remain idle as it became stronger and stronger. The mes of this ball of fire burned bright and strong, releasing a powerful heat.


    Lin Fan didn''t stop at just a single ball of energy.


    There were several other balls of energy that quickly formed in the air before transforming into different things.


    A ball of lightning, a ball of light, a ball of darkness, a ball of wind, and many other balls of other things appeared around Lin Fan.


    These balls of energy released a lot of power, but that was what Lin Fan wanted.


    He was using these balls of energy along with his control of thesews to release as much life energy as he could. That way, he would be able to use up all of the life energy that he received from his voidws.


    But no matter how many differentws he used, he still wasn''t able to reduce the pressure.


    It wasn''t increasing as much as before, but there was still a slight increase to the pressure that he felt around him. He knew that even if he kept this up, he wouldn''t be able to reduce it by enough to prevent his death¡­


    Not to mention, he had already reached the limits of how manyws he could use at the same time.


    He had experience with this through his ability tobinews, but there was a limit to how manyws he could control with one mind. So he eventually reached his limit and still found that it didn''t reduce it enough¡­


    He wasn''t even to create an equilibrium to buy himself time to think of another n¡­


    So in the end, Lin Fan used his final idea.


    The balls of energy disappeared and there were only the voidws that were around Lin Fan left. However, as time passed and one looked closely at it, they would see that the voidws around Lin Fan were getting bigger and stronger.


    There was more and more of a gap being created between Lin Fan and the dense life energy around him.


    It was as if the voidws themselves were getting stronger¡­and that was indeed the case.


    Lin Fan had stopped feeding the life energy that he gained from the voidws into the balls of energy and he started feeding them into the voidws themselves.


    This was something that he could have done a long time ago, but he had never done it before. That was because while it did strengthen his voidws, if they became too strong, he wouldn''t be able to control them anymore.


    But at this point, he really didn''t have a choice.


    He could only strengthen his voidws now and swallow up all the life energy around him, then he would deal with the consequences.


    As he was doing so, he almost felt like he heard a faint voice saying something.


    "He''s¡­the¡­one¡­"


    Lin Fan distracted himself for a second to see if he could find the source of this voice, but he wasn''t able to find anything in the end.


    So he focused on feeding the life energy into the voidws.

 Chapter 1082 Abandoned World (5)

    ?


    As he kept feeding more and more life energy into the voidws, Lin Fan could feel the suction force from the voidws getting stronger.


    They were stronger than anything that he had felt before and it felt like he was about to lose control of them.


    But then, all of a sudden, he felt that they were easy to control again.


    It was almost as if something had suppressed them at that moment, but he didn''t know what it was. Even though it was still much stronger than before, he also found that he could control it much easier than before.


    It was a very strange feeling, but he didn''t have too much time to think about it in his current situation.


    So Lin Fan just used more of that voidw.


    He had been holding back a bit so that he would be able to control it, but now that he had regained control of these voidws, there was no need for him to hold back. Since this was the case, he released even more of the voidws.


    Once again, the voidws became stronger and stronger until he was almost unable to control them again.


    Once again, when he almost lost control of the voidws, there was something that suddenly helped him control them again.


    But this time, Lin Fan had been paying attention to his dantian to see what caused this.


    He found that it was¡­the key that was floating there in the middle of the ck hole that represented his voidws.


    The moment that the ck hole swelled up enough and seemed like it would explode, there was a sh of light that came from the key. The moment that this sh of light appeared, there was some kind of force that suddenly suppressed the ck hole.


    It forced the ck hole topress into a much smaller one until it reached the size that it had originally been.


    When that happened, Lin Fan found that he was able to control the voidws properly again.


    At the same time, he noticed that the voidws that he used now were different from before.


    If he had to say what was different, it was that these voidws seemed much more concentratedpared to before. So they were more powerful even though it was still the same amount of voidws as before.


    Lin Fan didn''t know why the key in his dantian would do this for him, but he knew that this would make his voidws stronger.


    The only danger was that¡­would his voidws return to normal if he didn''t have this key in his dantian anymore?


    But that wasn''t something to consider now.


    Lin Fan turned his attention back to the voidws and used them at full force.


    With how much stronger they were, he could feel the pressure around him start to decrease. It was only a little bit at first, but it seemed like his voidws had finally be strong enough to suck the life energy out of the area around him.


    But at the same time, he could also feel something different as he sucked the life energy out of the air.


    Now that his voidws had evolved to a certain extent, he could feel more clearly what he was absorbing.


    It was simple life energy, but there was something inside of this life energy that felt familiar.


    It felt like the voidws that he was currently using.


    But he just couldn''t tell what it was exactly.


    Slowly but surely, the concentration of life energy in the room slowly started to decrease. There wasn''t the same pressure that was on Lin Fan from before and he could let out a sigh of relief from not feeling the same crushing feeling as before.


    But before he could let his guard down, there was a change that happened in the room again.


    It was as if in response to the sudden decrease in the amount of life energy in the room, there was more that was pumped in.


    He didn''t know why it happened, but all that mattered was that the pressure was increasing on him again. He had no choice but to use his voidws at full strength to absorb as much of the life energy being pumped into the room as he could.


    However, when he tried to do this¡­he found that it was different.


    This life energy¡­was actually even more concentrated than the life energy from before.


    When his voidws absorbed this life energy, they pumped out much more life energy than before. So even if the ck hole in his dantian had already beenpressed twice, it was still growing at a rate faster than the rate from before.


    It didn''t take long before the ck hole had expanded back to an unstable state.


    At that time, the key in his dantian once again shed and it was reduced again.


    Lin Fan was just stuck in a cycle of having to use his voidws to absorb the life energy around him and then use that to make his voidws stronger. Every time that he felt that the pressure was being relieved to a certain extent, that would stop once more life energy was used to fill this room.


    So he wasn''t able to find a way out of this.


    But at the same time, he couldn''t help being shocked and confused by how much life energy was avable here.


    This was already an amount that even Ruler Realm Experts would find hard to provide.


    So unless there was a special thing that was providing all of this life energy, it was impossible for there to be this much life energy to pump into this room. This was something that even a Ruler Realm Expert would find hard to do¡­


    But then again, this was a ce that the system brought him to, so it was most likely rted to a God Realm Expert just like the world with the Outer God Fragment.


    So Lin Fan could only just sit there and absorb as much of the life energy here as he could.


    After a hundred cycles exactly, he finally found that the life energy around him was decreasing.


    This time, it didn''t increase in the response to his enhanced voidws, but it actually started to decrease.


    But at this point, the room was already filled with enough life energy that it would even make Ruler Realm Experts find it unbearable. Yet somehow, Lin Fan was able to stay there without a problem.


    After he finally drained all of the excess life energy from this ce, he found that there was a door that had opened up in this room.


    When he looked carefully at it, he found that it led into a pathway that he couldn''t see at all. However, he remembered where the door that he came in from was and this door was on the opposite side. So he knew that this was a different door from the one that he entered this room from.


    It seemed that he would have to go deeper to find out what this ce was.


    But he had to take a moment first to stabilize his cultivation.


    The amount of life energy that he had absorbed had actually pushed him to the brink of breaking through. This was an amount of life energy that normally would be impossible to get, even with the help of the system.


    So this influx of life energy into his dantian had pushed him over the edge.


    After taking a bit of time to focus, his cultivation suddenly soared and reached the next level.


    He had already been at the peak of the Realm after everything that happened, but now he had reached the Sun Realm.


    This was apletely different transformation since only those in the Sun Realm could be considered truly powerful cultivators. That was because those in the Sun Realm were close to breaking through to the Dao Realm, or better known as the Ruler Realm.


    In this Sun Realm, he could feel the change in his dantian world.


    There was now a sun that was strangelypletely ck and instead of releasing light, it drained light from the world in his dantian.


    But the world was still able to develop in this manner.


    Lin Fan didn''t understand how exactly it worked, but he knew that this was a representation of his voidws.


    Since the formation of a world in one''s dantian was to allow one to be the controller of thew that the world was based on.


    From there, they would reach the Dao Realm where they would be thew itself.


    With this new breakthrough, Lin Fan felt much more confident in dealing with what came next.


    So he raised thentern and started heading through the door that was in front of him.


    When he went through, the door suddenly mmed shut behind him.


    It seemed like he wasn''t allowed to move backwards, he was only allowed to move forwards.


    But that was what he had nned on doing in the first ce.


    As he walked along, he raised thentern in front of him to see if there was anything special that he could find. However, there wasn''t a single thing special about this corridor that was revealed with the glow of thentern.


    Lin Fan didn''t have to walk long to reach the end of this corridor and there was another room that was waiting for him.

 Chapter 1083 Abandoned World (6)

    ?


    When he walked into the room, the first thing that Lin Fan saw were therge pirs that were all over the room.


    Unlike the previous room, this room was brightly lit by some kind of strange light that wasing from above. When he looked up to see where this light wasing from, Lin Fan wasn''t able to see a thing.


    The only thing that he could see was the light itself and not the source of the light.


    But that wasn''t important.


    The important thing was the pirs that were in this room.


    This room was much bigger than before and it was filled with many differentrge pirs. When he looked carefully at the pirs, Lin Fan found that there were different symbols that were carved on them.


    There were a few symbols that he could understand since they were simple and basic symbols, such as a symbol for fire, water, earth, wind, thunder, and other basic elements.


    Then there were symbols that he couldn''t understand since they had such strange shapes.


    Lin Fan didn''t put away thentern even though this room was fully lit and instead lifted it up to check the room around himself.


    But the eerie glow of thentern wasn''t able to find anything.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan had no choice but to move to one of the pirs to see what it was about.


    The one that he chose was the one that had the fire symbol on it.


    He made his way forward, but before he could walk up in front of the pir, there was something that suddenly happened with the pir. There was a me that suddenly appeared at the top of the pir before shooting out a ball of fire at Lin Fan who had been approaching the pir.


    This ball of me moved quickly and if it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s quick reactions, he might have been hit right in the chest with it.


    But he was able to dodge out of the way in the end and the mesnded on the floor behind him.


    Seeing these mes, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because he could feel the heat that wasing from these mes. If they had hit him head on, perhaps he might have been burnt quite badly.


    Even if he had broken through, the power and heat in these mes were intense¡­they might even be hard for a Ruler Realm Expert to blockpletely.


    The mes just continued to burn there in front of Lin Fan, almost as if they were taunting him.


    He didn''t understand why these mes didn''t disappear, but he didn''t have time to think about that.


    Instead, Lin Fan turned his attention back to the pir since he wanted to figure out why it had suddenly shot those mes at him.


    "It should be because I came too close, but will it shoot more at me if I approached again?" Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering out loud.


    After thinking about it, he decided that he should check out the other pirs first.


    He didn''t look at any of the other pirs that had symbols that he couldn''t understand and instead turned to the ones with the basic symbols. After looking through them, he decided to go with the five basic elements, like the fire one that he had just tested.


    Out of the five, he chose to go with water.


    After all, if things went the same way as the fire pir, water shooting at him should be the safest one.


    So he started moving closer to the pir with the symbol for water on it.


    When he reached the threshold, just like with the pir of fire, there was a ball of water that was gathered above the pir.


    Lin Fan revealed a smile when he saw this, but that smile soon turned stiff.


    That was because there was something different about this ball of water that he didn''t expect. This ball of water was bubbling as if something was happening inside of it.


    It didn''t take long before that ball of water hadpletely changed shape into¡­a de of water.


    That de of water suddenly shot out with a force that Lin Fan didn''t expect. If it wasn''t for the fact that he was already expecting this and reacted as soon as it shot, it might have hit him right in his chest.


    But the strange thing was that even though he felt the force of it as it flew past him, there wasn''t a hole that was created in the ground when itnded.


    It was as if it cushioned itself before it hit the ground or that the ground was hard enough to withstand this impact.


    Then the even stranger thing was that this ball of water didn''t disappear like he thought it would. This water dended on the ground and formed arge ball of water there that was simr to the ball of fire that was also idle nearby.


    It almost seemed strange how perfect this ball of water was. It was like there was this strange force that was holding it together.


    Lin Fan just stopped moving afternding and watched the two balls that were there. He wanted to see if anything else would happen with them.


    But he was disappointed to find that not a single thing happened.


    He could have taken this time to check the other pirs, but he had a bad feeling about these two balls. It was as if they were left alone, something bad would happen¡­


    He felt like he couldn''t just ignore them.


    So he released his spiritual sense towards them to see just what they are. But all that it told him was that these were balls of energy that didn''t seem to have anything different about them.


    It wasn''t as if he could do anything with this information.


    It seemed like the only thing that he could do was move closer to explore what these things were about.


    But when he came closer, he saw that there was another change with the ball of me that he was approaching.


    It had been still when he had been far away from it, but when he came closer to it, it started shaking as if it was reacting to him.


    Lin Fan paused for a second to try and use his spiritual sense to see what this was about, but once again, all he felt from it was that it was a normal ball of mes. There was just energy inside of it and nothing else, he couldn''t even feel a flowing to this energy even though he could see it.


    So after thinking about it, Lin Fan still decided to approach this ball of mes.


    When he was just a few steps away, the ball of mes finally reacted.


    It shot out a tiny ball of me right at him.


    This tiny ball of me gave off the same heat that therge ball of me did, so Lin Fan knew that he couldn''t take this head on. Lin Fan quickly dodged to the side and jumped back slightly so that he was out of the range of this ball of mes.


    The small ball of me quickly went past him as he dodged out of the way.


    But when he thought that he was out of danger, he felt something from behind him.


    Lin Fan didn''t need to turn around as he released his spiritual senses, seeing that it was the same small ball of meing right back at him. Without any hesitation, he quickly jumped to the side to dodge out of the way.


    This small ball of me was slower than before, so he was able to easily dodge out of the way.


    Then when it went past him, it hit therger ball of me and was reabsorbed by thatrge ball of me.


    When that happened, the ball of me settled once again because Lin Fan had moved out of the range of this ball of me.


    Lin Fan turned his attention to the ball of water right away and he fell into deep thought.


    After standing there for a bit, he started moving towards that ball of water as well.


    And as he had expected, the ball of water also shot out a de of water at him. This de of water boomeranged just like the small ball of fire, so he had to dodge out of the way twice.


    Once it was over, Lin Fan was certain of two things.


    The other pirs in this ce would also attack anyone that approached them and then leave simr balls in the ces that their attacksnded.


    At the same time, these balls would attack whatever came close to them just like the pirs did.


    That meant that the more pirs that Lin Fan approached, the more balls there would be in this ce.


    The more balls there were in this ce, the less space he would have to maneuver around.


    This meant that he had to figure out a wall to deal with these balls before he triggered more of these pirs. Otherwise, he would eventually be trapped like a rat by all of the balls that would appear.


    So Lin Fan turned his attention to the ball of mes that he triggered first.


    He gathered a ball of water in his hand before throwing it out at the ball of mes.


    The moment that the ball of water came near the ball of mes, it suddenly started to tremble.

 Chapter 1084 Abandoned World (7)

    ?


    The moment that the ball of water was about to hit the ball of mes, there was a tiny me that came out. This tiny me positioned itself so that it was right between the ball of water and therge ball of mes.


    The ball of water seemed like it would have no problem putting out this tiny me, but¡­


    When the ball of water made contact with the tiny me, it immediately evaporated and didn''t leave a single trace behind.


    But still, that wasn''t the end of that.


    After the ball of water had evaporated, the tiny me just floated there in the air. It didn''t return back to the ball of water like the other me shot out had. It just floated there as if it was searching for something.


    Then all of a sudden, it shot out in the direction the ball of water hade in.


    It shot out at Lin Fan who was standing there.


    Lin Fan had already expected this, so he quickly dodged out of the way.


    But then he found that the tiny me didn''t let him off with just that.


    He had already expected toe backwards though since he knew that it would return to the ball of me. So he easily dodged out of the way again and the tiny me quickly went past him.


    However, it didn''t go back into therger ball of mes.


    Instead, it suddenly boomeranged around and started flying at him again.


    Lin Fan was caught off guard this time, so he wasn''t able to fully dodge out of the way.


    The me grazed the side of his arm because he had been caught off guard and he couldn''t help wincing when he felt the pain that came from it. This was a very bad burn that had even cauterized the wound instantly after hitting him.


    It was more than enough to show just how hot this tiny me was.


    Lin Fan didn''t dare let his guard down and follow the conventions of before. Instead, he kept his eyes on the tiny me and followed it closely as it flew around the room.


    As it flew past him after burning him, it turned around again and came at him once again.


    After he dodged it a few more times, Lin Fan recognized that this tiny me was locked onto him and would keep following him no matter how he dodged it. It seemed that the only way to escape this me was toe up with some kind of method to take care of it.


    So he raised his hand and gathered more balls of water to shoot at this tiny me that wasing at him.


    But that didn''t have any effect at all.


    In fact, it was almost as if it had annoyed the tiny me as it became faster with each ball of water it evaporated.


    Lin Fan was finding it harder and harder to keep up with this tiny me until he found that he wasn''t able to shoot more balls of water at it. The only thing that he could do at this point was dodge out of the way of the tiny me.


    Even though it was clearly burning its own power to move around chasing Lin Fan like this, it didn''t slow down at all.


    It was almost as if as long it didn''t catch him, it would never run out of power.


    So Lin Fan knew that continuing to dodge it like this wasn''t a solution.


    Unless he figured out a way to take care of this tiny me, it would be impossible for him to get out of this.


    In the end, Lin Fan had no choice but to face the tiny me head on.


    But of course, it wasn''t that he was nning on using his body to resist it.


    Instead, he raised his hand and gathered a ck hole there that he was nning on using to absorb the tiny me with. This ck hole was formed from the voidws that he controlled.


    He knew that since he couldn''t stop it with other things, the only real thing that he could do was absorb it.


    This tiny me didn''t stop or even slow down when the ck hole was brought out. It continued charging forward as if it didn''t even notice the ck hole that had been brought out to face it.


    Then it charged right into that ck hole.


    When the tiny me made contact with the ck hole, there was a moment of equilibrium.


    This tiny me wasn''t able to continue moving forward to m into Lin Fan, but at the same time, it also wasn''t absorbed by the ck hole. It seemed like there was something inside of that tiny me that was stopping the ck hole from absorbing it.


    But this equilibrium didn''tst forever.


    Soon, the equilibrium between the two forces finally copsed and the form of the tiny me started to copse as well.


    It didn''t take long before parts of the tiny me flowed into the ck hole and the tiny me itself started to break up.


    The bits of the me flowed into the ck hole and then disappeared without a trace.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    Eventually, all of the tiny me disappeared from view and it was swallowed by the ck hole.


    After the tiny me disappeared, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because¡­he felt something familiar inside of that tiny me when the ck hole absorbed it.


    He couldn''t help turning to look at the ball of me that was there and he couldn''t help narrowing his eyes. He looked carefully at the ball of me as if there was something there that caught his attention, but he wasn''t sure if it was right.


    However, after looking at it for a bit, he was certain of one thing.


    "It''s a bit smaller." He muttered to himself.


    It was only a tiny bit, but he could see that the ball of me on the ground was a bit smaller than before.


    It seemed that by absorbing the tiny me, he had absorbed a bit of the power of the ball of me.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan knew what he had to do next.


    But at the same time, there was something about this ball of me that made him want to do this.


    Lin Fan gathered his breath before slowly walking towards the ball of me. As he walked forward, his hands were at his side, prepared toe up and release the voidws when he needed them.


    When he reached the distance that activated the ball of me, there was movement that came from it before it shot out a smaller ball of me just like before.


    But unlikest time, Lin Fan didn''t dodge out of the way.


    Instead, he lifted his arm and gathered a ck hole in his palm.


    When the ball of me made contact with that ck hole, Lin Fan couldn''t help wincing his face. At the same time, he couldn''t help taking a step back because of the force of this ball of me.


    But in the end, he was able to endure it and the ck hole started draining bits of the ball of me. There was a flow of energy from the ball of me that went right into the ck hole.


    As the energy flowed from the ball of me into the ck hole, the ball of me itself began getting smaller and smaller until it was just a tiny wisp.


    At that time, the tiny wisp of fire was swallowed up by the ck holepletely and disappeared without a trace.


    Lin Fan had to take a deep breath after this since the energy that he absorbed¡­was a bit too much for him to take in all at once.


    This was just like the room earlier where there was too much life energy.


    So in the end, he had no choice but to divert that energy into the ck hole in his dantian which grew once more.


    He could feel the power of the voidws getting stronger again.


    But at the same time, there was something different about it.


    It felt much moreplexpared to before, but it wasn''t because it was being fed the energy from the ball of me that it became this way.


    No, it was because of this ball of me, but it was also because of a different reason.


    It was because earlier when he absorbed that tiny me, Lin Fan had noticed something familiar from it.


    That was right, there was a trace of voidw in that tiny me.


    That was why it was able to get faster when it evaporated the balls of water that he had shot at it.


    It hadn''t just burnt away the water, it had also absorbed the life energy that had been contained within those balls of water, making it a part of itself.


    That gave it even more power and more speed.


    Lin Fan didn''t know where this voidw came from, but he was certain that there were voidws inside of this ball of me.


    After the ball of me had been absorbed by the ck hole, there was a visible change with therger ball of me.


    It had shrunk by quite a bit once the ball of me had been absorbed.


    It seemed that if he absorbed a bit more¡­it wouldpletely disappear.


    So Lin Fan took a deep breath to adjust himself and then he started moving closer to the ball of me.


    As he expected, there was another ball of me that was shot at him.

 Chapter 1085 Abandoned World (8)

    ?


    Lin Fan raised his hand again with the same ck hole in it.


    The moment that the ball of me made contact with that ck hole, there wasn''t even a moment of equilibrium between them. The moment that the ball of me hit the ck hole, it was immediately ripped apart by the ck hole and sucked in.


    Once again, Lin Fan felt the ck hole inside of his dantian expanding.


    Once again, when it reached the point where it would copse and explode, the key in the center released a glow beforepressing that ck hole together.


    But this time, Lin Fan also felt that there was something off about the voidw.


    It wasn''t that it was just more concentrated, there was also something that was special about it.


    He raised his hand and gathered the ck hole before ying around with it. The ck hole formed many different shapes in his hand, shapes that he had never been able to form before.


    It seemed that after absorbing the traces of voidws in the ball of me, he had gained much more flexibility with his voidws.


    Before, he could only use the voidws in certain shapes, but now, he had much greater control over them and was able to bend them freely. It was like having something that was solid suddenly gain much more fluidity.


    Like going from a piece of ice to moldable water.


    Lin Fan couldn''t understand why his voidws seemed much more flexible, but it wasn''t as if this was a bad thing. He had been restrained on how to use his voidws before this, but now he was able to use them in many different ways.


    After discovering this new ability, he threw this thought to the back of his mind and turned his attention back onto the ball of me.


    With each few steps that he took towards the ball of me, there was a small ball of me that was shot out at him.


    Every time, he raised his hand to use his voidws against the ball of me that flew towards him.


    Every time, the ball of me that flew towards him was instantly ripped out of the air by the suction of his voidws. It ripped it out of the airpletely and sucked all the energy in, not leaving a single trace behind.


    There was no longer the struggle that he faced when he first dealt with the ball of me.


    Just like this, Lin Fan was able to make his way up to therge ball of me.


    He just stood there a few steps away from thisrge ball of me, looking over it.


    Thisrge ball of me was much smaller than before after he had absorbed all of the balls of mes that it had shot at him. It was now half the size that it was initially, but he could still feel the heat that wasing from it.


    Even if it had been shrunken, the mes contained within were still as powerful as before.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind this.


    As he stood there, he slowly raised his hand until it was pointing right at the ball of me before gathering a ck hole in it.


    The ball of me didn''t react at first, but when the ck hole''s suction force fell onto the ball of me, it no longer remained idle. The ball of me suddenly started to tremble before ring up.


    The heat that came from in front of Lin Fan was something else, but he endured with the power of the voidws.


    Most of the heat that came his way was sucked up by the voidws before it could wash over him, so he only felt a minor heate over him. But he could tell from how much energy the voidws absorbed just how hot it was.


    The ball of mes continued ring up under the suction of the voidws, but then there were bits of the me that suddenly starteding apart. These formed lines of mes that led from the ball of me to the ck hole in his hand.


    With these lines, there was a flow of power that came from the ball of mes to the ck hole in Lin Fan''s hand.


    Slowly but surely, the power that was contained within the ball of me was being drained away by the ck hole.


    It was even more prominent by how the ball of me was slowly getting smaller as more and more of its energy flowed outwards. While this happened, more and more of the heating from the ball of me dissipated as well.


    It was clear that this ball of me was losing its energy and was about to copse.


    Then all of a sudden, it copsed.


    However, this copse wasn''t for what one might think it was. This was a copse of its own volition when it realized that all of its energy was being drained and it had no chance trying to fight like this.


    So it exploded into many small mes that came at Lin Fan from many different directions. It was like a meteor shower that was suddenly raining down on Lin Fan, each one with the might of the sun.


    But Lin Fan didn''t panic when he saw this.


    That was because he knew that this was ast ditch effort from the ball of mes. Not to mention, he had a new ability that would allow him to easily counter this.


    So with a wave of his hand, the ck hole that had been in his palm copsed as well.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    The ck hole suddenly spread out all around Lin Fan and created arge in front of him that was in the way of all of these smaller fireballs that were flying at him.


    When the fireballs made contact with the ck that had been created, there was no hesitation at all.


    The ckpletely swallowed the fireballs and took in all the energy that they had left.


    Even though these fireballs looked terrifying, they weren''t actually that powerful. After all, they had been created with the remnant energy that the ball of mes had. It was ast ditch effort that relied on quantity more than quality.


    So all of these fireballs were much weaker than the smaller balls of mes that had been shot before.


    They were just no match at all for Lin Fan''s voidw.


    Once the fireballs had been absorbed, there were no traces left of the ball of me at all.


    Lin Fan had relied on his voidws to clear it out.


    But then¡­he turned his attention to the ball of water that was also there.


    The ball of water had remained idle this entire time, as if it hadn''t sensed the plight of the ball of mes.


    It seemed that these things were just like stationary turrets that would only attack when something came too close to it. Before that, they would remain idle no matter what happened around them.


    So that was very good for Lin Fan.


    After taking a moment to catch his breath, Lin Fan started moving towards the ball of water.


    When he came close to the ball of water, it suddenly trembled before shooting out a de of water at him.


    But Lin Fan already knew what to expect after dealing with that ball of mes.


    He just calmly raised his hand to form the ck hole in his palm once more.


    When the de of water made contact with the ck hole, there was no resistance at all. That is, there was no resistance from the de of water as it was sucked right into the ck hole in an instant.


    It just entered the ck hole and didn''te out.


    Since Lin Fan had already absorbed that ball of mes, the ck hole in his dantian had already expanded andpressed three times.


    The voidws that he controlled now couldn''t bepared to the ones that he controlled before.


    So he effortlessly made his way towards the ball of water.


    With every few steps that he took, the ball of water shot more des of water at him. However, the ck hole in his hand just easily absorbed all of the des of water that were shot.


    In the end, he was standing just a few steps away from the ball of water just like with the ball of mes.


    His hand had been raised the entire time, so all he did now was release more voidws.


    The ck hole''s suction became stronger as it started draining away the energy inside of the ball of water.


    There was no shaking from the ball of water this time as lines of water immediately started forming. These lines of water quickly flowed from the ball of water into the ck hole, disappearing without a trace.


    This time, the ball of water used its final move right away.


    It shook a bit before spikes suddenly appeared all over the surface of the ball of water.


    These spikes were like the spikes of a hedgehog in that they were shooting in every direction.


    It was an indiscriminate area of effect attack.


    The moment that Lin Fan saw the spikes appear on the surface of the ball of water, he waved his hand again.


    The ck hole in his hand quickly formed a again, but instead of appearing in front of him, it wrapped all around the ball of water. There was no space left for it to go, all it could shoot at was the ck around it.


    There was no resistance at all from the ball of water as the ck wrapped up around it and sucked it dry.


    It took no time at all for that ball of water to disappear.

 Chapter 1086 Abandoned World (9)

    ?


    Once the ball of water disappeared, this room returned to normal.


    Or at least it returned to the way it was before Lin Fan came to this ce.


    Seeing that all of the balls on the ground were gone, Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief.


    He didn''t know how he would have taken care of them before, but he was just happy that his voidws worked. After all, if his voidws didn''t work, he really didn''t know what he would have done¡­


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t in a rush to do anything else right now.


    After he took care of these balls, he sat down on the spot and started cultivating.


    Not only had those balls given him plenty of life energy to make his voidws stronger, he had also absorbed quite a bit into the world in his dantian. This had made his cultivation grow stronger and be unstable, so he needed to stabilize himself before he did anything else.


    While this wouldn''t let him break through, it would still make him much stronger than before.


    It took him a bit of time to calm himself down and stabilize his cultivation, but he could feel that he was much stronger than before.


    After that, he stood up and turned to the pir with the fire symbol on it.


    He didn''t know what he had to do here to get to the next room, but he was sure that it was rted to the pirs somehow.


    After all, there was no reason to fill this entire ce with pirs if it wasn''t for this. So there had to be something that he had to do with these pirs to open the way.


    But so far, whenever he tried approaching a pir, all it did was shoot out a ball of energy at him. It didn''t give him a chance to approach the pir to analyze it, so he couldn''t figure out a way out of this ce.


    But at the same time, if he didn''t do anything, there was no way that he would be able to find a way out of this ce.


    So he had to approach the pir in the end to see what it was about.


    Luckily, his voidws had be much strongerpared to before, so he could deal with the balls of energy that the pirs shot at him.


    Taking a deep breath, Lin Fan took a step forward towards the pir with the fire symbol on it.


    Just like before, when he crossed the threshold, the pir suddenly gathered more mes into a ball of mes. Then after this ball of mes had finished gathering, it was shot out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan hadn''t remained idle while the pir had gathered the mes.


    The first thing that he tried was moving out of the range to see if it would stop it, but that didn''t work.


    So the next thing that he did was rush at the pir.


    He wanted to see if he could get up close to the pir before the ball of mes was condensed.


    But he noticed that the closer he came, the faster the ball of mes was condensed.


    It didn''t take long before it was shot out at him.


    Lin Fan didn''t panic seeing this and just calmly raised his hand to meet it.


    Inside of his palm was naturally the ck hole of his voidws.


    When the two sides shed, Lin Fan was pushed back a step by the force of the ball of mes.


    This ball of mes was stronger than anything that he had faced before, but then again, the things that he faced before were only parts of this ball of mes in the first ce. The smaller balls of mes that he absorbed were all parts that came from a ball of mes simr to the one that he faced now.


    So there was no way ofparing the might between them.


    But even then, his voidws had be stronger after absorbing all those smaller balls of mes, so he didn''t get pushed backpletely by this ball of mes. He was able to stand his ground and soon he started absorbing the power of this ball of mes as well.


    It was only a tiny bit of the mes at first, but soon there were lines of mes that came from the ball of mes into the ck hole.


    The ball of mes wasn''t able to push forward and it wasn''t able to pull out, while its energy was being drained, so it knew that this was a bad situation for it. Sensing this, the ball of mes started to tremble as if it was about to do something.


    But before it could, Lin Fan had already wrapped it up with a of ck voidw energy.


    This ck started wrapping around the ball of mes, forcing it into a single point before draining it of all the energy that it had.


    In the end, the ball of mes couldn''t do anything as it let its energy be drained away.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    When Lin Fan was done with the ball of mes, he turned his attention back to the pir with the me symbol on it.


    He was expecting it to gather more mes to shoot out another ball of mes, but that didn''t seem to be the case. It just remained idle as if it had run out of power¡­


    So after being surprised by this, Lin Fan didn''t waste any more time standing there and quickly started moving towards the pir.


    He went around the entire pir, but he wasn''t able to see a single thing that was off about this pir.


    Well, it wasn''t as if he had seen a pir like this before. It was just that he wasn''t able to tell what was different about this pir that would make it special from all other pirs out there.


    Even with his spiritual sense, he wasn''t able to find a single thing.


    So he could only look at the pir with a confused look.


    That is until he felt the flow of life energy again.


    When he looked up, he found that there were mes that were being gathered by the pir once more.


    The moment that Lin Fan saw this, he quickly moved back and focused his mind, paying close attention to the mes being gathered.


    It took no time at all for the ball of mes to be gathered and shot at him, but he was ready. So Lin Fan just simply raised his right hand with the ck hole in it and he absorbed the ball of mes shot at him.


    This time, it was easy for him to absorb this ball of mes since he already had the experience from the first time. He even went as far as using a to catch the ball of mes right away so that it couldn''t do anything after it was caught.


    In almost an instant, the ball of mes waspressed and swallowed by Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just stood there and waited to see if the pir would do anything else.


    However, he found that it just remained idle during this time as if it wouldn''t do anything else.


    After waiting for a bit, he realized that this pir must have a refractory period.


    It would be able to release an attack every so often, but after that, there would be a resting period where it wouldn''t be able to do anything. So it was during that time that Lin Fan would be able to investigate the pir.


    It was just too bad that he wasn''t able to find a single thing different about it.


    After not finding a thing, Lin Fan decided that instead of doing nothing, it would be better for him to check the other pirs as well.


    So he moved out of the range of the fire pir and then moving carefully not to enter the range of the other pirs, he made his way over to the water pir.


    When he came up to it, there was a de of water that was shot at him, but this was easily dealt with by him.


    In terms of power, it was on the same level as the ball of mes and Lin Fan had easily dealt with that. So it wasn''t a problem for him to take care of the de of water as well.


    But the problem was that there was nothing different about the pir of water either¡­


    It was as if there were no clues for him anywhere¡­


    He took two more des of water during his time searching around the pir of water, but there wasn''t anything that was found.


    So he had no choice but to retreat to stabilize his cultivation.


    After all, absorbing all of the life energy that the pirs gave him had pushed his cultivation into instability once again. He had to sit down and stabilize his cultivation base before he did anything else.


    As he sat there, he started organizing the clues that he had.


    "It seems like as long as these pirs are approached, they shoot out attacks. So is it all about taking the attacks that they fire out until they run out of energy?" Lin Fan couldn''t help wondering out loud.


    But unless one had the voidws, they wouldn''t be able to do that.


    After all, when he attacked with otherws, his attacks had just been absorbed and then used to fuel an attack that tracked him down¡­


    Wait, voidws¡­


    Could it be that he had to use voidws on the pirs themselves?

 Chapter 1087 Abandoned World (10)

    ?


    After this thought appeared in his mind, Lin Fan turned to look at the me pir that he had triggered first.


    The more that he looked at this pir, the more that he thought that this was the case.


    After all, all of the attacks that the pir had released at him had contained some form of voidws. It was very faint, but he had been able to feel it when he absorbed the balls of mes that it had shot at him.


    That was how it had stolen the energy of the water balls that he had shot at it to release that tiny me.


    The more that this thought lingered in his mind, the less that he could resist in the end.


    So Lin Fan suddenly stood up and walked over to the me pir.


    He already had his hand raised as he came closer and closer.


    Then on cue, the moment that he moved past the threshold, mes started gathering around the pir. It didn''t take long before the ball of mes was shot at him again.


    But Lin Fan was already ready for this.


    He just casually gathered the ck hole in his hand before releasing it as a that caught the ball of mes that had been shot at him.


    The ck instantlypressed the ball of mes into a single point before it disappeared into nothingness.


    Then Lin Fan quickly moved to the side of the pir and started looking around.


    He was seeing if there was a spot on the pir where he would be able to inject his voidws into, but he wasn''t able to find a single thing at all. There wasn''t a single thing that was strange about this pir.


    So where was he supposed to inject his voidws?


    After thinking about it, Lin Fan just decided to use voidws on the pir without thinking about how it would react.


    He raised his right hand and pointed it at the pir, gathering the ck hole in his hand.


    He tried draining the energy of the pir directly out of it, but he found that there wasn''t any energy for him to drain.


    Instead, the pir suddenly started to tremble as if it was reacting to the voidws that had made contact with it. This trembling became stronger and stronger before suddenly stopping out of the blue.


    When it stopped though, Lin Fan sensed somethinging from above him.


    He looked up to find that there was now a ck hole that was also at the very top of the pir.


    He didn''t know how this had appeared, but he was certain that this was a ck hole that had been created with voidws just like his.


    His voidws had created a resonance with the pir and it had summoned this ck hole.


    But what was he supposed to do with this ck hole?


    Was he supposed to use his voidws on it?


    No, he knew that this would be impossible¡­he had already tried something like this with his own voidws.


    He had wanted to see what would happen if voidws tried to absorb voidws, so he had separated some of his voidws to test this. When the two voidw masses tried to swallow each other, they kept canceling each other out until the energy finally didn''t have a ce to go other than to expand outwards.


    That meant that arge explosion happened!


    So I knew that there was no way that it would be that I had to inject my voidws into this ck hole.


    That meant that there was something else that had to be thrown into it.


    But what?


    As I stared at this ck hole, I just couldn''t understand what it was that I was supposed to do here.


    That is until I saw the me symbol on the pir again.


    Could it be that I had to shoot back mes at the pir for it to absorb?


    Was that why it had been shooting the ball of mes at whoever had approached it.


    But if that was the case, then the only people who could clear this were people who had the voidws¡­


    Then again, the first trial alone was already a test of voidws since no one would be able to process that much life energy unless they had voidws.


    Not to mention, to even trigger this ck hole above the pir, one had to have voidws.


    So this must be a ce rted to an expert who had wielded voidws.


    Now I was starting to understand why the system had brought me here in the first ce.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    I was even starting to wonder if this was rted to the Void God¡­after all, the key in my dantian was the same shape as the key that the system had given me. That key was from the various stones of the five sacred beast races, which was an inheritance from the Void God.


    So that meant¡­that the system had some kind of rtion to the Void God as well?


    His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by mes that had gathered around the pir.


    Even though there was the ck hole that was floating there above the pir, the mes didn''t seem bothered by the ck hole and continued to gather there above it. It soon formed another ball of mes above that pir that shot out at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t panic seeing this since he could sense the power that came from this ball of mes.


    He just casually raised his hand and used his voidws to absorb the ball of mes.


    Once that was done, Lin Fan focused on the me statue inside of his dantian.


    He hadn''t been paying attention to it since he had been focused on the ck hole there instead, but now he noticed that this me statue was also much bigger and much brighterpared to before. The aura that it gave off just couldn''t bepared to before.


    It was almost simr to¡­a Ruler Realm Expert.


    Lin Fan examined this me statue carefully before finally inciting it.


    The moment that he did, there was a powerful me that appeared in his hand. It was so strong and bright that even he couldn''t help being taken aback by it.


    But since it was the me that was created by his life energy, it wasn''t as if it could hurt him.


    Even if it was bright and strong, it didn''t release any heat while it was in his hand.


    So he was able to hold it without being burnt.


    Lin Fan looked down at the me in his hand and as he looked at it, he felt that there was something off about it. It was almost as if this me wasn''t as powerful as it could be¡­


    He didn''t know why he felt this way, but it was as if he suddenly had new understandings of the mews.


    So he condensed the me in his hand until it was just a tiny me.


    But even though it was a tiny me that shined less bright than before, the energy contained within it¡­was stronger than before.


    This was a power that couldn''t evenpare to what it had been before it had beenpressed.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help staring at the tiny me that he had gathered in his hand, almost as if he was trying to see if there was any part of it that he could make better.


    He had be much more sensitive to me energy after the me statue had be bigger, so that also included his gains with mews.


    But then he also noticed something else.


    When he looked up at the ck hole above the pir, he found that it was trembling.


    It was as if it resonated with the appearance of this powerful tiny me. It was as if it was showing its hunger to swallow this tiny me.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised seeing this from the ck hole, but since it wanted the tiny me¡­


    With a flick of his hand, the tiny me flew through the air towards the ck hole.


    There was nothing that happened to the tiny me at first, even when it was well within the confines of the ck hole''s suction force, there was nothing that changed with the tiny me.


    It went all the way to the center of the ck hole and only then did it start to change.


    There were bits of me energy that was drained out of the tiny me, but then it seemed to return into the tiny me.


    After this happened for a bit, the tiny me started to spin.


    It was slow at first, but then it began spinning faster and faster, generating more and more heat in the center of this ck hole.


    It was much stronger than the heat of the mes that the pir had gathered.


    Lin Fan had no choice but to take a few steps back in the face of these mes.


    After spinning for a bit, the tiny me suddenly ttened to be a disc in the center of the ck hole.


    This disc released me energy into the ck hole which also returned it once again.


    After this continued for a bit longer, there was a flow of energy that came from the bottom of the disc that flowed right into the pir.


    Once this flow of energy reached the pir, the pir started to light up.

 Chapter 1088 Abandoned World (11)

    ?


    As the pir lit up, there were a few mes that appeared around it.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he immediately raised his guard just in case it was what he thought it was.


    However, it wasn''t that in the end.


    Instead, the mes gathered around the pir itself before wrapping up the pir in mes.


    It looked more like a pir made of mes than an actual pir now, but when one looked closely, they could still see the pir that was right there in the center. The most eye catching thing about that pir was still the ck hole with what seemed like a star inside of it.


    After a long time, the mes suddenly disappeared and the ck hole also copsed.


    Everything fell silent and if Lin Fan hadn''t seen it happen, he would have thought that nothing had happened just now.


    It was almost as if the source of power for this pir had been cut with the way it suddenly went silent like this.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help doubting that something had gone wrong, but when he looked at it closely, he found that there was something different about the pir. He found that the me mark that was on the pir was now lit up.


    He could feel the power fluctuationsing from it, so he knew that whatever this pir was, it was satisfied with the mews that he had given it.


    Even when he stood near it, it no longer shot out the same mes as before.


    With this me pir taken care of, he turned to look at the other pirs in this room.


    There were just too many pirs here for him to count right now and if each of them represented aw that he needed to gain¡­how long would it take him to take care of it all?


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile as this thought passed through his mind, but at the same time, there was a trace of excitement that filled him.


    After all, he didn''t lose anything from doing all of this.


    By absorbing all of thews from the various pirs, he would be able to control all kinds of differentws in the future. At the same time, the power of thews that were given from each pir was not weak¡­


    If he had to rank it, he would say that it was already at the Ruler Realm.


    If he were to wield all of thesews at the same level as a Ruler¡­wouldn''t that make him almost invincible?


    Especially since he had the ability tobinews¡­though there was the small problem of if his body could endure it.


    But that was a problem for another time.


    So this was like a gold mine for him.


    There was no doubt that his power would explode after this, which was what he wanted.


    With something to protect, he needed to gain enough power to protect it or he would certainly lose it all.


    This ce gave him that solution.


    So without any further hesitation, Lin Fan turned his attention to the water pir.


    When he came close to it, the water pir shot out that de of water at him like it had done before.


    Lin Fan just very casually raised his right hand with the ck hole inside of it and released a that instantly surrounded the de of water. Thispressed that de of water just like it had done with the ball of mes before it disappeared into nothing.


    Lin Fan''s voidws had truly be powerful.


    At first, he had struggled even to absorb a small part of therger attacks, but now he was able to absorb the full power attack of the pir without any effort.


    But after he absorbed it, he didn''t move any further.


    Instead, he just stood there as if he was waiting for something.


    After a few minutes, there was water that was condensed around the pir again that formed another de of water.


    The moment that this de of water formed, it was shot out at Lin Fan once again.


    However, Lin Fan''s hand was already up and waiting for it.


    The same voidws came out from his hand and then quickly wrapped around the de of water. As soon as it wrapped around it, it drained all of the energy out from the de of water in an instant.


    There wasn''t a need topress it to a single point just like before because after thatst water de, Lin Fan''s ck hole had gone through anotherpression.


    With thispression, his voidws had be even stronger.


    After he absorbed the de of water, Lin Fan raised his other hand to gather a drop of water in his palm.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    As that drop of water floated there, Lin Fan looked carefully at it as if he was analyzing something before suddenly shaking his head. With the way that he shook his head, it was as if he was dissatisfied with something.


    However, even though he looked this way, he didn''t do a thing as he stood there.


    It was almost as if he was waiting for something else.


    Then after a few minutes, there was more water that was condensed around the pir that then formed the de of water. Once again, it was shot out right at Lin Fan who easily absorbed it.


    He gathered another small ball of water in his hand before shaking his head in a disappointed manner once more.


    This continued for three more times before Lin Fan finally gave a satisfied nod when he condensed the small ball of water.


    Then he took advantage of the refractory period of this pir to move closer.


    He raised his right hand with the voidws in them towards the pir, resonating with it to create that ck hole at the top of the pir.


    Once this ck hole had condensed, he raised his other hand to gather the drop of water that he threw into the ck hole.


    Just like before, there was no reaction from the ck hole at first until the drop of water had entered the center of the ck hole.


    The moment that it entered the center, there was some kind of force that ttened it in an instant to form a disc. This happened much faster than before and soon there was a beam of light that fell from the disc, entering the pir below.


    Lin Fan gave a satisfied look when he saw this.


    That was because he realized that the more pure thews, the easier it was absorbed by the pir.


    His one regret now was that he didn''t absorb morews from the me pir.


    If he did, his mews would have been even stronger.


    But there was no time for regret now since there were still plenty of pirs to take care of.


    At the same time, he also needed to change up his strategy.


    It would take forever if he went from one pir to the next since there was always that refractory period. If he waited for each of the pirs to fire at him, it would take him way too long to finish getting all of thews needed to fulfill each pir''s requirement.


    So he had to figure out a quicker way to do all of this.


    After looking at the cements of the pirs, Lin Fan suddenly had an idea.


    He moved up to one of the pirs and there was a streak of lightning that was gathered around this pir. Once it finished gathering, it shot out like a lightning bolt at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just casually raised his hand and used the ck hole to absorb that lightning bolt without any effort.


    Then the moment that he absorbed this lightning bolt, he suddenly turned and started dashing at another pir.


    This time, the pir was surrounded in a whirlwind that quickly formed a tornado that it sent in Lin Fan''s direction.


    Lin Fan used the voidws to absorb this without any effort just like with the lightning bolt.


    Then once again, he went in the direction of another pir.


    This pir was surrounded in dirt and rocks until it created a giant boulder that it threw at him.


    This boulder was also absorbed with no effort.


    All of this had taken him several minutes to do, so the next pir that Lin Fan ran at was the first lightning pir.


    When he reached the range of this lightning pir, it started gathering lightning around itself without any dy.


    That was his n, he was going to rotate between pirs so that he would be able to go between them without having to wait out the refractory period between them.


    With this, he was able to go between the three pirs and absorb attacks one after another.


    Of course, the downside of this was that it was very exhausting having to run between them like this while also using the voidws to absorb the attacks. However, since he was using the voidws to absorb these attacks, he was able to refill on energy through them.


    This was something that only he would be able to do.


    So Lin Fan quickly made his way between these three pirs until he was satisfied with the amount ofws that he had received from them.


    Only then did he activate their ck holes and throw the correspondingws in them.


    After he was done, he looked at the rest of the pirs behind him and revealed a bitter smile.

 Chapter 1089 Abandoned World (12)

    ?


    Using the same method as before, Lin Fan moved in between the pirs and satisfied their demand forws.


    It took several days just for him to aplish this.


    After all, there were just too many pirs that were here!


    During this time, he took breaks in between going to the various pirs to drain thews from them.


    He could have kept going during this entire time, but it really was too draining and he had to adjust to the variousws that he was gaining.


    It was fine at first since he already had ess to many differentws in the first ce.


    But this ce had many differentws that he had never even heard of before.


    These very obscurews werews that he was obtaining for the first time, so he had to take some time to adjust and control them. Otherwise, it wouldn''t be possible for him to satisfy the ck hole that those pirs released.


    So it took him a long time, but he was able to do it in the end.


    Right now, he was standing in front of thest pir that he needed to satisfy.


    This was a pir that contained spatialws, which was why he had left itst.


    When he had first triggered this pir, he had a problem with it since he didn''t know whatw it had. He had been caught off guard by the instant spatial attacks that came out and had almost cut off his arm.


    If it wasn''t for him deploying the voidw barrier of thepass at thest second¡­he might have actually lost an arm.


    So he decided to leave this pir forst since it was the most difficult one for him to deal with.


    Now that he had finished everything else, it was time for him to deal with this pir.


    So when the spatial de came out, he had already prepared arge all around him.


    The spatial de was instantaneous and invisible, so it could have appeared from anywhere.


    To make sure that he was safe, he used therge topletely cover himself so that there wasn''t a single blind spot.


    All of sudden, there was a force that came from behind him.


    If he didn''t have the set up, it definitely would have cut off his head. But the was there in the end and it took the blow for him, absorbing all of that spatialw life energy.


    With that, Lin Fan dashed forward at the pir, not giving it any time to recharge and shoot another spatial de.


    After all, he had already taken more than enough of these to gather the spatialws that he needed to satiate the pir. That was how he had been able to figure out how to use the voidw to catch these attacks in the first ce.


    Once he was at the tower, he did the same thing as before and used his voidws to activate the ck hole before tossing the spatialws in.


    After this pir was lit up, there was a silence that filled this room before a rumbling sound rang out.


    When Lin Fan looked in the direction of that rumbling sound, he found¡­that a door had opened in one of the walls.


    This wasn''t so much a door as a passage in the stone of the wall, so he hadn''t been able to see it until now.


    But now that it had been revealed, it was hard to imagine how he didn''t see it earlier since this passage really stood out from its surroundings.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t think too much about it and continued down this passage.


    The one thing that he did before heading down that passage was pull out thentern to light the way, even though this passage was surprisingly well lit. Even with how small it was, he wasn''t able to find how this passage was so well lit.


    He wanted to use thisntern to see if there was anything special about this passage, but he was disappointed to find that there was nothing at all.


    This passage wasn''t that long and it only took a few minutes for Lin Fan to reach the end.


    When he came out, he found that he was inside some kind of hall.


    This was an ancient styled hall that would normally be seen inside of the emperor''s pce.


    In fact, there was even a throne at the exact opposite end of the room from him.


    This throne just like this room waspletely vacant.


    There wasn''t anything else that was special about this hall, other than the few pirs that filled it.


    This hall was actually quite deste for a hall of this level.


    It didn''t have any decorations, it didn''t have any wealth, it didn''t have anything that showed status.


    It was as if whoever this hall belonged to was a poor person, or it could be that someone had robbed this ce before he had arrived.


    Lin Fan didn''t move forward right away after looking around the ce. Instead, he lifted up thentern in front of him to see if he could find anything.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    Sinceing to this special cultivation realm, it had be a habit to use thisntern whenever he went anywhere to see if he could find anything special.


    But he was disappointed in the end since thentern''s light didn''t reveal a single thing.


    So he didn''t hesitate anymore and started making his way through the hall.


    The first thing that he went towards was naturally the throne that was on the opposite side.


    There was nothing else in this room that remotely caught his attention except for this throne, so he didn''t waste time searching the other parts of the room. After all, he had already spent several days here¡­he was sure that those people waiting for him would be getting worried soon.


    When he walked in front of the throne, he was caught off guard by what happened next.


    There was a chill that came from the back of his neck before there was something that seemed to gather on the throne.


    It was like a mist at first, but then it became more and more solid until it formed a figure.


    Though it was solid, this figure was still see through¡­


    Just like a ghost.


    Once this figure formed, it just sat there with its eyes closed as if it was thinking something.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help taking a step back when he saw this, but when he did, the figure suddenly opened his eyes to look at him.


    Lin Fan felt a strong pressure fall on him the moment that this gaze fell onto him.


    But there was a part of this feeling that was familiar.


    It was just like when he met the god fragments of the five sacred beast gods. This was the feeling that came with meeting someone in the God Realm.


    That meant that this person in front of him was most likely the ghost of a God Realm Expert.


    After looking at Lin Fan for a bit, the figure suddenly said, "So you''re the one that passed the trial."


    Lin Fan revealed a bit of a confused look at first, but then he gave a nod in response.


    The trial that this ghost mentioned was most likely the two rooms that he had passed through before reaching this room. It was the room that kept filling up with life energy and the room filled with many pirs.


    After a pause, the ghost continued, "You have demonstrated great understanding of voidws and as such, you will receive my partial inheritance."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows when he heard this.


    After all, this ghost had just confirmed what he had thought.


    The trials had been rted to the voidws.


    If one didn''t have voidws, they wouldn''t have been able to pass those trials.


    But he couldn''t help wondering just who this ghost was.


    That didn''tst long as the ghost said, "I am the Void God, or at least I was in the past. But now, I''m nothing more than a shell of what I once was."


    Lin Fan''s chin dropped as his eyes opened wide to look at this ghost.


    This ghost was calling himself the Void God?


    The Void God was a name that he had been hearing for a long time, but he never thought that he would be meeting the remnant of the Void God so soon.


    Now the system had brought him to the Void God''s inheritance¡­


    Just what did the system want?


    The Void God was about to keep going when he suddenly stopped himself.


    He looked down at Lin Fan again and this time, he narrowed his eyes as he looked at him. It was as if he was trying to carefully look at him, as if he had noticed something special about him.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help giving a gulp when he felt this special attention, but he didn''t back down.


    The room once again fell into a silence as the two of them just looked at each other like this.


    After a long time, the expression on the Void God''s face finally changed.


    It slowly broke into a smile¡­before the Void God suddenly broke out inughter.


    Thisugh continued for a while before the Void God said, "I can''t believe it, it''s actually you!"


    Lin Fan could only reveal a confused look when he heard this.

 Chapter 1090 Abandoned World (13)

    ?


    The Void God didn''t say anything as he suddenly jumped out of the chair.


    He floated over to where Lin Fan was standing and then before Lin Fan could react, he started floating around Lin Fan as if he was looking over him.


    Lin Fan felt very strange with the Void God''s ghost flying around him like this, but he didn''t act as he waited to see what the Void God''s ghost wanted.


    After all, even if he wanted to resist, it wasn''t as if he could.


    This was the spiritual sense of a God Realm Expert. Even if he was deceased and only existed in ghost form, it still wasn''t something that he could resist.


    So he could only stand there watching as the Void God''s ghost moved around him.


    The Void God''s ghost didn''t do much as he moved around him, but during this time, his eyes were on Lin Fan''s center. Or rather, it was as if he was looking right into his dantian.


    But that wasn''t strange since the source of Lin Fan''s voidws was in his dantian.


    It was the ck hole that currently had the key in the center of it.


    After a long time, the Void God''s ghost finally stopped floating around him and suddenly raised his hand. There was a ck hole that was condensed in the palm of his hand as it was pointed at Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he couldn''t help feeling a bit of a panic.


    Just what was this ghost nning on doing?


    Was he going to absorb his soul so that he could take over his body?


    That kind of plot was actually quitemon when it came to situations like this.


    But Lin Fan calmed down when he didn''t feel any suction on him. Instead, he felt a kind of resonanceing from inside of his dantian. This was a resonance that came from the ck hole right in the center of his dantian.


    After a while, the Void God''s ghost said, "Since you have my key, then you are my true sessor."


    Lin Fan once again revealed a confused look when he heard this, but there was no panic in his eyes.


    After all, since the Void God''s ghost had acknowledged that he was his sessor, it wasn''t as if he would do anything bad to him.


    The Void God''s ghost then used the ck hole in his hand to¡­pull the key out of Lin Fan''s dantian.


    Lin Fan had been caught off guard when he felt this and he quickly paid attention to the ck hole in his dantian, as if he was afraid that it would copse.


    This fear was justified since it was the key in his dantian that had been helping him control the growth of this ck hole. If it wasn''t for the key, he would have lost control of the ck hole and would have been swallowed by it already.


    Seeing the look on his face, the Void God''s ghost said, "Rx, nothing will happen to you. The key is still binded to you and will help you control your new powers."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a skeptical look at first, but seeing that the Void God''s ghost was calm, he let out a sigh of relief. Then he asked, "What did you pull it out for?"


    The Void God''s ghost revealed a mysterious smile before turning back to the throne. He walked over to the throne and raised the hand with the key in it towards the throne.


    When he did this, the key started floating up towards the throne and then it inserted itself into a hole that was there.


    If one didn''t look carefully, they wouldn''t have noticed the hole in the first ce.


    But the moment that the key was inserted, the hole became very prominent.


    After the key was inserted into the hole, there was only silence that followed for a few seconds.


    It was almost as if nothing was about to happen.


    But then, there was a shaking in this hall.


    This wasn''t the shaking that came from something inside of the hall moving, but rather it was because¡­there was a portal that was forming right in front of the throne.


    This was a portal that waspletely white and revealed nothing, but Lin Fan could feel the life energy that wasing from it. It was even more concentrated than the life energy that had filled that room for his first trial.


    It seemed that this was the source of the life energy in this entire realm and where it was all contained.


    As for what it came from, that was not something that Lin Fan knew.


    After it was opened, he just stared at it and waited for the Void God''s ghost to exin what this was.


    The Void God''s ghost didn''t say anything at first as he stared at the white portal that formed.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    When it finally fully formed, he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "Inside there is my true inheritance that I''ll be giving to you. If you hadn''t shown up with this key, I would have only given you the partial inheritance out of respect for my friend who guided you here."


    The moment that Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help trembling.


    Then before the Void God''s ghost could say anything else, Lin Fan suddenly asked, "You said out of respect for your friend¡­" As his voice trailed off, he pulled out the key he had used before and showed it to the Void God''s ghost, "Are you talking about the one who made this key?"


    The Void God''s ghost looked at it before saying with a nod, "That''s right. You should have met him, so why are you surprised?"


    Lin Fan''s eyes lit up when he heard this before he asked, "Have you ever heard of something called the system before?"


    The Void God''s ghost knitted his brows as if he was thinking about something before saying, "I seemed to have heard something like that before, but I didn''t really pay attention to it."


    Lin Fan quickly asked, "Then can you tell me about this friend that you heard this from? Anything will do."


    The Void God''s ghost''s brows rxed as he looked at Lin Fan before he said, "It''s not my ce to tell you this. If you want to know, you should find out about these things on your own at your own pace. That would be what my friend would want."


    This time, it was Lin Fan''s turn to knit his brows.


    However, if the Void God''s ghost didn''t want to tell him anything, it wasn''t as if he could force him to speak.


    So he had no choice but to turn his attention to the portal that was there.


    After looking at it for a bit, he asked, "So I should just enter this to obtain the inheritance that you left behind?"


    The Void God''s ghost gave a nod before saying, "Once you receive my inheritance, you will understand what the true voidws are."


    Lin Fan had a skeptical look on his face, but he still gave a nod in response to this.


    So he walked up to the portal.


    But as he did, he could feel the powerful waves of life energy assaulting him.


    When he felt this, he had no choice but to release his voidws around himself to absorb this life energy.


    As he did, the pressure that was on him was relieved and he was able to face the portal.


    At the same time though, he could feel the ck hole in his dantian expanding¡­


    The key had been taken out of him, so if it expanded too much¡­there wasn''t anything that wouldpress it.


    The Void God''s ghost also seemed to sense this, so there was a wave of his hand before something appeared in Lin Fan''s dantian.


    When he looked at it carefully, he found that there was a smaller ck hole that was inside of his dantian. He didn''t know how this worked since this thing should have been made of voidws and cancelled out the ck hole made from his voidws, but it seemed that it was very subdued inside of his dantian.


    When this ck hole appeared in his dantian, he didn''t do anything as he waited to see what would happen after his dantian expanded.


    When it did, the smaller ck hole forced it topress just like the key had done.


    Lin Fan looked at the Void God''s ghost with a grateful look before stepping forward to enter the portal.


    Once he was gone, the Void God''s ghost followed him into the portal.


    After a sh of white light, Lin Fan found¡­that he was in a world of white. There was nothing around him and the only thing that was here was a temple that was behind him.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "What is this ce?"


    The Void God''s ghost suddenly appeared and said, "This is the ce where my inheritance lies."


    With a sudden wave of his hand, there was arge ck hole that appeared in the sky above him.


    The Void God''s ghost then said, "You''ll be safe in here. Take your time in absorbing the inheritance, you don''t have to worry about a thing."


    But Lin Fan was worried about somethingpletely different.


    He asked in a slow voice, "You''re saying that I can''t leave this ce until I absorb this?"


    The Void God''s ghost gave a nod in response.


    Lin Fan looked up at the giant ck hole in the sky and asked himself, "How long will this take?"

 Chapter 1091 Return

    ?


    The portal once again opened in the hall, but there wasn''t any life energy that poured out of it likest time.


    In fact, with the way that it drains some of the life energy from the air, it was as if there was a deficit of life energy on the other side.


    Slowly, there was a figure that walked out of this portal and into the hall.


    But this figure waspletely disheveled.


    They had messy hair and a long beard, as if they had been stranded for a long time.


    Aftering out of the portal, the messy figure said, "I''m finally out¡­"


    There was a ghost that came out with this figure that said, "It wasn''t that long. In fact, you actually absorbed the inheritance quite quickly. It was much faster than I had expected."


    When the messy figure heard this, there was a vein that popped out on his forehead.


    He turned to look at the ghost and said, "Five years! It took an entire five years to absorb all of that! And I couldn''t leave until I did!"


    The ghost just gave a shrug and said, "Five years isn''t that long for a cultivator. You should think about the bigger picture. You never would have broken through the Dao Realm if it wasn''t for the inheritance that you absorbed."


    The vein on the messy figure''s forehead popped out even more when he heard this before he said, "There was no reason to trap me here all this time! What about the people that I lost contact with! Don''t you think that I''m causing them to worry about my safety?!"


    The ghost gave a shrug before saying, "They shouldn''t worry about you if they knew where you were going. It''s probably your own fault for not telling them."


    The messy figure really wanted to punch the ghost in the face, but he knew that this wasn''t possible.


    So he could only resort toshing out at the ghost with his words.


    Finally, he calmed down and took a moment to adjust himself.


    Then he raised his hand and formed a mirror of water in it. At the same time, he raised his other hand and there was a white dagger that appeared in it.


    With a single flick of his hand, he used the water mirror to shave off the beard and to trim his hair.


    When all of that was done, there was a handsome face that was revealed.


    As for the owner of this handsome face, it was Lin Fan.


    After he went into the white portal that held the Void God''s inheritance, he had been trapped in there for five years absorbing that giant ck hole that had appeared.


    During that time, he had beenpletely focused on absorbing all of the energy from that giant ck hole that he had fallen into a daze. He hadn''t been able to do a thing during this time, which was why he had looked so disheveled when he came out of the portal.


    He had been sitting there for five years straight without moving once.


    Once he was finished trimming his face, he gave a satisfied nod before turning back to the Void God''s ghost who still had a stubborn look on his face, making it clear that he wasn''t willing to back down.


    He just couldn''t see it from Lin Fan''s point of view because he had lived for millions upon billions of years. For someone as old as him, a simple five years was nothing more than a blink of an eye.


    But for someone like Lin Fan who had only lived for less than twenty years when he went into that portal, this was equal to 25% of his entire lifespan.


    This was not a small period of time for him.


    But he knew that it was impossible for him to get the Void God''s ghost to see it from his point of view, so he knew better than to keep trying.


    Instead, he wanted to know something else.


    Lin Fan looked at the Void God''s ghost with a serious look.


    Seeing Lin Fan look at him like this, the Void God''s ghost revealed a strange look before asking, "What? What is it?"


    There wasn''t any prestige like his voice had when they had first met.


    During the five year span, even if Lin Fan hadn''t been able to move, his mind was still active.


    As a ghost, the Void God was able tomunicate with him during this time and the two of them had gotten close. They had personalities that clicked with each other, so it didn''t take them long to be friends.


    This friendship continued to grow over the five years that they spent together, so even with the difference in age between them, they were able to speak with each other in casual tones.


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first as he kept staring at the Void God''s ghost, but then he suddenly asked, "What are you nning on doing now?"


    The Void God''s ghost was caught off guard suddenly being asked this, but his expression fell after he did hear it.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    With that sad look, he said, "There''s nothing for me to do now. I''m just a simple ghost, there''s nothing that I can do. Not to mention, I''ve already given you my inheritance which is the source of my power, so I wouldn''t even be able to do anything if I wanted to leave this ce."


    Lin Fan''s expression also fell when he heard this.


    After all, he had thought that he would be able to take the Void God''s ghost back with him.


    He had nned on helping the Void God''s ghost create a new body just like he had done with Hong Long, but now the Void God''s ghost was telling him that it wasn''t possible.


    Well, it was possible, but if he did, the Void God would be a normal person.


    After all, all of his power had been absorbed by Lin Fan and it was impossible to give it back now.


    The Void God''s ghost could see what Lin Fan was thinking based on the expression on his face, so he said, "I appreciate the offer, but I''ve already made up my mind. This world isn''t a ce for me to stay in any longer, I should have moved on a long time ago. If it wasn''t for the promise that I made to my friend¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words, but it was clear that there was a story behind them with the look that he had on his face.


    After a long time, the Void God''s ghost said, "Anyway, my spirit won''tst in this world much longer, so if there''s anything that you want to ask before I go, then you should ask now."


    There was a sincere tone in his voice as he said this.


    It was as if he really wanted to do something for Lin Fan before he disappeared.


    This was his way of repaying him for the time that they had spent together in that white world.


    After all, he had been alone for a long time.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t able to ask anything at this moment.


    There were things that he wanted to ask, but he couldn''t ask them since he knew that they would touch on something that the Void God''s ghost didn''t want to talk about or couldn''t talk about.


    Just like how the Void God''s ghost wanted to help Lin Fan, Lin Fan wanted to give the Void God''s ghost a proper rest.


    So he didn''t want to do anything that would make it hard for him.


    After a period of silence, Lin Fan shook his head and said, "There''s nothing that I want to know."


    The Void God''s ghost revealed a smile when he heard this since he knew what Lin Fan meant with this.


    He looked down at him with a warm smile before saying, "I''m d that it was you who was chosen as my sessor. You are the kind of person that I could have been friends with if you had been around during my time¡­"


    Neither of them a thing as they looked at each other with emotional looks.


    But in the end, it was the Void God''s ghost who ran out of time first.


    His figure started to fade away and he started to dissipate into tiny bits.


    Neither of them said a thing as they looked at each other while he disappeared, but the looks on their faces were more than enough.


    However, as the Void God''s ghost disappeared, he suddenly remembered something that he had to tell Lin Fan.


    "The one who gave you the key, he has your best intentions at heart."


    That was thest thing that the Void God''s ghost said before he disappeared.


    Once he was gone, Lin Fan was just left there with a bitter smile on his face.


    He didn''t know why the Void God''s ghost said this, but it did have arge effect on him.


    After all, the one that had given him this key was the system that he had doubts about for the longest time¡­


    Now he knew that the system of his was rted to the friend that the Void God''s ghost had mentioned.


    He still didn''t know if he should trust this system or not¡­


    But for now, that wasn''t what he needed to think about.


    For now, he needed to think about what was waiting for him when he got home.


    He was sure that Ang would be angry¡­

 Chapter 1092 The Missing Years (1)

    ?An error urred while reading the file: Could not find file ''/data//panda_novel_py/used_emails.txt''.


    Since the Void God''s ghost was gone, there was no reason for him to stay here any longer.


    So Lin Fan opened up the screen that he hadn''t seen in a long time.


    It was the system screen that would allow him to go back to the Lin Astral Empire.


    When he opened it, there was a notification from the system that stated that he hadpleted the secret mission of this special cultivation realm.


    There was a reward given for this, but Lin Fan just wasn''t in the mood for this.


    As he stared at the screen in front of him, there were many thoughts that were passing in his mind.


    Finally, he couldn''t help asking, "Just what are you nning?"


    There was no response from the system, but Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that the screen in front of him trembled a bit.


    It was almost as if it was a trick of the eye, but he could have sworn that he saw a tremble from the screen in front of him.


    Seeing that the system wouldn''t say anything else, Lin Fan didn''t bother ying with it.


    After all, there were more important things for him to do right now.


    So he brought up the screen that would bring him back and he pressed the button. Though if he really wanted to, he could have just gone back with a thought.


    But he wanted some kind of symbolism now that he was returning after being gone for so long.


    There was a sh of white light before he disappeared on the spot.


    When the sh of white light faded, Lin Fan found that he was in the same back room as before. This room was the same as before and it didn''t seem like anything had changed.


    But that wasn''t strange since this was the store that was managed by the system.


    Even if he was gone for a long time, it would take care of itself so that he wouldn''t have to worry about anything.


    The one difference was when he opened the door, there were loud sounds that hit him.


    It was the sound of customers who were trying to buy things.


    Now that was strange since he knew what time it was. It waste in the afternoon, when his store was about to close.


    Usually during this time, there wouldn''t be a single customer in his store.


    After all, people didn''t trust his goods, so there weren''t that many people that bought them in the first ce. Other than the training spots that he offered, people wouldn''t buy anything else from his store.


    When he came out of the back, he was surprised to see just how many people were there.


    The store was almostpletely filled as people scrambled around the workers that were trying to fill the shelves still.


    He couldn''t help being surprised by this scene.


    But then he was pulled out of this thought by someone that called out, "Boss, is that you?"


    Lin Fan turned to see Lin Hong standing there behind the counter with sweat on his face. He lookedpletely different from how he had looked before¡­he seemed like he had gotten much chubbier¡­


    Lin Fan really couldn''t get over how much he had changed during the time that he was gone.


    But then Lin Hong called out again, "Boss, can you help us? There''s just too many people here."


    Lin Fan was pulled out of his daze when he heard this.


    He looked at the crowd that was in the store and gave a nod before heading over to the counter where Lin Hong was.


    Together, the two of them slowly took care of the crowd that had gathered in the store.


    When it was over, they were able to close the store.


    When the store was closed, all of the employees came over and Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised.


    After all, all of the people that were working in his store were his cousins from the Lin Astral Family, so they were people that he was somewhat familiar with.


    But at the same time, he couldn''t help being surprised because they all looked different from how he remembered them.


    This was a true testament of the five years that he had missed.


    Over time, they had all changed.


    The one that had changed the most was Lin Hong.


    He had gone from a strapping young man to this pile of blubber that was in front of him.


    It was almost as if there wasn''t a single trace of the previous Lin Hong in the current Lin Hong.<novelsnext>I think you should take a look at </novelsnext>


    Lin Fan really couldn''t help wondering what had happened to Lin Hong that he had be like this.


    When he was asked this, Lin Hong revealed a bitter smile before saying, "Cousin, it''s been a long five years. All of us have changed from the past, we''re no longer the same people as before."


    After saying this, he gave a sigh.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows since it didn''t seem like this was a good thing¡­


    It was almost as if something bad had happened to all of them and if something bad happened to these members of the Lin Astral Family¡­it would mean that something bad had happened to the entire Lin Astral Empire.


    When he had left, the Lin Astral Empire was being attacked by the Beast Race.


    Could it be that things had taken a turn for the worse?


    Lin Fan looked at Lin Hong and asked, "Is it the Beast Race?"


    When the Beast Race was mentioned, not just Lin Hong, but all of the cousins couldn''t help jolting.


    It was as if the Beast Race was a term that held a lot of trauma for them¡­


    Seeing the way that Lin Fan looked at him, Lin Hong gave a sigh and said, "While you were gone, the Beast Race didn''t relent in their attacks. As members of the Lin Astral Family, naturally we were expected to go out and do our parts¡­but¡­"


    His voice trailed off when he said this and his eyes turned distant as if he was remembering some kind of trauma.


    It wasn''t just Lin Hong who was acting this way, the other cousins were all acting the same.


    It was clear that they had all suffered some kind of trauma on the battlefield.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Hong said with a sigh, "The battlefield is much more different than we thought. It isn''t a ce of glory, but rather a ce of ughter and madness."


    His voice was filled with an intense emotion that showed just how much what he had experienced had affected him.


    This caused Lin Fan to knit his brows even more.


    Could it be that the Lin Astral Empire had found itself in a very bad situation while he was gone?


    If that was the case, he really didn''t know what to do with himself.


    At the same time, weren''t the five sacred beast races supposed to help the Lin Astral Empire while he was away?


    That was what he had arranged before going to the special cultivation realm¡­


    There were many questions that were going through his head, but he was interrupted by Lin Hong who said, "So in the end, I decided to focus myself on helping the people of our Lin Astral Empire another way."


    His expression changed to fill with a bit of excitement as he said, "Cousin, you never told us just how effective the things sold in your store are. It''s so powerful that even the elders of our Lin Astral Family can''t help wanting more of it."


    He went on to continue bragging about the things in Lin Fan''s store which just made him reveal a bitter smile.


    Of course he knew how effective the things in his store were, but no one was willing to believe him back then which was why they hadn''t sold.


    It turned out that these cousins of his had tried them themselves and that had proven how effective they were.


    With this guarantee from the Lin Astral Family itself, naturally people trusted the items in Lin Fan''s store more.


    Once they had a taste of it, they naturally couldn''t stop themselves just like with the training spots.


    So it took no time for his store to start selling out each day.


    During the time that he had been away, the system had been automatically filling up the store from the cultivation realms that he had already turned into farms.


    It was a bit rough, but the system had been able to pull through, especially since it made some improvements to the farms that he had.


    So just like this, his store was able to restock even though he wasn''t there.


    Lin Fan was about to ask a few more questions to his cousins, but there was a group that suddenly came in.


    This group was in full armour and they clearly looked like soldiers.


    When they appeared, even his cousins couldn''t help looking a bit afraid of them which surprised Lin Fan.


    After all, their positions as members of the Lin Astral Family should be higher than the position of any soldiers.


    The soldiers ignored this and came up in front of Lin Fan.


    After giving him a strange look, the leader of this group unrolled the scroll in their hand and said, "Madame General requests the Lin Astral Prince toe meet her at once. She also states that if youete, there will be consequences."


    Lin Fan was caught off guard when he heard this, but he could guess who this message was from.


    But the soldier had just called them ''Madame General''...when did she be a general?


    Just what had happened in the past five years?

 Chapter 1093 The Missing Years (2)

    ?An error urred while reading the file: Could not find file ''/data//panda_novel_py/used_emails.txt''.


    Since he had been summoned, Lin Fan didn''t resist following the soldiers that had arrived.


    When he came out of the store, he found that everyone was looking away from their group.


    It was as if they were trying to avoid attracting the attention of these soldiers that were guiding him. It was almost as if they were terrified of these soldiers who were currently with him.


    But there didn''t seem to be anything terrifying about them as far as he could tell.


    So he was curious, why was everyone acting this way?


    However, there was also something else that caught his attention.


    It was the state of the city in front of him.


    In the past, when he had walked down this street, there were far more people that were out shopping. Even if it waste in the evening like it was now, there were still plenty of people that were out on the street.


    But now there was barely anyone here.


    When he looked at the different stores closely, he saw that they didn''t have the same shine that they did before.


    He couldn''t tell exactly what was wrong with this ce, but¡­it almost seemed that the city in front of him was no longer as prosperous as before.


    But that shouldn''t be¡­


    This was the capital of the Lin Astral Empire, the ce where all of its wealth was concentrated.


    It shouldn''t be like this.


    Even if the Beast Race was attacking, that shouldn''t have affected the Lin Astral Empire that much since they were an Astral Empire. They had the umtion of many generations tobat the Beast Race, so they shouldn''t have been pushed so far that even the capital was suffering.


    However, the facts were there in front of him.


    Since even the capital was suffering, adding in the appearances of his cousins from earlier, it should mean that the Lin Astral Empire really was suffering in the fight against the Beast Race¡­


    Just what had happened?


    Lin Fan was escorted over to a carriage that quickly brought him to the Lin Astral Empire''s pce.


    But he wasn''t brought the usual way.


    He had thought that he would meet the Lin Astral Emperor along with the general who had summoned him, but the soldiers were bringing him to another ce that he was familiar with.


    This was the part of the pce that he had been given when he had first arrived, these were his private quarters.


    When they reached the entrance to these private quarters, the soldiers stopped and stood at the entrance like guards. The leader of these soldiers who had given Lin Fan the message said, "The general is waiting inside for you."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before walking in.


    The moment that he entered, he felt a powerful pressure fall onto him.


    Even if he had reached the Ruler Realm, this pressure was something that was hard for him to resist.


    It was like he had suddenly been frozen in a block of ice and he couldn''t move an inch.


    But there was also a bittersweet smile that appeared on his face when he felt this pressure.


    That was because this was a pressure that he was familiar with.


    He had been on the receiving end of this pressure more than once, so he couldn''t be more familiar with it.


    When he was expecting to be hit¡­there was a sudden pair of arms that grabbed him and a face that dived into his chest.


    Lin Fan was frozen for a second since he clearly didn''t expect this, but then with that same bittersweet smile, his arms came around her to take her in his embrace. The two of them just stood there like that for a while before Ang finally pulled her head out.


    Then in a not so sweet moment, she raised her hand to p him across the face and sent him flying.


    Lin Fannded against the wall and then fell to the ground.


    When he looked up at her again, he had a bitter smile on his face.


    Ang looked at him with narrowed eyes before saying, "Where did you go? It took you this long toe back?"


    Lin Fan raised his hands to show that he surrendered before saying, "It''s a long story."


    She kept ring at him, but then she crossed her arms and sat down at the table before looking back at him to say, "Exin."


    Lin Fan was about to stand up and walk over as well, but he felt the pressure falling on him again.


    He knew what this meant, so he didn''t try to get up again. Instead, he changed his position so that he was on his knees and had his head bowed.


    He didn''t have to do this, but he knew that this would make it easier for him.


    In this position, Lin Fan told them about everything that happened.


    That''s right, ''them''.


    It wasn''t just Ang who was sitting at this table, there was also Yuki, Momonga, and Zi Ling who were sitting there looking down at him.


    When he was finished, there was only silence that followed.


    Then he could feel the spiritual senses falling onto him.


    They searched his body as if they were trying to find something, but he didn''t resist and let them do what they wanted.


    Once they were done, he felt the pressure on him relieving and he was able to lift his head again.


    Lin Fan was about to stand up and join them at the table, but Ang suddenly lifted a hand and then pointed down.


    Seeing this, he knew that she was still angry, so he sat down on his knees in the normal position.


    Since they weren''t saying anything, Lin Fan asked, "What happened while I was gone?"


    Everyone looked away when he asked this, but in the end, it was Momonga who told him everything.


    In the first two years, everything progressed normally.


    The Lin Astral Empire was able to push back the Beast Race since there were plenty of experts in the Lin Astral Empire and they received the support of the other Astral Empires nearby.


    But then it all changed in the third year.


    The Beast Race suddenly invaded three different Astral Empires at the same time.


    No one knew where the Beast Race had found so many troops for this, but the beast waves came and there was no denying it.


    When this happened, the other Astral Empires had no choice but to withdraw their support to help these three Astral Empires that had been invaded.


    The Lin Astral Empire suffered a little from this, but they knew that this was for the best.


    After all, the alliance of Astral Empires was all about supporting the human race.


    Since the situation in the Lin Astral Empire had already stabilized, the forces of the human race were better used in helping these three Astral Empires that had been invaded.


    But it wasn''t the end there.


    Five more Astral Empires were invaded in that year and ten more Astral Empires were invaded by the next.


    No one understood just where all of these beasts hade from, but they had no choice but to defend their own territories. So all of the support from the Astral Empires disappeared and the Lin Astral Empire was left to face this on their own.


    They were able to hold on, but that was where Ang came in.


    She and the rest of their group had lived a peaceful life before this, but seeing that the Lin Astral Empire was in danger, she couldn''t just sit still anymore.


    After all, this was Lin Fan''s family that was in danger.


    She volunteered as a general which surprised the Lin Astral Emperor, but since he knew how important she was to Lin Fan, he gave her that chance.


    She surprised himpletely by changing the tide of the war.


    With her precise predictions, she was able to figure out exactly what the ns of the Beast Race were.


    Every time that they fought, the troops of the Lin Astral Empire would have the jump on the Beast Race.


    After many different wins, everyone started looking at Ang differently. There was no longer the doubt that they had when she first volunteered and even veteran generals gave her respect.


    With Ang at the helm, they started slowly pushing back the Beast Race and reiming territory that had been lost.


    But that all changed just six months ago.


    That was when the Beast Race beasts started using powers that no one had seen before.


    These werews that no one was familiar with and they did things that no one expected, so they werepletely caught off guard. At the same time, since these were powers that they were unfamiliar with, it wasn''t as if they could decipher them and fight back.


    So again and again, the Lin Astral Empire''s troops suffered losses and were pushed back.


    Even with Ang''s intelligence, they weren''t able to figure out a single thing.


    That was because thews that these Beast Race troops used werepletely foreign to them.


    It could even be said that they seemed like they came from apletely different world¡­


    For those that knew the secrets of the world, it wasn''t hard for them to guess what had happened.


    Outers.


    The Beast Race had definitely made contact with the Outers and worked out some kind of cooperation deal with them.


    That was the only way that they would be able to obtain this kind of power.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help deeply knitting his brows when he heard this.

 Chapter 1094 The Missing Years (3)

    ?


    The rest of the story wasn''t thatplicated.


    It was the same for the rest of the Astral Empire that were being invaded, the Beast Race troops that were invading them had gained this strange power and had slowly pushed them back.


    So right now, the Lin Astral Empire was still considered in a good position because of Ang.


    With her intelligence, she had helped the Lin Astral Empire avoid major losses even if they did lose battles, so they weren''t in a poor position like some of the other Astral Empires.


    In fact, some of the Astral Empires that did poorly had already lost more than half of their territory.


    The Lin Astral Empire that had only lost around 20% of their territory was considered quite good.


    But if the trend continued and they didn''t find a way to stop the Beast Race, then it would only be a matter of time before the Lin Astral Empire was pushed back as well.


    Going a step further, with the trend of the Beast Race''s push, it was only a matter of time before the human race was pushed to the edge.


    Now that Lin Fan knew the situation, he knew that he had to help.


    But before that¡­he still had to check on his family.


    So he asked about them.


    This time, it was Zi Ling that said, "Father and mother have been staying in the pce, so nothing has happened to them. Xiao Xue has been cultivating in closed doors to get stronger, so she''s safe as well."


    Hearing this, Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief.


    It was just too bad that it wasn''t over yet.


    Ang suddenly said, "The Beast Race has been encroaching on the territory of the Mu Empire and the Gctic Humanity Alliance."


    When Lin Fan heard this, he immediately knitted his brows.


    After all, there were still friends and family of his that were in those ces.


    Seeing the look on his face, Ang added, "We''ve already sent reinforcements, but it''s only a matter of time before they are pushed back as well."


    At the end of this, she gave a sigh since she knew how bad the situation was.


    She had tried to make it sound positive, but as one of the top generals, she knew everything that was happening in the war.


    Lin Fan also knew this, but he chose to ept the little white lie that Ang told him.


    After taking some time to gather his thoughts, Lin Fan made his decision.


    He stood up and said, "I''m going to see great grandfather."


    Ang stood up as well since she had already expected this, so she started moving towards the door with Yuki behind her.


    Yuki had served as Ang''s vice general during this time, so she was allowed to move freely in the pce as well.


    The only one who didn''t have as much freedom was Momonga who had been treated as a tactician. All he did was provide the strategies for a few of Ang''s battle and had never stepped on the battlefield himself, so the power granted to him was limited.


    However, those that knew his intelligence didn''t dare look down on him and he had friends in certain ces.


    Even the Lin Astral Emperor admired his intelligence after a few talks with him.


    When Lin Fan arrived in the usual hall, he found that the Lin Astral Emperor and many of the ministers and generals were already gathered for a meeting.


    The ministers and generals were surprised to see Lin Fan, with many of them not recognizing who he was.


    But that wasn''t strange since he had been gone for five years now and many of these ministers and generals had only been promoted in the past five years. They were young people with talent, so that was why they had received these promotions in the first ce.


    However, the fact that they were young meant that a few of them¡­weren''t as calm as the older ministers and generals.


    When they saw this person who they didn''t recognizee into the meeting, they immediately knitted their brows.


    Even though it was Ang who led them in, they still couldn''t help feeling angry that someone unknown had entered the room. Especially since this was an important meeting for the top strata of the Lin Astral Empire.


    So one of the younger generals stood up and pointed at Ang to say, "General Ang, what is the meaning of this? This isn''t a ce that you can bring anyone to! This is an important meeting, you can''t treat this as¡­"


    Before they could finish, they felt a chill fall onto them.


    This time, it wasn''t Ang who had put pressure on this general, but rather Lin Fan.


    The moment that he heard the way that this young general spoke to Ang, his eyes immediately started to re at him.


    This general felt it hard to breathe when the pressure fell onto him. He even found it hard to stay in his chair and fell out of it in the end.


    As for everyone else in the room, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with shocked and terrified looks.


    After all, they were all experts of the Lin Astral Empire and they knew what this pressure meant¡­


    A Ruler Realm Expert.


    This person was this young and he was a Ruler Realm Expert¡­


    Just where did this monstere from?


    Even the Lin Astral Emperor revealed a bit of a surprised look when he felt this, but at the same time, there was a look of admiration in his eyes.


    He hadn''t been wrong about Lin Fan when he met him and now he had proven it to him.


    A Ruler Realm Expert in his twenties?


    His potential was limitless.


    In the end, it was the Lin Astral Emperor who ended this by saying, "Alright, that''s enough."


    When he spoke, Lin Fan stopped exerting pressure on the general and that general was finally able to rx. His face was covered in sweat and he had a very ugly expression when he looked up at Lin Fan.


    The way that this general looked at Lin Fan, it was as if he wasn''t scared of him even though Lin Fan was a Ruler Realm Expert.


    That was because this was the Lin Astral Empire''s top meeting room.


    Even if Lin Fan was a Ruler Realm Expert, he was one of the top generals of the Lin Astral Empire. He believed that the Lin Astral Emperor would back him rather than this unknown person.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was a top Ruler Realm Expert, so he didn''t believe that a young Ruler Realm Expert like this would be able to match him.


    But right when the general opened his mouth and before he could say anything, the Lin Astral Emperor spoke.


    "Fan''er, you''re finally out of your closed doors cultivation and it seems like you''ve gained quite a bit."


    As he said this, the Lin Astral Emperor revealed a wide smile.


    When the people in this room heard this, all of them couldn''t help looking at the Lin Astral Emperor in shock.


    After all, not a single person had expected the Lin Astral Emperor to talk in such a tone.


    It was almost as if he knew who this person was and he was very close to this person.


    At this, many of the generals and ministers thought about what the Lin Astral Emperor had just said.


    ''Fan''er'', that was what the Lin Astral Emperor had called this young man.


    But as far as they remembered, there wasn''t anyone close to the Lin Astral Emperor with that name¡­


    However, then one of the older ministers remembered something.


    He looked carefully at Lin Fan''s face before suddenly revealing a look of realization.


    This young man¡­was the sessor that the Lin Astral Emperor had suddenly brought back five years ago.


    This young man was the crown prince of their Lin Astral Empire and the future ruler.


    At this, the minister immediately said with a bow, "Your highness, wee back."


    The other ministers and generals were confused when they heard this, but then some of them started to put the pieces together.


    Slowly but surely, the rest of them also understood what was happening and then they did the same thing as this minister.


    Eventually, even those that didn''t understand what was happening did the same when they saw everyone acting this way. After all, if they were the only ones that didn''t do anything, then it would be their futures that would be bleak.


    The one general that Lin Fan had ced his pressure on was shocked as he looked around at everyone else in the room showing Lin Fan respect.


    He couldn''t understand at all what was happening right now.


    Lin Fan ignored all of them and said, "Thank you, great grandfather. It really took a long time toe back."


    With this, everyone understood, including the general on the ground.


    This young man¡­was from the Lin Astral Family and he was a Ruler Realm Expert.


    With how young he was and with his cultivation, it was clear that his status wasn''t low.


    He was more than qualified to be in this room.


    The general tried to sit back up in his chair, but he could feel the pressure from Lin Fan again.


    Since he had no choice, he excused himself with a random excuse and left the room¡­but he knew that his future was bleak because of this.


    After this general left, all of the ministers and generals scooted down one seat so that the seat beside the Lin Astral Emperor was left open for Lin Fan.

 Chapter 1095 The Missing Years (4)

    ?


    Lin Fan casually walked over to the seat that had been left open for him before looking at the general who was sitting in front of him.


    When the general felt his gaze fall onto him, he couldn''t help feeling strange.


    He didn''t know what Lin Fan wanted from him, but he could tell that Lin Fan wanted something.


    Since Lin Fan was the crown prince and the sessor of the Lin Astral Emperor, naturally this general didn''t want to offend him.


    So he could only ask with a smile, "Your highness, is something wrong?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Move down and clear a seat."


    When the general heard this, the smile on his lips twitched before he asked, "Your highness, what do you mean by this?"


    Lin Fan released his pressure on this general before saying, "I mean what I said. Move down and clear a seat."


    The general''s expressionpletely changed after this.


    He had a shocked look of disbelief on his face, almost as if he couldn''t understand what Lin Fan was saying.


    But he didn''t dare say anything too harshly since he knew what position Lin Fan had, so he could only turn to the Lin Astral Emperor for help.


    It was just too bad that the Lin Astral Emperor wasn''t even looking his way.


    It made it very clear whose side the Lin Astral Emperor was on.


    Seeing this, the general had no choice but to go along with Lin Fan''s demand.


    Even though he was enraged that a veteran like him was being treated like this, he didn''t dare show it.


    After all, someone that was able to sit right beside the Lin Astral Emperor definitely didn''t have a low status. He was someone who was high up on the military rankings and didn''t have a low cultivation, being in the Peak Sun Realm.


    Butpared to the status of crown prince and the cultivation of the Ruler Realm, he just couldn''tpare.


    So he could only swallow this anger and move to the side.


    Once he moved down, Lin Fan gestured for Ang to sit down which she did with a smile on her face. Lin Fan then looked at the rest of the ministers and generals who were at this table.


    When he did, all of them turned away to avoid his gaze.


    It was as if¡­they were afraid of him.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan knew that he had aplished his goal. At the same time, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a satisfied nod since he was happy to see Lin Fan taking initiative like this.


    Lin Fan would eventually be an important person in the Lin Astral Empire and to establish this position, he had to establish his prestige. The best way for him to do that was to find a scapegoat and punish them in front of the rest, cing himself in a much higher position.


    So that was why Lin Fan had chosen to single out this veteran general.


    But of course, there was also a personal reason why Lin Fan picked on this general.


    When he had walked in with Ang, he had been carefully looking at the expressions that everyone had.


    This general¡­was one of the ones who had a bad expression when they saw Ange in.


    It was clear that there wasn''t a good rtionship between this general and Ang, so since that was the case, he wouldn''t hold back in taking a bit of revenge for her. Since he was in the position to do so, he didn''t mind abusing this position a little.


    That was also why Ang had a smile on her face when she sat down.


    After Lin Fan and Ang had settled, the Lin Astral Emperor restarted the meeting.


    Lin Fan didn''t speak at first and just listened since information about the war was one that he wascking. Ang had given him a summary of the war, but it was a very basic summary that only told him the general situation.


    It wasn''t like this meeting where he was able to hear all of the details of the war.


    After hearing these reports, he realized that¡­the situation was much worse than he thought.


    While they had only lost 20% of their territory, most of the troops were injured fighting the Beast Race. There were now less than half of their troops that were capable of fighting still and that was barely enough to keep the forces of the Beast Race back.


    If this continued like this, it would only be a matter of time before the forces of the Lin Astral Empire fell and the Beast Race swept thend.


    So it could be said that they were in a dire situation.


    There were many different suggestions from the ministers and generals, but all of them were only about stalling.


    Finally, there was one minister that couldn''t take it anymore and said, "Shouldn''t we ask for the help of the ancestors?"


    When he said this, everyone turned to look at the Lin Astral Emperor.


    They tried their best not to show any emotions, but it was clear by the looks in their eyes that they were hoping for some kind of response from him.


    Or rather, they were hoping for a certain response from him.


    The ancestors that this minister was referring to were the ancestors of the Lin Astral Family. They were the emperors of past generations that had passed the throne on to focus on cultivating and safeguarding the family.


    Of course, that didn''t mean that every single generation would be an ancestor and there were of course idents.


    But these ancestors were the strongest experts of the Lin Astral Empire.


    They were hoping that these ancestors woulde out and help them solve this Beast Race crisis.


    If they were willing to make a move, it was certain that they would be able to push back the Beast Race. After all, most of these ancestors had been peak experts in their generations and they had only be stronger with time.


    They were the strongest Ruler Realm Experts that the Lin Astral Empire had.


    But this was something of a line.


    If this line was crossed, it would be deemed that the Lin Astral Empire was on the verge of copse.


    After all, these ancestors would only interfere in destruction level crises of the Lin Astral Empire.


    So to call them now¡­was admitting that the Lin Astral Empire was close to being doomed.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t even bother ying with this idea as he immediately said, "No, that is impossible. Before the empire is on the verge of destruction, the ancestors cannot be disturbed."


    Everyone tried their best to not show any emotions, but it was clear that many of them were disappointed. There were many of them that had wanted the Lin Astral Family to step up, but now that they were refusing¡­


    However, it wasn''t as if they could force the Lin Astral Family to make a move, so they could only start discussing alternatives.


    During this time, Lin Fan had been silent the whole time.


    He had been silently listening and thinking, but the way that he looked almost seemed like this wasn''t rted to him.


    Finally, Lin Fan decided to speak, "Great grandfather, I want to enter the battlefield as well."


    When this was said, everyone suddenly turned to look at him with surprised looks.


    The Lin Astral Emperor knitted his brows immediately before saying, "Fan''er, there''s no need for you to go to the battlefield personally. You''re needed here more than you are out on the battlefield right now."


    While the other ministers and generals didn''t agree to this since a Ruler Realm Expert would without a doubt change the tide of the battle, they didn''t dare go against the Lin Astral Emperor.


    So they all silently waited to see how this would turn out.


    Lin Fan shook his head and picked up a report that he ced in front of himself before saying, "I want to be deployed here."


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked down at the report that was on the table before revealing a look of understanding.


    That was because this was a report about the battle around the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    He knew Lin Fan''s past with the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Gctic Humanity Alliance that was around that area. So he knew what Lin Fan was nning by going to back up the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    With a sigh, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod and said, "Alright, you can go." Then after a pause, he said, "But be careful."


    The generals and ministers also looked at the report on the table.


    It didn''t take much for them to figure out that this was where Lin Fan was being deployed.


    However, some of the generals couldn''t help looking like they wanted to say something more.


    After all, this area wasn''t that important of an area to them.


    If Lin Fan was to be deployed, as a valuable Ruler Realm Expert, they would want him in some of the more important battlefields.


    Only there would he be able to help them turn the tide of the battle.


    But it really was hard for them to speak when they really didn''t have the right to deploy Ruler Realm Experts in the first ce.


    The generals were working up the courage to say something when Ang spoke first.


    "I want to resign from my position as a general."


    When she said this, the entire room was filled with shock.

 Chapter 1096 The Missing Years (5)

    ?


    When the generals heard this, all of them revealed looks of panic.


    Even the ones that had looked at Ang with disdain when she walked in couldn''t help revealing looks of panic.


    That was because even if they looked down on her, they had no choice but to acknowledge her skills. Hermand and intelligence was on apletely different levelpared to them.


    Even the veteran generals had no choice but to yield to Ang when it came to abilities.


    So if she were to suddenly leave their Lin Astral Empire''s army¡­then it would be safe to say that it wouldpletely copse under the attack of the Beast Race.


    Even if they wanted to act tough and say that they could handle it, they knew that they wouldn''t be able to do so.


    So even if they didn''t want to, they had no choice but to ask the Lin Astral Emperor to deny this request.


    But before any of the ministers or generals could say a thing, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod and said, "Alright, you''re free to go."


    When the ministers and generals heard this, they all revealed shocked looks.


    It didn''t take long before the room was filled with protests towards this decision.


    The ministers and generals couldn''t hold themselves back since they knew that this would be a disaster for their Lin Astral Empire.


    "Your majesty, it is one''s duty to serve the empire. How can we let someone resign just like this?"


    "Your majesty, you should know the situation of the battlefield. We can''t let her resign just like this, we still need her help."


    There were many different methods of trying to convince the Lin Astral Emperor, but it didn''t seem like he listened to them at all. It was as if all of their pleas went in one ear and then went out the other.


    After letting them go on for a bit, the Lin Astral Emperor raised his hand to silence them before saying, "From the very beginning, this was how it was supposed to be, so there''s no changing it now."


    When the ministers and generals heard this, all of them couldn''t help revealing shocked and confused looks.


    Not a single one of them was able to understand what the Lin Astral Emperor meant.


    But the Lin Astral Emperor just waved his hand and said, "Fan''er, you and Ang can leave now."


    Lin Fan nodded before standing up and walking out with Ang.


    The ministers and generals had been too stunned to react to this¡­but when the door closed, they suddenly came back to their senses.


    All of them looked at the Lin Astral Emperor with shocked and disappointed looks. After all, they all knew how dire the situation for the Lin Astral Empire was, but the Lin Astral Emperor was making these decisions without consulting any of them.


    Not only did it make them feel not valued, it also made them worry about the future of the Lin Astral Empire.


    Seeing the way that these ministers and generals looked at him, the Lin Astral Emperor suddenly released his pressure on them.


    All of the ministers and generals shrank down in their seats the moment that they felt this pressure fall onto them.


    Then the Lin Astral Emperor said, "Look at all of you, you can''t evenpare to a bunch of kids and you''re begging them to bail you out. Aren''t you supposed to be the top officials of the Lin Astral Empire? Yet all of you are acting this way!"


    When the ministers and generals heard this, all of them couldn''t stop their faces from turning red.


    That was because the Lin Astral Emperor''s words hit them right where it hurt.


    He was right, they were trying to depend on Ang''s intelligence and Lin Fan''s new power as a Ruler Realm Expert to bail them out instead of finding their own solution.


    But that was just how desperate the situation was¡­


    The Lin Astral Emperor then said, "Instead of trying to let others cover for you, you should all think about what you can do!"


    All of the ministers and generals lowered their heads in embarrassment again, but this time, there was a bit of determination in their eyes.


    The Lin Astral Emperor''s words had inspired them in the end.


    That''s right, they were the top officials of the Lin Astral Empire. It was their duty to step up when a crisis appeared and there was no crisis that was as pressing as the one that they were currently facing.


    Instead of whining and trying to push the responsibility to someone else, they should be the ones that thought of the solution.


    After all, the ones that they were protecting weren''t just the people of the Lin Astral Empire, but¡­they were also protecting their families.


    If they didn''t stop the Beast Race, they couldn''t even begin to imagine what would happen to their families.


    After a long silence in this room, all of the ministers and generals suddenly looked up.


    There was a much more determined look in their eyes now.


    It started with one minister, but it didn''t take long before they were going over the reports on the table and trying to figure out how to defend against the Beast Raceing at them.


    As they discussed ns, they couldn''t help feeling surprised by the innovation that was in this room.


    Many of them pitched ns that they had never heard of before, but they had seen examples from.


    Namely, they had seen it be done by Ang.


    With this, it didn''t take long before they were filled with different ns to take care of the Beast Race forces.


    Seeing this, the Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help revealing a faint smile.


    One would think that no one would be able to predict this, but the Lin Astral Emperor knew better.


    That was because when Ang had first taken the role of general, she had made a promise with him.


    It was a promise that when she left, all of the ministers and generals of the Lin Astral Empire would be better than before.


    All that she wanted in return for this was for the ability to return to Lin Fan''s side when she wanted without being restrained at all.


    The Lin Astral Emperor would have agreed to this even without the promise of making the ministers and generals much morepetent than they were. After all, he knew that her ce was by Lin Fan''s side.


    He had been prepared to take the heat, but now¡­it seemed that he didn''t need to.


    Even the words that he had said were told to him by Ang.


    She told him that when the time was right, all he had to do was say these words to trigger their transformation.


    It seemed that she had been right and she had already seen how everything would go.


    This kind of intelligence¡­was almost terrifying.


    But it was a good thing that she was Lin Fan''s woman and was on the side of their Lin Astral Empire.


    Otherwise, it would be scary having her as an enemy.


    Still, the Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help feeling sorry for Lin Fan.


    He knew that this great grandson of his would definitely suffer under her thumb.


    ¡­


    After they had left the meeting hall, Lin Fan didn''t waste any time in getting ready to leave.


    Even though he had been gone for so long, the guards and ship that had been assigned to him were still there. They were paid and maintained by the Lin Astral Family, so they were avable to him at any time he wanted.


    While the guards and crew of the ship were surprised to see Lin Fan back after all this time, they were well trained and didn''t waste a single second in preparing everything for his departure.


    At the same time, Ang summoned her forces as well.


    Even though she had just resigned as the general, these were people that had been trained by her and followed her orders alone, so they wouldn''t leave her now.


    These were the troops wearing the special armour that hade to pick Lin Fan up at the store earlier.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised to find just how well they had been trained by Ang.


    But he was happy that they wereing with them since¡­they weren''t weak at all.


    The weakest among them were still in the Sun Realm, so all of them could be considered top experts.


    Lin Fan also learnedter from Momonga that the reason that they were so feared by the people was because of their conviction in following orders.


    They had found several spies in the capital of the Lin Astral Empire.


    When they found the spies, they dragged them out into the streets and then burned them alive for everyone to see.


    Yet even after doing all that, they weren''t punished at all by the militarymand.


    They didn''t even have to give any evidence as to why they had arrested and burnt these traitors.


    So when people saw them, they were afraid that they would be the next victim of their witch hunt.


    But in reality, they only went after people that they had conclusive evidence against.


    Since there was conclusive evidence, there was no reason for them to show any mercy to these spies and traitors.


    Once everyone was packed up, Lin Fan''s ship set sail and headed off in the direction of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    As he was traveling through space, he couldn''t help worrying about the friends and family that he hadn''t seen in all these years¡­


    At the same time, he couldn''t help wondering just how much they had changed¡­

 Chapter 1097 Completely Different (1)

    ?


    The first ce that Lin Fan''s group was heading to was the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    In the report that he had read, it had been stated that the Mu Ster Kingdom was currently being besieged by one of the smaller Beast Race tribes that had snuck away from the main army. It seemed that this Beast Race tribe wouldn''t be able to gain anything if they were to attack the main Lin Astral Empire forces, so they wanted to attack the smaller Mu Ster Kingdom to maximize their benefits.


    This was a smaller tribe, so they didn''t have any Ruler Experts.


    This allowed the Mu Ster Kingdom to fight back against this smaller Beast Race tribe.


    The Mu Ster Kingdom had been favoured because of how close they, or rather their Ster King was to Lin Fan. So they had received quite a few benefits from not just the Lin Astral Empire, but also the surrounding Ster Kingdoms.


    This had allowed them to grow their power over the years, so they didn''t lose out to Beast Race when they had invaded.


    They were able to hold back the Beast Race at first, keeping them on the edge of their territory.


    But when the Beast Race started gaining the strange power, the tribe that was attacking the Mu Ster Kingdom wasn''t an exception.


    With this strange power, they were able to push back to the forces of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    In just a few short months, the Mu Ster Kingdom had already lost 20% of their territory and the trend made it seem like it was very likely that they would lose even more.


    So he couldn''t help being worried about the people that he had left behind in the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Especially Xin''er who he treated as a daughter.


    Her real father was the Mu Ster King, so there was no doubt that she was currently suffering in the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Both Lin Fan and Ang were thinking the same thing as they were both in a rush to reach the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    But when they arrived, they found¡­the forces of the Mu Ster Kingdom currently facing off against the forces of the Beast Race.


    This was the edge of the Mu Ster Kingdom''s territory that they had just arrived in and they had picked up energy signals on the sensors of the ship.


    When they followed these energy signals, they had found a where these energy signals wereing from.


    From a scan of the, they found that it was some beasts that were currently fighting with some humans.


    As soon as they saw this, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to order his group to set down on the.


    The guards looked like they were thinking otherwise, but since it was Lin Fan''s order, they had no choice.


    These guards and Ang''s troops had already experienced fighting these demon beasts before, so they knew what kind of abilities that they had. But they had never been able to figure out a way to counter these abilities¡­so they had suffered quite a bit at the hands of these beasts.


    Even now, they didn''t have any confidence in facing these beasts that were fighting the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    After theynded, Lin Fan was the first one to get out of the ship and charge at the Beast Race troops.


    When the guards and soldiers were still hesitating, Lin Fan was already on his way.


    Following closely behind him were Ang, Yuki, and Momonga who had already expected him to do this.


    However, all of them had worried looks as well.


    Since they had helped the Lin Astral Empire''s army, they had all experienced the strange power that the Beast Race troops had gained.


    Even at their level of cultivation, they hadn''t been able to figure out a way to deal with these Beast Race troops.


    So they were worried that even Lin Fan would suffer.


    When the Beast Race troops saw them charging over, they were caught off guard.


    However, not a single one of the Beast Race troops seemed worried.


    Instead, they all had smiles on their faces as if they were staring at an idiot who was charging to his death.


    They didn''t hesitate at all to spread out so that they surrounded Lin Fan''s group.


    When the guards and soldiers saw this, they all thought that it was over for Lin Fan.


    They wanted to rush forward to help, but Lin Fan''s group had been too fast for them to catch up with. Even if they ran at their full speed, they still wouldn''t be able to catch up to them in time to help them fight the demon beasts that currently surrounded them.


    The demon beasts were about to release their attacks on Lin Fan, but Lin Fan just casually raised his hand and punched out.


    The shockwave from this punch alone was enough to push back all of the demon beasts that surrounded him. At the same time, all of the demon beasts suddenly spat out blood as they suffered injuries of varying degrees.


    At this, the demon beasts realized that they hadpletely underestimated Lin Fan.


    When Lin Fan showed his power, they realized¡­that he wasn''t a fool that had rushed to his death. He was an expert that far surpassed them when it came to power.


    They realized that he was a Ruler Realm Expert!


    But even then, the demon beasts didn''t back down.


    Instead, they spread out all around Lin Fan in a certain pattern.


    It seemed like they were taking a formation to deal with Lin Fan.


    This formation locked out the guards and soldiers that wanted to help since the demon beasts released a power that they were familiar with. This was the strange power that they had gained in just the past few months that they weren''t able to break through.


    However, when they were in formation like this, they found that this strange power became even stronger.


    It seemed that they had already prepared for the chance that Ruler Realm Experts would join the battle one day.


    When Lin Fan''s group saw this, they all had different expressions.


    Ang and the rest revealed ugly expressions since they had already experienced this power before.


    Even with their level of cultivation, they had never been able to figure out just what this power did.


    As far as they could tell, it was a power that was able to defend and attack at the same time, but they had no idea just how it worked. They knew that it wasn''t a type of power that was native to their world, so they just couldn''t understand how it worked.


    But Lin Fan had a calm look on his face as he watched the demon beast get in formation like this.


    It was as if he wasn''t worried at all about the power that they were about to use.


    The demon beast took some time, but they were able to gather their power in the end.


    Then, they suddenly released it at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan didn''t see anything strange about the space around him, but he could feel as if there was something there. There was this strange flow to the space around him, almost as if it was warping in on itself and was about to crush him.


    He could see that it wasn''t just him that felt this way since he could see the strained looks on the faces of Ang and the others.


    But even if he was able to sense that it had something to do with the space around him, he wasn''t able to tell just what kind ofw it was.


    This was simr to spatialws, but it was also something different¡­


    Still, he didn''t have that much time to analyze it since it was getting dangerous.


    As the space around them warped more and more, he was even starting to feel some kind of pressure from it. It seemed that if it became strong enough, this warping space might even be able to hurt him.


    So he had to take care of it before then.


    Ang and the others didn''t make a move since they had wanted Lin Fan to experience this strange power that the demon beast had, but since it was getting stronger, they had no choice but to interfere. After all, they couldn''t just let themselves be hurt by this strange power.


    But before they could do anything, Lin Fan suddenly raised his hand.


    When he did, there was this strange ck that appeared from the palm of his hand.


    This strange ck spread all around them and when it did, they felt the pressure from the warping space around them disappear.


    It was as if the ck had suddenly made whatever was warping the space around him disappear.


    But it didn''t stop there.


    When the ck appeared, the demon beasts suddenly revealed strange looks.


    It didn''t take long before these strange looks had turned into looks of shock and horror.


    That was because they could feel the power that they were using being sucked into that strange ck that hade out of Lin Fan''s hand.


    They had tried to pull back their powers, but they found that they weren''t able to do that. No matter how hard they tried resisting, they weren''t able to break free of the suction force that came from the ck.


    It didn''t take long for the first demon beast to fall down¡­and then the rest of them fell with that first demon beast.


    The look on their faces showed that they werepletely drained of all their power by that ck.

 Chapter 1098 Completely Different (2)

    ?


    Once all of the demon beasts had been taken care of, everyone couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    That was because not a single one of them expected the demon beasts to be taken care of so easily!


    While they were just staring at the demon beasts in shock, Lin Fan''s attention was somewhere else. He was focused on his dantian which had a new statue in it after absorbing thews that the demon beasts used.


    This was a strange looking statue for sure, but it was very simr to the one that he had in his dantian for the spatialws.


    It was just a bit more warped than that same statue¡­


    He had already thought that thews that the demon beasts used were simr to the spatialws that he had, but he had never thought that it would be this simr.


    When he yed around with it, he found that it was basically the same, but there were different properties to it.


    It seemed that no matter what universe it was, there were some kind of spatialws.


    The demon beasts that he had taken out were only a part of the main Beast Race army, so there were still other demon beasts that had been fighting the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    The leader of the demon beasts had been focused on the Mu Ster Kingdom, but they had also been paying attention to the division that had been sent to take care of this spaceship that suddenly appeared.


    The leader knew that if this spaceship was allowed freedom, it would attack them from behind and the consequences would be deadly.


    That was why he had sent that group to take care of them.


    However, the leader never would have expected that group to be taken care of that easily.


    With the power that they had been given, he didn''t even think that they would be pushed back.


    He was certain that they would take care of the enemy before anything else happened.


    But now the situation was different from what he had expected¡­so he had no choice but to divert even more forces to take on that group.


    There were more demon beasts that suddenly charged out at Lin Fan''s group.


    When they saw this, they couldn''t help revealing ugly expressions.


    That was because even if Lin Fan had taken care of those demon beasts before, they didn''t think that he would be able to do it again.


    They were certain that he had used some kind of special technique and he wouldn''t be able to use that same technique that quickly.


    So they were considering whether to fight or run.


    But Lin Fan just had a calm look on his face when he saw this.


    This group of demon beasts were even stronger than the group before.


    This group waspletely made up of Sun Realm Beasts and even had a few in the Peak Sun Realm.


    It was clear that the leader of the Beast Race troops was taking them seriously.


    These demon beasts didn''t do the same thing as before where they surrounded them, but rather they started attacking separately from different directions.


    Instead of using that strange spatialw as a wall to crush them, they were using the strange warping quality of the strange spatialws to warp through space. They came at Lin Fan''s group with incredible speeds that normal experts wouldn''t have been able to react to.


    But before they could hit Lin Fan''s group, Lin Fan suddenly waved his hand and they disappeared on the spot.


    In the end, the demon beasts justnded where they had been previously and all of their attacks just hit empty space.


    The demon beasts had no idea what had just happened and they quickly looked around themselves to see if they could find Lin Fan''s group.


    But they weren''t able to find him until they looked up.


    Lin Fan was already above them, floating there in the air.


    He lifted his hand which already had gathered the strange spatialws in it and then pressed down on the demon beasts under him.


    When the demon beasts felt the pressure falling on them, they couldn''t help revealing shocked looks before quickly releasing the same spatialws.


    It was just too bad that¡­these spatialws weren''t theirs.


    Lin Fan had absorbed the spatialws and made them his own while these demon beasts were just using an external tool to control them. So there was no contest between the two of them as the demon beasts had their spatialws smashed by Lin Fan.


    Once that happened, it didn''t take long before they were smushed into the ground and turned into paste.


    They couldn''t handle the pressure that came from the warped space at all.


    When this happened, everyone from Lin Fan''s group couldn''t help looking at him with shocked looks.


    This strangew that had caused them all that trouble had now been taken care of so easily by Lin Fan.


    Just what had all of their struggles been for?


    Lin Fan carefully looked at the demon beasts that he had just crushed. With the way that he was looking at them, it was almost as if he was looking for something specific.


    After looking for a bit, he finally found what he was looking for.


    With a wave of his hand, there was the same spatialw that appeared. It warped something that was among the corpses of these demon beasts into his hand.


    When he looked at it closely, he found that it was something that was like a gun. Though this thing had a much stranger appearance than any gun that he had seen before.


    It almost seemed like a gun from one of those alien sci-fi movies that he had seen before¡­


    Could it be that these were actually aliens from another world?


    No, when he thought about it, Outers were technically aliens in the first ce.


    After all, they were invaders from another universe that weren''t native to this universe. So they perfectly fit the definition of aliens in the first ce.


    He just wondered if they looked like the aliens from those movies on earth.


    As he was lost in thought, the leader of the Beast Race troops was looking over in shock.


    After they had obtained the strange power from the leaders of the Beast Race, they had never lost a battle like this. Even when they had been facing those that were much stronger than them, they were able to rely on this strange power that they received to take them down.


    But now¡­there was someone who had taken care of them this easily.


    The leader knew that this situation was bad and even if they had the Mu Ster Kingdom troops on the ropes, that didn''t mean that they would be able to finish them off.


    As long as this strange group that had appeared out of nowhere was here, they wouldn''t be able to do anything.


    So after a moment of hesitation, the leader made quite the determined decision.


    "Retreat!"


    Since they couldn''t beat them, there was no reason for him to risk the lives of his troops to fight them.


    They didn''t know if it was just this group who had the ability to cancel out their strange new power, but they were certain that it wasn''t everyone who had this. Since it wasn''t everyone that had this, why would they pick the hard target instead of the easy target?


    They would be able to attack another ce and defeat the residents there easily instead of facing this person who countered them.


    The Beast Race troops also hesitated a bit when they received this order since it had been a long time since they received this order. There were quite a fewmanders who wanted to go against this since they could see that they were clearly the ones that were winning.


    But a few of themanders with sharper minds had ced spies in the army and knew what the situation was.


    This was the difference between human armies and Beast Race armies, it was just a gathering of troops instead of an actual army with discipline. They followed their own group''s orders instead of the order of the overallmander.


    So only around half of the Beast Race troops started to retreat while the other half continued their attack.


    The leader saw this, but he didn''t stop the other half that kept fighting.


    He had already decided to use them as a distraction while his half of the army escaped.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had no intentions of letting any of them escape.


    With a wave of his hand, the entire Beast Race army found that the space around them had frozen.


    Not a single one of them was able to move a single inch.


    There were some that tried using the strange spatialw that they had to bend and warp the space so that they could get out, but they found that there was no reaction from the frozen space at all.


    It was clear that a stronger application of the same spatialw had been used to freeze the space around them.


    When they saw this, all of the Beast Race troops revealed shocked looks. At the same time, those that had chosen to keep attacking instead of running away realized their mistakes.


    But that was strange¡­no one should be able to use this power other than them?


    So just where had this spatial locke from?

 Chapter 1099 Completely Different (3)

    ?


    After all of the Beast Race troops had been frozen, the entire Mu Ster Kingdom army and Lin Fan''s group just stared at them in shock.


    Not a single one of them could believe what had just happened.


    A moment ago, the Beast Race troops had been attacking them and now¡­they werepletely frozen like this.


    Just what was going on.


    After he froze all of the Beast Race troops, Lin Fan didn''t y with them at all.


    He waved his hand a second time and warped away those that seemed like they were in charge. He warped these leaders away from the main group and gathered them all together in one location.


    Once he had gathered them, he waved his hand a third time and there was arge pressure that fell over the rest of the Beast Race troops.


    They tried to resist, but they weren''t able to resist in the end as they were all crushed by this pressure.


    In just three waves of his hand, Lin Fan had defeated the entire Beast Race army.


    If it was the past him, he definitely wouldn''t have been able to do this even if he had reached the Peak Sun Realm.


    The difference between the World Realm and the Ruler Realm really was something that couldn''t bepared. Just the amount of life energy that he had was something that was far beyond what he had in the past.


    Once they were all crushed and the leaders were captured, Lin Fan waved his hand again to pull out even more of those same strange guns from before. At the same time, there were things that were different from the strange guns that came out from the hands of the leaders.


    These things contained the same strange spatialws as the strange gun, but they seemed like they applied them in different ways.


    After Lin Fan had gathered everything, he turned his attention to the Mu Ster Kingdom''s army.


    The general of that army had already been warily looking at Lin Fan, waiting to see what he would do next.


    When he saw Lin Fan floating over with the leaders of the Beast Race army, he immediately had his troops raise their guards and their weapons. Though he also knew that it waspletely useless to do something like this.


    After all, this was someone who had wiped out the entire Beast Race army all by himself¡­


    Even if they had an army, they wouldn''t be able to do anything to him.


    Luckily for them, Lin Fan stopped in front of them.


    He didn''t say anything and instead, one of the guards came forward to announce who he was.


    At the same time, that guard pulled out a token for all of them to see.


    The moment that they saw this, they immediately bowed down in front of Lin Fan.


    As members of the Mu Ster Kingdom army and of the Mu Ster Kingdom, they naturally knew about the Lin Astral Empire.


    This was the powerful Astral Empire that the Mu Ster Kingdom was under and any member of the Lin Astral Family would without a doubt have a higher status than even their king.


    For a member of the Lin Astral Family to appear in front of them now, it was an honour that they could brag about to the day that they died.


    There were many soldiers that sneaked peeks at Lin Fan, trying to burn his appearance into their minds.


    After all, it wasn''t every day that they would be able to see a member of the famous Lin Astral Family.


    Lin Fan just waved his hand for them to stand before saying, "Where is your Mu Ster King right now? I need to meet with him and discuss something with him."


    When the general heard this, he couldn''t help jolting.


    After all, if a member of the Lin Astral Family personally came at a time like this¡­it was clearly not a good sign.


    Even if he had rescued them, it was clear that he came to their Mu Ster Kingdom for a specific reason.


    If it was really bad, their entire Mu Ster Kingdom might be sacrificed for the sake of the Lin Astral Empire.


    But it wasn''t as if he could just lie to this member of the Lin Astral Family.


    So after hesitating for a long time, the general finally said, "Our king is currently in the capital. There are many battlefronts that we are currently facing, so he has had no choice but to stay there and deal with everything."


    The general was about to say a few more things to help make their Mu Ster Kingdom stand out more, but Lin Fan cut him off again.


    Lin Fan said with a nod, "The capital? Alright."


    Without even waiting for the general to react, he headed back to his ship.


    The other members of his group also didn''t react right away, but they reacted faster than the general and army did.


    When the general and army reacted, they found that the ship that had been there was gone.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that they were surrounded by dead Beast Race troops, they might have even thought that everything that they had seen was an illusion.


    In the end, the soldiers all looked at the general, as if they were asking him what they should do.


    The general shook his head and decided that this was far beyond his paygrade, so he wouldn''t deal with it either. He just gave the order for some of the soldiers to send a message back to headquarters to prepare them.


    After all, he didn''t think that Lin Fan''s ship would arrive in the capital before his message would.


    He thought that even the fastest spaceships would take at least a day to reach the capital. They were on the very edge of the Mu Ster Kingdom''s territory to begin with and the Mu Ster Kingdom had quite arge territory.


    But his thoughts were only on the standards of the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Lin Fan''s ship was state of the art and had the Outer technology integrated into it.


    Over the past five years, the engineers had been working on it the entire time and had turned it into one of the fastest ships in the entire Lin Astral Empire.


    So this ship was able to reach the capital of the Mu Ster Kingdom from the border in just a few minutes.


    When the ship arrived, everyone in the Mu Ster Kingdom capital went on alert.


    After all, this ship had appeared just too suddenly.


    But since it was a ship that bore the mark of the Lin Astral Empire, it was allowed tond. The air control of the Mu Ster Kingdom quickly got the information they wanted from the ship and Lin Fan was escorted to the pce.


    When he arrived, he found a few unfamiliar faces waiting for him.


    However, it didn''t take long for him to recognize them.


    It was the Mu Ster King, his wife, and Xin''er.


    The Mu Ster King''s wife was the one that changed the least. She had only gotten a bit older, but she was still as beautiful as before.


    The Mu Ster King had changed quite a bit in the five years that he hadn''t seen him.


    To put it simply, the Mu Ster King was much thinner than before.


    It looked like he had beenpletely exhausted by everything that he had to do over the years. But that couldn''t be med on him since no one would have expected the Beast Race to suddenly attack them like this.


    But he could also tell that the Mu Ster King was stronger than before.


    However, even with the Mu Ster King''srge change, he wasn''t the most shocking change.


    The one with the most shocking change was Xin''er.


    She had gone from a weak little girl to a beautiful young woman who was filled with confidence. She no longer hung back and lowered her head like she had done before, she now looked straight up and forward with a confidence that was befitting her status as the Mu Ster Kingdom''s princess.


    But when she saw who it was that was visiting, that proud appearancepletely disappeared.


    She didn''t hesitate to run forward and jump into Ang''s arms.


    Ang also revealed a happy smile and took her in her arms, to the surprise of her followers.


    After all, these followers had only seen one side of Ang¡­the cold side that she showed all of her subordinates.


    They had never seen this side of her before.


    But as Lin Fan watched all of this, he couldn''t help feeling emotional¡­


    After all, things had changed just too much for him.


    He had already felt that things had changed in the past five years, but that didn''t have as much of an effect in the Lin Astral Empire. After all, the people that he knew there had a high level of cultivation and didn''t change much.


    The only ones that had really changed were his cousins who had changed because of the war.


    But when he saw Xin''er now, it really hit him how long five years were.


    Five years had been long enough for her to grow up from a young girl into a young woman¡­


    And he had missed all of that.


    Everything truly was different from how it was before.


    After Xin''er finished hugging Ang and moved out of her embrace, Lin Fan stood there waiting for his turn.


    But to his surprise, Xin''erpletely ignored him and turned away from him¡­almost as if she was ignoring him.

 Chapter 1100 Completely Different (4)

    ?


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he saw this.


    He had a guess as to why she was ignoring him like this, but there wasn''t anything that he could do since it was all his fault that things turned out like this.


    Xin''er was still standing beside Ang and Ang could see the look on Lin Fan''s face, so she decided to help him in the end. After all, she couldn''t bare to stand Xin''er unhappy like this.


    So Ang patted Xin''er''s back and then whispered a few things to her, while also pointing and gesturing to me from time to time.


    But during all of this, Xin''er had turned her head away and wouldn''t look at me for a single second.


    It was like she was doing all that she could to avoid me which hurt my heart even more¡­


    But it wasn''t as if I could me her since I was the one that had disappeared for five years.


    Finally, Xin''er couldn''t take it anymore and said, "He''s the one that disappeared for five years without even sending a single letter! He''s the one that doesn''t care about me, so why should I go hug him?"


    With her stating it so clearly, it wasn''t as if anyone could say anything to her.


    At the same time, it felt like my heart had cracked in half because of what Xin''er had said.


    But once again, I couldn''t fault her since it was all my fault.


    After this outburst from Xin''er, everyone fell silent as they looked at me. With the way that they were all looking at me, it was as if they were waiting for me to do something.


    I knew what they were expecting from me, so I slowly walked forward towards Xin''er.


    At first, Xin''er took a step back when she saw me moving towards her, but then she stood there without moving. However, she still wasn''t looking at me and firmly had her head turned as if she didn''t want to see me at all.


    Once I was in front of her, I said, "I''m sorry, it was my fault. I know that there''s no excuse for what I''ve done, but I just want to say that in the five years I was trapped, I wanted to write to you all every single day."


    Xin''er couldn''t help trembling when she heard this, but she didn''t turn her head around.


    Lin Fan just stood there, but seeing that she wasn''t willing to forgive, he suddenly turned around as if he was about to leave.


    It was then that Xin''er finally turned around and ran forward to grab him from behind.


    In a soft voice, she asked, "Did you really mean it?"


    Lin Fan turned around with a sad smile as he said, "Everything. I want you to know that I mean everything."


    With this, Xin''er could no longer hold it back and she ran into his arms with tears in her eyes.


    She had been hurt that she hadn''t heard a single thing from Lin Fan for these past five years.


    Before this, she would receive letters from him from time to time.


    These letters were just simple checkups, but they meant much more to her who had already adopted him as her father.


    She actually knew that there must have been some reason why Lin Fan had suddenly stopped contacting her. And even though Lin Fan had stopped contacting her, during these long five years, she had been in contact with Ang, so she did know everything.


    But there was still a small part of her that med Lin Fan for all of this because she was hurt by the fact that he hadn''t contacted her.


    It was almost as if he¡­didn''t want her anymore.


    So she had acted up since she was still a child, but more than anything, she was just happy that he was back.


    After this emotional reunion, Lin Fan turned his attention to the Mu Ster King again.


    He walked over to the Mu Ster King and patted him on the shoulder before saying, "It must have been hard over the years."


    The Mu Ster King gave a sigh, but he said, "There''s nothing that we can do about it. We can only me that damn Beast Race for all of this."


    Lin Fan gave a slight nod in agreement when he heard this.


    Even now, he was still confused why the Beast Race had suddenly done this.


    Even if they had gained some kind of power from the Outers, it made more sense to slowly build up their power and then try to invade the human race. That would allow them to gather more information and make the best moves in their invasion n.


    However, the Beast Race didn''t do this.


    Why they didn''t do this, Lin Fan had no idea.


    At the same time, it also wasn''t important.


    The most important thing was thinking of a way to deal with the Beast Race right now.


    His first starting point was the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    Only by driving out the Beast Race in the surrounding area would he be able to protect the people that he cared about.


    That was what he was going to discuss with the Mu Ster King.


    When they sat down, there were many others that sat down with them.


    Since this was a discussion about the defenses of the Mu Ster Kingdom against the Beast Race invasion, naturally the ministers and generals of the Mu Ster Kingdom had also been called to this meeting.


    At first, the generals and ministers were surprised to see Lin Fan at this meeting, but they quickly learned who he was.


    Then they were surprised for apletely different reason.


    After all, even if they were in the Mu Ster Kingdom and their king was the highest person here, that didn''t mean that the Mu Ster King was the highest person in this room.


    In terms of rank, Lin Fan as a member of the Lin Astral Family outranked him.


    The Mu Ster Kingdom was under the Lin Astral Empire after all.


    Not to mention that Lin Fan had a very special identity that even surpassed his identity as a member of the Lin Astral Family.


    Lin Fan had already been named as the sessor of the Lin Astral Emperor, so he was considered the crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire.


    Compared to a normal member of the Lin Astral Family, Lin Fan was much higher since he was the future Lin Astral Emperor.


    So no matter how one looked at it, Lin Fan had a much higher status than the Mu Ster King.


    But in this meeting, it was the Mu Ster King who sat at the head of the table and Lin Fan sat to his right.


    There were many people that were afraid that Lin Fan would take this personally.


    They all wanted the Mu Ster King to give up his seat at the table to Lin Fan, even if it meant lowering his own position in this meeting.


    In fact, that was what the Mu Ster King had intended to do before Lin Fan stopped him.


    Lin Fan just went to sit at the right hand side of the main seat on his own and gestured for the Mu Ster King to sit.


    Once Lin Fan did this, there was nothing that the Mu Ster King could do but take this seat.


    During this meeting, the ministers and generals went from being worried to revealing passionate looks. After all, they could see from the way that Lin Fan talked to the Mu Ster King that they were very close.


    With the way that they were talking to each other, one might even think that they were brothers with how casually they spoke to one another.


    If their Mu Ster King had such a close rtionship with the crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire, there was no doubt that they would have a bright future as long as they were able to weather the invasion of the Beast Race.


    That made all of them very excited.


    During this meeting, Lin Fan only spoke a limited amount as he listened to the reports about the Beast Race.


    He had already seen these reports since the Mu Ster Kingdom had already sent these reports to the Lin Astral Empire.


    However, it was different hearing these reports from the people that had sent them in.


    This allowed him to get a different perspective and he also learned quite a few things that weren''t in the report.


    First, there was no other specialw that the invading tribe from the Beast Race used.


    It seemed that all of the invaders only used one specialw, which was this strange spatialw that was different from the one that existed in this world.


    At the very least, that meant that this group of Beast Race troops had only met with a single group of Outers and hadn''t gained morews from them.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan didn''t need to hesitate.


    If he wiped all of them out, he was sure that he would be able to draw out the ones behind them.


    At the same time, if they didn''t have any otherws, he wouldn''t have a problem since he had already been able to defeat those Beast Race Experts that had used thisw.


    So with this, the n had been set.


    But before he left to take care of the Beast Race, Lin Fan had something else to take care of first.

 Chapter 1101 Completely Different (5)

    ?


    The ce that Lin Fan was heading to was his store in the Mu Ster Kingdom''s capital.


    It had been a long time since he had been there, but he knew that it was still running properly since he was earning points from this ce.


    But when he arrived, he couldn''t help being surprised by what he saw.


    That was because the ones that were currently running it were a handsome young man and five beautiful young girls.


    The store itself wasn''t as busy right now since the morning training slots had been sold.


    Unlike the store in the Lin Astral Empire, people didn''t trust the supplements that the store sold, so they didn''t sell as well. The only busy time for this store was in the morning when people fought over the training spots.


    So the six of them were just currently sitting there behind the counter.


    When Lin Fan came in, the young man''s eyes immediately lit up and he came over.


    But he didn''te over because of Lin Fan. Rather, this young man hade over because of Xin''er.


    Before he could reach Xin''er, Lin Fan was already standing between the two of them.


    This young man was annoyed when he saw this and he released his pressure to suppress Lin Fan as he said, "Who do you think you¡­"


    But before he could finish, his words were suddenly caught in his mouth.


    That was because he had finally seen who Lin Fan was.


    He had been so focused on Xin''er that he had only seen her when they came in. He hadn''t noticed Lin Fan at all until just now, but there was a look of horror that appeared on his face when he noticed him.


    That was because he recognized him with a single look.


    Even if five years had passed, it was impossible for him not to recognize him.


    "Bo¡­boss, you''re back." Xiao Tu said in a stuttering voice.


    Lin Fan looked at him with a faint smile on his lips before raising his hand.


    Xiao Tu immediately turned to run, but there was no chance for him at all as the fist had alreadye down on his head and ttened him into the ground.


    If it was anyone else, they might have been knocked out or seriously injured by this, but all that Xiao Tu got out of this was a bump on the head.


    Lin Fan looked down at Xiao Tu and he couldn''t help revealing a look of praise.


    After all, he had felt Xiao Tu''s cultivation just now when he had released his pressure.


    In the five years that they hadn''t met, it seemed that Xiao Tu had been working hard.


    He had already reached the True Soul Realm and was close to breaking through to the World Realm.


    Though when it came to cultivation, he was still behind Xin''er who was already in the World Realm.


    She really was the daughter of the Mu Ster King who had been the strongest genius in the Mu Ster Kingdom before her. With the resources of the Mu Ster Kingdom, she was able to break his record for the youngest World Realm Expert in the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    But of course, that was also because of Lin Fan''s help. Both in her case and Xiao Tu''s case.


    Before he had left, he had bought and refined some pills that he had left behind in the store for them to cultivate with.


    The ones that he refined were made with the vast alchemy knowledge that he had, so they were of course the best of the best.


    As for the ones that he bought, they were from the system, so there was no doubting their efficacy.


    After Xiao Tu had been pounded into the ground, the five girls behind the counter also came over. However, they all ignored Xiao Tu and ran over to Yuki who had just entered the store.


    When Yuki saw them running over, she immediately picked them up in her arms and held them tightly.


    These five girls were Xiao Tu''s little sisters who had been living and working in the store with him.


    They didn''t work in the store before, but after Xiao Tu took over when Lin Fan left, they helped him run the store.


    Seeing the way that they went right past Xiao Tu without even looking at him once, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking, "Are these girls going through their rebellious phase?"


    Then when he saw the bitter smile on Xiao Tu''s face as he looked at them, he figured that this was indeed the case.


    They had been cute young girls that had followed their big brother around all the time, but now¡­they were beautiful young women who were taking steps for independence. They still loved him, but they didn''t follow him around as closely as before.


    When they passed by Lin Fan though, they did look at him with res like they did before.


    It wasn''t just because he was bullying their big brother, but also because of how Yuki had influenced them.


    It wasn''t a secret that Yuki didn''t like Lin Fan for many reasons, so she had no reason not to teach this to these five little girls.


    Though it wasn''t actual hate that they had felt towards each other.


    No matter what, they had spent quite a bit of time together, so it was more of a yful teasing than anything.


    Once Xiao Tu got off the ground, he looked at Lin Fan with aplicated look before asking, "Boss, when did youe back?"


    Lin Fan looked at him with a calm look and said, "I just got back."


    Xiao Tu revealed a surprised look before saying, "Oh."


    Then the two of them fell into silence.


    It was an awkward silence, but neither of them seemed to mind this awkward silence.


    In fact, it was as if they were just silently enjoying one''s presence.


    It would be a lie to say that there weren''t any good feelings between them after all.


    Lin Fan had taken care of Xiao Tu for a while, both letting him run the store and leaving all of those pills for him to cultivate with. This was not something that Xiao Tu took lightly since before this, he had only had himself to rely on.


    This had left a deep impression of Lin Fan on Xiao Tu and in a sense, he almost saw him as a parent.


    Even if he had been away for five years.


    Not to mention, Lin Fan was Xin''er''s adopted father, so it wasn''t as if he could avoid Lin Fan if he ever wanted to chase after Xin''er.


    For Lin Fan, even if he saw Xiao Tu as a child he took care of, that didn''t mean that he would ever let him near Xin''er.


    That was doubly so for the Mu Ster King who hade with Lin Fan down to the store.


    He had pumped his fists when Lin Fan had knocked Xiao Tu to the ground and he wanted to get in between them as well, but he knew that Xin''er would call him a bully if he did.


    It was only Lin Fan who could get away with beating Xiao Tu like this since they had been close before.


    After a long reunion, they moved into the back of the store and sat down like they had done before.


    Lin Fan took this time to check up on Xiao Tu and the five girls to see how they had changed over all this time.


    Xiao Tu had reached the True Soul Realm, but he was only barely in the True Soul Realm.


    As for the five girls, they were all in the Child Soul Realm still.


    It seemed that they didn''t really have a talent for cultivation since the pills that Lin Fan had left for them should have been more than enough for them to reach the World Realm already.


    Still, he didn''t mind since they were just kids and there was no need for them to grow that quickly.


    He preferred if they grew up healthy instead of powerful.


    Now that they had settled, Xiao Tu went back to his ways and started approaching Xin''er again.


    The difference now was that there were two guardians instead of just one.


    When Lin Fan had been gone, it was up to the Mu Ster King alone to keep Xiao Tu away from Xin''er. But now that Lin Fan was back, he just had no way of approaching with these two guardians keeping him back.


    With the Mu Ster King, Xin''er would step in if he went too far.


    But with Lin Fan, it didn''t matter what Lin Fan did, Xin''er would always be on her side.


    This also caused coteral damage to the Mu Ster King.


    Even though he was her biological father, there was a special bond between her and Lin Fan.


    It seemed that in her heart, Lin Fan still had the higher spot, so she would pardon him no matter what he did to Xiao Tu.


    It could also be said that Xiao Tu did have a small part in her heart since she would speak up for him when the Mu Ster King bullied him.


    After they finished catching up like this, Lin Fan suddenly stood up and said, "I''ll be leaving again for a little bit."


    All of them were caught off guard, but Xin''er was the one that reacted first by saying with a worried look, "Where are you going? Can Ie with you?"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "I have to take care of some business, but I''ll be back soon. It''s too dangerous for you toe along, so I can''t take you."


    Then after seeing her disappointed expression, he added, "When Ie back, I''ll take you somewhere else with me for some fun, alright?"


    Xin''er was still disappointed, but she gave a nod in response.

 Chapter 1102 Completely Different (6)

    ?


    After visiting the store, Lin Fan headed off across the Mu Ster Kingdom''s territory without any hesitation.


    With his ship, he was able to easily traverse the territory of the Mu Ster Kingdom to find what he needed to find.


    The first battlefield hended on was the worst one for the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    On this battlefield, the Mu Ster Kingdom army was outnumbered a hundred to one.


    It was a miracle that they had been able to survive this long, but that was because of the brilliant leadership of the general.


    This general was General Li, the one that had fought with Lin Fan before.


    Lin Fan had always had a good impression of this general and seeing what he had done, he couldn''t help admiring him even more.


    But now that he was here¡­it was time to clean up this battle.


    When Lin Fan arrived on the battlefield, he found that it was in a dire situation. It was even more dire than the report had made it seem since the human forces werepletely surrounded by the demon beasts.


    With how it looked, it was as if the humans would be taken out in a matter of minutes.


    However, now that Lin Fan had arrived, it wasn''t as if he was going to allow that to happen. Now that he had arrived, everything would be taken care of in just a matter of minutes.


    Lin Fan didn''t even wait for the ship tond as he suddenly jumped out of the airlock.


    Before any of the guards could even react, Lin Fan was flying over the battlefield by himself.


    Of course, Ang, Yuki, and Momonga weren''t like the others.


    The moment that they arrived, they had already guessed what Lin Fan would do and had immediately jumped out of the ship with him.


    They wouldn''t help him since they too were a bit helpless against the strangews that the Beast Race used, but they wanted to see him fighting them close up.


    They had already seen him fight before, but they hadn''t been able to carefully analyze the new voidws that he used. They only knew that the voidws that he used now werepletely different from the ones that he used before.


    Even these top Ruler Realm Experts weren''t able to see through them.


    So they wanted to take a closer look to see if they could figure out just what this voidw was.


    After all, this was the voidw that had been able to absorb thews of the Outers.


    They had never heard of this before.


    As soon as Lin Fan appeared on the battlefield, his presence was immediately noticed by the Beast Race troops.


    They quickly created a division that turned to face him while the rest continued attacking the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    It was just too bad that this division wasn''t able to hold on for more than a few seconds.


    They had released the strange spatialws as soon as Lin Fan approached, wanting to trap him in them before squeezing him to death. But they found that this didn''t work at all as all of theirws suddenly disappeared.


    They didn''t know how it happened, all they knew was that the strange spatialws that they controlled were immediately drained away and they lost all of their energy. Once they fell onto the ground, they were immediately crushed by the same strange spatialws.


    Lin Fan made his way across the Beast Race troops, cutting into the nk of the group attacking the Mu Ster Kingdom army.


    Seeing that their troops were of no use against Lin Fan, the leaders of the Beast Race had no choice but to withdraw.


    It was just too bad for them that Lin Fan didn''t n on letting them escape.


    In an instant, it changed from the Beast Race troops pressing down on the Mu Ster Kingdom army to them being chased by Lin Fan who wouldn''t let them escape.


    The Beast Race troops couldn''t believe how quickly the situation had changed.


    At the same time, they wondered¡­just where had this monstere from?


    This was a monster where nothing that they did had any effect on him, so they couldn''t think of any effective ways to push him back.


    Lin Fan cut his way through the Beast Race troops, causing them to scatter in every direction.


    Unfortunately for them, Lin Fan had already covered the that they were on with ayer of that strange spatialw. So no matter what they tried, they weren''t able to break free of that barrier and were trapped there.


    If they had a Ruler Realm Expert with them¡­perhaps they would have been strong enough to break through the barrier that Lin Fan had put around the.


    But these Beast Race troops didn''t have a single one since they never expected a Ruler Realm Expert to appear. And even if they did, they would have been able to take care of that Ruler Realm Expert with the strange spatialws.


    That was how it had been before.


    Eventually, the Beast Race troops just stopped moving and tried to turtle under Lin Fan''s attacks.


    They used the strange spatialws that they had to block Lin Fan''s attacks, but the difference in power between the two sides was clear.


    The Beast Race troops all felt like they were in a nightmare.


    Lin Fan was about to end it, but then he suddenly knitted his brows.


    Instead of wiping out the remaining Beast Race troops that had gathered in a certain area, Lin Fan turned around to look a certain point behind him.


    He saw that the space there warped and then there were two figures that had appeared.


    When these two appeared, he couldn''t help revealing a trace of surprise in his eyes.


    That was because what they were wearing¡­seemed strange, but at the same time, it was a bit familiar.


    These two were normal humans, but the outfit that they were wearing seemed like something out of a sci-fi show. They were wearing clothes that clearly seemed like it was some kind of battle suit.


    While Lin Fan was sizing up these two, the two of them also looked at the area around them.


    After seeing everything below them, they couldn''t help revealing surprised looks.


    After all, neither of them had expected to see all of these demon beast corpses under them like this.


    One of the two suddenly spoke, "We already detected a mass destruction of our weapons and a decrease in spatial warp drive energy here, but why are they all like this?"


    The other one shook his head before saying, "I have no idea." Then after a pause, he added, "It seemed like we were mistaken to leave this in the hands of these beasts. These lowly beasts don''t even know what science is, so they would never be able to use these weapons we gave them properly. I told you that we should have captured some human leaders and turned them into cyborgs under our control."


    The two of them just discussed this without caring who could hear them.


    As Lin Fan had already suspected, the Outers that were backing the Beast Race were from a technologically advanced world.


    The thing that looked like a gun that he had found before on the Beast Race was a gun, but it was a different version of a gun from this technologically advanced world.


    He wasn''t certain on what this strange spatialw was, but based on what he had just heard, he had an idea.


    It was an idea that came from sci-fi fiction, but this technology world had made it possible.


    They used energy to warp space itself, which allowed them to disrupt time and space itself and allowed them to travelrge distances. This was the concept behind the warp drive.


    That was also why it was different from the spatialws that were found in this world.


    In this cultivation world, the spatialws used would connect two points in space with an invisible tunnel instead of warping the space itself. So it was more like teleportation than it was like warp drives.


    In the technology world, the warp drive would userge amounts of energy to warp the space around them itself. So by warping space, they would be able to bring two points in space closer together, which would allow them to instantly cross this space.


    Then once the space had been crossed, the warp drive would be deactivated and the space would return to normal. However, the one that crossed that space would remain in the new spot that they were in.


    This was a simple exnation of the difference between the spatialws of the two universes.


    In short, there were different aspects of space that they controlled, which made them two differentws.


    After the two figures talked amongst themselves for a bit, they finally turned their attention to Lin Fan.


    After all, he was the only one that it seemed possible to have taken down the Beast Race troops.


    But they didn''t reveal a hostile stance and instead looked at him with interest.


    The first person asked, "Hey, what are you doing here?"


    The tone that he had was very casual and there was even a bit of disrespect in it, but Lin Fan didn''t let that bother him.


    Instead, he just looked at the two of them without saying anything.


    Seeing this, the one who spoke before asked, "Cat got your tongue? Or are you just mute?"


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows before asking, "Shouldn''t you name yourself before asking someone a question?"

 Chapter 1103 Completely Different (7)

    ?


    When the two in battle suits heard this, both of them raised a brow as they looked at him.


    Then all of sudden, they burst out intoughter.


    They continuedughing for a bit and it was clear by the tone of theirughter that they weren''tughing with him, but rather they wereughing at him.


    The two of them bent over in the air and pped their knees, almost as if they had heard the funniest joke in the world.


    It took them a while to stopughing, but they still had wide smiles on their faces as they looked at Lin Fan. It made it very clear that they were looking down on him.


    But Lin Fan didn''t mind as he stood there with that stoic look on his face, waiting for them to speak.


    Finally, one of them said, "Are all of the locals like you? Are you all really that ridiculous?"


    After that, both of them released their aura¡­or rather they activated their battle suits to release the pressure from it.


    This pressure from the battle suits made Lin Fan slightly knit his brows because¡­these battle suits were equal to Ruler Realm Experts. Or at least the amount of energy that they released was equal to it.


    After they had finished releasing their pressure, the one who had spoken before said, "Do you need to know our names when you''re about to die?"


    The other one then said, "We''ll need a name for the sample identification."


    The first one who spoke hit his palm with his fist as he said, "Oh, that''s right!"


    Then he turned back to Lin Fan and said, "I''ll give you permission to state your name. We''ll make sure to properly record it so everyone will know that you were a valuable sample of ours."


    Lin Fan knew that it would be meaningless trying to talk to them anymore¡­


    So he just said, "It seems that there''s no need to know your names."


    Both of them were caught off guard when Lin Fan said this, but the first one then said, "Oh, why is that?"


    Lin Fan''s face turned cold as he said, "There''s no need to know the name of a dead man."


    Both of them were once again caught off guard as they revealed surprised looks before they suddenly burst out inughter. Thisughter was even louder than their firstugh, but at the same time, it was as if there was something else inside of thisughter¡­


    It was something much darker.


    When they finally stoppedughing, the first one to speak looked at Lin Fan with calm eyes as he said, "You really are funny."


    Though his eyes were calm, there was something dark hidden under it.


    It was anger from being looked down on by someone he considered inferior to himself.


    And he showed that anger right away¡­


    After he finished saying this, this person in the battle suit suddenly disappeared.


    When they reappeared, they were already in front of Lin Fan with what seemed to be a gun in his hand.


    He didn''t pull the trigger of this gun right away as he looked at Lin Fan and said, "You shouldn''t have been so arrogant for such an inferior being."


    Then once his voice fell, there was no hesitation at all as he pulled the trigger.


    The other one in the battle suit just floated there in the air, watching all of this.


    The look on his face didn''t show a single trace of worry, as if he could already see Lin Fan being destroyed by his partner.


    As soon as the trigger of this gun was pulled, there was a distortion in space that appeared in front of this person. The distortion was so powerful that one could even see it with their naked eye.


    This distortion started out in front of the person in the battle suit and it quickly spread towards Lin Fan.


    With how fast it was going, it didn''t seem like Lin Fan would be able to do anything before he was crushed by these spatialws.


    But at thest second, they suddenly stopped.


    It wasn''t as if they were blocked by something and couldn''t move forward anymore. Instead, these spatialws werepletely ripped out of the air and disappeared without a trace.


    When the person in the battle suit saw this, he couldn''t help looking down at the gun in his hand.


    After his expression changed a few times and he finally revealed one that seemed like he couldn''t find a problem with the gun, he looked up again to point the gun at Lin Fan, pulling the trigger once more.


    The same thing happened where the distortions in space appeared again, but just like before, these distortions in space suddenly disappeared right before they were about to hit Lin Fan.


    If it was once, it might be a coincidence. However, a second time proved that it wasn''t a coincidence.


    There was something that was getting rid of the spatialws that were being fired from this gun.


    The person in the battle suit looked at Lin Fan before shaking his head. Then he started looking around himself as if he was looking for someone.


    But when he couldn''t find the person that he was looking for, he turned to look at the other person in the battle suit.


    That other person had his arm up and there was some kind of screen on the arm of his battle suit. However, seeing the first person looking over, that person shook his head to show that he didn''t know what was happening.


    When the spatialws were negated the first time, this other person had already released a scan with his suit. He also didn''t believe that Lin Fan had been the one that had negated the spatialws, so he had been trying to find the one that was hidden in the dark.


    It was just too bad that there was no one there.


    So the first person in the battle suit suddenly raised his voice to say, "Why hide in the dark like this? Why don''t youe out and face us like a real man?"


    But all that happened was that his voice rang out in this empty space.


    Not a single thing came out in response to this outburst.


    Lin Fan just shook his head when he saw this.


    For people that thought themselves superior to him, they really weren''t that smart if they couldn''t recognize that he had been the one that had taken care of those spatialws.


    But he also understood that for their own pride, they wouldn''t want to ept that it was him.


    Since they wouldn''t ept it, he would force them to ept it.


    With a wave of the hand that had been raised, there were the same spatialws released from the gun gathered in his hand.


    Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to point it at the person with the battle suit in front of him, using them to warp the space around him to crush him.


    The moment that he did this, no even before he did this, there was a beeping that came from that person''s battle suit.


    That person had been pulled out of their thoughts and immediately pressed a few buttons before jumping back.


    After he pressed these buttons, there was a light barrier that appeared around him. This shed with the warped space around him, preventing it from approaching him.


    But there were fierce energy fluctuations that came from this sh.


    It was as if the barrier was about to copse at any moment.


    In the end though, the barrier was able to hold on¡­or rather, the barrier was able tost until Lin Fan decided to let him go.


    Once the spatialws were gone, that person immediately flew back to the side of the other person.


    When hended, both of them looked at Lin Fan with strange looks.


    The bug that they had thought was inferior to them was now showing their ws. It turned out that this bug wasn''t actually a bug, but rather a wolf in sheep''s clothing.


    This was someone that could even threaten the top of the line battle suits that they were currently wearing.


    Instead of speaking this time, the two of them suddenly looked at each other.


    As they did, there was a green light that appeared in their eyes, almost as if they had some kind of disy in them.


    Lin Fan could guess that they were using some kind of secret method tomunicate with each other, but he wasn''t that surprised by this. That was what sci-fi technology was all about and he would have been disappointed if they couldn''t do this.


    After their eyes glowed green for a bit, they suddenly turned back to look at Lin Fan.


    This time, their eyes were glowing red and it seemed like there was some kind of calction being run in them.


    Lin Fan could guess that they were getting serious, so he didn''t hesitate to gather the same spatialws from before.


    Then all of a sudden, the two of them dashed out in different directions.


    The first one in the battle suit dashed to the left and was a bit closer to Lin Fan.


    The second one dashed to the right and was a bit further away from him.


    Once both of them had gotten in their positions, the first one pulled out a gun while the second one had several things that looked like rocketunchers appear out of his shoulder.


    Without hesitation, both of them fired.

 Chapter 1104 Completely Different (8)

    ?


    The gun did the same thing as before and fired distorted space at Lin Fan.


    As for the rocketunchers on the other person''s shoulders, they did fire rockets like they should. At the same time, these rockets seemed to distort the space around them just like the gun did with its spatialws.


    But Lin Fan could tell that there was something different about these rockets.


    Thew that they used was different from the spatialw that the gun released, since the distortion of space was limited to a very limited area.


    However, that wasn''t the only thing that Lin Fan was worried about when it came to these rockets.


    After all, small as they might be, these were real rockets.


    Even if he were to absorb the energy of thews surrounding these rockets, that didn''t mean that he would be able to stop the rocket itself.


    Even if he used his voidws, the rockets would still explode after thews were drained.


    So he wasn''t sure if he would be able to block these rockets.


    He couldn''t tell just how powerful the rocket itself was from the aura that it released since it all blended together, so he really couldn''t judge just how powerful these rockets were.


    Even if he was stronger, that didn''t mean that he was the strongest person in the world.


    He was hesitating on whether to block these rockets or not¡­


    But in the end, he decided to take them on since he needed to figure it out eventually.


    With a flick of his hand, there were two vortexes that appeared around him.


    All of the distortions in space suddenly disappeared when the vortexes appeared.


    Even if they were blind, they would be able to tell that it was these vortexes that had caused their attacks to disappear.


    So this time, there were shocked looks that appeared on the faces of the two in battle suits.


    But even if he had made thosews disappear, there were still the rockets that wereing at him. These were made of organic material and not just energy, so the voidws couldn''t absorb them.


    Lin Fan waved his hand again and there was a distortion that formed in the air in between him and the rocket.


    This was the same spatialws that came out of the gun, but this time, it seemed to be controlled by Lin Fan.


    When the rocket mmed into this wall of distorted space, there was arge explosion that appeared. However, these mes onlysted for a single second before they disappeared just like the distorted space from before.


    It was as if something had suddenly sucked up these mes and caused them to disappear.


    There couldn''t have been a sign that was more clear than that that Lin Fan had something to do with thews disappearing.


    Both of the people in battle suits had ugly expressions when they saw this.


    As for Lin Fan, he stood there with a disappointed look on his face.


    The rocket¡­was just too weak!


    He had thought that it would be some kind of special rocket, he had even thought that since it was a high tech world, it would be something like a dark matter rocket or some kind of nuclear rocket.


    But in the end, it turned out that this rocket was nothing more than a simple propulsion rocket with fuel in it.


    The real attack was thews that distorted space, the rocket was nothing more than a delivery system.


    It was rigged with a control system that would allow the user to control the rockets as they chased after the enemy. Beyond that, there was nothing else special about these rockets.


    But Lin Fan had thought that there was something special, so he had used powerful spatialws to block them¡­


    It was a waste of his energy in the end.


    At the very least, he was able to regain some of that energy back because of the voidws.


    The eyes of the two in the battle suits flickered between red and green. It seemed that they weremunicating something while not daring to let their guards down for even an instant.


    If Lin Fan wanted to attack them, they would be ready.


    It was just that there was a strained look on their face as they did this. It was clear that doing this causes a lot of strain for them, whether it was physically or mentally.


    Then without any warning at all, the two of them took each other''s hands.


    After they did this, the battle suits on their bodies started to change.


    It shifted so that they came together, seeminglybining with each other.


    As these two battle suitsbined, there was a stronger aura that was released.


    Based on this, it didn''t seem like it was simplybining their powers together. After all, the aura that they released now was much greater than if their auras had justbined.


    It seemed like this was ast resort based on the expressions of these two since it was clear that it caused them even more strain to do this.


    The battle suits thatbined continued to morph and shift until it finally¡­took the form of arge gun.


    No, it was a cannon!


    This was a giant cannon, but there was something that was different about itpared to a normal cannon.


    A normal person might not be able to understand it, but Lin Fan who was well versed in sci-fi recognized it right away.


    Energy cannon.


    No matter how he looked at it, it looked just like the energy cannons that he had seen in those sci-fi films in his past life!


    As he was being caught off guard by this, the energy cannon started up.


    It was a faint glow at first, but it soon became stronger and stronger showing that it was gathering more and more energy.


    The aura that it released as it did this made it seem even more terrifying.


    Finally, the energy cannon had finished gathering the energy that it needed and right before it shot, the two of them shouted, "Die!"


    As soon as their voice dropped, the ball of energy that had been gathered was released.


    This was arge ball of pure blue energy that put pressure on whatever was in front of it and currently that was Lin Fan.


    However even with this pressure on him, Lin Fan didn''t show a single trace of worry.


    He just calmly raised his hand in front of this ball of energy.


    When it was about to hit, the ball of energy¡­started to shake.


    The closer that it came to Lin Fan, the more it shook until it finally couldn''t take it anymore.


    The shaking became so intense that the ball of energy couldn''t take it anymore. It suddenly copsed and streams of energy started flowing towards Lin Fan.


    These streams of energy flowed right to his palm before disappearing without a trace, as if they had never existed.


    Like this, it didn''t take long before all of the energy in the ball of energy was drained away.


    As it became smaller and smaller, it became more and more unstable until itpletely copsed. It became onerge flow of energy that went into the ck hole in Lin Fan''s palm.


    Once it disappeared without a trace, both of the two in battle suits copsed on the ground.


    Both of them had lost consciousness from an excessive use of their powers. They had clearly pushed themselves over their limits and had overdrawn themselves.


    Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod since this was what he wanted to see.


    With his powers, there was no need for him to take this attack from them. He would have been more than capable of raising his speed to the limit to avoid this attack from these two.


    But he chose to take this attack on purpose.


    It was to drain them of their energy and knock them out like this. He wanted to capture these two Outers alive so he could get information from them.


    So that was why he used his voidws to take it since he could drain even more energy out of them like this.


    Since they were all knocked out, they wouldn''t be able to escape.


    The guards that followed him had arrived during the fight and while they didn''t do anything since they knew that they would just be in his way, they had been watching the whole time.


    As soon as these two in the battle suits were knocked out, they immediately captured these two.


    They weren''t certain if what they used would be able to hold these two, but Lin Fan had already knocked them out, so there was nothing to worry for now.


    Lin Fan gave an appreciative nod seeing this before turning his attention back to the Beast Race troops.


    They hadn''t moved an inch out of fear that they would be caught up in the fight between Lin Fan and the Outers.


    But between the two sides, they had been cheering for the Outers.


    After all, only if the Outers won would they be able to escape this ce.


    So now that Lin Fan had won, they all revealed ugly expressions.


    There were even thoughts that they should just surrender and gamble on if they could survive or not.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had no intentions of sparing them in the first ce.


    He knew that these beasts couldn''t be trusted since they had invaded their territory, so the only fate left for these beasts was¡­death.


    With a single flip of his hand, all of the beasts were instantly crushed by the spatialws.


    He could have done this earlier, but he had been saving his power to deal with the Outers that he was certain would appear.

 Chapter 1105 Completely Different (9)

    ?


    Once the Beast Race troops had all been defeated, the Mu Ster Kingdom army came forward to greet their saviours.


    The moment that they saw who it was, General Li couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because he had a deep impression of the young man who was leading the group that had saved them.


    A long time ago, he had once fought with this young man against the two Ster Kingdoms that had invaded their Ster Kingdom.


    This young man had created all kinds of miracles that had allowed them to win that war in the end. Even he couldn''t help feeling inferior due to all the things that this young man had done.


    But then it turned out that this young man was from the Lin Astral Empire and he was one of the members of the Lin Astral Family.


    He knew that this young man was now far beyond his reach and he never thought that he would see this young man again.


    However, now here was this young man in front of him once more, saving his life.


    General Li didn''t know how to feel since it can''t be considered that he and Lin Fan had a good rtionship.


    Back when he had first met Lin Fan, he had been very doubtful towards him¡­


    So he had never actually gotten close to Lin Fan, even after the war ended since he never had a chance. Right after the war, Lin Fan had headed off to the Lin Astral Empire after all.


    General Li still took the lead when meeting Lin Fan again and said, "Your highness, thank you for¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan had already raised his hand to cut him off.


    If it was anyone else, this proud general of the Mu Ster Kingdom army wouldn''t have taken being treated like this.


    But in front of Lin Fan, General Li epted being treated this way since he knew that his position was below his.


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "There''s no need for this. You have done well protecting the Mu Ster Kingdom from the invading Beast Race, so take the time to ensure that as many people can survive and return to their families as possible."


    General Li couldn''t help being taken aback when he heard this.


    He thought that Lin Fan had cut him off because of the tense rtionship that they had before, but now he realized that Lin Fan was just cutting him off to stop him from wasting time with formalities.


    Lin Fan was right, instead of wasting time with formalities like this, it was better to make sure that as many people as possible survived.


    After all, while they had been in battle, it wasn''t possible for them to provide treatment to those that needed it with all that was happening in the battle.


    They had no choice but to dy treatment to these people and it had even resulted in some deaths.


    So once General Li understood what Lin Fan''s intentions were, he immediately gave the order for all of the soldiers to support the medical staff. The medical staff had already been working hard on saving these people, but the soldiers that could have helped hade to greet Lin Fan.


    They were afraid of offending him, which was why they hade to greet him instead of saving the injured.


    With this order, not a single person hesitated to go help the medical staff in many different ways.


    As they headed off, they all couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with looks of admiration.


    They all clearly had a different preconceived impression of Lin Fan, so now that he acted in a way different from that, they were very impressed by him.


    After they all headed off, there was only Lin Fan''s group and General Li''s group that were left standing there.


    There was an awkward silence that filled the air as they stood there.


    General Li wanted to say something, but there really wasn''t much to say since he didn''t know what to talk to Lin Fan about.


    As for Lin Fan, he was only interested in one thing.


    After a long silence, Lin Fan suddenly came forward towards one of the injured people.


    This person was in critical condition and it seemed very unlikely that he would make it.


    It wasn''t because he wasn''t receiving good enough treatment, but rather because he was poisoned and the medics didn''t have the antidote for this poison. It was a kind of poison that they had never seen before, so even if they wanted to create an antidote for it, they wouldn''t even know where to start.


    The medics had been depressed about this, but they were surprised to see Lin Fan suddenlye forward.


    Lin Fan raised his hand and there was a ck hole that appeared in his palm.


    Then before anyone could react, there were streams of this ck liquid that came out of the wound of this injured person.


    This liquid flew through the air before being absorbed by the ck hole.


    This stream continued for a while before it disappeared without a trace and once that happened, the face of the injured person looked much better than before.


    The medics didn''t waste any time in checking this injured person and they found that the poison that they had been afflicted with had beenpletely sucked out.


    They turned to look at Lin Fan with shocked looks, but they found that he was already gone.


    Lin Fan had moved on to another injured person.


    Just like this, Lin Fan went from person to person, curing them when the medics were helpless.


    By the end of it, it was hard to count just how many lives he had saved.


    He hadn''t just used the voidws, but also differentws to heal all of these people that the medics were helpless over.


    Once he had made sure that the situation was stabilized here, Lin Fan turned to head back to his ship.


    But before he did, he looked at General Li and gave him a nod before saying, "Good work."


    Then before General Li could reply, Lin Fan flew up to his ship and the ship disappeared.


    General Li was just left there with a bitter smile on his face.


    It seemed that he hadpletely misunderstood Lin Fan¡­


    Lin Fan didn''t hold a grudge over what had happened in the past. In fact, it didn''t even seem like Lin Fan remembered him with the way that he acted.


    He had been the only one that had thought that things were much more important than they actually were¡­so he couldn''t help feeling embarrassed over this.


    But he also had to admit that Lin Fan waspletely different from before.


    He wasn''t different that he became worse, but rather he was different in that he had matured much more. He had be much more cool, calm, and collected, bing one that was worthy of inheriting the throne of the Lin Astral Empire.


    This once again confirmed just how different their lives and statuses were.


    General Li gave a sigh before turning around to give his men orders.


    But in his heart, it could be said that he had been turned into a fan of Lin Fan.


    ¡­


    After entering the ship, Lin Fan turned his attention to the two Outers that they had captured.


    This was a ship that had everything put into it, which included a prison for these two Outers.


    After they had been brought to the ship, they had attempted to take the battle suits off the two Outers. However, no matter how they tried, they weren''t able to take them off.


    It was as if the battle suits themselves had some kind of protection that stopped them from doing this.


    They didn''t know how it worked, so they weren''t able to break it.


    As for destroying the two battle suits¡­they weren''t willing to do that since these two battle suits were powerful Outer relics. They wanted to bring them back to the Lin Astral Empire to study to see if they could find the source of the Outers'' power.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he didn''t waste any time in summoning a beautiful green haired girl.


    When this girl appeared, she also didn''t waste any time in dropping seeds in the mouths of these two Outers that were still unconscious.


    As for who this girl was, it was naturally Brainy.


    Lin Fan had now reached the peak of humanity as a Ruler Realm Expert, so he wasn''t scared of revealing Brainy.


    The others watching were all surprised by the sudden appearance of Brainy, but they were even more surprised by what the seeds she ced in the mouths of these two Outers did.


    These two Outers immediately reacted to the seeds being ced in their mouths.


    In the technological world that they came from, there was no such thing as spiritual sense cultivation. All they had was enhanced bodies which allowed them to use these suits, so their minds were very weak.


    So even if Brainy was still only in the Peak Sun Realm, she was able to easily control these two Outers.


    These two Outers immediately woke up and then fell to one knee in front of Brainy.


    Brainy looked at Lin Fan who said, "Get them to take off the suits."


    Brainy gave a nod before turning back to look at the two Outers.


    The moment that she did, they immediately took off their suits and ced them on the ground in front of them.


    Lin Fan had a few of the guards carefully take these suits away before saying, "Let''s start the interrogation."

 Chapter 1106 Completely Different (10)

    ?


    It didn''t take long to get the information that we wanted from these Outers.


    They had beenpletely subdued by Brainy''s seeds, so she had ess to all of their memories and knowledge.


    It was easy for Brainy to crack open their minds and figure out the ns of the Outers.


    The world that they came from was as expected, a technologically advanced world. It was one where cultivation didn''t exist, so technology took the ce of cultivation, allowing them to better their lives with all kinds of different technologies.


    The Outers from this world suffered the same fate as every other world in which theycked further space to expand, so they invaded other worlds.


    Namely, they invade this world.


    These were the Outers that had made contact with the Beast Race, offering them all kinds of strange weapons that allowed them to use thews from the Outers'' world.


    This was what they had used to suppress the humans during this invasion.


    Lin Fan was able to easily get a list of all the weapons that the Outers had supplied the Beast Race for their invasion. This list also included what each of these weapons did and what kind ofws they used.


    As long as he had this, he would be able to slowly figure out how humans would be able to counter this.


    Once he had gotten all the information that he wanted out of these two¡­there was no longer a reason for them to live anymore¡­


    That is until Ang suddenly stopped him.


    Lin Fan was surprised that Ang would stop him from killing these two, but then she gave a very valid point.


    "They can be used for infiltration." She said in a very calm and cold voice.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he immediately recognized that she was right.


    They would have to eventually invade the world of the Outers or else the Outers would never stop bothering them.


    Unless they caused substantial damage to the Outers, the Outers would never back down in this war. And the only way to do that was to hit them where it hurt, hit them right in their base.


    So by invading their world and showing them that they were more than capable of hurting them, they wouldn''t stop slowly building up and sending troops to invade their world.


    Once they showed that they were capable of mutual destruction, it would create a bnce between sides that would stop the invasions.


    So a pair of puppets to infiltrate the enemy lines at that point would be very useful.


    But there was no need for them to have a will or take the risk of them breaking free of Brainy''s control.


    So there was still no need to keep them alive.


    Ang argued that this would prevent them from gaining information in the future since she believed that Brainy wouldn''t be able to extract any information from a dead mind. But that wasn''t the case since death in this sense was only the death of the soul.


    The brain itself would be maintained by Brainy''s parasite seed, so it would be like a second brain for Brainy that had all the information that it had before.


    There was no loss for Brainy by doing this.


    Since Ang didn''t know this, she wasn''t able to stop Brainy from doing this.


    But she didn''t forget to re at Lin Fan for not listening to her advice.


    Once that had been taken care of, they quickly swept through the rest of the battlefields on the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    With Lin Fan''s power, he made short work of the Beast Race troops and there wasn''t another Outer that appeared.


    In just a single day, Lin Fan was able to clear out all of the Beast Race troops that had been guing the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    He was even able to return to the pce by night to enjoy a banquet with the Mu Ster King.


    As they sat there at the table, the Mu Ster King couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    It was a look that had a trace of mncholy to it.


    That was because he couldn''t help feeling that Lin Fan waspletely different from before.


    Back when they had first met, Lin Fan was weakpared to the Mu Ster King. Back then, the Mu Ster King could have crushed Lin Fan with a single pinky if he wanted to.


    But in just five years, he hadpletely changed.


    The Mu Ster King was only a bit stronger than before, but their positions hadpletely swapped where Lin Fan was the one that could crush him with a single pinky now.


    In just a matter of a day, Lin Fan had used his power to solve the problem that the Mu Ster Kingdom had faced for such a long time.


    Then there was the way that Xin''er looked at Lin Fan that made him die on the inside.


    It was the look of admiration that a daughter would have towards their father.


    Even now, he hadn''t received this from her yet even though he was her biological father¡­


    Still, that was the extent of his jealousy since his gratitude towards Lin Fan far outweighed the jealousy that he felt.


    Lin Fan wasn''t just the one who had saved his daughter, he was also the one who had saved their entire Mu Ster Kingdom.


    So they went all out with this banquet.


    All of the ministers and generals were the same since they knew that with the Beast Race forces destroyed, they were finally safe from the invasion.


    They didn''t hold back as they partied all night to celebrate everything that Lin Fan had done.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan wasn''t interested in any of this.


    After he had seen the shop and taken care of the invading Beast Race, he no longer had any business left in the Mu Ster Kingdom. He was even in a rush to head to the next ce since that ce was still in danger.


    Halfway through the banquet, Lin Fan excused himself and headed to the store with Xin''er.


    The Mu Ster King had wanted toe as well, but he had no choice but to stay.


    Once they were at the store, Lin Fan said to Xin''er, "I''ll take you somewhere fun now like I promised."


    When Xin''er heard this, her eyes immediately lit up and she agreed without any hesitation.


    But Xiao Tu had a bitter look on his face.


    After all, he wasn''t able to leave the store since he still had to work there, so he couldn''t go with them.


    However, Lin Fan could see that look on his face and said, "You''re alling with us. We''ll close the store for a bit."


    When he said this, they couldn''t help being surprised since the store had never taken a day off since they hade here. They assumed that it would never take a day off as well, so that was why they were so surprised.


    Lin Fan revealed a faint smile when he saw this.


    Even if they had grown up a bit, they were still kids in the end and quite easy to tease.


    With that, it was decided that they woulde with Lin Fan on his journey forward.


    When he told the Mu Ster King about this, he wasn''t worried at all since he knew that there was no safer ce that they could be than by Lin Fan''s side. Rather, he was worried about somethingpletely different¡­


    He was worried about the fact that Xiao Tu was also going with Lin Fan and Xin''er.


    He wanted to drop everything and go with them as well, but the ministers, generals, and even his wife were able to stop him in the end.


    They even had to tie him up to ensure that he wouldn''t run off with them.


    Just like this, they set off from the Mu Ster Kingdom''s territory.


    As they went, there were many people that were gathered to watch their ship leave.


    Afterst night, there wasn''t a single person who didn''t know about Lin Fan''s existence in the entire Mu Ster Kingdom. Everyone knew that Lin Fan hade to save them and they all wanted to have a look at Lin Fan.


    But it was just too bad that his ship was too fast and disappeared in an instant.


    As for where they were heading, naturally they were going to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Lin Fan had also received a report that the Gctic Humanity Alliance was facing the invasion of the Beast Race, though the enemies that were there were only at the level of the Gctic Humanity Alliance''s past level.


    With the new level of pets that they received from Lin Fan''s store, it had been no problem for them to fight off the Beast Race troops even if they had pulled out those strangews.


    But Lin Fan couldn''t feel assured about this and wanted to get there as soon as possible.


    He wanted to make sure that there wasn''t a single ident that could happen since there were people that he cared about there.


    As they were traveling through space, Xin''er asked, "What kind of ce is the Gctic Humanity Alliance?"


    Lin Fan patted her head with a smile and said, "It''s an interesting ce filled with interesting people." Then after a pause, he added, "There will be a friend waiting for you there."


    "A friend?" Xin''er asked while tilting her head in a curious manner.


    Lin Fan nodded before patting her head again.


    He couldn''t help wondering how Song Shu who he had left back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance was doing¡­

 Chapter 1107 Completely Different (11)

    ?


    With the speed of the ship, it took them no time to arrive in the territory of the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But when they arrived, they were surprised to find that there were no guards at all at the border.


    Thispletely went against the reports that Lin Fan had received in both the Lin Astral Empire and the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    After the Mu Ster Kingdom had taken care of the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, the Gctic Humanity Alliance had fallen under them willingly. Since they had entered under the banner of the Mu Ster Kingdom, the Mu Ster Kingdom had been receiving detailed reports from them about the battle.


    So there shouldn''t have been a mistake with the reports¡­unless something sudden had happened.


    As soon as this thought passed through his mind, Lin Fan turned to tell the staff of the ship to fire the radars at full power.


    But he found that they were already doing this.


    After traveling with Lin Fan for a bit, they had already slowly adjusted to his personality and could predict what he was nning to do.


    Not to mention, many of them were also worried that there weren''t any guards here and were afraid that they were entering an ambush.


    It didn''t take long for the radar to pick up a signal.


    This was a signal that was stronger than what was expected to be picked up in this ce.


    At the same time, it was clear that this wasn''t a signal from a human expert¡­


    Which meant that the Beast Race were ying for keeps.


    They had brought a World Realm Expert down to this upper realm where the limit was the Soul Realm.


    They had also done this when there were two Ruler Realm Outers that were watching over the battle in the Mu Ster Kingdom so that they couldn''t send a World Realm Expert to help the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    If it wasn''t for Lin Fan''s sudden appearance, perhaps both the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Gctic Humanity Alliance would have been destroyed.


    But now that Lin Fan was here¡­there was no chance of that.


    Without any hesitation, Lin Fan gave the order for them to head to this this signal wasing from. His followers also didn''t hesitate at all to drive the ship towards the.


    After all, there wasn''t a single one of them that was weak here.


    The weakest one among them¡­was still in the Sun Realm, even if it was the Low Sun Realm.


    As for the World Realm signal that they had received, it was only a signal in the Realm.


    So any one of their members would be able to take care of this World Realm Expert, even if they had weapons from the Outers.


    This was their chance to show off, but¡­Lin Fan didn''t give them that chance.


    When they arrived at this, Lin Fan was already flying out of the ship before any of them could react.


    He quickly arrived on the surface of the and he saw the carnage in front of him.


    This was very simr to the scene when he had first arrived in the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    The humans were currently being pushed back by the Beast Race troops and were about to be ughtered.


    At the head of the Beast Race troops, there was a single expert that was standing there who seemed to be the one leading them. From the aura that this demon beast released, it was clear that he was the World Realm Expert.


    On the side of the humans, Lin Fan could see a few familiar faces.


    They were the leaders of the twelve factions¡­well, it shouldn''t be the twelve factions anymore since there were some of those factions that had betrayed the Gctic Humanity Alliance to work with those people from the Bai Ster Kingdom.


    But these were people that Lin Fan had worked with before and hadn''t seen in a long time, so he couldn''t help feeling emotional.


    Not a single one of them noticed him since he was hiding his aura and they were focused on their fight, but if they did see him, they definitely would be shocked.


    Lin Fan was feeling emotional until he felt an aura that he was familiar with¡­and he was shocked that this aura was on the battlefield.


    After all, this aura belonged to Song Shu.


    Before he could even make a move, Ang had already charged forward.


    Shended among the troops of the Gctic Humanity Alliance and the moment that she did, all of them were shocked.


    Not a single one of them had sensed her approach and not a single one of them knew where she hade from. Not to mention, there wasn''t a single person around her that recognized her.


    That included a beautiful young girl among the troops that was standing in front of Ang.


    It had been too sudden of an appearance that this young girl hadn''t been able to react, but then she revealed a look of recognition and shock.


    She had recognized the person who hadnded in front of her.


    "Big sister Ang, what are you doing¡­"


    But before she could even finish saying ''here'', Ang had already moved forward to take her in her embrace.


    This young girl was lost in this embrace and after a moment of being dazed, she started hugging her back.


    There was only silence around the two of them until a certain voice suddenly cut in.


    "Oh, what is going on here? Are you humans saying yourst goodbye before you die? You humans really are just too sentimental." This voice had a heavy taunting tone to it, making it clear that it was making fun of them.


    Then the voice suddenly changed to a cold one as it said, "Don''t worry, I won''t let you even feel any pain as I send you off."


    This voice belonged to the World Realm Beast.


    He had also immediately noticed Ang when she appeared.


    He had been wary of her since she had even fooled his senses and he hadn''t been able to detect her approach, but now that he could feel her aura, he wasn''t as scared. After all, she only had the aura of someone in the True Soul Realm.


    He figured that she had some kind of special cultivation technique that allowed her to hide herself, that was why he hadn''t been able to detect her earlier.


    He didn''t even think for a second that it was because she was stronger than him that he wasn''t able to detect her.


    But as soon as this voice fell, there was a chill that came from in front of him.


    This was a chill unlike anything that he had faced before and it instantly froze him.


    It wasn''t just a normal kind of freezing, it was as if he had been thrown into ice and every part of him was frozen. It even went as far as stopping him from moving a single muscle.


    The World Realm Beast had no idea where this chill wasing from, but he did know that it wasing from in front of him.


    Not for a single second did he suspect that it wasing from Ang¡­


    But before he could even do anything, there was someone that jumped out to attack this World Realm Beast.


    It was one of Ang''s subordinates.


    They might have been on the ship, but they had heard everything that the World Realm Beast had said.


    When they heard this demon beast insulting Ang like this, they had naturally lost their temper and wanted to rip this demon beast to pieces.


    So this person who was the right hand woman of Ang had jumped down without hesitation to attack this demon beast. At the same time, this person didn''t hold back their power at all, creating arge pressure on the World Realm Beast.


    The World Realm Beast wanted to react, but he found that he wasn''t able to move at all because of the chill that had hit him.


    He could only watch as the fist falling down on him became bigger and bigger in his eyes.


    But before the fist could hit him, the space around him warped and he disappeared.


    When he reappeared, he was several feet to the right.


    The fist that was about to hitnded on the ground and created cracks in the ground immediately.


    When Ang''s subordinate looked up, she immediately turned to look at Lin Fan who had a hand raised.


    He was the one that had utilized the spatialws to save that World Realm Beast just now.


    Seeing him like this, she asked, "Your highness, what are you doing? How can you save this beast that insulted the general?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he saw this.


    He had already seen this, knowing that her subordinates acted like her, but it seemed that it was worse than he imagined.


    But he still calmly said, "Wait a minute. I want to see what kind of power he received from the Outers."


    The World Realm Beast didn''t know what had just happened, but he knew that he was in danger. If he hesitated at all, there was no doubt that he would be killed by these people that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.


    So without hesitation, there was a gun that appeared in the mouth of this World Realm Beast.


    When Lin Fan saw this gun, he couldn''t help revealing a disappointed look since he had already seen this thing before.

 Chapter 1108 Completely Different (12)

    ?


    Since it was a weapon that he had already seen, there was no need for him to stop the subordinate anymore.


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh and waved his hand at Ang''s subordinate.


    Ang''s subordinate was surprised to see this, but she also revealed an excited look after being given the signal to go ahead. Since she was allowed to finish off this World Realm Beast, there was no reason for her to hold back.


    With a single jump, she arrived in front of the World Realm Beast and punched out at it again.


    The moment that World Realm Beast saw this, he immediately pulled the trigger of the gun.


    There was a distortion that formed in the space in front of the World Realm Beast, representing the spatialws that had been gathered.


    If this was the past, Ang''s subordinate might have been worried about this.


    But now¡­there was nothing to worry about.


    Lin Fan had already taken thews from the Outer weapons and made them his own.


    Since he had already made them his own, he was able to find the weakness of thesews that he taught to the guards and Ang''s subordinates.


    Ang''s subordinate just shifted her fist slightly before punching out at the distorted space in front of her.


    The World Realm Beast had a confident look on his face seeing this, but that confident look quickly disappeared when he saw what happened next.


    The moment that the fist of Ang''s subordinate made contact with the distorted space, there was no resistance at all as she smashed through it. There was a clear shattering sound that rang out through the air as the distorted space was broken, disappearing without a trace.


    It was almost as if it had never existed in the first ce.


    When the World Realm Beast saw this, his expression immediately filled with shock.


    But that expression didn''t remain on his face for long as the fist of Ang''s subordinate smashed right through that face.


    This beast was only in the Realm, so it couldn''t resist the full power strike of a Sun Realm Expert like this.


    The World Realm Beast was smashed into the ground and his head popped like a watermelon, leaving behind a lifeless corpse there.


    Once she finished off the World Realm Beast, Ang''s subordinate revealed a satisfied look before turning to look at Ang as if she was looking for praise. But all that she met was a re from Ang that sent a chill down her spine.


    Even though she had fought for Ang''s honour, it seemed that Ang didn''t appreciate this at all¡­


    What had she done wrong to earn Ang''s ire like this?


    Lin Fan shook his head with a sigh since he knew that Ang was unhappy that her subordinate had taken this matter into her own hands.


    Ang had wanted to destroy this World Realm Beast on her own and show off her power to Song Shu, but her subordinate had ruined that n¡­So it was natural that the subordinate would earn her ire like this.


    Lin Fan knew that if the Beast Race troops remained here any longer, they would just make her even angrier.


    So he looked up at the ship and gave a signal to the ones that were still in it.


    The ones up there were surprised to receive this signal from Lin Fan, but they didn''t hesitate when they received it.


    As for what the signal they received meant¡­


    It was to destroy the Beast Race troops.


    They had wanted a part of the action earlier, but this subordinate of Ang''s had acted first.


    But at the same time, while they had been regretful over this, they had seen how Ang treated this subordinate. So at the same time, they couldn''t help letting out secret sighs of relief that they hadn''t done the same.


    Once they were given the signal, they all jumped out of the ship andnded down on the Beast Race troops.


    They didn''t hesitate to destroy all of them and it was aplete ughter since there was arge difference in cultivation levels in the first ce.


    These were Sun Realm Experts while the strongest of the Beast Race troops that remained were only in the True Soul Realm.


    Just one of these guards would be enough to take down all of these Beast Race troops, let alone this entire group.


    Even if the Beast Race troops pulled out guns that were simr to the one that the World Realm Beast had pulled out earlier.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan hadn''t only taught Ang''s subordinate how to break this spatialw, he had also taught all of the rest the same thing.


    This spatialw was powerful in that it bent space to create a chaotic mass that was very hard, but there were downsides to this. Since it was so chaotic, there were parts of it that were just too fragile.


    There were these points that could be considered weak points where if one smashed right there, they would be able to break the mass of space folded on each other.


    That was what Ang''s subordinate had done earlier.


    With this, they would be able to break the wall of spatialws with minimal effort.


    Simr to how Prince Rupert Drops were, where they were unbreakable at the head and would shatter as long as the tail was destroyed.


    So they had no effect on stopping the ughter.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about any of this as he turned to look at the group from the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    As he looked at them closely, he realized that there were more familiar faces than he thought.


    It was just that he didn''t recognize them since it had been a long five years that passed.


    Many of the younger generation of the former twelve great factions were on this battlefield, many of them that Lin Fan had gotten to know during his time on the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    But right now, there was someone else who he wanted to talk to first.


    So he went over to where Ang and Song Shu were.


    When she saw hime over, Song Shu''s eyes teared up and a trace of disbelief appeared in them.


    She couldn''t help taking a step forward before asking, "Big brother, is that really you?"


    Lin Fan also couldn''t help feeling a bit emotional when he heard this, but he gave a nod before saying, "Un, it''s me."


    After hearing this, Song Shu couldn''t take it anymore as she ran forward towards Lin Fan.


    Without any hesitation, she jumped into the air andnded in his embrace, burying her head in his chest.


    It had been a long time since she had heard from him¡­


    In the past, he would still send letters, but in the past five years, she hadn''t heard a single thing from him.


    She had even thought that she had been abandoned even though Ang had exined the situation in the letters that she had sent.


    But now, seeing him had made all of that waiting worth it.


    By the time that the two of them separated, all of the Beast Race troops had already been exterminated and all of the Outer weapons that they used had been gathered up.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan said, "Let''s go back."


    With this, Song Shu just gave a nod before following Lin Fan and Ang into the ship.


    As for the rest of the Gctic Humanity Alliance troops, they were just left there with dazed looks on their faces.


    After all, not a single one of them was able toprehend what had happened.


    Lin Fan and his people had arrived like a storm and just like a storm, they had wrecked everything in this ce before leaving them in ruins.


    All around them were the corpses of the demon beasts.


    One moment they had been on the edge of death and then the next, there was only silence around them.


    But of course, there were many of them that had recognized Lin Fan when they saw him.


    His appearance hadn''t changed much in these five years, but the power that he demonstrated was on apletely different level. It was as if he was apletely different person from before.


    The ones that knew him before all hadplicated feelings¡­


    As for Lin Fan''s group, they just took the ship back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    The that they had been on before was one of the minor realms like the Blue Star under the Gctic Humanity Alliance. They had sent all their troops there to fight off the invading Beast Race because they didn''t want to risk harming their own with this fight.


    The territory of the Gctic Humanity Alliance wasn''t wide, so it didn''t take long for Lin Fan to reach the.


    But during this time, Lin Fan introduced Song Shu to Xin''er.


    The two girls were very awkward when they met since they didn''t know how to feel about the other.


    They had both been saved by Lin Fan and they both looked up to him, but both of them had a different rtionship with him.


    One was treated as a daughter while the other was treated as a little sister¡­so technically speaking, there was a generational divide between them even if they were around the same age.


    But since they were both saved by Lin Fan and grateful towards him, they were able to quickly bond because of their love towards him.


    Lin Fan was very happy seeing this rtionship between the two of them.

 Chapter 1109 Completely Different (13)

    ?


    When they arrived at the Gctic Humanity Alliance, they weren''t weed as they thought they would be.


    Since they hade back too quickly, there wasn''t even time for a report to be sent back in time to notify them of their arrival.


    Since the defenders of the Gctic Humanity Alliance didn''t recognize this ship, they assumed that it was an enemy ship if it came at a time like this. So there were many ships that suddenly set out from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, as if they were prepared to attack.


    In fact, some of them even jumped the gun and fired at Lin Fan''s ship.


    It was just a good thing that there was arge difference in technology and power between the two ships.


    So in the end, the shots didn''t even leave a single dent on Lin Fan''s ship. They didn''t even have to turn on the barrier to block the shots in the first ce, the material used to build the ship was already strong enough to block this.


    When they saw this, all of the troops on the ships of the Gctic Humanity Alliance were shocked.


    This created a moment of hesitation that would have been perfect for Lin Fan''s ship to counterattack them, but he didn''t do this.


    That was the power to be magnanimous that came with power.


    After this moment of being dazed, the ships of the Gctic Humanity Alliance began charging the power of their cannons to fire at Lin Fan''s ship.


    But before they could make this mistake, there was another ship that suddenly came forward to block them. At the same time, all of them received the order to retreat from theirmander.


    The ships were all confused, but since this was a top grade order where disobeying it would mean death, they had no choice but to obey.


    After all, even if this fleet was made of ships from the various factions, this was an order from that ce¡­the ce that no one dared to offend.


    So they immediately pulled back and allowed Lin Fan''s ship to dock.


    Lin Fan had already expected this result, so he wasn''t surprised as he gave the order tond.


    The ship naturallynded in Harmony City.


    Once theynded, they found that they werepletely surrounded by people. After all, it wasn''t often that strangers appeared at a time like this where they were being invaded by the Beast Race.


    At the same time, there were those that seemed to be quite important that were also here.


    The way that they looked at the ship¡­it was as if they knew who it belonged to.


    That wasn''t strange either since after the Gctic Humanity Alliance fell under the Mu Ster Kingdom, they were able to obtain much more information. That included information about the Lin Astral Empire and the Lin Astral Family.


    Since someone had reported to the fleet earlier to stop them, they should know that this ship was from the Lin Astral Empire.


    As important people, it was easy for them to get this information from the troops.


    So they were all here to see if they could build a rtionship with those from the Lin Astral Empire.


    An Astral Empire represented the peak of humanity after all.


    If they could catch the eyes of someone from there and build a rtionship with them, this would be their ticket to the top.


    At the same time, there were many beautiful young girls who were dressed up in their finest clothes even though the Gctic Humanity Alliance was currently facing its biggest crisis in the Beast Race invasion.


    If they were able to charm the person from the Lin Astral Empire¡­then their family would certainly be saved.


    At the same time, they would have a brand new status as someone from the Lin Astral Empire.


    So many people were excited to see who wasing out of this ship.


    They weren''t disappointed when they saw Lin Fan''s group walk out.


    The moment that they saw Lin Fan, the eyes of all the young girls waiting lit up.


    This was a handsome young master unlike any that they had seen before.


    Lin Fan was handsome before, but after breaking through to the Ruler Realm, he was now on apletely different level. He was so handsome that even some of them fainted from the excitement.


    All of them wanted to go forward to greet him, but then all of them felt a chille over them.


    It was a chill that froze them on the spot and not a single one of them was able to move an inch. It was even impossible for them to move a single muscle as it felt like they were encased in ice.


    Lin Fan also felt a bit of a chilling from behind him that made the smile on his face a bit bitter, but he ignored it and walked forward at the same pace as before.


    There were those that tried toe forward to greet him, but they found that they weren''t even able to approach because of the pressure that came from this group.


    Lin Fan didn''t do a single thing, it was all the guards that had taken care of this.


    After all, this was the thing that they were trained and paid for, so of course they would do it without any hesitation.


    Lin Fan walked through Harmony City without a guide, walking these familiar streets.


    There were a few thing that seemed different, but he was still able to find his way to the ce that he was heading to.


    Over the years, this ce hadn''t changed a single bit ording to Song Shu.


    That was because after Lin Fan left, all of the remaining twelve great factions had gone all out to support his store. They had marked it as a special ce in Harmony City, so there was nothing that anyone could do to it.


    After all, no one wanted to offend the strongest people in the Gctic Humanity Alliance over this.


    When he arrived at the store, he found that it was still surrounded with people even though it was already getting to be noon.


    It seemed that these people were struggling to get in, which showed that the store itself was alreadypletely filled with people.


    But they quickly parted ways when they felt the pressure that came from behind them.


    All of them realized that Lin Fan''s group wasn''t a normal group, so they immediately made room for him. Though there were some that didn''t recognize this group and were looking forward to seeing them be punished.


    This store was a special ce in Harmony City, a ce where one had to put down their pride.


    No matter what status they had, they could never act arrogantly in this store because not only them, but their entire family would be punished if they offended the store. This store was just that special since it had powers that far surpassed everyone else.


    So while they parted ways, they were waiting to see Lin Fan stumble.


    Lin Fan walked all the way up to the store and then pushed the door to open it.


    Even if there were people crowding outside, they respected the store and didn''t open the door inside if there wasn''t space. So that was why the door had been closed even with all these people here.


    When the door opened, there was a voice that said, "The store is¡­"


    Before he could say the word ''full'', that voice immediately stopped.


    That was because they had seen who hade into the store.


    But for Lin Fan, he couldn''t help being confused since he didn''t recognize this person that was working in his store.


    As far as he could remember, he didn''t know anyone like this.


    That person''s eyes lit up and there were tears that appeared before he ran over to Lin Fan, trying to hug him. Lin Fan didn''t recognize this person, so he naturally dodged out of the way and that personnded on the ground.


    After standing up, rubbing his face a bit and patting the dirt off him, that person said, "Boss, why did you do that? Why did you avoid my love for you?"


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help feeling a bit strange¡­


    But at the same time, he finally felt that there was something familiar about this person.


    He looked closely at this person in front of him before revealing a look of recognition and shock.


    That was because he had finally recognized who this person was.


    Mo Ze Chen!


    It was the fatty Mo Ze Chen!


    But he was no longer fat and had lost most of his weight.


    He had transformed from a fatty into a handsome young man!


    His voice had even changed because of how much weight he had lost!


    Could a person really change this much in just five years?


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at him before cautiously asking, "Ze Chen?"


    The handsome young man gave a nod before saying, "Boss, could it be that you already forgot about me? It hasn''t been that long, so how could you forget about me already?"


    Lin Fan''s chin dropped even though he had already recognized Mo Ze Chen.


    This was just too much of a change that he couldn''t ept it at all!


    How could that fatty Mo Ze Chen lose all this weight and be apletely different person in just five years!?


    It didn''t make sense at all!

 Chapter 1110 Completely Different (14)

    ?


    Seeing the way that Lin Fan looked at him, Mo Ze Chen revealed a bitter smile and said, "I might have lost a bit of weight, but I don''t look that different."


    There was a beautiful girl that came forward to take his hand and ced a kiss on his cheek before saying, "I think you''re as handsome as you''ve always been."


    Lin Fan turned to look at this girl with a strange look, but he found that he recognized her with a single nce.


    It was Lulu.


    Unlike Mo Ze Chen who hadpletely turned into a different person, Lulu still looked the same as before.


    This was a relief to Lin Fan since the shock of Mo Ze Chen''s change was just too much for him. If Lulu had also greatly changed on top of that, he really didn''t know how he would have been able to react.


    Seeing her like this was like a breath of fresh air thatpletely restored him, so Lin Fan patted Mo Ze Chen on the shoulder and said, "It''s good that you lost a bit of weight. You were just too heavy before."


    Mo Ze Chen''s smile turned even more bitter when he heard this, but there was nothing that he could say to refute this.


    After all, Lin Fan was right about that.


    In the past, there was no one for him to worry about, so he hadn''t cared about his weight.


    But now that there was a woman in his life, he had no choice but to care.


    Not to mention¡­Lulu might have seemed like a calm and elegant beauty now, but Mo Ze Chen knew how terrifying she could be.


    It could even be said that she was the main driving force behind him losing all this weight in the first ce.


    Before any of them could say anything else, there was a cry that came from the back of the store.


    The moment that Lin Fan''s group heard this, all of them raised their guard and were about to charge back.


    But before they could, Mo Ze Chen quickly came forward to stop them.


    Lin Fan and the others looked at Mo Ze Chen who was waving his arm and saying, "Wait, wait, it''s not what you think!"


    They all raised one brow to look at Mo Ze Chen before putting away their weapons and waiting for him to exin.


    Seeing this, Mo Ze Chen let out a sigh of relief before nodding to Lulu.


    Lulu nodded back before heading into the back to settle that noise.


    Now that they had calmed down to listen to this voice closely, they found that it sounded like¡­a child crying.


    But why would there be a child here?


    A few seconds after Lulu disappeared, that crying voice stopped.


    Then a few minutester, Lulu walked out with what seemed to be a bundle in her hand that she was carefully cradling. At the same time, there was some kind of stench that drifted out from the back.


    Mo Ze Chen quickly came over and asked, "Did we wake her up?"


    Lulu shook head with a smile before saying, "No, she just woke up from her nap a bit early because she had a situation with her diaper."


    Mo Ze Chen nodded before saying, "Do you want me to take care of her for the rest of the night so you can rest?"


    Lulu shook her head again with the same smile as she said, "Big brother Lin is finally back. You should go and spend some time with him. I''ll stay home and take care of her."


    Mo Ze Chen gave her a loving look before patting her on the head and saying, "Thank you."


    Lulu just revealed a happy smile as she enjoyed this, but the bundle in her arms started crying again.


    Mo Ze Chen immediately pulled away while Lulu started rocking that bundle.


    On the other side, Lin Fan''s group had been too shocked to do anything.


    They weren''t fools, they could already guess what was in that bundle based on context and how they acted. However, that was why it was such a big shock to them.


    Lin Fan pointed at the bundle in Lulu''s arms and asked, "Ze Chen, are you looking after a rtive''s child?"


    Mo Ze Chen turned around with a confused look and said, "She''s clearly mine. Don''t you think that she looks like me?"


    The moment that he said this, they couldn''t hold back anymore.


    Ang, Yuki, and Zi Ling pushed Mo Ze Chen aside and gathered around Lulu to get a better look at the little girl in Lulu''s hands.


    Mo Ze Chen had a bitter smile on his face when this happened, but he moved aside properly.


    The way that he did it almost seemed like he was very used to this, almost as if he had been trained for this¡­Lin Fan had caught this with his sharp eyes and could guess what kind of things that Mo Ze Chen had suffered through before.


    So he felt a bit sympathetic towards him.


    But at the same time, he found it hard to believe that someone like Mo Ze Chen already had a daughter when he didn''t even have one¡­


    He could also feel the pressure that was nowing from Zi Ling and Ang as they were gushing over the little girl.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile before asking Mo Ze Chen, "What''s her name?"


    Mo Ze Chen said, "Marie, isn''t it beautiful?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a surprised look when he heard this since this was a western name instead of an eastern name like in this cultivation world.


    Seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face, Mo Ze Chen exined, "Lulu named her. She was named after Lulu''s mother."


    Lin Fan gave a nod of understanding and he didn''t ask anything else since he was certain that this would be a personal matter.


    Mo Ze Chen then suddenly added, "It would be a problem if her godfather didn''t know her name."


    Lin Fan didn''t react right away, but then he suddenly turned to look at Mo Ze Chen as he said, "Godfather, you''re saying that I''m the godfather?"


    Mo Ze Chen gave a nod before saying, "Are you saying that you''re too good to be my child''s godfather?"


    Lin Fan quickly shook his head before saying, "I was just caught off guard by the fact that you decided to make me the godfather. You never gave me a sign, I didn''t even know that she existed until now."


    Mo Ze Chen poured his lips at this before saying, "We sent letters, but you never responded once in the past five years. Even Ang stopped replying around a year ago. How were we supposed to know if you received it or not?"


    When Lin Fan heard this, there was another bitter smile that appeared on his face.


    After all, in the end, it was all his fault that he didn''t know a thing.


    They had been keeping up contact with him, but it was just that he never received anything that they sent since he had been trapped in that realm.


    There was no excuse that he could make since it was all his fault.


    Mo Ze Chen turned back to the girls surrounding Lulu and asked in a confused voice, "Why are they surprised anyway? We already told them about Marie in our letters a year ago, so they should already know about her."


    Lin Fan''s bitter smile became even more bitter when he heard this since he could guess what had happened.


    During this time, Ang had been busy dealing with the invasion of the Beast Race, so there were things that fell through the cracks.


    At the same time, with the invasion of the Beast Race, it would be hard for people to send letters to the Lin Astral Empire in the first ce.


    So she either never received the letters or she had received them and had been too busy to read them.


    Either way, it all came back to him since he should have been there to do what she had been doing¡­


    So Lin Fan couldn''t me anyone but himself for all of this.


    After being silent for a bit, he said, "Everyone has their own circumstances, so let''s just leave it at that."


    Mo Ze Chen was confused when he heard this, but he just gave a nod and left this matter alone.


    After the girls had finished gushing over Marie, it was finally Lin Fan''s turn to see her.


    He had to admit that she was a very beautiful little girl, so much so that he couldn''t believe that she came from Mo Ze Chen¡­No, with how much Mo Ze Chen had changed, he could believe that she came from him.


    Especially those eyes¡­she had inherited his eyes from him.


    But still, the fact that Mo Ze Chen and Lulu had a child now really was a surreal feeling.


    It really hit him hard how long he had been gone¡­


    Five years, it was enough for a child to be born.


    Though for a cultivator, this wasn''t considered that long of a time.


    As his cultivation grew, he realized that he was slowly losing his sense of time and that things were bing much more differentpared to before.


    In no time at all, this child would grow up and she would be the new generation, recing his generation.


    But that was only on the minor realms and not in the upper realms where generations were much longer.


    This feeling¡­really was a surreal one.

 Chapter 1111 Completely Different (15)

    ?


    Aftering to term with this feeling, Lin Fan epted it.


    He knew that things would change and he couldn''t do anything about it, so it was best if he didn''t put too much thought into this.


    With that, he threw these thoughts out of his mind and enjoyed ying with his new goddaughter.


    But the surprises didn''t end there.


    Jiang Zhi Shu gave him another surprise¡­


    He also had a son and a daughter now.


    This time, Ang and the rest weren''t as surprised since they had already received notification about this ahead of time. The news came several years ago, while the Beast Race invasion hadn''t been that bad, so they had received the news.


    Once again, they asked Lin Fan to be the godfather and he was happy to do so.


    When he was surrounded by all of these kids, Lin Fan really felt that he was missing out seeing how happy they were. At the same time, he could see the pressure that wasing from Ang and Zi Ling when they saw these kids as well.


    Perhaps it was time to put in that effort¡­


    However, before that, he had to take care of many different things.


    So he sent the kids back and he asked Mo Ze Chen some things about the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    He learned that the Gctic Humanity Alliance was now running on a new system now.


    Well, it couldn''t be considered apletely new system since there were parts of the system that hadn''t changed.


    In total, there were still twelve great factions that ran the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    After the factions had been removed because of their betrayal in the war with the Tai and Bai Ster Kingdoms, the other factions had found that they weren''t able to control the territory that these factions had once controlled.


    They could have, but that would mean putting their attention into maintaining them instead of expanding outwards.


    After they had fallen under the Mu Ster Kingdom, a new world had opened to them and they had been focusing on spreading their influence past their own world.


    So to manage this Gctic Humanity Alliance, they had decided to raise up some more factions to rece the ones that had been removed.


    Thus, they became the twelve great factions once more.


    But at the same time, there was a hidden thirteenth faction that everyone knew about which made it not as hidden.


    This was a faction that didn''t hold any territory and didn''t have that many members, but it was a faction that had enough power that everyone acknowledged.


    It was Lin Fan''s store.


    Mo Ze Chen acted on behalf of the store and guided the twelve great factions as Lin Fan''s representative. Of course, he didn''t use this power that much since there wasn''t much that he wanted with this power in the first ce.


    He would only act when it was necessary.


    Such as when the fleet had been about to suicide bomb Lin Fan''s ship.


    Lin Fan learned that it was Mo Ze Chen who had sent the message that stopped that fleet from going all out against Lin Fan''s ship.


    Though in reality, they would have found it hard to even dent Lin Fan''s ship in the first ce with the weak weapons that they had.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind that Mo Ze Chen was using his name and his store to wield influence in the Gctic Humanity Alliance in the first ce. After all, he knew that Mo Ze Chen wasn''t the kind of person to abuse this kind of power.


    If this power was able to keep the people that he cared about safe, he wanted Mo Ze Chen to use it all he wanted.


    Mo Ze Chen had been worried that Lin Fan would say something about him using this power, but he was d that Lin Fan was fine with it.


    The rest of the day, they just spent it catching up.


    The girls were all around Lulu and Marie, so there was nothing distracting them.


    The only one that was actually suffering was Xiao Tu who had nothing to do since he didn''t have anything to discuss with these people in the first ce. This was a ce that he was visiting for the first time and these were people that he was meeting for the first time, so even if he wanted to say something, there was nothing he could say.


    At the same time, his sisters and Xin''er were all upied with Marie, so he didn''t have anyone to talk to.


    He could have gone over there as well, but it was strange for him to be with all those girls and that baby. He just didn''t know what he would even do in that situation, so at best, he would have just stood there awkwardly¡­


    It was better to sit here awkwardly than stand there awkwardly.


    But that all changed when there were a group of people that suddenly walked into the store.


    Mo Ze Chen was about to send them out, but then he saw who it was and he stopped himself.


    Lin Fan also couldn''t help revealing a smile when he saw who it was.


    These were all of the people that he had met in his time on the Gctic Humanity Alliance, the ones that he had befriended and had helped him during his time here.


    All of them came from different factions, but they all gathered here because of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was happy to catch up with them, but there were a few that made him nervous¡­


    That was because they were much more aggressive than they were in the past.


    But it wasn''t as if he was able to ept them.


    When they came up to him, he could feel Ang''s gaze burning a hole in his back and to a lesser extent, Zi Ling''s gaze.


    So he had to avoid all of them and just talk to certain people. After all, there were people that he was closer to that he couldn''t avoid.


    As he talked to them, he couldn''t help feeling emotional because no matter who it was, they had changed in one way or another.


    He knew that the lower the realm, the more changes there would be¡­so he was not looking forward to seeing what the Blue Star would be like.


    After all, that was the ce with the lowest realm of cultivation.


    Perhaps it would be apletely different ce by the time that he arrived there.


    For now, he focused on catching up with all the people that he had once known from the Gctic Humanity Alliance, but he felt that there was a gap between them no matter how they talked.


    They no longer treated him the same way as before, instead there was a silent respect that they paid to him that prevented them from treating him the same way.


    It seemed that no matter what, they weren''t able to get over the fact that he was the crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire.


    As an upper realm under the Mu Ster Kingdom and a ce that Lin Fan had once stayed, they received all the news about the Lin Astral Empire. That is until a year ago when it suddenly stopped, but they knew from the scraps of information they got that this was because the situation had changed.


    At the same time, there was that Beast Race invasion of their own.


    In the end, Lin Fan wasn''t able to keep talking to them since it really was too strange for him to talk to them.


    That feeling of silent respect was just too overwhelming for him to take and he sent them all off with the excuse that he wanted to rest now.


    But of course, Song Shu, Mo Ze Chen, and the rest stayed.


    They respected him, but they were much closer to him than the rest and still treated him the same way since they still had the same amount of respect for him.


    So in a way, they had remained the same even if their outer appearances had changed.


    Once everyone was gone, Lin Fan walked around this store and reminisced about all the things in the past.


    But he realized that it was impossible to gain what he once had in the past.


    So the only thing that he could do was move on.


    The onest thing that he had to do now was visit the Blue Star and make sure that everything was safe there.


    There wasn''t anyone he was really close to there anymore since he had already brought most of the people following him up to the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so it was just a perfunctory visit and a familial visit at this point.


    Once he was done with that ce, he would return to the Lin Astral Empire.


    With everything that he had recovered from the Beast Race and the Outers, he was certain that he would be able to make a difference in this war.


    At the same time, he had confirmed that his voidws worked against the Outers and the Outer weapons that the Beast Race troops used. So he was certain that he was the best weapon that they had against the Beast Race.


    So once he finished this trip to the Blue Star and returned to the Lin Astral Empire, he knew that it would be time for war.


    There was a small part of him that even looked forward to this.

 Chapter 1112 Completely Different (16)

    ?


    After spending a few days in the Gctic Humanity Alliance, Lin Fan headed off to the Blue Star.


    This time, he didn''t bring anyone with him other than the usual four because he knew that this would be a very short trip.


    There was no one that he was close to on the Blue Star since he had spent too little time there in the first ce and he was still getting used to being in this world, so there wasn''t much catching up for him there.


    Other than the stores, there was the remaining Lin Family that he had to deal with.


    There were some that wanted toe with him, but in the end, he was able to convince them to stay.


    With that, they headed off for the Blue Star.


    This was a very short flight because there was very little distance between the Blue Star and the Gctic Humanity Alliance. It was so short that they were able to create a direct passage between the two realms, which would normally take a lot of energy, but was possible because of this short distance.


    In fact, Lin Fan could have taken this passage in the first ce instead of using his ship.


    But he didn''t want to since he had bad memories of this passage from when he first took it.


    After he arrived on the Blue Star, the first thing that Lin Fan did was head off to True Light City.


    That was where the Lin Family lived.


    Since this was a lower realm, he made sure to activate the ship''s camouge function and they hid themselves when they arrived. Theynded outside the city and then flew into the city under the cover of theirws, not alerting a single person.


    It was only when they arrived at the Lin Family''s manor that they revealed themselves.


    As soon as they did, they were immediately surrounded by guards of the Lin Family.


    These guards all had shocked looks on their faces since they hadn''t sensed these people until they suddenly appeared out of thin air. It was as if they didn''t exist until just a few seconds ago when they suddenly appeared.


    But they didn''t sense any dangering from them, so they didn''t hesitate to surround them with their weapons.


    Not a single one of them questioned why they didn''t sense any aura from them, almost as if they didn''t have any cultivation at all.


    They were only thinking about doing their jobs and protecting the manor. That was how caught off guard they were.


    Lin Fan didn''t seem to mind that they were pointing their weapons at him.


    Seeing them like this, he even gave a nod as if he was praising them.


    These people didn''t even think about the danger that coulde to them and only thought about their jobs. It seemed that the Lin Family had recruited some capable guards.


    The only limitation that they had was that they were born in this lower realm.


    If they had been born in the Lin Astral Empire, they certainly would have gotten somewhere. Lin Fan might have even been tempted to recruit them into his guards.


    But since they were too old, it was impossible for them to grow much stronger now.


    So bringing them back with him would be a waste.


    He was about to raise his hand to stop them, but before he could, there was noise that came from inside of the manor.


    It didn''t take long before a voice shouted, "Lin Fan!"


    Lin Fan didn''t need to think to recognize this voice, it was the second elder of the Lin Family.


    After they had left for the Lin Astral Empire, the second elder had taken over as head of the family since the first elder wasn''t willing to ept it. The first elder was still as obsessed with cultivation as ever, so the second elder was finally able to obtain what he wanted.


    But now that Lin Fan was back, the second elder couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition¡­


    He was scared of Lin Fan after everything that had happened between them and he felt that Lin Fan''s return wasn''t a good thing.


    But to his surprise, Lin Fan suddenly revealed a smile and said, "Second great uncle, it has been a long time since west met."


    The second elder couldn''t help being taken aback when he heard this before saying, "I''m now the family head of this Lin Family, you should address me as such."


    Lin Fan didn''t take offense at this before saying in an uncaring voice, "Is that so?"


    The second elder''s face twisted when he heard this, but before he could say anything else, there was a voice that suddenly said, "Your highness, what are you doing here?"


    There was another person that suddenly came over andnded in front of Lin Fan.


    Then in front of everyone, he fell to one knee and bowed in front of Lin Fan.


    When the members of the Lin Family who came out saw what thismotion was, they couldn''t help being shocked by this.


    That was because the person that was bowing in front of Lin Fan was Yu Ling.


    This was the person that had been left behind by the Lin Family ancestor to take care of them.


    On the first day that he was here, he had already shown them the difference between them. On that day, they knew that he was far superior to them and who was actually in charge of the Lin Family.


    So even if the second elder had be the family head, it was this Yu Ling who actually controlled the Lin Family.


    In fact, he was the one that had taken control of all of their businesses and hade up with a n that greatly expanded them.


    The current Lin Family had far greater influence on this Blue Starpared to before all because this Yu Ling was here. He had expanded all of their businesses and his subordinates had taken care of all the rats that had tried to move in on these businesses.


    In terms of intelligence and power, there was no one that could match him.


    But someone like this was actually bowing to Lin Fan and calling him ''your highness''.


    This was just too shocking for the Lin Family members.


    Just how much had Lin Fan changed in the time that he had been away?


    Lin Fan looked down at Yu Ling bowing in front of him and he knitted his brows as if he was thinking about something.


    After a while, he finally revealed a look of recognition as he said, "Yu Ling? Was that your name?"


    Yu Ling revealed a bitter smile, but he bowed his head again and said, "Yes, your highness."


    Lin Fan looked at Yu Ling a bit longer before giving a nod and said, "Oh, you''re the one that we left behind to take care of the Lin Family." Lin Fan looked at the Lin Family members and the guards around them before saying, "Not bad, not bad, it seems like you''ve done quite a good job."


    Even though they were currently at war with the Beast Race, the Lin Family members were all looking healthy and dressed in luxury. As well, there were these loyal guards that were guarding the manor.


    It seemed that Yu Ling had really taken proper care of the Lin Family.


    Hearing what Lin Fan said, Yu Ling gave an even deeper bow, but there was an excited look on his face.


    He knew that based on this, it would seem like he would be greatly rewarded for his actions.


    Yu Ling was only in the True Soul Realm, he wasn''t someone who was even considered that high up in the Lin Astral Empire, which was why he was chosen.


    He was one of the random workers for the Lin Astral Family that had shown great intelligence, so he had been picked out of the rest toe down to this lower realm to take care of this Lin Family.


    Yu Ling had been disappointed at first because of this, but then he heard that these people were rted to the Lin Astral Family, which was why he had put in all this effort to take care of him.


    Now that he had been praised by Lin Fan, he knew that all of his effort had been worth it.


    The Lin Family members didn''t say a thing as they watched Yu Ling''s interaction with Lin Fan in shock.


    But then they were pulled out of this shock when Lin Fan suddenly asked them, "Have you all been well?"


    All of them just looked at Lin Fan with strange looks after hearing this question from him.


    Not a single one of them was able to say a thing in response to this.


    Yu Ling couldn''t help knitting his brows when he saw this.


    He had trained these members of the Lin Family properly since he had been disappointed in them in the first ce. They would be joining the Lin Astral Family in the future, so he had wanted them to at least fit that status.


    But now he was disappointed that they couldn''t even remember a single thing he had taught them.


    Yu Ling looked at them and opened his mouth as if he was about to say something, but Lin Fan cut him off by saying, "It''s fine."


    Yu Ling was taken aback by this, but then he quickly lowered his head again.


    Lin Fan gave one more look at the members of the Lin Family before saying, "All of you get ready, you''reing back to the Lin Astral Empire with me."

 Chapter 1113 Completely Different (17)

    ?


    When the members of the Lin Family heard this, all of them couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    But at the same time, Yu Ling looked at them with envy.


    Being able to go back to the Lin Astral Empire with the crown prince like this, there was no doubt that they would be joining the Lin Astral Family. This was like having the opportunity to be a phoenix because the moment that they joined the Lin Astral Family, they would have the biggest backer.


    The Lin Astral Family was the ruling family of an Astral Empire, they were by no means weak.


    Once they joined the Lin Astral Family, it could be said that they would have the capital to do whatever they wanted since they would have the strongest backers.


    But it was clear by the looks on the faces of the Lin Family members that they didn''t want this.


    After a long period of silence, the second elder said, "Great nephew, are you telling us to abandon everything that we''ve built up here? You know we can''t do that."


    The moment that Yu Ling heard this, he immediately looked at the second elder like he was an idiot. At the same time, he wanted to use his pressure on the second elder to force him to shut his mouth.


    But before he could, Lin Fan had already given a cough for him to stop.


    Yu Ling had no choice but to suppress his aura and calm down.


    As for why he was so agitated¡­it was because he didn''t want the second elder to blow his chance as well.


    If the Lin Family was going to leave this lower realm, then as someone who had been sent to take care of the Lin Family, he would have the opportunity to leave as well. For the merit of taking care of the Lin Family during this time, he was certain that he would be properly rewarded by Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Family.


    So when the second elder refused, it was like he was cutting off his reward as well which made him angry with the second elder.


    But in front of Lin Fan, he had to restrain himself.


    It wasn''t just because of Lin Fan''s status, but also because of the feeling that came from Lin Fan. There was a pressure that came from Lin Fan that he had never felt before¡­far beyond anything he had felt from any of his superiors before.


    After suppressing Yu Ling, Lin Fan calmly looked at the second elder and asked, "Great uncle, why is that?"


    The second elder gave a snort and said, "If we leave this ce, do you think that we''ll be able to keep ourselves safe? I know about the Beast Race invasion, but they haven''t gotten far enough to reach us yet and you all will stop them before then. But if we leave this ce and get involved in the politics of the main family, do you think that we''ll be able to keep our lives? We''re much weaker than the others, so we should stay in a ce that''s suited for us instead of risking our lives for benefits."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing an appreciative look after hearing all of this.


    He had a bad impression of the second elder after everything that had happened between them, but now he realized that he wasn''t being fair. He could have the bad impression of his character because of the things that happened in the past, but he had to acknowledge his second great uncle''s intelligence and self awareness.


    He knew how to keep himself alive, so he could be considered quite wise.


    It was just too bad that the situation wasn''t as he thought it was.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "That is a smart way of looking at things." He gave a deliberate pause here which caused the second elder to reveal a slightly smug look, but then he said, "Unfortunately, your information is outdated."


    When they heard this, all of them couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with strange looks of shock and confusion, as if they couldn''t understand what he was saying.


    Lin Fan then said, "This ce is no longer safe, which is why I''m taking you all back to the Lin Astral Empire with me."


    "This ce is no longer safe?" The second elder couldn''t help repeating after Lin Fan.


    Then all of the members of the Lin Family couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with doubtful looks.


    But Yu Ling was looking at Lin Fan with deeply knitted brows and a serious expression.


    He had been worried about this since he wasn''t able to receive news from the Lin Astral Empire in this lower realm. Even if he did through connections, the news that he did receive was mainly outdated.


    Thest piece of news that he had received was that there was a new development on the battlefield and the Lin Astral Empire troops had been pushed back.


    He had hoped that this was only temporary and the situation would change, but the fact that Lin Fan was personally here to pick up the Lin Family meant that it hadn''t changed for the better. Rather, it most likely developed for the worst, which was why even this lower realm was no longer safe.


    The more he thought about it, the more grateful that he was that Lin Fan was here.


    After all, if it became serious, it was likely that this ce would be targeted because there were rtives of the Lin Astral Family here. Even if they couldn''t be considered a branch, they were rted to Lin Fan, the crown prince and had some value.


    So they would have surely been attacked.


    Yu Ling was certain that just him and the few people that he brought wouldn''t have been enough to guard all of this.


    But of course, it didn''t go the way that Yu Ling wanted in the end.


    The second elder shook his head and said, "No, we haven''t seen any signs of this at all. How do we know that you''re not lying to us?" Then the second elder turned to the others and said, "Who knows if we''ll even be able toe back if we ever leave this ce?"


    All of them revealed grim looks when they heard this.


    They all understood the implications behind the second elder''s words.


    After all, even if they didn''t have powerful cultivations, they were still considered members of the Lin Astral Family. While it wouldn''t be them that would pose a threat, one day there might be another one of their descendants that could pose a threat to Lin Fan''s future reign.


    So they were worried that Lin Fan bringing them back would be to take care of them secretly instead of actually taking them back.


    If they went with him now¡­it was hard to guarantee if they would actually make it.


    Or at least that was what they thought.


    Lin Fan could also see through their petty thoughts and he couldn''t help giving a sigh before shaking their heads.


    When they had so little responsibility and had all this free time, they thought of all kinds of crazy things. With their cultivation level and their talent, would any of them even give birth to a descendant strong enough for that?


    Not to mention, Lin Fan didn''t care about the throne of the Lin Astral Empire in the first ce.


    He wasn''t someone that would be satisfied with being tied down like this, so he wouldn''t have even considered taking this position if it wasn''t for the Lin Astral Emperor forcing it onto him¡­


    But for now, he was done ying with these rtives of his.


    He had tried to y nice with them, but it seemed that it was more trouble than it was worth to keep going like this.


    Since that was the case, there was no need for him to keep going.


    With a single snort, there was a pressure that fell onto the Lin Family members.


    All of them couldn''t believe the pressure that they were facing and they couldn''t evenst a single second under this pressure. All of them crumpled under this pressure and fainted right away.


    Once they were all subdued, Lin Fan turned his attention to the guards that were standing there in a daze.


    With a simple smile he said, "You can all go home for the day, there''s nothing left for you here."


    Then with a wave of his hand, they all disappeared.


    He had sent them all away with his spatialws.


    After this was done, Lin Fan nodded at his own guards that appeared out of nowhere and they started carrying the Lin Family members away.


    Yu Ling who had watched all of this had a look of admiration on his face.


    He had already heard that Lin Fan was powerful, but he never thought that he would be this powerful.


    Yu Ling bowed his head once more and said, "It is my honour to serve your¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan raised his hand to cut him off. Then he said, "You can stay here and take care of the Lin Family''s property for when they return to im it again."


    Hearing this, Yu Ling''s expression twisted and there was something that he clearly wanted to say¡­but he wasn''t given that opportunity.


    Before he could even look up, he felt the aura in front of him disappear.


    Then when he did look up, he found that Lin Fan and his group were already gone.

 Chapter 1114 Completely Different (18)

    ?


    When Lin Fan appeared again, he was alone.


    He had sent the others back to the ship without him and he had gone somewhere all by himself.


    The ce that he had appeared in was Wind Snow City, the very first city that he had appeared in.


    This was the first ce he had stood up in and the ce where his first store was, so this was a ce that was filled with memories for him.


    He gave the excuse that he wanted to get some things for his parents from their old home to go alone, but in reality¡­he was just feeling nostalgic and emotional that he wanted to go alone.


    Both Ang and Momonga also wanted to go along since this first store was the ce that they had first met Lin Fan, but he rejected their proposal since he really just wanted to be alone.


    He didn''t want to show any of the others the side of him that he was about to show.


    That was the bit of pride that he had.


    So as he walked through the streets of Wind Snow City, he surrounded himself in hisws that made sure that no one saw him.


    It was almost like he was a ghost as he walked through these streets, but his eyes were wandering all around him, taking in the various sights in an emotional manner.


    It had been too long since he had been in this ce that he almost forgot everything that was here.


    As he headed to the house that they had lived in before, he started remembering all the things that he saw before.


    It wasn''t just his memories that filled his mind, there were also the previous Lin Fan''s memories. Though now that their souls had fused, it could be considered his memories.


    After picking up a few things that he thought his parents and little sister would like from their old home, Lin Fan headed to the shop.


    As he walked towards the shop, he found that there were more and more people gathered there.


    This was the oldest shop and the first shop, so as the shop that had been open the longest, it had the best customer base. That is other than the shop in the Lin Astral Empire''s capital.


    But that one was backed by the Lin Astral Family, so it could be said that it was more the Lin Astral Family''s prestige that supported the store than Lin Fan''s actual abilities as an owner.


    As he walked in through the crowd, not a single one of them noticed him.


    Once again, it was like he was a ghost as he made his way into the store.


    When he came in and saw the employees working there, he found that he didn''t recognize a single one of them.


    In the past, it has been him and the others working here, but now¡­there wasn''t a single person that he recognized. Even if they worked for him, he had no idea who they were.


    That is until he saw a pale girle out of the back.


    This was the only person that he recognized in this shop, but it was for a different reason.


    It was because she was one of the undead that Momonga had left behind to manage the shop when everyone had gone to the upper realms.


    She was the one who trained all of these new workers that were currently in the shop.


    But in the end, she was a weak ghost summoned by Momonga, so there wasn''t anything special about her other than her intelligence.


    Lin Fan didn''t even remember her name.


    It didn''t feel like this was his store anymore seeing all of these unknown people working in it.


    Though he still earned points from the sale, it really felt like this store had bepletely different.


    But then again, he didn''t know what he had been expecting in the first ce.


    After standing there feeling emotional for a bit, Lin Fan turned to leave with a sigh.


    There was nothing for him to do here anymore since this ce was no longer his home. He had found a new home in a different ce with the ones that he loved, so it was time that he returned to that ce.


    As he thought this, there was a faint smile that appeared on his face.


    But then when he turned to leave, he couldn''t help narrowing his eyes as he caught something out of the corner of them.


    It was another face that he found was familiar.


    He wasn''t certain if it was the person he was thinking of, but it looked simr enough that he had to check.


    When he followed that figure out of the store and he came closer to them, he found that it was the person that he was thinking of.


    It was Luo Qing, his first customer.


    It had been a long time since he had seen her and he found¡­that she looked much older. But that was normal for someone of her cultivation in this lower realm.


    The time that they hadn''t seen each other had affected her much more than it had him since her lifespan was much shorter than his.


    At the same time, he couldn''t help being even more surprised by the figure beside her.


    This was a little figure that was holding her hand.


    It was a little girl who walked beside her that looked very simr to her.


    If one looked carefully, they might think that they were sisters¡­no, they would think that they were mother and daughter.


    That was exactly what they were.


    The two of them were happily talking to each other as they walked along, not noticing the person that was following them.


    Seeing them like this, Lin Fan couldn''t help thinking about the past and feeling emotional.


    She had been his first customer, his most loyal customer, and the one that had once¡­


    As he let his emotions get the better of him, he lost control of thews that he used to make himself invisible and soon there were people that noticed him.


    With how handsome he was, it was impossible for him not to be the center of attention.


    When Luo Qing noticed the crowd around them looking in a single direction, she couldn''t help looking in that direction as well. When she saw what they were all looking at, she couldn''t help revealing a shocked look.


    That was because there was a figure that had appeared in her dreams before, a figure that was the same as the day he left.


    This was a figure that she would never be able to forget her entire life¡­but she waspletely different from before.


    As she stared at him and he stared at her, there didn''t seem to be another person in this world until¡­


    "Mommy, what are you looking at?"


    This cute little voice cut through the world that belonged to the two of them and pulled them back into reality.


    Luo Qing looked at her daughter and said with an emotional smile, "An old friend."


    Her daughter tilted her head when she heard this before turning back to look at Lin Fan and said, "Is it that handsome man over there?"


    Luo Qing gave a slow nod.


    Her daughter''s eyes opened wide and sparkled as she said, "You actually know someone so handsome! I never thought that you would know anyone that handsome since you married daddy!"


    Luo Qing and Lin Fan both revealed bitter smiles when they heard this.


    But before either of them could say a thing, there was a voice that called out, "Qing Qing, what are you doing here?"


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help feeling that this voice was a bit familiar.


    Then when he turned in the direction of that voice, he immediately recognized who it came from. His appearance had changed, but this person was one of the first customers that came to the store, so Lin Fan remembered him.


    Not to mention, he was someone who had hung around Luo Qing since the beginning.


    It was Murong Quan.


    Murong Quan walked over with a smile on his face and picked up the little girl before saying, "Darling, what have you been up to today?"


    "Look daddy, there''s a handsome man over there and mommy says that he''s her friend!" The little girl said in an excited voice.


    Murong Quan followed the little girl''s finger to look at Lin Fan.


    When he saw Lin Fan standing there, he couldn''t help being shocked because he also recognized Lin Fan with a single nce.


    There were several different emotions that appeared on his face, but then he said with a smile, "Owner Lin, it''s been a long time."


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile and said, "Xiao Quan, it has been a long time."


    Then there was silence because there was nothing else for them to talk about.


    But Murong Quan was also secretly peeking at Luo Qing, waiting to see what reaction she had.


    He knew about Luo Qing''s feelings and it had taken him a long time to be able to wear her down. But now that Lin Fan was back, what if she decided to¡­?


    That was what he had been worried about the most over the past few years.


    But Lin Fan didn''t wait for them to say anything to turn to Luo Qing and say, "Congrattions."


    When she heard this, there were tears that gathered in Luo Qing''s eyes that suddenly came down.


    The little girl immediately said, "Mommy, why are you crying?"


    Luo Qing turned to look at the little girl when she said this and quickly wiped her tears before saying, "Nothing, mommy''s not crying."


    But then when she looked back where Lin Fan had been, she found that he had disappeared.


    She just stared at where he had been standing for a few seconds before turning to Murong Quan to say, "Let''s go home."


    Murong Quan had a worried look on his face, but he still said with a nod, "Alright."


    The family of three headed off like this with mixed feelings in their hearts.

 Chapter 1115 To War (1)

    ?


    When he came back to the ship, Lin Fan didn''t talk to anyone as he headed to his room.


    Right now, he just felt like he wanted to be alone to process the feelings that he was feeling.


    Ang and Zi Ling had worried looks on their faces, but they respected his wishes and left him alone.


    Yuki also had a worried look, but it wasn''t because she was worried about Lin Fan. Rather, she was worried about Ang feeling down because of how Lin Fan was acting.


    So there was a small part of her that wanted to beat up Lin Fan for putting Ang in this position, but there was a bigger part of her that knew that this didn''t involve her.


    She could understand what Lin Fan was feeling, so she didn''t do anything.


    Momonga was just watching all of this from the side with a calm look on his face since this was something that he was very familiar with. As the Lich King, he had lived a very long life and had many memories of the past.


    At this point, he had epted all of this and just knew that this was how life was.


    Eventually, all things would pass, even the bonds that he had now.


    But that didn''t mean that he didn''t treasure the bonds that they currently had.


    Since they were done with everything that they had to do, they were heading back to the Gctic Humanity Alliance to pick up Xin''er and the rest before bringing them back to the Mu Ster Kingdom.


    As for going back to the Lin Astral Empire with them¡­that was impossible since he knew that it was too dangerous.


    The Lin Astral Empire was the current frontline, so if he brought them there, he was certain that something bad would happen.


    So he couldn''t bring them back with him.


    As for the Lin Family, they were part of the Lin Astral Family, so they would be safe in the pce.


    It was different for them who weren''t a part of the Lin Astral Family. In the end, the guards wouldn''t sacrifice their lives for them.


    Not to mention, Lin Fan had already taken care of the Beast Race troops that were invading the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Gctic Humanity Alliance, so those ces were safer than other ces.


    That was why he insisted on leaving them there instead of bringing them back with him.


    They naturally didn''t want to be left behind, but they only agreed to stay as long as Lin Fan promised toe back for them, which he did.


    The funny thing was that the members of the Lin Family had wanted to stay behind as well since they didn''t want to go to the Lin Astral Empire. However, Lin Fan didn''t give them a choice on this matter and just trapped them in his ship.


    After saying his goodbyes, he headed off to the Lin Astral Empire.


    It didn''t take him long to arrive since he did have the state of the art ship and once he arrived, he found that there were many people awaiting his arrival.


    When hended, there was a crowd that was gathered that cheered for his ship as itnded.


    These were normal citizens that had gathered and were cheering the return of Lin Fan, the crown prince.


    As for how they knew about his arrival, Lin Fan had a few guesses. At the same time, he had a few guesses why such arge weing ceremony was prepared.


    So he had to suck it up and wave his hands at the people that were gathered.


    As for the members of the Lin Family, they were also forced to walk out in front of everyone since they were technically members of the Lin Astral Family. However, in terms of cultivation, most of the people here were stronger than them.


    Since the average level of cultivation was higher in the Lin Astral Empire, most people reached the Soul Realm once they reached adulthood, even if they didn''t cultivate.


    For the elders, they were shocked to see that even the children around them were stronger than them.


    When they realized this, they realized just how foolish they were to think that Lin Fan was there to harm them.


    He had indeed brought them to a much safer ce.


    So after realizing this, they rxed their mentality and started waving at the crowd as well.


    There were only a few people that cared about them in the end since the main show was Lin Fan. Still, they were members of the Lin Astral Family no matter how weak they were, so the people still cheered for them out of respect for the Lin Astral Family.


    When they arrived at the pce, they were even more shocked by what they saw.


    The guards that stood outside were at a level that they couldn''t evenprehend.


    This was a level that was even beyond the Legendary Realm that they thought was the peak of cultivation¡­so they werepletely out of their bounds.


    In the end, Lin Fan arranged for a few servants to bring them to their rooms that had been prepared. He had already called ahead and notified them that he would be bringing the Lin Family back, so they had prepared everything ahead of time.


    That included someone appearing right as they were about to leave.


    It was Lin Fan''s great grandfather, the ancestor of this Lin Family, Lin Jian.


    When he arrived, all of the members of the Lin Family immediately ran over to surround him.


    Seeing this one familiar face in this unfamiliar ce, it really put them at ease and they seeked this safety, so theypletely surrounded him.


    Lin Jian just calmed them all down with a smile.


    If it was anyone else, he definitely wouldn''t have done this.


    But in the end, these were his children, his grandchildren, and his great grandchildren, so he had no choice but to care for them.


    After calming them down and sending them off, he walked over to where Lin Fan was and said, "Good job."


    He didn''t thank him or say anything else, he just praised him for a job well done.


    That was enough for them as family members.


    And in response, Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in return before asking, "Where''s my father?"


    Lin Jian revealed a bitter smile when he heard this before asking, "Do you really think that Ao''er would want to see them?"


    Lin Fan also revealed a bitter smile before shaking his head.


    Both of them knew the history between Lin Ao and the rest of their family, so it was better if they didn''t meet. Especially since Lin Ao was now much stronger than before after training in this Lin Astral Empire.


    It was better if they kept them apart.


    After taking care of that, Lin Jian called Lin Fan to a meeting.


    When Lin Fan arrived, he found that there were already many different people that were gathered in the room. He recognized these people since they were the ministers and generals that he had metst time.


    However, this time, they looked at himpletely differently.


    Instead of looking down on him, they all looked at him with respect.


    As well as a bit of hope in their eyes.


    If Lin Fan had to guess what it was, he would guess that they had read the reports that had been sent back about his actions. About how he had found a way to counter the strangews that the Beast Race troops used and how he had even defeated the Outers that appeared.


    But for the Lin Astral Emperor, he was just happy to see that Lin Fan was back safely.


    With a wave of his hand, he gestured for Lin Fan to sit down beside him.


    This time, the seat had been left open for him by the rest of the ministers and generals since they knew that he would being.


    Lin Fan didn''t bother ying around with the ministers and generals either since he knew that this was an important meeting. This time, he was ready to contribute because he had already solved his problems, so now it was time for him to solve the problems of the Lin Astral Empire.


    Once he reached his seat, he didn''t hesitate to start talking.


    With a wave of his hand, there were two things that appeared on the table in front of him.


    When the ministers and generals saw what these were, they couldn''t help jumping out of their seats and moving away from Lin Fan.


    That was because what he had suddenly pulled out were the two battle suits that he had confiscated from the Outers.


    As soon as they settled, the Lin Astral Emperor asked, "Xiao Fan, what are you doing?"


    Lin Fan gave a slight bow to the Lin Astral Emperor before saying, "Great grandfather, these are the weapons that I have confiscated from the Outers. They contain the weapons that the Beast Race have been using against our troops."


    When the ministers and generals heard this, they all couldn''t help taking another step back.


    After all, Lin Fan had confirmed what they had only been suspicious of.


    Lin Fan confirmed that these things were indeed weapons used by the enemy, so they were all concerned about their own safety.


    They didn''t know if these things would identally go off or something.


    The Lin Astral Emperor also raised a brow as he looked at these things before asking, "Are they safe?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Yes, they have been deactivated. Plus, I want to tell you all about what I''ve found about the enemy."

 Chapter 1116 To War (2)

    ?


    The generals and ministers all fell silent when they heard this, but they were clearly very focused.


    They had all received the reports that Lin Fan had been able to negate the strangews that had been causing them all those troubles in both the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    The only way that this would happen is if he had some way to deal with them.


    That was what they had been waiting for the entire time since with those strangews, the Beast Race had been slowly pushing them back. They hadn''t been able to analyze those strangews since they were unfamiliar with the structure of those strangews, so they hadn''t been able to find a way to deal with it.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan began telling them everything.


    Once he had finished describing the things that he had done to take care of all those Beast Race troops, he started going into detail about the things that he had found.


    This was also what the ministers and generals cared about the most since the things that Lin Fan had told them were things they had already read from the reports. Of course, there were a few things that they hadn''t heard before that could only be told from Lin Fan''s perspective, but those things weren''t that important.


    Lin Fan started telling them about what he had found about thews of the Outers and more importantly, he started telling them the ways that he had found to counter them.


    During this, the ministers and generals cut in quite a few times for exnations which he slowly and carefully answered.


    After all, these were things that weren''t from their universe, so it was hard for them to understand in the first ce.


    Lin Fan was able to wrap his head around these concepts because he wasn''t from this world either¡­or at least half of him wasn''t from this world.


    That part of his soul came from a different earth that had all kinds of fiction, including science fiction which gave him an understanding of the concepts behind thews of the Outers.


    This world wasn''t as developed in that area because with cultivation, the things that people would have written novels about were in real life.


    So they were more focused on cultivating than developing their imagination of what could have been.


    Once Lin Fan had finished exining everything, the ministers and generals all sat there with confused looks of thought on their faces. It was clear that they were thinking as deeply as they could to understand the things that Lin Fan had just told them about.


    But this was a whole new world for them, so it was hard for them to understand in the end.


    It would take some time for them to digest all of this information.


    During this time, Lin Fan turned to the Lin Astral Emperor and said, "Great grandfather, I would like permission to return to the battlefield."


    When the Lin Astral Emperor heard this, he was pulled out of his thoughts. He had been lost in thought as well trying to understand the new concepts that Lin Fan had told him about.


    But as soon as he heard this, the Lin Astral Emperor deeply knitted his brows and simply asked, "Why?"


    Even though his words were simple, there was a deep meaning behind his words.


    To put it inly, he didn''t want Lin Fan to head to the battlefield.


    Lin Fan was his precious sessor and his precious grandson, so he couldn''t bear to watch him head to a dangerous ce like the battlefield.


    Even if he was much stronger than he was before, there were still powerful experts on the side of the Beast Race and he didn''t want Lin Fan to be in danger. There was nothing that was definite in this world, but at the very least, staying in the capital would be safer than going to the battlefield.


    But at the same time, he understood why Lin Fan wanted to go¡­


    Still, it was better for Lin Fan to stay in the capital and grow stronger. At the very least, the Lin Astral Empire wouldn''t fall so quickly that they would have to depend on someone who hadn''t matured yet to defend it.


    Lin Fan knew everything that the Lin Astral Emperor was thinking as well, but there was a reason that he had to go.


    So he simply said, "Because we need my powers on the battlefield."


    The Lin Astral Emperor knitted his brows even more when he heard this before saying, "There''s no need for you to go personally. Now that we know voidws have an effect on these strangews, we can send other people to handle this."


    Lin Fan shook his head as he said, "That won''t work. I''m the only one that can do this."


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a snort before saying, "You might have some sess on the battlefield, but you shouldn''t get ahead of yourself. There are plenty of people that can use the voidws in the Lin Astral Family. Do you really think that we''re so weak that we need to send a child to the battlefield?"


    Lin Fan didn''t take any offense from this because he knew that the Lin Astral Emperor only said all of this to protect him, but he couldn''t back down now.


    So Lin Fan just calmly said, "You should know that your voidws do not work. I''m sure that this has already been attempted in the past, which was why we were pushed into such a desperate situation."


    The Lin Astral Emperor revealed an ugly expression when he heard this.


    That was because¡­Lin Fan was absolutely right.


    The Lin Astral Family''s inheritance was the voidw, so there was no reason why they wouldn''t use it when the enemies were on their doorsteps. But they had found that these voidws didn''t have any effect on these strangews.


    No matter how they tried using the voidws on these strangews, they hadn''t been able to absorb them at all.


    Or when they could absorb them with the powerful voidws of the Lin Astral Family''s hidden experts, they couldn''t digest it. All they could do was barely break it down, but that cost too much energy for these experts that it wasn''t effective at all.


    So they had been on the losing side in every fight that they engaged in and that put the Lin Astral Family in this situation.


    It was fine if it wasn''t pointed out, but now that it was, the Lin Astral Emperor asked with an ugly expression, "Why do you think that it''ll be any different for you?"


    Well, he actually knew that it was different for Lin Fan and Lin Fan had already proven it with everything that he had brought back.


    But he couldn''t just put on a weak face in front of Lin Fan, his junior, could he?


    Not to mention, he actually was curious why it had been different for Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised to hear this and calmly said, "It''s because I have the Void God''s inheritance."


    "Void God?" The Lin Astral Emperor couldn''t help repeating before suddenly revealing a shocked look and asking, "When did you obtain the Void God''s appearance?" Then after a pause, he shook his head and said, "No, where did you even meet the Void God?"


    As a member of the Lin Astral Family, it was impossible for them not to know the Void God.


    After all, their ancestor had obtained the Void God''s inheritance as well, which was how they hade to have the voidws. It wasn''t that they were descendants of the Void God, they were just lucky enough to obtain a part of his inheritance.


    Now Lin Fan was saying that he had also obtained the Void God''s inheritance¡­didn''t that mean that he would be on the same level as their ancestor?


    But in the end, he answered his own question first as he said, "Is it the master of the store?"


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod when he asked this.


    The Lin Astral Emperor deeply knitted his brows when he saw this.


    After a long time, he asked again, "Is it the master''s order that you head to the battlefield?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod without hesitation again.


    This time, the Lin Astral Emperor fell into a deep silence.


    The ministers and generals had already been snapped out of their thoughts and were looking over at them with focused eyes.


    They cared very much about the result of this since they knew that this was something that would affect the entire war.


    Lin Fan''s abilities had shown that they were useful in dealing with the Beast Race troops which was what they needed the most right now.


    So if the Lin Astral Emperor allowed Lin Fan to go to the battlefield, they knew that they would all be able to breathe a sigh of relief.


    And if the Lin Astral Emperor didn''t allow him to go¡­they were prepared to risk their lives to go against him to ask him to allow Lin Fan to go.


    This was something that would decide the fate of the entire empire¡­


    The Lin Astral Emperor naturally knew this as well, but he was hesitant on letting Lin Fan go¡­


    After all, this was someone from his precious family and he didn''t want to sacrifice just to keep the peace.


    In a way, that was saying he had failed in his job as the emperor¡­


    In another way, he wanted to keep Lin Fan safe.


    But he knew that there was no other choice here.


    So with a sigh, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "You can go."

 Chapter 1117 To War (3)

    ?


    Since the Lin Astral Emperor had given his permission, the ministers and generals didn''t hold back at all.


    They immediately started giving suggestions on where Lin Fan should go.


    After all, they were in a dire situation and there were many ces that required Lin Fan''s help. So they all wanted Lin Fan to go to a certain ce where they thought needed help the most.


    Out of all the suggestions, there were three ces that were the most suggested.


    The first was the southern border which was being hit the worst by the Beast Race troops.


    The Lin Astral Empire troops there were outnumbered a hundred to one and the only reason they had been able to hold the Beast Race troops back was because of the great wall built there. This was a great structure that had been built with a lot of the Lin Astral Empire''s resources and wouldn''t crack that easily.


    But given enough time¡­all things would be destroyed.


    It was where most of the Beast Race troops were concentrated, so once the wall broke, there would be a beast flood in the Lin Astral Empire''s territory.


    This would be disastrous and woulde close to bringing the end of the Lin Astral Empire.


    The second ce was a small in the east where an important facility was.


    This was the control facility for the transport gates all over the Lin Astral Empire.


    Transport gates were an important part of the Lin Astral Empire''s supply line and once these transport gates were downed, the fighting ability of the Lin Astral Empire army would greatly decrease. After all, a soldier that didn''t have supplies would only be able to fight half as effectively.


    The Beast Race knew that, so they had pushed arge group of troops into the Lin Astral Empire''s territory to surround this.


    This was a suicide group that only had a single mission of destroying the control for the transport gates.


    As such, they fought the most fiercely and even now, the reinforcements weren''t able to save that.


    The third location was actually not in the Lin Astral Empire, but in the nearby Lu Astral Empire.


    The Lu Astral Empire had also been hit hard, but they hadn''t been able to resist as well as the Lin Astral Empire.


    There was arge group of Beast Race troops that were gathered near the shared borders of the Lin Astral Empire and the Lu Astral Empire, but they were currently fighting the Lu Astral Empire army.


    However, the current situation of that battle was that the Lu Astral Empire was quickly losing ground.


    Once the Lu Astral Empire''s army was defeated¡­all of those Beast Race troops that were left would surge into the Lin Astral Empire''s territory.


    Combined with the Beast Race troops that were already attacking the Lin Astral Empire¡­they would bepletely overwhelmed and swallowed by the beast flood that woulde.


    But in the end, Lin Fan didn''t choose any of these ces to go.


    Instead of these three ces, he chose a small ne that no one had ever heard of before that was inside of their territory. This was a that didn''t have much on it, but it was being used as one of the rally points for their army.


    Just like the other rally points, it was being attacked by the Beast Race troops, but it wasn''t heavy enough of an attack that would make it worthy of receiving Lin Fan''s help.


    This was nothing more than a small that didn''t need urgent reinforcements in the first ce.


    The only thing that was special about it was that it was close to the southern border where therge number of Beast Race troops were attacking. So it was a ce that could receive reinforcements from the Beast Race at any time.


    Seeing this, the ministers and generals all started trying to convince Lin Fan of this decision.


    After all, there were many other ces that needed him much more than this small.


    But in the end, Lin Fan wouldn''t budge on this decision.


    So they had no choice but to turn to the Lin Astral Emperor for help.


    The ministers and generals hoped that the Lin Astral Emperor would see how important it was for Lin Fan to be deployed in one of these three ces, but the Lin Astral Emperor wasn''t on their side in the first ce.


    He had been surprised that Lin Fan would choose this kind of small ce to go, but he fully supported this.


    Lin Fan going to the battlefield was not something that he could stop anymore, but if Lin Fan went to a ce where there wasn''t as much danger, that was fine too. It was just like when he had gone to the Mu Ster Kingdom and the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    He wasn''t too worried since those ces didn''t have that many powerful people in the first ce.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor approved of this and Lin Fan was given permission to head out.


    The generals and ministers clearly had more to say, but Lin Fan didn''t give them a chance at all.


    Once he had received approval from the Lin Astral Emperor, there was no need for him to hesitate anymore.


    He stood up and headed out of the room.


    The ministers and generals also wanted to pursue him to try and convince him otherwise still, but the Lin Astral Emperor was watching over them.


    The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t seem like he would let them go and would immediately punish anyone that tried to leave¡­


    So the ministers and generals could only let Lin Fan go like this.


    They all let out sighs of regret, almost as if they felt like they had let down the people of the Lin Astral Empire.


    Lin Fan had been their only hope and there were more important ces for him to be deployed, but they hadn''t been able to stop him from being willful.


    There was a bit of anger that came from Lin Fan being this willful, but there was nothing that they could do about it.


    After Lin Fan left the meeting room, he found that Ang and the rest were already waiting for him. At the same time, he was told that all of his crew had already been gathered on the ship.


    Although he had thought that he would need some time to gather everyone, it seemed that everything had been prepared.


    He looked at Ang with a grateful look since he knew that it was her who had arranged everything.


    She knew him better than anyone, so she knew exactly what he nned on doing.


    Once they returned to the ship, they immediately set out since the ship had already been prepared by the crew.


    As they were heading out, they asked Lin Fan where they were going.


    Many of them were confused why they would be going to a small like this, but in the end, they just followed Lin Fan''s orders.


    But as for where Lin Fan hade up with the idea to go to this ce¡­


    It was the system.


    This time, it wasn''t a quest that had popped up for him, but rather a blunt notification from the system.


    This time, it was a sincere suggestion from the system that he head to this ce.


    This was the first time Lin Fan was seeing this and he knew that the system wouldn''t do something like this without a reason, so he knew that there must be something special about this.


    With this thought in mind, Lin Fan decided to take the risk and head there.


    This was close to the border, but since they were in the Lin Astral Empire''s territory, they were able to use the portals that were there.


    As a rally point, it was naturally connected to the transport gate system, so they were able to take jumps until they reached it.


    In less than a day, they had already arrived at their destination.


    It seemed quiet at first, but Lin Fan knew that something was wrong since this was too quiet.


    This should have been surrounded by the Beast Race troops, but he wasn''t seeing any of them.


    Without hesitation, he ordered for the sensors to be activated and as he had guessed, there were fluctuations that came from the.


    It seemed that the Beast Race troops couldn''t wait any longer and had engaged in a frontal assault.


    Wasting no time at all, Lin Fan immediately gave the order for the ship tond.


    The guards all had worried looks on their faces, but they also had determined looks.


    After all, this was a fight to defend their territory from the Beast Race invaders, so this was something that they were excited about.


    On the contrary, Ang''s troops seemed much more rxed.


    However, that was just because they were used to the battlefield since they had followed her into it when she was the general.


    When theynded, they quickly followed the fluctuations in the air until they found the battlefield. They hadnded far away because they had wanted to scout the situation first, but it seemed like they had wasted too much time.


    That was because the Lin Astral Empire troops werepletely surrounded by the Beast Race troops.


    Judging by the weakening life energy fluctuations that came from within the blockade, they could tell that they wouldn''t be able to hold on for much longer.


    This time, Lin Fan didn''t try to do everything himself.


    Instead, he said, "Charge!"

 Chapter 1118 To War (4)

    ?


    As soon as they received this order, the guards and Ang''s subordinates immediately rushed forward to meet the Beast Race troops.


    They were all troops trained by the Lin Astral Empire and now that they were facing the Beast Race that invaded the Lin Astral Empire, as well as saving those from the Lin Astral Empire army, they didn''t hold back at all.


    They werepletely filled with passion and excitement as they charged at the enemies.


    The Beast Race troops were caught off guard by these enemies that suddenly appeared, but seeing how few of them there were, they didn''t show any fear at all.


    There was only a small portion of the Beast Race troops that broke off from the main group to face them.


    In terms of cultivation, the Beast Race troops could be considered weaker.


    But they didn''t have any fear as they charged at these enemies.


    That was because there were strange fluctuations in the space around them.


    It was clear that they also wielded the strange Outerws, so they didn''t think they needed to fear these new enemies that appeared.


    It was just too bad for them that these new enemies had already seen through these borrowed powers.


    Lin Fan had already taught his guards and Ang''s subordinates about these strange Outerws, so they had no problem dealing with these strange spatialws at all.


    In one swift move, all of them shattered through the strange spatialws that were in front of them.


    Once they had dealt with the trump cards that the Beast Race troops relied on, it took them to take care of the Beast Race troops in front of them. As the Beast Race troops were stunned to see that these borrowed Outer weapons weren''t working, they just stood there in a daze as the weapons of Lin Fan''s guards and Ang''s subordinates cut through them.


    In an instant, this group of Beast Race troops were wiped out.


    They didn''t even stand a chance in front of the des of Lin Fan''s guards and Ang''s subordinates.


    After all, these were elites that had been specially trained to protect Lin Fan and elites who had undergone Ang''s training. They were much stronger than experts of the same level, so there was no need to mention demon beasts that were weaker than them in the first ce.


    Once they saw that the group that they had sent out had failed, the Beast Race immediately sent an evenrger group. Though thisrger group wasn''t even a tenth of all the Beast Race troops that were here.


    It seemed that they put more focus on the Lin Astral Empire troops that were being trapped in the middle.


    Unfortunately for them, this group of Beast Race troops still wasn''t a match for these enemies that had suddenly appeared.


    The Beast Racemanders had no choice but to actually treat this group of enemies that had suddenly appeared as an actual threat.


    In the end, they made a very serious decision on how to handle them.


    There was a Ruler Realm Beast that came out to meet them.


    The guards and Ang''s subordinates were shocked to see this, but they didn''t back down which showed just how well they had been trained. Even though they knew that they didn''t have a chance of winning, they didn''t hesitate to face the enemy in front of them.


    But it was at this point that Lin Fan made his move.


    Once the Ruler Realm Beast appeared, Lin Fan didn''t hesitate toe out in front of his subordinates.


    The Ruler Realm Beast was surprised to see Lin Fan, but it didn''t hesitate to attack him.


    With a roar, there was a world of mes that appeared around Lin Fan.


    This was different from a domain¡­this was an actual world of mes.


    When one reached the Dao Realm, they would make their inner realm be the embodiment of theirw. This would be as if they embodied thew itself, which was what one called the Dao Realm.


    Since they became the dao itself.


    So instead of a domain, they released the inner world that they had condensed with thew that they chose.


    This Ruler Realm Beast clearly had a firew inner world, which was why Lin Fan was currently surrounded in mes.


    Even though the mes weren''t near them, Lin Fan''s guards and Ang''s subordinates could feel the heat that wasing from them. This showed them just how terrifying these mes were.


    If they were near these mes¡­there was no doubt that they would be destroyed by them instantly.


    But Lin Fan didn''t show any fear at all as he stood in the middle of these mes.


    It was almost as if he didn''t even feel the heat from them.


    That was because if one looked carefully, they would see that there was some kind of ck bubble that was around him.


    This was a very faint line, but if they looked carefully, there seemed to be some kind of ck energy that blocked him from these mes.


    The Ruler Realm Beast could also tell that there was something wrong and that its mes couldn''t touch Lin Fan, so it gave another roar.


    With this roar, the mes around Lin Fan started to burn even more intensely and released even more heat. At the same time, there were balls of mes that were gathered all around him.


    It seemed that the Ruler Realm Beast wanted topletely smother Lin Fan in these mes one way or another.


    But still, Lin Fan didn''t seem to show any fear when he saw this.


    It was still as if the mes couldn''t do a single thing to him.


    Still, Lin Fan wouldn''t remain idle forever.


    He still had to save the Lin Astral Empire troops that were surrounded by the Beast Race troops. They were still attacking them while this Ruler Realm Beast was attacking Lin Fan.


    So he waved his hand and made his move.


    In an instant, all of the balls of mes around him suddenly became smaller.


    It was as if something had drained the power out of them all of a sudden.


    The Ruler Realm Beast immediately revealed an ugly expression before giving another roar, stoking the mes around Lin Fan once more. However, Lin Fan wasn''t bothered by these mes at all.


    Instead, he turned to give the order to his guards and Ang''s subordinates, "Go and save our allies!"


    They had been watching in a daze because of how spectacr this fight between these two Ruler Realm Experts was, but then they realized that they had something to do. So they quickly came back to their senses and started flying towards the Lin Astral Empire troops that were trapped.


    The Ruler Realm Beast saw this and wanted to do something, but it was too bad that Lin Fan wouldn''t let it.


    With a wave of his hand, the mes that were around him were suddenly put out.


    There wasn''t a single me that was left in the space around Lin Fan, as it all disappeared in an instant.


    As soon as the mes disappeared, the Ruler Realm Beast suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood, showing that it had been injured.


    What had happened?


    Why did itsw manifestation suddenly disappear like this?


    It didn''t make any sense at all!


    But before the Ruler Realm Beast could even do anything, it found that there was something strange around it.


    It was a transparent ck bubble.


    If one didn''t look carefully, they would miss it. However, there was this ckyer that was around the Ruler Realm Beast thatpletely sealed it off from the outside world.


    The Ruler Realm Beast looked around itself and immediately burst into mes as if it was trying to defend itself, but those mes were instantly sucked away and absorbed by the ck bubble around it.


    Once again, the Ruler Realm Beast spat out another mouthful of blood.


    It didn''t understand what this thing around it was, it was able to absorb its energy like it was nothing and there was nothing that it could do against this ck bubble.


    Just what was this thing?


    But then, the Ruler Realm Beast suddenly remembered where they were and who they were fighting against.


    They were fighting against the Lin Astral Empire and the specialty of the Lin Astral Family was¡­their voidws.


    That meant that the thing that surrounded it right now¡­was ayer of voidws.


    Since it had been trapped by thisyer of voidws and itsw manifestation was even swallowed by these voidws, it knew that it was no match for Lin Fan.


    Without any hesitation, the Ruler Realm Beast suddenly shouted, "How long are you going to watch!? If you don''t help now, you know how this will end!"


    At this, there was a sudden wall of spatial energy that flew out at Lin Fan.


    But once again, with a wave of his hand, this wall of spatial energy was swallowed.


    Then with another wave of his hand, there were spatial fluctuations that were torn in front of him. When they settled, there was a figure that was now floating there in the space in front of him with a shocked look on their face.


    This figure¡­was wearing the same battle suit as those two Outers from before.


    This was the reason why Lin Fan hadn''t crushed the Ruler Realm Beast right away.


    He knew that there would be another one of them hiding in the area, so he used the Ruler Realm Beast to draw them out.

 Chapter 1119 To War (5)

    ?


    "What, what do you want?" The Outer Expert couldn''t help saying in a shaky voice.


    For the first time sinceing to this universe, he was actually feeling fear and it was an intense fear that came from having one''s life threatened.


    But Lin Fan just calmly said, "I''ll get what I want from you regardless of if you cooperate or not."


    Then with a wave of his hand, the Outer Expert was knocked out and thrown onto the ground.


    When the Ruler Realm Beast saw this, it revealed a look of terror.


    Since it had been born, it had never felt this kind of terror before and it never thought that it would feel this kind of terror from a human.


    This terror caused strong chills to run down its spine, but it forced itself to calm down and say, "I''ll be your contracted pet! I know that you humans make contracts with demon beasts and have them as pets! If you spare me, I''ll serve you and your descendants willingly!"


    At this moment, all that mattered was its life.


    Even if it had to degrade itself by serving the humans, it still wanted to live.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had no intentions of letting any of this happen.


    This Ruler Realm Beast was an invader, so it wouldn''t be treated with the respect that a normal captured enemy would be. This Ruler Realm Beast was already sentenced to death from the moment that it had stepped foot in the Lin Astral Empire''s territory.


    So while it was begging, the ck bubble around it started to shrink.


    The more that it shrank, the less space there was for the Ruler Realm Beast.


    After all, if it touched the ck bubble for even an instant, it would be drained of all of its energy.


    The Ruler Realm Beast had already tried many different things against this ck bubble, but not a single thing seemed to work against it. Every single thing that it tried doing had the energy drained out of it, so the Ruler Realm Beast was actually slowly bing weaker and weaker.


    So it could be said that this Ruler Realm Beast was slowly being forced into a corner.


    Seeing that it had no choice at all, the Ruler Realm Beast gave a defiant roar before saying, "I''ll take you all with me!"


    Then there was a surge of life energy that came from the Ruler Realm Beast¡­or rather it came from the center of the Ruler Realm Beast, where its core was.


    It was gathering all of its energy into its core so that it could¡­blow itself up.


    It would go out in a ze of glory, taking as many people with it as possible.


    But before it could do that, the ck bubble around it shrank in an instant.


    Lin Fan had been slowly closing the bubble since he had wanted to torture this Ruler Realm Beast before killing it, but now he didn''t have this chance. Since it wanted to cause as much trouble as it could before dying, then there was no need to keep it alive anymore.


    He closed his hand and the ck bubble instantly crushed the Ruler Realm Beast.


    All of the life energy that had been gathered was drained away in an instant and the Ruler Realm Beast''s body shriveled before turning into nothingness. It had also been absorbed by the voidws that had surrounded it, causing it to be matter absorbed by the voidw.


    Once the Ruler Realm Beast was dead and the Outer was subdued, the Beast Race troops knew that this was the end for them.


    After all, Lin Fan who had taken care of the Ruler Realm Beast was here.


    This was an expert that even the Ruler Realm Beast couldn''t defeat, so there was no chance that anyone here would be able to defeat him.


    Without hesitation, some of the Beast Race troops started to run.


    The Beast Race did havemanders, but they weremanders of their own tribes.


    So the overallmand of the Beast Race troops was very poor.


    They couldn''t keep them all here with some running away and it took no time at all before a full retreat came.


    They scattered in every direction like cockroaches when the lights were turned on, but Lin Fan had another idea for this. He wasn''t nning on letting them escape just so they could cause more trouble.


    With a wave of his hand, there was a spatialw bubble that formed around this area.


    Itpletely surrounded all of the Beast Race troops that were here and trapped them all here.


    The Beast Race troops did all that they could to shatter this spatialw bubble, but their attacks had no effect on it at all. They were just too weak to even put a dent in this spatialw bubble.


    But that onlysted for a minute before anotherw appeared in this space.


    It seemed like a strange almost transparent ck energy had filled this space¡­


    This was the same ck energy that had formed the bubble around the Ruler Realm Beast.


    It was the strange ck energy of Lin Fan''s voidws.


    This strange ck energy had also surrounded the Lin Astral Empire army, but it didn''t do anything to them.


    This strange ck energy suddenly drained all of the energy from the Beast Race troops, leaving them very weak. There were many of them that fell to the ground after having their life energy drained, but there were some that were able to remain standing.


    Lin Fan didn''t do anything else after that.


    Instead, he turned to the troops of the Lin Astral Empire and said, "They''re all yours."


    When they heard this, they were all taken aback.


    But they quickly understood the chance that Lin Fan was giving them.


    They didn''t doubt Lin Fan since many of them knew who he was with a single nce.


    It had been some time now that Lin Fan had been back and the news of this had spread to every single corner of the Lin Astral Empire. So even if they had been trapped by these Beast Race troops, they had still received the news and recognized him from the photo that came from it.


    Seeing that they were given this chance, the Lin Astral Empire troops all held gratitude towards Lin Fan as they faced the Beast Race troops that had been causing havoc on them previously.


    Now that the Beast Race troops had all been rendered powerless like this, it was easy for them to clean them up.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about that at all.


    After all, there had to be a reason why the system had strongly suggested him toe to this ce.


    If it was just to save these troops, then it wouldn''t be worth it.


    So there had to be something special about this ce.


    After he took care of the Beast Race troops, he turned his attention to the camp itself.


    Without hesitation, he released his spiritual sense and started searching the area.


    But then he suddenly turned in one direction.


    It was in a direction that was away from the camp.


    It seemed that the reason the system strongly suggested him toe here wasn''t because of the Lin Astral Empire troops or the camp that was here. It seemed that it had suggested that hee here because of something that was on this.


    He had felt a familiar feelinging from not far away from this camp.


    Lin Fan released the spatialw barrier that was around this ce since the Beast Race troops could no longer run away in the first ce.


    Then after giving the order to his guards and Ang''s subordinates to back up the Lin Astral Empire troops in taking out the Beast Race remnants, he suddenly started flying off in a certain direction.


    It didn''t take him long to arrive at his destination, which was a mountain on this.


    This was where he felt those familiar fluctuationsing from.


    Ang and the others had also followed him, but they only revealed looks of understanding when they arrived at this mountain. There was only Zi Ling who had a confused look on her face as to why they were here.


    Lin Fan looked carefully at this mountain before turning his gaze to a specific cave that was here.


    Without hesitation, he flew over to that cave andnded at the entrance.


    But he didn''t enter right away as he released his spiritual sense right away.


    After a bit of silence, he said, "You guys stay here, I''ll go in alone."


    They nodded in agreement after hearing this, but Zi Ling still had a confused face.


    Ang and the others had looks of admiration since they never thought that Lin Fan''s spiritual sense would be this powerful.


    Lin Fan walked into the cave, but he walked in a specific path.


    Sometimes he went forwards, sometimes he moved to the side, and sometimes he even moved backwards which didn''t help him enter deeper into the cave.


    Taking this path, he slowly went into the dark cave and headed deeper and deeper in.


    But he didn''t have to walk long before he reached the center of the cave where there were five masses there.


    When he came in, they suddenly stirred and turned to look at Lin Fan.


    But before anything could happen, Lin Fan suddenly summoned out five pets.


    When these masses in the cave saw them, they couldn''t help giving the same reaction.


    "Eh?"

 Chapter 1120 To War (6)

    ?


    When these five saw Lin Fan''s pets, they unfurled theirrge bodies to reveal themselves.


    These were the five Great Elders of the five sacred beast races. It was one Great Elder from each one of the five sacred beast races.


    After staring at Lin Fan''s pets, they finally turned their attention to Lin Fan and said at the same time, "Void God''s sessor!"


    Lin Fan shook his head and said, "What are you all doing here?"


    The five Great Elders all revealed bitter smiles when asked this, but they still exined.


    It turned out that they hade to help the Lin Astral Empire in the fight, but they had been doing it secretly.


    However, when the Beast Race troops had suddenly gained those Outerws, even these Great Elders of the five sacred beast races had been forced into a corner. They had no choice but to flee with the other elders who hade with them and they hadnded on this to rest.


    But they never expected another fight to happen on this, so they had been holed up here until Lin Fan had appeared.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Where are the other elders?"


    The five Great Elders pointed further into the cave and said, "They''re behind a fake wall that the ck Tortoise Great Elder created. They are heavily injured and need to rest."


    Lin Fan looked carefully at the wall that he pointed at and he found that there was indeed a fake wall there.


    After learning what had happened to them, Lin Fan decided that he wouldn''t leave them here, so he said, "Come with me back to the Lin Astral Empire and rest up there. We''ll also find people to treat the elders."


    The five Great Elders looked at each other before nodding in agreement to this.


    They had already figured that he was rted to the Lin Astral Empire in some way, which was why they hade to help the Lin Astral Empire in the first ce.


    Since they had found Lin Fan and their true descendants, there was no reason why they shouldn''t go with him.


    But there was a problem¡­


    Most of the elders were heavily injured and it wasn''t appropriate to move them in this state. If they tried to move them while they were like this, it would only exasperate their injuries.


    However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried about this at all since he already had a solution to this.


    He told the Great Elders to wait beforeing back with the medical team of the Lin Astral Empire army.


    The medical team was confused why he had called them here, but then they understood when they saw what was in the cave.


    They were taken aback by the appearances of these fierce beasts that had tried to scare them at first, but then when Lin Fan showed himself, all of the Great Elders calmed down.


    They had thought that the Lin Astral Empire army had found them and were here to capture them.


    They never thought that Lin Fan would actually be from the Lin Astral Family, not to mention being the crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire.


    But when they thought about it, they realized that it did make sense.


    After all, the Lin Astral Family was famous for their voidw cultivation technique.


    It wasn''t strange that the Void God''s sessor came from that family.


    So the medical team was able to easily evacuate all of the elders who were inside of that cave. At the same time, they were able to give them preliminary treatment to the elders who had been in the cave.


    The Great Elders had said that the elders had been recuperating in this cave, but what they didn''t mention was that this meant that they were forcefully recovering from their wounds with their cultivation.


    If they were back on their own homeworlds or were in a more stable ce, they might have been able to treat it properly.


    But being trapped on this and stuck in a cave like this, they weren''t able to receive proper treatment.


    Receiving proper treatment waspletely different from forcefully recovering with cultivation.


    One was just patching the holes while the other waspletely fixing the hull, so there was noparison between the two.


    When the elders had been treated, they had much more rxed looks on their faces.


    They were still injured since this was just temporary treatment, but at least it had relieved them of the pain that they felt.


    Once the elders had been treated, Lin Fan told the medical team to move them onto my ship.


    There was a medical bay that was big enough to hold all of them, so it wasn''t a problem for me to transport them back with him.


    Lin Fan had already taken care of the Beast Race here, so there was no need for him to stay here any longer.


    He had already aplished what the system wanted him to aplish, so it was time for him to actually help the Lin Astral Empire with the war. The three ces that they had suggested to him were still ces that needed help, so Lin Fan wanted to head there next.


    But that would be after he delivered the Great Elders and elders of the five sacred beast races back to the Lin Astral Empire''s capital.


    With his ship and the transport gates, it took him no time to return.


    The ministers and generals were all shocked to see him return this quickly, but they were even more shocked when they saw who he had brought back with him.


    Since there was no hostility between them and the five sacred beast races, the Lin Astral Empire quickly provided medical support to the Great Elders and the elders of the five sacred beast races.


    But of course, Lin Fan had been summoned by the Lin Astral Emperor to exin everything.


    Lin Fan didn''t hold back and told him about the prophecy left behind by the Void God. Then he brought out his pets and showed them to the Lin Astral Emperor.


    When it was all over, the Lin Astral Emperor had a look of disbelief on his face, but there was nothing he could say in response to this. After all, there were the facts that were ced in front of him, so he had no choice but to ept them.


    So in the end, the Lin Astral Emperor asked with a sigh, "So what now?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "We can just sign a cooperation agreement with them to take care of the Beast Race."


    The Lin Astral Emperor narrowed his eyes a bit, but he gave a nod in the end.


    After all, the five sacred beast races were considered powerful.


    With the full power of any of these five sacred beast races, they would be able to fight against the Lin Astral Empire and if they worked together, it would be easy for them to wipe out the Lin Astral Empire.


    If all five of them wanted to work with them, then there was no doubt that this would be very beneficial to them.


    At the same time, it would help them relieve the pressure of the invading Beast Race.


    They were about to discuss something else, but before they could, a messenger came to tell them that the Great Elders of the five sacred beast races had finished their treatment. They were now asking to talk to Lin Fan.


    So Lin Fan headed off with the Lin Astral Emperor.


    If it was anyone else, the Lin Astral Emperor wouldn''t have needed to go.


    However, since they were from the five sacred beast races and they were the Great Elders, the Lin Astral Emperor should go with his status.


    When he met them, he found that they were much easier to talk to than he had imagined.


    But he also knew that this was all because of Lin Fan.


    "Outers?" The five Great Elders said at the same time before knitting their brows.


    There was a look of thought that appeared on all of their faces before the Azure Dragon Great Elder said, "I thought that it seemed strange how they were using thosews. It turned out that they betrayed this universe and are working with the Outers."


    At this, the other Great Elders all gave a nod before the Phoenix Great Elder said, "We need to inform the rest of the Myriad Races of this matter."


    The other Great Elders all nodded in agreement to this before the Azure Dragon Great Elder turned to the Lin Astral Emperor to say, "Human emperor, we will leave this matter to you."


    The Lin Astral Emperor was caught off guard hearing this, but he still gave a nod with a bitter smile.


    After all, it was clear that the Myriad Race would help them with the Beast Race invasion once they knew that they were cooperating with the Outers.


    So this was a good thing for the entire human race.


    This was also what Lin Fan had wanted to see which was why he hade here in the first ce.


    The other piece of information that he gave the Great Elders was how to deal with the Outerws which they were surprised to receive.


    They didn''t know how Lin Fan had been able to see through the Outerws, but that didn''t stop them from being impressed by him.


    "As expected of the Void God''s sessor" was what they said the most.

 Chapter 1121 To War (7)

    ?


    After they had been settled, we gathered once again in the meeting hall.


    As we sat down, the ministers and generals looked at mepletely differently than before.


    After all, what I had done was much greater than what they could imagine.


    Saving the elders of the five sacred beast races and even the possibility of bringing the Myriad Races into this war¡­this was far beyond what they could imagine.


    After all, the Myriad Races wereparable to the entire human race.


    So all of these experts joining in the war against the Beast Race would without a doubt greatly help them.


    And even if not all of the Myriad Races joined, just having the five sacred beast races was more than enough.


    After all, any one of these five sacred beast races would be just as strong as the Lin Astral Empire or even stronger than them. With their help, they should be able to push back the Beast Race even if they had the Outerws since Lin Fan had already found the weaknesses of the Outerws for them.


    It seemed that things really were looking up for their Lin Astral Empire.


    But Lin Fan had a serious look on his face as he sat there.


    He was nning on discussing where to go next since he knew that this war was far from over.


    When this topic was brought up, the ministers and generals once again started giving their suggestions.


    But this time, they were much more aggressive as they gave their suggestions.


    They felt like they had failedst time when they gave their suggestions, so it was like they were trying to make up for it this time. So they were right up in Lin Fan''s face as they gave their suggestions.


    If it was any other time, there was no doubt that Lin Fan would have pped the stuffing out of them to get them away¡­but this time was different.


    He could see how passionate they were about protecting the Lin Astral Empire, so he endured through all of it since he knew that this was their way of showing care.


    However, even though they were more passionate than before, the content didn''t change.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been gone for long, so the problems that they were facing were still the same as before.


    It was still the same three ces that needed his help.


    As Lin Fan looked over them, he waited for something to happen.


    After all, when he thought about these three options before, the system had suddenly said something.


    He wanted to see if the system would have anything to say about this decision as well. However, it seemed like the system would be keeping out of this matter.


    So it was up to him to decide where to go.


    Lin Fan carefully considered the options before saying, "I''ll head to the Lu Astral Empire."


    When they heard this, there were disappointed looks and looks of joy on the faces of the ministers and generals.


    At the same time, there were many that tried to argue this since they didn''t believe that this was the right decision. However, there were also those that argued back since they thought that it was right.


    This created arge argument in this meeting room where generals and ministers either took one side or the other.


    But that didn''t matter since no one could influence Lin Fan''s decision. That is no one other than the Lin Astral Emperor who was the only person whose opinion Lin Fan respected in this room.


    The Lin Astral Emperor looked at Lin Adam with a strange look, but this time he didn''t go against him.


    He just simply said, "Take care of this matter quickly ande home safe."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this since he thought that the Lin Astral Emperor would be against this the most.


    However, hearing him be this supportive touched him.


    So Lin Fan said with a nod, "Un, I''ll be back soon, great grandfather."


    At this, all of the ministers and generals fell silent.


    They knew that since Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor had spoken, there was nothing that they could say to change their mind.


    It was determined that Lin Fan would be heading to the Lu Astral Empire.


    So the ministers and generals switched gears right away and started giving Lin Fan all the information that they had about the Lu Astral Empire''s current situation.


    They weren''t able to follow Lin Fan into battle, so the least that they could do was give him as much information as possible.


    There were generals that did want to go¡­but they had their own assignments and couldn''t abandon them just to go fight the Beast Race in the Lu Astral Empire like Lin Fan.


    So they could only send Lin Fan off and hope for the best.


    Once they had finished, the meeting was considered over. However, not a single one of them left the room.


    They were all waiting to hear what Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor were about to discuss.


    After all, the two of them wouldn''t remain sitting here like this for no reason.


    After a long silence, the Lin Astral Emperor asked, "Are you not heading out?"


    Lin Fan shook his head before slowly saying, "My crew needs to rest. I''ve been pushing them too hard and I can''t keep pushing them like this."


    The Lin Astral Emperor gave a nod before saying, "So how long are you staying?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything at first, but then he said, "A day or two, depending on the circumstances. This is an important mission, so we don''t want to rush into this and let any idents happen."


    "Un, it''s good to be careful." The Lin Astral Emperor said in a casual tone.


    It was as if there was something that they wanted to discuss, but neither of them were willing to bring it up.


    But in the end, someone did¡­


    It wasn''t either of them, but rather the Lin Astral Empress who came into the meeting room.


    When she came in, the generals and ministers were trying to greet her in an attempt to stop her from approaching the two of them. However, all she had to do was re at the ministers and generals to scare them off.


    She came to the head of this table and looked at the two of them before saying, "What are you waiting for? It''s time for dinner. Stop wasting time and let''s go."


    Both the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Fan were caught off guard by this sudden appearance by the Lin Astral Empress.


    However, neither of them dared to go against her after she said this.


    Both of them immediately stood up and followed after her when they saw the way that she red at them.


    After walking past her, both Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor looked at each other and revealed bitter smiles.


    They both knew what the other was feeling since¡­they all had someone like this in their life.


    Was it because it was hereditary or was it because of something else?


    After they left, the ministers and generals wereughing amongst themselves.


    It seemed that they had been worried for nothing¡­It turned out that the Lin Astral Empress knew exactly what these two needed and hade to take care of them.


    So with this, the ministers and generals left with smiles on their faces.


    For the first time, they were feeling relieved since the war began because of everything that Lin Fan had done. So they were supportive of him taking some time off since they knew how hard he worked.


    It would also help him remember just what he was fighting for.


    When Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor arrived, they found that everyone else had already been gathered. It wasn''t just their normal group, but also Lin Fan''s cousins and uncles, as well as the Lin Family.


    It seemed that everyone from the Lin Astral Family had gathered for this dinner.


    But there was also Ang and the others that were here.


    The Lin Astral Empress knew how important they were to Lin Fan, so she wouldn''t exclude them from this.


    Once they had all gathered, they were free to mingle however they wanted.


    Instead of sitting at the dining table and having a traditional meal, they were served appetizers and it was more of a party than it was a dinner.


    The Lin Astral Empress had arranged all of this to wee Lin Fan back and to wee the Lin Family to their Lin Astral Empire.


    That was why she had gathered everyone so she could introduce them.


    They were the descendants of her precious son and they were the rtives of Lin Fan, so she had high hopes for them¡­


    It was just too bad that she was immediately disappointed by what she saw.


    Even if they were rted to the ones that she cared about the most, they were disappointments themselves.


    Still, since they were rted to the Lin Astral Family in the end, she tolerated them. That was because she could see how much her precious son still cared for them even though they were like that.


    It was the same for the Lin Astral Family members.


    They were disappointed with the Lin Family as well, but they sucked it up and dealt with them in the end.


    But after today, it was certain that the Lin Family would be ced in minor positions andpletely forgotten.

 Chapter 1122 Family Matters

    ?


    Even though Lin Fan was here and he was surrounded by his family, there weren''t many of them that approached him.


    Even if they had mellowed out, they still remembered how Lin Fan had treated him before he had gone into closed door training. So the cousins were still afraid of Lin Fan and wouldn''t talk to him unless it was absolutely necessary.


    As for the Lin Family, they were even more terrified of him.


    There was drama between them and Lin Ao in the first ce.


    They were certain that Lin Ao wouldn''t just let this matter go, so they were prepared to suffer when they met him.


    It would be a lie to say that they didn''t let out a sigh of relief when they heard that he was still in closed doors training right now.


    They were hoping to find something to protect themselves before he came back.


    But then there was Lin Fan.


    They realized his position in the Lin Astral Family was far greater than their own and the fact that he was Lin Ao''s son meant that he was involved in this matter too.


    So far, Lin Fan hadn''t done anything, but they knew that it was impossible for nothing to happen.


    So they didn''t want to approach him and cause things to get worse.


    They were trying to avoid him as best as they could.


    What they didn''t know was that Lin Fan didn''t care about them at all.


    It wasn''t that he didn''t care about what had happened back then, it was just that what had happened seemed too trivial for him to care about anymore.


    Lin Fan had reached the level where these simple affairs didn''t matter to him anymore.


    What he was more concerned about was the future of the Lin Astral Empire itself.


    He would leave this matter to his father to deal with since it was his father''s matter in the first ce.


    But even though there weren''t many that approached him, there were still those that did.


    The ones that did were the ones that were at the head of the Lin Astral Family.


    After they had finished talking to the others, the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Astral Empress along with the Lin Family Ancestor, Lin Jian came over.


    They were all clearly worried about Lin Fan heading out tomorrow.


    The Lin Astral Empress was the one that spoke first by asking, "Xiao Fan, do you really have to go? You''ve already contributed more than enough, so no one will say anything if you stay here. Not to mention, you''ve already found out how we can counter the Outerws and brought allies from the Myriad Races, so we can take care of the Beast Race troops even without your help."


    The Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Jian didn''t say anything, but it was clear by the looks in their eyes that they thought the same.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t moved by this as he said, "It''s my duty as a member of the Lin Astral Family to protect the people of the Lin Astral Empire. If I were to hide, I wouldn''t be upholding the name of the Lin Astral Family."


    When they heard this, all three of them gave sighs before the Lin Astral Empress said, "Silly child, you''ve already done more than enough. You''ve done more than any of the other members of the Lin Astral Family have done."


    She paused at this and waited for the people around to move away.


    After all, they were important people in the Lin Astral Family, so the rest of the members of the Lin Astral Family were eavesdropping on them to see if they could hear anything important.


    But when they received this barbed jab from the Lin Astral Empress, they all started moving away from them and minding their own business.


    After all, she was correct.


    Compared to them, Lin Fan''s contributions were astronomical.


    They had gone to the battlefield out of the honour of the Lin Astral Family, but they had been beaten senseless and had been forced to retreat.


    Other than saving a few of the Lin Astral Empire troops, they didn''t have any other achievements to their names. After all, once they retreated, the positions that they had been guarding had been lost.


    Once they had moved away, the Lin Astral Empress continued, "You shouldn''t take everything on your shoulders, we are here for you."


    Lin Fan revealed a grateful look, but he still shook his head and said, "This is what I should do."


    The Lin Astral Empress looked at him in silence for a bit before shaking her head and turning around.


    It wasn''t that she was disappointed in him, but rather she was disappointed in his stubbornness. Of course, she was also proud that he was a fine young man who knew how to perform his duties, but she wanted him to rely on them a bit more.


    The Lin Astral Emperor however didn''t mention this matter at all.


    Instead, while being red at by the Lin Astral Empress, he said, "It''s a shame that the whole family couldn''t gather."


    After he said this, they looked around the room with all of these members of the Lin Astral Family before giving a sigh together.


    Even though they were all from the Lin Astral Family, it didn''t feel as if they were a part of the same ''family''. The ''family'' that they talked about were those that they were very close to, namely Lin Fan, his parents, and his little sister.


    Thetter three were currently in closed door training, so they weren''t here.


    After a moment of silence, Lin Fan said, "In a way, it''s better that they''re not here."


    Lin Jian revealed a knowing smile when he heard this since he knew what Lin Fan was implying.


    But they chose to ignore it and focus on the main topic with Lin Fan saying, "They''ll be out when Ie back. Right now, it''s better that they aren''t here with us or else they might do something rash as well."


    The Lin Astral Emperor just said with a teasing smile, "So you''re the only one that can do something rash?"


    Lin Fan also revealed a smile before saying, "I''m the only one that can afford to do something rash."


    The three elders knitted their brows when they heard this, but then they just gave sighs.


    Since he hade back, it was as if there was something about Lin Fan that they couldn''t see through anymore. While they were happy to see that he was much stronger than before, they couldn''t help feeling sad since it was like seeing him grow up.


    After sighing, the Lin Astral Emperor said, "Just take care of yourself and we will gather for family dinner again when youe back."


    Lin Fan gave a simple nod in response to this.


    The Lin Astral Emperor waved his hand and one of the servants came over with a tray that had several sses on it.


    He took one of them for himself and gestured for the rest of them to take one each.


    So all of them took a ss from the tray and waited for the Lin Astral Emperor to say what he wanted to say.


    But before he did that, he turned to look at Ang and the rest who were also here.


    He waved his hand at them and said, "Come, you guys join in as well."


    When the members of the Lin Astral Family saw this, they couldn''t help revealing dissatisfied looks. They were already dissatisfied when they saw that these outsiders were here, but seeing the Lin Astral Emperor inviting them to a toast as well¡­


    This was not something that they could tolerate.


    So there were a few of them that wanted toe forward to interrupt, but before they could even get close, they were hit with a powerful pressure.


    Neither Lin Fan or the Lin Astral Emperor said a thing, but the pressure that they released was more than enough to keep them away. After all, these two were much stronger than the rest in this room.


    These members of the Lin Astral Family had looks of protest on their faces, but they couldn''t do a thing since neither Lin Fan or the Lin Astral Emperor allowed them.


    So they could only wait on the side as Ang''s group came over.


    Once they had all picked up a ss, the Lin Astral Emperor lifted his cup and said, "To Xiao Fan''s safe return."


    The rest of them all raised their cup and drank to this.


    Once they had finished this toast, the Lin Astral Empress walked over towards Ang and Zi Ling before turning to Lin Fan to ask, "When are you going to hold the ceremony? Or are you going to keep these youngdies waiting forever?"


    When the two of them heard this, they both revealed blushes that didn''t match their personalities and lowered their heads.


    Lin Fan also spat out the bit of wine that was still in his mouth and looked at the Lin Astral Empress with a shocked look as if he couldn''t believe what he had just heard.


    But the Lin Astral Empress looked at him with a calm smile on her face and said, "They aren''t young anymore and neither are you. Are you really going to keep them waiting like this or are you a real man?"


    Lin Fan''s lips twitched when he heard this, but he knew that she was right.


    So taking a deep breath, he said, "I''ll get it done once Ie back."


    Hearing this, the Lin Astral Emperor and Lin Astral Empress revealed satisfied looks.


    But Ang and Zi Ling just had even stronger blushes on their faces.

 Chapter 1123 To War (8)

    ?


    Two dayster, Lin Fan was ready to set off again.


    He could see from the faces of his guards and Ang''s subordinates that they had spent a good two days resting.


    After all, they had family that were living in the capital and this might be thest time they would see them. So they had spent as much time as they could with their families.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind since he knew that this would also be a good form of motivation for them.


    After all, when he saw them now, he could see the firm and determined looks that were in their eyes.


    After seeing their families and spending time with them, they knew what they were fighting for. That made them even more determined and even more focused, which would make them even more deadly on the battlefield.


    As they were setting off, there were plenty of people that came to see them off.


    This included the families of the people heading out, but as well as many of themon citizens. They had been gathered at the port and were being held back by the guards of the Lin Astral Family, but they were allowed to cheer as Lin Fan''s ship headed off.


    Of course, for a gathering of this size, it was impossible for them all to gather without the permission of the Lin Astral Emperor.


    He had given permission and even gathered more people since he knew that this was what they needed.


    He knew that it was impossible to hide this information of Lin Fan setting off forever, so it was better to use this as an opportunity.


    This crowd that had gathered would let the crew of Lin Fan''s ship know what they were fighting for. At the same time, it was a chance to raise the morale of the Lin Astral Empire by giving them a hero that they could count on.


    As they had been slowly pushed back by the Beast Race troops, the morale in the capital had also sunk.


    They had been worried about being overwhelmed by the Beast Race and that had caused quite a few riots in the capital.


    But now, they would be able to relieve the people of the capital since Lin Fan was someone who had proven that he could beat the Beast Race and their strangews. By making Lin Fan out to be a hero, they could bring hope to the people of the Lin Astral Empire.


    It certainly was showing with how much they cheered for Lin Fan''s ship as they headed off.


    After leaving the capital, Lin Fan''s ship took the transport gate all the way to the border.


    Beyond this was some open space that wasn''t a part of either the Lu Astral Empire or the Lin Astral Empire''s territory. So there were no transport gates for them to take through this space and they could only travel with the ship.


    As they flew through this empty space, all of the crew werepletely focused.


    After all, this would be the perfect ce to set an ambush if they wanted to deal with Lin Fan''s ship.


    They had set out with such fanfare, there was no doubt that the Beast Race knew of their departure.


    It shouldn''t be hard for the Beast Race to find where they were going, so they should be setting up ambushes for them. That was what they were worried about the most and what they were trying to keep an eye out for.


    But Lin Fan seemed very rxed as they traveled through this dangerous space.


    It was as if he wasn''t worried about the possibility of an ambush at all.


    In the end¡­they were still ambushed by the Beast Race after all.


    Since it was such a perfect opportunity, it wasn''t as if the Beast Race would give up this chance.


    In an instant, Lin Fan''s ship was surrounded by the Beast Race''s flying beasts.


    The Beast Race didn''t use ships, but rather special flying beasts as transport through space.


    There were pros and cons to this, but they were much more flexible when it came to fighting in spacepared to humans who used ships.


    Seeing that they were surrounded, Lin Fan''s guards and Ang''s subordinates all prepared for a battle.


    But before they could go out to fight, Lin Fan had called them all back before giving the order for the crew to fire the cannons.


    When they heard this, the crew followed the orders even though they didn''t seem to have much hope that it would work. After all, they had seen how the Beast Race had used those strange Outerws to block all cannon shots fired at them.


    But to their surprise, they found that the shots of Lin Fan''s ship¡­worked.


    The only ones that had believed in the ship in the first ce were Lin Fan and the space engineers that worked to build the ship.


    The Outer spatialws formed distortions in space and formed a wall in front of the Beast Race troops, but the shots from the cannon just tore through those spatialw walls.


    It was as if they didn''t exist with the way that they were torn to pieces by the shots from the cannon.


    Everyone couldn''t help looking at the cannons of the ship, but all they saw was another round of shots being fired out at the Beast Race troops.


    This time, there was no spatialw wall in front of the Beast Race troops, so they took the full brunt of this attack.


    The moment that the shells were about to make contact with the flying demon beasts, there were cracks that appeared in front of them. These cracks were just like the cracks formed by the spatialws, but there was something different about them.


    After the cracks formed, the space that they formed in quickly copsed and there was a ck hole that formed.


    In these spaces, it ripped apart any matter that was there, which included the flesh of the flying demon beasts. At the same time, the more matter that it absorbed, the bigger these ck holes became.


    The Beast Race troops were all shocked by these ck holes that appeared.


    There were some that roared and released attacks at these ck holes, but all that happened was that these ck holes absorbed the energy of these attacks and they disappeared without a trace.


    It was as if their attacks hadn''t existed at all¡­


    No, the attacks did exist since there was something that happened to the ck holes after absorbing these attacks.


    The ck holes suddenly becamerger.


    As it becamerger, it swallowed more and more of the flying demon beast and it soon found that it wasn''t able to escape the grasp of this ck hole anymore. Unless it cut off the piece of itself that was stuck inside that ck hole, this flying demon beast wouldn''t be able to escape.


    There were many Beast Race troops that tried many differentws to counter this ck hole, but in the end¡­they couldn''t do anything.


    After all, every attack that they threw at the ck hole was just absorbed by it without any consequences.


    In the end, all they did was make the ck holes bigger and bigger until they were forced to escape from the flying demon beasts. They all had to abandon the flying demon beasts to their own fate.


    The flying demon beasts had also wanted to retreat, but they weren''t able to do so because of the pull of these ck holes.


    With how they were stuck, it was almost as if they had be a part of the ck holes.


    Once it was over, there were few flying demon beasts that were left.


    Many of the Beast Race troops were also exhausted because they had spent most of their energy trying to deal with the ck holes that had appeared.


    This was a very bad situation for them¡­but at the very least, they outnumbered the enemy.


    The enemy only had a single ship and there were so many of them here, so it shouldn''t be a problem for them to deal with the enemy.


    As for the ck holes that had been created¡­they didn''t believe that the enemy would have anything like this again. This kind of powerful attack should be very hard to use, so they should only be able to use it once.


    But as the Beast Race troops were preparing to attack Lin Fan''s ship, they found¡­that the cannons of the ship had lit up again.


    These were the same cannons that had fired those attacks that had turned into the ck holes that hadid devastation to them. So could it be that there was another round of those ck holesing at them?


    When this thought passed through their minds, there were many Beast Race troops that had wanted to run away.


    But they were forced to stay because of the suppression from the leaders of their tribes.


    The absolute submission between the leaders and their followers forced these Beast Race troops to stay.


    The leaders thought about it more and didn''t think that it was possible for there to be another wave of these ck hole attacks. So they stood firm and waited for the ship to finish its attack.


    Their n was to smash through these attacks and then surround the ship, bombarding it with their own attacks.


    With the numbers advantage, they would surely be able to hurt it greatly.


    But it was just too bad that they had underestimated Lin Fan''s ship.

 Chapter 1124 To War (9)

    ?


    As soon as the shells made contact with the Beast Race troops, there were ck holes that appeared.


    First there were the distortions in space before the ck holes formed.


    But once they formed, the Beast Race troops realized their mistakes.


    For some of the leaders, the ones that led the charge themselves, this error was fatal.


    They were on the front lines when these shells hit and they had taken the brunt of the attack. They had ck holes appear right on their bodies, marking them for death as they couldn''t escape the grasps of these ck holes.


    They could only watch as the ck holes attached to their bodies and swallowed them bit by bit.


    In theirst moments, all they felt was regret over not running sooner.


    The ones that were lucky enough to avoid this attack from Lin Fan''s ship¡­wasted no time in running away.


    They knew now that they couldn''t face the strange attacks of this ship.


    Not to mention, the strange ck hole attacks that these humans used wasn''t just a one time thing. This was something that they could use again and again against them, so they stood no chance at all.


    Their instinctive fear took over and they didn''t hesitate at all to run.


    Seeing them run like this, Lin Fan finally gave the order to his subordinates to chase after them.


    They were surprised to receive this order, but they weren''t against it.


    After all, they had been waiting for the chance to fight the Beast Race and now that it was here, they weren''t about to let it slip through their fingers.


    In truth, Lin Fan was just using them to clean up the battlefield.


    That was because the Beast Race troops had been partially right about the special shells that his ship had fired. These shells were limited, though he did have more than a single shot.


    They had used over half of the shells that they had developed in the past two days on this fight, but Lin Fan felt that it was worth it.


    The situation had developed just like he had hoped and even now, he was letting these Beast Race troops go on purpose.


    They would spread the news of the new weapon that he was bringing which would make it easier for him to move through this space in between the borders.


    The Beast Race would becking information on what he had done and they didn''t know if he could use this weapon again. In this situation, they wouldn''t do anything crazy such as ambushing him again.


    So this would allow Lin Fan''s ship to safely reach the Lu Astral Empire''s territory.


    But after that¡­there would be a great battle.


    The main forces of the Beast Race were there, so there would be far more demon beasts than the force that had ambushed them.


    There was no way that they would be able to take them all down with the weapons on the ship, so they would have to find the forces of the Lu Astral Empire first.


    The trip itself was very quiet because of Lin Fan''s n.


    Because of the trick that he had yed, there were no ambushes that had beenid for them.


    Though there were scouts that had been keeping track of their location the entire time.


    Lin Fan would send his subordinates out to take care of them, but it was more to rx them than to get rid of the Beast Race troops. If there was one thing that the Beast Race didn''tck, that was numbers.


    The Beast Race had much greater numbers than any other races because of their strong reproduction capacities. So no matter how many scouts they took out, it was impossible for them to kill them all.


    He only sent them out because he could see how tense they were.


    They had been prepared for action, but since Lin Fan''s trick caused the Beast Race to leave them alone, this tension was building up inside of them.


    It was best if he allowed them to fight a few beasts to let that tension out.


    When they arrived at the border of the Lu Astral Empire, that was when things finally changed.


    There was arge group of Beast Race troops waiting for them.


    It was a group that was ten times bigger than the one that had ambushed them.


    This time, they werepletely surrounded and outnumbered.


    It was just too bad that they gave Lin Fan and his men too much time to prepare.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been idle during the three days that he had been traveling.


    He had been making more of the shells that he had used against the Beast Race when he had been ambushed.


    This time, they were much more familiar with the process and it was easier for them to make these shells.


    Back in the Lin Astral Empire''s capital, most of the time had actually been spent on developing these shells and there had only been a bit of time left for creating shells.


    Now that they had spent all of their time creating these shells, their stock had exploded.


    Lin Fan had loaded up his ship with the materials for these shells, so they had no problem producing without stopping.


    They had more than enough shells to deal with all of the demon beasts around them.


    Without hesitation, the shells started firing out at the waves of demon beasts that surrounded them.


    The demon beasts still charged without hesitation since they had already figured that this was the case. After hearing about Lin Fan''s special weapon, they hade with the n to sacrifice numbers to whittle down the stock of this special weapon.


    The ones that were charging were only the weakest ones among the Beast Race troops.


    But as time passed and they realized that the shells weren''t stopping, the Beast Racemanders realized that they had made a mistake¡­


    So they had no choice but to call a special person toe and help them.


    When this person appeared, they couldn''t help looking at the ck holes that filled the space in front of them in shock. After a long period of silence, that person said, "These are¡­gravity bombs? How are they using gravity bombs?"


    This person was naturally one of the Outer Experts that had been working with the Beast Race. They were even wearing the same battle suit as the other Outers that Lin Fan had encountered before.


    As for the gravity bombs that he mentioned, these were the shells that Lin Fan used.


    The otherw that he had stolen from the Outers was the gravityw from those missiles.


    He had found that this gravityw was very simr to gravity from earth, so he had used his bit of science knowledge and his understanding of this gravityw to create a ck hole generator.


    These ck hole generators were put into the shells that they had and shot out at the enemies, which created the ck holes that swallowed them up. At the same time, there were spatialws at the tip of these shells that shattered through the spatialw barriers the Beast Race troops used.


    These werews from another universe, so the Beast Race also couldn''t figure out how to break through these ck holes.


    That was why they were suffering so much against these shells.


    The Outer Expert quickly went to the front of the lines and raised his hand to shoot out two missiles. These missiles flew into two ck holes that were in front of him before causing them to copse.


    This made the Outer Expert knit his brows even more since this just confirmed that this was indeed the gravityw from his universe if he was able to cancel it like this.


    Could it be that someone had betrayed their universe and was working with the people of this universe?


    As soon as this thought passed through his mind, this Outer Expert wanted to leave.


    He had to report this back to his superiors since this was an important issue, but he couldn''t leave¡­


    That was because Lin Fan had already found him.


    As soon as he saw this Outer Expert appear on the field, Lin Fan hade out of the ship.


    With a wave of his hand, there were spatial distortions that appeared around the Outer Expert.


    When they disappeared, the Outer Expert found that he was in front of Lin Fan.


    After being stunned for a second, the Outer Expert immediately raised his hands to shoot missiles at Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan just simply waved his hand and nothing happened.


    When the Outer Expert looked down, he saw that a few wires in his suit had been cut which caused the missileunchers on his arms to fail.


    Seeing this, the Outer Expert knew that he stood no chance against Lin Fan, so he immediately turned to leave.


    Unfortunately, Lin Fan didn''t give him that chance.


    With a simple wave of his hand, the Outer Expert''s eyes rolled back in their sockets and he fainted. Then with another simple wave of his hand, the Outer Expert disappeared.


    Lin Fan didn''t waste any time and just waved his hand at the ship which led to another barrage of shells shooting at the Beast Race.


    When the Beast Race troops saw this, they immediately started to run.


    Even the Outer Expert had been taken care of, so there was no chance that they would be able to do anything.


    But Lin Fan didn''t show the same mercy as before.


    With a wave of his hand, there was a spatialw barrier that appeared that trapped all of the Beast Race troops.

 Chapter 1125 To War (10)

    ?


    Since it was his job to wipe out these Beast Race troops that were assaulting the Lu Astral Empire, there was no need to show mercy to them.


    He would wipe them all out so that they could no longer harass the Lu Astral Empire.


    Though Lin Fan knew that in terms of all of the Beast Race troops that were assaulting the Lu Astral Empire, this was just a drop in the bucket.


    Still, it would help relieve a bit of pressure in certain ces, so there was no need for him not to ept this gift.


    Since most of the Beast Race troops here were only in the World Realm, he didn''t personally take care of them. He left it to his subordinates who would use this chance to both gain experience while also letting out the tension that had been building up.


    So one could only feel sorry for the Beast Race troops.


    Of course, they were stillpletely outnumbered even if Lin Fan had trapped them.


    He couldn''t just let his subordinates fight them alone since it would be easy for the Beast Race troops to swarm them.


    So while they were fighting, Lin Fan''s subordinates also received cover from the ship.


    Every so often, there would be another new ck hole that appeared.


    Just like this, they were able to slowly wipe out the Beast Race troops.


    At first, the Beast Race troops tried dividing themselves in half. Half of them would face Lin Fan''s subordinates while the other half would focus on destroying the barrier that he created that trapped them.


    This was a good n since only half was needed to deal with the enemies charging at them.


    It was just too bad that they would never be able to destroy Lin Fan''s barrier since he was in the Ruler Realm while they were all in the World Realm. Even when they tried using the Outerws, it still didn''t have any effect at all.


    That was because hepletely outssed them in terms of life energy.


    So eventually, the half that had been sent to stall out Lin Fan''s subordinates were all cut down and the other half was forced to fight as well.


    During this time, there was a group that suddenly arrived on this battlefield.


    But they weren''t reinforcements for the Beast Race.


    Rather, they were an envoy group that hade from the Lu Astral Empire.


    Theposition of this group showed that they had ced quite a bit of importance on this since there were two Rulers that came. At the same time, there was a face that Lin Fan recognized even though it had been five years since they hadst met.


    It was Lu Fei Yu, the princess of the Lu Astral Empire that he had met before.


    He was surprised that even someone like her would be sent here.


    When they arrived, the Ruler Realm Experts were nning on heading to the battlefield to support Lin Fan''s subordinates.


    However, before they could go, they were stopped by Lin Fan.


    When he stopped them, they immediately turned to see him sitting on his ship that was still firing shots out at the Beast Race troops.


    But that wasn''t what shocked them.


    What shocked them¡­or rather shocked the two Ruler Realm Experts was the pressure that they felt from Lin Fan.


    They could tell that Lin Fan was in the Ruler Realm just like them and they had even received a report about this a few days ago, but they never thought that Lin Fan would be able to exert this kind of pressure on him.


    After all, they knew that he had only just recently broken through after five years of closed door cultivation.


    How could a new Ruler Realm Expert like this exert this kind of pressure on them, people who had reached the Ruler Realm for many generations now.


    This just didn''t make sense at all.


    After stopping them, Lin Fan addressed Lu Fei Yu by saying, "Miss Lu, it has been a long time since we''vest met."


    Lu Fei Yu suddenly gave a slight bow before saying, "Young master Lin, it has been a long time."


    They hadn''t talked much in the past, they had only met each other once at the ball held in the Lin Astral Empire.


    But both Lin Fan and Lu Fei Yu had to respect each other''s positions as sessors of their respective Astral Empires. The only problem was that Lin Fan had suddenly jumped over Lu Fei Yu by reaching the Ruler Realm.


    Since that was the case, Lu Fei Yu was now in a weaker position and had to act more humblepared to before.


    But it wasn''t as if she wasn''t convinced of this in her heart.


    She could also feel the pressure that came from Lin Fan¡­it was even greater than the pressure that her two Ruler Realm guards gave her.


    The only reason that these two Ruler Realm Experts had been deployed in the first ce was because they had thought that they would need to rescue Lin Fan.


    They knew that the Beast Race troops would send an ambush for him, so they thought that he would be helpless against them.


    However, Lin Fan''s ship was the first reinforcements from the Lin Astral Empire, so they had no choice but to take this seriously.


    Their Lu Astral Empire was in a dire position where they could lose the fight any day. So if there were any straws for them to grasp at, they would grasp at them.


    That''s why they had been prepared for an arduous fight when they came here. They knew that it was impossible for Lin Fan''s group to fight off all these Beast Race troops, even if Lin Fan had be a Ruler Realm Expert.


    After all, there were just too many of those strangews that they couldn''t break through supporting the Beast Race.


    So they had been prepared to risk their lives to save Lin Fan''s group.


    But what they saw was a cleanup as soon as they arrived.


    There was nothing left for them to do, Lin Fan had already taken care of all of these Beast Race troops. And judging by how rxed he looked, it seemed like he hadn''t even broken a sweat when facing them.


    Even now, they could see that it wasn''t just Lin Fan alone who knew how to counter thews of the Outers. Even his subordinates had the upper hand when fighting the Beast Race troops.


    Lin Fan just stared at them for a bit before suddenly saying, "Miss Lu, do you want to try fighting against the Beast Race as well?"


    When she heard this, Lu Fei Yu couldn''t help being taken aback.


    But in the end, all she could do was reveal a bitter smile as she said, "Thank you for the kind offer young master Lin, but¡­this Lu is not strong enough to fight them."


    Lin Fan just casually said, "Oh, is that so?"


    When she heard this, Lu Fei Yu couldn''t help feeling embarrassed, but that wasn''t Lin Fan''s intention at all.


    He showed this with his next words, "Then do you want to practice fighting them? I''ll teach you how to break the Outerws that they use."


    "Huh?"


    As soon as he said this, all of the members from the Lu Astral Empire group couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with shocked and confused looks. After all, not a single one of them thought that Lin Fan was being serious.


    Lin Fan could see the looks on their faces, so he said, "This is for the preservation of our human race and your Lu Astral Empire is an ally to our Lin Astral Empire, it''s normal that I would share this kind of information."


    Once again, the Lu Astral Empire group looked at Lin Fan with looks of doubt, but that doubt started to fade.


    They could see the serious look that was on Lin Fan''s face and they started to fall for it.


    But in the end, what made Lu Fei Yu agree was her desperation for power. She knew that if they didn''t do anything, their Lu Astral Empire would be destroyed eventually.


    So she had no choice but to bow her head now.


    Lu Fei Yu said, "Young master Lin, if you could share this information with us, we will be eternally grateful to your Lin Astral Empire."


    Lin Fan just waved his hand with a smile before saying, "Now, now, there''s no need to be this serious. It''s just a bit of information shared between allies, it''s not much."


    Then with a wave of his hand, there were several demon beasts that were pulled out of the battlefield. There was a crack in space that formed not far away from them and when it faded, there were several demon beasts that were standing there.


    These demon beasts looked around themselves and couldn''t understand what was happening, that is until they saw Lin Fan sitting there. The moment that they saw him just casually sitting on the ship like that, they immediately raised their guards.


    After all, they recognized him as the enemy leader, the one that had taken out the Outer Expert.


    But Lin Fan just ignored him as he started exining the spatialw to Lu Fei Yu.


    In the middle of this, one of the demon beasts finally couldn''t take it anymore and roared out, "What do you want from us?"


    Lin Fan casually looked at him and said, "You will fight this girl and herrades. If you win, I will let you go. You can use your full power, I won''t stop you."


    As soon as his voice fell, the demon beast that had roared out was already flying out with a gun in his hand. He pointed it at Lu Fei Yu and pulled the trigger.

 Chapter 1126 To War (11)

    ?


    The moment that the trigger was pulled, there were cracks that formed in space.


    Lu Fei Yu immediately released her life energy to form a barrier in front of her, but there was a grim look on her face.


    That was because she knew that she wouldn''t be able to resist this attack at such a short range with this weak barrier that she had quickly formed. At the very least, she would be heavily injured by this and at worst, she would die from being hit with this attack.


    She never thought that this would be the way that she would die¡­


    But before the cracks in space could reach her, there were more cracks in space that suddenly formed in front of her.


    The cracks in space mmed into each other and then froze there in space.


    Then there was a ck hole that suddenly appeared that swallowed all of the cracks in space before disappearing as well.


    With how suddenly it had all disappeared, it was as if nothing had happened in the first ce. It was as if those cracks had never appeared at all.


    The demon beast that had fired the gun just stared at where the cracks had been in shock, but before he could do anything else, he felt a powerful pressure fall onto him.


    When he looked at the source of the pressure, all he saw was Lin Fan waving his hand.


    Then there was nothing but ck as his consciousness had faded.


    With a single wave of his hand, the demon beast had been turned to smithereens and disappeared without a trace just like the cracks in space from before.


    The Beast Race troops that saw this were all shocked before quickly bowing down in submission.


    They knew that what had happened could happen to them in an instant, so they immediately showed their submission for their lives.


    At the same time, the group from the Lu Astral Empire couldn''t help staring at where the demon beast had been just a few seconds ago with shocked looks.


    If it wasn''t for the gun that was still floating there in space, they wouldn''t have believed that there was anything there just a few seconds ago.


    Lin Fan then casually said, "Who told you to jump the gun? Wait until she''s ready and then attack her."


    With a snort, he ignored the rest of the Beast Race troops and turned his attention back to Lu Fei Yu.


    Lu Fei Yu and the rest of the Lu Astral Empire group looked at him with a very strange look.


    They weren''t fools and knew right away that what had happened had been because of Lin Fan.


    However, it was clear from the looks on their faces that they didn''t expect him to have this kind of power. After all, what had been used to counter the Outerw was the same Outerw used.


    How was he able to control the Outerw and use it with such ease?


    It seemed that there were many unanswered questions about this crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire.


    But they didn''t have time to ask anything as Lin Fan was already pushing forward on his own.


    He turned back to Lu Fei Yu and started exining something.


    At first, they were still in a daze over what had happened. But the more he exined, the more they started paying attention to him.


    That was because they couldn''t believe what they were hearing.


    Lin Fan was telling them the structure of the Outer spatialw and how to break it.


    With this information, there was no doubt that they would be able to push back the Beast Race troops. But this was also without a doubt precious information that should have cost many lives to get.


    They couldn''t believe that Lin Fan was willing to give up something this precious so easily.


    As he spoke, they carefully listened so that they remembered everything. There were even a few of them that started taking out notepads to jot down some notes on what he had just said.


    Once they were done, the looks of admiration and gratitude on their faces were very clear.


    Lu Fei Yu hesitated a bit before suddenly asking, "Why did you tell us this?"


    The others from the Lu Astral Empire group immediately looked at her with gazes that seemed to be telling her to be silent, but she had already asked this question and there was no taking it back.


    So the only thing that they could do was wait and see what Lin Fan''s answer would be.


    Lin Fan''s answer just shocked them even more.


    With a casual shrug, Lin Fan said, "It''s just a bit of minor information, it''s not that big of a deal. You''re our ally, so it''s fine for us to share this information with each other."


    They just looked at Lin Fan with confused and shocked looks.


    After all, this minor bit of information ording to him was something that would be the key to saving their entire Astral Empire. With this, they would be able to fight back against the Beast Race that were invading their territory.


    This was information that could have been traded for countless benefits since it was their lives that they were trading with.


    But to Lin Fan, it was such a simple thing that he told them without any hesitation.


    If this was a small thing, then what would be considered arge thing for him?


    The end of the world?


    They just really couldn''t understand Lin Fan''s thought process.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about their thought process either and just said, "Go on, try it out."


    He pointed at the Beast Race troops in front of them as he said this.


    The group from the Lu Astral Empire turned to look at the Beast Race troops before remembering what Lin Fan had said before.


    Now they understood why he had said all that before.


    He had specifically captured these Beast Race troops just for them. He wanted to give them a target to apply the things that they had just learned from him.


    He had already prepared for everything when he had captured the Beast Race troops.


    They couldn''t help turning back to look at Lin Fan with looks of admiration and awe.


    Lin Fan just floated there with a calm look on his face, as if he was waiting for something.


    Then they realized that he was waiting for them to finish off the Beast Race troops and they quickly turned their attention back to them.


    Since they had figured out how this strange Outer spatialw worked, then there was nothing holding them back anymore.


    So Lu Fei Yu and the others all came forward to fight the Beast Race troops.


    The Beast Race troops hesitated at first as they remembered what had happened to the one of them that had attacked early. But seeing the look on Lin Fan''s face that seemed like he didn''t care, they realized that it should be fine for them to attack now.


    So without any further hesitation, they all pulled out guns that were simr to the one used before, the gun that was still floating there in space.


    As soon as they pulled the trigger, there were cracks that formed in the space in front of them that started moving towards Lu Fei Yu''s group.


    When they saw these cracksing at them, they couldn''t help hesitating a bit.


    It would be a lie to say that these cracks hadn''t formed a small trauma on them.


    This was what had caused so much trouble and pain for their Lu Astral Empire, so they couldn''t help feeling a bit of fear towards these cracks in space.


    But remembering what Lin Fan had taught them, they steeled their hearts and raised their weapons.


    Following what Lin Fan had taught them, they moved in a specific way until they were in the position that Lin Fan had told them about. Once they were in these positions, they gathered their life energy and attacked in specific spots.


    They all had worried looks on their faces as they swung out, but they found that their worries had been unfounded. Everything that Lin Fan had taught them was true.


    The moment that their weapons made contact with the cracks in space, they immediately shattered those cracks. Then without any resistance at all, they cut right through the spatialw wall that had been heading towards them.


    After they had all cut through the spatialw wall, they couldn''t help looking down at their weapons before looking up at the Beast Race troops in front of them. One could see the shock and disbelief that was on the faces of both sides.


    But then, that shock and disbelief disappeared from the faces of those from the Lu Astral Empire. It was soon reced with a look of excitement and joy as they chased down these Beast Race troops.


    The Beast Race troops revealed looks of horror and immediately turned to run, but it was no use.


    Lin Fan had chosen those with weaker cultivation than the members of the Lu Astral Empire group.


    So in terms of power, the Beast Race troops were weaker.


    The only reason that they had been able to threaten the Lu Astral Empire group was because of the strangews that they used.


    Once those strangews were taken out of the equation, they didn''t threaten them at all.


    So it turned into a one sided ughter that also counted towards helping the Lu Astral Empire group vent all their feelings.

 Chapter 1127 To War (12)

    ?


    Lin Fan wasn''t surprised at all seeing this one sided ughter.


    In fact, he would have been surprised if he didn''t see this one sided ughter.


    After all, he had already fed the Lu Astral Empire group everything that they had needed to beat the Beast Race troops through a spoon. If they still couldn''t take care of the Beast Race troops after all of this, they would have been too disappointing.


    He might even have to reconsider working with them against the Beast Race.


    But he wasn''t let down by them as they quickly caught on to the tricks behind the Outerws.


    So at the very least, they were capable of learning.


    Once they finished taking care of the Beast Race troops, the Lu Astral Empire group looked like they still wanted to fight.


    They looked around to see that Lin Fan''s subordinates were still fighting the Beast Race troops, or rather they were still cleaning them up.


    Seeing this, they revealed excited looks before turning back to Lin Fan.


    With the way that they looked at him, it was almost as if they were asking him something.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile before saying, "Do what you want."


    Then with a wave of his hand, the Lu Astral Empire group disappeared.


    When they reappeared, they were now in the middle of the battle.


    They had all been spread apart due to Lin Fan teleporting them, but they didn''t care since they understood what he was doing. He had teleported each of them over to one of his subordinates so that they could work together with them against the Beast Race troops.


    Just like this, they didn''t hesitate to attack the Beast Race.


    Lin Fan''s subordinates had been surprised to see these members of the Lu Astral Empire group appear out of nowhere, but seeing that they were helping them fight the Beast Race, they didn''t mind it.


    Just like this, the ughter of the remaining Beast Race troops happened much faster.


    In less than half an hour, all of these Beast Race troops were ughtered.


    It was tiring work, but they had a satisfied look on their face when they finished.


    For both Lin Fan''s subordinates and the Lu Astral Empire group, they had suppressed the feelings that they had towards the Beast Race for a long time. They hadn''t been able to do anything to them, so they hadn''t been able to vent these feelings.


    But now¡­Lin Fan gave them this chance, so they wouldn''t let it go.


    After they were done, Lin Fan shook his head with a sigh before waving his hand to bring them all back.


    When they appeared in front of Lin Fan again, Lu Fei Yu was the first one to react. She immediately came forward to cup her hand and give a bow before saying, "Young master Lin, thank you for giving us this opportunity. At the same time, thank you for helping our Lu Astral Empire. If it wasn''t for the information that you gave us, our Lu Astral Empire would have been doomed."


    Following her, the Lu Astral Empire group all bowed to Lin Fan as well.


    Even the Ruler Realm Experts bowed to him, though when it came to rank, they wouldn''t need to.


    They were Ruler Realm Experts just like Lin Fan, so there was no need for them to be over courteous towards him. Though the reason that they bowed to him in the first ce was because of the respect that they felt for him.


    Lin Fan just casually waved his hand and said, "It''s nothing, it''s just helping an ally with a bit of information."


    When they heard this, they all couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with further looks of admiration.


    He wasn''t disdaining them, but rather he really was just acting humble when it came to this matter. For him, it really was like a small matter that didn''t matter.


    Lin Fan then changed the topic by saying, "Should we head to your Lu Astral Empire capital now? If we stay here any longer, more Beast Race troops wille and ambush us again."


    When the Lu Astral Empire group heard this, they immediately went on alert since they knew that Lin Fan was right.


    They had already stayed here for quite a while and had wiped out the Beast Race troops.


    The Beast Racemand should have lost contact with the group that hade here for the ambush. It wouldn''t take long for them to send a scout to find out what happened here.


    It was also impossible to hide the fact that the Beast Race troops here had been ughtered, so there was no doubt that more Beast Race troops would being to take care of them.


    So they needed to get out of here while they still could.


    Lu Fei Yu gave a nod and said, "Please follow our ship. We''ll bring you to one of the transport gates nearby and use that to head back to our Lu Astral Empire''s capital."


    Lin Fan just simply gave a nod before turning around to head back into his ship.


    The Lu Astral Empire group was surprised by how direct Lin Fan was, but then they couldn''t help revealing looks of admiration.


    Lin Fan was clearly a man of action rather than words, this was something that was truly admirable.


    They didn''t waste any time in getting into their ship and then they lockedmunications with Lin Fan''s ship so that they could stillmunicate with each other.


    Then when they set off, the Lu Astral Empire ship found¡­that Lin Fan''s shippletely disappeared from sight.


    Just with a single blink, Lin Fan''s ship was gone from sight.


    The Lu Astral Empire group was shocked when they saw this and they didn''t know how to react to this.


    But then Lin Fan''s ship appeared in sight again, it was as if they had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.


    Lin Fan''s voice came from themunicator and he said, "Miss Lu, why aren''t you moving your ship?"


    When the Lu Astral Empire group heard this, they couldn''t help revealing three ck lines on their foreheads.


    Just what was this person talking about?


    They were already pushing their ship at max speed, but it had been left behind in the dust by Lin Fan''s ship.


    This was already the top of the ss ship for their Lu Astral Empire. They had been given special permission to take this because of the importance of their mission. Otherwise, even Lu Fei Yu who was the crown princess wasn''t authorized to use something like this.


    Was the Lin Astral Empire''s technology really that advancedpared to their own?


    Lu Fei Yu just said in an awkward voice, "Young master Lin, this is already as fast as our ship can go."


    There was a moment of silence before Lin Fan''s voice came through again to say, "Oh."


    When they heard this, all of them couldn''t stop the three ck lines from appearing on their faces again.


    In the end, Lin Fan said, "We''ll slow our ship down so that we can match your speed. Is that alright?"


    If it was anyone else asking them this, they might have taken this as an insult.


    However, they knew that Lin Fan was being serious when he asked them this question, so Lu Fei Yu calmly said, "Thank you, young master Lin. That will be fine."


    Lin Fan just gave a casual ''un'' before cutting off themunication line.


    Once it went silent, the Lu Astral Empire group couldn''t help giving a sigh again.


    It seemed that they really couldn''tpare to the Lin Astral Empire when it came to anything.


    Still, they were at least allied to the Lin Astral Empire which gave them hope.


    As long as they stuck with the Lin Astral Empire, they might be able to gain some of this technology from them.


    So for now, they needed to show the Lin Astral Empire that their Lu Astral Empire was worth cooperating with.


    With this thought, the Lu Astral Empire group focused themselves on showing Lin Fan''s ship the way.


    On his ship, Lin Fan couldn''t help being surprised by the response that he got from the Lu Astral Empire.


    Max speed?


    Were these ships really that slow now?


    Why was his ship so much faster then?


    Lin Fan didn''t realize that in the five years that he was gone, the engineers had been working on his ship the entire time. They had continued to upgrade his ship with the ship parts that he had found before.


    His ship was now far beyond any other ship that the Lin Astral Empire had, so it wasn''t surprising that it had reached this level. Even the most elite ships of the Lin Astral Empire wouldn''t be able to catch his ship, even though they had been modified as well based on what they had learned from the Outer ship parts.


    So there was no need to mention this Lu Astral Empire ship.


    It didn''t take them long since they were going at full speed to keep up with Lin Fan''s ship the entire time.


    When they arrived at the with the transport gate, it didn''t take them any time to enter it either since the clearance had already been prepared.


    In fact, it was a royal decree that Lin Fan''s ship be allowed to pass since the Lu Astral Emperor already knew about his arrival.


    They wanted to bring Lin Fan to their capital as soon as possible.

 Chapter 1128 To War (13)

    ?


    When they arrived in orbit of the Lu Astral Empire''s capital, they were immediately greeted by a fleet that was waiting there.


    This fleet didn''t take any action when they saw Lin Fan''s ship and even opened a path up for him.


    It seemed that they were all here to act as an escort just in case anything happened, but Lin Fan knew that it had a different meaning. They were most likely here to protect the capital from the approaching Beast Race troops.


    Lin Fan had never thought that the situation in the Lu Astral Empire had actually gotten this serious¡­


    It seemed like he had gotten here in just the nick of time.


    When Lin Fan''s shipnded on the Lu Astral Empire''s capital, he found that there was arge crowd that had gathered.


    Once he came out of the ship, there was a loud cheer that rang out for him.


    Lin Fan slightly knitted his brows when he saw this, but seeing the people out there cheering for him, he had no choice but to put on a smile and wave at them.


    With his fine sense, he could tell that there were people that were out there keeping guard so it wasn''t a problem to have so many people gathered like this. There shouldn''t be a problem even if someone wanted to try something, since most of the guards were elites.


    Aftering out, Lu Fei Yu''s group also came over to them and walked along with them. At the same time, she waved out to the crowd along with Lin Fan.


    With the way that they were walking, it was almost as if they were very close.


    It seemed like a fake way of making it seem like their Lu Astral Empire had already built close bonds with the Lin Astral Empire.


    Still, Lin Fan didn''t mind this since he hade to the Lu Astral Empire to help them. At the same time, they were allies to begin with, so showing a close bond was a good thing.


    The only thing that Lin Fan didn''t like about this was how the Lu Astral Empire had brought out all these shy decorations.


    He could see the squalor of the city around him, so he knew that they were in a tough spot. In this situation, they were forcing the citizens to bring out these kinds of expensive things to wee them¡­


    It was clear that the Lu Astral Empire didn''t treasure their people as much as the Lin Astral Empire.


    After all, when the people of the Lin Astral Empire sent him off, they had only brought their homemade signs and other homemade things. The Lin Astral Emperor didn''t give a decree that would harm his citizens like the Lu Astral Emperor would.


    But it wasn''t his ce to say anything about the Lu Astral Empire.


    They were sent here to cooperate with them and not judge them.


    Since there was already an alliance with the Lu Astral Empire, there had to be some upside to it.


    Lin Fan decided to trust the Lin Astral Emperor''s decision on this matter.


    After making their way through the crowd, they were quickly led by someone who was dressed as a minister.


    When Lin Fan saw this minister, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows again.


    That was because he could see that the minister was wearing quite fancy clothes even though it was clear that the Lu Astral Empire was suffering from the Beast Race invasion.


    It seemed that it wasn''t just the royal family that was the problem, the ruling nobles were also a problem¡­


    But he endured this since he knew that this wasn''t something that he should address right now.


    Once the Beast Race invasion was over, he would have some things to say.


    But before that, they needed to take care of the Beast Race first.


    It didn''t take them long to reach the pce and Lin Fan was brought to the throne room.


    In the Lin Astral Empire, the throne room wasn''t used as much since the Lin Astral Emperor disliked using it. But here, it was clear by the decorations in this throne room that the Lu Astral Emperor very much liked showing it off.


    Once he arrived, Lin Fan just stood in front of the Lu Astral Emperor and gave a slight bow to him.


    When the ministers and generals around him saw this, they couldn''t help revealing displeased looks. Though when it came to etiquette, this was all that Lin Fan was required to do as both the crown prince of the Lin Astral Empire and as a Ruler Realm Expert.


    The Lu Astral Emperor at the very least understood this and raised his hand to settle his generals and ministers.


    Then the Lu Astral Emperor said with a smile, "Young master Lin, it is an honour for our Lu Astral Empire to have youe here. We hope that this will increase the bond between our Lu Astral Empire and your Lin Astral Empire."


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response to this, he didn''t say anything else.


    At this, the ministers and generals once again revealed dissatisfied looks. There were even a few of them that wanted to step forward to say a few things, but the Lu Astral Emperor once again raised his hand to stop them.


    The Lu Astral Emperor looked at Lin Fan as if he was sizing him up before finally saying, "Then young master Lin, I have to thank you for the information that you have given us. With this, we will surely have greater efforts in our fight against the Beast Race troops."


    The Lu Astral Emperor knew this because Lu Fei Yu had reported back while they had been traveling.


    So the method of fighting against the strange Outerws have already been tested and they have proven effective.


    At the very least, they had to thank Lin Fan for giving them this information since now they will be able to fight back against the Beast Race.


    Lin Fan once again gave a simple nod as if this was a very simple matter.


    At that, the throne room fell into silence.


    But to everyone''s surprise, Lin Fan was the one that broke this silence.


    Lin Fan cupped his hands and said, "Your majesty, I wish for your permission to enter your Lu Astral Empire''s battlefields."


    When the ministers and generals heard this, they all couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    After all, this was not something that they had expected to hear.


    Even the Lu Astral Emperor in all his wisdom couldn''t help being taken aback.


    After a moment of silence, the Lu Astral Emperor slowly asked, "Young master Lin, you''re saying that you¡­want to enter the battlefields of our Lu Astral Empire? May I ask what is your reason for this?"


    Lin Fan just said in a calm voice, "This is a battle that will decide the fate of the human race, naturally I have my own duty to fight on the battlefield."


    The Lu Astral Emperor slightly knitted his brows when he heard this before asking, "Then why not fight the Beast Race troops invading the Lin Astral Empire? I''m sure that there are also Beast Race troops who are currently invading the Lin Astral Empire as well."


    Lin Fan revealed a smile and said, "Well, it''s hard to fight on the frontlines when you have to worry about your back."


    The moment that they heard this, all of the Lu Astral Empire''s ministers and generals seemed like they were about to explode.


    They immediately understood what Lin Fan was implying with these words.


    He was saying that because of the Lu Astral Empire''s ipetence, he had no choice but toe here and help them instead of fighting the Beast Race invading the Lin Astral Empire.


    Even the Lu Astral Emperor couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows when he heard this.


    This caused a bit of pressure to fall onto Lin Fan, but hepletely ignored it.


    If one looked closely, they could see a thinyer of ck energy that was currently around him.


    But in the end, the Lu Astral Emperor calmed down and said, "Very well, you may enter our Lu Astral Empire''s battlefields."


    That was because he had to admit that Lin Fan was right.


    The Lu Astral Empire had been pushed back much further than any other Astral Empire, mainly because of the special cultivation technique of the Lu Astral Family. Their cultivation technique was very weak against the Outerws that the Beast Race troops used.


    This was no time to care about their pride when their Astral Empire was about to fall.


    Even if the Lu Astral Emperor was someone that treated his citizens poorly, he was still an Astral Emperor. He knew what he needed to do to take care of his nation and he could put down his pride when he needed to.


    The generals and ministers looked like they wanted to say something, but they all swallowed their words in the end since they too knew what kind of situation their Lu Astral Empire was in.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a look of newfound appreciation for the Lu Astral Emperor.


    It seemed that he had to raise his evaluation of him.


    It wouldn''t be by much, but at the very least, he could be considered apetent ruler.


    With this, Lin Fan gave another slight bow to the Lu Astral Emperor before saying, "Please send me the information that I request and I''ll be setting off soon."


    Then without waiting to be dismissed, Lin Fan walked out of the throne room.

 Chapter 1129 To War (14)

    ?


    Once Lin Fan left the throne room, there was a silence that followed.


    But then all of the ministers and generals couldn''t help venting the feelings that they felt towards Lin Fan.


    The arrogance that he had, the way that he had med them for being weak, the way that he almost ordered them to do what he wanted them to do. All of this really got under their skin and annoyed these proud generals and ministers.


    However, even if they did all this to vent, there was no realint that they had since Lin Fan was right.


    He was here to help them, that was the bottom line.


    So he was fully justified to act arrogantly if he wanted to, especially since the information that he had and the power he had demonstrated made it clear that he would be able to change the tide of the battle.


    Since they couldn''t vent themselves, they all turned to Lu Fei Yu to vent.


    After all, it was because of her report that they had already formed an impression of Lin Fan.


    They had wanted to treat him based on that impression, but it turned out that this impression was wrong in the first ce.


    So they could only me Lu Fei Yu who had given them this misconception in the first ce.


    Lu Fei Yu just said with a bitter smile, "That was how he acted when we met him. I just reported everything that I saw, I can''t help it if he acted differently from how he acted around me." Then after a pause, Lu Fei Yu added, "I''m sure that young master Lin has a reason for acting this way."


    "You''re still defending him!"


    "Are you from the Lin Astral Family or the Lu Astral Family!"


    "I think you might as well change your surname to Lin at this point!"


    The ministers and generals all threw theirints on Lu Fei Yu which made the bitter smile on her face even wider.


    But in the end, the Lu Astral Emperor mmed his fist on the armrest of his throne and he said in amanding voice, "Enough!"


    The moment that his powerful voice rang out, all of the ministers and generals fell silent.


    The Lu Astral Emperor''s eyes swept across everyone in the room which caused them to look down from the pressure he exerted on them.


    Finally the Lu Astral Emperor gave a snort before saying, "If it wasn''t for all of your ipetence, would we be in this situation? If it wasn''t for you failing in all of the tasks given to you, would others be able to look down on us?"


    The moment that he said this, all of the ministers and generals looked down again.


    After all, he was right¡­


    It was their fault that their Lu Astral Empire was in this situation in the first ce, so if they wanted to me anyone, they should be ming themselves. But not a single one of them wanted to take this me, which was why they had been venting on Lin Fan the entire time.


    The Lu Astral Emperor saw that not a single one of them dared to look up, so he said with a sigh, "If you don''t get your act together, we might not even be worthy of allying with the Lin Astral Empire at this rate. When that timees¡­"


    He didn''t finish his sentence, but the implied meaning was clear.


    All of the ministers and generals couldn''t help feeling a shiver run down their spine.


    They had seen how excellent Lin Fan was and whenparing Lu Fei Yu to him¡­it was a bit disappointing.


    But they were the future rulers of their respective Astral Empires, so if Lu Fei Yu was inferior to Lin Fan¡­that would mean a bad future for them.


    One of the ministers suddenly raised his head and gave a bold suggestion, "Should we¡­take care of the scion of the Lin Astral Empire before he goes back. Should we prepare some kind of ident for him?"


    There was a long silence that followed after the minister said this.


    But then all of a sudden, there was a powerful pressure that fell onto this minister that crushed him into the ground.


    The moment that the other ministers and generals felt this, they immediately trembled and moved away from that minister.


    The Lu Astral Emperor gave a snort before saying, "Dismiss this fool and throw his whole family out."


    The guards quickly came forward to take the minister who had been knocked out away.


    Once he was gone, the Lu Astral Emperor''s eyes swept over the hall again as he said, "Are there any other fools here?"


    At this question, all of the ministers and generals quickly shook their heads before lowering them to pretend that they were invisible.


    The Lu Astral Emperor gave a snort again before saying, "That Lin Fan was even able to confidently go against the pressure that I put on him, so his power isn''t weak. If we want to even hurt him, we would have to move one of the ancestors and the Lin Astral Empire won''t sit still if that happens. So even if we wanted to do something to him, it would be impossible for us."


    When the ministers and generals heard this, they couldn''t help breaking out in a cold sweat again.


    After all, they never thought that the Lu Astral Emperor would actually admit something like this.


    But if he actually admitted this, then there was no doubt that this was true¡­


    So this made them even more fearful of Lin Fan.


    The Lu Astral Emperor said after a pause, "The only way forward for us is to build a closer rtionship with the Lin Astral Empire, with that Lin Fan. If I hear any more foolish ideas, you can be sure that I won''t spare any more fools."


    The ministers and generals all nodded when they heard this.


    The Lu Astral Emperor was about to say something else, but there was a voice that suddenly cut in, "Royal father, may I have permission to follow young master Lin onto the battlefield."


    When this voice rang out, everyone couldn''t help turning in the direction that it came from with surprised looks.


    That was because the one that had spoken was Lu Fei Yu.


    After looking at Lu Fei Yu with a surprised look, the Lu Astral Emperor suddenly revealed a wide smile.


    He never thought that this daughter of his would take this kind of prerogative and offer to go to the battlefield like this.


    After all, the other n that he had was to get Lu Fei Yu closer to Lin Fan.


    Only then would their Lu Astral Empire be able to ally themselves with the Lin Astral Empire in the future.


    This would be dangerous, but if Lu Fei Yu followed Lin Fan, he was certain that she would be safe. After all, the feeling that he got from Lin Fan wasn''t normal.


    He wasn''t sure what it was, but even the Lu Astral Emperor felt threatened by Lin Fan even though he was a junior.


    So he was certain that Lu Fei Yu would be safe with him.


    After a moment of silence, the Lu Astral Emperor still said with a serious tone, "This will be a very dangerous matter. Are you sure that you wish to follow him?"


    Lu Fei Yu nodded without hesitation as she said, "Young master Lin is helping out Lu Astral Empire, how can I hide in the capital. I should head to the battlefield with him and fight for our Lu Astral Empire."


    The Lu Astral Emperor gave a satisfied nod when he heard this before saying, "You are free to follow him onto the battlefield." Then after a pause, his voice softened a bit before he said, "Just look after yourself, alright?"


    Even if he was the Astral Emperor, it didn''t change the fact that Lu Fei Yu was his daughter.


    That was right, Lu Fei Yu was the Lu Astral Emperor''s daughter and not his granddaughter.


    That was because this Lu Astral Emperor was one that had taken the throne not that long ago. He was still quite the young Astral Emperor, so his mind had flexibility that some of the older ones wouldn''t.


    That was how he had thought of the n to befriend Lin Fan right away.


    He had even thought about engaging Lu Fei Yu with him to secure an alliance with the Lin Astral Empire, but that was only a thought. After all, it wasn''t that simple to engage people when they had these statuses.


    Plus there was a part of him that didn''t want to let his daughter go¡­


    But most of it was because he knew that it would be impossible without causing arge fuss.


    Since he had given his permission, Lu Fei Yu didn''t stay here any longer.


    She gave a bow to the Lu Astral Emperor before leaving the throne room as well.


    The two Ruler Realm Experts who had been guarding her the entire time looked at the Lu Astral Emperor with hesitant looks. When they saw him nod at them, they gave a slight bow to the Lu Astral Emperor before following Lu Fei Yu out.


    As for the rest of the ministers and generals, they just stood there awkwardly.


    Since the Lu Astral Emperor didn''t say a thing, it wasn''t as if they could just excuse themselves.


    Finally, the Lu Astral Emperor waved his hand and said, "Get out."


    The ministers and generals didn''t waste a single second in leaving.


    With the way that they scattered, it was almost as if their lives had been pardoned.


    But the Lu Astral Emperor just sat there with a deep look in his eyes.

 Chapter 1130 To War (15)

    ?


    After returning to his ship, Lin Fan couldn''t help being impressed by the speed that the Lu Astral Empire sent over the reports that he had asked for.


    In less than half an hour, Lu Fei Yu had personally delivered the reports that he had asked for about the situation of the various battlefields across the Lu Astral Empire.


    As he went through these reports, he couldn''t help being surprised by how detailed they were.


    He had thought that it would take much longer for them to bring it here and that these reports would have far less details than this. He had assumed that the Lu Astral Empire would even be wary of them and would send people to watch them as they read these reports.


    But he was pleasantly surprised to find that this wasn''t the case.


    Even if there were some aspects of the Lu Astral Empire that he didn''t like, he had no choice but to admire the determination and efficiency that they had.


    Though if he had to guess, he would guess that it was most likely rted to Lu Fei Yu who personally came to deliver these reports.


    It was impossible for Lu Fei Yu to have ess to these kinds of reports, even if she was the crown princess of the Lu Astral Empire. There had to be someone backing her who had authorized these reports to be brought here.


    The only one in the entire Lu Astral Empire who could do this was the Lu Astral Emperor.


    So even if there were some parts of the Lu Astral Emperor''s personality that he didn''t like, he still had to admire the determination and decisiveness of this Astral Emperor. It was no wonder he was able to take the throne at such a young age.


    After going through all of the reports, Lin Fan was able to quicklye to a decision about which battlefield he was going to.


    He was going to go to a battlefield on the border, but it wasn''t the border that one thought he cared about.


    Rather than going to the battlefield on the border of the Lin Astral Empire, Lin Fan was nning to head to the battlefield near the border of the Wang Astral Empire.


    The Wang Astral Empire was the other Astral Empire that the Lin Astral Empire had an alliance with.


    They were holding out much better than the Lu Astral Empire, but it wasn''t by much. They were still struggling against the Beast Race troops that were currently invading their territory.


    Compared to the Lin Astral Family with their voidws, thews of the Wang Astral Family were badly matched against the Outerws like the Lu Astral Family. Still, the Wang Astral Family was able to hold out better which showed their strength.


    He was nning on going to this border to kill two birds with one stone.


    Not only would he exterminate a bunch of Beast Race troops in the Lu Astral Empire''s territory, he would also take this chance to help the Wang Astral Empire if he could.


    If both of their allies could rebuild their strength, when the Lin Astral Empire pushed back the Beast Race troops under Lin Fan''s guidance, it would be easier for them to take down the Beast Race troops with the help of these allies.


    So Lin Fan was already thinking about the future.


    Since he had already decided where he would be going, there was no time to waste in the Lu Astral Empire''s capital.


    Lu Fei Yu was surprised to see how decisive Lin Fan was, but she also showed how decisive she was by saying to Lin Fan, "Young master Lin, I would like to go with you to the battlefield."


    Lin Fan was of course surprised by this request, but he didn''t have anything against it.


    After all, this was the Lu Astral Empire''s territory, so it wasn''t strange that Lu Fei Yu would want to join the fight.


    However, the one problem that he had was¡­that her ship was too slow.


    If he had to slow down for her ship to catch up to his, it would take them forever to reach the battlefield.


    So Lin Fan just simply said, "You can all ride on my ship."


    Lu Fei Yu and her group revealed bitter smiles when they heard this, but there was no argument for them to refute this with. After all, it was true that their ship was much slower than Lin Fan''s ship.


    With Lin Fan''s ship, they were able to reach the battlefield in just a few hours.


    Though it wasn''t just the ship that they used to travel there. They also used the Lu Astral Empire''swork of transport gates to get there faster.


    The Lu Astral Emperor had given them a decree that allowed them to freely use these transport gates.


    When they arrived, the first thing that they saw were explosions that appeared in the distance. The sound soon followed after as many different sounds of explosions rang out.


    It seemed that the battle was still ongoing and the fighting was quite fierce.


    Since they were fighting, there was no need for them to hesitate.


    Lin Fan had the crew drive the ship right in the direction of the explosions and with the ship''s speed, it didn''t take them long to see the scene of the battle.


    This wasn''t like one of the smaller battles that Lin Fan had fought in where they wouldnd ons. Rather this was arge scale battle that involved both experts and ships.


    There were experts that floated there in space and behind them wererge ships with cannons pointed at the enemy. These ships provided cover fire while the experts fought each other.


    On the side of the Beast Race, there wererge flying demon beasts that had other Beast Race troops on them.


    So instead of ship cannons providing support fire, it was the Beast Race troops themselves providing cover fire with their attacks.


    It was arge scale engagement with many different explosions ringing out through space.


    It was so wide that it even covered the space in between three differents, which was why they didn''tnd on a single to fight. There were countless millions of experts that were engaged inbat right now.


    This was a scale of fighting that Lin Fan had never experienced before.


    Even if he wanted to take down the Beat Race troops, this was one time where he had to admit that he wouldn''t be able to do everything alone.


    After all, there was no way that the spatialw that he controlled would be able to trap all of the Beast Race troops across thisrge space.


    So instead of wiping them outpletely, what he could do was take down the topmanders.


    Once they were taken down, all he would need to do was let the rest of the Lu Astral Empire troops take care of the Beast Race troops. He would also be sending Lu Fei Yu''s group to teach each of the divisions of the Lu Astral Empire army how to defeat the Outerws.


    Once they learned this, the troops of the Lu Astral Empire army would be able to easily take out the Beast Race troops.


    Lu Fei Yu looked like she wanted to go with Lin Fan, but in the end, she had no choice but to ept his n. After all, she had promised that she would follow his orders on this battlefield and at the same time, she knew that this was the best n.


    With her power, she knew that she would just be a burden to Lin Fan instead of helping him.


    So before leaving, all she could say was, "Good luck."


    Lin Fan gave a nod back and said back to her, "Good luck to you too."


    Lu Fei Yu departed with an unwilling look and after she was gone, Lin Fan could feel two gazes piercing into him.


    He turned to find that it was Ang and Zi Ling who were ring at him like this, though he didn''t really understand what he had done to deserve this.


    Still, there was no time to think about that right now.


    After having the crew of his ship scan the battlefield, Lin Fan quickly found the one that he was looking for.


    That was because the ship had been upgraded with Outerw tracking technology.


    Lin Fan obtained many weapons from the Outers, so eventually they were able to tune their sensors to the frequency from those weapons. Once they removed the weaker frequencies and only tuned in on the frequencies of the battle suits that Lin Fan had brought back, they were able to create an Outerw tracker.


    Lin Fan knew that wherever there was an Outer Expert, there would be leaders of the Beast Race with them.


    As long as he found this Outer Expert, he would be able to find the Beast Race leaders that he wanted to take down.


    Since they were so close, Lin Fan didn''t bother using the ship to go to them and just directly used his spatialw to teleport over.


    When he appeared out of nowhere, the Beast Race troops couldn''t help being shocked.


    After all, this ce was the backline of the Beast Race formation.


    There shouldn''t be a single human here.


    The Beast Race leader looked at Lin Fan with an inquisitive look before asking, "Who are you?"


    Lin Fan just smiled and said, "The one to kill you."

 Chapter 1131 To War (16)

    ?


    When the Beast Race troops heard this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    They all looked at Lin Fan as if they were trying to figure out if he was being serious or not, but then they suddenly burst out inughter. After all, there was no way that it seemed likely that he would be able to do that.


    Lin Fan had appeared right in the center of the Beast Race formation, where the leaders of the Beast Race troops were.


    These leaders of the Beast Race troops were by no means weak since the Beast Race ran on thew of the jungle. Only those that were powerful would be able to lead in the Beast Race.


    So these leaders were some of the strongest members of their respective races.


    There were three of them here, so that meant that there were three Ruler Realm Beasts that were standing in front of Lin Fan. Not to mention, these were not weak Ruler Realm Beasts that had just reached the Ruler Realm.


    These were old monsters that had been in the Ruler Realm for a long time.


    Though they weren''t absolute freaks that were at the peak of the Ruler Realm, they should still be much stronger than someone who had just reached the Ruler Realm like Lin Fan.


    As veteran Ruler Realm Experts, they could naturally tell that Lin Fan had just reached the Ruler Realm and didn''t have as powerful life energy as them. Logically speaking, it should be easy for even one of them to take him down.


    However, they didn''t look down on Lin Fan since they felt a sense of dangering from him.


    They didn''t know where it came from, but they could tell that there was something different about Lin Fan.


    So they didn''t dare look down on him too much.


    Though they couldn''t help themselves since the way that he had dered this was just too funny.


    At the same time, the Outer Expert who had been with them couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    That was because he could feel a strange feelinging from Lin Fan.


    It was a very familiar feeling¡­like it came from his universe.


    So the Outer Expert didn''t waste any time in using his scanners on Lin Fan.


    Afterughing for a bit, one of the Beast Race leaders, arge lion said, "You''re going to do what to us now? Do you really think that you can do anything when you''re surrounded like this?"


    Another one of the Beast Race leaders, who was arge bat, gave a screechingugh before saying, "Human, if you submit now, I''ll make you my pet. How about it, will you ept my proposal?"


    The voice that it spoke with was a feminine one, so it was clear that thisrge bat was a female.


    There was a look in her eyes that showed that she appreciated Lin Fan''s handsomeness even though he was a human and she was a demon beast.


    Lin Fan didn''t say a single word as he just listened to everything that they said, but when they were done, he suddenly asked, "Are you done?"


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    That was because they could hear the disdain that was in his voice.


    It was as if he didn''t care about anything that they had just said and he didn''t even bother listening to them.


    For these prideful beasts, they couldn''t ept something like this.


    So all of a sudden, the lion beast raised its head up and gave a roar.


    As it roared, the mane on its head suddenly burst into mes and there was a world of mes that appeared around it. This world of mes quickly spread out and soon even surrounded Lin Fan.


    However, when one looked closely, they would be able to see that in the space around Lin Fan¡­there weren''t any mes. It was as if there was some kind of invisible barrier that was keeping the mes away.


    When the lion saw this, it couldn''t help being shocked.


    It was the same for the other two Beast Race leaders, but they didn''t remain shocked for long.


    The bat demon beast suddenly let out a screech that created a world of echoing sound around her. This world of echoing sound spread until it was around Lin Fan as well, trying to assault him.


    Though the world of sound was invisible, the powerful sound waves were creating ripples in space so it could be seen with the naked eye..


    However, just like with the mes, there was a small space around Lin Fan where these sound waves seemed to disappear. Just like with the mes, it was as if there was something that was keeping them away from him.


    Finally, thest Beast Race leader also released theirw.


    This was a giant bear who suddenly condensed manyrge rocks around Lin Fan that immediately went forward to crush him.


    It didn''t take long before ayer of rock was formed around him and he disappeared from sight.


    When they saw this, the bat and lion couldn''t help letting out a sigh of relief.


    But it was different for the bear.


    The bear had a confused and worried look on its face.


    That was because it could tell that while its rocks had surrounded Lin Fan, they hadn''t crushed him. Thisyer of rocks was only on the outside and there was still the same space around Lin Fan that was keeping them away from him.


    But it sensed something different from the bat and lion.


    This bear could tell that there was something that seemed to be absorbing the stone that it had sent to attack Lin Fan.


    But how was that possible when these stones were a part of his inner world?


    The more that these stones were drained, the more power the bear felt was being drained away from it.


    So in the end, it had no choice but to release Lin Fan from the rock prison.


    When the rock prison disappeared and they saw Lin Fan standing there without a scratch, the bat and lion couldn''t help looking at the bear with strange looks. The bear however didn''t care about this as it tried to stabilize itself.


    It had lost quite a bit of energy just now having its rocks absorbed by Lin Fan.


    Seeing that even this didn''t do anything to Lin Fan, they had no choice but to turn to the Outer Expert.


    When the Outer Expert saw this, he gave a sigh before raising his arm.


    He pointed his arm at Lin Fan and when he did this, there were rockets that suddenly came out of his battle suit.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit excited since he thought that he would see something new. However, he was disappointed to find that this was wrong since all that came out were the same missiles as before.


    These were the same missiles that the other Outer Expert had shot from his shoulders.


    So with a simple wave of his hand, there was an almost invisible ck energy that flew out that swept across these missiles. Once the ck energy wave swept across the missles, the spatial cracks that had been forming around them disappeared.


    The Outer Expert immediately knitted his brows when he saw this since he knew that Lin Fan had just crushed his attack with a simple wave of his hand.


    However, this wasn''t the only shock that Lin Fan had in store for him.


    With another simple wave of his hand, the missiles that were still flying through the air suddenly copsed into a single point. It was as if there was something in the center that waspressing the missiles into that single point.


    Once thepression had reached a certain point, the missiles exploded. However, the explosions of the missiles were the same where they werepressed into a single point by some strange power.


    The demon beasts were very confused by this, but that was it.


    It was different for the Outer Expert who immediately recognized this power that Lin Fan used to crush the missiles.


    Gravityw!


    It was the same gravityw that had been in these missiles!


    But how could someone of this universe use thews of his universe?


    Unless this person was¡­


    The Outer Expert looked at Lin Fan with a very strange look as he said, "Are you¡­"


    Before he could finish, Lin Fan had already waved his hand again.


    There were ck bubbles that appeared around each of the three Beast Race leaders and the Outer Expert, for a total of four bubbles.


    The moment that these ck bubbles appeared, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because the moment that they were trapped in these bubbles, it was as if they had been cut from the outside world.


    The parts of their inner world that had been outside of the ck bubble were cut off and absorbed immediately by the ck bubble. At the same time, anything inside of the ck bubble that came too close to it was immediately absorbed by it.


    The ones that were trapped had wanted to find a way to break out, but they found that their powers werepletely useless against it.


    No matter how they tried to attack, the ck bubble just absorbed everything.


    Lin Fan slowly floated over towards the four of them and said, "So, are you ready to die now?"

 Chapter 1132 To War (17)

    ?


    The three demon beasts and the Outer Expert couldn''t help feeling a chill run down their spine when they heard this.


    They didn''t know why they felt this way, but for some reason, they could feel potential deathing from Lin Fan.


    It was as if there was something about him that seemed to radiate mortal danger to them.


    But at the same time, they found that no matter what they did, they weren''t able to escape.


    The ck bubble around them just swallowed everything that they threw at it¡­


    Seeing that they were in serious danger, the three Ruler Realm Beasts started to waver.


    Beast Race Experts were the easiest ones to sway to the opposite side since they didn''t have loyalty to their races in the first ce. Other than their tribes where their families were, most of them didn''t care if they were in the Beast Race or not.


    That was why so many of them allowed themselves to be tamed by the humans in the first ce.


    In this situation where their lives were in danger, the three of them started to contemte¡­whether they should surrender and allow themselves to be captured by Lin Fan instead.


    After all, they could always be his tamed pets.


    But the problem was¡­they knew that humans could only tame so many pets in the first ce.


    If they were slow, they might not be able to entice Lin Fan at all.


    The three of them looked at each other and could guess what the others were thinking, so they were getting closer and closer to cracking.


    But before they could, the Outer Expert suddenly said, "You''re one of our double spies aren''t you? Why are you doing this?"


    The moment that he heard this, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    Until this moment, he hadn''t known a single thing about this, but now¡­he couldn''t just ignore it.


    With a wave of his hand, the Outer Expert was brought right in front of him, but he was still trapped inside of the ck bubble.


    But when the Outer Expert saw this, he thought that it was a sign that Lin Fan was on his side. He revealed a wide smile as he said, "I knew that you wouldn''t betray us after everything that we''ve given¡­"


    Before he could finish his words, he found that the ck bubble around him had shrunk in size and now it was now right around him, just an inch away. If he even made a slight movement, he would be touching this ck bubble.


    The Outer Expert couldn''t help trembling when he saw this and said, "What, what are you doing? We''re on the same side, stop this now!"


    But Lin Fan didn''t care at all about what the Outer Expert said as he just stared at him with narrowed eyes.


    When the Outer Expert saw this, he couldn''t help feeling more and more panicked.


    The way that Lin Fan looked at him, it was almost as if his eyes could pierce right into his soul.


    Finally, the Outer Expert couldn''t take it anymore and said, "What are you doing? What do you want from me?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "Tell me the identities of the spies that you have in our empires and I''ll make sure you die a painless death."


    Once again, there was a chill that ran down the Outer Expert''s spine when he heard this.


    He looked at Lin Fan in a daze before saying, "Aren''t you one of our spies as well?"


    Lin Fan didn''t answer with words and instead closed the ck bubble around the Outer Expert.


    The moment that the Outer Expert made contact with this ck bubble, he felt a powerful draining sensation run through his body. The moment that this draining sensation went through him, it felt like every single bit of strength in his body was being sucked away by this ck bubble.


    Of course, this was also a very painful sensation, so the Outer Expert couldn''t help crying out in pain.


    After draining him of his life energy¡­or rather whatever energy the Outers had, Lin Fan waved his hand and the bubble expanded again.


    As the Outer Expert was panting, he said, "If you don''t want to feel the same pain, I suggest you tell me what I want to know."


    The Outer Expert revealed a very ugly expression when he heard this.


    He never would have thought that he would be in this kind of position since he hade here with the mentality that this would be an easy cleanup fight. He had already received reports about what had happened in the Lu Astral Empire and that it was just a matter of time before they fell.


    So he had actuallye a bit early so he could gain extra credits.


    But now¡­it seemed that he had been trapped.


    However, there was no way that he would actually give Lin Fan the information that he wanted. If he did and this was found out, there was no doubt that he would be court martialed¡­


    The funny thing was that not for a single second did he think that Lin Fan would actually be able to kill him since he still had a trump card.


    And it was this trump card that he was considering using right now.


    This Outer wasn''t just any normal Outer, but rather the heir to arge family in the other universe.


    Their family had many ties with the military and as such, there were many experts that owed their family a favour. As long as he made a call, he was certain that someone powerful woulde to save him.


    But did he really want to waste this favour on this alone?


    Lin Fan could see the difficult look on the face of the Outer Expert, so he helped him make his decision.


    With a wave of his hand, the ck bubble once again shrank around the Outer Expert.


    When the Outer Expert saw this, he started to panic and pressed a button on his arm.


    The moment that he did, there was a strange barrier that appeared around the Outer Expert.


    This was apletely colourless barrier and if it wasn''t for the fact that it was shing with the ck bubble, Lin Fan wouldn''t have been able to see it. The only thing that he would have felt from it was the energy fluctuations that came from it.


    These were very familiar energy fluctuations¡­


    He had felt these energy fluctuations from the Outer ship that he had uncovered before, which meant that this was most likely some kind of nuclear radiation shield.


    As for how they would be able to build something like that, Lin Fan had no idea since he wasn''t a scientist in his past life.


    Still, he didn''t push the ck bubble to swallow this barrier and allowed the Outer Expert to act.


    If he wanted, he could have destroyed this barrier, but he didn''t for a specific reason.


    The Outer Expert realized that it was impossible for him to escape at this rate, so hemitted to using his trump card. He opened up hismunicator and said, "Big brother, please save me!"


    As soon as he said this, there was a red dot that started beeping.


    It didn''t take long before there were sonic booms that could be heard before there was a person that suddenly appeared in front of the Outer Expert. This person stood right in between Lin Fan and the Outer Expert.


    The moment that this person appeared, Lin Fan couldn''t be shocked by his appearance¡­


    That was because this person was in an armour that Lin Fan recognized¡­


    It was the power suit of a very famous superhero¡­one that fired repulsor sts out of his hands¡­


    There was even some kind of glowing thing on his chest that should be the power source¡­


    But wasn''t this technically copyright infringement?


    No, it wasn''t copyright infringement since this superhero most likely didn''t exist in their universe¡­but it was very shocking that people from different universes could think of simr things like this.


    The person in the power armour ignored Lin Fan and focused on the ck bubble that was around the Outer Expert.


    They then raised their arm which lit up before suddenly shooting out a beam at the ck bubble.


    Even though this beam gave off terrifying energy fluctuations, the ck bubble held and didn''t break under the power of this beam. Instead, the beam was broken down and absorbed by the ck bubble in the end.


    When the person in the power armour saw this, he couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    He finally turned to look at Lin Fan and said, "Who are you? What is this power?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this, he just calmly looked right back at this person in the power armour.


    The person in the power armour then said, "I don''t want to fight you, so if you let go of my little brother now, I''ll leave you alone."


    Once again, Lin Fan didn''t say a single thing, but he didn''t remain idle this time.


    Since the other side wanted to leave, he naturally couldn''t allow them to do that.


    After all, he had specifically lured them over here.


    If he really wanted information from the Outer Expert, it was easy for him to get it with Brainy''s help. These Outer Experts didn''t have any spiritual sense defenses at all, so it was easy for her to prate their minds.


    So he allowed this Outer Expert to do all of this so he could summon more Outer Experts.


    Instead of him chasing them down, he would let all of theme to him.

 Chapter 1133 To War (18)

    ?


    Lin Fan just calmly waved his hand and there was another ck bubble that appeared.


    But before it couldpletely form, the person in the power armour had already moved out of the way.


    This ck bubble had formed around where the person in the power armour had been standing previously.


    If it wasn''t for the beeping that came from his sensor, that person in the power armour wouldn''t have been able to avoid this.


    It was only because of that warning that he had been able to react in time.


    But he couldn''t help being surprised by the strange ck bubble that had appeared.


    This strange ck bubble had appeared in an instant and he hadn''t been able to react to it at all.


    It was almost as if it had appeared out of thin air.


    How was this person able to make these bubbles that were so resistant to their weapons appear out of thin air like this?


    Lin Fan was also surprised to see that the person in the power armour had been able to dodge out of the way of his voidw bubble. This shouldn''t have been possible since they shouldn''t have been able to sense it with the spiritual sense cultivation methods of this world.


    The voidw was something that was abstract and could appear in an instant, so there was no way to predict it.


    But there was something that was clearly telling this person with the power armour where his voidws were appearing.


    So what was it?


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the person in the power armour, but he also quickly gave up this thought.


    There was no need to think about it now, he could always take care of this matter after he had caught the person in the power armour.


    So with another wave of his hand, there was some other phenomenon that happened.


    This time, it was cracks in space that had formed.


    These cracks in space formed around the person in the power armour.


    Once again, the power armour of his warned him of this, but it was toote for him to do anything.


    The person in the power armour was using spatialws to escape in the first ce, but when his spatialws shed with Lin Fan''s spatialws, it became a match of whose spatialws were stronger. If his was stronger, then he would be able to break free of Lin Fan''s spatialw restriction and escape. If his wasn''t stronger¡­then he would be trapped by Lin Fan.


    In the end, the person in the power armour was frozen by Lin Fan''s spatialws.


    That was because there was something strange about Lin Fan''s spatialws that had stopped his own spatialws.


    He could tell that there was something familiar about Lin Fan''s spatialws, but it was as if there was something he was unfamiliar with that was mixed into this that had suppressed his spatialws.


    After being frozen, the cracks spread around the person in the power armour before he disappeared on the spot. When he reappeared, he found that he was inside of the ck bubble that he had escaped before.


    With a bitter look on his face, the person in the power armour tried to attack the ck bubble around him with the beams on his hands. However, the moment that the beams made contact with the ck bubble around him, the same thing happened where they were absorbed in an instant.


    But this time, there was another phenomenon that happened.


    He could feel the draining sensation that came with the energy of the beams being absorbed.


    It was as if this ck bubble was draining his vital energies just with the contact it made with the beams.


    Seeing this and the warning from the suit that its powers were being depleted at a rapid rate, the person in the power armour decided to cut off the beam.


    After he cut it off, he couldn''t help falling to his knees in the air while gasping for air.


    That drain just now had taken a lot of his power¡­if he hadn''t cut it, it might have even sucked him dry just now¡­


    Just what is this ck bubble around him?


    Thinking about it, the person in the power armour tried using his spatialws again to teleport out. He was careful about it so that none of the spatial cracks around him would touch the ck bubble around him.


    But before he could do anything else, he found that the ck bubble had shrunken and was right around him. It touched the spatial cracks and started draining him of his energy again.


    So he had no choice but to release these spatialws that he had been gathering.


    Realizing that nothing he did was any use, he decided to negotiate with the one trapping him.


    The person in the power armour looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Just what do you want?"


    Lin Fan calmly said, "Tell me who the spies you have in this universe are."


    The person in the power armour looked at Lin Fan with a very strange look as he said, "Aren''t you one of them? Don''t you already know?"


    After all, if this person in front of him wasn''t one of their spies, how was he able to use thews of their universe?


    That didn''t make any sense at all.


    Lin Fan didn''t say a thing in response and just waved his hand to make the ck bubble around the person in the power armour even smaller.


    The person in the power armour couldn''t help panicking when he saw this, so he quickly raised his hands and said, "Wait, wait, let''s talk this out!"


    When he heard this, Lin Fan didn''t react at all as the ck bubble around the person in the power armour continued to shrink.


    The person in the power armour revealed a bitter smile before pressing a few buttons on hismunicator.


    It didn''t take long before more sonic booms could be heard before two figures appeared this time.


    They were wearing the same power armour that this person was wearing and they didn''t hesitate to attack Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just raised his hand to create the ck barrier around himself once more.


    The moment that these beams hit the ck bubble, they disappeared without a trace.


    The two new Outer Experts in power armour were shocked when they saw this before quickly spreading out. They were nning on attacking Lin Fan from different angles so that they would be able to divide his attention and split his defenses.


    Then once his defenses were down, they would strike a fatal blow.


    This was a good n if it was against anyone else, but it didn''t work as well against Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan had already prepared his next move as two more ck bubbles appeared beside the person in the power armour.


    The person in the power armour realized what Lin Fan was nning on doing, so he shouted out, "Run!"


    The two new Outer Experts in power armour were caught off guard by this sudden cry from their superior. This gave Lin Fan an opening to exploit.


    As he waved his hand, there were more cracks that formed in space around the two Outer Experts.


    They tried to release their own spatialws to counter this, but they found the same thing as the person in the power armour from before. There was some kind of strange spatialw that was mixed with the spatialw that they were familiar with that suppressed them.


    They didn''t know what it was, but they found that they couldn''t break through it.


    So in the end, they too were trapped in the ck bubble just like the person in the power armour.


    Then they tried to break out of the ck bubble as the person in the power armour had done, but all that happened was that they too were drained of their energy and fell to their knees panting.


    The same pattern happened where they asked Lin Fan what he wanted.


    Lin Fan stood there in front of them and opened his mouth to speak, but before he could speak, he suddenly knitted his brows. It looked like he was struggling with something for a bit, but he was able to regain hisposure in the end.


    Then with a sigh, he said the same thing as before, "Tell me who the spies you have in this universe are."


    The two new Outer Experts in power armour knitted their brows as they repeated the same thing as the person in the power armour from before.


    Then it was the same thing as before where they tapped on theirmunicators asking for help.


    It was only the first person in the power armour who realized that something was off.


    If Lin Fan was able to trap them so easily, why wouldn''t he stop them from using theirmunicators?


    It should be a piece of cake for him to do this¡­


    So why didn''t he do this?


    As this thought passed through his mind, he couldn''t stop the bad premonition from filling his heart.


    Then adding in the look of struggle that Lin Fan had shown before, he realized that this was all a trap for them. Lin Fan was allowing them to do all of this so that they would keep dragging in more of their allies.


    The person in the power armour was about to open his mouth to say something, but he found that no noise came out.


    It was as if there was something there that stopped him from making any noise.


    He looked at Lin Fan and saw that he had one finger on his lip, as if telling him to be silent.


    He realized toote that they had all fallen into Lin Fan''s trap.


    The only thing he could do was reveal a bitter smile.

 Chapter 1134 To War (19)

    ?


    In the end, this happened around five more times.


    Each time, the ones that had been trapped before realized what had happened and wanted to warn the ones that came after, but Lin Fan stopped them with his soundws each time.


    No matter how they tried to warn them, they found that they couldn''t make a single sound.


    So they had no choice but to sit there silently with bitter looks on their faces.


    By the fifth time, there were already twenty of these Outer Experts that had been captured.


    Lin Fan could have continued to lure more Outer Experts in, but he felt that this was already enough. If he brought in more, he would start attracting suspicion and he wouldn''t be able to put his n in action.


    So with a wave of his hand, all of the Outers''municators were destroyed.


    When they saw this, they all revealed even wider bitter smiles.


    They had already figured that Lin Fan would be able to do this, but they didn''t understand why he never did this. After all, there was nothing for him to gain from trapping them like this.


    He might be able to stop them from influencing the battlefield, but there were plenty of other soldiers to take their ce. So even if he trapped them like this, it wouldn''t have an effect on the overall situation of the battlefield.


    They just couldn''t figure out what he wanted.


    But Lin Fan had ns for these Outer Experts that they never would have expected.


    It all started with the vine that suddenly slithered out of his sleeve.


    When the Outer Experts saw this vine, they couldn''t help feeling strangely afraid.


    They didn''t know why they were feeling afraid, but they could tell that there was something bad about this vine that sent a shiver down their spine.


    They had wanted to shout at Lin Fan for him to stop or demand to know what he was up to, but they couldn''t in the end since their mouths were still stopped by the soundws.


    So they could only watch as Lin Fan came up to them with the vine in his hand.


    Once he was in front of them, he raised the vine right in front of them, as if he was presenting this vine to them.


    The Outer Experts looked at this vine as if they were trying to figure out just what this thing was. However, before any of them could react, the vine suddenly stood up and blew out a green mist at them.


    The Outer Experts tried to avoid this green mist, but they were trapped in this ck bubble.


    When they tried to move out of their way, all that happened was that their energy was drained. Then they would open their mouths to cry out in pain or to pant while struggling, causing the green mist to enter their mouths, nose, and other orifices.


    Eventually, the green mist disappeared and there were twenty of these Outer Experts standing there in a daze.


    The nk look in their eyes almost made it seem as if there wasn''t a single bit of them left in their own bodies.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan gave a satisfied look before saying, "You know what to do with them."


    The vine in his hand looked up and gave a nod with what seemed to be its head.


    Then the vine turned to look at the other Beast Race troops that were around them.


    During this entire time, all of these demon beasts had been suppressed by Lin Fan''s aura and had been unable to move an inch. They had been watching the entire process of Lin Fan luring in and catching these Outer Experts without saying a word.


    Thought that was more because they couldn''t say a word with the way that Lin Fan suppressed them,


    After looking at the demon beasts around them, the vine did the same thing where it released a green mist that spread across all of these demon beasts.


    Once the mist cleared, the demon beasts appeared, standing there with the same nk look as the Outer Experts. It was clear that something had happened to them that had broken their minds like this.


    When this was over, Lin Fan gave a satisfied nod before waving his hand to create cracks around the Outer Experts and the demon beasts.


    As he did this, he said to the vine, "Brainy, you know what to do."


    The vine that had been in his hand was naturally Brainy and the green mist that she had spat out were her parasite seeds.


    With these seeds, she was able to easily take control of the Outer Experts and the Beast Race troops around them.


    Brainy just gave a simple nod in response without saying anything.


    Then with another wave of his hand, the Outer Experts and the demon beasts around him disappeared. However, Lin Fan wasn''t worried about this at all. Instead, he had a happy look on his face, as if he was about to enjoy a fun show.


    With that, he waved his hand and there were spatial cracks that appeared around him as well.


    Then all of a sudden, he disappeared from where he had been standing.


    As he disappeared, there was a voice that whispered, "It''s time for the show to begin."


    ¡­


    "The Outers have betrayed us!" A demon beast suddenly shouted out.


    When the other Beast Race troops heard this, they couldn''t help turning in that direction to see missiles that created cracks in space flying towards them.


    After a moment of hesitation, the Beast Race troops immediately started to scatter. They were all running desperately to avoid the missiles that wereing at them.


    However, they were also in a very dense formation, so they weren''t able to run away in time.


    In the end, the missilesnded right in the middle of the crowd of demon beasts and there were several ck holes that suddenly appeared in the middle of this formation.


    As soon as these ck holes appeared, they pulled in the demon beasts that were in their range and ripped these demon beasts apart.


    When these ck holes disappeared, there was nothing left in the space where they had once been. These ck holes had createdrge vacuums in the formation of the demon beasts.


    They looked like zones that had everything in it wiped out in the end with the way there wasn''t a single thing left after these ck holes disappeared.


    The Beast Race troops couldn''t help scattering in fear when they saw this, but there were two demon beasts that came forward. Based on the aura that they released, it was clear that these two were Ruler Realm Beasts.


    Seeing the missiles that wereing, both of them released their domains and immediately shattered the missiles that were holding the gravityws. As soon as these things were shattered, the ck holes appeared where the missiles were shattered.


    Seeing that the missiles weren''t working, the Outer Expert also stopped shooting and just floated there in front of the two demon beasts.


    One of the Ruler Realm Beasts, arge lynx suddenly said in a deep voice, "Why are you doing this? We allied with you because we thought that you would help us take down the humans, so why are you betraying us now?"


    The Outer Expert didn''t respond when he heard this and instead raised his hand.


    There was a bright beam of light that gathered in the palm of this hand and then¡­there was a beam of energy that was shot out at the Ruler Realm Beast.


    The lynx released his domain once more in an attempt to block this, but seeing that it was shattered, he pulled out a gun to shoot.


    As soon as he shot this gun, there were spatial cracks that formed a wall in front of him.


    This wall of spatialws was able to dy this beam for a bit before it was shattered by the beam of light in the end. Once it shattered, the beam continued at the lynx, but it was still deviated a bit.


    The lynx saw this and immediately moved out of the way of the beam, but he was still grazed by it in the end.


    In response to this, the other Ruler Realm Beast, an otter suddenly mmed a pir of water down at the Outer Expert.


    But the Outer Expert just raised his other hand to shoot another beam of light at this pir of water falling down on him. When that beam of light hit the pir of water, it melted it away and pierced right through.


    This beam of light was aimed right at the Ruler Realm Beast, but it was at least deviated by the pir of water, so the Ruler Realm Beast was able to dodge out of the way in the end.


    However, the beam did graze this otter just like it did with the lynx.


    All of a sudden, there was a sonic boom that was heard before another person in power armour appeared.


    When the two Ruler Realm Beasts saw this, they started panicking as they thought that it was another enemy. However, it turned out that this new person in the power armour was on their side.


    This person in the power armour came in between the two Ruler Realm Beasts and the traitor Outer Expert.


    However, when the person in the power armour saw who it was, he couldn''t help saying in a shocked voice, "Sergeant Grant, what are you doing?"

 Chapter 1135 To War (20)

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    The traitor Outer Expert being called Sergeant Grant didn''t seem to react at all when his name was called.


    Seeing this, the person in the power armour raised his hand and created cracks in the air around Sergeant Grant.


    When these cracks formed, the spatialw walls that had been formed trapped Sergeant Grant, making him unable to move.


    Then the person in the power armour kept shouting, "Sergeant Grant, stand down now! Do you even understand how many militaryws you are breaking right now? If you don''t stand down, then I have no choice but to use force!"


    But once again, Sergeant Grant didn''t seem to react at all to this.


    The only thing that Sergeant Grant did was struggle against the spatialw walls that were currently holding him.


    It almost seemed like he would rip his body apart just to break free of the spatialws that were holding him in ce.


    When the person in the power armour saw this, he couldn''t help deeply knitting his brows and revealing a pained look. He really wanted to release the spatialws that were holding Sergeant Grant in ce, but he knew that he couldn''t¡­


    So in the end, the person in the power armour said, "Grant! Think of Yumi! Would she want to see you like this! Come back to your senses!"


    When Sergeant Grant heard this, he suddenly stopped moving.


    After a while, his body started to tremble as if there was a fierce internal struggle inside of him.


    Seeing this, the person in the power armour revealed a hopeful look as he shouted, "Grant! I know that you''re in there! Come back to your senses! Not just for me, but also Yumi! She''s still waiting for you back home!"


    The trembling became more and more intense as if the internal struggle was getting stronger.


    Seeing this, the person in the power armour was even afraid that Sergeant Grant''s body would copse before it was over¡­


    But then, all of a sudden, Sergeant Grant suddenly fell forward.


    Seeing this, the person in the power armour released the spatialw walls around him to let him fall.


    Sergeant Grant fell to his knees and then lowered his head downwards as he started panting. It was clear that he had just undergone a great struggle that no one would be able to understand.


    However, the person in the power armour immediately flew over to his side.


    That person didn''t go right up to Sergeant Grant and carefully floated there beside him, looking at him with a wary look as he asked, "Grant? Are you alright?"


    There was no answer at first since Sergeant Grant was still catching his breath, but then Sergeant Grant asked, "Captain? Is that you?"


    When he heard this, the one who had been called captain made his way over to Sergeant Grant''s side to help him up as he asked, "Grant, what happened to you?"


    Sergeant Grant just slowly shook his head before saying, "I, I don''t know. One moment, I was fighting the humans of this universe and the next¡­I woke up here. I have no idea what happened during that."


    The captain knitted his brows when he heard this, but he knew that it wasn''t the time to question this right now.


    Through the disy of his suit, he could see the injuries all over Sergeant Grant''s body and he could see the damage to his suit. He needed to stabilize his injuries or Sergeant Grant wouldn''tst long.


    So the captain immediately brought Sergeant Grant back over to where the Ruler Realm Beast were.


    When the Ruler Realm Beast saw this, they couldn''t help taking a step back. The lynx narrowed his eyes and said, "What are you doing bringing him over here?"


    The captain just calmly exined, "Sergeant Grant was being controlled by the enemy just now, but I have already dispelled their control over him. There''s no need to worry."


    The Ruler Realm Beasts clearly looked like they didn''t trust Sergeant Grant still, but it wasn''t time for them to fall out with the Outers just yet¡­


    The captain also knew this, so he said, "Bring over some healers. We need to treat Sergeant Grant''s wounds right now."


    The otter said, "Why would we do that when he was just attacking us?"


    The captain had already expected this, so he said, "Unless we heal Sergeant Grant''s injuries and stabilize him, we won''t be able to ask him who is behind all of this. Wouldn''t you want to know about a person that is strong enough to control someone like this?"


    Both of the Ruler Realm Beasts looked at each other with hesitant looks since they knew that the captain was right.


    So after a while, the lynx called out one of the demon beasts behind it.


    This was a butterfly that didn''t seem like she belonged to the battlefield, but she was here as a medic because of her healingw. She was one of those rare demon beasts with the healingw.


    The butterfly flew over to the captain and raised her wings, as if she was about to p at them.


    This was to release the healing powder from her dust that would heal Sergeant Grant.


    But before she could release her healing dust, Sergeant Grant suddenly stood up on his own.


    The captain was caught off guard by this and couldn''t react as Sergeant Grant suddenly hugged him. Then the boosters on Sergeant Grant''s back suddenly activated and he was propelled towards the two Ruler Realm Beasts.


    Neither of them were able to react in time since they had no idea what was happening, but they quickly understood what the situation was.


    After all, they could sense the strong energy fluctuations that wereing from Sergeant Grant¡­or rathering from Sergeant Grant''s suit.


    The captain shouted, "Stop it Grant! What are you¡­"


    Before he could finish, there was arge explosion as Sergeant Grant blew up his own suit.


    The moment that he had grabbed the captain, he had activated the self destruct function of his power armour.


    This was a power armour that could even match a Ruler Realm Expert, so the explosion that it caused was without a doubt at the same level as a Ruler Realm Expert.


    When the mes disappeared and the dust settled, there were only the two Ruler Realm Beasts that were left there.


    The captain, Sergeant Grant, and all of the demon beasts that had been in the surrounding area had been blown to smithereens. Even the two Ruler Realm Beasts that had survived had been seriously injured.


    They were covered from head to toe in blood and they were vomiting outrge amounts of blood.


    The lynx was missing one of its front paws while the otter was missing one of its back paws.


    Both of them had looks of rage in their eyes, but there was no one for them to vent this anger on. After all, the one that had caused these injuries to them was already dead since he had blown himself up.


    So who could they me?


    Not to mention, why would that Sergeant Grant just suddenly blow himself up like this?


    It didn''t make any sense at all!


    But before either of them could do a thing¡­there were spatial cracks that appeared near them. Then before they could react, there were two swords of light that came out of these spatial cracks that stabbed them in the head.


    They didn''t have time to put up any defenses as these swords of light stabbed through their brain. At the same time, the power contained within these swords of light gave them a familiar and an unfamiliar feeling.


    That was because they could tell that these swords of light were created from the lightws of their universe. But at the same time, there was this unfamiliar energy inside of this sword of light.


    If they had topare it to something¡­it was like the beam that Sergeant Grant had shot at them before.


    The energy that came from the beam felt simr to the energy in the sword of light.


    That was thest thought in their mind before their consciousness faded.


    The Beast Race troops that were left had no idea what had just happened, but they could see the corpses of the two Ruler Realm Beasts lying there.


    Not a single one of them dared to move since they hadn''t even been able to sense the enemy''s attack. If they moved rashly now, it was certain that they would be the ones targeted next¡­


    It was just too bad that the enemy had already prepared their next move.


    Before any of them could do a thing, there were demon beasts among them that suddenly went feral. These demon beasts didn''t care about a single thing as they started attacking the other demon beasts around them.


    The demon beasts didn''t understand why they were being attacked, but since they were being attacked, it wasn''t as if they could just passively take these attacks.


    So it didn''t take long before the demon beasts suddenly erupted into chaos.


    It was even more so when other demon beasts started to turn to the enemy side as the demon beasts that went feral released this green mist. When the demon beasts breathed in this green mist, it was as if something had been released inside of them.


    At the same time¡­the green mist also floated over to the two Ruler Realm Beasts that were lying there on the ground¡­


    When it covered them, they suddenly started to move before getting up again.


    The jerky way that they moved made them seem like zombies, but the power that they had wasn''t any weaker than when they were alive. With these two Ruler Realm Beasts joining the fight, it didn''t take long before the Beast Race troops were overwhelmed.


    All over the battlefield, the same thing was happening where Outer Experts were.

 Chapter 1136 Triumphant Return

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    The Lu Astral Empire army just watched on in shock as the situation of the battle changed.


    One moment, they had been fighting the Beast Race troops and the next¡­they were watching the Beast Race troops killing each other.


    They didn''t know how it happened, but one demon beast started attacking another and soon¡­it was like a wave came over them and they were all attacking each other. At the same time, the more demon beasts were taken out, the more demon beasts joined in attacking other demon beasts.


    They could see that there was some kind of green mist that came out when the demon beasts attacked each other.


    When this green mist came over the other demon beasts, they all suddenly lost control of themselves.


    They didn''t know what this green mist was¡­but they could tell that it was dangerous.


    So when the fighting came close to them, they made sure that they did all that they could just so they could avoid this green mist.


    However, even when the green mist came over them, they found that nothing happened to them.


    Could it be that this green mist was something that only affected demon beasts?


    But if it was¡­where did ite from and why did it only appear now?


    The demon beasts kept killing each other without any remorse and soon there wasn''t a single demon beast left.


    There were a few of the Beast Race troops that had run away when they saw this ughter, but there were few that had been able to get away. So in the end, there were many demon beast corpses that were just floating there.


    In an instant, the fight had been over.


    This long fight that they had been fighting for such a long time had been over just like this.


    It felt surreal, it felt like this couldn''t be true, it felt unbelievable.


    They didn''t know how to react to this at all.


    This was the same for Lu Fei Yu who had been passing on the words of Lin Fan, teaching the Lu Astral Empire forces how to counter the Outerws.


    But unlike the others, when she saw the demon beasts killing each other and the green mist that they released, she immediately thought of Lin Fan.


    She didn''t know why she thought of Lin Fan right away, but she was almost certain that Lin Fan had something to do with this. She was willing to stake her life on this bet, that was how certain she was.


    And it was confirmed after the fighting was over.


    Lin Fan suddenly appeared in front of her and gathered everyone else from her group.


    While Lu Fei Yu was still stunned, Lin Fan said, "Let''s go. The fight is over, so let''s head back to your capital. I have a few things I want to talk to the Lu Astral Emperor about."


    Lu Fei Yu just looked at Lin Fan in a daze, almost not understanding just what he was saying.


    But Lin Fan didn''t give her a chance toe back to her senses.


    His ship had already arrived, so he didn''t waste any time in bringing Lu Fei Yu, her group, and his own subordinates onto the ship. Once they were all loaded on, the ship flew out without a care for the Lu Astral Empire troops.


    The Lu Astral Empire troops were just left there in a daze after Lin Fan came and left like a whirlwind.


    On the trip back, Lu Fei Yu finally reacted and was about to question Lin Fan on what he had done.


    However, before she could do that, she noticed that there was someone that she didn''t recognize on this ship.


    But when she saw the power armour that he was in, she immediately knew that this person was an Outer.


    Once she recognized this, she raised her guard against not only the Outer Expert, but also Lin Fan as she asked, "Young master Lin, what is the meaning of this? Are you colluding with the Outers now?"


    Lin Fan just didn''t care at all that she was wary of him and casually said, "I needed some information from the Outers, so I captured this one for that information."


    Lu Fei Yu once again looked at him in shock and disbelief, unsure if she should believe his words.


    But seeing the dazed look that was on the face of the Outer Expert, she could tell that he wasn''t lying.


    However, just how had he done this?


    For the experts of their Lu Astral Empire, they hadn''t been able to do a thing to the Outer Experts. It could even be said that the experts of the Lu Astral Empire had been at the mercy of the Outer Experts.


    While the Ruler Realm Experts were at least able to fight back, that didn''t mean that they were able to defeat these Outer Experts. At most, they were able to reach a draw with them and force them away.


    So there was no need to mention defeating them, let alone trapping them like this.


    Just how had Lin Fan done this?


    No matter how Lu Fei Yu thought about it, she didn''t think that Lin Fan should be capable of this.


    But then again¡­Lin Fan had ended a battle that had alreadysted over a year now for their Lu Astral Empire. He had done it all alone in just a few hours¡­


    This was not something that a Ruler Realm Expert should be capable of¡­


    Could it be that Lin Fan had already reached the God Realm?


    The more that she thought about this, the more she felt that it was likely.


    A God Realm Expert¡­that was the legendary realm that no one had reached in all this time.


    If Lin Fan really was a God Realm Expert, it would exin everything that had happened.


    After this thought passed through her mind, Lu Fei Yu couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a renewed look of admiration.


    Lin Fan didn''t understand why she was looking at him like this, but he did want her to listen to what the Outer Realm Expert had to say. After all, this was a matter that wouldn''t just affect the Lin Astral Empire, it would also affect the Lu Astral Empire.


    They needed to cleanse these spies as soon as possible.


    So Lin Fan turned to the Outer Expert and said, "Tell her what you told me before."


    Lu Fei Yu was confused at first, but as she listened to the Outer Expert, her brows couldn''t help knitting more and more.


    That was because out of the names that the Outer Expert gave, there were some that she recognized.


    The others she didn''t recognize because they weren''t that important in their Lu Astral Empire, but the ones that she did recognize were all ministers and generals of the Lu Astral Empire. These were the people that actually held power in the Lu Astral Empire, so if it was true that they were traitors¡­this was a very serious matter.


    Once the Outer Expert had finished giving the list and fell silent again, Lu Fei Yu looked at Lin Fan and asked, "Young master Lin, is everything that he said true?"


    Lin Fan just gave a slight nod before saying, "The technique that I''m using is one that reaches the very depths of a person''s mind. So there''s no way that they could ever lie to me."


    Lu Fei Yu couldn''t help knitting her brows even more when she heard this because this meant that the situation was much more serious than she thought.


    There wasn''t a single second where she doubted Lin Fan''s words since she had already recognized him as a God Realm Expert in her mind. A God Realm Expert''s abilities would be far beyond what a normal person could imagine, so she knew that it had to be something that she couldn''t even think of.


    After a long silence, Lu Fei Yu suddenly said, "We need to go back and warn my father. Only by removing these traitors can we take care of the hidden dangers to our Lu Astral Empire."


    Lin Fan just gave a simple nod in response.


    After all, the ship was already taking the fastest route back.


    After a few transport gates, Lin Fan''s ship arrived at the Lu Astral Empire''s capital.


    They had just set off this morning and now they were already back.


    However, even though it was currently the evening, people had still gathered outside of theunch pad to cheer for them.


    This time, they were much more passionate and invigorated with their cheering. It was clear that they had heard about what had happened on the battlefield.


    Lin Fan was surprised that the Lu Astral Empire government would announce something like this so quickly, but he realized that it made sense after thinking about it. After all, the Lu Astral Empire had been suffering losses for the longest time.


    Their morale was already at its lowest, so they needed something to boost it back up.


    This kind of major victory was just the thing that they needed.


    Though there were still some things about this wee back that Lin Fan didn''t like.


    After all, these people were still using the expensive things to wee them back with.


    Lin Fan however didn''t have any time for this and quickly headed to the pce.


    When he arrived, he found that the Lu Astral Emperor and his ministers and generals were waiting for them.


    It seemed that they had been gathered for a long time already with the state of the room.

 Chapter 1137 Dealing With Traitors

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    When the Lu Astral Emperor, the ministers, and generals saw Lin Fan walk in, they all revealed bright smiles.


    They weed him much more warmlypared to the first time.


    There were many ministers and generals that even stood up to walk over in an attempt to shake Lin Fan''s hand, but they were ignored by him in the end.


    All they could do was stand there with bitter smiles on their faces, but they didn''t push the matter.


    After all, Lin Fan was currently everyone''s hero.


    Lin Fan walked right up to the front of the table and looked at the general that was sitting beside the Lu Astral Emperor.


    The general wasn''t surprised to see this and even graciously gave up his seat to Lin Fan.


    If it was anyone else, then they would have some opinions about the way that Lin Fan acted.


    However, since it was Lin Fan who had just cleaned up thergest battlefield in their Lu Astral Empire in a single day, they had no arguments about him. They were certain that he must have something important to discuss with the Lu Astral Emperor if he was here.


    The Lu Astral Emperor saw that Lin Fan wasn''t saying anything after sitting down, so he took the initiative to say, "Young master Lin, I have to say that you have done an amazing job. I really can''t believe that you were able to take down all of those enemies all by yourself."


    There was naturally an inquisitive tone to his voice, as if he was asking Lin Fan how he had done all of this.


    However, Lin Fan just ignored all of this as he said with a smile and a wave, "It was nothing. It was just a small effort."


    When the Lu Astral Emperor and the rest of the people in the room heard this, they couldn''t help revealing bitter looks.


    If this was considered just a small effort, then what would be considered a big effort?


    Or are you saying that our Lu Astral Empire isn''t worth anything since we couldn''t take care of this thing that you called a small effort?


    But of course, they wouldn''t say this out loud since they had no idea how Lin Fan had even done this.


    The fact that he had done alone was more than enough to tell them just how strong Lin Fan was. Even the Lu Astral Emperor wasn''t confident enough to say that he would be able to take down Lin Fan now that Lin Fan had demonstrated his power.


    So in the end, all he could say was, "Still, it was a big grace for you to take care of them for us. If there''s anything that you need, please feel free to tell us."


    This was a two pronged attack.


    First, it was to repay Lin Fan so they wouldn''t owe him anything in the future.


    And second, it was so that they could build a closer rtionship with Lin Fan in the future so that they could keep this cooperative rtionship.


    If Lin Fan asked for anything, he would certainly not skimp on it and give him more than he asked for.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he revealed a mysterious smile as he said, "Well, there is something¡­"


    He let his voice trail off, but that didn''t stop the Lu Astral Emperor from feeling excited.


    His biggest worry was that Lin Fan wouldn''t want anything at all from them, that was the only way that his n wouldn''t work. But now that Lin Fan said that he actually wanted something, the Lu Astral Emperor would do his best to please him.


    Lin Fan kept everyone in suspense until he suddenly waved his hand.


    The moment that he waved his hand, there were several swords of light that suddenly appeared in this room. They surrounded several ministers and generals so that they wouldn''t be able to move a single inch.


    When the ministers and generals saw this, they immediately moved away from Lin Fan with fearful looks.


    That was because when Lin Fan had suddenly called these swords of light out, they hadn''t been able to sense a single thing. If it was them that Lin Fan had used these swords of light on, they wouldn''t have been able to resist at all.


    The ones that were trapped by the swords of light had looks of panic on their faces, but they found that they couldn''t break free at all. With how tightly the swords of light were packed together, it was as if they would be sliced up if they moved even a single muscle.


    It wasn''t even possible for them to say a single thing, or they would have already started cursing Lin Fan out and demanded to be released.


    The Lu Astral Emperor had been calm throughout all of this, but he wasn''t as calm as he seemed on the surface.


    After all, even he hadn''t been able to react in time to Lin Fan''s swords of light.


    While he wouldn''t have been threatened by them based on the aura that they released, he still wouldn''t have been able to dodge in time.


    He couldn''t help being shocked by how strong Lin Fan was once he showed his cards.


    However, this was the Lu Astral Empire and he was the Lu Astral Emperor. Doing something like this here was like a p to his face, so he had no choice but to stand up for them.


    Not to mention, some of the ones that Lin Fan had trapped were a few of the most influential ministers and generals of their Lu Astral Empire. He couldn''t just let them die for no reason.


    So the Lu Astral Emperor said, "Young master Lin, what is the meaning of this? Are you against our Lu Astral Empire as well?"


    As he said this, he released his aura as a Ruler Realm Expert.


    However, he was weaker than the Lin Astral Emperor since he was younger than the Lin Astral Emperor.


    This pressure from the Lu Astral Emperor was easy for Lin Fan to resist.


    He calmly looked at the Lu Astral Emperor and said, "I''m just taking care of a few traitors."


    "Traitors?" The Lu Astral Emperor said with a confused tone, causing him to pull back his pressure as he started to waver.


    After all, he knew that Lin Fan had ughtered the Beast Race troops and the Outer Experts for their Lu Astral Empire. So he wouldn''t do something like this unless he had a reason¡­


    So he turned to look at the ministers and generals that were currently trapped with narrowed eyes.


    When the ministers and generals saw this, they knew¡­that the jig was up.


    Even if they were to find some way to exin this, they wouldn''t be able to get out of thisbel of traitor. The seeds of doubt had been nted in the heart of the Lu Astral Emperor and he would investigate them no matter what.


    Since the jig was up¡­the only thing that was important now was their lives.


    For them to survive, they had to work together to break Lin Fan''s swords of light and then take down Lin Fan with a sneak attack.


    Once they took down Lin Fan, they would be able to escape since the Outers had given them abilities that would allow them to escape the Lu Astral Empire at any time.


    When they made up their minds, there were cracks that formed in the space around these ministers and generals.


    The moment that they saw these cracks, the others in the room realized that Lin Fan was right. They could sense that these were the spatialws used by the Outers, so they knew that these ministers and generals had colluded with the Outers.


    The Lu Astral Emperor didn''t hold back his anger and pressure at all when he saw this, using it fully on these ministers and generals. However, the ministers and generals werepletely focused on the swords of light around them.


    They knew that unless they took care of these swords of light, they wouldn''t be able to teleport out of this pce with the Outer spatialws.


    So the cracks immediately surrounded the swords of light around them.


    But then¡­they were shocked to find¡­that these cracks in space didn''t have any effect on the swords of light.


    In fact, the moment that the cracks in space tried to attack the swords of light, they were shattered to pieces in an instant.


    The ministers and generals couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with terrified looks when this happened.


    It seemed that they hadpletely underestimated Lin Fan¡­


    They thought that he had used some kind of secret technique to resist the Outerws and take down those Outer Experts, but it turned out that he was able to resist the Outerws this easily.


    Just what kind of monster was this?


    Seeing that the cracks in space had failed, the Lu Astral Emperor let out a secret sigh of relief before pressuring the ministers and generals again. He said in a stern and disappointed voice, "Why would you betray our Lu Astral Empire?"


    But in return, there was nothing said by these ministers and generals.


    He was confused at first, but then he remembered that Lin Fan''s swords of light were still around these ministers and generals.


    He looked over at Lin Fan and Lin Fan gave a wave of his hand which caused the swords of light to move back a bit.


    Once they found that they were able to speak again, one of the ministers said, "Why wouldn''t we betray this failing Astral Empire? The Outers will take over soon enough."

 Chapter 1138 Surprise Of Their Life

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    When the Lu Astral Emperor heard this, he immediately knitted his brows.


    Once again, the pressure that fell onto these traitors increased as he released even more of his aura.


    But there were some of the ministers and generals who couldn''t help revealing looks of being moved.


    After all, there was some truth behind what they said.


    Lin Fan had been able to help them win this battle, but it wasn''t as if Lin Fan would help them forever. They were a powerful Astral Empire, so they had also received news about the Lin Astral Empire.


    They knew that the Lin Astral Empire was also struggling with the Beast Race troops, so it wouldn''t be long before Lin Fan headed back.


    The only reason that he had been here in the first ce was that he and the Lin Astral Empire were worried about the Lu Astral Empire losing. Once the Lu Astral Empire lost against the Beast Race, the demon beasts that had been here would flood into the Lin Astral Empire''s territory.


    Now that fear had been alleviated and the Lu Astral Empire situation had been stabilized a bit, it wouldn''t be long before Lin Fan left.


    At that time, they would once again struggle against the Beast Race and Outers.


    Even if they knew how to deal with the Outerws now because of what Lin Fan had shared with them, it would take them a long time before they were able to fight properly¡­


    So it did seem like the Lu Astral Empire was close to copsing¡­


    Thinking about their families, they couldn''t help wondering if betraying the Lu Astral Empire really was the best way.


    The traitors could naturally see the effect that they had, so they decided to add even more fuel to the mes.


    "You think that we''re the only ones in this dying Lu Astral Empire? We''re just the one that got caught. There''s plenty more of us, so you''ll never be able to stop us. You might as well join us before it''s toote."


    When this was said, all of the ministers and generals couldn''t help looking at the people around them.


    They could see that many of them were affected by this¡­


    The traitors just revealed smiles on their faces when they saw this, but then those smiles quickly froze when an even stronger pressure fell on them. At the same time, all of the ministers and generals quickly looked away and hid their expressions.


    That was because they could feel the rage that wasing from the Lu Astral Emperor.


    A few of the traitors couldn''t help giving a gulp when they felt this.


    They were only in the World Realm, so facing the full pressure of a powerful Ruler Realm Expert like this was naturally hard for them. Even the aid from the Outers wasn''t enough to counter this out.


    But they didn''t seem like they were panicking.


    It was almost as if they felt like they were in full control of this situation.


    That was what confused the Lu Astral Emperor.


    He might have been filled with rage, but that didn''t mean that he allowed that rage to cloud his mind. He could see that these traitors seemed to have another trick up their sleeves, so he was really pressuring them to use it.


    Feeling the pressure getting stronger and stronger on them, the traitors knew that they wouldn''t be able to stay here for long.


    So with a look between them, one of them suddenly had something appear in their mouth.


    While this person was shattering this thing in their teeth, another one of them said, "We''ll be seeing you then. I hope that when we meet again, I will be able to see your face filled with despair."


    The moment that the thing in the mouth of that traitor was cracked, there were spatial cracks that formed once more.


    However, this time, the fluctuations that came from these spatial cracks were much stronger than before.


    It was clear that this time¡­these were Outer spatialws that were in the Ruler Realm.


    This was clearly a special item that had been given to them to escape with just in case that they had been caught.


    The Lu Astral Emperor wanted to do something, but he found that he couldn''t do a single thing to the spatial cracks that had formed. It seemed like he would have no choice but to watch as they escaped¡­


    But before they could, Lin Fan waved his hand.


    The moment that he did, the spatial cracks suddenly shattered apart and disappeared without a trace.


    The looks on the faces of the traitors were ones of absolute shock as they couldn''t believe what had happened.


    The Outer that had given them this thing had promised that unless it was one of the peak Ruler Realm Experts of this universe, it wouldn''t be possible for them to stop them from escaping.


    So how did it fail?


    Lin Fan just revealed a calm smile as he waved his hand again.


    One of the swords for each of these traitors suddenly came forward and stabbed them in the chest. Or rather, it stabbed them right in the dantian.


    When this happened, all of the traitors revealed looks of shock as they never expected to be crippled like this.


    Once all of their life energy had scattered, Lin Fan released the swords of light that had been holding these traitors and they fell to the ground.


    After falling to the ground, the traitors looked at their hands in a daze before they had different reactions.


    Some of them started waving their hands, some of them started punching out, and some started to run. However, not a single one of them was able to escape and not a single one of them was able to gather their life energy.


    They had beenpletely crippled by Lin Fan, so there was only one fate waiting for them.


    While they were distracted by the fact that they had been crippled, Lin Fan gave a snap and there were several things that suddenly appeared.


    These were the items that the Outers had given these traitors.


    He had been silent the whole time since he had been searching their bodies with his spiritual senses. Once he found them, it was a simple matter of using spatialws to take these things away.


    Seeing that they didn''t have anything left, the traitors crumpled to the ground.


    The Lu Astral Emperor couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange shocked look before giving a sigh and saying, "Take them away."


    The guards that had been on the side suddenly came forward to grab these traitors and led them away to the dungeon.


    But as the traitors were leaving, they didn''t forget to shout, "This is the end for the Lu Astral Empire! You''ll never be able to take down the Outers! You don''t even know who the other traitors are!"


    When the Lu Astral Emperor heard this, he deeply knitted his brows.


    But before they could be taken away, Lin Fan suddenly said, "Stop!"


    If it was anyone else, the guards wouldn''t have hesitated to ignore them, but it was different since it was Lin Fan.


    They turned to look in the Lu Astral Emperor''s direction and after a moment of hesitation from him, he gave a nod to those guards.


    Those guards stopped walking away with the traitors and waited to see what Lin Fan had to show.


    Lin Fan however didn''t say a thing as he turned to look at Lu Fei Yu.


    He gave her a nod that she understood and she walked out of the room.


    When she came back, she wasn''t alone.


    She came back with an Outer in full power armour.


    Seeing this Outer, all of the ministers and generals that were standing in this room moved even further away.


    The Lu Astral Emperor knitted his brows, but the traitors immediately said, "Please save us! Please save us!"


    However, the Outerpletely ignored the ones crying for help.


    After a moment of silence, the Lu Astral Emperor asked Lu Fei Yu, "What have you brought this enemy here for? Are you also¡­"


    He didn''t finish his words, but the way that he looked at her made it clear what he was thinking.


    Lu Fei Yu had wanted to say something, but under the pressure of a Ruler Realm Expert, she wasn''t able to make a single sound.


    Lin Fan was the one that said, "It''s not what you think. I''ve already broken his mind and have full control over him, so he won''t do anything to harm you."


    When they heard this, there was only silence that followed.


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan with looks of disbelief, as if they couldn''t believe what they had just heard.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan gave a demonstration as he said, "Name all of the traitors that you told me before."


    The Outer Expert started listing names in a daze.


    The first few names were the names of the ones that had been captured and crippled, but there were more names that followed.


    At first, the traitors had calm looks on their faces, but the more that they heard, the more disturbed they became. In the end, they looked at the Outer Expert with looks of absolute disbelief.


    This was more than enough for the Lu Astral Emperor to understand that the Outer Expert had given them the truth.


    He gave a nod to the guards on the side who quickly tied up the Outer Expert and led them away.


    Lin Fan ignored this and turned to the traitors to say, "Traitors will never have a good ending."


    Then with a smile he nodded to the guards behind the traitors to take them away.

 Chapter 1139 Sudden Notification

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    The Lu Astral Emperor couldn''t help giving a sigh when he saw this.


    He had never thought that Lin Fan would be such a vengeful person¡­it was a good thing that he had already resolved to befriend him. Otherwise, he might be the one at the short end of the stick.


    After the traitors were taken away, the Lu Astral Emperor gave a slight bow to Lin Fan and said, "Young master Lin, thank you for everything that you''ve done for our Lu Astral Emperor. If there is anything that we can do for you, please don''t hesitate to tell me."


    When the ministers and generals saw this, they all couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    After all, this slight bow from the Lu Astral Emperor was very significant.


    An Astral Emperor showing this kind of respect to someone who was only a crown prince of another Astral Empire¡­if this kind of news was spread, it would cause argemotion.


    But no one was dumb enough to do something like this.


    So all of the ministers and generals quickly looked away and pretended like they didn''t see anything.


    Lin Fan just calmly said with a wave of his hand, "There''s no need for that."


    The Lu Astral Emperor looked up at Lin Fan with a surprised look before revealing a look of admiration.


    It could be said that what Lin Fan had done was equal to saving their entire Lu Astral Empire. After all, if these traitors hadn''t been exposed, who knows what kind of damage they would have caused for their Lu Astral Empire.


    But even before any of that¡­if it wasn''t for Lin Fan taking care of the Beast Race and the Outers, they might have already been overrun by them.


    So Lin Fan could even be considered the great saviour of their Lu Astral Empire.


    Yet he was being so humble and didn''t lord this over them.


    This was clearly someone that was worth befriending.


    The Lu Astral Emperor gave a nod before saying, "Fei Yu, go and show young master Lin to his residence. Be sure to properly take care of our guests."


    When Lu Fei Yu heard this, she could see the special look that was in the Lu Astral Emperor''s eyes. Seeing this special look, she couldn''t stop a blush from appearing on her face.


    However, she still said with a nod, "Yes, royal father. I''ll be sure to properly take care of our guests."


    As she said this, she could also see that many of the ministers and generals were looking at her with special gazes. They all knew what the Lu Astral Emperor had nned for Lu Fei Yu, so they all hoped that she would be able to pull this off.


    But it was just too bad that Lin Fan had no intentions of going along with them.


    Lin Fan gave a cough before saying, "I''m sorry, but I have no intentions of staying any longer."


    When they heard this, they all couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with looks of shock and disbelief.


    After all, Lin Fan had just returned from a battle. Normally, this would be the time that they would be able to get closer to him as he rested before returning to the battle.


    Was he really that keen on going back into battle?


    The Lu Astral Emperor knitted his brows before saying, "Young master Lin, is there really a need to be in that much of a rush. There''s nothing to gain from rushing back onto the battlefield like this. You should rest up a bit before heading back."


    But Lin Fan just calmly shook his head and said, "I''m not heading back to the battlefield."


    Everyone couldn''t help feeling confused when they heard this.


    The Lu Astral Emperor was also confused, but he slowly said, "Then is there somewhere else you need to be?"


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "Since the matters in your Lu Astral Empire have been taken care of, I will be heading back to the Lin Astral Empire."


    "Huh?" All of the ministers and generals said this immediately after hearing this.


    Even the Lu Astral Emperor wasn''t an exception.


    They never thought that Lin Fan would leave so soon.


    They thought that he would at least stay a bit longer and help them stabilize the Lu Astral Empire after everything that he had done, but now it seemed that Lin Fan didn''t think the same as them.


    Without a single care, he was already heading back to the Lin Astral Empire.


    The ministers and generals of the Lu Astral Empire started to panic when they heard this.


    Lin Fan was the only hope that they had of defeating the Beast Race and the Outers, so if he were to leave now, they would just fall into the same bad position as before.


    So they all turned to look at the Lu Astral Emperor for help.


    Even without the ministers and generals asking this of him, the Lu Astral Emperor would have spoken up. He also knew what the situation of the Lu Astral Empire was and he knew that they still needed Lin Fan''s help.


    So the Lu Astral Emperor said, "Young master Lin, is it possible for you to stay a bit longer. You should know the situation of our Lu Astral Empire and we really need your help."


    Lin Fan looked at the Lu Astral Emperor with a calm look before saying, "The situation in the Lu Astral Empire has already been stabilized. Your majesty should also know what the situation of the Lin Astral Empire is, so I need to return to help."


    The Lu Astral Emperor wanted to say something, but he found that he couldn''t say anything in response to this since everything that Lin Fan said was logical.


    In fact, they were the ones being unreasonable by asking him to stay longer when he clearly had his duty to the Lin Astral Empire to perform.


    So even though he was being red at by the ministers and generals, the Lu Astral Emperor had no choice but to say, "I wish you luck on your mission."


    Lin Fan cupped his hands and gave a nod before leaving the room without any hesitation.


    The ministers and generals wanted to say something, but they knew that there was nothing to say. If even the Lu Astral Emperor who was their final hope couldn''t do anything, then there was nothing for them to say.


    After he left the room, Lin Fan wasted no time in heading to the ship and getting the crew to set off to the Lin Astral Empire.


    Though the way that he left¡­it seemed like he really was in a rush.


    It was much faster than he had ever gone during his time in the Lu Astral Empire.


    It seemed that there really was something important that he needed to get to.


    On a balcony in the Lu Astral Empire''s pce.


    The Lu Astral Emperor was alone with Lu Fei Yu.


    The two of them watched the ship departing from the in silence, both withplicated looks on their faces.


    Finally, the Lu Astral Emperor broke the silence by saying, "It''s too bad that you were unable to get closer to young master Lin."


    Lu Fei Yu gave a sigh before saying, "He''s not someone that would be interested in me in the first ce. He''s someone that has his sights set on something much further than anything that I could reach. I could see that when I was with him."


    The Lu Astral Emperor couldn''t help looking at Lu Fei Yu with a strange look when he heard this, but he gave a nod in response in the end.


    He didn''t know what Lu Fei Yu had encountered, but he could also tell that Lin Fan was anything but normal.


    In the end, he said with a sigh, "It''s too bad that you weren''t able to get closer to him while he was in our Lu Astral Empire." Then after a pause he added, "But I''m thinking about sending a group to help our allies in the Lin Astral Empire."


    Lu Fei Yu couldn''t help trembling when she heard this and she looked at the Lu Astral Emperor with eyes that had a trace of hope in them.


    The Lu Astral Emperor revealed a smile when he saw this and he said, "Yes, you will be the leader of this group."


    Lu Fei Yu immediately revealed an excited look before cupping her hands and saying, "Royal father, Fei Yu will not let you down."


    The Lu Astral Emperor gave a nod and said, "I know you won''t."


    ¡­


    After the ship had set off, Lin Fan just gave the crew the order to return to the Lin Astral Empire as soon as possible.


    The crew didn''t understand why Lin Fan was in such a rush to return, but they just obeyed his orders and pushed the ship as quickly as possible. Anyone that tried to ambush it was just outrun by the ship since this ship was much faster than any flying demon beasts that the Beast Race had.


    There was one time where an Outer Expert tried to chase them, but they just sted that Outer Expert away with the missiles.


    After they departed, Lin Fan locked himself in a room all by himself.


    He didn''t even bring Ang and the others in with him since there was something he wanted to see alone.


    There was a new notification from the system that had popped up while he had been in the Lu Astral Empire''s royal pce.

 Chapter 1140 New Realm?

    ?


    It took Lin Fan''s ship no time at all to arrive back in the Lin Astral Empire''s territory.


    The people were so caught off guard that there was no time to organize a weing ceremony for him.


    Naturally, the reports of what happened in the Lu Astral Empire had already made their way back to the Lin Astral Empire, so they knew what Lin Fan had done.


    The ministers and generals of the Lin Astral Empire had been shocked to read these reports, but the Lin Astral Emperor just revealed a face like he thought that it was natural. Though in reality, he was just better at hiding his emotions than the others and he was also shocked by this.


    He didn''t even know just how strong Lin Fan was now¡­


    There was even a part of him that wondered if Lin Fan had be even stronger than him¡­


    But of course, the Lin Astral Emperor would never be jealous over such a thing.


    It was inevitable that the younger generation would be stronger than the older generation, that was the way of the world. He would only be proud to see Lin Fan bing stronger than him since that would mean that he had grown up.


    So the Lin Astral Emperor was very happy to see Lin Fan doing all of these things and bing famous because of it.


    As soon as they heard that Lin Fan was back, they wanted to bring him into the pce to discuss what to do next.


    However, they were disappointed to find that Lin Fan rejected this request and made his own request to go into closed doors training for a while.


    The Lin Astral Emperor was pressured by his ministers and generals to refuse this request, but he didn''t care as he granted this request all by himself. It was as if he wouldn''t budge no matter what his ministers and generals said.


    In the end, the ministers and generals couldn''tin.


    After all, Lin Fan had already performed a great feat by stabilizing the situation in the Lu Astral Empire.


    Without having to worry that the Lu Astral Empire would copse and the Beast Race there would spill into the Lin Astral Empire, the ministers and generals could focus on the battlefields in the Lin Astral Empire.


    At the same time, because they had learned the secrets of how to counter thews of the Outers, they would be able to fight back against the Beast Race even if they used thews of the Outers.


    So they really didn''t need Lin Fan unless there was some kind of unpredicted change.


    But of course, it would be much easier if Lin Fan was on the battlefield since he was much more familiar with how to deal with the Outers than them.


    He would be the equivalent of millions of troops all by himself with the power that he possessed.


    Still, since the Lin Astral Emperor had spoken, it wasn''t as if they could say anything else.


    So they just had to figure out a way by themselves.


    As for Lin Fan, he was currently heading to the shop.


    As soon as his ship hadnded, he had ignored everything and ran right to the shop.


    Seeing him run off like this, Ang and the others quickly followed behind him.


    When he arrived in the shop, his cousins who were working there couldn''t help being surprised by Lin Fan''s sudden appearance.


    As members of the Lin Astral Family, they naturally had ess to information that normal people wouldn''t have. They knew that Lin Fan wasn''t currently in the Lin Astral Empire because of a special mission, though they had no idea where he was exactly.


    Since they thought that he wasn''t here, they were naturally surprised to see him.


    Lin Hong, who led the cousins, came forward to speak to Lin Fan, but all that happened was that he was pushed aside by Lin Fan as he headed to the back.


    Lin Hong was thrown to the ground and when he looked back up, he found that Lin Fan was already gone.


    He couldn''t help rubbing his butt which hurt from being pushed like this before saying, "What''s his problem?"


    Ang and the others immediately came in afterwards and all of the cousins started to work on their own thing.


    They had been in the Lin Astral Empire when Ang had been a general, so they knew all about her bad reputation. They were naturally terrified of her even though she had resigned as a general already.


    Once Lin Fan reached the room in the back, he turned around to face Ang and the others who had been following him to say, "Just leave me alone for a bit. I have something to take care of."


    All of them couldn''t help revealing worried looks when they saw this, but then¡­Ang, Yuki, and Momonga couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    That was because there was a notification that appeared in front of them.


    It prevented them from entering the back room with Lin Fan.


    It seemed that whatever he was about to do, it was rted to the master of the store.


    Since that was the case, they could feel assured since the master of the store wouldn''t hurt Lin Fan.


    If he wanted to, he would have already done so since it wasn''t hard for him to hurt Lin Fan. There was arge difference in power, even if Lin Fan had now reached the Ruler Realm.


    So they didn''t have to worry about Lin Fan meeting with the master of the store alone.


    It was only Zi Ling who didn''t get this notification, but Ang stopped her and calmed her down in the end.


    Seeing this, Lin Fan knew that the system must have interfered in some way, but he wasn''t surprised.


    After all, it was the system that was calling him to the back alone.


    In the past, if there was a new realm released, he would be able to ess it through the system anywhere he wanted to.


    But this time, it had called him back to this store and had stated that he needed to be alone before it could be released.


    This had never happened before, so Lin Fan could tell that something must have changed for the system to act this way¡­


    So he needed to see just what had changed.


    After he closed the door, he pulled up the system panel and waited to see the change.


    When he was finally alone, the system released the information for the new cultivation realm that had been unlocked¡­or rather it didn''t.


    That was because all that was given when this cultivation realm was released were question marks.


    "???"


    That was the only thing that was on the status screen when Lin Fan tried to find the information of this cultivation realm.


    It was as if the system was trying to keep it a secret on purpose.


    After a moment of being dazed, Lin Fanined, "System, what is this? Are you ying a joke on me?"


    The system remained silent after hearing this.


    Seeing that the system wouldn''t say anything, Lin Fan didn''t bother asking another question.


    He just simply swept his hand in front of him and pushed away the screen that was there.


    Since the system wasn''t going to tell him anything, he wasn''t going to y along with it.


    At this point, he knew that as long as he didn''t do anything, the system wouldn''t be able to do anything to him.


    Seeing that nothing appeared, Lin Fan started to walk out of the room.


    But before he could, there was a notification that appeared.


    The moment that he saw this notification, he couldn''t help revealing a shocked look.


    That was because this notification was unlike anything that he had seen before.


    "Do you wish to know the truth?"


    After that shock, he deeply knitted his brows as if he was lost deep in thought,


    This was the first time that the system was willing to share any information like this, but Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling that this was all a trap¡­


    After all, the system wouldn''t share something like this unless it absolutely had to or this was all a part of its n.


    Both ways would be bad for him anyway, so he knew that it was best if he didn''t go along with it.


    But the innate curiosity that humans had drove him forward. He really wanted to know what the system was built for and why he had been brought to this world.


    So he was hesitating over whether to go to this cultivation realm or not.


    He didn''t even need to use points to unlock it, it was already unlocked the moment that it was released. As long as he chose to go, he would be teleported immediately.


    In the end, Lin Fan finally decided that¡­he would go along with the system¡­


    No matter how suspicious he was of this, he couldn''t hold back his curiosity any longer.


    So he opened up the panel for the cultivation realm and pressed the button to activate it.


    This time, the teleportation wasn''t in the form of a white sh.


    Instead, there was a gold sh that appeared in front of his eyes the moment that he pressed the button.


    This golden sh was even brighter than the white sh and he waspletely blinded by it.


    Even when he felt his feetnd on something, he wasn''t able to open his eyes because he had been blinded by the golden sh of light.


    When he was finally able to open his eyes, he found that there was a golden pce in front of him.

 Chapter 1141 Other Me

    ?


    When he saw the golden pce in front of him, Lin Fan couldn''t help being shocked.


    That was because he could tell that this golden pce wasn''t built with any kind of material, but rather it was a building that was constructed with purews.


    As for thews that it used, it was the strange goldenw that he had found in the ruins back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    Even now, that strange goldenw was still inside of his dantian, wrapped around the suns that were there.


    But this golden pce in front of him, he could feel the powering from it.


    The strange goldenws that were used to create this golden pce were much stronger than any other samews that he had encountered before. Even his own goldenws far paled inparison to the ones of this golden pce.


    This level of power¡­it was strangely familiar.


    It was simr to the spatialws that were used by the system when its defense systems were activated.


    Now that he had reached the Ruler Realm, Lin Fan was certain that this wasn''t the kind of power that could be released in the Ruler Realm. He was certain that these spatialws used by the store weren''t in the Ruler Realm, but rather in the God Realm.


    Onlyws in the God Realm would be able to release that kind of power.


    So he knew that whoever this golden pce belonged to, they would be someone in the God Realm.


    The only God Realm being that he had faced before was the Outer God Fragment that he had faced before¡­so could it be that this was part of another Outer God Fragment?


    If the strange goldenw was indeed from another universe, then that would make sense since he had never found anyone using the samew in this universe.


    After being dazed for a bit, Lin Fan still decided to approach the golden pce in the end.


    After all, the system must have sent him here for some purpose.


    If he just stood here without doing a thing, then that would go against the reason why he even came here in the first ce.


    The system had asked him if he wanted to know the truth, so there must be the ''truth'' somewhere in this ce.


    If he didn''t do a thing and just stood there, then it would be a waste of this precious opportunity.


    Not to mention, when he was sent to cultivation realms like this, he would have the ability to revive. He had also confirmed it with the system before leaving, so he knew that he wouldn''t be in any real danger even if he died.


    With that, there was no reason for him not to explore.


    But after he took a few steps forward, there was a trembling that came from under him.


    This trembling became stronger and stronger until even the golden pce in front of him was trembling.


    Lin Fan immediately raised his guard, but he didn''t do a thing as he waited to see where this trembling would lead.


    After the trembling continued for some time, the golden pce finally reacted. After the trembling stopped, the gates of the golden pce suddenly opened and there was a figure that flew out.


    It floated forward for a bit before stopping in front of Lin Fan, floating there in the air.


    At first, Lin Fan couldn''t see the real appearance of this golden figure because of the golden light that they released. However, after they came closer, Lin Fan was able to see their real face.


    The moment that he did, his chin couldn''t help dropping.


    That was because it was like looking into a mirror.


    This golden figure had the exact same appearance as him, only he waspletely golden.


    It was like a gold statue version of himself.


    Lin Fan just stared at this golden version of himself for a long time before finally opening his mouth to say, "Who are you?"


    The golden version of him couldn''t help revealing an amused look when he heard this before asking back, "Who do you think I am?"


    Even the voice that the golden version of him spoke in was his voice.


    It was like this was a perfect copy of him.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the golden version of himself and after a long period of silence, he slowly said, "The system¡­?"


    There was an upwards inflection to his voice that made it seem like he was asking a question, but the look in his eyes made it seem like he was already almost certain of his answer.


    The golden version of him looked at him for a bit before slowly giving a nod.


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this before looking around and asking, "Where is this ce?"


    The golden version of him gave a shrug before saying, "Who knows?"


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    He could tell from the voice of the golden version of him that he did know where they were, but he just wasn''t telling him.


    Still, Lin Fan knew that there was nothing to gain from antagonizing the golden version of him.


    If he didn''t want to say anything, he couldn''t force him to say anything.


    After all, he could feel the power that wasing from the golden version of him. It was the same power that the golden pce had, showing that the system was indeed in the God Realm, or at least possessed power in the God Realm.


    Force really wasn''t an option for him.


    Lin Fan was silent for a bit before asking, "What do you want? Why did you bring me here?"


    The golden version of him didn''t answer at first, but then all of a sudden, that golden version of him gave a sigh. He shook his head before saying, "It''s too early to even bring you here, but there''s no choice. The Outers have made their move, so we can only respond in kind."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows once more when he heard this.


    He had already thought that it was strange that the Outers had been cooperating with the Beast Race, but it turned out that it was more than that. The Outers had gone against some kind of n and had made a move ahead of time.


    But he didn''t say a thing as he waited for the golden version of himself to exin things.


    In the end, the golden version of himself didn''t exin anything and just changed the topic.


    "I need to send you to a special ce now so that you can gain the power that you need to face the Outers." The golden version of him said in a simple voice.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he once again deeply knitted his brows, but this time he asked, "Where are you sending me now?"


    The golden version of him said with a smile, "It''s the ce that you''ve been waiting to go to, the God Realm."


    "Huh?" That was all Lin Fan could say in response to this.


    He had already learned that the God Realm existed from the fragments of the gods of the five sacred beast races. But he had also learned that this God Realm had been sealed for some unknown reason, so it should be impossible for him to ess it.


    But now the system was saying that it could send him to the God Realm?


    Was this a joke or did the system really have this ability?


    And if it had this ability, just how was it linked to the God Realm being closed in the first ce?


    The system could see the doubts in his eyes, but he didn''t answer a single thing.


    The golden version of him just turned around and said, "You''ll find the answers that you want soon enough. In time, you will understand why we did all of this."


    Lin Fan once again deeply knitted his brows after hearing this, but he didn''t get a chance to say anything.


    Before he could even react, the golden version of himself was already floating back into the golden pce.


    But before the golden version of himself could enter the golden pce, he suddenly turned around as if he had forgotten something. He raised his hand and there was a ball of golden energy that appeared.


    With a flick of his hand, that golden energy suddenly flew out towards Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan wasn''t able to react in time as that golden energy suddenly entered his body.


    When it did, it felt like his body was about to be ripped apart and he fell to the ground in pain. However, he could tell that this golden energy wasn''t bad for him, rather it was currently rebuilding his body to make it even stronger.


    The golden version of him looked at him with a smile before saying, "How strong you be will all depend on you. I hope that you will not disappoint."


    Then without caring for Lin Fan''s response, he entered the golden pce and the doors closed behind him.


    Lin Fan was just left there on the ground, writhing in pain as the golden energy refined his body.


    He gritted his teeth as he looked at the gates of the golden pce, with his eyes filling with determination.


    The way that the golden version of him had said that, it was almost like he was challenging him.


    That had ignited the mes inside of Lin Fan which made him even more determined to pass this test.


    In the end, he wanted to punch the system in the face if he could!

 Chapter 1142 God Realm

    ?


    Lin Fan justid there writhing with pain, but after half an hour, he finally stopped.


    There was still a painful sensation in his body, but it had reached the point where he was able to endure it.


    He could still see the golden light that wrapped around him, refining his body, but he was no longer restrained by it.


    So Lin Fan made a decision to sit up and sit cross legged.


    As he sat there, he started using his cultivation technique to absorb the spiritual energy that was in this ce to help increase his cultivation while his body was being refined. But he found that there wasn''t a single bit of spiritual energy for him to absorb.


    He could feel that there seemed to be something here that was stopping him from absorbing any spiritual energy in the air.


    He didn''t know exactly what it was, but it was much stronger than him and he couldn''t forcefully absorb the spiritual energy at all.


    So he gave up on this and tried using his voidws.


    After all, the golden energy that was currently refining his body, there was arge golden pce in front of him that was made of the same golden energy.


    If he were to use his voidws to absorb that golden pce, he would be able to refine his body even more.


    There was also the benefit of the system living in that golden pce. So if he could screw over the system while bing stronger, that was just icing on the cake.


    But when he tried to use the voidw against the golden pce, he found¡­that there was something stopping him from absorbing the golden energy of the golden pce. This was just like the thing that had stopped him from absorbing the spiritual energy of this ce.


    No matter how hard he tried, he found that he wasn''t able to do a single thing to the golden pce in front of him.


    In the end, Lin Fan had no choice but to ept the fact that he wouldn''t be able to do anything in this ce.


    He just epted that fact and focused on the golden energy that was refining his body.


    It took another half an hour before that golden energy faded away and Lin Fan stood up again.


    During thatst half an hour, he found that he was able to control the golden energy with his own golden energy.


    So he started using his own golden energy to guide the golden energy that was refining his body. Before he guided it with his own golden energy, that golden energy spread across his body unevenly which gave an uneven refining.


    But with his golden energy guiding it, it spread evenly across his body and refined it properly. With this refinement, he didn''t have a single weakness in his body anymore.


    It was like the legendary Vajra Body, the indestructible diamond body of legend.


    Could it be that this golden energy was some kind of Buddhist sutra from another universe?


    If it was, it really did make sense how it had refined his body like this.


    Once he was finished refining his body, Lin Fan knew that there was nothing left for him to do since the system wasn''t willing to give him any more information.


    Plus, the system was telling him to leave since it was showing him the notification that he could return from this cultivation realm.


    Taking onest look at the golden pce, Lin Fan gave a sigh before confirming that he wanted to leave this cultivation realm.


    After Lin Fan left, there was a window that opened in this golden pce and the golden version of him looked out this window to look at where he had been standing previously.


    There was a bemused look on the face of this golden version of him before it closed that window.


    As the golden version of him stood in that golden room, he muttered to himself, "It''s almost time¡­I wonder if he will be able to awaken his memories before then¡­"


    Then with a sigh, that golden version of Lin Fan disappeared from the pce.


    Not for a single second did Lin Fan suspect that this ''cultivation realm'' had been inside of him.


    Yes, this was the golden pce that had been in Lin Fan''s soul when Huang Xiao Hou had tried to take his body.


    That was why his attempts to absorb the spiritual energy didn''t work. After all, it was his own spiritual energy that he was trying to absorb in the first ce.


    Naturally his body and his soul wouldn''t allow him to do that, so that was why it hadn''t worked.


    As for the golden energy of the golden pce¡­the system was from the God Realm for a reason.


    ¡­


    When he returned, the first thing that Lin Fan did was check the cultivation realm list.


    Under the special cultivation realms, there was now a realm that was called ''God Realm'' as promised.


    But he had mixed feelings when he saw this.


    After all, while it was the ultimate goal of every cultivator to reach the God Realm one day, he also remembered that the God Realm had suddenly closed. The World of Gods wouldn''t close for no good reason, so he was scared to see what he would find there.


    Especially since he would be the weakest one there.


    It was called the World of Gods for a reason¡­


    So he was very hesitant about going to this God Realm¡­


    But that wasn''t a decision that was up to him alone because there was something that he had promised three people when he got them to work in the store.


    Now that this opportunity is here, he should at least talk to them first.


    So after taking a deep breath, Lin Fan walked out of the room where he found Ang and the rest waiting for him.


    He didn''t know why they were here, but it was a good thing that they were here since he needed to talk to them.


    But he could tell that they were looking at him with a strange look that he couldn''t understand¡­


    For now, he waved at them to follow him into the room.


    When they were all seated, Lin Fan said, "It''s time to pay up on the promise that I made."


    When they heard this, all three of them couldn''t help revealing surprised looks that also had a trace of confusion in them.


    But then when they opened up their system interfaces, they realized what he was talking about.


    They could see that the God Realm cultivation realm had been opened to them.


    It was a good thing that Zi Ling wasn''t in here with them or else it really would have been confusing since she couldn''t see the interface. At the same time, she would have no idea what this promise he made was.


    After being excited for a bit, they all immediately calmed down as they realized that there was more than meets the eye to this. After all, there was a reason why Lin Fan had called them in here to talk.


    Seeing that they calmed down, Lin Fan exined the situation to them.


    While they were excited to be able to ess the God Realm and have the chance to touch the cultivation realm that they wanted to reach, they had to admit that Lin Fan was right.


    This would be a dangerous journey for them since they had no idea what was waiting for them in the God Realm. At the same time, they had to recognize that they would be the weakest ones there since they were Rulers and not Gods.


    So this did make them hesitate a bit about going.


    After thinking it through though, they still decided that they wanted to go.


    If they didn''t take this risk and find out why the path to bing a god had been cut off, they would never have a chance of reaching that legendary realm.


    If they weren''t ever able to reach the God Realm, then what would be the point of cultivating?


    So they still wanted to explore even if it meant that they would be in danger.


    As for Lin Fan¡­he had already made up his mind to go while he had been exining the dangers to them.


    The system had said that he would find the ''truth'' there, so he wanted to find that truth.


    But before anything else could happen, Momonga suddenly said, "Since the master of the store is sending us there, he should be able to protect us, right?"


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile as he said, "He might be a God Realm Expert, but we''re going to a ce that is filled with God Realm Experts. It is very unlikely that he would be able to protect us."


    When they heard this, all three of them suddenly knitted their brows.


    After all, this was one of the things that they had been counting on to protect them when they reached the World of Gods.


    This God Realm Expert master of Lin Fan''s who had been hiding in this store¡­


    But now that it turned out that he wasn''t able to protect them, they couldn''t help feeling worried.


    Lin Fan then added, "He just suddenly told me to go to the God Realm, so I have no idea what to expect there either."


    When they heard this, they knitted their brows even more.


    After all, they were going to a super dangerous ce without any support and any information¡­


    Wasn''t this like throwing them into the lion''s den?


    So they couldn''t help feeling worried and started regretting their decision.


    But in the end, they still decided to go.


    Seeing that they had made up their minds, Lin Fan didn''t have any more hesitation as he said, "Then let''s go."

 Chapter 1143 Friends or enemies?

    <h4>Chapter 1143 Friends or enemies?</h4>


    Once they had made up their minds, they didn''t hesitate to go to the God Realm cultivation realm.


    But of course, they had to tell Zi Ling that they were leaving.


    Even if they wanted to take her with them, she wasn''t a part of the store. Well, she did do work for the store, but she wasn''t a contracted employee of the store like these three were.


    And even if Lin Fan wanted to, she¡­didn''t meet the requirement for bing an employee ording to the system.


    Comparing Zi Ling to Ang, Yuki, and Momonga, she was definitelycking.


    All three of them could defeat her with just their pinky finger if they wanted.


    So even if Zi Ling was able to go, Lin Fan wouldn''t want to bring her in the first ce since it would be too dangerous for her.


    Zi Ling understood in the end, but she was unwilling to part with them.


    Still, as they left, she waved goodbye to them as they disappeared with a sh of white light.


    After the sh of white light, there was a whole new scene that appeared in front of them.


    It was a field of green.


    They found that they had been transported from the shop into a wide open field of grass.


    As they looked around themselves, they found that there wasn''t anything around them at all. It was as if they were the only people in this abandoned ce.


    But was this supposed to be the God Realm?


    It didn''t feel like there was anything special about this ce that would make it seem like it was the God Realm.


    There was no thicker concentration of life energy, no powerfulws, or anything else like that. This felt just like a normal rather than the God Realm.


    After looking around, the three of them couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with confused looks as if they were trying to confirm something. However, all Lin Fan could do was shake his head since he didn''t know what was happening either.


    The system had said that this was the God Realm, but it didn''t seem that special to him either.


    At the same time, the system didn''t provide him with a map or an objective like it would normally do.


    It was as if the system just wanted him to explore this ce all on his own.


    Since that was the case, it wasn''t as if they would gain anything by just staying here and doing nothing. Since that was the case, it was better if they tried to explore this ce and see if there was anything that they could find in the surrounding area.


    So they just chose a random direction and started heading off.


    Of course, they didn''t run at full speed, but rather moved at a slow and cautious pace.


    They were in an unknown ce, so it wasn''t as if they could just dash into the unknown where danger could be waiting for them.


    They had to take it nice and slow to see if they could find anything without putting themselves in danger.


    However, even after an hour of traveling, they still weren''t able to find anything.


    In fact, they still hadn''t left the field of grass that they were currently in.


    It was as if no matter how far they went, there would only be grass around them.


    Almost as if there was only grass in this world.


    At one point, they had tried flying up into space to see if they could see anything from above. However, once they reached a certain height, they found that they weren''t able to go any higher.


    It was as if there was something that was preventing them from climbing any higher than this certain altitude.


    Like there was some kind of barrier there.


    But that was to be expected of an isted realm like the World of Gods.


    If it was a ce that anyone could enter, then the path to the God Realm wouldn''t have been closed off for so long.


    So the only thing that they could do was keep going.


    They kept walking and walking, but there was nothing that they could see other than grass.


    At this point, they had lost track of the amount of time that they had been walking and it seemed like they were about to lose themselves.


    But Lin Fan suddenly stopped and said, "Let''s have a meal."


    The others were surprised, but they nodded in agreement to this.


    It wasn''t as if exploring the God Realm was something that could be done in a single day. This was a realm that was muchrger and more mysterious than anything that they had encountered before.


    If they went on like this, they wouldn''t be able tost long.


    They had just forgotten themselves in their curiosity and excitement that they had forgotten the basic rules.


    So they quickly went to set up a campfire.


    All of them had Storage Rings and in those Storage Rings were supplies for instances like this.


    While they wouldn''t actually need the food and water to survive, it gave them a feeling of being alive enjoying things like this. It allowed them to calm themselves in this new and strange environment, so it wasn''t a bad thing.


    But they ran into another problem when they tried to set up a campfire.


    Since they were surrounded in grass, it wasn''t as if they could just light the campfire right away. They needed to clear an area around themselves before they were able to set up the campfire.


    However, they found that it wasn''t as easy as they thought to cut down the grass around them.


    When they tried to cut down the grass, they found that they couldn''t actually do a thing to them.


    No matter how hard they tried to cut it, the grass just resisted all of their attacks.


    It was as if this grass had some kind of barrier around it.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows and raised his hand to gather a ck hole in his palm.


    When the ck hole was pointed at the grass, there was a bit of life energy that came from the grass into that ck hole. But the moment that this bit of life energy entered the ck hole, Lin Fan immediately released the ck hole and bent over.


    With a pained look on his face, Lin Fan immediately sat down cross legged and started to cultivate.


    If he didn''t¡­he might have exploded from the life energy that was building up inside of him.


    Just this bit of life energy was already enough to make him burst.


    So just how much life energy was contained within this single de of grass?


    It seemed that nothing was simple in this God Realm.


    So while Lin Fan was cultivating, Ang, Momonga, and Yuki gathered their power to start cutting the grass.


    It was hard at first, but then they found that there were certain spots of the grass that were weaker than the rest of it. As long as they cut in those spots, they would be able to cut the grass down.


    But even after the grass was cut and set aside, they found that it didn''t wilt at all. It was still filled with as much vitality as before.


    When they tried to burn it, they found that the mes that they used weren''t able to burn this grass at all. Even when they used mews, it was useless.


    Lin Fan had recovered at this point and had joined in the experimentation.


    He summoned Xiao Huo and had him use the sacred mes of the phoenix that he had gained during the five years. However, this sacred me wasn''t able to do a single thing to the grass either.


    So they had no choice but to leave the grass on the side and use the kindling that they brought to make the campfire.


    Once this campfire was lit, it was up to Lin Fan and Momonga to cook the food.


    The other two weren''t able to cook at all.


    Even though they were girls, theycked this feminine power.


    It didn''t take long before a nice smell filled the area and a happy atmosphere came over them.


    Now if only the sky was dark, it would fit the mood even better.


    However, even though all this time had passed, the sky didn''t show any signs of darkening. It was almost as if there was no night time in this World of Gods.


    There were many things that went against what they were used to.


    But at least they were able to enjoy this meal.


    Or at least that was what they thought, but there was a voice that suddenly rang out, "Eh? Why is there a fire in my field?"


    As soon as they heard this, all four of them immediately put down their food and raised their guards.


    While it didn''t seem like this voice had any hostility, they were in an unknown ce and anyone could be an enemy at any time in a ce like this. So they didn''t dare let their guards down or they would regret itter.


    Then all of a sudden, there was arge figure that appeared in the air.


    When they looked up at it, they were shocked to find a half man half cow floating there in the air looking down at them.


    This half man half cow thing narrowed their eyes to look at them before saying, "Who are you and what are you doing in my fields?"

 Chapter 1144 Real God Realm

    <h4>Chapter 1144 Real God Realm</h4>


    We didn''t let our guards down when we heard this voice, but we could tell that this half man half cow thing didn''t have any hostility towards us.


    It seemed like it was a genuine question about why we were here.


    We didn''t answer right away, but then I said in a slow voice, "We were teleported here by someone and we were trying to find a way out. But since we couldn''t, we took a small break to gather ourselves."


    The half man half cow thing looked down at us with a thoughtful gaze before saying, "So it''s a bunch of kids¡­" As his voice trailed off, his eyes were on Momonga. He had narrowed them as if he was carefully looking at him.


    But in the end, he still said, "A bunch of kids that got lost."


    With a sigh, he said, "Alright, I''ll help you get out of this ce."


    With a wave of his hand, there was a strange force that suddenly surrounded Lin Fan and the others.


    Even if they wanted to struggle, they found that they weren''t able to do a single thing against this strange force that was lifting them into the air where the half man half cow thing was.


    As they were flying up, they heard him mutter, "These kids¡­they messed up the field too. I''ll need to fix thatter when I get back." After he said this, they heard him give a sigh.


    Suddenly, they couldn''t help feeling bad for what they did even though they didn''t know anything about the circumstances when they had done it.


    Still, Lin Fan said, "We''re sorry about your field, we really didn''t know."


    The half man half cow thing waved his hand and said, "It''s fine, you kids have your own circumstances or else you wouldn''t have been trapped inside of my farm. I''m sure that someone must have put you in here for a reason."


    Though he was annoyed, it wasn''t as if he could me them since this half man half cow thing knew that it was a real ident that they were here.


    Taking a deep breath to draw his courage, Lin Fan then asked, "Sir, can you please tell us where we are?"


    The half man half cow thing looked back down at us and said, "You''re on my farm. Where else would you be?"


    After hearing this, there were three ck lines that appeared on Lin Fan''s face.


    But the half man half cow thing wasn''t done as he said, "I''m just kidding with you. I know what you''re really asking for. You''re in the northern part of the World of Gods, at the edge of the north continent." After a pause, he added, "Do you know how to get home?"


    Lin Fan slowly shook his head in response to this.


    The half man half cow thing knitted his brows a bit when he heard this before saying with a sigh, "Alright, I''ll bring you to Waterfall City. That''s the closest city to this ce. You should be able to find a way home from there."


    Hearing this, Lin Fan and the others all let out sighs of relief.


    They were worried that even if this half man half cow thing helped them out of this ce, it would be a problem if he left them in the middle of nowhere.


    But now that he said that he would help them to a city, they could rest easy.


    Lin Fan then said, "Thank you sir."


    The half man half cow thing just waved his hand as if it wasn''t that big of a deal.


    Then Lin Fan suddenly asked, "Sir, may I know what to address you as?"


    The half man half cow thing tilted his head at this question before suddenly saying, "Oh, right, my name. It''s been a long time since I''ve actually talked to anyone, so I''ve already forgotten about that."


    Then he revealed a smile as he said, "You can just call me Satyr. I am the god of nature."


    God of nature¡­


    As they had expected, this person was a God Realm Expert.


    But a God Realm Expert was calling himself a farmer¡­this was just too strange for them to ept.


    However, before any of them could recover, Satyr added on his own, "Oh, that''s right, I''m not exactly the god of nature¡­It would be better to call me the god of farming."


    God of farming?


    That was even more strange since as far as they could remember, there wasn''t any kind of farmingw.


    There was farming and such in this world since it wasn''t as if they could just ignore eating, but they had never heard of anyone using farming as a method of cultivation.


    It didn''t even seem possible as far as they could tell.


    Seeing the confused looks on their faces, Satyr didn''t seem insulted. Instead, he just revealed a smile and said, "Never heard of farming as a method of cultivation? That isn''t strange since it''s been a long time since anyone has taken farming that seriously. Farming in the human world became just something that is needed to feed people and not something to take pride in. When I ascended, I was thest cultivator of the farmingw, so it isn''t strange that you''ve never heard of it."


    All of us couldn''t help looking at Satyr with strange looks, as we hesitated on whether to ask him questions or not.


    But in the end, we decided against it.


    After all, the questions that we had weren''t actually about his farmingw, but about the ascension that he mentioned.


    In the human world, there were no records of why the God Realm closed, so someone like him who had been in the World of Gods for a long time should know what they wanted to know.


    But right now, Satyr was under the impression that they were kids from the World of Gods. If they asked him about this, it would make it very obvious that they weren''t people from the World of Gods.


    They didn''t know how he would react if he were to find out about this¡­


    Would he be hostile towards them or would he still treat them the same?


    For now, they knew nothing about this World of Gods and Satyr was their only source of information, so it would be better if they didn''t do anything to offend him.


    But they didn''t have the chance to ask anything as Satyr suddenly said, "We''re here."


    They looked at where he was looking and found that there was nothing in front of them.


    He had used his power to lift them all the way up into the air, much further than they had been before. With him lifting them up, they didn''t feel the same strange power that forced them back down like they did earlier.


    Then all of a sudden, there was a sh of light that forced them to close their eyes.


    Once that sh of light disappeared and they could see again, they found that they were in apletely different ce.


    This ce was much more magnificent than the ce that they had been in before.


    They were floating in the air and when they looked down, they could see the domed area that they had been in before. This was a dome that covered arge field of grass, but it seemed much smaller than it seemed when they had been inside of it.


    This seemed like a small garden in one''s backyard instead of therge field that they had been in before.


    But that wasn''t the most shocking thing that had appeared.


    They found themselves floating above a house which was clearly Satyr''s house since the dome with the field in it was right beside it.


    Then further out from that house, there were fields just like the one that they had been in before. But unlike that field, they could see different nts and animals among the grass. At the same time, there were many different rivers that seemed to flow through that field.


    But the most amazing thing of all was what was actually above them.


    They hadn''t noticed it at first since they had been focused on the scenery around them, but when they looked up, they werepletely shocked.


    That was because the sky waspletely blocked.


    It wasn''t blocked by clouds or anything like that, but rather it was blocked by anotherpletely.


    This seemed like a reversed version of the world that they were currently on and it seemed so close that they could even jump to it. But they could feel the powerful barrier that was isting this world in the sky from the world that they were in.


    Other than that, there were alsorge rocks that were floating in the sky.


    There were some that were barren, some that were covered in greenery, and some that seemed like they werepletely made of water. All of these rocks floated there and it seemed like they were full of life.


    This was what they had expected the World of Gods to look like.


    This was a world that looked like a world that would be filled with immortals.


    But the most simple indication of this was the concentration of life energy in the air.


    With how thick it was, it was even hard for them to stand there without being crushed by it.


    This was what the true God Realm looked like and they weren''t disappointed with it one bit.

 Chapter 1145 Waterfall City

    <h4>Chapter 1145 Waterfall City</h4>


    Satyr was still in control of all of them, but he didn''t actually send them flying just yet.


    It was almost as if he was waiting on purpose to give them a chance to see the scenery.


    After a while, he said with a smile, "It''s pretty isn''t it?"


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help raising their guard. It was almost as if they were being threatened with the way that they reacted.


    However, Satyr didn''t seem to notice this as he said, "The northern part of the northern continent always has the best scenery. You won''t ever find another ce like this in the entire World of Gods."


    When they heard this, they all let out a secret sigh of relief.


    It turned out that he wasn''t indirectly questioning their identity, but rather he was just bragging about how pretty his home was.


    This was the normal thing to do when one had visitors over, so it wasn''t strange that he was asking this at all.


    Lin Fan took the lead by saying with a nod, "It really is beautiful. I''ve never seen anything like this in my life."


    The others followed along by praising this ce as well.


    The one with the best praise was naturally Momonga since he used all kinds of difficult and big words to heap on the praise.


    But it didn''t really matter in the end since Satyr didn''t really seem to understand the praise that he was giving. Though that didn''t stop him from proudly raising his head as if he himself was being praised.


    This was the pride that one would take when one''s home was praised, so it was understandable why he felt this kind of pride.


    After they finished praising the area, Satyr gave a satisfied nod and waved his hand. With that wave of his hand, they started flying off in a certain direction.


    They didn''t know exactly where they were going, but they guessed that they were heading towards that Waterfall City that Satyr had mentioned before.


    As they were flying towards the city, Lin Fan and the rest seized this chance to ask some questions about the World of Gods.


    But Satyr couldn''t help revealing a concerned look when he received these questions.


    It wasn''t because these questions were asking about anything sensitive, but rather because these questions were basic questions that everyone should know the answers to. The only people who didn''t know these things were people who didn''t havemon sense or people who had been living under a rock.


    These kids seemed like they hadmon sense with the way that they acted, so Satyr didn''t think that it was that.


    Then could it be that these kids were sheltered kids that didn''t know anything about the world?


    But the fact that they had been teleported to his farm in this remote ce was enough to tell him something. Something must have happened with their family if they were sent to a ce like this¡­


    So for now, he wouldn''t mention that.


    For now, he would bring them to Waterfall City to his friend to see if he could help them.


    Still, he answered all of the questions that they had.


    With this, Lin Fan was able to learn the situation of the World of Gods.


    This world was divided into five different continents, each with many different ces for gods to live in.


    Since gods were not restrained by the limits of mortals, they didn''t need what mortals needed to survive. They could survive being isted, only focusing on their own cultivation¡­though they really didn''t need to cultivate to be stronger since they had already reached the peak of cultivation.


    So most of them were fine to iste themselves.


    But there were those that were bored, so they gathered together to form cities just like the beings outside of the World of Gods.


    Most of them were normal cultivators that had slowly reached the God Realm, so they had lived in the mortal world before.


    They just gathered in cities to pretend that they were still mortals for fun.


    Waterfall City was one of those cities.


    When they arrived, they couldn''t help being surprised by the concentration of life energy in the air. It was much stronger than anything that they had felt before and it even made it hard for them to breathe.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that they were all powerful Ruler Realm Experts, they might have copsed under this pressure.


    But with their various methods, they were able to resist and stand tall under this pressure.


    Still, the look on their faces made it clear that it was still hard for them.


    Satyr looked at them with looks of admiration since most kids¡­would find it hard toe to a ce like Waterfall City. The fact that they could resist the pressure entering the city for the first time without his help was more than enough to show that they were talented.


    But Satyr also couldn''t help narrowing his eyes when he looked at Lin Fan.


    It was almost as if he noticed something.


    However, that expression quickly disappeared as he said, "Shall we explore a bit before seeing my friend?"


    When they heard this, all four of them revealed awkward looks.


    That was because they didn''t have any money to look around with even if they wanted to.


    Satyr could almost guess what they were thinking, so he said, "It''s fine, it''ll be on me this time. You can pay me back in the future."


    All four of them were surprised by how generous he was, but they quickly bowed their heads and thanked him.


    They might be proud people, but that was only in the mortal world.


    In front of this God Realm Expert who had already shown them that they couldn''t resist him at all, they had no choice but to act humbly.


    As they walked around, they realized that this city¡­wasn''t that different from any other city that they had been in before.


    Since this was a ce for God Realm Experts to act like mortals and y around, it was based on the cities in the mortal realm. That meant that many of the things here were just the same as the cities that they had lived in before.


    There was even the same level of technology.


    Though one difference was that¡­all of the people in the city were God Realm Experts.


    From the people walking in the street to the people that were running the stores. Even the uncle who was running the noodle stall was in the God Realm.


    In this ce, they were the weakest ones.


    But another surprising thing was just how many God Realm Experts there were in this city.


    As far as the eye could see, there were God Realm Experts all around them.


    It was shocking to think that there were so many God Realm Experts out there since they didn''t think that there were that manyws, but that didn''t seem to be the case.


    That was because other than the pressure that came with facing a God Realm Expert, they could sense that there were differentwsing from all of these people.


    That meant that every single God Realm Expert here had a differentw.


    There wasn''t a single one of them that had the samew.


    Were there really that manyws in this world?


    As they moved through Waterfall City, they really understood why this was the World of Gods.


    This ce was just filled with so much life energy that they weren''t able to do anything without being stuffed by the life energy here.


    Just a single dish that Satyr bought them was enough for them.


    If they tried to eat another meal without digesting this one first, it would have made them explode.


    However, this one meal that they ate was the most delicious meal that they ever had.


    Since this was a meal made for them by a God Realm Expert, it would be strange if it wasn''t the most delicious meal that they ever had.


    After this meal, Satyr took them to a park to rest or rather to let them digest the food with a bit of cultivation.


    When they finished, they could tell that they were much stronger than before.


    The concentration ofws in their dantian was also much greater.


    It seemed that the meals here didn''t just help with increasing their cultivation, but also helped increase their understanding ofws.


    It wasn''t strange since there were traces of a God Realm Law in these meals.


    Finally, when they had finished exploring, Satyr brought them to a more rundown district. This seemed like a ce that was filled with crimes and dangerous things¡­


    They couldn''t help wondering why he had brought them here.


    Even for a second, they thought that he might be selling them for human trafficking¡­


    But he brought them to an old bookstore that seemed to fit this ce.


    For Lin Fan who had read a lot of novels beforeing to this world, he knew that this kind of ce wasn''t simple.


    Normally, there would be some kind of hidden expert here that would make deals in terms of information. Or there would be some kind of protagonist here that tricked people into making deals.


    But of course, those were only in novels.


    It wasn''t as if this ce would be the same as those novels.


    When they walked in, they found that there was an old man who was sitting at the counter currently reading a book.

 Chapter 1146 City Lord

    <h4>Chapter 1146 City Lord</h4>


    When the old man heard the bell above the door ring, he looked up from his book at them.


    Seeing them at first, he didn''t really react. However, when he saw Satyr, he suddenly revealed a smile and said, "Friend, it''s been too long since youst visited. Why haven''t youe by recently?"


    Satyr gave a shrug and said, "I''ve been busy with my farm, so I''ve had no reason toe to the city."


    The old man shook his head and said, "What''s the fun of ying with that farm? You shoulde and learn from me in the city."


    Satyr shook his head with a smile as he said, "You know what myws are, so why would I live in a city? Anyway, that''s not important."


    Satyr turned to point at Lin Fan''s group before saying, "I found these kids on my farm recently and I was hoping that you can help them."


    With him saying this, the old man finally turned his attention to them.


    As his gaze fell onto Lin Fan''s group, they felt an irresistible probing force entering them. This was most likely the spiritual senses of this old man.


    Even if they wanted to resist, it was impossible for them to do so.


    All they could do was wait and see what he wanted with them.


    After a minute, the irresistible probing force went away and they all let out a sigh of relief.


    The old man looked at Ang first as he said, "This one has a familiar feel to her, almost like those spirits from the south." Then he turned to Yuki and said, "This one too, but it''s a bit weaker."


    When he turned to Momonga, he revealed a smile and said, "This one feels simr to an old friend."


    Momonga couldn''t help revealing a confused look as he looked at the old man. With the way that he was looking at his face, it was as if he was trying to figure out just who this old man was that he would say this.


    Finally, the old man turned to Lin Fan and said, "This one¡­this one has a strange feeling that I haven''t felt in a long time. This one could be¡­"


    Before he could finish, Satyr suddenly came forward to say, "I know what you want to say, but let me say a few things to you first."


    The old man had a confused look on his face, but he still followed Satyr to the side.


    As the two of them spoke, the old man couldn''t help turning back from time to time to look at Lin Fan. With each time that he turned back to look at Lin Fan, there was more and more surprise that filled his face.


    Finally, when the two of them came back, there was a wide smile on the old man''s face as he looked at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling like he was in some kind of danger when he saw this face.


    After all, the way that the old man was looking at him was like a predator looking at prey.


    Still, he forced himself to stay calm as he waited to see what the old man had to say.


    The old man gave a nod of approval seeing this calm look on my face.


    Then the old man said, "We''ve been waiting for you for a long time. It''s great to see that you''re finally here."


    "Huh?" That was all that Lin Fan could say in response to what the old man said since he had no idea what was happening.


    The old man said that they had been waiting for him for a long time, but Lin Fan didn''t even know who this old man was. So why would he say that he had been waiting for him?


    At the same time, who was this ''we'' that he was talking about?


    It was clear that there was more than meets the eye with this situation.


    Since he had finished escorting them here, there was no reason for Satyr to remain here any longer. He waved his hand at the old man and said, "Old Fong, is it alright if I just leave them to you? You''ll take care of them, right?"


    The old man called Old Fong gave a nod and then waved his hand while saying, "Go and take care of your business, I''ll take care of these kids."


    With that, Satyr turned to look at Lin Fan''s group to say, "I''ll just leave you with Old Fong. He''ll be able to take care of you guys."


    Then he took a deep look at Lin Fan before saying, "I''m very d I was able to meet you."


    Without waiting for a response from Lin Fan, he turned and walked out without another word.


    After he walked out, there was a smile that appeared on Satyr''s face as he thought, "There is hope after all. I have to tell everyone about this."


    With that, he happily headed off into the city.


    But back in the bookstore, the mood was anything but happy.


    Lin Fan''s group waspletely on guard against the old man because of what he said and did. Right now, they were even trying to think of a way to escape this ce¡­


    After all, it very much seemed like they had just been sold into human trafficking with the way that things went.


    The old man named Old Fong just stood there with the same smile on his face, almost as if he was waiting for something.


    But finally when it seemed like Lin Fan wouldn''t say anything, he said, "Do you not know why you''re here?"


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a very confused look as he stared at Old Fong.


    The way that Old Fong said this, it was almost as if he knew why the system had sent him here¡­But why would Old Fong know something like this?


    Lin Fan slowly asked, "Do you know something about a system?"


    Ang and the others were confused when they heard this, but Old Fong''s eyes lit up when he heard this. He quickly said in an excited voice, "I knew it, I knew that it was you!"


    Lin Fan was certain now that whoever this Old Fong was, he was rted to the people that had given him the system.


    Then did that mean that Old Fong knew why they gave it to him?


    Also, how did he find out about him?


    As far as he could remember, he didn''t do anything that would have revealed that he had a system¡­so how had he been able to tell that he was the one with the system?


    Slowly, Lin Fan asked, "Do you know what the system is?"


    Old Fong slightly knitted his brows when he heard this before asking, "Are you still only that far into your quest? This is much too slow with what''s been happening recently¡­"


    His voice drifted off as a thoughtful look appeared on his face.


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    With this, it was confirmed that Old Fong knew quite a bit about his system, as well as why he had been brought to this world.


    So Lin Fan quickly asked, "If you know anything about the system, I would be grateful if you told me."''


    Old Fong came back from his thoughts to look at Lin Fan before shaking his head with a smile, "Unfortunately, I can''t tell you anything. This is something that you will discover for yourself."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    However, before he could say anything, Old Fong said, "For now, let me introduce myself. I am the City Lord of this Waterfall City, one of the pantheon of the northern continent."


    "Pantheon?" Lin Fan couldn''t help repeating.


    Old Fong nodded before saying, "It''s the group of strongest gods on a continent. I''m one of the strongest God Realm Experts on the northern continent, which is why I''m in the pantheon of the northern continent."


    It seemed to make sense since with so many Gods Realm Experts, it was strange that there was this kind of order in the city. Only someone that was much more powerful than them could keep this order.


    So it would make sense that there was a powerful God Realm Expert acting as the City Lord to suppress the God Realm Experts.


    But that still didn''t answer Lin Fan''s questions.


    Old Fong could see the anxiety on Lin Fan''s face, so he said, "For now, I''ll be sending you to Mist City, thergest city on the northern continent. That is where the head of our northern continent pantheon is. You will receive your next clue there."


    "Clue?" Lin Fan repeated in a confused voice.


    "That''s right, you''ll be receiving a clue there that will slowly answer your questions." Old Fong said with a smile.


    Seeing the unhappy look on Lin Fan''s face, Old Fong added, "You have to know the history of this world before you can know the reason why you were brought here. So before that, we need you to visit all of the continents and slowly learn about this world."


    Lin Fan didn''t know how to react to this, but he could see from Old Fong''s expression that he didn''t have a choice in this matter.


    It seemed that the path had already been prepared for him and the only thing that he could do was follow it.


    So with a sigh, Lin Fan said, "Alright, send us there."

 Chapter 1147 Special stories (1)

    <h4>Chapter 1147 Special stories (1)</h4>


    Seeing that Lin Fan had agreed, the old man didn''t hesitate to turn around and walk into the back of the store. As he walked back, he waved his hand at them to follow him.


    Lin Fan''s group just looked at each other before following behind the old man.


    In the back of the store was an array that the old man stood in the center of.


    Seeing that they hesitated to enter the array, the old man said, "Juste in already, this is just a teleportation array to send me back to the City Lord Manor. This is how I sneak out to manage this store from time to time."


    Hearing this, all of them couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    Even though this old man was a powerful god, one of the most powerful God Realm Experts on this continent, he still acted like this. It really was hard for them not to say anything about this.


    But still, they entered the array with the old man.


    Once they were all in, there was a wave of the old man''s hand and a sh of white light before the scene around them suddenly changed.


    They were no longer in a dirty old room in the back of the old bookstore, but rather in a stern looking room befitting of a City Lord.


    The old man waved his hand for them to follow him again as he walked off all on his own.


    They looked at each other again before following him with a sigh.


    When they came out of the room, they found that there were people waiting outside.


    Once these people saw the old man, they immediately went to surround him, but he just raised his hand to stop them before saying, "It''s a Code Gold."


    As soon as he said this, all of them couldn''t help looking at them.


    But every single one of them was a God Realm Expert¡­so the pressure that fell onto them was very intense. Following that pressure, there was a powerful spiritual sense that came over them.


    They couldn''t resist even if they wanted to since these were God Realm Experts, so they just let it happen. After all, they weren''t able to feel a trace of hostility from them.


    Once they were done checking them, all of them turned their attention to Lin Fan.


    After all, they were all immediately able to tell that this Code Gold was involving him.


    They were about to surround him, but the old man then said, "I already said get to work! What are you all crowding around for?"


    When they heard this, all of these God Realm Experts couldn''t help trembling.


    In the end, they all took onest look at Lin Fan before heading off to do what they needed to do.


    With the way that they looked at him, it was almost like they were lovers of his who had been ignored by him.


    Ang couldn''t help feeling very strange when she saw them acting this way.


    The old man just calmly said, "Alright,e with me."


    Without waiting to see if they followed or not, he turned around and walked down the hallway.


    They watched him walk off and after a moment of hesitation, they followed behind him.


    As they walked through these halls, there were many people that they passed. Every time that they passed by someone, they would always turn to look at their group.


    It was clear by the direction that their eyes were looking in that every single one of them¡­were looking at Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan almost felt like an animal in the zoo with all of the attention he received, but he pretended like he didn''t see any of this. He just calmly followed behind the old man through this hall.


    Luckily for them, they didn''t have to go far to reach their destination.


    With just a few turns, they reached a room that seemed to be an office.


    The old man didn''t sit down at the desk and went over to one of the walls in this office.


    He tapped a few times on the wall before finding what he was looking for and pressing something on the wall. That part of the wall that he pressed slid in to reveal a hidden passage in this wall behind a bookcase.


    Once again, he didn''t wait for them at all as he went through this hidden passage that appeared.


    Seeing him go in, they had no choice but to follow behind him.


    It was another short walk to find that there was a small room at the end of this hidden passage.


    The only thing of note in this small room was the array on the ground.


    But the moment that he saw this array, Lin Fan couldn''t help knitting his brows.


    That was because he could sense the spatialws that wereing from this array.


    These were spatialws that were on the same level as the spatialws that the system used in the defense system for the store. This meant that these were spatialws that were in the God Realm.


    Only when we were in this room did the old man stop and turn around to face them.


    He pointed at the array and said, "Get in."


    Lin Fan''s group was certain that this was a teleportation array, but as for where it would send them¡­


    The old man naturally knew what they were thinking, but since he had alreadye this far¡­


    There was a powerful force that came over them that lifted them off the ground.


    Then as they were flying, they were lifted into the array and ced in the center.


    After Lin Fan''s groupnded there, they could feel the spatial energy surrounding them as the array was activated.


    The old man just calmly said, "You''ll find out why I needed to send you once you arrive."


    They didn''t even get a chance to say anything as a bright sh of white light appeared.


    Then when it disappeared, Lin Fan''s group found that they were in apletely different ce with apletely different old man standing in front of them.


    This old man looked at them with a smile, but it was the same thing where a powerful spiritual sense filled them. They couldn''t resist, so they didn''t resist and just let this spiritual sense sweep over them.


    After a while, the spiritual sense disappeared and the old man said, "So it really is you."


    He waved his hand and turned around as he said, "Come,e, we have much to talk about and little time."


    All that they could do was look at each other before following the old man out of this room.


    Aftering out of the room, they found that there was another group that was waiting outside for them. But this time, the old man didn''t allow them to sweep them with their spiritual senses.


    With a single nce from the old man, the crowd immediately moved aside and created a path for them.


    But there were still many of them that looked at them with longing looks, just like lovers that had been abandoned.


    Ang knitted her brows seeing this, so she moved over to Lin Fan''s side and grabbed his arm.


    Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile, but he allowed her to do what she wanted.


    After following the old man through the crowd, they eventually reached a room that was just like the one that they had been in before. This was clearly the room of a person who was in charge of a city.


    But this time, there was no secret passage that they were made to enter.


    Instead, the old man sat down and gestured at the seats in front of him, making it clear that he wanted them to sit.


    They looked at each other before finally sitting down.


    The old man gave a nod seeing this and then said, "I''m sure that you have plenty of questions, but there are many things that I can''t exin to you. I can only tell you that I''m the city lord of this city and this city is the capital of the northern continent. You could also call me the paragon of the northern continent''s pantheon."


    This was what they already knew, so they were waiting to see what new things he would have for them.


    The old man saw that they weren''t surprised, but he also wasn''t surprised by this since those that sent them here should have already told them this.


    The old man just calmly continued, "As for whates next, you will be sent to each of the capitals on each of the continents to meet the city lords there. Each of them is a paragon just like me and each of them will give you some information."


    Once again, they didn''t react as they waited to hear what he had to say.


    The old man once again calmly said, "For me, I will be telling you about the God Realm and exining just what it is."


    This time, they couldn''t keep the same calm expression that they had the entire time.


    The God Realm¡­this was what they had been chasing after this entire time.


    The one peak that they had never been able to reach¡­


    And now it was being exined to them in simple words¡­


    This just wasn''t something that they could react to that simply.


    They didn''t know how to feel about this, but the old man didn''t wait for them.

 Chapter 1148 Special stories (2)

    <h4>Chapter 1148 Special stories (2)</h4>


    "The God Realm is the peak of cultivation, but it''s actually much simpler than that. It''s when one bes the very personification of aw, that''s what it means to step into the God Realm." The old man said in a calm voice.


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    It all seemed very simple, but they knew that it wasn''t as simple as this.


    As for how they became the personification of thew, they knew that it had to do with the world that was being created in their dantian. That world in their dantian seemed like it contained thew that they specialized in itself, which made it seem like they were bing thew.


    Since the God Realm was bing the personification of aw, then it seemed likely that it was rted to that world.


    The old man had given them a moment to digest this, but seeing that they didn''t say anything, he continued by saying, "As for how you be the personification of thew, that is by forcing thewpletely under yourmand. Once you do that, you are thew and thew is you."


    Once again, they knitted their brows even more when they heard this.


    The way that the old man was exining this almost made it seem like a puzzle instead of actually exining anything to them.


    The more that he ''exined'', the more confused they became.


    So in the end, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Can you put that in more simpler terms?"


    The old man revealed a smile when he heard this before saying, "I''m already using the simplest terms possible. I don''t think that I can make it any simpler."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile before saying, "Please pretend that I''m five years old and exin it to me that way."


    The old man couldn''t help looking taken aback when he heard this.


    He looked at Lin Fan with a strange look after hearing this, but he gave a sigh and said, "Alright, I''ll give it a try then."


    The others also looked at Lin Fan with a strange look when they heard this since they had never heard this phrase before.


    Lin Fan just kept that bitter smile on his face.


    This was a popr phrase in his past life, but he was certain that no one would get this meme in this life.


    After thinking for a bit, the old man said, "I''ll put it as simply as possible. Once one reaches the God Realm, they be thew that they practice. They are the one representation of thatw."


    Seeing that they didn''t say anything and just knitted their brows, the old man said, "I''ve already put it as simply as possible. I don''t know of a way to make it even more simple."


    But still no one said a thing in response to this.


    So the old man just waited to see how they would react to this.


    Finally, Lin Fan said in a slow voice, "So you''re saying that once one reaches the God Realm, they are the only one that can reach the God Realm with thatw?"


    The old man was surprised to hear this kind of conclusion, but it was technically correct, so he just gave a slow nod.


    When they saw this, all of them deeply knitted their brows again.


    As they looked at each other, they could see the looks of understanding in each other''s eyes. Or rather, Momonga, Yuki, and Ang saw the looks of understanding in each other''s eyes.


    Lin Fan hadn''t been in the Ruler Realm for as long, so he didn''t feel it as strongly as they did.


    However, they knew that whenever they tried to reach the next realm, it was as if there was something that stopped them.


    They had all reached the peak of the Ruler Realm for a long time now, so they should have been able to break through to the God Realm if everything was normal. But there was that thing that seemed to be stopping them from doing so.


    And now they finally realized what it was.


    It wasn''t because they werecking anything, it was because¡­it wasn''t possible for them to reach the God Realm because of the limitations of this world.


    Even if they wanted to reach the God Realm, because someone had reached it before them and had be the representation of thatw, it was impossible for them to take that ce¡­unless¡­


    All of them had the same thought, but they didn''t want to keep this thought in their mind.


    Even though this was a cultivation world where fighting and killing wasmon, they didn''t want to ept this truth since it would change the world too much. It would simply throw the world into chaos if this were to get out.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t as delicate as them and directly asked, "So do you need to kill a God Realm Expert with the samew to reach the God Realm?"


    As soon as they heard this, they couldn''t help ring at him.


    Lin Fan didn''t back down as he looked at the old man, waiting for an answer.


    The old man revealed a smile and casually said, "That does seem like the only option, doesn''t it?" But then he said in a serious voice, "But if you think that God Realm Experts are that easy to kill."


    As he said this, there was a powerful pressure that swept over them.


    It was as if he wanted to, he could crush them with his pressure alone.


    This was just his way of proving that God Realm Experts weren''t that easy to kill.


    That was right, they were God Realm Experts for a reason.


    Because of the shocking news, Ang and the others had only focused on one thing instead of this fact.


    Even if there were a thousand Ruler Realm Experts gathered, it was very unlikely that they would be able to do anything to a God Realm Expert.


    So how did God Realm Experts appear in the first ce?


    Was it just that someone had reached the pinnacle of theirw and then stopped the progression of everyone else with the samew?


    Once there were enough God Realm Experts, was that it?


    After all, God Realm Experts should be able to live forever as long as they didn''t put themselves in any form of danger. They were in the God Realm and the personification of theirws, so as long as theirws existed in this world, they would never fade.


    There were many questions that they had just because of this one thought.


    However, once again, Lin Fan took the lead by asking, "So did this World of Gods close because they were afraid of people killing each other to allow new gods to appear?"


    The old man shook his head with a faint smile at how blunt Lin Fan was, but he didn''t seem to mind it.


    He just calmly said, "That''s not the reason¡­" But then seeing that Lin Fan was about to keep questioning him, he said, "I can''t tell you the reason since it''s not my job. As long as you keep going, you will get the answer that you want."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he didn''t keep asking more questions since he knew that it would be pointless.


    The look on the old man''s face made it clear that he wouldn''t tell him anything else.


    Since that was the case, the only thing that he could do was continue to let the old man tell his story.


    The old man saw that he wasn''t going to ask another question, so he continued, "In the beginning, there was one person that reached the God Realm and he slowly taught the rest of us the way to reach it."


    Once again, after hearing this, all of them knitted their brows.


    But the old man said, "There''s no need to ask me who that person is, you''ll eventually find out if you keep following this path. For now, just calm down and listen to my story."


    All of them knitted their brows even more when they heard this, but they didn''t say a thing as they waited for the old man to finish his story.


    The old man saw this and gave a simple nod before continuing, "Those of us that make up the pantheon now are those that received his guidance. However, that man has since disappeared from the World of Gods, so you won''t be able to meet him even if you want."


    It was as if he had already predicted their question and answered it before they could ask it.


    So with that, he continued by saying, "Those of us that remained created the current system of living in cities. In the past, gods just lived wherever they wanted and the continent was like prehistoric times. But now that we''ve gathered people in cities, we''ve been able to slowly bring our culture up to the same level as the mortals down there."


    With a sigh, he said, "That is the history of our World of Gods and what the God Realm is."


    After hearing this, all of Lin Fan''s group revealed veryplicated looks.


    They looked at the old man with thatplicated look, as if they were trying to figure out just what he was doing by telling them this story.


    But the old man had a calm look on his face as if he wasn''t bothered by their gazes at all.

 Chapter 1149 Special stories (3)

    <h4>Chapter 1149 Special stories (3)</h4>


    Once he finished his story, the old man suddenly stood up.


    Lin Fan and the others were still lost deep in thought so they remained seated at first, but they also made to stand up when they saw the old man walking away from them.


    However, before they could stand up, the old man suddenly said, "There''s no need for you to move, I''m just making some tea for us. It''s been a long time and I''m sure that your throats are parched after that."


    The old man walked over to a table in the room and took out a tea set along with some tea leaves.


    With a wave of his hand, there was hot water that appeared out of thin air that dropped into the teapot like it was nothing.


    But when Lin Fan''s group saw it, they couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    They could sense both waterws and firewsing from this water when it appeared.


    The old man had gathered moisture out of the air to create this water and then used tiny mes to heat it up before dropping it into the teacup.


    To do this, one needed very precise control of bothws to perfectly control the water and heat it up. Unless one was very skilled with thesews, it was impossible for them to use it like this.


    It seemed that those that could reach the God Realm were all geniuses.


    They were able to usews like this even if it wasn''t their mainw.


    After all, they knew that it wasn''t this old man''s mainw just based on the feeling of the water.


    They knew what the feeling of the God Realm was like since they had experienced it many times sinceing to this World of Gods. They didn''t get this same feeling from the water that he had made appear.


    They couldn''t help wondering just whatw this old man had cultivated to reach the God Realm.


    As if he could tell what they were thinking, the old man suddenly said, "Spatialws, that is what I am the god of."


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help looking at the old man with shocked looks.


    Based on what they had learned from him¡­since he was the God of Spatial Laws, then that meant that he should have been the one that created all of the teleportation arrays that they had taken.


    But for Lin Fan, there was a different meaning.


    Since he knew that there could only be one God Realm Expert for eachw¡­then for the system to have that defense system that used God Realm spatialws¡­there was only one exnation¡­


    When the old man came back with the tea, before he could even sit down, Lin Fan asked, "Are you familiar with something called the system?"


    When the old man heard this, he couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with one brow raised.


    After looking at Lin Fan for a bit, he suddenly revealed a smile and said in a soft voice, "System, what a nostalgic word that is."


    Lin Fan immediately knitted his brows when he heard this.


    Hepletely focused his mind and waited for the old man to speak.


    The old man just stroked his chin and slowly said, "The system, it''s been a long time since I''ve heard that term. However, I can say that I''m familiar with it since I was a part of the group that developed it."


    When the old man admitted it himself, Lin Fan couldn''t help being shocked.


    After all, he never thought that the old man would admit it that easily.


    But before he could say anything, the old man said, "While I was a part of the team that developed it, I didn''t know what it was actually used for."


    Lin Fan immediately closed his mouth and looked at the old man with narrowed eyes, as if he was trying to figure out if this old man was lying or not.


    But in the end, he couldn''t help giving a sigh.


    That was because he could tell that this old man was telling the truth.


    It was clear by the expression on his face that he didn''t know any more about this matter.


    Not to mention¡­he might not even tell them even if he asked. Lin Fan had no way of forcing him to answer, the old man had already made this very clear.


    So Lin Fan could only give a sigh and take a sip of the tea.


    The others also sipped their tea since they wanted to take a break to calm themselves down.


    But then the old man suddenly said, "Of course, the one that took that system away should be someone that you''re familiar with. He''s the one that gave you your powers."


    As soon as he said this, Lin Fan couldn''t help doing a spit take with the tea.


    After a second, it was the same with the other three.


    It was a good thing that the old man reacted in time.


    The old man casually waved his hand and waterws controlled the tea that they had spat out.


    With that waterw, the old man controlled the tea to fly back into their cups before saying, "Even if you were surprised, that wasn''t very polite."


    But none of them were in a mood to y with him.


    That was because for Ang and the others, they assumed that what this old man was saying was that he knew the master of the store.


    But for Lin Fan who knew that there wasn''t a master, this old man was probably talking about the one who had brought him to this world and gave him this system.


    He had never thought that he would get this kind of clue here, not to mention how casually it had been brought up.


    The old man looked at them and was surprised to see how surprised they were, so he slowly said, "Don''t you know who gave you that power inside of your dantian? The strange golden energy, right?"


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    After all, the golden energy wasn''t just something that he had obtained by chance in those ruins in the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    He had found that this golden energy was what the system wasprised of when he had gone to the realm that the representation of the system was. So he knew that whoever was the god of this golden energy was also the one behind the system.


    This person was also the person that the old man was talking about.


    The old man waited to see how Lin Fan would react.


    In the end, Lin Fan just simply shook his head and said, "I have never met the person you''re thinking of. The power that you''re referring to was found by me inside some ruins."


    The old man narrowed his eyes, but he could tell that Lin Fan was telling the truth.


    However, what confused him was how the others looked at Lin Fan.


    It was like they were wondering why he was lying.


    In this case, which one of them was telling the truth¡­?


    But in the end, the old man didn''t dwell on this.


    After all, he knew that this was all part of that person''s n, so he wouldn''t interfere with it.


    The old man gave a sigh and said, "Alright, then let''s drop this matter. I have nothing else to tell you, so let''s go and have a meal first before settling you in. I''ll send you off tomorrow morning."


    Even though it was the World of Gods, it still followed the same day night cycle as the mortal world.


    After all, that was part of thew of the mortal world and there were gods associated with thosews, so this didn''t change in the World of Gods.


    But Lin Fan knitted his brows when he heard this.


    After all, he wanted to keep going as soon as possible.


    This old man had said that he would receive some information at each of the ces he would be sent to. Just the information that he had received here was this shocking and gave him clues as to who the owner of the system was.


    So he wanted to go to the next ce as soon as possible and receive the information there.


    Lin Fan said, "I want to go right now."


    The old man and the others were all caught off guard by this.


    They never thought that Lin Fan would be in such a rush.


    The old man took a moment toe back to his senses before saying, "I''ve already prepared a banquet for you all. Are you sure that you don''t want to stay and try some of the delicacies of our World of Gods?"


    When Ang heard this, her eyes immediately lit up.


    If there was one thing that could move her, it was without a doubt delicious food.


    But Lin Fan said, "No, I want to¡­"


    Before he could finish, his words were suddenly stuck in his mouth and he couldn''t get them out.


    That was because he felt a chilling from beside him.


    He didn''t need to turn to know where it wasing from, but when he turned to look over, he saw that Ang was ring at him.


    He could already guess what she was thinking¡­so in the end, he had no choice but to say, "Alright, we''ll stay."


    The old man revealed a smile after seeing this.


    He could easily tell who wore the pants in this rtionship.


    In his youth, he also had many rtionships like this, but now that he was an old man, all he could think was¡­


    "This was youth."

 Chapter 1150 Special stories (4)

    <h4>Chapter 1150 Special stories (4)</h4>


    The food in the World of Gods didn''t disappoint, they were worthy of being called food for the gods.


    There were even traces ofws contained within the food itself, so every bite actually helped increase their cultivation.


    They could feel that their grasp of theirws became better, but there was still that invisible block in front of them that stopped them from breaking through. It was as if no matter how much they umted, they would never be able to break through this thing blocking them.


    Still, that didn''t stop them from enjoying the food.


    Ang just ate most of the food that had been brought out and no one fought with her for any of it.


    That is until dessert came out and Yuki joined in.


    The two of them ate 80% of the food brought out, even though it was clear that they were forcing themselves to eat after a certain point.


    After all, it wasn''t just politeness that kept Momonga and Lin Fan from eating more, it was that they couldn''t digest all of the energy that was in the food.


    So it really was amazing seeing the way Ang ate.


    Even the old man couldn''t help looking at her with a strange look.


    After a while, he turned to Lin Fan and put a hand on his shoulder before looking at him with a sad look.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile when he saw this, but he also didn''t say anything.


    After a good night''s rest, they were ready to set off again.


    They once again returned to the old man''s office and just like before, he pressed something on the wall to reveal a secret passage. Following the old man through that secret passage, they soon arrived in a secret room just like before.


    In the center of this secret room was an array that had traces of spatialwing from it.


    But before the old man could send them through, Lin Fan couldn''t help asking, "Why are you still using an array when you can send us off yourself as the God of Spatial Laws?"


    The old man wasn''t surprised to hear this and just revealed a bitter smile before saying, "Do you know how big the World of Gods is? It''s not a small feat to send a person from one end to the other end of this ce, even for someone that reached the God Realm with spatialws like me. It''s much simpler to send you using arrays, even if the amount of life energy consumed is much greater. After all, even for me, it would take half of my power to send you to your next destination and I would be weakened for some time."


    However, Lin Fan''s next question actually stunned him.


    "So just how big is the World of Gods?"


    The old man realized that he had made a mistake.


    These kids weren''t from the World of Gods in the first ce, but rather had been sent here by that person.


    So it wasn''t strange that they didn''t know how big this ce was.


    But the old man wasn''t in a mood to exin, so he simply said, "It''s even bigger than the entire mortal world, so that should give you an idea of how big it was."


    All of them couldn''t help revealing shocked looks when they heard this.


    Bigger than the mortal world¡­then how was it possible that they weren''t able to find it from the mortal world all this time?


    How could the World of Gods seal themselves like this without anyone noticing a thing?


    All this did was raise more questions, but the old man didn''t want to answer them.


    So he simply waved his hand and they were lifted into the array.


    Then with another wave of his hand, there was a sh of white light that appeared.


    Before they were sent off though, the old man suddenly said something as if he had suddenly remembered it.


    "Oh, that''s right. I almost forgot, but there should be a surprise waiting for one of you on the southern continent where I''m sending you. I hope that you enjoy it. I won''t tell you what the surprise is since it won''t be a surprise if I tell you."


    "Eh?"


    That was all that they could react with when they heard this.


    Wouldn''t it not be a surprise if you told us!?


    Why does it have to be a surprise?!


    But they didn''t have a chance to say any of this as the white light made them disappear.


    ¡­


    When the sh of white light disappeared, they found themselves in another room like the one they had appeared in when they arrived in the northern continent''s capital.


    But this time, it wasn''t an old man who was waiting for them.


    Rather, it was a little girl who was shorter than all of them.


    She almost looked like she was too young to be in a ce like this¡­


    But when they arrived, she said, "So you''re finally here. I''m the southern continent''s capital''s city lord, the paragon of the southern continent''s pantheon."


    When this little girl said this, it was really hard to believe that this little girl was who she said she was¡­but they could feel the pressure that wasing from her. So even if they wanted to doubt this, they couldn''t with the facts in front of them.


    After giving them some time to adjust, she said, "Well, let''s go to my office to talk."


    When it wasn''t an old man, the treatment really was different.


    She patiently waited for them to get up and follow her before walking out of the room.


    Once again, there were a bunch of people that were gathered outside, but this time it was different.


    This time, the young girl was surrounded instead of them.


    "Grandma, are you done? Let''s go y."


    "Mom, you can''t spoil her like that."


    "Great grandma, do you have any more of those candies from yesterday?"


    The things that these people surrounding the little girl were saying¡­they were just too shocking.


    Such a little girl had such arge family?


    This almost seemed like it should be illegal with the state of her body¡­


    But the little girl just calmly dealt with each of them while letting Lin Fan''s group wait.


    Once she was done, she turned back to them and said, "Shall we go?"


    Lin Fan and the others just slowly nodded before following behind her.


    When they entered her office, she said, "You can sit down first, I''ll go make some tea for us."


    She left the room without a single worry, not afraid that they would do anything while she was gone.


    Lin Fan''s group just looked at each other before sitting down at the sofa in the reception area of this office.


    They didn''t really know what to do as they were sitting there.


    They could have gone through the office, but they didn''t.


    It wasn''t that they weren''t curious about what was in the office, it was just that they felt like it would cross a line if they did.


    They didn''t know what it was about her, but there was a part of that little girl that they didn''t want to disappoint.


    Almost like a mother¡­


    Though she was a mother, grandmother, and great grandmother already¡­


    Luckily for them, it didn''t take long before that little girl came back with a tray that had a teapot and tea cups on them.


    She brought it over to the table in front of them and casually poured some tea for them.


    As she was pouring their tea, she also asked, "Do you want any milk or sugar?"


    With the way that she said this, they just calmly went along with it and let her prepare their tea for them.


    When she was done, the little girl sat down in front of them.


    Though with her height, it was hard for her to get up at first. She had to reach up to the seat to pull herself up.


    It really was strange that she would have this kind of seat in her office if she wasn''t able to reach it in the first ce.


    They even wanted to reach out to help her when they saw her like this.


    However, she was able to pull herself up into the chair in the end.


    Once she sat down, she looked at them and said, "So, I''m sure that you have a lot of questions for me, but I''ll answer thoseter. First, I''ll introduce myself."


    She reached her hand up and gathered a ball of energy there.


    This ball of energy was a soft green colour that seemed very soothing, but it was anything but soothing when they felt the pressure from this ball of energy falling on them.


    This ball of energy was a gathering ofws in the God Realm, so it created a lot of pressure for them.


    The little girl didn''t mind this and calmly said, "As you can see, I am the God of Nature, but¡­" As she paused, she turned to look at Ang before continuing, "It is different from the power of nature controlled by this little spirit girl."


    With a wave of her hand, there was a flower that suddenly appeared in the center of the green ball of energy.


    Then she said, "It''s the power of physical nature rather than spiritual nature. It''s the power of thend itself."


    After a pause, she continued, "But because of this power, I do have a connection with the spirits. As such, there''s someone that I want you to meet."

 Chapter 1151 Special Stories (5)

    ?


    As soon as her voice fell, there was the sound of a door opening that rang out and the sounds of footsteps.


    When they turned back, they saw that there was a beautiful woman walking in.


    Between the two of them, if they were asked to identify the city lord, they definitely would have gone with the beautiful woman who walked in.


    However, that beautiful woman came up to the little girl and gave a slight bow before saying, "Thank you city lord for giving me this opportunity."


    The little girl just gave a nod before saying, "Don''t leave any regrets, alright?"


    The beautiful woman gave a nod before turning to look at us.


    Though she was looking at us, it was clear by the direction that her eyes were looking in that she was looking at one person in particr.


    This one person was sitting there staring back at her.


    When the rest of Lin Fan''s group stared at the two of them¡­they couldn''t help feeling that these two seemed very simr!


    Not just simr, it almost seemed like they were mother and daughter with how much they looked alike.


    Plus the sensation that wasing from this beautiful woman¡­


    After a long period of silence, Ang finally said, "Are you¡­"


    She didn''t finish her words, but the meaning behind them was clear.


    The beautiful woman gave a nod before saying, "That''s right, I am your mother."


    Then to everyone''s surprise, Ang suddenly gathered her life energy in her hand and formed a fist before punching out at this beautiful woman.


    The beautiful woman didn''t miss a beat as she also gathered her own life energy in her hand and raised her palm to block this punch.


    Ang quickly turned before her punch hit that palm and she brought her fist down.


    It had been aimed at the beautiful woman''s face, but now she was trying to punch the beautiful woman''s stomach.


    The beautiful woman twisted with her and her palm came down to block the punch.


    There was no impact at all, there was just the force behind the punch beingpletely negated. There wasn''t even a single shockwave that came out like it normally should have.


    It was clear that this beautiful woman had perfectly countered out Ang''s attack.


    But at the very least, it was also clear that she didn''t have any intentions of hurting Ang.


    With the difference in cultivation, she could have easily injured Ang in this sh if she wasn''t careful. However, she had made sure to perfectly control her power so that she wouldn''t hurt her.


    If she had any ill intentions, she wouldn''t have done that.


    But then again, this beautiful woman had said that she was Ang''s mother, so that wasn''t strange.


    Everyone just watched as the two of them continued to go at each other.


    One side kept releasing punches while the other side blocked with their palm.


    It didn''t seem like it would end any time soon, but then Ang suddenly let out a deep breath.


    It turned out that she had been putting on a strong appearance this whole time, but in reality, she was already running out of energy.


    It seemed that she had put quite an amount of power into each of her punches.


    With this panting, she stopped throwing out more punches, but that didn''t stop her from ring at the beautiful woman.


    The beautiful woman just had an awkward look on her face as she looked at Ang, not knowing what to do.


    So the two of them just stood there awkwardly facing each other, with neither of them knowing what to do.


    In the end, Ang looked over at Lin Fan for help.


    Lin Fan gave a sigh and walked over to stand in between them before saying, "How about we all calm down first? I think we''ve be a bit too agitated, so let''s sit and have some tea."


    The beautiful woman was about to say something, but when she saw the way that Ang just simply nodded in agreement, she couldn''t help being stunned. She looked carefully at Lin Fan, trying to figure out who he was.


    Was he using some kind of special restraining spell against her daughter, or was it something else?


    But eventually she was able to understand what it was based on the way that Ang looked at Lin Fan.


    When she saw this, she couldn''t help revealing an unhappy look.


    But she still followed them and sat down on the sofa opposite them.


    The little girl just revealed a faint smile and poured a cup of tea for that beautiful woman, though she didn''t even bother taking a sip. She had been ring at Lin Fan and Ang the entire time.


    Ang had been ignoring it, but eventually she couldn''t take it anymore and said, "What do you want?"


    When the beautiful woman heard the cold voice that she spoke in, she couldn''t help being taken aback.


    This was definitely not the way that she thought that this reunion would go¡­


    Lin Fan could tell that this wasn''t going well, so he took the initiative to break the tension by saying, "Now, now, there''s no need to be so tense. Let''s just slowly talk this out."


    Ang looked at him without any expressions on her face, but the secret way that she was pinching him made it very clear what she was thinking.


    Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile, but he didn''t say anything else as he waited for the beautiful woman to speak.


    The beautiful woman had moved her gaze over from Ang to Lin Fan now.


    Her eyes were narrowed as she red at Lin Fan, as if trying to figure something out.


    Finally she said, "Who are you to my daughter?"


    Before Lin Fan could answer, Ang said, "Who else would he be? I think that it''s already very clear."


    Lin Fan just had the same bitter smile, but he gave a nod to agree with what she had said.


    The beautiful woman narrowed her eyes even more when she heard this and this time, she even started putting pressure on Lin Fan.


    When he felt this pressure fall on him, Lin Fan couldn''t help shrinking back in the seat.


    If it was anyone else, he might be able to withstand it since he was slowly adapting to the pressure of God Realm Experts. But this person was his mother inw and the way that she was judging him¡­put a lot of pressure on him.


    Ang quickly snapped, "What does it matter to you? You were never there for any moments in my life, so it isn''t as if you can start acting like a mother now."


    The pressure instantly disappeared after she said this.


    The beautiful woman revealed a crushed look on her face, but she didn''t refute this since Ang was right.


    It really was hard for her to be called a mother since she had never been there for Ang.


    After her expression changed a few times, the beautiful woman said, "There''s a reason for that¡­I, I¡­"


    Her voice trailed off as her expression kept changing.


    It was as if there was something that she wanted to say, but she couldn''t bring herself to say it.


    With the way that she looked, it was almost as if she felt like all this was doing was making an excuse.


    Instead of anyone else saying anything, it was the little girl who spoke this time by saying, "Your mother had a reason for doing this. It''s the rules of the World of Gods, you''re not allowed to stay in the mortal world. The only time that she went down was to deliver you to her ancestral home."


    Ang revealed a bitter look as she said, "You mean the time that she abandoned me."


    There was even more pain that appeared on the face of the beautiful woman when she heard this.


    The little girl just calmly said, "Do you know why she left you in the mortal world?"


    Ang turned to look at her before slowly shaking her head.


    The little girl said, "If she didn''t leave you in the mortal world, you wouldn''t have survived."


    The beautiful woman was about to say something, but the little girl shook her head at her to make her fall silent.


    She turned back to Ang to say, "If she hadn''t left you in the mortal world, you would have died."


    All of Lin Fan''s group couldn''t help being surprised when they heard this.


    Seeing the look on their faces, the little girl gave a sigh and said, "This is why I say exin everything properly."


    With another sigh, she exined the situation.


    It turned out that spirits were different from other creatures, they were born very weak and they became stronger as time passed.


    But because they were weak, they couldn''t remain in the World of Gods or they would be destroyed by the pressure here.


    The only choice was to send them down to the ancestral home of spirits, which was the World of Elements that Lin Fan had visited before.


    That was where the beautiful woman had once reigned as queen and now it was Ang''s turn to reign as queen.


    But that didn''t mean that the beautiful woman was willing¡­


    She had been waiting for Ang toe see her all this time.


    After learning all of this, they couldn''t help looking at this beautiful woman with a strange look.


    She just looked at Ang and said, "Now that you''re here, I can finally do what I need to do. I will transfer my powers to you."

 Chapter 1152 Special Stories (6)

    ?


    There was silence that followed after the beautiful woman said these words.


    But then Ang suddenly said in a voice filled with disdain and anger, "Your powers? Why would I want something like that? You think that you can just show up whenever and try to fix everything by¡­"


    Before she could finish, Lin Fan suddenly grabbed her shoulder.


    She stopped mid sentence and turned to re at Lin Fan, but she couldn''t help being surprised by the look that he had on his face.


    It was a very grim and serious look that she couldn''t understand at all.


    Lin Fan took a deep breath and said, "Do you remember what the God of Spatial Laws told us about the God Realm?"


    Ang had a confused look on her face when she heard this, but she tried to remember what Lin Fan was talking about.


    The God Realm¡­


    The God of Spatial Laws had told them that the God Realm was bing the representation of thew itself.


    As such, there could only be a single person that reached the God Realm with eachw since there was no room for another person to also represent the samew.


    While she was thinking, the beautiful woman said, "I''m sure that you''ve felt something blocking you from breaking through. This is the only way that you''ll be able to break through."


    Only way¡­


    Ang couldn''t help thinking this to herself before finally realizing what she meant by this.


    That was right, there could only be one person that reached the God Realm for eachw and this person in front of her was her mother. But before that, she was the queen of spirits before her¡­so she cultivated the samew as her.


    That meant that she was the God Realm Expert for the samew as her.


    For her to reach the God Realm, that meant that this person had to be eliminated to make room for her to ascend.


    This was what she meant by passing her powers on.


    She was nning on passing down herws to Ang and then dying to make room for Ang to ascend.


    This was her way of making amends.


    Even if she had been a terrible mother, this was not how Ang wanted the rtionship between the two of them to end.


    So she started to hesitate.


    She turned back to look at Lin Fan who still had a serious look on his face and looked at him with a look that was asking for help.


    Lin Fan just gave a sigh before saying, "Let''s not be too hasty here. There''s no need for you to transfer your powers right away, right?"


    The beautiful woman had a conflicted look on her face, but she gave a sigh in the end and said, "That''s right, there''s no need for me to transfer my powers right away." But after a pause, she said, "But there''s nothing else for me to say. This is how it''s been for our Spirit Race for the longest time. Once the Spirit Queen reaches the World of Gods, the previous generation will pass on the ancestralws of our Spirit Race to the new Spirit Queen."


    She hesitated a bit more before turning to look at Ang to say, "That was how it was with my own mother." She gave a sigh before continuing, "I know what you''re feeling because I felt the same way as you in the past. But after bing the Spirit God, I''ve learned many things about her that I never knew before. I hope that you will be the same and can forgive me one day."


    After saying this, there was a burst of life energy that appeared around her.


    It was almost as if she was releasing all of the life energy that she had.


    After being released, this life energy started creeping towards Ang, as if it wanted to enter her body. But it was clear by the look on Ang''s face that she didn''t want this.


    It was just too bad that none of them could move under the pressure of this beautiful woman.


    This was a God Realm Expert releasing her full power, it was unlike anything that they had experienced before. If it wasn''t for the God of Spatial Laws releasing his power to prove a point, they might have already been crushed into the ground by this power.


    The only thing that they could do was sit there and let the beautiful woman do what she wanted.


    But Lin Fan wasn''t nning on just sitting back like this.


    So Lin Fan turned to look at the little girl for help.


    He had seen the slight frown on her face, so he knew that she didn''t approve of this either.


    Seeing Lin Fan looking at her, the little girl didn''t move at first.


    But then she suddenly gave a sigh and raised a hand to stop this.


    After she raised a hand, there was a green light that appeared around the beautiful woman that suppressed the life energy that she was releasing.


    When the beautiful woman saw this, she couldn''t help revealing a shocked look before turning back to look at the little girl. With aplicated look on her face, she said, "Mistress, please don''t interfere."


    It was surprising to hear that the beautiful woman, the previous Spirit Queen and the current Spirit God called the little girl ''mistress''.


    It seemed that the paragon of a continent really was different among God Realm Experts.


    With a sigh, the little girl said, "I brought you here so you can talk to your daughter, not so you could kill yourself. Why are you in such a rush? Why not listen to what they have to say first before that? It''s not like you hate her and want to leave as soon as possible."


    The beautiful woman''s expression became even moreplicated when she heard this because the little girl was right.


    She wanted to do this to make it up to Ang and apologize, but she was unwilling since she didn''t want to die and leave her alone.


    But this was the only thing that she could do¡­


    So she wanted to bite the bullet and do it before she started to hesitate.


    The little girl could see the look on the beautiful woman''s face and could understand what she was feeling since she was also a parent.


    So with a sigh, she said, "Just wait and see what they have to say first. I know how you feel, but sometimes you need to listen too."


    The beautiful woman''s expression changed a few times before she finally gave a nod.


    With that, the pressure disappeared as both of them released their powers and the beautiful woman sat down again.


    There was a silence that filled the room, but it was clear who everyone was waiting for to speak by the direction that they were looking in. That person just had aplicated look on their face and looked down, as if they were thinking about something.


    Finally, Ang looked up and said, "I dislike you."


    It was three simple words, but it was like a dagger had been driven into the beautiful woman''s heart.


    She had been waiting a long time to meet her daughter, much longer than her own mother had waited.


    It was all because the World of Gods had beenpletely sealed off during this time that Ang hadn''t been able to reach her.


    But she had always dreamed about how it would go¡­


    This was the worst way that it could go in her imagination and it was happening in front of her.


    The look on her face seemed like she wanted to die¡­


    But Ang wasn''t done yet.


    Ang took a deep breath and said, "I dislike you, but that doesn''t mean that I want you to die. In the end, you are still my mother and I would rather have you alive to dislike than dead."


    The beautiful woman didn''t know how to react to this.


    Her expression changed several times, but in the end, all she could do was reveal aplicated and bitter smile.


    The two of them just sat there looking at each other withplicated looks on their faces.


    Lin Fan shook his head with a bitter smile when he saw this before turning to the little girl to ask, "I think that it''s time that you told us what we''re here for."


    The little girl gave a nod before saying, "Un, perhaps you''ll be able to find a solution to this from what I''m about to tell you."


    The little girl calmly took a sip of her own tea before asking a question, "The ce that you came from before was the God of Spatial Law''s northern continent, right?"


    Lin Fan slowly gave a nod to this.


    The little girl suddenly revealed a look of disdain.


    This was their first time seeing this look on her face and the feeling that it gave really was strange.


    However, it didn''tst long as the little girl''s expression quickly returned to normal.


    But before it did, she had muttered, "That old geezer is still alive. I can''t wait to see him die."


    It seemed that the rtionship between the gods, especially the paragons, wasplicated.


    After she calmed down, she said, "Since you''ve already heard about the history of the World of Gods, what I''ll be telling you is a story about a special someone. You should have heard about him during the history of the World of Gods."

 Chapter 1153 Special Stories (7)

    ?


    When they heard this, they all couldn''t help knitting their brows.


    Even the beautiful woman couldn''t help knitting her brows even though she was a resident of the World of Gods.


    When Lin Fan''s group saw this, they realized that the information that they were about to receive was much more special than they thought.


    It was information that was even kept from the people that lived here¡­


    But why would it need to be kept so secret?


    The little girl ignored the looks on their faces and continued by saying, "This person is a special person, he was the one that gathered all of us together and created the current World of Gods."


    They weren''t as surprised since they had heard a part of this before, but the beautiful woman revealed a very strange look.


    The look that she had almost seemed like she knew something.


    When they saw this, they couldn''t help looking at her with a strange look.


    The little girl also stopped speaking after this and waited to see what she had to say.


    The beautiful woman hesitated a bit before saying, "Isn''t this taboo knowledge? Should we really be discussing this?"


    The moment that they heard this, they all knitted their brows even more.


    Taboo, what did she mean by that?


    After this thought passed through their mind, they immediately turned to look at the little girl who was sitting there with a calm look on her face. As they looked at her, they narrowed their eyes that started to fill with doubt towards her.


    When the little girl saw this, she couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    Finally, she said with a sigh, "It is taboo, but it''s fine because he''s the one."


    "The one?" The beautiful woman couldn''t help repeating after her before slowly turning to look at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    Lin Fan could feel the spiritual sense that came over him, but he didn''t resist as he let her search him.


    After searching him for a bit, the beautiful woman couldn''t help revealing a shocked look before turning to look at Ang.


    The way that she was looking at her, it was almost as if she was asking, "How did you meet this person?"


    But Ang just ignored her and turned to the side to avoid this gaze.


    The little girl gave a nod before saying, "Now, if that''s settled, may I continue?"


    No one said a thing, but the look on their faces made it clear what they were thinking.


    The little girl gave another nod before saying, "The person that gathered us all was the one that taught us how to cultivate and reach our current levels. It could even be said that he was the person that created this current world with his teachings."


    After she said this, the little girl couldn''t help looking up as if she was looking at something distant.


    The look in her eyes¡­was admiration.


    It was clear that whoever this person was, she was filled with admiration towards them.


    After a moment of silence, she continued by saying, "That person was known as Light and he was the owner of the golden power inside of you. As for whatw that golden power represents¡­even we had no idea. All we know was that it was something very powerful, which was why we had all submitted to him."


    The others couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan when they heard this.


    The golden power, they had already heard about this from him before.


    They didn''t know where it came from, but they had seen its effects, so they knew that it was a powerfulw.


    But it had apletely different meaning for Lin Fan.


    Light¡­he finally had a name to put on the person that had given him this system.


    Since he knew that the owner of this golden power was the one that had given him this system in the first ce.


    The ce that the system had sent him to meet with him, there had been a golden pce filled with this golden power there. So it was clear that whoever had created this system was the one who owned this golden power.


    But just where was this person?


    Lin Fan wanted to find him so he could punch him in the face¡­no, he wanted to find him so that he could ask him why he brought him here and gave him this system.


    Now that he had found a trace of this person, naturally he wouldn''t let it go.


    After a moment of thinking, Lin Fan asked, "Do you know where this person is now?"


    When the little girl heard this, she shook her head with a bitter smile before saying, "If we knew where he was, would we be in this predicament?"


    They all couldn''t help revealing confused looks when they heard this, even the beautiful woman had the same confused look as them.


    It seemed that even a God Realm Expert like her had no idea what was happening here.


    The little girl didn''t borate on this and instead said, "All you need to know is that Lord Light disappeared shortly after we reached the God Realm. No one knows where he went, but it''s said that he was working on a secret project that would save us all."


    Secret project?


    No matter how one looked at it, it was the system that she was talking about!


    But as for the purpose of this secret project¡­


    To save them all?


    How would he do that?


    But for Ang and the others, they had a different reason to be shocked.


    That was because they had thought that there was a master in Lin Fan''s store.


    After hearing about this person and the golden power that Lin Fan had, they guessed that the person in Lin Fan''s store was most likely the ''Light'' person that they mentioned before.


    If that was the case, should they tell them that they were in Lin Fan''s store?


    No, they wouldn''t since they didn''t know anything about these God Realm Experts or this World of Gods other than what they had heard.


    If these God Realm Experts were just pretending¡­wouldn''t they be repaying kindness with ill intentions if they brought them back to Lin Fan''s store to look for the master?


    So all of them kept their expressions calm while thinking this over.


    Seeing nothing from their faces, the little girl gave a sigh before saying, "Before leaving, he gave us instructions that a person with the same power as him would arrive one day. When that person came, we would be in charge of telling him specific things."


    All of them turned to look at Lin Fan when they heard this.


    Lin Fan just had a calm look on his face as he looked at the little girl.


    After a moment of silence, he asked, "Is there anything else that you have to tell me?"


    The little girl revealed a smile before saying, "I was supposed to tell you the history of how we met him and what happened during that time." After a pause, she said, "But it''s clear that this isn''t what you want to know. I can see from your eyes that there''s something else that you want, but unfortunately I can''t give it to you."


    Lin Fan just silently looked at her for a bit before giving a slow nod with a disappointed sigh.


    Ang looked at him with a confused look before asking, "What did you want to know?"


    Lin Fan looked at her, at the beautiful woman, and then back at her before saying, "If he was able to teach them how to reach the God Realm, then perhaps that person knows a way to break the limits of the God Realm and allow multiple people with the samew to reach the God Realm. If that happens, there''s no need for¡­"


    As his voice trailed off, he turned to look at the beautiful woman.


    Both of them revealed shocked looks when they heard this.


    They slowly looked at each other before quickly turning away.


    The beautiful woman turned to look at the little girl who just spread her hands before saying, "I can neither confirm or deny this. All I can say is that Lord Light''s powers were always beyond what we were capable of understanding. So there is a chance that he will be able to do this."


    When they heard this, both the eyes of Ang and the beautiful woman lit up.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "So there''s no need to be in such a rush to die. Just wait for us, we''ll see if we can find him."


    The beautiful woman looked at him and Ang before slowly giving a nod.


    Lin Fan then addressed another issue by asking the little girl, "She said that this matter was taboo, but it seemed like everyone already knew about my golden power. Why is that?"


    The little girl revealed a smile and said, "We received the prophecy from Lord Light that someone with this golden power wille one day, so of course we spread it across the World of Gods. However, Lord Light is too powerful that those who don''t have a connection with him can''t talk about him freely without being punished, which is why he is taboo. But we made sure to tell everyone about the golden power, of course, we gave the excuse that you were his sessor."


    After she said this, the beautiful woman couldn''t help revealing a shocked look like she had been lied to.


    With this, Lin Fan revealed a satisfied look as he understood what had happened.

 Chapter 1154 Special Stories (8)

    ?


    After this, the little girl brought them over to another banquet.


    This had been prepared ahead of their arrival and there were already piping hot dishes on the table just waiting for them.


    It seemed that some kind ofw had been used to preserve these dishes so that they would be able to eat whenever they wanted.


    The same thing happened before where Ang ate the most out of their group.


    However, one surprising thing that happened was that the beautiful woman actually matched her in terms of food eaten.


    Both of them didn''t hold back at all as they swallowed the food that had been prepared for them.


    Both of them didn''t eat in a manner befitting of their appearances, but seeing them eat like this really made one understand that the two of them were mother and daughter.


    Yuki couldn''t help feeling a bit envious of this since¡­she also didn''t know her parents even though she was a spirit just like Ang.


    She couldn''t help looking at the beautiful woman, as if she was hoping that she knew something.


    But in the end, it was the little girl who burst her bubble by saying, "I don''t know much about the spirits, but I do know that she''s the only god of the Spirit Race. So you won''t find more spirits here."


    When she heard this, Yuki couldn''t help being disappointed¡­


    So in the end, she drowned herself in desserts to cope.


    After dinner, she found out that the beautiful woman didn''t know about her parents either¡­or rather her parent.


    The one that had given birth to her was one of the spirits that had served as one of the aides for the beautiful woman when she was the Spirit Queen.


    After she had ascended, she had no idea where those aides of hers had gone.


    And Ang naturally didn''t know since when she took over as the Spirit Queen, they were already gone.


    So Yuki was disappointed when she heard all of this.


    But she was able to ept this fairly easily since¡­if it was something that you never had before, it was easier for you to ept that you wouldn''t have it.


    If it was something that one had before and lost, they would want to do all that they could to get it back.


    So sometimes¡­it was better not to have something.


    After this meal, they stayed in this city for a bit longer, meeting all of the little girl''s family.


    Some of them¡­were quite taken by Lin Fan, so they tried flirting with him.


    Ang of course didn''t like that¡­so Lin Fan was punished. She would have gone against these girls that tried flirting with Lin Fan, but they were God Realm Experts, so it wasn''t as if she could do anything to them.


    The beautiful woman tried to help her, but Angpletely ignored her.


    In the end, it was the little girl that stopped them.


    Though these girls looked at her like she was treating an outsider better than them who were her family.


    Just like this, they spent a few days in this city.


    ¡­


    A few dayster, they finally arrived on the central continent.


    After the southern continent, they had been sent to the eastern and western continents to meet with the paragons of those continents.


    They all had stories to tell Lin Fan.


    On the eastern continent, they had told them the story of how the ability of taming demon beasts had spread.


    The eastern continent was filled mainly with humans, so they practiced that same cultivation method as Lin Fan.


    Almost all of them had pets, but there were limitations to these pets.


    These pets were not able to break through to the God Realm, so most of them were in the peak Ruler Realm.


    ording to the paragon of the eastern continent, the ability to tame pets came from someone who had sacrificed themselves against the Outers, taking out many of the Outers before sumbing to his wounds.


    When Lin Fan heard this, he couldn''t help revealing a bitter smile.


    That was because this was a story that he was already familiar with.


    To say that he was familiar with this¡­was considered an understatement.


    After all, he had lived through this story back on the Gctic Humanity Alliance.


    It had been a simted space and he had been allowed to do what he had wanted, but most of the story was kept the same because of how the simted space had been designed.


    So the story was the same as the one that Lin Fan had experienced.


    But the ending was a bit different.


    As he had expected, the cultivation technique of that person had been lost and what had been passed down was nothing but a fragment of the real cultivation technique.


    That was why humans weren''t able to share their cultivation with these pets and gain a portion of theirw like he was able to.


    On the western continent, the story that the paragon had for him was the story of the Beast Race and how they came into this world.


    This was a surprising story since it touched a theory that Lin Fan hadn''t encountered in this world.


    The Beast Race¡­was the origin race of this world.


    Everything had been a part of the Beast Race in the beginning, but as they developed their own abilities, they started differentiating themselves from the Beast Race.


    Even the humans had once been a part of the Beast Race as primates.


    However, as they developed their culture and cultivation methods, they started separating themselves from the Beast Race.


    Eventually, they became an entirely different race that quickly popted the universe with their fast reproduction speed.


    This was very simr to the theory of evolution that Darwin had proposed in Lin Fan''s previous world¡­it was just a bit different since the scale was much bigger.


    But it was surprising to learn that everything hade from the Beast Race.


    Though the more shocking thing was that the western continent waspletely made up of gods from the Beast Race.


    The Beast Race, this was not a race that had a good impression in Lin Fan''s heart because of what they were doing in the mortal realm. But he found out that this was not something that was condoned by the gods of the Beast Race.


    After all, the gods of the Beast Race would never ept working with the Outers.


    Competition between members of the same universe was normal since that was how this world worked, but cooperating with the Outers was¡­considered betraying one''s own universe.


    So the gods of the western continent did want to stop the Beast Race and didn''t have any grudges with Lin Fan.


    After several days, they now arrived on the central continent.


    Waiting for them was a young man standing there.


    The one waiting for them on the eastern continent was a middle aged man and the one waiting for them on the western continent had been a small bird.


    It seemed that these paragons really didn''t care what they looked like, they just seemed to take whatever forms they wanted to take.


    This young man was a handsome young man in a white robe with white hair.


    His overall appearance gave him a very mysterious feeling.


    Out of all the paragons that they had met, this was the one that gave them the most proper feeling.


    After all, this was one that looked like he was hiding his power.


    Lin Fan knew from novels that this kind of person was someone who was a secret expert and hid his powers for certain reasons.


    But they already knew that he was the strongest since he was the paragon of the central continent.


    The other four paragons had already told him that this paragon of the central continent was the strongest person in the World of Gods right now. This handsome young man in the white robes was Light''s final disciple, so he received more teachings than everyone else in the World of Gods.


    When he saw that they were here, the white robed young man said with a smile, "It seems that you''re finally here. I''m d that I''m able to meet you."


    They just looked at the white robed young man when he said this, not saying anything in return.


    After a pause, the white robed young man said, "Unfortunately, this is not your final stop."


    When they heard this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    Lin Fan had thought that he would finally receive the answers that he had been waiting for, but it seemed that it was all in vain.


    The white robed young man said, "I will not be telling you a story, but rather sending you to a certain ce."


    All of them once again couldn''t help being surprised by what the white robed young man had said.


    The other paragons had weed them, but this one was sending them off already.


    Why was it so different this time?


    Was it because he was that person''s final disciple or was there a different reason?


    The white robed young man didn''t bother saying anything else as he raised his hand and waved it.


    When he did, the transport array under them suddenly changed.


    The floor under them cracked, but they were being held up by something invisible.


    When they looked down, they found that there was another array that had been revealed.


    This one was much more powerful andplex than the one that they had arrived in.


    As they were about to be sent off, the white haired young man said, "Good luck and I hope that you''ll be able toe back."

 Chapter 1155 Finger Bone

    ?


    Before any of them could say a thing, there was a sh of white light that appeared..


    When that sh of white light disappeared, they found that they were in the middle of nowhere.


    This was a ce that didn''t have a single thing around, other than a cave that was in front of them.


    Since there was nothing here other than the cave, they turned their attention to this cave.


    They couldn''t feel anything when they used their spiritual senses to search the cave, but that wasn''t because of how deep the cave was. Rather, it was as if there was something that was around the cave that had blocked their spiritual senses from entering.


    It was like there was some kind of barrier around this cave.


    Since they weren''t able to see through this cave with their spiritual senses, then the only thing that they could do was head in and see what was there.


    After all, it wasn''t as if they would be able to escape this ce if they avoided this cave.


    If they just walked off, who knows if they would even be able to find a way out of here. If they actually did walk off, they might just be more and more lost until they wouldn''t be able to find a single thing.


    In time, they would just be trapped here forever.


    So it was better to take the path that was ced in front of them instead of trying to force their way out.


    But they didn''t dare let their guards down as they headed into the cave.


    At their level of cultivation, it wasn''t a problem for them to see in this dark cave.


    However, this cave wasn''t that long in the first ce.


    They only had to travel a bit before they reached the end of this path.


    It led them to a cave that wasn''t that big and wasn''t that small.


    This cave didn''t seem to have anything other than a single pedestal that was in the center of it.


    The moment that they saw the pedestal though, they couldn''t help raising their guards.


    They could feel the aura that wasing from this pedestal, so they knew that whatever was on it wasn''t simple.


    As they came closer, they were able to see just what was on it and they couldn''t help revealing a shocked look when they did.


    That was because there was a single finger on the pedestal.


    There wasn''t anything else there, just a single finger bone that seemed to be made of a kind of material that they didn''t recognize. That was because this finger bone was golden in colour rather than just simply white.


    They had no idea what kind of creature this finger bone belonged to, but it seemed like it was very simr in biology to a human. It seemed very much like a human''s index finger.


    As they stood there around that finger bone, they didn''t know what they should do.


    Since they had entered this cave, they had found that they were able to use their spiritual sense again.


    With that spiritual sense, they had already swept through the entire cave and hadn''t found a single thing yet.


    It seemed that this cave waspletely empty other than this finger bone on a pedestal.


    Since that was the case, what should they do with this finger bone?


    Should they destroy it or should they take it with them?


    After a moment of not knowing what to do, they finally decided to at least approach the finger bone.


    While they didn''t know exactly what it was or what it would do, there was nothing to gain from just standing around here doing nothing.


    So at the very least, they would try to see what would happen if they approached it.


    As they came closer and closer, it didn''t seem like anything was about to happen.


    But then¡­all of a sudden, the finger bone suddenly lit up.


    It was covered in a golden glow and then it suddenly started floating into the air.


    When they saw this, they immediately took a step back and grouped up together.


    There was no need to say anything since they all knew what they were doing. They all took a proper formation where they would be able to cover for each other if anything happened.


    There was a moment where there was a stalemate between the two sides.


    The golden finger bone just floated there in the air, almost as if it was searching for something.


    Then all of sudden, it turned so that the tip of the finger was pointed right at them.


    As soon as they saw this, they immediately raised their barriers just in case anything happened.


    All of a sudden, the golden finger bone started flying at them.


    They raised their hands and expanded their barrier so that they could block the golden finger bone, but they found that it was no use at all. The moment that the golden finger bone made contact with their barriers, all of their barriers were shattered without a trace.


    There was no resistance at all as the golden finger bone made its way through the barriers.


    Seeing this, they decided that it was better to dodge this golden finger bone instead since it wasn''t that fast.


    It was at a speed that they could easily dodge, so staying put and putting up the barrier was actually the worst thing that they could do.


    Without a single word, they all split up and ran off in different directions.


    As soon as they did, the finger bone started changing directions.


    With the direction that it was going in¡­it seemed like it was targeting Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows seeing this, but there wasn''t anything that he could do about this.


    All he could do was do his best to dodge this finger bone and find a way to stop it.


    Seeing that the finger bone wasn''t going to chase them, the other three stopped and carefully observed the finger bone.


    They didn''t rush in since they knew that this wouldn''t help anyone.


    Instead of rushing in and making things worse, they carefully observed the finger bone to see if they could find a way to stop it. Or even to see if they could identify what it was.


    Lin Fan had no choice but to keep the finger bone distracted while they did this.


    However, the finger bone had no thoughts of going along with this n.


    It was about to reach Lin Fan and he was about to dodge out of the way, but then¡­the finger bone suddenly sped up.


    Lin Fan tried going as fast as he could, but he found that the finger bone was already moving faster than him. Even if he wanted to escape, he wouldn''t be able to outrun the finger bone.


    With this thought, he turned to attacking.


    Since defending wouldn''t work, he wouldn''t give up and use his powers to attack this finger bone.


    Without hesitation, he gathered a ck hole in front of him that blocked the finger bone from him.


    This was the strongest voidw that he could gather and his final attempt at fighting back.


    It was just too bad that it didn''t even stall the finger bone for a single second.


    As soon as the finger bone made contact with the ck hole, the ck hole was shattered.


    Lin Fan also immediately spat out a mouthful of blood from having his strongest attack shattered like it was nothing. This ck hole had even contained part of his domain, which was why it was his strongest attack.


    He fell to one knee after the ck hole was shattered and couldn''t move as the finger bone came closer and closer.


    When the three others saw this, they couldn''t remain idle anymore and went forward to help Lin Fan.


    It was just too bad that they couldn''t reach him in time.


    They all tried to use their different abilities to stop the finger bone, but none of them were able to reach it in time.


    The finger bone suddenly dipped as it was about to hit Lin Fan.


    Instead of piercing him through the chest as they had thought, it went right to his hand and drilled into his finger.


    There was a spray of blood that came out, but then there was only silence that followed.


    Lin Fan had only let out a scream of pain before everything was silent.


    When he looked down at it, he found¡­that his finger had already healed.


    There wasn''t a single trace of the finger bone at all.


    But on the ground, there seemed to be chunks of white things justying there.


    When one looked at it closely, they could see that these were chunks of bone that were lying there on the ground.


    When they came over, Ang immediately went forward to check every inch of Lin Fan''s body.


    Even if she acted cold normally, she was actually a very caring person and her heart had almost jumped out of her chest when she saw his blood spurt out.


    After checking his body, she said, "Is there anything wrong? Are you alright?"


    Lin Fan gave a slow nod before slowly saying, "I''m fine¡­"


    All of them let out a sigh of relief after hearing that, but then Momonga couldn''t help asking, "So where did that finger bone go?"


    Lin Fan looked down at his hand, the one that had been attacked by the finger bone before slowly saying, "It seemed to have integrated into my hand."


    "Huh?" That was the only reaction the other three could have.

 Chapter 1156 Strange New Powers

    ?


    As soon as they recovered from their shock, they gathered around him and looked at his hand.


    As they sent their spiritual senses in, they could feel that there was something there that resisted them. No matter how they tried to send their spiritual senses in, they weren''t able to sense anything from it.


    It was just like how the finger bone had smashed all of their barriers earlier.


    When it made contact with any form of energy, it just shattered it apart with no resistance at all.


    So they couldn''t find anything out about the finger bone.


    The only thing that they were certain about was that it was there in Lin Fan''s finger, taking the ce of his normal finger bone.


    The white pieces on the ground were the bones that had been in his finger previously that had been destroyed by the golden finger bone when it reced it.


    After staring at his finger for a bit, Momonga suddenly looked up and asked, "How does it feel? Can you control it or does it not listen to you at all?"


    Both Ang and Yuki also looked up when he asked this, waiting with bated breath for his answer.


    Lin Fan just looked down at his hand before raising it in front of him.


    Moving it around a bit, he said, "It seems like I can control it and it doesn''t seem to be doing anything to me. However, I don''t know if¡­"


    His voice trailed off as he narrowed his eyes to look at his finger.


    None of them said a thing as they waited for him to speak again.


    Lin Fan just kept moving his hand around, almost as if he was testing something.


    Finally, he pointed his finger at the pedestal in front of him and then brought it down.


    There was a moment of silence before the pedestal suddenly split in half.


    It was a clean cut, right down the center that split the pedestal exactly in half.


    As for what had split the pedestal in half¡­they could feel a trace of spatialw energy.


    So did that mean that this finger bone was from an expert of spatialw?


    But then Lin Fan suddenly waved his hand with one finger pointed forward.


    The moment that this happened, it was as if all the life energy in that room suddenly disappeared.


    This feeling¡­was almost like the voidws that Lin Fan had used, but it was clearly much stronger than Lin Fan''s own voidws.


    Lin Fan could even tell that these voidws were even at the same level as the Void God''s inheritance.


    That meant that this finger was using voidws at the God Realm level.


    But if that was the case, then what about the Void God?


    Or did that mean that this finger once belonged to the Void God?


    There were many questions that filled Lin Fan''s mind after learning this, but there were no answers for him.


    He just stared at his finger in silence for a bit before finally saying, "It seems like I can control it."


    When they heard this, Ang and the others all let out sighs of relief.


    They were worried that Lin Fan would be slowly corrupted by this finger that had parasitized his body. But now that he showed that he could control it and even draw power from it to a certain extent, they were a bit relieved.


    Though they were still worried that this process was a slow process that would allow the finger bone to take him over.


    For now, they were just d that he was alright.


    Anything that came after, they would deal with when it came up.


    But there was still another problem.


    They were trapped here without a way to go back to where they were before.


    One might think that after the golden finger bone had integrated itself into Lin Fan''s body, there would be something that would bring them back. However, there wasn''t a single thing that happened after Lin Fan stopped testing out the power of the finger bone.


    They just stood there in silence in this cave, waiting for something to happen.


    But when nothing happened for over ten minutes, they had to admit that nothing was going to happen.


    When nothing happened, they had no choice but to start exploring this cave to find some way out.


    As for exploring the area outside of the cave¡­that was ast resort.


    The first thing that they turned their attention to was of course the pedestal that held the finger bone.


    They moved to it and started looking it over, trying to find anything special about this pedestal.


    But in the end, this pedestal was nothing more than a normal pedestal.


    No matter how they tried investigating it, there was nothing that they could find.


    The only thing that was strange about this pedestal was how hard it was.


    Halfway through, Ang and Yuki had lost their temper and started wailing on it.


    But even with the two of them working together like this, they weren''t able to leave a single dent on it.


    It was like this thing was made out of some indestructible material that they couldn''t touch.


    However, that made it even more incredible that Lin Fan was able to destroy it¡­


    No, it was better to say that this finger bone was incredible that it was able to destroy it.


    This made them even more worried that Lin Fan might be possessed by this finger bone one day¡­


    In the meantime, while they were investigating this pedestal, Lin Fan was still ying around with his new finger.


    He had been looking at his finger at first, but then he slowly started moving it around and testing what he could do with the finger.


    There was a kind of connection to this finger that he couldn''t exin, but he felt like he couldmand the finger to do whatever he wanted it to do and it would be able to do it.


    With a flick of his finger, he was able to summon a me.


    From the aura that this me released, he was able to tell that this me was powerful¡­just as powerful as the spatialw sh that he had just released.


    That meant that these mews were at least in the God Realm just like the spatialws.


    But a single being that could control multiplews at the God Realm¡­that went against what the paragons had told them.


    After all, they had been told that there could only be a single God Realm Expert for eachw. There wasn''t space for more than one God Realm Expert.


    For there to be another God Realm Expert, that meant that the current God Realm Expert either had to die or they would need to pass down theirws.


    So what did this finger bone belong to that was able to use all of thesews?


    After a pause, Lin Fan waved his hand again and there was anotherw that appeared.


    This time, it was a ball of water that formed in the air.


    When this ball of water formed, it gave off the same feeling as the me did before.


    That meant that this ball of water¡­was also in the God Realm.


    With another flick of the finger, there was a ball of wind that formed that was once again in the God Realm.


    Then another flick caused another ball of earth to appear that also had the same aura¡­


    It seemed that no matter whichws he thought of, as long as he flicked his finger, it was as if it would appear.


    It was like this finger bone that had integrated with him was able to use every singlew there was.


    At the same time, everything that appeared seemed to be at the God Realm¡­


    Just what was this finger bone that had integrated with him?


    Or rather, who did this finger bone belong to?


    After they had finished checking the pedestal, Ang''s group came over to where Lin Fan was.


    They could feel the God Realm auraing from him, so they came over to be shocked by his tests. They were shocked by all the different God Realmws that he suddenly seemed like he was able to use.


    After a while, Lin Fan finally stopped using those God Realmws and turned to look at the three looking at him.


    He could tell that they were looking at him with strange looks, so he said, "It''s still me, I''m alright."


    There were still looks of doubt in their eyes, but for now¡­they couldn''t prove anything. Not to mention, they wanted to believe that he was still in there since they cared for him.


    So in the end, they just epted his words.


    With a sigh, Momonga said, "We still can''t find a way out of here. I really don''t know what we''re going to do."


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response to this and just looked down at his finger.


    After waving it a few times, he suddenly said, "I think that I can bring us back."


    As soon as he said this, all of them couldn''t help revealing a shocked look.


    They looked at him before looking down at his finger before looking back up at him, almost as if they couldn''t believe what he said.


    But Lin Fan ignored all of this as he raised his finger and cut down in the air with it.


    As he did, there was a portal that formed in front of him.

 Chapter 1157 Sudden Appearance

    ?


    When this portal formed, not a single one of them dared to move towards it.


    In fact, they couldn''t help taking a step back away from this portal after seeing it appear.


    They could feel the powerful fluctuations that came from this portal, so they knew that these were spatialws in the God Realm¡­However, how could Lin Fan control thesews so well?


    It was fine if he could use spatialws to cut that pedestal, that didn''t take much skill.


    But to create a portal like this¡­


    Unless one had a very deep understanding of spatialws, it was impossible to do something like this.


    At the same time, they were worried that something mighte out of this portal.


    After all, they had no idea where this portal led and the other side was safe.


    So they all watched carefully and waited for things toe out of the portal.


    Or at least Ang''s group did.


    Lin Fan just stood in front of the portal and looked at it carefully before sticking his head in.


    Ang''s group were shocked to see Lin Fan''s top half disappear through the portal.


    After a moment of hesitation, they were about to go forward to pull Lin Fan back just in case something happened.


    But before they could, Lin Fan suddenly stood up again and his top half came back out of the portal.


    He turned to them and calmly said, "It''s linked to the same ce as before. That white haired young man is waiting for us."


    The moment that they heard this, their jaws couldn''t help dropping.


    They just looked at Lin Fan with doubt and shock, as if they couldn''t believe what he said.


    Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile when he saw them like this, but he didn''t me them.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that he could sense his attachment to the golden finger bone, he wouldn''t have believed that any of this was possible. But through his connection with the golden finger bone, he knew what he could and couldn''t do.


    That just made him even more curious as to the real identity of this golden finger bone.


    However, it would be a lie to say that there wasn''t a familiar feelinging from this golden finger bone.


    It was as if this golden finger bone belonged to him¡­but that would be crazy.


    After all, neither of his past lives should have anything to do with this thing.


    After a long moment of silence, Ang''s group slowly came forward after taking a deep breath.


    For now, there was nothing else for them to do in this ce.


    If they just stayed here, they would just be sitting here doing nothing.


    At the very least, Lin Fan had offered them a chance to escape this ce.


    So even if it seemed dangerous, it was still the best thing that they could do.


    They believed that Lin Fan wouldn''t want to hurt them¡­


    Or at least they believed that before the golden finger bone took over, Lin Fan wouldn''t want to hurt them.


    It hadn''t taken over Lin Fan yet, right?


    Seeing that they were still hesitating a bit, Lin Fan decided that it would take some drastic measures to get them to move. So he took a step forward and then walked right through the portal.


    All three of them were shocked to see this, but they quickly followed him.


    They were afraid that since Lin Fan had disappeared, the portal would disappear along with him.


    If the portal disappeared, then they would be trapped in that ce forever¡­


    So at the very least, they should stick together.


    After a bright sh of white light, the scenery around them revealed itself.


    They found that they were back in the same room as before.


    There was even the white haired young man who was standing there with a surprised look on his face.


    But after a while, that surprised look turned into a smile as he said, "So you''ve passed and epted the inheritance."


    Without any warning at all, Lin Fan pointed his finger at the white haired young man and a ball of mes shot out at him.


    The white haired young man didn''t panic at all as he casually raised his hand and gave a gentle wave. With that wave, the fireball that was shot at him was pped down and dissipated into nothing.


    When Ang and the others saw this, they couldn''t help being shocked.


    They could still sense that this fireball wasn''t weak, it was still something that was in the God Realm and yet¡­this white haired young man had pped it away so easily¡­


    Lin Fan knitted his brows seeing this, but he rxed them since he figured that this was the case.


    Even if this finger bone could allow him to use God Realmws, that didn''t mean that they were that powerful.


    He was still in the Ruler Realm, so it was impossible for him to use powerful God Realmws.


    The other side was a paragon, one of the top cultivators in the entire World of Gods, one of the top God Realm Experts.


    So it wasn''t as if he would be able to hurt them that easily.


    That fireball just now was nothing more than a simple act of venting himself.


    The white haired young man didn''t reveal an angry look, but rather he had an amused smile on his face.


    He was about to open his mouth to say something, but then there was a bright sh of yellow light that appeared in this room.


    Coming from Lin Fan was a beam of yellow light that converged in front of him.


    This yellow light came together until it took the form of a golden figure.


    For the others, it was too bright for them to look at, but Lin Fan could see it clearly.


    It was the same thing that he had seen in the realm that the system had sent him to.


    It was the golden clone of himself.


    Everyone watched this golden figure in silence, trying to deal with the shock that they felt from the appearance of this sudden golden figure.


    But the one that reacted first in the end was¡­the white haired young man.


    "Master, it''s you!" As he said this, the white haired young man gave a slight bow to the golden figure, which the golden figure justpletely ignored.


    The golden figure just stared at Lin Fan the entire time.


    However, the faces of not just Lin Fan, but also Ang and the others all changed when they heard this.


    Master?


    Did the white haired young man actually call the golden figure ''master''?


    If that was the case, did that mean that the golden figure was¡­that person that they had been hearing about?


    The person that should be considered a taboo?


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes to look at the golden version of himself, but before he could say anything, the golden clone spoke.


    "Go back to the Lin Astral Empire and clear out the Outers. Once you send them packing, follow them to their world and seek the truth. You now have the power to obtain what you seek."


    It was the same mechanical voice that spoke.


    As soon as they heard this, they all turned to look at Lin Fan who just had a bitter smile on his face.


    If this was all that it had to say, why did it have to appear like this?


    Wasn''t this just announcing its presence now?


    But then he said with a bitter smile, "You know I hate you, right?"


    The golden version of him looked right at him before giving what seemed to be augh and saying, "I know."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being taken aback by this.


    After all, before this, the system had never responded to him like this.


    The system would usually just ignore him, but this golden version of him was actually responding to him.


    Did that mean that this wasn''t the system, but the creator of the system?


    If that was the case, there were plenty of questions that he had to ask.


    But the golden version of himself shook his head and put a finger to his lip before saying, "Now''s not the time. You will find your answer soon."


    Without waiting for Lin Fan to say anything, the golden version of him started to dissipate.


    He turned back into golden light that soon integrated back into Lin Fan.


    When he was gone, everyone finally reacted.


    The white haired young man ran up to Lin Fan and grabbed him, looking at where the golden light disappeared as he said, "Master, please don''t leave! Master, we need you!"


    But the only one that he was actually shouting at was Lin Fan who had to cover his ears with how loud this white haired young man was.


    Ang and the others just stared at Lin Fan in shock, while also having a few other emotions in their eyes.


    Lin Fan just revealed a bitter smile before turning to them to say, "Well, you heard him. It''s time to head back."


    But in response to this, Ang just shook her head and said, "We didn''t hear anything."


    It was true, when the golden figure had spoken, it sounded like gibberish to them.


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but then he said with a sigh, "Well, he said that we should head back to the Lin Astral Empire, so we''re going back."


    Ang and the others hesitated a bit before giving a slow nod.


    As for the white haired young man¡­it took a while for him to calm down, but he did calm down in the end.


    He gave a cough before saying, "I''m sorry for showing an unsightly side of myself. I hope that you will not disappoint master''s expectations."


    As he said this, there was a hint of jealousy in his voice, but that was it.


    Lin Fan just revealed another bitter smile before saying, "We won''t."


    With that, they disappeared.

 Chapter 1158 Once More To The Battlefield

    ?


    When the light in front of them cleared, they found that they were in front of Zi Ling once more.


    She had been standing there with a worried look on her face and she was shocked to see them suddenlying back.


    She had been prepared to wait much longer, so she never thought that it would only take a week for them toe back.


    After all, some of the trips that they took¡­had been much longer than this.


    When they appeared, she quickly went over to Lin Fan to check that he was alright before checking on the others.


    But Lin Fan didn''t want to waste any time here.


    He had a path to take and he wanted to take it as soon as possible.


    So leading the rest, he headed to the royal pce.


    There were many people that were surprised to see hime out so quickly, but they were also shocked by the look on his face. That cold and determined look on his face made it impossible for people to approach him.


    Just like this, Lin Fan made his way to the royal pce.


    Along the way, Zi Ling had asked Ang and the others about what had happened, but not a single one of them answered her.


    They knew that these things should be best kept secret, so even if it was Zi Ling, they wouldn''t tell her these things.


    But the more important thing that they were doing was keeping watch over Lin Fan.


    Or more specifically, they were keeping watch over his finger.


    They were still worried about the finger bone that had integrated itself with him, so they had been watching him just in case anything happened.


    While they weren''t sure if they would even be able to stop him since he had that finger bone that allowed him to use God Realmws, they would still do what they could to stop him.


    They didn''t want to see him lose himself in a rampage in this ce that was important to him.


    But in the end, they were able to reach the pce without incident.


    Even the guards didn''t dare stop Lin Fan when they saw the look on his face, but he stopped to ask them, "Where is great grandfather?"


    The guards looked at each other with unsure looks before saying, "His majesty and the ministers are currently in a meeting."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before asking, "The usual room?"


    The guard said with a nod, "The usual room."


    Then without even caring about the guards, Lin Fan walked right into the pce and headed down a familiar path.


    This was a path that he had taken quite a few times since every time he hade back from something, he would go down this path to reach that meeting room.


    This time was no different.


    The guards just watched as he went off, but they did give a shudder when they saw Ang walking back.


    After all¡­she was still a legend in the Lin Astral Empire.


    When Lin Fan came into the room, the meeting was currently ongoing.


    A minister had been trying to report when the door suddenly opened.


    That minister was caught off guard before going to say, "Who is¡­"


    But before he could finish, he saw who it was and immediately closed his mouth.


    In fact, everyone immediately turned to look in Lin Fan''s direction when they saw that it was him.


    As they looked at him, their eyes immediately lit up.


    While they had been able to repel the Beast Race forces during this time without Lin Fan, but if he were to step onto the battlefield, there was no doubt that it would greatly help them.


    So all of them just waited with bated breath to see what Lin Fan would do.


    Lin Fan came to the front of the table and stood there in front of the Lin Astral Emperor to say, "Your majesty, I want to step onto the battlefield again."


    The moment that they heard this, the eyes of all of the ministers and generals lit up.


    This was the result that they had wanted to see and now that it was in front of them, of course they couldn''t hold back their excitement.


    Many of them even started pulling out reports as they made their preparations to convince Lin Fan on where he should go.


    However, they didn''t dare act until they saw how the Lin Astral Emperor reacted.


    The Lin Astral Emperor hadn''t reacted at all after hearing this from Lin Fan. He just calmly sat there looking at Lin Fan without showing any signs of emotion.


    But then all of a sudden, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a sigh and said, "Xiao Fan, they are out of closed door cultivation now."


    As soon as Lin Fan heard this, his eyes couldn''t help narrowing a bit before he calmed his expression.


    However the ones that were the most bothered by this were the ministers and generals.


    After all, they could tell that the Lin Astral Emperor was hesitating in sending Lin Fan to the battlefield.


    Last time he had opposed this and now it seemed like he would oppose this again¡­


    They couldn''t help feeling anxious, but they knew that there was nothing that they could say in this situation. So the only thing that they could do was wait and see how they reacted.


    They just hoped that Lin Fan would have the same firm will as before.


    After a pause, Lin Fan said, "Can you call them here? I want to talk to them a bit."


    The Lin Astral Emperor hesitated a bit before giving a slight nod.


    Then he turned to his guard waiting on the side and gave an order in a small voice that no one could hear.


    The guard couldn''t help revealing a surprised look when receiving this order, but he still ran off to carry it out. During this time, everyone just waited in silence to see what would happen next.


    It didn''t take long before the doors to this room opened and four people walked in.


    It was Lin Fan''s family.


    It was his father, his mother, his little sister, and the Lin Family ancestor.


    It was these people that hade out of closed doors cultivation, or rather it was his father and little sister who did.


    After they came in, they walked over to where Lin Fan and the Lin Astral Emperor were waiting.


    Lin Fan could see in the eyes of Yue Qingru that she wanted to run over and hug him, but she also knew that this was a serious ce and she shouldn''t do something like that.


    When they came over, Lin Fan said, "It''s been a long time."


    Lin Ao just gave a nod in response.


    This was the first time that they were meeting in five years sincest time, they were still in closed door cultivation.


    There was a silence that followed before Lin Fan said, "I''m heading to the battlefield."


    When they heard this, all of them knitted their brows except for Lin Ao.


    After a shorter pause this time, Yue Qingru said, "Fan''er, this is¡­"


    Before she could finish, Lin Ao raised his hand to cut her off.


    She looked at him with a sad look, but Lin Ao just shook his head before turning back to Lin Fan and asking, "Do you have something to do there?"


    Lin Fan gave a slow nod.


    Lin Ao also nodded before saying, "Then do what you need to do. A man shouldn''t worry too much about things like this. As long as youe back safe, we''ll wait."


    Lin Fan looked at Lin Ao with a strange look before slowly giving an appreciative nod.


    Then he turned back to look at the Lin Astral Emperor.


    The Lin Astral Emperor still had an unwilling look on his face, but seeing Lin Fan look at him like this, he could only give a sigh before saying, "Do what you want."


    The ones that were the most overjoyed with this were the ministers and generals, but they knew to hold themselves back. They made themselves as small as possible while they were having their reunion out of fear of offending Lin Fan.


    After the Lin Astral Emperor said this, Lin Xue suddenly came forward and punched Lin Fan in the back.


    Lin Fan didn''t even flinch when he felt this punch, but he did reveal a bitter smile.


    When he turned around to look at her, he also couldn''t help revealing a bit of a look of praise.


    He could tell from the power behind that punch that Lin Xue had already reached the Realm.


    For someone of her age to reach this realm, it really was impressive.


    But then again, it was only in the Lin Astral Family that she could reach this stage since without the support of the Lin Astral Family''s resources, it wouldn''t have happened.


    He turned and looked at her without saying a thing because he knew that she wanted to say something.


    After a long silence, she said, "Come back safe."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying, "I will."


    Then as if it was an illusion, he seemed to have heard her murmur something under her voice, "If you die, I''lle to hell to kill you myself¡­"


    But that had to be an illusion because his cute little sister wouldn''t say something like this.


    With this, Lin Fan finally turned his attention to the ministers and generals.


    None of them revealed a confused look, but rather their eyes lit up when they saw this.


    They knew what he was looking at them for, so they started pulling out the reports that they had prepared.

 Chapter 1159 Domination

    ?


    The next day, Lin Fan''s ship set off for the battlefield once more.


    His men and Ang''s subordinates had already rested well during this time, so they were looking forward to heading to the battlefield once more.


    But when they met Lin Fan again, they couldn''t help being surprised by the change with him.


    Just his aura alone waspletely different from before.


    Before, his aura was much calmer than it currently was. But now, just being around him puts a kind of pressure on them that makes it hard for them to be around him.


    It seemed that he had broken through during this time, or else he wouldn''t be able to put this kind of pressure on him.


    They all couldn''t help feeling impressed by Lin Fan''s dedication to his cultivation.


    The other thing that was different about Lin Fan was¡­the overall feel that he gave.


    He was much colder and more determinedpared to before¡­


    It was as if something had happened, which made them anxious about the battlefield that they were heading to.


    If this battlefield could make Lin Fan act this way, then¡­it most likely wasn''t a normal battlefield.


    There must be something that Lin Fan knew that wasn''t in the reports that they received.


    However, not a single one of them dared to ask Lin Fan what he knew.


    They just followed their orders and prepared to head to the battlefield.


    The battlefield that they were heading to was the main battlefield of the Lin Astral Empire. They were heading to the southern border that waspletely overrun by invading Beast Race troops.


    There were also many different Outer Experts that were hiding among the Beast Race troops that caused plenty of trouble for the Lin Astral Empire.


    While the techniques to deal with the Outers that Lin Fan had given had spread to the army, they were still getting used to using these techniques to deal with the Outer Experts.


    So right now, they were still getting pushed back by the Beast Race troops and the Outer Experts.


    The situation had only stabilized because they now had a way to fight back, but it still wasn''t looking good.


    But there was a certain reason why Lin Fan had chosen this battlefield.


    It was the ce where the most Outers had been reported.


    The system had told him to clear out the Outers in the Lin Astral Empire and then follow them back to their universe to find the truth¡­


    As for how he would follow them to their universe¡­he would think about thatter.


    For now, he was thinking about clearing out as many Outer Experts as he could.


    At the same time, he was also nning on capturing as many of them as he could so he could get information on their universe.


    With the transport gate system of the Lin Astral Empire, it took them no time to reach the area of the battle. Though they weren''t able to reach the frontlines right away because the transport gate system there wasn''t working.


    With the situation changing every day on the battlefield, it was impossible to leave transport gates up that close to battle.


    So they arrived at the closest transport gate to the battlefield and flew the rest of the way.


    With the speed of Lin Fan''s ship, it took them no time to arrive.


    As they came closer and closer to the battlefield, they could hear the sounds that wereing from the distance.


    There were countless noises that sounded like explosions and bright lights that appeared in the distance.


    It seemed that even now, the fighting was very intense.


    But that was what Lin Fan had wanted to see.


    If it was intense fighting, that meant that the enemy experts were out in droves.


    That meant that there were many targets for him to take down.


    So before the ship could even reach the battlefield, Lin Fan raised his hand and cut down in front of him.


    There was a portal that suddenly appeared in front of him that he stepped through, disappearing from the ship. After he walked through the portal, it disappeared behind him.


    His subordinates were all shocked, but Ang and the others knitted their brows seeing this.


    Even if they wanted to follow, they knew that they couldn''t do the same thing.


    That was because they knew that he had used the finger bone to create that portal. They had been able to feel the God Realm presence from that portal when it appeared.


    So they urged the subordinates to make the ship go even faster.


    When Lin Fan stepped out of the portal, he appeared in the center of the Beast Race lines.


    When the Beast Race troops around him saw him appear, they couldn''t help being shocked by the sudden appearance of this human. But they quickly reacted in the end and surrounded him.


    Lin Fan wasn''t bothered by this at all as he just casually raised his finger and drew a line in front of him with it.


    The Beast Race troops couldn''t help being surprised and confused when they saw this from him, but they treated it as if it was nothing¡­that was until something happened.


    It was only the ones in front of Lin Fan at first, but then all of them suddenly started to slouch a bit.


    It wasn''t that they wanted to slouch, but rather because their bodies started to lean on their own.


    When they looked down, they found that it was because there was this strange red line on their bodies.


    This strange red line appeared not only on them, but also the ones behind them.


    It appeared in a circle around Lin Fan, hitting all of the Beast Race troops that had surrounded him.


    All of them looked down to see this red line, but they didn''t understand what this was at first.


    That was until blood suddenly started to spurt and they realized¡­that it was a line formed from their bodies being cut.


    The slouching that had happened¡­was their top halves falling off their bottom halves!


    Before they realized what had happened, they had been cut in half!


    Even in death, these Beast Race troops didn''t understand what had just happened.


    In an instant, there was arge area around Lin Fan that had been cleared.


    The Beast Race troops that had been just out of range looked down at the dead beasts in front of them before suddenly taking a step back. But then, without hesitation, they all turned to run in the opposite direction of Lin Fan.


    They didn''t know what he had done, but they didn''t want to stick around to find out.


    This person¡­was dangerous, they recognized that.


    They knew that this was not the kind of person that they would be able to face, so they wouldn''t dare try.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about them as he waited for something to appear.


    Not long after, there were several beasts that suddenly appeared in the area around him who quickly surrounded him.


    Without hesitation, all of them released their domains in an attempt to crush him with theirbined might.


    But Lin Fan just pointed his finger up and flicked out.


    When he flicked out like this, there was a golden energy that appeared that went upwards a bit before disappearing without a trace.


    Before it disappeared though, all of the domains that had been around Lin Fan shattered and all of the beasts that had surrounded him spat out blood.


    Not a single one of these beasts were weak, all of them were in the Ruler Realm just like him.


    But a single flick of the finger had been enough for him to shatter all of their domains¡­


    This was the difference between the God Realm and the Ruler Realm.


    The Ruler Realm Experts were nothing in the face of the God Realm.


    Even if he was only borrowing the powers of the God Realm through this finger bone.


    After all of their domains had been shattered, the beasts looked at Lin Fan in shock and fear before suddenly turning to run as well.


    But this time, Lin Fan didn''t let them run.


    With a flick of his finger, there were different orbs ofws that appeared around the various beasts that trapped them.


    They weren''t able to break through these orbs at all, even if they were at full power.


    So the beasts started demanding to be let out.


    There were also some that took a softer approach by asking who he was and even offering to be his pet as long as he spared them, but Lin Fan ignored them all.


    Once again, he stood there as if he was waiting for something.


    In the end, there were several people in battle suits that suddenly appeared.


    These were the Outers that had been sent here to support the Beast Race.


    When the Beast Race saw them, their eyes lit up as they asked for help from these Outers.


    But these Outers all couldn''t help revealing ugly expressions as they looked at Lin Fan.


    That was because through the sensors of their suit, they could tell that there was something strange about him.


    Lin Fan gave off energy readings like they had never seen before¡­


    They knew that they would be able to win against him with normal methods¡­


    So they immediately came together to use abined attack.


    It was just too bad that these suits were all suits that Lin Fan had seen before and he had analyzed them.


    With his new found finger, he could use spatialws to cut a few wires in their suits and then¡­it would stop functioning.


    With that, he was able to capture a bunch of Outers and Ruler Realm Beasts.


    Dominating.


    That was the only word to describe his performance.

 Chapter 1160 Trap

    ?


    After he captured the Outers, Lin Fan didn''t waste any time with them.


    They all had different things to say, but he didn''t listen to a single one of them as he had Brainy insert her seed into them.


    With this seed, she was able to easily control them and learn information about them.


    She learned about the troop that they belonged to, information about their universe, and many different things.


    One interesting thing to note was that these Outers belonged to a different regiment than the one that Lin Fan had met before in the Lu Astral Empire. They were still from the same country, but they were from apletely different regiment.


    Armies in the Outer universe were simr to armies in their universe, but the ones that had been sent here were all elites of their regiments.


    There wasn''t a single rank and file troop that had been sent.


    But that did make sense since they were here to infiltrate and stealws.


    There was no need for rank and file troops since they were just here to infiltrate and not invade.


    After learning all of this, Lin Fan decided that he¡­would use them for a trap.


    Since he had captured them, he would utilize them properly before giving them their deaths.


    There was no need for him to show mercy since these were invaders of his universe.


    ¡­


    "The rescue signals seemed to being from here." A person in a power suit said to the others following him.


    The others all started looking around for the source of the rescue signals, but they found that they weren''t able to find a single thing.


    It was as if whatever was sending these rescue signals was hiding in a different space that they couldn''t see.


    As they saw this, they couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition.


    Some of the people in power suits turned to the Beast Race Experts that came with them and said, "Help us search already."


    The Beast Race Experts had ugly expressions on their faces hearing this, but they still just followed this request without saying anything.


    They still needed the help of these Outer allies, so it wasn''t as if they could tear off all face with them yet. If they made a request for help like this, they just had to go along with it for now even if they didn''t want to.


    After all, the Beast Race Experts also couldn''t help feeling a bad premonition from this ce.


    They didn''t know what it was, but it felt like there was something really bad here.


    It made them really just not want to be here.


    But there was another reason why they didn''t want to be here.


    It was very simple, it was a report that many Ruler Realm Beast Race Experts had disappeared.


    No one knew exactly how they disappeared since they had suddenly disappeared.


    That was one of the disadvantages of arge battlefield like this.


    There were many times where information would be hard to gain and spread because of how wide it was.


    But something like this really was strange.


    They would have preferred to be looking for their own experts or at least finding out what happened to them instead of being here¡­but they had no choice.


    But after searching for a bit, they still weren''t able to find a single thing.


    However, that just didn''t make any sense at all.


    They could clearly feel the aura of the ones releasing the rescue signals here. Even the Beast Race Experts could feel these auras, but they weren''t able to find a single thing.


    So just where was all of thising from?


    They were more and more confused by this as they searched the area.


    However, they also couldn''t help feeling the bad premonition growing stronger and stronger.


    It was as if something really bad was about to happen¡­


    The Beast Race Experts suddenly stopped and one of them said, "We should leave this ce, now."


    The Outers looked at each other withplicated looks.


    Their regiment taught them not to abandon allies, so they had wanted to save the people that they could.


    They didn''t want to abandon whoever was sending these rescue signals, even if they were to abandon these Beast Race Experts. After all, in their minds, these Beast Race Experts were just pawns that they were using.


    But they could feel the bad feelinging from this ce.


    They also knew that something dangerous seemed like it wasing¡­so in the end, they finally agreed to leave.


    It was just too bad that before they could¡­there were different bubbles ofws that appeared around them that trapped them.


    They didn''t even sense a single thing as these bubbles suddenly appeared around them.


    They didn''t even know where these bubbles hade from.


    But of course, that wasn''t the first thing on their minds when they saw these bubbles.


    The first thing that they thought about was¡­how to get out of these bubbles and escape this ce.


    The enemy had clearly arrived, so they needed to run.


    But they found that no matter how they attacked these bubbles, they weren''t able to make a single dent on them. Even when they released their domains or used the strongest attacks that their suits had, they weren''t able to do a single thing to these bubbles around them.


    It was as if they had beenpletely outssed by whateverws made up these bubbles.


    Not long after the bubbles appeared, there was a voice that rang out, "Oh, it seems like there are more than I expected."


    When the trapped Beast Race Experts and Outers heard this, they immediately turned in the direction that this voice came from. They saw that there was a figure standing there with what seemed to be a vine creature on his shoulder.


    There was also this glow that came from his finger.


    They all instantly recognized that this was the person that had trapped them and many of them started to threaten this person.


    However, that personpletely ignored them as he looked at them as if he was observing them.


    After a moment of silence, that person said, "Well, it doesn''t matter. Let''s throw them all in."


    With a wave of his hand, there was a rip that appeared in space.


    When this rip appeared, all of the Beast Race Experts and Outers realized why they hadn''t been able to find the source of these rescue signals.


    It was because the source of the rescue signals had been hidden in this pocket in space.


    But what they couldn''t understand was how they hadn''t detected this pocket.


    There were some Beast Race Experts that could use spatialws among them.


    Logically speaking, they should have been able to detect this pocket in space¡­so why didn''t they sense a single thing when they had been going around this area again and again?


    At the same time, the Outers had their sensors that should have picked up traces of this pocket in space.


    They should have had all the tools to find this ce.


    So how had they missed it?


    As the Beast Race Experts and Outers were trying to figure out what had happened, the bubbles around them started to move while carrying them.


    When they reacted, they found that they had all been thrown into the pocket in space.


    Once that happened, the pocket in space suddenly closed and they were trapped in here with the ones that had been thrown in here before.


    These were the ones that had sent the rescue signal.


    These Outers that had been trapped just sat there as if they didn''t notice a thing which really seemed strange.


    So one of the newer Outers walked over to see what was happening with them.


    When he came close to them, they suddenly turned around and lunged at him.


    Before this new Outer could react, the old Outers trapped in this pocket space suddenly opened their mouths and a green mist came out towards them.


    He wasn''t able to react in time before his eyes suddenly misted over like the older Outers trapped.


    After that, they all turned to face the other Beast Race Experts and Outers that were trapped, lunging at them just like they had done with the first Outer.


    All of them couldn''t help thinking of a single thing¡­


    Zombie!


    These were just like zombies!


    But just what was happening?


    There was only chaos that followed after the first Outer had been corrupted by the green mist.


    It didn''t take long before all of them had been infected by the green mist and they went back to sending rescue signals.


    ¡­


    After sending that group into the pocket space, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a disappointed look.


    He had created this pocket space for one reason, he wanted to use it as a lure for the target that he wanted to catch.


    But so far, the target that he had been looking for never came.


    Even after all this time, they never came.


    This pocket space wasn''t the only pocket space that he had created.


    He had already created several pocket spaces in different areas to lure in his prey, but that prey never came.


    Just how long would he have to keep doing this before he could lure in the one that he wanted to lure in¡­


    That was what he thought to himself before a voice suddenly said, "Who dares to break the rules? Do you really think that no one would do anything if you break the rules like this?"


    When he heard this, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a smile.

 Chapter 1161 Outer God

    <h4>Chapter 1161 Outer God</h4>


    There was a powerful presence that appeared the moment that this voice rang out.


    This pressure was unlike anything that Lin Fan had felt before, but he had felt plenty of pressure just like this before.


    This was aw that he wasn''t familiar with, but he could tell that this was the presence of a God Realm Expert.


    This meant that this was one of the Outer Gods that hade to their universe.


    With the appearance of an Outer God, that meant that this invasion had apletely different meaning.


    But there weren''t any of the God Realm Experts of their universe that came.


    That was because¡­Lin Fan was already here.


    Or rather the finger bone was already here.


    Lin Fan didn''t know what this finger bone was, but the God Realm Experts knew what it was.


    And before that person said that they could, they wouldn''t leave the World of Gods.


    So they had no problem leaving this matter to Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan just calmly faced this Outer God since he was already used to this pressure after being in the World of Gods for a while. There were many God Realm Experts in the World of Gods with varying degrees of power, so he had already experienced the difference in level between God Realm Experts.


    When he felt the pressure that wasing from this Outer God, he could tell that this Outer God¡­was weak.


    Compared to even the regr God Realm Experts that he had met in the World of Gods, this Outer God wascking.


    The only exnation for that was that this Outer God was weaker than those God Realm Experts that he had met before.


    So this Outer God could be considered the perfect test subject for him.


    That was because Lin Fan had already thought of a new thing that he could do with this finger bone, something that would suit the way that he fought.


    After the Outer God appeared, he red at Lin Fan.


    He could feel that there was the aura of a goding from him, but he couldn''t tell exactly what kind of god he was.


    So he didn''t know how to counteract this person¡­


    When God Realm Experts met each other, they would have a general understanding of what the other person''sw was because of the resonance between them. They had a deep understanding ofws and they were able to recognize differentws in an instant.


    This was the case even across different universes.


    Even if they were from different universes, God Realm Experts should be able recognize each other''sws.


    But this Outer God couldn''t feel anything from Lin Fan.


    It was as if he was a God Realm Expert, while also not being one which just confused the Outer God even more.


    After a long moment of silence, the Outer God looked at Lin Fan and said, "You are the one who did all of this?"


    Lin Fan just calmly looked back at him and gave a nod.


    The Outer God revealed an ugly expression when he saw this before saying, "Openly viting the rules like this, are people of your universe really that shameless?"


    "Rules?" Lin Fan asked in a confused voice.


    The Outer God couldn''t help revealing a strange look when he heard this.


    He looked at Lin Fan like he was trying to make sure that he was being serious.


    Seeing that it didn''t seem like Lin Fan was joking, the Outer God couldn''t help saying, "Are you a new god or is your universe just unaware?"


    Lin Fan didn''t say anything in response.


    Seeing this, the Outer God said with a sigh, "We all know that unless the existence of a universe is being threatened, God Realm Experts won''t appear on the battlefield. Coming out and fighting among juniors, aren''t you ashamed?"


    Lin Fan just calmly said, "Who said that I was a God Realm Expert?"


    The Outer God''s eyes opened wide when he heard this before he said with a disdainfulugh, "You think that you can hide it from me? You''re using all of these God Realmws and you want to¡­"


    His voice drifted off in the middle of saying this as he suddenly realized something.


    That was right, there were many different God Realmws that were used, he was able to clearly sense this. However, there was only Lin Fan who was standing there.


    He didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to use differentws since that wasn''t possible.


    The only possibility of this happening was that¡­there were different God Realm Experts that were around waiting in ambush.


    So the Outer God immediately raised his guard and prepared to fight anything that came his way, but there wasn''t anything that came. There was only him and Lin Fan in this area in space.


    Lin Fan could guess what he was thinking, so he said, "You don''t need to worry, there''s just you and me."


    The Outer God revealed a sneer when he heard this before saying, "Who would believe that?"


    Lin Fan just flicked his finger and then disappeared into nothing, but his voice still rang out, "Believe what you will, it doesn''t matter."


    The Outer God knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t move rashly.


    He knew that there was no need for him to make a rash move since he wasn''t able to find the enemy.


    Instead, it was better for him to wait and see what the enemy was capable of doing.


    After all, he could sense that he was stronger than Lin Fan.


    When he had sensed all of those God Realmws earlier, he had been able to tell just how strong they were.


    With the level of strength that they had, it was easy for him to break through them with his ownws.


    Different bubbles of energy formed all around the Outer God all of a sudden, each one representing a differentw. These were all attacks that were at the God Realm, but the Outer God didn''t panic seeing them.


    Instead, he just simply raised his hand and there was ayer of metal that appeared around him.


    Thisyer of metal formed a bubble around the Outer God, but since it was metal, itpletely hid the Outer God.


    Then¡­there were things that jutted out from thatyer of metal around the Outer God.


    They seemed strange at first, but eventually they took the form of cannons.


    These were a bunch of cannons that had suddenly appeared, each one aimed at one of the bubbles that surrounded him.


    There was a light that came from these cannons, which symbolized them charging up their power before they suddenly shot out beams of light at the different bubbles ofws around them.


    Lin Fan wasn''t certain what thew the Outer God used was, but he was certain that thisw was somehow rted to machines. After all, it was from the metal that he could feel the energying from.


    The way that the Outer God controlled this metal made it clear that hisw was in some way rted to machines.


    However, that really didn''t bother Lin Fan since he already had a way of dealing with this.


    The various beams of light were allowed to shoot without any interference.


    From inside of the sphere of metal, the Outer God revealed a confident look since he knew that his beams of light would be able to take down these bubbles that wereing at him.


    Then he would wait to see if he could find that person and shoot him down.


    But¡­it didn''t go the way that he wanted it to go.


    These beams of light were able to hit these bubbles, but they weren''t able to do a thing.


    The Outer God watched in shock and confusion as his beams of light seemed to be absorbed by these bubbles, making them even stronger.


    He couldn''t understand how this was happening, but in no time at all, those beams of light had disappeared and the bubblesing at him were bigger than before.


    The Outer God didn''t have time to be shocked as he directed the cannons to fire once more.


    This time, the Outer God didn''t hold back and continuously shot with those cannons, firing waves of beams of light at these bubbles that were slowlying at him.


    But he found that the results were the same as before.


    Each time the beams of light that he shot out made contact with one of the bubbles, they were absorbed by the bubble and the bubble became stronger.


    It was as if his powers were being taken and used against him which applied quite a bit of pressure on the Outer God.


    He didn''t know how he would be able to get out of this situation since nothing worked no matter how many beams of light he shot at these bubbles.


    So he stopped his cannons from firing before raising his hand.


    Theyer of metal around him opened up and the metal pieces suddenly flew out towards the bubbles that wereing at him.


    They didn''t fly right at the bubbles, but rather they spread out so that they perfectly surrounded them.


    Then with a clench of the Outer God''s hand, the metal pieces surrounded the bubblespletely, forming ayer of metal that trapped them.


    Seeing that these bubbles could be trapped, the Outer God let out a sigh of relief.


    But this sigh of relief came too early as the metal covers around each bubble started to be thinner and thinner.

 Chapter 1162 Combined Laws

    ?


    All of sudden, the bubbles that had been contained within theyer of metal suddenly burst forth.


    The Outer God was shocked to see this, but he didn''t stop his hands from moving.


    More and more metal gathered in front of the Outer God before he shot them all out towards the bubbles that were stilling at him.


    When these metal bits reached the bubbles, they tried surrounding them once again.


    However, the same thing happened as before where the metal was slowly corroded away.


    Corroded¡­was the wrong word. It was better to say that the metal was absorbed and incorporated by the bubbles.


    There seemed to be something around the bubble that drained away the power of thews that he had.


    The Outer God was able to see and feel it more clearly this time.


    As soon as the bubbles made contact with the metal balls that he created, there was a strange force that drained away thews that created this metal.


    Since this metal was formed by hisws, that meant that once thew energy was drained away, the metal would also disappear.


    As such, the metal balls weren''t able to stop the bubblesing at him at all.


    But the Outer God couldn''t help beingpletely confused.


    After all, he had no idea whatw this was that it was able to do all of this. He had never heard of aw like this, he couldn''t even see through it even though he was observing it with his own eyes.


    This just didn''t make sense at all.


    The Outer God knew that if he dyed, the only thing that woulde was his own death.


    So he no longer stayed in the same ce and started to run.


    There was metal that gathered under his feet that quickly formed something that seemed like a hoverboard.


    Once that hoverboard formed, he started moving in the opposite direction of the bubbles that wereing at him. With the speed that he was running, it didn''t take long before he had created some distance with the bubbles chasing him.


    He would have continued in that direction, but¡­he suddenly felt a sense of dangering from behind him.


    When the Outer God turned around, he saw that there were other bubblesing at him from the opposite direction.


    He had been pinched by Lin Fan''s attacks.


    The Outer God couldn''t help being confused since he hadn''t sensed these attacks at all, but he didn''t panic.


    After all, there weren''t just two directions that he could go in¡­


    But that was wishful thinking.


    If Lin Fan was going to trap him, he naturally wouldn''t only do this much.


    Before the Outer God could move again, there were more bubbles that appeared around him.


    They appeared in every single direction that he could move in, so that it was impossible for him to go anywhere without bumping into one of these bubbles.


    Even if he was faster, it was impossible to escape since he waspletely surrounded.


    The Outer God''s jaw dropped when he saw this.


    He stared at the bubbles that were slowly floating at him before saying, "You really are thorough! All of these God Realm Experts gathered here just to take care of me alone!"


    After all, all of the bubbles that surrounded him were formed from differentws and each one was at the God Realm.


    It was an established fact that only one person could reach the God Realm with any singlew, so for all of these God Realmw bubbles to appear around him, it meant that he waspletely surrounded by God Realm Experts.


    The only thing that confused him was how they had hidden themselves so well that they were able to surround him like this.


    If there were so many of them here, he should have discovered them in an instant.


    So just how had they hidden from his senses like this?


    Seeing that no one answered, the Outer God said, "A bunch of cowards live in this universe! All of you sneaking around and ganging up on a single person! Just wait until the real experts of my universee! You will all be on your knees then!"


    Lin Fan just shook his head with a sigh before saying, "Why do you think that there''s others here? I told you from the beginning, I was the only one here."


    The Outer God gave a soft snort before saying, "You still want to keep pretending? To keep acting dumb? You think that you can fool me with such poor lies?"


    Lin Fan gave another sigh before saying, "There''s no acting, there''s no lies. From the beginning, it''s only been you and me."


    The Outer Godughed at this before saying, "Just you and me? Then where did all these differentwse from? Do you really think you can fool me with the evidence in front of me?"


    Lin Fan once again gave a sigh, but he didn''t say anything this time.


    When it came to this, it was better to give a demonstration than to keep arguing with him.


    Lin Fan raised his finger and pointed it at the Outer God.


    As he did this, all of the bubbles that had surrounded the Outer God had stopped.


    The Outer God couldn''t help being caught off guard by this because with the act that he was putting on, it almost seemed like he really was controlling thesew bubbles.


    But the Outer God didn''t let his guard down since he knew that it was impossible.


    Whatever he was doing, it was just the other God Realm Experts around that were coordinating with him.


    For the Outer God, this could be considered an opportunity.


    If he was able to find a gap in their formation, then he would be able to escape this ce and return to his own universe. Once he returned to his universe, he could report this matter to the stronger God Realm Experts and bring them all in droves.


    Since the God Realm Experts of this universe were so shameless to group up on him like this, it meant that there was no need for them to hold back.


    Since they had broken the rules, there was no need for them to worry about breaking the rules as well.


    They could all me them on this universe and the other universes wouldn''t be able to say a thing.


    When the time came, they would be much stronger than the other universes since they would be able to swallow this shameless universe.


    That was what passed through the mind of the Outer God until he saw what was gathering at the tip of Lin Fan''s finger.


    It was just a ball of energy at first, but then¡­there were many different feelings that came from it.


    This ball of energy¡­gathered many differentws in it and they were all in the God Realm.


    While he didn''t know how this was possible, he could tell that this ball of energy was able to gather many differentws together. At the same time, he could tell that this ball of energy¡­was under Lin Fan''s control.


    Just how was this possible?


    This went against the very fundamental rules of any universe!


    The shock was just too much for this Outer God and he couldn''t help saying, "You¡­Just what are you? Just how are you¡­doing this?"


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile since this was the question that he wanted to ask.


    He had no idea what this finger bone that had reced his finger bone was, but this was all this finger bone''s ability.


    He was just borrowing it to fight against God Realm Experts.


    Without saying a thing, he shot out that ball of energy as a beam at the Outer God.


    This time, the Outer God didn''t dare look down on Lin Fan and gathered all of his energy around himself. He created a thick iron wall, using all of his power just to block against this beam of light that Lin Fan shot at him.


    But when the beam of light made contact with that iron wall around him¡­


    It corroded it away just like with the bubbles.


    It wasn''t able to resist for even a moment as a hole was created in this iron wall, revealing the Outer God.


    The beam of light continued until it hit the Outer God right in the chest since the Outer God had nowhere else to go surrounded by this ball of iron.


    The Outer God tried to resist as best as he could, but he found that the flow of his energy waspletely disrupted when he was hit with this beam of light.


    It was as if there was something that was draining his energy away¡­


    This beam of light, it was actually sucking hisws out of him!


    "How? How is this possible?!" The Outer God called out in shock as he was being drained of hisws.


    Lin Fan just calmly watched all of this as he felt the Outer God''swsing to him.


    This was a feeling that he was familiar with since he had done something like this before.


    Though the one that he had done this with before was much weaker than this Outer God.


    The one that he had done this with before had only been a fragment of an Outer God and not aplete Outer God like this.


    As for the mainw that was in the beam of light¡­it was naturally the voidw.

 Chapter 1163 Strange New Law

    ?


    The voidw, that was the onew that he had forgotten about when he tested out the finger bone back in the World of Gods.


    He had only usedws that he didn''t have with the finger bone, but heter realized that he could also use thews that he specialized in with the finger bone.


    So he started practicing using the voidw with the finger bone.


    When he used it, he found that the voidw that the finger bone released was even stronger than the voidw that he had absorbed from the Void God. It was much stronger than any otherw that he had tried using with the finger bone.


    But why was that?


    Lin Fan practiced a bit more to find¡­that the deeper his understanding of thew, the stronger thew released by the finger bone.


    It was almost as if the finger bone really was a part of him, growing with his power instead of being something that was parasitizing off him. Instead of being this foreign thing that had snuck into his body¡­


    But Lin Fan found that the power of the voidw released with the power of the finger bone was much stronger than the voidw that he had inherited from the Void God.


    It wasn''t just weak God Realmws, but rather an actual powerful God Realmw.


    This would be enough to even threaten some of the powerful God Realm Experts in the World of Gods. It might have even been enough to threaten the paragons if they had been caught off guard.


    So this was not something that this weak Outer God could resist.


    The Outer God did try doing all that he could to stop the voidw that had been attached to him from draining him dry, but nothing that he did had any use. All he could do was struggle as he felt himself bing weaker and weaker as the voidws drained him of everything.


    In the end, the Outer God just fell t in his ball of iron which had already been dissipating.


    This ball of iron had been formed by the Outer God''sw and since Lin Fan was draining him of thatw, it wasn''t strange that it was disappearing.


    The Outer God felt weaker and weaker until he wasn''t able to move anymore.


    It was as if all of his energy had been drained by something and it was hard even to move a single finger.


    But that was because¡­all of hisws had been drained.


    He could feel it, the essence of hisw that should have been in his dantian was now gone.


    With this gone, it was as if he was no longer a God Realm Expert, but just a normal person.


    As heid there, the Outer God looked at his hands in nk dismay before saying, "What have you done to me? What did you do to myws?"


    Lin Fan justpletely ignored him as he looked down at his hand.


    He looked at it as if he was trying to figure something out.


    This was the hand that had the strange finger bone in it.


    Normally when he used his voidw, thew that was absorbed would form a statue in his dantian where he would be able to draw on its power to use thatw.


    However, this didn''t happen this time.


    Whether it was because he used the voidw with the finger bone or something else, there was nothing new that appeared in his dantian.


    Or at least that was what it was at first.


    After he had finished absorbing thatw from the Outer God, he could feel a flow of energying from that finger bone. It was as if some kind of strange energy was flowing from it and entering him.


    He wasn''t certain just what this strange energy was¡­but he felt that it was simr to thew that the Outer God had used.


    But he could feel that this energy was much stronger than before.


    It was as if something had purified it for him¡­


    After this energy flowed into him for a bit, it started to gather inside of his dantian before slowly taking form.


    It was taking the form of a statue that was of some kind of strange machine that he had never seen before.


    But he knew that this was thew that had just been taken from the Outer God.


    Taking a deep breath, Lin Fan just ignored the Outer God and sat down cross legged in space. As he sat down, there was a swirl of life energy that suddenly appeared around him, almost as if he was cultivating.


    The Outer God was shocked by Lin Fan''s sudden actions and didn''t know what to do at first.


    But then the Outer God made a decision that he should get out of this ce as soon as possible.


    He didn''t know what had happened, but the most important thing was getting out of here with his life.


    So even if he felt weak, he reached into pocket and pulled out an orb.


    This orb gave off a powerful feeling.


    It was clear that this orb contained some kind of God Realmw.


    The Outer God held it in his hand and gathered his strength to crush it¡­but right before he could¡­


    Lin Fan had been sitting there cross legged with his eyes closed, as if he waspletely separated from this world. But when the Outer God tried to crush that orb, his finger suddenly raised and pointed at that Outer God.


    There was a ck hole that suddenly appeared where the bead was that swallowed it whole before the Outer God could crush it.


    At the same time, the Outer God felt a pain from his hand when the ck hole appeared.


    It was as if something was ripping the flesh from his hand.


    When he looked down, he found that the bead waspletely gone and his hand was covered in blood.


    It wasn''t just as if something had ripped the flesh from his hand, it had actually done it.


    He didn''t know what it was that had ripped the skin off his hand, but all he had to show for thisst attempt at escaping was a bloody hand.


    With this final attempt foiled, he couldn''t do anything but faint as he ran out of energy.


    But Lin Fan didn''t care about any of this as he was still focused on his own cultivation.


    He had condensed the energy that flowed in from the finger and formed the statue in his dantian.


    After he finished condensing that statue, he finally opened his eyes and looked down at his hand.


    Taking a deep breath, he was able to gather a ball of iron in his hand.


    If the Outer God had been awake, he would have been shocked.


    That was because there was the God Realm aura that wasing from the iron ball in Lin Fan''s hand.


    In other words, Lin Fan was using the same God Realmws that he had just been using¡­


    But that shouldn''t have been possible since that was hisw and he was the God Realm Expert for thatw.


    So why was Lin Fan able to do this?


    It was because the finger bone''s voidws hadpletely stolen this God Realmw from this Outer God and given it to Lin Fan.


    Using this statue in his dantian, he was considered the new God Realm Expert of thisw.


    It made it so that one didn''t need to die to transfer their God Realmw over to a new person, so it could be considered a solution to Ang''s problem. But of course, Lin Fan wasn''t certain that he would be able to transfer this God Realmw to another person in the first ce.


    So he wouldn''t ept this as a solution.


    But he could see the hope with this.


    If this finger bone could even stealws and use multiple God Realmws, then there should be a way to do what he wanted to do.


    There should be a way to make it so that two people could reach the God Realm with the samew.


    With that Outer God taken care of, Lin Fan turned his attention back to the battlefield.


    Since he had obtained a neww, he wanted to see what it could do.


    After all, thisw would be used as part of his n to infiltrate the other universe, so he needed to get himself familiar with it.


    So instead of luring them in like he had done before, Lin Fan was taking the fight to the enemies.


    He teleported back to his ship where his subordinates were waiting for him.


    They had tried to follow him, but they hadn''t been able to.


    Even Ang and the rest couldn''t follow him since there were just too many Ruler Realm Beasts on this battlefield.


    They didn''t know why all of these Ruler Realm Beasts had suddenly appeared, but they were more than enough to stop them from heading across the battlefield. Though they most likely could have done so if they revealed their true identities.


    It was just that right now, they weren''t ready to do so yet.


    After Lin Fan returned, he suddenly felt somethinging from the seat under him¡­or rather from the ship he was on.


    He felt a kind of connection to the ship that he had never felt before.


    And as for the source¡­it was thew that he had stolen from the Outer God.

 Chapter 1164 Sweeping The Battlefield

    ?


    With this connection, Lin Fan felt like he could control every part of the ship.


    So with a thought, he suddenly gained full control of the ship and locked his subordinates out.


    They were all shocked to see that their controls weren''t working anymore, but it didn''t take them long to realize that Lin Fan had been the one responsible for this.


    They could feel the strange neww that wasing from him, so they could tell that he was now controlling the ship with this strange new power he gained.


    But they couldn''t help wondering just what this power was, that it allowed him to control a ship like this.


    They had never heard of anything like this before.


    However, even if they asked, Lin Fan wouldn''t have answered.


    He waspletely focused on controlling the ship that he was now connected to.


    With a thought, the ship charged onto the battlefield.


    There were lines on the battlefield between the two sides, but he had charged this ship right into the center of the battlefield. This ship was now in between the two lines, right in the line of fire for everyone.


    Both sides were caught off guard by this ship that had suddenly charged in, but then the Beast Race troops began firing at it.


    The Lin Astral Empire troops recognized this ship as Lin Fan''s ship since it was a ship that was now famous across the Lin Astral Empire.


    They all wanted to help, but it was toote for them to do anything.


    Lin Fan''s subordinates also couldn''t help being shocked by Lin Fan''s recklessness and wanted to do something to protect themselves, but they couldn''t ess the ship controls. They could only watch as the attacks of the Beast Race troops came closer and closer.


    However, Lin Fan didn''t seem to have a single trace of fear on his face.


    As he stared at all of these attacks approaching his ship, he just calmly revealed a smile before gathering the neww again.


    As he gathered this neww, the metal of the ship suddenly started to flow.


    That was right, the metal started flowing like a liquid and it didn''t take long before a new structure was added to the ship.


    This was a very strange structure, one that had never been seen before. Or at least it had never been seen before by the people of this universe.


    After this strange structure appeared on the ship, there was an energy fluctuation that came from it before a barrier suddenly appeared around the ship. The barrier was so faint that one might not be able to see it if they didn''t look closely at it.


    No one that was on the ship believed that such a thin barrier would be able to block these attacks.


    However, not a single attack was able to make it through this barrier in the end.


    This barrier held firm under the barrage of attacks that came at the ship, there wasn''t even a single crack that formed in this barrier under this barrage.


    It was as if it would hold firm no matter what hit it.


    But they just couldn''t understand why it was so strong.


    It didn''t make sense that such a thin barrier with this amount of energy would be this strong.


    In the end, the barrier was able to hold out under the barrage of attacks from the Beast Race troops.


    They had stopped because they wanted to see what happened to this ship, but all that met their gaze wererge barrels of cannons that were pointed at them.


    While the barrier had been blocking the attacks, Lin Fan had been modifying the ship to create all of these cannons.


    Now that the smoke was gone and the dust had settled, he was able to see the Beast Race troops again and the cannons started to charge.


    When the Beast Race troops felt the energy fluctuationsing from these cannons, they couldn''t help feeling scared.


    While they weren''t able to tell exactly how strong these cannons were, they could feel the sense of dangering from them. It was clear that whatever these cannons were, they clearly weren''t weak.


    Just where had the humans found this weapon all of sudden?


    There were Beast Race troops that had wanted to run away, but the leaders of the Beast Race tribes wouldn''t allow them to do so.


    With a roar from these leaders, the lower rank beasts had no choice but to face these cannons.


    All of them gathered their attacks just like before and then shot them all at once at the ship once again.


    But this time, the cannons had finished charging and shot out at the Beast Race troops.


    The beams of light that were shot out of these cannons flew right at the attacks that the Beast Race troopsunched.


    When the two waves of attacks shed¡­it was the Beast Race troops'' attacks that couldn''t hold up. When the beams of light hit the attacks of the Beast Race troops, it was as if there was something that absorbed the energy of these attacks.


    The attacks of the Beast Race troops weren''t able to hold up for even an instant as they were scattered away by the beams of light.


    The Beast Race troops didn''t have time to process this as they were mmed by the same beams of light.


    The moment that these beams of light hit them, it felt like something was draining them of all of their energy before they were hit by some kind of attack that tore them apart. These Beast Race troops weren''t able to resist at all as they were hit by these beams of light.


    There were some demon beasts that tried hiding in the back.


    They wanted to use the other demon beasts as human¡­beast shields against these beams of light.


    However, the beams of light didn''t be smaller as they mmed into these demon beasts. Rather, it was as if they were absorbing energy from something and each one grew in size and power.


    It seemed that being at the back¡­was the worst way to die.


    Being at the back meant being hit with the most powerful attack which was the most painful.


    As for how this happened, if one looked at the beams of light closely, they would see that there was this faintyer of ck energy around them.


    The identity of this ck energy¡­was naturally the voidws.


    It was simr to what Lin Fan had used against the Outer God.


    He had coated these cannon shots with voidws that would absorb all the attacks that shed with these beams of light. Then the energy absorbed by the voidws would strengthen the beams of light, making them even stronger.


    As long as there wasn''t anything that was too strong for the voidws to absorb, there was nothing that could stop these beams of light.


    And the voidws he used¡­were from the finger bone.


    They were voidws that even God Realmws couldn''t fight against, so there was no chance these rank and file soldiers would be able to do anything.


    After these beams of light hit the Beast Race troops, there was arge gap that was created in the lines of the Beast Race.


    They didn''t dare fill this gap out of fear of bing Lin Fan''s next target, but it was just too bad for them that Lin Fan didn''t n on sparing them in the first ce.


    The ship started moving¡­and the cannons started to aim.


    The Beast Race troops weren''t able to react at first, but when there were beams of lighting at them, they had no choice but to react.


    If they stayed still, all that would happen was that they would be blown up by the cannons. So not a single one of them dared to stay where they had been before and turned to run away.


    It was just too bad that they weren''t able to outrun this ship.


    They didn''t even understand how a human ship could be this fast, but it took no time for this human ship to catch up to them.


    The only thing that they felt was pain from their backs as they were sted by the ship from behind.


    Just like this, Lin Fan''s ship swept through the battlefield with its cannons.


    When it was attacked, the barrier would appear again to block all attacks that came at it.


    But different from before, after each attack¡­it almost seemed like the ship was getting faster and faster. Almost as if the ship was absorbing the energy from each of their attacks to make itself stronger.


    But how could that be possible?


    It was just a ship!


    The stir that this ship caused forced the Beast Race to react.


    There were powerful auras that appeared among the Beast Race.


    This was the aura of Ruler Realm Beasts.


    These were the ultimate experts of the Beast Race that humans couldn''t help fear.


    When they saw these Ruler Realm Beasts appear, Lin Fan''s subordinates couldn''t help feeling worried.


    Even if Lin Fan was able to sweep through the weaker beasts with the ship, they didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to do the same with these Ruler Realm Beasts.


    After all, these were the peak experts of the Beast Race.


    But to everyone''s surprise¡­the same thing happened with the Ruler Realm Beasts.


    Their attacks were stopped by the barrier and then they were crushed by the cannon fire.


    There was no resistance at all as they were swept by the ship.


    Lin Fan had watched all of this with a calm look on his face since the fish that he wanted to bait was much bigger than these Ruler Realm Beasts.


    He was hoping for another Outer God.

 Chapter 1165 Other Outer God

    ?


    When even the Ruler Realm Beasts couldn''t fight back against this ship, the Beast Race troops had no choice but to retreat.


    Following this, the Lin Astral Empire army didn''t let this chance escape.


    As the ship scattered the Beast Race troops, the Lin Astral Empire army coordinated with the ship to pick off the stragglers.


    Since the Beast Race had dared to invade their Lin Astral Empire, they wouldn''t let them return then. Or if they did return, they would return in a body bag.


    They wouldn''t let a single demon beast escape now that they were here.


    Just like this, the Lin Astral Empire army gained a second wind and started sweeping through the Beast Race troops. Though most of it was still done by Lin Fan and his ship bombarding them with cannon shots that they couldn''t resist at all.


    In the end, the Outers had no choice but toe out.


    That was because most of them could see that something familiar wasing from the sensor.


    They didn''t know why this was the case since the sensor was showing that an ally was attacking the Beast Race.


    Why would one of their allies suddenly be attacking the tools that they were using?


    So many of them gathered around Lin Fan''s ship in the end and¡­they were also shot down by the cannons of that ship.


    The ones that arrived first didn''t even know what happened as they were hit by the beams of light that had been shot at the Beast Race troops.


    The ones that came afterwards did what they could to try and stop the ship when they saw that it wouldn''t stop attacking them.


    But still, they couldn''t do a single thing against this ship.


    At the very least, they recognized why this ship gave off the signal of an ally.


    This was the power of Major General Briggs.


    Major General Briggs was known as the Machine God in their army for his ability to control machines with a touch of his hand. He had the ability to modify any weapon in an instant and create something that waspletely different from before.


    But now this ship was demonstrating the same power.


    They could see as the cannons deformed and reformed all over the ship depending on where the enemies of the ship were.


    This was the power that Major General Briggs had used.


    Since they couldn''t stop it with force, there were many Outers that started calling out to the ship.


    "Major General! What are you doing!"


    "It''s us! Your subordinates! Why are you attacking us?"


    "Major General, please ceasefire! If there''s something wrong, you can tell us about it!"


    But amidst these calls, the cries of pain and betrayal rang out more clearly.


    Even though the Outers shouted out at the ship, there wasn''t a single response¡­


    Well, there was a response that came with each call¡­it was a beam of light shot from a cannon that responded.


    Every single one that called out to the ship, asking it to stop attacking was met with a beam of light that caused the death of the person that shouted out.


    In the end, there wasn''t a single Outer that was able to do anything and they stopped shouting.


    They looked at the ship withplicated looks before starting to fire their weapons at it as well.


    Since there was no response, they assumed that whatever condition Major General Briggs was in, he wasn''t in any condition to stop himself.


    Since that was the case, they would need to stop him even if it meant hurting him.


    After all, if there was one of them running on a rampage among their allies, naturally they would have to stop them or else it would cause doubt in the allies.


    At this point, the Outers still needed the Beast Race as allies since they were natives of this world. Without them, they wouldn''t be able to put their n in action, especially before the others arrived in this universe.


    So even if it hurt them to stop Major General Briggs like this, they had no other choice.


    It was just too bad that none of them were able to stop him.


    That was the difference between God Realm Experts and Ruler Realm Experts.


    There was a reason why he was a major general and they were all his subordinates.


    Not to mention¡­it wasn''t even him.


    It was Lin Fan who had a firm understanding of all the Outerws that were being thrown at him, so he was able to easily disrupt all of these attacks and fire back at them.


    In the end, the Outers had no choice but to report this upwards.


    There was a voice that suddenly rang out across the battlefield that said, "Major General Briggs, what do you think you''re doing right now? Do you know what the punishment is for doing something like this? We''re not just talking about a simple court marshaling, we''re talking about execution here!"


    But there was no response that came from the ship.


    After all, the person called Major General Briggs was no longer living in this world.


    Seeing that there was no response at all and the ship was still firing, the voice rang out again saying, "That''s it! I''ll personally execute you!"


    Then there was a rip in space before a figure appeared out of nowhere.


    As soon as this figure appeared, all of the Outers immediately gathered around this person.


    They all saluted this person showing that he was an important person.


    Based on the ranks that Lin Fan had learned about, this person was most likely one of the generals from that other universe.


    That person just ignored all of them as he stared at the ship before suddenly releasing his pressure.


    When this pressure came out, everyone suddenly froze. Whether they were demon beast or human, they found it hard to stand under this pressure.


    Those from the Beast Race had naturally experienced the aura of a Ruler Realm Beast before since they ruled over their various tribes.


    Those from the Lin Astral Empire army had also experienced the sensation of someone in the Ruler Realm before since the highmanders and the experts hade to fight with them.


    But this pressure¡­was far beyond that.


    This pressure¡­was something that was far beyond anything that a mortal could reach.


    This was clearly the pressure of a god rather than a mortal.


    This was clearly the pressure of someone in the legendary God Realm.


    How would they fight someone like that when God Realm Experts had long since disappeared from their world?


    There was no way that Lin Fan would be able to take down this God Realm Expert with just this ship even if it was powerful.


    So they all started thinking about how to save themselves¡­


    Even those on Lin Fan''s ship couldn''t help revealing shocked looks of panic. They didn''t think that Lin Fan would be able to do anything against someone in the God Realm.


    That was especially true for Ang and the others who had actually faced a God Realm Expert before.


    But when Lin Fan saw this Outer God descend, he revealed a faint smile.


    He was waiting for this Outer God to show himself, so now that he did¡­there was no hesitation at all as he suddenly shot the cannons at the Outer God.


    The Outer God was caught off guard by this, but then he raised his hand and created a crack in space in front of him.


    This crack in space was very familiar to Lin Fan since he had seen many Outers use this.


    It was the spatialw of the other universe.


    It seemed that this Outer God was the God of Spatial Laws in their universe.


    The beams of light came closer and closer to the spatialw barrier that the Outer God had created and¡­when it hit the spatialw barrier, it was stopped by it.


    Seeing this, the Outers all revealed looks filled with hope.


    After all, when they had tried to attack these beams of light before, all that happened was that the beams of light had ripped through their attacks. It was as if there was something that had absorbed all of the energy of those attacks and then made those beams of light stronger.


    They had almost given up hope when they saw that they couldn''t stop the cannons of this ship.


    After holding back the beams of light for a bit, the beams of light suddenly disappeared.


    This caused more hope to flood into the eyes of the Outers.


    This was the first time that the beams of light had been stopped, so of course they couldn''t help being excited.


    This meant that this ship could be stopped, this meant that they had a hope for survival.


    But the Outer God didn''t have a hopeful look on his face.


    Instead, the Outer God had knitted his brows as if something was wrong¡­


    He couldn''t help looking at this ship with a very strange look before suddenly saying, "Who are you? You are not Major General Briggs."


    As soon as he said this, all of the Outers revealed looks of shock as they turned to look at the ship as well.


    Their scanners were all telling them that this was Major General Briggs, so why was the general suddenly saying that it wasn''t?


    There was no response from the ship, there was only the movement of cannons as they all pointed at the Outer God.


    Seeing this, the Outer God said, "Fine, I''ll drag you out myself then."

 Chapter 1166 New Law

    ?


    After the Outer God said this, he waved his hand and there were cracks in space that formed around the ship.


    These cracks in spacepletely surrounded the ship, not leaving a single gap for it to escape in.


    It was clear that the Outer God wanted to trap the ship and then crush it with his spatialws.


    But the ship didn''t move at all.


    When Lin Fan''s subordinates saw this, they all couldn''t help panicking.


    They could see that they were trapped by these spatialw walls and knew that it was a matter of time before they were crushed.


    After all, the shots from the cannons hadn''t been able to prate through this spatial wall. They had seen it earlier when the cannons of the ship had concentrated its fire on the Outer God.


    The Outer God had easily blocked it with his spatialw wall.


    So shouldn''t they try to run or at least figure out a way to get out of this situation?


    But to their surprise, they found that Lin Fan didn''t have a worried look at all.


    Lin Fan just had a calm look on his face as if he had already expected this and was prepared.


    Just what was he nning to do?


    Lin Fan calmly controlled the ship to create even more cannons that he aimed at the spatialw walls around them.


    However, instead of firing in all directions, all of the cannons were aimed in one specific spot. It seemed that this ship was concentrating its fire on a single spot to make it even stronger.


    That was right, up until now, the ship had only fired in all directions and had never concentrated its attacks.


    It had been able to demonstrate that kind of power while scattering its power like that.


    So if the ship were to concentrate fire in a single spot, just how strong would that be?


    It should be enough to break this spatialw wall, right?


    When the Outer God saw this, he realized what they were nning to do right away and he couldn''t help knitting his brows. After all, he wasn''t certain if he could block this concentrated fire either.


    It had already been hard for him to block the scattered shots with his spatialw, so if these shots were concentrated¡­would he be able to stop them?


    So the only thing that the Outer God could do now was¡­


    "I won''t let you!"


    The Outer God shouted before waving his hand.


    The moment that he waved his hand, there were more cracks that appeared in space. These cracks came closer and closer to the ship as if it was about to crush it.


    Lin Fan''s subordinates all revealed looks of shock and fear seeing this, but Lin Fan still had a calm look on his face.


    All of a sudden, all of the cannons stopped gathering energy and went silent.


    Instead, the barrier was released in all its glory to block the spatialw walls.


    When the spatial walls mmed into the barrier, there was a moment of silence before the Outer God suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood.


    After the Outer God spat out this mouthful of blood, the spatialw walls that he had used to surround the ship suddenly copsed.


    The cracks in space disappeared in a cascade, shattering until there wasn''t a single thing left.


    If one looked closely, they could see that the fragmented energy was flowing as if it was being absorbed by something before it disappeared.


    But no one had time to pay attention to that as their attention was on the Outer God.


    The Outer God fell to his knees after suddenly spitting out that mouthful of blood. He looked up at the ship in front of him in shock as he asked, "How? How is this possible?"


    The Outers all looked at the Outer God in shock and confusion as not a single one of them could understand what had just happened.


    One second, it was clear that the Outer God had the advantage, but then the next, the Outer God suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood and fell to his knees.


    They just couldn''t understand how the situation had changed this quickly!


    There were a few Outers that wanted to help the Outer God up, but he waved his hand at them to stay away.


    That was because the fight wasn''t even close to being over yet.


    There were countless bubbles that suddenly appeared.


    It was just like what Major General Briggs had faced before. In an instant, he waspletely surrounded by all of these bubbles ofw.


    The Outer God suddenly revealed a bitter smile as he said, "Are the gods of your universe really such cowards? All of you have to gang up on me like this to take me out? It seems like an honour, but I''m embarrassed for you!"


    He had shouted this out loud, but there was no reaction that followed. This just made the expression on the Outer God''s face even uglier.


    He had hoped that he would be able to bait out a few of the enemies to take them out, but it seemed that none of them were taking the bait.


    But that was his problem since he was under the misconception that there were many enemies.


    In truth, there was just Lin Fan alone.


    When Ang and the others saw this, they couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    They had known about this ability since Lin Fan had tested it in front of them, but they never thought that he already had this much control over it.


    They couldn''t help worrying that¡­Lin Fan had already been taken over by the finger bone.


    But Lin Fan ignored all of that as he was focused on taking down the Outer God.


    The Outer God didn''t move an inch when he was surrounded by all of these bubbles ofws.


    However it wasn''t as if there wasn''t a single thing that he could do.


    He was the God of Spatial Laws and there was one thing that spatialws was known for.


    Teleportation.


    Since he knew that this was a bad situation for him and there wasn''t a way out for everyone, he was nning to abandon his subordinates to their fate.


    In his mind, as long as he was able to escape, he didn''t care what happened to his subordinates.


    So there were cracks in space that started forming around him.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had already expected this once he found out that he was the God of Spatial Laws.


    As soon as the cracks formed, there were several bubbles that suddenly came forward.


    The Outer God didn''t dare teleport when the bubbles came right at him, so he was nning on using the spatialws to form walls around him to stall for time.


    As long as he was able to buy himself some time, he would be able to use his spatialws to escape this ce.


    But his spatialw walls weren''t able to do a thing against these bubbles.


    The moment that they touched the bubbles, there was something that drained the energy out of his spatialw walls.


    So in the end, the spatialw walls were torn apart by the bubbles that touched them.


    The Outer God had no choice but to throw out as many walls as he could to protect himself, but he still found that these bubbles were pushing right through his spatialw walls.


    It was almost as if there was nothing that could stop these bubbles.


    The Outer God gritted his teeth and finally came to a decision.


    Even if it was risky, he wouldn''t waste any time and directly use his spatialws to teleport.


    While he didn''t know where that would put him, he knew that it was better than the current situation that he was in.


    So he gathered his spatialws and prepared to teleport.


    It was just that¡­there was a sudden beam of light that hit him in the chest.


    The Outer God looked down at this beam of light in shock, as if he couldn''t believe what had happened. At the same time, he couldn''t help thinking just where it came from and how it had hit him without him noticing¡­


    But the moment that this beam of light hit him, he could feel his powers being drained away.


    He wanted to gather his powers to block this, but he found that he couldn''t even gather his life energy.


    So he could only watch as his powers were drained away.


    Lin Fan had teleported out of the ship and onto the hull of the ship at some unknown time.


    He was still touching the ship with his feet, so he was still able to control it to a certain extent. It wasn''t as great as when he was sitting in the control room controlling it, but he still had control over this ship.


    His finger was pointed right at the Outer God and the same beam that he shot at the other Outer God wasing from it.


    He could feel the neww flowing from the finger into him and it strengthened one of the statues in his dantian.


    This was the statue that represented the spatialw of the Outer universe.


    But after the statue fully formed, he could feel that there was something different about this.


    There was a resonance that came from this statue that seemed to be with the other spatialw statue in his dantian. This was the spatialw of his universe.


    After that happened for a bit, the two statues suddenly copsed.


    The fragments of these statues floated together before forming a new strange looking statue.


    But the power that came from it was much stronger than anything that he had felt before.

 Chapter 1167 Invasion

    ?


    After the statue had finished condensing, Lin Fan could feel the new power that wasing from it.


    He raised his hand and slowly waved his hand as if he was testing something.


    Then he suddenly turned his eyes to the Outer God.


    The Outer God had fallen to his knees after being hit with the beam of light from Lin Fan''s finger.


    He felt like all of his power had been drained and he wasn''t able to move a single finger, but he had been forcing himself to regain his energy. After all, he knew that he was in a very dangerous situation and if he didn''t get himself out of this ce, there was no doubt that he would die.


    He couldn''t let himself die in a ce like this, so he did all that he could to try and escape.


    It was just too bad¡­that hisws had been taken from him.


    In his dantian where there should have been a world that was filled withws, the world was now barren.


    The world that had once been filled with spatialws was almostpletely empty now.


    So the Outer God wasn''t able to use the same power as before.


    He felt like he had been turned back into a normal human.


    When the Outers around him saw that he wasn''t moving at all, they couldn''t help calling out for him to do something.


    "Lieutenant General Raven, please respond!"


    "Lieutenant General, please do something about this enemy!"


    "Lieutenant General, please escape while you can!"


    There were some that wanted him to protect them and there were some loyal soldiers that wanted to let him escape.


    It was just too bad that Lin Fan had no intentions of letting that happen.


    Since they had chosen to invade his universe, then he would let them stay here forever as corpses.


    Lin Fan waved his hand and there were cracks that formed in space.


    When the Outers saw this, they all revealed shocked looks.


    That was because these were the same cracks that had formed when Lieutenant General Raven had used his powers earlier.


    How had this human from this other universe used the same power as their Lieutenant General?


    This didn''t make sense at all.


    But the reaction of the Lieutenant General was even stronger than the reactions of the Outers because he was more familiar with these cracks in space.


    Unlike those that used the weapons that were made from his power, he couldn''t be more familiar with his own power.


    Plus, he could feel the empty feeling that was inside of his dantian.


    He didn''t know how this human from this universe had done it, but he had stolen his power. He had used that beam of light to drain him of his power and make it his own.


    Now he was even using that power that he stole against them.


    The Outer God weakly opened his mouth and said, "How? How did you do it?"


    It was more of a mutter than loudly asking this like the Outer God had wanted.


    Whether it was Lin Fan not caring about what the Outer God said or whether it was him simply not hearing it, Lin Fan didn''t respond after the Outer God said this.


    Instead, he just flipped his hand around and then clenched it into a fist.


    The moment that his hand clenched, the cracks in space suddenly became much more solid. They had formed walls of spatialws all around the Outers that had gathered around the Outer God.


    The Outers were confused when they saw this and didn''t understand what was happening, but it wasn''t the same for this Outer God.


    The moment that he saw that he was surrounded by these spatialw walls, he could already guess what Lin Fan was nning to do.


    He immediately opened his mouth to say as loudly as he could, "Don''t do¡­"


    Before he could finish, the spatialw walls had already pressed in on them.


    There were some that weren''t able to react in time and they were the lucky ones. They weren''t able to put up any defenses and were instantly crushed by the spatialw walls that came from around them.


    They were ttened like pancakes the moment that his spatialw walls pressed in on them, creating a mass of flesh and blood.


    The ones that were able to react in time created walls of spatialws around them that stopped the other spatialw walls that were about to crush them.


    When they saw this, they all turned to the Outer God to say, "Lieutenant General, please stop this! We are on the same¡­"


    Before most of them could finish their sentences, they all revealed shocked looks as they stared at where the Outer God had been.


    That was because the Outer God¡­had already been ttened into a pancake.


    The Outer God had already lost hisws and most of his energy, so he wasn''t able to resist even if he had wanted to resist.


    All he could do was allow those spatialws to crush him without any resistance.


    When they saw this, their morale waspletely crushed.


    There were some that just released their spatialws and allowed themselves to be crushed when they were ovee with despair.


    But there were some that still held firm.


    Since they knew that the Lieutenant General wouldn''t be able to save them, they decided to take another route.


    Since they knew that there was no chance at all of escaping, they could only count on the enemy sparing them.


    As for how they would get the enemy to spare them¡­


    "Wait, don''t kill me! I have important information for you!"


    "As long as you let me live, I''ll tell you everything that I know about my universe!"


    "Spare me and I''ll serve you as my master! I''ll even lead you when you invade my universe!"


    They were begging Lin Fan to spare them by using anything and everything that they had at their disposal.


    At this point, it didn''t matter if they had to betray their own universe as long as they were able to survive.


    For trained soldiers to act this way, it could be seen how much despair they were feeling.


    But in the end, none of this mattered.


    Lin Fan didn''t even react as he heard all of this.


    He just simply looked at them with apathetic eyes that sent chills running down all of their spines. Even though they were only seeing it through the monitors of their helmets, they could feel the despair that those eyes caused in them.


    It was as if he didn''t care about their lives at all.


    To prove that, Lin Fan just simply clenched his hand a bit harder.


    The ones that had survived found that there were cracks forming in their spatialw walls as the pressure around them became stronger. It was as if the power of the spatialw walls crushing them was growing.


    Lin Fan had to take some time to adjust and now that he did, he could exert power far beyond what he was using before.


    After all, he had stolen God Realmws and thews that the Outers were using were in the Ruler Realm.


    This shouldn''t have been a contest in the first ce.


    With this single clench, all of the remaining Outers were crushed and killed.


    Once the Outers were gone, there were only the Beast Race troops left.


    Lin Fan didn''t personally take them on as he used the ship to fire at them again.


    The Beast Race troops weren''t able to do a single thing as these beams of light fell down on them.


    Lin Fan teleported back into the ship and sat down again, leaving everything to the ship as he looked at his hands. It was as if he was trying to figure out something new that he had just obtained.


    Ang and the others looked at Lin Fan withplicated looks.


    After all, the power that he had shown just now was far beyond anything that they had seen before.


    The looks in their eyes made it clear that they were worried that Lin Fan had already been possessed.


    After looking at his hands for a bit, Lin Fan looked up to see them looking at him this way.


    He gave a sigh before saying with a bitter smile, "I''m still me. I can still control my body."


    They looked at him with doubt after hearing this, but no one pushed this matter further.


    While they weren''t able to confirm this, they wanted to believe that he was telling them the truth.


    So if they did push it further, they might get an answer that they didn''t want to get.


    For now, they would just leave things as they were.


    Seeing this look on their faces, Lin Fan didn''t say anything else about this.


    Instead, he said, "I want to go to a ce with all of you."


    They all revealed confused looks when they heard this.


    ¡­


    This was a city that was filled with all kinds of modern buildings, a city that one could find anywhere.


    But in the center of this city, there was arge building that seemed like it was the headquarters for something.


    There were currently four young people that were walking in.


    All four of them were wearing military uniforms.


    When they walked in, they entered a lobby that was filled with people in military uniforms.


    But these four attracted quite a bit of attention because of how handsome and beautiful they were.

 Chapter 1168 Central Command

    There were many people that didn''t recognize these four and they couldn''t help finding it strange.


    With how beautiful and handsome they were, it was strange that they couldn''t remember them.


    After all, the appearances that they had really were hard to forget.


    In the end, there were some people that had wanted to approach these four¡­but they were stopped when they saw the badges that were on their chests.


    These badges were an indication of rank and the badges that these four were wearing showed that they were all majors.


    The rank of major was not a low one and it signified that they were in the special unit. This was the unit that had been chosen to pilot those special armour suits, so they were very powerful.


    They were not people that could be approached that easily.


    With this, the four of them were able to make their way through this building without many people bothering them.


    Normally, there would be far more people with the same rank or higher rank as them here, but most of those people were currently deployed in the other universe. So there was no one here to stop them even if someone wanted to stop them.


    This group made their way deeper into the headquarters and they eventually reached the archives.


    The person who was in charge of the archives was surprised to see them, but he was easily convinced to let them in after seeing their military IDs and badges.


    The four of them made their way into the archives and started going through the information that was there.


    The person who was in charge of the archives couldn''t help looking at them with a strange look as they looked through these things.


    It wasn''t because the information that they were looking for was ssified, but rather because it was information that could be obtained anywhere.


    This was information that could be obtained freely in their military state, so it wasn''t as if it was anything dangerous. It was just that he couldn''t understand why they woulde all this way just for this information.


    The only reason that this person in charge of the archives could think of was that they needed this information for some kind of special mission.


    However, this information was just about the founding of their military state and nothing else.


    There wasn''t anything that was special about this information that could be used in any missions, whether they were special missions or normal missions.


    Just what were they using this information for?


    That person didn''t bother them in the end since they had already verified their identities.


    These identities had been registered in the system and even the fingerprint technology was a match.


    With all of these checks, it would be impossible for them to fake their identity.


    That was just how advanced the technology of their military state was.


    In the end, that person in charge of the archives just left them alone.


    This group of four went over the material in front of them for a while before¡­two of them almost seemed like they were about to fall asleep.


    It was the two women who had gotten bored of reading all of these things.


    The two men were still reading these books that had been brought without any problems.


    But seeing that the two of them were about to fall asleep, they stood up with bitter smiles on their faces. One of them said, "Let''s go and get something to eat."


    As soon as they heard that they were going to eat, the two women immediately stood up with excited looks and followed them out.


    Once they left the military headquarters, they went over to a small cafe by the side of the road.


    The two women just happily ordered dishes while the men looked on with bitter smiles.


    One of them pulled out a wallet before looking at how deted it was.


    Would it be enough to feed them?


    In the end, the two women seemed to hold back a bit as they made their order.


    When the waiter brought over their food and left, there was some kind of barrier that suddenly appeared around them. It was as if all of the sound in the surrounding area was blocked off from them.


    At the same time, it was as if nothing they said was transmitted out.


    With a sigh, the man who had taken out the wallet said, "If we keep going like this, we''ll run out of money in just a few days."


    The two women revealed displeased looks before one of them said, "If you just use that money, we wouldn''t have a problem."


    The man said with a bitter smile, "The moment that we use it, they will immediately start tracking us and the jig will be up."


    These four that were sitting in this cafe were Lin Fan, Ang, Yuki, and Momonga.


    Using the power of the system, they had passed over to the Outer universe.


    Then with the power of the illusionw that Lin Fan had gotten from one of his pets, he was able to fake their identities with military IDs that they had gotten from the Outers that he had captured.


    But they were now facing arge problem even though they had smoothly made their way into the Outer universe.


    Money.


    They didn''t have enough money to buy the things that they needed in this Outer universe.


    Most of the Outers that they had killed or captured were high ranking Outers and they all had bank ounts in this world. They didn''t carry around cash with them and only ess cards for their bank ounts.


    So they didn''t have any money that they could use aftering to this world.


    Ang was suggesting that they use the bank ounts of these Outers since they had the ess cards, but Lin Fan rejected this.


    He knew that bank ounts were much more connected than one would think.


    As soon as they touched the money in those ounts, warning signs would appear and it would only be a matter of time they would be exposed.


    After all, those ounts were connected to the family members of those deceased Outers.


    The moment that those family members were involved, they would be exposed.


    So Lin Fan was strongly against this.


    Before they ran out of money to maintain a proper and not suspicious lifestyle, they would need to find what they were looking for.


    When they had been in the archives, they had been learning what they could about this universe.


    It turned out that this universe had developed under a military regime, which was why almost everyone in this universe had military ranks.


    There weren''t any things like demon beasts in this world, so humans had been the only force in this world.


    It took a single dictator to unite all of them under a military regime and allowed humans to expand out into the universe. This was the military state of Amestris.


    Now several generationster, they were still ruled by a single person known as the Fuhrer who was the head of the military, but it was no longer a dictatorship. Instead, the Fuhrer was chosen by the council of highest military officials and only ruled for a certain period.


    It was a strange form of military democracy.


    But the most surprising thing was that most of the people in this world weren''t able to cultivate. They were able to use body refinement techniques to make themselves stronger, but they didn''t cultivate life energy.


    It was only the ones at the top that had these things known as special powers, but Lin Fan knew that these were the God Realm Experts of this universe who could use the power ofws.


    It seemed that the high ranking military officials had kept the secret of cultivation hidden amongst themselves to ensure that they would be able to keep their positions. They had spread the body refinement techniques so that they could have powerful soldiers under their control.


    Those that weren''t able to cultivate fought with technology.


    Humans in this world had created amazing technology to make up for the fact that they didn''t have cultivation.


    This gave them ships that could travel all over the universe in an instant and many different amazing technologies that Lin Fan didn''t have in either of the universes that he had been in before.


    But learning this made him realize just how hard it was for him to aplish his goal.


    Right now, what he needed to decide was whether to find a way to earn more money or quickly find a way to find what they were looking for.


    Ang said in the end, "Since we can''t do anything, we should just break into their main facilities and find what we''re looking for."


    Lin Fan revealed a bitter smile when he heard this.


    Break into their main facilities?


    There were God Realm Experts in this ce and they were all alone.


    Lin Fan could fight one or two God Realm Experts with the power that he obtained, but this was the enemy territory and there were more than just one or two God Realm Experts.


    So breaking in was the worst idea possible.


    However, Momonga said, "That''s not a bad idea."


    Lin Fan couldn''t help looking at him with a shocked look when he said this.


    Momonga said with a smile, "While I was reading through those books, I noticed a few things that I thought we could explore. I would need to verify a few more things, but I think it could work."


    Since it was Momonga who said this, Lin Fan trusted him since he knew that he was more intelligent than him.

 Chapter 1169 Hidden depths (1)

    Chapter 1169 Hidden depths (1)


    After they finished lunch, they headed back to the headquarters.


    With the rank badges that they had, no one dared to stop them as they headed back to the archives.


    After arriving at the archives, the person that they had met before was still there.


    That person wasn''t surprised to see them and helped them obtain the books that they asked for.


    But this person couldn''t help revealing an even stranger look.


    That was because the books that they requested became even stranger.


    "1001 ways to cook aliens."


    "My alien wife and me."


    "The time that I got lost in the universe."


    These were random books that had been ced in the archive for historical preservation reasons. These were books that had been famous in the past when they had just started roaming outer space.


    Nowadays, these books were considered garbage because of all the things that they knew.


    The books that they had requested before rted to the history of their military state, he could at least imagine that they could be used for some kind of special mission. But these books¡­they didn''t make any sense at all.


    Why would they suddenly request these nonsense books?


    Still, it wasn''t his job to ask why they were looking at these things.


    It was his job to bring these books to the people authorized to read them.


    It didn''t take long for this person to bring them the books before heading back to his desk.


    Of course, he also couldn''t hold back his curiosity as he kept peeking at them from time to time.


    All he saw in the end was just them seriously reading these books even though they were nonsense.


    Or at least that was what he saw because of the illusionw that Lin Fan used.


    Momonga had already confirmed that they were able to use the illusionw to trick them, so he was having Lin Fan use it in a different way.


    The books that they were reading seemed to be the ones that they had requested, but Lin Fan had swapped them out while that person was getting them. Though it seemed like he had been waiting at the counter the entire time, he had actually gone into the archives with this person and swapped out books that he thought would be helpful.


    Right now, they were just going through those books.


    After reading for a long while, Momonga finally put down the books and rubbed his eyes.


    When Lin Fan saw this, he turned to look at him with an expectant look.


    As for the two girls, he just ignored them since they seemed like they were about to fall asleep again.


    Momonga finished rubbing his eyes and said, "I''ve found something, but it''ll be hard to get to it."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he also looked like he had already expected this.


    If it was easy to get, it wouldn''t have been that hard for them to find a direction to go in.


    Momonga gave a sigh before saying, "We''ll have to go to that ce after all. It seems like that''s the only way for us to reach this thing that I''ve found."


    Lin Fan knitted his brows even more when he heard this.


    The ''ce'' that he was referring to was the dorm for members of the special elite unit like them.


    This was the special elite unit that had the right to use the power suits, the ones that had been sent in to invade their universe.


    But since they were the elites of the military, naturally they were in a ce that was much more restricted than this.


    That was where they would be hiding the secrets that they didn''t want other people knowing about.


    So going there and infiltrating was the best move for them.


    However, the payoff was that this ce would be much more strictly surveilledpared to the rest of the headquarters.


    So if they were going there, it was likely that they might be exposed¡­


    That was the risk and reward that came with this¡­now it was time to decide what they would do.


    Lin Fan considered it and he decided to go with Momonga''s n in the end.


    Momonga had found something worthy of following up on, or he wouldn''t have mentioned it.


    So the least he could do was trust him.


    At the same time, it was better than what they were doing where they were just wandering around doing nothing right now.


    So aftering to this decision, they headed off together.


    With their rank badges, it was easy for them to arrive at the dorms.


    When they arrived, they were surprised how empty it was¡­until they realized why this was the case.


    Most of the ones that had lived in this ce had been sent to invade their universe and that was why they weren''t here right now.


    Of course, they wouldn''t have sympathy for these people since they volunteered for this in the first ce.


    After arriving in this ce, they immediately started looking for ces that seemed suspicious.


    They used the illusionw to cover themselves while they searched this ce.


    They didn''t know what would appear, so it was better safe than sorry.


    But in the end, they weren''t able to find a single thing.


    There was nothing special about this ce, it seemed like it was nothing more than a normal militaryplex which they had seen plenty of back in the Lin Astral Empire.


    So once again, they were stuck in a dead end¡­


    Or that was until they learned about a certain ce.


    "What did you alle back for? Didn''t you all get sent for deployment?"


    This was one of the colonels that had been here for some reason that had found them. This colonel seemed to know the identities that they were using which was a very bad thing for them.


    When they didn''t answer, the colonel pulled up some kind of tablet that he used to check something.


    After a while, he said in an understanding voice, "Ah, it seems that there was a withdrawal that was called¡­" Then he looked at them with sharp eyes as he said, "So you were called back to be re-educated."


    Lin Fan''s group was confused when they heard this, but they didn''t say a thing as they waited for the colonel to make a mistake.


    The colonel saw that they weren''t talking and mistaken it as them trying to keep silent.


    So the colonel said in a sharp voice, "That''s it, I''m taking you there myself then."


    He grabbed Lin Fan''s hand, or rather he grabbed the hand of illusion Lin Fan and led him away.


    Seeing the illusion him being pulled away, Lin Fan''s group had no choice but to follow this colonel.


    They arrived at thisrge set of doors that opened after the colonel showed his badge and then the colonel pushed all of them¡­or rather the illusion versions of them in there.


    Once they were all pushed in, he shouted, "Now, properly receive your punishment and stop trying to y hooky!"


    But after he said this, he let out a sigh of relief before muttering under his breath, "Luckily I found them and could fool them¡­If they knew what I was doing, who knows what would have happened."


    The colonel seemed like he was hiding something, but that wasn''t their concern at all.


    After he had finished shoving them in that room and pressing a button, the colonel quickly ran off to do his own thing.


    They had debated whether to follow the colonel, but they suddenly realized something much more important.


    From the room where the illusion versions of them had been shoved, they could feel some kind of strangewing from it.


    They didn''t know what thisw was, but they could feel the power of it.


    This was aw in the God Realm.


    A room that had a God Realmw filling it when a button was pressed¡­no matter how one looked at it, this was a very suspicious ce.


    It was clear that they should start their investigation in this ce.


    But they had no idea what they would even find.


    The room continued to run for a long time and during this time, they searched around the room to see if they could find the source of that God Realmw. However, they weren''t able to find it no matter how they looked.


    It seemed that wherever this God Realmw wasing from, it wasing from inside of the room.


    So the only thing that they could do was wait for this room to finish whatever it was doing before heading in to investigate.


    This room continued for around an hour before finally opening its doors again.


    Once it was open, they split up into two groups.


    One that would watch outside to make sure that no one disturbed them while the other would check the inside of the room.


    As they checked the room, they found that there were still traces of that strangew that was in the air.


    So Lin Fan didn''t hesitate to raise his hand with a ck hole in it to absorb thew that was around them.


    But when he did, he couldn''t help slightly knitting his brows as if he realized something.


    He looked around the room until he looked at a certain part of the ceiling.


    He raised his hand up towards that part of the ceiling and then revealed a look like he had found something.

 Chapter 1170 Hidden depths (2)

    Chapter 1170 Hidden depths (2)


    Lin Fan used hisws to float up to the ceiling of this room.


    This room was quite spacious, so the ceiling was quite far up above him.


    When he reached it, he used his spiritual sense to check this part of the roof before suddenly grabbing a part of the roof.


    With his strength, it was easy for him to pull the roof tile out and reveal what was hidden inside.


    When it was pulled away, there was a tube that appeared.


    This tube didn''t seem like anything special, but when it was revealed, Momonga knitted his brows.


    That was because he could feel the God Realmwsing from it.


    He didn''t know what thesews were, but he could feel it even influencing him.


    When the God Realmws came over him, it was almost as if it was inhibiting his mind and slowly putting him to sleep.


    He might have sumbed to this God Realmw if it wasn''t for Lin Fan suddenly raising his hand with a ck hole in it. The ck hole in his hand drained the God Realmw away from Momonga and he slowly felt his braining back.


    Taking a deep breath, Momonga said, "Thanks."


    Lin Fan gave a nod before turning his attention to the pipe.


    As he did, he made sure to raise his hand with the ck hole in it up so that he could absorb this God Realmw, making sure that it wouldn''t affect him as he was looking into this pipe.


    After looking for a while, he was certain that he wouldn''t be able to get anything more out of this and decided on what to do next.


    The first thing that he did was call Ang and Yuki into the room since there was no need for them to stand guard outside anymore.


    Once they came in, he showed them the pipe and both of them knitted their brows as well before turning to look at him, as if waiting to hear what n he had.


    Lin Fan looked at them and simply said, "We follow it."


    All three of them couldn''t help being caught off guard when they heard this, but after thinking about it, they realized that he was right.


    This was the only thing that they could do right now since this was the only lead that they had.


    So they slowly gave nods to show that they agreed with Lin Fan''s n.


    The one that would be leading the way into the pipe would be Lin Fan since they needed him to clear the God Realmws that kepting out of this pipe. If they didn''t have him clearing this out for them, there was no way that they would be able tost under this continuous release of God Realmws.


    So Lin Fan went into the pipe first with ayer of voidws around him.


    He made sure that thisyer of voidws stretched out behind him so that it would also protect the others when they entered the pipe.


    After that, the rest of them entered the pipe behind Lin Fan and they started moving forward.


    With their level of cultivation, it was an easy matter to move through the pipe.


    They didn''t even need to crawl through it like others would, they could just use their life energy to float themselves through this pipe.


    The pipe was actually quite long and it took them quite a while to reach the end, but when they did, they found that there was a vent blocking their path forward.


    Luckily, they could still see through the vent since the holes of the vent were big enough.


    As they peeked through, they were surprised to find that this room wasn''t what they thought it would be.


    This was a room with arge vat of water in the center that had some kind of crystal inside of it.


    When they looked at this crystal, they could feel that the power of the God Realmw wasing from that crystal.


    It seemed that whatever this crystal was, it was concentrating the power of the God Realmw.


    The more that they looked at it, the more that they had a bad feeling.


    Could it be that this thing¡­was the form of purew?


    Could it be that they had extracted thew from whoever this belonged to and left it here to continuously radiate thatw?


    They couldn''t help feeling strange feelings when they saw this, but they knew that this would be their fate as well if they lost this universal war.


    That was most likely how each universe stolews from each other.


    They couldn''t figure out what this God Realmw was, but this meant that this universe they were currently in was quite dangerous.


    After all, they had already defeated another universe and taken theirws.


    That meant that they had experience with universal war¡­


    That meant that they had God Realm Experts that were strong enough to defeat the God Realm Experts of other universes.


    That was a bad sign for Lin Fan especially since he wasn''t sure that he was that strong.


    He might have been able to defeat the ones that had invaded their universe, but that was because they weren''t that strong in the first ce.


    If they were strong, he definitely wouldn''t have been able to win with the power of the finger bone alone.


    And now that they had infiltrated into the depths of this universe, they were in even more danger.


    If they were found and surrounded by those powerful God Realm Experts, Lin Fan wasn''t certain that they would be able to escape even with the system. The system was made by the strongest God Realm Experts in their universe, but he had no idea how they would match up against the God Realm Experts of this universe.


    He wasn''t looking forward to testing that.


    He was nning on leaving as soon as they found anything helpful.


    As he looked at the crystal in the center of the room, he was debating whether to absorb it with his voidw or not.


    If he did, then he would gain its power and it would make him stronger. But the moment that he did¡­he was certain that they would be revealed and caught.


    So it wasn''t worth it to absorb this crystal.


    They opened the vent easily and dropped into this room with the crystal.


    After entering that room, they were surprised to find that this room was covered in different vents.


    They were certain that all of these vents led to different parts of this headquarters building.


    But what was the point of venting thisw to all those different ces?


    After thinking about it, Momonga said, "Could it be that this is how they are controlling their people?"


    They all couldn''t help looking at him with a confused look when they heard this.


    Momonga exined the sensation that he felt when he had been hit with the God Realmw earlier.


    When Lin Fan released the voidw and they felt the influence of the God Realmw, they understood what Momonga was implying.


    They were using this God Realmw crystal to null the senses of everyone in this ce.


    At the same time, there were rooms where concentrated amounts of thisw would be pumped in so that they could change the personalities of those that they didn''t like.


    They were basically controlling people through this God Realmw crystal by mind controlling them.


    This really went to show just how ruthless this ce was¡­


    In the end, Lin Fan said, "We shouldn''t stay here long or we''ll be caught. Let''s go and see if we can find anything. If we can''t, we''ll leave and head back to our universe right away."


    The other three nodded in agreement.


    Just this alone was already enough for their first time here.


    If they kept pushing it, it would only be a matter of time before they were caught.


    So they shouldn''t push their luck and get out of this ce as soon as possible.


    There was only a single door that led out of this room which showed how secure this ce was. Once they left this room, they would almost certainly be in a location that was very high security.


    So they had to be prepared to escape at any time.


    As for how they would open the door¡­


    Lin Fan had wanted to use their own badges first, but Momonga shook his head to show that he was against this idea.


    He was no longer the same Momonga that didn''t know a thing about human technology.


    Now that he had been with Lin Fan for a while, he had learned quite a bit about technology through the books that he read.


    He said, "The moment that we open this door, we will expose ourselves. Instead of using a wrong ID to give them a warning right away, we should use the highest clearance ID that we have. Then we''ll at least have some time before they realize that something is off."


    I looked at him for a bit with a surprised look, but I slowly gave a nod in the end since what he said made sense.


    I was just surprised that he was able to think of something like this since I had still had the preconceived perception that he wasn''t good with technology.


    So I took out the highest ranking ID that we had, the ID from Lieutenant General Raven.


    After making sure that everyone was ready, I moved the ID towards the sensor.

 Chapter 1171 Hidden depths (3)

    Chapter 1171 Hidden depths (3)


    The moment that the door opened, we didn''t hesitate to move out of the room.


    We came out into a hall that didn''t have anything special about it. It seemed like a hallway that one would find anywhere.


    But the life energy concentration in the air here was much greater than outside.


    Whatever was in this ce, it was clear that it was something important.


    Anything that could increase the life energy in the air like this was definitely something important. At the same time, with this concentration, it was clearly something powerful.


    However, which way should they go?


    They were in the middle of the hallway and there were two different ways for them to go.


    There was nothing different about these two ways, so it wasn''t as if there was anything for them to use as a reference in choosing which way to go.


    Both ways looked and felt simr, so it didn''t seem like there was a way for them to choose other than luck.


    That was until Lin Fan''s hand suddenly came up.


    Or rather¡­Lin Fan''s finger suddenly pointed in one direction.


    All three of them looked at Lin Fan with a surprised and confused look, but then they looked at Lin Fan''s finger with a strange look.


    That was because this was the finger that the finger bone had gone into.


    Though they had strange looks on their faces, Lin Fan had the strangest look on his face because he could feel something from this finger.


    It was as if there was something attracting this finger bone in the direction that he was pointing in.


    But what would be in this universe that would attract the finger bone like this?


    The finger bone was from their universe and came from an unknown being, so it shouldn''t have been rted to this other universe at all. It didn''t make sense that there would be something that would attract it¡­


    Unless this finger bone was from another universe in the first ce¡­


    Or this universe had already invaded theirs before and stolen something from their universe.


    Whatever it was, they were both bad for them.


    Since that was the case, Lin Fan said, "Let''s follow it. There must be a reason for this."


    The three of them looked at him with very strange looks that had traces of worry in them, but they still gave slow nods in the end.


    They also seemed like they were prepared to subdue him at any time, just in case anything happened.


    Lin Fan just revealed a secret bitter smile seeing this, but he didn''t say anything since he knew how it looked. If it was him, he would have thought the same thing as the three of them.


    So just like this, they followed the pull from Lin Fan''s finger down the hallway.


    As they went down the hallway, they were surprised to find that there wasn''t even any surveince equipment in this ce. They had been prepared to use their illusionws, but it seemed that it wasn''t necessary.


    Or at least that was what it seemed like to their eyes.


    If there was some kind of new surveince system that they didn''t know about, it was still better to put up the illusionws just in case.


    So that was what they did.


    But the other thing that they noticed while heading down the hallway was that the concentration of life energy in the air was getting thicker.


    They could feel it with each step that they took.


    So it seemed like wherever this finger bone was leading them, it seemed like it was the right direction.


    However, that still didn''t stop them from looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    All of a sudden, Lin Fan stopped in the middle of the hall.


    When he stopped, all of them raised their guards as if they were prepared for a fight, but¡­there was nothing that appeared in the end. Lin Fan was just standing there in the middle of the hall looking at one of the doors here.


    His finger was still pointing, but this time it was pointing at this door.


    It was as if whatever was attracting the finger was behind this door now.


    But they could see that this door was also different from the other doors that they passed.


    First, this door was much thicker than the other doors.


    It might not seem like it if they just looked at it straight on, but they could sense this when they used their spiritual senses. It was as if whatever was behind this door was important enough to be protected by this thick door.


    It was no wonder the finger bone was pointing at it.


    There was something that was powerful and valuable here.


    So they all turned to look at the sensor for the door.


    It was the same as the other sensors that they had passed, so it should make sense that they would be able to use the same ID as before to open it.


    So Lin Fan pulled out Lieutenant General Raven''s ID and handed it to Momonga while positioning himself in front of the door.


    He did this so that he would bear the brunt of whatever came out.


    The other three knew that while Lin Fan had been the weakest back then, he was now the strongest among them all because of the finger bone.


    So they just left this to him.


    Momonga stood by the door and held the ID up before looking at Lin Fan with a look, almost as if he was asking him if he was ready.


    Lin Fan gave a firm nod in response to this.


    After seeing this, Momonga brought the ID up to the sensor to open the door.


    But instead of the door opening like they had thought it would, there was an rm that suddenly rang out that caught them all off guard.


    This rm spread and soon it was ring all around them.


    With such a loud rm, they were certain that they would be surrounded soon by the God Realm Experts of this universe.


    There was no time for them to do anything, they needed to escape right now if they wanted any hopes of escaping.


    So they all gathered around and prepared to use the system''s teleportation to go back to their own universe.


    That was except for Lin Fan.


    Now that he was here, he could feel the attractioning from his finger getting even stronger.


    It was as if whatever was here very much wanted toe together with this finger bone of his.


    He was also very curious what this finger bone was, so he wanted to find whatever it was that was behind this door.


    Lin Fan just calmly walked right up to the door and pointed his finger at it.


    Seeing this, the other three were caught off guard before they came forward to grab him. They looked like they wanted to drag him back to their universe, even if they had to use force to do so.


    But before they could reach Lin Fan, there was a pressure that suddenly came from him.


    All of them couldn''t help stopping in their tracks as they couldn''t approach him anymore.


    They felt the pressure of a God Realm Expert falling down on them and itpletely forced them away from Lin Fan.


    It was just a good thing that Lin Fan''s target was never them, or else they might have been crushed by this God Realm pressure.


    There was the sound of some kind of metal being cut that rang out before an invisible gust suddenly came from Lin Fan, pushing them back slightly.


    After a moment of silence, there was the sound of something creaking that rang out before the door¡­fell into pieces. Those pieces fell onto the ground with arge ttering sound and the way forward was revealed.


    Looking at the pieces of the door on the ground, they could see that it was even thicker than they had thought. At the same time, they could feel that there was an unusual resistanceing from it.


    It was as if whatever this door was made of, it would be able to resist any kind of life energy thrown at it.


    So how had Lin Fan cut the door?


    Lin Fan didn''t care about any of this as he walked into this room.


    When he walked in, he saw that there wasn''t anything special in this room at all.


    This room waspletely empty except for a single thing.


    Right in the center of the room was a pedestal and above that pedestal was a pillow holding three things.


    The lighting down from the ceiling perfectly shined onto these three things, lighting them up for everyone to see.


    It was another finger bone and what seemed to be two arm bones.


    These two arm bones seemed to be a radius and an ulna, the two bones that made up the forearm.


    The most surprising thing was that these bones¡­were the same golden colour as the finger bone that had entered Lin Fan''s index finger.


    That should be why there was the pull from his finger towards this thing.


    These bones most likely came from the same being, which was why there was an attraction between them.


    Before Lin Fan could do anything else, the three bones that had been on the pedestal suddenly floated up.


    These three bones just floated there in the air for a bit before suddenly flying out.


    As for the direction they were flying in, it was in Lin Fan''s direction.

 Chapter 1172 Hidden depths (4)

    Chapter 1172 Hidden depths (4)


    When these three bones started moving towards Lin Fan, he suddenly remembered what happened thest time that this happened.


    The finger bone in his hand was still a firm reminder of this.


    But at the same time¡­Lin Fan couldn''t help hesitating since it was because of the finger bone that he had been able to get this far.


    If it wasn''t for the finger bone, not to mention the God Realm Experts, he might not even be a match for some of the stronger Outer Rulers.


    So it was the finger bone that had given him the power to do all of this.


    If he could get another finger bone and even two arm bones¡­just how strong would he be?


    There was of course the risk of being taken over by the bones flying at him, but was it a price worth paying?


    There were many things that Lin Fan considered and many things that were racing through his mind.


    So even though the finger bone and the arm bones were moving slowly at him, Lin Fan didn''t dodge out of the way.


    When he wanted to dodge, it was already toote.


    The finger bone and the arm bone suddenly sped up before smashing into his arm.


    There was a ssh of blood that came from his arm, but he didn''t cry out in pain this time since he knew what to expect. He already knew that it would be painful, so he had gritted his teeth and endured the pain.


    But the pieces of bone still fell from his arm along with the blood that spurted out.


    The other three looked at him with very concerned looks, but there was nothing that they had been able to do.


    That was because the moment that the finger bone and arm bones sped up, they had felt a pressuree over them.


    This was pressure even greater than the pressure the paragons of the World of Gods had put on them, so there was nothing that they could do. It was a surprise that they weren''t squashed under the pressure that had fallen on them.


    But the pressure didn''t seem to have any hostility towards them so they weren''t crushed by it.


    Once the finger bone and arm bones entered Lin Fan''s arm, the pressure that had been on them suddenly disappeared.


    They looked at Lin Fan with concerned looks still, but not a single one of them moved towards him.


    It was as if they were cautious of him¡­


    But that was for good reason.


    One finger bone was one thing, but now two finger bones and even two arm bones¡­it wouldn''t be strange if whatever these bones belonged to suddenly took him over.


    So they waited to see how he would react.


    Lin Fan didn''t move for a long time as he closed his eyes.


    It was almost as if he wasmunicating with the bones that had reced the bones in his arms.


    It was almost as if he was integrating those bones as part of him.


    After a long time, Lin Fan finally opened his eyes and said, "I''m fine."


    But even when he said this, they couldn''t help revealing looks of doubt and concern.


    That was because¡­there was a faint golden glow around Lin Fan''s arm and in his eyes.


    This was something that they had never seen before, but they could sense that¡­there was a feeling of oppression that came from this golden glow. It was almost as if whatever this golden glow was, it was ruling over them to a certain extent.


    So they didn''t know how to react to this.


    After a while, the golden glow disappeared from Lin Fan''s eyes and arm and he returned to normal.


    Only then did they finallye over to check him.


    After going around him a few times, they made sure that there wasn''t a problem with him.


    But they were still in a very bad position¡­


    After all, the rms had been ring the entire time all around them.


    They were still in enemy territory and the enemy knew that they were here, so it was only a matter of time before they were surrounded by the enemies.


    The most important thing was getting out of here as soon as possible.


    But¡­it was toote.


    Before they could do anything, there was a pressure that fell on them again.


    The moment that they felt this pressure, they knew that it was all over.


    This pressure¡­was even stronger than the pressure that the Spatial Law God had shown them before.


    Perhaps it was even stronger than the white robed young man¡­


    Maybe the only one that could match this was the master of the store.


    But Lin Fan surprisingly wasn''t pushed down by this pressure.


    Seeing that everyone else was being suppressed by this pressure, Lin Fan raised his hand and created a voidw shield around them that helped them nullify this pressure on them.


    All three of them looked at Lin Fan in shock when they saw this.


    Momonga even said, "How did you¡­"


    But there was no time for him to finish this statement as they could hear the approaching footsteps.


    When they looked at the door, they found three stern looking men standing there.


    The pressure that was on them wasing from just a single one of these men.


    But it was clear that they were all as powerful as the one releasing this pressure.


    As expected of a universe that had already defeated other universes¡­their experts truly were powerful.


    The one in the middle was the one that was dressed in the most decorations, making it clear that he had the highest rank out of the three of them.


    This stern looking man looked at Lin Fan''s group before looking at the pedestal.


    When he saw that the bones were missing from the pedestal, he immediately knitted his brows and released his pressure as well to suppress us.


    But Lin Fan just calmly raised his hand and blocked that pressure.


    The three stern looking men looked at Lin Fan with a strange look before their eyes fell onto his arm.


    Their expressions changed several times before looks of shock appeared on their faces.


    The man with the most decorations looked at Lin Fan with a strange look and asked, "Where are the bones that were in this room?"


    Lin Fan looked into his eyes, but he didn''t answer this question.


    This made all three of them even more agitated as they released more of their pressure to suppress Lin Fan''s group.


    But with Lin Fan there, they couldn''t do a thing to them.


    Finally, the three of them lost their temper and the one that had put their pressure on me first acted.


    That person didn''t hesitate at all to release theirw to attack us, but¡­that didn''t matter since Lin Fan''s voidws absorbed thews that wereing at them. Even though he had no idea what thesews were, the voidws had no problem breaking it down and absorbing it.


    Though it was being absorbed into the new bones in his arm rather than into his dantian.


    "What is this?" The Outer God said as he felt his energy being drained.


    The man with the most decorations knitted his brows after seeing this, but then he said, "We''ll attack together."


    The other two hesitated a bit before nodding in agreement.


    Then all three of them released their attacks at the same time, stacking on each other as they came at Lin Fan.


    But Lin Fan just calmly raised that voidw barrier.


    When thebined attacks of the Outer Gods hit the voidw barrier¡­it had no effect at all as all of the life energy behind their attacks were absorbed.


    They couldn''t do a thing to Lin Fan''s voidw barrier.


    As they stared on in shock, Lin Fan made his move.


    He suddenly flicked his finger and a beam of light shot out at the three Outer Gods.


    All three of them tried to block this attack, but they found¡­that it was no use at all.


    When the beam of light hit the barrier they put up, it drained all of the life energy from their barriers.


    They could feel that it wasn''t just draining the energy from the barriers, but also from them.


    The three of them tried to resist, but they couldn''t resist at all as they were drained of all their energy by this beam of light.


    But before they werepletely drained, Lin Fan cut off the beam of light.


    He suddenly grabbed his hand when he cut it off, almost as if there was too much energy absorbed and he couldn''t contain it all.


    Once he had taken care of these three Outer Gods, he looked at the other three and said, "Let''s go back."


    Ang and the others looked at Lin Fan with a strange look, but they still nodded in agreement in the end.


    The Outer Gods tried to stop them, but they weren''t able to do a thing since they had beenpletely drained.


    The man with the most decorations reached out and said, "Wait! Don''t you dare leave! Give us back our treasure!"


    But Lin Fan just ignored this as he used the system interface to send them back to their own universe.


    However, as they were leaving, there seemed to be something thatpelled him to say, "I''ll see you again soon."


    The three Outer Gods were shocked hearing this, but they couldn''t respond since Lin Fan''s group suddenly disappeared.

 Chapter 1173 Simple explanation

    Chapter 1173 Simple exnation


    When the white light cleared, they were back in their own universe.


    They were standing in the back of the store once again, standing in one of the secret rooms that Lin Fan had prepared for their trip to the other universe.


    This room should have beenpletely empty, but there was someone that was standing there.


    It wasn''t someone that they didn''t recognize¡­but they were surprised to see him here.


    It was the golden version of Lin Fan.


    Lin Fan was the one that was the most shocked since he never thought that he would be able to see this golden version of himself this soon. He had thought that it would take a long time before he would be able toe face to face with this golden version of himself again, but here he was¡­


    The golden version of Lin Fan just stood there looking at them, not saying a word.


    It was almost as if he was waiting for them to speak.


    But Lin Fan and the others didn''t know what to say either.


    For Ang and the others, they knew this golden version of Lin Fan as the owner of the store, the powerful God Realm Expert that was Lin Fan''s master.


    Since he was Lin Fan''s master, it was only right that Lin Fan talked to him¡­but neither of them were saying a thing.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan finally asked in a hostile voice, "What are you doing here?"


    When Ang and the others heard this, they couldn''t help revealing a shocked look.


    They thought that Lin Fan and this God Realm Expert were master and disciple, so they couldn''t help being shocked by how Lin Fan treated this God Realm Expert.


    It almost seemed like they had a bad rtionship rather than a good one¡­


    But this also made them remember how Lin Fan had treated this God Realm Expert previously in the World of Gods.


    He had also spoken to him in the same tone back then¡­but they hadn''t been aware of this since they had encountered too many shocks.


    Could it be that the rtionship between the two of them weren''t as good as they thought?


    If that was the case, who should they support?


    Should they go with Lin Fan who they knew all this time or should they go with the God Realm Expert that was his master.


    After all, it was all because of this God Realm Expert that they had been able toe here in the first ce.


    It was all because of this God Realm Expert that they had been able to reach the World of Gods.


    They really didn''t know what to do¡­


    It was just too bad for them that they were thinking too much over nothing.


    The golden version of Lin Fan revealed a smile when he heard this before turning to look at Lin Fan''s arm.


    This arm that he was looking at, it was the arm that had the golden bones in them.


    As he looked at them, he couldn''t help revealing a strange look that the four of them couldn''t see through.


    It was almost as if he was reminiscing about something¡­


    After standing there with this look on his face for a while, the golden version of Lin Fan finally said, "So you were able to find it and obtain it. It seems like you are slowly moving towards the truth."


    Ang and the others once again revealed confused looks, but this was not because they had heard what the golden version of Lin Fan had said.


    Instead, what they had heard was¡­the same jumbled words that they had heard this golden version of Lin Fan say before.


    This was just like when they had met this golden figure back in the World of Gods.


    But Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    After a silence, he asked, "The truth? What do you mean by that?"


    When he said this, Ang and the others couldn''t help looking at him with the same confused look that they gave this golden version of him.


    That was because¡­Lin Fan''s words had also been jumbled.


    They couldn''t help finding this very confusing and strange.


    One moment, Lin Fan was talking properly and the next¡­he was talking in this jumblednguage.


    They couldn''t help being afraid that the bones were talking over him.


    After all, they were golden bones to begin with.


    They started to wonder if they were the bones of this God Realm Expert to begin with.


    A master using their disciple to revive, that was a verymon thing, wasn''t it?


    So could it be that this ''master'' of Lin Fan''s was using these golden bones to slowly take over his body?


    If that was the case, shouldn''t they remove those golden bones from him as soon as possible?


    But then again, it wasn''t as if they would be able to do anything to those golden bones in the first ce even if they wanted to.


    Those golden bones¡­were far beyond anything that they could match.


    After all, those golden bones were able to control multiplews in the God Realm¡­


    While they were thinking about this, the golden version of Lin Fan shook his head before saying, "You''re still not ready to hear it yet, but you should have some idea because of these bones that you''ve integrated into your body. If you keep traveling this path, one day you''ll learn everything."


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    There was a part of him that wanted to tell off the system and get him to tell him everything, but there was also a part of him that wanted to believe the system. After all, there had to be a reason why the system was going around in circles like this.


    The way that the system spoke, it was almost as if it already knew exactly where these golden bones had been.


    If that was the case, why didn''t the system just directly teleport him to the golden bones instead of making him go through all of that trouble?


    Did that really mean that there was something special about all of this?


    Taking a deep breath, Lin Fan said, "What else do you have for me?"


    The golden version of himself revealed a smile before saying, "There are still other universes that you have to go to."


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this, but when he opened the system interface, he found that there were indeed even more special cultivation realms open to him.


    These were different from the special cultivation realms that were open before because most of these were worlds that he had never even dreamed of before.


    It seemed like there really was a wide universe out there and there were all kinds of different worlds to explore.


    But he really wasn''t in the mood for such a thing because these were ces that the system was sending him.


    There was no doubt that the system would be sending him there for a reason.


    Before the system disappeared, it said, "When the timees, you will save our universe and all the other universes out there."


    I couldn''t help looking at the disappearing shimmers of gold with a strange confused look, but the system didn''t stay around for another second.


    After the golden version of me disappeared, Ang and the others immediately surrounded me.


    With the way that they were looking at me, it was easy to guess that they thought¡­that I had been taken over.


    It took a while to exin what had happened since¡­even when I tried telling them about the system, it didn''t work.


    The second time that I tried, I realized that there was something that was scrambling my words and preventing them from hearing me, so I gave up trying to reach them that way.


    Instead, I just convinced them that the system meant no harm and this was just a test for me.


    Of course, they had to inspect my hand before they could be assured, but it all worked out in the end.


    Before heading off to the new universes, I made sure to check in with the Lin Astral Empire.


    It turned out that all traces of the Outer had disappeared from the battlefield.


    The Beast Race was now fighting alone and facing thebined forces of the humans and experts from the Myriad Races, the Beast Race really wasn''t able to fight back.


    So even without Lin Fan''s help, the Beast Race was being pushed back by the Lin Astral Empire.


    As for why the Outers disappeared¡­


    Lin Fan guessed that it was most likely rted to what he had done in the Outer universe.


    He had put enough threat on them that they withdrew their forces back to their own universe to protect themselves.


    After all, the bones in his arm were most likely the greatest treasures of their universe and he had stolen them away from them.


    Since that was the case, they didn''t dare invade another universe while their own was under threat since they didn''t know where I went.


    That was most likely what changed the situation of the battle.


    Since the Lin Astral Empire could handle things themselves, there was no need for me to worry about them.


    So I was able to put my heart at ease as I chose one of the universes the system presented me with.


    Taking a deep breath, I pressed the button and started the teleportation into that universe.


    If only I knew what I had gotten myself into¡­

 Chapter 1174 Final piece

    Chapter 1174 Final piece


    In the middle of a cave, there was a pedestal with something on it.


    Lin Fan was at the side of the cave, looking at the thing on the pedestal with narrowed eyes.


    After a long silence, he said with a sigh, "This is the final one¡­it''s been a long time."


    As soon as his voice fell, the three behind him all gave sighs.


    They could only agree with him since it had indeed been a long time since they had started this journey.


    They could still remember it as if it were yesterday.


    When they had set out, they had just taken care of the Outers invading their universe and now it had been several yearster.


    They had gone to many different universes during this time thanks to all of the special cultivation realms that the system had prepared for them. They had to slowly grind through each one of those universes, looking for what the system had wanted them to find.


    Each universe''s goal had been the same in the end.


    It was what was currently on the pedestal as well.


    It was a bunch of golden bones.


    During their travels to different universes, Lin Fan''s entire skeleton had been slowly reced by the golden bones.


    There was only a single bone left that hadn''t been reced by the golden bones.


    This was the toe bone that was on this pedestal.


    At first, Ang and the others had been worried about Lin Fan''s bones being reced by these golden bones, but eventually they became used to it. Or it could be said that they had be numb to it.


    Since Lin Fan never changed a bit after having his bones reced by these golden bones, they just assumed that he would never change.


    They assumed that it was safe because it was who they thought was the master of the store, as well as Lin Fan''s master that sent them to retrieve them.


    If that person wanted to hurt Lin Fan or take over his body, there had already been countless chances that he could have taken. If he really wanted to do this, he wouldn''t have taken that long.


    So they just assumed that the way that Lin Fan talked to the master of the store was just his normal way of talking to him.


    After taking a deep breath, Lin Fan suddenly walked forward towards the pedestal in the middle of the cave.


    The other three just watched silently as he did this.


    When he came closer to it, Lin Fan could feel the attraction that wasing from inside of him towards that bone on the pedestal.


    It was as if every bone in his body wanted to bring that golden toe bone into him.


    But then again, every bone in his body had been reced by the golden bones, so it wasn''t strange if it was attracted to that toe bone.


    However, before he could reach it, there was a screech that filled the air.


    When he turned in the direction that this screech came from, he found that there was this strange creature there that released this screech.


    This creature looked human, but it waspletely covered in bones.


    These were bones that didn''t seem human at all, but they had been brought together to form some kind of bone armour around this creature. It seemed like it was wearing the bones of its prey.


    This strange creature immediately released its hostility on Lin Fan after seeing Lin Fan heading towards the pedestal in the center.


    This creature was the owner of this cave and the owner of the toe bone in the center.


    So when it saw Lin Fan heading towards its possession, it naturally showed its hostility towards him.


    But this creature was anything but weak.


    The aura of this creature showed that it was in the God Realm and it wasn''t a weak God Realm Expert.


    Then again, if it was weak, it wouldn''t have been able to im this toe bone or the cave that it currently lived in.


    This cave had an intense concentration of life energy, so strong that only those in the Ruler Realm would be able to move freely.


    If anyone else came in here, they would be crushed by the intensity of the life energy in this cave.


    So this cave was not a simple one.


    Lin Fan didn''t feel pressured at all after the hostility of this creature fell onto him. He just looked at the creature with a rxed look, as if he was waiting to see what this creature would do.


    The creature revealed a very surprised look when it saw this.


    Normally when it released its aura like this, the other side would run away or at least try to appease it.


    But this strange being waspletely rxed when feeling its aura.


    This was the first time that this creature had experienced this.


    This creature made some more strange sounds which Lin Fan didn''t understand, but based on the tone and the context, it was most likely trying to get Lin Fan to move away from the toe bone.


    But¡­Lin Fan didn''t listen to this creature and turned back to face the pedestal.


    Then in front of this creature, he started moving towards the pedestal again.


    The creature revealed an ugly expression when it saw this and it let out an angry screech before suddenly springing out.


    There were different sharp bonences that suddenly appeared in the air around Lin Fan before falling down towards them.


    The pressure that each of these bonences gave off was immense.


    It definitely wasn''t something that Ang and the others could resist.


    But Lin Fan just calmly raised his hand and ck holes appeared around him.


    They appeared in front of all the bonences that appeared.


    When the bonences made contact with the ck holes, they immediately started being absorbed by these ck holes.


    In a matter of a few seconds, the bonences had disappeared without a trace.


    The creature was shocked to see this.


    Lin Fan finally made his way over to the pedestal and the toe bone suddenly reacted.


    It trembled before floating up in the air.


    After floating there for a bit, the toe bone suddenly flew out at Lin Fan like all the other golden bones had done before.


    The creature didn''t know what was happening, but it knew that it couldn''t let this toe bone go with Lin Fan. So the creature was about to make a move until it suddenly felt a strong pressure fall onto it.


    This was a pressure that it had never felt before and it was a pressure that it couldn''t resist.


    The toe bone disappeared with a spurt of blood and some white bone falling to the ground.


    When the creature saw the toe bone disappear like this, it couldn''t help revealing aplicated look.


    This creature had a bone basedw, so it absorbed bones and wore them like this to increase its power.


    It had also tried absorbing that toe bone before, but it hadn''t been able to in the end.


    There was this immense power inside of the toe bone that it hadn''t been able to control.


    If it hadn''t given up, it might have even been killed by the immense power inside of the toe bone.


    So that was why the creature had enshrined it on this pedestal in the first ce.


    It had hoped that it would be able to use this toe bone one day, but before it could¡­this toe bone was being stolen by Lin Fan.


    After thatst toe bone entered him, Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit disappointed. After all, he had expected something big to happen after he obtained thisst piece of the puzzle.


    However, nothing happened in the end.


    Feeling disappointed, Lin Fan turned to face the creature.


    He could see the creature struggling, so he decided to point his hand at the creature.


    Then there was a beam of light that suddenly came out of Lin Fan''s hand and hit the creature in the chest.


    As soon as it did, there was this draining sensation that filled the creature.


    It didn''t take long before the bones that it was wearing fell to the ground revealing its true appearance.


    It was an albino young woman who had pale white skin.


    She would have been considered beautiful if it wasn''t the mud and dirt caked onto her skin and hair.


    But with it, all she looked was messy.


    Lin Fan felt a chill when he saw this naked woman in front of him and he knew who it wasing from.


    So he quickly turned his head away and moved back over to them.


    Since they had aplished their goal, there was no need for them to stay here any longer, so he said, "Shall we go?"


    Ang gave a snort when she heard this, but Momonga just said with a bitter smile, "Let''s head back then."


    With a nod, there was a white sh of light that appeared.


    Even though Lin Fan had already absorbed two sets of spatialws from different universes, he still wasn''t able to see through thews that the system used to teleport them.


    Just where did the spatialw for thise from?


    When the sh of white light disappeared, Lin Fan and the others were back in the store.


    However, they weren''t alone this time.


    There was the golden version of Lin Fan who was standing there, almost as if he was waiting for them toe back.

 Chapter 1175 True enemy

    Chapter 1175 True enemy


    When Lin Fan saw the golden version of himself standing there waiting for him, he just revealed a bitter smile.


    But there was no surprise on his face since he had already expected this to happen.


    This was thest special cultivation realm that they had to go to, so naturally the system would appear once they came back.


    As the two of them stood there, they just stared at each other in silence.


    But for the other three that were also here, they couldn''t help revealing strange expressions.


    That was because for the first time, they were able to see the golden figure clearly.


    Before this, they were never able to make out the true appearance of this golden figure. The only thing that they were able to see was a golden featureless figure.


    So when they were able to see the golden figure''s true appearance for the first time, they couldn''t help being caught off guard. After all, this golden figure¡­was a perfect clone of Lin Fan.


    It was just that he waspletely made of golden light.


    Why would this figure look just like Lin Fan?


    Their expressions couldn''t help changing again as they thought of something.


    Could it be that this God Realm Expert had slowly been taking over Lin Fan and that was why he looked like Lin Fan now?


    If that was the case, could it be that they had been helping with the slow takeover of Lin Fan the entire time?


    As they were thinking about all the worst case scenarios, Lin Fan and the system were in their own world.


    After a long period of silence, Lin Fan finally asked, "Is it time for the truth?"


    The system didn''t answer right away and instead asked, "How do you feel?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this since he never expected the system to suddenly ask him how he felt. But he still slowly answered, "The same as always."


    The system looked at him with narrowed eyes before asking with a sigh, "You really don''t feel any different at all?"


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit confused when the system asked him this.


    Still, he shook his head and said, "I feel the same as always."


    As he looked closely at the system, it was almost as if¡­he could see disappointment on the face of the system.


    But why would the system look disappointed?


    Was something supposed to happen to him?


    He couldn''t help feeling that there was something strange about the golden bones that had integrated into his body.


    After many years, he had actually gotten used to it and didn''t think too much about it.


    In fact, the bones didn''t even feel that different from his own bones. It was almost as if it hadpletely integrated with his body, bing his actual skeleton.


    It wasn''t strange when he didn''t think about it, but it was strange when he did.


    Why did he feel so connected to these bones that should clearly be foreign to his body?


    Why did it feel like they belonged to him?


    Once the first question filled his mind, there was a cascade of questions that followed.


    As for the one that could give him those answers, it was the system standing in front of him.


    This system was the one that had sent him to retrieve all of these bones after all. So if there was anyone who knew what these bones were, it would be the system.


    Lin Fan didn''t wait for the system to say anything as he asked, "What are these bones?"


    The system looked back up at him after he asked this and he looked right at Lin Fan for a bit before giving a sigh.


    He didn''t answer the question right away and instead asked, "Do you know who I am now?"


    Lin Fan was surprised to hear this question from the system, but then he knitted his brows.


    With this frown on his face, he looked right at the system until he finally said, "You''re the one that they all talked about, right? The one that taught them all?"


    The golden version of him slowly gave a nod before saying, "But how did I be like this?"


    Over the years, Lin Fan had learned many different things during his journey.


    Some from the different universes, some from the God Realm Experts that he met, and some from the system himself.


    With all of these different clues, he was able toe to a conclusion, but this was a conclusion that he didn''t want to acknowledge since it was too out there.


    This was a conclusion that seemed crazy if he said it out loud¡­


    But it seemed like that was what the system was trying to tell him.


    "You turned yourself into the system using the various contributions of the other god. You were the system all along." Lin Fan said in a slow voice that almost seemed uncertain of what he was saying.


    But as he said this, the golden version of him revealed a faint smile before giving a nod to confirm this.


    Seeing him confirm this, Lin Fan couldn''t help revealing a surprised and confused look.


    After a long time, Lin Fan asked only a single word, "Why?"


    He didn''t want to know how he had done this, all he wanted to know was why he did it.


    The golden version of him revealed another faint smile before saying, "Because it had to be done."


    Lin Fan felt even more confused when he heard this.


    Had to be done?


    What did that mean?


    Why did this have to be done?


    At the same time, he couldn''t help wondering why he had to be brought to this world after he had died.


    Out of everyone, why did the system choose him?


    Seeing the look on his face, the golden version of him spoke as if he knew what he was thinking, "It''s because it was you that it had to be done."


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this, but he didn''t say anything as he waited for the golden version of him to exin.


    The golden version of him gave a sigh before saying, "It''s a long story, but it has to do with the creation of this universe and my master who taught me everything that I knew."


    "Master?" Lin Fan couldn''t help repeating.


    The golden version of him gave a nod before saying, "Yes, my master."


    With a sigh, the golden version of him told a story.


    But it wasn''t the story that he expected.


    It was the story of how he became the system.


    He had gone to the different God Realm Experts for their help in creating this system. Even he was not someone that was able to use multiplews, so he had obtained the energy of the different God Realm Experts to create this system.


    But before that, he had to teach all of them to be God Realm Experts, which was why they had said that he had taught them how to cultivate.


    Once he had gathered all of this energy, he used his own soul as the core of the system and created the system.


    Then he had found both Lin Fan, binding it to their souls and bringing him to this world.


    Finally, Ang and the others heard the true story of his existence.


    After learning this, they couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look.


    But Lin Fan dispelled it all by saying, "I''m the same me as when you met me. This is the me that you know and nothing else."


    They realized that he was right.


    Everything that happened to him happened before he met them.


    So the ''real'' him that they knew¡­was the current him.


    So in truth, nothing had changed with their rtionship.


    Once he had finished exining how he had be the system, the golden version of him fell silent.


    Lin Fan looked at him and asked in a slow voice, "Then does that mean that you can separate yourself from me and return to the way that you used to be?"


    The golden version of him shook his head before saying, "No, I''m bound to you with my soul. Unless my soul disappears which will cause my death, I will never be able to unbind from you. This system will always live to serve you."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a strange look as he asked, "But why? Why did you do all of this?"


    The golden version of him took a deep breath before saying, "Like I said, it was because of my master."


    Lin Fan just looked at him with the same strange look as before, waiting for him to exin.


    The golden version of him finally took a sigh and said, "It''s to take down your true enemy, the one that ruined this world."


    Lin Fan just looked even more confused when he heard this, not knowing what to say in response to this.


    But the golden version of him continued by saying, "This is the enemy that caused the death of my master, your previous reincarnation."


    "Huh?"


    A look of absolute shock appeared on Lin Fan''s face after he heard this as he didn''t know how to react to this at all.


    Previous reincarnation?


    Did that mean that he used to be the master of the system?


    The golden version of him revealed a bitter look before saying, "The true enemy that you face is the Chaos, it was the one that imposed this system of cultivation on this world."

 Chapter 1176 Integration

    Chapter 1176 Integration


    "Chaos?" Lin Fan couldn''t help repeating after hearing this.


    The golden version of him gave a nod before saying, "Chaos was a being that came from the void that suddenly invaded this world. My master was recovering from creating one of the many universes in our world when Chaos attacked. In his weakened state, my master wasn''t able to fight back and was defeated by Chaos."


    His voice trailed off as he said this and a trace of sadness filled his voice.


    But then he said, "In his final moments, my master made sure to scatter his souls throughout the universes he created. As long as the fragments of his soul existed, he would one day reincarnate, which was where we are now."


    He looked at me and said, "I knew that you were the reincarnation of my master since the system bound itself to you. The system is made from my soul, so it has a karmic tie with my master and will seek out my master''s reincarnation."


    Lin Fan looked at the golden version of himself with a doubtful look when he heard this, but then he said with a sigh, "So what am I supposed to do now?"


    At this point, the story that the system had told him was just so out there that he had no choice but to ept it at this point.


    It didn''t seem like something that the system would make up, not to mention that the system¡­was most likely still stronger than him.


    So it didn''t matter if he believed it or not.


    The golden version of him nodded before knitting his brows and revealing a conflicted look.


    He opened and closed his mouth a few times before falling silent again, as if he was struggling to say something.


    It was almost as if there was something that he couldn''t say.


    So Lin Fan couldn''t take it anymore and said, "What''s wrong? Is there something wrong with me?"


    He thought that because the golden version of himself kept looking at him with a strange look.


    It was almost as if he had noticed something off about his body.


    The golden version of him shook his head slowly before saying, "It isn''t that something is wrong per say¡­"


    The way that he said this just made Lin Fan knit his brows even more as he said, "Just tell me what''s wrong. You can check my body if you think that something is wrong."


    "There''s no need, the system is integrated into your body. Checking the body of the host is a very simple matter for the system." The system said while shaking his head.


    All this did was make Lin Fan reveal a bitter look.


    He knew that the system was right, but when he put it so bluntly¡­


    The system then took a deep breath and said, "It isn''t that something is wrong, but something isn''t working."


    "Huh?" Lin Fan said in a confused voice.


    The system then continued by saying, "It seems that you are able to draw on the powers contained within the bones left behind by my master, but you aren''t able to awaken the fragments of the master''s soul left in the bones and awaken your true power. If you can''t awaken those soul fragments, your soul won''t ever beplete and you''ll never win against Chaos."


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows again after hearing this.


    He slowly asked, "Will I change after those soul fragments awaken? Will it change me forever to awaken these soul fragments?"


    The system immediately shook his head and said, "These are fragments of the master''s soul, which means that they are part of your soul in the first ce. Just like how the original Lin Fan of this world and you are all part of the master''s soul, it won''t change a thing since you were all part of the whole in the first ce."


    After a pause, he added, "In fact, you will even feel more whole after absorbing the rest of these soul fragments."


    Lin Fan looked at him with a skeptical look since when it came to absorbing soul fragments like this, it usually meant that the personality of the person absorbing all of these soul fragments would change.


    It would mean that they would be a different person because of the personalities hidden in these soul fragments.


    But the system was telling him that this wasn''t the case.


    So should he trust the system and allow it to do this?


    After thinking for a long time, Lin Fan decided to allow the system to do what it wanted to do.


    After all this time, the system hadn''t ever really done anything to harm him¡­


    Everything that the system had done had been to help him grow stronger and reach his current stage.


    So he decided to trust the system in the end.


    Lin Fan gave a nod and said, "Alright, do it then."


    The golden version of him couldn''t help revealing a grateful look before saying, "Just leave it to me."


    Ang and the others couldn''t help feeling worried when they saw the golden glow appear around Lin Fan, but they weren''t able to do a thing. They felt the pressure that came from Lin Fan, a pressure that they had never felt before.


    If one had to describe a ruler of the heavens¡­this was the aura of that.


    This was far beyond any of the God Realm Experts that they had met when they were in the World of Gods.


    But they couldn''t understand why Lin Fan was giving off this aura.


    There was only silence that filled the room as this golden glow remained around Lin Fan for a long time.


    But eventually it did fade away and Lin Fan opened his eyes again.


    As he opened his eyes, there was this golden glow that appeared in them.


    He slowly said, "I remember now, I remember everything."


    The system had been right when it said that he wouldn''t change¡­that was because all that the soul fragments contained were memories of his past life.


    The personality that he had was the same as his past life, so it wasn''t as if it would change him at all.


    But the memories¡­were definitely very useful.


    These memories helped the golden bones fully integrate into his body, allowing him to control their powers fully.


    No, it wasn''t controlling their powers as they were his to begin with. He was just regaining his powers now that he had gathered his soul again.


    Still, the memories were the most important things.


    After another long silence before Lin Fan turned to the golden version of him and said, "Xiao Guang, is that you?"


    When the system heard this, there was a golden tear that appeared in his eyes as he said, "Master, do you remember everything?"


    Lin Fan gave a slow nod before saying in a sad voice, "It really has been a long time¡­"


    "Master¡­" The system said in the same sad voice.


    But Lin Fan took a deep breath before saying, "There''s no use dwelling on the past now, let''s look to the future."


    He turned to Ang and the others and said with a smile, "There''s no need to worry, I''m still me. I just remembered the memories of my past life."


    "Past life?" All three of them said in confused voices.


    Lin Fan gave a nod before saying with the same smile, "My past life."


    This was just too much for them to ept, so they could only just ept it like Lin Fan did before.


    Lin Fan didn''t mind this and just let them slowly process before turning to the system and asking, "Xiao Guang, what happened to my world? Why did it fall into this state?"


    The system gave a sigh before saying, "Master, you''ve already seen with your own eyes what Chaos has done to this beautiful world. I tried to stop it, but I was too weak and could only hide in this universe, the one that we came from¡­"


    Lin Fan patted him on the shoulder before saying, "Xiao Guang, don''t beat yourself up too much over this. You couldn''t do anything, Chaos was even too strong for me."


    Xiao Guang gave a sigh before taking a deep breath to say, "Master, I don''t deserve these kind words."


    Lin Fan just patted him on the shoulder again, while waiting for him to speak.


    Xiao Guang took another deep breath before saying, "Master, Chaos has distorted the natural way of the world to weaken these universes. Chaos has distorted the dao, only allowing one person to reach the peak of eachw."


    As they heard this, Ang and the others couldn''t help waking up.


    Especially Ang¡­


    After all, wasn''t this the problem that they were facing?


    The fact that only one God Realm Expert could exist for eachw, which forced Ang and her mother to decide which one of them would take that position.


    Ang quickly asked, "Then if Chaos is defeated?"


    Xiao Guang looked at Ang with narrowed eyes at first, but then he said, "Yes, if Chaos is defeated, the natural order of the dao will be restored. Thews won''t be restrained anymore and will flow freely in this world. There will be free cultivation and everyone will be able to reach the God Realm freely."


    Ang''s eyes lit up when she heard this, but then her expression fell again.


    This was a monster that had been able to restrain an entire universe''s cultivation path, was it that easy to defeat?


    So she could only look at Lin Fan with a worried look.

 Chapter 1177 One hope

    Chapter 1177 One hope


    Lin Fan could see what she was worried about, but he also knew that this was something that he had to do.


    Chaos was an invader from outside their world, someone that wanted to destroy this world for its own gain.


    Chaos as the name suggested was something that came from the void outside of the known world. It was a being that was made of pure chaos, which was why it wanted to create chaos in this world.


    The more chaos that was created by Chaos, the more food that it would have to be stronger with.


    That was why it wanted to weaken this world so that it could destroy it.


    The one who had stood in its way was Lin Fan''s past reincarnation.


    Lin Fan''s past life had been able to hurt Chaos in the first ce, which was why it had done this to this world. It had wanted to weaken the world before destroying it, making it easier for it.


    Chaos had of course slowly recovered over the countless years and was only getting stronger now.


    So it didn''t matter if he attacked Chaos now or if he attacked Chaoster.


    He hadn''t been able to defeat Chaos in the past and it was unlikely that he would defeat him now, that was unless something had changed about him.


    But right now, he had only just reached the point that he was back in his previous life.


    No, he was even weaker than he was in his previous life since he was still getting used to his powers.


    Even with memories, without properly testing them, it was impossible for him to use his powers properly.


    So there was still much to do before the fight with Chaos.


    Still, there was hope since there was something that Lin Fan had already thought of.


    He took a deep breath and said, "Don''t worry, I have a n."


    Xiao Guang couldn''t help looking at Lin Fan with a strange look since he had never heard anything about this. There was no one that could be considered closer to Lin Fan than him, but even then, he hadn''t known about this.


    He couldn''t help asking in a concerned voice, "Master, are you sure about this n of yours? You should remember how terrifying Chaos really is¡­"


    Lin Fan just said with a confident smile, "This n of mine might be our only hope."


    Everyone couldn''t help revealing concerned looks when they heard this.


    The way that he said this seemed like he was certain of this and if he was certain of this¡­then could it really be the only way?


    But just what was this only hope?


    Before they could ask, Lin Fan suddenly looked at Xiao Guang and asked, "Tell me about the World of the Gods that you established. I want to know all about the God Realm Experts that developed there."


    Xiao Guang was caught off guard when he was asked this, but Lin Fan wouldn''t take no for an answer.


    Over the next day, Xiao Guang had no choice but to tell Lin Fan everything that he knew about the World of Gods.


    There were some things that he didn''t know since it had been a long time since he had been there. When he had been the system, it wasn''t as if he was able to get detailed reports on the World of Gods.


    He had only been able to get some information because of the things that he had set up before bing the system.


    As for the detailed information about the World of Gods, that was not something that he had.


    But since he had revealed himself, it was easy for him to get this as long as he went to the World of Gods.


    His status in the World of Gods was still there, so he would be able to ask anything he wanted from the God Realm Experts.


    So it was decided that they would head to the World of Gods after this.


    But Xiao Guang still couldn''t help asking, "What are you nning to do in the World of Gods?"


    Lin Fan said with a smile, "We''re going to gather hope."


    Xiao Guang just revealed an even more confused look when he heard this.


    He didn''t understand what Lin Fan meant by that.


    Wasting no time at all, they used the powers of the system to go to the World of Gods.


    Since Xiao Guang had revealed himself as the system, there was no need to worry about missions or points anymore. Anything that the system had would be used for Lin Fan''s benefit since that was what it had been prepared for.


    From the very beginning, the system had two missions.


    The first was to wake up Lin Fan and let him reach the point he had been at in his past life.


    The second was to prepare resources to help Lin Fan fight Chaos when the time came.


    All the things that had once been in the store of the system were now free for him to take as he wished.


    But now that he had recovered his abilities, it wasn''t as if he needed any of this.


    These things were for those that hadn''t reached the God Realm yet.


    After he had awakened the soul fragments in the bones, he can''t be considered in the Ruler Realm or God Realm anymore.


    He had woken up to apletely different system of cultivation that didn''t fall under the current system of cultivation.


    So these things were useless to him.


    After they arrived in the World of Gods, they arrived on the central continent.


    Xiao Guang had sent them into the office of the white haired young man that they had met before.


    When they appeared in the office, the white haired young man was caught off guard.


    He even thought that it was an enemy, so he had been prepared to fight them.


    But that onlysted a few seconds as he recognized a familiar aura.


    "Master¡­" The white haired young man said before turning to look at Xiao Guang.


    Xiao Guang gave a nod before saying, "Xiao Bai, you grew up well."


    The white haired young man being called Xiao Bai just gave a small nod.


    If there was anyone else that tried to call this Master Bai, Xiao Bai, he would have never let them off. This was a name that he would only allow a single person in this world to call him by and this person was currently in front of him.


    Lin Fan gave a cough to interrupt this and Xiao Guang quickly came back to his senses.


    He also gave a cough before saying, "Xiao Bai, gather everyone for me. There''s something that I need to discuss with all of you."


    Hearing the serious tone that Xiao Guang had, Xiao Bai immediately bowed and said, "Yes, master."


    Without wasting a single second, Xiao Bai ran off to take care of this matter.


    In less than half an hour, all of the paragons and many of the powerful God Realm Experts gathered on the central continent.


    They had gathered inside of arge dome that had many seats for them.


    At the very front of this dome was a podium.


    Once they had all gathered, Xiao Guang walked up to this podium for everyone to see.


    The moment that they all saw Xiao Guang, they all revealed excited and emotional looks. After all, it only took a single nce for them to recognize who this person was.


    "Master."


    That was the word that was said the most by those in the crowd.


    Xiao Guang also had an emotional look as his eyes swept over the crowd, but he had learned from his mistake the first time.


    He knew that there was no time for this, so he gave a cough to calm down before saying, "I''m sure that all of you are wondering why I have gathered you here."


    All of them looked at him with surprised looks at how serious he was being, but then they all revealed calm looks as they waited for him to tell them.


    Xiao Guang revealed a look of appreciation when he saw this.


    These kids that he had taught back then had grown up now and were all important people.


    It really made him feel emotional, but he knew better than to let these emotions take him over.


    Right now, there was something more important to do.


    So Xiao Guang took a deep breath and said, "I want to introduce someone special to you today."


    He turned to gesture with his hand before saying, "This is my master, Lin Fan."


    When the God Realm Experts heard this, they couldn''t help revealing shocked looks.


    The master of their master, just what kind of a person was this?


    But when Lin Fan walked out, many of them revealed confused looks.


    The only ones that had strange looks that could be considered calm were the paragons that had met Lin Fan before.


    This was the kid that they had thought was the sessor of their master, but now he turned out to be the master of their master?


    Just what was going on here?


    Lin Fan didn''t waste time exining as he said, "I''ve had Xiao Guang gather you here for one reason¡­our universe is in danger."


    When he said this, all of them looked at him with knitted brows, but there was also doubt in their eyes.


    Lin Fan didn''t care about that and continued by saying, "The only hope that we have now is¡­"

 Chapter 1178 Chaos (1)

    Chapter 1178 Chaos (1)


    The edge of the universe.


    This was where Lin Fan and Xiao Guang had suddenly appeared.


    This was also where the final battle would be.


    Beyond the edge of the universe was just the void, chaotic energy which Chaos came from.


    Since it was made from the same chaotic energy as Chaos, this was where it hade to heal after the fight with Lin Fan''s previous life.


    So this was where they would find Chaos.


    When they arrived in this ce, they could sense the energying from in front of them.


    Chaos didn''t even bother hiding itself since it knew that there was nothing here that could threaten it.


    As they floated there in space, Xiao Guang couldn''t help asking, "Master, are you sure about this?"


    They didn''t have toe here this early, there was still plenty of time for them to gather their power and then attack Chaos. There was even time for the others to be stronger and then attack Chaos together.


    But Lin Fan had insisted oning to face Chaos now, which was why Xiao Guang had no choice but toe with him.


    As for the rest, they had no choice but to stay behind since they were too weak.


    They knew this after facing the new powers that Lin Fan had gained from the golden bones, so they knew that they would only hinder him in the final fight if they came with him.


    The only thing that they could do was stay behind to stay out of his way and pray for him.


    That was why Lin Fan and Xiao Guang were here alone.


    But it was different from Xiao Guang who knew how powerful Chaos was.


    In the past, Lin Fan had died to Chaos and Xiao Guang had witnessed it.


    So he knew that with the powers that Lin Fan had shown, he wouldn''t be able to defeat Chaos. Even if Chaos was still recovering from the wounds that he had inflicted in his past life, he still wouldn''t be able to win.


    So Xiao Guang did what he could to try and convince Lin Fan to leave this ce.


    But Lin Fan just calmly shook his head and said, "No, it has to be now. If it isn''t done now, he will grow too strong and I won''t be able to defeat him."


    Xiao Guang had a look of doubt on his face when he heard this.


    After all, he had no idea what Lin Fan was basing this on.


    They hadn''t scouted out Chaos and they didn''t know how strong Chaos currently was, so there was no way that Lin Fan could know this.


    So he just didn''t understand where Lin Fan found all of this confidence¡­


    Lin Fan just ignored the look of doubt that was on Xiao Guang''s face and said, "Come, let''s go and see if we can find anything."


    Xiao Guang couldn''t help revealing a concerned look when he heard this, but he still followed Lin Fan forward.


    Of course, forward wasn''t really the best way to describe this situation.


    They were in the void itself, so it wasn''t as if there was a direction here since there was nothing all around them.


    Forward was just whichever way was in front for them.


    But that was the way that this aura wasing from, so they knew that Chaos was in this direction.


    As they floated through the void, Lin Fan couldn''t help stopping from time to time, as if he was checking something.


    Xiao Guang revealed a confused look each time, but Lin Fan didn''t say a single thing as he just continued to stop from time to time.


    When he did, he would always take out his voidw and act as if he was absorbing something.


    But there shouldn''t have been anything for him to absorb since this was the void, outside of the known world.


    There was only chaotic energy found here and that was just too random for the voidw to absorb. So there shouldn''t have been anything here that the voidw could have absorbed.


    Xiao Guang was very tempted to ask Lin Fan just what he was doing, but he stopped himself in the end when he saw the serious look that Lin Fan had.


    He didn''t want to bother him in the end, so he just silently followed behind Lin Fan to see what he was doing.


    But in the end, he couldn''t figure it out for the life of him.


    After he went around using his voidws in different ces, Lin Fan finally stopped stopping all over the ce and headed directly towards the aura that wasing from in front of them.


    He didn''t go quickly as he wanted to see what Chaos was like before the fight began.


    As he came closer and closer, he found that there was a part of space in front of him that was different from the void around them.


    There was something there.


    It was a ck mass that was different from the darkness that was all around them.


    That was because there were bits of white that were scattered all around this ck mass that seemed to catch the attention when one looked at this ck mass.


    It was hard to tell exactly what these white spots were until he came closer.


    Eyes.


    It was a bunch of eyes that were on thispletely ck mass that seemed like they were looking all around. But at the same time, it didn''t seem like they were focused on anything.


    Was this how Chaos was when it was asleep?


    It really was unsettling seeing this thing.


    But this thing was definitely Chaos that he had fought before.


    When they came closer, Xiao Guang couldn''t help giving a tremble seeing this ck mass.


    This was the thing that he had seen from afar all those years ago, the thing that had suddenly attacked his master from the void.


    Seeing it up close triggered his trauma again and he couldn''t help saying, "Master, we shouldn''t¡­do this. We should wait until we''ve gathered enough forces to fight it beforeing back."


    This wasn''t just the trauma speaking, but also logic.


    Xiao Guang could feel that the aura of this ck mass was even greater than before.


    Chaos was even stronger than when it had attacked Lin Fan in the past.


    Xiao Guang didn''t think that they had a chance to win this fight if they were to fight now.


    But Lin Fan just shook his head.


    Xiao Guang wanted to convince him otherwise, but then he saw what was happening in Lin Fan''s hand.


    Lin Fan had raised one hand with the voidws up and seemed to be doing something.


    Xiao Guang didn''t know what it was at first until he sensed it.


    Chaos energy.


    Somehow, his master had found a way to control it and gather it in his hand like this.


    It was a swirl of different forms that seemed to sh with everything around it, making it stand out more than anything.


    But there was no doubt that this was chaos energy.


    Xiao Guang looked at Lin Fan in shock as he asked, "Ma, master, how did you do this?"


    Lin Fan just revealed a knowing smile as he said, "I told you, voidws are the only hope."


    Xiao Guang was confused at first before slowlying to a realization.


    That was why he had been stopping all this time and using the voidws in all those random ces.


    It turned out that Lin Fan had been using the voidws to collect the scraps of chaos energy around them the entire time.


    That was how he had been able to gather this chaos energy in his hand now.


    But was the voidw capable of doing this the entire time?


    Why did Xiao Guang not know about this?


    He had been close to the previous Void God and he thought that he knew everything about the voidw, but now it seemed that his master had found something new with the voidw.


    He couldn''t help thinking back to when his master had gathered all those God Realm Experts.


    He had asked them all for a bit of theirws so that his voidws could devour them.


    With Xiao Guang''s help, he had been able to gather all those differentws, but Xiao Guang didn''t see how it would help.


    After all, his master had been the progenitor of all thosews in the first ce.


    His master had been the master of the dao before Chaos had put the current system in ce, so all of thews hade from him.


    How would getting a bit ofprehension from these juniors do anything for him?


    Lin Fan could see the look of confusion on Xiao Guang''s face, but he didn''t bother exining himself as he looked at Chaos.


    There was an emotional look in his eyes as he looked at Chaos.


    After all, thest time that he had seen him, it was when they were in a life and death battle.


    And in the end of that¡­he had lost and died.


    So it would be a lie to say that he didn''t hold a bit of a grudge.


    After staring at Chaos for a bit, he suddenly said, "It''s time to end this."


    Xiao Guang wanted to say something, but before he could¡­


    Lin Fan suddenly flicked the hand that had the chaos energy gathered in it and he threw that chaos energy out at Chaos.

 Chapter 1179 Chaos (2)

    Chapter 1179 Chaos (2)


    The ball of chaos energy flew straight and true at the ck mass that was floating there in space.


    At first, the ck mass just didn''t react at all to the ball of chaos energy that was flying at it.


    But as it came closer and closer, the ck mass suddenly started to writhe.


    The eyes that had been out of focus suddenly came into focus and turned to look in a certain direction.


    It looked right at the ball of chaos energy that was flying at it.


    When the ck mass saw this ball of chaos energy, there were confused looks that appeared in its eyes.


    However, even if it was confused, it didn''t dy.


    There were bulges that came from this ck mass before tentacles suddenly shot out from it.


    These tentacles were just as ck as the ck mass that it came from and they also had eyes on them.


    As these tentacles came out, the eyes seemed to look in every direction, as if they were looking for where this ball of chaos energy came from.


    The tentacles flew true and were all aimed at the ball of chaos energy.


    All of these tentacles mmed right into the ball of chaos energy and shattered it without any resistance. Though there was a bit of the tentacle that was destroyed because of the chaos energy.


    After destroying that ball of chaos energy, there seemed to be things that were like holes that opened up in this ck mass.


    When these holes finished forming on the ck mass, there was a sound that came from these holes.


    It was a guttural roar that seemed to contain all of the instincts of this ck mass.


    But at the same time, it also seemed to contain the rage of the ck mass. This was the rage of the ck mass aimed at whoever had attacked it just now.


    The ck mass started to stir and expand after it gave this roar.


    Lin Fan knew that there was no turning back now, so with a flick of his finger, there were bubbles ofws that appeared all around the ck mass. These bubbles ofw were much more intense than before, but they still paled inparison to the ck mass.


    Still, with the number of bubbles there were and how big the ck mass was, it was impossible for it to avoid this.


    The bubbles rained down on the ck mass,nding on itspletely dark tentacles.


    However, no matter how many bubbles ofwnded on the ck mass, it didn''t seem to affect it.


    It was only the first ball of chaos energy thatnded on it that had affected it at all.


    Lin Fan narrowed his eyes and said, "I see, so it has ayer of protective chaos energy that blocks all otherws."


    He had already seen this before when he had fought Chaos in his past life, but that had been a very short fight since he had been ambushed by Chaos.


    He hadn''t been able to analyze the reason why Chaos had been able to stop all his attacks back then.


    But now he knew.


    Chaos energy was just a swirl of random energy that destroyed anything that it touched. Unless one was able to resist it with their own energy, giving it so much energy that it couldn''t be destroyed, the only way to resist was to control it.


    But Chaos¡­was a being of chaos energy that could freely wrap itself up in ayer of it that created the ultimate defense.


    That meant that unless hepletely overpowered Chaos, he wouldn''t be able to take him down.


    "The chaos energy worked¡­" Lin Fan muttered under his breath.


    Xiao Guang followed his gaze to look at the tentacles that were reaching back now.


    The tip of the tentacle had been injured by the ball of chaos energy that Lin Fan had thrown at it.


    This was an important discovery since that meant that Lin Fan now had a way of hurting Chaos¡­but at the same time, it wasn''t as if there was much else that he could do with this.


    After all, it was hard for him to gather chaos energy.


    Xiao Guang didn''t even know how he had done it, but if he was able to control chaos energy well, he wouldn''t have created such a small ball of it.


    So Xiao Guang knew that this wasn''t something that they could rely on.


    They should have waited beforeing here¡­


    But to his surprise, he found that Lin Fan still had a confident look on his face.


    Before Xiao Guang could say anything, Lin Fan suddenly went forward as if he was about to face Chaos head on.


    The eyes of Chaos had been looking around at first, but when Lin Fan came close, they immediately turned to look at him.


    At first, there was no reaction from these eyes.


    But after looking at him for a bit, they suddenly narrowed as if they recognized him.


    The holes appeared on the ck mass again and there was another roar that came out.


    It was almost as if¡­Chaos was asking Lin Fan how and why he was here again.


    But Lin Fan just revealed a smile without saying anything.


    Seeing that he didn''t do anything, Chaos didn''t waste any time as it suddenly sprouted buds again. These buds quickly formed tentacles that flew out in every direction before centering around Lin Fan.


    It was nning on crushing Lin Fan with all of these tentacles.


    This was simr to how it had fought in the past.


    The Lin Fan of the past had dodged out of the way, but this time¡­Lin Fan just stood there and waited for the tentacles toe at him.


    It was as if he wasn''t bothered at all by these tentacles.


    Xiao Guang wanted to say something, but it was already toote.


    The tentacles really were fast as they cut right through space.


    However, they weren''t able to reach Lin Fan in the end.


    There was ayer of energy that appeared around Lin Fan that blocked the tentacles from reaching him. Before they could hit him, they mmed into the barrier around him first.


    Then¡­they seemed to fade away.


    It was as if there was something eating away at them, ripping them apart.


    The eyes of Chaos immediately widened when it saw this happen and it quickly pulled back the tentacles, but it found that there was some kind of suction force that seemed to prevent it from doing this. It was as if there was something that was ripping its tentacles away from it.


    It couldn''t understand what was happening and it didn''t have time to think that much.


    So all it could do was rip off the parts of the tentacles that were stuck and let it be sucked away by the enemy.


    The parts of the tentacle ripped off floated there in a space for a bit before something absorbed them as well. They were ripped to pieces and then disappeared without a trace.


    During this entire time, Lin Fan had slowly revealed a smile.


    Once the tentaclespletely disappeared, he said, "As expected, it does work."


    What he had been doing with the voidw earlier wasn''t just to see if he could form that ball of chaos energy.


    What he had been doing was seeing if the voidws could absorb chaos energy.


    He hadn''t been able to do so in the past, but with the new experiences in this life, he had made a breakthrough with the voidws.


    He could now use voidws to absorb and control the chaos energy that flowed here.


    And since Chaos was a being made entirely of chaos energy¡­that meant that he had a way of fighting against Chaos now.


    Chaos was very confused as to what had happened, but it knew that it couldn''t think too much about it since the enemy was still here.


    It didn''t understand how this lower creature had obtained this power, but now it could even threaten it.


    Since that was the case¡­it wouldn''t hold back anymore.


    With the holes opening up and a roar, the ck mass suddenly started to change.


    It stopped writhing and gathered in on itself, folding itself into a single point.


    It kept folding and folding, getting smaller the entire time until it formed a single ball.


    This ball was covered in eyes and looked very creepy floating there.


    But the aura that it gave off waspletely different from before.


    This time, when it released the tentacles, they moved much faster than before.


    These tentacles flew out in all different directions and converged all around Lin Fan.


    Itpletely surrounded him, not giving a single avenue of escape.


    Lin Fan didn''t remain still this time when he saw these tentacles.


    He could feel the power that wasing from them, he knew that they wouldn''t be as simple to resist as before.


    So he knew that he couldn''t just stand there and let them hit him or he would be the one that would suffer.


    Lin Fan suddenly charged forward at the tentacles that wereing at him.


    But this time, instead of forming a barrier around him, he formed a single ck hole in front of him to face the tentacles that wereing at him.


    When the tentacles hit the ck hole, they were ripped to pieces and absorbed by the ck hole.


    Chaos knew that this wouldn''t work, so it immediately pulled back its tentacles.


    Lin Fan saw this and thought, "There is a way to fight."

 Chapter 1180 Chaos (3)

    Chapter 1180 Chaos (3)


    It was a long fight that went back and forth.


    Lin Fan had a method of fighting using the voidws to hurt Chaos, but each time that he did, he would also suffer injuries.


    The voidws would only be able to negate so much of the power behind each of Chaos'' attacks, so it wasn''t able to negate everything. So that meant that the force that was left was taken by Lin Fan''s body and he had to endure it all himself.


    With each hit that he took, Lin Fan couldn''t help spitting out a mouthful of blood.


    The force behind each hit inflicted internal injuries on him, but Lin Fan forced himself to keep going.


    At the same time, there was a green glow that seemed toe from his chest.


    When one got closer to this green glow, they would feel like there was a powerful vitality that wasing from it.


    What this green glow was was a mixture of differentws that healed.


    There was the lifew and the naturew that came from his universe, but also a bunch of otherws from other universes incorporated into it.


    Lin Fan was probably the one who could receive this kind of luxurious healing.


    After all, any single one of thesews at the God Realm already had very powerful healing powers.


    But when they werebined like this, their healing powers went through the roof.


    This was enough healing power that it might have even been enough to bring someone back to life.


    Lin Fan was just running thesews in his body to recover from the internal injuries that he suffered from the attacks of Chaos.


    But with each attack that Chaos threw at him, he was also slowly chipping away at it.


    The voidws really had their effect, absorbing the ends of the tentacles.


    It didn''t seem like this would do much at first, but then to Lin Fan''s refined senses, he could see that the ck ball covered in eyes in front of him was growing smaller. It was as if something had taken away the energy that was stored inside of this ck ball.


    This continued as the ck ball grew smaller and smaller until it was visible.


    The ck ball also knew that this wasn''t the way to keep going, so it only used a few tentacles instead of the mass of tentacles that it did before.


    It was as if it was trying to buy time for something.


    Lin Fan of course noticed as well, but there wasn''t anything that he could do about it.


    His only way of attacking was using the voidws to slowly drain the chaos energy out of Chaos. If he came too close, he didn''t know what else Chaos would use to attack him.


    Once that happened, he might be caught off guard by whatever came.


    So he had been cautiously watching over Chaos to see what it would do.


    But as the auraing from Chaos became stronger and stronger, he knew that he had no choice.


    If he didn''t do anything now, it might be toote.


    So gritting his teeth, Lin Fan suddenly charged at Chaos.


    The eyes on Chaos suddenly opened in surprise before narrowing as if it looked pleased.


    This time, Chaos didn''t hold back as tentacles suddenly came en masse. At the same time, there were buds that formed on the tentacles.


    These buds quickly formed more tentacles out of these tentacles and they all mmed in Lin Fan''s direction.


    Lin Fan knitted his brows, but he didn''t panic.


    Raising his hands around him, Lin Fan suddenly created a bubble of voidws around him.


    The moment that the tentacles mmed into the voidw bubble, they were ripped apart and their energy was drained away.


    The eyes of Chaos narrowed seeing this, but it didn''t stop as it continued trying to m Lin Fan with these tentacles.


    Chaos didn''t believe that Lin Fan would be able to keep this up for long, so it kept mming its tentacles against the voidw bubble without care.


    There was blood that kept dripping out of Lin Fan''s mouth as the tentacles mmed into the voidw bubble.


    This voidw bubble was weaker than the ck holes that he had been using to counter Chaos'' attacks, so he was suffering the shockwave of each of those hits. And these were stronger than the ones that he had suffered before.


    It was just a good thing that he had stored up on life energy before this from absorbing the chaos energy of Chaos.


    If it wasn''t for that, he wouldn''t have been able to cure his wounds with those healingws.


    This was not something that wouldst long, Lin Fan was fully aware of that.


    He knew that this was just ast ditch effort to stop Chaos from doing whatever it was doing, so he pushed through with his willpower alone.


    When he was within striking range of the ck ball, the tentacles suddenly stopped attacking.


    Lin Fan looked at Chaos and found that there was a hole that was shaped like a smirk.


    It was almost as if¡­Chaos wasughing at him for falling into its trap.


    Lin Fan didn''t have time to do anything as a bright light came from in front of him.


    This was a mass of chaos energy that Chaos had gathered.


    This was its final attack.


    It was a beam, a beam of concentrated energy.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help feeling a bit disappointed since this was almost too cliche of an attack, but he knew that this attack wouldn''t be weak either. He could feel the power that came from this beam, so he knew that he would have to go all out or die.


    So he gathered his voidws in front of him to form arge ck hole to face this beam with.


    But before the beam hit him, it suddenly exploded catching him off guard.


    The beam then split into multiple smaller beams of energy that came at him from all directions.


    This was a fake out, it was actually a wide area attack!


    But Lin Fan didn''t panic seeing this.


    Or rather, he knew that he couldn''t panic so he forced himself to stay calm.


    The moment that he panicked was the moment that he died.


    So taking that ck hole in his hand, he started to spin.


    As he spun, the suction force from the ck hole started pulling in all of the smaller beams that wereing at him.


    These were all ripped down by the voidws, but he could feel the power mming into him.


    There was just too much life energy for him to process that it was actually hurting him.


    At this rate, it wouldn''t be long before hepletely broke down.


    This was not something that he could keep up for long, but there were just too many small beams of light around him that he had no choice but to keep going. After all, it would be much worse if these beams of light were to hit him directly.


    So Lin Fan had to keep up the voidws to protect himself.


    Under his breath, he muttered, "Is this it? Is this how it ends?"


    But then, there was something that changed.


    There was a power that came from his dantian that started breaking down all of the life energy filling him and giving it back to him, making him even stronger.


    Lin Fan couldn''t help being shocked by this, but then he found that it was the suns in his dantian.


    These suns were his original power, it was a mysterious cultivation technique that he had found in his first life that had allowed him to be the master of the dao.


    This was the power of rule.


    It was the power to rule over all things.


    These suns were suppressing therge amount of life energy that was flowing into him and forcing it to calm down. They were putting their rule over this life energy and forcing it under his control.


    So he was able to ess the life energy and control it to heal himself.


    With this enhanced healing power, Lin Fan was able to use the voidw to absorb all of the beams of light.


    Chaos realized that something was off and moved to send out more tentacles at him, but¡­Lin Fan had already made his move.


    He was charging forward at Chaos with that ck hole in front of him, using it to cut down anything that Chaos threw at him until¡­he mmed into Chaos.


    With the ck hole of the voidw, he was able to slowly absorb Chaos itself.


    With this, it was over.


    But before Chaos was broken down and absorbed, there was a voice that suddenly said, "How? How is this possible? How can a lower realm being have this kind of power?"


    Lin Fan deeply knitted his brows when he heard this.


    But before he could ask clearly, Chaos started to swell.


    He had been absorbing slowly since he didn''t want to overwhelm himself, but now¡­he released his voidws at full power and broke down Chaos faster.


    After all, if he didn''t do this, Chaos would have exploded before he could do anything.


    So he forcefully absorbed the ck ball before anything could happen.


    When Chaos was gone, there was only silence that followed.


    However, that silence was quickly broken by Xiao Guang who came over to say, "Master, you did it!"


    But Lin Fan just shook his head and said, "Let''s go back."


    Xiao Guang was caught off guard by this, but he quickly nodded and followed Lin Fan as he teleported back.


    When he appeared, Lin Fan was immediately surrounded by everyone who had been waiting for him toe back.


    There was his family, his loved ones, and the Gods of the World of Gods.


    They were all filled with joy to see him and Lin Fan let out a sigh of relief when he saw all of them.


    After a long celebration, Lin Fan went into a private room with a few people.


    Once they were settled in the room, Xiao Guang started by saying, "Now we have to rebuild this world. Master, we''ll be depending on you."


    Everyone looked at Lin Fan after he said this, but Lin Fan was just looking forward as if he was lost in thought.


    Seeing him like this, everyone couldn''t help revealing surprised and confused looks.


    Xiao Guang slowly said, "Master, is there something wrong?"


    Lin Fan didn''t respond at first, but then he said, "As Chaos died, it said something disturbing."


    Everyone was even more shocked when they heard this.


    Lin Fan said with a sigh, "It doesn''t seem like this is over yet. Whatever Chaos was, it was nothing more than ackey¡­"


    [1/12 fragments collected.]


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